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- [00:00]
A
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B
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C
Stein, managing editor of the Bulwark, joined by Andrew Egger, author, Morning Shots, wearer of a Washington Commander's Captain Loser franchise. Just kidding. They're fine. My franchise is. My franchise is the Loser franchise. The New York Giants. We're going to talk about Morning Shots for this A Bulwark Takes episode. I'm getting into the habit of saying that every time. Subscribe to the feed so you can get great takes. Subscribe to Morning Shots so you can get a great newsletter. We're going to be Talking about the content of the newsletter, but I'm more interested in the reaction to it. Andrew is in what we call the barrel. The RNC Twitter handles are all going after him. You are apparently scum, garbage, and one of the worst journalists ever to grace this profession. Why are they so mad at you, Andrew?
- [02:39]
D
Yeah, I'm used to hearing all this from you, Sam. So it was a little shock to hear the RNC also express so many correct opinions. I'm not used to that from them. No, it's. The reporting from this morning is about Joe Grutters, who is the chair of the RNC as of this summer. Um, and he is kind of an interesting guy because he is not nearly as public facing as a lot of the RNC chairs we've had in the past. Most notably, Obviously, like, Ronna McDaniel, who has, like, more than a million Twitter followers and stuff. People don't pay a ton of attention to, like, his every utterance. Right. He's not. Doesn't have this giant media operation. So it was interesting to us when we learned this weekend, or just a couple days ago, that, that he has spent the last week kind of going around to all these conservative talk shows and talking about the midterms in kind of wild ways. I mean, he's really, really, really trying to set expectations very low.
- [03:29]
C
Let's play a couple of them. Thank you.
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E
You'd hit the nail on the head. This is a absolute disaster. You know, no matter what party's in power, they normally get crushed in the midterms. What's interesting is the. The party in power always gets crushed in the midterms. It's not a secret. There's no sugarcoating it. It's a pending, looming disaster heading our way. And the question is, how can we reverse that trend? But let me put in perspective. Only three times in the last hundred years has the incumbent party been successful winning a midterm.
- [04:04]
D
Wow.
- [04:05]
E
Four times in the last 150. We're facing almost certain defeat. The only person that could bring the nose up and help us win is the president, United States, Donald J. Trump.
- [04:15]
C
That's not really low, buddy. That's like below the floor, through the earth, down the earth's core, basically.
- [04:22]
D
Right, right. And that's always kind of the way these things go. Right? I mean, it's all. It's all.
- [04:25]
C
It's not.
- [04:26]
D
No, no, no. Him saying it is not. But. But I'm saying doing the expectations game is normal. Right. I mean, every operative wants to, like, set a lowish bar that they can then exceed and clear. But this was really unusual, like from any party chair ever to hear like this kind of like dramatic. The word disaster is not the word that you ever really hear any political operative using to describe their own chances ever. Even if it isn't, let alone the.
- [04:52]
C
Chair of the RNC or the DNC or anything like that. It's nutty. So what's the reaction? Well, actually, to give you a sense of how crazy this is. Okay, because it is crazy, first of all. And we should have made more note of this in, in, in the newsletter itself, I kind of kicking myself by this. But it is diametrically opposed to the White House's own messaging. Right. Which is that things are gravy. They're going to be fine. They're going to keep control of the House. Things, you know, politically they're, they're totally in control. They expect to retain this. The House and Senate. Two is the reason this sort of matters is because it can deflate your donors, it can deflate members of your own party. Could signal to members of your own party that maybe you should probably, you know, get out before you get beat. Right. So you're too young to know this. How old were you in 2009?
- [05:41]
D
How old was I in 2009? I guess I would have been about 15.
- [05:43]
C
Okay, maybe you're not 10. So back then, during the Obama White House days, Robert Gibbs was pressed, right. And there's kind of like this. There was a moment where he was asked at one of the briefings. Oh no, sorry. It was, he was asked that, I think on a Sunday show, Meet the Press, what he expected if they were worried about the midterms. And he said this. Okay, this is all he said. I think there is no doubt there are enough seats in play that could cause Republicans to gain control. That was the totality of the quote, which is like not, it's not even in the same stratosphere as what, as what the RNC chair has said. It caused a multi day crisis for Democrats. You know, Nancy Pelosi was pissed. I'm pulling up this story from cnn. This is what one senior Democratic official told senior members were hot, hot, hot about it. He had to backtrack it. It was, it was just, you know, it was bad. So again, this is not a normal utterance from a committee chairman. Bulwark Takes is sponsored by Seoul. The holiday season can be stressful. Endless shopping, travel, parties. Every weekend when I need to slow down and actually relax, I reach for Soul's out of Office Gummies. It's the perfect balance of CBD and THC and it helps me find my calm and and keep my peace of mind. Sol is a wellness brand that believes feeling good should be fun and easy. Sol specializes in delicious hemp derived THC and CBD products designed to boost your mood and help you unwind. Their best selling out of Office Gummies were designed to provide a mild relaxing buzz and enhance your creativity and relaxation. There's five different strengths you can tailor your dose to fit your vibe. There's the gentle 1.5 milligram microdose which as I have mentioned many times, perfects my art of parenting. And there's their newest 15 milligram gummy for a more elevated experience. And if you like their out of office gummies, try the new out of Office beverage, a refreshing alcohol free alternative that's perfect for winding down on the couch or socializing with friends at one of those endless Christmas parties. Bring on the holiday cheer and treat yourself or someone you love to Seoul this season. Right now, Seoul is offering our audience 30% off your entire order. Go to GetSoul.com and use the code Bulwark takes. That's Get Soul promo code Bulwark takes for 30% off to kind of give.
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D
A little bit more context about what's happening here. Right? I mean, the, the, the point he's making in each of these quotes is kind of the same one. And each of them he's saying, look like the party that's in power just tends to get absolutely destroyed in the midterms. Right? Historically that tends to be the case. And he, and he goes on in each of them to say that like our only hope of, of bucking that trend and, and averting this disaster that I'm talking about here is to, to just cling to Donald Trump harder than we've ever clung to him before. And that's interesting in and of itself, right? Because right at this moment, Republicans are more so than at any point since like, maybe, I don't know, 2018 or something like that, starting to actually sort of reassess their priors about how much they need to be like bear hugging Donald Trump. Like every Republican in the country pretty much has been bear hugging him or all the time through every race for, you know, more than five years at this point. But because it's so many of his own policies that have, that are putting them in trouble, especially when it comes to affordability and the tariffs and all these sorts of things, and because we're also starting to see some of these, like, loyalty cracks happening in the MAGA base with people like Marjorie Taylor Greene and things like that. It's become more of an open question than ever before. Like, how much are these guys going to all keep bear hugging the President? And so the chairman is going out there and he's saying, don't stop. You know, like, this is our only shot to. To, you know, do fine next year is keep going, keep going, keep doing it. But. So, but. But it is notable that while he is doing that, he is talking about, you know, the alternative or. Or what is likely to happen in these just, again, just insanely apocalyptic terms.
- [09:41]
C
All right, so that's one part of the story. But the. The funnier part of the story is how the RNC's digital team has handled it, which is not well. I'm gonna read you a few of the tweets that the RNC research account, clearly doing a lot of research here has put up. Some of them are response to you and me and others. Some of them respond to other people who pulled the same quotes. Here's one. You're a lying piece of. That is in response to Henry Sisson. Okay, great. You're a lying piece of. They said, here's the full quote. This is to me. So I take a little pride. Hey, jackass. Here's the. Hey, jackass. Here's the full quote. Now, mind you, they put in this full quote, and I'm just going to read the full quote that they themselves are highlighting. I like our chances in the midterms, but let me put it in perspective. Only three times in the last hundred years has the incumbent party been successful winning a midterm. We're facing almost certain defeat. Again, I don't really see why they're pushing this stuff, but whatever.
- [10:39]
D
And he goes on to say, you know, like, unless. Unless we really embrace Donald Trump harder than we ever had before. Like we were. Let me keep going.
- [10:44]
C
I'm cooking. Let me cook here. This is in response to Democrat account. They say, here's the full quote, you comma scumbags. I don't know why they put the comma in there. Kind of broke it up. Then their spokesperson accused you of doing poor reporting. Then the RNC going after Gavin Newsome. You're a liar. Then they made fun of you for misspelling the RNC chairman's last name, which you. I did do that quickly. You did up. I'm not going to sugarcoat it. You that up.
- [11:08]
D
In the heat of battle.
- [11:09]
C
In the heat of battle. Going after Aaron Blake. This is fake news. Here's the full quote, comma, scumbag. They really like scumbag. Oh, Bill. Crystal. This is a good one. How much does Harvard charge these days to learn how to report bullshit? What I don't. Is Bill being paid by Harvard still. He's a graduate. Hold on, there's more. I'm gonna let it go. Oh, and then we'll get.
- [11:31]
D
People get the idea, I think.
- [11:32]
C
No, no, no, no, no. We're gonna go. Here's another one breaking. You're a massive loser and a liar. The Daily Beast, which picked up on the story, is a left wing hack outlet spreading fake news. Okay. They get the point. So how are you feeling about that?
- [11:45]
D
Well, it's been interesting. The, the one interesting morning interesting Friday from like a comms perspective. Right. I mean they, it is interesting to see the, the kind of like confidence in the, in the narrative silos so strong there.
- [11:59]
C
Yeah.
- [12:00]
D
They're not really trying to win an argument with anybody who is like actually reading the piece. Right. Because I did, I did give context for all these remarks and I did talk about.
- [12:08]
C
You were over the top fair about it.
- [12:10]
D
Yeah, yeah. I mean like people can go read it if they want to. I linked to the full audio clips of these, these radio hits that the RNC had posted themselves on SoundCloud, which the RNC then subsequently pulled off SoundCloud and deleted while they are accusing me of not putting guy in contact. It's all just very strange. But like, again, the idea is not to like reach a median kind of like reasonable person. The idea is to take what is sort of an alarming story for Republicans of, of these, of their chair talking in these sort of dire terms about their own chances instead of doing the pump up work he's supposed to be doing, taking that story, trying to turn it into like a media story. Right. Like the story of the dastardly fake news bulwark as well as all these other organizations, you know, being unfair and taking things out of context and basically just trying to keep the attention on anything other than the actual words that the, the chair has been saying out there in the media.
- [13:05]
C
I liked what town hall did. They accused you of Ms. Stating or Ms. Giving no context to the chairman Joe Gruder's quotes. But then they missed. They mangled the quote.
- [13:17]
D
Yeah. They themselves actually then did mangle the quote. And then they also included an audio clip in their tweet where like nine seconds in, he says the thing that I quoted him as saying. It's Just, it's a very surreal, very surreal story overall. I don't know. Like, it's, it's, it's true, though. I mean, like, it's. It is true that the chair was correct in his assessment that. That it is really hard for any incumbent to win in the midterms. And it is also particularly true, as I got. I mean, like, this is so weird is like, we haven't talked at all about the actual, like, real reporting that I did in the piece, which was not just sort of transcribing these radio hits, but also talking to a bunch of Republican strategists about what they make of, like, you know, this idea that they just need to grasp Trump ever more aggressively, clasp him to their bosoms, you know, and they're. A lot of them don't like that idea. A lot of them think that it's his policies, you know, it's the affordability stuff that is. That is gonna kill him next year, but they feel kind of sunk because this White House does not permit you to, like, go your own way at all. If you're not, like, MAGA waving the flag the whole way, you might have to worry about MAGA nuking you from orbit before you even get to, you know, your, Your tough purple state race against a Democrat or whatever. So there's all kinds of difficult, difficult landmines for that. Republicans are inching around right now.
- [14:28]
C
And that's the funny part about this piece. It's like such a classic. I think they call it Kinsey gaff or whatever, where it's like, he's telling the truth. Like, they're gonna, they're. They're probably gonna get killed in, in this midterm. And you substantiated not just by quoting him, but by getting these Republican operatives to say, yeah, it's bleak out there. And the surfacing of the truth is the most problematic thing for everyone is that they just. They can't handle it and they have to then go on the attack. Very.
- [14:59]
D
I gotta say, I was sympathetic. I was sympathetic to, to, to the chair for one reason, which is that I myself know what it's like to get off a radio hit and be like, that's kind of stupid, that thing I said. I, you know, let's hope that just sort of slips back into the past. And, and maybe he thought he was clear. You know, this is all from last week or so, so I'm sorry about that, Mr. Gruder's, in that respect.
- [15:18]
C
I think the problem here is I think they gotta. It's mostly they gotta please an audience of one here. And that's Trump. Doesn't want to hear his RNC chair saying they're about to get killed. All right, buddy, I'm glad your voice is getting better. I can still tell that you're soldiering through it.
- [15:35]
D
We're playing hurt, as JBL says. Yeah, we're doing it.
- [15:38]
C
Playing hurt. I've made this comparison before to other people. It's like the MJ flu game.
- [15:42]
D
Exactly.
- [15:43]
C
It's unbelievable what you're doing here. People are going to write books about it. Okay.
- [15:47]
D
World historical. Yeah, exactly.
- [15:48]
C
Andrew taking it, taking it on the chin online, suffering from some sort of ailment medically. And yet here he is doing a bulwark takes. That's how much we, we care about our audience. Thanks, buddy. Talk to you later.
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E
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