A (2:38)

What does that mean?

C (2:39)

According to Google, in Capricorn, Pluto is Set on fiscal, material, and structural transformations, Capricorn knows of the traditional hierarchies and. And climbing to the top of them. Pluto is a planet that symbolizes power. In Capricorn, this is important. Pluto asks us to see the corruption that lays at the heart of our relationship to the Earth's resources.

A (3:02)

Oh.

C (3:03)

So I think this is all simmering. A simmering. We're ready for something new. And so when Pluto goes into Aquarius for the next 20 years in November, that is the same sign, if I'm not mistaken, or the same kind of situation that was happening during the American Revolution.

A (3:22)

Oh, all right. I'm excited.

C (3:24)

Every 200 years. Okay. So I'm just saying this is all, like, this is the final frontier. This is the last episode. This is the cliffhanger. This is, you've returned your apartment. You're just doing one last swoop around to make sure you got all the shit out. That astrologically is what's happening.

A (3:40)

Checking your hotel room for the.

C (3:42)

Yeah, checking. Checking the safe in the hotel room for, like, the shitty necklace that I, you know, I've had since high school that I left there.

A (3:50)

Dude, I love it. And the power of Pluto is coming into Aquarius, which is a super chill vibe.

C (3:55)

Super chill vibes. But it's also like, hey, we're not going to take it anymore. So it entered Capricorn in 2008. And what happened in 2008? Recession, you know, like, so many things. So this has all just been like, hey, look over here. We need to work on this. And I feel like this is kind of what's happening.

A (4:12)

I'm excited. Then this sounds great. I am a Capricorn Aquarius cusp. So shut up.

C (4:19)

You've been going through it the last 20 years.

A (4:21)

Then I feel the vibrations of the changeover to Aquarius.

C (4:28)

Yes, that's good. You should. And you should feel empowered now. All the caps out there, you've been through it.

A (4:34)

Okay, great. Okay. So brat. Summer's over.

C (4:39)

Yep. God, summer's over.

A (4:40)

Pluto, Capricorn is nigh. I'm excited.

C (4:43)

Me, too.

A (4:44)

Or, excuse me. Pluto, Aquarius is nigh. That's very cool. All right, well, there is the astrology update that no one asked for, but that we desperately needed. And, you know, in that vein, Dana's gonna be back tomorrow. I know everybody has been sending a love to Dana, and she sends her love back. We text all the time. And I think our last text exchange was me asking about where her friend gets her haircut, because it's the best haircut I've ever seen. So we're gonna.

C (5:11)

I wanna see this haircut.

A (5:12)

We're gonna get into. We're gonna get into a bunch of news. And then later today, we're gonna be joined by Steve Bennon. You know Steve Bennon. You know him, he writes the Maddow blog. He's a producer on the Rachel Maddow Show. We're gonna talk about his new book called Ministry of Truth, Democracy, Reality and the Republicans War on the recent Past. All about how Republicans are trying to rewrite history, erase what's actually happened, fill the, you know, infosphere with lies and gaslight, everybody. So it's very, very important book. And it's out just in time for the election. Just came out August 13th. It's available now. So everybody grab your copy. It's called Ministry of Truth by Steve Bennett. We're gonna speak to him. Biden's approval rating, I just found this out. Has jumped to 48%. I love this for him.

C (5:59)

And he's at the beach, girl. He's living his best life.

A (6:02)

That's a 13 point jump. That's huge. Huge. Wow. Yeah, I love the. I'm so happy for him. And he just did that great campaign event we talked about yesterday with Harris at the union. With the union. So on Labor Day. So fantastic. There's a new episode of cleanup on aisle 45 out today, but missing from that episode because this is breaking news today. A federal court has denied Trump's latest attempt to postpone his September 18th sentencing in New York State for his 34 felony counts in that election interference hush money case. In a last ditch effort to postpone his sentencing, Trump filed a Hail Mary motion to move his case to federal court again because of immunity. But he already filed that motion. He was denied last year. He didn't appeal. So to refile it, he would have had to get permission from the court or from Alvin Bragg. Alvin Bragg ain't fucking saying yes to that shit. So yesterday, Trump asked the court's permission to file it and the court came back just a few hours later and said, no way, Jose. Sorry, no. Denied his request and said, sir, this is a Wendy's. Well, basically it was. I'm not an appeals court, but you know, that.

C (7:13)

Is that even, like, proper procedure? Who is representing this man?

A (7:16)

It's Emile Beauvais and it's embarrassing. But probably the most interesting part of this ruling from this federal judge is when he said nothing. In the Supreme Court's opinion, the on immunity affects my earlier conclusion that the hush money Payments were private, unofficial acts outside the bounds of executive authority.

C (7:35)

And I. Oop, Is that a little bit of a preview as to what's to come?

A (7:40)

I think it might be, because this is the federal judge. Right, Hellerstein?

C (7:44)

Yeah.

A (7:44)

But Judge Merchan, the state judge overseeing this case, still has to decide on the immunity issue on September 16, two days before the sentencing. And I think having a federal judge say that these are private acts will make it a lot easier for Judge Marshawn to come out and say the same. So we'll keep you posted.

C (8:00)

But, yeah, I feel like that's. He's giving cover in a way. You know what I mean? Like, the federal judge, it's like, hey, so. Because, I don't know, aren't judges kind of like, they're not one to, like, want to make history? You know what I mean? They want to go with the precedent. Obviously, this is unprecedented, but it feels like if somebody above you is like, actually, then you have a little more wiggle room.

A (8:20)

Yeah. They usually want to uphold the law.

C (8:24)

Right.

A (8:26)

Except for some justices who find the need to overturn it and strip our rights away. But they'll pay. All right, we have a lot of news to get to, so let's hit the hot notes. Hot notes. All right, first up, I can't stop laughing at this. That's from the Associated Press. A Michigan judge ruled that Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. Must remain on the November presidential ballot, dealing a blow to his crusade to strategically remove his ticket from the battleground state. Kennedy suspended his campaign and endorsed Trump in August. And since then, he sought to withdraw his name in states like Michigan, where the race could be close, especially because when he's a part of the mix, Harris does better and Trump does worse. Now, at the same time, he's trying to remain on the ballot in states where he's unlikely to make a difference between Trump and Harris. Kennedy filed a lawsuit Friday in Michigan's Court of Claims against Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson in an effort to withdraw his name. And Michigan election officials have previously rejected Kennedy's notice of withdrawal. So we just talked about this yesterday. Or Dave with the North Carolina. Mm.

C (9:36)

This man is so bad at this. I don't understand who was like, you know what? I think you'd make a great president. Like, this is the NEPO Baby times 1000. Except, I don't know. Dare I say, most Nepo babies have a little bit of talent that rubs off, and none has rubbed off on this poor man.

A (9:55)

Yeah. And I think it's. I mean, the strategy, like, okay. He puts out the apb. He puts out the notice. Hey, Harris. Hey, Trump. I'll drop out and endorse either one of you. Harris is like, no, we're not even going to meet with you. And Trump's like, ooh, that's interesting. And then they go, okay. And they meet up and they say, okay, wouldn't it be great? We could have this unity thing. Or what about J.D. vance? Ah, fuck that guy. Doesn't matter. We'll have this unity thing between the Kennedys and the Trumps. Even though he's the only Kennedy in the history of Kennedys.

C (10:25)

Truly. Like, his whole family came on cnn was like, we don't claim them. We don't claim them.

A (10:30)

Yeah, like 9,000 of them. And there's so many Kennedys. And. And then. And then they were like, oh, shit, we should get my name off the ballot in battleground states because it'll hurt you. And now I've endorsed you. And we've held hands and played a song that we didn't have the license to play on stage at a rally, and we now aren't allowed to play it anymore. But, you know, I should get my name off the ballot. Oh, too late. They're already printed. They're already going on.

C (11:00)

I just don't understand this boner for power. Like, sir, you are wealthy. You can do whatever you want. If you're so obsessed with your legacy, you could do a million cool things. You could. You can pull a. Oh, well, what's her name? Jeff Bezos's ex wife. I hate that I don't instantly recall her name, but she is, like, giving away millions and millions of dollars. Like, incredible. You know, he should do that instead of.

A (11:26)

Or. Melinda Gates.

C (11:27)

Melinda Gates. Yeah. What are they doing? Come on.

A (11:30)

Yeah, it's weird to me. Like, what more power do you need?

C (11:36)

I don't know. Be a person club.

A (11:38)

They want that immune Oval office so they can just commit crimes all the time. That's what they want. All right, next up from Gabe Gutierrez at NBC Gold Star families did not invite President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris to Arlington National Cemetery last week to commemorate the third anniversary of the attack at Abbey Gate in Afghanistan. That's according to a White House official and Harris campaign aide speaking to NBC News. And that rebuts separate claims that made Sunday by Republican Senator Tom Cotton and former Representative Tulsi Gabbard. And so, basically, and you know, I've speculated on this, what went down was that Trump was like, let's do this. Let's film it. Let's say it was an official thing. And let's say that Biden and Harris refused to show up so that we can somehow say they don't like veterans and they got in trouble because they brought their own videographers. And then they pushed a lady and then it turned bad. So they're trying to rewrite it. And then they told Fox News like, hey, why don't you tell everybody that Biden and Harris didn't show up to this ceremony because they don't care about these, you know, war dead. And they did. And now it's just a whole fucking mess. But now that it's been confirmed that Harris and Biden weren't even invited, they didn't even know it was happening.

C (12:56)

Right. I mean, this is like the worst episode of, Of Love island and 90 Day Fiance and all of the other ones all mixed into one because it's, they're making all this unnecessary drama, you know, and it's not helping. It's just making them look worse. But I had a feeling that that's what happened, and I'm glad that somebody got to the bottom of it, but it's just gross. And unfortunately, the people that believed it the first time aren't gonna come back and be like, oh, no, I was wrong about that, you know.

A (13:24)

Yeah, that's pretty rare.

C (13:25)

Yeah.

A (13:26)

And NPR is now reporting that they know the identities of the people who were involved in the altercation, but they aren't releasing them for some reason, which is odd to me, because at any time a publication can get that kind of breaking news and you have it on sources. You would release it, but they don't want to.

C (13:47)

It's a photographer, right? How many photographers does he have?

A (13:50)

I don't know. Yeah. I don't know if it was the photographer or if it was someone that worked Lewandowski or La Civita or Chung or who. But NPR knows, and Jamie Raskin, by the way, is trying to get. Yeah. More information on it as well as Tim Kaine. This is from the Daily Beast. This next story, the youngest son of late Senator John McCain on Tuesday slammed Donald Trump's political appearance at Arlington and revealed he has become a Democrat who plans to vote for Kamala Harris. He said, quote, it was a violation. That's Jimmy McCain talking to CNN about Trump's actions at Arlington, where several generations of his family are buried and where partisan political activity is prohibited. McCain, who joined the Marine Corps at the age of 17, has served in the military for 17 years and recently returned From a months long deployment to a small base at the Jordan Syria border. He said. It blows me away. He's saying that about Trump's decision to use the cemetery as a backdrop for a campaign ad. These men and women that are laying in the ground have no choice.

C (14:52)

Yep.

A (14:53)

McCain, who has been a registered independent for several years, also said he registered as a Democrat weeks ago and he will vote for Harris in November. And he added that he, quote, would get involved in any way I could, unquote, to help her campaign.

C (15:07)

Wow, that's really powerful. I mean, and he's so right. You know, they don't have a choice. They died bravely for defending our country. And then just to be used as like a ploy is just really disgusting. I'm glad he said so. Yeah.

A (15:20)

And to drag out these gold star families or a couple of gold star people to say I invited Trump or whatever and I did this and I did that.

C (15:28)

Yeah.

A (15:29)

That doesn't mean that you get to, while posing in front of your kid's grave, stand on some other grave and give a thumbs up and a, and a yeah, Satan horns sign like she was giving. So it's just ways weird. So weird and disrespectful and they should know better. And you know, forever since the beginning of time, we've never had political conflicts about Arlington National Cemetery. And now, thanks to Trump, we do.

C (16:01)

So the bottom is bottoming lower and lower.

A (16:04)

Yes. The Pluto is the bottom of Capricorn.

C (16:10)

Scraping the bottom, baby.

A (16:11)

Trying to get out.

C (16:12)

Yeah.

A (16:13)

All right, next up from Jessica Piper at Politico, Kamala Harris's campaign and the DNC Democratic National Committee said Tuesday they're sending nearly $25 million to support down ballot Democrats, an earlier investment and far more money than the top of the ticket has sent in past elections. The newly announced funds come from both the Harris campaign and the DNC, with a total of 10 million each going to committees supporting Democratic candidates for the House and Senate. That's the DSCC and the DCCC. There's 2.5 million going to the National Democratic Group supporting state legislative candidates.

C (16:47)

That's huge.

A (16:48)

That's the dlcc. And a million each for Democratic governors, the Democratic association of Governors and the Democratic association of Attorneys General. So it's not just the state legislators. Not just the state legislators, but. And it's not just the Congress and Senate federally, but they're also sending these to governors and to attorneys general. That blows my mind. Now, the transfers to support down ballot races are notable, first of all, because of their Timing. And because of the huge amounts in 2020, the DNC transferred 5 million to the DCCC and a million bucks to the DSCC in mid October. And that's according to filings with the fec. Earlier money gives the committees more spending options. So this is much sooner. This is a month and a half before we did it in 2020 and it's five times as much money. And back then we didn't send anything to the state legislators or the attorneys general and governors. Meanwhile, Trump is spending tens of millions of dollars on legal bills and Laura Trump music videos.

C (17:55)

I guess it's gonna be at the VMAs best new worst new music video. This is so huge. Like I, we were talking about this yesterday how important it is to just ad nauseam, like until we are blue in the face, tell people about the down ballot people, because that's really what's going to affect your day to day living. And I think this is huge. And it's probably because she got such an influx of money when she stepped up and it was, I think, unprecedented, the amount of money she was able to raise within a really short period of time. So that just goes to show, like putting their money where their mouth is. They could have, like kept that, you know, up in their ticket. And the fact that they're spreading it around is really amazing. And they mean business.

A (18:43)

Yeah. And the way Trump is doing it is he's got his instead of that, you know, the Harris Victory Fund, he's got something called Trump 47. And he takes all that money in there. And then the second on the distribution tree is the Save America Pack, which is where he pays all of his legal bills and pays his witnesses to be quiet and gives them jobs and pays his witnesses legal bills. And then the RNC gets a little money after that.

C (19:11)

That's real dirty, man. I mean, yeah, that's dirty.

A (19:15)

It's dirty. And it shows he only cares about himself. Right? I mean, that's always, we've always sort of known that. Next up from Kate Brumback at the Associated Press. A federal judge in Atlanta ruled today that Donald Trump and his campaign must stop using the song Hold On, I'm Coming while the family of one of the song's co writers pursues a lawsuit against a former president over its use. The estate of Isaac Hayes Jr. Filed the lawsuit last month, alleging Trump and his campaign and several of his allies had infringed its copyright and should pay damages. After a hearing on the estate's request for emergency preliminary injunction, the U.S. district Judge Thomas Thrash. Nice. Ruled that Trump must stop using the song, but he denied a request to force the campaign to take down any existing videos that include the song. Tuesday's ruling was a preliminary one only. The litigation will be ongoing because Isaac Hayes III is seeking money damages for the estate as well. But there is this preliminary injunction. Trump must stop using it. So now what song is he gonna jerk off? Imaginary sky dicks, too? I don't know.

C (20:19)

They're gonna make a fake one. You know when you watch a low budget movie, Like, I was watching this low budget movie yesterday about, like, sharks and a bachelorette, and they clearly wanted to play, like, a Spice Girl song, but they couldn't pay for the Spice Girl song, so they made like, Love and Friendship. We Love to Dance. Like, it was like a fake song.

A (20:36)

Tell me what you need. I'll tell you what I need. Yeah, exactly. Totally.

C (20:39)

So I wonder if they're just gonna get one of those shit shitty. Like, I don't know.

A (20:44)

I love how some, like, sort of like, half assed casinos in Vegas, like, don't have license to play that music. So it's always like, next up, Britney Spears.

C (20:52)

Britney Spears.

A (20:53)

A Kidz Bop version with Hit me another time, baby. You know, sounding like that.

C (21:00)

Oh, I'm a genie in a carpet. Help.

A (21:02)

Like, it reminds me of the Janis Joplin musical on 30 Rock. But, yeah, he should be forced to use Lara Trump songs only.

C (21:11)

Oh, my gosh.

A (21:12)

Please. Oh, please.

C (21:13)

I'm begging. I'm begging.

A (21:15)

Be great. That would be great. So he's down to Kid Rock and he's that guy that does Proud to be an American. Yeah.

C (21:25)

That's all I know.

A (21:26)

That's fine.

C (21:27)

That's more than you deserve, Trump.

A (21:29)

They used to make us listen to that song at boot camp.

C (21:32)

Oh, no.

A (21:34)

Yeah.

C (21:36)

As everyone's punishment.

A (21:37)

Everyone's like, crying and I'm like.

C (21:41)

I mean, get a better version of it.

A (21:43)

I don't know.

C (21:43)

Give us an acoustic version.

B (21:44)

Yeah.

A (21:45)

Give me Whitney's Star Spangled Banner.

C (21:47)

Yeah, that's it. That's patriotic.

A (21:49)

Patriotic as fuck. Yeah. All right, next up, this is big. The Justice Department has announced criminal charges against Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar and other militants in connection with the October 7, 2023 rampage in Israel. The criminal complaint, filed in federal court in New York, includes charges of conspiring to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization resulting in death. I'll read the other charges here in a second, but Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement the charges unsealed today are just one part of our effort to target every aspect of Hamas's operations. And these actions will not be our last. So I reviewed the indictment. These are the seven counts. Conspiracy to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization resulting in death. Conspiracy to provide material support for acts of terrorism resulting in death. Conspiracy to murder US Nationals. Conspiracy to bomb a place of public use resulting in death. Conspiracy to use weapons of mass destruction resulting in death. And conspiracy to finance terrorism, and also conspiracy to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. So these charges were released, and Merrick Garland says there'll be more.

C (22:56)

So what I have a question. Why is it conspiracy to versus the actual doing? Because they planned it. And they don't know who executed the actual crimes.

A (23:07)

No, these guys executed the actual crimes, but the conspiracy charges, because there's more than one of them. There's more than one dude. They all got it.

C (23:15)

And other militants. Okay. Yeah. You said. Oh, okay. Copy. Yep. Yeah. That's huge.

A (23:22)

I mean, it should be life in prison.

C (23:25)

Right? If they. If they ever step foot in.

A (23:27)

Right. We would have to. It was like kind of like when Mueller indicted the Russians.

C (23:32)

Right, right, right, right.

A (23:33)

It's. We do it and then we put out a red notice. And if Interpol gets them or they go to an extradition country. Right, Bing. Anyway, I'm glad they did this. Next up, and our final story for today. And this is from Judd Leggum at Popular Information. An incredible story. A drug kingpin convicted for the murder of a federal law enforcement officer had his life sentence commuted By TRUMP On January 20, 2021, the last day in office. Why now? The man set free by Trump, Jamie Davidson, was accused by authorities of strangling his wife during a 2023 dispute. Convicted by a jury of domestic violence and In July of 2024, just this past July, was sentenced to three months in jail, according to court records obtained by Popular Information. Davidson's reoffense has not been previously reported. Judd Lagoon was the first on this. In the waning days of Trump's presidency, Davidson eschewed the office of the pardon attorney and sought relief directly from Trump. Davidson's attorney, Betty Shine, had deep connections to the Trump White House. Shine and her husband, Allen Fuder Foss, that should ring a bell. Represented people associated with the Trump Organization, including Donald Trump Jr. So Puderfoss is Trump Jr's lawyer, and his wife was this guy's lawyer. Now, Davidson's request for commutation also won the support of Alice Johnson, a woman whose life sentence was commuted by Trump after reality Star Kim Kardashian championed her case. Johnson appeared in a 2020 Super bowl ad supporting Trump's reelection. And her support of Davidson was highlighted in the White House press release announcing the commutation of Davidson's sentence. According to Johnson, Trump's daughter Ivanka and son in law Jared Kushner assisted her in winning Trump's support for Davidson and others, the prosecutors and Davidson's 1990 conviction. John Duncan was never contacted and was dumbfounded by the decision. And he said, quote, if you asked me for a list of people who nobody should give a presidential commutation to, Davidson would pretty much be at the top of the list. On March 31, 2023, a little more than two years after Davidson was set free by Donald Trump, Davidson was arrested in Orlando and charged with battery by strangulation and domestic violence. David was accused of attacking Nayeli Chang, his wife of five months. Davidson is the first person granted clemency by Trump known to be convicted of another crime. But he's not the only person Trump set free who has found themselves in legal hot water. The record raises serious questions about the atypical process used by Trump to grant pardons. Jonathan Braun, a New York drug dealer and predatory lender, was sentenced to 10 years in prison in 2019 for conspiracy to import marijuana and commit money laundering before being granted clemency by Trump. But Braun was arrested in August after he allegedly punched his 75 year old father in law in the head. His father in law, according to prosecutors, was trying to protect his daughter, who Braun was chasing after while the couple had an argument in their home. And Braun's wife told police that Braun had assaulted her twice in the past five weeks. So this, now I want to clarify that this guy, who the first guy that Trump set free and was accused of strangling his wife in 2023. The jury didn't come back with a guilty verdict for the strangulation, only came back with a guilty verdict for the domestic violence, which is why he only got 3 months and 12 months probation.

C (26:59)

Geez Louise, this is. So what I'm hearing here is because, you know, he did all of these commutations, like you said, at the 11th hour, just at the very. Unless he could get some good press out of it like he did, you know, via Kim Kardashian, et cetera. So it sounds like he. And from what I know about Alice Johnson, it was like a people had been fighting for her, right, to get her sentence commuted. Right. So it seems like he kind of snuck one past with her it feels.

A (27:33)

Like when he went to the Fyre Festival guy to see if he could recruit rappers to support his campaign. Do you know what I mean? Like, trying to be like, black people love me. I helped do the crime. Bill Kim Kardashian says so. And so I think he was trying to, you know, I think when, you know, Kushner or Fuderfoss or Junior or whoever came with his wife's client and said this could probably help that cause, but it went through. And we also know people were paying for pardons as well.

C (28:06)

Just bananas. We'll never know how many crimes he committed in office. I don't think we'll ever know. We'll just keep learning until we all die and that's it.

A (28:14)

Yeah. And then probably the next generation will learn the rest.

C (28:18)

Totally.

A (28:19)

Yeah. So that's just horrible and awful. But hats off to Judd Legume, who was able to pick up that story. New York Times then reported on it and gave him a hat tip, but didn't put a direct link to Legum's reporting. But you should definitely subscribe to popular information. There's a lot of good stuff in that newsletter. All right, everybody, we have to take a quick break, and we're gonna do the good news. But before we do the good news, I have this great interview with Stephen Bannon, who has his new book, Ministry of Truth, out now. So stick around. We'll be right back after these messages. We'll be right back. Hey, everybody. Welcome back. I'm honored today to be joined by the writer for the Maddow blog producer for the Rachel Maddow show, who, as you know, Rachel Maddow is a hero of mine. And we've covered his writing here on the Daily Bean several times, including this past January when he wrote about Republican Rep. Pete Stauber taking credit for Biden infrastructure money in Minnesota that he voted against. And again in May when he wrote about how Barry Loudermilk wanted to bring Cassidy Hutchinson in back in for questioning. We thought, be careful what you wish for there, buddy. But he's got a new book out now. It's called Ministry of Truth, Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans on the Recent Past. It came out August 13th. It's available now wherever books are sold, and it's a New York Times bestseller. Please welcome Steve Bennon. Steve, hi. Hello.

B (29:48)

It's good to see you.

A (29:50)

It's good to see you. It's good to put a face to the name. I've been reading you for so long. I really appreciate you coming on and talking to us about this new book, Ministry of Truth, which is incredible. It was a fast read, but it was so in depth and super fascinating that I found myself marking passages and going back and reading them again, as I'm want to do with like court filings that I thought it was just so well put together. But talk a little bit about something that I find really wonderful about this book is the timing of the release. We're just coming up to the election now. I know when you were, I know how long books take and when you were putting all this together, it was a Biden Trump campaign and now we have a Harris Trump campaign. But everything still applies and maybe even more so as we look back to the haunting 2016 way that that election was covered. Talk a little bit about the timing of this book.

B (30:41)

Well, you know, I was thinking ahead, of course, to the 2024 presidential election. And I knew that it was likely not only that Trump would be a nominee, of course, but that that Trump would be relying on the rewriting of recent history because for him, it's the only way he could actually succeed as a candidate, that if he were to simply run on his record and perhaps his vision for the future, he would lose 50 states. And so I realized at the time that it would be inevitable that to see the Republican nominee, the former president, trying to rewrite recent history in order to justify his candidacy, in order to justify his desire to regain power. And to my, to my delight, of course, things have worked out quite well in terms of the timing of the book and the messaging because Donald Trump is of course, relying heavily on kind of just trying to overpower our memories and bully us into submission, trying to get us to believe his version, his alternate version of reality, which is exactly the case that I lay out in the book, has been the problem in Republican politics for in recent years.

A (31:39)

And what I love about this is it really takes some other coverage of this phenomenon a step further. We talk about Ruth Ben Guillot and Gish Gallup. We talk about, you know, the muted mics at the, at the Biden debate. We, we listen to Ultra by Rachel Maddow and, and, and kind of see how history, how past is predicate to, to what we're realizing now. We have attack from within by our good friend Barb McQuaid. But where this goes further is it takes us really deep into the machinations of exactly specifically what the Trump campaign has been doing. And talk about your because you bring up four pillars, right, of how he accomplishes what he accomplishes and everything Else that he does kind of springs from those four pillars. Can you talk about those?

B (32:26)

Yeah, absolutely. In fact, it's important to understand, and I encourage your readers to check this out, because it's not just a matter of rewriting history, because that is something that authoritarians have done as long as there have been historical records. What's different is that there are these, this systemic approach to approaching reality that I call the four pernicious pillars. The first is that they are indifferent towards reality. And of course, that speaks for itself. They're lying so brazenly they just assume that they were going to believe nonsense. The second is an indifference to shame, because really, if they were sheepish in the way they approach this, it wouldn't work. People are too smart for that. They would say, wait a second, these people don't seem to believe what they're saying. They're trying to pull a con on me. So that's number two. Number three is the reliance on allies, because no one person, no matter how politically powerful, no matter how politically influential, no one person can rewrite history by himself or herself. He or she needs allies. And in this case, we see in Republican politics is not just Trump, but his party. At the federal and state level, of course, conservative media, Fox News, conservative radio, and others all play a role in making this scheme work. And so that's number three. Number four is the importance of repetition. You know, I think about how many times we've heard Donald Trump say that the. That his economy was the greatest in the history of the world. It's nonsense. And as I document in the book, there's. I can prove that it's nonsense. But nevertheless, Donald Trump wants people to believe it. And so he found. He finds that it's necessary to just repeat the lie over and over again, almost in a cartoonish, comical way, in order to just get that point across and to get just enough people to understand it and believe it, even though it's completely and demonstrably wrong.

A (34:00)

Yeah. And let's talk about in depth about how these four pillars manifest in some of these lies. We can talk about the big lie, for example, that the election was stolen. There was election fraud. I know Jack Smith breaks this down pretty well in his indictments. There's two now that have come out since the Supreme Court made its immunity ruling and its ruling on Fisher, which our listeners here are very well informed about. But talk about that. Talk about how, like, give examples of those four pernicious pillars, how it pertains to the big lie, for example.

B (34:31)

Well, sure, Right. I mean, in terms, I have a whole chapter, of course, on the big lie and the fact that Donald Trump relied so heavily on these tactics when trying to rewrite the history. And so really, I mean, reality is not in doubt. Donald Trump's. Not only did Donald Trump lose, he was told he lost by his campaign manager, his campaign lawyers, his campaign data researchers, his campaign independent researchers. They all told him the same thing. He lost fair and square. It was time for him to exit the stage. And so what did he do? Well, he rewrote the story and this alternate version of reality that tried to gaslight the public. In that version, he's the victim of an elaborate scheme concocted by these nefarious forces, none of whom he can identify, none of which he can support any evidence. And so, right. So right off the bat, we first pillar is an indifferent towards reality. The reality is that he lost. Is it indifference to shame? He's the first president in American history to deny a defeat and to try and overturn the election and in fact, instigate an insurrectionist riot. Number three is relying on allies. And of course, we saw the entire Republican messaging operation and conservative media joining forces, linking arms and attacking the integrity of the political system and attacking the integrity of the electoral process in order to sustain Donald Trump's lies. And then, of course, number four is repetition. And how many times have we heard Donald Trump say that he had won the he secretly won this election, that he had lost. And what's frustrating, of course, about all this is that it's been effective. You know, we have ample polling data right now that shows that roughly 2/3 of Republican voters genuinely believe that Donald Trump was the rightful winner of the 2020 election, despite reality, despite the evidence, despite the facts. And so I think it speaks to why they do this. They do this because they were able to convince the people that they care about most. Republican voters, Republican donors, Republican activists and so on.

A (36:17)

Yeah. And I think what's really interesting is, you know, it's very effective. It's effective to the public. Right. All these election lies and everything. Now, eventually justice comes home to roost and people get sanctioned and lawyers get in trouble and they have to take pleading classes again and cles because they. They've been sanctioned for what, you know, their lies. You can't pull this off in court, right. Until obviously the Supreme Court comes in and says, yeah, well, sometimes you can, but it is very Orwellian. And you talk about that as well. You know, don't believe what you see and what you Hear. Listen to what I tell you. And those four pillars really help kind of push that idea forward. Right. To just ignore what you have seen with your own eyes, like the attack on the Capitol.

B (36:59)

You know, I'm glad that you mentioned Orwell, because, of course, that is an important part of the theme that I kick around in the book. Of course, the name of the book itself is Ministry of Truth. And so for those who haven't read Orwell, 1984, of course, is this dystopian classic. Winston Smith is the hero of the story, the protagonist of the story, and he works for the authoritarian government's propaganda arm, which of course, is in the book described as the Ministry of Truth. And in Ministry of Truth, Winston Smith is responsible for, among other things, rewriting recent history and to discard any facts or evidence that is going to be counter to the wishes of the ruling party. Orwell described it as having. They thrown those details down the memory hole. And so I think that while the book isn't about Orwell, I think that there are parallels between what what Orwell described in his dystopian classic and what we see right now in terms of Republican tactics and the way they approach our understanding of reality and the fact that as far as they're concerned, our reality is up for grabs. And they feel like they have. They have a. They have a systemic approach that they feel like their tactics are going to succeed over ours.

C (38:01)

Yeah.

A (38:02)

And, you know, you also talk about the impeachment in that sort of light. The first impeachment, I should say, we've had.

B (38:09)

We have to clarify these things.

A (38:11)

I know, right? Everyone's like, wait, which crime was that again? Which impeachment was that? You know? Cause we talk about. I was on stage in Chicago with, I think, Renato Marioti doing a live show, when we caught a little bit of a word from Adam Schiff that, oh, there might be a whistleblower about this call. And then later on, as we were continuing to do shows and the Republicans, directed by Donald Trump, were trying to just convince us the impeachment wasn't real. It wasn't a real impeachment because it wasn't voted on by the House. And I think I had joked at the time that it's not impeachment unless it comes from the impeachment region of France. Otherwise, it's just sparkling treason. And that was like they were really trying to push that into our face. And for me, of course, going all the way back to 2017, it was actually Rachel Maddow watching her in the all the President's Men Revisited reruns that were being played on MSNBC after Mueller was appointed. And I was like, you know what? I bet this Mueller thing is important. We should cover it on a weekly basis. But after that, the Russia thing is a hoax. Russia, Russia, Russia, Russia, hoax. And it's all there. It's right behind me, I think, actually like hundreds and hundreds of pages of it's not a hoax. But it was still so effective to repeat that messaging, as you say, one of your four pillars, over and over and over again. So talk about a little bit about how this impacted other things besides the big lie. Russia, hoax, impeachment. I mean, it's all over the map, everything that he did wrong. And he wants to make us forget Memory Hole, as you say, as Orwell said, to kind of erase it, raise it, and then rewrite it for us.

B (39:45)

Well, right. I mean, I find it so extraordinary about looking back at the Trump era is that we had this avalanche of controversies, an avalanche of scandals and missteps and mismanagement and incompetence and so on. And so when we. So how can someone like Donald Trump then run for reelection? How could he possibly seek a second term after all those failures when it's because. And it's because. I think I make the case in the book that it's because he feels like he's justified in rewriting the stories about what happened. So everything from January 6th to the federal response to Covid to the Russia scandal, the first impeachment, and on and on. Even, even the fact that he failed to build the border wall, to this day, you'll hear him at public events saying, no, no, no, I finished the border wall. And, and which is extraordinary because we know better. We can see with our own eyes that this isn't the case. But he's nevertheless feel, feels justified and he's convinced his party to go along with him in this entire larger con. Trying to believe, comfortable in the knowledge that Americans are going to be foolish enough, or at least enough Americans are foolish enough to fall for this con. And so it's, it's, you know, when we think about what issues, it's almost like we have to go the other way around. What issues aren't he, what stories aren't he trying to rewrite? I mean, it's impossible to limited to just a few. I tried to pick my favorites. I thought the strongest for the book, but the list is not short.

A (41:03)

Yeah. And that's why I love so much that this book came out when it did, right before the dnc. And my last question to you is going to be a little bit about the media. And honestly, the way that Kamala Harris and Tim Walls are handling it quite differently from, I think maybe Hillary Clinton learned a bit too late how to handle the media in this case. I know Jay Rosen has said it's the stakes and not the odds. And your book here focuses so much on the stakes. So talk a little bit about that.

B (41:30)

Yeah, I'm really glad that you emphasize that because I feel like it's something that's too easily and too often overlooked. You know, when I think about why this is important, why people should care, it's not just an abstraction. It's not just like, oh, yes, Donald Trump lies a lot. No, no, no. It's important to understand because of course, I mean, we know that that's the background noise of our civic life. But the reason I emphasize this is because the stakes are real. You know, when Republicans rewrite history, this affects everything from legislation to elections to democracy itself, because democracy itself relies on a foundation of shared knowledge. And when that knowledge is corrupted on purpose by partisans with an agenda, the consequences for all of us are real. It's not an abstraction. We're talking about concrete things that happen to our political system. And we were. And if our system is corrupted in this way, we're going to feel the effects.

A (42:18)

Yeah, 100%. I couldn't agree more. And I mean, going forward, I think it's going to be very interesting to see how a 99 day election cycle plays out. I love it. I think we should do this every year or every election.

B (42:31)

Agreed.

A (42:32)

And just kind of run a sort of a candidate who looks like they're in the lead and then just bam, in July just be like, nope, it's this person 99 days go, it's been kind of a breath of fresh air because it's almost. There's not enough time for him to adjust to this and try and rewrite the Kamala Harris history. He's been working so hard on rewriting the Biden history and sending his attack dogs in Congress to, you know, investigate the Biden crime family or whatever. And so it seems like when back when he's back on his heels, he doesn't have enough time to do this or prepare for it. And I think that that's fascinating and I love that this book came out when it did because of that.

B (43:13)

Well, yeah, I like to think of it as the psych approach to elections. You thought you were running against one Candidate Psych. But yes, I think you're right. I think that this entire approach to rewriting history and attacking the integrity of reality, it takes time. It takes effort. It's not something you can just throw off in a tweet.

A (43:33)

I mean, the repetition takes linear time just in and of itself.

B (43:36)

Quite right. And so I think that combination of factors, he's on his heels not just because he's down in the polls, but because the usual tactics require time that he does not yet have. And so I think you're right. I think that it helps explain the landscape that exists right now that we're all seeing unfold in real time.

A (43:55)

Yeah. And I would love to see another book going over that and how it was attempted and perhaps failed. Hopefully failed. Fingers crossed. Failed in this particular election, especially with the short Runway that she's had since she declared her candidacy. All right. Tell everybody where they can find you and follow you where the, the Mata blog is. And because, you know, I've been sharing your, your writing and your ideas for a very long time now because they're just so pointed and I think very critical to this time period in history.

B (44:22)

Well, that's kind of you to say. Your listeners can find me on all the major social media apps. I'm also, of course, available@matablog.com and there's also my own. I have a personal homepage@stevebennon.com that's not Steve Bannon. Steve Bannon. N E N. Thank you very much. It's a different person. I only have one shirt on. It's nevertheless. So, yes, your listeners are welcome to find me on any of those sites. And I look forward to interacting with your audience online soon.

A (44:49)

Awesome. Well, the book is called Ministry of Truth, Democracy, Reality and the Republicans War on the Recent Past. It is a New York Times bestseller. Now it is available wherever you get your books. I appreciate your time today, Steve Bennett. Thank you. Thank you, everybody. Stick around. We'll be right back with the good news after these messages. We'll be right back, everybody. Welcome back. It's time for the good news. Who likes good news? Everyone? Then good news, everyone. Good news.

C (45:25)

Good news.

A (45:26)

And if you have any good news confessions corrections, especially pronunciation corrections, you want to play what the mutt Find the cat opine on the bovine. What the heck wine? What the hell is in that shell? What's the model of your axolotl? And by the way, Amy, it could be model M O D E L. What's the model of your axolotl? Or what's the Mottle M O T T L E I just want to.

C (45:47)

Point out that you are not reading. This is just off the top of your head.

A (45:51)

This is very true.

C (45:52)

This is just you've memorized it. It's in your bones.

A (45:55)

It is. I've been saying it for so long. And if you don't have podpet tax to pay, or if you don't have a pet you want to send in or a wild animal, anything, you can always send an adoptable pet in your area. We'll find him a forever home. And of course we love shout outs. We love our shout outs to loved ones. We love our self shout outs. Those are my fav. Send those in especially if you're Aquarius because Pluto's coming. Send in yourself shout outs. And of course shout outs to government programs like Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid pact, wic, snap, good VA healthcare that you've received. You know, Medicare drug negotiation prices, $2,000 cap a year on out of pocket costs for medication, the $35 insulin cap, and of course student debt forgiveness. Biden's set to announce another round, by the way, in October and we'll see how that goes. We know the Supreme Court right now and all Republicans are really fighting hard to take away your votes, take away your rights, and take away your student debt relief. So why anybody would vote for them I'll never understand. But send any of that good news to us@dailybeanspod.com and click on Contact. First up, friendly quadriplegic, no pronouns given. We loved meeting you in San Francisco. Thank you for the video you made for our daughter Alison. You're one of my idols and I forget to say thank you when you complimented me so sweetly. I think I made a video for their daughter Caitlyn. If I'm remembering correctly, in two episodes about undamming the Klamath River, I heard a slight mispronunciation on the local Yurok tribe. It's pronounced Yurok or Yor Rock.

C (47:31)

That's me. I fucked that up.

A (47:33)

Yurok with the emphasis on the first syllable. I went to school with members of this tribe and live about an hour from the Klamath river, so you were very kind at the San Francisco show, as were Pete and Olivia in dealing with my soft voice. Oh, it was my pleasure, my friend. It was so good to meet you. I'm glad we got to spend some time together and I hope that your daughter appreciated the video.

C (47:54)

Aw, that's great. I love San Francisco. I wish I was there more. It's a beautiful city, gorgeous, good food. Okay, next up we've got Irma K. DEI is about way more than race. Most people aren't aware that it's all about marginalized people because people with disabilities are rarely included in any conversations. Many people don't even know that they are excluding this community. Please be more aware of this in the future and begin to include people with disabilities and their needs and lack of equity. The Obamas produce a movie called Crip Camp. I highly recommend it. This is such a good point.

A (48:29)

Mm. And Irma, what I was talking about with race is that the I'm saying Republicans only use it to, you know, be they use it to be racist and not just racist against marginalized people, people of color, but also misogynist against women and also ableist against disabled people. Armaya wrote a whole piece of about this because you know, the DEI odei and I, I have said multiple times and will say here again now that that must mean that they are against disabled veterans getting preferential hiring treatment at the federal government because disabled veterans DEI hires, you know, and so I, I wanted to point that out as well. And so yeah, I, I apologize there. I, I just, I want everybody to know that just because I don't name everything and every single thing every time I talk about it doesn't mean I'm forgetting or, you know, or purposefully discounting because, you know, I'm a disabled veteran. And so I appreciate you pointing that out and that it's not just about people of color and race. I do realize that. I want you to know I realize that. And sometimes I forget that when I don't include those things that because so many people listen to what I have to say, sometimes I forget I'm talking to more than just Amy or Dana. Do you know what I mean? I assume that everybody who's listening knows that already. And so that's my bad. And I need to be better about that. So thanks for pointing it out. Next up from Jeff M. Man looks into the abyss and sees nothing staring back at him. And that's when man finds his character or the Daily News. This isn't a correction at all, just a weird quirk of a British place name that I heard today and wanted to share with you in your audience. Torpenhow Hill in Cumbria in Northern England means Hill, Hill, Hill, Hill in four different languages. It was a small piece of trivia that someone shared with me. It brightened my day, so I needed to share. Thanks for doing what you're doing. It really does Keep us all going through the ups and downs. Jeff M. Thanks for that. Thanks for pointing that out.

C (50:36)

I love all these English. There's that one duchess that like, I mean, this isn't a gossip rag, but apparently allegedly Prince William had a little dalliance with and like, when you read her name, it's like the Duchess of Chomala d'. Or. It's like chumlee is how you pronounce it. Just ridiculous. Chomala Ditcher, you're free.

A (50:57)

I remember that. I remember seeing that. And I was like, who the what?

C (51:01)

Yeah. How would I even begin? But somehow they know. Next one is from Evan S. No pronouns. I love, love, love my daily beans and everything you do. Not so much correction as food for thought. I work for a large government contractor. The work is exacting. And our contracting officers, Representative Cor, is demanding because what my team does has to be correct. When I hear and say sometimes quote, close enough for government work, I cringe. It subtly reinforces the stereotype stereotypes the opposition uses to tear down our government. So I try not to use it. Just sharing. Because little things do matter. Keep the thoughtful and hilarious coverage of this show going. You're doing the Lord's work out there.

A (51:46)

Okay, fine.

C (51:48)

They're really on your ass today, huh?

A (51:50)

I know. Fuck. Can't do anything right today.

C (51:53)

It's.

A (51:54)

I know. I worked for the government for 12 years, Evan. I know, I know, I know. I'm sorry. I'll try not to perpetuate the hatred of our government. All right, next up, from Patrick from Michigan, pronouns, he and him. Salutations, Team Bean. A listener in yesterday's good news mentioned the Neverwalls tent at the Minnesota State Fair. Fun fact. In the latest edition of Republicans Can't Tech, that particular group failed to register their domain name, neverwalls.com. this was then apparently scooped up by someone on the blue side of the aisle. So now when someone goes to neverwalls.com, instead of getting the right wing propaganda they were hoping for, they get a truth bomb and then are redirected to donate money to the Harris Walls campaign. The message is Trump is a convicted felon. Let's vote for adults. Try being joyful instead of an asshole.

C (52:44)

Oh my God. Excellent. No notes.

A (52:48)

Yeah, 10. 10. 10 out of 10 for pet tax. Here's a what the word is on that bird? What's the word on that bird? Sorry. Or maybe talented. Guessing. I get it. Talon for you. That's tremendously easy. Given. Given. With zoomed phone camera picture, the gent spent a Few minutes on the 40 foot pine tree in my front yard last summer. There have been an increasing number of sightings of them in the metro Detroit area recently, which I think is pretty awesome. So here's a picture from neverwalls.com, which is great. And I'm assuming that's a bald eagle.

C (53:21)

So good.

A (53:22)

But he's very beautiful. Nice gentleman. Thank you for that.

C (53:26)

Is that.

A (53:26)

I love that.

C (53:27)

Is that a bald eagle?

A (53:28)

Is it a bald eagle? Is it a bald eagle?

C (53:31)

That's cool. I've never seen one in the wild before.

A (53:35)

I don't think I have either. Like in person.

C (53:37)

No.

A (53:37)

I've seen some red shouldered hawks in my backyard here, but no, never a bald eagle.

C (53:44)

We get hawks in California, but yeah, I've never seen a bald eagle because. I don't know, they just hate Florida, I guess, where I grew up. I don't know who. Nerves.

A (53:54)

Probably not.

C (53:55)

Probably not. Okay, next up from Bill and Pam.

A (53:57)

Hi.

C (53:58)

Leguminaries. I have good news for Amy. Yay. If she truly would love to have a cat in spite of her allergies. Oh, yay. I'm also very, very allergic to cat dander and cat saliva. And for years we did not have a cat, even though I knew my wife would absolutely love one. We tried ferrets, but I was also allergic to them. Solidarity. I understand. And they're not exactly interested in lap cuddling or being pet. No shit. But I bit the bullet one day about a year ago and a half. And I went to our local shelter where we adopted Chloe, our tortoiseshell fur baby. I take Allegra for seasonal allergies most of the year, so I figured the rest of the year wouldn't hurt. Then we also discovered Purina Live Clear cat food. Oh, cool. Which can reduce the allergens a cat produces by almost 50%. Wow. Between that and the Allegra, Chloe can cuddle me all she wants, even against my bare arms with no allergic reaction at all. Before the diet change, my arms would have been covered in hives from her laying against them. It really has been a life changer as she's brought us so much joy with her loving, torty, quirky personality. We feel so lucky to be her adoptive parents. So yes, you can have a cat, even if you're allergic to them, without having to settle for the hairless variety. Hilarious. They're so cute too. I don't expect you to read this on air. Oh, but I did want to relay.

A (55:16)

Oh. Oh.

C (55:16)

But I did want to relay that it was the best. I didn't know if that was private. I was like, maybe he's going to get a Social Security number. But I did want to relay the info to Amy as it's. This seemed like the best way to do it. How cool is that? Thank you. And there's a picture of the little kitty cat.

A (55:29)

Oh, she's adorable. Adorable.

C (55:32)

Chloe, thank you so much for that info.

A (55:34)

Yeah. And you know, I hear that the naked cats, they aren't really hypoallergenic either. Because it's a saliva, right? Yeah, yeah, saliva and dander, which is the dry saliva. So it's all about cats bit, I guess. Anyway, beautiful baby and thank you for sharing. Next up, Teresa. She and her hi beans team. I wanted to shout out my mother in law who recently passed away. She was a born and bred Ohioan who was never afraid to speak her mind, but who used that skill to stand up for what she thought was right. My husband was her only child and her entire life we're trying to find a home for her two cats. Now, Darby and Darcy, they're a bonded pair of siblings who are around 10 years old. So if you're in the greater Cleveland area and you're interested, we would love to have you take them. They come with all kinds of cat accessories. A catramal, would you call that? Yes. And we would be happy to financially support their upkeep. Thank you for providing this space to share. Look at the sweet babies.

C (56:32)

Oh, they're just sweet little babies. Oh, I hope somebody wants them.

A (56:38)

All right, well, let us know. Write into hello.com and say put Darby and Darcy in the Put Darby and Darcy in the subject line and we'll see if we can put you in touch with Teresa.

C (56:49)

How cool is that? I love that. Next up from Rick. He him. Hi, I'd like to share my dog Munin. Or is it Munin? You guys, we're gonna get a correction on this because I don't know how to say it. I'm an artist. And when we got her, I decided to make a statue slash designer's toy slash figurine of her. I wanted her to have the Winnie the Pooh vibe. The first pick is a two month puppy shot, AKA where we started. Then a front show of the piece and finally a picture of my beautiful girl at age 7. She's still going strong after 14 years as a teaching assistant in a special ed program. I walked away and kind of in a free fall of what to do. I sell art pieces through my business and that is spelled R I C S t r o h.com and I make YouTube videos at the end of a lot of the videos. I put a bonus dog video at the end I C S T R o H on YouTube too. Thank you for the great content. I typically have the daily beans running as my morning startup routine. How cool.

A (57:53)

Oh my gosh. This is so cute.

C (57:57)

Oh my God. That is. That is like chic.

A (57:59)

Also, isn't that dog beautiful, by the way?

C (58:01)

Beautiful.

A (58:03)

Oh my gosh.

C (58:03)

Wow.

A (58:04)

All right. Rickstro.com R I C S T R O H We'll have a link in the in the show notes. Thank you so much.

C (58:09)

How cool.

A (58:10)

This is from Mark Pronouns he and him Howdy Beans Queens. I'm a devoted listener, proud patron from all the Way Back at the Kitchen Table days and despite the stress and challenges from the Trump era, I feel blessed beyond belief. First by having your fantastic slate of shows to listen to as I stay informed, but also for the first time by the presence of true unconditional love in my life. And I wanted to share my happiness and gratitude with you in the form of a happy birthday greeting. On the January 31 episode Swift Boating Trump, you read a good news submission from a beautiful, intelligent, hard working, witty, thoughtful and all around extraordinary woman named Rita in which she mentioned bonding on a second date with a guy named Mark over They Might Be Giants and political podcasts like the Daily Beans Jack and cleanup on aisle 45. Well, to paraphrase then candidate Harris, that mark is me.

C (59:00)

Whoa.

A (59:02)

Since that episode, Rita of I have gone to see Madonna, Tool, Pearl Jam, Dua, Lipa, Arcade Fire, Jessie Ware and the Smashing Pumpkins and more in concert together. And our love of dancing to great music is just one of the myriad pillars of our special connection that continues burning strong to this day. After many years of struggling to date in Los Angeles, I know what it means to be in a loving Is that LA or is that Los Angeles or Louisiana?

C (59:26)

Oh, I don't know, maybe la. I mean, unless they're traveling for all.

A (59:30)

These concerts, it's gotta be hard in both.

C (59:33)

Yeah, it's gotta be hard in both.

A (59:35)

But I know what it means to be in a loving, stable and supportive relationship and to have the person I want to spend the rest of my life with by each other's side and in each other's corner. As we lovingly joke. I'm the Ken to her Barbie, the Han to her Leia, and the Doug to her Kamala. So I wanted to write in and celebrate Rita with a big Happy birthday. Shout out for her big day, August 30th, as well as an early happy eight month anniversary. Yes, I asked her to be my girlfriend on New Year's Day 2024. I love you with all my heart, Rita. I'm tearing up as I write this, thinking of all that we've done and we'll do together. As poppet talks. I present sparky, my sister's 14 year old cat. As I am currently petless. Sparky is an excellent conversationalist who enjoys his morning meals showing a sassy blephone and a good scritchy scratch on the chin. Thank you AG and DG for all you do to keep us educated and motivated and for being an integral part of our life and our love. Keep up the amazing work. Let's go win this together. And you know what? Happy birthday, Rita. Mark, thank you. I. I'm emotional.

C (60:38)

I mean, I know. Hello. You facilitated a love. How cool is that?

A (60:46)

Oh, look at that little sweet baby.

C (60:48)

Kitty, kitty.

A (60:50)

And there's the blep. I love a blood. I love a blood.

C (60:54)

So when's the wedding?

A (60:55)

I know, right?

C (60:56)

I want to know. I want to be invited.

A (61:00)

I love your Australian accent so bad.

C (61:02)

And listen, I apologize to all the Aussie listeners out there. I'm not actively working on this accent. This is as good as it's going to get and it's pretty fucking bad. So thank you for being patient and. But I.

A (61:15)

Somebody, there's a baseball cap you can get that says O NAR.

C (61:18)

Oh no. Okay, okay. It's really bad.

A (61:23)

It's 19.

C (61:24)

No one's ever gonna cast me as an Australian anything. But I did have some good news.

A (61:30)

Okay, share.

C (61:31)

Okay, well, it's kind of old, but it is like about a good government program. And I'm about to give Florida a compliment, so hold onto your hats. So I grew up in Miami and I looked this up. They still have this. There is a scholarship program, state funded called Florida Bright Futures. And at the time I graduated 2006 from high school, if you had like a 3.0 average, you got a certain amount of scholarship to a state school. And then if you had a 3.5, I think it was like a free ride. And I, and I went to college for free. So I went to Florida International University for the money of $00. I paid for books and like my parking pass and the parking tickets I got at the, you know, parking garage. But that's a cool government program and it's still around. I did look it up and apparently in 2011, they upped the GPA minimum. But if you're in Florida and you've got kids that are going to go to college or whatever, look that up. Because they could go to, they could go for free.

A (62:32)

What's it called?

C (62:32)

Florida Bright Futures.

A (62:34)

I love it. Wonderful.

C (62:36)

A broken clock still right. Twice a day, you know.

A (62:39)

Yeah. Good stuff happens in Florida because there's still Democrats in Florida.

C (62:42)

That's right, that's right.

A (62:44)

Fighting the good fight. Well, thank you all for your good news. And Amy, it's been so great to see you these past few days.

C (62:52)

Oh, I just love hanging out with you so much and happy to fill in whenever.

A (62:58)

Wonderful. I will let you know when I'm up in your neck of the woods. You do the same. And now we're having off screen conversations. We're having them on. On.

C (63:07)

I love it. People love. People love this stuff.

A (63:09)

People love it. But we talk all the time, even when you're not. We do.

C (63:12)

I do. Well, before you come back, how this all started was because I texted you because I saw Henry Winkler had like tweeted you. And I was like.

A (63:21)

That'S right, that's right, that's right.

C (63:22)

I think I had started.

A (63:23)

I think I clapped back on something.

C (63:26)

Yeah. And he was like, way to go. Yeah, that's a good thing. Oh, I love it so much. I love it so much.

A (63:32)

I can't even remember what it was.

C (63:33)

But it was, it was a sick burn.

A (63:36)

It was. Yeah. Okay, now I have to. Now I have to see if I can find the same.

C (63:40)

Well, we gotta frame this. I mean, what's happening here? Are you just getting like cool tweets from cool people all the time that you're not even phased by it? Because I would frame that shit.

A (63:50)

Well, you know, I, we've. Henry Winkler and I've gone back and forth a few times.

C (63:55)

He's an old friend. He's an old friend.

A (63:57)

Yeah, we're old for, well, Twitter friends, you know. So Megan Kelly tweeted out that. So she's for banning fracking, banning private health insurance, banning red meat, banning all gas powered vehicles, wants a mandatory gun buyback law, wants to decriminalize illegal border crossing. Got it. And I just replied, you're so full of shit, it must be difficult to stay blonde. That was the.

C (64:19)

That is, I mean, hang it up in the Louvre. That is a tweet to end all tweets. That is so good. No, this has to be framed. Maybe I'll do that for you. I'll send it for your Birthday.

A (64:29)

Oh, that would be fun. Yeah, I would love that. But yeah, Henry Winkle was like. Ay. Like, he was like a sick burn. That was a good one.

C (64:35)

That's very cool.

A (64:36)

And so, yeah, then we started talking with her. I'm like, you should come on the beans, Dana. We'll be back on Wednesday, but. Or, well, Thursday. You know, we time travel a little bit on this show, but she will be back in your ears tomorrow and she sends her love. And I. But I have to say, I'm so glad that you came and kept me company for the last three days, my friend.

C (64:51)

Thank you for having me.

A (64:53)

Tell everybody where they can follow you.

C (64:55)

Well, you can follow me on Instagram and X Amycarero and. And I think I have a show coming out in April or in the. In the spring. I'll let you know. Maybe you'll have me on before then. Yeah, we can talk about that.

A (65:08)

Yeah, just let me know. And we're gonna rewatch the Americans.

C (65:12)

Oh, it's a good one. It's a really good one. And you can hear my terrible Nicaraguan accent. So I'm not gifted in accents. Have a lot of other respects, but. Oh, no. Oh, she's so bad at it.

A (65:26)

You're way better than me, my friend. Thank you so much. Everybody will be back in your ears tomorrow. Check out the latest episode of clean up on L45, which I host with Pete Struck, who's the guy, by the way, who had the whole. The case that the Americans was based on and it was called Operation Ghost Stories.

C (65:44)

Oh my God. Does he have a book about it? Wait, you said a podcast? A book. What?

A (65:47)

He writes about it in his book Compromise.

C (65:49)

Oh, well, that's my next read. That's so cool.

A (65:52)

Yeah. Yeah. So tune into that. We'll see you tomorrow, everybody. Until then, please take care of yourselves, take care of each other, take care of the planet, take care of your mental health, take care of your family.

C (66:00)

Vote blue over Q and bring someone with you.

A (66:03)

She had it written down. Haha. It was awesome. And make sure to go to vote.org, check your voter registration status and vote down ballot all the way. And thanks to Harris and Walls for giving all of that money to down ballot candidates. I've been AG and I've been Amy Carrero and them's the beans. Yay.

C (66:21)

That was so fun.

B (66:22)

Refried beans.

A (66:23)

I like refried beans.