The David Pakman Show - 11/8/24: Now it gets very real very quickly

Episode Date: November 8, 2024

-- On the Show: -- Now that their chosen candidate has won, Trump supporters are going to get what they deserve -- Senator Bernie Sanders blasts Democrats for failed, disastrous loss to Donald Trump and Republicans -- Interest in leaving the country surges among Americans after this week's election results -- California Governor Gavin Newsom calls a special session to prepare to block forthcoming Trump initiatives -- Trump, MAGA, and the right wing media ecosystem are coordinated and effective, while left wing shows have to beg Democrats to appear on their shows -- Donald Trump's possible cabinet picks leak, and they are a terrifying disaster -- Fed Chairman Jay Powell says that he will ignore Trump if Trump attempts to fire him -- Right wingers are now putting pressure on President Joe Biden to pardon Donald Trump -- This week's Friday Feedback and reactions to this week's election results -- On the Bonus Show: Trump's enemies list, world leaders get together to strategize about Trump, and much more... 🐶 Ollie dog food: Use code PAKMAN for 60% OFF your first box of meals at https://ollie.com 🔊 Babbel language learning: Get up to 60% OFF at https://babbel.com/pakman 🛌 Helix Sleep: Get 25% OFF and 2 free pillows at https://helixsleep.com/pakman  ⚠️ Ground News: Get 50% OFF their unlimited access Vantage plan at https://ground.news/pakman 😁 Zippix Toothpicks: Code PAKMAN10 saves you 10% at https://zippixtoothpicks.com 🧠 Try Brain.fm totally free for a month at https://brain.fm/pakman -- Become a Member: https://www.davidpakman.com/membership -- Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/davidpakmanshow -- TDPS Subreddit: http://www.reddit.com/r/thedavidpakmanshow -- Pakman Discord: https://www.davidpakman.com/discord -- David on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/davidpakmanshow -- Leave a Voicemail: (219)-2DAVIDP

. well my friends those who are still here and that's most of you of course it has been a very very long week it didn't go our way I joked about my voice being gone yesterday or the day before it's actually struggling right now but we have what I think is maybe the most important show in months today and it's not hyperbole, but when things don't go your way, you have to contextualize, you have to seek to understand, we have to figure out what happened and what to do next. And I want to start with a really good editorial by Tom Nichols that points out that Trump

voters are now going to get what they deserve in the sense of what they voted for. It's not about the left will now punish Trump voters. Hey, the left has very little electoral power right now. It looks like we're losing everything. But there is no doubt here that although Donald Trump expanded his coalition on Tuesday, he got more of the Latino vote. He got more of the black vote. He won the popular vote first Republican in what decades to win the popular vote. He took back the blue wall or at least part of it in the north of the country. But now at their peril, these new voters are going to face the consequences of a Trump

presidency. Even if you voted for him, you are still going to get what Trump is going to give you. And there are many voters that supported Trump, not for his policies, but for his reality show of rage and resentment fueled by nativist instinct and fascist wet dreams and cultural grievances. And in the op ed that we're linking to Tom Nichols compares this support by some of these groups to sort of an illiberal populism where voters who are hostile to democracy participate in democratic institutions, right? Some of them would have been fine with Trump stealing the 2020 election. They don't really

care about democracy, but they're participating in it this time. They are voting to punish others even if they themselves are also going to be punished. So we now have a situation where millionaires and billionaires ended up somehow aligned with a sliver of the working class Trump vote, despite Trump's policies, likely harming younger minority voters, working family voters, Trump's policies towards those groups aren't going to change just because some of them voted for Trump. If Trump's policies don't do much for the average Texas Latino voter, if they voted for Trump, they're still going to suffer as a result of Trump's policies. And as I've said before, from what I'm seeing, Trump's going to

give me a tax cut. The type of business I have is likely going to get either a new tax cut or an extension of the previous QBID tax cut under Trump. It's not good for the economy. It's not morally justified. It's not economically stimulative to do that, but he's going to do it. And I didn't vote for the guy, but I'm still going to get, or my business is still going to get that tax cut. And the opposite is true for those that did vote for Trump. Trump's priority here was avoid legal accountability for his crimes, which seems like he's going

to succeed at dismantle checks on his power, including the rule of law. It seems he's going to succeed at that. I told you recently that at least the federal prosecutions of Trump are just going to poof evaporate like a miracle. They're going to disappear. And now Trump and his voters are going to have to bear the consequences of his governance, which is not going to spare supporters from harm. One thing we learned in this election is Democrats can't win over these voters with policy arguments. It didn't work. We've got to acknowledge that any serious

postmortem has to, uh, concede that that's the case. So now we will see does suffering at the hand of Trump impact these voters. They voted for him. Some of them, if Trump's second term is anything like the first term, many of those voters are now going to suffer. Will that get them to see the light? Now, as far as Trump goes, it doesn't matter because he can't run again, but as far as what they will support in 26 and 28, it's very relevant. So we keep talking about what do Democrats do? What does the left do? So much that we've tried just hasn't worked in this particular case with Republicans taking the white house, taking the Senate.

We don't yet know about the house, but it's not looking particularly good for Democrats. Democrats have to take a step back and let events unfold the breathless blame games, most of which make no sense. The problem was it was the wrong VP candidate. The problem was Liz Cheney campaign with Kamala for a day. The problem was people in Michigan angry about Gaza. We need to step back. We've issued plenty of warnings.

Any further cautioning is going to increase their fixation. It's time to allow some space for the people who said, I think I want Trump over Harris. They may be need to experience the consequences now firsthand, and then we will evaluate what effect that has on their voting patterns. Let's now talk about Senator Bernie Sanders and a little bit about the blame game. Senator Bernie Sanders has dropped the hammer, issuing a blistering critique against Democrats for the electoral bloodbath that took place this week, losing the white house, losing the Senate. Although Bernie got reelected, we don't yet know about the house, but it's not looking

good. Now, Bernie's diagnosis is clear and it is stark. Democrats abandoned working people. So working people have abandoned Democrats. When average people look at Democrats long, the party that has claimed to be about working people and labor and they don't see it, they will go and vote Trump or at least some of them will. I can sit here and tell you the Democrats defend unions and labor and Republicans don't. Unemployment is lower under Democrats. Job creation is higher under Democrats. Inflation is

lower under Democrats. GDP growth is higher under Democrats. I could do this until my head is blue and it might be turning blue, although maybe that's just my background. But if people don't believe it, it doesn't matter. And we saw this with more Latino voters than before, more black voters than before. Many groups still favoring Democrats in some cases, but not by as great a margin as before. Now I know that many of you will react by saying, wait a second, Trump's even worse for working people. And you'd be right. But at a certain point, it doesn't matter if you haven't been giving me what I believe I need. I'm going to try someone else, even if they also aren't going to give it to me, even though recently we've seen wages outpace inflation, inequality decline a little bit overall, we still have massive economic

inequality, wages that longterm are stagnant and 60% of the country is living paycheck to paycheck. Bernie is also sounding the alarm that if the current democratic strategy isn't working, it's going to fail even harder in the future. If you don't adjust, especially pointing to threats from technology, AI, and the effect on displacing workers or even killing jobs that AI may well have. Bernie talks about this. Bernie also notes that Democrats have not secured affordable healthcare for everyone. Now, of course, Obamacare did a lot. Obamacare, which now is 14 years in the rear view mirror, went a long way towards securing some healthcare for more people,

but not affordable and not for all. Even though Democrats are the party of the working family, Bernie points out that big money interests still play almost as big a role in the democratic party as the Republican party, the consultants, the strategists who are totally disconnected from grassroots issues and economic justice. My reaction to this is essentially Bernie is absolutely correct in his diagnosis. And it's not logical to vote for Trump because Trump would be even worse on these issues. But the proof that it's not working for Democrats is the proof from this week's election results, which are a complete and total bloodbath. And you know, it's funny working people, right? Trump laughed with Elon Musk on that Twitter spaces

about firing workers who choose to strike, just fire them and bring in scabs. They laughed about it joyfully. Trump won't protect working people, but once you decide, damn, the Democrats aren't really doing enough either. You go and you try Trump or you stay home and the stay home is critical. Joe Biden had 81 million votes in 2020. As of this moment, right? They're still counting, but I see as of this moment, Kamala Harris has 69.1 million votes. That's a nearly 12 million vote decline from Biden to Harris. Now I don't agree with it. I wouldn't do it, but I get that a slice of voters will.

So what I would do the next two years while the Republican party has the white house and the Senate and maybe the house, we don't know yet. Focus on the pocketbook issues in a way that isn't patronizing and that also doesn't mince words. Make it clear. Democrats are the ones who fight to improve wages and lower prescription drug costs and make life affordable. Highlight when those things don't happen. Thanks to Republicans, even though just about every economic metric improved under Joe Biden, Republicans still pointed to where it wasn't perfect and said it's Joe Biden's fault and it worked. So what Democrats need to do is now that Republicans are going to control most or all of

House, Senate and White House point to Republicans when they fail to do what they promised to do. Point to Republicans when they obstruct and get in the way of actually doing the things that would be good for these working people. Double down on some of these economic policies like, hey, maybe we need fair taxes here for the wealthy. Maybe we need a tax code that actually supports working families. And you've got to distinguish yourself from what we are about to get. What more can you do? Right? I mean, as I said earlier, we have to let the consequences of Trumpism hit people. And that's what we talked

about earlier. Bernie's diagnosis is essentially correct. The solution is tougher. And one of the solutions, this is wild. One of the solutions, a record number of Americans are seeking is to leave the United States. I want to talk about that next. Americans are investigating how to flee the country in record numbers after Donald Trump's win and the electoral bloodbath that Democrats and the left suffered on Tuesday. There's a Reuters article by Lewis Jackson, which points out that based on search data, it is clear that a record number of Americans are now researching. How do I move out of the United States? The reasons are clear. Despondency, disappointment,

disgust. They don't all start with D, but a lot of them do do, I guess. Dissatisfaction with what is going on. Total and complete exhaustion with the fact that we have, we have to acknowledge guys, even though we find this entire MAGA movement disgusting, tens of millions of Americans like it and prefer it to Kamala Harris and prefer it to Joe Biden. Now, what I want to do is approach this kind of tactically and morally. Let me do morally first. As far as leaving every election, I get calls from people. I'm thinking of leaving. Should I leave? Are you thinking of leaving? So let's first establish just a couple of different things when it comes to the morality. Any time someone talks about leaving, you have a group that shows up and says, oh, you're

just going to leave rather than trying to fix things. That's not the right thing to do. That's not looking out for your fellow American. That's not you just thinking of yourself, huh? I am not going to shame anyone if they decide I just have to get out. I love activism. I'd love to improve things, but I've got to get out because it's what's best for my family. Not going to shame anyone. We have 340 million people in this country. They're not all activists. You need to do at some point what is best for you, what is best for your family. And if you

determine, Hey, you know what? It's going to be two, four, six, eight, 10 years. We could have a Maga Supreme court till 2050. I've got to get out. I am not going to shame you for determining that that's what you have to do. What I do want to lay out are some of the challenges and considerations that I might think about. First of all, in general, if do want to lay out are some of the challenges and considerations that I might think about. First of all, in general, if you want to leave the United States and go to another country, there are a number of different challenges. It's not that easy to move to most of the countries I assume you would want to go to.

There are countries in South America where if you can go and either find work or enroll in school, you have a path to normalization within a couple of years in Argentina. There's others, but my instinct is the economies of a lot of those countries are not stable enough to actually be attractive to most Americans. So when we think about the places I assume Americans would want to go Canada, Western Europe, some of the developed, uh, Asian countries, Southeast Asia, maybe Australia, et cetera. It's actually kind of tough to leave the United States. There are immigration restrictions, visa limitations, financial and logistical barriers. It's expensive. If 60% of

the country is living paycheck to paycheck, how are you going to move to Denmark? Even if you could figure out a way to legally go there, Language barriers, of course, cultural differences, which can impact quality of life. Most people have a life where they live, even moving across the state or country completely upends their life. The UK, what are we even talking about? And also you could end up in a country that doesn't offer the rights protections or quality of life that you actually want. Maybe accessing healthcare would be difficult.

What about retirement benefits? What about all of those things? And also it's important to remember, even if you leave the United States as an American citizen, you still have tax obligations here in the United States. So that that's number one. Secondly, what I would urge some folks to consider if you're at the point of, I just have to get out, listen, I'm in Georgia, I'm in Texas, I'm terrified. I have a daughter what's going on with, uh, women's rights and access to reproductive

healthcare. And I'm worried about them coming after me me even for who I like on Facebook or what I follow on Instagram. I do think it's important to say, consider moving to a blue state. Now again, there's a moral case. We don't abandon the red states and go to the blue states. We stay in the red states and turn them blue. I'm with you a hundred percent. But like I said, I'm not going to shame someone if they say, you know, I remember this caller I had a couple of months ago.

My my child is trans. I live in Mississippi. I'd love Mississippi to be better, but I think I've just got to get out and I've got to move to I don't remember. They're considering Maryland or something like that. How am I going to say, no, you're wrong for doing it? I live in a blue state. Right. And one of the things that suggests to me that if you're determined to get out of where

you are, if you're in a red state, consider a blue state is that you have no citizenship issues. You have no work permit issues. You don't have to deal with an immigration process. You can maybe retain closer connections with family and friends. The language barrier is resolved. It's much easier to do. And we're going to talk about this a little bit later. The standard of living in a lot of the blue States is as high as Norway and Finland. Okay.

Look up HDI. HDI is the human development index. This is a sort of blended metric that accounts for access to health care, education, longevity, income, quality of life, a bunch of these different metrics. States like Massachusetts, Connecticut, I believe to a slightly lesser degree, New York, California, Oregon and Washington. OK, these blue states, they have an HDI number similar to some of the best places in the world to live. Does being in a blue state protect you from everything Trump can do? No, there are federal issues that, of course, are of critical importance and Trump will affect,

but the States that have figured it out, a lot of these things are not impacted nearly as much by what federal government does. And so if you're committed to leave, I would just consider that as an option. Let's take a quick break. We'll be back right after this. Those who follow me on social media may be familiar with my dad's dog, Nemo Pacman. Like me, Nemo Pacman has no middle name. And that's why I love our sponsor, Ali. It's clean, fresh nutrition for your dog in five flavors. Your dog will love. You don't need to be a veterinary nutritionist to know that feeding

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Normally I would talk about membership now. I'm not going to do it. I'll mention something about it later. But I do want to thank the more than 800 new members that signed up this week in the wake of a very, very tough election. We'll get to that later. Gavin Newsom in California, the governor is calling a special session to try to nuke the things Donald Trump plans to do. And it is exactly the reason that it is still important to have democratic governors in as many states as possible. California governor Gavin Newsom is gearing up for what is

effectively a war against Donald Trump's anticipated second term. He's rallying lawmakers for a special session to try to Trump proof California and protect progressive policies from a right wing reactionary onslaught. And what Gavin Newsom is trying to say, the message he's sending is clear. Trump wants to bulldoze California's freedoms and in general, the freedoms of blue States to keep having a really high standard of living like we have. And so what Gavin Newsom is doing is calling on the California legislature to fortify the legal defenses in California, especially what we know is going to be an assault on immigrant

rights and assault on reproductive freedoms and assault on climate protections. This is why it's so important that we stay engaged. A California's attorney general, Rob Bonta, he's ready to go. He's looked at 120 lawsuits that were filed during Trump's last term to know what is it that we are to expect and to be ready for a legal battle. He's rallying attorneys across the country, not only attorneys and attorneys general across the country so that they are ready to take Trump's agenda on directly. And we have other examples. The New York governor, Kathy Hochul, her attorney general, they're on high alert. They're assembling legal strategies to block Donald Trump's attacks on civil rights protections, environmental protections, LGBTQ rights,

Massachusetts governor Maura Healey. She has already said, I've gone against Trump in court. We know about the threats. We know their real agenda is project 2025. We know it's a blueprint for dismantling the things that so many blue states have figured out how to do correctly. This is why we must stay engaged. Why off your elections matter, why midterm elections matter. And this is why, I mean, so much of what we've been talking about today, thinking of leaving the country, think of a blue state, something worth considering. Uh, Trump's own words, as we know, are extraordinarily disturbing. He's talked about, let's use the military domestically against the enemy from within. We talked about that many times.

This is straight up on American language. It's terrifyingly authoritarian. And so many people are doing this. Maura Healey, Kathy Hochul. But what I love about how Gavin Newsom is doing it is he is doubling down on the things that California is already doing right. And he's saying this is not a place where we are going to allow Trump to run through with a bulldozer.

We are ready to turn California into a fortress of resistance against Trump, says Gavin Newsom. So California Democrats are not playing nice. Trump's going to stack the courts with more right wing judges. He's probably going to get two Supreme court picks. The stakes couldn't possibly be higher. And I love to see that Newsome and his allies are ready for a relentless battle to defend their state from this dystopian vision of America that Trump has. Trump doesn't think it's dystopian. We do.

So this is exactly what I mean when I say we can resist, at least in the blue states and hope is not lost. I know that when you look at the map and you say, damn, look at what happened presidential. Look at what happened in the Senate. It's not looking particularly good in the house. Well, what do you do? Well, the first thing is you look to who is ready to fight and ready to go. And you very quickly come across Gavin Newsom's name. I'm excited to see what he does. I hope other governors follow suit. All right. So the blame game is running rampant. I've read 30, 40, 50 different supposed explanations for why Trump won.

Why Mago won? Why Republicans won and why Democrats and the left lost at this point? It is both true that the problem must be identified and true that the blame game as it's being played is pointless. There was a clear choice presented. It wasn't ambiguous. I know that there were undecided voters to some degree, but for the vast majority of Americans, this was not ambiguous. They chose Trump. Okay. Their ideas won, even if their ideas are not based in fact, even if their ideas are based in lies, that's all true. They won. And if we don't recognize that we are unable to take steps to fix it. I want to focus in on one aspect of this and it is alternatives to corporate media. Ezra Klein did a commentary about how not doing the Rogan show, alienating Rogan, et cetera,

was a misstep for Democrats. The increased criticism of Rogan, arguably the biggest podcaster in the world, Kamala Harris, ultimately not doing the show, even though it was said to be a scheduling error. Was it, was it not now Ezra Klein points to this and says the Republican Party had a strong online media strategy. Trump did all of these appearances on podcasts. It made him more relatable. It humanized him. Lex Friedman was saying, let's bring Harris on.

Trump did it. Harris didn't. Rogan had Trump on Harris. OK, so I don't want to pretend that Rogan is the reason Harris lost. When you see, you know, as of this moment, it's 12 million Democrats as votes are counted. It'll, it'll probably end up being 6 million in the end. 6 million Democrats opted not to vote. It's not just because of Rogan, but I think that what Ezra Klein is bringing up and our friend Brian Tyler Cohen has brought this up recently, et cetera, is that it is abundantly clear now the strategy favored by Democrats of we rely on corporate media.

I'll sit down for my 60 minutes interview and I'll sit down on MSNBC and I'll be interviewed by Jake Tapper and I'll stand up on a stage with Anderson Cooper and ask preselected questions that is dead as a media strategy right now. Republicans get it and Democrats, if they get it, they are failing. I'll give you some personal examples. We have to beg Democrats to do this show and most of them don't. Bernie, we've reached out dozens of times. We don't even get a response. AOC, we've reached out dozens of times. Twice. We got to know 10 times or 20 times. We just, we don't even hear back. Okay. We've tried Obama. I get it. He's a former president. Who the hell am I? But the point is Trump did a ton But the point is, Trump did a ton of shows.

JD Vance did a ton of shows. They're doing Lex Friedman. They're doing Rogan. They're doing Theo Vaughn. They're doing Dave Ramsey, Patrick David, Dr. Phil. It's hard for me to say this without sounding like how dare they turn me down. That's not the point I want to make. I get turning me down.

But the bigger point here is it's not it's not a do you know who I am? It's that in total, if you look at the top five or 10 left wing YouTube shows, this is one of them, right? If you look at the top five or 10 YouTube shows, we are talking about tens of millions of subscribers, hundreds of millions, if not over a billion views a month. And Democrats just kind of don't do it. Okay. Now, Brian Tyler Cohen gets some of them. There's no doubt he, he did get a Biden, um, and he's interviewed Kamala Harris, but what Brian pointed out on Twitter, uh, he put out a tweet on Twitter or now that it's called X, we could say Brian excreted the following on Twitter. He said that quote, we can't compete by sticking our candidates on an episode one time in October of an election year.

Democrats need to embrace year round progressive media, either directly political or political adjacent if we want to compete. But you cannot only remember independent media outlets exist two weeks before an election, not in a media environment where the vast majority of Americans and practically all persuadable Americans are consuming content on alternative outlets. He's absolutely right. If this doesn't get fixed within the year, the midterms will probably be a disaster.

And again, this is not, you'd better do my show. I'm not a main character here in this whole thing. It's representative of right now. Look at the shows that the right confidently appears on and reaches tens of millions of people in a format that is useful to them. Theo Vaughn, the NELC boys, Dr. Phil, PBD, uh, the, the daily wire stuff. It's an endless list and they do it regularly. Even when we get a democratic elected official, they try to restrict that the handlers go out of their way to restore you. You're going to have 12 minutes, David.

Here's 10 things we want you to ask about in 12 minutes. And we go, we come up with our own questions and we need to give us at least 20 minutes. Come on. Um, and then they reschedule 10 times on us and then they appear once in a year. And then it's like, this isn't helping anybody. It's not good for the shows because these don't, don't make for interesting interviews. And it's not good for the media ecosystem for the, for the left as well. If the democratic party helped us build an interview circuit, the way that they've helped the right, that interview circuit builds power. And then the interview circuit that has built power can then help them when the elections come around. Uh, look at, you know, turning point USA versus the nothing that we have on the left. So this is a real issue.

And who, you know, I don't want to say I'm optimistic, but what I will tell you is that in the few days since the election, we've reached out to a few more democratic elected officials. And while we still haven't heard back from most of them, there are a couple higher profile folks who have expressed interest in being on. Now you might say, well, David, in November after the election, what's the point? That's exactly the point. You need to build the ecosystem. The right funds it.

The right watches it. The right watches it. The elected officials appear. That's the critical thing. And so you might say, what difference does it make if AOC goes on your show on December 2nd of an election year? The issue is let's build the platform so that then we build something for the midterms. We build something for the next election. Now, I will say one other thing.

It does seem as though a lot of the kind of dead weight is abandoning some of our shows. And the latest, I told you earlier this week that the moment that it became clear Trump was going to win thousands of people started unsubscribing from the YouTube channel. What's absolutely fascinating is that after I brought this up, even though thousands and thousands unsubscribed thousands and thousands also subscribed, the net decline is about 2,500 out of 2.6 million. That's two point. That's 0.1%. That is a sign, hopefully that there are people disengaging, but really engaged people coming

in. But here's the amazing thing. It's very transactional and easy to subscribe to a YouTube channel or to unsubscribe from it takes a second. Doesn't take much thought since the election, 800 paid members signed up on my website. Now 350 canceled. It's a record level of cancellation, but it's also a record level of people signing up. So it's a fight, right?

It's two in one out, two in one out. But there are signs that there is a new wave of activism forming here and that maybe people are understanding the importance of building this ecosystem the way the right has done it. Also notable, my forthcoming book has rocketed in preorder to the top book in the democracy category on Amazon and the second place book in the fascism category on Amazon. There are superficially concerning numbers, all of the people who do what I do, losing some YouTube subscribers, but it might be a shedding of people who they popped in for

the election. They're popping out, but now we can more strongly build the media ecosystem or at least I hope let's go to one of the other reasons that will be very important to do so, which is Donald Trump's cabinet. We now are starting to get a sense of who could make up Donald Trump's cabinet and it is nothing short of a living nightmare. The new Republic has a very good piece on it. Trump's proposed cabinet is the stuff of nightmares. They have a reporting from the Washington post about some of the people that Trump is considering including Susan Wiles to be his chief of staff, a radical, radical person.

Aaron Rupar took a screenshot of Fox news. Let's see if I can get this up on the screen. Uh, considering for treasury secretary, John Paulson or Scott Besant, both extremists for secretary of state conspiracy whack job. Richard Grinnell is being considered. And so is Senator Marco Rubio. Other names likely to have a prominent role. Doug Burgum, probably the least controversial name on this list. Vivek Ramaswamy, Elon Musk and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. I don't know that I can think of a scarier triumvirate here.

Vivek, Elon and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Having significant and important roles in the forthcoming administration. Now, there are a couple of caveats I think are important to mention here. Number one, if you are going to be an actual cabinet pick, you need to be confirmed. So, uh, uh, Democrats are not going to have control of the Senate, but they're going to have a say. And one possible check on Trump is he can get around this by saying, well, I'll make Bobby Kennedy jr. a special advisor. Great.

Doesn't need congressional approval. But if you actually want to put Vivek or Robert F. Kennedy Jr. or Elon Musk in a formal cabinet position and some other positions, they will require congressional approval. And it's not obvious to me that they will get it. Secondly, we know that if you go to work for Trump based on his first term, there's a really good chance that you will end up on the outs with Trump.

You'll end up quitting. Trump will end up saying you're a horrible person. And so I am holding out some hope that some of these total nut jobs that Donald Trump is going to be selecting are going to fail miserably, generate massive public backlash, which Trump absolutely hates and actually lead to them leaving. Now, as is always the case with Trump, when you have someone replaced, it usually is someone even crazier. That was certainly the case with with a lot of people during that first term.

And you know, if if Robert F. Kennedy leaves and you replace him with someone even wackier on medical stuff, you maybe you end up with that Florida Ladapo guy or someone even more kooky. That's obviously scary. But if we have anything here, it's congressional approval will be necessary. And a lot of these people's worst decision might be to go to work for Trump. Let's hope after the break, we'll talk about what fed chairman Jay Powell will try to do. If Trump fires him, it's very funny. I've been sleeping on a Helix sleep mattress

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would cause problems after the election, but that the left would saying the left is the enemy from within and might be needed to be handled by the National Guard. The Washington Times reported this interview with the headline Trump says no chaos from his supporters this Election Day, which totally whitewashes and saying washes what Trump actually said. Luckily, we have ground news, the app and website that provides context on every story. Like for this Trump interview, ground news provides more context. Like Trump's defense secretary said, we should believe Trump when he says he wants to use the military against Americans because that's what he wanted to do during the unrest in

the summer of 2020. That's why ground News is so valuable. Our sponsor, Ground News, is an independent, nonpartisan news analysis tool dedicated to exposing the hidden agendas that influence the news you consume. Ground News has features designed to expose the narratives that circulate in biased media bubbles, and it'll even show you your own media blind spots. We all have them so that you can understand every story from every angle. the David Pakman Show David Pakman dot com. The link is in the description or scan the QR code. That's ground dot news slash Pacman. The link is in the podcast notes. What are some of those phrases? Uh, when life gives you lemons, you make lemonade beggars, can't be choosers, that kind of sort of thing. Uh, I want to play

for you what fed chairman Jerome Powell said when he was asked, what if Trump fires you? And he said, well, I'm not going to allow it. Now, of course, firing would be Trump asking Powell to resign. And there's a reason for that. And it's because Powell has a term that wouldn't expire until 2026. We'll get to that in a moment. But this happened during a press briefing yesterday.

And Jerome Powell just going, yeah, I just would not do it. I'm staying. I'm not going. Hi, Victoria Guido with Politico. Some of the president's elects advisors have suggested that you should resign. If he asked you to leave, would you go? No. Can you follow up on it? Do you think that legally you're not required to leave? No. Oh, I love this. There was follow up. This was interesting enough that other reporters seized on it and said, wait a second, I need to ask about this as well. And here's another reporter saying, do you even believe Trump has the authority to fire you? And Jerome Powell goes, nope, not allowed. Do you believe the president has the power to fire or demote you?

And it has the Fed determined the legality of a president demoting at will any of the other governors with leadership positions not permitted under the law, not what not permitted under the law. I absolutely love this. Now, who's right here? Because a bunch of the Magapatamians and the Macedonians have come back and said, how is Jerome Powell going to get away with this? How can he say this is we need law and order. And if Trump says you go, you go. Well, we do have something called the facts. And the fact is a federal reserve chairman can indeed refuse to quit when a president fires them or tells them to resign because the president does not have direct authority to fire the fed chair.

The federal reserve is designed to be an independent agency. The whole point here is you prevent political influence from compromising its decisions. Trump would love to be able to control the fed and tell them cut rates now, raise rates now help me juice the stock market returns. It's designed not to work that way. And indeed the fed chair is appointed by the president. They are confirmed by the Senate. They get a four year term. And during that term,

they can only be removed for cause if they committed some crime or misconduct or something along those lines. Now, Powell's term as chair goes into 2026. His position as Fed governor continues into 2028. If Trump does try to fire him and Powell simply says you don't have the authority to do that under the law, it's going to be really interesting to see where the standoff lands. Now, of course, you know, and I know that if such a situation were to surface, you would probably start getting pressure from Republicans in the Senate saying, Powell, you should really leave. They don't have the authority to force him out, but there would start to be pressure

and it's conceivable. It's conceivable that they could make life really difficult for him. But I absolutely love that. He's simply saying, nope, can't, nope, can't do it under the law. We'll see what happens if and when Trump tries to push him out. We are now starting to see pressure on president Joe Biden to pardon Donald Trump. I think this is a very bad idea and I'll tell you why. But we are now starting to see editorials like this one in the national review, a conservative

publication called Biden should pardon Trump. The article is written by Mark Antonio, right? And the article argues that for the good of the country, for unity, for healing, for all of these different reasons, Joe Biden should pardon Donald Trump, especially since Trump might just end up pardoning himself. I think that this is a very bad idea and I'm encouraging Joe Biden not to do it. First of all, when Gerald Ford pardoned Richard Nixon, it was harmful. Nixon was getting special treatment. It damaged trust in government.

Ford's pardon prevented Richard Nixon from facing a trial, which is rightly seen as an injustice as an injustice. People were affected by Nixon's actions and the pardon from Gerald Ford made it so that there was no possibility of real consequences. Pardons of powerful figures can undermine public faith that there is equal justice under the law. We all know there really isn't. But you only make that more stark and obvious when you pardon someone like Trump or like Nixon.

When leaders are pardoned, it signals that they are above the law, which to a degree Trump believes himself to be. Knowing that there is a chance of a pardon, if you set that as a standard or as a tradition, can embolden leaders to do whatever they want to take unethical actions to take illegal actions. And even though they love to say it would, it would generate unity, it would turn down the temperature. That is absolutely not the case. If Biden now came out and pardoned Trump after everything Trump's put the country through, it will be justice denied.

It will anger a huge portion of the country. And the right decision here is not to pardon Trump, reinforce the idea that no one should be exempt from legal consequences. Now, of course, functionally speaking, Trump is exempt from legal consequences. The federal cases against Trump are going to be wound down. As we talked about yesterday, uh, Donald Trump is unlikely to be sentenced in the 34 guilty felony counts because of the fact that he is now president elect. I mean, it's, it's unfortunate, but Trump is going to be exempt under the law from consequences.

Given that the last thing I want to see is Joe Biden formally make that a reality when it comes to federal charges. So it won't unite the country for Biden to pardon Trump. It won't reduce polarization. It won't suggest that our Democratic guardrails and judicial guardrails are firm and sturdy. It will do all bad things. Ford was wrong to pardon Nixon. Biden would be wrong to pardon Trump. And I really hope that we don't see it and that Biden resists the

pressure that is very clearly and very obviously building here. Now, if I'm wrong on this, if I'm missing something and there are people in my audience who are on the left, Biden supporters, Harris supporters, whatever, not Trump supporters. And you do think that Biden should pardon Trump. I want to hear from you. Change my mind. Info at David Pakman dot com. I don't see it.

I don't want to see it, but I will welcome good arguments to the effect that it should be something that happens. Let me know. You can't vapor smoke inside. You're tired of people seeing you put those little pouches in your lip. There is a nicotine alternative that people won't notice. Zippix nicotine toothpicks. Our sponsor Zippix makes the only nicotine toothpick on the planet that is FDA registered. You can use it anywhere. Work, restaurants, airplanes, sporting events

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That's Pacman one zero. The info is in the podcast notes. When I'm working on the show or doing stuff on my computer, staying focused and getting in the zone is super important. It's not always easy. I would try Spotify or YouTube playlists. I'd end up actually more distracted than focused. And then someone told me about Brain FM's Focus Music, which is actually made by scientists working with musicians specifically to help you focus. I tried it and it worked really well for me, which is why I asked them to be a sponsor. With Brain.fm, I just feel more productive and focused, easier to start on difficult work,

easier to stay focused without getting distracted and do that really important deep work that I love to talk about. Thank you. amazing sleep sounds that I've started using at night. You can try Brain FM totally free for an entire month. Just go to brain.fm slash Pacman. The link is in the podcast notes. All right. Friday feedback. The first post-e election Friday feedback riddled with various instances of blame and finger pointing. I want to evaluate some of it, sort of taking the temperature of people in the audience as to what happened here, who, what is to blame. There are some good points made, some not so good points made.

I'll tell you what I find to be based in fact and what I don't. So let's start with two blood who commented on YouTube. Bottom line, Kamala hug too many Republicans and unpopular Democrats like Clinton. They tried to pull moderate Republicans and zero of them moved. Meanwhile, potential democratic voters did not want to vote for a weirdly war hawkish Hillary style Democrat. The Gaza issue is part of it. The perpetual ineffectiveness of democratic administrations failing to solve day to day problems that people are dealing with is probably one of the biggest parts. The only thing I agree with you on is men.

Kamala ran heavily on abortion. It's a very serious issue, but the democratic party has in large part abandoned younger men, especially in the environment of the Tate's Paul's podcast, bros, et cetera. Yeah, there's some stuff here that, that rings true. Uh, and some that doesn't, I haven't seen evidence that the focus on abortion hurt Harris. I haven't seen evidence that Gaza hurt Harris. I just haven't seen it in the data. I have seen evidence that there was just significantly reduced motivation to go out and vote for Harris in an environment where maybe some people didn't believe that a second Trump term would be as bad as some were saying. Here's another response. This is from white dark 40 on the subreddit. Biden would have done better. The election's not over. Harris can

still win. Okay. This was written when the results were still coming in. But the point here is Biden would be doing better. Did Joe Biden drop out is being Googled as we speak. His approval ratings skyrocketed after he dropped out, but that may be because he dropped out. He probably could have brought in more Pennsylvania votes. He would appeal to the more sexist, xenophobic centrists, et cetera. So listen, I don't know whether Biden would have done any better than Kamala Harris. Maybe he would have done a little bit better. Maybe not.

Certainly there was not an indication where he got out when he got out that he was going to do better. But what I can tell you is that given that the election was generically a referendum, referendum on how people perceive the direction of the country to be and how people perceive the economy to be Biden being at the top of the ticket instead of Harris does not seem to me that it would have led to a better outcome for Joe Biden. I'm just, I'm just not seeing it in the data. And I understand that a lot of this is sort of like gut feeling and emotion and how we feel and how we would like to feel in this sort of thing.

But it just is not seeming to me like that is the case. Excuse me. Excuse me, excuse me. No says the problem with the democratic party is that they know what the problem is, but are too afraid to admit it. Radical progressives are killing the party with their nonsense ideology. When you ask a progressive, what is a woman, but they can't answer for fear that they will be labeled homophobic. It's problematic. I disagree that this was an issue and I'll tell you why it has nothing to do with Kamala Harris as a can.

Kamala Harris didn't participate in the what is a woman stuff. Kamala Harris didn't participate. Whatever this person's talking about, whether it's gender stuff or whatever. Kamala Harris was criticized more for not doing enough of that stuff by some on the left, uh, rather than for doing too much of it. So again, it's not, we're just exploring what people are saying is to blame. I think that Harris was arguably, I'm not saying necessarily, but arguably hurt as much from not kowtowing to that slice of the left than hurt for actually doing it. I didn't see any of that from her campaign. Rob Hernandez says the moment Democrats stopped showing how weird the Republicans were and

started hanging out with Cheney begging for their votes is when the election was lost. Republicans aren't going to vote for Republican light when they have the real thing. And that strategy suppresses the Democratic based turnout. I'm not sure about this either. And I'll tell you why there are based on exit polling. It's not just Republicans worried about crime and the border. While our solutions would be radically different, no doubt, as we spoke about with Congressman Greg Kassar yesterday, there are many Democrats who are worried about the issues that Republicans bring forward. They just don't necessarily love Republican solutions.

And so to me, it's again, maybe I don't disagree that the full day of campaigning with Liz Cheney may not have been a good idea, but there are as many people criticizing Harris for being Republican light as there are criticizing Harris for not actually delving in a more systematic and forceful way into saying, Hey, they have identified some problems over there, but here's how I would propose to solve those problems. That that's what I'm seeing in the data. Cray Vegas says so much for democracy, so much for a more equal participation in politics.

David, you often say many things that are true and worth paying attention to. That said, you aren't perfect. And your wantonly harsh criticism of Jill Stein is proof of that. She's not a horrible person. She and other candidates exist to remind us that the American political system is in dire need of profound reform. Instead of bashing her as a spoiler, you should applaud the fact that she's still present despite the abhorrent bullying she gets from status quo parties.

Yeah, I just disagree. First of all, Jill Stein didn't play spoiler. fact that she's still present despite the abhorrent bullying she gets from status quo parties. Yeah, I just disagree. First of all, Jill Stein didn't play spoiler. This election was not close. Jill Stein didn't play spoiler in even a single state. I'm glad that her influence was diminished. I'm glad that because of that, we have the clarity to say, Hey, you know what? The problem was tens of millions of people just preferred Trumpism. Not that some tiny slice went for Jill Stein instead of Kamala. That's the greatest. If there

is any relief here, it's, Oh my God, Jill Stein cost Kamala five States. Otherwise she would have won. Nope. We don't have to now consider that as the explanation. We know that it was much bigger than that. And so my, the most positive takeaway for me about Jill Stein is she got like 0.2% of the vote and didn't affect the results in any state. That's good news. Random handle has the following view. Genocide lost her Michigan. It's disingenuous of you to ignore the impact of Gaza in the election. It wasn't the main reason she lost, but it was very significant. She let Trump pass her on the left as an antiwar candidate. Doesn't matter if it's only lip service.

He said the right things completely wrong. So two things on this. Number one, Trump didn't on Gaza. Trump didn't surpass her as the antiwar candidate. Sure. Trump said, I'll solve Ukraine, Russia on day one. Sure. Trump said, uh, October 7th never would have happened if I were president and it's just lip service.

We know it. But Trump has said he would just let Israel finish the job. That's not anti-war. There's, there's no interpretation of that. That is anti-war. Trump would have just said, go ahead and level Gaza completely. And if you don't like Harris's view on the issue, you would like Trump's even less. One other thing.

I've looked at the numbers. The story was Michigan was lost for Harris because of Muslim voters displeased with her position on Gaza. And a bunch of them voted for Trump. Look at the margin in Michigan. I think it was like 70,000 votes or it might even be more now. Look at the number of, um, Arab Americans in Michigan. Look at the percentage that are voters based on about a 50 to 60% turnout, maybe even a little less. Look at the fact that by a small margin, they voted for Trump. and you very quickly come up with a

really tiny, tiny number, tiny number relative to the total margin in Michigan. So it's fine to say this. It's just not borne out by the facts and it's not borne out by Trump's campaign rhetoric. Kudos King is coming in hot and says you deserve to lose more than 5000 subscribers. You led people in the wrong direction for years and the proof is in the pudding. Loss after loss until I hear accountability and contrition and a change of tactic. I don't want to hear anything else from you. You failed and now we have Trump again. Well, a couple of different things. Let's take it piece by piece. Thankfully, even though we lost like 15,000 subscribers, we also gained 13,000. So it's like minus 2000 out of 2.6 million. It's not terrible. I think we're doing okay. Secondly,

we, I led people to loss after loss. Trump barely won in 2016 and then Republicans lost everything since they underperformed 2018 Trump lost 2020 the red wave turned into a slight blue increase. They lost off your elections. They underperform midterm elections. They lost everything. Yes. Democrats now got crushed the idea that I even as a minor character have presided over

loss after loss. It's just not born out by the facts. And this kind of relates to the final one that I want to put here about predictions and estimates and all of it. Two nine nine one. J.M. says I am so mad at myself for believing you and that effing Alan Lichtman and Seltzer F all of you totally unfollowing and will'll let never listen to stupid pundits like you again. J.M., I want to remind you of something.

I'm speaking directly to you here. For months I've been saying Trump's running stronger than he ran in 2020 and Trump's running stronger than he ran in 2016. I've been saying this for months and the last two weeks I shut up about it because a lot of my audience didn't want to hear it when I would say, folks, this doesn't look good. Trump's numbers are better than they are when he won in 2016. Some in my audience said, David, shut up. Give us a positive message. Tell us Harris is going to win.

And it wasn't in the numbers. So I don't know what you're saying about believing me. I'm the one who's been saying Trump's numbers look better than in elections past. That all being said, if you want to make me the villain here and you want to unfollow me, I understand it's a tough time. It's been a very tough week. What I hope is that after the dust settles, we realize that when Republicans lose, they go back and double down on let's get involved. If we lose and say bye bye, then we are just going to lose again. I don't want that. I don't want that.

So we'll have the bonus show today. You can sign up at join Pacman dot com. The forthcoming book, The Echo Machine, which includes an explanation of how things like what happened this week happen, has jumped in preorder to the number one democracy book on Amazon and the number two fascism book on Amazon. I would be honored if you preordered this book anywhere. You can call your local bookstore, Barnes and Noble, Amazon, Audible, anywhere you want Kindle.

Let's go to the drawing board. We've got some time and we are going to come back. I believe I believe stronger and more prepared than ever. So we'll see you on the bonus show. And then, of course, we'll be back on Monday.