The Bulwark Podcast - Edward Luce: Why Big Business Is Caving to Trump

Episode Date: January 26, 2024

Tax cuts and a gutted regulatory state are a big draw for Wall Street. But under a Trump 2.0, it would be the aspiring monopolists—not the publicly-traded "corporatists"—who would be the winners. Democracy isn't the only thing on the line. Ed Luce joins Charlie Sykes for the weekend pod. show notes: https://www.ft.com/content/8fbf3a47-f622-46cc-ac06-17732cecc313 

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October is the season for wearing masks and costumes, but some of us feel like we wear a mask and hide more often than we want to. At work, in social settings, around our family. Therapy can help you learn to accept all parts of yourself, so you can stop hiding and take off the mask. Because masks should be for Halloween fun, not for your emotions. Whether you're navigating workplace stresses, complex relationships, or family dynamics, therapy is a great tool for facing your fears and finding

a way to overcome them. If you're thinking of starting therapy but you're afraid of what you might uncover, give BetterHelp a try. It's entirely online, designed to be convenient, flexible, and suited to your schedule. Just fill out a brief questionnaire to get matched with a licensed therapist, and switch therapists at any time for no additional charge. Take off the mask with BetterHelp. Visit BetterHelp.com today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P, dot com. Welcome to the Bulwark Podcast. I'm Charlie Sykes. One of the most interesting pieces that I read this week was in the Financial Times with a headline, Wall Street's Bargain with Trump. And again, this is in the Financial Times and it begins with this paragraph. The Financial Times, same publication, had only nice things to say about Benito Mussolini in a June 1933 supplement entitled

The Renaissance of Italy, Fascism, Gift of Order and Progress. Trains were running on time, investment was humming, and friction between capital and labor was a thing of the past. The country had been remodeled rather than remade under the vigorous architecture of its illustrious Prime Minister, Signor Mussolini, wrote the FT's special correspondent. And that was written by FT's Financial Times U.S. National Editor and columnist at the Financial Times, Ed Luce. Ed, welcome to the podcast. Charlie, it's a delight to be with you. Don't any of your editors say, really, hey, thank you, Ed, for reminding us of our history. It was ominous silence from my editors. Nobody objected to me including that,

but it wasn't the most glorious chapter of the Financial Times, the prism through which we see the world. Let's put it that way. Well, you connect the dots to say that what's happening right now is also a reminder that it is incredibly naive to assume that the titans of business are going to be bulwarks of democracy. I mean, this was, I think, one of the fondest fantasies of the resistance for some time was that the financial elites that Wall Street would, in our moment of peril, would mount the barricades to defend democracy and our culture. And that was always naive, wasn't it, Ed, to think that when push came to shove, people like Jamie Diamond

would stand shoulder to shoulder with the defenders of the constitutional order? Or was it naive? I think it was naive. I mean, I think we've had a larger sort of way of looking at the world since the end of the Cold War, which is that democracy and capitalism go hand in hand. And I think, you know, that was always rather a fond notion. But it's clear that from history, capitalism doesn't need democracy. Democracy does need capitalism, but it doesn't work both ways. Explain that, because that's an interesting thing. So why does it work that way? So democracy needs capitalism because capitalism, in most of its functioning forms,

involves a dispersal of power, not a concentration of power, not a concentration of ownership. And that's what democracy is about. It's about navigating disputes between different centers of power and interest groups. Democracy and socialism don't really work together because that involves the ownership of the commanding resources of the economy and therefore gives rise to monopoly of political power as well, which leads to autocracy. So democracy does need capitalism. Capitalism, you know, as we've seen in many different countries and many different political systems, does not need democracy. It does need a degree of stability, for example, what Singapore has provided, or what the United Arab Emirates and arguably, you know, to the extent it's become a

capitalist economy that China has provided. Capital doesn't need democracy in order to grow, to thrive, to have great returns on capital. I think it's hard for us because we've had it so drilled in that they both need each other equally. It's hard for us to understand that that's just not the case. So for about five minutes after January 6th, it did seem as if the titans of industry had discovered this kind of a moral democratic compass. You had the U.S. Chamber of Commerce saying that they were not going to give any more money, they were going to cut off any money to election deniers, to any members of Congress that voted against certifying Joe Biden's election. You know, Jamie Dimon from J.P. Morgan very clearly said, you know, was talking about the peaceful transfer of power, said this is not who we are. This is not what America is. I mean, there were a lot of full page ads and a lot of, you know, heavy breathing about, you know, we're going to stand against this sort of thing. And then fast forward, the Chamber of Commerce has dropped that ban, right? The cash is flowing again to election denialists. That was then. They're more worried about, you know, regulation

of business. And then there's Jamie Dimon, who got a lot of attention for his comments in Davos. Let's talk about that because he's an outsized figure and essentially implying that, you know, business is business. If the constitutional order is trashed, that's maybe collateral damage. I can live with both. So just talk to me about the evolution of Jamie Diamond and what that means, what that tells you. It's a very, very significant evolution. As you say, he was one of the first out of the starting blocks to condemn the storming of capital, the attempt to overthrow the constitutional order, as were the Chamber of Commerce, as were many businesses. The boycott of raising money for those 147 Republican lawmakers who'd voted not to certify the Electoral College result lasted really barely 10 weeks. 10 weeks, really? It was about 10 weeks. So it was an

extraordinary fast turnaround, mirrored, of course, by the turnaround of Kevin McCarthy and Mitch McConnell. I mean, to a much greater extent, Kevin McCarthy. They were absolutely clear that this is a repulsive behavior. Three weeks later, Kevin McCarthy's gone to Mar-a-Lago. So I think from that, you know, the point of view of Jamie Diamond, you know, who's such an outsized and important figure in American business. What we have now is permission to support Trump. I wasn't in Davos this time, but my colleagues were there. And he was the one, Jamie Darman on CNBC was the one who went on the record to say, look, Biden, Trump, you know, we'll accommodate to either. We're just here to do business. But there were dozens and dozens of American chief executives saying the same thing to my

colleagues on the ski slopes and, you know, in the various cocktail functions, that it's going to be fine. His bark is worse than his bite. And I think the reading I take from this is not necessarily that they all want Trump to come back in, although some do. And I think in the banking sector, there are very clear, very specific things that they think Trump would do, like lower the capital adequacy ratio that Biden won't do, as in a direct impact on the cost of capital, then there are others who wouldn't want Trump. But think, I think have somehow persuaded themselves that his train is now inevitable, and you've got to get on board it, or he'll run you over. Okay, so there's a lot of things going on there. So let's play Jamie Dimon. This is he's talking

with Andrew Ross-Rokin, who asked him, I want to break down the nuance of what Dimon is saying or what he's trying to say here. So let's just play the soundbite. I'm curious when you just look at the candidates from as a CEO of a multinational global business, what you think would be better for the business? Yeah. Remember when I gave opinions in the UK, I got nasty letter emails from all the people in the U.K. like leave, get out of here, Yankee, who would have you right? I have to be prepared for both. I will be prepared for both. We will deal with both. My company will survive and thrive in both.

You know, I hope the country survives in both. And I hope whoever it is is respectful of other people. You know, and it's not about retribution. It's about growing your economy, helping people. And, you know, if you talk about America first, I always say, you know, no president's going to run for president and say, America second. Well, there's a lot more there, but okay. I'm not trying to defend him in any way, but he was asked, how do you do with this as a business? I mean, this is why he's paid the big bucks, right? Isn't Jamie Dimon paid the big bucks to hedge against various

alternatives, basically saying, hey, I'm going to keep running my business, whatever happens, my business is going to be okay. Isn't that what you'd expect from a business executive, or do you hear something else? No, I would expect that from a business executive, narrowly defined, and even somewhat medium defined, his fiduciary duty is to his owners, to his shareholders, and they have to prepare for all eventualities and alienating the potential next president, even if he's an aspiring autocrat, could be fatal, given the methods of that potential next president of Trump could be fatal or at least hugely damaging to your company. So I've no doubt that that's the motivation for this, is a form of hedging

and a form of self-protection that Jamie Dimon's taking. But the effect of it is, as I say, to give a green light to the normalization of Trump. The odd thing about all this is in 2016, he wasn't prepared. You know, there wasn't a plan. And the reason why I strongly resisted anybody describing Trump as fascist is because fascists have plans to take over the organs of the state, particularly the military and law enforcement organs of the state. Trump didn't have any such plans. He was chaotic. Now he has such plans and he has the personnel to implement such plans. And if you look at the details of Project 2025, the Heritage Organized document, which is very detailed, there's 900 pages, their first publication, and it really is worth reading. There are plans,

there are people, there are rationales, there are laws, draft laws drawn up. In your piece, you go through the way that they're rationalizing this, and obviously the most obvious is they think that Trump will be better for their business than Biden because of specific policies. They really, really like the idea of the tax cuts. They're willing to tolerate tariffs, maybe even a little bit of a trade war, because nothing is as important to them as tax cuts. The oil and gas industry figures, they will make more money. The real estate industry, bankers, all of those things. But let's go to the heart of this. And this is where there's a little bit of ambiguity. They're saying his bark is worse than his bite, but they are worried.

It's very clear that they know that he's promising a campaign of retribution. They also live in a world with this vast network of regulations. And you mentioned the Heritage 2025, where he's talking about taking basically direct control of a lot of these independent agencies that have been insulated from politics. So you're talking about the FCC, you're talking about the FTC, you're talking about the IRS, you're talking about the SEC, you're talking about all of these agencies that have tremendous power and influence over corporations. So I'm trying to balance out the naivete that, hey, we can handle this guy. It's not going to be that bad versus, don't screw with this guy, because if he does half of what he's saying, he could stomp on our faces. Where do you think they fall into the fear? What I wrote this morning was they are afraid, but perhaps not as afraid as they ought to be. So where do you come down on that continuum? I think it's a very good question.

And a lot depends on which businesses you're talking about. Because, I mean, you mentioned the carbon emitting industries. Clearly, Trump would be very good news for them. And it's something I suspect the Trump presidency is actively desired by the anti-ESG sector of the American economy, I suspect the defense industrial complex is fairly happy, and certainly Wall Street would be, and private equity would be, because of the tax cuts and the hollowing out of the regulatory of the administrative state that he's promised and that will be executed. I have no doubt about that.

The plans now are very, very sophisticated, not moronic at all. I mean, if I have a criticism of the left in this country, to continue to dismiss Trumpism and the forces, you know, that are now organizing it as moronic is to do a grave disservice. There's a lot of thought and planning going into this. There are clearly regulatory reasons why tons of industries across America dislike Biden. And if you look at Suzanne Clark, the president of the US Chamber of Commerce, if you look at her public utterances, and I know Suzanne, this is no personal criticism of her. I understand she's representing her members. But if you look at her public utterances, the word democracy and constitution doesn't appear.

What does appear again and again is Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission. The idea that these two agencies in particular under Biden are seeking to prevent monopoly, to break up monopolies or oligopolies. The concentrations of economic power in the American economy is clearly something that's exercising her members. And Trump wouldn't just, you know, stop those agencies from doing it. He would gut some of them, like the Consumer Finance One and like the FTC, he would gut them. And, you know, the Schedule F plans to fire disloyal civil servants. This has radical potential for businesses that want to be freed of, you know, any regulatory restraint and the impact that that has on their bottom line. So I do make a larger point here. It's not just about democracy versus the strongman that's on the ballot in November, which it undoubtedly is.

This is also about capitalism versus capitalists. Capitalism is a system, and it's a system that requires competition and requires fair competition. It requires transparency of rules, the sanctity of the contract, and a state that can keep a level playing field. That means robust courts to uphold those contracts and clear and fairly applied regulations. Hopefully not too complicated, but fairly applied. What Trump represents is the monopolists and the aspiring monopolists, not the system of capitalism. It's the capitalists, it's certain members. Who are the monopolists? You're not talking about small businessmen, you're talking about these large corporations that can eat up competition if they don't have the federal government

regulations to worry about? Yes. So I say aspiring monopolists, because I mean, there are very few areas where there's one in the American economy, where there's one single company. There has been a great concentration of winnowing out of competition in most sectors, in airlines, in hotels, in insurance, in car rentals. I mean, you name it, there's just far fewer competitors today than there were 15, 20 years ago. The incumbents are the ones that are more likely to like Trump. They're more visible. They're therefore more vulnerable. So, you know, JP Morgan is an example. You can elevate your everyday wellness with the number one meal kit for clean eating and discover new gut friendly recipes each week.

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also saying, you know, you also want to get on board because if you're not on board early, you're not going to be at the table. You're not going to be in the room. You might be cast into outer darkness and you might get you might get shat upon. We've seen a willingness on the part of Republicans like Ron DeSantis, as well as Trump, despite the alliance between corporate America and the Republican Party, to go after corporations, to use the power of government to retaliate and hurt companies or individuals that take the wrong political stand or that criticize them.

And they must have a sense of vulnerability. Now, they may say publicly that his bark is worse than his bite, but the bite could be very considerable for all these industries, right? I mean, if Donald Trump sits down and says, you know, I want to screw JP Morgan. How can I do this? I want to screw this company. I want to screw Southern Power. I want to screw Southern power. I can do so many things. And right now they're all saying, why risk it, right? I mean,

might as well go along. And if you look at, you know, the arguments that Trump's lawyers are making in his various criminal trials, which is, as president, I have total immunity from anything I do, you know, up to including killing people. And they have made that argument extraordinarily. Yeah. Well, you can imagine with all the sort of draft executive orders being drawn up by Project 2025, just what presidential powers they will discover, inherent in unitary executive powers, to target businesses that are perceived as being disloyal.

Disney, of course, you know, is the canary in the coal mine in Florida with the Santas' actions there. Publicly listed companies that have HR departments that follow the DEI agenda, ones that follow ESG, you know, pro sort of green, clean energy financing, investment principles, there are sort of obvious ones there that really cater to the base, and that have clear winners and clear losers picked by the executive branch by the president. And that's, that's not a sort of fantasy. That's not yelling, the fascists are coming. This is something that Trump talks about. They're doing, they're planning. And what a radical departure from what, you know, small government pro-business Republicans used to claim that they cared about, which was, we don't want the government to tell the private sector what to do.

That's the private sector. This is private property. And there's been an inversion. So how do these business executives process this weird cognitive dissonance between the sort of anti-corporate populist rhetoric that you get from some on the right and this kind of wink-wink pro-corporate, you know, pro-capitalist policies that they're desperately hoping for? I mean, it does seem like they're in tension with one another. That's a very good question. The term I would sort of prefer to use, and this is where, you know, what we started with, the democracy and capitalism, do they go hand in hand or not question, is key, is patronage capitalism, clientelistic capitalism.

Let's take an example. We have a real-time example in Hungary today, the star pupil of CPAC. Viktor Orban really is the hero of CPAC. He is Tucker Carlson's… And of Donald Trump. And of Donald Trump. And of Donald Trump. And it's overt, you know, we want to have that kind of capitalism. Well, there are a lot of rich people around Viktor Orban, some of whom he's made rich. There's a lot of people he's made poor.

A lot of former businesses, particularly sort of in media, in areas that did have some political impact, who've just been banished, who've had tax audits, who've had all government advertising withdrawn. There are sort of instruments that Orbán has used to mold a capitalist sort of circle of very, very rich people who are essentially his arm in the private sector. Now, it's a much easier thing to do in a country of 8 million people, like Hungary, than in a continent, really, of 330 million people, like the United States. But the process will, I have no doubt, get underway.

I mean, your sort of second point, the tension between his anti-corporatist rhetoric. You know, Haley is the corporate candidate, right? Yes, right. Corporate in Trump's language. Corporatism, I think to him, is a signifier to the base of politically correct, publicly listed companies.

It's a certain kind of corporate. Like globalist. The globalists. The big privately owned companies who are very, very pro-Trump. There is a real difference there between privately held companies, the big family ones, and publicly listed ones, which have much, much more complicated constituencies. The politically correct ones, the corporate ones, are the sort of Fortune 100, the listed ones. They're in a quandary.

I'm not pretending it's easy for them to hedge against Trump 2.0. It's a genuine quandary. the right was about, you know, free markets, you know, free enterprise, and the small businessman and the small business was, you know, the backbone of the country. And yet you fast forward to today, and you not only see, you know, these vast disparities in wealth, but you also see the concentration of power. You know, you've referred to the monopolist, but we also we have these oligarchs, the billionaires who wield tremendous power, both in the private sector and increasingly in the culture and in government. So can you talk to me about how concerned we ought to be about this? I mean, authoritarianism in the federal government is obviously a real imminent threat, but we're already living in a society that would have been somewhat dystopian, I think,

for the founders because of the concentration of power in the hands and the increased concentration of the power in the hands of oligarchs. I mean, we really are in many ways an oligarchy already, aren't we, Ed, or is that too doom and gloom? No, America's been oligarchizing for quite a while. The Reaganite idea and, you know, in some history of democratic administrations idea of of supporting small businesses making it easy to have a startup and rewarding people for initiative that's just completely absent from trump's vision of capitalism it much as he likes sort of in the political world strong men big men like xi jinping and putin and all that yeah he has the same instincts in the business world he likes super rich people and because he envies them right

and so there is nothing either sentimental or philosophical in trump about startup about small business creation that's just not in his vision and it's not in the sort of the new right policies they're drawing up for him. That just doesn't feature. And it's a glaring absence because this is America. You know, I think that the argument I use to the Jamie Diamonds and others who might get even fatter, well, probably almost certainly will get even fatter bottom lines and returns probably, almost certainly, we'll get even fatter bottom lines and returns in the short term from Trump, is that look at where the oligarchs are strongest in Russia. No matter how rich you are, you are utterly powerless when it's ultimately an autocracy. He can do anything to you. You could be worth 40 billion.

It is no defense. Once the system is gone, even you are vulnerable with all your jets and your private armies. Even you are completely defenseless. And that's, you know, obviously too dramatic an argument. It just couldn't happen here. And therefore, it doesn't have much effect. Yeah, there's a certain arrogance that, you know, it can't happen to me. I am too big. I can control this. We've seen this before in history. This is an ad by BetterHelp Online Therapy. October is the season for wearing masks and costumes. But some of us feel like we wear a mask and hide more often than we want to, at work, in social settings, around our family. Therapy can help you learn to accept all parts of yourself so you can stop hiding and take off the mask. Because masks should be for Halloween

fun, not for your emotions. Therapy is a great tool for facing your fears and finding ways to overcome them. If you're thinking of starting therapy but you're afraid of what you might uncover, give BetterHelp a try. It's entirely online, designed to be convenient, flexible, and suited to your schedule. Just fill out a brief questionnaire to get matched with a licensed therapist and switch therapists at any time for no additional charge. Take off the mask with Better Help. Visit betterhelp.com today to get 10% off your first month. That's betterhelp.com. Okay, so neither you or I are in the business of being political consultants, but how do the Democrats and Joe Biden counter this? Now, you know, one of the real paradoxes, I think of,

you know, 2016 on was watching a lot of voters saying, hey, I like what that Bernie Sanders is thinking. But then they turn and they vote for Donald Trump, where you have working class populists who are going along with this monopolist ideology. Is there room for a populism that is, you know, the counter populism to what Donald Trump is offering that actually says to working class voters, guys, you understand who he's really working for here. Because Donald Trump has been very, very effective in saying, I am your voice, I am for the little guy while he's shoving all these goodies to the Jamie Dimons of the world. It does seem like this is a puzzle that the Democrats haven't cracked yet. I think it's a really important question. I start with the premise that what you and I and

people in places like DC are so steeped and versed in, which is the constitutional threat, the threat to the US Republic, it just doesn't resonate very much with most voters. It will resonate with more as 2024 goes on and hopefully as the trials get reported, but it's still not going to be. If you look at the sort of top voter priorities, it's not that high up there. What does resonate is economic populism. Economic populism does resonate. And that was the sort of blow up the system appeal of Bernie and why you could switch to the other blow up the system of Trump. If you think the system is rigged against people like me, you're looking for someone who says that even if they have completely opposite approaches, because the system does feel

rigged to the average working class, middle class person here in my home state of Wisconsin. You say, you know, is it rigged or is it fair? Overwhelmingly rigged. So the question is, which way do you go? And it's a reasonable sense of helplessness that a lot of people feel. If you look at the cost of education, the price of admission to the top jobs in the economy is prohibitively high. You know, unless you're lucky enough to get a scholarship, you know, which is a one in 100 to the top institute, to the Ivy Leagues, that's understandable. So Biden, I think, and the democratic establishment implying that meritocracy is alive and well and fair, you know, it begs you to blow them up. It really does. I think there's got to be a much, much more candid, maybe Bernie Sanders-esque admission that this system is, it might not be consciously rigged, but it comes across as rigged. And it requires radical action to make America a land of equal opportunity again, not equal outcomes.

We don't need a socialist message here, but equal opportunity. And that involves capitalism working for the people. And that involves, you know, breaking up big monopolies who are, you know, overcharging you and squeezing the people they employ. You know, I think there's a lot of populism in saying, look, if you work for an Amazon fulfillment center and you've got to get permission for bathroom breaks, that you deserve to have representation. So more of that, I think, would be very effective.

I mean, Obamacare has never been more popular. The rate of uninsured Americans has never been lower. And Trump is promising to repeal it with no credible plan to replace it. The Medicare prescription caps that Biden passed last year, why aren't we hearing more about that? This affects tens of millions of Americans. $35 insulin is a major change in many people's financial circumstances. I would like to see a much more coherent rolling out of what he's done and is going to do and what Trump would mean for those kinds of gains. So did you read Matt Iglesias' newsletter on that question of why do we not know more about the Medicare changes and everything? I thought he had a really interesting point. He says, you know, part of this is the problem is that, you know,

journalism is dominated by, you know, young, highly educated reporters and editors who care much more about issues like student loans, student debt, than they do care about things like Medicare. So you got this vast world out there, where people of a certain age are benefiting tremendously, and nobody hears about it, because the people who decide what's news are generally like, well, they're in their 30s, or maybe their early 40s, or in their 20s. And this is invisible to them. I thought that was really insightful. So you had a piece about Biden and, you know, you wrote, you know, Biden's always aimed for this transactional space where, you know, consensus can be achieved, you know, and, you know, he's gotten shots from the left about that.

But again, you know, his strength has been when a bargain's needed, Biden is there to do it, you know, and his vice president, you know, he famously averted a debt default. People forget that. So he has struck probably as many bipartisan deals as any Democratic president that I can remember, much better than Obama. But now you wrote the party's on tenterhooks for a physical stumble or a gaffe that would cement the skepticism about his age. So tell me what your thoughts are about what Biden needs to do. And Biden thinks that the challenge is one thing. But now in 2024, we're finding out it's a completely different ballgame. Bad analogy, but there is no COVID.

You know, he's got to get out there physically on the stump. And of course, you know, hearts will be in mouths for the physical frailty. I mean, there is a sort of mirror image here. I think the cognitive decline is Trump's. And it's interesting that Nikki Haley is finally really calling this out of all the people. You know, I didn't think it was going to be her. She's the one calling him out for all the cognitive decline there. A little belatedly, but I'm glad she's doing it. But I think what people react to is physical frailty. And Trump, of course, looks robust. He's got that sort of animalistic

magnetism. And Biden does look more frail. And he is, you know, he's getting older. Right. So they're going to have to deploy a lot of surrogates. I think that if Biden can focus on the four or five really key Midwestern swing states, plus perhaps Arizona and Georgia, although Georgia might be a bit maybe beyond reach, but and be very, very clear. You know, the UAW endorsement is to be expected at one level of Biden this week. Sean Fain's, you know, very clear speech as to why Trump is anti-worker and why Biden is pro-worker and why this is a united, diverse working class.

That kind of rhetoric, I think, will be heard by the Hispanic blue collar vote that's been drifting to Trump and the sort of African American male that's been drifted. It's absolutely critical to win them back. There hasn't been any change in white support for Biden. This is what's quite remarkable. The change here is in blue collar non-whites. He's got to win those back. And I hope more attention will be paid than that I'm seeing right now. Let's talk about the economy because, you know, that narrative seems to be shifting

rather significantly now. All of the negative vibes of the past year and now the numbers seem to be lining up. You know, you have the Dow around thirty eight thousand. You have the jobs numbers continuing strong. GDP continues strong. Most important, you have the consumer confidence level coming up. You wrote that on the economy, Biden's best bet is with the Fed, since obviously he's not going to be able to get any economic policies passed through Congress. What can the Fed do to either help or hurt Joe Biden at this point? So the last Fed meeting, they signaled that around about April, the next but one FOMC, the Fed would be ready to start easing interest rates, to cut cutting interest rates.

I think we've had a slight red herring debate on inflation because inflation doesn't include interest rates. That's not part of the measure of inflation. But most people's experience of sticker shock is the monthly mortgage they're paying or the auto loan they're paying. If your auto loan goes up from two years ago, $600 a month to $950 a month with the same car, that's inflation in your view. It might not technically be measured as inflation. So the single most disinflationary thing that could happen is a sharp cut in interest rates. And if we could get 1.5, 2 percentage points lower in the Fed prime rate by September, then you're in time for that to feed into a feel good sentiment amongst voters that I think could be very, very significant. It could even be

decisive. Okay, so let's talk about this really extraordinary moment when right now, for a while, it looked like, you know, an immigration deal was actually likely that they were going to come up with this sort of grand bargain involving the border and Ukraine. Donald Trump steps in and basically blows it up or is trying to blow it up, dividing Republicans. I mean, this is really quite a scene on Capitol Hill that you're getting, that it used to be that Republicans, you that Republicans were kind of united on the border. Now there's the big question, are Republicans rather nakedly going to basically say, we think the border is a crisis, we think it's an existential threat, but we are consciously not going to do anything about it because we don't want to help

Joe Biden. That seems kind of breathtakingly cynical. How do you see that playing out? Because I mean, the real politique is like, hey, we'd rather have the issue than solve the problem. And, you know, historically, we've seen sometimes that works. Is there any reason to think this will play differently in 2024? I mean, the double standards here are breathtaking. I mean, you know, Greg Abbott in Texas saying we had to take this Lone Star operation. We had to take these urgent measures without delay because this is an emergency. This is a crisis. And now all of a sudden the message is, no, no, no, we can wait a year.

So, I mean, there's the dissonance there. Mitch McConnell, of course, has based his career as Senate Republican leader on the thesis that when Washington doesn't work, Democrats get blamed. Not just when there's an incumbent Democrat in the White House, as there is now, but more generally, because they're the party of government. So is he right about that? Is that correct? I mean, I think, unfortunately, on the evidence to date, he's more right than wrong. I don't think he's 100% right. But I think this does sort of go back to what can Biden do. And I think at some point, he has to sort of resist his, we can all be reasonable and meet in the middle sentiment about Congress and go to the country and do a do nothing Congress appeal and say, I have this border bill and they don't want to pass it.

So they won't take yes for an answer. And this has got to be drummed in again and again and again, because we forget most people aren't paying attention to anything like the degree you or I would be. It has to be drummed in. So you're talking Harry Truman, 1948, running against the do-nothing Congress, which did in fact work. But I mean, to your point, I do think that one of my criticisms of the Biden White House is they do seem to feel that if you say something once, you've said it, as opposed to you need to say it over and over and over and over again. Trump, for all of his flaws, understands the marketing, right? You keep doing it again and again and again. Okay, one last question. I'm trying to stay away from the horse race politics, but one of the things that I've written several times, very critical of the way Nikki Haley is flipped back and forth. And I said, you know, she's not

the one we've been waiting for. And yet you and I are, you know, speaking a few days after the New Hampshire primary, she is still in the race. And she seems to be kind of, I don't know, finding a little bit of a little bit of rhythm. I have to admit, I'm I am surprised by Nikki Haley post New Hampshire. I thought that if she didn't win in New Hampshire, she was going to fold. She's going to endorse Donald Trump. Instead, she's going to be kind of relishing it. What are your thoughts about it? I mean, it's like, which Nikki are we going to get any given day?

I mean, if we would have seen this Nikki six months ago, I'm not saying it would turn out differently, but the campaign would have felt very different, wouldn't it? It would have. And it's a pleasure to watch this belatedly. I mean, Trump's victory speech, you know, was a big mistake. He obviously really provoked her. Yeah. So I kind of think maybe this is wishful thinking. He isn't your ordinary potential nominee, Trump. He's kind of like an incumbent, even though he's not president, because he has been president. The rules, normal rules don't apply.

And so Nikki Haley could perform a sort of Pat Buchanan to Trump's George H.W. Bush role here, or a Ted Kennedy to Jimmy Carter sort of role here by really fatally wounding him. And so although she's not going to get the nomination unless there's a sort of medical event with Trump, she can perform a larger civic role by indulging her sense of fury with Trump. That's the role that I thought that Chris Christie was playing and that could continue to play, why I wanted him to stay in. I didn't see it, Nikki doing it. But you're right when you say that she's gotten under his skin, and she seems to be enjoying it. I mean, the fact that he,

he then sort of rants and raves that anyone who gives money to her now is like excommunicated from MAGA forever. And she's marketing t shirts, you know, like, you know, I don't know what they say, but I mean, she's kind of getting into it. And the way that she goes on and says, look at him, look how unhinged he is, look how he is losing it. It is an interesting moment. There also seems to be, and again, a lot of this is wish casting and I try to avoid this, but there's a certain real sense of desperation on the part of Republicans to get this over that they don't want it there to be a primary. I mean, it's like the fact that they, the RNC is apparently going to actually consider this proposal or was going to consider

a proposal to just declare him the presumptive nominee after, you know, what, 20 delegates or something like that. It's like, okay, what's the rush? It's almost as if he keeps thinking, I have to nail this down before something, something, something happens. I don't know. What do you think? This pesky woman with an Indian name that he keeps trying to sort of revive, which doesn't stick. She's getting under his skin. She's showing the way to Biden and Kamala Harris for the general election. Get under his skin. Get him barking at the moon as much as possible. It won't put off a single MAGA voter. It's not that hard. But there are lots of Republican non-MAGA voters who are quite ambivalent. Get him howling at the moon. See, this is where I think that at some point

we need to stop obsessing about the MA know, the MAGA voters in the, you know, the truck stop in Western Pennsylvania and begin talking about the kinds of voters you're talking about, those soft Republican voters, the independents, the moderates, who in fact are watching him, you know, baying at the moon and going, you know, I'm not wild about Biden, but I really don't want to put that guy back in the White House. Edward Luce is U.S. national editor that guy back in the White House. Edward Luce is U.S. national editor and columnist at the Financial Times. His books include, and I have it right here, The Retreat of Western Liberalism from 2017.

And by the way, Ed was reading me the blurb, scariest blurb on the cover of a book ever from Lauren Summers. Edward Luce provides a terrifying view of the challenges facing the West. We have to hope that his prophecies are self-denying, something that is more likely if his penetrating analysis gets the wide attention it richly deserves. And this was 2017, and it's gotten so much worse since then, hasn't it, Ed? Sadly, but it's not too late. It is not too late. And thank you so much for joining me on the Weekend Bulwark Podcast. I appreciated it very much. It's a great pleasure.

Thanks so much, Charlie. And thank you all for joining us this weekend. I'm Charlie Sykes. We will be back on Monday and we'll do this all over again. Bulwark Podcast is produced by Katie Cooper and engineered and edited by Jason Brown.