Financial Feminist - 50. How the Government Actually Works with Sharon McMahon

Episode Date: October 18, 2022

With less than a month to the midterms, it’s never been more important to understand the power of your vote and the importance of understanding how our government actually works. We wanted to know more about the electoral college, misinformation, and why there’s so much money in politics –– so we sat down with Sharon McMahon, who you may know as America’s Government teacher. During this lively conversation, Tori and Sharon dive into the nuances of the American government, from Citizens United to who’s actually in charge of your school district's curriculum. We also learn A LOT of shocking details about Aaron Burr. Learn more about our guests, read episode transcripts, get resources from the show, and more on our show notes page: https://herfirst100k.com/financial-feminist-show-notes/how-the-government-works Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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pru dash disclaimer. Hello, financial feminists. Welcome back. We got a great episode as always for you today. This one's especially incredible if you're just trying to figure out how the American political system works and you're trying to figure out what you can do to support the kind of candidates and issues that you want to support. Before we get into it, some housekeeping. One, as always, please feel free to subscribe, review, rate the show. It helps other people discover the show and discover our movement of financial feminism. And speaking of the movement of financial feminism, we also have a book called Financial Feminist that is available wherever you get your books, not only as a hardcover, but also as an ebook or an audiobook. In case you're living under a rock

and haven't figured it out, if you're based in the United States, we're just a few weeks away from midterms. And it has been impossible not to notice how contentious these last few years or really last decade has been in US politics. And you've probably seen the like, oh my gosh, the amount of texts I get every day from the Democratic Party. And I love y'all, but like, oh my gosh, they're texting me like crazy. They're like, hello, I need this. I need this. I need this. And it's just crazy that the ads I'm seeing as well on television. And I feel like we've been in midterm season for months. They're coming up here. In addition to the advent of rampant disinformation on social media and conspiracy theories and political stunts and politicians just ignoring the values and needs of their constituents for payouts from lobbying bodies and super PACs, we wanted to bring on someone to talk about all of that and how we can see through the bullshit and make our political system better for people. Sharon McMahon is on a mission to curate facts, fun, and inspiration by educating Americans on democracy, politics, and history. After years of serving as a high school government and law

teacher, Sharon took her passion for education to Instagram with a mission to combat political misinformation with nonpartisan facts. Sharon has earned a reputation as America's government teacher and quickly amassed over 1 million social media followers, affectionately known as the Governerds. Sharon is also the host of the top-rated Here's Where It Gets Interesting podcast, where each week she provides entertaining yet factual accounts of America's most fascinating moments and people in history. She has also led her community in various philanthropic initiatives that have raised more than $4 million for teachers, domestic violence survivors, terminally ill children, victims of COVID-19,

medical debt forgiveness programs, Ukrainian refugees, and more. She's a total badass. We're just so excited to have her on the show. And I was so impressed by this interview and so impressed by her work. We brought her on specifically now because as we get closer and closer to the elections in November, we felt it was really important to talk about how the government actually works, how to spot disinformation and misinformation, and including what is the difference between those two things, and how we can get money and lobbyists out of politics to encourage elected officials to work for the people and not big corporations. As I mentioned in her bio, she does a great job of distilling facts that are nonpartisan. So regardless of where you fall or where your

friends or family may fall on the political spectrum, this will be a powerful episode to just better understand elections, how government works, and how we can make sure we're getting our information from places that are factual. Sharon is an incredible teacher, so full of knowledge, and just a great example of someone making a difference. And I can't wait for you to hear this conversation. So let's go ahead and get into it. All right, I'm going to dive right into it. What do you think are the biggest misconceptions about how government works? Well, I mean, of course, there are a lot of misunderstandings about how it's structured, whose jobs are what. I think people greatly overestimate the power that a president

has. They feel like somebody asked me last week, they were talking about this potential Supreme Court decision that might overturn the precedent that Roe versus Wade established. And their question was, what good is being the president if you can't change things like this? Their opinion was that it should be changed, right? Do you remember when you were in elementary school and they're like, if you were president for a day, what would you do? And it was always like, give everybody candy, give everyone money. There's this perception that presidents have a lot of power that in fact, they do not have. So I think that's one of them for sure is a misunderstanding of whose power we're talking about when we're talking about governmental action.

What is your favorite quirky fact about the government or something that the average person wouldn't know? Oh my gosh, there are so many of them. Well, I'm sure most of your listeners have seen Hamilton or listened to the soundtrack, at least at the minimum, familiar with the concept. What song do you want me to sing? I'll pop off right now and I'll give you the entire three-hour musical. Okay, so let me give you a couple interesting Aaron Burr facts that were not in the show. Yes, please. You want to hear some? Okay, so everybody knows that he married this woman who was already married to a British officer and they had a child named Theodosia, right? Well, her name was also Theodosia. His wife's name was Theodosia and their daughter's name was Theodosia. What the show

does not tell you is that she already had five children and that she was 10 years older than him. She was 35 with five kids when they got married. So that's one thing. Okay. Let me give you just, I could, we could spend this, we could spend this whole episode talking about Aaron Burr.

I got so many facts. So here, here's another one. When they got married, Theodosia had a servant. She was not enslaved, but she was a servant. She was of Haitian descent, was raised in India, and had lived with Theodosia for a long time. Well, they have now definitively established through DNA evidence that Aaron Burr had a secret family with Theodosia's that Aaron Burr had a secret family with Theodosia's servant.

And not shocking, but also, oh my God. Yes, right. I mean, when we say, I mean, this is the 1700s. How much agency did a woman of color who worked as a domestic servant, even though she wasn't technically enslaved, as a domestic servant, even though it wasn't technically, she wasn't technically enslaved, how much agency would she have had over a powerful white vice president, right? So that is, I think, interesting. There are a couple people who've been able to establish definitively that they are his descendants through this woman, through Theodosia's servant. And then here, I'll just give you one more uh which

is that after of course he shoots alexander hamilton he goes back to being the vice president for a couple of months because he was the vice president when he shot alexander hamilton imagine that today imagine mike pence or kamala harris shooting a political rival and then never being charged with anything and going back to resuming their duties as vice president. So that's absurd, first of all. Well, because everything's legal in New Jersey, right? So then he decides he's going to head west. He's going to head down to what is now Texas, the border of Texas and Louisiana. And he is going to try to seize land in an effort to make himself the ruler, have this region secede from the United States and make himself the ruler of that land he was later put on trial for treason by the united states government for attempting to seize land and make himself essentially the emperor he was never tried for

killing alexander hamilton but he was put on trial no but he's like i you tried to take what is now texas your trees that's right he wasn't convicted He was never convicted of that. I could continue, but I won't. Oh, maybe we'll do it at the end. We'll do like an Aaron Burr. Yeah, we'll make an Aaron Burr sandwich out of this episode. Those are great facts. I think I knew the Theodosia, the one. Yeah, I knew about his because I think I actually saw it on TikTok that Theodosia's servant had fathered his like the quote-unquote illegitimate child but multiple illegitimate children uh one of with one daughter was named the same thing as theodosia's children from her previous marriage

so it's like when you have a dog and then you have another dog and it's the same dog name? Yeah, except what's unclear is how much Theodosia knew about, I mean, she had to know that her servant was randomly pregnant. Because ultimately they ended up not living together anymore. But then Aaron Burr and her name is Mary Emmons, they named their daughter together the same thing that Theodosia had named her other child. Moving on from Aaron Burr. Lots of drama, and I love it. So what got you to the work that you do on Instagram? What was the catalyst for that work? Misconceptions about how government works. It was leading up to the 2020 election. And I saw a lot of people spouting off on social media about how the Electoral College worked. And they were just

straight up wrong. It was just like, that is not even real. That's not a fact. Where did you get that? And the certainty with which people were wrong was a little egregious. And so I decided I could either argue with, you know, 5 million people individually, or I could just start making some videos that provided some resources and facts, and then people could share them if they wanted to. So that was the catalyst. It was it was being tired of listening to other people be certain, but they were also certainly wrong. Was this a issue with just one side of the aisle? Or was this, you saw this lack of information or this getting it wrong,

regardless of somebody's political standing or political views? I mean, both sides of the aisle tend to believe different wrong things. Right? They tend to believe different wrong things, right? They tend to believe different wrong things. But there are some things that they both get wrong. So the things that they both get wrong are the things that I really started making videos about. Like not understanding what could happen as a result of an election. Lots of people thought that, you know, if well, if we can't decide,

then it'll just do this thing, this thing, this thing will happen. None of that is real. So certain, you know, people on one side of the spectrum tend to believe different things about the government than people on the other side of the spectrum. I think this is, you know, about the government than people on the other side of the spectrum. I think this is a pretty well-documented concept that the left tends to view government as a useful change agent, that government programs can make society better, that things like social safety nets are needed and necessary. And that the government can and should be relied on for these sorts of things. That's correct. That's right. And that the government, and should be relied on for these sorts of things that's correct that's right and that it and that the government although sometimes it gets it wrong

has created programs that are in the best interest of its citizens and people on the right tend to believe that self-agency is should be relied upon instead of the government. And that much of the time, not 100% of the time, because they do believe that certain government actors do have their best interests at heart. But just sort of this overarching belief about the government as a whole, that it does not have your best interests at heart, and that it should not be used as an instrument of societal change. Right. So we've been dancing around the phrase or the word disinformation, right? So can you define what disinformation is for us? And how do you spot it? Are there telltale signs of like, oh, this is disinformation? Are there common tactics that they use? How can we discern

what is or is not disinformation? Well, it's challenging. If it was super easy to spot, then nobody would fall for it, right? So most of the time or much of the time, disinformation appears plausible. It appears like, hmm, that's interesting. I wonder if that's real. So that said, That's interesting. I wonder if that's real. So that said, disinformation, generally speaking, is somebody or something that is spreading information that they know to be false to achieve some larger endpoint. Misinformation is, you know, perhaps you share the wrong statistic about something, but you don't have a nefarious intent. Maybe you're like 25% and in reality it's 15%. Perhaps you don't have a nefarious intent when you are sharing misinformation. Oh, I didn't realize the difference. So disinformation is

like the intent to spread information that you know for a fact is false versus misinformation is like ignorance or like just not knowing something, right? Or getting it wrong without the intent to get it wrong. That's right. Yes. There's usually a malicious intent with disinformation. I know this is a lie and I'm spreading it anyway. It's not a mistake. So that's part of what makes disinformation even more dangerous is because there is that nefarious intent behind it. And that's part of what makes disinformation even more dangerous is because there is that nefarious intent behind it. And that nefarious intent is usually aimed at trying to achieve some objective, right? So, I mean, Russia is one of the biggest purveyors of disinformation

in the world. And it can take a variety of sources. And a lot of times we think that it's going to just be like somebody typing something absurd. And you're going to read it and be like, well, that's absurd. Most of the time, that's not true. They're very sophisticated at it. They've been at it for a long time. They know what it takes to make something go viral. They know what it takes to make something, to make an idea spread. It can also take the form of promoting the posts of other people who they want, who they believe are aligned with their interests. And when I say promoting, gaming the algorithm so that those posts go viral, right? So let's say they determine person X has goals that are aligned with their chosen objectives, creating so much interaction with their posts that the

algorithm is like, whoa, popular, push this out far and wide. That's a very prominent way that people spread or box or, you know, these kind of comment farms, etc. Spread disinformation is with gaming the algorithm. So let's talk about the role of social media in all of this, because I'm sure there was disinformation or misinformation, of course, before social media was prominent. But it feels like social media is like the rocket ship for all of this. So can you talk about what changed about disinformation or misinformation when Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, et cetera, started becoming popular? Sure. Of course, disinformation has existed since the dawn of humanity. It just was way more

difficult to spread your message. If you were not a government agency, like let's say you're not the Third Reich, where you have the ability to make videos and spread your information via newspapers, you're not a government agency with a propaganda department, it would be very difficult for just a normal, It would be very difficult for just a normal, average, everyday citizen who works in a factory to spread their wackadoodle ideas. How are you going to do that? Like, just tell the five people you know. Go to the printing press and do a thing. Right, right.

How would you convince somebody to buy it, publish it, all of those things. It was much more monumental task to spread disinformation. Doesn't mean it never happened. It was just much, much harder to do. And so now we can spread it with the click of a button, truly. And so social media has made it much more easy to encounter mis- and disinformation. Well, and you can share other people's work too. It's not just you being able to create, right? Because I think the vast majority of people who, of course, are consuming social media, I don't think actually create much social media, right? And so I think, yeah, it's the wildfire effect of one person creating something, but then the ability to have it shared to the entire world.

ability to have it shared to the entire world. And the criteria for shareability is what? I like it. I like it. And thus it's shareable. That's what most people are using as a criteria of like, oh, yeah, I like that. I believe that. Even if it's not necessarily supported by any evidence or facts or whatever, if you like it, it's shareable. So that's now the criteria is, are you speaking directly to the deep-seated fears of a certain subset of people so that when they read this, they feel seen? They feel like this person gets me. And that's the criteria for shareability. It reminds me, I think it would shock a lot of listeners to know I studied terrorism in college for like two and a half years. I majored in theater and communication, but I took a 400 level poli sci class my sophomore year

because I wanted to, and it was called the politics of terrorism. And it talks about, you know, how terrorist groups use, you know, certain propaganda to recruit. And a lot of the things you're saying are very similar. This was my whole senior thesis was specifically like the sort of messaging that ISIS uses to recruit Western women to come and join ISIS. And to your point, it's all about like being seen, being heard, love and belonging and typically reaching people who don't have an established community already. And we see this on a minor scale with, you know, churches or, you know, just any community in general, right? We're all trying to be seen and heard. And so we're trying to find the places where that can be given to us and where we feel accepted. And especially for people on the fringes of society or who don't feel love and connection, these groups, I think, are especially dangerous. And it sounds like misinformation is very similar where it's reaching people who have a deep-seated fear of something. And it's either validating or confirming or unconfirming that fear or that belief and stoking the fire of that fear.

affirming that fear or that belief and stoking the fire of that, that fear. Yeah. You absolutely see that even prevalent in communities today, like the QAnon communities. These are people, again, I'm painting with broad or the broad brush here, but they tend to be people without a lot of social capital.

And so this is the, so this, this becomes social capital for them that they know the secret truth. You see this with terrorist groups as well. They know the secret truth, and they can look down upon and pity the rest of us who are not purveyors of the secret truth. And then the others that know the secret truth become their social community. And so then to turn their back on that is turning their back on an identity. And that identity is difficult sometimes to walk away from. Oh, I have so much I want to talk to you about. So

if this is happening on social media, do you believe that social media companies have a responsibility inherently to curb disinformation? Because there's a lot of debate about that right now. There's no question that social media companies have to have some kind of content moderation. They must. Because otherwise it is just going to devolve into child porn and Nazis. That's what it would become. And so they must have some kind of content moderation. There's profit motive in having content moderation,

it has to be, it has to be a pleasant and enjoyable experience for the user. I'm not going to go on a social media platform that's all child porn and Nazis, my time spent on that platform would be zero. So there's a profit motive in content moderation, they need to keep you as a user. But there is also there's federal laws they need to follow. But the real debate is not should we have any content moderation at all? The real debate is how much and what kind, right? And people have different perspectives on how much and what kind of content moderation is the right amount to have. And you're seeing this very strongly in the news right now with Elon Musk's bid to purchase Twitter and people continuing to interview him with how

much content moderation would you have? Would you ban this person? Would you ban that person? And he's strongly in the camp of we will only ban irredeemable accounts that are like 100% spam and bots. If you're just controversial, then we'll keep you. Right. I think Twitter has been the one weirdly the like the social platform that I think has done the most what like clearing they've banned probably the most people you know famously donald trump no longer has a twitter account so it's really interesting to see how that might shift under different leadership it is and it's very interesting to see the american discourse around whose job is it to moderate this content some people think it's the government's job and who

is in charge of moderating the content? Because those people have a tremendous amount of power in the in the not not just on the social media channel, but just sort of in the context of American political dialogue, cultural dialogue. They have a tremendous amount of power in controlling that narrative. Tremendous. We know. Yeah. I mean, Facebook, we're only now, I think, truly starting to understand how much sway Facebook has on election outcomes.

Absolutely. I mean, even the intelligence community in the United States is like heads up. There was significant election interference from Russia, from Iran, from China in the 2016 election via social media. So how are we currently or not currently holding people and companies accountable for dis or misinformation i mean i don't know that the average user really is other than than refusing to give them their eyeballs right the eyeballs are the currency for a social media channel and so it's very difficult to hold aside from like well i'm selling my twitter sack you know what i mean like i refuse to own meta um aside for which writer i'm yeah i'm deleting my twitter stack you know what i mean like i refuse to own meta um aside for which writer i'm yeah i'm deleting my twitter account i've had a bunch of people say

right right until those things happen at large scale twitter doesn't care if you sell your shares you know what i mean like it's not affecting them um so until there is some larger movement where they really start getting hit in their bottom line, which again equals users, eyeballs. Until that happens, we're not holding them accountable. The only entity with true power over them would be some sort of government regulation, which they are frankly quite afraid of. The social media companies? Yes. Yes. Quite afraid of what that government regulation might look like. Because of their profit margin? Like, what are they afraid? I mean, I can guess what they're afraid of, right? But like, if I'm Mark Zuckerberg in that scenario, but if I am, like, I want the best experience for people,

right? And of course, I want what's best for the world. And again, this is I'm talking like, you know, not a billionaire. So it's like, like, is it the threat to and the control that worries them of like this platform will change? Our bottom line will change if the government oversees it. will change if the government oversees it. So right now, there is a portion of a federal law that governs internet communications. And that portion of the federal law is called Section 230. And that law, it allows social media companies to not have the responsibility of acting as a publisher. And instead, they are reviewed or believed to be a platform. And so if you are a publisher of whatever it is, like the New York Times, right, they have to they go through certain due diligence of ethics of reporting. That's right.

It's incumbent upon you. You're not allowed to knowingly publish false information. But a platform is different. And so users can come on and post whatever they want. And it's up to Twitter, Facebook, et cetera, to determine to what extent they want to allow that on their platform. So what they're afraid of is the government taking away Section 230 that grants them platform status and making them a publisher or creating additional regulations that say things like, creating additional, additional regulations that say things like, you must allow this kind of content, you must not allow this kind of content. And then to speak to your point, yes, if the

government says you must allow this kind of content, but their current user base hates that content, that hits them in their bottom line, then you're affecting the user experience. If it's telling me I have to see content about how to change the oil in my car and I don't care because I pay someone to do that, I'm not going to stay on your platform. So that's, you know, like, especially Meta, especially Mark Zuckerberg have been very out in front being like, we want a seat at this table.

We want to tell you what kind of regulations you should have for us, because, you know, we own all of this data. Like, that's the other thing, of course, is that they own a tremendous amount of data on their users. So they're trying to be proactive. And then we get into the, you know, the cycle that I'm sure, you'm sure is very easy to find where Zuckerberg has enough money to sway entire elections. most definitely, are buying certain, you know, electoral positions in order to affect the change that they want to see or, you know, not cause the change that they want to see. There's no question that there are billions of dollars pumped into elections in the United States from all industries promoting their own self-interest. And so, yes, these huge tech companies absolutely do the same. They absolutely pay a lot of money. Totally. That's how the system is set up.

Oh, makes me mad. Okay. So it's not shocking what my politics are. This podcast is called Financial Feminist. It should be pretty obvious. So when I hear you say that there's a line item in federal law distinguishing what's a publishing company or what's a publisher versus a platform, I mean, there's misinformation or disinformation on both sides completely. But I think about Fox News, right? Where I'll take a very specific thing in my own life. When Black Lives Matter resurgent happened in June of 2020, there was so much conversation about Seattle in particular, as like this very, especially on Fox News, is like this very unsafe place. And I would literally walk to the neighborhoods that they were talking about. And yes, there was, you know, there was

protests, there were all these things, but it was not the dramatic, big picture that they were trying to paint. So what sort of regulations or kind of hoops do these publishers have to jump through in order to maintain, I'll put integrity in quotes, but integrity, journalistic integrity. A lot of institutions seem to not have much journalistic integrity or not meet a lot of the ethics of reporting a true story. So what does that look like? So there are two things at play here. The first thing is that when you are publishing something in a newspaper, generally speaking, When you are publishing something in a newspaper, generally speaking, or let's say even a media company's website, and the website is there to provide news for people, that is subjected to different federal regulations than entertainment is. And so specifically related to Fox News, and this is not me picking on fox these are just facts

that have happened in courts of law fox news has been sued for on multiple occasions and is currently involved in a lawsuit and to be fair other people on the left are sued as well but they're currently involved um in multiple billion dollar lawsuits like over two billion dollars against fox news against specific hosts on Fox. The ones I'm thinking of most recently are related to things about the 2020 election, but they have been sued in the past. And the defense that they were successful in advancing was that this is not news, this is entertainment. And that anybody watching this would not take it to be the truth they would take it to be entertainment yeah which no the average consumer it's called fox news

and so the there's do you see the difference there between like a media person? I do, but I'm so mad. A media personality providing their punditry about tonight. Seattle is on fire. That is legally if they can prove it in court that it's entertainment that's different than opening up the Chicago Times that says, you know, like two fires were set at a federal building. They were quickly put out by firefighters. That is viewed as the news. And if it's not, you know, like there was recently Sarah Palin sued the New York Times saying you printed false information about me. Sarah Palin, of course,

being former vice presidential candidate, former governor of Alaska, you printed false information about me. Sarah Palin, of course, being former vice presidential candidate, former governor of Alaska, you printed false information about me, and she filed a lawsuit against them. So people who have false information printed about them, the enforcement mechanism, here's the other thing that people don't understand is that the enforcement mechanism for printing false information, putting fake news out on your channel, the enforcement mechanism is somebody suing you. It's not the government showing up at your door and being like, you printed fake information about Sarah Palin. It is Sarah Palin suing the person in this case that she believes, the New York Times, that she believed was publishing fake information about her. Which requires money on both sides, too. That's the other thing. Right. Like, you need money to

put a lawsuit against, especially somebody as big as the New York Times or Fox News. That's right. It requires a tremendous amount of resources to mount a successful lawsuit against a large media company. And then conversely, it used a lot of resources from the media company to defend themselves against lawsuits. Sarah Palin lost. They determined that the New York Times did not knowingly that it also requires knowingly printing false information that then harms you in some way. If you print information that's like, Tori has $48 billion in the bank, and she is really gorgeous and is a supermodel. So those things might not be true. You might not have $48 billion, but you also, it would be

difficult for you to demonstrate that that harmed you in some way. It made me too attractive that no man would go on a date with me. That's what it was. I'm so rich and so hot. Oh my God. So yeah, it might be false, but it also probably didn't hurt you. So it requires both of those things. It has to be knowingly false, but also has to harm you in some way. So if I'm a listener, I'm doing the classic thing where I'm sitting down at the Thanksgiving table and Uncle Joe is spouting off some shit that he heard. How do we politely engage in conversation with people, especially people we care about, who are maybe probably not knowingly, but spreading misinformation. And then my second part is if we want to engage with people online, how do we do that in a smart, respectful way as well? Okay. So the first thing you need to ask yourself about Uncle Joe is, is this an argument

I want to have? Do I want to argue? Because the answer might be no. And you do not have to agree to engage in every fight you're invited to. The answer can be no, thank you. I'm not getting into that fight today. And so if your goal is to like, I don't want to fight with Joe. Like I am just here trying to eat pie and take a nap. You just want to have a nice little Thanksgiving. You can go with the like, oh, that's fascinating. I'm going to have to, I'm going to have to look into that or I'm going to, oh wow. I'm going to have to give that some thought and then don't, and then don't give it any thought. Don't look into it, but it makes Joe feel better. And then you don't have to argue about it.

Right. Like it, it placates him. But let's say you do want to get into an argument with him. Let's say you do want to ruin Thanksgiving. That is your goal. I think, I think weirdly there's like, there's a lot of talk, especially after like 2020 with, with, you know, trying to be anti-racist. I know I've, I've heard this from so many people is it's like, in order to be anti-racist i know i've i've heard this from so

many people is it's like in order to be anti-racist it's you know all these things it's voting it's protesting it's donating it's it's discovering you know and and working through your own anti-racism it's also calling family members on the bullshit like that's your responsibility and so i for a long time especially the last two years like have caused a lot of family fights and I've tried to figure out like which ones are worth quote unquote fighting. Like which ones do I actually think are going to make some progress and which ones aren't. But I feel like weirdly myself and my friends, when we've talked about this, like there's like this underlying responsibility that you have to do this. And I appreciate that you're also like, you know what? Like if you don't want to do that today, that's okay. Yeah, some things are not worth arguing

about. But if you feel like, listen, this is one of my issues that I am not willing to set aside, I am willing to argue about, then a great question that, do you know who Nedra Tawwab is? She has a fantastic, a fantastic fantastic Instagram account and she has a book called Set Boundaries, No Peace. And she's a black therapist. She's fantastic. I love her. One of the things that she suggests is asking somebody, what do you mean by that? It's my favorite question. I'll go, tell me more about that. If you listen to this podcast, you've heard me say that. Tell me more about that. Yeah, tell me more about that.

What do you mean by that? And they'll be like, well, what do you mean? What do I mean by that? Because that sounded really racist. So I just wanted to make sure that I was understanding what you meant by that. I want to make sure I was understanding correctly so that I didn't. So I was operating on the correct information. And even just forcing them to reflect and justify themselves, that in and of itself can be a great seed to plant. That can be a great tool to pry open a

bigger conversation if that's something that you, if you feel like this is my issue, I am willing to talk about it. What do you mean by that? Yeah. I think I've also realized that you can only have conversations, you know know there will inevitably be a disagreement with somebody who's willing to change their mind you know so it's like if you're going into something with curiosity and the other person's also curious great but if you're trying to you know oh i'm going to send you six links to different news articles to disprove the one that you just spouted out and they're not will willing. It won't matter. Yeah. There's a lot of research, actually, that shows that the more you attack somebody's deeply held belief, and I'm not talking about

racism. I'm just speaking like, let's say you believe a weird conspiracy theory or whatever. The more you attack somebody's deeply held belief, the more deeply they believe it. That is very, that's terrible. I hate that about people. Is it because it's like, it's like to your point earlier of like, I know something you don't know. And weirdly, like it makes me feel more powerful for this potentially smart person to not know that 9-11 was an inside job. Is that it? That's an aspect of it, but it is also another thing related to what I said before about it being part of your identity. But if you think about, let's say somebody has a deeply held religious faith. And if I'm like, your religion is trash.

Here's six articles about why your religion is trash. Here's terrible things your priests or your pastors did in the past, your wackadoo beliefs, you know what, and I'm not trashing anybody's religion. But let's say somebody wants to trash your religion. Are you going to read those articles be like, well, I'm not a Jew anymore. I'm no longer a Christian. No, yeah, that actually is what's it going to do? It's going to make you mad at the other person. You're not going to cause you to question your beliefs. It's going to make you mad at the other person. It's not going to cause you to question your beliefs. It's going to make you dislike them. And so consequently, you then lose your ability to influence that person in the future.

If you send them six articles about why their religion is terrible, you lose your ability to influence them in the future. So if the goal is like i would like to maintain this relationship so that someday down the road when you might be interested or curious in abandoning this conspiratorial thinking i will be here i will be a resource for you i might be able to influence you in the future but just sending them a bunch of articles is just going to make them believe it more in many cases. It's terrible. I wish they could just read the article and abandon it. Well, and it's just the general, the psychological

need for us as humans to be comfortable, right? And if someone is going to make us uncomfortable, even in a positive way, right, potentially the outcomes, like we will shut down and not do it. Like we see that with money. Like we know that from money, right? As it's like so many people, we call it the ostrich effect in personal finance, right? They bury their head in the sand. It's just so much easier to like not look at your money. And even though it is temporarily uncomfortable, it ultimately betters your life to, you know, look at your money or to work out or to go to therapy or all the other things, right? Or to leave that toxic relationship that like is comfortable now, but you know, deep down, you're not supposed to be with that person.

I know people that don't, you know, like, don't even open their mail because the bills are too uncomfortable because they know that they maybe don't have the resources to pay them or whatever. And so the, the human brain's desire to avoid discomfort, like don't underestimate your brain's desire to avoid discomfort. And so it requires a concerted effort on your part to wade into that discomfort with the long game in mind. And that is true of money and a variety of other things. Right.

Totally. Switching gears a little bit, let's say that I, as an individual, am trying to figure out how do I affect change on a personal level? What can I personally do on a hot button issue? what can i personally do on like a hot button issue abortion critical race theory like if it isn't the president that's in charge right who is in charge of making these decisions that affect my life and what can i do to make change beyond voting or like emailing my representative or calling my representative i hear that all the time. People are like, I emailed and nothing happened. You know what I mean? Like I said, I emailed this very busy person who got 60 million other emails. I emailed and he didn't listen. I get it. Like just the advice of email and vote. Those are important things. Voting is actually extraordinarily important. It's frustrating when that's all you have. It seems like those are important things. Voting is actually extraordinarily important. It's

frustrating when that's all you have. It seems like those are your only tools that you have. I will tell you that there is always power in numbers. The more people that are involved in something or advancing a cause, the more likely you are to get noticed. And so for many people, that looks like joining an organization that supports what it is they want to achieve, racial equality, whatever that is, whatever it is for you, joining an organization with infrastructure, with money, with contacts, with all of those things, the power and the numbers of that organization, and then perhaps that organization can provide you with information, tools, resources, etc, that you can then be like, I am going to this thing, I'm going to go to this hearing at my state capitol, I'm going to sign up

to be on this board, I'm going to engage in this media opportunity, because of course, the squeaky wheel gets the grease. So anytime you can bring media into it to draw attention to your issue, those organizations that align with your beliefs can often provide you with a lot more opportunities than you could just get by firing off an email or voting one time every two years. You know what I mean? So there are other things absolutely as well. But I think people overlook the importance of organizations in civic engagement, organizations that align with your beliefs and the causes that you care about advancing. I would also tell people this. We have a lot of things that we care about. Humans care about a lot of things, and we should. But it is okay to care more about more than one thing. And you can have more impact

on the one thing. You know, like, I'm sure you have many interest story, but money is your thing. That's your thing. That's where you have the greatest level of impact. And you shouldn't allow yourself to step away from your highest impact because there are other things to care about. It is okay that this is your thing. Just like it's okay that my thing is government and current events, et cetera. It's okay that that's my thing. That's where my highest impact is. So maybe somebody's highest impact is homelessness and you care so deeply about it. The things that you care so deeply about are given to you for a reason. We need people to care about different

things. We cannot all care about only microplastics in the ocean, but nobody's over here caring about children who don't eat. Do you know what I mean? We all have to care about different things and that is okay, necessary and needed. ASPCA like I need to take care of all the doggies and the kitties like that is so important to me but also like I can't I can't spread myself too thin right so it's like yeah finding the things yeah that's right that's right it's okay to do that that's right you don't need to feel guilty I I have three dogs I absolutely love animals you but I don't need to feel guilty that it's it's not actually my job to save all the dogs in the world. And we, especially as women, I feel like tend to get stuck in this, like, I can't, I want to fix everything. I care about all these things. And then we get stuck in this, like, I can't fix it all. So I will fix nothing. I will spin my wheels because I feel overwhelmed. What is it? Ron Swanson,

don't a half-ass one thing when you can hold, or don't half-ass two things when you can whole-ass one thing. That's right. Your whole ass will have more impact. That's right. That like one eighth of your ass will. That's right. That's right. You don't have to commit to rainforest for the rest of your life.

Your season of donating to the rainforest can be now. And then in five years, your season of donating something else that did or working for a cause that deeply impacts you, it can change. So don't just like your career can change. Don't think you have to work at the telephone company for 40 years. You're not getting locked into a cause today forevermore. You can change down the road. Amazing. And we talked to, I'm not sure which episode will come up first, but I spoke to Amanda Lippman, who's the co-founder of Run for Something yesterday. Incredible. She's incredible. But one of the things that she highlighted is focusing too on local, very

specific local government, local issues, because that's where you can have one affect the most change and two, where the change is actually going to impact you the most. These huge national elections, especially presidential elections are very flashy, right? And don't not vote in them, please God. But also they're not going to affect you a ton. And you can't, of course, as one individual have a ton of sway or effect change, but you can run for your school board or support a certain person who's running for your school or library board or, you know, the district attorney's office or something like that. And those positions then become stepping stones to bigger things if you want them to be. Where do you think people who, you know, people who are like Joe Biden was on his city council. think people who, you know, people who are like Joe Biden was on his city council. You know what I mean? Like people get experience and then they can move up if someday you're good. That's your

goal. But you're 100% correct that the issues that impact your daily life the most like what good is is talking about the ASPCA if nobody is actually picking up your trash. Do you know what I mean? Like somebody needs to pick up your trash and like make sure you have clean drinking water. Or who's banning a certain book for, you know, the children who are being educated at the elementary school three blocks from you. That's right. Those are all very real things that impact your daily life. Trash pickup, roads, clean water, homelessness in your community, that health care, that also impact your life at the micro level on a daily basis. And those happen in your own community. And it's usually not the president has nothing to do with picking up trash

at your community. You know what I mean? Like those are very important things. Right, right. You've talked about how candidates are using sometimes these hot button topics as rallying points, right? Like critical race theory in schools, but they actually have no control over legislation that has to do with schools. So how can we look out for this? Like, how can we find, I don't know, how can we like fact check that? Okay. So this is, this is where education on government, why I think it's important, because if you don't know that the person who's on city council has nothing to do with the school board, then you might vote for them based on what they want to do for schools, when in reality, they have zero control over the schools. what they want to do for schools, when in reality, they have zero control over the schools. And they absolutely do use wedge issues, whatever it is for their what they believe their voter base wants to hear. They use those wedge issues that differentiate themselves between them and their opponent,

in an effort to try to galvanize their base. So one of the ways you can fact check that is to figure out what actually are the responsibilities of this candidate. This person is on the water board. He has nothing to do with critical race theory at my school. Do you know what I mean? Sometimes it's obvious, but sometimes it's not obvious that congressional candidates actually have no say over what happens in your community

schools because those rules are set by states and local communities. Those are not set by the federal government. Congress is not making laws about what's happening in Seattle public schools or I mean any public schools for that matter, outside of a few narrow areas like, you know, like special education, the vast majority of what happens in schools is done at the state and local level. And so if you are voting for congressional candidates based on their beliefs about schools, you're going to be disappointed when they don't deliver on anything related to schools. Yeah. Can we talk about the Electoral College for a second? Of course. Yeah. Can we talk about the electoral college for a second? Of course. Absolutely.

Probably your favorite topic. Okay. What are the pros and cons of the electoral college system? And is it something that is actively disenfranchising voters or is it something a little more complex than that? Well, okay. So the 2020 election did align with the popular vote. The 2016 election did not. Hillary won the popular vote. And there were a couple of elections where like Barack Obama did win the popular vote and he did win the Electoral College. George W. Bush is the is, you know, like another example of a differential between a popular vote. Which election?

The 2000 election yeah in fact george w bush won the 2000 election by a 500 and i want to say 538 votes there's so much debate on whether he actually did win right because oh yeah absolutely it depends on how you want to recount the votes in florida um he either won by 500 and something votes or Al Gore narrowly won, but it depends on the criteria. It's like the simulation, right? Where it's like, what would this world be if Al Gore? Yeah, very different.

It would be very different. It absolutely would. What would Al Gore's leadership on 9-11 look like? Would 9-11 have happened if Al Gore? Totally. The 2000 election is absolutely fascinating. It's so interesting, but I won't belabor the points of the 2000 election. Okay. Electoral college. Talk to me. People ask me all the time, should we keep the electoral

college? Is it worth having? Is it protecting people? And if you live in a small state, and by small, I mean population population small your inclination tends to be that you want to keep it and because it gives you a larger impact larger influence on the outcome of the election than you would have otherwise if you live in a big state if you live in Texas you might want to keep it but if you live in a state like California or New York, the swing tends to be that you don't want to keep it because you feel like your vote is diluted. Your vote is diminished because you only have this tiny sliver of the pie. When if you were going by pure population, your state would have more influence. by pure population, your state would have more influence.

Well, in addition, it seems the way they've split districts, right, the gerrymandering that's happened in terms of the electoral districts, right, is I think that's the other big issue, right, is you're seeing very specific tactics to suppress votes from largely Black and brown communities. And that affects the way the electoral College can operate. It does. And so the question that we have to ask ourselves then when we're talking about this issue is, what is the most important thing to achieve in an election? Is it one person, one vote? Is it state identity? Or is it something else? Because the Electoral College props up state identity politics. It firmly establishes that we are South Dakota, and our votes go this direction. Do you know what I mean? Whereas a straight popular vote

is much more focused on the identity of a single individual, one person, one vote. Younger people tend to be very against the Electoral College statistically. Gen Z does not like the Electoral College by and large. People older than me, the boomer generation, tends to want to keep it. They feel comfortable with it. Maybe they understand it better than Gen Z does. Yep. And there's also that differential that younger people tend to live in more urban areas, and they are more likely to feel disenfranchised by the Electoral College. So that's really the question we have to answer. Is it state identity, or is it one person, one vote? Because if it's one person, one vote, the Electoral College does not support that. If it's state identity, then the Electoral College supports that.

And that question of state identity, states' rights is truly fundamental to the United States that has existed since this country's inception is what is the role of state government? And it's something that people are clearly still arguing about today. one of the things that i'm he can't not hear about it is that this this perspective of this thinking that so many of the quote-unquote issues with government would be solved if we would just move away from the two-party. Do you agree with that? What like, tell us more about that. And because, yeah, I'm over here. I'm like, I don't know. You can't like I obviously identify is pretty clear. Again, what my politics are. But like, I am much more, I think, left leaning than a lot of people who identify as Democrats. So it's like, is is that something that is necessary?

Do you think based on your vast knowledge that that's just the inevitable? Like, what does this look like? want more than two political parties. Most Americans feel like neither party accurately represents their views. And you as a pretty, you know, pretty far to the left, you probably feel like that moderate wing, that center wing of the Democratic Party, like the Joe Manchins of the world, you probably feel like he does not represent your views. I'm hypothesizing. he does not represent your views um i'm hypothesizing i i do the like i would yeah well i think of um even like the past presidential election joe biden was not my first choice like it was not my first choice at all he's very he's much more moderate than a lot of people who are farther left yes but i understood this is like the nuance of it i understood that joe biden was probably the best person to beat Donald Trump. So like,

I believe that at least because I was like, I was very much Elizabeth Warren was like my candidate. And it was like, she is much more left leaning than Joe Biden is. But I understood that just from thinking about the political sphere in general, not just what I personally want, like who is more likely to beat the other person, like who is more likely to appeal? I was like, okay, it's probably Joe Biden. Yes. so many americans are like you in that they vote strategically or they vote for the lesser of two evils but they don't necessarily what happened with hillary and trump right they don't necessarily feel like the candidate truly represents what they would like to see accomplished in the united states you know So I pretty strongly believe that the Electoral College is one of the

largest barriers to increasing the number of viable political parties in the United States, because 48 out of 50 states operate on a winner-take-all system, where you're going to get all of our state's electoral votes. It makes it next to impossible for a third party candidate to gain viable traction for a presidential race. You know, like they might have success at a local race. They might even win a governorship. But when it comes to the presidency, they're not going to win unless the electoral college is is removed. Right. I think famously about Bernie Sanders, who runs, I believe, as an independent. Correct. I think he does. He is an independent.

Yep. He caucuses with Democrats in the Senate, but he is registered as an independent. So it is, you know, of course, then the other issue is the money that's associated with the two big political parties, that if you want to have more parties, they need money. They need money and they need viability. People don't want to put money behind something that they feel has no chance, right? Are you going to just write a $10 million check that you know is going to go nowhere? No, you want to think I at least have a 50-50 shot of

my person getting elected. You don't want to write a huge check to something that has no viability prospects. So as long as those two things are in place, the money that is, we don't change anything about the way elections are funded, and we continue to have the exact same system of the Electoral College, you will not see the prevalence or the spreading of more parties. We certainly have parties, more third parties. There's lots of them. They just don't win national elections. So speaking of the writing the big checks, probably the biggest issue that we see is politicians working for personal gain, right? Where it's like money and politics are so entrenched at this point. So it seems like so many politicians are not listening to constituents. They're not serving the people that they were tasked with serving.

They're instead serving the companies and the donors and the billionaires. Is there a way that we can get back to the true like public servant mindset of politics? Are there ways we can keep lobbyists out of politicians' pockets? Is like, how do we solve it? Can we solve it? Yeah, it is solvable. It requires a pretty radical departure from the way things work right now. And it would require a commitment to that. But there certainly is a path. It's just a path that is difficult to navigate. So there's a few things that could happen. One is we could fundamentally change the way elections are funded in the United States. And that would require a constitutional amendment to change the

way elections are funded. And the reason it would require a constitutional amendment is because there have been federal laws that have passed changing the way elections are funded, and they were determined to be unconstitutional. Tell me more about that. They were unconstitutional. One of the most famous decisions is a 2010 opinion called Citizens United versus FEC. And that was a Supreme Court opinion that found that corporations have the same First Amendment constitutional rights as individual citizens. And that money is speech. Money is the speech. I just think, how do I explain this? Community is such like, it's so deep in it. There's an episode where they bring, they open a Subway sandwich. They open a Subway location on campus, but because it's like a corporate conglomerate, they're not allowed. So what they do is they have a student enroll and his identity becomes Sub like his name is subway because they they're not

allowed to bring like a corporation into the community college that isn't associated with the community college in some way so they literally pay this kid to like become subway and i just like that literally that's what it sounds like yes yes this is a landmark supreme court case how do they have that's so the corporations are people yes corporations are people and money is speech that is why we have super PACs that can pump tens of millions of dark money into elections because we cannot infringe on the free speech rights of corporations. And so that's why I say that we need a constitutional amendment to change that, in my opinion, because just passing a law is not going to do it because the Supreme Court has decided that they have those free speech rights. So until the Constitution

changes to say the citizens have free speech, but this doesn't include businesses, until that changes, you're unlikely to see the way elections are funded change. So that's one thing. If we're looking at the graph prior to 2010, is there a huge spike after 2010? Oh my gosh, yes. Oh my gosh yes oh my gosh yes absolutely if you even look at say um remember after the 2020 election they couldn't decide uh they're like the race was too close between the two uh senators in georgia that there were both senators had come up for election at the same time um that's normally not the case it's one one senator at a time in a state right wasn't there like a runoff? I'm trying to remember.

There was they had runoffs. Yes, they had runoffs between, you know, a Democrat and a Republican in one in one seat and the same in the other. And the Democrats narrowly squeaked out a win in both of those both of those seats. seats. And the amount of money that was pumped into just winning those two seats in just the runoff election between November 2020 and January of 2021 was over $700 million was spent trying to win those two congressional seats. 90 days, less than 90 days, over $700 million. So who is this? What's the what's what's the $700 million coming from? It's not coming from individuals, right? Super PACs. Yes. And those are political action committees that are allowed to get donations from companies and individuals, conceal the identity of the company or individual, and allow them to donate large, large sums of money.

You know, like there's an actual limit that you as an individual can donate to one specific candidate, right? Like you cannot write a $40 million check as Tori Dunlap to Raphael Warnock candidate for Senate. Because as we know from the previous part of this episode, I have so much money and I'm so hot. Yes.

So the obvious thought, right, if let's say I am a huge corporate conglomerate and I'm donating money to this campaign, I am trying to support this candidate in the hopes that they are supporting my goals as an organization right supporting my goals as a company are they still anonymous to that candidate because you said they like enter anonymous generally speaking yes generally speaking yes they are interesting so in so why is why donate because you feel like so for example with these two candidates in georgia they wanted the democrats to have control of the senate and they were or they desperately wanted the democrats to not have control of the senate so they vote they donated to the opposing candidate so the idea is that if the Democrats have control or the Republicans have control is of tremendous importance. And if it affects tax laws, it affects regulations.

Right. Right. That's right. If the Republican part, you know, the Republicans are more friendly to my industry or Democrats are more friendly to my industry or my cause. So the idea that corporations or very, very wealthy donors have a tremendous amount of out, you know, like an outsized influence on American law and American politics is very evidenced between like, I want to say it was January 5th of 2021 and November 3rd of 2020 that they spent $700 million, something in that range. I do think that there could be federal laws passed that limit the impact of lobbyists on Congress. There are only two countries in the world that allow lobbying. All the other democracies- Can you define what lobbying is?

Yeah. It is an organization or an industry that employs an individual or a group of individuals. And the goal of the individual or group is to advance the interests of the group that hires them. And they advance their interests legislatively via things like education. And so one of the reasons people say that lobbying is necessary and needed is because America is a very large country population-wise. It's a large country geographically. It is a very complicated economy. We're not just a small tourist country. You know what I mean? We have a large amount of moving plates spinning. And so lobbying organizations would

say that they provide very needed and valuable education to legislators about what's important to their mining industry or their medical industry. Or I'm ExxonMobil and I have hired lobbyists to talk about oil. That's right that's exactly right um and so there's it's it is probably true they do provide education on things they do it's not if that's education to representatives to senators and representatives yes about things like here's why the american heart association or the american Medical Association would oppose this legislation or would want this piece of legislation. They want you to renew the Clean Air Act because it has negative impact on Americans' health or whatever it is. So they're providing education

on how that constituency, that group feels about an issue. So some people in Congress would say, that's useful to me. I want to know how doctors feel about this piece of legislation. How will I know otherwise? Will I just send out a survey and be like, hey, doctors, fill out this survey. You know, like how else will they get the information?

So that's the upside of lobbying. Could we take more steps to limit lobbying? Of course. Yes, we absolutely could. It's an uphill battle, though, because people get money from these organizations and they get money to run their campaigns. And so that all goes back to my prior point that if we change the way that elections are funded, we will change the influence that lobbyists have. actions are funded, we will change the influence that lobbyists have. Can you give us like three quick things that we can do to be good consumers of media that we can do to determine where to get our media from, what sort of information is dis or misinformation,

and any sort of influence we can have on politics as individuals sure yeah i have one great quick tip which is a media bias chart that your listeners might find interesting it is there's an organization called ad fontes mediaN-T-E-S. I'm not affiliated. It's free. Ad Fontes Media. It's Latin for to the source. And they evaluate, they have a team of people left, right, and center that evaluate media sources, not just for bias, but also for accuracy. where like your favorite news source, let's say you love to read the New York Times, does that they'll show you does that lean left? Is it strongly left? Is it super far right? And then additionally, how accurate how reliable I think is the word that they use? How reliable is that source in reporting facts. And so that I think is tremendously useful. It allows you to see how reliable are my news sources. So that's one thing very quick and easy that people can do to better educate themselves about the media they're consuming, adfontesmedia.com.

And they actually have like curriculum stuff for teachers. So like there's a lot of things that they can, that they have a lot of resources. Another thing is I always recommend reading your news instead of watching it because what you read is more carefully vetted. There are multiple people looking at that. It's not somebody spouting garbage because somebody had to write it, type it up. An editor had to read it. They had to format it for the web. There are like multiple. And it's not as emotionally potentially jarring, right? Because if somebody is presenting news to you, just like me talking right now, you can tell if I'm agitated, right? Because if somebody is presenting news to you, just like, you know, me talking right now, you can tell if I'm agitated, right? Or you can tell if I'm more calm, right? So it's going to, that's a great point. Watching your news or your entertainment

is going to be, you know, more emotional just because you're watching somebody else deliver it. That's exactly right. You're way more likely to feel emotionally manipulated or fired up than you are if you're just reading a fact-based news source, reading it. So those are two quick tips. And then the other third thing that I would say is when people are like,

oh, there's so many things to fix. The whole thing is broken. Just light it all on fire. I hate it all. That's a very common way to fix. The whole thing is broken. Just light it all on fire. I hate it all. That's a very common way to feel. I would encourage people to not let the enormity of the world's problems keep you from doing something. It's not your job to fix everything, but it also does not mean you have no responsibility. It's everyone's job to do something, but nobody's job to do everything. Pick something that you love.

Pick a cause, rainforest, microplastic, whatever it is, and work on that one thing and do one small thing for that issue that you care deeply about. And if all of us do that, that will have a much bigger impact than five of us trying to do everything. That was very poetic, and I wish I could end on that. However, we have Aaron Burr. I need to know at least one more fact about Aaron fucking Burr. Okay. Okay. Yes. Okay. So when Aaron Burr was acquitted on his treason trial, he went to Europe. He was like, these people hate me. They were like burning him in effigy around the entire country. He was a complete villain. And europe he was like these people hate me they were like burning him in effigy

around the entire country he was a complete villain and so he's like i can't stay here it wasn't after hamilton though because in the musical it's like he shot hamilton and that's the that's his like claim to that's it that's the end of his story no no he the whole thing about like i'm gonna take over texas part of texas that all happened after Hamilton. And people are pissed off about that, not the fact that he shot him. Totally. Totally. Yes. Totally. So he's acquitted for treason. He realizes, I can't stay here. I'm going to go to Europe. While he's in Europe, he attempts to convince Napoleon to help him take over Florida. And Napoleon's like, no, I'm not helping. We're not doing that. Yeah,

we're not doing that. The Spanish already had it. Like, we're not. I'm not fighting the Spanish on your behalf to help you become the leader of the emperor of Florida. No. So. So really, it's not a Napoleon complex. It's a Burr complex. Yes. So he eventually, he writes to his, by the way, Aaron Burr and Theodosia, his wife, had four children together. Only one lived, his daughter Theodosia, who was his oldest. The other three died. So he writes to his daughter. Wait, wait, wait. Okay, hold on.

This family tree is insane. So we have Theodosia's first marriage had how many children? Do you know? Five. Right. She already had five she had five she had four only one survived with Aaron Burr so we got six children either biological or or stepchildren then we have the servant affair yes two children so we have two three what eight yes eight living 12 yeah or 11 total 11

total yeah holy okay i'm trying i'm literally i'm i'm not that i gif of like the swirling numbers is like me right so okay so theodosia his daughter has been keeping all of his stuff you know like when he flees to europe it's not like he brought everything he owned with him. He left it in her care. His daughter was married to the governor of South Carolina, by the way, James Alston. And his daughter only had one child whose name was Aaron Burr Alston. And then after he's been in Europe for like four years, he decides, I'm coming back. And Theodosia is excited to see him.

She's going to meet him in New York. Sheia is excited to see him. She's going to meet him in New York. She lives in South Carolina. Again, she's going to meet his ship in the harbor. Well, shortly before he lands in New York, her only child died. So Aaron Burr Alston, her only child, Aaron Burr's only grandchild died. So she doesn't meet him in New York. She's like, I'm too overcome. He died. Her son died in June. Aaron Burr was set to land in July.

And she was too overcome and said, I will have to come meet you later. So she finally sets sail to meet him in December and leaves on New Year's Eve. And then, of course, it's going to sail the beginning part of January. She brought like a bunch of his stuff, including a big trunk of correspondence that he had. And people kept letters back then, you know, like they just did.

Her ship encounters a storm or is seized by pirates. One of those two things and was lost forever, along with all of Aaron Burr's correspondence. So all the letters he wrote, you know, potentially between him and his wife, Theodosia, his daughter, Theodosia, potentially his correspondence with people like Hamilton, with people like, you know, the people who were helping him, helping him try to seize Texas.

That's all gone. That's all at the bottom of the ocean. So eventually he was single for many, many years. When finally in his late seventies, he remarried a wealthy widow and within one year had spent all of her money. And so she decided I'm divorcing you. I'm divorcing you. But the only way a woman could initiate a divorce and be granted a divorce during that time was if there was infidelity. So she accused him of infidelity. It's unlikely that her like

80-year-old husband was actually having affairs, but she accused him of that. husband was actually uh you know like having affairs but she accused him of that and so eventually after multiple years of being separated her divorce was finally granted she was represented in her divorce by the son of alexander hamilton by alexander hamilton jr talk about a full circle moment her divorce was finally granted on the day aaron bird died you can't make it up if it was a novel people would be like that's not believable right like that's nobody would write that in a novel it ends with he steals a wealthy widow's money. Is that not fascinating? Oh my God.

What I'm taking is Aaron Purr is a fucking piece of shit. Yes. It ends with you marrying a wealthy widow and stealing her money. What? He learned nothing. And then dying on the day of the divorce by Alexander Hamilton. He never got to be in the room where it happened. He never got that chance. Sharon, where can people find you?

At Sharon Says So on Instagram. My podcast is Sharon Says So. Thank you. This was so good. Thank you. Thank you. This was so good. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you to Sharon for joining us and teaching us so much in this episode. I'm now going to read everything I can about Aaron Burr and about, by extension, Leslie Odom Jr. And please, if you're a citizen of the United States and are legally able to vote,

please vote. Please register to vote. Make sure your family and friends are registered to vote. Make your voice heard. This is a luxury, unfortunately. It is a luxury to be able to vote. It is a privilege and we want you to exercise that privilege. Fight misinformation and disinformation. Call out your elected officials when they put corporations over people. Get involved in your local political scene. We also talked on a previous episode with Amanda Lippman of Run for Something about how to save our democracy. That's a great also place to continue learning more. So go back to that episode. We really can make a difference from the bottom up and voting is one of the most precious rights we have. Thank you for listening. Links to voting resources, Sharon's links and more in our show notes. Please check those out. Vote like your

life depends on it, y'all, because unfortunately, many do. Catch you later, financial feminists. Thanks, as always, for being here. Thank you for listening to Financial Feminist, a Her First 100K podcast. Financial Feminist is hosted by me, Tori Dunlap, produced by Kristen Fields, marketing and administration by Karina Patel, Olivia Koning, Sharice Wade, Marketing and administration by Karina Patel, Olivia Koning, Sharice Wade, Alina Hilzer, Paulina Isaac, Sophia Cohen, Valerie Oresko, Jack Koning, and Ana Alexandra. Research by Ariel Johnson. Audio engineering by Austin Fields. Promotional graphics by Mary Stratton.

Photography by Sarah Wolf. And theme music by Jonah Cohen Sound. A huge thanks to the entire Her First 100 K team and community for supporting the show. For more information about financial feminist, her first hundred K our guests episode show notes and our upcoming book also titled financial feminist, visit her first hundred K.com.