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- [00:00]
A
Why have I asked my h vac guy I found on angie.com to change my grandpa's trachea tube? I was so amazed at how he replaced our air ducts. I knew I could trust him to change Pop Pop's tube.
- [00:09]
B
I think we should call a doctor, Angie, the one you trust to find the ones you trust. Find pros for all your home projects@angie.com.
- [00:20]
C
All right. The way we all get news now has completely changed. And I really look to a lot of influencers on Instagram that have common sense, sharp as tacks, and know how to fight these fucking fasc. One of my favorite follows online right now is a man named Charlie Goldenson. And his Instagram handle is Shay Chuck. C H E Z. Chuck. How are you, Charlie?
- [00:44]
B
I'm doing so good, Jennifer. How are you?
- [00:47]
C
Very well. I. When did you start doing political commentary on Instagram?
- [00:54]
B
Well, and I also, before I even say that, I need to stop saying I'm so well. It's just like an automatic response in this environment. And then I say that, I'm like, that's insane. This is the world I started less than a year ago. But the thing is, I was. I've worked in politics my whole career. I've been a Democratic strategist basically since I left college. I've worked on the Hill, I've worked in the Senate, I've worked in the White House, presidential campaigns, media companies. And so, like, my. My background has always been in producing digital content for impact for political purposes, but I've never been public facing. The reason I started, you know, screaming into my phone myself was I was a. I was an advisor on the Kamala Harris campaign at the very end. And I got brought in after Biden dropped out. And, you know, I just saw the insanity that was that campaign, and that was how we continue to run Democratic political operations right now, which is setting hundreds of millions of dollars on fire on massive premium production TV ads, endless testing, endless consultants. And simultaneously, we're having all these discussions about we need a Joe Rogan of the left and we need to figure out how to utilize digital infrastructure and invest in digital infrastructure. And when we lost that campaign, I was invited to speak on some panels and I was in a thousand meetings about how do we get Democrats back, how do we win back young men, blah, blah, blah. And I was really thrilled to be in those meetings. At first I was like, this is great. We're ideating, we're figuring out solutions here. By the 30th meeting, the 30th panel, I fucking lost my mind. And I was like, this is insane. This is the problem. We need to stop fucking ideating and we need to start doing. And it genuinely was out of frustration. I figured, I'm a guy, I have a deep voice, I know how to talk about these things. Let's see if I can be a voice here. And it just took off immediately, to my surprise.
- [02:50]
C
I think that's incredible. So knowing that you were a Democratic strategist, I, right now have been probably since Kamala Laws, probably a little bit before then, have gone through a bit of a political evolution where all I can think about when I think of Democrats right now is just how weak and feckless they are and that they have to crowdsource and that they can't stand up to Benjamin Netanyahu and that Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries make me want to individually tear out every piece of hair on my head and then paint my room with a Q tip, two coats to not listen to them. And it's so frustrating right now, being a Democrat, because you probably read this report where the autopsy came out, which I think is really important information. I think that the fact that Ken Martin said, no, we're gonna give it to you is very insulting to my intelligence, takes advantage of my vote and also millions of other Democrats. What is your take on them spiking the autopsy, which now we know is because they didn't 10 to the progressive base. Instead, they trotted around with Liz Cheney.
- [03:57]
B
Yeah, I have a thousand thoughts. I'm so glad you started with this. If I could just set some context really quickly. So I worked in the Biden White House in 2020, and before that, I was the digital and brand director for Jill Biden on the 2020 campaign. The Biden campaign had asked me to come onto that campaign in the. Early in the primaries in 2018, early 2019. And I said no, because I was a Bernie Sanders supporter. I've a life. I was. I've been supporting Bernie since I was in college. And Bernie, you know, Biden was not my horse. I thought he was going to lose, so I turned them down. I was volunteer. I was, you know, doing work with the Bidens and doing work with Elizabeth Warren and. And Booker on their campaign side, on the strategy side for a while. But on my weekends, I was volunteering for Bernie. And so I turned them down. And then a year later, when they won the primary, they came back to me and they said, what about now? And at that point, I said, Fuck it. All hands on deck to beat a fascist. And that's when I got in. In my mind, it was a binary choice at that point. It was the same thing that happened in 2024 when I went onto the Common campaign, when it was still Biden. They were asking me to come on. It was post Gaza. I said, absolutely fucking not. And then when it switched over to Kamala, there was some. For me personally, there was kind of like a psychological switch that just that allowed me to jump in and say, all right, all hands on deck, let's do this again. That being said, I think the biggest fuck up, morally, politically, socially, whatever of the Democratic Party is Gaza. And I think what this Axis Report did is just prove what all of us have known for a very long time. You've been talking about it on your show. I've been screaming about it into the ether, into my phone, right? To me, the fact that they buried this report and now the reporting shows that the reason they buried it, buried it seems to be because it revealed that, yeah, like a genocide in Gaza did lose voters, did lose young voters. To me, not only is it stupid and feckless, but it's like, criminal. What it's saying is that the Democratic Party, the dnc, has knowledge, strategic understanding of things that went wrong. Again, from a messaging standpoint, a campaigning standpoint, a policy standpoint, a moral standpoint, they're sitting on that knowledge and still refusing to actually change their position, still refusing to actually pivot direction, which to me is insanity. That's making a proactive choice to say, we know we fucked up here and we still are going to not make an adjustment. And so while it's infuriating, it's also like so many other things I'm feeling these days, which is like, no shit, right? Like, of course it lost votes. We knew that when we were on the campaign. We knew it was going to lose votes. So it's just another one of these things where it's like, I unfortunately hate to say I told you so, but it's like the progressives here have been right and like, we're trying to drag folks along. And like, slowly but surely it seems to be happening. And, you know, they're, they're, they're holding out, but maybe these kinds of reports will help.
- [06:58]
C
So when you see House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries get interviewed by Joy Reid and Waj Ali, and Waj Ali says, are you going to continue to take APAC money? And Jeffries says, I'm going to continue to raise Money the way I always have, which means, yes, I'm going to continue to take APAC money. And then you know about this report. To me, the biggest betrayal that I've felt is coming to an awakening of how condescending the Democratic Party treats its voters. And I bought into it. Hook, line, sinker. I voted for Hillary in the primary in 2016. I was a good MSNBC Democrat. I did my job trying to fight in this red state for women, for queer people, et cetera. And they took my vote for granted. And so now as I've really dug into this, like, how do you lose a campaign to a convicted felon, dipshit? Seriously, like, how do you do that? How do you fuck up so bad? And then you see Hakeem and chuckles, pretty much beholden to aipac. And then you see who would be a good front runner. But he's made a lot of fumbles lately. Gavin Newsom, seed ground in podcast to Ben Shapiro. I'm like, what the fuck are you doing? Like, why aren't you sitting down with Hasan Piker? Why aren't you, why aren't you courting progressives? Even if you disagree with them, court them. So what is your take on that again?
- [08:27]
B
Thousand takes on this. I'd say, like, it goes back to me. Again, not to set additional context. I think, like, you can't have this conversation without talking about the like, massive debate that we're still fucking having over, like, should Kamala Harris have gone on Joe Rogan, right? And like, there's, there's two discussion points there, right, which is should she or shouldn't she have? That's one. The other is like, could she have done it successfully, right? If you had dropped Kamala Harris into a three hour interview with Joe Rogan, would she have performed? Would she have been able to do it? And my view is she should have done it because the risk was worth the reward. And yet I'm not that confident. I'm not confident that she would have done well, right? Because we know that a lot of these politicians, Kamala Harris included, respectfully, I work for you, but like, come on, like, if you are Hakeem Jeffries, like Gavin, if you are building your entire messaging points around consultant driven talking points, you're going to be fucking exposed when you were questioned by folks like you, when you're given actual time to have to give answers, when it's not a four minute rushed interview with some traditional media, but you're actually gonna get follow ups and follow ups and follow ups. So I think that's one of the reasons that these folks don't go on these podcasts. It's not because they don't understand the importance of it. It's because they know they're gonna get cornered and drilled. You know, like, I've seen you do it, Jennifer, right? And like, thank God that you do that. And I think they're scared of that, but that's a reflection of why they are not the right people for this time. Like, if you can't have a fucking conversation and sound like a human being, then, like, maybe you shouldn't be in a fucking elected office right now. And I will say that, like, I'm going to tie this to Zoron really quickly, which is, like, there's so many things Zoron's team did, right? And everybody talks about their social media and their influencer strategy, etc. And their video program, like, yes, of course, amen. And their, their policy positions being genuinely populist. And yes, of course, amen. But, like, I think it's underappreciated that he just talks like a human being. He just is relatable, right? He's not being pressure tested against some bullshit $100,000 poll every day. And so, yeah, and when you talk about Gavin Newsom, oh, my God, I mean, I just did a little interview with Vogue about this of, like, it's not just good enough to go everywhere, right? Like, it is the baseline now is that Democrats have to be everywhere, all time, every podcast, local news, national news. Like, go, get out there. However, if you're unable to actually perform in those arenas, if you're unable to actually drive your point forward, if you're unable to actually stand your ground and fight for your positions and not give ground on trans issues or the billionaire tax or whatever like Gavin continues to do, then, sorry, man, like, that's a bad strategy. Like, you need to be able to go in there and fight and debate, not befriend them, not tell them that your son loves them. Like, that's ridiculous. And so I think there's a thousand different factors at play here, but at its core is like, if you can't go on these shows and speak honestly, then you're probably not the right person for this time. That's my view.
- [11:43]
C
You know a person who does this really well is Ro Khanna. He was on my podcast the other day and before that he was on, like, Sean Ryan. He's done that guy. I forget his name. The guy with the mullet. Right wing mullet podcaster.
- [11:58]
B
Theo Vaughn is that you're talking about?
- [12:00]
C
Yeah. And Ro Khanna goes on all of these places and never cedes ground and gets them to agree with him.
- [12:08]
B
Yeah.
- [12:08]
C
And then when I see Gavin going, having Shapiro on or the late Charlie Kirk and he's seeding ground, I just, it makes me, it enrages me. I'm like, I get so angry because I'm like, why are you committing social suicide right now? Like, why are you doing this? But when we get to this, I want to go back to this autopsy. And don't you think it would be best? Because it's going to keep dripping and there's going to be more that comes out. What do you think it is? Do you think the DNC is, is every bit as beholden to the same corporations and they don't want to cut off funding? Is this all solely, do you think, about Israel? Because it seems like all roads in the Epstein files with this DNC autopsy lead to us having this relationship with war criminal Benjamin Netanyahu. And my fear is you have some opportunists on the right like Tucker Carlson and Marjorie Taylor Greene. That message very simply, these people are not America first. They, they seem to be Israel first. And that for people that are low information voters that only tune in a couple weeks before an election is going to pull a bunch of people in. And I think the Democrats just not having more moral clarity on the Gaza issue is really damaging.
- [13:33]
B
Again, a thousand things. So one is, first thing I'll say is I think that, like, I think that there's a. It's not to like, justify or excuse, but I think we need to, like, people need to understand or we need to do a better job explaining that like the dnc, Capital D, capital D and capital C, like, is, it is its own institution. Right. And like, they are not necessarily. They do not like, have power over Hakeem Jeffries. Right. I think people kind of like misunderstand how this stuff kind of works where they do have power and influence of courses and they're fundraising dollars and how they allocate those fundraising dollars. So like, I do think that, like, we often have, it can be complex, but like the Democratic Party can be at times different than the dnc. That being said, I think one of the problems with the DNC or the Democratic Party both, is that, yes, there's entrenched interests, there's big dollar donors, there's aipac. Those are all tangible, real factors that I think are driving this ridiculous position. I also think, though, that it's that our party, the establishment wing of the party is run by an older generation who does not fucking understand the media landscape we're in anymore, who does not understand how quickly and rapidly information is shared, how does not understand, they don't understand that like you can't change people's minds with a million dollar ad buy on local cable news anymore. Right? And so like that's actually, I think there's beyond the like moral and like philosophical questions here. I actually think there's also just like bad fucking archaic strategy happening which is they don't think they have to actually own up to this stuff. They view Gaza as like gas prices. They view Gaza as, you know, single issue voter issues that are like much more day to day versus an entire generation or multiple, multiple generations of Americans who are watching a fucking genocide happen on their phones, right? And like, I think they think that they can just like dump a bunch of money into paid advertising three months before the election and like win people back. I genuinely, I think it's bad strategy is what's like leading so much of this stuff. And a lot of that comes from a failed understanding of the modern media ecosystem. Like, and those are the people running their party and running these kind of, these operations.
- [15:56]
C
You're, you're putting into words what I feel like when I think about the Democratic establishment, I feel like they're conservative. I, and it's not so much that they're like conservative issues, but their approach to politics. They are preservationists. They want preserve the losing strategy that handed the executive branch to a dipshit. And I, I just, and, and then the hostility, passive hostility that they treat the electorate with that were so stupid about Israel and the weaponization of anti Semitism is, it is just such. Because I was kind of skeptical when I educated myself on this to even speak out about it because I didn't want to be a bigot. And the Democrats should provide a path, a moral path. Very concisely criticizing Israel is the best thing you can do to support Jewish people. Just like right now in the United States, I'm begging for people in Europe to hold everybody in the Epstein files accountable because I know cash cha ching money dip Patel isn't going to do it.
- [17:13]
B
No, he's too busy, you know, drinking beers at the Olympics. No, I mean I'm Jewish, right? Like, I talk about this a lot and like it sounds so bizarre to say this, but like, you know, I'm a straight white dude, but I'm also Jewish and that gives me permission to like speak on this in a way that I think other folks can't, because they're concerned that they're going to be called anti Semites and they should be concerned. Right. Like, I can't imagine the amount of people in your DMs and messages calling you a Jew hater, calling you an anti Semite Hasan piker. Right. Like he's wearing it on the chin every day. I am a Jew. I am a Jewish American. And I can tell you that like the insane rhetoric, whether it's Republicans or Democrats, anybody tying our political processes, tying our allegiance to the government of Israel and supporting a genocide, saying that anybody who supports Palestinian liberation is somehow in the hands of Hamas, calling us anti Semites. Here's the reality. That kind of rhetoric drives up anti Semitism. It does not drive it down. And we do, we do a good job, I think. But like mass media and politicians, you know, there's this cognitive dissonance when we talk about rising rates of anti Semitism in this country, which there are. That is an objective truth. But in my mind, again, as a Jew, you cannot separate the rising rates of anti Semitism from the insane rhetoric that's coming from Republicans and Democrats, pro Israel Zionist Republicans and Democrats. Because every time they call a Palestinian supporter a jihadist, of course, and then base that language in their Judaism, of course people are going to blame Jews. Of course they're going to come back and say, well, that's a Jewish position. So like, you know, that's been one of the most infuriating pieces of the last three years for me. Yeah.
- [19:05]
C
Let me ask you a question. So I'm familiar with living in Oklahoma, rapture preppers and how they feel like, like I'm talking about Huckabee crew, Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham. These guys are full blown Christian nationalist rapture preppers. And they think in order for Jesus to come back for the rapture that the Jews need to be in Israel. I've always found that to be dismissive and using a whole race of people as a prop. But that's just my take. As an atheist that had to live around all these Bible thumper rapture preppers. I'm like, well, that seems really hateful. What is your take about the religious rapture preppers that now Benjamin Netanyahu is co opting these people to get what he wants the same way that the NRA co opted them, the same way that, you know, the pro life movement co opted them, the same way the Republican Party co opted them the same way. These are the 90% people that got Trump. So what is your take on these white. The Lindsey Graham's, the Ted Cruz's, the Huckabees that want your ass to be in Israel so that Jesus can come and then send you to hell? That seems pretty insulting to me.
- [20:15]
B
Want us to go back to Israel so that I believe, like 70% of us will die also.
- [20:19]
C
Right?
- [20:19]
B
Yeah. I think it's fucking insane. And like, the part that, you know, I know, like the Tucker Carlson piece of this to me is important, right. Because he represents a really big or growing sect. Not growing, maybe a publicly acknowledged growing sect of like these like anti Zionist Christians or Catholic Republicans. And I'm sorry, like, Tucker Carlson is an anti Semite. Like, yes. Like, his support for Palestinian liberation and against Bibi Netanyahu is not about his care or his morality. It's because he wants to be brought to heaven or whatever. And he wants. It's a religious act. And like, the fact that that gets ignored in this discussion. Right. Or that people like, I won't name names, but like, some folks on the left supposedly are now, like, aligning themselves with Tucker Carlson because they somehow find like a meeting point on Israel, it's just as infuriating to me. I'm like, you know, we can't. It's part of the battle here when it comes to Gaza, when it comes to whatever we want to call this problem now is it's difficult to try to stand up for this cause while simultaneously calling out the real legitimate anti Zionism that does often align itself with. With this cause. And I think that we do damage to ourselves when we do not call that out. It delegitimizes our position by saying that, no, none of this is anti Semitic. There's absolutely anti Semitism in this as well. We should call those out. Excuse my French, but, like, we're not doing that. And then we have leftist commentators, Leftist commentators trying to find common ground with them. And my view is they're doing this for a very different reason than you. They're doing this for like a. What I view is like insane broken. Like, they're.
- [22:24]
C
They're totally. They're nobody. And it's crazy.
- [22:28]
B
Yeah, it should be institutionalized in my. Like, it's crazy.
- [22:33]
C
It totally is. Huckabee just recently said that his foreign policy, Tucker Carlson was interviewing him, was based on biblical law. But here's my thing about Tucker, about Marjorie Taylor Greene, about these people that are using the Israel thing. And I know why they're using it. It because if they go into red states and they, they're trying to keep the cult together. And they say this policy of Ted Cruz, of Lady Graham is, it's not America first, it's Israel first. In Israel, they have health care and blah, blah. It is an opportunistic play that they're trying to. For higher office. It won't surprise me one bit if Tucker runs for higher office. All I need to know about somebody's sense of human rights is are they universal? With Tucker Carlson, about three weeks ago, he was calling gay people faggots on his podcast. Over and over and over and over again. He said it over and over and over again. Well, then how am I supposed to expect that you care about Palestinian people when you call American gay men faggots multiple times? I know that you're full of. Same with Marjorie Taylor Greene. I know she is full of. And an opportunist. And the fact that Tucker Carlson said that he was in bed and demons attacked him when he sleeps with these large dogs. I know the type of people that believe this because I grew up around all these crazy Bible thumpers, and I know that they believe spiritual warfare is real. And I know that Tucker Carlson knows he wasn't attacked by a demon. And I, I know the. These types of people, and that's why I think their stance against Israel is more as a means to keep. Keep the cult, Donald Trump's base together because they've seen it. This guy's frail. Donald Trump is. I mean, it's curtains for this dementia duck that's in office. And so they're moving on. And I'm just 100% with you that we have to talk about how insane the foreign policy is, people.
- [24:37]
B
Yeah, I also think, and I don't have numbers on this, there might be somebody who disagrees with me on this. I don't know. But, like, my sense has always been, or recently is like, like, it's also strategic. Like, they know that Gaza and Israel is fracturing the Democratic base. So, like, why would they not continue to hammer it knowing that, like, until the DNC actually acknowledges these fuckups and pivots? Like, there's going to be a delta here. There's going to be a space between the Democratic base and the party. And, like, if I was a Republican strategist, I'd absolutely be trying to widen that gap. Like, of course I want to drive voters away from their leadership and their party. Like, that would be the best strategy for me. So. No, I'm with you 100, Jennifer. And it's just like, I Mean, it's. It's. It's almost like, I genuinely can't believe we're still having this conversation. Right. Like, it goes back, I think, to the, like, speaking politicians who speak honestly component of what you said earlier of, like, you know, I think one of the most insane things Democrats and Republicans were like, you know, Biden really let it on. The, like, TikTok ban initially was the blaming of TikTok for the radicalization of young people when it comes to support for Palestinian liberation or whatever we want to call it. Instead of understanding that this isn't a tool being weaponized to radicalize young people, it's that information is being shared and young people or everybody are seeing visuals perpetually that, like, we haven't seen before. And so the problem is not with TikTok leaders all over the country. The problem is that your fucking policies are disgusting and immoral and broken. And, like, the American people finally have an opportunity to actually see what this looks like overseas, and they're disgusted by it. It's pretty simple.
- [26:27]
C
It's devastating. It's really devastating. Okay, Charl, Charlie. Do you go by Charlie, Chuck or Charlie?
- [26:34]
B
I go by. I go by. So I started that. I started the Shay Chuck account under Chuck because I was like, I didn't want to dox myself. Like, I was like, I don't want people to know who I am. So I introduced myself as Charlie. Friends tend to call me Chuck, but, yeah, Charlie, Chuck. I go by both.
- [26:49]
C
I loved having you on. I'll be back in New York next week and we'll do it again in person once the blizzard has passed. I'll have Kylie and Seth put up where to follow you online. You guys, he is an excellent, excellent follow and as a guest on this podcast, because I believe that some of the best opinions and news are from independent voices that are not beholden to the same people that made us lose. So thank you so much for your voice. I promise we will do this again in person in New York. Go follow Shay. Check. Thank you.
- [27:19]
B
Awesome. Thank you, Jennifer. Really appreciate it. Bye, Sam.