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This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Fiscally responsible financial geniuses, monetary magicians. These are things people say about drivers who switch their car insurance to Progressive and save hundreds. Visit progressive.com to see if you could save Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states or situations. The resistance is on the come and there are much better days for Democrats ahead if if they read the room. I'm Chris Cuomo. Welcome to the Chris Cuomo Project. Here is the idea. If you want to see midterm wins, if you want to see social media shifting in terms of the level of the dialogue, which right now is all MAGA dominant, except for nasty angry reaction from some on the left, which I don't think is getting you where you want to be. You have to remember one key piece of wisdom, and here it is. Change the game. Don't let the game change you. Within this aphorism is the mistake and the correction that will lead to the outcome. MAGA has to be a disappointment to people even within MAGA if they are more reasonable than just resonant with whatever Trump says. Prices aren't where we wanted them to be. The job market is not where we needed it to be. Culturally, we're not where we needed to be because of the hostilities. Charlie Kirk is, of course, an inflection point. But murder can't be the methodology in America. And I get why it is so aggravating for people to have a discussion about Charlie Kirk's ideas in the same breath as the wrongness of his murder. I get it. There is place for both absolutes. One absolute is murder is always wrong. We don't kill for ideas in America, period. You want to lionize Charlie Kirk. You want to enshrine him as a political figure on the right, that's your choice. On the right, you can do that. You can't make everybody else see him the way you want them to. Then you're becoming what you say you oppose. However, if you want to enshrine his ideas, you should get ready for pushback. And now here is the opportunity, okay, for Democrats to reassert political dominance on the basis of what they do best, which is showing they can do better. Okay, look, the key to Bill Clinton saying I feel your pain was not just to harness people's outrage and anger and grievance, no matter how justifiable those feelings are. It was that I get where you're coming from. I'll do something about it. Now, that proposition for MAGA has been almost exclusively reductive with one exception. Shutting the southern border the way Trump did. That was the right way to do it. No matter what your politics are, okay? You got to enforce the law if you're going to have law and order, right? Other than that, legal immigration, what you do about the companies, what you do about the sustainability of the employment, of our pricing, of our job structure, of our manufacturing base, of our foreign entanglements, all of those things have to be disappointments for maga. And there are huge opportunities for. For better. And that is the opportunity that the resistance has been waiting for. And I tell you, drop that word. Drop it. What is resistance? Resistance is this. I'm holding you back. I'm holding back maga. Whatever that is in your mind, I'm holding it back. What is that doing? The rate of losing. That is the rate of losing. Resisting. You think it's, I won't be you. I won't let you do it. Well, what are you doing then? Because this isn't winning. You're not winning. Okay? In the movie, when the walls are coming in and crushing the guy and he's like, oh, no. And he stopped. What has to happen next? Something has to make the walls stop, and then you got to get the fuck out, right? When you're resisting somebody, they come with a knife, right? And you put your arms up. Oh, and you're holding them off. You're holding them off. Is that winning? Are you winning? Right? No, you're not winning. You're resisting. You're forestalling, losing, right? Oh, the knife. What do you have to do? Right? Swing his arm down, take it in here. Bam. Now you're starting to win. You're changing the dynamic. That's where we are politically. MAGA has an outsized feel of dominance because of social media. And that one of the biggest platforms, and I would argue the biggest platform in terms of political chaos and is run by a Trumper, right? Elon Musk. He may not like what's happening with Tesla on the tax side, but he knows he's in bed with Trump and he knows he is an enemy of the left, and that's what he is doing. And he is allowed by our laws to amplify content and decide what gets in front of you and how much of it and what gets rewarded and what trends without any accountability. So he's doing that. That is not a space for the left to win. If they play the game, you are letting the game change you. This is why I say often, and it frustrates you guys. Look I'm not going to hate on Trump for him playing the game. You don't hate the player. You play the game. You guys are letting the game change you. You're trying to match fury, you're trying to match aggression. Okay? This idea that you're too soft, you're too nice, you're too sweet, you're too empathetic. I don't think that. I think that you guys are pretty buck fucking nasty. Most of the time. It's about what your cause is. There's a misunderstanding. Who's the toughest guy in the room? The guy who comes up and says, I'm gonna beat your ass. Let's say he's a big, muscular, menacing looking guy and he says, I'm gonna beat your ass. Is that the most threatening guy in the room? No. You know who's the most threatening guy in the room? The guy nobody else wants to fuck with. The guy that nobody wants to take a swing at. That is rarely the guy who's saying, I'll beat your ass. He usually gets swung on first. Right. Why fear self protection. This guy's threatening me, I gotta come at him. There is a lesson in that. When Democrats are best, it's because they are better. It's because they have better ideas that they can actually fix. That's why you guys beat your opponents over the head with the fact that when it comes to job creation in America, you guys overwhelm the right in terms of your history of what you've done with time and leadership. Why? Well, some of it is about public sector expansion. And you can feel one way or another about that, but the other is that you have better ideas about taxation, about regulation, about what works and what doesn't and why. And that means you have to change the game. Because right now there is no room for better in our dialogue. It's all about who's worse, right? I mean, what does Charlie Kirk's murder mean politically? Is it really a galvanizing point for the right? No, I don't think we're gonna go on a vengeance tour. I think that that's too anathema to civility. It's anathema to law and order. It's anathema to conservative principles, frankly. It's not about avenging. Sure, it's galvanizing for them, but if they're going to listen to the words of Charlie Kirk's widow and lean into their Christianity, they're going to come very soon to grips with the reality that they're not living their faith. So that's not what this moment is about. This moment is about going too far, about it being too much. Too much violence, too much aggression, too much harshness. That's why the answer isn't to say, Charlie Kirk shouldn't have been killed. But, man, he was a really hateful person, and it makes sense that someone targeted him. No. Why? Because there is no comma, there is no check on the wrongness. Don't balance that out with what he said. Now you want to talk about his ideas and what should be remembered about him. Now we'll have a different conversation, and that is a meaningful distinction. Okay? It takes some tact, it takes nuance. That's not weakness, it's intelligence. Okay? Now the opportunity is what is better than what got us here. MAGA does not have an answer for that. Trump does not have an answer for that. He literally went on stage after Erica Kirk says, I forgive the killer, and said, not me. I don't forgive people who are my enemies. That's who he is. Okay, yes, maybe he was joking, maybe not. But, you know, sometimes there's some truth and levity, and that's how he got where he is. He is the spirit animal of people's animus, of grievance, of being angry. That's what he is. That's done. What's next? What gets us to a better place? Affordability issues are real. Okay? Our job situation in this country is a real problem. Our markets are gonna go the other direction. There's been way too much money put in for way too long. With quantitative easing and all the currency manipulation we've done, we're gonna have ramifications and repercussions for this. I don't know whose watch it's gonna be on, but that's not the primary focus of the political ambition here. The political ambition here should be better. Okay, we're not going to talk about trans athletes anymore. Why? Because it's an excuse for dealing with incivility in our society. We have problems with violence in our society directed towards ideas and ideals, and we can be better than that. I can be in a debate with somebody, dismiss what they're saying as childish and stupid and absurd, but not become them. You know, I'm not a wimp. You're a wimp. That's not strength. You're being what you oppose. You're matching your opponent. You gotta be better. This game of the battle to the bottom of which side is worse, you guys are literally debating who's more violent, the right or the left. There is no statistical evidence that the left is anywhere near as violent in politics, the ADL and everybody. That's your argument, Right after Charlie Kirk was shot in the neck by a guy who thought he was standing up for his trans lover. You just shot him in the neck. You're going to make the case that it's all about the right? How stupid do you have to be? It's not about stupidity. It's about convenience. You're so desperate for clickbait, you're so desperate to be relevant, to be in the mix, that you say, whatever's going to get you the clicks. Change the game. Change the game. 1. Change the game by going after the companies that control the algorithms. You don't get to amplify certain shit because that's where you make your money. And that comes with no responsibility. Listen, Fox News and Newsmax almost got sued out of existence for doing what? Exaggerating. Misinformation about smartmatic. Right. Why? Because there's accountability. Fox News and Newsmax were drops of rain compared to a hurricane of misinformation about smartmatic that was amplified, weaponized, monetized, commoditized on social media with the empowerment, the facilitation and the consent of the companies. They are publishers. They are creators. And here's the simplest analogy. While we didn't write any of the articles. Yeah, but you decide which ones get amplified. You're a publisher. You're a publisher just as much as anybody else. The game has changed. The Internet Decency act of 1996 doesn't make any sense today. Section 230 doesn't make any sense. Change the game. That should be part of the Democratic platform, that censorship. No, it isn't. It's responsibility. It is applying the same rules to them that everybody else has. Everybody else has them. It is not censorship. No, it embraces the First Amendment because this is about state action. We're talking about private responsibility. Okay? There's space for better in that argument. There's space for better and affordability. Why aren't prices coming down? Because of our currency situation. And because companies are rewarded for what they give their shareholders, not what they give their customers. And you can say the two are related, but they're not as related as you think. What if you changed your policies to have tax codes that reflect what they pay their workers? Certainly constitutional. What about that? You pay 10% tax. Just making up a number. If you pay your workers on average $8, you pay 6% in tax. If you pay them 11. What would be wrong with that? It's a good idea, right? That's how you change the game and that is the opportunity. MAGA is a battle to the bottom of grievance. You're not going to win the pissed off battle. You're matching it right now. You got your own pissed off person. You've got MAGA reaction formation going on on your side. I don't think that's how you win the midterms. I don't think that's how you win the majority. I think the way you win is by exposing that MAGA hasn't made what matters better. Give it its due. Don't say that the southern border. Don't just ignore it. Say, that was good. But what about legal immigration? What about all the workers we're losing? What about all the companies who say they need these people? What about the dreamers? What are we doing to build for the future with our workforce? What are we going to do if you get rid of 2, 3 million people, who's going to take those jobs? How are we going to. What are going to happen to prices? Then there's room for better support. Comes from being. You know, people think podcasting is just talking into a mic. Tell you, my brain doesn't just shut off when I turn off the mic. There's so much noise coming through that I got to deal with. 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Beam says they've improved over 17 and a half million nights of sleep and they have 92% of their users saying better sleep, waking up refreshed. What do I love the most? Beam's an American company. It's built and Run right here. And that matters to me and it should matter to you if you're in America. So when you support them, you're back in real people making real products who could live right by you. Plus, for a limited time, Beam is giving my listeners their best offer yet, up to 40% off. So if you try their best selling Dream Powder, you can get up to 40% off. For a limited time, go to shop beam.com forward/cuomo and use the code CUOMO at checkout. That's Shop Beam. B as in Bravo, E A m as in mike.com forward/cuomo and use the code Cuomo for up to 40% off. Who's going to grab the initiative on bringing back the arts? And by that I mean the trade arts artisans. That is one of the biggest needs in our economy. Did you know that for every five members of the trades who are retiring, they're being replaced by two? Do we have less toilets than I thought? Do we have less houses than I thought? Do we have less H vac systems? Do we have less driveways? Do we have less construction than I thought? Huh? Because I thought we needed more of all these things, yet less of the people who are doing it. And you don't think you're going to get people who come here out of the desperation of our need illegally? Who's going to seize that? There's the opportunity for better, right? What are we learning about colleges? People hate them. Why aren't they expanding their freshman classes in a way that reflects their endowments instead of barely matching the population rate? Why aren't they expanding their freshman classes? Why aren't they expanding access? Why aren't they expanding scholarships? Why are we rewarding them for creating scarcity? Why are we rewarding schools and saying that they're good on the basis of how many people they don't let in? Why aren't we rewarding them for the percentage of people they do let in? The number of people that they can teach and make better? Why isn't that the mechanism of reward? That's about being better? That is a space that should be inhabited instead of demonizing all young males now that you know how dominant they are on social media, Maybe you don't blame them for every cultural dynamic in the world. Maybe you address their distress. Why do you think they resonate with Trump when you believe that he is exactly the opposite of what you wanted to raise your son to be? Well, how does that go together? What is he saying? That is being missed elsewhere. You are enough. You are not the problem. You are not to blame for everything. I'm telling you. See the opportunity to be better. Change the game. Gerrymandering is a real thing. Tit for tat of who can rig the system more is not the way to get it done. You can feel how you want about Proposition 50 and Newsom's efforts in California to offset Texas. What about the idea of we gotta redistrict the whole motherfucker? And here's how we do it. An independent panel picked by both sides of people who get paid different ways based on how efficient and effective and timely they are in redistricting the entire country to reflect the actual census in those places. It can be done. This is not that complicated, okay? It's just done out of political expedience instead of any real demographics. Where's that idea? It would be better, okay? This is the space for you. This is where the battle to the bottom has taken us. Everything sucks. Everyone sucks. Everybody's angry. Everybody's upset. Social media is allowed to weaponize all of our worst thoughts, feelings instinc there is room for better. And in that is victory. And it is victory that is pure. It is victory that we need. It is victory that the majority will resonate with. We want better. You don't get to fix my roof by telling me the other roofers suck. You don't get to fix my roof by telling me, yeah, I know this is too much and the job won't be done that great, but what else are you going to do? You don't get the job by sounding obnoxious, by saying hateful things that play to prejudices and divide. You don't get the job. We only allow it in politics. Why? Because people are stupid? No, because politics is stupid. Because their expectations have been lowered. The people aren't stupid. The problem aren't the people in maga. The problem is not the people in the reaction formation to maga. The problem is in the standards that we've allowed. Support comes from Cozy Earth and I'm happy that it does. Man, I love their products. Cozy Earth does good and does well for you. How? Products that bring comfort shows up day in, day out. Right? You got the bamboo. Joggers and their everywhere pant next level. Just like the sheets. And I love the bamboo. Why? Because it's environmentally sustainable. And I like feeling good about having how the companies I use treat our world. All right, if it doesn't matter to you, fine. The products are just great and they're a great price point. But to Me, it's about more than that. The everywhere pant, by the way, is the epitome of refined comfort. Okay? You can, you know, it doesn't matter your size, they kind of fit to you. And they're a go to pant for me. Why? Breathability, flexibility. And they wash so well. The bamboo joggers are a great workout tool for me. I dig them very much all season. They work well. I can get a sweat on in them. I could just be around the house. They wash easily and they get softer all the time, which is very cool. And I know the family feels the same way because my wife keeps putting them on all the different beds. So there you go. And my kids have stolen a couple of my shirts, so they must be liking them. Go to cozyearth.com and use my code Chris for up to 40% off the best pants, joggers, shirts, everything. And if you get a post purchase survey, please tell them you heard about Cozy Earth right here at the Chris Cuomo project. Built for real life, made to keep up with yours. That's Cozy Earth. Look, as a wannabe tough guy, when somebody says to me, hey, Fredo, I should kick your ass, he says, no, I should kick your ass, you fat piece of shit. I don't match invective. Why? I'm just being like him. What do I say in situations like that? It depends. Are the cameras around? Am I with my kids? Can I get away with it? If I can get away with it, you know what I would say? Try it. Try it. That's what I say. I've made many people in my life nervous waiting for what the response to the request would be. Why do I say that? Because I know who I am and I know what I'm capable of. Try it now. What do I say if my kids are around? That's the way you talk when you see my kids. Why? Every adult, certainly every parent, knows that's just a line you don't cross. You don't do that. You're a piece of shit all day long and everybody knows it. We're in mixed company. You want to have a conversation? You want to talk about something and see where you're right and I'm wrong? Or you just want to be an asshole. What do you want? Why? Because I'm not going to be what I oppose. Shit. I do that. Enough. I'm enough of a hypocrite. I'm enough of a failure. I'm flawed enough. I've made the same mistakes again and again and again. Okay? I know my weaknesses. I know my shortcomings. It doesn't mean I get to correct them. I try sometimes. Why? Because I'm human. That's why I'm all too human. Right to err is human, to forgive divine. Why did Alexander Pope write that line? Because it's so hard to be better than what we are as the miserable, frail, weak, insecure, damaged little beings that we are that are here for a blip. But there is an opportunity for better. When everything has been run down as far and as deep as it has, there's so many people saying so much ridiculous shit. You don't need to say Charlie Kirk was a racist. You just need to have better ideas to remedy the wrongs that he was arguing about, just to keep him in context. You want to talk about prices and grocery prices. Give us the better ideas to help us with them. And by the way, you're going to have a hard time bringing the prices down. Why? Because it's really complicated about why they are where they are because of how much money has been flooded into the economy. You're going to have to find ways to get people to make more money. Now, I'm not saying it's easy, but you want to lead or not make your politics. That is a reaction to what is wrong, what will sound with people as being right about being who we are at our best. What do we do when somebody is killed wrongly? We talk about how to stop it the next time. How to protect against this better. How to make people safer. Not to justify why the guy wasn't that great a guy in the first place. It's not what we do. There is an opportunity here. If you don't let the game change you, if you try to out maga maga and show that you can mock Trump the way he mocks everybody else. Okay, look, look. That may be one arrow in the qu, but it ain't the whole bunch. It's not the arsenal. You gotta have better ideas. You are not going to win a battle of which is worse and you shouldn't want to. There is opportunity in this. Who are the right people to lead? I don't know. They'll bubble up once the expectations change. I want solutions. I want you to show me that you understand why it's wrong and that you understand that it's not just one blame away and that cooperation is not weakness. No, that's. That's not weakness. There's opportunity in where we are right now. Specifically for Democrats. I don't see it for the other side right now. Why? It's because they're riding this train. They're on the pain train and they're riding it. And when Trump's term is up, and it will be up, there's going to be a battle for who is his heir apparent, and there'll be a little bit of a splintering of do we want to go back to being real conservatives or do we keep down this road of conspiracies and complete contagion of every virtue we once had? And that's an open question right now in that political club. Why? Well, because you've got these kooks on their fringe. It wasn't really Robinson. He didn't write the texts. It was Israel. There's a conspiracy afoot. It was somebody else. It's something else. They, they, they, they. Deep state, deep state, that's just all about clickbait. It's just all about making money on social media. That's it. That's all that is. As stupid, as shallow as it is, it will get traction as long as it's amplified and it will be amplified until we change the rules and the responsibilities. So that's that side. They're on the pain train. They're riding this ride or die. What is the other side? What is the alternative? That is about better. That is about being rational. That is about being strong in your convictions, that doing it that way makes it worse. Now, that's strength. Don't you want to call me names? That's great. Insult yourself. You got no ideas. You got no better ideas. You want to come at me personally? Because you got nothing. Now, by the way, we know that that is a tested and proven demagoguery works, okay? The Greeks didn't even give us a positive opposite for it. That made it into our lexicon. That's how strong the negative is. Why is there a rule that, by the way, I think Rashida Tlaib totally violated and should be censured for the other day in how she was acting on the floor of Congress. On the floor of Congress, you're not allowed to launch ad hominems attacks against another member. Why in a court of law, you're not allowed to openly attack personally opposing counsel. Why in sanctioned debate, you're not allowed to levy personal insults against your debating opponent. Why? Because we know that decorum has to be enforced if your goal is decency and cogency, that's why. Because you got to get the cheap shit out the base shit out to elevate it. And that's what you need to do now. You want to call names. You want to say things. What you just said is not true and you know it's not true. And here is the fact. And you can do it with anything. No, the study did not say that no one should take Tylenol when they're pregnant. And I'll leave aside the fact that you said Harvard was full of shit and now you're saying they're a single source. That we should change our entire pharmaceutical understanding on it. That's convenient. They didn't come to the conclusion that just came out of your pie hole. They said use less, use it for shorter. Talk to your doctor. There's an open question here. They didn't say Tylenol bad, good, no Tylenol. That's not what they said. That's how you have the discussion. And I think that we should have a review of it. And I want to hear from clinicians about it and I want to have a hearing on it. That's competent. That's how you do it. Not you're stupid for saying Tylenol is bad. Why do you want to own Tylenol's position? Who knows what the truth is? Gas and groceries, what is behind them? Money supply and what we reward with our corporations, which right now is just payoff to shareholders. That's it. They're allowed to have a pure form of capitalism that works only for them. That's how it is. They get the most and they give the least. It does not have to be that way. There are better ideas. There's a better way to conduct yourself. You do not have to be an asshole to be heard except on social media. And I'm telling you there has to be a change. That is part of changing the game. Change the game. Don't let the game change you. Don't become what you oppose. There is going to be a change in what this country wants and expects from its leaders. And it's coming soon. And it is not going to be to the benefit of who is in power now. There is opportunity. Democrats should be on the come. Democrats fates should be improving. What do you mean? You see how they responded to Charlie Kirk. You're talking about the few. You're talking about the frustrated. Not the many and not the majority of this country who totally understands that Charlie Kirk should have never had a hand laid on him about what comes out of his mouth. And that's the end of that conversation. It was just wrong. Catch the guy and do whatever you want to do with him. Now how do we get to a better place. Well, we got to reject toxic ideas. And Charlie had some. So let's talk about those ideas, not Charlie's death. As a function of those ideas, the ideas. There is room for better. The country is desperate for it. The majority wants it and will reward it. Change the game. Chasing after people on the street to have them say the most obnoxious thing is working on social media because they amplify the most obnoxious thing. What if the things that resonated most on social media were people coming up to you with the microphone and saying, how do you feel about Charlie Kirk being dead? And instead of them saying, well, I didn't like what he said, I've smiled at some obituaries. Let's just put it like that. Instead of that being amplified, what if what was amplified was, look, I didn't like a lot of what he said, but it's just disgusting what was done. And we need a better politics in this country. And I'm open to ideas from either side if they help make a difference in my life. And right now, it seems that everything only makes a difference for them. And nothing's changing in my life. Not for the better. What if that got amplified? What if that went viral all over the place? You don't think you'd see more of it. So I get why they're doing what they're doing on social media. Change the game. Change the game. We don't think Congress is about censorship when they have a rule that you don't do ad hominems. Now, I'm not saying that's the rule for social media. I think you got to let people vent. But I think companies amplifying the worst shit because it gets them paid is a problem. Let's have the debate. Let's have the debate. And if you don't like hearing the President of the United States go before the UN and say, all your countries are going to hell, have a better idea. We can't have the UN not be involved in settling conflicts. They can't be seen as part of the problem. We have to rethink how this organization is organized and how it is staffed and how it acts. And as the largest shareholder in it, I'm not going to continue this way. That's a better idea for an American president. Be about that. Change the game. That it's not about just telling people off all the time. It's about how it gets better. And I'm telling you, America is ready for better. We know what's bad. We know what's worse. We know what sucks. We know what hurts. We want better. Everybody's sick. Do you want to compare fevers and symptoms or do you want to talk about potential medicine? That's the opportunity for Democrats. If you don't let the game change you and you decide to change the game, who will do it? When will they do it? How will they do it? That all remains to be seen. But the opportunity is there. The country is ready for it, and the midterms are coming. What do you think? I'm Chris Plomo. Thank you very much for subscribing and following and being with me here, having conversations that are about making sense, about getting things to be better. Okay. And there is opportunity in the chaos that we're all suffering through right now. Thank you for checking me out at News Nation, 8p and 11p every weekday night. Thank you for checking out all the wellness stuff and the 50 plus fitness stuff. I'm just showing you what I'm doing, what's working for me, what isn't working for me so that, you know, you can have more informed choices. And I'm happy to be here for you to do it. My friends, the problems are real. We got to deal with our politics the way we deal with everything else in life. What will make it better? Let's get after it.