The Dispatch Podcast - The Bubba Vote | Interview: David "Mudcat" Saunders

Episode Date: January 15, 2024

Self-described rural advocate and Democratic strategist David “Mudcat” Saunders joins Jamie to discuss the issues concerning bubba voters. The Agenda: —Who would Mudcat vote for? —Haley as a uniter? —Evangelicals —Calls from Paul Manafort and Steve Bannon —Bring manufacturing back? —Mudcat’s thoughts on Rich Men of North of Richmond —Democratic conventions and all hell breaking loose Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to the Dispatch podcast. This is Jamie Weinstein. My guest today is Dave Mudcat Sanders. He is a famed political strategist, famed for helping Democrats, particularly in the South, win over rural voters, what he calls the Bubba voter.

He was a key campaign strategist for Jim Webb's run for Senate, for John Edwards' presidential campaign in 2008, and Mark Warner's Senate campaign. He is not, with the campaign that I know of at the moment and hasn't really talked to the media in some time, but we were able to get him on to discuss

what it would take for Democrats to win the Bubba Voter in 2024, what he thinks will happen in the 2024 presidential race, and much more. I hope you enjoy this podcast as much as I did. Without further ado, I give you Dave Mudcat, Saunders. Mudcat, welcome to the dispatch podcast. Good talking to you, Jamie, real while.

It's been a while. In fact, I think the last time we talked on air, some type of forum, was maybe around 2015, 2016. So maybe start by just talking about the evolution that I know we've talked on the phone a little bit. I believe in 2015, 2016, you seem to like Donald Trump. I don't know if you ended up voting for him, but it seems like you have a different view on him now. So maybe just that evolution from what you saw in Donald Trump in 2015, 2016, and how you view him now. Well, a lot of it is to do. Of course, in 2006, I was former boy Jim Webb. You know, we had that short-lived campaign

and very early decided to get out. I mean, when 90% of the superdelegates are already with Hillary Clinton at that time and all the candidates hadn't even announced. It was pretty obvious what was going to have. But I never was totally for Trump. I want to be clear, you know, you know about it. My long run in the stain of the Clintons. And, of course, I live in rural America. I live in Craig County, Virginia, and counties fluctuates between a little less than

5,000 or a little over 5,000. You know, I just saw the damage that the Clinton trade policy. had done, you know, to my area and fly over America in general. I'm a rural advocate first and a Democrat second. But anyway, McClentons had lost me a lower line with, you know, the NAFTA CAF, if there had been a shaft or they'd have done it. A favored nation status for any number of people, including Red China. That's the question I got for the media.

Why do everybody quit calling from Red Chita? And they had in shade. But anyway, you know, and the lack of antitrust, you know, suits on big boxes, which retail, which killed, you know, retail small towns. And, of course, the vertical integration of agricultural industry. It's culminated now. Smithfield Food, which was a Virginia company, has been bought by China and the Chinese concerns. But I would say this, I was more against Hillary Clinton. And I felt like a Democratic Party had to go in a different direction.

And I came out in April that year in 2016 and made a prediction that Trump was going to beat her. And she couldn't beat him in the Rust Belt, you know, with his economic populism, which ended up, in my opinion, being totally rhetorical. I didn't see what he did for us. You know, and Trump today, you know, everybody hates everybody. And that bugs me big time. My county voted 18% for Joe Biden. And I think this is true, you know, when I'm getting ready to say throughout rural America.

You know, it's been since 1980, it's pretty much Leattwater Godguns and Gates. It's been not long after that, that it became culturally unacceptable to be a Democrat. Donald Trump made it socially unacceptable to be a Democrat. and all the hate that's going on now, I can't deal with. I really can't. And, you know, I'm a spiritual guy.

I'm not very religious, but I'm very spiritual. And I don't like it. I think it's time that we had a leader, somebody would unite us back again rather than continue to divide. Looking at kind of the presidential field right now, it does seem like it's going to be Joe Biden versus Trump, but there is still a primary, particularly on the Republican. side. Of all those candidates, is there any candidate that you think you would prefer and as a

corollary that you think the Bubba voters? And we can describe what those are as well that you're famous for knowing how to talk to who they would prefer. Well, you know, if I was a Republican, I tell you right now, Nikki Hayley. And I like, she got into my heart a little bit in the first debate when she talked about not demonizing people for the way they believe. And, yeah, that's the truth. I mean, like I said, she got into my heart a little bit that she could possibly unite. And one thing I know for sure, she is without question, the strongest Republican to run against Biden.

I mean, the polls, all the polls right now don't mean all a lot, as you know. But I like her attitude towards, you know, uniting people. And I can't understand, you know, the Republicans usually, you know, they say Democrats, you know, fall in love and Republicans fall in line. And, you know, I think in any normal campaign that should be doing a heck of a lot better because Republicans like to win. And without question, in my mind, she's the only one they've got right now. Before I go any further, for those who don't know what you describe and when you say

Bubba voter, that, you know, you're famous for the campaigns, Democrats, conservative Democrats or Democrats who won in conservative states and Republican states, what is the Bubba voter that you helped them win over and what issues do they care about? People don't understand it all right. I remember when I did Mark Warner, his rural guy, in 2001, he was catching a great deal of heat. Of course, Mark got 50.1% of a rural vote. He's the only Democrat that's carried the rural boat like that in 50 years, a majority. Anyway, I told him right at the beginning that out here, I said, these people have been voting for Republicans,

but they're not necessarily Republicans, and there's a large, you know, a group of Republicans out here, they call Republicans, that Republicans, but they're looking for a way to get out. And I mean, down deep where they live, they're Roosevelt Democrats. Of course, culture, you know, defines, you know, the way they go. But Mark was great as a candidate. But I told him when he was telling me about all the people in Northern Virginia talking about rural votes, it's not that many of them, you know, out in rural areas. And, you know, this was all coming from Northern Virginia.

Virginia, you know, a huge, you know, suburban sprawl. And I told him, I said, you go to Alexandria, Virginia, where you're from, and you go out Route 1. I said, there's more voting rednecks out there than there is in all the cult producing counties of Virginia. Everybody comes from somewhere, and rural is a mentality. It's down there where you live and you're going to still vote rural issues and rural ideas because that's their culture.

you know, I believe in the two-for-vote. And I told Mark at the time, you know, like, Jamie, if you vote for out here in Craig County and you vote for a Democrat, how many votes is that worth to? And most people will say, well, but it's not one because you just took one away from the Republicans. So in reality, it's to it. You know, we went half from hard. Mark did not pander, you know, with the voters at all.

He said right up front. He said, you know, I'm a city boy. And, you know, Northern Virginia, telephone guy. And I'm not from the culture, but I like it. And it's fun. Well, we went out and we did everything. We got a race car course that. So Linda Lake, you know, did the soccer mom's deal.

She immediately called it the NASCAR dance, which was berserk, when 44% of the NASCAR fans are women. You know, we were just, you know, trying to get involved in the culture. We ran a truck race at Martinsville. And then we had the largest hunting and fishing group in the history of Virginia elections. We had 1,500 people signed up, and they worked on it, getting outside.

We had big rallies, you know, hunting and fishing shows. We had bluegrass music with the Bluegrass Brothers and, you know, a campaign song. and I go on and on and all the things that we did that were cultural. And anyway, Mark O'Mewey says, I'm not taking anybody's gun. So, you know, he was halfway to first base on that. But the people who come out and try to pay it to the culture

are getting nowhere. And I remember AP Bob Lewis came in and wrote a story about it. We went turkey hunting and he asked me, you know, I said, and I was God, Mark, asked me how he was hunting. And I said, well, he was like an elephant in the woods. He made a noise getting around and such. And he asked me, you know, did Mark ask you the most important thing about hunting?

And I said, yeah, I said, he didn't. I told him don't sheet Mudcat. Mark embraced that. But Mudcat, if I asked you, or if you were advising a candidate and they said, you know, Mudcat, what are, you know, one, two, and three, what are the three most important issues in order to reach these voters. What would you tell them? Understanding is number one, two, and three. Understand who you're going at. And the Democrats have never put money into it. I mean, Chuck Schumer, bless his heart, he did try to do that at one point in time, you know, with some rural reach out,

but they've got nowhere. But you've got to have understanding of the culture. And if you don't, you know, you can't do it. But inside every rural Democrat or a lot of them, there's a Democrat, rural Republican, there's a Democrat trying to get out. And if we go back to the founding principles of the party and that's what I am. And, you know, Andrew Jackson has become a dirty word. I mean, he

obviously did some multiple things you know, with the Indians and with his slaves. But an expanded form of Jacksonian democracy that covers social justice, economic fairness, and individual liberties, but expanded

to everybody. Radio or white or black, red or yellow, black or white. There are presses in his sight. And, you know, it's just going for everybody. But we've abandoned a lot of very press. Can Joe Biden, if he is the nominee, which he will be, versus Donald Trump, who is likely the nominee on the Republican side, can Joe Biden win back the rural vote or the Bubba vote?

Or are these a solidly Trump base and, you know, that he can't take from him? Well, no, I don't think Joe Biden. or can really get after the rural boats. These people, you know, Trump's branded, you know, he's their savior. In fact, you know, go crazy. You know, I'll talk a little bit about the evangelicals. Is that okay? Yeah, go for it.

Anyway, you know, I've seen these signs, you know, popping up and, you know, saying that Jesus is my savior and Trump is my president. And that kind of thing burns me up. I mean, John Fryan said it best, you know, said, or Jesus of Messing News, he said, Jesus was a good guy, he didn't need this shit. And he doesn't. I mean, God and politics don't sit down at the same type. They just absolutely do not. Politics right now is about divide and God's about unite, you know, politics. God's about his will. Politics is the very, you know, zane of the man's will. And this idea of bringing them in together is wrong. I mean, as far as I'm concerned, people use it for political purposes. I never had is committing blasphemy.

They're going for personal gain or political gain or money gain. It doesn't matter. It's still blasphemy if you bring, you know, manifesto forces into it as far as I'm concerned. What is the hold that Trump has on these voters? What is it about him that makes him such a, cult-like figure? And what is it about Joe Biden that makes it hard for him to win over these voters? Well, you know, go to the leadership principles of the Tilo the Hunt, which was a book back I think it was the early 80s that came back out. And one of the principles was when

tubs are the dark, it's the tribe will always turn to the meanest toughest son of a bitch in the tribe for leadership. And that's basically what's happened. There's a lot of, you know, It pinned up anger, resentment, frustration, and the hearts of many, you know, from the middle class on down. And it's easy, you know, to saddle it, and Trump did. And, you know, the evangelicals, I just mentioned this, going back to support him. I mean, here's the most unprice-like individual than we've ever had in the White House. I mean, and they jumped on him. I mean, to me, you know, I asked him a boy one time.

I had a lot of wisdom. What would Jesus say if he came back to saw us today? Well, I know the same answer he gave in. It's what I'll give now. He'd say, y'all got too tied up to message. Messenger, it didn't pay a damn bit of attention to the message. The mingling of those two will always be a puzzle to me. I'll never figure that out.

As far as Biden is concerned, his biggest problem is that he's been branded with, you know, the age. And, I mean, he's branded. There's nothing he could do. I don't understand Trump's. I'm about the same age while he's not branded, but that's just the way it is. And honestly, if Chris Lasavita is doing that, he's from over here in Palatown, Virginia, which is the way that he's to hear down in Richmond. I'm noting for years.

But I think that he's not even going to run again. But I think that he'll be running against Donald, Cavillard Harris. and, you know, just take it for Greg that Biden's not going to make it for four years and this is where you're going to get in return. Do you think that's going to be the Trump campaign message is that I'm not really running against Joe Biden because he's not going to last four years. I'm running against Kamala Harris. I think that's what Chris will do is what I really do.

I mean, it'll make it a big emphasis of the campaign. How important then will be the... the debate for Joe Biden? Does he have to, I mean, people are saying that he can do like what Trump did and say, oh, I'm not going to debate you. But doesn't Joe Biden have to show up and show that he's not the caricature that he's being framed as, you know, this frail out-of-touch person? But Joe Biden will show up without question because he's a gifted debate.

I mean, he'll wear Trump out. I'm not so sure to be like, you know, as we all know, if you take out the, the, the, Kennedy Nixon race in 1960, debates about really never done anything in the campaign. But Joe Biden, you know, has always been a gaffe machine, as you know, Jamie, doing this for a number of years. But if he's only at 50%, which is way more than that, obviously, he'll show up for that without question. Not long ago, I saw someone go through a sudden loss, and it was a stark reminder of how quickly

life can change and why protecting the people you love is so important. Knowing you can take steps to help protect your loved ones and give them that extra layer of security brings real peace of mind. The truth is the consequences of not having life insurance can be serious. That kind of financial strain on top of everything else is why life insurance indeed matters. Ethos is an online platform that makes getting life insurance fast and easy to protect your family's future in minutes, not months. Ethos keeps it simple. It's 100% online, no medical exam, just a few health question. You can get a quote in as little as 10 minutes, same-day coverage, and policies starting at about two bucks a day, build monthly, with options up to $3 million in coverage. With a 4.8 out of

five-star rating on trust pilot and thousands of families already applying through Ethos. It builds trust. Protect your family with life insurance from Ethos. Get your free quote at ethos.com slash dispatch. That's ETHOS.com slash dispatch. Application times may vary. may vary. This episode is brought to you by Squarespace. Squarespace is the platform that helps you create a polished professional home online. Whether you're building a site for your business, your writing, or a new project, Squarespace brings everything together in one place. With Squarespace's cutting-edge design tools, you can launch a website that looks sharp from day one. Use one of their award-winning templates or try the new Blueprint AI, which tailors a site for you based on your goals

and style. It's quick, intuitive, and requires zero coding experience. You can also tap into built-in analytics and see who's engaging with your site and email campaigns to stay connected with subscribers or clients. And Squarespace goes beyond design. You can offer services, book appointments, and receive payments directly through your site. It's a single hub for managing your work and reaching your audience without having to piece together a bunch of different tools. All seamlessly integrated. Go to Squarespace.com slash dispatch for a free trial, and when you're ready to launch, use offer code dispatch to. save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.

Well, let me ask you this, Mudcat. You mentioned that you obviously worked on Jim Webb's Senate campaign, successful Senate campaign. I think you might have been the one to convince him to jump in. And then he had that 2006 short-lived presidential run. If I remember it correctly, I mean, on the debate stage, he was so kind of not in the center of the Democratic zeitgeist. I think they even laughed at him at one point for his,

tremendous war service. Can a Democrat, I mean, is there the Democrats that used to court to win elections, are they viable in today's Democratic Party? It'd be hard to find one. I think John Tester, at Montana, I mean, he understands the power of the culture. And anyway, of course, Jim Webb understands the Scots-Irish culture. You know, he wrote the bestseller, you know, born fighting. Jim and I, of course, both the Scots-Irish. So he understands the culture. thoroughly. But it's like I said, understand. You've got to understand. You've got to work at it. And you've got to get in the middle of. And you can't be off culturally. It's like, you know, any time of Democrats talk about getting guns, they lose votes. And I think the key to this election, I really do is that any time the Republicans go after abortion, they lose facts. And I mean, that's, you know, institutional memory there. I mean, it's always worked that much. but you've got to be sympathetic towards the culture. You really do, and show respect for it.

You don't have to be from it, like Mark Warner, but you've got to be respect. I have a couple questions I'm going to bring in from our mutual friend, Matt Labash. I reached out to him, the former writer for the Weekly Standard, a friend of the dispatch, I think more broadly. He gave me a couple questions for you.

He said, one is that, you know, you've been an articulate voice for populism for a long time, but we sort of have it now, he writes. Did it work out like you planned? Where did it go wrong? Where did it go wrong? What's been a retort? It's where it's gone wrong.

I want to see action. I really do. I want us to start. We need to bring manufacturing back. I don't claim to be a columnist or anything, but we've become completely pretty much a service nation. We're not bringing in any money. You know, any digital income from manufacturing.

You know, I think we need to go back there. And, of course, we're a real lot on the workforce now on this border problem. Listen, I'm not for wholesale on the American citizenship by any means. I think people all have to stay in line, and I think that's what most 90% of the American people believe. But at the same token, we got to get a workforce somewhere. And, you know, I think shutting down the illegal immigration across the border, you know, is the right thing to do. But at the same token, I think legal immigration could help us. And, you know, with wonderful background checks and family, you know, situations.

But Glenn Yonke, you know, our governor in Virginia, and I like Glenn, he's been very nice to me, you know, when I've seen him, I like him, but he's started a new workforce training deal and says that, you know, we're down 300,000 jobs in Virginia, right? now. We're talking about manufacturing. And, you know, you can't find people to work. And people say, you know, people are too lazy to work. That's not true. Not everybody. And it's just people are employed now. They've already got jobs. But we need to do something about the workforce. We really do. I think we need to really work on an immigration issue. Mudkat, just out of curiosity, a lot of the episodes of this podcast since I started it here or since I started hosting it at the dispatch in October, have been focused on the Middle East.

How do Bubba voters view what's going on in the Middle East? How do they view Israel? A candidate that comes and tries to appeal to them, is that an issue that they care about? My neighbor up right here, Curtis Hallwell, he's a Vietnam veteran, as big a Trumpster as you can find. And he's got Israel flag up on his flagpole. than I've seen more of, honestly, out here that I've taught,

they're going to talk a lot about the Middle East. What they want to talk about is immigration, for the most part. I don't think it's the issue that much. And is that what, you know, is that one of the issues that even just rhetorically, immigration trade that Trump, you know, constantly pounded in 2016 and is, you know, a common topic in 2024 for him, is that what attracts them? Or is it just his personality that attracts them? Oh, he's the anger, his personality.

It's like I say, it gives back to a team of a hundred, the principal. When times are the darkest, that's when, you know, the tribe will turn to the mean as tough as a bit of the tribe for leadership. And that's one thing it really bothers me is that the idea that this country is going to hell. I mean, if you look at the economy, you look at what's happening, you know, I think with the infrastructure bill, Wall Street sure feels this way. We got some clean sail on the head,

and people only focus now on the negative rather than the positive. And I think Trump bears great responsibility for that. We're the greatest nation in the world. How do you expect, you know, obviously gave your view of the primary and where the Bubba voters will be, but if you looked at more broadly how the 2024 election will play out, do you have a view on who do you think will win? Do you think it's going to be a close race?

Do you think one of the candidates of the other, Biden or Trump, is going to win in a landslide? How do you view 2024 and how it will play out? Well, I'm with Christenado up for New Hampshire. I don't think mathematically possible for Trump to win. And, of course, all is going to happen is he's going to get beat. Joe Biden, I'll get 300 electoral votes again. And he'll say the election was rigged.

And I was reading the other day, Do you know that he raised hell with the Emmy Committee because he didn't get an Emmy for the apprentice and said the voting was rig? But it seems like every time he loses, he claims it was rig. I don't think he can win. I really don't. Because you know kind of the Bubba voter who supports Trump, there have been people that suggest that there could be violence if he's indicted, or not indicted, but if he's convicted

or he loses an election. And do you think that there is any chance of that, or at least in the area that you are, do you see anybody who's willing to, you know, fight if they see Donald Trump either lose the next election or is indicted? Is that overblown? Or do you think there's any grain of truth to that?

I think it's cold off a lot of it. And it's not like it was on January the 6th, the anger. It's really, I don't understand. You know, I guess any, but if you look at electoral politics and national operatives, Republican operatives, how many of you heard saying that the election was rigged? They all say, well, you know, there could have been real regularity, you know, but how many of the roads are the Mike Murphy's, you know, or the Jeff Rose, how many of those guys are saying it was rigged exactly zero, because they look like a bunch of fools of their peers, if they did it, you can't rig a name. national action. It's too many moving pieces. And, you know, that movie, that documentary, 2,000 mules, I counted up how many people they had to known about it. Those 4,000 people, and, of course, it would be more than that.

There was just to get it all three there. And, but that 4,000 people, none of them told their wife or their girlfriend. None of them got drunk at a bar and told a friend, and more importantly, not one of them got the 20 to 50 million dollars. that you get from some network to express and, you know, for an explosive story on it. And I don't get that part of it either. Just out of curiosity, have you ever met Donald Trump

or, alternatively, have you ever met someone else who advises him or has advised him for many years who has been in kind of your political operative game, Roger Stone? And if so, what insight can you give us on those two figures? Well, Paul Mafford, Colman. Paul Mannerford. Yeah, he was the first one to call me. He wanted me to get Webb, see if I could get Revsburg.

And I told him, I said, you know, nobody gets Webb's broke. You know, Jim, of course, tells people that when he ran for the Senate in 2006, I talked to him into it. I thought that was nice and was proud of it for a while until I got to know Jim really well. And then found out that nobody talks to him in anything. And I just happened to be on the telephone when he decided to run. But then I talked to Paul Matafort.

Fox came here in August of 2016, did a documentary highlight in me and called it the Trumpocrats. Well, I got a call from Steve Bannon after that. And Steve was very, very nice to me. And he's a Czech boy and a Richmond Benedictine boy. But they offered me, you know, want to know what I could get done for this and for that. You know, but I told him I'm a Democrat,

and I don't get to work for Republicans, and that I'll be it, I'm not a very good Democrat, according to many. But that's the only contacts that I've had with him was Paul Manafort and Steve. But you never met Trump or talked to Trump. No, I never talked to Trump. Trump was, he tweeted, there was 13 times,

I think that documentary was showing that he was tweeting out every time you know, watch, you know, the Trumpocrats, but, you know, it wasn't so much a pro-Donald Trump documentary for me as it was, you know, talking about the Clinton. Their trade policies and other policies

with really, and, you know, this idea that they said when they did it, that, you know, after it was over with, you know, When they did it, they said, you know, this would create new, more eye-paying jobs and that that was over with. They said that the ratifications of the trade treaties were unintentional. And so anyway, I said, yeah, it's unintentional.

They were unconsidered is what they were. Amundka, I actually don't know this. Are you completely done as a political strategist? Or would you, are you working for anyone anymore? Or would you work for a candidate if they came and asked you for help? but it depends on who it is I've done a good many campaigns but every time I did one

it was for somebody I believed that including John Edwards and to this day I'll still say John Edwards was wonderful to me you know as you know he gave me an open field to run down if I wanted to but I'm just not able to go

to work for anybody I mean, I like to think I'm not a political whore. Do you think, you know, two of the three most famous candidates you've worked for are no longer running for office or seem to not have a plan to run for office, John Edwards and Jim Webb? Do you think that they would ever run for office again,

or are they completely done? I'd say they're both completely done, but Web especially. I mean, Web 77 now. I'm pretty sure that's correct, but he understands the rigors of it. You know, personally, I've got 70% of the American people. I wish neither one of them would run. My buddy, Dave Axelrod, you know, he said that.

Joe ought to step down. He got, you know, smeared on it. And Obama said the truth about Joe Biden last week, and he needs to get first strike on the field. And I'm not disparaging who he's got on his staff. out, but in the presidential campaign, you need a lot of institutional memory. You really do it. Expertise, and there's a lot of people sitting on the sidelines like Axelrodol, but I think

Dave's done, Robert Gibbs and the singing and fluff, you know, I'd be talking to those guys. Modka, let me close on these questions here. Just out of curiosity, did you watch the Richman North of Richmond singer? And is that a guy who embodies the Bubba kind of mindset? No. No. Do you know who I'm talking about? Oh, yeah. He's saying rich men north of Richmond. And that to me, I would think embodies kind of the voter that you're talking about. Am I wrong? What did you think of that kind of viral moment? Oh, he was singing to the choir is all he was doing. I mean, you're going to drive votes. You've got to sing to more than the choir. Everybody liked that is locked in with Trump. Let me close with this question. Mudcat, have I missed anything that I should have asked you, that, you know, you haven't talked to the media in a long time that you want to opine about?

Because I want to give you this forum to say anything that I haven't prodded out of you so far. I've got a theory. And it's, it's, I think it's about a one or six or seven chance. I think the Republicans could have a broker convention. And then all hell will break looks. That's just a food for thought out there is all. it is. How would that happen? How would that happen, Mudak? Can you just walk through the scenario where is it that Donald Trump doesn't get the delegates or that, you know, by the time he gets the convention, people are trying to come up with rules that will prevent him from from being the actual nominee? I just like if there's, of course, what is there, 104 or 104 or 104 electoral votes. I mean, delegate votes that are super delegates, just like a Democrats. And I think of about

500 out of them. If they can get through the first ballot and Trump is not 50 plus one delegate care, I think they're, you know, they're let go on the second, the pledge delegates are let go on that second ballot. It's just something about Nikki Halle that tells me that they could jump for the electability. I'm surprised more Republicans, you know, are jumping up because, I mean, they got to win. I don't think. It's like I said earlier that Trump can win. And a lot of my Republican friends, and I talk across a lot of scrimmages, you know, Republicans, so I've developed, you know, a bunch of great friendships, including Ken Kucinella. Ken and I think so he's a close friend. We shoot together, skate and talk about real things.

Electability, I think, at some point in time, is going to come into question. And Republicans, like I said, you know, they fall in line. It could happen. You could have a big live call. Well, Mudcat, if it was Joe Biden versus Nikki Haley for the presidency, who would you cast your ballot for? I don't know. I hear more about Nikki Haley, you know, you know her a little bit better. But it's like I said, she's talking about Unite and not the Biden, which to me is a huge deal. I do think that if she wins, you know, if you look at history, you know, the first.

historic first for presidents or prime ministers in the country, they always come from the right. They never come from the left because women on the left, a certain number of are going to vote for a woman on the right because she's just a woman. You know, the glass sailing to be broke. And, I mean, if you look at, let's see, Golda Meyer, that was one, Maggie Thatcher,

this lady in Italy, I forget her none. But if you look all, you know, through the history, they always come from the right. And I think that Nikki Ailey would be a formidable, if not unbeatable, a pun. I really did. Well, provocative Mudcat, as always. Thank you so much for joining the Dispatch podcast. Thanks for having me, Jamie. We're going to be able to be.