A Beast of a Candidate. Mark Halperin Talks to Armstrong & Getty

and Doubled Down with John Hyliman Uh. He's been a former senior political analyst for ms NBC. He co hosted The Zoo, The Uh, The Gymnastics of Anthia, the Circus, which is great politics show as well. Uh I kild Um and is a clear eyed and clear headed thinker and write about the writer about politics because four hours imple this is Armstrong and Getty extra large. And Mark Halpern joins us. Now, Hey, Mark, welcome to the show.

We look forward to talking to you, and I gotta tell you from from my standpoint, I'm really glad to have you back on the scene. Talking politics a missed voice, in my opinion, very nice. I appreciate that. Thank you. Oh yeah, the feeling goes for both of us. Long

long enjoyed your work. Um, there are so many different directions I could take this, and obviously we want to take talk about the book How to Beat Trump, but just your expertise and all this and some sticks out in my mind going back to you criticized it at the time, you criticize it afterwards, outlets, particularly The New York Times, predicting who could win by how much and

whether or not that was the role of journalism. I mean, I think Donald Trump has done a lot of things that are rightly criticized, but I think the American media has largely failed to rise the moment of covering this president. A lot of the media acts says things that the Democratic National Committee wouldn't say in in going after the President. I've just never thought that was the role of the press. The role of the press is to inform the public,

to tell people what's being said. It's not a matter of false equivalent to as a matter of safeguarding the public interest. I think the most ironic thing about all this is the press helped Trump get elected the first time.

And even though a lot of people in the media would like to see Donald Trump not be reelected, as I write about in the book, so much of the coverage is gonna is helping him because it's leaving the impression if you're New York CNN or reader of MSNBC or reader of the New York Times, get the impression that Trump can't possibly win, when in fact, most of the democratic strategies I talked to, who are very smart people who got a lot of experience, say Trump is

the favorite to get reelected, and the press is helping him by leaving the impression he can't possibly win, just like they did four years ago. Well, and I think

it goes beyond that. I was reading one of the lead articles about the recent impeachment hearing in the New York Times, and it was so clearly it was so soaked in editorial that I think a lot of the uh most respective voices in American journalism have absolutely given up on the idea of I am going to maintain a relationship with moderates or moderate Trump supporters, or those of us will hold our nose and like the judges

or whatever, um, I think they've given that away. You just anybody who has any affinity for Trump whatsoever, even nose holding affinity, can't stand a lot of the coverage. Well, look, the conservatives in this country. I've said from the beginning of my career about half the country thinks the press is completely liberally biased, and they've got a lot of

the data they can point to. I used to say to my friends in the media, even if you don't think you're liberally biased, you need to understand that half the country thinks you are. And you should look in the mirror and say, well, why do they think that? Are they making it up? Or do they have reason

to think of think it. One of the things I read about in the book that I think that I think speaks to the question you just asked, is you have to appreciate that almost have the country voted for Donald Trump, that the consultants I talked to, the strategist I talked to, think he's the favorite to be relected

in parts disease and incumbent. And you have to understand those people, those people who voted for Donald Trump, many of them did holding their nose to some extent, but they thought that the country was going in the wrong direction. They didn't want another career politician. And as you said, so much of the coverage of impeachment of aval Trump in general, it is colored by a disdain for his supporters,

a disdain for him. But again, I just don't think it's the role for journalists, particularly disdain for Americans almost half the country who still support him. Our job is to explain not just who they are, but what they care about, why they feel the way they do, and not look down our noses at them. And I think I think it's just like I said, it's it's helping Donald Trump, absolutely absolutely. I mean I want to get to the particulars of why you and strategists think Trump

is gonna be hard to beat. But well, you're just saying, how does the media not get that they're helping him? They loathe the guy, but the way they approach it. Many times I've been fed up with Trump, where I've thought that the nation would be better off with someone else, And then either Bill Maher will say something. You know, nobody can control what comedians do, but whether it's Bill Maher the Washington Post, not just think fuck you guys,

I'm voting for Trump just because I hate y'all. I mean, and that's that happens. That is that is that is a that is a sentiment that I hear whenever I've talked to people who supported the president four years ago, and there's almost no one who supported the president outside his family who couldn't list a bunch of things they

don't like about what he does. But when it comes down to a choice between Donald Trump and the Democrats, and when they and they, they're subjected to a daily drumbeat of media coverage which is hostile not just to the president but to his supporters. What he expects going to happen. People are gonna say, you know what, the press doesn't want me to do this again, I'm gonna do it again, and that I don't know why the

media doesn't see that. Um, they're running, they're running their lives in a way that is counter to what they want more than anything else, just to get donalds up out of the White House. Which is really interesting. Yeah, it is. Although you know, this is certainly not under disgust,

but I think it's under appreciated. Were based out in northern California and the the ideological bubble phenomenon where you willingly surround yourself only with people who agree with you um as opposed to you know, back when we were growing up, where you might be dimly aware of somebody's politics, but it's unlikely to come up, so you just you always brush up against different opinions and ideologies just because you don't particularly care. Um. The ideological bubble thing is

absolutely deadly. You just are never cross examined in your beliefs. But again, you know that's certainly been discussed. So so you talked to strategy, Go ahead, Well, I was gonna say one of the reasons that I was one of the few national reporters who said Trump could win four years ago is because I covered Trump rallies in over twenty five states, and I didn't just stand in the press area and listen to speech and make fun of

the way he talked. I talked to the people who were there, and I asked them why they were there, why they supported him, And I looked at how big the crads were, and I went to Hillary Clint events and I did the same thing. And if he did that, it was easy to see that of course Donald Trump would win because he had enthusiasm and they're writing the book he was leading a movement. A lot of liberals in the press mock that and say, oh, it's not a movement. It was a movement. It was a movement

that Trump didn't create. It's a movement that he saw and took charge of, and and and and used to get elected. Hillary Clinton did not lead a movement, and and that made the difference. And the same thing could happen in this election. And you talked to a whole bunch of strategists, Republicans and Democrats. People have run campaigns, some of the smartest people in the country on this stuff, and they believe he can win. And why is that? Most of them think he's an overwhelming favorite. Some of

them were down right despondent. On the Democratic side, first of all, you go to the question of incumbency. Since four elected incumbents have lost their bids for re election, it's hard to beat any incumbent. And we've had three straight two term presidents, first time since the founding of the Republic. That's happened. Clinton, wish Obama, all of them learned from the previous guy. How do you use the benefits of incumbency. And as we know, Donald Trump will

use every every trick in the book. This guy does not want to lose. So incumbents always leveraged the office. Trump will leveraty office. And finally, Trump is a beast of a candidate. You know again, you can you can say he's he's got, he's shallow, you can say it doesn't always tell the truth. A lot of negative things

about Donald Trump. He's a beast of a candidate, he does not want to lose, and he's going up a Democratic against end up going up against the Democrat who's not gonna have the same amount of money as Donald Trump, who's not gonna have the same experience running nationalist Donald Trump, and is not going to have the leverage of incompacy the way Trump does. So he's got a ton of advantages.

And that doesn't even get to the question of the fact that the Democratic candidates have gone so far to the left that that's going to make it more more possible for Donald Trump to get votes in the center, which a lot of people thought he couldn't possibly do. Follow up a little more on him being a beast of a candidate, whether you know at at the podium and a rally on the debate stage. He's he's interesting. You know, even people who hate him follow him on Twitter,

watch his rallies, talk about him all the time. One of the people I've interviewed for the books that Trump doesn't dominate the news. Trump is the news. If you want to try to run against him, you need to figure out how to play alongside of him in his space. But don't have the illusion that you're going to do something to to be part of the news. Trump was a television producer. Trump Trump is the most successful person in politics and the history of Twitter. He understands how

to communicate with real people. Talk like a real person. I think like a real person. He's like Frank Sinatra, He's like he's like Johnny Carson. He has the capacity to communicate with people in a way that they find entertaining, even if they don't like him. And you look at these democrats, and one of the people interviewed for the books that our candidates are they were all they all took debate class in high school. We need a theater major.

We need some who understands how to how to communicate, how to talk from the heart. Trump does that like him or not? These democratics strategists said, he knows how to win. Last time it was Korey Lewandowski, Donald Trump and a Twitter account. This time it's Donald Trump, air Force one and maybe close to two billion dollars. So you harness off a real campaign to a candidate who I think, after Bill Flynn, it's the second most impressive

political athlete I've ever covered. And I've said it before and I got heat for it. But look, I think I think it's I think it's it's it's uh, it's people like to these Latin these days. I think it's prima facia true. He won the Republican nomination and the presidency. He had no business winning either. This is a guy who was a Nancy Pelosi Chuck Schumer donor, a guy who was pro choice, a guy who had never run

for anything. First time out, he runs and wins. I just think, of course, he's a great political athlete, and Barack Obama is a great as a great politician too, But he he had been touted as as a president since he's been at Harvard Law School. He had David Axelrod, David Plos, He raised a ton of money, He had a real infrastructure of people, county delegates, he had lots

of help. Donald Trump did it pretty much all by himself, and now he's got all those same skills with the benefits of incumbency and a big, big death star for presidential campaign. So one of the ways we amuse ourselves primarily off the year, but sometimes on is will speculate about what the debate would look like. Can I realize we're getting way ahead of the book because it kind of moves chronologically, but um on the debate stage, as Trump does what Trump does, I don't know. I mean,

Bernie could certainly match him for bluster. Uh we we just we pictured Joe Biden having that moment he had in one of the debates recently where Joe Biden goes off on a venezuela and record players. You know, that's one of his moment and Trump just turned into the audience and saying what the hell was that He'll go in for the kill and people laughing in yeah. Look,

it's instructive again to look at four years ago. A lot of the Democrats I talked to you for the book said, after every debate, we said Hillary one, and we slapped ourselves on the back and said, you know, Trump's losing the election right here in these debates. After Trump won, a lot of them went back and looked at the three debates as I did for the book, and you see again he was a strong debater for

speaking to real people. He had an unusual style. He was often he often looked angry, um, he often went on tangents, He often didn't answer the question that was asked. But in terms of gut communication, he was. He was effective. And what a lot of people I interviewed said was Hillary was too passive. She she basically thought she had the thing in the bag. She thought, let Trump talk and and show off his his negative sides and people will turn against him. All of them said, You've got

to be much more aggressive this time. So these are strategies who are worried about Trump winning. But the point of the book is not an attack on Donald Trump. It's it's my reporting of what these democrats say must be done if Democrats are gonna have a chance to And so it's not an anti Trump book or a pro Trump book. It's a book that says what a

smart democrats think that need to be done. And in terms of the debate, a lot of them share the view you guys have, which is not very many of these Democrats are easy to envision standing on that stage with Trump and and obviously winning the debates. Do you do you do you play at his level? I mean if he if he says on the stage you ought to be in jail, or you're a liar or whatever, do you do you get down to that level? Do you try to be above it? I mean, what are

most strategist thinks to do it? Yeah, I mean that's one of the big questions that people were grappling with after after what Hillary Clinton went through. I mean, if it's basically somewhere in between. You can't let him get away with stuff they say, But you can't play at his level because, as one of them said, Trump is the master at the level he plays on. You're not no one's gonna walk in and do this. You know, most of the people running have run before a lot.

You know, they've been career politicians and they know how to run a normal race. They don't know how to run this phrase. So what all these all these people said is not just in the debates, but in the game pay. In general, you have to not play Trump's game. You have to figure out the game you're gonna play. We have to engage with him. He can't just let him gallop off and do what he does. So somewhere in between, engage a little bit and try to pivot to talk about what you want to talk about on

the level you want to talk about it. Just as an aside, it occurs to me I had to sell my services as a Trump stand in for debate training. I mean, because I tell you what, you had better be stealed to that sort of thing on a debate stage. I mean because if you think I'll handle it, I'll think on my feet, I'll deal with it. I just it would be a rare, rare brain that could deal with that. Yeah, I mean because as you may never

dealt with anything like it. And what the consultants I talked to said was, you can't wait for the debates to start engaging with them. And a lot of them, you know, since the book was published, and and and and the campaign's gone forward, a lot of them say they're all making a mistake. Now they're thinking just about running against the other Democrats. They say, you've got to start practicing about what it's like to go up against him. You look at Elizabeth Warren when she went up against

Trump on the Pocahona stuff killed her. It killed her, and and and it's an example for a lot of Democrats to say, not that's how you shouldn't be trying to engage with Trump. You got engaged with him, and you gotta and you gotta win, and you gotta show that you can do and you gotta practice because if you wait till September of next year, when you're on the debate stage with him, you know it, maybe too will be too late. I'll say one more thing. A lot of the people I talked to you for the

book said it's possible Trump won't debate. You know, there's nothing in the law that says he has to. And if he thinks he's better off not debating, he may just say I'm skipping him. Oh. I don't know that he would turn down that sort of the super TV extravaganza. I'm not sure if people can talk about it. Here's what he could do, though. You know, the debates for the last many years have been run by this group, the Commission on Presidential debates. Trump hates the Commission on

Presidential Bates. He thinks that he they screwed him last time. Trump could basically say, you know what, I'm the president, I'm hosting the debate. I'll show up in debate. Sean Hannity will be the moderator. You'll welcome to come. It's fantastic. I got a question straight out of the book I want to hit you with. But I've been wondering this and since you've you know, you've been on the ground in Iowa New Hampshire and followed all this sort of stuff.

Does any precedent matter for anything anymore? Is there any point in looking at, you know, historical trends or which is just everything new loss is new. But I'll tell you Iowa New Hampshire. Every four years people say, well, how can they be as influential as they were in the past. That's so anachronistic. They're they're lily white states, they don't have big cities. I wan to Hampshire are shaping up to be super influential for the Democrats. So

that's something that stayed the same. And I think I think another thing is the same is you've got to have a message. You've got to have a story to tell, as as I was saying in the book, an American story. And if you're gonna beat Trump, you gotta have an American story that's better than Trump's story about how you're gonna how the country will be under your under your presidency, if you beat Trump, what will America be like? That

hasn't changed. So a lot is different social media, you know, first and foremost in the partisanship, there's a lot that's different. But there are some bedrock things that are the same. And those those two are pretty key. You know, I can't get past what you said, Trump, that's so great. It's Tuesday night, eight o'clock, Madison Square, Garden. Handy's the moderate are. If you want to debate, that's where I am. I'll pay for your stool. You're welcome to common debate me.

But that's that's what we're doing. And and and again. If you're the Democrat, what do you do? You either say I got no debate or I play on Trump's terms. So putting aside Joe Biden's uh limitations as a candidate, Um the whole end of the chaos, Fatherly steady, Um mature feel of his candidacy. I think is really good. I think he's a terrible candidate, and I don't think he'll do I don't think he'll get the nomination. But

what did your analysts think about that field? Just understanding that even Trump's reporters are getting a little stressed out and getting Trump fatigue. A minority of the people I interviewed, a small minority agreed with you. Most of them said, that's basically what Hillary Clinton did last time. Remember a lot of her advertisements were, uh, you know, kids watching Trump say outrageous things on television and parents being alarmed at the example. He said, that's how she ran. But

she she was a crappy candidate. Well but but I mean, if you look at her weaknesses, a lot of the same things are true Abiden, She'd been around forever. Uh people, people didn't you know, who didn't see what their message was, and just saying I'm different than Trump wasn't good enough for her. I don't think it will be good enough

for Biden at past nominee. With the majority of them said was the winning messages issues and how Trump's policies are affecting people, And you're starting to see some of the outside groups that are trying to help the candidates. Do this. We just go to Wisconsin, go to Michigan, go to Pennsylvania. Find real people who have stories to tell about how Trump's policy, who voted Trump last time, who say his posities haven't worked for them. Find a

farmer to the tariffs. Find them someone who worked in manufacturing who said, you know, I've been found a job in manufacturing after Trump got elected. And make those real people not a sideshow but central to the campaign. That's that's what the vast majority of the strategist I talked to you said will be required to beat him. You can't beat him by saying the guy is outrageous. The guy is on Twitter all the time. He told us

what he was when he ran the first time. There's not There's almost nothing Trump's done as president that people consider outrageous that wasn't on offer when he was Trump the candidate. None of this is a surprise to people, so they most of the people say I talked to you said, I don't think you can beat him with his Biden message of restore sanity, restore the America the way it was before, because you know what, We're still

in a post Brexit world. There are still a lot of Americans who don't want to go back to the way it was before. They still want change. They don't like the way Trump's doing it in every way. But if it Trump against someone who's for the status quo, a lot of the people I talked to you said, that's that's not a winning message. Wow, you mentioned Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvanian. From reading the book, and I've heard you speak on this,

uh uh talking to other people about the book. You feel like candidates are already behind Trump in those battleground states and it's gonna be hard to catch up. Play. This is one of the biggest worries of people I talked to you said. They said, if if the candidates only think about winning the Democratic nomination, and even if they win the nomination, say in March after Super Tuesday, there to the facto nominee. It's too late. Trump has spent three years with very smart Facebook and other ways

of targeting the voters in those states. For all your food, he is out there. I'm unwrapping a McDonald steak, egg and cheese bagel. Look at this steak and the juice running down the sign. Get a little bit on the rapper here, and then the fluffy egg and real cheese flowed over the side, looking just so good. M m mmm, grey old onions and about a bagel too foumbs off a McDonald steak, egg and cheese bagel for breakfast. Love

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That's Fisher House dot org. Trump's gonna get more votes in those states than he got last time. Almost definitely turn out going to be up. So he's gonna find people who didn't vote one last time. I take Wisconsin. One of my favorite statistics. There are six hundred thousand nonpology educated white men in Wisconsin who didn't vote last time. Trump campaign is gonna find a lot of those guys

and get him to vote this time. And if the Democrat you know, Democrats spend all their time, all their money, all their focus just thinking about winning the Democrat nomination. By the time they get the Democrat nomination, whether it's in March or July at the convention, they'll never catch up to targeting the voters. No statlegrand states, and and we've we've had in the last few elections cycles very

few states in play, meeting a dozen or so. This time, literally the election could could be just those three states. And Trump only needs to win one of those three states if he holds the states he won last time, in order to get re elected. So it's it's a challenge for the Democrats in those three particular states to try to be ready to go for a general election. We heard a lot of discussion in the days leading up to the last election, um about how Trump had

no ground game whatsoever. I mean, he had no staff, he had no people. It was laughable. Um, how true was that? It was entirely true? What they had last time, which they have this time with more money and more time to plan, is Facebook and and and Twitter and the modern methods of a ground game, not not not physically on the ground, but communicating people where people get their news and information. This time they will have both, and they'll have both in an extraordinarily well funded way.

It is it is laughable what they did last time. Now, the Republican National Committee last time had a bit of a ground game, and they did coordinate with Trump campaign. But the Trump campaign itself was tiny. There was a point in the general election. I don't know if it's true by election day, but there's a point in the general election when Hillary Clinton's staff working on in the

internet was bigger than the entire Trump campaign. And and Brad Parscale, who was Trump's data guy last time and kind of a secret weapon, he is in charge of the whole ball of wax. Now is what do you think of him? Pretty capable guy. He is a guy who has his slaws like all of us too. But but but he understands how to get along with people, and he knows what he doesn't know. And one thing he knows and he has honed is how to communicate,

particularly on Facebook in the digital space. That's what he did for a living before so so people can make fun of him for for not knowing you know everything that Karl Rove knows about politics, but he's learned a lot, and and and what he's done is and by Trump choosing him, is they put at the center of the campaign this notion of now having more time and more money by a lot than they did four years ago, and figure out how to reach voters, people who voted

last time, persuadable voters. Um they're targeting the African American voters. If Joe Biden, the democract nominee, African American voters are going to be bombarded with information about biden support for the crime bill in the nineties, that that is extraordinarily unpopular with a lot of African Americans. And and they'll be targeting those six hundred thousand white, non college educated

nails in Wisconsin so parstale. If Trump is reelected, the decision to put at the center of the campaign a guy who understands the digital space will be one of the most important decisions Trump made. The book is How to Beat Trump is one of the ways to beat Trump. To portray him as a racist, because that certainly seems to be popular um, you know, as I said, most of the people I talked to do not think putting front and center personal attacks against Trump was the right

way to go. They were much more focused on is the impact his possies have on real people. But there's no doubt that both parties have to do two things. And sometimes people like to say it's one or the other,

it's always both. They both need to energize their base, and they need to reach out to persuadable voters, and and there's it is certainly the case that if Donald Trump is called a racist by people, it energizes the Democratic based so so rhetoric like that will certainly be part of how the Democrats try to win this election,

no matter who they nominate. Anybody has watched a handful of election cycles as an adult is familiar with the idea of, um, you know, tacking way left or right and then coming back to the center for the general. But has the have the left leaning leaning the lefty candidates on the Democratic side gone so far left they're gonna find it hard to tack back. I think it's impossible.

And most of the people who I talked to you for the book worry about this Uh, you know, just just there are three issue positions alone that that Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders have that a lot of the Democrats I talked to, even some who are very liberal, think are just qualifying for winning a general election supporting uh single pair and the elimination of all private health insurance for a hundred eighty million Americans who have private

health insurance now, be criminalizing the border, saying people can come in without facing criminal penalties, elite, you know, without without a legal status, and giving health insurance and health free healthcare to people who come into this country illegally. Those three positions alone of the Democrats I talked to, you said disqualifying. And the Trump campaign knows that. And I'll tell you you rarely hear Donald Trump talking about those things. The reason is he's saving it for the

general election. He's showing unusual for him, disciplined in in in waiting to talk about those things when there is a Democratic nominee. And that is the biggest worry of all that the Democrats have, along with not starting soon enough to think about the general election, which is disqualifying the Democrats disqualifying. That's a heck of a term, not just a bump in the road. Disqualified George Bush, disqualified John Kerry. For a lot of Americans, they made him

a flip flopper. Unacceptable. Barack Obama disqualified uh Vit Romney by saying he only cared about the rich people in this country, Baying Capital, et cetera. Bill Clinton disqualified Bob Dole. You go back and look at those three guys, all re elected the year before the election, and look at what the press said about their chances for re election. Much grimmer than what people say about Trump, despite Trump's

low approval y UH. One year, one year before the general election, UH when Obama was running for election, the New York Times magazine ran a cover story titled is Obama Toasts and their scientific formula said that Obama's chances for being reelected were seventeen percent. A year later, he was overwhelmingly reelected because he disqualified Mitt Romney. Not for everybody, but for enough people that he was able to get re elected. And that is the theory of the case

of the Trump campaign. And that is why the Democrats I talked to for How to Be Trump said he can only beat Trump if you are strong enough to survive hundreds of millions of dollars of negative ad Trump's Twitter feed, Trump's press conferences in which he will try to do to the Democrat who has nominated, what he did to Jeff Bush, what he did to John Kasik, what he did to Chris Christie, what he did to Hillary Clinton, which is destroyed them politically, physically, whatever it

takes physically mentally. I mean, Trump is the master. You know, the single greatest skill you can have the president of Canada is the ability to define your opponent on your terms. And that is Donald Trump's single greatest skill. How many persuadables are there in a in a presidential election, and then especially this one, how many people are you talking about that could go either way, because you know most

people aren't in that crowd. Well, look, you talk about persuadable voters, and normally you're thinking about swing voters, and there are enough to decide the election, not just the question are they going to vote for Trump or the Democrat, but also are they going to vote for the Green Party candidate? Are they going to vote for the Libertian? But then I think of persuadable voters in addition as

people who need to be persuaded to vote. People who didn't vote four years ago for Trump who might vote for him this time. People who didn't vote for Hillary Clinton who voted for Barack Obama. I mean, the number of people in Wisconsin who voted twice for Barack Obama and then voted for Donald Trump is extraordinary. Those are persuadable voters. So, yes, we have fewer than we used to. Yes, we are more polarized. Yes, there are a lot of people who are out of reach for for one party

or the other. But there are plenty of people who will this this election, who who are up for grabs, either because you've got to get him to vote or you got to convince him which side to vote for. What do you make a mayor? Pete's candidacy really interesting? You know, Look, there are four candidates right now who are positioned to be the nominee. We could see somebody rise up, but right now, therefore people who are leading the national polls, the state polls in Iowa, New Hampshire.

The other three are in their seventies, Biden and Warren and Sanders. Uh, he's a young guy, he's a smart guy. He has he's he has captured the imagination of donors, both both a very wealthy fat cat donors who write checks, but also people give small amounts on the internet. He's a military veteran, which was one of the few in the field who's got military experience, and he talks about a new generation. You look at Democrats who have won Obama, Clinton, Kennedy,

these were younger guys. These are people who talked about, you know, turning the page on on the leaders of the past. Now he's got some downsides. He's the mayor of a town of a hundred thousand people. Um, he's he is young, he doesn't have very much experience. The fact that he's gay is a positive for a lot of people, but a lot of people who have no personal problem with worry that that would turn off voters in those in those critical states. So I think that

he is he is. He could easily be the nominee. I think that he would have a hard time winning a general election, but it wouldn't be impossible, and I think that his his His greatest advantage now is, as I said, he's running against three seventy year olds and and for for a lot of voters of all ages. They just don't want to candidate that old. They want

someone who's loose, more future oriented. I'd like to go through all the candidates actually with you, but we won't take the up that much of your time because I'm interested in your opinion. But it's been bubbling up a lot lately. I've come across a lot of long articles and podcasts about bringing back the smoke filled rooms, and

maybe this system is a too much democracy. Maybe we're better off when it was about a party platform and in a picking a person to carry out that platform, instead of seeing which personality bubbles up and they decide the platform. Well, it's not gonna happen. So people may say it might be better, but it's not gonna happen. Not with that attitude. I'm all for smoke. But the the Internet has has democrat and social media has democratized the process even more than it was before. Parties are

not nearly as powerful as they once was. Trump is the ultimate manifestation of this, of just pure personality, no no history with the Republican Party, no fidelity to the Republican Party. And I think I think that's better. I think the up sides of all this are better than

the downside. But it's still gonna take. If you want to be the Democratic nominee, you want to be a Democrat elected president, you still have to you know, you still have to win the delegates, you still have to you still have to participate in Democratic caucuses in primary. So I don't I don't think that the elites are out of the game entirely, but they are less less a part of this. And you know, you look at Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders not taking money from fat Cat,

not going to UH fundraisers with big donors. Unprecedented to have two people in a strong position to be the Democratic nominee who have adopted that posture, that is, that is a big manifestation about what you're talking about. But the elites, it's not just in the United States, elites pretty much all over the democratic world. I have to get used to the fact that elites aren't in charge the way they once were. And and it's not going

to go back that howling mob is so good. Mob mob is in charge and and hopefully hopefully somebody knows how to organize them. Yeah, no kidding. So, Mark, we have a tradition at the Armstrong and Getty show that if you make a prediction, you have to bet a finger if you're easy to make a prediction, and then nobody ever holds you account for it exactly. It's stupid, it's a waste of time, and you've probably been asked a thousand, ten thousand times to make a prediction. Um,

so Aberry said, a bad predictions? What's that? Berry said, predictions are difficult to special play about the future. Those are the worst. Well, I'll say, I'll hit you with this then, um, you can predict anything you want. Oh no, no, here's here's a better idea. If you were offered a thousand dollar bet on any of the Democratic candidates at

this point, would you throw that thousand dollars down? Or is it just way too unclear at this point and you don't don't name any names if you don't want Yeah, it's it's more unclear than it's been for either party in my career. I think I think if I had

to pick someone today, would be Elizabeth Warren. But I don't think she's been tested yet, and I think over the next couple of months she will be tested, and I'm based on how she's performed when she's been pressured, like with her problems with her talking about her Native American heritage. I'm not sure she'll pass that, and she's got no chance of winning in a general election. I just I can't imagine anybody winning who's for healthcare, free

health care for illegals. I just can't imagine that winning. That That is that is of the view of Donald Trump and is the view of Nancy Pelosi. And when those two agree, generally, I would think it's probably true. So you're you're right, and and and you've got you know, a lot of the leading candidates have that position. So I don't think it's clear who the nominee will be. If I had to pick today, i'd say Elizabeth Warren.

But but I don't feel strongly about it. I think I think, uh, I think Sanders and footage age could be the nominee. I've been buried down on Biden's candidacy from the beginning, and nothing I've seen has has caused me to alter that. He still does well in the national polls, but I think I think he's more likely to finish third or fourth or even fifth than I was than he his first or second. And I think

that will do a lot of damage to his candidacy. Wow, I'd say, But there there are a lot of crap political books to get written when the season is hot and they know they can sell them. This isn't one of them. This is really, really a good book. And I've always really liked your punditry. But we can't let you go without asking you about Hillary. What's the chance she gets in her answer the other day sounded so

Clinton esque to me. She said, lots of people will have been asking me, and I'm not going to rule it out. Not ruling it out now sounds like a yes to me, she said, And I quote many, many, many people are pressuring her. Triple many. Yeah. Look, I was struck by that same thing too. A lot of times people say, oh, a lot of people are asking me to run for you know, senator, governor president, and they just you know, basically, their their their bookkeeper and

their daughter is asking them to run. She's being at She's being asked by a lot of people. It's the most undercovered story in the in politics today. The panic that exists in the Democratic Party over the concern that Sanders are Warren or Boota Gage will be the nominee, and they'll they'll happen in the blink of an eye, one of them will win both eye when the answers say and basically lock things up, and the party will be in a panic because they don't think that those

people can win. Schumer doesn't think they can win, Pelosi doesn't think they can win. So many of the other the donors, so many of the other elected officials. So that's why you see Deval Patrick getting in the race. That's why I see Michael Bloomberg, you know, thinking about getting in the race, and that's why people are saying Hillary Clinton, Look, you can raise the money. You know how to do this. You've got more votes in the

popular vote last time you could. You could correct the mistakes he made in Does she believe her own lines? Does she believe any of her own lives about it was stolen by Russia or it's about misogyny. Does she recognize she's a bad candidate and people don't like her. She she she, I think she believes all those things. She knows she's not a great candidate, But I believe and I think she had some cause to think so that she was hurt by by what Putin did without

a doubt. But but you know, I think, I think I've said this before. I think that history is going to show that that what what helped Donald Trump more than anything else was the decision, the misguided, in some way selfish decisions that Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden made to the Rust side to run for president. Neither of them should have run. They both they both were such

obviously manifestly bad presidential candidates. Are Clinton allowed Trump to win, and Biden, even if he's not the Democratic nominee, he kept other establishment candidates for getting in the race, allowing Warren and Sanders and Boutig to rise up. And now it may be too late for any other establishment candidate to get into the game, and the party may be left because because of Joe Biden's decision with somebody who

can't win a general election because of those positions. We talked about Joe, you don't have to do this, Barack Obama, you don't have to do this, and and and he was talked out of it before. And just look at his record. I mean, he ran in in in in two thousand and eight and he got one percent in Iowa, and he can't paign. He was wet, you know, and and so yeah, you know, I don't I think I think Barack Obama and Bill Clinton agree with what I said.

Namcy Plosi and Chuck Schumer think these guys can't win. Biden can't win the nomination, and the other three can't win the general. Wow, and the party is in is in a huge, huge pickle. I think Biden would have the best chance of the foreigner general election, but I'm not sure he'd win a general election either. Mark Halfred, so glad to hear you talking and pontificating and analyzing and doing what you do the way you do it. Really enjoyed the conversation. Yeah, that was great. You guys

are very generous. It's great to talk to you, and I have a good day. Let's do it again. Thank you. So we've got to we're recording this for the podcast. We gotta air some of this on the show, because that right there is flipping amazing. And it doesn't mean he's right, but he's he's as good as analysts as there is out there, and he's talking to fifty of the best people out there who could also all be wrong.

But anyway, he says Biden can't get the nomination, and Bill Clinton, Chuck Schumer, Barack Obama, and Nancy Pelosi don't think that either Warren Sanders or Buda can win. Right, That's incredible. That you can win is a complete dud. That is incredible. Yeah. Yeah, the most underreported story of the presidential election cycle. I would agree. I would agree. I'm not in those circles. Um so I'm not feeling it,

but I can absolutely imagine the panic right now. You know, if you were a half wit trying to sound like a smart guy, you might say, well, nobody thought Trump could win. But it's for different reasons. I mean, the Trump himself is tough to take. But his message was very heartland sympathetic, very you know, very very traditional American. People are saying his people are saying his personality couldn't win. People are really seeing his policies. He wasn't offering a

policy so radical. People's jaws drop when they hear them. Yeah, this one is their own party saying these people can't win. I've been a Democrat my whole life. You can't win with this, right, I tell you what I As we were discussing um Brad Parscale and and the ads and how how Trump is sitting on those radical policies. Not he's not talking about him much now. He's saving for the general. If I'm Brad Parscale, if I'm Donald Trump,

I just have a loop. I have, you know, half a dozen different ads on a loop of this, these people advocating those three horrific ideas that he mentioned, the the open borders, the health care for illegals, and the eliminating all private insurance and turning it to government healthcare. I just run those over and over again. Donald Trump for President. Then I go play golf at the Raw.

I'm not sure you need to do anything else. Mark Halpern was the only guy in the set of Morning Joe four years ago that would say on a regular basis, now I think Trump can win. I think he could win, and I'd laugh at him. Look at the New York Times. It's got to five. Yeah, that's good stuff right there, buddy, extra large for all your food. He's out there. I'm unwrapping him McDonald's steak, egg and cheese bagel. Look at

this steak and the juice running down the side. Got a little bit on the wrapper here m. And then the fluffy egg and real cheese folded over the side, looking just so good. M M. Grilled onions and a butter bagel too. Thumbs up a McDonald's steakagg and cheese bagel for breakfast. Love It, I participate in McDonald's