The Bulwark Podcast - Peter Hamby: Living the Racist Porn Message Board Life

Episode Date: September 20, 2024

Mark Robinson thinks so much about porn, he wouldn't have enough head space or time to do the job of being North Carolina's governor. Meanwhile, the "Black Nazi" calls trans people and gays filthy. Plus, Kamala's confidence on the trail, the absurdity of the Trump campaign thinking she delivered a gun gaffe —and white people varietals in PA, WI, and NC.  Peter Hamby joins Tim Miller for the weekend pod. show notes Tim Walz talking to high school bros More Walz showing how to talk to voters Neil King's book, "American Ramble" Tim's playlist

Hello and welcome to the Bullard Podcast. I'm your host Tim Miller. I couldn't be happier to be here today with the host of Good Luck America on Snapchat, founding partner at Puck, host of the Powers That Be podcast, which comes out every day, but don't listen to it before you listen to mine. He's a teen heartthrob, mostly for awkward teenage boys, and he's a porn message board culture analyst, so he's perfect for today's show. Peter Hamby. Hey, Peter. Hey, better than tiger droppings, right? Barely, barely. He's also one of my besties.

I guess I should have said that. Peter, I needed somebody to just chop shop with on Mark Robinson today. It's quite the story. For anybody that's been in a hole, the Republican nominee for governor in North Carolina was revealed via CNN's K-File to be a very frequent messenger on a porn website, Nude Africa. On the site, he said, among other things, I'm a black Nazi. I'd take Hitler over any of the shit that's in washington right now slavery is not bad some people need to be slaves i would

certainly buy a few martin luther king get that commie bastard off the national mall he said that a woman who complained about being sexually assaulted by a taxi driver the moral of the story is don't f a white bitch the cienna didn't even include some other good ones he some peeing stuff you know some stuff about sleeping with his wife's sister some other gross stuff that's even too gross for this podcast dude was in it i guess is the big thing here he was like living the racist porn message board life at like a very high level. If you're like, have that paper trail on the porn message boards, it's not like you're checking in once a day. Like, you know,

you open the Yahoo sports app and you see if the reds won last night. You are spending a lot of time on that website and others. You're thinking a lot about it, by the way, this brings up a good point. Not that his opponent would bring this up but like if you're thinking that much about porn and it's occupying that much headspace sir how much time are you going to be spending as governor of the great state of north carolina

thinking about this stuff or are you going to be thinking about bringing textile jobs back to the to the triad you know it's a good hit no he's gonna be he's to be thinking about bringing textile jobs back to the triad? You know, it's a good hit. No, he's going to be thinking about transsexual sex, which he's very into, according to many posts about that, despite, obviously. And Doc Rivers. Poor Doc, catching strays. I mean, Doc is one difference, one key difference between Doc and Mark Robinson, among many, is that he's not going around calling trans people and gays filth he's not going around you know talking about how he wants to keep trans people out of women's bathrooms that's an interesting law that he's proposing the bathroom law considering one of the other things he discusses on the porn message board is how he'd

like to be a peeper he'd like to he'd climb on ladders and peep into ladies bathrooms oh i missed that yeah there's a lot of material to sort through it peter and i wouldn't have expected you to read every every post every piss porn post that he posted the other thing i think i'd like to layer in here is in addition to like logging hours on the nude africa message board he also was a nightly visitor to the porn shop the physical porn store yeah the video store where you go into the back room and and according to reports you'd bring a pizza into the back room where you do this further it's just like i mean how did this guy have time to like make a living he went bankrupt several times also like how did this guy find time to you know go to the bank go to the grocery store you know i mean this dude was logging huge

hours on message boards in person porn stores i mean hey like whatever floats your boat is fine with me but just like as a practical matter this seems inefficient this is something that'll send a throw up the leg of bulwark listeners the maga grift has brought into the political class a bunch of people who you know prior to donald trump were just like people who either lived on the fringes of society or fringes of the economy who were weird, lonely, had a lot of time on their hands, found a, you know, you would call it a cult, found, you know, something to hold on to. And there are plenty of people who are Republicans in the Trump era. I think Mark was holding on to something. It sure is. There are plenty of people in MAGA Republican politics who had nice careers as entrepreneurs and businessmen and lawyers and doctors or whatever before becoming politicians in whatever level of government. There are also plenty of people who were just like, didn't have anything to do, and they are just kind of clowns.

And he seems like an emblem of that can we tie this to the campaign though like i think mark robinson was already on track to lose republicans i talked to rga adjacent consultant types yesterday like they already thought this race was kind of gone for him all the things you mentioned the peeping and the the piss porn first time saying that on a content activation the black nazi yeah don't forget the black nazi martin lucifer coon you know there's just there's a lot there okay great so here's here's when you think about north carolina and maybe you're thinking about comel harris in november and how these two races are correlated obviously brock obama won north carolina back in 08 when you were

on the mccain train he had spent considerable resources there organizing college campuses and black communities in the primaries and they continued to target it as a swing state and they ended up winning that state kind of a surprise but a good w for obama since then hasn't been a battleground. 2012 was the last time it was a real battleground with a lot of resources invested there. People forget in 2022, there was a black female at the top of the Senate race ticket there for Democrat Sherry Beasley. Lost by three points, I think. That's the Richard Bursey. The problem for Dems is they haven't been able to maximize turnout in sort of more rural, out of the way, black corners of the state.

The whites there, it's a great genre of white. College educated whites. For Democrats. College educated white folks in the Research Triangle outside Charlotte over in Buncombe County, which is Asheville. Those folks are going to vote for Kamala. And we were texting about this the other day. Like, you think about the South, like North Carolina is a little different than Georgia.

Like North Carolina is a little more mid Atlantic, you know, just a different kind of white, less of an sec dad, a little more progressive, more willing to vote for Kamala Harris. Democrats need to maximize black turnout and then get all those white folks out.

And then a bunch of college students so maybe the black nazi stuff maybe the pro-slavery stuff you can bundle that into messaging and radio mail door knocks whatever tv digital i don't know how you reach voters these days but i think it's pretty helpful like if you're in the coordinated campaign in north carolina for for both campaigns you've made two trenchant points there. One about this election, one about the state of the party. Let's just, I want to start on this election first. I'm sure everyone's heard this clip, but it's worth just listening to one more time in the context of just having heard what Mark Robinson was posting on these message boards. Let's hear Donald Trump

talking about Mark Robinson recently. This is Martin Luther King on steroids. Okay. Now I told that, I told that, I told that to Mark. I said, I think you're better than Martin Luther King. I think you are Martin Luther King times two. And he looked at me and I wasn't sure, was he angry because that's a terrible thing to say? Or was he complimented? I have never figured it out, and I wasn't sure, was he angry because that's a terrible thing to say, or was he complimented? I have never figured it out. But I'm telling you, he's one of, right? When I said that to you, you looked like, I don't know if I like that comment. You should like it.

You should like it, Mark. But you don't, because you think Martin Luther King is a commie bastard and Lucifer, and we should take down his monuments. Donald Trump was on to something there, donald trump was on to something there peter he was on to something he was like he's like i'm sensing you don't you aren't taking this as a compliment i'm comparing you to the only good black person i can think of in my brain if i'm donald trump and that's martin luther king i can't think of any others to compare you to and so i'm comparing you to him and you don't think of don king don king would be the other thing that trump's like muhammad of the late great muhammad ali and you're like them combined and he's like it's kind of strange that mark arvidsson doesn't seem to be taking this as a

compliment i think we know why now but um you know some of that stuff's going to look ugly in the ads and just that whole combo of you know what the democrats need what you're talking about depressing turnout among republicans exciting the black voters within north carolina bringing over the suburban acc dads like this seems to help on all three counts right yeah the depressing the white turnout maybe not maybe not you know maybe it does so that's the other thing so one reason north carolina is is hard for democrats is you do have you know maybe there's some bulwark listening charlotte dads out there who definitely are yeah sorry there definitely are those people if you're listening to bulwark and you live in in charlotte and uh you work in finance sorry you're not voting for donald trump but the jesse helms whites like the folks out in the coastal plain, out in the hollers where my family is descended

from, those folks, they turn out for Donald Trump. They're not going to hear kind of, I wish I owned slaves, and I've bankrupted three times. I don't think they care. There's nothing. Hitler's better than everyone in America. They're still like, dude, I want this guy to run North Carolina.

He's a total mess in his personal life i don't think he spends all of his life watching porn or going to porn stores and he's done nothing but he should be in charge of the state yeah sure yeah yeah i i think that that's a down down the line or check the box if donald trump is at the top of the ticket that's my only take i'm just making clear i agree with you but i just you know like this is all new and fresh so we're just trying to state it clearly they just don't care about it like they wouldn't put this guy in charge of their local arby's they might feel like probably we could probably we could find somebody better yeah we could probably find a better candidate well the trump campaign apparently was pressuring robinson to drop out on thursday before

the deadline to switch candidates that was a gambit that wasn't going to work this too i mean you talked a lot about sprint primaries back in july how do you have a primary in two hours two hours yeah they were looking over the democrats like you pulled off this switch it's working out for you can we do this in the next four hours no but the sort of base trump voters have a way, they are the kings and queens of motivated reasoning. Just like Mark Robinson was yesterday on television with Andrew Kaczynski saying that some internet goblins went back in time using AI to invent these fake posts. I think Trump voters can self-justify anything as long as Trump is at the top of the ticket and he's wearing the the maga jersey i guess and i will say this you say this about trump now trump obviously we had suzanne craig on

yesterday like most of trump's businesses have been disasters and it's all kind of a big con but like he just gives off the aura of somebody that was a good businessman at least he could be like he should be in charge of stuff he was a businessman mark robinson's entire life was it just it has been just a disaster like he's in shambles in his personal life he's like the guy that if this dad was the other dad on your kid's baseball team you're like please don't sit next to me in the stands this is who this person is like he might ask me to borrow some money so like i don't know there's gotta be some gap there i get there obviously some gap. Trump is doing better than him. There's some people out there that are getting there for Trump, but not for this guy.

It's tough. You made another point, though, that I want to get into. Because you were, for a while, I still are, but really for a while there in the mid-2010s, in our heyday, kind of made your bones at Republican events. Know the Republican people, know the types of Republican candidates, had good relationships with Republican candidates. You're in South Carolina, had good relationships with Republican candidates. And I think it's underappreciated just like from a supply and demand side,

like how bad the supply of Republican candidates is right now. I don't hear like the response with a quote unquote response or Republicans like Scott Jennings on CNN or Josh Holmes. None of them ever say this, but it's like when you've created a party where the only thing you need to do to win a primary is be just totally beholden to a charlatan. Like that's all you got to do. The top two skills are like be the Trumpiest Trump fan in the world and be as

mean to woke libs as you can right like those are the two skills like that it should be at the top of your resume if you want to win a primary like you're gonna naturally draw these people and this is the point you're going to like you're gonna get george santos and mark robinson and herschel walker and carrie lake like these are the people you're gonna attract because like you're not judging for military service or business success or whatever and like you know we had weirdos in the republican party in the aughts but like it is a category difference like the candidate like quality yeah look i think there are some exceptions to this i mean obviously you have candidates and politicians in the Republican Party. Dave McCormick. Or like someone like Doug Burgum.

Yeah, like self-funders. Well, he's in North Dakota. Right. No, they exist sort of outside the boundaries of like media attention and big media markets. And maybe they came out of nowhere. I don't know enough about this race, I should say. But like Tim Sheehy in Montana kind of feels like someone who's like not necessarily like full blown MAGA Republican. You kiss the ring when you need to.

I'm not saying it's most people. I'm not. So here's a good example. This is in the news right now. Mike DeWine. Like how is he governor of Ohio? So Mike DeWine, when I first met him in 2010, he was in the Senate, right? Before he became governor.

He was sort of campaigning around for the Republican ticket. At the time, he became governor in 2018, which is a very Trumpy time in the Republican Party and has been reelected twice. He stood up to Trump in the early days of COVID. He has been a little bit of an aberration in that state. A very reasonable guy wrote an op-ed in the New York Times today, standing up for Springfield and immigration, legal immigration, and attacking Trump and Vance for what they're saying about Springfield. Like, that guy also

exists in a state that is no longer on the table for Democrats because it's so Trumpy. So there are exceptions out there, you know? Like, how does a guy like mike dewine win a primary just name id well do you think that mike dewine so much one will be term limited out there in 26 and so who are the republicans going to attract to run for that governor's seat like no matter what happens in this election is it going to be a mike dewine type or is it going to be a vivek and like i mean it'll be a vivek yeah if you want to take if anybody wants to take the other side of this bet for me if there are any like dispatch stands out there that want to take the other side of this bet i'm i'll take i would love to be wrong i would gladly pay out you know sometimes i bet on you know i bet on lsu because i'm hoping you know because i'm wishing but like

i'm glad to i'm glad to pay out if we lose we were at the lsu ucla game a couple years ago out here at the rose bowl uh do you have money on the game this week yeah i think this weekend's will be better than that one i think this will be better than that one but you know i'm happy to pay but like sometimes you're wrong i could be wrong ucla could surprise lsu this weekend but like all signs point to the fact that like a vivek model is not a mike dewine model is what's happening and a big reason for that like why does this keep happening like it's because of the incentives right it's because there's nobody that's like you know there's no incentive to say hey like to win a republican

primary in my resume i want to demonstrate to you that i ran a business and i'm for tax cuts and i'm like that people and i'm a good upstanding citizen I'm a member of the community I was a leader of the Elks Club like nobody cares about that shit like they want to know can you own the libs and and do you like Trump both of these categories though maybe I'm being naive and optimistic here are both backward looking so you've got the MAGA Republican and then you've got the sort of old model Tim Republican you know let's attack Vivek for a second because Vivek is the ultimate grifter cornball. This guy, you know, he wrote a couple of books about anti-woke corporate culture. He's, you know, you know, one of these all in podcast types for somebody who postures as a business guy, an entrepreneur, an innovator innovator someone who's you know he went to

harvard uses the internet and embraces it no imagination so this is the thing like and this might not be your type of republican but can't there be some republican out there to sort of like fuse the worlds and bend the narrative a little bit in their direction like vivek is all just grafted onto the Trump train. And he's like, I'm going to do this because I can get famous in this culture. I can get on Fox News, et cetera, and make some bucks off a few books and then run for office in Ohio. You know, I think Ohio is interesting. I mean, in that same election, DeWine won, Sherrod Brown won, you know, like Republicans won the House vote in Ohio in 2018. And I think, by the way, Sherrod Brown won you know it like Republicans won the house vote in Ohio in 2018 and I think by the way Sherrod Brown can win this year against a Trumpy guy I'm not saying Ohio

Republicans will reject Vivek but it's all just like very backwards looking very uninteresting at this point like the cult maybe we're just in our blue bubbles i guess but it feels like it's getting old like can't somebody come along and rebrand not the party but like what republicanism means yeah i mean there'll have to be some kind of fusion if trump loses i guess but i don't know how you get away from the supply and demand problem like if what people are are incentivizing is lib owning then you're gonna get isn't 2022 the counter example like all the republicans run as maga and they're now lost yeah you know and that's a general election he's on the primary electorate the primary electorate's like look mark robinson ran in a primary against

somebody that was like you know what's a good Southern name? Give me a good Southern name. Brett. Yeah, you know? Brett. Yeah, what's a good Ole Miss SAE name? Thad. Thad.

Yeah. He ran against somebody that was just like. Cooper. Yeah. Cooper. There you go. He ran against a guy that was just like, Cooper Brownstone. And Cooper was like a regional manager.

He's like a business guy. He's at the Chamber of Commerce. And he wore a blue blazer. And he also had a casual outfit that he wore that he got from Billy Reid or whatever. And he just was like an upper middle class southern man. Like, whatever. Went to NC State and did everything you're supposed to do. And Mark Robinson, who before we even knew that he was a porn fiend,

we already knew that he was a Holocaust denier and a freak weirdo, like beat him like 70 to 30. That's the problem. That is like to me the biggest takeaway from what we're learning from the Vivac thing. Vivac though, you mentioned this. I have one little note here. I'm glad you mentioned Vivac. I want to come back to him him to just show you how fucking weird

jd vance has gotten in all this i don't know if you saw the story vivek wouldn't go there on the cat eating like makeup asked he had some event for trump and they were trying to pressure him because he's thinking about running for governor of ohio and they're like so what do you think about this catting thing it's like yeah you know it. You know, he's like, I can't really. I'm not going to be the judge between what people are saying out there. I just know that there's some real problems in the community we've got to deal with. I mean, if you are J.D. Vance, you've got to be like, man, if I'm advancing a conspiracy so absurd that not even Vivek would go there, they're pretty deep down the rabbit hole. Yeah. Vivek has actually in recent months tweeted a few things where like, I wouldn't say he's been urging sanity.

You can see that little antenna. Yeah, exactly. Like, and this is what I'm saying. Like God bless the people of Ohio. This is the, the Peter Hamby sports slash coaching tree special.

Like, you know, I have North Carolina people. My dad's from Cincinnati. My family's from Cincinnati. I'm a Reds fan. I don't think Vivek's been to a single reds game this year uh you know challenges ohio credentials on that but yeah like his antenna is toward running for governor and maybe he's got to moderate a little bit he's like ben shapiro like he confuses being loud and confuses being good at debate with being an intellectual and you know

he can bend words to whichever direction he wants to suit his political ends one last closing thought on ohio before i want to get to kamala the mike dewine op-ed that you mentioned it was nice it was nice it was good except for one it was everything that I would like. I was going to say, most of that stuff really was City on a Hill, Reagan. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Could be Georgia. Compassionate conservatism. Immigrants are an important part of the fabric. Pluralism. And he was hitting all my notes.

And then we get to this line. As a supporter of former President Trump and J.D. Vance, I'm saddened by how they and others continue to repeat claims that lack evidence and disparage legal migrants living in Springfield. This rhetoric hurts the city and its people, and it hurts those who have spent their lives there. Does he have to do this? Why does he have to do this? He's 77. He's retiring. He's retiring.

Come into the light, Mike Devine. It's okay. It's okay. Just kind of go down to the store grab a couple coconuts just jack comel's fine um comel water's fine for mike dewine how does he look at these people and he's like you are disparaging and lying about my constituents and you are putting them in danger and i'm proud to support you for president of the united states these united states it is it's one of those

things so it's a little it leaves me wanting people overanalyze the behavior of politicians like mike dewine and by the way this cuts to a lot of maga stuff and why a lot of republicans went along with the train he wants to keep going to the conventions and the fundraiser like this is his whole life why he's 77 people like going to conventions i don't know man it's your whole life take your wife down to del boca vista go down to del boca vista you know that's great it's a great life enjoy your golden years you want to go to a fucking rubber chicken dinner with don trump jr in toledo in 2025 that's what you want to do really so i you know i'm on the mike dewine wikipedia page right now he was first elected as a county prosecutor in 1977 i am bad at math what is that 40 years ago it's a long time it's a long time man when you get in the game you become an addict and this

is like your whole life and your whole culture and your friends and the people you date and the parties and your commonalities with people like it's just what you do and so but by the way i agree with you and scott our pal we always text about this too. Like if you are Rupert Murdoch or you are Bob Iger, or you are, you know, any super rich person, like it's the Logan Roy thing. Like if you're that rich, what's stopping you from like boating around the Caribbean all the time and like living your life. And like you have 10 horse ranches, like go ride horses or whatever. And so politicians, I think the same thing, not wealthy,

but like, yeah, you know, there's lots of things you can do. Mike DeWine, let me be your Nalaxone. Like, let me get you off this drug.

This, you know, you can just do it. Come on down to new Orleans. That's great. We'll have a purple drink. Your life will be fine. Life goes on.

You don't need to do it anymore. It's been a good, it was a 46 year run. Mike DeWine is not going to lafitte's my friend i have heat well we could find you something we can take you to brandon's shit there you go we can have a nice dinner go to our notes right sit up there on the balcony come on mike dewine you got 40 some odd days left we gotta talk about kamala uh you were texting me last night i forget what it said something like this is my shit so let's listen to it i'm a gun owner tim i did not know that if somebody breaks in my house they're getting shot

yes yes i i i hear that i hear that probably should not have said that but my staff will deal with that later kamala the cop kamala the rogue cop shooting breaking and entering people that's good right it's really good like so our pal keith edwards by the way tweeted this last night he tweeted the quote if someone breaks into my house they're getting shot kamala harris and then he tweeted a screen grab of a 270 to win map that's entirely blue like 100 electoral college victory but that's the thing like the trump campaign tweeted this out as if it were a gaffe that was weird the trump campaign flipped it out and by the way the relatable Kamala and Doug live in Brentwood, which is, you know, not since the OJ murder.

Pretty safe place. But relatable, relatable L.A. homeowner comment. Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln. Other than the most famous murder of our lifetime. It's been a really safe neighborhood. By the way, by the way, I'm going to fact check myself. Home invasions in Los Angeles are up this year. Los Angeles obviously has a crime problem.

Liberals can pretend crime in cities is fine. It's not. Kamala Harris saying I would fucking shoot somebody if they broke into my house to protect like my family. Extremely relatable, not just in LA, but fucking everywhere. And so it's not just the Kamala is a cop thing that she's going back on. There's something I've noticed about her. And this goes back to when I interviewed her in March for my Snapchat show.

You and I and our friends on our text groups, we've talked for a while about the Kamala Harris between 2019 and 2021 was like, what are you? What do you believe in? You don't have a coherent worldview. You feel insecure. You're always playing defense. You're not good at interviews. When she is confident, she is very good. And for whatever reason, she has been confident since joining this campaign as the nominee. And when she talks about herself and when she speaks freely off talking points, she's pretty good, man.

Like it was like when she was talking to Dana bash and said, next question about, you know, her, her racial identity. When I think this was in the NABJ thing the other day, someone asked her about her laugh and she just pivoted. And she's like,

be yourself. Like she's good be yourself like she's good in those moments when she kind of goes candidly off script like she is a normal person despite being a politician none of them are normal we should never idolize these people but that was a great answer like it just felt relatable regardless of the politics that's on drudge this morning and uh this is a wall street journal headline the most surprising new gun owners in america U.S. liberals. After decades of decline, U.S. gun ownership is rising among Democrats.

So I don't really love that trend, to be honest. Well, this might be correlated here in L.A. and other cities. Your former city of Oakland, a big rise in gun ownership is among Asian Americans and AAPI because during COVID, these people were getting harassed and beaten on the streets. Like in L.A., people were lining harassed and beaten on the streets like in la people were lining up asian folks were lining up at gun stores to buy guns asian people tend to vote them i'm not saying those things are related or correlated but i'm not sure i love it either but you know what it's not a bad thing for kamala harris to say donald trump doesn't know how to shoot a gun yeah exactly no he doesn't and the thing about the oprah follow-up that i liked was

it was authentic and it was at the debate it was like the one moment from the debate that i was like she's a gun owner and like on the one hand it was like that's an interesting fact i just learned on the other hand it's like it was kind of like really you're really one she said that in 2019 yeah and i'd forgotten that i had missed that completely she said it also a few weeks ago i just i just missed it so the debate when she said that i was like is that real like did she did she just buy one to say it like um and so i it was much more like oh no i'm a gun owner and i'll and i'll cap you if you break into my house i like i liked that element of it just felt more real the other point though about kamala and how she's really kind of coming to her own you were

you were on this after your interview with her you in march you said it was and this was you know well before the switch like what what struck you about that interview i guess you're in arizona with her right was there was there anything that you kind of remembered that struck you as being particularly particularly strong or giving you kind of a different different look at her so i again i'm not one of these reporters who's covered the hill or covered her in california going back a long time i'd interviewed her twice once in oakland i was crashing with you and tyler uh and did a gla interview drew was there 2018 2019 it was the first time i talked to her since being vp and i done some reporting for puck about you know all

the stuff we've been hearing about like like staff turnover in the White House, but also stuff going back to when, you know, she was AG in California. And so, I just hadn't spent time around her. This was an abortion rights event in Arizona. She's been, like, since Dobbs, her portfolio under the Biden administration was abortion, but also, like, rallying the young people on college campuses. And so she had been spending time on campuses. She's been spending time talking about something she was comfortable talking about, like abortion rights. Like she's good. Remember the whole like prosecutor thing, people miss the, like people oversimplify. I can take the case to Donald

Trump. That's not it. The prosecutor thing is one reason she was good in these Senate hearings is she just needs a clear target. One thing to aim at and talk about. In the primary, like you have 10 opponents in 2020. Like, I don't know what to talk about. Got to grab something out of thin air and run on it. Here with abortion rights, it's great for her. And so it was that.

This is also during like some hot Gaza moments. And I just noticed when I interviewed her after this rally, her tone on Gaza was much more sympathetic to the Palestinians without deviating from the Biden administration policy line. So, I thought that sort of rhetorical move was good. And that I think was sprung from spending time around college students and young people in a way Biden doesn't and didn't. And just like, it was again, this confidence that I think comes from one, spending time campaigning and talking about issues that are good for her, but two, just batting practice. So, you're vice president. And this is why Kamala Harris, you and I agreed in the days of July when Biden was in trouble, she was always going to be the nominee. And it wasn't because this is the party

of black women or like Kamala Harris deserves it. She deserved it because she was the vice president and she would be the best option to slot in there and run a sprint campaign. You put Josh Shapiro and Gretchen Whitmer and sorry, Sarah Longwell, I know you're sprint campaign you put josh shapiro and gretchen whitmer and sorry sarah long while i know you're listening and you're a josh shapiro super fan i gotta tell you i gotta tell you the whisper campaigns are in the whispering around never every time there's a pennsylvania poll that's not good the whispering that comes out about she should have picked josh i just i just i'm telling you in these secret never trumper basement meetings that i go to no nobody wants to say it out loud anymore because it's like, we're not going back, but you hear the whispers.

But anyway. I want to give Josh Shapiro a stray here. He won his race against Mark Robinson of Pennsylvania. White Mark Robinson? Yeah, he won his race resoundingly against a total zero. Anyway. I thought Doug Mastriano was a zero, but it turns out Doug Mastriano was like a 15

because it mean like it seems like he had you know gainful employment and had some hobbies that weren't related to piss porn so you know that's true good on you doug mastriano but just just to punctuate the kamala harris thing like she she unlike these governors like had been in the cauldron of national politics as vice president for several years and running for president had done the media interviews, been in meetings with world leaders, been in the oval office. So when you show up and talk to a reporter,

you know, that's small potatoes suddenly after doing that for two or three years compared to stepping into the democratic primary in 2019, just again, it's confidence. It's like any interview, like i'm smarter than this fucking person that i'm talking to and i'm going to show it and by the way i think

she kind of thinks that about donald trump too now yeah she really does i know uh you listened to uh the amy walter podcast on tuesday amy i was i'm a little more bullish than amy i think amy was insightful very insightful about kind of the demographics but a little bit cautious on the prognosticating you're more of a you know you're a pundit type you got you're not weighed down by having to have race rankings so where do you kind of see things standing here on friday september 20th you'd rather be kamala harris and donald trump right now on september 20th but remember there was a poll a very good high quality poll of wisconsin from marquette university also in the handby coaching tree because my mom went to marquette biden winning

by five or six points in late october wisconsin by five days before the election and he won by what one point less than a point so i was talking to our pal at dsu actually no he said, he said this very good episode of Pod Save America, by the way, with him and Dan the other day. Pod Save what? Pod Save America. It's a John Lovett from Survivor hosts it sometimes. I don't know if you know him. He lost in the first.

I'll have to check that out. John Lovett got voted off in the first episode of Survivor. Which I know. I broke the news. I spoiled that for people on yesterday's podcast. Two mentions so far week about that um yeah yeah more strays caught but adisu made an astute point which is like all i know like if the race is in a margin of error and democrats are in a position to win right now that's the best we can hope for and underneath that you know i have tools and levers as a campaign that I can pull to get over the finish line.

So I think Amy made some very smart points going in. And when you guys were talking about the different shades of whites in all of these states, I think you guys unlocked something that was very interesting in your conversation. And I had a conversation with the Pennsylvania Republican yesterday that sort of aligned with this. Kamala Harris is making inroads with non-college whites a little bit, which is good. We'll see if that holds. Women in particular. Yes. What's interesting is that she's kind of at parity with Biden, with college whites around like Philadelphia. So, you would think that she would be doing a lot better with college whites around philly and she's

kind of according to this washington post poll that came out this week she's just kind of the same so why isn't she maximizing her numbers and this way this might be why she's statewide so worse than the wisconsin whites i know amy walter didn't say that i said it but it was my interpretation of her analysis let's talk about different varietals of white. The Philadelphia College Suburban Whites. How are they different than the whites of Wisconsin? This is your line, like Madison, Wisconsin, Dane County, they deliver North Korea levels to Democrats these days, like 90-10 margins.

And that kind of white is the kind of white guy who wears a Futurist female t-shirt and a white woman who listens to Pod Save America. But over in Philly, you've got, is it crime? Is it, are these, you might know better than me, like the Philly dads who live in Bucks County, like what's different about them? Well, there are no blondes.

I mean, we're really getting into it now, but you know, it's a lot more. You got the Italians and, you know, it's just a little bit, yeah, it's different. What do you mean the Italians? I mean, I'm just telling you, like, yeah, I mean, like you have, I mean, they went to college, but it's just like a different culture. Like the Catholic, you know, kind of Philly, sort of Italian and Greek and like that, like that is the vibe. And Philly, like that. Aren't you talking about like a white ethnic, like lunch bucket type? Yeah, like the white. That about like a white ethnic like lunch bucket type that's a non-college type that's a non-college Peter I want to let you know that many of the white ethnic lunch bucket guys who you know from like the

Sopranos they had children but you know they went to college AJ went to college and AJ is a Robert F Kennedy jr voter okay that's what I'm talking about. Like, it's still a different, like, it's a different cultural vibe than you have around in Dane County. But in Pennsylvania, do they care about crime? Do they care about fracking in a way that they don't in, like, Detroit? Yeah, I mean, sure. Yeah, yeah, I guess, probably. But I think that I don't think that it's as much that,

right? Like I just, I mean, I think that there's a more of a progress. I look, you also have the Wisconsin kind of long progressive history, you know, in the state. I think that it's cultural and it's, you know, and I think Sarah Long will point this out when we were talking, I forget on one of our a hundred podcasts the other day. And she's like the other people that are college educated. And I can't even name these colleges because um i just i have to raise my hand i'm an out of touch elites at sometimes but she's like you know she's from central pennsylvania and she's like you forget that college educated whites include like people that went to mechanicsburg college that's not real i just made that up but like you know what i mean yeah they're like all kinds of colleges in the

middle of the state and like the types of people who graduate from there, they have some cultural interests and elements that are closer to MAGA than college-educated folks that went to more premier schools. I'm taking Good Luck America, my show, on the road in October. We're doing a little college tour. We are going to Penn State. So I'm interested to hear from the folks there and like turning point yesterday had a big flex where they registered like like hundreds of voter bros mostly bros on campus ahead of the election so yeah i think that'll be a feeding frenzy for me and my camera crew when we get there i'm very interested to see what they say just take a second to last topic i was not a big fan of the white guys for com local

and many listeners weren't a big fan of me not being a big fan of that they thought it was nice and okay and if it was nice for you and you're on the call i honor your experience but i just you know the white guy affinity groups are a little weird for me and the whole energy around it was a little weird and um i gotta tell you they put out an ad, I guess they raised money and I thought it was supposed to go to the campaign, but maybe they had a separate fundraiser for themselves. And they put out an ad yesterday and let's just listen to a little bit of it. Hey, white dudes. So I think we're all pretty sick of hearing how much we suck. Every time you go online, it's the same story. We're the problem. And yeah, some white dudes are. Trump and all his MAGA buddies are

out there making it worse, shouting nonsense in their stupid red hats and acting like they speak for us when they don't. All they've ever done is screw us over. But if you're not on the MAGA train, where do you go? Isn't it just swapping out one crappy option for another? Then it hit me. This isn't about picking teams. It's about who's got a plan that's gonna make life better for me and my family my own research it goes on from there it's just like it's really bad man dude the worst ad of the cycle by far and some people are gonna be like why so tell them why it's bad let me me tell you why. Okay. And I'm not a political practitioner like you, but I've learned a lot from you and your friends, former and current

over the years. Here's a few reasons why. My beloved high school English teacher, Ms. Gunter, taught me the singular rule of writing and storytelling, which is show, don't tell. This voice actor or AI generated bozo. It's just saying like, Trump sucks. Trump sucks. Trump sucks. We have a plan. We have a plan.

They have a plan. I'm a bro. What's the plan? Like, what's the plan? Why are you a bro? Yeah. Why are you a bro?

Who are the bros? Is the bro like, is the white dude that's talking? Is it Tim walls? Is it bill Clinton? Is it baby Gronk? Is it Channing Tatum? Like who the fuck is the white dude for Harris that is telling me here like to vote for walls

Harris? So I learned something from you in 2020 that was interesting. And I also did a piece for Vanity Fair about this with some Democrats who are message testing ads against Trump in 2020. When you were doing Republican voters against Trump in 2020, The stuff was stripped down, but it was good because you would find our pal Brett in North Carolina or Chuck in Detroit and they could be- Tommy in Texas. Tommy in Texas. They could be 40, they could be 60. And it would be straight to camera

recorded on their phone. And they'd be like, I voted for Trump in 2016 because I wanted to change. Now I realize he's been a disaster for X, Y, Z. And so one, you have this relatable person giving you permission to not like Donald Trump. And that worked because it wasn't just ad hominem attacks against Trump, which actually in focus groups and an online message testing show backfired because it's like, okay, like leave the guy alone, but tell me why I should vote for you on a basis of issues. And the issue, by the way, could be democracy, could be he's disruptive,

but it could also be something about the economy. Here's the other thing is there's no issue set at all in here, like none. Like they're not telling me any single issue, any reason, any compelling reason to vote for Harris or Walls. And then it's such a waste of money. They spent $10 million on this ad.

They should have given it to the campaign. They should have come up with some different kind of creative. And it's not, it doesn't tell me anything. Just handed it out to kids on campus or whatever. Yeah, it's bad. It also sounds, just my one sentence and we'll just move past this. It also sounds like it was written by an Elizabeth Warren supporter. And again, nothing wrong with Elizabeth Warren supporter, nothing wrong with that, if you're Elizabeth

Warren supporter. But like, you're not trying to reach Elizabeth Warren supporters, they're already voting for Kamala. So you want to sound authentic. The other thing that just came to mind is Harris has been very astute this campaign of not talking about identity politics, like that's good right she's talking to subgroups hispanics black folks young old whatever women men uh based on issue sets that matter to them you can see that kamala harris is a black woman a black south asian woman you can see that and the reason she picked tim walls is apparent, too, to counterbalance that. But when Tim Walls goes out and talks to white dudes, he's saying, putting things in relatable terms for those white dudes and their wives and daughters, abortion rights, whatever. And this just is it's a very online thing.

Like it's a bunch of Elizabeth Warren supporters on Twitter who like wear Futures female t-shirts to the brew pub. And it's like, we don't need you guys. You're already voting Democrat. Yeah, great. Yeah, we already got you. We already got you. It's like an idea that was concocted in like a clubhouse chat room in 2019 for other dudes to validate themselves. And it's not talking to people that harris needs to get off the couch or pull away from donald trump i'm gonna end on a positive note on this front there's video tim wallace out there we'll put it in the show notes because i don't have time to get to it but there's video tim wallace talking to some high school bros tim wallace is

actually good at this and sounds like an authentic person so there is ways to do this maybe if you're if you're out there white dudes for harris just cut ads of tim wallace talking instead of the ai person alternatively if you don't want to use tim wallace if you're going to go really based like go find that video of dave portnoy barstool dave portnoy shouting about how terrible the overturn of row is and like literally just playing that 30 second ad in front on bro podcast just just literally here's 30 seconds of dave portnoy paid for by white bros for harris like that would that would be a hundred thousand times better than what you did so there are two constructive ideas for it for any rich democrats that are listening one last

thing i do want to mention neil king you knew neil king right yeah great guy great man great guy he's a reporter for the wall street journal he's's a great writer, a great person. He loved the country. He did not equivocate about Donald Trump. He got cancer a few years ago, left the journal, went on a walk across America, wrote a book about it. I'll put the link to the book in the show notes as well. And in addition to me admiring him as a writer and as a reporter that I worked with on stories, I also admired him as a father. I bumped into Neil King on a weeknight at a Foxygen show at Rock and Roll Hotel. I walked into the Foxygen show. I forget who I was with. Maybe Tyler, I guess probably not you, or you'd remember,

and some other friends. And I saw Neil King in the back corner. I was like, hey, Neil, what's up, man? What are you doing? And he's like, oh, I like the band. And I was like, oh, cool. Are you here by yourself? And he said, no, my daughter's up there at the front with her friends. And I brought her to the show. And I was like, that, Neil, what's up, man? What are you doing? And he's like, oh, I like the band. And I was like, oh, cool. Are you here by yourself? And he said, no, my daughter's up there at the front with her friends.

And I brought her to the show. And I was like, that is a good dad. That is the kind of dad I want to be. So Neil King will be missed. Neil, I really got to know like 2011, 2012 when you were doing that primary. He's exactly like you described. He cared about politics and journalism and media. But he had a life beyond that he was wry and

cynical in a funny way and by the way as a younger reporter you always like idolize these older reporters he always took the time to be nice and complimentary of your reporting and like some older folks didn't do that out on the campaign trail i will never forget how kind he was while also being like a funny cynical guy that like you and i like to hang out with and get there's not a lot of reporters that like you tim would want to like go out and hang with neil was one of those guys i have his book everyone go order his book american ramble in memoriam of him just a fantastic guy neil king rest easy my friend peter hamby thanks for doing this let's do it again soon everybody else up next i got just a few quick thoughts on the olivia nutzi story

all right so if you missed it uh news broke that frequent podcast guest olivia nutzi was in what is reportedly a romantic but not physical relationship with RFK Jr. and is on leave with New York Magazine. That's a strange one. Many of you have asked my thoughts. A couple have been pretty nasty about it and should maybe step away from the computer. But it is an ethos of this podcast that I'm radically candid with you. And so when stuff like this happens, I'll tell you what I think, not hide from it. And here's the deal.

I have a personal relationship with Olivia. We're not divulging affair level friends, apparently, because I was as caught off guard as anyone. Like I said, it's definitely a strange situation. I'm still not exactly clear on the details on what that means. What I do know is that Olivia and I have a personal bond. We've been through some shit together. I also got a note from David Frum this morning.

David said that among all the younger journalists who knew their late daughter Miranda, Olivia was among the most attentive after she'd passed, drove to Toronto for the funeral, and her consideration meant a lot to them at a tough time. So people contain multitudes. Darren is two-dimensional, as they may seem online. My concern for Olivia right now is as a friend who's taken a lot of abuse and not about whatever kind of imaginary Twitter war people are in with her. As far as what that means is her status as a guest on this podcast, I just, I don't think that's as important as the other elements out there right now. I know in past episodes, she was candid and informative and enlightening and engaging exactly what I'm looking for in a guest on this podcast. But guests also need to be truthful.

And if it turns out that she wasn't practicing that, then we'll assess what happened. And we'll be transparent about it whenever the time comes that she's back to work. And hopefully there'll be a time that she's back to work because everybody gets second acts in this life. So that's all I got for you on that. I hope everybody has a very fulfilling weekend. Stay away from those porn message boards and we'll see you back here on Monday with Bill Crystal. Peace. Paid a seven year old hooker to make out with me Now the get high shack is just a memory Downloading porn with Dave-O Downloading porn with Dave-O

Put a latch on the door so mama don't know that I'm downloading porn with Dave-O Tried to buy a book but I came up short So I fucked a little waitress in exchange for a snort My girl's got a dick hanging out of her shorts Me and Eric in the bathroom with the weather report Downloading porn with Dave-O Downloading porn with Dave-O Put a latch on the door so mama don't know that I'm downloading porn with Dave-O Oh baby I know you love the good old days

Cruisin' on the Long Island Expressway I used to be dead but now I'm gay All I ever think about is drownin', drownin' Downloaded porn with Dave-O Downloaded porn with Dave-O Put a latch on the door so mama don't know That I'm downloaded porn with Dave-O. Downloaded porn with Dave-O. Put a latch on the door so mama don't know that I'm downloading porn with Dave-O. Ow! The Bulwark Podcast is produced by

Katie Cooper with audio engineering and editing by Jason Breff.