After Party with Emily Jashinsky - “Cornell 7” Case Gets Political, Mamdani Sells Socialism to Theo Von & the Right Turns on Zach Bryan

Episode Date: October 5, 2026

Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Welcome to After Party, everyone. Thanks for being here with us. Make sure to subscribe. If you haven't yet, it's so helpful to subscribe on YouTube. Let's just keep doing our independent journalism. Subscribe also wherever you get your podcast. Really recently, I don't think some people are subbed on Apple or Spotify and are missing those Friday episodes, which sometimes are like two hours long. I think every one was two hours long. I just go through all the emails. You send into Emily at Doublemaicare Media.com over the course of the week, and we have some great conversations there. So if you're interested, please do sub on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcast. We are going to go through a lot of news today. Some Democrats weighing in on the

Cornell 7 story. Jack Smith showed up at a Bruce Springsteen concert in a No Kings t-shirt. Isn't that interesting? Theo Von hosted Zeran Mamdani on his show, David Brooks Let Loose. Just a blistering critique of legacy media from David Brooks of all people. And there's a fake Nazi scandal going on with Pete Hegeseth right now. It's so dumb. We'll break that down. I'm excited also to talk about the Zach Brian controversy. He wore a free Palestine slash appeal to heaven shirt at Gillette Stadium at his Friday concert. So there's a ton of news to get to. The midterms are about a month away at this point. So without further ado, we're going to break it down after this quick break. For 20 years, Preborn has stood in the gap between fear and hope. And this year alone, God has used

preborn to save nearly 60,000 babies from abortion, 60,000. Since Roeborne, since Roeborn. Roe v. Wade was overturned. We covered this a lot here on the podcast. The abortion industry has actually not slowed down at all. It's adapted. Women now face this decision faster, they face it more privately, and also more alone than ever before. But every day, inside a pre-born network clinic, a woman sees her baby on an ultrasound and hears a heartbeat for the first time. And everything changes. The chance for new life skyrockets. And this year, that moment has led to thousands of commitments to Christ, proof that preborn isn't just saving babies, it's saving souls, too. 20 years in, we still believe we were made for this moment. Will you help us meet the next woman

before it's too late? Right now, another mother needs that moment. You can give it to her. Just $28 helps provide one life-saving ultrasound. $140 helps rescue five babies. All gifts are tax deductible. Please give today. Dial pound a 250 and say baby. That's pound 250, baby, or visit preborn.com slash Emily. That's preborn.com slash Emily. Well, Democrats are really leaning into this Cornell 7 story. Some, I should say, are. Some are being a little bit more careful with it. Kirsten Gillibrand

and Chuck Schumer, both of course, senators from New York, were slightly more circumspect than Letitia James was. If you missed our segment, by the way, on Friday, did a breakdown of the Lettia James announcement and new details we learned in the Cornell 7 case from that massive New York Times report, blockbuster New York Times report. That breakdown was posted on the

channel Friday. So take a look at that. If you're interested, but a couple of them have been a little bit more careful and it isn't a full-blown me-to pile on among elected Democrats or Democrats running for office yet. But several Democrats actually have leaned into it, including Abdul Al-Sayed. We mentioned that last week, Whedon in support of the Jane Doe. I think it's fair to say, again, when I say that Kirsten Gillbrand and Chuck Schumer have been a little bit more circumspect, they didn't fully go all in with the Jane Doe story yet. but Abdul al-Said basically did.

Letitia James basically did. That's why it's insane for Kathy Hokel, who is in a tighter-than-expected gubernatorial election in New York, appointed Letitia James, of all people, someone who had already said that she's standing with the alleged victim in this case. Totally, and I won't mix my idioms like I did on the last video. I think I kept saying tip your hat. I was sleep-deprived, but tipping her hand.

I had already said she was standing in solidarity with the alleged victim. Thank you to everyone. who caught my idiom, one lesson of existing in YouTube and on YouTube and social media is that people will catch it if you if you do that. So shout out to everyone for keeping me honest on that one. But in all seriousness, that's why it's crazy for Kathy Hochle, who's, I think, trying to excite the base ahead of the election. And maybe she also totally believes that it's good for Leticia James here to be the special prosecutor. But if you're actually interested in a fair investigation, as Hockel says she is, as Letitia James says she is, you would never put James in that

position, somebody who has already referred to the alleged victim here as a victim. That's clearly inappropriate if you want a fair investigation, which I think at this point, by the way, we all want a fair investigation into this because it has become such an enormous conversation. AOC is another person who has already rendered a judgment in the case. and said that she's standing in solidarity with the alleged victim here, the Democratic Women's Caucus, this hasn't gotten a ton of pickup, but they put out a statement last week saying that they stand with the Jane Doe in this case. So what you're seeing is some Democrats actually fully going in on one side of the story, which has not been litigated in the court of law. And once again,

was not investigated, well, was investigated, but was not, charges were not brought initially, in 2024 because the sworn statement that was delivered by the Jane Doe in this case did not describe non-consensual activity, did not describe being drugged, but described consensually taking drugs and consensually engaging in sexual activity with one possible exception, which is that the Jane Doe, towards the end of that sworn statement that was given in November of 2024, said one of the sexual encounters, she did not remember how it started. And you could see how that would be on its own, perhaps grounds for an investigation into whether an assault or rape occurred. In this case, there was a long-sworn statement about a long night, unfortunately, and many times was given

the opportunity to stop, did not take it, did not say no, and continued engaging in drugs and sexual intercourse. So all that is to say, it's a very complicated case and for people to take one inside of it. Obviously, it's true that women find themselves in these situations and are not treated properly, incredibly when they should be. That is obviously true, and it is horrible. Nobody knows what happened in that room, and just about all of the evidence, including text messages that came out in that New York Times story, indicate that this person did not see it as assault or rape was texting back and forth with one of the boys saying nothing illegal happened, enjoyed. The time was invited back according to this Times story to a Halloween party and then disinvited

saying she was excited to go to the Halloween party is the indications from text messages. Then when she was disinvited for what appears to be, I don't even, I actually don't even know how you could characterize the fraternity's disinvitation here. But when she was disinvited, then starts to really get extra bitter and turn on these guys. There's also an element of it where she appears to have really liked one of the guys and really wanted to be with one of the guys. And one of the big text messages that came out in the New York Times is that she said, you know, people have to realize this type of thing, meaning group sex is going to become more common and basically just get used to it and more accepting intolerant of it. So anyway, there are plenty of indications, including the sworn statement that she gave to the Cornell Police Department. department at the time, which was then turned to the DA and the DA said, we're not going to bring

charges, but offered to explain to her why they're not going to bring charges. There are plenty of reasons to say this is a complicated case and you're going to let justice play out. But actually, some Democrats have already leaned into it. Let's roll Michelle Cottle. This is Michelle Cottle on ABC News this week, opinion journalist at the New York Times. Connecting it to Donald Trump. It's a fundamental disrespect for women. You can't send those messages. no matter how drunk you are as a frat boy, without having some kind of misunderstanding about what women are there for

and whether this is a real person you're dealing with. And that, I think, starts, you know, we can go to the president for this one. I mean, we are in a moment in this culture where the glorification of being thuggish and swaggering and mistreating women is kind of making you a cool kid. Okay, thuggish and swaggering and mistreating women. Does that describe Donald Trump?

Probably. Does that have anything to do with the quote-unquote start of where these fraternity brothers decided to mistreat women? No, that goes to their biology as men. Probably goes to Donald Trump's biology as a man as well. Just a completely unnecessary injection of partisan politics into that panel. as though fraternity brothers have enacted like this, regardless of whether Donald Trump is the president. In fact, all contrary to her argument,

they now have popular culture coming down on them. They were named in the civil suit, then by media outlets. They were not treated at all, as though this was quote-unquote cool at all. Now, you could make the argument that internally, they're reprehensible and discussing behavior, saying free P-word upstairs. Just disgusting stuff.

No question about it. You could argue that there was internally a culture of thinking that was cool. And a lot of the stories, people upset that nobody stopped it. Someone did go up there and say, we're shutting this down. I think it was two people went up there and said, we're shutting this down. Didn't work. But there were people who tried. And then afterwards, it became the talk of coordination.

which was apparently also part of what upset this alleged victim so much. So it's not at all clear cut that there's some cultural incentive, some cultural fashion trend to mistreat women. Again, that's not clear cut at all, let alone that it quote, quote, starts with Donald Trump himself. There's just no reason to bring that up. As much as you can think Donald Trump, as I'm sure she does, is a pig. Like say you think that.

This has happened throughout time and Donald Trump has nothing to do with it. Nothing to do with it, but to sit on a Sunday panel, Sunday show panel, and bring Donald Trump into this. It was, by the way, the Trump Education Department that fixed the absurd Title IX standards that the Obama administration, and then the Biden administration sought to bring back. that created kangaroo courts, that even people on the left came to see by the end of the Obama administration, were disastrous for men and for women. The Trump Department of Education comes in, fixes that once again, because it was unfair, and it was causing chaos. It was wreaking havoc for men and women on college campuses. It's just so asinine, so asinine to inject Trump into this story for making it cool for, rap boys. I mean, actually, the best culprit here would probably be porn culture that does

normalize for a lot of younger people. You even see that in the text message where the victim says, hey, the alleged victim, I should say, says this is going to be a lot more normal in the future. People have to just get used to it. That text message is a perfect illustration of why, if anything, you might want to blame the culture of sexual libertinism, porn culture, especially in the minds of young men that makes them believe women want this. On average, women certainly do not want this. It makes women believe they should want this. On average, women do not want this.

Are there some women? Aren't there some men? Of course. But on average, no. So we could blame, actually, the trends of sexual libertine norm shifting that have conditioned young people to think all of this stuff is should be empowering, that would probably be a better culprit here than Donald Trump,

than Donald Trump. But of course, she could not resist. Let's move on now to Jack Smith showing up at a Springsteen concert outside of the D.C. area In a no-kings t-shirt, fresh off of his Senate testimony. He got a shout out from Dave Grohl. Can we put these pictures up on the screen? This is former special counsel. Jack Smith, who was looking into Donald Trump. Obviously, he was a former special counsel investigating Donald Trump shows up at Merriweather Post Pavilion, it's in Maryland suburbs outside of D.C., flat out wearing a no-kings t-shirt. I'm going to read here from just the news that reports former special counsel, Jack Smith, was spotted sporting a Bruce Springsteen's, quote,

no-king shirt at the quote, Power to the People Fest on Saturday in Maryland. Several social media users posted selfies posing with Smith at the festival wearing the quote-unquote no king shirt, which Springsteen sells on his website. The shirt is from his recent Land of Hope and Dreams, American Tour. Foo Fighters lead singer Dave Grohl reportedly dedicated a song from a set to his favorite Jack, which was apparently a reference to Smith. I think Grohl was also wearing an Iowa Hawkeyes T-shirt. That part's kind of funny. The event was held in Maryland near Washington, D.C. to demonstrate the quote, power everyday human beings have when they come together through music, art, community, and action to shape our country and our planet on and beyond

election day. Guitarist Tom Morello from Rage Against the Machine, organized the festival, and he said, quote, hopefully you've been energized, radicalized, revolutionized, democratized, and wound the F up when he was closing out the festival. And it is so spectacular once again to see Jack Smith championed as some people's special council. We went through this last week on the show. need I remind everyone, this man issued subpoenas directly for journalist source communications

in his investigation into Trump. He specifically asked for, and we're not just talking about one American News Network, although he did subpoena those. He subpoenaed journalist communications from CBS News with sources at Republican consulting firms in the days between the election and January 6th. Now, some people say, oh, no big deal. He's just trying to get to the bottom of Trump's coup plot. There's absolutely no justification, which we also know in retrospect because he didn't use any of that material from which he subpoenaed Jamestown's communications with news outlets, CBS included. By the way, I thought we were also supporting CBS, pre-Berry Weiss as the People's Network? Well, this is Pre-Berry Wise CBS, getting subpoenaed by Jack Smith.

It was a subpoenaed to Jamestown, but he was looking for the communications with CBS. 60 minutes, by the way, included in the National Archives dump of records, source communications between the White House and 60 Minutes. This is the 60 Minutes of Scott Pelly, who I also thought we were championing as the People's Broadcaster. Jack Smith took that information and used in an investigation. You can see the emails that were released by Chuck Grassley. There was no attempt to screen out journalist communications before this was all forwarded to Jack Smith's team. And he's now being championed as a revolutionary, despite the fact that he is coming out as an anti-Trump partisan, meaning he's part of the partisan anti-Trump movement because he

chose to wear a no king's shirt. And Jack Smith was actually kind of a, a, He was constantly interpreted as somebody sending tea leaves, like when he would go out to the subway. I'm not even making this up. There would be the media like chattering costs to be like, what signs is he sending? Well, he just sent a sign that's as clear as day. After his Senate testimony, he comes out, gets lauded by Dave Grohl in a No King's shirt. The No King's movement is about Donald Trump. And so he is wearing an anti-Trump t-shirt.

Everybody knows that. It's completely obvious. And then he is being championed. as the people's special counsel. These two things are not compatible. I mean, that man subpoenaed like half, at least half, if not more than half, of the entire conservative movement.

Whether or not you love or hate conservatives, that's an insane thing to do. I mean, bank records, Chuck Grassley showed last week, small dollar donors, people who had given like $10 to Donald Trump. The very people that some on the left believe they're championing as Trump exploits them, you know, Trump is exploiting you, he's your working class, you think he's your champion, he's not, well, Jack Smith didn't even use, seemingly didn't even use any of this information,

but got all of this donor information from campaign funders, small dollar campaign funders, almost 5,000 checks. These two things, again, are not compatible. He cannot be the people's champion and also be. being some, be somebody who is abusing his power as special prosecutor. And yes, these were lawful subpoenas. Some on the right might actually argue whether or not they were lawfully obtained, but yes, they were signed off on.

Historically, journalists and civil libertarians have not used that as an excuse to say everything is fine. That's part of a system that is problematic in and of itself. The fact that judges are signing off on such extremely broad subpoenas is a problem. And historically journalists have taken issue. even with lawful subpoenas for their communications. A back look into Eric Holder. There are many of cases of this throughout history, throughout even recent history,

where that's been a problem. It's not an excuse. And obviously, it's better than not getting a subpoena, but it's not an excuse for the government to abuse its power to seize these types of communications. And here he is, having had the mighty power of the federal government, the FBI, behind him, then showing he's a total partisan after the fact with credible allegations he abused

that power. And he's being lauded as like the people's prosecutor. Like these people think this is radical and revolutionary. I'm quoting Tom Arello here. Energized, radicalized, revolutionized, democratized. In a democracy, it should be enormously problematic that the president in the United States appoints a special prosecutor who abuses the powers of the judiciary to sweep into an investigation. We read from Matt Taibi last week, his take on Arctic Frost, I think it was a good one. I'm going to pull up this quote. He said, if Smith simply focused on those damaging episodes in states like Arizona, Michigan, Georgia,

or on Trump's interactions with Mike Pence, this prosecution, referring to Smith's, would be an easier sell to the general population. Instead, Smith has tried to pen a unified theory of unified, field theory of insurrection that would massively expand the meaning of concepts like incitement to include false statements, tweets, and other forms of protected speech, down to classic Trumpisms, like, quote, I don't care about a link. I have a much better link. And I have a lot of friends of Detroit. Detroit is totally corrupt. And what Taibi is getting at here is that you have to prove with the Smith prosecution that Trump did not believe what he was saying. Good luck with that. What precedent does it set

for future presidents, who could be Democrats, for what it's worth, who could be real people's champions. That was Smith's design. It's so insane for him in particular to be treated this way. And it shows this like rot in the elite liberal mind to treat. You could also, by the way, have supported Jack Smith's prosecution, disagreed with Taibi, disagreed with me, and still seen this as wildly inappropriate to show up in a no king's t-shirt. It's maybe it's even worse if you do support support it because it shows him like nakedly revealing himself to be anti-Trump when he was supposed to be the so expressional prosecutor who's still defending the validity of these prosecutions as they are investigated by Republicans. So it's not like this is in the past. It's still

something he has to defend because it's currently under investigation. Mark Ruffalo was also speaking at this type of thing over the weekend. I think this was in New York. It just, like, I feel like we're in this period similar to between 2018 and 2024 when there were so many like political missteps among elite progressives and elite liberals because they felt like they had anti-Trump momentum at their back. And they did look at Trump's approval ratings now after January 6th until really around the Butler time period, but on the Republican side until the Santa starts running against him, the Alvin Bragg indictment comes down.

And I feel like we're again in one of these time periods where they feel like they have all the momentum in the world and then they're not capable of landing the plane because they still fundamentally are too willing to reflectively embrace the fever instead of coming down with some like rational decent pitch to independents who may be supported Trump, Trump voters who may be disillusioned. Here's Ruffalo. This midterm election is going to be one of the. the most consequential elections of our lifetimes. I mean, we always hear that, but this is the one.

We got to get this dumb ass, fool ass, tired ass, lame ass, duck ass out of office. We got to run to January. We got to make sure our people get seated. They're going to try and stop them. They're going to try and stop us. They're going to try and stop us from taking our country back, and we're not going to let them. Hands off! Hands off our fucking vote! The last... I'm gonna Hulk out. You wouldn't like me when I'm angry.

Hey, I'm still here. They thought I was out for the count. I'm still here. I'm still playing the Hulk. Oh, it's so lame. It's so lame. and it's exactly why some people started to be like, oh, Trump is not afraid of these lame celebrities. Maybe that makes him cool.

It's this exact type of, what did he say, tired ass, duck ass. Let's stick with tired ass. It's the exact same, like, tired ass MSNBC, circa 2019 commentary that is destroying the cause. Mark Rufflow is trying to fuel because it is so painfully lame to do these like disheveled celebrity yelling into a mic in Manhattan schicks over and over again. It's going to backfire because it's not nearly as cool as you think it is. It actually comes across as like painfully, painfully lame. Find better material. How many years into the Trump phenomenon at this point? like 11, almost 12 years into it. He's been president twice. I feel like as part of the

cultural decadence and stagnation that allowed him to in 2024 cast himself to a lot of voters as dynamic, indifferent, and fresh. And again, disagree with that all you want. But this is what made that possible. And Ruffle is still doing it. And you can tell he still thinks he's absolutely cooking. He thinks he's absolutely cooking. Come on, man. What we're going to learn? What are we going to learn? There's actually plenty of ways to persuade people, to be anti-Trump, to get Democrats to show up at the polls in November. It don't involve this. Don't involve this. I guess it's like self-satisfaction that I find especially pathetic. Because you can tell he thinks again, he thinks he's absolutely cooking.

He thinks he's roasting the hell out of Trump. It just comes across as so tired, tired ass, dare I say, and lame. And once again, a sign that like the no king's wing of the anti-Trump operation. Is it popular with boomers and some affluent suburban liberals and politicians? liberals and progressives, yes. It may be helpful to get out the vote, although I doubt this reflough speech is particularly helpful to getting out the vote. But if you're trying to win the culture, you're trying to win back the culture, I should say. It's like actually a remarkable L that Hollywood took in being so uncreative in its anti-Trump efforts that people started

turning away and finding there was like weirdly more dynamism in the I don't want to say pro-trump side but in the anti-anti-left side when you had guys we're about to talk about Theo von and Joe Rogan starting to see the left as being like fundamentally stagnant and self-important and not creative anymore in dynamic, fresh, interesting ways. And here you have Ruffalo just still doing the exact same routine and still thinking that it's fire. All right, let's take a quick break. We'll be right back with Theo Vaughan and Zora Mundani.

Life insurance, we all know we need it, but we keep putting it off because maybe it feels complicated, expensive, or like something that can wait. But stop waiting. take care of it today with select quote. In just 15 minutes, high quality coverage can be secured to fit any life and budget. Here's what makes select quote different. Their licensed insurance agents work for the consumer, not the insurance companies. They can bear options across multiple trusted carriers to find the right coverage at the absolute lowest price. Unlike other brokers

who push policies that pay them the most, select quote agents actually shop around. With nearly 40 years of experience and over two million families helped, this is expertise you can trust. Even with health issues like high blood pressure, diabetes, or heart disease, their agents know exactly which carriers will provide the best rate. For those in good health, same-day coverage is available with no medical exam required. Don't delay peace of mind. Select Quote. They shop. You save. Get the right life insurance for you for less at selectquote.com.com slash Emily today to get started. New York City mayors around Mom Donnie went on Theo Vaughn's show and defined socialism for Theo. They had a very friendly conversation.

Let's take a look. I want to talk a little bit about socialism, right? Please. It's a buzzword, right? Because socialism, will you define socialism for us? Because people say it a lot and don't know what it is. And sometimes those people are me. I'm so happy to be with those people right now.

Socialism to me, it means that you will have whatever you need to live a dignified life. and that it is the government's job to deliver on that. Okay. The government's job should not be to deliver on whether you have a dignified life. It can partially be the government's job to ensure everybody has the opportunity to live a dignified life. So that is a definition that I fully reject, but it's a definition that is going to be very persuasive when expressed on Theo Vaughn's podcast. Now, the responsibility to live a dignified life lays on all of us, and it's our responsibility also to help others live dignified lives. You can say that's through hashing out what the responsibilities of the government are to provide, for example, for people who have genuinely fallen on hard times.

But I think the way Mom Dani described it, like we could parse, but the way he described it as it being the government's responsibility is genuinely why people are. frightened of the friendly face of socialism that Zaraamam Dani puts on this self-professed ideology because the way he described it is that it is the government's job, right? He didn't say it's partially the government's job, but it's the government's job. And it's terrifying if the government is the deliverer of dignity, fundamentally the deliverer of dignity. Because we find our, this is actually like the entire Enlightenment concept or Western Enlightenment concept. In fact, so much so that a lot of post-label conservatives have an issue with it. But the idea is that we define and pursue, pursue, I'm using that word intentionally in a Jeffersonian

sense, pursue our own dignity. And the government exists to protect our abilities to pursue our own definitions of dignity. And that is very empowering. That is individualistic. And does that sometimes err in a direction that is too individualistic, absolutely, of course. But to see the government as the primary guarantor of human dignity is to export a lot of responsibility to the government itself to this distant power. And it actually is, in a way, disempowering because it grants an enormous amount of power to the government. But those are my, just like off the top of my head disagreements with Mamdani's definition.

What I don't disagree with is that he did a great job on Theo's podcast and in a way that showcases his generational political talent and in a way that will probably be persuasive to a lot of disaffected people who listen to Theo. So Mamdani did a good job.

It consistently does a good job. And if conservatives are worried about Mamdanianism and him bringing in people who again, as I mentioned, are among the 45% record 45% of Americans got found identifying as independence or actually even Democrats who are wondering if maybe Democratic socialism is a better path for the Democratic Party. There's a lot of work to do in persuasively rebutting that and making the case that it's really like it's a disempowering way to see the individual. It's a disempowering way to see us and it can genuinely lead to real authoritarianness. because of the way that you slot the government into that role in an individual's life. That argument is not being made.

Instead, people upset with Mamdani. We're trying to make this entire thing about J.D. Vance. So I just can scroll through some of these posts. Now, Vance has said that he is a friend of Theo Vons. He's been on Theo Vaughn. They're very, very friendly together. But here's Kimberly Ross. Theo Vaughan, brainless darling of the woke right and VP Vance, agreeing with Momdani.

As he says, Netanyahu is a quote-unquote architect of genocide. So making it about Vance. That's what I want to talk about here. Here's Max Abrams saying Vance's main spokespeople are Jack Posobic. Theo Vaughn, Tucker Carlson. Their similar, racist, dumbest shit, anti-America reject this trash. So that was posted on October 3rd, pretty clearly in response to the conversation around the Mamdani, Theo, appearance. Here we have.

This is Jamie Mitchell saying posting this quote, I love Theo Vaughan. He's one of my favorites. He's just incredible. I think Theo has a good heart. And that's one of the reasons I like listening to his show, J.D. Vance. And Jamie adds recognize the op when it slaps you in the face. That was directly in response to a mom, Donnie on with Theo and Justin USA on X posted. Nobody is winning a general election as a Republican by saying, quote unquote, I love Theo Vaughn. He's one of my favorites reposting a clip in response to Mom Donnie defining socialism on Theo show. Justin USA says catering to the podcast bros is not the best idea because they have absolutely. no values. They're right leaning one day and a communist the next. Again, such an massive, glaring, obvious political miscalculation here. What J.D. Vance is saying is why he's better positioned than most of these people or their champions would be to make a persuasive case to the millions of Americans who listen to Theo Vaughn and find themselves enormously frustrated with the right and the left. And I'm sorry, but that is a perfectly rational position for a person in the United States of America to have right now.

There are perfectly rational reasons. And this is why it's showing up in polling for people to be deeply frustrated with Republicans and deeply frustrated with Democrats, both of those things. And that's why actually the quote unquote podcast bros are a very important part, or this is like one of perhaps the most important battlefield in American politics right now,

precisely because of what Justin USA says here. The podcast bros are, quote, right leaning one day and a communist the next, describing them as people having no values. The reason that Theo Vaughn gets along with J.D. Vance and was Trump curious. It's the same thing that goes for Joe Rogan, Tim Dillon, and others, is because their value is rejecting the status quo. And they don't know what the proper way to channel that politically is. They're open-minded. And you see that on all of their shows, where they just talk to people, have genuine friendships with people, whether they're popless left,

popless right? they talk to them and they're open to their ideas. And that's why it comes across as sounding like they have no values, but what they don't have, obviously, are perfectly neat, quote-unquote values that align with either parties, let's say, convention platforms. They're not those people. And that's a growing number of Americans. So the argument that they're proving here is actually J.D. Vance is the person who is best positioned

to make a case to those type of folks. And what this is really about is all of these people really disliking J.D. Vance and really disliking the types of people in the country who haven't yet made up their minds left or right. And I'm sorry, one thing they can't control is that's a lot of the American public. That's a lot of the American public. You can't do anything about that except try to persuade them. And the wrong way to persuade them is to say they have, quote, unquote, no values because they're open-minded about conservatism, progressivism, socialism, libertarianism, is like the absolute worst way to try and persuade people.

And it's even worse to dismiss them as cranks and bigots because they disagree with you on a political issue. That is actually what started persuading people away from the left. And to make that mistake again from the right, to see people who are definitely politically homeless, who are looking for a kind of ideological life raft, because they're not. they don't trust either side and they don't like the status quo. And because they have had open minds and made especially or been persuaded especially against, for example, Israel, which is clearly the undercurrent of some of these criticisms of Vance and Theo Vaughn. That is a huge chunk of the country. Whatever you think of them, it's a huge chunk of the country. So if you're prepared as the

lefted to dismiss a swath of the country as cranks and bigots, you will send them to the other side. This is exactly what the left did with people who were frustrated with cancel culture and DEI. It's exactly why people like Theo Vaughn and Joe Rogan started becoming Trump curious and Vance Curious. It's because they were being dismissed like Rogan was as a crank and a bigot. So they said, nope, nope. Not going to do that. going to the other side, or I'm willing to give the other side a chance. This is the opposite playbook that you would want to run in a situation like this. And it also, I think, shows how much of this is just about J.D. Vance.

Like, to tie Mamdani going on Theo Vaughn into a political attack on J.D. Vance, because he has a friend who is a comedian slash podcast host, who is willing to hear out, who is like a total eccentric, ideological eccentric, and novice, admittedly, he comes out and says, he doesn't even know what socialism means and he gives someone an opportunity to explain it. To tie that into an attack on J.D. Vance, because once again, he has a podcaster, comedian friend who's really popular with the American public, which, if anything, is, by the way, an advantage for Republicans, if these people are Republicans, to tie that into an attack on J.D. Vance is just nonsensical and

counterproductive. It's so frustrating to watch happen. Speaking of all this, let's go to this clip of David Brooks of the New York Times and PBS on his PBS show. This must have been Friday laying into, there's just a blistering critique of legacy media here from David Brooks, who has had a lot of class critiques of sort of elite liberalism, but tied in to the kind of midterm cycle, what we're seeing right now, a critique of legacy media that from David Brooks, New York Times, comments, let me tell you when I was at the Aspen Ideas Festival, the mob of people around David Brooks as he walked through the campus was a sight to behold. Only at the Aspen Ideas Festival, would you see this? Let's roll David Brooks. But if I can't vent one pet peeve about us, starting in

2015, we in the mainstream media learned that if you bash Donald Trump, the clicks go up, the ratings go up. It became the business model. And I'm not saying we're, you know, we played it straight. We do our job. But it's become the business model. And I get, we get to go, or at least to dinners, sometimes off-the-record dinners between journalists, columnists, and politicians. And I would say over the last two years, used to be when you, when you were at a dinner and off-the-record dinner with the Democratic politician, there was distance between the journalists and the Democrats. Because they're politicians. Our job is to keep some distance. In my view, at many places and in many of the dinners I've been to, there's no distance anymore. And that is a problem for the media. And that is

our problem. We've got to reestablish some distance from the Democratic Party. These are people we cover. They're not people we root for. They're not people we're spin doctors for. They're people we cover. And I do think we have done a not ultimately excellent job at maintaining as much distance from the Democrats as we keep from the Republicans. So he just explained that really well. What happened during the Trump period is that because journalists felt like Trump was such an egregious, such an egregious figure, it meant they could dispense with, in the case of Trump, the pretense of neutrality and objectivity, which I, of course, support if you're

incapable of actually being neutral and objective dispensing with the pretense altogether. many times, I think the corporate press could fix its reputation with the American public, basically overnight by dispensing with the pretense where pretense were appropriate. There are a few people, like I can count them on one hand, knowing a lot of journalists who can genuinely, maybe more than one hand, maybe two hands, but who can generally report neutrally and objectively to the extent that's actually even possible. It's not neutral or objective to write a headline or to choose what stories to cover. There's always going to be some measure of selection bias and everybody has their own biases.

what we came to do in the post-war period as mass media surged was have this notion that we are chasing as many advertisers as possible. There's less choice compared to what there is now. It's like a few stations. And so we're trying to get the biggest chunk of the American public, a bigger chunk of a bigger pie, right? And to do that, we have to appeal to quote-to-quote both sides, Republicans, Democrats, really all sides, and independence. And so that's why I think Johnny Carson explains everything about corporate media, the

Johnny Carson versus Stephen Colbert model, as I've said many times before. but what Brooks is doing is taking that a step further and saying it's not just about rooting for Trump's opponents. It's about then allowing the journalistic skepticism of concentrated power to melt away because you are rooting for Trump's opponents in a way that you weren't necessarily rooting. You may have detested George W. Bush. You may have detested the Iraq War, although many journalists did not. But let's say you detested George Bush, let's say you detested Ronald Reagan. Many journalists did. But that didn't make you think it was okay. This was kind of a contagion inside journalistic circles. It didn't make it think it was

okay for you to also dispense, because you thought we were in such an emergency period, to also dispense with your journalistic duty to challenge power, to be skeptical of power rather than just getting in bed with power. That is the secret that's been happening behind the scenes. That goes much further than just having an anti-Trump bias. It's as David Brooks blew the door wide open on behind the scenes at these off-the-record dinners and meetings, the cozying up to power. It's exactly what we're talking about earlier in the show, with Jack Smith being lauded by these elite liberal musicians and artists, showing up in a no-king shirt, a no-king shirt, and then being lauded and seen as a champion, and then some of these same news outlets, barely uttering a peep about the fact that he subpoenaed their communications

or that he collected their communications from the National Archives with their sources. Why? Because they believe it's more important to boost Jack Smith, because they believe the most important goal in politics is to get Donald Trump out of office and out of political life. And that may be a perfectly fine goal. You can say that's your goal. Then you need to leave journalism or you at least need to come out and say you are not objective or neutral whatsoever. And some of them flirted with the idea of doing that and never fully did. many of them never did. Like Scott Pelly is such a good example of this.

I guarantee you Scott Pelly is acting exactly like David Brooks describes behind closed doors. But he becomes a champion of other journalists because they share this viewpoint. And I think what Brooks pointed out there is the real secret fueling a lot of the cozying up to power, which is that journalists made a decision to stop being skeptical of concentrated. power when it was anti-Trump. And that's been going on for 10 plus years now. And Gallup, I cite these numbers all the time, but they just released their annual survey of trust in media. And it was tied for record low last year. This year, it's edged up from its record low. They have their new numbers out. Americans trust in the mass media has improved from last year's record

low, Gallup reports, although it remains weak by historical standards. 33% of U.S. adults say they have a great deal or fair amount of confidence in newspapers, television, and radio to report the news, quote fully accurately and fairly. That's up from 28% last year. So a 5% bump. We saw this happen after 2016. I think it's mostly driven by Democrats who in the anti-Trump forever say they trust medium more and more. 33%. Not a record low anymore. So I can't say it's tied at a record low anymore. It is damn low. That was the low after 2016 was 32. It went down to 28. Obviously, say that was the record low. 33 would have been a record low in the pre-Trump era. And by a wide margin, 2015 was at 40. So that was the low in the pre-Trump era. And Gallup's numbers go all the

way back to the 1970s. So this is still a very low number. And some of the reason it dipped back down again after surging to 45 percent in 2018. So we're seeing a similar kind of midterm era trend is exactly because media and Democrats started overreaching. There's a ridiculous new scandal swirling around Secretary of War Pete Hegeseth because he gave a speech and I'm going to show the pictures here in front of what appears to be a redesigned Department of War logo. So people like this Lucas Sanders person on X, I'm telling you, this was everywhere on X over the weekend, said, look at this back-to-back comparison between Pete Hegeseth and Hitler. He's trying to be like Hitler because Hegseth had his arms open as just about every politician does in a speech. and Hitler at one point had his arms open, just like every politician does in a speech. And then Hexeth had this eagle that now people are saying resembles the Nazi eagle. By the way, when I worked at the Federalist, we used to get this all of the time.

It's just an eagle. It's just a different iteration of an eagle. Sometimes an eagle is just an eagle. And because the eagle has like horizontal wings and horizontal markings on the wings, People are saying that it's intentionally a Nazi eagle. Let's go down to some other examples of what people said. This is Jamie Bonkowitz. You can't accidentally do this much Nazi shit.

And then a friend of the show, Brian Krasenstein, joking, of course, Hitler and Hegsef, notice anything? Amazing. And then, of course, another friend of the show, Martina Navratilova, the similarities are not accidental. On what level of blue and on fever do you have to be at to think people are sitting around in the Pentagon intentionally saying, how can we telegraph that we are secret Nazis in a way that would also show that we're actual Nazis? Could we make the eagle look like a Nazi eagle? Do you think we could do that? and do you think that might allow us to both be secret and overt at the exact same time? That we're just going to be, it's like it's on the down low, it's subtle,

but let's use the least subtle thing in the world. Let's bring in some intentional Nazi imagery here. It looks a lot like the New Deal Eagle that, from the FDR era, by the way. That's actually my editor on Hardin Sorbonari pointed that out. That is what it looks like. And listen, I think people. people are right to have some very significant criticisms of Pete Heggsleth. Unfortunately, I think people are right to have very significant criticisms of the Department of War, obviously, Iran,

but the boats, the extrajudicial boat killings in the Pacific and the Caribbean, you know, we should probably do a whole segment on that at another point. But I think people are right to have significant concerns about Hexeth, Hexeth's use of what was already a very concentrated power at the Pentagon and with the boat killings, what has been an even greater concentration of power. Now, sadly, war powers are very broad, and you can create a war power for just about everything, and you can create a constitutional justification because of the way our war powers have been written and interpreted, sadly, especially in the last 100 years, you can create a justification for a lot of different things, but I think it's been incredibly unfortunate and infuriating how

Hexeth has leveled that power, has leveraged that power at different points during this administration. People are absolutely right to be concerned and angry. And if you're somebody on the left, of course, you're going to be extremely concerned about the Pentagon. To believe he is intentionally telegraphing, when he's also called out Nazis recently, by the way. Not that that matters, because that's this whole, this whole theory is that there's some like covert but subtle. I mean, it's just like listen to yourselves before you start stupid Nazi controversies because at some point you might need to not have the public believing your crying wolf. At some point, you might actually need to say, oh, this person is a real, this person is a real

fascist, the person is a real Nazi. And because you've cried wolf over an eagle with a theory that is incoherent, and doesn't really make sense a million times. They're not going to believe you. They're not going to believe you. Think before we post. I'm sure they have thought before they post. I'm not trying to be condescending and patronizing.

But does it make sense? And is it worth saying that there's some type of intentional effort inside of the Pentagon for Pete Hageza to telegraph that he's a real full-blown follower of Hitler? Is that worth it? Is that worth the political, the expenditure of political capital? Is it worth the fearmongering? And does it make that much sense?

That's all I'll say on that. All right, we'll be right back. I'm going to dig into Zach Bryan's Free Palestine T-shirt at Gillette Stadium. So I feel like we've all gotten surprisingly good at making up ridiculous excuses for sleeping badly. Some people will say, like, I'm just a hot sleeper, or I'm just a light sleeper, or my back always hurts that night. night, but when did we decide that was just normal? You don't have to live this way. Switching to a ghost bed could completely change your perspective on this. You might realize that you've been settling for subpar sleep for years. Your body needs real support where pressure builds up most,

like your hips, your shoulders, your back, and a basic flat block of foam just does not cut it. Ghostbed, it's so cool. It's engineered specifically to deliver targeted pressure, relief, and support right where you need it, paired with this awesome cooling technology that keeps you comfortable all night long. Seriously amazing. You will notice the difference almost immediately and wake up feeling completely cool, fully supported, and genuinely refreshed. Because bad sleep isn't something that you should just accept. We should not accept that. With Ghostbed, you don't have to. Best of all, you can try Ghostbed right at home for 101 nights to experience the difference yourself. You can get an extra 10% off their lowest prices of the season with my code Emily at ghostbed.com

slash Emily. That's ghostbed.com slash Emily promo code Emily. Well, country superstar Zach Brian wore a free Palestine shirt at his concert at Gillette Stadium on Friday. And obviously being Gillette Stadium, that's pretty obviously a call out to the Robert Kraft-McCla-Macklemore controversy, Ed Shearine, let's toss him in the mix to the McLemore, Robert Craft, Ed Shearine controversy that unfolded a number of weeks ago over McLemore's decision to, during his warm-up for Ed Shearin, speak out in support of Palestine and in opposition to Israel. Robert Kraft said not coming to Gillette Stadium. It all blew up. Zach Bryan then shows up wearing a free Palestine shirt. It's actually pretty interesting, though. I think we can put this up on the screen. This is a clear image of the

shirt. It's so fascinating. This is an appeal to heaven. It says free Palestine, then it has the pine tree from the appeal to heaven flag and says appeal to heaven on the bottom. So it wasn't just a free Palestine shirt. In this, you see Zach Bryan making a lot of different people uncomfortable because he's mostly been embraced by the left when they realized it was just a free Palestine shirt or when they believed it was just a free Palestine shirt. But remember, the appeal to heaven flag has been the subject of many hand-wringing essays from corporate media and other folks on the left who believe that it's being kind of appropriated as a Christian nationalist sign. And by that, they would also go much further to not just say Christian nationalists, but like white nationalist, bigoted, conservative conspiracy sign with Appeal to Heaven being.

There were some people who had the appeal to heaven flag on January 6th. Why is that? Because it's actually just a popular flag. It's especially very popular in New England for historical reasons. That is a quote from John Locke's second treatise in government. It's why a lot of conservatives have embraced it. It's especially why a lot of Christian groups have embraced it in recent years because Locke is saying that you have a right to appeal to heaven when your liberty has been deprived. And so here is Zach Bryan, somebody who isn't just like your average Hicklib country singer.

Believe me, those people annoy me as much to the next person, although I really love some of them. But he's not just that type of dude who's flaunting his fashionable politics. This is a guy who did eight years in the Navy. He comes from a military family and left to pursue his country, He said critical things about ice from time to time. He's had a totally checkered personal life, the Brianna Chicken Fry drama. You can go go to that.

I can't possibly begin to break it down here. But he's doing only a very interesting guy, and he has enormously talented. So when I see things like this from Ted Cruz, first, it makes your blood boil. I think we can pop this up on the screen. But second, it's just such political malpractice. So I'm just going to read this Ted Cruz response.

The right flipped out because Brian showed up in the free Palestine shirt at Gillette Stadium. Ted Cruz quote tweets this Fox News report on it and says in related news all of Zach Brian's future concerts will be sponsored by Bud Light dot dot dot and meet optional. Oh my gosh, it is such a disaster to think that is a own of Zach Brian. To think you just like slam dunked on Zach Brian as an Ivy League senator to this dude who spent eight years serving the country in the Navy has a different opinion from you, and you're trying to emasculate him? I'm sorry, Ted Cruz, this is simply not going to work for you politically and

also morally. The guy did not do a big speech like Macklemore. He literally just wore it on his shirt, which is what I thought everyone was suggesting is a better route for some of these artists instead of doing lectures, which McLemore apparently was doing. He was playing videos of Palestinian children at a concert, which a lot of people see is escapism. Not everybody, to be fair, but it's an Ed Shearing concert. It's not even a spring scene concert. It's an Ed Shearing concert. And so, listen, I understand why some people were just frustrated with how political the McElmore show was. Zach Bryan just wore a shirt. It's all he did. He just wore a shirt. And even that is too far. Even that is worth apparently Ted Cruz suggesting that he's a gay vegan.

Political malpractice, I think it's not, it's like the tip of the iceberg with how ridiculous this entire attack from so many people on the right was over the guy wearing a t-shirt. This is where sometimes I think social media biases us to even speaking in the first place. Like you don't need to talk. But of course, when you open up X or social media, like I just opened up X, it has a big thing on the that says, what's happening? It's inducing you to post. Nobody had to say anything about Zach Bryan having an opinion that now most of the country has, by the way, whether you agree with it or not, it's hardly fringe, it's hardly ridiculous. There was just a massive war and a lot of people died. And so naturally,

some people are going to be upset about that. He wore a shirt. He didn't do a lecture. He wore a shirt. And to further complicate matters, he wore a shirt that was a combination of the flag. Conservatives have been defending as part of the fabric of American history, not some sign of white nationalism, blended together with Free Palestine. This guy served the country. And he can't say on a shirt, Free Palestine, without getting called a gay vegan by Ted Cruz. It's just morally stupid, but it's also politically so dumb. I have a friend who went to a Zach Bryan concert recently.

And there's everybody, by the way, he's filling up stadiums. Like that's how this his his appeal outside of country is kind of almost like Americana, which is from my perspective really heartening to see be so popular. It's not surprising because it's like, I think it speaks to the soul of the American spirit. Actually, I'm mixing metaphors there. It speaks right to the American spirit. Let's put it that way. Or the soul of the average American. But all that is to say, it's really wonderful music. He's a he's an incredibly talented musician. And for his brain of music, which sometimes is so simple, uh, guitar. drums. Sometimes it's like very hard rock, but it's so simple. And he's pulling in people in mass

to stadium tours. And he's like 10 years into his career. Maybe not even 10 years into his like mainstream musical career, pulling people into stadiums. Like this guy is beloved. So I have a friend who was at one of his stops recently. He was playing East Side of Sorrow. And the first line of the song is 18 years old, full of hate. They ship me off in a motorcade. They say, boy, you're going to fight a war. You don't even know what you're fighting for. And my friend said, right behind them, this group of Gen Z boys shouted out Israel after that line. Now, this is sort of separate, but agree or disagree with that. It is now a problem that the right has to deal with, that a lot of the country, especially younger people in the Republican Party,

support Palestinian civilians over Israel because of what just unfolded over the last several years. And so Ted Cruz basically saying you're a gay vegan if you wear a shirt that says that is a political disaster. It is a political disaster. This isn't, Zach Bryan's not like Garth Brooks trying to be an elite liberal going to Dem fundraisers. He's beloved, like he's really beloved. I mean, Garth Brooks is beloved too, but he's genuinely beloved. He actually, he actually, served the country and he just put this on a shirt. That's it. That's all he did. He just put it on a shirt. And by the way, it was a shirt with like the Christian foundation of human rights written into it as well. Appeal to heaven. What is the appeal to heaven about? Is an appeal to heaven when your liberty has been

deprived by the government, by the government, which is why it's popular with conservative. So in some sense, you see Zach Bryan here as the physical embodiment of somebody defying a lot of the modern political labels and also a lot of the modern political kind of fault lines. Like as a human being, he is embodying why Gallup is now finding a record number of people identify as independence, 45% of the country identifying as independence. He is physically embodying that. And the response can't be you're a gay, vegan with these like old bud light jokes. Has Ted Cruz noticed that like Shane Gillis and Peyton Manning are doing Bud Light ads now? Like this is this is behind us. That's just a note on his comedy

stylings. But seriously, Republicans are not prepared to deal with the fact that people like Zach Bryan are popular for a reason. And it's because they're also reflective. of this populist sentiment that doesn't fit neatly on the right, doesn't fit neatly on the left. And your response can't be thinking you just absolutely cooked with a joke about the dude being a gay vegan. It's so tone deaf, it's an absolute disaster. And there was a lot of conservatives piling on Zach Bryan.

You didn't even have to post about this. You really didn't even have to post about it, let alone did you have to post about it in this way that shows conservatives are so utterly intolerant of people, people disagreeing with them on this issue that now most of the country disagrees with Ted Cruz on so intolerant of it that it's you can't even wear a shirt at a concert people will say oh with Malcolm Moore why did he give this lecture he didn't have to give this lecture okay so Zach Bryan comes into Gillette and just wears a damn shirt and even that is too far it's a joke and it shows how

utterly ill-equipped leaders in the party like Ted Cruz by the way who is not just some backbencher, but leaders in the party are to handle this next generation of voters and even voters on their own side. Very frustrating to watch all of this happening. Not just because it happened to like Zach Bryan. I'm certainly not like the world's biggest Zach Bryan fan, but because this is an enormously popular beloved guy. He's got his own checkered past. His complicated politics is a complicated person. He's an artist, but he's filling up stadiums.

unlike Macklemore, to be honest. He's filling up stadiums. He's beloved. He's extremely popular. And his music is great. And he's not even trying to do a lecture. He just put it on a shirt. And a shirt that quoted a popular line among Christians

in a pretty interesting and deep way, might I add. Absolute political disaster. Absolute political disaster. that we saw in the response to Zach Brine. All right, that's going to do it for us on today's edition of After Party. Thank you so much for tuning in. We'll be back Wednesday with more. Make sure to subscribe on YouTube.

Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. See you then.