Pod Save America - "Fine, we’ll talk about Joe Rogan.”

Episode Date: February 8, 2022

The Republican Party passes an official resolution stating that the violent insurrection on January 6th that left multiple people dead and injured was “legitimate political discourse;” Mike Pence says Donald Trump is wrong about his ability to overturn the election, and guest host Sam Sanders joins to talk about the controversies raging through the media over Joe Rogan, Jeff Zucker, and Jon Lovett’s interview with Jen Psaki.For a closed-captioned version of this episode, click here. For a transcript of this episode, please email [e-mail] and include the name of the podcast. 

Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau. I'm Jon Lovett. And filling in for Tommy today, we are lucky to have with us in studio the host of NPR's It's Been a Minute, Sam Sanders. Welcome back to the show. It's great to be here. Always great to be here. It's great to have you. I have fun here. We have fun having you.

On today's show, the Republican Party passes an official resolution stating that the violent insurrection on January 6th that left multiple people dead and injured was, quote, legitimate political discourse. Mike Pence says Donald Trump is wrong about his ability to overturn the election. And we dive into raging media controversies over Joe Rogan, Jeff Zucker and John Lovett's interview with Jen Psaki. Maybe the greatest controversy of all. Yeah, no, it's maybe the greatest controversy of all. One thing, it's been a weekend of podcast apologies. And I just want to add one, which is I referred to Mark Short as Mike Short, and it led to a pretty stupid joke on Love It or Leave It. I would say that given that other podcast hosts have apologized for saying the N-word dozens of times, I don't think it really is that big a deal. But I did want to issue that apology. apology. Before we get started, some great news. Dan Pfeiffer, one of America's biggest YouTube stars, is back with another season of Political Experts React. In the newest episode, Dan is joined

by The Lincoln Project's Stuart Stevens to break down Republican midterm political ads from candidates like Dr. Oz and the MAGA mom to Mallory Staples. To watch, head to Crooked Media's YouTube channel. Also, if you haven't heard, Pod Save America and Love It or Leave It have just announced a ton of live shows this spring and summer. You bet. Heading back on the road. Yep, and we're live every Thursday in LA again at Dynasty Typewriter. Oh, I didn't even know that.

And those are fun live shows. Those are really fun live shows. Cannot wait. We're going to leave my backyard soon enough. You're going to want to go to crooked.com slash events to get your tickets for all this stuff. All this stuff. Pod Save America, Love It or Leave It, the Dynasty typewriter shows, all of them. All right, let's get to it. I have to admit, when I first saw the New York Times headline, GOP declares January 6th attack legitimate

political discourse, I thought there might be some like context missing or like a headline writer got a little out of control. No. But here's, the Republican National Committee shall immediately cease any and all support of them as members of the Republican Party. Sam, what was your initial reaction to the story? And like, why? Why did the RNC do this?

Why do you think they did this? Why is anyone still doing this censure business? It doesn't do anything. It doesn't mean I hereby declare this. I'm going to censure you right now. You're censured, John. Oh, my God. I think... So first reaction was like, oh, yeah, of course. But second reaction was when you read the piece, what was really interesting about the article is the meeting itself felt really bipolar. So the Times said at first in this meeting,

this was a GOP winter meeting, all these party leaders came in and condemned the attack. They condemned the attack and the insurrection and Trump's conduct. Then the Times story says over the course of the meeting, everything shifted and they went to downplaying it and then denying it and then this censure thing. And so for me, the takeaway is like right now in the GOP, if you put 100 Republicans in a room, any room, doesn't matter how they walked in. We know how they walk out. There is a small and loud minority in this party that is in charge of the party, no matter what, and like at no matter what level. And I think it really boils down to just the

perverse incentives of national politics right now. All these House members, all these senators, they don't want to get primaried. And that is more important to them than a general because these seats are so predictable in so many cases. They're most worried about an even further right primary. And if that is the case, then they'll always do this, right? So you put them in a room and the extremism just like spreads like Omicron. It's just whether they walk in like that or not, that's how they walk out. It's the same trajectory they've taken in the past year since the attack, right? Like the first week when it was fresh in everybody's mind, it was a violent insurrection. It was wrong.

Everybody was, every Fox News host was texting Don Jr. to try to get his dad to stop. And then over time, they kind of get on the party line that actually was just a small group of people, even though the Department of Justice estimates. And I didn't realize how many. 2,000 to 2,500 people went through the Capitol. Wait, they were in there? That is, it's not. Let me tell you. And I know this doesn't need to be said anymore, but let it be 2,500 black people up in the Capitol breaking in.

No. Let it be. I know. And just one small note on what they're excusing as legitimate political discourse. A lot of people peed in there. Wait, I didn't know that. Yeah, they peed. I knew. And just one small note on what they're excusing as legitimate political discourse. A lot of people peed in there. Wait, I didn't know that. Yeah, I knew they were taking stuff. There's pee.

So I just. They're on the record there, too. All right. I mean, I just look. So Ronna, our friend Ronna Romney McDaniel, she she issued a cleanup statement that called the January 6th investigation a Democrat-led persecution of ordinary citizens who engaged in legitimate political discourse that had nothing to do with violence at the Capitol. Here's the thing. As you pointed out, Sam, many hours of negotiation went into this censure. They talked about it a lot. They poured over the language. No one thought that maybe this could

be construed as endorsing violence they really are going to try to get us to believe that they oh that's not what we meant yeah well i mean but they're trying to do two things at once they're trying to seem like a palatable party for typical dc discourse and they're also still trying to wink and nod to potential primary voters who are insurrectionist sympathizers that's hard to do yeah i mean like it's just like it i think look it's not like the question facing them was, should we embrace Donald Trump's belief that the election was stolen or not? Right. And we want to wink to all the people in the party, the majority of people in the party who believe that it was stolen. This was the FBI called January 6th an act of domestic terrorism. Right. Dozens and dozens of people were injured.

Police officers, they had brain damage. They had, you know, all kinds of horrible injuries. Five people died as a result of this. And you can't just say that that was not legitimate political discourse and make that clear. I just don't get why they said anything. Well, here's why they could have avoided this whole plot line. Exactly. That's right.

You start from what Cheney and Kinzinger are doing is making them mad. It is making them mad that they are doing this, that they are participating in this. And those feelings must be valid in some way. They must be validated in some way. They must be explained. And they can't be explained for what they are, which is these are two people showing a kind of modicum of integrity. It makes us all exposed as the dirty cops we are. And we dirty cops don't like having these kind of less dirty cops rubbing it in our faces. And so they kind of need to get together and come up with some rationale for why what what these

Republicans are doing on the committee isn't just wrong because they don't like the politics of it, but wrong for some other reason. So they work really hard to come up with an explanation. Even the corrected version is still a fucking lie. It's all a lie. Like there are lots of Republicans protesting all across the country. They're protesting against masks.

They're protesting against all kinds of things. There's only one that there's a fucking committee looking at. It's the one where several thousand people broke into the Capitol and took things from Nancy Pelosi's desk. And oh, by the way, a bunch of people got hurt and died. So, of course, anything they come up with is a fucking lie. I think they just got a little bit focused. To your point, the insurrection was bad, but we fucking hate these two. I think a lot of the conversation was on the but we hate these two and not enough on the insurrection was bad. How strong is the National Party like the GOP actually in moments like this?

This whole statement seems very reactionary. Trump has taken so much power away from a national party infrastructure anyway. Like, does the GOP matter less now, the national GOP, less now than it ever did before? Yeah. Well, look, I think national, both national parties and the national party committees less now than it ever did before yeah well look i think national both national parties and their national party committees people their critics always think they have more power than they do i think the same is true oh yeah there are no back rooms people are always arguing about the dnc oh the dnc is getting exactly what they wanted there's

there's no dnc's not those conventions yeah they're not doing any things neither is the rnc it is the base of the party and by the base of the party, I mean sort of like the right wing media folks who are leading the rest of the party around. But you're right, love it. Like they got they just got they were so pissed it was Cheney and Adam Kinzinger. They had to say something. But also like, yeah, the idea that they're that the January 6th committee is somehow persecuting people who were just peaceful protesters who never entered the Capitol, who were just outside at the Stop the Steal rally. They're not. People forget. They're not dealing with those people at all. Before they went inside the Capitol, there was a noose out there. There was a Confederate flag out there.

A lot of them said if they got to Pence or Pelosi, they would do stuff. Hang Mike Pence. It was a lynch. It could have been a lynch mob. Like, not even exaggerating. But it just was an unsuccessful one. I mean, yes. Like, I will.

Look, it's amazing how quickly you forget the feeling of it. Like, I wonder if Ronna remembers the video of her fucking uncle running down the hall to get out of the Capitol. There's video of him fucking running and that livid look on Mitt Romney's face sitting in the Senate chamber while one of the insurrectionists, Seven, decided to give some speech defending their indefensible position, the kind of rage in his eyes. Like a few people on that side haven't lost that.

Does that make them great? No, but it makes them better than the fucking scumbags getting together at this meeting. Well, you know who remembered the video of mitt romney running is mitt romney because he he tweeted shame falls on a party that would censure persons of conscience uh apparently uh he also said that he exchanged some texts with rana over this though he didn't tell us what they were oh man oh wait i got three dots from Uncle Mitt. Oh, fuck. What emoji does he send to her?

Yeah, I was going to say. What emoji? Upside down smiley. He just sent her the thumbs down. He did the thumbs down reaction emoji on his statement. Other Republicans who condemned the censure included Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy, Maryland Governor Larry Hogan, Chris Christie, Lisa Murkowski. I saw Susan Collins today, Todd Young, a couple of them. I didn't see too many.

How important do you think it is to get every elected Republican on record about this? Most people don't know about this story. Yeah. Right? I think people who are really plugged in are following what the GOP at the national level is saying. I think folks are going to plug into the midterms a few months before the midterms, and they're going to be probably not going back to what happened this week

with the statement right? so very unusual for me to disconnect from the news at all I was at a wedding since Thursday and the few times I just scrolled through Twitter to see what was going on I was like legitimate political discourse

what's going on? and it really wasn't until yesterday I was going on. I was like, legitimate political discourse? What's going on? And it really wasn't until yesterday I dug into it. I'm like, no, this really happened? So, yeah, I was one of those people. Yeah. And I'm an avid news consumer. Yeah. I mean, love it.

The question is, like, we have debated to what extent Democrats should make January 6th an issue in the midterms and beyond. Like, how, if at all, should the RNC resolution change the parties thinking about this, knowing that, you know, as Sam just said, probably a lot of people don't know the story and people are going to tune in, you know, a couple months before November. Yeah. Here's my, I really have been stuck on the fact that the UK has been trapped in a kind of government shaking scandal over a party from over a year ago. Several parties. Several parties. Because in part because of the sort of attention it's gotten from the media, but also concentration on it from people trying to make it

a story. One lesson I would take from what's happening right now is I think like sometimes we've debated on this podcast, right? Like, well, is this is this the best thing? Forget. We obviously think it's the right thing to do to point out the kind of incredibly dangerous authoritarian tendencies of the Republican Party. But when we're at our most mercenary, we ask, like, is this the right way to make sure we're in a position to win the election? I would say that it's because we have the January 6th committee that it has stirred up enough noise and news and interest and coverage that it has kind of caused these kind of knock on effects of of of Trump issuing these statements of stories now about document retention of of of Chris Christie and Pence giving these competing speeches of a censure resolution coming out of the RNC. And all of a sudden, this story now is kind of, it's self-perpetuating at least for a few days because it's Republicans talking to each other about this incredibly important divide inside the Republican Party,

which is, should America be a democracy, yes or no? So my lesson is only that it does seem as though concerted attention from Democrats on this issue has stirred something up that is even bigger than what the committee could have done on its own. I agree. But I also think that the kind of slow burn of a story that you get from this insurrection panel committee is not the kind of story that national news media knows how to do well with or that Democrats know how to do well with. Like it's a slow trickle of these really damning details about what happened that day and before that altogether make a pretty strong argument. But it's not being delivered in one simple package on a given day. And it's like, well, the Democratic Party be able to keep tying

all of these dots together over time. Yeah. No, say in October. Look at all this. Democrats aren't good at not tying. But I was going to say, I think tying all the dots together is a challenge. And saying tying all the dots together, mixed metaphor or whatever. Sorry, but you get it. Yeah, I didn't even think about that. But anyway, tying it all together is a challenge. But I would say this. Obviously, we've seen in polls. You can even hear it in focus groups that have been done. People are not January 6th is not top of mind for a lot of voters. And so it's hard to make it a big deal. It's hard to make anything a big deal that happened in the past and not in the future. I also think it's hard to make a big deal, something that doesn't directly affect

people's lives, right? Like even a conversation about democratic institutions and what the Republican, all this kind of stuff, it's tough to make real to people. I think what's different here is an endorsement of violence. Like an endorsement of violence is simple to understand. It also has a direct effect on people's lives. Like, do you want a party in control that is endorsing political violence that could come to your town, that could come to you, right? Like, is that really what you want? I mean, Data for Progress polled four swing districts and found that voters overwhelmingly disapproved of what happened at the Capitol, obviously. But in no swing district did more than 15 percent of likely voters approve of the insurrection,

and all of the districts, at least 80 percentroved like it is once sorry when you ask that kind of question in a poll you're also led to answer the right answer you're like yeah although in in some of the in the same poll they'll say things like yeah the election was stolen right or or yeah trump's big lie was right like the the one that got the most disapproval was obviously violence and you're right people can say different things about that but i do think democrats making the point based on this and they and again, you have to keep the keep saying this over and over and over again, that this party has now endorsed political violence. And this part, all the all the mayhem that you've seen in January six, don't just leave it in the past. It's actually about what could happen if they return to power or if they don't get their way.

And that's a big problem. That's why you want to keep it's harder to do that when Trump is not there. It is harder to do that. Well, that's why. But that's going back to the original question I had asked. Like, I do think that's why every single Republican, elected Republican and Republican running for office in 2022 should be made to answer that question. They should be made to answer their question at campaign should be made to answer their question at campaign events, at debates, wherever. And that's why you're seeing so many, I think, today already disavow it.

Not just the usual suspects, but a lot of like, because they know that that's- Not good politics. It's not good politics. It's not good politics. It's horrific, but it's also not good politics. And they want it behind them, right? They don't want to be dealing with this indefinitely.

That's right. One prominent Republican who made some headlines about January 6th over the weekend was former Vice President Mike Pence, who said for the first time that Donald Trump is wrong, that Pence had the legal authority to overturn the election, and that the Republican Party should accept the outcome and move on. Though he still wouldn't say that Trump lost, or he still wouldn't reject the big lie. This unsurprisingly enraged Trump, who called Pence, quote, an automatic conveyor belt for the old crow. Mitch McConnell. Old crow. I'm sorry.

Oh, it's old crow. So weird. It's just never stops being weird. Doesn't work. He's stuck with it. The first of all, the like triangulating on fascism is amazing. Like finding a third there's a third way uh amazing but also like trump's statement really muted actually like really soft i hadn't noticed that at first just because my i was so focused on the conveyor belt for the old crow that i hadn't realized that yeah it's a visual right yeah it's imagining crow mitt it's not personal it's not uh he doesn't uh once, urge his followers to kill Mike Pence, which had previously been one of his go-tos. So pretty muted.

And obviously it's because, you know, Trump has a, you know, some loyalty and a trick. No, he's really worried that Mike Pence is a person out there with a story to tell. Well, yeah. The story was he got killed. Right. Like they would have killed him he knew that he i think i just don't understand no i think he knows it's a story to tell and back to what we were just saying he he knows deep down that it is bad politics

does he want to run for president again at some point yeah like is that what he's trying to figure out that some a lot of the reporting says that he does i can't i mean this was a speed i read this speech was read like someone saying and therefore i'm not running for president i'm going to tell the truth in this very specific and direct way uh oh really you thought that's i tell who knows that's interesting look i just see all the rest of them like i don't ronda santos is a smart smart guy. Marco Rubio thinks he's a smart guy. These are both people choosing to avoid touching this, to avoid saying emphatically one way or the other because they want to leave their options open. Mike Pence has done the exact same thing for six years now.

And this is the first time he chooses to be this emphatic about something so central to Donald Trump's view of 2020 and 2024. Why is he even making speeches then it went further than he needs to go and why not mike pence and you and and like my colleague almost got me killed day after i'm out meanest most withering statement and then i'll never speak to you about you ever again that's what i've done go if you're gonna never run for president again go all the way don't triangulate fascism if you're gonna run for president again i would say they tried to kill me they did not goodbye to you all i just don't in his mind he still thinks there's

like some space to carve out between liz cheney and donald trump which is not i don't think that's i mean he's never been very good at politics. Well, that's the... He was vice president because he was about to lose the Indiana governor's race. So he like jumped onto this thing because he thought losing his vice president would be better than losing at the top of the ticket. And lo and behold, you almost get four years later,

he's almost hung at the Capitol. Life's funny. So a group of bipartisan lawmakers is still working on a bill to reform the Electoral Count Act in an effort to prevent future attempted coups. And over the weekend, Joe Manchin and Lisa Murkowski did a joint interview where Manchin said the bill would, quote, absolutely pass. What do we know about what specific changes they're looking to make? I mean, first thing we know is be careful what you believe from Joe Manchin.

Yeah, exactly. For that. But for starters, the bill would clarify that the vice president has no power to reject the state's electors. Wow. Great. Yeah. Low baseline. Huge step forward. Yeah.

And the measure would also ensure that state houses cannot appoint electors after Election Day in an attempt to change the results. There's some other stuff. And I'm reading from The Times now and CNN. There'd be a timeline for states to complete challenges to results the results. There's some other stuff, and I'm reading from The Times now and CNN. There'd be a timeline for states to complete challenges to results of elections, a clear method to certify the results, even a format for transporting the electoral college certifications to Capitol Hill, and stage directions on how the day of the actual thing should go. So, I mean, all of it seems pretty common sense. And I guess it could pass.

But when I read it all together, I'm like, that's a low baseline. And like, how dare anyone up there pat themselves on the back for passing that? Yeah, I mean, well, I will say a lot of the Republicans who sound like they may support it, like Marco Rubio was saying something like, well, if Kamala Harris is VP, we don't want her to have the power to overturn the election, right? So the whole like clarifying

the VP's role thing does seem like the lowest, lowest common denominator that they can all agree on. If they just do that, I'm like, eh. The thing you mentioned about ensuring

that state legislators, state legislators can't appoint electors after election day. I think that's big. And I think it might not pass. Well, that was going to say, so the things you, you just mentioned,

Sam, that were from that time story, that was in the draft legislative text from, um, uh, Dick Durbin and Amy Klobuchar and Angus King. And they're in like their own separate group. And then there's like the Murkowski, Manchin, Republican group.

Now, it does say that those groups have started talking. I think if that, if the Klobuchar, King, that bill, if all that stuff gets into the overall bill and that passes, I think that's, look, it's not nearly as good as voting rights passing, but it is, that's going to do a lot to protect against the next coup. It really is. The fact that we have to say that, protect against the next coup. We do need to protect against it. We're through the looking glass. But we need to do a lot to protect against the next coup. It really is. The fact that we have to say that protect against the next coup. We do need to protect against it. We're through the looking glass. But we need to do that. We need to do that. And like we have Democrats for a year

combined vote suppression with overturning of elections in a way that I think was really harmful. We completely lost on the ability to pass something on voting rights. That is not happening now. But we have this one chance to possibly pass something on voting rights. That is not happening now. But we have this one chance to possibly pass something to like shore up against potential against a future Trump run. Like, of course, we should take it. It does nothing to hurt us. It can only help clarify. I mean, what what what Manchin said is right. You know, Trump issued this statement the other day saying, well, if they need to pass something to change the rules, it means that my statement was

correct, right? Like if you're changing the rules to stop Mike Pence from overturning election, sure sounds like he could, which is why they're talking about in terms of clarifying, what have you. All of this, though, in the end is playing in like very kind of like first order constitutional questions, which will ultimately land before a Supreme Court. Regardless, none of this ultimately will stop Republicans from breaking the rules, pretending the Constitution says whatever they want to put whoever they want in power. So the most important protection is winning some fucking elections. But barring that, it would be great to have some kind of a break from what happened in 2020, some kind of a procedure or set of rules that tells Republicans they don't have

the power to overturn the election if they so choose. And part of the reason I think it's possible that it's going to pass is a lot of these Republicans don't want to think they have that power. They would like to not feel the pressure from the base to overturn these elections. So whatever they can do, do it. It's the Kamala stay home bill. Kamala don't show up that day. No gavel for you. Look, i think any bill that's worth passing has to do something about the real danger which is that the state legislatures mostly these republican state legislatures decide to just appoint the red slate of electors like if it can handle that i think it's definitely worth passing if it doesn't handle that if it doesn't

handle that and if it's just like if it's just the common stay home if it's just the common stay home bill come on no thank you yeah um. Come on. No, thank you. Yeah. OK. When we come back, we will talk about the various raging media controversies. Sure. All right. There have been quite a few media stories dominating the news, which we're going to talk about since we have a real live journalist with us today. Allegedly. I mean, we're certainly not. Let's start with the controversy over Joe Rogan, who hosts a podcast that averages nearly 11 million listeners per episode, which led Spotify to pay $100 million for the exclusive rights to host the show on its platform.

Is that V1 or V2? Oh, man, that's an inside joke. All right. A few weeks ago, 270 health professionals signed a letter asking Spotify to moderate misinformation on its platform, specifically related to Rogan's stance on COVID vaccines. He's discouraged young people from getting vaccinated, incorrectly claimed that vaccines are gene therapy, and hosted hardcore anti-vaxxers who spread so many lies they've been kicked off Twitter. Spotify said it would include a, quote, content advisory on Rogan's episodes about COVID, and Rogan said he would try harder to interview guests with different opinions.

Then, over the weekend, Spotify confirmed that it had removed about 70 episodes of the Joe Rogan experience, not because of COVID misinformation, but because the singer India Arie shared a supercut of all the times Rogan has used the N-word on his show. Rogan apologized, and Spotify said that it would invest $100 million towards music and audio from historically marginalized groups. I won't believe that. I just won't believe that. What a classic corporate thing.

Though their CEO also said, quote, I do not believe that silencing Joe is the answer. Canceling voices is a slippery slope. Meanwhile, artists Neil Young and Joni Mitchell have pulled their music from Spotify, while podcasters Brene Brown and Roxane Gay have stopped putting their shows on the platform. What a mess. Let's start with Spotify. They claim to be just a platform, not a publisher with editorial control. What's their responsibility here? Love it.

Well, look, here's the thing. Also, by the way, one thing they have said in all their statements is that Joe Rogan decided to take down the episodes, right? Because very careful, they're not in charge of what's on on joe rogan's uh feed there uh look spotify paid joe rogan a hundred million dollars to silence him on apple to silence him on google uh to silence him in every single place they could except for one all right so they're really just one there's really just one left for them to do to get the final value out of their hundred million but all that aside like i don't this idea like, oh, we're not a publisher. Everybody wants to have a party.

Nobody wants to clean up. You paid somebody a lot of money to make content for you. They are doing it. I think part of the reason they're a little bit fucked is they can't claim like, oh, we're not going to pay him this. We had no idea he was saying the N word all the time because these were just living in his feed that they have been that they were fully available to everybody for years. The other thing I will say to defend Joe Rogan is it's a different time. You know, look, 2014, he was just a young man in his mid-40s. People didn't know then. All right.

A lot has changed. Sam, what do you think? I think my first thought was Indiari. Good to hear from her. Hope she's doing well. Love that album. Really did. Secondly, I think that like a lot of this argument we tried to have before and then we just didn't have it. A few years ago, there was a whole is Facebook a publisher or a platform conversation? And eventually we just moved on. And Facebook is just moved on and Facebook is still crazy. And Facebook is still full of conspiracy theory.

And I think that like if Spotify had any business sense about all of this, they would understand that the life cycle of internet outrage is extremely short. And if you just shut up, we'll move on something else. They started talking. Then they began to pull episodes down. They're keeping this story alive. They're keeping the story alive. And I don't know why they're doing that. I also feel like right? The larger conversation is why does a guy like Joe Rogan have this big of a contract and this many listeners for that show?

It's not a good show. It's not scientifically informed. It's not even really factual. And the larger issue here is that like so many Americans increasingly don't trust actual news outlets. They don't trust national news outlets. They don't trust national news outlets and they don't think that we, because I'm one of them, are being truthful with them.

The latest numbers from Pew Research Center show that nationwide, only 58% of US adults trust national news media. And when you just go to Republicans, it's like 35 or 30% trust. And so in that context, of course, I think those are even higher than the ones probably had it even worse. It's really bad. But like in that context, of course, a Joe Rogan succeeds. And so we can have a conversation about, you know, what kind of company Spotify is, but there's a larger information conversation

to have about who Americans trust and who they don't and who fills the gap. And I think instead of national news organizations like mine and others having conversations about how we rebuild trust, we got to talk about the saga of Jeff Zucker, you know? Which we are going to get to. Yeah, and so like, I am not mad at Spotify because why would it benefit me to be mad at a company?

It's a company. It's a company. Yeah. I mean, like, I think that Spotify is bullshit here, right? Like they, look, the reason they're trying to get away with this is that they are both a platform and a publisher, right? So the way that Spotify works is there are some podcasts that are just on Spotify because it's like a platform.

Our podcast is one of them. Your podcast is one of them, right? And then Spotify goes out and picks and chooses which podcasts they want to make exclusive bids for and pay a lot of money to. And that's what they did with Joe Rogan. Like you said, love it. They decided to make sure he couldn't be heard on any other platform, but there's, that's not the case with a lot of the most, most podcasts, right? So they, of course they have responsibility for this, right? But beyond that, I think the question

you raised, Sam, is the right one, which is like, what should be done about Joe Rogan? And specifically, what should be done about the misinformation

and disinformation that is coming from the Joe Rogan podcast? Because if Spotify kicked Joe Rogan off tomorrow, Joe Rogan would go on any number of other platforms. Also, that's the tip of the iceberg. Have you seen YouTube? Rumble, a Canadian version of YouTube that's now aligned with Trump, offered Rogan $100 million

just today to come onto their platform, right? He'd go on YouTube, he'd go on Play. So like, the misinformation and disinformation does not stop if Spotify kicks Joe Rogan off the platform, which is why I actually think that when it was just the COVID disinformation that was the story, Rogan said, oh, well, I want to have different voices, differing voices on that disagree with me. And I got an answer for that. Right. Because I actually think that that's the best. Look, is that a surefire way? Is that going to work? I have no fucking idea but we have to do

something to expose some of the people who are listening to that podcast to competing forms of information i'm gonna push back on that okay because i think that like it's really easy for someone like joe rogan to do the whole i didn't know i'm just a dumb comedian i don't pre-interview i I don't fact check. I just talk. And instead of saying I'll do a better job about fact checking and pre-interviewing and booking and being thoughtful about these conversations or maybe even

cutting out the bad parts in post before you post it, instead of saying any of those things, he says, well, I'll just have some other voices. That is so lazy. It is so lazy. And it's so disrespectful of course it is to people who are actually trying to credibly inform the public but he's not only to be that no but when you have a platform that big you have some of that and i think that like and i think

that like only a certain kind of like man can get away with that foolishness y'all put a show together i'll put a show together. We are in pre-production. We are fact-checking. We are editing script. Before it runs, we're going to listen to it two or three times just before we put it up. And, like, you do that because, like, you know that when people are listening to you, you have a responsibility.

And so it doesn't matter if Joe Rogan says he's a comedian or this or that. At that point, when you're getting that much money and talking to that many people, just do better. Sorry, not to fuss at y'all about this, but it just burns me up. But I agree with that 100%. But like Joe Rogan is a lazy, irresponsible asshole. Of course.

He exists and he's got 11 million listeners. Yes. And I have encountered a lot of people who come up to us and say, oh, I listen to Pod Save America. I listen to Joe Rogan. Sometimes I believe what you guys say. Sometimes he has other points. Sometimes I listen to Ben Shapiro. I hate Donald Trump.

I hate the Republican Party. I don't like the Democrats either. There is a group of people like this that I do think we have to contest and that we have to try to persuade. Fuck Joe Rogan. Forget about Joe Rogan. It's not about him. It's not about Spotify, right? It is about who is that misinformation and disinformation reaching

and how do we fight that? Is the answer just, you know, throwing good information on top of bad information? That didn't work. Not necessarily, right? But we have to figure out,

like, we are in a fight to persuade people and I don't know that we can count on Joe Rogan acting responsible for Spotify I don't think I'm in a fight to persuade people.

My fight is to inform people. You're right. Well, we have a difference. I'm fighting to actually persuade people. Go ahead. Sorry. No, no. Look, for good and for ill, Joe Rogan is not producing a news show.

You know, you point out these studies that say X number of people don't trust the news. That's absolutely true. The vast majority of people, by definition, if you have 70% of people saying they mistrust mainstream news, a lot of those people are distrusting something they are not consuming. These are people answering a question about content they are not imbibing. The biggest divide in this country is not between people who are engaged in following and paying attention to the news and the tens of millions of people, the majority of the country, who are not. Joe Rogan has a big audience of people that are probably more in that category.

No, I'm saying, but like... So all I'm getting, all I'm saying is we, I don't even know why, we're not even disagreeing. I agree completely. But like, what you're saying is, I want Joe Rogan to be held to the standards of the news. No, I want him to do a little bit better. Right, of course.

And I also want the news to do a better job of appealing to more people. How do you think they do that? I don't know. But I know that for a long time, especially during the pandemic, it became hard to listen to or watch or read most mainstream national news. Because the spirit behind every headline and every story was like, aren't you panicked? Aren't you worried? You're going to die.

This is bad. This is bad. This is bad. And there are studies about the tone and tenor of national news coverage. Most of it at this point is anxiety-inducing and negative. Yeah, totally. And so that, I think, needs to be addressed. Are we making a product that is informative and not depressing?

Are we making a product that is informative that can, like, at least start to stand bit head to head with like all of the entertainment and disinformation swill that exists? I mean, you've touched on something, which is a lot of reporters will say, well, the reason that there's distrust in media is for purely partisan reasons. So, you know, Republicans don't trust media because they think it's liberal. And, you know, Democrats will have complaints about media because they think it's, you know, not tough enough on Republicans. Right. And I think, you know, and there's probably needs more study on this, but I think the point you just made, which is that so much of the media, it's bringing you down. It feeds you anxiety. It makes you nervous. And it's treating politics like a game and a sport and it's making everything afraid and stuff like that.

That gets to the distrust that a lot of people feel as well. And people like Joe Rogan are saying, you know what? I'm not going to make you nervous. I'm not going to make you nervous. I'm just going to talk to you like a friend. Trust me. And I don't have all the answers. And this guy came on my show and he's saying crazy shit.

Maybe he's wrong. Maybe he's right. Who knows? This is also not a lot of what Joe rogan is doing on that show isn't also that new like yes we we there's that we are we are now discussing the tons of racism that's been on that show we're talking about the misinformation that's on that show uh but there's always been an audience for a certain kind of like white male very masculine bro-y conversation around the table in which some days it's somebody like Fauci. Some days it's a famous

comedian. Some days it's a UFO expert. There's been like Howard Stern did that. There's lots of shows that have done that. And I do wish I think that the conversation like how do we get more people to pay attention to the news? Fine. There is millions and millions of guys out there that find that kind of conversation appealing and like the answer to telling them en masse like you're wrong to like what you're liking like it's true like i think what joe rogan's doing is pretty gross but like i really am much more interested in like how do we peel some of those people off like how do we make something that reaches them that kind of touches that kind of community that like conversation without it having to be infested with the kind of toxic qualities

that we see in sort of the Rogan universe. Or even some of the toxic qualities that we see in mainstream news. Yeah, sure. If there is a way to make national news appeal to more people and depress them less, I think we should do that. I think there are studies after studies about the way that all major newsrooms cover the pandemic. It was unnecessarily negative.

That's clear. There's a recent episode of the Freakonomics podcast that spends a whole hour talking about why is U.S. media so negative right now? And these are real questions that have to be asked because as long as the news feels like a chore and it's making you sad, fewer people are going to listen to it. And I think more people need to listen to the news and not to Joe Rogan. And I do think, too, part of this, some of this comes down to what it means to respect speech. And I think there's a kind of argument from their side that's like, we respect the power of speech and, therefore, we don't want to see any hindrances.

We want to say whatever we want whenever we want. We want to pay no consequences for saying something racist. We want to pay no consequences for spreading misinformation because the most important thing is individuals having the power, whatever that power means to them, to spread. And what we're basically saying is like, bad ideas have incredible power, right? You have incredible responsibility that comes with your ability to spread those bad ideas in far-reaching ways. Like if you, it is a big difference between telling somebody, like there's a, I just sometimes imagine Joe Rogan having one of these anti-COVID, one of these anti-vaccine guests on, just imagine going from person to person to share that information, like handing it out like a pamphlet. Like, have you heard, like it's killing teenagers. Have you heard of natural immunity is stronger,

et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And you imagine like telling this to people, telling 11 million people something completely false individually, I think gets at just how hard, how bad it is to do it on math. Well, I also think that the controversies over these stories play into the polarization. So like just preparing for this podcast, I was like, I want to find out exactly what the COVID misinformation was and disinherit that Joe Rogan was spreading. And I'm Googling and stuff like that. And Joe Rogan, Spotify, all you get is stories about the controversy. And I'm like,

it took me a while to find out what the actual thing he said was. Because I'm like, so what is that? What is that actually doing for the cause of making sure more people trust the vaccines? Which should be our goal. I feel the same way about this whole conversation that i'm being pulled into over what i think about joe rogan saying the n-word don't ask me stop let's not the larger issue is that never in the history of media has anybody other than a white guy like Joe Rogan got a deal as big as Joe Rogan. Right. You know? And so the N-word is secondary to me.

And I'm also tired of these other comedians circling the wagons acting like Joe Rogan saying the N-word is like the last frontier of free speech. We've got to let comedians tell hard truths. That ain't a hard truth. That's a low-hanging fruit. Well, that's another thing, too, is that it also gets, again, the controversy gets distilled to, well, he said the N-word. Did he say it because he was talking about other people saying what was the context? He also, he's made comments about how black and white people have different genetics. He had a guest on who claimed that black people have a gene that makes them predisposed to violence.

Like, it went beyond him just being like, oh, I'm saying the word because someone else said it. Also, at this point, if you tell me that any white person said the N-word, I'd be like, oh, I bet they do when we aren't around. I'm not surprised. I just, I'm sorry. Like, I don't have any space for surprise for that anymore. I don't have any space for surprise for it. It's also like, you know, horrible things with Jordan Peterson about trans people

and how they represent the harbinger of the end of civilization. He said the N-word dozens of times. There is something so like, it is not surprising to me that these things are kind of offenses that get you, is this okay? You know, like if it was 70 times Joe Rogan talked about kikes controlling the media, right? Like it'd be a very different conversation.

One other point I wanted to make on the other, on the misinformation side of it. I mean, I also understand given how bad the coverage has been, the pull of finding some expert, some guru, some person, some Sherpa to follow who can break it all down. Because I mean, like, you know, you and I, I think at the height of the pandemic became as close to scientists as we'll ever be in our whole lives. Like, and I remember, I remember vividly telling, I said this to Ronan, almost verbatim. He, I was like, I, I, he like said some, sent some, some, some story about some new information we were learning, I believe about Delta. And he was like, look at this. It looks like it's more dangerous in this way than we thought. And I was like,

you can't fucking trust that. That is misinformation. He's like, it's Reuters. And I was like, I'm telling you, you can't trust anything. You got to read the fucking studies. Because I was like, at that point, so I felt so kind of like manhandled and misled by even the most anodyne and basic and straightforward news coverage of COVID. I have a child who can't get vaccinated, and I pay more attention to COVID than almost anything, and read from experts who would never be on Joe Rogan's show, right? And the amount of conflicting information over the last several months, it will drive you crazy. And I follow this stuff.

And the headline, the will drive you crazy. Yeah. And you know, I follow this stuff and the headline, I mean, the experts are one thing, the headlines like millions more children are dying. Should you be scared and not leave the house? You know, it's just that kind of tone. I'm still hurt over Fauci telling me for months to not wear a mask than

saying you better get one real quick. Right. I'm still reeling over that. And this is a person who is good faith, trying to do his best, been an expert forever. And so like, you're right, Love It, when people hear some Sherpa on

a podcast that says they know it all and they're like, well, I might as well believe that person because all the other people are leading me astray as well. Lack of trust in institutions is at the core of this problem. And it ain't about Joe Rogan saying it in work. Let me tell you, I was an undergrad

when the number one song for 12 weeks was Kanye West's Gold Digger. All these white folks were saying the N-word. It's not new to me. It's not surprising to me. And it's just like distractionary. Yeah. Yeah. There's been like a few moments where it was like, that's it.

I'm not reading anything else except Dr. Ashish Jha's Twitter. That's it. I'm done. Just Dr. Jha and me. That's the only thing. Just me and him in conversation. And then that point, I tweet some stuff and everyone's Twitter. That's it. I'm done. Just Dr. Jha and me. That's the only thing. Just me and him in conversation. And then that point, I tweet some stuff and everyone's yelling at him about something. I'm like, oh, I'm sorry. He's just the Dean of Public Health

at Brown. I'm still stuck on Joe Rogan said the N-word. The sky is blue. Come on. But okay, on that point, though. Go ahead. I do think also once the first round of this probably is going to be a controversy

came up months and months and months and months ago put three interns on listening to what's in the fucking archive you can't pay those interns enough oh my god Spotify really did a serious vet on that one what I'm worried about or not worried about just wondering about like app silent

in this entire conversation is advertisers on Joe Rogan's podcast. Usually when this stuff flares up in TV or cable news, there's a push for the advertisers to pull ads from Tucker Carlson or whoever, and eventually some do. From what I understand, no advertisers have pulled their ads from Rogan's show, and none of them have even really spoken about it. What's up with that? I don't know. So, and I don't know this because I don't listen to Joe Rogan's podcast, but is part of the exclusive deal with Spotify

that you don't have to listen to ads if Spotify, it's just subscriber based? He reads them. Oh, he still reads them. So people will pay for Spotify to have Joe Rogan read. And when you buy a Spotify Joe Rogan ad package, they also, I think, make you buy in other Spotify shows. Yeah, that is interesting. I would just say, you know, look, there are podcasts where you'll hear the N-word zero times.

And there are podcasts where you'll hear the N-word from one to a million times. And I think you just think about which ones you want to put the ads in. I almost used the N-word once on my show, and they were like, no. And I was like, you're right. I don't even like this. It's really simple to have a standard. Obviously, you know, we hope that media makes itself more responsible. But I don't know if that can happen without Jeff Zucker.

And we do need to talk about how he is the one media titan who did get canceled last week. He resigned after failing to report a consensual relationship with one of his longtime colleagues, which is against CNN's internal policies and came to light as a result. And it's like, OK, I mean, I guess Wolf and I never had the conversation, but I thought we were. like, okay, I mean, I guess Wolf and I never had the conversation, but I thought we were excited. So this came to light, Jez Lucker's relationship came to light as a result of the network's investigation into former anchor Chris Cuomo, who was fired after using his sources to help his brother, then Governor Andrew Cuomo, respond to allegations of sexual misconduct. Talk about

a butterfly effect. Which I want to point out started because they were worried ronan farrow might publish a story about andrew cuomo so a call from ronan about a potential story led chris to try to track down who was who else might be talking and doing ads for ronan now i'm just saying it leads all the way i'm just saying i'm just saying does ronan not have enough i just think it's amazing that he's just sitting on the couch playing video games and just canceling people left and right i don't think zucker's canceled i know i'll end up's amazing that he's just sitting on the couch playing video games and just canceling people left and right. I don't think Zucker's canceled.

I think he'll end up on Puck News or whatever it is. Oh, he's going to be fine. Oh, Puck News. He's going to Puck. He's going to be fine. I don't know if... I couldn't give a Puck. Zucker will be fine.

I don't know if CNN's, you know, anchors or employees will be. They spent the days following Zucker's departure offering impassioned tributes to their former boss. Here's a clip. Inside CNN, this was a week like no other. The sudden removal of CNN boss Jeff Zucker has rattled this news outlet to its core. This is the ugliest shakeup at CNN since the days Ted Turner was still walking the halls. Zucker was in charge one minute and he was gone the next. So why?

It's been a really tough day today and a tough few days for us here at CNN. All week, really. I didn't want to talk about it until tonight. So the truth is that we're all heartbroken because we lost our leader here. We lost the man who was the backbone, the glue and the spirit of this company. The man who I personally credit with changing my life a man who believed in me when nobody else did so thank you jeff sucker for everything you did for everyone at this network and what for what you did to the entire country for the entire country sam everything you were just saying about that's the voice and tone of media that caused people to distrust it.

I'm turning that off. We didn't even plan that. It was encapsulated in those clips. Not since Bernard Shaw was under a desk in Baghdad. Also, let me tell you something that happens in legacy newsrooms all the time. CEO turnover. It happens a lot.

There's a lot to unpack here. He invented putting Trump's empty podium on CNN until Trump shut up. Can't take that away from him. Like, okay. There's the whole thing about like, you know, should he have been fired because of a consensual relationship? I'm going to stop you right there and say yes, because the two of them were in charge of a lot. And if, and she was working under him. If there's any

even sense that their relationship meant that her department got more or others got less. She was getting promoted or anything like that. That's why you got it. It's not fair. And I'm surprised that she still gets to stay. Yeah. I mean, look, again, I don't know all... And, you know, there's

rumors that there's other there's there's rumors that there's other shoes there's another shoe might drop what other who else was he messing with no no no

that like you know she was also former communications director to Andrew Cuomo so were they involved in helping with the Cuomo stuff too

I don't know again like we don't know all this kind of stuff and they're also like were the Discovery Warner Media Titans trying to push him out and they use this as an excuse. Was it Chris Cuomo's?

So all of this, whatever. Follow the money. Whatever. This is all like sort of internal stuff that I don't actually think is a big, you know, story in the national interest. But I am like the CNN employees. Right. Like, and look, you love your boss. Your boss leaves.

I get it. But sort of the public, the public just, I don't know over this is a lot. My boss. Someone wrote a new, Sarah Jones in New York Magazine wrote a piece that was just like, hey, CNN, everyone calm down was the headline. I was just like, yeah, that's sort of how I feel right now. I think stepping back from this, I think there's a kind of navel-gazing. Yeah, that's the word.

It's the navel-gazing. It's a lot. In the mainstream media that is sometimes a bit smug and sanctimonious. That's a nice way to put it. And just out of touch with what people are actually worried about. They're trying to get their kids back in school. They want to get their young kids vaccinated. They're worried about. They're trying to get their kids back in school. They want to get their young kids vaccinated. They're worried about inflation.

Can I afford a home? And then it's, come on now. And like, Zucker will never be broke. He'll never be broke. He'll be fine. It's just Jeff Zucker. Yeah, it's about the perspective, huh? It's like, what are we covering today?

Also, also, Parker Molloy wrote a piece about this in her excellent newsletter about just reminding everyone about some of Zucker's quotes in Jonathan Mahler's 2017 profile of him for the New York Times Magazine, in which he said, Zucker said, the idea that politics is sport is undeniable, and we understand that and approached it that way. Let me tell you, that is a huge fucking reason Americans have record low trust in the media. Because politics is true to sport.

And then he said, as Zucker sees it, his pro-Trump panelists on CNN are not just spokespeople for a worldview. They are, quote, characters in a drama. That's what it was. That's what we were talking about. Characters in a drama. Characters in a drama. That's what it was. That's what we were talking about. Characters in a drama. Characters in a drama. Yeah, I'm turning on Joe Rogan at that point.

Come on now. And I just like, whatever. I get it. Some of these people work with Jeff Zucker. They liked him. They thought he was good. Whatever. But like that view of what news should be where he was like a guy that helped make Trump in the first place

and then turned on Trump because that was a more interesting story. Yeah. But you know what's really frustrating? I know a lot of CNN journalists. When I covered 2016, I was on the road on the same buses and the same gaggles with CNN journalists who on the ground are literally trying to do the Lord's work. And the bulk of the newsroom of these institutions, not just CNN, they are in it for the right reasons.

They believe in it. They are not served by that approach to journalism. And it's just like, I don't know, there needs to be a big old come to Jesus meeting because like, what are we doing if this is what's happening? What are we doing? And I do think there is a difference, even with the anchors and the folks on air, there's a difference in the journalism that you see from Jake Tapper and Dana Bash and Caitlin Collins and people like that. And then, like, you know, the monologues that you get, you used to get from Chris Cuomo or Don Lemon. Remember their pass offs?

Or fucking Jim Acosta. Like, it's just. It's a little. People can tell. It's a little much. It's a little bit. It's newsroomy. And I say that as someone with very first hand experience. On the creation of the newsroom.

You know look. I did. There's a kind of like the newsroom. Made cable news seem more serious. And then a bunch of people watch the newsroom and now they're playing out their own version of everyone's doing good night and good luck every single fucking night. Like, hello. It's unbelievable. Until Jeff Zucker's new media startup partners with Joe Rogan. Okay. Well, I didn't know until I read Parker's newsletter that Jeff Zucker was instrumental in the rise of Joe Rogan. Fear factor. Fear factor.

Fear factor and The Apprentice. Come on. It all connects. It all connects. All right. Finally, a media scandal that hits very close to home. A few weeks ago on this very podcast, our own John Lovett asked former Obama colleague and current White House press secretary Jen Psaki about how she handles annoyingly dumb questions from Fox News correspondent Peter Doocy, including a recent

attempt to make Biden seem like he doesn't care about crime. Here's how Jen answered. You know, I am not here to work for Peter Doocy or Fox. But I will say that, you know, if you look at how it's portrayed and how my answers are portrayed, even when I say, no, we don't think crime is good. And here's all the things we've done, including the thing that makes I think makes Republicans crazy, just anecdotally by the hate hate tweets I get on Twitter when I say this, is that they voted against funding for local cops programs because the American rescue plan also that Biden has supported $300 billion more in funding. And at the same time, he also thinks we need police reform. It's like, they don't know what to do with that. But every time we say that it makes them crazy. I, you know, I think it speaks to, if you look at Fox on a daily basis, I mean, do you remember the four boxes that you had that we had on all the TVs, right, which is on my TV right now. So right now, just to give you a sense, so CNN, Pentagon, as many as 8500 US troops on heightened alert. Okay, true. Same on MSNBC, CNBC is doing their own thing about the market. And then on Fox is Janine Pirro talking about soft on crime consequences. I mean,

what does that even mean? Right. So there's an alternate universe on some coverage. What's scary about it is a lot of people watch that and they think that the president isn't doing anything to address people's safety in New York. And that couldn't be farther than the truth for other places. And here's just a small taste of what Fox did to that answer over the last week. Jen Psaki laughed about, quote, soft on crime policies and said those are in an alternate universe. Well, Jen, we're not in an alternate universe, you are. Jen, are you so locked up in your ivory tower that you have no idea what Americans really care about and what they're concerned about.

That's Jen Psaki's position. You'd have to be delusional to think crime was a problem in this country. Now you see Peppermint Patty dismissing crime because, well, she hates the messenger too. Lovett, what do you have to say for yourself? Talk about navel gazing. We decided to really end with this. I had no idea that this interview had blown up so much because i'm in my own information bubble same well all of it's a leading we're on tucker run we're on the five amazing you made the five we made the five it's just amazing that jen's whole point in the answer

well she started by talking about how crime is a real issue like yeah like she they they took her they didn't just take her out of context. They made her make the opposite point of what she was trying to make. You know, it speaks to something that ties all these conversations together, which is all across our media, there are crafty, innovative people

trying to find ways to make money, taking advantage of the mistrust people feel and very, very few people making money by trying to rebuild that trust. Lots of people talking about the trust issues, not a lot of money in it right now, but then there's a lot of people trying to figure out ways to kind of like, how can we exploit the fact that they assume that the Democrats are soft on crime? How can we exploit the fact that they're never going to listen to the actual episodes so we can just take this out? How can we exploit the fact that they assume that the democrats are soft on crime how can we exploit the fact that they're never going to listen to the actual episode so we can just take this out how can we exploit the fact that they don't trust cnn or don't trust the new york times when we talk about covet how can we take advantage of this um end of thought i mean if you're jenner

the white house like how do you handle shit like this well what do you do you go fact check it and then you you know the the washington post fact checked it great how many people saw the fact check yeah yeah i just it's it's what they do I remember there was a documentary about Fox years ago and they talked about how for years at every morning meeting there was like the Jesse Jackson portion of the morning meeting like what do we got on him today we got to beat up on Jesse today what are we doing like this is like just what Fox News does. They're going to find something to whip. Yeah. Right?

And that's also an example of just like the playing field here is not level. And I'm not just talking about the playing field between conservative media and progressive media. It's conservative media versus progressive media and mainstream media. And dare I say it's a for-profit media versus non-profit media i know i'm biased but well and like exactly especially if you're non-profit media like you don't have the resources to fight that yeah and you know and on our side we have a lot of uh liberal millionaires and billionaires who will donate money to all kinds of causes except for you know actually kind of create a progressive media infrastructure well because they are they're they're cosmopolitan moderates right they just they find trump they

find it distasteful uh they're you know they they're pro-gay they're uh pro-women's rights but when push comes to shove that's not where their heart is in here's the other thing i would say about this too which is i think a lot of times Democrats get into these intrademocratic arguments because Democrats, you know, you argue with people who argue back in good faith. You tend to pick your fights with people who are willing to kind of come back at you. And there have been multiple news cycles about who's responsible for our messaging problem? Who's responsible for our losses in this election? Is it the progressives?

Is it the moderates? Was Terry McAuliffe lose because he was a Clintonite? Or was it the schools? There was nothing wrong with what Jen Psaki said on the show. There was nothing even remotely distasteful about it. Nothing whatsoever. She didn't screw up. She didn't make a gaffe.

She didn't make a mistake. She didn't tell me to go kickboxing. screw up she'd make a gaffe she'd make a mistake there was nothing she didn't tell me to go kick boxing and yet and yet for a day and yet for a day it was exploited to drive home the message that democrats are soft on crime and democrats want to abolish the police because it's a political operation because fox news is a political operation and the problem is the problem it's not what some random activist says about crime it It's not what it's not Jen Psaki, not exercising messages, discipline. She was she's incredibly disciplined. It's not the it's not the disputes within the Democratic Party on policy, which gets

nowhere near what happens on Fox. There is a giant corporate backed machine designed to make Democrats look evil, feckless and stupid. And we do not have the equivalent on our side, half the media says Washington is fucked. The other half says Democrats are fucked. And we wonder why we can't win elections. The problem is the problem. Yeah. Yeah. They don't. Well, also they're all shameless there, right? So if you're running a very well-tuned political machine, political operation, and you are shameless

and you don't mind just driving home the same message every day. That's how people have won campaigns forever. Fox News has been running a campaign ever since they've been around. You bet. And that's how they do it right there. It's not like magic.

All you have to do is be shameless and repeat the same message. Every day they have their morning meeting and then you march down into the mausoleum and you get your orders from Roger Ailes' fucking head. And that that's that you think his head's there yeah i think he's calling the shots on that note the only thing that i can take away from this whole conversation is that the way to fight back against all of this is to go stream india re that's right repeat

on spotify for the rest of the week there's's only one hero in this entire conversation. India Hari. It's India Hari. We love her. And I also... She's not the average girl from your video. That's a legend of her songs. Wasn't there a moment

of poignancy when she said she was surprised by the attention she had gotten for sharing this information? It was like, how dare we as it make her feel that way?

Yeah. India deserves nothing but flowers, nothing but streams. Thank you, India. And thank you, Sam Sanders, for joining us today. It's so great to be here. A wonderful conversation.

Come back anytime. Thank you. Support your nonprofit newsroom of your choosing, listeners. Love that. Yeah, we're sort of progressive, sustainable media companies trying their fucking best. All right, music, play us out. Oh, wow, it's a 501c3. All right, music, play us out.

Oh, wow, it's a 501c3. Hot Save America is a Crooked Media production. The executive producer is Michael Martinez. Our senior producer is Andy Gardner-Bernstein. Our producer is Haley Muse, and Olivia Martinez is our associate producer. It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle Seglin is our sound engineer. Thanks to Tanya Sominator, Sandy Gerrard, Hallie Kiefer, Madison Holman, and Justine Howe for production support.

And to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Phoebe Bradford, Milo Kim, and Amelia Montuth. Our episodes are uploaded as videos at youtube.com slash crooked media. In the 1970s, a young group of violent revolutionaries joined forces to create the Weather Underground Organization, a group of radicals who brawled with police officers and bombed the Pentagon, all in the name of ending racism. Hi, I'm Zayd Ayers-Dorn, host of Crooked Media's new podcast, Mother Country Radicals, host of Crooked Media's new podcast, Mother Country Radicals, which dives into the true story of how my parents and their friends went from peace-loving activists to topping the FBI's most wanted list. New episodes of Mother Country Radicals are out every Thursday. Listen and subscribe wherever you get podcasts.