Where We Go From Here

I want to impart upon, folks. And I know I say often on this show that you know, I hold about a mustard seed of hope, and to be honest, that's really not true. I've been kind of thinking about my relationship to hope and my relationship to faith over the last couple of months, but truly the last couple of years. And the thing is, I do this work on Woke af with my other show, Democracy Ish, writing and spending time on social media platforms because I truly

believe in the promise of this country. I really do. I believe that it can be better than what the founding fathers have even framed. I believe that there is a lot that is good here. And I remember, you know, naively when I was younger I remember President Bill Clinton saying that there is more that is right with America than that is wrong, and there's nothing that can't be

fixed about America with what is right about America. I remember Barack Obama when he became the talk of the town at convention talking about the fact that there are no red states and there are no blue states. They are just the United States. The reason why I went into politics was because I believe that all people in this country should be treated with dignity and respect and have the opportunity to access their version of the American

dream without oppression, without degradation or dehumanization. And so I've made it my mission in order to wake people up to their power. It isn't just about waking people up and to live in a state of rage all the time,

but it is to understand that we are powerful. Your vote is powerful, your voice is powerful, and if it wasn't, then people wouldn't be working overtime to try and silence you and to try and throw out the thing that makes this country great, which is our ability to choose our elected officials, the ability to live in a country that is governed for and by the people. We have lost sight of that we have become complacent. We have allowed our elected officials to become complacent and to become

the fucking proxy of corporate America. And so what I am saying is that regardless of where things stand right, whether there's a red wave or a blue wave, the reality is is that we need to wake the fuck up before we all drowned, right before we all drown in their ideas of what America should be. We are the ones with the power, We are the ones with

the vision. We are the ones that know what is best for ourselves, and for too long we put up these representatives because we believe that they knew more than we do. The fucking reality is is that if you see the slate of Republican candidates, you know, good god damn well, you know a hell of a lot more than they do, and you care a hell of a

lot more than they do. So, folks, what I need us to get to a place of, after we rest, after we wipe away tears and wipe our brows right, and stretch our sore backs and hands from dialing and campaigning and canvassing and doing all the things, is that I need for you to harken back to those that fought for freedom and equality and justice that they would

never see. This is not about us anymore. And once we remove our egos and our need for immediate gratification away, then we see a bigger picture, right, We see what is actually possible, because possibility doesn't come from a place of scarcity. It comes from a place of abundance. It comes from understanding that we can do the audacious things if we decide to be audacious. And what fear does.

What fear does is shrink us into being afraid of our own fucking shadows, our own neighbors across the street or next door, or above us or below. That's what Republicans want. They want us living in fear of ourselves and everybody around us, and only they alone can come in and save the day with their fucking law and order. Their law and order and their values are bullshit, and

we know that. So at this time, dear friends, we must hold steadfast to who the fuck we are and how we want to show up, because regardless whether the outcome is good, bad, or indifferent, there is still work to be done. Because this union is not yet perfect, and it is each generation's responsibility to perfect it to the best of our ability and then pass on the baton.

And right now we're doing a shit fucking job because we have polluted waters, we have crumbling schools, and we have a white supremacist national part that is working to assume power. And here's the thing. We know that every time that we make progress that there is whitelash. Every single time that we move the needle further, that we bend that are a little more, there is always backlash. This ain't nothing new, but the question, and this came from Ann who you will hear from later in the week,

The question is how long? How long will the white lash be? Because following the Civil War we had reconstruction. Reconstruction only lasted twelve years, and then following that reconstruction we had Jim Crow for about a hundred. So it isn't about what that backlash is going to be, because that's going to be expected because these are the ancestors. These are the fucking people whose ancestors were standing in front of public schools because they didn't want integration. Right.

These are the same people that held up bats and were beaten queer people for daring to live their lives out in the open. These are who these people have always fucking been. They ain't dying off. They're like motherfucking gremlins. So what is being asked is for persistence, is for vigilance, and is for hope and to have faith that the work that we're putting in will have impact. If there's nothing else to be taken from this time, win or lose, it is that we took our eye off the ball.

We just assumed that democracy was something that would just continue because it had for over two hundred and some odd years. But things don't just continue without hard work. We don't always get to see the fruits of that labor, but we plant the seeds anyway. Coming up next, my conversation with our friend, our in house doctor, doctor Jonathan Metzel. Hey, I'm David. Plots of Slates Political Gabfest. As another election season accelerates, it can be tricky to sort through all

the noise and the news. Each week on the gap Fest, John Dickerson, Emily Bathlona and I decipher the headlines, break down the races, and tell you what issues really matter. We do not always agree, We definitely do not always agree, but we always deliver thoughtful debate and we always have a good time. So subscribe to Slate's Political Gapfest, new episodes every Thursday, folks. So you know that whenever we have the opportunity to talk to our good, good friend,

doctor Jonathan Metzel, we are always pleased. Jonathan. At the time of this recording, we don't know the official outcome of uh the midterm elections, and frankly, even if we were recording this a week from the election day, we may not know. Um. But I want to start off today with just kind of you know, taking your temperature. You have been on a media junket, mad dash, spreading the good good word about the danger that we are in,

about what people need to be paying attention to. The thing Jonathan that you know that I always appreciate about you is that you try and weave in optimism, you try and weave in hopefulness while also sounding the alarm. So I just you know, again, folks, as we're as we're talking right now, the polls have not even closed yet, but I want to get a sense of how you're feeling.

I'll share how I'm feeling, and then we'll talk about you know, where we go from here, well, I think if I had to say again, not knowing that outcome, I heard a rumor that Trump got every single vote, but I can't confirm it until we know for sure. But I would say, if there's a if there's a silver lining to all this, it does seem like there are an awful lot of people voting, and it does

feel like people are paying attention. I mean, as you and I've been talking about a lot of bad stuff's been happening, people understandably are living their lives and just trying to stay a float right now. But part of the reason we're in this pickle right now is because January sixth happened, and the Republicans doubled down on running for every school board, every election, monitoring every single thing. And Democrats, god love them, Um, we're not We're not engaged.

I mean, the Republicans really saw this as a power grab moment, and we were doing other things. I mean, certainly, you know, saving the economies and important, and stimulus money is important, all those kind of things, but we were not focusing in the place where the change was really happening. And I think if we had to do it again, you know, the minute all these people were storming school boards, we should have like stormed back with our own people

storming the school boards. And if they were running for a crazy election post, we should have been running our own person for that election post. So I just think we gave up on the local government angle of this too much. And I think that's really the issue. But I'd say that the optimism is right now. There are a lot of people who appear to be engaged and paying attention, and hopefully that's something we can sustain, you know, going forward, you know there, I think that there is

actually a lot to take away from this moment. I think one, Jonathan, is that we, oftentimes, and we, I'm talking about the big we Democratic Party. We not you and I, but we in the Democrat Party often, you know, play this game from election to election, from candidate to candidate.

And what I heard the other day, and I keep saying this because I like to get folks's reaction, is that, you know, former Senator Doug Jones from Alabama, and if you remember, he was placed into the Senate in a mid term election because of black women voters in Alabama, not because of the investment that had been put in by the DNC or the DSCC, the big establishment funders in order to win his campaign. And he said this, He said, the Democratic Party is too vested in candidates

and not a movement. They move from candidates to candidates as opposed to here is who we are. Here are our values as Democrats, right, and this is and this is who regardless of the name that is on the ticket, this is what they stand for. And I wanted to get your reaction to that because I also thought, you know, we as Democrats, we love to fall in love with our candidates. We want to fall in love with them, we want to have a beer or a glass of wine with them, we want to hang out with them.

And I don't necessarily think that we need to take our democracy like we do dating frankly, right, this is so I want to get your reactions to what he said. Well, I think that it's not like we have to agree on an issue. I mean, I certainly don't think that

the Republicans all agree on an issue. I think the Republicans agree on the importance of power, and so it's more like if somebody may or may not agree with us about this one issue, but the idea of like, I mean, Republicans understand what it means to take over the judiciary. And I feel like with all this noise, there have been two people on television who have been warning about this for the past two years. Us we've been saying this ship, you know, spoiler alert, Yeah, like,

where's already been. We've been saying this ship forever. And so I just think that I think that it's it's not even like everybody agrees on one issue. It's more like, oh, that person doesn't agree with me about filling the blank issue, therefore I'm not gonna blah blah blah with them. And it's more like the bigger goal is not this one issue. And so I just think that because the Democrats aren't going to agree on energy policy, they're not going to

agree on Middle East policy. I think that if the bigger goal is not just like we're all on board with one agenda, that's not going to work with the Democrats. But but the Republicans, the bigger goal is to control the judiciary. It's not about any one particular issue. And I don't think the Democrats see that. They see it

as a bunch to different interests that are whatever. So again, like because I'm not optimistic that there could be one slate that everybody who identifies as a Democrat would agree on. I don't think that's there is no core value set, really, but I do think if the goal is, like, Okay, look, as you and I've been saying, the goal is to have people in positions of power who are gonna you know,

blah blah blah. I mean, I just think of how many Democratic candidates have been picked apart because of one particular issue, and really it's more than Democrats don't ever see the bigger picture, or they don't see it often enough. So I want to push back a little bit because I wrote a piece probably a couple of weeks ago now for the Daily Beast, and the piece was on patriotism and the fact that we seed patriotism, we've ceded freedom, liberty,

family values right all to the far right. And language matters, particularly when you're trying to persuade people from one point

of view to the next. So when you say, you know, there's not a slate of things that we can agree on, and I agree with you to that point, But couldn't the banner of freedom be that thing that we are coalescing around because frankly, you know, from healthcare, to public education to the formation or not forming a family is based around the idea that you have freedom, you have choice in this country. And so rather than use the word of choice, we take the word freedom back from them.

And then whether you're going in front of a climate audience, or you're going in front of a school board, or you're going in front of you know, a medical board or what have you, that what you're carrying with you, right, and what you're weaving in is this idea of freedom. Is that not something that you think that we can coalesce around because we've seeded that conversation and allowed these red hat you know, rabbit racists to claim that, to

claim that mantle. I mean, I guess the question would be do you feel like defending democracy was enough, was concrete enough for people to mobilize around. But that's not what I'm talking about. I don't because I'm when I say freedom, I'm not just talking about democracy versus fascism. I'm literally talking about your freedom to live the life that you want to live, that your family wants to live. And I think that there are so many ways to weave in whatever issue or interest area you want to

under this larger battern of Americans. We're about freedom, right, the freedom to live, the freedom to like, and you can run down that list. But we don't talk in that way. We don't speak to the electorate in that way. And I wonder if you think, in all of the ways in which you have talked to people, particularly those in the in the middle and then these red states and in these rusted areas, you know, patriotism and freedom I think is something that would resonate with them. I mean,

I don't I don't know. I mean, I'll give you a counterexample to that, which I think it is pretty interesting. The minute New York election was on the I mean, it seemed absurd that the New York governor election was going to be about crime, because crime is way lower in New York than it is here in Tennessee. And New York actually, for all the crap, has actually been doing pretty good. Subway ridership is as of last month's back up to the pre pandemic levels. The more people

who come back, the more people there are around. So this idea of like New York is a burning hellscape with immigrants running around with mattresses and all this crazy stuff, you know. But the thing is, there are all these great things about New York, right, I mean New York, as you and I have talked about could you run?

I mean, I just feel like New York. New York didn't fight back and say, hey, here's what's great about New York and here's what fighting for is the ability to have like ten million people living in a dense urban area and bike lanes that go everywhere, and you can get a train anywhere at night, like just to make that cool or something I understand like this, I mean, I know Zeldon was trying to He wasn't. He didn't

give a crap about New York. He's trying to scare people in the suburbs that like exactly who never who don't live, who don't live, and don't have a daily understanding of what it is like what the beauty that you describe last week of being able to bike from one borough to the next, and like where in the country where you know, can you do that other than in New York safely? And so you know, Obama framed the election as hope, and that was a guiding principle.

I just felt like New York was caught so flat footed that it even New York at a hard time articulating. And it's not just some random bs like New York actually has a relative degree of safety compared to other cities. It has public transportation, it has I don't know, as you know, I go to the airport every week. It takes me nineteen minutes from Atlantic Terminal to JFK Airport on a Long Island railroad. It costs seventy dollars and

seventy five cents. When I go to the airport here in Nashville, it's fifty bucks and I'm stuck in traffic for two hours. New York, I can take Long Island railroad Atlantic Terminal to Jamaica for less than ten bucks, and it always is nineteen minutes. So I just think, you know, if you're flat footed all the time, you're

not kind of selling all the stuff. And so I just I just think that I don't know, I guess freedom is awfully abstract to me, but I do think that here's what we're fighting for in New York, and then these kind of examples and make it concrete and not just New York, but across the country. I would like to think that. I mean, I don't know what's your sense, because for me, like these zelden Ads, by

the end, they were just embarrassing. Like you maybe yeah, the whole time you were heart you heard it and it was like, oh man, somebody trying to jack my shit. Um like after thirty after thirty times of hearing, hey, somebody's trying to jack your ship, and then you're like, um, this is embarrassing, dude. And so but there was no counter, right,

there was no counter. So we're more like playing offense on these things that Hey, there, I want to tell you about another podcast I think you'll love The Brown Girl's Guide to Politics, hosted by a Shanty Gohler the President I've Emerged. BGG is the one stop shop for women of color who want to hear and talk about

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Tuesday wherever you get your podcasts. I think that all of the things that you lift up as opposed to being in a reactionary posture, meaning that the Republicans and a Zelden say the cities are filled with crimes and undocumented people and disease and all of the whatever rhetoric that they're using. Democrats normal responses, No, it's not. And then to tell you all the ways in which they're going to be tougher on crime, and they're going to

be this, that and the other thing. And what you're saying is, why can't we just lift up what's good? Why can't you just lift up the reason why New York City is one of the beacons and most traveled places in the world. Right that the place is you know, yeah, the rent is too damn high here, but it's because everyone wants to be here. And why is that because of the offerings that it has. The other day I was I had decided to take an evening walk. I watched the sunset over the city, walk back home to

my block. It's you know, it was before daylight saving, so it's pretty dark outside. I can tell you that

I have never felt unsafe in my neighborhood. I have never felt unsafe when I'm traveling around the city, and so his idea of this violence, and I mean, the thing that has bothered me is that there is a lack of a plan for the homeless in New York and that when people left the subways there people have set up full, you know, homeless condominiums in the cars, right, and so there was a lack of a plan to deal and to help those people and to mitigate that issue.

But again, that wasn't about crime. And so I think that the counter to these these these the antics that Republicans like Zelden us is to be like, show me the pictures of how you actually want to live, Hey, Tennessee, wouldn't it be great if you didn't sit in traffic for two hours to just get to you know, a mode of transportation. Wouldn't you like to be able to bike to work, um and and and and and send

off your kids and and feel comfortable doing so. And instead of it being this reactionary about how tough you are, to show like, how great it would be if we all had the access to these things. And I love your framing of that, and I think that that is where democrats have missed the boat this time. Around. But to me, it doesn't mean that there isn't an opportunity because I this is this is why people have been texting me all day Jonathan, and probably the same with

you and asking you how are you feeling? How are you doing today? Selection day? How are you doing? How are you feeling? And I got to be honest, I feel fine? And why do I feel fine? Why am I not filled with anxiety and stress and pulling my

hair out? Because I know, regardless I'm waking up tomorrow to fight for freedom, regardless of what happens, I'm waking up tomorrow and I'm doing the same work to try and wake people up to their power and that this is a long haul movement, right, And you know, if Republicans take over, yeah, the work is going to be harder.

But it's always been hard, right, And that that's kind of my reality because if if it's like, if we're pinning our hopes and dreams on one election or the other, then we're always going to be in a place of devastation. And that's not where power comes from, right. I Mean, you know, it's an interesting proposition because I do are

people burned out on all this stuff? Quite possibly, you know, could we do for America what we're talking about doing for New York, which is like, hey, here's what's cool about America and then kind of make the other side uncool by nature of you being cool. Now, I don't know how you're feeling. I kind of really can't see Biden running again, to be honest, And if that's the case, then the Democrats will have the chance to reset again.

I have no inside information. I just I know the cards seem like it's probably time for like there might be a change. That's just my feeling, I'm you know, And so whatever happens, that the Democrats have a chance maybe for a reset. But it's also I don't know, there's so much like crap going on with just the machinery of elections that it's going to take a lot of work. Yeah, I think that it's all going to take a lot of work. I don't know if Biden is going to run again. I can't imagine that he

won't barring some type of like medical disaster. I don't see him seating and saying like, oh, I'm not going to run. And then we open up the clown car of a primary to figure out who is going to come up behind him. There was an awful it was funny, but it was like also sad snl skit. That was all about the Democrats going back to the same people over and over again to be the champions of this party. And it's just like, you know, I don't foresee anything

different than what they've been doing. But what I'm saying is that people can do things that are different, right, Like we have to be the ones that are challenging these people to be different. And it doesn't we can't just care about our freedoms every two and four years and then the time in between we just kind of throw up our hands or bury our heads in the sand, Like that's we've lost that privilege because we hadn't been vigilant this entire time about the courts about our democracy.

So the privilege of just walking around dazed and confused is over. And that's kind of what I want people to take away from the mid term is that like, yeah, not being engaged or saying politics isn't for you, that time has passed. Yeah, I mean you know, remember like it and it's not even like democracy or equality, Like remember when all these people were storming the school boards demanding no more books and stuff like that when they

were burning the books on top of burning masks. Yeah, and you and I were saying, like, where's the counter to that? So it's not like, but like where were the ten thousand people out there in support of having lots of books in the library, you know what I mean? Like, it's not even like it's got to be some one thing, but it just feels like one there's no counter to a lot of this stuff that is about daily life. Also, Yeah, so we'll see. I'm I'm curious to know what we

know by tomorrow when the show ends. Right now, we're obviously talking into a in the show airs. Obviously, we're talking to a vacuum right now. But yeah, so you know, let with the last minute or so that we have, if Democrats are able to squeak out a win, what do you think we do next? I don't think they're gonna sweek out a win. Maybe I'm this is Devil's Advocate Jonathan. Oh, yeah, that's true. A good point. Um, I think corrupt all the voting machines and uh, and no,

I was kidding. I think I just have a feeling that people are awfully burned out on all this crap, and I feel like if there was some reasonable way to come back towards some kind of middle ground, that is even possible. Um, I don't know. It's just like you're not going to out Trump Trump or to Santists or whoever. But it does seem like it does open up a space to like, I don't know, maybe that's

too hopeful, but that is kind of my feeling. I mean, even the right wingers I interview, they're like, I mean, I do think a lot of people are afraid right now, and so I don't know, but I know the negative affect always takes the air out of the room. So but yeah, but I do feel like the root the

attack is to the center, not to the extreme. I feel like, if what happens after this election is it's Marjorie Taylor Green against AOC for the next three decades, then the Democrats were just going to be a perennial protest party. So I don't know, that's my feel How would you answer that question? How I answer it is that you know, people need to understand that our rights and privileges that we have in this country don't go by election cycle, And the reality is is that you know,

I am going back to you. And I continue to say this on Wokaeth and every other show that I am on, that I'm going back to the roots of abolition. They had an audacious idea about abolishing the founding economy of this country after centuries of watching enslaved human beings beat down, broken apart, terrorized and murdered and raped for centuries, and they had this audacious vision to end it and what would what could we what could we do instead?

And they kept at it and they did not for those that were fighting, those that were free and those that were enslaved. For those that were fighting, they were

fighting for something that they would never see. And so I kind of need people to pull themselves and this is me saying this, to pull themselves out of marinating in the misery and start to think about what they are going to do to recharge and refocus and think not inside of their own egos about the immediate gratification about what they want to see, but what they want their legacies to be. Yeah, that's where I want people

to think. That's what I want the tomorrow and the day after tomorrow and the day after that to be about because it cannot be just about what we need in this moment, because what we need no longer matters. You know, if let's just say, for conversation's sake, Biden doesn't run again, it will be an opportunity for the Democrats to define their values. I think that, you know, there's that opportunity. So you know, again, who knows what

this opportunity will be and who does what'll happen. But if that's the case, it does seem like something like that might come up organically. But again, you know, I don't want to I'm not trying to push anybody out the doors the President of the United States with that, Jonathan. By the time that this airs, we still probably will have no idea where things lie. But I hope that folks that are listening to this recognize and start to think about where their fight is going to lie. Regardless

of the outcome of this election. It may be easier, it may be much harder, but regardless, we're still going to have to fight. And that's just the reality of what it means to be part of a democracy. It doesn't just happen. Thank you, dear friend, for making the time to join us. We appreciate you, my pleasure see you guys. That is it for me today. Dear friends on woke f As always, power to the people and to all the people. Power, get woke and stay woke as fuck.