Kristen Bell (9:50)

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Chris Cuomo (10:23)

But you're not going to change the system. So then what can you change to get us back to where the concerns of the many are the priority, not the fringe interests of the few, Especially when they're a complete distraction to what matters. That's a tough question. And I think it's largely cultural. And I actually think that if I were going to cast blame, I would do it on the powerful. But they're just playing the game, man. And the game rewards provocation and playing to these minority things because the media covers it. We've gotten lazy and easy. We don't want to have to cover the disconnect. We don't want to have to cover what the many want. We want to go with what's easy and what's tasty. And then you Guys will say, yeah, but that's not what the news is supposed to be. Yeah, but that's what you watch and consume, you know what I'm saying? So, like, you know the old line, like, you're pointing the finger at me and being like, you should just be giving us the straight news. Yeah. And what about these fingers that are pointing back at you? Because all you do is consume and get involved in these, you know, little extreme jihads that are taking place in our culture all the time. So how do you change it? Well, part of the responsibility is on these platforms to not have the algorithmic algorithms pick up just what's provocative and negative and destructive. Ooh, that's subjective. And how they're going to be making choices, and that's an infringement on speech. Well, isn't rewarding the provocative, the violent, the extreme? Isn't that subjective? Also? Isn't that making a choice? Isn't that preferencing a kind of speech? So they're already doing that. So the algorithm could be designed to enhance whatever it wants, Right? To reward whatever it wants. And you don't think that over time, if what they did was find a way algorithmically to reward people who are reasonable and looking for compromise, that. That got echoed more and more? You don't think we'd have more of it? I do. And I think those platforms should be taken a task about why they do it the other way. Why do they put their ads near the most salacious shit? Right? It's a choice, right? Well, because it's commerce. It's capitalism. Well, capitalism without any sense of responsibility is just greed. And you don't have to have it be that way. It can still be capitalism. And there'd be. Look, look at Chick Fil, A look at other conscientious commercial ventures where they have certain things that matter to them and they embrace that regardless of what it does for their cost structure or their P and L, their profit and loss. So part of it I put on them, but the rest of it is on us. And podcasts like this are a part of it. And there is a growing trend on social media of people correcting things, of being tone neutral, of not being just agitators all the time, of not just being provocative. You know, I saw this piece the other day about me, and the only reason it got picked up by this group called Mediaite, which, like, is a great demonstration of the problem because it's like all it reflects in its media coverage are things that are provocative and things that are outrageous. And it really makes the point. They might as well be tmz. But the only reason it got picked up was because I said the left needs to shut the fuck up about Epstein. Had I not said it that way, they would have never picked it up. They picked it up because I used the invective and because it was such a hostile notion. And that's all the piece was, was that idea, because the rest of it was very reasonable. The reason I was saying shut up about Epstein is because it doesn't matter to you guys. You guys had an opportunity to put things out. You never talked about it before, you're only talking about it now because it's bad for Trump. And that's not the way you should compete with the other side. You should compete with the other side by having better ideas, not just trafficking in shit and mud and salacious things and negativity all the time. That's what I meant. And I'm sure the majority of people agree with it. See, but the way it got picked up was just because of the provocative nature of it, because that's what gets clicks. So you have to change your own appetites as well as I have. I have unfollowed so many things. Sometimes I'm a little out of the loop. I'm actually relying more on my production team than I used to because I've stopped following so many people on Twitter that usually become part of the Zeitgeist. And I just won't follow them because they're full of shit and they're just purveyors of negativity. So I actually need to be put in the loop by my team sometimes about things that I'm covering. For instance, with the shooting that happened recently in New York City, I needed my producers to kind of clue me in as to how people were reacting to it, because I don't follow a lot of the pod bros and the hot takes and blaming CNN for making it anti white and blaming this one and blaming that, and that's what the NFL gets. And all these other hostile, aggressive, aggro agendas that I tune out, and I suggest you do also, because they're not relevant. They're not. They're not intelligent. They're just set up to be provocative. And that's all it is. You got to have a hot take, you got to take a side, you got to be against the other side, you got to be hostile to the other side, you got to attack the other side. And not always with good arguments. It can be specious, it can be hollow. It can be deceptive, it can be perverse, it can be twisted, as long as it's effective in that moment and then you move on to the next one. And I think that's as much a problem as anything else. And it has allowed the few to dominate the interest of the many. And that's why our government never works on majority concerns. You know, even immigration, which is the closest we've really come to it in, in recent time. I mean, that's not true. Obamacare was the most recent effort where an issue that affects the many was actually acted upon by government. And it was done at the behest of half the political system because they absolutely didn't want Obamacare. Now they want it now. They haven't been able to do any better. Right? They tried to kill it like 70 times and never had a better idea. Trump promised to you that he was going to get rid of Obamacare. He never even brought it up. Right. It's just proof of what I'm saying. He just said negative, hostile. Because that's what resonates. He never had any intention, intention of doing anything about it. Concepts of a plan he hasn't done about health care. Think about it. Why? Because what resonates is the hostility and the hot talk and the animus, the outrage, not doing anything. But what does the many want? The many wants action. The few just want words, just want to see someone owned, see something destroyed. And that's what has to be adjusted. And our system right now is set up to reward it. Because we are not a democracy. We are not a direct democracy. Support comes from Fume. If you're ready to break a bad habit, first step doesn't need to be hard or expensive. You just need the right tool. And look, smoking is tough. Vaping may be tougher. And that's why I like working with Fume. The episode is sponsored by FUM0, the brand new grab and go flavored air device. Okay, so why is it different? Well, first of all, it's affordable. It's 25 bucks. Okay? Sleek pre filled device. No commitment, no refills, no batteries. It's clean. Zero nicotine, Zero vapor. Just natural plant based flavored air. Okay. It's the first truly easy way to try the good habit. 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Commercial Narrator (18:44)

Mike and Alyssa are always trying to outdo each other. When Alyssa got a small water bottle, Mike showed up with a 4 liter jug. When Mike started gardening, Alyssa started beekeeping.

Chris Cuomo (18:55)

Oh, come on.

Commercial Narrator (18:56)

They called a truce for their holiday and used Expedia trip planner to collaborate on all the details of their trip. Once there, Mike still did more laps around the pool.

Chris Cuomo (19:06)

Whatever.

Commercial Narrator (19:07)

You were made to outdo your holidays. We were made to help organize the competition. Expedia made to travel.

Chris Cuomo (19:17)

Now, sometimes it winds up in the same place anyway. Right. The President won the majority of the popular vote. Very rare. Right? Last few cycles. Last time around, he did not win the popular vote, but he won the electoral College. This time he won both. Well, he still didn't really have a mandate. He barely won. Whatever. I mean, at some point, it's a mandate. He won in those swing states. But look, if you break it down, you're not wrong either if you say that. Why? Because within each state, you're going to have a population center that is way more populated. Right. Because it's a population center than the rest of the state. So Even though it's one or two or three counties out of 20 or 30, the rest of them lose because they don't have as many people in it. The system is based off population, not off land. Right. Every time you look at the map, it's like, wow, this country's all red. No, the land is red. The people are mostly blue. If you look at the population centers, right? So it gets dicey. But you have to know this. America is not a democracy. It is not a direct democracy. It is a constitutional republic which enables the few to dictate the outcomes of the many. Yes, the few are supposed to reflect the views of their constituents, but that happens less and less. And where do we see that? We see that in the reality that Congress has like a 1% approval rating and a 95% retention rate within its incumbency. How? Because you just play to the few. You play to who would primary you. Because the general election is a fait accompli. As they say in French, the general is a done deal. Why? Because of gerrymandering and Redistricting. Most of them are locked in red or blue. So only thing you got to worry about is getting primaried. And who do you got to worry about in a primary? A more extreme mofo than you. So you play to those crazies, you play to the fringe. That's what's happening in our politics because it is not a direct democracy. So you have to know that and you have to think about it and you have to think about the limitations of it and what it means for us, for how we get back to a country that is focused on the macro needs of the many. The hard stuff. We ignore all the hard stuff. Why are so many of our kids just like to have too much and the have not enough, which I think is better than have and have not. It's not have and have not. It's have too much and have not enough. That's really what we're looking at. Well, who's to say too much? What's too much? I'll say it, okay, when you, when you have people who are two paychecks from being on the street and other people have more money than they could ever know, well, you, when you don't know your net worth, you got too much money. How about that as a line and how about if we put a line. And you know what, they've examined this in social science. The utility effect of increasing income. The difference between 50 grand and 70 grand is huge. Okay, the difference between 70 grand and 150 grand is huge. Difference between 75 and 150. The difference between 10 million and 20 million is not huge. It is not a different lifestyle. The difference between 3 million and 6 million is not the difference between 500,000 and a million. Between a hundred and 200,000. That's huge. So what does that tell you? That there is a too much. There is a line that we could agree on that over that line, you should get the tax stat of you. Why? Because there's no increase in the utility of benefit. That's why. That doesn't feel good. For who? I'll tell you for who. And this is the fucked up part. For people who aren't in that bracket, you have people like me who will be like, well, what's the line? Hopefully I'm under it. But if I'm over that line, all right, well, if everybody's going to be taxed that way, then I'm all right with it. There are a ton of people who make a ton of, you know, in the 1%, which I'm in I'm on the really low end of the 1%, but I'm still in 1%. But the people who don't want that to change are the people who aspirationally want to be in the 1% someday. So they don't want you to fuck with the benefits of that because they're trying to get there, even though doing it now will help you. That's how you get to a populist movement on the left that's calling for socialism. That's how you get a populist movement on the right that is calling to destroy corporations. How do you think these two places wound up in the same place? Bring back the golden age. Bring back all the manufacturing that is anti corporate evolution. Why? Well, what made the jobs leave here? Bringing China into the WTO under the Clinton administration with the help of the Republicans. Yeah, but what else? Innovation is accountable, responsible for about 80% of the manufacturing jobs we've lost. Oh, and by the way, remember what the number one manufacturing economy in the world is? Right? China. Do you know what's right behind it? What were you going to say? India? What were you going to say? Vietnam? Were you going to say Japan? America. The idea that we don't produce anything here anymore is nonsense. It's that the number of people who are needed to produce things in places where they can afford the innovative nature of manufacturing is just much smaller. So it's only in the places like Southeast Asia where they don't pay the money to innovate because they have cheap human capital that they still do it that way. So the reason you have these offsetting populist movements right now, which again is another manifestation of what I'm telling you about us not being a direct democracy, which is that pockets, populist pockets of angry, pissed off people who are not wrong to be pissed off, but they dominate the dialogue, whereas the many are not represented in that. So you say tariffs because it really helps people who want to punish companies in other countries. But what has it meant to the overall macro economy? We don't know yet, but there is a lot of indication that it's not going to be that good. But we're not really focused on that. We're focused on the few, not the many, because we are a constitutional republic where the few can nominate the many. We are not a direct democracy, and it makes all the difference. And that's something that you got to think about because we have to get back to the concerns of the many being more important than the fringe fancies of the few.

Commercial Narrator (26:29)

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Chris Cuomo (27:08)

What do you think now? I don't care what you think about the starting premise because you can disagree, but you're wrong. America is not a direct democracy. It is a form of democracy that is called the Constitutional Republic. But we are not about where the majority always wins. That is not how the system is set up and as a result the majority has been losing more and more and more. And you got to think about why. Thank you for subscribing and following. Thank you for checking me out on News Nation 8p and 11p Eastern every weekday night. Thank you for subscribing to the substack and for paying so that I can help people get long Covid and I can take those who pay and get your questions and your comments and give them the people in my live conversations I have with different influential people every week on Substack. All right my friends, the problems are real if you want to show people that you are an independent critical thinker brought by the free agent gear and where you're independent minutes. And remember, we know the problems. We have to stay together and let's get after it.