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- [00:00]
A
On his 89th birthday. In my imagination, this is a novel. Donald Trump is celebrating both his birthday and the 20th anniversary of his first run for the presidency. He is at Trump Tower going down the famous golden elevator, and he dies of a massive brain stem stroke on the elevator. As he's going down, the people who had gathered for a party decide that it's a deep stone assassination and begin rioting and go out on Fifth Avenue in New York and bash pedestrians and car windows and store windows. And it's the first spectacular piece of violence, spontaneous violence that then results a year later in an uprising, in a, in a true right wing uprising.
- [00:49]
B
I'm Joanna Coles. This is the Daily Beast podcast and today's guest has spent the last three years imagining Donald Trump's death for his novel. So we get into that. What is it like imagining the President's death for a living? And also we get into which of Trump's goons has he been hate watching the most recently? And who does he think is emerging as a plausible contender for the Democratic presidency in 2028? Okay, I'm talking of course, about our regular guest, Kurt Ash Anderson. Before we get into the conversation, I just want to remind you, please subscribe to the Daily Beast podcast wherever you get it, Spotify, Apple, YouTube, and don't forget to leave us a comment on YouTube after you've watched us telling us your favorite part of the conversation and who else you would like us to interview. Okay, that's enough throat clearing and preamble. Let's get into it with the author, with a commentator, with the broadcaster, and with the novelist and the man who coined the phrase short fingered vulgarian when he was a co founder of Spy magazine, Kurt Andersen. Kurt Anderson, I am so glad to be clutching a copy of your book the Breakup. You spent three years writing it and in that time you have imagined the death of Donald Trump. A smile crept across your face when I said that. Tell us, tell us. Can you tell us in the book without too much of a spoiler alert, how he dies? Cause it's not perhaps as one would imagine.
- [02:36]
A
Well, the book is set in 2045 and there's a backstory to 2035, when at age 89, in fact, on his 89th birthday, in my imagination, this is a novel. Donald Trump is celebrating both his birthday and the 20th anniversary of his first run for the presidency. He is at Trump Tower going down to meet his throng of January 6th pardonees and MAGA people and ICE agent pardonees and this crowd of his to celebrate and party going down the famous golden elevator. And he dies of a massive brainstem stroke on the elevator. As he's going out going down, the people gathered who had gathered for a party decide that it's a deep state assassination and begin rioting and go out on fifth Avenue in New York and bash pedestrians and car windows and store windows. And it's the first spectacular piece of violence, spontaneous violence that then results a year later in an uprising, in a true right wing uprising, terrorist uprising. Because the Democrats, meantime, in the last few years in the early 30s, have had a full comeback into federal power.
- [04:07]
B
Okay, so the breakup refers to two breakups, right? There's a divorce in it, but it really refers to the breakup of America. You, as a regular guest on the podcast, you spend a lot of time thinking about what's happening culturally to America with this current president. And it's odd that we're recording this on a Thursday and it's actually 10 years, I think to the day since Donald Trump accept the Republican nomination to be president. So it's particularly timely that you're here. How much have you sucked out of the chaos that's going on now to inform this book?
- [04:51]
A
It's a good question. My last two books were these big nonfiction books about 500 year American history and 50 years of American history. As, as a friend said, and you like repeating basically my two fuckening of America books, right? And so those certainly fed into this. And for a while I was thinking, oh, maybe I should write a nonfiction book about what the future could hold. I said, no, no, no, no, I'm done with those. I'll return to novels. This is my fifth one, but certainly I was fed by that and fed by the last three years, as you say. I mean, when I started, it was set in the future, so of course AI would be part of it and robots and all that stuff. But a month after I started writing, ChatGPT appeared. So it was like, whoa, this is cooperating life with my writing process. And the Trump thing, of course he was out of office and was running, but like back then. And then of course, 23 led to 24. And here he is, so the last year and a half. And I was basically done when he took off, almost done when he took office this time. The horror show of this term, the nightmare beyond what I expected to tell you. And I'm not alone in that, obviously, and what one of my characters expected, who never thought her husband was overblown and hyperbolic in thinking, oh, this time it's going to be a threat to democracy and all these things. Well, it was one of his I told you so moments to his wife in this story. And so, yeah, what has happened the last year and a half didn't require any kind of wholesale restructuring of my story, which was basically complete, but certainly required me to go through and darken the backstory and make, you know, the Trump 20s, as one of the characters calls them, more horrible and nightmarish than I had had them in the earlier draft.
- [07:09]
B
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- [09:34]
A
That's a good question. I hadn't thought of it as bad karma or good karma I think it's useful to squarely and clear eyed ly face the various possibilities, the various contingencies. And I'm not saying this is inevitable or even that it's probable, but I'm saying certainly that it's possible. And I think I've depicted it plausibly and, and I think that in the last year and a half, in the last three years since I was began writing this book, it has become much less far fetched than it seemed when I began as, oh, this would be interesting to think about. So, no, it, I don't, so I don't think it's bad karma. I do think it is so difficult to think about and so horrific to think about the war and the violence, let alone breaking the country into parts. But I also think I've, you know, will provide an ability for people to look at this future possibility in, in some, with some basis for thinking about it and some framework for thinking about it.
- [10:41]
B
All right, well, I'm going to come on to the blurbs you've got in a moment and ask you how much you paid for them, because the blurbs for this book are outrageous. But I wanted to ask you something else first. You've got a very good line in there about how American journalists refer to everything as a tragedy. And I'm actually going to quote it and you go, life is half tragedy, for Christ's sake. Maybe more than half. Which is one of the reasons why I grade almost everything on a curve. And I guess my question is, are we living through an American tragedy?
- [11:13]
A
Short answer, Yes, I do think that we are already in a tragedy. And I, I don't see how we get out of it suddenly or without pain of some degree between here and whatever the end is. I mean, that's the thing, isn't it, I find is to imagine a happy ending now.
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B
A happy ending for Trump or a happy ending for America?
- [11:45]
A
Well, for America. And what I want to say is, I mean, this book is immediately categorized by the algorithms as, oh, it's dystopian, maybe dystopian satire, but still dystopian fiction. And, and I, I had a conversation with my friend and blurber, Gary Steingard, who writes dystopian satires and he's, he's
- [12:04]
B
got a, a great, he does. But we'll go on to that in a minute.
- [12:07]
A
But I, I said, do you think of your fiction as dystopian? Said it's. And, and basically he said, it's, It's. They're comedies. So. Sure. But And I said, I agree because I feel like dystopias are where there are zombies and everything is collapsed and it's rubble and wreckage and oh my God, it's horrible. I mean, on the other hand, if you want to say we're in, we're. We're in a quasi dystopian situation now, I'd buy that too. So. But, but I feel one of the things I ended up writing with the breakup is, is an ending. I wouldn't call it a happy ending because there's a war and there's breaking up of the country. But as with divorces, and some of us at this table have been divorced and one knows they're painful and complicated and awful in many ways and some, many worse than others. But, you know, sometimes they're mandatory and sometimes there's no other way to manage such a thing.
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B
Well, and they can also be new beginnings.
- [13:16]
A
Precisely. There is, as my wife, who as last I looked, we're still married, said to me as we were talking about this very thing the other day, she said about the book, not our marriage,
- [13:26]
B
not your divorce, not your pending divorce.
- [13:29]
A
No, she said, you know. And no, she said, you know, it was horrible and awful and if you're lucky, liberate it, you know, and so, you know, I think so in real life and certainly, and certainly in my story, five, 10 years from now, 15, the war itself looked pretty horrible and dystopian. But I think, you know, out of facing the facts and dealing with the facts at hand, if we can ever do that and see, that's the thing with this book and this story really is. It's hard for me to imagine how we go back to, you know, pursuit of happiness and everybody getting along without some giant spasm that. That provokes everybody. Looking at things the way they are, it's hard to imagine a great leader will come, Jon Ossoff will come and lead us all together back to a normalcy, maybe. And that would be great, and I hope it happens. But for many years and more these days, I feel like the likelihood that it's impossible for that to happen in a normal way without some kind of fever breaking invasion, civil war, I don't know, who knows? It could be many things, but just on our own, given everything, given the way we live in our digital bubbles and hate the other and hate the other and hate the other and have different views of how life should be led and countries should be governed, it's hard to imagine it without such a violent, literally violent or not rupture of some sort.
- [15:24]
B
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A
Shouldn't you be reading it?
- [17:03]
B
Well, you know what, I was going to read it and then I thought, you know what, ask the author to read it. And I'm not asking you to read your own words, which is probably cheeky, but it's also very, um, it's very relevant to what you're talking about. And of course he was writing about a completely different world 120 years ago, which at the time seemed as disruptive as what we're living through now. I think.
- [17:27]
A
Absolutely right. And I so am. I'm really happy you had me to do this because again it's. Instead of just the famous first line, it goes on so beautifully and so good, so evokes the present moment. And of course he's writing about another revolution, the previous revolution, the at that point, 70 year old French revolution. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief. It was the epoch of incredulity. It was the season of light, it was the season of darkness. It was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair. We had everything before us, we had nothing before us. We were all going direct to heaven. We were all going direct the other way.
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B
It's so good, isn't it?
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A
It gave me goosebumps, to tell you the truth.
- [18:16]
B
Yes, it does well. And it gives me goosebumps hearing you read it. And I'm rereading Great Expectations at the moment, which. And the best one.
- [18:24]
A
You mean the best book?
- [18:25]
B
Maybe. Well, it's still the best one.
- [18:26]
A
Well, I don't know. It's one of the top five. We could argue about that.
- [18:29]
B
One of the top five, yes, definitely. And I was thinking about the Atlantic, wrote a piece and in fact I was gonna ask you this question. The Atlantic just wrote a long piece saying it's one. We are experiencing the ending of reading. So I wanted to know what you thought about writing a novel. If we're going through the end of reading. In the piece, she talks about how our syntax and our grammar is getting more simple. That actually because. Precisely because people aren't reading. People like Dickens, who write in long sentences with endless clauses and complicated plot lines that you have to follow, we're actually all getting slightly simpler. But what did you think about writing a novel for people? Now novels feel less. Somehow less relevant. I find them much harder to read. And I thought the piece in the Atlantic was both ridiculous but also led to a greater truth, which is if you don't write and you don't read as much, your thinking changes all beautifully and perfectly said.
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A
What I think is that ambitious literature has always been read by minorities mostly, which is a. Minorities of the population. It's not as though. I mean.
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B
Yes, well, it's an elite pastime, we should say.
- [19:44]
A
Exactly. And of course, Dickens was not. But I think, yes, the novel, way before there was were computers, which is to say, in my youth, in your. You. Even your babyhood, practically starting around the 70s and 80s. You know, there are exceptions along the way. Tom Wolf wrote a novel that was very, very popular and was a serious.
- [20:07]
B
Oh, the Bonfire of the Vanities, which my then husband, we went on safari. I had taken with me the Bonfire of the Vanities and he complained the entire trip. I never once looked up to look at the animals because I was so riveted by such a good book.
- [20:22]
A
It was a good. It is a good book. And he was not so much for his fiction, although I was impressed by that coming out, but by his earlier nonfiction. But, you know, but, but there was back in, when I was a young person, a child, where Gore Vidal and all kinds of novelists, I mean, John Updike, Philip Roth were big celebrities on the COVID of Time magazine, which was a giant thing.
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B
Right. Which was itself a big thing on
- [20:51]
A
the Tonight show, all those things. So all the ways in which novelists and novels were central to the culture peaked, you know, 40, 50 years ago. And so I grew up, I didn't start writing novels until 1996. 9. So that's the world we've been given. So is it less so? We'll see. There are still giant bestsellers that are much, much longer than this book. You know, for instance. So, you know, it's, it's. And there are 330 million people in this country. If 330,000 of them read a book, it's a gigantic bestseller. So it doesn't need to be for everybody as long as it, you know, in my one's hope that people read it and it affects how they think about the world and people and all the rest. So I don't. It doesn't. Sure. And I worry about in the best of times, worst of times approach to what AI will do to us. Well, were I to have grandchildren and hope I will hear that.
- [22:05]
B
Kate and Lucy, right? Well, yes, Kate and Lucy, Kurt's daughters. I think that's a sign. I think your father's speaking to you through the podcast.
- [22:14]
A
We've had these conversations, but you know how it will be to have to think less and write less as a child growing up today where he just Claude, tell me everything I need to know about this. And I use it and it's useful. But the downside of that of making one think more simply making one be more about images than text. We'll see. Hi, Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile. Are you looking for a beach read this summer? May I suggest your big wireless bill? It's got suspense, mystery, a slightly flat emotional arc and a shocking twist where you realize you've been overpaying the entire time. Fortunately, though, Mint's story is better. Every plan, $15 a month, even unlimited.
- [23:00]
B
That's it. Happy ending, zero tears. Give it a try at mintmobile.com upfront payment of $45 for three months, $90 for six months, or $180 for a 12 month plan required $15 per month equivalent taxes and fees. Extra initial plan term only greater than 50 gigabytes. Me slow when network is Busy see Terms. We had Dick Costello on the podcast last Friday and he former CEO of Twitter and he is investing now in a lot of AI. But he says he fears AI actually signals the end of thinking that we're all going to think differently because this thing thinks for us. So why would you do the hard work of think to sort something out for yourself if someone, if something else can do it so fast for you?
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A
No, that is the great fear. And you know, because it's an epic of ignorance and an epic of genius or whatever.
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B
Right. Belief and incredulity.
- [23:49]
A
Well, indeed. But then for those of us who have already learned to think and write, it's an extraordinary tool. Just in my little but less little these days use of it as this super hyper amazing research tool. And instead of just having a thesaurus where I can what's that attitude? I'm thinking I can have a conversation about the precise context of the word I'm looking for. So I find for. So basically for smart people, it'll make you smarter. For people who have no either aren't there yet or just like aren't particularly curious or you know, interested in reading. Well, you'll get stupider. I mean, I mean that's the hard way to look at it. Similarly with the wealth situation, what it will do to the political economy, you know, if we continue having this version of capitalism in this country. We do and you know, the Zuckerbergs and Elon's Elons of the world, you know, have all the money. If and are the tech and control big tech as they do today, well then that's pretty dystopian. But so however, if AI can be part of creating such bounty and relieving people of the need to do drudge filled labor and there's all this bounty to share, we could share it and it'd be closer to utopia than dystopia. So. And that's the question of, you know, you want to live in Norway or the United States in 50 years? I don't know, we'll see.
- [25:29]
B
Yeah, good question. Which one will melt faster, I wonder. All right, I'm going to read a couple of blurbs from for your book and then I want to move on to talk about another dystopian figure, Pete Hagseth, who I know you've been watching this week. All right, this is from Gary Stingart. Pairing two divorces, one personal, one nosh, one national, within a novel that's funny and beautiful is something few writers could do. Thank you universe for Kurt Anderson and this page turner that isn't thanking the universe who writes that. How much did you pay him?
- [26:06]
A
I bought him a drink afterwards. I did buy him a drink. So it was afterwards and it wasn't promised. It was just a friendly drink.
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B
Okay. All right. And then another quote. This is from Walter Isaacson, who of course wrote the books, the biographies on Elon Musk and Steve Jobs. Kurt Anderson is the most brilliant social novelist of our time. In the tradition of Tom Wolfe, who you mentioned, and Don DeLillo, but even funnier and deeper. With a light touch and an instinct for telling details, he mixes pitch perfect satire with profound insights. Okay, that's enough. And here's my promise to you, is that we will call the White House and ask them what they think of you Imagining Donald Trump's death on the Golden Escalator. We'll see what he says. We'll see what machine gun lips. Caroline Levitt.
- [26:54]
A
Yes. Or Steven Cheung, my favorite of those people. Well, Steven Chung is better on. He's a scumbag. He's better on the brutal, brutish thing. Interestingly, I had a book out in 2009 called Reset that the New York Post called Donald Trump to ask about and because I'd compared him in that book unfavorably to Warren Buffett, who I knew as a child because we both grew up in Omaha.
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B
Oh, of course, Nebraska. Right.
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A
And saying Warren good, good billionaire. Donald the idiot Donald Trump in 2009, bad billionaire. And he, he gave a great quote and included me in his pantheon of third rate writers.
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B
Well, he probably up the fact you called him a bad billionaire because he probably wasn't a billionaire at that point technically. Right. But he just, that seems to be. As long as you describe him as rich, he's happy.
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A
Yeah, that's probably true.
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B
All right, so let's talk about the goons that he has around him. You mentioned Jon Ossoff earlier. Jon Ossoff particularly good filleting. Both Jay Clayton, who's standing for the national intelligence job to replace Tulsi Gabbard, and the acting intelligence chief Bill Pulte. And also Pete Hegseth. What did you think of Hegseth at his hearings?
- [28:14]
A
I am. I keep a running list in my head have since 2017 of who in Washington. Basically I am most viscerally I find just the loathing I feel on a visceral level kind of beyond policy. Just who do I really hate? And it changes and I rank them 1 to 10. I haven't done it in a while, but. But Pete, hexseth is very high up there right now. And I, and I, I hate watch him avidly.
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B
And so I loved you hate watch him avidly.
- [28:54]
A
The confrontation of calm, even Keel, never yelling, but not without emotion. Senator Ossoff talking to him about, basically, it was about, this was a hearing
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B
I think of is this where he's asking for more money?
- [29:14]
A
He's asking for, yeah. So it's the appropriation. It's the Senate Appropriations Committee. And Ossoff is saying, well, four months ago, 16 days or whatever it was into the war, you were saying, we have destroyed their military and their combat incapacitated, I think was the phrase or something close. And he said, was that an inaccurate statement? So it's a very kind of not you liar, you, whatever. Was that an inaccurate statement? And of course, Hegseth says, well, we sunk the navy, which is like, oh, we were so everyone is so worried about the Iranian navy before we sunk it in a day. And it's the thing that he and Trump always said, well, we sunk the navy and we, we got rid of the air Force. So he didn't answer the question. He said, I'm asking you, Mr. Hegseth, if that was an inaccurate statement. You also said this. He repeats this again and again and again. And each time Hegseth getting angrier and angrier in his high t way, doesn't answer and just says, no, well, we did this and we did this. And then Ossoff asked him, but he basically just. And keeps even keeledly asking, was that an inaccurate statement or was that an accurate statement? And then finally I actually wrote it down. I mean, yes, Iran's military has been completely destroyed, combat ineffective. That's not accurate, is it? And he just never will give in. And just in his increasing undone ness at being asked this very simple question, was were you wrong when you said this war is about over four months ago or not? And he wouldn't. And it was just. He was. You could see the, in his comic book way, the smoke coming out of his head as calm young John Ossoff was questioning. It was fantastic.
- [31:09]
B
So Ossoff seems to have shot up. We've discussed this on insert. Trump's head seems to have shot up the ladder of Democratic hopefuls. I mean, two appearances that suddenly put him in front of people and as you say, incredibly calm, wasn't reading. I mean, I always find it interesting and I find it frankly, a bit disappointing, the level of questioning that goes on from senators and the way they lead, the way they read the questions and you think, are you not on top of this material? Did your people not brief you? Are you nervous you're going to get it wrong? And sometimes you're sitting on the edge of your seat worrying that they're gonna get the question out wrong somehow. And you had none of that anxiety with him. He seemed completely in control of the material, wasn't going to get annoyed. And as you say, the contrast with Pete Hegseth just seemed increasingly obvious. Do you trust this man? And also Hegseth, who was in charge of two veteran affairs associations, both of which he left unceremoniously after people compl. He was a chaotic manager. And there were financial shenanigans.
- [32:23]
A
Yes, yes. As opposed to this multi trillion dollar operation he's now running. No. And it was extraordinary. So Ossoff, I mean, again, what Ossoff has, in addition to being smart, obviously, is just enough performative ability and in this day and age to be considered as a possible president. Certainly that's a necessary thing. Whether you're Barack Obama or, in his way, Donald Trump. You need to be a good character in this show. And by the way, congressional hearings are shows. They just are. I mean, yes, when I was 17 years old or 18 years old watching the Watergate hearings, there was apparently revelations about the White House secret taping system existing. But they knew that. They knew that ahead of time, that that was going to be the big story of the day. It's a show. And so you have to, you know, both put on a show, but not seem too much like you're putting on a show, which is one of Hegseth's problems. And many of the.
- [33:29]
B
Well, and Pam Bondi's problem and Kristi Noemi's problem. But they come and they're like, this is for an audience of one. I'm going to get really angry because that's what worked for Brett Kavanaugh. Oddly, I think he sort of set the standard. Yeah, the sort of red face, puce, anger, flex, spitting fury.
- [33:47]
A
Well, especially when he was facing then Senator Kamala Harris, who was, again, this kind of calm prosecutorial questioner. No, absolutely. That's right. And they. I mean, because the WWE in professional wrestling sort of is so much their model for the show in the largest sense of the Trump show, you know. No, Pam, Bonnie comes on as a caricature of a villain. I'm a tough villain, lady. And Hegseth, in his cartoon way and his hair, which I worried as I was combing my hair, I said to Anne, I said, is my hair a little Too Hegsethy. But no, he and his little stupid.
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B
Oh, his pocket square. His pocket square, which is like an accessory you would buy from American Girl Dol.
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A
He's like a cartoon character, but he also, he's like a cartoon character in the famous Lichtenstein pop art pictures of these military heroes going pop, bang. That's Hegseth. He's ridiculous. Which is why I like watching him as much as I do.
- [34:53]
B
Who are the other cabinet members that you similarly. I mean, you said you had a list of the worst people around Trump. Pam Bondi's now left, Kristi Noem's now left. Actually, the women are basically left. Who are the others that you hate watching?
- [35:08]
A
Well, Bobby Kennedy, of course.
- [35:10]
B
Bobby Kennedy, from whom you bought cocaine when you were at Harvard.
- [35:14]
A
That's the one time I bought cocaine in my life. He was my cocaine dealer.
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B
Right.
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A
But for instance, as Pete Hegseth now in his caricature, self parodying way, wants every member of the armed services, all several million of them, including women, to get tested for whether they have high, potentially low testosterone. Because obviously he's. They want to. They should all be as jacked up as I am. I'm sure what he's thinking. Interestingly, of course, Bobby Kennedy not so long ago on Stephen Miller's wife's podcast
- [35:46]
B
said you may be one of the only people. That's what Stephen Miller's wife's podcast people give it to. Katie Miller.
- [35:52]
A
Katie Miller's podcast.
- [35:53]
B
Katie Miller's podcast.
- [35:54]
A
Bobby Kennedy said that Mehmet Oz, the actual doctor who works for Bobby Kennedy in the Health and Human Services Department, said that he checked over Donald Trump's testosterone levels and that he, Dr. Oz had never seen a level that high in somebody over 70. So they're just all. And you know, and of course Hegseth and Bobby Kennedy famously, you know, did their pull ups together in jeans and shirtless because they're just, you know, in this, I don't know, to me, kind of homoerotic gym rat photo op life that they're all about. And like, I got my test of high tea. And so but yeah, Bobby Kennedy, I mean, he's not, you don't see him that much anymore. He's not as front and center.
- [36:47]
B
And I'm assuming that's deliberate, that they understand that the vaccines really don't play. They might play with a curious part of the MAGA base, but they don't play with the entire MAGA base.
- [36:56]
A
That's true. And he, I think, I also think he's Not. He's not smart and he's kind of dumb, but he's not. I think he may be thinking about his next chapter and, like, maybe it's time to sort of separate myself from this guy a little bit, you know, although still occasionally on in the Family in Katie Miller's podcast, reminding everybody that the President has very, very high testosterone.
- [37:24]
B
High testosterone. So he's separating himself from Trump. And clearly the Trump people, I'm sure this is organized by Susie Wiles, are slightly separating themselves from him. What about JD Vance? Have you read JD Vance's book Communion yet?
- [37:39]
A
I started it and I moved on to other things. I moved on to regime change, but no, I haven't. And I'm eager to because he's also in my top 10 of. I mean, maybe number one again, I won't commit to that now because I haven't thought it through, but JD Vance may be the top because he's just such. So completely craven combined with what has seemed along the way and what he makes a show of being this sanctimonious, searching for God and purpose and. And escaping his unhappy childhood and all that. So the sanctimony, which I understand the book is full of, and about his journey to a better version of Catholicism than the Pope himself has done. But have you read it?
- [38:38]
B
I'm slightly stuck on page 100. I had a sort of run at it, and it's as far as I can see, it's really about him looking for something to do. And I haven't quite got to the Catholicism bit yet. I've got to the point where he meets Peter Thiel, and Peter Thiel, like the Pied Piper, leads him off to Silicon Valley. Have you watched his wife's podcast, Story Time with the Second Lady?
- [39:04]
A
Again, I've seen only clips I saw. I watched her whole one with the President, which, again, was just such a wonderful spectacle of the man I call, among other things, the greatest self parodist of all time, Donald Trump. It was just remarkable. So that was remarkable. But no, I've not watched Usha's other podcasts.
- [39:27]
B
Well, it's worth watching because we have Cheryl Hines. So she talks. So the story she chooses is.
- [39:34]
A
That's my Bobby Kennedy wheelhouse.
- [39:35]
B
Well, exactly. And the story she chooses to read is the Three Little Pigs. And when Usha Vance asks her, why did you choose this story, literally, Cheryl Hynes says, apparently without irony, I like pigs. It just hangs in the air there. And J.D. vance, whose story is. It's A.A. milne. It's Christopher Robin, which she manages to overcomplicate. He says it's quite difficult to understand the beginning. And it's like. It's literally the easiest, most beautiful children children's story you could imagine.
- [40:10]
A
Winnie the Pooh.
- [40:11]
B
Winnie the Pooh.
- [40:12]
A
J.D. vance talks about Winnie the Pooh.
- [40:14]
B
Yeah.
- [40:14]
A
J.D.
- [40:15]
B
vance reads a Winnie the Pooh story.
- [40:18]
A
That was my first important book was Winnie the Pooh.
- [40:21]
B
Wonderful books. Absolutely wonderful books and great illustrations.
- [40:24]
A
You should read those. I'd buy the audiobook of Joanna Coles reading Winnie the Pooh.
- [40:28]
B
Oh, maybe I should do that. Maybe I should do that. All right.
- [40:31]
A
And then you could do it in the Melania accent as well, and I would love it even more.
- [40:35]
B
Yeah. How would you go? Vinnie. Vinnie the Pooh. I read Vinnie the Pooh to Baron Trump. He know, like books. Baron. He liked Tate Brothers. Tate Brothers are. The Tate's going to be extradited. I thought it was a good move that the White House said they weren't going to stand in the way of the Tate Brothers. And if the British wanted to take them back, they could. I don't know how fast that was moving. Yeah, I was very surprised by that. Because they helped them get out of Romania.
- [41:01]
A
Yeah. Yeah. I'm so horrified by them and Andrew, who I know more about than the brother that I don't. And I know what I'm going to find if I read more. So I don't. I know the basic horror show, you know, misogynist warriors stories that they are. I enjoyed watching the Arrest, though. I enjoyed seeing what Andrew Tate, because I'm superficial on some level, was wearing. Which is. Which is to say, as Tom Nichols, I think, said. And I agreed with him and extended
- [41:34]
B
his Tom Nichols at the Atlantic.
- [41:36]
A
The Atlantic. He said, basically, he. Somebody said, what are these. Are these shorts or are these. What are the pants that he's wearing? And he said, no, they're Capri pants, which. Which Mary Tyler Moore made famous back in the 60s, which I thought was hilarious, being old, too, and remembering the Dick Van Dyke show and Mary Tyler Moore. And I saw that he. In fact, he had on the same flats, the same sort of slippers that Mary Tyler Moore wore on that show, which I was able to add to the comparison. But no. So I enjoyed that. And God knows they should be sent back. And, you know, those are some aliens that should be. Should be deported, certainly. But no, I've not. I mean, that's. You know, I have a maximum of trash I need in my mind at any moment. So the Tates Have. Not yet. Really. I don't want more of them in my head.
- [42:31]
B
Well, fair enough. Well, let's hope that Andy Burnham, the new Prime Minister of Britain, can put them up on trial.
- [42:38]
A
I have a question about Andy Burnham.
- [42:39]
B
Far away.
- [42:40]
A
It won't be a long conversation. And again, superficial. Why does Burnham look so like Keir Starmer? And there's been previous Prime Ministers who looked. There's, like. There's one, you know, white man, Englishman look that those two have and others have. And then occasionally there's the, you know, the Indian British guy, and then there's the women, occasionally. But otherwise they all look like this kind of wankery guy.
- [43:11]
B
Why is that interesting? I actually hadn't thought they looked similar. Partly because I think they give off such different energy. Andy Burnham, first of all, who knew that there could be a Labour politician who was quite so ruthless? I mean, the ability he's had to get rid of Keir Starmer, who made the party electable, who took over from the real socialist, Jeremy Corbyn, who made Labour unelectable and gave socialism a bad name, and gave socialism a terrible name and was an anti Semite. How Keir Starmer managed to lose his job, having been elected with such a big majority of Labour MPs is really a testament to Andy Burnham's extreme ambition and that he got someone to leave their seat. Cause you have to be an MP to be Prime Minister. He was the Mayor of Greater Manchester. He had been a Cabinet minister and had left the Cabinet to go and run Manchester, which he did pretty successful, actually. But he's got extreme ambition and he's got an energy that Keir Starmer doesn't have. Keir Starmer was a prosecutor. I mean, he was head of the Crown Prosecution Service. And he treats everything as if it's a legal problem. He's got no ability to speak about vision and he's a terrible public speaker. He was the guy that got the party elected and then he's had to step aside and now he's hustling to be the Secretary General of the un. Because why wouldn't you want to fly around countries dispensing advice despite the fact you couldn't run your own country?
- [44:48]
A
I just. I mean. And as you say, he was overwhelmingly elected and made labor electable again, but also became.
- [44:54]
B
They don't all look the same. Boris Johnson didn't.
- [44:57]
A
No, Boris Johnson's another one.
- [44:58]
B
Boris is a political character.
- [45:00]
A
I'll send you the two pictures I saw together of Starmer and Burnham and saying well, you know, and it's partly when a certain kind of guy is standing outside 10 downing and. And looking like this and worried the same, like trying to look serious in the same way. They tend to look, but they do. They're also just. They're just like. I don't know. They're funny Englishmen. To me.
- [45:22]
B
They're funny Englishmen. Well, the interesting thing about Andy Burnham, actually.
- [45:25]
A
I love Andy Burnham. I can tell.
- [45:26]
B
No, no, I don't love Andy Burnham. The jury is out on Andy Burnham for me. My jury is out. Except that I like that he comes from the north. Cause I come from the north, so. I appreciate that.
- [45:39]
A
I get that. I get that.
- [45:40]
B
But I also like the fact that he stand and talk to people without a podium. You know, how normally. And there's been this character, hot podium guy, who's the guy that carries the podium out for the seven prime ministers that Britain has had over the last 10 years. Yeah, well, five in four years and seven in 10 years. But he's become a character because people are like, oh, it's that guy again. He comes out with his big arms and he's carrying the podium. Andy Burnham didn't want to compete with the hot podium guy, so he did it without the podium. Just spoke to people. He's a very good politician. The difference between them, they may look similar because they're both guys of a certain age, but Keir Starmer was a terrible politician and Andy Burnham is a ruthless politician. And that may be.
- [46:25]
A
Boris was the last good politician.
- [46:28]
B
Yeah. Rishi Sunak, not a great politician. Too technocratic. Probably the smartest of all of them. And actually, if he'd had a bit longer, might have helped with the economy. And Liz Truss, you know, head of lettuce. Was there ever a better. I mean, the head of lettuce remains the best political commentary. Well, and they just had the head of lettuce, do you remember? And it was like, who will last longer, this head of lettuce? And it wasn't the head of lettuce with cyclospora, as far as we know. Another. Another treat from RFK Juniors. Fda.
- [47:07]
A
Yes. Well, no, indeed. And now we're getting to the problem. Well, we already had, of course, with the measles, not epidemic yet, but outbreaks that he's responsible for the FDA not dismantling, but whatever. Degradation. That's a very worrisome thing.
- [47:28]
B
Well, and people really don't want to. Explosive stomach issues.
- [47:33]
A
So in general, most people don't.
- [47:35]
B
Most people don't. Kurt Anderson is always a treat to have you in the in the studio. Thank you for coming in and I look forward to hearing what the White House say about the breakup and how you've spent your last few years imagining Donald Trump's step.
- [47:51]
A
Wow. It was, it was a treat to me. And even though it doesn't come out for another several weeks, it can be
- [47:57]
B
ordered now so people can pre order the breakup on Amazon or anywhere. Or your independent bookshop.
- [48:03]
A
Correct.
- [48:04]
B
Your independent bookshop. I look forward to seeing you again soon.
- [48:09]
A
Same.
- [48:14]
B
I love hearing from Kurt Anderson. I really enjoyed reading his book and there's almost no Donald Trump in it actually. So don't feel that you're going to be pursued by the man who seems to be in our waking consciousness at all time. But write and tell us what you thought about the conversation. Who do you hate? Watch among the current cabinet and we'll be back on Monday with David Rothkopf to start your week with David's insights. Thank you. If you have been for watching, for listening, don't forget to subscribe to the podcast. The reason we can bring you conversations like this is because we are independent media and a big shout out to our production team, Ryan Murray, John Romero, Rachel Passer, Heather Passaro and Neil Rosenhaus. So the good news is we have so many Beast Tier members now there are too many names to read out and we really appreciate your support.