Chris Aliza (1:46)

And.

Mike Pesca (1:46)

And I introduced to him the word Antwen Tig. Remember that word? So that's why it's kind of a best from the Vault because we haven't talked about an Antwen Tig in a while. And I don't know if he was and I don't know if he was delighted or confused. I know if I do my job right in this conversation with Chris, you will be both. Now, I do have to say this is. I think what Chris likes to do is put him behind the paywall. And I'm not. I'm not going to get in the way of this man's monetization strategy. We are both independent producers and we have to ask very much thank but ask you are public for our help. And so if I were to give this whole episode for free, it would undercut him, it would be a workaround. And so I'm going to give you, I don't know, a good deal of our conversation. I will give you maybe two segments that will account for more than half, but less than three quarters of our conversation. So you are robbed of the super bowl talk at the end. And if you heard in the beginning me saying a variation of my prediction of what's going to happen at the polls this week, then then count that as one for the week. It's kind of nice. Sometimes I talk into a microphone and get a reaction from you, the listeners, but it's also kind of nice to lay that out to a person in real life and see what they think. And so Lizza went along with my prediction of there will be bluster, there will be ice there, there will be countervailing forces. Not saying don't worry, everyone but you and me needs to worry. People need to go on Fresh Air and MSNBC and get very, very worried. Not cuz they're wrong, but because their worry will lead to our deliverance. So thank you people who are worried. And if that's you, that's you. But don't worry me. And Crystal is up next. So building a wardrobe takes the right kind of balsa or perhaps oak. But actually I speak not of the physical construct. I speak of the concept of a suite of clothes. I'm learning this as I age. And quince is helping me. They have everyday essentials with quality that lasts. Organic cotton sweaters, lighter jackets that keep you warm in the changing seasons, and polos for every occasion. Except, and this was weird. But polo, you should not actually wait. I'm being told you can play polo in their polos. It was a situation like Acme earthquake pills that asterisk do not work on roadrunners. And I thought that was the same with the quince polos. But no, I'm wrong. Polos actually for every occasion. And that's good because I own quince polos and I've never played polo, but I've worn them quite casually and, you know, to a place that says we prefer a collared shirt. And not only do they qualify, no one will be squinting at you like you got away with anything. That is how nice my quince polo is. Refresh your wardrobe with quince. Go to quince.com/the gist for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. That's Quincom. Slash the gist. Free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com/the gist the gist is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Fiscally responsible financial geniuses, monetary magicians. These are things people say about drivers who switch their car insurance to Progressive and save hundreds. Visit progressive.com to see if you could save Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states or situations. This podcast is sponsored by Talkspace. Last year I went through many different life changes. I needed to take a pause and examine how I was feeling in the inside to better show up for the ones who need me to be my best version of myself. When you're navigating life's changes, Talkspace can help. Talkspace is the number one rated online therapy bringing you professional support from licensed therapists and psychiatry providers that you can access anytime, anywhere. Living a busy life, navigating a long distance relationship, becoming a first stepfather, Talkspace made all of those journeys possible. I could speak with my therapist in the office. I could speak of my therapist in.

Chris Aliza (6:05)

The comfort of my home.

Mike Pesca (6:06)

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Chris Aliza (6:29)

That is Mike Pesca. I am Chris Aliza. We did Mike. When did we do. A couple weeks ago we did a substack live.

Mike Pesca (6:37)

It was a fortnight, though. I invented this term called an Antoine tig, which means 21 in Old English. So it might have been an Antwen Tig.

Chris Aliza (6:43)

I think it was an Antoine Tig. You know, the only reason I know what fortnite means is because when I was a kid, I was really into tennis and you know, the, the majors in tennis, Wimbledon, French Open are two weeks long, right? Most tournaments are weak and so they'd always be like a fortnight at Wimbledon. And I was always like, what the hell is that? And I eventually figured out two weeks. So Mike and I did this and Ant Twinton. Did I say that right?

Mike Pesca (7:07)

And twin Tig. It's the old English for 21. Ann and twin Tig. Yes.

Chris Aliza (7:12)

Okay, so 20ish, 21 days ago. And we liked it so much. We both enjoyed so much. We thought, well, what the hell, let's do it regularly. So that's what you're getting. So we're going to do it pretty, pretty regularly. So if you don't follow Mike already, you need to. If you don't follow me, I hope you. I hope you take the advantage of this. All right, so, Mike, we're going to talk a bunch of things. Let's start with. I was just watching Caroline Levitt, the White House press secretary, and she learn a lot.

Mike Pesca (7:42)

I did.

Chris Aliza (7:42)

It was very informative. She was asked about this Steve Bannon comment about using ice to patrol. I don't know what the right word is, polling places in the midterms. And she said, well, Donald Trump's not going to do anything like that. But I want to talk to you about that, because this is all of a piece with Trump saying, both to members of Congress and in an interview, saying we should nationalize the election. And he doesn't mean, like, make it on national issues. He means take control of it because these 15 states are so corrupt.

Mike Pesca (8:21)

You have that. Nationalize it. If the issue was affordability, yes, that should. But he's uninterested in that. Yeah.

Chris Aliza (8:28)

So you have that. Then you have Bannon and now. And Trump has tried to say, well, I didn't mean that. I meant past the SAVE act, which is a voter ID thing that's sitting in the Senate right now. Give me your take. Because I know you went deep on, like, the full Bannon and never go full Bannon. No, the full Bannon comment on this. So give me your take on that. Because a lot. Bannon tends. I think Bannon kind of runs interference sometimes on the tip of the spear for Trump, you know, like testing stuff out because he can say anything. Give me your. Give me your take on it.

Mike Pesca (9:03)

So between the two of us, we each have a shirt and then an undershirt under it. So that's about four. So that's the full balance. I think I have a jacket I.

Chris Aliza (9:11)

Could put on, so I could go three layers. It's not all.

Mike Pesca (9:16)

I've not shaved in a while. I can't say that my hot tub has acid in it, which is the really full band. But anyway, okay, so even to real, to go back a little bit, this was an example of, I just think, Trump riffing slash buzzing bullshitting. Asked by Dan Bongino in Dan Bongino's triumphant return show, and he wasn't even asked a question. Bongino just bragged a little bit about some initiative that he had at the FBI. And then it was Trump's turn to talk, and he went on for six minutes. And I played a condensed dish version on my show just to give the listeners an impression of what this pro, where this proposal really came from. And it came. He would say weave. But first he started talking about Minnesota immigrants and then he started talking about and we'll never win another election. And there should be election security. And I had the biggest, I had a wave election, but they took it away from me. And then he said, you know, Republicans are stupid about this. They should. And these are the phrases that got repeated. They should nationalize the election. At least 15 states can't be trusted. And he talked a little bit about Georgia. He had no plan to say any of this. It was free floating grievance. And then he was on to a ranking of the presidents and we did better in Venezuela than Carter did. I think he was talking about his attempted rescue of the hostages. All right, if you didn't know to get upset about this, I think everyone could have just ignored it. But I don't fault anyone for hearing a president say this. And maybe people, I'm sure the president doesn't know that it's actually unconstitutional to nationalize the election. People, people rightly said this would be a gigantic change. People, like you said, and I saw your morning video. Not only would be gigant, it is never going to happen. No, Congress doesn't change the Constitution. And I don't know if you made this point on my show. I said, and the last thing elected officials ever change are the very rule that got them elected. They're loathe to ever change those rules.

Chris Aliza (11:17)

It's like voting to raise their own pay. They know how politically fraud it is.

Mike Pesca (11:22)

Yeah, they'll just kick it down the road. And a lot of retiring senators cast that vote. But the thing that happened with Bannon is, so would it die? Is it only going to live because election watchers and, you know, actual proponents of democracy raised the red flag on this. Maybe it would have, except then Bannon knows what his job is. And I really don't think it's coordinated. I just think he's a skilled practitioner of classic propagandistic arts. And what there is, is. And this actually, this actually happened with the Russian interference thing. There was no coordination. But you get a signal, you, you know what the signal is. You relay the signal. You're a relay station. And then it disseminates and goes wide. So this is exactly how it's going to play out. That Trump maybe meant it didn't mean a dictator for a day. There's enough people to get upset with that. And I don't fault them. And I'm going to even get into that in a second. And then Bannon and others say, actually this is a good idea. And the, you know, so called intellectual journals of the right will say, well, this is why it's a good idea. And they might be clever enough to say, you know, Democrats and liberals are hypocrites because what when Yer Bolsonaro was trying to monkey with Brazilian elections, the Brazilians have this national system and they even have one judge. And so many liberals in America were cheering that that clarity that is true. You can make those points anyway. It'll become a news cycle. But then there's and I'd like to hear what you think about this. I am pretty sure how this is going to play out, which is that it's not going to affect elections, but not because Trump is benign or Trump won't try it or there' no reason why an ICE official near a polling booth will actually intimidate an actual voter. I mean it shouldn't. But we know that things like that have an effect. I just think greatly underestimated, sorry I've gone on so long, but greatly underestimated is the counter mobilization effect. And it always happens that there are suppression effects and then the people being suppressed, usually Democrats make the point they're trying to take away your vote. People hear about this and they vote in ever greater numbers. And the interesting thing about it is I am not faulting. I heard Robert Kagan on Fresh Air talking about the death of democracy and this was a Ms. Now segment. Without that there won't be the counter mobilization. So I say good, you know, take it as seriously as you can. Don't let it get you so depressed or so miserable that you check out of politics or think America is a failed state. But that's my analysis of what's going on. The counter mobilization will swamp whatever weird meandering half assed mobilization there is, which they're very well could be.

Chris Aliza (14:04)

I think that's right and I think it's a really good point. I have two, I like have two general thoughts thought. One is the people, the people who think and this is very prevalent on the left and then on the very far MAGA right that everything Trump says is carefully planned and plotted out, that it's all he's operating under a plan. He said the nationalized elections thing on purpose because he's trying to. The Fulton county thing is tied to that. I have never seen any evidence that the dude is playing three dimensional chess. Like I just have it. You know what I mean? Like I remember after 2016. That was a big storyline. Oh, see, he was making moves at a level you guys couldn't figure out. I don't think that's true. So I'm always, I always assume that you didn't say it this way, but my assumption always is he's just saying shit. I mean, I like, he just says stuff. And the other point I wanted to make is it reminds me that the evolution of this whole nationalize the election thing reminds me of how, and this speaks to how even though its origins are probably just him saying shit, it can have real impacts. The origins of Doge. So Doge, for people who don't remember, was basically like an Elon Musk troll move. Like, we should start the Department of Government Efficiency.

Mike Pesca (15:33)

Ha.

Chris Aliza (15:33)

It smells Doge.

Mike Pesca (15:34)

Dogecoin.

Chris Aliza (15:37)

And then it was like, then Trump was like, we should do that. And then it became like a real thing and it was like, wait, but this was just like a trolley joke that Elon Musk made. But then it had real world consequences because hundreds of thousands of federal employees don't have jobs anymore. And by the way, they got rid of Doge. I mean, you know, it was like a nine month fever dream. But the point is, it's like to, to. What you're saying is it's not. Just because he doesn't have some broad strategic plan doesn't mean it can't matter.

Mike Pesca (16:08)

Right. He often talks.

Chris Aliza (16:09)

I just keep that in mind.

Mike Pesca (16:11)

He often talks things into being, or not being, or talks bad ideas into being. I don't think he would have tried to pursue getting Mexico to pay for the wal wall if he didn't say that once or twice at a rally. Wasn't so even committed to that idea. Got a huge reaction. So not only did it become a permanent piece of rhetoric, he really did spend diplomatic capital trying to get Mexico to pay for the wall. That's the most prominent example I could think of. But there are a lot of ideas where he will say something, it will get a reaction. Or you could see in real time he says, oh yeah, that is a good idea. This thing I actually said. And I can't think of, I can't think of a good example where that became some great policy. It's a cousin of I met a waitress and she said no tax on tips. And I guess that works for him. It's very popular. But the other thing about what you said, no grand strategy. You constantly find this in the discourse about, well, this distraction is meant to distract from the last distraction.

Chris Aliza (17:07)

Everything's a distraction from The Epstein files, Mike, everything I write that isn't about the Epstein files, people be like, you fell for it. And I'm like, not everything in the world is a distraction from the Epstein file. Go ahead. Sorry to interrupt.

Mike Pesca (17:21)

Belichick was not let into the hall of Fame because of the Epstein files.

Chris Aliza (17:26)

You just don't see the whole picture.

Mike Pesca (17:29)

Yeah, Billie Eilish said that stuff about stolen land to distract you from the. But I also think that he does benefit from it. He might not know what he's doing, but he has a general sense of the more that is happening and the more that's chaotic. And so back to Bannon. Flood the zone with shit. That does really work for him. I do think. I just want to also emphasize that this stuff that he's proposing, it is horrible. If you are listening to this and saying, Mike's pretty blase about this. No, I'm just prognosticating what I think will happen. But for it to happen, people have to be a lot less blase than I am. And I'm not blase. I'm predicting how it will play out. But it does play out because very earnest defenders of democracy do take it seriously. Just like, you know. What's another interesting angle to this? I was watching press conferences of Georgia officials, and they were. And not even officials Democrats, state level. And they were very upset that Tulsi et al went in and took the election material. And they just defended. These were all Democrats. They defended the system of voting in Georgia. Now, remember, this system of voting in Georgia, with their rules about drinks online and anything else you couldn't do, was such a national Kansas belli among liberals that it became the spotline of the last season of Curb youb Enthusiasm. Just meaning that a liberal guy in California thought this was such a big idea that he incorporated into the plot. That would be Larry David. But because of counter mobilization, after all these attempts to, you know, cause election chicanery, we do have two Democratic senators from Georgia. That's kind of interesting.

Chris Aliza (19:13)

Foreign.

Mike Pesca (19:18)

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Chris Aliza (19:41)

He saved hundreds on auto insurance. Switching to Progressive.

Mike Pesca (19:44)

With that money, he bought a mini treadmill.

Chris Aliza (19:47)

Is walking on it during video conference calls more distracting than he thought?

Mike Pesca (19:51)

Yes.

Chris Aliza (19:52)

And is that because he overestimated his foot.

Mike Pesca (19:54)

Eye coordination, definitely. But it's Logan's savings and if he wants to burn calories and any chance at a promotion, we say good for you, Logan.

Chris Aliza (20:03)

Switch and see if you could save with progressive and treat yourself Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates. I just want to say one more thing that sticks in my craw. I don't know if people still say that, but one thing I always, I always come back to when Trump talks about fraud and in election fraud in 2020 and Mike Johnson did this weirdly, you know, he was like asked about Trump talking about nationalizing elections and fraud and he's like, well, there were three congressional races where a whole lot of votes came in at the last minute. I was like, dude, that's how elections work. Like that doesn't. That's not evidence of front. Anyway, the thing that makes me insane, okay, so Donald Trump says that in at least eight states, six to eight states in 2020, the election was stolen from him. And lots of members of Congress, lots of Republican members of Congress, over 100. And you know, seven or eight U.S. senators voted to object to the results in Pennsylvania and one other state before January 6, on January 6, before the rioters broke it. If those results were fraudulent, then, then does that mean that there was only fraud in the presidential race? And those members of Congress who got elected in Georgia, Republicans who got elected in Georgia or Pennsylvania, that was above board, but the presidential was fraudulent. Like, I just don't understand. Like, if the election was stolen and corrupt, then how did you, how are you fine with being like, well, I mean, my race, I won fair and square, but the race we lost, like, it doesn't make any sense. Makes me crazy.

Mike Pesca (21:43)

Right? There's, there are some elements to the claim that do not make sense. Like the, like the Sidney Powell endorsed theory that it was the Venezuelan who had pre. Monkeyed with the machines.

Chris Aliza (21:55)

Oh, yeah.

Mike Pesca (21:55)

So again, again, not to monkey with the.

Chris Aliza (21:58)

Wouldn't you.

Mike Pesca (21:59)

If the Venezuelans wanted the Democrats in, why wouldn't they, you know, like you said, make the Republicans who are elected to the Senate and the House hurt too. But then there was other monkeying. I think the. I don't want to get into the bamboo theory, but the Italian satellite theory, there's, there is in fact quite a bit that doesn't make sense. I also think a thing that doesn't make sense is Donald Trump thinking this is a good issue for anyone other than his cult. And it does work for the cult because, you know, the cult has to. I don't Want to be too dismissive. There are many fans of Donald Trump who aren't in a cult. There are rational reasons to like the man. But this part, I do think, if you do earnestly believe there was. That the election was stolen, not some watered down version of the claim like, we need election integrity.

Chris Aliza (22:45)

Right.

Mike Pesca (22:45)

That's cult like behavior.

Chris Aliza (22:46)

That's fine, but. Right.

Mike Pesca (22:47)

And it re. It reifies the cult into. When you believe the stuff that's illogical, that really shows you as a true believer. But why does he think this is good for him electorally? Why does he think that increasing the salience of the issue helps at all with midterms? Because all the evidence I can see is the more past candidates, past Republicans, who to some extent have to play footsie with the stolen election theme, but the more they really, really believe it, the more they underperform their fellow Republicans.

Chris Aliza (23:17)

No, and it's not. And it's. It's just not an issue that an election that ended 1900 days ago is just not something that the average low information swing voter is like. You know what that guy says? The 2020 election is stolen. I'm gonna vote for them. That's a great vision for the future. Right. Like, it's just. Yeah. It doesn't make any sense. It's just his personal hobby horse, and he can't get beyond it. All right, I don't want to spend too much time on it. Let's. I want to go to the. For me, the most personal, certainly, story of the week. And you and I, I think, are both very interested observers of the media, Both the kind of independent media we're in, then the legacy media for people who were on another planet. Over the last 24 hours, the Washington Post laid off 300 people. That's more than a third of its editorial staff. They have about 800 reporters or had about 800 reporters. They got rid of the entire sports section, largely. They decimated the local news section. They decimated international. They got rid of their photographers, they got rid of their graphics people. Am I to. Look, I'm not. I'm not above bashing a billionaire. Let me just make that clear. Like, I. If, if the billionaire deserves it, fine. And I think Jeff Bezos does at some level deserve this, because I was there when he bought the Post. I was working there. And you know, he said at the time, it was amazing. He said all the right things. He was the richest man in the world. He was putting money behind all. Even when I left in 20. Early 2017, he was it was still the good Jeff Bezos. So I get that the switch and you know, there's obviously political ramifications. He's kissing up to Trump, blah, blah, blah. I get all those things at the same time, and I think he bears blame at the same time to put everything at the feet of him and Will Lewis, the publisher feels to me like we are forgetting the last 20 years of what the Washington Post either swung and missed that or did or more damningly didn't even swing at. Right. I mean, I pointed this out like the Athletic was for sale. The New York Times bought it. Wirecutter was for sale. The New York Times bought it. Punchbowl didn't. News didn't have to start or even if it did, could have been bought. I was there when Politico was formed. The Post had the opportunity to keep Jim Van Di and John Harris and Mike Allen in house and do it. They didn't. So Jeff Bezos didn't do any of those things. Will Lewis didn't really do. I mean, maybe he could have bought Punchbowl. Right. I mean, but what's your take when you see this? Because the thing I like about you is when people are like, why do you like Mike? I always say he's unafraid to voice his honest opinion because I think a lot of people have been cowed into this very narrow tunnel of what's acceptable talk, and especially as it relates to the media. Bari Weiss is terrible. She's destroying media. Emma Tucker is good because she's at the Wall Street. Like, it's like, there's no independent thought. Give me your take. When you saw. Not like, we didn't know this was going to happen. We knew it was happening. I don't know if we knew the depth. Give me your take on it.

Mike Pesca (26:25)

Yeah, I was sad and I thought it was a shame. And I also think that the easiest thing in politics is to request that someone richer than you pay taxes. And the easiest thing in journalism is to request that a philanthropist lose more money on your. Your PA entity. And he was losing a ton of money. He was losing a little bit of money for about seven or eight years. And then perhaps the Post was actually doing well in 21 and 22, but he was losing $100 million. And there's just. Yeah, there's just something about even Centi billionaire or a desi sent a billionaire or whatever Bezos is, he can't abide that. He doesn't want to abide that. And then he also says, and for my return of negative 100 million. I certainly am not in good stead with the administration. I think that definitely went on. He probably graphs onto this a theory of we need to tack the post more to or more less away from wokeness or liberalism or some descriptions that probably fairly attend to a lot of the Post story. But it's very easy to say that Bezos is a coward and Bezos stabbed us in the back and to some extent he did. I haven't watched the Melania documentary, but I expect I saw that it's a Rorschach test, but sometimes the inkblot could look like an extremely scary dragon ready to bite.

Chris Aliza (27:47)

Right?

Mike Pesca (27:53)

And that's it for today's show. Cory Wara produces the Gist. Kathleen Sykes runs the Gist list. Jeff Craig runs our Media. We're looking for a great booker. A couple of you have suggested yourselves or friends. Email us if you want to book great guests for the show and other Peach Fish entities. We're@the gistkeepa.com who's monitoring that email and pretty much everything else. It's COO of peach fish Productions, formerly Chief Bullshit Officer. She's moved into the realm of the actual Michelle Pesco in Peru. G Peru. Do Peru and thanks for listening. Marketing is hard, but I'll tell you a little secret. It doesn't have to be. Let me point something out. You're listening to a podcast right now and it's great. You love the host. You seek it out and download it. You listen to it while driving, working out, cooking, even going to the bathroom. Podcasts are a pretty close companion. And this is a podcast ad. Did I get your attention? You can reach great listeners like yourself with podcast advertising from Libsyn Ads. Choose from hundreds of top podcasts offering host endorsements or run a pre produced ad like this one across thousands of shows. To reach your target audience in their favorite podcasts with Libsyn Ads ads, go to Libsynads.com that's L I B S Y N ads.com today. New year, new Vibe. You want the warmth of a drink, that smooth little kick. But you also want to wake up tomorrow feeling amazing. That's where RK comes in. RK is the world's first zero proof spirits brand and they invented the Warm molecule giving you the burn of whiskey or tequila without a drop of alcohol. Start the year strong with 2028 Bold zero proof spirits, zero calories, zero sugar, zero regrets so you can celebrate big and still keep your resolutions on track. Start the year right. Join the zero proof resolution at rkbeverages. Com.