Maine Squeeze

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Commentary Magazine Podcast — "Maine Squeeze"

Date: June 1, 2026
Host: John Podhoretz
Panel: Abe Greenwald, Seth Mandel, Eli Lake
Episode Theme:
This episode dissects the shifting realities of the Middle East conflict involving the U.S., Israel, and Iran, with deep dives into the resurgent warfare, American policy weaknesses, and the moral and political deterioration manifest in both domestic and international affairs. The team also takes a close look at the scandal surrounding Maine Senate candidate Graham Platner, unpacking what his candidacy reveals about cultural shifts and the new standards—or lack thereof—in American politics.

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1. The War in the Middle East: Ceasefire Collapse and Iran’s Escalation

[03:39–13:14]

Key Points:

• Resumption of Hostilities:

  • Iran pulls out of ceasefire talks not directly because of the talks themselves, but in response to Israel's increased activity in Lebanon against Hezbollah.
  • Iran now explicitly includes Lebanon in its ceasefire demands and claims responsibility for attacks against U.S. positions.

• Trump Administration’s Stance:

  • Despite renewed hostilities and Iranian aggression, President Trump claims Iran is "eager for a deal." Panelists question this perspective.
  • Eli Lake ([05:36]):

    “I think that there’s a partial explanation… when Trump says he wants a ceasefire, that we're close to a ceasefire, it has, at least thus far… managed to calm the nerves of the global markets... But that said, he is legitimizing a regime that he started off on February 28, trying to topple… There is a certain benefit and clarity that America has an interest in living in a world without the Islamic Republic in it.”

  • The credibility and strategy of the administration seem shaken as Iran doubles down on its hostile posture, emboldening regional proxies.

• Broader Regional Escalation:

  • The so-called “Axis of Resistance” (Iran, Hezbollah, Houthis) now threatens key maritime routes.
  • “If they’re firing ballistic missiles at us, that’s not what I call a ceasefire, because it involves the word ‘fire’ in firing missiles.”
    — John Podhoretz ([04:37])

• Hostages and U.S. Military Paralysis:

  • Serious discussion about the U.S. becoming hesitant to deploy troops due to hostage-taking risks.
  • John Podhoretz ([11:16]):

    “If we can't use our military out of fear that one person will be taken and used as a bargaining chip, then our military is useless unless it's in a plane or I guess on a ship.”

• Cultural and Educational Crisis:

  • Eli Lake ties this military hesitancy to a wider “cultural rot,” underscoring the need for renewed education in military history and civic virtue.
  • Eli Lake ([13:14]):

    “We have to kind of reinvigorate some of the ancient values that make our republic great and explain… the valor of military sacrifice.”

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2. The American Aversion to “Boots on the Ground”

[16:49–26:52]

Key Points:

• Seth Mandel ([16:49]):
  The paralyzing aversion to committing U.S. ground troops is a “cultural, ethical question” decided against American military engagement, while adversaries do not share this hesitancy.

• Abe Greenwald ([18:25]): Draws parallels with the Kellogg-Briand Pact of 1929, which “outlawed war” and emboldened aggressors by projecting Western pacifism.

• Boots on the Ground as Taboo: The stigma now attached to ground operations is likened to the international ban on chemical weapons; “boots on the ground” has become a relic.

• War of Choice vs. War of Necessity: The panel argues that the new doctrine—refusing any war but one of total necessity—has blurred lines and made America appear weak and indecisive.

• Special Operations as Middle Ground: Eli Lake ([25:36]):

  “America had a lot of success in… using our special operations with local forces, mainly the Kurds, against ISIS… That is a long American tradition of partnering up with indigenous forces… Which is different in the American mind than sending in… army reserve units.”

  • Trump administration’s reluctance to utilize Kurdish forces attributed to Turkish lobbying and personal relationships.

• Corruption and Influence:
  Discussion on the web of personal business interests (in Turkey, the Middle East, and crypto) possibly influencing presidential decision-making, raising emoluments issues.

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3. The Platner Scandal: Sleaze, “Nazi Tattoos," and Norm Collapse

[34:36–45:57]

Key Points:

• Who is Graham Platner?

  • Maine Senate candidate with a controversial past: Nazi tattoo, history as a mercenary, extreme ideological swings (claimed conversion to communism), and now a sex scandal involving online adventurism.
  • Panelists see this as the bottoming out of ethical standards.

• Democratic Consultant's Intimidation Tactics:

  • Platner’s campaign consultant, Morris Katz, threatened a whistleblower to maintain silence, exposing a ruthless new style in left-wing campaigns.
  • John Podhoretz ([39:06], quoting Genevieve McDonald):

    “After WSJ reached out to the Platner campaign for comment, Morris Katz demanded that I call the Journal, retract my comments, tell them their reporting was inaccurate, and send him a recording of the call… [He wrote] ‘If the story goes in its current iteration, we’ll communicate directly on the record and by name that Genevieve violated the personal trust… and shared explicit falsehoods to sabotage the campaign.’ ”

  • Eli Lake ([41:25]):

    “Socialists don’t care. They just want power... Their strategy is to take over by any means necessary. The Democrats. And Democrats should get their act together… This is an entryist strategy.”

• The Erosion of Disqualifying Standards:

  • The accretion of red flags around Platner—extremist ideology, offensive personal conduct, sexual sleaze—has not disqualified him.
  • Abe Greenwald ([44:56]):

    “Everything is permissible, nothing is disqualifying, and that’s frightening.”

• Trump’s Precedent and the End of Shame:

  • Panel discusses how Bill Clinton’s and Donald Trump’s scandals “tested” America’s commitment to personal moral standards, leading to the effective collapse of such standards in politics.
  • John Podhoretz ([46:18]):

    “The test was the politics matter more than character… There is no Trump without Clinton… And so this is where we are: morality is over.”

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4. Generational Morality and the Fight-to-Win Ethos

[50:32–62:24]

Key Points:

• Can Moral Standards Be Restored?

  • Panelists debate whether future generations could reverse or react against the current permissiveness.
  • Abe Greenwald ([50:01]):

    “What follows are generations... who are all using the same apps, who are intrigued by the extremist ideologies, who haven’t been raised as serious moral participants in civic life.”

• Historical Pendulum:

  • John Podhoretz points out that history offers examples of abrupt moral corrections (e.g. Sherman Antitrust Act, MeToo movement, Watergate reforms).
  • The hope: After Trump and Boomer politics, a new era of seriousness and restored norms may arise.

• Mimicry and Failure:

  • Seth Mandel suggests that future attempts to copy Trump’s norm-busting ways may fail, as they lack Trump’s singular style.

• Populism and Scoundrel Politics:

  • Eli Lake ([53:55]):

    “He was a billionaire who rubbed elbows... and then he packages himself... saying, the people at the very top... are a bunch of hypocrites... and I am going to restore the country to you, the people… it resonated in part because of… scandals like Epstein… and that has had an effect where it’s okay to be a scoundrel if you were opposed to that.”

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5. The Lessons of Victory-at-Any-Cost Politics

[57:37–73:48]

Key Points:

• The “Fight, Don’t Fold” Lesson:

  • Both parties have learned from Trump that aggressive, norm-breaking behavior can pay off.
  • Eli Lake ([57:37]):

    “You win by fighting. And that's what Graham Platner, that's the appeal… All that matters is that you win and you fight hard.”

• Comparisons to Past Scandal Candidates:

  • The panel compares Platner to Roy Moore, noting that Republicans once did say “no” to unsavory candidates. Democrats, by contrast, are seen as failing to draw any lines, especially even in the face of anti-Semitism.
  • Abe Greenwald ([69:42]):

    “When you take a case like Graham Platner… there’s not a peep on the left… all about trying to put him back into an acceptable box… explain why he’s really a good guy…”

• Trump as Gatekeeper:

  • Ironically, Trump has acted to police the most egregious elements on the right, such as Marjorie Taylor Greene, Tucker Carlson, and Paul Massie, showing “a bit of a gatekeeper” function ([69:42], Eli Lake).

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6. Long-term Consequences: The Jewish Community and Party Loyalty

[71:13–73:48]

Key Points:

• The recent tolerance—or even embrace—of anti-Semitic rhetoric in the Democratic coalition may mark a generational breaking point for Jewish affiliation and political fundraising.

• Eli Lake ([71:13]):

  “What the Democrats are doing right now, I believe will have a generational effect on American Jews… I think what we are seeing now will change that trajectory.”

• Political Donations vs. Voting:

  • Even if the Jewish vote does not swing, crucial donor support is likely to abandon the Democratic Party.

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

• “If we can’t use our military out of fear that one person will be taken and used as a bargaining chip, then our military is useless unless it’s in a plane or I guess, on a ship.” — John Podhoretz ([11:16])
• “Everything is permissible, nothing is disqualifying, and that’s frightening.” — Abe Greenwald ([44:56])
• “The test was the politics matter more than character… And so this is where we are: morality is over.” — John Podhoretz ([46:18])
• “You win by fighting. And that's what Graham Platner... that's the appeal.” — Eli Lake ([57:37])

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• [03:39] The war reignites—Iran, Israel, the U.S., and Trump’s narrative
• [11:16] U.S. military paralysis and the hostage dilemma
• [16:49] The cultural aversion to military engagement
• [25:36] The Kurdish proposal and internal White House influence
• [34:36] Graham Platner’s scandal(s) and its implications
• [39:06] Morris Katz and the intimidation of whistleblowers
• [41:25] The “entryist strategy” of the DSA/socialist left
• [44:56] Collapse of political and personal standards
• [50:32] Debating the potential for moral renewal
• [53:55] Trump as outsider and the rise of “scoundrel populism”
• [57:37] “Fight to win” supersedes principle on both sides
• [69:42] The left’s refusal to police itself
• [71:13] The future of the Jewish community in U.S. politics

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Conclusion

"Maine Squeeze" is a searing exploration of the entwined crises of foreign policy indecision, the erosion of American military will, and the collapse of basic moral gatekeeping in both parties—highlighted by the Platner scandal. The panel calls into question the mechanisms of accountability in American politics and wonders whether the decline in public standards is a phase or a new reality. With memorable moments and sharp historical analogies, this episode is a revealing snapshot of the nation’s political and cultural crossroads.

Transcript

[A]

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[B]

Expect the worst Some green champagne Some die at first no way of knowing which way it's going Hope for the

[A]

best Expect the worst Hope for the best welcome to the Commentary Magazine Daily Podcast. Today is Monday, June 1, 2026. I'm John Budhortz, the editor of Commentary Magazine and before I introduce today's panel I want to provide you listeners with a special offer. This is the first such offer we have made in the history of this podcast and that is we are doing a summer sale for first time subscribers to Commentary magazine and commentary.org $19.95 a year for the first year of your subscription to Commentary, the monthly magazine and to the website which provides you with access to 80 years of commentary's astonishing archives and helps us support this podcast. So commentary.org offer that's commentary.org offer for a 1995 per year subscription to commentary and commentary.org again. Never priced at this low before. Never made an offer like this before. Only for first time subscribers to get you in the door and in the room with us forever in the room. With us forever, just like the movie backrooms. But I'm not going to get into that right now. With us today, of course, executive editor, Abe Greenwald. Hi, Abe.

[C]

Hi, John.

[A]

Senior editor Seth Mandel. Hi, Seth.

[D]

Hi, John.

[A]

And joining us today, contributing editor, host of the Breaking History podcast, Eli Lake. Hi, Eli.

[B]

Hi, john.

[A]

Once again, commentary.org offer okay, Saturday, I sent jokey texts around saying, hey, remember the war? Whatever happened to that? Because we had about 48 hours where we weren't really talking about the war. Well, guess what? We're talking about the war again. The Iranians have announced that they are pulling out of the talks, not because of anything having to do with the talks, apparently, but because Israel is advancing on Hezbollah in Lebanon. And Iran has decided that these ceasefire talks, or the ceasefire, must involve Israel and Lebanon. And if Israel is going to do what it's doing in Lebanon, that's it for the ceasefire. Not that there is a ceasefire or has been a ceasefire since. According to the news last night, Iran fired two ballistic missiles at an American base or an American something or other position that were intercepted. So if they're firing ballistic missiles at us, that's not what I call a ceasefire, because it involves the word fire in firing missiles. Trump says this morning Iran is really eager for a deal. And once again, one must wonder if he's taking gummies because I or eating gummies. What? They fired ballistic missiles at us, they reject every deal we offer, and they unilaterally declare an end to the ceasefire. But he's saying they really want a deal. Eli, you're not a psychoanalyst. You don't even play one on television.

[B]

No.

[A]

Do you believe that there is a psychoanalytic explanation for this or that there is a geopolitical explanation for this?

[B]

I think that there's a partial explanation, which is that when Trump says he wants a ceasefire, that we're close to a ceasefire, it has, at least thus far, and now we're talking like almost three months, managed to calm the nerves of the global markets and put somewhat of a damper on the potential of a kind of financial spin out that, that I know from my own reporting that the Treasury Secretary, Scott Bessen, and his political advisors have all said this is the potential here, which is that if it looks like there's no hope then, and that Hormuz is gonna be closed, then there's gonna be potentially calamitous economic implications. And that is coming in the summer before midterms. So there is an interest there in making it seem like we might be very close. And I think that that explains some of it. But that said, I think that it's also the reason why Trump is perceived to have lost this war, because he is legitimizing a regime that he started off on February 28, trying to topple with the Israeli strike on Khamenei and the other senior leaders. And there is a certain benefit and clarity that America has an interest in living in a world without the Islamic Republic in it. So that really does put things in a tight spot. I thought that there was a point maybe a month, month and a half ago where part of the talking points from Trump was that people are figuring out other ways to get energy and other goods to Asia, and that that would maybe be the way to kind of get out. We're already seeing, you know, alternative shipping routes so that, you know, this is not closing the Strait of Hormuz in 1996. It's 2026 where we've had, and we've talked about on the show. There's been the fracking revolution, the shale revolution. There are lots of other energy sources. We are much better at supply chains and mapping things out like that. So in my view, there is a downside, which I think is it's kind of harder to measure when we keep making it seem like we're desperate for a deal. And, of course, that also makes the Iranians think they can do whatever they want. So there might be a. I mean, I don't know. If I was advising the president, I would say your terms are acceptable. We're going to. We're going to try our best to try to now open the straits even with the depleted munitions that we have. There are kind of workarounds. We're going to pressure our allies to help us out here, and we're going to really play up the fact that you can try to get energy to China without going through the Strait of Hormuz. And I think that that would probably be a better thing, because he's cooked if it's perceived that this war was for naught. So in some ways, the Iranians may have done Donald Trump a favor.

[A]

I should add that not only have they have the Iranians declared an end to the ceasefire, but they are claiming that they are now activating the axis of resistance, that, of course, the seven fronts that attacked Israel in, you know, beginning in October, on October 7th, and they are threatening the Bab Al Mandab Strait, which is the strait where the Houthis.

[B]

Yeah, the tip of Yemen.

[A]

Right, right. So that would be two straits closed. They're raining rockets down on northern Israel. Hezbollah is, which is understandable in the sense that Israel is now apparently going to rain down the fury of the gods on the neighborhood in Beirut where Hezbollah's headquarters are and has been now taking Lebanese territory in order to encircle Hezbollah in the south of Lebanon. So there is a really engaged war going on between Israel and Lebanon. And now Iran has decided to say that that's their war, the war with America is their war. And now they're going to activate the, and I guess Hamas if they can, whatever that might mean. And so Trump may think that they want a deal and that there is a ceasefire. There is no ceasefire, there is no deal. Iran is going back to war. And so I guess we're going to go back to war because what.

[B]

One more thing.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

The other factor involved is that when in the early, I think it was the second or third week of the war, the Iranians had shot down some lower flying aircraft, there was a wonderful rescue operation where the pilots were rescued and the Iranians were deprived a hostage. There is a real concern that if Iran or its proxies were to get a hostage, it would be a disaster. So my mind immediately asked this question I've been asking now for a month. What about the mercenaries? You can certainly hire people who would go on the ground and do some of the things in just terms of holding territory that would be used to launch operations to menace international shipping in these two important choke points. That seems like a no brainer. There is an obvious need for that that I think could be we wouldn't even have to necessarily pay for it. I would imagine you could get the Gulf states and particularly the UAE to pay for it. So, so that's another thing is that I would start really trying to look at possibilities for mercenaries because you will have to have some on the ground component. And I understand that Trump doesn't want to send in the Marines.

[A]

I mean, if you're right, speculate about this just for a second. If much of American war fighting strategy has now come down to the idea that the taking of one hostage paralyzes the world's most powerful country in its aim to reckon with the and eliminate the threat from one of the world's worst countries. That is an astonishing whip hand of a sort that is so dangerous. I mean, obviously we've seen Israel have to reckon with the existence of the hostages and having and the role that one hostage can play like Gilad Shalit leading the negotiations over releasing Gilad Shalit, leading to the release of 1200 Palestinian prisoners, among whom was the person who planned October 7, thus demonstrating the kind of Hobson's Choice that is involved here. But we're a nation of 330 million people, and I don't mean to be heartless, and maybe I'll sound heartless, but we have a volunteer military. Everybody in the military has chosen to be in the military. This is not a draft. And if we can't use our military out of fear that one person will be taken and used as a bargaining chip, then our military is useless unless it's in a plane or I guess, on a ship. I guess if you're on a ship, unless the ship is boarded by Long John Silver, you know, there's no, there's not much threat there. But if you're right, I don't even know how to begin to calculate the danger to American national security of the 21st century if that is now being considered as part of the danger of any battle plan.

[B]

JOHN Well, I would argue just one thing. I'd say that it would mean that something that Christine Rosen talks a lot about and the commentary has written a lot about, which is to prioritize the teaching of history, particularly military history in our middle and secondary schools, let's leave college aside for a second, is absolutely should be like a Manhattan Project level priority, which is that we, I mean, there is a, you're described. We're talking about a cultural rot, we're talking about a cultural crisis. And that if you really want to be serious about it, it's a long mark, it's a long road ahead. But we have to kind of reinvigorate some of the ancient values that make our republic great and explain how, you know, what military and what the valor of military sacrifice and so forth. But that's a long way off. I mean, I just think we've got a lot of work ahead, but we gotta do that. That's why we have to think about it.

[A]

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[C]

John, I think we are at the place that you're talking about already. But it's not just the fear of our enemies taking one hostage. It's the entire prescription around ground troops that is self paralyzing. And it's not just, I mean I agree with Eli that it's a question of understanding history and a lack of understanding history, but it's not just the knowledge of how wars are fought, how wars are won. There's a cultural ethical question that has been decided the other way in the US which is that no fight is worth ground troops risking any U.S. ground troops. And the enormous long term, short term problem with that is that our enemies don't feel that way at all.

[A]

All right, well this is an important point. So, Seth, let's. What we're talking about here is a modified version of the Kellogg Bryan Pact. So what was the kellogg Brian Pact? 1929. It was a proposed. Describe it. Proposed League of Nations International Forum idea.

[B]

Outlawing war forever.

[D]

The end of war.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

Yes. That nations would agree not to conduct war against each other, and Western nations voted for it. And there was a famous. There was a famous. There were debates in England over the Kellogg Bryant Act. And we know from historical records, both in. From the Soviet files and from what we understand about Nazi war planning and all of that, that the. The idea that the west, what we now think of as the west, what we would just call Europe at the time, or Europe and America at the time, wouldn't fight if they were attacked, was a central feature of the ideas that led to World War II. So if we're serious about this, and I think you're right, that we've now decided that. So ground, it's modified because we don't care about hitting from the air. Apparently nobody cares that much about hitting from the air. But. Yeah, but boots on the ground is now something that is effectively being. I mean, it's not being outlawed, but it is now being treated as though it is a relic of the past that we can no longer afford. And as Abe, as you mentioned, this is a huge issue because the question is what our enemies, our more martial enemies and our more adventurous possible enemies might take away from this. Not that we should put boots on the ground if we don't need to, and not that we need to do it in order to show that we're willing to put boots on the ground. I don't think it needs to be some meta battle. But Eli's saying what he said frequently.

[D]

It's like war of choice. I mean, it's another term that's being reduced to something oversimplified and then discarded as, you know, as a rel. As you said, as a relic of previous wars. It's like it's being treated like. Like gas, like using gas on the battlefield after World War I. We all agree that that can never happen. We all agree that we can never put boots on the ground again. Because boots in the ground, they don't mix. Bad things happened when boots hit the ground. And so just like these other terms that we're using, war of choice and things like that, that really are meaningless. Right. I mean, we choose to go to war almost. We've discussed this before on the podcast. Wars of choice are most wars. You don't have to hit back. A defensive war is also technically a war of choice. And then you start scrambling your own brain by getting into these Talmudic, you know, discussions, these spirals about what the word means and this and that. And I think, I think boots on the ground is the same thing. We just, and we talked about ceasefire the other day also, that this is just, you know, we have like totems and you can't conduct war through totems. You can't conduct war through bumper stickers and, you know, and terms of art and things like that. You conduct war through reality. And we got a good view of that this morning. There's a piece in the, in the New York Times about what's happening between Israel and Lebanon, within Lebanon. And the piece says, it quotes Lebanese people saying, or Lebanese experts saying, well, I don't think they're going to disarm Hezbollah until Hezbollah sees Iran as brought to its knees or something like that. These are not hawks speaking. These are peace, not peaceniks, but these are doves, you know, these are doves, essentially speaking. And it just, it reminds you that there is something at the center of this, which is Iran is going to war with the west, has been for a long time. And we can choose whether and how to respond to that war, but we can't pretend we're not at war. We can't pretend that Iran is not at war with us and they are still at the center of it. And that Time story and the Iranian demand that the ceasefire include Lebanon and also maybe if we really get upset, we're going to reactivate the Houthis is all a big admission that this is all Iran. That like Naftali Bennett said a year ago or two years ago when he was asked about, you know, what would you do? And he said, you have to go straight at the head of the octopus or whatever it was, you know, whatever term that he used, that all of this pretending that you can pacify Lebanon, that you can solve a, you know, a proto famine in Yemen, that you can. All these things that are being caused by Iran, that you can solve them without solving the problem of Iran and its ongoing, long term, decades long war against the west and in these countries and is futile.

[A]

But I want to make a defense of the war of choice thing in this one sense, which is there are no wars of choice. We need to, we needed to do something about Iran's nuclear program, period. Whether we did it before they got the bomb or after they got the bomb, we don't Know, and after we got the bomb could mean that that's not a war. That's like a capitulation. We didn't have to go to war with Nazi Germany. They weren't. Nazi Germany wasn't going to be able to reach our shores and, like, bore, you know, like invade New York. What we would have done was negotiate some kind of a zones of influence thing and leave Europe to Nazi predation.

[D]

We were late additions to both world wars.

[A]

Yeah, we had choice. And in this case, we chose to go to war with Iran on the basis of various facts that had happened in the two months prior to our going to war that suggested that we. That the ground was softened in a way that it would never be again, and that this was our best shot with our best weaponry to do what we needed to do to eliminate this program and maybe do regime change. Even though we said we didn't want to do regime change, we didn't have to make that choice. Trump didn't have to go in on the 28th of February. He did. And the logic now is Iran is now saying, we're done. We are not. This whole ceasefire conversation is over. We're going with all guns blazing in all directions. This leaves Trump without this one card that he has been playing now for weeks, which Eli mentioned, which is to say, well, we're doing X, Y and Z, we're firing on their boats. But the ceasefire hasn't been, you know, the ceasefire is still on. There's no cease. The ceasefire is now over. So the question is, what do we do? What do we do now that the ceasefire is over?

[B]

Can I just say, on the ground trip thing, there is a middle ground, which is America had a lot of success in the late 20 teens, we should say, in using our special operations with local forces, mainly the Kurds, against isis. That is a long American tradition of partnering up with indigenous forces. And that is different, I think, in the American mind, than sending in, you know, army reserve units and so forth. And also it's a different mission. So sometimes I think that the boots on the ground, it obscures more than it reveals. Because what we're really talking about is you don't want Americans in a position where they can be captured. That's obviously a big one. But the main is you don't want them as peacekeepers. You don't want them kind of doing the local rebuilding of what we were doing in Iraq and Afghanistan. But if you have highly trained, our most elite soldiers whipping into shape, Peshmerga fighters who are gonna Basically destroy the ISIS caliphate. We had great success with that militarily. And there's no reason why we couldn't have done something like that, you know, in this war. Kurdish forces in Iran.

[A]

Well, here's Trump's great flaw. One of, I mean, it's many flaws, but the, the Israelis had an, had an idea. Part of their, their advice on the war planning was to activate the Kurds to provide a military front. That would at least be something that the Iranians would have to engage, dividing, having a second front. They have to fight on two fronts, not just against us. Right, right. And we said no. And the reason I say this is Trump's flaw is I think we pretty much know that the reason that he said no is that Erdogan in Turkey, who was no friend of the United States, is of course, in this century long war that the Turks have with the Kurds and didn't want it to happen. And Trump's best friend is our ambassador to Turkey and is basically serving as Erdogan's, has gone native and is Erdogan's puppet in talks about what's going on in the Middle east and what the United States should do. And Trump, he's his own man, he makes his own decisions, all this. But we know he is uncommonly influenced by this circle of five or six or seven people that he is genuinely intimate with. And, you know, Barak has business interests in Turkey and he is, you know, I mean, there's a, there's a whole lot of stuff going on there that is really bad and not the way that our policies should be made. Are there reasons not to use the Kurds? Could this be a disaster? Yes. Is that why we didn't go along with it? Probably not. So it's the same questions that are being raised about. It's one of the reasons why we have emoluments issues and why the Constitution forbids, you know, has emoluments as a, as a, as a. No, no, because we don't know what's going on in Trump's head in relation to the businesses that his son is involved, his sons are involved in and that the Kushners are involved in and that Howard Lutnick is and his kids are involved in with crypto and the gutterys and all sorts of stuff in the Middle east and how that's playing a factor. But I think we kind of know it's playing a factor. And, you know, that is, you know, sort of terrible. And, but here we are. And I still think that Trump somewhere in his native animal cunning, understands that if he doesn't get this to a resolution that is unambiguously benefiting the United States, that he's toasted, he's done for. Not that he'll be impeached and removed from office, but that that's the end of his presidency. He will have made a big play and failed and everything is running against him. Our friend Mark Halperin says, according to what he sees, it is conceivable that a wave in November might move eight seats. This is unthinkable, would have been unthinkable three months ago, eight seats toward the Democrats in the Senate, which does make removal, impeachment and removal a possibility if Trump's numbers sink into the 20s or something like that. So he's the one who put the chips in the middle of the table. And, you know, this is his pot.

[B]

The only way out is through, Mr. President.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

And if you, if you get, if you succeed, you will be remembered as doing something. I mean, he was already taking credit for it. He's like, all these presidents should have been done a long time ago. You will get credit for having done something that every president since Jimmy Carter should have taken care of from the get go.

[A]

All right, so let's see what happens. Cuz obviously this is, as you might call it, a kinetic situation in which we, you know, we're not, we don't get to make. Trump doesn't get to make unilateral decisions here. Iran has a vote and Iran is going to start moving, apparently. Or it could all be a bluff. It could be that Iran is saying that they're activating the Houthis, but the Houthis aren't going to do anything. And we have, by the way, been pretty savage in the seas off Yemen when they try to do stuff to boats and international shipping. It's not like we haven't been engaged in a naval war to prevent the Houthis from controlling the straight there. So, you know, we have, we have two years of experience or three years of experience of this. You know, when I go out and people who are listeners to the podcast see me on the street, they're always asking me, is that Quince is what you're wearing Quince. And the answer is yes, it's usually Quince. And why I keep coming back to Quince is because they focus on high quality essentials that feel and look amazing. Think breathable linen and soft organic cotton, particularly for summer, well made basics, but without the luxury markup. It's that rare balance where everything feels elevated but still effortless. Quince European linen pants and shirts. Perfect warm weather upgrade to add to your rotation. Starting at just $34. Their tees are soft and easy to wear, and their lightweight cotton sweaters are perfect for cooler summer nights. Elevate your summer wardrobe. Go to quints.com commentary for free shipping on your order. Quarter and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E.com commentary for free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com commentary. It's hot. It's a hot summer night and you're hot in your bed and the air conditioning isn't helping. You got your partner next to you and that partner is making you hot. You blame the thermostat. You blame the ac. You blame the person next to you. It's the sheets, man. It's the sheets. It's your bedding. Wrong. Sheets trap heat. Bowl and Branch provides you the cool side of the pillow and everywhere. Summer bedding options by bowl and Branch are breathable, lightweight and designed to keep you cool all night long with 100% organic cotton sheets woven specifically for airflow, not just softness. I'm somebody who doesn't sleep well. Trust me when I say that these sheets make you sleep better. So sleep cooler this summer with Bow and Branch. Get 15% off your first order plus free shipping at bowl and branch.com commentary with code COMMENTARY that's Bowl and Branch. B O L L A N D B R A N C H.com commentary code commentary to unlock 15% off bolandbranch.com commentary code commentary exclusions apply. Shall we move on to our friend in Maine, Mr. Plattner, who would I assume in Mark Halperin's calculation be one of the eight that would succeed in winning race and flipping a seat and you know, and bedeviling Trump's life. So story comes out. Man is a. He's a man whore, basically. Let's just face it. He's he's on some site I never heard of before called Keek or something like that, offering himself up for sexual adventurism while he is relatively newly married and that this is something that his wife reported to the campaign as a form of self oppo research. In other words, like let's prepare to let's prepare for the fact that people are going to find out about this. I don't think that this is any I don't know why this is more important than the fact that he has a Nazi tattoo, said he joined the military because he wanted to kill people, and then went to work essentially as a. With a. With a mercenary group, kind of a private military organization, and then decided to be a big left winger out of nowhere with a Nazi tattoo, so.

[B]

Or that he proclaimed to be a Communist.

[D]

Yeah, I think it's one of those. I just think it's one of the rare cases where someone with Nazi SS tattoo turns out to have other personality defects.

[A]

You know, who. Who would have thought. Is that what you're saying?

[D]

No, he's the guy you least expect.

[A]

Yeah.

[D]

I mean, thought he would treat people with respect.

[A]

But I think more interesting in some ways than the Platner story itself, because. Okay, it's June. Two big facts have come out about the. Actually, a whole bunch of facts have come out about the guy. Not just the Totenkov tattoo, the communist stuff. The fact that he said things like, I went into the military because I wanted to kill people, not serve his country, not to defend freedom. He wanted to go kill people, which

[B]

I think he justified. Like the American Sniper guy. He said it was a good thing he was killed or something.

[A]

Like all kinds of terrible things justify the. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there's bad stuff. Right. I'm a little more interested in the behavior of his chief consultant, Morris Katz, who's about 11 years old and is the son of a. Of a successful screenwriter and was materially involved in getting Zoram Hamdani elected. He's 27 or 28. And we now know from one of the sources, one of the people that the Wall Street Journal talked to, woman with whom Graham Platner was in some fashion involved, that Morris Katz wrote her a text threatening her, basically, you know,

[B]

saying,

[A]

you're a terrible person for revealing private confidences.

[D]

Well, I think this was the. I think this was the former staffer.

[A]

Oh, the former staffer. Okay. I believe.

[D]

I believe it was. Because I believe what happened is that they had said, you know, they had said to the family, if there's anything you think we should know on the campaign that we need to be ready to bat back, tell us. And Graham Platner's wife called in this staffer and said, just so you know, I found these texts. And so this staffer has become the target of Morris Katz's ire.

[A]

Right. Well.

[B]

And he also said, we'll deny it and we'll call you a liar.

[A]

Yeah. Basically, we will destroy. If you open your mouth, we will destroy your reputation.

[D]

But key to this is that she was not the reason the story happened. And that was what was easy to believe when you first read the story. And I'm not saying it's intentional, but just when you first read the story, you could easily believe that this advisor, because she was the person told about the texts originally, that she was the source of the story and she had gone to the Journal and said this. But what actually happened was that the Journal had been reporting and they had confirmed this from different sources and they had the story and they went to her for a comment and they. Or to, you know, to check their facts. And that's what Morris Katz said to her. Something like, well, you should. You better lie for us.

[A]

I have it here.

[D]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay. Her name is Genevieve McDonald. So this was. This is her account. The Wall Street Journal called me Friday morning to tell me they were running a story they had verified through multiple sources. I had spoken with the months ago off the record. So it was a courtesy call. I'd probably still get some blowback. After WSJ reached out to the Platner campaign for comment, Morris Katz demanded that I call the Journal, retract my comments, tell them their reporting was inaccurate, and send him a recording of the call. When I refused to lie for the Platner campaign, he sent this text. Just want to be clear on where we are right now. If the story goes in its current iteration, we'll communicate directly on the record and by name that Genevieve violated the personal trust of Amy and Graham and shared explicit falsehoods to sabotage the campaign. So I went on record with the nyt. Now, here's what's important about this. This is slander. She actually has. She actually has a legal case against Morris Katz for slander. He has said, I demand. I demand you lie for me. I am going to, you know, I am going to destroy your reputation. Maybe it's not slander.

[B]

I don't know.

[A]

Maybe it's not slander because he didn't do it. Or maybe he did do. I guess he did do it. I don't know what he. This was very impolitic of Morris Katz to do this, obviously, and raises questions about his viability as somebody you can have as your. Even though he seems to be very skilled in his own barbaric, evil, communist

[C]

way

[A]

at getting far leftists elected or getting them the kind of attention that they need. But, I mean, this goes to show that there is a take no prisoners approach that the DSA people have that maybe puts the negative politics, the negative campaigning of the 1970s and 1980s to absolute shame that they are. We always heard Lee Atwater, he always figures out ways to go negative on people. And it's really terrible. And this is like, these are like baby steps compared to the, this goes

[B]

back to the original Bolsheviks. The left don't care about norms. The Neft, the left, they don't. It's. I mean, the left is too broad. Socialists don't care. They just want power. That's why when we had that brief period after World War II, all the Bolshevik parties in Eastern Europe won because they were willing to do things up to and including killing occasionally their rivals. That liberal minded parties in mind using that small l don't do. That's why you can't let them in the tent. It's the same reason why it was an enormous mistake to allow Hamas to run in the 2006 or 2005 legislative elections. And this was a huge mistake that Condoleezza Rice and George W. Bush made. You just, you have to. And this is a huge mistake that Democrats are making. This is called an entryist strategy. These are. I don't wanna. It's a parasitical movement. It's like, they're not like, hey, we'll have some socialists in New York. And then, you know, you'll have some like, no, they wanna take over the Democratic Party because they know that if the ds, if it's just the dsa, they will forever be a minority party. So their strategy is to take over by any means necessary. The Democrats. And Democrats should get their act together. The remaining ones who are not hardcore socialists who would rather attend a Pakistan Day parade than an Israel Day parade, for God's sakes. Which is what Mamdani just did. This is like, okay, we see it now. Don't let them in your primaries. Fight them. Come on, stop playing dead and rolling over.

[C]

But you know, there's something else going on here aside from this sort of cutthroat negative aspect, which is that just when you look at the whole Platner phenomenon and the accretion of red flags in every direction, extreme ideology, horrible things he said about American troops, the, the, obviously the, the embrace of the Nazi iconography. And now, and now we're, now we're on to, you know, sort of online sleaze or whatever, this spectacle of trash and sleaze all the way down is just a stunning if. It doesn't make him. If this, if this, if the, if the accretion of this is not disqualifying for him, that says something remarkable about where we are here. I mean, even his wife's defense when she came out to comment after this, it was disgusting. I just respect the F out of him. Of course, she said, you know, she didn't say F. She said the word. All of it is just garbage. And it's like, you know, I'm not a prudish person. And obviously you have to acknowledge that Trump opened the door here or gave it a big kick when it was ajar. But this is the point. We are at some sort of tipping

[A]

point where

[C]

everything is permissible, nothing is disqualifying, and that's frightening.

[D]

Okay, well, you mentioned Trump and kicking the door open, and, you know, I agree to a certain extent. But then there's this. What I always say is, do you have. What does this mean to you as a voter? Like, if a voter or a political commentator says to me, well, Trump did this, okay, I mean, but you. Your standards, your personal standards. Have your personal standards changed about marital infidelity and Nazi tattoos or whatever? I guess we're not. Trump doesn't have a Nazi tattoo. So let's just. We're talking about, you know, being a sleazebag. Have your personal standards about how to treat your wife, have they changed because Trump changed? So then it doesn't. Shouldn't matter what Trump also did.

[B]

This is beyond marital infidelity, which has been a problem.

[D]

I know, but I'm just saying the people who are minimizing it and saying that, oh, Trump did it, and the Republicans before that said, oh, Bill Clinton did it. And my point is just. But you have your standard, your personal standards changed, or have you decided that whatever Trump does is the new standard?

[A]

But there's an answer. The answer is yes, everybody's personal standards have changed. Everybody in America's personal standards have changed. And the answer, in my view, does go back to Clinton. And it goes back to the fact that Clinton tested liberal. He tested his side. First of all, he said something. He lied. He said that he hadn't had an affair with Monica Lewinsky. Everybody on the planet knew that he was lying. And the issue here for Democrats and liberals in 1998 was if we accede to or turn on him, then the world is going to be turned over to these Christian zealots and monsters led by Newt Gingrich, and they are going to eat our rights and take everything away that we care about. And so we're sticking with him. And we will say that it's okay that we'll say Monica Lewinsky is a liar. We'll Follow Sidney Blumenthal and believe that Monica Lewinsky wasn't telling the truth. We'll say that any investigation into his personal life is an outrage, and so on and so forth. He tested them, and the test was the politics matter more than character. What he'll do or what the other side will do is more important than the idea that it matters how a president comports himself and what that means for the country at large. And there is no Trump without Clinton. There is no. There's literally no Trump without Clinton. Trump used Clinton against Hillary Clinton by bringing the eight women who accused him of sexual misconduct to that debate. And then you have the evangelicals and all those preachers who screamed about marital infidelity and all that, excusing Trump and saying Trump was fine, comparing him to King David, saying he's like David, you know, which is a great way to acknowledge the sin of someone is to say that he committed the same sin as one of the great figures in history. And they still excuse it. They still say that all of this is okay. And so this is where we are, is we are not as a country and as political actors or people who are the most involved in politics this generation. Morality is over. Personal conduct is not a disqualifying act for anybody anywhere. If you are involved in politics, I don't think that lasts. I think there is going to be some kind of a major American revulsion that comes after this baby boomer generation finally exits the stage.

[C]

Oh, boy. I don't mean to interrupt. I'm so scared of the opposite, though, because the baby boomer generation remembers a time where you at least paid tribute to the fictions of morality. What follows are generations and generations who are all using the same apps, who are intrigued by the extremist ideologies,

[B]

who

[C]

haven't been raised as serious moral participants in civic life. So I don't know who's gonna be around to bring on this backlash. I hope you're right, obviously. But this is my deep concern, is that Platner sort of represents something generationally here, which is, I think, part of why his conduct is not disqualifying.

[A]

Okay? But when moral changes happen, they happen because a new group of people says, this is all disgusting. Stop it. And we have these periods of history. I don't mean the moral Great Awakenings. I'm not just referring to religious revival, but the Sherman Antitrust act and the behavior of Theodore Roosevelt as president was about the fact that wealth was being concentrated. We talk about this and income inequality, all this, but that wealth in America was being concentrated in the hands of 15 people. There was one person, JP Morgan, who himself was worth 2% of the nation's GDP. The entire country said, no, something's going on here that has to stop. So politically, stuff like this happens. We have explosions of moral. We have these spasms of moral reaction. Like the MeToo movement. You could even say the Black Lives Matter movement was the post Watergate period.

[B]

There were a number of reforms of that period.

[A]

Right, exactly. So can it happen? Sure, it happened. And Trump, by the way, as he exits the stage, is a perfect almost once the focus on him is gone. Almost like Roosevelt dying. And then we pass the amendment limiting the presidency to two terms. We can harden the emoluments laws, we can harden the nepotism laws so that people can't work for administrations. We can harden all kinds of things once the person who was the direct target of that misbehavior no longer clouds the view of people who have to vote on legislation later. That happens all the time, or even not with legislation.

[D]

I mean, maybe there's a parallel theory here along these lines where, because Trump is so distinctly good at getting away with what he does, that we've seen other people try to mimic Trump in other ways and completely fail. Right, Because Trump is. There's. There's just Trump. Trump is Trump. There's only one Trump. He has a way and that and. And that's it. And it doesn't work for other people. We've watched, you know, Trump get elected while other crazy Republicans get rejected or something like that. So maybe there's a parallel concern here where it just will stop working. I mean, maybe that's too much to hope. But along those lines of once Trump is out of office, as you say, we can strengthen the emoluments clause. Also, maybe once Trump is out of office and there stops being somebody who keeps getting away with it, people won't try to get away with quite as much as they're getting away with now because it's harder for most people to.

[B]

The thing with Trump is that he was a class traitor. He was a billionaire who rubbed elbows and went to the Clintons, and the Clintons came to his wedding to Melania. He was somebody who was part of this elite, and then he packages himself, particularly in 2016. But I think you could argue it starts with that 2011 White House Correspondent's Dinner when he is humiliated by Obama after he dips his toe in with birtherism. But he's somebody who is saying, listen, the people who are at the very top of our society are a bunch of hypocrites. They are scoundrels themselves. Everything they say, they're full of s. And I am going to restore the country to you, the people. And that was kind of the typical populist line. And it resonated. And why did it resonate? It resonated in part because of his ex friend scandals like Jeffrey Epstein, where you see that there were people who did terrible things, who were at the very top, who had accumulated extraordinary amounts of wealth, who got away with it pretty much. And that has had an effect where it's okay to be a scoundrel if you were opposed to that.

[A]

Okay, but you're right. But what did he do? He said, I know it's all corrupt because I was there. You have to set a thief to catch a thief. You have to set a scoundrel to catch the scoundrels. And then in his second term, he is now to. All evidence suggests that through various modalities, he is now doing what he accused them of doing.

[B]

Absolutely.

[A]

In the swamp, he is arranging, helping arrange his son's billions in crypto and this and that and the other thing. And so his critique has now been, you know, has now been validated on both sides. He said basically the liberal establishment that is incredibly hypocritical and does this. And now he does it, though he's not particularly hypocritical about it. And now when he leaves the stage, there won't be a Trump and there won't be a liberal. The liberal establishment is somewhat discredited. He'll be somewhat discredited or he'll at least have passed from the scene. And then everybody can get together and say, no two terms, as I say about Roosevelt. Like, Roosevelt shouldn't have served four terms, but he did. And no one was gonna stop him then. But the minute that he was gone, the norm was reestablished, you know, without any objection from anybody, anywhere. And so I think that this. We're gonna have basically the boomer presidents will have discredited boomer morality, ideology, behavior, hypocrisy in some way or other. That's where I sort of disagree with Abe. I mean, they got it all. They got the 60s, they got the post 60s, they got to run the country, they took over the businesses, they did this, they did that, they did the other thing. And now Epstein class, Trump emoluments, Hillary wiping her server with a cloth, all of that stuff. And they're all bad news. And it is time to close the generational book on them and restart morality anew.

[B]

There's one residue though, which is that what was the lesson that TRUMP Remember after 2012, the Republicans did their own autopsy and they said, we have to reach out to Latinos. And then they nominated the guy who did the Cinco de Mayo tweet with the Taco Ball from Trump Tower. And the lesson was, no, you win by fighting. And that's what Graham Platner, that's the appeal. Because you see a bunch of people that you think that you remember two years ago would have decried Nazi tattoos and going on teen dating sites and everything like that. They would have said, absolutely not. We have standards, we're the good guys, Trump is the scoundrel, et cetera. And now they're all getting behind Platner. What happened? This is their lesson that the Republicans Learned in the 2016 cycle, which is you win by fighting. And it doesn't matter what. All that matters is that you win and you fight hard. And that's. And it turns out that he got even more Latino votes or whatever, you know what I'm saying? So the similar thing is happening, I think, on the Democrat side. So you're seeing the pod bros who are all in for Platner and all in for destroying Israel and all in for all these Epstein class nonsense. They're all in for it because it's like they've internalized the thing that they once were revolted by seeing their fellow Republicans. And so we're kind of seeing that, especially with this cycle, which is why it's actually incredibly important beyond Maine and beyond the Senate, that if Susan Collins wins, then that is an important lesson that. No, actually you can't do that. Trump is a one off.

[A]

Look, I think we have no, that analysis is absolutely correct, but it is situational. It is in response to certain given realities of the United States. And as you know, my great hobby horse over the last 10 years has been that we still haven't, we don't understand the once in a generation effect of the 2008 financial meltdown, which is the real explanation for Trump's rise, the real reason of the discrediting of the sort of Obama, the idea that Obama, who won the election six weeks after, you know, everything melted, the day of the meltdown, and that he comes in and he oversees sort of the response that does not do anything to help people over those eight years. And in fact, Democratic Party is decimated at the state and local and federal level, losing more than 1,000 seats. Elected seats from 2009 to 2016 because of this. So he had the response that he failed. Trump failed on the COVID response. Biden failed on the cognitive response. Trump is now, I think, gonna fail on the greed or moral enrichment response. And so what's left? The people who are going to take the lesson that what you should do is fight and fight and never fight and always fight and never fight, that's fine. And they are taking the right lesson at this moment. And all that fighting is very serious. Whether that persists or whether there is a kind of national revulsion at what it was that we surrendered to on all sides, it's very possible. People, like stopped smoking. You know, 60% of the country smoked in 1992 and 17% smoke now. I know that sounds like a ridiculous analogy, but do people's personal. Do these moralities change? Yes. Do people's reactions to things that they accepted in life alter themselves? Yes. And so I think that's something to look toward because Graham Platner is either, as Abe says, is sort of like a new low, the gates and we're going lower and the boulder is rolling further down the hill, or is it like, oh, my God, this is the moment at which we better slam on the brain and start to like, get a chain at the top and start pulling the rock.

[D]

So how does that happen today is the question.

[A]

It doesn't happen today.

[D]

Who pulls the chain? Right.

[A]

Without a monoculture, it can't happen today because Trump is sitting there distorting the field. And Democrats are right to say that their sole purpose now is to block Trump's efforts. That is politically correct and advantageous and is going to be the thing that wins them in 2026. I mean, I think that's inarguable. And then Republicans have to defend him because they got nowhere to turn or sort of defend him or do whatever. Whatever isn't joining the Democrats in this. But 2028 represents an entirely new world and 2032 really represents an entirely new world because, say, the Democrats pick a Trumpian, a left wing version of a Trumpian, or like a radical, anti establishment, anti Trump establishment person like AOC or something like that. You think that person just becomes the next leader of America? No, that person is going to face the whirlwind as well. And we already have examples. We have how many presidents in the last. Bush was defeated after one term, Trump was defeated after one term, Biden was defeated after one term. We have not established that presidencies are going to have two terms. Forever. And so that's as I look forward. This is my answer to Abe's. But Abe could also be right in that we're basically, you know, we have slouched toward Gamora as we're in it.

[C]

Well, I mean, you know, I think the new low, the Platner future, if there is one, will be a disaster. So. Right, so, so, so at that point.

[A]

Right, yeah.

[C]

At that point, someone from either party or a critical mass in either party has to come forward and say, we've got to get on track here. We've got to get to the business of governing and being serious and being serious people, because we are in a dire situation.

[A]

Look, I just also wanna point out that there have been moments of clarity even in this terrible period where voters say no. Right. Roy Moore versus Doug Jones in 2018. So Roy Moore not only sort of like the most performative, you know, right wing moralist, putting the Ten Commandments on a big slab of rock outside the courtroom house and all of that, and then is revealed to have basically been a teenage girl chaser in his 30s. And basically people said no. And in the reddest state practically in

[D]

the country, that's a key part of this. Who said no. There were Republicans, establishment Republicans, Republicans who are seen as conservatives in the state who said, don't vote for this guy. I, that is one thing, and that is one thing I have not seen with Platner and El Sayed in Michigan and maybe even we'll see with Hamaui in New Jersey. But one thing I haven't seen is Democrats saying no country over party. You can't vote like, this guy's a scumbag. So if it means that the other party gets elected and we learn a lesson, then I guess that's what we need to do. But one of the, one of the Roy Moore aspects of this was you did have, again, you had them with Trump. Trump steamrolled. If we all remember, we were all. There wasn't like we, you know, in 2016, like he'd even noticed we were there standing athwart. But there were people who said, like, ah, this is, this is too far for, you know, my party, my movement, my ideological cohort, whatever. That's one thing we have not seen. Not once. If I'm, I understand. Jake Washington did say that. It's not that nobody says, but nobody is saying if it means elect the Republican, elect the Republican, or if you have to vote for the Republican to teach the party a lesson, vote for the Republican. That to my knowledge, hasn't happened once.

[A]

And the worst part of it, and this is the worst part of it, is that the thing that we thought, we hope, particularly with Democrats, that we would have hoped would have been disqualifying, which is either flirting with or outright antisemitism, turns out not only to not be a disqualifying thing that leads establishment Democrats like the show Mayor of Jerusalem Chuck Schumer to say no way. That El Sayed guy should not be the. I do not want him in my caucus come 2019. He's an anti Semite, he hates me. He wants to kill Jews. He supports the killing of Jews. He is not. Schumer's mouth is shut. Right. And so that's the thing that is

[B]

there was one race, the Galindo woman in Texas managed to get a lot of Democrats to say, wait a second, I think only in the last camps for Zionists where you castrate them. That's a little too far for me. It's a little too hot to handle.

[A]

But that was a primary, by the way.

[D]

They found the line.

[B]

It was a primary.

[A]

So another Democrat won instead of her. Like that's not a right. But I mean that's like she was obviously like a clinical, paranoid, schizophrenic psychopath. Like that was a reasonably easy call.

[D]

But also since she didn't win the nomination, we don't, we never got to the stage where you had Democrats saying if it means electing a Republican, then it means electing a Republican.

[A]

Yeah. Okay, so

[C]

because we talk about like, you know, Trump's contribution to this, when say the Access Hollywood tapes came out, there was a huge eruption on the right of people who said this is

[A]

Paul said that Trump should resign. Right. Yeah. I mean, so the speaker of the

[C]

House and when you take a case like Graham Platner here, there's not a peep on the left. It's all about trying to put him back into an acceptable box, trying to cover it over, explain why he's really a good guy, why it's really okay, and you know, and whatever else.

[B]

So can I point one other thing out that's along those lines? The evolution of Trump is such that in this cycle he has been a bit of a norm enforcer. He came out against Massie, obviously for self interested reasons. Marjorie Taylor Greene turned on him, but he's managed to sort of excise her from the party. He's had a break with Tucker Carlson. So to Trump's credit, he has actually been a bit of a gatekeeper with the very kind of alt right tendencies that we fear as American Jews on the Republican side that he. In that respect, I'm pleasantly surprised. So let's credit Trump there.

[A]

But I mean, the bulk of the party has accepted Trump's bad behavior as something that is a positive.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

And that is a huge moral problem for the country and is a. Is. Was hypocritical. Is. Given that they. A lot of these people were moralists who denounced Clinton and didn't vote for George W. Bush in 2000 because he had had a drunk driving charge 24 years earlier and that kind of thing. And that for them to say that Trump is fine, I mean, it's all bad. It's all bad. But that's true.

[B]

But specifically on American Jews, I'm gonna go out on a limb here, and I'm gonna say that what the Democrats are doing right now, I believe will have a generational effect on American Jews, which is that for what, nearly 100 years since FDR, Democrats were the home for Jews and Jews. They're not a lot of Jews, but they raise a lot of money and they're very generous. And I think what we are seeing now will change that trajectory. There will be the. As a. Jews like Alex Soros who will still give money to progressive left wingers and Democrats, but for the most part, that kind of institutional base of Jewish fundraisers that was a given for Democrats for a century. I believe that's over at this point. And I'm basing that empirically on just talking to people in that. I'm sure we've all had those conversations as well. So.

[A]

So here we have to bifurcate. We're going along here, but bifurcate. So will the Jewish vote go Republican? I don't know. It could. We've been talking about it for a generation. Probably won't, whatever. But the importance of Jews in American electoral politics has to do with their generosity, their commitment to the political system, their desire to put their money where their mouth is and get candidates elected. And yeah, I mean, we've already seen. We've seen since October 7th, a sea change. We're talking about people now who number in the tens of Thousands, not the 5.2 million. Tens of thousands is a lot, but let's say 5,000, like important givers. And a lot for a lot of them. I mean, this is something to watch over time because it's, of course, comic in a weird way that Democrats are targeting aipac, Right? They're targeting aipac. They're targeting. Targeting aipac. Okay, good Luck. Like you're gonna win. You're gonna target aipac, you're turning AIPAC into bad guys. Then everybody who gives to AIPAC is gonna be like, I have no home in this party anymore. Those are people who love Israel. The American Jewish community is overwhelmingly supportive of Israel, even if they don't like Netanyahu's government. Like that is just simply a fact. And so, yeah, I think a lot of this is going.

[D]

If the American Jewish community produces the Morris Katz's, then we have a responsibility to also do what we can to counteract the Morris Katz's.

[A]

Fair enough. All right, well, we will leave it there. Be back tomorrow for. Thank you, Eli, for joining me.

[B]

Thank you for having me.

[A]

I always love coming on and everybody should go read at the Free Press. Eli's two drinks with Ben Shapiro. He went, flew to Boca Raton. Ben was drinking some disgusting

[B]

Jerusalem martini.

[A]

Jerusalem martini, which is apparently like a martini with grape juice or something. I don't know, something. He said it was a girly drink. That was the most appalling part of it. The rest of it is not appalling at all, but it's.

[B]

And also I did a, an Elbridge Colby profile recently.

[A]

Yes, a long profile.

[D]

The Bridge. The Bridge. The Bridge profile is excellent. Highly recommended.

[B]

Thank you very much.

[A]

Thank you.

[D]

Yeah.

[A]

Yes. And Eli did it without burning the bridge.

[B]

No, I don't feel like I did burn the bridge.

[A]

You didn't burn the bridge. Okay.

[B]

All right.

[A]

So thank you, Eli, and for. All right, thank you for Abe and Seth John Podhoritz. Keep the candle burning.