What do you think of last night's debate?

And very happy Wednesday to you. At twelve oh seven in the West, it's the John Phillip Show, mister Randy Wings in Culver City.

Well, Johnny, last night we were sitting in the front row as we witnessed the CBS gubernatorial debate, and John had a direct line of sight with Katie Porter.

You can.

So we get to the theater yesterday and I tell Randy, I want to keep a low profile. I don't want any incidents. I don't want any confrontations. I don't want anything that's going to make the news. So let's just show up, sit wherever they put us, and blend in.

So what happens.

We get to the theater, We hand our tickets to the docins, and the docins direct us to the front row, directly in Katie Porter's line of sight.

I couldn't really believe.

It at first, but after we sat there for a moment, they never moved us. I thought, all right, this is where we're gonna be.

Please did not throw her off her game, even if she did recognize who we were, which it's very possible she did not, because this is radio.

Well, she did stare.

Us down for a little bit right when she walked out there, but I think that's also just her natural demeanor, So I don't know if she had specific animosity for us or just men in general. Now, we were in the room last night for all ninety minutes of the debate, and it's my first time ever being in a gubernatorial debate in the room.

Was it your first time, Randy? That was my first time. Okay.

So we've watched them all on television, and you kind of get a certain idea as to what the candidates are like when you see them on the boob tube. But when you see it in person, you get, I don't know, maybe a different view where you see things that you would otherwise not see just watching on television. And a couple of things from last night jump out at me, Randy, First and foremost, in person, tom Steyer looks much older than he does on television.

This was maybe the most jarring thing. And there were a few different people we talked to that all had the same takeaway. Tom Steyer walking out in that suit with the sneakers looks so skinny and sickly, looking almost like a for rare level of sickly.

He looked extremely elderly and extremely frail. And then when you combine in the fact that whenever he talks, his head bobs around like it's a show. Heyo, Tommy bobblehead dull. It made him look nine hundred years old.

And we're sitting in the front row and there's a monitor right to the right of us, so we can see what's on stage, but you can also see the close ups of the shots that are going over the television airwaves, and it stuck with me. At one point, they're on Tom Steyer and you see his hand and he has all these weird like hashmarks or something. He was drawing things on his hand and it was really odd.

He looked like he escaped from the nursing home. And then on the opposite side you have Antonio Virigosa, who is actually older than Tom Steyer, and in interviews when he's asked questions, he can get lost and he can meander, and there's a lot of oz and oms and those sorts of things. But on stage, that guy was bouncing around like a kid. And during the commercial breaks he'd come up to the crowd and start working the crowd.

He'd start shouting out people and when the debate ended, that all the candidates were supposed to be sequestered before they bring them out for question and answers with the media, and Antonio Viragosa runs down into the crowd and starts doing a victory lab. I want to shake everybody's hand.

And who were the first two people he walked up to us? Now that could very well be because we were the two closest seats to the stairs. A third thing that jumped out at me is that on television, Matt Mahon comes across as being kind of a nerdy tech guy from San Jose. He comes across as being very thin, someone that you would see with an engineering degree hanging on the wall. In person, I thought he was much better looking than he comes across on TV.

Yeah, he looked more dynamic in person than he comes across on the television. But yeah, I got to shake Matt Mayhon's hand, and I don't.

Know how he makes that translate over the airwaves.

When he's trying to.

Get votes, because I think that that is a ding on him. I think there are people who are out there who think that he is one of these tech bros, and a tech bro is not a strong leader, and a strong leader can't be You have to be a strong leader to run the state of California, and if you're one of these nerdy pushovers, you can't have the job.

So that was Matt Mayhon.

Katie, on the other hand, who was right in front of us all night long. I don't think she's confirmed this in any interviews. She one hundred percent has to be on OZIMPK.

Sorry for the noise.

I'm cutting carrots.

Because she looks like a half a Kadie. She has lost a lot of weight over the last year. I do remember in an interview she did, she mentioned that she has a peloton and she's enjoying being yelled at by the peloton trainers.

Okay, that's more than just the peloton. That is pharmaceutical.

You think she's injecting herself daily.

I think she is lost, and I'm not saying this to be outrageous. I think she is lost. Between seventy five and one hundred pounds.

Oh, definitely possible. If you had to ballpark it, where would you put it?

I would put somewhere around that you look at. Especially what's jarring is people keep going back to the video that went around the world, and that was Katie in twenty twenty one. Completely different face.

Yeah, she looks like a different person. Good for her.

As someone that has also lost sixty to seventy pounds, I applaud anybody that can lose the weight. Now that being said, the personality was still there because I don't know if the camera caught this. Because there were so many people on stage, you can't see the facial reactions of all the candidates when someone else is talking.

When someone would speak.

Who she disagreed with, whether it was Matt Mayhan or Chad Bianco or Stevehilton or Bessera or whomever, she would have the angriest look on her face and it would just be resting right there. And at one moment, and again we didn't see it on TV, so I don't know if it got picked up. She was upset at the bickering that was going on, and she put her head on on the the lect hen in front of her.

I did see.

I think in one of the links to the California Post review of the debate, they got that shot. Yeah, if you go to the California Post, they have it. They have Katie Porter were their head down. Now, she didn't do any schmoozing at all with the crowd. Ivirra Gosa did, may had did, some of the others did. She was just up there on stage in the zone. And if she acknowledged anyone in the crowd, I didn't

Yeah, what's that about.

Well, Steve Hilton's going to be on this show in about forty five minutes.

You're gonna have to ask.

And during the breaks, here's another odd couple peering. Chad Bianco would talk to Tom Steyer, that was his buddy. Now, you were correct that Katie Porter and Steve Hilton did speak to one another during a break. I think Mayhan was involved in that conversation. More often than not, she was by herself. She didn't talk to a lot of the other candidates. She spent probably the least amount of time interacting with the other candidates than anyone else on that stage.

I did notice one thing when they went to the second commercial break, which was after the segment of the debate, which was my favorite segment of the debate, which was Julie Watts doing the solo moderating and holding every candidate to the things that they have said in the interviews that they did with her at the at the end of that segment, Katie Porter went up to Julie Watts and said something. It looked like it was complimentary. I think Katie was trying to play nice with Julie.

Oh yeah, because that interaction, along with cursing out the staff or sunk her campaign. Well to those voters.

Okay, so I don't want to keep doing this, so I'm going to call it.

Thank you. You're not gonna do the interview with.

Them, Nope, not like this.

I'm not not with seven follow ups to every single question you ask.

So she was playing very nice with Julie.

Oh she was.

Now, there's been a lot of criticism about CBS News and the moderators of the debate and how they handled it, and I guess a lot of people on Twitter, particularly from the left side of the aisle and the Lincoln Project guys. They are very openly critical of the debate moderators. I haven't seen it on TV, so I don't know how it came off there. I can tell you as someone who was in the room, I kind of enjoyed the fact that they were mixing it up.

I like that it was the most lively debate we've had of the entire season, and there were a lot of memorable moments a lot of people. Here's the thing that I enjoy. I have seen every single one of these candidate stump speeches. I've seen all of their interviews. I know all of their can't answers, and every single one one of them got thrown off their game and had to think on their feet, and I think that's important.

When they went to them the first time, it was can Ancer, can Ancer, can Ancer, and then Pat Harvey and the gentleman I forget his name, who is moderating with her for the first portion of it.

That's Tony Lopez from CBS thirteen in Sacramento.

Okay, Tony Lopez and Pat Harvey decided, all right, well, we're going to interact with the candidates a little bit, and we're going to try to get them to go one step further in their explanation as to how they feel about a specific issue. Now, if you're interviewing someone and they're giving you the same can answer that everyone has heard five hundred times, and you're trying to get something unique out of them, You're trying to get them to reveal a little bit more.

That's what you have to do.

And Pat Harvey, who has taken a lot of slings and arrows right now from people like Mike Murphy and others, she is a class act.

She is not someone who is nu the game.

She is not someone who just rolled out of bed and was put on TV. She's been doing the news since you and I were kids, Randy.

She has been on Channel nine and then Channel two, I'm pretty sure my entire life. She is a legend down here in southern California. And she was being very respectful as pretty much every candidate wanted to talk over her and not listen when she said we're moving on, which is why when they got to the Julie Watts part of it, she started to think, saying, I will cut off your mic.

Well and Julie Watts was magnificent.

I know I'm a fanboy, but I really really enjoyed watching her moderate that every single candidate was caught off guard because what it ended up being was follow up questions to questions that she had already asked them in that interview series from earlier this year, and every single

Now, in terms of who won who lost the debate, I have essentially three notes, and we're gonna have Steve Hilton, who is a Republican candidate for governor on the program later on, and I'm sure he has plenty of thoughts on last night's debate, and we'll get those thoughts from him later today. But note number one is that Matt

Get closer to election day.

Point number two is that the two leading Democrats in the race I thought had a poor performance. Javier Bacheria and Tom Steyer. These are two guys who are helping to put in a performance that will cause them to pull away from the other, that will cause them to be looked at as being the leader in the race and not someone who's bunched up with a bunch of other candidates. I didn't see anything spectacular from either one of them. Stier kind of just blended in with the background.

So he looked confused.

And he looked like a guy who was not a leader of the pack. The third thing that jumped out at me after last night's performance is that Chad Bianco clearly is aware that Steve Hilton is starting to pull away from him in the polls. Steve Hilton, of course, was endorsed by Donald Trump, and that's going to cause a lot of Republican voters to get behind him and his campaign. That's a problem for Chad Bianco. So Chad Bionco last night was thrown out partisan red meat. At

On the radio somewhere.

I'm curious to hear what you thought of last night's debate.

Who did well? Who did poorly? What say you?

At eight hundred two two two five two two two one eight hundred two two two five two two two eight hundred two two two five two two two. He is a telephone number one eight hundred two two two five two two two. If you'd like to email the show, you can do so at Johnny Don't Like show at gmail dot com. That's Johnny Don't Like show at gmail dot com.

And Randy.

If you missed yesterday's show and you want to go back and hear our preview of the debate to figure out if our predictions were right or our predictions were wrong, that's easy to do.

It was our pre debate special broadcasting live from an undisclosed location and beautiful Claremont, and it was a heck of a lot of fun. Search for the John Phillips Show wherever you get your podcast, whether that's the Apple podcast app, iHeart Spotify. Search for the John Phillip Show, hit subscribe you get download all the episodes. You can do a Google on the YouTube, get the KABC app or the KSFO app. You can get the KMJ now

All right, it's your turn, way in on what you thought of last night scubatorial debate at eight hundred two two two five two two two one eight hundred two two two five two two two. Let's begin with Thomas and San Jose. Thomas, Hello, Hi.

John, Randy and Crewe. Thank you for taking my call. I think I decided to step away from personal opinions living in Santal today pretty much my entire adult life. And I went to the statistics board and listening to the debate last night because it's important to me because my mayor, Matt, I call him Matt m At like a Matt that you step on Mayhem, m A h G. M. And I, guys, I was the one that I'm gonna

Well, and to that point, Thomas, that thing that you're talking about that mayhon always say that we have this study that shows that we are the safest big city in America. I remember when he touted that and we covered it because I looked up that staf and it does very specific things to pick out the numbers. And here's how you know that study is full of crap because it said, yes, San Jose is the safest big city in America, and then it said LA is number two.

This is why I love you guys. You guys were enough send to people like me, and there's a lot of people like me out here. We just don't have a voice, and you guys have become our voice. I love you guys like brothers.

I appreciate everything you do and I will support you in any way that I can. And I can send any statistics anywhere you want. If you guys want me to swing it over to like your ex Twitter, I can set it up there. I do send stuff to you. By the way, John, I don't know if you get it. I won't tell people mine. Look, I'm not actually getting credit. I don't tell people might handle because I don't need

All right, thanks for the call, Sir Randy.

Maybe next year in that survey, Oakland will be raided the safest big city in America because occasionally, when the crooks are robbing a seven eleven, they shoot and miss a lot of crime.

Now I got to look. I got to see if I can find that study again. It was from quite a while ago, but I wonder where Oakland ranks on there. But that's how I understand why he says it, because he can point to that and say, look at this, and yes, San Jose is a safer city than a lot of the big cities in California, specifically La, Oakland, San Francisco. But if a study says that LA is the number two safest big city, you know their methodology makes no sense.

Let's go to Jim in the Bay Area. Jim, Hello, Hey, how you guys doing today.

My take on it last night, the biggest losers were the moderators. Now I didn't get to see them all yet because I taped it, but the first three, especially the first two, they couldn't control them. They just let them talk over them talk over each other. And if we didn't get any answers in the first segment and

And one more thing, if we don't I've watched the last two debates, and if another Democrat gets elected, which I was a Democrat in California, I changed when Hillary Clinton was running pure evil.

But if we don't get something different in this state, we're in big trouble.

That's what I got to say about the whole situation.

From your lips to God's ears, Let's go to Larry and Oxnard.

Larry, Hello, Hi, God grace you guys, and God bless Julie Watson. If for anything getting you two in there. I thought Hilton was consistently good. Didn't have, you know, long long segments in the area when he was talking, but I liked his on the homeless issue. He can balance the compassion with you know, toughness, go following the law. You can have all a man it's amount of homeless in one area for instance, I think Bianco, you know, had he had moments. But on the fire thing, he

Well, as we get closer to the election, As we get closer to the ballots going out, I'm going to provide more expansive explanation as to how I intend on voting, but the reader's digest version is that I will be voting for whichever Republican is polling second. Given the fact that Hilton was endorsed by Trump, I think it is highly likely that that candidate will be Chad Bianco, even

Yeah, that's it sounds and I'm glad you restated it. And the first time I heard I thought it was good advice. It'll be interesting to seat plays out. But I think Jolton might be might have heard what you said because he didn't criticize bianco as before, so I thought that was interesting. I would have liked to hear the candidates talk a little bit more, the moderators a little bit less, just on that issue as well, but appreciate the time that.

All right, thank you for the call, sir. Let's go to Chris in San Francisco. Chris, Hello, Hey, John.

I just want to get your opinion. Being a political science major, did do you think Trump endorsing Hilton before more the debates are over hurts them in any way because a lot of the other candidates are using it as a lightning rod against him.

Yeah.

I think it helps him in the primary. I think it hurts him in the general, and I think it hurts our chances at getting two Republicans on the November ballot. For Republicans to get two Republicans on the November ballot, Republican voters need to split their vote as close to fifty to fifty as possible. You don't want one to do significantly better than the other. You want them to come to a draw. If they split the vote fifty to fifty, that's your best shot at getting two Republicans

Yeah, I'm kind of wishing Trump had endorsed Stier as a fellow billionaire.

Thank you for the call, sir. Let's go to Mike and Lakewood.

Mikelow Hi, John, Hi, Randy. I think Pat Harvey did a great job. The guy that was her sidekick, I thought was kind of gave the appearance of being a phony.

And well he's like Market thirteen as opposed to Market one.

Yeah, yeah, there you go.

And then Julie Watts was outstanding, although cut the candidates off quite a bit, and sometimes that was a little bit disturbing, but I understand why because they get off track and she was good at reeling them back in. I am thinking along the same lines as you, John, that I want Hilton to win, and in order for that to hopefully happen, my wife and I both are going to vote for Chad beyond Goo and uh in the in the primary, and and so hopefully that'll happen.

Uh.

A couple observations I think, uh uh, I don't know how anybody would vote for Styre. I mean, the guy's wearing tennis shoes and and and a suit.

Not a good look.

But uh uh.

The other thing was I think via Via Regosa, I don't even know why he's up there in the first place. He sounded completely rehearsed and canned answers, and I'm not sure why he was even there. But anyway, those are my my observations, and we'll see what happens.

All right, thank you for the call. Shared. Let's go to David Whittier. Dave, welcome.

Yeah, I thought, uh the moderators were bad.

I really didn't get it. Not uh, I he didn't more from these candidates.

If I had a pick a dark horse, you know, I was leaving.

But Sarah, but I like Mayhan.

I really liked this young man.

I think he's got the right stuff.

So last night was enough for you to consider at least changing your vote from Besara to Mayheon.

Correct. Yes, yes, and I'll just leave it at that. Thank you very much.

All right, thank you for the call, sir. Let's go to Chris in Long Beach. Chris.

Hello, Hi, I'm a Chad Bianco supporter and I just want to you guys were talking about how the those candidates their appearance while I think his accent, he's going to lose a lot of voices. It's kind of aloof. And in this climate, do you think anyone's really going to vote for somebody with the last name Hilton here in California?

Well, do you think they're Marriotte partisans?

I don't know.

It just comes off as wealth and privilege and Bianco is the only one who knows how to handle crime and gangs and homeless and that's the number one issue. You guys spend half your show on it some days. And then also Mayhan. I mean, he reminds me of a younger Newsome with a stubble beard. And again I was just really, I'm really impressed with Bianco. You know, he runs a huge county, so he could easily translate that into the state of California. And he looked he

Like Kurt Russell if he was pissed off all the time.

Yeah, who need I mean.

Yeah, I liked his I liked his fire last night because he didn't he didn't seem to worry about upsetting the Apple card, where you have a lot of people on that stage who agree with one another on so many of the subjects. He and Hilton disagreed on many of them, but he absolutely, to borrow a phrase from Shang Tao, didn't hesitate to go ahead and throw down

Yeah.

I mean again, let's hope for the fifty to fifty split, like you said, and then maybe we'll get to him to be governor.

All right, thank you for the call, sir. Let's go to Rob in San Jose. Rob. Hello.

Yeah, I don't know if I want the vacuum in San Jose to be, you know, open for to get some kind of somebody who's not as stable as May

I mean, yeah, he's not part of the family that owns the hotels, so we should definitely make it a point to clarify that. And he's going to be with us coming up during the Fixed California Hour. Eight hundred two two two five two two two is a telephone number one eight hundred two two two five two two two. If you'd like to email the show, you can do so at Johnny Don't Like Show at gmail dot com. That's Johnny Don't Like Show at gmail dot com. Coming