The Bulwark Podcast - Stuart Stevens: I think Joe Biden Has Been A Great President

Episode Date: June 26, 2024

So many of the people who worked around POTUS 44 think no one will ever be as good as Obama, but Stuart Stevens argues that Democrats need to make the case that Joe Biden is a great president. Meanwhile, Dems on Tuesday showed they are the one party holding their crazy people to account. Plus, Vance is too smart to be Trump's VP pick, more Republicans need to follow Kinzinger's example, and Ole Miss, college sports and civil rights. Tim Miller's show today. show notes: Stuart's latest book, "The Conspiracy to End America" Stuart's book, "The Last Season: A Father, a Son, and a Lifetime of College Football" Wright Thompson's piece on Ole Miss in 1962 Stuart's piece on calling Biden a great president 

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Like you were hiding behind a mask? BetterHelp online therapy is convenient, flexible, and can help you learn to be your authentic self so you can stop hiding. Because masks should be for Halloween fun, not for your emotions. Take off the mask with BetterHelp. Visit BetterHelp.com today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P dot com. hello and welcome to the bulldog podcast i'm your host tim miller i'm just delighted to be here with my old pal stewart stevens former republican strategist advisor at the lincoln project author of numerous books including his latest the conspiracy to end america and my favorite the last season a father son and a lifetime of college football we're going to end with books, including his latest, The Conspiracy to End America, and my favorite, The Last Season, A Father, Son, and a Lifetime of College Football. We're going to end with college football.

But Stu, we have a tendency, the two of us, when we get together, we get a little dour, a little bleak. So can we start with a happy news item we have this morning? Well, to me, the happy news item is I'm glad that Latimer won that race. We have a couple happy news items, but yeah, go ahead. I worked for Sharon against Netanyahu, and Sharon beat nethia who i'm not a nethia who guy but i am very much pro-israeli and i'm glad to see that happen so that's good news for me yeah that is good news and i want to talk a little bit more about that race and some of the primaries here i'm still in my parents basement for people watching on youtube so that we had some interesting

primaries here in colorado as well i want to get to those, but first our buddy, Bulwark contributor, Adam Kinzinger. We had an awesome little town hall last night with him for Bulwark founders. So if you want to be a founder, you can go to thebulwark.com and like click on the thing at the top of the screen there. And me and Kinzinger kind of got a little teary eyed talking about John McCain and Jesus and stuff. It was personal, but anyway, he made some news this morning and I want us to listen to it together. I'm Adam Kinzinger and I'm a proud conservative. I always have been. As a proud conservative, I've always put democracy and our constitution above all else. And it's because of my unwavering support for democracy that today, as a proud conservative, I'm endorsing Joe Biden for re-election. My entire life has been guided by the conviction that America is a beacon of freedom, liberty

and democracy. So while I certainly don't agree with President Biden on everything, and I never thought I'd be endorsing a Democrat for president, I know that he will always protect the very thing that makes America the best country in the world, our democracy. Donald Trump poses a direct threat to every fundamental American value. He doesn't care about our country. He doesn't care about you. He only cares about himself, and he'll hurt anyone or anything in pursuit of power.

We saw that when he tried to overturn an election that he knew he lost in 2020. He attacked the foundation of this nation, encouraging a violent mob of his supporters to march on the Capitol to prevent the peaceful transition of power. Now he's become even more dangerous. He's called for termination of the Constitution. He wants to be a dictator on day one. He actually said that. And he's continuing to stoke the flames of political violence.

There's too much at stake to sit on the sidelines. So to every American of every political party and those of none, I say now is not the time to watch quietly as Donald Trump threatens the future of America. Now's the time to unite behind Joe Biden and show Donald Trump off the stage once and for all. Thoughts, Stuart? Listen, I think that's what everybody who has said all this stuff about Donald Trump has to do. They have to endorse Joe Biden. Chris Christie has to endorse Joe Biden.

I hope that Mitt Romney endorses Joe Biden. It's just a logical choice. It doesn't really have anything to do about Biden, except that he is an alternative to Donald Trump and is in the American political mainstream. Why do you think there's been so few? I mean, I guess for people that don't know, you were Romney's top advisor. So on 2012, that's when we met. And so I guess I should at least note that. But like all these guys, I mean, you just named two of them, but there's a long list of people, all the Trump cabinet officials we could start naming, Esper and Mattis and McMaster and Kelly. Why do you think Kinzinger and, you know, Jeff Duncan in Georgia down there

are so lonely on this pretty obvious endorsement? Yeah, Jeff Duncan, give a shout out to the former Lieutenant Governor of Georgia. I worked for Johnny Isaacson, the Senator there, sadly died a few years ago. And Jeff was always one of these guys coming up who's clearly going to be a superstar. And he's someone who really has put his career on the line. I mean, this guy could have been future, may still be governor of Georgia. But, I mean, it was a real sacrifice for this guy. His young family put it out there. I'm just glad you mentioned the young thing, right? That's why Jeff Duncan does deserve some credit.

He is on the come up. A lot of these old farts that are just their next step is retirement that don't have the courage that Jeff Duncan did. What's the holdup there? I have no idea. I think that the problem with the unimaginable is it's hard to imagine. So maybe that's part of it, that we can't really believe that Trump is going to do these things.

But that seems foolish, given the fact that he did do what he said he was going to do before, or tried to do. I don't understand it. I just keep going back to my standard line that I'll never ask myself why 1930s Germany happened again. or tried to do. I don't understand it. You know, I just keep going back to my standard line that I'll never ask myself why 1930s Germany happened again. You're still talking to some folks in that world, though. I mean, what do you actually hear? An argument is the future of the Republican Party

is important because we need a center-right party in America. If you go out and endorse Joe Biden, you have negated any future impact you may have within the party. So the day after, you will not have any chance of being an effective persuader of where the party should go. I feel a lot better about that if you knew that Trump was going to lose. If there was a day after, if we were sure there was a day after. Yeah, if there was. Yeah. You're certain there was a day after. I like that you make that point because is a good argument i have my pushback to people that make that argument is always

well are you 100 sure there's a day after because if you're only 98 sure then like yeah you know in 2016 i went out about this time actually to some prominent republican conservatives in key states and tried to get them to run as favored sons just to peel off the vote from Trump. And I can say I had 100% failure rate. And it was like this. Look, Stuart, if we, the establishment, put our thumbs on the scale, when Trump loses, it's not going to be because he had terrible ideas, not because he's a racist, not because of the alt-right. It'll be because we rigged the elections. And we just have to let him lose and then rebuild. And I'm like, okay, great. But what if he doesn't lose? I probably wasn't very good at arguing the other because I didn't think he would win,

but I'm not going to do that again. It's funny you brought this up because it was where I was going next eight years ago. I don't know if you're going to remember this, but Brian Lizzo wrote a story about this very question. And it was, I went and found the date. It was June 13th, 2016 in the New Yorker. And the story was about kind of what these people that spoke out against Trump during the Republican primary that year are going to do. And he went and talked to all of the Republican elected officials and strategists who had spoken out and was trying to figure out, are you going to be for Hillary? Are you going to be for somebody else? Are you going to suck it up and vote for Trump? The story ends up writing, it's kind of quaint in a lot of ways. In some ways, it's very similar to now in that everyone ends up getting in line,

but there's a lot of gnashing of teeth. There's a lot of concerns about policy. There's a lot of, I hope Trump will come around. All that sort of stuff you don't get now from the candidates he interviews. But my memory from it was off the record. I was talking to Liz. He was like, man, my interview with you about whether or not people are going to fight this guy was the second most bleak of any of the interviews I did. And I was like, oh, really? Who is the first?

And he goes, Stuart Stevens. It wasn't even close. And he's like, Stuart, it just, he's like, you won't go on the record in the story because he's right now still trying to recruit all these guys to do what you just called for. But he's like, none of them are going to do it. And like, haven't seen anything like this in certain modern American political history. And I don't think we see anything like it in American history. And if Trump got hit by a bus tomorrow, it would only get marginally better. You have to beat these people. You have to beat them, beat them, beat them. And then finally, my best hope is that in 32, you could have a sane Republican nominee. 32. That's your last best hope?

That's my last best hope. Is Mitt still around at 32? He's going to outlive us all, man. There's some things that are unique about Trump. I do think that if Trump went away tomorrow, we got the hamburger from heaven. We would probably be safe on the conspiracy to end America. But like, there'd be a lot of really cruel, bigoted, nationalist, hateful, un-American ideology still in the party. But like the compulsion to end elections probably goes away with Trump. Do you agree with that? Or do you think it's deeper than that? I think it's deeper than that. I mean, I think, what is the intellectual framework of the Republican Party now? I mean, is it not still

the Heritage Foundation? And what does the Heritage Foundation want to do? You know, they basically want to end democracy. Who are the superstars? You know, who are the emergents? And who would be a positive voice for that? J.D. Vance? I don't think so. That's what gets me. Like, who's out there in a party that doesn't have a room for Cheney? I think it's an extremist movement, not a political party anymore. And the history of extremist movements is they only get more extreme until they burn themselves out. There wasn't like a moderate element of the Red Guard that emerged that reformed it. It just burned itself out. There wasn't like, you know, well,

the same people in the Khmer Rouge are going to get together and stop this. And I think that's where it is. And I don't see any forces within the party that would stop it. It feels like the flame is starting to burn out a little bit. I do feel like the intensity of MAGA is down this year. I go to these rallies and we drive around rural America and the signs. And it feels a little bit like their intensity is down. And I do think that Trump losing again, part of the reason why this was able to persist was the big lie, right? I mean, the main reason why this was able to persist was a big lie, right?

Because Trump didn't become a loser because he didn't lose, right? He got cheated. He really won. How many times can you play that game? I mean, some of these people go along forever, but isn't there some percentage of the MAGA crowd that starts to be like, all right, buddy, that's enough. I think the decline in enthusiasm is just because Trump's act is getting old. We're in season nine of the TV show. Yeah. The most powerful word in advertising is new. So Trump is old. I think that only sets

the stage for someone new, like a J.D. Vance, who would come out and be like a, you know, pass the torch to a new generation of it. I think you have to defeat the Senate candidates who go out there and try to have it both ways, like McCormick in Pennsylvania. He needs to lose. I think Payne is the only teacher. I just don't see any center of gravity in the party that could emerge and assert itself. I mean, all these people I helped elect just collapsed. I never thought I'd see it happen, but they did.

Not Mitt. Everybody except one that you elected. Not Mitt. No, Mitt stayed. but they did not mitt everybody except one that you elected not mitt no mitt mitt state i worked with liz very closely in debate prep for her dad you know i wrote a book about the bush campaign the big enchilada and i actually predicted in that book that liz would run for president she was that impressive i was kind of joking but not really this is oh four vp debate prep 2000 debate prep 2000 vp debate prep. Which she ran.

And let me tell you, she did an amazing job. Shockingly, there were a lot of people around Dick Cheney in 2000 who really thought a lot of themselves. And she had this deft way of dealing with them. Like explaining to Paul Wolford, you know, Paul, there's really not a foreign policy angle to welfare reform. There's really not. Thank you very much. Do you look back on that debate prep and think that maybe there were some hubristic signs that might have foretold some of the mistakes that might come in that foreign policy regime?

You know, it's amazing when you go back and look at those debates. The number one topic was what to do with the surplus. Is that right? The 2000 2000 yes go back the first question in the bush gore debate and the word terrorism was never mentioned in four debates three presidentials and the one vice president it never came up you go back and look at it it's like artifacts from the lost civilization the same if you go back and look at it, it's like artifacts from the lost civilization. The same if you go back and you read Michael Gerson's beautiful speech that he wrote for Bush's acceptance in the 2000 convention. You read that and you go like, oh man, this guy couldn't get 5% of the party right now. This is a loser. All this optimism, humility, charity. Oh man, that guy is just, he's going to get killed.

Do you think Dick Cheney will support Joe Biden? Does Joe Biden want Dick Cheney's support? Sure. Sure. I'd be shocked if he hadn't already done it. You know, in my fantasy world, I'd like to put together a roadshow of Liz Cheney, Mitt Romney, Chris Christie, and have them go around. I don't understand why Christie wouldn't do it. I mean, look, I worked for Christie in all his races. I loved the guy. I literally was standing in Atlanta Airport when he endorsed Trump in 16 and tears came to my eyes. It was like watching a friend overdose. And couldn't believe he continued to support him, even though Trump tried to kill him in debate prep with COVID. The guy you see now in the primaries, the guy who he always was. And it's just like, why do we have to go through this other stuff? But I guess in life, you have to meet people

where they are. It's better that he's there now. I don't think there's any chance he's going to support Trump, but he should actively be out there for Joe Biden. Unlike you, not only did I not work for Chris Christie, but I savaged him mercilessly and several times being on the opposite side of him. So I don't think Chris Christie gives a fuck about my opinion. But I also just think that, A, it's the right thing to do for the country. Everything Kinzinger said in his endorsement is correct. But even if you were just looking at it from a pure ambition standpoint, like even if you did not have a moral core and you're like, what is the right thing to do for my ambition? If Chris Christie came out and used the skills that we know that he has at the convention and then on the campaign trail all fall to savage

Donald Trump and to make a moral case against Donald Trump and to acknowledge that he has policy differences with Joe Biden, you know, he might come out of that. He's much more likely to be in Joe Biden's cabinet in the second term than he is in Donald Trump or J.D. Vance or, you know what I mean, some Republicans. So, like, even from a career standpoint, it would make sense. I agree. He's more likely to get on boards. He's more likely to have a regular gig on television. He's more likely, if he writes a book, this might actually sell, unlike his last book. So, yeah, I mean, I think if he looks in his heart and asks what's best for me, that would coincide with what's best for the country. I hope he does.

I mean, I haven't talked to Chris in a long time, but I think he should. Hope he does. This is an ad by BetterHelp Online Therapy. October's the season for wearing masks and costumes, but some of us feel like we wear a mask and hide more often than we want to, at work, in social settings, around our family. Therapy can help you learn to accept all parts of yourself, so you can stop hiding and take off the mask. Because masks should be for Halloween fun, not for your emotions. Whether you're navigating workplace stresses, complex

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Your Toronto apartment should be safe and well-maintained. If it isn't, and your landlord isn't responding to maintenance requests, RentSafeTO can help. Learn more at toronto.ca slash rentsafeTO. and then let's talk about what Donald Trump has out of him. Yeah, you know, Beth Meyers ran the VP vetting, and it was extraordinarily discreet, extraordinarily buttoned down. It was just unspoken that you didn't ask about it. You know, my one experience in this is in 2000, when Bush was looking for a running mate,

he and I and Mark McKinnon were out in Crawford in the summer, so it was like 120 degrees, and we were runningon, we were out in Crawford in the summer. So it was like 120 degrees and we were running and we're there for debate prep. And I wanted to push Tom Ridge as his running mate. Yes. So I said to him, as we're jogging along there, you know, dying, I said, so governor, would it be appropriate if I talked to you about who's going to be vice president? And he looks at me and says, why the fuck would I care what you say? And to which Mark McKinnon fell down laughing. And later he said to me, he goes, look, Stevens, let me give you some advice, man.

You know, when a guy's getting married, wait until he asks you what you think of the chick before you tell him. Yeah, that's not bad advice, man. That's not bad advice. That's only good advice, though, if the spouse is not toxic or you know some secrets about the spouse. I don't know. So in the Romney case, he never came to me and said, who do you think I should select as vice president? I think he looked at it very much as who he would like to serve as president with and have a vice president. I think he looked at it in a very nonpolitical way.

And there's a lot of data to back that up, that it doesn't matter who's vice president. So you might as well do that. You know, he picked Paul Ryan. That's who he wanted. And that was it. I mean, it was all done in a dignified way. He didn't have this roadshow of dragging people in and out. You know, I was in the room when he called the people who had been named who weren't going to be, and he was incredibly thankful and

respectful. So, I mean, those were sane times. What's your handicapping of what, I mean, God forbid we have to get inside this guy's brain, but what do you think? Well, my track record of being right on Trump is pretty short, but I would not be surprised if all these three names are being floated out there that his choice isn't going to be among those three. The one I think, God forbid, you know, give advice to help Trump. But I mean, I think J.D. Vance would help him the most.

Really? Why do you say that? Because I would have thought Marco. I think J.D. Vance is a bigger figure than Marco. Marco is just such a shattered human being. And there wasn't much there to shatter to begin with. So Vance is smarter.

He is more articulate. He will say anything and is more desperate. There's some weird internal dynamic inside J.D. Vance that makes him such a desperate, despicable figure, and that's all very useful to Trump. And Ohio doesn't hurt. I doubt he'll pick Vance because he's a lot smarter than him. The one test here is, is someone going to write an article that the ticket should have been reversed? And whoever would qualify to be written about like that will never be Donald Trump's running mate. Yeah, there's a related thing to that. And, you know, again, who knows what possibly gets inside his lizard brain at the last second to make a decision.

So maybe he does this anyway. But to me, the question is, who will go along with my attempt to stay in power if necessary in 2028 is number one. And who can I be sure will not try to kick me off the stage at the last minute and i worry a little bit about vance and ruby on both those points which is kind of why i'm like i you don't kick either of them because it's like you get into 2027 you get into winter of it's christmas 2020 you know and it's like all right it's me i'm next right and you know then you start to not give trump the the cover that he needs he needs somebody to give him cover no matter what maybe he'll pick vivek on the show me vivek would do that do whatever

i think vivek got a little too weird with the 9-11 conspiracy theory trump like is like one of these guys who has a drinking problem that's, if you have one more drink a night than me, then you got a problem. Trump's like, I'm the outer edge of crazy that is acceptable. If you go a little bit over the line from me, that's too crazy. And I think Vivek might have stepped over the line. What about the debate side of things? I guess you never debate prepped against Trump, but you've done several debate preps. So what would be your advice if Ron Klain called you after listening to this podcast, which I'm sure he's doing because they're not busy at all at Camp David right now? My theory of debate prep is that you have to go in with a very specific strategy. And you have to go through a process and outline what your goals are. And there should be two to

four goals that you're going to try to accomplish in that debate. And devise a strategy to get those points out. And if you do that, it greatly reduces chances of debate will be a disaster. The other rule is the most aggressive candidate usually wins the debate. There's a couple of exceptions, but mostly. If I was advising the president, I would have him attack from the get-go. Whatever the first question was, I would say, I'll answer that question. First, I got something to say to Donald Trump. Donald Trump, you're a disgrace. You're a convicted felon.

You should not be in the Oval Office, much less elected to the Oval Office. This is not what America is about. Okay, I'll answer the question. Hit him upside the head from the very beginning. And I wouldn't go into this with, like, I need to appear question. Hit him upside the head from the very beginning. And I wouldn't go into this with like, I need to appear presidential. I would try to get him to walk onto the stage that one of us is going to walk off the stage alive. And that's how it's going to be. This is a cage map. And don't worry about alienating Trump voters. They hate you. You're right. He's wrong. Go after him. So that's the mindset that I would go at. So in 2012, famously, you know, Mitt bested

Obama in the very first debate. And there's a long tradition of this, of sitting presidents doing poorly in the first debate. But in part, I think because you get to, well, you're a little bit in the White House bubble. And so you're not kind of used to sparring, one. And two, you're very defensive of yourself, of your record, and you spend too much time caring about that than about winning the debate. What was your experience there, and were there any lessons from that? I think that if you spend three years, you walk in a room, they play Hails of the Chief, and people are nice to you. And then you get out on stage, and somebody's out there ripping your face off, saying, you're wrong. No, you're wrong, you're wrong, you're wrong. I think that's a shocking experience. So I think that's an easy trap to fall into. Bush fell into it in his first debate with Kerry. It was not a great debate for him. Obama had a lousy debate. Now, look, I'm of the

opinion that the Biden campaign is smart. They're seasoned. They have this quality I think that's very rare in politics, which is very important, which is patience. So I think they will prep him well, and I think that they'll prepare him for that. You know, I think Biden, if you look at his performance against Paul Ryan, he went in against Paul Ryan after the not great Obama debate to dominate Paul Ryan. That was his thing. Just be all over the guy. And it was particularly effective with Paul Ryan because Paul is very much a policy person and wanted to make these very sophisticated points about policy. And Biden just like crushed him.

It was like a pancake block. And I think he needs to try to go into that same mentality that he had then with Trump. That was probably the most effusive praise of Joe Biden's campaign team that we've heard on this podcast or anywhere. So talk a little bit more about that. And I think that there's a lot of consternation that they're too patient, that it's too patient to the point of like, you know, we want people with a bloody shirt in their teeth and they're not giving it to us. First, let's go back to 20. They defeated incumbent president. So just a little, you know, nerd moment here. So after Watergate, we instigate federal funding for nominees. So both nominees got

the same amount of money for the general election. Literally, when you gave your acceptance speech, you walked off stage. There was somebody there from the Treasury Department. They'd have a check. It was around $81, $82 million. Literally? Not literally. Literally, yes. Like there was literally a Treasury Department person at the convention? Yes.

Yes, and we were always like, can you wire this? No, we do checks. And then you charter a plane to fly to have it deposited the next morning. So that did, among other things, level the playing field. So Carter lost under that system and Bush lost under that system. So for the first time in 2012, you had two candidates who weren't in the federal funding system and then come up president one or on the loss. Second time you've had since it was 20 and Trump lost. So it's a fair question

to ask when is the last time an incumbent president lost who was not in the federal funding system? The answer to that is Herbert Hoover. And he had a bad year. So I think, you know, the Biden campaign, I think ran a brilliant campaign in 20. They reinvented the convention, which having sat in those rooms planning conventions a lot, it's really hard to have like all good nights and they had all good nights. If I was inside the Biden campaign now, my biggest concern would be peaking too early because I think that there is a comeback story to be written about Joe Biden. But if he goes up and then he comes back down, that's a harder, second comeback is a harder story to write. So I would have this on a glide path so that you don't think you're going to be ahead until the convention.

And then after the convention, you just pour it on. The June 27th debate makes that a little tougher. It does. It does. It's a very interesting choice. I wasn't in the room when they decided it as to why they went for it. I mean, on one hand, you could say, okay, if it's a disaster, it gives you time to recover. On the other, it's sort of a wake-up call for your candidate to get in a campaign mode, which is always a question. If you go back to Bush versus Clinton, it was always, he was going to be,

he wanted to be president. And these guys do have day jobs. Poppy Bush just cared too much about governing. That was the problem in those days. And couldn't imagine losing to Bill Clinton. Yeah, that's true. Maybe a little hubris. I think the Biden campaign is doing a good job.

You have to be inside these campaigns to know what they're really like. And I'm not inside a campaign. I don't know what it's really like. But I think that they know how to run a campaign. I think there is a logic to their campaign. And I don't see how Trump is adding voters. So if you just go back to the base level, right? Trump lost by what, 7 million voters. He needs new customers. What is he doing to get new customers? How many Biden 20, Trump 24 voters are there? I don't think a lot. I'm worried about working class men being that voter. Look, I mean, Trump's best group are non-college educated white men. So they used to be 60% of the electorate. Now it's 39% and declining. So here's a stat that always blows my mind. 1980, Ronald Reagan wins the sweeping landslide with 55% of the white vote.

2008, John McCain loses a not particularly close race with 58% of the white vote. And that, to me, sort of says it all. This is what we're about in the Lincoln Project, trying to get those voters that came over to Biden in 20, after either not voting or being for Clinton, just enough of them, in 16, to stick with Biden. One of my frustrations with the Democratic Party is I don't understand why they're not out there calling Joe Biden a great president. I wrote a piece about that. I was going to ask you about that.

I'm just going to read it because I have the quote right here. A plea to my Democratic friends. It's time to start calling Joe Biden a great president. Not a good one. Not a better choice than Trump. Biden's historically great president. Say it with passion, backed by the conviction that it's true. I may have a different take, but explain that.

Go ahead. Well, I mean, what is it that's bothering people the most about Biden? Is it the record stock market or the record low unemployment? He saved the world by putting together this coalition to oppose Russia. You have record achievements like the Infrastructure Act. If you had been a baby born the first week that Republicans had an infrastructure week, you'd be almost entering the first grade before Democrats passed it. Logic Public Works project in history. You have real achievements that affect people's lives, like insulin now, inhalers.

This is like real stuff. Student loan stuff is important to people who have student loans. There's like tangible, good stuff. And what always gets me, Tim to him so imagine working in the Biden White House in congressional liaison and we've all had friends that did it so you go over in the hill and you walk into a Republican's office now you're used to like okay I hate your guy I think he's wrong you go I get it I get it but look let's try to work something out you walk into that office now and they don't think you're working for a legal president how do you begin a

conversation you say okay i know look i know you think my guy stole the white house but what about that infrastructure act baby with polling if i was doing polling which i kind of am i would have a screener do you think joe biden's illegally elected president if you say no i would just continue the poll what possible good is there in polling these people and that also does mess with like the numbers on everything else right yeah the same people also say the economy's terrible we're in a recession it's the worst economy since 1950 these are all the same so that spikes those numbers so it's hard to figure out what normal if any normal people think that but um this is my counter maybe it's a chicken and egg thing maybe if democrats said biden was great more people think he was

great not very many people think he's been great and. And to me, isn't it more compelling to say Joe Biden's been pretty good and the other guy is an existential risk. You don't know what's going to happen. The downside risk could be anything. Last time the Capitol was stormed when he laughed at a million people died of COVID. And isn't that good enough? Isn't that a pitch that's maybe more, what's wrong with that? I don't know. I mean, when cars are introduced, they don't ever say good enough. Haven't really changed anything from last year. It's always like- Toyota Camry does, I think.

Toyota Camry 2024. It'll get you there. They haven't screwed this up, trust me. I think if campaigns have to, if they want voters to care about something, they have to prove that they care about it. And I think that there is this Obama hangover. And you see it with a lot of Obama people, which I get. Obama will forever be their one true love.

There will never be anything as pure, as good, as special as that moment. And so Joe Biden is always going to be like the third or fourth wife. And I think that the party shouldn't negotiate from he's a pretty good, I think they ought to negotiate from he's great. And it's important to go out and say this stuff. It is a problem that Biden has that he doesn't get enough credit. And I think that the party should be about trying to change that. And is everybody going to agree? No, but I think you have to begin somewhere.

And if nobody's saying it, then, Lord, where does that put you? We can continue to hash it out. And things probably differ for different people, right? And different groups have different obligations. And the DNC probably should be listening to Stuart Stevens and Adam Kinzinger and, God willing, Liz Cheney and Mitt Romney and Chris Christie. Maybe she would listen to me because it gives them a little bit more credibility.

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Jamal Bowman didn't vote for infrastructure. Jamal Bowman denied that Hamas committed rapes on 10-7. He dabbled in 9-11 conspiracies. I mean, he pulled the fire alarm and pretended like he thought it was the door handle. He's an idiot. He gets primaried by a center-left, probably too conservative for the district, frankly, county executive George Latimer in New York. Across the country, in Colorado, where I am right now, Lauren Boebert, after trying to tug on somebody's hog inside Beetlejuice the musical, changes districts to run in congressional district four. And the Republicans cannot

field a candidate to come within 30 points of her. They have a broad field, some of them normal, some of them crazy, all of them get crushed. And similarly, I should mention, in South Carolina, the three Republican women who showed a little bit of courage, rare Republican courage to speak out against their draconian abortion bill. And they're not pro-choice. They're just like, we need reasonable restrictions. All three of them were defeated in primaries by crazy migrant people. What does this tell you about the parties, right? It's that the voters in the Democratic side are holding their crazy people accountable and the voters on the Republican side are not, are doing the opposite. And I think that's a really important contrast that a lot of centrists

and a lot of contrarian centrist guys and stuff, like when they're like, I'm really worried about the squad. I feel like they miss that. And I think it's an important contrast last night. Yeah, I think that's a really good point. Parties in our system should have a circuit breaker function. And the Republican Party never pulled a circuit breaker on Trump. And, you know, for those of us that spent decades pointing out flaws in the Democratic Party, there's a little bit of hubris to come out and sadness to say they are the only pro-democracy political party in America. Yeah. only pro-democracy political party in America. So the rest of the stuff doesn't matter. I go back, you know, Joe Trippi's involved in the Lincoln Project, too. Joe and I used to go against each other. If you go back and look at what we used to make ads about, it was like, should the capital gains actually be 34% or 28%?

I mean, it's like arguing about your cholesterol count. Prescription, Medicare prices, prescription drug too expensive. It's just, you know, I mean, that's the way politics should be. But now, none of that matters. And I think there is a much saner center element to the Democratic Party than there is to the Republican Party, which goes to my point that the Republican Party is an extremist movement, an extremist twin. I mean, there's only one example. Because it gets in the mindsets of the actual normal Congress people. extremist movement and extremist win. I mean, there's only one example. I think because it

gets in the mindsets of the actual normal Congress people and not to give any excuses to the Brian Fitzpatrick's or the, you know, all of your old friends that you elected or in the Senate, but like these guys get in their head that they can't compromise with the Democrats. They can't break from Trump or else they'll get primaried. Right. And so it impacts their behavior. Now they shouldn't, they should have a spine, but it does. And on the democratic side, like that's not the case. Like there's no examples of Democrats getting primaried and losing because they cut a deal with Republicans on immigration. It's the opposite. Those members are like, okay, well, if I dabble too much in this pro Hamas stuff, maybe I'll get challenged. Like that's how this shit should work that's how this shit should work

i couldn't agree more i would have been out there making ads with apex it would have been a good client too they spent like 14 million dollars are you still doing ads i thought you were retired i mean like no i'm only the lincoln project you're not taking on clients all right you never know we got people listening no but if you run, Tim, I'm open to it. I'm not running for anything. For your race. Okay. I appreciate that you listen

to the podcast sometimes because I hear from you, but if you listened every day, you'd know that my career is over. And so I'm with you, though. I say that to my friends who are more responsible. I'll do favors for friends,

but I'm retired. Let's do a little football. The book that you wrote was just so beautiful, man. I've given it to a couple of my Ole Miss friends as gifts. It was about you and your dad going to every football game for Ole Miss in one year. This might be the best Ole Miss season in memory, potentially.

Am I jinxing you right now? It's either going to be the best or the worst because they have assembled arguably the most talented team in football. Ole Miss really got the whole NIL thing right. They went out and they brought a guy to run it, an Ole Miss football player graduate who was a top CAA sports agent, and he's done an amazing job putting this together. And they didn't try to pretend that this wasn't the free market.

They embraced that it was the free market, that this is free agency. And they went out and they bought a great team. Incredible depth. I think it must be very weird to be in a locker room now where you've been there three years waiting your time to start, and then they bring in somebody else. And first day of practice, they show up in a Lamborghini. That's literally happening. Look at the parking lots now. They're extraordinary. Deserved, right? Deserved. They're the ones you're paying for the tickets,

maybe getting the money, not the boosters. I am all for it. I'm all for it. Though, I think Charlie Baker, my old friend and client, is going to bring some order to that. The thing about sports is it will always break our hearts, but at least it reminds us that we have one. And

I would love nothing more than Ole Miss to have this perfect magic season. It's possible, but I stand ready to have my heart broken. Are you still able to have the joy and the pain? Or is the politics of it and the fucking Ole Miss people being mega and your dad

being gone like is there any melancholy no no no I I have zero melancholy about this you know I think Ole Miss is actually sort of a moving story when you think about it so the last time Ole Miss won the national championships 1962 the year that Meredith integrated Ole Miss in which they had arguably the last battle of the civil war on the Ole Miss campus, right there at the Grove. As I said, beautiful Wright Thompson article about this. I'll put in the show notes. I'm trying to have Wright on the pod. He's got a new book coming out on the pod soon. He's so good. Beautiful writer. He had 30,000 troops in a little town of Oxford. And now,

when you go to home games, they have the tradition where the bus pulls up in front of the Grove and the team walks through the Grove to the stadium. And now that team looks a lot like Mississippi. And I find that really moving. York passed the Confederate Memorial, which is still there. And I think it really shows that the impact of college sports and civil rights and civil rights and college sports is a fascinating subject to me. I mean, it was really the first time that blacks and whites in the South cheered for each other. And they say rugby in South Africa played a similar role. And, you know, it's a fascinating story.

You know, when I worked for Lin Swan, when he ran for governor of Pennsylvania, and he said, you know, I was like the second generation of black athletes to be recruited. For me, look, I grew up around Oakland. I took ballet lessons. It was not a big deal. I was famous when I was 14. But these other guys, he says, I'm really interested in these other guys. So if you go back to like the some black females because otherwise they're going to be going out with like, you know, white sorority girls. So, you know, you start out wanting like a running back, you end up with, you know, a black sorority.

It's sort of the law of unintended consequences. And I think that it's been an extraordinarily positive force in the South. Oh, God, Stuart, that was way darker than I thought it was. It took me a second for that to sink in, why they needed black girls. But, okay, anyway. Well, I mean, can you imagine walking around the University of Alabama campus with a white girlfriend if you're a black player in 1968? Yeah.

You know, would have been a long walk. There's a fascinating book called Rising Tide. There's a lot of books called Rising Tide. It analyzes the impact of Joe Namath on the University of Alabama's racial segregation history. And its premise makes a lot of sense to me. Joe Namath came from this small integrated steel mill town. He was the coolest guy on campus by far. It was not cool to be racist around Joe Namath. And that had a ripple effect throughout the campus. He had a picture of his high school prom up on his wall, and there was a black student, female student in there. And it got out like Joe had a black girlfriend. Actually, it wasn't his girlfriend. She just happened to be in the picture. But I think this makes a lot of sense. And you look at the difference between that and Ole Miss. To me, it's really fascinating and very hopeful. I like a little bit of hope. And I just like picking your brain. I could just come to Baton Rouge for the game this year. Come to Baton Rouge. I want to hang out with you.

The Ole Miss-LSU game is probably going to be the game of the year. You're going to probably have both those teams undefeated. Okay, well, now you're jinxing LSU, but go ahead. There's a history of Ole Miss. The last two times that Ole Miss went down to LSU undefeated, they left defeated. It's at night in Tiger Stadium at night. Some of the formative experiences of my youth.

I was there the night that Billy Cannon ran back to Pond on Halloween. No way. Yes, yes. You were there on Halloween? It was terrifying. So it should be an extraordinary game. If I was going to go to one Ole Miss game, I wouldn't go to Ole Miss, though the Ole Miss-Georgia game is going to be something, hopefully. I would go to Tiger Stegum.

Well, I hope you do. If not, we'll figure out a way to have a whiskey somewhere else. Stuart Stevens, if everybody had acted like you the last eight years, we'd be in a lot better place. I appreciate you so much. I'm grateful to you. And let's talk again soon. Thanks for having me, buddy. All right. We'll see y'all back here tomorrow. It is debate day. We'll have somebody who knows Joe Biden pretty well chatting about what his plans are. We'll see y'all then. Peace. We walk the line, your day is the number, so am I. Time is piling up, we struggle and we stray, but our old box did nowhere to escape City's just a jungle

More games to play Trapped in the heart of it Trying to get away I was raised in the country I've been working in the town I've been in trouble ever since I set my suitcase down Got nothing for you, I had nothing before Don't even have anything for myself anymore

Sky's full of fire, paint pouring down Nothing you can sell me past the Euro-Prel All my powers of expression, I thought soose of blood Could never do you justice in reason or rhyme The Borg Podcast is produced by Katie Cooper with audio engineering and editing by Jason Brown.