Full Episode - Trump’s Most Consequential Scandal Wasn’t Clickable Enough + What Teddy Roosevelt Can Teach Us About Trump’s America

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plus free croyissants for life. Come on when you go to wildgrain dot com slash podcast to start your subscription today. That's thirty dollars off your first box and free croissants for life when you visit wildgrain dot com slash podcast, or simply use the promo code podcast at check out. This is a sponsor I absolutely embrace, so use that code. Hello, They're happy Wednesday and welcome to another episode of the Chuck Podcast. Let me give you a quick little rundown

of what to expect in today's full episode. I will

have an answer to the question that I get more often than any other will the midterms happen? But I want to explain it in such a way that kind of builds off of what we talked about on Monday. I will get to that in a minute. My interview today is with author David S. Brown. He's got a great it's a new ish Teddy Roosevelt book out there.

It's called In the Arena, came out last year. Many of you know, I'm obsessed with the sort of this fifty year period between eighteen eighty and nineteen thirty in America because it really feels like we are, you know, that fifty year period that basically nineteen ninety through where we are today, that we're kind of living a similar time frame. That was a transition from an agrarian economy

to an industrial economy. We had income inequality growing by leaps in back, and the democracy did something about it, and Teddy Roosevelt sort of captured the anxiety of those moments and he became the sort of the lead figure there. But what I also find fascinating about Teddy is is

how often and how much similarities there are, at least to his personality that are similar to Donald Trump. So we get into that, and we get into all things Teddy, both the era, how much the current era we live in and the era of sort of Teddy from you know, nineteen hundred to nineteen twenty. Is you know that we're we're in a moment that feels like we need a you know, who's going to be the Teddy Roosevelt, right, Who's going to be the one that says, you know what,

this is out of hand tech Titans. We've got to rein you in, so we make a So that's the interview. I'll also going to have my top five list, and this one has to do with thought I'm calling Project twenty thirty two for the Democratic Party. I'll just leave that little tease at that, and you'll get an idea of where I'm going to go with my top five list on that, and of course we'll take some questions and go from there. All right, So let's go back

to the to this exercise I want to do, and it wants to I want to build on the story we talked about on Monday, but try to explain why why it's disappearing, and I'm going to lament why it's disappearing because I don't think it should be disappearing, and try to sort of help you discern which one of these alarming stories. How much do you worry about Trump's alarming rhetoric versus his alarming deeds. So look, if you

listen to Monday's episode. You know, I spent a good chunk of time slowing things down, walking through a story that I think is easy to miss in this current information ecosystem. I knew that this didn't have easy visuals to show bells and whistles. But what I really believe is that this is the worst sort of This is the worst corruption scandal we've ever had involving an American president.

It's bigger than teapot doma bigger than Watergate. And I know, because we're so numb to Trump's transactionalism, we just don't see it right. But that's why I wanted to walk through the details very deliberately, because it's incredibly important and it was. Of course, I'm referring to the Wall Street Journal story, the report about how Sovereign Wealth Fund of UAE investments into a crypto company that really wasn't going

anywhere for Trump that suddenly became relevant. It led to a change in America in the United States of America's policy on AI and chips, and of course led to a pardon of a very controversial figure in the crypto world. And all of it happening while Trump was receiving hundreds of millions of dollars in cash Trump and his family. Now, the story didn't have to metic visuals, and it wasn't easy to villainize somebody in a moment. It was a dense it was It's a story that requires some patience

in some ways. As I said, right, you need a you need to either the whiteboard on a beautiful mind or clar Danes and Homeland to sort of see how everything is connected. And I really believe that it was the most important story of the weekend and really something that that should be seen. You know that every congressional

reporter should be asking every member of Congress about it. Right, that type of story to sort of get Congress off its ass and start worrying about whether presidents are following the constitution. But then the rest of the then the

rest of Monday happened. Right, You had the Dan Bongino podcast that the President did where he mused about federalizing elections, which, of course that quick comment coupled with the video footage of the bizarre Telsea Gabbard leven FBI rate of Fulton County in Atlanta with the twenty twenty ballots and boom, Right, you instantly had a bit viral of a feeding frenzy on a specific story. You know, by Tuesday morning, you wake up and it's Kennedy Senator has been Kennedy Center.

He's just canceled it, shutting it down for two years. Again, a shiny metal object story became the lead of the day. And oh, by the way, the government was shut down, so we had to reopen that and all of it,

shoving what is the perhaps the biggest scandal in American history further and further and further down the information ecosystem ladder. And of course, the sudden burst of rhetorical crazy from Trump involving the midterms led to a whole bunch of questions that I regularly get from both listeners, viewers and friends and family starting to panic, you know, is going to is he going to cancel the midterms? And it always leads to this, because how anxious should we all

be right now? And you know you can and I get it right. Are things collapsing? Is this different? Is Trump actually serious this time? What guardrails are left that

could stop him on this? So here's what I want to do. I don't want to hype your anxiety and I don't want to dismiss it either. What I want to try to do is organize it, because one of the biggest mistakes we make in moments like this is confusing volume with importance and mistaking what feels scariest for what's actually doing the most damage. Right. It goes to the original trope with Trump. You know, right, you know which is you know, do you take him literally or

seriously or both? Right? And in this case, what I would say is should you worry about what he's saying or should you worry about what he's doing? Now, of course I would argue the answer is yes to everything. And that's what going to get to. So let's start

with the story that everyone understands. Immediately, Donald Trump goes on a podcast muses again about federalizing elections, which, of course, you know, reminds people of him musing about just I wish I could cancel the midterms, and almost simultaneously, right when you play that, you have your file footage, right, So if you see this on video, you could just show the weird Tulsea Gabbert thing and the striking images out of Georgia of federal agents executing a raid connected

to election materials from twenty twenty. You know, we're at

nearly six years later. We've had multiple elections in Fulton County ever since. I mean, I sort of look at what he's doing is laughable. I think it's silly, but it's also very serious. Right, we know he's desperate to continue to sell this lie that he somehow was illegitimately thrown out of office in twenty twenty. So Trump talks about overriding elections and then all of a sudden, you see federal agents seizing ballots. Right, the great fear that

so many people have. So you don't need a constitutional law degree to fill your stomach drop. That is scary. Rhetoric plus visuals, threat plus spectacle. It's an easy story to tell. It fits in a tweet, it fits in a cairn, and it fits in your nervous system, and it rides the algorithm. Now, let me be very clear, the rhetoric is not harmless. This isn't normal, and it

shouldn't be normalized. Election interference talk is as damaging as election interference itself, and using federal power to intimidate state workers matters a great deal. So I don't want to I'm not trying to minimize what he has said or

what he has done. But here's what I want, I want you to understand, and I want to make this clear because it's essential. What feels existential is not always what's most consequential. So these two events, the rhetoric and the raid, landed together. They functioned together, They were consumed as one narrative event. It almost doesn't matter which technically came first, right, the raid itself or is rhetoric To Bongino,

the meaning formed through proximity and imaging. Right, that's how political narratives work now, thanks to these algorithms, thanks to these big tech companies that control the flow of information that you and I get to see. Isn't done through chronology or nuanced but through what shows up next on your screen. And that's why this story dominates. It feels like democracy itself is on the line, and it animates

a lot of people. But feeling existential isn't the same thing as actually being the thing that does the most lasting damage. Now, let me talk about the Kennedy Center here.

First glance Trump's move to effectively just shut down the Kennedy Center unilaterally under the guise of renovations. I see why some see it as cultural authoritarianism. And symbolically, sure, it's pretty ugly, and if fits a broader pattern of treating institutions as enemies and loyalty tests. But then the context of all this matters, right, and I think it tells us something pretty important about how Trump actually operates. So why did he shut this down? This wasn't a

first strike, This was a reaction. He was being humiliated right. Artists were pulling out, performers were canceling, events were unraveling quietly but visibly. The reputational damage was happening big time for Trump. Right the minute Trump touched the Kennedy Center got involved. Everybody wanted out. The opera wanted out. People, every classical, anybody with any level of integrity wanted in. The art community wanted out. And it was humiliating the

Kennedy Center. It was humiliating Trump. Right. So Trump wasn't dominating the story. He was losing control of it. So what does he do? This is a classic Trump. He flips the script. Instead of having to deal with they're rejecting me, which is what they are doing, it becomes I shut it down and instead of absorbing a thousand small acts of descent, he creates one big spectacle. Instead of reputational damage accumulating quietly, he centralizes the conflict and

reframes it as Trump versus the culture. Right, it's just simple spin. Right, And notice what happens when he does that, right? The story becomes about Trump's power, Trump's move, Trump's dominance. Can he do it? Is it legal? The stories of the cancelations fade, the accountability dissipates, and the noise replaces the consequence. This matters because it's the same dynamic we're seeing everywhere else, which brings me back to Monday. Right.

While George and the Kennedy Center sucked all the oxygen out of the room early part of this week, the story I walked through earlier in the week is already fading. And that should worry us more because that story, the fact that Donald Trump has turned America into a kleptocracy

for his personal enrichment, that's the story that ought to be alarming everybody, because he's already doing it, and he's already done it. He has taken these payments, he has enriched himself. This isn't he might he's thinking about he's doing. This is stuff he's done, okay, Foreign sovereign wealth flowing into Trump linked enterprises, policy decisions especially around AI chips and crypto, suddenly aligning with the private financial financial upside, pardons, permissions,

and access, all moving in parallel. And as I said, the journal never says it was a quid pro quo. But all you have to do is look right. The modern corruption doesn't look like a brown paper bag anymore. It looks like timing, proximity and mutual benefit. Each step defensible on its own and technically legal in some sort

of byzantine way of looking at it, but it is damning when taken together. And it is illegal when you realize it's being done by the President of the United States, and violation of the Constitution. And here's the moment that really sort of crystallized all this for me. So on Tuesday morning, I was scanning my usual mountain of newsletters right by us. You know, lots of good ones out there, lots of mediocre ones, but I read a lot of them good faith actors, smart people, outlets that are deeply

focused on democratic norms. And the foreign policy story was gone from a couple of them that I was shocked to see it gone from. But the election rhetoric that was everywhere, the midterm anxiety that was dominant. I mean,

my friend Bill Crystal, who does the Morning Shots newsletter for The Bulwark on Tuesday, not a single mention of this Wall Street Journal story anymore. Look, they did a lot on Monday, but they were obsessed with the midterm issue with playbook. Had nothing on that had a slew

on the midterm issue. We all know how how this stuff right, Some stuff travels more, some stuff rides the algorithm right, And the way the independent media landscape works, a lot of editorial folks examine what's getting attention what isn't, and they may lean more heavily on the stories that are getting more traction, even if there are other stories that are arguably more important. And I'm not calling it.

I don't think that's bad faith. I don't think it's corruption. But it is sort of how our information ecosystem is kind of doing exactly what it's designed to do. It rewards stories that are visually immediate and emotionally legible, and quietly pushes aside stories that are technical, slow and complicated. It and might not be as gripping to as large enough of an audience. And that's exactly why the story of the of the creation of the American leptocracy is

much more dangerous. So it brings me back to the anxiety question and something I want to be very clear about. As alarmed as we all are by some of Trump's rhetoric and by the sense that there are no guardrails left, the truth is a bit more complicated because what's interesting is every time we lament this idea that there are no guardrails, you start to see that some of them do work, not all of them, not consistently, but some

of them some of the time. And it's interesting for us to realize when they do work and when they don't work. And understanding which ones work and why is the difference, I think, between whether you should panic and whether you should view it as some sort of strategy. So let me give you two examples. First, there's Minneapolis

after the killing of two Americans, and let's just say it took two American deaths for Trump to do this. Trump did something almost never does rhetorically. He back down, He sat down Senate Democrats, he negotiated, he accepted the premise that they were going to shut down the government if he didn't negotiate constraints on ice, and he said, okay, right, here's a guy that his critics consistently say, you know, doesn't listen to anything, there's no and he did on

this one. So why was it because of norms? No, we know he doesn't care about norms. Was it because someone made a better constitutional argument to him? Sorry? Or was it because the political costs suddenly became undeniable even for Trump? Right? Public opinion has shifted dramatically on this issue. Republicans got nervous. The backlash wasn't abstract anymore, and it wasn't just coming from Democrats that owned the Libs. It was measurable. And Trump does respond to measurable pain, at

least political pain in Poland look at the Fed. We heard all the noise, the threats, the posturing, and then the choice came down to picked Kevin Walsh, a conventional, even market reassuring pick. He didn't pick a sickaphan, a guy like Kevin Hassett, who might have been somebody who would have just yes, you know, been a yes man for whatever Trump wanted on interest rates. So why did

he do that? Well, one guardrail. He does seem to care about our markets, right, and he cares about what some donors think, his donors, and he certainly cares about

what the elites that he interacts with think. So the guardrail wasn't the idea of FED independence. It was the risk of immediate, tangible financial consequences for him and his friends. So it's an interesting pattern that you've watched over. It's like, every once in a while he responds to a guardrail, but it's never that for the reason you want him to respond to a guardrail. It's for usually some sort

of personal cost and personal nervousness. So it does seem as if Trump accepts push back when when three conditions

are met. First, the cost is immediate, it's not theoretical, it's not long term, it's immediate. Second, the backlash is something he sees poll numbers, market drops, donor anger, maybe even a ratings issue. Right, It's not an editorial, it's not a whole bunch of statements, right. And if the pressure is across the board, right, lots of people and lots of different parts of his life going hey, are you sure about this? Are you sure? About this. Are you sure about this? Right? It was. It's why he

seemed to back down a bit on Minneapolis. And I know some of you are going to say he hasn't back down that much, But for Trump, he's back down. Right what happened? You had Republicans saying, oh whoa, well

this went too far. The same with the FED. But all those reasons are also explained why it's so hard for the foreign policy monitoration story to get legs. Because it fails those three tests, the costs are delayed. We won't see the impact of selling out American form policy, creating loopholes for China to catch up. We won't know this until after it's too late. The consequences are on a spreadsheet, and none of us like to read spreadsheets.

And of course the backlash is a bit fragmented. There's no market crash, there's no single dramatic moment, there's no image on cable news. Just a slow monetization of power.

And we see it almost every week when he signs, when he releases the list of people he's pardoned, and you start to go through it and you realize most of them were represented by friends of Trump, and he just was monetizing, helping them win fees from these rich crooks. And it also explains why I'm less worried about Trump's election rhetoric than I am about what he's doing in the form. Elections in the United States are decentralized by design.

States run them, counties administer them. The diffusion isn't a weakness. It's actually a firewall. Right. Trump doesn't control it. Republicans quietly know he can't override it without detonating their own power. They can't do it. They'd have to pass Acts of Congress. There's so many different ways in order to make this happen. It's for it to happen, the Republican Republic would essentially

have to collapse. We'd have to suspend the Constitution, and we're not. And he doesn't have that kind of power. And now, ironically, I think politically, every time Trump muses about interfering with elections, he doesn't suppress turnout, which I know is of fear some people have. He fuels it.

He energizes opposition voters, he repels swing voters who just want to get rid of the chaos, and he deepened cynicism among his own bank so if you were trying to design the dumbest possible strategy heading into the midterm election, you'd be hard pressed to beat the one Trump is doing right now, talk about if you're on the Democratic side of the isle, you should want him talking about this.

All it does is make it saved you money on get out the vote. Donald Trump is going to get your base out to vote, and then he's sending a message that he thinks the whole thing is rigged anyway, and he's sending a message to his own base that, you know, maybe he's sort of winking and nodding, don't worry, I'll rig it, so it doesn't matter.

get it. This Congress has shown no interest in investigating the leader of their own party, so that story is just going to keep going he's going to keep selling foreign policy decisions to the highest bidder. Sometimes he'll do it right out in the open. Sometimes they'll do it quietly. I mean times it feels like Venezuela and the oil is he's just doing it right out in the open.

Most of this he'll do out of view. So the point is this, No, I don't think the country's collapsing tomorrow, and no, I don't think elections are going to get canceled twenty twenty six. But I do think we're watching something more subtle and more corrosive. Democracies don't usually fall from who's they actually erode. They look more like what happened, what's happening in Turkey, what's happening in Hungary. They erode when corruption becomes complicated, normalized, and easier to ignore than

the latest outrage, cultural outrage. You know, bad bunny. You know, pay attention to bad Bunny, but don't pay attention to the selling out of American foreign policy. So what Trump does say threatens democracy symbolically, but what Trump does corrodes it materially, and our information ecosystem, whether it intends to or not, keep steering us towards the loudest, scariest stories, while the most consequential ones fade in the background. That's

the real danger. It's not the panic, it's not the calm. It's miss placed attention and mist placed concern. There used to be a publication out there that once reminded us democracy dies in darkness, but sometimes that darkness is also noisy, and the democracy can die in a lot of distraction and noise. All right, on that uplifting note, let's sneak in a break and when we come back, we're going to talk a little Teddy Roosevelt with David S. Brown.

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getsold dot com promo code toodcast for thirty percent off. Well, you have heard me talk to da that history is rhyming, that there's a familiarity in our recent history early twentieth

century with what the current situation is. We're in a we're in a we've got these big tech titans. We had the big robber barons. And you've probably heard myself another say that, you know, boy, the country really needs a Teddy Roosevelt. And what's fascinating about Teddy Roosevelt is that he's a rorschach Test. If you're a liberal, you love certain parts of him. If you're a conservative, you

love other parts of him. He is somebody. He is like Lincoln in Washington and maybe to a lesser extent, Eisenhower, where it's the rare biography you can write, where there are interested people on the left and the right, and there are people that are devoted to say, no, he's really a progressive. No, he's really a conservative. He's a disruptor, he's this, and Teddy is definitely one of those. And

let's just say I devour every Teddy Roosevelt book. I think I've only read more Lincoln books than Teddy Roosevelt books. He is clearly one of the most fascinating Americans we've ever had. My guest today is David Brown. He's got one of the more recent additions in the Teddy Roosevelt Library, if you will, is called in the arena, which of course is a homage to his man in the Arena

speech back in the day. And this is a it is it is not just the Teddy of the Roosevelt presidency or the Roosevelt this it really is as much an attempt to capture the zeitgeist and the culture that was Teddy, that inspired Teddy, and the culture that he helped try to create and build. So that's my intro. David hod I do mysell in your book pretty well?

just because it's an incredible life. Yeah, really an incredible life, but that life it tells us so much about America. And I think what I think, what an a story and can bring to it, you know, five years from now, twenty five years from now is the perspective of the culture. And so as you note, you know, there's something of the times in this book. You know, it's a life, but it's also at times and historians also bring, you know,

additional perspective. They've seen additional presidents, they've seen people use and the used roseults reputation. We might read Roosevelt's actions differently in say nineteen fifty or twenty twenty five, then we would have in nineteen ten in the moment. So in that sense, I think that there's almost always something, something fresh, something interesting perspective that the storying can bring to a topic.

or avoid other takes on him? What was your balance? Yeah?

you decide you wanted to tackle Teddy?

And also I think writing that biography of Henry Adams, it drew me to the late nineteenth century. So I was starting my graduate work. I tend to focus on America in the early Republic seventeen nineties, eighteen twenty, eighteen thirties, and there was a lot there in the late nineteenth century. Early wasn't aware of cultural history, intellectual history. So I do Henry Adams. I'm thinking there's a lot there about intellectual life at that time. Now I'm interested in the politics,

so i'd obviously read something. You know, some things about Roosevelt before, but never systematic, never in depth, And so I started to read just my own curiosity and the deeper I got into it, the more I said to myself, you know what I really want to write on this guy. I want to write a biography. So it was deep in COVID back in twenty twenty, and that's when I started the project.

to be compared favorably to said president. Right, And I have, I've been having an uncomfortable intellectual exercise which that I've and i'm and I'm gonna I'm this is with trepidation that I and that I tiptoe on this, which is Donald Trump and Teddy Roosevelt and the shocking amount of similarities that there are. There are some important differences, and

if you're a fan of Teddy and not a fan of Trump, you probably recoil at this. But you know, there's there's there is something about Teddy in the time that he served of narcissism, right, I mean the original great quote the bride at every wedding, and the and the corpse at every funeral was about him, right, you know it was it was said of him by his daughter. Right. What do you make of it? And how much? How much do you see of it? And how did you avoid it? How did you write about it?

a threat. He was never supposed to be presidents. He was a war hero, and they made him a veep, and of course McKinley wasn't supposed to get shot and killed. But then Rosald becomes presidents and he's so popular that they can't do anything with him until Roosevelt decides that he's going to leave after a couple of terms and then once the crown back, and at that time, for GOP regulars, this sort of gave currency to their concerns for the last few years that Roosevelt was a maverick,

he was a loose cannon. He could not be trusted for party regularity, and they opposed him, and they were able to essentially keep them from getting the nomination in nineteen twelve, and in Roosevelt said that this was stolen, that the people wanted him, and of course he then broke away from the party, which is said that Trump had talked about doing in twenty sixty if the GOP at that time had kept the nomination from him.

more votes and delegates in these thirteen primaries? Right the sitting president did. And there's a number of reasons why these these these these primaries would expand, but one was that it was seen that that perhaps that people need to have more say and we would look back to, for example, nineteen twelve and say so, clearly the party wanted Taft to get the nomination, but clearly most garden variety Republican voters wanted Roosevelt.

love to see right now where billionaires go right, new billionaires support Trump. Inherited billionaires support the left right now. It's just an interesting era that we're in.

the country becoming soft and not sharp any longer. So he did feel I think, when he called, for example, JP Morgan into the White House, that there was a sense of superiority on his side in reading, in culture and background. And if Morgan had a bit more money, which of course he did, that was okay because Roosevelt had had some money too. But more important, I think I think Roosevelt thought that he Roosevelt understood how money should be used, and people like this new rich They

liked imagination. They didn't know what was best for the country. They only understood what was best for themselves.

to John Hey, the Secretary of State, after he Roosevelt had toured the country, and he said, you know, seeing these these common people out there who were standing in you know, by a train stession for two hours in the wintertime, you know, waiting to and we talk. Uh, they're so sincere. There's so they're such hard workers. You know, we we we need to we need to do right by these people. He did believe that, he did believe that he that the presidency, that the government had a

responsibility the people. So there was something also, I think

a little bit of old money about that, the sense of paternalism where they're they're social work economic betters so called, and we need to take care of them. That's our obligation. Also though when when he's thinking about obtaining the trusts. But I think I think there's something about Roosevelt that is vaguely consulted, that that these that these titans, that they should have so much just because they invented something or they have a factory, and why should they have

so much say in our politics? Why should why should they be able to put politicians in their pockets through through through lobbying. So I think he sincerely saw them something of a potential thread to the Republic in a different way, but not unlike say Jefferson with the First National Bank and Jackson with the Second National Bank, looking at money congealing together and saying, if this continues, this could be a real problem for the Republic moving forward.

want to harness AI. He would he would want to use it to make you know, as America as powerful as possible. That would also tie him with the second part of your question, because so these people who have this this this this resource, some of the billionaires, I suspect that he would look upon them not unlike he looked upon the rich class of his own day, which is they have a purpose. The purpose is to continue to be patriotic and contribute to the growing wealth of America.

And they could have their nice houses and and and and and whatnot. But but I think he would draw a real line at the kind of influence that these people would have. So I wouldn't see him inviting billionaires to be in his official cabinet family.

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life insurance is something you should really think about it, especially if you've got a growing family. This is where you know, when you look deeper at rule Roosevelt's sort of point of view and actions in the Western hemisphere, the actually pale in comparisons to Trump's beltic.

into the Union. Then we become a golf golf of Mexico, golf of America, depends on who you talk to these days. That becomes the focus of our foreign policy, and then American it becomes this beginning of a global power in the late nineteenth century with with with the acquisition Philippines

and whatnot. So the Central in South America had always been sort of an abstraction. There was the Mono doctrine, but America didn't really have much power to police that. There were there were there were various individual filibuster attempts by American citizens with armies and whatnot private, although some were sort of okay by congressman senators to cut out parts of Central and South America. It's really not until about nineteen hundred. It's all through the nineteenth century.

wanted to I mean, it was interesting you used a phrase. I think he viewed it as a police you know, he wanted to police the governments in the Western hemisphere, you know, know what was going on, right, And it was almost the first use of the idea that we're going to be the global police force. Yeah, you know.

but it's with the different Roosevelt. And so certainly you know Roosevelt have been the top cop in New York when he was a commissioner, and he took policing very seriously. He applies the concept not just to you know, a city or a state, but to an entire country. If countries will not live up to the obligations, he said,

the name must be they must be policed. Of course, what we know is happening here also is that there's there's a game that's being played by European countries as well, which is to get some of these Latin American countries into debt and then it would be made to pay by for example, leasing a ports, we're opening up markets. And Roosevelt was very very quick to ensure that, for example Great Britain and in Germany, we're not going to

be effective doing that, violating the minour doctrine. But it was also tactic, as you suggested, that he from time to time employed as well.

a service. But Rosewock came in at the low end, and he was questioned about this some of his friends, and he said, you know, either either I'm going to be part of the willing class or I'm not, and

I aim to be part of the ruling class. In other words, the ruling class had been losing its share ever since whenever eighteen under eighteen twenty, eighteen thirty, the Patricius right, and so Roosevelt is going to, in effect try to reassert that no bless oblige. So in democratic age, well you've got to get involved. He gets involved, but he was not he was not a great party man.

There's a maverick. There was a lot of talk in eighteen eighty four about the Republican Party's presidential candidate, James G. Blaine, as someone had the continental liar from the state of Maine, very controversial, reputed to be the dirty politician, had taken bribes, and so Roosevelt fought very hard as a young man to try to stop that nomination, and of course he couldn't at that time, but there was a real question would you stay with the party or would you bolt?

And Rooselt understood that if you bolt it, if he was not regular, then he would have really no chance. There was no way he was going to become a Democrat at that time. The Democrat Party in the North was associated with the immigrants, with Irish, in the South was associated with secession. And so he swallowed real hard and he became a regular politician in eighteen eighty four, and he gave campaign speeches on behalf of Blaine. But that was of the moment that was opportunistic, and he

was always free. He thought to go his own way, and sometimes he did.

Jennings Bryan.

sometimes Rooselt's progressive and sometimes he's a conservative. He was earing a conservative on Brian, who he thought was just you know, this kind of you know, was going to make the French Revolution happen in America, was going to attack the money supply, and and representing a group, you know, American farmers who Roosevelt respected but did not really take seriously as as being a part of part of the ruling class. They had their place, they should vote, and

they should have like like Roosevelt. I wonder if Roosevelt. Also, you know, we think of Roosevelt being so young, the youngest American president, Brian was actually just a little bit younger. He was the boy orator. I always wondering if there was a part of Roosevelt it was vaguely jealous that Roosevelt didn't have a great speaking voice, could get a good speech, great speaking voice, and here's Brian, just wonderful. He would have been on radio time or television and

really give a speech. If we know, blind's because this cross of gold speech you gave. There wasn't a little bit of jealousy that here was this younger man who had these qualities that he aspired to have himself.

And you just brought up something that I think is you know, one of the things I like to say is you know about certain people that run for president in the modern era, boy, they'd have made a great nineteenth century president, meaning when you didn't need this sort of public oratory or the public charisma, And here's Teddy Roosevelt thought of it as this incredibly charismatic president, larger than life figure. Would he have been a nobody in the TV? The TV era?

maybe look like, I don't know, Douglas MacArthur, you know, with.

It's also possible that because people who went to see him live they said, wow, you know, there's.

the strong legislative branch. You know, the last time there was big fights like that was you had to go back to Andrew Jackson, and you were sort of painting a picture that Roosevelt in many ways was, you know, sort of certainly in the twentieth century, and now in hindsight, looks like he laid the groundwork for a strong the strong executive that we're now used to today. And in many ways he epitomized this.

imperial power. And that means that how the presidency is also going to increase. There's more resources, there's a bigger military, there's more money available, and this can give someone who's interested and not necessarily expand the part of the presidency just to do it or to challenge the constitution, but to project, say his vision about what America should look like, or the fruition of America. If you don't have a real strong congress or court system, then with those advantages,

that president can really push things. And it doesn't come just with the times. The individual is also important, because we don't talk about McKinley that way. We don't talk about William Howard Taff that way, and if talk about Wilson that way. Wilson came from a southern state troits tradition. What allows Wilson to and somebody's expand the power of the presidency. Not unlike Lincoln, he was involved in a great war.

he didn't have a moment where he could have made history right. You know, there's always the debate, right, do the men make the history or just the history make the men right? Type of thing. And you write something similar about Woodrow Wilson and Teddy Roosevelt that there was a jealousy of sorts that Wilson, you know that he didn't get a chance to lead. But here's the thing, Like he ran for president in nineteen twelve. You know he could get elected in nineteen twelve and in theory

have been president during World War one. Give you know, I'm a big fan of alternative histories. That's a that's a sliding door. That's not unrealistic. Teddy Roosevelt as president at the start of the Great War, there's a America get in sooner or later? Or is it just different rhetoric but same same basic result.

in late nineteen fourteen, whereas the Wilson administration waited until hunting right and I think unless the Germans had sort of pulled back on unrestricted some warfare, I mean they did, but then by nineteen seventeen they they put it back in play. I think Roosevelt I could see a Roosevelt administration going to war in nineteen fifteen unless the German government recognized this guy's real serious, this guy will do it,

and then completely, you know, leave the Americans alone. And then I wonder in that context if Roosevelt would have found ways too, For example, aid the Allies even at the United States wasn't part of the Daly cause of course you could do so saying we're neutral country and we can trade with who we want to. In that sense, it would not have been much different than what occurred under Wilson's presidency, which is that billions went to the

Allies and millions went to the Germans. But I think we would have been in the war earlier.

the world stage, and if he had been in power, one could easily imagine that he would have made some proposal for this great, huge crusade which is world peace. Well, actually, you know, that's sort of what Wilson was asking for the war to end all wars. One can imagine Roosevelt's

sort of adopting like rhetoric and the like mission. I can't remember who it was, but the research one of contemporaries said the other thing that really bothered Roosevelt was that Wilson was doing things that that Rooselt would have loved to have done, including including, uh, go to Congress and and give the you know, the State the Union Address,

which which was just like habitually just sort of like delivered this this this big long paper. And now here's Wilson going to Congress and delivering it. And of course, you know from now once a year that's what we do. We sit around our TVs and whatnot, and we've watched rallies depending on this, and I think, uh not unlike Roosealt's relationship to Brian, there was a little bit of jealousy in Roosevelt's reaction, it seems criticism to Wilson.

the moment, people didn't realize it, right. I always say that about the moment we're living in. Like, you know, we think every election is this permanent you know picture of a coalition. I mean I watched these people going the Trump coalition. It's like, Okay, on one day, Trump had these voters and there's a whole bunch of people that literally the next day might not have voted that way. Like a This is a more fluid situation than we

give it credit for. But as you went through and writing this book, you know, how much did it echo with the current era? In your mind as you were writing.

We were just entering a phase where we're going to become an imperial power, which seems to contradict our history, right. I mean, the United States was born in a great anti colonial rebellion. We identified ourselves as the world's leader against colonization. And now with the war against Spain. You know, there's Hawaii, there's the Philippines.

best people. So the American identity is undergoing a great change. Some people would argue of last twenty five years or so from policy AI dot com billionaires, the American identity is undergoing a great change, and so in times of uncertainty, one might rebel against the existing structure. In nineteen you know, term the century. It wasn't that that people dumped the Republican Party, but in a sense and latched under Roosevelt.

They latched onto a maverick within the party who was never within the good graces of the party's old guard. One could say that Trump is a transactional Republican and was quite willing to go his own way. So he said that maybe in twenty sixteen and run a third party candidcy, which is what Roosevelt did, And so the party sort of, you know, went with him whenever he was in power. And when Roosevelt was in power, the

old guard went with him too. But when Roosevelt left, they quickly moved on to Taft.

to look quite a bit different. Maybe so perhaps, But another hand, you have to win elections, and so what are the voters pushing for? What are the voters demanding? And in nineteen twenties, you know, even though farmers had are difficult, there was a booming stock market, the standard living kept increasing, and so they were Republicans who might, you know, in their library have a couple of books by Roselant, say Roosevelt's Great, Roosevelt's My Hero, and I'm

supporting the results because I'm voting for Republicans. But really they might be supporting a Republican party that was antithetical to Roosevelt. They can't necessarily see the difference because it's party labels. They're voting the pocketbook. They feel good.

future of how the things that been happening the last year. So I'll jacked in play out this year we have elections and in you know, three years and moving forward. So wow, it's a steal. It's a hard question.

I'm an incrementalist, and that I'm a believer that ultimately, like you know, we have you know, whenever we incrementally move, it's on solid footing. It takes you know, and it's incremental, right. SOID security is the best example of incrementalism that over time takes root and then it becomes something something more permanent.

To many people. When you view the center of American politics, do you view it in terms of the middle ground between left and right or do you view it more in terms of how I describe, which is it's not whether I have some views. I'm very progressive, some views I'm very conservative, but ultimately I come down as an incrementalist. Some might call that a pragmatist. However you want to

view it, What do you view as the center of American politics? Is it ideological or is it really more about how you practice politics?

Jefferson and Madison. For parties to be successful, they have to attract coalitions and people, and so that's where I think of moderate, That's where I think of connecting with voters. And if you're too far on the right, I think if you're too far on the left, you're not gonna be able to do that effectively. You'll have your hardcore, you know, enough to lose elections respectively. But that's not

the name of the game. And so, you know, when I think of the two major parties and I look at some of the rhetoric, I can usually find some appeal at a center, and sometimes it's a big appeal, and sometimes maybe not. For example, it's not such a big appeal. And when I don't see the appeal to the center, that gives them suggestion that that party may not be very successful in the next selection.

plus one. And this is generically you know, in certain places it's blue or and you can you can do this, but the Democrats need more of these moderates to get to fifty percent plus one. By the way, this was reversed right when you and I were growing up in the sixty seventies and eighties. You could argue it the other way. The Republicans right where they considered more of the centrist party, well they didn't. They had a smaller base.

The Democrats had the larger base, so the Democrats didn't have to you know, it always I always was trying to tell the student, Look, it's just a numbers game. You know. Parties aren't centrists because they want to be Parties reach out to the center out of necessity, right, not out of so in looking at that, there's clearly

a vacuum, right, there is a We always say there's this vast middle of America, and some of us want to believe it's between the thirty yard Lindes. Is it is that correct? Or how should we describe the vast moderate center of the American electorate?

vote for you. And so I I, you know, I look at the hardcore voters on both sides, and what always interests me though, is that who's available, who is in play, And it seems to me that that's that's who you need to go after. That that, to me, that's that's the art of politics, which is which is building coalitions, big tents. And you obviously have to do this because if you if you're in a country our size and you only have two major parties, well.

represent everything I believe. That if we had, you know, if we had more parties and no majority and no party had to get a majority to get power, but you had to form a coalition. I mean, in some ways, I always say both parties are coalitions, are not parties,

They're coalitions of multiple sub parties. Right, there's a there's a Christian Conservative Party, there's a business party, right all on the right, there's a progressive you know, you could put together your for pieces of each you know, basically

multiple political parties within this umbrella group called the left and the right. You know, look, I will I will admit, well, I don't want us to be a parliamentary system. I do wish we had a system that allowed for parties to be more representative of where people wanted to be. But you but you had sort of top four, right, we had four major were really I think we're really four major political parties stuffed into two.

try to gain things all the time. So if I could do in one more result reference and this guy really was a romantic and he wasn't thinking about, you know, sort of electoral votes, and he wasn't counting. He was really leading from his heart. And maybe this is romantic thing to say, but I think if we had more of that, I think voters would really resonate to someone who they thought was speaking directly to them, was mostly sincere and believed that we all had something in stake together.

It wasn't just reading spreadsheets.

Then that's changed, I would argain in the last twenty years, we've gotten the proper what I think is a proper amount of historians tackling him in different ways, which feel there's some people that are overwritten about, like Kennedy, and I say this with no disrespect, they just you know, I get, I get why what what does it? Because of the circumstances of his death. But I'm curious because I still actually think there are more things to learn about Teddy. So I'm not saying this to say, hey,

we've written. You know, we've had too much on Teddy. I don't agree. I think not enough sometimes still there. But who's somebody that he thinks a bit under represented in your ranks of the historians? Now you like to see tackled?

we're not we're not republicans. We're just all in this together, which which looks so antiquated by that time, it's just blown out the waters in eighteen twenties. But I'm interested in the intellectual history that's there, his readings of you know, I Thinkian democracy and the Roman Republic, and you know, he was the last chief executive to essentially run you know, all by himself. There was there was no one opposed him.

So there really was that moment of what do you call it moderation or the center or consensus that we could we could, we could as a country say, yeah, you know, we're essentially behind this person. It doesn't last.

FDR is pretty close to achieving that status. Eisenhower, I think has that status. But there's not many presidents that have that status.

my top five lists this week, I'm going to the Census and a little bit of a riff as there's some new census updates went around and there there was a new round of panic among Democrats and liberals about how the electoral college map in twenty thirty two after the twenty thirty census is going to become a disaster for the Democrats because the power shift essentially, you know,

the Democrats. You know, had Kamala Harris simply carried Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan in addition all the other states she carried, she'd have been right at two hundred and seventy By twenty thirty two, the same configuration of states would have only gotten heard to two hundred and fifty nine electoral votes. So basically Democrats in the next census are going to lose a dozen base electoral votes, which means the Republican floor is going to go up about a dozen votes.

Just to give you some technical numbers, Essentially, you've got Republican states Florida, Texas, Idaho, Utah that collectively are going to net anywhere from say ten to twelve congressional districts, which means electoral votes. And then you will have a bunch of losses in the blue based states. Right, California in your collectively are going to lose eight to nine. Throw in Illinois's going to lose another two, and then you're going to lose one each from Oregon and Minnesota.

Never mind some of the swing states that you're going to see someromp shifts in right, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin each lose one, but North Carolina, Arizona, and Georgia will each gain one. So in that sense, the swing states, the numbers are going to be the same, but it is going to mean that the Blue wall is not going to be the important thing. It's the Sunbelt purple wall

that's going to matter more. Of Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona are going to be at least as important, if not more important than the trio of Pennsylvania, Wisconsin in Michigan. But that's just if you're sitting there, assuming the map is what it is. Right, Political parties are supposed to be dynamic organizations, and they, based on investments, can can try to take a base state from the other party and turn it into a swing state. Take a swing

state and try to turn it into a base state. Right. Virginia and Colorado Democrats successfully took what were swing states and turn them into base states. Arguably, Republicans Florida and Ohio took what was swing states and turned them into base states. Right, So political parties, right, you've got right. Now, Republicans would love to take a swing state like Minnesota and see or a lean blue state like Minnesota and see if they can turn it into a swing state.

Democrats have been amusing about the idea of taking Texas and making it a swing state. But now the project is more acute than ever for the Democrats. Now, look, I'm going to make one tangent real quick because those of you that read me closely and listen to me closely, No,

I'm obsessed that the easiest way to fix this electoral You know that one of the ways we need to fix the electoral college unfairness is to not have a constitutional amendment but simply expand the House to the size that the founders and tended it to be. Right, it is no longer a representative democracy we have now. We now have every congressional districts the size of a major

city with about eight hundred thousand. They're too big. They don't they are not representative of communities of interest anymore. They're simply dominated by the most powerful faction within each of these congressional districts, and so they're not doing what the founders intended. The House of Representatives was supposed to expand with the population of the country, and they did this every decade until nineteen twenty when there was a dispute between the two parties, and then they locked it

in at four hundred and thirty five. That is now why you feel like you live in a congressional district likely where you feel like your a member of Congress doesn't really represent the district. They either represent to liberal part of the district over they sort of overrepresent the liberal part or overrepresent the conservative part. But it doesn't feel like anybody represents right the district as a whole.

So I want to set that tangent aside. So if you're the DNC and you have leadership that is thinking beyond tomorrow, and I don't know if that's the case, I say it. I'm not trying to be snarky, but

you know, leaders of political parties are like general managers for sports teams. The fan base expects immediate results. They are not interested in you building a foundation that pays dividends in eight years, because that general manager won't even be there in eight years, just like that political party leader won't be there in eight years. So it is the incentive structures are messed up. But that doesn't mean there aren't other outside entities that should be thinking about

the following, which is, if the Democrats are suddenly have an electoral college majority problem, then they need to design what I call a Project twenty to thirty two and decide they've got to put eight to ten They've got to invest in eight to ten states, and about half of them are swing states that they've got to attempt to make more reliably blue and or red states that

they can put into the competitive category. They have got to expand the map even though it doesn't look obvious that they can expand the map, so that long wind up is designed. So if project with twenty thirty two's presidential election in mind, with the new map that we'll have,

then I give you the top five list of states that the Democrats should be targeting now in an effort to keep them competitive on in the electoral college going forward, top top top, because the political power that California and New York, that sort of floor of support at times made it seem like the electoral college, and this is something that always is cyclical. At times it looks like there's an advantage to the Democrats, at times looks like

there's advantage to Republicans. Really it usually is who's winning the middle more often, right is and who's got the larger base, And right now Republicans have a slightly larger base than the Democrats. So with that in mind, I'm going to give you my top five lists of states that the Democrats have to invest in, either because they

need to try to make that state more reliably competitive, or they need to try to take a state and make it competitive in the first place. So number one on the list is North Carolina. North Carolina by twenty thirty two is likely to be up to seventeen electoral votes. It's arguably should you know, it is trending the way we've seen with Georgia trending. It is younger, it's a bit more diverse, but it hadn't quite tipped yet. Right, But it is one of the highest education to growth

ratios in the state. Right, it's seven percent higher education than some of its neighbors. So you know, here they've they've got Virginia as a light blue state. Georgia is a model here. But North Carolina they have multiple markets. Charlotte, Raleigh, Ashville can serve as anchors there. But the bottom line is they've they've acted while they are while they're competitive in North Carolina, they usually come up short. Right, It's

sort of what Minnesota has been to the Republicans. And yes, Barack Obama carried North Carolina once and in that one year they won a Senate seat, and occasionally they win Senate seats just like Republicans occasionally win statewide. In Minnesota, there seems to be a hard cap of about forty eight percent in most federal elections. DIDO in Minnesota for the Republicans did oh for that in North Carolina. They've

got to change that. And North Carolina has been a state that they you know, it's always like, was on the periphery of targeting in the swing states. Yeah, we're gonna to target North Carolina the same way they would say, yeah, we might target Florida back in twenty twelve and twenty sixteen, and sometimes they didn't. Sometimes they didn't. Now they've got to treat North Carolina the same way they treat Wisconsin

and Michigan. It's got to be that that sort of you know, it's got to be treated on another level. So that's number one North Carolina. In some ways, I don't know if a Democrat's going to get elected president

without carrying North Carolina and Georgia. At the end of the day, you know, when you start to look at this in the way trend's going in the demographic makeup of the Democratic Party versus what we're seeing in the Republican Party aging in smaller populations, I suspect over time, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin's going to start drifting right, which means Democrats have to figure out how to turn Georgia, Arizona and North Carolina collectively into the new Trio into their You know

that's going to be the new wall, right, It's either a red wall for the Republicans that Democrats can't penetrate, or becomes the building blocks of a Sunbelt blue wall.

But either way, the anchor of it is likely North Carolina number two on that list, I think of targeting is a bit of a reach state, but it's Texas Texas more than Florida right now. It's I think the trend lines in Florida for some demographic reasons with the Latino population. In some ways, I think Hispanics are more gettable for Democrats in Texas than Hispanics are in Florida. They're more swing voter, swingy swing votery in Texas than

they are in South Florida. So I think that when you start to just look at the numbers, they're there. Texas is just getting a lot of new residents and any just like how Florida transitioned in the nineties from being a fairly reliable Republican state to becoming a swing state. First Clinton carried it in ninety six, and then of course it became the single most important state in two thousand thousand and four. That's the sort of reasoning and

rationale why Texas has to be a focal point. And the fact is, rhetorically, the Democrats have talked about Texas for a long time. They've never actually put their money where their mouth is. Maybe this year's Senate race, if it's indeed competitive, if Ken Paxton is the Republican nominee, that jump starts interest in it. But I would argue regardless, they have to treat Texas like a swing state even when it's not, in order to get that state comfortable

supporting a Democrat by twenty thirty two. It's not going to happen overnight. And that's why it's sort of like again I go back, I have. You know, it is hard to get political parties to think more than a luncheon cycle ahead. That's not how the incentives work. But

when thinking this far in advance, that's why Texas arguably is number two, because it's going to be very expensive, and it's going to be and you just got to plot along. Number three on my list is the state that I talk about all the time that it's a head scratcher to me that Democrats really don't focus on it,

and it's Kansas. It is. We've seen this now two different Democrat, two term Democratic governors over the last you know, sixteen of the last twenty four years have had Democratic governors, and they've won due to Republican overreach, but they've also won because you've seen you know, you have a growing you know. Look, the biggest sort of deno way to find out if a state leans will inherently lean red

or blue is you know the number of college grads. Well, Kansas is one that in Kansas and Missouri are kind of going in the opposite directions. You've got the growing suburbs of Kansas City in Kansas that have taken have basically taken what used to be a lean red district and turned it into a lean blue district. Both with Chaitan Tipeaka are growing. You've got two big state schools

in Lauren and in Manhattan, Kansas and Kansas State. And so when you look at the sort of formula that Democrats have used to succeed in places like Wisconsin or Michigan, or let's see smaller states or like Nevada, I could I could argue that Kansas looks more like that. Look there I get the sort of the historical trends of Kansas, but Kansas is not as you know, Yes, there's MAGA in Kansas, but there's sort of this Kansas Republican that is different than the MAGA makeup as well. Where Missouri.

You know, it's funny, Missouri feels more like a southern

state and Kansas feels more like a Midwestern state. And Democrats, I think right now have a better shot, particularly among white voters in the Kansas winning those folks over than they do winning the white voters of number four on the list. Very similar argument to North Carolina. It's Georgia. Georgia is a state that you know, we're going to find out in twenty twenty six just how strong the

Democratic Party is. Is this a state that just is competitive only when they have Rafael Warnock on the ballot, or is this a state that is going to be competitive now no matter what. And asof winning reelection would send one signal, Democrats winning the governor's mansion would send another signal. So I think we're going to learn a lot about just sort of the health of the Democratic brand.

How much is this the marginal success Democrats have had in Georgia been just because of backlaster Trump or is there is this starting to become durable. I think we're going to learn, but no matter what, again, because of

the math issue, right Georgia. When you think about how much money and resources over the decades have gone into Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania, Georgia, North Carolina and number five of my list Arizona, three the they have to become just core states. Arguably now they're as important, if not more important, than the blue Wall of the Midwest. It's going to be a red wall, a purple wall, or a blue sun

butt wall either way. So there's that. So three states that didn't make my list that I think deserve some investment in when you're looking at Project thirty two, Iowa, Indiana, in Florida, I think all of them. It's one of those where you want to get into a position where you're competitive in those states where you have enough because you need some buffers. You can't always have to draw this.

You know the perfect inside straight and you know if you want to expand the map for Senate seats, and you want to expand the map for more governor's mansions, you've got to give yourself buffers and Indiana, Iowa, and Florida, in theory, all have enough combiny of metro areas and suburban populations in some allergies to MAGA policies that collectively, in theory, should give the Democrats opportunity. Now, you know, it's interesting the Democrats in this in what should be

a focal point here Project twenty thirty two. And I'm at some point waiting for there to be an organization that's spun off just called this, right, you know that some big donor decides to fund and just focused on

voter registration programs things like that is when the Democrats decide what the early calendar looks like. And they just over the last week greenlit twelve states that plan to petition to be in the early primary window for presidential politics. If the Democrats are thinking long term, they should be thinking about these four states as this decision as an opportunity to invest in Project twenty thirty two for them how to strengthen their ability to get more a few

more states in play, expand the map. Right, So I wanted to look at their twelve states and see where they overlapped with states that perhaps they need to strengthen

in in order to give keep themselves competitive and a presidential by twenty thirty two. So the twelve states they put in out of the east, it was Delaware, New Hampshire. Out of the midwest, Illinois, Iowa, Michigan. Out of the south, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, and out of the west Nevada and New Mexico. So North Caro and the

top five lists Georgia and North Carolina overlaps. You know, I think on the you know, I've said this before in the early state stuff, the bigger the state, the more ineffective that state can be at being sort of a fair fairness because with the bigger states then rewards those with big money. And both Georgia and North Carolina

are expensive states. So while I think you could argue this would this in theory them as early states, having more Democrats campaign in them all the time could serve to overtime invest them, I don't know if they're the best states to create a level playing field for those candidates with big money and those candidates that don't have

big money at the beginning. That would be the two negatives right, just very expensive states to advertise in, but having them as early states where Democrats are just always traveling to those to Georgia or North Carolina. Certainly, I think that is why Iowa state in the battle round, even though demographically Iowa looks like a state that should be darker red than it is. Iowa. Obviously, I think

this is a way on the smaller state scale. I was disappointed to see that either Kansas didn't apply or there was no interest. I saw that Nebraska didn't do this either. So when you look at it, the only viable small states that applied for the early state window for the Democratic president primaries with Iowa right. The other two in the Midwest or Illinois Michigan again too big, too expensive, will only be there to help the big

name candidates. It doesn't really doesn't really work as a good early test where Iowa you have to campaign in

rural parts of the state in order to win. Versus Ellinois Michigan, you don't have to campaign in the rural parts of the state in order to win. The most interesting state that's on there that's got advanced for consideration to be in the early state window is Tennessee and I want to close with Tennessee because Tennessee is a state that has been a head scratcher to me. Twenty years ago, I thought Tennessee was going to go was going to be a part of Georgia North Carolina. Right.

You always said Florida was the first state in the sun Belt that became competitive, and then the question was, okay, which ones are going to go next? And if you went by sort of socioeconomics, where we were seeing more people move to write Georgia North Carolina on the list, but so is Tennessee and Tennessee is is actually moved become more Republican, not less Republican over the last twenty years.

Is that going to continue? Does the growth of Nashville does that sort of the bigger it grows, the more it becomes sort of Austin meets Las Vegas, which then creates your sort of suburban and you just get more non sort of cultural Southerners in your in your electorate. It's certainly something that I think a lot a lot of US election observers have been waiting to see, and

there's been very little evidence of it. I mean, you know, if this were happening, that Tennessee special in December would have would have seen a flip, while we didn't see a flip. Right, it was a little bit more competitive, but it wasn't necessarily a flip. So, you know, part of it is, you could say the election lines. I do think Democrats have a Memphis problem in the state. Memphis is just it's just it's a city that is not as it's not what it was thirty years ago.

It feels as if and there's this whether it's fair or not, this perception, well, it's a Democrat run city and it's poorly run and et cetera, et cetera. And

Republicans have weaponized sort of Memphis a long time to win elections. It's been sort of something they've done, been sort of a you know, Memphis has been used as sort of a code word for race. But when you look at the elector in Tennessee, you know the I know that if I if I were a strategist over at the DNC, I'd be thinking, you know, yeah, Tennessee's a reach state, but here's the state that that is that's got something in common with Virginia, something in common

with North Carolina. You know, maybe more resources into the state opened some doors here. I found of all the of all the states that made it through in the top twelve, the one that you know, which one of

these is not like the other, It was Tennessee. But I'll tell you if you if you went back thirty years, a lot of US election forecasters would have said Tennessee was one of the states that we expected to start to sort of I think a lot of people saw the South sort of splitting into sort of you know, the South more Cosmopolitans south of quote New South, right, and the sort of old South, deep South, however you

want to describe it. And there was a you know, you had sort of your your Tennessee, your North Carolina, your Georgia, You're Virginia in one area, Florida in one area, and then you're Alabama, your Mississippi, You're Louisiana, South Carolina in another area. So it is mostly broken along those lines, but not totally. In Tennessee has been interesting. I know, my friend Brad Todd has a lot of theories there.

He thinks that that Tennessee Republicans have benefited from a lot of Midwestern refugees, if you will, sort of Midwestern conservatives who have left the higher tax states of Ohio, Illinois, Michigan and have not moved all the way south, but moved to Tennessee, a low income tax state. So he says, one of the ways you notice it is if you go in the suburbs some of these suburban communities in Nashville on a fall Saturday, you don't see Tennessee flex.

He goes, you see a lot of Ohio, State, Michigan, Purdue, Indiana flex. So that's been It's an interesting anecdote. I

think it's one worth processing. But the reality is this Democrats have a major problem on their hands come twenty thirty two, and if they start worrying about it in twenty thirty one, it's going to be too late. So if they're going to launch Project twenty thirty two, now, let me go through it again. The five states. They should be focusing on North Carolina, basically the sun Belt, Purple Wall of North Carolina, Arizona, and Georgia, and then

i'd throw in Texas and Kansas. They've got to expand their map, and then maybe you dabble in Indiana, Iowa, and Florida. And then of course we'll see what they do about Tennessee. But if the party doesn't start thinking

that way, they could get locked out of the presidency for a generation. That's how dire this population shift is from California, New York to Florida and Texas. Ask Chuck,

all right, let's do a little last chuck before we get out of here. I think I'm going to try to do six of them today, so let's keep me honest. Number one. This came from Brian from New England. He says, Hey, it's been about a year since you announced your departure from NBC. Yes, it is feels like it feels like a de but anyway, I imagine you're happy with the move. Was there a moment that made you realize going independent was the right call? Or had you just done everything

you set up to? Two in a broadcast? Any regrets or roles you wish you'd tried, like foreign correspondent or local politics, and any future plans you can tease, maybe a check sports cast. Thanks Brian from New England. Well, there is a fun little sports project I'm working on. I'll have more details soon ish. Partnering with somebody that is probably very familiar to many of you in the sports space. I'm looking forward to it, but it sort

of combines my love for sports in history. So I will throw that out there and leave that out there as a tease for you, but it's something that should be come into fruition in the next four to six weeks. On that front, Look, I have, I have no regrets. Miss I missed the collaboration. I miss some of my friends in colleagues. I ache currently for my longtime friend Savannah got three, who's going through just the worst, the worst experience imaginable.

for that, you know I have. When you go on the regret front, you know, some of my regrets. I I it's not really regrets. It's sort of like, I, uh, I leaned in, I should have jumped into certain to certain things, right. But I honestly, I'm pretty proud of my work. I think it's aging. I think it's aging very well, so in that sense, And frankly, I feel like I got out at the time, just before everybody else was being shoved out because of what's happening with

corporate ownership of media. So in some ways I feel lucky to be in the independent space before it was cool. I feel lucky to get this opportunity to help really talented friends and former colleagues jump into these waters. As I say, it's a big cliff dive, but I promise you there's water there. And you know, I you know, when you look back and realize this moment that we're in with corporate owned media, I don't know. I think I think I was able to maximize everything that was

possible under that situation. And you know, that was as I was talking with an old friend yesterday. Actually we were doing a little catching up and reminiscing and lamenting about what's happening to our friend's mom, And you know, He put it as like, you know, it's so different now that it's it's not even the same thing I worked. I don't recognize this network. I say, it is. No. This not me dissing them. It's just totally different, right,

the separation from the there's no cable channel anymore. They basically, you know, just reimagined. Right, there's a real shrinkage of what NBC News is. And you know, I don't I

know this. I wouldn't be happy under this circumstance, but you know, I wore the jersey, so I still root for him. I root for the individuals there because there's some good people. I'm still there doing some good reporting. I just hope they're given the opportunity to do it all. Right, next one, let's see, He says, Hey, I rarely miss an episode and really appreciate how you approach issues with balance and thoughtfulness. You give me hope multiple times a week.

My wife tells me this all the time. You have to get people help, don't depress them too much. So I appreciate you saying that. I sensed a bit of fatigue in your one twenty six episode, which is understandable given the repetitive nature of our political chaos. Just wanted to say, your perspective is helping thousands of us see the bigger picture and hold on to hope. Keep it up. Well, can I confess your You know, I worried that I let my fatigue show that night. I just was tired.

I'd been traveling and doing all this, So I you know, my goal is to never let you see me tired. Trust me, I always have a cup of coffee going because I don't you know, I appreciate the sentiment, but you shouldn't catch that. But you were correct. You caught me a little tired. Next question comes from Eric R. North Oaks, Minnesota with parentheses. Want to be Canadian Chuck?

First time? Long time? Why isn't there more discussion about the contrast between Trump wanting to send US troops into Iran to protect protesters while abeying protesters in Minneapolis as domestic terrorists. Imagine if Canada crossed our border to defend US protesters, how would MAGA respond? The inconsistency is baffling, Eric, That's a terrific observation. I you know, I want to sit here and say, oh, well, you know this is apples and pairs and you know, no, it's a terrific observation.

I think the second part, what if Canada sent in troops to protect protesters. It's you know, if you recall Tim Wallas was asked about bringing in the National Guard and he seemed to think he was concerned that you know that maybe the military confrontation is is is the pretext that that Trump might be looking for and all that. So it's I, you know, I don't have I don't have a lot to add to your comparison. It is now, can I just say something on Iran? Donald Trump is

playing with America's credibility again, these Iranian protesters. It's just like he is messing with these Venezuelan Venezuelan dissidents. You know what, the Venezuelan dissidents want, the democracy. You know what, Donald Trump is not delivering a democracy. He is keeping right Maduro's number two in power because she is simply trying to buy time and is playing the transactional game. And Trump, as long as he gets what he wants in regards to control and oil, he doesn't care about democracy.

So I do think Donald Trump is telling us something about what he thinks of democracy by what he's not doing in Venezuela. The fact that this is not a priority. Well, if democracy is not a priority when you have an opportunity to make it a priority in another country, it's clearly not a priority for him here. So that's the

unfortunate takeaway. Now, speaking of American credibility with the Iranian hostage of the Iranian protesters, you know, every time we make a promise and don't follow through overseas, a potential terrorist, future terrorist attacking the United States or a US entity only increases. Right, somebody who's fifteen protesting in Iran will see their parent killed and wondering how come the Americans didn't come. They said they would come, but they didn't

follow through. Their word means nothing. The impression that leads each time, right is it is to make a promise and then abandon is in some ways worse than not doing anything. But at least you didn't promise that you would. So look, it's a fair picture you're painting about, you know, the sort of protesters. But I think if we're really trying to understand does he care about democracy or not? I think the actions in Venezuela say it all and

the lack of prioritization of making this a democracy. There is a democratic elected government already ready to go, and the inability to acknowledge that is because for whatever reason, they haven't financially paid whatever price. I guess it needs to be paid to become to get this, to get the support of the United States for what the will

of the people want it. But I also worry about you know, he's used a lot of hot rhetoric with these Iranian protesters, and we can debate whether American firepower should be used to protect these protesters or not. You know, why in Iran but not in me? And mar right why in you know? Picking and choosing when we step

in is always comes with that comes with a lot of problems long term. But making a promise and not keeping it is in some ways the worst possible outcome. Next question comes from Darryl He says, longtime listener and fellow alum of Miami Killian and the University of Miami at class in ninety seven. Hey, what you take on the current state of NILAN college football, specifically Yum's approach to bringing established quarterbacks rather than developing talent from within.

I worry this could push promising recruits like Darien Coleman to transfer and thrive elsewhere. Thanks and keep up the great podcasting, Darryl. You're not the only person worried about this. And I saw that the Hurricane. You know, I'd say the Hurricane fanatics like yourself and myself were pretty divided, right Like I was, I was weirdly not confident that we'd be okay if we didn't get a top notch portal quarterback. But that but that, I'm like, all right,

you know, we'll find a Ken Dorsey. We'll find it Steve Walsh. And what do I mean by that? Both Steve Walsh and Ken Dorsey did get a couple of cups of coffee in the NFL. Ken Dorsey became a coach, really and he's a really good coach. Steve Walsh, I think does some coaching in Minnesota. But neither one. We're sort of highly touted NFL quarterbacks. But they had great offensive lines, they had great running backs and receivers, and they were I don't want to call them game managers,

sounds like a negative. They were better than that. They were cerebral, they understood the offense and all that so I certainly think that the way Miami has built this brother the way Mario wants to build, which is, you get as deep of an offensive line and defensive line as you can, you get as many playmakers as you can, and then you know on receivers, and then you make it where it is hard for an average to above average to a great quarterback to fail no matter what

level they're in. And so as long as we're building these powerful offensive lines, I'm not concerned about this, and I think that this quarterback. I mean, here's the thing. I mean, look at the top, look at all of the top top ten. Let's just go through the top ten programs real quick. Ohio State last year won a national title with a portal quarterback. In the end of this year went to a national lade with a portal quarterback. Notre Dame was in the finals, lost the finals with

a portal quarterback. Miami lost the finals with a portal quarterback. It is it is not you can do both. One could argue Georgia hasn't won a title because they stuck with Gunner Stockton when maybe they should have shopped for a portal quarterback. Is that what happened? To Alabama, right is you see LSU has had some success with portal quarterbacks, Texas has arch Manning. I don't even think that counts right on that front. But I think that, you know,

you're assuming this is in Miami's control. I think until we get some sort of parameters around transfers and how this all works, the quarterbacks themselves are going to keep shopping because the paydays are there. Because you know, there's always one program that thinks they're a quarterback away from relevancy if some form or another, and will overpay. So you're going to get more of these quarterbacks to get out of the portal and go in. And so do

I do? I you know, think, well, my guess is sixty percent of Miami starting quarterback until the system is sort of changed. If this is the system, that a

majority of our starters will be portal quarterbacks. But if there's you know, we'll find out, you know, what happens to how we recruited for we get a major injury, right, you know, there's also unforeseen issues that could pop up that could end up forcing our hand, and we'll find out just how good our high school recruiting has been and our quarterback development has been But I think as long as we're building an offensive line and whether it's making sure we have the best freshman and the best

portal right like that is you know, then I do

think you can plug and play quarterback. It's probably the only position I'm comfortable plugging in playing like that. But I think you can. Next question comes from Heather from Decatur, longtime listener. I'm curious Illinois or Alabama. Heather, long time listener, appreciate the clear, nonpartisan analysis that helps me stay grounded

in two day's political climate. Well, thank you for saying that, Heather, as a Georgia native, I'm curious about your recent confident that's in John Ossoff holding the Senate seat beyond the two flipped PSC races. Do you have other insights? I were those results might be skewed since many Republican areas had fewer races on the ballot compared to Democratic strongholds. Thanks and war Eagle. Obviously it's de cater Alabama. What you take on Auburn's new head coach. I love Auburn's

new head coach, Alex Grolls. I think he's got a great story. I don't know if you know it. I think he was, if I'm not mistaken. He was born in Moscow in nineteen eighty four. Parents brought him over to the United States at the age of seven, became a football crazed, got into it, all that stuff, and he's bringing over a great quarterback and Byron Brown. So I you know, look, I've got Auburn fans in my in my family and two our closest friends, and some

of my closest relatives big Auburn fans. So I'm I'm an Auburn apologist in general. I've become I'm learning to become one. They still didn't deserve a shot at the national title over Miami in nineteen eighty three, Stephen, and I'll just leave it at that. But I'm bullish on him. I uh, you know, I just hope the Auburn powers that be have patience, right, They're so impatience nobody ever

seems to get a chance to build a program. But I think I like that they they're trying this, you know, instead of like trying the searching for Bobby, you know, in the obsessions with Bobby Petrino or throwing cash at Lane Kiffin or doing something like that, right, seeing if they can get a guy from the level below, find their own Urban Meyer, right, who came at the time from the mid majors and then turned you know, came

in and helped make Florida power. So I would I'm I am more bullish on him, and I'd like I'd like to see the South Florida guy do good on that front. Now, as for the other part of your question, John Assoff, what gives me this confidence? It's the weak Republican primary field as well. Right, So you throw a bunch of things. Number one, you know, Asofsun and Coombent has an enormous financial advantage. Number Two, the only can the I would argue, there were two candidates he had

to fear, Brian Camp and Brad Rathensberger. Neither one of them are running. Three, you have the national climate and Georgia clearly being a swing state now seems to move in that direction. I agree with you, I I it is not the margins. It is the result of the PSC races, not necessarily even the margins. That impressed me because you're right, you know, you had you had to turn out differential that was huge. But the fact that you still got those huge margins, says something, but it

mostly goes this is a weak field. I think the strongest candidate will be Derek Dooley, but it looks like the likely opponent's going to be somebody with the first name of Congressman, which I think is an absolute gift because his biggest competitive you know, in theory, being a part of the Washington Swamp is not good. But if

you're a House Republican people, people don't like Congress. I think they hate the House more than the Senate, just generically, right, So I just think you throw all that together, open governor's seat. No Brian camp leading the ticket either, right, his his political machine. Just yes, it's helping Derek Dooley

in that Senate primary. But I think when you throw all that together, and I was, you know, look, I thought as Off was the accidental senator when you know, sort of writing the coattails of Raphaeld Warnock back in during those runoffs. You know, he's got a formidable he's always been formidable on raising money, and he works his you know what, off, he works his as Off Off. I guess it's a to to try to create a Dad humor pun there. So, yeah, that's I think this

is I'm I'm inclined to right now. It's in lean

deed to me. Until you show me proof that one of these Republicans can get the fifty percent plus one right now, I don't see it all right. Final question of the day comes from Colonel Stephen Mitchell, the United States Air Force retired, and he writes this good day check. I really enjoyed your January twenty ninth podcast, especially in

the segment on Trump's pull numbers. It seems he's losing support from voters who backed him for economic reasons, but I'm unsure if the same is true for those focused on the border. Given your polling expertise, what you take and aside from the economy, what do you think will be the top issue on voters minds? Thank you very much. Look,

I think obviously you're gonna have economy one. I think there's the question I have is is there a do we create a bucket called sort of chaos or tumult right, Because ultimately, I think the reason why Trump won in twenty twenty four is because the perceived chaos Biden created at the border. In addition to sourness about the economy, like you need it, you needed sort of both things. I think sourness in the economy, plus you know, is

he intentionally dividing the country with ice? Right, it's not that the it's not that what he did on the borders unpopular. In fact, that's an important distinction, which I which you're I think indicating that you understand about how you know. The danger for Republicans now is that the voters are pretty sophisticated in how they are processing the immigration issue. When you ask them about border security, they're

impressed with the Trump administration. They're mostly approving. When you ask them about immigration, they see that through the prism of ice, not security anymore, and they don't like what they're seeing. So I think the fact that that's been split right where it's an opening if a nimble Democrat knows how to take it, which is look, Biden was terrible on border security. I'm not going to let that

happen again. And I'm glad to see what the Trump administration has done at the border, but what they're doing in our communities across the country is outrageous, etc. Etc. Right. So the point is that I think what it does provide is the Democrats an opening to look like, hey, I'm no Biden on the border, but I'm no Trump

in harassing Americans either. Right, It's a way to differentiate yourself from the Democratic brand on a negative aspect of the border and at the same time being able to differentiate yourself and show empathy and compassionate about what's happening in places like Minneapolis. So that's where I think that there's a real problem now for Republicans on this issue, and why so many of them are starting to whisper loudly that Stephen Miller's a problem, that he is creating

a narrative, creating a perception about Republicans. It's going to be hard to overcome in many of these places. You know, maybe the base is happy, but that is it on this stuff. But when you're asking about other issues, look, I think obviously economy, anything that's you know, So do you consider healthcare and economy issue? I kind of do, right, So I think that's there. If Democrats let me do this,

let me flip the question here. If Democrats have a huge night, it isn't going to be because they only want on the economy. If Democrats have a huge night, it means they got the corruption issue into the mind of the swing voter, that they found a way into it. Maybe they did it via exhaustion, you know, the Trump chaos idea, look what he does at the White House, Kennedy Centers selling foreign policy, like lumping it all in together.

But you know, I think the difference between Democrats having a good night in November and having an incredible night in November is their ability to take these various gross, corruptive, uncomfortable stories and figuring out how to package it as one. Right. COVID helped paint a picture of, you know, all the Trump chaos and it led to this right, and so that's why that messaging was was pretty easy to get him out of there. If you know, it's sort of I'll be curious to see how they do it and

if they can do it. But my point is is that it's one of those if I'm in a coma, If I go in to coma to my and I don't wake up till day after election and you tell me they won six Senate seats and thirty House seats, I'm like, oh wow, the corruption issue must have played

that would be my initial instinct. So I don't know if it's going to play, but I think this is one of those for them to go from good to great, they need to figure out how to get the corruption issue to be easy to digest and something the quote check on Trump, right, the check on his power, you know it is. It is the path for them to get to that messaging. But you need to make the case that he's corrupt and that this corruption is happening in order to do it. And we'll see if they're

able to pull that off. All right, there you go. That does it for me. On a Wednesday, man, I got to this is a political junkies, junkies episode trying to explain this is like the old hotline for me, little media narrative explanation, a little historical comparison with Eddie Roosevelt, a little electoral scoreboard in college strategizing for twenty thirty two, plus this, and somebody's asking me whether you know what

do I miss about NBC at this point? Nothing? This, This is this is the broadcast, the type of broadcast I've always wanted to do. So I appreciate you listening, appreciate your support. I can subscribe, don't forget to use all the codes from our advertisers, and with that, I'll see you in twenty four hours.