← Truth in the Barrel
Truth in the Barrel
The Holy War Cosplay Of Trump's Liquor Cabinet | Unfiltered w Beth Silvers
00:39:56
Loading summary
Transcript57 lines
- [00:00]
A
When Mother's Day means celebrating your mom, your wife, maybe even your daughter as a new mom. Trust 1-800-FLOWERS to help you celebrate every important woman in your life with double blooms from 1-800-Flowers. Order one dozen roses and get another dozen for free. It's a simple way to give beautifully with colorful blooms that make Mother's Day feel meaningful for every mom you're celebrating. Order with confidence and get double blooms at 1-800-FLowers.com podcast. That's. That's 1-800-FLowers.COM podcast. Hey, everyone, thank you so much for joining us again on a brand new edition of Truth in the Barrel. Inflation is up. The Iran war is still going on. The President is fighting with the Pope. Now there's a lot to get to, and luckily we have the perfect guest to talk through it all with from Pantsuit Politics, and it's Beth Silvers. Welcome, Beth.
- [00:57]
B
Hi, Amy. It's so good to see you.
- [00:59]
A
How are you?
- [01:00]
B
I'm, I'm doing well here in America in 2026, you know, all things considered. I try to keep my head above water. How about you?
- [01:09]
A
I'm pretty busy, so for, for listeners, Beth and Sarah run Pantsuit Politics, which is a longtime podcast. And we'll talk about your podcast at the end. But I want to get right to what's happening right now in the Middle east with now we have an extension of this ceasefire, I guess indefinitely. The United States is blockading Iran's blockade. So we got two blockades going on. Both the United States and Iran are both firing on ships trying to go through Strait of Hormuz at this point. So it is completely shut down. And more and more as I think about this, Beth, I just think this is an unwinnable fight. I've known it from the start with all the war games that I have done throughout the years, that this is why we didn't want to attack Iran in this manner. And we're now to the point where we have dropped, I don't know, 15,000. We've hit 15,000 targets in Iran. This is not militarily a winnable fight because Iran has this big card called geography, which they will always have, and they're fighting for their survival. And we're now in an, basically an economic war of who is going to back down first. How do you see it?
- [02:39]
B
Similarly, you know, I keep thinking one of the, the facts about the world that I'm obsessed with is that birds outlasted the dinosaurs.
- [02:46]
A
Right.
- [02:46]
B
And I keep thinking about how I have no doubt about our military's power and sophistication and skill level. And we just plan differently than smaller nations and we plan on different timelines. And Iran has been planning for decades for something like this and putting its proxies throughout the region so that even if you take a big hit like they did from us, there are survivors and there are people playing a very long game. And I worry that it's unwinnable too. I worry when I read reports that experts view this as kind of a dry run for what would happen if we went to war with China over Taiwan or a similar issue in the Pacific. And I worry that the economic consequences of this are going to go on for years. I feel like we were just getting our footing back from COVID in terms of global shipping and logistics and now we chose to set ourselves back again.
- [03:44]
A
It's a self inflicted wound. And you know when people say well, well we're going to choke off Iran now, so we bomb them but now we're going to choke them off. Okay, Recognize that they can take a lot more than we can. I mean they have been living with sanctions for many years already and they can still export oil. If you look at a map, Iran is very big country. You can export over land, over Pakistan, some of these oil, some oil. And now as, as oil prices rise, Iran can still have a lifeline here. And meanwhile the globe is going to have an economic meltdown. And I feel like this comes down to one man's decision as to how much he economic suffering he is willing to impose not on Iran, but on us.
- [04:41]
B
And it's not just oil, right? It's helium, it's Petra, it's petroleum that's used in products. I was reading about how condoms are going up by like 30%. Like products that you can never imagine. It's fertilizer which affects our agricultural supply. Again, that's a long term thing. He could change his mind today and this we're still living with the consequences of it. Something that I've been excited to ask you about is in, in your war games experience all the planning that you've been part of. I'm sure it's not a brand new thing that a commander in chief might reject the advice of military experts or go in a different direction. When you find yourself in a situation like this, even hypothetically, what do you do? I'm thoroughly convinced we should not have done this. I'm thoroughly convinced that the options in front of us are really limited right now. Is there a responsible path forward from here?
- [05:34]
A
Well, in war games Certainly, if you are the commander, for example, you're the, the three star, four star admiral or general, and you seriously disagree with a decision that the President is about to make, you can resign and you can do it quietly, you can do it publicly. That's kind of the only avenue you have as a, as a somebody in the service. Where we stand right now, we don't have a lot of good options. And this is why we shouldn't have started this to begin with. Because when you do war games and exercises, you play them all the way out. And in every single scenario when it came to Iran, every single scenario that I did over 20 years in the Marine Corps, when you play it all the way out to the very end, it always ends up in this, A global economic meltdown with the Strait of Hormuz shut down. And then what? And it comes down to this idea of, is this in America's national interest? I mean, Iran could not reach us. And what it comes down to, Beth, is when you start to think about the use of force and starting a war like this, do the pros outweigh the cons? Because, yes, we can go to war and we can, we can get rid of some of their military capability. But what is the cons? When you play it all the way out, do you really want global economic meltdown? It be, you know, is that, is that, is that worth it? And that's why no one's decided to do this.
- [07:19]
B
And so when you've gotten to that point, oh, this is how it ends. That's also a beginning. Right? How do you, we're here. We are going to have some level of global economic meltdown. It's happening. What's the path forward from here?
- [07:34]
A
The path forward is to come up with a negotiated settlement where Iran probably has more power.
- [07:45]
B
Right.
- [07:45]
A
Because of this. I mean, that's what we're seeing. I don't like to make a ton of predictions, but if, if, you know, if I had to, we would have to come up with an agreement which would probably be worse for us than the Iran nuclear deal that the Obama administration put together many years ago. Iran's probably going to come out with more. They're probably, they're going to have more power over the Strait of Hormuz. They're probably going to be able to keep the uranium. I just feel like that's where we're headed, because we in the globe can't stand this Strait of Hormuz being shut down forever. You did a podcast or part of one of your podcasts on diesel prices. And you talked about a man the New York Times had, had talked about fasting. He was a truck driver, I believe, right? Fasting to help pay for diesel fuel for his truck. I mean, we, there's a connection here. When diesel prices go up, you know, the transportation for groceries gets passed to us. The diesel powers our farm equipment, so our farmers get hurt. And that all gets passed down to us with diesel heats home. So, I mean, it's, it's just, it's bad.
- [09:08]
B
We've been interested in where those indicators are. Our audience quickly said, that's not fasting, that's rationing. You know, that's malnutrition caused by food prices. We've seen reporting about the price of raspberries going up as a bit of a canary in the coal mine on where groceries are heading. I do think this is going to hurt people. And I think Americans are willing to make sacrifices when we understand why. But a question that I have been obsessed with and I have asked the elected officials that we've had on our show since this began. We had a Kentuckian die in Iran in these operations. Why? What for? What for? People are willing to sacrifice for their country, but there has to be a reason. And I have searched and searched for the reason. I've tried to check my biases. Would I support this if we had a different commander in chief? Is there a strategy that I understand? Even if I don't like the people executing it, I cannot find it.
- [10:03]
A
When I was in Afghanistan, I had a friend of mine who was shot down, was a helicopter pilot, and he and I were both aviation planners. He was a helicopter planner, I was a fixed wing planner, meaning a fighter jet planner for the ground troops. And he went out on a mission about four months into our deployment, and he was shot down by an RPG and killed. And I'll never forget being on the tarmac at the air base that we were at, which was Camp Leatherneck, Camp Bastion, and watching the box of his remains go into the C130 and watching it. And the only thing I kept thinking along with, of course, his family and the prayers for his family, but I kept thinking, what, what, what did he sacrifice for? What are we doing here? And that was in Afghanistan where there were. There were some. There was some level of, okay, we're making this country better. You know, this country harbored people that attacked us, and we're, we've gotten rid of them, and we're going to try to, you know, make sure that they don't get back in power. And so there was, there was some belie in this. I don't know. We are causing a global economic meltdown. Wasn't in our national interest. It wasn't an immediate threat to our country. Iran was not. And I feel like right now everything that's going on with interest rates and everything going up is just a self inflicted wound. This is different than Covid because Covid wasn't in my belief, self inflicted. I mean we're, we're doing this to ourselves here.
- [12:00]
B
Yeah. I think back about President Trump. One of the things I've tried to give him credit for is speaking to that sense that people felt about Afghanistan. Why are we doing this? Why has this cost our families so much? Why do we have so many people coming home with terrible trauma if they are lucky enough to make it home with just trauma? You know, why have we done this to ourselves? And watching his conduct in office in the second term, I've realized that I don't think he was giving voice to that. You know, I think he was maybe giving voice to dumb wars because they inconvenienced his businesses or hurt his stock portfolio or limited his ability to negotiate deals overseas. Like, I have a friend, Brian who jokes with his wife about how she needs to ask the next follow up question. They have great stories about showing up late to parties or not understanding the dress code or something. And he's always like, one more question. And that's how I feel about the president. You know, even the places where he's getting to something that a lot of people feel one more question. And not so much. And that's really what I think has happened with his, his views on foreign wars and why so many people who voted for him are expressing a sense of betrayal and, and unhappiness right now.
- [13:17]
A
Yeah, I mean he was very open about we shouldn't be starting wars. I mean, his campaign talked about voting for Trump, being the peace president. And if you voted for Harris, you would be the president of forever wars. And I mean, I feel like it's just completely flipped now. And the other thing that is interesting and bothersome to me in this administration, as opposed to really any other administration, with the exception of the first Trump administration, which was, I think had some of this is our national security leaders openly grifting and selling out our national interests.
- [13:57]
B
And I think we are at the tip of the iceberg because when you start factoring in the prediction markets and the way that these very specific bets on timing and weaponry and will, will a bomb Land here in this specific city. But, you know, in this window of time, and the way that I loved the way McKay Coppins wrote about this in the Atlantic, that on the prediction markets, insider trading is the feature, not the bug. That's basically what it's for. And I think we are only beginning to get our arms around the level at which so many people are profiting from this decision making and turning it into a game. You know, if war is a casino, what are the principled ways that we move through it? How do we decide matters of life and death bound to anything other than who profits from them?
- [14:47]
A
Yeah. And that also takes me into another piece of this, which is this administration's and particularly the national security leaders using religion as sort of the basis for this war. You know, this, this war in Iran is somehow a holy war. We're doing, you know, prayer services at the Pentagon now. We're invoking this religious language and how we talk about this war. And this gets me to the now conflict between our president and the leader of the Catholic Church. And it's almost one of the most insane stories that I've heard in a long time. Right. If you would have told me a year ago that on orthodox Easter, our president would be attacking the new pope, Pope Leo, the new American Pope, the new American from Chicago, I mean, over a war that the president unilaterally started and also posting a picture, an AI picture of himself, the president, as if he were Jesus Christ, I would have been like, that's a little out there even for Trump. And now here we are.
- [16:13]
B
Here we are. You know, I am a member of the Christian Church, Disciples of Christ. And so I would never tell anyone who's Catholic how they should feel about all of this. But just taking it in as a person of faith and as an American, what I think is so illuminating in this is that it's really a one sided conflict. Like Pope Leo isn't fighting with Donald Trump. Pope Leo is saying what he believes to be the truth that the world needs to hear right now. That's how I interpret it. And if that ruffles anybody's feathers, so be it. That's what the prophets and priests have been doing throughout time. But the fact that in the face of that, this White House can't handle itself, you know, that even J.D. vance, who markets his conversion to Catholicism later in life, is drawn into this because they can't handle a person who just says no. Like, I am guided by larger truths. I am guard. Guided by principles for which I am willing to sacrifice and put myself on the line and not just constantly enrich myself. They. I think that it's a very clear demonstration to the public what kind of leadership is going on in the White House and what kind of leadership is happening at the Vatican.
- [17:27]
A
Yeah, it's interesting. You use the word market. That. That is. That is right on. We have a vice president who is marketing his conversion to this faith. And now he's turning around and saying, you know, the. The Pope is wrong, and the Pope should be more careful about talking about theology, which is. It's wild. It really is.
- [17:57]
B
I think the president's attraction to religion has always been that he sees how powerful it is. And I think he is just attracted to power in any form it will take, especially forms that he feels have an element of like, no one can question me. So I'm really obsessed with the God Squad. Do you know about this?
- [18:16]
A
No tell.
- [18:17]
B
Okay. So I was really upset about that Jesus AI image, too. And then I learned about the God Squad, and I was like, no, this is what I'm really mad about. So in the 1970s, and I'll try to not do too much nerdy history, but our listeners know I love details. So in this. In the 70s, the endangered species act gets passed and it gets tested by the building of a dam in Tennessee. And the Supreme Court gets this case that. That people refer to as like snail darter versus Teleco Dam, because there's this teen fish at issue. And the Supreme Court says, sorry, I know you want to build a dam, but the Endangered Species act is clear. We're protecting the teeny tiny fish. And Congress sees that and is like, well, we probably need, for extreme cases where humans really need something. A little bit of an escape path from the Endangered Species Act. So they create a committee. What everybody does when they have a hard problem, right? Let's make a committee. And the committee is. Is nicknamed in the 70s by activists and people watching this the God Squad. Because if this committee grants an exception to the Endangered Species act, it is often saying, yeah, this species is going to go extinct because of what we want to do or build. Okay, so that's been very rarely used, hasn't met since 1992. The Trump administration, on day one, issued an executive order saying this committee should meet quarterly. The God Squad should convene quarterly to decide where pesky environmental regulations are in the way of industry. They met for the first time on March 31st. It's a committee of cabinet secretaries. The Secretary of Army is involved. NOAA is involved. And they loved it. And they just passed this blanket exemption for all oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, no matter what, no matter what it does to the whales and the many sea turtles who are endangered there. And they've decided they're going to keep meeting regularly to figure out where they can sort of bulldoze their way through. And I just think that is the most clarifying example of what this administration is about. No respect for details, no interest in process. They didn't call any expert witnesses. There's a whole process they skipped through to do this. They said, in the interest of national security, we got to stop worrying about the whales, you know, and we weren't not drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, as anyone who is familiar with our domestic oil production knows. We were mitigating. We were slowing boats down so they wouldn't hit whales. You know, we were trying to reduce the noise so it wouldn't stress the population. But the God squad comes in and says, I guess, be smited environmental lovers. Like, we're just going to do what we want to do. And they want to keep meeting like this. And I think that religious fervor connected solely to power is the animating theme of this administration.
- [21:12]
A
Yeah, that's so interesting. And the other piece of this, and it doesn't surprise anyone that's sort of watched Trump and Mega World for the last few years, but to say that the Pope is weak on crime and terrible for foreign policy, and then accusing the Pope of catering to the radical left, I feel like every time there, there's a disagreement with the President, with Republicans, it's the automatic label of your radical left. And it's just like, does that work? I mean, do people think that?
- [21:55]
B
I just.
- [21:56]
A
I don't know.
- [21:57]
B
I don't know what people, you know. So Sarah has been really focused lately on a question. My co host, who is persuadable topic by topic, because that's, especially with midterm elections coming up, who we have to think about, Right? And I am certain, just based on the last decade, that there are people who are going to side with Trump versus the Pope, you know? Yeah, there are. I have to believe. I have to believe that there is a larger persuadable block watching this and thinking, good grief, like, come on. And. And I hope that they are either motivated to show up and reject all of this with their votes or to just sit it out and see what happens. Sometimes I think sitting it out is the best we can hope for. But I do think there are persuadable people watching this and not loving what they're seeing. Because you. This is easy to understand. You don't have to have a law degree. You don't have to have foreign policy experience. You can see this for exactly what it is.
- [22:59]
A
I wanted to get your take on another topic, because you have a law background and you and Sarah. Right, okay. And recently, Trump's new Interim Attorney General, Mr. Blanche, he has said that it's. Our president has a right and a duty to investigate his enemies.
- [23:23]
B
Right.
- [23:23]
A
Using government, using the Department of Justice. So they're basically saying, you know, we have a right to weaponize the Department of Justice to take on the president's enemies. I'll give you an example that's just come up recently. Is this the criminal charges that are now going after the Southern Poverty Law Center? This is a nonprofit research and advocacy organization. It's worked for a long time, for decades, to combat racism, combat white supremacists, neo Nazi hate groups. Okay. And one of the things that they have done for many years is pay informants to go infiltrate some of these groups. And now we have the Department of Justice basically trying to prosecute them for that, saying that that's fraud to their donors. And I just, like, here we are, the Department of Justice, going after groups that are trying to stop and infiltrate, like, groups like the kkk. We don't want to do that anymore. Like, first of all, how is, is this legal from a. From a. A lawyer perspective?
- [24:44]
B
Well, there's so much going on here. So I always start with remembering that Todd Blanche was Donald Trump's personal and now he is the acting Attorney General. And that connection is important to understanding everything Todd Blanche does. He was first Trump's personal lawyer, and he continues to behave that way. And I would like to pin everything on Todd Blanche because of my feelings about him. But the Department of Justice has, for the entirety of this second term, been looking for people to prosecute. Grand juries have rejected those efforts. You know, juries and judges have looked at the attempt to prosecute James Comey, Letitia James, and said, this is absurd. Now, the administration did get a win in Texas. There's a case it's about. It's in Prairie Land, where you had a group of protesters at an ICE facility convicted. And I think that group did some property damage. A police officer was struck by a bullet, like there. There were some illegal issues going on there. What's concerning about that case is that the Department of Justice has branded Antifa a terrorist organization, and they bring different Tools to the table when they decide that you're a terrorist group. There are many speed bumps in the legal process. It sucks to be investigated by the federal government. It's horribly expensive to be indicted. It's reputationally damaging. This is all very bad. And there are places where it gets shut down in the process when it's not right. To me, one of the more concerning things going on is they aren't just using the Department of Justice to hurt their enemies. They are also using it to pay their friends. So we just Learned about a $1.25 million settlement being paid to Carter Page, who was improperly surveilled by the FBI in connection with the Trump campaign. They've paid over a million dollars to Michael Flynn for what they say was his malicious prosecution by the last Department of Justice. Trump himself has a claim outstanding against this government for, for all the ways that he thinks the Justice Department under the Biden administration was cruel to him. There are fewer breaks on the money going out. Taxpayer dollars settling these bogus lawsuits from friends, and we can't catch all of those in the court system the way that we can. The bad faith prosecutions.
- [27:05]
A
There's so much going on that we can't, we can't stop it. And that's, that's, you know, the things that would be on the front page in almost any other administration are really on the back page right now because we've got, you know, price up, healthcare, going away, a war, all of these things. And also the FBI director, in a recent report in the Atlantic, has been apparently showing deeply erratic and alarming behavior in office. Unexplained absences, episodes where he's unreachable or incapacitated. It's raising a lot of concerns inside the FBI. This is the head of the FBI, Cash Patel. We all knew that maybe he wasn't the right guy for the job, but, I mean, it's pretty. Again, it's just amazing that you would get into a position of such magnitude and basically be a drunk. I mean, I. I don't know what else to say. I'm. I'm sort of. This is a. This is a major position of national security and that kind of behavior. I mean, when I was in the military, if you exhibited that kind of behavior and you had a security clearance, just a basic security clearance that didn't even rise to the level of being the head of an agency with massive amount of security clearance that you have to have, you would be fired. I mean, your clearance would be taken away. It's one of the things that when they do investigations just for you to get a clearance, you have to make sure that you're somebody of that doesn't have a drinking problem, that comes to work on time, you know, all of these things, you know, now Cash Patel is, is suing the Atlantic saying this is not true, but I don't know.
- [29:05]
B
Well, similar reporting out there about Pete Hegseth before he was confirmed. I lay some of this at the feet of the Senate. Drinking and being off, you know, off at all hours, doing whatever you want was part of the issue with Lori Chavez Duramer, the Labor Secretary, who has now resigned. I mean, this is rampant in the administration. And I know that Donald Trump himself does not have a drinking issue, but I think the culture from the top of this office is here to serve you. You're not here to serve. It is exhibited in myriad ways throughout his cabinet. And it's really alarming for the people, career people in those departments, the people who are left after the doging of it all, who are trying to hold it together. That's. That's where my heart always goes. I worry about leadership, and I am going to until we have a new administration. But the people living it every day.
- [29:57]
A
I hate that you just hope that, that the career officials. I often try to think about what would I do if I had worked 15, 17 years in the FBI, work myself up to a position and really care about this country. And then I see just a buffoon. And he's not the only one. There's others come in on top. And do I try to work within that system? How do I get through it? Because you want to serve the country, you want to keep your career. But man, how much, how much damage is being done right now?
- [30:39]
B
Well, and we just saw Hegseth fire the Secretary of the Navy when we are dealing with the Strait of Hormuz as the key issue in that conflict. Kash Patel has gotten rid of a lot of Iranian experts who could have been helping us think about the domestic risks of this war and seems to be more focused on his press than his position. And those threats, you know, suing the Atlantic as the FBI director, that alone is so inappropriate. The, the government chilling of speech created by that kind of ethos and those types of actions. The way that the FBI is reported to have been investigating a New York Times reporter for stalking because she wrote a piece about the way that Kash Patel has been using FBI transportation and security for his girlfriend. And so they, they take whatever tools they have and if there's nothing else, they file a complaint in court. There was a time when those would have been some of our biggest issues because we don't want the government going to war with the press. But you're right, like, those are the kinds of things that barely rise to the surface because there's so much.
- [31:49]
A
Yeah, I mean, our, our national security leaders, Secretary of Defense, FBI director, all these things. The open, the open grifting, the selling out of national interests, the. In putting religion into, you know, holy wars into. Into our military. The hate, the embracing of hatred and cruelty and racism. It seems to be pretty high in this administration as well. I just, I do feel for the rank and file who love this country and are serving in the FBI, in the military. With this such poor leadership at the
- [32:31]
B
moment, I do too.
- [32:34]
A
Well, listen, I want to talk to you and have our listeners understand a little bit more about pantsuit politics, because this is your. Pantsuit Politics is your show. You started it with Sarah. And how I got to know your show was because of my sister who said, this is a really cool show. It's a really cool podcast. This was kind of in the days of podcasts were somewhat new and you should listen to it. And the reason I loved your show and still do is because first of all, you were like me. You had kids, my kids age and you were talking about politics, which I'm not a political junkie, but I'm somebody that loves our country and I see the connection. And I saw in politics that a lot of things were happening in our country that if we didn't talk about them, we were going to be in bad shape. And I also loved about your show, how it took headlines and broke it down, complex things and sort of broke it down so people could understand them. And that's what I loved about your show. So I want to take some time and have you tell everybody about pantsuit politics.
- [34:01]
B
Oh, thank you. That's really generous. And the way that you found us is very emblematic of what we do. We are not a viral show. You know, we're not trying to make clips that 200,000 people see. We are trying to have long form conversations. We think of our listeners as people who could just be in the room with us, around a table, drinking coffee, discussing things. And we grow. One listener texting a friend or a sister at a time saying, hey, I think you might like this. Sarah and I went to college together in Kentucky. We went our separate ways. We did, we did both go to law school. Sarah worked for a Senator worked on Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign and then decided she wanted to come home to Paducah, Kentucky, to raise her family. I stayed in Kentucky that whole time. I went to a law firm. We reconnected, and I was writing some posts on maternity leave for Sarah's blog when she suggested making the podcast. I didn't know anything about podcasting, but. But I was interested in what she was writing about because I. I share your view. I'm not a political junkie. I did grow up in a news household. My parents read the newspaper cover to cover every day. They had cable news on all the time as soon as it was a thing. So the. The soundtrack to my childhood is like the Clarence Thomas confirmation hearings and the O.J. simpson Bronco chase, that stuff. So Sarah and I started talking and realized that we have different views about some things. We have very different personalities and styles, and that's where a lot of political conflict lives, in personality and style and just prioritization. What sticks out to you here? What's the most important thing? We were also frustrated with cable news because we. We saw the design of cable news where it's like, you bring people on to deliberately disagree on basically everything and to present as very different people who see everything very differently. And we just don't want to listen to that all day, every day. And we didn't want to do it. And so we thought, let's make a show where we talk as we would in our living room and let other people hear it. And that became pantsy politics. And we still try to keep that. It's very different from when we started, but we really still try to keep that feel.
- [36:15]
A
What's the most fun you've had while you're doing it? What do you love about it?
- [36:21]
B
There are just moments, I think, in about every episode where Sarah will say something and something will light up in my brain. I've never thought of it that way before. And then with our audience, I love how things just stick, that you don't plan at all. I'll tell a story about road rage. I really try not to have road rage. And so I have this habit when I get cut off or something of saying, be careful, friend. And it just, like, helps. Kind of helps me reset instead of saying something ugly or, you know, getting in my head about it and those kinds of things. When we do a live show, people come up to us and say, oh, my gosh, I heard you say this seven years ago. I've been doing it ever since. Changed my life. Made me so much healthier. And just the way that you have this really intimate relationship with the people who listen to you. Because I'm coming along as people are doing their laundry and changing their baby's diapers and driving to work every day. We have engineers who listen and are, like, staring at spreadsheets, and we're talking to them while they do it. And it's like, I live in the world's classroom now. I get to follow my interest and hear from so many people. And it's incredible.
- [37:31]
A
When you started out, your topics were very. It was sort of like you were explaining the news a little bit more, which I love. But recently, in the last couple years, you've kind of shifted a little bit.
- [37:44]
B
You.
- [37:44]
A
You guys talk a little bit more about other things that are not political. Right, Right.
- [37:50]
B
We've brought in a lot of culture because our people have some news fatigue. Imagine that in Donald Trump's America, there's some news fatigue. And also, we've realized that if you stick just to politics, you are going to miss a lot of the things that gave rise to a Trump figure. You know, we talk a lot about education right now. Part of that is because we have kids in school, and we're seeing issues from elementary school to high school and about to hit higher ed, too. And we realize, like, if you're not talking about what a special ed parent experiences every day, you're missing a huge number of people and what they really care about, what they have capacity to engage on and what would really make their lives better. And so we don't want to just be sort of led by the nose on whatever dumbass thing Donald Trump is saying or doing today. We also want to say, like, what is going on in houses like ours and our friends and our family members and people. We're nothing like that affects how they feel when they go vote and when they listen to people running for office.
- [38:56]
A
Yeah. And how many years have you been doing your show?
- [39:00]
B
It'll be 11 years this November. So we're like grandmothers in the industry.
- [39:05]
A
I mean, it's great. And I have to say, you, in your format, you inspired me to want to do something like this, to want to do a podcast. I think it's amazing, and I'm so thankful you came on the show. I hope you and Sarah can come back onto this show soon. It's been really great to talk with you. And where can people find Pantsu politics?
- [39:32]
B
Truly, anywhere you listen to podcasts, you'll find us.
- [39:34]
A
We.
- [39:35]
B
Our home base is on substack. So if you go to Pantsu Politics on Substack, you'll see everything that we write and everything that we make. And it's so fun to talk with you. We'd love to come back anytime. And you'll have to come back over to fancy politics soon, too.
- [39:48]
A
Would love to do that. Two amazing Kentuckians, Sarah and Beth, from different parts of the state. Right. You're you're almost in the opposite ends of the state. And so I guess my shout out would be to both of you today because you have such an amazing show, and it's great to have you on this one. Okay.
- [40:08]
B
Thank you so much, Amy.
- [40:09]
A
All right. For everyone, thanks for listening to Truth in the Barrel Unfiltered, where we go over all of the craziness going on in our politics today. And we'll see you next week.