Rep. Doug LaMalfa Has Died, leaving GOP with a tiny majority; What's Next for Trump and Venezuela?

Summary

The Morning Meeting: Rep. Doug LaMalfa Has Died, Leaving GOP with a Tiny Majority; What's Next for Trump and Venezuela?

Podcast: The Morning Meeting
Host: Mark Halperin
Guests: Kevin Walling, Eric Erickson
Date: January 6, 2026

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Episode Overview

This forward-looking episode, hosted by Mark Halperin, zeroes in on seismic shifts in the U.S. Congress after the reported death of Rep. Doug LaMalfa, and dives deep into the fast-evolving aftermath of the Trump administration’s operation in Venezuela. With guests Kevin Walling and first-time co-host Eric Erickson, the panel debates U.S. foreign policy pivots, domestic political ramifications, party strategy, and the strategic messaging surrounding both Venezuela and emerging global hotspots.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Breaking News: Death of Rep. Doug LaMalfa and its House Implications

[19:12]-[20:58]

• Breaking: Mark confirms reports that California Republican Rep. Doug LaMalfa has died, shrinking the GOP House majority to 218-213.
• Implications:
  • Eric Erickson [20:18]: “We’re headed into an election year... House isn’t going to do much of anything this year anyway.”
  • Mark [20:36]: “If he [the Speaker] loses his speakership, then we could have impeachment hearings... it would be a fundraising boon for the Democrats.”
• Further Complications: Every vote is now critical, and additional absences (e.g., Rep. Jim Baird in the hospital) threaten to flip the majority.

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2. U.S. Operation in Venezuela: Political and Strategic Effects

[08:58]-[18:38]

• Kevin Walling [09:19]:
  • White House messaging: Operation framed as highly successful; prominent military leaders front and center.
  • "MAGA world is generally united behind this operation," with ~33% approval overall.
• Eric Erickson [10:33]:
  • Right now, Venezuela can do "literally nothing" to respond; U.S. military superiority evident.
  • "We took out an Iranian drone factory on the way out... Russia and China cannot do what we did."
• Mark [11:53]:
  • U.S. can "run the country through mafia-like threats by the U.S. Navy"; time is on America’s side.
• Ethnicity and Voter Impact [18:09]:
  • The operation could shift the Hispanic vote, especially among Venezuelan and Cuban communities in the U.S.

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3. What’s Next for Venezuela – Risks, Messaging, and Regional Power

[13:40]-[16:24], [54:51]-[57:20]

• Regime Change, But Stability?:
  • The U.S. left in place power-brokers who can suppress dissent; the absence of chaos seen as a tactical policy choice.
  • Kevin Walling: "Bullying and threatening is somewhat working."
• Foreign Messaging:
  • Both guests question why the Trump administration isn’t emphasizing the “axis of evil” (Iran, China, Russia) connection more forcefully.
• Risks [54:56]:
  • Kevin Walling: Greatest worry is escalation with China and Russia (e.g., emboldening China on Taiwan).
  • Eric Erickson [56:08]: Real risk is if nothing truly changes in Venezuela: “We get the oil, but the regime stays.”

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4. U.S. Foreign Policy & The Spheres of Influence Doctrine

[41:31]-[49:23]

• Listener Joshua raises concern: Trump’s focus on Western Hemisphere could mean ceding influence to Russia/China, undermining U.S. global leadership and alliances like NATO.
• Kevin Walling [44:31]: Shares the worry: “If we retreat...to spheres of influence...that’s entirely problematic.”
• Eric Erickson [45:52]: Suggests current Trump thinking is: "We’re a nation in decline...so we have to mitigate it," imitating Britain’s declining empire strategies, even as U.S. still holds enormous power.
• Mark [47:18]: Trump seeks to “shake up the chessboard” instead of incrementalism, with an eye on breaking stalemate with China and Russia; admits the risk but frames it as necessary change from failed status quo.

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5. Other Flashpoints: Greenland, Ukraine, Domestic Developments

Greenland [21:35]-[24:21]:

• Stephen & Katie Miller push “Let’s take Greenland” rhetoric, seen as a “dickhead diplomacy” move by Erickson [22:53].
• Both guests agree it’s rhetoric, but may still yield more U.S. basing/mineral rights.

Ukraine Peace Talks [24:21]-[29:07]:

• Mark & Guests: Skepticism that Putin will agree to any deal; a potential walk-back of U.S. involvement is likely if no progress.
• Eric Erickson: U.S. oil reserves as leverage; U.S. may profit via arms sales even if it steps back publicly.

Healthcare Subsidies [32:12]-[35:42]:

• Premium increases are sharp; bipartisan talks ongoing, but abortion remains a sticking point for extending subsidies.

NYC Mayoral Politics [35:42]-[38:03]:

• Concerns that new left-wing mayor Mandami isn’t resonating as a feared national “face” for the GOP, but both guests urge watching how his term unfolds.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Eric Erickson on Venezuela:
  “[In Venezuela]...We did something neither Russia nor China can do...the American military and intelligence is hands down better than anything any other nation has.” [13:02]
• Kevin Walling on Dissent Suppression:
  “They left in power people who can suppress dissent...you could imagine rioting in the streets...the fact that there isn’t seems to me to be a positive.” [14:07]
• Eric Erickson on U.S. Messaging:
  “I get it’s Trump and fly by the seat of his pants, but...Iran and Hezbollah both do have land—there’s an island in Venezuela...now it’s an actual Hezbollah training facility.” [15:10]
• Mark on GOP House Majority:
  “Every vote now makes everything harder.” [21:17]
• Erickson coins “Dickhead Diplomacy”:
  “I’m coining the term today of dickhead diplomacy...you don’t have to be a jerk to these people [the Danes].” [22:53]
• Eric Erickson on Spheres of Influence:
  “They are trying to go back to the 19th century, essentially.” [45:52]
• On the risks of Venezuela:
  “The biggest risk is...nothing actually changing in Venezuela. Maybe we get the oil but the regime stays.” [56:08]

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [08:58] — Venezuela Operation: Political impact and polling
• [13:02] — U.S. vs. Russia/China capabilities in Venezuela
• [18:09] — Hispanic vote implications of Venezuela policy
• [19:12] — Breaking News: Rep. Doug LaMalfa’s death and House implications
• [21:35] — Greenland rhetoric/"Dickhead Diplomacy"
• [24:21] — Ukraine peace process update
• [32:12] — Healthcare subsidies & bipartisan negotiations
• [35:42] — NYC’s Mayor Mandami and national party image
• [41:31] — Listener Q: Spheres of influence, U.S. global posture
• [54:51] — What’s the riskiest part of U.S. Venezuela intervention?

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Listener Q&A Highlights

[41:31]-[49:59]:

• Joshua asks if focusing on the Western Hemisphere opens the door for China & Russia elsewhere; Walling and Erickson both express concern over a strategic retreat and possible ceding of U.S. leadership.

[51:36]-[53:52]:

• Dan inquires about institutional changes to prevent another January 6th. Both guests are skeptical change is likely; most reforms will be incremental at best.

[54:03]-[57:20]:

• Ellen queries about the risks of U.S. intervention in Venezuela; responses highlight escalation with China/Russia and the risk that substantive change in Venezuela fails to materialize.

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Conclusion

This episode delivers a brisk yet thorough debrief of the day’s major political developments—unfolding congressional math after Rep. LaMalfa’s death, the rapidly shifting landscape in Venezuela post-U.S. intervention, and the interconnected challenges of global and domestic policy in a Trump-led America. As ever, the hosts aim for forward-looking, candid conversation, pulling back the curtain on political operators’ real-time anxieties and analyses.

For those seeking “the next day in news” and the raw calculus behind headline events, this is essential, inside-the-room listening.

Transcript

[Mark]

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[James Patterson]

I'm James Patterson. I write way too many books. Welcome to Hungry Dogs. The title comes from my maternal grandmother, Isabel Zelvis Morris. Nan used to always say, hungry dogs run faster, James. And I've been running fast ever since. Here's what will be coming your way soon, and this is a really terrific list. I think you'll hear from some incredible people like Stacey Abrams. Yay. BJ Novak.

[Kevin Walling]

Yay.

[James Patterson]

Kathy Bates, Dolly Parton, Josh Gad, and Pope Leo. Okay, maybe not Pope Leo, but who knows? Maybe he'll show up. Hungry dogs run faster. Thank you, Grandma, for turning me into a hopeless, obsessive, compulsive. Listen to Hungry Dogs with James Patterson. That'd be me on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

[Eric Erickson]

Foreign.

[Mark]

Welcome to the Morning Meeting, a program based on the Network News Division's morning meetings and often what happens in the morning meetings. Usually they're around 9 o' clock when we meet with the Eastern time. Based in New York City, as I am, news often breaks around 9 o' clock because stuff happens in the morning and flows right into the start of the workday. We're working on trying to break a little story right now. So it's if I appear distracted to you, it's because I am. I'm watching my inbox to get a second source. In any event, we'll have our normal format along with the disruption of breaking news and to talk a lot about Venezuela. But oh, so much more with our two guest hosts today. Couldn't be happier to have Kevin Walling back. Kevin gonna unmute you because you muted yourself. And Erik Erickson is here for the first time. You know, a lot of times people say to you, oh, you gotta watch this TV show. I love it. It's a Swedish procedural drama. It's so good. Two seasons, 17 episodes. You gotta watch it. And you always think, ah, whatever. A lot of times people recommend a sub stack to you and you'll think, eh, I read enough substacks. If you don't get Eric Erikson substack you should. It's brilliant. Eric is fearless and smart and well connected and it just, it just, it's, it's essential reading every day as well as listen to Eric's show. 12 to 3 Eastern. Carve out three more hours of your day and listen to the entire show every day. Eric Erickson, show.com Eric, so happy new Year to you. Very grateful to you for being here. Excited to have you here. All right, so I'll continue to check my messages for breaking news. Damn. Just missed a call from someone who could have confirmed the story. In any event, stand by for that. We're going to run through as we normally do, the day book. Then the three of us will chat a little bit about the news of the day, including a lot about Venezuela, but also about what's going on with Congress and the president. And then as always, if you're here on the two way platform, we'd love your questions, raise your hand if you're here. You want to be part of the conversation, an opportunity to ask Eric a question, Kevin a question. You guys know each other?

[Eric Erickson]

This is the first time.

[Kevin Walling]

Yeah, we know of each other.

[Mark]

Yeah. It's an opportunity literally of a lifetime because I've never been on together anywhere. So. And most programs, you get a chance to ask them questions.

[Kevin Walling]

So please, longtime listener, first time caller with Eric.

[Mark]

Feel, feel, feel free to raise your hand and you'll get in the conversation. If you're watching on X or on, on YouTube, don't put smack in the chat. When we announced Eric was going to be on, I saw some lovely comments. I also saw, Eric, the kind of comments you're used to getting just denigrating your, your physic, your physicality, the power of your brain, your views on things. Just extraordinary what people will write.

[Eric Erickson]

My wife was on here with.

[Mark]

Yeah, yeah. Well, I tried to, I tried to block her, but, but we're an open forum. In any event, even if you're Stephen Miller, please, no smack in the chat. Stephen's just smacking around on CNN twice yesterday after they seemed to bar him, all of a sudden it was, they went from barring him to Katie, bar the door. How's that? All right, here we go, the daybook. And then, and then I know I owe you a word from a sponsor, which I'll get to in a second. The president in the next hour is supposed to be at the Trump Kennedy center to speak to the House Republicans. And the news we're trying to break involves House Republicans. So this could be interesting. 10 o' clock. He's supposed to speak to them covered by the travel pool. It'll be part politics, I'm sure there'll be a lot of victory lapping on Venezuela. And then230 he's participating in a closed press policy meeting. They announced a similar event yesterday. Now this seems like a new thing in the new year. They just announced these policy meetings of unknown topics. Don't know where the vice president is today or what he's doing. House Republicans, as I said, are at their day long retreat at the Kennedy center, or maybe we like to call it an off site, not a retreat. They did away with the word retreat for obvious reasons. House Democrats, congressional Democrats spending a lot of their day talking about the fifth anniversary of January 6th. So you have Hakeem Jeffries with a 10 o' clock press conference with Bennie Thompson and other Democrats talking about that. The Democrats at 5 o' clock Eastern gathering on the Senate steps to talk about the anniversary and those lives that were lost. There's a march from those who were recently pardoned to commemorate the death of Ashley Babbitt from the Ellipse to the Capitol. As far as we know, they don't plan to storm the Capitol when they get there. Just maybe stop at the bus stop there. House is doing a bunch of other small things. Jared Witkoff and Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff have been in Paris at meetings for a couple hours. Zelensky is also there to talk about security guarantees. And there's a big juxtaposition, a lot of optimistic talk by those in attendance and claims to Reuters and others that there's been advances on security guarantees, which is along with the ceding of land is the two big One of the two big sticking points. Zelensky himself last night extremely pessimistic about the talks amid really a growing sense, we'll talk about this, that Putin is just not going to agree to anything and that all of this is a big waste of time because they're trying to build a deal and this guy won't take any deal of any sort. All right, so we're going to talk about stuff. I'm going to kick it over to my colleagues in a minute on Venezuela and pretend to listen while I actually do some reporting. But you all can listen to what they have to say. But before a quick word from one of our sponsors. I'm just so disorganized this morning because of this news. Anyway, quick word from the [e-mail] they were a sponsor last year. They're back Grateful to have them. Entire site is 20% off. Go to takelean.com avoid fad diets. The weight loss, weight cycling, losing and gaining weight. No way to run a railroad or to be physically fit. So rather than losing 10 pounds and then gaining it back, this is a consistent way to lose weight. Most people need some sort of help. This was created Lean Products by doctors. It's an oral supplement, not an injection. I continue to be down on the injection. Some of you love them and swear by them. But I'll show you photos. I'll. I'll sneak some photos of people I know who do injections and you'll see what their faces look like. And, and you'll say to me, mark, what has happened to those people? And I'll say, they thought they could lose weight through injections in a safe way. The science behind Lean, it helps you maintain healthy blood sugar, control appetite and cravings, and helps burn fat by converting it to energy. Again, 20% off the entire site. Use the promo code 2WMM 2WMM. Two way morning [e-mail] Again2WMTakeling.com Get 20% off the whole site.

[James Patterson]

I'm James Patterson. I write way too many books. Welcome to Hungry Dogs. The title comes from my maternal grandmother, Isabel Zelvis Morris. Nan used to always say, hungry dogs run faster, James. And I've been running fast ever since. Here's what will be coming your way soon. And this is a really terrific list. I think you'll hear from some incredible people like Stacey Abrams. Yay, BJ Novak.

[Kevin Walling]

Yay.

[James Patterson]

Kathy Bates, Dolly Parton, Joss Gad, and Pope Leo. Okay, maybe not Pope Leo, but who knows? Maybe he'll show up. Hungry dogs run faster. Thank you, Grandma, for turning me into a hopeless obsessive compulsive. Listen to Hungry Dogs with James Patterson. That'd be me on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

[Mark]

All right, we always try to be forward looking here. A million things happened yesterday related to Venezuela. But guys, let's talk forward looking. Kevin, what's going well right now, Leaving aside whether you agree with the President on anything, including this, from their point of view, if you were White House Communications director, what's going well operationally, message wise, et cetera, right now for them?

[Kevin Walling]

Yeah, I think it's a good question, Mark. I think what the administration continues to highlight is the incredible success of the operation. Right. Putting the Chairman and the Joint Chiefs front and center on that. Obviously, there was a briefing for leading Senators yesterday with Pam Bondi, Secretary Hegseth Rubio. So again, focusing on the operational nature of the incredibly successful incursion into Caracas is certainly part of it. I think too what we're seeing with some of the more recent polling and it's more snap polling since Saturday's operation is that a majority of Republicans are sticking with the president when it comes to this operation and taking out Maduro. Right. It's got about 33% approval overall in terms of the operation based on this latest Reuters poll. But you're seeing more kind of the anti foreign entanglement folks on the right kind of holding their fire that we've seen in the last couple of days and mostly uniformly lining up behind the president on this element. So I think that one of the only positives really for this administration right now is the fact that MAGA world is generally united behind this operation, Eric.

[Mark]

Both on politics and on the substance in Venezuela.

[Eric Erickson]

What's going well, yeah, you know, I'm always dismissive of the Snapples, particularly ones over the weekend. But the president, I think he does need to make the case a little more. I don't know that most people realize Iran and Hezbollah have fronts within Venezuela right now, including an Iranian drone factory that we took out on the way out of Venezuela the other day. The fact that we were able to do it though, there's always a rally around the flag opportunity the president can seize on here because I mean this was a really impressive operation. It's something that neither Russia nor China can do. It's something that we did against Chinese and Russian air defense systems in Venezuela that they couldn't match the F35s, they couldn't match any of our even the helicopters. So the president's got that. He's got a united Republican front right now to be able to make the case. And the Democrat message is really split on this. You've got the gotheimers of the world praising getting rid of Maduro. You've got a lot of people who were demanding Trump 5, six years ago get rid of Maduro now saying why did you do this? This is illegal. This is look, you got Floridian foreign policy at play right now, which is good for the GOP because we're catering to the voters in South Florida. You've got the Cuban situation now destabilizing. The question though is what comes next? And I think a lot of people expecting reform in Venezuela may be disappointed by what comes next.

[Mark]

So. Well, let's talk about that because you know, I don't think the president's ever going to put serious military on the ground. I think he wants to threaten. He can use the Navy to blockade. He can threaten them with arrest. They can start indicting more people and then, and then go in and seize them. So sometimes when this stuff happens, you got to move quickly, Right? The Pentagon's like, we got to go to Baghdad right now. We got to get in there. We got it. We can't waste the momentum. It seems to me one thing, I'll just put this out for your consideration. One thing that's going well is this is all place and time of the choosing of Stephen Miller and, and Marco Rubio and the President. They don't have to rush. The ships are there. That seems to me, I put this up for consideration. That seems to me to be one thing that's going well. If the goal of to run the country through mafia like threats by the US Navy, do what we say or we're going to ruin your economy. It seems like time is on the side of the United States, except for the fact that it's costing the taxpayers money. Isn't Am I right that that is a positive thing for the plan that they seem to have, Eric?

[Eric Erickson]

Yeah, I think so. I mean, there's literally nothing Venezuela can do and for that matter, there's not a lot Cuba can do, which is the second domino here for Western Hemisphere control is dealing with them. And their oil is now gone. We had three ships yesterday try to run the embargo. All three were caught showing the dynamism of the American Navy being able to handle three major oil tankers at one time going in different directions. The coordination of the American military and intelligence is hands down better than anything any other nation has. So, yeah, I mean, this is, they got time on their hands that where is the Venezuelan government going to go? Nowhere. Yeah.

[Mark]

And Kevin, there's some reports that they're using the secret police and the military to stifle dissent. But again, you could imagine a parallel universe where there'd be rioting in the streets and chaos and fighting between different factions. The fact that there is, and again, this seems to me to be a positive and not by accident because they left in power people who can suppress dissent. So do you agree that this is a positive?

[Kevin Walling]

Yeah, Mark? Well, and certainly there's been reporting that, you know, there's obviously assessments coming out of this. Do they take out the entire regime? Obviously they opted to keep, you know, the vice president in place, this Delsey Rodriguez who was sworn in on, on Monday, you know, who'd been in office for the last eight years. Her brother is the head of the National. And to your point earlier, Mark, you know, it seems like bullying and threatening is somewhat working. She, you know, when we took Maduro, her, you know, her statement was, there's one president, it's Maduro still. And then just the next day after Donald Trump said, well, we'll go after you too. You saw her change her tune a little bit with regards to, you know, the geopolitical nature of this element. I wonder, I wonder, Eric, you bring up such an important point, and I wonder why the administration isn't talking more about this, the axis of evil, when it comes to Iran, China, Russia. I'd be emphasizing that a lot more. And you really. Obviously they're talking about the oil element of this, but I'd be talking about these three countries are making inroads in our neighborhood and this is why we took action. I wonder why they're not doing that as much.

[Eric Erickson]

That's the thing that flounces me about this administration and its messaging, and I get it's Trump and fly by the seat of his pants. But for people who don't know, not only has China been going into South America and taking over mines, giving loans they knew couldn't be paid back so they can take over mineral wealth in South America. But Iran and Hezbollah both do have land. There's an island in Venezuela. When I was back in my day in college, guys fantasized about going to this island because it was essentially golf, hookers and cocaine called Margarita Island. And you had all.

[Kevin Walling]

This is still. Eric, this is still a family show in the morning.

[Eric Erickson]

You gotta Maxim magazine and the like would do these stories on this island of Venezuela where I actually know some people who went for golf. And now it's an actual Hezbollah training facility. And we dropped bombs on it on the way out the other night. They're making Iran makes drones for Russia in Venezuela. There's a money laundering operation.

[Mark]

Sounds like the ultimate story for Vice back in its heyday. Yes, yes, exactly.

[Eric Erickson]

And this is a. It's a major operation and we're not really talking about it. There's something which is, by the way, I'm fine with as an oil brat who grew up in Dubai. But also you do have this ancillary issue that's a major issue.

[Mark]

There's something weird going on with China and Russia, and they're not their lack of enthusiasm about talking about it. They're happy to talk about Hezbollah. And obviously a big part of this is the whole macro. Trump, foreign policy, spheres of influence, sending a message to China and Russia, this hemisphere is ours. We can talk about Taiwan and Ukraine later. But. But they don't want to talk about China and Russia. Even though you're right, that's an axis of evil that people in this country respond to. I don't know why that is. The other thing, Eric, you mentioned the oil. The press is so against American having access to oil and fossil fuel in general. It's one of the few areas of coverage that I think has been anti Trump. I'd say overall the coverage has actually been pretty positive given that it's Trump. But they just don't, they don't like notion of gunboat diplomacy for. For oil. Now, again, I'm not telling you here I'm for using fossil fuel till 2070. And I'm not here telling you that I endorse a gunboat diplomacy to get to steal the oil from another country. But leaving that aside, just the president's openness, he did owner with Joe Scarborough yesterday and he said we're keeping the oil. And he said, I was such a critic of Bush not keeping the oil in Iraq. And he was at the time he thought we should have kept it.

[Kevin Walling]

So is that Maduro was something that Chuck Schumer called for a decade ago, that this has been a priority for the United States in terms of our foreign policy goals and that Democrats oftentimes are just on autopilot anti Trump on everything. And we've got to thread the needle a little better when it comes to this and be a little bit more agile when it comes to saying this is a good thing. But to Eric's point, what's next? What comes after this? That's the real question.

[Eric Erickson]

Real quick, Kevin, the implications for the Democrats, the Hispanic vote on this one is something that I don't think has gotten a lot of conversation out there in the media. But it does seem that you've had this shift towards the right then with the overplay of immigration, a little bit of a shift back to the left. And I do wonder your concerns for the Democrats playing the way a lot of them are playing and how this affects the Hispanic vote, particularly the South American people who have fled from South America to the US who don't like regimes like majority.

[Kevin Walling]

Yeah, it's a really good question. And you look at, you know, someone like Debbie Wasserman Schultz that represents, you know, a pretty large community down there. Her statement initially was, this is a great thing. Let's celebrate full Stop. Right. And not. Let's, let's hedge our bets on this when it comes to constitutional authority and things like that. Because I do think this would, you know, you see the images of folks celebrating the streets not just in Venezuela, but all throughout Florida, some places in Texas, other places, because this is roundly good thing for the 8 million Venezuelans, many of them are here in this country that have fled since Hugo Chavez.

[Mark]

All right, I want to talk about Greenland in a second, but I want to deal with some breaking news. And our policy on two way is to not hide news from you. I don't think there's anything wrong with talking about a possible story even though it's not finally confirmed. Don't, don't go, don't go to Vegas and bet on it and just take it. Take it. For what it's worth, an excellent source tells me that a member of the House has passed away, a Republican. And with Marjorie Taylor Greene's departure yesterday and the fragility of the majority that would give Republicans 218 votes in the House this if. And the second source just didn't confirm it. But, but responded in a way that makes me think it's true. So I think it, I think, I think it's true. So let's. Sorry, just reporting in real time. That happens. So let's talk about this. If the majority is 218, it means that the speaker could lose his job. Right. So the House is a complicated place. Yes. A member of the House just passed is being reported by others as best way. So let's talk about it. Eric, what are the implications of this?

[Eric Erickson]

Yeah, you know, I mean, we're headed into an election year right now, so the House isn't going to do much of anything this year anyway. The Republicans still have a numerical advantage. I think you're probably going to see people departing the House recognizing nothing else is going to get done other than the pro forma stuff they have to do.

[Mark]

Yeah. The speaker of the House. Sorry, the member of the House who passed away, California representative Doug LaMalfa, was 65 from Northern California, was the chair of the Congressional Western Caucus. I take all the points you just made, Eric, but if he loses his speakership, then we could have impeachment hearings. Right?

[Eric Erickson]

You could. And again, I just, I still think there is a numerical advantage there. You're not going to go. I don't think you're going to see him lose. But if he does. Yes. The House Democrats want to show their fighting to their base. The way to do it would be to push impeachment, which would die in the Senate, but it would still be a fundraising boon for the Democrats and excite their base.

[Mark]

Yep. So it's 218 now to 213. Okay. And, and, and so they still have a majority, but obviously every vote now makes. Makes everything harder. Okay, let's talk about Greenland. The. The Millers, Stephen Miller and his. And his wife. Blanket on her first name.

[Kevin Walling]

Katie.

[Mark]

Katie, thank you. Katie and Stephen Miller are the first couple of. Let's take Greenland. Katie put something on X about it, and then Stephen talked about it yesterday. Kevin, how seriously should we take this? What do you think the White House is actually trying to do? What would be an acceptable outcome for the president? Denmark says, no, you can't have Greenland still.

[Kevin Walling]

Yeah, I don't think there's any invasion imminent. Right. You know, we saw 15,000 service members, you know, off the shores of Venezuela before this military action. We're not seeing that obviously, play out. But he likes to, you know, have this kind of rhetoric and bully the Europeans. He bullied them into supporting more in terms of NATO commitments and things like that. So this could also be more. I think this is more rhetoric than anything. You see, there's a bipartisan Danish caucus in Congress, Blake Moore of Utah and Steny Horror of Maryland, Republican, Democrat, condemning any kind of this, not just the idea of invasion, but rhetoric down this path. You know, the Danish prime minister said this would shatter NATO. So this is a lot different than, you know, what we've seen with Venezuela taking out Maduro. I think you'd see real bipartisan pushback to this. So I don't think anything is imminent. I think it's all just rhetoric from this president.

[Mark]

Eric, is it just rhetoric?

[Eric Erickson]

Yes, it is. But. So I realize you're family friendly here, Mark, and so am I. But I'm doing my show. Note that comes out to what I'm going to talk about on my show, and if you'll forgive me for saying it on the show, if it offends people, I'm referring to this. I'm coining the term today of dickhead diplomacy. And I gotta say that this offends me as an American to have, you know, bad guys look at themselves in the mirror. And they don't call themselves bad guys. They think they're good. When you have Stephen Miller, who is a substantive policy person in the White House, going on television bullying not only an ally, but a better ally of ours in Europe than Germany, France and the UK The Danes have been Very good. I'm sorry, but you don't have to be a jerk to these people. You want an upgraded military facility in Greenland, Go talk to the Danes about upgrading the military facility. This performative bluster that they're engaging in, I think undermines them with allies and actually does make groups like the Danes, who have been really good partners of ours, less likely to want to help us in what actually is a very good strategic need of ours. We do need to build up what we've got in Greenland. And the level of engagement and diplomacy the White House is engaging in here undermines the President's core need, which is a substitute. It's like don't get me started on the national links Trust in D.C. same thing. You're just railroading through everybody, when actually you could get what you want and take ownership interest from other people if you just weren't such a jerk.

[Mark]

Yeah, Dick had diplomacy named after Richard Burton, by the way, the famous actor. Just in case anybody's wondering where Eric got that from. Speaking of great partners, Polymarket's partnering with us again this year. Glad to continue to be partnered with them. And here's. We're going to Polymarket. This question. Will Donald Trump acquire Greenland before 2027? Go ahead and put that up. Polymarket traders currently put the odds at 11% that by the end of next year or by the end of this year, the US Will acquire Greenland. That's up a little bit in the last few days, as the President's talked about this, but still only 11%. There you see the graph. For those of you not listening to the podcast, but watching us on YouTube or elsewhere, up to 11%, but still pretty low. I think the President's going to get something out of this. It may be dickhead diplomacy for some, but I think he's going to get more mineral rights, more base rights, and a greater cultural connection and probably a Trump hotel, let's be honest. In 2029, I mean, the Danes. Let's. I'll be honest, the Danes have done a crappy job with economic development and military fortification. And even though the President doesn't want to talk about China and Russia much regarding this hemisphere, that's what this is about. It's about being a bulwark against their influence in this hemisphere. All right, Ukraine, peace deal. As I said, everybody's meeting in Paris today. You know, Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff have better things to do than lost causes, so they at least think there's something to it. There is a report today here's the Reuters headline, Ukraine's allies meet with aim to make security pledges concrete. There's even talk again of some American military involvement that goes beyond intelligence and weaponry. But American forces, I'm still skeptical that that would ever be agreed to. Here's Zelensky's post on X from earlier today. These talks are meant to deliver more protection and strength for Ukraine. We are counting on our partner support and on steps that can guarantee real security for our people. Thank you for everyone who stands with Ukraine. Kevin, what I'm hearing from people in the national security community is they have to do this, they have to see it through, but that every indication now is that Putin is not going to agree to anything and that this is dead. So what happens? Let's just again try to be forward looking. If they determine Putin can't make a deal, won't make a deal. Does the president walk away from Ukraine?

[Kevin Walling]

Yeah, I think he does. We're coming up on four years of this invasion of Ukraine by the Russians. They've danced around quite a bit. Obviously. Zelensky was at Mar a Lago this past weekend, had a press conference, said we're very close. You know, he talked to Putin. But that's the whole ball game. As you said, Mark, at the outset, what is Putin going to agree to? He's already said, you know, not just American forces or boots on the ground in Ukraine with security guarantees, but any kind of foreign troop in Ukraine is a nonstarter for the Russians. You know, they want to take more land that they've not even captured at this point when it comes to Donbas. And that's a non starter for Zelenskyy. So, you know, again, I think, you know, the president likes to set these expectations out there, especially in these press conferences and things like that, obviously beyond what happened in Alaska. But I don't think they're anywhere closer to a deal than they were last year when we talked about this right before the end of the year. So again, you've got this coalition of the willing with France and ironing out these security guarantees today. But I doubt anything is going to really come down to it because Putin is not on board with anything.

[Mark]

Eric, if the president stops doing military aid, additional sanctions are still possible. Where do you think they'll head? If Putin. It's clear Putin won't make a deal.

[Eric Erickson]

I mean, we've just taken the greatest oil reserves on planet Earth. We can leverage that against the Russians, which it seems like we're probably going to. There are some chess moves that are happening behind the scenes here related to that? I think so, yeah. I think the president probably does walk more away from Ukraine, but also allows NATO to keep buying weapons. You just had the polls, the checks, and several other Eastern European countries that Trump likes step up and offer money to buy more weapons to give to Ukraine. So the president wants to make a deal and he's gonna profit our weapons industry off of this, even if we publicly, I think, step back, it seems like. And this is. And again, I don't have the insider information here on this one, Mark, you might, but it seems like he's given Rubio the Western Hemisphere so that Vance can scratch his itch on getting out of Ukraine, but we're too entangled with the European partners, whether we want to be or not, to completely walk away.

[Mark]

Yeah. So here's. Let's poly market this as well. Will there be a ceasefire by the end of this year? Polymarket betters pretty bullish on the prospect of a ceasefire by the end of the year compared to, I think, where a lot of people in the Trump administration are and where Zelensky seems to be, sorry, that's the wrong one. That's the Greenland put up the right one. 45% chance be a ceasefire by the end of the year, according to Polymarket betters. You can bet on anything on Polymarket and politics is one of them. And international relations. 45%. They've been around 50%. You still have the Greenland up guys. It's been around 50% for quite, quite some time. Toggling a little bit back and forth above 50. There you see it there, 45% now we shall see. But I'll be curious to see if Putin reacts to this and how much longer Jared Kushner will give up hanging out at home in Miami with his kids and working on business deals to butt his head against the wall. All right. Governor Waltz announced he wasn't running for election. We still don't know if Klobuchar is going to run, but it looks like she may. Well, there's some punditry and commentary about again, raising the question of the judgment of Kamala Harris for picking this guy. And we talked about this on two way tonight last night, which is how could the press have not talked more about this story in the context of Waltz being picked? Eric, going forward, what are the implicate. What's an implication, you see, of Waltz not running for national politics, if any?

[Eric Erickson]

You know, I do think it comes back to Kamala Harris's bid in 2028. Behind the scenes, Democrats are gonna have to second guess her political acumen. If that's her first big pick and she made it the big deal that this was going to be her pick and go with her gut. But also, I got to just scratch my itch on this one and say that for the last multiple days we've been treated to nonstop stories of who Nick Shirley is and how there's no there there. And yet there's no there there that took out the governor from running for reelection. Maybe the national press corps could show a little more curiosity about the scandal.

[Mark]

Yeah, Kevin, what implications do you see?

[Kevin Walling]

Listen, I'm just a big believer on if you're a mayor or a governor and you have the ability to run for a third term, you shouldn't. You know, there's been no real successful third terms in American history when it comes to big city mayors or governors. People get tired of you after 12 years. And, you know, I do think to your point, Mark, that Clobo is going to get in and run for governor and be, you know, a two year governor from a Midwestern state, turn the state around politically because of this, maybe capture a House seat or two, and then is looking really sharp to be a vice presidential contender because there's nothing that is not political in terms of what Amy Klobuchar thinks through in terms of her next step. So I think we'll be done talking about Tim Wallace for a long time. But to Eric's point, it will come back to haunt Kamala Harris down the road that this was her one decision. She was so dead set against Josh Shapiro, who was my guy, that she went in this direction and it was a failed choice.

[Mark]

Yeah. All right, a couple more topics to get to and then to your questions. If you're here on the platform, would like to be involved in any of these topics or topic of your choosing, please raise your hand. And if you've never raised your hand before, today would be a good day to do it. Healthcare, the premiums have expired. People are starting to see the premium. Healthcare subsidies have expired. People are starting to see the premium increases. They're incredible. I don't know how many of you guys know people who've already seen this, but massive premium increases. House Republicans meeting today at the Kennedy Center, Trump Kennedy center trying to figure out what to do about it. The president still hasn't weighed in. The bipartisan Senate group, a gang in formation that includes, amongst others, Jean Shaheen, who was on Fox News this morning. They're trying to come up with a solution and they're relatively optimistic. There's a bipartisan group in the House. There's of course, the discharge petition that'll be voted on maybe, maybe this week. And even though people continue to say this is a totally separate issue from the appropriations bills, I continue to believe that they're going to have to be co. Mingled in some way, even if it's just in terms of a deal, even if they're not putting the same legislative vehicle. So, Kevin, are you bullish or bearish on there being a deal on subsidies this month and why?

[Kevin Walling]

I'm bullish to your very point. I don't think there's any real interest to have, you know. Well, this may have been the reality before Venezuela. Any additional government shutdown in 24 days at the end of the month and that health care will be part of this. Again, there's a procedural vote with that bipartisan group in the House tomorrow and then final passage most likely on Thursday. Potentially in terms of that three year extension, Thune has said it's dead on arrival in the Senate. That so, I mean, that's going to be the real battle is between the Senate and the House when it comes to this extension. You've got Bernie Moreno and Gene Shaheen trying to work out this deal on the sidelines with a gang of the willing.

[Mark]

Are you bullish or are you bearish? I'm confused.

[Kevin Walling]

Well, I think it's going to happen. So. Yeah.

[Mark]

And what's the path? How's it going to happen?

[Kevin Walling]

There's going to be concessions on both sides and Democrats are going to have to give up shutting down the government again in order to make it happen. Because there's a lot of things on the table. Right now. You're seeing some bipartisanship when it comes to, you know, Hakeem Jeffries and Speaker Johnson supporting the minibus. It's going through when it comes to Interior, Commerce, justice and the appropriations process. So there is a willingness to get this stuff done and there is a path that we've seen. Obviously they're not tackling the more thornier government issues when it comes to funding, but there's enough on the table, I think enough concessions to be had to make this work.

[Mark]

Eric, how do they what's the most likely deal on health care? How do they finesse abortion? How do they finesse the length of the subsidy extension?

[Eric Erickson]

I mean, with the news today now of an even smaller House majority, it's gonna be hard to get anything through Republicans of the compromise on abortion. It's gonna Hurt them with their base and suppress turnout. You've got the midterms coming. My, my, my thinking is that they're going to come up with a very bad deal because both sides want to kick the can down the road further. So it'll be a bad deal that blows the caps off the budget, the national debt will go up, they will give lip service to solving it later, and they'll get onto the midterm. So they'll get something that no one will like, and it'll just spend a whole lot of money throwing money at a problem they don't want to fix.

[Mark]

I think that everybody wants a deal, but I still don't see how they finesse both. Abortion.

[Kevin Walling]

The House.

[Mark]

In the House. Yeah.

[Eric Erickson]

The abortion issue is going to be the tough one.

[Mark]

It's very complicated. All right, last thing. So when Mandami was going to on a glide path to being the mayor of New York City, everybody said the president wants him to win. Congressional Republicans want him to win because he'd be the face of the Democratic Party. Then he meets with the president and they have a love fest, and everybody kind of confused about what that would mean. But they said, well, they can still use him as a, as opposed to job. Now, I know there's a lot of other news, particularly Venezuela, but I'm here in New York City. I see it every day. This guy is doing all the things that Republicans dreamed about. He's hiring radicals for his government. He's doing policy stuff that's extremely left wing. You may agree with it, but it's the very stuff Republicans had hoped for. And yet it doesn't seem to be part of the national conversation. It's not even that big a story in New York. Even the New York Post and New York Times are, they're covering it, but it's not explosive. So what happened? Why did it go from he was going to be the face of the Democratic Party to so far, not that big a deal?

[Eric Erickson]

Eric, one, I think you got to let it play out a little more, get a little further into this. But also, you know, I've talked to a number of Republican consultants who were kind of banging their head against the wall on the idea of making him the face of the Democratic Party because they're thinking this is going to be an election about Trump, not Mandami, and you're going to have to have local politics. And the people in Iowa, the people here in Georgia, they're not really scared of Mamdani. He's a life lesson in what you don't do. And maybe you can prop up some Democrats in races around the country and say he'd be the Memdani. But I think most Republican consultants all along have thought it was a bad idea to try to make him the face of the Democratic Party when he's the mayor of a city.

[Mark]

Kevin?

[Kevin Walling]

Yeah, he's not the bogeyman that, you know, everyone was worried about. I think from a national perspective, he's not the Nancy, he's not the Nancy Pelosi, you know, run those ads in every single House district against the Democrats. But to Eric's point, you know, we've got to give it time. Obviously, Venezuela has knocked off any kind of, you know, he was sworn in on January 1st at midnight. Has knocked off any kind of coverage of what he's going to do. And now's the hard part, right? This is, this is the pros part. This is the poetry part of what he's got to do. And now he's got to deliver on affordability and things like that. And some of these appointments, too. I'm just like, you know, we'll see what happens.

[Mark]

They brought, they brought an anti Israel socialist to New York City. They made one of them mayor, and then they put the other guy in prison.

[Kevin Walling]

And executive orders, too, that are just.

[Mark]

I don't know, I didn't quite get that line right. There's a guy in New York, there's a socialist and anti Israel socialist in New York City who's dominating the news and his name is Maduro. How about that? That's really what I meant to say. All right, a quick word from another sponsor and then to your questions again. If you're here on the platform, want to be in the conversation, please raise your hearn. Very glad to say the Cozy Earth is back as a sponsor. I wore my Cozy Earth pants all vacation. I wore them to the beach and then I wore them. I'll, I'll mention the brand. I wore them to brunch at the Four Seasons and no one said, mark, why are you wearing your Cozy Earth pants here at the fancy Four Seasons? You just wore them on the beach. No one was the wiser. Cozy earth products available 20% off now, including the pants. Cozyearth.com promo code 2 WMM. That extends to the sheets, the bamboo sheets, the bubble cuddle blanket, all of the different pants that I love so much. Give the gifts of luxury this year. Buy some for yourself. Make every moment comfortable. Head to cozyearth.com use my code 2WMM for 20% off everything on the site. Be sure to mention you heard about Cozy Earth here. Some of you mentioned to me that you got Cozy Earth products over the holidays for your loved ones or got them as a gift. And everybody was very pleased. So right now, cozyearth.com promo code 2 WMM for 20% off everything on the site. Here we go. Nelson, welcome in. Tell folks who don't know where you are what's on your mind. For Eric and Kevin, thank you for being part of Two Way and Happy New Year.

[Nelson]

Happy New Year. I have an odd idea for 2026 have President Trump nominate Thomas Sowell for a Medal of Freedom. He's the foremost conservative economist in the country and he's brilliant, absolutely brilliant. And he hasn't got the Nobel Prize economics for the same reason Trump didn't hit the Nobel Prize for Peace, because he's a conservative and they should have a celebration day where they honor him and counterpose him against Mondami. He understands that everything that Mondami is doing is counterproductive. He became a conservative when he was working for a government agency where he figured out minimum wage laws hurt poor people. And he also understands that rent control laws hurt people. Mondami is now yesterday was walking around showing all these dilapidated apartments. They're dilapidated because they were rent controlled. So that's my idea. Celebrate. Mr. So he's 95 years old and make it a whole day and invite madame to debate him and put enough money on the plate so that madame can get incentivized to do it. That's my suggestion.

[Eric Erickson]

So Nelson singing a song I have been saying for a while, Amen.

[Mark]

Yeah, it's an interesting idea, Nelson, but I googled why you were talking and I see that Mr. Soul has criticized Donald Trump, said he had lacks character and knowledge and doesn't like the tariffs so it makes it less likely. But, but I do take your point. Thank you, Nelson. Good idea for many and I know Eric is a big fan as well. But I think if Donald Trump has somebody Google and you know, Laura Loomer could just walk in with it.

[Eric Erickson]

By the way, Mark, if I can add there, I actually raised this issue and was told the exact same thing, that the president knows that Soul's views on tariffs would come up.

[Mark]

Yeah, yeah. So there's, there's a lesson in there for somebody about something. Joshua, welcome in. You're more likely to be getting the Medal of Freedom apparently than Thomas Solis, at least from this president. Unmute. Happy New Year. Tell folks who don't know where you are. What's on your mind for, for Kevin and for Eric and thank you for being part.

[Joshua]

Yeah, I'm, thanks, Mark. I'm, I'm definitely not getting the Medal of Freedom from Donald Trump. That's, that's, that's for dang sure. I've, I might be on, on a little smaller record, but, but it is still a record of, of being a little bit critical of, of the Donald worried a little bit. First off, I'll say the, the Donald Trump corollary to the Monroe Doctrine. At least it's a coherent foreign policy, but a little bit worried that it moves us, it moves us all in on 19th century spheres of influence, global order. Again.

[Mark]

But Joshua, just, just, just to ask you on that, what's, I'm not saying there isn't a downside, but to you what, what's the downside of being all in on that? Assuming it's conducted the way he seems to conduct it, which is tactical strikes, not occupying a country, but just using our leverage, what are your concerns about it?

[Joshua]

My concerns are global. The 80 years post World War II, however we want to describe the social order, whether we want to refer to it as a Pax Americana or, or some sort of American stabilization effort.

[Kevin Walling]

The.

[Joshua]

Number of deaths post World War II in the 80 years post World War II significantly less than the number of deaths Pre World War II. Well, World War II and the 80 years prior to that. So I'm concerned that this focus on, pure focus on the Western Hemisphere is going to cede a sphere of influence to, to Russia is going to cede a sphere of influence to China. I worry about our, our promises and our security agreements with Taiwan and Japan now. And I'm a little bit worried about the relevance of NATO if the United States isn't all that concerned with, with supporting NATO and our, in our allies. And so I'd like to get, I'd like to get everybody's take on that. I, I am a proponent of post war Pax Americana all in on that. But, but maybe time is passing me by and, and I'd like to get everybody's take. It's good to see Eric. I haven't seen Eric in a while, so it's good to see Eric too, by the way.

[Mark]

Yeah, it's a, it's a hologram. It's like Max Headroom. We couldn't get Eric, but, but, but thanks but thanks to AI Eric, Sarah.

[Joshua]

Eric Erickson is actually dead and this is just a hologram like Michael Jackson.

[Eric Erickson]

It's incredible. I may I now.

[Mark]

Incredibly life. Incredibly lifelike. Kevin, address Joshua's concerns, if you would, about balancing concerns about this hemisphere with America's role in the world.

[Kevin Walling]

Yeah, Joshua, we're in complete agreement of those fears. Mark brought up the point earlier. You know, why have we been, you know, somewhat quiet when it comes to the threats posed by Russia and China? And maybe it's because Trump believes that he's going to cede other regions to these rising powers just as a part of the art of the deal. So this post World War II era that we've been in, to your point, has been relatively peaceful, and the rise of economic achievement and all that statistic wise certainly speaks to that. And if we are indeed entering into this now kind of global situation where you have these different regional spheres of influence with these dominating powers, I think it's a very dangerous thing, especially when resources get less and less, there's more competition. There's 60 active conflicts going on in the world right now that we're not even talking about. So, again, I think if we retreat to that mentality of spheres of influence with dominating powers, that they can just territorially grab whatever they want, resource wise or land wise, I think that's entirely problematic.

[Mark]

How many conflicts did you say, Kevin?

[Kevin Walling]

60. 60 active conflicts.

[Mark]

How many of those involved. How many of those do involve Laura Loomer? Just kidding.

[Kevin Walling]

It all depends on who's paying her off this morning.

[Mark]

Eric, thoughts?

[Eric Erickson]

Yeah. You know, so I actually think that there is a prevailing line of thinking behind the scenes in the Trump administration that we're a nation in decline. We got $39 trillion in debt. We can't get anything done. We. We can't build ships, so we have to mitigate it. And I think they're playing a. They are trying to go back to the 19th century, essentially. They looked at what the British Empire did in decline and said, that's what we've got to do, or we've got to start playing off people focused on our own interests. And it sounds smart, except we still, like we've seen in the bombing of Iran, in our weapons in Ukraine, in what happened in Venezuela, we're still the dominant party. So decline is a choice. I think the thinking within the White House has made to act as if we're a nation in decline and have to retreat to the Western Hemisphere, which is a dangerous game to play. It's going to put future administrations in a worse spot. And I really do think that we still have the ability to lead and to deal with China and Russia. At the same time. And they don't want to.

[Mark]

Yeah.

[Joshua]

Do you think it's a.

[Mark]

Go ahead, Joshua.

[Joshua]

Well, Eric, do you think it's a political choice then? So it's a messaging choice to. To act domestically like we're in a nation in decline for political leverage with. No, I don't think they're ever going.

[Eric Erickson]

To say it, and I don't think they can, but I think they believe we are. And so they're actually doing what they think is in the best interest of the country from their vantage point. I just disagree with them.

[Mark]

Yeah, I'm a big believer in thinking about the alternatives. Okay. So the challenge for every president since the Bushes has been leverage over China and Russia and over Bibi, honestly. And no president's been able to do it as powerful as the United States is, as powerful as the president's a bit. And I think one of the things Trump came back in after this interregnum of time to think about it, one of the things he said is you got to shake up the chessboard. You can't keep doing the same thing and expecting we're going to get leverage over China and Russia. That's the major responsibility of every president, and it's been for decades now. And I think just everything he's doing in this hemisphere is with an eye towards that. It's with an eye towards saying, through both confrontation and accommodation, we're not going to have the United States blood and treasure be oriented towards how are we going to match China particularly, but also Russia in the short term. And so I'm not saying this is going to work. I'm not saying I agree with every tactic or every decision, but it is a different policy, just as remaking NATO different policy. You had the Republican and Democratic presidents before Trump saying, well, of course NATO is fundamental, NATO is sacrosanct. And Trump said, no, NATO's not sacrosanct. Not trying to get rid of NATO. I'm trying to get them to pay their fair share. And I'm trying to reorient the mission towards keeping America safe as well as Europe. This may not work, but it is purposeful. It is with an eye towards saying, we're going to have peace in the Middle East. We're going to. We're going to make Iran less of a threat, we're going to make North Korea less of a threat, we're going to make China and Russia not be able to call the tune about how things go. May not work, but it's not doing the same thing. That Clinton, Bush, Obama, Biden all did. They all basically tried the same things. It didn't work. Same with the tariffs. The tariffs may not work, but the path we were on for long term economic decline to not be a manufacturing nation is not sustainable. So this, this could be a good thing, could be disastrous, but it's different and it's purposeful and it's leveraging the strength of the United States.

[Joshua]

Do you have any predictions for how this, how this shake up policy continues and what is, what's kept and what's cut away after Trump leaves office?

[Mark]

I've had the policy, no predictions post Trump. It's impossible to say anybody tells you what's going to happen to the Republican Party, American foreign policy after Trump, even if you knew who the president was going to be. To me, it's impossible to say that's going to be my policy for the next three years.

[Joshua]

Which again sort of like it hits right at the core of my concern because when we stray away from respecting international norms and again international law is what it is, maybe it's nothing. But when we, when we stray away from, from, you know, the, the historic alliances and, and respecting, supporting and upholding international norms and stability across the world, we, we get into this sort of up and down. Yeah, you know, chaos monster of policy.

[Mark]

There's a downside to it. Jeb Bush said Donald Trump would be a chaos candidate and a cast president and he was right. But Trump's view is he's, you know, Barack Obama had this view. A president can only make the world and the nation just a little bit better, just incrementally better. And that's just not Trump's view. Trump wants to leave having fundamentally changed stuff and there are risks involved. But I'll say again, got to think of the alternative. There are huge risks involved in just following the Bush, Obama, Clinton, Biden template. Huge risks involved and you can see that in America's unhappiness with the right track, wrong track, that's, that's sustained over a long period of time. We want to be a rapidly growing, powerful, respected nation. And, and you can't, you can't say we were on the right track before to do that. Joshua, thank you. Grateful to you. Thank you for being part two way. Dan, welcome in. Happy New Year to you. Do you get Eric Erickson substack? I do not. You should, you should look at me than I am one of the best out there. Just, it's so good. Dan, welcome. Happy New Year. Tell us what's on your mind. For Kevin and Eric, please.

[Eric Erickson]

Happy New Year, guys. I'm just wondering, assuming if the Democrats taking control of Congress this later this year and get the presidency in 2028, what institutional and legal changes can be made to prevent January 6th from happening again?

[Mark]

Eric?

[Eric Erickson]

Not a whole lot, frankly. I don't actually think that there are institutional changes that can be made largely because both sides have their own conspiracies over the election. And I think Democrats are given a little more leeway in the media to suggest that there's impropriety in elections when they lose. See Stacey Abrams treatment of the press. I don't think either side really has interest in fixing those institutional guards. Where you probably are gonna get some buy in is more restraints on presidential power. But I will say when I listen to the rhetoric of Democrats right now complaining about the stuff Donald Trump is doing, it sounds more like they don't like that he's doing it, not that they want the president to not have that power. So I just, I don't think you're gonna see those. Plus you're gonna have filibuster in the Senate blocking any of those reforms anyway.

[Mark]

Kevin, anything that could be done?

[Kevin Walling]

Yeah, I mean, you saw some activity, you know, a few Congresses passed with, you know, reforming electoral vote count act and things like that to make sure that there's some more structure around the role of the vice president coming out of what Mike Pence did. So I think that's already come to fruition, signed by President Biden. I do think this is decades long of Article 1 ceding all of its power to Article 2 and a commander in chief that has just amassed so much executive authority and power when it comes to executive orders, war making powers, what have you. And there really is no Appetite for Article 1 in Congress to reassert itself. It pops up when we see things like Venezuela, right, And. Or when we saw things with Syria under Barack Obama. But for the vast majority of our time that we've seen with Congress, there's no appetite to really do anything because they don't want to take the hard votes and they're happy to just cede all this ground to an imperial president.

[Mark]

Dan, thank you. Grateful to you for being part of two Way. Thank you. Ellen, welcome in. Thank you for being part of two Way on mute. Tell folks who don't know where you are what's on your mind. For Kevin and for Eric.

[Nelson]

Hi.

[Ellen]

Happy New Year, everyone. First, Eric, I have to tell you that my sister, my sister recommended you to me. She's very liberal. And she said, erik Erickson is the only conservative I can stomach. So she's like, you got to follow him on substack.

[Eric Erickson]

Thank you.

[Ellen]

I appreciated her recommendation. But I was just listening to what you all were talking about regarding risk and just all the recent events, and I was wondering what is the riskiest part of us intervening in Venezuela in this way or.

[Mark]

Yeah, great, great question, great question, Kevin. What's the single biggest risk of this?

[Kevin Walling]

I think some of the, it's a great question, Alan. Some of the unintended consequences of what Russia and China's reaction will be because of this. And do we, to Joshua's point earlier, see them ground when it comes to spheres of influence? Does this give some semblance of moral cover for Xi Jinping? All indications are he wants Taiwan by 2027. Does this give the Chinese some more leverage on the world stage if we're going in and just taking out the head of a government? They obviously view the Taiwan question as a domestic question, not even an international question, because of what they view Taiwan to the homeland of China to be. So that's, I think my fear is the geopolitical nature of this or does it also, to maybe Trump's point, give them pause when they see how effective this operation was, when they see how effectively we destroyed their, their, you know, their anti air systems and things like that and caused a blackout in Caracas to do this, does it give them pause militarily? I don't know. But again, that's my, that's my fear with any of this. Does it give, give the CCP cover, Eric?

[Mark]

Eric?

[Eric Erickson]

Yeah, I actually think the biggest risk is the political risk of nothing actually changing in Venezuela, that maybe we get the oil but the regime stays. There have been people dancing in the streets in South Florida, New York and Los Angeles over. We get to go home now because Maduro is gone. You can't go home now when the Chavistas are still in charge of the country and they don't want you coming back. So suddenly people start wondering, is there going to be any more from the Trump administration other than just we've changed the leader, it's still the same party, but we get the oil.

[Ellen]

Is there anything in particular we should be keeping our eye on as to us leading into a certain direction of this whole situation becoming more concerning, or is it just unknowable?

[Eric Erickson]

I would keep an eye on Cuba next. Not, not overthrowing the regime, but do we block further Cuban assets from Venezuela? The Cubans aren't very good at much other than their intelligence apparatus is incredibly good, particularly in Central and South America. We took out over 30 Cubans who were protecting Maduro so that they were protecting him to get the oil. If we can further destabilize them, that then further destabilizes other socialist regimes in South America as well, including the new Colombian president.

[Mark]

Yeah. Alan, thank you. Very grateful to you. Thank you so much. A few things about the House in the wake of the death of Congressman, first of all, very beloved gentleman who passed away, Congressman La Malfa, I confess I, I've heard of him, I've never met him, didn't recognize how beloved he was. The statements that are coming out from his colleagues are quite heartfelt and you know, all of us have read statements like that over the years. These are truly heartfelt statements. In addition, Representative Jim Baird, 80 year old house Republican from Indiana is in the hospital after a car crash. So 218 is their number. Now. The, the Democrats only have 213. That means they can only lose two on any vote now which is, which is a slim margin. But losing the majority requires not just Republicans dropping below 218 because we're dealing with vacancies here. Democrats would have to actually pass them numerically. I haven't yet lined up all the specials that are coming up, but I'm telling you where one or two, one or two House departures away, given what I recall of the schedule for the specials coming up to being a real possibility that Democrats have the majority. So it's not a prediction. It's not, it's not a, it's not determined that that will happen. But it really could happen. And at a minimum, even though Eric correctly pointed out there are not a lot of huge House votes coming up, but for instance, House Republicans want to maybe do reconciliation on some things very hard to do with, with this lack of margin of error because you've got one or two who are just recalcitrant and almost anything in any event, Thomas Massey, for instance, the gentleman from Kentucky coming up today two way tonight special time, four o' clock live on the platform. We'll have all the latest news. So join me at 4 o' clock today live on the platform for two way tonight, regular time on YouTube and X at 6 o'. Clock. But 4 o'.

[Kevin Walling]

Clock.

[Mark]

I'll send you a reminder from my substack but four o' clock today, Moynihan Report. Also recording early, Michael will be joined by Daniel DiMartino. If you've never, if you haven't seen Daniel in the last couple days. He's at the Manhattan Institute, a great expert on on Venezuela. So join Michael at 6 o' clock Eastern again air on YouTube at 7 tomorrow. We do not have Kevin and Eric back, although I hope they'll both come back soon. Who we do have tomorrow is Matt Gorman and Jaime Moore who are back here tomorrow to guest co host with me on the morning meeting in 23 hours from now. And grateful again to both Eric and to Kevin again, I'll say if you don't get Eric's substack, you're making a huge error. You should do that. And you can listen to him every day, 12 to 3 Eastern on the Eric Erickson Show. Kevin, anything you want to plug, family vacation, Instagram photos, anything.

[Kevin Walling]

I'll be back on with you on Friday morning. All right. Well, all right. Conversation. So can't wait to be back.

[Mark]

See you in a few days. Thank you all for being part of the two way community. Thank you again to Eric and Kevin, all the folks who produced the program. And I'll see you at 4:00 today, special time on the platform and then six o' clock on YouTube. Have a great day everybody.

[Eric Erickson]

Thank you.