Bulwark Takes - Stupidest Timeline Imaginable: 1600 Penn Is A Drama Filled Diva House

Episode Date: April 23, 2025

Tim Miller and Sam Stein talk all the wild news of the day, with Elon Musk and Scott Bessent's Oval Office brawl, Donald Trump wandering around the White House lawn planning for a flag pole or two, and Pete Hegseth renovating a makeup room at the pentagon.

Hey guys, it's Tim Miller from the Bulwark here with managing editor Sam Stein, and we live in the stupidest fucking timeline imaginable. And so, some news has happened since we taped the podcast. There's been a billionaire sumo wrestling match in the White House. And a couple of other items, news items, got like kind of page six gossip items in normal times. But unfortunately, news items that are central to what is happening in our democracy in our era and so we'll just run through them really quick sam uh how you feel i think we should start with our erstwhile colleague mark caputo okay boarding in axios yeah we're hoping to get mark on for the ogs of the youtube i never even asked so no well i just i assume that when mark has a story such as this he should saying, when are we going to get on YouTube to discuss it?

Yeah, that's a good point. He should ask me. Yeah, but here it is. Elon Musk and Treasury Secretary Scott Besant got into a heated shouting match in earshot of President Trump in the Oval Office last week during a dispute about the IRS. Quote, it was two billionaire middle-aged men thinking it was WWE in the hall of the West Wing, one witness said of the argument. Bad news for Scott DeBessent. He's long past middle age. Well, it's good news for Scott, right? To be described as middle-aged when you're fairly past it. There are some great quotes in here. They were not physical in the

oval, but the president saw it. And he carried it down the hall. And that's when they did it again, one witness said. And then another. Quote, it was quite a scene. It was loud. And I mean loud. Sam, when was the last time you were chest to chest with somebody thinking about throwing hands?

I was thinking about this. Last Thursday. Last Thursday you were chest to chest with somebody? With Sebastian. Just did not like how he was treating me. You didn't like the thumbnail on the YouTube video that he showed? I got in his face and I said, do better at thumbnails, bud. No, I didn't do that. I love Sebastian.

That's not normal behavior. People who throw down in the office are weirdos. They need help but that's kind of like the theme here is people who i had a help i had a very minor verbal confrontation with a with a colleague with a tourist woman at the bar recently uh but we were not just how many drinks in were you i was only one drinking uh we were not she was several uh we were not just to just she was under the hold on your your your history is a little bit shady here you you got into with kerry lake sorry i'm not making you happy the other stuff is i don't know why you're touching me the other stuff is what you have to do to win kerry confronted me i was just standing who is

she in this i was gonna hug her i had this effect on people is the thing. Apparently. But in both of those cases, I mean, look, I have definitely been chest to chest with somebody screaming at them. It's been a long time, though. And in a work setting, I can't. It's hard for me to think. You were chest to chest with Trump. Where's the tie made? Your tie is where's the made? Ken, is that a tie?

I'm all right. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, back in 2015. But I mean, like a work colleague like i don't i can't think of a time where that happened to me with a work colleague it's never happened and i'm pretty and i'm pretty hot under the collar i'm aware if you were in the office about two hours ago instead of on zoom i think you and i might have had a moment Anyway, this is just childish behavior. No, but this isn't even like – at least this is sort of like over substance.

They're arguing on like tariffs. They were not arguing over tariffs. They weren't? No. Okay, great. This is where I was going to go next be like, you know what, Elon? Somebody should yell at Scott Besant and put their finger in his chest and be like bro you're gonna ruin you're ruining the country and this administration and my my bottom line that would be rational that's not what happened um this was over the i guess uh irs temporary head of the irs or the

whatever you call it was originally going to be a guy gary shapely, who Musk had liked because he was a Hunter Biden whistleblower. And so him and Musk had, I think, had a connection over their brain worms. I think they probably followed the same types of accounts on Twitter. And Besant wanted Michael Falkender, who I think has more of a kind of traditional uh background yeah so it was in but it was initially shapley and then they switched it trump switched it to falk falkinder and that was what was underlining this personnel policy decision yeah personnel's policy i think the other subtext here and it's in the pieces that everyone pretty much hates elon and wants him to go yeah and i think the other subtext about the irs

so why might elon be so upset about this it's worth thinking about possibly because you know chemical imbalance in his brain was off possibly possibly because he didn't sleep at night because he was just tweeting all night. Possibly because he's a stubborn child. All those things are possible. But maybe also the IRS. I mean, Doge really has tried to get its little tentacles into the IRS. And there's a lot of data there.

The Kara Swisher argument that Musk wants the IRS data for his own purposes. i think it's worth thinking about the fact that that musk was so upset about this particular incident because having having a flunky in the irs would have been something he could have yes but also advantage also and the other thing is like i think we sort of talked about this yesterday but all these guys are masters of the universe, or were prior to doing this, right?

I don't know who Scott Besson was, actually. He was running kind of a mid-level fund that kept losing money every year. My point is, when's the last time someone told these people, no, you can't? I'm sure no one said that. The woman told Elon Musk she couldn't have her womb. Oh, yeah, unless it's in the DMs,

and Elon's offering you his sperm. That maybe they said no to. But in business, I'm sure these guys are not used to being told, no, actually, fuck off. And when you spend years being catered to and told you're the best thing in the world and the world's smartest man, and then suddenly you're like, actually, no, we're not going to do it your way. You probably freak. So I don't think these are particularly stable people either. So there's that. Hot there.

Luckily, we have a very stable genius at the top of the totem pole. Are we going to top? Can we do Hegseth first? I want to go straight to the very stable genius because people need this right now. We'll end with Hegseth. Been a busy day. Lots happening the very stable genius because people need this right now. We'll end with Hegseth. Been a busy day. Lots happening. There's a lot going on.

Lots happening. We might be officially abandoning Ukraine in that war. We're bombing Yemen. Israel-Gaza continues. We're trying to figure out a detente with China. There was a terrorist attack in India. Detente with China we're working on. We're negotiating trade deals with 70 countries apparently.

Economic instability at home. It's 90, but yes, correct. Yeah. Here's what Donald Trump was up to this morning. I don't know. How long should we show it for? I don't know. How long should we show it for i don't know just how long should we show it for we're gonna let the we're gonna let the producers and the viewers decide how long do you want to

see this for they're pointing they're pointing what do you think about that spot there let me think about this that gets but donald trump is out there checking out where he wants the 100 foot high american flag i love it to go he's paying for it he's out of his own pocket he didn't he did stress that it's coming out of his own pocket thank the lord luckily i mean he just according to molly white in our crypto interview just like cashed out like 5.4 million in fake crypto money and made it turned it into fiat dollars so i think he should probably build that should cover most of the flag the trump coin shit is gonna go to spending all his trump coin on flag yeah i think flagpoles um and uh you know the portraits the chinese uh you saw a dude walking

around just going like you feel like this man is crazy he just wants to know exactly he wants to get exactly the right angle of that flagpole he also wants it to be his flagpole because he's not going to do this bullshit if george w bush dies he's not going to be putting he's not going to be letting the speaker of the house determine whether the flag goes at half mass like it happened during mccain you that is his fucking flag i will say paid for it and he's only going to put it at half mass if somebody that stormed the capitol dies or other celebrities he has to be far and away the president most obsessed with interior and exterior decorating that we've ever had he's obsessed it's a very

masculine pursuit like the rose garden he's obsessed with like its renovations and, you know, bulldozing trees. He like sent out a picture of him planting new trees a couple weeks ago. Like they send White House updates all the time about this stuff. Like he's truly upset. And like the colors of Air Force One force one you know combine that with his love of 80s show tunes and i mean i love interior design okay you have different i think you have slightly different uh tastes than donald i don't think so uh his are a little more traditional his are his are a little bit more traditional a little more gauche you know i kind of have

more kind of uh kind of a new New Orleans gothic kind of vibe. You do have a gold toilet at your home. We've not done any toilet renovations at my house so far. Yeah. Okay. Well, there you go. So that's what he's been up to. We'll keep an eye on him, obviously, since that's what we're here for on the YouTube feed.

Make sure to subscribe to the feed, by the way, because where else are you getting this kind of analysis? Where else are you getting it? I don't think anywhere um you know certainly not over there on the cnn feed who knows what they're talking about you hear we got scott jennings okay i'm just saying you got scott jennings yelling at people all right that's one option for you or you can watch our flagpole coverage okay last topic speaking of masculine pursuits pete hanks has been doing a lot of push-ups but he's also uh he's added a new a new room into the pentagon and i just have to say by the way i did a late night video maybe over the weekend or last week where i said that the pentagon was in foggy bottom everybody corrected me i was like obviously it's

wrong i lived in foggy bottom knew, I know where it was. I just, you know, sometimes the brain just spits out something that, that is incorrect, you know, and I didn't even catch myself. So I'm aware of where the Pentagon is. Drove by it every day on the way to work. Anywho, over there in Virginia, the Pentagon added a new office. Is it, it's not a weight room. It's not a CrossFit room. Tell us about what he's added. Apparently, Pence got a briefing room, was retrofitted to add a makeup studio to be used

to prepare for television appearances because he can't go on a gig. Look at you. Look at you. Is that always there? Did you even know about this? Because you can't go. When you're the defense secretary and you're going on TV as much as Pete,

you got to get the makeup applied. You got to get some powder. Look at this. You got to get some powder going. That'll look good. See, this is how Tim does it. But if you had a makeup pro, you look unbelievable. How are we looking? We look horrible. Do I look masculine? This is, you'd look unbelievable. How am I looking?

You look horrible. Do I look masculine? This is why you need the makeup room. Clear out the powder. That's interesting. What is the makeup room for? What do you think? His TV hits.

The guy's on TV more than any Pentagon press secretary. More than Pentagon press secretary. There's more than any defense secretary that we've ever seen. Jim Mattis actually wanted this room first. Maybe he's doing drag at night. I don't know. The in-house construction group renovated the adjacent green room. They don't deny it in the piece.

The quote is definitely not a denial. A large mirror with makeup lighting was installed. That's exciting. I'm happy for him. He looks good. He's looking oranger. So I want to just tamp down a little bit. That's what you do when you try to impress the boss is you adopt their look.

Did you see Scott? We talked about this on the next level, but I have to do it again. Did you see Scott Besson's comment about Ray Dalio? No. While Donald was out there checking out the angle on the new massive flagpole, he said this, there's an opportunity for a big deal here with China. If they want to rebalance, we can rebalance together. This is an incredible opportunity. I think if Bridgewater founder Ray Dalio were to write something, he could call it

a beautiful rebalancing. This is an incredible opportunity. I think if Bridgewater founder Ray Dalio were to write something, he could call it a beautiful rebalancing. Why does he talk like, why are they talking like Trump, man? They're talking like Trump. It's fucking weird. Who talks like that? ray dalio would say this is a big beautiful deal and could you imagine they all do it and they all do it in some of its

subconscious do you remember when mike pence you remember the famous one where he had the water bottle and he was like mimicking trump with it like i think it just kind of seeps in through osmosis tony blinken started imitating biden He started mumbling, started saying literally all the time. Going to the wrong doors. Walking in the gate. I don't know. Hard to explain. I maybe overdid it a little bit.

Okay. A little bit. This has been a great show. Everybody, I hope you enjoy it. Keep an eye out for the new flagpole coming to the White House. I'm excited. 100 foot. And be nice to your colleagues. Treat your colleagues well no no fights in the hallway we'll see you guys back here

soon