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Support comes from Calm. Calm is the number one app for sleep and meditation for a reason. Works for me, it'll work for you. Why? You gotta have tools to help you live the life you want to live. It can't be all go all the time. Not only is that not reasonable, it's just not effective. Downtime matters. Slowing your brain, quieting your mind, setting yourself up for success in rest and recovery. That's what we're really expanding our understanding about most. And that's where calm comes in. Guided meditations. Why? It's like training for your brain to get rid of the toxicity. It helps build focus, build habits. Taking better care of yourself. Sleep stories to help you sleep, meditations, music. Calm has over 2 million 5 star reviews and can help you stress less, sleep more, live better, calm your mind, change your life. Calm has an exclusive offer just for listeners of our show. You can get 40% off a calm premium subscription. If you want, go to calm.com C A L M.com Cuomo. That's a great value. 40% off. C-A-L-M.com Cuomo 40 off. Unlimited access to comms Library. All right. And please tell comm you heard about them from me. Are you a real one? What is a real one? If you're talking about the right or the left, what does it take to be a real one these days? It is a really important question and I think the answer is going to bother, shock and or amaze you. This is Chris Cuomo. Welcome to the Chris Cuomo Project. What is a real one? Well, let's start with the easy answers. A real one is someone who's seen as completely authentic. All right? Archetypal is a word we used to use when we cared about English instead of things that we could just type in two and three letter abbreviations that mean something or nothing. Although I do love Sybau, which I noticed one of my kids said to one of the other kids the other day, and I was like, subaru. And then it was sybau. You know what that stands for? Shut your bitch ass up. That one I like, but in general, I don't like it. And I don't like the idea of being a real one. I'll tell you why. Because unless we're talking about kindness or being a friend or something where there is a loyalty component, where you should be committed, everything else should be conditional. Meaning what? What are you getting? What are you giving? What are you asking me? You understand? Now, in politics, what does that mean? Well, right now, because of populist fervor. It means that there is an intensity to your engagement, meaning you're a nasty mofo. That's what you are. You're mean, you're harsh. And you'll justify it and say, well, no, I'm righteous. I'm righteous. This is passion. This isn't just straight up animus, you know, this is an animated sense of righteous purpose. O so I remember that in 2015 with the Maga folk, and many of them were living in truth when they said that they felt the system was against them, that the powerful had forgotten them, that they didn't represent them, they represented themselves, and that they wanted someone to be their retribution, to get back at the system and maybe to change it in their favor. And so to be a real one within MAGA is to be all in with Trump at all times. You forgive him everything, you judge him on nothing. And anything that he does is rationalized in a very simple way. If you're a real one. If you're a real one, it's better than the alternative. That's what the answer is about anything, whether it's his involvement with Epstein or any of the allegations against him, personally, professionally, politically, it's better than the Democrats, better than the other one. Now, not only is that a pathetically low bar in terms of what your standard is, what you're about, but it's also really easy to manipulate and make it low enough for you to get over it whenever you want to. And that's what a real one was in maga. Now, the better question is, what is a real one right now? That I don't know. Why? Because MAGA is collapsing under its own weight. Why? Well, not only has it met and passed critical mass, but I don't want to get old Neil Dewgrass Tyson, on you here, but it's not working for people the way it used to. It worked great as an outside presence, as an insurgency, but now that you're in power and you own the status quo, it's not as easy to be angry at everything the government says and does because you're running the government, even if you want to believe what these guys keep telling you, which is it's the deep state and it's everybody else and we're trying to fix it. Doesn't really wash a year plus into it, does it? Doesn't hit the same. It's hard to be a real one. So now being a real one is changing, which is what we don't know yet. We don't know. And in that is opportunity. For the left, there's a problem. And now the thrust of this episode of the Chris Cuomo Project. What is a real one on the left? Well, I'll tell you who it isn't. I'll tell you what it isn't. Michelle Obama. And I'm not saying she's not going to run for president or whatever. I don't care about any of that. I don't think she will. But that's not what my point is. Michelle Obama, one of her best lines, one of her best contributions to the political dialogue was when she dismissed somebody who had said something particularly ugly about her and or her husband. And she referenced the idea that, look, they're going to go low. That's what they're about. When they go low, we go high. Now, not only is this something with a great history within humanity and Christianity, but within black humanity and the black experience. There has often been a call within the black American experience to be better than your critics and your opponents and your jailers and your abusers. And there was a moral dignity in that. And I have watched it and I have studied it. I understand it and I respect it. It's hard, though, and it's much easier to be what Malcolm X was as a counter to Martin Luther King, at least early on, which was this. Love your brother. They don't love me. I don't love them. He became known for what by any means necessary, sitting in that window with the rifle. That was frightening. No, small irony. No. To me, a coincidence that the only time we had meaningful, comprehensive, collaborative and collective desire for gun control in this country was when the Black Panthers said every black man in America should legally get a weapon, learn how to use it, and be ready to defend themselves against an oppressive state. You look at it and you'll see that man being a real one sure changed on that issue, because right up into Reagan, Reagan was calling to get guns out of the hands of black men. He didn't say that, but he was talking about gun control. We're too civilized to have all these weapons. Isn't that interesting that that was the right's disposition? That's what it used to mean to be a real one. Now on the left, being a real one used to mean those things that I'm articulating as most recently seen through the lens of Michelle Obama. When she was saying that, she said other things, too. And of course, you could look at her different ways, but that's not my point. It's not about her. That is not what being a real One is anymore the left out of reaction formation, desperation, or in my opinion, miscalculation, believes that they need to be what beat them. And now they're on the outs and they're pissed about it, and they're pissed about who's in there, and they're pissed about what those people are doing, and they think they're up to no good and they think it's on purpose. And by the way, there's a lot of proof that they're right. And by the way, MAGA checked all those boxes early on, also. Different issues, different rationales, different players, but the same thing. And they had reason to be right. Also, does the left have better reason to be right? Let's say yes. Let's say yes, that Trump has set a new standard for perfidy in the presidency. Let's say he has. Not just because it's alliterative, because it's true. Okay, fine. So what does it take to be a real one? You gotta hate that. You gotta hate his ass. Nazi, fascist, isis, gestapos, everything that's going. This is the. The. Everything that's going on in Venezuela is an autocratic state gone crazy on steroids. It's all bad, it's all wrong, it's all illegal, it's all impeachable. And anybody who supports Trump is a fucking dumbass. Just like Trump. His people suck. He sucks. They're stupid. They're ruining our country. And if you don't say it at every opportunity. Stephen Miller is a Nazi. Isn't he a Jew? He's a Jew. Nazis. A Nazi Jew. I'm going to make a new word. A naju. That's what he is. That's how bad he is. His wife, too. You're hearing that more and more. I'm not even making it up. I'm not even exaggerating it. All of these things are said. Why? Because it feels like powerful strength and resistance. Yeah, this is the now. Now we're the ones. Now we're angry. Yeah. Yeah. Now we're up off the canvas and we're a real one. Support comes from AG1. I'm a big fan, man. I'm an OG when it comes to AG1. And they just keep getting better. I love the daily health drink. I'm one and done. I get my multivitamins, pre and probiotics, superfoods, antioxidants in just one scoop. And for me, some warm water. Drink it in the morning. I'm good all day. And this time of year, you got to get on it. Everybody is sick in my house. The adults, the kids, the dogs. Everybody's got something. And traveling only makes it worse. All right? So you gotta be on your immune game. You have to. And that makes AG1 an even more important thing and a great gifting idea. And they keep expanding what works for you in your world. AG1 Next Gen contains more vitamins and minerals than ever before. It's clinically shown to fill common nutrient gaps. You get the pre and probiotics right in AG1 that help your gut health and your digestion. Now, for me, the original is enough, but they have new formulations that again, are a function of science. They have a nighttime option that helps you sleep and uses things that doesn't that don't make you wake up worse than you went to bed. Okay? So for me, AG1 is just the brand to stick with. Okay? And AG1 is their best offer ever. If you head to drinkag1.com CCP for the Chris Cuomo project, you're going to get the welcome kit, a morning person hat. That's cool. A bottle of vitamin D3K2 and an AG1 flavor sampler. And you'll get to try their new sleep supplement I was telling you about. Ag Z as in Z. And you'll get to try it for free, which has been a game changer for nightly routines in the cuomo clan. That's drinkag1.com CCP and you'll get 126 bucks in free gifts for new subscribers.
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The holidays mean more travel, more shopping, more time online and more personal info in more places that could expose you more to identity theft. But LifeLock monitors millions of data points per second. If your identity is stolen, our US based restoration specialists will fix it, guaranteed or your money back. Don't face drained accounts, fraudulent loans or financial losses alone. Get more holiday fun and less holiday worry with LifeLock. Save up to 40% your first year. Visit LifeLock.com podcast terms apply.
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Thursday Night Football is on Christmas night and it's only on prime video.
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Wide open. Touchdown.
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This week, the Denver Broncos and the Kansas City Chiefs meet in a Christmas night showdown.
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Has the league ever seen anything like this?
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Coverage begins at 7:30 Eastern with football's best party teeing up tonight presented by Verizon. Not a Prime member? Not a problem. Simply sign up for a 30 day free trial. It's the Broncos and Chiefs Christmas night at 7:30 Eastern only on Prime Video. Restrictions apply. See Amazon.com amazonprime for details.
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This has been tricky for me. Why? Because I dismiss Empty talk. I dismiss hot talk that isn't acted on. Now, I'm not telling you to act on it, because this last thing we needed, more political violence. There has been. And I will say this. Which side of the political spectrum has produced more political violence in the last 20 years? The right. When you look at the list of domestic risks to national security, what do you see at the top of that list? Right wing extremism. True. No, but look at who tried to shoot Trump. And what about Scalise? And what about. You're right, two things can be true at once. In recent months and years, have we seen an increase in violence, political violence and extremism on the left? Yes. Yes, we have. Does that change that? 50, 60, 70, whatever the percentage is. But more than a majority, more than a plurality of that violence is still from the right. When you do a full accounting. No, that's still true. But recently we have seen an increase in violence on the far left. Why? I believe being out of power, I believe the way the people in power have acted, and I believe reaction formation to desperation and anger and social media rhetoric and constant hot talk and this false bravado of threats contributes to it. Absolutely, I do. So being a real one now on the left means exactly that. You're going to get written about if you say, fuck you, Trump. That is what now meets the mark for notable criticism. Why? Because there is a harshness. Because social media plays to harshness. Because the left has learned that they watched the right rock it up in digital relevancy by playing this nasty invective game, right? And now they've become almost cartoonish. You don't know which one hates which the most and for what reason. What is the conspiracy? Is it. Is it about who killed Charlie Kirk? Is it about tp? Is it about. Is it about, you know, some other conspiracy? Is it a deep. What is it? Is Candace Owens. Does he hate Tucker Carlson? No, Tucker Carlson hates the other one. That's not what. Oh, so is. Wait, is he still a conservative? No, he's not there. He's out. So is he maga? No, he hates maga. He just said he hates the Republicans. Oh. Because it's all hate, all the time, and it's exhausting, and that's why it's collapsing on itself. But it's hard to stand back and look at that and not want to be like it in terms of that initial ride, those millions of followers, the money, the relevancy, and then the media, right? Soulless. Nothing but opportunists. What do you see as an industry there? Well, I gotta reward Megyn Kelly, Candace Owens. I mean, they're getting the numbers, but you reject everything they're about. They're lying, they're dividing all these things that you always moralize about. Yeah, but at the end of the day, we're about success. And that is the measure of success. They are real ones. So now on the left, you have real ones. You have angry podcasters, people making threats, ready to beat someone's ass with their words. Now, this was a problem for me because in this new perverse world, or really this new world of perverse provocation, the rules as I understood them have changed. It used to be, don't fear the guy who says he's going to kick your ass. Fear the guy who's saying nothing. But not moving away when you say you're going to kick his ass. That guy is probably a dangerous guy. And when he knocks you on your ass now you know who the tough guy is. That's no longer the standard. That is a criminal, that is a bad guy, that is a barbarian. What we do is we say we're going to kick your ass. We're going to say terrible things about you that used to lead to a fist fight. We're not going to fist fight. We're a bunch of pussies. We don't know how to fight, but we know how to talk shit. And talking shit is now an end and of itself. That's a real one. Shut up. Fuck off. Lose your account, all this stuff. What? What is this? What are these? What are they saying? Yeah, yeah. Oh, he owned you. He destroyed you. That's the new toughness. It is the opposite of what used to be seen as toughness that used to be dismissed. Like, what are you talking all this for? Go find them. There used to be these moments when guys would see each other and be like, hey, I heard you were saying something about me, about my family, about whatever it is, here I am, say it now. That doesn't exist anymore. You should see these people. When I see them in person, how nice they are, how quick they are to want to accommodate that. Hey, look, you know, we have our disagreements online, but, you know. But what? Not now though, right?
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So I am not an easy adapter to this. But that is what a real one is. A real one is someone who is online trying to own the other side and saying really aggressive things, quasi threatening things. You know, they don't really mean it. They're not going to do anything physical. Right. None of them are really acquitted to that kind of thing, which to me is a pejorative. I think a guy who can't back up his words is kind of a, A and not a real one in my own definition. But that's not the definition of a real one anymore. Not on the political right, not on the political left. A real one is someone who talks the talk. Hot talk, threatening talk, menacing talk, mean talk. That's a real one. So when Trump says what he says about Rob Reiner may rest in peace, his wife rest in peace. If you say, look, of course this is what this guy says, okay? He's not a, he's not a consoler in chief. He's not a moral leader. He reflects us at our worst. Most often, that's what he is. And the less attention you pay to him, the better. That's weak. You're not a real one. A real one is you. Trump you with your small dick. That's what got people featured. That's what got them picked up by the algorithm. That's what went viral. Why? Because that's what's a real one these days. That's what it is. Now here's my problem with it. How do you believe that this leads to winning? Now what is winning is if. Now if winning is you getting your following and getting your money and getting paid and having everybody wear a shirt with your name on it. See, I don't do that. I don't sell stuff with my name on it. Why? Because I'm not about me, okay? I'm about we and ideas of what can get you to a better place where you are being guided by your reasoned choice. A critical thinker, not a Cuomo head. Right. Because that's just vainglorious about me. Because that's all it is, is how much money can I make off of whatever it is that you take from me. I get it. That's being a real one, especially on the left right now. On the right too. But the left is coming to its own in this way. They're angry, they've got their own populism, they've got their own outrage and they got good reason for it. So when I say the other day what I said about Trump, because I don't want him to be the center of attention all the time, I wanted us to focus on Rob Reiner and how his reaction to it was wrong. And here's how it should have been reacted to. And here's where this is coming from. And here's why this, we need to be better than what this is. See, that's what I want. I don't want to make it all about Trump. The left is okay with that. Being a real one means, oh no, it's all about Trump. We're going to come at him 24 7, 365. I don't think that wins the midterms for you. I don't. And I know that people on the left as smart as me and much smarter than I, they disagree with me and they say no, we can do both. I'm going to own his ass every day. I'm going to beat up all his people with my words and I'm going to be talking about affordability, do all of it. I don't believe that. I don't believe you move the needle with the majority that way. Now, maybe the majority is being subsumed by social media, minorities and amplified minorities. Maybe we're all getting sucked into the black hole of social media and its algorithms that feed us nothing but poison by design, with impunity. But being a real one now means you are on it 247 and you are aggressive in your attacks. You give no quarter to anything, no mercy, no forgiveness, no rationalizing, no collaborating, no compromising. Fight these motherfuckers, be against them, Shut the government down. Down. I think it is a risky, short sighted and hyper emotional strategy. In fact, I don't even think it is a strategy. I think it's a set of tactics that is woven together with things that will not hold tight, not under stress. And I'll tell you why. You are playing Trump's game. You think you're going to outplay him at it, and you might, and you do have the anger in the outside and the opposition, but that doesn't make you a real one for a majority of this country. But wait a minute. That's how he won. Look, he only won the popular vote after you guys absolutely imploded in the Biden situation, okay? And Biden still got a. Kamala Harris still got a shit ton of votes. The reason that they don't win the popular vote and the reason that the swing states are what they are is because people in positions of actual and real need, actual and real desperation, they don't want a real one. They want reality. They want real results. They want something they can trust, something they can believe in that's real for them. Not someone who talks shit on social media really well and gets a lot of clicks. So I get it that to a lot of you guys, I'm not a real one. Well, first of all, you're right. By any definition, I'm not. I'm not on your side. I'm not. I think you're foolish to have picked a side. I think you have been played by a bunch of opportunists who want your help in just getting power and keeping it, not necessarily doing anything with it for you. I think very few of you could come up with any real big achievements that either side has had that's really made a difference for the majority. Even immigration, right? That would be the most recent one. God forbid they do anything about the cost of healthcare, but immigration would be the most recent one. Has that really been a huge benefit to the majority? Well, yeah, if you agree. These lies about how much criminality comes from migrants in this country. But I don't believe that. I don't accept it because it's not true. So has it made my life better? I don't know. It's probably compressed the economy in certain ways. It's going to drive pricing, in my opinion. I think it's also reduced our sense of who we are and what we're about. And the new Colossus mattered to me. It mattered to my family. And M. Lazarus's poetical words mattered to me. And the metaphor of the Statue of Liberty mattered to me as someone whose family benefited from it greatly, as being people who technically came from a country as far as the president is concerned. Right. The Italy that my family left was broke. People were uneducated, they were unskilled, they were desperate, and they were not from Norway. Right. My people weren't even considered white when they first got here. They were Italians, they were ethnics. Now I'm white. What does that tell you about America? We're different than other places. Right? You come here once, you assimilate and you fit in, you become part of the majority. I guess if you look anything like white people. So I get it, I accept it, I take it. But I'm not a real one when it comes to being on the left, and I'm not a real one when it comes to being on the right, and I never will be, because I believe in right and wrong, not right and left. And you guys surrender right and wrong all the time out of advantage. And that's the truth. And I know you don't like it, and I know you're going to criticize me for it. And I know you're going to say, yeah, but Trump, or, yeah, but Biden, or, yeah, but Pelosi. And I say, yeah, but that, because there's right and there's wrong. And if you go issue by issue, everything becomes clear. It's just that you guys get stuck in advantage. Right? But I'll give you examples. You bring in drugs anywhere near America, you're asking for the worst. Now, should it be prosecution and not blowing you out of the sky or out of the water? Yeah, but politically, I think the winning side of that battle is I'm stopping the drugs. Now, do I believe that that's what it's about for Trump? On one level, I believe it's a distraction in the main, showing he can beat somebody up who's a socialist because he wants socialism to look as bad as possible, because he's afraid of it here and there's oil there, a lot of it, has some of the biggest natural resource deposits on the planet. I think that's part of it, too. So is he a real one? Sure, if you like those kinds of things. But I think that being a real one is somebody who sees right and wrong, not just right and left, and avoids fringe issues that are just about division and not about bringing people together or bringing anything to a better place. You don't want to live or die on the Hill of whether or not your daughter has to play against somebody who looks like me. You don't want to die on that Hill. It's not a real one, not for you not for most people, it's not real. And the rights that need to be preserved legally, mostly are now. Reproductive rights was a much more profound manifestation of identity than is being played with with trans. But you guys surrendered that by losing an election that you should have won. Now, being a real one, you can make it whatever you want. And in the moment, it's outrage and it's being rageful against the right and calling Trump a piece of shit for what he said about Rob Reiner. And I'm not saying you're wrong to view it that way. Of course you're not. But you really believe that that makes you better than him or stronger in any way, more of his supporters and gives you a better chance that anybody like him is going to vote for your people. Do you look in the comments to see how many people within MAGA hated what he said about Rob Reiner and said so? Imagine if instead of rewarding someone for saying you for saying that, Trump, you rewarded people reaching out to the MAGA people who rejected what he said and said, thank you for rejecting that. Thank you. We are the same. We know right and wrong, and this was wrong. Why wasn't that rewarded? Why isn't that a real one? It's not as satisfying, right, in terms of hostility and wanting to be right and wanting to put him down and wanting to beat him. So then that's what you want. But what if you want a better place? What if you want to build a real coalition? What if you want people who have common interests and concerns to be the coalition instead of people who are most conveniently divided? You see what I'm saying? I think what you're being convinced is a real one in this moment is. And that a real one is someone who plays to what reality is, which is that this is a place where there is a lot more shared than there is that divides us. And when we forget that, we forget it at our peril. So what is a real one? Who is a real one? And what is going to get you to where you want to be? You should think about these things, not just accept what somebody else is telling you about them, not just playing to the algorithm. That's what I think being a real one is all about. What do you think? Thank you for subscribing and following. I'm Chris Cuomo and fuck yeah, I believe I'm a real one. I'm a real one. I am. I'm an independent. I'm a real one. I'm a free agent. I'm a critical thinker. I am different than the pack. To me, that's being a real one. The one who has my own agency, my own mind, my own ideas that I develop through my own rigor, not just rinse and repeat. What about you? I'll see on News Nation 8p and midnight every weekday night. If you want to wear your independence and give a gift to somebody and say, hey, I respect you, or I don't respect you, I want you to be better than that. Be a free agent. Be a critical thinker. Try it out. And rewarding someone for being that. Put some money in the kitty. We'll crowdsource it and we'll make contributions we can all feel good about. Get your mug. Get all the great things that Rose picked out in the TikTok shop. Love it, use it. And thank you for making me part of your personal process.