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- [00:00]
Isaac Saul
Foreign
- [00:04]
Mike Pesca
It's Thursday, May 21, 2021 from Peach Fish Productions. It's the gist. I'm Mike Pesca. Today is it not even mad day. You know, when we originally conceived of the shows little left right talk. I've got two guys who are very much in the middle, maybe for different reasons. I think that Isaac, Isaac Saul is temperamentally in the middle and also he, he commits himself and his outlet tangle to taking in both sides. And if you really do this and are really assiduous about it, I find that you don't conclude, you know, this one side has anything close to a lock on the truth. This is the side that is never truthful. Now besides an American debate, I mean they're really extremists out there and maybe they're never truthful, but there are depending on how you define the sides. There are enough examples of let's say you have a liberal orientation and maybe once you believe that, Steve, in Stephen Colbert's aphorism that truth has a liberal bias, there are enough counterexamples, you just have to throw that out as a heuristic. It doesn't fall 5050, let's say or let's acknowledge. I don't know, maybe your impressions may vary but within debates, within the big debates, the general what we call and this isn't always the most useful way of thinking about it. Leftward way of thinking is so often not the best way. And the rightward way of thinking so often has genuine value in the interpretation of issues. At the very least as an exercise it's best to expose yourself to all the best arguments of whether it's left or right or NIMBY or YIMBY or interventionist and diplomat. Whatever the orientations are, there usually are good arguments, not just venal arguments, not just self justifying arguments, but good arguments to at least consider. And that's what by the way, Isaac is done with his life. My other participant here is Jamie Kirchuk. And one way to get to the middle is to have not extreme views that average out to the middle, that's not Jamie. But firmly held beliefs often that align with what would once be called conservatism, maybe is now classic liberalism. And that's Jamie and then other firmly held beliefs that can't be contradicted, that run afoul of at least in the American conservative tradition, what they have long believed. Also both guys are really smart as I think you'll glean from this if you do listen on the not even mad feed there's some bonus material because it turns out there was a guy named Saul Isaac. Our guest today is Isaac. Saul. Saul. Isaac was a member of the House Commons. So we talk about him. Why not? We talk about this rally. Why not? And also I should note, I could have noted a lot of things, but at one point we talk about effect of the Trump revenge tour where his disfavorite candidates have been losing. And Isaac makes the good point. Oh, I don't want to step on anything, but this has some really bad consequences in terms of the actual agenda in Congress. And I did mention that the billion dollar funding for the ballroom might be imperiled. So too might the Trump defense fund that we talk about in other parts of this interview. There's a lot on the table that might be off the T because Trump is getting his way and sort of freeing the people who are going to lose their jobs because they were punished by Trump. And now with all that said, so much more is to be said. As I asked you to enjoy not even mad. Ever notice how the second you google something, every ad you get is about that thing, banner ads and they chase you all around and if the thing that you were googling is not something maybe that defines you, you don't want that. You definitely don't want that. Or try to watch something when you're traveling and that thing is just blocked. There are so many ways that the Internet, this miracle of communication is less than a miracle and less than open. And that's why I started using Proton vpn. This content isn't available in your region. Well, there are no regions with Proton VPN whether you're traveling or just at home. And you don't want your online activity following you all the time. That's your activity. Proton VPN takes the power back and gives it to you. It adds a layer of protection that keeps your browsing habits private. Unlike most VPNs, Proton is backed by strong European privacy laws and years of expertise creating safer, faster and more open Internet for everyone. 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Upgrade to the T2 work pant and stay comfortable no matter what the day brings. Get 15% off your first order@truewerk.com with code the Gist that's T R U E w e r k.com code the gist true Work Built like it matters, because it does. We all need advice, but it's not always clear who to ask, even in 2026. Enter how to the long standing Advice show and Ambie Award nominated best personal growth podcast. That's back with new episodes and a new host. And that host. Here's the reveal. It's me, Mike Pesca. Each week I tackle a listener question ranging from travel to finance to relationships and beyond, with help from world class experts who actually know what they're talking about. Think of it as eavesdropping on someone else's therapy session without the copay or awkward silence. No question is too big or too specific. Some topics how to protect the elderly from scammers. How to take Psychedelics Therapeutically, and, of course, how to emigrate to the Netherlands as a throuple. You've got questions. We'll find the answers, so follow how to with Mike Pesca on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hello, and welcome back to the show that promises to give a wider birth to the drunken son of Rand Paul than any other show out there. It's not even mad. Today we speak of Trump's deep but narrow sway in Republican primaries, his fund to pay out people like him who've been the subjects of injustice from the Justice Department and the middle. Where is the middle gone? As we do so, we promise to uphold our reputation for refutation while at the same time vowing to be not even mad. Who are we? James Kerchick is contributing opinion writer for the New York Times, writer at large for Air Mail, and author of Secret City, the Hidden History of Gay Washington, and a lot of Other places too. Right, Atlantic. What else, Jamie?
- [09:35]
Jamie Kirchik
Whoever Will have Me.
- [09:37]
Mike Pesca
That's good. It's pretty good. He's the shingles out. Whereas Isaac Saul has a very targeted demographic. He is the founder of Tangle, the online newsletter designed to provide balanced coverage of current events, which it does. Which I'm going to say, Isaac, is why most people are upset with you most times.
- [09:56]
Isaac Saul
That's right. Yeah. It's. Anytime you're writing from anywhere near the middle, it's a very effective way to piss off everybody at once, which we take a great deal of pride in.
- [10:04]
Mike Pesca
So, speaking of someone adept at pissing people off, on Monday, the Department of justice announced that as part of a settlement agreement in President Donald J. Trump v. Irs, it would create a new fund that could issue formal apologies and monetary relief to individuals and entities who claim to have suffered from lawfare and DOJ weaponization. The anti weaponization fund will receive, it's widely reported, as 1.8 billion, but it's $1.776 billion from the federal government, used to settle and pay other cases. And there will be five AG appointees to oversee the fund. One of those five must be chosen in consultation with congressional leadership. And by the way, I crib that entire description from Tangle, which does a very good job. So I come to you first, as if not the author, then the boss of the boss of the author of that. Tell me what you're thinking about the fairness of this fund, Isaac.
- [11:06]
Isaac Saul
Well, look, I mean, I think there's. There's a couple of framings. One is we've never really seen anything like a president Creating effectively a payout system like this for what Trump has made clear are going to be aggrieved parties who are also supporters of his. I mean, J.D. vance paid some lip service to the idea that maybe someone like Hunter Biden could apply for some compensation for what was done to him while he was. While his father was president. I wouldn't put the odds, particularly likely that President Trump is going to give Hunter Biden millions of dollars for facing DOJ charges while he was the son of the sitting president.
- [11:46]
Mike Pesca
But he is now making common cause with Candace Owens.
- [11:49]
Isaac Saul
I did see that. Yeah. You never know. We are in interesting times. That much is certainly true. So I'm a little. I was a little stunned, you know, jaw gape at the move. It was a very sly legal move. It's a very sly political move. They sort of, you know, withdrew and settled this case with themselves to create the fund. I think the other framing of it, though, is that Trump takes things that have been done in Washington, D.C. in some form in a long time, and then he does the most extreme possible version of it. And, you know, the thing a lot of conservatives have been saying, which I think is true, is Democrats, especially under Obama, sort of perfected this sue and settle art form where, you know, if they didn't want, if they didn't need Congress to get a regulation change or they wanted to, you know, move the needle in some way on something like an environmental regulation, they would invite lawsuits against the EPA and then go settle those lawsuits in order to minorly shift, change some obscure regulation about an endangered bird or something, and then pay out a certain amount of money to some foundation that does environmental work. We're talking about tens of thousands of dollars in obscure rules about endangered birds, not billions of dollars and the President of the United States handing out money through a slush fund. But it's sort of of the same flavor. And I think that is something Trump, we've seen him do over and over again. You know, a little executive power under President Biden becomes a ton of executive power under Donald Trump. And conservatives who are still in the business of defending some of this stuff will point to that. And it's not that they don't have a leg to stand on. It's just I don't think we should sit around and accept this as the new norm.
- [13:36]
Mike Pesca
Yeah, I would say that's exceedingly fair to the Trump worldview, and I don't blame you for it. That's true. So this is Trump as satirist. He takes and critiques a government proposal or government way of doing thing and creates the vulgar version of it, the so that we can all stare, but really so that he can make some money on the back end or the front end. Jamie, what aspects of this most concern or interest you?
- [14:07]
Jamie Kirchik
Well, I think just the continuing legitimization or the attempt to rehabilitate the January 6th protesters, I think is a very serious and worrying development. This was one of the first things the president did upon being reelected was to basically was to pardon all these people. And I'm sure some of them did have sentences that were probably too long, right? I'm sure that, you know, and that's fine. If you wanted to pick out a couple of those or, you know, anyone whose sentence was, you know, too long by a reasonable standard, if they thought it was politically influenced in that way, then that's fine. But to just do one single sweep and, you know, pardon every single person obviously sends the message that the kind of lawless behavior that we saw that day is totally kosher. And so I think that sort of, that, that continues to be, I think, the worst, one of the worst things actually President Trump has done as president in his second administration. I think it gets people, I mean, people. Because there's so many other things that are piling up that people forget that. But I mean, to have the President of the United States do something like that and then to add on top of it what he's doing now with this legal defense defense fund, I think just, you know, just only exacerbates that. Also, the amount of money just seems crazy. I don't understand how you would need that much money to address all of these, you know, supposed, you know, wrongs that have been done to these people. It just seems like an outrageous sum.
- [15:40]
Mike Pesca
Well, I would say it's because they are supposed in many instances and not real. And when something supposed or fictional, what's the limiting factor on how much money you affixed to it? Now, I will say and give you an update. When Todd Blanche, the acting attorney General, went up to Capitol Hill, he was waylaid by Republican and Democratic senators, the Republican mostly being Susan Collins, saying, how do we know that people who beat up Cops on January 6th and the proud boys specifically, aren't going to get the fund? And Blanche said, well, I share your concerns, but there are also privacy concerns. Today, I believe, or yesterday, as of this taping, two plaintiffs in the civil case in the US District Court who have sued to stop the fund are Harry Dunn and Daniel Hodges, who are a former and active member of the Metropolitan Police Department. They're suing to stop the whole fund. But the point being, we don't want people who beat us up to get the fund. This brings up, I think, a bigger question, or to me, a, an insight that I think that it might be the case that Donald Trump is just past the point where he's trying to be appealing to, to anyone politically. I do think that even though partizans will point to some of his past actions as only hurting his enemies and helping his people, he did think, for instance, that tariffs might help everyone, and he certainly thought the big, beautiful bill was good for the economy. But I'm sensing with him going full bore into these sorts of initiatives that he has pretty much written off ever having broad appeal for his policies in the American public. And now he's in the I'm going to reward my friends, but I'm going to get mine phase of his presidency. Isaac, do you think that's plausible?
- [17:30]
Isaac Saul
Yeah, I think it's plausible. I think I generally share the view. I mean, one of the things that I always find really funny and, you know, I typically am just chuckling to myself, is I read a lot of these political analysts in my world who are trying to make sense of some of the things Trump is doing, like, say, endorsing Ken Paxton and in Texas. And, you know, they kind of wonder, doesn't he know that this is going to hurt the Senate, the Republican chance of controlling the Senate in the fall? And the answer is just he doesn't care. The idea that the president has any concern at all about the future of the Republican Party to me, is genuinely farcical. I mean, he has concern about his legacy and I think the future of certain movements that he cares a ton about. I think politics, politically, there are maybe one or two issues he feels really, really strongly about. It's immigration and maybe tariffs. And aside from that, he seems like a political chameleon and has been for 10 years on basically everything else. So I always find it a little bit amusing that there's this lens we all look at this through. You know, how is he making this decision when it might, like you said, sort of imperil the political popularity of some of his programs and stuff. And it's like, this is term two, end of era Trump. I don't think he's going to run again in 2028 or whatever Steve Bannon has up his sleeve. I think Trump knows this is the end of the road. I don't think he cares very much about what happens after he leaves. And like you said, right now he's just, he's worried about getting his and taking care of his enemies and that. I mean, it's just look at what he's doing, how he spends his time. I mean, that's where his focus is.
- [19:07]
Mike Pesca
Yeah. And you were, you took some of the thoughts right outta my head or words outta my mouth. And that if there is a silver lining, it does argue for there's not gonna be a third term and he's not setting his Eric up for running for president. I don't really care if it's JD Or Rubio, except to the effect that each of them pays proper fealty to him in the moment. But that's not much of a silver lining. I'm more concerned with the gold that will be lining his pockets on the way out.
- [19:33]
Jamie Kirchik
Yeah, I actually don't. I actually do think he will care about his legacy in a sense. And I think he's actually going to play an important role in determining who the next Republican nominee is. I think he will be invested in them winning because, you know, he, look, what's going to happen is he's going to want them to win, obviously, because then it, then it's a vindication of his rule. Right. And then if, if the next Republican candidate loses, then he'll immediately say, I had nothing to do with this and it's all their fault. So he, you know, he wins either way. Right. But I do think that he's going to make an attempt to play a role. He'll obviously wait until the very last moment when it's obvious which of the Republican candidates is going to be the winner. He's not going to want to pick a loser, certainly. So I don't think he's going to intervene very early on behalf of Vance and, you know, give him the sort of deference that a, that a VP can, that a vice president is, you know, supposedly supposed to have. But, you know, Ronald Reagan didn't do that for H.W. bush in 88. So I don't. There should be no expectation that Trump's going to help Vance out. And at this point, I would say I think he's probably favoring Rubio just because, you know, Rubio is doing a good job. By my, by my lights, he's obviously out there a lot more kind of racking up these sorts of successes. And you can tell that then that Trump is very proud of him. He almost smiles on him as if he's like, you know, his older son almost in a Way.
- [20:50]
Mike Pesca
You know what that should.
- [20:51]
Jamie Kirchik
Yeah, in a way that should be making Don Jr. Quite jealous, actually.
- [20:57]
Mike Pesca
So this brings us to the other political news of the week. It's being called the Trump Revenge Tour. And what this describes is the electoral pound of flesh that Trump has enacted from anyone who wronged him or crossed him. So Bill Cassidy out as senator from Louisiana, Tom Massie out in Kentucky's 4th congressional district a few weeks ago, you had all those Indiana state senators who all but won, lost for not going along with Trump's plan to redistrict Louisiana. And so that says something, right? It does say that Trump is exceedingly popular with the Republican base. Should we look at this as well? We knew this and it doesn't really go far beyond Trump. Has this, has this almost mind control over a fairly small portion of the electorate? Or does it say something like, you know, Trump is still very, very potent even if he in the polls. He's at an all time low among American voters.
- [22:01]
Jamie Kirchik
Yeah, I don't underestimate, I wouldn't underestimate him on this. And look, he's, I mean, has he ever endorsed a Republican in a primary and lost?
- [22:10]
Mike Pesca
Yes, he, I believe, withdrew his endorsement of Mo Brooks in Alabama when it looked like Mo Brooks wouldn't win. So that's one example.
- [22:20]
Jamie Kirchik
Right. But anyway, but, yeah, so he's actually been quite potent and I don't think that that's going away. And I just, I just don't generally count him out. Not just because of his own skills as a political figure, because, you know, we haven't mentioned the Democrats yet. Okay. And the Democrats are very good at screwing things up and moving and, you know, doing things, doing things that alienate and scare the average American voter. And I think, you know, we still, we're going to talk about, you know, certain Democrats later on in this conversation that are, you know, very good examples of that. And so they make his job even, even easier in that, in that regard.
- [22:55]
Mike Pesca
Yeah. What do you make of Trump's continued sway on the Republican or the MAGA base? Should we be surprised? I mean, should we, do you think, Isaac, we should look at his overall popularity and have said some of this will show up among Republicans because it doesn't seem to have.
- [23:13]
Isaac Saul
Yeah, look, I mean, I think we sort of go through these cycles every few months where there's all this hubbub about whether Trump still has control over the Republican Party or he can swing an election with an endorsement, and then the election comes in. 98% of the time. He does he gets what he wants? The, you know, whoever is standing in his way either bends the knee or they get run over. And it's his party. And honestly it's been his party since 2016. It was briefly not his party in the wake of January6, and then by 2022 it was again. And I think anybody telling themselves anything different is kind of delusional at this point. I mean, it's over. Trump won. The Republican Party's his, he's making it in his image and that's who the Democrats are running against and that's who Republicans inside the party have to play ball with. That being said, I will say there is something interesting that's going to happen now, meaning between mid May as we sit here recording this, and November, when the November elections come, which is that Trump kind of just blew up his Senate majority in a very interesting way. I mean, Senator Bill Cassidy, who Trump just primaried and ended his term in office as of November is now going to be this sort of loan shark, 6 month independent minded person who can do whatever he wants. We saw him just switch his vote on the Iran war resolution and come play ball with the Democrats and help push that forward. John Cornyn has no more reason, you know, to pretend like he likes Trump. We all know he does. And he posts his little pictures of him reading Trump's book book on Twitter to try to win his favor. That's over now. Trump has endorsed Paxton. So Cornyn's going to be a little bit of a more unpredictable senator in the next few months. Murkowski, Collins, they've been, you know, basically independent, though less independent than many Democrats want for years now. And Senator Thom Tillis is retiring, so he's been kind of doing his own thing already for a few months. We've seen he blocked the Fed nomination for a few weeks. I mean that's five senators with a 53 to 47 majority who I think are basically unpredictable. So there's some live swing votes in the Senate now and I'm really curious to see how that impacts the legislative pushes the Trump administration has in mind before the midterms, which I'll remind you, I mean, despite all the gerrymandering, Democrats I think still are likely to control the House after November, at which point Trump really does become the traditional kind of lame duck ish president. So in some particular ways he might have just blown up whatever last four or five months of majority power he had.
- [25:59]
Mike Pesca
Yeah. On that War Powers act, they needed Fetterman to defect from the Democrats and You can't always count on Fetterman. I don't even know if Fetterman can always count on Fetterman. I will also say that if you look at all the senators who voted for impeachment in 21, Richard Burr, Bill Cassidy, Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, Mitt Romney, Ben Sasse, Pat Toomey. So that would be out retiring, embattled there. Out retiring, retired and dying and defeated. Murkowski survived because of Alaska's ranked choice voting system that allowed primary voters who weren't Republicans to vote for her. And that's a big angle to this. You said that Bill Cassidy was primary. The only reason it was primary. It is, for the first time in decades, Louisiana eschewed its jungle primary and went with partizan primaries. So the way that, and this is also true in Indiana, the way that primaries work have a big effect on if these Republicans really are embattled. And if you look at, say, the thresholds of victory on those unbelievably expensive Indiana races, there were still, I mean, for a local state Senate race, there was a big turnout, but it was still a tiny turnout. So is Trump all powerful within the Republican Party or is he all powerful within the people who actually show up to vote in primaries, which by design suppress turnout? I'd say the latter, but that is the situation that we're dealing with. Jamie, you share any of the concerns, or at least the insights of what Isaac was saying about Trump giving himself a harder time in the Senate?
- [27:38]
Jamie Kirchik
I don't think he cares. I mean, I just, I don't think he thinks about these things.
- [27:43]
Isaac Saul
We agree about that. Yeah.
- [27:45]
Jamie Kirchik
Yeah. I don't think, I don't think he's a long term strategic thinker, you know, And I think you see that with the Paxton endorsement. Right. Because, you know, John Cornyn would have been a shoe in. I think he would have won by double digits or. We don't know yet. Right. Who's going to. What's going to happen. But if John Cornyn is the nominee, he will win by at least 10 points again against James Tallarico. Right. Ken Paxton is a much more risky bet. Okay. And why is he doing this? Purely for his own vanity. Right. I mean, there's no other reason for him to be endorsing Paxton in my, in my assessment of this other than the fact that it, you know, it like, warms him more to have, like, a guy who's more of a supplicant in Texas than, say, you know, someone who's a more traditional Republican. Right. So I just, I don't think that he's, he really cares about this. I don't really think he thinks that much about it. I really think it is about him at the end of the day.
- [28:39]
Mike Pesca
Yeah. I think his bet on Paxton is a little like his bet on Iran. All right. You know, might not work, but let's see what happens. Could be interesting. What's the downside? Yeah, yeah, it's a roll of the dice where he probably only has two of the six numbers, but again, he doesn't care. I think Paxton will probably win because Talrico, though some somewhat talented among the Democratic field. And while the general election map is like plus five for Democrats, Texas is still plus. Isaac, what would you say is a state six or seven for Republicans?
- [29:12]
Isaac Saul
Yeah, I would say about six or seven for Republicans. And even in a year where their popularity and Trump's popularity is underwater, I mean, this is almost as redundant of a kind of conversation as does Trump still control the Republican Party? Is can a Democrat win a statewide election in Texas? And, you know, the answer is no until it's not. And I'm not sure that Talarico is the one to change that equation. But to James's point, I mean, Ken Paxton is probably going to be as close and as risky as we've seen in the last two decades. I mean, I don't think if he gets the nomination, it is definitely not going to be a shoo in election. And as Lindsey Graham said, who is wrong about a lot of stuff, but right about this, at the very least, this probably means that Republicans are going to have to spend three times as much as they would have if Cornyn was running just to defend the Senate seat.
- [30:05]
Mike Pesca
So something else definitely doesn't care about.
- [30:08]
Isaac Saul
Right. Even if they win, they're going to have to spend a lot more money to do it. That much is almost certain.
- [30:14]
Mike Pesca
Yeah. And also, and no voters think like this or, you know, but 5% of voters, they're giving up a lot of power. Cornyn was, you know, the second most powerful senator in the Senate, and they go to Paxton to scratch their ids. And not just in terms of him being a freshman. He hasn't shown great political acumen or the ability to really get things done outside of, you know, redoing his own kitchen counters and so forth.
- [30:39]
Isaac Saul
And Cornet Cornham's, well, like too. I mean, you see the way all these senators responded. A lot of them, you know, from the maga, Right. To the sort of establishment, Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, Moderate middle. There was just total upset about the decision that Trump made. And I think that does actually still matter quite a bit in an institution like the Senate. I mean, we saw when President Biden came into office, a lot of people thought he wouldn't be able to get anything done. And he accomplished quite a bit in the first couple years, mostly because he understood how that chamber worked. And despite all the public posturing, he had really good relationships with a lot of Republicans in the Senate who he could get to play ball. Those relationships matter in a smaller chamber like that. And it's hard to calculate what kind of loss that is if Cornyn actually gets run out. But it'll be a different dynamic with Paxton in there, for sure.
- [31:37]
Mike Pesca
Yeah. And let's also point out that we listed a lot of candidates who did something to show as Trump perceived it, disloyalty. And yet voting to impeach the guy or convict the guy is, quote, unquote, disloyal. Cornyn's not in that camp. I think Cornyn didn't vote to impeach Trump. He's given him. I mean, this is a very annoying statistic, the percentage of time you vote with Trump, because things don't come to a vote unless the vast majority of Republicans want it for their agenda. But anyway, he's with him, like, 99% of the time. And if you go down the list of what he might have done to offend Trump, it's just defending the prerogatives of the Senate more than Trump would like. I think what's driving the endorsement is something temperamental. He doesn't like the stodginess of a Cornyn, but really, Trump was looking at the polls and he thought Paxton would win, and so he decided to take his shot. As far as just being on the right side of a bet, he is a little bit of a riverboat gambler with both his party in America.
- [32:39]
Isaac Saul
Yeah. And I'd be curious. One last thing I'll just say is I don't think it's over for Cornyn yet. I mean, I think the Trump endorsement, as we talked about at the top of the show, it matters a great deal. He very rarely loses those sorts of endorsements. But I think John Cornyn's one of those politicians who I'm pretty sure has never lost an election since he was running for, like, railroad commission in Texas 30 years ago. I mean, he's a very good politician with a lot of deep roots in the state. And if there was somebody who's going to overcome the Trump endorsement. I think somebody in his mold is probably the kind of person who could do that. So I definitely think Paxton's the favorite now. And if I were a betting man, I would put my money on him. But I'm not sold that this is a done deal. And I could see a world where Cornyn still figures his way out of it. So we'll see.
- [33:36]
Mike Pesca
I could tell you are not a betting man because right Now Paxton is 94% to get the nomination and Cornyn is 6. And the odds at 6%, you get 15 times your investment. Anyway, this is not, this is not an endorsement, but I will announce that
- [33:51]
Isaac Saul
that's a poly market.
- [33:53]
Mike Pesca
That is a cow she who are coming on as endorsers and sponsors of the gist. But also, you know, the markets convey some actual interesting information without, without destroying
- [34:05]
Isaac Saul
your sponsorship with Kalshee. I'll just say happens. Yeah, I'll just say I think the prediction markets are getting worse at predicting, is my opinion. There's been some statistical analysis of this. I just, I don't, I, I, I, Again, I think Paxton's the favorite. I think 94's absurd. I think it's maybe more 70, 30, 65, 45 odds. So maybe I'll fire up my Couchy account later and see if I can make some money. But. Yeah, that's it. That's interesting. That's much more skewed than I would have expected.
- [34:39]
Mike Pesca
Massey was favored over Gallerin up until a week and a half ago, so I don't know. That doesn't necessarily. Yeah, that doesn't. I, I may have also made $20 on gallery, but that doesn't mean they're bad at predicting, by the way. Like, a 70% chance of winning comes in 70% of the time, you know? Right, right.
- [34:57]
Isaac Saul
And then the betters are bad at betting, but.
- [34:59]
Mike Pesca
Yeah, yeah, exactly. All right, in a minute, we're going to talk about not if the markets are bad at predicting, but if our politics are bad at being reasonable, moderate, normal, and in the middle when we come back, back on. Not even mad. I want to talk about Navy dolphins. Did you know that our desire to assist the older. They don't like to be called aged, but the older Navy dolphins helped unlock a secret to healthy aging for all of us. Yes, I am excited to share with you. C15 from Fatty 15, the first emerging essential fatty acid to be discovered in more than 90 years. A scientific breakthrough that supports healthy aging. Here's the dolphin connection. So Fatty 15 co founder Dr. Stephanie Van Watson discovered the benefits of C15 while working with the Navy to improve the health and welfare of older dolphins. You know, the truth is as our cells age, our bodies age too. And as many as one in three people worldwide may have low C15 levels and fragile cells. 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Upgrade to the T2 work pant and stay comfortable no matter what the day brings. Get 15% off your first order at true work.com with code the Gist that's T R U E w e r k.com code the gist true Work Built like it matters because it does One great podcast that talks about everything we're going through in our democracy through a constitutional lens is the Oath in the Office. I've been on it. I listened to it. It's hosted by bonafide constitutional scholar Cory Bretchneider, past Just guest and Sirius XM host John Fugal saying here's a tip. Future Just guest and the show, which always ranks in Apple's top five in government, has featured guests like Senator Sheldon Whitehouse and journalist Dahlia Lithwick and Justice Stephen Breyer and me, Mike Pesca in that company. Smart, accessible, focused on power. Listen to the Oath in the Office wherever you get your podcast. Also on YouTube with full video episodes every we're back with Not Even Mad. Our guests are Jamie Kirchik and Isaac Salt. Let us now quote a different great song. It just takes some time, little girl, you're in the middle of the ride. Everything, everything will be just fine. So saying Jimmy Eat World and a number one song from 2001, that song, name the Middle. Here is an update. Jimmy never got to eat the world as he had his eyes set on. But the extremes in America seem to have swallowed the middle. It's very hard to find it. Not only do I agree, but so does Barney Frank, a stalwart of, if not the left, but certainly the Democratic Party and liberalism for much of my life. Now Barney Frank is winding down his life. He's in hospice care. But you spoke to him, Jamie, and tell us what you found about what he thinks about the middle and what you're thinking about the middle.
- [41:05]
Jamie Kirchik
Well, I don't. You know, he, he would certainly would not identify himself as being in the middle. And he was very much an outspoken liberal. I mean, really, one of the most prominent, you Know, liberals, left wing liberals of the, you know, late 20th century in the United States. You know, the message that he was, was putting forth and, you know, he unfortunately died today, the day that we're recording this. He, he felt that the sort of cultural left of the Democratic Party and the left wing coalition had basically spoiled the Democratic Party's chances. That the Democratic Party was essentially the more popular party in terms of its economic policies and that most Americans are on the left economically. They want a strong social welfare state. Right. They don't really want to make cuts to, you know, major government programs like Social Security and, and Medicare and Medicaid. And Donald Trump certainly has this, you know, recognize this as well. But that because of these very alienating positions that the far. That the cultural left basically was taking on things like, you know, immigration and, you know, the transgender issue and whatnot, that they were really. He actually called it, you know, a vote repelling platform. And he shared, he shares these views in a book that he will be publishing posthumously in the fall. He shared them on Jake Tapper show about two weeks ago when he was interviewed. And he got a really nasty response, you know, from the kind of online left, you know, people like Matt Stoller and the Willy Wonka character in New Orleans. What's his name? Oh, Nathaniel Robinson. Right, that's him. He was making, you know, very derogatory
- [42:51]
Mike Pesca
Willy Wonka owned a successful factory, sir.
- [42:54]
Jamie Kirchik
That's true.
- [42:54]
Mike Pesca
Nathaniel Robinson runs a family.
- [42:56]
Jamie Kirchik
I don't think Willy Wonka was a Willy Wonka. Wasn't a union buster either. Unlike.
- [43:01]
Mike Pesca
That's right. Favorite Gobstoppers. Wasn't a job.
- [43:04]
Jamie Kirchik
Yeah. Didn't have bad labor relations with the Oompa Loompas. But he got this very kind of, you know, we're all, we're all used to this. If you're sort of conversant in American politics on the Internet, you know, he was, he was excoriated by these, you know, very online kind of Mamdani type leftist as being, you know, oh, it's so, it's so perfect, isn't it, that he poignant that he's basically, you know, attacking the left on his deathbed. And this is, you know, why should we be listening to people like him because they don't know what they're talking about and that that Democratic Party is dying. And so that's kind of what he was met with. But I think he, you know, whatever you think of Barney Frank and I obviously had my political differences with him. I'm certainly not as far Left as he was. You have to acknowledge, and you know, the kind of smart conservatives even acknowledge this, that he was extremely intelligent, certainly one of the funniest, wittiest, clever members of our, of our Congress over the past couple of decades. And he was, you know, he was a force to be reckoned with. And I think it's, you know, he, where it's, it's sad that we don't have more people like him on either side of the aisle. You know, regardless of your ideology, I think it's sad that we don't have more people of his sort of thoughtfulness in our politics today.
- [44:19]
Mike Pesca
Yeah. So I know Barney Frank wasn't in the middle. I was thinking more of defining the middle of the Democratic Party. And he was very powerful. And was it maybe even a little to the left back in the time when there really were Blue Dog Democrats? But Isaac, you could either take it from is the is he right about the middle of the Democratic Party or this thing that is your ongoing project. Is the middle in American politics out there worth cultivating? Monetizable, cool, potent. What do you think?
- [44:49]
Isaac Saul
Look, I think first of all, there's more self identified independence now in America than they've ever been as a percentage of the electorate. And there's very little party partisan loyalty among the next generation of voters that are coming into adulthood right now. You know, younger millennials and Gen Z, they don't have the same sort of attachment to Democrats or Republicans or Bill Clinton or Ronald Reagan that, you know, my parents generation and their parents generation did. So I do think it's a, it's a jump ball in terms of which kind of political future is going to own the day, whether it's going to be the sort of more extreme fringes of the right and the left or whether it's going to be this more kind of thoughtful, purple, moderate middle. And honestly, I think there just needs to be a handful of leaders who have some charisma who can carry that baton into the future for it to be a forceful political party. But it's certainly true in my view that what Barney's pushing at is a real thing, which is that, you know, one of the things that I found really interesting about the article that Jamie wrote was about the, the kind of economic populism that the left used to champion, that the right took and then as Barney seemed to be kind of hinting at, paired with a more palatable social political perspective, while the left paired that economic populism with a less palatable social political perspective that turned off a lot of voters in the middle or center left. So I think the economic populism is clearly ascendant and if somebody can sort of capture that while carrying a more moderate posture for the party on all manner of social issues into the future, that seems like the winning formula. And we're witnessing right now. Graham Platner in Maine is probably the best example. Example. He's really doing the working class like economic. Class warfare, economic populism talk. But also is like this gruff, masculine. Yeah, stick this, this gruff masculine guy who's you know, trashing a lot of the more sort of far left sensitive, safe space type liberal politics which I think is an interesting combination and probably why he's having a lot of success in a state like Maine.
- [47:22]
Mike Pesca
Yeah. So I'll just play. I'll just do the raft of to be sure isn't caveats. One is that independent doesn't necessarily mean moderate. And I know, you know, of course people identify themselves as independent sometimes because my party's not to the right or to the left enough or I just so hate I'm a Republican, but I so hate their stance on name an issue abortion Israel that I can't call myself a Republican. There are purity tests showing up there. Also the moderation of politicians. It's a very fraught word and no one likes to be identified with it. But not, not online and not in public posturing. But when people go to the polls, people who don't even think about these things and would never post anything online, it is just their natural inclination to other things. It's not just Barney Frank. Seth Moulton was one of a couple of Democrats who a few months ago said the exact same thing about trans in sports. And he also got piled on. But you know what? So did Tom Suozzi who is not in a Democrat plus 20 but is in a Democrat plus 2 district on long island. And he didn't get piled on. So it's interesting when very left leaning, or maybe this is true with right winning people, but when people from very left leaning places who are identified with with the more progressive wing say something quite obvious like abolish the police is vote repellent, they get slaughtered. But when other people who are just trying to get elected and get their fellow Democrats elected say that, I don't know, there doesn't seem to be the Nathan Robinson zeal to come out and strike against them. And then the last thing I would also say in this pretty annoying caveat role is that I know that every Democrat hearing this is saying something like fine, yeah, you're right, trans rights, sure, it could be better, but are you kidding me? Who cares about the salience of that issue when compared with all these real things that are going on? And I co sign to that. But you got to understand how politics works and you got to understand how messaging works. And when you identify yourself with unpopular message, it's going to make you unpopular. Maybe I'll say another thing which is that it's not like the Democrats have been so great as champions of the working man. I know Sherrod Brown would like to think so and Platner would like to think so, but every time they've had a chance, there are definitely members in their coalition who say no, we don't want to give this contract to the blue collar worker because of environmental reasons or because of equity reasons. So they do get in their way as in terms of the substance of what Frank thinks is naturally true, that the working man, working woman should identify with them. All right, those are 40 quick. What do you think?
- [50:05]
Isaac Saul
Yeah, I just want to add, I mean on the salience of, you know, something like the trans issues, I do think there's a, there's kind of an interesting political dynamic that I feel like is really under discussed there, which is voters often cast ballots about what they're scared of, fear of politics. Everybody knows that, that, but we don't really internalize the implications of that. Like, you know, I think about conservatives who might go Casabelle for Trump because they're worried that there's going to be this like non white takeover of the country. And if you go pin them down on that and ask them like the likelihood of, you know, in 20 years that Spanish language is going to be the primary language in the United States or something. None of them are going to say that. It's, it's 50% or greater. It's, it's, there's maybe a 5 or 10% chance of some sort of major cultural takeover that scares them enough that they're willing to go become a single issue voter and punch a ballot for Trump despite all these things they don't like about him. There's a similar thing on the left with like something like the trans stuff, which is, it's not like every Democrat who's switching their vote to vote for a Republican or every middle of the road person is like deathly afraid of trans people and thinks all these horrible things are going to happen in the future. It's that they, they sense there's like a 5 or 10% chance there's going to be this big cultural takeover where at their kids school they're going to have to do XYZ things they don't want them to have to do in order to like check off the progressive boxes. And they hate that it's inconvenient, it annoys them, it worries them about their traditional views on sex or gender or whatever. And so in order to nip that in the the bud, they're willing to cast a vote for somebody maybe they don't necessarily like that much. And you really do have to resolve that kind of risk calculation for a lot of voters in order to move them to their side. And I think for a long time, you know, between 2016 and 2022, 2024, Democrats were pretty resistant to the idea of doing anything about that, doing any work in that sort of pursuit. And now they're realizing that's not really a political politically sustainable posture and they have to change course. So we're seeing more of that now all of a sudden.
- [52:14]
Mike Pesca
Yes. And lest people hearing this think, oh, so to be middle on trans issues you have to sell out trans people. To this day, even though there's been this quote unquote backlash, 80% of Americans, maybe at 70, still are in favor of protections in the workplace of trans adults not being fired just because they're trans. The middle on trans rights is not where the median Republican elected is, but it is also not in favor of girls, trans girls playing in boys sports, as small an issue as that is. Jamie, I'll give you a chance to pick at any of this, but I did want to ask you in your area of expertise, which is gay rights and the state of gay Washington, was Barney Frank a trailblazer by example or by substance?
- [53:08]
Jamie Kirchik
Well, both. I mean, he was the first elected federally elected official to come out voluntarily. I use the word voluntarily because there were two previous congressmen in the 1980s who were sort of forced out of the closet by scandal. And people kind of, it sort of gets confused in people's memories because not long after he came out in 1987 and 1989, he had his own scandal involving, you know, a prostitute who he had hired and was basically living in his apartment and whose parking tickets he had fixed. But people, so people forget that he actually came out of his own volition, you know, two years earlier, which was a big deal. I mean, to become the first. You know, this was at a time when, you know, an openly gay person could not get a security clearance, you know, in the, in the U.S. so national security state. So he's, you know, he's clearly very much a trailblazer in that sense. And I think, you know, substantively, I think he just. He made the arguments for gay rights in a very kind of intelligent way. He was, you know, as I said before, he was very witty, and he was very, extremely smart, and he really had a. Had a way with words. And he very famously said of the pro life movement that they begin. They believe life begins at conception and ends at birth because of their complete lack of regard for social spending programs. And then in his later life, he sort of presaged a lot of the fights that you see now between maybe the more moderate side of the LGBT movement and the kind of trans wing when he supported. He was the real chief sponsor of something called the Employment Non Discrimination act that would have banned discrimination in employment for people who are not straight. And he only. At first, he only had it to protect gay people, and then he kind of got pressured and bullied into adding the tea. And that basically was like a poison pill. I mean, there was. You know, he might have been able to have passed it. This is back in the late 2000s, early 2010s. You know, theoretically, he might. It would have been difficult when George W. Bush was. Was president, but certainly when Obama was president, it wouldn't have been that difficult. I don't. I don't think for him to have passed a bill like that. There were moderate Republicans who would have passed that, but for whom, you know, adding the T would have been a bridge too far. And it was just sort of a very early example of the kind of, you know, emotional politics that are not really rooted in reality that I think you see a lot of the left, you know, falling for over the past 15, 20 years.
- [55:41]
Mike Pesca
Yeah, good. Good context. And so part of the reason that he's resentful of this now is he probably says millions more people would have enjoyed protections had we not insisted on this small number of people who represented the poison pill.
- [56:00]
Jamie Kirchik
Yeah.
- [56:01]
Mike Pesca
Yeah. All right, now is the time in our show where we talk about those little annoyances, those some would call them grievances that come up day to day. They are the things that grind our gears or get our goats. They're the goat grinder. Isaac, you're no stranger to go grinding you. I know you and your show, suspension of the rules, describe them kind of differently. But do you have what you call a grievance, what we call the double G Goat grinder?
- [56:28]
Isaac Saul
Yeah, I like. I like the goat Grinder. I might have to steal that vernacular. And I was, yeah, I was laughing at the prompt just because on, on my podcast with my co hosts, we end our weekly show by, yeah, she sharing our grievances. The things big and small that are bothering us from the week. A safe space to complain, we like to call it. So I'm used to looking around and finding things to bitch about. That's what I'm really good at is basically what I'm trying to say. You know, I, my, the big, the big goat grinder in my world right now is I have a 16 month old son who just discovered the virtue of shrieking at the top of his lungs whenever he doesn't get what he wants. It took him that long. It took him that long. And he has realized, especially when we're in public, that if he screams as loud as he possibly can in the most high pitched tone he can muster, everybody looks at him. And he loves Nathan Robinson. Yeah, he loves that. No comment. He loves that kind of attention. And my wife and I have been desperately trying to ignore it because all the, you know, modern parenting stuff tells you that if you give him the attention, he reinforces the behavior. So we're doing a lot of looking away and laughing and trying not to let him see us laughing while he's screaming as loud as he can, pointing at, you know, a piece of cheese or a cup of milk. And it's, it's horrific. I love my son dearly, but waking up to that sound in the morning is one of the most unpleasant things I can possibly imagine. And I can't wait for this phase to be over. So that's my, my goat grinder.
- [58:07]
Mike Pesca
Right now, my goat grinder is about basketball, not professional, because here we go. Yeah, doing quite well, I believe. They beat the Philadelphia 76ers quite handily. Isaac. There is a coach at LSU, Louisiana State University, will Wade, and he has looked at the rules of college basketball and realized I, there are no rules. There just might not be any rules. So he has gone out and recruited a couple of 22 year olds, couple of 23 year olds. One of the 23 year olds will be RJ Lewis. He used to play for my favorite team, St. John's and then he went pro. And I don't know if you know anything about college basketball, though, not the readout of amateurism that it once was. It is still supposed to be College. So R.J. lewis never wore an NBA jersey in an NBA game. He wore an NBA jersey in the preseason and he got hurt and but for some bad luck he would have been a Boston Celtic. He's going back to lsu. But even worse or more egregious and more blatantly, Yam Madar, who is a rising star in the Euroleague and is turning 26 next year, will apparently be going to play for LSU. Now my goat grinder isn't about this one guy exploiting the system. It's this weird phenomenon where there was so much injustice in college basketball in that coaches in schools were making money and the players weren't. So the path to justice though has injected so much more injustice into the sport. And I think about it, is it the case that there was no way to really reform this? That what we really had was a professional institution strangely grafted onto colleges? There was no logical reason for this to happen and so all we were ever going to inevitably seen when someone tried to reform it was some sort of Marxist heightening of the contradictions. Maybe. Or maybe the reformers just went crazy and were driven by money and now we have 26 year old men with, I don't know, grandchildren suiting up for the Bayou Bengals. Jamie, I know that college basketball occupies most of your time and gets most of your goats ground, so I'll request, request that you not talk about John Wooden or any other wizard of Westwood type figure.
- [60:18]
Jamie Kirchik
So you don't need to worry about that with me. What I've, I've noticed a trend, I think, I think it's a real phenomenon. The more I've, I've read about it of Gen Z people, individuals not making eye contact with you when they talk. This is something that happens repeatedly in my life when I'm dealing with someone from this generation. They sort of, you know, their head is maybe directionally towards you, but their eyes are not looking at you, they're looking away. They're looking, looking up, they're looking down to the right or to the left. There's no eye contact. It's extremely difficult and sort of off putting and strange to deal with and you know, just add it to the list of, you know, social traumas that Gen Z has, I guess is how I would put it.
- [61:04]
Mike Pesca
That's awesome.
- [61:05]
Jamie Kirchik
Have you noticed that yourself, either of you?
- [61:08]
Isaac Saul
Yes.
- [61:09]
Mike Pesca
Yeah, I have. I have some Z ers in my house and I make them look at me. I make them not avert their gaze. I've also tried to drum the like out of them. That's less successful. And when it comes to haircuts, these kids, they love having the muffin heads. What are you going to do?
- [61:25]
Jamie Kirchik
What are you going to do?
- [61:26]
Mike Pesca
You know, who am I? Who am I? What standing do I have to criticize anyone's haircut? Really?
- [61:31]
Isaac Saul
You took the joke right out of my lips, man.
- [61:35]
Mike Pesca
Well, I want to thank both of my guests who've been awesome and Isaac Saul is the founder of Tangle and not the first Jew elected to the House of Commons. Although maybe Saul, Isaac wasn't either. Thank you, Isaac.
- [61:48]
Isaac Saul
Thanks for having me, Mike.
- [61:50]
Mike Pesca
And Jamie Kirchek writes for quote, anyone who will have him. But I do recommend and commend you to Barney Frank, Second Coming out. That's what we talked about today, and that's in the Atlantic. Thanks so much, Jamie.
- [62:01]
Jamie Kirchik
Thank you.
- [62:01]
Mike Pesca
And until next time, we're not saying we're right. We're not saying you're right. We are saying we're not even mad. And that's it for today's show. Corey War produces the gist. Kathleen Sykes runs the gist list. Ben Astaire is our booking producer, and Jeff Craig runs our socials. Michelle Pesca oversees it all Benevolently improve and thanks for listening.