The Daily Beast Podcast - The Greatest Threat the United States Faces Is Coming From Within

Episode Date: February 7, 2023

On this week’s episode of The New Abnormal, David Rothkopf, CEO of the Rothkopf Group and the host of the podcast Deep State Radio talks Trump and Putin. Then, a look at China’s spy balloon and the ensuing hysteria with Spencer Ackerman. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hi, I'm Andy Levy, former Fox News and CNN-HLN guy, and current cable news conscientious objector. I'm a former libertarian who now sits pretty comfortably on the left. Hi, I'm Danielle Moody, former educator and recovering lobbyist. But today, I'm an unapologetic, woke commentator on America's threats to democracy. And I'm producer Jesse Cannon, and I'm here to make sure things don't go too far off the rails. We're here to have fun, smart conversations with some of the most knowledgeable and entertaining people in politics, media, and beyond. goal is to try and make sense of our current crazy world, our new abnormal, and hopefully even make you laugh through the tears.

What an excellent show we have today. Spencer Ackerman, who writes the newsletter Forever Wars, is going to tell us what to make of this silly balloon stuff that the media is making a huge deal out of. Then we'll talk to David Rothkoff, who's the CEO of the Rothkoff group and the host of the podcast Deep State Radio, and he'll go into the dynamics of Trump and Putin and what to think of that. But first, let's have some fun. So, Danielle, new week.

This is obviously a very big week. A lot of parties this week. A lot of people eating wings and drinking beer. And I am, of course, talking about the state of the union happening tonight. Are you excited? Have you got, I don't know. I know I wasn't invited, but I assume you have a pretty packed guest list and there just wasn't room for me.

Yeah, I just, you know, potato skins, chicken wings, popcorn, the entire thing. I can't wait to see how Marjorie Taylor Green is going to run the field. So I'm excited. Yeah, a lot of people calling in sick to work on Wednesday. Got too drunk watching so too. So yeah, that's what's going on this week. But, you know, we're not going to talk about the State of the Union because it hasn't really happened yet as we're recording. So we can't tell you.

I'm hearing it's going to be fantastic, though, Danielle. Yeah, I'm certain no Republicans are going to boo. I'm certain nobody's going to yell out hang Joe Biden. Like, I'm certain it's all going to be A-O- fucking K. So we'll get back to you at the end of the week, folks. Let's be honest here, though, on some accuracy. There's zero chance he doesn't get called Brandon. Yeah.

There. Yeah, that is absolutely happening. Oh, God. All right. So let's get to the serious stuff. Not a great week for the people of Texas. Just power outages everywhere because of ice storms and stuff like that. Power lines down and just an absolute nightmare.

I think over 400,000 homes and businesses lost power. just unreal and a lot of what we saw we were seeing images of supermarkets they had lost power and you know when you lose power in a supermarket food goes bad there were just images of all this food being thrown in the trash but then we saw people thinking that they were offering free food and running to get it because they had no power and they had no food in their house and it was just you looked at it and you realize we are, like, we are living on the knife edge of all the dystopian stuff that we watch, the last of us and all of that. And we are like one national power grid failure away from being in that situation, it feels like. I was watching and I'm looking at the pictures and I'm thinking

how scary all of this is. One, because Republicans did not invest in the power grid in Texas. I believe that part of it is run privately. We knew that the last time that the last time that the power grid failed in Texas, people froze to death because that was during a major snowstorm. So they know where their weaknesses are and Republicans have just decided that, hey, we don't really give a shit, right? Ted Cruz will go to Cancun. Greg Abbott will throw his hands up and they just will do nothing. But what troubled me, Andy, mostly looking at these pictures where gridlock was formed outside of this grocery store where, again, I think it was via social media saying that these grocery stores were giving away free food, was that the lines of cars were reminiscent

to what we saw during COVID at food pantries. That people are living, like you're saying, on the knife's edge of food insecurity, of collapse in this country in a lot of ways. I think that this just shows us a bigger image of the undergirded problem, which is that American families are not largely in a secure place. And food being one of those basic things, shelter being the other, clothing being the other. And when we're seeing lines like this form, we're talking about a couple of weeks ago, the price of eggs, if you're going into grocery stores and you're looking to see, like literally, the price of eggs have jumped three, four dollars in certain places. You're seeing these lines and I'm thinking to myself, what are we doing? And I feel like we are one manmade disaster,

natural disaster away from full catastrophe and that we're not talking about the bigger problems here. Yeah. And then you look at Greg Abbott, who I believe last I checked is the governor of Texas. Yep. And I took a look at his Twitter feed because I figured, you know, oh, he's got to be tweeting about all the hardships that his constituents are going through and what the state is doing to help them out. And he has one tweet from February 4th saying that he's issued a disaster declaration for the counties impacted by the ice storms. His next tweet was about criminal activity at our border. The one after that was Texas is building our own border wall with a video of them.

Because that's important. Yeah. And then the tweet after that was announcing today a statewide plan to ban TikTok. And then the tweet after that, which is his most recent tweet, is about the fentanyl crisis plaguing our country. So other than one mention of the unbelievable hardships being faced by his. own constituents, this is the shit that we are seeing from him. And I talked to some people who live in Texas and have families in Texas, and they were like, look, this is a different situation from the last time when it was the power grid that failed. This time, it was literally physical

wires being just taken down by ice, and which is not something that they're used to in that location, which obviously gets into discussions of climate change. Climate change. The other thing that Republicans love to deny, right? Exactly, which they don't believe in either. But so, okay, you can even say, you know, you can't point the finger at Greg Abbott for this. This was an act of God, you know, an act of nature. It's no different than a hurricane, whatever.

Fine. But the fact that he is sitting there tweeting about the border wall in the middle of this is just, it's disgusting. And yet somehow he keeps winning office. So, you know, I'm not going to make that mistake of saying Texans deserve. this, which is idiotic because, first of all, not everyone voted for Greg Abbott. And second of all, no one deserves to be without power for a week and be food insecure. But stop voting for this guy to you Texans who are voting for this guy. Stop voting for this guy. Stop voting for this party.

And vote for people who actually maybe at least a little bit care about you. I don't know. Is that crazy? Yeah, it's wild. I mean, we know that Texas is gerrymandered and voter suppressed beyond belief. Yeah. Right? Like we know when we see people like a Brian Kemp in Georgia, when we see a Greg Abbott in Texas, our immediate reaction is to blame the voters. And I love how you made the distinction. You blame the people that are actually voting for him and those that have not voted, but also understand that the way that their elections are set up. They, you know, close down polling stations that just happened to be in black and brown neighborhoods, forcing people to drive, you know, 10, 20, 30 miles in order to get to a polling station. They make it illegal for you to do mail-in votes. They do everything in order for them to stay in power. And the thing is, is that I just don't understand how you look at the situation that your policy, because I don't know why I say I don't understand. I do understand. They don't give a shit, right? They don't care about their constituents. They don't care about anything

but power and being able to be in the governor's mansion and do whatever the hell they want and turn these states into their own fiefdoms. That's what they're doing. That's what Republicans are doing. They don't care. But if you have like 30% of the country, which I say is completely lost and they are all part of the same fucking cult, then, you know, it's those people's fault to blame that they're food insecure. It's those people's fault to blame that they're not able to, you know, to keep their, why didn't she get a generator, right? Like it's going to be, you know, it's just full on hunger games around this country right now. And all we can do is like hope, pray and vote that it doesn't become nationalized and institutionalized if one of these kings of their

red state become president of the United States. Yeah, I mean to say, I'm just, I'm looking at this again, because I'm just, I just can't believe it that on Monday, while all this is going on in Texas, he's sitting there tweeting about a statewide plan to ban TikTok throwing in a mention of the Chinese Communist Party. I'm not even saying that there's not a discussion to be held around that, but How do you do that in the middle of an emergency for your constituents? There's a part of you that's missing if you think that that's the way to behave. And I guess the part that's missing is empathy. I mean, I don't know how else to...

A heart, a brain, you know. It's unreal to me. But look, it's just those pictures. We're heartbreaking. You know, we are like every part of this country is one natural disaster away from being really close to pure chaos. And that's something that we need to think about. And it shouldn't be like that. Like there should be there should be firewalls and there should be things like,

okay, these 60,000 people don't have power. Here's what we're going to do for them. You know, we've got to plan for this. We're the richest country in the world and we can't plan for shit like this, which by the way, as you mentioned earlier, is going to be happening more and more frequently as climate change continues to affect, well, the climate of the planet. it and you're going to see ice storms in Austin, Texas and things like that, that they are not equipped to deal with because it's not something that happens there year after year after year,

or at least not until now. And God knows what is going to be like going forward. But we have to be better prepared for this stuff on a national level, it seems to me. And it seems to me that we could be. And maybe I'm just, you know, pie in the sky here. But it just seems to me that we got a lot of smart people in this country and we have a lot of resources and we could come up with a way to make sure that we can take care of people when emergencies hit like this. I mean, you can only prepare for things that you choose to see. As Baldwin said, you can only change things that you choose to face. So Republicans' purposeful ostrich stance of sticking their heads at... Alephine?

It's Black History Month. Don't call. Come for me. You know, when you look at Republicans and, you know, the fact that, look, you could think about what do we do for the power grid, giving as how we're having weather that is no longer the norm in the state of Texas, that every season now, there is some type of major storm. Is it an ice storm? Is it a snowstorm? Is it this?

Is it that? That people are unprepared for. And guess what? are dying because of. So you would think, oh, our weather is changing. I don't remember this. I actually said the other day, I said, is it just me? Do I not remember Texas having the kind of snow and cold ice issues that it's been having for the last five, six years? And I'm like, I don't remember that growing up. And so I'm like, you can do something about these things if you choose to recognize they're a problem. But if you keep pretending and going to war with bullshit

things like what we're about to get into, which is, you know, between gas stoves, M&M's, Mr. Potato Head and the rest of it, and not the actual things that are facing your people, your constituents, then, you know, I don't know where we go. I'm actually being told, and I think you sort of hinted at this, I'm being told that the Republicans actually do have a plan. The schools will have to have chocolate milk. Take that, China. Like what? I don't know. At least Stefanik, the GOP, congresswoman from here in New York who used to be sort of a normal conservative, and then she woke up one morning and said, holy shit, I got to go full maga. And now she's just legitimately one of the worst people in Congress. She has introduced a bill called the Protecting School Milk Choices Act of

23. And this comes on the heels of, I guess, Mayor Eric Adams here wants to ban chocolate milk in New York city schools for health concerns, which actually seems like not a horrible idea. I'm just going to say, what's funny here is that Stefanik says, instead of taking away milk choices from students, my bill will give them better access to essential dairy nutrients critical for their development. Is she a fucking doctor? There is not a doctor, a pediatrician that will tell you that dairy after a certain age, and I mean like, oh, I don't know, when you're a couple of months old.

is actually good for a child's development or humans and that like just adult humans as well right like milk is not the thing that like makes a body good what was what was that like 80s thing it does a body good it does a body good yeah and guess who that was run by the milk lobby yeah of course because pediatricians and doctors are just like you know what's not actually that great lactose tell me about it If you had to guess, though, Daniel, what the largest agricultural sector of New York State is based on Elise Stefanik going out there and being very pro-milk, what would you say it is? Let me see. Would it be her 21st Congressional District? Well, no, it's dairy farming is what it is in the... Oh, okay.

That's New York State's largest agricultural sector. So it's pretty clear what she's doing here, which, you know, again, look, if just say I'm doing this for, for, for, because it's important to my state. Just don't pretend it's for something that it's not, but that's what they have to do. And it's just, I'm out of things to say, go ahead. I just wish that they, I mean, every time that we come on here, it's another stupid fucking thing we're talking about.

These are the same people who didn't want Michelle Obama to provide your children at school with fresh fruits and vegetables. They wanted, you know, the meat industry to be able to feed your kids pink slime. Because, you know, the meat industry has to make money, somewhere. And it's just like, does it have to be off the expense of our health and well-being? Like, stop fucking gaslighting us into thinking that you give a fuck about kids when you don't. Because you would have banned assault weapons instead of, you know, putting together legislation

to quote unquote save chocolate milk, you dummy. Yeah, but I mean, look, this is what we see all the time in this country. And to move it beyond food, we see it with like coal mining. And, you know, we have to save coal mining, even though coal is an absolutely horrible method of fuel. But because of the jobs, which, look, I don't want coal miners to be suddenly unemployed, but it seems to me the smart thing to do is to invest in retraining them for jobs that don't involve coal mining, which, by the way, ain't great for their health. No, and nobody's giving them, you know, any back pay or paying their medical bills after they develop black lung, but I digress.

Yeah, but the idea that we have to keep these industries afloat because of jobs, when they're clearly, first of all, they are bad for the country and the world, And secondly, they are bad for the people who work in them physically. Instead of putting actual resources into training them to be able to do something else, it's just, and that's what we do. And that's exactly what you're saying with the meat. That's exactly what Stefanik is doing here with the milk. And it's just that's, I guess that's capitalism, baby.

Yeah. Welcome to America. It's the story everyone was talking about over the weekend. That's right. My New York Islanders signed newly acquired Center Bo Horvat to an eight-year deal. But since this isn't a sports. podcast yet. Let's talk about the other story that captured the nation's attention, the Chinese spy balloon that spent the last four days of its life traversing America before being shot down

by a missile fired by an F-22 Raptor. Here to walk us through the story of the century is the publisher of the Great Forever Wars newsletter, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Spencer Akerman. Spencer, thanks so much for coming back on. Andy, I was told we were going to talk about the Kyrie Irving trade. What's going on here? We were going to talk about that. And then I am being censored. by Jesse Cannon, the producer of this podcast. I'm familiar with Jesse. Big Cannon is censoring me, and I'm not allowed to talk about sports. So, all right, so let's talk about this balloon.

And I was thinking let's maybe divide this into two sections, because there's sort of the more serious, what does this all mean one? And then there's the simultaneously funnier and more infuriating response from many on the right part of the story. So let's do the serious part first. In your estimation, how big a deal is it that the Chinese sent a spy balloon over America? Zero percent. Zero deal. Not a deal.

Not when you think about the amount of aerial surveillance, satellite surveillance, that the United States conducts on not just China, but the world, to say nothing of electronic surveillance. The surveillance that China conducts on its neighbors on the United States and so forth, balloon negligible. Balloon big, balloon big, but balloon negligible. Balloon big, right. But we would never do something like this. I don't know why you are insinuating that we spy on other countries.

I know it's unheard of. I don't cotton to that kind of talk here on the new abnormal, Spencer. No, it's true. It's a giant calumny against the United States that, as routinely documented for decades, the United States maintains a massive surveillance apparatus, the least objectionable aspects of which are focused on national surveillance against great power rivals. Right. This is the most routine thing that great powers do to one another.

Sometimes it happens to involve balloons. So let's talk about the sometimes it happens to involve balloons part. Is there any intelligence or any information that the Chinese could gain from a balloon like this, that it couldn't grab from the satellites it has? You know, it's so happened that right before I got on this call, I dialed into the Pentagon briefing from Northcom's general Glenn Van Herth. And his response was no, that while this isn't going to be something that you'll get a whole lot of clarity on and is going to be sort of shunned it off into a veil of classification, the general's comments were that they took, this is the euphemism, maximum precaution to prevent any intelligence collection. collection, which is to suggest that perhaps there were some jamming aircraft at play to prevent transmission. And similarly, vaguely, he said that we did not assess the balloon presented a significant

collection hazard against the United States. If anything, it may turn out to be an intelligence collection opportunity for the United States now that Northcom, Navy, and Coast Guard elements are fishing it out of the waters off of, I think, South Carolina. Yeah, I've been reading that, that this, you know, at least that's, at the very least, I know there are voices in the Pentagon or in the Biden administration that are absolutely putting that out there, that we actually got more intelligence about them and their capabilities than they got about us from this balloon. Now, I suspect some of that is going to be pretty exaggerated simply because, again, balloon.

Right. You know, we'll see what they end up recovering in the water about the payload that the thing carried. But while there may be some tactical intelligence. that the United States might have about Chinese balloon-borne surveillance capabilities. I don't think anyone believes that this would be on the more sophisticated edge of what the Chinese can marshal in terms of intelligence gathering. So I guess that leads me to my next question. Why? Why did they do this? If, you know, they had to kind of know they weren't going to get much from this or if anything

that they couldn't already get from their satellites. So was it sort of like, why not? We've got the balloon. Or was it a provocation? Or what, you know, what's What's the logic here? I have no idea if it turns out to be an intentional provocation caused by launching a balloon over the United States of America. But if so, that's a pretty small provocation. The United States has just signed a deal with the Philippines to use four more Philippine air bases and naval ports, not far from what the Chinese will certainly

consider their territorial waters. I think in the last week, the provocation weight of this kind of defaults to the United States rather than China. Again, I go back to the point that rival nations surveil each other constantly. This may not have looked like so much of a provocation to the Chinese and why I think, while it's absurd, you know, it's absurd, you know, given what we're about to find out of the payload for the Chinese to argue that this was simply a meteorological balloon that went untethered. There probably is something to their surprise at how this became kind of the story of the weekend in the United States, given its marginal significance for intelligence gathering.

Yeah. And you know, you mentioned that rival nations spying each other all the time. I think it's fair to say friendly nations spying each other all the time, too. Quite seriously. One of the United States, although it doesn't like to talk about this very much, one of the United States is in secret documents that I have viewed. Clear counterintelligence challenges and priorities is Israel. One of the United States's principal allies. Yeah. I mean, we have definitely, you know, seen that. And look, this is just, this is a fact of life. And it's, I, I'm just agreeing with you that to me, it's just silly to be like, how dare they do this? But I think the silliness is the point and that

leads into the second section. Yes, absolutely. That you're talking about here, which is that, you know, as we saw with a recent leaked assessment from the Air Force General who runs Air Mobility Command, General Milken, there is a tremendous risk over the next several years of the United States and China finding themselves at war, in part because of Chinese, like, extant provocations around what it considers its key territorial waters, but also because of the Biden administration, building on the Trump administration, before its decision to decouple the American and Chinese economies, bolster its military presence around the Western Pacific and East Asia. All of this goes to show that we are going to be at a level of Cold War hysteria

that I think the balloon has kind of inaugurated. The balloon is almost like a maiden flight here of what's going to look like an enormous impediment to keeping rational and peaceful public perceptions. between the United States and China that's just going to make dealing with one another in a world of rising Chinese power, in a world where a hope of saving humanity from climate-induced apocalypse is going to require American and Chinese cooperation. What we got this weekend was a glimpse of just how hard this is going to be, just how hard the contrary political currents are going to be to it.

those currents blew this balloon into the United States and resulted in one of the most extraordinary pieces of security theater I have seen, which is the F-22 Raptor finally getting to engage in air-to-air combat. This was for its time the most advanced fifth-generation U.S. fighter aircraft. This is supposed to be the dogfighter of the future. It has never seen any air-to-air combat because there has been none to be had for the lifespan of this aircraft. Finally, it shot down a balloon. Do you think, do they get to paint a balloon on like the fuselage? I think from now on, you can probably expect the call sign of whoever shot that balloon down to be balloon boy for the rest of that pilot's career. All right. So let's talk about, you sort of led into it,

let's talk about the often infuriating part of the response on the right. We had, there were numerous GOP officials and mouthpieces, i.e. Fox News, etc., screeching that President Biden was being weak by not immediately shooting down the balloon. And Mr. Pike, you said off air that you agreed with them. And that surprised me, Spencer. I didn't expect that from you. If Biden won't pop the balloon, he's the weakest president there's ever there. How's that when another nation has a balloon, you're just not going to pop it? Is that what I've come to expect from the might of the United States of America. We're not popping the other boys balloon.

Well, that balloon got popped, Andy. Brandon popped your balloon. But should it have been popped earlier over Montana, say? It's funny that in this briefing just now, you'll probably, I don't know when this thing is going to go up. This is Monday's briefing. Okay. General Van Herc made a point of saying that his assessment from the moment it began

transiting over Alaska, was that, quote, it did not present a physical military threat to the United States, and that is why he didn't pop the Chinese balloon. This is apparently a balloon with a, you know, 200 feet tall payload it's carrying is about comparable to the fuselage of a regional jet. So we're talking about something that weighs several thousand pounds, and they didn't want to risk downing this thing when it presents no military threat over a population. area. But I joined them in their outrage. You know, but it, you know, let's go, Brandon. We've got to pop that balloon. I can't believe that balloon was able to transit over God's America without getting shot down. We look like a nation of cucks, Spencer. We look like a nation that's afraid of balloons

and. Yep. Balloons. It's amazing. With all the parades, we have all the thanksgivings, etc. to now fear balloons is just, I didn't think I'd see it in my lifetime. Well, you know, the wave of balloon fear is very likely to characterize. I don't know, the next years to decades of American foreign policy guided at an imperial containment or frustration of China. So, okay. It's only the first of an era of balloons. Well, and let's talk about that because Mike Pompeo said something like this never happened under the Trump administration. And a day after he said that, it was reported that it in fact happened at least three times. And then Trump himself called that fake news. So who should I believe here, Spencer? Well, again, funny. General Van Herk addressed this

on the call and said that he learned about these prior, what could I even call, balloon incursions during the Trump era from the intelligence community once this thing had happened. So I don't know. Are you going to believe the deep state or are you going to believe Mike Pompeo? It's tough. It's a tough call. It's a tough. It's a toughie.

You know, Mike Pompeo, who's so not the deep state that he ran the CIA. All right. So I want to talk about some of the more bizarre reactions from the first. folks on the right because the ones we've talked about aren't even that bizarre. You had multiple Republicans, just to name a few of them, J.D. Vance, Carrie Lake, Paul Gosar, posting pictures of themselves with weapons ready to shoot down the balloon. So even leaving aside the hilarity of thinking that an AR-15 or in Gosar's case, he actually had a handgun, leaving aside the hilarity of thinking that any of those weapons have a maximum effective range of 10 plus miles, i.e. could even fire around

capable of reaching the balloon. It's just, have they just made the entire party out of call of duty griefers at this point? Remember, MAGA is a movement addressing a manufactured, and to some degree real after the war on terror. Grievance based on a perceived national humiliation. So this is always going to be the way it was going to go. The point of, you know, aiming your AR-15

and believing that it will spew God's righteousness 60,000 feet in the air at a Chinese balloon is about making a statement about who gets to fly surveillance flights over which country and who must never suffer these things, regardless of how frequently, in fact, we suffer these things. This is a statement of American exceptionalism. And that's always going to have on the right, and particularly in an era of, you know, both perennial war, real and cold, or I should say hot and cold. You know, a constituency, and a kind of marshaling power. And it's precisely for these kinds of dangerous political exploitation moves that we should

recognize the danger of a China Cold War. There's just going to be more of this. Yeah. It's definitely going to get worse before it gets better, assuming it gets better. You know, we've kind of grown accustomed to they'll take any excuse they can get for posing with a gun. But this was just, I mean, I'm watching. this and Paul Gossar has a little, I don't remember if it was a picture or a video of him

literally firing a handgun at a range, I think it was, as if, and saying he was ready to join the army against the balloon. Like, these people are not well. I think this is something we'll revisit should China ultimately invade an attempt to reconquer Taiwan, that this is going to look like a prelude and a test of whether the United States will treat a Chinese military aggression in, I think we can say, I don't have the exact language, but, you know, a traditionally Chinese territory rather than its power to marshal American, you know, wartime mobilization versus a balloon in the sky. I don't, you know, I wonder if, you know, this is just reinforcing a kind of dry run about how the United States ought to act in an event that we're, you know,

China's actions truly do have strategic in military significance. Do you think it's possible that going back to why they sent the balloon and whether it was a provocation? Do you think it was a test and that they have seen the responses of the J.D. Vance's and Carrie Lakes of the world and they now realize they cannot go into Taiwan? I think that once- Because we are ready for them. I think that like what they needed to see, what Paul Gossar and company, like, valiantly demonstrated is that, like, we are ready to shoot at clouds. If you want to test us with a balloon, like we're going to end up, you know, shooting at a cloud in our own backyard. And then won't the Chinese have learned something about, you know, who not to mess with in the world. Okay. So before I let you go, I have to ask you about a Wall Street Journal story that I think it was Ken Klippenstein that tweeted it.

And I swear I didn't think it was real and I had to look it up for myself. the Wall Street Journal published a story and the subhead of the story was Chinese craft raises fear of a balloon gap in intelligence gathering. Hell yeah. And I just, I read that and I, you know, I am a longstanding fan of Dr. Strange Love. And I just, my jaw just dropped. I'm like, how is this real life? I mean, I feel like that was an AI generated by general dynamics. You know, it so happens, this is your mistake, Andy.

You shouldn't have invited me to talk about this because it so happens that I have covered a fair amount in my day of American balloons, blimps, aerostats used to gather intelligence above bases in Afghanistan and Iraq. And like Richard Nixon, faced with the calumny of a missile gap, engineered by the fake news, of John Fitzgerald Kennedy. I can say that the United States still knows how to innovate in terms of giant balloons. So I don't think that's really the kind of criticism that, you know, can be responsibly aired in a time of increased Sino-American tensions. And, you know, if Ken Clippenstein has a problem with that, then he can take it up with you. Well, okay, I mean, you prefaced that by saying that you were, that I was going to be sorry I brought you on, but I'm actually incredibly happy that I brought you on because I don't know if you can imagine. I did not sleep

last night worried about this balloon gap. And you have reassured me that in fact, we are full speed ahead on the balloon front and that there is in fact no gap and that we are good to go for the next round of the balloon. We're good on balloons. We're good on balloons. Rest assured America. I will sleep like a puppy tonight. Spencer, thank you so much for being here. Everyone, check out Forever Wars. It's a fantastic newsletter, and it usually, but not always covers more serious subjects than the Chinese spy balloon, but it's so informative, and I just, I can't recommend it enough. Thanks so much, Spencer. Thank you, Randy. Folks, I am very happy to be joined on The New Abnormal by Daily Beast columnist and author

and Foreign Policy, National Security and Political Affairs Analysis, and commentator David Rothkoff, who's also the author of American Resistance, the inside story of how the deep state saved the nation. David, I want to start off with Republican hysteria, if you will, around the Biden administration's response to the surveillance balloon that over the weekend was shot down. According to many media reports, they're collecting whatever type of evidence,

whatever type of information they can from the remnants of that balloon. In a piece that you wrote for The Daily Beast, you said that Secretary Blinken should not have canceled his trip to China and that essentially that was a reaction to Republicans, you know, saying that the administration and Democrats in general are soft on China. So can you explain that a bit more? Sure. I mean, the first thing to keep in mind is that this was a. much less significant incident than the media has made it out to be. Why? Because countries spy

and each other all the time. The Chinese have scores of satellites with which they do this sort of thing. They've got other mechanisms just as we do. We actually have hundreds of satellites that do this sort of thing. And so we shouldn't be shocked that it goes on. A balloon is a pretty low-tech way of doing it. The technology on the balloon, although it enabled them to gather certain kinds of information via sensors, was still not the height of sophistication. It didn't make us more at risk in any way. And the United States military identified the balloon quickly and were tracking it. They jammed its ability to send out signals.

So essentially they neutralized it as a surveillance satellite. And then when the time became appropriate to shoot it down, they did over the ocean so that it didn't cause any human casualties. You know, I think the response of Republicans that somehow the Democrats or the president had put the country at risk, contrary to the facts. He did everything you're supposed to do. This happened three times during the Trump administration. It's not even clear that senior officials in the Trump administration, when it happened, were aware of it happening. The Chinese have done this in other places. And if anything, I think the administration, as you indicated, may have overreacted.

In other words, I think that, you know, this kind of thing suggests we need more communication. communications with the Chinese, not less, because mistakes and misinterpretations of events like this could lead to escalation. And that's why I think the Secretary of State should have gone. I think he should have gone with a tough message about this. And I think we should focus on building the kind of mill-to-mill communications channels, military-to-military communications channels that are necessary to avoid misunderstandings around incidents like this. I mean, I think, you know, to that we obviously just live in such a fraught political climate in the United States that whether or not the Biden administration shot it down on site or whether they waited a couple of days, you know,

to make sure that no one on the ground would be killed, which Republicans clearly didn't give a damn about, that there was going to be no move that Biden was going to make around China that Republicans were going to turn around and say, oh, add-a-boy, good job. Do you think then that Democrats, particularly around foreign policy, react too much to Republican foe outrage and don't address the issue as the issue, meaning this was not a big deal. In your piece, you refer to it as 18th century technology. It's a balloon that is hovering, that got pushed away by the wind and is hovering up in our airspace.

Is there a way for this administration and just Democrats in general not to be provoked by foe Republican outrage? I think we need to find that way because if we allow ourselves to be provoked by this outrage, then we're going to end up with escalation of conflicts everywhere. You know, the Republicans think we ought to be at war at our southern border. They think we ought to be negotiating with the Russians and giving up land in Ukraine, you know, forcing Ukrainians to take a bad deal, not supporting the Ukrainians. The Republicans have an appetite for supporting autocrats around the world, whether it's Putin or Orban or Modi or Bolsonaro. So, you know, if we did what the Republicans wanted us to do, we'd be much less safe as a country and our values would be at much

greater risk. I think presidents have a special responsibility. There's a reason the Constitution gives them disproportionate power on foreign policy. And that is that they're supposed to tune it out and do what's in the national interest. Not what's politically expedient, not what looks good on the nightly news, but what is right. And sometimes those two things don't fit together. You know, in July before Pearl Harbor, I think it was something like 17% of the American people supported going to war. So, you know, sometimes presidents have got to do things that are unpopular. Sometimes those things involve taking action. Sometimes those things involve not taking action,

showing restraint, maintaining communications. And I think this situation falls in the latter category. Question on Ukraine as well, since you brought it up and we understand. And Republicans said this before they took back the House by their very, very slim razor margin, that there was going to be no more money for Ukraine, right? That their empathy is not with the people of Ukraine or seeing the bigger picture about preserving democracy abroad. How much danger do you feel that Zelensky in his ability to fend off Putin is in now that McCarthy holds the gavel? Well, I think it's greater danger. I mean, the president has said from the very beginning that he was going to support the Ukrainians, and he has been remarkably strong and consistent on that point,

and has provided tens of billions of dollars of aid to Ukraine, much more than I think the Russians had counted on. I think it's really been absolutely one of the paramount reasons that the Russian campaign this past year has not been successful, as they hoped it would be. And now, of course, having, you know, the Speaker of the House and the, those around him suggesting that we ought to perhaps not provide as much to Ukraine. That's got to be emboldening to Putin. He's got to be thinking, well, if I wait long enough, the money will run out.

And that'll give him a better negotiating position. And if he gets a better negotiating position, he assumes he'll be able to get some land from all of this. And that'll give him the kind of positive outcome that he wants that might make him do it again. And I think that's what we have to be aware of. We've got to create every disincentive for Vladimir Putin to ever attack another country in Europe or anywhere else again. And frankly, giving tens of billions to Ukraine, who's willing to put up their soldiers in their country in order to defend not just themselves but us, is a bargain compared to what it would cost us to defend ourselves against a Russian attack, say, on the Baltics, where those countries are part of NATO.

And we would be obligated to step in, not just with money, but with our own military personnel and forces. And that could lead to a much broader war, which would be many, many, many times more costly by any metric, right? So what we have in Ukraine is an opportunity to make ourselves safer for pennies on the dollar. And the Republicans are suggesting we do something different. Do you think that how Democrats message this, how Biden message this, you know, we're going to see at the state of the union what conversation he offers, what narrative he offers around Ukraine. But I'm wondering, should the messaging be that Republicans are in bed with Putin? Your article from last week in the Daily Beast entitled Trump is still a Putin stooge and a traitor to his country, you know, it's not just Trump. It's the entirety of the Republican Party because this is their Messiah and this is who they

follow. And, you know, even with the incident around the China balloon, we know that media reports have said that there were three incidences of this same kind of surveillance that was happening at the hands of China during the Trump administration and they didn't say anything about it. So do you think that the messaging then that Democrats need to offer in showing the, clear distinction between who is standing with democracy and who isn't needs to be ramped up. Ramped up, repeated, emphasized. The reality is that the greatest threat the United States faces is coming from within, from Donald Trump, from the party around him that are allied with our enemies and support movements

within our country that will attack our system of government, make us weaker, and put us on a track towards the kind of authoritarian regimes that Trump and those around him emulate. And when Trump last week reiterated what he had said in Helsinki in 2018, where he said, I trust Putin more than I trust the CIA or the FBI, it was outrageous as it was before, but it was perhaps doubly or triply outrageous because in the intervening period, in the five years since he first said it, Putin invaded Ukraine. He committed war crimes. He showed that he was this threat to the world. He has identified himself as the great villain on the international stage, the principal imminent enemy of the United States. And where is Donald Trump on this? He supports him.

And where is Donald Trump on this? He supports him over our own intelligence community and law enforcement community. And where is the Republican Party on this? Well, Trump said it again. They could have said, we don't agree. There were crickets. Once again, they embrace Trumpism, which is Putinism, urbanism, the sort of worship of these autocrats, and we are at greater risk. Every time somebody says, oh, it's politics as usual. Let's look at this poll. Oh, yeah, Trump's winning. He'll do well in New Hampshire. and we start getting numbed into a discussion about the way things sort of were 30 years ago when people ran against each other, we're losing sight of the fact that the enemy is inside the gates and that a victory for these people is not a political victory. It's a defeat for the United States of America for our national interests.

and it is a threat to the ability of our democracy to survive. So, you know, that may sound like hyperbole. It's not. And all you have to do is look at the statements of Trump or look at the embrace of Orban or look at the behavior of Ron DeSantis, you know, shutting down the ability to teach certain classes in his schools or shutting certain books out of the schools or trying to shut down the ability of the press to cover his events

or the same kind of thing from Greg Abbott or the same avid support of all of this from Kevin McCarthy. And you see how dangerous the situation is if we don't do what you said we should do, which is call it out, call it out loud, call it out every time. Do you think, because David, I don't, I mean, I'm the last person to say that I believe that this is hyperbole. I have been saying this in many different ways over the last several years under Trump, under Trumpism, watching the Republican Party, following an insurrection and attempt to overthrow our elections. I mean, we are seeing this, right? It is not the path to fascism. Like, we're headed there. When we're referred to for the first time in our country's history as a backsliding democracy,

you know that shit is not well. What worries me is that Democrats who have a microphone who are in power in the Senate and have the White House are not saying it with that kind of rigor to wake the American people up. I still believe that they think that this Republican Party is not as dangerous as they present themselves to be. Am I wrong? No, I think you're right, but I'll offer a slight nuance to it. And honestly, I'm the last person to suggest we need to nuance this. This is, you know, the alarm should be going off. This is a national emergency. But when we say Democrats, you know, some people will then say, well, why is Joe Biden trying to work with them or why are, you know, some other people not. emphasizing this. Well, I think one of the good responses of the Democratic Party, politically speaking,

has been to tune out the Republicans and to focus on governing. And Joe Biden, in creating jobs, in responding to the crises he inherited, in building infrastructure, in focusing on competition, I think governors, Democratic governors, Gretchen Whitmer, Jared Polis, Andy Bashir, Cooper, Murphy in New Jersey, et cetera, et cetera, have said, you know, I'm going to tune it out. I'm going to focus on governing and getting the job done. And I think they've been very effective in that. But I think the Democrats, as a party, need to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time. And so when Donald Trump says something that's traitorous, they should call them a traitor.

And when Donald Trump says something that's a lie, they should say it's a lie. And when Ron DeSantis is, you know, Trump, but perhaps more dangerous, they should say it's more dangerous, even as they focus on governing. And, you know, there are a lot of Democrats, there are a lot of voices out there. So we don't have to turn off one message in order to achieve the other things that we need to achieve. You know, I think that one of the major issues that Democrats have faced, and we saw this happen in Virginia with the election of Glenn Yonkin, was the desire not to wade into the culture war that Republicans have been stoking. He was able to get into the governorship because of quote unquote parental choice around

critical race theory, which is not even taught. And that was the beginning of what then Ron DeSantis has turned into a full on fascist state in Florida with taking books off of bookshelves and out of libraries and threatening to jail librarians and doing all of these things. And so by virtue of Democrats not wading in and pointing out to people, this is not what a democracy looks like. We don't threaten to jail librarians in a democracy. That's something that you hear in Afghanistan. That's something that you see in Iran.

That's something that you see in Russia. That is not what you see in the United States of America with these people that want to wrap themselves around the flag, but know nothing, nothing about the values of this country. So, you know, David, just last question for you, where do you see in all, honesty, the next two years, with McCarthy having the gavel, Republicans deciding that they're going to be obstructionists and Putin supporters, where do you see us going as we head into the presidential? Well, I think we are going to be heading for trouble. If we say, well, because Glenn Yonkin is wearing a fleece and he doesn't look like Trump, he's not Trump, or because Kevin McCarthy looks like an insurance salesman and doesn't look, you know, doesn't look like a mafia Don.

He's not Trump or Ron DeSantis is smarter. So he's not Trump. That's a mistake. That's a trap. Yep. These people are every bit as dangerous or more dangerous. They've actually seen Trump, seen his crimes, seen as lies, seen his coup attempt, seen his fake electors a scheme, seen all that and said, yeah, we're going to do that more.

So they're more dangerous than he is, regardless of how they present themselves. And if the Democrats don't do what you're absolutely right to say and engage in the culture wars and understand them, understand what Yonkin was tapping into, which was a bunch of parents who'd had their kids home through COVID and were angry at their school systems. And he gave them a focus for their anger, which was specious and racist and horrible. But, you know, the Democrats have to understand, engage in those culture wars, call out the other side for what they are, and offer a better alternative. And if we don't, we may not emerge from the 2024 election with a heartbeat in our democracy. Because people who want to deny voters the right to vote, deny equal representation to people based on their skin color or wear.

they come from, their zip goat. Those people, if they win, they're going to institutionalize their impulses, and it's going to become harder and harder to fight them. David Rothkoff, thank you so much for waking us up and sounding the alarm and joining the new abnormal. We appreciate you. Appreciate you and keep it up. Andy Levy. Daniel Moody. Who is your wonderful, outstanding disgrace for a member, a state for your fuck that guy today. Today was actually an easy choice for me.

And that doesn't mean there aren't other strong contenders and shout out to all of them. But this one was an easy call for me when I heard about it over the weekend. It is Marjorie Taylor Green, who is his MTG on FTG. It ain't the first time. And this time she went on

former journalist Glenn Greenwald's podcast, she talked about her congressional salary, which is around 175K, 174K, something like that. And she is upset that she is underpaid. And she said, quote, becoming a member of Congress has made my life miserable. I made a lot more money before I got here. I've lost money since I've gotten here. Well, a couple things. One, you being a member of Congress has made a lot of people's lives miserable. I was going to say. Not really feeling bad for you there. And if you made a lot more money before you got there owning your CrossFit gym, I got a little bit of a possibility for you. Go back to doing that. She talks about how, quote, the nature of this job, it keeps members of Congress and senators in Washington's too much of the time that we don't get to go home and spend more time with our families, our friends.

It's turned into practically year round. Oh, no, 174K and you have to work practically year round? Wow, that is just rough. You know, I started this out. I was mad at her. And now I sort of feel bad for her. And I want to send her thoughts and prayers the way she does every time there's a school shooting. And I am just as sincere as she is when she does it. Get out of the job if you don't like it. That's easy enough. There are people who are stuck in jobs who are legitimately underpaid and have horrible work conditions who can't afford to leave those jobs. You are sitting there bitching because

you're getting paid less than you say you were making before you took this job. Leave the fucking job. Nobody cares. Like, just stop your whining. Just, I have no patience for the shit. And of all people, for her to be whining that the life of a congresswoman is so rough. I just, uh-uh, fuck that gal. I mean, and also, she's the person in the office that makes going to the office fucking suck these days. So she's like complaining about the working conditions. Bitch, you are the working condition, right? Like if you removed Marjorie Taylor Green, I bet satisfaction in Congress would go up. So by all means, you know, leave. I'll throw you a parade. Yeah, I think AOC would be a lot happier not having MTG stalking her in elevators. I just don't want to be stuck in an elevator at Marjorie

Taylor Green. Oh, God, what a nightmare. Danielle, who is your fuck that guy? Well, also not new to our list. Probably he's an all-star at this point, but Ted Cruz. And for what does Ted Cruz deserve this honor? Well, because apparently he was watching the Grammys and decided to tweet that the Grammys are evil. And why are the Grammys evil? Well, according to Ted Cruz, Sam Smith's performance with Kim Petrus in their Satan-themed duet of Unholy, which by the way, that song is so money, is teaching children how to be trans and LGBTQ.

I'm surprised he got the letters right. Let's just be clear. Ted Cruz thinks it's evil because he thinks that trans people are evil and non-binary people are evil and LGBTQ people are evil. And if he had it his way, if the Republican Party had it their way, we wouldn't exist anywhere outside of somebody's camp. Let's be clear. or they would wait to try and beat the gay out of us or pray it away or any other archaic version of turning us straight.

So his tweet is bullshit, as is Ted Cruz, because we know that he actually truly is evil, as is the entirety of the Republican Party, for their attacks on the LGBTQ community, for their attacks on transgender children, for their attacks on education. If you want to talk about evil, look at people who are banning books in order to keep people stupid so that they can be controlled. old. So Ted Cruz for so many reasons, but particularly for referring to this set, also, Kim Petrus, they made history last night as well for being the first non-binary trans person to win a Grammy, the first trans woman to win in the best pop duo group performance category, and Sam Smith, the first nine binary artist. So of course, Ted Cruz will be up in arms because history is being made. Progress is happening right in front of our eyes. So Ted Cruz, go back to bed, my man. There's nothing that the Grammys for you, my man, okay? Nothing. I thought he thought that maybe he

said the Grammys were evil because Bonnie Raid and Harry Styles both beat Beyonce. But I guess, I guess not. Hope you enjoy checking out this episode of The New Abnormal. We're back every Tuesday, Friday, and Sunday. If you enjoyed it, please share it with a friend and keep the conversation going. This podcast is a Daily Beast production with production by Jesse Cannon and Seamus Calder. Want more great listens? Check out our comedy podcast, The Last Laugh, and our star-studded The Daily Beast podcast at the Daily Beast.com slash podcasts. If you enjoyed this episode, consider becoming a Daily Beast subscriber.

Subscribing is the best way to feed the beast and support all of your podcasts as we cover what might become the darkest timeline. Head to the DailyBeast.com slash membership slash podcast and sign up today.