After Party with Emily Jashinsky - “Happy Hour”: Skepticism of Elites, Emily’s Journalism Style, PLUS ICE’s Impact on the Midterms: Emily Answers YOUR Questions

Episode Date: January 23, 2026

On this week’s edition of “Happy Hour,” Emily Jashinsky answers a series of questions about her role in the media landscape. She explains why “After Party” has such a wide range of guests on, including people with opposing views to hers like Cenk Uygur and Krystal Ball. Emily explains how she views her job, why she doesn’t care about the impact her comments have on the right or left, why she’ll talk to anyone who has skepticism of elites and are willing to poke holes in the political establishment, and why she’s conflict adverse. She also answers questions about Europe’s assimilation problem, how we can learn from Europe’s mistakes and why America is so remarkable. Emily also talks about AI data centers and if Big Tech is good or bad. She explains why she gets so annoyed by powerful people who try to co-opt Christianity, why nobody is more obsessed with journalists than other journalists, why postmodern politics will always fail you, and how the ICE story could impact the midterm elections. Emily rounds out the show with some questions about her life in D.C., the most ‘redneck’ thing about her, and her favorite travel spot. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Well, hello, everyone. Welcome to another edition of Happy Hour. It's self a special edition of After Party. Make sure to subscribe, by the way. If you haven't subscribed on the YouTube channel, it helps so much. Please go ahead and hit the subscribe button, subscribe wherever you get your podcast, because of course, that's the only place you get these special afterparty editions that we call Happy Hour that drop every Friday around 5 p.m. And I get to talk to all of you through these episodes. So it's one of my favorite things that I do every single week is go through all the questions that you've sent to Emily at DoubleMake. care media.com. That's where you can reach me. Helps to put happy our question in the subject line. But no problem. If not, you can also send questions over to the after party Emily Instagram. Tell your friends, tell your family, having lots of fun on the show and just appreciate all of you so much for sending the emails and for listening and watching every single week. As a reminder, I actually go through these emails live, just categorize them in my inbox. I think it's way more entertaining that way. that way I can't like self-censor or anything. As you all know, I'm a big fan of reality television, and I just think that if you're going to do something like this, you might as well make it interesting and compelling.

There's no point in trying to be anything but honest when you talk as much publicly as I do. So let's go ahead and get to it. Here we go. This is a nice, here's a nice note from Nick. Nick says, hey, Emily, you have become my favorite political commentator. Whoa, that's high praise. I started following your numerous shows back when you joined Breaking Points. Ironically, that's the only show I don't follow anymore. Crystal and Zagher, been really difficult to listen to over the last year. Nick goes on to say, I really appreciate how you are strong in your beliefs and stay calm, one confronted by opposing points of view. I also like that you will have anyone on your show, regardless of viewpoint and have a respectful, entertaining conversation. Here, Nick goes on to say lots of really nice stuff here. having also grown up Protestant in the Midwest during the 90s, I find it easy to relate to the foundation of your viewpoints. It's a cultural perspective that doesn't get represented by politics of the media. On an unrelated note, if you ever host a show with Robbie Suave, where you BS about culture and politics, you could just take my money. I've really enjoyed the shows you've done together in the past. Thanks for all you do. Yeah, Robbie's always fun. I've known him for years, and both of

us kind of come from the small circle of like millennial DC conservative. So we have a lot of the same friends and know a lot of the same people and have been to a lot of the same stuff. So I do always enjoy hanging out with Robbie, even though we disagree on a ton. Robbie's a good conversationalist, and he will always play devil's advocate. And you will not know whether he's playing devil's advocate or if he is actually serious. So it's fun to chop it up with Robbie for sure. On the Crystal and Sager Point, different strokes for different folks. I feel like my style is, you know, I always say I have more questions than answers.

and one of the things I enjoy about watching Crystal and Sager is that they are so, they are so wise about their own individual convictions. Like they're both so well read and deeply aware of everything that's happening. And you can tell on their pet issues, sometimes their pet issues clash, like immigration, I think has been one of them. And I feel like watching those two, I get such a good contrast. And I can, you know, it's one of those things that helps me make up my own mind is watching, I think, a clear contrast between both of them when they're talking about something that's really, really difficult for people who find themselves on the opposing side of these issues to talk about it. And you can probably tell that I struggle to talk about some of those things because I have nothing but respect for all of my colleagues. And I am so conflict averse. That's probably one of my weaknesses in my job. It's a strength.

some ways too. But I like, you know, talking people, getting along with people. And so I tend to err on the side of learning more, asking more questions, and all of that stuff. And I really appreciate when Crystal and Sager come from these positions of deep research and understanding and clash respectfully with one another. So it's probably just a difference of opinion maybe about what you're looking for in coverage, but I find it to be super, super helpful. Justin emails, oh, I can already tell this is a negative one. The subject line is displeased. Justin says, Jenk is insufferable to listen to. I can't stand him on peers. He's just as bad with you as you laugh along with his condescension. This episode was the last straw for me to stop listening to you and other political commentators

for a while. I'm fully blackpilled and fed up. What was the purpose of this episode besides to shit talk our own side? Well, I'll first respond to that last part. I don't, I could not care less about if what I'm saying has a negative effect on the left or the right, to be honest. I try, though, this is one thing I think some folks on the left misunderstand about what I and others on the right exist to do. I try to fill gaps that aren't being filled in the coverage. And all that is to say, there are people who are full MAGA who are going to give the pro-Trump perspective in conservative media. And there are, you know, an endless supply. There's an endless supply of center-left liberal, millennial, they don't have to be millennials,

but liberal corporate journalists who are going to pick apart Trump at every, every, every step of the way. So the point of having Jenk-on is to hear from somebody who is not fully, and some of you will disagree with this, but who is not fully in any way, like, deluded by, well, this is my perspective on Jank. And I mentioned this at the end of the show, especially after what happened to Charlie. He genuinely wants to have these conversations with people who disagree with him. And he comes at it from a different perspective than what you'd hear on MSNBC. And by the way, I watch a lot of, I guess it's called MS now. I watch a lot of MS now. I watch a lot of MS now, and I watch a lot of that coverage. And I think the populist left, like you don't, you won't find me talking to

a lot of people on the kind of center left. Even someone like Tim Miller, who's been on the show is interesting because he's now almost, I mean, he would hate this. And Tim, if you're listening, you will hate this. But on some issues, he's more of a populist than he is a kind of centrist. And that's, you know, I think speaks to how meaningless a lot of our labels have become. But anyone who's willing to poke holes in the political establishment, if they're left to the right, I'll have them on because I think what that does is fill those gaps in coverage that the corporate media is not filling. So that's why I do what I do because I was interested in media as someone from, quote, unquote, flyover country who saw the underrepresentation of voices from that space. And so I'm not, you know, if I wanted to go help the Republican Party or if I wanted to use journalism to help, you know, aside, quote unquote aside,

I just wouldn't be doing what I'm doing. My job is to be skeptical of concentrated power. And I'm happy to have anybody on who is fully skeptical of concentrated power without fear or favor. And obviously, you know, there are some people who have favor, populists who have favor in one direction or the other. And so you'll find me, you know, just talking to people who are willing to have those conversations across the board. And you're jinks on the left. If you saw our guests coming up, you'd see where we're, I think one of the few shows that is really, really intentional about just mixing it up and bringing a bouquet to the table. So different ideas that don't get a ton of play. You know, the poking fun at Trump stuff, Jank does that sometimes.

Like, you can get that basically anywhere. But his perspective is rooted in an ideological populism. Like, for example, his criticism of identity politics during Wednesday's show, that is not something that you get on MS now or CNN or in the pages of the New York Times or the Atlantic. And that's something that I think is well, well worth elevating and was happy to have that discussion with him. I am genuinely sorry about that, Justin, to see a go for a while. It's hard not to be blackpilled. Like, even working in the space, it's hard not to be blackpilled. I get it.

I do. hope you come back, of course, and hope that helps explain a little bit of how I see my role in the media landscape. And for me, it's really about representation and skepticism of power. And, you know, as I look back on the Biden years, for example, watching the infiltration of, like, right-wing spaces, you know, even places like proud boys, oathkeepers, and all of that, the Gretchen Whitmer kidnapping plot. I'm obviously going to bring a program anger about that, how stupid it is to the conversation about what the Patel FBI is doing.

I'm going to bring that context and that background to the conversation. And why? Well, it's because, you know, while I am a conservative who believes in limited government and is Christian above all else, it's, for me, my job is just, I'm skeptical of elites, like a lot of people around the country. You know, a lot of people where I grew up, skeptical of elites, maybe more on one side than the other, but fundamentally just don't trust people here in D.C. or up in Manhattan or Los Angeles.

So just explain a little bit about why, you know, I'm happy to have people who, you know, it's not going to be like, you're never going to see me having like Jonathan Last from the bulwark on or Bill Crystal or any of those types. just Jonah Goldberg just that's not what I'm here to do and you know it's unless it was

for the sake of you know it's intentionally I don't like to do any ambush type of stuff but if I was intentionally trying to have a tough critical conversation but after party's party and so we try to kind of flesh out

ideas and perspectives that you are getting after the party of the mainstream media is over. We're on at 10 p.m., having fun, doing our best to have fun. So certainly I'll do things here or there where it's a grilling, hopefully. You know, we had Brendan Carr on, who's somebody that I've been acquainted with for a couple of years, chairman obviously of the FCC. And that was a pretty serious interview, pretty serious, straightforward interview

that actually previewed what was to come with the Colbert situation. If you had watched that interview, you were not surprised at all by what happened with Stephen Colbert. So that's what we try to do with the show. And it's a little bit of both, but it's mostly trying to have fun and elevate perspectives that don't get a lot of play in the rest of the media landscape. So that's how I see what I do. I hope that's helpful. Here's a question from James, who says,

people seem so perplexed as to why we are making the moves we are now and why we are seemingly going against our allies. Can't they see this isn't just looking to the next four years or the next election. This is about the next 75 years. I guarantee you this is what the Trump administration is looking at. Here's an uncomfortable truth. We all have to realize. Europe, as we have known it, has fallen. They've allowed their birth rates to drop so low. They imported to people that do not assimilate well into Western culture and are breeding people. I don't think I would put it that way. I see what you mean. Birth rates are higher. This will transpire much more quickly than most people realize, but the math is mathing and can't be reversed. Example, the UK's

birth rate for Judeo-Christian slash non-secular native sits at one. point four children per woman. That means they lose 30% of their population per generation. The Muslim population they brought in as conservatively a 3.2 birth rate per woman goes on to do some of this math here and says basically they were colonized and slowly eliminated and they don't realize that we're pulling back into a hemispheric alliance and Greenland will be our buffer. They lost their sovereignty without firing a shot. The birth rate question is an interesting one. And what I would say to that is I get frustrated sometimes when even like, even like, like friends of mine on the right, will explain it in a racial context.

Because I think, first of all, that immediately turns people off and sometimes misses the point. And James, I'm not accusing you of that because you use the key word here, assimilation, assimilation, assimilation. That's, if you combine that, you know, if you have a population that has shown an aversion to assimilation that also has a high birth rate, then, yeah, you have a problem on your hands, even if the native birth rate. And here in America, what's awesome about our native birth rate is that it's people of all backgrounds. It's not just, you know, you say native. You're not just talking about like the English in London. You're talking about people across the board. And that's what we believe in the United States.

Like it's the content of your character, not the color of your skin that matters. And when you have, you know, the level of assimilation that you have in the United States, I always say this. It is historically unprecedented that you have so many people of different racial, religious backgrounds living in, I know it doesn't feel like it these days very often, but in such a state of relative harmony, you know, based on historical precedent, it's just extremely rare. And it is, I don't want us to lose sight for a minute of how remarkable our country is, our civilization here is here in the United States. It is a feat.

It is a human feat. it is like going to the moon that we are able to live in relative peace and prosperity and that we have been able to for the last, especially like half century or so, I would argue, since the civil rights movement. And that's strained right now because as in Western Europe, to James's point, there are populations that, you know, aren't assimilating very well. And centers of power are dismissing the problems with that for the reasons of political correctness for ideological reasons that involve, you know, intentionally targeting the

native culture or whatever you want to call it. And I think that's very real. I mean, what's happened in Western Europe with no go zones and outside of Paris, it's unfathomable, unfathomable. And yeah, I think it's, there's a stark realization so often it feels like, and this worries me about our national debt as well, though nobody in Western Europe is quite in the same level

that we are in terms of influence and power and obviously as the with the level of currency influence that we have. But we so often can see previews of what could come here. what could happen. And I don't disagree that the assimilation question is one of them. I think

I think that's why during the Biden administration when you suddenly had in communities around the country, remember Springfield, Ohio with that massive new Haitian population. I want to say if I'm remembering correctly, it was something like a quarter of, like the population increased by a quarter with just the new arrivals from, not directly from Haiti, but of Haitians from around Central and South America over the course of the Biden administration. I mean, obviously, that is going to strain resources. And obviously, it's going to make people seriously question the wisdom of mass immigration in a really rapid period of time. So some interesting points here in this email. James, here is an email from Christine, who says, Hi, hi, Emily, love the show. You became one of my favorite guests on the MK show.

and now I am a loyal listener of After Party. Thank you so much, Christine. Goes on to say I was listening to your episode with Shane, Shane Cashman, about AI data centers and had some thoughts and wanted to know yours. I was listening to the All-In podcast the other day because I saw they were discussing free water and utilities for Americans as a benefit of the data centers funded by the AI companies that would be self-paying for the centers.

I understand the potential for propaganda from this source on this particular topic, but I have to say it does seem inevitable that these centers will be built. As a populace, this idea seemed like the best way. to leverage the inevitable benefit to us. We have a landfill on the edge of my hometown in New York, and they subsidize the taxes for the area, a similar situation. Something that you wish wasn't there,

but is hopefully responsibly regulated for environmental purposes and gives you a huge savings on your monthly expenses. Love to know your thoughts. Sorry, it's a bit long. Christine, this was not long at all compared to some of the other emails I get. So no need to apologize at all anyway. But certainly for this email. And it's full of really good points.

And I think this is well worth. conversation in light of the discussion that I had was shame, which was much more domery. But even Shane and I both discussed, pirate wires reporting on the truth about some of these data centers. Again, understanding, like you said, with All In, the guys that pirate wires are inclined to be really positive about this stuff. So I get all of that, too. But they've crunched the numbers pretty persuasively when it comes to water use, which is really

one of the big questions here. And Shane and I both mentioned that actually may be kind of a red herring. The water use question might be one that is, we'll see how things go from here. But if those pirate wires numbers hold, it might be one of those things where it's blown out of proportion. And then it ends up discrediting some of the more important arguments about the data centers. And for my mind, it's just the land to job ratio. You know, these data centers are going to take up. I scrolled through a list that meta posted recently just to do some due diligence.

And, you know, they were posting some of these developments that are happening probably accelerated by Project Stargate, which is, as Shane mentioned, what Trump announced on the second day of his presidency, his second presidency last year. And the estimates of jobs that would ultimately be coming to these communities, I mean, again, we're talking like between 70 and 100 permanent jobs, a lot of jobs, construction jobs in the process, because they're taking up huge, huge, huge. swaths of land because you need all of that land. But ultimately, you end up with a lot of land being taken up for not so many jobs. And the question of whether taxpayers, does it come out positive for taxpayers? I'm so jaded by the Foxcon situation in Wisconsin, which turned out to be like a crony grift to the company that Republicans were willing to give all these tax breaks to. And some of them were conditional. So haven't been, you know, paid out. We're comfortable for I think that might even be becoming a data center. Some of our southeastern Wisconsin listeners can

fill me in on that. I think it might be becoming a meta data center literally. But, you know, there's all kinds of public infrastructure projects that come with these data centers. So, you know, accelerated state work goes into that. State infrastructure work goes into that. And so when you crunch the numbers at the end of the day, I'm genuinely concerned about whether these data centers are a benefit. And as I said with Shane, I don't have the numbers. I think it's probably one of those things where you're going to want to judge it on a case-by-case basis. But as I said, with Shane, I'm actually not convinced that we need to be winning the AI arms race. Like, that's the predicate for these data centers in the first place. Like, I don't buy into the argument that we

need to be subsidizing meta and Google and Open AI expanding these data centers around the country, period, because I don't know that what they plan to do with the data centers is a good in and of itself. I do not think they are regulated to the degree that they should be regulated. I fully understand the argument about China beating us in AI, that this is an inevitability, therefore we must embrace it. I'm not going to pretend that I have the exact right answer to that question right now. I will tell you, though, I do not trust these companies as far as I could throw them, which is a useless metaphor in this case because they're companies. But I don't trust them. And I don't see why anybody would trust them after what just happened with Facebook turned

meta and Google in the last 20 plus years. So I'm very, very skeptical that we are not walking ourselves off a cliff into digital oblivion here on the data centers. That's a really good idea, Christine, for a big topic that we could have on a guest and go super, super deep and maybe even philosophical on the question of artificial intelligence. I'm fascinated by the topic. You can probably, if anyone watches breaking points, you can tell we're definitely fascinated by it. So it's a really good one to look into. And I think, you know, your points are totally correct about like a landfill comparison, which also takes up, of course, and it's in the name, a lot of land. So I'm very open to that.

argument, Christine. I think it's probably wise to adjudicate these things on a case-by-case basis. My bigger picture problem is just with the goals that these data centers are built to fulfill in the first place. And I'm just bringing a lot of skeptical baggage with me into the conversation about whether these companies are going to ultimately be a net benefit or a net drag on American society, even given what's happening in China. So that might not be. be super helpful, but just something to think about. Jesse emails, as a converting Catholic, I have come to find it deeply irritating when liberals in the mass media lecture Christian conservatives about what Jesus would and would not approve of. Amen, Jesse. It goes on to say they tweak the

message of the gospels to fit the social justice movement of the day. The language they use always as a cringy West Wing, Jed Bartlett feel to it. What has your experience been like as a lifelong Christian and longtime media observer? I'm used to the media bashing Christians, but watching them co-op, the message of Jesus is actually way more annoying. Jesse, thank you for this email. That is so well said. It's been happening the entire last week. Don Lemon saying he's a Christian and would Jesus let the protesters in the church to scream and shout in the faces of little children completely maddening? And I explained this a little bit earlier in the show. I talked about it a lot, but one of the things that made me want to come here to D.C. was just frustrating.

with that lack of representation in media. And what was really frustrating to me is that you had these rich people in their fancy jobs in the TV studios and in Congress, lobbying firms, wherever else, writers' rooms, looking down their nose at decent people, especially decent Christians, who, when I was growing up, you millennials remember that was the height of the, you know, Prop 8, pre-Obergefell gay marriage movement. And the way the center and the left talked about Christians during that time period was animating.

I mean, that's the only word that I can use for it. Like, for me, that's what made me motivated to do what I do in no small part. You know, it was also the way to talk about gun owners and hunters and all kinds of like cultural truck drivers and all kinds of cultural differences they had with other people. But the way, you know, in the heyday of that conversation, Christians were constantly lectured about their own religion, about religion in general, it was maddening because I think to Jesse's point, the kernel or the spark of my anger. is really the combination of arrogance to ignorance,

like the ratio of arrogance to ignorance. They think they're so smart and so right, and they are so often just dead wrong. And that's not to say Christians have done a perfect job of representing their own faith. Of course, that's not true. And a lot of people who are most critical of Christians grew up during the kind of televangelist heyday, Jim,

and Tammy Fay Baker and all of them. that and you know you can sort of understand where it comes from for some people but that's no excuse to get things wrong and to get things wrong so confidently and from such a position of power so it's maddening it is infuriating um and part of that is also like don lemon saying that or other saying it's hypocrit Christians are being hypocritical in that circumstance because they don't accept who's really the primary victim in this situation.

Come on. Come on. I mean, I talked about this on the show this week, but don't you think some people are concerned that maybe the victims that we should care about are our fellow citizens who have been victimized

by criminal non-citizens who have been victimized in big and small ways. You know, people whose identities have been stolen and have had their lives turned upside down by those stolen identities. And New York Times profiled a guy who's been dealing with this for years. What was that? Like just last month? We covered it on the show. And they, of course, you know, said it was that they were trying to imply that both the man who stole his identity and the man with the stolen identity were equally sympathetic. It was like the implication of the headline, which is obnoxious in and of itself.

but it's at least a step up from the broader narrative, which is that there's only one set of victims here. And it's the poor illegal immigrants who broke the law knowingly or made bad asylum cases or whatever it is, many of whom are victims themselves because they paid human traffickers in the cartels and were sexually assaulted or beaten and robbed on their way up here. It was a utterly broken system. It's still a broken system. but to lecture people who just, because of their faith, have a different perspective on the political question at hand. When you have not stepped foot in a church and how long so many of these people in the media,

when you don't spend time with people who go to church every week or active in their church who are so philanthropic and doing so much in their communities is absolutely maddening. So great, great point. Jesse, thanks for the email. This is from Tom, who says, Love Your Podcasts. I know a lot of things that happen here in the U.S. this weekend, but maybe you could comment on the viral AR Avatar Amelia and the use of the pathways gained by the British government

to shape the behavior of their citizens. I will look this up, Tom. I haven't followed this closely enough, but I will say that it reminds me a bit of what we were talking about earlier in the show about learning from the... mistakes of Western Europe and from, you know, the Brits as well, just about how quickly these things can happen could come to the United States and sort of viewing what's happened there as a preview. To me, I think about immigration a lot. We were talking about what was it

last week, the Wegman grocery store example in New York. And I'm sure it happens not just in New York, but where they're using surveillance, like facial recognition, surveillance in a wagon's grocery store in New York, well, the business would say their explanation, or they do say their explanation for that is crime. They're trying to stop crime. And that raises the question of the eternal question of safety versus freedom, security versus freedom. And lacks policies on. immigration and crime, push people, not everyone, but push many people to want to choose, this is what happened with Buckelé, to want to choose security over freedom. And that worries me a lot in the

United States because obviously our speech policies still to this day are better than Canada and Western Europe. Our gun policies are better than Canada and Western Europe. You know, we, I don't want us to turn into those countries. I think there's something unique and beautiful about the freedoms that we have here in the United States and the relative peace and prosperity that we enjoy here in the United States. It doesn't mean that there aren't tradeoffs. Of course, there are tradeoffs. But I think the Biden immigration policies pushed a whole lot of people further into the security camp than the freedom one. And as these things happened, you're like the frog in the boiling pot, right?

Like Justice Brandeis was writing about the privacy concerns created by cameras, right, in the early 20th century, that cameras themselves would pose. Does someone else have a right to take a picture of you? These are questions that we've just, of course, if you're in public and as a journalist, it's a firm, hell yeah. But these are questions that we've just been conditioned to not even think twice about. and something that might strike us as crazy now, which is being surveilled by facial recognition software in a freaking grocery store, may strike our children, our children's children,

as almost quaint. And that's the situation in the United States. I think we're fighting to avoid. Here's a question from Howard, who says, just listen to the latest happy hour, great show, still laughing about your thoughts on Palm Beach. Let's see, it goes on here to say, Oh, he's talking about how Jay Leno used to do the man on the street interviews.

Those were called jaywalking. Those were absolutely hilarious. Leno gets so much hate. And he's one of those people who was beloved by Middle America, just to continue the theme of today's show, who Hollywood snobs detested and would see as like not just middlebrow, but less than because he was middlebrow. But those jaywalking segments were so, so funny.

Howard says he looks at Washington the way I look at Palm Beach. What was the word creepy? Yeah, I think that's fair. I think that's fair. There's not quite as much wealth in Washington, believe it or not, as there is, like, in those really nice areas of Palm Beach, because Washington has, maybe it's like, you can bear it's like West Palm Beach and Palm Beach. But it's the concentration, I guess like Georgetown and Palm Beach are probably similar. Howard says, I guess you must get a kick out of dealing with all the lunatics. you know not really I don't know it's it's not it's not great Howard goes on to say I'm so glad I discovered you were on the

Megyn Kelly show talking about Olivia Nuzzi boy there's a story that fell off the map when are we going to get away from all these invasion and ice riot stories to get back to the important stuff like who's sleeping with whom should be an interesting year thank you for the email Howard and thank you so much for the kind words

that story did really fall off the map Did you see how many books that Olivia Nese sold? Like, none. It's incredible. People didn't even have the morbid curiosity to buy that book. And it speaks to how I didn't even want to cover that story originally for the reason that I explained at the beginning of the show, which is that everyone was talking about it. And I don't see my job necessarily being, you know, weighing in on every story in the same way that others are weighing in on it. So I tried to, I was like, if we're going to cover the story, I got to do something different.

And that's where the satirical reading of American Canto came in because I don't ever want to, the entire media establishment was obsessed with that story. And I knew right off the back that that literally nobody else cared about it. Some people might have cared about the RFK angle to it, the RFK junior angle to it. And it had, I think, some real political significance because of that, because, you know, Is he potentially compromised? There was that leaked audio or that seemingly illegally obtained audio of Donald Trump. That was in question.

But overall, it was a media fascination story, and nobody is more obsessed with journalists than journalists. So I knew, like I did not, as fascinated as I am by stories about other journalists, I try never to cover them unless it's from a fresh angle, which is how is nobody else? We're going to talk about the story. We have to talk about it in a way that nobody else is talking about it. And sometimes the only thing you can do is mock. So thanks for the note, Howard. Yeah, DC, man, I've been here. I'm a much sure when I was 18. And it's, you know, the people, just say the people don't get better. People don't get better. There's talking about moving here. Even, you know, you meet some people on the right who move here and have the best intentions and come from different parts of the country and are fully captured in. a matter of six months because there's just so many opportunities for advancement if you go along to get along or even turn on your prior beliefs and prior allies. So yeah, I mean, it's great. Like people in new media, I consider myself in this, are really lucky to be doing what we're doing right now because it's a time when the market is sort of ripe for

independent commentary outside of the big corporate lanes. I don't know if that'll always be the case. I think technologically we're heading in a direction where that's probably going to be the case and I'm grateful for it for now. But yeah, it's always depressing to see the capture happening. Let's get to a few more here. Nick says, hello again. I forgot to mention last time that I think it's cool that you consider a goal of yours to advocate for the conservative good old boys and girls that in fact, not evil white, supremacist Nazis.

Well, I'm sure you would never claim to be one. What is the most redneck thing about you? Or what is the most redneck thing you've ever done? That's funny because it kind of fits with the theme of today's show as well, which is about, you know, kind of representation in media. Most redneck thing about me. Yeah, I don't have a ton of redneck things about me. I have some rednecks in my family who have way more redneck credibility than I do.

But let's see. Here we go. I'll say my first car was a rusted at that time probably, let's see. Yeah, I would have been a 12-year-old, 11-12-year-old Ford F-150. So that's probably the most redneck thing about me. I don't have a lot of things I can claim. Oh, we also, you know, my dad spent a lot of my childhood doing a lot of work in our house. And if my mom's listening to this, she's going to hit the roof. But all my friends growing up, we remember this. We just had a giant dumpster in our front yard. You know, we were kind of in the woods, blocked by trees. But, you know, and other people would come over.

You know, the soccer car pool is just a giant. green dumpster in the yard for, I want to say it was at least a couple years. I may be misremembering that, but personally, I loved it because I could throw softballs and baseballs at the dumpster and then practice grounding with the dumpster or pitching with the dumpster. So that was a real, I really did appreciate that, to be honest. So I guess that's, I guess that's my answer, good question. Nick. Brandon says, I saw your segment with Megan Kelly. I'm surprised you didn't mention the word

awful. The people in the video were all awfuls. This is referring to some of the protesters in Minneapolis. Annoying white fat leftists or angry fat white ladies, you get the idea. I'm not sure if that has hit the DC media journalist circuit yet, but a woman with a bull nose ring and blue hair is called an awful. May all your dreams

come true. Thanks for the note, Brandon. Yes, that's a common a lot of conservative journalists use the phrase awful, or kind of heterodox folks use the phrase awful. I don't love it personally. I just wrote a longer essay for Unheard about why so many millennial

women are quote dark woke. And my answer is so many millennial women are miserable and looking for purpose. And people find it in postmodern politics. And postmodern politics will never fulfill you. So if you are searching for meaning and identity, you're just never truly,

going to be fulfilled in a worldview that fundamentally just doesn't accept truth as a concept. And that's just not going to make you happy. It's not make you happy as a human being because it doesn't understand humanity. Like it feels to me like it's always all downstream of Rousseau. A man is born free and yet everywhere he is in chains, right? That the human condition is, you know, always downstream of that. And I, you know, don't think that's particularly fulfilling. So I don't like to be derisive. I think sometimes these videos are absolutely incredible and hilarious, and I don't feel bad laughing at them. But I try publicly not to be derisive or even privately.

I try not to be derisive, too derisive of some of these women in particular because I just see abject misery. And I want to have answers to people who are feeling unfulfilled. and, you know, I think I've seen people who've gone from a position like that to being deep into Maha, for example. And I think that's because they were given a positive representation of what could be. So that, to me, is important. And I try, honestly, just like to, like it's a pragmatic thing. You know, you don't want too many miserable people to go on being miserable in your country because that makes your country more miserable. but it's also just a kind of human thing from my perspective now brandon i don't think there's anything wrong

with laughing at some of these videos uh the woman who had like what adult diapers in the front seat of her car while she was like chirping at a nice officer yeah i'm gonna laugh at that sorry gonna laugh at that marlow says a couple more here um oh wow a lot going on here um do you think all the craziness of these past two plus weeks will bring out more Democrat or Republican votes at the midterms, or will the flywheel of the news cycle have all this too far in history for the midterms? Great question, Marlowe. I've been thinking a lot about this. I think the ICE stuff is going to continue to November, and I think that is going to be overwhelmingly animating for the left. It's going to be animating for the populist left in primaries, so you're going to see more squad-like

candidates, this is my prediction, win their primaries. But that could in turn, at least lead to a higher turnout, even from Republicans in the midterms. Now, I'll have to go double-check this and look it up. I think that the midterms were, I think the 2018 midterms, there was also higher Republican turnout. It was like the rising tide lifted all boats. So the rising tide of the craziness post-women's March and during that immigration news cycle, it turned out, and it was higher turnout from the left, but still slightly increased turnout on the right as well, if I'm remembering correctly. Even if that's not what happened in 2018, I kind of think that's probably what will happen this time around is that the crazies will just be more motivated or the crazies,

not just the crazies, I shouldn't say that. I think the crazies will be more motivated to do all kinds of activism from now until November. And that's going to push some of these issues to the forefront of the conversation in a way where, you know, Democrats have benefited in the midterm cycles from affluent suburban voters who Republicans were typically relying on. And that's really how they won in 2018, healthcare and immigration. And I am not at all optimistic that immigration is, or I'm sorry, that the Republican Party is going to have a good answer on health care. A lot of people are seeing premium increases. When you're the party in power, Republicans are, you know, it just, it has a negative effect on turnout because people are always dissatisfied with the party in power.

And right now, Republicans have House, Senate, presidency. So anything that people are unhappy about in politics, it ends up getting blamed on the party in power. So Republicans are going to have to do their best to, again, we're just talking about politics of it, motivate people who are like the Glenn Yonkin voter in 2020, right? They're going to need to try to get that 2020 coalition back together again and motivate those suburban, more affluent voters and the working class voters who usually only turn out when Trump is on the ticket to get to the polls. And that's tough when you're the party in power. And some of those voters are, again, like they'll come out for Trump, but they're not going to

come out for your standard issue Republican. So that's my prediction. Another great question. One more here. this one is from Ryan who says where is your favorite place to travel I'm not that I'm not that well traveled like I have a lot of friends who just even for work and for journalism have been everywhere

and I wish I traveled more like the last 10 years I wish I traveled more I love like this is a really uncultured answer but I love the Caribbean I just like I love love love a beautiful beach where I can just, you know, open a Corona at 11 a.m. and open a book and chill until 5 p.m., fall asleep in the chair, take a shower, go to dinner, and repeat that for like four to five days. So I have a Caribbean trip, like my first real vacation in a while coming up in a few weeks. It won't affect after party or happy hour, probably. But that's coming up in a few weeks with some of my friends from college. So I'm excited for that one. otherwise I've been to Rome a couple of times and I could go there every single time I go overseas and be totally happy. I wouldn't need to see any other city. Just could keep going to Rome. Just the most incredible place that I've ever been. So great question, Ryan. Thank you everyone for your great questions. It'll do it for today's edition of Happy Hour. I appreciate everyone

sticking in there with me, especially as I'm reading these questions live. I'm sure a lot of the questions are that people would be like, stop answering this. Why are you answering all of these people who are saying they're stopping watching because of jank or whatever else? But I really don't mind. And I think it's better to just hash these things out with the listeners. So I appreciate it. And feel free to keep on sending those emails to Emily at devilmakermedia.com.

Let me know what you're thinking. You can reach us on the after party, Emily, Instagram. Always do my best to be in conversation with all of you because I'm so, so grateful, pose my mind that anyone listens to anything. So thank you. Make sure to subscribe on YouTube. It helps us a ton. Subscribe wherever you get your podcast. Leave us a review. Appreciate everyone for being part of the after-party community. And we'll see you back here on Monday for another edition of After Party Live at 10 p.m. or you can catch it afterwards as well. Have a great weekend, everyone.