The Bulwark Podcast - Michael Steele: The GOP's Humiliation Kink

Episode Date: November 29, 2023

This is the era of political humiliation: From Kevin nursing Trump back to health after Jan 6, to dominatrixes who get paid to mock your political views. Plus, the Koch network is doing it backwards. Michael Steele joins Charlie Sykes.

Welcome to the Bulwark Podcast. We are almost at the end of November 2023. I don't know how we survived this long. I don't know how we're going to get through the next year. So we are joined by my good friend, the former chairman of the Republican National Committee. It's not his fault, Michael Steele. How are you doing, Mr. Chairman? I am great, my friend. How are you doing? I am just hanging in there, living the dream. Could we start with by far the funniest story of the day? Okay. Liz Cheney has a new book coming out next week. I think we're going to have her on the podcast, by the way. It's just chock full of great anecdotes. But my absolute favorite is her story about Kevin McCarthy and his visit to

Mar-a-Lago. You know the one I'm talking about here? She basically says, okay, so Kevin, you went down there to kiss the ring. I mean, WTF, what was that about? And she says that Kevin McCarthy said, well, they called and said that Donald was sad. He was so depressed that he wasn't eating. So they wanted me to come down. So the Kevin McCarthy went down on a mission of mercy. So that Donald Trump, in his grief and his sadness and his loneliness, did not waste away. So I can't get it out of my head, the notion of Kevin McCarthy flying down to Mar-a-Lago and feeding Donald Trump, nursing him back to health. That's the part.

That's the image that I like right there. Sitting by the bedside, a forlorn kind of, you know, disassociated Donald. Open up, Donald. Yeah, right. Open up. Come on. one more. One more. Just one more bite for Uncle Kevin.

Just one more. Oh, how pathetically pathetic. Obviously, it was successful because it didn't take too long for him to get back up to 215 pounds, right? No, it did not. In fact, what is amazing to me, it seems like he didn't waste away the 215 either. No, but he could have if Kevin hadn't gone down. Okay, so we have a lot of other things to talk about today, including the Koch network deciding that it is going to get involved in the primary. There's endorsing Nikki Haley. We'll talk about whether there's any sort of Nikki Haley momentum.

Donald Trump continues on a daily basis to throw out some sort of weirdness. I guess now he is threatening to use the government power to go after MSNBC, which is like, feels like same old, same old. We have a new twist on the Mike Pence story. Okay. The Mike Pence story, Mike Pence apparently saying that he had at one point decided that he was not going to preside over the county of the electoral votes on january 6th which which is really quite an interesting development his son who's a marine apparently talked him into doing it we have talked in the past about you know what a close call things were you know the contingency of history yeah things might have gone very differently on January 6th if Mike Pence had said,

yeah, I got this thing. I can't make it. Let's have Charles Grassley preside over this because what could possibly go wrong? And Chuck, you can handle it, right? I mean, I'm just going to be down the street, you know, just let me know if there are any issues. That's how thin the line was between insurrection and democracy. And the attempt at insurrection, I think, foretold a lot about what we would later see, obviously. But it is fascinating now to sort of step back and go, imagine what could have been had Pence just been a little bit more MAGA and decided that his interesting relationship with Donald Trump was worth preserving more than the country. I think we'd be in a very different space right now. And there would probably, with very little exaggeration, be tanks on the street and, you know, the country roiling and all kinds of stuff right now. Well, we may have that to look forward to. Let's not get ahead

of ourselves, right? I mean, we may have the tanks in the street. Okay, I have to admit, Michael, I'm a little distracted this morning as I was preparing to do this and going through all of the serious issues, you know, crane and Israel and the expulsion of George Santos, which is also a rather entertaining story. I opened up my edition of the Washington Post and started reading this story, which I have to tell you, Michael, I don't know whether you've had a chance to read it. It is extraordinary on several levels, not the least of which is that it is in the Washington Post. I want to do this in case you think, Charlie, you are cruising some bizarre corner of the internet and why are you interrupting your podcast to talk about this? This is the story. And I don't know, by the way, I'd be interested to talk to the reporter about how she stumbled on this story. Right. Here's the headline. In the world of sexual fetishes, crossing the political aisle is a kink.

And it has a note to readers, which I should share with listeners of the podcast. Because of the sensitive, highly personal nature of sexual fetishes, several subjects use their stage names or fetish site usernames to speak candidly about the subject. The Washington Post has independently verified all of their identities. And it starts off with a story of a woman who goes by the name of Roxy Ray, of course. Lying on her pink bedspread, her, bear with me here, her bleach blonde hair draped on her black teddy, other details about her body. She turns her backside to the camera and purrs, hmm, that looks like just the view to persuade you to vote Republican for Daddy Trump. We both know you don't know what it's like to be an alpha. You're just a beta, obeying, doingying doing everything i say pretty soon you'll be preaching

and posting the republican way all over your social media the best part is you'll really believe in it this apparently this video is one of dozens on okay you can look it up in the washington post i'm not going to name it an adult video sharing website whose content creators cater to all kinds of sexual fetishes including one that is rarely discussed outside of niche kink circles, political humiliation. See, Michael, it feels like it was always going to come to this point. Of course it was. Where there was so much political humiliation that, of course,

it would become a political. People would go on and say, yes, yes yes make me vote for daddy make me vote for daddy trump yes i'm a beta oh i know i know okay there are people okay for people who get turned there are people who get turned on by the idea of having their political views mocked usually but not always by members of the opposing political group. Liberals desire being dominated by conservatives and called pejoratives that imply they are weak and unintelligent, while conservatives want to be mocked for supporting former President Donald Trump, among other perceived transgressions, according to those who participate in this subculture.

So there's at least, look, listen, there are at least four political humiliation groups, in case you're taking notes here. Oh, they're groups. MAGA doms, libtard subs, also active. Okay, this is in the Washington Post. I'm just telling you, folks. Okay, there are also sites that cater to the taboo turn-on with names such as Triggered Liberal Snowflake. Oh, my goodness. According to those who are active in the world of kink, an appetite for this type of political role-playing grew during the Trump administration.

Oh, we know. Right? I mean, you know, Michael, this was the one piece of the puzzle that perhaps we didn't have. What's going on? It makes so much sense now. It makes so much sense now. I mean, you can see the arc, you know, just all the various stories over the years that have sort of seeped out into the ether. Call me a name, Daddy Trump. Call me a nickname. Yes, yes. Call me a nickname.

Point those tiny fingers. Tell me I'm a rhino. I am weak. I am a loser. Absolutely. Tell me my wife is ugly that my father assassinated John F. Kennedy. I'm not naming any names here, you know? Oh, my God.

Can I get through the next 30 seconds without saying Lindsey Graham's name? No, I'm sorry. I can't. I'm not naming any names here. Can I get through the next 30 seconds without saying Lindsey Graham's name? No, I'm sorry. I can't. I fail. I don't know. I just, I can't do it. So this is a real thing. But this story, this story is in many regards, not that surprising because look, over the years, you hear stories. You've been, I've been in a few rooms. I'm looking at people going, okay, that's not normal. And you realize that a lot of this has always been projection. That for all of the haranguing of the left about their culture and their degradation and all of this stuff, it was projection.

Meanwhile, this SOB senator or that SOB congressman is going to a little night shack down off of K Street where there's a dominatrix there waiting. They call him a libtard. I mean, it's not surprising. Okay, so there are going to be academic studies talking about, you know, bondage, sadism, masochism, and the political moment of 2024. Explaining American politics by the number of politicians who just crave humiliation. And, okay, you spent too much.

Charlie, it's all now, it's hit me like a V8. I understand now why they were so mad at me when, you know, we had a staffer spend money at a lesbian themed strip club in Los Angeles when I was RNC chairman because they didn't get the invite. It makes so much more sense now. I understand. I could actually go on on this for a long time, but we need to move on. So we move on. We move on. So here's a simple but meaningful gift idea for that grandparent who lives across the country, a digital picture frame from Aura. I mean, it's perfect for sharing pictures of all the things they can't be there to see, from family vacations to their grandkids' graduation. Okay, in this particular case, I am the grandparent, and I just

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and it's super simple to set up. It took just a couple of minutes to download the app, connect the frame, and then you're ready to pick photos and videos right from your phone from anywhere in the world. Aura Frames was named the best digital photo frame by Wirecutter, and it's easy to see why. Give the perfect gift this holiday season by visiting AuraFrames.com today and get $30 off their best-selling frames with the code BULWORK. That's A-U-R-A-Frames.com with the promo code bulwark. These frames sell out quickly though. So get yours before they're gone. Terms and conditions apply. So let's talk about the Koch network getting into the presidential race. Now, back in 2016, they said they were, you know, wanted to be anti-Trump, but they made the decision that they weren't going to get behind

one candidate. So we all remember 2016, right? It's burned into our, you know, into our cerebellums that there was no consolidation. They made a different decision, the strategic decision. They were going to go all in for Nikki Haley, which, okay. So I wrote my newsletter today. I said, let's start with a stipulation that they are unlikely to win. Nikki Haley is not going to beat Donald Trump. On the other hand, you know these folks. This is a lot of money. There's a lot of organization. It's a strategic decision. It signals that this is the moment for consolidation and that Nikki Haley is going to be the last person standing. And it will probably shake loose other big donors who might coalesce

around her as opposed to Ron DeSantis. So I guess I want to get your take on all of this, because of course, the big question mark looming over all this is, does the money actually matter anymore? So let's start with that. No, it doesn't. How do I know that? Look at the polls. It's not complicated, people. The moneyed class inside the party did what at the very beginning of this campaign. They decided, oh, we don't like Trump anymore because he's bad for business, whatever that business is. And so they galloped over to the governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis, and they started pouring cash in and showing him love and elevating him. Tons of money, yeah.

And getting him out on Fox News and Rupert and the organization was like, oh, no bright shining object. Let's do this. And what happened? His numbers went nowhere. Before he started to tank on his own, he got close. And the closest he got was 20 points within Donald Trump, right? Okay, but how much of that is the money and how much of it is the fact that Ron DeSantis He got close and the closest he got was 20 points within Donald Trump. All right. Okay. But how much of that is the money and how much of it is the fact that Ron DeSantis is an asshole and he's just a terrible candidate? Assholeishness notwithstanding, money will buy you an asshole if it can buy you one.

If that actually worked, if Trump voters looked at DeSantis and said, you know what? You guys are right. He's a better value proposition than Trump. I'll move over there even though I may have some issues. And yes, at the end of the day, he's an ass. But they didn't. So then they pivot to Tim Scott. Oh, Tim Scott. He's so Reagan-esque. Oh, he's so wonderful. He's from the South. yada, yada, yada. That went nowhere. Now they've pivoted to Nikki Haley. The same result is going to occur. It's not going to move the Trump base off of Trump. Why would I take someone like Trump when I got Trump? Let me take a more positive view of

it. What's being positive? And I've been critical of the Koch network in the past. I think that their position on foreign policy is very different from mine, actually very different from Nikki Haley's. They didn't have to get involved in this particular race. Sure. But they have decided that it is so crucial to stop Donald Trump that they are willing to do this. The difference with Nikki Haley is, and I have lots of problems with her, and I understand that she's a flip-flopper. She's a hell of a better candidate than Ron DeSantis. She's much, much better than Tim Scott. She's better as a candidate. She's got a more plausible thing. I don't think she's going to

win here, but I do think that it's a worthy effort. If we want to stop Donald Trump, if we recognize that 2024, the number one imperative is preventing the return of Donald Trump, then it's kind of all hands on deck, you know, and you've made alliances that you're not proud of. I certainly have. I actually have a picture in a desk drawer of myself. I'm really sorry to say this right before the Wisconsin primary with Ted Cruz. And I'm thinking you're like the worst human being on earth, except for this guy. And I'm willing to, you know, work with you to stop Donald Trump. You know, so,

so I feel like we're in 2024. You have Nikki Haley. And again, what the Koch network did was interesting. In one respect, they are very different, I think, ideologically from Nikki Haley, but they decided we're going to put aside our ideological differences. We are not going to let the perfect be the enemy of the good. We are not going to apply a purity test. Right now, it's like anybody but Trump, who is the most likely to be able to put, either stop him or put a major speed bump. And so I have to say that, you know, at least one and a half cheers for them getting involved in that. Because if you want to take back your party, the Republican Party, then you're going to have to have somebody. Okay. Number one, you're not taking back that party. That's gone. So the framework has got

to be different. Because in order to take that back, you got to excise or maybe have an exorcism of all the MAGA meltdown bullshit that's inside the party, the party infrastructure, so all that. The Koch brothers aren't investing in that. They're not going to invest money in that. Don't disagree. I'll be honest, a little bit conflicted. I work with the Koch brothers on various other projects at times. And so I really appreciate a lot of what they're trying to do here. But at the same time, the reality is this. If I were the Koch brothers, the first conversation I would have had was with Chris Christie and Ron DeSantis. Vivek is a joke, so we just take him aside. He's not probably wanting to be on the stage the next time, but I think he's now polling at 1%. But have that conversation and say, gentlemen, you know we love you, but we need you to leave the stage, stage right. We need you to go. We want to consolidate your

support, our support, right-minded Republican support behind Nikki Haley. Aren't they saying that now? Isn't this what they just said? No, baby, you have that conversation before. You have that conversation before you roll out your endorsement and your announcement. You think you're going to back pressure Chris Christie into jumping off the stage? No, you get that done up front. That's the first conversation you have because you need to appreciate the landscape because you're now pouring this money into a race and there's still two other guys who arguably can at least drain votes from her. So there is no consolidation here. Not yet. You get that agreement before you run out and make that announcement. In fact, when you make that announcement, you make it with the two of them standing by your side.

And then now you've created momentum. Now you've changed the paradigm. If in two months, something like that happens, then the strategy will have worked. Are you too late in two months, baby? You're too late. Okay. Well, this is all the question with it,

but I don't disagree with you. I mean, I think this is Trump's party. It's Trump's party all the way down. I said yesterday, if you squint hard enough in the right light, if you turn your head in a certain way, you look at Nikki Haley and you think this is what a post-Trump Republican normie party would look like, but no, it's not going back to norm. So going forward though, what would you advise them to do? They have resources to put into this race. I'd shut down the money train access, the donors, and the support network for the other candidates. If this were a functioning Republican Party, that's a conversation the chairwoman would,

as national chairman, with Donald Trump on that stage, not being on that stage, I would have had this conversation months ago. I would have corralled everybody and said, look, OK, somebody in this room needs to stand up and be the one. And the rest of you need to get behind him. I'm leaving the room. I'm going to lunch. I'll be back in an hour. And you let me know your decision. Because if it's the wrong decision, when we walk out of here, let me tell you what I'm going to do as national party. And then you just lay out how you're going to manage the resources.

That party obviously doesn't exist anymore and there is no discipline. It doesn't exist. So all those little things, Charlie, weren't put in place for this moment to be any different two weeks, two months from now. But this is different than 2016. And you think about where we were in late November 2016. You had a bunch of candidates who were not getting out of the race, unlike Scott Walker. At that point, it wasn't super clear that Donald Trump was going to walk away with this. They were all thinking somebody else is going to take him out. Maybe my moment will strike.

There's a chance. There's just a chance. They hung on for months. Now at the end of November, it does look like Ron DeSantis is on life support. He's being abandoned by the donor class. Chris Christie has a niche campaign. I mean, I think he's doing the Lord's work by telling the truth about Donald Trump. I've said this before. I'm not urging him to get out because every single day he's pounding him, but he's got a one state strategy. It's all about New Hampshire. The only candidate now that has any sort of a reasonable path, and I think it's a big question mark over it, is Nikki Haley. I mean, a whole Donald Trump under 50% in Iowa.

But a reasonable path to what? See, here's my problem. Now, let me jump ahead because what I can't get to is, and then this happens, and she becomes the nominee, and Donald Trump does what? Yes. Thank you. This is the moment where it's like, let's play out all the game theory. And she runs the table, and she wins in South Carolina, and then this happens, and this happens, and then Donald Trump, you know, graciously concedes and shows up in Milwaukee, you know, wearing his ankle bracelet, and he walks around the stage holding her hand. No, see, this is it, Michael. Oh my God, it doesn't happen. There's no

world in which any of that happens. I've been saying it, you've been saying it. You know it. I know it for over a year now. This is such a farce, not even on earth for, let alone one, two, and three. Does Donald Trump say, you know what, Nikki, you bested me. You outlasted everybody else. So you served with me. You were my ambassador at the UN. You did all these great things. You stood by me. Here are my resources. Let me go out and campaign for you. Let me get the MAGA base behind you to defeat Joe Biden. That ish does not happen. Okay. Here's something else that doesn't happen. And I hope that people get their heads around this. No matter what the result in November is, I mean, no matter what the result is, Donald Trump is not going to

concede this election. Donald Trump will never say that he's legit. So what you had happen after 2020 will happen again after 2024. Now he won't be in the White House. He will not have the levers of power. He does have a MAGA dominated House of Representatives, but this is going to be ugly. And I guess this is where you get to the Republican Party in general. And I want to get to Chris Zanunu in just a second, or the Chris Zanunus and the Peter Myers of the world. Before you go there, I don't want you to roll past, he will have a Republican dominated House in Congress. That's very important right there is a reason why johnson is speaker i think so there's a reason why you're seeing things like play out the way they're starting to play out because

that has always been from what i piece together talking to various people that has always been the play is the house is going to be the break wall. It is going to be the space where the 2024 election will ultimately get decided. That's their goal. And so we can't lose sight of that. Let's clarify what you're specifically talking about, because for people who think they have a worst case scenario, what you're describing is, what happens if nobody gets 270 electoral votes, if you have one of these no labels candidates or a third party candidate that peels off just even one state somewhere. I don't know which state it would be. If you don't have a majority, under the

Constitution, the presidential election is decided in the House of Representatives, but not by a vote of members of the House of Representatives. No. And what percentage of Americans know how this works? You have 50 state delegations, and each state gets to vote. So the woman who replaced Liz Cheney in Wyoming, she is the only congressman. Wyoming has the same number of votes. They have one congressman as California.

Right. has the same number of votes. They have one congressman as California. And so you have the majority of states' delegations, which is dominated by Republicans at the moment. And I cannot imagine, you know, you want to talk about the political chaos that we live in now after something like that. This has only happened once in American history. Am I right? It was 1828? The 28th election, correct. And of course, resulted in Andrew Jackson not winning. He said that he was defeated as a result of the corrupt bargain, which created this massive backlash. Four years later, he was elected. I mean, it shaped and embittered American politics for a generation back then. And of course, they worked things out amicably in the middle of the 19th century.

And they didn't have Twitter. Well, we don't either. We don't either anymore. And we don't either. Fair point. It'll be interesting, the debates. And I'm sorry to just jump ahead here, because I think about this all the time. What is the debate about democracy going to look like then?

What is the democratic outcome? Joe to look like then? What is the democratic outcome? Joe Biden wins the popular vote by 7 million votes, let's say, theoretically. Donald Trump becomes president of the United States without winning the electoral college, but winning in this House election that no American even knew existed. Right, right, right. So it would make Bush v. Gore and all the complaining that liberals did about their lack of understanding of how the Constitution empowered the Supreme Court to make the decision they made because of the constitutional clock that apparently the, you know, the Gore team was not aware of. That argument will pale in comparison to the noise that will come out about

this election. And certainly if it was the other way around, where Joe Biden is short of the electoral college vote by, you know, 269, you know, as opposed to 272. And that gets thrown into the House. And Donald Trump is, you know, 20 or 30 electoral college votes behind Joe Biden. He still wins. It's a mess. So it's an important feature of this that I think we will need to spend some time educating and preparing people for because not only is that likelihood, what sets up the likelihood of that is not just the fact that you don't get the 50 plus one, but what certain states decide to do because they've elected MAGA election officials to go back and try to jerry-rig an outcome in their states. That is also a very real possibility. And we're doing a lot of

wargaming around that now to try to understand exactly what those consequences look like and what the responses should be. So this is where I was going, though, with the question about the Norman Republicans like the Chris Sununu's and the Peter Myers, knowing that if, in fact, Donald Trump is the nominee, you have the very high probability of election chaos, this kind of disruption, followed by the possibility of just an absolute shitshow, you know, one constitutional crisis after another if he gets back into power. And yet they're making the calculation, yeah, we're willing to go along with that. This is where I come back to the Koch brothers. And I'm not trying to carry water for them because I'm not a huge fan, but at least they're willing to say, okay, while there's an opportunity to take an off ramp, let's goddamn, let's take it. You know, the Republican party has Nikki Haley versus the guarantee of chaos, win or lose, from Donald

Trump. And they're saying, yeah, we are willing to put the country through that. We're willing to put the country through these felony trials, the fact that he may be a convicted felon, the fact that he will try to disrupt the election. And we're willing to do that to America because of X when we have reasonable alternatives right there. And even guys like Chris Sununu, who knows what a crazy son of a bitch Donald Trump is. Peter Meyer, who voted to impeach the son of a bitch, is now saying, yeah, I'm willing to support him. I'm willing to put America through that again. I agree with you on the coax. I look, I'm glad they're doing what they're doing. I'm glad they're putting that pressure on the political class within the party, but that class

doesn't give a crap about it. They don't care. So how do we think the outcome is going to be any different when, I mean, Peter knew damn well what the landscape is and was, and yet he full-on embraced it because he wants to be a U.S. senator. Yeah. I mean, this is a perfect example of putting party over, not just party over country, but putting raw personal ambition over everything else. Putting your humiliation kink over the country. So I guess at this point, I guess I'm the, you know, all hands on deck. Anyone that's willing to stand up and say, we cannot do this. This is an emergency. This is an existential threat. And so we're willing to put all of our ideological

differences aside. So I don't disagree with you about whether this is going to work, but, but at some point, I think that if we all recognize this is an existential threat to democracy, then let's act like it, which means that we are going to have to make alliances and deals and even launch charges that are doomed from the beginning. Like, for example, Chris Christie, who is a political suicide bomber, and more power to him. No one is willing to do that. And the reason they're not willing to do that is because there's still a Republican primary in process. There's still the Peter Majors out there who are willing to endorse Donald Trump. And that creates a greater problem

for the efforts by the Kochs and others to try to persuade and to move those pieces in alignment against Trump. Whether it's behind Nikki Haley or anyone else, there is still that resistance. That resistance has been in place since 2016. When you look at the people who capitulated, who shouldn't have. And we started this conversation about Kevin McCarthy going down to Mar-a-Lago because Trump didn't feel well. Well, I would have told that son of a bitch, take an aspirin. I'll talk to you later. I'm not coming down to Mar-a-Lago to feed you soup. But they did and they do.

They continue to. So in one sense, what the Koch effort is, is inspirational. And we hope that people will get behind it. I'm behind it. You're behind it. We're trying to move the needle. But at the same moment we're doing that, Peter, Stenunu, others stand up and go, no, Trump's my guy. And we're picking on them because we know they know better. This is the best lack all conviction. And this is the story. It doesn't actually bother me when you see the Matt Gaetz's or the George Santos's or the Margie Taylor Green's because, I mean, that's who they are. Okay.

It's the guys who make the compromises. The ones. And you know this, Michael. These are the ones who sit in a room with you and they'll share a scotch. They'll say, absolutely, this guy's terrible. This is the worst thing. He doesn't understand the Constitution. Liz Cheney tells the story of one congressman named Green who's signing the support for this bogus lawsuit saying, oh, what we have to do for the orange Jesus.

But he does it. It's the people who know better that are the ones who break your heart. Okay. Let's get to the section of the podcast that listeners hate the most. Okay? Okay. As former Republican. Are you a former Republican? No, I'm still a Republican. No, dude, I'm still inside the tent. You're just over in the corner there. Personnel over by everybody inside the tent. That's what I'm doing. Yeah, see, I think there's a big tent, and I think there's a little pup tent out there. And it's like, that's Michael's.

Michael Beck is out there over by the trees. Yeah, just go over there by the latrine. That's where we keep Michael. You're not in the tent, Michael. I'm not in the tent. You are not in the tent. I do not want to be the one to tell you this, but you are not in this tent, Michael. I'm not in the tent. I'm not in the tent. I do not want to be the one to tell you this, but you are not in this tent. Okay. And I'm not sure you want to be under this big top

either. Okay. So, but okay. So given everything that we know about how crazy this party is and Donald Trump on a daily basis, he's not like dialing it back. And you can tell there's nobody at Mar-a-Lago saying now it's time to be statesman-like. No, you know. And can we also mention that he still is facing, you know, four criminal trials, you know, 91. It's almost like that's become like the background noise. Okay, so why are the Democrats not beating him? Why is Joe Biden losing to him in the swing states? Why do Americans trust Donald Trump over Joe Biden by double digits on key issues?

What is happening, Michael? I don't believe they trust Donald Trump over Joe Biden on key issues in an absolute way. That is actually a form of voter projection, projecting their frustration with the administration. What is it that they're frustrated about? Their frustration is they believe one thing, but are being told something else. And that happens in politics when you don't communicate the thing you're doing. And so voters begin to backfill stories and narratives. They begin to connect dots that shouldn't be connected. So for example, I'll give you how this all began. Two years of Democrats talking about the

filibuster while the American people were asking, who's Phil, who's Buster, and what did they do? Why is everybody so angry at them? What did Joe Manchin do to piss off who's Buster, and what did they do? Why is everybody so angry at them? What did Joe Manchin do to piss off Phil and Buster, right? There was no connection there. That's worked out so well for them, by the way. It worked out so well. And so they started backfilling stories about it. And so when you try to educate and inform after the fact, people are like, what the hell are you talking about?

Second example is the age narrative. Now, instead of getting out in front of that because A, you knew it was coming, and B, we all knew it was coming. It's getting worse. They didn't. So what happened? Who set the age narrative? Republicans did. Republicans started talking about how old Biden is, right? And there was no counter narrative to it. There was no, what the hell are you talking about how old Biden is, right? And there was no counter narrative to it. There was no, what the hell are you talking about? Your guy walks up a plane with toilet paper on his shoe. What are you talking about, right?

But there was no punch back. And that's the thing, more than anything else, Charlie, the Democrats are the most politically inept party I've ever watched in the modern era with no ability to punch back. They sit there and they whine and they grind and they wring their hands and they're like, oh, we can't say that. That's too political. Meanwhile, they're getting their lights punched out politically by a party that doesn't give a

shit about politics applied to policy. And that's exactly why they find themselves on the defensive on good stuff that they've done. So now they're trying to figure out how do I tell Americans that all those shovel ready projects that are popping up in their neighborhoods, all the roads that are being fixed, all the bridges are being fixed, were not the result of, you know, infrastructure week for four years under Donald Trump, but infrastructure legislation actually getting passed under Joe Biden. And they don't have the president out necessarily telling that story. So you now find yourself layered on top of that Ukraine, layered on top of that Israel-Palestine, layered on top of that,

you know, all these other things, the weight of it. And the voters are like, you know what? These people don't know what they're doing. I don't trust them. And it's not that they trust Donald Trump more. It's just they're frustrated with the process of being told something that their eyes and their experience is saying, well, that's not true. Okay. I'm really working on coming up with the right analogies. I am trying to figure this out because when I talk to Democrats versus listening to Republican voters, it is like two separate realities, but not in the way of alternative realities. It's like two split screens where Democrats believe that politics is about policy. It is about legislation. It is about shovel-ready projects.

And the American public looks at that and go, okay, that's fine, but that's not the show. The show is politics. And there's a separation there. And the Republicans bring the show, and the Democrats bring the whiteboard. And they bring the simple broad strokes where the Democrats are bringing my white paper. I'm going to read you. I'm going to tell you how you don't understand what's going on. But it's not just a messaging issue. I think that there's a disconnect, which I find fascinating. I was talking to David French about this yesterday. You know, you talk to Christian businessmen and parents, and they think that character matters, values matter. You ask them to do something dishonest.

They won't do it because they're Christians. You ask them to lie. They won't do it because they're Christians. Their children are being raised to respect people, to be good sportsmen. Sorry, I don't mean to laugh. Go ahead. And then you have this incredible disconnect between the way they live everything else in their lives versus then when they walk into the ballot box and they go, yeah, Donald Trump, he's the man that I want to lead. Yeah, let me vote for the guy who's the antithesis of everything I claim to believe in. Right, right.

So I get the sense sometimes that these are like conversations that are just not happening on the same planet, that we sometimes think that politics is about this okay let me let me torture this analogy the democrats have come prepared for the championship cricket match and they walk into the stadium and it turns out it's rugby it's rugby instead and they play three quarters of the game and they're getting killed by the rugby players. But here's the thing. They won't even hit the other players with their cricket sticks. Well, no, they're holding their cricket sticks saying, wait until the fourth quarter when we get our ups or whatever the hell they do in cricket. It's like, wait, wait.

Have you not noticed that for the last three quarters you have had the shit beat out of you because it's actually rugby, not cricket. And they're going, you know, if we just could message the fact that we need to follow the rules of cricket, we're going to do better. I mean, there's some just like, folks, you know. I'm trying not to go to the, you know, bringing the white paper to the gunfight type thing. No, but you make an incredibly important point. And it is, in one sense, a way of speaking to what has happened among the American electorate,

not just in the last four years or eight years with Donald Trump since 16, but actually over a longer period of time, sort of the entertainment value of politics became much more important because it became like a live action series. And you would have all these great characters who would come out and everybody was watching and wondering and anticipating. And to your point, the Democrats want to present a 50-page analysis of all of that and how policy fits in at various points. And the public is like, yeah, but I got popcorn right now and a soda pop, and I'm watching some really crazy stuff. And that's actually more interesting than reading your 50-page thesis on

why healthcare is better here than there. There is this disconnect, not just from the political structures that have changed, but a disconnect from the voters themselves who are much more interested to your very, I think, important analogy to the action on the field. Yeah. Right? A rugby match is far more entertaining to watch than a cricket match. Trust me, I've watched both. Right?

And the reality of it is I like the scrum. Okay? Well, that's it. In the NFL right now, everybody is like, oh my God, how does Philadelphia always on fourth and three push the opposition? That is an amazing... I mean, there's always that thing that people latch onto and the Democrats don't have that thing that people are latching onto. And they need to find that thing that people will latch onto in this election. It is not just, oh, let's have an in-depth conversation about Israel and Palestine to

convince young voters that Joe Biden is right here, right? It's actually in a weird way deeper than that, because it involves things that so far they're not prepared nor willing to do that actually will get the voters' attention that show the one thing that Republicans consistently show, I'm willing to fight not just for what I believe in, but what I think you should believe in. And that's the difference. The public likes the idea. Maybe they want the mango mousseline. Okay, so let me close on this, Michael, with a return to the Washington Post. Let's go full circle. Okay. What is her name here? Roxy Ray. Did not start out making political fetish videos. The dominatrix began working as a stripper at age 18, transitioning

to online videos a few years later, specializing in foot fetish. Washington Post. Now she works full-time online and says she earns six figures annually. About 90% of her work is producing other performers and 10% is making her own content. On X, formerly known as Twitter, where Ray advertises, she's open about her conservative Republican beliefs. She voted for Trump twice, although she currently supports Florida Governor Ron DeSantis in the Republican primary. Ray received her first request for a political humiliation video in March 2021 from a fan who DM'd her, writing, one of the most difficult and humiliating sacrifices to make is to vote for a Republican candidate when you're a Democrat. If I were to surrender control of my vote to you, that would be the ultimate sacrifice. She charges about $150 for a five-minute custom

video and resells them for a dollar per minute in length. Okay, so, Michael. We're in the wrong business. We spent this hour talking about politics and policy, and there's a world out there where people are like, no, dominatrix, humiliate me. Humiliate me. I want to have the tears of a libtard. So Michael, this is again, we think it's one show. It turns out to be something completely different.

And when I started my day today, the last thing I thought I'd be doing is having this conversation with Charlie Sykes. Well, I think that political reporters obviously are going to have to expand the kinds of things they're looking at online, by the way. There's a reason why you don't read a lot of stories like this, you know? Yeah, there is a reason. There's a reason. And I love that you kept emphasizing it's in the Washington Post. It is in the Washington Post. So don't DM me or Michael about this. Michael, it is great talking with you. Always good to be with you, Charlie. Absolutely. And thank you all for listening to today's Bulwark Podcast. I'm Charlie

Syker. We'll be back tomorrow and we'll do something like this all over again. The Bulwark Podcast is produced by Katie Cooper and engineered and edited by Jason Brown.