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Oh, for the best, expect the worst
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Some drinks champagne Some die at first no way of knowing which way it's going Hope for the best, expect the
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worst, hope for the best. Welcome to the Commentary magazine daily podcast. Today is Friday, August 7th, 2026. I'm John Pod Hortz, the editor of Commentary magazine. With me, as always, executive editor Abe Greenwald. Hi, Abe.
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C
Hi, Jon.
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Senior editor Seth Mandel. Hi, Seth.
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D
Hi, John.
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And joining us today, host of the Breaking History podcast, columnist at the Free Press, contributing editor to Commentary magazine, Eli Lake. Hi, Eli.
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B
Hi, John.
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Wheels are coming off buses, but for both parties, in my view. One is that we got job numbers today, and it turns out that we are in a period of job loss. We have lost preliminary reports, or 83,000 jobs in the month of July and May and June have been also revised downward into negative territory. So for the past three months, the United States is not creating jobs, it's losing jobs. And this is just as Republicans have to go and try to get people to vote for them in November. And they, of course, are in control of the House, the Senate and the presidency. So that is pretty bad for them. We have Donald Trump, with every hour, starting to become an almost comic figure in the way he talks about what is going on with Iran. The Strait of Hormuz is sort of open and the Iranians just can't take anymore. So they're going to make peace with us, the deals. Things are going really great. The negotiations are solid. It's just absolutely wonderful. And the Democratic Party has decided to take the very, I think, risky step of going all in on Abdul El Sayed, the senatorial candidate from Michigan, who is, I think now unquestionably the highest ranking or the most anti Semitic person ever to run for higher office or a national higher office in the United States statewide higher office, governor, senator, presidency. No one like him ever before. And he is the candidate of a major party. And what does the major party do with the exception of one, so far, from what we can tell, one member of Congress from Michigan, everybody is lining up behind them. Eli, you called me last night, or we talked last night in a bit of a state, because you, as a much peppier and more optimistic and less cynical person than I, still seem to hold out some kernel, tiny kernel of hope that the Senate majority leader, minority leader, excuse me, who describes himself as the most important elected Jew or the highest ranking Jewish, but the highest ranking elected Jew in United States history, Chuck Schumer, is now putting the full faith and credit of his Party, his position and his standing to see to the election of Abdul El Sayed. I believe you said to me, just to set you up, you said to me, look, he's 79 years old. Chances are he doesn't even run for office again in 2028 because the DSA is going to come for him one way or the other. Doesn't that give him a free shot? Couldn't he just say, I'm sorry, but this is a bridge too far? I want Democrats to win the Senate, but I, in all, you know, as a person of faith and a leading figure among Americans of my faith, I cannot stand with this man. He should not be in the Senate. You said, shouldn't he be that person? I'm like, I gave up on him 25 years ago. But I think you still. I'm touched that you still have the capacity to be shocked and disappointed in Chuck's.
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I mean, it's not.
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I appreciate it's not even shocked. I think it's the smart thing from his own legacy, self interest and well
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being, which is that to oppose El Sayed.
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Let me explain why.
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If he had opposed El Sayed, that's
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not like the rest of his party and his party's leaders. He is the cheapest of cheap dates. Because we should point out that there wasn't a deal where. All right, here's what we're gonna do. You're the nominee, we're gonna get behind you. We wanna win. But you need to give a speech where you say, hasan Piker is not us. I denounce him and go through it. Here's, by the way, a little roadmap. It's the 2008 speech that Barack Obama gave about Jeremiah Wright. And if you do that, then we'll be able to do it. There was no bargain. Abdul Said was asked about this and he's doing a gazillion interviews and he's just like, hey, you know, I'm a candidate. He's a streamer where I'm focused on the voters and just dodges it. So there is no, like, as far as we can say, why did you campaign with this guy who thinks Mao Zedong is terrific? Okay, so there was no deal. It was just, we're all gonna get behind you. The second point here is that Schumer does it, endorses him. National party puts out a new ad for him. That same day, Said gives an interview. He says, I'm gonna support Chris Van Hollen for majority leader when I'm elected. So, I mean, you've got a kick me sign on your back. At this point, the people who you're appeasing will hate you whatever you do. In fact, they don't care that you're lining up behind him. You get zero credit for that. The Jews that helped elect you, that gave you money, that supported you for years, that the pro Israel community, larger than just Jews, the people who care about Israel and the US Israel relationship with even just a slight gesture of this is too far, I can't go there. Will praise you that that will be seen as an act of political courage. And you will have at least granted. I understand that's not your Democratic Party anymore. I get it. You're not gonna be popular in the Democratic Party. Guess what, Chuck Schumer, they hate you in the Democratic Party already. The Democratic Party is already a lost cause for you. And the values you alleged you say you believe. So why not remain true to your conscience? And by the way, there will be people that will lift you up and that will see what you've done as an act of real courage. And maybe you won't win this cycle, but maybe you will plant the seed for what needs to happen for the Democratic Party to save its soul. And you will be remembered as somebody who has courage. As opposed to Nancy Pelosi, who took AIPAC money for decades and was happy to do it. And as soon as the winds shift and she's all same age, this is her last term, just as a congresswoman, no pressure whatsoever. She voted for the Massey Amendment in June, which was the amendment to cut off all arms sales to Israel. She was the one who voted with the jackals. So the end of her career, she's lying down. And I mean, I don't think there's any excuse for it given her track record, but at least maybe she could say her constituency in her last term is San Francisco. That's what they think. Chuck, you were elected by pro Israel Democrats. You campaigned as a pro Israel Democrat. So for you in this moment to just kind of go along to get along and get nothing out of it, and they will hate you anyway and your career's over anyway. Then why not do something bold at this point? Because it is just one Senate seat. But maybe by taking this stand, you will be protecting the Democratic Party from what I hope will be political oblivion because they've embraced anti Americanism and socialism. But maybe with just this one small step, you can actually say at the end of your political career, you did something of real merit. So that's my pitch.
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Can't you say?
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C
I don't think that's particularly bold or. Or counts for much by way of merit. I mean, were Hasan Piker not to exist at all or have nothing to do with El Sayed, El Sayed would still be an unprecedented nightmare for the country. And I think Schumer knows this, that the problem is so much bigger than getting one candidate, one nominee to denounce one streamer. To me, it's so superficial and insignificant, to be honest, that Schumer has aligned with his values to the extent that he doesn't care enough to do anything. I mean, this is where he is.
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I mean, you use the word conscience, Eli, and I just don't know that he has a conscience. There's no intention to me that he has a conscience, number one. Number two, as I said to you last night, what this demonstrates is that he is not a proponent of the Jewish faith. He is not a person for whom Judaism is central to his life. He is a person who worships the Democratic Party, and his interest is in the furtherance of the Democratic Party's power. And that is what he has committed his life to. And that means that Democrats have to win the Senate race in Michigan and, and therefore hold that seat so that they can go at other seats and try to get a majority. And if he, as the minority leader is in place when the Senate turns from a minority to a majority for the Democrats, that will be a crowning triumph for him. And that is what he cares about most of all. I just want to make a point about the Obama Jeremiah Wright speech because you want to talk about a cheap date. Democrats were a cheap date in relation to the Jeremiah Wright speech. Remember, Obama did not disown Jeremiah Wright in the Jeremiah Wright speech. In fact, he literally said, I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother, a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in the world. Remember that Jeremiah Wright was one of the chickens come home to roost on people.
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He also said, the chickens coming home to roost. And he also said, goddamn Americ. And he made it very clear that there was a difference between being critical of America's history and then only focusing on negative Americans. And I think the line that he used was, and failing to see all that makes us great in order to say that everything we do is wrong or something like that. Now, I agree with you that it was, you know, he had some outs in there. He's like, I can't fully disown. But the speech itself and the substance of the speech was to make a clear line. This guy whose church I attended for years in Chicago, who married me and Michelle and who baptized my kids does not represent an ideology that I believe in. I believe that America is a good country. And that is a huge difference. Because Hassan Piker hates America. He fundamentally. He hates the Jews, he hates Israel, he hates America. He thinks that the people who want to kill Americans are the good guys. And that is not a crazy ideology. From the perspective of, like, the broader American left, that's what the academic left largely thinks, but it's not what the Democrats think. And there had been a line. And that's why that speech that Obama gave 18 years ago was important, because he was saying, no, we're Democrats. We don't buy this stuff. And that's. I'm just saying that that's drawing lines. And back to your point about. He only cares about the Democratic Party. What Democratic Party, John? A party is a collection of politicians, but it's also a collection of ideals and policies and things that you fight for, things that you believe are right. And the party that the Democrats were big government, but still free market, more or less, and that they believed in a strong and a strong US Israel relationship. And what defined the Democratic Party before is not a Democratic Party that is beholden to socialists. They're different kettle of fish. So, I mean, I just throw it back at you. It's like, yeah, that's the part, you
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know, well, don't throw it back at me. I'm not describing. I'm not describing myself. This is a description of Schumer. Schumer's life has been in the furtherance of the Democratic Party. And when it was convenient for him to do so, he played the Zionist Jew card. When he was going to raise money with Jews, when he was going to speak in front of the uja, when he stood in rubber chicken ballrooms and said, my name is Schumer. Schumer is a version of Shomer. The word Shomer means guardian, and the Shomrim were the guardians at the gates of Jerusalem. And that is the most important role that I have. He would tell Jewish audiences that was his fundraising pitch for himself and for his party and everything else. And here he is in 2026. He just endorsed the single most anti Semitic candidate for major office in American history. So all of that, he's the guard
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of the gates of Jerusalem who allowed the Romans in to sack it.
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Did he change? I don't think so, because I think he is A. As E.M. forster said of Dickens characters, he is a flat character. That is to say, he does not have depth. He is what he is on the surface. What he is on the surface is a hunger, an appetite. His appetite is for public attention, and his hunger is for power. And his goal is the furtherance of the vehicle that provided him with attention and provides him with power. And that is the Democratic Party. And he will judge it a triumph if El Sayed wins and if the Democrats take the Senate. And that is way more important to him than the empowerment of, and the legitimization of radical anti Semitism in the person of Abdul Al Said. That's.
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That's.
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Yeah, go ahead, Seth. Sorry.
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D
No, I think. I mean, first of all, I like Eli's idea a lot, but I also like it because whatever Schumer feels his responsibility is and his obligation is, I think the Jewish community has the obligation here. We have to say things of the sort that Eli said last night and is saying this morning. We. We have to say, you need to show a conscience, even if we don't believe he has a conscience, because we have to somehow counteract the damage that people like Chuck Schumer are doing to us. That. The idea that. That we don't. That none of this really matters to us, that when we talk about antisemitism, it's just a partisan thing and we don't really care, and we can be bought off and we can be, you know, we could be lured with power and all that stuff. He is embodying too many of the. Of the sort of characteristics that we need to avoid and we need to disown. And I think it's important just to say that. And whatever he does, we should say, you know, Chuck Schumer's an embarrassment, and he should do this, he should do that. And watch him not listen to us, you know, fine. But it's like I was telling somebody over the weekend, I had a rabbi when I was younger who knew, understood that people didn't always do. Wouldn't always take his advice. When they asked him a halacha question, they asked him. So he would say he had an answer for you. He would. If the answer was no, this rabbi would say, don't ask me. So you'd call him up and say, oh, you know, we got this, but I know it's this. And he'd say, don't ask me, Schumer may not. Schumer's not going to take our advice. But we still need to make it clear that the Jewish community has, you know, standards. And those standards in this case would hold us to that. And whatever he does or doesn't do from there. And also I think that he, you know, because Schumer was the one who gave speeches saying Hashem put me in this position. That also I think that you, when you invoke that sort of thing, you really do have to, you really do need the backlash. And I think the community really needs to, you know, say so. I think these things need to be said. Even if there's 0% chance that Schumer will listen or do it. I think we need to say. And lastly, we also need to say whatever benefit you may or may not get from it, maybe let's say we don't believe that it'll save the Democratic Party, that you won't plant the seeds for the Democratic Party to have some resistance against, you know, this, this infection for your own soul, for your own ability to sleep at night. You should, you know, you, Chuck Schumer should do this. And in doing so, you deserve nothing. You should get nothing out. You deserve no benefit. You deserve to see no benefit from this, no political advantage whatsoever. You should just do it because for crying out loud, once in your life your 75 year old man who talks about Hashem, you should do something. Right?
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Or maybe we're the chief dates. Maybe the Jews, the Jewish Democrats of New York that believe they had a shomer this whole time. Maybe we've been the cheap dates because John is right. It's not the first time Chuck Schumer is disappointed. Now we should say he did vote against his own party on the Obama nuclear deal, but he did so after the rules had been rigged in such a way that they only needed, they would have had to have gotten in 67. They inverted the treaty clause.
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67 votes.
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They inverted it so that they only needed 34 votes to have it kind of go through.
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He had a free vote to vote against the jcpoa and he didn't whip for it.
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He didn't put any pressure. He didn't whip for it. Exactly right. So, okay, but I'm just saying that maybe what it shows is that the people who care so much about Israel and for a long time, as we all know, the Jews in our community who cared a lot about Israel, most of them were Democrats and they gave money to Democrats and they did it to keep the Democrats. But maybe what it shows is in fact that they've been, you know, the Jewish Democrats have been deluding themselves.
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They work with ethical factories and cut out the middleman. So you're paying for high quality, not brand markup. Everyday staples that work harder like their ultra soft organic cotton tees and premium Mongolian cashmere sweaters which I've been telling you about for years. And it's not just clothing. Quince has become my go to for everything from hotel quality bedding and bath essentials to premium cookware and travel must haves. I also just got a new Quince wallet just to give you a sense of how this goes. Upgrade your everyday Download the Quints app for app exclusive offers or go to quints.com commentary get free shipping on your order and 365 day returns now available in Canada and the UK too. That's Q Y N C E.com commentary. Can we move this away from, from Israel for a minute? Because the issue here with Abdul El Sayed goes way beyond, but it goes way beyond Israel in terms of his trafficking in anti Jewish stereotypes and anti Semitic hatred that I'm perfectly willing to equalize with anti Zionism. But if you're not, if you don't like that argument, you've got a hundred different reasons and 100 different things that he has said in the last 10 years to say that Abdul El Sayed is an enemy of the Jewish people. And that's. And so if you don't, you like Chuck Schumer. And this is the challenge to the Jewish community, as was the case with Zoran Mamdani, if you privilege the Democratic Party and your vote as a Democrat over this question of whether or not Jews themselves have to take measure and account of their own responsibility to protect themselves against the barbarians who are now increasingly looking like they're going to storm the gates. And if they decide that because they don't like guns and they're supportive of trans and they hate anti abortionism and this and that and the other, all of those things, all of those temporal policy things that they disagree with Republicans on, that all of that justifies either a vote for El Sayed, implicit support for El Sayed, or a forbearing of criticism of the Democratic Party for its embrace of El Sayed, that they are betraying their birthright, they're betraying their history, their legacy, and they're betraying their children and their grandchildren. Because things in this country are only going to get worse and worse for Jews if this tide that is pulling in El Sayed and Adam Hammawi and Dariel, Eliza Chevalier and others, Menat Kiros, if this tide is not reversed, and that's just the fact of it. And so the Jewish voter in the United States is facing an increasingly uncomfortable choice. And this goes even to very secular Jews. That's what I'm saying. Even to very secular Jews, congratulations, you're a secular Jew. But even if you're a secular Jew, maybe you want your kid to have a bar mitzvah or in a blue moon you'll go to a high holy day service. So good. So let your synagogue be blown up, Let the synagogue and your neighborhood be blown up. Or make it clear that your kids probably can't Go to somebody else's bar mitzvah because it's not safe for them to do so. There is no this is now, no longer. I mean, Jews have. There's been all sorts of evidence of the dangerous move of the Democratic Party toward anti Semitism, particularly since 2012. And Jews have largely decided to forbear and continue voting the way that they have voted for, you know, forever. And I just. I just don't. This is a moment for Seth's saying the Jewish community needs to stand up. But Jews like us, or Jews of faith, or Jews for whom, you know, Judaism is sort of central to their lives, that this is not a question. The question now goes to the people whose connection to Judaism is weaker or their connection to their peoplehood is weaker than ours. They are threatened. It's time for them to understand that they are threatened. This is no joke. This isn't. And Jews did know when they were threatened. In the past, Jews did not vote for Zoran Mamdani. Last year, 75% of Jews voted for another candidate in the race here in New York City. I assume that that number will be comparable or higher in Michigan with El Sayed and with a much smaller population that does not really have the ability to alter the results of the election unless it's unbelievably close. And 20,000 Jewish votes going one way as opposed to the other way could make the difference. But it's a time of testing. And I wish this weren't the case because I have no confidence that the Jews of the United States are going to pass this test.
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B
Does anybody? No, they're not going to pass this test, John, because we've already seen.
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A
And I'm not talking about voting for Republicans. I mean, stay home.
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B
I know, I know. What you're saying is you can't vote
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A
for El Sayed and you can't vote for.
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B
You want to. Really uncomfortable fact.
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A
Hold on.
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B
Yeah, you want a really uncomfortable fact. Yeah. The top advisors right now in Gracie Mansion to Zahran Mamdani are Jewish Americans. If you look at the people who recruited Graham Flatner, this Morris Katz and the Fight Agency, and Rebecca Katz, who I grew up with in Philadelphia, they grew up as Jews. And I'm saying that if you're worried about what will become of the Jewish American identity, which is worth worrying about, I think we have to acknowledge that something has happened over the generations and that maybe it's the old Voltaire phrase about wooden clogs going up the stairs and silk slippers going down, but whatever it is the Jewish community has become so prosperous and so comfortable and so successful that we have, in some ways have forgotten that the sort of whatever it is that kind of gives us that identity, and it's hard to kind of keep that. That's why I agree with Bret Stephens in his brilliant piece that was a cover for Commentary a few months back, that maybe the thing to invest in is Jewish education and not Holocaust education and fighting antisemitism and so forth and trying to kind of be in the process. And as for a political strategy, I'm always gonna be optimistic about America. And I just think that we have to make people understand that again. I mean, this is cliche at this point. The stuff about singling out the right of Jews to organize themselves and participate through giving money through organizations like aipac, which was the only thing Sayyid wanted to talk about in the primary because they were spending a lot of money against him. But that is obviously a direct. But, you know, we gotta appeal to Americans. We gotta appeal to saying, listen, this guy wants to fundamentally change what makes our country great. That he is, you know, he represents a movement of people who really despise our country. And while I think said is the nicer version of it, doesn't say the stuff out loud the way a Hasan Piker or a Chevalier or people like that do. They are all kind of part of that same movement. And the way to do that is to appeal to our neighbors, not as Jews, but as Americans.
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A
I'm interested in this existential challenge because we are almost three years past October 7th, and the Jews of the United States rose to the challenge after October 7, and then seem to be. The question is, are they settling back into a homeostatic place that they've been for the last 50 years, that they are just a sort of, you know, constituency of the liberal constituency in the United States and therefore a reliable fundraiser and ally and member of the Democratic Party. Or were they changed to the degree
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E
that
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A
they might at least feel politically homeless? Let me just put it that way. I do not expect this to make Jews transform into Republicans who now support, you know, charter schools and, you know, want data centers built and support fracking and believe in deregulation. If that's not who they are, that's not who they are. But Jews have no home in the Democratic Party any longer. Democratic Party. One of the 33 people who is running Senate, Huh?
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B
There's a difference. Jews who will denounce Israel. Jews who will sign up for the faninist, anti colonialism, garbage are welcome. And they make the anti Semites and the anti American haters feel good. Because, hey, I've got all these Jews around me. I'm not answering.
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C
Yeah, they have an important role in the Democratic Party.
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B
They do. In some ways. They're the beard for these guys. But the. Yeah, no, Jews who want to be accepted as Jews who have a connection to the state of Israel, they're not welcome. They don't have a home.
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A
I'm not sure this is a Jewish.
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D
And also just like allowed Jews in sort of with any connection, honestly, to Judaism. I mean, let me give you an example. There's a. You know, right before the primary, there was this piece. There was this op ed in the foreword by someone named Alana Alpert, who is apparently a rabbi in Detroit. And so it was just, you know, it was a progressive rabbi backing El Sayed. And in the, in the piece, it's probably the, the most revolting thing written by a member of Jewish clergy in the past hundred years. But it is. This is how they think. Okay? When I cast my ballot on Tuesday and when I cast it again in November, I do so with the wisdom of Pirke Avote. That's the Ethics of the fathers 118 in mind. On three things does the world stand on justice, on truth and on peace. And then she goes on to talk about how justice, truth, peace, how El Sayed is the candidate for justice and truth and peace. And you know, when she goes to justice, she calls it judgment. Who will fight for fairness, who is beholden to corporate interests, and who will stand for economic equality? There is a. I don't even want to read more of it, but it's an entire article about how you can manipulate ethics of the fathers to vote for an outright anti Semite because you don't want somebody who's beholden to corporate interests. Right? That's what the Mishnah is talking about. Clearly, the pillars of Jewish law and the organization of Jewish life has always been about who will stand up to corporate interests. Right? I mean, Moses famously about standing up to corporate interests. Abraham was chosen because he stood up to corporate interests. And that's the longest Jewish tradition of all is who will stand up to corporate interests, who will protest ice, who will protest ICE as our forefathers protested ICE in our communities. I mean, this is he. People like Abdul Syed and Zoran Mamdani are actually surrounded by people who hold their rabbi card right in their wallet and say the real Jewish tradition is about standing up to corporate interests. And aipac and he doesn't. You know, El Sayed is probably smart enough to know that he should have nothing but contempt for these people. And I think Zoran Mamdani and others do too. I think the, the, you know, the. What's it a lot of Alperts of the world, I don't know if they realize, but I think that the people they're around have nothing but pure contempt for them because they're willing to sell, you know, their, their, their birthright for a, you know, a pottest dew. But, but I think that, you know, this, you can use this, this is such a great tool for the El Sayeds of the world to use. He can go around if he wants quoting Ethics of the Fathers and you know, and, and he, and he's emboldened to do so by this. You know, the other day he, he went to a rally. He does, he actually did this commonly. And we'll say, you know, I, I the one who separates Jews from Zionism and Jews. I don't think all Jews this, I don't think all Jews that. I love the Jewish people, just not 92% of them, you know, but I love the Jewish people. Just not nine out of every ten Jews who, you know, who believes that Jews have a right to self determination, at least this stuff, they give him a theological component of the Democratic National Committee's platform. And that to me is what, you know, going back to Schumer, that's the kind of thing that Schumer has to avoid. But also I think that these guys understand that they can put Jewish clergy and Jewish and these, you know, the ultimate, as a Jews front and center. And it is a, and it's an argument. It's not just some Jews vote for me. Look, the Jewish theologist says you have to vote for me.
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A
Seth. So that's a cover. Is that a cover for Jews or is that a cover for him to make himself look inoffensive to non Jews in Michigan whom he wants to vote for him who might otherwise have troubling feelings about how he conducts himself and talks about these matters. Okay, so Alana Alpert. I don't know that Alana Alpert. How many divisions Alana Alpert has. But I do know that being able to say, look, everybody says that I'm an anti Semite, but I do have some of my best supporters are Jewish is a useful rhetorical strategy. But people in Michigan who come to know if they don't know yet that he did not have words to speak when Somebody drove his car into a Jewish preschool with the intent of creating a mass casualty event. Or someone was murdered in Bloomfield Hills.
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B
No, no. He had words to speak because we should be very. He did something very deceptive, which is he started off by saying, it's a terrible thing. He used the phrase, my Jewish brothers and sisters. I understand this pain, but, you know, in Lebanon, there was this bombing and he didn't mention that the guy was Hezbollah, you know what I'm saying? And that hurt people. Hurt people. So what he was doing was he wanted to get credit.
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A
Okay?
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B
That's what any politician would say about a horrible terrorist attack.
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A
Okay.
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B
While then negating.
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A
I don't want to parse his, like,
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B
okay, but it's different than, like, not finding it.
- [39:59]
A
I bring it up only when I say I don't want to parse his words. I mean, that he said. What was notable about what he said, wasn't that he said, my Jewish brothers and sisters. It was notable that he said, hurt people. Hurt people. And that is what people heard. And that is. So it's one thing if you don't care that much. And so you just wanna make sure. Are you ticking a box where you say, oh, I hear he's an anti Semite, and I don't like that kind of thing. Like we're, you know, that's kind of gross. But no, but there's this rabbi says he's fine. So I guess. I guess he's fine. This is a different question that I think we're raising here about American political leadership and the American Jewish community, whom, again, I expect to turn out in great numbers against him in November or at least not to vote for him. And yes, enormous amounts of money are going to be raised in the next two months from Jews all across the country who see this as an existential threat to our people. And will he attempt to use that as a weapon the way he did in the primary? Look, they're coming after me and they're trying to silence me. And this money is being spent for me that's out of state and all of that. Sure. Can that money be used in a way that will help lead to his defeat? Yeah, if it's spent right and it's done well. And they.
- [41:33]
B
Are you sure about that?
- [41:36]
A
Statewide?
- [41:37]
B
Well, I mean, listen, there's an argument, and I'm not sure where I stand on it because it was much closer than everybody thought in terms of the polls, but there's an argument that the role that money plays because you needed money to buy ads on television. And in an era when you can get your message out virally through social media, you don't need that money. And we have plenty of examples of campaigns that were relatively spent far less money, such as Trump 2016 or Bernie Sanders primary that did very well without that kind of money. So I'm not, I mean we might be, I'm not sure that the traditional way that you fight back with political donations works unless that spending goes into something a different kind of thing.
- [42:26]
A
A million and a half votes were cast in the Democratic primary in Michigan in 2018. In 2018, the number of votes cast statewide in the midterm election in 2018 in a Senate race in Michigan was 4.1 or 4.2 million. So El Sayed made the sale with 750,000 Democrats. That's 15% of the overall vote in the state of Michigan. And he's a highly controversial candidate. So he's got to close the sale with the Haley Stevens voters because they're, you know, these are the engaged voters who vote in the primary who voted against him. And one will assume that most of them will come home and vote Democratic, but not all of them. And then there is this question of who else is in the state and what message they are going to hear. And they are low information voters and they may not be paying very much attention. And if you just. By the way, that money doesn't need to be used on ads on television, it can be used on brilliant social media campaigns. I don't know. But the, the idea part of this idea that money doesn't help anymore is based I think on two fallacies. One, Haley Stevens outraised him nine to one. And then she ran a campaign in which she did not take him on. She didn't take him on. She didn't say don't vote for this anti Semite. She didn't say he's evil. She didn't say he's an apologist for Hamas. She didn't say any of that.
- [44:22]
B
The very end she started to.
- [44:26]
A
Barely, I mean, you know, barely.
- [44:28]
B
No, no, I understand. But she did it in the soft,
- [44:31]
A
raised a lot of money and did nothing with it, right? To secure her victory. She did nothing to take an ax to his reputation the way he took an ax to hers. He said, she's a puppet, she's a puppet, she's a puppet, she's a puppet, she's a puppet. And she's like, three Arabs might vote against me. So I better be really quiet and speak in my exaggerated Michigan accent. So that I seem like I'm one of you. So this is a whole different ball game. The electorate is vastly larger than the primary electorate was and he is a target rich opportunity. And the targets were not aimed at. Today's executives are more threatened, more exposed, and more vulnerable than ever before. Corporations spend billions on workplace security. But what happens when a threat finds your executives outside the office? Here's why that matters. 70% of attacks on executives happen at home or away from the office, and Ironwall understands a terrifying reality. If someone has a grievance against your company, the first place they turn to is Google. It takes about five minutes to find one of your executive's home addresses online. And if their personal information is sitting on the open web, they're far too easy to find. You're leaving them unprotected. The team at Ironwall knows this better than anyone. They protected some of the most targeted executives and individuals on the planet for almost two decades. As a white glove enterprise enterprise security service. They protect your people with continuous personal data removal, proactive prevention tools and emergency support. So when someone goes looking for your executives, Ironwall ensures they hit a dead end. So here's what to do. Go to ironwall.com commentary, fill in the quick form and request your free risk assessment. Their team will show you just how exposed your executives are and how to lock it down before a threat reaches their front door. That's ironwall.com/complyment. Stop online threats before they become real world attacks. The links in the show notes August is the perfect time to hit reset before the autumn rush begins. And honestly, I can't think of a better place to start than my closet. That's why I love shopping at Quints. If you're still hanging on to the same worn out basics, Quints makes it easy to upgrade. For example, I just bought a bunch of linen shorts because frankly I've been losing a little weight and I need some shorts that fit. And these are fantastic, comfortable, breathe and very, very good looking. Everything at Quint's is priced 50 to 80% less than similar brands. They work with ethical factories and cut out the middleman. So you're paying for high quality, not brand markup. Everyday staples that work harder like their ultra soft organic cotton tees and premium Mongolian cashmere sweaters which I've been telling you about for years. And it's not just clothing. Quince has become my go to for everything from hotel quality bedding and bath essentials to premium cookware and travel must haves. I also just got a New Quince Wallet. Just to give you a sense of how this goes, upgrade your everyday. Download the Quince app for app exclusive offers or go to quince.com commentary get free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada and the UK too. That's Q U I-n c e.com commentary. Let's move on to targets. Let's move off this and move on to targets. So Donald Trump says the straight is almost as kind of open. Abe. The straight is kind of open. Are you going to go sail through the straight
- [48:24]
C
first? I'd have to stop at the bank
- [48:27]
A
because, well, we don't know what the toll is.
- [48:31]
C
Oman on my way in and Iran on the way out. Or I think maybe I have it backwards. Yeah, yeah. You know what I'm actually wondering now is, is this finally the bad deal that he takes?
- [48:46]
A
You know, I mean, the question is whether, whether the Iranians will allow him to take this bad deal because they're going to, they're going to reject it because they think that they can get twice as much. Could be. Once he's gone down this path to saying, you know, I basically, I want this war to end next Tuesday, what won't he agree to? He's dropped sanctions. He's talking nice standing there while Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan are signing a mutual defense treaty, which is the single most important geopolitical moment to follow in the wake of this war. Because they're all looking at the balance of forces in the war and saying we better go into alliance with each other because the United States has screwed the pooch here and we don't really have a future allied with them. And nobody believes anymore that he's gonna. Nobody believes anymore that he's gonna take a big blood.
- [50:02]
B
I'll believe that when I see it. Saudi Arabia has a military supplied entirely by the US with tech from Israel. The idea that you could just turn around and say, all right, I'm with Turkey and Pakistan now, that's not how the world works. And the Saudis are also engaged in a kind of new, whatever you want to call it, counterinsurgency campaigning in Yemen, which are Iranian proxies. And I know if it lands on this particular spot, then that's bad and then they make good on it. But I'm not. That's a tall order for the Saudis. The entire Saudi military as it exists, not just the military. I mean, the Saudi is very much embedded in American system.
- [50:50]
A
They didn't have to do it and they didn't have to do it right now, and it doesn't mean nothing. I'm not saying it means everything, but it doesn't mean nothing. And it is not something that is in the US Interest for there to be a sideline.
- [51:04]
E
No, it's not.
- [51:04]
B
I agree with you. It's not in the US Interest, but I'm just.
- [51:06]
A
Okay. So they did it. They did it as a message, and the message is, okay, you know what? We are up for grabs. We're up for. Our future is not assured in this Western framework. With implicit friendliness toward Israel, since, of course, Turkey is not Israel's foremost enemy outside of Iran, but certainly one of them. And so I take this as a very. Particularly if he's calling things off because the Saudis ask him to, and he's this and he's that, and then the Saudis are basically, you know, treating him with grave. With great disrespect by making this side deal. And what is he gonna do about that? What's the matter?
- [52:01]
B
Nothing.
- [52:02]
A
He lost his pugilism. He lost his, you know, don't. You know, I'm the most important person in the world and you better kowtow to me.
- [52:08]
B
I really feel like he's.
- [52:09]
A
As long as somebody wears a burnous, that's okay for them to punch him.
- [52:13]
D
He loves Turkey. You notice that. In truth, social. He makes sure Trump is not very careful about spelling and grammar, in case anybody notice. But he makes sure to spell Turkey the new way. Turkey that, that everybody is suddenly. I. I was reading the, you know, a semaphore morning newsletter this morning, and it's spelled Turkey, you know, with the, with the, um, lot over the U, and then, you know, T, U, R, K, I, Y, E, and, you know, so there's a, There's a tremendous amount of respect for, you know, this, this ancient country of Turkey. Yeah. That Trump, you know, has, has always had, you know, a great admiration for the people of Turkey. Yeah. And for the culture of Turkey.
- [52:58]
B
Yeah.
- [52:59]
D
And. But also, I have to say that I figured out, by the way, when Iran is bluffing. It said today that through its new deal with Oman, it could prevent US And Israeli ships or US And Israeli flagged ships from going through the Strait of Hormuz. Under the new deal, it'll open the Strait of Hormuz, but if it wants, it'll shut down US And Israeli flagships. And I just realized that's when you can realize, that's when you can see when Iran is bluffing when it mentions Israel. There's no way Iran is going to, after everything, after the bonanza that it is getting from the Trump administration, there's no way Iran is going to antagonize Israel into doing something against it. They, they are afraid. They have some fear remaining of Israel and Israeli retaliation. They do not have that fear of the US So when Iran threatens the US they might not be bluffing. The only time they seem to be bluffing is when they are threatening Israel. And I think that's the crucial distinction here, is that there is no fear left of the Trump administration in Iran. They can, they can taunt them. It's not just the, the, what was it, the Lego video propaganda videos or whatever they were. It's not just the, it's, they just feel like they can say anything and Trump is not going to. What's Trump going to say? Because he's already said everything and not meant it.
- [54:33]
E
Right.
- [54:33]
D
What can you threaten in response to I'm going to keep US ships out of the straight or Hormuz? You can threaten, I'm going to hit all of Iran's energy infrastructure and we're going to bomb them into the stone age. But he has already threatened that three times in response to other things and not done it.
- [54:52]
A
I think, you know. Yeah, go ahead. I just want to say, just briefly,
- [54:56]
C
like there's been a lot of talk over the years that sort of, you can't beat Trump at Trump's game because no one has his, no one's working from the same idea of what a negotiation or a threat is. You know, so when Trump, someone says something in another country about Trump, he goes, the tariffs just went up another 25%. You know, and he's sort of the only person that can do that. The wall just got 10ft higher. The Iranians are sort of playing his game, you know, they're sort of toying with him, responding to every American threat with, we're going to run a two way toll, you know, and now we're not going to let Israeli and American ships through. It's a really, it's a strange thing to observe. Like you've got to be as sort of, you know, exotically crazy as the Iranian regime to play his game.
- [55:59]
A
See, I think two things that the United States did not learn from the war between Israel and Gaza. Reason the war between Israel and Gaza was a catastrophic defeat militarily and strategically for Hamas and did in fact contribute to the greater safety of the people of Israel in neutralizing Hamas's offensive capabilities. That was true. But of course, Israel lost the world propaganda war because it didn't care. But it couldn't really take account of this because Hamas wanted Palestinian citizens to die as part of their overall strategy. The more people, more civil innocents were killed, the better it was for them to make their propaganda case. We, I think, have made the same blunder here. Not that the Israelis made a blunder, but we have made a blunder here in misunderstanding Iran, like Trump thought. We decapitate them, we blow things up for weeks, and they're going to be like, no more. No more. Our suffering country can no longer take this. And the Iranian leadership doesn't give a shit about the Iranian people. And what's more, is perfectly happy to kill 40,000 of them or to see millions of them killed in more American raids. They don't care. They care about themselves. They are not defensive. They do not have the same structure of, you know, we have a very great difficulty understanding this mindset. And so we go to war believing that they're just like us and they're nothing like us. They're mass murderers. They are, you know, they are religious fanatics, and they're willing to absorb an enormous amount of pain because in the end, are they suffering that much pain? Aside from the decapitation stuff, I mean, are there, you know, storehouses full of caviar and luxury goods and all of that? Are they still there? I'm going to assume yes, for the leadership. Are their families off in London, living in Mayfair in their mansions, safe and secure?
- [58:33]
B
Yes.
- [58:34]
A
Are, you know, some of them studying here? Yes. So Trump thinks by saying, I'm going to blow you up, they're going to come to the table. Once they decided it was okay for Trump to blow them up, he lost his whip hand against them. So he threatens and he threatens and he threatens, and they don't care, granted.
- [58:59]
B
Isn't it ironic, by the way, that the failure of Trump here, which is to understand that the Iranian regime are maniacs who actually don't care about the suffering of their own people. The same kind of conceptual error that Barack Obama and they made with the Iran deal in the other direction. But it was the same mistake. It was the same, well, you know, we'll give them a lot of money and there'll be international investment and they'll get all these great jobs and everything like that. And look, this Rouhani guy, you know, the Iranian people, they won. They, like, they voted for the engagement person. And the moderates are. We can't do anything against the moderates because of the Iranian System and everything like that. It's the same thing, except with Trump, it's kind of in reverse. It's like, oh, I killed the hardliners and now they want to make a deal and oh my God, they're crazy people. But whatever. We always fail to understand that the real way to take down this regime, which has to go, is to align ourselves with the people who are, you know, the Iranians themselves, who have made it very clear that they don't want to live under them.
- [60:11]
A
So anyway, Trump faces an interesting bifurcated threat and opportunity, partially because of the war and partially because of the economy in general. So on the one hand, we have this job loss that I mentioned at the top of the show. Hundreds of thousands of jobs, we're going in the other direction, we're losing jobs instead of gaining them. And on the other hand, he fiddles around with the markets and the oil price is relatively high but stable, and the Dow and the S and P are at record levels. So choose your poison or not your poison, choose your own adventure. Trump's on the I'm saving oil prices and boy, your stock portfolio is in fantastic shape. And then there's data from the American people that their inflation is eating away at whatever salary gains they had. They can't buy houses because there's a housing shortage, yada da da da. And so he thinks that he is saving himself and winning by talking up the markets. And that is a kind of blinding him to the fact that his failure to win this war means that he's got nothing to go to the American people with to say, look what I've done for you as president. I mean, if you're American, you win a war, you can at least go and say, there was this evil regime, it had nuclear weapons, I took it down, I took away their nuclear weapons. I've ended a 47 year tyranny at very little cost to our forces and at very little. And aren't I great? Said he can't say that. What's he gonna say? I did put on tariffs and the Supreme Court overturned them. I don't even know what he's gonna say. I'm building a ballroom, I'm painting things gold, I don't know, what is it?
- [62:23]
C
I secured the border. I secured the border.
- [62:26]
B
Right.
- [62:26]
A
Which turns out, by the way, it turns out, by the way, in polling terms, he's lost the American people on that too. So Democrats are now tied with Republicans on the border. That was a 30 point margin in Republicans favor just three years ago.
- [62:44]
B
Okay, this gets back to the fundamental thing with Trump, his strength, you could argue what he had that I've never seen any other politician have, was an ability to believe through the power of positive thinking, which is kind of the Norman Vincent Peale stuff, which influenced him as a young man. Norman Vincent Peale was the pastor in his first wedding to Ivana Trump, and that gave him the ability after the Access Hollywood tape to say, I can still win this election, gave him the ability to think that he could win the election while they're running for president. And that ability to kind of just believe that it's going to work out and pushing out everything else gave him a kind of will that was absent from, as I said, almost any other politician at some point would have said, all right, I've got to face reality. This is unsustainable, and everything like that. So that's his strength. It's the strength that gave him the ability, when he was being indicted all over the place during the Biden administration, to continue to run for president and to think he could win. And it's the same reason why he is failing right now, because he believes that he can just say, I won the war. I'm sure he thinks he did win the war. He believes he can just say it. And it's true. And we've reached the point where that really doesn't work, except for a much smaller minority part of the electorate. And in that respect, he is, you know, it's like a Greek tragedy. It's like his great strength became, you know, his great weakness in some ways. And that's how I think.
- [64:28]
D
I also think you should not, you know, the old Thatcher line about if you have to tell people you are something you aren't. You know, I just, I feel like when it comes to what can he tell the American people that he did for them, I think really what that means is what would the American people, what do they think he did for them?
- [64:50]
B
Right.
- [64:50]
D
How do they feel about their daily lives? And so he thinks that when you say, what can he tell the American people? That all he has to do is literally tell the American people, as Eli said, like, as never before, as we've done this, as never before the first time, and blah, blah, blah, the way that his, you know, his predecessor, not his direct press Obama used to use unprecedented a lot. And the people around Obama used to use unprecedented a lot. He believes that he can just say that. But the truth is that what we mean when we say, what would the. What can the president say he did for you, what we mean is, what do people already believe has been done for them?
- [65:32]
E
Right?
- [65:32]
D
The President saying I did X for you is not what convinces people. Because we've seen. We saw this with the Biden administration, too, when they tried saying inflation's not really a problem and all that stuff. That what we see is that people feel the economy in their own lives. And his advisors and people in the media who wanted him to do better were trying to tell him this. Don't tell people. Don't gaslight people. Right? Because you saying it, if they don't feel it is in some cases, maybe even worse, like, maybe even detrimental, because it sounds silly, but people feel in their lives. And if you looked at the war right now, what percent of the American people would feel that America is now, if it ended today, if we called it today, came out of this with some kind of benefit to any area of their lives, including American prestige, American respect, even. Even those sorts of things that you can't really measure but, you know, you feel through the daily discourse about the war.
- [66:40]
E
Right.
- [66:41]
D
I mean, if people are being honest, I don't think that there's a lot of, you know, that. I don't think that percent is very high because people feel beaten down by it. People feel like this has been, you know, in some cases embarrassing. Iran calling our bluff and we coming to the negotiating table when they bluff, you know. And so that's what I think that he doesn't understand is that people, People come to their own conclusions. And, you know, the. You, the, the. The I did this for you isn't actually what matters. It's. That has to be a confirmation of something that people already feel that you did for them and that there just isn't much going on right now that people would say to themselves, I feel this is what he's done for me.
- [67:29]
A
I think he knows this because the obsession in the first couple of months with the idea that what he needed was physical manifestation of the victory in Iran through securing the nuclear materials physically in the United States, taking possession of the nuclear materials and having some kind of visual, I don't know what, like an urn or something that he could carry around and say, this is the nuclear material. Because he wanted a mark of victory where he could say, they had this. I took it away from them. It's actual stuff, and they no longer have it. So he could say, I have now effectively eliminated their nuclear program. Problem is, he said it last year. So he said it last year, and then he had to go back in and do it again. So he said it last year, he says it now. They're like, well, didn't you say it last year? And then you had to go in again. So you were, were you lying last year? Did we not do it last year? I don't really understand what happened then, but why should I believe you now? How do I know that their program is destroyed? I don't know that. And I don't know how that makes me feel particularly safer. So I think he knew that there needed to be a victory, an unambiguous victory. And some point two months ago, it became clear to him he wasn't going to get that somehow. So he would declare it, and then whatever the Iranians did to bend in his direction, he would then claim that as the win. Except then they just didn't bend. They never bent. They haven't bent. They haven't done a single thing to bend.
- [69:25]
B
So it's so depressing.
- [69:30]
A
And he. Look, he's a risk taker as a politician and his whole political career was a result of taking a remarkable risk that he. That he succeeded at and doing it again. And now the downside of the being the risk taker is that when you take the risk and then you actually don't follow through on securing the thing that you were risking, that's the end of it. And so November is gonna be a very. I mean, he's not on the ballot in November, but of course what's on the ballot is the Republican mood. And I just don't think the Republican mood is going to be very good come November. Okay, quick recommendation. Movie opening today, I don't think in some places, not all across the country, called Tony. It is a really wonderful original and inventive biopic about Anthony Bourdain, the famous chef writer who tragically took his own life eight years ago. And it simply tells the story of the summer when Bourdain was 19 and found himself on Cape Cod with nothing to do and stumbled into a kitchen and found his calling. And it's a portrait of this obnoxious, arrogant kid who isn't that likable and is a liar and a fraud and a con man. And despite all of that, somehow learns that there is a thing called hard work and there's a thing called integrity, and there's a thing called taking responsibility for your own actions. And all of this happens very subtly and quietly along the way. This is a movie by a Canadian director named Matt Johnson, who made what I thought was the best movie of 2023 BlackBerry, which a story about a working business. BlackBerry was about research in Motion, the firm that made the BlackBerry. He's a Canadian comedian, web series producer, very obscure guy, just 40 years old. This is a major piece of work, an annunciation of him as a major talent. This movie is gonna get a raft of Oscar nominations. It is very vivid and interesting and a portrait of this world 50 years ago on this, you know, in Provincetown, before everything was gentrified and when there was still a kind of local culture that Bourdain finds himself stumbling into. It's a remarkable movie. I strongly recommend it. I have a review of it in the Free Beacon, which you can read now if you want more details. That's Tony, starring Dominic Sessa and Antonio Banderas in what may be the Oscar winning supporting actor performance of 2026. That's what I got to say to you guys. Eli Lake, thank you so much for coming. Thank you, Seth and Abe. Keep the candle burning.
- [73:00]
E
I'm James Patterson. I write way too many books. Welcome to Hungry Dogs. The title comes from my maternal grandmother, Isabel Zelvis Morris. Nan used to always say, hungry dogs run faster, James. And I've been running fast ever since. Here's what will be coming your way soon, and this is a really terrific list. I think you'll hear from some incredible people like Stacey Abrams. Yay. BJ Novak. Yay. Kathy Bates, Dolly Parton, Josh Gad. And Pope Leo. Okay, maybe not Pope Leo, but who knows? Maybe he'll show up. Hungry Dogs run faster. Thank you, Grandma, for turning me into a hopeless, obsessive, compulsive. Listen to Hungry Dogs with James Patterson. That'd be me on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
- [73:57]
F
From the State House to the courthouse, in the emergency room and in the classroom, Americans are losing trust in their leaders. In a 2025 U.S. news and World Report survey, 85% of Americans said government leaders care more about their own power than the people they serve. 73% are disappointed in healthcare leaders, 72% in business, and 68% in education. But there are still leaders worth believing in. I'm Eric Gertler, CEO and executive chairman of U.S. news World Report. This is the Best Leaders podcast sponsored by the Noble Reach Foundation. On this show, we'll go deeper into the stories, challenges and lessons of extraordinary leaders across public service, business, healthcare and education. You can find the Best Leaders podcast from U.S. news World Report on YouTube, Apple, Spotify, Amazon, Music, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [74:57]
G
I started with one shop. No college degree, no big investors. It was just a willingness to work. Over time, that one shop turned into a multi billion dollar business called Crash Champions. All the lessons I learned along the way came from the grind. And that's what my show Pod Crash is all about. We have real conversations with people who've built things the hard way. We talk to founders, athletes and blue collar leaders who kept going when things got tough. You'll hear stories of grit, leadership and growth. Plus real world lessons you can take back to your team and your life tomorrow.
- [75:31]
A
When you get momentum, you step on the gas.
- [75:34]
D
That's how you get separation from everybody else.
- [75:36]
A
I was at Harvard Law School. I was, blah, blah, blah. I looked up, let me tell you something, there's kids in my neighborhood putting in sheetrock that are smarter than you.
- [75:43]
D
AI is going to disrupt a lot of stuff.
- [75:45]
A
It is never going to disrupt physical blue collar trade skill.
- [75:49]
D
And the guy just looked at me
- [75:50]
A
and he said, it's bloody impossible. So I asked him this question. I said, it's impossible.
- [75:55]
G
And unless that's Pod Crash with me, Matt ebert. Watch on YouTube and listen wherever you get your podcast.