The Ricochet Podcast - Politics and Coffee

Episode Date: March 19, 2015

This week on the Ricochet Podcast, it’s early in the cycle, but regardless, we call on The Washington Examiner’s Michael Barone and Ricochet’s own Paul Rahe, two of the most experienced voices on the political scene to help us parse 2016, some Congressional races, and the mayoral contest in the Second City. Also, the President tips one for Likud, the best cup of Joe on the planet... Source

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They don't understand what you're talking about. And that's going to prove to be disastrous. And what it means is that the people don't want socialism. They want more conservatism. Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall. It's the Ricochet Podcast with Peter Robinson and Rob Long. Tear down this wall. There you go again. Yes, this is the Ricochet Podcast, number 253. It's brought to you by a fine product that has the problem and the solution in its very name.

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We're also brought to you by Ricochet.com. And you know there are apostates among you. There are people who have fallen away from the fold and now seek to come back penitent. And is there something we can do for you? Why, sure. We can repay your prodigal nature with a special treat. Wait, that's biblical. If you look, i mean it is if you can really understand the position of the other son who didn't leave the guy goes away he acts all

prodigal he comes back and what does dad say let's have a party let's yeah welcome back slay the fatted calf i see you're not exactly going to be uh disposing of any livestock with the ceremonial blade but you are going to help people come back to Ricochet. Yes, we are, James. Listen, we have some big plans for Ricochet. We're really growing. We have some big plans to build it out and sort of add a little more features. And we know that there are some members who let their membership lapse or listen but don't pay or whatever um we are going to offer you uh a rick

if you are a previous member of ricochet go to ricochet.com slash membership use coupon code the coupon code is rejoin you get two months free you get two months free okay look if you just want to join you go to ricochet.com slash membership use the coupon code join if you're a podcast listener you get two months free now is the best time to join why join look go to the site just if you we we it i can't really tell you how many people listen to these podcasts versus how many people are members of ricochet because the number hurts my feelings um And it also kind of like – and I get it. I totally get it. But I also feel like there are people who are listening who are like, oh, you know what?

I'm going to go. I'm going to check it out. I just haven't had a chance to because I get it. If you're listening to a podcast, you're not in front of your computer. That's the whole fun of podcasts, right? I get it. That's what I listen to them. Next time you're at your computer or your phone, go to Ricochet.com.

Check it out. Check out the conversations. Check out the high-level discourse between and among contributors and members. Check out the Daily Shot. Sign up for that every day. It's free. Do it for a week. I'm telling you, you will want to join. We want to have you. We want to create a really vibrant, civil, smart community because I think that's the way you win back the country. Rob, may I repeat that all that Rob is asking, Rob is adjusting the ask. He's not saying join. He is not saying join.

All we are asking today is go to Ricochet.com once a day for a week and while you're there, go to the upper right-hand corner, click, and sign up for the Daily Shot. What does it cost? Nothing. The Daily Shot is free.

Just do that. Just look at the site once a day for a week and sign up for the Daily Shot. That's all we're asking. Am I not correct? Because the site sells itself. Exactly. But here's how bad we are at this, Peter. If you do want to join, okay?

So we're messing up the message here. We're not telling you not to join. No. But if you do want to join, go to rickshaw.com slash membership, put in the coupon code rejoin if you've already been a member, or join if you just want to join. Basically, it ends up being the same thing. You get two free months. So that way, it's really no risk to you. Try it out for two months.

You don't like it, then you can tell us to buzz off. But we know, like all good drug dealers, first one's free because we're going to get you hooked. Yes, and comb a little bit of it through your hair every day and watch the gray gradually disappear. You will also note when you go to Ricochet that there are not any of those irritating tricks that send you away from a site forever. The other day I clicked on a link and it was some link thing where it allowed you to post what was on other sites without having to go to the other site and give them all the traffic. But in order to continue, you had to click on a like Facebook button. It was the most pathetic thing I'd ever seen. Please click like to continue.

And there was no other option not to you either had to back out of the page and tell them to go to hell or you had to like them on facebook which is a meaningless transaction excuse me so ricochet doesn't do this to you are you telling me that james lilac's professional journalist was monkeying around on a site that enabled you to steal material and you caviled that their request to hit a like button? You might say that, Peter, and you would be inaccurate in doing so. I had no idea I was going to a place that was hoovering up content. None whatsoever. I'm not even one of those people who has ad block, because I know that ads are kind of necessary to this whole thing. And I will sit through five seconds of ads and drum my fingers to see if me too. Let me get to the content.

And, you know, Ricochet, the great thing, when you load it up, you don't hear your computer fans whir and scream anymore because it's a clean thing to look at. Speaking of clean things to look at, there's the resounding victory for Likud and President Obama having one of his preferred candidates go down in flames. And, gosh, I love the way it was put, I believe, on Ricochet, President Obama loses his bid to defeat a U.S. ally. I understand there's some hurled crockery and ashtrays in the White House. Or do you think actually that they don't care one way or the other? Peter Robinson, you take the first. Oh, they care. They absolutely they care.

I was in Washington, what is it, three weeks ago now, which was the week before Prime Minister Netanyahu addressed Congress. And everyone I spoke to said the one thing they had never seen before that was happening. straight party vote like Obama. Precedent after precedent has been broken during this administration, but the new precedent breaking was taking place as the administration pretty much officially set its face against the prime minister of the state of Israel. And the White House was briefing reporters against Bibi Netanyahu, doing everything it could on the record and off the record to undermine him before he came and off the record to undermine him before he came and delivered his speech to Congress. Yesterday, we know that the prime minister of Great Britain, the president of France, and the chancellor of Germany had all telephoned the reelected prime minister of Israel to congratulate him.

Did the president of the United States? No. He had the vice president do so. They mind. They mind a lot. Now, Rob, I'll ask you this. Do you think it's because there is a genuine policy disagreement or there's a personal animus that is perhaps rooted in the fact that the president looks at Netanyahu and sees what the rest of the world pretty much considers to be a man as opposed to a mom jeans bicycle helmet wearing guy who can't do the first picture i um i don't know i don't i i've given up trying to psychoanalyze barack obama i i suspect it's it starts as a policy disagreement that's long standing um that this goes way back before probably when when when netanyahu was still a member of the IDF. Barack Obama has always been a part of the American left, the American left – a segment of the American left I should say that is defiantly anti-Israel. I would say the Edward Said side of it.

That's pro-Palestinians, always felt that Israel needs to accommodate. Look, this all comes down to one thing. It always has. It always will. Every American president grapples with it and every American president fails because there's one issue and that's the right to return. That's the only thing that matters in the entire sphere. why and israeli uh prime minister q together at camp david they all agree on almost everything and they have an agreement except for one thing and that's the right of palestinians self-described palestinians to return to israel and vote because the israelis know that that they outnumber them and that israel would cease to exist and so israel can never agree to that the palestinians will always demand that and that's it. That's a stalemate. There's absolutely no solution to it.

And this president believes that fundamentally that these Palestinians have a right to return. Therefore, he is an enemy of the state of Israel however you look at it. And so Netanyahu and Obama, even if you replace them with cutouts who believe what they they believe are always going to be at odds and i suspect netanyahu unlike every single and i really believe every single israeli leader up until now has all had came to this country and met this president feeling he had a strong political hand the the golden rule of israeli politics is never to show no daylight between israel and america no matter what the american president does does, you stand right next to him. And this Israeli prime minister has done the opposite and he gambled. It was very, very risky but he did it.

It was risky for him to call the election when he called it in December. It was risky for him to speak in front of the – Congress when he spoke in front of Congress. But he did it and he won and this president is revealed to be sort of a petulant small-timer. But there's no solution to this. I mean we keep thinking there's no solution to this at all. Until the president of the United States is replaced with a person who believes that the Palestinians have no right to return, we're done here, right? Well, OK. Add Iran to that analysis.

You make it sound almost as though Bibi addressed Congress over the right of return. That's part of the next, right? But go ahead. You're right. No, no. You add Iran to it. The Iran problem – actually, look. There are two things you – I would say two things you want to take away.

One is I would read John Walker's post, Saturday Night Science, a couple weeks ago about a very, very lucid post about how you take uranium and turn it into a bomb and what it takes and why once uranium is 20 percent enriched, it's very, very easy to get it to 95 percent enriched. We'll link to it in the in the podcast notes it's really clear and lucid if you're listening to this podcast and your brain fuzzes out like i do whenever this stuff comes up like you're reading a russian novel you know and like you read the names you just kind of zip right over them um this is great the second thing i would look at is another a member a ricochet uh blaine lantry yesterday or today i can't remember i think it was yesterday posted just just the video which i love it when members do this hard-hitting and quite funny it's on the member feed i think we'll probably bump up the main feed so everybody

can see it it's just a tv ad from israel from israeli television and it's a it's a it's a campaign ad that the netanyahu people put out and it's a couple and they're getting ready to go out and they're waiting for the babysitter the doorbell rings they open the door the babysitter's there it's bb that yeah and they're like well mr prime minister what are you doing here because i'm here to take care of your kids i mean you aren't you busy as well you know that's what i do who else do you want and it's the other two candidates right it's a brilliant it's one of the most brilliant TV ads, political ads I've seen in years. Two ironies there. One, Obama dispatched probably one of his top political operatives to Israel to work for the opposition that failed. Two, you learn very quickly that Israelis may believe that Netanyahu is stubborn and a jerk and a warmonger and intransigent and all sorts of things.

But who do you want taking care of your country? Beautiful. And that's what it came down to. It's a brilliant ad. You should look at it. And the third lesson I would say is – the bigger lesson is when foreigners of any foreign country try to think – figure out the politics of another country, they almost always get it wrong no matter how smart they are. Yeah, and of course if you're Barack Obama, your tendency is to think that it's all about him. Right, right.

Such an idiot. It's like – no. Israel is a small country but small countries have complicated politics. Very. You just don't – no matter who you – how smart you think you are, other people, other countries are a mystery. James? No, I am here. I'm just enjoying the back and forth.

It was an extraordinary election. I'll remember that. Okay, we had that pause. Are you getting the guys? I just want to know here. I have to stop to get them. Okay, all right. So we already stopped at the end of that, then there was a big pause,

and I'm going to come back here in three, two, one. All well and good, but you'll notice we're not talking about Hillary's emails. It's entirely possible that the president wanted this thing to – well, actually, no. I think the president is enjoying the email situation because it puts the Clintons in their place for whatever payback that he wants to exert. And we'll get to that in just a second here. But first we have to remind you that one of the reasons that you can – one of the reasons you'll love Ricochet is that Jack Dunphy, our favorite policeman, posts there as well and joins in some of the conversations. And as his avatar might say – oh, I hate this segue. I absolutely hate it.

You know, I'm sorry. I just – I can't. I can't do it. I can't. Wait. I can't. I can't even give Rob something to ruin. Wait.

No, no. I was ready to ruin it. It was perfect. I can't even give Rob something to ruin. Wait. No, no. I was ready to ruin it. It was perfect. I was going to ruin it and everything. You can't interrupt my interrupting your segues. That's just rude. That's just what I just did. Thank you very much.

Oh, you're inside my head. It's like you're inside the inside part of my head. It's called a preemptive strike, which is what we call it. That Israel may have to do. I don't know how many centrifuges you had spinning up there, Rob. A lot. I was 20%, baby. I was ready to go.

Ah, but enough Jack Dunphy and L.A. Every business needs leaders. Those with the vision to see where their business is going. Those who make big decisions where they matter most. At ESB's Smart Energy Services, we work with business leaders every day. Because we lead the way in delivering clean energy solutions at scale. So whether you want to reduce your energy costs or reach your sustainability goals, we can lead your business to a clean energy future. Find out more

at esb.ie forward slash smart energy. Looking for reliable IT solutions for your business? At Innovate, we are the IT solutions people for businesses across Ireland. From network security to cloud productivity, we handle it all. Installing, managing, supporting and reporting on your entire IT and telecoms environment so you can focus on what really matters. Growing your business. Whether it's communications or security, Innovate has you covered. Visit Innovate today. Innovate.

The IT solutions people. Every business needs leaders. Those with the vision to see where their business is going. Those who make big decisions when they matter most. At ESB's Smart Energy Services,

we work with business leaders every day because we lead the way in delivering clean energy solutions at scale. So whether you want to reduce your energy costs

or reach your sustainability goals, we can lead your business to a clean energy future. Find out more at esb.ie forward slash smart energy. Please. Just the facts, ma'am, as Jack Webb never actually did say.

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Coupon code RICOSHAY for $5 off. Start shaving smarter today, why don't you? And now we bring along our fine guests, friends of the program. And we're keen to hear exactly whether or not Ronald Reagan would have saved Minnesota back in the 80s. And here are some smart fellows who are here to tell us. Michael Barone, Paul Ray. You know Michael. He's the senior political analyst for The Washington Examiner, co-author of The Almanac of American Politics, and a contributor to Fox News.

Paul Ray is the professor of history at Hillsdale College, where he holds an endowed chair. And last year, he was a national fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. Welcome back, both of you, to the Ricochet Podcast. Good to be with you. Hello. Michael, just so you know, you're on. Paul is already on the line. Rob Long is here.

Peter Robinson talking now. James Lilacs as well. Oh, my gosh. I'm going to be number three or four in the humor category. Yeah, no, it's the League of Supervillains. You're on with the teaching. Michael Barone and Paul Ray, welcome to the Ricochet Podcast. Peter Robinson here.

All right, let's just deal with the subject that we must deal with and move along to other matters. Hillary Clinton and the emails. Is it true, Michael? You've published it, so I'm tempted to say it must be true, but sometimes a columnist will rethink things. On mature reflection, do you still want to stand by your suggestion that Democrats are trying to figure out how to dump Hillary Clinton. I think a lot of Democrats are having second thoughts about what they consider to be an inevitable nomination. Is this the best way to go? And Mark Halperin just reported today or yesterday that a focus group in New Hampshire of strong Hillary supporters

voiced a lot of troubles about, were troubled about the Clinton emails and questioned whether she had handled it correctly. And I think that the Democrats are thinking about alternatives. Their problem is they don't have a strong bench, not only because they've been losing a lot of statewide elections, including in target states, but because the Obama Democratic Coalition, gentry liberals and blacks at the core, is one that does not have a lot of appeal outside areas

where those voters are heavily clustered, central cities, unsympathetic suburbs, and university towns. Well, what about this argument we've been hearing for years now throughout the Obama administration, that the presidential electorate was getting harder and harder and harder for Republicans and easier and easier for Democrats? Well, I remember the prediction some people made, and I gave them some publicity and perhaps encouraged them to have a 2004 election that Republicans now had an enduring national majority. That didn't endure for more than two years.

The fact is that President Obama, like President Bush, was reelected with 51% of the vote. I think Democrats have a sort of small structural advantage in the Electoral College because those clusters of very heavily Democratic groups have, in the last four elections, certainly given them more safe electoral votes than Republicans, who are more spread around evenly around the rest of the country, get from their voters. But that's going to work for them until it doesn't. Paul Ray, Vice President Joe Biden, 72 years old. Socialist Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, 73 years old. California Governor Jerry Brown, 78. Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, 67 years old. Who do the Democrats go to to and doesn't all this thrill you uh of course of course it does and uh they go to Martin O'Malley uh who is age I don't know he's in his

40s oh is he that young former former Maryland yes I looked it up at one point and I'm I'm working off memory now but I this is everybo series come to life you know charismatic guy comes out of the you know out of nowhere and barnstorms his way to the presidency i look he's he his problem is of course he comes from the bluest of blue states and his successor was a republican which is a judgment on him uh and that's the argument that's going to be made against him. There's also Andrew Cuomo, but he's been crippled by the scandal in New York that threatens to engulf him. So they have real troubles. On the other hand, look, Hillary is a corpse. She's the Bob Dole of the Democratic Party.

She's John McCain. A corpse is one thing, but calling her Bob Dole of the Democratic Party. She's the John McCain of the – A corpse is one thing, but calling her Bob Dole. Can I – hey, Paul. She's the John McCain of the Democratic Party. Her sell-by date passed some time ago. But, Paul, this is – it's Rob in New York. Are we celebrating here too soon? I mean – and I'd ask Michael Barone the same question.

No one's dead yet. It's March of 2015. It's a long way to go. I still think we're going to wake up in January of 2017 and be watching Hillary Rodham Clinton or Hillary Rodham, I'm sure she'll style herself between Election Day and Inauguration Day, be sworn in president of the United States. Am I crazy? When was the last time a little mini scandal in the early days before a candidate is even – and even announced taking that candidate down? There's – Very hard. Go ahead, Michael. Go ahead, Michael. I think you're about to agree with me, so I want to hear you before Paul disagrees.

Go ahead. Well, nothing's inevitable about the results in the next couple of years. I mean, President Obama's job performance rating is 44 percent now. That's under 50. That's a problem for Democrats. That's not as low as George W. Bush's was at this time eight years ago. So I think there are a lot of results that are possible. But if you look at the trend of Hillary Clinton in polling over 2014 and 2015, it's been slightly downward both for the Democratic primary and in the general election. She's been running 2015 polls behind, below 50% in six states that were carried by Obama that have 79 electoral votes. If Mitt Romney had carried all those states,

he'd be president now. That tells me this is certainly an open election, one which Republicans can win. It will depend on the nature of the nominee, and that Hillary Clinton clearly is not as strong a candidate. Leaving aside the substance of her performance on this email issue, look at her in the press conference. She brought to mind the statement by the New York Post columnist Murray Kempton in the 1965 mayor race in New York where he said that John Lindsay is fresh and everyone else is tired. Yes. Fresh is not how you describe Hillary Clinton. Tired is more like it.

Her performance had the dynamism of somebody announcing the death of Brezhnev. I mean, it was – Wait, Brezhnev is dead? Wait, OK, Paul. OK, Michael, I'm going to just take it that Michael Barone agrees with me even though the second half of what he said seemed to suggest that – You're right. Are you baking a cake now?

Are you – do cake now? No. Anything can happen and never underestimate the capacity of the Republicans to seize defeat from the jaws of victory. But I do think that Hillary is – look, remember when she published her book a few months back and she went on all the radio shows? Fortunately, no one does. It was a disaster. They threw her softballs and she'd get angry and bitter. She's not had a good day yet. The other thing is there's something more serious going on than the emails. And that is the money that's been given to the Clinton Foundation in breach of an agreement that they wouldn't take foreign money

while she was Secretary of State. And the money's come from bigwigs in the party in China. I mean, there's a lot to attack her on. And if the Republicans have, you know, if she's going to be the nominee, the republicans should take the summer of 2016 to demonize her the presumptive sole runner at this point. How much trouble will she be in on a scale of one to – an analogy being a sitting president being challenged by a member of his own party for reelection in the primary? How much trouble will she be in if someone gets in and is serious about it? If an O'Malley gets in or if somebody – or if Al Gore – people are saying Al Gore gets in or my own dark horse prediction. If Governor of Colorado John Hickenlooper starts looking at the numbers and thinking, I don't know, a Rocky Mountain Democrat could do pretty well, he gets in.

How much trouble is she in then, Michael? My favorite candidate is Governor Moonbeam. Well, he's only 74. Come on. That's right. And he's got more life than she does. I think that Hillary Clinton could be in trouble if she gets into a one-on-one situation and the other candidate has some positive support and you start aggregating that together with anti-Hillary or qualms about Hillary voters, you could start to

have some trouble in the Democratic primaries. And I think there's one other factor here that could come into play. I sense a certain tension between the Obama White House and Camp Clinton. There's stories out there that Valerie Jarrett is behind the New York Times story on her emails. I don't know if that's true or not. But I can remember there's always a certain tension between kings of England and princes of Wales. And we've had similar situations where a president has, in effect, a designated successor, Richard Nixon in 1960, Al Gore in 2000. There was tension that came out. President Eisenhower was asked about Vice President Nixon's contributions to policy and said, if you give me a week or two, I can think of one. President Clinton was known to be a little perturbed with Al Gore's lack of total support in the blue dress issue.

That turned out to be problematic, and I sense the potential for something like this here. Take Iran as an issue. Does Hillary Clinton really want to sign on to the Iranians getting nuclear weapons? I very much doubt it. But does she dare speak up? I very much doubt it. It's real trouble for her. The Republicans. So if we're talking about Hillary having passed her sell-by date,

let's take a look at the, it seems to me fair to say, the three Republicans, the polls have established that there are three Republicans in what may be temporary, but for what for now looks like a top tier. Jeb Bush, passed his sell-by date? Michael? Well, the answer is that I can tell you a good reason why each of the candidates for the Republican nomination cannot be nominated. The good thing is that in the zero sum game think is a way to have a good presidency, trying to sound similar themes and platforms in the primaries and the general and with a view towards governing. But he's out of sync with a lot of Republican primary voters right now. He's a little bit out of practice.

And I think there's just the bizarre thing of three members of the same nuclear family. Some years ago, I drove by the house in Midland, Texas, a little ranch house, not very possessing at all, where the 41st president, the 43rd president, and the man who would like to be the 45th president were living in the 1950s. It's bizarre. Well, when it comes to the base, the base feels about the Jeb Bush presidency like a goose whose jaws had been pried open and stuck there so the foie gras can be made. He's just, his inevitability is being shoved on them, and they don't like it at all.

But that takes us to Iowa and, well, the other two. Every business needs leaders. Those with the vision to see where their business is going. Those who make big decisions where they matter most. At ESB's Smart Energy Services, we work with business leaders every day. Because we lead the way in delivering clean energy solutions at scale. So whether you want to reduce your energy costs or reach your sustainability goals, we can lead your business to a clean energy future. Find out more at esb.ie forward slash smart energy. IT solutions for your business? At Innovate, we are the IT solutions people for businesses across

Ireland. From network security to cloud productivity, we handle it all. Installing, managing, supporting and reporting on your entire IT and telecoms environment so you can focus on what really matters. Growing your business. Whether it's communications or security, Innovate

has you covered. Visit Innovate today. Innovate, the IT solutions people. Every business needs leaders. Those with the vision to see where their business is going. Those who make big decisions where they matter most. At ESB's Smart Energy Services, we work with business leaders every day because we lead the way in delivering clean energy solutions at scale. So whether you want to reduce your energy costs or reach your sustainability goals, we can lead your business to a clean energy future.

Find out more at ESB.ie forward slash smart energy. Michael, you were saying there are the other two. Well, Scott Walker. So far, I don't think we've seen from Scott Walker anything like mastery of national and international issues. We've seen strong performance in Wisconsin. He bridges the divide we saw in the 2012 Republican primaries between the suburbs and metro areas of a million or more, which Mitt Romney carried, and the countryside, areas outside million-plus metro areas, where Rick Santorum carried.

Scott Walker grew up in the countryside. He's political bases in the suburbs. That's all positive. I think we've got to see more substance. One of the things, you know, Scott Walker went up in the polls very heavily following that speech at the January 24th event in Des Moines. One of the things that tells us is there's a lot of movement possible, both up and down, for a lot of these candidates in the Republican primaries. Those numbers are not etched in stone.

But Walker's being hammered now because of his supposed capitulation to the dark powers of ethanol at Iowa. The fact that he fired a social media director because of things that she'd previously said. A lot of people are looking at this and saying, wait a minute, where's the tough guy who takes on every enemy? This is a guy who's just folded like a cheap tent the minute that the all-powerful Iowan started complaining. Well, you know, even Iowa caucus goers may not be hugely affected by who your press spokesman in Iowa is. But look, he's got, you know, a positive, he's made an initial positive vibe. He has yet to follow up, and there's lots of time, with serious substantive policies.

He's yet to be tested. Just as that January 24th speech could zoom him upward in the polls, an oops moment in a debate can zoom him down. And if you don't believe that, ask Rick Perry. Paul Reddy, you're a man of words. Marco Rubio. I don't think very highly of Marco Rubio. You don't. He was taken Marco Rubio. You don't?

He was taken to the cleaners by Chuck Schumer on the immigration issue. Now, he's admitted it to his credit, but it took him a long time to admit it. He ought to be more experienced than that. He was a guy in the Florida legislature. People have tried to take him to the cleaners before. He allowed himself to be fooled. I think the same thing has happened on this question of sexual violence on campus where he has signed on with the Democratic senators on that question. I worry about him.

He's a very good speaker. He's handsome. On foreign policy, I agree about him. He's a very good speaker. He's handsome. On foreign policy, I agree with him. But I'm wary of him. I'm also wary of anyone who has not had executive experience and he could move people to tears. That package is not available this time around. So, Michael and Paul, here's my working theory at the moment. I put it to you because you will have better theories. Read Jeb Bush, read Scott Walker, and the ability to move people, to inspire people, to suggest to primary voters that we can get beyond these eight years, that we can take the country back to all of that. As between competence and inspirational abilities, inspirational ability after this six years, six and a half, seven years, eight years of Barack Obama with Hillary Clinton waiting in the wings, inspirational ability may win primaries. Michael? Well, I think inspirational ability is a little overstated. I mean, Obama's inspirational ability was not just a question of his oratorical things or his 17-minute speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. It was the whole idea of having a black president in a country

that went through slavery and segregation and so forth. It's part of a national story, very meaningful to Americans. I don't think it's as meaningful and reverberates the same way with foreigners as President Obama seems to think it does. But that's a unique situation, and it's not going to be repeated. I think that our conversation so far has been moving towards conclusively proving my point that none of these Republican candidates have been nominated. We've all given good reasons why each of those we've talked about, and we can go down the list. Mike Huckabee, Rick Perry, blah, blah, blah.

Ted Cruz, Rick Santorum, why they can't win. But somebody's going to win and they're going to surprise us by how they win because it hasn't happened yet. A couple more issues before we let you, gentlemen, return to your ordinary and remunerative lives. Thanks for pitching in and the check is in the mail. Paul, the 47 senators, Tom Cotton's letter and the 47 senators, including Senator Cotton, who signed it, was that an error to address a letter, even an open letter, to our enemies or at least our adversaries on the other side of a negotiating table to address that letter to the leaders of Iran. Was that an error? No. And it was technically addressed to the leaders of Iran. But in fact, it was addressed to the American people and to Barack Obama. And it reminded him that Congress has a role to play in ratifying lasting international agreements. And it was a response to the fact that Barack Obama seems to think that he can use the United

Nations Security Council to do an end run around the United States Senate. Now, people worried that because it was signed only by Republicans, it would drive off Democratic support for a law that would bind Obama. But that doesn't seem to have happened. And we may get that law because there are many Democratic senators, obviously Senator Menendez, but also Senator Schumer, who's in line to become the leader of the Democrats in the United States Senate. They're going to push hard against this. And, you know, if you go back to the other supposed faux pas, inviting the prime minister

of Israel to speak before Congress, what John Boehner did. Well, that has not backfired. I think it's put Barack Obama in ever greater difficulty. And see, this is an issue. Iran is an issue that splits the Democratic Party. And that's crucial. And I think the Republicans pushing it hard and what Tom Cotton did is all for the good and good for the Republicans. Michael, even the editorial page of The Wall Street Journal said that letter was an error. Are you with the journal or with Paul Ray?

Well, listen, The Wall Street Journal said it was a tactical error. I'm not so sure that's true. It highlighted something which is ineluctably a fact, which is that Congress has a role on foreign policy and that an agreement made without the sanction of Congress is not necessarily lasting. You could ask Woodrow Wilson about that in the Treaty of Versailles. You know, if you want Congress in on the landing, you have to have Congress in on the takeoff, and other presidents have negotiated agreements with that in mind it also highlights a basic uh disagreement on a basic issue in which the republicans are pretty much united and the democrats as paul said are split and that is whether we should have a grand bargain a change of alliances in the middle east a grand bargain

with iran as michael duran former bush NSC staffer, has argued in, I believe, Mosaic magazine, is the thread that explains a lot of Obama's policies over the last six years. He's seeking an agreement with Iran, which he says could be a very successful power in the Middle East. You could argue that his actions have already helped to make Iran a very successful partner in the Middle East, although success as defined by Iran is not success as defined by most of the American people, and certainly by all the Republican politicians and many Democrats.

So it highlights a fundamental disagreement, one that Hillary Clinton, as suggested earlier in this podcast, may have to weigh in on one way or the other, tending to split her coalition, one of which the Republicans have a majority of American people on their side. So score one for 37-year-old senator for two months, Tom Cotton. Yes? I think so. Yeah. Let me add, he's a veteran of Iraq.

This is a guy who's lived out and been shot out in that part of the world. Right. I think he has a big future. Well, AP is reporting what the deal actually is. Tehran originally wanted 10,000 centrifuges. Washington said 500 to 1,500. They're going to get 6,000. 6,000 centrifuges.

Now, the one thing worth throwing in here that also causes one to think about what Tom Cotton did in another light, and that is Barack Obama is breaking his promise. He ran for the presidency saying he would not allow them to get nuclear weapons. So this is a betrayal, and it's a betrayal of quite a few people in his own party. I actually – this is Rob in New York. I actually am more angry that he's allowing them to get nuclear power. He won't let us get nuclear power. Somehow he's more in favor of nuclear power for Iranians who are the third or fourth or whatever it is, largest oil reserves, than he is for the state of Michigan to have nuclear power.

It seems kind of crazy. But can I take you guys back just to one other political question on the Republican side? And it's sort of a general question, and I'm going to reveal my bias just by asking it. What you read and you hear on blogs and on Twitter and on sort of the more activist, grassroots conservative movement is we don't want the Republican establishment shoving their establishment candidate down our throne when has that really happened i mean the people who choose the republican candidate are by definition republican primary voters who are the most conservative

republicans who are the most active conservatives in every state, who in many ways are exactly the same people as self-proclaimed Tea Party members. Is there a Republican establishment in D.C.? Can it help choose a nominee? Where are the mechanisms and the levers for doing that, Michael? Well, the Republican establishment is located on the fifth floor of 1700 K. Okay, all right. So now we know. We know where it is.

In Washington. So if you just hang around the entrance to the men's room and the ladies' room there, you're going to be able to corral some of the members of the establishment sooner or later as they come down the hall, perhaps with some urgency. Look, one of the interesting things about Republican primary voters as they come down the hall, perhaps with some urgency.

One of the interesting things about Republican primary voters is that in 2010 and 2012, as we saw in elections for the Senate in particular and for other offices, they went with provocative, confrontational candidates, Tea Party candidates, if you will, people that were campaigning often against other Republicans and with criticisms of not only Barack Obama's administration, but George W. Bush's. 2014, we saw a different picture. Some of those provocative candidates lost seemingly winnable races in states like Missouri and Indiana, states that were carried easily by Mitt Romney. And I think that 2014, less appeal by Republican voters for provocative candidates. The people who decry the establishment say this is all because of money spent or channeled by Karl Rove and the like in the Republican establishment.

I think it reflects a genuine change in mood on Republican primary voters, and we can see some evidence for this in the presidential polls. When you see that Ted Cruz, a hugely talented candidate who has taken the confrontational and provocative approach, is running along about 3% or 4% despite being active around the country, not doing as well as some of the other candidates. I think if Republican primary voters were in the mood they were in in 2010 my lifetime, literally before my lifetime, chosen the slightly surprising or more conservative candidate to run or the anti-establishment candidate if you want to say that way precisely twice, once with Goldwater and once with Reagan. Every other time, they've chosen the next guy and you could also make the case that

Reagan having run for president in 76 was chosen the next guy, and you could also make the case that Reagan, having run for president in 76, was also the next guy. Aren't the Republican primary voters the establishment? If these people don't like the establishment candidate, they should stop voting for them. Yes. No, I think that's right. But if you look at the last race in 2012, the establishment candidate was Mitt Romney, whose turn it was, and there really wasn't another candidate. This time, there are a number of well-established candidates. Rubio is one, Scott Walker is another, and Jeb Bush is a third. This is the first time it's really been wide open and there have Party that most people think of as establishment, which is the money men.

And I don't think he's going to make it. I think it's Scott Walker's to lose. Partly because he's younger. Partly because he's ferocious, but he has an affable manner. Partly because he's fresh. Partly because his last name is not Bush. Now, as for getting people on their feet, he showed what Pawlenty showed he couldn't do. Scott Walker showed he can do.

He can get people on their feet. Now, he may stumble. It's a long time and many opportunities to stumble. But I have a feeling he's not the kind of guy that loses. I had lunch with George Will about a year and a half ago, and we chatted about him. And his comment about Scott Walker was he really liked him. He said his political enemies always end up in the morgue. Hey, Michael, Peter here.

Listen, you're the kind of person who would know this in detail as nobody else would. Scott Walker got started as the county executive in Milwaukee. As I recall, there was a special election. His predecessor was brought down in some kind of scandal, which opened the door to a Republican in that heavily Democratic city and county. But then he got reelected.

I'm remembering this correctly, am I not? That he started twice. Yeah, Milwaukee County in 2012 won 67% for Obama, so that qualifies as a Democratic county. I mean, there are suburbs of Milwaukee that vote less Democratic. Wauwatosa, where Scott Walker's legal residence is, where his parents are living now, voted 50-49 for Obama over Romney. It was just basically one point off the national average there. And, you know, Scott Walker then won two races there. in Milwaukee County, and what he did as governor was to apply a certain kind of tough logic to budget problems and say, look, we've got to change some of these rules, particularly

the kind of rules that are imposed by the public employee unions, which are costing a lot of money and not producing good results for consumers of government services. And he was successful at that. He was able to make his arguments and to get them accepted. So, yeah, Scott Walker has a creditable record of winning in Democratic constituencies. Wisconsin is not as Democratic a state as some people say. It's 53% for Obama in 2012. It's a as democratic a state as some people say. 53% for Obama in 2012 is a pretty good index. But, you know, Scott Walker's won three elections in 2010, 2012, and 2014 in that constituency,

and that shows an ability to frame issues. What I have a qualm about him so far is that he hasn't really, you know, identified and zeroed in on the hard issues yet. He's got plenty of time to do that. You mean the national issues? But it's also possible that he could, that could cause him some trouble. Last question. Who's going to win in Chicago? Paul, you live driving distance from that, from the second city. I think Rahm Emanuel will win in the end, not because he's popular, but because the other guy doesn't really have a plan. And every time he gets pressed on details, he can't come up with anything.

It's not good enough for him just to be not Rahm Emanuel, Michael? Well, I think it's not enough for him. One of the interesting things, and I'm going to write my next Washington Examiner column on this, I think is that when you look where Rahm Emanuel ran best, where he got over 50% in that February first election, it's gentry liberals, the lakefront liberals. This is an important constituency in the Democratic Party. And the gentry liberals of Chicago.

Gentry liberals 20, 30, 40 years ago were allied with black voters in various cities and installed mayors, including Harold Washington in Chicago in the 1980s, who was a role model for Barack Obama. And the Chicago elite has seen what a left-wing, smart black mayor, and Harold Washington fitted that description. They saw what such a mayor could do in Detroit. They didn't want it to happen in Chicago, so they shunted Obama off with funding his campaign hugely generously, cutting off the Clintons from money to a less important offices that had less effect on them,

U.S. Senator and President of the United States. Oh, great. Thanks a lot. We don't want Mayor Obama, so we'll just go with President Obama. Thanks a lot, Gentry guys in Chicago. Thanks a lot on your lakeshore towers that all look out at the water, not at the city that you're helping to destroy. Thanks, guys. And we have to thank both of you for being with us on the podcast today. Take care. Great fun. We'll talk to you soon. Thanks, fellas. Thanks. I love that phrase,

gentry liberal. Don't you love that phrase? I'm going to use that now. I'm going to steal it. Well, one of the things that the gentry liberals might get behind, since the president has not proposed it, is, well, the president was musing aloud about the virtues of mandatory voting. CNN is reporting that he said you know a lot of other countries have mandatory voting and in america that might help to counteract the effect the pernicious

effects of money in politics because the people who don't vote tend to be young immigrants minorities unbelievable and so why not have mandatory voting? My question is, again, you look at the president of the United States and say, is it entirely out of the bounds of imagination to consider that he would put in place measures that force you to vote and then the next day give up Guantanamo to Cuba and then begin the process of returning Hawaii to its indigenous. None of that stuff is unreal with this guy, which makes him the most un-American American president ever. I'm sorry I questioned his patriotism and love of country. But let's go back to the mandatory voting thing. How do you think actually that this would be enforced? What a juicy, juicy opportunity for the state, isn't this?

Well, it would be enforced probably the same way Obamacare is enforced, right? It would be with an individual mandate. You pay a fine for not doing it. It's a tax. How do they know that you don't do it? Well, it's – you say you did it and it's the same thing with how they know you don't have health insurance. They just – Well, that's a little –

They check creaky. But the point – the only way to prove that you didn't do it is if you have ID checks at the polling places, right? Exactly. The only way to do it is to abridge their people's constitutional right to vote many times. Well, I think you'd have to have a national database of thumbprints. Just as we've seen the wonderful image of people with their purple thumbs proving that they voted in countries that never had a good election before, we will have Americans proudly taking their purple thumbs and pressing them against the little reader there to go into the national database of everyone's thumb, which is paranoid nonsense, of course, but how else are you going to enforce this sort of thing?

Again, mandates. They just love mandates, don don't they they just love the idea of bypassing the usual processes and making you do the things you ought to do for a better world well anybody go to starbucks yesterday and get themselves forced into mandatory conversation on race uh i did not um however you know the two interesting things happened. One, I realized – someone brought to my attention. I didn't realize it. The actual perfect place to have a conversation about race at a Starbucks is at the Starbucks in Ferguson. But there is not a Starbucks in Ferguson, which surprised me because I thought, well, surely they had taken care of at least those basic optics before they had decided that we all needed to have a conversation. They at least have put a Starbucks in Ferguson.

But the second thing I realized was – and I actually said this on Red Eye, which is that Starbucks is selling drinks that are in excess – some of them in excess of 500 calories for a beverage. Race is not the problem they should be talking about. They should be talking about type 2 diet. Every time you buy something at Starbucks, you should have a mandatory or compulsory conversation about all the sugar and garbage you're putting into yourself and how bad it's going to be for you if you do that once a day. We need to have a national conversation on the pernicious effects of that little ribbon of caramel that they dribble over your – On the mocha caramel macchiato or whatever it is. Yeah. What I can't figure out about Starbucks is whether they're being cynically shrewd or just plain fools.

Cynically shrewd would be if they understand their market in enough detail to know that what they're doing is selling overpriced beverages to, to use the phrase again, gentry liberals, and that the gentry liberals, part of the value that they derive from going to Starbucks is that it's their kind of place. It makes them feel – part of the value that people derive from driving Priuses. It makes them feel better about – it flatters them, right? So you go to Starbucks because it's the kind of place where good liberals go. But I thought they had gotten away from that. I thought Howard Schultz came back to the company because they wanted to double in size. And you can't double in size without reaching out to ordinary Americans. And that would argue that Howard Schultz is just being foolish.

It's foolish. I mean Starbucks is in every airport, seven in every airport. Right. It's just foolish. They're everywhere. I mean, Starbucks is in every airport, seven in every airport. They're all down. They're everywhere. You can't drive. I mean, look, Starbucks, I'm not a big fan of it, but I'll tell you, I drive across the country regularly, and it's a godsend when you see it, but they're all over the country. It's not

gentry liberals. It's not hipsters. It is the McDonald's of coffee, and the people who work there are the last people you want to have any... You're lucky if they spell your name right right right right right well i was there with my daughter yesterday and i i braced myself actually to yeah she likes to go there and have a skim skinny chai latte whatever it's 70 calories and i have an americano um and i was i braced myself and americano is another term for

a cup of coffee well yes and no regular coffee right it's america it's espresso uh good hot potent bitter espresso over which they have poured hot water so it's like good right it is yeah i knew it i knew if i could get the two of you talking about coffee, you'd end up sounding like gentry liberals yourself. No, no, no, no. I was talking about pouring coffee over espresso. Unbelievable. You see what I have to live with. Go ahead. I don't really like Starbucks coffee very much. I find it over-roasted and burned, and the taste of it has never appealed to me.

But it's hard for them to mess up an espresso and putting hot water on an espresso. That's okay. As it turns out, I had the best espresso in my life in a place that was the first bar in Europe where Byron went in Venice on the Piazza di San Marco. I had the most extraordinary espresso after which every single other espresso in my life will fail and pale. But speaking of pale, I am. So here I am at Starbucks and I'm waiting for them to ask me if I check my white privilege at the door, stealing myself for this. Just as, you know, remember back in the 70s where you'd go to the lunch counter at Woolworth's and they'd say, we'd like to have a conversation about expansionist communism.

Yeah, right. No, of course that didn't happen because not every single bloody element of life had been infected by politics. Two days ago, I'm making supper. There's a knock on the door. I look, I see a smiling, beaming face through the window and I realize it's a door knocker, somebody with a petition. All right. Well, I opened the door and I said right away, you know, I got chicken going on the, I'm sauteing some chicken. I really can't. But she says, well, if you have 30 seconds here, I'm here to talk about our zero waste initiative. And I said, I'm sorry. I have to go.

I'm cooking. It's dinner time. Well, can I circle back in an hour from now and talk to you? At which point I wanted to say, no, no, you cannot. Just as I cannot legally get your address and show up at your house at 12 o'clock tonight to talk about Lord Vishnu and his role in your life, which is very important to me and is a time convenient to me, and I don't care what I'm interrupting. I have a life. This is my house. You are a rude, rude person who is wasting your life walking the streets on a chilly night to collect signatures on a worthless piece of paper, supposedly to bring about zero waste. Does that sound even remotely possible in this world? Zero waste. No, not unless you mandate that I have to scoop all of the fetid organic vegetable matter and put it in some stinky bin outside for some vehicle to rumble alongside burning petrochemicals and pick it up so you all can pretend that there's zero waste and oh, everyone's composting because it's the law. By this time, the friendly neighborhood lady with the clipboard is backing her way down the sidewalk, her eyes the size of coffee saucers, reaching for her phone to call 911.

In the neighborhood, they say, don't knock on old man Lylex's door. But I don't because I went right back to my laptop and typed everything that I just said and put it up on the blog. I mean years and years ago, I had a tender young thing come to my door to advocate for higher taxes. She wanted – a candidate who wanted to raise taxes on like our neighborhood, right? And I remember giving her what I called the parable of the steps. I told her how the Bush tax cuts had paid for the steps that she had walked up. When we moved into this house, it was busted, broken concrete with weeds coming up between the steps and a rusty little iron banister that fell apart and pushed away if you put your hand on it. And it's not cheap.

It's not cheap to get steps. But I used my Bush initiative and I hired a guy who was himself an entrepreneur, hauled the stones up, hired two other guys to bring the stones and run the little lifter. And I hired an African-American fellow. And I mentioned that simply because to her that would matter tremendously because it was a diverse work project, who had a business in his house of custom-making railings. And probably five people got the money from the tax cut that I spread to them. And I said to her, you know, because it's my money. And as she went down the stairs, the stairs that she had to walk down, because I just told her about them, her response to it's my money is, well, it shouldn't be. And that's what I get from all of these people. James wins another convert.

It's outrage at the way that the world has arranged itself and how difficult it's going to be to get all these mandates through to make it the utopia that we know it will be. Anyway, that's enough for me. Apple Watch. James, though, but we – Yes. Go on. You do – I'm trying to think. Just reassure me because I want to know that you and I are going to be friends for a long time.

You go to the doctor. You get the blood pressure checked. you do all that you're supposed to do, right? It's all okay, right? We're not – No, I'm fine. Okay. I'm going to come to your house and put a sign in front of it saying absolutely no solicitors

because these people are killing you. Rob. Actually, if anything, it's just the polite Midwest repression that is required to be a nice, kind person. But dispositionally, I just – I like to vent a little bit here. Good. Okay. That's what I want to hear. Yes.

Yes, sir. Rob, excuse me, but I still have a mental image of James Lilacs in the Piazza San Marco. Yeah. It's Florian, right? Which of course leads to the... Oh, of course, of course you both know. Yes, yes, yes. I know where Byron hung out.

And... Give us the first stanza of Childe Harold right now. Go. I couldn't do it, but I know we're eating coffee. Where did you get the best espresso in your life? Well, thank you. Thank you, Peter, for asking the question. It's so difficult to answer fully.

There are two, right? There's one great coffee place in Rome called the Café Sant'Eustacio. And they have a thing called the Grand Café. And they make it. It's an espresso, but it's got a little something in it and nobody really knows what. Oh, yeah. It's heroin. It might be because the guy who makes it, the machine is behind this wall.

Not wall but like a big counter thing and you can't see what he's doing. It's really the only place in Italy like that and there are lines out the door and it's some weird thing they do. I think it's a malted thing they do. I don't know what it is. It's a delicious, delicious little espresso. And then there's a couple other really good ones. There's some good ones here in New York City

and there's some good ones in LA in fact. I still think that part of the fun of having that kind of coffee is where you're having it. So when I'm in San Francisco, I will go to oh god, I can't believe it.

It just went right out of my mind. There's a little cafe there, Cafe Trieste and it's in the North Beach and it's great and it still feels very traditional and kind of cool. It's interesting. Whenever I'm in Trieste, I go to the Cafe San Francisco. Oh, that's good. Cafe Sadness. Well, my daughter is going to Seattle in a while, and they're going to make a pilgrimage to the very first Starbucks, which began it all.

They probably won't be able to get in. Lines around people wanting that authentic experience. That authentic chain experience. Right, of where this multinational, multistore thing began. In another subject that was brought up in the endlessly diverse thing that is Ricochet, who was it? Tara Bulbous. Great name. Noted that 49ers Chris Borland quit because he doesn't want his head knocked around. And Tara was worrying, is this the beginning of the death of football? Now, Peter, all your kids play these brain-knocking sports. Is this where you? when his head knocked around and Taro was worrying, is this the beginning of the death of football?

Now, Peter, all your kids play these brain-knocking sports. Does this worry you? Do you think that this is indeed? I hope they're not listening, but the level at which my three boys play football, people don't get hurt that badly. They just don't. But now I speak up and say, of course,

yeah, the National Football League, the NFL is going to have to do something sooner or later. And being the NFL, it'll probably be a little bit later. But I actually have a friend who's a lawyer who works for the NFL. And they are spending money doing research, trying to figure out different helmet design. They're going to have to address the issue. But the death of football, that I find just – it's too commercially worked into the culture of the country. That's the crass answer. But the answer from somebody who just loves the game is that it's also just too beautiful a game. They'll adapt. They'll figure it out.

They'll impose weight limits. They'll adapt. They'll figure it out. They'll impose weight limits. They'll come up with better helmets. By the way, at Dartmouth College, where my son Pedro played, they had helmets fitted with sensors so that if a kid received an impact above a certain level, he immediately got yanked to the sidelines and examined. That's one way of handling it. So football won't die. But they've got to address the

question. Well, I work next to an enormous construction project of a new football stadium. It best not die because there's a billion dollars worth of stuff going up there. You know what we ought to do, though, is bring out... We ought to try Australian football.

Have you guys ever seen Australian football? You don't mean rugby? No, we've got a strong you don't mean rugby no we've got a we got a we got a strong league here they use an american style football really it's like it's like soccer but they can catch the ball they can throw they can throw the ball and it's like soccer as it would be played by people who have arms as opposed to penguins with vestige but it's also i mean it's also not as padded, right? No, not at all. No, not at all. See, that's ultimately one of the problems with, I mean, they always say with the, it

seems counterintuitive, but it's what they call the peltzman effect, where when you have, when you're padded and you're especially wearing those helmets, those helmets, because you feel like your head is safe, you use your head as a weapon. So there's that spearing they do at the NFL. They ram each other with their helmets and that's creating a lot of the concussions. Whereas in the old days when they wore leather helmets, they naturally protected their heads better. They were more – they would shoulder – hit with their shoulder more. Or rugby today. You look at rugby. It is a very violent, rough tough game. They were more – they would shoulder – hit with their shoulder more.

Or rugby today. You look at rugby. It is a very violent, rough – It's a really tough sport. Far fewer concussions. Far fewer concussions because they don't use their heads just as you said. Injuries. They get their ears torn off. But they don't get concussions.

And there is something about that that – I mean just not to bring it back to sort of everything. But the Peltzman effect is really true. People say like when you feel that you're overly safe, you tend to take bigger risks. When the government subsidizes your risk, you end up buying too much house. It would fall to the welfare. Whoa, whoa, whoa. James, James, that was a segue. It was.

It was very good. And I saw it coming. And I saw it. Oh, you are too polite to interrupt. Because I am one of those people whose blood pressure is not going to soar because I'm having to tamp down and repress everything that I fear. Well, I know. Not too bad.

I wore head protective gear in the office and found that every meeting ended with me headbutting somebody. So, yeah, Rob's absolutely right. There you go. But in the future, of course, you'll have a device on your wrist which will tell whether or not my blood pressure is shooting up because I'm discussing the person that comes to the door or

whether or not I received a blow in the temple. And that device will be the Apple Watch, which some people want for their health monitoring. I want to turn all that stuff off because the last thing I need is a wifely nag on my wrist. But I will ask either of you, are you going to get the Apple Watch? And no, I don't think either one of you is going to get the $10,000 model.

I thought it through. I have thought it through, and I bought – I'm wearing it for my third day right now. I bought a Fitbit instead. The answer is no to the Apple Watch. It's over-elaborate. It looks too clunky. It makes no sense. Why would you look at your wrist when you have your phone in your shirt pocket already? And the little Fitbit, which counts steps and heartbeat. And by the way,

I've actually gained weight in these last three days. But no, the answer is no, I'm a Fitbit man. Rob? Every time I see an Apple keynote, and I'm an Apple fan, I want everything they are talking about. You usually do go out and get everything they're talking about. And when I saw them – when I saw Steve Jobs introduce the iPad, I thought I don't – there's no need for this. I have no need for this object and I still want it. Really? And I went and got one, yeah.

That was my best Peter Robinson. Yeah, it was a good one. And when I saw the Apple Watch, I thought, wow, this is the first time I've seen something introduced and thought to myself, nope. break the spell because the person who spends ten thousand dollars on an apple watch that you know in two years is going to be worthless is a moron and i don't think that apple you don't want people walking around with your products especially for apple who are legitimately morons or worse or just give these kind of hard it's the delorean of products and i think it's a huge mistake for them to do and um it's going to look stupid and and look at people who buy the ten thousand dollar one are going to be it's going to hurt the whole object i think um and so i

you'll never see anybody with them they're all going to be chinese millionaires or russian millionaires and the rest of it and as far as being useless in a couple of years, they will upgrade. They'll have money. It's the $350 one. And that's the thing is that you can buy something that scales up to $10,000, but if you want, you can spend $350. And essentially, you have the same operating system. It's like what Andy Warhol said about Coke. The rich person, the poor person, everybody gets the same Coke. The operating system, the capabilities of the $10,000 one are equivalent essentially to the $350 one. It's all fashion. And I will get one and I'll tell you why. Peter said, why would you want to do it when you have your phone in your shirt pocket? First of

all, take it out of your shirt pocket. You're going to lean over and it's going to fall out and break. Lord knows we've all been there. Mine is in my back pocket or my front pocket. I don't want to take it out. That's the whole point. And you can talk about, yes, it's absurd. We used to carry watch. We used to have watches on our wrist and then we stopped wearing them because we had a phone that we could take out like an old style watch on a chain that we tucked in our plutocratic vest. And now we're being trained to put the watch back on. I get that. But when you take the, you have to take it out, stab it, interact with it, call up whatever you're doing, look at the thing. Again, you generally get sucked into looking at your Twitter feed or

something else, and then to put the phone back as opposed to simply looking at your wrist, flipping your wrist and taking a look at it. I like the idea of taking a phone call from it without having to get my phone out. I like the idea of taking a phone call from it without having to get my phone out. I like the idea of controlling my music from it. It's a little device that doesn't make me take out, put my head down, and with two hands manipulate an object. It's easier. It's a time saver. I just like my watches.

I don't like that watch. That watch looks like a weird little square toy, and I just don't want to put it on my wrist. I like having the phone in my pocket. I like the control I have over it and I like the self-control I have over it. The idea that it's getting – that the alerts and the alarms and the notifications and my accessibility is getting closer and closer to my face and my brain is something – I want to get it farther away from both of those places. If I could keep my watch – my phone in my shoe, I would do it. So I'm not looking for more connectivity. I'm looking for less.

Rob Long with the Maxwell Smart telecommunications device of the future. Would you believe in his shoe? Would you believe? Everyone over 90. I believe actually that Peter Robinson in a post somewhere. Didn't you bring out the cone of silence, Peter? Some technological. I did.

And that was a wonderful little Buck Henry Mel Brooks reference. Well, with that, folks, it's time to end the show. Thank everybody who's appeared on the show today. We're going to thank everybody who's appeared on the show today. We're going to thank Harry's shave, go to harrys.com,

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Now I've got myself lost I was writing to tell you That my feelings tonight I was staying on my my notebook that brings your goodbye Oh, now she's gone And I'm back on the beat A stain on my notebook Says nothing to me

Oh, now she's gone And I'm out with her friend Out with her friend Her lips full of passion Coffee in bed Ricochet Join the conversation With the way that you left me

I can hardly contain Hardly contain. The hurt and the anger and the joy of the pain. Joy of the pain. Now knowing I'm single, there'll be fire in my eyes. Fire in my eyes. I stand on my notebook for a new love tonight. Bye. A stain on my notebook Says nothing to me

Oh, now she's gone But I'm out with a friend Out with a friend With lips full of passion Coffee email