Hi, I'm Molly John Fast and this is Fast Politics, where we discussed the top political headlines with some of today's best minds, and Trump accidentally helped Democrats get some key judicial nominees approved by taking Republicans to watch this SpaceX launch. Thank God. How presidential, very modern day presidential. We have a great show for you today. The Washington Post Dana Milbank stops by to talk to us about Donald Trump's nominations and what they're signaling for our dismal
political future. Then we'll talk to Russian media monitor Julia Davis about how Russia is delighting in Trump's recent moves. But first the news.
Somali a lot of fun news today, as I'm sure you'll be very shocked, mister Trump is only nominating the best people. And we have wrestling magnate Linda McMahon as Secretary of Education. You might be wondering what she has to do with education, as I was until I read this article.
Linda McMahon I actually know from my misspent youth, because she did try once to run for Senate in Connecticut. It was universally hilarious until she dropped out. But I want to point out Linda McMahon. Trump wants to close the Department of Education. So Linda wanted to be Commerce Secretary. She was the co chair of Trump's transition team. She gave him a ton of money, and she thought she
was going to be Commerce Secretary. Now what happened was this guy called Howard Lutnek, who also was co leading the transition team with her, ended up getting Commerce Secretary. And that meant that Linda had nothing to get. And since Donald Trump feels he's going to close this Department
of Education anyway, he figured he'd just put her there. Now, what I want to realize is like in the last Trump admin, Trump actually put someone in there who was not without her problems, but who was actually interested in education, quite a pedigree. Right had done some education stuff, was from a family they were Some of their education ideas might have been a little screwy, but she actually did work in education. This time, there's no pretense. We're just
got a donor needs a job. Let's figure it out. And so she is now going to be heading the Department of Education. This is a little ironic because in two thousand and nine, when she ran for Senate in Connecticut, she had stated that she had a bachelor's degree in education. I don't know how you would get that, But in fact, she had earned a degree in French and a teaching certificate from East Carolina University, and that is not the same thing. And during her brief tenure on the Connecticut
State Board of Education the error was made public. It became an issue during her twenty ten campaign for US Senate. She decided to step down from that board because of legislative limits on her political fundraising that could hurt her campaign goals. The point here is that she lied about her education and then tried to run for her senate. Then now she is leading the Department of Education, which is so very perfectly trumpy. I am not even a little surprised. Are you surprised, Jesse?
I sure not.
Now.
I was a little shocked this morning where I saw some news as I also learned I shocked some listeners on Monday because I got a text in the morning about our episode that said, why the fuck did you randomly say hot tub crime machine in the middle of the Rick Wilson segment. I said, that is a callback to what you me and Rick used to do. The New Abnormal as we would call Matthew.
Whittaker hot tub crime machine.
That's right.
He has other nicknames. There's a nickname he gets called a lot, but hot tub crime machine is because Matthew Whittaker has been involved in all sorts of gadgy small businesses, including toilets for well and down men, hot tubs. He was involved in some kind of time machine situation, right am I remembering season one of this fiasco correctly.
The point what we could say is when you read his dossier of weird fuckery, you literally feel like you may have been slipped at acid tap.
So, needless to say, he has a job in this advent because Trump only knows a few people.
But only the best people, right.
A lot of these cabinet picks are people you've seen on television.
He has a qualification that Trump likes. Big goomba energy is what I like to call it.
I can't say that because I'm Jewish and that seems like a slur.
I come from the part of New Jersey where that's just coming.
You can say it because you're Italian? Are you Italian?
No, that's not true.
I can say that's not true. You can say.
Sopranos was filmed.
You can say it just he's getting canceled. So anyway, he adds actually served three months as the nation's top law enforcement official after Jefferson Beauregard session step down for allowing Trump to be investigation. Did you remember Jefferson Beauregard Sessions the craziest attorney general we ever thought Trump could appoint before Matt Gates. Whittaker does not bring any so he's going to be I just want to point out he's going to be the ambassador to the North American
Treaty Organization NATO, something that Trump has liked. The Department of Education mused about shutting down so you could tell how important this job is to Trump. Mister Whitterker does not bring any foreign policy experience to a job that may serve as the focal point for mister Trump's complaints about how much the United States pay is to help
NATO keep Europe secure. And this is like a gift to Vladimir Putin, right, Like, let's put one of our guys in there who doesn't know anything and isn't super interested in it. He is known for his personal loyalty and willing to defend mister Trump during his first administration. He is likely to bring a similar approach to his ambassadorship doing something he knows nothing about.
I just want the record to show that I have looked up at Goomba's a sawyer and it actually means friend.
All right, Yes, I'll let you. Just just let the record show only cancel Jesse for this, Okay. Mister Trump has repeatedly voiced skepticism about the alliance. He has long threwn to a draw from it, and now hot tub crime machine will run it.
Okay, on to a last bit of a fucker in the section. House speaker Mike Johnson has waited on the use of bathrooms in the Capitol Complex. What are you seeing here?
So Nancy Mays, in her long quest to become Marjorie Taylor Green has his bathroom bell, Mike Johnson. Now it's a bathroom bell targeted at the new member from Delaware. She wants to make it so she can't use the bathroom because because Sarah McBride is traned. Now, Mike Johnson has a problem here, right, which is he is leading a group that is you know, really delights in hurting trans people. But he is at least theoretically a very
serious religious person. So he does not know how he should he be horrible to the trans woman because that's what the base likes, or should he try to operate a little bit in his principles. So he's gone back and forth. So first he said that he wants to make everyone comfortable, and later he said he had to go back and be a little meaner because that's what the base wants. So he said, all single sex facilities in the Capitol and office building are reserved only for
individuals of that biological sex. And he then went on and on. He even said, you know, women can only be women, men can only be men. It was more of that, and he also said, like all it's enforceable. We have single sets facilities where reason women's deserve women's only spaces. We're not anti anyone, we're pro woman. Again, that's not really true. They're really not. By the way, if there's one thing they're not, it's pro women. I
think it's important policy for us to continue. It always has been, I guess, an unwritten policy, and now it's in writing. He added again, Yeah, it's hard to be both very religious and believe that you're there to take care of others and also be run by a troll. But here we are Speaker Mike Johnson again trying to thread the needle between religion and cruelty.
SAMAI I said that that was one last piece of fuckery, but but it's not. I did realize there's something we have to address here, which is that right now we are in these big, big standoff. There's a bunch of journalists right outside the ass Ethics can be while they're weighing whether to release this report on nominated ag Matt cats.
One of the things that we were reminded of is at our time with The Daily Beast, there was a very big scoop about all the Venmo payments he made to these possibly underage women, and there's some more details about that here. What are you seeing here?
Oh, Venmo gate? So it's Gatesgate. So remember Gates resigned last week to avoid this Ethics Committee report from being published. The Ethics Committee. I just want to point this out. The House Ethics Committee is known to be particularly toothless. So this whole thing becoming such a big deal shows just what a big problem Matt Gates has. Now we have these Venmo payments. Okay, the House Ethics I mean, I think this is the drip to a drip of
the House Ethics stuff coming out. But remember the lawyer is speaking to the press. Some of the witnesses are speaking the press. The House Ethics Committee obtained records, including a check and the records of VENMO payments. Remember, Matt Gates's VENMO had been accidentally not private. He had accidentally people could have could see it paid more than ten thousand dollars to two women who were later witnesses in sexual misconduct probes conducted by the House and the Justice Department.
According to documents obtained by ABC News, the VENMO records showed that between July twenty seventeen and January twenty nineteen, Gates, who was first elected in twenty sixteen, allegedly made twenty seven VEMO payments totaling ten thousand, two hundred and twenty four dollars and two cents to the two witnesses who were over the age of eighteen at the time. Good for them for being over eighteen. They are the very
few people in the story who are over eighteen. The payments, which sources said were displayed during closed door testimony ranged from one hundred to more than seven hundred dollars each. Probably not what you want in an attorney's general, but we shall have to watch this play out. The Milbank is a columnist at The Washington Post and the author of Pools on the Hill, The Hooligans, Saboteurs, conspiracy theorists, and dunces who burned down the House. Welcome back, my
friend here to keep me from completely falling apart? Data mail Bank.
Well, Molly, if I'm the one who's will keep you from falling apart, you're in big trouble because I'm I'm just picking up the pieces over here.
Yes, you emailed me like what are we going to talk about? And I was like, I saw the email and I was seized with panic. And then I was like, we are just so incredibly down the fucking rabbit hole. So I wanted to Can we talk a little bit about the uh, the geniuses who are running and now we will again run the United States Congress? Please?
Yes, indeed, I'd love to talk about.
That, because you have a book about that.
I do a book about that, which you were kind enough to mention on this this very podcast. And they did such a fabulous job time that they've been returned with it even it looks like maybe even a smaller majority. Yes, certainly, no better than the last time. So if you thought the last one was a disaster, wait till this one.
Get ready. I want to talk about the United States Congress and the House of Representatives because they were so bad in this last two year period. They won the majority quote unquote by you know whatever two or three seats. Then they fired their speaker because Matt Gates got into a fight with him, and then they were almost unable to pass anything even like postal office namings. This time discuss.
Well, this time we don't have Matt Gates to kick around because he made me the Attorney General of the United States.
Again, we laugh to keep from crying.
Continue, I guess so and then, and what are we going to do? Well, Nancy Mace is already moving to ban the first ever trans member of Congress from going to the bathroom. So you know that that is exactly what the voters were asking this Congress to do. They said, we're suffering from inflation in the border, but yep, don't let any trans person in Congress, p.
Ever use a bathroom. Yeah. One of the things with Nancy Mace is she's such a great example of what MAGA does when Maga gets the chance. Like, here's someone who was in a much more mixed district, right, and then she got redistricted, and so she decided she no longer believed in any of the more normal values that she had.
Yeah, I mean that's pretty similar to the Aleast Stephanic route. Also now going to be a member of the Trump administration.
But least Ivonna got one of those jobs that women get in the Trump administration. You know, you can have that because he really wants to end the un anyway.
Right, And that's exactly And Linda McMahon's the other great example of that. You know, who knows you know, because you know, professional wrestling definitely teaches you how to run the education system in the United States. But of course Trump wants to abolish that.
Sue anyway, right. I mean that's the thing is, like you are allowed to lead a department that Trump has already said he wants.
Gone, right, so you're you're in charge of turning out the lights I guess.
Right, I mean, does that mean he keeps it going now because he wants Linda to have something to do because she did run transition.
Well, he keeps it going because he won't have the votes to shut it down, you know, And I wonder, Molly about all of these things about I feel like, you know, reading the personnel announcement, it's like onion headlines. I mean, it's just, you know, it's too insane to be believed with hag Seth and Gates and all the others. But I wonder how much of this is to just give the app hearans that he's going to go mad and shake everything up and then but we don't know
what he's actually going to do. I mean, you got to assume it's at least a possibility. He starts a trade war, he surrenders Ukraine, China goes after Taiwan. You know, we're off to the races here. But you know, last time he didn't do as many crazy things as it seemed he might. Now, I don't want to say he's going to be normal. I'm not doing the whole He's going to be moderate things that ship has already sailed, But the actual level of disruption is tbd.
Let's say, well, one of the things that really worked for his favor when he ran for office was he was able to say, well, you know, I said all this stuff, but I didn't do it because Democrats prevented him from doing a lot of it. That is not the makeup anymore. Right, you know, he controls the House, not by a huge majority. He has there's a you know, Mitch McConnell is not in charge anymore. He really wanted to get what's his name, the guy that looks like
the president from Mars attacks in there. He was unable the floor Rick Scott, Yes, Scott, Yes, Rick Scott. You know he has Thune who is not quite as much of a lackey. Though. We'll see what happens. Hard to imagine that anyone fails his plans. But again, that was the thing when he was running for office, you know, and voters would say, well, we don't believe he's actually going to do any of that stuff, right, you.
Know, I'm of two minds on this one. Is you know, because they have the trifecta of power that they can do all of these truly alarming things that you know, like the House Republicans did try to do last time, and say, well, you know, Chuck Schumer and Joe Biden are bottling it up, whether that's going to be restoring the Confederate names or banning the abortion pillar, whatever else.
So there's no excuse now. So I mean, I'm worried and alarmed about the potential damage they can do now, but there is part of me that says, have at it, guys, now you've got no excuse. Let's see what your actual agenda is. Because there is nobody to them other than themselves, and I think people will probably quickly see that they
can't actually govern in this Congress. You know, like this this House is not going to line up and walk the plank on a vote after vote, but they're not going to be able to blame the Democrats this time.
I mean, if you harken back to last season of Congress doesn't do anything. We saw the House really deadlocked and basically they needed Democrats to pass anything they could pass.
That's absolutely right. But then they could turn around and say, well, you know it's the Senate that's democratic control, or you know, you know Biden will veto something. But those excuses are
all gone now. So it's just like, if they can't do something, it's the Republicans, who can't do something, And of course they're not going to be able to do a lot of the crazier things, unless, of course, that they succeed in getting them to walk the plank, and then this little fun experiment ends very badly.
Yes, I mean, one of the things that I think a lot about is camps.
Right.
Donald Trump wants camps, and Steven Miller wants to give him camps. Right, wants to deport seven trillion immigrants and ten zillion billion children and families and YadA, YadA, YadA. One of the things when you think about this idea, you have to think about, like, where are you going to build the camps, who's going to staff the camps?
How's this going to work? And the big problem with deporting millions and millions of people, besides the ethical considerations of deporting people who are here legally okay, and the fact that you're going to have a lot of trouble getting a country to go along with us, is that you don't have the money to pay for it, right, Like Congress wouldn't give them money for border security, So how are they going to get money to deport millions and trillions and zillions of people?
Right. Well, and this was the point with border security during the Biden administration when they looked at the whole list of things that Trump said, you're not continuing my tough on the border policies. Well, that's because many of them were unfunded in the first place, and they had no choice, or the courts had blocked them and they had no choice. So yeah, so the border policy is about to run smack dab into reality. I mean, it's it's so hard to imagine the camps being built federal land.
Are they on state land? Right? Yeah?
National parks?
Who is going to staff them? The National Guard? I mean, like you really are down a rabbit hole here.
Right and there of course there's no actual plan. There's probably not even in the concept of a plan here, and you.
Know, we love a concept of a plan.
We're going to solve the housing crisis by kicking out illegal immigrants as if they're the source of the housing crisis, when in fact they're disproportionately the ones building the house that we need, you know, in the same thing with agriculture workers and everything else. And then how do you get the states to cooperate with all of these things? So it all sounded good, But this is one of those areas where I suspect this, you know, the outrageous
rhetoric is going to run into reality. And yeah, he'll make a show of something, but I mean, we all know he's not deporting. What did he say, twenty million people?
Twenty million people. It's problematic because there if you're going to like technically look at this, it's a lot of people and many of them are actually not even the math is not math. But the good news about math is that the government efficiency agency named DOGE, which is run by the richest man in the world who got rich off government subsidies. The irony here is pretty pretty rich and another guy who is basically a miniatureum but from Ohio. Those two are going to cut our shumongos.
Dad discuss yes, no, and they've already got brilliant plans underway.
You know.
Ramaswami's idea was to cut everything that is not currently authorized, you know, like the not renewed. So oh, sorry, veterans, you've just lost your healthcare.
They're super psyched about that.
No, that's right, that's perfect. And then Elon must said, right, we're going to cut two trillion dollars. But Trump is already you know, off limits is social Security and Medicare. Defense, I can't do anything about, you know, payments on the debt. So you're down to about let pocket of what is it, forty percent discretionary spending or maybe twenty percent, you know, if we're not including non defense discretionary spending. So you're going to cut two trillion out of that. But guess
what that is? About two trillion? So if you were down to the point where you are going to stop every single function that government does, you know, whether that's food safety or TSA or the FBI or everything else the government does. So we'll just say goodbye to that. So that's another place where I'll be I'll be very interested to see how they follow through on that.
I want you to go back and explain to our listeners because you did it as a drive by, but I think it's really important, this idea of not funding programs that Congress hasn't approved. Those programs are not fungible.
Well, there's two categories. Well, you know, some are the entitlement categories, you know, which which you can't touch at all, but some are I guess in theory. Ones that you know, you could touch. But a lot of government runs on autopilot, so you know, they're not renewed when they're supposed to be, but by general consent, they just keep getting funded anyway, So you know, I mean, I guess Congress could intervene on the other side to stop that from happening, but
they haven't done that either. So I don't know. We're talking about half a trillion dollars here, but including as mentioned, what is it. You know, it's one hundred something billion for veterans healthcare, and it's not like because it's not currently authorized or whatever the proper word is, that doesn't mean that the Congress actually does not want to give healthcare to.
Veterans, right, I mean, I feel like healthcare to veterans probably not going to be a popular thing.
To cut, No, but it has always been the case that, yes, if we're going to get the budget under control and start making a dent in the debt, you have to do something about the things that are driving that, and that is primarily entitlement. So I mean, if you're not going to touch Medicare and Social Security, whether that's with you know, higher taxes for wealthier earners, or extending the retirement aage. I mean, none of it's terribly popular, but
that's really the only way to fix the problem. And or increasing revenues through taxes, well, that's off the table. And then you know, then the huge chunk of the budget that is a defense, Well, okay, if that's off the table, you know, and we did get down to
this happened in the last Congress. You know, they looked at the you know, all of the House Republican commitments on this, and that's where I got that bit about they literally have to eliminate everything the government does outside of entitlements and.
Defense and paying off the debt.
Right, Yeah, that's not that's not an option. Well, I guess anything's an option. Now, we could go into we could go into default on the dest.
I mean that Trump has in his own personal life gone into default on debt. Not to get too dumroush here.
And we had this fight during the last Congress, and you did have a significant chunk of the you know, the MAGA Republicans saying that, well, this debt limit, it's not you know, we can we can blow through it. It's not a real thing. We can prioritize debt and pay the debts we want to pay off. I mean, and who knows, it's never happened before. Maybe they could get away with it. But also, you know, maybe that destroys the dollar as the world's reserve currency and throw
it in the deepest depression we've ever seen. I don't know.
Let's roll the dice, right, delights Russia, Good for Russia. I mean, if anyone is winning here, it's Russia.
Right, well, or China it could be it could be close on that school, right, It's true, Right, they're doing well. And of course Bobe's done exceptionally.
Yeah, BB, it's it's been great for Babe.
Oh heck, it's been good for urban. This has been good for a lot of people.
Molly, right, exactly, Thank you for orbon BB, all of arcs around the world. Space travel, can we just talk about I don't want people. I know there are people still listening to this podcast as I decompensate rapidly, But I do think it has been strangely these rich people, while wanting to kill us all, are really into space travel.
No, it's true, that's not That's not an area of complaint that I have I'm sorry that all the money is going to Elon Musk, but sure, I'd love to see somebody on Mars. I mean, it is funny the way we're sort of bargaining with ourselves and that's not so bad, and then we're thinking like, well, actually there are some intro maybe maybe we don't need fluoride in the water. It's some of the things RFK says that crazy, you know, like, yeah, yeah, it's be good to limit
pharma and have healthier food. Right, We're all sort of bargaining here to say, oh, it won't be that bad.
Well, it's also like, this is the thing about authoritarianism, right, because that's what this is. I mean, maybe the maybe some of the systems hold and we don't completely become Russia and we are able to keep this. But ultimately, if you think about it, right, there are no choices here.
There are no choices.
There are no choices. Right, this is happening.
Yes, I mean we strap in and enjoy the ride. I mean the only other option, as I was writing about, is you know, just sort of retreating and ignoring it.
Yes, tell us what you're writing about this week in the Washington Post.
Right before we came on. I was saying, I am spending this week writing about my adventures on this tractor I just bought out on the farm. In the many ways it is conspiring to kill me because I don't know what I'm doing with it. So yeah, I'd love to be just spending my days not reading the news. I'm reading scandalously little now I'm watching zero in just sort of wishing it away. But you know, I wrote this to be saying, you know, we can't retreat. You
have to engage, you know. I mean, look, if you know, if they send us to the Gulag, I look forward to bunking with you or something. But until that happens, you know, we have to engage and do our best in this. But you also need to pace yourself and breathe a little bit, and you know, yeah, it is happening, and we got to do what we can to fight the worst excesses of it. But also know that, you know, we also have our lives.
We've got to protect norms and institutions, and that's in my mind.
Got to protect those things. And you've got to protect the norms in your own life and not decompensate, as you put.
It, and that's why I think that you know, we will continue to do this and until we get sent away to the camps. But I do think people it's okay to take the next until January. He's not in office until January, so none of this is happening until January. So we should all ride tractors, read Joan Didion, and we.
Have sixty days to breathe and to.
Breathe, and so we should enjoy those sixty days of tractor writing and reading Joe Didion.
That's it. That's the best we can come up with, and I'm taking it.
Thank you, Dana Mobank.
Molly, It's always a delight.
Julia Davis is the creator of Russian Media Monitor, a columnist for The Daily Beast, and the author of, in their own words, Welcome to Fast Politics Kennel, where dogs bark and we talk about politics.
Julia Davis, Hi, thank you so much for having me.
So you and I know each other for a while, and you do a thing that you do. You watch Russian television.
Yes, and analyze it because it's remarkably informative as to put In splints.
And one might even say prescient. Often Putin's plans and the newly re elected president of the United States. Plans dovetail together. So here is the scariest sentence I will say today, Hopefully, what does Putin have planned?
Well, actually, it's remarkably similar to what they have been discussing for years. The only thing that is different is that the Trump's reelection happened later than they have hoped. But they have been talking about this for years, and unfortunately it's shaping up exactly as what they have hoped. They have always said that everything depends on Trump being in power, because they know he will give them Ukraine and then they can keep moving forward with the rest
of their plans. But also another important part of that is they believe that Trump is a destroyer of America, and in his second term he would be totally unhinged.
He would be unchained, there would be no guardrails, no adults in the room, and he would get to destroying America, which would then become a regional player that is totally embroiled in its internal affairs, and it would also be quiet authoritarian, so he wouldn't have to care how much of the population agrees with his chosen course of action, So he would become very much like Putin in that and America would start to resemble Russia, with a circle
of billionaires controlling poligarchy exactly controlling everything. And the rich people that agree to fall in line would also be fine and be able to enrich themselves. The rest of the population would be too impoverished to have any ability to fight back, and protests would be outlawed. And you know, Trump already said he would use the military to stop
any protests. And unfortunately, based on everything we're seeing, based on what Trump himself has been saying, and the team that he has chosen, everything points to that dark future looming on the horizon, and that is exactly what Russia wanted. They also predicted the West would blink first and not go all the way to support Ukraine, go only as far as it takes to keep the war going, but not really to damage Russia severely. Unfortunately, these approvals to
use long range missiles are too late. Unfortunately, there's not much time left. And what I'm hearing on Russian state television right now is that Russia is un likely to retaliate in any big way against the United States or the West because they know Trump will give them exactly what they want, so it'll be worth it for them to just hold out for that. And they just released
the Tass, which is one of their biggest newspapers. They just released an article where an unnamed member of Trump's transition team told them that Trump would be willing to lift all sanctions, resume normal relations with Russia, all trade, all economic relations. Then the next day Putin says, well,
he's ready to negotiate. It all seems like it's falling into place where Putin will be rewarded for his aggression and will get to keep portions of Ukraine that they managed to conquer, in addition to those that they declared as theirs but never were able to and they expect Trump will be fine was letting them keep that as well. So it's really not looking good either for Ukraine or for the United States.
Yes, and also this is propaganda, right, so explain to us a little bit like you are watching Russian propaganda. So Russia wants Americans to think this is a feed to complete, but it's actually not right. So I want you to talk with that in mind. I want the information from it, but not the gloom because I think the idea that this has already happened is really the most dangerous way we can think of this, because it hasn't right. Donald Trump is not president yet a lot
of things. You know, America has been this anti democratic before. I talk to anyone who grew up in this Jim Crow South version of color. You know, there's always been a push pull here. And again, yes, I agree that this is not this is far from my deal, but we have to I think, be thoughtful about not just totally. Like Russia had never been a democracy, they had really weak institutions to push back. We have again not great
checks and balances. Republicans are really willing to roll over, but there still is a real history in this country if nothing else.
Absolutely, and it is not a done deal. But I think it's important for Americans to realize what the worst case scenario is so that if we see the country moving in that direction, we proactively do something. And I'm observing so much resignation and despair and that's not the time for that, because if we are resigned to it, that's when it becomes possible for sure.
And so talk to me though about this sort of is Russia telegraphing glee at the Trump election. Explain to us sort of what you're seeing on Russian television.
Yes, they're absolutely thrilled with his victory and with almost all of his picks, especially Tulsey Gabbard.
Yeah, I'm hoping you could talk about Tulsea Gabbert.
Sure, yes, And she has been spouting essentially the same talking points as they have been for years. They have
been rebroadcasting her along with Stucker Carlson. She's about the same magnitude of importance to them, and so they're absolutely thrilled that she will now be in charge of all of these intelligence agencies, and they believe she will help dismantle or undermine them because for years they have openly discussed her and described her as their girlfriend, their friend, their agent, and they are beyond thrilled that she is getting this position of prominence. And it's really interesting even
back in twenty two. In twenty twenty three, she was talking, for example, about how they might cut our undersea cables or Western undersea cables, to quote unquote retaliate against US for helping Ukraine. And look what is happening now.
Yeah, can you talk to us about the Russian undersea cables and what that's about.
Yes, they are cutting internet cables at least that's what is being said. That it's being attributed to their sabotage, and they have talked about it for years now. As a matter of fact, they initially attributed this idea to Tucker Carlson who said in twenty twenty two that what if they do this? And their response from government officials on their state TV was oh, what a great idea?
Why not? And then Talca Gebbert was throwing around the same ideas as deterrent for the United States opposing Russian anyway. So they're essentially helping them to put these threats into American mainstream to scare people off. So that way the average person would say, well, why would we risk this happening? Why not just appease Russia and mind our own business? And that's exactly what they want.
Right now talk to us about the missiles because Biden it's very late to do this, but Biden did in fact give Ukraine land minds at missiles. Will that shift the calculus or is it too light?
I hope that it will, because Russia is really in a bad state economically. They don't have enough people, which is why they're involving North Koreans, and they've been talking about that for a while now. They not only do they not have enough cannon fodder at this point, but also they don't have enough laborers to even keep making
their munitions and their weapons. They are running out of people, period, and so that's why they are an act of desperation turning to North Korea, which is quite humiliating for Russia. They really are teetering, and that's what is so disheartening is that Trump is coming here to potentially throw them a lifeline where they are not in a good position.
They're not in a strong position right now, and I hope Ukraine will keep hammering them and taking out their weapons depots and the troops and whatever else they can because it does make a difference, and they still have time to cause considerable damage and retaliation for Russia's invasions. So I was certainly happy to see that this decision was finally made.
Do you think that Ukraine can theoretically win this in such a short I mean it's still three months or two and a half months.
Well, you know, the best case scenario in terms of winning, it doesn't necessarily mean a Ukrainian troops storming the Kremlin. What it simply means is that Russia would withdraw from Ukraine the way the Soviet Union withdrew from Afghanistan. And they could call it a victory or whatever they decide to call it, but that would be a victory. If they were depleted of their resources and of their human resources to the point where they had no choice but
to withdraw, that would be a victory. And it is possible.
Because Russia really is very depleted. Explain to us sort of what that looks like, because I know they've sent many, many, many young men to the front and many have died, right.
Yes, And they have been initially promising that they would only send the trained soldiers in the battle, but they ended up sending just anyone they could get their hands on.
And the only reason they're not declaring a real mobilization because even their shaky demographic have been apparently falsified, so they don't even have as many people as they were said to have, which is already not enough for Russia's size, So they are really in a state where it's not feasible for them to keep this going without outside the support, and they're already talking about North Korea sending more soldiers, and that's literally because they need that to keep going.
They can't keep doing it on their own. And it's a good thing that Ukraine's strikes with these missiles are specifically targeting the places where they have the North Korean troops, so hopefully deter North Korea from sending even more when they see that it's to their certain death.
Yeah, great, So explain to us a little bit about sort of the other picks. So they like Tolci Gabber for any number of reasons, I'm not saying it, but members of Congress have said it that she is Russian asset. I mean, like, I've seen at least four different Democratic members of Congress say that on television. So clearly there is a there is a group that believes that who else are they excited about in the cabinet?
Certainly Musk. They're thrilled about him, and they are repeating and rebroadcasting almost every statement that he makes that relates to Ukraine or Russia and demeaning Ukraine and talking about how Russia is in nuclear power and we should make a deal with them. And yes, they certainly thrilled about Musk and the other picks. They're thrilled because they are inexperienced and not fit for their positions. So that's the
part of Trump destroying America. And they say that that basically almost everyone on his team is inexperienced and unprepared for what they were chosen to handle. So they like that a lot. The only reservations they had were about Waltz and Rubio. But after Waltz criticized the decision for Ukraine to be able to use American missiles for these strikes, yes, they said, okay, so they too will fall in line.
So they're watching pretty close. Huh, very close.
I could see something on our television here and then I turn on there and they're already talking about it. We are like their pet cause they're obsessed with us. They don't have any politics in Russia, it's whatever Putin says, so there's nothing to discuss about their own affairs, and their future depends on what happens in America. So they are obsessively watching and calculating their next steps.
So what do they think of tackle Carholson.
They thought that Trump would make him his press secretary and they were completely thrilled about his visit to interview Putin. They believe that he delivered some message, some messages between Trump and Putin at that time, that he was delivering some sort of back and forth messages at that time. So they totally So they say yes, they say that I haven't seen any obviously, any anything concrete, but they believe that there was some exchange of messages that may
have taken place. And then that interview looked like it was produced by North Korean producers the way it was gushing over everything and didn't ask Putin almost any important questions.
But one of the things about Russian propaganda, which is what you have to watch, is that it wants you. I mean again, I'm not defending chuckle crosson by any certain imagination, but it wants you to think things that may or may not be true, right like the Steele dossier, Like it's better for them. They would like the American media to run with every story in order to discredit them.
Well, yes, they actually intermixed some truth with some fiction and try to pass it off as a story that the paints Russia as an omnipotent country that gets to pull the strings here and there, so waiting through that is those are murky waters, definitely.
Yeah. And in fact, like what I think is so interesting about like if you look at a lot of the stuff that came out about Trump and Russia, some of the bits of the Steele dossier really did undermine anything else that it called into credibility other things that seemed more credible.
Right, It was muddy. The waters were muddy because it was you know, it had had some things that were based in reality and others that were not, and it sort of discredited the whole thing. And it's certainly something that Trump and his followers have capitalized on, just trying to discredit the whole idea that there is something under the surface.
Yeah. Do you see that as a way that the admin the coming admin will try to get the media in trouble, to flood the zone with things that may be true, may not be true in order. I mean we saw that a little bit with the first Trump admin, where they'd be leaking stuff to some people that might not be true or might be set up to embarrass them.
Yes, I think that our media is in for some rocky times, and unfortunately some are starting to obey and advance and are I'm sure are afraid of retribution, and others will you know, they have to be emboldened by, you know, the flood of lies that got this election where we have it today, and I'm sure we'll only get worse.
Thank you, Thank you, Julia.
Davis, Thank you so much, Molly always my pleasure, no.
More, Jesse Cannon, my John Fasts.
And one of the things we've been talking about a lot lately is the concept of obeying, an advanced concept that Timothy Snyder popular arized and we as Democrats are trying to not kowtow to trumpet advanced.
But man, they're winding up down in Texas. Is in the Republican Party to do it? What are you see in here?
So this is a little more complicated than that. I think where we are here is just deep deep Craven sucking up to Trump in the hopes of getting something from him. Now the Texas Land Commissioner, that's an elected job in Texas. Remember, Texas is in a race to impress Donald Trump and get you know, whatever good is
Donald Trump can bestow on them. And remember this is all oligarchy, right, This is a sort of oligarchy kind of situation, So Texas Land Commissioner Don Buckingham, showing that the ladies can be just as crazy as the men use of the one four hundred and two acre ranch in Star County on the US Mexico border for the construction of deportation facilities. Buckingham, a Republican, made the offer in a letter sent to Trump on Tuesday, in which she pledged to support what she has described as the
largest deportation of violent criminals in the nation's history. Guess what's also going to be in their families? People who are here legally and perhaps a journalist or too. Trump made cracking down on a legal immigration a key component is a successful twenty twenty four presidential campaigns began to rally in October, the then Publican candidate said he won. The border will be sealed, the invasion will be stopped,
the migrant flights will end. On Monday, Trump indicated that he plans to declare a national emergency and deploy the military to assist with deportation. In a post on his Truth social website, It's going to get real dark, real fast. And also I would like to point out that Trump, in his first admin twenty sixteen, deported like about a million people less than Obama did, and heard his first administration.
That's it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in every Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday to hear the best minds and politics make sense of all this chaos. If you enjoy this podcast, please send it to a friend and keep the conversation going. Thanks for listening.