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Sacha Stone
Hi, this is Free Thinking through the Fourth Turning. I'm Sacha Stone. The real autopsy the Democrats can't face. No point in cutting open a body if no one can talk about what's inside.
Barack Obama
If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible, who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time, who still questions the power of our democracy, Tonight is your answer. It's the answer told by lines that stretched around schools and churches in numbers this nation has never seen, by people who waited three hours and four hours, many for the first time in their lives, because they believed that this time must be different, that their voices could be that difference. It's the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Hispanic, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been just a collection of individuals or a collection of red states and blue states. We are and always will be the United States of America.
Narrator/Reporter
We've come to Philadelphia, the birthplace of our nation, because what happened in this city 240 years ago still has something to teach us today. Our country's motto is E pluribus unum. Out of many, we are one. Will we stay true to that motto? We heard Donald Trump's answer last week at his convention. He wants to divide us from the rest of the world and from each other. We will not build a wall. Instead, we will build an economy where everyone who wants a good job can get one. And we'll build a path to citizenship for or millions of immigrants who are already contributing to our economy. We will not ban a religion. We will work with all Americans to fight and defeat terrorism. If you believe the minimum wage should be a living wage and no one working full time should have to raise their children in poverty, join us. If you believe that every man, woman and child in America has the right to affordable health care, join us. And yes, if you believe that your working mother, wife, sister or daughter deserves equal pay, join us. That's the country we're fighting for.
Civil Rights Speaker
Ella Baker, a giant of the civil rights movement, left us with this. Give people light and they will find the way. Give people light. Those are words for our time. The current president has cloaked American darkness for much too long. Too much anger, too much fear, too much division here and now. I give you my word, if you entrust me with the presidency, I will draw on the best of us, not the worst. I will be an ally of the light, not the darkness. It's time for us, for we the people, to come together and make no mistake, united, we can and will overcome this season of darkness. In America, we'll choose hope over fear, facts over fiction, fairness over privilege.
Narrator/Reporter
Our nation, with this election, has a precious, fleeting opportunity to move past the bitterness, cynicism and divisive battles of the past. A chance to chart a new way forward.
Sacha Stone
The 2024 election was a disaster for the Democrats. They've never been held accountable for any of it. That would ordinarily be the job of the legacy media, but they've long since abandoned any pretense of objectivity. They're part of the resistance, and friendly fire is not in the job description. Do I sound bitter? I suppose I am. I once believed in not just the Democratic Party, but the Obama coalition. I was a loyal, devoted soldier who believed we were all fighting the good fight. Even before Trump won. We were the side that cared about climate change, women's rights, the poor, the marginalized. It took me decades to go from being a cynical 18 year old in the 1980s to who didn't think there was any point to voting to a person who believed my vote could change the world. That cynicism would be polished off over time. As we headed into the 1990s with political correctness and therapy, culture on the rise, we wanted to fix ourselves. We wanted needed to fill the void left by the doom spiral in the aftermath of the me generation and their counterculture revolution. It was Bill Clinton by way of Aaron Sorkin who ultimately pulled us out of it and primed us for a spiritual revival under the euphoric history making win of Barack Obama. I believed in hope and change. I believed in a new America. I believed my friends on Facebook who treated me with respect and love every time I fired off an impassioned plea for votes. I believed all the women who made those signs for the Women's March, the Climate March and the Gun Control March. I too thought Trump's win meant America couldn't handle the first black president and the Confederacy was back for another round. What I know now is that none of it was real. We were not the new Puritans leading the country into the promised land. We were like every other political party, seeking absolute power and total control. Any truthful autopsy would have to start there. The Democrats have been lying to themselves and lying to their voters about what these last 10 years have really been about the refusal to relinquish power. After losing an election. Democracy becomes a problem for a party that no longer believes in it. If the wrong people win. Here is real clear politics. Andrew Walworth, Tom Bevin and Carl Cannon.
Political Analyst
This has been controversial from the beginning. DNC chair Ken Martin ordered the report, then squashed its release. And miraculously, in my view, he kept it from being leaked. And then they did release it and we quickly learned why he wanted to keep it under wraps. Here he is explaining the importance, or maybe in his view, the non importance of the report.
Sacha Stone
There's no smoking gun in the report.
Political Commentator
And I know that's, that's what everyone's so eager to learn and I.
Civil Rights Speaker
The smoking gun.
Political Analyst
So Tom, what do you make of that?
Political Commentator
We don't want to be focused looking backwards, but what we want to do is we want to learn the lessons of two years ago so that we can use those lessons, move forward. I'm like, look, this guy has, has, has botched this in the worst possible way. You know, so I skimming, it's 192 pages and they put this, you know, sort of odd disclaimer at the top of every page that this, this doesn't represent the view of the dnc and, and all these things. There's no executive summary. It's, it's like missing, they didn't, they didn't produce one. So this thing is a, it's a mess.
Everything Martin said in his, in the clip you played, Andy, is simply wrong. You know, smoking gun is not even, that's not even the appropriate metaphor. The, the Democrats lost to Donald Trump in 2024 and they didn't expect to. They thought he was, they thought the American people would reject him and it would be a landslide. They were proven wrong. Not only did Trump win, he won a plurality of the vote. He almost won an outright majority. He carried all the swing states and he did better in all the blue states than he'd done before. And the Democrats have such a low opinion of him. What you want to do is, all right, what did, what you did, what did we do as a party that led to this? So it won't happen again. It's not a smoking gun. You want to figure out where you went wrong. And so he commissioned this report. From the beginning, it looked like it was going to be a cover up. Then it was delayed. Then this thing comes out riddled with typos, half finished annotation. They denied it. They did that. They only released it because CNN released it. The thing is just a terrible, it's not even a finished product in it and it wasn't even an honest document. What, what the problem for the Democrats, for the DNC is that they're, I said, I quoted Barney Frank yesterday on the show that we take, we take our least, the Democratic Party has taken its least popular policy issues and made them litmus tests for candidates. This has caused them problems. Trent, Transgender sports was not really mentioned in the report, although Donald Trump's ad on transgenderism, you know, he's for they. What was that?
Political Analyst
She's for they them. He's for President Trump is for you.
Political Commentator
Yeah. And, and they say, well that would, that was an effective thing. But she couldn't really respond to it. It wasn't her fault. Well, she couldn't respond to it because the Democrats have painted themselves in a corner on this issue. The same is true at the border. The other big and the biggest issue of all is how they even end up with Kamala Harris as the nominee. They never had primaries. They ran, they, they gaslighted the American people for years about Joe Biden's condition. Then when that became untenable, they, you know, did this big switcheroo.
Sacha Stone
Any honest autopsy of the 2024 election would have to start back in 2016. Hillary Clinton was anointed by Obama who leapfrogged Biden, meaning Biden would finally get his shot in 2020. They should have thought that one through because it would come back to bite them four years later when they pushed him out of office. They practiced top down democracy in which party leaders attempt to steer voters in the right direction rather than allowing candidates to make the case to the people. The problem with the Democrats is that they needed someone like Donald Trump to blow through their carefully laid plans. Here's a video from Fox the Five.
Political Commentator
So what does it say? Well, it pins the blame on Team Biden for failing to elevate his VP before she took over the reins of the party and blasting Kamala for failing to address Trump's they them attacks. It also says the Democrats lost connection to working class Americans focusing too much on anti Trump messaging. But these Democrats don't want to hear anything about it.
We didn't need an autopsy to tell us the Democratic Party doesn't know what the they are doing right now.
Civil Rights Speaker
I don't really care. I mean, I'm not sure those are the right people to diagnose what went wrong with the election.
Political Commentator
An autopsy is a medical procedure you do over a corpse. And now it sounds like we need a malpractice attorney because we couldn't even do the autopsy correctly.
Singer (Simon & Garfunkel - 'Most of the Time')
Yeah.
Political Commentator
The report is also getting called out for what it doesn't talk about, there
Political Analyst
is nothing about Joe Biden and what happened in the debate. There's nothing about Kamala Harris getting the nomination without any kind of primary process.
Sacha Stone
And.
Political Analyst
And also there is nothing about the way that voters were responding to Gaza and how Joe Biden and Kamala Harris policies and comments about it were hitting their minds.
Political Commentator
It felt like it was a document designed to make sure nobody in the
current
leadership of the party would get fingered for the blame.
Singer (Simon & Garfunkel - 'Most of the Time')
No.
Political Commentator
Well, to make matters worse for the left, according to the latest poll, only 20% of voters approve of the job the Democrat Party is doing. That puts them at 52 points in the hole heading into the midterms. Jessica doesn't believe that, Greg. I think it's true, though. I think this autopsy, what makes it so amazing is it wasn't that it had something in it no one knew and they didn't want anyone to know about it said the autopsy essentially confirms the entire line of attack Republicans used against Kamala and Biden through the entire election.
Yeah, that's part of it, you know, but why? People keep asking, why did it take so long to release the autopsy? Well, they were waiting for Kamala's toxicity toxicology report to come back. But autopsies are like an intervention. You know, your friends and family show up to tell you all the bad stuff that you've done. But here, they did skirt a lot of the issues. Why was that? You know, they. The ones that mattered were the cultural issues. They weren't brought up here, and they weren't mentioned especially trans, because they haven't changed their positions on them.
Sacha Stone
The shame of what the Democrats did in 2024 is almost as bad as what they did in 2020 to orchestrate Joe Biden's win. Both of these elections were rooted in the mass delusion that Donald Trump wasn't just a political opponent, but an existential threat. So anything goes. Even censoring the Hunter Biden laptop or pushing out a duly elected president. That delusion gave them unlimited power in their minds, which made them the most corrupt political party in my lifetime, taking what never belonged to them, pushing resistance theater throughout American society and coming up mostly empty. Anyway, the real autopsy would require cleaning house on all of it, admitting everything. It would also require admitting to their voters that they knew they were lying about Trump to cover up their own failures. After all, wouldn't it have been easier just to offer the people something better rather than treating Trump like a supervillain who could not be destroyed by ordinary means? No, because their biggest problem is that their only vision for the future is to reach back into the past. They still want to undo the Trump presidency rather than learn from it. They're fighting to bring back the utopia we all built under Barack Obama. And that has been the Democrats fatal mistake. Barack Obama's grip on the party means they can't move forward. A real autopsy would have to talk about Obama's ongoing influence and control of the party. Why do they think he's making appearances with Zorhan Mamdani and James Tallarico A
Narrator/Reporter
special visit for children and parents at a childcare center in the Bronx Today, former President Obama joined Mayor Mamdani at the Learning Through Play Pre K Center in Mott Haven. This comes as Mamdani pushes to expand access to free care for two year olds. The two read a book together and posed for pictures. It is the first time Obama and Mamdani made a public appearance together. Memorable day. For those kids and parents, this meet
Political Commentator
and greet was such a secret that no one would even tell us who was coming until he walked in the door. And the minute he got out of his car, those not in the know were shocked. Barack Obama made his way throughout the restaurant, referring to Talarico as the future senator and Hinojosa as the future governor of Texas. The former president made sure to shake hands and talk with everybody in the store, including the families of Hinojosa and Talarico. After Obama signed books, took photos and talked to nearly everyone in the shop, he shouted this on his way out.
Thank you.
Sacha Stone
Thank you guys. Thank you so much.
Singer (Simon & Garfunkel - 'Most of the Time')
All right, everybody remember the vote.
Sacha Stone
He sees them as the party's future because they are Obama clones, more or less. You don't see him out there boosting Gavin Newsom, just as you don't see many leaders on the left rising to take Obama's place. They all must be shadows of him. Which is why it was Kamala Harris in 2024, Joe Biden in 2020, and Hillary Clinton in 2016. Obama couldn't lose. He was treated like a God and king. He was never going to let Trump win this ten year war. He couldn't hand the country over to the guy who dared question his birth certificate. The guy they called a racist and a rapist. But more than that, he represented the undoing of the Obama coalition and the worldwide movement it inspired. There was no way the Democrats were ever going to let that happen. And by 2016, they had control of almost everything from institutions to universities to culture. So why not use it exiling and disenfranchising Trump voters was all done in the name of Barack Obama. You see, it had to be racism that gave rise to Trump because Obama couldn't fail. Isn't it so much easier to blame America, to blame it on sexism and racism? Isn't that what they tell themselves now about 2024? America wasn't ready for any woman, especially a woman of color. Isn't it easier to see it that way? Rather than address the real problem with the utopia we all built? It shuts too many people out. The culture of silence and the climate of fear. The Vanity Fair story about how Democrats fear Kamala Harris running again is telling, or rather not telling. They're too afraid to use their real names. It is still considered blasphemy inside the Democratic Party to criticize her as she has attained Obama level status. She campaigned for Obama back in 2008 and was once called the female Obama. Harris rode the coattails of making history. Here's an early video about Kamala Harris. And here is a Dave Chappelle joke about how Kamala Harris introduced him to Barack Obama.
Narrator/Reporter
38 year old Kamala Harris came out of nowhere and was swept into office as San Francisco's district attorney. And as she did, she made history. She's the first woman ever to be the city's top prosecutor. And she is the first African American in such a job ever in the state of California. Just following in big footprints.
She says, my mother and many others before me, you know, I'll tell you on the subject of my mother and I keep saying this, but it's true. You know, she said, since we were young, you know, you may be the first to do many things, but make sure you're not the last.
Kamala Harris was born in Oakland, raised in Berkeley. Her parents were both professors involved in the civil rights movement. Her father African American, her mother Eastern Indian.
And then I show up to the club late that night. Sitting in the dressing room is Gavin Newsom. Kamala Harris, who sit next to her was Al Gore weird. And it was Chris Ducker. And Paul Mooley was drinking scotch. At some point, Kamala Harris says, a friend of mine is announcing his candidacy for president tomorrow. I went to college with him. I'm like, what? I go, barack Obama. She goes, you've heard of him? Like, yo, I just read about this dude. And she goes, yo, yeah, we talking. She goes, you know what? She says, let's, let's call him on the phone. I said, what the. And she picks the phone. Up and she dials and she's listening like this. And she goes, ah, this is voicemail. And she gives me the phone, she goes, leave him a message. You know, I didn't know what to say. I just, what you say to any black dude is running for president, you know, stay low, running his exact pattern, this kind of shit. And then the last thing I say is, you know what I said, sarah, I really do believe you can do this. Like, man, I'm wishing you luck. Now, I had a chance to go to the last debate on the Democratic ticket. And I went, it's me and Chris Tucker sitting In Myrtle Beach, S.C. it's the last three candidates. It was Barack Obama, John Edwards, and Hillary Clinton. Now, Obama's a lot taller than Edwards and Clinton, and he had the center podium. And at one point they're all on stage and they start fussing and Obama goes, look, none of us are perfect. And I was sitting in the audience like, this nigga looks like Jesus. And I realized in that moment that I was looking at the next President of the United States. I was certain of it. I couldn't explain it, but I knew what I was seeing.
Sacha Stone
Winning was easy for her. She was pretty and tough. She made the Democrats look good and won every single race. As her star began to rise, District attorney, attorney general, senator and Vice president next in line behind a very old Joe Biden. Probably he would have stepped aside and handed her the presidency had he won a second term. Either way, Harris was not the best choice for vice president, and the Democrats knew that at the time. The hundred people who signed a letter urging Biden not to choose Harris for cosmetic reasons were then shamed back into silence lest they be called racists and misogynists. The so called autopsy vindicates Harris, which is all part of the same game. She's too big to fail and too popular to be cast aside. Especially now after the redistricting fight has put Democrats back in Jim Crow 2.0 mode. For podcast listeners, a series of headlines. Five takeaways from the Democrats autopsy of Kamala Harris 2024 loss five key takeaways from Democrats Autopsy Report. Democrats Admit why Trump Beat Kamala Harris DNC Autopsy Report Vindicates Kamala Harris Exposes Party A real autopsy would have to confront this. How they continue to fall back on the same blame game. It's those racists over there. It's not our fault. We haven't failed our voters. We have to stop them. We have to keep fighting this war against them. Our fellow Americans. How can they begin to confront who and what they are and what they've become? How can they reckon with all the madness they've put the American people through for 10 long years? The January 6 show trials, the lies about Kenosha being a civil rights protest, the mocking and celebrating of Charlie Kirk's assassination, the raiding of Mar a Lago, the censoring of dissent via the FBI on social media, Russiagate, the collapse of a once thriving culture, impeachments, indictments, and the unending no Kings protests. If they want a real autopsy, they should talk to people like me, once loyal supporters who were chewed up and spit out by a political party that could not tolerate even simple questions about cancel culture, mass hysteria, or the rising intolerance in the left writ large, or why someone's career would go up in flames just for voting for Trump. And forget about asking whether toddlers should wear masks or preteens should take medication that sterilizes them for life. I walked away from the party in 2020. I couldn't believe what I watched them do, what I helped them do to drag Joe Biden over the finish line. I knew he was too old. I knew Kamala Harris was a ticking time bomb. I knew it would all blow up in our faces eventually. But lying was so much easier, especially with a full court press serving as a propaganda front. They've been lying for so long that they don't even know how to stop. The biggest lie was that Trump was a fascist. They're still telling that lie. They're still scaring Americans into manic desperation every day. The lies are what drove me away. I couldn't live with them. The truth matters, especially if you're cutting up the body to find out what killed it. The lies began in 2016, when Hillary Clinton, the Democrats and loyalists like me couldn't face the truth about why she lost. It was one lie piled on top of another, and no one had the courage to face down the social media mobs to set the record straight. Any dissent was met with strict reprisals. And before long, everyone settled into a climate of fear and a culture of silence as the new normal. Their problem goes back to the art of war. If you don't know yourself or your enemy, you will succumb in every battle. They should first try to understand themselves. If they could just see who and what they are and why Americans would choose Trump a second time. They'd be halfway there. Then, if they could understand Trump, who he really is, rather than the character they invented, they'd finally come back to the real world with the rest of us. The Democrats are in love with the dream Obama sold, not the reality of what America became. With the Democrats in power, there are too many truths left to face. There are too many ghosts haunting them. And there is no point in performing an autopsy on a body with nothing inside but smoke and mirrors. Thank you for listening to my podcast sashastone.com from Lakewood, Ohio. It's a kind of a noisy little Airbnb here and I have dogs running around and so I don't have the ideal sound, but I try to do the best I could. If you like my work, please consider leaving a tip on the main page sashastone.com or becoming a paid subscriber. Then you can get the travel dispatches which are behind the paywall and hope you're having a lovely Memorial Day weekend. And remember to thine own self be true.
Singer (Simon & Garfunkel - 'Most of the Time')
Most of the time I'm clear, focused all around Most of the time I can keep both feet on the ground Follow the path I can read the signs. I can hold right with it when the road unwinds I can handle whatever I stumble upon and don't even notice she's gone Most of the time. Most of the time. Most of the time well it's well understood Most of the time Wouldn't change it if I could make it all hell up I can hold my own I can deal with the situation right on down to the bone I can survive and I can endure I don't even think about her Most of the time. Most of the time. Most of the time I got my head on straight Most of the time I'm strong enough not to hate
Narrator/Reporter
don't
Singer (Simon & Garfunkel - 'Most of the Time')
build up illusions till it makes me sick Ain't afraid of confusion no matter how thick and I can smile in the face of mankind
Narrator/Reporter
I don't even
Singer (Simon & Garfunkel - 'Most of the Time')
remember what her lips felt like on mine Most of the time. Most of the time. Most of the time she ain't even on my mind Wouldn't know her if I saw her she's leaving that far
Sacha Stone
behind
Singer (Simon & Garfunkel - 'Most of the Time')
Most of the time I can't even be sure she was ever with me Or I was ever with her Most of the time. Most of the time. Sa. Most of the time I'm halfway content Most of the time I know exactly where it all went I don't cheat on myself and I don't run and hide Hide from the feelings that are
Sacha Stone
buried inside
Singer (Simon & Garfunkel - 'Most of the Time')
Now I'm on compromise and I don't breathe 10 and I don't even care if I see her again? Most of the time. Most of the time. Most of the time, Sam.
Podcast: Free Thinking Through the Fourth Turning with Sasha Stone
Episode Title: The Real "Autopsy" The Democrats Can't Face
Date: May 26, 2026
Host: Sasha Stone
In this episode, Sasha Stone examines the Democratic Party's "autopsy" after a disastrous 2024 election loss to Donald Trump. Stone – a former Democrat and Obama coalition loyalist – delivers a deeply critical reflection on the party’s unwillingness to confront hard truths, its culture of denial, and the power structures (particularly Barack Obama) that define its ongoing failures. Interwoven with media clips, commentary from political analysts, and even comedy, Stone paints a picture of a party in denial, unable or unwilling to look inward or reform.
Sasha Stone’s episode offers a scathing indictment of the modern Democratic Party’s avoidance of self-reflection, its reliance on narrative control, and the continuing shadow of the Obama era. For Stone, any real “autopsy” would demand honesty, confronting uncomfortable truths, and jettisoning the culture of blame and denial—not just procedural post-mortems.
For more analysis and essays by Sasha Stone, visit sashastone.com.