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- [00:04]
Abe Greenwald
Hope for the best, expect the worst Some preach and pain Some die of.
- [00:14]
Jon Podhoretz
Thirst the way of knowing which way it's going Hope for the best Expect.
- [00:21]
Seth Mandel
The worst Hope for the best.
- [00:25]
Jon Podhoretz
Welcome to the Commentary Magazine daily podcast. Today is Wednesday, March 5, 2025. I am Jon Podhoritz, the ed of Commentary magazine. With me, as always, Executive Editor Abe Greenwald. Hi, Abe.
- [00:37]
Seth Mandel
Hi, John.
- [00:38]
Jon Podhoretz
Senior Editor Seth Mandel. Hi, Seth.
- [00:41]
Matthew Continetti
Hi, John.
- [00:42]
Jon Podhoretz
And Washington Commentary, columnist and Director of Domestic Policy Studies at the American Enterprise Institute and the author of the the 100 year battle for American Conservatism, Matthew Continetti. Hi, Matt.
- [00:54]
Abe Greenwald
Hi, John.
- [00:56]
Jon Podhoretz
So that was quite a show we watched last night, an hour and 40 minutes of the Donald Trump show. And apparently, if you watched it, according to Both CNN and CBS, you loved it. 76% favorable impression among CBS polls. The poll by CBS who watched the speech, 69% on CNN. That's not unusual. These speeches have now become partisan events. People tend to tune out the president that they don't support, don't want to watch the president they don't support. Biden got favorable reviews for his States of the Union. This, of course, not an official State of the Union, but I think there was something special about this State of the Union. And so I would now propose and like to discuss with everybody the idea that what Donald Trump needs to do for the rest of his presidency is go and solely give speeches and rallies in berserk Democratic neighborhoods. Park Slope, Takoma Park, Los Feliz, you know, I don't know where the Mission District in San Francisco, Portland, downtown, where Chop was. He is so blessed in his enemies and their behavior toward him. He should go on msnbc. He should literally go on Rachel Maddow three times a week. He is blessed in his enemies. He does something alchemical, alchemistically to them that redounds to his benefit in the most remarkable ways. I don't think that speech would have had the popularity numbers that it had had it not been for the Pavlovian response of Democrats to. To him, which, of course, really set a new standard for misbehavior in the Congressional chamber. I mean, not since Charles Sumner, you know, Kane or the guy Kane, Charles Sumner. I don't we've ever seen anything quite like this in my lifetime.
- [03:10]
Abe Greenwald
Involved.
- [03:11]
Jon Podhoretz
Yeah, Al Green of Texas had a cane, was shaking his cane at Trump, and he's a year younger than Trump. It was like a little, you know, maybe don't look so old. They kept cutting to very old Democrats as I was watching the Speech like you cut to sort of Nancy Pelosi who now has this kind of also has surgery, rictus and a cane. And then Rosa DeLauro with her purple hair and this kind of, I don't know, you know, Baba Yaga look, Schumann, Durbin, right? I mean, just James Clyburn. James Clyburn.
- [03:46]
Abe Greenwald
The Democrats were either old and decrepit or crazy social justice wine moms from the suburbs wearing resistance T shirts and holding up bizarre props saying Elon Musk steals or squad members like Rashida Tlaib with a whiteboard. And then Ilhan Omar sitting silently as the president awarded a Secret service Designation to a 12 year old cancer survivor greeted by silence.
- [04:20]
Jon Podhoretz
13 year old.
- [04:21]
Abe Greenwald
I'm sorry, 13 year old greeted by silence by the Democratic Party.
- [04:25]
Jon Podhoretz
But this is exactly my point. Okay, let's talk.
- [04:28]
Abe Greenwald
No, here's my point, here's my point. The Democrats thought they were going to troll Donald Trump.
- [04:32]
Jon Podhoretz
Yeah.
- [04:34]
Abe Greenwald
What possessed them to think that this was possible? What possessed them? He was so ready for the disturbances. They were telegraphed in Axios the morning of the speech. The Democrats told Mike Allen, this is what we're going to do. We're going to have props, we're going to stage walkouts, we're going to disturb the speech. And Trump was ready for it and he just played into it. And the idea that you could out troll the troll meister is completely filled with hubris. And so this was a terrible night for the Democrats. I thought it was a good night for Donald Trump. It was a terrible night for the Democratic Party.
- [05:12]
Jon Podhoretz
I, I honestly, I mean, you put it right and they were ready and all of this, but it is sort of like, here, let me hold up a baby. Why don't you throw some, why don't you throw an egg at a baby? Here's a 13 year old cancer. So here's a kid who was desperate to get into West Point. Welcome into West Point. Like, it's not like they didn't know what he does. He did this every State of the Union. He turned every State of the Union into an Oprah. You get, and you get a car and you get a car. Was his fifth speech before a joint session of Congress. There's nothing new here in his, how he structured this, including, by the way, the last, the final peroration of the speech, which sort of like Melania Trump's plagiarism of somebody else's speech was literally the ending of the inaugural address that he delivered 43 days earlier. Our settlers went across the uncovered wagons and now we're going to go to Mars. So it's not like Trump has innovative game.
- [06:20]
Matthew Continetti
Yeah, but that was 43 days in human years. Dog years. How it feels.
- [06:27]
Jon Podhoretz
Yeah.
- [06:28]
Abe Greenwald
I have another question. What happened in those 43 days? Because at the inaugural, the Democrats did join the honor procession. The Democrats did participate. Amy Klobuchar was there. Chuck Schumer was there when he signed the documents making him our 47th president. They didn't even join the procession when he came down the aisle. As is typical of our history, and I just want to take a step back for a second. The history of State of the Union, or State of the Union, like speech interruptions, really begins in the modern era with 2009, Obama's speech to the joint session on Obamacare and the Congressman Joe Wilson screaming out, you lie. Now, that was what, almost 16 years ago. And that was greeted as though Congressman Wilson had committed treason against the United States of America, him shouting out and contradicting Obama in the midst of this address. You contrast that behavior with what happened last night. And if I have to say, if the shoe was on the other foot, the Democrats and the media would be melting down about how the Republican Party had destroyed the norms of American democracy.
- [07:53]
Jon Podhoretz
They did melt down about clap.
- [07:55]
Abe Greenwald
They did not walk down the aisle with him. They screamed and yelled. The old man with the cane had to be escorted from the building. Why?
- [08:05]
Seth Mandel
I want to add to this, just so it doesn't get lost in all this. Before the speech, don't forget there was this scripted Democratic campaign of videos where you had them all saying, s that ain't true. Yeah, right. If you talk about the destruction of norms and the degradation of political discourse and also another sort of failed trolling effort. I mean, a really cringy, horrible idea in and of itself.
- [08:40]
Jon Podhoretz
Well, so they did say that everything was broken when Marjorie Taylor Greene, either last year or the year before last. Remember, she was wearing this white coat with a fur collar and she stood up and started yelling at Joe Biden from her seat. And that was of course, one of those moments when both Democrats and non maga Republicans said, that woman is crazy and behaving grotesquely.
- [09:12]
Abe Greenwald
We've become a certain number of disturbances.
- [09:15]
Matthew Continetti
Importantly, in that sense, if you remember, Biden was ready for it. Biden, the, you know, sleepy Joe who was barely there by the end, was prepared for what? For the taunting that he got and the interruptions that he got. He parried it well, and we all talked about it the next day that he was ready for it and he Seemed loose and whatever. So if Joe Biden was ready for Marjorie Taylor Greene and all that, what would make you think that Trump could be surprised by it?
- [09:49]
Jon Podhoretz
So this is an interesting thing that we're about here because, of course, it is only 43 days. And Trump did make wild claims about the success of his first 43 days. Said it said people are saying it's the best ever. And the only person that compares in number two is George Washington. I don't actually remember that. George Washington's first 42 days were a particular moment in time that people go back and remember. Someone should write a book on that, introducing an activist presidency. That's not, not quite the model that you would.
- [10:28]
Abe Greenwald
But, you know, when he says that now. Yeah, all the Republicans laughed and a lot of the Democrats laughed, too, including Mike Johnson and Vice President Vance. I thought the facial expressions of Speaker Johnson were once again my favorite running commentary on the speech. Last year's speech with Biden, he would frown. He. Sometimes he had a frightened look on his face by the way Biden was acting. It was kind of an amusing commentary to watch Speaker Johnson this year as well, though he would laugh. He obviously got annoyed by the disruptions from the Democrats, which, by the way.
- [11:07]
Jon Podhoretz
I mean, but he was also set. He was also ready. He had the actual proper language to insist on the removal of Representative Al Green, the guy who was shaking and screaming and shaking his cane. He, he had a text in front of him and he said, in accordance with Rule 211B, please remove representative Green from, from the chamber. So, like you say, because Axios had prepped them, they had their script ready. And I don't even mean they're like social script, like Irving Goffman. Social script, like procedure. Yeah, they had, had the, they had their.
- [11:47]
Abe Greenwald
But even the Al Green, the more explosive moments were just one of a pattern, one piece in a pattern that was ongoing throughout the speech. Our friend Ben Shapiro commented on X today, he was in the chamber. He said, if you weren't in the chamber, you didn't get the full picture of what was happening. Throughout the speech, they were yelling or talking over President Trump. Some of the social justice wine moms who are now in Congress would leave dramatically in the middle of his remarks. And we saw some of them, some of them were wearing Resist T shirts.
- [12:22]
Jon Podhoretz
No, they had. So they had regular. They had like jackets on or something. And then when they got up to leave, they would take off their jackets. You could see the resist on the back of their. But. But the camera work did Not. Did not do their. Do the job because you only saw it for like half a second.
- [12:46]
Abe Greenwald
Yeah.
- [12:47]
Jon Podhoretz
Because the camera was.
- [12:48]
Abe Greenwald
Well, what's the job of the camera work at this speech is to show the president give his address.
- [12:52]
Jon Podhoretz
Right.
- [12:53]
Abe Greenwald
It's not to show that the. The fact that the Democratic Party in Congress has become the equivalent of Code pink.
- [13:00]
Unnamed Speaker
Right.
- [13:01]
Jon Podhoretz
So I have to.
- [13:02]
Matthew Continetti
Literally pink. Because they were wearing pink glasses, a lot of them. I have to say. I have to say that last night set a very high bar for the upcoming McGilla reading at my synagogue on Purim. I don't know how to top what we saw last night. Last night with the costumes and the sketches and the shtick, as we would call it. So maybe it was just, well, depending.
- [13:25]
Abe Greenwald
Talking over people.
- [13:26]
Matthew Continetti
Talking over people.
- [13:28]
Abe Greenwald
But.
- [13:28]
Matthew Continetti
Yes, that's right.
- [13:29]
Abe Greenwald
But.
- [13:29]
Matthew Continetti
But depends on your shul.
- [13:31]
Jon Podhoretz
At some shuls, Heyman will be Al Green, and at some Shuls, Heyman will be Trump. It depends on your ideological coloration.
- [13:39]
Matthew Continetti
But there is, but there is a thing here that, you know, in 2015 or 2016, right when it was first getting started, our friend Leo Leibowitz wrote this piece. He. He. He called Donald Trump America's last vaudevillian. And this was like, right at the beginning. And that's really what it was.
- [13:57]
Abe Greenwald
Right.
- [13:58]
Matthew Continetti
I mean, that was. It was. It's. It's more like being at, you know, one of those Poconos hotels where you have a host who is sort of a comedian, but also gives out prizes, but also, you know, takes part in the. Introduces people, but also takes part in the show and whatever. That's very much what he is like.
- [14:20]
Jon Podhoretz
And so the Poconos. Did you say Poconos? Shame on you. It's not the Poconos. Our own Abe Greenwald has a. Has. Has a. Has a deep familial connection to the Catskills. It's the Catskills where the Tumler with the prizes and the. And the. And the. And the barbed insults to the. To the guest who eats too many blintzes.
- [14:42]
Matthew Continetti
Isn't Kutchers in the Poconos?
- [14:44]
Seth Mandel
No, but.
- [14:46]
Jon Podhoretz
Oh, my God.
- [14:47]
Matthew Continetti
I only went to.
- [14:49]
Jon Podhoretz
Do you have a fever? You are a very young man.
- [14:51]
Abe Greenwald
Fever.
- [14:53]
Matthew Continetti
I only went to the.
- [14:54]
Jon Podhoretz
What's going on? What I. Time for a re education camp for you, Seth Mandel.
- [14:59]
Matthew Continetti
My camp was literally in the Poconos.
- [15:01]
Jon Podhoretz
I know your camp was in the Poconos, but the hotels were in the. What was called the mountains. That's the Catskills.
- [15:08]
Abe Greenwald
The cat skills.
- [15:09]
Jon Podhoretz
Okay, but, but you make an important point, which is, you know, there was that jaw dropping moment when he goes into his thing about how he wants to bring peace to Ukraine, which I maybe we can get to later, and then says, oh, well, maybe all you are applauding Ukraine. You want the war to go on for five years. Oh, yeah, look, Pocahontas wants that. It's like, you don't heckle Don Rickles. What are you, an idiot? Like, A, he's got the microphone, B, the camera's on him, and C, he is so much as. Matt, you say he's so much better at it than you heckle the pro. Like the pro. That's like putting a target on your forehead. Don't do it. The thing you want to do is not make eye contact with the. With the insult comedian. Don't make eye contact. Look the other way if he's scanning the room for you, because then he is going to make a lunch of you. And he made a lunch of them for an hour and a half.
- [16:15]
Abe Greenwald
You know, I thought it was interesting that the one extended part where they were relatively silent was when he was cataloging all of the wasteful spending that Doge has found. But that was also a comic bit because he would go through item by item, and they were crazy. And as he said, there are crazier ones there, too. But the Democrats, I think they were holding up the Elon Musk props, but that wasn't captured by the cameras. It was an interesting moment where, again, I think that the. The Doge stuff lands in D.C. very differently than it lands elsewhere around the country. And when Democrats certainly are going to defend the rights of federal workers who are. They're in many cases their primary constituents, they can't really have a defense against the type of spending that Trump was laying out.
- [17:11]
Jon Podhoretz
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- [18:50]
Unnamed Speaker
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- [20:46]
Matthew Continetti
Well, and also his, he had, he had punchlines for those. Yeah, it was funny on the, you know, it was like, you know, he made a joke about the sedentary migrants, whatever that is. Like that.
- [20:58]
Abe Greenwald
Well, I also think sometimes he had trouble reading what was on. And so I'm not sure what the sedentary migrants, but he made it funny. He also had, he was very funny when he was talking about Lawfare. And he said, you know, the president would go against his primary opponent, like me, and then he'd go on and, I mean, it was a, I think it was an engaging performance, which is one reason it got such accolades in that SNAP poll you mentioned.
- [21:27]
Jon Podhoretz
So Abe and I had a disagreement. I wanted to go to the funny part. So Abe thinks that Trump is funny. Abe has always thought that Trump is funny. He's lost on me. His humor is mostly lost on me. But last night, for the first time, I think like in forever, he made me laugh out loud. And Abe, you didn't like was when he said, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, for the nation of Lesotho, which no one has ever heard of.
- [21:55]
Seth Mandel
That's me.
- [21:57]
Jon Podhoretz
So Lesotho. For people who don't.
- [22:00]
Seth Mandel
It's a fascinating geographical reality.
- [22:03]
Jon Podhoretz
Lesotho is the donut hole. If South Africa is a donut, Lesotho is a donut hole. It is a country inside the territorial confines of South Africa. And it's oval shaped, it's not round, but there's nothing like it on the map of the globe. And therefore, if you sort of look at a map, you're like, what the hell is that? That's how you find out about, about Lesotho.
- [22:31]
Seth Mandel
But it's a country of a couple million people, so to say the American President said, I've never heard of it is. I don't like that.
- [22:42]
Jon Podhoretz
Okay. Carol Markowitz on Twitter said she'd never heard of Lesotho. I just want to point out.
- [22:47]
Abe Greenwald
So is that how it's pronounced?
- [22:48]
Seth Mandel
I always thought it was.
- [22:50]
Jon Podhoretz
I thought it was. That's.
- [22:51]
Abe Greenwald
I agree with Abe. I had thought that, too. He did.
- [22:55]
Jon Podhoretz
So he did.
- [22:57]
Abe Greenwald
Maybe he's never heard.
- [22:59]
Jon Podhoretz
To our listeners, how do you pronounce it In. In zosia or.
- [23:03]
Seth Mandel
Well, I have to admit, until he said it, I think I had only ever read it, never heard it pronounced.
- [23:08]
Jon Podhoretz
So, okay, so there you go. So, so, so he's right. You've literally never had a conversation in your time here on Earth in which the name of the country that he made a joke about has ever been spoken in your presence.
- [23:25]
Seth Mandel
Never been Spoken, but I'm aware of it.
- [23:27]
Matthew Continetti
So from your perspective, it was basically the asshole countries type of comment.
- [23:32]
Jon Podhoretz
Yeah.
- [23:33]
Matthew Continetti
And I think, I think a lot of people from yours, right, And I think a lot of people saw it as like the Becky, Becky, Becky, Becky stand situation with Herman Cain and the, and the, you know, countries. You've, you know, who's the president of Uzbekistan, you know, and he was asked or whatever, and he was calling out that sort of what he considered a gotcha question.
- [23:53]
Jon Podhoretz
Look, you should never, you should never analyze humor too closely because it's like you rip it apart, you make it unfunny. But the point, if you're, the deeper point is Democrats are saying, my God, what are you doing with, with, with foreign aid? This is so terrible. It's so important. Lives and what about lives? And then he goes into this list of these preposterous grants being given out in US Foreign aid, most of them very small in size, but nonetheless at the taxpayer's dime. And then he gets to this, which is, here's a grant that's going to a country and you haven't, no one's ever even heard of the country, let alone the grant money that is going to people in this country that you never heard of, meaning nobody in America, you know, practically is from Lesotho. Nobody, nobody knows anybody in Lesotho. What are we giving money to this Lesotho? Like it doesn't, you know, that's the thing where it's like, well, why aren't we spending that money in, you know, in McAllen, Texas or something? It kind of makes the point on its own. I'm just saying I'm not generally inclined to laugh at Trump's humor. And so that was the one moment that he kind of got, he kind of got to me. Now, how about the Oprah moment? The Oprah moments. Because it was like that was the trolling of all time. I mean, what happened there? And Abe, you mentioned the 21 congressmen saying exactly the same thing. And someone did this thing on social media where they clipped together everybody saying exactly the same thing, which was like that ad on TV from years ago, which was he tells someone and then he tells someone and then it turns into the Brady bunch and then 100 people are saying the same thing. But Trump engendered something like that on social media with what happened. But it was organic. No one had to plan it, which was they can't even stand for a 13 year old cancer survivor or they can't even applaud when he introduces the wife of a murdered police officer. They can't even stand for the wife of a murdered police officer. Nobody had to advance maga or even the right, the generalized right to say, what the hell is the matter with you people? I remember John Boehner when he was the speaker of the House during Obama's States of the Union, when Obama would deliver the applause line that was like, let's hear it for our troops, or whatever it was, right? And he didn't want to have to stand up and applaud for Obama, but he would get this kind of, like, rueful grin on his face. It's like, all right, here we go. And then he would stand up and he would sort of do the little kind of like, you got me. I'm applauding for you right behind you. And I'm a Republican thing, because that's what you do, right? There was no cue for that. Maybe if Pelosi, maybe if a Democrat had been in the chair, it would have been different, you know, because there was Vance and Vance and Johnson and the chair.
- [27:12]
Matthew Continetti
When Pelosi was in the chair. She ripped up his speech.
- [27:14]
Abe Greenwald
No, at the end of it.
- [27:15]
Jon Podhoretz
Yeah, at the end of the speech. But somebody like Pelosi would have had the political, as you might say, to say, I guess I should probably stand up and applaud for the. For. Here's the wife of police officer murdered on Long Island.
- [27:31]
Abe Greenwald
You know, I think Pelosi and Jeffries seemed really sad and broken during the speech. And I think their disappointment was not just about Donald Trump, who they obviously despise. I think it was also about the behavior of the House Democratic Caucus, because sometimes during the disturbances, the cameras. I was watching the Fox Feed cameras would clip, would cut to Pelosi, and she wouldn't. She was not getting into it. You know, she didn't seem that she was very happy about some of the behaviors that she was. She was witnessing from her own side. Clearly, she doesn't like what Trump is saying, but she just seemed, you know, she's aged. She had a fall. She has a cane now. And I just looked at all these Democratic leaders who were the point of the spear against Trump during the last term. They're broken. And Jefferies is young. He's never been in this position before. Just kind of sat there, you know, I, I look at this Democratic Party. What do they have? What are their issues? Trump did a long extended thing on biological men and women's sports. He, he. And he singled out that poor girl who had been hurt in the head.
- [28:53]
Jon Podhoretz
Traumatic brain injury from a brain injury.
- [28:55]
Abe Greenwald
From the volleyball spike.
- [28:57]
Jon Podhoretz
Yeah.
- [28:57]
Abe Greenwald
By a biological male on the other team. And the Democrats just sat there and they don't, and they don't support something that over 70% of the country supports, which is saying that girls sports are for girls, biological girls. Immigration, the same thing. We've seen this huge shift in public opinion toward controlling immigration. The record of success from this administration in its first six weeks on the border is remarkable.
- [29:30]
Jon Podhoretz
What are the Ukraine, Nothing. You know who said that at 6 o'clock I saw on one of those advances of the speech, Mark Warner, the senator from Virginia, who said, I think we should all acknowledge that the remarkable things have happened at the border. That's a politician with his finger in the air understanding where the wind is blowing, who's running for reelection next week, re election. Right. So I think you look at, I think as, as I'm, as we're talking about this, that 2019 was the moment that broke Pelosi. And then she had a kind of revivification because Biden won because she attempted to assert norms on the Democratic side twice in 2019 and lost both times and basically handed the party to the squad. Right. The first was the effort to sanction or censure Omar. Was it Omar? Yeah, it wasn't Ilhan Omar, it was Ilhan Omar. So she went for saying it's all about the Benjamin, you know, doing this anti Semitic thing. And in, in the meeting of the House Democratic caucus, newly minted 2018, people who had got said, I'm not, we're not attacking this. This is why are we giving in to them and attacking. And she didn't get what she wanted. And she did not want to impeach Trump on the perfect phone call. She did not. She did not want to do it. She didn't want to go there and the party made her do it. And she, that was the moment at which the sort of like, don't you understand the potential negative consequences of an impotent impeachment are worse than the satisfaction of casting the vote to impeach? And don't you understand that we need to be able to say we're willing to impeach our anti, we're willing to censure our anti Semites. That gives us power to go after theirs and to say that we are upholding the civility and principles and practices of American politics while Donald Trump is tearing them down and the Democrats are like, no, no, no, we don't want to do any of that anymore. And last night was the essential fulfillment of what it was that she was worried about in 2019, in my view, was that the ha. That the, that the party is now turning into a crazy charnel house. So you have behavior and self destructive behavior.
- [32:07]
Seth Mandel
And so, you know, on this thing of them not standing for a kid who survives cancer or the wife of a murdered policeman or whatever it is, in their mind, they're thinking, well, to stand when Trump says it is to normalize Trump's presidency. So that's why they can't stand for it. Right. But all it looks like to everyone else is that they're not standing for a kid who survived cancer.
- [32:37]
Jon Podhoretz
They also, because what was happening was happening in the balcony. They didn't see the video. That was the heart, that was the gut punch or was the thing that, you know, basically forced tears to your eyes unbidden, which was that little boy hugging, like hugging the head of the Secret Service who had handed him his Secret Service badge. I mean, and the look on the head of the Secret Curtis, the head of the Secret Service's face as the boy hugged him. DJ Daniel. It was just, you know, I mean, it's, it's a, it was a, it was a stunt. It was a kind of, was exploitative, like the end of Terms of Endearment or something. But I mean, if you were watching it on tv, the heartlessness of people not responding to him, like quadruples in intensity, but they didn't even know it was going on because it was going on above their heads and they're not watching it on tv.
- [33:38]
Abe Greenwald
I want to make a comment about this is not normal because one of.
- [33:42]
Jon Podhoretz
The Democrats, Michelle Stansberry.
- [33:46]
Abe Greenwald
Is that who it was?
- [33:46]
Jon Podhoretz
Yeah.
- [33:47]
Abe Greenwald
Wrote on the card.
- [33:48]
Jon Podhoretz
Yeah. She had a card as a card.
- [33:51]
Abe Greenwald
This is not normal. That she tried to place over the shoulder of the President of the United States as he walked down the aisle of the House of Representatives to deliver a message to the joint session of Congress. I mean, this is second grade behavior. All right? Moreover, it's completely wrong. It is normal. I'm sorry, guys, let's get with it. He's been in our lives for a decade now. I have spent a decade waking up every morning thinking, what did Donald Trump do today? What am I going to say about it? How will people react to it? What might happen tomorrow? We have to just realize that this is our life, this is our country. He is the President. He was reelected. He won every single swing state. He won the popular vote. And so the Democrats are in this time warp where they think it's still 2016 and they still think it's 2017. And the pussy hat march in Washington, D.C. when it's not, the country has left them. And I think you're right. I think there are some Democrats like Mark Warner, who's facing reelection, who's going to say, yeah, immigration is important and we should acknowledge there's been progress on the border. I'm sure John Fetterman thinks the same thing. But when the camera panned to that side of the aisle last night, I saw, honestly, a Democratic Party I do not recognize at all. It is a Democratic Party of the far left of the university campuses of.
- [35:24]
Jon Podhoretz
So you do recognize it. You just don't recognize it as the kind of center of the opposition, like.
- [35:31]
Abe Greenwald
The majority party of the United States of America for over 100 years. Yeah, that's this broad span working class party that had every single type of person in it, that had men in it. It's weird, you go, you pan to the side of the Democrats, there are very few men. You look at the. Then they show the Republicans, it's everybody we go back to. And it was the same thing at the convention that I noticed. So this is a party that really has to try to understand the rest of the country and shows no signs of doing so at this point, at this early point in Donald Trump's second term.
- [36:07]
Matthew Continetti
And I think that there's also a basic rule of this stuff in politics is you have to have a sense of humor. That's like a simple thing. You know, when Reagan said that line when he was debating Mondale and he said, and the age thing was working against Reagan in the campaign. He's so old. He's so old. And Reagan said he wanted to address it, it. And he said, I just want everybody to know that I will not hold my opponent's youth and inexperience against him. Yeah, Mondale laughed.
- [36:39]
Jon Podhoretz
Yeah, but Mondale laughed. Yeah, but you know what? That was Mondale, that was the moment that everybody in America knew that Mondale had lost.
- [36:47]
Matthew Continetti
But that was because of the line. The line was, you know, you have to be able to say, okay, this guy, like, he won that round. You have to be able to give him a victory every so often. He sometimes, you know, he, he checkmates you with these things because he has an advantage. And when a Democrat is in that position, giving the State of the Union or the State of the Union, like you have also the ability to call people up and, you know, and have everybody. You have to be able to just.
- [37:16]
Jon Podhoretz
Say, all right, look, fair enough. Life is long. This is one day out of a presidency that will last, you know, more than a, you know, 1200 or 1300 days. Right. But it's one day. It's one night. So, yeah, you can behave civilly and you can get back to being a ferocious, vicious opposition the next morning. That has sort of been a common understanding, but that isn't quite the way things work anymore. Remember that Joe Lieberman lost the Democratic nomination for Senate. The guy who had been the vice president and presidential nominee of the party in the election that the party won the popular vote in in 2000. And in 2005 or 2006, George W. Bush hugged Lieberman on the floor of the Capitol chamber when he came in to give his State of the Union. And that moment alone led Lieberman to lose the primary in the Democratic Party for the Senate in Connecticut that he was the incumbent of. He went on. Went on to win the election as an independent. But the stakes supported the Iraq war. Well, but, I mean, that's why. No, I know, but it was that. That was the moment that crystallized where Ned Lamont said, I got my. I have a real shot here. And it was that picture that was used to raise $20 million against Lieberman in a very small state and all that. The stakes are very high. If you're caught on camera laughing when Donald Trump makes a joke, and you have somebody who might be to your left in your safe seat who can primary you next year, maybe it's not safe for you even to crack a smile.
- [39:12]
Abe Greenwald
Look, I mean, not clapping is one thing. People do that all the time. Not standing is one thing. People do that all the time. Acting like fools is a completely different category. And they acted like fools, beginning with not coming down the aisle with him.
- [39:28]
Jon Podhoretz
Yeah.
- [39:28]
Abe Greenwald
You know, I mean, that's just bizarre.
- [39:30]
Jon Podhoretz
Yeah.
- [39:31]
Abe Greenwald
And I just. On the issues, too, it's, you know, one problem.
- [39:34]
Jon Podhoretz
There were 300. There are 300 Democrats in that chamber. Right. I mean, there are 215.
- [39:39]
Abe Greenwald
Right.
- [39:39]
Jon Podhoretz
Democrat or whatever. There are 250, 260 Democrats in that chamber. So a bunch of them acted like fools and a bunch of them acted, like, solemn. You know, I'm just gonna, like, sit here and pretend I'm a. I'm a. I'm a stone and, like, not do anything and not say anything. And, of course, the ones who did that had, you know, were impotent in the face of the misbehaving people, and they're gonna get blamed for the misbehavior. I'm just saying that I think there is a risk. The reason that Melanie Stansberry held up the thing saying this is not normal is that she's gonna use that image to raise money for her next campaign, next year in New Mexico, for her House race, or if she wants to run for governor or for senator. It's to create a viral moment. Right? The only way you can't do that, the viral moment could go against you if you look like you're not treating Trump as though he's Hitler. But 76% of the people who watched the speech ended up on his side.
- [40:45]
Abe Greenwald
Well, and that might work if she's in a. If she's in a deep blue district. But the Republicans have won the national House vote for the past two cycles. The Republicans are underrepresented in the House of Representatives because of gerrymandering in New York and California. Donald Trump's approval ratings are above water. His issues, particularly the border DEI and gender ideology, are far more popular than even he is. So the politics of trying to make a viral moment by suggesting that Trump is a fascist or he's a dictator and democracy has ended in the United States works only in certain contexts. And in the broader context, I don't think it helps the Democrats at all.
- [41:36]
Unnamed Speaker
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- [42:54]
Jon Podhoretz
Look, you're probably right. And by the way, Stansbury, who did the one who held up the sign that said this is not normal. It does not, like, have her district running away. She won 56% of 44. You know, 44% in, in, in 2024, she. And she was the incumbent. That's not like, that's not like safe, you know, rock rib number for her. So I, I don't know what her political future is. What I do know about her because we, I added an article about her yesterday that is the first time I'd ever seen her mentioned is that she is the ranking member of the Doge Committee in the House, the chairman of the Doge Committee being. Yes. Marjorie Taylor Greene. And there was a hearing on Monday that we are going to have a piece about in the next issue of Commentary about USAID and funding and whether or not USA American monies went directly to basically to Hamas and Stansberry tried to defend was standing there defending federal workers and USAID against this, against the testimony that was kind of open and shut about how this money had been misused and misspent. So I'm only bringing that up to say I don't, I didn't know who she was before. I now know who she is and she's from Lesotho. Okay. Fair enough. Okay. Do we want to go to, do we want to go to Substance Now?
- [44:35]
Abe Greenwald
Sure.
- [44:36]
Jon Podhoretz
Was there any substance?
- [44:38]
Abe Greenwald
Well, it was.
- [44:39]
Matthew Continetti
Are you saying the substance or are we still in the Oscars or.
- [44:42]
Jon Podhoretz
Look, substance is a really, really, really good body horror movie. If you can take body horror, go watch it. It's now streaming. It's pretty horrifying. But so there's my review of the Substance. Now, Seth, Matt, what do we make of the substance of the 9,978 word speech that was that we watched last night while, you know, wanting to go and run, run away at many moments.
- [45:09]
Abe Greenwald
I think he outlined the Trump agenda. I think it was a very typical on message President Trump, he went piece by piece, common sense, culture, border economics, then foreign policy. What I thought was most interesting was in the first half of the speech he said several times I'm attacking inflation. So I think there was an acknowledgment there that inflation is one of the main reasons that he won reelection and really his signal task. And so he mentioned the energy piece, he mentioned the cutting spending as a means of reducing inflation. He mentioned the egg crisis and he told Secretary Rollins to get on it and to fix it. And good luck, Secretary Rollins, she has a plan. She outlined it in the Wall Street Journal last week. So I thought that was very important. So I wasn't substantively new. Trump sticks to his script in terms of the points he wants to make even as he ad libs. And there is one other funny moment I should mention which was in his list of the, you know, the, the overaged centenarian Social Security recipients in Doge. And we know that people are debating that. And we have an expert at aei, Mark Wacharsky, who's written on it and tried to explain what's happening there. But as he got older and older and older, he said, he said something like, wow, Americans must be in better health than we thought, Bobby, huh? And they cut to Bobby Kennedy. And that was a moment where I was just reminded of the Trump coalition and how unusual it is that here we have this president returning to office after four years out of power, and he has brought with him now ex Democrats like Tulsi Gabbard and like RFK Jr. And RFK Jr. Is not just an ex Democrat. He is a political leader of his own movement.
- [47:25]
Jon Podhoretz
And as Trump did in a funny moment, I thought you would have applauded. His name is Kennedy.
- [47:31]
Abe Greenwald
Yeah. Did he say that too?
- [47:32]
Jon Podhoretz
Quickly they forget.
- [47:34]
Abe Greenwald
Yeah, quickly they forget.
- [47:35]
Jon Podhoretz
He said at least you should applaud him, his name for his last name. Yeah, Again, like, you know, don't heckle the insult comedian.
- [47:46]
Abe Greenwald
That was my takeaway. It was the Trump message. As it stands now, the agenda he wants to pursue that is targeted toward this coalition. I will say the more traditional Republican part of that coalition, really what they're getting right now is the energy piece. And he mentioned Chris Wright, our Secretary of Energy, or at least the cameras cut to Chris Wright at one point. He mentioned the great team. He did mention Chris Wright and Doug Burgum by themselves, but he said he has a great team. So the traditional Republicans right now are getting energy deregulation. He talked about he's going to cut 10 regulations for every new one. And the taxes, which of course, depends on Congress to pass.
- [48:30]
Seth Mandel
And drill, baby, drill.
- [48:33]
Jon Podhoretz
Right. That's the energy.
- [48:34]
Abe Greenwald
Liquid gold. Yeah, liquid gold.
- [48:36]
Seth Mandel
You know what's interesting, I think on the substance point, when Trump talks about the social issues, particularly when he talks about the trans stuff, and when he talks about biological males and female sports, he goes right at it without any. He doesn't try to say, look, I'm inclusive, but this can't stand.
- [48:57]
Jon Podhoretz
We love you.
- [48:58]
Seth Mandel
Everyone should be them, you know, as perhaps I would imagine someone like JD Vance would think to do. Trump doesn't do that at all. And it's extremely effective, actually.
- [49:10]
Abe Greenwald
No euphemism.
- [49:11]
Seth Mandel
And it's what scares the hell out of the other side.
- [49:15]
Jon Podhoretz
So there we go.
- [49:16]
Matthew Continetti
We should also note, by the way, that he, substance wise, he answered Christine's question asked 12 hours earlier on yesterday's podcast. Which was, will he make the argument explicit that there will be some pain from the tariffs and there will be some adjustment period. But you have to sort of stick with me. And he did make that. That was the other substance.
- [49:41]
Jon Podhoretz
There will be disturbances.
- [49:42]
Matthew Continetti
There will be disturbances. And he said it happened last time, he said. Had bought his. He said had Biden enforced the tariffs and everything last time, it would have, you know, would have been even better. We would have been able to get through. But he did say. He did suggest there will be some pain. And he did make the argument that it will be well worth it in the long run. And I guess we'll see, you know, whether people have the patience for that or not. But he did make that argument.
- [50:10]
Jon Podhoretz
So let's talk about the Foreign policy section, which was very short, or the Foreign and Defense or whatever, the international portion. So as Matt would say, the territorial expansion is on. He was basically saying to people, the. The 11 people who live in Greenland, you'll really enjoy being Americans. He said, we're taking the Panama Canal. And he made some reference to Canada being the 51st state. So the territorial expansion, the idea that he's going to be the first president in, since, I don't know, 1898 or something like that, to actually acquire land. Acquire land for the United States, which I think. I think it was 1898, wasn't it? I mean, we got the Philippines as a result of the, The Spanish American War. Yeah, I think. And then obviously we don't have the Philippines.
- [51:06]
Abe Greenwald
Hawaii was in the 1890s.
- [51:08]
Jon Podhoretz
Okay, so. So, so the. For the. So we're gonna. We're gonna somehow expand out America's holdings in, In. In the world. We're taking options basically on. On this. So that's on. And then he mentioned a golden dome. He wants a golden dome, meaning he wants missile defense.
- [51:28]
Abe Greenwald
The Iron Dome. Yeah.
- [51:30]
Jon Podhoretz
No, he calls it a golden dome.
- [51:31]
Abe Greenwald
He calls it the Golden Dome now. Okay, right. Because Iron Dome for America.
- [51:34]
Jon Podhoretz
And he's Trump. And of course we know what his apartment looks like. So he wants the golden dome. He likes gold. He likes gold plate and he likes gold leaf and he likes gold stuff. And then he said something interesting, which he said, Ronald Reagan wanted it, but the technology is not there. And now the technology is there and we should have it. We do kind of have it. We don't have it. You know, we don't have sort of like a network of it, like Iron Dome. But of course, Israel is a very contained area, and the missiles that are aimed at Israel are Mostly low hanging fruit, so you can shoot them down from the ground. The whole thing about Star wars, of course, or the SDI was that it was going to have to be space platform based anyway. It's an interesting thing.
- [52:33]
Abe Greenwald
Israel's developing a laser technology to shoot down.
- [52:36]
Jon Podhoretz
Right, Right.
- [52:36]
Abe Greenwald
I think that's what Trump's referring to. Well, so when he said the technology wasn't there.
- [52:42]
Jon Podhoretz
Right.
- [52:42]
Abe Greenwald
It was the, you know, Star wars was a space based.
- [52:45]
Jon Podhoretz
Right.
- [52:45]
Abe Greenwald
Laser defense.
- [52:47]
Jon Podhoretz
Right. And so the whole thing is now we're in a position maybe to do space, space stuff. But that's sort of an in. That was an interesting. I mean, he's been, he's been making reference to it through, through the campaign. He made reference to it, but there was like sitting there along with his other favorite, which is that we need to go to Mars, which I don't know why we need to go to.
- [53:06]
Abe Greenwald
Mars, but Elon says we should.
- [53:08]
Jon Podhoretz
Okay. And then there was the Middle east and Ukraine and there was very little about the Middle east which was striking because we had been led to. I don't know who led us to believe it, but we were led to believe that he would talk about the. He said, we're going to get the hostages home. But it was literally two sentences. And I'm going to make the argument now that this is part and parcel of the pro Israel, pro BB strategy or pro Israeli government strategy here, which is he know he does not want to be a pressure point for the continuance, even though it's part of the Witkoff framework of the ceasefire forever. He's saying Israel, we're on Israel's side, hostages bad, we need to get the hostages home. Abraham accords are good, things are going to get better. They're going to get better. And he's not saying until every last hostage home, Da, da, da, da. Here are the hostages. That stuff, as he may understand, actually shackles the Israeli government from freedom of action because of the horrible Hobson's choice that is in front of the Israeli government, which is we can't keep fighting until we get the hostages out. And there's no reason for them to let the hostages out because that keeps us from fighting. What are we going to do? So in that case, I think that less was more and that people who are disappointed that he didn't focus on it, if they are believers that the war needs to be won against Hamas and not simply dribble out, should be thinking more positively about this than, than the kind of texts I was getting last night. And then there was Ukraine. He did something interesting on Ukraine, which is that he used Zelensky as his. As his defensive shield against the idea that he was misbehaving toward Ukraine. Well, how can you attack me? Look at the letter I just got. Just now. I just got this letter from Zelenskyy saying he wants peace. He wants peace. He wants to give us the minerals and he's willing to work with me. And he thanks, America. Pretty interesting. Again, canny, the whole speech and the whole approach of this administration. He's still himself. He's still inconstant and weird and does weird stuff and has instincts on matters like democracy and freedom that I find noxious. But they're so much better at this than they were before, figuring out that they could insert that letter into the speech to kind of throw the pro Ukraine forces on the back foot a little bit.
- [56:00]
Abe Greenwald
Or the letter had arrived and the letter had.
- [56:03]
Jon Podhoretz
Yeah, right, that's what I'm saying. But that the letter had arrived and that they put it in because they only got the letter at 3:00. They put it in to the speech.
- [56:11]
Abe Greenwald
Well, I do think that speaks to his desire to have the deal done.
- [56:16]
Jon Podhoretz
Right.
- [56:16]
Abe Greenwald
He wants the deal so that he can then move toward trying to get the negotiation on with Russia.
- [56:23]
Jon Podhoretz
Right.
- [56:24]
Matthew Continetti
And also, in contrast to the Israel issue, his side is not in love with Zelensky or Ukraine or any of that stuff. And it opens internal, you know, internecine battles that you really don't want to have on your own side, you know? You know, he. I don't think he wants to talk much about Ukraine at an event where Republicans are standing and cheering for him. You know, everything he's saying, I think he just doesn't want to open up a can of worms very much more than he absolutely has to.
- [56:53]
Abe Greenwald
And also, Americans don't care about foreign policy.
- [56:55]
Jon Podhoretz
They don't, number one. Number two, that's.
- [56:57]
Abe Greenwald
That's why he put it at the end. I'm just going to talk a little bit about it. We're going to be strong. Recruitment is up, but Pete Hegseth is back there and he's doing PT with the troops. And everybody's excited to join our new warrior cast. And we have Raisin Cain. You know, he's got a cool name. He's going to be the Chairman of Joint Chiefs. Chairman of Joint Chiefs. I've nominated him. And don't worry, we'll be fine. But the key thing that I want to tell the American people is I'm trying to Fight inflation. And I am going after woke like a dog with a bone. And I've closed the border. And those are very powerful messages at this moment.
- [57:37]
Jon Podhoretz
So finally, social issues, because we did talk about the transgender and sports and stuff like that. But he went further than simply the sports thing, which is sort of like a consensus issue. And there were two things I want to bring up and talk about how they represent a chasm between Democrats and Republicans, that the chasm is very dangerous for Democrats, in my view. One was that he introduced this woman whose daughter had been being secretly encouraged without her their consent or anything to transition in her grammar school or elementary school, using they, them pronouns and all this and that. And that she found out about it and put a stop to it and that, you know, thank God. And then Republicans applauded Democrats, of course, who were stoney. And then he said it is important for every child in this country to know that they are perfect as God made them, which dovetailed and connected to him saying later that he believed that he was spared in Butler, Pennsylvania for a reason, that God wanted him to live so that he could make America great again. And I saw on social media all kinds of people going, oh, does that mean that God wanted Cory Imperatori to die? Is that what you're saying? Or what is. And then apparently Nancy Pelosi leaned over to Hakeem Jeff, whoever was next to her and said, oh, my God. That he had. That he had had the audacity to say that God spared his life for a reason or to give him a purpose.
- [59:26]
Matthew Continetti
And he folded the Foley thing in, too, because the Foleys are residents of Butler, Pennsylvania.
- [59:31]
Jon Podhoretz
That's right. Fol the hostage, the teacher who was being held hostage by Putin for the sin of having a little pot in his bag 12 years ago. That was a very well rendered thing pulling Butler into that. But my point is that if Democrats really, really, really want to be known as the aggressively secularist party and they want to openly make fun of a political leader saying that God spared me for a reason and is giving me a purpose, 75% of people in the United States say they are believers in God. Believing that God takes a hand in human affairs is a subsection of belief in God and the purpose of prayer and that sort of thing. Now, maybe these aren't. That's. I don't advise.
- [60:28]
Abe Greenwald
Well, but moreover, John. Yes. Pew foundation announced last week that the slide, the decrease in people affiliating with Christianity in America has stopped.
- [60:41]
Jon Podhoretz
Right.
- [60:42]
Abe Greenwald
It had been on the downswing for some time, but it has stopped now and it's flat and perhaps even reviving again. And I do think this speaks to what we call the vibe shift overall. Whereas what Pelosi's comment or the snark from the cynics on social media would have been totally par for the course a decade ago, it's no longer the case. The country has changed and we noticed it, remember at the Republican convention with the different pop culture, the hip hop artists for Trump and the WWE aesthetic and the frat boys with the American flag. Maybe we thought that that had been suppressed or something during the joy explosion of the Kamala Harris campaign, which we now know was simply fumes. But that I think is what American culture is trending toward at the moment. And so it's perfectly in sync with Donald Trump's comment that he, he is a beneficiary or an object of providence. And I completely agree with you. Again, Democrats have to understand that this is now normal. And I think some people who are friends of us have to understand this is now normal.
- [62:07]
Jon Podhoretz
But it is normal. It would have been normal if Obama had said is. By the way, I don't even know that I believe that Trump believes it. I would would probably guess that Trump doesn't believe it. But it is more normal than not to be the President of the United States and say I feel God's. I feel that I have been called to help this country, that it's not me alone. Something got me here that is providential. That is by the way, not vainglorious. Which is the misunderstanding really of the, of the people who are saying, oh, so it's okay that Corey, you know, Imperatori died. It's that he's saying, or comparatori. Excuse me. He's saying I am an important, you know, I am an actor on this in history and maybe I hope God is working through me because that would mean that what I was doing would be blessed and not not. But you know, first.
- [63:17]
Seth Mandel
But it's not new. I mean even when George W. Bush would say things like that he would less. It wasn't that he was, he wasn't spared in that in the same way, but that, you know, he sort of believed in a divine guiding hand here and that, you know, he had, that he had an obligation to Democrats attacked him as being on some crusade, you know.
- [63:46]
Jon Podhoretz
Yeah, well, people said that Reagan wanted to bring about the end times because he was a believing believed in relatively standard Christian eschatology. You know, I mean that's not, this is A. This is a problem for the secularized liberal community in the United States and has been for 60 or 70 years and always had this weird break because there was Martin Luther King, there was the sort of, the pastor, particularly the African American pastor, who was a major figure in sort of American public life, including people like Jesse Jackson, whom people forget was actually a pastor, you know, and so you couldn't just wipe it away. These were people who, Al Sharpton, a reverend, you know what I mean? Like, you couldn't just wipe it away. And yet over the course of the last 30 years, there has been a desperate effort to wipe it away or to act as though anybody who talks about God or uses God talk is, is a psychopath or a, or, or, or something, or something worse. I think you could say that maybe Trump is Tartuffe, that is say somebody who talks holy and acts unholy. That's Moliere's great comment. A character, but, but not that he invokes or evokes God. And then that sentence, that one sentence saying our children should know that they are perfect as God made them is very powerful stuff because it also, it also uses kind of like left wing, mushy, New Agey.
- [65:31]
Matthew Continetti
Self esteem, body positivity.
- [65:34]
Jon Podhoretz
Body positivity stuff that was very much the province of the sort of the crunchy California left from the 70s onwards. So there's something unifying about it. In a weird way, you should think that you're perfect. That was actually Est Earhart training seminars. The first really popular kind of New Age self improvement game in the 1970s was you all should know that you're perfect. And the goal of our seminar here is to get you to stop thinking negatively.
- [66:09]
Seth Mandel
It was also weirdly, I mean, it was, it was kind of the, the spine of a lot of gay activism right up until the trans stuff.
- [66:17]
Jon Podhoretz
Right?
- [66:17]
Seth Mandel
I mean, born this way, you know.
- [66:21]
Jon Podhoretz
Yeah, I was born this way. And therefore don't, you know, don't, don't, don't, don't diss God.
- [66:26]
Seth Mandel
Yeah.
- [66:26]
Jon Podhoretz
And then God made me gay and therefore I should. I, you know, like that.
- [66:31]
Seth Mandel
And then the trans movement completely contradicted it all and got them jumbled up.
- [66:34]
Jon Podhoretz
So I will just end by saying I don't think it was a very good speech except in, you know, point. It was way too long and it was exhausting and all of that. But as a political moment, it might be something that we will be studying for decades to come as, as a representative of this, as the thing that showed the vibe shift that Matt mentioned made flesh. And the question is, how are Democrats going to behave next year when he goes before a joint session? Hopefully there will not be another joint session of Congress before next year with Trump there. Because if there is, that probably means there was a, there would, there will be a disaster or calamity or something absolutely horrifying happened that would result in such a thing being done. So let us hope that that is not the case. But, but next year Democrats are going to have to take a long, hard look at themselves and say maybe we got to take a different tack. Maybe, maybe. Or, or they're going to have to do a lot of fundraising for 2026 and they're going to want those viral moments to raise, to get, get the Soros money and act blue and all that to.
- [67:56]
Seth Mandel
But not the same Democrats who held up signs and had whiteboards. They are not throwing away their signs in their whiteboards. They might be changing them in for other gimmicks, but they're still one of.
- [68:11]
Matthew Continetti
Them is going to have to replace the one that the Republican grabbed out of her hand and took away.
- [68:15]
Jon Podhoretz
Or they might not, or they might not, might not show up. The Democrat who did the best last night was the one was the Democrat who was not in the chamber. That was Alyssa Slotkin and who gave the Democratic response and I thought was very good, like it was a very good speech. And for somebody who is a first term, like a first term senator with a very interesting political history, she came off to very good effect. I don't know that it has any long term.
- [68:39]
Abe Greenwald
Yeah, I had the reaction of the rest of the country, which is I went to bed and didn't watch her. So I think that will be how her speech is received.
- [68:47]
Jon Podhoretz
Yeah. But whatever it was, it was not the usual, oh my God, she really screwed the pooch on this one. It wasn't. And it wasn't Rubio drinking the water and it wasn't Kate, it wasn't Katie Britt in her kitchen. It was a very effective piece of mainstream.
- [69:04]
Abe Greenwald
So if I get you right, what you said is that Trump's speech was bad and Alyssa Slotkin's speech was good. Is that what I'm hearing from you, John? Because that's totally, I totally disagree with you. Yeah. Okay.
- [69:15]
Jon Podhoretz
You don't even know. You didn't watch Slug.
- [69:17]
Abe Greenwald
I have a prediction like Karnak the Magnificent. If I watch the, that speech after this podcast, I will not like it. And I did think the Trump speech is very good.
- [69:26]
Jon Podhoretz
Okay. I want to, we're going to address this. I think you're on sport. We're going to, we're going to address this. Okay, you watch it and tell me that it was a bad speech because I don't think, honestly, even if it.
- [69:36]
Abe Greenwald
Was a good speech, it was not as good as Trump's. I've saying it here first.
- [69:41]
Matthew Continetti
Okay, I can I, I have a recommend that's better than recommending the Alyssa Slot speech.
- [69:47]
Jon Podhoretz
Recommending the Alyssa Slot speech.
- [69:49]
Abe Greenwald
I just heard.
- [69:50]
Jon Podhoretz
I will not. Not a good speech.
- [69:52]
Abe Greenwald
Alyssa Slotkin speech. Very good.
- [69:57]
Matthew Continetti
Even, even better than Alyssa Slotkin's speech is, at least so far, is the new series A Thousand Blows on Hulu. This is Steven Knight, who created Peaky Blinders, has created a sort of follow up. This one is about the famous all women pickpockets in London's East End in the late 19th century. And it's very good and it's very, it's, you know, this is the elephant and cat, the famed elephant and castle neighborhood, you know, from which the DC watering hole gets his name on Capitol Hill. But it's, it's, it's the, the, the pickpocket troupe is real. The characters are, are not historical figures, but the crime ring is real. It was an all female crime ring and it's not an all female show. It's just a slightly different take on the sort of organized crime thing so that it doesn't play like a copy of Peaky Blinders or something else. It's jumping around historical periods and Aaron Dougherty, who. I think the only other thing I remember seeing her in was she was in the Crown. I think she, she was Princess Anne at one point. Right.
- [71:18]
Abe Greenwald
I don't know.
- [71:19]
Jon Podhoretz
I didn't watch the Crown.
- [71:20]
Matthew Continetti
She's, she's wonderful. Really wonderful. And so if you're looking for a historical, it's, it's violent, but the violence is mostly in the ring because part of the plot has to do with the, the bare knuckle boxing that, you know, that was done in London's East End at the time. So if you, the violence is, is unlike Peaky Blinders, it's not people or their faces blown off so much as, you know, getting them punched in. But it's a fun escape from things. If you were a fan of Peaky Blinders, as I was, this will, you know, at least tide you over until the Peaky Blinders movie that they're making comes out.
- [72:01]
Jon Podhoretz
So that's A Thousand Blows and it's on Hulu. Yep. Okay, we're back tomorrow for Matt, Abe and Seth. I'm John Pothorst to keep the camel burning.