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- [00:00]
Host
Greetings from my tub. I'm in here getting 5% cash back when I pay in 4 with PayPal. No fees, no interest. Make the most of your money this holiday with PayPal save the offer in.
- [00:09]
Ben Rhodes
The app ends1231 see paypal.com promoter points can be redeemed for cash or more paying for subject to terms and approval. PayPal Inc. And MLS 910457 this episode.
- [00:16]
Commercial Announcer
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- [00:46]
Host
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- [00:59]
Ben Rhodes
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- [01:02]
Host
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- [01:10]
Ben Rhodes
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- [01:14]
Host
Hey, welcome back to the In Good Faith podcast where every week I'm talking to people I think are the most important and influential people in the world. And that stands today, even though I am recording from the saddest looking bedroom in the world. But this week my guest was Pod Save the world's Ben Rhodes. Ben was Obama's Deputy National Security Advisor and now he's the host of Pod Save. Hey, we talked about his experiences with Mossad, the Israel of it all, America's democratic backsliding, how we can fight back, his life as a public servant, and whether or not AOC is gonna be the next President of the United States. Also, I might have accidentally sparked up a little drama with him and his co hosts. But I will say if you enjoy today's episode, you know, give it five stars on Spotify and Apple or give it a like on YouTube. Also, definitely subscribe wherever you're consuming these things and leave a comment on what you agreed with, disagreed with or who you'd like next as a guest. So Ben, I'll just start off by saying, you know, you were kind of an outlier in Washington, weren't a fan of Netanyahu or the Israeli government kind of earlier on than what we've been seeing lately. You helped sell the Iran nuclear deal, you helped negotiate the opening of Cuba. And at the time, I would say these were kind of portrayed as fringe ideas. But Now, I guess 10 years later, when you look back, do you think you were wrong on anything? Do you feel vindicated or a heightened sense of vindication about any of them? Would you change anything? I kind of wanted to start there because you're a unique guest for the show so far.
- [02:40]
Ben Rhodes
I mean, I was wrong about a bunch of things in government. I was not wrong about Bibi Netanyahu and being willing to kind of take some lumps in some battles with the Israeli government. I mean, if anything, I think the Obama administration was wrong for not going further. You know, even though we had the fight over the Iran deal, we still gave Israel a 10 year, you know, over $30 billion military assistance package. Right. I mean, I wasn't comfortable with that at the time, but I feel somewhat vindicated because. But part of what's frustrating to me is even when I was in this space and we can talk about it, I mean, it got pretty ugly for me. I mean, I literally, when I left government, I had ex Mossad spies following me. Oh, wow. Which is a whole other story we get into. But at that time, I will tell you privately, if you're behind closed doors with other people working national security or other people in Congress, they would agree with me, oh, my God, I can't send Netanyahu. Oh my gosh, this Israeli government is moving further and further to the right. There was just this fear to say anything. And so what I find frustrating is I was saying things publicly that I know other people, colleagues of mine or other people in politics would say behind closed doors, and they wouldn't say it out in the open. And so part of what's happened now is just people are beginning to say what they have long thought. And that's part of what is so frustrating to me about how the whole US Israel relationship is dealt with in American politics and media.
- [04:13]
Host
Well, something I appreciated that I saw you say yesterday on pod Save the World was that you were going to talk about the ceasefire deal from a real place. Because it did feel like. I felt like I was going crazy. I talked about this on another podcast. I felt like I was going crazy where everyone was like, okay, let's take everything at face value and that everything's going to be perfect and land. We're not going to do this. We're not going to talk about this cease fire deal in a fluffy way. I think what are your big concerns or big issues with, I guess, the situation there and the coverage of it?
- [04:48]
Ben Rhodes
I mean, quickly, my concerns would be, first of all, this did not need to happen, right? So there's this kind of triumphalism around the ceasefire. Well, 20,000 Palestinian kids did not need to die. I don't even know what Israel's been doing militarily in terms of degrading Hamas the whole last several months since the ceasefire collapsed in March. Why did we have to kill? Why were thousands more Gazans killed, displaced, starved? And so there was some that was absent, this kind of sense that where's the accountability for that? Instead you've got Trump speaking to the Israeli Parliament and it's kind of full embrace. That's the first thing. Then the second thing is going forward, this doesn't solve the problem. It's by definition a ceasefire. That means they've just stopped the fighting for now. And look, there's the question of what's going to happen to Hamas, Are they going to demilitarize? And then there's a question of the IDF is still in 50% of Gaza. Are they going to stay there? Are they going to resume military operations at some point? Is food going to get into Gaza? Are international journalists going to be able to get into Gaza and see what's actually happened there? And so I thought part of what was so unsettling about the coverage is people kind of wanted to act like, oh, thank God this is over. But it's not over. It's not over for people in Gaza who don't have homes and don't know who's going to be governing them. It's not over in terms of what's the future of the Palestinian people and not just in Gaza, but in the West Bank. I think people just kind of wanted this off their plate. They're tired of their kids asking them whether they're going to call it a genocide. They're tired of seeing it on their screens. And the problem is not solved. It's not peace, it's a ceasefire. It's very tenuous. And I think there was this kind of collective in this country at least desire to just say, okay, now we don't have to think about this anymore because it's uncomfortable to think about it. And that avoids all these hard questions about why did we just spend two years arming A military that was serially committing war crimes, killing thousands and thousands of children. Those are harder questions to ask than just saying, Trump got his ceasefire, like, let's all give him the gigantic win and move on.
- [06:55]
Host
And actually, you got a hook in me really quick because I definitely saw, or you constantly see, people concerned about speaking out. It became less so, obviously, in recent weeks and months. It was becoming more and more of a mainstream position. But you got the hook in me. What is the Mossad story? Because I know that there are people that get concerned about, oh, I might get public pushback, or we've seen certain people talk about, oh, I'm worried about donors and things like that. What's that? That sounds crazy.
- [07:23]
Ben Rhodes
Well, when I left government, I was not on the best terms with the Israeli government. It was after the whole Iran deal fight, and it was about a year and change later that the Guardian had this report that a group called Black Cube, which is a collection of former Mossad agents, had been contracted to kind of dig up dirt, spy on me. Now, Black Cube was also the same private intelligence outfit that had done this to Harvey Weinstein's accusers. They've been around the. And actually, I could go back and see that they had contacted my wife. And what was interesting is they had contacted my wife and said that they were movie producers from a group called Shell Productions, which is kind of aptly named, and they wanted to talk to her about the private lives of people that had negotiated nuclear deals and normalization of relations with an adversary. So it was suspicious on its face. And then I talked to some journalists who'd seen this file, and they had, like, pictures of my car or they had my parents phone number and things like this. Now, what I found interesting about this whole thing when it happened is, first of all, they weren't exactly trying to cover their tracks that much. So I actually think in kind of looking at this question of private intelligence and how it harasses people, that the intimidation was as much the point. I actually don't think that they were there to, like, dig up dirt and blackmail me. I think actually it getting out and, like, you know, that, like, you know, hey, we've got pictures of your apartment or whatever it is. You know, that was part of it. Then there was these bizarre cover stories that started coming out that, like, a Taiwanese person hired them. I didn't believe these at all. Right. It just felt like intimidation. But I think the broader point is it didn't feel in isolation. Like there were. If you. If you Google, I mean, I remember when my first book came out, my litter agent was like, hey, you should clean up your Google. It's a dumpster fire. And I was like, yeah, I know. I mean, I'm a right wing target. I live with that. But she's like, no, no, talk to one of these reputation cleanup firms. You know, I felt a little weird about it. I'm not like, I wasn't super rich. I'm not like a celebrity who does that kind of thing.
- [09:33]
Host
Sure.
- [09:34]
Ben Rhodes
But what's funny is when I talked to those people, they said, hey, look, this would cost way more than you can afford because somebody is doing to you what we would do for you. And I was like, what do you mean? He's like, well, it's all about manipulating the algorithm so that the stuff that is, you know, that Google thinks is the most important content about you is at the top. So we're literally just kind of clicking on the good stuff. Well, someone is doing that to you with the bad stuff. And look, I have no proof, but it's a pretty small list of people that might be doing that. So I felt, like, pretty targeted, not just with, like, public comments, but, you know, by, you know, if not the Israeli government, certainly people that agreed with them at that time also.
- [10:14]
Host
Okay, so that, that kind of. I'll use that as a transition to kind of speak more to what's happening in the country now, because one of the questions I had there was, it does feel like America's backsliding rapidly. But I wanted to know, as far as your opinion or your take or what you're seeing, how much of that backsliding is real versus kind of what. What the administration wants you to think is real? Right?
- [10:38]
Ben Rhodes
I think it's real. And so my last book after the Fall was about basically the authoritarian playbook. And I looked at Hungary, I looked at Russia, I looked at China, and I looked at the US And I also kind of looked at countries like Turkey that have been through this before too. And what I'd say that's interesting is it wasn't real the first time that Trump was president. He was kind of softening things up. He was kind of pushing boundaries. This time he is actually like, relentlessly working his way through that playbook. And the example I give is that I asked a Hungarian, hungary's gone from basically being a liberal democracy to at least a soft autocracy. And I said, how did that happen? And he said, well, Orban got elected on right wing populism. He enriched some cronies through Corruption, who then finances politics. He then had them buy up the media and turn it into kind of compliant media that's pro Orban. He redistricted the parliamentary seats to entrench his party in power. He made it easier for his supporters to vote and harder for his opponents to vote. He packed the courts with far right judges who would find in favor of his power grabs. And he wrapped this whole thing up in an us versus them message. Us, the real Hungarians against them, the liberal elites, the Muslims, the gays. And look, this is the playbook and it's happening here now. And I think what's scary is it's happening even if you look at the last guardrails. I think it's the military and the justice system. Those are the last things that civilian control of an apolitical military and an impartial justice system are the ultimate final guardrails of democracy, and they're going squarely at that. If you have the military in the streets potentially being used for the president's personal interest and political purposes, and you've got a Justice Department that exists essentially to kind of go after Trump's enemies and not go after, by the way, people that he likes, you have the ingredients all assembled for this to get real very fast.
- [12:41]
Host
So you don't think it's normal that Texas National Guard are invading Illinois?
- [12:46]
Ben Rhodes
I don't. You know, and I also don't think, you know, none of this is normal. It's not normal that there's a militarized police force in ICE that has powers to do pretty much whatever it wants. That's characteristic of other authoritarian regimes. This kind of non uniform, irregular, almost militia that has impunity in American communities and answers only to the President, United States and maybe Steven Miller. Right. That's not something. We weren't directing ICE raids in the Obama years, even though ICE existed. So this is happening. And I just say to people, too, like, we might have an. I think there'll be midterm elections. Do you think that they would accept a result in which they don't win? I mean, Trump didn't in 2020, when he had not wired this so well. If he goes to the Justice Department and says there was fraud, I want you to investigate it. You don't think that Pambani and Kash Patel are going to, quote, unquote, discover fraud? Of course they are. So more tests are coming for us. And I think people need to kind of be just. My whole point is just be aware, just be informed, be aware, be mindful here's what to look for and part of what to look for. The military in the streets and the Justice Department doing the bidding of the president.
- [14:04]
Host
Do you think that we are going to see that for sure going into the 2026 midterms? Or do you think it's that the kind of big end game situation is more 2028 in that maybe 2026 is more. Okay, we're going to try and have Abbott and others find seats. We're going to try and, you know, take away precedent and free up more seats and go through something that could be perceived a more legitimate way.
- [14:32]
Ben Rhodes
Well, I think those things are connected, right? Because if they can hold Congress and also kind of weaken kind of electoral norms in this country, it sets up, it just opens up the space for them to do a lot more in 2028. I mean, the obvious example is if they hold the House, then the House in 2028 has to certify any election results. We went through that in 2020. And so Republican House in this Republican Party. And look, let me say this, I know your viewers are across the spectrum. I wish I'm not right about everything. Like I wish there was a good opposition party that won some elections and lost some. This is not, I don't want permanent Democratic rule. I just don't want what I feel like is happening. Because look, I think they're going to test some things out in the midterms, right. I said polling sites, right. Like DHS playing, you know, what is the role the Department of Homeland Security is going to in quote unquote, securing our elections but potentially intimidating voters in certain places. What happens if the Justice Department is kind of sent instead of Rudy Giuliani trying to uncover fraud? Like in 2020, what if it's the entire US Justice Department that is told there's fraud? Go find it. And then so what if the Democrats eke out a few seat majority and then the Justice Department says no, no, no, no, there's all this fraud. We have credible evidence of it. And then Mike Johnson, the Speaker of the House, is like, well, because he has to seat the new Congress is like, well, I'm not seating this new Congress. There was fraud. And I think that basically while 2028 feels like the big test, this is kind of like the stepping stone in that direction. Because if you look at other countries, what a lot of these autocratic leaders do is they just keep pushing, right? It's like, you know, think of someone running against a wall and banging into it until it starts shaking, starts shaking Then they knock it over. Right. And so I think they're going to be testing things out in 26 to see what happens in 28.
- [16:34]
Host
And I mean, something that you mentioned, you know, in regards to a takeover was media. Right. And we've seen things obviously like Elon Musk with X. And now we're looking at the new owners of TikTok in the States. But something a little more recent and a little different. But maybe you'll see it's aligned. And I think there's an older connection for you. Do you have a take or an opinion or a reaction? Maybe you shared it and I didn't see it. Regarding Bari Weiss over at CBS News.
- [17:05]
Ben Rhodes
Yeah, I did. I mean, we got in a bit of a dust up with Pod Save the World with Barry Weiss in the Free Press when they, they ran a piece about how pictures of Palestinian kids who were starving were bad journalism because actually those kids had pre existing conditions. They'd done some googling and found that some of these kids had pre existing conditions. As if that shows that there's no starvation in Gaza, which was grotesque on its face. But even under the surface, the first people to starve in a famine are people with pre existing conditions. Some of the preexisting conditions, for instance, were a traumatic brain injury from an Israeli airstrike. Right. Pretty important context there. Putting even that aside, here's what concerns me about this two pieces. The first is just David Ellison, Larry Ellison's son, Larry Ellison, one of the richest men in the world, very pro Trump mega billionaire. They buy CBS News under Paramount and immediately we see a new ombudsman hired at CBS who's kind of a right wing guy who's supposed to be looking over the news. And then Bari Weiss hired his editor in chief, right? The person who's going to be guiding the editorial decision making of 60 Minutes, CBS Evening News, CBS Morning. These are pretty iconic American media brands and that is the Hungarian playbook, the Turkish playbook, the Russian playbook. You get your billionaire friends to buy the media. This is not new. I mean, this is the first thing Putin did in the early 2000s is get his oligarchs to buy up the television. And then Barry Weiss specifically. What concerns me is this kind of brand of politics where the reason I think she's such an interesting figure is, yeah, she's not like a MAGA person, but she thinks, and she's kind of propagated this notion that the big problem in American society is like the woke left. And look, the woke left has all kinds of excesses. It got way over its skis on a bunch of stuff. But if you're looking at what's happening and you think that's the main story, you're literally, you're willfully deceiving yourself. And I think she has a set of views like extremely pro Israel, extremely anti kind of left that are kind of designed in a laboratory to appeal to a certain kind of American billionaire. By the way, including the people that invested in the Free Press are Marc Andreessen, very pro Trump, super tech libertarian type billionaire, a Bill Ackman type guy would love Barry Ice, another mega billionaire who's supported Trump. And so where I see it's not just the pro Trump of it all of co opting the media, it's also this idea that we have this kind of super class in America now that these billionaires are not only supposed to get whatever they want. Their tax cuts, their deregulation, they're also supposed to feel good about doing it. Bari Weiss will make them feel good. You don't have to feel bad about the fact that there's rampant inequality here and you're worth $100 billion while most people can't afford groceries in this country. You don't have to feel bad about the fact that you support an Israeli government that just killed tens of thousands of kids in Gaza. Like that's kind of what Bari Weiss's politics are. We don't have to feel bad. And she takes advantage of the true excesses of, if you want to call it, woke left. Sure, that's true. But the question is, what's more offensive in American society today? The fact that there are people that are worth $100 billion giving themselves tax cuts? Or the fact that there's some college professor with some crazy views at one university that we're gonna shine a spotlight on?
- [21:02]
Host
Yeah, I mean, but maybe that's how you get that multiplier.
- [21:05]
Ben Rhodes
Yeah, yeah, totally.
- [21:06]
Host
Maybe that's how you get that valuation.
- [21:07]
Ben Rhodes
No, that's why Pot Save the World is not bought for $150 million, you know, yet. Yeah.
- [21:18]
Host
Then I'll get you back to the podcast in just a minute. But let me take a minute to say credit card companies, they love you. Or I guess they love your money. Because the second you're late, boom. Fee. It's like dating someone who charges you for texting back slow. And every minimum payment, it's just another way to keep you on the hook forever. But here's the good news. PDS debt helps regular people break Free where they've already helped hundreds of thousands cut debt, stop the harassing calls and actually keep their own money. Credit cards, personal loans, medical bills. PDS debt has custom options for all of it, but this isn't a one size fits all gimmick. They actually look at your unique situation and create a plan designed for you. No minimum credit score, no schemes, just real solutions that work. That's why PDS debt is a rated by the bbb, has thousands of five star reviews on Google and holds a five star trustpilot rating. The translation people trust them because they actually deliver results. It's your money, it's your future. I mean, why let banks keep writing the rules when you could be on your way to being debt free in less time than it takes to scroll TikTok and you're just 30 seconds away from starting that journey to get debt free. Go get your free assessment and find the best option for you right now@pdsdebt.com DeFranco it's pdsdebt.com DeFranCo or hey, the QR code's on screen. Just scan it and take the first step today. So I mean, when you talk about kind of going, things being aimed at different classes, the ultra wealthy, I mean, when you look at America's elites, right, the rich, the people that control these things, I mean, do you think that we are ever gonna see someone fight back against Trump or will they continue to roll over like the closest? It feels like at times. And then it's not obviously universal, it's more specific would be like people are so torn that they're like, I guess I'm rooting for Harvard and Rupert Murdoch at times where it's like, is that, is that the Murdoch stuff? Is that like show or I don't know, will there be a stand? Because it does feel like there's not many backbones out there. People are bending knees. We've seen through history, like it seems like rich people think if I play along, they'll never come go like come after me. Well, is America different in any way?
- [23:16]
Ben Rhodes
I think part of what we've learned, like the last several years is America's not different. And why would we be like, we're, you know, we, we're human, we're frankly, everybody here, except for indigenous people, like, came from one of these other countries that's been through this stuff, right? And I think if you look at it, there's a reason too that they've kind of methodically gone after universities, law firms. Now they're Going after kind of the NGO sector. They're dismantling the people that might become sources of opposition. The law firms that could sue them or represent people. They go after the universities that provide an alternative way of thinking about things. The media companies, obviously, that report on things. This is not by accident. This is by design. I think the people that are most disappointing to me are, if you look at the tech oligarchs and some of the corporate leadership of America, these are actually people with the means to stand up to Trump. Right? I mean, Jeff Bezos could lose $100 billion tomorrow and not notice it. Like, it'd be like me losing $100. And yet he's still. And what I take from that is there's this kind of societal need to kind of belong to the clique that's at the Trump inauguration or that's at the state dinner. Like, there's this kind of internal pressure among our kind of oligarch class to kind of stay on the inside. That has clearly been very powerful. And obviously, yeah, they don't want to get on the wrong side of Trump and lose some money. But. But again, these are people that can afford to lose money and probably have money hid all over the world. I think in terms of where the opposition comes from, the Democratic Party's been a disaster. I incredibly disappointed in the leadership of the party in both houses. We can talk about that. But I do think it's two places you need a populism to fight populism. And I do think. And you see this, whatever you think of all their politics, like, you know, Bernie and AOC are the only people like that have. Are generating a pulse out there. Mamdani is generating a pulse in New York. Like, that's because they have a broader narrative that's not just about, you know, quote, unquote, democracy. Like, it's something that is a word on a page. It's about this. These are, like, basically wealthy people protecting their own interest at your expense. And the takeover of our democracy by Trump is in service of that. And so democracy is not just something that people like me talk about on television and we read about in the Atlantic magazine. It's not just elections. This is important. Democrats tend to talk about the economy over here and democracy over here. No, it's all one thing. Because if they take away democracy, that's why you can't afford the fucking groceries. That's why they're rich and you can't get ahead, right? And so you need that populism. But then you also need, if you look at history, conservative elites or conservative people to say, wait a second, this is not conservative. I mean, conservatism is not supposed to be like the US Government tariffing every country in the world or taking an interest in American companies. And so you actually do need. I'm not hopeful for Rupert Murdoch, but, but you need people like that to start to say, this is not what we signed up for.
- [26:36]
Host
Now, I'm glad you mentioned as far as the leadership, because I've seen you talk over the last week where I've kind of just been going back. I was like, oh, okay. We align on a number of things. I didn't know if it's like just with so much going on, if it's a distracting thing or it's just something that does need to be said. As you kind of do two things at the same time and move forward. It doesn't feel to me like Jeffries and Schumer are the people that lead the moment. Everything feels like, I don't know, someone told them to do something. Rather than to your point, that you have a Sanders and an AOC that actually feel and think and care. Because the care. Right. And the feeling that feels like such a big win for kind of right wing Trump populism of like, let me make you feel these things. And I don't know, also something that stood out to me was Bernie last night saying, you know, I mean, so he was asked a question that was kind of connected to how I feel. It was, I don't think that they should have to go through it, but it does feel like we're not going to see change unless people feel pain. And a lot of the things that are happening from the Trump administration are going to inflict pain on a number of his own voters. And it's like things where you have some people that are like, oh, they're gonna, you know, they're gonna have to feel those things. I, I don't root for that, but it does feel like that's going to be the only thing that can change someone's vote or their mindset moving forward.
- [28:08]
Ben Rhodes
Do you, do you have.
- [28:10]
Host
I don't know. That was, Sorry, that was like four questions at the same time. I just have a lot of feelings towards this.
- [28:15]
Ben Rhodes
They're all connected. And the quick thing I'd just say about Bernie is like, you never wonder whether that guy had to have a meeting to figure out what he wanted to say about something.
- [28:22]
Host
Something.
- [28:23]
Ben Rhodes
You never feel like he's focus grouped something or responding to the polls. And you feel that way when you hear Schumer and Jeffries. And look, someone from Turkey who's a tremendous thinker about democracy and autocracy, she's a journalist who's been exiled because she was on the wrong side of Erdogan there, said something to me after Trump's inauguration, which is that when there's an authoritarian takeover of your country happening, the worst thing the opposition can do is look, look like conventional politicians, because we're living in an extreme time. And if Trump is doing this thing over here and he's built a movement and he's moving at 100 miles an hour, and you just look like politicians, like, you become completely irrelevant. And I think that's. You have to look like you're authentic and you're trying different things. And like, Schumer and Jeffries just do not feel designed for this moment. Right. And by the way, it doesn't just mean you have to be left like Bernie. You could do this from anywhere in the political. Look, Thomas Massie, I don't agree with, is a libertarian, but he's like, he doesn't seem conventional. Right. It's gonna take different kinds of opposition, and you have to be open to that. I do think the hard truth that I would say to the point you made about Bernie's comment is I don't think we're getting out of this without something really disruptive happening. And by the way, I don't mean when I say this, I mean for all of us. In other words, this kind of politics, this kind of is not just the U.S. if you look globally, you've got Trump in charge here, you've got Putin in charge in Russia, you've got Netanyahu in charge in Israel, you've got Xi Jinping, pretty aging, autocratic guy in charge in China, Narendra Modi in India. This is not the collection of people that is going to lead to a soft landing right. In history. It's usually this kind of politics leads to. Led to World War I and World War II. And the whole reason we set up a whole system of international rules, the whole reason liberal democracy got more entrenched in the US was because we got scared by World War I, World War II. And we're like, we don't want to do that again. I don't think it's a coincidence that, you know, it's 80 years now. We don't have historical memory of this. And so, like, we're experimenting with that politics again. Nationalism, authoritarianism, like, far right populism. Right. That leads to something really disruptive happening. I hope it's not the big war. And right now, that's part of what concerns me, is you look at, you got Ukraine, you got the Middle east, and you've got Taiwan sitting there as a flashpoint. I hope it's not like a civil conflict here in the United States either. But it does feel like this isn't sustainable. And even not just the politics, our economy doesn't feel sustainable. Like, I do well in this economy, and I can barely forge it. I don't know how people are getting by in this country. And meanwhile, the deficits are ballooning, the debt's ballooning, like the tax cuts are getting shoveled out the door. God knows what kind of tax cheating's happened. God knows what kind of crypto bubbles are being created. So I kind of do feel like there's probably some major economic or financial collapse, like, that is probably not that far away. I'm not going to be predictive about that. All I'm saying is that I don't think this kind of fever that we're in of extreme polarization and extreme political change breaks with an election result. It feels like there's some kind of calamity. My hope is it's not the worst kind, which is a war. And look, we're all going to feel pain from that. I think what we can do, though, is try to empathize with some of those Trump voters, if you're from my perspective. I mean, not all of them. I don't empathize with these billionaires who've sold us out. Like, I don't empathize with, like, kind of people that are straight up racist. But, like, you know, that's not everybody in the maga. And we need to figure out some way to have a shared identity with those people again.
- [32:26]
Host
Yeah, I mean, it's rough because even, like, when people start talking about no contact and obviously everyone's relationship and like, to your point, everyone that voted a certain way or doesn't care until maybe it impacts them, they're at different levels. Right. Not everyone's at a. At a 10. Not everyone's across, like, some line. But when you're talking about wars, do you. Does Venezuela, like, what's happening there pop up on your radar, is getting closer and closer to the podium, or is this kind of this, like a little bit of an outside thing posturing or here and there, or could that spark something?
- [33:02]
Ben Rhodes
I've been worried about this for weeks because you can see this thing coming right so they're blowing boats out of the water off the coast of Venezuela. First of all, Venezuela is not a main source of drugs in the United States. So if the problem they're trying to solve is drug cartels using boats, far, far more drugs come from Mexico or Colombia or Ecuador. The fentanyl precursors come from China. We're not bombing boats off those countries shores. Venezuela is an ideological right. It's softened up. There's a lot of oil there. And so I see these converging interests down there because get rid of the left wing dictator, get the oil. But also importantly, I think being a wartime president gives you authorities, right? Bear in mind that the Trump administration was deporting Venezuelans under the Alien and Enemies Act. At the beginning of the administration that really over 200 year old law said you can deport people if you're at war with the country that they're from. And the Trump administration said that they were at war with Venezuela because of some gang that none of us had heard of before that. And so the point is that I think guys like Steve Miller have looked at this and be like, well, shit, if we're in a state of war, we have extraordinary powers to deport people, to use the military in different ways to potentially claim powers at home. If you think this is hyperbolic. No, this is how it's worked throughout history. Authoritarian leaders use war as a justification to claim more power. And everything Trump does seems to be about sometimes it's ideologically schizophrenic. The one constant is what gives him more power. And so I worry about going to war in Venezuela. He seems to have a view of this hemisphere, like Latin America, as kind of our domain. Remember we're talking about taking the Panama Canal with the Canada stuff, the Greenland stuff. I think that Trump's the Venezuela could be the beginning of flexing of military muscles in the Americas. That, by the way, I don't think would end. Venezuela is a big country. I don't think that'd be a simple military operation if it's a regime change one. So I do worry about it.
- [35:16]
Host
So in your mind, is it pure regime change? Because wasn't there a conversation around there actually being something, a stake in Venezuela's oil and mineral wealth that just got turned down, or not just, but was turned down.
- [35:29]
Ben Rhodes
So this is what concerned me, this is what really got my flag up on this one, is that there were two tracks kind of in the Trump policy Venezuela. One was this pressure bomb boats, regime change kind of approach. And the other Was this guy Rick Grinnell, who's not someone I agree with about many things, but was negotiating with Maduro, the president of Venezuela, to basically get stake in the oil, get everybody that we care about out of prison. And Trump shut off those negotiations. He shut off that track. And it was right after that happened that it was reported that that happened. That was a couple weeks ago that we start to see reports about maybe there's CIA covert activities in Venezuela, maybe Trump now is threatening strikes into Venezuela. Maria Machado, who won the Nobel Peace Prize, ironically, is calling for US Regime change operation in Venezuela. It feels like a lot of stuff is aligning.
- [36:22]
Host
Yeah. I mean, when I know that we've kind of talked here and there about several countries, Hungary has continued to come up, and I was kind of talking about the rich elite in the country. But when we think of America, do we have certain things in our government that make us a little more resistant to an authoritarian takeover, or is that kind of out the window with this current Supreme Court, or are there certain guardrails that you think are going to be kind of the most resilient?
- [36:50]
Ben Rhodes
The most resilient. And the thing that makes us different is our federal system in the sense that we have very strong state government in this country. The elections are administered by the states. The states have their own budgets, like the states, and municipalities have their own police forces. Right. That's different. They don't have that in Hungary. They don't have that in the same way in Turkey. They didn't have that in the same way in Russia. What we've learned that's interesting is that the federal government is not as strong as we thought. Those guardrails seem to be down. The Justice Department, Pete Hegg, said that the military, the Supreme Court can kind of be counted on to rubber stamp most things Trump wants to do, not all of them. So, yes, we have a layered system. We have courts that can tie up Trump a little bit. But actually, the thing that is different is the fact that we have a lot of power in this country in ways that are not the case in states. And it's interesting to me because we all think back to checks and balances, and we were just thinking about Congress and the courts. That's actually proven not to be as protective as we thought. But I do think that the federal system is, and that's the last hope for elections. Look, if these guys could run federal elections, we'd be totally screwed. But elections in this country are administered by the states. And remember that in 2020, it was Republican secretaries of state that told Trump, no, I'm not changing the election result. And so I think that's going to be the last kind of guardrail here is do states hold the line on things like elections, on things like, you know, their own ability to control their communities? Because that is different.
- [38:33]
Host
And, I mean, regarding the elections, I think I know where you would stand on this. But as far as Newsom and California trying to get Californians to vote yes in this upcoming election and get more seats for Democrats in response to what's happening in Texas, are you for that? Are you concerned about that at all? I went on a little rant on my show of why I was for it, but I didn't know if you had thoughts there.
- [38:57]
Ben Rhodes
I'm for it, and I'm for it because, again, I think people don't realize that we're not at the. When I talk about, like, the authoritarian playbook, we're not at the beginning of it, we're at the end of it. Like, this has been a decade of Trump. But if you look at redistricting, the Republicans started to go crazy with that in 2010. That was 15 years ago. Like, this didn't begin with, like, Texas. Like, the maps. If you look at the way the maps were drawn since 2010, and frankly, even before, like, this thing is tilted Republican constantly. And Democrats are the ones who are like, we'll be the nonpartisan redistricting people. I would prefer that we're not living in normal times. And it goes back to what I was saying. If you are acting normal while the other people are like, if you're playing a sport and you're playing against someone who's abiding by no rules, and you're, like, stopping to play by the rules, you're not just going to lose, you're going to get obliterated. And that's kind of where we are. And I think people need to kind of. It's hard for people mentally. You know, it's interesting we started talking about Israel. Like, it's the same thing, right? As someone who's comes from a Jewish background, people I know who are American Jews, some of them just. They just don't want to believe that this has happened in his. The same things happen here. Americans are like, this isn't really happening. Oh, this is Trump's just. This is not really an authoritarian takeover. I'm sorry, people. It is. And even if you don't think it's going to lead to as bad a place as I do, you got to get your head out of the ground here and see what's happening in front of your own eyes. And Gavin Newsom is trying to do something about it, and we should be for that.
- [40:40]
Host
In regards to people with Jewish backgrounds and what happened with Israel, I don't know if it's changed for you. Maybe you have more of an experience with this. Following October 7th, it did feel like there were a number of never Trump voters that I knew that became single issue voters. And I don't know if you saw that and if so, if that has changed over what we've seen happen since then. Obviously that's anecdotal, but I'm just.
- [41:07]
Ben Rhodes
I've seen it too. Oh, no, I've definitely seen it. And I think this has been a very interesting. As someone who's been in the middle of this issue for 15 years, and like, when I was in the government, one of my jobs was to liaison with the kind of organized Jewish community, right? So I had to meet with, you know, AIPAC or the ADL or the American, you know, the Federations of Jewish Federations. And part of, like, what's so interesting about it is this is an identity issue, right? Like, part of your identity is the support you have for the state of Israel. And it's also the projection of, like, you want to believe in the best version of Israel, right? And so, you know, I mean, the time is frozen with like Golda Meyer or something, you know, or the story of Israel as the underdog fighting for its existence, not Israel as the regional superpower bombing seven countries. It has flipped so entirely, right? And when I look at what's happened since October 7, some people became kind of single issue voters because they felt an existential threat to something that was an identity issue to them, Israel. Which, by the way, I don't think was ever true. I don't think even the horror of October 7th, there was no existential threat to the state of Israel. But it felt that way for reasons I understand now. I think part of what's challenging is to see what is happening with your own eyes. Because if you look at it, this is indisputable that they destroyed all of Gaza. It's indisputable that tens of thousands of children were killed. It's indisputable that people were starving. The Israeli government was announcing these policies. I used to go on my podcast and just say the things that Israel. Israeli officials were saying. And I'd get hate mail. I'd be like, the Israeli government was saying, we want to starve These people like no food, water, get in. The Israeli government was saying that they're, they're comparing them to animals, right? And if you just repeated the words or the Israeli government was saying they wanted to ethnically cleanse Gaza, if you just repeated those words, people would send you like unhinged emails about like, how can you're anti Semitic? I'm like, I'm just saying what these people are saying. But part of what is interesting psychologically is to acknowledge that that's happening is to change your, you have to reprogram your entire story about this government in Israel, right. And about its relationship to the Palestinians. It's not just about, it's not like changing your opinion about a tax cut. It's not even about like changing your opinion about whether we should give Ukraine another weapons package. For those single issue voters, just to see what is happening requires kind of a complete reprogramming of how you think about something that has really been important to you. And I get that that's hard. But I also have lost the capacity to really have a lot of empathy for it when you consider what's happened to the Palestinians and frankly what's happened to Israel. It's not healthy for society to do that. And I had somebody say to me, well, haven't they won? You know, they blew up all these Hezbollah guys in Lebanon, they blew up all these Hamas guys. If you think that that's a good thing to kill that many people with impunity, you know, I think that's the wrong. I think I don't want that kind of victory. I'm 32, juggling family, working full time and earning a bachelor's degree at University of Phoenix.
- [44:46]
Host
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- [44:49]
Ben Rhodes
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- [45:06]
Host
A far out as a tornado two.
- [45:08]
Ben Rhodes
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- [45:54]
Ben Rhodes
It done, you know, and again, I think the same thing is happening in the US it will take to acknowledge what Trump is doing is actually like an effort to have a total authoritarian takeover of this country kind of requires a bit of reprogramming because, like, we've been programmed to think that can't happen in the United States. Or maybe you liked Trump and thought Joe Biden was out to lunch. I thought he was out to lunch too. But it doesn't mean that it's okay to like be ripping kids away from their families in the streets of American communities, because Joe Biden was like an old guy who was out to lunch and wasn't a very good president, you know, But I think this is hard for people because it requires like reckoning, not just changing, changing minds.
- [46:36]
Host
Yeah, well, I mean, okay, so I will say, you know, Poland, they recently reversed their democratic decline through kind of mass civic mobilization. I mean, what do you think enabled that? And is that entirely or are facets of that replicable in America, do you think?
- [46:53]
Ben Rhodes
I think so. I know some of the people that were involved in that Polish election a few years ago. And like, when I look at what it took, it took mass mobilization, it took like movement building. Right. And not just nationwide. It took like different communities mobilizing around things they cared about. You know, I know people that were mobilizing around abortion rights in Poland. Right. In a Catholic country, by the way. That's not everybody in that movement. Some of these people are mobilizing around democracy issues. Some of these people are mobilizing about economic issues. But you mobilize, but then you put a very big tent over your mobilization. So, like, if I know someone who is mobilizing on abortion rights in Poland, they have to be in a coalition with people that are staunchly Catholic and pro life, you know, and be okay with that. You know, like, let's. You can't fight with each other. If you're fighting an authoritarian takeover, you cannot fight with each other full stop. And if you look in this country, that is not what's happening on the center left and left. We love to fight each other or the, or the libertarian right or whoever is in this big ten. Just, just the fights have to stop. You put a big tent over it. You mobilize, you're single minded about it and that's how they won that election. And then you fight about things after you win the election.
- [48:06]
Host
See, that's what I wonder if that is possible because there are a number of opinions that I have and disagreements I have with people that are center left and people that are full, deep left. And I'm just like, at what point are you just punching each other and you're freeing up what you're trying to overcome, or I guess what you'd hope would overcome. There's like this whole argument, I would say, yeah, argument and narrative that like some people want to be hard for the sake of it so that everyone can experience some, some of the same suffering they've, they've done. I don't know, I think that we're getting, we're getting a taste of it and everyone, like, to your point, has to come together. But I, I want to, I want to flip this to a little something to some more personal questions for you. But I do want to start with, and this is, this is more of a YouTuber question. I was going through Pod Save the World. Why are you never in the thumbnail when you're a co host? I had to go back 17 videos to find you in the thumbnail on YouTube. And that was a highlight. And then I had to go up to 28. Who's making your thumbnails? And why do they love Tommy so much?
- [49:12]
Ben Rhodes
I love this question, man. I've never gotten to. Let's just say it's funny. It's so funny you asked this. I mean, the short answer is we're all friends. I love those guys. But I went to work at a company that had three founders, Tommy, Jon Favreau and Jon Lovett. And I've always felt like, definitely like I, I'm. Those are the three founders, right? Pod Save America is the flagship and I've no, I don't complain about it. But you have identified something that I've been aware of for years that I actually don't say to them. So I'm glad I can say this. On the YouTube, it is very clear who is being promoted at Cricket Media and who is kind of like the help. And I'm fine with that because I have other platforms too. But yes, that would be my answer. I'm not a founder, I'm not a Pod Save America host. And there's a definitely second class host at Cricket Media. Get this off my chest.
- [50:13]
Host
Yeah, that sounded like 10% of. I might have accidentally opened Something.
- [50:17]
Ben Rhodes
No, no, no, no, no. I love those guys. They're like my closest friends. I mean, it's. It's the. They're not sitting there picking the thumbnail. I mean, I'm not, I'm not. It's just the nature of the beast. When, you know, if I'd founded the company, I'm sure I'd be in more of the thumbnails.
- [50:32]
Host
I'm expecting. I'm expecting to see your face in the next week. I want to. You know, your career has been very interesting to look back at. And I don't know, for you, when you. When you look back, were there certain experiences or was there like a key moment that kind of most influenced your kind of thought process around moral or civic responsibility or even just to get into the space? I don't know. I don't know if everyone gets into it for a moralistic reason, but yeah, I did.
- [50:59]
Ben Rhodes
I mean, the quick answer is I was on a trajectory widely mocked by Republicans ever since I was in fiction writing grad school. I was getting an MFA at NYU on 9 11. And I was. But I was working a local. I always was interested in politics. I was actually working a city council campaign in Brooklyn. I was on the waterfront. It was election day. And I witnessed all of 9 11. And so that was the first turn for me because I was like, well, shit, being like a short story writer writing short stories about a guy in a small apartment in Queens trying to write short stories suddenly felt kind of trivial. And I wanted to be a part of whatever happened. And that kind of led me down to D.C. and I got involved in national security and foreign policy. I went to work at a think tank, the Wilson center, which has since been doged. Actually, that was the first turn. Then the second turn is I was in for the. In D.C. for the Bush years, and I was working on these issues, Iraq, terrorism. And I was. I was like, what the fuck? Like, I came down here for this. Like, these guys are nuts. Like, why are we invading Iraq? Like, why are we doing Guantanamo? And so then I was like, I don't want to just be in policy. I want to be in politics. Because the only way you change things is in politics. And so then the next turning is I jumped on with Obama. And what's interesting about that is I never had a plan to be a deputy national Security advisor in the White House. I was kind of just following that impulse. I do think what I've tried to. Then over the course of the eight years, you definitely learn that they're not happy endings in the world. And then the ultimate unhappy ending is Trump getting elected. And I think what I am actually proudest of, or not proud of stuff, that's the wrong word. But I kind of made a decision like I don't want to be one of those guys who's in the revolving door and like self censors because I wanted some job or hangs out in D.C. at the think tank. And in fact, if anything I want to kind of move away. I looked at power from the inside out and I want to spend maybe the rest of my life looking at power from the outside in because I think that's something that's interesting. And so that's the kind of third turn. If it was a 911 Obama Trump election, I'm still on the back end of that turn and it will take something else to get me to turn back.
- [53:19]
Host
How do you go from being a speechwriter for Obama to deputy national security advisor? Does the president go any other interests? How do you do that?
- [53:29]
Ben Rhodes
It was much more of a trajectory, you know. So for instance, I was not like, like my five or six years in D.C. before Obama, I worked, I was a speechwriter, but I also, I was kind of an aide on the 911 Commission. I worked for the co chair of the 911 Commission. He then did this thing on Iraq. So I had a foreign policy kind of background. So when I was on the campaign, you know, I was actually hired as a speechwriter but I was also hired to kind of be the guy in the headquarters who knew something about foreign policy. Right. So I could like help prep Obama for an interview or I could jump on the phone with a reporter or I could like help write, you know, write a policy paper. So I was always kind of a bit of a utility player when I came into the government as a speechwriter. I then was made a deputy national security advisor with a communications portfolio. So I was. There are multiple deputy national advisors. I was the one in charge of speechwriting, messaging, basically whatever the US Government, what Obama or the press secretary is saying, what are we saying about things? How are we messaging things? And then it was only over time that my responsibilities, because I'm there for eight years, I'm getting more experience and they give me more responsibility. So at the beginning I'm just writing speeches. By the end I'm negotiating normalization with the Cubans. I would not have been doing the stuff I was doing at the end. At the beginning it was an evolution.
- [54:52]
Host
Do you think this is, I mean it's Connected. But are you a mindset of you don't get Obama without Bush and you don't get Trump without Obama as far as maybe reactions from the population, or does that give kind of too much credit in the wrong direction?
- [55:08]
Ben Rhodes
No. Look, I think there's always. David Axelrod used to say to us that Americans tend to try to pick the opposite of the previous person. Now, what I'd say. I'd say there are a couple interesting things. One is that if there's a common thread in every election since Bush, I think Bush was a more cataclysmic presidency than we think of. I think if you stack up the Iraq war and the financial crisis, people basically lost confidence that the whole system was working. The elites knew what they were doing. Iraq showed that. That you could do something that stupid, even if you were like, the experienced people. And the financial crisis showed that globalization wasn't working for people. And basically every election since has been like, let's find an outsider. You know, the thing Obama and Trump have in common is that they're just. They're total political outsiders. I think Biden's election was a total anomaly because I don't think there's any way that happens without Covid. And so the message Americans keep sending is we want somebody different. We don't want somebody from kind of the inside of the system. And then with Obama, what I'll say defensively about Obama is he was quite popular at the end of his presidency, and he was also a pretty moderate president. And frankly, here's where the racing does matter. The thing that was most triggering to people about Obama wasn't like Obamacare. It was that he was black. And I'm not saying everybody. I'm really not. But there's a core, right? There's kind of a core base of almost. The thing about Obama is for such a temperamentally moderate guy, he seemed to enrage people. Just look at the trajectory of Fox during his presidency. That's not because of his policies. It was because of his identity. And so I have a hard time blaming him for some of the anger he engendered because I don't know what he was supposed to do about the fact that he was black.
- [57:15]
Host
I mean, where were you when. When the tan suit dropped? Who knows? I remember where I was.
- [57:20]
Ben Rhodes
No, I.
- [57:21]
Host
The longer this goes with Trump, I feel like the more likely a President AOC emerges. To your point of.
- [57:29]
Ben Rhodes
I really do.
- [57:30]
Host
People want to go towards something drastically different and someone that has energy, because right now it feels like, obviously everything changes. Once you get into the actual build up to the election. But it feels like everyone just kind of mentions Newsom and AOC and it's kind of drast different but also understandable, like they're doing something well.
- [57:50]
Ben Rhodes
And I'd also say, by the way, Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden were like designed in a laboratory to be people for Trump to run against. You know, like people have been around forever. They're the establishment. Like you don't beat Trump with that. Like that is perfect for him. Like him, he can come in and say like burn it all down. Right? And that's not, I'm not, that's not even to try to pick on them. It's just saying like, like Democrats make this mistake of thinking that the safe person is the person that's been around forever and the safe person maybe is the outsider. I mean John F. Kennedy, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, like Barack Obama. Like it tends to be like younger, newer, fresher, seemingly out of nowhere people that win for Democrats. Look at Hillary Clinton, Walter Mondale, you know, these kinds of people, you know, Al Gore, like, I don't know why. When are Democrats going to learn that picking like the next person up or the insider or the safe white guy, like it tends to lead you to lose when you roll the dice like you, you tend to do better as Democrats.
- [59:03]
Host
Well, so okay, I guess with that, I mean is how much of that do you think think for, for Dem leadership is kind of self serving? I want to stay in my position. This is the way things are versus you know, actually strategically thinking about the, the future of the, the country. Is it, I mean are they thinking, do you feel like Dem leadership right now is thinking more self, self supporting and, and more party over the actual country?
- [59:26]
Ben Rhodes
Yeah, some of them are. I mean if, if you can't, I mean this, I mean this main thing. So the Democrats are getting behind the 79 year old governor of Maine to be their candidate. Or maybe I don't know how it is somewhere in that, like it's both that they're staying in office, but also that that's a crazy lesson to take from what just happened with Joe Biden. Like, and so I think that part of it is. And like Biden was entirely that. Right. I cannot, I think I'm indispensable but I also, I cannot, I would always tell people Joe Biden got elected to the Senate when He was like 30 years old. His entire life, for 50 years was running for office and being a politician and he just like literally could not imagine Life without that. Now, that is not a reason to condemn America to the second Trump term by not stepping aside and let. I mean, if we'd had an open primary in 2022, I think it would have been fascinating and it probably would have produced. It certainly would have produced someone in a much stronger position to beat Trump. So I think Biden was entirely about the mentality of not being willing to step aside. I think you see that a bit with Chuck Schumer. I think you certainly see that with people in their 80s in Congress. We had two Democrats die in Congress just in the last year. That shouldn't happen. I mean, I say that with empathy, but the point is that I don't know that you need to be in office after you're 75. And then the other thing I'd say, though, is that even among our, if you talk to other Democrats, there is this constant desire to find the white man swing state governor, as if that it's this kind of strange electability thing. You don't think about what you want in a candidate. You think of person designed in a laboratory to be acceptable, you know, And I'll tell you, like, after 2004 was a pretty, you know, tough election. I don't think quite as tough as this one. I remember after that election was like, maybe we need like, you know, Evan Bai, who is this kind of like vanilla Indiana senator. I don't think many people were like, I think we should have a black guy with an African name. You know, nobody was, but that guy won the biggest landslide for a Democrat since Lyndon Johnson. You know, and so I think we just have to banish this kind of electability thing. Just like, who is connecting out there, who is showing they've got that thing, that extra thing. I don't care whether what color they are or what gender they are. Like, are they catching fire out there? By the way, if we'd follow that lesson, Bernie should have been the candidate in 2016 because he was catching fire out there, right? But, like, everybody's like, oh, shit, we can't take a. We can't afford to take a risk with Bernie. Like, we. And by the way, I had this view at this time, you know, like, oh, Hillary, Trump could get elected. We need Hillary. Well, nobody thought of the fact that, like, maybe you beat right wing populism with left wing populism, not with the establishment. Because if it's populism versus the establishment. So anyway, it's a long way of saying, you know, people need to, like, let go of these Theories.
- [62:38]
Host
Yeah. Well, Ben, actually, one of the last things I want to ask you connected to that then, is like, who on the Dem side, or at least is not Trump aligned? That kind of gives you hope or gets you most excited right now. And it can be a few people. It could be politicians, it could be people, communicators in the space. Anyone stand out to you right now?
- [63:00]
Ben Rhodes
Yeah. I have to say, I really like Mamdani. And it's not. Cause I agree with him on every issue, because I just haven't seen young people want to participate in politics like that and not just. Here's the thing. In the Trump years, including a crooked media, like, the thing that tends to mobilize people is they're scared of Trump. There's not been many people where it's like, I want to be part of that group. You know, like the MAGA people look like they're having fun. It's not my idea of having fun, but like those rallies look like fun for those people. Like Mamdani, that campaign. I'm from New York. I know a lot people are having a great time with that campaign. Not just because they, they hate Andrew Cuomo, because they like Zohra Mamdani, because they feel like it's not just about him. They want to be in that group. They want to, like, be with their friends canvassing for him. Like, they, they want to what? You know, they. They want to like, do the scavenger hunt or whatever the thing he's doing. And, and, and, and that, that, to me, that, that. That is such an obvious thing that you would want to replicate. It's also the case that he. The fact that he has views that some people don't like. I think that if you don't show that there's something that you believe in that you're willing to lose over, you actually aren't going to win. Like, Democrats are so afraid of taking an unpopular position that it looks like they believe in nothing. So I like that too about him, that he's like, doubling down on views. Even some of the things I don't agree with, like, he's sticking to those things. Well, that's good. I like to see that. I like to see what Bernie and AOC are doing out there. If I look in Congress, I like the people that are just trying different stuff, like a Ro Khanna or a Chris Murphy who just seem like they get it, like what's going on. Right. But if I look across the country, there's a lot of stuff that's happening. In kind of grassroots level. Like here in la, people mobilized on their own to like help out when, like the National Guard was here and people were scared ice, you know, And I think that's happening everywhere. And the question is, can you kind of capture that so it's not just like these pockets of activism and community, because ultimately you're not gonna. This sounds weird, but you're not gonna win unless people are having a good time. You know, like, the OA Obama campaign was a great time. Like, it has to be fun to fight authoritarianism. It has to be fun to be involved in politics. If it's just fear based and anger based, the other side's gonna win because they're better at fear and anger than we are.
- [65:31]
Host
Ben, thank you so much for the time, man.
- [65:33]
Ben Rhodes
Thanks, Ben. It's good talking.
- [65:34]
Host
And that, dear listener, is the end of your In Good Faith podcast for the week. But of course, I'll be back with a new one next week, so definitely subscribe. And if you enjoyed the episode, give it five stars on Spotify and Apple or give it a like on YouTube. Also, hey, leave a comment on what you agreed with, disagreed with or who you'd like to see next as a guest. Stay safe out there and I'll see you next time.