Pete Buttigieg, Jeet Heer & Waleed Shahid

head into the mid terms. But first we have the time of Monsters, podcaster and writer at the Nation. Get here. Welcome to Fast Politics. Jeet here, that's me. How happy are you that you live in Canada? Pretty happy? Dirk Clouds on the horizon. Even here we have the head of the Ontario Conservative Party to give you an idea of what things are like. Here is a huge fan of both Richard Nixon and Roger Storm that's been tweeting

on how much he loves Roger Storm. Yeah. Unfortunately, you know, the old joke is America sneezes and Canada gets a cold. We're not going to prognosticate, but we can talk about this state of American democracy, because why shouldn't we Let's talk about it right now. Are you was worried as

President Biden about the state of American democracy? Yeah, no, absolutely, I mean yeah, I think that uh you know, I mean, you're long time listeners will know all the reasons to be concerned about the authority in train of the GOP. What we're seeing in this election is like it goes far beyond Trump. One thing that struck out to me was the Republican governatorial candidate in Wisconsin basically said if he wins, you know, Republicans will never lose again in Wisconsin.

You know, not a great sign for democracy right there. No mean, yeah, I just think like they are absolutely and one season in especially those great Lake states, but also places like North Carolina. You know what happens when Republicans take control of the state level, like they will jurymander in a way where like Democrats could as they have you know, get you know, not just fifty percent or eight percent and still being a minority party. So

I just think it's a very dire situation. And yeah, I mean, I you know, we won't predict, but there's a you know, a real possibility. You know, both the House and the Senate could be Republican. And I think beyond that, I mean beyond the sort of state of democracy. I think it's important to understand the dynamics within the Republican Party that are going to make things very dire.

And I think it's good to go back to the sort of election with Nut Ingred and what happened there, because Ingred was able to win by, you know, by being very demogoguic painting the Democrats is corrupt and really stirring up the you know, the fruitcakes and you know people the black helicopter people like Helen Cheno, the militia people, and they want, they want, they want dirty, but they want. But the thing is that ging Ridge himself, you know,

who's like not a wilthy flower. He could not control his own party because elected so many fire right people and they were a big part of the caucus and they thought, you know, ging Ridge didn't want the impeachment. And this is something worth remember. Gingli thought it was bad politics to impeach Bill Clinton over you know what is you know, like an activity that many people enjoy. That reminder, I think your your mother has written, Yes,

another great reminder. But ging Ridge could not control his own caucus because they had, you know, had an extreme fringe caucus. You know, like ging Ridge looks like a giant. He looks like Abraham freaking Lincoln compared to like McCarthy and so McCarthy. If let's say the Republicans win in the House, McCarthy is like the speaker. He's not gonna be able to control the crazies. And they will absolutely

at a minimum, I'm calling it out. We're gonna see the impeachment of Joe Biden what I don't know, and the Homeland Security secretary, I mean, my orcha. I think we're gonna see endless and impeachments and investigations and over like you know, you know, you you name your son Hunter. That's an impeachable offense, right like just I'm fully expecting to be called up there, you know, I mean, they're just gonna anyone who annoys them is going to end

up with a congressional investigation, I think. And that is like both scary and also um I think imminent, But I do think ultimately that will backfire on them, hopefully if we have democracy in place. But if we don't have democracy in place, it won't matter. It will be an overreach. And you know, if the ninety nineties and even more recent histories any guide you kill him in twenty four thing, we should underestimate the amount of damage that they can do. And what is these investigations and

probably a phony impeachment over nothing. The second is that they're gonna try to use the leverage the debt and leverage to the dead ceiling to try to push through like you know, Medicare and Social Security cards and you know, like again you're gonna have the most extreme Republican Congress ever and you know, like they might pull the trigger on stuff that other previous converses weren't willing to do, and you know, like we could have a real financial crisis.

And they're already talking about working around with the dead sailing. They Yeah, they are talking about it. I think they're gonna do it. I mean, I think we have to take these people at their word. I think we have to understand the dynamic, which is that if they're not willing to like, you know, sanction Marguerite Taylor Green for like saying like just the most horrific stuff as really

literally hanging out with Nazis. Then you know, like that that really means that Margie Taylor Green and that faction Republican Party is in charge, and they will they will be like in the driver's seat. I think it's gonna be great. I mean, like, you know, like American politics. I think, at least since Obama was like having a seesaw right, like it's a fifty you know, it's a fifty one forty nine eight, and so you know, like in off years, Republicans can gain some victories, but then

they'll get pushed back. So they won't be pushed back. So that's the robust side of democracy. Like I think, I don't think they could end democracy quickly enough to stop like you know, like a democratic wave coming in. But it's gonna be really rocky and really dangerous. And I think they're gonna be fool around with stuff like the economy right in the dead ceiling and foreign policy,

right money to Ukraine. They already said they're going to do that absolutely, and if you look at the polling, half of the Republicans already think, like, you know, Americans

doing too much for Ukraine. I think that's gonna be like really, uh, but even beyond Ukraine, I mean, I think one of the interesting things is that, like you know, in the Cold War and even beyond the Cold War into Clinton and Bush, you did have a kind of foreign policy consensus, and you know, like Republicans Democrats agree on some issues. Some of the time that's kind of broken down and you really see like you know, Republicans

like alligning themselves. One can say too much about like maybe Putin, but sir, only with like Netta Yah who certainly with the Crown Prince Mohammed been Salmon, like these are like foreign leaders who like are not like the foreign leaders of the past who think like, well, we got to keep both Democrats and Republicans happy because either one could be empowered. They've like really like put all

their chips into the Republican Party. What happens to foreign policy when you have like, you know, one party that where there's no consensus and one party is willing to you know, work with regimes that are fairly hostile to the US. And Mohammed been Salmon already did the GOP a huge like favor, you know, like he did them like he did the Massola because of raising the gas prices. Yeah, yeah, yeah, by by raising a gas prices a month before the election.

Think about if a Republican had been president and Mohammed been Salmon had been like, fuck you, We're going to raise gas prices. This is fun for us who are OPEC. This is what we do. Imagine if Trump had been president, what do you think you would have done, I mean,

gone to war with Yeah, it's really threatened. I mean think Obama was right in the sense that like Trump is a little bit where you've actually like full military action, but he was only remaking, you know, usually tweeting out like you know, like yeah, we're gonna bomb, we will take over the old fields. And to some degree, Democrats are a little bit playing catch up. But you did see some Democrats talking about ending the Saudia Alliance, and I think you can see more and more of that.

But I mean what I want to say is the broader picture, which is that you can't have a normal system of the United States being allied with certain countries and making agreements if you have this sort of seesaw politics and then sort of polarized politics because whatever Biden agreement fighting makes with the Ukrainians or with sul or Saudi Arabia. He's got to know that that's all up for grabs now that and the Courbas actually has a

lot of power. People think, well, the president runs more in Polosky, but you know, Comress Act has a bit a bit of power to like actually check that, and especially in terms of like where funding goes. I just kind of think it's gonna be a real period of instability. I just think, like, you know, I'm really not sure like how you govern a country in that situation where you have a party that is so nihilistic and so willing to like you know, like just do everything for

partisan gain. Everything is just really so focused on power that everything else goes out the window, including you know, the idea that you shouldn't work with foreign regimes to undermine your own government. There's no idea of cheating in this new Republican party, right because all that's valued is winning. And so I do think we're ultimately you know, if truth doesn't exist, I wrote about this like post truth mid term phenomenon, and if truth doesn't exist and none

of our norms exist, I mean, what stops anyone? I mean, maybe nothing stops any of them. Yeah, no, exactly exactly. And I mean I think that you know, the attack on the Pelosi household and you know, the horrifect thing with Pap Polos, he like kind of illustrates us just like on a very basic human level, like to have a functioning society and that includes you know, like just a society as well as the politics, but includes politics.

You kind of have to like see other people as human, right, and you have to be like when Kennedy was shot, like Richard Nixon, you know, wrote a letter to Jackie onassas you know Kennedy, like you know Jackie Kenny at the time, you know, just saying like, you know, like how sare you was? And you know there weren't people saying, well, you know, was Oswald in a love triangle? That's why you regular shot? Excuse me, there may be more to

this story, you know, a teeny bit more to this story. Yeah, when Reagan was shot, you know, like you know, there are a lot of people do that myself included doing like Reagan, you know, but they weren't saying like well, John Hinckley, you know, like maybe uh and uh and Reagan where we're sharing a trios with Nancy, like you wanted to get Reagan out of the picture so you can have Nancy for himself Like that, Yeah, some did not happen, and so when it happens, when you get

the situation, just like even so you have like you know, some people come even remember the Congress spreading these lack of conspiracy theories, but then other people the lack of sympathy for Nancy Pelosi. That's just so striking on a human level, Like how do we love a society where you can't express sympathy for like a person that underwent something like that. I just don't know. He's eighty two

years old. It's not like I mean, I feel like we've seen other political violence where you'd be like, well, you know, but with this, it's like he's eighty two years old. He's still in the hospital, right, I mean my parents are in their eighties. I don't know. I mean that was the thing I was surprised by when the Pelosi family was like, we know, he's gonna make

a full recovery. I was like, really, I was like, because the eighty three year olds in my life are not I mean, I would not want them to be, you know, in the hospital having surgery like that, would you know, I'm not convinced that they would make full recovery race. No, absolutely, absolutely, It's just that it's a really horrific thing. But the reaction to it, I mean, it just shows how bad things have gotten. And I think that like to be more than anything, speaks to

this democracy crisis. Like you know, we could talk about you know, Jerry rendering and like refusals to accept elections and all the attempts to like play around with elections and and that's all real and serious, but I think it's good to think about these things in human terms,

like how do you have a society? Like if you can't express sympathy in that situation, If you have a horrific attack on you know, someone who's eighty two years old, you know, your first instinct is to politically maximize it and to like flame the victim and to just play these games. It really speaks to like a kind of you know, dehumanized view. And there's a hardcore visions which to the Q and On and you know, like I sort of wrote about this, but Q and On people

need to understand that's just conspiracy theory. It an eliminationist ideology. That is to say, it's based on the idea that the leaders m Car Party are all pedophile monsters and they need to be executed and they need to and then you have these santasies that maybe Trump secretly executed

some of these people. But but it is. It is the type of you know, three nineteen thirty three Germany situation, you know the Jews are cockroaches, or the Runda situation, you know, where you know that you call your enemies like, you know, sub human, and you create a warrant, you create a way in which you think about other people that justifies murder. And that's the hardcore version, and the software version is, well, you don't necessarily do that, but

you kind of minimize it. You make up false theories about it, you don't confront it, and you don't express any sympathy towards the victims. Yeah. Yeah, I feel like there's a real sense in which we've like cross this rubicon. And I still think that if you had a critical mass of Republicans being like this is not how we do it, you could stop before things are too late.

But the problem is, and I think about this a lot It's like the problem in inflation is that people then feel their money has less value and that makes everyone crazy. And this is coming from a pandemic where all of us are you know, not all of us, but I certainly thought for a couple of weeks there that this was the end of it. Right, So we have pandemic than inflation, and there's this sort of instability in American life that I think is feeding this craziness.

I mean, obviously right wing leaders are playing up into it, but the reason it's so accessible to them is because of this destabilized American population. Do you agree or am I crazy? Yeah? No, I I think that's right. I

think that's right. I think that, like they sort of what the pandemic and inflation, a lot of people are becoming on more than we are becoming destabilized, and you know, one sees it in you know, people were once normal people but have somehow something has happened to them, you know, like I often think of this woman Monica Crawley, who's kind of just a generic was just a generic Republican, very conservative Fox News type person, but with it, you know,

had been an assistant to Richard Nixon, but still very stable person and now you like look at her and she's kind of like tweeting out stuff. You know, these conspiracy theories about the pack on pop Pelosi. There are people who like we're somehow at one point tethered to reality and have become untethered. And I think it's a

bunch of different factors that are work. I mean, I think, you know, even before the COVID, I think Trump himself, you know, it was a huge gateway drug just in terms of what he was able to get away with, and he gave permission to other people to do the same thing, to be the kind of conspiratorial and nasty and win at any cost. But certainly, like, yeah, I mean, the lack of stability, uh in society. I mean, it's

a big issue. And to be honest, like I just don't know, Like I mean, there's a real issue whether the Democrats did enough or I mean they didn't have them the numbers to do it. But like you know, one could imagine if they had like a bigger victory in two thousand twenty and more people in Congress in the Senate, they could have, like you know, spent a lot more money trying to stabilize American life and getting

things back to normal. But unfortunately what we have is just they themselves have kind of embraced a lot of the austerity politics and especially to it, like with the Feds, you know, like like you know, Jerome pal was kind of like you know, raising up those interest rates, and you see a lot of like these Larry Summer's type, you know, saying that wages have gone up to pass and like it's gonna be a really bad combination if the Democrats become the party of austerity in a time

whereas you said, we had both COVID and inflation and you know, like people not knowing where they are. To me, that's my big worry, Like I think that's the pathway where by democracy ins. We don't know how it's gonna go, and we're not pregnasticating. One of the many good things Jesse Cannon, are wonderful producer, has been drilling to my head is that we are not here to pronuncigate. And you see these polls and they're all over the place, so we really don't know how this is going to

go down. But it seems to me like Republicans will

control certainly some part of our government after January. So, I mean my sense is that in my mind, the thing that worries made the most are like the governorship in Arizona, the governorship in Nevada, the places where like their swing states where they might not count the votes because I don't care about the Senate, I mean I care, but where the rubber is going to meet the road is going to be the governorship in the Secretary of State, right because if Democrats get the votes in twenty four,

but then the governor decides, we don't do that anymore and we need to, you know, keep recounting until Republicans win. That I think is more worrying. I mean, they're all worrying, but that's one of the many worries that keeps me up at night. Yeah, no, I absolutely agree. I mean, like we're gonna be entering a new world where, at least then on places you have really trump eys candidates at real levers of power, and we we don't know

how to respond to that. We don't know. I mean, I just think it's just gonna be a rocky road. The positive side of polarization is that if as the Replicans do this, more people, more and more people wake up. And I think, like the fact that the Democrats are competitive at all should be like a saving grace. And like the fact is that, like you know, like a lot of what the Repicans are doing is brand popular.

In a normal election year, this would be a democratic quite pote And like, actually the post shows something a little bit closer and some robustness in unexpected places, like while we gotta hope, I mean, the only way we hopefully going forward is that, like you know, one has to, people will start waking up and realizing what's going on. And as the danger increases, I hope the opposition to the danger increases. Yeah, no, exactly, And I think that's

a really good point. Thank you so much, Cheat, This was so interesting, always that great to be here, and congratulations on your new ascension, your continued rise in the meat yet now invented. Pete Buddha Judge is the United States Secretary of Transportation. Welcome to Fast Politics, Mayor Pete.

I know we shouldn't call you mayor Pete anymore, but I'll always answer I am so happy to have you, and I'm so I want you to explain to us a little bit about what your job is Transportation secretary and what you have been up to in this sort of time right before the midterms. So this is an

amazing time for transportation. On one hand, we have never seen this many simultaneous disruptions to transportation system in my lifetime, and then something if you think about everything from container shipping to airline cancelations and delays and everything in between, but those are mostly for temporary reasons related to the them. Meanwhile, we've also never in my lifetime had this much of a chance to make investments around the country in making

transportation better, and those are going to be permanent. So it's been a demanding time for anybody who works in transportation, but also an incredibly exciting time because while we fight these fires and the issues that that have come up affecting everything from from goods movement to passenger travel, we're also setting ourselves up for successes in country and a big part of how I spend my time is looking at how to prioritize the use of these funds to

support projects around the country, from a sport that needs to be upgraded, to an airport that's ready for new dates, to bridges that need to be improved and keeping money flowing to two states and local governments that are actually gonna be doing the bulk of the work. We talked to us about electric car chargers because I feel like that is one of the one of the really kind of most important things that is going to be a

transition for us hopefully. Yeah. So this is a big change, and this is the biggest change to driving really since the arrival of the modern auto age that started about a hundred years ago. It's where the industry is going.

The industry is going electric here and around the world, but we need to work to make sure that it happens quickly, to make sure that America wins, that it's a native America evy revolution, that we don't get beat out by other countries, and to make sure that that it's one that that can reach everybody, because we need to make sure these evs are easy and affordable to use, to own into charge so that people can take advantage of.

Part of that is making sure we have enough charger Now in some way, it's charging infrastructure for people who live in single family homes is quite easy. It's actually less like a traditional car and more like a phone

because you can charge at home. On the other hand, if you're out on a road trip or if you're in a multifamily dwelling, if you're in a big city and it's not so simple as just plugging it in in your garage, then we've got to have solutions here, and it is going to look different than how we're used to filling up our cars. Again, easier in some ways because many Americans can do it, and how harder in other ways because you can't just do it in

a couple of minutes. You were talking about the sort of disruption of the supply chain we saw, you know, these ports, like with the l A port, where there were lines and lines and lines, and some inflation has been caused by this pandemic disruption. Talk to me about where we are with that as a source of inflation. Dealing with supply chains is part of the fight against inflation. What happens is you had these backups of these bottlenecks.

That means shipping prices go up, and prices are part of the cost of the things we pay for it, so it's definitely part of the equation when it comes to inflations. One of the reasons why We've been working on this with such urgency and we've seen a lot of improvements. But this time a year ago people were saying, as Christmas canceled, nobody's gonna be able to get gives right, And what wound up happening was the all time record

high in terms of retail sales. This time a year ago, there were a hundred ships waiting off the coast of l A and Long Beach this year. Last time I checked it was it was eight or nine. So we've seen improvements, but we're definitely not out of the woods. We've got issues affecting our rail system, the availability truck drivers,

in alability of warehouses. You know, good news is demand came back, and Rescue Plan and other actions that that I believe really are for the results of the President's leadership mean that people have the income and the inclination to to buy things. But that means that the supply chain has struggled to keep up, and that's something we're going to work on with immediate measures. But but also importantly a part of how we get at that is

the long term investments. I've of talking about. When you can add a birth to a container report, we can add a rail line or improve the way of bridge works. All of that adds up to goods moving in a more fluid way, and that means lower shipping costs and ultimately that that's part of how we beat information. One of the things you've been really good at is going on talks news and sort of being able to message in that right wing ecosystem. How do you do it?

And how can you get all the other Democrats to do it too? No pressure pressure. Well, I would never have guessed coming to last year that a place like Fox News would kind of be a specialty of mine. But I think I did form certain habits as a mayor in a place like Indiana, doing lots of local television, trying to render our priorities in plain English and reach people where they are. That doesn't mean that people are going to do an into Fox and immediately be converted

to my point of view. But I do think we need to go into these spaces were certainly on my side of the I don't need to go into spaces where people don't often hear our view because otherwise they'll they'll believe whatever they're told. How can you blame them for believing the only messages they hear, and I do see more and more colleagues from officeholders who belong to my party who've been willing to do it. I think,

you know, you have to draw certain lines. There's certain bad faith opinion shows, for example, that I'm just not going to go on. But if you can have a reasonably fair hearing, I think it's always worth a shot. Let's just talk about this for a second. We're coming up on the mid terms. Explain to me what if you're going to make a case for Democrats, can you talk about the infrastruate because infrastructure is a huge thing

that by and passed. Sort of give us a little bit of the nuts and bolts of what is going on in your town that Biden has done with American Rescue plan. That should be sort of you know, when you're talking to your relatives about getting out there and voting. So I'll choose my words carefully, just because appearing as

secretary means I can't elections. But but let me say this, the policy achievements of this administration are something I'm very very proud of, and we need, we do need to talk about that because it's easy to forget how far we've come in two years. Two years ago, we were millions of jobs shorter than where we are now, with the most people working in private sector at any time ever.

A couple of years ago, we were you know, people were still saying, Oh, this infrastructure really going to happen or is it just gonna be one more talk of the game about it. It was infrastructure every week, infrastructure we call the time nothing happened. And then you know, as we were negotiating this bill last year, I think it was declared dead, you know, half a dozen times.

We got it done. But you know, I think people really care that much about the ins and outs of legislative victories, seats and folks obviously want to know how this isn't affecting everyday life. And that's why I really try to make sure we're conveying. Look, this is how you got this new bridge that's under construction in your neighborhood. This is why you see these new gates coming into the airport that you come on. Is where that new

bus line is going to come from. You know it's coming because the President led and we had a success and by the way, including a handful of Republicans crossing now to vote with Democrats to get this done. More broadly, I think it's also important for us to emphasize what's been achieved in terms of the fight against inflation. Right this is a global fight. I mean, every developed country

is dealing with inflation. It's in a lot of European countries too, but there are different strategies on what to do with it. Now. I have yet to hear any congressional Republican answer to inflation. What I will say is that we have taken a number of us to take the edge off the cost of living someone wh you're outside of my transportation lane. But things like getting insulin down at thirty five bucks of for people on Medicare. You know, we couldn't get one Republican vote to do that,

but we got it through. And when we think about coming back to e VS. Making its cheaper, you know we can get any couldn't get any Republicans to help us with that, but we did it. It passed, and that's going to mean money in the pockets of Americans who can get these vehicles more affordably to the tax credits and then say money on gas once they have them. I want to just go back again for this idea,

like Republicans don't really have a plan for inflation. It would be one thing if we were debating our fight, our plans for fighting inflation with their plan for fighting inflation. I'd love to have that debate on the floor of the Senate, our house, right. Um, but we haven't seen

any that they like to mention inflation. Because it's the problem, but the way they talk about it makes me sometimes wonder if they see more value in the problem than in solving it, because we haven't heard a lot of solutions. I mean that speaks to this idea. The same sort of issue with immigration, right, They don't really want to solve that problem either. Many of them have stood in the way of immigration reform that would put us in a much better position when it comes to these issues.

We're saying it before, so again you'll you'll see an enthusiasm for mentioning the problem remarkably little by way of a solution. Let's talk about there. I'm not going to talk about Fox News as much as I want to talk about the rainbow fit. How they managed to get

everyone upset about rainbow fent at all. Yeah, I mean this is something that that really upset me, not as uh, you know, a Democrat, but as transportations, because there is a very real documented risk for children going out on Halloween. And it's not drug dealers randomly deciding to give free opioids to two children. It's car catches. I mean that that's where kids get killed or hurt on Halloween every

single year. I'm not sure of a single documented case where one of these urban legends of of you know, drugs or whatever being put into candy has been documented and resulting in a serious injury or death of a child randomly triggered treating. But I know of far, far too many heartbreaking stories of car crashes, and that's when

we can do something about. I wish that for every story we got about you know, fentanel going into somebody's candy, we had a story about news you can use to keep your kid physically safe when they're trick or treating, because that really is something that that is a safety issue to to worry about. And by the way, not just on all the more generally, I mean road safety that kills forty people a year. We treat that like

it's normal. It's on par with gun debts in this country, and it's not the same as what you see in other developed countries. Were taking a lot of steps to deal with that, and it deserves to be talked about. We should at least be talking about the real killers as often as we're talking about the urban leaging. Right. No, And I think that's an important point. I mean, this shift on reality that you're seeing through right wing media,

how do you even begin to debunk some of this stuff? Well, facts matter, right, We start by talking about things that are most important, And it's tricky. Sometimes when you're debunking a myth, you wind up helping to spread the myth. Allogy is weird that way, So I think often you actually have to blow past it and just get to what actually matters most um and talk about the facts more than we talk about the lives, even if we're talking about the lives for the purpose of exposing them.

I also think that we need to bring it back to everyday life. Right, So lots of people who will watch and perhaps believe a news story about and do not think that happened in there. They don't know anybody in their actual life that happens lots of people who were tricked into thinking that millions of illegal immigrants voted last year do not think that happened that their precinct.

People who believe all kinds of wild things about elections generally actually trust their own local officials to fairly handle elections. So on issue after issue, it's one thing to talk about it in the abstract. It's another to talk about what we're actually experiencing in our actual lives and then your actual you know, our actual everyday lives. Infrastructure is getting improved, most of us have jobs. We are experiencing higher prices, and there are things that are helping with that.

We need to bring this conversation back to the concrete so that you can't get caught up in all this nonsense. Such an interesting point. M mayor Pete, thank you so much joining us. My pleasure. Thanks for having me off while Lead she Heed is a senior Democratic strategist and the spokesperson for Justice Democrats. Welcome to Fast Politics. Will Ly, thanks for having me. I'm very excited to have you here. We are in the run up to the mid terms,

big excitement. What is on your radar? Well, I am really concerned and you know, while I think it's really important for people to volunteer, donate, and vote for all the Democrats running up and down the ticket, I'm very nervous given the direction of the past few weeks of media coverage, particularly about the cost of living in inflation, and I'm concerned that Democrats haven't really addressed those concerns for a lot of working class and middle class families

out there who are struggling to pay the bills, pay for groceries. And that's kind of what's been keeping me up at night. I've had horrible sleep since the weather ex changed. Also well, Jesse, and I too. So you are a very very senior Democratic strategist, and you've worked with a lot of our favorite candidates. And one of the things that Bernie has done so well is this ability to talk about the financial the way that Democrats

are committed. And you know, my grandfather was like very big into labor unions and also communism, and so the idea here is that Democrats can help working people and that's been a message that is very tough for Democrats. For some reason, as a party, they've kind of gotten away from this message, which is really an important message especially when you're trying to get people to vote for you.

On some level, like I can empathize because there's so much other stuff happening, Like the overturning of abortion rights is incredibly important. People are really fired up about that. The threat to our democracy from the Republican Party is incredibly important. There is a constituency of people who are

really concerned about that. You know, at the end of the day, my feeling in my personal life, my conversation with people on my family and my friends, are that it's their pocketbooks, it's their expenses, it's how much money they have in their bank accounts, in their while It's

that's also important. I think because there's been so many crises this past year, we've kind of forgotten the most simple effective message for Democrats is that where the party for working people, no matter where you're from, or what your gender is, or what your zip code is. But I don't know how many people know this, But like grocery prices have gone up thirteen percent this year, gas prices have gone up eighteen percent, rent has increased seven percent.

Health insurance is up and these are the biggest increases in a single year in like the past fifty years, and so it's historic what we're witnessing. And I think because it's such a personal problem for so many people, and people have shame around money and that kind of stuff, it just hasn't been uplifted to the kind of crisis that it actually is. And Republicans are running away with the message even though they have zero solutions to address

people's concerns. Well, that's something I think a lot about, right, because we have Republicans are like, we're good on crime and we're good on the economy. And it's like, I want to point out, like we elected in New York. We all live in New York. Here, we elected this mayor who was basically a Republican who was like, I am a cop. I was a cop, right and a promoter, and I sleep on a mattress and I live in New Jersey. But again, but he was like, I'm a

cop and I'm going to stop crime. Okay, you're a cop, alright, we elected you. When does he stop crime. I live in a neighborhood, you know, a black, working class, black immigrant neighborhood where Eric Adams did very very well. He has an appeal to working class voters of color that I think liberals and progressive shouldn't underestimate. Look, politics is not what we would like it to be. It is

often really terrible. And like the local media coverage in New York City, whether you're reading the New York Post or the New York Daily News on the subway, or you're watching local news or you're just looking at Facebook, it's all these kinds of crazy stories about how you will be murdered tomorrow. I think sometimes Democrats and progressive and liberals just like laugh at that, but also think that is like the reality of the media that people

are consuming. And I think that there are progressive in liberal arguments to be made on crime that go beyond we fund the cops, because I see a lot of Democratic ads this year that are like, we will fund the police, and I understand why people are doing that, but that is the exact message that Republicans are using, and they will always outfund the police more than you. And so I would love to see democratic messages that like, we also think crime is a problem. We want to

reduce crime. That's why we support affordable housing. That's why we support behavioral mental health treatment programs that have been you know, there's evidence that shows that those programs are significant in reducing crime, and I don't know. I just think that there could be more effective messages on some of these things that I haven't I haven't really seen this year. Yeah, I want to ask you about that.

Like there was some messaging with this Inflation Reduction Act, right, like the ideas if you're not paying two or three dollars a month for insulind but you are paying thirty five dollars a month for insulin, that should write drug prices being cheaper will theoretically lower the effects of inflation on your lifestyle. Definitely. I mean that is one of the biggest things that Joe Biden has done. Canceling student debt puts money back in people's pockets. There are significant

things that he was able to accomplish. But if Democrats lose the House on Tuesday, like the number one person they're gonna blame is Alexander kazy Cortez on Wednesday morning, the person who's most to blame on Wednesday is you know, Joe Manchion, Kirsten Cinema, Josh Gottheimer, who could have made the Inflation Reduction Act way more expansive on reducing childcare costs, on expanding Medicare to include hearing aids on paige family

and sick leave. Like, I think things that people would have really the concrete material things that people would have been able to point to as having addressed some of

the pressure that people are in. But I think it's very, very historically those three figures I think will go down as like, yeah, we'll just be infamous because there was a real moment where they could have delivered sweeping change, and I think they they really hamstrung the Democratic Party from being able to present the American people with a huge program that they were able to deliver at a

time of crisis. You never want to be the person that black Masters is celebrating and black Masters declaring his love for kirston cinema. I didn't see that he did yes in the Daily Mail. Perhaps you've you may have missed the Daily Mail's political coverage, but he's like the Liz Cheney for the Republican parm right. She's look Liz Cheney.

That's a really good point. I just want to get back to this idea of like some of the problem with messaging against Republicans is that Republicans are not bound by the truth. And this is becoming more and more true, right. You know, if you watch a Republican ad, you um will think that trans people, immigrants, Black Lives Matter are running the country at federal, state, and local off you know,

I don't think it is factually true. But and then yeah, all the stuff that's been happening with Elon Musk this week on fact checking very just President Biden's tweets. It's incredibly dangerous and scary to think about, how, you know, one of the biggest ways that people get news in this country or in that you know, lots of journalists and political people are on like that. The owner of Twitter is just going out of his way to fact

check only what only the Democrats Like. I'm like Marjorie Taylor Green every day is tweeting factually inaccurate statements who it never gets a fact check. Like just yesterday she was like, Mexicans are coming over the border and bringing in fentinel and Joe Biden is doing nothing about it. And I'm like, almost every word in that sentence is and is factually inaccurate, but there's no fact check being given. And yeah, it is it is scary. Yeah, I mean

I do think that is a real worry. And and I mean also there's like a fundamental problem with billionaires owning our media, right, I mean, and then this is just another app worth of that. Yeah. I know, we wanted to talk about these um Stephen Miller ads that came out this week, like yeah, yeah, let's talk about the Stephen Miller related to factually inaccurate. But it's crazy.

I keep getting text messages from people all over, like in San Francisco and Georgia and New York, in Chicago who are getting these ads from Stephen Miller where whether it's TV, whether it's on Hulu, whether it's on in Mailer's where the ad is basically saying that Democrats, whether it's in pandemic relief programs or whether it's employment programs, or whether it's social media, that Democrats are racist against

white people. The ad has a really big sign that says whites and sometimes it says whites and Asians need not not apply. And this is a tax deductible organization, so whoever is funding them got a tax right off. I mean, it's so sinister and kind of ingenious of Stephen Miller to do this, which is like the logical outcome of where all of the republic, all the Trump messaging was gonna go, which is us to explicitly state

that the Democrats are against white people. You know, they've been dog whistling at it for decades, but now they're just Stephen Millers like, let's just go, let's just go for what, go for the real thing, right. I Mean That's the thing that I think is like kind of crazy, is that we are in a situation now where like that is full on white supremacist talk. Right. Chris Hayes tweeted something where he was like, there is no difference between what David Duke says and what Steven Miller says

at the spot. There's no and there hasn't been for

a long time. I mean, Stephen Miller is basically I mean, he gets a lot of his ideas from, you know, all of this white nationalist stuff, and you know, his the only thing he has going for him that gives people pause that he might not be a white nationalist is that he's Jewish, right, because generally, as a Jew myself, I would say that, like, these are not the people you want to go with, you know, if you have a choice, these are not our people, man, So I

just I'm curious, like, how are those those running with a tax deduction? So it's being run by this is an American first legal there five one C three nonprofit organizations, so that five one three basically means that if you donate to the organization, you can write it off with a tax deduction, which is like insane. I mean, I mean again, I know that it's watching Ted Cruz deep fund the i R s like that's the favorite rallying call of conservatives now, but isn't that an important issue.

I'm not a lawyer. I don't know what the laws are on free speech and and what you can say in an ad or not, but it's definitely concerning. I think it's It's one of those things where and this is the struggle with Democrats generally is like if the Republican Party is increasingly just going to say that the Democratic Party is codd laying you know, is the Democratic Party fights for undeserving people of color and are being

coddled by liberal elites and they're against white people. And now asia that the Democrats like they need a better message than just saying that ad is racist, and that's what a lot of people were saying once I posted the ad. That I I saw was like, this ad is so racist, and I'm like, yes, but I also think this ad is effective. I think if you're just like, if you're just receiving this at your house, you're like, yeah, like, maybe maybe I feel discriminated against in uh in some

way and I think that or I feel left out. Yeah. I think Democrats need to get way better at saying something basically along the lines of like, the Republican Party is doing everything they can to make you think that they are fighting for you, when when as soon as they get power, they're gonna cut your soul security, they're gonna cut your Medicare, they're gonna cut your Medicaid, and

they're gonna give tax breaks to their corporate donors. And all this race stuff is just a trick for you to think that they're fighting for you because of your skin color, when it's just deployed they're gonna swindle you. And I haven't seen Democrats really make that case so

explicitly that all this stuff we hear during elections. Sason in the last two months about the election, when about Black lives matter, about crime, about trans kids, about you know, all the things they waive in the last two months of the election like that. It's all just a strategy for them to distract from their economic agenda, which is to you know, allow their corporate donors to jacob prices as high as they want and essentially lute working people

across the country. Thank you so much, Wilde, thank you so much for having me. Jesse Cannon, Molly John Fast. We've hit our segment a moment of funckeray, and today for our moment of fuckery. We have media fuckery, which is its own kind of Fuckeray. Should that be muckery muckery? It should be muckery. We have muckery fuckery, which is media fuckery. And I want to talk about Biden gave a speech the journalists from NPR was like another speech.

I mean, it's democracy, the death of democracy. It might merit more than one speech. He gave a speech at Union station in Washington, d C. It was a speech that is like, honestly, what I say when I'm interviewed by European television stations, which seems to happen weirdly a lot right now, which is you should vote for democracy. And there are certainly a few races like that Arizona Senate race, the Arizona Secretary of State race, the Nevada

statewide races. All of those races are the Republicans on the ticket no longer believe in democracy and and even don't really even believe in counting the vote. President Biden found that upsetting. I can't imagine why, and so he gave a speech which basically said, please, let's try to

vote to keep democracy going. This should not be a controversial statement, right we're representative democracy, but we are a democracy, and and it's worked for us for a long time, and so the side to fascism is in my mind, a bad choice. So but instead there was a lot of two sides of this. I don't know who suggested Biden give a speech at Union station, but it was

a terrible idea. Don't you think most of these people who are mad about this are just meant the Starbucks closed and they're mad about the blue Bottle being in there. I don't understand, what is there not a Starbucks in there? I was like in there for like twenty minutes the other day trying to find the Starbucks. Any any time a Starbucks closes, you call me shocked, and I hate Starbucks.

I still know that people value it. The topics that biden primetime presidential speech, the two topics that didn't make it inflation and the economy. Democracy is clearly where what Biden wanted to talk about. I mean, yeah, okay, it should be noted that the president had chosen an evening address to focus on the importance of democracy rather than topics that are proving difficult for Democrats. So a lot of the criticism was that, you know, there wasn't talk

about inflation, but but ultimately people know about inflation. The thing that we should all be really concerned with this democracy. Another tweet terrible optics from the White House. Why isn't the presidential seal on there um? And of course you have to remember that this presidential White House is extremely worried about the Hatch Act. Before the Trump administration, the Hatch Act used to mean something. So for that, uh, the mockery fuckery gets a hearty fuck you from this

here podcast. That's it for this episode of Fast Politics. Tune in every Monday Wednesday and Friday to your the best minds, and politics makes sense of all this chaos. If you enjoyed what you've heard, please send it to a friend and keep the conversation going. And again, thanks for listening.