Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - 6/28/23: Time Bomb In SCOTUS 2024 Ruling?, Report: Trump Aide Wanted To Drone Immigrants, 2024 Candidate Faceplants China Question, Modern Men Cry More, Gov Closes Case On Epstein, Liz Cheney Whining, Office Space Apocalypse

Episode Date: June 28, 2023

Krystal and Emily discuss a SCOTUS ruling that could effect 2024 race, a report that a Trump aide wanted to drone strike immigrants attempting to cross the border, Miami mayor and 2024 GOP candidate faceplants on a basic question about China, a study showing Modern Men cry more than Women, a Gov report hopes to close the case on the Epstein "suicide", Liz Cheney whines that we're "electing idiots", and the Office Space Apocalypse hits NYC.To become a Breaking Points Premium Member and watch/listen to the show uncut and 1 hour early visit: https://breakingpoints.supercast.com/Merch Store: https://shop.breakingpoints.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Camp Shane, one of America's longest-running weight loss camps for kids, promised extraordinary results. But there were some dark truths behind Camp Shane's facade of happy, transformed children. Nothing about that camp was right. It was really actually like a horror movie. Enter Camp Shame, an eight-part series examining the rise and fall of Camp Shane and the culture that fueled its decades-long success. You can listen to all episodes of Camp Shame one week early and totally ad-free on iHeart True Crime Plus.

So don't wait. Head to Apple Podcasts and subscribe today. DNA test proves he is not the father. Now I'm taking the inheritance. Wait a minute, John. Who's not the father? and subscribe today. his irresponsible son, but I have DNA proof that could get the money back. Hold up. They could lose their family and millions of dollars? Yep. Find out how it ends by listening to the OK Storytime podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Have you ever thought about going voiceover? I'm Hope Woodard, a comedian, creator, and seeker of male validation. I'm also the girl behind Boy Sober, the movement that exploded in 2024.

You might hear that term and think it's about celibacy, but to me, Boy Sober is about understanding yourself outside of sex and relationships. It's flexible, it's customizable, and it's a personal process. Singleness is not a waiting room. You are actually at the party right now. Let me hear it.

Listen to VoiceOver on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey guys, Ready or Not 2024 is here and we here at Breaking Points are already thinking of ways we can up our game for this critical election. We rely on our premium subs to expand coverage, upgrade the studio, add staff, give you guys the best independent coverage that is possible. If you like what we're all about, it just means the absolute world to have your support. But enough with that. Let's get to CounterPoint.

I was going to use my favorite joke, which is I'm joined by Ryan Grimm, but I think I've used it way too many times. The funny thing is, I feel like Ryan Grimm, but I think I've used it way too many times. The funny thing is, I feel like Ryan Grimm does have more doppelgangers than literally anyone I've ever known on the planet. Like, really dead-on ringers for him, but I am probably not one of them. Probably not.

We'll let the audience decide. For the most part, Ryan does have that top, but he doesn't usually wear it. Actually, we're going to talk about this. He wears it casually, not on the show. We will talk about this at one point in the show. We're going to talk about men. We will talk about this at one point in the show. We're going to talk about men today. We have one block. You can see it on the screen. That's just men. Yes. So a lot of good stuff in the show today. We have some Supreme Court rulings that we're going to break down for you, a couple of which are really quite significant. We'll preview

for you what else is coming up. We've got some big GOP moves with regard to the border and immigration and a little bit of a retrospective on how the Republican Party has shifted in the Trump era. So that'll be interesting. Also, a big old 2024 blooper from one of the new entrants into the GOP. Is this a bad one? This is a really bad one. So we'll play that for you. The aforementioned study on men. Emily and I, being that it's, you know, the ladies show today, we found the study really interesting. It's about men, their level of sensitivity, how often they cry in a month. There's a survey that actually says men cry more often than women. So we'll tell you what we think about all of that. And there is a new report breaking down what supposedly happened in terms

of Epstein's quote unquote suicide. We have those details for you. Emily is taking a look at some new comments from Liz Cheney. I am taking a look at a potentially cataclysmic crash in the commercial real estate market. So a lot of good stuff to get into this morning. That's right. And we're eagerly awaiting, as we sit here right now, some Supreme Court results that could, I think, have really dramatic consequences for the country. But we're going to start with some results from yesterday that actually already really dramatic consequences for the country. But we're going to start with some results from yesterday

that actually already have dramatic results for the country. So, Crystal, this is in the case of Moore v. Harper. Yep. So, guys, go ahead and put this first one up on the screen. This is from More Perfect Union. In a 6-3 decision, Supreme Court decides Moore v. Harper and rejects the so-called independent state legislature theory. I'll tell you in a minute what that is, which claims state legislatures have total authority over elections. This ruling ensures that courts can still strike down state election laws and maps. So here's the backstory.

There was a dispute between the North Carolina legislature, which at that time was, and still is, dominated by Republicans, and the North Carolina state courts, which had more of a liberal bent. The court said, the maps you drew, the gerrymandered maps you drew, these are wrong, these are unconstitutional. And the legislature argued, and this is the case that went all the way up to the Supreme Court, that you don't get to have a say in this. There's this clause in the Constitution that says it's up to us, the state legislature, to determine everything with regard to elections. So you don't get to have a say in this. This theory has been kind of fringe. It's been floated for a while, but the Supreme Court has never affirmed it. It came up in the context

of actually Bush v. Gore. There were some dissenting opinions that made reference to this theory and gave it a little bit of credence. But the court yesterday pretty clearly saying we don't agree with that and that this really goes to the core of what judicial review even is. They mentioned Marbury versus Madison in the decision here. That is a seminal case that established that federal courts can strike down laws. It basically established judicial review. And they're like, so yes, we think that courts have power and jurisdiction over this. And the fact that it's mentioned in the constitution that state legislatures have power doesn't mean that they have free reign to do whatever they want. This became really important, Emily, as you know, because this was one of the theories that was floated in 2020 by people who wanted to hand the election to Trump, even though he had lost. So in a state like Georgia, the

argument was, sure, voters might have voted for Biden, although they don't really accept that, but maybe they voted for Biden. But the legislature, since it's packed with Republicans, they can pick whatever electors they want. They don't actually have to listen to the will of the people. And one of the theories here was that because the legislature had complete control, they could just discard whatever else had happened and they could pick their electors. So it had far-ranging potential consequences here if this one went the other direction. However, it did not. And a majority on the court said, no, we're not buying it. Courts still have jurisdiction here. Federal elections are one of the most interesting sources of tension, not just on the right,

but I think when we talk about what America is, because judicial review obviously is germane in this case, but it's also this idea that the right at least supports federalism. So the state's ability to determine what's best for its people and for its voting, and what that creates is this disastrous patchwork of different election laws. And that's where you have conservatives in some cases saying, well, you actually really need a more robust federal government policy when it comes to election law. Because we have this insane patchwork of different laws, which in 2020 was a disaster with COVID in particular, that you have very different early voting, for instance. You have very different time periods that people are actually going to cast ballots, very different laws for how they cast those ballots depending on where they live. And, you know, maybe that's the sort of blessing of federalism or it's the sort of disaster of it. It's a double-edged sword of federalism.

And this is from Slate. They write, in the last part of his majority opinion, that's Chief Justice John Roberts who wrote the majority here, he got the liberal justices to sign on to a version of judicial review that is going to give the federal courts, and especially the Supreme Court itself, the last word in election disputes. The court held that, and this is the quote, state courts may not transgress the ordinary bounds of judicial review such that they arrogate

to themselves the power vested in state legislatures to regulate federal elections. And that's just all of it right there. Like that's the nut of the issue. Yeah, so put the second element up on the screen because, well, they did sort of, you know, they did not accept independent state legislature theory. They did put a little bit of a caveat here, and they did give themselves a little bit of wiggle room. So part of what they said in the graphic that's at the top right of the screen, although we conclude the elections clause does not exempt state legislatures from the ordinary constraints imposed by state laws, state courts do not have free reign. State courts are the appropriate tribunals for the decision of questions arising under their local law, whether statutory or otherwise. They cite a case there. At the same time, the Elections Clause expressly vests power to carry out its provisions in the legislature. So expressly saying there, state courts do not have

free reign. So they're saying there may be some limiting principle here if the state courts, in our view as a Supreme Court, get way on over their skis in terms of rejecting what the state legislature does. But in no way do they define what that limiting principle might be. Now, without getting too much into the weeds, it may already there. Yeah, facts. This may become really relevant really quickly because there are a number of states where you have a mismatch between the partisan valence of the legislature and the partisan valence of the courts. The primary one people are pointing to, Emily, is Wisconsin, where you have a Republican legislature, you have a gerrymander that was drawn by Republicans, and you have a state Supreme Court that, I don't know if you guys just remember, there was just a huge election

where a liberal was elected, very clear and ran as a liberal. And this actually gerrymandered lines was one of the things that she ran on. And so you're likely to have this same dispute. You actually already have this dispute between the Wisconsin state Supreme Court and the Wisconsin legislature. So is the Supreme Court going to say, yes, it's within that court's jurisdiction? Yes, it's fine for them to strike down the gerrymandered lines drawn by the Republican legislature. Are they going to use this wiggle room that they gave themselves to go in the opposite direction when it comes to Wisconsin? A lot of, you know, there's a lot of analysis out there that this, there's going to be an immediate test to what the sort of limiting principles here are and whether the court is

really giving state courts kind of, you know, an open, a blank check to do whatever they want with regard to the gerrymander, you know, within the bounds of whatever their judicial process is. Right. And that's where some people I've seen on the right, legal people, I'm reading from Ilya Shapiro right here on Twitter, who's at the Manhattan Institute. And that's where some people are saying, well, Justice Roberts sort of pulls back a little bit and has a, quote, middle of the road decision. He declined to adopt a standard, as Ilya writes, for determining when state courts cross the line, to your point, or even to say whether the North Carolina court did so here. This is a ruling that doesn't actually even weigh in on those questions where it could have. And so this is where Ilya says,

we basically have to wait until the justices are forced to make that hard balls and strikes call that the Chief Justice referenced at his confirmation hearings. And this decision stops sort of doing that. So these questions are now up in the air going forward. Yeah, so they haven't really clearly defined where the boundaries of state court power lie and where it butts up against the state legislature. But, you know, zooming out from this,

the reason people were really watching this closely, this particular case, was because of what happened in 2020 and fears that we could see a repeat of this, especially with Donald Trump, very likely the Republican nominee again. And, you know, I think it's likely you can't say 100 percent, but I think it's likely that they have closed the pathway to them being able to, you know, appoint a fake electors slate in a red state like Georgia and just completely overrule the will of the people and do whatever they want if they happen to have a legislature that is pro-Trump. So it seems like they've more or less

shut the door to that, although they've given themselves a little bit of wiggle room. But, you know, this was one of the cases that liberals were really, really concerned about. And frankly, I think everybody should be concerned about because we do want the will of the people to actually matter in our democracy. And so this is one that people should feel fairly good about, that it went in the direction of saying, no, you can't just do any old thing because you happen to like one outcome over another outcome. It's so interesting how when we're hitting a fever pitch, I think culturally, some of these areas of tension that when you have more social consensus in your constitutional system start to break down. And I feel like you start to see that

kind of first. Like this is where these mechanisms that worked for maybe decades, certainly we've had issues with this throughout American history, but it's just a good example of how when we're not getting along as a country, you start to see it show up in some like warning signs like this. Yeah, I think that's right. There was another decision yesterday, another ruling that we thought was interesting. Put this next one up on the screen.

So the Supreme Court said that a conviction for online threats violated the First Amendment. This is a write-up in The Washington Post. The subhead here says prosecutors have to show that a person responsible for threats understood the threatening nature of that speech. So the backstory here, as I understand it, is you had a music artist who was being stalked effectively by this dude who kept sending all these threatening messages. She said it really impacted her. She was scared for her health and safety. She, for a time, stopped doing public appearances and public concerts, so it impacted her career because she just never knew whether this guy was going to turn up and what he might be capable of doing, et cetera. And so the question here was whether or not you could uphold this conviction for these online threats.

And let me give you a taste of what she was being sent here. And she would block his account on Facebook, and then he'd create a new account and still post these messages, etc. So among the messages that were presented at trial, there was one that said, I'm currently unsupervised. I know it freaks me out too, but the possibilities are endless. So listen, no one wants to get that message. That sounds really creepy, but it to me doesn't meet the test of like a direct and specific threat. Another one said F off permanently. Another one said you're not being good for human relations. Die.

Don't need you. What the majority decided here in a 72 ruling with Elena Kagan writing for the majority, and I'm reading the Washington Post now, the court emphasized that true threats of violence are not protected by the First Amendment, of course, but to guard against a chilling effect on non-threatening speech, the majority said states have to prove that a criminal defendant has consciously disregarded a substantial risk that his communications would be viewed as threatening violence. So it's not enough that it is a violent threat, which is not protected by the First Amendment. There also has to be an intentionality around it or a reckless disregard. I'm not sure that's exactly the language that they use, but that's effectively what they're communicating here. But that there needs to be

some sort of understanding of the way that these threats would ultimately be perceived. You had Justice Clarence Thomas and Amy Coney Barrett who were in the dissent. Barrett wrote that the standards set by the court on Thursday gives, quote, preferential treatment to a broad range of threatening speech and makes it more difficult for law enforcement to address actual threats. A little bit more from Elena Kagan. She says our decisions have often insisted on protecting even some historically unprotected speech through the adoption of a subjective mental

state element. This is writing for the majority. We follow the same path today, holding the state must prove in true threats cases that the defendant had some understanding of his statements threatening character. What do you think of this one? And, you know, that's very different than saying, you know, to your point, which I think is a good one, whether or not this particular speech met the threshold, whether or not someone knew it as a threat. I think that's probably the more interesting question with those messages. It's like, is, especially now that we live in this online world where people almost feel like they're playing, they're seduced into thinking they're playing a video game when they're talking to real human beings on the other side because of the way

social media functions. I think it's a really interesting question of whether speech where you say die and then, you know, but it's not really like I'm going to kill you die constitutes a threat. Like that's to me a more interesting question than whether he knew it was a threat, because I actually kind of tend to side with Barrett. And one of the things we should say, like these last two decisions we've been talking about, 6-3 and 7-2. So they were not just partisan down the line votes. Yeah, exactly. So you have Justice Roberts writing in the 6-3 decision and you have just Amy Coney Barrett and Sotomayor and Gorsuch coming together in that role. Like that's a beautiful, beautiful friendship. But I think in this case, I'm sort of tempted to be with Amy Coney Barrett on that because I can envision, especially for people that are mentally ill, a whole lot of threatening speech. Yeah. Now not being or being protected in ways that it absolutely shouldn't be because you can make the argument with a good attorney that,

hey, this person didn't know. They didn't understand this to be threatening because they lacked the capacity at that particular time. I think that's a fair point. I mean, it's undeniably, like, it's a subjective judgment. So if you can hire a great, if you're wealthy, you can hire a great attorney. They can convince, you know, they can convince a jury that they didn't even know what they were doing, right?

They had no idea the way that this would be perceived as so threatening. Then you potentially, you know, allow think the First Amendment rights are so foundational that I would always err on the side of protecting them more and have more concern about, you know, potentially chilling effect of non-threatening speech if you do not have these sorts of bounds in place. So I tend to err more on the side of, all right, let's err on the side of free speech. But, you know, I think the concerns voiced in the dissent are completely legitimate. Like, where are the boundaries here? How do you even interpret somebody's subjective intent or what was going on in their mind?

But in some ways, that's the nature of a lot of our laws turn on determining someone's mental state and their intent at the time that a crime was committed. And also, this is how you met Kyle. Well, in case you don't know, Shu actually documented this, that I was the first one to reach out to him. So if anything, it goes in the other direction. That's one of my favorite viral tweets ever. It's like, ladies, don't be afraid to make the first move,

and it's crystal sliding in the cast. Go for it. But I would argue that you didn't know that was a threat at the time. I didn't, yeah. So I agree with the majority here. I don't think it should be considered that way because I was out of my mind.

I had no idea what I was doing and getting myself into, clearly. So we are expecting, make a hard turn here, we are expecting some other really momentous decisions here. And listen, as much as we expect these are going to go one way or the other, you just never know, right? The justices have already proven themselves to be somewhat unpredictable.

So put this last piece up on the screen. Supreme Court's biggest decisions are coming. Some of these I think could come down today, tomorrow. And I think, Emily, that this is the last week when we are going to get rulings from the court. So all of these are still hanging out there. Big one, affirmative action. This is per the AP, the survival of affirmative action in higher education, subject of two related cases, one involving Harvard, the other University of North Carolina. Supreme Court has previously approved of the use of affirmative action in higher education decisions, reaching back to 1978.

But the justices' decision to take the cases suggested a willingness to revisit those rulings. So obviously that's a big one. We're already planning a panel for tomorrow, which, by the way, it's going to be me and Emily again tomorrow for Breaking Points. Because Sagar, as you guys know, is away for his first of two wedding ceremonies. So we're planning some coverage of that whenever that decision comes down. They also have on the docket student loans. Are they going to uphold President Biden's plan to reduce student loan debt that has been highly contested? There is a potential that the justices decide the challengers lack the right to sue that they don't have standing and therefore the plan can still go forward. I think that's the best hope for those who are hoping that that student loan debt relief remains in place.

And the challenge with that one is basically like, OK, well, who is actually harmed by this decision? And conservatives have had a hard time coming up with a group that was, you know, legitimately harmed. They went with, I believe that this case relates to a student loan processor that says like, our fees are being cut and we're being hurt by this decision. But that's a possibility that they could just sort of like punt on this one and say, listen, they don't have standing. So we're not issuing really a ruling at all. Another one here is on gay rights and religious rights and the, you know, where's the line here? This one involves a graphic artist in Colorado who is Christian, who wants to design wedding websites, but does not want to design same-sex wedding websites. This has, you know,

the gay cake baking thing, very similar kind of dynamics here. Yeah, I've talked to her. It's basically the exact same thing as Masterpiece and the Washington flower shop. So, how, Bernal Stutzman. So, how, has this not already been, like, didn't they already rule on those?

What happened there? Yes, but it's just, it's so state-based. So, if your state has a very particular law, that can then get sort of stress-tested intentionally. And in the case of Jack Phillips with Masterpiece Cake, you had LGBT activists intentionally stress testing the laws and making

sure that these were cases that were ready for the court, basically. This is sort of similar in that it's preemptive, that Lori Smith of 303 Creative, who wants to design websites, wants basically the state, she doesn't think the state law protects her right, to refuse to make wedding websites for gay couples, a gay wedding. And so it's similar in the sense that it's kind of a preemptive thing where it's going to court and it's kind of intentionally stress testing. Got you. So seeing where exactly the bounds of this are. Right.

Okay. All right. So those are some of the big ones that we're watching for. Obviously, all of these would be extremely momentous and, you know, we'll be all over it. And like I said before, we're trying to get together some experts on both sides of the affirmative action debate so that we can kind of like get into that one tomorrow on Breaking Point. So make sure you stay tuned for that. I was assigned segment blocks in my favorite order here, which is BD. We were talking on the phone yesterday about who's going to start each block, which is like a little inside baseball thing that Sagar and Crystal do,

and Ryan and I probably should do. But I got the B block, the D block, and the E block, and I had to make the joke. Well, Sagar and I are just more like plan-y, like a little more stress-y and plan-y than you guys are and you guys are a little more like, you got that like chill, like fish vibe, I guess. He put a fish water bottle on his side. I did not notice that. That was funny. Obviously. Well, we're going to talk about the border actually. It's perfect for section B because there's a really interesting Rolling Stone report and we can put B1 up on the screen here, that Stephen Miller, who you are surely familiar with as one of Trump's

big advisors, particularly on the border, particularly on immigration issues, quote, advocated using U.S. predator drones in 2018 to blow up migrant boats full of unarmed civilians, according to an upcoming book by a former administration official. Now, I'm going to keep reading from this Rolling Stone report because actually this takes us back. I'm almost nostalgic for the era of the Trump White House leaks where you really had to be reading tea leaves to know exactly what was happening because there's disagreement on whether this actually happened. And the book is from Miles Taylor, who is, again, perhaps a familiar name. If you torture yourself by watching MSNBC enough, you definitely know Miles Taylor. I actually forgot about this

whole saga. He's the one who said, it was a capital A anonymous in the New York Times, who said basically we are, what was it, the 25th Amendment, right, back then. And people in the Trump administration, he was listed as a senior official. Yeah, it was like we are the dissidents within, I'm getting the language right, wrong, but that was like the basically the vibe is like we're the secret dissidents within the Trump administration. Right. And Miles Taylor was given cover to write this by the New York Times as a senior administration official. And they gave him the anonymous byline as a senior administration official. He really was nobody. I mean, it was an incredible stretch to say he was a senior administration official. But Rolling Stone

continues and says they have reviewed written documentation from during the Trump administration that supports Taylor's claim. Taylor's account, however, is contested both by Stephen Miller, says it didn't happen, and another person present, who is Paul Zuckunft, a since-retired admiral who was then commandant of the U.S. Coast Guard, reached for comment. He said he has no recollection of that, and he says, quote, I vividly recall having a lengthy conversation with Stephen Miller regarding Southwest border security in 2018.

My point was that the U.S. is not exerting enough influence in the form of foreign aid in the tri-border region of Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador. He goes on to basically say, that didn't happen and we had these conversations, but there was a different context. But to that point, let's put this Axios graphic up on the screen. This is B2. GOP presidential field embraces Trump's border wall. They sort of run the gamut of all of these different Republican candidates and where they've really kind of coalesced and become a block when it comes to immigration policies and the border wall. And then it gets even, we're going to take it even

a step further here and put B3 up on the screen. This is reason they did something similar to Axios, but actually on a very specific question, not just about the wall, not just about hardline immigration policies. This one is about the Republican primary consensus for sending the military into Mexico. So Reason says, listed in order of the RealClearPolitics polling average for the past month, here are the top six 2024 GOP presidential candidates talking in their own words about using the U.S. military in Mexico to fight fentanyl-dealing drug cartels. So the version of 2016's Build the Wall is going to be send in the troops. That's basically how this is emerging. And it's become a really hot debate in conservative circles. So on that note, Crystal, it's actually very interesting when you have

the Heritage Foundation starting to talk about, for instance, like even the Heritage Foundation, long supported by the defense industry to the tune of millions of dollars, saying we should cut the Pentagon budget. Now talking about in conservative circles, I don't know if anyone from Heritage has said this in particular, but as you have so many people on the right to the point where it's leaked to the Heritage Foundation or trickled into the Heritage Foundation, talking about the Pentagon and excess of spending on the Pentagon forever wars, thinking about starting a military conflict in Mexico. In Mexico. Right. Yes. Which is, I mean, listen, I think it's patently insane. I don't even think it's a smart idea if you're worried about fentanyl, et cetera. I mean, we've been trying the war on drugs for a long time, hasn't worked out, et cetera. But so there's that piece of it. There's the merits of the idea. There's as you're pointing out, Emily, there's the hypocrisy or the distance between some of the rhetoric. I mean, the GOP is very divided on even using this rhetoric, but some of the

rhetoric that you now hear from Republicans about ending forever wars, about certainly this is used a lot when it comes to Ukraine and our involvement there. But when you start talking about China or you start talking about troops into Mexico, you hear a very, very different narrative. And specifically, like the idea that has been taken up and mainstream, you've got, you know, Tim Scott sounding like this. You've got Nikki Haley sounding like this, not to mention Vivek Ramaswamy, Ron DeSantis, Donald Trump, et cetera, is, hey, let's use the same justification as the war on terror to, you know, justify these, to label these cartels as terrorists and then to justify military action basically with a blank check. So any semblance of, hey, let's curtail, like the war on terror has gotten out of control. It's been a blank check for presidents to do whatever they want around the world.

When it comes to this issue, then suddenly there's a very different tone and polar opposite direction. But the other thing that just strikes me about this politically, Emily, is like it just shows you what a totally dominant force Donald Trump still is in the Republican Party. Because Chris Christie, Nikki Haley, and some others in 2016, they actually were against the border wall. They would make fun of Trump for it and say like, this is a preposterous idea. It's not going to work. Chris Christie would mock his voice and like, you know, push back on the idea of the border wall. So even someone who's a quote unquote moderate, like Chris Christie is now accepted like, yeah, we got to be in favor of the border wall, I guess, because that's just where the Republican base is now.

And I noted, too, you know, Trump had floated when he was in office. He floated ending birthright citizenship. Yeah. Ron DeSantis has now picked this up. is what a, you know, what is it, 800-pound gorilla Trump is in the room, that the idea that he isn't the leader of the Republican Party is sort of preposterous because even the ones, even like Chris Christie, whose whole run is about opposing Trump, just basically has fallen in line with him when it comes to policy. And then the other thing that made me think of is like, the worst thing about Trump, one of the worst things about Trump, let me couch that, one of the worst things about Trump in our politics is the way that it just makes everything centered around him.

And where you are put on a political spectrum versus like in terms of media perception and public perception is just all about how you feel about Donald Trump. So you can be Brian Kemp in Georgia, who is really hard right. Like this is no squish, right? Really hard right in terms of his policies, in terms of what he's done in office. But because he bucked Trump on a key issue, he's seen as a quote unquote moderate. Same thing with, you know, Christie. Ron DeSantis is actually a perfect example. The fact that DeSantis is going up against Trump, he's to the right of Trump on a variety of issues. But he's still pitched and viewed in some ways by the public as like, oh, a more sort of mainstream, moderate, acceptable alternative to Trump.

It's just made it impossible to actually think clearly about where do people stand on a policy basis? What would they do in office? Everything just becomes about this central question of how do you feel? How in for Trump are you or how opposed to Trump are you? And I hate that. Well, and it's why the media pushes that too. I mean, I think that's what's really frustrating to voters is that they're forced to see everyone through this, the media's lens, which is a Trump lens. And it's not just the

media's fault for focusing on it. Although the media loves it for ratings. They love it. Like the legacy corporate media loves it for the sake of ratings. That's why they've always pushed Trump. Like going back to those early morning Joe appearances when two people who now claim to be diametrically ideologically opposed to him were fetting him and salivating over him. Like that's always been the case. And what's super interesting about this is to your point about Chris Christie and Nikki Haley going from mocking Trump on the wall to saying, hey, we can maybe do a wall or we have to do a wall. It's interesting because these are people who have not come around and to the sort of anti-chamber of commerce approach that some Republicans, whether or not you agree that this has taken over the Republican Party,

and Ryan and I have definitely debated that. I know there's some people on the left that are absolutely skeptical that there's really been motion that the Republican Party has really become against the Chamber of Commerce because, frankly, you have people like Nikki Haley and Chris Christie who will never do that. It's easy to say we need a border wall. It's a lot more difficult to start talking about things

like birthright citizenship, to start talking about things like actually having an asylum policy that makes sense and that it disincentivizes the cartel trafficking that goes up through northern Mexico and preys on the fact that we have some of these really lax asylum policies that don't make a ton of sense and are easily exploited, etc., etc. That is super interesting because they would not do that. They can talk about the wall as the symbol, but will they actually execute on a Trump-type immigration policy? No. And Trump himself was

talking about- Trump did not execute on a Trump immigration policy. He was talking about DACA. In my opinion, he did way too much that was terrible and unconscionable with regard to the actual treatment of human beings. But in terms of the most maximalist of his rhetoric, I mean, he talked about ending birthright citizenship, but he didn't do it. He was talking about making a deal with Pelosi on DACA. I mean, he's really not ideologically committed to this. It's also kind of symbolic for him, I think. Yeah, I think that's right.

And, I mean, there's just been so much rhetoric over these past number of years around the border, around immigration, in conservative media, and with Trump sort of leading the charge rhetorically that, yeah, even the quote unquote moderates are saying patently insane things about literally invading our southern neighbor. Right. So it's it's a sign of a lot of things. It's a sign of how dominant Trump is. It's a sign of how far right they feel OK to move to please, to placate a GOP base when the only issue that anyone pays attention to is like, what are you saying about Donald Trump? That really gives you cover to do whatever policy-wise to appease a base that, you know, that really is pretty hard line in terms of

immigration and pays a lot of close attention to this. So, you know, it's kind of, it's a pretty fascinating situation. And the same thing, you know, the same brain rot has taken hold, obviously, in the Democratic Party too. You're talking about Liz Cheney today, where it's like, again, what you actually think on any issue is just completely wiped clean.

What you did during the Bush administration, what passed like war crimes, all of that is just water under the bridge if you're willing to say the right things with regard to Donald J. Trump. Yeah. And the final thing I would say to just bring it full circle is there's an actually esoteric sort of academic debate happening on the right now about whether there is a just cause for war with Mexican cartels. Not with the state of Mexico, because Mexico is a failed state where you have, even though AMLO won't admit it, a swath of the country actually in the control of cartels. So can you then justify declaring war on the cartels? And that's an actual debate that's

happening. And so there will be more conversation. I understand the temptation to drone some of these fentanyl operations in Sinaloa. I actually understand why someone would want to do that, just take them out in one fell swoop. But the idea that we can just do that and get out is basically exactly what we've seen repeatedly over the last 100 years fail. Because, I mean, we don't even need to get into the reasons, but that is a sincere conversation happening.

And that's where I have no idea whether Stephen Miller actually said that. But it's in tension with this idea that on the right, you've seen a real improvement in the conversation about immigration. And maybe it's for tactical reasons. I don't know. But that cartels are actually exploiting migrants. They're telling them, you know, you can do this. And they're trafficking them, kidnapping them, raping them, torturing them. Horrible, horrible situation because we have certain policies that they take advantage of. Droning migrant votes is not whatsoever. It's not in the bounds of any sort of conversation anyone should be having. I do want to say I'm a little bit skeptical of this report, too. Like I'm not I'm not I think Stephen Miller is psycho and I don't like put it past him,

but it is worth emphasizing that the person who is claiming this is writing a book. Yes. Was, you know, there's clearly an incentive there. Has a history of exaggeration. Potential history of exaggeration. And it seems like, I don't know that much about the other dude in the room who was, you know, from the military, but he didn't seem like he's some like hardline Trump sycophant who would be going out of his way to cover for the former president. So anyway, take all of that for what it's worth. All right. This is, you guys are going to enjoy this one. So I don't even know if we've mentioned

on the show, but this guy who's the mayor of Miami, Francis Suarez, has decided he also wants to run for president in 2024 in the Republican primary. I most knew him because he's like really embraced crypto for Miami. That's been like kind of a thing. Apparently, the Miami mayoralty is kind of a very weak position. It's almost like more of a just a title and name, only there isn't a lot of power. The king of Miami. Exactly. Which I guess is an important title for what it's worth. But he was on Hugh Hewitt's radio show and he got asked a question about whether or not he would be talking about the Chinese Uyghur Muslim minority and their treatment. But, you know, some of that context was left out. He was just asked,

will you be talking about the Uyghurs? It didn't go too well for him. Take a listen. Will you be talking about the Uyghurs in your campaign? The what? The Uyghurs. What's a Uyghur? OK, we'll come back to that. You won't be obvious.

You got to get smart on that. What's a Uyghur? Oh, that's so bad. And it really reminded me, and I don't think I'm the only one, of how it seems like every presidential election cycle, there's at least one of these moments where someone who fancies themselves the next commander in chief fails to grasp even the most basic information about our foreign policy or what's going on in the world or what their own plans are. So we put together a little, thanks to producer Mac, we're putting together a little bit of a trip down memory lane of some of the worst brain fart moments for political candidates over the past number of years. Let's take a listen to that.

What would you do if you were elected about Aleppo? About Aleppo. And what is Aleppo? You're kidding. No. Aleppo is And what is Aleppo? You're kidding. No. Aleppo is in Syria. It's the epicenter of the refugee crisis. Okay, got it.

Got it. Okay. It's three agencies of government when I get there that are gone. Commerce, education, and the, what's the third one there? Let's see. EPA say EPA EPA there you go seriously is EPA the one you were talking about no sir you can't name the third one the third agency of government I would I would do away with the education the commerce and let's see.

I can't. The third one, I can't. Sorry. Oops. So you agreed with President Obama on Libya or not? Okay, Libya. Yeah. President Obama supported the uprising, correct? President Obama called for the removal of Qaddafi.

Just want to make sure we're talking about the same thing before I say, yes, I agree. No, I didn't agree. I do not agree with the way he handled it for the following reason. No, that's a different one. I got to go back and see. Got all this stuff twirling around in my head.

Do you agree with the Bush Doctrine? In what respect, Charlie? The Bush... What do you interpret it to be? His worldview? No, the Bush Doctrine, enunciated September 2002, before the Iraq War. I believe that what President Bush has attempted to do is rid this world of Islamic extremism. The Bush Doctrine, as I understand it, is that we have the right of anticipatory self-defense,

that we have the right to a preemptive strike against any other country that we think is going to attack us. Yikes. The Gary Johnson one, what is Aleppo? I love the way that he has like a little bit of an attitude about it. Like, how dare you ask me about this thing no one clearly knows about, Aleppo, at a time when this was really central to what was going on in terms of political news. But what did you make of Suarez's mess up here? You know, there was a Politico article this week about how the Republican field ended up getting so crowded that really interested me because what a lot of people on the right have been talking about in sort of conservative D.C.

circles for the last five plus years is basically how do you avoid a 2016 situation? And I'm not weighing in to say that you have to avoid a 2016 situation. I'm sort of of two minds. I think it's great that you can field a bunch of candidates from a bunch of different parts of the party and have them duke it out for public support in this, like, high-profile arena for the presidential primary. Like, to an extent, I think that's better than having Martin O'Malley, Bernie Sanders, and Hillary Clinton and, what, Jim Gilmore? I mean, who else? No, he was Republican. Yeah, Webb ran.

Yeah. And like, so, okay. But at the same time, it's also very clearly for some people not about becoming president of the United States. And if it is, and they actually think, despite their obvious long-shot odds, that it's worth them becoming president of the United States. It's just using our politics, using voter resources, using donor money for vanity projects. And I mean, I don't know that every donor, even like super wealthy ones, understand that. I don't know if Suarez has any money, but clearly it's just a profile raising thing because they've seen it happen again and again in these wide open primaries. I mean, it happened with Dems in 2004. People were

able to raise their profiles. Bill Richardson, like this is like a real thing now. Yeah. People have learned and it's not just Republicans, but it's really Republicans in the last 10 years. So I think Suarez is just doing that. And it's really unfortunate because it's a total waste of everyone's time. It's not actually contributing anything meaningful. Yeah, there's so much to be gained from just positioning yourself to be like a media figure, you know, like a conservative media darling or like a frequent podcast guest. You know, there's a lot to be gained and frankly, not a lot to be lost from just being like, sure, I'll throw my hat in the ring. Like, I guess the thing that you could lose is like your dignity is found out when like this, I'm really the only thing anyone now

knows him for is going to be this moment of, you know, just not knowing a basic fact that many, many people know, and that you certainly should have some idea of if you are serious about being commander in chief. I feel similarly to you, Emily. It's like, I am all for, if you feel like you have something to say and you genuinely feel like, all right, even if I think the path to presidency is really challenging, like I have something I can contribute to this conversation that's not being said, I can put pressure on the top contenders to come around to my view a bit more. Ron Paul's a great example. Mike Gravalla is a great example, right? Then, yes, do it, even if it looks like a suicide mission. And that's why Bernie ran, by the way. So that's exactly what

happened and it worked. That is correct. He thought, he didn't really think he was going to have a shot at winning. You know, his campaign took off in a way that I think no one really expected. But he felt that there should be a left challenge to Hillary Clinton to put pressure on her. And obviously, you know, worked out and transformed the country in a lot of ways. But even if you don't have that path to like Bernie stardom, it can be important to have those voices or issues that aren't being heard or aren't being talked about in a certain way. So I don't want to minimize that whatsoever. But, you know, for some of these people, it's like, you're not saying anything different. Like you're just saying the same thing that everybody else is saying.

Your politics are, you know, they're not challenging anyone. They're not raising new issues. It really either seems completely delusional, which I do think that some of these people are egotistic and delusional and narcissistic enough to actually imagine that they really have a shot at it. So I would like to inhabit that mind for a day and like know what does that feel like to be that like super confident and anyway, and just have that level of self-delusion. I would like to know what that is like. Maybe people out there will be like, you already have it. Anyway. So that's one possibility. The other is, yeah, they just want to like, you know, get their Fox News gig or get their podcast or, you know, raise their media profile. And I don't know which category Suarez falls into,

but I don't think it's really particularly helpful. And this is one of the downsides of like the new media ecosystem is so much of our politics is about vibes and about branding and not about substance that it's like there's no barriers and there's no real downside to just taking this particular path. Well, and for me, it ends up feeling like so many different things these days where you just have people picking at the carcass of the country, right, that are just like profiting. It feels like total like late stage republic stuff where you just have people picking at the carcass

of a great country and using it for their personal profit because it feels like it's going downhill. That's really pessimistic. I'm not saying that's definitely what's happening. I'm saying that's often when I feel like what's happening. And this is a great example of just somebody who's able to just field some like FU money from wealthy donors to launch a perspective or a silly bid that's really not intended to go anywhere but wastes, you know, $500,000 or whatever in the process because it's nothing to these donors who want to see him talking about crypto on a debate stage. Yeah.

I mean, listen, on the other hand, that's probably why Trump ran, too. It was like a brand building exercise, right? So, and president of the United States, there's another sign of like the perils of our republic. But yeah, the fact that what should be the most serious responsibility of the citizenry, of the, you know, of the public apparatus, of the town square,

which should be the most serious function has just turned into this like clown show reality show is it's not a great sign, not a great sign for the future. Love reality TV. Don't love it in the presidential election. Yes, correct. Let's go ahead and throw up on the screen where the Republican primary sits today. And then we have some news about our dear leader, Donald Trump. You know, this is looking increasingly difficult for anyone not named Donald Trump to imagine themselves being able to overcome what are a lot of obstacles to their success. Trump in the morning consult tracker is at 57 percent. Ron DeSantis at 19

percent. Mike Pence at seven. Vivek Ramaswamy at six. It's a good showing for him. I mean, he's been, I think, really successful at raising his profile in terms of that lane. Nikki Haley at three, Tim Scott at three, Chris Christie at two, Asa Hutchinson on the board at one. Sadly, my favorite candidate, Doug Burgum, zero. Francis Suarez, the aforementioned, zero percent. Will Hurd, who just jumped into the race, zero percent. And else, 1%. And I mean, listen, the argument for Ron DeSantis was like, once he gets in the race and he's actually going head to head against Donald Trump, things are going to change and he's going to be able to consolidate the vote. And the fact that you now have Donald Trump routinely not just in this poll, but in a

lot of polls, over 50%, it's hard to see how this works out without something that we don't expect happening, which, listen, American politics, you never know. Well, this is the big difference with 2016, that these numbers, and this was consistent throughout the entire primary. When you looked at those numbers, it was really the other way around. You had Donald Trump, you know, if you put the five and six for Pence and Haley together with DeSantis as 19%, here's somewhere around 30% in most polls. That was more what Donald Trump had. And the other people were split with that 57%. So you had most Republican primary voters in 2016 voting for someone else.

It was just that there was so much spread out between so many different people and they didn't consolidate in the sort of Pete Klobuchar way that happened with Democrats in 2020. They never were able to do that. And so Donald Trump has this clear lane. Now it's the exact opposite of that, where Trump is around 60%. And there's just not, that 30% is not going to be enough unless you really start to really, I mean,

it's possible when we think about how there are, you know, you have New Hampshire, you have Iowa, you have South Carolina. People get momentum if, you know, they have a really good ground game in Iowa. Ron DeSantis does have a good ground game in Iowa. He wins Iowa. I think Ted Cruz won Iowa. I mean, it's not your shoe-in, but that can change momentum. It can change money. It can change the media conversation. So again, nothing is impossible, but this trajectory where you have Donald Trump sitting that high, not great for anyone else. It's one thing when you're saying, all right, if I just consolidate everyone who's like, not anti-Trump,

but who's like anti-Trump curious, like interested in, let's maybe go in a different direction. Then I can pull it off. Because you can imagine that, right? You can imagine these other, Doug Berger and Chris Christie or whatever. You can imagine them falling to the wayside

and you being able to consolidate that vote. It's a whole different beast when you're talking about, I got to actually take away from people whoatively are saying, like, no, I'm with Trump right now. That's that's a different a different animal. And I think kind of in a show of force right now, the Trump operation is moving swiftly to effectively rig the rules of the primary and rejigger the order of the states and whether their primaries are caucuses in order to best benefit, in their opinion, the former president. Put this up on the screen. Interesting report here from Reuters. They say Trump team lobbying for primary rule changes to boost his 2024 chances. They talk a lot about Nevada in particular, where they want it to be a caucus instead of a primary. Their analysis is that they think caucuses are better for Trump because his people are

more committed, so they're more likely to show up. Caucuses obviously lower turnout because it's more effortful than just going and casting your ballot. The DeSantis campaign, they don't necessarily agree with this, though, Emily. They think that because their base, and this to me was an interesting admission, they think because their base is wealthier and higher education that they'll have more free time to go and show up at a caucus. So they actually aren't sure that this is bad for them. But Trump is also moving to push pro-Trump states earlier

in the process so that he can sort of close the door on any of his rivals, Ron DeSantis in particular, early on. And I think there's a couple things to note here. Number one, as I said, show of strength, because Trump does have a lot of loyal allies in a lot of these states. So this is what comes from having been president of the United States, from having this infrastructure sort of like, and true believers set up ready to go for you to go to him and say, hey, this is what I want. And they're like, yes, sir, we'll do it. The other thing that I think is interesting, and we had a reporter on that mentioned this as well, is Trump's campaign's previously not known as like a model of organizational glory. You know, 2016 famously was like chewing gum and duct tape, basically.

It was less a campaign than sort of a traveling rock concert or something like that. 2020, they had huge issues with, I'm forgetting what was the name of the campaign manager that like blew all their money. And like, that was kind of a mess as well. This time, it seems like they have a more competent campaign team.

Like this is the kind of stuff that a well-oiled political machine is on top of and they appear to actually be on top of it, much to many people's shock and surprise. Yeah, and then there's always that question of if that blows back on Donald Trump in any way. I don't know, because consultants can, professional D.C. consultants can obviously do

in questionable decisions, which is what some folks are wondering when it comes to DeSantis right now. But this is the kind of stuff that professional campaigns and political attorneys know how to do. And if you don't have that, you're obviously always going to be at a disadvantage. It's one of the annoying things about our politics, actually, is that you have to pay money to hire people to sort of do this stuff for you, which is like lobbying for rules changes. It's ridiculous. And that is definitely a difference between 2016 Trump and 2024 Trump, also 2020 Trump, is that you just didn't have the exact same level of like professional politicos attached to the operation. You had Paul Manafort.

Right. Yeah. And I don't think that anyone would be under an illusion that the consultants who are attached to the Trump campaign are going to like be able to rein in Donald Trump. Right. Because many have tried. Let Trump be Trump. Yeah. That part is not going to work out. So if they can still listen, it's not my cup of tea, but there are a lot of people who love Trump's unvarnished, like he is a legitimately hilarious person, unfortunately, as well. So if he maintains that and they also have an effective organization, again, I think that's going to be pretty tough to beat.

Let's move on to my favorite block maybe ever, which is just called men on the screen. Just men. Did you know we put this in the D block? This is in the D block. And we did, of course, consult McGriffin, the extraordinary production team here for their thoughts on the study. And Crystal actually has some thoughts to include from one of her offspring when it comes to men. But let's put, let's go ahead and put D1 up on the screen. This is from studyfinds.org. They write, modern men are now just as likely as women to openly display a sensitive side, according to a new survey, the poll of 2,000 adults find 71% of men confess to being in touch with how they feel compared to 82% of women. So pretty close there. Across all respondents who consider themselves sensitive, 41% outwardly show this side of their personality, quote, often or, quote, always.

A third think being in tune with how they feel is the sign of a good leader, while 37% of men would consider being called, quote, sensitive a compliment. Only 23% of women feel the same way. In fact, 24% of women in the survey would feel insulted if someone referred to them that way. Now, this study, I found this actually pretty amusing, was commissioned by Aveeno, and it found 55% think others, men, who openly show their sensitive side make them more likable. And the research found 48% of respondents believe it's more socially acceptable for women to show their sensitive side than men. That's not entirely surprising. Yeah. I mean, none of this is super shocking to me. It does feel like a shift,

of course, but one that's somewhat predictable. Yeah. I thought one of the most interesting, I thought, I wonder what you think about this, is they said 37% of men would consider being called sensitive a compliment, whereas only 23% of women feel the same way. In fact, 24% of women in the survey would feel insulted if someone referred to them in this way. But I sort of think that that's justified because I do feel like if you call a woman sensitive, it is kind of more of a slight, whereas if you call a woman sensitive, it is kind of more of a slight.

Whereas if you call a man sensitive, it's like, oh, he's like in touch with his feelings. He's very sweet and he's sensitive, you know. So I sort of feel like that's a legitimate way to view it, that the word is a little gendered in the way that it is applied. What do you think? Yeah, no, I agree with that. And I think it's, we have these, we've sort of tried for some really good reasons to walk away from the excesses or the stereotypical traits associated with both sexes. So overt masculinity is now, has now been like pinned to toxic masculinity and over femininity has been pinned to like what Sheryl Sandberg would, you know, probably not personally describe, but implicitly sort of cast as a weakness

in the workplace, et cetera, et cetera. And so you see people now increasingly finding that as like actually offensive because it's been associated with, you know, in some degrees, if women want to, you know, I don't know, like if you're in the workforce, then men are going to obviously make sensitivity

probably a negative trait for women. Right. Which is not right, but like that's what's going to happen. And so you see this like walking away from that on both, from both sexes. That's really actually fascinating. It kind of reminds me of some of the research about how when women take time off from work to like go to their kids' ballet recital or be soccer coach or whatever it's held against her whereas when men do it it's like look at that great dad wow what a great what a great guy so involved in his own children's lives right um so i do think like that's tied to this sensitivity um conversation there was another stat here that was surprising to me. Take all of this with a grain of salt. But there was a survey in 2021 of over 2,000 people, so it's not a super small

sample or anything, that found men cry on average about four times a month. That seems like a lot, right? That seems like a lot. It was actually more than women reported crying. And this is all self-reported. Women weep about three times in a given month. Men weep about four times in a given month. That's 48 times a year for men and only 36 for women. This is the piece that I asked my 15-year-old who, you know, is in touch with the young gents and the upcoming generation, the Gen Z vibes, and also is just a legitimately hilarious person. And she said, she texted me,

they need to cry more, complain less, and start fewer podcasts. That was her analysis of all of this. Legitimately wanted on one of these mugs. Seriously. She's amazing. But I have to say, like, there's a fine line, Emily, between, like, you know, not just shoving your feelings down,

not feeling like you have to put up some brave front all the time and be toxically masculine, however you want to define. Like, there's a fine line between it's fine for men to have feelings, to show feelings and be themselves and all that stuff and being overly self-indulgent. And I honestly don't even feel like that's a male-female conversation. I also feel like there's just like a little bit of that generationally where there's so much emphasis on like working on yourself and self-care. It can go from being a good thing, which is beneficial to, you know, pay attention to yourself and what's going on and feel comfortable with your emotions and like be able to work through those things, et cetera. And just like a narcissistic self-involved tendency that ends up being a burden on the people around you. To me, there's a fine line between those things. And

gotta say weeping four times a month feels like it's over that line. Just to be totally real, not to go all Andrew Tate here, but that feels like it's a little over the line. Not to go all Andrew Tate. I mean, I don't think I cry four times a month. I don't think I cry once a month. I consider myself, I do cry once a month. There's no doubt about it. Well, and here's the other thing I want to know.

I feel like I cry a lot, but I don't know that I cry once a month. Here's the other thing I want to know. What counts as crying? Right, right. know that I cry once a month. Here's the other thing I want to know. What counts as crying? Because, listen, you put up even just like a stupid television commercial about like kids and something sentimental. I am a sucker. I will tear up over anything. My kid's dance recital, right? Or her little kindergarten graduate. Forget it. Like I'm done, you know? But is just like welling up, is that considered crying crying or are we talking about like a real proper cry with you know some breathing and sobbing or whatever that's true what are we what

are we talking about here because do i well up like that emotionally three times a month probably yeah probably yeah i would say so um do i actually like have a full-on i don't remember the last time i had like a full-on cry right you know no the last time I had, like, a full-on cry. Right. You know? No, I don't either. But this is another thing that's interesting. It goes to exactly what we were talking about earlier.

Are men self-reporting more crying than they actually do because it's, like, proving a point that is socially rewarded now, right? That you're not toxically masculine. You're somebody who is sort of sensitive, which for a man is sensitive. Yeah. They see it more as a good thing. And are women then under reporting the crying? And that's like one of the reasons that I find the Sheryl Sandberg sort of approach to femininity. And I find the like toxic masculinity conversation frustrating is because the reason I think women do belong in the workforce is that men and women are different. I think that's actually great. And the reason that women should be in the workforce—

Emily comes out in favor of women in the workforce. Listen— Bob Schell. Controversial stuff, I know, as two of us sit here. But the reason for that and the reason that I actually have argued conservatives should prioritize, for instance, putting a woman on the Supreme Court. More controversial opinions is that men and women are different.

That has particularly political, that has political salience, but it also has salience in the workplace. And women's sensitivity makes them good workers. Men's stoicism makes them good workers. You contribute different things to the table. And yet there are women

who probably could use a little bit more stoicism in the workforce. We've all worked with them. But there are also men that could use a little bit more sensitivity in the workforce. But on average, those differences are helpful and important. And it's just frustrating that we're all now trying to prove we can be more than toxically masculine or feminine. Yeah, the Sheryl Sandberg point is a good one. And listen, obviously we're talking about averages here. There are women that are more on what would be the traditionally male idea of characteristics and personality traits of the spectrum.

There are men who are more on it. And all of that is fine, right? And it's just within the range of human differences and it's all well and good. But yeah, I read that Lena and Sheryl Sandberg book and I despised it. No, you were inspired. I was inspired and it's how I got to where I am now. To pillage American culture and build a mansion. It was the perfect symbol of that moment in feminism where, first of all, it was just all about, like, representation in the C-suite,

right? Which is also really inapplicable to almost all women, right? It's like, doesn't apply. Women can exploit workers, too. Yeah, exactly. Like, we can be the head of horrific systems as well of oppression, no problem. But it really did, the research that went into it and what she was advocating for was basically, like, forget about who you are and how you would naturally operate in the workplace and do it more like the men. Like just embrace it's a, it's a male environment. You just got to deal with it. And so embrace all the male characteristics and just like fit yourself into that mold,

even if that's wildly not who you are. And so I do think that having understandings that there are some natural differences and that those differences bolster each other rather than, you know, being in competition or undercutting each other, et cetera. I think that's a good thing. But yeah, I mean, I guess overall, to take it back to this study, do I think it's a good thing that men feel more comfortable expressing their feelings and they don't feel so like boxed in, et cetera. Yes. But I think for men and women, keep in mind the balance between overly self-indulgent and narcissistic tendencies and, you know, and just like a healthy acceptance of one's feelings. Do we can just stop trying to prove ourselves?

Speaking of actual toxic masculinity, let's move on to the next block. Actually, a pretty big development, whether you agree with the conclusions or not. It's pretty, I think, monumental that the Justice Department finally released this. We can put E1 up on the screen. This is from the New York Times, as you see. Report on Epstein's death finds errors and mismanagement at Manhattan Jail. Now, of course, we have all known about the errors and mismanagement at the Manhattan Jail that Jeffrey Epstein was found, as they say, dead in his cell with a bed sheet tied around his neck back in 2019. So that's four years ago now, by the way. This is the New York Times.

They say he died by suicide, not foul play, after a cascade of negligence and mismanagement at the now-shuttered federal jail in Manhattan, where he was housed, according to the Justice Department's inspector general. So an inspector general report came out yesterday. They say, quote, after a years-long investigation, the IG said that leaders and staff members at the jail created an environment in which Mr. Epstein had every opportunity to kill himself. Really? No kidding. The IG Michael Horowitz, a name that might be familiar to you, referred two employees, including one supervisor, for criminal prosecution by the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York after they were caught falsifying records. But prosecutors declined to bring charges, the report said. So note right there,

they're recommending criminal prosecution for record falsification. And then the charges are declined to be brought. So you have records being falsified when it comes to Jeffrey Epstein, then charges declining to be brought when it comes to those falsified records. And the IG continues, this is from the New York Times. They say, the IG says that staff members at the jail court engaged in significant misconduct and dereliction of their duties. And this is investigators who apparently combed through 100,000 records and did dozens of interviews, quote, did not uncover evidence, according to the IG, that contradicted the FBI's finding that Mr. Epstein had died by his own hand with a makeshift noose. Now, that is very different than saying he definitely died with a makeshift noose.

That's saying you don't have evidence to contradict the FBI's finding, right? Like you're not meeting the preponderance of evidence or whatever standard that they use. And we've all known, again, about, as Bill Barr said, these, quote, serious irregularities. Yeah. So this is a pattern, obviously, going back to 2007 of law enforcement irregularities as it comes to Jeffrey Epstein. So where you have, I think, some of the media establishments circulating this as sort of the final nail in the coffin of Epstein conspiracy theories, the IG themselves came out. This continues to raise even more questions. And again,

in IG, that's the government sort of internal audit system you have government folks go through the government's records and are supposed to hold the government to account sometimes IGs can be sort of the whitewashing force where they sort of have this what's the best way to put it they'll have this kind of smokescreen like we did find some things wrong but the thing that you think was really wrong that we can't really prove. So just forget about that. That's how I'm reading this IG report and the coverage of it. Again, I'm not saying definitively one thing happened or the other.

This definitely isn't either. Yeah, I don't think this is going to put about the conspiracy theories. No. Hot take there. I thought this language was interesting. They say, listen, they found no evidence of a plan to kill Mr. Epstein. However, described a remarkable, at times unexplained, succession of circumstances that made it easy for him to kill himself for reasons that remain unclear. The jail staff members allowed Mr. Epstein to hoard extra blankets, linens, bedding, and clothing, even though he had already tried to hang himself earlier.

So they knew this man was on suicide watch. They knew that he had literally tried to hang himself earlier. So they knew this man was on suicide watch. They knew that he had literally tried to hang himself before. And they're still like, here's some extra blankets. Here's some extra sheets. And that's what he ends up using to hang himself. I also thought this was interesting. They spoke to a former cellmate of Epstein who said that he would threaten staff members at the jail, sort of try to throw his political weight around still even while he's an inmate. And he would sit, tell staff members that he was going to report them and they were sort of afraid of him. And so according again to this former cellmate, he said that led them to relax some restrictions, such as a prohibition against keeping pens. You know, pens can be used as a weapon in certain circumstances as well.

And this former cellmate had said he was so concerned about Epstein killing himself that he literally asked him, like, please don't kill yourself. And Epstein was like, oh, I'm not going to. So listen, with this case, I guess there would be nothing that would surprise me. Is it crazy for me to imagine that the Bureau of Prisons is such a cesspool and so poorly managed that even someone who is as high profile as Jeffrey Epstein, literally maybe one of the most notorious inmates at the time, that they would be so lax that they're, they're lying on their records, you know, that, that may have just been routine for these prison guards that they were, you know, always saying that they were doing the rounds when they really were just like sleeping

and hanging out and doing nothing, that they would not follow protocol even when there was such a clear suicide threat. That wouldn't shock me. It also wouldn't shock me if there were other nefarious things afoot because of who this man is and what he was into and what he knew on so many powerful people. Yeah, exactly. I think, you know, irregularities obviously do happen, but this is a case again, where there's a pattern of irregularity dating back with his relationship with law enforcement, at least to like 2007. And so at that point, when you have so many irregularities and very obvious connections to intelligence, like this is reported out. Yeah. That combination of things puts you at a really obvious place, which is there's something

deeper happening here. And another interesting thing I think about this is the way, you know, usually conspiracies aren't really conspiracies, they're incompetence. This case, I think, is actually probably there was some type of conspiratorial behavior happening on behalf of the government, happening on behalf of different interests. And the way that is actually pulled off is people don't, like only very few people know. And we've seen that be the case. So it makes perfect sense that you'd have some people at the prison worried about Epstein killing himself and taking some steps to make sure that Jeffrey Epstein doesn't kill himself. And then we just find out not all of those steps were taken by every person. And that's where you end up having to falsify records and not

prosecute people for the falsification of those records, because who knows what comes out in that trial. So again, this pattern, I think, is abundantly clear. Yeah, I think that's well said. All right, Emily, what are you looking at? All right, well, I actually want to start by putting this headline up on the screen. This is from the Washington Post, and you may actually be relieved by what you see or what you're hearing. So I just want to warn you that it could be false hope. Ex-Congresswoman Liz Cheney, says this tweet from the Washington Post, offered a blunt assessment of her former profession Monday night. Quote, what we've done in our politics is create a situation where we're electing idiots.

I know it's perfect, right? Liz Cheney has finally come to the realization, has finally had a glimmer of self-awareness about her family. Of course, I'm kidding. She's talking about other people. She's not one of the idiots. She would never count herself among this class of idiots, which absolutely exists. Actually, at The Federalist for a while,

we had stickers with a great Ben Domenech quote that said, consider the possibility we are led by idiots. That doesn't just apply to government. That also applies to the business sector, the media sector. It's all true across the board. And lest you think Liz Cheney has finally come down and realized it and is ready to grapple with it and come on breaking points and talk to Sager

and Crystal about why it is that we keep electing idiots like herself. No, it's everyone else is an idiot. And she was in a, this came from a conversation that she had on Monday night at the 92nd Street Y in New York City. It was moderated by David Rubenstein, who asked basically if she would be interested in running as an independent, not as a Republican, but as an independent next year for president, if she was hypothetically given data, polling information that showed her run would hurt Trump. And she replied kind of cryptically. She said, quote, look, I think that the country right now faces hugely challenging and fundamentally important issues.

And what we've done in our politics is create a situation where we're electing idiots. The audience laughs, according to the Post. So Cheney continues, I don't look at it through the lens of, is this what I should do or what I shouldn't do? I look at it through the lens of, how do we elect serious people? And I think electing serious people can't be partisan. You know, because of the situation that we're in, she adds, where we have a major party candidate who's trying to unravel our democracy, and I don't say that lightly, we have to think about, all right, what kinds of alliances are necessary to defeat him? And those are the alliances we've got to build across party lines. This is a great

example of when people in Washington talk about bipartisanship, what they generally mean is grift and corruption. Now, that isn't to mean bipartisanship doesn't have benefits. Of course it does. We're here on a show called Counterpoints that is predicated on the notion there is good conversations and constructive conversations that can be had across sort of the ideological divide and, in fact, are necessary to have. But what Liz Cheney wants is the exact opposite of that. She believes in bipartisanship for the sake of punching down at any threats to the political establishment, which is why she now has to deem everyone else an idiot who could possibly, possibly come with a challenge to her position on this. And I actually think it's really funny where she says particularly, quote,

I think electing serious people can't be partisan. This is a woman who hired an ABC producer to create a spectacle about the January 6th hearings. And by the way, as somebody who was covering January 6th on the ground, and it was one of the craziest things I've ever seen, one of the most tragic things I've ever seen for a number of reasons, I thought the idea that she would intentionally orchestrate a media circus around those hearings, which should have been very serious, should have genuinely been bipartisan and not bipartisan with Adam Kinzinger and Liz Cheney being your Republicans on the committee, but actually allowing different voices to come in because we've seen, you know, as much as you believe Republicans may have run in the wrong direction when it comes to J6, so have

Democrats. And there are serious things that should be discussed when it comes to the FBI, serious things that should be discussed when it comes to electoral law and whether or not anybody should be challenging it, whether it's Democrats in 2016 or Republicans in 2020. But being serious is not hiring an ABC producer and intentionally scripting, producing congressional hearings in prime time to be what she turned them into, which was not serious at all. And that she now has the audacity to say it's unserious, that everyone else is unserious but her, that she is the arbiter of what constitutes seriousness in politics is laughable. But I also wanted to zero in on her talking about this major party candidate who's trying to quote, unravel our democracy, unravel our democracy. Coming from Liz Cheney,

the daughter of, you know, she's the daughter of the one and only Dick Cheney, the architect of our policy in Iraq and Afghanistan, or one of the leading architects of our policy in Iraq and Afghanistan, which she has defended, to say that somebody who's actually tried to unravel those wars or to end those wars is the greatest threat to our democracy or is a threat that is going to unravel our democracy. Maybe that's true. Maybe you can make that argument about Donald Trump. You know who doesn't have a leg to stand on when it comes to making that argument is Liz Cheney, because things that actually do also unravel our democracy, our constitutional Republican system of government, are wars that are not properly predicated, where you send working class men to die thousands of miles away for a lie. That is a threat to our democracy.

So for Liz Cheney then to be getting this positive coverage in the Washington Post and the New York Times and wherever else she gets quoted, to be at the 92nd Street Y in New York having this interview is pretty interesting too because that's where oftentimes you see like media elites congregate and do these high profile conversations where they're very thoughtful and the NPR tote bag crowd can come and feel serious for a night. That is a statement on how absurd the political establishment in this country is, that when they decide the Iraq war has gone really badly, they'll sort of turn on it, right? But they'll push it and then turn on it. They'll

help the intelligence community float bad information that predicates a war. And then when it starts to go poorly, turn on the war, turn on George W. Bush. But then when Donald Trump comes along and someone wants to go after him as this sort of blunt force object, the media is suddenly not just going to treat them as a utility, but actually say, vet them and say that this is a serious person, like this person does have the moral standing. And in this case, what she's saying is essentially what she wants to do to our democracy, to the sort of Republican system of government, is create threats from normal Americans who disagree with the political

establishment, spy on them, and start more wars. So it sounds very serious to me, just not in the way that she thinks it is. By the way, it also sounds very idiotic to me, just not in the way she thinks it is. Crystal, the audacity of Liz Cheney and the audacity of- Crystal, what have you got for us today? Well, guys, the commercial real estate crash may well be upon us now. Let's take a look at what is coming out of New York City in terms of latest sales statistics. Put this first tweet up on the screen, guys. So in New York, according to a report in the Financial Times, buildings are selling for less than the value of the land that they sit on. We are seeing prices lower than they have been in 20 years. Imagine if your home value declined,

like lost all of its value that was obtained over the last 20 years. I'm not sure people have come to terms with how long the storm will hover and how much damage it will do. Go ahead and put this full Financial Times report up on the screen because I want to get into a bit of this. Now, this is a topic that Sagar and I have been talking about for a little while. I did a monologue about, I look back about a month and a half ago about this coming financial storm. Well, the Financial Times headline here is pretty dire. They say financial storm bears down on U.S. commercial real estate. Long-awaited reckoning arrives as building loans come due at a time of scarcer credit. They take a look at a 20-story tower at 529 Fifth Avenue that they say stands out from

the other buildings around Grand Central Station for the surreal pink designs of an Alice in Wonderland-inspired art exhibit installed to fill vacant retail space on its ground floor. It's also remarkable as one among a small number of towers that have recently changed hands, giving a clue as the value of Manhattan's older offices, now that the commercial real estate sector has emerged from a historic era of ultra-cheap money. Silverstein Properties sold the building three months ago for $105 million in price per square foot terms. That was even less than a plot of land across the street commanded in just 2015. There's some incredible details here, but we went over this recently of some of the factors that led to this. And just to remind folks, there's a lot going on here. First of all, just as the housing

market has been massively impacted and affordability massively impacted by Fed rate hikes, the same thing is happening here with commercial real estate. Furthermore, you have what has been described as a wall of debt, $1.5 trillion of debt that is coming due on these commercial real estate properties in just the next few years. So if you had these mortgages, these loans at very low interest rates, and now you're in a position where you have to refinance and the rate has gone way, way up, it's going to be tough for a lot of people to be able to make that work. Some of that bill is coming due now. By the way, overwhelmingly, that $1.5 trillion in debt is held by small and medium banks, which, as we know from the Silicon Valley Bank collapse and several other bank collapse, have been under tremendous pressure also because of the Fed interest rate hikes. So we've already seen banks moving to get out of commercial real estate and to try to sell off their portfolio, even at a loss to try to get ahead of this coming reckoning. But the big story here is remote work. During the pandemic, workers forced to work from home. Now, many of them do not, for good reason, want to come back to the office

or want to come back to the office full time. So you have all of this vacant office space, especially in New York, especially in San Francisco, is probably the hardest hit of all cities, also in L.A., but really in cities across the country where you just don't need nearly as much office space as you did just a few years ago. So some of the estimates are that office space valuations could drop by as much as 40%. 40%. Imagine what that means. To give you a few of the numbers here in terms of how many workers are working remote

and how quickly this has dramatically shifted. Back in 2018, you only had 6% of workers nationwide who were working remote. In 2023, you have more than a quarter, so 26% of workers who are now working remote. 66% of workers work from home at least some of the time. As I said before, this obviously had a huge impact on office space. Less than half of offices are occupied nationwide. Less than half. Back just a few years ago, occupancy rates were in the 90 percentile. So this is radically different from what we've seen. To go back to the Financial Times report that was specific to New York, there was one analyst there who was asked, I think this was a broker who was asked, how bad are things right now in the city of New York? They estimated that only the top 10% of office buildings in the city were not distressed, either in terms of the level of debt or of occupancy.

Quote, I think we are on the edge, front edge of the forced sales. So really take that in. 90% of offices in New York City are distressed. 90%. And as I said before, the debt is about to come due. And if this sale and others like it, where buildings are being sold for less than the plot of land was worth just a few years ago, it would certainly appear that the reckoning has arrived. And Emily, to me, increasingly, the more that I've looked at. Well, Crystal, thank you for joining us on CounterPoint. I loved it. It was great. Always a blast. Also, I loved going on

Chris and Kyle and Friends last week. You guys have such a fun time. We really, both of us, really genuinely enjoy that conversation. So if people want to check that out, we got into like, you know, some culture war stuff, trans kids, drag shows, some of the laws that have been struck down recently and what that means. Also the like Trump indictment and Hunter stuff. So yeah, we loved it. It was fun. We're going to, it actually inspired us to do more debatey type shows. That's awesome. You sounded like Stefan from SNL. They're like, it had everything. Drag shows, Hunter Biden. Anyway. Anyway, let's do this again tomorrow.

How about it? I mean, what a good idea. Let's just change the lighting in the background. Right. And the little bug on the side will say breaking points instead of counterpoints. And let's just do it again. And I think it sounds great. Ryan's in Vermont.

Sagar's getting married. So we're holding down the fort here for the next couple weeks, actually. We'll find some more studies about men so we can belittle them in their absence. That's actually a really good idea. I'm all for it. So tune in tomorrow for some sort of man-hating surprise. Love you guys. See you tomorrow.

DNA test proves he is not the father. Now I'm taking the inheritance. Wait a minute, John. Who's not the father? Well, Sam, luckily it's your not the father week on the OK Storytime podcast. So we'll find out soon. This author writes, my father-in-law is trying to steal the family fortune worth millions from my son, even though it was promised to us. He's trying to give it to his irresponsible son. But I have DNA proof that could get the money back.

Hold up, they could lose their family and millions of dollars? Yep. Find out how it ends by listening to the OK Storytime podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Camp Shane, one of America's longest-running weight loss camps for kids, promised extraordinary results. But there were some dark truths behind Camp Shane's facade of happy, transformed children. Nothing about that camp was right.

It was really actually like a horror movie. Enter Camp Shame, an eight-part series examining the rise and fall of Camp Shane and the culture that fueled its decades-long success. You can listen to all episodes of Camp Shame one week early and totally ad-free on iHeart True Crime Plus. So don't wait.

Head to Apple Podcasts and subscribe today. Have you ever thought about going voiceover? I'm Hope Woodard, a comedian, creator, and seeker of male validation. I'm also theard, a comedian, creator, and seeker of male validation. I'm also the girl behind Boy Sober, the movement that exploded in 2024. You might hear that term and think it's about celibacy, but to me, Boy Sober is about understanding yourself outside of sex and relationships. It's flexible, it's customizable, and it's a personal process.

Singleness is not a waiting room. You are actually at the party right now. Let me hear it. Listen to VoiceOver on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an iHeart Podcast.