Have you decided whether you are going to run for re election in four You haven't set up a re election campaign yet, as your predecessor had by this time. My predecessor need to need you to my predecessor. Oh God, I missing. Um No, an answer is yes, my plan is the run for reelection. That's my expectation. Do you believe you'll be running against former President Trump? Oh? Come on, I don't even think about I don't. I have no idea.
I have no idea what it will be a Republican party. Ah, those are dumb questions in my opinion, It's a dumb conversation of all the things we need to talk about. But anyway, Um, we're happy every Friday when we get to talk to Lawn he Chen. He's the David and Diane Stephie Fellow in American Public Policy Studies at the Hoover Institution and the Director of Domestic Policy Studies at Stanford University, and he's a regular contributor at CNN Opinion.
In Lawn he welcome to the Armstrong and Getty Show. How you doing? Always great to do with you. Thanks, Um. This is what I'm and asked today whenever we've I don't think we've ever approached this way. As a smart guy who follows all kinds of different stuff, what is the most interesting thing to you right now? Not what you know. I know lots of people have be on his guests and they want to talk about the news of the day, and that's not always the most interesting
or important thing going on. What's like, what's actually on your mind? Like things you're going to be reading up on today? Uh boy, I mean, I there's a lot of things. I'm always I always come back to this issue of how polarized we are as a society, you know, and how how many uh and and really kind of intractable differences there seemed to be between people based on
kind of how they see politics. And I've been thinking a lot recently about how it is that there are institutions and the ways that we do things that actually make it worse. Um. You know, one of the things I'll just mention this is this might be a little nerdy, but the thing is every ten years, you know, we take a census and then we actually draw new UH
lines for congressional and state legislative districts. Right, we sort of create these new districts, and that's a really contentious process politically, I don't I don't know if people realize it, but there's a lot that goes on behind scenes. But one of the things that the states, yeah, it's done state by state and one of the things, and different states do it differently, by the way. Some states have a commission, independent so called independent commission of people that
come out and propose lines. Some have experts draw the lines, whatever. But one of the things that struck me is how when we draw these lines and we put these districts together, we oftentimes pack pack in people who think in a very similar way. We don't put people next to each other who have very different ways of thinking. And so as a result, people say, well, why are we much more polarized now? And I say, one of the reasons is because we elect people to Congress, or we elect
people to state legislatures who are increasingly polarizing. Because that's also kind of what's what's happening to us. We're living next to people, by and large, who we you know, may may think in a very similar way to who may look like us. And that's much more common now than it was. Let's say a couple of decades ago,
and I think that's actually made the polarization worse. Yeah, I've seen some of those stats on the number of counties that are um, you know, way more of one than the other, and how much more that is than it used to be. It's culturally, it's interesting. So, you know, getting to the press conference, which is the news of the day, when he was talking about the filibuster in
that sort of thing. Well, I've seen a lot of cable news articles and our discussions and read a lot of articles about the filibuster, and each side chooses their own point. Going back as to who's to blame, you know,
who started this whole thing. Well, Mitch McConnell did do away with the filibuster for Supreme Court justice, but Harry Reid did it away with it for Lord Court judges, and then before that you had you know, stonewalling on this these nominees, and so it just keeps getting further and further down the track of of of tip for tat and getting further apart is it. Well, like you said, you've been thinking about this, trying to figure out how to fix it, but it doesn't seem like we're going
in the right direction currently we're not. I mean, this debate over the filibuster is a great example of that. I mean, you can very easily if you if you go on the Google machine, you can very easily look up and find clips of Joe Biden and Barack Obama and prominent Democrats talking about how important the filibuster is when they were in a position to use the filibuster
to stop let's say, either nominations or legislative action. And you know, now the rules are reversed, and you've got the same Democrats saying, well, you gotta get rid of the filibuster. And by the way, you know, Republicans aren't aren't necessarily immune from that hypocrisy well when it comes to these kinds of issues. So it really is that kind of political convenience that I think gets people worked up.
I mean, at a at a very basic level, you would hope that there can be some consistency in politics, but we just don't see that as much anymore. And I think that also contributes to we're talking about this polarization thing, when you feel like you have to always take the positions that your side is taking, otherwise there's some kind of trader or you're somehow less than uh. In in the Republican Party, we have this term rhino that's been thrown around. You know, you're a rhino if
you don't support everything the Republicans do. And and you know, I think that's really too bad because there are a lot of things that you just took a good hard look at it and said, look, you know, is this something that that is conservative? Is this something that's progressive? And if it's so, then I'm gonna support or oppose it. Then you know it's understandable. But when it comes down to just as kind of shirts and skins partisanship, uh, that to me is probably not not great for America
in the long run. We're talking with Lona Chen. You probably see him on various big time shows here. I'm on various big shows. Readers, articles, that sort of stuff. Um. One interesting thing we've been discussing is apparently, according to reporting, Joe Biden met with some historians the other day and said, you know, how big should I go? Am I going too big? And know they are because he invited in
super liberal progressive historians. Um, they all said no, no, no, go big, goes big now's your time, and so we think he's working on trying to be a transformational People talk about him a hundred years from now like FDR sort of president. And you know, if he takes some hits right now politically for doing away with the filibuster, that won't matter if people are still talking about the major, the important changes he made to America, you know, a
century from now. Do you think that's where we're headed. Yeah, I mean, I think that is part of the goal of uh of of many who support him, and perhaps Biden himself. I mean, just look at it for context. We've passed two trillion dollars in fiscal stimulus spending or
fiscal relief, whatever you want to call. It's two trillion dollars of spending and we and we did so in sort of a record amount of time without a whole lot of reflection in my view, And now they're talking about doing four trillion dollars in additional spending later this year on you know, I mean, some of it is surely stuff that we need. We need better roads and
bridges and airports, and no one's arguing with that. But the notion that we would do it, and you know, just kind of say and wave our hands at it and say, well, it's just another couple of trillion dollars. That amount of expansion and spending and expansion in the
rule of government will will truly be unprecedented. And I think if Biden manages to be successful, even if it's just with that two trillion impact to two trillion dollar package he did and another several trillion dollars and spending going forward, that will met his place in history in some ways as being the most progressive president that we've
that we've ever seen. And I and I think it's remarkable because a lot of people, I think who voted for him and supported him said, Okay, look here's someone who's going to be relatively moderate and reasonable and gonna come in and try to heal the divisions. And you know, I just say, let's look at where we are and let's look at what let's actually happened into. Yeah, you
never know what you're gonna get. I've done a lot of reading about L. B. J and all those Carol books, and you know, he was the guy in the Senate that stopped any civil rights legislation from ever even getting a sniff in a committee for years and years and years, and then when he becomes president, you know, he turns on a diamond and takes the other direction. So you never know what you're gonna get with the president. It's
it's really interesting. And that was a good thing obviously, but um uh, I guess you don't know what's in somebody's true heart until they get the power to do things. Do you have any idea how many push ups you can do in a row right now? I don't know. It's a good question, so we could lie. I could lie and say a hundred, but that would I think, Uh, I don't know. I I think fifty. I think my son can do more than I can actually, because he's
you know, he's and he's ten. So that just tells you what kind of that's funny because I'm my oldest is eleven, and uh the other day we ran and he's just about faster than me. Now I have to run full speed to barely beat him now in a sprint. Um yeah, yeah, there are points when you realize your own physical limitation. And I will I will say that that is that is a that is a part of the of the age curve. I'm starting to find myself on Now. It's interesting because every day I get slower
and every day he gets faster. So at some point those lines are gonna cross, like supply and demand. The reason I ask is we had this health thing. Um, your chance of heart disease goes down two thirds if you can do eleven push ups as opposed to ten in a row. And I did, and I cranked out eleven. So I'm feeling good about my heart health. So I just wanted to you know, that's a stat Yeah, I didn't. I didn't know that I learned something today. Yeah, that's
that's andy. Um. One more political question before we let you go, um uh. Watching the press conference, what do you think the performance was like overall? Were you bothered by a guy who used to chair the Foreign Relations Committee and was on Meet the Press every Sunday and could talk about any place in the world and name the leaders and had all those facts and figures at you know, at the tip of this tongue. That's the way he was young Joe Biden now having to read
few cards for his own foreign policy. Yeah, I mean he's clearly lost several steps since he uh, you know, played those roles you know. I mean, look, I think me at least, that's not what I focus on. I don't. I'm not bothered by whether he's reading or not. What I am bothered by the actual policy. What I'm more bothered by is what they're actually doing, rather than what
he's talking about or how he's talking about it. I mean, Joe Biden is never gonna win on style points, so you know, whatever, you give them that and I understand people, you know, take issue with the fact that he can't even talk about it without the que cards. And that's fine if they want to. My my bigger issue is, you know, do we really think four trillion dollars in additional spending makes sense? Do we really think that that, you know, a foreign policy like the one that we've
got now, you know, makes sense? I think those are the kinds of questions we should be asking and not you know, did he read off a cute card or not? I mean that that's kind of where I would spend my time and energy. So does he do like two press conferences a year, all with just a handful of reporters on his side, that he knows what they're gonna ask? Is that the way he's gonna do it well the more to me, at least, the more shocking thing was
not his performance, but the reporters performed. The fact that you've got so many reporters who are unwilling to ask tough questions. It's their job to ask tough questions. They asked a lot of tough questions of Donald Trump when he was president. That's what the that's what the media is supposed to do. Now when it comes to Joe Biden, they you know, they say things like, well, you know, you have an image as an honorable and decent man, and you know, you know, it's almost like Uncle Joe's
story time instead of holding a president accountable. And and you need to hold president's accountable. I don't care if the Republican or Democrat. The job of the media, if they're doing it well, is to hold people in power accountable. And you look at what's happening in Washington, by the way, you look what's happening in state capitals like Sacramento. That's why there's all these people, all these who have worked up about Gavin Newsom. No one asked the hard questions anymore.
And and that's when you get essentially politicians who decide they can do whatever they want. Pomo is another one. Well, part of it got away with murder. Well, part of it, especially now, is you'll get lit up by your own side on your Twitter feed if you if you come out. There was an there was a column in the Washington Post saying, hey, media, go easy on Uncle Joe. Remember he's on our side, not trying, you know that sort of thing. It's yeah, I don't think people want to
take the bullets from their own side. Yeah, there's no our side or their side when it comes to there shouldn't be when it comes to the media. Unfortunately we know that in too many cases there is, and it shouldn't be that way. Well, I took a lot of your time today. Appreciate you doing it. I expect you to tweet out later how many push ups you did in a row, and I'll be following your Twitter feed that'll see. I'll be I'll be a shame you're not gonna see that number. But but but all the best
for for good heart help. If that's a great whist for everybody, you bet, Thank you very much. Loon heat Chen, regular contributor on CNN Opinion uh, David and Diane Stephie fellow in public policy at Hoover and all around smart guy and I like it. Whenever if I see he's on facination or something like that, I know it's gonna be a good episode. Art Strong