Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - 2/8/23: State Of The Union 2023

Episode Date: February 8, 2023

Krystal and Saagar are joined by a slate of guests to discuss the pre and post reactions to Biden's State of the Union 2023.To become a Breaking Points Premium Member and watch/listen to the show uncut and 1 hour early visit: https://breakingpoints.supercast.com/To listen to Breaking Points as a podcast, check them out on Apple and SpotifyApple: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/breaking-points-with-krystal-and-saagar/id1570045623 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4Kbsy61zJSzPxNZZ3PKbXl Merch: https://breaking-points.myshopify.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. I'm Sagar and Jetty. Welcome to Breaking Points. Every week, we have four shows for all of you, bringing you the most important stories in the country, especially those that the mainstream media won't touch. So if you want to support what we are up to here, we have a special discount for all of you this month at BreakingPoints.com. With that, let's get to the show. Hello, hello, everybody. Good evening. Welcome to our State of the Union live stream with the dream team that we have assembled here. What do we have today, Crystal? Indeed, we do have a great program for you this evening. All right. So as you guys know, the president is preparing

to give his annual State of the Union address to Congress. A few things that are different this year. I mean, the big thing is that we have Kevin McCarthy now in as Speaker of the House. So visually, he'll be there instead of Nancy Pelosi. Signal of the fact that it is a different time in Washington. And frankly, all of the things that he's going to lay out that he would theoretically want to get done are obviously not going to get done because of that reality. But we're going to take a look at some things we have pulled for you about the actual state of the economy in particular, because he's going to lean a lot into that. And also the political landscape, because in a lot of ways, this is kind of his launch for his reelection. He's not going to officially launch till March or April.

But this is the beginning of Joe Biden making the case for what he's done, what he wants to do going forward. And also, you know, what he thinks needs to be pushed back on for the Republicans. So we are joined by the wonderful Marshall and the wonderful Kyle. Gentlemen, welcome. Hey, me and Marshall did not plan our outfits to look as similar as they did. You guys look good. I agree. I think we look good.

I think watchers are breaking what's been noticed, that Kyle has been really stepping up since that first episode. You're morphing into Sagar and I. I'm looking forward to the tie next time. Yeah, I was going to say, what happened to the ties, gentlemen? What was the first episode? Yeah, what was I wearing?

Pajamas? When we unveiled the first breaking points live recording back in, geez, 2021. So, look, I think there's something we could all do and learn from each other. Oh, wow. I was probably wearing pajamas, pants, or something. I mean, I don't want to- He's like, why is Pikachu on learn from each other. Oh, wow. I was probably wearing, like, pajamas pants or something. I mean, I don't want to.

He's like, why is Pikachu on your pants? I don't want to give away the game here, but he is wearing sweatpants and slippers right now, so. Hey, listen. Don't blow my spot up. There's been one time the sweatpants actually matched the jacket, and here you are raining on everybody's parade. Be careful, Kyle, because on our set, you can actually see the upper lengths of your tie. True, but this looks good. Just trying to be transparent.

That's all right. He's being true to form. I didn't want people to think I changed you. You're still the same guy. I actually have no pants on right now. But he's got no seltzer next to him, so that's how you know that things are a little bit different. All right. Okay.

State of the Union, as Crystal mentioned. This is something where the president is basically running for re-election. I actually did not know this, and I'm actually curious what you guys think of this. I don't really know why, but a lot of people watch the State of the Union. So I was looking at 2022 data for some of the most watched programming in the United States, top 100. Vast majority of it was the NFL, unsurprisingly, or it was almost all sporting events. The only political one, and it was actually within the top 50, State of the Union. Tens of millions of people watch and actually tune into

this, probably more so than when President Biden eventually will announce his re-election. So this is his case, and he's running on the economy. So one of the things that we pulled, and this is a very important metric as to how exactly he's talking right now. Let's go and put our first element up here on the screen, guys. A1 is the state of the U.S. economy right now. I don't think there's ever been a weirder economy to actually discuss, which is the jobs report came in red hot. 517,000 jobs added in January. They completely crushed the estimates. We have a 53 year low of unemployment. We have modest real wage growth. We have changed from a zero interest rate environment. Social security checks went up. However, they went up because of inflation. And that's the downside to this entire discussion, which is that people are upset about the state of

the economy. In some ways, they've never felt worse, and we'll get to that. And in general, there's a sense of malaise while all of the top line metrics are really good. So I really, we've struggled with this a lot here on the show, which is how do you describe that? You know, eggs are $7, but you know, people have got jobs. So what is that? What type of economy is that? And how do you, how does the president relay that to the American people? Marshall, why don't you pick that one up? Because I'd be interested to hear your thoughts. Yeah, I think the argument that they're going to want to really make here is that things were at their worst probably last summer. And since then, we've seen and this is me echoing what a different version of Biden

would be saying on 15 different levels. But things have just gotten better and they're going to keep getting better. And we should have faith in the president that that message is going to work. That's basically, I think, what they're going to want to get from folks. Because if you just really see with those midterm results, Republicans just came in thinking that the economic message was going to be particularly successful, that that malaise Sargeri you referenced was going to translate into the ballot box. And it really didn't. So I think they're just betting that the next two years are going to follow the pattern that September to November did. Yeah. But I feel

like they might be learning the wrong lesson for that, because I don't think that the midterms were really a referendum, like to the extent that they outperformed expectations, which no doubt about it, they definitely did. And to the extent that Republicans underperformed expectations, I don't know that they really reflected that people felt great about how the economy was going, because we just haven't seen that data reflected anywhere. I mean, let's go and put the next element up on the screen. You have record numbers of Americans saying that they are worse off under Joe Biden economically. That's not a good sign. You've got plenty of people who are saying we're on the wrong track. You have people feeling like we're headed into a recession or we're already in a recession.

I just saw numbers today about how everybody's spending down like whatever savings they were able to accumulate during the pandemic from pandemic relief programs. They're spending all of that down. You have credit card debt going up and going up. So you might have a low unemployment number, but people are not feeling like this is a great economy. And I've always thought there's a real danger in trying to oversell something to try to pretend like, hey, mission accomplished. We got this. It's all good. When that is not what people are feeling or experiencing in their regular lives. I mean, I actually think there's we talked about this before, but it's the bluff strategy.

And I actually think there is a little bit of wisdom in that. I think that this is why you see after every state of the union, you get a little bit of a, you know, a pump in the, in the approval rating, five points, if you're lucky, maybe 10 points. Now it's temporary, it doesn't last forever, but you get a little bit of a, cause people are looking for, you know, the rah-rah cheerlead, let's go get this, we're America type stuff. So I think there is wisdom in that, but I agree with your point that I don't think the economy is great. Like, yeah, they're probably going to do a victory lap over these jobs numbers. But we looked at the data, Crystal, and correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't we see there was mostly like medical field and service sector jobs? Yeah. So that's what people,

so basically, I mean, look, gig economy type stuff, right? Like people have jobs, but it's not like it used to be back in the day where you go to, you have a manufacturing job, you make a decent money, you have a pension, you have a house and a car and maybe even a little vacation home. It's not like that anymore. Yeah. Well, and OK, so to break down the jobs numbers a little bit, you're absolutely right that most of the growth has been hospitality, leisure. So things that in the service economy that really went away during the pandemic, that is now coming back. And so there's a lot of job growth there. There's a lot of job growth in terms of health care. I mean, that's both in terms of like demographic trends, but also you had a lot of turnover during

the pandemic in the health care sector as well. So that's where a lot of the growth is. And you also see in terms of wages, you see the fastest growth of wages, which is still not enough, especially when you consider inflation, is also at the lower end of wages, which is still not enough, especially when you consider inflation, is also at the lower end of the spectrum. But when you consider that we've gone decades without the lower end of the spectrum getting any raise whatsoever, when you consider the wage stagnation that we've had basically my entire life, it's going to take a lot more than a tiny percentage point increase, slightly more than inflation for people in that segment of the economy to feel like, hey, I'm good. Everything

is OK now. So, yeah, I think it is a strange economy. I think there are things that the Biden administration can sell about what they've done so far, you know, with working across the aisle in certain instances with the infrastructure bill, getting the Inflation Reduction Act passed. I just saw some numbers about how that has created something like 100,000 jobs in terms of green energy. There are things there to sell. But I think you've got to level with people and meet them where they are. And the bottom line is Americans do not feel like it is mission accomplished. They feel very unstable. They feel like they are worse off than they were previously. And if you are needing that emotional energy and also laying out a path of, OK, here's what we have to do from there, there's no doubt that your political adversaries are going to take advantage of that opening. Yeah, for me, I think that Biden's speech has

got to be all about balance. Kyle, as you said, I mean, President Obama, essentially, we have the same economy now that we did under Obama. Obama crawled out of 2008, and then you did see some job growth, but the job growth was all in non-unionized sector, service economy, wages were significantly down. That's one of the things that Mitt Romney actually ran against him. So if I'm Biden, one of the things that you want to do is, you know, you want to bluff your way a little bit. I actually think leaning into the economy would be the biggest mistake. So he's got three of the most popular things right now that are on his side. Number one is stop the steal. And actually, we have an excerpt right now from the president of what he's going to open, or at least be at the top of the speech. Quote, two years ago, our democracy faced its

greatest threat since the Civil War. Today, though bruised, our democracy remains unbowed and unbroken. Now, look, I'm not saying I agree with that. Personally, I find it cringe. That said, it would be completely undeniable to say that that message didn't resoundingly work during the midterm. So that's number one. Economically, it's not even about selling what he's done or selling what he plans to do because we all know it's not going to happen. It's like these people have people in their ranks who want to cut social security. And even though

inflation is up, and that's why the social security checks went up, he'd be like, you're got a raise under President Biden. Again, I'm just making clear, like, politically, what he should be saying. And then third is abortion, obviously. If you have those three things, and you put yourself as a bulwark against GOP extremism, specifically on Stop the Steal and on abortion, while contrasting yourself relentlessly with Speaker McCarthy, with the Freedom Caucus on the debt ceiling, I actually think that, and at the end of the day, that's the most honest, right, Marshall? That's all he actually can do. You can say all you want about a billionaire minimums tax. That's

not going to happen, okay? It didn't happen during a democratic, unified government. It's certainly not going to happen whenever we're talking about cutting Social Security. So an honest and a balanced version of the speech, I actually think that might land. What do you think? Yeah, and I think the two things to highlight that you really just hinted at are Biden's central political skill, which only really came into account at this period of his life, so it explains why he wasn't able to become president at the earlier 40-year period in his political career, is against conventional wisdom, he's read the political mood of the country. So for example,

2019, 2020, his whole candidacy, once again, this isn't a comment on how he actually governed, but his candidacy is actually let's make things normal. It's not actually about being the youngest candidate. It's not about being the hippest candidate. It's not about having the best policy, quote unquote. It's just I get the sense that Americans are sick and tired of everything being crazy. So I'm just going to run as the old, reliable, conventional guy. That was the right call in 2020. In 2022, I think all of us are on record to echo your point, Sagar, in arguing that, hey, the democracy is under threat thing is cringe. It wasn't just sort of us arguing that. Basically, the broad mainstream of both parties thought that was going to be an effective message.

That was an incredibly effective message, especially in the swing states that are going to make or break him in 2024. So the real thing I'm looking for tonight is, is Biden going to be able to read and set up what the actual political vibe, quote unquote, is moving forward? Then the other thing to think about is obviously the Republican responses, party responses in general, aren't particularly important. But I think this one is going to be important in the sense that Sarah Huckabee Sanders, newly elected governor of Arkansas and obviously former press secretary for President Trump, she is basically representing like the mainstream of the Republican Party. And if we're looking back at American politics since 2008, I think one of the most important

stories has been the Republican Party's consistent inability, with the exception of Trump in 2016, of reading the political vibe. So you obviously have the Tea Party wins, but then that leads to Tea Party win arrogance going into 2012. It leads to Mitt Romney winning the nomination. That leads to Trump misreading the electorate in 2020. And of course, 2022, where Republicans thought that the inflation numbers and gas prices would be enough to win a resoundingly straightforward victory with the claims of a red wave. So the real test is going to be, A, can Biden do actually, could Biden repeat what he's been able to do since basically 2018? And then will Republicans actually read the country correctly? That's a great point. So I want to get

everybody here's opinion. So we have some excerpts actually of Sarah Sanders. This is what I hate about the response. If you have an excerpt of your response, it's not a response. You know, it's just a preplanned attack speech. It's, if you have a scripted speech that you could release before the speech, then it's not an actual response. But all right, let's put that to the side. I'll read it for everybody. Crystal, Kyle, I want your guys' reaction. In the radical left's America, Washington taxes you and lights your hard-earned money on fire. You get crushed with high gas prices, empty grocery shelves. Our children are taught to hate one another on account of their race, but not to love one another or our great country. While you reap the consequences of their failures, the Biden administration seems more interested in woke fantasies than the hard

reality that Americans face every day. Most Americans simply want to live their lives in freedom and peace, but we are under attack in a left-wing culture war that we didn't start and we never wanted to fight. So that's what we have so far. What do you guys think? Oh boy. All right, here we go again. Look, the argument is never going to land if you're trying to say that Joe Biden is woke. This is the guy who famously had gaffes, you know, before he became president, like, bro, you can't go into a 7-Eleven without seeing an Indian behind the counter. I mean, this guy was just, you know, shooting from the- I will defend him on that. Okay. Look, there is some truth the counter. I mean, this guy was just, you know, shooting from the left. I will defend him on that. Okay.

Look, there is some truth to it. All right. Let's just put it to rest. You're just not going to get him on the woke stuff. It's just not going to happen. Now, on the taxes thing, I just find that point kind of funny because Republicans in the House just passed what's called the fair tax, which is effectively a 30% tax, a 30% sales tax. And that is a massively regressive

tax. So it raises taxes on the poor and the working class while it cuts taxes for the wealthy. So I always found it interesting. I think this is an argument that Republicans have made effectively. They've defined themselves as like, we're the tax cut party. And I think a lot of people believe that means, oh, they're going to cut my taxes, random working class American. But effectively, that's not the case. They actually are increasing taxes on working people, or they want to according to their own plans, and decreasing it for the wealthy. Yeah, I mean, the fair tax stuff is such an own goal that it is unbelievable. And for people who don't know, a vote on the fair tax was something that the Kevin McCarthy holdouts demanded.

And as Kyle just alluded to, what it says is you're going to get rid of the income tax altogether. And instead, you're going to have a 30 percent sales tax. So as expensive as all your groceries, your meat, your eggs, your milk, your whatever is at the grocery store. How about we add 30 percent to that? That's literally what they demanded in terms of their you know, that was one of their concessions that they got from McCarthy. So, yes, on that part, they have left themselves incredibly vulnerable. I'd be shocked if Biden doesn't talk about that ultimately in the State of the Union tonight. But, you know, another piece of this, she she sort of alluded to like these fights over education that Ron DeSantis and now Trump are really leaning into. And I think it just whatever you think about the

politics and ideology of that, I think it is a stupid strategy, strategy politically. They thought that Glenn Youngkin really won in Virginia on running against critical race theory. I don't think that's the case whatsoever. I think you had to the extent that the election was was about education, it was much more about that you just come out of a pandemic where schools had been literally shut down. But the minute that you're the party that is going, I as president from the federal government top down want to tell you what your kids can and can't learn, that does not feel like freedom. And it also doesn't, you still to this day, even with Republicans leaning so heavily into this fight, guess who voters say they prefer on education? It's still Democrats. You know why? Because the things they care about from the federal government on education are like funding and getting more teachers in the classroom. Those are the sorts

of things that they're interested in hearing from candidates. So I know they think this is a real winner. I don't think there is any evidence to back that up whatsoever. What do you think, Marshall? The other side of the coin, I would say, is Ron DeSantis just won by 20 points. You know, he's incredible. This is essentially, if I were to look at this, I'd say this is the DeSantis theory of the case. Republicans did win 6% on the national popular vote during the midterms. They clearly think that this is a winner. What do you think of this as a response in relation to what Crystal and Kyle were saying? Yeah, I just want to echo what they both said, because I think it's a really helpful analysis.

So A, my take would probably be that education is the definition of a state in law. I mean, it literally is in terms of the way our country is structured. But if you're looking, if I would bet money that if you're looking at a state like Florida and a state like Virginia, a purple state in the case of Virginia and now a very red state in the case of Florida, yeah, it's probably true that if you're fighting over school boards

and you're fighting over how the specific state government is gonna set education's path, yeah, totally, I think that's the definition of an issue Republicans could win on. But I think we can look at the results in the 2022 midterms and say, hey, if we zoom out, does that state and local energy translate to national issues? I don't see it as much. And then, Sagar, secondly, to your point about Florida, look, I would bet that if we just took out, let's say, Ron DeSantis' fight with Disney and let's say,

for example, how he's really been aggressive on the university system, like AKA appointing new boards at Florida universities, like explicitly fighting against wokeness. That's about him signaling for the 2024 Republican primary. It has nothing to do with the broader party realignment in Florida. I bet if we actually looked at the voters who, for example, were probably more purple in the 2000s. They're not voting based on how Disney is specially, like Disney has a special district that was governed in a unique way. Him getting rid of that isn't shifting those voters.

It's just the Florida Democratic Party has been a dumpster fire since basically 2010. So I think that's the most important thing you need to think about. Go ahead, guys. What was I gonna say? Something about, nevermind, go ahead. I was gonna say something about the sky. We can need to think about. Go ahead, guys. What was I going to say? Something about, never mind. Go ahead.

I was going to say something about DeSantis. We can pivot to polling. I was going to actually, Sagar, you made this point about, you were laying out what, if you were DeSantis, how you would run against Trump. Yeah. And you were talking about, look, the economy in Florida is good. We're booming.

We're open for business. I think, to Marshall's point, like, his strength in the state and the fact that he was able to win and win so, you know, lopsidedly, I think has a lot more to do with that than it does these niche, hyper online Republican base issues, which may serve him well in a Republican primary. But back to your question, Marshall, of like, are Republicans gonna be able to read the room in terms of the mood of the electorate? Like how many regular moms,

like swing mom voters out there are like, you know what really the problem in the country is and in my life is wokeness. Yeah. It's a niche online issue. To your point though, DeSantis, I watched his debate with Charlie Crist. And when debating Charlie Crist, he didn't just do the, you know, Republican Ron DeSantis primary

tap dance. He did the general election sort of tap dance. Yes. And so hearing what Sarah Huckabee Sanders said there, that sounds to me more like a Republican primary speech than a general election speech. And she should be doing more general election type speech now because you're talking nominally to the whole country, not just to your own little segment. Although she also is probably auditioning for like a vice presidential slot. Yeah, who knows? Do you think so? I think my actual takeaway is that all of that would be smart. But here's the thing. Republicans don't actually agree on economic policy. So you just have to leave it out of the speech. And I actually think that the real reason that it's not in there, outside of a mention of high gas prices or taxes, is literally because they really don't agree across the gamut on all of this. Yeah, I mean, look,

I've always thought it's a potent strategy for Ron DeSantis. I thought look at the scoreboard was the best political comeback that he's given so far. It's perfect, right? Just look at the scoreboard. In terms of how they're talking in his debates or whatever with Gavin Newsom, it's like, dude, literally half a million of your people moved to my state. That's it. Dunk. And the reason why is open for business, keeping the schools open. Everybody's moving here. We're dynamic. We're having fun. To the extent that we're prosecuting the culture war, it's to try and preserve normalcy, quote unquote, whatever that means to the people of Florida. So that's probably why I think that the Sarah Huckabee Sanders speech is not going to land necessarily in the way that it needs to. But let's also consider this. How many people are watching

that actual rebuttal, right? Is this real? At this point, is this the general election or what did we all talk about that's a republican primary speech well probably republicans are the only ones are going to watch it what's the reality that all three of these cable networks even play we're not gonna play it the only way a lot of people are gonna watch it is if it's a freaking disaster we'll watch the clips of it after you know marco rubio like water drinking situation i think about him every time i drink something on here on the stage yeah i'm like i hope i don't bring back bobby jindal now i am also traumatized by the marco rubio water drinking situation as someone who has to like drink water

on camera yeah and bobby jindal i mean that one is just infamous because that dude was seen as like the up- coming star. And then that was it. That was it. So there is a chance that a lot of people will see Sarah Huckabee Sanders speech, but she should hope that that is not what comes to pass. That's a good point. OK, let's let's talk about polling data because this actually gets to exactly what we're all talking about. What do people care about going into the State of the Union? So let's go ahead and throw up this next element here up on the screen. Latest data that we have from Pew Research right ahead of the State

of the Union. I'm going to go ahead and read these off. Our graphics team did a great job here. Strengthening the economy is the American top policy priority. Dealing with COVID-19 is among the lowest. So that gives me some hope. So I gonna read these off number by number strengthening the economy 75 reducing health care 60 percent or 60 percent defending against terrorism 60 reducing the influence of money in politics 59 making Medicare financially sound 58 reducing the budget deficit 57 reducing crime 57 improving education 57 reducing the availability of illegal drugs,

53. Dealing with immigration, 53. Energy, 52. Improving the job situation, 49. Dealing with the problems of poor people, 47. The environment, 44. Transportation, 42. Military, 40. Dealing with climate change, 37. Dealing with global trade is 34. Addressing issues around race is 32. Dealing with challenges facing parents is 27. And dealing with the coronavirus outbreak is all the way at the bottom with 26. So what I take away from that is that this is the, you know, and I hate using the phrase, but it's a kitchen table, you know, issue as normal. And it's like one of those, which is catchy. You sound like a 1990s Bill Clinton political pundit,

but you know, the guy won the presidency. So maybe we should just borrow from it. What do you take away from those numbers, Marshall, in the context of everything that we're talking about? You can finish, you can sip your drink first and then answer. No, I'm sipped. We're good to go. So A, the number one thing that stuck out to me when you were reading that out loud

was that energy was in the middle, which seems like a huge win if you're Biden. Massive. I agree. If you had this conversation in the middle of the summer, like I was saying earlier, it's all about energy. It's all about the prices being high. It's all about everyone seeing the photo of that, what, $7, $8 gas we had in California. So that's the victory right there.

And that's kind of the point we're making at the top about Biden doesn't have to convince people that everything is hunky-dory and perfect. That's not what his job has been. It's kind of funny if you're, and this is kind of why there's this interesting like Obama versus Biden contrast. I think if you're President Obama, you have to convince more of that. But for Biden, it's basically like, look, man, it's pretty okay. Let's keep things okay. So that really falls into that. And then two, and this is just where the COVID thing is so interesting. This goes back

to the Ron DeSantis conversation. To what degree is the 2024 electorate going to be interested in relitigating 2020 and 2021? So that's another thing to really think about there, too, because this that poll number of COVID concerns just, I think, would generally skew towards us just moving on from that issue and basically in either direction, pretending it didn't happen or not. Yeah, well, and that's a problem for Ron DeSantis, too, because his whole case against Trump is about what he did with regard to the coronavirus versus what Trump did. And so if that is lessening, if that's becoming less of a hot issue, even among Republican based voters,

that makes his case somewhat less compelling at this point. But, you know, looking at the issue set, it makes sense why Biden is going to focus on some of the things that he's going to focus on. Apparently, in his State of the Union address, he's going to pull back some of the things that he's going to focus on. Apparently, in his State of the Union address, he's going to pull back some of the Build Back Better elements that didn't make it through into the Inflation Reduction Act, talking about renewing the expanded child tax credit, something I am very big on. $35 insulin cap for all Americans, that also would be great. And health care costs was one of the top issues there. Medicaid expansion in 11 states, and child care and elder care. Now, as Sagar said, this are all this all messaging. None of this is going to

happen with the Republicans in control of the House. So this begins to lay out what the, you know, reelect pitch will be, what I would do in a second term as president. But you can see he's like squarely focused on these sort of core economic issues that clearly are top of mind for voters. Yeah. And when you look at, you know, top one, strengthening the economy, then you have reducing health care costs. There are things he can point to of like, look, we're moving in the right direction here. So the thing we were talking about earlier, Crystal, we're on shoring three hundred and fifty thousand jobs right now. That's something that he probably will brag about, if I had to guess. Also on the lowering health care costs. I mean, as part of the IRA, they do have lower

prescription drug prices. Now, it's only certain drugs, and it's only for seniors. But there's also a cap at $2,000 out of pocket, and there's $288 billion in savings for seniors. These are things that he could bring up to say, like, look, I'm addressing your top concerns. And so, like, I'm on it. And what are those guys doing? Nothing. Yeah. By the way, shout out to the live chat. Marshall, my favorite comment so far is that you are the breaking point's designated survivor. That's a good one. That's a good one. We got to shout it out to all of them. I'm imagining the terrible

monologue I'm gonna have to open with tomorrow. Just get chat GPT to write it. By the way, if the Capitol does, God forbid, get attacked, we will be incinerated in the blast because we're close enough to that.

We love you all. You'll be able to see all of that going on here. If we have any super chats that are good, we'll go ahead and read some of those. Sagar floated beforehand that George Santos should be the designated survivor because he's what the country, he's a true representative of what the country is. I have a fun Santos update of if everybody is interested. Santos has sat himself in the center aisle of the House of Representatives specifically to try and shake President Biden's hand on national TV. And he is drawing attention to himself with a bright traffic cone orange tie. Oh, my God.

You got to give it to the man. He has no shame. That is a bad call. First of all, fashion wise, disaster. But second, just the shamelessness. Like, he knows that millions, tens of millions of people are going to watch. He's going to go in there for that handshake. There are a couple of notorious members of Congress who do this, who get there hours and hours early.

Sheila Jackson Lee, I remember from my time as a congressional intern, it was like lore that she always does it. Because apparently her constituents are always like, I saw you at the State of the Union shaking. Apparently it works. Again, I don't know why people watch this thing, but they do. This is going to save George Santos' career. Maybe it will. He gets that big Biden handshake and he can grab the photo. It's amazing. Also, what are his creds? I hope it does happen though. How can he have GOP creds if he's going to sit there and shake the president's hand? He's in the district. He's got to do what he's got to do. As for other stunts, Kevin McCarthy has confirmed he will not rip up the State of the Union. So thank you, Kevin, for keeping decorum in the House.

Is he going to clap like this? Yeah, will he do a clap like this? It's always fun, actually. That's actually his biggest problem. You're not going to turn him into a meme in either direction. I agree. Yeah, that's fair. He doesn't have it in him.

That's fair. That's unfortunate. Something I look for in a good Speaker of the House is very memeable either direction. I agree. Yeah, that's fair. He doesn't have it in him. That's fair. That's unfortunate. Something I look for in a good Speaker of the House is very memeable. Right. I mean, listen, actually, Biden, if I remember, was hilarious to watch during Obama's State of the Unions. He would sometimes, like, forget to button his jacket, or sometimes he would do that thing where he would button every time he stood up, unbutton every time. It was like, chill, dude. Just, you know, sit up and down. It's all good. You know, we're fine. You don't need to button it every single time. It's always the game, too, of, like, who's going to stand for which lines and who's going to sit for the other lines.

There's always that dynamic going on, too. The majesty of the state of the union. Yeah. It is funny, though, because, I mean, people really do take time out, like normal people take time out and sit down. It is part of, of like the American tradition. And so it is as much as we sort of make fun of some of the pomp and circumstance and like ridiculous nature of how this all comes together and the way people behave, et cetera. It is important. And I'm in favor of more transparency, more accountability, more going in front of the American people and

laying out what you did and how you're selling it and what you think about it and what's going to come next. So I am I am a State of the Union supporter and I am unironically excited to hear how this all goes tonight. The one thing I wish people every now and then a president would do is be more honest and say, ladies and gentlemen, the State of the Union is terrible. There actually was one, I forget who it was. We watched a compilation the other day. I don't know if you remember.

Who was it? Was it Ford? I think maybe Ford did it. Well, he did it in a way where he was like, it was like moving on from Nixon. As in, it was like, look, I get it. You know, we've had a bad time. But now we're all together.

So he's blaming the other guy. I mean, he was smart. He almost won re-election. So it actually worked. I was going to say, how'd that turn out for our president? Not well enough. It came close. You got to give the man credit where it's due.

Wait, wait, wait. Real quick, Kyle, because it's kind of interesting because you think about it. I think what it makes, and this goes to the whole debate about whether or not the Republicans want to make Trump the presidential candidate again. Trump's the only guy in modern American politics who's won, and once again, referring to 2015, 2016, on a message of pessimism and carnage. We make fun of Jimmy Carter for saying malaise for a reason. He didn't technically say malaise, but like it was called the malaise speech because that was the general vibe of it. But I think it's a real interesting test about whether or not people are going to want to hear

that everything is shitty versus, hey, we're moving forward. Things are getting more normal again. That's another one of those debates of what the country's mood is. Yeah, I mean there was a realism to it, though. You know, like when Trump was specific in saying, you know, our infrastructure is a mess. Our airports are a mess. You know, the middle of the country has been hollowed out. We're shipping all the jobs to Mexico.

And that stuff is actually true. You know, now Republicans were used to the Ronald Reagan style of politics for a very long time, where it's like morning in America and everything's happy and sunshine and puppies and all that stuff. And Trump really changed that mold. I think a lot of that is dependent on the personality, kind of like can the personality, you know, create a convincing case with the pessimism? Or is it, you know, somebody whose disposition is more in line with something that's like sunny and positive? You know, I think I think there are other candidates who could probably get away with it. I mean, to an extent, Bernie kind of did that, too, right? 2015, 2016. It was more hopeful, but certainly. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. But I mean, I think that is a note that Biden

could potentially land. Listen, I just don't. OK. All right. Biden at this point in his career. No, he probably can't. Let me let me let me wind that back. But I don't think there is anything more powerful than meeting people where they are, than expressing a truth that they feel like in their life and that they don't feel like is being reflected in Washington. And that was the power of Trump. Yes. He said things that other politicians weren't saying. And people were like, you know what? I feel that. Like, that's what I see. That's how I see things at this point. And so you can you can meet people where they're at and not just be like, and so everything sucks. I mean, Biden always layers in this like, you know, American exceptionalism, optimism, whatever, like we're American, we're going to do this and whatever. Like he you can have that piece, too. And here's the plan. And here's how we're going to pull it together.

I just think it's a fool's errand to try to persuade people that the economy is amazing when that's not what they feel in their lives. By the way, Trump would also, when he did his state of the unions, he would also brag relentlessly. So like, as long as he's in power, it's like, everything's great. Everything's phenomenal. Everything's amazing. But when he was out of power, it's like, it's amazing. But when he was out of power, it's like it's terrible. Remember when he was having the debate publicly? Should I do Make America Great Again again or should I do Keep America Great? Remember?

He was like polling the audience. And I think he actually used both slogans. He certainly did. Yeah, I mean, that was actually a funny time. I remember that. By the way, shout out to our Super Chats. Marshall, somebody wants to get you on JRE. Kyle, somebody is loving the hair.

And somebody says, I would make an excellent statesman. You are incorrect, sir. I do not agree with that. Poiling back a little bit, Marshall, you, I don't remember the quote, but there was a Peter Thiel quote, I believe, from what was it, 2015, where he talked about supporting Trump. And it was anchored in exactly what we're talking about here, where Thiel, known in Silicon Valley for contrarianism, effectively said something, and Marshall will fill in the gap here, where he was like, no, I actually think that the message to bet on is a message of decline, not a message of optimism. Marshall, I know you have more of the details on that. Yeah, no, this is in George Packer's interviews with Peter Thiel from 2013.

He also did a great book called The Unwinding. It's somewhere back here, but I think folks should definitely check out George's 2010s work. But basically the point of the quote was, Peter was saying, my contrarian bet is that everyone thinks that people are looking for optimism

and a sunny disposition. This is coming out of obviously 2012, where you've got Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan running as America's comeback team, all that like very specific, like we can rebuild and fix all the mistakes Obama supposedly made. And his point was, I think whoever's smart

is gonna pick up on the vibe that the country wants something negative. And obviously I guarantee you that Trump did not read The Unwinding or read The New Yorker. But once again, I think that that Trump did not read The Unwinding or read The New Yorker. But once again, I think that speaks out in certain moments, certain politicians have specific skill sets that are important. And Trump's important skill set in 2014, 2015, 2016 was that he could pick that up when all of his opponents, Marco Rubio running as like the

candidate of the new American century, that was actually like the slogan. You have like Jeb Bush saying we're going to have like 4% economic growth and we can do it. But this is once again, the problem though, of a politician who is specifically good in one moment and not another moment, which is Trump bringing that energy to periods when he didn't need to bring it. And I also think Trump's like everything is a disaster energy is also what is also what urges him to be an election denier. It's what urges him to select like ridiculous candidates like, you know, Carrie Lake. Sure. Use his endorsements improperly. So the real test is can 26, can he course correct, which probably not, honestly. It's also I mean, it's also the

difference between being an incumbent and being in opposition. Right. Right. If you're in opposition, it's easier to be like, everything sucks and these people are blowing in. It's terrible and it's harder. I mean, admittedly, you're in a more difficult position when you're like, I've been president for a few years now and things are still challenging, but we've done some good stuff. I mean, there is just more of a line ultimately that you have to walk there. Yeah, that's true. Quick shout out. Somebody left a super chat, Alex Daslieb. He says, Biden fetishizes bipartisanship so much he has one red eyeball and one blue eyeball. I'll be happy and wrong if he vetoes cuts to Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security. I do think he would veto cuts to Medicare and Social Security. Also, given the fact that you have Donald Trump out

there literally saying, don't do that. So there's going to be a sizable portion of Republican senators and of Republican congressmen who are like, look, they're like, I may support this stuff behind the scenes, but I'm not voting for that. I hope that's true. I hope Trump really still has that kind of sway over them. I personally think that, yes, I believe that on this issue, that while in the driver's seat, the Freedom Caucus and some of the ideologues there are, that they're probably at this point, I could be totally wrong, and we will see what the ultimate vote count on this. I do not think it will ultimately come down to cuts for Social Security. I do think that is important. Fun factoid, Biden will be the oldest

man to ever deliver the State of the Union today and from this day forward. So that is a fun one for everybody. In terms of what else that we know about the speech, one of the things he's actually going to be taking credit for, Marshall, and this goes to what you were talking about, is gas prices. So whenever you brought it up, I've got the national average in front of me. It's $3.45 a gallon on average. I mean, it's still high, but it's not terrible. If you look at a year ago, it was exactly $3.40. That's right around the time that Russia invaded Ukraine, or I believe right before that. So gas is relatively stable. There's not a state in this entire country where gas is over $5 a gallon. Our friends in California are paying $4.60. Of course, that's going to be

an important metric. So I really think that he just has to come back to the basics. He's got to talk about Trump, stop this deal. You want to frame it exactly in that way. You want to hammer abortion probably at the very top. Thank the voters who kept the Democrats in the Senate. Give shout outs to John Fetterman. Give shout outs to who's the Arizona gubernatorial candidate, Katie Hobbs. You want to give shout outs to John Fetterman. Give shout outs to to who's the Arizona, the Arizona gubernatorial candidate, Katie Hobbs. You want to give shout outs to those people and say, we heard you on that issue. And, you know, this is part of what's folding it back into reelection is. But Republicans have the House. So if you want us to get anything done, you have to vote for us again in 2022.

So I want to ask Marshall. Marshall, how long do you think Biden can keep going back to this January 6th well? As long, that's a great question. As long as Republicans nominate candidates that activate voters as whoa, let's not do that. And this is the thing, because that's actually the way to think about it, which is the reason why Republicans were screwed in 2022 is they, like I think many of us in the commentary space, thought the voters didn't care. And it's not as if Republicans were like, and by that I mean the party establishment in D.C. It's not as if they were explicitly saying, yay, stop the steal. I think they were probably arguing or believing it was going to be a wash.

But it was a huge issue, obviously, in those big results in those swing states. So as long as Republicans nominate the wrong candidates, and I'm not meaning wrong in the moral sense, I'm saying wrong in the sense that candidates who are performing for party primary bases who want to hear stop the steel bullshit without obviously like intercepting with the general election, why does he have to be able to talk about it until the Republican Party. And by the way, I don't mean the entire Republican Party. I mean, until swing state Republicans basically move on from this issue or start saying in their primaries, hey, we'll select whoever reads the vibe and doesn't talk about elections not working. Biden's going to be able to go to it. Yes, you're absolutely

right. As long as Donald Trump is alive and breathing, Biden should thump it for all he can. He's not going to let it go. I wish it didn't work this way, folks, but it does. So there's another piece that's going to be very critical to his performance. As much as we all pay a lot of attention to the policy and have a lot of opinions on what would be good and what's bad and how things have gone, all of that, a lot of opinions on what would be good and what's bad and how things have gone, all of that. A lot of this is also people taking a vibe check of whether this 80-year-old man is up to the task of another four years. That's a good point. And, you know, it's not just because they're concerned about, okay, can he personally handle it? But you also will have visibly behind him Kamala Harris, the vice president, who would be next in line, who not a lot of people are super fond of. We can actually put this up on the screen from the New

York Times. This piece from the New York Times about Kamala Harris is devastating. The headline here is Kamala Harris is trying to define her vice presidency. Even her allies are tired of waiting. They say in here that even some of the Democrats that her own office told reporters would give them supportive quotes confided privately that they had lost hope in her. So even the people that Kamala Harris was like, this guy is going to say great things about me. When this New York Times reporter actually went to them, they were like, oh, this is not going that well. And so you couple the age issue with concerns about whether the current vice president would be up to the job and just the optics of how he's able to navigate the speech and what his energy level is like and how he delivers it. That's going to be almost as crucial, Sagar, I think, as anything else that he says here. Absolutely. I mean, one of the things that always drives me crazy is that they mention like Biden who overcame his stutter and they're like,

he's working very hard on over. Listen, I've listened to the man for literally over a decade. He didn't have a stutter until he miraculously became 78 years old and started running for president again. Shocking. So they're pointing that as one of the issues that he's going to have to deal with is overcome his stutter. You're right, though. Look, it's a key thing. And if you look at all of the polling data that we have available to us, Biden's age is a serious problem. It is one of the major reservations. It's one of the main reasons Democrats do not want him to run again. I mean, you said this, and it's internal.

He will be 86 years old on his last year as president if he gets reelected. That's crazy. Like, 86 years old, his last year as president if he gets reelected. That's crazy. Like, 86 years old, it's difficult to even describe. I think most people know who has interacted with somebody who is that old and exactly what exponential decline can look like, especially at that age. This is not a commentary. I hope that it doesn't happen to him. But if we're betting on the odds, it's very likely to. And then if you're going to have a political successor,

one of our super chats says, I hope that Biden fires Mayor Pete live on the air. That would be good for his political popularity. I agree. Listen, he'd be like, we're going to make air...

He goes, come on, man. Airplanes aren't flying. You're out of here. We got... By the way, I got the exact same super chat. Oh, really? That's perfect. Whoever that guy is, I love this guy.

It's true to a lot of normie Americans. Vibes really do matter. And they should. Vibes are really important, and so a lot of the speech is going to be just about optics and very intangible things like how is he communicating? And so I hope they

give him a nice, solid dose of Adderall and he can get through it. I also wanted to point out that I do find it genuinely hilarious that Biden really struggles to talk, but he's more popular than Kamala Harris. That's interesting to me. And there's something, she has like an anti-charisma about her. I love, there was a story that came out yesterday or the day before where she says how she hates platitudes, which is the most ironic thing anybody's ever said because she is a platitude machine. Oh, my God. Yeah, glorious. What were you saying there, Marshall? Go ahead.

Well, yeah, no, I just – I think the thing that – so several things. So one, I just looked it up. So Trump right now is 76 years old. And this is one of those awkward arguments that, DeSantis is in such an awkward position because the strongest arguments he could make are ones that basically rely on actually assuming that Biden is more powerful than he looks.

So I think those, so for example, if Biden's just this like weak, hobbled old, he's going to be knocked over just like that, okay, does it really matter that Trump is 76 years old and would obviously be in his mid-80s by the time he leaves as well too? A strong argument for DeSantis would just be that generation, would be making an aggressive version of that generation argument, but he's not gonna be able to make it, I think for, I think, complicated reasons with what the GOP base is looking for. But then on a broader level too, I think the problem that Republicans also have when they focus on like Biden's speech issues

and how he's doddering is, I think at this point it's a sunk cost. Everybody knows it's been priced in. If you just don't think that Joe Biden is particularly compelling, speech issues aside, you're probably already lost. And I think the last thing is that I'm just really skeptical of these poll numbers, especially of like Democrats who are saying, oh, like we don't really want Biden to run again. Because I think at the end of the day, if you give them most of their alternatives, they're actually plausible. They don't want that alternative. Yeah, that's fair. And then B,

if you ask that question in the vacuum, that's a different question than, OK, Biden or Ron DeSantis, which is going to be the main thing. It's a base turnout issue. All right. So let's take a look at some polling. Let's put this next element up on the screen, B2. And you have Trump-Biden head-to-head here from, this is ABC Washington Post. And you have had, since September, a significant move towards Donald Trump. So they have Trump over Biden, 48-45. That's three points. It's, I believe, within the margin of error. You have him up nine points on Biden with regards to independence.

Again, this is a five point swing towards Trump from September. And, you know, the reason Joe Biden is won the Democratic nomination, the reason he is president of the United States right now is because Democrats thought he was the most electable candidate and their number one goal was beating Donald Trump. So the more he has numbers like this, where it's like, I don't know, I don't know, you're not even in a position to beat Donald. After everything that Donald Trump has done and how sick everybody is of this guy, you're still not in a position to beat this guy? That's a real problem for him. You're looking skeptical, Kyle.

I am very skeptical of that. Yeah. I mean, look, we're a little removed from the insanity of the Trump presidency, you know, but I don't think it'll take all that much to remind Americans just how insane Trump was. And yeah, Biden was the return to normal candidate. Like, OK, things are getting a little too wacky. Let's, you know, let's get back in line here. Let's calm down a little bit. And he won. I think if it were to be Biden versus Trump again, Biden will do the best against Trump that he could do against anybody. In other words, if you put DeSantis against Biden, I think DeSantis is a big favorite. You put fill in the blank with generic Republican versus Biden. I think the generic Republican is going to do better. I think Trump is the most beatable of the Republicans.

I'm not doubting these numbers at the moment, but I don't think that can hold. I don't think these numbers will hold. I agree with you that Trump is the most beatable, probably, of the Republicans, but I also don't underestimate him. Don't underestimate Trump? Yes.

I am. I'm doing that. I don't underestimate him. I am underestimating him. I am. I'm doing that. I don't underestimate him. I am underestimating him. You've always underestimated him. No, wait, wait, wait. That is, okay. I have to correct the record here. That is not true.

I'm saying in recent, oh, let's say the last two years. Correct, correct. Hold on, Marshall. One sec, one sec. In recent times, yes. Because people need to remember, I was one of the first people saying

Trump can win the whole presidency. And I was one of the first people saying, especially when we realized it was Hillary versus Trump, I said Donald Trump is the favorite because he's going to pounce on Hillary for all of her weaknesses. So early on, I called a lot about the Trump era

that a lot of people missed. And the conventional wisdom became like, Teflon Don, Teflon Don, Teflon Don. And again, I think I'm a little bit ahead here because I think the era of Teflon Don is largely over. Now, to be fair, it has changed a little bit in recent days. I thought DeSantis was a solid favorite. Now I do think Trump is a favorite in the Republican primary.

But I'm just saying that the conventional wisdom is still in people's heads of, oh, he's unbeatable. He's Teflon Don. And I think now it's the opposite. I think he's the most beatable. He's the most fringe. He's over on Truth Social talking about terminating the Constitution. That stuff matters. DeSantis is a rumor.

What's that? He called it DeSantis rumor. That was matters. DeSantis is a rumor. What's that? He called it DeSantis rumor. That was hilarious. I want to talk about that. That was actually funny. That was really funny. Go ahead, Marshall. You've been waiting.

Let's actually go there for a second. I'm not sure I believe this, but I'm just going to respond to what's being said here. Why should – I think there's more danger of overestimating Trump than underestimating Trump. The story of Donald Trump, with the exception of the Republican primary 2015-2016, and November 2016 is the story of disaster. It's him deciding that he's going to pass a tax cut as his first act. It's deciding to do the Obamacare thing and then pissing off John McCain so that goes down in flames.

The midterms are a disaster. The 2020 election is a disaster. And he selects the worst candidates in 2022. So what's the case for thinking actually he's got something in his back pocket? He hasn't had something in his back pocket since 2016. Correct. Hold on. Let me say, though, this dude did such an abysmal job during COVID that people were literally dying because of his lack of leadership. And he's still almost won. But he did 40,000 votes. But he didn't almost. But he didn't.

So you can't just like write him off when it was like 40,000 votes go in a different direction. And he's still president of the United States. I agree. He's what I think DeSantis would be a stronger candidate. I think any normal Republican would be a stronger candidate. But I'm not going to go out there and say, like, there's no way Joe Biden could lose to this guy, because I think Joe Biden definitely could lose to this guy. Yeah. And I think that's where I am. And more what I think I'm responding to is the idea of, like, look, after 2022, he's done. He's dead. He's got no power. And there is quite a bit of this. Maybe it's too online and I'm guilty of just internalizing it. But I see, especially in the days right after 2022, a lot of people willing to say we're moving on. Well, it's it's done. And guess what, guys? Ron DeSantis has not

announced her president so far. Only Nikki Haley is the one who's signaling that she's going to do it. We all know that she doesn't have a chance in hell. Mike Pompeo, who is as pathetic as Nikki Haley as a candidate, is also not announcing for president. Many, Asa Hutchinson, the guy who was talking against him on CNN, wears his super pack. So, look, he's still got a lot of power. How about this one? Larry Hogan.

Yeah, there you go. He's like the never Trump dude, right? I mean, he's been like very anti-Trump for a while now. They asked him if he would back the Republican nominee, even if it was Trump. And he was like, yes, I guess Trump is out there. Like, I don't know. We'll see. We'll see if I back the Republican nominee. Maybe here's a way, a better way of putting it. Like at the end of the day, anybody, and I actually remember saying this whenever Trump was on the ballot and everybody was like, nobody, he can't win. I said, look, sometimes if it's 50-50, like if your name is on the ballot as a presidential nominee, you absolutely can win

the American presidency. And so that's, that's where I, that's when I say not underesting in him. Do I think it is more likely than not? Honestly, I don't know. I mean, I look at a poll like this and again, I'm just taking back, which is, yeah, look, stop this deal. That was dumb. And here's the other thing. Have you heard about it from Trump since? You might have heard about it on Truth Social. Who the hell knows what's going on on Truth Social?

So I will just say this. At the end of the day, the debate is electability, right? And I think Marshall and I, maybe we agree on this, Marshall, correct me if I'm wrong. I think that after losing three elections in a row, 2018, 2020, 2022, the Republicans, even the base Republicans, some of the base Republicans might go, you know what? Maybe electability actually does matter a little bit. And maybe Republican voters will start acting a little more like Democratic voters where Democrats seem to put that first and foremost above everything else. I desperately wish that

were to be true. I'm just saying it's possible. You and I have talked about this. There is zero evidence that these people care about electability at all. See, I disagree with that. Especially the Trump people. I'll come in and disagree here. This is where, especially

in the breaking point cinematic universe, there's a lot of discussion about how, oh, the two parties are the same, like body, body, body, body. Obviously there's critiques you could make there. But a way the two parties are desperately different from each other in a way that severely has hurt Republicans

basically from 2018 onwards is Democratic Party voters, they basically just say electability. They're not thinking, okay, what's the coolest policy? They're not thinking, oh, like, is this quite the guy who I like? It's just like, look, I just want to go across the finish line in November, and that's just it. No evidence that a majority of Republican voters think the same way. Because once again, if Republican voters thought the same way, for good or for ill, Ron DeSantis, we would be doing

the cakewalk right now. Trump would have been shut out. Everyone, for example, like Nikki Haley, Mike Pompeo, Asa Hutchinson, Larry Hogan, all these guys would have already endorsed Ron DeSantis because it would be that overwhelming in his favor. If a Democrat performed the way Trump performed, the notion that he could come back and run for office again, just not on the table at all whatsoever. There's a reason why Jimmy Carter never came back. There's a reason why, you know, Al Gore didn't make a comeback.

John Kerry, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. I guess with the exception of, I guess Hillary lost the primary. She didn't lose the general. The Democratic Party actually severely punishes politicians who can't win. Now, maybe that's a good thing. Maybe that's a bad thing.

Maybe it means that the party is going to be more like quote unquote corporate centrist and not really like push the needle and go more to the left and do something innovative. But that's a successful way of winning the popular vote in seven of the last eight elections. So my response to that is there were many polls in the wake of the 2022 election

that had DeSantis up double digits. Even today, there are still polls in the wake of the 2022 election that had DeSantis up double digits. Even today, there are still polls at the state level, certain states, where DeSantis is beating Trump in those states. So my point is not to say Republicans definitely will prioritize electability this time around. My point is let's have a little humility and realize they might, they might actually go, you know what, we got to calm down a little bit with this psychotic guy who lost us three elections in a row. But, you know, the reason why you ended up with so many fringe candidates who ran, you know, as Republicans and who actually got the nomination in a lot of key states and key races, et cetera,

it really isn't so much about Trump endorsed them. It's about because that was what the Republican base was looking for. I mean, he Trump successfully made stop the steal and where you stood on that issue, like the most important litmus test in the Republican Party. You were with him or you were against him. You were either a sellout or you were, you know, in a cock and a rhino or you were like a true believer and you were willing to say the truth on Stop the Steal. And I also don't really see any signs that that has particularly changed. No, okay, but don't deny, though,

that there is a Republican civil war going on at the grassroots level right now. Absolutely, it's happening even in right-wing media. You have Ben Shapiro and Candace Owens and those types versus Stephen Crowder. I would dispute that that even matters at all, but go ahead. Well, I'm just saying, there's an actual split. There's a fight. And it's the

Sanchez people and Trump people. It's not like there's no fight and Trump already has this and it's a cakewalk. Absolutely. Go ahead, Marshall. Well, what's interesting, Sagar, I think you and I agree on this. I think I know where you're going. There's not a grassroots fight, but there really is an elite media, elite organizations. It's kind of like the political, I mean, political parties aren't as powerful as they used to be in terms of like, who's even in charge of the RNC and the DNC? No one really knows anymore. But like what's happened is those parties

have like separated into media organizations and nonprofits and think tanks. All these things used to be done by the parties themselves. That is where the fight's going on right now. So that's where people should be looking. You're not gonna be, it's not like back in the 1950s where JFK and LBJ are battling over

like state delegations from Wisconsin and Wyoming because the party precinct committee chairman really matters there. So I think it's the, but this is where, I think this is why we're overestimating DeSantis. And I see this more on the right side. The elite structures, I think matter is why we're overestimating DeSantis, and I see this more on the right side.

The elite structures, I think, matter on the Democratic side, not in the conspiratorial sense, but like capturing elite structures is a way of signifying electability and normalcy. On the Republican side, it doesn't really matter if D.C. likes you. If anything, it's probably a bad thing. Yes. Just from a pure political perspective. So that's a real difference between the two parties, too. Yeah, I'm jealous of that. So there is some truth to that. And I'm very jealous of that. I have an update. Labor Secretary Marty Walsh, who will be leaving the Biden administration to go and work for what is an airline union? No, the NHL. Sorry, the NHL Players Association. That's right. The NHL Players Association. He is officially the designated survivor tonight.

So congratulations to the Labor Secretary. Also, for a George Santos update, there appears to have been an altercation between Mitt Romney and George Santos on the floor. When you say altercation, what do you mean by that? I mean, Romney said something to him. Then he looked away from him. Here, I'll play it for you guys. Didn't Romney do some mean by that? I mean, like, Romney said something to him. Then he, like, looked away from him. Here, I'll play it for you guys.

Didn't Romney do some, like, celebrity boxing thing? Oh, he did. Didn't he? Yeah. He looked great. Here's what you can see. Romney says something to, I wish we had this for you guys. I'm very sorry.

But what you're watching is that Santos is pissed off, and he's kind of, like, saying something back at him. There's no fisticuffs. If I had to guess, what happened is he was like, you're a disgrace. Don't stand in the center aisle. I'm joking. There's no, there's no fisticuffs. If I had to guess, what happened is he was like, you're a disgrace, don't stand in the center aisle. I'm joking.

We'll just assume that's what he said. He might have said something, though, to that effect that wouldn't actually be a bad thing. Apparently,

yeah, so anyway, everybody on the, everybody on the floor right now is making fun of George Santos. Want to shout out to the super chats right now

saying, I just want to say, I appreciate you was able to get my twin brother to have more open mind by watching. You could give your opinion on the future of the used car market, please. And what politicians could do. I'll tell you what,

sir, for the used car market, keep watching the show and we will continue. I know that you have a high level of interest in that. And also thank you very much to the other super chats. Marshall, which said that you look like Forrest Whitaker. I enjoy that.

I hope I'm every single black celebrity. What are these people? It's just like, you know, just no. What's the most common one? Give me something new. The most two. So the most common one is like Charlie from the West Wing. Oh, right.

Or Gus, if you're watching Psych. Those were the young day ones. So, Sagar, if I may, I want to shout out. Please, go ahead. Sean DiStefano, Super Chat here. We give the politicians their jobs. We deserve the same health care they have. Republicans say they are pro-life, so give everyone health care.

Ah, okay. Agreed. Not a particularly original slogan, however. You're pro-giving everybody health care. We'll go with it. Support that. You failed to entice Sagar, Super Chat person. You failed. You were this close. Well health care. We'll go with it. Support that. You failed to entice Sagar,

super chat person. You failed. You were this close. Well, I'm just looking for some ingenuity. Not 1990s level dunks. But look, it's all right. We'll take it

here over at Breaking Points. Before we go over to, I think he'll be coming in here shortly. We may have to. So we. Oh. Oh, he's not up yet.

We're getting standby from our producers. Just transparency. They're going to... Oh. Oh, he's not up yet. We're getting standby from our producers. Just transparency. They're going to tell us whenever the president is walking in. You've got the whole iconic, like, what is it? Mr. Speaker? I guess it would be Mr. Speaker. Hey! The president of the United States,

and usually it takes on average between like two to seven minutes to walk down the aisle. He shakes a bunch of hands as the cameras will track him. We'll break in sometime around that. It is officially 9 p.m. here on the East Coast. So that is officially when the president is scheduled to talk. For those who are wondering why it's 9 p.m. and why it's past my bedtime while we're even doing this, that's because 9 p.m. is the traditional. 9 p.m. is the traditional, obviously, primetime hour here in the United States.

It's the most time in which eyeballs, or at least in the old times, whenever people were watching linear TV, are glued to the screen. Part of the reason why that they do it here at 9 p.m. Yes. And you can see right now, oh, I see Pete talking to people, Joe Manchin, whatever. Anyway, they're all milling around talking, waiting for the president to come. But one thing I wanted to bring up before the speech, because this will undoubtedly be part of that, this is last year at the State of the Union. You know, this was right after Russia had invaded Ukraine. This was obviously incredibly important focus of the speech. And it will continue to be, I'm sure, an incredibly important focus of the speech.

And one, you know, critical political dividing line that is emerging is you have Trump really putting himself not just oppositional to Biden, but also to some of the other Republicans who might contest him in the primary in terms of saying, you know, he said no tanks. I would make a deal on the first day of my presidency, et cetera, et cetera. So you have him trying to seize Marshall on the Ukraine war as a sort of key dividing line for him within the Republican primary, but also for a potential general election. Yeah, I think the interesting thing about the, yeah, it's kind of amazing we made it almost an hour without bringing up Ukraine. Look, I think the Ukraine war matters. So obviously the Ukraine war matters, but we're talking in terms of party politics here.

The Ukraine war is an important, within the Republican Party primary fight. It's just right now, in terms of where things are right now, it's just not going to be a big, defining general election issue. This is one which we also saw in terms of the midterm results. The status quo as things are right now is not one where the 2024 election

is determined by what's happening in Ukraine. It is going to be an opportunity for Trump, because when Trump's talking about the peace deal, he's not really fighting against Joe Biden as much as trying to signal subtly. You're sort of seeing talk of this, I'm sure you've noticed this, that Ron DeSantis is actually much more hawkish on foreign policy than he's let on. And you actually know this is almost certainly true

because he doesn't talk about it. DeSantis has basically almost everything. We could all know DeSantis' positions on basically everything, except for kind of China, beyond like the, so like separate from cultural issues. So like the TikTok stuff, we actually don't know where he's at when it comes to like issues like

Taiwan. We don't know where he's at when it comes to Ukraine, which is strong evidence. He's actually much more to the more traditional Republican party. Yeah. To back that up, Trump has retruthed at least one or two things, calling DeSantis a globalist on Ukraine. He has taken some potshots at him on there. I actually agree, which is one of the things that Trump, what I think Trump is fantastic at is saying the politically popular thing that nobody wants to say from a political correctness point of view. Right now, he literally is the only major national figure on the other side of Ukraine. Although, look, let's be honest. He's been all over the place calling for bombing the Chinese planes, my personal favorite one that he's always had out there.

What would he actually do in the event of all this, and should he get elected? I have no idea. By the way, history suggests that he would... Yeah. This was interesting, though. I just want to push back a bit on you saying it's like unclear whether it's the Podokny Podokny thing. It's actually not. It's not popular right now yeah right now like it's it's

good well no i don't think that's true it's exactly 50 50 but the point is i think it's kind of so i guess that's what we're trying to say here because from my perspective we arm the ukrainians we don't put american boots in the ground that's the majority position right now uh that's actually in terms of the way the debate is being framed, that's not really how it's looking right now. In terms of the actual 50-50 polling. So it's- What's the polling?

It's for 50-50 for all continual aid to Ukraine from here on out. So that's what we could do. That's not very popular to give aid to Ukraine. But the key thing though, Sagar, that's not the debate anymore. Like the Republican Party controls the House. Like you're not going to see massive, massive, massive packages. Because we got to pull out of this because the president is actually coming in now. So let's go ahead, guys, and we'll we'll throw here to the president. We'll watch this. We're going to have to.

All right. You have, of course, been listening to the president of the United States delivering his State of the Union, leaning heavily into an economic message front and center at the top. But I think probably the thing a lot of people will pay the most attention to is how raucous the Republicans were. You had Marjorie Taylor Greene yelling, you're a liar, lots of, especially over his comments about Social Security and Medicare. There's a big uproar. They were yelling at him about the border and other things. Kyle, let me go to you. First of all, what were your sort of big takeaways, big impressions? Geez, well, I like the fact that most of the speech was economic and the early part was economic. I feel like that, you know, if you lean into that, that's positive and that'll get a good reaction, I think. But obviously, yeah, the bigger story is how I'll go with the word annoying, how annoying the room was. And I'm very curious to throw it

to you guys. I don't know if it's just because I'm getting old. I don't know if it's because I'm tired and it's past my bedtime. But every single time somebody chirped up, I was like, shut up. Just wrap it up. I don't want to hear it. It's annoying. He's speaking. He's the president. Even if he wasn't the president,

if he was Bob from the PTA meeting, it's like, let Bob finish his thought. Because they're all just trying to get a viral moment. They're all just trying to fundraise off it because of the Joe Wilson moment back when Obama was president. And he screamed, you lie. And he had massive fundraising numbers.

It's like, I get it. I get it. I get it. You're all virtue signaling. You're all trying to get, you know, the spotlight on you, but it's, it's dumb and it's annoying. Do you guys agree with me? Uh, I'm not so sure. Here's the thing. Uh, in terms of my objective feelings about, or in terms of my personal feelings about it, I'm indifferent. If anything, I actually do kind of enjoy it just because I like the idea of a raucous house of representatives that said, look, if it's all fake and it's all a stage, then these people are going to have to play their part, right? You pointed to that. Marjorie knows exactly what she's doing. She's absolutely going to raise a lot of money. But I would even step back. I don't think that was the biggest

story that's going to come out of that. It might be a 24-hour thing and some people will be like, oh my God, my norms. Guys, the biggest story, the takeaway is whenever he would confronting them directly on Medicare and social security. I mean, in terms of the take, like in terms of what we will be talking about probably for weeks now, that moment is going to get replayed over and over again when he's like, okay, are we all agreed here? Oh, so you agree with me. So it's not going to be a problem. Stand up if you agree with me. That was actually, look, I'll give the man credit. That was the best absolute part of the speech.

It was the only part where he went off script and it did actually work for him. There were a couple where, what did he say? Name a man who would trade places with Xi Jinping. I still do not know exactly what that means. All right, so like my meta takeaway, I was telling you guys this during the speech, vast majority of people stop watching the State of the Union after about 30 to 45 minutes.

The first 30 to 45 minutes was all an economic message. Most of it was made in America. I mean, look, not even President Obama ever gave a made in America speech like that. And to me, that just shows me the way that Donald Trump really changed politics forever on Made in America and on China. So those two issues, it's solidly in this state of the union. No president even almost disagrees now at that point. So for the Medicare and the Social Security, and then I thought overall it was an effective speech as far as Biden once goes. If I were him, you know, I'd be pretty happy with my performance. Marshall, I want to get your thoughts. I sort of feel like with the Republican interruptions, et cetera, Biden really led with this message of like bipartisanship and unity. He made a long show at the beginning of congratulations to Kevin McCarthy. Congratulations to Mitch McConnell.

We're going to work together. We did work together in the past. So he wanted this message of like, I'm the guy who is here to work with anybody. We've gotten some things done together, et cetera. And so it certainly serves Marjorie Taylor Greene's and whoever else's interest to get their little viral moments for their Republican based fundraising. But I also do feel like that sort of plays into Biden's hands as well when he's trying to portray himself as the grownup in the room and the one that's serious about actually reaching out and getting things done? Yeah, that's what we were talking about at the start of the real live show here, which is that voters like hearing that. You could obviously, I think it's important to separate the annoying

DC version of like, oh, back in the 80s, everything was super chill and everyone was best friends. The Gipper and Tip O'Neill, like the Joe Scarborough thing. But at a baseline level, the centerpiece of American politics right now is what suburban moderate voters think. And they want to hear that. Marjorie Taylor Greene's district may be interested in her doing that performance, but no one else is. And that's a real misjudgment that could be effective in 2024. Yeah, exactly. I mean, look, let's step back. What did we say at the top? Or at least for what I said, I said, the balance is economy, lead yourself,

try to gaslight a little bit about, oh, everything's great, you know, all of that. At the same time, you're like, I'm a bulwark again. So what did he lead with? He goes, here's all the things I've done. Goes straight into the bulwark against Medicare, Social Security, I will veto. And what does he end on? He ends exactly on stop the steal. Now, look, saying that Paul Pelosi attack had anything to do with, quote, the big lie and not schizophrenia is ridiculous. However, politically savvy move, I think, to try and tie— I mean, schizophrenic people pay attention to what people say. Right, yeah, so it's like one of those where, listen, you tie those two things together, and it's savvy, I think, in that regard. You end on the democracy thing that really kept people there.

So, look, I think he hit all the notes. It clocked in at around an hour, 15 minutes. As state of the unions go, that's pretty average. I mean, overall, again, I just come back to him like, effective job. I really think so. So one of the things, I jotted down a bunch of this stuff that I thought was most interesting. One of my favorite lines was, he was talking about the 15% minimum tax rate for corporations worth over a billion dollars. And he says, they have to pay a minimum of 15%. And then he said, like, kind of casually and flippantly, God love them. And that got a decent laugh. And, you know, I was chuckling here. I thought that was a good line. I noticed early on, one of the very first lines was like, we've

created 12 million jobs. And then everybody starts clapping. of the very first lines was like, we've created 12 million jobs and then, ah, everybody starts clapping and Kevin McCarthy sitting there like, yeah, I will not clap at 12 million new jobs. It's like, dude, this is one of the ones that it's like, you have to do it just to look like you're sane. Um, and then like you were pointing out the social security and Medicare moment there, what I was getting really annoyed by is like, just own it. It is a lot of the Republicans position' position that they want to cut it.

They might soften the language to try to blunt the effect by saying, no, we're just trying to reform it or save it. But functionally, they want to cut it. And when he says that's what they want to do and they're like, boo, boo, boo, it strikes me as so disingenuous. Like, just say, yes, this is our position and we would like to debate that on the merits and we would like to defend the position of cutting Social Security. They get so weaselly about it. And that's what was driving me crazy. I was screaming about it here in the studio when we were watching it. So the thing that he's referring to specifically when he talks about like sunsetting these provisions was what Senator Rick Scott, who was in charge of the Republican

senatorial campaigns this time around, so not like an insignificant player. It was part of the plan that he put out. And this was Mitch McConnell was basically like, shut the F up. We don't want to talk about that. We're trying to run on nothing here and just like bash them on inflation. So this is not without basis. And you've had other Republicans also talking about the debt ceiling, talking about cuts to entitlements. You have had some others who say, no, no, we don't want to do that. Donald Trump obviously said, like, this is off the table. But what's sort of more interesting to me is I feel like in previous eras, in the Mitt Romney, Paul Ryan era, they were much more comfortable owning the fact that they really wanted to cut Social

Security and Medicare. Like if Obama had said that at a State of the Union, they would have been like, yes, we do. And here's our plan. And here's Paul Ryan with the PowerPoint of how he's going to do it. And so, I mean, this is another way that even though you still have a lot of the same ideology, even though many of them still are committed to it, would like to cut Social Security and Medicare, et cetera, et cetera.

The fact that they're offended that this is suggested about them, that they want to cut these programs, represents a pretty remarkable shift in terms of the Republican Party and what they want to publicly put forward. What do you think of that, Marshall? Yeah, I think that's a great way to put it, Crystal. I mean, the core thing, as you guys are articulating, this really reminds me of the defund the police debate in terms of how you could identify a vulnerable area. So think of defund back in 2020. There were some Democrats who were very defund. There were plenty of moderate Democrats who weren't vulnerable. You can take the more extreme position as the party's trying to figure it out. And that's as an attack point. That's basically what's happening with Social Security. Back in the 2000s, like think of when George W. Bush tried to reform slash cut slash privatize Social Security after one re-election in 2005.

Like back then, the party consensus was that this is what we do. We fight against the New Deal. We're fighting against the Great Society. That's our party. After the Social Security privatization failed, after Paul Ryan flopped as a VP, and then after Trump then ran in favor of Social Security and in favor of Medicare, also we need to add the failure of the repeal of Obamacare, Republicans genuinely don't know what to think. I think as you see, and the thing that's funny, Kyle, I get your point about needing to have a fair debate. And I agree with you most of the time. But like J.D. Vance, for example, J.D. Vance actually wouldn't be in favor of cutting Social

Security. He came out to what you said. I don't think he's the I don't think he's the best. I don't think he's the majority of the party. But especially with younger Republicans who are basically grown up in an America that's accepted the New Deal, but it's accepted Social Security. It's actually not quite clear what the actual position is, which is why it's perfect for Joe Biden to attack in that direction. I completely agree with that characterization. The defund is exactly right, right, which is one of

those they're like, no, no, no, what we want to do is raise the retirement age. It's like, well, okay, well, you know, you're still when you're already within that heuristic, it's like, it's not going to be good for you. Just so people know, cutting Social Security and Medicare is probably up there with defund the police and affirmative action as the least popular things that you could actually try and do in politics. Hence why he beats him over the head with the club with it, which is exactly what I would do. I was surprised that he didn't mention abortion more in the speech. My count was a single line.

It came, let's say, like two-thirds or so into that. I was pretty shocked by that, actually. That's something I would have led with if I was president. So I just want to say, look, I hope I'm wrong, but we just saw with this whole fight with getting Kevin McCarthy to be speaker, there was a whole fight and there was a right flank that was pushing back against him. And one of the things they settled on is we're gonna have a debt ceiling showdown and our whole position in the debt ceiling showdown is we wanna force cuts to Social Security and Medicare.

So I think the overwhelming majority of the party is gonna be on board with that. Now, whether or not, you know, I hope Biden is telling the truth when he's like, I'm not gonna do some sort of grand bargain. I'm not gonna cut it at all. But I think the predominant position in the Republican Party is let's cut it. Well, I'm not going to do some sort of grand bargain. I'm not going to cut it at all. But I think the predominant position in the Republican Party is let's cut it.

Well, I'm not so sure, because remember, there's only 17 people, right, who tried to extract that. Those are like the Tea Party, Freedom Caucus diehards. What the look, the majority, I genuinely have no idea. I do not know. If you were to ask me my gut feeling, I think most of them would say what I said, something around like they want to raise the retirement age. But of course, we don't. But that's that's the cut. Yeah, I agree with you. What I'm saying is like that is what I think most of them. They don't want their position to be characterized as cutting. Yes. So security and Medicare. Because they're disingenuous.

And they're trying to save it. That's the line they're going to go with. Right. But that is even just them not wanting their position to be characterized that way is very different. And of course, the fact that, I mean, Joe Biden was part of the Obama administration that actually put a deal on the table that would have cut Social Security. And now clear and he, you know, over the course of his career, a number of times talked about cutting Social Security. So it does show you the way that the politics around this issue have clearly shifted. Now, one thing I think that's really important to say is that in terms of the big money institutions within the Republican Party, like the think tanks and, you know, the Koch industry, the Koch network, they still are very much looking for every opportunity they can possibly find to cut these programs. And that matters a lot. I think they want to have their cake and eat it, too. They want to, like, piss on people and say it's raining. So they want to do the debt

ceiling thing, force the cuts and then go, oh, we're not we're just reforming it. We're saving it. So that's that's what they that's their game. That's what their game has been for a long time. So I think that's the goal. It's not like they're actually becoming more moderate on it because they're afraid to acknowledge what their actual position is. They recognize how toxic and terrible the politics are for them. They recognize that they cannot be out and out being like, yes, we want to cut Social Security because they have realized that that is devastating for them.

I want to pick up, Sagar, on what you were saying because that was something I noted too. You know, in advance, you were saying like, okay, here's the formula. Yes, economics, but clearly the stop the steal stuff in January 6th and abortion, like that's what won the midterm. So he's going to lean into that. He really didn't. Both.

He closed with democracy. He closed with January 6th. Paul Pelosi with abortion was also in the latter part of the speech. But the part that really counts in terms of what they're focused on and what the message they want to take away, it really was loaded up with economics. And I was also surprised that you had very little mention of abortion ultimately in this speech. I mean, the two themes that he leaned into very heavily to start with was this idea of like, I'm the guy who can work with anyone, bipartisanship, let's get things done for the American people, and then laying out the case of what he thinks he's delivered and what he still wants to do. Now, one challenge for him is the fact that we were looking at a poll before the speech. Very few people say they feel like they've been impacted by the Biden agenda. So,

you know, whereas I think if you're overselling the economy and the rosy picture of the economy, you're going to have a hard time. There probably is some benefit you can get just from selling. Here's the things we did and going down the list and trying to persuade people that, no, actually, we have been doing some stuff. What do you think, Marshall? Yeah, I think it's, I just want to go back to a quick thing you said about the lack of focus on the abortion, the democracy thing. Like maybe, I think this kind of goes to my early comment about how I'd be curious about Joe Biden's like political analysis here. And it seems to me the political analysis is that you need to move on from 2022. Like you're going to reach those heights, you're going to be successful in that midterm.

But maybe that's just not going to be successful running on that retread when it comes to 2023. Like, there could be an instinct of like, man, we're going to still, like, you're still talking about that. Like, it's not up for grabs as much. So yeah, I'm really curious how the right responds to the economic stuff, especially, Sagar, to your point about

how Biden and Team Biden are clearly taking the economic stuff, especially, Sagar, to your point about how Biden and Team Biden are clearly taking the, like, made in America, compete with China bit that Trump added. So that, especially given the, I think, attempt to bring things back to culture wars is going to be an interesting shift there. Yeah, I already know what they're going to do. They're going to go culture war,

they're going to criticize them on the border, and they're just not going to talk about econ because that's how it goes. Anyway, Kyle, let's get our last thoughts from you before we bring in Ryan and Ryan and Emily. Sure. Yeah. So I wanted to point out the fentanyl line from Biden. So he's over there talking about fentanyl. And you have Marjorie Taylor Greene and others start screaming at him. And I heard somebody say China. Yes. And then somebody say like, it's your fault or something like that. To be fair,

the vast majority of the fentanyl comes from China. Okay, I know. I understand that. But I always get super triggered over this because I feel like the approach from many people is just brain dead. Because Crystal and I have talked about this. About 30,000 people a year die from overdoses

when it was the pain pills. Then we crack down on the pain pills with all the good intentions in the world. And then people went to the black market and they got heroin. Some of that heroin was laced with fentanyl. And now we have about 100,000 people dying every year. So it's this like the tyranny of good intentions in a sense, because if I were to tell somebody like Marjorie Taylor Greene, like, hey man, we need to legalize tax and regulate drugs in order to get past this whole fentanyl crisis, she'd be like, you're insane. That would add to the problem. Well, I mean, I think that's a fair point. I think it's also a fair point to say,

like, there is a lot of fentanyl coming across the border. And from what I've seen, they've said that actually, if you did at least have some more enforcement that was happening there, it would make it much harder and raise the price, which would increase actually the amount of pure heroin. Now, I'm not saying that's necessarily a good thing. What I'm saying is it's complicated. I also would remind you, we have to talk about what's in the realm of the possible. And in that, what was it, in the polling data that we had there, which one is that if we have that element? Is that A3? Can we go and put that up there on the screen? Pew Research. I think cracking down on illegal drugs was at like 57%. So, I mean, the public is just not there whenever it comes to legalizing drugs. There it is. Reducing the availability of illegal drugs is right there at 53%. Biden also doesn't get credit

though when he, a lot of, Biden gets a lot of shots from his left on the border because he's continued a lot of the Trump policies on the border. So he does a lot of the things Trump has done and it's not like anybody on the right goes, hey, we agree with you on this one, fella. They just act like he's not doing it. They act like he's in favor of open borders or something. Well, you're talking about migrants, and to be fair, his administration has tried to end

a majority of those policies in court, and it's only after they weren't able to end those administration policies in court that they ended up keeping them. Well, actually, they not only kept them, they expanded them. Well, then they expanded them. After they tried to kill her in. Well, then they expanded him after they tried to kill him

in the court. Then they decided. And also, there has been a lot of fentanyl seizures at the border. There's been a number of them. There's been some. The idea that he's not trying to see.

My point is, look, we can keep going around and around in circles trying to do the same policy that's not working or we can do the actual solution, but she's not interested in a real solution.

She's interested in yelling at Biden in the middle of a speech when he's talking about a very serious issue like fentanyl. I don't think he needs to get serious on it. She needs to get serious on it, too. I don't think anyone on this stream has claimed Marjorie is interested in a real solution. And neither is Biden. Neither is Biden. She's there. We perhaps can close this out with something that will unify us in the spirit of what Joe Biden wanted to bring, which is both Kyrsten Sinema and Marjorie Taylor Greene apparently dressed like it was the Hunger Games.

Yes. What is going on? Kyrsten Sinema wearing some yellow, big bird ass looking thing. People will have all kinds of memes and Marjorie Taylor Greene in some white fur. Yeah, she looks like from Lion, the Witch and the Fucking Wardrobe. I mean, look, I'm going to break my cursing thing. This is driving me insane. What the fuck is going on? Like, Kirsten Sinema literally is dressing like she's going to the goddamn Met Gala

after presiding over the Senate in a t-shirt with a heart on it. She is solely responsible for breaking a lot of the female dress code that is there. And I blame her

for Marjorie looking like she's literally in Hunger Games or Lion, the Witch, and the... I am losing my goddamn mind over here. Marjorie didn't throw a thought off there. Over the collapse of dress code. Go ahead, Marshall. What'd you say?

If we're gonna rank, I think we have to say George Santos' orange tie isn't great. Yes. I think Marjorie... Let me put it this way. I think Marjorie's more compelling than Kirsten Sinema is. Let me put it this way. If Marjorie showed up think Marjorie, let me put it this way. I think Marjorie is more compelling than Kirsten Sinema is.

Let me put it this way. Like if Marjorie showed up in yoga pants and a t-shirt and you met her at a coffee shop, she would still like have like a lot of like main character energy to her. I clearly think Kirsten Sinema is someone who accessorizes to make up for the fact that she's just like, bleh. Boring. I think that's insightful commentary. Okay. Everybody stick with us.

Just give us five minutes. We're going to switch the chairs out. We're going to have Ryan and Emily in here. Thank you all so much for your support. Control room, let's throw the graphic up there, and we'll start the transition process. Marshall and Kyle, thanks, guys. Marshall, Kyle, you guys did a fantastic job.

Thanks for listening. Okay, we're back. Thank you, everybody, for sticking with us. Look at that wide shot. We got Ryan and Emily here. We got counterpoints, which is in the house. Yeah, lots of headroom. If this were any other time,

we would be doing a little bit of camera adjustment. But this is what it looks like when it's live, when we have a brand new, beautiful studio that you premium subs are helping us with. It will be different, we promise. Okay, so people have heard us talk a little bit now. Ryan, Emily, you guys watch the speech with us. What do you guys think?

Ryan, you go first. All right. I mean, the thing that's most important to me about this is that it is the launch of his presidential campaign. Right. So you're really not going to make a whole lot of policy and you're not going to make a lot of – you're not going to move the needle on public opinion and really on the ground or in the room, except for that Medicare thing. And so Medicare and Social Security thing, which was absolutely remarkable. We want to talk more about that in a minute. But if this is what he's going to run on,

this is kind of exciting. Like this is a party that like working people could get behind. I mean, what did he talk about? He talked about, you know, supporting organized labor, pass the PRO Act, go after big pharma. We're going to address climate change. He said, we're going to, you know, cap insulin prices, you know, Medicare and Social Security, billionaire tax. We're going to bust up monopolies and all the different fees. I'm going to a resort and it's not even a resort and I'm paying a resort fee. But, you know, that seemed resort fee. That seemed very personal. He stayed at his friend's house for free. That was clearly personal.

He's never encountered this fact. And his friend charged him a resort fee. Good point. And he's going for the identity theft and some funny stuff like that. People are getting to him. Yeah. But in general, that's a platform

that people could get behind. It's strange. It was a lot of – Matt Stoller was very excited because he's talking about antitrust. What was it? First President. The First President since 1979 to mention antitrust. To mention antitrust. You're talking about industrial policy.

You're talking about – Making things in America. Making things in America. And then, you know, I mean I'm not big big on this whole squishy, like, bipartisan comedy, whatever. But there are a lot of people who are really into that. That's a very normie sentiment of, like, why can't we all just come together and get some things done? What I said earlier, Emily, and I want to get your thoughts on the whole thing, though, is I think the fact that you had this sort of ugly raucousness from the Republicans in there really did kind of play into Biden's hands of looking like the grownup in the room. He looked in control too. He was almost like

engaging with the crowd. He let them finish. He wasn't, he wasn't heckling them back. He let them finish. So I think optically that's a hundred percent correct. That did not work in the way that let's say Marjorie Taylor Greene or whomever else was involved in it wanted it to work. That said, to Ryan's point, and actually Kyle made this point too, he gave a speech that was so front loaded on economics. And that's really smart. If you're Biden's speechwriters, you should be really happy with how this turned out. He's sort of checking down, going through the laundry list and fleshing out actually, not just listing off, but fleshing out things like infrastructure, things like the CHIPS Act. Now, to the bipartisanship point, I think that's a fascinating point because it works with people until the country stops working. Because he had a line earlier where he talked about basically decades of hollowing out the middle class.

Who was in the Senate? Who was the senator from MasterCard with identity theft for decades of hollowing out the middle class? I mean, it's just like, so that's a real problem for Biden. And I think he has never had a real answer to confronting it head on politically, but tacking in that direction. It's not just good news for Democrats. It's good news for the country that Republicans, at least optically, were so vehemently offended by what Joe Biden said with Social Security, Medicare. They said Kevin McCarthy gave his whole speech last night. It's off the table. It's off the table. That's good news for the country because it tells you where the Overton window is.

You know, it's funny. I'm monitoring the professional press corps. What are they all talking about? Decorum in the House. I'm like, who cares about the decorum? Like, look, I'm not saying it isn't a thing, but Social Security people, Medicare, that is going to define the next couple of months of our politics. It's driving me nuts. And like, that was the first thing I zeroed in on. I was like, man, that's a big moment. That is going to be every ad, the Biden ad, the launch. I'm the one who protected it. I will veto the bill. Crystal is picking up on the fact that Republicans are not willing to go there yet. This also puts Trump on the back foot where he's like, no, they're lying that we don't want to cut Social Security, but he doesn't have a unified coalition.

I'm like, this is it. This is the whole ballgame, Ryan. So what else do you want to dig into on that? Yeah. And for decades on the left, there's been this internal argument. Do you work within the Democratic Party to try to make the Democratic Party a better thing? Or do you work outside it? You start a third party and try to pressure them from there. As the working class is kind of being divided by between the two parties here, a kind of new answer is emerging, which is that you actually work within both parties. And Joe Biden did that tonight. Like, I've never seen a speech like that kind of change the negotiating table, change the game in the way it did. Before this speech, Republicans had their game plan for when it came to the debt ceiling crisis. You know, they're going to hold it hostage. They're going to force Biden to the table and get some cuts. And then they're going to agree to it the same way that they jammed Biden up 10 years ago. They come out of this speech with nothing left. Right. Like so what are they? OK, well, now what are you going to do? You're not cutting military spending because you're Republicans. Right. Now you can't cut Social Security and Medicare because you just told the whole country that he's a liar and that you would never do such a thing. So you're left with the EPA and like NOAA and the BLM.

They can cut BLM and tell their base that it's Black Lives Matter. And actually they can trim the Bureau of Land Management. I was going to say, leave Clyde Bundy alone. He's going to fly back for that meeting and defend his budget. Well, I do, to your point, because they obviously took great umbrage at the suggestion that they wanted to cut Social Security and Medicare. They would never do such a thing. No, they want to save it. They want to save it.

They want to strengthen it. Right, exactly. But, I mean, the numbers just don't work out. Like, the math just doesn't work out. If you're like, I want to slash the budget by this huge amount, right, which they do and which they've said publicly, but I don't want to touch those security medigate. Like it just literally doesn't. Or the Pentagon. If we put those together, like it's not going to work out for you.

And so that's why it is a fair hit to say to them, like, no, you you want to hold the debt ceiling hostage. You want to cut these programs. You have a track record of wanting to cut these programs. Senator ceiling hostage. You want to cut these programs. You have a track record of wanting to cut these programs. Senator Rick Scott said you want to cut these programs. And it was pretty remarkable to see how much they freaked out about that. And a good sign, though, again, because this is post-Paul Ryan politics, and Republicans have realized, I mean, you can cut the entire Pentagon. This is per Brian Riedel at the Manhattan Institute. You could literally get rid of the Department of Defense and you can't balance the entitlement balance sheet in the way that Republicans say that they want to. And there's a reckoning with that on the right right now that

doesn't mean that Mitch McConnell wouldn't love to get his hands on and strengthen Social Security and Medicare. But I think it's at least sort of becoming, and again, I think this is good for the American people. You have J.D. Vance, Donald Trump coming out and saying the same thing and setting the tone. You have Russ Vogt, who's hugely influential in the new right and in Republican politics. His entire plan to balance the budget, he was OMB under Trump, is don't touch Social Security and Medicaid. You can get rid of, to the point that you guys were making, all of the woke policies. And you don't have to. You can balance the budget in 10 years without touching anything else. And just the fact that the wheels are in motion on that

tells you that Republicans are like, no, we literally cannot even whisper a word about it. And if it comes out of your mouth, we are putting you in the corner. That's a really interesting point. We got Marshall and Kyle's reaction. I was curious for your guys' reaction. So right now, Sarah Huckabee Sanders is giving her rebuttal. I don't know who's watching it, but we have an excerpt. And I think the excerpt is important more so in what's not in it and what is in it and what the case of what the potential Republican pushback against this is going to be. I'll just read this again. In the radical left's America, Washington taxes you and relights your hard-earned money on fire. You get crushed with high gas prices, empty grocery shelves. Our children are taught to hate one another on account of their

race, but not to love one another or our great country. And while you reap the consequences of your failure, the Biden administration seems more interested in woke fantasies than the hard reality that Americans face every day. Most Americans simply want to live their lives in freedom and peace. We are under attack in a left-wing culture war that we didn't start, and we never wanted to fight. Emily, what did you think of the strategy there to really go hard at the culture war? And to be fair, she didn't actually watch the speech before she had released that excerpt. So clearly, but I mean, that's kind of how all these things work. You don't get a predetermined little fact sheet and all that. What do you think of that strategy? That's a really good study in contrast, I think,

because she expects Biden to come come out which is wrong i mean it's a good example of how republicans are disconnected from the biden that they're actually fighting as opposed to the straw man and then it's not to say that biden isn't doing stuff in the culture war of course he is sort of bureaucratically in the executive that's in the drj right it's not a national name right and the education department and all these things that people aren't necessarily able to follow on a single day to day basis. But that Sarah Huckabee Sanders comes out anticipating a Biden culture war speech and what she gets is something like what Stoller points out. The first president to champion antitrust reform in the State of the Union since 1979.

I haven't seen the full Sarah Huckabee Sanders speech yet. but man, is that going to miss the mark if Biden is out there talking about increasing manufacturing, increasing jobs, decreasing unemployment, and all of these economic metrics? She said the choices between normal and crazy, this is a quote I just saw from Twitter. Republicans punching at a culture war straw man is not giving people that choice very clearly. She's saying, yeah, right. But that's their problem because Biden is the one that comes off as normal. This is that. Right.

And that that's why that's Biden's strength is is in some ways his weakness. He's this like centrist old white man. And it's just not going to land. You're just not going to call him a radical wokester and have it stick. It was like Jesse Waters or somebody said, people just don't hate Joe Biden. It's true. It's something good for them. So on the other hand, let's go ahead and put, what is this, B3 guys that we could put up on the screen here from the Washington Post,

where you have the latest Post ABC poll, which had a lot of bad numbers for Joe Biden, says more than six in 10 say the president has not accomplished much, despite, they say, the passage of numerous bills, which is true. 62% of Americans say Biden has accomplished not very much or little or nothing during his presidency. Only 36% say he's accomplished a great deal or a good amount. His approval rating is low. We showed a poll earlier that has him losing to Donald Trump. Of course, a lot of polls out there, too, having him losing to Ron DeSantis if DeSantis ends up

being the nominee. You have a majority of Democrats, Ryan, who say we don't want this guy to run again. We want someone else. So even as, you know, I listened to that speech and there's a lot in there that, you know, I respond to. I think it's a good case he makes about what he's done, about what he might do going forward, laying out industrial policy, antitrust, pro-labor, et cetera. But there's a lot of signs the American people aren't really feeling that right now. The flip side of nobody hating Joe Biden is that nobody really likes him either. He's just kind of okay. He exists. 7% of people who said they were excited about him.

Who's excited about Joe Biden? We'll work at MSNBC. It's the cast of Nicole Wallace's show. It's the low-rated one, too. Not even the good one, if there is such a thing. Yeah, I don't know. So, yeah, nobody's excited about him, but that's not how you govern anymore in America, and it's not necessarily how you win elections. Yeah.

Like, Hillary Clinton's problem was nobody was, you know, she had this small group that was really excited about her, but in general, people weren't excited about her. They thought she was qualified and most qualified, et cetera. But people intensely disliked her on the other side. Yeah. etc but people intensely disliked her on the other side yeah and it became a contest if you remember in the polling at the very end of who was the least disliked by the american public and biden ended up beating trump four years later because he was less disliked than trump was that's a good point yeah with trump he has very high favorables and very high unfavorables nobody feels ambivalent towards right whereas Right. Everyone's ambivalent

to Biden. Yeah, everyone is basically ambivalent. He's like, he's fine. I mean, Emily, the thing I keep coming back to with Biden and his reelect is, I don't know

if you remember, Ron Klain, after Emmanuel Macron won re-election in France, where his approval rating was total trash. It was like in the 30s.

And he's able to win and he won pretty easily over Marine Le Pen because people really hated her as. And he's able to win and he won pretty easily over Marine Le Pen because people really hated her a lot. And so, you know, Ron Klain tweets this out and is like, oh, interesting. He won reelection with a 36 percent approval rating or whatever. I mean, that kind of seems like the path that they are hoping for for Biden. And so that's why you see, you know, not only in the speech, he really did front load with what he's done and what he wants to do and where we are, et cetera, on the economy. But there's also quite a bit in there, which obviously Republicans got upset about, about the Republican

plans and why they were the wrong direction. So, I mean, in some ways, I think his reelect hinges on how much people dislike the Republicans, how extreme they are and how much they want to avoid going in that direction again. Right. And that's why it totally depends on the nominee. And we've seen that show up in polling. But it's a really important point because I think American politics is lurching towards that reality for the foreseeable future period, where you have people with really low approval ratings, maybe even low favorability ratings that are just able to muster the right, cobble together the right coalition and just scrape past or get to that 50% mark or 49, whatever it is. And that's the reality I think we're facing in the country,

that we're too divided to have, I think like Ronald Reagan's reelection, where he's just trouncing absolutely everybody. That's just not going to happen. Or Bill Clinton. I mean, we're just, we're not in that world anymore. world anymore And so Republicans I think need to realize that if they want to create this dichotomy of normal versus crazy They need to figure out how to make that stick to Joe Biden. They need to not be the not be crazy Deville thing and stand up and yell it's a tough thing I really don't know how they get their way out of it. Because I can make the case on either side. Like if I'm Ron DeSantis, look, okay, let's say Trump. We had a fun debate at our live show.

What happens if Trump and DeSantis both die? But what's more likely? What the hell is wrong with you guys? It was a funny, it was a fun, honestly, it was a fun segment. All of us have debated Trump and DeSantis things so many times. We're like, all right. We're like, what if they both get arrested? My scenario was that they were both on Air Force One and Air Force One crashed.

Marshall had a good one. They blow up the Chinese balloon over Florida. And the debris takes them both out. DeSantis arrested for grooming. Yeah, Santos. Actually, no, George Santos killed them both. Okay, so part of what we got from, so part of what we got from that dialogue was that they need to try and reconcile the craziness of Trump and the energy of that with the fact that they still won 6% of the national popular vote during the midterms. Like, this can be done.

Joe Biden is weak. We have all of the polling data to show that. It Trump and that wing, which is dragging them down electorally. However, they hold so much power institutionally. Go ahead. Yeah, no, I think that's that's 100 percent true. And Biden is picking up on this with his own party in a way that Republicans who have seen the culture war sort of path to victory in a Virginia or a Florida, you cannot just translate that to Sarah Huckabee Sanders going all in and having absolutely no answer to Biden's very sort of like normie aimed square at the middle economic speech. That's like a kitchen table, real person speech. You can't just come out swinging with that kind of stuff. And Biden, for instance,

he didn't say much, as you guys pointed out earlier, on abortion. He didn't say much about the border. He didn't say much about LGBTQ issues. He said we had one mention of transgender young people. But the bulk of the speech was on the economy. He didn't even talk about Ukraine that much. Yeah. It was at the bottom third. I was shocked by it. Right. And so I think Democrats have realized, probably picked up on the number from the midterms, which the midterm narrative was one thing. But it is true. Republicans did have a decent night, not nearly what it was projected to be, but they did OK in the popular vote. So if Democrats see that, they do have a lot of culture war problems. There's just no question about it. You did a great podcast this week on Deconstructed where you sort of talked through some of this. They do have those issues, but Republicans can't fight them in a way that handicaps themselves going into those battles. Biden doesn't give

them a lot of ammunition, and I'm not aware of a national election that has ever been won on the question of what local schools should be teaching or not teaching. That is our destiny, though, to have presidential elections hinge on who gets to play on the lacrosse team. That will be eventually where this system is heading. I don't know if it'll be this one or four years from now, but it's part of the process of just removing more and more decision making away from elections. But you still have to give people something to fight over. But speaking of not having anything to fight over, it's like the Democratic Party seems like they don't have the civil war that they had

over the last kind of six, seven, eight years. It was basically won by the establishment with Biden finally beating Bernie. But they also absorbed a decent amount of what Bernie was fighting for. And so that's why you see so much frustration on the outside that Bernie's not fighting more, that Bernie's become a big supporter of Joe Biden. Because Bernie, as budget chairman, is writing the reconciliation package. He's, you know, he's seeing trillions of dollars of spending go through. You're seeing, you know, unemployment knocked down to what, 3.4 percent? Lowest since like 1969.

Right. And so you have this, he talked about the nearly $400 billion in climate spending. And so. He called himself a capitalist? Yeah. Yes. Yes. Right. Right. Exactly. So they kind of they kind of ended this civil war by a beating Bernie, but then

be bringing in a decent amount of what he was fighting for, just enough to kind of keep them happy together. And because Democrats, Democratic voters are so fired up about electability and beating the evil Republicans, they're going to keep putting forward people like Biden, probably, whereas Republicans still are, you know, fired by the by the culture war issues. And because I think they were told that Trump was unelectable, they said, screw it, we don't care. We're electing him anyway. We're not nominating him anyway. He won. They don't they don't want to hear about anymore for people. Yeah, I agree. And they're not going to want to hear that for a long time. Go ahead, Chris. Emily, what do you see as the contours

of the coming Republican? I mean, the Republican civil war is sort of upon us. You know, people are kind of choosing their sides and the battle lines are breaking down. But like, are there economic issues that are involved in that Republican civil war? Is it primarily around culture war issues? Clearly, Ron DeSantis is positioning himself as like, you know, I was during COVID. I was the guy who was open for business. Donald Trump was shutting things down. Whether the facts of that, whatever, that's how he's positioning himself.

Is that going to be the key dividing line? How do you see this playing out? So it looks like Nikki Haley is going to announce formally and do a rollout next week. And that's already what I've seen some on the kind of new right talking about is like what an embarrassment that this is just a Tea Party ghost who has not updated herself whatsoever. But then the question is, what is the substantial difference between Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley? Because with Donald Trump, we know to some extent that it's just a mixed bag. It's the same thing with his foreign policy. You're going to get some new, some shocking new, and some of the old stuff. It depends on who wins the fight at any given moment, the tug of war at any given moment. But how substantially different is Ron DeSantis or Glenn Youngkin,

Mr. P.E. Patagonia vest going to be on that issue? And I think that's a really open question. And the primaries are going to be a place where that's sorted out because Republicans do face pressure now after Donald Trump, this is post-Paul Ryan era, not to do things to Social Security and Medicare. This is a huge source of pressure on Republicans. So I think a lot of it will be hashed out in the midterms. I think it's completely up in the air now. I think anybody who says the Republican Party has been permanently changed for good and turned into the party of the working class is absolutely wrong. That's not to say there isn't some reason for optimism. It's possible. Right. Yeah.

And by the way, Stoller talks about this. This is good for everybody. The Republican Party is never going to be a beautiful, wonderful, pure party of the working class. It's not going to happen. The Democratic Party is not going to be either. One might be better than the other. But the Republican Party at least being dragged, kicking and screaming to say things like, if we're going to balance the budget, we're not going to do it from stealing and raiding from your entitlement funds. That's a good day for everyone. But the question is still open. I mean, I see that and I don't because at the end of the day, the McCarthy holdouts also begged and demanded a vote for the frickin fair

tax, which is, you know, terrible, terrible, regressive, like total Tea Party throwback stuff. And the whole contours of the debt ceiling fight outside of them just not publicly wanting to be accused of cutting Social Security and Medicare. This is Tea Party 2.0 stuff. I mean, this is all Tea Party tactics. They're asks. They're Tea Party asks.

So it's, you know, when I look at something like that, I'm like, is it really changed? Is it really different? Because now that Trump is sort of less clearly in command, too, you know, a lot of their talking points and their economic policy has just floated right back to that Mitt Romney, Paul Ryan era, ultimately. And I mean, it's Trump himself, his biggest accomplishment was the gigantic corporate tax cut that they all are perfectly happy with. Well, and the other thing, and you'll definitely have thoughts on this, but antitrust is a huge, and I'm actually very curious if Sarah Huckabee Sanders

had a word about antitrust because Republicans have actually made significant motions. Some of the most powerful antitrust suits have been filed by people like Ken Paxton in Texas and the Trump administration against Google. There's some real meat on the bones. That's like one of the areas where there is actually truly a realignment, to borrow a word from Sagar and Marshall, that you can see happening. And who is Rhonda Santos? Is Sarah Huckabee Sanders? Is Nikki Haley? What are they going to say about that? How would they govern? That's a completely- Nikki Haley is already on record. We know where Nikki would be.

She's already on record against what is it. And she's staking her lane out on that. Now is not the time to rethink capitalism, is what she famously said in her speech. So good luck, Nikki. I'm going to enjoy watching you fail. I really will. I could say that as the Indian American who doesn't want to see you be the first one on the stage for all of us. But, Ryan, I'm curious here also on the Democratic side.

So at the end of the day, you know, the laundry list of here's what I want and all this, it's not going to happen. This was all just oppositional. So to that extent, Biden, we were talking about this is the kickoff of his campaign. It seems like it did pretty good job. Like overall, this is probably as good as you could probably hope for. And he didn't step into any of the pitfalls. I saw that he's on his way to Wisconsin and Florida. In Florida, I'd just be like, give up, Mr. President. That ship sailed, sir. Wisconsin, that's a smart move.

But yeah, going into those two states in the next couple of days, this is probably going to be a pretty high point for him, especially coming off the midterms. There were two paths he could have taken when Republicans said, we're going to hold the debt-stealing hostage to force demands. He could have taken the last Joe Biden approach, which was great. We all need to get together. We'll do a commission. A little Simpson Bowles. Simpson Bowles. We'll hold hands together. I got Bruce

Reid here. He was my staff guy then. He's still in the White House. Dust the plans off. And yes, like people want to work longer. Medicare is too generous and Medicaid, you know, that, you know, people people need to be incentivized to get back to work. Like they could have been that Joe Biden. Right. Or it could be the Joe Biden that we saw tonight. It was like who baits them with the Rick Scott plan, and he could have baited them with the Kevin McCarthy plan saying they were going to strengthen Social Security and Medicare. He gets them to call him a liar. And he said, oh, wait, we got a lot of converts here. I'm happy. So great. So he goes the other direction and says, we're not going to go down that path, which means that the Biden who came out of the

gate with the, you know, he said, here's my offer on the American Rescue Plan, $1.9 trillion. And Susan Collins comes back. She's like, here's our offer, $550 billion or 600, whatever it is. Two hours later, he puts out a statement. He's like, we're doing this alone. We're not we're not taking six months like Obama did and like allowing Susan Collins to just like dictate this to us. That was a shocking moment in democratic political history. You know how he's been like conferring with John Meacham and trying to step into the FDR shoes. And this is like actually reported. Axios has had reports on Biden, like genuinely trying to rescue the soul of the nation and seeing himself as this FDR figure, not like FDR light, but like FDR next generation, truly. And he had a line in the speech where he talked about, I think it's the Inflation Reduction Act provisions of it not going into effect until

January 1. So people are just starting to feel the economy heating up and the economy is heating up in different ways. And that might explain the disconnect between the mood of the country and polling and what Biden sees as a hot economy or a heating up economy. But to that point, is it some of that seeing him slotting himself into that character, this FDR like figure that has made him say, I'm not the old Joe Biden. Screw it. We're not waiting for Susan Collins. But at the same time, he did say Republican friends over and over again in that speech. Notice that? I mean, this is in particular a real break from the old Joe Biden. Here's the line from the speech.

If anyone tries to cut Social Security, I will stop them. If anyone tries to cut Medicare, I will stop them. I will not allow them to be taken away. Not today, not tomorrow, not ever. Now, he doesn't say in there not yesterday because he's tried multiple times in the past. For 40 years, I tried to cut Social Security. But if you try it. Today, no, not tomorrow, not ever. Take what we can get, folks. Yes. So God love you. Yeah. I mean, listen, I don't want to oversell it because on the other hand, you know, went out of his way to like bust the potential rail strike and hand power to the

bosses there, like hasn't fought for lifting the minimum wage, you know, mentioned the pro act here that fell off the table, didn't really put the screws to mansion and cinema over build back better. And so, you know, we were all happy when we got something in the Inflation Reduction Act, but it's easy to forget how much the actual original vision was trimmed by a lack of willingness to play hardball and a willingness to like just accept the rulings of the parliamentarian and things like that. So I don't want to oversell it here, but I do think there are some noteworthy shifts in terms of, I mean, even just industrial policy and antitrust. These were like antitrust.

I mean, the Obama administration was terrible on antitrust, terrible, allowed some of these gigantic mergers to go through that now people are raging about, right? The ticket master being a primary example there. And, you know, so industrial policy was basically a dirty word in both parties for my entire life until now. Up until literally, I think, three years ago. Yeah. Really, when Biden put out. You were a communist. Do you remember when Biden put out, what was it? His like Made in America plan. I praised it on Rising In Here. I was like, hey, listen, that's pretty good. I was like, you can say whatever. I was like, by the way, I was like, Jared, please release the Made in America thing from the National Security Council, which I know that you held up for two years and then didn't end up passing for literally no reason. So in a lot of ways for Trump, this is dangerous territory.

I mean, Biden is taking the two most singular popular things that he did, which was China and it was made in America. Look at that, you know, the way he talked about China in the speech. Although not much. No, he didn't talk about it much. But look, he did not say that, what, seven years ago. Right. What he was trying to say in that whole switch places with Xi, I speak Bidenese, is because I used to watch him whenever he was coherent. And he would always talk about how he was one of those people.

He was so pro-engagement with China. He often says this. I'm the only person. I've spent more hours with Xi Jinping than any other Western leader in the world. I've sat there, and I've talked with him across the table. That was his big selling point. He was so excited. He even brought his son.

Oh, I know. Yeah, actually, there was a lot of business dealings going on. That was side of the big guy. All on Air Force force two another story for another day of which we have covered several times but the point is is that he has gone from engagement to confrontation clearly that is without trump that doesn't happen and he's also now gone completely with made in america the full embrace of all that i do want to know who he is he goes many people don't like when i say this, but we're going to buy American.

I'm like, who is saying that? Outside of like JP Morgan CEO, who is saying that? I'm like, I like that. Most people like that.

Larry Summers. Yeah, okay. Got some flap in the country club. One last thought, and then I want to hear you guys' final thoughts as well.

One thing we talked about going into this, which maybe it shouldn't matter, maybe it shouldn't matter. I think it's reasonable for people that have concerns about a man who would be 86 by the end of a next term. And so as much as the New York Times was running a story that I know was planted by Biden aides about how he's preparing to overcome a stutter in this speech, sort of trying to set the bar low that if it doesn't go well, don't be an asshole. It's because he has a stutter. It's not because he's old, guys. Don't say that. But ultimately, you know, I mean, he's still Joe Biden at 80 years old. Still not what he used to be. It wasn't like an incredibly masterful oratory. But Ryan, I think,

you know, in terms of what he's capable of, this was a pretty well delivered speech. And as Emily was saying, you know, being able to do a little give and take with the audience, that's not easy to do. So I think also he did himself some favors in terms of persuading people that this is a man who is still capable of conducting the business of the presidency and that we're not all going to be left in the hands of Kamala Harris dear God I think I think we're also starting to all grade him on a curve relative to what we expect from him like I think he has successfully set the bar really low for his public performances every time he tried to go off the teleprompter off script with a little riff yeah you're almost holding your breath for him.

Outside of the Medicare thing, they were all bad. All bad. Every single one. Even his start. He starts out by saying, I get to be here because Jill's going to the game tomorrow.

What are you talking about? Are you talking about the Super Bowl and the Eagles? Yeah. What are you, what? That's Sunday, man. He's very excited to see how Donovan McNabb performs. Yes. What? He's Sunday, man. He's very excited to see how Donovan McNabb performs.

Yes. What? He should have finished with a Go Birds at the end. Yeah. Because he's not winning Missouri. That's true. That's true. That's what a doctor is saying.

Fly, Eagles, fly, Rocks. Well, on that point, and he did seem to get Tyree Nichols' name wrong. Alden Tyler. It wasn't great. Sounding like Tyler. Yeah, it wasn't great. Sounded like Tyler. Yeah, it wasn't a perfect performance. But I do think that because the bar is so low for him, every time he clears it and looks like he can give a normal presidential speech for an hour, again, because the bar is so

low. And part of that, by the way, is because Donald Trump was the preceding president. Yep, that's a good point. And Donald Trump's State of the Unions tended to be pretty boilerplate and conventional. That wasn't true of the rest of his communications. So Joe Biden being able to just give a speech

for an hour, talk about his Republican friends, and make America at least sort of be back in the political theater that people are comfortable with, I guess that's a win for him. Yeah.

All right. Okay, guys, thank you so much for your analysis. I hope everybody enjoyed this stream. Thank you so much also to our premium members who help support the show and keep all of these things going. They are expensive to put on, so we really much appreciate you. And we love you all. We're going to have some content for you guys tomorrow. Hint, it involves a congressman

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