The Daily Beast Podcast - Trump Isn’t Going to Help Make the Cost of Eggs Any Cheaper

Episode Date: November 12, 2024

A week after the U.S. presidential election, The New Abnormal co-hosts Andy Levy and Danielle Moodie reflect on what Kamala Harris could have changed in her campaign strategy. Plus! Dean Obeidallah, host of the The Dean Obeidallah Show on Sirius XM Radio is here to talk about his recent piece posted to their substack. 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. Dino Badala, the host of the Dino Badala show on Sirius XM Radio, is here to talk about his recent piece posted their substack titled, Asking Whether Convicted Fellon Trump cheated in this election does not make you an election denier. But first, let's have some fun. Well, it's been a week since the election. We are still all trying to unpack and figure out exactly. what it is that happened. And most recently, AOC took to X to ask her followers, her supporters,

people who voted for her, and seemingly voted for Donald Trump, how and why. One of the questions that she posted, people who support both Trump and me or voted Trump slash Dem, tell us why. And Andy, the responses are really eye-opening and kind of a gut punch. Some of them are, it's real simple, someone wrote. Trump and you care for the working class. Or voted Trump, but I like you and Bernie. I don't trust either party establishment politicians. What do you make of this?

It's easy to say, okay, it's anti-establishment sentiment. I mean, one person said, I feel that you are both outsiders compared to the rest of D.C. and less, quote-unquote, establishment. Fine, I get that. But I don't really know what to make of this other than, than that people are weird. Believe me, I understand the, you know, burn it all down sentiment. I get that that was big for Trump in 2016.

First of all, the idea that Trump at this point is not the establishment is bizarre to me. Yeah. He was the government for four years. He's appointed countless numbers of people to the judiciary. Like, it's nuts, but okay, fine. You still want to think of him as an outsider. then think of them as an outsider. A lot of people on the left, you know, sort of a favorite thing about 2016 was saying Bernie would have won. And I don't know that that's true, but that's what

that tapped into. It was the idea that Hillary Clinton was as, I mean, as establishment as it got. And Bernie was much more of a populist. So I understand that impulse. And I think a lot of it is not wrong. I, it just, I guess what I can't wrap my head around is the idea that you could possibly believe that Donald Trump is any kind of populist in the sense of if you want to define populist as caring about the working class or however, you know, I mean there are other definitions for populace. Let's stick with that one because that does seem to be these responses to AOC. seem to bear that out. I don't know what to say to someone who thinks that that is Donald Trump,

like a guy who does nothing but favor laws that help him and his ultra-rich cronies. The idea that he gives the slightest shit about anybody else, let alone quote-unquote working men, and I'm going to, I hate it, but I'm using the phrase working men to mean white or working people to mean white working people, because that's what we're talking about here. And we shouldn't just say working people. We should say white working people, white working class. But the idea that Donald Trump wants a more powerful white working class, it's insane.

I realize how hesitant I sound as I'm saying all of this because I really don't know how to wrap my head around this. I get the outsider part. I get the anti-establishment part. It's the believing that Trump wants to help you part. that I don't know what to say to someone who after eight years of this, nine years of this, let alone the rest of Donald Trump's life, after all this time, you still believe that? Like, I don't know what to say to that person. I just don't. I honestly don't. I mean, some of this is like, I feel like Trump and you are both real.

Voted for Trump in Arizona, but voted for Dem Rubin instead of Carrie Lake because thought he's good handling war. I've never believed in education more. And I've never really seen the fact that America is probably one of the most undereducated places. Because the idea, first of all, that folks are just waking up to the idea of what tariffs are and what Donald Trump has been talking about in terms of tariffs. It didn't matter what economists think because we have moved into a place where people who are experts on things no longer matter.

that eroded during COVID. We don't believe scientists. We don't believe economists. We don't believe climate scientists. We don't believe anybody. And somehow Donald Trump has captivated the American public into believing that he's real and he knows everything. And I just, I did not think that it was so easy to sow disinformation and discord. But when you have a truly undereducated populace that does not know the basics of how government works,

that does not know how imports or exports work, that doesn't know really what the office of the presidency and what the branches of our government do, then you have people making decisions on fucking vibes. They're talking about, oh, well, this was all about the economy and we didn't talk to the white working class. And I'm just like, can we also just acknowledge the fact that this is deeply about racism? while we look for every other excuse to fill the void and help us process what we have been talking about here as unimaginable, which is now arrived here that an authoritarian was willingly voted in by the people because somehow Biden didn't bring the economy back stronger and faster, which again is a lie, but the truth doesn't matter. People wanted their egg prices low and they wanted the ability to like stop transatlantic. people from getting hormones. When you're talking about, oh, the economy, the economy, the first thing Donald Trump has

now opened up his mouth about is trans people. He's not offering anything to the people that voted for him. He's just going to be systematically taking away things from Americans. And I just, I find it wild. That once again, Democrats are doing a blame game rather than recognizing that you're never going to reach white America. You just are not. When 53% of white women and 59 or 60% of white men vote, it has nothing to do with their economic angst. It has everything to do with the fact that they don't want to lose power. And Donald Trump told them that you are the center of the universe.

And so long as I am in control, you will have the power. You will remain at the top of the pyramid. I don't know how you battle that, except by abandoning your base. and your values, which I'm pretty sure Democrats will willingly do over the next couple of years thinking somehow that they're going to win this back. Yeah. There are things, I think, that could have been done on messaging that weren't done. I vaguely remembered this, but I was looking it up. Back in August, Kamala Harris proposed a federal ban on price gouging across the food industry.

And I don't know that she talked about it ever again after that. I know a lot of economists say, hey, those kinds of policies end up hurting consumers more than helping them fine. Forget about the policy. Talk about the fact that price gouging, particularly in the food industry, is a very real thing and has been since COVID, basically. And you look at the profits that all these grocery stores and places like that, you look at how much their profits are up. and it's because they're price gouging. And eggs aren't as expensive as they are because of inflation. They're expensive because grocery stores, et cetera, decided they could get away with charging more.

So I think if there had been stronger messaging around the fact that, you know, hey, it is the rich people that are causing this problem. It's the people who own the grocery store chains. It's the, you know, breakout. populist terms, it's the fat cats. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm. And make it very clear that you're not paying more for eggs because of Joe Biden. You're paying more for eggs because of the people who love Donald Trump. He's the rich people who, again, do not give a damn about you.

And, you know, if they can squeeze an extra, you know, $50 million in profits on top of what they're already making, because it's not like they were hurting. And this is the only thing they could do to. stay in business. No, we're not talking about that. We're talking about padding their profits, making their profits even greater. And even if you are like, if you want to get squirrely about, the government shouldn't be telling places what they can charge for eggs, fine. I don't even care about that as much as I care about getting the message out as to why the eggs are so damn expensive and making it clear that Donald Trump is not going to make the eggs cheaper. And in

fact, he's going to make them even more expensive and not just eggs when you're talking about tariffs and stuff like that. But there, I think the Democrats could be better on populist messaging. And I do think that that is something that Bernie Sanders is actually good on. Believe me, there's stuff that Bernie does that I don't like. And I think he excludes other things too much and focuses solely on economic stuff and underplays race and racism and things like that and makes everything about class. But at least he's making some things about class. And I do feel like the Democrats could do a much better job at incorporating that, not doing it at the expense of throwing people under the bus, but bringing it in and making it part of the messaging that, hey, yeah,

these prices suck. But guess what? That's got nothing to do with Joe Biden. And the economy is actually doing well. And these business owners don't need to be charging you this much. They are choosing to because they want to line their pockets more. So I don't know. Maybe that kind of messaging helps to break through this. But it's just so annoying to see people say, oh, I like AOC and I like Trump. Come on, man. You have right now one of the things that are being said, but again with no actual plan, Donald Trump is going to defund the Department of Education. Just shut it down. You You have folks that willingly voted for that, thinking that everything is bluster. I just don't know when people get it.

And maybe it will be now. Like maybe the thing is that you have to lose everything and then wake up and then realize, oh, but you now have no power either. Because it's not going to change in four years or two years. This is what people voted for and they're going to turn around and they're going to recognize that what they thought was their economic downturn before, that they're not going to be able to afford shit. I just don't understand.

Like, riddle me this. How do you decide to shut down or gut the Department of Education? And let me say that you're a CEO of a company. Where the fuck are you getting your employees from? Who know nothing? Like, who can't be competitive with the rest of the world? I guess what? Do you just abandon American workers altogether?

and you just go to other countries. Like, how are you getting an educated workforce is my question? What does that look like without a department of education? And we cannot say like, oh, well, people will send their kids to private schools because obviously no one can fucking afford that except for the rich. So what's the end game here if you don't have an educated populace that can do your work? It's definitely not replace them with immigrants. We know that.

Right. When you think about some of the things that were put into Project 2025, that we know that they're going to operationalize, if we thought that Betsy DeVos was bad, I can't imagine who is going to be put in charge of the Department of Education. And I'm just thinking to myself, so if I own a company and I require, like that company, I only make money and I make money for my shareholders based on what we're producing and innovating and putting out into the world, but I no longer have educated people that are doing that work. And people can no longer afford college because they're saddled with six-figure debt. I'm just curious as to like, who is successful here?

Like, there's no long-term strategy around like what success is ultimately going to look like for America, even for those that are sitting in the top 1%. Where are you? I guess what? Everything just turns into some type of sweatshot slave labor. Like, those, those countries, that employ those kinds of policies. How viable are they? Yeah, look, I don't know. You want my guess for who he's going to name for Education Secretary. It's probably Ryan Walters, the guy who's the head of the Oklahoma Department of Education, who is just a god-awful. I just, I mean, we've talked about him on this show. He's not a big name, but we've definitely mentioned him. But look up Ryan Walters, and you will not like what you see.

I guess it could be lives of TikTok. That's the thing. These are people who put the Ten Commandments in schools. Right. These are people who have ripped down the rainbows and the safe spaces for queer kids and trans kids in schools. These are the people that have prosecuted teachers, shut down libraries, burn books. And again, I'm asking, what does long-term success look like here?

You know, Russia doesn't look like an economically viable country to me with like a population of people that are the innovators and the creators. So I'm like, so you stomp out America, which is what Putin had wanted. And Donald Trump and the Republican Party hand over the keys and we reorganize like the axis of evil. I'm just wondering like how long it takes America to just go completely belly up here. Yeah, but at least it will be a good Christian nation. Yeah.

You're right. I mean, that is there. Like I say that, you know, half jokingly, but that's what they want. you know, that is far more important to them than kids learning about history or or science or anything like that. So, you know, I mean, look, we haven't really talked about this since the election, although we talked about it a lot beforehand, but we are in for a lot of Christian nationalism over the next four years. There's just no way around it. And let's be honest, those people, they do not put a premium on education. They put a premium on obedience, reading the Bible. That's

pretty much it. I don't think any of these people are concerned with or quite frankly smart enough to think about what gutting America's education systems is going to do to this country eight years down the road, 12 years down the road. They just want a Christian nation. And I mean, look, we're already starting to see some actual staffing news that we don't have to speculate about. And that includes the former acting director of ICE, Tom Homan, Trump says, is going to be his borders ours. Tom Homan is an absolute nut job. I mean, the things he wants, for people who thought Trump wasn't serious about mass deportations, that's what Tom Homan wants. That's why you put someone like Tom Homan in charge of this.

He was on 60 minutes talking about deporting families together. He has a lot of, has told Congress, undocumented immigrants should be afraid. He oversaw the putting the kids in cages that we went through and are possibly still going through. This is the tip of the iceberg, but Trump is already signaling he wasn't just saying that shit. He meant it. And all the people who thought, oh, I'm going to vote for him because he doesn't really mean that stuff. You were dumb to think that before and you're dumb to think that now. Time is going to reveal whether or not people will have buyers remorse. And the fact is, is that it won't matter. I guess that's the thing for me is that people will just become incredibly calcified and hardened at the fact that this is what they chose.

When it's too late and you can't turn back the clock and families are being broken up and your kids are being undereducated and you can't afford to send them to private school and college is now out of reach and is a pipe dream, not just for the black and brown that they thought, but for everyone. You know, you lose your house. You don't have Social Security Medicaid. I mean, good luck, America. Good luck. Because then, you know, Elon must set a best.

He said, well, we have to have short-term hardship for long-term prosperity. Didn't put a time frame on it, though. So I guess we'll see while he's sitting in his $35 million compound with his 100 children. Good luck, America. I hope it was worth it. The biggest election of our lifetimes is less than a month away, and the news is only going to get crazier and more important as the countdown continues. As each day brings new headlines and critical campaign updates,

the future of the country may be decided by the stories that cut through the noise and capture our attention during the next few weeks. If you want to stay informed through all of the twists and turns, the Daily Beast's new daily newsletter, October Surprise, is the reliable resource you're looking for. It will keep you in the know on everything that's happening as we race toward election day. Sign up now at beast.pub slash October surprise. Beast.pub slash October surprise.

Folks, I am very, very happy to welcome to the new abnormal Dean Obadala, host of the Dean Obadala show on serious XM, on serious progress, who has written a piece in your substack, Dean, the dean's report, asking, the title. Asking whether convicted felon Trump cheated in this election does not make you an election denier. Don't let GOPers and never Trumpers silence you. Talk to us about your thoughts around this. Being as how, we have no credible evidence that states right now that there has been any type of interference. It seems as if the interference has been probably misinformation and low voter turnout. What do you make of this and what are you hearing from your audience that calls into your show on a regular basis? Rigged election, dead people voting, thousands of people, the minute, flip the software. Now, none of that. That was all Donald Trump. What I'm hearing are

legitimate, good, fake questions, which I think everyone should have after election. And I think there should be, after every presidential election, or even midterm, DHS does a press conference saying to reassure people and answer questions from the media about this. My point is that so many people call the show, and we're saying things along the lines of, you know, I'm worried about Elon Musk, his name came up a lot, and about flipping, maybe they'd snuck in, could they do anything? It's more a question.

And I'm like, I'm not an expert on election security, but I did some research. But my point was the same to everyone. Ask questions, but we need credible objective evidence. I'm a trial lawyer by training. I tried cases. I need that evidence. And if you're going to make an argument that there's fraud, well, you've got to go do the work and present me with that evidence.

And some people email me. And it's good because when you ask people to put it in writing or to email me, they didn't. And they would give me anecdotal things. But in that same email, they would say, I haven't seen anything widespread. And that's the reality. But there's nothing wrong with questioning. There's a window of time after elections where candidates can ask for a recount if it's within a certain percentage where you can litigate claims of fraud.

It's when we get into denying the election results after recants, after audits, after your own administration, like in Donald Trump's case, has told you there's no fraud. That is the most secure election ever. And there's literally no evidence supporting your lie because you just want to overturn the elections, they empower. That's what Donald Trump take. I don't want people to be cheap. Your critical thinking skills involve questioning people in a power and authority and never, never stop asking questions. But don't peddle misinformation either. You can't find the proof.

move on. And that's the reality. So I was trying to make this space where people can ask the questions, but at the end of the day, you've got to use an credible objective proof that someone could bring to court. And if you can't, then we're just going to regroup as a party and look how we win based on policy. So let me ask you this now. I agree with you. I think that we should ask questions. We should have critical thought. It isn't something that should just be shut down, given who we're dealing with. A man that has lied pretty much about every single thing, that is teamed up with the most powerful and the most wealthy that do nothing other than spread lies and misinformation to ask these questions about the integrity by which our election systems are

run. Right now, we're at a place where it is most likely at the time of this recording that Pennsylvania will head into a recount, a recount that is automatically triggered. How do you think that even the idea that even though that this is a part of Pennsylvania, and their structure that when things are this close, that a recount is automatically triggered, do you think then, Dean, that this assuages some of the conspiracy theories that are going around, or does it add more fuel to the fire?

I think if you come at this with good faith and you really are curious about, was our election secure, then I hope people will not deny when a state like Pennsylvania, with a Republican governor, with a secretary of state like Alice Schmidt, who's a Republican,

but appointed, by Josh Stern. I've interviewed Al Schmidt a year ago who stood up to Donald Trump and when he was there at Philadelphia Election Commissioner. They said we went through it all and there's no evidence whatsoever of fraud that he votes being overturned and the results are confirmed.

I hope then we move on. There are red flags raised and there should be more investigations. But, you know, Danielle, to your bigger point, what makes it even more fair to ask question this election is that Donald Trump was convicted by a jury of cheating in the 2016 election As Albin Bragg, the DA said many times, this was not a hush money case about hiding an affair. This is presidential election corruption.

He cheated. Donald Trump was convicted of cheating. Donald Trump attempted a coup after the 2020 election. He is facing felonies for attempting to cheat in that election. Donald Trump knew if he lost, he would die in prison. Another motivation for him or anyone who was facing that scenario to cheat. I'm not saying he cheated. I'm just saying because of that, you are being a lemming.

You're being sheep if you don't ask questions. You said Elon Musk, as I document in my article, was not only these companies being investigated by various federal agencies, from employment discrimination to workplace injuries, there's a criminal investigation by DOJ, which went public in 2020 to documented by the Wall Street Journal where did he get perks from this company

and mislead shareholders by telling the company to lie about it. That was open in 2023 by the Southern District of New York, DOJ. That's going to end. So Elon Musk didn't donate money. He invested. He invested in his own freedom and to make more money in the long run. But a criminal investigation into Elon Musk is going to Ed now because he helped Donald Trump win. All this raised their flags.

Plus, as I know in my article, then, you know, Harris, we never saw that kind of enthusiasm. 2008 with Obama, that's it. So this is common sense stuff. Gallup poll showing the highest enthusiasm in 2008. And we've seen voter turnout numbers. The week before the election, Gallup came out showing 10-point gap. Democrats more enthusiastic to vote than Republicans. That was a Gallupil a week before the election. She was setting records, Vice President Harris and Harris has a small dollar donations,

far out raising Donald Trump. All of that, don't divorce common sense when you're asking questions. When I was a trial lawyer, we would tell juries, common sense should be your guy. Now, common sense only gets you a certain place. Common sense gets me to a place where I'm open to hearing evidence. No one's presented it. Unless someone comes forward the next few days with some credible evidence, it's over. But you should still ask these questions. And that's my mind. whole goal. If you asked the question, there's our whole conspiracy theory over the weekend about Elon Musk Starlink, it had flipped votes, and there's a lot of fact checking showing that they're not connected to the internet, the election machines, and they do this on purpose, which thank God for that.

And those articles were written before the election to a slage mega supporters, not about Elon Musk, but about could Dominion or some other company do that? And they were written there on good faith. And there's no evidence that's happened. So that's important. And by way, the last thing I mentioned, the never Trump is the reason I say that on Friday, I simply posted on X and on threads that people are calling my show. And I put it in there. I've seen no evidence of fraud. But I encourage people to ask questions.

And I encourage DHS, Homeland Security, to have a press conference before any conspiracy theories really take hold. And that's destructive for our democracy. Well, people on the right, and especially the Niper Trumpers on Twitter, were telling me they shut up and you're embarrassing yourself and all that. Democrats weren't saying that the never Trumpers, who are Republicans, who built this monstrosity of a GOP that now has, a monster ahead of it, we're mad at me for asking questions. They're not Democrats. I don't care

what they say. They were useful allies. They could continue to be useful allies. But it's time for them to set aside to let Democrats lead our party on policy, not just that Trump is the monster. That was true. Very helpful. But we kind of move forward on policy. That's how we win on populist policies that help people economically. And those never Trumpers are still conservatives. They don't want higher taxes on the wealthy. You know, they don't agree with our populist fusion. So I want to this slightly vent on that. I don't just like them. They were great. They were very helpful. A lot of them I like a great deal person, but it is now a time for Democrats to lead the Democratic Party. I wonder, Dean, now that America has revealed itself, I think, and you tell me, but I believe

that America has revealed itself to be what it has always been, but did a really good job of disguise, which is a deeply racist country. We can have as many conversations as we want about economic viability, which we know that Joe Biden had the best economic recovery of any country since COVID, that he was able to do what countries around the world were not able to do. He was able to add hundreds of thousands of jobs, millions of jobs back. He's able to put together a bipartisan infrastructure bill, you know, the thing that Donald Trump was never able to do in the four years that he was president. And so we look at this and we realize, oh, what I thought was 30% of the country that was racist and wanted a return to white nationalist ideals,

it's actually 50%. And now that we know that, and I think that a lot of you're seeing, particularly black women on social media, being like, I'm done. Right? I'm tapped out. Like, so you all can carry this moving forward. And I'm going to tend to myself, my family, my friends, and my community. And I'm done. That's a lot. is the base of the Democratic Party? Black women voted 92% for Kamala Harris and the Democratic Party. And so revealing these things, the truth about who America is, the base of the party being like, I'm tapped out and finished, y'all can do your marches and your protests, but don't call me. What does that signal to you about how Democrats even begin to pick up the pieces and move

forward when their entire coalition, which is, again, grounded in black women, black people, it's tapping out. There's so much to unpack there, Danielle. There's like eight questions and one there. A couple of things. One, and it's just my always desire to push back on the way the corporate media is now framing this is a mandate and over 50% of Americans voted for Donald Trump. The reality is, and this might not assuage anyone, make anyone feel better, but I like facts.

I'm a doubted person. A voter turnout was 63%. Donald Trump got slightly over 50%. That means of eligible voters in America, Donald Trump literally got 31.5%. Yes, Donald Trump got one-third of eligible voters. Not 50%, 301.3.3.5%. In 2020, you got 74 million votes.

In 2024, you got 74 million votes. We're still counting. It might get to 75 million. My point is there's no mandate. There's no landslide. For people who feel upset, I understand it completely, but I do know that I've spoken to many Democrats on my show over the years, black women, black men, people are all backgrounds. We are Democrats. It's in our DNA to be compassion and care. When we see people begin to suffer under Donald Trump, when he becomes present,

some of those same people are not going to be able to fight the urge deep within them to help their fellow Americans. And as much as they might be discussed with some of us, and I understand it, that I think many of them will step up again and know that this is a reason for being, is to stand up for a democracy and stand up for people in need. As I always say in my show, being a Democrat means caring about people you've not met. In fact, care about people you'll never meet, but it doesn't matter. That's what makes us Democrats. It's a compassion and empathy that drives us.

So I think some will come back. I get it, the frustration. We will see in time how it spins out. And is there racism and sexism? Well, I think one good indicator, Daniel is look at the Fortune 500 companies. There's 500 of them. How many black CEOs, 1.6% of the 500 of the black CEOs. How many are women?

50, right now. 50. 10%. That's like a record. Okay? So when you don't see just in elections, you see it in our society. Forty-five hundred companies reflect America. The biggest 500 companies and only 1.6% of the CEOs are black and only 10% are women. That's not happenstance.

That's not luck. That's a system that has encouraged and is sort of ingrained in it for any excuse, subconscious to conscious, to say I'm not giving the promotion to that woman. I'm not putting her in leadership positions. I'm not making that black man the head of the company because I don't like it or I think other people my company won't like it. Whatever is, we're just out not discrimination. Whatever the reason is that, to me, says a lot more than the election. We're something deep in our society about racism and sexism that's protected by the corporate structure. And that's the

world we live in. So does it change then? Like in all, like right now, you know, like you had said, people were energized. They felt hopeful for the first time in a long time. What it was that Tim Walls and Kamala Harris and the team were able to do in three months, three months time. I just like want to remind folks, three months time. What they were able to do, what they were able to engage and energize was nothing short of astounding. But here we now find ourselves where you are seeing some folks say to Democrats, you need to make a hard charge for the right or go to the go to the center. I don't know how they could be more fucking center and center right, frankly, than they already are. that if you adjust, you see some people blaming trans folks and saying this is your fault.

There shouldn't have been so much conversation around gender identity. I just wonder, what does it look like to rebuild when people have literally lost hope? And they lost hope in the democratic establishment. We need new leadership in the Democratic Party. And that's a part. There are some good leaders that there'll be a part of this movement. but the corporate Democrats, the people, look, so many Danielle, going back to a point made earlier, so many of the people on TV who are trying to defeat Donald Trump for the last few years

have not been Democrats. They've been conservatives who are never Trumpers, and they were really effective in some were amazing, and I like it very much. It's been on my show. But we have to go forward on policy. To me, resistance 2.0 has to include progressive populist policies. Donald Trump is more populist than the Democratic Party, in that he'll never follow through,

but he tells the working class he cares about them and tells them to do a tax cut on tips. And I'm going to do things to help you that you're struggling to make ends meet. And I'm going to address inflation and all that stuff. He has no answers for any of it. But he says it. We just mock it.

I don't mean we collectively Democratic leaders as opposed to saying, we need progressive policies that poll really well, such as family leave, the idea of expanding Medicare, raising taxes on the wealthy. To me, taking big money out of politics is such an important thing. That's not the number one thing we do.

I don't want to affect people personally. It's got to be part of it. But in the long run, that is holding back the Democratic Party from effectuate and change consistent what our base wants on issue after issue from domestic to foreign policy. It's all there. Take big money out, have more voice to the people. I think power to people.

It's got to be Democrats going to lean in on a populist message, a moderate message? This idea was watching some hosts saying, Democrats are too woke and the issue by transgender. We didn't raise that. They, on the right, redefine what we're about and then we were silent in the face of it and allowed them to define us any way we want.

We're not going to stop being compassionate or empathetic. If we are, then we're just Republicans. Why should I be that? I could be a Republican tomorrow. Sure, tax cuts are good. I do pretty good. That's not what I'm about. That doesn't motivate me.

Helping people in need, standing up with people, the most vulnerable in our communities and being part of those vulnerable communities myself. So to me, it's got to be push back on their bullshit when they try to demonize the idea of turning our back on the transgender community when they're a community in need

would be like four years ago turning your back on Muslims or in 2016 when Trump made us the boogeyman. But then he got Jared Kush, you got $2 billion from Saudi and Trump went from Muslims are bad to like best people. I love Abdul's. These abduals are great. You know, that's what Donald Trump has done. So he is transactional.

Any community that is difficult because the right is demeaning them and define them grotesquely, if you turn your back on them, you've turned your back on your values. Like, that's not the party I want to be. We've got to be for the vulnerable communities, help people, help the working class, the lower class, the poor. We need a populist message that cuts to that stuff where it's economic and compassionate. Matt, to me somehow bringing together a populist economic message and compassion and empathy, or the Democratic Party I want to see going for an issue after issue. Well, Dean, we will see.

We will leave it there today. But we will see in the coming weeks, months, and years ahead, whether or not Democrats will repair the deep damage that has been done. Really appreciate you, my friend, for making time for the new abnormal. Thank you, my friend. Great chatting, Michael. Andy Levy. Daniel Moody. How would you like to begin?

begin what is the end of days of America with you or fuck that guy? I want to pick something that I guess it sort of goes back to what we were talking about earlier in the show about the AOC Trump thing and people thinking Trump is fighting for them and is some kind of populist in the sense that he wants to help working people. So my fuck that guy is a guy named Timothy Mellon. He's one of the heirs to Andrew Mellon's billions of dollars from way back, in the Gilded Age. Andrew Mellon gave $125 million to the Make America Great Again Super PAC. That is to say he gave more money to Donald Trump than even Elon Musk did.

That's a lot of money. Yeah. Oh, yeah. You know, he did it quietly. Unlike Musk, he doesn't seem to want to ever be the center of attention. But he does want to elect people, get people into office who are, I don't know, let's say not there to help working men and women? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Timothy Mellon has referred to federal entitlement programs as slavery redux.

This is according to a Fortune magazine piece. He is a big fan of Trump also gave a lot of money to RFK Jr. So he just has a lot of money to waste. Got it. He does. But this is, he is so bad. The Mellon family has a combined net worth of $14 billion. Mellon himself, his personal worth is, there have been estimated.

It's anywhere from 700 million to closer to $4.2 billion. Whatever it is, it's too much to have money. His own family, his own unbelievably rich, unbelievably privileged family, hate the fact that he's supporting Trump. And one of them told Vanity Fair, I think what it comes down to is he wants to be left alone and he wants no one to tax him. It's that libertarian viewpoint that's become radicalized. There's a lot of really rich people out there who just don't need to think about what's

best for America anymore. I think all of that is spot on and all of that is something that somehow a lot of working men and women in this country, particularly white working men and women, don't understand that these people don't need to think about what's best for America and they don't think about what's best for America because they don't care. All they want is to not be taxed. And there's a reason that all of these rich guys, whether it's Mellon, whether it's Musk, whether it's Mark Andreson and Ben Horowitz, there's a reason why all these guys went all in on Donald Trump. And that reason is they don't want to be taxed. So my fuck that guy is Timothy Mellon, but it really is the entire billionaire class pretty

much of this country. And it's the people that are out there who still. think somehow that Donald Trump is fighting for them when by any possible metric you could look at, he absolutely is not. And if anything, he's conspiring against you with his fellow billionaires to make their lives better and your lives worse. So fuck all those guys. You know, the reality is, is that in so many ways, billionaires are in their own class. And I don't mean like just their own economic class. Like I mean, they don't have to care. You get to have enough money where you want to hoard it all. There is no sense or requirement of there being any type of give back. And you will just

do whatever it takes in order to hold on to every scrapping bit of your money. And it is this like, this selfishness, this greed that really has destroyed us. And Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth, with Warren, the rest of them have been talking about this for how many decades? Yep. And we watched it during COVID that these people that were wealthy before we went into COVID were wealthy became absolutely disgustingly filthy rich after. And it's just like this is what happens with unchecked grift, with unchecked greed. Mm.

Mm-mm-mm. Fuck those guys. Yep. And a little side fuck that guy to me for having been a libertarian for so long. But you came to your senses. I did. I did. But I would like to slap the shit out of that guy.

Danielle, who is your fuck that guy to start off this repulsive week? Right. Well, it's America. But in seriousness, it is America. But really looking at who is congratulating Donald Trump on his win. Because here's the thing, folks. This is what I actually have been thinking about, Andy, which is that Donald Trump wins last week. It has been eerily quiet in terms of celebration.

I don't know if I'm the only one that thinks that, but it has been. And, you know, nobody out in the streets, no, oh, congrats. You know, no real sense of like, oh, we won, even from the MAGA base. But do you know who is celebrating and congratulating Donald Trump out loud and in the open? The Taliban. The Taliban congratulated Donald Trump on winning the presidential election and said that it hoped that it marked, quote, a new chapter in relations with America and that they were proud that Americans are not ready to hand over leadership of their great country

to a woman is what was said. The Taliban, which has come back into power, have restricted women in ways that are unimaginable. It is a horror to live inside of that country as a woman. where they just most recently made it illegal for women to hear other women's voices. That even if you are in the midst of prayer, which is basically the only thing that they are allowed to do, and a woman is near you and can hear you, you have to either stop or whisper. They are not to be seen. They are not to be heard. They are not to leave their homes without permission.

This is the group that is congratulating Donald Trump and America for not handing over power to a. woman. This is the company we keep now. Well done. Fuck those guys. All of them. You know, it's funny. I was remembering a story and I just looked it up that came out and it was back in September about how Afghan men are now upset because the Taliban has passed laws and edicts and whatever that affect them. But they have to have a fistlong beard. They're not really allowed to wear jeans. They can't have haircuts that are against. Islamic law, all stuff like that. And all these men are like, wait, we didn't think you meant us. Mm-hmm. And boy, do I have a feeling that's going to be a familiar frame in someplace other than

Afghanistan over the next four years. Mm-hmm. Four or four to. Yeah. As usual, the horrific things that they're doing to women were not unpredictable. That's who they are. But it is absolutely wild to now see the men i mean it's the ultimate you know leopards eating their face yeah party thing just if you don't think that authoritarian's of any stripe are going to go after you too oh boy you're in for a rude awakening so yeah fuck those guys Andy levy Daniel moody how would you like to begin what is the end of days of america with you or fuck that guy I want to pick something that I guess it sort of goes back to what we were talking about earlier in the show about the AOC Trump thing and people thinking Trump is fighting for them and is some kind of populist in the sense that he wants to help working people. So my fuck that guy is a guy named Timothy Mellon.

He's one of the heirs to Andrew Mellon's billions of dollars from way back in the Gilded Age. Andrew Mellon gave $125 million to the Make America Great Again Super Pack. That is to say he gave more money to Donald Trump than even Elon Musk did. That's a lot of money. Yeah. Oh, yeah. You know, he did it quietly. Unlike Musk, he doesn't seem to want to ever be the center of attention. But he does want to elect people, get people into office who are, I don't know, let's say not there to help working men and women. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Timothy Mellon has referred to federal entitlement programs as slavery redux.

This is according to a Fortune magazine piece. He is a big fan of Trump also gave a lot of money to RFK Jr. So he just has a lot of money to waste. Got it. He does. But this is, he is so bad. The Mellon family has a combined net worth of $14 billion. Mellon himself, his personal worth is, there have been estimates anywhere from $700 million

to closer to $4.2 billion. Whatever it is, it's too much to have money. His own family, his own unbelievably rich, unbelievably privileged family, hate the fact that he's supporting Trump. And one of them told Vanity Fair, I think what it comes down to is he wants to be left alone and he wants no one to tax him. It's that libertarian viewpoint that's become radicalized. There's a lot of really rich people out there who just don't need to think about what's best for America anymore. I think all of that, all of that is spot on. And all of that is something that somehow a lot of working men and women in this country, particularly white working men and women, don't understand that these people don't need to think about what's best for America.

And they don't think about what's best for America because they don't care. All they want is to not be taxed. And there's a reason that all of these rich guys, whether it's melon, whether it's Musk, whether it's Mark Andreson and Ben Harrow, There's a reason why all these guys went all in on Donald Trump. And that reason is they don't want to be taxed. So my fuck that guy is Timothy Mellon, but it really is the entire billionaire class pretty much of this country. And it's the people that are out there who still think somehow that Donald Trump is

fighting for them. When by any possible metric you could look at, he absolutely. is not. And if anything, he's conspiring against you with his fellow billionaires to make their lives better and your lives worse. So fuck all those guys. You know, the reality is, is that in so many ways, billionaires are in their own class. And I don't mean like just their own economic class. Like, I mean, they don't have to care. You get to have enough money where you want to hoard it all. there is no sense or requirement of there being any type of give back. And you will just do whatever it takes in order to hold on to every scrap and bit of your money.

And it is this like this selfishness, this greed that really has destroyed us. And Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, the rest of them have been talking about this for how many decades? Yep. And we watched it during COVID that these people that were, We're wealthy before we went into COVID. We're wealthy. Became absolutely disgustingly filthy rich after. And it's just like this is what happens with unchecked grift, with unchecked greed.

Mm. Mm-mm-mm-mm. Fuck those guys. Yep. And a little side fuck that guy to me for having been a libertarian for so long. But you came to your senses. I did. I did.

But I would like to slap the shit out of that guy. Danielle. who is your fuck that guy to start off this repulsive week? Right. Well, it's America. But in seriousness, it is America. But really looking at who is congratulating Donald Trump on his win. Because here's the thing, folks.

This is what I actually have been thinking about, Andy, which is that Donald Trump wins last week. It has been eerily quiet in terms of celebration. I don't know if I'm the only one that thinks that, but it has been. And, you know, nobody out in the streets, no, oh, you know, no real sense of like, oh, we won, even from the MAGA base. But do you know who is celebrating and congratulating Donald Trump out loud and in the open? The Taliban. The Taliban congratulated Donald Trump on winning the presidential election and said that it hoped that it marked, quote, a new chapter in relations with America and that, they were proud that Americans are not ready to hand over leadership of their great country to a woman is what was said.

The Taliban, which has come back into power, have restricted women in ways that are unimaginable. It is a horror to live inside of that country as a woman, where they just most recently made it illegal for women to hear other women's voices. that even if you are in the midst of prayer, which is basically the only thing that they are allowed to do, and a woman is near you and can hear you, you have to either stop or whisper. They are not to be seen,

they are not to be heard, they are not to leave their homes without permission. This is the group that is congratulating Donald Trump and America for not handing over power to a woman. This is the company we keep now. Well done. Fuck those guys. All of them.

You know, it's funny. I was remembering a story and I just looked it up that came out and it was back in September about how Afghan men are now upset because the Taliban has passed laws and edicts and whatever that affect them. But they have to have a fistlong beard. They're not really allowed to wear jeans. They can't have haircuts that are against Islamic law, all stuff like that. And all these men are like, wait, we didn't. think you meant us. Mm-hmm. And boy, do I have a feeling that's going to be a familiar frame in someplace other

than Afghanistan over the next four years. Mm-hmm. Four or 40. Yeah. As usual, the horrific things that they're doing to women were not unpredictable. That's who they are. But it is absolutely wild to now see the men. I mean, it's the ultimate, you know, leopards eating their face.

Yep. party thing. Just if you don't think that authoritarian's of any stripe are going to go after you too, oh boy, you're in for a rude awakening. So yeah, fuck those guys. 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.

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