Lovett or Leave It - Kirstjen Gets Firjed (LIVE from Boston)

Episode Date: April 13, 2019

Trump purges DHS over immigration. Republican legislatures pass draconian anti-abortion laws. And Tucker Carlson can't understand code switching even though he does it on television every single night. Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang joins Jon on stage live in Boston to talk universal basic income and memes. Plus Cecile Richards, Sam Stein, and Janelle James join to talk about the democratic primaries, scammers at congressional hearings, the lessons of Shazam, and all the week's news. Oh and don't forget, HARVARD TAKES BRIBES. Thanks Boston!

Good evening, Boston. Good evening, Boston. Before I get to the week's news, I just do want to remind everyone, Love It or Leave It is going to Texas. May 2nd will be in Houston. May 4th will be in Dallas. May 5th will be in Austin.

On May 2nd in Houston, I would like to see some people. I've seen some complaints online that it's hard to buy tickets through the website. Persevere. Houston, Dallas and Austin are making you look terrible. Crooked.com slash events. Fix it. What a lovely spring you're having. No wonder the people in this city have that Boston look on your faces.

The combination of the fashion choices, facial hair choices, and facial expression choices of the men in this town, you all look like you're about to help Bane take over a stock exchange. Did you throw the shit quattros in the harbor? They're gonna leave that part out of the history books?

Here's a story that I, this is my personal experience with Bostonians, I will tell you, that to me captures something essential about you all. I was on a party bus with a bunch of bozos from Boston. I'll leave the names out, but you can imagine how I personally end up on a bus full of a bunch of people from Boston.

One Bostonian throws a beer can out the window. But the other says, what are you doing? What are you, BP? We're trying to have a society here. And to me, the question, what are you, BP? We're trying to have a society here, to this day is one of the funniest questions I've ever heard asked.

And I came to understand that as a city, you use charm and humor to overcome the fact that you're barely functioning human beings. This is your city hall. If you're... Look at it! If you're listening Look at it. If you're listening to this on a podcast,

the only way you can hear it, other than in this room, Google the Boston City Hall. Beautiful city. A place where storefronts and quaint New England homes and print shops and little bars, a new nation was formed. And then you plop this brutalist Aztec temple

upside down in the middle of your fucking city. It looks like a prison for aliens who tried to help us fight climate change. You have to expect Robocop to wander out of that thing. And then you Google the building, and what pops up? Pictures of fucking Tom Brady celebrating in front of it. Cheer all you want.

How good at football do you have to be for people to ignore how weird that kiss on the lips was? And we know the answer, isn't it? It's Tom Brady good. Makes sense that Tom Brady would celebrate in front of that building.

That's where Bob Kraft made his deal with General Grievous. And I'm pretty sure it's where Bob Kraft pays his tickets for being disgusting. Interesting where you guys are on all that. A little bit more self-aware than I expected. Bravo to you. It's also an erudite city,

home to MIT, and Harvard, and Toofs. I believe it's... I've never heard it said. I've only read it. I think it's pronounced Toofs. I'm going to Toofs. I believe it's... I've never heard it said. I've only read it. I think it's pronounced Toofs. I'm going to Toofs.

It's good. It's good. Look at all you proud Harvard people cheering for your school. All of you who earned your place. Earned your place by having parents who went to Harvard or having parents who could pay the fencing coach so you could go to Harvard. Any legacies? Honestly, you should just own it now.

It's cool. It's cool. kushner works in the white house it's cool to be a legacy america's a legacy at this point i don't know what it means either this is what i thought was interesting 50 people were indicted as part of the college admissions scandal that's currently embroiling celebrities who we know. There are 4,000 colleges in America. 50 people were indicted. Seven of the 50 are Harvard alums. Tells you something.

It's what makes Harvard special. That Harvard degree, it opens doors to the highest echelons of criminality in the United States. The network, the connections, the corruption. You could spend a lifetime fighting your way into some sort of international conspiracy. Get that Harvard sticker on the Volvo. They open the gates. Fencing coach sells his house

at twice the market rate to someone who decides to never live there and resell it at a huge loss. That person's son ends up at the Harvard fencing team. What I like about this story

is first of all, according to the Crimson, I did some research, they're planning to train the coaches on conflicts of interest, which is hilarious. Like it was all just a misunderstanding. You work at Harvard. What is that class?

And then there's the Z-list where after the admissions process is done, they just let in like 50 rich donor kids, who just get under that closing stone door like Indiana Jones, reach back and grab the Phillips Exeter hat. UMass! UMass! UMass! UMass.

That's exactly right. In conclusion, UMass. Anyway, I think it makes a ton of sense that Harvard has a $30 billion endowment and Flint doesn't have clean water. $30 billion endowment and Flint doesn't have clean water. Think about why it bothers you. Budget bigger than the state of Colorado.

Got that giant other brutalist building that looks like a Polaroid. What kind of mania took over this city? You guys are plopping down monstrosities all over town. I'm having a good time. I don't feel like ending the monologue. Any Eves out there?

Isn't that classic? How few of us. Any people that went to Amherst? Who cares? Swarthmore? There was a... I heard a Holy Cross BU

My mom went to BU And she's here somewhere BC MIT Hey MIT You guys got a congressman up there on the hill It's one of the dumbest motherfuckers I've ever seen woke up. MIT? Hey, MIT, you guys got a congressman up there on the hill. It's one of the dumbest motherfuckers I've ever seen.

John Kerry has a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science. It blew this fucking guy's mind. What are they teaching there at MIT? Put those pencils down. Look outside. It's a world out there. Any other colleges in this town?

What? Brandeis! Where are my Jews at? You know what? That is perfect. I ask where the Jews are, and then they all just start talking. Let's start the show. talking. Let's start the show. We have a fantastic panel for you tonight.

She's a comedian and writer, and her debut comedy album Black and Mild is out on Netflix. Please welcome back Janelle James. How you doing, Janelle? I'm good. Alright. Yeah, Boston, what up? You know him from his work at the Daily Beast. He's formerly at the Huffington Post. He's a frequent contributor to MSNBC. Please welcome

Sam Stein. How are you, Sam? I'm good, man. Boston! She's the former president of Planned Parenthood Pro-choice activist and her book Make Trouble Is out now, please welcome Cecile Richards Big welcome

For Cecile Really making Sam feel like shit I go on hardball I don't get that type of applause, what the hell For Cecile. Really making Sam feel like shit. I go on hardball. I don't get that type of applause. What the hell? Thank you guys for being here. Let's get into it. What a week.

Over the last few months, Trump has ratcheted up his immigration consternation, shutting down the government, declaring a national emergency to steal funding to build a border wall, and just last week he threatened to cause an economic crisis by shutting down the southern border. Then, over the weekend, Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen, the J is silent because it's gay and terrified of being sent back to its home country, gay and terrified of being sent back to its home country, abruptly resigned from her position in a meeting with Donald Trump. Trump asked Nielsen to close the ports of entry along the border and to stop accepting

asylum seekers, which Ms. Nielsen found ineffective and inappropriate. That's weird, since she is most well-known for championing family separation and lying about it on behalf of Donald Trump. Nielsen's firing set off a series of events that the dweebs in the media have begun calling the Purge. Trump withdrew the current nominee to run ICE because he wanted to go in a tougher direction,

and many other staffers and lifetime civil servants were forced out. Most onlookers believe this was orchestrated by C-plus Santa Monica fascist Stephen Miller, the first member of Gen Z to go bald. Oh, when liberals break a barrier, you applaud. When it's a conservative, you don't like it.

Breaking that hair ceiling. Trump? Trump and Miller, the president's top immigration advisor, have privately complained about Secretary Nielsen for a long time because she was such a softy uh it also comes as trump has suggested that law enforcement disregard judges orders along the border and trump has repeatedly maligned all asylum seekers as coming here on false pretenses uh sam i want to start with you what do you make of nielsen's

departure and uh what do you think are her hopes for rehabilitation which is very much on her mind she's probably got a Harvard Fellowship in the works right too soon honestly it's like would they hey Harvard would you deep down you know you would uh. No, I actually think that the policies that she became the face of were so inhumane, so controversial, that even if someone were to try to give her a board membership or a network contributorship, the outcry from not just progressive groups, but like fresh thinking, honest Americans would be so overwhelming that this would be tough for her. And we've heard that our reporters on the White House, we'd have heard this. I mean, basically, there's real palpable fear among people in the administration that they're just too toxic at this juncture.

But her departure, like all things with Trump, you know, there's like this weird dynamic where you don't know if what comes next is worse, right? Of course it is. We don't know. That's why you think it might be because it enables Stephen Miller even more. And so while, you know, it's weird, you like, you know, if you're progressive, you're sort of like, oh, thank God, you know, she, you know, spearheaded the family separation policy. And then you step back and you're like, well, what comes next? And God only knows. So, Jadel, how do you feel about Stephen Miller, a 33-year-old Republican extremist pulling the strings now on immigration?

I mean, that whole statement is a joke. Who is this guy? And why does he exist? He's a weirdo. We're letting weirdos run the country, it seems like. So let me just take you back to the beginning. He went to Santa Monica High School where he did not have a lot of friends. From that metastasized a deep sense of grievance and a sense that he had a chip on his shoulder and that the world was against them.

Now, he could have directed that toward noble purpose, as many high school people who have been bullied have done. Shut up! Shut up! But instead, he seems to have decided that all that sense that he was put upon, that life was hard for him, that it wasn't because of anything he did wrong. It was because of some other. And it wasn't the cool kids at his school, though God knows he must hit the looks,

he must shoot Jared Kushner breezing through life, could burn a fucking hole in a brick wall. He directed it at immigrants. And then by a twist of fate, having been Jeff Sessions' advisor when Jeff Sessions was a backbench extremist senator who's most famous for stopping criminal justice reform, managed to wend his way into the White House because no one talented or good wanted to be associated with Trump. He ends up at the White House making immigration policy. And it turns out even making immigration policy at the highest levels cannot sate this deep sense that life owes him something and that something is wrong

and that he's the one who can fix it. And maybe, maybe, just maybe, if he can stop these fucking immigrants from coming into this country, someone will reply on his goddamn Tinder. Anyway, Stephen Miller. Thanks for explaining that to me. It still makes no sense why he exists in the White House.

He is a weirdo. He sounds like a cartoon villain. He's going to shoot out the moon next, it seems like. But, yeah, I don't have good feelings about it. It seems like she may be a scapegoat for this 32-year-old booger-eating weirdo. Cecile, to that point... You know he does. Think about that.

Cecile, Donald Trump's White House, tons of turnover. There's acting chiefs of staff, there's acting defense secretaries. We've seen incredible turmoil in the administration, and yet throughout, Trump is Trump. he's pursued the same agenda from the very beginning do we overplay this question about who's minding these jobs

versus the actual impact it has on policy you know Sam makes this point like oh someone like Kirsten Nielsen leaves but maybe it'll get worse at the same time she oversaw family separation do we do we focus on this sort of palace intrigue too much? I think so. I think we just, this is what obviously the president has been doing ever since he came in, which is every day there's just more crazy stuff. And then people don't actually talk about what's going on. I think that in this family separation, like we can laugh about her, Kristen, but I was horrified that people actually were kind of rushing to her defense. And the only reason they were was because the president is worse. And that to me is a terrible sign about like how bad things she's over.

You know, her policy of family separation is so horrifying. And I worry that people are sort of taking their eye off of the, off the situation. I come from Texas where a lot of the separation has happened. It's unbelievable. The kind of tragedy that families are experiencing. And the reports this week that it will take them two years to actually reunite, if they'd even do, children with their families. I don't know about you.

I've got three kids. The thought of someone taking away my children for two years and then trying to recover from that is horrifying. And every single American has got to commit to never stopping on this fight until every single child is reunited with their loved ones. We cannot, cannot stop. Sam, this, you know, it seems Donald Trump is frustrated. He wants to make immigration central to his re-election. At the same time, he's been president now for... He will be president for four years during that campaign. There's this balance he's trying to strike

between making the issue central while also being unable to acknowledge that these crises have been on his watch for a long time. What do you make of his effort to try to kind of restart the issue this week in this way? Yeah, no, it's weird because, you know, for a long time I thought that he didn't really want to solve the issue, right? Like, for him, in a way, not having that border wall was better than having it because he could always be like, we need it, we need it, we need it. And now he's taken these emergency powers to do it and he can't criticize Democrats,

he can't criticize anyone else because his policy is in effect. That doesn't mean he's not going to use this as a galvanizing election issue. The man, literally, this is what he does. I mean, he runs scare tactics about brown people to get conservatives out to the vote. I mean, it wasn't all that long ago that we were inundated with stories of crazed caravans making their way up to Mexico. Suddenly, you know, after the election, no one cared about them anymore. But that's the playbook. I mean, this is, it's pretty simple stuff. It's not really sophisticated politics. As we get closer to 2020, he will talk about an invasion from the South. And all the stuff that

we're hearing now about closing down the border, about sending the military there, you know, that's just going to be amplified. And let me just say one quick thing about the parlor game of politics and i agree like the lack of humanity in the policy is really the important story and as a new father i can't even imagine the idea of my kid being taken away from me it's disgusting but i do think in a way we do have to acknowledge that having semi-competent people in positions of power makes a difference in this case. I mean, there's plenty of stories out there of like Gary Cohn or someone else taking papers literally off Trump's desk so that he couldn't implement really asinine policy. If those people are not there, and if you have the Stephen Millers of the world who have even more access to the president, then the likelihood is that you're not going to have those papers taken off the desk.

You're going to have Trump acting on his animal instincts to send the military down to the border. And so while I think it's, you know, Kirstjen Nielsen's legacy is horrific, I do shudder to think at what actually comes next, especially in an election season. I just want to follow up on this question, though, just to remember, because I think as progressives, a lot of times we're just fighting the next battle instead of kind of learning from what happened. So even during this last election, I come from Texas, right, where it was like the caravans coming, crisis on the border, and Beto O'Rourke damn near beat Ted Cruz in the United States Senate race, right? And so I, and of course, we had incredible victories in the House of Representatives.

So I think it's important, too, that we don't just give in and say, well, this is what he's going to do, and therefore. And I know you're not saying that. I wasn't saying that. No, no. But I think it's important that we remember that sometimes these scare tactics, we sort of move away from issues instead of confronting them head on and saying, we are better than this in this country. And if we can do that in Texas, we can do it anywhere, honestly. Let's talk about this idea of being better than this. You know, putting the politics aside, right? If you just step back and look at what Donald Trump is doing, he believes this cruelty works for him, that, you know, he gets laughs when he says the country's full, when he mocks asylum seekers. He clearly views this as

a way of connecting with a sizable portion of Americans, that there are millions of Americans he appeals to with this kind of appeal to cruelty. And we can talk about, we all talk about the politics of that, the politics of the base. But Janelle, what does it say to you about where the Republican Party is at, that we have somebody in the president who believes one of the key ways he can drive turnout is by exacerbating the cruelty and trying to appeal to people to not be compassionate. I mean, it's very scary. As a regular person, I'm just every day like, how is this happening? And I feel like that's how a lot of people feel. And it's almost like, okay, so he has his base. Who are those people?

How many exist? That's all I think about. Because you want to think that it's not a lot, but it's obviously enough that we're still letting this happen and all of these things are still happening. And I don't know if it's because the other side isn't doing anything, whether they outnumber us or we're not doing anything. But a lot of these things, every day I see something that is supposedly impeachable or not legal and he just still exists and keeps doing so I'm losing hope a little bit so I know that's not the thing to say but y'all know it's fine every day I'm like how how are white people letting this happen y'all letting this happen you have the power and it's happening.

Every day we make jokes and we talk about it and nothing changes. It gets worse. There's a bunch of weirdo freaks running the whole country and it's so scary. That's all of it. I'll say two things. One, no better place than Boston

to say to a group of white people, how did you let this happen? I don't care. I'm here all the time. Two, we did win the House. We won some elections. Look how relaxed I looked when I said it. Sam, before we move off of this topic... White people? What?

Something I found particularly chilling recently is Donald Trump going before a Republican Jewish group and saying that America is full and getting a laugh. Did you find that as particularly disheartening as I did? As a Jew? Yeah, man, that sucked. I was not happy. You know, I actually do think about the historical parallels because obviously, what was the ship, the St. Louis? I don't know my historical references too well. But, you know, there was obviously a precedent of Jews fleeing catastrophe and possible extinction and being turned away.

And you'd like to think we learn from history, but we don't. You know, for Trump to be making that case was, you know, expected. That's Trump. For the Jews in the audience to be like, hell yeah, that was not. And to bring this back to your dear friend Stephen Miller, you know, he's Jewish. He's Jewish. His uncle, I believe, wrote an op-ed that was vicious in how it treated Stephen Miller. And, you know, as I've been reporting this out, and I'll take off my reporting hat a little bit and opine, one of the biggest mysteries to me and one of the saddest elements of this whole debate is that there's a huge evangelical community in this country.

Weirdos. That was not me. For the people listening, that was not me. There's a huge evangelical community in this country who not too long ago was highly supportive of immigration reform on the grounds that the persecuted, the poor, the destitute need our help. And asylum seekers are the people to whom we should not turn our backs upon. And they have rallied around Donald Trump more than any community in this country. They have stood with him through extramarital affairs. They've stood with him through all this

horrific language and the killing of norms, which is terrible. And then they've stood with him through all this horrific language and the killing of norms, which is terrible. And then they've stood with him through this anti-asylum push. And if you're not going to stand up for the people who are so desperately in need, then what the fuck do you stand for? Honestly, what the fuck do you stand for? I also, you know, to Sam's point about the evangelicals, I do think, too, part of this is what's shaking out is what's a, about the evangelicals, I do think, too, part of this is what's shaking out is what's a... How many different labels had become

politicized and partisan in a way we didn't understand? That evangelical was at first a term to describe a kind of religious person. But as it became more and more associated with Republicanism, it was less about being religious and more as identifying as a Republican

who votes along a certain set of issues. It's a religious Republican voter now. Right. Correct me if I'm wrong. Are these not the end times people? Some are. Some aren't. You know, it's a big group.

Okay. I mean, I'm an end times person. Let it come down. These are the times and things are ending. When we come back. Okay, stop. Kate, don't go anywhere. things are ending. When we come back, OK Stop! Hey, don't go anywhere. There's more of Love It or Leave It

coming up. And we're back! Now it's time for OK Stop. You know how it works. We roll a clip and the panel can say OK Stop at any point to comment. Bernie Sanders, the underdog slash frontrunner for the

Democratic nomination, always finds a way to bother conservatives. And in the case of Tucker Carlson, it sometimes makes him so mad he could molt. And if he molts too early in the season, he's vulnerable to predators, so it's a problem. Recently, Tucker asked a random British man what we should make of Bernie and AOC.

And they couldn't help but sneak in some racism. Let's take a look. To continue with your asylum analogy, in the land of the entirely deranged, the fitfully sane man is king. Okay, stop. That is the funniest joke Tucker Carlson has ever heard. It's such a good joke. That is so funniest joke Tucker Carlson has ever heard. It's such a good joke. That is so funny. Funny is the proverbial stop clock.

Just ten minutes ago, you mentioned a burst of sanity on immigration, where he said, we can't have open borders because all the world's poor will want to come here. He sounded as crazy. Okay, stop. This dude ain't from here. Why are we listening to him? Paul will want to come here. He sounded as crazy. Okay, stop.

This dude ain't from here. Why are we listening to him? I think you'll find that Tucker's problem with immigrants has a certain kind of Pantone-related vetting mechanism. He sounded as evil as you. He sometimes does that, I know. I know. I can't tell them apart, Bernie Carlson or Tucker Sanders.

Can I ask you a question that's been bothering me? Why couldn't you have a candidate who was populous in economics, who wasn't any kind of supply-side or libertarian economics, but more conservative on the social issues, who was focused on the country rather than the rest of the world, who was pro-family? Those are not incompatible positions, are they? Bernie's brother is like an old school British Labour Party socialist.

He's all about the workers, by which he means the British workers, not six and a half billion other workers who want to move to... What the fuck are they talking about? Exactly. Where is he going with this? Also, that yellow shirt you can't see on the podcast, but it's bad.

I was going to say, with a pumpkin handkerchief, what is going on? What's going on with his style? Seriously, what are they talking about? The labor party. I think that this is what it's like to be so deep in a conversation

that we're not a part of, because this all makes sense in the cathedral of nonsense that Tucker Carlson has built. What does this chyron mean? You're in jail and that's bad. But I don't understand it. I think it might be because Bernie said that people should be able to vote.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. He wants people in jail to have the right to vote. They should do some context with that, Kyron. So I've got to ask you about this. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez started sporting a new accent while speaking at Al Sharpton's extremely tax-exempt conference. Come on. Oh, my God.

I love it that this young, incredible woman in Congress is sending them out of the roof. She's making them crazy. Like more power to her, more power to her. Unbelievable. What? I'm proud to be a bartender. Ain't nothing wrong with that. Ocasio-Cortez says she's from the Bronx, and she's always spoken that way. She says it was code switching and that her normal day-to-day voice is the fake one. I wonder though. Okay, stop. I just, like, here's the thing.

Tucker Carlson finds the idea of code switching hilarious. Because he, first of all, doesn't talk to people that don't look and sound like him. That's the first thing. The second thing, in part, though, is he code switches all the time. Because this is not what he sounds like when

the cameras aren't on. He's not a gruff anti-elite populist when he's at fucking Daniel Restaurant. You know? No one code switches better at fucking Daniel Restaurant. No one code switches better than Fox News hosts. No one. They pump out the most vicious fucking anger for their entire professional lives. Those cameras are on.

They are angry. They are furious. They got all kinds of people to blame. Those cameras are off. They are nothing but nice because their lives are fucking gilded. I don't believe that. These people are very happy. I don't believe that. These people are very happy. I don't believe they're nice.

I think to each other. To each, maybe. I don't think they're tipping well, I just think they're nice to each other. Okay, cool, okay, that. ...the same age, didn't you grow up in a world where people were encouraged to be who you naturally are? When you were a kid, could you imagine living in a country where people are supposed to be who you naturally are. When you were a kid, could you imagine

living in a country where people are supposed to be ashamed of how they were born? Stop. Stop. Again, I'm just like, who are these people? I know people watch this and they agree, but who are they and how many are there? I just want to know.

It's so disingenuous. I'm wondering why I can look at it and see that he's basically making shit up, making up his anger about this thing, and no one else can. How about the fact that I grew up in an America where you were allowed to be whoever you wanted to be? Interesting place to have that opinion.

Fucking trans bathroom ban news. We have politicians who are actually trying to pretend to be... So Elizabeth Warren is Harvard Law School's first woman of color. And nobody laughs. That's the insanity. Stop. We laugh. You got to look at Tucker's facial expression.

I wish you could see it on the podcast. Petrified or constipated? I can't really... That's a zoink? I mean... Also a little bit sexual. He like barf. Can I just make a serious point about this?

Yes. It's just so frustrating to like see some guy who's been handed everything in life and has obviously a very nice probably seven figure plus contract to go talk on cable news every night

complain that people are trying to be something they're not people who've bartended people who are trying to just make it in this world I mean for him to criticize others when he has had literally every privilege handed to him is so frustrating. Must be nice. Right, he's heir to the I believe the Swanson meal fortune,

right? Anybody fact check that in real time? Is that right? He got soup money? He's got frozen meatloaf money. Wow. He's got frozen meatloaf with a little apple pie, some peas, and mashed potatoes money, which is good money. That's why I only buy Marie Callender's. Because I'm a patriot.

When we come back, we're going to have presidential candidate Andrew Yang. Don't go anywhere. This is Love It or Leave It, and there's more on the way. And we're back! He was named a Champion of Change in 2012 by the Obama administration and a Presidential Ambassador for Global Entrepreneurship in 2015. He's the founder of Venture for America, which supports potential entrepreneurs,

a proponent of a universal basic income, and he's the most mean candidate that's currently running for the Democratic nomination for President. for America, which supports potential entrepreneurs, a proponent of a universal basic income, and he's the most mean candidate that's currently running for the Democratic nomination for president. Please welcome Andrew Yang. Thank you very much for being here. I have a small present for you. It's a math hat.

It's a math hat. I love a math hat. Thank you very much for this math hat. It stands for Make America Think. Okay. I like it. I like it. We're gonna put it right there. So I think a lot of people haven't heard of you yet. Part of it, right? Yeah, yeah, for sure. And I think a lot of people may have started hearing some rumblings about this Andrew Yang person. You're running on Medicare for all, universal basic income. That would mean every American would receive a monthly stipend and

something you're calling human-centered capitalism. What does that phrase mean? I like to talk about my wife, who's right, I literally got off the phone with her FaceTime, where she's at home with our two young boys, one of whom is autistic. And her work counts as zero in GDP, which is clearly not an appropriate reflection of the value. And so GDP right now is leading us off a cliff, where we're cheerleading this measurement that we made up almost 100 years ago. And so one of the things I ask people is, how many of you were excited about GDP when you woke up in the morning? How many of you were like, I'm going to make a big contribution today? And so what we have to do is we have to update our measurements to things that would actually reflect how we're doing. So things like mental health and freedom from substance abuse,

health and life expectancy, clean air and clean water, that if you have the wrong measurements, you can't make progress. And right now GDP is going to keep hitting record highs, even as our life expectancy shortens and more and more Americans get left behind. So human-centered capitalism is about updating our measurements to actually reflect how we are doing. In practice, you know, so you're elevating these other measures of what makes a society healthy, right? But in practice, you're talking about a better social safety net. You're doing it through UBI and Medicare for All. You're talking about better regulations of corporations and protecting people from corporate

abuses, both as workers and as consumers. When you put aside the terms, how does that differ from the version of capitalism that, say, Elizabeth Warren advocates for, one with a much more strict regulatory regime to protect workers and consumers, and a much, much stronger social safety net, which might include Medicare for all? What's the actual policy difference between the more mainstream liberal Democratic candidates? I'm a big fan of Elizabeth Warren's. candidates? I'm a big fan of Elizabeth Warren's. I think many of the Democratic candidates for president have very aligned and similar visions. We just have slightly different points of emphasis

as to how we get there. So I think an America with Elizabeth Warren as president would be vastly better. You know, and I think that we just have a slightly different path to get there i have many friends who are working with elizabeth warren right now so i mean it's there is one thing that i think democrats tend to get a little bit too um emphatic about which is sort of like trying to curb the harm it'd be even better to start trying to figure out what the good is and then direct more of our energies towards it instead of always trying to curb the abuses. I mean, curbing the abuses is definitely needed

and something we need to do. But we also need to keep our eyes on the prize about how to improve our own lives. Let's talk about memes for a second. You developed a big online following. Yang gang. Any yang gangers out there? A few, a few. Don't worry, we'll get the rest of you following. Yang gang. Any yang gangers out there? A few, a few.

Don't worry, we'll get the rest of you soon. Yang gang at the wang. But this following, you've drawn attention, even some support from some of the darkest and most hate-filled parts of the internet, including alt-right Trump country. There was one image that I thought captured at least part of this sentiment. Can we put up this meme? So it shows behind you, or you can look at it

right there. Yeah, it's for those listening, because it is a podcast. It shows a red, angry person bleeding from the eyes because it is a meme with a MAGA hat. That person slowly morphs into what looks like a kind of stoned person who's pleased and a Yang supporter. Do you believe that this is a real phenomenon, and what do you make of it? What do you make of your relationship to this part of the kind of worst part of the Internet? Well, one of the themes of my campaign is we have to solve the problems that got Donald Trump elected. of the themes of my campaign is we have to solve the problems I got Donald Trump elected. And one of the main things I got Donald Trump elected is this economic dislocation around the country that is not being driven by immigrants. Furthest thing from it, it's being driven by

technology and the fact that more Americans' labor is getting minimized in value. And so I've already completely disavowed any support from anyone who has any kind of hateful or racist ideology. And I myself, I'm the son of immigrants. I mean, one of the things, it's like, do I look like a white nationalist? It's been kind of a point of confusion. But I think that my campaign is drawing in people from different ideologies because they can tell that I'm just trying to solve the problems on the ground and improve Americans' lives. All right, let's talk about universal basic income. And I think this is, for a lot of people, something new that they're learning about. So just to let people kind of know what the policy is, every American adult would get $1,000 a month, no strings attached,

paid for by adding a value added tax, which businesses would pay. And it seems like you offer two rationales. One is that there's automation and technology that's going to eliminate a lot of jobs. And the other is just the benefits that you see of a universal basic income, that it will help people

pay for things, it will make it easier for people to negotiate for their own jobs because they no longer feel like they can be exploited, that it'll improve the economy, it'll give people the ability to find a new job, that kind of thing. But these to me seem to be in tension because one is based around the jobs that will go away and the other is about how people can improve their own lives, find work, and find careers that are fulfilling. Is part of your belief in universal basic income that you believe that there won't be new jobs to replace the jobs that automation makes go away? Yeah, so we're in the third inning of the greatest economic and technological transformation in the history of the country. It's being called the fourth industrial revolution.

and technological transformation in the history of the country. It's being called the fourth industrial revolution, and here in Boston, folks at MIT have been saying, look, this is going to be two to three times more dramatic than the industrial revolution at the turn of the century. There are going to be many new jobs that get created with artificial intelligence and robotics and new software, but those jobs will tend to be for different people in different places with different skill sets

than the folks that are being displaced. And unfortunately, the dynamism between those two environments and contexts has been going down, not up. So a universal basic income would help strengthen Americans' ability to make that transition. But as you say, there's this very compelling social rationale for it as well. And one thing I like to say is that the Democratic Party wants to be the party of empowering women, which we should be. But right now there are millions of American women that are in abusive and exploitative jobs and relationships that would be improved by getting $1,000 a month. Will automation mean to you that there will be huge numbers of Americans who get this basic income because they will not work again?

Is that part of it? Is part of your rationale for this that in the future there will be more Americans that don't work, that will not have jobs because there simply will not be jobs to replace the ones we've lost? Well, so a couple of things. If you can imagine an economy where all of you are getting $1,000 a month, just think about where that money would go. That money would go to tutoring services and car repairs you've been putting off and the occasional night out

and some hardware store. And all of those businesses might then need to hire another person or two to meet the increased demand. We'd create over 2 million new jobs based upon putting this consumer buying power into people's hands. But if you look at what's happening right now in our economy,

we're in year 10 of an expansion, and our labor force participation rate is already down to 63%, a multi-decade low in the same levels as Ecuador and Costa Rica. And this is year 10 of an expansion. Our life expectancy has declined for the last three years because of surges in suicide and drug overdoses that has actually gone hand in hand with people finding no spot in the workforce. So when you say, do I project a future where people aren't going to have jobs? I don't need to project a future

because it's in the data right now. And we need to think much bigger about how we can help Americans move forward and create those jobs that they can actually access in their communities. Let's talk about the labor force participation. So you're right. So right now we're at 63%. At the worst part of the Great Recession, I think it dropped to 60%, right? The peak is, say, 1990s, around 67%, right right so roughly 1954 to now uh the participation rate of men dropped from 98 to 88 right and women came into the workforce it peaks in 1990 and then the recession happens and it flattens and yet labor force participation rate in around 1954 is around 60 something percent today it's around 63 percent. Men, still 88 percent, are in the labor force. A drop that is not precipitous based on technological change now,

it's a change that's been happening literally since 1954. Can you look at that data and say, you know what, actually we've replaced jobs that have been lost to automation, that automation won't actually end up, that this is once again the kind of prediction we've heard before, that automation, like the industrial revolution, that this is once again the kind of prediction we've heard before, that automation, like the Industrial Revolution, was going to make certain jobs obsolete and there wouldn't be ones to replace them. In your mind, is this the first time that that truism hasn't worked out,

that this is the first time ever that new jobs didn't come to replace the old ones? Yeah, so I wrote a book on this topic that sussed out the data around what happened to the manufacturing workers in the Midwest. And I studied economics at Brown University. Any Brown alums in the room? Yeah. Do you want to compliment me on the fucking data I pulled out of my goddamn head? Yeah, no, it was really impressive. It was like had a graph. I was, I should say.

So if you look at what happened to the 4 million manufacturing workers that lost their jobs, almost half of them left the workforce and didn't work again, and then of that group, about half filed for disability. So this went hand in hand with the decline in the labor force participation rate from 2000 to 2015. So that has been, to me, the single biggest

sign that this time really is different, that our labor force is not realigning in the way that we would hope it would? Okay. I'm out of data. So I want to know about the politics of UBI. And I want to focus on this because this is what you made central to your campaign. I think it's something that is interesting and important because it's a new debate that we're having. So right now we see political fights and they're not about passing universal basic income, right? There's a fight about a work requirement for Medicaid.

When AOC and Merkley announced the Green New Deal, a single poorly worded talking point about a benefit for those on... What'd I say? Did I say Merkley instead of Markey? And we're in Massachusetts and he's from here. When AOC and Marky announced the Green New Deal, if you laugh, I can't make myself look smarter in the edit. He's going to edit that out. Now I'm going to leave it in. It's all part of the show. Alright.

Anyway, to my point, you Boston animals, is I can't take these people anywhere. Anyway, to my point, you Boston animals, is... Okay. I can't take these people anywhere. A single talking point about people being unwilling to work became central to the Republican critiques of it. We also just beat back a privatization effort on Social Security. It seems to resurface every few years.

I looked up the HHS description of TANF, right? This is a program that provides a small amount of financial support for women who are pregnant in need. It provides help for food and rent and utilities to make sure that women, when they're pregnant and in need, that they can provide for their children and provide for their families. This is what the HHS website currently lists for the purposes of TANF. It says, provide assistance to needy families so that children can be cared for in their own homes. It then adds, reduce the dependency of needy parents by promoting job preparation, work and marriage, prevent and reduce the incidence of out-of-wedlock pregnancies. It goes on from there. And the reason I bring it up is universal basic income is this huge, big idea that will provide a benefit to everyone, right?

Rich and poor, people who are working, people who aren't working. And yet the fights we're having right now in politics seem to be so difficult and so rooted in this idea of dependency and earning things that even a program for helping needy pregnant women to get through, to get through our political system has required this language about dependency. How do you square this vision for something as big as UBI with the amount of struggle and fight it's taken over 50 years to build this patchwork of benefits we have now? Yeah, I couldn't agree more with the examples you cite, where people are being forced to defend benefits that by any standard we should just look at and say, of course, that these expected mothers should be getting these benefits. Of course,

that these children should have more support. And that's one reason why I'm so passionate about the Freedom Dividend, which is what I've rebranded Universal Basic Income, is that it helps change the battleground to something that becomes much more universally appealing because instead of it being presented as something that someone else in some situation gets, which unfortunately Americans right now seem to lack the compassion and empathy to see that as something that we should be championing, if you say, look, everyone gets this, then all of a sudden people ease up and be like, oh, I'm everyone. I qualify. And so this no longer becomes like an us versus them fight. It becomes a universal right of citizenship in the richest and most

advanced economy in the history of the world. And so what I start pointing people to is like, look, it might seem far out, but Thomas Paine was for this at the founding of the country. Martin Luther King was for this in 1967. Milton Friedman and a thousand economists signed a study saying this would be tremendous for the country. And one state has had a dividend for almost 40 years where everyone in that state gets between $1,000 and $2,000 a year, no questions asked. And what state is that? And how do they fund it?

And what is the oil of the 21st century? Technology, that's right. And so what... Hold on a second. What kind of fucking yang gang plants do we got out there? You didn't applaud when he asked. He was like, oh, there's...

I guess there's no yang gang members here. What is this? You have rigged casino games? What are you, tapping each other messages? Sorry. So I love the Alaska example because Alaska is a deep red conservative state and they've had this dividend and it's wildly popular, has created thousands of jobs, has improved children's health, has decreased income inequality and has stood the test of time. And Alaskans like their dividends so much that a majority said they would accept higher taxes to fund the dividend. It's the reverse of all of the fights we're having over benefits to mothers and

children. And so if you make it universal, then you make it something that everyone can get excited about. So you have a very large number of very specific policy proposals, some big, some related to, say, MMA fighters. And, you know, you run the gamut on that website. But there was two policies that I wanted to talk about with you. You called for a local news fund and a national news ombudsman at the FCC. And these are ideas that strike me as interesting. And then you think about what happens when an idea like that meets our political system, meets the realities of partisan politics, and you start to worry, well, I don't want the federal government getting involved in local journalism and making those decisions. And I certainly don't want the FCC deciding what's true and what's false. When I see an idea like that, I think, oh, this is somebody from tech, this is somebody from business, not somebody from politics.

What do you say to those that are concerned that, yeah, you have these big ideas, but you've never been in politics before, and calling for something as big as UBI, calling for proposals like this, it reveals that you've not been in the political trenches and therefore don't know how to move things through Congress, move things through the bureaucracy if you were to become president. It's a fair question. So first, I just want to address the local journalism piece because I think it's really important. If you're going to have a functioning democracy, you need journalism. And over 1,200 newspapers have gone out of business in communities around the country. And it's been shown that if you don't have a local paper, then your voting becomes more polarized and people have lower information. So as a country, are we just going to say and say, well, local newspapers, their time is

done because the market doesn't support them anymore? Or do you say if you believe in democracy, then you have to actually support local journalism? So my plan is just to have a matching set of grant funds to initiate public-private partnerships, in many cases cooperative business models or non-profit business models, because a lot of these communities can have a local paper. It's just not going to become a huge moneymaker. So this is like the vision is to put public resource to work, but of course the federal government is not going to decide what the heck is going on in that paper. It's just going to come and say, hey, what's that? You have a proposal? Like, here's some money to help you make the transition. In terms of me and Washington,

D.C. and getting things done, I spent the last seven years running a national nonprofit that I started. And anyone, raise your hand if you've worked in nonprofits or you've, yeah. So if you have, then you know that the way you get things done is by consensus and having a vision that other people get behind. you of hundreds of stakeholders. I am the opposite of the guy who will say, I'm going to run government like a business, because anyone who says that is dumb. They're just completely different things with different leadership models and different skills required. But in addition to running a business that was acquired, like, I started and ran a multi-million dollar non-profit that was extraordinarily

human. And I think getting things done is going to require the same sort of galvanizing people around a shared vision that would help move this country forward. What do you think of Howard Schultz? Man, I have a rule not to say not nice things about people.

But I've been around Howard, and let's just say his force field is strong. Okay. I'll take it. All right. So before we let you go, we did want to play a game. Since 2012, Grover Norquist, a conservative activist who programmed

Paul Ryan's artificial intelligence software... Anyway, Grover has long asked Republican candidates for office to sign a pledge committing them to his core values. No new taxes, no elimination of tax deductions, no girls allowed in the clubhouse. And since I consider myself

the Grover Norquist of people with a skincare regimen, we started our own pledge. For the next two years, I'm going to pin presidential candidates down on the issues that matter to me most in a segment we call Queen for a Day. Andrew Yang has graciously agreed to be the second candidate to face the gauntlet. Are you ready? I am ready. On day one, do you pledge to eliminate daylight savings and never let the American people see dark before 5 p.m.? As in land on daylight savings time permanently and never fall back.

Not only do I so pledge, but if you go to yang2020.com, you will see it is policy number 86. Listen, there are three leaders on this issue. Me, Marco Rubio, Andrew Yang. What a group. Shut up. All right. Should the FCC legally require Apple to put the headphone jack

back on the iPhone? Yes, and there should be a rule that you're not allowed to do anything that's going to intentionally shorten battery life on those phones. And what are we going to do about this whole USB-C? I got too many cable ends. Can you fix

that? Got a policy on that yet? I got this whole USB-C? I got too many cable ends. Can you fix that? Got a policy on that yet? I got USB into USB-C, into lightning, into thunder. Steve Jobs died. The place exploded with dongles. There's not even a question. You met Elizabeth

Holmes at the White House. Was I dumb to have found her charming? So I've been reflecting on my meeting with Elizabeth over the last number of days. She charmed you too, didn't she? Just admit it on this stage. And I will resist admitting that she charmed me. I remember thinking, like, huh,

she's not quite what I expected. And then I thought, well, who am I to question, you know, like the youngest self-made female billionaire like in our nation. And so I shrugged and said, like, it must be that I'm not understanding something. Standard mall food court. Where are you eating? Sbarro, Taco Bell, or Panda Express? Panda Express, obviously. It's a smart answer. You can get a vegetable.

Follow-up. There's a 20-minute wait for a table at the California Pizza Kitchen. You're seeing a movie. The timing is doable. Do you wait, or do you go to the food court? CPK is delicious. I definitely wait.

Okay. Good answer. Good answer. Do we need a national moratorium on companies that do April Fool's Day pranks, aka non-consensual comedy? As someone who had my own April Fool's policy, which was the canine dividend that every American would get a thousand dogs per month. I am against said moratorium. Let's let the PR people run wild for a day. They get it all out of their system. After a period,

one space or two? I am a classically trained typist, and I say two. Correct! Correct! Boo, you illiterate Bostonians! The man is correct! Two spaces!

What are you, newspaper men trying to save space in a column? What are you, newspaper men trying to save space in a column? Amy Klobuchar raised $17,000 from her ex-boyfriends. You have 20 seconds to pitch your exes to vote for you. What do you say? Let's just say I would raise much, much less than $17,000 for my ice cream. If you arrive at a restaurant before they're done serving breakfast, but by the time you order, they've stopped serving breakfast,

should burning down the restaurant be against the law? Are they flexible in their willingness to serve breakfast a little bit after the time? Then arson should be allowed. Yes, yes. Is Superman too powerful a character? Oh, yeah, clearly. Superman's not relatable at all. That's why I was always a Spider-Man fan myself.

Quick test to the audience. You got to vote. I'm going to say three superheroes. Superman, Batman, or Spider-Man? Superman. Spider-Man. Superman. Spider-Man. Batman. That's correct.

Final question. Should it be illegal to call the new Lion King movie live action? Yeah, very much so. That's not live action. As far as I can tell, it's a bunch of CG fake lions running around each other. They're computer lions. As a parent, I refuse to let my children

watch that sort of thing. He got in one as a parent. Guys, give it up for Andrew Yang. Thank you all very much. That was great. Thank you so much. Thanks a lot. Such a pleasure. Thank you all. Thank you all Thank you Boston One more time for Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang

When we come back We're going to play a game with our panel Hey don't go anywhere There's more of Love It or Leave It coming up And we're back How you guys doing? Good I'm alright And we're back! How are you guys doing? Good.

I'm alright. Two spaces after the period, I don't know. What'd you say? Two spaces after the period. Absolutely. It's not the right platform for president. He's a web guy. Every space counts. He's got to keep those eyeballs on the page.

This is why Democrats lose. This is, listen, there are a lot of reasons. Two spaces after a period is not why. So we are lucky enough to be joined on stage by Cecile Richards, who has been a leading advocate for women's health care and freedom for

decades. Because she was kind enough to join us, we wanted to focus on something that's been happening currently across the country. They're called heartbeat bills. Heartbeat bills sound like the second half of a bad folk band name. Please welcome to the stage Dirt Swamp Cat and the heartbeat bills.

But the reality is obviously far scarier. Currently in Georgia, a fetal heartbeat bill passed the state legislature and currently sits on the governor's desk. If Brian Kemp signs it, and people think he might, it would ban all abortions in the state after a fetal heartbeat can be detected long before the fetus is viable and often before a woman knows she's pregnant.

This restriction would shorten the window for when a woman could receive an abortion to around six weeks down from 20 weeks. To highlight how awful this law is to women in the state of Georgia, we thought we'd play a game called Georgia on my mind and inside of my body making decisions. Would someone out there like to play the game? Hey, John, can I just save it for you to ask the first question? If every single person in Georgia had been allowed to vote

and every vote had been counted, Stacey Abrams would be governor and we wouldn't be dealing with this, okay? Absolutely. Absolutely. Hi, what's your name? Jessa. Jessa. Yeah.

You seem to have a sash on. I'm getting married later. Not tonight. Later Jessa. Yeah. You seem to have a sash on. I'm getting married later. Not tonight. Later this year. Yeah. Is this part of your bachelorette celebration? It is! My future sister-in-law's right there. That's fun. Thanks for coming out.

I'm gonna ask you some questions. Panels can have some clues and some options for you. Alright? Is Jessa? Yes. Like Jessica, but not. Yeah. My parents wanted to be different. It's fine. Alright, Jessa. Question one.

You can actually, this is an open-ended question, but you can ask for clues from our panel, okay? Up to three clues. The Georgia Heartbeat Antichoice Bill outlaws all abortions after a heartbeat can be detected in a fetus, which usually happens around six weeks after conception.

When do most women learn that they are pregnant? Can I have one clue? Let's hear the clue from Janelle first. Clue number one. It's not like in the movies where you have sex with a guy and then the following morning you vomit and look in the mirror and go,

oh no. Oh no. have sex with a guy and then the following morning you vomit and look in the mirror and go, oh no. Okay, I have a guess but I really want to hear the other two clues because I bet they're funny. You're doing great, Jessa.

Alright. Clue number two. Clue number two. The answer is a small enough time frame after conception that many women will not have any idea they are pregnant by the time the choice to terminate a pregnancy is taken away by the government. That's not funny. No, it is not. That was a serious one. You blew it.

Sorry, I had to read that clue. Clue number three. Okay, Jessa, listen up. I think I'm going to help you on this one. clue number three. Okay, Jessa, listen up. I think I'm going to help you on this one. The answer rhymes with between s'more

and fate weeks. Eight. Eight. Eight weeks. It's kind of close. Very close. I think we should give it to her. I think we should give it to her. Democrats lose. I'm going to give you that one. I'm going to give you that one.

I'm going to give it to you. Most women find out they are pregnant somewhere between four and eight weeks, which means it will be illegal for a huge number of women to have an abortion by the time they discover they are pregnant. Question number two. This question is multiple choice. You will hear three possible answers. Are you ready? Yes.

Heartbeat bills aren't the only way conservative politicians are making it impossible to access reproductive health care. In Mississippi, there's only a single facility to receive an abortion, and once you're there, you still have to do what? Is it A? Despite the fact that over half the women seeking abortions in Mississippi are below the poverty line, abortion isn't covered by Medicaid, and so you have to find a way to pay for this procedure. Or is it B? You are forced to receive an ultrasound? Or is it C, you have to listen to a doctor talk to you about a completely unfounded link between abortions and breast cancer?

Or is it D, you still have to wait another 18 to 72 hours between asking for an abortion and receiving one, which means you have to plan for travel, lodging, child care, work leave, and any other logistical hurdles that might come up. And since the single provider can often be swamped, your wait might actually be more like a few weeks. And if the wait pushes you past the 16-week mark, that may make the procedure illegal. It's all of the above. That is correct.

Jessa, final question. This is a lightning round. I'm going to say a series of statements about women's health care. That is correct. Jessa, final question. This is a lightning round. I'm going to say a series of statements about women's health care. If a fact I say is true, say true. If it's false, say false. Are you ready? Yes.

One in four women in the United States will have an abortion by the age of 45. True. Nations with liberal abortion laws have some of the lowest abortion rates in the world. True. Nations with robust women's rights have some of the lowest abortion rates in the world. True. Nations with robust women's rights have some of the lowest abortion rates in the world. True. Nations with easily accessible birth control, especially long-acting birth control,

have some of the lowest abortion rates in the world. True. Nations with pictures of Eric Trump posted all over the place have some of the lowest abortion rates in the world because no one wants to have sex anymore. True. True. Technically false, but I'll give it to you.

Countries that have limited access to contraception have a higher abortion rate. Oh, true. Criminalizing abortion stops abortions from happening. False. Criminalizing weed stopped weed from being smoked. False. Making all crime legal for a day

will allow us all to have a 24-hour catharsis and stop a second civil war. That's false. False. Yeah, I saw that movie. 59% of women who attain abortions are mothers. True. Almost 60% of people in the United States

believe abortion should be legal in almost all cases. True. Worldwide, more than 22,000 women die every year from unsafe abortions. True. After passing a heart-built bill, the Republican majority leader in Kentucky's state senate said that if his law was challenged in court

and overturned Roe v. Wade, it would be the absolute pinnacle of his legislative career. Oh, true. True. That guy from Kentucky can go fuck himself. It's true. You got it. Jesse, you've won the game. Thank you for playing. Congrats on getting married.

Before we move on, Cecile... Wait, I have one for you, true or false. If half of Congress could get pregnant, would we finally quit arguing about abortion and Planned Parenthood and birth control? Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe.

But, Cecile, you know, look, played a game about this issue, but this is, clearly we are seeing kind of emboldened anti-choice politicians who are putting a bunch of bills like this in state legislatures across the country. They are testing the boundaries of what they can keep through the judicial system.

This is a clearly unconstitutional measure, but it's about to head into a more conservative federal court system. What do you think, what are you concerned about as these bills move through the judicial system? Well, obviously, I mean, it's why the confirmation hearings of Brett Kavanaugh were so, I mean, for so many reasons were distressing for lots of people, lots of women. And as we're seeing all of these federal judges just rammed through the Senate under Mitch McConnell, a much more conservative male white judiciary. So I think it's deeply concerning. But I think it's important to remember is this isn't a government that is only trying to end

access to safe and legal abortion. They're trying to actually end access to birth control for millions of women in this country. They're dismantling the Ashley Family Planning Program. And just from what you were saying actually earlier about the WIC program, this government is literally making it hard for you to get birth control to prevent getting pregnant. They're making it harder for you to actually get a safe and legal abortion if you do become pregnant and you don't want to be. And they're making it harder for families and women to raise healthy

kids. I mean, it's like women can't win under this administration and it's really, really frustrating. So for people that want to fight bills like this who want to get involved, what do you think is the most important thing people can do to protect women's reproductive freedom right now?

Vote all of them out of office. That's the most important thing we can do. And look, marching, great. The Women's March, loved it. Loved to march. Knitting your pussy hat, great. You know, drinking with your friends and writing irate postcards to Mitch McConnell, that's fine too. But voting

is the only way we're actually going to get their attention. And this is, I mean, to Janelle's point earlier, like what's happening? Last November, 54% of the voters in that election were women, right? 54%. Okay? Yeah, so give it around for that. But I think the important thing is, and also, of course, I just want to make sure we acknowledge that the most reliable progressive voters in this country are women of color

every single time. So, but I think the most important thing is if in 2020, 54% of the voters are women, we're going to change the political direction of America, I think the most important thing is if in 2020, 54% of the voters are women, we're going to change the political direction of America, I think. And that's what we should be focused on. Okay, great. Thank you for that. When we come back, the rant wheel. Don't go anywhere.

This is Love It or Leave It, and there's more on the way. And we're back! Now it's time for the rant wheel. You know how it works. We spin the wheel wherever it lands. We talk about the topic. This week on the wheel, we have presidential debates. We have Kansas Owen testifying before Congress. We have Trump's cabinet. We have the TurboTax welfare bill. The film

Shazam. Trump's tour of Mount Vernon. Duncan Donuts. And Disney villains. Let's spin the wheel. It has landed on Trump at Mount Vernon. So, I want to read the quote. I have the quote here.

While touring Mount Vernon, a tour in which Donald Trump seemed to have an absolutely miserable time, he said, if he was smart, as in George Washington, he would have put his name on it. You've got to put your name on stuff or no one remembers you. He apparently also remarked about how rich George Washington was and his burgeoning real estate fortune. Do you remind me who George Washington is again?

I don't remember him. No, he's this... Famously, he said it's amazing. Yeah, he's got some stuff named after him. I love this quote. And I actually love it for a counterintuitive reason. I still think there's a chance Trump knew it was funny. I think it's borderline. I think we should

be open and intellectually honest enough to admit to the possibility that it's borderline. Sometimes he says shit so unaware of himself that he could legitimately stand in Mount fucking Vernon and say, nobody's going to remember this guy. There's no name on the door.

Very possible. Very possible. But the diabolical thing is, he could also say that knowing that it's kind of funny, because George Washington's pretty fucking famous. And I just want us to remember that it's a chance he knew he was making

a great joke, because sometimes we underestimate our villains and our enemies. How many of you are willing to be open to the possibility that that was a great joke, because sometimes we underestimate our villains and our enemies. How many of you are willing to be open to the possibility that that was a funny joke? How many of you think I'm an idiot? Let's spin it again. It has landed on Candace Owens testifying before Congress. Janelle, I believe you suggested this. Yeah, I figure I'll talk about the black lady.

Lord knows I love a scammer, and that's what she is. But I'm less upset with her, because I know what she's doing, but that's her own shit to deal with. I'm more upset with the fact that it seems like if you just have a lot of Twitter followers, you can testify before Congress now. Is that what's happening? And just lie. And she just lied and nobody challenged her. Nobody, you know what I mean? And it wasn't until after the fact, they say misspoke. And that's a big thing that's happening now nobody is calling people out on their lives and we're just all just letting these charlatans who don't even have she didn't even graduate college like who is It has landed on presidential debate.

Sam suggested this, and he had some nifty ideas he wanted to share. Yeah, I don't have a... I'm not, like, ranting so much as proposing a brilliant solution. Can't wait to hear it. Andrieng, if you're here.. So like, there's going to be something like 30 candidates. It's going to be crazy, right? And there's just simply no way to put everyone on the stage, and there's no way to give everyone an adequate amount of time where they feel like they can make their point. So how do you

make the debates interesting? And the solution I have is this. You treat it like it's a game of pickup basketball okay so you take the top two polling candidates in this case Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden and then you basically go back and forth and they can pick the people who they have to debate okay then it becomes a real strategic game Biden might want to debate Andrew Yang but he might think he's a little radical and crazy doesn't doesn't want to debate that guy. So he picks Castro. And then you go back and forth, and suddenly they have their own debate stages. And you get to actually get a sense of which candidate thinks which other candidate is a good debater, a worthy opponent, and who they actually

think is weak and they would like to debate. So it's just a way to spice things up a little bit. week and they would like to debate. So it's just a way to spice things up a little bit. Counterpoint. Fourth grade. Mrs. Freelander's gym class. Two captains are chosen. I gotta assume it was Paolo and Peter.

I even know their last names. I'm not gonna say it. Big gym class. They're going back and forth they're making their picks what's funny is you think you know where it's going finally there are two kids left

me and again I know the other kid's name let's say his name was something along the lines of Rick Bergstein. That's not what it was. There's just two of us left. Who's going to be the last one to be picked?

Rick looks over at me and realizes that the final two people to be chosen are me and him. He just bursts out crying. And I was like, what's wrong? Is this a surprise to you? Because I gotta tell you, I'm not surprised to be sitting here with you. Why are you surprised to be sitting here with me? I'm four foot tall and gay as hell. to be sitting here with you. Why are you surprised to be sitting here with me?

I'm four foot tall and gay as hell. You got a thick coat of red hair and glasses two inches just wearing glass blocks on your face. Yeah, we're last. Rick, we're last.

Now you may say to yourself, why did Mrs. Friedlander choose this way to make the teams for Color War? Like, why is the fairness of the Color War teams more important than little Rick's feelings? But that's a question you have to take back to 1990s Bill Clinton's America. It's a fair counterpoint.

Let's spin it again. What is it? Kickball? What's going on? It has landed on Trump's cabinet, suggested by Cecile. There was that beautiful picture today of old white men ruling over all the

rest of us. And it brought back a lot of memories. The birth control panel of experts in Congress, the only thing they had in common is none of them used birth control. They were all men. But the thing, I guess, so of course it makes me irate that this cabinet is so unrepresentative of everyone, frankly, in the United States of America, or at least the majority of Americans. But the thing I can't figure out, John, is given how low the bar is now to get into the cabinet, how is it that the only completely incompetent woman they could find is Betsy DeVos. And so there have got to be, there have to be other incompetent women who could at least be balancing out the cabinet right now. I don't understand it. No, I think that's a very fair question. I think it speaks to the inherent misogyny of Donald Trump that he can't find an incompetent woman to join his administration. This is America in 2019.

Right. Incompetent women can be part of the Trump administration too. I will say, though, I am so glad that they have stopped even fainting towards representation because I want to see... When did they even faint towards representation? Well, you know, it's gotten less diverse. Well, Herman Cain.

Herman Cain. I was going to say. Yeah, that was a big announcement. Pizza party. The point is, I want to see 40 lily white interns in that photo. I want to see a cabinet of old white men. That's who they're for. I don't want them to get the chance to pretend to be anything else.

That is what they want. I think you're going to get it. It is just a bunch of Wilbur Rosses making policy. Just eating soup and coming for you. Let's spin it again. Maybe Tucker can get his family to cater.

It has landed on the TurboTax welfare bill. This is something that's playing out right now. How many of you have heard about this controversy? Okay, so here's the deal. The IRS could make it easier for people to file their taxes. They could create simple tools. Most people's taxes are pretty simple.

In fact, the IRS actually has all the information for most people in which they could just print out your return for you, mail it to you, and you could approve it. Some people have been for this. Ronald Reagan has could approve it. Some people have been for this. Ronald Reagan has been for this. Barack Obama has been for this. It's a simple and good idea, right? The IRS doesn't just mail you a blank piece of paper

and have you pull together all your W-2s, but the IRS could do that for you. They've stopped that. They've made that impossible. Now there was an effort to just let the IRS create simple tools so that you could fill out your taxes more easily online. But Intuit, the company behind TurboTax, has spent millions and millions of dollars lobbying Congress trying to make sure that TurboTax and H&R Block still have a thriving multi-billion

dollar business of people needing help to file their taxes. And lo and behold, it wasn't the Republicans that passed it through the House of Representatives. It was the Democrats, the Democratic House, that managed to get this welfare bill for TurboTax and H&R Blocks over to the Senate. A lot of claims about how, oh, there were other good things in the bill. They're in charge of the bills. This was a bad example of the kind of politics that people are frustrated with. It is a successful lobbying campaign to help a few corporations at the expense of millions of Americans who end up having to pay more out of pocket to file their taxes. It's now in the Senate. We need to make

sure we urge Democrats in the Senate not to get behind this. They were hoping they could do this without people noticing. People noticed. That's good. Got to make sure this thing doesn't happen because all it is doing is outlawing making it impossible for the IRS to make life easier for Americans and there's a reason people like Grover Norquist don't want these simple measures for helping people file their taxes because they want taxes to be a pain

they want taxes to be hard they want you to hate doing your taxes because they want you to hate taxes so this actually does have larger implications making taxes easier to pay, making taxes simpler, will help people have a better relationship with the money they have to give to the government every year.

So that's all I wanted to say about that. Let's spin it again. It has landed on Dunkin' Donuts. I think to end the show, I am going to combine Dunkin' Donuts, Disney villains, and Shazam. Can it be done? I want to talk about Shazam for a second.

I saw the film Shazam. How many of you have seen the film Shazam? I had a lovely time at the film Shazam. I thought it was good. I had a nice time. A couple laughs. Liked Shazam. Zachary Levi doing his thing.

Kid from It doing his thing. This is going to be a spoiler for the film Shazam is everybody okay with hearing a Shazam spoiler? it's been out for a while you don't care a group of foster kids form the emotional core of this film there's one that I believe may turn out to be gay gay person in a superhero film, that seems impossible, but there it is

toward the very end of the film here's seems impossible, but there it is. Toward the end of the very end of the film, here's the spoiler, they get to be superheroes too. And I gotta tell you, worked on me. 100%. 100% worked on me better than any campaign announcement video. I am a sucker for that. I'll tear up. Foster kids becoming superheroes? Sign me up. But one problem, and I just want to flag it. They all got to be hot. And here's the thing. It's a little twisted that, like, the happy ending of the movie

is that the foster kids, who all come in different shapes and sizes, some have disabilities, you know, some are overweight, some are small, that they get to look at each other like, I'm fucking hot. This rules.

Not only am I hot, I'm no longer disabled. Amazing. It's a little fucking weird. It's a little... You think about it for two seconds, you're like, what? The happy ending is they all get to be hot? Which brings me to Dunkin' Donuts.

You know you can't buy one munchkin? I'm a guy trying to cut carbs and I can't buy one munchkin. And so basically you get a large coffee and you either gotta buy a bunch of munchkins or you get a guy in a good mood, you get one free munchkin. If you're lucky, if you're lucky. Which brings me to Disney villains. Jafar, Ursula, Scar. Three of the great Disney villains. They have something in common. They're gay as hell. They are campy, British-y,

vivacious, queer, larger-than-life villains with a lilt and an in-on-the-joke, having a fucking blast, turning Ariel's dad

into a little monster, and smacking Gilbert Godfrey at a bird around and just faggin' out at Pride Rock. Ursula's based on Divine. These are some of the great, even if it's unspoken

due to literally a thousand years of internalized homophobia. These were gay characters of my childhood. These are the handholds climbing gay mountain. And I'm a little worried that

these new live action villains some of them prayed the gay away. And I just want us all to keep an eye on it. All right? I don't know. I haven't seen the movie. All right?

I'm a little concerned. I'm a little concerned about what's happening with Ursula. I'm a little concerned about what's happening with Jafar. I'm a little concerned about what's happening with Scar. And it's just something for all of us to keep an eye on. All right? Because the one thing I learned from Shazam... Is that you got to stay true to yourself.

Wow. Brilliant. Even if you can't buy one munchkin, which seems like something Andrew Yang should put on his fucking website. Yes. That is our show. I want to thank Janelle James, Sam Stein, Cecile Richards, Andrew Yang, Bob Craft,

and Nancy Pelosi. Thank you, Boston and the Wang Center, Bach Theater, Wang Center. Thank you for coming out. Have a great night. Thank you.