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- [00:00]
Tom Nichols
Foreign.
- [00:10]
Charlie Sykes
I'm Charlie Sykes. Happy Easter. We're releasing this on Easter Sunday. I thought I would dress for the. The occasion, but we have so many things to talk about today, and I am joined by my good friend, Professor Tom Nichols, staff writer for the Atlantic magazine. How are you, Tom?
- [00:29]
Tom Nichols
I'm well, Charlie. Happy Easter to you.
- [00:32]
Charlie Sykes
Thank you so. And by the way, I'm getting a very, very interesting reaction to my Friday newsletter where I asked the question, you know, the headline is Give us Barabbas. And just reminding people of the choice that was made during that trial. The freeing of the guilty, the crucifixion of the innocents, the washing of the hands afterwards. And I do kind of a. Because I'm a contrarian, kind of the edgy question, how many of the people who are wrapping themselves in Christian identity these days would have actually chosen Barabbas? You know what I'm saying there? It just would have. We, you know, for years, reveled in the cruelty.
- [01:11]
Tom Nichols
For years, every time I see the maga mob, I've heard Give us Barabbas in the back of my. My mind. So I was. I was happy to see that when you wrote it because it gave voice to something that. That has always kind of been there. The other phrase that always comes to mind, especially when I see these maga Christian leaders, is whited sepulchers.
- [01:36]
Charlie Sykes
Oh, my God. Okay. I don't want to get too deep into this, but, you know, I have been rereading some of the, you know, some of this literature. And what's interesting is that when Jesus comes into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, about the first thing he does is he goes to the temple and he kicks out the money changers, basically, the people who are trying to profit and grift off of. Off of faith. The very first thing that he does is to go after them and then spends a good deal of time talking about the hypocrisy of, you know, the whited sepulchers of the Pharisees. So he comes in the phonies, the hypocrites, the people who are grifting off of faith. And it's interesting how there are so many people that just sort of gloss over all of that. Like, he wasn't saying something very specific about. Very specific. He wasn't talking ideas. Yeah, I don't know any.
- [02:27]
Tom Nichols
You know, it's like Trump with John Roberts. Well, you didn't mention my name.
- [02:32]
Charlie Sykes
Okay, so it is. It is Easter Sunday, but we have to dive into all the things that are going on. And it strikes Me that the last week, or, I don't know, the last 80 days, has really been the sum of all fears. And I'm just thinking of the last couple of days. Donald Trump very openly weaponizing the IRS to go after Harvard, which dared to defy his attack on their independence, their academic freedom, talking about removing their tax exempt status. Boy, what a precedent that would be. The chairman of the FCC is going after Comcast, which owns NBC and msnbc, for the way they've been reporting on the illegal rendition of Mr. Abrego Garcia, actually threatening government action to take away licenses because they don't use the words that the administration wants. The ongoing attack on the courts, the defiance of the Supreme Court, and I take a deep breath here, the suggestion that Donald Trump is attacking the independence of the Fed, suggesting the termination of Federal Reserve Chairman Powell, meanwhile, the ongoing abandonment of Ukraine. And I'm just keeping running through the list of things that are going on, which is why I describe him as the sum of all fears. You know, you and I, I think, you know, we, we warned again and again and again. But I was thinking about all the, all the smart people that thought that we were being too hysterical, that we suffered from Trump derangement syndrome, and yet here.
- [04:08]
Tom Nichols
And it was worse than it was, worse than we predicted.
- [04:11]
Charlie Sykes
It is, it is because it's all happening at once. And, and I think it's worse because the resistance has been so ineffectual so far, although I am now getting increasingly, I won't say confident, confidence, not the word, hopeful, that the federal judiciary is starting to push back. They get it. That decision by Judge Wilkinson the other day from the 4th Circuit was, It's a masterpiece. People ought to read it. It's eloquent and it has a sense that the, that the judges understand the constitutional significance and the historic significance of what is happening right now.
- [04:51]
Tom Nichols
A Reagan appointee. So the administration can't even throw up its hands and say, these are, you know, these are Obama judges, these are Biden judges, the worst judges ever. You know, these are, these are old school Republicans who've been around for 30, 40 years out there.
- [05:10]
Charlie Sykes
Yeah.
- [05:10]
Tom Nichols
You know, as you were saying, the sum of all fears, Charlie, all I could think of was, and it could still get worse, you know, that it's just there. You know, every time we think we've reached the bottom, there's a new bottom. But I think what you're seeing now is everything that a lot of the never Trumpers warned about that didn't happen because in the first term, There were, you know, it's an overused phrase now, but there were adults in the room, there were guardrails, there were, I always refer to it as putting, you know, baby bumpers and pool noodles on all the sharp edges of government around Trump so that he just couldn't hurt things or hurt himself too badly. But, you know, a Don McGahn, even, even a Don McGahn or someone like John Kelly, they would, they would have thrown themselves in the doorway rather than let some of this stuff happen. I mean, what. Aside from. Yeah, they did at the time. Right. And even some of the people that now have access. One of the things that you didn't mention, because the news cycle moves so fast, the new National Security Advisor, Laura Loomer.
- [06:31]
Charlie Sykes
You know, I wanted to get to that. I, I want to get to that because there's so much, I mean, we're only two weeks out from signal gate. Laura Loomer, who is one of the craziest, nuttiest, bigoted figures on the crazy. Right. Is doing that, by the way. You know, what else I didn't mention? And I was going through my, some of them all affairs, the way that Donald Trump is fucking up the world economy with his on again, off again. I mean, all of these things and you leave out stuff that actually may be the most consequential. I mean, we may look back on all of this, you know, the beginning of a great recession or anything. So, you know, the point you're making, though, is this is the key, is the difference between Trump 1.0 and Trump 2.0, which, I'm sorry to say we did predict. However, and I don't know, I think it was David Frum who came up with the best analogy. He said, you know, the difference between Trump 1.0 and Trump 2.0 is the velociraptors have now figured out how to open the doors and they've figured out all of the, you know, the buttons to push. And, and don't misunderstand me, but there's a certain impressiveness about it that they really do now know how to do things or how to test the limits. Right? And they figure that.
- [07:47]
Tom Nichols
And yet to extend that analogy, for people who've seen Jurassic park, they're still kind of running around and falling over in the kitchen and sliding off the counters and crashing about. You know, they figured out how to do certain things, but they, you know, they can't help themselves. I mean, the problem is that the president, everything the president is doing is just this kind of Expression of unrestrained id.
- [08:13]
Charlie Sykes
Yes.
- [08:14]
Tom Nichols
And.
- [08:15]
Charlie Sykes
Right.
- [08:15]
Tom Nichols
You know, in the end, if you want to be clever about it, then you need to have a better answer than. Than. Screw you. I know it's gratifying to his base, but you can already see this business running. I mean, where's. This business is running out of steam. Where's Elon Musk, where's Doge, what happened, all that stuff, and of course, the Wall Street Journal. And you don't want to try to connect too many dots, but interesting that about the time that Trump is trying to get rid of Musk, the Wall Street Journal drops this shocking article about what a weirdo, you know, Musk really is.
- [08:54]
Charlie Sykes
Oh, my God, the sperm donor. I mean, the sperm donor of his nation. I mean. Oh, my God. Yeah.
- [09:01]
Tom Nichols
So, you know, there is. I'm like you about this. I'm feeling more hopeful than I did two months ago in that sense.
- [09:09]
Charlie Sykes
But as you just said, it could get worse. I mean, there's so much that's going on, it's hard to keep up with all of it. And I think a lot of it, though, and I'm trying to think, as I'm talking, whether or not this is hopeful or not, how much of what Trump is doing and succeeding in doing is based on just fear, that. How central it is to his agenda and to his tactics, that he wants people to be afraid. He wants political critics to be afraid, he wants law firms to be afraid. He wants universities to be afraid. He wants the media to be afraid. And you have Lisa Murkowski, senior senator from Alaska, admitting that members of the US Senate are actually afraid. They're afraid of speaking out against Trump. They're afraid politically there may be physical fear of physical violence. But the question then becomes, what happens if people stop being afraid? What happens if somebody stands up and goes, okay, no, I'm not going on with this, because it is the schoolyard bully. You know, once the. As long as everybody gives. Gives their lunch money to the schoolyard bully, he's going to become, you know, more and more empowered, more and more aggressive. But when somebody punches him in the nose, and so I don't know, what does it mean that there are some big law firms that are pushing back? What does it mean that Harvard has decided to say fuck you? What does it mean if, in fact, Wall street turns around and says, we're just not buying what you're selling on tariffs? I just don't know the answer to that. But I do think that it is important to understand how much fear There is out there. And really what an ugly commentary that is, because I never actually imagined that I'd be in a moment where my fellow Americans would really be afraid about what they wrote and what they said and what they did, fearing that a government could come in and destroy them. And Donald Trump is signaling, I will destroy you through the fcc. I will destroy you through the irs. I will destroy you through the Department of Justice. And this really is at the heart of what he's been doing, isn't it?
- [11:19]
Tom Nichols
Tomorrow, you know, it's. I have a point about how I used to feel coming back from the Soviet Union, but I have to let my cat out.
- [11:26]
Charlie Sykes
Okay, well, that's fine. I have a dog here. And just people should know that if they actually hear, like very loud snoring during this, it is not me. I am not bored. I have a 40 pound German.
- [11:38]
Tom Nichols
He's right there.
- [11:39]
Charlie Sykes
Well, and he's had a traumatic morning because we had a lot of storms. So he's kind of tired. But when he starts snoring, it's going to be very, very loud. I'll try to turn off the microphone, but people do need to know that I do have this dog here, so. Okay, go ahead.
- [11:51]
Tom Nichols
She meows to get in and then she meows to get out. And it's, you know, cats, what are you going to do? But, you know, when you were talking about the fear, I would go to the Soviet Union. I went to the Soviet Union four times before it fell. And every time I came back to get off the plane in New York was this. I remember one time I was going through customs, and, you know, customs, especially in those days, was not fun, yet they opened up your luggage and they went through everything, you know, and I was with my parents who had come with me on a, on a trip, and we were going through customs, and the guy at JFK said, all right, you're good to go. He said, welcome home, folks. And I remember feeling this warm, almost physical sensation of relief to be out of the Soviet Union and in the United States of America. And the, the thing that Donald Trump is taking away from so many people is that feeling that when you return to your own country, even if you're a citizen or a permanent resident.
- [12:52]
Charlie Sykes
Yeah.
- [12:53]
Tom Nichols
That, you know, you don't know what awaits you. And I think it's intentional, of course, because Donald Trump is an insecure, cowardly man, like every schoolyard bully who wants people to be afraid of him. I think it means a lot that Harvard, for example, stood up to him. And that they've now gotten expressions of support from Princeton and Stanford. And, you know, a lot of places that I think are having the realization that we will still be here long after you're gone. And, you know, we're not going to bow that, you know, Harvard didn't make it through 360 years or whatever the hell it is from, you know, the 1600s by caving to failed casino bosses. And I think that's a really important thing. And courage is. Fear is contagious, but so is courage. I mean, these are, you know, tropes, right? I mean, courage is contagious, but it is contagious and it does encourage people to stand up because I think they, people have to realize that the capacity of the government, the bandwidth of the government is limited. I mean, the government is never as capable or powerful as people like Donald Trump or the resistance liberals think it is. Anyone who's ever worked in government can tell you that. And I think, you know, that the Trump administration is now overwhelming itself, which is why I think you're seeing these targeted, performative, small scale things like they're gonna, they're gonna set up this fight over Abrego Garcia, right, and say he's a gang member and, you know, he's a abuser and all of that stuff. Because all of those things that Trump promised on day one, we're gonna have, you know, hordes of cops roaming the streets, you know, sweeping people up into can't. There aren't enough people and there isn't enough government capacity to do that.
- [14:58]
Charlie Sykes
Well, that's why I do think it is. There's a little bit of the wizard of Oz thing there. You know, when I was running through the list of fears, I didn't even get to the question of immigrants. What it is, what must it be like to be an immigrant or be married to an immigrant or, you know, have them in your family. Children are afraid to go to school, people are afraid to travel, going, you know, in and out of the country. It is really an extraordinary moment. And the question is whether it burns itself out. One of the key things, though, we're talking about the difference between 1.0 and 2.0, besides the fact that they figured out what buttons to push, what doors to open and the collapse of some of the opposition. But it is, and you mentioned this, the people around him, and it's not just that he doesn't have the John Kelly's around him or the Reince Priebuses around him or any grownup around him. He's brought in some of the most deplorable folks, people who have no power base outside of their slavish loyalty to Donald Trump, which none of this is accidental. But we're not just talking about people who are politically loyal. We are talking about people who are on the far side of demented. And, you know, I was telling you right before we started doing this that, you know, I was trying to plan future things. I was going to write and I was going to write a piece called Meet Ed Martin. But then you, as usual, beat me to the punch. You have a fantastic piece in the Atlantic. Ed Martin has completely disqualified himself. Now, I'm guessing that even our listeners are extraordinarily well read and informed. Right. But some of them might not be, you know, really up to speed on how extraordinary this story is. Ed Martin is Trump's pick for U.S. attorney in the District of Columbia. And as you point out, he's a Russian state TV darling. But that's only part of the story. So tell me about Ed Martin and the test that it's going to pose for the United States Senate because he needs to be confirmed by the Senate. And I'm not going to say he's the worst appointee, but it's pretty extraordinary, isn't it? Okay, so tell me, tell me a little bit about Ed Martin, the guy that Donald Trump has picked to be the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia. So it's a crucial job, right?
- [17:19]
Tom Nichols
It's a very important job. Ed Martin was the former chair of the Missouri Republican Party, is a failed candidate, I think twice now for public office. And he is now the head of the Phyllis Schlafly Eagle Forum.
- [17:40]
Charlie Sykes
Okay.
- [17:41]
Tom Nichols
Which would take a lot of explaining in and of itself, but to say that this is, you know, pretty far right wing, you know, so far, especially when you watch his TV appearances, so far to the right that it, it starts to complete the horseshoe on the left, you know, the really extreme right. And he is a darling of Russian media. He's been on Russian television and Sputnik 150 times now.
- [18:12]
Charlie Sykes
What is that? How did that happen?
- [18:15]
Tom Nichols
Well, you know, when you're angry now.
- [18:17]
Charlie Sykes
He'S a lawyer for some of the January 6th rioters. Right?
- [18:20]
Tom Nichols
He's a January 6th truther. Yeah, he's a J6 truther. You know, he is a conspiracy guy. If you listen to him, he goes on about, you know, how the Ukraine war wasn't really going to happen. This was just big government and big tech and big media and people, you know, Washington is driving these events and it's just, just kind of incredible. Not just opposition to American aid. You know, it's not a standard Republican neo, Republican isolationism or Republican neo isolationism. This is like Putin's right. He's just looking for peace. Lavrov is trying to talk to U.S. and Washington and dark forces. But you know, the judgment to be on Russian tv. I, I was invited many times over the course of my ac back when I was in my professor life, you know, they would contact me and they would say we'd very much like you to be on RT and you know.
- [19:25]
Charlie Sykes
Or come to our show.
- [19:26]
Tom Nichols
Never went, never went there. There are only two outlets that I ever said no to after a certain point after I did, I did a few hits on Fox back 15, 10, 10, 12 years ago and then, and then I just said no more to that. And so Fox and rtv, I mean you are rt, you just, you know better. Fox is a personal preference. RT as an American, you should know better. You should know.
- [19:56]
Charlie Sykes
Okay, let me, let me read you what you wrote here. They're not in your piece. The United States of America is still a free country and every private citizen has the right to speak to anyone, anywhere in the world about anything. If the propaganda arm of an avowed enemy of the west calls and invites you to bash your own nation in public, you are free to do so. It might not be the most patriotic or sensible choice, but it's your privilege. If you also would like to join the Department of justice As a U.S. attorney, however, you should expect it. Appearing on the state television outlet of a neo fascist dictatorship and engaging in conspiracy laden anti American rants might attract some attention, especially if it seems you're trying to hide those appearances from the U.S. senate committee. But that's where we're at. This is and Trump is not backing.
- [20:44]
Tom Nichols
Away from known how bad this looked because he oops, forgot to disclose it as he is required to on the forms that he had to fill out for the Senate for his confirmation. And you know it's, yeah, you know, well I've done this and I head of the Eagle forum and I've been a lawyer and oh by the way, I've been on Russian television 150 times. He's just sort of left that part out until it got two or three days ago he finally made good and said he's filled out all the paperwork.
- [21:17]
Charlie Sykes
Well and as you, as you pointed out before though, it's not just that he parrots Russian talking points about Syria and Russia he goes on rt and one of the reasons they loved him so much is that here's this, this American attorney who's also going to defame and bash America, which he depicts as a repressive nation in the grip of dark forces. You know, if you say elections are bad in America in 2020, you'd probably be arrested or, you know, debarred, which you said meant disbarred or attacked. And he goes on and on and on talking about how awful and malign America is. But it's not just the fact that he, I mean, I think Ed Martin was one of the most deplorable appointees even before we found out about the Russian television. Right, Tom? I mean, wasn't he? He's the guy that wrote the letter to Georgetown Law School basically threatening legal action because of something they were teaching about diversity. He was the guy that actually wrote a letter to Elon Musk saying, hey, basically, you know, here at your service, if you want me to do anything to, you know, help you. I mean, this is a guy who even in the Trump world is out there. Here's a guy who actually, apparently now one of the latest stories is he's been advising January 6th rioters who were, you know, have been engaged in, in who were being prosecuted by, by his own office. I mean, here's a guy who is, how do you describe it? I wanted to say the word questionable, but that seems like a bullshit word to use.
- [22:50]
Tom Nichols
No, I mean, he, as, as with so many of Trump's appointees, he would be immensely destructive to the office he would occupy. And that's intentional. You know, the, the, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia catches a lot of high, high profile cases. Oh yeah, you know, espionage. One of the reasons that I really focused in on the Russian television appearances is that, you know, Trump's, Trump's circle is full of people with a lot of crackpot views and far right super extremist right wing views. You can say, okay, you know, you're, these are people who have different views about how things should be done in America. I disagree with them. I think they're dangerous. I think they're fascists, some of them. I think, you know, that they are a threat to the rule of law. To me maybe because, you know, Charlie were men of a certain age and grew up during the Cold War. To me, when you add to that going on and 150 times, you know, yucking it up with some of America's worst enemies and then getting an atta boy as I Point out in the article, he gets a big attaboy from Margarita Simonyan, who is, you know, basically a cheerleader for Russian war crimes. He was paired up often with George Galloway, you know, to. To laugh it up about, you know, I mean, I'm sorry, there are people you probably don't want to share a. Especially if you want to become an American political, you know, public figure, like a. A prominent U.S. attorney, you probably don't want to share a stage with certain people, including guys like that. And to me, that just that, you know, that that raises the kind of the whose side are you on? Question. I mean, well, you know, I'm on Russian TV enough times. You're a Russian TV commentator.
- [24:40]
Charlie Sykes
See, you raised that fundamental question, which side are you on? And, of course, we do have the saga of Ed Martin, but that's a question that I ask of the man who's the President of the United States of JK Vance. Whose side are you on? Yeah, it has been resolved, and I guess this is one of the things I wanted to bounce off you. It does feel, again, we knew that it was going to be bad. The pace of change has been extraordinary. It does feel as if in the last 80 days, the tectonic plates of the world order have shifted both in terms of geopolitics, in terms of economics. I'm reading and listening to some of the comments of European leaders about the economy and their relationship to the United States. And we have one country after another that is essentially saying, we don't know that we're allied with the United States anymore. We don't know that we can trust them anymore. We don't know whether or not they're on our side anymore. And so there are conversations that are taking place that we've never heard in our lifetime. And I'll be honest with you that even I. And we had a pretty dark view, Never thought that we would be in this particular moment where our closest allies are basically saying, look, you've insulted us, you've threatened us, you've betrayed us. So give me your sense, though, of, Of. Of America's place in the world right now, because we have had a president who has made it clear that he's not on the same side that we thought the President, United States would always be on.
- [26:17]
Tom Nichols
Yeah, I. My big worry is not that we're siding with the bad guys, because we are. There's no doubt that that's already done. It's that we're becoming the bad guys.
- [26:26]
Charlie Sykes
Yeah. Oh, shit. No.
- [26:29]
Tom Nichols
You know, what do you Mean, you, you quoted David from the other day, and he, he had a, he hauled off a great one the other day on, on tv. He said, you know, in the first, with the first Trump administration, we could turn to our friends and allies and say, look, this will net. We promise, we swear to you that we will never mix tequila and Quaaludes again.
- [26:53]
Charlie Sykes
Yes, I, I heard him say that.
- [26:55]
Tom Nichols
And, you know, now I just think Tequila and Quaaludes be such a great name for a band, you know, but that we, we promise we'll never mix tequila.
- [27:04]
Charlie Sykes
Never happen again.
- [27:05]
Tom Nichols
Never do this again. It's a freak occurrence. I, I totally approached it that way. You know, Hillary Clinton was a once in a century bad candidate. Trump was a once in a century bad candidate. The country was in a weird place. You know, 2016, you could just say it's a perfect storm. He was not elected by a majority of the voters. The Electoral College is weird, you know, just weird shit happens. But we promise that we're going to limit the damage from this and it won't happen again.
- [27:35]
Charlie Sykes
And we've learned our lesson.
- [27:37]
Tom Nichols
And we've learned our, like Susan Collins, you know, we've learned our lesson. Except now, and just to quote another of our, you know, great pieces in the Atlantic, they're doing Pete Werner wrote the other day about, you know, Donald Trump as our mad king. Problem is now he has, there are 77 million, you know, co conspirators or, you know, participants in this that, you know, put him back there. And you can't just say, well, it's just Donald Trump. It's just a weird outcome. And I say, so the problem with talking to our allies is to say, look, the majority of Americans still believe in NATO. The majority of Americans still support. I mean, we know this from polls still, and in fact.
- [28:23]
Charlie Sykes
But they're now skeptical because we told them that we would never mix Quaaludes with tequila again. And so maybe they believe that. But now we have mixed the Quaaludes with tequila again. So they're starting to think that maybe we're addicted, maybe we have a problem. Maybe this is not something that's going to go away. And so that's why this is so different now than it was back in 2017. It's not a flat fluke anymore.
- [28:46]
Tom Nichols
Right. Even if we say, look, a majority of us, you know, are committed to NATO and the defense of the West, a majority of us believe in free trade. I think our allies can say, but not as many as there should be, and not enough of you to stop what's going on. And clearly your Congress isn't going to stop what's going on. So, you know, all the checks and balances and circuit breakers and fire breaks that you have always, we have always, we, your allies have always counted on don't seem to be working. And you are not just, I mean, you are, we are a de facto ally of Russia now. It pains me to say, yes, I know it's.
- [29:32]
Charlie Sykes
I'm wins, I'm wincing because it's painful to say, it's painful to hear, it's painful to understand what that actually means.
- [29:39]
Tom Nichols
That we are turning, but we are turning into a worse country. It's not just, you know, there was a, you could have argued, for example, early on or even in the first term, say, look, America is going to be America. It's, you know, we're still the country of, you know, within our borders of human rights, of the rule of law, of good order. But we've decided that we are going to have a completely amoral kind of realist foreign policy out there, you know, which. Which we kind of did on occasion in the 70s, right. We're the shining city on the hill, but we're also in bed with some pretty ugly sons of bitches, you know, out of necessity. That's not the case. I mean, now we are, we are gravitating toward these bad guys with glee, out of almost like, you know, with, with a kind of joyfulness in the White House that says we finally get to be bad. And I think a lot of you're seeing, I think a lot of what you're seeing in all these appointees and this, this is what links Ed Martin to Bobby Kennedy, to Pete Hegseth to Tulsi Gabbard, is that these, there isn't really anything programmatic going on. It's this destructive impulse that says, you told me I couldn't do this, so I'm going to do it. And it's because of one man who says, I'm a toddler, I can never be told I'm wrong. And I'm going to prove, you know, tariffs right. Everybody, first term, they're like, tariffs to trying to do things through tariffs. A discredited theory. It's been 100 years have proven that this is always a bad idea, that, you know, tariffs are a very gentle instrument that you have to wield, like a scalpel. And Trump said, now that I, now that nobody's around here to tell me no, I'm going to prove that I was Right. Because what's important is not what's best for America, but proving that I, Donald Trump, am always right.
- [31:38]
Charlie Sykes
You know, you're talking about sort of that gleeful, you know, approach to, you know, breaking all of the norms and being as cruel as possible. That was my takeaway from that Oval Office meeting between Trump and the president of El Salvador. Was it Bukele, who calls himself the world's coolest dictator? And the way that they are, the juvenile trolling that's going on. You remember when they sent one of the migrants to El Salvador and the judge was saying, you know, had. Judge Boasberg was, you know, had told them not to do it, and it was Bukele, the president of El Salvador, who put out a tweet or something saying, oopsie. I mean, what a juvenile piece of shit, you know, but it was. You could see Donald Trump reveling in being part of this club. The part of the club that might have included, know, Duterte from the Philippines, Orban from Hungary, Putin from, from Russia. And so, you know, my, my, my really subversive, contrarian take on that was. We know that one time the axis of evil was, was what? Russia, China, Iran, North Korea. You know, now we seem to be edging into an axis of evil where it's Russia, El Salvador, Hungary and the United States and.
- [33:02]
Tom Nichols
An axis of ness. I mean, it's just, but it's just this kind of shitty low behavior that, as you say, that's juvenile and, and it's, you know, this is one of those rare moments where you kind of miss the Cold War, which imposed order and seriousness on everyone's thinking because things had consequences, especially if you were a smaller country. And, you know, I mean, this Bukele think that Donald Trump's gonna rule the United States forever. You know what?
- [33:36]
Charlie Sykes
Well, that's an interesting question, you know, because people are doing things that seem to imply that they are, you know, there will be no karma, that, that, you know, shit won't come back around.
- [33:46]
Tom Nichols
Yeah, right, yeah. That nothing's ever going to change, you know, that you can put the. And even back home. I mean, I think, you know, one of the, one of the wise things that Trump's advisors in 1.0 did was warn him about the realities of politics. That, you know, if you lose the house, bad things can happen. That, you know, we aren't actually a dictatorship. And speaking of the bad guys, by the way, did you ever think you'd see yourself in a position. I mean, I, I think China is, you Know, an immensely dangerous country.
- [34:17]
Charlie Sykes
Yeah.
- [34:17]
Tom Nichols
And, you know, no friend of the United States. And yet here we are saying, well, President Xi seems to be acting like an adult, you know, going, reaching out to the Europeans. And I mean, it's, you know, I mean, we're sitting here saying we're getting outplayed in our own backyard, in, in, you know, among our own allies by, excuse me, China. But that's because he doesn't get this is all a narcissistic revenge fantasy for him. None of this really has anything to do with national policy. And the reason, you know, this is because his advisors, every Sunday when they go out there, can't explain what national policy is. The tariffs are. The tariffs are temporary. No, they're not. Oh, they might be. We don't know.
- [35:05]
Charlie Sykes
I mean, and how dangerous this is. I mean, playing a game of chicken is a stupid thing when it's, you know, 17 year old guys with, you know, Pabst ribbon beer and souped up cars. It's also, it's much more dangerous when you're dealing with nuclear powers. And the Chinese have given no indication whatsoever that they are backing off on all of this. And so Trump, you know, keeps escalating and they keep escalating. And I guess what it comes down to is who's more vulnerable, who has a higher tolerance for pain. And my guess is that it might be President Xi, but we're going to see where that goes. I guess part of me, as we're talking about this, though, I've talked about Donald Trump's clownishness, his narcissism, all of which is true, the sort of erratic incompetence of the man. But the reality is that the people who have written and warned about autocracy and authoritarianism have been laying out what we need to watch for and look for in great detail. And you check through the boxes. The attack on civil society, the attack on the media, the use of fear, the transfer, the weaponization of the Justice Department, of the irs. You get law firms to back down, you get, I mean, all of the things that you would put together as a serious, serious, long term threat to the constitutional order are taking place here. And I'm really struggling with this because I like to keep a sense of humor and laugh at the guy. But on the other hand, this needs to be taken deadly seriously. You know, and again, I'm struggling not to go back to some things I've been reading about the 1930s. There was a great literature, great deal of literature, you know, mocking certain, shall we Say, figures of the 1930s as clowns and buffoons. But we know how that ended up. In fact, I think right around the time of the election, I encourage people to be more like Charlie Chaplin and the Great Dictator. Let's make fun of these people. Let's laugh at these people. And I still want to do that, Tom. But also, I'm just looking at what has happened in the last 80 days to this country in. In one institution after another. And, you know, you know, the clown. The clown with a flamethrower still has the flamethrower, and the flamethrower is doing a great deal of damage.
- [37:41]
Tom Nichols
Yeah, there's. There's two issues here. One. One, you know, your. Your point about mockery. I mean, it was years ago that I actually wrote a piece called Fight Like Adults, because I was really tired of people talking about, I remember this, the Orange Menace and Cheeto, Jesus and Drump and, you know, Trumpolini. And I'm like, you know, that's all very funny, but you have to remember. And in fact, at the time I said, you have to remember there are people like Kash Patel in the background who are no longer in the background. You know, I said, these people are deadly serious. Now, one thing I think is important to point out is that they are not 10ft tall. They may be deadly serious, but they're not good at this. This. I mean, Cash Patel is trying to run the FBI from Las Vegas. I don't know how you do that. That's kind of an interesting management approach, especially in a government that has told everybody to come back to the office. But. So, you know, I think there's. I think they're still. I think mockery still plays an important.
- [38:43]
Charlie Sykes
Role, and I'm not giving up on that.
- [38:46]
Tom Nichols
Yeah, mockery makes people. It gives people perspective, it gives them courage, and it also, I think, especially with a very emotional, weird bunch of people like the people around Trump, I think it baits them into making mistakes. It baits them into doubling down and doing dumb stuff. But that's not an excuse for then not doing the hard work. And here let's give a shout out to a group of people that. Two groups of people that America doesn't like very much. One is lawyers, who I think, you know, are. There's a reason that Shakespeare said, first kill the lawyers. Well earned, because they are really carrying this. And I've said all along, you can laugh and joke, but where the rubber meets the road is in the court. So the lawyers and the judges, who I think are showing a lot of the judges, especially showing a lot of bravery in the face of personal threats to their well being. And the other is for all of the backing down that's happened at places like the Washington Post, the media is still doing its job. We're still getting. It's amazing to me when someone says the media has collapsed and they don't really understand how bad Trump is, as this story in the New York Times points out. You know, it's like they're doing their job. And even if their owners are, you know, knock kneed about endorsements or opposing Trump, so, you know, the institutions of America are still working. And I think this comes over to this problem that you and I talked about at the top of the show, which is the fecklessness of the resistance to Trump. And I think part of that comes from an anticipatory resignation. I can't tell you how many times I've talked in person, not just social media, but, you know, 3D meat space of saying, well, what can we do? You know, what are we going to do? Like people just throw up their hands and say, well, that's it, it's dictator. And I'm like, okay, first of all, there is another election in 18 months, you know, 7 million fewer people voted. Go, go find them. I was doing a talk with one of my friends with Juliette Kyem the other day, and Juliet said something like to the effect of go register 100 people, you know, between now, if you want to get out there and do something, go register a bunch of people between now and Labor Day. You know, that's, that's, that's actually doing stuff. The other though is that I think we are still paralyzed and I think many Democrats are still paralyzed by a failure of imagination, that this is just a normal Republican right wing kind of, you know, super right wing administration and not a dire threat to civil liberties.
- [41:42]
Charlie Sykes
And even as they abandon one conservative principle after another, there is still an amazing school of thought out there that thinks that somehow the Trumpism is still a direct line from, you know, Ronald Reagan. And look, I understand that there were, you know, you can cherry pick certain things, but the abandonment of free markets, the abandonment of American leadership as, you know, as the shining city on the hill, the changing the sides, the use of the power of government to force private companies to bend to your will, this would have been absolutely horrifying. Conservatives would have been absolutely horrified by the notion that the federal government would pick and, you know, pick the winners and losers in the economy. They would be Doubly horrified to find out it was one man. If they thought that Barack Obama had the power to pick the winners and losers of the marketplace, that Barack Obama had the power to pick up the phone and say, I want you to eliminate the tax exempt status of the Heritage Foundation. If they thought that it was a Democratic president that would strip TV licenses, if they thought that the government had that much power, in theory, they would be horrified. So what you're seeing now is not, it's not American conservatism, it is European style, you know, popular front, right wing politics. And, and I, that's the failure of imagination. And that's why the Democrats seem to think that they're in a, in a different show than the one we're actually in.
- [43:18]
Tom Nichols
You know, the people, of course, you know, I always sort of enjoy shadow boxing a bit with the people who think everything that Reagan caused everything, you know, or Nixon or whoever. But, you know, right now I'm hoping that there are people out there pretty happy that Ronald Reagan appointed a guy named Wilkinson to the bench because that's the old, that's the old time religion that you're getting out of that, out of his opinion that that's what real American conservatism with a small circumstance looked like. And that, that's a, that's a Reagan appointee because that was the philosophy at the time when, when you and I were, were youngest. But the other thing, Charlie, is we know how angry Republicans would be because we, we saw it when Barack Obama said, I have a pen and a phone. Remember that? When Barack Obama said, I'm not going to screw around with this anymore. You know, if you guys don't do what I want you to do. I have a pen and a phone. And the American, including me, the American right wing went berserk. I remember he said that. And I said, man, he is going to regret saying that because one day somebody else is going to say, I have a pen and a phone.
- [44:28]
Charlie Sykes
Right. Well, do you remember the, the, you know, years of controversy about whether or not the IRS was targeting the Tea Party groups? And this went back and forth and I think in to a certain extent that was debunked. But the very, very suggestion that they might have weaponized the IRS to go after conservative groups was one of the big animating issues for a decade. And people are now saying, well, you know, how can you criticize Trump for going after Harvard? That's exactly what Obama did with the irs. No, there may have been some problems. I don't want to relitigate that. But Barack Obama never stood in the White House and ordered publicly the irs. I want you to go after these people. And I do hope, I do hope that. And I'm always reluctant to say a turning point, but I hope people understand that once you weaponize the irs, to go after Harvard, leave Harvard out of it, leave universities out of it. Imagine the power of the president to go after any private nonprofit entity, any charity, foundation, church, church that defied church. And you do wonder whether or not it's like, wait, do you really want to give the government this power? Do you, Are you really comfortable with this? Because what goes around comes around. But again, we'll see whether or not the churches begin to realize, well, wait, maybe this is not such a great. We hate Harvard. But, you know, once you cut down all these laws, all of these norms and everything, we're all vulnerable.
- [46:02]
Tom Nichols
Vulnerable. Nixon tried to weaponize the irs, and he knew it was so wrong that he whispered it behind closed doors and kept it a secret because he knew, you know, that this was within the American framework of norms, completely unacceptable. And I remember, you know, that that whole business about the irs, I thought, and I still think that was. That were some lower level official, lower level IRS officials who were basically being vindictive. I think there was something going on there.
- [46:37]
Charlie Sykes
Yeah.
- [46:38]
Tom Nichols
And it shows you that we were a different country, that recently that we would all have been appalled by that. You know, even people on the, on the left and center would say, it can't. The IRS can't be involved in these kinds of things. Trump now has made an international policy, and again, it's because people don't think there's going to be a tomorrow. You know, I'm sorry, if you want to take away Harvard's nonprofit status, then I'm sure with good reason. And on the same rationale, there are some evangelical mega churches that are basically political organizations that could fall under the same hammer. I don't want to see that happen. You know, I, I think of myself as still a conservative. I want as few organizations taxed as is necessary. And, you know, the less government intrusion into private American life, the better. But, my God, there is no sense that, as you say, that this boomerang can come around, because it's almost like it's all it is. It's tequila and Quaaludes. Everybody's having a great time. They're living in the moment, and they're not thinking about the country. They're not thinking about precedent. And there's one other Thing I wanted to bring up, Charlie, about the people around Trump. The reason that once upon a time, the Republicans that you and I knew back in the day would have opposed this is because they were people of substance who had lives and careers that we're not wholly dependent on.
- [48:15]
Charlie Sykes
Right.
- [48:16]
Tom Nichols
On what goes on in Washington. One of my favorite George Schultz stories is that he used, when he was negotiating with the Soviets, he would say, look, you know, this is the deal I can give you representing, you know, President Reagan. He says it's not going to hurt me one way or another. Whatever he says, I, he's. I have, I have tenure at the University of Chicago. You know, I have a job. I can, I can, I can go back and I can leave. You know, the. Now you have people who never would have been in Washington under any normal circumstances, who have no background in what they're doing, who are there for the limos. And it's really, it's, it's projection. Right. They always say, you, the elites, you know, they want to be there for the parties and the limos and the staffing. That's why they're there. I mean, you know, Pete Hegseth has no business being Secretary of Defense. He probably knows that. He's got, he's already had three guys, you know, frog marched out of the building, escorted from the Pentagon. He's not going to step down. He's living his best life right now. And that is true. I always think of what. Who was Trump's. She turned on him later. Stephanie the Grisham. Grisham, yes. She said, of course I took the job. How else was somebody living in the middle of Kansas like me going to end up at the White House? And now you have an entire White House of people like that who don't have four stars on their shoulders, have never served in major positions in industry.
- [49:49]
Charlie Sykes
Or who can't walk away and go back to something good. Because this is everything. I mean, there are people who would not only not have the limousines and the power and everything, but wouldn't be allowed in even polite society. What would Stephen Miller be doing if he was not at the right hand, Hand of the throne?
- [50:04]
Tom Nichols
So be writing angry letters to his local newspaper.
- [50:09]
Charlie Sykes
Yeah. That's about angry comments to YouTube videos. Well, I think, I think that, that, I think that that is, that is the key. These people are all absolutely dependent on, on him. But I guess, you know, where do we go? And I think. Let me ask you this question, because I get asked this question a lot, and I think about It a lot, which is how do you focus on decide? Like I'm going to focus on this threat in a week in which, as I said before we started this conversation, it's the sum of all fears. It's like, where do you start, you know, the irs? Do you look at the fcc? Do you look at the tariffs? Do you look at the, the attack on the Fed? Do you look at what's happening to immigrants? You look at the defiance of the Supreme Court. The problem is the zone has been effectively flooded. And so how do those of us who want to stay sane and in opposition, or let me put it the other way, stay in opposition while still remaining sane? How do we do that? Do you have a formula? Because I'm not sure that I do.
- [51:14]
Tom Nichols
That's a good question. And part of what I've been doing is making sure, I mean, like you, I have to spend my days watching the news and writing and, you know, going from issue to issue. But my advice to, to anyone watching or listening to us disconnect every now and then and just go outside. I recently had to go give a talk in Los Angeles and I, and I said to my wife, you know, for a day or two, I'm not going to watch the news. We're going to rent a convertible. I'm still, in fact, I've still got sunburn. We're going to run a convertible and we're just gonna, you know, toodle around, you know, Southern California in between. What I've got to do, because we really need a day or two where I'm not, I mean, you know, I, I programmed the Sirius radio in my rental to all classic rock and no news channels. And you know, that's really, I think that everybody should do that. I always tell people, look, I'm paid to write about this stuff and I probably don't watch as much TV news as you do. So unplug from it because everybody's doom scrolling at this point. Now when you re plug in, I think it's important not to chase every shiny lure that the administration throws out there.
- [52:37]
Charlie Sykes
Right?
- [52:38]
Tom Nichols
That's why they're doing it. They're, they're trying to exhaust, you know, it's the Bannon theory of flooding the zone with and exhausting everyone who like, well, I've got to think, I have to. What am I going to do about the IRS and what am I going to do about Ukraine and what am I going to do about the judges and what am I going to do about him? First of all, the average Person can't do very much about that. What you can do is contact your elected representatives. And I know this just sounds so old fashioned and grumpy, grandpa, but you can vote. There are elections off year elections, special elections, the midterms coming up. You know, this is still a country where Donald Trump's return to office happened with fewer votes than the vote that threw him out of office. I mean, it's really, you know, it's appalling how many people have just decided, eh, you know, what are you going to do? Well, one thing, and I say this without, you know, I am an independent. But as a matter of political strategy, a lot of what Donald Trump is able to do right now is because he has the trifecta. He has the White House, the House and the Senate. And if people say, well, what can I do? What can I do? If you can break that stranglehold and recapture the house in 26, you've gone a long way toward containing this disaster. But, but, you know, it's, it, it drives me nuts and I'm stealing this from a friend. He said, you know, resistance liberals will do everything they can to stop the rise of authoritarianism except show up to vote. And that's really got to be the next, you know, the, the, and I, and I'm gonna just be mean spirited here and say, and that's not looking good in a Democratic Party where David Hogg is promising to primary out other Democrats right now. You know, the Democrats really have.
- [54:33]
Charlie Sykes
David Hogg turned out to be exactly who you thought. Yeah, I don't, sorry to throw that.
- [54:37]
Tom Nichols
Grenade at you right at the end of all this.
- [54:39]
Charlie Sykes
No, no, don't, don't get me going. Okay, So I agree with absolutely everything you say. You know, the way I cope with it is the way you do. But also I go for long walks with my dogs, hang out with my dogs. I really enjoy my birds that around my bird feeder. And I will binge on things that distract me as much as possible. Are you watching anything? That's that it's all interesting to you at all. I just finished.
- [55:07]
Tom Nichols
We are living in the golden age of television. I just finished paradise, which I highly recommend to people have watched that.
- [55:15]
Charlie Sykes
Yes, I am making my way by the same producer as this Is Us, which is one of the great shows of all time time. If people have not gone back and watched that. Okay, go ahead.
- [55:25]
Tom Nichols
I am, I am halfway through the last season of Bosch, which I will miss greatly when it's over. I and I, I, you know, every now and Then I like something a little lighter. My wife and I are big fans of Will Trent, which we watch every week. And then when we really want to just tune out completely, we are huge fans of. Wait for it, the Floor, Rob Lowe's game show. It's just. It's hypnotic. It's hypnotically good fun among a bunch of people who are very nice to each other while they're competing with each other. So I go from, you know, Harry Bosch beating the shit out of bad guys in alleys in Los Angeles to Rob Lowe yelling, activate the randomizer. So there's a lot of good tv, and you don't. You know, I. I've been telling people, even before Trump, you don't need to have an instant opinion about everything, but everything.
- [56:24]
Charlie Sykes
No, no, that's the. That. That's. That's crucial. Okay. And I just. Before we leave the TV thing, make sure you watch the Residents. It is absolutely addictively fun.
- [56:33]
Tom Nichols
I watched it.
- [56:34]
Charlie Sykes
Okay. Did you just.
- [56:35]
Tom Nichols
Hilarious. But I'm gonna be. I'm gonna be bitchy about the Residents in only one way, Charlie. It went on a little too long with too many red herrings, and by the end of it, I was like, just tell me who did it. But it was a joy to watch because the. If you're a fan of sharp dialog and funny zingers, it really had a. It was sort of like the West Wing meets Clue.
- [56:59]
Charlie Sykes
Yeah, no, I really. I really enjoy it. Okay. I would. I would recommend the Pit very, very strongly. I'm actually all. My wife was out of town, and I spent the time going back and forth between. Between watching a couple of episodes of the Pit. I can't take more than one or two at a time. Then watching an Italian series called the Law according to Lydia Poet, which is absolutely excellent. Watch it in the original Italian. Read the subtitles. It is beautifully shot, absolutely brilliant. And I'm just now beginning. And I know that I'm way behind the curve here for a lot of you folks beginning White Lotus, but we are in a golden age of television. And I have to say that one of the problems is you get split, spoiled when you watch a really, really good show, and that once you watch something really outstanding and then you do that double, you know, step down, and you go, man, the writing just sucks. Oh, what is that about?
- [57:53]
Tom Nichols
It's like eating in a gourmet restaurant every day, and then you're like, what is. What is this swill? I have one more addition that because, you know, people who are so concerned when My wife was feeling down during the election. She would start watching the West Wing, and I think the West Wing is okay, but I think too many people have gotten an image of politics from the West Wing that isn't real. The show you should binge at this point to recover your sense of humor and your sense of perspective is Veep. I love that because we're living through it. I mean, we are living in a conservative Republican version of Veep right now. And I think, you know, what's the British version?
- [58:42]
Charlie Sykes
What. What was the British version of that? In the Thick of Thing or something? It was. It was. There's a British. The same producer who did Veep did this British series, which I strongly recommend.
- [58:53]
Tom Nichols
Was it.
- [58:54]
Charlie Sykes
No, no, no. It was after that, in the. In the Thick of It, I think there's a movie and then there's a series. People will correct me on all this, but the writing is absolutely brilliant. And the funny thing is, you'll be watching it and you'll be like, wow, this has a feel of Veep. That's how I actually realized, oh, it's the same people. The same people are responsible for. That's that same sense of how I feel when I'm.
- [59:16]
Tom Nichols
That's how I feel when I'm watching the news. And they say, boy, this really has the feel of.
- [59:21]
Charlie Sykes
Well, that's how you keep your sanity. Did you keep your sense of humor?
- [59:25]
Tom Nichols
The president yesterday saying, a lot of people are coming from the Congo. I don't know what that is. I mean, that's a. That's practically a Veep scene, you know, the Congo. I don't know what the Congo is, but a lot of people are coming here from that. I mean, it's just if you. If you don't laugh and recover your sense of humor and, you know, you need Julia Louis Dreyfus dropping some F bombs now and then just to get you back on your feet. And I think that's.
- [59:50]
Charlie Sykes
Just.
- [59:51]
Tom Nichols
Don't watch it when the kids are.
- [59:52]
Charlie Sykes
Around, you know, that's perfect Easter advice, I think, and let's just leave it at that. Tom, thanks so much for joining me. I appreciate it very, very much.
- [60:00]
Tom Nichols
Thanks, Charlie. Happy Easter to you.
- [60:03]
Charlie Sykes
And thank you all for joining me on this Easter Sunday for this episode of. To the Contrary. We do this every week because you know what I'm going to say, right? More important than ever, remind ourselves that we are not crazy.
- [60:18]
Tom Nichols
Next.