Bill Kristol: What Does 'They' Mean?

Summary

The Bulwark Podcast — September 15, 2025

Episode: Bill Kristol: What Does 'They' Mean?
Host: Tim Miller
Guest: Bill Kristol

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Episode Overview

This intense and sobering episode sees host Tim Miller joined by Bill Kristol to grapple with the political and cultural fallout from the shocking assassination of Charlie Kirk. The discussion weaves together personal reflection, a critique of extreme rhetoric and illiberalism on both left and right, and a sharp analysis of the weaponization of tragedy in current US and global politics. Listeners are offered a thoughtful defense of liberal democracy, a warning against cycles of violence, and a call for more responsible civic and political leadership.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Tim Miller's Opening Monologue: Grappling with Assassination Aftermath

[Timestamps: 00:55–22:21]

• Tim expresses deep anger and distress at the response to Charlie Kirk’s assassination, particularly the lack of discussion about gun culture, the misrepresentation of online subcultures, and the horrifying rise in people—some known personally to Tim—expressing that “Charlie had it coming.”

• Moral Clarity: Tim clearly distinguishes legitimate criticism of Kirk from gleeful acceptance of his murder:

  “Let me be clear. Don't fucking do that. I consider anyone who is pro-assassination of Charlie Kirk a foe. Even if we voted for the same person in the last election.” [09:48]

• Liberal Democratic North Star: Tim grounds his worldview in liberal democratic ideals:

  “I believe that people should have an opportunity to live a life of purpose and meaning if they choose to, and that the government should do what it can to foster it and do what it can to protect people from threats to that... another way to put it, threats to their life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. That's my North Star.” [10:36]

• Critique of Hypocrisy: He draws parallels between defending the rights of unsympathetic figures—referencing Kilmar Brego Garcia’s case—and the necessity to do the same for Kirk, emphasizing the rule of law and due process.

• Danger of Political Violence: Tim warns against a spiraling cycle of violence reminiscent of “the Troubles” in Ireland, where both sides enable the other’s extremism.

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2. Assassination Response and Political Polarization

[Timestamps: 22:22–30:42]

• Bill Kristol’s Reaction: Bill bluntly assesses the assassination and its polarized aftermath:

  “It's very bad when someone gets murdered, assassinated. It's very bad when the reaction is immediately polarized and politicized... I think with more culpability and impact on the right... you have the President of the United States leading that reaction and weaponizing it.” [23:37]

• Historical Perspective: Bill notes historical rarity of US political assassinations and warns that “one does tend to lead to another if you look at history.” [24:19]

• Asymmetry: Both point out the contrast between Democratic leaders’ responsible reactions and the right's weaponization of the tragedy.

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3. The Role of Propaganda and Demonization

[Timestamps: 26:18–32:27]

• Stephen Miller’s Dangerous Rhetoric: Tim highlights a quote from Stephen Miller threatening to use state power against a broad, ambiguously defined “you”—which could encompass anyone opposed to MAGA:

  “The power of law enforcement under President Trump's leadership will be used to find you, will be used to take away your money, take away your power...” [26:18]

• Bill Analyzes the “They” and “You”:

  “That ‘everyone else’ is a very broad group, since Stephen Miller is the person who said the entire Democratic Party is... a domestic terrorist just last week... If you are in any way part of the opposition to Donald Trump, you are part of what Stephen Miller is targeting.” [27:00]

• Danger of Dehumanizing Rhetoric: The hosts note the deliberate use of vague pronouns (“they,” “you”) by MAGA leaders to foment fear, justify crackdowns, and cultivate a sense of civil war.

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4. Scapegoating and Transphobia

[Timestamps: 32:27–37:56]

• Tim and Bill discuss an acute effort to scapegoat trans people following the assassination, despite facts contradicting right-wing narrative.

• Bill calls out the irresponsibility:

  “Holding... any relationship one has with a trans person, any person who commits a crime, has such relationship, is now that's going to be blamed on the trans individuals, on trans rights... it really is appalling.” [33:53]

• Tim notes the desperation of MAGA to pin the blame on the trans community, reflecting broader efforts at demonization.

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5. Irresponsible Speculation and Investigation

[Timestamps: 35:20–37:56]

• Both criticize Utah Gov. Spencer Cox and others for “freelancing” on shooter’s motives and possible radicalization, arguing that this jump to conclusions is unhelpful and often rooted in poor understanding of internet/gamer culture.
• Bill:

  “People my age should not be even pretending we have some... the foggiest idea for what's going on in gamer world...” [36:53]

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6. MAGA, Far-Right International Movements, and Illiberal Momentum

[Timestamps: 40:29–45:30]

• Bill discusses the global context: connections between America’s MAGA right and far-right movements in Europe, referencing Putin’s ideologue Dugin, and the massive far-right march in England led by Tommy Robinson.

  “[Dugin] basically a fascist... They're in the right place. They are the American front of this global war between... fascism and liberalism.” [40:29] “The movement of the far right, further right, and the accelerationist... element of what's happening on the right is terrible.” [43:52]

• The discussion highlights the real, alarming international coordination among illiberal forces (e.g., Elon Musk’s visible support for right-wing marches).

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7. The Need for Pro-Democracy Organizing and Liberal Counter-Mobilization

[Timestamps: 45:30–51:21]

• Tim proposes that this tragedy should galvanize “liberal” and pro-democracy organizing to counter the effective organizing of figures like Kirk and TPUSA, especially among youth.

  “We could use... something like [TPUSA] that communicates and galvanizes people against illiberalism throughout the world... in particular.” [47:53]

• Bill references layers of necessary work: intellectual, political, and grassroots community organizing—with a call for unity despite current intra-Democratic squabbles.

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8. On Responsible Voices and Reason for Hope

[Timestamps: 51:21–62:39]

• Both note that, despite some ugliness on the left, the most prominent leftist figures (AOC, Zoran, Hasan Piker) have demonstrated responsible leadership in condemning violence and upholding democratic values.

  “Probably the two most prominent leftists... AOC and Zoran and then the streamer Hasan Piker and all of their responses were extremely responsible.” [52:02]

• Bill closes with encouragement, reflecting on the heroism of Americans like the slain officer David Rose and his own positive experiences speaking with students:

  “There are people like [David Rose]... for all the talk about how horrible our politics are... it was a really admirable and heroic person.” [60:40] “A lot of the students he [Jay Nordlinger] meets are, you know, intelligent. They don't like Trump and Trumpism. They don't like the radical parts of the left...” [61:39]

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Notable Quotes

• “Being for democracy means you are for their ability to express them and that you will push back on them in the public square. You will try to push back on them at the ballot box... that is what being in the pro democracy coalition is.”
  — Tim Miller [18:23]

• “One does tend to lead to another if you look at history. And so you just don't want to be living in a country where [political assassination] becomes routine...”
  — Bill Kristol [24:19]

• “The power of law enforcement under President Trump's leadership will be used to find you, will be used to take away your money, take away your power, and if you've broken the law, take away your freedom.”
  — Recounting Stephen Miller [26:18]

• “If you are in any way part of the opposition to Donald Trump, you are part of what Stephen Miller is targeting.”
  — Bill Kristol [27:00]

• “Actual American greatness... means tolerance at home and standing up to bullies abroad.”
  — Bill Kristol [61:39]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Intro & Tim’s Monologue: 00:55–22:21
• Kristol Joins & Assassination Reaction: 22:22–30:42
• Weaponization, “They” and “You” Discourse: 26:18–32:27
• Transphobia, Scapegoating, Investigation: 32:27–37:56
• MAGA & Global Far Right: 40:29–45:30
• Organizing Liberal Counterforce: 45:30–51:21
• Positive Example & Hopeful Notes: 51:21–62:39
• Signoff: 62:39–end

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Tone and Language

The tone is frank, at times profane and impassioned (particularly from Tim), but always rooted in a defense of principles over partisan animus. Both speakers mourn the loss of civility and warn of a dark path if cycles of retribution and illiberalism deepen. Still, they end with encouragement, citing responsible political actors and hopeful student engagement.

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Useful For

• Those seeking a comprehensive, reality-based analysis of a major political assassination and its broader social impact.
• Listeners interested in the defense of liberal democratic norms against illiberal threats—left, right, or international.
• Anyone curious about how leading “Never Trump” voices are processing grief, anger, and the need for strategic counter-mobilization in a new era of volatility.

Transcript

[Bill Kristol]

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[Tim Miller]

Contiguous US Only hey, this is Sarah. Look, I'm standing out front of a.m. p.m. Right now and, well, you're sweet and all, but I found something more fulfilling, even kind of cheesy.

[Bill Kristol]

But I like it.

[Tim Miller]

Sure, you met some of my dietary needs, but they've just got it all. So farewell. Oatmeal so long, you strange soggy.

[Bill Kristol]

Break up with bland breakfast and taste.

[Tim Miller]

AM PM's bacon, egg and cheese biscuit.

[LifeLock Advertiser]

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[Tim Miller]

Melty cheese on a buttery biscuit. AM PM Too much Good stuff. Hey everybody, I just wanted to talk to me and y' all for a little bit at the start here, and we'll get to Bill Kristol in a minute. There are a lot of things that were making me very angry over the weekend in the fallout from Charlie Kirk's assassination. Among them are the fact that I see almost nobody discussing the gun culture that this young man was steeped in, and that is being ignored and being considered irrelevant to this conversation. For some reason, I'm upset about how stupid the punditry is about the online subculture this killer was steeped in, and we're going to be talking more about that this week. I'm angry about the despicable attacks on trans people, the incitements to civil war I've seen from prominent people on the right Ted Cruz's creepy AI slop tributes to Charlie Kirk RFK claiming Kirk was his soulmate. I could go on. There's a lot pissing me off about how supposedly responsible leaders in the MAGA world have acted, and I'm going to be covering all of that and more on this podcast and in the weeks ahead. And by the way, that's one more thing that I'm angry about that I have to steep myself in this assassination coverage for the foreseeable future. That's something that makes me angry at the killer, frankly. And before we get to all that with Bill Kristol, there's one other thing that I'm really upset about and that really shook me this weekend and I want to talk about that with you. The number of people who I've encountered who told me some variation of Charlie had it coming is deeply, deeply alarming and upsetting. And, and it's something that has really kind of shaken me to my core. And before I talk about those folks, I just want to be clear about who and what I am not talking about. I'm not talking about people who are posting their strongest agreements with Charlie, lifting up his past noxious comments or any of that. It's perfectly appropriate to speak the truth about his role in our national discourse, to express strong disagreement with him with the TPUSA mission. It's a free country, or at least it's supposed to be still. So I have no qualm with folks expressing their political disagreements with him. I'm also not talking about the algorithmically delivered sludge from random strangers that Elon and the Chinese are elevating into my for you page. And I've seen some pretty fucking nasty stuff on there, but I'm not letting that get to me. And I'm not, It's important to say, talking about the Democratic Party or Democratic leaders who have been acting extremely responsibly throughout all of this, at times in contrast to their GOP counterparts and certainly in contrast to how their GOP counterparts acted following the attack on Paul Pelosi and others. So I think that it is important that I distinguish the thing that is upsetting me about some on the left from what is happening in the leadership of the Democratic Party. Because a lot of my criticism of the Republican Party is how leaders responded to pressure from voters that was pushing them in a direction that they knew to be wrong. And so I appreciate the Democratic leaders for acting responsibly over the last few days. But what I am talking about, the thing that is getting me really upset, it's coming from people that are real, that either I know or I know to be not inauthentic. It's coming from people I follow posting things like, hey, fascist, catch, had to unfollow a couple people on that. Coming from people that I follow on Instagram posting pretty gleefully. It's coming from the people that follow the show and comment on our posts at times. And it's coming from people in real life that I met at a bar. That's right. On Friday, I was watching my friend DJ and there was somebody that I've met before but don't really know that well, and they came up to me and apropos of nothing, told me that they have French ancestors and they know what it's like to fight the fascists and they're happy that this fascist is dead. Someone volunteered that to me at the bar and I had a couple other people say something not quite as gross, but close to the same ballpark. I don't know what signals I sent to the universe that led someone to decide that I was a person they should confess that they're pro assassination to. But let me be clear. Don't fucking do that. I consider anyone who is pro assassination of Charlie Kirk a foe. Even if we voted for the same person in the last election. I know we discussed this last week and I know that probably some folks are sick of it. And that's fine. You can fast forward to Bill. But I wanted to one more time explain why this is also important to me. Number one, just fundamentally, this is wrong. I believe that when people ask me about what my ideology is now that I left the Republican Party, I always come back to this one phrase. I believe that people should have an opportunity to live a life of purpose and meaning if they choose to, and that the government should do what it can to foster it and do what it can to protect people from threats to that maybe another way to put it, threats to their life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. That's my North Star. And I guess it should go without saying, but I'll say it explicitly, that you can't live a life of purpose and meaning if you get gunned down on a campus. I also think that people should have the chance to grow and change and find that meeting. It's kind of something that I've been thinking about. It's striking that on Friday I had David Frohm on this podcast. Today I had Bill Kristol. And I wonder what some of the people lethally posting about Charlie would have said if one of them had been assassinated 20 years ago. Because it sure seems like some people that like Bill Kristol now would have been at least neutral to that 20 years ago, if recent reactions are any signal. And that's a disturbing thought to have. It's a disturbing thought to have. And let me tell you, I've had a lot of people tell me they thought that they hated Bill Kristol when he was on the Sunday shows. They watched him growing up, or they watched him as they were getting involved, as they were coming into age, into adulthood, and they didn't like his views on a lot of issues. And that because of this podcast and because of other things, they've come to see him for what he is. I mean, it's self deprecating and thoughtful and great father and grandfather and somebody who cares about this country. And I'm not saying that Charlie Kirk was any of that, but I'm just saying that I think that it's important to allow people the space to demonstrate who they are. Allow people the chance to grow and learn and change. Some people change for the worse, some people change for the better. This is part of the human experience. And I would think that people who thought that Bill Kristol was an enemy and have come to find him charming and lovable and thoughtful, might kind of think twice about the one dimensional way in which they view a 31 year old who got assassinated. I'd secondly like to say that even if it wasn't morally reprehensible to support assassination or to give comfort to assassination, it is morally reprehensible. But even if it wasn't, does anybody think that this worked or helped the anti maga or anti fascist cause? If you are that guy at the bar and you think that the right thing to do is to fight and defeat fascism in all its forms, does it seem like that happened over the last week? Because I don't know. I think if you're a real anti fascist, you should be furious at the man that just empowered the fucking fascists. From the LSU game on Saturday where I'd watch a flyover about Charlie Kirk to reports from friends at church services about how priests were talking about Charlie Kirk to the NFL tributes to social media feeds. Charlie Kirk is now a martyr. People who had never heard of Charlie Kirk are now hearing these hagiographies and these tributes to him. People that had never heard of Charlie Kirk. My section around me at Tiger Stadium on Saturday were cheering and whooping and hollering for him. It sure doesn't seem to me like the anti fascist cause was advanced in any way. Then you got Stephen Miller, little golem in the White House talking about how to use this to crack down on anti fascist groups, on liberal groups, on activist groups that are working to oppose the MAGA cause, to advance the progressive agenda. Now the arm of the government is planning on cracking down on them even more. It doesn't seem to me like any anti fascist objective was met this weekend. Seems like the opposite. And how about the trans folks? Do you think that the trans roommate of the shooter thinks that this made their life or the life of trans people safer or better? Because I fucking don't. I really worry for the safety of that person. For their future. I worry for all of trans folks right now. I think that we are already in an ugly period for them, and I think that it's about to get worse. And while TPUSA was definitely hostile to trans Americans, I don't think that what happened in Utah is going to do anything to make their lives better. Doesn't fucking seem like it to me, at least. The other political thing about this that makes me think about is last year when people were asking me, like, where we're going, I said, one of my worries that we're going to a place similar to in Ireland with the troubles. Like, not that we have a real civil war, but there'd be just spates of violence, of political violence cropping up in this country. And a lot of times this was before Trump had won again. In my head, I was envisioning, I don't know, Kamala Harris being president and that there would be spates of MAGA violence and domestic terrorism. And obviously we've seen some of that. Still, I guess the worst case scenario I can think of is a world where the MAGA nationalists are in charge, the fascists are in charge, and there are spates of anti fascist violence martyring them and empowering them further and creating a cycle that allows them to use their power to crack down even more. That seems like the worst possible case scenario. It seems like there's some people out there on the activist left that want to careen us towards that. Maybe not that many people, but too many people for comfort. One more thing about why this has hit me so hard. I genuinely believe what I say on this podcast, which is why you're getting this rant. I genuinely believe all the reasons that I've given you about why I left the gop, why I upended my life, why I thought that the illiberalism of Donald Trump was such a threat to the country. I'm never offering arguments here as opposed or as some kind of, you know, triple bank shot, clever way to get back at maga. I'm not pretend, I don't pretend to have used like. I oppose illiberalism in all its forms. I oppose the violent rhetoric that Donald Trump reinserted into our politics. I oppose the ill treatment of political foes and the dehumanization of political foes that he advanced. I oppose the way in which they want to take away the rights of political enemies. None of this is a pose or positioning. When I oppose illiberalism coming from Trump, I'm not going to then flip around the other side and say, I love or I defend or I understand illiberalism from the other side. Let me just give you a specific example. There's the case of Kilmar Brego Garcia this year. It's something that I was really upset about and talked about a lot. This notion that somebody could have their life taken from them, that they could be grabbed and sent to a foreign torture prison without due process just because the government or some people in the government did not like what he stood for. On the right, there was a big conversation on Fox and other places among Republican politicians that I found disgusting about how well Kilmer Garcia beat his wife or whatever. He was a trafficker, he sold drugs, he was a drug dealer. And what I would say to that is, okay, prove it. Prove it. Take him to court. We have a rule of law in this country. If that is true, then find legal remedies for dealing with this problem like we do in a liberal democracy. We within the construct of a liberal democratic system of the rule of law of a democracy, you can't just say, that guy's a wife beater, so I get to send him to a torture prison camp. You have to prove it. You have to go to a jury. You have to prosecute him. Whether or not he's a bad person or whether or not he's a person that's done bad things is irrelevant to an autocrat wanting to snuff out his rights. And in some cases, if people hadn't objected, if Kivo hadn't pushed back, Republicans and MAGA and Donald Trump was happy to essentially end Kilmar Garcia's life at the time, nobody had gotten out of Sukkot. It was pressure from the courts, pressure from lawyers, pressure from activists, pressure from the media, pressure from politicians that led him to be able to get his day in court. And this is all still ongoing. This is a fight that's still ongoing. My point is, it was like it didn't. What I said at that time is it didn't matter whether I disagreed with his behavior. He still needed to be treated as a human who has rights in this country. Everybody on the left that I could see fully agreed with that argument. That was an argument a lot of people advanced, Right? So it's hard for me to understand how you could say, unless you were faking it, right? Unless you could say, if you said, I believe that somebody that allegedly beat his wife and sold drugs and trafficked people should not have their rights taken away from them, should not be sent to a torture prison Then I don't understand how you can flip it around and say, well, I don't care that much if somebody with bad opinions got killed, got assassinated. That doesn't work for me. The inverse of that. That doesn't. That doesn't compute. Okay. Like, Charlie Kirk had a lot of opinions I disagreed with. We argued all the time. I would go every, every Christmas, I went and argued with people at his TPUSA function and we met and we would talk and, and argue and, and tease each other. He had bad opinions. Some. Some real ones. We live in a country where people are allowed to have bad opinions freely and where they do not need to be afraid. They should not be afraid that somebody will do a summary execution on them because they didn't like their opinions. So for me, these liberal democratic principles that applied to Kumar Abrego Garcia also apply in spades to Charlie Kirk. And I gotta tell you, I don't think you are a liberal. You might say you're a liberal, but I don't think you're a liberal if you're a neutral on the topic of stochastic political terrorism. All right? And I don't think that you're in the pro democracy. No, let me correct that. I know you're not in the pro democracy coalition if you are neutral on someone getting murdered while practicing open debate. Being for liberal democracy means standing up for the rule of law. Standing up for people to have the ability to express their views in public on a college campus, even if their views are noxious, even if you disagree stridently with their views, even if you think that their views are a plague on the country and the youth. It doesn't matter. Being for democracy means you are for their ability to express them and that you will push back on them in the public square. You will try to push back on them at the ballot box. You will encourage people to go out and vote against that worldview. That is what being in the pro democracy coalition is. And frankly, if you want to really define yourself as being pro democracy, it is especially true, especially true that people who have views you disagree with are protected, that they are safe to express them. As you can tell, this is something that I care very deeply about. It is, frankly, at the core of why this exists, why this project exists, why this bulwark exists. Because my outrage and horror at Trumpian illiberalism is what made me decide that I need to speak out against it and act out against it and organize against it. At the time I was considering maybe I just quit politics and I don't know, go be a PR guy for a corporate law firm or something. Or a corporate, you know, some company's pr, ma'.

[Bill Kristol]

Am.

[Tim Miller]

Right. I was living in Oakland at the time. I used to joke, like, maybe I'll go do PR for Clorox and, like, sell bleach wipes or whatever. I. I don't know, like, screw this. But. But my. My passion and my anger and my rage at the illiberalism and the dehumanization that we saw from Trump and from the MAGA movement is why I am here talking about this with you. And I'm not trying to create an equivalent. And obviously, as I said at the top, it is much, much worse when it is leaders of a movement or a party that are acting illiberally, that are dehumanizing, that are. That are trying to undermine our democratic system. And a gap between Democratic leaders and Republican leaders on this front is so wide that you can't even see it with the naked eye. And yet I still just cannot abide anyone even feeling just the tiniest bit confused about whether I might be in a fellow traveler with them if they think it's okay to post. Hey, fascist, catch on social media. I am not. I'm not in the business of trading one form of the liberalism for another, and I'm never going to be. So that's what I got for you. Up next, Bill Kristol. All right, everybody. Inflation isn't going anywhere. Our pockets are getting tight. We might have some trumpy and stagflation ahead. And everybody knows there are things you can do to reduce monthly costs and improve your finances. But who has the time to kind of go through all their expenses and really figure it out and figure out what's worth it to cut? Well, with Rocket Money crunching the numbers for you, this all gets a lot easier. Rocket Money is a personal finance app that helps you find and cancel your unwanted subscriptions. Just to be clear, not the bulwark plus. Okay, that is a very valuable and key subscription. And we all appreciate you so much. So much we appreciate you. If you're not a bullock subscriber, maybe adding 10 bucks a month. But with Rocket Money, it can do is help you balance that out by finding the worthless dumb subscriptions you're still paying for. It monitors your spending and helps you lower your bills so you can grow your savings. Rocket Money shows you all your expenses in one place, including subscriptions you forgot about. If you see a subscription you no longer want, Rocket Money will help you cancel it there's a dashboard that lays out your total financial picture, including bill due dates and paydays, in a way that's easy to digest. You can even automatically create custom budgets based on your past spending. I guess it just occurs to me that as I'm reading this ad, if you're listening to this ad, you're not a Bulwark member yet because Bulwark members get ad free shows, so that's something to think about. My ad reads are really fun, though, so it kind of cuts both ways. Cancel your unwanted subscriptions and reach your financial goals faster with Rocket Money. Go to RocketMoney.com the Bulwark today that's RocketMoney.com the Bulwark RocketMoney.com TheBullwork.

[Podcast Outro Singer]

Hello and.

[Tim Miller]

Welcome to Buller Podcast. I'm your host, Tim Miller. It is Monday, and so we're here with editor at large Bill Kristol. Bill, boy, you know, how thrilled are you to be podcasting with me today? Great. You know, I'm always thrilled to be.

[Bill Kristol]

Podcasting with you, Tim, especially when you're in, when you're upbeat. Big LSU victory over the weekend. I know that was your big tailgate. Was that the first home game you've been to this year?

[Tim Miller]

First home game was a good win. The defense is unbelievable. It's like a 2011 defense.

[Bill Kristol]

Is that right? I was talking to Lauren Egan, our colleague Lauren Egan, huge Vanderbilt fan. She has tickets there and they're off to an undefeated start, too. So that game, you're going to go up to Nashville for that game in a month.

[Tim Miller]

It's going to be a showdown. October 18th.

[Bill Kristol]

Intra bulwark tensions will rise. You know, it'll be good.

[Tim Miller]

It was not on my schedule, but yeah, no, Vandy's looking good, so maybe I will. Maybe I'll have to make an exception. All right, well, from that upbeat note, we, I want to say, I would.

[Bill Kristol]

Like to say I did my best to pretend to be vaguely upbeat and to be living in a normal America where we can focus on college football. And for 45 seconds of this podcast, I'd like the record to show that.

[Tim Miller]

Well, I just got about half of my annoyances out in a monologue before you came on about all things Charlie Kirk assassination. So I just kind of want to give you the floor. I'm wondering what you're seeing out there and what your main reactions are.

[Bill Kristol]

It's very bad when someone gets murdered, assassinated. It's very bad when the reaction is immediately polarized and politicized. When on all sides. So I think with more culpability and impact on the right in the sense that you have the President of the United States leading that reaction and weaponizing it. You have a lot of. Of people online on the left saying stupid and foolish and offensive things, but not really many, almost all Democratic politicians, I think. And. And I'd say sort of respectable liberal opinion types have been pretty responsible. So it's asymmetrical, but not good in either way, honestly. And I mean, terrible for him, obviously, and his family and all that, and terrible for the country. Assassinations are a bad thing to unleash. Someone reminded me this of, you know, you. One does tend to lead to another if you look at history. And so you just don't want to be living in a country where this becomes routine and it has become more common. Right. I mean, the Minnesota assassination, which people didn't talk as much about, but that was an assassination of elected officials. That hasn't happened that often in U.S. history. And it happened and actually it was kind of memory holed pretty quickly in.

[Tim Miller]

Their homes in a particularly totally ideological motive.

[Bill Kristol]

I mean, lists of Democrats and so forth, no question about that motive. Have been nice to have had a President of the United States on the other side from these Democrats who would have denounced it, which I just do want to make that one point. I mean, every president we've ever had would have done that.

[Tim Miller]

Yes.

[Bill Kristol]

Nixon, Carter, you don't. You like him. You don't like him. Some of them were not great on everything else, and race makes it a little more complicated. But let's just say, leaving that aside, maybe, yeah, every president we've ever had would have felt compelled and felt it his duty. And it would have been a real duty and a real public good to make clear that this is unacceptable. And we have a president who didn't make that clear three months ago. We have some people not saying it on the left now, and that's very bad.

[Tim Miller]

And just to your point, like the contrast you've got today, like, J.D. vance is hosting Charlie's podcast to tribute to him, which is again, his fine, his right. They had a big Kennedy center thing last night. RFK Jr. Is talking about how Charlie Kirk was his soulmate. It's a very strange thing to say. And you know, there will be a big memorial next Sunday, I think, in Arizona. Just again, like the contrast between that. It would have been appropriate. Maybe they didn't want him, but it would have been appropriate for J.D. vance to have offered to speak at the memorial of the, you know, minister of Melissa Hortman or whatever, you know, and so, and that contrast is pretty, pretty noteworthy.

[Bill Kristol]

Be nice if JD Vance invited on his podcast today the governor of Utah, Spencer Cox, who's been responsible in his statements. Be nice to be invited on some Democrats who got out of their way to express their revulsion and horror at this murder. Do you think he will?

[Tim Miller]

No, I don't think so. I think we're getting the other side. And you guys wrote in morning shots about Stephen Miller as kind of the locus of this effort to weaponize this tragedy against Americans. He said this, the power of law enforcement under President Trump's leadership will be used to find you, will be used to take away your money, take away your power, and if you've broken the law, take away your freedom. That was Stephen Miller talking about, I guess, activist left groups and protesters and Soros and troublemakers and kind of this whole grab bag of villains that they are trying to create out of this. That's a pretty alarming sentiment is what you guys wrote about. So talk about that a little bit.

[Bill Kristol]

Yeah, and the you in that sentence is kind of un. What's the term for that in grammar when there's no like, reference for the, you know, for the pronoun? I mean, we don't know who the, that you is. It could be a very wide swath of people he and Donald Trump don't like or who have criticized them or who at different times have criticized Charlie Kirk or organizations that fund people who haven't been sufficiently respectful. They would judge of Kirk's achievements after his death. I mean, the degree to which we are looking at a, at Miller says this explicitly. Right. A government led onslaught against the, quote, power and the money of people who apparently haven't broken the law. If you've broken the law, you're going to lose your freedom. I don't know. You know, presumably there would be trials, maybe not. Maybe it'd just be martial law at that point. But for everyone else, at least the government's going to go after your power and your money. And again, that everyone else is a very broad group, since Stephen Miller is the person who said the entire Democratic Party is, what did he say? A domestic terrorist just last week. So I mean, by his own account, you might say people who are writing it as if he's going after some radical left groups and thinking deep down, well, I'm not part of that. If you are in any way part of the opposition to Donald Trump, you are part of what Stephen Miller is.

[Tim Miller]

Targeting while we focus on grammar for a second, you're talking about the kind of undefined you. And this is what we've seen from Trump and from a lot of MAGA leaders is the undefined you and the undefined they. Right? This was a rant that I went on following the attempted assassination of Trump and Butler last year, which was just the degree of irresponsibility among leaders of, at the top of the Republican Party, talking about how they wanted him dead. They wanted him dead. Even like, even like the more traditional old school type of Republicans who just stuck around for MAGA were doing this, right? Like it was completely widespread. Like they were going after him, they wanted to jail him, they wanted to kill him. And that does contribute to this notion that, like, we have some civil war happening in this country and that it is, you know, maybe, you know, justified to go after this undefined. They undefined you. Right? And that is something that just should be called out every time people see it in public because it's important to force them to actually talk about what really happened. Right? And like, what really happened is not in both those cases is extremely bad, but is not part of some civil war, some generational struggle, right? It's in the case of Trump getting arrested, it was specific. Grand juries looked at evidence and decided that he had done wrongdoing with specific people. In the case of Butler, it seems like just a loner kid that had too easy access to firearms and it could have been any famous person that came to his town. In this case, we don't quite know exactly yet, but we're still going to find out more. But even still, it's just one guy. It's one young guy who lived in a MAGA family in Utah who didn't. You know, you saw people over the weekend talking about how the college radicalized them. Like he went to some technical college in Utah, right? Like he's not. It's not like he went to Wellesley and got radicalized by the far leftists. Right. He went to Orem Provo, Utah, they went to St. George, Utah. He's like one of the reddest parts of the country. I think that in talking about it, the responsibility to do it is obviously to condemn this in all forms, but talk about what it really is to try to identify what the real problems are that need to be addressed. This administration doesn't have any interest in that. They have interest in using it to go after their political foes and to try to broaden it out beyond what it really is. And create a greater struggle, greater troubles, if you will, than we have now.

[Bill Kristol]

Yeah. And to encourage fairly vigilante violence, pretty directly, I would say, almost. And also to threaten, as we were saying, to use the force of the federal government. Now that Trump and Stephen Miller in charge of that, again. So that's very different from denouncing some. You know, there could be some reckless rhetoric that might lead some people to do this. That's sort of, I think, a reasonable thing to do. If you cite particular rhetoric and. And maybe there's some connection to the shooter. Again, what's striking in the case of the murder of the Minnesota representative and her husband and then the assault on a colleague of hers, and I think it was his spouse, where they were very badly wounded, that was explicitly political. And I don't recall Democrats then saying they might have said, you know, Trump and his people should be more careful about their rhetoric. But that was about it. And they didn't use anything approaching the kind of rhetoric that Trump and Miller and Vance are using in this case. And the whole MAGA movement seems to be on board this, blaming everyone who is not part of maga, basically, honestly, or is not at least willing to acquiesce in maga's dominance of America. You are not just part of the problem. You're not just, you know, insufficiently attentive to maga's concerns. You are basically a domestic terrorist. Maybe they'll tolerate you using your rights of free speech and being. Holding your job and so forth for a certain amount of time, but basically, you are not a. In any way a fellow American citizen. Maybe I overstated that a little bit, but I, I think the rhetoric is pretty. It's pretty dangerous and very dangerous and pretty appalling. And that's for sort of the whole. The big picture, the big. The big you and they, as you, as you correctly say, and then the demonizing of particular groups, obviously subgroups, is really, really dangerous and, and terrible.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, a lot there. So just a couple thoughts, just briefly. I should just say also the way that they're going after people, I mean, they literally have a list that they're gathering of people who said wrong thoughts about Charlie Kirk that they want fired from their jobs. Which shows you about how genuine the whole cancel culture fake outrage was with these guys, of course. But, yeah, they do want to punish people and target them. Right. Like, there is an effort to. Effort to do that, an effort to go after them. And I think it's the most acute on the trans issue, of course, you mentioned It. But I guess just, just to give people the facts here of what we know so far. Governor Cox on ABC this weekend said that the shooter lived with a romantic partner who was undergoing a gender transition. He said also that the roommate was aghast at the slaying when speaking to investigators and was cooperating. So I do think that's an important thing to say, at least based on what, what we know. So it's not like was stoking it or whatever. Yet I don't think that that fact is going to stop what we all have already seen and what is all coming, which is a campaign of demonization, of dehumanization of trans people you posted over the weekend. It should be needless to say, but it is perhaps at this moment worth saying that transgender individuals have the same right as anyone else's to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It's not hard to see where this is going, I guess.

[Bill Kristol]

I gotta say Spencer Cox has been pretty good and I agree with a lot of the praise of him. He didn't need to say all this stuff on Sunday. It's not appropriate. He's the governor of the state. He hasn't done his own investigation. He doesn't know what's hearsay and what's real. He doesn't know if people are saying things to, I don't know. For whatever reason, I'm not saying they are, but I feel like even he is not quite following the right protocol and the norms of how one conducts a serious investigation of this kind. As you say, maybe he was saying it with a certain good intention, say that the, the roommate was cooperating and therefore shouldn't be held accountable. But, but the roommate's not accountable anyway. I mean, it's all ridiculous, right? I mean, just as, just as the wife of the 57 year old murderer in Minneapolis isn't accountable unless that person is accountable and was a co conspirator, in which case, fine, then that will come out in the, in the investigation and in court and the person might be, might be indicted and so forth. But this holding, any relationship one has with a trans person, any person who commits a crime, has such relationship, is now that's going to be blamed on the trans, on trans individuals, on trans rights, on human rights, for, for transgender people. I mean, it really is appalling. And the targeting there is just so over the top. And I will say Charlie Kirk engaged into some of that himself. He was not careful in what he said. He, you know, he's entitled to have his views Obviously, but he was not careful in the way he framed his objections to, to the extension of human rights to transgender individuals.

[Tim Miller]

So. And you can tell they wanted this fight obviously from the starting. Like initially it's like, oh, the bullets had trans stuff on it. No they didn't. Oh, the shooter might be trans now. That's not true. Oh, the roommate is right. Like it's like you're desperate for grasping for any way to kind of demonize that community. To your point on Cox, I just want to echo on both points. I think that obviously compared to a lot of other MAGA leaders right now, his tone has been much better. That said, both on this transit shoot and on like the shooter's motivations, I do feel like he's freelancing on that quite a bit. And I think that I've seen a lot of freelancing in a lot of places, particularly from a lot of old people who could not possibly translate the meme culture frames from the Helldivers video game that was on these bullets. Right. I mean I'm getting old. I was trying to explain it to my husband who was like what is ow outright like this person is 22 years old, is deep into Internet subcultures and I think that we're going to learn more about what the views are. But it was intentionally ironic and cryptic some of what he's putting on there. And maybe Spencer Cox knows some stuff that we don't know yet, I guess. But I think that he was speaking in a way that was a little bit definitive about motivation when he's a person as a post middle aged Mormon man that just doesn't, I just don't know how, how well he can translate for people what was in the head of this young killer.

[Bill Kristol]

No, and he shouldn't be trying to just to be obvious. He's the governor of the state. He should be reporting what is real fact. Facts, but not trying to put himself in the head of a suspect, the alleged murderer. I guess we should say it that way. But presumably the murderer who isn't apparently cooperating hasn't therefore I gather one gather spoken directly to law enforcement about his motives and didn't seem to leave a manifest though. So how do we know? We really literally don't know. And I take, I very much take your point about people my age should not be even pretending we have some the foggiest idea for what's going on in gamer world in terms of the eight levels of bizarre irony and self referential stuff that's going on in these inscriptions in that world, let me just put it that way. But even if you were a 23 year old hipster, you wouldn't know what's in his mind. Right. Which really makes it irresponsible. So let's. Okay, we've been a little tougher on Cox. We should come back to yes, close the loop by reiterating that he's been better than 99% of Republicans. Which of course tells you, which tells you a lot.

[Tim Miller]

They should all be, they should all.

[Bill Kristol]

Be at worst, like Spencer, like Governor Cox, you know.

[Tim Miller]

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[Bill Kristol]

Yeah, I mean, Dugan really is Putin's court philosopher. I guess you're right. Bannon's combination of Bannon and, I suppose, Michael Anton and some of Peter Thiel's more recondite thinking about Carl Schmidt and all this stuff. He's more like Carl Schmidt, if you want a historical example, the Nazi jurist who justified and provided a rationale for much the Nazis did. But himself before that, a distinguished professor at German universities. And Dugin, in his own way is written long books that some people have taken very seriously. He's basically a fascist and therefore is totally. He's on board with Putin and Putin's on board with him. What's striking is the. He has some qualifications about his admiration for maga. Not quite where. Where he would be on every issue, wants them to be at every issue, but they're. They're in the right place. They are the American front of this global war between. I will use terms he doesn't quite use, but he almost does. Between fascism and liberalism. Liberalism he uses. He's against it. But whatever you want to call his version of fascism. So that doesn't mean that maga, everyone in MAGA is like Dugan, obviously. Be nice if someone in MAGA repudiated Dugan and Dugan's endorsement. But it's very. It is telling that that's how he sees it. And I think it's. I think he's being honest in his judgment there. Unfortunately, MAGA World has given him enough material, you might say, to work with on this.

[Tim Miller]

As mentioned, there was the march in England over the weekend. Far right activist Tommy Robinson, who is anti migrant and also doesn't fully map onto America. It's kind of anti cop in a way, but over there, because they think that the cops are sort of in line with the liberal leadership and it's more like pro militia. Right. But anyway, he is a far right activist and provocateur really. Their March drew over 100,000 people and I saw it in several places of people on the right, on the MAGA right celebrating this. I saw some people calling it like the biggest nationalist march or rally that they've seen in Europe. There were some clashes with police officers. I bring it up just because I think also in the context of the reaction we've seen to Kirk. Let me just caveat this at the top. I'm the type of LSU fan where after a big win, I'm like, we're going to win the championship. And after a loss, I'm like, we're never going to win again. Sometimes I'm a little too emotional in reacting to recent events, and I try to be thoughtful about putting things into context. I guess there's a concerning amount of momentum that I see on the illiberal right here and in Europe, certain parts of Europe at least. And that march happening the same time you saw this kind of outpouring of support for Kirk. It's alarming to me.

[Bill Kristol]

It is. I mean, I don't follow British politics as much as I used to. And someone like Robinson, so loathsome, it's hard to even read about him. But I mean, he is far right. I mean, he's beyond farage. He's beyond the sort of.

[Tim Miller]

Of.

[Bill Kristol]

Let's call it the equivalent almost of Trump and MAGA world here, I would say, and is often.

[Tim Miller]

It'd be almost closer to like, the Proud Boys or something.

[Bill Kristol]

Yeah, yeah. Laura Loomer, Proud Boys Fuentes. Is that his name?

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, yeah. Even he's kind of like a little bitch. Like, I don't like. He's kind of a little wimpy guy. Okay. And he's very far right. But, like, Robinson has the stochastic side.

[Bill Kristol]

Totally.

[Tim Miller]

Like, with him.

[Bill Kristol]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So and so.

[Tim Miller]

Really.

[Bill Kristol]

Right. I mean, and 100,000 people is not good. And Elon Musk spoke by video. Hook up to it. So he's on board with them, just as he was on board with the AfD, the Neo Nazi party in Germany. I mean, the degree of both. Of international coordination, or at least support for each other on the far right and as you say, and the movement of the far right, further right and the accelerationist, if you want, element of what's happening on the right is terrible. I mean, very, very dangerous. I mean, Robinson is basically pro violence against migrants. I'm going to say this, and now you'll probably sue us if this is shown in line. And so I'll qualify it by saying I'm not familiar with everything he. But I Think he's pretty far out there.

[Tim Miller]

There's a vibe of that. That's what the kids are saying. The vibe gives off pro violence against migrants.

[Bill Kristol]

Well, Nick Cohen, who's a very respectable, very sober, center left British columnist, wrote that this was the largest far right march since Oswald Mosley's fascist march in London. The Union of Fascists, I think they were called in the 30s in Britain and explicitly pro fascist. And they also had a March of under 100,000 people and let everyone forgets how much, much how popular fascism was all around the world in the 30s. So, yeah, so if Nick Cohen said that, I'm and is very alarmed about it. I think we are entitled to be too. But again, the fact that Musk is, you know, all the ties between these, these groups and the relishing of the fact that everyone's getting more extreme, I mean, that is very dangerous. But these things have a momentum of their own. We've, we've talked about that before and it's just danger. I mean, obviously it's dangerous, you know, in so many ways. But, but yeah, yeah, terrible.

[Tim Miller]

Hey, everybody, we are going on the road this fall and I want to see you. Sadly, our Toronto tickets have already sold out, so I'm plotting a return to Canada. You guys just wait on that. But there's still tickets left for our events in Washington D.C. and New York City in October. Come join me, Sarah jvl, for two nights of camaraderie and joy and resistance and podcasting and maybe some special guests at the the DC event. We might give a big middle finger to the masked agents of Donald Trump that are roaming the city's free streets. And we'll be back in New York a couple times later. First time we've been in New York in ages. The last time we had a live New York event, it was, I can remember because it was during the Nuggets title run. And me and a handful of the folks who came out went and watched Jamal Murray, like put up 40, I think on the Lakers after the podcast, it was quite enjoyable. Maybe we'll have a similar night. We'll see. And if you really want more time with us and you don't want to just place a bet that you'll end up at the same bar with me after, because you never know. You could pay for VIP tickets. They're included in the sale. It'll give you earlier entry into the show and you can hang with us for an intimate Q and A. You can check out all the details and get [e-mail] events for more, that's thebullwork.com events. See you all on the East Coast. I want to do something a little constructive on this front rather than just lamenting all of it. To me, I hope that this is a flashpoint kind of a series of events for liberals and I'm using that word particularly to try to create kind of a counter movement against this. I think that for all of the accurate negative things that could be said about Charlie Kirk, this isn't really even a value judgment thing that could, that I could say just without caveat positive about him is he put in real work to organize young people, to communicate his views, his ideology to young people and to engage with them and get them involved. And when I went to TPUSA last year, the article was like 90% all the gross horrible things that I saw, but 10% at the top was like that. We could use this, whatever you want to call us, the pro democracy side, the Democrats, the liberals, whatever. Any we that you find yourself identifying with could use something like this that communicates and galvanizes people against illiberalism throughout the world and these kind of far right activities in particular. Anyway, I don't know exactly. This is something that's just been banging around my head all weekend. I don't know exactly what that looks like, but it is something that I want to put out into the world because I think that this is a good instigating moment for liberals to start to think about how they can actually put more effort into, to use a now out of vogue word, community organizing, young people that are open to hearing the message.

[Bill Kristol]

No, I very much agree with that. I mean, I think there's different levels of different kinds of efforts and some of them someone like me is more focused, better at maybe, or more familiar with, let me say, more suited to than others. There's a kind of intellectual effort of, you know, rejuvenating liberalism, recreating it for the 21st century. There's a, let's call it political kind of elite effort, you might say, bringing together different elements of the coalition so they work together and, and so forth. And then there's this much more grassroots.

[Tim Miller]

Movement effort and there's all this indivisible stuff and the.

[Bill Kristol]

Yeah, and they're all important and they should all be broad based it as much as possible in my opinion. One moment of real. I got really very depressed this weekend as I happened on social media somewhere to notice that there's some fight. I didn't really See what caused it between Chris Van Hollen and Hakeem Jeffries about something or other and Snipe and they were staff were sniping at each other. And I thought, I mean really, I think it was maybe Van Holland said everyone should support Momdotti and Jeffrey should already have done so for since he's from New York and Jeffries was staffer was like, well, let's stay in your lane or get who cares about Chris Van Hollanders? So they're actually spending time sniping at each other on something that's utterly unimportant. I mean it's important, I guess who's the next mayor of New York. It's utterly unimportant when Hakeem Jeffries supports him. You know, the voters of New York City are not waiting to hear from Hakeem Jeffries on this. I'm going to.

[Tim Miller]

Which is the reason why I should just support him, by the way. But also totally.

[Bill Kristol]

No, I agree. If I were asked, I would say that. But the idea that this is the moment to let's have, let's have a lot of really fun intra Democratic fights and let's have the centrist attack the left and the left attack the center and young attack. I mean it's not that they should suppress their opinions about various things, but there's going to be a shutdown. I fight about a shutdown in two weeks. Maybe the members of Congress actually who do actually have to coordinate their effort, the rest of us don't have to. We can say whatever we want. I suppose maybe they should actually work a little harder on that and not sort of. So I do feel like yes, the opposition could use improving on a lot of different of these. On all these areas, the intellectual, the political and the one you've mentioned, which is so important, the kind of organizing I guess you call it.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, I agree with that. And just since you mentioned Zoran again, he was a flashpoint for getting people involved. Right. In some ways that were not specifically how I wish it would happen. But it was working and people are getting involved and excited in New York now. He's going to have a real big job of trying to govern the biggest city in the country. Well, should he win? So he's not really the person for this, but that same notion could be channeled towards a more broad based activation of young people throughout the country. And it's just you look out and like who's doing that. And it's hard to kind of think about that. I mean like you could throw out some names but they would feel insufficient, I guess.

[Bill Kristol]

And one footnote to that my impression I saw something quickly that he had said I think on at a rally or something over the weekend was responsible about Charles.

[Tim Miller]

His was great. I played it on the okay, well good.

[Bill Kristol]

You're on Thursday.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, I played it on Thursday because it was really, really good. Yes.

[Bill Kristol]

So all this talk about the left has gone this way. He's the most prominent leftist leftist Democrat that running for office. Not quite well in office, in state office right now in America I guess he and AOC and he was utterly responsible and did not say any of the things that Trump and Stephen Miller are saying. The radical left types are saying. Right. So it really does show from I now having complained about the Democrats for a while, it shows that they are so much more responsible.

[Tim Miller]

And I would just say one more thing about the left just as this is not, you know, again as I specifically chose the word liberal because of where I identify myself after having myself complained in the intro about how some regular Americans in my life were responding to this tragedy. Gosh, I'm really gassing this guy up by saying this right now. But probably the two most prominent leftists to use that word, like maybe three most are you mentioned AOC and Zoran and then the streamer Hasan Piker and all of their responses were extremely responsible. And Hasan is tamping down the people in his comments who are doing the opposite and they were all talking about the importance, importance of people being able to speak in a free country. And that is really encouraging. And so I just want to say.

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[Tim Miller]

The other big news of the morning is related to China and TikTok. Trump sent this bleat this morning. The big trade meeting in Europe between the US and China has gone very well. All caps. It will be concluding shortly. A deal was also reached on a quote, certain company that young people in our country very much wanted to save. They will be very happy. I will be speaking to President Xi on Friday. The relationship remains a strong one. Exclamation point, exclamation point, exclamation point. Donald Trump really loves Xi and that is a lot of exclamation points to use when talking about how much you're friends with somebody. Since that Besant has now come out and said what Trump was implying by saying that they have a framework for a TikTok deal. And I thought this was the most grotesque part of all of this was this statement from Besant at the end. They have a deal between two private parties. Then he goes on. The two leaders, President Trump and party chair Xi will speak on Friday to complete the deal. Is that how things work here? The president of the United States has to stamp off a private deal between a private company and a foreign country. That's one of our adversaries and us. Trump and Xi are the same. We have of state run deal making now when it comes to social media accounts I guess anyway what do you make of all that when it comes.

[Bill Kristol]

To other corporations as well it turns out right. Intel and stuff.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah.

[Bill Kristol]

I mean Trump is being taken to the cleaners by Xi is my sense as he has been by Putin and some of our Trump accommodating or acquiescing foreign policy hawks thought okay, we can work to get him okay on Ukraine and anyway at least he'll be tough on China. That's the one thing he'll really be tough on China, that's the real competitor for the 21st century. Bill, you're a little too obsessed with the Europe stuff and some of these NATO that's kind of old school. And this gee, he's going to really be tough. Look how tough he was in the first term. And he was somewhat tough in the.

[Tim Miller]

First term up until that last year and a half we won the trade deal and Covid.

[Bill Kristol]

Right. So the trade deal always cut against the, the Pompeos and the others in the administration who were authentically I think pretty anti China sometimes in intelligent ways and useful ways, sometimes somewhat silly ways. But still Trump's just, has just thrown all that under the bus. And he's now all in on a trade deal with Xi and let them have whatever chips they need to improve their semiconductors and let them have obviously no political challenge to them. We're not going to let the president of Taiwan travel through the U.S. i mean, yeah, it's, it's all fake that. I mean, it's hard to know how much of the, the China toughness was always fake among a lot of Republicans just to kind of bellicosity because they sort of vaguely think that if you're for American greatness, you can't just be for being a wimp. So you. But you don't actually do anything about Ukraine, where there's actually a massive brutal assault on an ally in Europe by Putin. But we could pretend to be tough on China. Nothing's happening there really. But now that's beginning to collapse. And so, yes, Trump's getting along with the dictators everywhere.

[Tim Miller]

The relationship remains a very strong one. Heart, eyes, emoji. It's just like, okay, whatever. I don't think that's the right posture.

[Bill Kristol]

What's good, Tim, is that the Republican hawks, Senator Cotton and all the theorists of the anti China side of the Republican Party who are also pro Trump, they'll speak out. You know, they're going to call Trump on this. They're not going to just roll over the people who screamed and yelled about TikTok 18 months ago and who screamed and yelled about Taiwan and streamed and yelled again, not without some reason in some cases about the balance in Asia and so forth. They're going to call balls and strikes on this. And I wonder who will call. I guess the Wall Street Journal might, do you think? I don't know, National Review, but any actual elected official. No way. Right. I'm being obviously sarcastic when I say.

[Tim Miller]

I mean, I don't know, Rand, one of the libertarians like Rand maybe or something. But.

[Bill Kristol]

Yeah, well, they're against being hawkish. No, but I mean, I'm being obviously sarcastic when I say they're not going to. Of course they're not. They're going to work quietly though, behind the scenes. They're going to really work hard to make Trump more responsible on this.

[Tim Miller]

Don't believe so. Moving on to Russia, Trump, the other news on that front is he has said that he is willing to do sanctions. Harder sanctions on Europe. There's a sanctions bill on the Hill. Speaking of the bellicosity talk, Lindsey Graham keeps doing press conferences over on the Hill about worry about ready. We're gonna crush them. We got the sword of Damocles hanging over, over Russia's head. We're gonna pass this bill any minute now. We're just waiting for Trump to tell us we can. We're just gonna pass it. It's been ready. We have the co sponsors. Trump said he's willing to do those hard sanctions only if Europe has to do it first. He wants Europe to. He wants to make sure Europe is getting no gas from Russia, that all of the countries are fully on board. He can't do it unless the Europeans are willing to sacrifice themselves. You wrote over the weekend, since President Putin's invitation to Alaska by Trump, the Russian leader has ramped up attacks in Ukraine, threatened to kill any future foreign forces in Ukraine, hit Western targets in Ukraine, and unleashed a drone incursion into Poland. And the response from Trump is, once again, well, I'll be tough. Maybe. We'll see. Let's give it another couple weeks. Weeks.

[Bill Kristol]

And the Europeans have been moderately tough on the Poland situation. It's right there. And didn't Trump have some. What was his important contribution on social media to that? I've never forget something last week.

[Tim Miller]

It was like, let's see what happens or something. Like, I was like, it's really good. Started now or something. It was like. It was just a surprise exclamation. And then when he was asked about it on the tarmac, he said something to the effect of like, oh, well, like the drones got knocked down before they landed in Poland. So, you know, not that big a deal.

[Bill Kristol]

I mean, the degree of weakness. There's been a lot of wishful thinking, in my opinion, the first eight months of, you know, well, he's not quite as. He said some bad things in February when Vance and Texas gave those speeches in Europe and all that. But, you know, it's not quite as weak as you think, Bill. And it's not. There's some good things. It's all weakness. And that's very dangerous, too. So he's very strong and persecuting, and I, I think that's a fair verb to use people he doesn't like in launching the federal government against his enemies, his perceived enemies, his opponents, whom he thinks of as enemies here at home and very weak against actual brutal dictatorships abroad. That's kind of the Trump. The Trump doctrine, right? You know, attack transgender individuals who are minding their own business, 99.8% of them here at home, and do nothing against brutal dictators who are killing people abroad.

[Tim Miller]

Yeah, okay. Well, that's good. That sums things up. I think we can kind of leave it there. I ended the pod last week with a reading of your newsletter. That's how good it was about David Rose, who's killed. The police officer was killed at the cdc. So I figured we could see if you had any final thoughts or ruminations on that before we let people go.

[Bill Kristol]

Well, it's encouraging that people like heroes like David Rose exist. He's a young man. He's almost the same age. He was a young man, almost the same age as Charlie Kirk. And so for all the talk about social media and all the talk about how horrible our politics are, and they are pretty bad. David Rose grew up in America and came from American family. And it was a really admirable and heroic person. Fought in Afghanistan and then obviously ran to the gun, so to speak, here in Atlanta. Then that assault on ctc, it was, was tragically killed. So there are people like there was. I was talking to Jane Ortlicer on the Sunday bull work thing, and he's been at some college campuses and we just talking about that in general and he said he's heartened. So for whatever that, you know, again, for all the talk, I do think the social media stuff is a little overdone, like it's ruining this whole job. I don't know, are they so much worse than people my age or, you know, like Donald Trump or people JG Vance's age, who's your age, basically, or, you know, I mean, it.

[Tim Miller]

What was he heartened by? I'm ready to be heartened. Give me something to be heartened by.

[Bill Kristol]

The students he was seeing at the campuses where he. He had just was coming back from the campus. We just talked about J.D. vance being shot in the campus and sort of the Charlie Kirk and he said a lot of the students he meets are, you know, intelligent. They don't like Trump and Trumpism. They don't like the radical parts of the, of the left that you criticized earlier. And therefore, you know, actual American greatness, which means tolerance at home and standing up to bullies abroad. But it's. It'd be nice if there were more people reflecting that, I'd say in our leadership, both political leadership and there are some, but also, let's call it civic leadership. That's the one thing I was struck by. I read some little thing over the weekend. If I could just close on this. The collapse of the elite institutions is also very damaging. And that compounded with Trump and Miller, creates a very dangerous situation, obviously.

[Tim Miller]

Well, you had me encouraged there until that Final caveat anyway.

[Bill Kristol]

But Jay Nordlinger had some. But Jay Nordler has some great conversations with students at college. So cheer up. So cheer up.

[Tim Miller]

I find this as well. I go to campuses and I always, because I am sympathetic to the stated notion that a liberalism is happening on campuses, that, like, people are shouted down. People aren't free to kind of share their views if they're wrong thoughts or whatever. But I feel the same way when I'm on campuses. I always ask about that question, kids, do you feel like you have to self censor? Do you feel like this? And, and I don't know, maybe the people self selecting to come see me talk are a different category from the broader campus or the broader generational cohort, which is why it's something I'm exploring in FYPOD and our other efforts to reach out to young folks. But I agree with that. And I think that there is some things that are alarming, of course, but I also am heartened when I'm hearing from actual, actual students who have to live this stuff every day. It's just, I don't know, it's just eventually it becomes too much, right? The overwhelming amount of the negativity in your face and in your feed every day. But we soldier on. All right, that's Bill Kristol. Quite an episode. I don't know if this one's going to go in our highlight in our hall of fame at the end of the process, but we did the best we could. We'll be back Monday. That's the good thing about this. We get to do it again next Monday. And who the knows what's going to happen then? We'll see you all then. We'll be back here tomorrow for another edition of the Bulwark Podcast. Peace.

[Podcast Outro Singer]

This is my guitar I play it with my hand it's part of me Just like the song I sing this is my life I live the best I can Part of you and part of everything I know it's hard I feel like you've been broken so much love is missing from the start I know it's hard not to feel like you're alone A world just lost and swimming in the dark oh, help me this is my voice I sing the best I can the music in my head is from my heart this is my chance the only chance I've got To shine the light into the dark I know it's hard not to feel like you've been broken Nothing seems to work the way you should.

[Tim Miller]

I know.

[Podcast Outro Singer]

It'S hard But I know that I'll keep holding cuz all I've ever seen you is good oh help me, help me please oh help me, help me please.

[Tim Miller]

The Bulwark Podcast is produced by Katie Cooper with audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.

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