The Press Box - Ep. 106: 'Keepin' It 1600' With Tommy Vietor

Episode Date: May 5, 2016

Jon and Dan rehash the highlights from the White House Correspondents' Dinner. Then, Tommy Vietor, former spokesman for President Obama, joins to discuss Trump virtually securing the nomination, Hillary-vs.-Trump scenarios (22:00), Hillary's strategy vs. the Donald (44:00), and the anniversary of the Bin Laden raid (50:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today's episode of Keeping at 1600 is brought to you by Seatgeek, our presenting sponsor and the only fan-friendly app for buying and selling sports and music tickets. Other sites have gone back to the same old tactic of showing you a lower price and then charging huge fees at checkout, but at Seat Geek, the price you see is always the price you pay. The Seat Geek, there's no guesswork, you'll know exactly how much you're paying, where you're sitting, and whether or not you're getting a good deal, all right from your phone. So drop your old site and experience buying and selling tickets the way it should be. To start using Seatgeek, download the free Seatgeek app.

go to seatgeek.com. Our show is also sponsored by HBO Now. HBO now is the new way to stream all of HBO's series, movies, documentaries, sports, specials, and more. And there's no TV package required. Download the app on your favorite device to start your 30-day free trial instantly. Welcome to another episode of Keeping at 1600. I'm John Favro.

I'm Dan Pfeiffer. And we are here today with our special guest, Tommy Vitor. Good morning. Tommy was National Security spokesman in the Obama White House, one of Barack Obama's first press secretaries on the 2004 Senate race and then the Senate office. I'd like to be defined by my year in Iowa during the caucuses. Yes, the Iowa Press Secretary from 2008. One is the state.

Under the tutelage of one Josh Ernest, we brought it home for the Obama campaign until the New Hampshire people ruined it. That's it. Yeah, well, Josh is the White House press secretary and you're on our podcast. And I have nothing better to do at 9 a.m. Okay, so we have a lot of us. a lot to talk about today, big day. But I want to start with a quick recap of the White House Correspondent Center since that is the place five years ago where we first, the three of us, helped troll Donald Trump into running

for president. Good work. So it's our fault. So I think the president did pretty well this year. Yeah, I did too. I mean, I don't think that you total up the funny of all the jokes and then divide by the number of minutes and that's how you did judge these things. It's like, what were the big funny moments in the speech?

and I thought he had some absolutely laugh out loud, hilarious things. The Boehner skit was amazing. It was unexpected. Yeah, John Boehner was great. Bainer was amazing. He was hilarious. Also, the Bainer's cigarette ploy at the end, which was really funny because at first I heard that Bainer ad-libbed that.

And then Bainer tweeted out that it was POTUS's idea. So it was like a rehash of the grand bargain. Yeah. Yeah. We did not get a grand fiscal bargain, but we did get a great skit out of John Banner. So everyone wins. Yeah. The other idea for that coupling was a Kobe Bryant, Barack Obama,

trying to decide what to do with their lives now that they retired. But I actually think Bainer worked that better. Yeah, we had a couple of good ideas there. But I think Obama did well. The one thing I noticed was Trump Jokes 2016 versus Trump Jokes 2011. The room was almost a little more reluctant to laugh as much at Trump as they were the first time. And I'm wondering if it had to do with the fact that he's now the nominee of the party. Yeah, they don't want to get sent in Gitmo under a Trump presidency.

Like, he's going to go through that video. Like, this is a Bruder film and find everyone that laughed in prison. They've all had their suck-up email to Corey Lewandowski in their draft folder for like the last six months. Last night that thing got sent, fired that puppy off. What did you guys? Go ahead, Dan. I think the one thing I thought was interesting about the dinner was this was like the, presidential comedic version of like the Kobe Bryant Farewell tour.

So many retrospectives just about like how good Barack Obama was at this. And it was nice to see people appreciate that he, like not that this is a very important part of that presidency, but sort of brought like comedic performance to a new level and people were beginning to miss. Because no matter who the winner of this election is, Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, unnamed Republican White Knight,

everyone acknowledges they're not going to be as funny or as good at this as Barack Obama is. Yeah. I mean, I think for a long time those speeches were sort of Bob Hope style jokes, right, appealing to sort of that age, that sense of humor. Barack Obama brought a coolness to this job and to that dinner that I think didn't exist before, and I think it was greatly appreciated by the younger crowd. Yeah, he enjoyed making fun.

In the Internet. He enjoys making fun of Washington. Yes, yes, he does. Now, the other thing that you always get from that dinner is the ooze and odds. about any media criticism are especially pronounced. And I think Larry Wilmore in particular is feeling the wrath of that today. Yeah. Yes.

Yes, I think so. What did you think about Wilmore, Dan? I actually left halfway through Wilmore's thing so I could get to parties faster. To be completely honest. So I missed sort of, I missed the whole controversy of, I saw his opening, which I thought was pretty funny. And then I guess it didn't, there was some problems after that. I mean, like, we have seen over, you know, I skipped dinner this year and basically went to the beach in California to get as far away from the dinner as I possibly could without leaving the continental U.S.

But, you know, we've been for the last decade or so, and there's a mixed, mixed performances all across the board. And it's hard. Like, it's a really hard thing to do. The president's hard to follow. And it's hard to get the feeling in the room right where you're sort of making fun of people, but also, like, half-stroking their egos enough that they'll laugh for you and your jokes are insider. enough the reporters will laugh and outsider enough the celebrities and you know cast of game of thrones will laugh and i don't think i don't think will i don't think will i think will i think will more speech will work if someone i see this for someone on twitter like the colbert speech in

06 will work better in retrospect than it did in the room right it did very poorly in the room for one at least i wasn't in the room but from watching the room on see how to c-span feed the next day it looks like it didn't do great but i think his criticisms will time. Yeah, I mean, he was harsh, and I don't think he was funny enough to be as harsh as he was at times. And he also didn't really sell it. Like, I think he allowed himself to get intimidated by the early silence in Uzana's. But the controversy over the close, I think, is sort of your classic silly U.C. thing.

I mean, yeah, I wasn't as persuaded that that was a huge problem. Yeah, I don't think Barack Obama looked particularly upset about it. He did not. did not. Now, one of Obama's first jokes was the end of the Republic has never looked better, which was quite prescient because here we are with Donald Trump as the presumptive nominee of the Republican Party. So let's talk about Indiana. It is over. I mean, I mean, what else can you say? I'm like, what the fuck? Donald Trump is the Republican nominee. That is an insane thing. Like, we all joked about this for a long time. And like now what's happening? It's like happening.

It's like happening for real. You know, you can see today, you know, last night and today we're a Republican, you know, they are embracing it, Reince Priebus. He's really having a hell of a year. Yeah. Good. Good job. You know, tweeted last night that Donald Trump was a resumptive nominee. Mainly, I think, for job security since the first thing the presumptive nominee does is clean out the National Party Committee and put his loyalists in there.

Right. So, Brent probably likes his, he once again invited to next year's 100th most influential time people party. Yeah. Food and beverage guy at the Mar-a-Lago is going to be running the R&C in a week. Yeah, it's like, well, it's also how perfect is it that Donald Trump's presidential campaign began with a conspiracy theory about Barack Obama not being born in this country? And he clinched the nomination on the day that he accused Ted Cruz's father of being involved in the John F. Kennedy assassinations.

Great bookend. Whatever a remarkably blatant thing. Like, you know, I'm a person, Dan, you are as well, who's laid down some opposition research hits in our day. You don't... I have no idea. Yeah, right. You don't call the National Enquirer,

pitch your garbage story, and then raise it out of nowhere on Fox News. And be like, I don't know where this came from, but maybe he killed JOK. What are you talking about? Maybe you, maybe you do. It looks like it works. I mean, he's the nominee of the Republican Party.

I mean, it's... Maybe that's all it works now. Ted Cruz has dropped out. Uh, lion Ted is no more. Lion Ted is gone. Carly Fiorina has lost twice. Yeah. The matter of seven days.

Yeah. Did she have a better run as a VP nominee than Sarah Palin? I think it's debatable. Yeah. She certainly had a shorter run. It shouldn't be shorter, but. She seems unlikely to get a reality show out of it, though. That's true.

That's true. Maybe a website. And it seems like as of the taping of this podcast, it's Wednesday morning, by the way, um, John Kasick is dropping out now, too. Yeah. So we have no more Republicans. It's just Trump. So now what is what what of the never Trump movement at this point? What what happens to them? Do they I mean, clearly there's, you saw a lot last night a lot of Republicans, Republican activists, Republican writers have said, you know, they're burning their Republican registration cards. They're changing never Trump to I'm with her. The question is how far that movement spreads. and does it spread to the elected Republicans? Does it spread to actual voters? Like, is this a real thing or not?

I think we got a pretty good sign about it this morning when Kelly Ayat, who is the Republican senator from New Hampshire, one of the most endangered Republicans in the country, came out and said she was going to support Trump. I was so surprised by that. Like, what is she doing? Well, I mean, I think Trump did win her state by like 20 points. and all of these Republicans who were up on the,

I think there's going to be a separation between the Republican pundit, commentator, strategist, donor, lobbyist class, and the elected Republicans because Kelly Ayat, Pennsylvania Senator Pat Toomey, Wisconsin Senator Ron Johnson, every member of the House. They need Trump voters to win. Trump is getting 40% or more of the Republican voters. those people still or don't vote for them, they have zero chance of winning.

And so even that is like that is probably for her. She needs those Republican voters more than she is likely to get, um, crossover voters. So they're sort of damned if they do, damned if they don't. Right. I mean, there's this weird sense of strength and momentum, not weird. There's a sense of strength and momentum with Trump right now because he beat all his nominees.

He's been winning overwhelmingly in all these states. But he has 70% disapproval among. He's doing worse than Romney among white voters in every presidential battleground state. I mean, this guy is limping into the nomination the way no candidate we've seen in our lifetime has limped into a nomination. Obviously, Bernie Sanders has done a number on Hillary Clinton and her unfavorables are up too, but, you know, Donald Trump might be the least likable nominee in history. I know.

I just wonder, Tommy and I were just talking about this. like, couldn't you be a Senate candidate in a swing state who just says, you know, if you're Republican and says like, you know, I don't like Donald Trump and I really don't like Hillary Clinton and I'm not supporting either. Yeah. You know, or I'm going to write in someone. I'm going to write in, you know, whoever I want. Like I just, it's really, I think in the in the most purple states it's going to be a problem

for those Senate candidates. You're right, Dan, though. They need the voters. So I actually don't know what you do if you're in that position. I think it's hard because Donald, like if you're Kelly Aon, for instance, Donald Trump's going to campaign in New Hampshire a lot. So it's going to be super awkward every time he shows up if you can't answer the question of are you for him or not. Does she campaign with him when he comes? That's a great question.

Do they all just have like a long list of excuses? I have to shampoo my hair. Was it Tompkin Jr. who said you got caught in traffic for like three and a half hours when Dick Cheney was in New Jersey? Jersey. A lot of that. I mean, we saw this in 2014 with conservative red state Democrats with Barack Obama. They would come up with any excuse not to command with them. Now, none of those people are in the Senate anymore. So we can see that that strategy of trying to like be too cute by half didn't work out so great. But I think they're going to have to. I think that they are going to come around. The one possibility, this is like the one last remaining card for the never

Trump movement is try to get someone like Nebraska Senator Ben Sass or who has already said he still will never vote for Trump last night. Yeah. Kudos to him. Also not on the ballot. But can you get one of those people to run on a third party, either on the libertarian ballot or just like someone like a reform party or something like on the innovation party? Okay, good.

I just want to make sure. I mean, it's out there. It's out there. It's sitting there. You've got that Vanda High. Zuckerberg money. Yeah, I got that a little hanging for you.

That's right. But so can the question is can they get someone on the ballot? And the answer to that is probably no because these people

have been unable to organize themselves out of a box this entire time. Did they have any chance? Could the never Trump movement have done anything

differently to avoid this outcome? I don't know that they could have. I mean, the problem is your standard error was Ted Cruz. And I think

did a really good job early of selling the press on the idea that he had a coalition to be built, right? He had this four lanes thing, the Tea Party, Libertarian, blah, blah, blah. It made sense to me on paper that he was the guy who could assemble all those people. It's sort of like all the worst parts of those coalitions come together for Ted. He also had this SEC primary point he was making. It's just, I think the execution was terrible. You know, like when he tried to stand in front of the cameras and do sort of American president moment, defend his wife or defend his honor of his father, he stunk at it. And when he allowed his campaign

to like speak publicly about all these machinations and deal cutting in Indiana with Kasek, voters hate that stuff. Yeah. It was a terrible idea. Tactics can't lead your campaign. I think Ted Cruz had a great campaign organization, maybe one of the best on the Republican side, but it was, he was, he was a lousy candidate. Yeah. I think one of the Cruz, it may be the Cruz, the mistake was that Cruz was the alternative. Like, I have stipulated for a while now that Donald Trump had never run and Cruz had played the role of Donald Trump and run out ahead here, all of the hashtag never Trump people would be hashtag never Cruz. Right. I mean, before Donald Trump was the most hated unlikable ridiculous Republican candidate, Ted Cruz played that role for years.

Right. I think the Cruz did, to the extent that tactics matter, and I'm not sure they do in this case, the mistake Cruz made is the same one that Rubio made and others is that you run as a anti-establishment or quasi-anty establishment candidate. Then you go one-on-one with Trump, and your first move is to get all the endorsements you can get and be the establishment candidate. And then he kills you because people hate the establishment, right? So I don't think it was a particularly wise move for Marco Rubio to go get all those endorsements that he got and then spend the whole time campaigning with, you know, governors and senators and members of Congress and announce the billionaire hedge fund guys who were coming onto a super PAC.

And once Ted Cruz aligned himself with John Kasich in a, in the exact, Ted Cruz run around saying he was against backroom Senate deals. And then he created a, did a backroom deal with John Kasich, who was, who was, as important about, was running is running currently fourth into two person in there was running as i just said i was running fourth in a three person race still eating his sandwich in the deli when the results were coming in what happened that's right and then and then you pick the former CEO of a fortune 500 company

as you as you're running mate and announce it like it you're not helping you like you were running you're you're off brand to the extent that takers has a brand understated. You look desperate and ludicrous. Also, I do think all of these guys played this strategic game of cowering in fear for Donald Trump for months and months and months. Ted Cruz was the forefront. I mean, it was not long ago when he was tweeting, sorry to disappoint, Donald Trump is terrific. Hashtag deal with it.

Well, buddy, he's dealing with it now. Yeah, you got a lot of free time to deal with it. No, I think the die was cast in this whole primary at the very beginning when there was six, 17 candidates and no one went after Donald Trump for three months, which was also, I mean, we talked to Tim Miller about this, not exactly any one of their fault because if you were in any of those individual campaigns, if you were Jet Bush or Chris Christie, why do you spend the first three months going after Donald Trump? Well, because at the beginning, every other candidate who went after Donald Trump met the fate

of the guy who peed on the new giant defender in Game of Thrones, got his head smashed through the wall. You're dead on sight. Yeah, watch Game of Thrones. and the ringer wrap-up game of Thrones. No, that's exactly right. They were too afraid to go after him. They had no, there was no interest,

and self-interest to go after him. And he seemed different in a field where a lot of those guys seemed the same and seemed typical and couldn't break out because he also sucked all the oxygen out of the race. And the right-wing conservative media covered Donald Trump far more than anyone else in those early months.

And so he built up an early lead. He had the rest of the field, divvy up the vote. And that's how he want. That's how he got to lead. To me, it's sort of that simple. I don't know if I'm... Wait back at Ted Cruz.

He ran the most, like, tactically woven together campaign of anybody. Like, you would listen to him speak. And I know people make fun of Trump and say he's a human comment section. But Cruz actually was like a birther website comment section, dog whistle page. Like the Churchill bust would make its way in there. The innocence of Muslim videos. New York values thing, which was widely viewed as sort of anti-Semitic. He hit all the Orogenessones of the Tea Party.

All the Tea Party hotspots. I was going to keep going, but I won't. I'm glad he didn't do. Yeah. Yeah, so I don't know. I think that was, I think it was destiny for Donald. Yep. Before we get to the general election, I just want to talk about our sponsor, 5-4 Club.

5-4 Club is an L.A.-based clothing brand. and if you don't have time to shop, you sign up $60 a month, and every month you get a package of clothing delivered for your house. This is men's clothing. It's really great. It's a profile for every guy,

whether you're looking for clothes for the office, the club, a lazy weekend, whatever. 5-4 has you clovered. Free shipping, direct delivery to your doorstep, and it's great style, seasonal, shorts and button-ups when you need them, jackets and jeans, when it gets colder. And it's very easy to sign up.

Go to 5-4 clubs. and use promo code BSPN at sign up and get 50% off your first package. That's $120 worth of clothing for $30 for your first month's package. The only way to get 5-4 is to be a member. You can't find 5-4 in any other store. It's got to be direct to your doorstep. And the deal is $120 worth of clothing for $30. It's a really great deal.

Now we have a general election of Donald Trump versus Hillary Clinton. that is not going to be pretty inspiring. Dan, will this be the most negative campaign ever? The answer to that question is probably yes, because campaigns just tend to get more negative as time goes on, and the super PACs on the Democratic side are not going to be able to contain themselves.

I'm sorry, super PACs on both sides are not going to be able to contain themselves. Per PACs will work out all of their identity crisis over Trump being their nominee by going after Hillary Clinton. Like Hillary Clinton, The Superfacts on the Democratic side have not been known for subtlety in the past. So there will be a lot of that. I think there is a question and an opportunity for Hillary Clinton where is, can she find a way to rise above this and try to make this be about something bigger, right?

If this was just Hillary Clinton against Jeb Bush or Ted Cruz even, it's like your standard Democrat Republican race just less inspiring and interesting. than in previous years. Like, I think that a lot of people believe, including the three of us here, that like kind of the fate of the free world is at stake here, like who we are as a nation, is whether we're going to elect this, you know, misogynistic, prejudiced bully, inexperienced bully as our president, or we can do something different? And we're at a crossroads and can she raise the stakes on it and make it be about two competing visions for the country? Then it has a chance to be slightly different than that. I think it's going to be very hard to do that. And I'm not, but there's no chance.

I have two major worries. So I do not believe that Donald Trump will win at all. I think it will be a landslide for Hillary Clinton. So I'll put that out there. But the only two concerns I have, number one, can you imagine the pressure that Hillary Clinton and her campaign will be under for the next six months to win this thing? if they don't, like, you know, the media, Democrats, independents, the rest of the world will be just, you know, are at risk here.

And so, like, think back to the 2012 re-election campaign when Barack Obama lost the first debate to Mitt Romney and the ensuing bedwetting from every corner of Washington and the media that landed on all of us, right? Now think of that times 100. Yeah. on Hillary Clinton's campaign every single day, every decision they make to be second-guessed. Every time there's a poll that gets closer, they'll be second-guessed. I mean, that sucks.

Yeah, and to Dan's point, I mean... Oh, it's terrible. Yes. To Dan point earlier, like, the hardest thing in the campaign is having discipline, right? It's having people like Dan or David Pluff or David Ackxerad around to keep everybody looking six months out and eye on the prize and focused on a big message. When back in HQ, you have a room for... full of over-caffinated people like me,

ready to jump on everything Donald Trump says. And press corps more than willing to make that their cheap, easy. No offense, press corps. Make that the quick headline of the day because that's the back and forth. And focusing on that high-road, high-minded message, while Trump is like wallowing in the gutter like we know he will do is going to be very tough.

Yeah. Yeah, it's, look, I think they, we know how this is going. CNN has a poll out today that has Hillary winning 5441. Hillary Clinton is not going to win this race 5441, right? That is not going to happen. That is Barack Obama won a massive landslide in 2008, 2012, and didn't get more than 53% of the vote. Okay.

And so that will not happen here. And so there's going to be a poll, like whether it's a month from now, six weeks from now, that's going to be Hillary Clinton, 51. on, you know, Trump 47. Six points in a month. Is he, you know, is he coming? Is he gaining on Hillary? They'll panic. And, you know, when we had these moments in 2008,

when we were in Chicago, where, you know, things were telling gets on the bat, gets picked, McCain's theory, researchers in the polls, we were, like, insulated in Chicago, and we didn't have to go to some terrible cocktail party. and hear, you know, every other DC Pundant type tell us how terrible we are. Being Brooklyn in the age of Twitter does not save you from that. Right.

They're going to have to listen to that every minute of every day. And they're going to have to be very disciplined. And, you know, I think they've run a very good campaign so far. It hasn't been perfect. But they've stayed fairly focused on sort of the bigger, strategic things they had to do. It's going to be harder to do that now, no doubt.

Well, meanwhile, you have Trump, you know, putting out photos of him at lunch with Ed Klein, who is the most despicable lying anti-Clinton, like, discredited author out there. But I think that does sort of signal that, hey, Apo Research and all this garbage, this guy peddled is what my campaign is going to be about. He's going to use every single conspiracy about the Clintons. Yeah. That has come. I was saying when we were talking about like a VP pick for Trump, Gingrich actually makes some sense. if what he wants to do, first of all, he wants like a Washington insider who can help him govern.

And second, he can, with Gingrich, replay every single one of the 1990s controversies against the Clintons in real time. He can just basically take us back to the 90s. It's funny that we ran against reliving the paddles of the 90s, and here we are again. And now Trump's going to just dive headlong into them. I mean, I think that the big, one of the bigger decisions that the Clinton campaign is going to have to make early is there is, so there's a huge temptation to run. a completely non-ideological campaign where you really reach out to Republicans and

independents and say this isn't about, right, this isn't about Donald Trump's ideology because it's unclear that he has one at all. We don't know where he's a conservative or liberal. But what we do know is that his character is deeply flawed, perhaps more so than any other politician we've dealt with in a long time, and he's unfit for the office. You do not want to hand this man the nuclear codes, right? The question is, do you, like, how do you reach out to Republicans while still making sure, you She's still in a primary against Bernie Sanders, and she doesn't want to move off any of the progressive positions that she's taken, and she still wants to rally the base here.

And so I think there's going to be a lot of push and pull on that issue. Can I give you a hot take here? Yes. Steaming hot, let's go. Just prepare. Brace yourselves. I do not think she should spend very much time reaching out to disaffected Republicans. I agree.

Yeah. I think, look, if every voter who voted for Barack Obama, votes for Hillary Clinton and not a single Mitt Romney voter flips over and votes for Hillary Clinton. Hillary Clinton will win a huge landslide. It'll be a huge electoral landslide. She'll get 51% of the vote. And you can wrap yourself around an axle pretty quickly trying to woo these voters at a time in which what matters in a presidential year for a Democratic candidate is motivating the Obama coalition. Absolutely.

And, you know, like someone on Twitter suggested, you know, should, will there be some Republicans who will do what Joe Lieberman did in 2008 and speak at the Democratic convention? Like, that is a, that is a terrible message. What Joe Lieberman said in 2008. Right. Yeah, no kidding. That's right. Still don't care. That's right.

But it's like, don't, you know, focus on turning out your voters. You should, this you should disqualify Donald Trump. that should not be that hard but they should do that right one of the ancillary benefits of that is that some number republicans will vote for her yeah i think don't spend your time trying to get them i i think yeah i was going to say the one addenda i agree with you guys the one addendum i have is like i don't think she needs to do anything to overtly attack republicans constantly right like i think this is this is a race about donald trump and i mean it's it's sort of like like barak obama we were always like fairly careful when he was out there campaigning

to attack Republicans in Washington to attack Republican politicians, but to say that, you know, Republicans in the country, Republican voters, like, you're more than welcome into our party. You're more than welcome to vote for me, you know, if you believe these things. And so I think she can sort of split the difference a little bit here, but I agree that there's no, she does not need to be going on this big campaign to, like, bring in all these new Republican voters because, A, a lot of them, first of all, a lot of them voted for Donald Trump,

and a lot of them who don't want to vote for Donald Trump still don't agree with much of anything that Hillary Clinton says. So she should be open to it. She should not be, like, overtly attacking. But I agree that she, I shouldn't have, like, Mitt Romney speaking at the convention. The win is having those people stay home. It's not getting their vote. Right, right.

Meanwhile, Donald Trump is getting his intelligence briefing starting pretty soon. So just let that sink in. Well, I mean, should start somewhere, right? Hillary Clinton is probably the candidate, the worst possible. candidate to a vessel for all the disaffected Trump people, right? If there's one thing that could possibly unify or come closer unifying Republicans, it's Hillary Clinton on the ballot. And so, you know, you can see in your head a world where a bunch of the old, you know,

the older political folks whose worldview was shaped in the 90s, thinking how this is a great opportunity to bring a bunch of quote-unquote Reagan Democrats back to the Democratic Party. And that will lead to like strategic confusion in the campaign. And the only way Donald Trump wins is if Democratic voters have historically low turnout. And that's the thing you've got to solve for every day. Right, because he is not, he is not persuading. I mean, someone asked us last night, like, what part of the Obama coalition, how many Obama voters, even in 2012 or 2008, are going to turn and vote for Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton? At the end of the day, that is what you have to ask yourself if you think there is a

possibility that Donald Trump could win the presidency. And by the way, Barack Obama now has, he is, Hillary Clinton is heading into a general election where the incumbent of her party that she's trying to replace has a 52, 53% approval rating. John Lovett's dad might be the only one we know of so far Right John Lovett's dad is a Trump supporter and a former Obama voter So we got to keep an eye on Westchester County Keep him home

Well what else scare So the only other thing that scares me is I do believe that the media will try to make this a close race Not that there be not because they're a bunch of closet Trump supporters I don't think that at all But this is getting a lot of ratings this is exciting. This is something to write about.

It's something to talk about. It's great for saying, yes. We're spending most of our podcast talking about it here. So I think that the way they'll cover this is not that suddenly they'll turn Donald Trump into this like working class hero great figure, but they're going to cover it as his political savvy versus her political missteps. And every time he tries to moderate himself, every time he looks more presidential and tries to exert some discipline, they're going to say, wow, isn't this a different

Donald Trump and look at the polls closing and maybe it's working. They're grading on a curve too, which is very annoying. I mean, last night you could already see it. People were like, wow, guys, if this tone keeps up, like, this is going to be a different race, he could really come back. In theory, I agree with you. Like, sure, he could moderate his tone. But last night he referred to the Hispanics love me.

I love winning with women. Like, he made an entire press conference about himself and how great he was and reading stupid Rasmussen polls. I mean, the guy is an embarrassing egomaniac. None of his message is about reaching out that people are talking about stuff they care about. It's about how great he is. And I think, you know, the guy, most people look at him and think he's a pretty big asshole. Yeah.

What do you think, Dan? Well, I think there are a couple of things to think about here. One is he, the press will, like, they're natural, they have two natural biases here that will have some effect on the race, both good and bad for Trump and the Democrats. One bias is a bias towards a close right. race. But it is not a, like, it is bad business and boring. It's bad business and bad entertainment for the next six months. It's like Hillary Clinton is definitely going to win. And we're just like playing out the string and we'll cover stuff and like it needs to be interesting and exciting. Right. Like that that will not have it. Even in 08, if you read in 2012, if you

read the New York Times, the day, like sort of recapping the final week of campaign encourage you would think that we were one coin flip away for Mitt Romney being president instead of him losing a you know a near record number of states so that will happen Peggy Noon column she could see she could see something in the air right she could she could see yard signs everywhere she could see yard signs all over Park Avenue there were signs that Mitt Romney was becoming up and down the morning Joe studio she saw yes I actually think that Romney may have gotten less than one vote in Peggy newton's district but that's fine but then so that actually will help Hillary like it is hard to turn out young voters

voter you know a lot of members of the Obama coalition who only have ever turned out when Barack Obama was on the ballot if they think this thing's in the bag like why go wait in line for three fucking hours voting is hard in like unreasonably hard in this country and if you don't think it matters you stay home and that's where things get dangerous totally the other bias is towards quote unquote fairness like there is a world where you will treat what Hillary Clinton

as to what Donald Trump says as two similar things. The press can't really struggles to cover asymmetry between two positions, right? And that will benefit Trump because they don't want to, no one wants to get a thousand email, no report wants to get a thousand emails from Trump supporters saying how in the bag they are for Hillary Clinton. And so they'll write it fair, you know, quote unquote fair. You know, I think. Right, yeah, like Donald Trump will say like, you know, Hillary Clinton, like killed someone in the 90s. And then Hillary Clinton will say, Donald Trump will say, Donald Trump.

Trump's tax plan, you know, gives, gives like a million dollars to millionaires. And they'll be like, well, she was a little off and he was to. On the one hand, she didn't kill anyone. Yeah, it'll be like, it'll be like, Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump says Hillary Clinton was involved in a drug deal to kill people in Arkansas in the 80s. Hillary Clinton's campaign said that is not true. Right. You know, and or it'll be like, you know, Trump will read some National Enquirer story and Hillary Clinton will make a case. against a Social Security plan and the headline will be Clinton Trump trade barbs from the trail.

Well, or the media will, what they'll do is they'll debunk the most obvious, craziest allegations from Trump and then think that that's enough, right? So like yesterday when like Tapper went on, Jake Tapper went off on CNN for a couple minutes on the Ted Cruz father assassination of JFK story and like thoroughly debunked it, which was great. But it's like, you know, that's fine because that's pretty obvious, but there's going to be a host of other policy implications from Trump that need to be debunked, like him continuing to say that he was against the Iraq war when, in fact, he told Howard Stern at the beginning of the Iraq war, Howard Stern, that he was for the invasion. And no one has been debunking that on television. And that's probably just as important as his crazy cruise JFK thing. Yeah, I have a few of the – I mean, I also think the press – I hate this debate of like who's to blame. for Trump is at the press. I don't think anyone's to blame, but I do think the press has bent the rules for Trump, and it's time to stop doing that. For example, stop letting him phone into morning shows. The New York Times did a great 90-minute interview with him on foreign policy, but it was on the phone, so the guy had notes in front of him. He could read from it. He lies casually all the

time and gets a pass for it, and he makes ridiculous statements when he doesn't know what he's talking about, like on foreign policy says, you know, I don't want to tell you what I do there because I want be unpredictable. You know, it's like, well, actually, other countries want to know where we stand up. I think that's a very important part of diplomacy, and you can't have it otherwise because you just don't know what you're talking about. Right. Tommy, is someone who has worked in foreign policy and national security extensively, like,

how do you, if you're Hillary Clinton, prosecute the campaign against Trump on the foreign policy side? Like, so he will go after Benghazi. She was sleeping, and he does this whole thing. She was asleep during the 3 a.m. for Benghazi, which is a conspiracy theory. He'll talk about Libya. He'll talk about Syria.

He'll talk about Iraq on her Iraq vote. And so he will, on one hand, he will paint her as overly hawkish, and on the other, he will say she's weak. Yeah. I mean, it's really hard, because this sort of, the argument that I think she'll probably make is, is one about him just being totally incompetent and unprepared. And then he'll point to a bunch of decisions she made in her past or point to the that she's advised by the establishment to say, well, more of the same. And as we know, that is a

potent argument. But, you know, the other challenge with arguing on foreign policy matters is the fact that he didn't know what the nuclear trident is, that's sort of the three ways the United States could deploy nuclear weapons in the event of, like, the most catastrophic attack in the history of our nation. He didn't know what that was. Maybe it's good that he doesn't know how to deploy the nukes. That's my saving grace. But like, to make that a salient attack, you can't be just talking to some loser like me who's heard of that before. You need to have people come in with the baseline of information where they understand

these matters and why they're important. So it's way harder. I'm wondering if for the first time, and I don't know how long, do you think there's foreign leaders will come out and be involved in this election in the sense that they will, they will come out against Donald Trump and support Hillary Clinton? Like, I wonder what the calculation there is. Yeah, I do. I mean, when Obama would talk to foreign leaders, they would speak very candidly about politics.

Like a lot of them were not big fans of beeping that in Yahoo. for example, and that would come through in the transcripts I would read all the time. Right. I don't know that they'll go out and give speeches about that, but I do think there's a decent chance. They'll background reporters, they'll leak it. They'll make clear that they think he's dangerous. I mean, if you're part of NATO and this guy is essentially looking to defund it and pull the thing apart, that's got to make you worried, especially as you watch Russia creeping into their territory.

Right, Russia. I mean, you... It's Donald Trump, Putin-Stooge. buddy yeah all right i think this is a very hard case for hillary clinton to prosecute because a it's target rich she's very wonkish on this um he is on some days like half the time more on the side of where the american people are in terms of um trying to avoid you know additional foreign interventions that hillary clinton's natural instincts are and sometimes her language is and so you can see a world where one of the um foreign leaders

you know, says something on, you know, on background or in a press conference about Donald Trump. And then the Clinton campaign will, like, run out and be like, the, you know, the president of, you know, the president of Poland said Donald Trump's not ready. And Donald Trump will be like, yes, so what? And the voters won't give a shit, right? So I think the, like, the message here is Donald Trump is unfit for the White House. And then you have several strategic branches. And that one is, like, it's a complicated, dangerous world, and he's totally no dick about it. The second is he's a hateful human being who doesn't represent who we are.

And that's your immigration, your message on, you know, the sexist things he said and done. And your third is on, is that his economic policies are wrong. That's where you would run pretty hard at his tax cut and those sorts of things. So he can't hate, he's unfit as a person. He's unfit as a commander chief. unfit as a as a president or leader of domestic policy. And to be super disciplined because the opportunity, you can see,

you can, I can imagine the Clinton campaign chasing as I would probably be, want to do myself. Like you could, every day they're going to wake up and their meetings can be like in their communication and hear 75 things we can chase after Donald Trump on. And you're going to have to pick, you're going to be very disciplined about it.

And that's going to be hard in a Twitter environment where you can feed content to anyone. You can say, well, we'll have Brian Fallon do this on Twitter and then John Podestl do a media post on this and then, you know, we'll put, you know, someone at Robbie Mook on MSNBC to do it. And like, if you don't sort of get everything aligned around the overarching message, it's going to feel very diffuse and less effective. There's some basic things that you might be able to get people to get like he's cool with South Korea and Japan having nuclear weapons. He won't rule out using a nuclear weapon in Europe. I mean, these are some sort of threshold insane comments that someone needs to dig into a little deeper. The old daisy ad might be coming back.

Two things on this. One, the target rich environment is a huge issue. I remember being on the carry campaign in 2004, and we had that problem almost every day with George Bush. No one could decide what the frame against Bush was. Is he incompetent? Is he extreme? Is he wrong? Remember there was actually a couple weeks on the carry campaign where the theme was W stands for wrong. Oh, God, yeah. Just really embarrassing. So bad. So bad.

But no, every single day, there was like a different hit on George Bush, and that was pre-Twitter, pre-social media world. And that's what's in the back of my mind, which is we spent a year being as condescending as possible calling George Bush stupid. And people were like, hey, I'd rather hang out with that guy. Right. Yeah, there's that, too. And the second thing, Dan, is hearing you talk about Trump being like a hateful human

being and you were just very blunt, I think Hillary needs to be very blunt about all this stuff. She doesn't need to be like vitriolic, but I worry that the tendency in campaigns is to like find funny quips that can be quoted and like interesting lines. And I think she just needs to prosecute the case in the plainest language possible. This man is unfit for the office. He should not be given the nuclear codes, right? Like she should just lay it out like normal people talk about it. And I don't think there should be a lot of like set-ups with fancy lines and snappy quotes and all that kind of shit. Dangerously ignorant. man yeah um yeah it's a problem it's gonna be tough but he's going to lose i'm gonna i just i'm not

gonna we should be we should take i think there's a difference between taking his candidacy seriously which we should all do and panicking oh and giving into like just complete like look at the data the data is your friend you know like look at the demographics and just you know we got the level set this here um so tommy this is also the uh the fifth anniversary of the Happy anniversary, guys. Happy anniversary. What do you get your loved one for Osama bin Laden? If you're bin Laden interested, I've probably a commemorative coin sometimes.

So I hadn't realized this over the weekend because it was also correspondence dinner weekend when the mission succeeded five years ago. So let's, you were you were there for this. I was. Can you tell us the story of how you learn this and how this all unfolded? Sure. You don't have to tweet out every moment like the CIA did. Like this. What was it in?

When you say Tommy was here, you mean in Abadabad, right? Yeah, I was in Abadabad. As if not, I don't know why you're on this podcast. Tommy took the dog out. Yeah, so, yeah. I learned about it that day. I got an email from, it was a dancer-wettos correspondent's dinner, which, you know, meant that like every person who was there was out way later than they normally were out.

It's like five in the morning, so you wake up exhausted. I was watching a Celtics game or something in my house. And I got an email from Ben Rhodes that said, hey, you might want to come in. And I'd just like to hit pause there and note to future bosses that when you shoot bin Laden, that's not like a hey, you might want to swing by the office email. I'd be a little more emphatic. Got a few things in your inbox.

I'd be a little more emphatic in the future. That it was probably time to get to the office. I actually debated whether to change into more adult clothes than I'm glad I did. Tommy was wearing a Celtics jersey. What's funny is like there was some signals there like leading into it. So I remember Dennis McDonough about a week out kept searching for roads because he needed to read him in. And Ben was cloistered off somewhere writing a speech that he was very worried about. There was one that I don't think ultimately was ever delivered. But, you know, Ben was like

very stressed freaking out about it. And then after he finally connected with Dennis, I walked into his office and it was the roads like tie off, you know, cigarette break number 43 with whoever. It was very clear. He had a different demeanor. And I also walked into a very senior staffer's office at one point and remember seeing a folder on his or her desk that said had a photo of bin Laden and said a bad a bad compound raid which I didn't know if that was at the time but anyway so yeah we came in that day didn't ask questions I didn't ask questions as I didn't do most days in that job but went into the went into the office and I went up to Tom Donald's office and was was signaled downstairs by some of his aides and walked into the situation room and

one of the first things I saw were some colleagues from the CIA and they you know sort of threw down the photo of bin Laden Which is never actually been released where you know we finally had proof that he had been shot in the face And we went through the sort of long discussion of what to do how to roll that out and I remember Damn, I'm sure you remember this too there was debate about whether or not Obama should talk about the operation that night and there was a group of us that kept saying hey guys we just parked half a helicopter in a backyard in Pakistan like this is going to get out we're going to have to we're going to have to talk about this one um so you know ben and the team crafted the remarks for for the president um you know i think we all were there at the way to us so what two or three in the morning sort of watching this thing unroll um waiting for the sun to

come up overseas and trying to see what the fallout would be and mitigate that but it was an you know, extraordinary operation. Thank God the CIA. It's been months and months and months thinking through sort of every contingency in terms of telling that story. Because, you know, I think in hindsight there were some things we got wrong that we got criticized for in some cases rightly, but I don't think proportionately. But, you know, this wasn't about like selling this for political benefit.

That didn't need to happen. You didn't need to put spin on that ball. It was about like when you have. have undertaken the greatest counterterrorism operation in the history of the world, you have an obligation to tell the American people about it. And it has a cathartic effect for all the people who were affected by 9-11. Which I remember when Rhodes first spoke to the president, which was right before he gave the remarks. That speech was written, you know, very, very close to the actual moment when he spoke. I think one of the first things that POTUS told Ben was, I want to talk about

9-11 and the day this happened, because this is cathartic for a lot of those people who have lost people on 9-11 and i think that's a that's a key part of this you know yeah it was you know it was also a great lesson because you know you had a guy like john brennan um who had been chasing bin laden for 15 years of his life uh who had lost friends uh terrorist attacks who was one of the most i mean john looks like he is one club away from killing you like a caveman right he was like this burly burly human but he's actually a really sweet guy and like you know deeply felt uh emotion about what had happened that day. And John had been awake for, you know, three days straight planning and thinking about this thing.

And he went out and briefed the press with the best information we had at the time. And it really bothered me to this day that he was the one who sort of got criticized and nitpicked for getting important details wrong. But they were based on the best information. What was the major details he got wrong? I forget this controversy. It was a question of whether he had used his wife as a human shield, question of whether he was armed. And, you know, John was relaying the story that he had been. been told by sort of operators who were being debriefed at the time.

But John was also trying to denigrate bin Laden and denigrate al-Qaeda. Right. Because there's a strategic communications fight going on at all times. And he's smart about that. But anyway, he, you know, stepping back away from the sort of challenges of that week, it was one of the most incredible things I was a part of while there. This is an important point that you make about getting information real time on an operation like this or something that's happening on the other side of the world,

because later this becomes an issue in Benghazi, right? Is that I think people think when something goes down, whether it's a terrorist operation, whether it's, you know, a terrorist attack somewhere in the world, that automatically the White House knows everything that's happening in real time. You don't have the CBO. You know, right? We're not rewinding this thing and checking the tape.

It's you're speaking to human beings about what they recall from an incident and trying to piece that together and fact check it. based on what other operators said they saw at the time. And Benghazi is a great example. That was one of the most difficult intelligence questions to sort out because ultimately what we were being asked to explain were the motives of the people who did what they did that night and stormed the compound.

And knowing what's in someone's head is almost impossible. Now, there were guys quoted outside of the Benghazi compound that said, I'm here because of the innocents and Muslims video and I'm upset about that. Ultimately, that, you know, whatever. Didn't pan out. Well, no, I mean, it's hard to know why those folks were there. I think, in fact, most of them probably were there because they were riled up about that video.

Now, whether they were part of an extremist group and whether they had had a plan on the shelf to attack that compound for a long time is also very possibly true. No, I mean, assessing people's motives is difficult no matter what. Assessing people's motives in real time. It's impossible. Except they said it to reports. What we got wrong was the idea that this was an innocent protest that bubbled over into an attack. that I was totally wrong and corrected it. I think that goes to like what I think is the great challenge,

communications challenge in this age, which is there's a discordance between the time it takes to get the correct information and the speed at which the new media world demands you put it out. Like we like the night of the bin Laden operation, you know, we put John Brennan, we put Tom Donald on the phone first and I think John Brennan out the next morning. and it was not an option to not do it because people were just going to report what some unnamed intelligence official somewhere or some Pakistani official told them.

And so you have to tell the best story you can. The best story, the best you know it at that time and kind of hope it's do the best you try to get as right as possible, but you're going to get burned some. Right. And you know, people got, on the line, we got burned. Yeah. And, you know, it's interesting, Dan, because, you know, I can't remember exactly when it was. maybe it was last year.

Sy Hirsch wrote that article that said, essentially the whole bin Laden operation was a lie. We colluded with Kayani and Pasha. They knew about the attack in advance. They handed it over. There wasn't a firefight. They dumped his body out of the helicopter. It was every word of it was wrong and was debunked by every single official.

But that thing got days and days of news. Every reporter covered it. Only one reporter from the Times sort of said, well, she maybe had a source from the ISI that said, yeah, maybe they knew. Clearly they were covering their asses because they were humiliated that we were able to do this. But, you know, it speaks to your point, Dan, like a totally counterfactual story was told by Cy Hirsch, and it just kind of came and went.

Yeah. It's bizarre. I will give, let me give two quick Tommy-related bin Ladenite stories. Okay, good. So I was not wearing a Celtics, Jersey watching a Celtics game. I had taken myself to the fifth installment in the classic. American movie series Fast and Furious and I was watching it as I was recovering. I was safe say I was not my best self post White House correspondence dinner.

And because I'm a diligent staffer, I was violating the rules and looking at my Blackberry. And I got a similar email from Ben Rhodes to me and David Plough saying, can you guys make a meeting at the White House at 630? And I immediately get an email from Plough forwarding that one saying, do you think this is Tommy sending a prank prank email from Ben's computer? which I know injures Tommy sold to this dead. That's so good. And so I walk out of the movie. I get to the White House and I'm like, what is this?

And Ben was obviously not being forthcoming on email about why he was calling us in the office, but the assumption was it was unlikely to be something good. And so I get to the gate and the day after the correspondence dinner is normally a time when all these celebrities in town get their White House tours. And so I get to the gate and I see our friends,

and Nick Shapiro in a pretty aggressive discussion with the Secret Service agents at the gate about why they had canceled his tour for the entire cast of True Blood. Was he wearing like cowboy boots and some just screaming? He was wearing, he was being very polite to the Secret Service, but he was very concerned about why the cast of True Blood couldn't get into the White House. Nick Shapiro went on to be deputy chief of staff at the CIA. Yeah, that showed a good run in Nick's defense. And I'm not I'm sure the cast of your buddy eventually got their White House store.

Jesus. Yes. Bill and Suki finally saw the West Wing. Yeah, they did. That's right. Tell me one last question. Sure. President is winding down his term.

What do you, how would you sum up his foreign policy legacy? Yeah, the hardest question. I mean, I think that the deal with Iran, the deal with Cuba, the diplomacy with Burma, those efforts, totaled together, have the chance to be the most impactful work he did long-term. You know, obviously, everything is up in the air still. These are long-term efforts. But I think that sort of reinvigoration to diplomacy, a recognition that a strong country like the United States is able to talk to its enemies and its allies and that we can

maybe get more done that way is a really important, you know, sort of establishment or a fact or an approach on foreign policy that's important to get back. I think he'll also go down as one of the most effective and impactful terrorist hunting presidents in the history of the White House. I mean, I think that's not an uncontroversial moniker to wear. There's a lot of questions about the tactics used, the tools use, questions about drones, questions about the legality. But I think he has taken a lot of steps to speak more Canada. about these issues than was ever thought possible. And I think that's hopefully an important enduring legacy and conversation that will continue.

Lastly, I think his reticence to engage militarily is challenging in the sort of politics of Washington, the politics of feeling good, the politics where people want you to just do something. But he is that someone I think understands that if you look at our history, military engagement or covert action has had as many unintended consequences as intended consequences. And being a little more clear-eyed about that, I think, is a good level setting of our willingness to engage in those sorts of efforts abroad. Yeah. And look, I think his reluctance to engage in military interventions all over the world is also a legacy that will play out in this election, as you will now have two candidates,

even though Hillary Clinton has traditionally been more hawkish and Donald Trump has been full of shit and all over the map on his foreign policy, I think they both will be reluctant to talk about taking this country to war. Yeah. So one would hope. Tommy, do you think all of those things summed up together outweigh the disaster it was to move the Churchill bust out of the office?

One of my greatest regrets. That's funny. talk about regrets. I mean, I do think it's hard to, if you leave that White House having worked in foreign policy or Syria in particular, I think, you know, I think there's going to be tough questions asked about what, if anything, he could have done to improve that situation. The answer might be nothing, but I do think that, you know, the results are not where anyone, including the president, wants them to be. And that's, you know, that's a challenge. That's something that will take the next president to continue to work on to stop ISIS and to try to rebuild that

country. Whoever she may be. Or that president could be Donald Trump. And on that note, that is all our time for today. But thank you, Tommy, for joining the show, a friend of the show. You can catch Keeping at 1600 on Channel 33 on iTunes, Stitcher, and SoundCloud. And we will be back next week. Thanks, everyone.

Start you guys next week, guys. Before we go, I just want to tell you about our sponsors one more time. HBO now is the new way to stream all of HBO. No TV package required. Get all of the series, movies, documentaries, sports specials, and more. Download the app on your favorite device to start your 30-day free trial instantly. Also wanted to tell you about 5-4 clothing, a $60 a month high-end clothing membership that will provide you with stylish clothes that are bound to make you stand out in the crowd.

Go to 54Club.com and use promo code BSPN at ScypN. sign up for 50% off your first package. That's $120 worth of clothing for $30 for your first month's package. Also wanted to make sure everyone subscribes to our newest podcast, The Ringers NFL show and the Ringers NBA show on iTunes, SoundCloud, and Google Play Music. And remember to check out After the Thrones hosted by Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald. It's available after every episode of Game of Thrones on HBO Now, HBO Go,

and even HBO proper. Winter is here, and Chris and Andy are ready to break it down.