3665 - Trillionaires, Botched Wars and Midterms w/ Heather 'Digby' Parton

Summary

Podcast Summary

The Majority Report with Sam Seder
Episode 3665: Trillionaires, Botched Wars and Midterms w/ Heather 'Digby' Parton
Date: June 12, 2026
Special Guest: Heather 'Digby' Parton

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Overview

This episode delves into the intersection of economic upheaval, political machinations, and the consequences of unchecked wealth in America. Sam Seder and co-hosts break down the unprecedented ascent of Elon Musk to trillionaire status, the latest twists in Donald Trump’s foreign and domestic maneuvers, and the fast-changing dynamics of the 2026 midterm elections. Expert political columnist Heather 'Digby' Parton joins for a deep analysis of current events, Democratic party transformation, and the terrain ahead.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Elon Musk Becomes the First Trillionaire and SpaceX’s Controversial IPO

Timestamps: 06:28 – 13:43

• Musk’s wealth reaches $1 trillion following a record-shattering $1.78 trillion SpaceX IPO.
• Detailed breakdown by A More Perfect Union (Eric Gardner) on how Twitter (X), XAI, and SpaceX were merged in a complex, cashless maneuver benefiting early investors.
• Unprecedented: SpaceX’s IPO is opened broadly to retail investors, signaling a lack of appetite from institutional investors.
  "When you see an IPO give a far larger allocation to ordinary investors, it’s usually a sign that they can’t get professional investors to buy at that price. The price is nuts." – Analyst (08:48)
• Regulatory rules were changed to let SpaceX immediately enter the NASDAQ-100 index, forcing many index funds (including 401ks) to buy in regardless of the stock’s merit.
• Hosts liken the scheme to market manipulations before the 1929 crash:
  “This is the kind of stuff we saw before the market crash of 1929.” – Sam Seder (12:55)
• Concerns are raised about potential risks to retirement accounts and the financial system if SpaceX collapses.

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2. Iran Crisis: Trump’s War Flirting, the Economy, and Geopolitical Blowback

Timestamps: 21:24 – 32:45

• Trump claims to have struck a last-minute deal with Iran, averting a planned attack—amid skepticism from all parties.
  "There's stories now that there was a mad scramble to convince him not to do it. And now today he's like, we've got a deal." – Sam Seder (21:59)
• Heather Parton explains the political cross-currents:
  • Trump’s desire to defuse tensions, given worsening inflation and economic instability, is at odds with “the blob,” pro-war hawks, pro-Israel factions, and MAGA opposition to “forever wars.”
  • U.S. economic turmoil (bond and oil markets, food inflation) makes continued military escalation risky for Trump’s political fortunes.
• The U.S. is portrayed as adrift, its foreign policy unraveling globally.
  “If you believed in the big theory of, you know, the Pax Americana...done. That’s done.” – Digby (24:09)
• The market's volatility is framed as a cynical game where insiders profit from Trump's impulsivity.

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3. Election Lawfare: Voter Suppression, Scare Tactics, and Enthusiasm Gaps

Timestamps: 33:00 – 48:07

• New Trump directives restrict ballot delivery in states resisting federal demands, while the FBI raids an Ohio voting rights group.
• Host Emma Vigeland highlights ongoing attacks on ActBlue, critical for Democratic fundraising.
• Digby warns that Republican allegations of fraud and slow vote counts are “not for our consumption… [it's] laying the groundwork for their own followers to justify what they're going to do for the election.” (44:11)
• The group discusses how this narrative prepares the ground for extremist or antidemocratic actions after November.
• Echoes of Bush-era efforts to fabricate voter fraud are noted.

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4. Midterm Election Terrain: Blue State Drama & Democratic Shifts

Timestamps: 37:58 – 43:16, 51:45 – 70:04

California

• Republicans amplify bogus claims of blue-state election fraud, focusing on delayed ballot counts.
  “California counts very slowly… There’s a dual commitment: make sure everyone gets to vote, and very transparently prevent fraud. That takes time.” – Digby (37:58)
• Karen Bass and Nithya Raman, two progressives, advance in the mayoral race, deflating right-wing “red wave” hopes.

Maine & the Platner Factor

• Record Democratic primary turnout for Grant Platner, despite (or because of) personal controversies.
• Digby draws a historical arc, noting Democratic Party’s shift left after decades of centrist and corporate dominance (50:00 – 62:30).
• Brian Beutler’s argument (via Digby): Democratic “moderation” as an identity brand is less relevant; most people support progressive policies, even if they resist the “progressive” label.

Broader Party Change

• Transformation: Democrats, once stymied by southern “Dixiecrats” and 90s centrism, are now more uniformly left, with old guard (like Joe Manchin, Joe Lieberman) nearly gone.
• “The party is much more left-leaning than it used to be. The centrists are much more center-left than center-right…” – Digby (61:00)

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5. Candidacies, Redemption Narratives, and Electability

Timestamps: 70:04 – 76:07

• Platner’s candidacy: fiercely anti-oligarch, populist, and commended for his lived experience and redemption arc after Iraq War trauma.
• Emma Vigeland:
  • Argues that Platner’s story of recovery and outsider status resonates with young men and disaffected ex-Trump voters:
    “His story of redemption is important — it means that you’re not cancelled if you maybe supported Trump before.” (74:12)
• Digby agrees the anti-Trump energy and disdain for Republican hypocrisy are fueling record turnout, drawing a parallel to how Bill Clinton’s support surged after impeachment.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the Trillionaire Economy:
  "We should not allow any of our citizens to ever accrue that much money." – Sam Seder (06:28)

• On Systemic Financial Risk:
  “If it collapses and all these big investors sell... this is the kind of stuff we saw before the market crash of 1929.” – Sam Seder (12:55)

• On America’s Geopolitical Decline:
  "If you believed in the big theory of, you know, the Pax Americana and global security…Done. That’s done." – Digby (24:09)

• On Election Narratives:
  "The complaining and whining that we hear now is not for our consumption…It is laying the groundwork for their own followers to justify what they're going to do for the election." – Sam Seder (44:11)

• On Democratic Party Transformation:
  "The party is much more left-leaning than it used to be. The centrists are much more center-left than center-right..." – Digby (61:00)

• On Redemption in Politics:
  “His story of redemption is important — it means that you’re not cancelled if you maybe supported Trump before. … I want to see somebody like him on the Senate floor questioning members of the Pentagon as somebody who has experienced PTSD and had struggles and admitted to them..." – Emma Vigeland (74:12)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• Elon Musk and SpaceX IPO Saga: 06:28–13:43
• Trump’s Iran Climbdown / War Averted: 21:24–32:45
• Election Lawfare & 'Fraud' Set-up: 33:00–48:07
• Party Transformation / Maine & Platner: 51:45–70:04
• Redemption & Populism in Candidacy: 71:34–76:07

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Tone & Style

The episode is characterized by a mixture of irreverence, deep skepticism toward “establishment” narratives (corporate, governmental, or media), and an undercurrent of urgency about rising authoritarian and oligarchic trends. Both hosts and guest, Digby, are blunt in their analysis, pragmatic in their appraisal of the present, and insistent on historical context.

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Conclusion

This episode serves as a dense, lively primer on the state of U.S. politics and finance as of mid-2026. It spotlights the perils of unchecked wealth and crony capitalism, the unraveling of old geopolitical doctrines, and the ways in which both parties — especially Democrats — are changing in response. Sam, Emma, and Digby cut through the noise and insist that political success, and the defense of democracy, requires not just better policies but an astute sense of narrative, identity, and history.

Recommended for listeners interested in the intersections of politics, finance, and progressive strategy.

Transcript

[A]

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[B]

it's my fault, I will say that it's my fault. I tried to fix the camera for when Hassan came in and I may have made it worse.

[A]

You definitely did.

[B]

Okay. I thought you said you fixed it.

[C]

But it's not your fault that we're losing power every five seconds.

[B]

No, that's certainly not my fault. That's because, because the air conditioning mobile unit is destroying the circuit breaker.

[C]

So somebody had to go to.

[A]

Apparently I am very green today.

[B]

Okay, well, you told me you fixed it before, so I'm sorry, we guess

[C]

it at the end of the day, it's all my fault.

[A]

Yeah, we'll see. Well, my greenness notwithstanding, maybe I'll try and fix it at the break. We got a lot to get to today. This weekend is, I don't know, Donald Trump's birthday or something. And there's going to be a big wrestling match on the White House that Trump has figured out how to monetize or something to that effect.

[B]

Bare knuckle fighting on the White House lawn. The dignity and grace of America on display.

[A]

But in the meantime, Elon Musk has decided to become, or I should say has become, the world's first trillionaire. That is a total failing on behalf of the United States government. We should not allow any of our citizens to ever accrue that much money. But it is what it is. And his SpaceX IPO was went live today. Here is Eric Gardner from A More Perfect Union walking us through how this happened.

[D]

In 2022, Elon Musk raised $44 billion and bought Twitter. His backers, Andreessen Horowitz, a Saudi prince, the co founder of Palantir, and Jack Dorsey, the guy who founded Twitter in the first place. Musk renamed it X, and within a year it's worth less than half he paid. That's a problem. There was also a solution. AI was hot. Musk owned an AI company, so he merged X into xai. No cash changed hands. X investors received XAI stock. But that solution raised another problem.

[E]

XAI is essentially a money furnace.

[D]

The solution? Musk has a rocket chip company. He uses it to buy XAI. Again, no cash exchanged. 3 companies, 2 mergers, $0 actually paid. Everyone who helped take Twitter private now holds SpaceX shares. Now SpaceX isn't just a rocket company that sells Internet. According to Musk, it's the future. Data centers in space. If some of my predictions come true, SpaceX will launch more AI than the cumulative amount on Earth combined. Of everything else combined, I see no

[A]

evidence that it's a viable business opportunity. There are far too many physical challenges with doing this.

[D]

But the value has to hold, because so far, no one has been paid. Investor shares are only worth something on paper. To turn paper into cash, SpaceX has to go public. When a company goes public, it opens its doors early. Investors cash out, get paid for the risk they took. Everyone else gets a chance to own a piece of something that used to be off limits. It's called an initial public offering, or IPO for short.

[A]

It is a very normal part of a company's evolution and life cycle.

[D]

There isn't just Twitter investors here. SpaceX's original investors took a big risk. Peter Thiel, Palantir's other co founder, Google, and Andreessen Horowitz. But SpaceX's IPO is anything but normal. In a typical IPO, 90% of shares go to institutional investors, pension funds, banks, insurance companies, regular people. You get 10%. SpaceX says they're changing that 30% to ordinary people. Main street, not Wall Street.

[E]

When you see an IPO give a far larger allocation to ordinary investors, it's usually a sign that they can't get professional investors to buy at that price. The price is nuts. And if you can't sell it to professional investors, well, you sell it to unprofessional investors who don't know any better.

[D]

If people want to invest in SpaceX's IPO. That's right. The problem is, Musk found a way to make people invest in SpaceX whether they want to or not.

[A]

How?

[D]

Index funds.

[E]

The index fund is one of the rare examples of the finance industry coming up with something that lines the pockets of ordinary people and not Wall street itself.

[D]

An index is a list. Someone decides which companies go on it. A fund is a basket. Someone builds it to mirror the list. When a company gets added to the index, every fund mirroring it has to buy shares not because they think it's a good investment, but because the rules require it.

[E]

Index funds have both outperform the vast majority of active managers in every market in every country over any timeframe.

[D]

In the long run, Thousands of indexes exist. Nearly a third of American stock is tied to one of them. One of the most popular tracks the NASDAQ 100. The 100 biggest non financial stocks on the NASDAQ exchange. Under Nasdaq's index rules, SpaceX isn't eligible to be included in the Nasdaq 100. New companies have to wait up to a year. It's called seasoning.

[A]

Seasoning a stock is just the process of having it trade publicly for a while. Public markets tend to be unsure of how to handle certain kinds of investments. Novel sorts of companies really quickly.

[D]

Like a rocket company that makes most of its money providing satellite Internet and wants to build AI infrastructure in space. If Musk could change that rule, he could trigger mandatory buying of SpaceX stock by every fund that tracks the index. This spring, Nasdaq changed their rules. This document outlines the proposed changes to the NASDAQ 100 index. The most important, a fast.

[B]

Just a little bit. Two more seconds there.

[F]

Yeah. Oh, I was about to.

[B]

Yeah, here we go. Sorry.

[D]

Rule if a huge company goes public, it gets into the index in 15 trading days. No seasoning. There was a public comment period.

[B]

Yeah. So basically I don't know what happened there.

[F]

Right.

[B]

It looks good on, on the screen. It might just be that filter, but. Okay, sorry. We're, we're, we're shorthanded today just to say here like that. Basically, SpaceX started trading today. The IPO price is $135 a share. It's a huge valuation of $1.78 trillion. And $75 billion are going to share in shares to investors through the ipo. That is nearly three times the previous record. And so what they're basically doing here is a pump and dump scheme for all of the early investors into Twitter or who helped take Twitter private, who are getting bundled into this as well. And they'll be able to cash out when retail investors pump up the price. That would be bad enough. And I'm telling you how much, like insane, how much larger this is. It is almost three times the previous record. It would be bad enough if it was just overvalued like that, but it's worse in that the S and P or not the S and P, the NASDAQ appears poised to change the rules to allow for a company that is this green and immature and large without like this long period of waiting to determine if the company is overvalued to potentially enter into these index funds. Which means say goodbye to your retirement if, if it collapses and if all of these big investors sell, which it looks like they're trying to do. I mean, this is the kind of stuff that we saw before the market crash of 1929.

[A]

So there it is. I mean, we'll see what will happen. I will tell you though that I don't know that many super wealthy people. I have none of. No one I have ever known has told me, hey, the person I have working for, we said I can get in on this ipo, except for this one. They were just like everybody. They were opening it up to every non professional investor they possibly could.

[C]

That feels good.

[A]

That feels like that's a. I'm sure that's not a scam. I mean, look, Elon Musk invested in Donald TRUMP Nearly $300 million, maybe more, to get him elected to be president. And it seems like it paid off. So there you go. All right, in a moment we're going to be talking to Heather Parton or Digby. But first we get a couple of words from our sponsors. Today mentioned this the other day. It's a lot of like grooming products out there, a lot of like spray on things. Somebody was telling me the other day that like one of some actors got this plugs in Turkey. People are always trying to get healthier and more fuller hair. And I know the way that I've been doing it and that is neutral. Neutral is the number one dermatologist recommended hair growth supplement brand. It's used by over one and a half million people. Back when I was contemplating doing because I was feeling like I was getting a little thin up here. Emma knew somebody who had success with it. Yes, I know somebody who had success with it. Both women just coincidentally. And I figured I'd try it. I didn't want any of the side effects that come with taking drugs. And it's been great. I've noticed less shedding. That's the big thing for me. I notice a lot less shedding when I come out of the shower and dry my hair off. But my hair has stayed thick and seems healthy. And the Upside right now is Nutrafol has formulas built for men at different life stages. I'm one of those men Nutrafol men for guys 18 to 49 that does not include me. And the new neutrophil for Men 50 plus, which is the first product of its kind specifically made for men over 50. Address the key root causes of thinning wherever you are at and life Grow visibly thicker, fuller hair in three to six months. Start Neutrophil today. Make the hat optional. Visit Nutrafol.com Enter the promo code TMR10 for 10 bucks off your first month subscription and free shipping. Find out why Nutrafol is the best selling hair growth supplement [e-mail] spelled n u t r a f o l.com promo code tmr10 that's nutrafol.com promo code tmr10. Also sponsoring the program today. The other way I get sleep. And really your mattress can't do anything about getting woken up in the morning by the cat or the sun. But nevertheless, about two months ago, I guess it was three months ago. I can't remember at one point in 2026, I switched my mattress. My mattress was very old to a Lisa and I got an original King King size mattress.

[F]

Wow.

[A]

Yep. I don't have much room to walk around my room, but that's. What are you gonna do? The big thing for me is I was waking up every morning sore because I'm I guess because I'm old, but also because my mattress was too hard, wasn't supporting me properly, I guess. And I'm trying to move because I was snoring too much, tried to move to become a side sleeper, which I've had success doing. Actually. My snore score is way down now and I think it's because of my mattress. The original King is actually four side sleepers and one other maybe stomach or I can't rem. But the point is Lisa has a lineup of beautifully crafted mattresses and they're tailored to how you sleep. Each mattress is designed with a specific sleep position and your preferences. You what you do is you go to Lisa Lee S A L E S A and you try there. You take their sleep quiz and you're going to find your perfect match in less than two minutes. They've got, they've got hybrid mattresses. They've got all memory phone mattresses. They are meticulously designed and assembled in the US for exceptional quality. They back it all up with free shipping, easy returns and a 120 night sleep trial. Lisa won the best hybrid and the best memory foam mattresses by the wire cutter from New York Times and West Elm features it as their go to mattress partner. When they sell you a bed, Lisa isn't just about sleep, it's about impact. They work with local nonprofits in the US to donate thousands of mattress to families in need with over 43 mattresses, 43,000 mattresses I should say donated to date plus leases committed to eco friendly materials and sustainable manufacturing processes. They partner with organizations like Clean Hub and Green Worms to help remove harmful plastic waste from the environment. Go to Lisa.com for the early access July 4th sale. 25% off plus you get an extra 50 bucks with the promo code Majority that's exclusive for our listeners. That's LECOM promo code majority for 25% off plus an extra 50 bucks off with the promo code Majority. Support our show. Let them know we sent you after the checkout. Again, Lisa.com promo code majority will put all that information in the podcast in YouTube descriptions now. Quick break. We come back, Heather Parton or Digby. We are back. Sam Cedar, Emma Viglin on the Majority Report. It is time for some. There you go. Ladies and gentlemen. It is the Digby theme song just in time for Heather Parton or Digby. Well done, Brian. Emma jumped the gun a little bit on that, but that's all right. We were just talking about the Knicks.

[B]

Sam's mad at me.

[A]

All this Knicks talk. It's gross.

[B]

Well, I'm wearing black today. In the words of Michael Strahan, ahead of the 0708 Super Bowl, I'm either wearing a funeral for the or I'm either wearing black as in the I messed it up. It's either a funeral for the Knicks or a funeral for the Spurs. Damn it. I messed it up. I messed it up.

[A]

Heather, welcome.

[F]

Thank you. Thank you. Glad to be here.

[A]

We had, we had some primaries this week. Well, before we get to the primaries, let's just talk about where we are in terms of Iran. I mean, oh my God. Donald Trump announced a day or two ago was going to, we're gonna, we're gonna bought, we're gonna take Carg island and we're gonna bomb the hel. Iran. And then apparently there's stories now that there was a mad scramble to convince him not to do it. And now today he's like, we've got a deal.

[F]

And

[A]

I don't even know like how to talk about this anymore. My sense is Donald Trump would love a way to get out of this because the inflation numbers this week, both the consumer and the wholesale producer are off the charts. And the stock market is starting to freak out a little bit because with inflation, they're not going to get the rate cuts that they had counted on. And so they're nervous and the bond markets have gone crazy and we have yet to see the sort of like what's going to happen with the oil markets and food is going to go up and with the screw worm that's going to add to the food inflation. So I think he wants to get out of it. But the problem is, and he, I don't think he cares one way or the other as to what deal he has to make to get out of it. But the problem is everybody else around him now he's opened up this Pandora's box and there is still this sort of like rump of the blob that is in existence in D.C. and is saying if you leave and give Iran control of the Strait of Hormuz, which seems to be part of the deal, or from the more sort of like Zionist focused group, if you leave and allow Iran to monetize their oil, we have lost this, you know, and maybe we've lost our entire sort of like theory of power in the world. And I don't think Donald Trump gets it one way or another or cares. I don't know that I do. But they're gonna try and pump the brakes on this again.

[F]

Oh, they're gonna try and pump the brakes. There's not, it's not just those, the blob, it's also the Iran hawks and those exist in both parties. Most, you know, primarily in the Republican Party, but there are some still in the Democratic Party as well that are just absolutely hostile to the to do tell.

[A]

Do tell. Digby.

[F]

I don't, I don't know specific, but I'm pretty sure there are some in the side deals. But so there's that too, that, you know, and then of course that fits in also with the, with the pro Israel, you know, faction as well. So there's that, that's pulling him on one side. Then he's got the MAGA folks who are going, wait, what, what, what about those forever wars? And they want him to get out. And he is seeing the, the stock market and the economy in general as you just, you know, reacting and starting to react pretty strongly. And I think probably that is going to get worse. Not probably everybody, all the experts say it's going to get worse simply because there's been this backup of, of events in the Strait and then the hangover from the tariffs and the whole thing is going to, you know, it's going to reach critical mass here pretty soon. And so there's no going back, at least before the midterm elections. I think the die is cast on a bad economy next November. There's just no way that he's going to be able to reverse that. And also there's just, there's Donald Trump's psychology, which is that he cannot stand the idea. I think we know that he is the sorest loser in world history. There's never been anyone in the world who has been unable to take a loss, take a big L than. More unable to take a big L than him. And so he is really stuck. He does not know what to do. Expect this. And I've read that he tells people that, you know, well, he can sell it as a victory if he does this, but he's got these people on his shoulders. The Israeli people, the Israel people, the Iran hawk people, the MAGA people, the, you know, the Democrats, you know, plenty of people who are going to, you know, he is going to be buffeted from all sides no matter what he does. And honest to God, everything I read about this is that this is done. It's lost one way or the other. It doesn't really matter from an American perspective. If you believed in the big theory of, you know, the Pax Americana and global security, you know, guarantor and all that stuff. Done. That's done. I mean, everything. Look at what's happening with Europe and what's happening with the allies in Japan, Australia, South Korea. It's over. And he did that. He did it purposefully. He did it without having any understanding of what he was doing. And he did it, as far as I can tell, without any kind of support, really, from anybody. I mean, there were no Democrats or Republicans, hawks or Magas or otherwise who were really signing on for his, for what's happened here. He just went ahead and did it because he's an idiot and had no idea what the consequences of his actions were and didn't care. And he's just going to carry on with that for another two and a half years. So that's over. It's over. And I don't. We'll, you know, I guess the country will have to pick up the pieces. Maybe it might be nice if we could reduce our military footprint and reduce our military spend, but that doesn't really look like it's going to happen. Since last Night, I think the Senate Armed Services committee approved a $1.2 trillion Pentagon budget. Now, it's not going to happen. I mean, that's not going to pass the Congress. But 1.2 trillion. And so, you know, if we do end this global security guarantor business that we've had ever Since World War II, you would think that we would be able to at least reduce that. But that doesn't look to be on the menu, E for the near future. So, you know, we're just sitting here waiting and watching the whole thing to unfold. And as for the events of this week, it's pretty clear to me that this was a way for Trump to cope by saying that they had a deal. He was clinging to straws that probably didn't really exist. Some, some Steve Witkoffer Kush called him up and said, hey, looking good, boss. You know, we got it, we got him going. They hear the Ayatollah said, gave it a big thumbs, a thumbs up, and he ran out and posted about it and went on tv. But he also wanted the market rally real bad, and that's what he got. And it was a big rally and that's what he was really looking for. That's what they're all looking for. In fact, the game that's being played on Wall street is, to me, one of the most astonishing things I've ever seen, because it's all a game. They know that Donald Trump's full of shit. They know it, but they use that as an excuse to, to, you know, do whatever they're doing, short selling, buying whatever it is they're doing in order to take advantage of the fact that they have this freak that comes out and speaks off the cuff and says whatever, you know, whatever he wants on a day to day basis. And this is really a scandal. But I don't know that, you know, I mean, what isn't really, it just

[A]

hops on the heap of scandals.

[B]

Kushner was at the Knicks game with, with Trump, by the way. And I just, just a small thing was, yeah, he was there, that scene, walking in with his kid. And it's just a little funny to me that Trump went to the game and said he didn't have time to go to his son's wedding because of the war. Just saying that.

[F]

But like Kushner, his chief negotiator, sitting there at the game with him. I mean, exactly. Who's negotiating? I mean, well, that's the question.

[B]

Like, I mean, I think that obviously Iran is. And Dropsite has Done some really good reporting on this, that Iran is really sensitive to being humiliated. They have domestic political considerations as well. So when Trump goes out at, you know, at the end of these negotiations and they think they make any progress, and he does this attempt to kind of like, bully them on Truth Social, they're going to retreat because they have domestic political considerations as well. And what is probably driving him nuts is that Iran's position has strengthened. And we can see this by the fact that they bombed Israel in response to Israel bombing Beirut, their not allowing Hezbollah to be delinked and Israel and their fighting to be delinked from these negotiations.

[F]

And then they shouldn't.

[B]

And they shouldn't. They should not. Of course not. But that just shows how, as time goes on, Iran's position strengthens, the economic situation gets worse in the West. We're in weeks away from the reserves being completely depleted. Time is on their side. And you can see that as, you know, evidenced by their actions as it relates to Israel.

[F]

Absolutely. And, you know, they've also shown that they are willing to, you know, threaten and if not destroy the facilities in the other countries in the Middle East. And that has divided Trump from his, you know, his Middle Eastern allies, you know, because they know that they're vulnerable, too, to really getting embroiled in this thing, and they're putting pressure on him, too. That's another area of, of leverage that's against him. I just don't see how this ends, you guys. I mean, other than, you know, an ongoing stalemate that more or less what we're in right now. I just don't see how it finally ends. I mean, maybe Donald Trump can, you know, hire, you know, take that plane that Qatar gave to him as a gift and fill it with, you know, thousand dollar bills or something, or Trump bills with his face, $250,000 bills with his face on it and send it to. I don't honestly know how, how this, how they get out of this. I mean, Israel is being very intractable. They've got their issues too, right? I mean, Netanyahu is fighting his own political battles and completely unwilling to back off. Iran is unwilling to back off. Trump, I think, would love to back off, but he just doesn't know how to do it in a way where he can come out on top. So, you know, stay tuned, because yesterday, you know, when he came out with the big announcement, right, you know, we've made a final deal. We're gonna. He's gonna send JD over to Europe this weekend. You know, I Think he wanted a signing on his birthday, which would have been just so sweet. And maybe they could do it and they could.

[A]

He also wanted J.D. vance not to be at his party. It sounds like relatable would want him

[F]

at trippy, you know, JD at the party. But. But yeah. So I think, you know, you know, his, his, when he came out and said it yesterday was the first time I just saw everybody go, yeah, right. Well, we'll believe it when we see it. You know, other than Wall went, oh, goody, you know, and decided to go ahead and do their route.

[A]

Right. That's just an. I mean, yes. I mean, the volatility is fantastic for those institutional players. I mean, it gives them every new context, provides another opportunity for them to make more money. And I also wonder how much pressure he was under from Elon Musk to make sure that the news was good going into this day when his IPO came out. Because you want that context. The Iran war is over and then the, you know, space X goes up. I have to imagine that's not a coincidence. And I guess we'll find out by Monday or, I don't know, in the next two days as to whether any of this was even remotely real. But I'm with you. I don't know how this ends, but it's quite clear that no matter how it ends, it's. It has weakened the United States. And I'm not sure, frankly, like, I, I'm terribly upset about that. But it's come at the cost of, it's come at the cost of a lot of, like, you know, thousands of lies in Iran. It's come at the cost of projecting forward food insecurity for God knows how many millions of people around the world and inflation for people. I mean, there's been a huge cost associated with this. And I'm not convinced that the failures of the Iran war aren't going to drive up. I mean, you say 1.2 trillion and we don't think it's going to pass. I'm not convinced that that number won't pass. Like, even during the Biden, even during the Biden years, they were, they were inflating the hell out of the military budget. And I also think it feels like every time I see Donald Trump put out a press release about voting, he's now including $1.5 trillion for the military. And I think from his perspective, it's like, here's a bribe. Like, you know, things are going to be interesting. I mean, I don't know, it just seems Weird. I mean, like, you know, here's a bribe. Because the other part of this, as we, as the inflation numbers, you know, increase and increasingly we're seeing more and more indication of, of, of just tsunami level polling numbers for the Republican Party, despite the fact that, like, I feel like the Democrats have missed an opportunity over the past five or six years to really bind Donald Trump to the Republicans. It is quite clear, you know, particularly for a midterm election, because you have almost definitionally a more informed electorate for a midterm than you were for a general. They seem to be aware that the Republicans are a big problem on one hand. On the other hand, you've got maybe a dozen new House districts that are available for Republicans just because of the Supreme Court and its assault on the Voting Rights act and Florida changing its maps and etc. Etc. That's just the terrain that we have to play on now. There's nothing we can do that. But I will also add, like, I think part of, like his sense of what actually happens is secondary to what we can do to influence the vote story today. FBI agents raiding an Ohio rights group they are prosecuting ActBlue right now, which is the mechanism in which people just, it's basically a portal that creates a networking effect for donations. There's not really much else to it, but that has been very effective in helping small donors get to candidates. So we have all of this happening, but we also have a tremendous amount of enthusiasm on the Democratic side, despite the fact they don't have enthusiasm necessarily for Democrats. They want to go and vote against Republicans. Which leads into California this week. A lot of the results came in. And in Maine, where Graham Platner,

[F]

his

[A]

sort of personal, past, personal failings notwithstanding, got the highest amount of Democratic primary votes in the history of a Democratic primary at 150,000.

[B]

He broke through in Maine.

[A]

In Maine, I should say numbers. I don't know if there have ever been that many people who came out to vote, but certainly you got the highest number of voters. So I don't know what's your sense of what we're seeing there. I'm curious about the Platner thing too. I want to move into that. But more broadly speaking, let's talk about that and then we can get into Platner a little bit.

[F]

Okay, well, in. Let's just talk about California briefly. You know, they're kind of running a preview, I think, of how they're going to, you know, go about contesting the election next November, which is saying that, you know, the vote count is all corrupted. And, you know, there was signs of voter fraud, all the usual stuff. I fully expect that any election that either, look, either comes out to be close or where the results changed from election night to later favor Democrats. This is one of the things that they're going to do. Trump did it in the last election and in 2020, you know, the late votes are coming in. They're che. Bringing in, you know, truckloads of ballots and all that stuff. So they're going to do all that. I think we know that now. We saw it here. And it's. And it's absurd. It is true that California counts very slowly. There's a reason for it, and that is because there's a. There's a dual commitment. The first one is to make sure that everybody gets to vote, who, who is eligible to vote. And, you know, there's. So there's this long period of time where people can cure ballots and where they accept ballots that were postmarked by election Day and all that stuff, and they give plenty of time for that to happen so that nobody's vote gets discarded for some kind of text that everybody who tried to vote and had, and there's a cure on it, some minor clerical error or something that they can fix it. And also the other side is that it's very transparent and very, very scrupulous about fraud. So they go to great lengths to verify signatures and to go through all this stuff, that takes time. It's a very big state here in la, huge city, and there are, you know, a lot of votes to be counted. So the idea that it's slow. I mean, I'm sure what they're going to do is, you know, California, even Newsom, you know, out and said, well, we got to do something about this, because it's giving the impression that there might be something wrong, which is their new thing, the new Republican thing, which is, well, it looks bad and we can't have that, even though there's not. They can't. There's nothing going on, but it just looks bad. So, you know, they had this, this ridiculous guy, Spencer Pratt, who's a clown, a joke, you know, he's a reality TV star. Of course, that's the new Republican, you know, Avatar. And the idea that that guy was ever going to win in Los Angeles was just absurd. I mean, that he was going to get in the top two. I mean, I never believed it from the minute I saw it. I'm going, that's not happening. No, because LA has maybe 20% Republican registration. It's, you know, it is so blue that it's, you know, beyond blue. And the idea that that guy, that clown, was going to in any way possibly ascend to the mayor's seat was wrong. And the matchup that we have now, which is between the establishment Democrat, Karen Bask, who's actually pretty, you know, she's pretty progressive. She was always known in Congress as being more or less liberal. And then her rival Raman, who is actually very progressive. I mean, she's kind of got a bit of a Mamdani pin tinged to her as far as her politics are concerned. So that's a much more logical language battle going into the, into the general election that into a runoff is between those establishment Democrat and progressive Democrat. That's who we are in la. And as far as the governor's race is concerned, you know, we've got another clown, Steve Hilton, a spin doctor from Britain. I mean, I guess the Republicans couldn't find anybody from America to run for governor of California. So, you know, and that's, that's not going to be a battle either. Javier Becerra is going to be the next governor of California. There's probably no doubt about it. So here we have this blue state. Blue, blue, blue, as blue as it gets. There is nothing, you know, there's no Republican anything here. The days of Nixon and Reagan, who we also produced, are over, however. And so this is terrible. Megyn Kelly comes out and says, well, you know, if Steve Hilton and Spencer Pratt aren't on the ballots in California, we will know it's fraud or something to that effect. No, how ridiculous. It's a blue state. How many red states do you know that vote red? You know, Republican slates all the way down the ballot over and over and over again. There hasn't been a Democrat there in, you know, what, 50 years, anybody. And, you know, no one complains about that. No one says there's, you know, anything fraudulent about it. But here we are, you know, blue states aren't allowed to do that. We have to have Republican representation, apparently. So that's where we stand here. Just everybody get ready. This is going to happen. It's going to happen in the fall. And I think we all know it. And I think, I think the Democrats are prepared for it. I think they understand what they're up against in that regard. Whether they're up against the legal assault that's going to happen, you know, I'm not sure. I mean, we'll have to see. But, you know, they Better be, let's just put it that way. And so, you know, in the, in the broad sense of it, I think the Republicans know very well that they are on the run, that this is a, this is going to be a blue election. Totally expected, maybe worse than they thought because the Senate is in play and I don't think they expected that. And, you know, we're just going to have to fight it out. It's going to be a disgusting, ugly campaign. What they're doing down in Texas is enough to make my. I mean, it's really, it's vomitus what we're seeing them do down there.

[A]

Two things strike me. One, it was very, very clever of you to allow Hilton to get into the runoff, but not Pratt. Then you throw people off the scent. Exactly, absolutely. Because you give a little bit to the Republicans there. Well done. None.

[F]

Well, that's, that's thanks to the, to the whole huge, you know, all the, all the cows and rocks that are represented in the east side of California because those are all red districts and they. And naval voted for, for Hilton, of course, but they couldn't vote for Pratt. So, you know.

[A]

Right. But also you have the satellites that, that work on the voting machines. So I know this is the outcome that you were looking for.

[F]

Of course, the Venezuelan that Hugo Chavez did, he did his work here. He came back from the dead and did what he was supposed to do. So we did get that done. What was it that Mike Johnson said this week? He said it was so. Oh, I can't even remember, but it was.

[A]

It is so far upstream. Upstream that it was something nefarious. Diabolical. Yeah, diabolical. Stinks to high heaven. It stinks to high. Like, literally like he's saying God level cheating.

[B]

Well, that's where Hugo Chavez is our comrade up in heaven, manipulating the machine,

[A]

pulling the strength there. I think you do. We just did Heather. Just freeze on the video. But we can still hear you, Heather. So you can hear me? Yeah. On the video. Well, yeah, just see if you can fix that and then we'll get her back in. But we can still hear you. Right? So. But here's the other thing that sort of scares me about that. And then I want to move on to sort of like these other issues is the complaining and whining that we hear now is not for our consumption. It is not for the general population. It is laying the groundwork for their own followers to justify what they're going to do for the election. Oh yeah, here she is.

[F]

No, I'm Here,

[A]

Heather, we'll just have you rejoin right now, if you could.

[F]

Okay. All right, so I'll leave and then I'll come back. All right?

[A]

Yeah. All right, so. And Heather heard that point. But what I'm concerned about is this stuff is not to convince anybody other than to edify the aggrievement by the same people who, like, I don't know if Donald Trump won in 2020. I mean, that is why this stuff. And we were talking to Josh Orton about it the other day from Demand Justice. I had. All right, let's get back in. I.

[B]

Well, it harms the trust and in participatory democracy. And that's what they. I mean, that's what they value.

[A]

But, but, but I was saying that we had Josh Orton on the other day from Demand justice and talking about these judicial hearings where, you know, finally Blumenthal and some of the other senators are asking, like, who won the 2020 election? Asking this of judges. And we'll play, you know, more clips of this later. But the short story is they won't say. They may say something technical like, well, you know, Joe Biden was the President, etc. Etc. And the reason why they are holding onto this is because they want to show fealty to Donald Trump. But the reason why Donald Trump holds onto this, or at least why the apparatus around him, I mean, who knows what goes on in his addled brain is they want their. Their people to feel justified when Trump goes in and shuts down the voting in certain areas, or when Mike Johnson says, I refuse to seat these 15 congresspeople from L. A because of all these shenanigans. They are. That is, they're not looking to convince anybody. They're looking to strengthen the conviction of their own people so that they have the latitude to do something that is extrajudicial, extra, you know, Democrat, what. However you want to put it. And, and people should be aware that's what they're setting up here. This is not like they're not whistling into the dark. They are talking to a specific group of people, a large group of people, and they are edifying those people's belief that all bets are off. And if all bets are off, then all bets are off. And, you know, you got to do what you got to do.

[F]

Well, I mean, consider this. I actually wrote a piece about this last week for. Or maybe it was earlier this week for Salon, this voting thing. You know, Donald Trump didn't invent this. He wasn't the first one to say that the Vote was fraudulent. Remember, we had people like true the Vote. You had all these groups that were out there saying that illegal immigrants were voting and they were challenging votes all over.

[A]

I mean, George W. Bush, Bush and Karl Rove were firing US attorneys across the country in 2004 and five because they were pressuring them to find voter fraud. And they couldn't find any. And they would fire them.

[F]

They fired them. And it was one of the. It was one of the biggest scandals, you know, in the. In the Bush administration. So Trump didn't invent this. He didn't invent anything, really. But, I mean, he just glommed onto it. He understood it. And of course, it fits his personality perfectly because he's a malignant narcissist who, you know, like I said before, the greatest sore loser in history. So, you know, he needs to have somebody to blame and have some way of explaining the fact that he lost something. So that. So he became this perfect kind of vehicle for the Republicans. I mean, it may be the biggest gift he gave the Republicans, which was to give real life, real feeling and meaning to this idea that the elections are illegitimate if Republicans don't win. I mean, that is really what it comes down to, that, oh, they are only. They are the only people who can legitimately claim to win. Because you note that any, like Steve Hilton, he's out there saying, oh, yeah, the vote's fine. Looks good to me. You know, I mean, no problem. Even though they're all screaming about the fact that, you know, the vote here in California was fraudulent. So this is something they've been aiming for for a very long time. And Trump just has, you know, sort of put it at warp speed to kind of, you know, bring, you know, put flesh on the bones of their. Of their myth of voter fraud. And of course, this is what they're going to do, and there's no doubt about it that they're going to find, you know, new ways to contest the vote. They're going to. I mean, the idea is, is that. Look at something I just saw this morning. I can't remember who it was. It was the head of the Republican Campaign Committee, one of them, the House or Senate, saying, you know, they asked him, well, you know, what are you. What are you feeling about these polls in the fall? I mean, it doesn't look good for you guys. And he just said, well, I don't believe any of the polls. Just don't believe them. So they're telling people the polls are wrong, and then they'll say that the election results are wrong. And that just sort of, you know, so you can't. Because that used to be one of the arguments. Right. Well, you know, hey, in fact, here in California, people have been using that argument about the Pratt thing kind of going well, you know, he did what the polls said he was going to do, which is lose, and everybody's going, well, we don't believe the polls. Polls are wrong. So they're creating this sort of, you know, myth around the idea of voting just being fundamentally structurally fraudulent in favor of the Democrats. And, you know, we just don't know. I think you're absolutely right that it sets the table for that next level, which we saw, of course, January 6th was our first sign that there were people who were willing to actually, you know, take that to, you know, a violent place. And, you know, Trump's being very nice, you know, telling people pretty clearly that he'll take care of them. They do it right now he wants to give him a million dollars each or more. So, yeah, I mean, I think we'd be foolish not to expect this. It absolutely is coming.

[A]

All right, let's turn to Maine. And thinking about it also in terms of, like, the. You had a couple of posts on Digby's blog Hullabaloo, as it were talking about, and then in one of them, featuring a portion of Brian Beutler's piece, which I'll let you describe his argument there, because I think there's. It resonates with me. I mean, at least in the very least, you know, know, with the premise. And you and I know this sort of firsthand from this vantage, that the Democratic Party has moved in a progressive direction. I mean, significant portion of that is attrition on some level, and just sort of like younger people entering into politics with an awareness of how dangerous the Republican Party is and how failed the response of the 90s was to that party.

[F]

Right, right. And that's an important historical context, I think, because if you, if you've read any of Rick Perlstein's books, you know, about the 70s and Nixon and Reagan and all of that, you know, that the Democratic Party was pretty liberal during that period. Not, I shouldn't say the Democratic Party. The majority of the Democratic Party, they had a rump group of racist Southerners, basically, that were still in the party during that period. They all fell off and moved to the Republicans after 1968, but it took a while after the Voting Rights act passed, Civil Rights act, and they moved to the Republican Party, but took a while for that to happen. There was a churn in that and again, there was attrition. But the Democrats had been pretty liberal. The response to that, to Reagan's ascension in the early 80s, was to just, you know, completely re. Evaluate every liberal instinct they'd ever had. And they started to move, you know, pretty seriously to the right. And by the time the 90s came along and Clinton was elected, you know, he had some cultural signifiers. You know, he was the first baby boomer and you know, we were all kind of, oh, he plays the sacks and Fleetwood Mac and you know, all this. All that stuff. So, you know, he had that. That sort of was. He was young too, you know, so he. At the time and so he, you know, he sort of captivated, was able to kind of capture the full spectrum of the Democratic Party. But he was quite conservative compared to the. To the Democrats of 20 years before. And it was a very, you know, there were a lot of conservative, very centrist Democrats that we dealt with for at least 25 years in the, in the Democratic Party you had the Blanche

[A]

Lincoln, I want to be like even more specific. Like the. The conservatism that was in the Democratic party in the 60s was largely, it seems to me, an anti. Like a Soviet Union hawks and not necessarily the same group, although often similar and sort of like racists. Southern Dixiecrat types from the first half of the 60s anyways. And then the conservatism really in the. Of the 90s was less. It almost flipped on some level where as in the wake of the 60s, there was a social liberalism, for lack of a better term. But the conservatism came in the form of economics and in the form of a disposition towards poverty and crime that was very sort of like racist. The race essentialism sort of like snuck in there and still breathed there, though there wasn't the sort of like same outward sort of racist rhetoric. Well, there wasn't the same sort of like black people shouldn't vote. They should. But there is a cultural problem, you know.

[F]

Exactly right.

[A]

And so I just want to make that clear because it's hard to sort of like that. That inversion, I think became very confusing for people.

[F]

It was. And the thing is that there was actually. I mean, they created a whole ideology around it. They called themselves the New Democrats, came out of these think tanks where they were trying to justify this move to the right. And it had little bits and pieces of culture. It had a strong element of economics, foreign policy as well. There was some real hawkish elements in there. And then this kind of veneer of, of, you know, younger. You know, you think about Tony Blair and you know, the new in. In England and you know, the new London. You know, they had all that stuff going on. It was this generational.

[A]

Gore and Clinton were the first like sort of two candidates of the same generation.

[F]

Yeah.

[A]

Review.

[F]

And they were both.

[A]

And they were both young. Both young Southern. Like there was a sort of like New right.

[F]

Yeah, yeah. Like I said, you know, the whole Fleetwood thing, that was, that was a big.

[A]

Back in the time when Fleetwood Mac was like.

[F]

They were young too. Yeah. I mean, you know, but yeah, I mean this was, this was, you know, everybody was very excited about that. But you know, it was also that this was a true ideological program that they had put together in the wake of Reaganism and feeling. There was the idea then that the Democrats had lost the country for a generation all because of the hippies and the, you know, and Vietnam and the anti nuke and all that stuff. So. So that's what they did. Now we dealt with that. That was very, very. All the way up until, you know, into the 2010s. I mean, we were dealing with people. I mean, even till recent. Joe Manchin was maybe the last of that. Of that, you know, crew of these sort of right wing Democrats who had certain populist, you know, they had some populist things about them, but they were also, you know, obviously very culturally conservative and often just served as the pain in the ass of the Democratic Party in the Congress. Always pushing them to the right and kind of forcing right wing policies even when the majority of the party were against it. So we dealt with all that and those of us who went through that, it was intensely frustrating. You know, we had Blanche Lincoln on it. You know, you remember going. What we went through with the, with Obamacare when Joe Lieberman was also Joe Lieberman.

[A]

Joe Lieberman had a weird combo because, I mean, people forget this, but Joe Lieberman and Tipper Gore, Al Gore's wife, who was. Were the leads on going after like heavy metal music.

[F]

It was, yeah.

[A]

Parental poisoning the minds kids and. But also Joe Lieberman was the guy who at one point was in favor of a buy in to Medicare at age 55. And when that came up in the context of like time to put up or shut up, he shut that down in Obamacare. And that would have been a huge deal.

[F]

Oh, it would have been so different. Yeah, I mean that would have.

[A]

Once you start getting 55 year olds into Medicare, then all of a sudden it's like, why don't we just have 45 years old? Right?

[F]

Yeah, well, yeah, that would be easier. Yeah.

[A]

Just why don't we just keep kids onto their parents until they're 30 and then you got 15 years of like, well, we might as well just go down to 30. But, but I'm sorry, that's what they

[F]

were afraid of and that's what he was afraid of. And of course, he was in the pocket of the insurance companies. You know, I mean, all of this. And that was a big part of it too. The big corporate takeover of the Democratic Party, which was very, very strong during the 1990s and the early 2000s, that was really exerting their power over the party. So anyway, going back to the Beutler thing, the reason that what he was writing was is that, look, it's frustrating for progressives because, you know, we have a program, we have a group of policies that we really know and we really want to see enacted and we want to have leadership and government that will do those things. And that's always been true, by the way. I mean, progressives have always been that way. The most liberal wing, that's kind of, you know, they're known for that. They're not really sort of a cult like, identitarian sort of faction the way that the MAGA right wing extremists are. They really have a program that they want to see enacted in the country. And so his point is that, you know, one of the things that we have to recognize first of all, which is just what we were talking about, the party has moved left. And some of that's just because of the sorting of, you know, the aftermath of what we just talked about. The sorting of all the Democrats, you know, the liberals into one party and all the conservatives into another. That's pretty much happened now. And so there's that. That's happened. And then I think there was a lot of work done by progressives over the course of the last 20 years that made it possible for someone, you know, an old guy like Joe Biden to come in and pass things like the, you know, inflation reduction act and you. The kind of big programs that he did. And you know, the country didn't really blink about that. They got very upset about other things. So the party is much more left leaning than it used to be. The centrists are much more left centrist than they used to be, instead of said they are more center left than center right than they used to be. And those of us who've lived through it can See it pretty clearly. It's not enough, and it's never enough. And the progressives in the party have an obligation to push their side of it. That's how politics work. You have to use your leverage. And there are a lot of young progressives and a lot of people who have big new ideas that they want to. However, when we're in this situation and just getting into the Platner thing, which is kind of like what stimulated, I think Brian's piece was. As much as we want to promote progressive ideology in our government, we simply have to deal with this threat from the right. We have to. It is extremely, extremely dangerous. And if we're stuck in this situation where a Platner ends up being the guy on the ballot and he doesn't have bad ideological ideas, as far as I can tell. I mean, it's more of a character problem with him than anything. I mean, I don't mean. You guys tell me I don't follow the main politics that closely, but from what I've seen, he seems to be. Be pretty progressive guy. Backed by all the progressives.

[A]

Oh, yes.

[F]

You know, on a. On a, you know, on a political, you know, basis, he seems. Okay. Not crazy about him as a person, and I never really was. I mean, to the extent that I was aware of him and saw what saw. Knew of him, I wasn't entirely thrilled. But that's what they. That's what Maine put up. So, you know, okay, Maine, this is your thing. But, you know, we have to recognize the moment that we're in, which is, you know, on an historical basis, is extremely dangerous and threatening and urgent that we deal with it. And if we have the chance to take the Senate, you know, we need to do that. So I think that that's pretty much what he was saying. I mean, I think he was practically trying to put things in the context of, you know, the historical movement of the Democratic Party and explaining that, you know, sometimes this is sort of happening on an organic basis over a period of time and that, you know, you have to deal with, you know, live and deal with the moment. Am I getting that wrong, Sam, or what am.

[A]

I mean, I think. I think there were two things, though, that struck me about what Beutler said. One is a message for the entire party, which we are seeing, like, even today. There was a piece in Politico about, you know, some senators saying now we don't necessarily need Maine to get to take over the Senate, which is just insane to me. Like. Like. Like, in terms of, like, just A sheer investment return on investment. Maine just has a much better chance of going blue than Texas.

[F]

I'm sorry for Harris and Clinton and yeah.

[A]

It's just absurd and it is, it belies something that I think is just sort of fascinating around Platner stipulating Platner has personal failings in the past and he's dealing with the Nazi tattoo thing is, is like I think just silly. The fact that the part that struck me about boilers was Boiler was saying is that that from his perspective as a progressive there needs to be sort of like an understanding that the way that people sort themselves the way they identify is sort of untethered in many respects to. From policy.

[F]

Yeah.

[A]

And that you as a progressive his argument would make would be you have a much better shot thought of electing somebody who is. Has a huge set of progressive policies but doesn't necessarily lead by saying I'm a progressive. Just wear that moniker that it's that like you know, people say they want a more moderate candidate but all of their policies are far to the left of what eccentric. They don't mean anything.

[F]

They don't mean anything.

[A]

The thing that I find fascinating about Platinum is is I'm quite convinced that Platner will be to the left of every sitting senator actually in the, in the Senate today. And I include in that even Bernie Sanders, but he does not he. His rhetoric and his pitch it seems to me, you know from I'm not up in Maine, but I've seen quite a bit is a populist one, one that talks about things like single payer health care, that talks about things like you know, reforms in the Senate to ostensibly allow for more progressive. But I don't know that he comes out and he'll. If he's asked are you progressive? I imagine he would say yes. But it's not about at this point like even his race against Mills was more about like anti establishment more about change than necessarily I'm more progressive than Mills or it was grounded in specific issues in Maine like her relationship with unions and her relationship with indigenous people, et cetera. And so.

[F]

Well, you know and I would also just add I think that in for instance if you just take California and the governor's race, the two Democrats that were in it, Steyer and the Sarah etc. I mean this is as progressive as it gets. Right. And Steyer was the, was the progressive and he got a lot of votes. I mean and there's a real signal there I think for Becerra about his base which is that you Know, there's a whole lot of progressives in there who were looking for more progressive policies than perhaps they thought he was going to deliver. So there's that, you know, I mean, even. Even here, there is that Platner is coming from a different direction. And you could compare him. We could talk for hours about this. Because it's really interesting that top down in Texas also is coming at it from a completely different direction. And I sort of look at those two races kind of in tandem because you couldn't find two more different people. Right? I mean, Platner and Talarico are like from different planets, but they both have quite progressive policies and are in these, you know, are sort of in the Democratic Party. They're part of the coalition that are coming at this in sort of the very specific, specific campaigns tailored to the place that they are living. And that's part of what Boitler is.

[A]

And they code differently.

[F]

They code differently. And they're coding very, very, I think, very consciously in a certain direction and in a certain direction for their states and, you know, go in keeping with who they really are. I mean, they're authentically, I think, being the people that they are. And somehow or another that's capturing attention. One of the things I would say about Platinum before we go is just that it reminds me to a certain extent, you know, when you look at the polling, the thing that's holding, that's really pushing Democrats and huge numbers of independents, you can't just say that it's Democrats because the independents are very hostile to Trump. I mean, it's down to, like, you know, I don't know, 20% or something of independents are seeing him and the Republicans in favor. It's not. They don't like the Democratic brand particularly. Neither did the Democrats. The Democratic brand is very targeted, tarnished. But they are really very hostile to Trump and they don't like what these Republicans are doing to Democrats. They don't like it. So when you see something happen with Platner and, you know, we can argue about where any of this came from or what the dynamic was that brought him to the place he's at. But one of the things I think that brought people out and that made people vote for Blattner in big numbers in the primary and could do it in November, is this idea of the Republicans, of all people, the massive amount of hypocrisy in them trying to destroy Grant Platner. They have no leg to stand on. And that's a dynamic we saw with Clinton back in the 90s. It was one of the things that boosted him up. It was, you know, nobody approved of his behavior with, with Monica Lewinsky. Nobody approved of it. Nobody thought it was okay. But it had been years of absolute, you know, just non stop assaults by the, by the right wing on him that by the time that happened, people just said, no, enough. We're not going to, you know, no, we've had enough. We don't care if you know what's going on. You, you people have no, no place in doing this. So there is a dynamic that happens in politics, you know. So anyway, yeah, I mean, I would

[A]

say because, you know, to some extent, like I, I attribute part of that, you know, 150,000 people coming out like the, the highest vote tallies in a primary to the attitude in Maine which is like, you know, we don't like any of those outsiders. Outsiders from all the way down to, from Connecticut coming up or something. But, but it is true. People forget this. Bill Clinton won with 45% of the vote. 45% of the vote. By the time in his second, his second reelection was. I think he got over 50, but it wasn't by much. And his approval rating was never higher than after the impeachment attempts by the Republicans. That's where the whole, that's where move on came from.

[F]

That's right.

[A]

Was people saying move on from this.

[F]

Yeah, they said censure and move on which encompassed the two ideas, which is he, you know, was wrong. But that we're not going to do this. We're not going to do this.

[A]

I have a question for you about Steyer, which is. And you know, at one point we were thinking about having him on and I love his, his politics as he states them now. And I think we just said like, you know, getting into governor's races is tricky outside of, even outside of New York and whatnot. But be that as it may, I don't know that we would have made the difference. But I'm curious from your perspective. Perspective was one of the hurdles he had was that he was a billionaire.

[F]

Yes.

[A]

Like, I mean, it seems to me because this is going to implicate Pritzker. Like, you know, like, like.

[F]

Well, I had this discussion. It does he. Pritzker is a billionaire, but he's also a governor who has run a big state and has a lot of experience in politics. Part of the Steyer problem was the twofold. He had never, he was a billionaire and he just had never run in, I mean California is like running a country and For Democrats, we look at this guy in the White House now who absolutely is a devastating failure on every level and has no idea how government works. And you'd hear Steyer talk and, you know, he's a smart guy and, you know, he had all the right ideas, but there was always a sense with him. And you saw him in the, in the presidential primary back in 2020. He ran that. This guy, you know, a lot of good ideas. But does he really know government? Will he be able to do it? And, you know, there's a temptation and everybody kind of. Well, we'd like an outsider. We want somebody who's not part of the system and anti establishment.

[A]

But it's hard to say that you're anti establishment when you're a billionaire. Like, you must have engaged with the establishment just a little bit.

[F]

Well, and we know he did, you know, he invested in private prisons. I mean, he did some pretty, you know, he made his money in some pretty not okay ways. So I think that's what it was. And you had Javier Becerra, who we know very well in California, he was the attorney general here, he sued Trump like 120 times. He's from LA, and he, you know, he's. He was a guy that seemed that we've known as a good progressive for many years. So I think people were comfortable with that. And he said he'll be the first Latino governor of California and that. That actually has some meaning here, too.

[B]

But isn't he in bed with those tech guys, though? Or. I mean, he's pretty.

[F]

And Steyer is too. I mean, you. What about Ro Khanna? I mean. Oh, yeah, Mr. Ultra. You know, it's like, what do we do? Especially in California politics, not being in bed with tech guys means, you know, it's like saying you hate Hollywood. It's just right. It's part. It's part of who we are.

[A]

Anyway, I just find that interesting because Platner runs on anti billionaire. He's running an anti oligarchy thing, which doesn't necessarily, I think, translate into I'm a progressive in terms of the ears of the voters.

[B]

Well, I mean, the ads that he's running, talk about the political establishment is coming after me. He's not saying the Republicans are coming after me because it's actually true and that.

[A]

Bipartisan.

[B]

It's bipartisan. And, you know, I like, we probably disagree a little bit, Heather, on platform Ratner's candidacy, because I'm a pretty big fan and I think, you know, for all this talk from the Democrats about how we have to win back young men and how they've lost men. His story of redemption is important. It means that you're not canceled if you maybe supported Trump before or it's not this internalized shame that I think sometimes liberals lean on when they should be focusing on a more collective message. And I want to see somebody like him on. And I think Ryan Grim made this point before on the Senate floor questioning members of the Pentagon as somebody who has experienced PTSD and had struggles and admitted to them and. But the allegations are not that extreme, by the way.

[F]

No, they're not. And that's part of it is that. Is that this idea somehow that these are disqualifying.

[B]

It's ridiculous. But like, yeah, just imagine that for a second, though. You know, you guys of course covered the Iraq war so extensively. Somebody who saw so much cost from that war, I didn't realize that he has a machine gunner and his unit was one of the units that experienced the most casualties. And he was really on the front lines. And then to come back and realize this was for nothing. And then he could be a senator questioning the very people that are choosing to send men that. And young women that were like him to war for God knows what reason. The fact that the Democrats could potentially reclaim that after we've lost so much credibility with young people due to Biden's complicity in the genocide in Gaza. I'm encouraged by that politics.

[F]

Yeah. Yeah. Well, I, you know, I am too. I mean, I'm fine with it. I actually am. Listen, guys, I've got to go, unfortunately.

[A]

Okay. I'm sorry. You told me that. No, that's okay.

[F]

I'm so sorry.

[A]

No, I forgot. Got. But as always, really great. We could talk to you for two hours and I promise you we get you out at 1:15 and I forgot about that.

[F]

No, no, that's okay. That's okay. But Heather standing here going, we gotta go.

[A]

We will link, of course, as always, to both your pieces in salon.com and at the Hullabaloo.

[F]

You guys have a great weekend. Thanks.

[B]

Thanks so much, Heather.

[F]

Bye. Sure.

[A]

I totally forgot. Forgot that was on me.

[B]

That happens all the time.

[A]

What? With me? Yeah. What do you mean? I forget about.

[B]

You get so excited about the conversation that you lose track of the time.

[A]

But she had specifically said 115. And of course, at the time I'm like, ah, of course. What, now you're close. Not even gonna get close to that. So what are you gonna do?

[B]

What are you gonna do?

[A]

I guess that's it for the free show, ladies and gentlemen, Gonna head into the fun half of the pro. Oh, oh, wait, no, we don't have that today. Right. That's coming up. I had a couple of things that I wanted to plug, and of course, I forgot to once again, to put them in the thing. So we'll do that on Monday, folks. Just a reminder that it's your support that can help this show so survive and thrive. We're sitting here in a sweat box. I don't want to guilt anybody outside of maybe our landlord who's not watching, but I did say in mid April. Yes.

[B]

Hey, man, it's not working.

[A]

And then we talked about the portable, and we plug in the portable, and the entire show shuts down.

[B]

And even when we're running it at 80 degrees degrees, even when we run that portable at 80 degrees.

[A]

No way.

[B]

Because it's hotter than that out right now. It's 90 degrees.

[A]

Why would you run it at 80 degrees?

[B]

You tell me. This is what you do.

[A]

Oh, oh, oh. It's because it's 90 degrees in here. And so therefore, it turns.

[B]

But to try to limit the power turning off, we run the air conditioning at 80 degrees, and it still shuts off our power.

[A]

Well, it's still. The way that these work is that it's still operating the exact same compressors and whatnot. It's just that it'll turn off once it gets the. The room to 80 degrees, but during the time that it's on, it's still drawing the same amount of power.

[B]

Oh, okay. So then why don't we run it at, like, 68 degrees, and it would

[A]

be the exact same thing? Oh, Brian, did you not know this? No. Okay.

[F]

All right.

[A]

Well, there it is. See, one of the things we try and do around here is learn a little bit about physics. H vac work.

[F]

The.

[A]

Nevertheless, that's not my way of saying, please become members, but we got to get Emma some type of.

[B]

Like, it's hard for me. Like, my. My commentary is worse because I'm just thinking about being hot.

[A]

It's.

[F]

It is.

[A]

Somebody's gonna clip that. Yeah.

[B]

Damn it. I mean, if the shoe.

[A]

Somebody's gonna clip that. We're gonna have to bring in, like, big blocks of ice and put it in front of the fan every day. That's actually, I have to say, that's what I've done in my apartment is I've got. I put milk cartons full of water in my freezer, and then I take the milk carton out, put it in front of my fan.

[B]

Yeah. And I've heard that's actually worse because it's of the moisture that it puts into the air that it actually makes it hot. Hotter.

[A]

Oh, it makes it more humid. But that's why what I do is keep it in the milk cart.

[B]

You know, either way big enough that we should, you know, that we should be able to pressure the landlord to come in and fix the tv.

[A]

What am I supposed to do? The other day, and the, the. The AC technician walks in, he looks at it and he goes, hey, yeah. And they just walks out.

[B]

Yes.

[A]

Like, it took six weeks to get him in here. And the first thing he does. Walks in. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then walks out. Yeah, you're all good.

[C]

The landlord goes, I'm actually a little confused. That was it.

[B]

That was it. Well, I wasn't in the front.

[A]

First of all, we're the easiest tenant in the world. Like, they haven't had to do, I mean, had to do anything in here. That window wouldn't open for years until Brian got here. I guess it was just a muscle issue. You and no problem. Hell yeah. Hi, I'm Graham Platner. Folks, it's your support that helps this show keep on keeping on through the sweat and the sweat and the tears. And the tears. Sweat and tears.

[C]

Tears.

[B]

Yesterday, it didn't come. The tears didn't come out. Okay, it almost came.

[A]

They almost came.

[B]

They didn't. But the, you know, Hasan was ripping me for the same thing. He was like, you cried? I was like, I didn't cry. Cry. He was like, it's on camera.

[C]

We'll just cite the other 400 times you've cried on this show.

[B]

Fair enough.

[A]

Yeah. We have 15amp outlets and the AC unit draws 20amps. That is my guess. Maybe we need like even like a lighter weight AC or something, but I don't know what's. What's going to do. Folks, it's your support that makes this show possible. You can become a member@jointheim majorityreport.com we should actually get like a. We should. We should level. No, I was thinking we should just get a. A URL. That is like, it's so hot in here.com for the membership.

[C]

Oh, I was thinking a tier level.

[A]

Oh, yeah.

[B]

Air conditioning tier.

[C]

Yeah.

[A]

Oh, that's a good idea.

[C]

You're a big donor.

[A]

Yeah. The chill out tier. Yeah. In the meantime, just go to the ones that we have at. Join themjorityreport.com also. Also just coffee, co op, fair trade coffee, hot chocolate. Use the coupon code majority get 10% off. You can buy the majority port blend. You can buy a two pound bag, a five pound bag. You can buy it ground, you can buy a whole bean. You can buy single origin, all sorts of coffees, just coffee co op. Matt. Where's Matt? Where is Matt?

[C]

Matt is on vacation, but as far as left reckoning is concerned. Two days ago, his most recent episode, Matt and David check in with an old unfaded favorite of theirs, Sam Harris, and his clinically hysterical way of denying atrocities. Then Conrad Blackbird talks about state assembly in Harlem. And finally, the Medi PBD debate.

[B]

Boom.

[A]

Folks, see you in the fun half.