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- [00:01]
A
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- [00:43]
B
Hello, and welcome to the Bulwark Podcast. I'm your host, Tim Miller. Delighted. Welcome back to the show. Co host of Ms. Now's the Weeknight. Also a former chair of the rnc. He was Lieutenant Governor of Maryland. It's Michael Steele. What's up, Chairman?
- [00:55]
A
What's up, Big Tim? How you doing, baby? Look at you. Looking good.
- [00:59]
B
I'm doing good. Well, you think so? I don't know.
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A
Know.
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B
I'm. I'm at the end of my wic, man. I got the. My vacation starts tomorrow. I got. I got one more after you. So I. I don't know. It might be a little rough.
- [01:12]
A
That's all right, baby. All right. Don't worry. We got you.
- [01:15]
B
I'm just trying to sprint through the tape. Sprint through the tape, man. There was a lot of shit happening yesterday.
- [01:22]
A
Yes.
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B
So we're going to play for a lot of people. There's a confirmation hearings for the new attorney general, the new Director of National Intelligence. The Vice President was on Joe Rogan's show and had some interesting theories. Much to get through. I guess we'll start with Blanche. It feels like the most important story.
- [01:40]
A
Yeah.
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B
This president's own attorney being Attorney general. Why don't we just go straight into that? John Kennedy, my senator from Louisiana, just kind of asked him about his relationship with President Trump, and I think it kind of sums up the whole deal. Let's take a listen to that. Are you and President Trump friends? I'm his lawyer. Was his lawyer, and now I'm the deputy Attorney general. They called that the Kinsley gaffe for old Michael Kinsley.
- [02:09]
A
The thing about it is these guys just cannot help themselves right now. A lot of them, because they've had arguably a lot of success bullshitting people and pushing through narratives and upending so much of not just culture and economics, but, you know, the political dynamics that. That have always been in a very important balance between Democrats and Republicans, between our country and the world. And now they sit there in their arrogance, and there's moments like that, you know, and it gets better, you know, when the guy's sitting there referring to himself, you know, you know, as the President's, you know, lawyer. Like, dude, this is not how this works. This is not the role you're supposed to be playing, but it is the role Donald Trump wants them to play. And that's the critical thing. I think, Tim, you've talked about it, I've talked about it. All of these actors are in, are on the stage because that's where they want to be, and they're doing what they want to do for one person and one person only. Their self value is zero. They have no self worth. I don't care if you're Marco Rubio. I don't care if you are this guy.
- [03:24]
B
Right.
- [03:25]
A
The. The reality of it is you. You give yourself over in a way so completely and so fully. It's the only way you get on the stage is the only way you stay on the stage. So there were so many revealing moments yesterday between both of those, the dni, the Attorney General nominees, and how they responded when asked very simple, direct questions. That's when you see that butthole clench up real tight. It gets real tight and they get real nervous and they just start hubba da, hubba da, hubba da. And then the truth slips out.
- [04:01]
B
Yeah, I mean, there are definitely two ways to go there with Ty Blanche. There is the psychology of this. Like, why do you want to humiliate yourself like this? Why do you want to be this person like this? And then there is the serious nature of this thing. You were around Chairman. You were around after Watergate, right? How old were you back then? I don't want to age you, but.
- [04:22]
A
Oh, Watergate. I was 15.
- [04:25]
B
Around 15, yeah. Okay, so it's kind of like my version of the Clinton stuff. And it's like, look, that's formative. We made all these changes because the President of the United States was corrupt and he was using the power of the Justice Department to go after his political foes. And that's not how things should work in a rule of law country. And we realized, hey, okay, we gotta make some changes. There need to be some more rules, some new laws, some new norms, some new mores to like, prevent this from happening again. And like, here we are and John Dean still, all these people are still alive.
- [05:01]
A
Nixon's not.
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B
But, like, it's not as if this was a lesson we learned in the history books even. Right. You know, like, a lot of people lived through this and we're just like, no, fuck it, we're going back. And I guess 51 Republicans are going to be like, yeah, whatever.
- [05:15]
A
Yeah, that's exactly the part. I mean, just the fuck it attitude to me is the most disturbing. And just how easily we slid into it. I mean, it's just. I mean, what. What angers you or dulls your senses about the country so much that not only do you live through the insurrection fermented by the sitting President of the United States and individuals around him, that just four years later you say, let's do that shit again, let's just go back there again. And I think a lot of it, Tim, and I've said this from the very beginning, leadership defines. Leadership is an essential element in things that move and shape a city council, a community, a country. When the men and women in power in leadership capitulate and give in, give up, give up on the idea, give up on their own leadership, this is what it looks like, Republicans standing on that stage in 2016. I still, for God only knows what reason, they put Donald Trump's fat ass in the center of that stage. He had no political relevance in the conversation. The only thing he had going for him, that he was a billionaire, purportedly, and everybody started licking his feet and working their way up his legs and the rest of them.
- [06:59]
B
It's a little early for this.
- [07:00]
A
Thoroughly. Thoroughly. In that moment, that give in, that give up set us on a very perilous course. And so now the question is, we sit here and, you know, listen, can we stop playing the bullshit game? All right. Oh, do you think the Republicans are finally going to break with Trump and not support, you know, the nominee?
- [07:27]
B
I got a laugh out of this this morning. Chairman, just really quick, just for the record, I want the record to reflect. I was watching hearings yesterday, so I'm going to speak in that manner. I said it's early when you're starting to talk about those people getting lascivious with Donald Trump in 2015. You thought I said thoroughly, like I was. I was. Yes. And to you. And I was. I was trying to reign you back in. I'm not ready for that mental image yet. But anyway, here we are. There's more of that coming.
- [07:53]
A
Oh, there's more coming.
- [07:56]
B
I was watching CBS this Morning. I like to check in on what's happening over there on the real news from time to time. It's still a television station, so I
- [08:05]
A
guess they do shit.
- [08:06]
B
And the reporter, Kaylan Huberton's actually a good reporter, but she's like, talking about how the key vote here is John Cornyn. Yeah. And how John Corden hasn't decided what he's going to do yet because he doesn't have an election anymore to worry about because Donald Trump just totally pantsed him and took away his dignity and supported like a criminal, like, absurd job of the hut looking, cheating, nasty motherfucker instead of. So anyway, Corn has no reason to do it. Donald Trump wants. He actually has good reason to do the opposite. He was questioning yesterday about this weaponization fund, Blanche, and basically saying, this isn't dead, though you keep saying it is. It's not. There's no. It hasn't been formally shut down. And so, you know, they're speculating over there on CBS like, well, this could be the key vote. It's just like, guys, I mean, real John Cornyn is going to have his John McCain thumbs down moment right now over Todd Blanche. After a decade, it's just. It's laughing.
- [09:09]
A
Nope, it ain't happening. It ain't happening. I'll be happy to come back on this podcast and need every inch of the words, but it ain't happening. They will line up and they will bend over as they always have, and they will give Donald Trump exactly what he wants, and they would give it to him in the way that he wants it. And so all of this, you know, speculation in our press, I just wish our press would grow the fuck up. I just really wish they would stop. I don't know how much more Runway, you need to recognize how this administration functions and what this administration's objectives are and how they punk everybody, everybody, including you. And yet you continue to write stories and tell narratives as if this is George Bush and Barack Obama, you know, going at it. This is not that environment that's dead, that's gone. That is in the history books right now. We are living in a new reality politically in this country in which a lot of ugly and very dangerous precedents are being set. And so the concern you should have is not corrective action by the next Democratic administration praying for that, but praying that the next Democratic or Republican administration doesn't want to build on this shit and doesn't want to expand it and doesn't want to sit there and say to herself, let me show you how to really do it right.
- [10:49]
B
We're bringing in some competent people in here. We're not going to bring in the president's parking lot attorney to do this stuff. Have you ever thought I really should be doing more to protect myself from stalker scammers and hackers? But you're not sure what. Here's what to do. Go to www.joindeleteme.com bulwark Enter code bulwark and you'll get 20% off DeleteMe. DeleteMe removes your personal information that's being sold online. In the age of AI, we're all especially vulnerable to scammers using your personal data that's floating around on the Internet against you. Have you ever googled yourself and found your home address, phone number or the name of a family member? It's unsettling. But the good news is delete me can help. And delete me has never been more affordable. Our listeners can get 20% off at joindeleteme.com bulwark with code bulwark you can get an individual plan for as little as eight bucks a month. I always think I should be doing more about this. I'm a little bit too much of an open book. I'm a blabber, you know, I don't like secrets. Not a big secrets man. And you know, sometimes that means too much stuff's out there. And as you guys know, I also don't really love, you know, doing the paperwork, going in, doing the login, fixing things, doing the secret, all that sort of stuff. Just not, not in my nature. Good to delete me makes this stuff as easy as possible. Make it easy to kind of go through. It's constantly scanning on your behalf. It's removing information if it pops up somewhere new. It's not just a one time thing. They're being vigilant. They're out there in the world taking my stuff down when fuckers are popping it up places and I appreciate them. Take control of your data and keep your private life private by signing up for Deleteme now at a special discount for our listeners. Get 20% off your Delete Me plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com Bulwark and use promo code Bulwark at checkout. The only way to get 20% off is to go to www.joindeleteme.com bulwark and enter code bulwark at checkout. That's www.joindeleteme dot com bullock code bullork. Everyone likes being pleasantly surprised in life. John Cornyn wants to decide who knows. We'll see how it goes. I know how it's going to go, but we'll see. I'm open to a pleasant surprise, but the political kind of ramifications that could be possible for the blanche confirmation I think are related to Epstein. And I think that most people don't really know what the Attorney General does. This is not going to be the swing voter in the Iowa Senate races. Key issue. Maybe that's not a swing voter. Maybe it's just somebody who's, who's disillusioned by Trump and decides that they're not going to do this, etc. I want to play the other, I think key exchange from yesterday was with Cory Booker talking about how Blanche moved Maxwell to this Club Fed after an interview. Booker said. What. What did you. What. What did you get out of that interview? Let's watch.
- [13:26]
A
Did Your interview with Ms. Maxwell lead to a single additional person being charged, yes or no? No. Did it lead to a single new investigation, yes or no?
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B
I can't talk about whether there's any investigation.
- [13:44]
A
Did you discuss her transfer to another institution?
- [13:47]
B
Yes or no?
- [13:48]
A
No. Well, just one week after your meeting, Ms. Maxwell was transferred from a low security federal institution to a minimum security prison camp. Were you involved with that transfer?
- [14:01]
B
When, as I've talked about before, in the time leading up to me going down to meet with her, we learned that she was receiving threats
- [14:12]
A
that turned out. I'm going to interrupt you for a
- [14:13]
B
matter of time because. Okay. Well, it's not a question I can answer.
- [14:17]
A
Apparently, in the term that you're giving me, sir, I'm going to tell you this because I deal with issues of criminal justice. When people are under threats in a Bureau of Prison facility, they're put into solitary confinement or protective. They're not moved to a camp. That's not always true. It is. Well, what is true is someone that is accused of child sex trafficking under the Bureau of Prison's own policies is not put in a facility like this. That seems clearly like a reward.
- [14:47]
B
Hmm. Rewards.
- [14:50]
A
He is so full of shit. This is this. I'm glad Corey did what he did because that's just a clear example of how bland Blanche speaks. And I'll give Blanche credit. He is. He's got a silver tongue of. And he knows how to say the words right. Because his assumption and, and largely correct is that most people don't know what the he's talking about and don't know how the, the system, the prison system or the Bureau of Prisons works, what the transfer rules are. Cory Booker does. He was a mayor, right? He's a United States senator. He deals with these criminal justice issues all the time. So he knows how the prison system works. And he's absolutely right. If you are a prisoner, I don't give a damn what prison you're in. You're in Rikers or the local pokey. When you are threatened, they don't send you to Club Fed. They don't send you to the best prison in the country with minimal security,
- [15:54]
B
like goat yoga, right? You know, got therapy dogs, right?
- [15:59]
A
They don't. They gonna give you a kitty. No, baby, that's not how that works. That does not works. Todd. Blanche did what the. What the deal was. He gave Maxwell what she needed to keep her damn mouth shut. And I guarantee you on the table is some type of commutation or pardon for this bitch later on. Trust me on that.
- [16:23]
B
This is important when dealing with these liars, right? Like they construct these lies and they construct these fake narratives and fake stories. And sometimes rather than going at the fake story, the best way is just to roll back the lens a little bit. And I like that. Where Corey started there, which is like, if you were going to go interview Jeffrey Epstein's right hand man, you would think that, like the point of that would be to get additional information, right? To find the other pervs, right? And I said, that's where he starts. I like that. You know, because you know he's going to lie about transferring her to the other prison. But it's like, wait a minute, right? What were you doing? Like, that was your job. You were the deputy general. You're sitting there with the most notorious child sex trafficker alive in the country. You didn't get another lead? Like I'm in the Big Lebowski. It's like, he leads.
- [17:14]
A
Nope.
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B
You know, not why I was there. What about the Credence tapes?
- [17:18]
A
I was there to let her know. You keep your mouth shut, you play ball with Donald Trump in the administration, we will take care of you. That's why he was there. He did not go there to get any additional information to find out anybody else's name. None of that. When you are mentioned 38,000 times in the files, trust me, your lawyer's not going there for any other reason but to protect you, period. That's it. And so I agree. I love the way he set that conversation up. You know, the smart ass lawyer fell into the trap because he had to answer the question that revealed the ruse and that was it. Those two questions dwell. Did you, you know, get you getting the information, did it lead to any of the prosecutions? Nope.
- [18:14]
B
Nope, nada.
- [18:15]
A
Okay. Why the hell were you there?
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B
It's a pretty depressing state of affairs. He's going to make it through. And this is what I was talking with Mayor Pete about on Tuesday. It's like, how do you even, you know, once you've moved back to this, this World where the Department of Justice is just at the beck and call of the President. Like, you get to a bad place. Back in the winter, I was in the sweater market and I made the mistake of buying a sweater from somebody that wasn't one of our sponsors. And it looked good. It's kind of a cable knit deal. But when I actually put it on, terrible. Sleeves are a little too long, little cattywampus. Neck was too tight. And I don't know, I'm sure you've had this happen. Online shopping can be a little bit of an adventure. You buy something that looks amazing, you buy something that they're advertising to you on Instagram, you get caught up in the moment, looks really good on that hot model, and then comes to your house and you're like, what is this? This is garbage. Then you're stuck with dealing with returns and shipping. And I'm sure some of you are more vigilant about that than me. I've got in the back of my closet some clothes I never returned that are just sitting there that end up going to the Goodwill. When you go through a situation like this, you think to yourself, maybe I should have just used dupe.com's research for me tool before I bought it. Now, when we're searching for new Panio furniture or when we're searching for really new anything online, you can use dupe.com and their research for Me tool makes it all feel completely different. They don't put the ads at the top. They're not forcing stuff on you. There's no sponsored best pick that you know somebody paid for. You just give Duke.com a short description of what you're looking for. And it goes through a ton of options, pulls from real sources people actually trust, filters out the sponsored links and gives you a straight answer on what to buy and why. So if it takes research to buy it, let Dupe do it for you. Stop wasting time comparing options. Just go to dashupe.com and tell it what you're looking to buy. That's dupe.com to finally feel confident about what you're buying online. I want to go over to the DNI as well. So this is an interesting situation. So Trump had appointed, obviously, Bill Pulte, who is that guy that's like 37 but looks like he's 55 and he's a Nepo baby and he was part of the meme stonks at the Gamestalk stock. He's just a scammer all the way down. He had no background in intelligence. He gets appointed to be into dni. It was the one time where some of the Republican senators are like, come on. Like, this is ridiculous. There are plenty of hacks that at least went to one class, went did foreign policy class at the Elliott School or something, but then you replace it with another guy. That's a ridiculous choice. Jay Clayton is just a lawyer hack. He had been in the Manhattan DA's office. Interestingly, he was the one that signed the warrant this week going after the New York Times for their reporting about Trump's hand me down plane and how it doesn't have the air defenses that. That you need to keep people safe. His performance was. We're gonna play one clip, but I just. I don't know if you had a chance to watch much of it. I mean, it was significantly worse than Blanche for me. It was awesome. And he's a preposterous selection.
- [21:37]
A
No, dude, that was a shit show. Just on the question of who won the 2020 election.
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B
Let's just go straight into that one. This was John. John Ossoff was really good. This goes on for, like, three minutes. I'd recommend people watch the whole exchange. You know, we have limited time on the podcast, so I've picked out my favorite part, but Jon Ossoff was just relentless on this. And let's just play a little bit. We've established that you have an obligation to be honest and forthright with this
- [22:06]
A
committee and with the American public, but you refuse to answer a simple matter of fact about the 2020 election. Is that right?
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B
No, that's not right. Then answer the question. Who won the 2020 election? I have answered the question. Answer it. What is your answer?
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A
I've given you my answer. What is your answer?
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B
Just sitting back in his chair now. You refuse to answer a basic question about who won a presidential election, but
- [22:34]
A
you asked to lead America's intelligence community.
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B
Isn't it humiliating to be unable to answer this question, to have to indulge the president's delusions?
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A
That right there, for me, that sums up everybody. It goes back to what I was saying a moment ago about all of these assholes that get trotted out, whether they're current members of the United States Congress or the Senate or want to be appointees to various positions? That right there, that humiliation that you have to put yourself through, that you consciously agree to that. I want this job so bad. I want to be in Donald Trump's. I want him to like me so much. I don't want him to say A bad word about me. I don't want him to have a negative tweet about me. I will do whatever he tells me to do. I am that much less of a
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B
man
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A
that that's who I am. He is my sun. He is my moon. He is the stars to which I go to bed at night. And the breeze that I wake up to in the morning, that's Donald Trump for me. That's what I hear when these motherfuckers get up and start talking that shit, when they can't sit there and say the basic thing, yeah, Trump lost. But guess what? He's president again. That's all you fucking have to say. That is not hard. What is so hard about that?
- [24:14]
B
He won the next one.
- [24:16]
A
He won the next one.
- [24:18]
B
This guy, man, Clayton, he was a prick. He was unserious. In a different clip, I forgot to pull this, but Ossoff's asking him about the raid on Fulton County.
- [24:29]
A
Yes.
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B
He says, I learned about this yesterday in your office. It's like, what, you want to be the Director of National Intelligence, and you're telling me that you did not know the biggest news story of what happened to your predecessor?
- [24:43]
A
Was she there? I didn't know she was in Georgia. I just learned yesterday she was in Jodah. Why was she there?
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B
Nobody has mentioned that to you in any of the briefings for this hearing. You didn't pick up the Wall Street Journal. I don't even ask you to read the New York Times or watch msnow. You didn't pick up the Wall Street Journal. Like, this has been the news. I think it was on Fox, that
- [25:03]
A
whole string of words. I'm sitting there, Tim, going, what the hell is happening here? This man. And see. But the thing about it is, he did know about it.
- [25:15]
B
Well, duh.
- [25:15]
A
They briefed him on it. He doesn't come to this hearing not being prepared to answer the question because he knew his staff or the people preparing him knew he would be asked. So they found the best way for him to answer it was to pretend to be stupid. Well, it's.
- [25:33]
B
The Director of National Intelligence. Intelligence is kind of in the word, knowing in the word. What's the phrase these days, people like to say, monitoring the situation, kind of monitoring what's happening out there is kind of the job, actually, of Director of National Intelligence.
- [25:48]
A
I monitor shit. So I know a little bit about everything. I hear a little bit about everything. Then I get details about the thing I need to have details about. But that wasn't where he was going and what he Wanted to do again, doing a little bit of the Pam Bondi asshole arrogance, right? Sitting back from the microphone. There is no deference. No deference to the Senate, to the individuals who are making the inquiry, who hold their political appointment in their hand because they know that regard. They could sit there and shit on the table and the Republicans would absolutely go, that's the best shit I've seen in years.
- [26:35]
B
Make you get me a spoon. Get me a spoon. Will a staffer fetch me a spoon, man, this is.
- [26:44]
A
And they vote him in.
- [26:45]
B
Honestly, I was apoplectic to watch this. It's just like, how can you. Tom Cotton is the chairman of this, supposedly the national security guy. How can you pretend like you care about the country's national security and vote to confirm this person? His performance was clownish. This is his. This is his resume. It's kind of like the resume is slightly more serious than Bill Pulte because he's just a scam artist and an echo, baby. And some people kind of don't talk about it. He worked at Sullivan and Cromwell from 1995 to 2017. His whole career, he was just a lawyer. He did the Barclays acquisition of Lehman Brothers. I'm just going through his bio here. He was. He was part of the M and A sale of the Atlanta Hawks. It's like this guy doesn't know anything about national intelligence. And then after that, Trump put him at the sec. Like, he doesn't know anything about foreign policy. You know, he's. I'm sure he's been to some chateaus in France with the money made.
- [27:46]
A
He's been to a few chateaus, like, that's it. But here's the thing. As part of the job is in the title, right? The statute creating the job is very clear. It states unequivocally, Tim, that the Director of National Intelligence must. Must have, and I'm this exact words, extensive national security experience. It uses the word extensive in the description of the job. Extensive national security experience. That's who the DNI should be. Not some M and a lawyer
- [28:41]
B
who
- [28:41]
A
put together a merger or happens to be the buddy of the President. But he's going to the job because come this November, they want to use the national security apparatus. Once they declare a national security breach relative to our elections. That's what the speech tonight by the president is going to be about. They're already setting up the conversation for evidence that China or Russia or some nefarious country, maybe Iran, is interfering or trying to interfere with our elections and this motherfucker is going to be the one on point to execute on the Project 2025 plan to rip the election apart to help the Republicans hold the House.
- [29:38]
B
That's where your skill as a M and a lawyer does come in. Because really, what they're trying to do, I mean, based on what we've seen from what they're planning on talking about, like, a lot of the stuff is that we've known, like, oh, China was trying to get voter data. It's like, well, like, okay, you could go get the voter roll if you have a couple hundred bucks in a lot of these states. You know what I mean? So the job here as DNI is not to actually learn things or inform things or protect. Right. It's to, like, take little nuggets of information that can be manipulated to make it seem like Donald Trump's a victim or one of his foes is a bad person, and then put that like, that's his job, and that's kind of a lawyer's job, I guess. So he does have experience with that.
- [30:26]
A
Yeah. I mean, look, sorry, lawyers, this is the plan. It's why they want to put these people in strategic positions ahead of time, so that once the narrative is set, they start to call the shots they need to call to move the objective along. It's having this fool as the DNI is having Blanche over at the Department of Justice. It is having the players in place. It runs everything from immigration to ice. Uber ICE activity. Look, ICE has killed two people in the last week and a half, two weeks. And I'll be honest, it's just almost a dull roar from the American people at this point.
- [31:13]
B
So I was talking about all day yesterday.
- [31:15]
A
Yeah, it's just a dull roar.
- [31:18]
B
I know.
- [31:18]
A
And these weren't even individuals that they wanted to. These were the wrong people. Yeah, they're killing the wrong people. Right?
- [31:27]
B
Are they, though? I mean, they're both brown guys.
- [31:29]
A
Yeah, there you go. There you go.
- [31:31]
B
Do they care?
- [31:32]
A
They don't. They don't give a shit. And the reality of it is the country is like, okay, well, let me know.
- [31:42]
B
I know. I had a meltdown. God love Sarah, man. She did a focus group this week and was telling us about. It was asking people about the Medford, Maine shooting, and it was just blank stares. And I get it, man. It's summer, you know, kids are at home, you got a parent in work, you know, you got to go down to the barbecue, go down to the lake. But, like, you know.
- [32:06]
A
Yep, that's where we are. Turn on the News, that's our country right now. Our civic senses have been dulled, deadened. Our aspirations for the future of our kids is seeping away from us. And they know that. Stephen Miller knows that. And they keep pounding the same thing to the point where he's like, all right, fine, whatever, whatever, whatever. I just want to go back to my book. And that is the unfortunate part. Generations before us, Tim, in moments like this, leaned in not away from what the country needed, defining real time, who we were in the face of Nazism, even with homegrown Nazis here in the US Finding a way to push through that, not succumbing to it. And today, it's just easier to give up. And it's frustrating in so many ways. And look, I know that's not everybody. I know that there are a lot of good people out there.
- [33:13]
B
It's not, you know, people listening to this. They're suffering through this.
- [33:16]
A
Exactly.
- [33:17]
B
They suffered through an hour and 20 minutes of me banging the table yesterday.
- [33:22]
A
And they're back today.
- [33:23]
B
You're hearing this.
- [33:24]
A
So, you know, but we're linked, folks. I just want you to know. We are linked arm in arm. We are linked in arm together. And so, yeah, you know, guys like Tim and me, we have. We have that honest moment where it's like, what the fuck, people? Come on, we're not talking to you. We're trying to wake up everybody else who's sleepwalking through this shit. Because I'm telling you, on the 5th, the 6th, the 10th, the 12th, the 15th of November, we could be in some real shit where the. Every election that a Democrat won in this country is called into question and is called corrupt, because that's how Donald Trump wants it to be. And he's put in place the people who will do that. And so what we're saying is be vigilant now. Waking up on Wednesday going, what the fuck? That's. No, that's not where we can be on this.
- [34:18]
B
Amen to that. So this is the administration in a nutshell, right? It's these serious menacing threats paired with clownish absurdity. Right, so let's go to the clownishness now.
- [34:33]
A
I thought we were dealing with that part.
- [34:35]
B
Well, I mean, again, they're always intertwined, you know, and sometimes it's like it's 80% clown, 20% menace, and sometimes it's 80% menace, 20% clown. I felt like the confirmation hearings were mostly menace and a little clown.
- [34:50]
A
They were menacing.
- [34:51]
B
The Joe Rogan interview and the Pete Hegseth social media posts are Mostly clown. Dealer's choice. Do you want to go to the Naval Observatory or the Department of War? Next. Who do you want to.
- [35:02]
A
Oh, wow. Okay, let's do Naval Observatory.
- [35:06]
B
Okay, let's do J.D. vance. He went to Texas to meet with Joe Rogan. They talked for three hours. So we're not going to do that many clips of that because you can only take so much. But they did a lengthy Epstein thing. We kind of covered Epstein with Blanche. But like, JD Is doing this interview with Rogan. It's like, I don't know. Epstein might be Mossad. It seems like he's Mossad. He could be CIA, but probably Mossad, because it's probably the Jews. And also, you know, he has. He's at the highest levels. He just. He had infiltrated everything. But not the very highest. Not the tippy top, not Trump. But, you know, he was in the pictures of them the most. But everybody else, he was involved. And I just. We just don't know. And it's just like, guys, you've been in there 18 months again. It's back to plans. You haven't had a lead. You haven't had. Anyway, so then it's not. The Mossad isn't just behind Epstein. They're behind the failed war plan that he's working on as well. It seems like. Let's listen to them talk about that a little bit.
- [36:06]
A
But my sense is that the way that all foreign influence works in the United States is people try to manipulate American public opinion, and then from manipulating a public opinion, they try to get the outcomes that they want. This thing is a very good example of this. There are some people within their system we know beyond a shadow of a doubt, who are manipulating and trying to change American public opinion to keep the war going on indefinitely.
- [36:33]
B
That's Israel he's talking about. They're manipulating us to keep the war going on.
- [36:37]
A
Wait a minute. Before that last little bit, he just described the Trump administration. He just described the fuck what they're doing every damn day. They're manipulating information to get the result they want.
- [36:50]
B
It's a bad one. The Jews do it. He's saying that Israel is manipulating. The telling part is that they are doing that to keep the war going on and they're succeeding. And it's like, bro, I mean, sure, like you invited him into the Situation Room. So you kind of started this, but it's like the war's going on because you guys don't know what the fuck you're doing. Like, that's why.
- [37:10]
A
So basically what you're saying is you and the president are so damn dumb, are so gullible and stupid, that you allow Benjamin Netanyahu trick you or manipulate you into going to war with Iran, and you're still so damn dumb and stupid that you don't know how to end it? That's what you're telling me, Mr. Vice President? That you're that stupid?
- [37:42]
B
That's his pitch?
- [37:44]
A
That stupid that you allowed yourself to be pulled into a war in which 14American soldiers were killed? That didn't happen with Barack Obama because Barack Obama wasn't that stupid. Barack Obama actually negotiated a deal and that pissed off Israel, really, Because Benjamin Netanyahu couldn't manipulate Barack Obama. And over two years, not one soldier died. There was no inflation. There were no high gas prices. Beef was not at 16% over what it cost. I could buy some hamburger. But y' all were so stupid that all these things happened. That's what you're telling me.
- [38:36]
B
That's his pitch. And it sounds bad when you say it, but you would say that. But, like, that's his story that he's telling Joe Rogan. It's like, you know, we're getting manipulated. And it's like, I don't know. And it does go on longer than that. And he's like, you know, we gotta hit them back when they hit us. It's like, okay, well, you were saying how cool they were two minutes ago. It is the most feckless thing imaginable. And I do think it's important to call them weak and stupid and feckless and all this, because that's what the Republicans would be calling a Democratic president that was doing this, that bungled their way into war and was too weak to try to win the war, but too feckless to get out of the war. That's their situation, Deb.
- [39:19]
A
You just nailed it, baby. That's exactly it. That is exactly it. This is our storyline. Here's the irony of ironies is that when they come out with the piece of paper that has the deal on it, it's gonna look exactly like what Barack Obama did.
- [39:38]
B
Worse. Way worse, actually. That'll be the baseline. But then there's gonna be other shit that Iran wants out of. We gotta pay him more money than Obama paid him. Lebanon. I mean, you knew that the first Treaty of Versailles was not going to work when point one had the word Lebanon in it three times. And so it's like, oh, okay, so the vice president saying that Israel's manipulating us, which, okay, I mean, like, you did this, all right? You're a big boy, and then now you strike a deal. Just think about this. He was the point man on the deal, right? And so he's worried about Israel's influence, but then he struck a deal where the fleet. First point on it was like it was incumbent upon Israel to not attack Lebanon.
- [40:23]
A
There you go.
- [40:25]
B
So it's like he put together a deal that allowed Israel.
- [40:28]
A
And who certified that interest? Iran. So, okay, Ben, put, put your shit down. Don't hit them anymore.
- [40:38]
B
All right?
- [40:39]
A
That's, that's, that's the first part of the deal. You can't, you can't go out to Lebanon anymore.
- [40:43]
B
So just stop, defend yourself, and, oh,
- [40:46]
A
by the way, Ayatollah Badass. Okay, all right, fine. Here's 300 million. Just take it, okay? Just go ahead and take it and we won't worry about that. You know, Barack Obama was stupid. He only offered 150. But that's all right. We're going to double that.
- [41:04]
B
Okay, 300.
- [41:05]
A
We'll double it to make it 300. Okay. The straight. We going to control the straight. Oh, hell, fuck it. You guys continue to control the straight, but we'll charge a fee. All right, fuck it. You guys control the straight. We won't charge a fee now either. Okay? So that's our best offer. This is where we are, people. That was that stupid. I hope. We gonna talk about a little testosterone?
- [41:36]
B
Oh, yeah, that's coming up. We got one more though, because I have to get. I have to do this one because it's so strange. Look, here's the thing. I do sometimes like to be a little bit more generous to people who are on podcasts and other podcasters who get talking about weird stuff because it's like, that's the point of this. It's a free flowing conversation. Sometimes the word doesn't come out exactly right. You're shooting from the hip. You don't have an editor while you're talking. I get it, I get it. So you're gonna sit down with Joe Rogan, you're gonna talk for three hours. You're going to cover some weird stuff. This, though, I just, I can't let this one go past and they're discussing what. Let's just listen. Actually, yeah, you'd have to be a very manly man to be able to eat a. Confidently. Confidently eat a corn dog.
- [42:23]
A
I don't know that I could do it, Joe.
- [42:24]
B
I eat them. They're good. Yeah, but they taste good.
- [42:27]
A
Are you photo. I love corn dogs. I've been photographed. You've been photographed eating a corn dog?
- [42:31]
B
I'm sure someone has. What if I've eaten corn dogs? The odds are much more interesting.
- [42:36]
A
Life that I've led, I try to eat my corn dogs. That's between me and my kitchen.
- [42:42]
B
I'm not scared to eat a corn dog. I just think it's funny that people just. They're so afraid of being anything that looks like a dick. You can't. Bananas, corn dogs.
- [42:53]
A
The thing I couldn't get over Biden is just bad staff work, man. The way that he ate ice cream. I mean, it's like, you know, we could bring some of this stuff up, but it's like they would get him eating ice cream in the most ridiculous suggestive way imaginable.
- [43:10]
B
So J.D. vance saw Joe Biden eating ice cream and he started thinking about.
- [43:14]
A
He got turned on by it.
- [43:15]
B
I don't understand. He got horny.
- [43:17]
A
He started thinking about, he's so horny
- [43:20]
B
for the ice cream.
- [43:21]
A
I don't understand.
- [43:22]
B
What was he. I don't even know what is the suggestion when Joe. But I don't.
- [43:27]
A
Man is insecure eating a banana or corn dog. And have you been to a state fair? Fuck. Have you been to a state fair? Just walk around the state fair. There's not a man who's sitting there going, shit, I'm going to go in the closet and eat this shit.
- [43:41]
B
Let me go into the bathroom.
- [43:43]
A
Find me a corner corned off room somewhere where I can just go have my corn dog in private.
- [43:48]
B
Yeah. J.D. doesn't have the self confidence to eat a corn dog. And he watches Joe Biden lick an ice cream cone and he thinks, American, it's kind of like whipped cream.
- [43:59]
A
He apparently has spent time, Tim, watching Joe Biden eat ice cream, thinking about
- [44:05]
B
it, getting going, that he's formed an opinion, hot and bothered. It never occurred to me. I don't know. You know, look, I'm a sexual being, Michael. I think about it, but like I've watched Joe Biden eat ice cream and that it never occurred to me that there was something erotic happening.
- [44:22]
A
No, there was nothing erotic about eating ice cream and there's nothing erotic about eating a corn dog. Unless you eat it suggestively. Unless instead of just putting it in your mouth and biting on it. Right.
- [44:36]
B
I can imagine a suggestive way to eat a corn dog. But you don't have to do it like that. Here's the thing. I'm sorry, you don't have to reply to this if you don't want Michael Steele. So you can just sit there silently if you want. But I always thought. Are you familiar with the Kinsey scale?
- [44:51]
A
Oh, yeah.
- [44:52]
B
Okay. Yeah. So it's, you know, it's. I forget which way it goes. If you're like a six, you're. It's just all gay. If you're a zero, you're just all straight. But like, you know, he interviewed a lot of people. I always felt like the person that was like a one or a two, they're just like a little bit gay. That's kind of challenging, you know, because you're still grappling. You know, you can't be your true self, but you're grappling through this thought that goes through it from time to time. And some people are, you know, are good, are, you know, some men handle that well because they have self confidence. Other men can't handle that. I look at the JD and I'm just kind of like, if you can't eat a corn dog and you're thinking about dicks when Joe Biden's eating ice cream, it feels like you might be a 1 or a 2 on the Kinsey scale. For me, that's just me. You can sit it with that. Speaking of manliness, the Department of War has a new manliness policy for 30 plus for geriatric war fighters. I don't even have an intro. We'll just listen to that too. This was a social media post from Pete Hagsoth yesterday.
- [45:51]
A
But while we invest heavily in our weapon systems, platforms, gear, our most decisive tactical advantage will always be the individual warfighter. We have a sacred duty to maintain that advantage, which is why we must constantly look for new ways to optimize your performance, your resilience, and your long term health. And to meet that commitment, today I'm authorizing a new screening program for testosterone deficiency for our service members, ensuring you have the right testosterone levels to operate at your absolute best. Here we go with the dicks again. These guys, these guys are obsessed about what's between your legs. They're absolutely obsessed. Well, what is going on with this? I don't need the Secretary of Defense worried about my testosterone levels. That's between me and my doctor. If I'm so concerned, if I'm not concerned, I can still bench press. I can still do shit that I want to do that has nothing to do with my ability to fire a gun or to push a button on a drone. For a drone. What the fuck is this man talking about? Would you stop obsessing about this Aryan military that you want to create. Because that's all this is. That's all this is. They're dragging black people out of the military now. They got this dumbass policy that if you can't find a solution for the bumps that you get on your face, because that's a thing in our culture for some black men. You've heard of razor burn, right? So the reaction from the razor blade on the skin causes these bumps to form. Right.
- [47:41]
B
Is it because of the coarse hair?
- [47:43]
A
Right, yeah, coarse hair. And some of the hair grows back in, which causes the bump to form. It's a medical condition. It is something that we deal with in the community. Oh, really? So now that's something that they want to go after. But it only applies largely to black men, let alone the fact that you've denied more black officers than who are moving up in ranks advancement in the military. So we know what you want to do with getting black and brown people out of the military. So now you want to try to play this other game. I guess you're going after young white men who somehow don't have the right testosterone level. What the. I don't under. I don't. I don't know what we're doing here. What do you think this military is going to look like?
- [48:35]
B
You know, Kinzinger talked about this yesterday. It's kind of. This is one of those things where it's like. It's such performative, fake masculinity nonsense.
- [48:42]
A
Thank you.
- [48:42]
B
Okay. I don't know, whatever. Maybe to be on Seal Team 6, you know, it's better to performance max and to, you know, make sure your levels of various things are at the right. That's not me, man. I just. I sit here in my hole and just talk. Okay, that. But. So it's fine. Like, I'm not a performance maxer.
- [49:02]
A
Was it a problem before? But Tim Hicks said took his ass off the couch and sat it behind the desk. Was it a problem in our military? Would show me the report, the report out of the DoD that said, you know what? We have a testosterone problem with our military. There was no such thing. This is all made up bullshit. Because what he. What? Donald Trump and he. When they look at the review of the troops, they don't want to see anybody's belly over their belt. They don't want to see anybody walking slower than anybody else or someone. Here's the thing. Who may look a little bit more feminine, who's. Whose face and jawlines may be a little bit more soft. You must have a Testosterone problem. What the fuck are we doing here then?
- [49:48]
B
Text him at the next checkup. That's the whole thing. Do we have this? That's going to make a big announcement about it? It's just. It smells. We're just gonna leave there. I can't do anything.
- [50:01]
A
That's all I can say.
- [50:02]
B
The poor people. Some people listen to this podcast on school. Well, we're in the summer, but like on pickup, you know, for camp, on carpool. And so I just, I want to apologize to the moms and dads out there that are doing carpool duty. It's just this is what the news is giving us.
- [50:20]
A
This is the news. It's not like we were seeking the story out.
- [50:24]
B
All right, we went deep on this, by the way, what he's doing to the military when it comes to black folks with Clint Smith on our Fourth of July episode. If people missed that because you're on holiday, go check that out. Last thing here. Just on that point. This is another kind of related news item, and it's same as it ever was, but I just wanted to mention it. The Trump administration has replaced an exhibit on slavery at the President's house where Washington lived as president in Philly. They removed the Dirty business of slavery panel, which referenced how the liberty of the Constitution was intertwined to slavery and the number of slaves increased through forced breeding. There's another panel about Washington controlling the lives of 300 plus enslaved people at Mount Vernon that was also removed. Just a related point to this, showing my ignorance, I was listening to a different podcast about a week or two ago where I learned about Ona Judge. I don't know if you know her. She was the escaped slave of George Washington that he tried to track down anyway. And it's like on my book reading list for vacation, kind of the story of owner judge. I didn't know anything about it. And so, like, you know, this is. They want to make sure people don't. Don't just learn the basics about what happened to the founders.
- [51:33]
A
Well, that, that is true. But I'm sorry, every time a white person walks out the house and sees a black man or a black woman, guess what, you got history right there in front of you. Because if you have to, if you make any level of inquiry about that person, it's all going to come back to how they got here. They didn't come on the same boat that your ancestors did. We were on a different boat. And you got off your. Your folks got off with coins in their pockets and they found their way to New York or Chicago or wherever they found themselves. We got off the boats in Baltimore and Annapolis and in places like the Caribbean in chains. And that's the story. You can't erase it. You can't rewrite it, because every time you look at a Negro, guess what? That story is there. So just get over your dumb shit and recognize the history of the country. Embrace it. It's who we are. It's not what we do now, thankfully, although Stephen Miller and others would probably like to do that. That's not where we are. And it's going to be up to us to stop this stupid shit. You can't dumb us down. We've already read the books. We are already living the experiences. We have too many videotapes on YouTube and everywhere else of what happened in the 50s and the 60s. We know such a thing called civil rights, right? We know this. And. And if you know this, guess what? Your kids know it too. So while you sit there trying to drum black people out of your life, you may want to go upstairs and talk to that white child of yours who's trying to emulate what black people do. How we talk, how we express ourselves, how we live, what we eat, how we dress. Right? So if it's that fucked up for you, go talk to your kids and have them explain to you why you're wrong.
- [53:34]
B
We'll just leave it there. That was wonderful. Thank you, Michael Steele, and we'll be seeing you soon.
- [53:40]
A
Yeah, baby. Go get that break, my friend. Go enjoy time with your family. You know, love to them, and just spend some you time and us time and let this shit roll a different direction for however long you're away, I'll
- [53:58]
B
catch you on the flip. I'm going to be refreshed. I have my shit kickers on. I'll be ready to go. All right, that's Michael Steele. Everybody else, we got one more. We'll see you back tomorrow for another edition of the podcast. Bye.
- [54:08]
A
Here comes the ice cream man part to the end of the road with
- [54:15]
B
a swish of his magic with all
- [54:17]
A
the people and the part frogs, scribble, chocolate chip umbrella in his white glove and shade from the sun was his intention.
- [54:30]
B
The Borg podcast is brought to you thanks to the work of lead producer Katie Cooper, associate producer Ansley Skipper, and with video editing by Katie Lutz and audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.