The Ricochet Podcast - Confessions of a Democratic Operative

Episode Date: August 14, 2026

For once, we can all agree with AOC: Woke 1 was crazy. But rather than laugh it off and set the stage for "true woke has never been tried," perhaps we could ask the youths to learn from their mistakes. To that end, we were pleased to chat with Evan Barker, a former fundraiser who worked within the Democratic Party's establishment and progressive insurgent wing. Having left the party in disgust in 2024, she penned the just-released New York Times bestseller, Nothing Left. James, Steve, and Charlie sat down with Evan to hear her story.Plus, the trio discuss JD Vance's take on how to sway the youngins from socialism; the Trump admin's new childhood vaccination policy; and the coming Reagan biopic about the 1986 Reykjavik Summit with Gorby.Opening Sound this week: AOC laughs off “Woke I” on ABC’s This Week, and Karen Friedman Agnifilo, attorney for Luigi Mangione, talks about his“unfair” treatment.Closing Music: "Je Plante Mes Légumes," by Bamtone via MotionArrayBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-ricochet-podcast--5817275/support.

These races ultimately are local, and all politics are local. My understanding is that Francesca Hong has made clear her present stances to her electorate. Yeah, she's moved away from it. Right, she's moved away from it. And I have a local city councilman that has this saying, Woke One was crazy. It's the Rickettsie Podcast with Charles C.W. Cook and Stephen Hayward. I'm James Lillis, and today we talk to Evan Barker, author of Nothing Left.

confessions of a democratic operative. So let's have a result of a podcast. Despite this being a single isolated event, Mr. Mangione has been unfairly treated since the outset in every way and has successfully fought off terrorism charges and the death penalty. Today's guilty plea triggers the statute

and we just filed our motion in state court explaining why the state charges must be dismissed under New York's double jeopardy protections. Welcome, everybody. It's the Rikoshey Pines. episode number 802. Why don't you just join us at Rickashay.com? Do you have any reason, excuse why you shouldn't? Nah, you really don't. It's the place where you'll find this most stimulating conversations and community on the web, the place you've been looking for ever since

they plugged this thing in way back in the 90s. I'm here with Charles C.W. Cook and of course, Stephen Hayward, who appears to be broadcasting from a Bauhaus-oriented bathroom somewhere. I mean, what is this? Is this a shower? Is that a phone about? I'm in this, I'm in Bartholona, as I learned. Bartholona. The correct pronunciation from Rob Long is very precious about these. And so, yeah, that's a shower behind me in my little one-room thing here. Steve, why do you pay California taxes?

You're never there. Well, how do you know I'm not scouting? At this point, you could probably prefer to play Spanish taxes than California. Well, I might. How do you know I'm not scouting out a location to exile to? It is possible. Well, I love Barcelona, and I'm going to call that because I stay, the people that I stayed with native cattle and speakers would call it Barcelona.

And then they look and realize they were amongst others and say, oh, Bartholona, they go back and forth. They really do. But it's a beautiful city, a masterpiece of planning. And they are tired of tourists. We pointed out all the graffiti that said tourists go home, foreigners go home and the rest of it. They're sick to death. Romans go home.

Yes. What are they ever done for us? Anyway, gentlemen, we have a guest coming up in a little bit, but why don't we talk about J.D. Vance and these kids today and their socialism. We've had the elections. I'd like to hear what you guys had to think about that. I was not expected that Minnesota turned out as it did. And I was, however, delighted that the, I think Peggy Flanagan put out a tweet that if she won, she would be the first Native American senator, which either betrays an ignorance of what somebody else is claiming or was an intentional dig. Anyway, Vance was talking about how the DSA is infecting

absolutely everything. And some people are saying that what happened to the DSA in Wisconsin proves that the fears are overblown. And others are saying, no, no, they're just learning how to co-opt with the DSA wants. They're still being infiltrated from the inside. I don't know. Guys take it wherever you want to go. Charles? Well, actually, I want to hear from you because I want to know a couple of things, James. One, why did the Trump endorsement of Mike Lindell fail so badly. I'm serious. Why didn't that work? It's not as if Trump in the past has been ignored. I'll answer that for you right now, so I don't say we don't, so people don't forget the second one. The reason is the Minnesota GOP here has a habit of nominating people who just don't stand a chance.

It's just odd. They will just throw up people because they're the purest or they like them or whatever. The days when there was a real power and sensibility to the GOP seemed to me from a distance, because I don't participate in the party politics to be gone. But this year, there was enough realization that it's absolute suicide, complete and utter suicide to put Mike Lindell up there. And that nobody could figure out why Trump did it, because Lindell is regarded as completely of shot every single advantage that he had in the public mind. We loved him. My pillow was great.

And then he went where he went. And so no, they weren't going to vote for him. I mean, too, part two, which is related. Can the Republican candidate beat Peggy Flanagan? Is it true that she's got all of the Waltz baggage and there's an opportunity here? Or is it Minnesota in a year where Republicans are unpopular, forget it? I think it's entirely possible. Now, I was talking on the Hewitt show last week, earlier this week, where I was saying that I didn't.

But I think that Flanagan is more vulnerable than the other woman would have been. The reason is, is because as you said, yes, she has the, she has the, baggage and they're going to say, no, we're the ones who uncovered the fraud. We're the ones who prosecuted the fraud. But nevertheless, she does have that. She's not a particular, she's a goofy candidate for one thing. And, you know, the Amy Klobuchar is going to win because everybody loves Amy for a variety of reasons. Some people say, but she threw a soup bowl and a fork at her, underlings. That's why I like Amy Kloa. You know, but it's entirely possible that, that Flanagan could, or that she could tank partially because of the waltz thing.

So, yeah, I'm glad that Lindell didn't get it because that would have been just the laughing stock of the nation. But that's basically it. Okay. Anyway, the rest of the policy, Stephen, you are observing all of this with your usual practiced eye. Well, yeah, I mean, well, I've been overseas for a week, and so I've just read from afar. I understand the total Democratic turnout was almost twice Republican turnout on the two-party primaries, right? which suggests a lot of Democratic enthusiasm, which, you know, a year when Trump is down, I mean, I think we all know how that plays out.

Your other question, you mentioned Vance, right? And I have been following closely what he's been saying. You know, I really want to like Vance, but he's sure making it hard. And it seems to me he's making a, well, it's what sometimes he said is that what he said a few weeks ago, you know, he said the same thing Joe Biden said. He said, Milton Friedman's not running a show anymore. Not the exact words, but close enough. And I thought, boy, this is not a good sign when all.

our guys are paralleling Joe Biden at a time when we're wondering about inflation, right? But then, you know, he said, you know, the DSA is infecting everything and young people like socialism. We've got to make people's lives better. And, you know, I actually think the old free market religion is the best way to make people's lives better. It takes persuasion. It takes real proposals. And, you know, one of the mistakes that Republicans made, you know, 50, 60, 70 years ago is they try to be low-budget liberals, right? Well, our alternative, in fact, it was known as the conservative Republican alternative program, or crap, for short, for the action.

That would be the, you know, the smaller version of Medicare, the smaller version of a welfare program. And the problem is when voters are confronted with a choice between low-budget liberalism and high-budget liberalism, nowadays they're going to choose the high-budget liberalism every time. So I think it's bad politics to talk the way Vance is talking. I think he should be attacking their socialism and, you know, keeping score, and anyway, pointing It's also annoying, Steve, because we didn't get this fictional 40 years of libertarianism that he implies his there. I mean, if we'd had it.

And then people said, you know what? We're tired of this and we're going to do something else. You go, well, at least we got that. We didn't get it. I mean, I understand that in some ways it was probably necessary politically for Republicans to moderate on maybe social security. I don't think it changes the math, so I wouldn't advocate it. But if you make the purely political argument, I think it's difficult to argue against.

But this notion that for 40 years we lived in this Ein RAND universe, I mean, we have extremely high deficits, which have led to a $40 trillion debt because we never, ever, do anything about spending on Social Security Medicare, Medicaid, the Department of Education, agriculture, or anything else. And then I'm told, oh, we've really got to stop this austerity. Sorry, this what? This what? It's infuriating.

So I'm not under any illusions that if extreme fiscal conservative Charles Cook gets his way, then the public will line up in delight and gratitude. But we have done only one thing that you could construe as being libertarian-ish over the last 40 years, and that's cut taxes. But we never cut spending to go with it. So I find Vance's implication really annoying. It's one of those things when taken with a whole bunch of other things,

makes me think that Rubio is the guy to look at in the next presidential cycle. Unless, of course, Trump suspends the election or make sure that he gets a third term. I guess there was talk. Somebody asked him if he was going to suspend the election or something this week, and he said, stranger things have happened. I'm not sure stranger things actually have happened along those lines. You know what, James, this is a big flaw in Donald Trump that he can't ever reject the premise of a question.

I know, I know. And so if you, the journalists know this, and it took me a long time to realize this and relax a bit about it. Oh, yeah. journalists know that if they walk up to him and they say is it true that you intend to turn the state of Oregon into a giant ice palace only for your family he'll be like it's it's something I'm considering

right it's on the table right he'll never say no yeah brilliant absolutely you're absolutely right well Stephen let's see what else do we have that we might bother you with here I know you have been following the vaccination arguments keenly Of course, no, you haven't.

You're probably full of the things, and they're still rattling around your blood system saving you. But they've got a new vaccination rollout, and it's surprised. It's controversial somewhat. I think anything connected with vaccines and RFK is controversial these days. But was this the sort of thing that they needed to do, or is this the sort of thing that's just going to blow over? Because it really doubt there in the pyramid of things that people care about in the moment. Yeah, maybe a parallel here with the socialism problem. Nobody has experienced childhood diseases for a very long time or big academics, right?

And so we've forgotten how awful it was 100 years ago or even 70, 80 years ago. And I think it's probably, I'm no expertist, I think it's probably ill-advised and mistaken, but it's just a prejudice of mine. On the other hand, it is what happens when the medical and the public health community disgraces itself like it did during COVID. And I guess we've got some entries from Fauci's Diaries expressing some doubts about the vaccine with certain. kinds of populations, pregnant women perhaps. And it looks like, again, that they concealed this or, you know, just bailed through and made the politically driven decisions rather than scientifically based ones. And so no wonder there's a large constituency behind RFK and the Maha movement, as it's called, right?

The adjunct of MAGA. And so I don't know. I do worry that we're going to wake up here in 20 years and find vaccination rates are down and suddenly some really awful diseases are back. I don't know. Hopefully I'm wrong, and maybe I am. But it seems to me we've done pretty well with the childhood vaccinations we've been using for decades. My generation got poked with everything, as far as I can tell.

Yeah, me too. And we did not have the idea of autism was confined to the absolute margins of our knowledge. Now, it seems to me, and this is related but not, and I'll ask you both the same thing. I think that there's a massive diagnosis and over-definition of the term autism. I think that there are people who are profoundly autistic, and I've met parents who have the product, I've seen the kids, and it's a trial. But the idea that we've sort of pathologized

the entirety of human personalities and put everybody on the spectrum is an insult, A, to the people who have to endure it, but B is also part of this, oh, you know, well, he's a little bit of the way he is because of the vaccines that he took. No, he isn't. It's just simply a human personality. And those of us who grew up with a full spectrum

of the inoculations, my daughter included, did not end up with these things. We just sort of redefine what human, means to be human and then blamed it on the things that actually were preventing childhood mortality. And I'm sure we'll have a good zesty discussion about that in the comments at a ricochet. It's not a place for it. Go on. James, I got jabbed or poked, was it you said?

Yeah. On a single day in the summer of 2012 because when you become a permanent resident, you have to provide the federal government with proof of all sorts of inoculations. And the National Health Service, disaster that it is. had lost mine. So when I went to my doctor in England and said, hello, I have to have the 15 inoculations on this list, I know that I've had 12 of them.

Can you please provide me with proof of this? He said, no, I can't. And the federal government said, don't care, you have to have them again. So I trundle along to this nice woman who had signed up to do this work. You have to register with the federal government to do the work, be trustworthy and so forth.

turned out she was actually a Coptic Christian who had escaped the Middle East during the early 2000s. She had a picture of George W. Bush up on the wall of her practice because his government had got her out. And she said to me, I'm afraid you're going to have 11 injections today. Now, I don't expect our listeners to know this is no reason that they should, but I have a phobia of needles. So for me, this was a bit like being told, I'm going to put snakes and spiders and scorpions on your face for the next hour. Anyway, she was super nice and helped me get through them. But instead of having them through the course of a few years, I had them in one sitting, again, having already suffered through most of them as a child.

So my advice would be, before you move to the United States, make sure you have the requisite paperwork. Well, now we know it is in Charles' personal room 101. Yeah. That was my personal room 101. Yeah, that was. For some people, though, the idea of just taking all of these shots, pumping your body of these things is unnatural. But on the other hand, hey, Ozempic, that'll help because it always felt.

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former Democratic political consultant and fundraiser, raising over $50 million for campaigns. But she became fed up with the party, eventually walking out of the 2024 Democratic National Convention. And she tells her story in her newly released New York Times bestseller, nothing left, confessions of a Democratic operative. We love Appa States here. Evan, welcome to the show.

Thank you guys so much for having me. It's good to be here. Let's set the stage here. You say in the book that you started out volunteering as a high schooler. You had a rare and debilitating medical condition. We hope everything's better. But you were volunteering in Missouri for Obama in 08 because you believed in more affordable health care. Now, as you put it in the book over time, you're a, quote, ruthless fundraiser who taught progressive politicians and organizers how to raise money

and a, quote, a live player who helped the progressive insurgents infiltrate the party from within. But I take it that that's not precisely where you are now. So for background here to start, give us a little idea of how you went from that first point to where you happen to be today. Yeah. So it was more than just making health care affordable. It was being able to get health care at all. As a child, I was denied health insurance because I had a preexisting condition. And that was the reality of life before the ACA. And so I was kind of afraid to graduate high school. I was afraid to go to college. I thought I might need to get a job right out of high school

instead of being able to go to college. Neither of my parents went to college. It was a dream of my mom's for me to go. That's how I got so involved in Obama's first campaign. And back then, things were, it was more of a colorblind mission, I'd say. He ran a pretty populist campaign. You know, we were coming out of a time of a lot of recessions, unpopular foreign wars and

you know we all just kind of look to him as a new hope right and over time you know I ended up going to school I know the ACA has a lot of problems but it did help me a lot with the preexisting conditions and I was able to go to college

and get on Obamacare and it worked really really well for me and I went to college and then after college I got re-engaged in politics again. I briefly worked for Hillary Clinton. I kind of just needed a job, to be honest with you.

I wasn't particularly inspired by her candidacy in 2015. I just really needed to work. And they were willing to hire me because of my experience with the Obama campaign. And then after college, I got really reactivated in politics. That's really when the story begins, is when after Donald Trump got elected in 2016. and I ended up taking a fundraising job on the East Coast. At that time, I wanted to get away from the middle of the country. I'm from Kansas originally, Kansas slash Missouri.

I claimed both because I lived in both sides. It was in Kansas City, so we lived on both sides of the state line off and on. And I started working back in Democratic politics, but kind of even back then, back in 2017, I started to feel kind of disillusioned by what I was seeing. I worked for this. I call her in my book, A Pussy Hat Wearing. housewife, whose husband was part of Lehman Brothers during the financial crisis and, you know, spent his days dressed as a magician and fiddling with pasta and bankrolling his wife's run for

Congress. And, you know, they were just kind of awful, to be honest with you. I guess you called them like limousine libs, right? Around that time, my brother passed away in the military. and there was just like a lot going on in my life, and I couldn't really deal with it. So I left her campaign and then moved back to Kansas and ended up working for a progressive,

who was running in a really hotly contested primary race in Kansas. And he had Brent Welder and AOC come, actually, I was with them the day that they first ever met each other to Kansas to rally for him. And that's really where, where my career started. And so I ended up, you know, kind of from that campaign going into national politics, went to AOC's office again a few months before she officially beat Crowley in November of 2018, went to all these different progressive races around the country, ended up working for a progressive

fundraising firm in D.C. that was blacklisted by the Democratic establishment for helping primary incumbents. And, you know, what really drew me to Bernie's movement was that just, that he, I felt like he was a truth teller at that time about the Democratic establishment and kind of like challenging them in a way and challenging them on their failures. But I soon realized, you know, after working in progressive politics and in his movement and at this firm, you know, whose clients included like Ilhan Omar and Corey Bush and Jamal Bowman and Jasmine Crockett and all these different people, that the progressive movement was not at all like what,

Bernie's movement in 2016 was like either. They also radically changed and went in a very, very bad direction that moved away from economic populism and colorblindness and towards a movement that only focused on identity politics, really. And so that is kind of when I fell out and I and I had a boy in 22. And that also opened my eyes quite a bit and changed the way that I viewed the people that I was working with and for. Evan, it's Steve Hayward talking to you today or tonight, for me, actually, from over in Spain, where I've been listening to your book while driving around the countryside all week and enjoying you very much. I got two or three opening questions. I got a lot of questions, but I'll limit myself to two or three

because Charlie will want to get in with his own bundle of questions, and then we'll try and juggle the balls together and see where we can get them to land. I think there's a through line in your book that I picked up, and very early on, you mentioned when you were first, breaking in in democratic politics, somebody would say to you, oh, you went to college, where, the University of Kansas? I mean, you sort of found some snobbery going on there, right? A lot. And this, I don't think this is really brand new. I'm an older guy, got rid of a ton of political history. And one of my favorite lines from way back was Adelae Stevenson, the Democratic nominee in the 50s, a wonderful, a liberal hero and a very good man.

And the woman runs up to him running against Eisenhower, the poor man, had to do that. Some woman ran up to him, and I think in 56, and said, oh, Governor Stevenson, every thinking American is for you. And this was his problem. He said, yes, ma'am, that's very nice, but I need a majority. Right? I don't know if you've ever heard that story. That was a legendary story.

But there you go. Right. And then, you know, limousine liberals with a phrase that people used when I was growing up in the 70s. Now we called them Gulfstream Limbaughes, which, you know, is more current. A couple of things here. One is this, you mentioned with, I think, appropriate disgust at all the Democrats who said, or progressive, sorry, who said, you know, we can't win back to white working class. We shouldn't even try.

We should write them off and go for the new coalition. Yeah. And yet I think, again, that, you know, one of the reasons Ronald Reagan got those two landslides was he attracted the Reagan Democrats. Yeah. In places like McComb County, Michigan. And, but Bill Clinton got them back. He did. I mean, that was Bill Clinton's success in the 90.

It is amazing to me that there don't seem to many Democrats, even in the old conventional party, that say, wait a minute, we did it once before, not that long ago. Why can't we do that again? Is it simply they're overwhelmed by the identity politics business, or is there a forgetfulness or incompetence or what is it? I think that's part of it. So I think I write about this in the book later on, but I think that a lot of, well, the Democratic Party, progressives, too, both of them. Chuck Schumer kind of said he was fine with losing working class people, especially working class whites is really who he was talking about, because he knew that for everyone that he lost, he would get two suburban voters. So I think that there's been this gamble that they can kind of switch their strategy from appealing to white working class people to appealing to overly college-educated suburban white people. And then also there's this other idea in the party that demographics is destiny. And so they have this obsession with winning Texas. And this was a frustration for me as somebody from Missouri, Kansas, is, you know, Missouri, 2018 elected a Democrat statewide office.

And I would bring this up. But they didn't really care or seem interested in winning Missouri. And I think it's because they thought that they would need to cold. culturally moderate to win there. They would need to moderate on some things that they just can't because their base won't let them. And some of them don't want to anyway. I mean, there are some Democratic politicians, I think, who do think the trans stuff is really stupid and would moderate on it. But they feel captured, right? And so they have this obsession that demographics are destiny and that young people and people of color are natural progressives. And because of changing demographics

in Texas, they don't need to win back places like Missouri. They soon won't need to win the blue wall, the rest belt at all. They're fine with that going to Trump too, probably. And they can just rely on the sunbelt. I mean, I can't help just interject here, Evan, that, I mean, that argument is also the demographics' destiny goes back a couple decades now. And, you know, John Judas and Ruea Cheshire, who first promoted it about, they repudiated it, right?

We've talked to both of them several times, right? Yeah, he blurbed my book. Yeah, yeah, he did. Yeah, he really liked it. Yeah, he's been in crest of ours several times. But I can't help it interject, especially since you're a recent mom. But one problem right now for the demography argument is that progressives aren't having babies anymore or not very many of them. So the long-term future doesn't look very good if you're going to bank on young people. I know. I talk about this with my husband sometimes.

I'm like, yeah, do you realize that like in 30 years, I don't know what they're going to do? I mean, maybe I don't know. I mean, that is such a good point. They're like breeding themselves out of existence. Well, last question for my opening round. I perked up when I heard you mention the work of David Shore, the data analyst. And I followed him very closely. I'm an academic political scientist, so I follow him.

And when I was at Berkeley for a while, I got to know Omar Raso, who had written about his work so much, an African-American scholar who was very moderate. And anyway, but what I noticed this is, and you mentioned he went to start his own progressive consulting firm. he didn't shed any of his progressive commitments, which I think maybe are like your original ones and maybe your one still, which is the question I'm coming to. Yeah.

Which is, I mean, yeah, he did that wonderful work about, you know, if you want to win Michigan, stop talking about electric cars. I mean, he really had the date about it. And Alyssa Slot can listen to him, I think, right? He's brave. He's brave. Yeah.

Anyway, I'm sure where would you put yourself now? I got hints in the book that, I think the sentence I recall you was saying was something like, I wish Democrats would talk like Trump and think like Bernie, meaning the old Bernie at least. Right. Right, right.

And so, I mean, are you still for, I don't know, Medicare for All or a Green New Deal or? Yeah, no, I'm not. The Green New Deal, I think is stupid. The Medicare for All, universal health care, yes. Not maybe the way that someone like Abdul El-Sayed lays it out right now. But I think some sort of, and I think at the end, end of the book I put out I put out a call

to Republicans actually because I think that Republicans are really the only party that could get this done. You know, Nixon wanted universal healthcare. It's not like it's totally unfathomable right, but I think that some sort

of mixed system, I think, is probably the way forward. Although if you do that, you have to address the supply side of health care as well. And I think that's something that progressive sort of gloss over. They don't really understand. And I think that you also have to do it in a common sense way. So you can't also extend that to anybody that shows up to the United States on a tourist visa like they have in California. I think the only way that we could really reap the

benefits of a system like that is through being common sense. And that's why I think the Republicans would probably do a better job at it if they, you know, could, I think, healthcare is a blind spot for Republicans. It's consistently a top three issue, and they don't really seem to have any plans for it other than taking us back to the way it was before I could get health insurance. And so, yeah, I would love to...

But I have, basically, I lean to the left on economics still. I haven't shed. I don't haven't done a 180 on every single issue. When it comes to social and culture stuff, I lean right now. And so I think I'm actually a reflection of most of Americans, but I don't, but I'm not like far left on economics and I'm not far right on culture either. So I'm kind of politically homeless at this point. Just a quick comment and then I want to let Charlie have a shot at things.

I appreciate you're reaching out and challenging Republicans. I have an axiom, but I'll just mention it and free to file away and for future use. I've been saying for a while now that only Republicans can fix health care. if they want to and if Democrats will let them. Why do I say that? Because Republicans, I think, have a better grasp of markets and how they could actually help sort out the problems. They're not always very good at that, but at least that's their inclination.

Conversely, I think only Democrats can fix entitlements if they want to and if Republicans will let them, right? That's what are the standoffs in American politics based on the strength of the parties and their disposition. So I'll just stop there and leave that for later on and invite Charlie to take over. Yes, so I just wanted to ask, analytically, as opposed to your personal preferences, whether you think Bernie is electable. So, look, my card's on the table. I'm originally from England. I grew up there. I loathe universal health care in the way that the British do it. I think it's a disaster. I lived under it for 26 years. I watched my family live under it. Now, I would oppose it tooth and nail. But I also understand that the public is not me.

Steve mentioned Reagan and then Clinton. They weren't socialists, famously. And Obama was more left-wing than them, but his signature healthcare plan was extremely unpopular and sort of wiped out his presidency, even though he got it past. So I suppose I'm asking the stuff that you write about in the book, I think is both morally and intellectually loathsome, right? Yeah.

The rejection of racial equality, essentially. This sort of, this progressive elitism that you hate to. I mean, I'm 100% with you on all of that. But do you think that Bernie analytically is going to win back that white working class vote? No, I think he could have in 2016. Okay. I think, you know, yeah, he's a very different political animal than Clinton or Reagan. However, I think that wealth inequality has changed a lot since either of those people,

especially for working class people, you guys. I mean, the Rust Belt has been hollowed out since NAFTA and the World Trade Organization, trade deals. And then we had the financial crisis, and we've had a continuation of wars and recessions. And I just don't think that people without a college degree, which is still the majority of America, really have a shot at the middle class life like they used to when Bill Clinton or Ronald Reagan were elected. And so that's why I kind of think it's a mistake. That's actually why I like some of J.D. Vance's commentary this week. I don't know if you've been following, but him just saying the best way that you fight socialism isn't just by giving out free market slogans, aka going back to the

reflexive previous days of the Republican Party, but actually making people's lives better. And I think he's absolutely right. I don't know exactly what that vision looks like. I'm not a policy expert. I, that maybe that's my next book. I don't know. I have to do more research. But I think that, yeah, I think in Bernie in 2016 absolutely could have gotten elected. He did really, really well in states where Hillary Clinton failed miserably. And, you know, I know it's anecdotal, but I have people in my family who were rooting for him because they wanted a sledgehammer to the system. And when that didn't happen, they voted for Donald Trump and they have sense. And so that's, that's, that's, that's, But I think at this point, no, I don't think Zoran Mom Doni's brand of Bernie is going to ever appeal.

You know, I talk about this too. It's like people in my family, they're struggling. They don't hate billionaires, though, the way that Zoran does. They like the job creation. They just want a fair shake. I think they want more opportunities to exist. They want some sort of social safety net floor to exist in this country. they don't want it wiped away, like the way that some fiscal Republicans wouldn't mind or libertarians,

no offense to anybody here would not seem to mind having that happen. But at the same time, they just don't think grocery stores should be free. And so, no, I don't think that there is a, I don't think that his style of politics is a winning national coalition for the Democrats. but I think Bernie in 2016, he was moderate on guns. He was very moderate on immigration. He actually had working class views on immigration. And he led a colorblind, non-identity politics class-based message and actually was against free trade and was supportive of tariffs,

the way that Donald Trump is. And so I think that version of Bernie could win. but at this point that version is long gone I don't even know really who represents that in the party at this point maybe just me if I were still a Democrat

but I'm an independent now so I have a second question which is also practical you hung out with a lot of the people that you'd decry in the book and they annoyed you now you probably know more of them than I do but I do meet them

they're overrepresented in middle-class professional circles. They're especially over-represented polling would suggest among white women. Yeah. How does the Democratic Party get out of that spiral? Because in my limited experience, a lot of what it is those people believe

is unfalsifiable, and the more you challenge it, the more they become convinced by it. So you will say, for example, this thing you believe isn't true, or I don't think you're right. And they will say, yes, well, that's just your male-white privilege speaking, which isn't a real argument. And I wonder, that's almost like being an occult. And I wonder how you think that fever gets broken.

Because in other circumstances, if you have debates with people, people are pretty normal. They'll say, yeah, you make good points and I make good points and we'll agree to disagree. But that's not what's happening here. So how does that stop? It's really hard. It's really hard because it's not just a reflection of the voters. And this is where I'm the most pessimistic. And I say this in the book.

I feel like the culture inside the party is going to be the hardest thing to change. And the culture inside the party is a reflection of what they prioritize. And so the problem is that so many donor groups, so many organizations, identity. The Democrats have organized themselves around oppression and identity. Their actual infrastructure is reflective of the way that they speak about these issues, too. And so, you know, for example, I talk about Emily's list in the book. I talk about like groups like color of change and equality fund and all, you know, all these. And so the Democratic Party has just kind of organized itself.

And the people that are inside the party are fully bought into these ideas. Very few of them come from backgrounds like me. I think that's part of the reason that I was able to sort of become a traitor and then call them out is because I didn't come from the type of of background that they came from. And they are, they are just very captured on all ends. And it is almost cult-like. It is a real, it's like a religious fervor or something. It's, it's really, really, really hard. I think maybe if you had some sort of Donald Trump-like figure that could rise through the ranks on the left, who's maybe like a problematic man, doesn't even have to be white, right? But preferably a man, actually, at this point.

because I think Democrats have a huge problem with winning men, and rightfully so. I mean, I write this in the book. No one wants to be a part of a coalition where your very existence is controversial, and it is inside of democratic politics. I would hear very degrading things about men said almost on a daily basis, and even before I came a mother, I didn't like it, just so you guys know. And I would talk to my male peers after meetings. I'd be like, are you okay?

That was really rough. But then when I had a son, I was like, I cannot, I cannot participate ever again in any of the shit. So sorry, I don't know if I'm supposed to cut. That's why we understand it. Yeah, and that's when I really flipped because I was like, uh-uh, like you're not going to treat my son like this when he grows up. And so all women should have a boy, maybe, and all men should have a girl, right? That would be so beautiful. We could totally heal everything.

I'm absolutely delighted in the fact. The book, by the way, has nothing left, confessions of a democratic operative. Now, you mentioned, you know, how some beliefs these days are like a religion. Well, that brings up something else. As much as we talk about intersectionality, which makes it sound like there's a kaleidoscope of things

coming together and all are equal, we all know that there's a pyramid of grievance. And the person who stands at the top of the pyramid and has the most power in the organization is somebody who accumulates the most grievances, disabilities, and the rest of it. If they're trans, black, you know, Islamist, they are at the summit because they've ticked the requisite boxes.

It's the alliance between the left and Islam that is really making me scratch my head. And I see a lot of it here in Minnesota where I live. Because on one hand, you have what people would in another circumstance regard as a illiberal idea steeped in patriarchy. And on the other hand, somehow it is now progressive to align yourself with, Islamist candidates or just the very nature of being a Muslim is somehow progressive. I remember during the George Floyd riots, there was, you know, when my city was burning up there, where they were attacking this cell phone store. And I was just live watching this live stream.

And the owner comes out and the guy who's doing the live stream says, hey, guys, guys, he's a Muslim, which somehow just oil in the water of the crowd. And I see this plays out over and over and over again here in the cities. It seems peculiar. White, women went 60% for that guy in Michigan. Is this just a marriage of convenience, or is this some sort of caucus contribution connection that's going to last forever? I think it's just convenience and that they'll shove each other, the two sides the moment they can.

I mean, this is a hard, it's like such, somebody else asked me this the other day, and I didn't even know quite how to answer it. You might have a better idea than me, honestly, but I remember not to be. long ago. I saw this candidate was running in the Pacific Northwest. She was a progressive and she wears a hijab, I think. And she took off stuff about LGBTQ people on her website because she didn't want to offend Muslim voters, but then she's running as like a far left progressive. It is very disorienting. It's a strange alliance. Yeah, it does seem sort of befuddling. But I think it's the, it must be related to the Israel stuff.

I think it's like the oppressor, oppressed narrative that people here kind of like look at everything through that lens. I think it's simply because post 9-11 or post, you know, even the terrorist act of the 90s is that people associated a dislike of Islam with wrong people. If you were criticizing Islam because you associated it with terrorism in 9-11, you were a bad person, you were a bigot, you were an Islamophose. So I don't think there's any particular. you know love on the left for Islam.

It's just they don't want to be the people who are against it. And as such, we'll make the sort of connections that they do. Evan, last question. Last question, this is a hard one. You got a Robbins Egg, blue fender on your wall. Is that yours or is that somebody in your household? That's my husband's, but I play guitar too. It's a great instrument.

That's a fantastic. It's a, yeah, it's a, it. Was it a telecaster? It's nice. No, it's a strap. It's a strap. Yeah, yeah. No, the blue ones. Telly. I can't see the head.

one's a telly. That's the blue ones is how like that's how like that's. Good for you. Yeah. Is that the Paul McCartney? Yes. Yes. Nice. Fantastic. Behind me that's the John Lennon Rickenbacker 325. So together we've got half the Beatles. We got half the Beatles. This is great. Those of us in the right were cultured, we're we're, you know, we're accepting, we're warm. We did we all love the jam. We may disagree in marginal tax rates, but we got to come through to save and and and and we're You can't pay a tax because they need to buy more guitars. Exactly.

Nothing left. Confessions of a Democratic operative. New York Times bestseller by Evan Barker. We thank you for coming by the show today. And we'd like to talk to you later as you're raising your son goes on and the things that you've learned. I raised a daughter and it was the happiest days of my life. So, yeah, you're right. Good luck with that.

And thanks for being on the show. Yeah, thank you. That was awesome. Thanks, guys. Well, gents, before we go, we got a couple of things to talk about. First of all, Luigi pled guilty. this must be stunning to people some people thought

Candice Owens did it or something I mean isn't doesn't this doesn't this violate some sacred bond that he made with his fans that he wouldn't do this but from what I understand he pled guilty because this will allow him to make some sort of statement at the end of his trial

before he sentenced and then he can say what he should have I don't know put it in an op-ed instead of plugging a guy in the street yeah I don't know it seems to me that the first rule of becoming a progressive martyrs to be convicted in an unfair trial and you know, and it'll be in a cell next to Mumia

in Philadelphia or something. Exactly. We also have, on a good note, a Ronald Reagan movie is coming. How did they make a movie about a Ronald? How did this, you know, it's about Reikiivik. The 1986 Reykjavik summit. It's called the brink of war.

And I remember the pictures at the end of the summit. Reagan looking grim as he went to the car because it hadn't worked. And we were told, of course, this was all Reagan's fault because he wanted this crazy technology and wouldn't, you know, since we weren't talking, now war was imminent, which of course somehow didn't happen. Jeff Bridges is Reagan, Jared Hess is Gorby, J.K. Simmons is George Schultz. You guys seen the trailer? You getting ready to go to the theater and enjoy it? Yeah, I actually, I think Angel Sudu is going to send me a screener since I've missed any pre-releases. I did see the trailer and I was very dubious about it. First of all, Jeff Daniels is Reagan. He's of hardcore lefty.

It's hard to imagine him taking the role if he didn't approve the script, but I've heard other things that are favorable about it. But there are a couple of things about trade with or inaccurate. And I won't go through them all here, but I will say that what I'm going to be looking for because the guy who wrote this as a young director who's got a couple of good credits to his name, said he went through original documents and interviewed people who were there.

To make a long story short, and I've actually visited Hoffty House in Reykjubik. It's a pilgrimage for me. And I declare that the Cold War ended on the third session together, but they didn't know it at the time. And it wasn't about the nuclear weapons. It was this moment that's, and by the way, where you find this is in the Soviet transcript, which was translated years later, and then I got hold of.

It's much more detailed than the State Department memorandums, the note takers do. And there's a moment where Reagan brings up, you know, here's why we distrust you. It really goes back to Marx and Lenin who said, you have worldwide revolution. And Gorbachev's very frustrated with this. He says, Mr. Schultz, because just Reagan, Schultz and Chevroner, Nards, and can we please get the president off talking about Marx and Lenin? And Reagan wouldn't let up.

And he said, no. Reagan says, every Soviet leader from the beginning until you, he says, you have not said this, he said. They've all said that communism requires worldwide revolution. And then we can repeat himself. He says, every Soviet leader has said it except you. maybe you don't believe it, but all the others said it. So Reagan was paying attention, and it's true that Gorbachev omitted that.

By the way, it was, oh, you what, a year and a half? No, two years later, it's when Gorbachev came to the UN and repudiated the Brezhnev Doctrine, which really was a public declaration that the Cold War was over. But Gorbachev's frustrated at this point. He says, I'd love to argue about philosophy, but let's get back to nuclear weapons. And Reagan had just given in this opening to say, no, we're, you know, whatever we are now, it's not that. But there is in the second episode that's very funny that I think... But when you say whoever we were not bad, then what are they?

What are they than just oligarchical collectivism? Oh, see, that gets to a second exchange that's both humorous and also revealing. Gorbachev says, you know, we want to have reciprocity on trade. And his example was movies. He said, you know, like half the movies in the Soviet Union are from Hollywood. And you don't show any Soviet movies. Can you believe it, Charlie? I thought, really? He's going to bring this up with a former Hollywood actor,

and Reagan had to have had all the discipline in the world not to laugh in his faith. It's like you just did, right? Instead, Reagan said, look, it's a private industry in America. So if you want to send us some movies that are, you know, I'm sure all theaters will use them. Carbichita says, well, you can make it happen. I mean, you're going back to talking about business again. And Gorbichab really had the orthodox view that business is a creation of politics and all the rest of it. So Reagan, it finally comes back to, you know, we have a two-party system in America.

and you only have one party. I'll cut it short to say the closing line of Gorbachev was, yes, we only have one party because that's the result of a definite historical process. Well, that's Hegelian Marxism. It shows that for whatever liberal reformist instincts Gorbachev had, which he did, he was still an Orthodox Marxist at the end of the day in his view of how the world works. So those were very revealing exchanges, and all got lost in all the drama over the abolishing nuclear weapons. Well, the movie thing is great.

The movie thing is great because I was, and I have to explain why, I have this feature in my website where I just do ads. I look at the ads from various years. I go by decade by decade by decade. And I hit the 30s, and I was looking around for some material to some ads to look for their sociological value. And I decided to take them from the New Republic magazine in 1933, which was not exactly overstuffed with ads, I should say. My favorite ad from the New Republic in 1933 was by Soviet bonds. Chase National Bank had struck this deal where they were going to sell Soviet bonds backed by gold.

And I don't know exactly how many they did, but that's such a New Republic 1930 thing to do. But there's also an ad for one movie, Fador Oseps, Mirage de Paris. And Fadour Osep was a Russian film director who made a whole bunch of bolshe stuff and then came over here for some reason. and never cracked the market and ended up doing one feature in Canada about beavers or something like that.

But at the time in 33, of course, all the good, right-thinking people would go down to this small little theater smelling of mothballs and watch a Russian movie congratulate themselves for their broad-mindedness. And I'm sure that it was absolutely dreadful. There's Sergei and there's everybody else. Anyway, Charles, you have anything to add to the Reykivik thing, or should we attempt right now to see exactly what albums you have put up to stump? me this week. The only thing I would add is it's always bad news when a country wants to privilege or prioritize its art without the demand already being there. In France,

there's some law, or at least they used to be, that dictated that they had to play a certain amount of French pop music on the radio. Well, Canada, too. Yeah, Canada has the same thing. and it's just garbage. It's just garbage. I think in France, it's part of their Accol-Francise, or whatever it is, attempt to preserve the language. They know that every pop song on the radio

would be in English otherwise, but it's garbage. And I just, this goes back to our conversation about socialism and markets, is that if you have to put your thumb on the scale for a given piece of art, it's probably not very good.

Yeah, and I think you're right. Yeah, I can't name it a lot of French groups out the top of my head, except for Jean-Michel Jarre. If it's Jarre or Jarre? Jarre. Jarre. and then, you know, Johnny Holliday, who was a really French

in a sort of totally American kind of way. Oh, that's right. Well, the classics. I mean, yes, they have great crooners and all the rest of it, and they have... Assusted. You do the Piaf and all the rest of it.

And I love, you know, the cliché de accordion. music and the rest of it, but the pop of the day, uh, not so much. But Charles, uh, has some albums on his wall. And for those of you observing this video wise, I have to see exactly what they are. Now, I assume all the way to the right once again, the thing

that I mistakenly thought was some grateful dead thing is your son's picture, which is still there. Spider-Man. All right. So we have three them that I have to go for. However, there is one that is sideways. And it is um, it's, it's propped at an angle. And from what I can tell, being all black with a single shaft of light emerging from one head has got to be pink Floyd dark side

of the moon, right? Correct. Okay. And so next to it, what appears to me to be sort of some sort of blurry gecko with its eye prominent is metal by Pink Floyd. You got past my little gauntler, because I thought that if I put an obvious Pink Floyd next to a less obvious Pink Floyd, then you might second guess yourself, but you didn't. Well, well, I'm absolutely completely at sea, the one in the middle. It just, I can't get it. It looks like a head of somebody. A face maybe. What is it? Serenade by Neil Diamond. Ah, never would have go. Oh, yes, of course. Of course, of course. And the next to it, are you, are you joking? Are you playing with me? Are you thinking that it's so obvious that he's going to think it's something else? Are you insulting me by giving me such an easy layup? This is the WNBA. That is, of course, brothers in, that is, that's dire straits right there. That's that classic album. That's actually out because I was playing it, not because I was trying to insult you.

Well, there we go. And I did take a screenshot of our guest, and I'm convinced that that's not a telecaster. That's a strax. The Robin Blue one is a, you're telling me that's a telecaster? How can you tell when you didn't even see the part where it curves over on the top? Well, first off, because the pickups. And second, there you might be right. There you might be right. And second, if you look at the top where it curves over on the right, which you can see, it's short. It's a stubby telly. All right, I say that is a man who won't distraught. I stand accused and I stand revealed and I stand embarrassed. But I'm not going to be embarrassed once I start the Mars Men because, of course, then I'll have you more tea and I'll go to the gym and get even more lean than I am right now. I don't have a dad bod, but I don't want one and I am up for everything that keeps me from getting to that point. Gentlemen, we welcome you to come back next week because next week, Rurcce, 5.0 will be up and running.

Right, Charles? No, I don't say that. It won't be up and running. But I will say it could. If I brought forward the launch, which I'm not going to. But if I brought forward the launch, it would work nicely. It is done. The testing is mostly complete.

But I am ironing out little things that pop up only in the course of people using it. And I don't want to do that with paying users using it. So I am going to keep the existing time frame, I think. But it's so close. And you know, I'll stop. But I thought this morning, I thought, you know, this is actually going to happen. This is great. This is actually going to happen.

I can't wait for it to be there in app form and for me to have all of my troubles with embedding videos to be over. That's just about the only complaint that I have with Rurcce. You should go there. You should sign up. You should join the member site because there, as we keep telling you, is the community you've been looking for on the web. There is a code of conduct that keeps things civil. There is an expansive and diverse range of opinion and subject matter,

the likes of which you don't find any place else. Rikoshae.com, go there, join up, sign up. And of course, all the podcasts are available to you, all the wonderful glories of the Rikosha Audio Network, and more to come. I'm bringing back to diner. I know I keep saying that, but it's coming back. My mojo is returning milliliter by milliliter,

and eventually I will be back. Stephen, eventually you'll be back in the country from Bartholona, as Sylvester the cat might say, and we'll talk to you next time. Charles, same in Florida. And gentlemen, it's been a pleasure as ever. We'll see everybody in the comments at Rickashay 4.

Such and such and such and such. Bye-bye. I plant the carotts, I plant the choo. I plant the potatoes in the park to show. I plant the carote, I plant the choo.

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