The Prof G Pod with Scott Galloway - Raging Moderates: Trump's Immigration Crackdown and the Democrats' Muted Response

Episode Date: January 28, 2025

Scott Galloway and Jessica Tarlov dive into Trump’s whirlwind first week back in office. From immigration crackdowns to controversial pardons and foreign aid freezes, they break down the chaos and its implications for the U.S. They also explore why the Democratic opposition is falling short, the balance between confrontation and compromise, and how moderates fit into the current political climate. Follow Jessica Tarlov, @JessicaTarlov.  Follow Prof G, @profgalloway. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Be supportive. They have to go to college, even though higher ed is such a disaster. Hit it now. Please help us out and in exchange, we will do our best. Maybe we'll be as moderate as you like, but we promise we'll be very, very raging. We will. You're not supposed to tell them that.

That's right. Now we'll be both raging and moderate. Please hit the subscribe button. Welcome to Raging Moderates. I'm Scott Galloway. And I'm Jessica Tarloff. Jess, this is the part of the show where we banter. I'm reading the same note.

What would you like to banter about? Well, let's bring this back to me. So ask me what I did this weekend. What did you do this weekend? How fantastic was it? Well, Jess, I don't like to talk about me or my personal life, but on Saturday morning, I had my 14-year-old, just me and him.

And so I said, what do you want to do? And I knew it involves something in football. So we jumped on the EuroStar on Saturday morning, which is lovely. Amazing. Yeah. It takes two hours and 20 minutes. Pancras, or St. Pancras station is about 10 minutes from where we're living. Two hours and 20 minutes later,

we're at the Gare du Nord, which is I think train station of north or something in French, just for those of you out there. And then we're at the hotel, we went and had an amazing, my favorite, our favorite lunch, we had steak frites. And then we went to the most amazing little stores, mostly chocolatiers and crepe stores. And then we went back and napped and went to the pool. When you have a 14 year old, you gotta go to the pool. I've learned that.

That lasts until high school? That they're into going to the pool? His only criteria for hotels is do they have a pool? And we always go to the pool. And then we went and then we had a dinner at the most fabulous restaurant at the top of this new fancy hotel called Cheval Blanc. And we got dressed up and then we got dressed down

and we went to the PSG Paris Saint-Germain football. That's the major team in Paris. Oh, someone's gonna say, no, they're not. Thai Rennes, which was a big disappointment for PSG. But we went and saw the football game, came back next morning, woke up, had a lovely breakfast, and then went to Notre Dame, which is spectacular. Oh, it looks amazing.

Spectacular, and then cut the US star back, I mean, 24 hours, and just, it was one of those incredible weekends with my son. What did you do? Well, I went to a three-year-old's birthday party on Saturday morning. There was cake, funfetti flavor, which is my favorite. Do they rent a place, or is it one of those

where it's rich people in Tribeca, or do they have to rent a place? Well, I think both of those types classify as rich people. Because if you can rent a place for your toddler's birthday. They did it at their building, actually. So, and I don't know what they earned, so I can't comment on that, but it was a lovely party. And then Saturday night, we went out to dinner with three other couples, which was very lively.

A lot of fun. We're trying out a new babysitter. It seemed to go okay. The toddler by the end said, I liked new babysitter, so great. But it was nice to go out. You know how you usually are out with one other couple, but being out with three other couples, tons of conversations going on.

We had a nice time, but home by 9.30, asleep by 10, the usual. So four couples that usually gives everyone permission to drink more is what I find. And two- There was a lot of drinking and a discussion about how one person thinks that their partner drinks too much, which- It makes company, that's nice.

Yeah, I asked to be excluded from the conversation because also I barely drink. I'm a lightweight and I guess not that fun. And so I'm always very uncomfortable with those conversations. Yeah, so I'll give you a little bit of a heads up on what's coming your way. In about seven to 10 years, you're going to freak out about the fact that you've spent so much time just raising kids and that you're losing your youth and you and your female friends will start

partying like rock stars diagnosed with ass cancer. You're going to start drinking like crazy. You're going to start doing girls trips all the time. You're gonna abuse alcohol. You're gonna experiment with drugs. And you're gonna make all the guys trips that movies have been depicted on seem like a tea party. They talk about the midlife crisis that men have. I think men's are longer, but less severe.

The midlife crisis for women happens earlier. Specifically, I think when they leave kind of their birthing years and they're worried they're losing kind of their hot girl 20s and 30s, and they go ape shit. So anyways, you got that coming. You got that coming. Oh, well, that sounds like fun. Cause I, yeah, I'm definitely not doing any of that.

No, none of that? At this point. Well, it's hard, you know, what are you gonna do? Every once in my life, a lot of good friends because I- You have a second glass of Chardonnay. Is that when you- No, it's hard, you know, what are you gonna do? Every once in a while, I have a lot of good friends because I- You have a second glass of Chardonnay. Is that when you- No, I'm not, wait, wait, I have one drink also.

What is your drink? I only drink Tito's, grapefruit, and soda. You're so fancy. It's like a modified Paloma. So here's another prediction. I mean- You're gonna start getting unsolicited bottles of Tito's. When I started talking about how much I love Zacapa,

I'd show up to events and they'd have a bottle of Zacapa. So everyone, Tito's for the lady. Good, good, all right, enough of that. Great banter, I loved it. Yeah, that worked, check that box. In today's episode of Raging Moderates, we're discussing Trump's whirlwind first week in office, how Democrats are responding to Trump,

and what it really means to be a moderate in today's political climate. Okay, so let's bust right into it. Donald Trump has hit the ground running in his first week back in office, signing nearly 50 executive orders and actions that are already sort of reshaping politics in our country. These include escalating immigration crackdowns or deportation flights and a southern border troop surge, as well

as targeting birthright citizenship and freezing asylum programs. On Sunday, he also got into a feud with the president of Colombia over deportation flights. Meanwhile, he has halted foreign aid worldwide and revoked security clearances from former officials critical of him. Add to that his controversial pardons of January 6th defendants, the confirmation of cabinet appointments including Pete Hegseth despite numerous allegations against him, and threats to eliminate FEMA while visiting disaster zones including Hurricane Helene's wreckage in North Carolina and wildfire ravage California.

It's a whirlwind start that is already redefining how America governs, communicates, and is viewed globally. Jess, there's a lot to unpack here from Trump's first week. What stood out to you the most? That there is a lot. That's the point, right? We're so quickly back to where we left Trump 1.0, which is I'm gonna throw everything at the wall

and just see what sticks. And it feels as though we have a bunch of angry teens throw everything at the wall and just see what sticks. And it feels as though we have a bunch of angry teens that are in charge of the government, right? Trying everything, pushing boundaries, waiting for someone to slap them on the wrist to push back. Maybe that comes from, you know, part of the internal caucus.

We'll talk about that later on with some of the DEI initiatives that they scaled back, but like waiting for the courts to come and get them, you know, hoping that they just can skate through with some of this stuff. I feel there's an overwhelming sense of manufactured chaos to everything and that we are living in the midst of, you would know better than me, if it is in fact the biggest branding exercise in history, but this golden age of America and he has lots of social media spots about it out there on all of his channels, it feels like he's just going full steam ahead with this social media driven approach to governance, loyalty tests, everything that he left on the table from the first time around, he's picking it up and doing it to the nth

degree if he can get away with it. And he's just calling our bluff, right? Just saying, well come and get me, right? So that's my feeling writ large about what's gone on so far. What about you? Yeah, I think that's right. It feels as if one, you could argue this is leadership, that he's had four years to prepare for what he would do, and just hitting the ground running. And has decided, OK, I'm going to, you know,

promise is made, promise is kept. And it's going aggressively at everything he talked about and moving their fleet afoot, signing executive orders on the dais. So you could argue it's leadership. I like what you said, the world's largest branding event. I hadn't thought of it that way. I think that's really interesting. At the same time, you sort of flooding the zone, which is so much shit

or actions that wouldn't have, wouldn't have flown before. And one of the things about our government, the reason why we have three branches is it's meant to have this wonderful intransigence where we sometimes to a fault, wrestle stuff to the ground and really examine it. And there's just none of that now. The, I would give more points to the Trump administration than I would give to the Democratic party right now, who appears to be just caught flat-footed in this mixed of can you believe this shit?

We don't know what to do and trying to sign up for this PBS Hallmark channel bullshit of we need to come together and we need to cooperate with the president. They're all trying to, they're all in such shock about this win and you know, while it was a small number of votes, it went kind of seven for seven in swing states, they're all trying to pretend to be more moderate and say, I'll work with the president and they don't want to come right out of the box, shit posting them.

I think that's a failed strategy. I think they wanted war. I think we should have it. I'm not up for normalizing an insurrectionist and a rapist. So I guess that doesn't make me a moderate because I won't sign up to this. Great. We'll just end the podcast right now.

But I would argue that there's this, we have this sort of notion it's time to come together. I don't agree. I think Democrats and moderate Republicans need to come to the rescue. I think some of this stuff is just so over the line and so un-American, rescinding the security detail of people who he doesn't like.

With live Iranian threats to their lives. I mean, if you have Tom Cotton, maybe the hero in all of this, which is frightening to me. But... Well, he wants a security detail when he's out of office. Well, he definitely wants one on January 6th. Oh, then it was Josh Hawley, who was running away like a little girl.

No offense to little girls. Some of it is just petty. Some of it is the revenge tour. Some of it, I do think, is rooted in a genuine ideology. But then it's always taken one step further. And I've been thinking about this notion of what is the kernel of truth that gets us to the crazy place that we've ended up, right? Because a lot of what's going on right now, I believe is Democrats' fault, right?

We walked into very specific traps. And so we ended up with people telling us, essentially, I want a bloodless revolution, right? I want the establishment so far away that I can't even see Nancy Pelosi. All of this makes me sick and I would rather take a flyer on the chaos agent than have someone who is routine and boring and also is afraid to say things that are common sense, like the thing that's right in front of you. So if we look at with the DEI revolution that's going on now,

that comes from after the murder of George Floyd, that companies just added 50 to 100 DEI employees. So it was crazy. I was looking at data from Loudoun County, Virginia. They have a DEI office that they're spending enough on it that they could hire 125 new teachers if they took that money and did that. Obviously a parent in that district is going to say, I would rather have new teachers

than have dozens of employees in the DEI office. For instance, on the trans issue, we talk about this regularly. If you're gonna say that it's fine for Leah Thomas to compete at the collegiate level, people are going to say that it's fine for Leah Thomas to compete at the collegiate level, people are going to think that you are insane on trans issues and then they're going to pick someone who's going to overcorrect and take away protections for trans people. On immigration, if you're going to say the border is secure, people

are going to look at you like you're a lunatic, especially once migrants are getting bussed to northeastern liberal cities and they're understanding the implications of how El Paso, Texas has been living. And we're going to have the overcorrection and we're going to see stuff like this. Like the, I don't even want to call it a rise in deportations. I find it fascinating and this goes to the social media presidency or just who has the best branding exercise of this because they're're out there saying promises made, promises kept, we deported 310 undocumented people or illegals, they would say, I would say undocumented, because I'm polite.

And Biden was deporting, sometimes it got over 400 people per day. I think on average, he was at 310 per day. But the Democrats never talked about anything that they were doing. And that's the difference in this. If you leave people in the dark about what your administration is actually doing, and I'm talking about the stuff that matters to them,

not the stuff that feels ancillary or for show, they're gonna pick the other person. And now people are running around saying, oh, well, Donald Trump is the toughest on immigration. No, actually Barack Obama was the toughest on immigration. And we have been deporting a lot of people. People don't know that border crossings are down 55% at the end of the Biden administration,

after obviously a huge surge in the beginning. So we need a new digital strategist. That's for sure. The next time around that we do this. And I don't know, have you listened to any of Chris Hayes' interviews about his new book about attention and like the attention economy? Oh, that's a new term, attention economy.

I think I started using that about 15 fucking years ago. Anyways, what did Chris Hayes said? He's discovered the attention economy? What does Chris have to say? No, he didn't, no. He didn't discover it, but he was, he's talking about it in context of recent outcomes and this race just to be the first person to say something that someone sees on their phone and how meaningful that is for that. And I cannot think of an instance where Democrats were

the first people to be able to say something. It's always the Republicans, and usually it's Trump. Well, just starting there. So first off, I would like to see what committee would it be. We need immediately, in my opinion, to get probably not Musk because I think it would be too much of a spectacle and just bring him more power. It's like one of those villains in a comic book that the more you throw shit at him,

the more he absorbs it and becomes more powerful. But the Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee should, in my opinion, have hearings in the tech industry's influence on democracy and its elections because there I think is now emerging evidence that basically Musk and Jacarino weaponized Twitter, including creating thousands and thousands of accounts and its elections because there I think is now emerging evidence that basically Musk and Jacarino weaponized Twitter, including creating thousands and thousands of accounts

to elevate misinformation and essentially spread just a ton of propaganda misinformation that had a real impact on the election. I'm not sure it's illegal. It's a private company. He can do what he wants with it, but I want her up there to under oath to say, yeah, I knew that he was creating thousands of bots pretending to be humans and we were elevating information or lies, even though we knew they were lies such that it would influence the outcome of the election. I just want her to go on record saying that so Americans know what they're dealing with.

And they have very effectively, even if it's Umberto Eco, the Italian philosopher said along the lines of the attention economy, that it's not what you're famous for. It's just about being famous. So say something incendiary. And as long as you're dominating the news cycle, I mean, Republicans, I feel like Republicans are dominating 90% of the news cycle right now. And unfortunately we have Senator Schumer who brightens up a room by leaving it, just

kind of doing nothing or saying nothing. We have Speaker Emerita Pelosi, who just purchased $50,000 to $100,000 worth of call options on Tempest AI. And when that was disclosed, the company had its best one day performance in history at 35%. So she's spending more time on Robinhood engaging what is effectively insider trading than actually paying attention to real issues. My question is, where the fucking Democrats? I don't agree with a lot of AOC's policies, but at least she's out there. At least she's trying to push back. Where is Senator Klobuchar talking about, you know, antitrust and competition and inflation

and talking about how the tenure is surging and that these policies are incredibly inflationary. We have, we're literally fighting fire with fucking squirt guns. And when I say squirt guns, I mean, senior leadership in the Democratic party that is too old, too tame, thinks they're in a PBS drama where they, good sir, and they like hit them with their glove.

I mean, enough already. This is insane that we don't have, I want to see hearings on, let's immediately have a hearing on this new crypto AI community. And first thing is we need them to come, this committee organized by the president. We should have the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing investigate legal implications of Trump's meme coins. I want and bring the new head of this AI and crypto community to explain the Trump and Melania coin.

Let's have him go on the record and say, what is this? And is it good for the economy? And we'll be able to invite dozens of the 60,000 people who bought this coin and are now off 70 or 80% about 72 hours. Instead, we just sort of sit there and give this bullshit, well, it's time to come together. There's things we can work on together.

Work on together. We had an immigration bill that the president basically from Mar-a-Lago killed so he could take credit for it. And we're all sitting around thinking, it reminds me of the movie, The Mission. I don't know if you saw that movie with Robert De Niro and Jeremy Irons. But Jeremy Irons plays this, I don't know what you would call it, priest or religious figure and the British are coming basically to slaughter this indigenous community. I don't know if it's Argentinian or Brazilian. They're missionaries. a religious figure, and the British are coming basically to slaughter this indigenous community.

I don't know if it's Argentinian or Brazilian. They're missionaries. Anyways, and the priest, Robert Tenuro, is trying to get everyone they know they're coming to prepare for war. And the priest says we're about nonviolence. And they're slaughtered, of course. I just watched a movie called 24, which is about the most famous Norwegian spy of all things. And a woman stands up as he's speaking to this university saying, why didn't you try non-violence? I feel like the Democrats have decided to try non-violence. And I'm like, Cersei, I choose violence.

This is not working. Sitting around trying to pretend we're taking the higher ground and we're gonna work with the president. It hasn't worked, folks. We need to be calling balls and strikes here and saying that this is when you have the president saying things like polluting blood, and then you have the person who, in my opinion, weaponized a platform to get him elected, telling the far right party in Germany,

you shouldn't dilute your culture. I mean, this is pre-Hitler shit. And yet I don't see a single Democrat with anything resembling a following of social media out there saying, fuck all. So yeah, we right now, as far as I can tell, we have one party and another party that thinks they're at cotillion training their kids to be polite and that peace and love will win out. Thank you for my Ted talk. Okay, let's take a quick break. Stay with us. and that peace and love will win out. Thank you for my TED Talk. Okay, let's take a quick break. Stay with us. What's up, Spotify?

This is Javi. I remember this one time we were on tour. We didn't have any guitar picks and we didn't have time to go to the store. So we placed an order on Prime and it got there the next day ready for the show. Whatever you're into, it's on Prime. Support for the show comes from Vanta.

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to see why it's so tea-rific. On your way there, relax with free beer, wine, and snacks, free fast-streaming Wi-Fi, and no middle seats. You've never flown to Florida like this before, so you'll land in Tampa ready to explore. Visit flyporter.com and actually enjoy economy. So a couple of things. Enjoy Economy. So a couple of things. Democrats said all the stuff that you just said before the election for months.

And voters turned up and said, I don't care. Right. So I care. Millions of people do care. But the pivotal number, that's seven million people who voted for Biden in 2020 sat home in 2024. That's how little they cared about what you're just talking about. AOC is out there. She posted before the inauguration, you know, people are asking me why I'm not going to inauguration and I'm not going to the inauguration of a rapist, to use the term that you use, though I know there's a legal conversation about that. I'm not looking to have a defamation suit. So AOC is saying stuff like that. She was on John Stewart's podcast, talking a lot like you were just now. But I feel like for someone like Hakeem Jeffries, who is a very unifying leader, he is trying to figure out, as Nancy Pelosi had to for

years, how to manage a caucus that is being pulled in many different directions. Because the difference between what goes on for a safe seat Democrat and a swing seat Democrat is like night and day. And we're going to have Congressman Tom Swasey on for an interview later in the week, talk to him about this because he's from a swing district. And he was one of the first people out there saying, these are the issues I'll be able to compromise on. We've got to work together like the Lake this is he's from a swing district. And he was one of the first people out there saying, these are the issues I'll be able to compromise on. We've got to work together like the Lake and Riley Act

for immigration. And I'm definitely looking forward to pushing him about the parts of that bill that are definitely not good, in terms of not projecting dreamers and minors. But obviously, you can't affect any change if you're not in office. And if these people want to continue to be reelected so they can even make incremental progress,

they're going to have to work with the other side to some degree. It's something like 83% of the American public wants the two sides to work together. And that's why I think going back to the executive orders and kind of the beginnings of this, like it is important to look at the list of things and to say this is stuff that I kind of understand, right? Like if you want to call a national emergency on the southern border, if you want to put more resources down there, I can get on board with that.

I completely understand it. All the people who live along the border would tell you that's exactly the kind of conditions that they're living in. But the stuff that you have to figure out a way to effectively hold the line, not just rail about it or post about it, you know, he's basically undoing the entire asylum system. I was watching Tom Homan, he was being interviewed about what happens now to all the people who had their Customs and Border Patrol appointments canceled because they got rid of the CBP One app. And he said, well, go to a port of entry.

And the whole point was that you don't want people showing up at port of entries. I mean, there are tens of thousands of people who have been waiting in Mexico, some upwards of a year to do this the legal way, also completely forgetting the fact that people who are here illegally do have rights. That is enshrined in our Constitution, that they have a right to legal counsel, that they have a right to due process. And the DOJ has new directives. This is one that I thought, this can't be real, where they're now telling legal

service providers who get federal funding not to do their jobs, not to help these immigrants that are here who might have a completely legitimate asylum claim. I already mentioned the DEI offices in the Fairfax County. Sorry, I said Loudoun County before it's Fairfax County. So that's obviously bad. but then you sprint ahead. Did you see this? That the Department of Defense, because they took down all of their DEI stuff,

removed promotional video material about the Tuskegee Airmen. Yeah, and women in World War II. Yeah, the Wasps, which is such a great name for it. And it was Katie Britt from the center from Alabama who tweeted, oh, this must be a mistake. And within a couple hours, the new defense secretary Pete Hegsteth was like, you know, I've fixed it.

But that feels like one of those circumstances where they were trying it on, right? They thought, well, we could just go ahead and get rid of these things. And if someone catches us, so what, you know, we'll put it back up. And we're in the news. Right. And we're dominating the news. We're still in the news. Right, and we're dominating the cycle no matter what because all news is good news

or all press is good press, I guess. And that's a credo that Trump has lived by forever. There's also just such a lack of expertise and willingness to want to do the work. They wanna eliminate things en masse and not spend the time going through and actually looking at what the relevance is. Like, you know, purging the government

of any of those checks. They got rid of, I think, 17 inspector generals over 12 huge bureaucracies, right? These are things that used to piss off storied members of the Senate, like Chuck Grassley lost his mind in 2020 when Trump got rid of two IGs. Now 17 have been removed. Did you see this communication freeze for the NIH and the CDC?

Like in the midst of bird flu, they can't tell people what's going on with something. Yeah, exactly. And the foreign aid freeze is just totally frightening. Yeah, much like the World Health Organization. To your point about sticking our chin out, you know, I believe Biden's first executive order had to do with transgender athletes' rights, and it took him three years for an executive order around immigration.

To your point, illegal border crossings had dropped to about 45,000 in December of 2024, but in December of 2023, a quarter of a million people came across the border illegally. What I find sort of ironic and telling about these, I don't know what the term is, roundups or when the ice shows up, they've decided the most efficient place to quote unquote find these unproductive people who are freeloading, is it workplaces? I thought, so if you wanted to deport Americans, you'd probably go to McDonald's

or to their, to their basements where video games are. But with, with undocumented workers, you go to places of work. Cause that's where they are. I thought that was sort of ironic, but we had this coming. We ignored the problem. It got out of control. But we had this coming. We ignored the problem. It got out of control.

And just as you can never actually visually spot a pendulum at the middle, they have swung, they have taken advantage of this and they swung back. And quite frankly, I don't have a problem with deportations of undocumented workers. Let's start with those who are in prison. Let's start with those who've now committed two crimes, one crime coming over here illegal, the second one. I think that's absolutely fair game. The, I mean, some of the other issues

that we really screwed up on, we talked about transgender, we took just a, I don't wanna say irrelevant, but an issue and gave them just a free gift with purchase for parents all over the nation who don't wanna have their daughters kind of run over. The macro, the biggest issue hands down in my opinion is that a mix of identity politics, weaponization by special interest groups essentially had the Democrats implicitly and explicitly

turn their backs on the group that has struggled the most the last 40 years. Everybody feels when young people aren't doing well, their parents, society, and these are the people on social media saying, okay, great, Nvidia's worth $3 trillion, I can't afford rent. So instead of focusing on policies like inflation, how to build more houses, bring down costs, lower enrollment instead of being weaponized

by these universities that are, I mean, essentially some of the most corrupt organizations in the world are seen as the center of democratic politics, specifically my industry. What is more of an epicenter of kind of democratic ideals than elite institutions who I just interviewed the president of Dartmouth, they have an $8 billion endowment and they let in 500 kids. Okay, excuse me? You're not this elite cast enforcer talking about big, big fancy ideals, but you don't wanna give people this drug

that decreases obesity, anxiety, gives them a shot at getting married, making money. No, you'd rather hoard it just for you and your elite friends. So let's create a misdirect of DEI. Michigan, University of Michigan has 200 DEI officers. 60% of Harvard's freshman class identifies as non-white, but we need to have DEI on campuses

such that we can discriminate against what? White kids from rural states? I mean, it's just, we got so out of control with the identity politics, the DEI apparatus, not focusing on inflation, not focusing on young people, that we just gave them a layup to become sort of, you know, just go overboard, flood the zone with a ton of shit. I get it. We deserve it. We had it coming. What I'm really disappointed about is why we're all taking it and calling on people to work together. As far as I'm concerned, it used to be about a certain level of mutual respect.

You know, Democrats and Republicans at the end of the day thought, well, if they get in power, I want them to show me some mutual respect. It seems to me like we need to move to mutual destruction and say, look, Marjorie Taylor Greene and Stephen Miller, if you want to start revoking security details, just be careful what you ask for. Cause once you're out of office,

my guess is you're going to be real fond of a security detail. You know, if you want, I mean, if you want us to stick the DOJ on you after our guy gets in office, but right now we're giving them the impression that if you hit us, we're Gandhi, and we believe that peace is going to work here,

and I think it's to our disadvantage. I think we come across as total wimps, and there's no incentive for them to say, well, maybe we shouldn't be cutting the security detail of General Milley in case our generals that we like are under threat after they leave office. I don't think there's any sense that we'll ever hit back, so to speak.

Your thoughts? Yeah, to back up your point that I think it's crazy that we had His whole transition knowing exactly who he is What he's going to do. He's telegraphing it every day and that we showed up on January 20th at inauguration and did not have a solid message or a plan For countering this. The Democrats' response post-inauguration or the complexion, for me, defines the term flat-footed.

Just on our heels, responding, not even responding, just kind of paralyzed, just incredibly encephaletic and not counterpunching at all. It feels to me like in terms of the viscosity or strength of the Democratic party right now, I've never seen us this week. That's a major declaration. I don't know if it's necessarily wrong. I think the right attitude,

like Congressman Golden's team has said, we're not gonna respond to everything that Trump does because you can't live in the midst of an outrage cycle constantly. But if we just take it on the chin constantly, I could see voters showing up again in 2026 and just saying, well, what are you about? I still have absolutely no idea. So Huckin-Jeffreys really wants to focus in on cost of living issues. And the Republicans have put forward all these EOs. They have a bill about banning transgender people from athletics, but they don't have a cost of living bill.

And JD Vance was on with March Brennan over the weekend and said, well, it takes time to bring prices down. When they had told us it would happen on day one. So I think you have to keep hammering that. But you also need to have a personality and be able to go on a long form podcast and chill with people and talk about other things besides politics. And I'm not seeing that from that many key players in the Democratic Party. Most people, myself included, thought Biden went too far with his preemptive pardons, but he

may be vindicated in that in the long term. You know, that these are ruthless people who have said in public forums that they're going to come after these folks and that that was actually the right thing to do. I mean, that's a Mitch McConnell move, right? It's not a traditional Joe Biden move to go for the absolute worst-case scenario. So I hope that if Cash Patel gets confirmed and it looks like he will and it looks like he will,

because it looks like everybody will, maybe not Tulsi, that he isn't as punitive and as motivated by retribution as he details in his book. But who knows? I wanted to add to what you're saying about young people. I was talking to a friend of mine whose brother is 30 years old, went on a bachelor party, 13 guys, 10 of 13 voted for Trump. And these were all liberal minded guys, they went to university together. And what we were discussing that I found so interesting, and it links also to the discussion about what's going

on with higher education, is that we just are seeing now amongst young people a new definition of what sounds smart. So it used to be, you know, all of your degrees, your level of credibility was directly connected to how fancy the school you went to was, right, like what kind of job you had, you know, how, that you knew which fork went with which, right? Like going back to the pretty woman scene, right? Slippery little suckers, right? Like that was what low class looked like. And high class looks like someone who dedicates their life

to public service, but also has a trust fund that they're relying on and went to Harvard for everything. And now the people that are revered or that folks think are smart are the ones who are asking questions incessantly. And it doesn't matter what they're questioning. Like R.F.K. Jones, oh, I'm just asking questions, right?

About the measles vaccine or fluoride in the water or whatever it is that day. And the right has weaponized that against us to an incredible advantage. Because all of these young people who are smart and very well educated now think that it is cool and forward thinking and what they want to see in leadership for people to not actually know the answers to questions. And I don't know how you rectify that.

Because, you know, I talk to my toddler and she's asking questions all the time, right? Like, but why, mom? Mommy, why? Why do we do this? Why are you going here? Why do I have to brush my teeth? Why do I have to make my bed?

And then you fast forward to where she'll be in 25, 30 years. Let's say is she going to sing Joe Rogan is the smartest person in the world because he's just asking questions? I mean, even Lex Friedman, someone who's a very traditionally smart person, right, in terms of education and productivity, is just asking questions. Like asking Zelensky, why don't you just give up your country? And that's what passes now as the folks that we should be looking up to. And that's leading to a set of government officials

who are also doing that same thing, who are just flooding the zone with wild questions that then leave them with this route that they can go through to throw all of this administrative shit at the wall. And we're ending up with a government that I'm sure will be in complete crisis in a matter of months.

Yeah, it's definitely, I mean, we say this a bunch that we're sort of in uncharted territory. It seemed like I'm just, you said something that sort of, I don't know, piqued my interest because you know more about this than I do, but that you believe Cash Patel will be confirmed and that there's a chance that Tulsi Gabbard won't be. And I would have reversed that,

but I don't know the latest. What's going on there? Well, what's going on is, I mean, you saw Pete Hegsass go through, so there were three no votes on that. It was quite clear that Senator Tillis did want to vote against him because he required Hegsass to write a letter to him answering specific questions about accusations of abuse against his second wife. There was a big New York Times piece about this. And you can see even on Joni Ernst's face that she didn't want to do this. But when you're threatened with a primary

and probably with violence, knowing how the internet works, you do those things. The reason that I say that I think it's possible Tulsi doesn't get confirmed, Lindsey Graham over the weekend wouldn't answer, right, on how he was voting on it. And I feel like if there is anyone who's not going to get through, it's the one that people are being the quietest about. And no one really talks about Tulsi Gabbard. They're talking about the other ones. I think it's feasible that Republicans decide that RFK Jr. is not actually a threat to vaccines or whatever and let him through. But it seems like they're

advertising having good meetings with Cash Patel. And I haven't seen one thumbs up MAGA post with people standing with Tulsi Gabbard. But I'm prepared for all of it to get through. I love someone said that Mitch McConnell voting against Hegseth would be like Hannibal Lecter going vegetarian on his deathbed. It's just like, don't hold your breath. But yeah, it's- He did it.

Yeah, again, he's got very little to lose at this point. Right? He's leaving, he's old. I mean. Profiles encourage though, right? That you're doing it and then nothing really to show for it. But I guess I appreciate it anyway. But you think Cash Patel is gonna get through.

That's super interesting. Right now, I don't, who knows, but it looks likely and people seem to be thinking that Donald Trump is entitled to whatever he wants in terms of a cabinet. And usually people do get what they want. There have been cases where it hasn't happened. Um, but they strongarm everyone and they have this fleet of people online just threatening anyone who opposes them, including, you know, members of their family will do things like that, whether that

is a sitting elected representative or the president of another country, like this game that went on with the Colombians about using military planes versus the regular detention planes. I mean, first of all, it costs three times more. They can get up to $852,000 to send back migrants on these C-130s, I think, or C-17s. It's all about branding, right? And have them cut.

So it's just like a huge, it's all the show. And CNN was reporting this morning that they want all of the ICE agents to be wearing their vests and for this to be made for TV. Cuz we're in the Truman Show, but like a really bad version. Yeah, that's not a one jet blue. Okay, let's take a quick break. Stay with us. Support for Prop G comes from Nutri-Full.

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Senior reporter and producer for the program. Hello. Hi. You went to public school, right, Miles? Yes. Go South High Tigers. What do you remember about school lunch? Ooh.

I remember sad lasagna, shrink-wrapped in little containers. I remember avoiding it. Do you remember the nugs? The chicken nuggets? Yeah. If I had to eat school lunch, that was a pretty good option. I actually liked them. But in addition to being very tasty tasty those nugs were very processed and at the moment America has

got processed foods in its crosshairs. It's true we are collectively very down on processed food right now none more so than Health and Human Services secretary nominee Robert Fullride Kennedy jr. I'll get processed food out of school lunch immediately. About half the school lunch program goes to processed food. Hen the man who once saved a dead bear cub for a snack, fixed school lunches. Today Explained. Every weekday, wherever you get your podcasts.

Welcome back. Before we wrap, we got to address something we've been hearing from some of you. Apparently, there's a feeling that we're not quite living up to the moderate in our show name. Maybe we're leaning a bit more into the raging side. People say we're more raging than moderate. That's a fair point. So what does being a moderate really mean to us, especially during this new administration? Jess, you kick us off. What do you think it means to be a moderate? Well, first, the fact that we're talking about this

is your fault because you made me a comments monster. And I went and looked at what people were saying and there's a lot of positive stuff. But it- Oh, don't look at the comments. I mean, read the first five, learn from it, and then ignore it. Just your own mental health.

I stay up later than everyone in my household. So I could spend a good amount of time comments doom scrolling. But seeing a lot of this, like this is not what a moderate means. And I am completely willing to accept that A, a moderate means different things to different people. And that also I think of myself as a liberal moderate, not someone who

is a swing voter at this point. And most people who advertise that are lying because there's usually a crucial issue that puts you into one camp or the other. For a lot of people, it's whether you're pro-choice or pro-life. And as a pro-choice person, I would be hard pressed to support a candidate that was pro-life. But I guess I wanted to talk about this because I think what we share and why we wanted to do this specific podcast together under this name is because we want to talk about politics through the framework of pragmatism, not just optimism or what we want to happen.

And that it's important to have political discussions that are cognizant of the guardrails of the way government actually operates. And also, I think most crucially, understanding that the framework of a partisan worldview is not how the general populace operates. And the 2024 results were so indicative of that transformation that people are not interested in backing a team in the same way.

If anything, they're backing Trump because they back that player, right? Like that's their favorite football player or their favorite basketball player or whatever sport they're into. And I think that being a moderate right now is trying, as per our earlier discussion, to see the good in what the other side may be bringing to the table and saying like, sure, that works for me. And also I have constituents or I have people that I know who absolutely feel that way, recognizing the faults of the party that we both belong to, and then trying to find a way to constructively and effectively push back where we need to.

That's how I see it right now. How do you see it? Even though you said earlier, you're not moderate, so the podcast is over. I would define myself as ground zero for moderates. And that is, as far as I can tell, moderates are basically people that everybody hates. And essentially, I mean, the generous or the actual Webster definition would be someone who has tempered views

and is somewhere in the middle on the political spectrum. And the way I see it is I've tried as I've gotten older to not be lazy and sign up for any political orthodoxy. When I hear something crazy on the left, I like to call it out. When I think our democratic leadership is too inefficient, feckless, cowardly, I call it out. When I think DI is out of control, when I think that immigration is out of control, when I think that social security spending is out of control, you know, some of their favorite policies of the left, I call it out. And when I am, you know, I'm vigorously pro-Israel, it's like I don't bark up any one tree. I try to have my own views. In this environment, based on where the political spectrum is

I'm now seeing a center-left in the 70s. I would have been a Rockefeller Republican That just would have been I would have would have been in that party But I think it's also just saying look I'm gonna look at I'm gonna be a critical thinker I'm gonna look at issue by issue and Regardless of the political orthodoxy you're supposed to sign up to, you say, okay, I'm not down with this. And it's almost like you become, unfortunately, to a certain extent, the left is much harsher on moderates. They treat you like an apostate.

Scott, I thought we could trust you. People from the Biden campaign sign up. Don't you understand the assignment? Sign up. Well, no, he's too fucking old. What are we doing here? And then people on the right are just like kind of write you off as a libtard, but they Don't you understand the assignment? Sign up. Well, no, he's too fucking old. What are we doing here? And then people on the right are just like,

kind of write you off as a libtard, but they don't come after you the same way the left does when they thought you were quote unquote, when we thought you were one of us. So I see a moderate as someone who says, okay, I'm gonna go issue by issue. I'm gonna use critical thinking. I'm gonna be unafraid to say this makes no sense, regardless of the

cult dynamics of pressure to sign up for the full orthodoxy and narrative. Because when the narrative gets crazy or makes no fucking sense, you say, okay, I don't buy this. I don't, I don't have a problem with deporting criminals. I get the symbolism of it. I don't have a problem with the surge of troops at the border. Fine. Deficits, you know, anyways, my point is, I'd like to think a moderate is someone who says,

I'm a critical thinker. I'm going to look at the issues and I'm going to decide one by one what I think is the right view on this. I'm not going to sign up and just say, okay, I'm a fan, I'm a cultist, no matter what they say. And this is true about the left and the right. But I will say as someone who's seen or identified as a Democrat, that I get more hate from the left than I do from the right. The right has just kind

of written me off. And that's how it is in our society. You got to pick a side. You can't say, well, I want to go issue by issue, Right. Do I believe women should have the right to terminate a pregnancy? Yes. In the third trimester. Okay. That's worth a discussion, right? If, if the woman's health or the baby's health is not, you know, in, in danger at the same time, nobody trusts each other.

So nobody wants to have anything resembling kind of a moderate conversation. In addition with Citizens United and gerrymandering that has hard right and hard left districts, there's no political room for moderates anymore. They can't get elected, right? Because basically every election now with these hard blue and hard red districts is decided in the primary. So it's basically who can be craziest, who can be more crazy left or who can be more crazy right. And a moderate is just a recipe for not getting elected. So I think in the media or as a commentator or quote on whatever

you want to call yourself a thought leader, I think it's especially important that we demonstrate it's okay to be a critical thinker and occasionally have your followers on threads or blue sky come after you because you say, yeah, I don't get this democratic policy. I don't, you know, I think the vice president was a great senator. I think she'd be a great Supreme Court justice. I don't know if she'd be a great president. And then everyone comes for you. And I'm not willing to sign up and bend the knee for, see above, an insurrectionist and a rapist.

Critical thinking. Look at every person, look at every issue, and decide where you are on it. Anyways, that's my story. I'm sticking to it, Jess. No, I think that's the right story. And I think that there's so much pressure to always be a good soldier.

I certainly feel this in my role, you know, being part of the conservative media ecosystem, that there are liberals who get enraged if I even say, well, this doesn't make a ton of sense or this is an issue that 70% of Americans agree on. Like, why can't that just be our position? It seems pretty normal. Like, you know, the, what was it, Prop 36 on the California ballot, making it not okay to shoplift up to $950 without getting arrested. Like, these are just obvious things. And you should be able to have opinions about them without people flipping out on you.

But I do think a critical component of how we approach this and you should be able to have opinions about them without people flipping out on you. But I do think a critical component of how we approach politics and how people who are governing more in the middle do is that they fundamentally understand that it's not the intentions that matter, it's the outcomes that matter. And we just had an enormous outcomes election

where people said that governance in blue cities and states is not meeting the moment, far from it. That riding the subway is not a good option anymore. That we don't support law enforcement, that we have people who are incompetent, perhaps corrupt in big positions of power, and that we are not living up to the covenant that our elected officials make with the people who send them there, and that

we're actually failing ourselves when it comes to our values because of how poor that governance has gotten. And that's really crucial to how I think about politics and how I think about my advocacy for policies that I think will improve quality of life. And more often than not, those policies are linked to more liberal legislators or people who see the world through a similar prism to me.

But I am completely open to the fact that there are good representatives from the other side of the aisle that also live by those ideals or certainly can meet us somewhere in the middle to get something good done. I remember when the Democrats were funding MAGA candidates to run against moderate Republicans. I understood it from a, we got a win perspective. But it was upsetting to me that good people like Peter Mayer in Michigan lost his seat

because we put in tons of money to back a crazy person that would then go on to lose to the Democrat. And I think that those are the kinds of things that we need to explore of money to back a crazy person that would then go on to lose to the Democrat. And I think that those are the kinds of things that we need to explore because we're only going to have a healthy political system if we do have two thriving parties, right, that are full of people that actually capture the cultural and political zeitgeist of the country. And the extremes on both sides are wildly dangerous. I think that the right more dangerous than the left. But when you look at what people think

and how they're talking about the issues, you know that the Marjorie Taylor-Greens of the world are not appealing to the general population writ large. And that for some like the Ilhan Omar's or the Rashida Tla-Talibs of the world are not appealing to them either. And so I think it's important to be trying to stake out ground to have these discussions about it to, you know, bring people on from the other side of the aisle or people who

work regularly with Republicans so that we can hear about how progress can actually be made because they're the ones, we can talk all we want from our studios, but they're the ones actually casting the votes for all of this and hopefully making a big difference in people's lives. Yeah, it's something I think the Republicans have done much better than Democrats.

And your buddy, Tim Miller, I thought made a great point on from the Bulwark podcast, that the kind of the coarseness and the, I don't know, just the provocative, sometimes stupid, sometimes weirdness that's come out of the right, it came across as authentic. Whereas Democrats, it's as if they're reading off a press release or believe that they're crossing the Delaware or giving an inauguration speech.

I mean, they're just so like, it's like speak like a regular person for God's sakes. And the Republicans do that better than Democrats. Also, it strikes me that a big component in terms of what impacts people's lives and gives them the impression of the respective brands, we have to get our shit together around on the ground, running some of these democratic cities.

A bunch of my friends lost houses in the Pacific Palisades and they basically all said the same thing. They're like, I keep hearing these excuses for the reservoirs weren't full, the water pressure was down, whatever it is. And he's like, we pay 13% a year in additional taxes. If I'm going gonna have my house burned down, I'll move to Florida or Texas where I pay 0%. It's like, we should have the super-sized gold-plated VIP, you know, a white glove government when you're paying 13%. And instead, some of the highest tax states are offering,

I mean, they're expensive but bad, which isn't a recipe for a good product. And the most expensive, but bad metros right now are governed by Democrats who seem to be weaponized by unions or whatever it might be, special interest groups and are just taxing the shit out of their local residents and doing head up your ass, you know, enforcement like you're talking about, where if you steal less than $900, they don't even prosecute you. So I think until, and by the way, I think, I don't think that's true of New York. New York has 12, I think it's a total of about 12 or 13% also on taxes, but I would

argue Manhattan is worth it. I think it's actually, I think Manhattan is well run. And I don't, I don't know about you, but I, I do feel, I do feel that the subway feels a little bit different. I've noticed that more aware. That's an understatement. Yeah. You really feel it. Don't you? Well, I do personally, but I don't remember. I grew up here and have ridden the subway my whole life, the number of people being like thrown in front of cars,

being punched, slashed, a woman burned on the F train. That's not normal. Oh, things happen every once in a while. And Kathy Hockel is definitely getting the message because of Richie Torres, but it's bad. Yeah, and also I just, in terms of crime, I think it's- Well, crime is down, but those are also to the point about the messaging of this. If they feel less safe and you come at them with a bunch of statistics, it doesn't matter.

If I don't feel safe on the subway, if I can't have my pods in because I need to I have to feel like I'm more aware All right, that's all for this episode. Just thank you for listening to raging moderates Our producers are David Toledo and Chinenye Onike our technical director is Drew Burrows You can find raging moderates on its own feed every Tuesday. That's right raging moderates on its own feed Please follow us wherever you get your podcast Just have a great rest of the week. You too Scott. Thank you