Full Episode - Could A Government Shutdown Backfire On Democrats + Diagnosis Doesn’t Define You: Growing Up With Autism

This is a created political a manufactured political drama based on legal interpretations of two Justice departments that go back to the Carter and Reagan era, and a whole bunch of members of Congress who claim they don't like these shutdowns but have refused to pass legislation that actually would

make these showdowns moot. So I'm not going to bother to rehash that, but it really bothers me how that New York Times did a story about sort of, oh, we've had fifty years of this polarizing and sort of didn't sort of glossed over the fact that this is simply an interpretation. There's no law in the Constitution that says the government is open or closed on October first,

depending on when you pass appropriations bills. This is essentially a decision that people in power made in order to create a point of drama or leverage, apparently for no particular good that's come from it. Right, this has just been a disaster. And I think this is the challenge that Democrats have being the instigators of this, which is for my entire adult lifetime, it has been the Republicans that have been the instigators of the shutdown we've had these.

It was when there was a Democratic president that we had it in the nineties, democratic president, when we had it during Obama. It is with Trump. That's the first time we've had this with a Republican Now, the first

time it was Republican. This is now the second time we've had a shutdown with Trump as president and Republicans in charge of both the House in the Senate now because of the filibuster. And I'm going to get to that in a minute, because you got to ask yourself, what if this is what ends the filibuster. I'm fascinated to see what the reaction would be among some of the left who've been agitating for getting rid of the

philibuster for some time. Imagine if this is the trigger for it, just something to put a pin in that right, let's just file this away for a second. But we're here, and I think the issue and it's reflective. I've got some pull numbers I want to go through that are actually well timed, sort of end of September polls. They're

well timed. But they we get at this question of shutdowns. And you know, the Democrats have messaged for twenty years the shutdowns are bad, and now here they are on the other side saying passing up the opportunity for a clean of temporary six week extension to keep the government open because you know they want their And this is I said this before. I think tactically they made a

mistake not accepting this continuing resolution to November. I think they would be better off having this showdown over the exact same issue healthcare subsidies, the Obamacare subsidies. They'd have been better off, I think starting that fight in November after the twenty twenty five elections in Virginia, New Jersey, New York, et cetera. But here's you know, here's what's interesting.

So the time says this new pulling out and let me read you one of a couple of the questions that had to do with the with a shutdown, who would you blame if there is a shutdown? The Democrats in Congress, Donald Trump, and the Republicans in Congress, both or both parties equally or all entities equally. Now they

combined Republicans and Donald Trump into one column. There's other polling out there that has put Democrats in Congress, Republicans in Congress, and Donald Trump as separate three you know, three categories. So essentially, when you start to see it that way, if you separate it out, more people blame Democrats in Congress than Trump. But if you combined Republicans in Congress and Trump, you see where I'm going. But there's essentially a third, a third and a third right.

A third are saying it's one party's fault, a third

are saying it's the other party's fault, and a third just blame everybody type of mindset. But I thought this was interesting. They just asked a straight up question, which statement comes closer to you view your view, even if neither is exactly right. The Democrats should shut down the government if their demands are not met. Twenty seven percent agreed with that statement. The Democrats should not shut down the government even if their demands are not met. Sixty

five percent agreed with that statement. That's the uphill battle here that I think Democrats are dealing with because you've got you've got a sort of a you've got a confluence of things that have happened over the last twenty years that frankly, have conditioned the public about shutdowns. One is they're not that serious. I explained this to you

in the last episode. They exempt social Security, they exempt military pay, they exempt TSA, They're not going to disrupt the flights, They exempt food inspectors, they exempt so many things that it's sort of like, all right, it's it's sort of the operational part of government that matters, matters a lot. People will notice over time when those parts of government are shuttered, but they don't notice in the

immediate right. So anything that the public might notice immediately, politicians over the years have tried to sort of, you know, shield that right. So that's how you've had these military gets paid. Back pay for federal government workers is now guaranteed. You know, you have all these little things in there that are done to sort of mitigate the consequences of

a shutdown in the moment. But as I've said, what it's done is lowered the consequences for a shutdown, if the consequences were much higher, as in Social Security checks don't go out tomorrow morning, heart stop, Military doesn't get

paid next Friday, heart stop. I promise you there'd be more urgency to this. But they took all of that out, which is again and so the public has gotten used to it that these shutdowns are annoying, their distractions. You know, they over time impact the economy negatively. They're not good. They slow down. I told you all the wasted government money, wasted time for people, particularly in your fear in a

public private defense contractors have time wasted. They still get paid but and the government will eventually remburse him, but they don't do the actual work. And this could be this could be, could be a few weeks, could be longer. So I don't know what the exit ramp is here for anybody. It does seem as if the Trump administration would love to try this out. And the threats that Trump has made actually showcase an issue that I wish

more voters cared about, which is Donald Trump does not believe he should govern for people that didn't vote for him, and if anything, he wants to punish anybody by getting rid of any program that the government funds that doesn't benefit him somehow politically. And he's essentially telegraphed this. He goes, I'm going to be able to reverse some things that they're never going to be able to get back. He is almost excited about the opportunity to govern with a

political lens and a harsh one at that. Next week, I'm going to have an interview with the mayor of Oklahoma City. But I want to give you a little preview of something he said, which is, this is the consequences of these partisan primaries and the way we nominate people.

If you're if you have to answer to everybody all the time in your voters, if you're a member of Congress and you're facing all voters in a primary rather than just this small slice of obsessed partisans, you're going to have a different incentive of who If you have to win over a middle of the road voter to get a nomination to get to the second uh, to get to actual general election, well you're going to comport yourself a hell of a lot differently than if all

you have to do is deal with a partisan set of voters. And you know, for him, it was his explanation of my mayor's or the least polarized executive that you have in the country, that all across the country where where the Republican mayors or Democratic mayors, almost all of them treat a pothole as a pothole. They don't look to see what the precinct, how which way the precinct voted before deciding to fill the pothole. Now I know that they're back in the days of the machine

political machines of Chicago and New York, there was always rumors that, you know, the daily wards got their potholes filled, and if you weren't a daily guy, you didn't get your pothole filled. But you can't get away with that being a mayor of a city these days, and you don't do that. But it is remarkable to me how often we're seeing some partisans governed this way as governors

and as president. And it's particularly a hallmark of magga driven politicians because the whole owned the Libs like it's ok, you know, we're if if we're suffer, if we all suffer, and it makes the Libs cry, then it's a worthy cause to do anyway. That's sort of this mindset at times on the own the libs mentality, and so it's a it is this is the fact that Trump's going to do this. But the point is this gets to sort of all the times you have confrontations with Trump.

And don't get me wrong, I do think that that Trump respects a fight er more than he respects a capitulator. So I do think that in some ways, if if the more resistance they put up in certain areas, that in a weird way, Trump will will will respect that because he's a he likes to be resistant, but he's also got a higher tolerance for this pain.

at his presidential average. He's sitting at forty three percent job approval in this bowl. It's about what he was the last time. It's about what he was for just

about the entire first term that he had from seventeen to twenty. You know, he's never he's never really sniffed fifty percent. And in order to do that, you'd have to have at least fifty percent of independence happy. And that's the problem he's having. Is that independence or more sour about his presidency? Then you know they look they don't. They're not as they're not as sour at his presidency as Democrats, but they're closer to looking like Democrats than

they do Republicans when it comes to this. So I'll fully confess here, I have no idea when this ends, or how this sends, whether in what kind of stomach senate Democrats are going to have for how long are they going to go on this? When I think about who the seven votes would be, we know Fetterman's one, Jean Shaheen could be two, she's retiring. Would Tina Smith be three as a retiring senator? I don't know uh

as as a third one, Gary Peters. He could be right, you see where I'm going here that some of them who are not going to be in ballots could could do this, uh, if they so chose to. But I don't know if there's seven that are that are ready to break completely. But ask me again in a week, ask me again in two weeks. How aggressive does Russell Voight, the O and B director get and trying to potentially

fire furloughed government employees? Is it? Is it aggressive? So I think some of the reaction and some of the

stiffness of the spine. How stiff will the democratic spine be depends I think on how aggressive omb is in using the shutdown to maybe reorient government permanently in some form or another. So we're, you know, like with many things with Trump urban uncharted territory. Unlike the previous shutdown. With Trump, he's got a he's got two aids who

know their way around the bureaucracy. Russell Void's been thinking about this for years as the author of Project twenty twenty five, and Stephen Miller understands how to manipulate the bureaucracy in ways that are pretty much second to none of any presidential aid I've ever covered. Regardless of what you think of his politics, he's extraordinarily knowledgeable on how to on the co essentially the legal code, and on the ability to sort of tinker with the federal government.

We saw it during the pandemic, how he used it to shut down the border, came up with sort of some interesting unique ways in rationales to do it. And so you know, that's that to me, is the uncharted territory that we're entering and that we don't know a lot about, and we don't know how aggressive and where

this has headed. But I think if there's a big danger for the Democrats besides what I just outlined with the aggressiveness of Trump, the other one is whether the public is just paying attention, whether even the activists, whether this is turning into action, whether it does fire up folks, or if there's sort of an exhaustion that comes with this, because again, the Democrats have never been on this side of a government shutdown, and we're going to see a

lot of conservative media sites re treading all these quotes from the Chuck Schumers over the years of Nancy Pelosi's talking about clean CRS. Government shutdowns are bad, they should never happen, etc.

By the way, it's worth noting the Pew Center came out with some new poll polling that happened to hit today, and what they had is they had some favorable unfavorable ratings on the congressional leaders. And what's interesting is just how unpopular Chuck Schumer. Chuck Schumer is the new Mitch McConnell. Mitch McConnell was always the most unpopular of the four political leaders. When it was McConnell, Schumer, Pelosi, and McCarthy.

McConnell was always far and away the most unpopular because McConnell was the only one that had negative ratings among Democrats and negative ratings among Republicans. Well, Chuck Schumer, welcome to Mitch McConnell country. He not only has negative ratings among Republicans, but he has a negative ratings just narrowly

thirty nine unfavorable, thirty five favorable among Democrats. By the way, Jeffrey's numbers are not bad overall, he's got good numbers among Democrats two to one on that favorable rating overall. That allows him to have a thirty to twenty four, so he's he's got some he's got some room here. He's sort of got a net positive view, which is rare for a gouvernile. John Thune, the least known of the of the of the current set of four, also has a net positive. He's narrowly net negative. Je excuse me,

I read this wrong. Jeffreys is narrowly net negative. But his positive rating with Republicans is with Democrats, is better than for instance, Thunes p a a rating is among Republicans. Sorry for confusing that there a little bit, but the real headline of this is Chuck Schumer is unpopped more unpopular among Democrats than he is popular among Democrats. And that also means he's going to be really resistant to caving because he's really afraid of the base. It's the

base that's the most angry with Schumer. He sort of mismanaged the communication of the first one. I think he made the right call, but he spent a day talking up a shutdown and then completely reversed course, which is what really I think angered the left. He sort of he led him on and then he yanked the carpet from underneath them. I think on this one, he's going

to want to stick it out longer. Well put it this way, If he's interested in running again and he's up in twenty twenty eight, he's going to probably care more about what the base thinks of this shutdown than what swing voters think of this. Show them. But this gets to the sort of larger dilemma that I think democrats face, and it's the subject of my substack column. I encourage you to go subscribe. I don't charge any it's all free. I don't charge for this podcast. It's

all free. I do not want to be captive to an audience. I don't want to be captive to a paywall. I think that has been that is that becomes self fulfilling. I am trying to swerve away from that way of building an independent media operation. So it is free and I'm not going to triculator and charge it. Okay. The one place where you do have to pay to go check out what I'm doing is new Sphere. It's a unique app and there's some terrific journalists there. That do

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helping a whole bunch of independent journalists. There's a reason results matter more than promises, just like there's a reason Morgan and Morgan is America's largest injury law firm. For the last thirty five years, they've recovered twenty five billion dollars for more than half a million clients. It includes cases where insurance companies offered next to nothing, just hoping to get away with paying as little as possible. Morgan

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to get your back. Check out for Thepeople dot Com, Slash podcast or Dow Pound Law Pound five to two nine Law on your cell phone. And remember all law firms are not the same. So check out Morgan and Morgan. Their fee is free unless they win. But in the substec I talk about this democratic dilemma, and that is if Democrats want if a Democrat wants to win the White House in twenty twenty eight, just saying Donald Trump is an existential threat and a dictator and a fascist

isn't going to cut it, because in order to win the presidency, you're going to have to win over some Trump voters. So and in order to have a conversation with us Trump voters, you're going to have to admit that Trump was right about some things. And you can do it in a way. You know that Trump has identified problems, He's just been terrible at solving them. In fact, his solutions make things worse in some cases. Right, he's

trying to return manufacturing back to America. His transactional tariff policy, which is turning us into a kleptocracy, is a horrendous way to do this, Terrible for the economy, terrible for the consumer, and doing nothing to bring manufacturing back. But what the voters. You got to sort of understand what the voters were voting for when they voted for Trump in sixteen, and then they did it again in twenty four.

It's almost like the old Verizon commercial. Can you hear me? Now? You know, Democrats misinterpreted the twenty twenty election. They thought the voters were like, Yep, Donald Trump was a mistake. This is an accident of history, and he needs to be Trump and Trump is that needs to be excommunicated essentially from mainstream American political debate. That's not what the voters were saying. By the way, if Joe Biden had had four hundred electoral votes, you could have made the

case that that's what the voters were saying. If he did have, but Joe Biden, while he won every swing stay but North Carolina, it only would have taken a couple, you know, a couple of hundred thousand, basic, about one hundred thousand plus votes for Trump to win the electoral college. Right, It wasn't a landslide. It wasn't some sort of massive repudiation of trump Ism. What it was was a bunch of swing voters exhausted from COVID and wanting off the

roller coaster. But it wasn't a repudiation of the reason why Trump got elected in the first place. You know, and I think when you now, I think we have to view Trump's election and this and this is sort of the blueprint that I think any successful Democrat in

twenty twenty eight has to follow. And that is, you know, in fifteen, when Donald Trump essentially launched his candidacy by going after John McCain and the Bush family, many of us stuck in some conventional thinking, myself included, thought, well, that's a mistake. Republicans are not going to tolerate that. They're going to punish him for that. It turns out, and I don't think Trump knew this is what he was doing by doing it. He just did it because

it was his instinct. He just got angry at people who didn't take him seriously. This was no strategy. But you know, and I think the biggest sometimes we all try to look for a strategy, and with Trump, Trump just sort of stumbles into these things. But the voters have a strategy, okay, And that's where I think Democrats in general have to respect voter decision here a lot better than they go about doing it right now, by signaling that he was willing to take on McCain and Bush.

He signaled he was a different type of Republican, that he wasn't going to be the same type of Republican that they were used to that was doing essentially nothing but losing elections for them, Going back to George H. W. Bush, Bob Dole, George W. Bush winning only the popular vote once right, John McCain met Ronniey. It singles that he's different,

he's willing a bucket. Party made him, gave him an independent credential. So suddenly you had non Republicans going, huh, I'm curious what that guy's up to. I want to check that out. And so, yes, the sixteen election was more of a vote against Clinton than it was a vote for Trump. But Trump was a vehicle to say, no, we don't want establishment status quote politics.

wanted to excommunicate Trump and trump Ism. And I think the reason the voter ended up rallying around Trump was not because they liked Trump, but they didn't want all of us to forget the initial message in the first place, the same power, the same message that was sent by electing Barack Obama, the same message that was sent by electing Donald Trump, which is, we don't want the same old,

same old. We want something entirely different. We want not restoration preservation, We want annihilation, if you will, of the way things work, and a rebuilding and a renewal of some sort. And in order to talk to that voter that didn't like the way things have been going, who's been a Literally they voted Obama, they voted Trump, they voted Biden, they went back to Trump. Right, who are these unsatisfied people?

Like they'd love to reach for it, but they can't even get there. Income inequality has gotten worse, So there's I think it's that disconnect that a future. So I say this and that in order to have a conversation with the very voters that reluctantly voted for Trump. These people don't like them. This is great. I was telling you about a focus group last week that I observed out of Michigan of Biden Trump voters. And there's one voter going on and on not liking all the power

that he's accumulating. I worry he wants to be a dictator, this voter said. And then like, well, do you approve of the job he's doing? Yeah, i'd say it. Do you regret your vote? No? I don't regret my vote. So they, you know, they kind of already know that he doesn't really have the temperament for the job and isn't really and is going too far in what they want him to do the latter, but they wanted something.

They wanted somebody to attempt something. Their biggest fear on Kamala Harris was that she wasn't going to change things. She was gonna be status quo. And you know, look it was revealing in her own memoir when she said she underestimated the need that people wanted to know she was going to be a lot different from Joe Biden. She thought her mere presence was enough to indicate she'd

be different from Joe Biden. I think we've learned in politics you got to say something over and over again, and you sometimes have to make a symbolic sacrifice at

the altar of sorts in order to prove to this group of voters no, no, no, no, you're going to be different in one form or another. And I say all that in that I know that some on the left don't want to hear that. That you can't acknowledge that Trump's gotten has identified some issues that the Democrats have failed to address, and that the threat to democracy that he presents is such a front and center threat that

that needs to be the focal point. The problem is, I don't think the voters you need to win are interested in that conversation, and they still want to know what are you going to do for them? They understand what he's doing, it's still going to come back of what are you going to do for me? And what are you going to do about these problems he's identified? Are you going to do something about it? So you know, I think about it going back to Bill Clinton in

the eighties. The Democrats spent the eighties trying to repudiate Reagan and Reaganism. Even in eighty eight, the campaign wasn't trying to sort of accept the premise that Reagan was a successful two term president. There was still the DNA of the Democrats in eighty eight was no, the Republicans were wrong about everything. By ninety two, after another shellacking in eighty eight, Bill Clinton's was not sitting here repudiating

everything Reagan did. In fact, I always say that you know, you knew Reagan won the argument when in nineteen ninety five Bill Clinton said the air of big government is over right when a Democrat said that, just like I believe in some ways. Barack Obama won the argument on entitlements when Donald Trump is out there campaigning saying Social Security and Medicare cannot be touched, right, that is you know, that was the central argument he said of the twenty

twelve campaign between Obama and Romney. Ryan and Donald Trump said, you know, Obama was right. He doesn't say it that way, but he's essentially saying it, which opened the door for him to have a conversation with a whole bunch of other voters who basically, while they may have agreed with Republicans and a lot of the cultural issues, just didn't

trust them on issues like social security and healthcare. And then Donald Trump found a way to have that conversation by saying no, no, no, I hear you on that. It's a similar vibe. You got to get somewhere where, whether it's crime in the cities, security at the border, skepticism of big tech, getting other countries to share the burden of global security. You do it in a way.

You could say, hey, look, he's identified these problems, but he's chosen ways that actually make it worse, doesn't make it better, or he you know, Essentially, Democrats would be better served by running Trump against Trump, saying, hey, you know, Trump said he was going to do this. I was hoping that he actually might follow through on something. The

guy never follows through in everything. But it's too bad, and here's something but I And then you have days like what happened Tuesday, where Trump behaves in such an Unamerican way, behaves in pretty much the worst way a commander in chief could ever behave in front of America's

uniformed military leaders. And I understand why there are some on the left that just can't stomach the idea that gift accept the premise that there are some things his presidency has identified that voters like. All Right, I get it. I mean what he did in front of the uniform military was outrageous, the essentially declaring war on American citizens. You know, he's really put these military leaders in an

impossible situation. None of them have been given an illegal order yet, and I think the moment, you know, if you're wondering, why aren't there should there be mass resignations. I've talked to plenty of my friends that have served, and I've asked them about this, whether they're they're disappointed that there hasn't been resignations in the upper echelons and military rank to this just clown show that is Pete

hag Saith and what Trump has been doing by essentially desperately trying to politicize the military, pit the military, you know, essentially say the military has to be pro MAGA and they say, you know, until he until he issues an un constitutional order, unlawful order. You know, if you're gonna if the whole goal of the military is to stay above politics, a political you salute whoever the people of

the country decide to elect to that office. Then the way they behave today is exactly correct, or excuse me, behaved on Tuesday is exactly correct. Yes, I'm doing this on a Tuesday evening going into tomorrow.

kind of pathetic that that hag Seth is trying to lecture a whole bunch of people that have gotten a whole lot of more promotions than he ever got went in the military, and he's trying to lecture these guys about what a warrior ethosays, Oh to be a oh to be a fly in their brains as they were thinking about about about this, but just think about where you don't you don't really you didn't earn the respect, but you have to beg for it. You have to demand it. Man whoever wants to be in a position

where they have to beg for respect. If you are in a position of leadership and you have not earned the respect of the people you're leading, it's on you. You've done something wrong here. So today's spectacle is and it is it is alarming. It is everything that folks that plenty of folks are saying, and it is going

to be the counter that many have to what I'm saying about. If you're gonna if you're gonna sort of win back voters who left the Democratic Party, you're gonna have to acknowledge the reason why they left, and you're going to have to acknowledge that there were some things that Trump tapped into that the Democrats failed on. So it's I get it instinctively, you're alarmed and want to fight over here. But in some ways he's the one trying to bait everybody. He wants those debates on his terms.

He would love for people to spend all this time criticizing him about military and how he's trying to use it to deal with crime in the streets. What he would be have a harder time dealing with is when you're like, boy, you know, well, he's right about getting manufacturing. He's too bad. He's taking too many bribes from companies in different ways that he's been that he's had his own personal wealth enhands in lieu of actually doing what he promised to do. So you're better off, particularly in

a democracy that I still think is functioning here. Okay, I know it's we are not in a great place. By the way, the number two most important issue to voters who volunteered, the New York Times did not give them a list. Number one was the economy and number two was political division. It was the only two issues that got double digits. And again I liked the way the Times did it. They did not offer a list

of issues and asked the respondents to pick. They said, what's the most important issue, and they just waited for them to say. It is the better way to figure out what are the issues that voters care about most? You ask them and you let them. You don't prod them, you don't push them, You let them tell you. The fact that political division was two. The fact that we are now this poll and another one over sixty percent think we have a problem with political division in this country.

Another poll identified it as a political crisis. There's no doubt that that that that the country is going to be looking for a leader that's going to figure out how to bring us together. But part of being able to bring us together is acknowledging you know what it is that that Trump tapped into that the Democratic Party needs to lean into more. So we'll see, UH coming up, I have a terrific interview with a journalist, Leland Vittert.

He is an anchor and reporter for News Nation, used to be with Fox News UH, and he wrote a personal story he dedicated to his UH. It's called Born Lucky, A dedicated father, grateful son, and my journey with autism. Obviously, autism has been in the news a lot with with Kennedy and Trump out there trying to UH claim that

that maybe they have found the cause of autism. And I think what Leland's story is, and I really I think you'll find it inspiring, is you know, it's sort of as the saying goes in the in the in the world of autism, when you've met one person with autism, you've met one person with autism, that every journey is different, every ability sort of ceiling is different, and in many ways, I think what what Leland and his father are trying to say is, look, the regular programming codes to raising

a kid without autism didn't work with a kid with autism. But Leland's dad essentially figured out another code and another way to do this. And Leland's a very successful journalist, is married, is going to have is. So it is a remarkable story, particularly if you've got somebody in your family or you've dealt with this. I think the book is worthwhile because it's Look, it's not a book that tells you this is how you do it. It's simply

a book that shares their story. So anyway, for those of you listening for the full thing, this is definitely that's what's coming up next. We'll sneak in a break and after the break my conversation with Leland and Vitter. Well, joining me now is a familiar face to many of you. It's Leland Vitter. He is a anchor at News Nation,

long time before that, longtime correspondent and journalist for Fox News, and he's out with a new personal memoir of sorts. It's called Born Lucky. A dedicated father, a grateful son, and my Journey with autom It's a very moving book. And if you're somebody, if you're a parent, if you have a child struggling with some of these issues, I think you're going to find this story in this book quite inspiring. And with this issue in the news, it is worth looking at how families deal with this, not

how governed. We're going to look at this from a family perspective, not necessarily a government perspective. Leland, Welcome to the podcast.

understand childhood development issues, and how little we understand is how you can overcome.

of this book.

are struggling having such a hard time. And when I was diagnosed, you know, when my parents I write this in the book, right, they know there's something wrong with me. If a kid would touch me, I'd turn around and slug them. I was really repellent to kids. And they go into one of those little psychology testing centers, you know, linoleum floors, crummy chairs, we've all been there, stale coffee, old magazines. And they bring me back and take one to take me over to, you know, play with blocks

or whatever. They talk to my parents and they look at my parents, they said, we really can't imagine what's going on inside his head, and my dad goes, is there anything we can do? Anything? You know, he's desperate, and she goes, generally, not, what year is this? This is the mid eighties, right, nism wasn't understood what it was.

classic story of the eighties. I don't think that's the response the school gives you. If this is two thousand and seven or two thousand and eight, what do you think?

me once it there are a few things. But there is now even more in our society, this desire to put kids who have any type of special need in bubble wrap, right, to give them medicine, and to say meet them where they're at, and you have to accept them as who you are they are, and you have

to tell them that this is their superpower. And all of these things that if my dad had done to me, I would have had no chance to operate in the world that I operate in now, because his method was not about adapting the world to me. It was about adapting me to the world. And he was brutally honest about it, right, Chuck, And that's not something parents are told to do. You know, when I was in seventh grade, I wanted to play tennis. My dad was a phenomenally

gifted athlete still and I writing born lucky. How he took me to a couple of tennis lessons and after the third or fourth one, he looked at me and he said, I'm your father. I love you. I will come to every tennis lesson. I will drive you, I will cheer you on. You will never be able to play tennis. You just can't do it. You don't have the coordination, you don't have the hand eye coordination, you don't have the depth perception, you don't have the motor skills.

It's never going to work. Which, considering I really hope that tennis was my way into asking this girl out. I was heartbroken, but I knew then my dad would always tell me the truth. And then when he said you can do something, boy, that meant something.

adapt to the world that you live in, not make the world adapt to you. Right, boy, if this is

not sort of what I would argue. You know, we sit here and we have these these fights sometimes through left right prisms, but I don't I think we're having left these are because that's how in many ways, that's how I was raised where and now, you know, especially if you're from a if you're if you're seen as from a group that isn't part of the majority, whether it's a religious minority, whether it's a gender minority, whether

it's you know, something else. Those that succeed are the ones that learn how to adapt to the world as it is and then slowly but surely fight for acceptance versus trying to turn you know, three hundred and forty nine million people to your way right right, which is which is something that you know, if everybody behaved that way, we'd never get anything done as a country.

my dad said, I didn't want you to be defined by it, and I didn't want you to all have that. And I think people can say, you know, good things are bad things about that, but it certainly was a different way, and it now forced me to know that I could work through anything. But fifth grade private school. He comes into c the pe teacher. I'm in Pe, and my dad goes, hey, how's he doing in this guy who he knew, big, big former football player, knew my dad from football. He said, I think he's doing

better today, you know, better this week. But he goes great, let's go, let's go see him in pee. And the guy goes, I don't think that's a good idea, and they're looking down on all the fields and dad goes wise as well. He says, I've had to put him with the girls because I had to protect him from

all the boys. So you think about that from a father's perspective, a fifth grade father hearing that the only way for the pe teacher to protect his kid is to put him with the girls. My dad said okay, thanks and walked off. But I think that sort of shows you where I was at in my social ability to interact with Some people were sort of magnetic in their attraction of friends and kids. I was repellent.

how to read people, but not everybody can. And sometimes you just like you might need extra help to learn actually read words. Some people need extra help to read social cues. Right, is that a fair description?

lunch with mister Todd, right. And it was easy because I didn't have any friends. I didn't have anything else to do with my life. My dad was my only friend. And I loved interacting with adults because I could talk to them about things that I talked to my dad about about politics, about sports out I think that's much sports, but politics, business, all that kind of stuff. And we'd

go to munch with mister Todd. And this is a perfect example because I would just be badgering the hell out of you with questions, how do you book your guests, how do you decide what politician's telling the truth? How do you come up with your questions on and on and on, and my dad rather than sort of saying you know, okay, lucky, stop or enough, he would tap his watch, and that was my moment to be.

skills that so many other people have. It's a small example, but it was a way to actually teach me in real time what was happening, rather than just say, look, you know, he can't he can't come out with anybody, which at the time I really couldn't. But at the same time, if you say to a kid okay, stop, okay, not now, okay, whatever, it embarrasses the kid. And so that was the line he had to tell.

he talked me through it and worked through it. And what was interesting at the end of the conversation every night he'd say to me, look, the qualities that make you unpopular now and that you are picked on now and that make you humiliated now, is what's going to be your strength later on. And it wasn't ever about academics. It wasn't ever about being smart or successful. It was about turn hard work and self esteem was earned, not

given right. You know, I started as a kid doing two hundred push ups a day at six or seven years old, because Dad was like, I can teach you that hard work is rewarded and that goals matter. So that was where he would He was very clear to me that I was different. I think you'll appreciate this, Chuck.

Living where you and I both live now. I used to say I never liked anyone who liked high school because the values of high school are so screwed up that if you like high school, there's something wrong with you. And there's a little bit to be said about that about Washington too, But if you really.

mean they ever became student council president, but they all wanted. So you have. The point is it's a town of busybodies, right like it is. It is, it is, it is. It is that very part of high school on steroids.

never picked up You know, sometimes I'd like to think, oh so and so you know, you hear this phrase on the spectrum. And at this point I don't love the phrase because aren't we all on the spectrum? It just depends, right, I mean, yeah, all on the spectrum. So it's this weird shorthand that we've given to Hey, they're a little bit off center from whatever the spectrum is and all this stuff. But why'd you choose to

share your story? Because in some ways it sounds like your dad's goal was to help you adapt so that you didn't have to constantly say I'm different, treat me different.

of the school here. In fact, everybody here really thinks Lucky is quite weird. That's a seventh grade prince Walchetize.

was my fault. Again, great training for a newsroom. But the reason I went public with it is because I think we are in a reckoning about parenting in America, and I think parents need to know there is real hope. George Will wrote the forward to this, and he said, this is the proof of the mountain moving power of

parntal love. And I think parents have been told for so long, you know, let the village raise your kid, you know, but let your kid be them and and sort of the experts know better, and there's this new methodology and on and on and on and told parents basically not to take control, and mine did. And I thought it was a really important story for people to hear.

to frame it, because you know, the fact is this is true not just when it comes to parenting, which is the parents need to take more control, right, And there's there is this perception that somehow you don't have the ability to change things. It's also true with the healthcare system, right if you if you don't take control of your own medical care. And and by the way, remember that the doctors work for you. You don't work for the doctors. These people work for you. You don't

work for them type of mindset. But you, the parent have a lot more station here and that you also have a lot more responsibility when it comes to your kids. I mean, I love it when you when you it feels like we have a a lot of broken young men out there right who are susceptible to all sorts of violent ideologies or violent actions. Perhaps some of this

is social media or you know, whatever we're doing here, but you know, there is a through line that I notice in some of these people, whether it's a school shoot or all that is, there is some sort of lack of parenting, or a parent not in the picture, or a parent sort of not seeing things. What I find your story to be inspiring, it's it's a reminder that the parent needs to take control here, because nobody else is going to love this kid enough to do the kid right. Only the parent.

who clearly was diagnosed with what we now know to be autism, just got married to this wonderful woman who you want to have kids with. Here's we know that it's a higher chance that I will have an autistic child, but we don't know why, and we don't know if there's anything that can be done either during.

It's from my father died of hepatitis C in nineteen eighty eight. If he gets diagnosed with hepatitis C. Today you take a pill and you're fine. But in nineteen eighty eight, by the way modern medicine we sort of you know, in the eighty eight you know, you know, I would have said, oh, the eighties are And yet in hindsight, right, that's like, you know, it feels like the nineteenth century. And it compares point what I.

not doctor Jay Boticharia. I have doctor John tonight. It's amazing how TV works that way. But about a Charia ahead of the nih That was his message. He goes, we have to be humble enough to say we don't know, and he said very few scientists are. But to pick up on what you were saying about fatherhood and everything else. This tells fathers, you can make this enormous difference, and

you should. And I again, over the past ten or fifteen years, fathers have been really sort of told to take a back seat and that, you know, not to sort of demand more of their sons and demand that their sons stand up and take responsibility. And I don't, you know, do it two hundred push ups to day when you were five or six years old is not you know. I'm sure now he would be counseled against that because you're, you know, doing whatever. And it was

a very different way. And I write in the book you know and born lucky that how lucky I am also that I had two parents eighty you know, and a family say together, my parents have married for fifty plus years. Tell the story about how they got engaged in your rip joint after three dates, but they you know, that's not discussed at all. Eighty percent of kids who

have a disability of some type, right especially autism in these other issues, eighty percent of them their parents get divorced.

that's the message. I mean, I don't want to get into specific examples out of privacy concerns, but there's some there's a lot of examples that way where I think when you have a single parent where the other parent walks away because it's just too hard right in their heads, right,

it is too disruptive, you know. The sad fact is this is the reminder that we don't give out drivers, We don't give out the equivalent of a driver's license to be a parent, right, And if we did, that person probably wouldn't have qualified to be a parent if they're willing to walk at the first sign of struggle. But that is it is. It's funny you say it that you were lucky to be born with two parents willing to throw themselves into you, and if you didn't, you might not be where you are today.

all this being public? And then of course you reward the reader with that.

to inspire and give people a lot of hope. And I told you about all the times that you know, I would come home humiliated, bullied, pushed around, isolated at school, and I would take it out on my dad. You know, we go to my bedroom and he'd sit there and listen to me, just hammer away about how angry I was and how upset I was and how hard this was and why am I having to do this and why am I having to go through it? And he'd put me to bed or leave and I'd read or whatever.

And I found this out now twenty five thirty years later. He'd go downstairs by ten eleven at night. My mom would have been asleep or watching TV, whatever goes to sleep, and she'd come out and find him in the living room all dark, just sitting on the couch, crying himself, having internalized everything that I had been through.

was just funny, you know, the typically in these situations, and even I think kids who have great parents they have a therapist. And but anyway, I never ad anything. So this has been like going to therapy on national television. Right. But my dad and I still talk three or four times a day. I still call him every night to say good night. He is still my best friend. And that's just him and I. I don't know how else

to say it. His our relationship changed because of it. No, I think certainly in the in the course of writing this book, and I talk about and tell the story of Rachel and I meeting and her sort of realizing that as we got to know each other, better that there were clearly moments that I revert back and there still are right to sort of my old tendencies when I'm less disciplined than I should be, and her learning

to accept that. So yeah, I mean, I think I've gained through hearing the stories and experiencing the emotion, not as a kid living in it, but reliving it as an adult. I've gained an enormous more amount of respect and gratitude for my parents than I already had, which was significant.

said I found your wife, And there you go. I don't remember, like a Okay, we need to talk, you know, turns out that I have whatever it was, I think probably just came up in conversation, but she has an e Q that's off the charts. Mine was near freezing.

watch this and are interesting. I tell the story in the Book of the Faithful interview on Fox News after the twenty twenty election when I went at it with Aaron Prainey, who was a Trump spokesperson over the Trump claims that he had won and was just going after her. And look, I think probably in the moment, did I know that that wasn't really what Fox wanted me to do. Probably, But I think there's part of condition personality, whatever you want to call it, that I kind of didn't care.

You know, I'd always been taught to do the right thing. My dad always said, do the right thing, no matter the consequences, and I you know, it's sort of all social graces and social stop points in your brain were lost. Can I blame that on autism? I don't know, but it certainly goes to there's times that sort of there are miss social cues.

you never over it. You know. Two or three weeks ago, I was with my father in law at his golf club and I was putting my golf clubs in my travel bag and I was late, and I was focused on something else, and this older gentleman come over and wanted to talk. And one of the very you know, classic tendencies of autism is that you just sort of focus on a task and you just everything else gets

blocked out and you kind of become obsessive. And I was obsessive by getting my golf backpacked, and I was horrifically rude to him.

feel like you? Where is it showcased itself as this superpower for you?

of those things I'd love to someday ask your father how he would have you know, now that he saw your version of this, does it change how he may describe what he did, if that makes sense?

and situation. And yet what you guys are trying to do, what I'd like to think I'm trying to do, and what I tried to do before, and the media industry fights against us, which is, Hey, you know, I'm a person who looks at politics through the prism of incrementalism, Meaning when you're trying to govern three hundred and fifty million people who are pretty evenly divided, you can't do

anything rashly. Right, if you want to turn an aircraft carrier, you do it slowly, and you do it sort of a little bit at a time, because you want to bring everybody along. If you do it too fast, you will do one step forward, two steps back. And yet

we know in news or and information is I always say the people most interested have strong opinions. The people least interested are watching sports or are watching something else. Right, And yet I get the sense you're trying to appeal to that person somewhere between the thirty five yard lines. It's center left, center right. I'd like to say I'm doing the same thing. And yet we know the business is driven by those between the goal line and the thirty yard lines. Right.

algorithms is actually sort of tailored to you personally. So what has been underserved is the Center because people mistook the Center for being bored and uninvolved and uncaring and watching sports and just sort of uninterested. And I think what we've found is that there is a radical center. There are people who are upset with both sides and that sleeping giant of the of most of America that's between the thirty five yard lines, as you point out,

that's in a bell shaped curve. That's where most people live. They've been awoken and they don't they do care about sports, but now they're scared. They're scared of the extreme left and they're scared of the extreme right. So we're at NewsNation. We try to be is in the middle, calling out both sides. Both sides get a hard get a hard time,

And I think, what's different about my show? And you know I say this, I got asked or invited not to return to Fox News because I've went after Donald Trump and I have had Trump send down the White House, send out stories and commentaries I've done and said, look, see how great of a job we're doing. Leland says, we're doing a great job. So to me, that's what a journalist should be. And I think people are yearning

for and that radical center, for somebody to call balls and strikes in a sense on both sides so that's what we're trying to do. Book. So far, it's working two ways. One, ratings are up significantly. We beat MSNBC and CNN across the board last weekend. And two, I think when I meet people and see them. It used to be when I left Fox, like what happened to you? Oh, I went to News Nation News, And now I have people coming up to me saying, I see you on News Nation, and I love that you give both sides

a hard time, and I love that I don't agree with you all the time. And it's like, oh, okay, so it must be working.

Borough of New York, right and Florida. You know, I joke, we're so backwards in Florida to go you have to go north, to go south, because culturally, the farther north you go the But I love me a good Southern expression like that, and I cleaned it up a little bit, But that is the sense sometimes, right, you you sit here and I'll watch I'll watch a story go Haywire on cable, and I'll sit there and say, you know, there's a lot of other bigger stories happening that are

much more consequent, and yet we're obsessing over a vote. And I don't want to be dismissive of the Epstein story. I'm not dismissive of it. I'm not dismissive of what happened to the victims. I think they deserve their say. But because of the way the incentive structure works in media, there was this obsession over covering it, and it was

across the board. It didn't matter whether it was on sort of the legacy cable channels or on this And You're sitting there going, you know, these tariffs are a much bigger story. What's happening with the Venezuela, whether or not the president has authority to bomb a boat in Venezuela, whether or not. You know, there are much more consequential stories,

but they're not as entertaining as Epstein, like, how do you how do you fight that? I've got the luxury where I don't have to have a boss these days, But I if I look, I remember those days where all right, I want to do this and if I want to do this story, I got to sort of do this story so that I can do this story.

and it was whatever combination of of unknown people. ABC would come up with, well said, right, yeah, un till Jennings really right, NBC and ABC had had some NBC and CBS had real stability, ABC less so because they were always the number three, right, they were always trying to catch Walter or mister Brinkley. I always call him mister Brinkley. I used his desk at NBC, so I

have a very fond I I Brinkley at Russer type of mindset there. But but it is a Now there's a thousand of US curators.

to go back and I spent a lot of time in local news and small markets, and I spent a lot of time, you know, in Colorado in small markets. So I I think that I tend to go back to when people are drinking with their buddies on Saturday afternoon, wh they're watching college football, when they're playing golf, what are people talking about, how is it how are their lives being changed and affected? And in trying to cover it through that prism. You know why why this matters.

didn't live there, right, the local lived there. And I also view that local journalism is different from national journalism in that on the local level, you're there to help people live their lives. Ninety percent of the stories local news does is to help people live navigate their life

in that community. National news is different, right, It's about telling you what you need to know in civics, like what you need to know about the country as a whole, which, of course in and out of itself, is more divisive. Local news much less divisive. But I think the loss of local news, as I joke, a man named Craig came along and said, you know, classified ads ought to be free. YadA, YadA, YadA. We destroyed the entire local news ecosystem, right. We didn't fully appreciate how much that

revenue stream kept so many local publications together. And yet I look at our media problem today and I think the loss of local is what is the biggest. It's sort of like a house can stand up, but there's always one pillar that is keeping the whole thing up together. And it turned out local news was that pillar. And when we wiped it out, it collapsed the entire information ecosystem as far as I'm concerned, which given your experience coming through local, how would you revitalize it? O.

If you put out good content, they will come because people are the viewer, and people are smart. They are extraordinarily interested in their own city, town, state, country, and that you if you fill that void with good, meaningful news and information, people will respond to it. And I think that that is the lesson that good journalism is rewarded because it's something that people crave and always have. People always want to know what the news is, and

I so, yes, it's become commoditized. The flip side of that is, I think that if you if you offer something special, if you if you really offer people compelling, must read, must know information. I remember there was research done in the nineteen nineties about why people watch local news. The number one reason was the weather the number two and so they didn't sound stupid at the water cooler. So if you can provide them that information in that context, well, that's always a thing.

a good educator? Are you a bad educator? But you're educating no matter what you're doing when you're in the news and information business. Hey, Leland, I have to tell you, it's it's good to get to know you because reading the book, I find it, I find it weirdly unfair in a situation like this, Suddenly I feel like I know a lot about you right in this situation, and

it almost feels upside down. I mean, you've put yourself out here well and so people and I admire it, but it's you gave up a little privacy.

It's about me, but it's not for me. It's for parents and grandparents and aunts and uncles who have a kid. And what parent doesn't want to help their kid.

I hope you enjoyed the conversation with Leland and if you want to check him out and check out his reporting, he's on News Nation in prime time. Formally, it's on the what used to be WGN, and Hey, as a baseball fan when I hear WGN, I think of the Cubs and Hey, we're in the middle of baseball season.

but they're the in order of most likely to switch to Essentially, in this case, it's the five most competitive races in the country, but in the order of most likely to flint. So number one on that list is North Carolina, the open seat. There. We've had a little bit of early polling. You've got somebody who's held state wide office versus somebody who hasn't. Right, Michael Wattley has it as essentially the Republican nominee to be and the Democratic nominee to be. Roy Cooper has one state wide

office multiple times. But you already see it's I think I've seen two different polls and they both basically have shown the same thing. Cooper's got a lead, but it's all within the margin of era forty six, forty two, forty seven, forty four. And guess what, that's what the numbers are going to be between now and November. This

will be, as the cliche goes, all about turnout. But I do think since this is a Republican held seat, the Democrats a slight favorite, right, I would probably make if you want to do it as point spreads here, I'd probably make Cooper a one and a half point favorite here a little bit, but you know that's when you're talking about margins that small. It doesn't take much

to lose this race. But when you look at it for the rest of the map, and I think it shows you how tough the path is for Democrats to pick up the four seats they need to win the Senate when the best shot at flipping a seat that they have is essentially a coin flip on its own, right, you need your third or fourth seat to be the coin flip. And the fact is they're not anywhere near that.

They might get there. We'll see with recruiting. So right now, this one year and one month out from election day twenty twenty six, number one most likely Senate seat to flip North Carolina number two. I didn't put an open seat there. I think the last time I did this, I said, I usually prioritize open seats, but I have as off there. I think the John Assoft seat Georgia's Senate seat is all the polling have indicated. He's got a narrow lead, just like Cooper, right, nothing's big I am.

I am not as convinced as others that George's a pure swing state. I think Georgia is a organizing state that Democrats, you know, sort of have to a lot of things have to go right for them to win statewide races. The last time John Osoft was on the ballot, Rafael Warnock was also on the ballot with them when we had the two Senate seats at the same time. How much did that matter with mobilizing African American vote. I think it's worth something can Assoff generate the same

enthusiasm as Reverend Warnock. That's an open question. When you look at other statewide races in Georgia, right, it is, Yes, Biden carried it in twenty twenty, Harris got close but lost it. One governor's race there has been fairly close, but the second but the one in twenty twenty two wasn't that close. It's still an uphill battle for Democrats to win. State wide race is sort of in a generic environment. I'm not saying this is going to be a generic environment, and a lot of this may depend

on who the primary is. But when you just look at the demographics of the state and sort of just by the pure numbers, I put Georgia as the second most likely to flip. And again the fact that Georgia is above other Republican held seats. You know, this is why the Democratic path to winning four seats to get control of the Senate. The path is so narrow that right now it's not visible. I'm not saying it might not become visible, but right now it is not visible.

Number Three, I'm the most likely to flip. I put the open seat in Michigan. Mike Rogers is not going to have a primary. That's a big advantage. The Democratic primary is gonna be messy, it's going to be fascinating, it's going to be telling in many ways. I think it's a preview of what to expect in a twenty twenty eight Democratic presidential primary. You have sort of different flavors. You have sort of an establishment favored in Hailey Stevens.

You're going to have sort of an outsider but sort of in the mainstream wing of the party in Molly McMorrow. And then you have a more progressive candidate Abdul Sayed. And so I'll do ALLOL sayat sorry, And I think that's very representative of what you're going to see. Some outsiders that are mainstream. You're going to see some progressives that are exciting the base and could create a very messy primary. It could be very hard to unify. But

we don't know yet. And I still think there's a slight blue lean to Michigan generically, which is why I have it further down on the list than Georgia on there. As remember, right now Michigan is a Democratic held seat, but it is you know, if you look at the open seats, the Democratic open seats Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, Illinois, Michigan is the best shot that Republicans have of winning

one of those open seats. But I still actually think Georgia right now is still a better shot for them than any of the open Democratic seats. I'll be doing these monthly, so this list could change. Number four on

the list. I tell you I vacillated on this. I went back and forth. I had three different seats in this slot over the last few hours as I was having these debates. I ended up settling on Maine at number four. I do think Susan Collins is very difficult to beat, but I also think this is Susan Collins has never attempted to run for reelection this unpopular before. Her favorable ratings are as low as they've ever been. Her unfavorable rating in Maine is as high as it's

ever been. I am not going to underestimate her ability to win elections, and this is not a presidential year. I always thought she'd be more vulnerable in a presidential year. So we'll see. We could have an intense primary here if the governor Janet Mills does get in and it becomes sort of establishment versus progressive primary with the oyster farmer.

Let's see what happens. I will say this, I think if Janet Mills runs, she'd better come across more enthusiastic about wanting to be a Senator than she has so far. The way that she sort of kept her likely candidacy live has been this sort of if it's the mindset I have to if you twist my arm. You know one thing about Susan Collins, she loves being in the Senate. I don't know if it always plays well with voters.

I get that you may be a reluctant partisan and maybe you don't want to do that, but are you reluctant to actually do the job. I don't want to be in Washington, Okay, then don't run for the office. Right So I'm a little I'm gonna be if she runs. I'm very curious to see what her rollout is because she needs to show a lot more enthusiasm for this race, I think to win it. Then she's shown so far and in the number five slot. If I vacillated a bunch with Maine, I always was gonna have Maine in

my top five. For this fifth slot, I contemplated three different races. New Hampshire right, it's an open seat. Johnny Soon, who news being recruited heavily. It looks like he's more likely than not. Big baseball card collector, by the way, really great collection. His is all pre war. He's real super old school in that. Scott Brown has not been polling as well. I understand why Republicans think he's he's

he's not electable there. I still think that he would run a competitive race against Chris Pappus, but there's no doubt all the polling has shown that, you know, the Chris sonun who hangover effect I think has really helped Johnson, who's name idea. What's funny is is well Johnson Who's no trumpy trumper. He was much more of a conservative

ideologically than his brother. But his brother's governorship I've seen very much through a moderate lens, and I think that spillover has really helped because and I think John would agree with me, his poll numbers look better today than they did when he when he ended up losing reelection the last time he ran for the Senate. So I don't know if he wants to admit that his younger brother might have helped his political political brand a little bit.

I'll tell you my thinking on Ohio. I just don't know how Shared Brown gets to fifty, right, I'm not ruling it out. I also think Brown has a complicated messaging challenge, which I've shared with you before. On tariffs. On one hand, the tariffs are are causing a lot of sort of consumer pain. On the other hand, tariffs are not a bad word to working people in Ohio. When it comes to goods, perhaps you'll see a shared brown say, the food tariffs are bad, the tariffs on

autoparts are good, the tariffs on cars are good. They're bad on food. And I'm kind of wondering if we're going to start to see that split because I've had a lot of conversations with labor leaders where you know, they like that Trump is willing to use tariffs. They liked that Biden was willing to use tariffs, particularly when it came to some of the to steal into some of those some of the sort of the non food tariffs, right, but the tariffs on ag are really causing pain. The

tariffs on coffee are causing all of us pain. So I wonder if you're going to start to see an attempt by Democrats who are still trying to win labor back and labor union members back, finding a way to split at the attack on tariffs and essentially go after the food tax, to griffs on agg and what's hurting farmers and try to sort of create a create a sort of a separate distinction with the steel tariffs and the auto tariffs, and then I contemplated Iowa because of

the open seat. But I will tell you, h look, I've been impressed without quickly Republicans have rallied around at Ashley Hinson's campaign. I still think this is going to be a competitive race. But another reason I kept it out of the five slot is I've been following a story and I don't know how many of you have, but I keep an eye the story about the the Moines superintendent who turned out to be not an American citizen that came to as a shock to a lot

of people in des Moines. He was apparently well regarded in his job, but somehow he was in this country illegally and had a de port deportation notice for over a year, and there was sort of an awkward you know, as usual. How Ice has been conducting itself has been horrendous, you know, sort of unnecessarily confrontational. But it doesn't mask the issue that apparently this the now former des Moines superintendent, I believe he's resigned at this point, essentially lied to

the school board of des Moines. Well guess what one of the people running for the US, Nate Jackie Norris, is on the Des Moines school Board. This story hasn't finished playing out, but I wonder how much this sets back Democrats in the state. Generically, may not. It may end up being a non issue a year from now, but it isn't a net positive for the Democratic brand,

and I think that's fair to say. Again, let's see this whole story play out, make sure we have all the facts on this, But it was I've been following the story pretty closely. It's like, you're just like, wait, what when I saw that Ice had detained the superintendent of schools? Wait? And he was not an American citizen? How did this happen? Right? There's a lot that needs to be unpacked with this story. But to say that

it's it's super high profile in the largest media market in the state, so it's going to get its share of attentions. In what I would call my others receiving votes category, they're not near the top five yet, but who's to say they won't get there. Nebraska, Texas, Minnesota Republicans have had a surprisingly hard time finding a credible candidate in the Minnesota open seat. Alaska and Louisiana still

waiting for some candidate things to develop there. But anyway, the five right now most likely to flip my top five right now thirteen months from election day North Carolina one, Georgia two, Michigan, three, Main four New Hampshire. So with that,

let's do a few questions.

then why is this lie so pervasive and unquestioned? I haven't heard left leaning outlets discuss this point, and it makes me wonder how much of a kernel of truth is in the claim that Dems are unwilling to admit. Are Democrats able to handle this talking point without fracturing what's left of their coalition? Thanks in advance, love the show, Luke. So Luke, look, no, the answer is no, it's not true. Now.

What happened before is that they discovered that some people who were here, undocumented people were somehow accessing some benefits because perhaps they were with somebody or had a child who is an American citizen who was getting benefits. Right, if you're looking for the kernel of truth, it's not the parents may be here illegally, but their kid is here legally. They do have access to the medicaid, to these various things, but the parent doesn't. So I'll let

you decide. Can you say, are the parents that are not of legal status in this country benefiting because their child who does have legal status is getting a benefit? You see where I'm going here. So, if you're looking for the kernel of truth, which many on the right would say, you know democrats are claiming it's not true, but you know they're benefiting from this, et cetera. So that's the semantic you'd be debating over. But no, nobody who's here illegally is supposed to be eligible for this.

But if you are an American citizen, and then you are. And so where the gray area is is is the children who are here who were born here to folks who are not of legal status. I hope that helps a little bit in the clarification. Next question comes from will E says, Hey, Chuck, your commentary was spot on. I just don't know which commentary I'll keep going because

aren't they all sorry? I think that's what you have to do as a podcast host now, right, is I have to overinflate my ego and how say how smart and great?

was spot on. I appreciate, thank you, and I By the way, some of you are probably asking me, weren't you at a football game this weekend? How come you didn't talk about in the last show. I'll tell you the second here, but I want to get through a

couple more questions. This next one comes from Deborah You. Hey, Chuck love the podcast. Your recent discussion on polls showing democrats less interested in talking with Republicans really resonated with me. Many of us have tried to have rational, civil conversations with Trump supporters, presenting facts, listening, seeking common ground, but it feels futile. I consider myself moderate and open to compromise, yet too often the loudest up voices drown out dialogue

with outrage and hypocrisy, leaving me exhausted and disheartened. Well, Deborah, I would just say start with people in your family that that you know, Start with people you work with, or people in your neighborhood that that you that you know are on the other side, and try it that way. I think if you have some sort of previous relationship that isn't political with somebody, that's where you can start to break, to sort of break the ice and thaw

things out a little bit. I try humor, you know. Look, I I have over I have my own ways that I you know, I consider myself pretty good at reading people. I kind of know where I think people will go. So, you know, if I don't know somebody very well, I usually try to connect on another subject first, sports or weather or you know, if you're on an airplane, you know the frustrations of flying or something, you know, sort

of non controversial like that. But I think it feels like what you're describing is having a conversation with somebody that's super online. And I will say, there's no I've tried to have civil conversations with pen pals. I have quite a few pen and piles I've I've I've accumulated over the years. Some of you may be listening now that are regular pen piles with me. Where Frankly, if you if you email me, I usually will respond if

you're fairly civil, even if you're tough and discree. You know, I don't think you you know, I really you're always you know, giving a pass to this side or give it a pass to that side. You know, as long as you're not like filled with venom, I'm usually going to respond and try to have a civil back and forth because frankly, I'm always trying to learn. I'm trying to understand the you know, what is it that has you exercised? Maybe it's something I'm missing, So I always

think there's something to learn. But when the person's super online and they're just sort of you know, you know, they spend more time reading cat Turd fifty two or whatever that right wing meme, Twitter feed is or TikTok feed. I just call them all cat turns, but I think one of them is called cat turd fifty two.

He was. He was anti he was an anti trumper from the beginning, and then when he flipped a maga, he decided, I'm gonna smoke four packs a day. You're not going to have a rational debate with with somebody who's who's that online? So I guess, you know it. It's certainly a better conversation to be had in person

then it will be, uh, you know, digitally anyway. But it probably is best to start off with somebody you might have a pre existing relationship with even if it's something as innocuous as you're dry cleaner, or you know somebody you just happen to see while you're walking your neighborhood all the time. Next question comes from Gail in Woodinville, Washington. Hey, Chuck, so glad I discovered the toodcast me too. Tell your friends, Uh, our numbers are growing a lot, that's for sure. You

know again, I think of Sister paud in my chest. We're the fastest growing podcast in you know this section three, two four five. So anyway, I'm sort of kidding. I know hindsight is twenty twenty, but do you think the country would be better off now if Trump had been re elected in twenty twenty. I've heard this argument. For the sake of argument. Let's forget that many of us

probably would have died from COVID under his leadership. But had he been reelected, Mike Pence would have been VP, and we might never have known of J. D. Varans. Trump and his clown posse might have been bumbled through the second term. With more guardrails. There would have been no indictments or prosecutions to trigger his revenge to her.

There wouldn't have been the four years from twenty twenty one to twenty twenty five to develop Project twenty twenty five and give Stephen Miller the opportunity to consolidate power, and best of all, Trump would be out of office right now. What do you think? Keep up the great work, Gale. I have had this conversation. I have humored this conversation with various friends of mine on this front. It's a it's as as you know, I'm going to have a what if series coming up, and what I do is

sort of forks in the road. You know, what if this would have happened instead of this? In the past, I've done what if Hillary Clinton had run for president in two thousand and four instead of two thousand and eight, which you've actually won the presidency in two thousand and four. I certainly make the argument that her best chance was two thousand and four, more so than eight or sixteen

for a variety of reasons. What if Bill Clinton had resigned in nineteen ninety eight, as many Democrats wanted him do in the peak of Monica Lewinsky, then you would have had a President Gore running for a full term in two thousand what is that election like nine eleven still happens, but this time it's ten straight years of democratic So you see how you know, you start to

go down these roads. And so anyway you have I'll tell you this, you have potentially helped preview one of the what ifs that I want to go down because I think this is it is true. This is a more damaging presidency to the sort of guard rails of American democracy than if he had served two consecutive terms. There's no doubt about it. It's an interesting question though, whether I think it's weirdly, I think we need another twenty years to figure out whether it was better or not.

You know, do any of the Biden policies work, And if they do, you know you're going to have to consider those as well. So I think it's I understand where you're coming from. I think there's there's certainly when you look at the when you look at this the what he's done so far and we're not even through year one, and what I've said earlier about Steven Miller

and we'll see how the shutdown goes. I think it's put it this way, Donald Trump is a much weaker figure inside the Republican Party if he had won reelection, and he'd have been a much weaker figure sooner inside the party. And maybe Democrats control the Senate after twenty twenty two in a bigger way, not a smaller way. Maybe their map is more navigable, right Like, I could certainly paint a very rosy picture for Democrats right now,

but it's a anyway. The point is is I think this is a discussion that you should look forward to on the Chuck Podcast towards the end of the holiday season, when I will do my annual what if series that I've done in my previous iterations of the Chuck Podcast. If you search them, some of these episodes NBC's taken off the website, but some of them you can find. But it's I call it my what if series, so you can check it off from there. Do one more question,

and then I'll give you a quick little update about my football travels. This next question comes from Cold Tea. Oh. The question is, Hey, Chuck, hopefully you've seen this crazy story. The Des Moines superintendent was arrested by ice, which is crazy enough, but it could also take down a leading Democratic Senate candidate, Jackie Norris, who was chair of the school board. Wild stuff in Iowa. No one seems to

know what is true or not. You just summarized everything I was saying earlier with my top five list and why I didn't put Iowa in that fifth spot because I want to see this story finished playing out. It is wild. If you don't know the story, it does feel it's amazing people that love Look, the superintendent was beloved by any people, and they don't want to believe the facts that apparently are in this case. And that's why I think the the fallout from this could be

more damaging to the Democratic brand. I again, I'm I want to wait. I'm not gonna lie. I want to wait a little bit to just let's get all the facts out. Let's see what everything looks like. Is he is everything that's been said true that he you know about a weapon in his car, cash, et cetera. He was the second superintendent job. I mean, it's sort of like does anybody do any vetting anywhere in this country on this front? So there's a there's a more information

I want to know. But I thought Cole you summarized it well. Have you seen this crazy story? You couldn't have made up a story like this right as a plot line. And this is always a reminder when you're whenever I'm trying to write fictional political storyline, for the

various attempts I've done for political fiction, story like this happens, and you're like, how do you manufacture fiction when the truth is so much crazier? All right, I will tell you I was at that crazy Dallas Green Bay game. I think I sort of hinted that I was going to that, which in full sort of toodcast behind the curtain plotting. You know what that meant is that Monday podcast I taped before I left for Dallas on Sunday morning. I went down Sunday, came back Monday, so it was

a quick trip. My son's doing great. Thanks for asking. I know some of you are at least thinking that, so I thought I would pre answer that question. But I'll tell you this. I'll we get to the game and it feels it felt like sixty forty cowboys to Packers fans. There were Packers fans everywhere, and I know some of it is like, oh, you know, we're packers,

so all we're seeing are the other Packers. Fans, But when the teams came out, you felt the cheers and early on, and of course the Packers got a quick start thirteen to nothing, and here they're about to kick the extra point, and you could just feel the Dallas fans were like, oh, this is going exactly as I feared. US Packer fans were as cocky as ever. And then they blocked that extra point and run back for two points and it's instead of fourteen to nothing, it's thirteen

to two. And I just sit there and look at my son. I'm like, what the second week in a row we're getting We get that field goal block with the Browns and then this extra point block, so we just are stewing from here on out. We stopped and joined the game. We're angry at Rich Bisaccia, who's the special teams coach, who a bunch of US Packer fans have been like, get rid of this guy. The special teams is atrocious. It's been atrocious for two years now.

And then every single time on the kickoff, the Packers didn't know the rules. They kept the ball would bounce in the landing zone and they'd take it in the end zone thinking they were getting it at the thirty five, and they did it multiple times, and it comes out to the twenty. All these little hidden yardages, and then there was the bizarre play calling of Lafleur at the end of the first half, end of the regulation, and

at the end of the overtime. This was one of those where so the game ends in a tie and the Dallas fans felt like they won something and all of us Packer fans felt like we lost. This was not one of those where everybody, yeah, and you did. I'm sorry I didn't leave gone. Boy, that was a great game. It was not a great game. The Packers played terribly. The Cowboys. It was really interesting. They were

playing afraid for the first quarter and a half. It was like they did not want Michael Parsons to even get a chance to sack doacks. They didn't even bother to pass the ball, or if they did, it would be like a quick strop and a little dump off. Then they get this two point conversion. Like Schottenheimer, the Dallas coach decided, you know what, there are other plays

in the playbook, why not? And you know the way football is, right, it's like a this this game felt like one of those college games where a highly ranked team is visiting an unranked team and they let the unranked team hang around, and then all of a sudden, the unranked team realize they have a chance to win and they start playing the best game of their lives. George Pickens, who's never consistent when he's on a football field, paid attention and seem to actually participate in the offense

almost one hundred percent of the plays. And guess what, when he's fully paying attention, he's a dangerous threat. The Packers couldn't get a pass rush. They were only you know, the whole key to the Packers is just that doing that four man pass rush, the assumption was they were going to get to Dak and they couldn't get to him. Really until the overtime did they finally seem to fit figure that out. But Schottenheimer out coached Halfley, and we

hadn't seen Halfley out coach. So the Packers are are what are we now? Two to one and one? And it just feels off right, And now you got to ask yourself, was was the Lions game sort of an anomaly where the Packers simply a little bit more ready and the Lions weren't they were still in preseason mode, because all of a sudden, they look like the best team in that division, and the Packers are not playing

like the best team in that division. So what I have to say, I think it's a full indictment on the coaching staff, from Halflee to Lafleor to Bisachia Basacia. This is I don't I admire that Lafleur is very loyal to his coaches, but he kept the defensive coordinator

a season too long. And I think it's painfully obvious with these new special teams rules that nobody on the team seems to know that they probably kept the special teams coach a season too long on this front, And if you follow Packer, you know, for those of you that follow the Packer stuff closely, you know that most Packer fans are raging right now about that more than ever on the college front. Look, it was just a

great game, great weekend of games, and it was great to not have to worry about the Hurricanes to be in that. I will say this, I'm a little bummed that Florida State lost that Uva game on Friday night because what that sets up is a more desperate Florida State team against Miami this Saturday. This is another big test for crystabal rights. There was a couple of coaches that have high ranked teams that have not been able

to win the big game. James Franklin at Penn State, Mario Cristobal, whether it was at Oregon or at Miami. You know, are you going to be able to win? Be able to you know, not lose a dumb game. I think Christa Ball passed one test against Florida when they played not their best game. That's a game they would have lost last year, and they figured out how to win it this year. This is the first road test against a team that's more desperate to win than Miamias.

You know, can we do? We do? We treat it as a business trip and we go up there and just out physical them. There's no reason why they shouldn't. But Florida State's now a bit more desperate. I would have preferred a more hyped up Florida State team thinking that they're going to go nose for nose and would would have had a little bit more attention on that. But it's uh. I'm looking forward to Saturday night in Tallahassee.

But I'm not gonna lie. I wish they had won that Friday game because I think in some ways they're going to be a bit more desperate, which means they're going to be playing whatever that means, right, just slightly slightly with more urgent and see more in time, because Florid State has to win if they want to get there. Because I think one thing we know is true, ten and two ACC teams are not getting into the playoff. We already found that out. Might be found out the

hard way. You're going to have to be eleven and one in the regular season. You can have two losses, but your second loss has to come in in that conference title game. So Florida State has to. If they accumulate their second loss, I think they go down where the only shot they have would be to win the conference a la Clemson last year. So we shall see that's coming up. By the way, I want to share one more totally inane fact and for five of you you'll find this funny or weird, or maybe you think,

why the hell is he sharing this? But I did something that I have never done. I swear in my entire life. I got to the end of a chapstick too. I am one of those people. I never have chapstick when I need it. So you go and you're always buying new ones, always buying new ones, and then you find your old stuff and all this stuff, right, and over time I end up with my little sticks of chapstick.

of my missing pairs of sunglasses as well. So with that piece of inane trivia that I hear that podcasters are supposed to share with their with their listeners and viewers, I'm gonna call it for twenty four hours and we'll see it when we upload again.