The Daily Beast Podcast - Is Agent Margaritaville On MySpace For Fascists?

Episode Date: June 26, 2020

Digital soldiers. Agenta Margaritaville. Laura Ingraham. What do all these things have in common? They’re all part of the world of QAnon, where up is down, down is right and the end goal is seeing anyone who Tweets negatively about Trump get shipped off to Guantanamo Bay. In Episode 20 of The New Abnormal, Rick Wilson and Molly Jong-Fast talk to Daily Beast reporter Will Sommer about the craziest Q conspiracies (“The first level of Q Anon is sort of a step beyond Sean Hannity.”) Then the two chat with #Resistance superstar Congressman Ted Lieu (D-CA) about Trump’s racist “Kung Flu” comment, Devin Nunes’ reading level and why Congress won’t just impeach Bill Barr. (“What he's done ranges from the unethical to the potentially criminal.”) Plus! Rick and Molly discuss the MySpace for fascists, Louie Gohmert and how Florida is “killing it,” literally. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi folks, it's Rick Wilson, and welcome to The Daily Beast's The New Abnormal. Hi, I'm Molly Jongfast, a left-wing pundit and editor-at-large at the Daily Beast. I'm also an editor at The Daily Beast, a former Republican political strategist, best-selling author, and full-time troublemaker. We're here to have fun, sharp conversations with some of the smartest people in media, politics, business, and science that help make what's happening in the country and the world clearer. I'll try to keep Rick to the minimum number of F-bombs and try to keep RR. kids, pets, and other wildlife sounds from invading our respective bunkers. So, Rick, what did you do to Brad Parzcal? This time?

Yeah. Other than pointing out the fact that he's burned through a quarter of a billion dollars of Donald Trump's campaign money and his numbers are slipping desperately. I was not the one who infected him with the vid. Does he have the vid? I don't know if he has the vid or not, but he is currently quarantining and in isolation. I think he basically wanted to go home and spend more time with his humiliation. Or his Ferrari.

Or his Ferrari. I mean, you can't get the COVID from the Ferrari, from what I understand. He could also socially distance on his $400,000 boat. But Brad Pascal is off the campaign trail, not visiting the White House because he was exposed to people who had attended the Tulsa COVID-Palooza. But he wasn't in Tulsa. No, he was not in Tulsa, but all the campaign staffers that came back to the campaign may have exposed him to the vid.

Grand Moth Pascal has retreated to his death star to hide out from having the vid after a failed raid on Tulsa by the Imperial Trump forces. My question for you about Tulsa is Trump was on that flight home and that walk of shame with him with the tie untied at 2 o'clock in the morning. Let me tell you, that is a guy who looks like he's waking up after a long bender. He realized his credit cards are maxed out. He realized his phone's got 800 missed calls from his wife. He's got a business card in his pocket from a girl named Destiny Rainbow.

And he's missing a kidney. And he's missing a kidney, right? There's nothing good about that expression. He just looks so beat down that if I had normal human emotions, I would have felt even some pity for him. My favorite thing was the pink makeup on his white collar. That high-res pick, I wish I'd had high-risk video of that for my ad that we made because I saw that and I was just like, he lays it on thick. He does not look good. That is some heavy duty.

My favorite moment from that whole news cycle was Junior's Instagram story. Bad Had Dad was just fine. You know, Junior, the heir apparent, is really working hard lately to win Daddy's love. Did you say that interview he did with Trump? Not only did I see it, I wrote about it. Harry Siegel, our editor. Oh, that's right. You did write about that.

And I were watching it. It's so sad. Daddy love me. Daddy love me. Oh, my God. He's such an angry, mean, evil individual. But then there is this tragic, like Shakespearean undertone there. How sharper than a serpent's tooth than to have a thankless Trump.

It's so ugly. And I do think you're going to see more of that because they're just getting more and more pissed off at each other. And as Trump gets further down in the polls, he is going to slide further into that sense of, I can't trust anyone. He's already bunker curious again. Let's put it that way. You know what's going to make him more insane this week? Did you hear about the Mary Trump ruling just now? Let's talk about the Mary Trump lawsuit.

So on Thursday, while we're taping this, a judge in New York has ruled that the Mary Trump book can proceed. And of course, their super attorney on representing Mary Trump, Ted Boutros, I think, is probably anticipating that Trump is going to file some sort of objection to this, which is just bait. I think that the book is coming out. And I say this with all respect for the book, Trumpers won't believe a word of it, but it's just going to continue to lock in that shittiness about him. Because apparently the rumor in publishing world, as you've heard, is that this book is very much about how cruel and shitty he was about their entire family, about how Donald Trump Trump's dysfunction stems way back from his mommy and daddy not loving him.

Of course, the iteration of Don Jr. trying to get his daddy to love him probably plays out from some deeper wound that hit Trump himself from his parents. It's a circle of life. Wait, we're singing now. We don't have to. No, I love it. I love it. I just need a warning. Trust me, there won't be a lot of, like, actual singing on this show, Molly.

My question for you is, with the Trump family stuff, it doesn't even matter because it will just make him so. No, not. Look, the idea that the book is going to come out, no matter what he does, and even if he wins whatever NDA battle he wins and keeps the money, just like the Bolton book, when the facts come out, it drives him crazy. And it constantly sets him off on a tangent. I mean, he's spent a day and a half chewing the furniture over the Bolton this week. Even though Bolton may end up not making any money off the thing. Trump, he's also sick to his pet interior minister, Bill Bar to try to put John Bolton in jail. Who is more Trump's lawyer? Bill Barr or Rudy Giuliani? Oh, Rudy's been reduced. used to like the slip and fall injury stuff at the law firm practice of bar Giuliani. He's been marginalized completely. It's why he has plenty of time for his video podcast. Common sense with Rudy Giuliani and other non-sequiters. And also to get his fingers covered in ink from his very expensive fountain pens.

As a guy who spent a lot of years in school writing with a fountain pen, I don't miss them. I love using one once in a while. How old are you, Rick Wilson? I'm 56 years old, thank you very much. They had fountain pens in school? Oh, no. Try this. At the school I went to for elementary school, we had fountain pens with inkwells.

I kid you not. You had to dip your pen into the inkwell. I kid you not. What was Florida like? I come from a stricter upbringing than you might expect. Whereas Don Jr. grew up, occasionally looking at dad's Sharpie collection, thinking, someday I will draw hurricanes. Can we just talk about John Bolton for a minute?

The tragedy of John Bolton, a play in three acts. I've never seen anyone who is less likable on television than John Bolton. John Bolton is a man who has never relied on his charisma, as you might imagine. Yes. If John Bolton were on the dating scene, it would be like, I will now write you a policy paper about why you are wrong about Iran. I also like walks on the beach, dogs and home cooking. As a Jew, I love Wolf Blitzer. Don't tell anyone, but that's my secret.

You know, he's son of Holocaust survivors. He's like, my man, whenever I get the chance to secretly watch my Wolf Blitzer, and I watched him on Wolf, and he was just such an asshole. I couldn't even believe it. Look, I think the fact that Trumpism leads to asshole adjacency on the best case scenario is now a pretty much scientifically established fact. There's a bad people in a shitty world. Speaking of bad people in a shitty world,

did you happen to catch any of the House Judiciary Committee yesterday? I only got to see my favorite congressman, the dumbest, the entire Congress, won Lewis Gomert. You mean Louis Gomer, the Jim Hoft of Congress? That would be Lewis Bowler, Gomer, Jr. Say that shit three times fast. Yes, the dumbest man in Congress, the Jim Hofft of the Republican Party. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Imagine how steep that competition is for the dumbest Republican congressman.

Well, look, Devin Nunes always throws the curve to the right on that. He's just like, weights it in there. to talk some more about Devin later, you know. Yes, I do. We're going to finally answer the question who broke Devin Nunes's brain. We'll never get that answer, Molly. That's like chicken or egg. That's like how wide is the universe? The mystery of Devin's brain. I would have solved it if it wasn't for you meddling kids and George Soros. That's right. It's always George Soros. It always is George Soros. Hey, so Louis yesterday, we've talked about this before, but like the essence of Trumpism is performative dickishness. And when Don Ayers, a former Justice Department official who served

Republicans and Democrats was saying Bill Barr is the most corrupt scumbagged walk on two legs. I'm summarizing it for you. Louis Gohmert was up there making grunting noises and banging his little own mini gavel to try to stop him from completing a statement. And it's just the whole hearing on Wednesday just really troubled me because not one of these guys ever gets to say again, hey, I believe in the rule of law. Because they're up there like, what about the lovers page and struck? What about the deep state? And it's just like, oh, shut the fuck up. For God's sakes. Give an arrest. Face the real thing

that you're looking at in front of your eyes, which is that Bill Barr is the minister of the interior for the Trump authoritarian regime, and he is doing things that if Eric Holder had done these things, he would have been impeached 72 times by now.

Well, I was thinking about Trump. Think about if Barack Obama had killed 125,000 people. There would be a gibbet erected outside the White House. They would be screaming for his head, and I don't mean metaphorically,

they would have lost their goddamn, minds about 50 times over. Also, while we were taping this, the president of the United States just tweeted, Black Lives Matter leader states, quote, if U.S. doesn't give us what we want, then we will burn down this system and replace it. This is treason, sedition, insurrection. There's no way he knows what sedition means. I'd like to pay extra for sedition. I feel like that's Jared with the phone. I understand that Trixie is a specialist. Why is Alec Baldwin on our podcast? I'm telling you, I will get to the point where the Trump

imitation works. If there had been podcasting then or YouTube videos then or even anything else, there was a time when my Bill Clinton was quite excellent. Molly, I think you know how beautiful you are. I just don't think anybody has ever shown you before. It's so wrong on so many levels. Oh, I know how to be wrong on so many levels. Oh, Jesus. Honestly, his Bill Clinton is pretty good. It's better than your Trump. Oh, it's by far better than my Trump. I mean, like, Miles better than my Trump. You've had practice. Time to practice. Hey, so, Molly, have you twexited? I don't know what you're talking about.

You don't know about twexit? No, it sounds dirty. Well, it's not like twerking. So, twexiting is the exit from Twitter, much like Brexit. What? Much like the imaginary people's movement of Brexit. Yeah, there's a big movement among folks on the Trump right to leave the platform to a new website. It's not actually new.

It's been around a while called Parlor, P-A-R-L-E-R. Okay. The queue is silent. The transition to parlor is because apparently none of their... old free speech will be censored on the parlor app. If only they were censored more on Twitter. Well, there are all sorts of these people who are the various Trump blue checks are migrating over there. Bingo Bongo has decided he will be going to parlor.

I'm pretty sure it's Bingo von Bongo. I believe it's Bingo von Vling dango dingo. Yes, that was his maiden name. You know, I told you we were not going to talk about that. I don't want to go into the operations details. Anyway, the Twexit, all the little blue checkers. and a lot of the Washington Examiner type kids are huffing around saying, I'm going to parlor, find me on parlor, I'm transitioning to parlor.

But none of them are deleting their Twitter accounts, intriguingly enough. I would like them. Because they know they're going into a Trump media box canyon where they will talk to themselves, and half of Trumpism is trying to trigger the lips, and no one's going over there. I'm not going over there. It's my space for fascists, right? It's authoritarian Zanga. Although when it first popped up, I instantly formed an account there and then signed out because I didn't want somebody to squat my name just in case.

I haven't logged in there. I think I did that like sometime in early 19 maybe. But I'm sure there are a dozen rants on there like, Cuck-Shill, Rhino, Rick Wilson. You're not going to go to parlor? My kids won't let me go to TikTok. My kids who are like relatively uninterested in my actions were like sat me down and did an intervention. and we're like, it will ruin our lives. You have to promise me that after we finish the show,

you're going to go to your kids, serious straight face, as serious straight face as you can and say, guys, I'm doing a TikTok channel after all. It's going to be called Molly's Dance Party, and all I'm going to do is interpretive dancing. They were like weeping. Like, one of them was actually weeping and was like, this will ruin our lives.

And I was like, stop making me want to do it. Hey, folks, we're delighted to have Will Summer with us today. One of the Daily Beast's intrepid reporters covering the mysterious esoteric order of QAnon. Will, I have to ask you, we have to lead right off. Have you taken your oath? Yes, the Q&OND digital soldiers oath. I'm still thinking about it.

Can you tell us the digital soldier backstory here a little bit? Because I am versed in Internet, and I have no idea what you're talking about. So back when Michael Flynn was still in the government, he said something, they were talking about basically like cyber war operations against Iran. And he said something like, you know, we've got these digital soldiers. And so a couple years later, Michael Flynn becomes this hero to like your Trump internet folks. And they become convinced that digital soldiers was a reference to basically people who sit on Twitter and post about Trump all day. So they identify as digital soldiers.

I'm a digital soldier. Shit posting edge lord division. Why do they need to take an oath? It's very strange. I mean, they certainly don't. But the trend this week, as you mentioned, is people posting videos of themselves taking oaths as digital soldiers. and sort of the service of Michael Flynn and QAnon. It's very weird, but, you know, I think it kind of plays into a lot of what you see,

both on Q&on and broader kind of like Trump Internet culture, which is something that makes people feel like they're a part of something and dramatizes their lives. It is, of course, the oath of service that all Americans take either entering the military or service in government, but it ends, of course, with where we go when we go all. I think the Q&ONV version actually had some mistakes in it. I'm going to read my version of the Q&O, what it should have said. I solemnly swear or affirm that I will support and defend the absurdity, of the Q&on conspiracy theory against all enemies, realistic and imaginary, and that I will bear

full faith and allegiance to the cray, and that I take this obligation freely without mental capacity or ability to evade, and that I will well and faithfully discharge the office of the duties of the office to which I am about to enter. So help me Zinu, where we go one, we go all. So does Q&OND seem more unhinged than usual, or am I wrong? I think what's interesting about this is, and sort of what's been the story of Q&ON for years, is that as it becomes crazier and crazier, it continues. sort of gaining mainstream power. I mean, in Georgia, it looks like we're going to have a Q&on believer elected to Congress. But at the same time, sort of what happens is the real hardcore

Q&N people are just constantly digging and kind of going down these esoteric holes online and starting to believe in lizard people and stuff like that. And so even as people kind of come in at first level Q&ON, which is sort of a step beyond Sean Hannity, there's all these like kind of crazy things getting appended on. And it's actually, it's funny Rick mentioned Zinu. I think in the same way that, you know, when you go into a Scientology church or office and they first say, like, you know, this is about personal wellness. And only when you get to like level 13 do they tell you about the alien gods. And so sort of like with QAnon, it's like, don't you think like Trump's really getting a raw deal? And then only at the end do they get into the real crazy stuff.

I have to just call you out on something. You just said start to believe in the lizard people. Because it's now obvious to me that you're a Gates-Soros disinfo agent seeking to prevent the truth from being known. but the lizard people will be running the mass arrests. I don't know about you, Will. That's like my favorite thing. The mass arrests can see. They love this idea that suddenly the petos are going to all be swept up in one day.

Absolutely. As you say, I think the mass arrests are sort of maybe the most important tenet of QAnon, this idea of the storm in which anyone who has ever opposed Trump or his supporters, even tweeted negatively about Trump, is going to get shipped off to Guantanamo Bay and either imprisoned or executed. Getting beyond all the kind of the crazier, elements of it. I mean, it's fundamentally, you know, it's like a fascist dream. You know, let's just arrest our political enemies and shoot them. The fact that people are so obsessed with this, you know, I think it's pretty

concerning. That QAnon supporter who's running for Congress, who was probably going to win in Georgia, she was endorsed by Jim Jordan. Yeah. In her case, I mean, she had like legitimate backing. I mean, she, I believe, was supported by a PAC associated with Mark Meadows. This is a kook, right? But it's not some random kook who just filled out the forms. I mean, this is someone who has been endorsed by some pretty powerful Republicans. Yeah, the NRCC obviously is going to make a choice to support her because they've gotten their ass beat so badly in the last two years that they're going to obviously be there to support her because they have to play every angle to try to rack up more seats. But if you're the young staffer who gets assigned to her, best of luck. But it's nice to see it. You won't give me a million

dollar media buy because you're part of the conspiracy. But maybe they will. I think the main thrust of Q right now, at least from what I'm seeing, is I think that whoever's pranking this whole giant ocean of boomer rubs. They're almost like begging to get caught now. The stuff just gets more ludicrous and more baroque and more involved. It depends on this concatenation of various imaginary things happening. Then JFK Jr. will rise from the grave as a robot giant. I guess like all esoteric conspiracies, they dig in and they can't stop digging. Right, exactly. I mean, this is kind of a classic when prophecy fails sort of situation where, I mean, we were told, or the Q&Non believers were told at the end of October 2017, Hillary Clinton was going to

going to be behind bars. That Barack Obama had been arrested. Right. And so then you say, well, how do we explain that away? And it becomes, oh, well, that's Hillary Clinton's clone or something like that. You know, and it kind of spins out from there. Well, she was arrested in another dimension where Q travels. So, well, let's break some news here. Can you reveal to us the story of Agent Margaritaville? Absolutely. This is a special one for the listeners. There's various Q&ON factions, and some of them love to commit crimes. And so there's been one I've sort of been working on looking into Q&ON groups, often involves just listening to hours and hours of just demented rantings on YouTube. And so I was watching this one guy who is himself currently a fugitive.

And he was just saying, he was like trying to send a message to like a sleeper cell. And he was saying, tell your attorneys to look up all the phone calls from Agent Margaritaville. And you know, he was saying, you know, Agent Margaritaville has the truth. And it just struck me that how absurd that first of all, for something that has captured so many boomers' minds that one of the characters is named Agent Margaritaville. Margaritaville. Is that a code name? It's an internet handle. These people are all kind of engaged in their shadow war to become like the king of QAnon.

But just the idea of this deep state operative named Agent Margaritaville really struck me. Agent Margaritaville is leaving Ford operating base Kokomo. You wrote about Lara Logan. And she's often on Laura Ingram. What happened to her? Because she was like a legitimate CBS correspondent. So I wrote this story about how Lara Logan, she had this kind of transformation from a very well-respected,

if sort of iconoclastic reporter at CBS, and then to basically one of the kind of fringier elements at Fox now. And so she was following for these, like, really obvious hoaxes about Antifa. And so she was saying, like, someone posted that members of the insane clown posse were in Antifa. The Antifa rank and file were called juggaloes and all this. She's kind of dug herself in this hole where she then just kept saying,

like she would see these tweets and see like, see haters. Like there is a secret Antifa army. It's really fascinating what happened to her. My sense is that I think she had this Benghazi reporting that really fell apart. And I think in some ways, in academia or in science or in media, is that someone in sort of a mainstream position really kind of sticks their head out on something and then gets disproven. And rather than accept it, they sort of are like, well, I'll just run off to the right. And those are the only people who are going to push up this idea that, you know, I've been undone by a

conspiracy. Magnets, how do they work? But Laura Ingram keeps having her on. Yeah, no, it's fascinating. I mean, Fox would not respond to us when we said, she keeps reporting these, like, comical, like, she had this thing called the Antifa Riot Manual, and it was just this, like, ancient thing from a hoax from, like, five years ago,

that says, Antifa Soros operatives gather at, like, location gamma prime. I mean, it's clearly fake. And we asked Fox about this, and they just said nothing. And then after our story ran, they didn't complain, which is very unusual for Foxx, are. So I think they're really kind of trying to keep their heads down on it. But as you say, they keep having her on as this expert in Antifa. Antifa. Do you think this reflects the larger reality about what Antifa is? I think the Fox and certainly

Trump have decided that the best move here for the election is to run against Antifa and to, you know, obviously there are some violent elements in these protests. But I think that the key is they need to project it is this organization, this kind of conspiracy. I mean, we saw Louis Gomer today saying there's like Marxist-funded elements looking to overthrow the government. I believe the phrase it was Bolsheviks. Yes, even better. Louis government being a noted historian of early Soviet history, would never have just said mere Marxist.

He was a judge. You know that, right? Of what? Like a hog-calling contest or something? It's like a legitimate judge. Texas is like a crazy place. Was he really a judge? My God, the backlog for the fucking appeals must be historic.

That's one of those ones where you get a note that's like, hey, this judge tried your case. You might want to appeal. So you mentioned earlier, Will, there's this constant battle inside, like, QAnon world of who's going to be the king of the Q world. It's like studying the most exotic subculture. So for a while there, you know, praying medic looked like he was like the guy who was the Q channeler. And then it became, I don't even keep track of them well enough to know. But I know there would be like a bunch of these like internal squabbles.

And do you see any part of these people going, hey, guys, maybe we're just being fucking crazy. No, no, not really. But as you say, yeah, I mean, there's constant fights. Because I think there's a lot of people who recognize QAnon believers. as number one, people who are really gullible and that they can, if you can kind of gain control of them, would be pretty useful. And second, like, people, you can soak for money. Kind of the Er-Q-Anon fight was between Jerome Corsey and Info Wars versus the rest of Q&N world, because Jerome Corsey and Alex Jones were initially, like, we love Q&ON. But then I think whoever runs QAnon was like, oh, wait,

these guys, they're running away with it. And so then they said, hey, don't trust Jerome Corsey. And so then that kind of created a whole new element. Right now, I think one of the more amusing feuds. There's a young man, real, like, he's currently facing a couple of criminal charges, but he claims that he has come back in time and he's Q, and he calls himself baby Q. And so this is very controversial. When he is Q? Yeah, it's crazy. It involves time travel. And you might think, oh good. Is Matt Whitaker involved? No, right. I mean, it's truly bizarre, but I call up another Q&on promoters for some info on a rival guy, because they love, as with all right-wing personalities, part of what makes my job so easy is that they love betraying one another.

And so I called up this guy and I said, you know, I'm calling about someone you don't like in QAnon world. And he goes, great, I love to destroy my enemies. You know, it's a very sinister kind of thing. The fights are so vicious because the stakes are so low. Right, exactly. Wait. Now, who do you think is Q? I think there's a lot of questions about it.

There's various theories, whether it's obviously the QAnon people think it's like Dan Skavino or someone in the Trump administration. But in the real world. Which it could theoretically be, though. Sure. That could be. You have various U.S. tubers that potentially could be behind it, could be the guy who runs 8chan, which obviously has been really benefited by the fact that Q&on posts there.

That fucking pig farmer? Yes. So it's very mysterious. I think the whole Q mystery cult, I had a Trump-friendly blue check the other day say to me, well, all of our attacks on you would be going much better, but all these three stars and Q people are doing it. And you're making fun of them. I'm like, well, yes, I am.

Well, I mean, you saw Eric Trump just over the weekend posted a Q&on meme on Instagram with a giant cue on it. I'm not like you can't miss that. They're definitely playing along with it. Have you met the guy who looks like JFK? Yes, Vincent Fuska and I are old pals. Yes. So the back story here is that there's this guy who does not really look in any way like JFK Jr. Not at all. The Q&ONB believers are convinced that he's JFK Jr. in disguise. So he's a big Trump fan and he showed up at a lot of rallies. And so they're convinced. And the interesting thing about him is that he won't come out and say he's not JFK Jr. He knows he's not, right? And he dresses, kind of like a member of like Al Capone's gang or something. He wears like a fedora. So I see him every year at CPAC and I say, hey, you know, are we going to do an

interview? You're going to talk about this JFK Jr. stuff? And he goes, oh, no, man, like, you know, can't do it now. And then I think he said something last CPAC, like something like, hey, like it sure is crazy. What can I do? So. Can you imagine you would have to be so strung out to think that guy looks like JFK. And the funny thing is, like, the original picture of him behind Trump at a rally was it was him. And then, like, five people away, there was a blonde woman. And they said, well, that's JFK Jr's wife. In some ways, I think Q&ON would get a gigantic lift out of Donald Trump's defeat. I think that's right, Rick. For the past three years now, Q&ON has been whipping people up into this frenzy. And they've convinced them that not only are Democrats bad, but basically that Democrats are, like, demonic cannibals that are eating children.

And so the whole thing has been premised on the idea that people can relax. though, because Trump is about to arrest them all. Patriots in charge. There's something like, you know, get some popcorn. Let's say Trump loses. Suddenly, that sort of promised release in that sort of utopian world, they've been convinced is going to happen, is taken away. And so I think then that's when people start seeing, and we're already seeing some

examples of it. But I think that's when potentially more Qaeda on believers start kind of taking matters into their own hands with weapons. Oh, that's not good. I've gotten some particularly lurid emails from Q&ON people who describe the delicious tortures that await me because of my role in Hillary Clinton's secret volcano underground pizza restaurant child cannibal ring. There is some vivid imagining going on there. Can you talk to us about that crazy Florida town hall? This is a planned demic. This is totally political and you know it.

You cannot escape God, not even with the mask or six feet. Okay? Six feet, like I said before, is military protocol. So when the cameras, the 5G comes out, what? They're going to, they're going to, they're going to scan everybody. We got to get scanned. We got to get temperatureed. The kids have to go to school with masks. Are you insane? I am not a terrorist. I am not a sex slave that wears masks. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, so this is a town hall in Palm Beach about whether they want to have a mandatory masking. And this should be no surprise for those of us who have been living through the pandemic at this point. But it's not like folks are saying the masks aren't effective or anything. It's just this, this is a symbol that you're going to enslave me. I mean, it's really wacky stuff.

of its Q&ONN inflected. And I think what's maybe interesting about that town hall and I think why it went viral is it sort of is the high point for all this conspiracy theories and this right-wing attacks on authority on science and the media kind of really reaching a point where it's going to be fatal to potentially all of us. I mean, if people just won't wear masks because they think it's like a don't tread on me thing. Can you explain conservative tree house to us? Yeah, absolutely. So conservative treehouse is kind of a zany blog that came of origins or kind of came to prominence during the Trayvon Martin stuff. They were kind of the big. Trayvon Martin Truthers. And so now it's a very kind of old school blog. Like, it's a kind of

blog you might see in like 2006. And so there's just tons of commenters and they refer to themselves as like living in the treehouse and they have different branches and those are the comment sections and you got to like, I think what's interesting about conservative treehouse is, you know, it provides a lot of kind of a counter narratives. The reason conservative treehouse is in the news now is because they came up with this idea that the, the protester who was pushed in Buffalo by the cops whose head was bleeding. They came up with the idea that he was like, doing some kind of like high-tech spy stuff to the cops. Fell harder than he was pushed, right?

Right. And then we saw that ends up on OAN and then Trump tweets about it. And people just say, well, reportedly this happened. And you kind of dig into what that report is. And it just ends up being some blogger calls himself Sundance Cracker on conservative treehouse. Prior to the show, I glimps through conservative treehouse. And I'd seen it before a couple times. And yes, first off, the whole motif of branches and leaves and roots and rhizome

and whatever the fuck is irritating to begin with. But it just shows you, like, these individual blogs build a little culture, and their brand is like conservative treehouse for when Gateway Pundit is too sold out to the limbs. Yes. I was about to say, like, Gateway Pundit is sort of the more mainstream version of conservative treehouse. Jesus.

Yeah, Gateway Pund is the gentry version of Conservative Treehouse. Just as the Federalist is the gentry version of Gateway Pundit. Oh, Jesus. I think what's also interesting about Conservative Treehouse is there's, like, a strong religious element to it. They have like a little chapel in the treehouse where you go do your prayer requests and stuff. And I think it combines what we also see in QAnon, which is like a union between Republican conspiracy theories and like really hardcore evangelical Christianity, just kind of mashing them all up together. I think that that strain of evangelical Christianity inside of

a lot of the Trump world, they're really selling the resistance short. We have a religious offering as well. It's an altar to Moloch in the basement of a pizza restaurant. Well, where do you think this stuff in Florida is coming from? Is it coming from? Is it from conservative tree out? I mean, I think it's kind of coming from all over in sort of the conservative social media media ecosystem. You may remember a month or so ago, there was that viral video Plandemic that was basically saying the coronavirus is fake and all this stuff, like Fauci, Venetabola, blah, blah, blah. And then at the same time, you know, I think it's a lot of just kind of Fox News, talk radio, sort of laying the groundwork with saying the masks are a sign

of submission or proof that you believe the liberal media. And then watching that video from Florida, you can see kind of different strands of it. So one of the women who gets up, she says, arrests are already happening, blah, blah, blah, that's QAnon right there. I mean, she's not out and out saying it, but that's clearly influencing her. There's also, like, weird alternative health stuff where people are convinced if you wear your mask too much, you're going to die. And 5G, of course, has to make an appearance because no crazy conspiracy theory is complete

anymore without 5G. Absolutely. So, well, a couple months ago, I tweeted out this thing progresses. I'd be curious to see the overlay of Fox News viewership to COVID-19. infections in a couple of months. I got a tremendous amount of shit from not just the Trumpers, but also from some of the National Review crowd and whatnot. They just like, ah, you want people to die because they watch Fox News. But it turns out I wasn't wrong. Right. First of all, we're seeing, you know, a huge boom in red state coronavirus infections, as you say. But yeah,

these studies have come out. We're just summarized in the Washington Post this week, showing in various ways how consuming conservative media and particularly Fox News promotes sort of a laxness towards the coronavirus, makes people social distance less, wash their hands less. Spreading corona to own the lips. Remember that backlash you got for that tweet, Rick. But I think it makes a lot of sense, even now before we see it scientifically, if this is what people are consuming and they're going by what Trump is saying, which is don't worry about the virus that's going to go away, it's really only natural that people would then not take it as

seriously. And I think the backlash you may have gotten from some national review types sort of strikes at something I run into a lot among kind of prominent Republicans, which is this idea that, well, people don't really believe all the crazy stuff they're saying. You know, that's just a game. But then in reality, you know, we see it play out in real life again and again. Say, for example, when they elect Donald Trump. I think it only makes sense that people who are watching Sean Hannity say the virus wasn't a big deal, then thought it wasn't a big deal.

And they've been telling them it's not a big deal forever. Right, exactly. I mean, who would have guessed that you might be responsible for what you say or in the same way that the media I consume changes how I view the world. It only makes sense if the same applies to Fox News. who speak truth to power. Believe it or not, your actions speak louder than our words, and our super-egos can get very loud. Visit new abnormal.thedailybeast.com to sign up and become a beast inside member. Ted Liu is an American politician serving in the U.S. House of Representatives

for California's 33rd Congressional District and is probably the best congressman on Twitter in the world. So we have interviewed a number of congresspeople, and one of my favorite questions to ask, what broke Devin Nunes' brain? Ah, well, first of all, thank you, Molly, for having me on this podcast and very excited to be on. I served with Devin Nunes for now close to six years, and I don't really understand what makes him tick. I also know that he threatened to sue me, so I did write a letter to his attorney, basically telling them to shove it, and he just doesn't seem to really understand actual facts,

and he lives in a reality distortion field. Another friend had the theory that once they put him on intelligence, that was it. Well, not only does he not understand actual facts, he will take actions that are completely stupid. So you may have remembered last term when he concocted this story, how he got this super secret classified information, and he was going to run it over to the White House and share it with them. And the later we discovered it was a White House that gave him that information.

That was Devin Nunes' midnight run. Exactly. And it's just stupid antics like that, that make you realize he really puts party above country and he really lives in a whole different reality than most Americans do. So Congressman Liu, I have to ask you one question. How satisfying was it to write that letter to Devin Nunez's attorney about truth being the ultimate defense?

Because I occasionally go and read that just to go, yeah, that's what a middle finger looks like. That was very satisfying. And something I actually haven't shared is I sent Devin Nunes a copy of that letter. And I also put a handwritten note on that letter directly to Devin Nunes. What was the note? Go on. It basically said, if you ever threatened me again,

and then I can't really say the rest of what I said. Good for you. It's too bad Devin Nunes can't read. Well, we know that when he came out with this infamous Nunes memo, that he actually admitted he hadn't read the underlying evidence before he had someone ghost to write that memo for him. One of my favorite moments. I still think Devin Nunes is not necessarily the dumbest member of Congress.

I don't know. Louis Gormert's a close second. So why won't Congress impeach Bill Barr? So we're opening investigation now in a House Judiciary Committee, and we're going to do that to preserve the evidence while memories are fresh. We've already done one hearing with whistleblowers. We're going to take additional evidence of people under oath. We're going to get documents, and then we're going to make a decision.

My view is we shouldn't foreclose any options until we're, we see what the evidence shows. And certainly, Bill Barr has taken a large number of actions that I believe ranged from unethical to potentially violating the law. And we've already held one hearing with whistleblowers. We're going to be holding additional hearings. He's agreed to come in under oath in July. Now, at the same time, he also agreed last year to come in. And then at the last minute, he backed out making up a flimsy excuse. So hopefully he won't do that again. I do believe that we have to dig deeply and look at his action. I think what he's done ranges from the unethical to the potentially criminal, and we need to do this investigation and then decide what the next steps are.

It's just sort of shocking to me. You're from California. You're in L.A. LAPD is really having trouble cleaning themselves up. Can you talk a little bit about that? Sure. Let me give you my overall view of police reform. And my view is it's not a few rogue cops.

I believe that the overwhelming majority of police officers are good. But the issue is beyond just a few old cops. It's the system that is in need of change. So I'll give you an example with the George Floyd case. It wasn't just one officer that had his knee on George Floyd's neck. Additional two officers that had their knees on his body. And then a fourth officer that started to look out. And then they all had to be trained in procedures that obstructed people's airways.

And then you had the Minneapolis Police Department spokesperson that gave a misleading initial account of what happened. And then you had all those civilians and police officers who knew about. Derek Chauvin's 18 misconduct claims and didn't take strong enough action. So it really takes an entire village to allow for the persistent police brutality by our government. When you look at the data, black Americans are more likely to be killed by police at a rate two times higher than white Americans. That's not an issue of a few bad apples. So the Justice of Policing Act will do systematic reform of police departments. It bans choke codes. It requires racial profile training and racial bias training. It bans no-knock warrants and drug cases. It reduces qualified immunity

as a whole set of data and transparency provisions. And it's not an issue related to the LAPD or the NYPD or other police environments. It's all police departments that need to take up these reforms. And my hope is a Senate will also pass the bill as well. But do you think that the Senate would ever do that it's Mitch McConnell's Senate? I believe the pressure is so high that even Republican senators want to take action. So Tim Scott's bill is weak and it doesn't accomplish reforms that we need. However, many of the concepts are the same. So we're not talking about very disparate issues. I think we largely agree on the issues. It's just how do we get to a compromise that can have effective reform of police departments. So I think there's hope to get something done this year. And certainly, we didn't

do the Justice of Policing Act as a message bill. Our intent is to get that bill into law. makes sense. Trump did this insane speech where he called coronavirus the Kung flu. And we see a lot of the Trump administration trying to stoke racism, especially anti-Chinese racism, anti-Asian racism. And I know there's been a spike in that. What can we do? That's a great question. So there's a difference between calling out China for what they did with this virus early on. And China suppress evidence about the virus, it's not defensible what China did early on. That's very different than saying words and phrases that are going to increase hate crimes against Americans who happen to be of Asian descent. So we know that during this pandemic, there has been a large surge in hate crimes

against Asian Americans. The Asian Pacific Policy and Planning Council has been tracking hate crimes, and it's around 1900 hate crimes that have occurred since the pandemic began. There was an Asian family in Texas that got stabbed, including a child, because a perpetrator thought they were spreading the coronavirus. And when the president uses phrases like China virus, Kung flu, or the Chinese virus, that just adds fuel to the fire and it increases their attacks on Asian Americans. And that is something the president should not be doing. He is the president for all of America. And by the way, we know that Asian Americans are also the fastest increasing ethnic group in America. and there's enough Asian Americans in swing states to be the margin of victory in November.

So, for example, their Asian American electorate in Nevada is 11%. In Texas, it's 5.5%. In Georgia, it's 4.7%. And in Michigan, it's 3.8%. These are margins that can swing a close election. It's really true, and it's just unforgivable what's happening. What do you think is happening in California with your numbers? Because, like, I see a place like Florida, okay, they're not.

They don't wear masks. They don't believe in science, whatever. But like, what is happening in California? We know that when you start reopening, you're going to have an increase in coronavirus cases. So people are still trying to figure out what's the best way to achieve this balance. We obviously can't just shut down for over a year. That wouldn't work. On the other hand, how can you reopen safely? And that's why I think it's important that the governor of California order that everyone has to wear masks, whether they're in public. And then social distancing is a very effective way of stopping the transmission of this virus. But if you reopen, it's just going to result in additional cases. That's how can we manage those cases so that our hospitals don't get overwhelmed. And we make sure that the most vulnerable don't actually get the virus who are at highest risk of dying. So you think the spike was inevitable and not because people weren't following the rules? I don't think it was inevitable because we've seen what other countries have done.

Many countries have been able to reduce the number of coronavirus. virus cases to low levels. America has not. And part of it, I think, is directly defaulted Donald Trump. He actively discourages wearing a mask. He promotes stupid snake oil treatments like hydroxychloroquine. He muses about whether we should inject people with bleach. He holds large indoor rallies, where people aren't wearing masks or doing social distancing. And so he is a force for all sorts of bad behaviors that increase the spread of the virus. It's so interesting because he really has turned what's a public health issue into a culture war. What's so disappointing is Donald Trump puts himself above country.

He puts himself above his own party. He will take actions that in his mind believes helps him even if it harms millions of Americans. And making masks a culture war is just stupid. It's just a scientific issue. Study after study shows that if you wear masks and everyone wears masks, it reduces significantly the transmission of the coronavirus. And it's very confusing to American people because at the same time, you've got the Surgeon General of the United States and the Trump administration making videos telling

people to wear a mask. And then you have the CDC telling people to wear a mask. So you have this very confusing message being sent to the American people. It is a really dumb way to govern. Did you ever think when he got elected that he would be this bad at this? No, exactly the opposite. After the November 2016 elections, I issued a public seat. statement that went something like this, one of the things that makes America great is our peaceful

transfer of power. Donald Trump won the electoral college. We should give him a chance to govern. And I remember watching his election night speech. And it was a rational speech. He mainly talked about two issues, infrastructure and helping veterans. And I thought, you know, I can work with that. I can work with this person. And then a few months later, I concluded I was wrong. He just started to go off the D-Pen. He started to attack institutions of our democracy. He attacked the legitimacy of the judiciary. He attacked the legitimacy of the free press. He suppressed internal dissent. And then he lied at a rate I've never seen another human being lie. And I concluded that he was a danger to our democracy and a threat to the republic. And that's what I concluded I was going to resist him. You're good at Twitter.

You're good at social media. How do you see communicating on social media? And can you talk a little bit about that? First of all, it's all based on anger. But then I count to 10 before I write something. So that's generally helpful. And there are so many. draft tweets that no one ever sees because it probably goes too far. I also believe in the use of satire. I think humor can point out truth in a way that some other forms of communication cannot. One of my favorite literary works of all time was Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal. I thought was pretty effective at the time when he wrote a whole piece about cooking children to eat and it really highlighted the plight of their poor. And the way that Donald Trump acts and speaks and his policies

are so open to being parodied because much of what he says and does is ridiculous. And I think humor is a way of pointing that out. I also just came to conclusion that if Donald Trump is going to do or say 37 insane things in a month, I'm going to try to point out all 37 things because my view is we can't normalize what should not be normalized. Oh yeah, no question. I think that's really true. What would be the thing you would have Biden focus on? First of all, he should wear a mask and not get six feet near any stranger.

And I'm glad that the Democrats have largely canceled indoor convention in Wisconsin. I think it's pretty dramatic to show the difference between what the Democrats are doing on this pandemic versus what Trump is doing. And the American people are going to see this really huge difference with this big indoor rally, what they call a super spreader event. And the Democrats actually listening to science and trying to protect the health of American people. And I think Joe Biden is doing an absolutely right thing right now by being compared. passionate by listening and just letting Donald Trump speak. And every time the president does one of his press conferences or into a rallies, he ends up saying things that lowers his approval rating.

Let's hypothesize for a moment. You end up with a Senate majority or a working Senate majority, close but functional. And keep the House majority in Joe Biden wins. What are the first couple of things that you think the House needs to focus on right away? I mean, obviously we've been putting off Infrastructure Week for a couple of years now. We have.

Now, the House is also actually now going to pass a robust infrastructure. package. So we know that Donald Trump has said he wants to do infrastructure, and I actually think it would in fact benefit him heading into November. So we'll see what happens. We know that healthcare continues to be a major issue. It's at the top of people's minds. And this pandemic has shown large healthcare disparities. We know that African Americans, Latino Americans, Native Americans, and Asian Pacific Islanders die at far higher rates with COVID-19 than Caucasian American. And we absolutely have to fix our health care system. The polling shows that Americans not only care about it, they also trust Democrats to address this issue and we're also not suing to eliminate their Affordable Care Act as the Trump

administration is doing right now. I was just writing a piece about this, that there are a lot of these Republican congressional candidates that are like crazier than Trump, especially there's Q&on candidates. Do you think that the Republican Party can ever go back to normal? That's a great question. I think if Donald Trump loses in November, I think the Republican Party could. I think if we had another four years of Donald Trump, I think he would have finally changed the character of not just our country, but also the Republican Party. And even though I'm a Democrat, I don't want that to happen. I think it's better if we don't have one completely crazy party in America, but we have a rational party for both parties. So we'll see what happens in November. Also, what happened last term is a lot of

their moderate Republicans and those that stood up in Donald Trump got taken out in their own primaries or they lost in the general election. So we end up having a lot of Republicans and Congress who are basically Trump enablers and believe every word he says. And that's unfortunate. Did you see one thing that was just so insane this cycle that a Republican did that you were just like beyond struck by it? Well, one simple thing. It's not even something they did. It's something they're still doing. It is insane for them to not wear masks in public. And I think it's insane that you have Republicans in Congress who don't want to wear masks, even in committee hearings, or when they're walking around on Capitol Hill. And the problem is they think that somehow this is an issue that hurts Donald Trump.

What ends up happening is if COVID-19 keeps spreading, that's what's going to hurt Donald Trump. If they all wore masks, it would actually help stop the spread of coronavirus. So it's insane just on a number of different levels. So now we are at the very, it's literally everyone's favorite part. part of the show. Fuck that guy. And I have two fuck that guys this week. One is the Federalist, which I cannot, it's probably going to be like my... Every week. We have this piece they wrote. And I love that it's under the title Wuhan virus, because we got to make this as racist as possible. This was in April when we were struggling. And then also Brett Stevens, everyone's favorite,

America shouldn't have to play by New York's rules. The idea was cut off New York. because they can't control their coronavirus spread. Well, now, shoes on the other foot, Florida. But we're doing well in Florida, killing it. And by killing it, I mean, seniors. Yeah, but not supposed to actually kill the people. Florida, Texas, and actually Cuomo, who I'm no fan of, has toyed with the idea of banning Floridian.

Sorry. So there we go. That's my fuck-that guy. Well, look, as a Floridian, you should probably ban Floridians. We're dangerous in general. So my fuck that guy this week is Seminole County Florida tax collector Joel Greenberg. Why are I drilling so far down to give you a fuck this guy from Seminole County? Yeah, because this feels like a deep cut, Rick Wells.

Oh, but I will. Oh, don't you worry. This will move into circular motions. So if you follow along there will be a point. Joel Greenberg, the Seminole County tax collector, was arrested this week for cyberstalking, online identity impersonation. He went completely bonkers trying to beat this guy. he thought it was going to run against him for tax collector.

You'd think this story was like a, whatever, but crazy level cyber-stalking stuff. Right. Like what? Oh, like making fake accounts saying that the guy that he was running against was a child molester and all these other things. Really committing to the role. Let's put it down. Very Trumpy. And I'm on a conversation with a Florida friend of mine, an elected representative, and he says,

Hey, you know who these fucking guy is, right? I'm like, who? He goes, oh, he's a big buddy of your friend Matt Gates. And I said, excuse me? And within a few minutes, I find pictures of this guy and Matt Gates and Roger Stone, partying in 2016. I'm like, Oh, of course. Good Lord. This guy, apparently part of a little ring of these guys

involved in some shenanigans. So fuck that guy goes to Seminole County, Florida tax collector, Joel Greenberg, only because I think we'll be hearing more about him and his friends. Today, because we had missed a fuck that guy last week and people were upset, we have an extra fuck that guy. Absolutely, we do.

Our extra fuck that guy is Mad Cow aficionado, Devin Nunez. Devin Nunes's relentless quest. to sue a fictitious cow came to an end today. A tragician. Pour one out for Devin Nunes. A man obsessed with a parody account that features a cow. There are so many better obsessions to have.

Anime. Right. Medieval torture instruments. I don't know. Devin Nunes has. He's lost against the cow. This is probably the end. Devin Nunes loses against simple inanimate objects a lot of the time.

So it's not surprising that he lost against the cow. Will Devin try to bring this to the Supreme Court? I think Devin will step. the Supreme Court with pro-cow justices. Well, they'd be anti-Cow justices, wouldn't they? Well, the anti-Cow justices, actually, but President Devin Nunez will expand the court. How will RBG

on Devin's cow? At that point, she'll be, have been uploaded into the singularity. Have you been watching that show? Oh, I would have been into the singularity way before that show. It may or may not be true that I have a tattoo on my chest that says, do not resuscitate, push 50,000 units of heparin, cool body to above freezing.

May or may not. Could happen. On that note, we'll wrap up this episode of the new abnormal from The Daily Beast. In future episodes, we'll be talking with smart folks from The Daily Beast and beyond from media, culture, politics, and science who will help us understand what's happening to our country and the world. We hope you'll subscribe to us on your favorite podcast app and share the show on social media. We're just getting started and don't want you to miss an episode.

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