The Ricochet Podcast - The Republican Standard Bearer

Episode Date: July 22, 2016

The moment we’ve been preparing for all year finally arrived this week: Donald J. Trump is the Republican Party’s nominee for President of The United States. With the help of the Washington Post��s ace political reporter Bob Costa, we break down the whole week, from the family member speeches, Ted Cruz’s speech, Trump’s own speech ( and Peter Robinson’s brush with the Trump campaign)... Source

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Deeds and fees apply. See OnPost.com. Good evening, Mr. and Mrs. North and South American. All the ships at sea, let's go to press. Hello. If you love our country and love your children as much as I know that you do, stand and speak and vote your conscience, vote for candidates up and down the ticket who you trust to defend our freedom

and to be faithful to the Constitution. One of the things people love about you is you speak your mind and you don't use a politician's filter. However, that is not without its downsides. What Boehner is angry with is the American people holding him accountable. If I become president, oh, do they have problems. They're going to have such problems. I don't know why that's funny. It's the Ricochet Podcast with Rob Long and Peter

Robinson. I'm James Lylex, back after an absence, and we have our guest, one guest, don't need anybody else, Bob Costa from the Washington Post. Let's have ourselves a podcast. Welcome to this, the Ricochet Podcast, number 312. I'm James Lilacs, and I've been gone for a couple of weeks, which is why I'm really happy to give you double the number of commercials. Starting, of course, well, commercials. No, it's endorsement. It's a thanks to ZipRecruiter,

because you can find candidates in any city or industry nationwide. Just post once and watch your qualified candidates roll in to ZipRecruiter's easy-to-use interface. We're also brought to you by The Great Courses Plus. To start your free trial today, keyword free, you can sign up now at thegreatcoursesplus.com slash ricochet. And we're brought to you by Harry's Shave. For a great shave at an even greater price, you can go to harrys.com and enter the coupon code. All together now, ricochet.

And brought to you by Casper Mattress. I slept last night, even though it's 95 degrees and we have no air conditioning. Why? Because I was aided into slumber by a Casper Mattress. You can try one for 100 nights risk-free in your own home. If you don't love it, they'll pick it up and they'll refund you every penny. Go to Casper.com slash Ricochet and use the coupon code Ricochet. And we're brought to you by Ricochet. to you by which is your place to go

and slap other people with metaphorical mackerels because this is the era for that and here to tell you why you should get on board because if you don't get on board you're helping to make Salon.com profitable it's all on you if you don't get on board so Rob

if you don't get on board you're responsible for the Kennedy, if you don't get on board, you're responsible for the Kennedy assassination, retroactively, like a time machine. First of all, I would like to take a brief moment after I do this to ask about the air conditioning situation in your house. I'm interested in that. And the second thing I want to say is if you are listening to this podcast

and you are a member of Ricochet, we are pleased to have you. If you are not a member, we want you to join. And here's what we need. This is really literally all we need. We have over the Ricochet network, we have millions of listeners. We really do. And that's great.

And this part of the fun of this podcast is reaching millions of people. We only need 1,500 new members to make a very important milestone for the company happen. If you are listening to this and you're like, oh, I was going to, maybe I'll do it.

Please do it. Please do it today. Please do it right now. Turn this off and do it because if we can get that 1,500 new members, it will be a remarkable milestone for us. And I think also a remarkable milestone

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You can do a lot of stuff that you don't have to write a comment if you don't want to. But you'll be supporting us, and you'll be making a big, big, big, big difference for us over the next week or two. It's a place to vent, lament, or find like-minded people who share your ideas. No epistemic closure, however. It's hard to live in a bubble when you spend any time on Ricochet because there's a lot of back and forth from both sides of the center right and the right right

and the new economic mercantilist approach that some are taking. But Rob asked about my air conditioning. I know everybody's just keen to hear the whole story. It's short, and we'll bring Peter into this too since he's with us. Hi Peter. Hello. Alright shut up I'm talking. It's

like this. A while ago the power company said we'll install a kill switch on your air conditioning unit for those peak demand days. We'll just shut it off for a little bit. Just a little bit in the afternoon when you're not even home. And so I let them do that but it never came back on. It struggles. Every five minutes, it

turns itself off. And it killed it. So when I called them, and I've been calling them for days, and you know, it's customer support pretty good. It's local. It's not in Mumbai. And she told me that, this is my favorite part,

one of the guys in maintenance had said, well, maybe it's not our switch problem. Maybe it's his unit. And I said, okay, so coincide until this thing happened. Right at that moment, this thing, which had been working perfectly right up until then, decides it's going to break on me. Does that even seem remotely like something you want your customers to hear? Anyway, somebody's coming right over.

So I may not – Okay. So it wasn't a choice. That's really what I want to – yeah. Right. But it was sort of like a little bit of Europe here at home and I just came back from there. And I know we want to get to that member post about why people hate elites. But before we get to that, Rob, let's talk about Paris.

Yeah. I was in Paris very briefly. So do you want to talk about? An elitist talk about Paris. Yeah, I was in Paris very briefly. Is that what you want to talk about? Any elitist thing to do. My next national review column about this has to do with the fact that it's a tired city. It's a shabby city. Everyone loves Paris,

but I'm sorry, I did not see a place that was full of vim, vigor, confidence in Western. Well, you went in the summer, to be fair. You were there in July, right? Yes. Yes, I was. I mean, look, it is definitely an old person's city

at this point. Europe is an old person's place. The young people are either in prison or killing people, or the other young people are kind of trying to leave. Not London in london they're in london exactly right london is london is rocking and hopping and that's where i was next so peter have you been in london recently you can back me up here i have not but i can back you up to the former point because i was in con

at the beginning of the summer couple of days oh he was in con see. Did you have a croissant on the Esplanade? Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Hold on. Hold on. You're the man. Nine weeks out of ten, we get something about James's sturdy Midwestern forebearers. And today we get, oh, just got back from Paris. And you topped him with Cannes. Unbelievable. What were you doing in Cannes? Is that something you can share with us? I loathe to share it with you. I haven't shared it with you for these three past weeks because I was afraid of exactly this reaction. A friend of mine had to go to a conference in Cannes, and I am an advisor to his company for reasons that have nothing to do with wealth. Believe me because I invested $10.99.

Anyway, there was illness in his family. There were certain people who really needed to be told about the launch of his company. And he said, here, here's the list. You go. So I spent three weeks in Cannes at a big marketing and advertising conference. I landed in Nice. This is three weeks before the horrible explosions. Cannes is what, 25 miles to the east of Nice. And I have to say, I'd never been in Cannes before. I'd only seen

pictures of it during the film festival. This was a marketing and advertising festival. And I had a couple of reactions. My first reaction just driving the Uber in was, wow, this place could use a little capital investment. It really did look pretty tired to me. Nice and calm. The airport at Nice, the traffic was snarled. Something had broken down. It had a borderline third-worldy feel, to be perfectly frank. Then the usual reaction, everything beautiful, every beautiful structure dates from at the most recent, the day before the First World War. And so you get this exquisite medieval stuff and then beautiful in Cannes, of course, which was a resort town in the late 19th century, early 20th century.

And then you get this kind of lull. Nothing was built until the 70s. And from then on, it's all been ugly as can be and then I will tell you this. I'll tell you a little anecdote because it confirms what James has said and what you've said and maybe actually sets us up for another discussion. So there

were kids, this was, they call it the Cannes Lions. The Lions Award is something like the Oscar but for advertising. So there were advertisers and marketers. It turned out to be an overwhelmingly young crowd, mostly European. And there was a sense of, there they are wandering around from one loud rock party on the beach to another with their tattoos and their body piercings. And I found myself talking to someone from Israel,

a young woman from Israel who was in this business. And I have to say, I was struck by her poise. There was something about her that I just, her bearing. And I said, listen, I have to ask you what I ask everyone I meet who lives in Israel. How can you? It must be so nerve wracking to live there. And she sort of looked across the beach at these European kids. And then she looked at me and she said, well, we have an advantage. We Israelis live in a country that is still a cause. Exactly. Wow.

Exactly. Precisely. That is what you get when you stride around the great boulevards. You see civilizational confidence. Now, you may say for all the wrong reasons. You may say it led them into folly. But there is a cultural cohesion that you sense from those old buildings that you simply don't get. The new ones seem designed to crush the soul and mince it into a fine paste and then smear it on a stick you rammed up a baboon's rear.

It's just – we went to this garden. That's a very vivid – wait. I've got to process that. The Citroën Gardens, which is all concrete, nothing but concrete and fountains that don't work anymore. So you have all of this nature that's been forced into these concrete boxes and then placed in this arid landscape just devoid of life or joy. And then you go to London with these wonderful well-manicured parks and you can actually feel a sort of humanism that seems to escape them elsewhere on the continent. But I don't know. This should be obvious.

And if it isn't, then you need to read more about what the cultures used to be and what they believed in. And there's got to be a Great Courses for that. Because the Great Courses Plus has got stuff for everything. You've already signed up for this great video learning service. Good for you. Then you know that you have access, unlimited access, to 7,000

fascinating videos. But if you haven't signed up, well, this is the perfect time since we have a very special offer, which is this. The Great Courses Plus, of course, lets you learn about anything that interests you. History, as we were talking about. Business, how to cook, how to play chess, how to speak Spanish, how to speak can, should you be sent there. You can watch

these engaging online video lectures anytime, anywhere, on your TV, your laptop, your tablet, smartphone, wherever. One of the courses we've been listening to and watching is called How Conversation Works, which is sort of what we had here, where nobody expected to talk about Peter and can and Europe and their civilizational confidence, but that's where you go, that's where it goes. A bad person would have interceded and said, stop talking about that. Stay on purpose. But no,

you'll learn other tips and tricks. I'm not talking about you, Peter, or Rob, or anyone. Just the theoretical listener is out there waving his hand saying, get to Trump! Right, exactly. In due time. Well, anyway, go to The Great Courses Plus and sign up because as one of our podcast listeners,

you will immediately get one month free to start watching as many lectures as you want. So greatcoursesplus.com slash ricochet. That's thegreatcoursesplus.com slash ricochet. So the European kids go to London or they come here. Do they find here then, gentlemen, the sense of purpose? Or do they find a country that was seemingly painted in dark tones last night? Some people are saying that Trump's speech was very dark. Well, so was Reagan's. Maybe these are dark times. Let's ask somebody who's on the beat. Not that they're

not their dark times, but just how this is all playing out. We'll talk to Bob Costa. He's the national political reporter for The Washington Post, of course, and you can follow him on Twitter at at Costa Reports. Welcome back to the podcast, Bob. Hey, it's great to join you. Thanks for having me. Hey, Bob, Peter here. First question. In dealing with the Trump organization, abstract out all the ideology and we'll, of course, we'll come to last night's speech but before we even get to that you're a professional political reporter what are they liked to deal with on the level of competence organization professionalism and so forth the trump campaign is unlike most campaigns i've ever dealt with because it has such a small inner core of people.

This is a campaign that's run now by Paul Manafort, a former aide to Gerald Ford and to Bob Dole. And he has a small staff around him, people who go back as advanced men with the Dole campaign and others. And in terms of professionalism, I think they're overwhelmed at times with responses and inquiries from reporters, and they're just not really clicking on all fronts. But they're also really dominated by the candidate. This is a campaign that, in spite of all the professionalism that they do bring in their exchanges with reporters, it's really driven by the candidate and his whims.

Over to Rob, James. Yeah, Peter. Well, I have a strange feeling about that because isn't one of his brand attributes or one of the things he's trying to sell is, you know, I'm competent. I'm a CEO. I get things done. And I can't remember a convention in my lifetime, Democrat or Republican, that was more slipshod and improvised and amateur hour. Do you? I mean, I've only been covering this about eight, nine years, but my sense is this was not a Republican convention. This was a Donald Trump convention.

He was barely making a conservative ideological case. This was a Donald Trump convention. He was barely making a conservative ideological case. This was introducing Trump to the country with his family, a populist-infused law and order message, and with a dash of some celebrity soap opera stars, different kind of wrestling people,

business friends of Donald Trump. This was not selling the Republican Party of the country. This was Trump being Trump. I think that's what we always expected all along, but it came through. Yeah, I note that this morning Ivanka Trump tweeted, if you liked my, shop my look at the Republican National Convention. And you could click, I'm not kidding, you click on something

and you could buy the outfit she wore you click on something and you could and you could buy the outfit she wore she's selling the outfit she wore um so so i guess my i'm trying to i mean look i you know full disclosure nobody's surprised here that i am not a trump supporter but just looking as a piece of political state stagecraft today donald trump spent 15 20 minutes talking about rafael cruz and the kenn assassination. Right, because the people who thought the speech was the real Trump, no, no, no, no, no. The day after the speech, spending 15 minutes on the National Enquirer. So, Bob, is this, I mean, the people inside the Trump campaign who are not drinking the Trump Kool-Aid but are just trying to to do the job. What is their take on it? On just the success of it as a piece of stage?

I mean, it's a great question. I mean, their take is they've got to just ride the stallion for the next few months. There's a sense that he can't be tamed, he can't be controlled, he can't be advised. Just getting him to read the speech and sticking to kind of a Jeff Sessions-esque script was, in their minds, an accomplishment. And they kind of signed up for this whole endeavor knowing they weren't going to be Karl Rove to Donald Trump. That he's going to be really choosing his own media interviews. He's going to be doing his own message.

And today, he likes to change it up and be unpredictable and be inflammatory and be incendiary. I mean, after a speech that showed some flashes of social moderation on different issues like gay rights, and then you see him, how he doubled the protester, he didn't go out of control, he didn't get him out, instead he said, you know, praise the police. Then we see today, it is a total flip donald trump it's the old trump it's the yelling trump it's the anti-ted cruz trump but i think this is the kind of thing that if you work for donald trump based on all my reporting you expect this day-to-day you don't expect the standard conventional right but i mean it's like every

great i mean the the two most flawless campaigns i've ever seen was Bill Clinton in 92 and Barack Obama in 2008. And whether you like the outcome or not, it's just a piece of political strategic execution. They were brilliant and they won. They were successful. I mean Obama a lot more so, but Clinton got in the White House. But they were relentlessly disciplined. You talked about what they wanted you to talk about. You never ever – you were never wondering what the theme of the day was. nonsense that no one needs to do? Or, I mean, is Trump really blazing a new trail? Because to me, full disclosure, it feels like Trump is every day winning over his previous supporters over again and not expanding the number. But I could be wrong. What's your sense of that in the room?

What's your sense of that for the delegates who were there and just for the country as a whole? My sense is that, and I just haven't talked to Trump about this, is that he sees the whole election is about rousing these blatant voters in New York, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Ohio, kind of working class voters who haven't participated,

who aren't conservative, aren't really liberal. He thinks he can get them if he can inspire them with some kind of celebrity populism or nationalism that every day is in the airwaves so he doesn't have to spend money on advertising. I mean, it makes a lot of Republican consultants and people who work for Cruz and other Trump rivals scratch their heads and go, this is not how it's done. I mean, every metric for presidential campaigns is being missed and it's being done wrong. But I think Trump's whole gamble from the start, and it was reiterated this morning and even last night, is that if the country wants wholesale change, if it wants total change, it may be willing to forgive his veiled racism at times, his vulgarities, his controversies, his incoherence, because he's not Hillary Clinton and he's disrupt or uproot even the political class. Hey, can I – I just want to ask you one more question just about the people you talked to because the political – of the political class in Cleveland.

Did you talk to anybody who was anti-Trump who converted, who said, you know what? Had a road to Damascus moment. I thought the guy was a loser and I hated him for nine months. And now I'm really seeing that he could be the next – a great next president. And did you talk to anybody who – anybody in that political establishment class who had humility about the way they've run things and understood Trump's appeal. I think it was most telling when I was wandering around the floor last night and ran into a lot of state party chairs, delegates. And, you know, they're usually the country club chamber of commerce types running these state parties and deputy chairmen to the state parties. And they're all in for Trump.

I mean, I know they need Trump to do well for their own candidates down ballot. But there's a sense that a lot of these delegates and party leaders around the country, that whatever they knew about politics, they're just willing to shelve, if not just for now, maybe forever. And they wonder, maybe the Republican Party isn't as conservative. Maybe presidential campaigns don't need to have grassroots and all this. Maybe in the age of social media, things could be different. And this is kind of a blind faith now that they've bought in, even if they didn't like Trump.

And they're trying to make the best of it. And there's a sense that maybe he's catching on to something with law and order. Bob, Peter here. Listen, you say you've only been reporting on this stuff for eight or nine years, which of course seems like nothing when you're talking to fossils like Rob and me. But eight or nine years is actually a pretty good time slice. Here's the question. I'm asking you now not so much for reporting as for your considered judgment.

You haven't had a chance to write your book about the campaign, but how does this feel to you? On the two elements in this campaign, one is the notion that it's Donald Trump and Donald Trump alone. He's a one-off. It's unrepeatable. There were contingent circumstances. If only Marco Rubio hadn't repeated the same phrase during the debate when he was goaded by Chris Christie. If only this, if only that. You could point to two or three contingent moments in the campaign and we would have been listening to Rubio or Ted Cruz last night instead of Donald Trump.

The sheer contingency and one-offness of it versus Donald Trump has identified deep and permanent trends in the country that the political class missed. And something is here that is here to stay, whether Donald Trump wins or loses. How do you weigh those two proportions in the mix that you felt in Cleveland? I think when you think about the ideological movement, conservative types, I think they're here to stay. They've maybe lost some power this year, but in four years,

2020, 2024, that element of the Republican party, the Cruz wing, whatever you want to call it, national review, others, it's not fading.

It's faded a little bit in power, but that still remains for many people, the soul of the Republican Party. And so the other thing, though, that Trump has picked up on, and I think that's so profound politically, is everywhere I go for Trump events, I'm meeting people who are just totally disconnected, disconnected from the country civically. And they don't really even know much about who's in the cabinet or what the president's doing or what Congress is doing.

They don't really care about Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan. It's just total civic disengagement coupled with this economic frustration and stagnation and the kind of fast-changing culture, and it's kind of whipped up this this maybe long simmering idea that you know there's this group in the country that rarely voted but was large and now it's kind of roused and awake and trump's just taking advantage of that that's why i don't think this is a black swan in every respect it's black i think the conservative right will will rear its head again and will bounce back. Where is this disconnected group of voters that have come out for Trump who aren't really Republicans or Democrats? Are they just going to go back into their hole?

Are they going to go back into the cave? I don't think so. I think that's why that populism that we're seeing now, I don't think it just goes away. Got it. Okay. So, Bob, do they demand another candidate in the future? Then do they keep pushing populists and economic nationalists up? Or is this just a case of you have a perfect synchronicity between somebody arriving and feeling the need of these people who are ready, finally, en masse to speak?

I mean, I don't see these people forming a party and then coming up with candidates. Right. And I covered Bernie Sanders for two weeks at the end of the California primary and all that. It's the same kind of voter with Sanders in many respects. I think Hillary Clinton's having the same problem that a lot of establishment Republicans and conservative movements Republicans have been

having. I think, though, the Republican Party's not going to go in the Trump direction fully. It just, even the delegates, this is still a party. It's a broken party, but it's still a party. And I think what you're going to see is a blend of some populism, some Trumpism. But unless you have the celebrity of Trump and the 100% name recognition, to be a truly kind of populist nationalist without any kind of conservative bearing will be very difficult. So I think you'll see a blend

of conservative ideology mixed with more populism. Got it. Hey, Bob, Peter here one more time. Listen, I know you've got a pact for Philadelphia. So if you've got to run, say so. But you and I talked earlier this week about the speech as you know and as i explained on ricochet for about four days i was helping with the speech and then i wasn't so that speech was all new to me last night how did you grade it length energy delivery response in the crowd help us understand what it felt like in that in that uh. It was pretty dark in that arena. Assertive, confident, delivery by Trump.

He's a little stilted with the teleprompter, much better as a political talent extemporaneously. But inside the room, I think the speech was too long. And that hurt Trump with his momentum with the crowd. But he had some lines

that went across swimmingly. He showed some moderate instincts. I think this whole speechwriting process, Peter, and just doing my job was reporting it out. I first heard about you and Elliot, Ben Elliot, being involved, and then maybe Matt Scully and John McConnell, the Bush speechwriters being involved. They had nothing to do with the speech. You really had nothing to do with the speech. We were just consulted briefly. I think what you saw at the end of the day was a speech written by Stephen Miller, the third-something former Jeff Sessions staffer.

And if you've ever listened to Jeff Sessions speak at CPAC or these conservative conferences over the years, that was a Jeff Sessions speech. I think that's the one problem with the speech was it wasn't really in Trump's voice. It captured a lot of the thrust of Trump's political message, but that wasn't his voice. Got it. Got it. Got it. This is – so during my three days when I was on the campaign – not on the campaign, but consulting three days, five days, whatever it was, I just had this – I just can't hear that. I just – whenever you say that, Peter, you should – no, I have a mini stroke.

Go ahead. Keep talking. Rob, lie down on your Casper mattress as we discuss this. Tiny mini stroke. Go ahead. Keep talking. Rob, lie down on your Casper mattress as we discuss this. Tiny mini stroke. I just had this impression, Bob, of these good people this ship had set out to see without a rudder, without a – they were trying to construct an actual campaign staff. And one of the things as the ship was underway, so to speak, they were trying to do something extremely difficult. I had a long conference call, as you know, because we talked about this in which Stephen Miller participated. Very, very bright guy. But I will say, and I put it to you for your response, that developing a candidate's voice is a very, very hard thing to do. And it takes time and it takes the candidate's own attention.

With Ronald Reagan, we had the immense advantage that he had already developed his voice, the sound of the man, long before he ran for president. George W. Bush, one reason the speechwriters were so influential in that administration was that they invented the sound of his voice during the campaign. He needed them. He didn't have a voice without Gerson and McConnell and Matt Scully. So what – I'm just wondering, how do they – you can't run for president without giving a few big set speeches like the one last night and yet trump doesn't it's not trump it's

just not trump and people people recognize that how do they fix that i don't think they do fix it because having covered trump for so long and observed him in private and in public it's so difficult for people who work for donald trump to him at times, to really make him sit down for an extended period and force him to think through his own voice. Because this is someone who's so confident in his public profile and the persona he's cultivated over the last few decades. And he really believes he knows better than almost everyone about how he communicates, how he's perceived. He's very self-aware about his look. And I think he's just not as concerned about his political voice. And I don't think Miller and Manafort are the kind of people who are challenging him.

They're more the kind of advisors who are trying to channel him, get him at his best moments in private, and just try to guide him towards some kind of pitch. This is not a real speech-writing operation. This is Stephen Miller on the plane using his Jeff Sessions lines, trying to pack together something. And that's what he ended up with. Bob, last question. James Lylex here. The last convention I covered was in 2008, Democratic,

and the swag that they passed out was interesting. Tofu bars and condoms. So I'm wondering, what's the swag like? To ask an irrelevant elitist insider question, what's the swag like in Cleveland? The stuff that you could get, was it anybody complaining or was it fun? The stuff you can get? Yeah, I remember walking around with the swag. They were handing out bags of stuff.

You were always given post-it notes and zip drives. Last night, everyone popped in the balloons and trying to get the big balloons. But there wasn't much Trump swag. There was the Make America Great Again hat. There was the Trump pen sign. But I think the one thing, if you were here in Cleveland, what you would think of yourself more than anything is this actually isn't as showbiz and as glamorous as you would think with Trump.

It was very conventional, generic, Republican in its setup, its colors, its whole atmosphere. And so the swag was this kind of R&C elephant, some bags. It wasn't Trump, but it wasn't gold, and it wasn't really interesting. It was just party stuff, and that was it. Well, maybe in the next year. MAGA swag. That's what I want for the 2020 campaign. Bob, thank you very much.

We'll see you at the Washington Post and elsewhere, and you can follow him, of course, at Twitter at AtCostaReports. Talk to you later, Bob. Thanks, Bob. Thanks, Bob. You know, he mentioned, this is an interesting point, that there wasn't, you know, you have the GOP and then you've got conservatives and maybe it's not a conservative party anymore and maybe it's, maybe the conservatives don't have a role. And I'm sorry, if it's not conservative anymore, what is the exact point of it? I mean, what's the point of having a party that is as statist, as liberal, as interventionist? There's no reason for it.

And, I mean, we've heard for years that we lose elections because we try to run as Democrat light. Apparently now we're going to run as Democrat heavy. And I just threw that out. I thought you hit the kill switch I literally checked my connectivity but wait a minute Skype just go down for me no I'm so used at this point to Rob pouncing

somewhere around in there I want I want Peter to give me the tip it's not my job Rob to tell you when to come in ok maybe you need to find a new job, James. I would like to, but I'm not hiring anybody. But if the people

listening to this podcast are hiring somebody, then they don't know exactly the best way to hire people, and that's why they ought to go to... James, James, watch this. Watch this. You ready, everybody? Rob? I just did it. Rob? Okay, but you see, that whole thing was a setup. And we're already in... Yes, we're already in the commercial now, people.

We were segueing to the ZipRecruiter.com commercial, Peter, and you interrupted us. Oh, no! Unbelievable! So rude. Excuse me. I'm good. Listen. You blocked that like John Kerry into the door at 10 Downing Street.

It's amazing. I have boorish rudeness. I'm muting myself. I'm muting myself. I'm muting myself. All right. Stifleish, rudeness. I'm muting myself. I'm muting myself. I'm muting myself. All right. Stifle yourself, Edith. I was talking about ZipRecruiter because I said it's not my job to tell Rob what to do.

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One more time. Free, yeah. ZipRecruiter.com slash free trial. All right, that was a spot. And we are thankful that ZipRecruiter is with us. And now that I'm done, I should probably tell Peter it's safe to unmute himself and explain exactly why he turned down the chance

to make America great and refused to participate. Before you do, before you want to talk about this, about the voice, well, Peter, there was your chance to craft a voice, and you let America down, Peter. Before you start, Peter, I want to say to podcast listeners that this is a benefit of Ricochet membership.

You could have heard this kind of the TikTok here and interacted with Peter on the site. That's part of the premium kind of connectivity and high-level conversations we have on Ricochet.com. 1,500 people who was thinking about becoming a member.

This is a perfect reason to become a member right now. You would have heard the story and you could interact with Peter Robinson who was almost a kingmaker. Peter? Rob, are you lying down? What happened? Very, very briefly because I explained all this on Rico Ricochet so I'll just be brief about it here. But for people who haven't read my note on Ricochet so that you can make sense of what Bob and I were just talking about, Donald Trump was not my first, second, third or fourth choice. I believe he was my – well, he was my choice when he was the last man standing.

So reluctant Trump. Not never Trump like Rob perhaps, but not, but reluctant Trump. In any event, our friend Larry Kudlow called and said, look, would you like to help? Not would you like to, but you need to, it's your patriotic duty to help out here. You're a speech writer. You know how these things are done. Consult with the campaign. So I helped, I spent a few, I spent, put together a few notes for Larry. I suggested young writers who might be willing to help. I suggested the right way to set up a speech writing shop. Then we had a long conference call with Larry and Ben Elliott, another former Reagan writer, and Steve Miller whom you just heard about discussing themes for the convention speech.

And then the campaign sent me its non-disclosure agreement and I will not go into this in great detail, but I had a lawyer friend look at it who is a very skilled lawyer and has done dozens of deals here in Silicon Valley and had the further qualification that he's one of the two people I know here in Northern California who's been a Trump supporter from the very get-go. And he looked at the NDA and said, run in the other direction. I have never seen an NDA as restrictive as this in my life. Now, I've never been asked to sign an NDA in politics before, but in this new world of Twitter and Facebook and social media, maybe a campaign has to get a tighter grip on its staffers than campaigns used to in the old days. But just to name one provision, the NDA would have required me to get approval

before talking to people in the media. What am I doing right now? I'm talking to James and Rob in the media. And it would have remained in force not through election day or not what a very aggressive NDA does out here in Silicon Valley expire after five years. Astoundingly, it would have remained in force

in perpetuity. So scientology contract where it's like for one billion years yes exactly and as i this part i didn't put on ricochet so this is a benefit to the to the podcast listeners if they're not if they're not already bored with the story final note as i was reviewing this thing i had it up on on the iMac, the one with the big screen. Somebody sent – I think it was the Blue Yeti. He sent me a report that had just moved over the wires that Donald Trump was already suing a former staffer for $10 million for violating the NDA. And Mrs. Robinson happened to pass by the screen at that moment. And she said –

Why Mrs. Robinson? She said, fine. You sign that and pack your bags. You're moving out to the Marriott Suites. So that was it. I told the campaign, listen, maybe some people can sign that thing. Fine. I can't. I just can't.

And that was that. That's all. Over to you, Rob. Over to you, James. Back to air conditioning. Yeah, that's not – I guess – I mean I suppose I'm still in the sort of denial part where I wonder how this all happened. But just to get back to James' question about what do we stand for, I think ultimately the answer to that question and the answer to it are the problem with the Trump message and the Trump movement, which is they continue – and I said they continually rewind their own supporters.

We are in a 51 percent country whether we like it or we don't, right? And you have a binary choice when you vote for president. Ultimately, you only have two. It's Hertz or Avis, Coke or Pepsi. And there are other flavors but they're not quite – they don't get quite this kind of shelf placement as those two. Up until now, I don't think that's going to change. I'm not as sanguine as Bob is about the future of the Republican Party, but whatever.

So – But for now, it's Dr. Pepper. It's just a minor brand. Go ahead. Right. You got to get a whole bunch of people to vote for you. Some of those people are stupid and don't pay attention and don't know what the Supreme Court is.

Some of those people are smart and ideological and really care about two or three or four issues and you better be on the right side of those issues. Some of them are persuadable on the middle stuff, but a good portion of them are kind of attentive, not too attentive, don't really care and that's about some of the hot button issues, but they're the ones who don't like it when it looks about some of the hot button issues but they're the ones who don't like it when it looks like it's going to get crazy that's the 11-15%

that still kind of decides elections so two things out of that you'd say to become a 51% leader which is to become president of the United States you have to constantly be people who probably don't like 49 or 50% of what you say.

Correct. But you can't make them nervous. And that is not a primary voter. That's the opposite of primary voter. a certain kind of despair but also kind of a sick satisfaction as I watch what I'm pretty much convinced is going to be a disastrous campaign this morning, was that Donald Trump seems to be – seems unable to accept the nomination for president. He seems to still be running in a primary, which is – I get it. That's a very lucrative business because you're going to get 15 million people who are going to vote for you and they're going to love you. And it's great to get 15 million people who are going to vote for you, and they're going to love you. And it's great to have 15 million people. Because if 50 million people tuned into my TV show now, I'd be a monster hit.

But I started in my – 80 million people to watch, and that was considered a monster hit. Once you start getting down to the smaller levels, it's still great business, right? 15 million people buy your ties or buy your stakes or check into your golf resorts. That's great. But that doesn't get you close to what you need to get. That's barely 20% of what you need to become president of the United States, and I think he doesn't understand that, and I don't think my dear friend Ann Coulter understands that.

She sells a million books or has in the past a million books. She needs 65 times that has got to vote for you on one day. It pains me to give you the satisfaction because I know you've been saying, Peter, you're out of your mind. It pains me to give you the satisfaction. But that is the most beautiful, elegant, penetrating summary of what happened or what didn't happen last night that I have heard the president, but he didn't really. He did not accept the responsibility or the challenge to speak to all the people. It just didn't happen. unhinged but it's also that doesn't necessarily disqualifying right i don't think that's disqualifying from being a great president according to you know a lot of people think that abraham lincoln was a manic depressive but fine uh but you realize you're now you're now doing a

jackie mason routine the nazi bastard sons of bitches and i say that in the nicest possible way i don't i mean no disrespect and I say that in the nicest possible way. I mean no disrespect. And I say that in the nicest possible way. The Nazi bastard sons of bitches. What am I talking about? I'm just talking here. I'm just listening to you guys. As a sheer act of political strategy. Yes.

People said, oh, it was more Nixon than Reagan last night, that speech. Nixon had run, in 68, he'd already run two massive federal, I mean, general elections. He'd already been on the ballot. He was already a cold, calculating political animal who would say or do anything to get power. That is not Donald Trump. I mean, maybe that's to his credit,

but that is not to his credit when you're running in a national campaign and you need massive amounts of people, not just the white working class disenfranchised, but massive amounts of people to vote for you. And I think part of what's so stunning to me is that no one seems to – in the Trump camp, no one seems to understand that. They still think they're surfing the little wave and there's a gigantic tidal wave behind them. For what it's worth, I'm just around – for what it's worth, during my – whatever it was, three days advising the campaign, I did get exactly the sense that Bob Costa mentioned when he was with us a few moments ago that the professionals in that operation and I guess Paul Manafort, Stephen Miller, Larry Kudlow, those guys are just trying to hold on and help channel this guy. They're just trying to make it as much better or as less bad as they possibly can. That's what I felt called – when Larry said, help us, I felt that was a patriotic duty.

But the notion that you can actually – Richard Nixon ran for Congress in 1948 and it was a shrewd, tough, hard-fought campaign. He defeated Helen Gahagan Douglas. It was a big deal congressional campaign. And when he ran for president in 1968, he'd been in political life including in the Senate and eight years as vice president. When Ronald Reagan ran in 1980, he had been governor of California for eight years. It was his third time running for – this guy, this guy still doesn't – is still working out how you use a teleprompter. Well, perhaps he doesn't think that he really is going to be president as it's commonly previously understood.

There was a story that broke this week that apparently somebody had reached out to John Kasich and said, hey, you want to be beep? It was Donald Trump Jr. That's who it was. All right. I'm trying to recall the story without referencing it up on Google. You want to be vice president? You'll be the most awesome vice president ever. And Kasich said, why would that be?

He said, well, you'd be responsible for domestic and foreign policy. To which John said, well, then what is Donald Trump going to do? And he said, well, he's going to make America great, which makes you think perhaps that he regards the job like a television newsreader, that there's this whole big, vast team that's actually doing this stuff, and he just drops into the seat once a day at 5.30 and does the thing. You know, that would be, I mean, just to break in there, that would be a successful strategy, actually, if your speeches and your general demeanor and your political persona and your public persona was this kind of all-embracing, healing, trust me.

I love you all. loving leader you know i mean not that i would want that person but i think that person would be would be able to scoop up everyone in their embrace and like well you know guy's an airhead right but everybody loves him chauncey gardner right and and then he legitimately will say look i don't know anything about this stuff so the case is you could do it all i'm i'm going to be spreading love and and and togetherness uh to the rest of the country i mean that's what we thought barack obama was going to be the people who were supporting him in 2008 who didn't support him in 2012, which is a lot of people. They thought he was going to be this big, healing, warm, hugging guy

who was going to make America feel good about its racial past and racial present. And instead, of course, he turned into this disastrous little thin-skinned, little bastard. But that person could do it. All right, go ahead. Sorry. It's entirely possible and he may want that role because it's a little bit comforting

to know that you actually are not going to have to do the heavy lifting. You have to think that no matter how egomaniacal one is, how great one's estimation of one's own capabilities might be, that actually in the cold dark 3 a.m. you might actually your drawers when you think of exactly what's coming, of what you're going to be responsible for.

That it's no longer a matter of saying I can get along with Putin because we chatted in the green room. That there are actual consequences, dire consequences that can stem from what you do. But going back again to where we're talking about what the party is going to be, it's obvious that what conservatives are selling, nobody's buying. We're selling smoke alarms next to a house fire. The message of liberty and being free from the onerous hand of government doesn't

apply to people who want it turned to their benefit. And that's why we have the statism of both parties that we do right now. Go ahead. No, you were going to say we do right now. Now, go ahead. No, you were going to say. Well, no, no, I do. I have had an experience already this morning.

It is morning for us out here in California. Oh, it's morning for me as a matter of fact. I'm rubbing my hand along my cheek right now and just saying, you know, hours after that shave, it's just still smooth. It's still smooth. It still is. That's how good a shave it is. Because Harry's cares more than you possibly can imagine about how to have a good shave. Because they're guys, right? So they shave their own faces.

So they've spent a lifetime dealing with crappy blades and bad electronics and the rest of it and stuff. No, they've crafted a perfect, well, they say better. I say perfect shaving experience. And this is what I'm here to tell you about. So why exactly and how does Harry's give you a superior shave it's very simple they bought a blade factory in germany so they can control the quality and its quality like you'll never see the world's highest quality blades for almost a century and by cutting out the middlemen by the way they can offer you an amazing shave at a fraction of the price of the drugstore brands you know what you pay at the drugstore right it's preposterous it's ridiculous what are you made of money no you get blades right to your house

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And Peter, you were about to say something. Yeah, well, I was about to say I've had an experience already. And by the way, watch this because this is a segue, boys. I'm segueing into a comment that we had put up on the member feed. and to me really quite disconcerting thing to see that people could look at exactly the same set of facts and come to diametrically opposed conclusions. Except that in those days, it broke on racial lines, which you could sort of understand. Polls showed that African-Americans thought O.J. either didn't do it or should be let off even if he had. And whites thought he was fine. What I see in my inbox is this divide between friends of mine who never Trump can't stand

the guy, all the things, frankly, that we've been talking about this morning and friends of mine who say, wow, that was really a good speech. In fact, a couple of them said, Peter, you may not have had much influence, but you can be proud of yourself for having helped for two days or whatever it was. And this is just so disconcerting that friends, people I know look at exactly the same set of facts and fall out in totally – there's no ethnic divide. There's no divide. Frankly, in my inbox, there's no divide among where people live or their education levels or anything of that nature.

So I always – when I start down the road of Donald Trump, that orange comb over, that who does – he knows – I have to stop and say, wait a moment. There are very bright people who still are in favor of that guy and And this brings me to the post that Rico put up. And I'm just going to read a couple of sentences because even now, even after that speech last night, even after whatever crazy talk the Donald has done this very morning, there is an argument quote, it's time to put the divisive GOP primaries behind us. The choice is clear.

Either the executive branch will be led by this man or it will be led by Clinton Incorporated. Consider that conservatives have an opportunity under a Trump administration to promote conservative policies. Debating with a somewhat receptive administration would be an outstanding outcome for conservatives, particularly when we consider where we find ourselves today. Trump is still Trump, but the choice before us became clearer and for many Americans more promising last night, close quote. And I have to say that guy still stood on his list of Supreme Court nominees, the list

from which he would draw, which was to me a very impressive datum. He still stood – despite all the LGBT rights, the kind of sense that they may be a kind of drifting away from fundamental moral values or any moral sense at all, he still stood on the sacredness of every human life including the right – You don't believe that. I'm not saying whether he believes it, but he said it. It was a plank in the party platform and his people – You also said that Rafael Cruz killed Kennedy. I am making the point that he is taking stands that Hillary Clinton would never take.

That was the Trump – yeah, I mean he's taking stands like trade wars. I am taking – I am making the he's taking – like trade wars. I am taking – I am making the point a much more limited point. I'm not giving my heart to this man as I have just made very clear in detail. Here's my – I accept – Donald Trump remains in place and it is called Hillary Clinton. I accept that argument and I accept that statement and I do accept that logic even. And I think that how you began this is sort of why this is so painful and maybe even challenging. We should look at it more.

Yes, I do find it. Yes. In a Christian way, this is a challenge to see just how good your spirit is that there are a lot of very smart people I know and like and respect. Larry Kudlow is one of them who are Trump supporters. There are a lot of people that I like and respect who are kind of like, well, he's between the two of them. I don't know.

I'll take my chances. I'm not one of those people. I have a competing vision, which is that we're not better off with an erratic, incredibly self-centered, bizarrely disconnected to reality president who can't even run and doesn't understand how to run a convention, let alone run a White House. We have this fantasy that it's all going to be run by the smart people and we're going to have our voice there. That is simply not the case. I mean – or maybe it vote is for anybody but that. serve frankly having messed this up so terribly as people who believe in free markets and free trade and and actually a meaningful and useful position for america in the world and not brooding about

the idea that we're going to violate the nato pact i mean this kind of thing is just it's just bananas i would rather i i feel better with President Hillary Clinton, Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. Now I have to make a theological point. You come in, James, a brief theological point. We Catholics, Rob, have already gotten used to this in the current pontificate. The pope says something crazy and then the press office immediately rushes out and says, no, no, the Holy Father, he'll know I mean that. He'll know I mean that. He'll know I mean that.

Yeah, well, okay. I don't want to live in – I don't want that to be president. Russia is not going to invade Vatican City because the pope said it's wrong to fight back, okay? I'm asking you, Peter. Now, everybody said – Don't ask me anything. Please don't put me on the spot. No, no, no.

I know for Peter. I know. I know it's unfair, but you just said that we should take Donald's word at something about life. We should take his word at it. I just said he's saying certain things. Okay. All right. So he's saying certain things.

And because we know that some things he has to say, some things that he's been put in front of him to say, some things he says because he believes them. Away from the speech is the stuff that I find interesting. And Rob mentioned the thing about NATO. This is one of those things. Everybody says, Hillary, horrible. Supreme Court, taxes, regulation, health care. I understand all that. And we know that when it comes to the State Department that her tenure is,

well, we know what it is, and we know. All of these things we know. But do you believe that Hillary Clinton would be as cavalier about sundering our alliances in Europe and Asia as Donald Trump seems to be? And does that bother you and speak to a mindset that troubles you? Because this is what Rob is saying. This may be one thing where you actually say, like P.J. O'Rourke did, Hillary may be crazy and horrible, but it's going to be within the parameters that won't cause the loss of Europe, the loss of the Baltics. I mean when Newt Gingrich comes out and says Estonia is practically a suburb of St. Petersburg, what the hell happened to the Republican Party and the desire to stand up for the freedom of smaller nations. I mean, I can understand giving away absolutely every single thing on the table because we want the power back. I mean, every – but you ought to think that at some point it ought not to be a bipartisan consensus that the United States is an immoral country that has no standing to judge other nations.

I mean, when you say we can't talk to China, we can't talk to Russia, we can't talk to Turkey because we've got people shooting cops here in America is no example itself. I get that from somebody who doesn't believe in American exceptionalism. I just can't figure out how everybody got so happy being that being the standard of our party. Again, because we've got two parties now that don't believe in american exceptionalism we've got two parties that believe in some howardson narrative of this place is an utterly corrupted place that has no desire to know that there has no standing to say that it's a place of ideals you know i don't know how some of these people sleep at night but that's because they don't have a Casper. Well, they probably toss and turn. They do, James.

Absolutely. They toss and turn and they're beset. I mean, I understand exactly why people in the State Department are, you know, John Bolton was on BBC yesterday and saying, well, you know, it's good to have some thinking outside the box because the sclerotic nation of the State Department has represented an ossified international order that really maybe needs to be shaken up. And I get that. But there have to be smart people in the State Department who are having sleepless nights because they can't figure out whether or not 50, 60 years of alliances are going to be broken. We can offer them a premium sleep at a price they're never going to believe, and it's going to come right to their house, and it's going to be no problem whatsoever.

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50 bucks off this low price, which I can't imagine why you wouldn't, well, you go to casper.com slash ricochet and use the coupon code ricochet. Terms and conditions, as we like to say, apply. So, in this lacuna now, you may say something before we get out here. I have to call the air conditioning people and say, well, the little switch you put on my thing apparently had nothing to do with the reason that my air conditioning is now broken. Just one of those coinciding little coincidental matters that will have to chalk up to the strange odd synchronicity of the universe. Translation, no, send somebody over now and fix this. But we'll see how that goes. Right. Well, good luck.

Good luck with that. Can we talk briefly about – I mean I know this is – I don't want to – Of course. But briefly about um i mean i know this is i mean i don't want to get over but like briefly about the the cruise speech absolutely peter what you think of that speech oh wait a minute what did you think no okay so what did i think look look ted cruz can yell at you so i like ted cruz in all kinds of ways i admire him in in many ways. At the moment, four years from now, who knows where things will stand. But at the moment, it's just,

it's a kind of, it almost feels like a Greek tragedy in that you have this wonder, this tremendous hero who keeps sleeping with his mother. I mean, it's shooting himself in the foot. It was, would be a little, it's just, he wanted to be president so badly that he sidled up to Donald Trump earlier in the campaign. It didn't bother Ted Cruz that Donald Trump was launching vicious attacks on other candidates earlier in the campaign.

But now it bothers Donald Trump – I beg your pardon, Ted Cruz – that Donald Trump attacked Ted Cruz's father, that he attacked Ted Cruz's wife. No fair! You can't insist on fair play only when you yourself have been injured. That just does a tremendous – that record of Ted Cruz on Donald Trump with him and then against him, but only against him when Donald Trump has damaged him personally, that is just not an impressive record. It's just not an impressive record. And if you look at it in principle, you've got the argument, which I just made, that Rico put up on Ricochet, which is, look, for the next 108 days, you're either with Donald Trump if you're a working professional politician or you're helping Hillary Clinton, maybe unintentionally.

But that's the choice. It's the only choice you have for – yes, excuse me, for politicians for sure. And Ted Cruz went to the convention and failed to help Donald Trump. It just – I'm sorry. It was the one moment when i was not impressed in almost any way or at any level by ted yeah i would say two things i agree with you on that kind of like no you're in if you're in the party and you're on the dais that's you know you gotta you know sing the song they're gonna they're playing right marco rubio stayed away you could

have just stayed away just stay away if you don'tich stayed away. If you can't do it, you stay away. That's fine. On the other hand, I did – the ham-fisted reaction from the Cruz – the Trump campaign was idiotic. When they should have turned it in, should have said, we love it. Vote your conscience. Absolutely. You can't vote for a person who's put American servicemen at risk and all sorts of things. I mean they could have turned that into a positive. Let me interrupt for one second.

Vote your conscience. Vote your conscience. It's a meaningless thing to say. Who said that? Dennis Prager. Continue. Well, it's sort of meaningless. Who knows?

I mean it's meaningless enough that if you're the Trump campaign, you're in Trump world, you can say, yeah, vote your conscience. This is a vote about conscience. I mean every politician says that. Yes, yes. It's only if you secretly think, oh my god, you can't vote for this guy that you're mad that someone said vote your conscience. That's like having him say vote for the best person. Well, that's not an insult unless you think say, vote for the best person. Well, you know, that's not an insult unless you think your guy's not the best person. Anyway, all I could think of was that moment in

The Godfather when Michael Corleone, you know, when he's trying to figure out who's going to be treacherous. And it turns out that it's Tessio. Sal Tessio, played by... Oh, spoiler, man. Come on.

Yeah, well, played by A. Fagota. And Tom Hagen, who's like Robert Duvall, who's like the consigliere, says, wow, that's... I didn't think it was going to be Tessio. And Michael Corleone says,

no, it's the smart move. Tessio is always smarter. Meaning, if you're looking at this game, the pieces on the game board right now, it doesn't look like you want to... I wouldn't back Michael Corleone either. Of course, Tessio has got to die, but fine. What's weird about it is that I think Cruz thought that to himself.

I think he thought because he believes in this weird narrative stuff, this strange political pundit stuff that, okay, this is going to be my time for choosing speech. This is going to be my big speech at the convention that's going to kick off my 2020 campaign. And that's just wheels within wheels. If there's one thing we've learned from Donald Trump, and I'm thankful that he's taught us, is that a lot of these old-style mousetraps that people in politics build are totally done and finished. Ted Cruz is so smart and such a fundamentally good, good person. He'll be back, but in my judgment, it will take a while before people are willing to listen to him again. He'll be back but in my judgment it'll take a while before people are willing to listen to him again he'll be back hey Rob so while we're summing up

sum up the career of Roger Ailes well I'm news this week that Roger Ailes is stepping down as CEO of Fox News the operation that he himself built.

Everybody would agree. Mr. Rupert Murdoch put up the money, but everybody would agree it was Roger Ailes who built the organization. It's now 20 years and he's stepping down. He's stepping down under pressure for sexual harassment. And it's a very curious, I find it very curious. Look, Roger Ailes is a television genius. He started his career, I didn't start his career,

but when he was young, a young kid working on the Mike Douglas show in Philadelphia. And he was like an associate producer. He was in his 20s. And he was in 68, I believe, or 67. And then presidential candidate Richard Nixon was on the Mike Douglas show.

And I guess he was taking his makeup off or something, and he turned to the young associate producer Roger Ailes and said, how'd I do? Like just kind of making ridiculous small talk. And Roger Ailes said, terrible, you're terrible on TV. In that blunt Roger Ailes. So Roger Ailes was Roger Ailes even when he was the underling at a daytime talk show.

And that turned into a gig with the Nixon campaign which turned into a career in political sort of masterminding. Because, be it noted, Richard Nixon was willing to listen. Yeah, and he also knew that he was bad on TV. It's like he knew.

You don't go through 1960, the 1960 general and not learn a thing or two. So he – it is an interesting segue. A lot of people I know who are in that – who have been in that political game naturally gravitate to show business and entertainment because it's kind of the same thing. It's a little has no parking. That's a hard job. Getting people to go see your movie is not so hard comparatively.

So he did this amazing thing, and then he started – look, people forget. They always think, oh, well, Roger Ailes was just sitting at home and then Rupert Murdoch called him. No, Roger Ailes built MSNBC first. It was a station called America's Talking and in this one astonishing afternoon, he created an entire lineup that ironically included a show starring Roger Ailes called Straightforward or something. It was an interview show and he kind of did it off the cuff and it did really well. It did well enough that it turned into MSNBC and then he had success at that and was ideologically compatible to Rupert. So he then created Fox News and Roger Ailes' famous statement about Fox News is – people said, oh, well, it just appeals to conservatives. It's like a weird niche.

He goes, yeah, it's niche. It's 50% of the country. That's my niche. And he was right. And I know him. Not well, but I do know him. And I have no doubt. Here's the weird thing, and I shouldn't say this, but I'm going to say it anyway, because

if you're a Ricochet member and you're listening to this podcast, that's what you get. You get good inside stuff. If you like this inside stuff and you're not a member, join. I will say this. Roger is a blunt guy, and I'm sure he said those things. And I'm sure he said a lot worse to a lot of people. You don't look at Fox News and see the talent that's on there and not think to yourself, there's a guy in front.

He's got an eye for pretty women. But he is also, like his boss Rupert, ferociously loyal. The idea that anyone there would think that he would fire you for anything other than you – get fired by roger ailes if you're if you're a decent person and you've done a good job is really by or is really really hard you have to have like strangled an orphan you have to do some bad stuff and it is simply not credible that anyone even someone who had been subjected to this kind of like you unwanted notwithstanding, it is not credible that that person would fear for their career. He does not have manifest faults. I will say he probably has all sorts of sins hidden and not. He is fanatically devoted to his team and he's extremely loyal and he would never have fired Gretchen Carlson.

And may I add one? You're talking about talent? Yeah. One additional note further to your point. I did an interview with Roger at Fox News. I did it for Uncommon Knowledge. This must be five, six, something like that years ago. And by the way, if you're about to interview Roger Ailes, people at Fox News do help you out

to set up in the studio and so forth. But as I was waiting for Roger, I made a point of chatting with the lady who was making up with the guys who were fixing the lights with each of the cameramen with the crew. And do you know, I couldn't find anybody who hadn't been on the job at Fox News for at least a decade. And several of them had been there from the beginning. And they all loved Roger Ailes. And I don't mean they liked him or it was the best job or they all just loved Roger Ailes. And I'm talking about – I didn't mention this, did we?

That fellow who preceded Donald Trump last night, the billionaire who said, oh, yes, Donald Trump went over to a nondescript little man. Those were the words he used. I wrote them down. I found them so revolting. Nondescript little man whose son was – there were no nondescript little people in Roger Ailes' life. Nobody in his audience was a nondescript little person. Nobody at Fox, if you were sweeping the makeup, lights, floor sweepers, there were no nondescript people in that man's life. Well, that's the career, right? You bet. He was a television professional and he understood how a TV show works and it works predominantly by people like that.

That's what makes it work. Now, I mean he was clearly trying to downgrade Gretchen Carlson. Her ratings were not good. She was not strong. But the idea that she was going to lose her job, that's just not credible. I'm not saying it's not true. I'm saying that it doesn't ring true. Everything she says that – everything everyone else has said that Roger Ailes has said to them in the past, that rings true.

The guy is old school in the nicest possible way. Old school. But he is also fanatically, fanatically loyal. And that's one of the reasons I admire him. I admire the fact that he built this business. Now, if you cross him, he him, he's not a nice dude. And that way he does resemble his boss, Rupert, in that they don't throw people out. They really don't.

You have to – and even when they get rid of you, as I suspect will happen with Roger, there's a spectacular, spectacular package later. You're still in the family. When Rupert needed to make a big leadership change at the studio because that studio head was just not working out for a whole bunch of reasons including imperious crazy behavior. Not crazy behavior but imperious – that's what happens to all studio chiefs eventually. They start thinking that they're the Pope. He was exited with the world's greatest production deal ever written, including

episodic commitments from the studio and movie deals and stuff. He built a studio. He built a company off of that contract. I have no doubt that Roger will do the same. In fact, in his letter, I'm sorry, I know I'm going on,

but in his letter he said, I look forward to being a consultant later. And to me, that said it all. That said it all. I'm still here. The brain of Roger Ailes is still going to be hooked up to the giant Murdoch supercomputer because those guys are smart.

You don't take a Roger Ailes and put him out of the tent. I maybe watch Fox twice a year if I'm in a hotel and the pay-per-view options are scant. I just don't like it. It feels like it's 2002 every time I turn it on.

It used to be you hear that whoosh and that bong breaking news when they'd found another 50 bodies in the wreckage of the World Trade Center. And now it's because Donald Trump's plane has landed and is being restocked with entrees. I just – I don't watch it. And I'm happy not to because then people say, oh, you just get everything from Fox News. No, I don't. It is very amped up. So it's entirely true that the point of Donald Trump's campaign was to eventually

establish his own network along different lines. For those people who regard Fox either as too rhino or too, as Mark Levin was saying yesterday, or just too shallow. We'll see. I guess that's our motto for the rest of the year, isn't it? We'll see. 2016,

which some people say resembles a, you know, did Quentin Tarantino of the year, isn't it? We'll see. Yeah. 2016, which some people say resembles, you know, did Quentin Tarantino get the job to direct this year? Somebody noted on Twitter. Well, we'll see, won't we? In the meantime, of course, you can fill up your idle hours, if you have any, by going to thegreatcourses.com or ZipRecruiter or Harrys.com

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It will be meaningful to this company in a major major way and all we need is 1500 of you which is about 1% it's in the last day in the last thing we ask of you one we don't we don't ask a lot we ask for example you don't fast forward to my commercials I appreciate that we ask that you don't just go to

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That's how it works. Whatever comes in 2016, we'll be here together, fighting like good old families do. Peter, Rob, it's been a pleasure. We'll see everyone in the comments. It's a brand new gorgeous, might I add. Yes, yes, yes. Thank you, I add thank you James I know that you James has high standards

he was trepidatious well once they fixed that two pixel drop shadow problem I was on board now you're just showing off ok next week boys thanks fellas Ricochet! Join the conversation. © BF-WATCH TV 2021 ¶¶ Thank you.