The Young Turks - Caving to Pressure

Episode Date: May 11, 2022

Nancy Pelosi says that we need a strong Republican party . . . again! President Biden put the $10B COVID relief bill on the back burner to make sure $40B Ukraine war funding passes. The Senate on Monday easily cleared a bill to extend security protections to the immediate family members of Supreme Court justices. The bill passed the Senate by unanimous consent, meaning it passed without a formal vote. A former defense chief said Trump wanted to court-martial the retired Navy SEAL who led the bin Laden raid for criticizing him. Hosts: Ana Kasparian, Cenk Uygur ***  The largest online progressive news show in the world. Hosted by Cenk Uygur and Ana Kasparian. LIVE weekdays 6-8 pm ET.  Help support our mission and get perks. Membership protects TYT's independence from corporate ownership and allows us to provide free live shows that speak truth to power for people around the world. See Perks: ▶ https://www.youtube.com/TheYoungTurks/join SUBSCRIBE on YOUTUBE: ☞ http://www.youtube.com/subscription_center?add_user=theyoungturks FACEBOOK: ☞ http://www.facebook.com/TheYoungTurks TWITTER: ☞ http://www.twitter.com/TheYoungTurks INSTAGRAM: ☞ http://www.instagram.com/TheYoungTurks TWITCH: ☞ http://www.twitch.com/tyt 👕 Merch: http://shoptyt.com ❤ Donate: http://www.tyt.com/go 🔗 Website: https://www.tyt.com 📱App: http://www.tyt.com/app 📬 Newsletters: https://www.tyt.com/newsletters/ If you want to watch more videos from TYT, consider subscribing to other channels in our network: The Damage Report ▶ https://www.youtube.com/thedamagereport TYT Sports ▶ https://www.youtube.com/tytsports The Conversation ▶ https://www.youtube.com/tytconversation Rebel HQ ▶ https://www.youtube.com/rebelhq TYT Investigates ▶ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCwNJt9PYyN1uyw2XhNIQMMA Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to The Young Turks, the online news show. Make sure to follow and rate our show with not one, not two, not three, not four, but five stars. You're awesome. Thank you. Welcome to me on church, Jake, you've got to conspirator with you guys. You know what's going to happen today, the Democrats being peckless as always, Republicans being monsters, Donald Trump being, according to one of his own staffers, too stupid for words. All of that coming up on tonight's show. Casper, boom, right away, take it away. Let's do it. Let's get to our first story. Let's not waste any time. Rather than saying, well, we have to defeat them, no, let's just try to.

persuade them. I want the Republican Party to take back the party. Take it back to where you were where you cared about a woman's right to choose and you cared about the environment. And all the great, all the, hey, here I am Nancy Pelosi saying this country needs a strong Republican Party and we do, not a cult, but a strong Republican Party. When exactly did the Republican Party believe in a woman's right to choose? You just heard from the leader of the Democratic Party, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, saying again for, I don't know, it's been several times at this point, that she wants a strong Republican Party. The same Republican Party, by the way, which has fought tooth and nail against any type of action to combat climate change.

The same Republican Party that has stripped women of their, honestly, their control over their own bodies. The same Republican Party that has decided to focus all of their energy persecuting members of the LGBTQ community, including the parents of transgender children who happen to be too loving toward their children, who happen to provide the right type of health care to their children. Those are the people being persecuted by Republicans in this country. But for Nancy Pelosi, what she would like to see is more strength, Jank. More strength, strong Republican Party. That's what the country really needs.

So I'm going to decipher why she said that, because it seems unbelievable. Unless you live in Washington, in which case they think, oh, she nailed it. Master of legislator does it again, Supreme Goddess. In fact, we're going to get to that in a little bit. But before I do that, let me just say the second part that's egregious. She said that she doesn't want to defeat the Republican Party. She wants to persuade them. Well, that's obvious.

And she doesn't even really want to persuade them. But what is she done to persuade the Republican Party? I think her not wanting to fight them has been abundantly clear during her tenure. I mean, it's nonstop ass slap football. I don't know exactly what that means, but it sounds right. That's just slapping each other's ass. Go get them, your turn, your turn. Now you screw them and now I screw them and now I screw them.

It's, yeah, slap football. Pretty much. Yeah, now I made that up, but it sounds like that. Sounds fine. All right, so on her saying that the Republicans, she wants them to be stronger, that's the second time she said it. And she said, I want them to take back their party. So who is they? Given that 93% Republicans voted for Donald Trump in 2020, not 2016, 2020, they saw all the monstrous behavior, the insanity, the chlorox and the lungs, everything. And they were like, yeah, I'm here for it. So who is they? And this is important, guys.

She's talking at the Aspen Ideas climate conference in Miami. She's talking to- In Miami. Yeah, in Miami. She's talking to an intensely rich crowd, exactly her kind of crowd. The kind of crowd that thinks a Bonap home can win the Ukrainian war. And so if you notice when she said those insane, ludicrous things, they all plotted like, yes, yes, yes. And so what she's saying is, hey, donors, remember when the, you used to control us and the

Republicans, why don't you take your party back? Remember that the Republican Party is the original party of the corporate donors and the, and they're really rich, right? So she's like, why don't you take it back? And that way, we'll keep playing these nonsense games. Now, we'll agree on social issues like being pro-choice in climate change, although that is a lie. They've never agreed to there was only a couple of Republicans who did, but it was enough for the the optics of bipartisanship while they robbed us blind and handed all the money to the corporate donors. That's why it gets such a great applause line there when the rest of the country thinks, oh my God, what did she say? She's insane. Why is the leader of the Democrats in the House saying that she wishes these lunatic

Republicans who think the 2020 election was stolen, COVID is fake, et cetera, that they should be stronger. That's insanity. And that somehow she's going to magically persuade MAGA to be pro choice and in favor of climate change and being reasonable. But guys, we're going to show you there's articles today in Washington talking about how the Democratic Party needs more Nancy Pelosi's. Because to them, they don't see what we see. Everybody in Washington thinks she is brilliant and it's just an unbelievable leader for the Democratic Party and is super strong and fights Republicans better than anybody does. Yes, in Washington, there's a completely different cult to use her word. And that is got its alternative facts. And it is just as crazy as the Trump

cult. So let's get to the press and what they have to say about her. One other thing I do want to bring to your attention. And these are statements that she made during the same conference, this Aspen conference in Miami, I just think it's funny that this is like a climate change related conference by the Aspen Ideas climate group. And they're like, yeah, you know, Aspen sounds a little too cold. Let's do this in Miami and let's have a little fun. But anyway, that's beside the point. Sorry for the tangent. I had to bring that up. Let me also just get to what she had to say about Joe Manchin, right? Because one of the areas where we've been very critical of Democratic leadership, not just Nancy Pelosi, we've been talking to.

about Chuck Schumer, Joe Biden, even the heads of various important committees in the Senate, like the budget committee, Bernie Sanders, like please, for the love of God, call out your colleagues, all right, start playing hardball with members of your own party. We've seen how Republicans discipline their own to ensure that they fall in line. You don't see that with the Democratic Party, unless it has to do with progressives. Now, in regard to Joe Manchin, okay, when asked about Democratic Senator Joe Manchin, a centrist known for his record of opposing legislation that seeks to combat climate change. Pelosi responded, Joe Manchin and I are Italian American. We're Catholics. We have our friendship. I've helped him. Even though I think clean coal is an

oxymoron. And I've told the coal miners that I do believe in getting their benefits, whether it's pension or health care. What was that? No. Like what was that statement? That was a garbage statement. First of all, let me let me just be clear. And no offense to the Italian Catholics out there, okay? This has nothing to do with you personally. I don't care about Nancy Pelosi's identity. I don't care about her identity as a woman. I don't care about her identity as a San Franciscan. I don't care about her identity as a Catholic or as an Italian. All of that information is completely irrelevant to the fact that she is doing a poor job representing the interests of the very people who elected her in that position of power in the first place. She has failed the American

people. She has failed the Democratic Party. She has failed Democratic voters. And distracting us with like how she's this lovely Catholic woman. I don't care. Totally irrelevant. No one asked you about your identity. Yeah. So guys, again, in Washington and in in the media, they keep saying she's brilliant. You just heard that quote. That quote makes no sense at all. It's as incoherent as anything Donald Trump has ever said. They asked her, well, how are you going to get Joe Manchin to support legislation on climate change? It's a great question. And actually the most important question since he's blocking all of this and he owns a coal company. At the end of the answer, she got to, well, I've helped him with pensions and or I've helped

minors with pension in health care. What? Okay, but wait, what does that have to do? I mean, if you If she then connected it back to, and hence we're doing horse trading, and because they got the pensions, then he's going to vote with me on climate change. Okay, I said, okay, completely. I get it. No problem. And we're not talking about half a loaf and purity tests and any of that stuff. We're just talking about like, hey, how are you going to get into?

But remember, we're both Italian and Catholic and then pensions and blah, la, la, and I love Republicans. No, she's gone. She's gone. None of that makes any sense. So I swear to God, and for you that don't live in Washington, you just keep thinking, Chang, why are you emphasized this is so obvious, right? No, we're persona non grata in Washington because they find these things to be outrageous. They think, oh my God, what a great answer.

Of course, Italian, Catholic pension, that's how you're going to get mansion to do what? No, all of Washington has lost their goddamn minds. No, she needs to, she needs to go instantly. She's, do you think she's going to go up with a strategy to beat Republicans? No, no, we're totally and utterly screwed. These are our effectless, ridiculous, totally out of touch, clueless leaders. Well, let's reset for the next part of this story. Because while we've seen failure from Nancy Pelosi and Democratic leadership overall,

the corporate media loves to give them cookies. succeeded in stripping women's reproductive rights away from them, says that the country actually needs strong Republicans. She has said this multiple times, okay, not once, not twice, but actually several times. She has been on the record as the Democratic leadership calling for a strong Republican party. And so how is the corporate media covering that? Are they critical of the fact that Democratic leadership, including Nancy Pelosi, have only enabled and emboldened right-wing fascists in this country, they actually decided to give her cookies. So first, let me begin with Margaret Brennan. It's a very short clip, but it gives you a sense of how they typically frame

questions related to Nancy Pelosi and her leadership. You have been fighting for decades on this issue. No, Nancy Pelosi has not been fighting for decades on the issue of reproductive rights. And I want to make my case. I want to provide the receipts for that. The most recent receipt, by the way, is the fact that she is out there shilling for a Democratic incumbent by the name of Henry Quayar in Texas. And Henry Quayar, as some of you might already know, is the only Democrat who voted against codifying reproductive rights for women in the House. Why is she endorsing and shilling for Representative Quayar, who by the way, just had his home off, his home and office rated by the FBI, when she could be endorsing the progressive candidate in the race who does,

in fact, want to codify Roe v. Wade or codify reproductive rights. Now, the Hill also gave her some cookies recently in a piece titled, and by the way, this is not an op-ed. This is supposed to be straight news reporting. Abortion fight could cap Pelosi. long historic career written by Mike Lillis. Okay, so far I see some red flags. Seems like this is a little disconnected from reality, but who knows? Sometimes headlines are bad,

but the body of the piece is not so bad. And then you read it. Pelosi, the nation's first female speaker is well versed in the divisive fight, having been a champion of women's reproductive rights since long before her arrival in Congress Congress more than three decades ago. The piece continues with last week's blockbuster news that the Supreme Court is poised to overturn Roe v. Wade, the landmark 1973 ruling that legalized

abortion nationwide. Pelosi is a natural fit to play a leading role in the Democratic opposition to the potential decision heading into November's midterm elections, where Democrats are hoping the issue will drive abortion rights supporters to participate. Lillis also writes, quote, the protections provided by Roe remain overwhelmingly popular across the country. And some political experts predicted the Democrats plan to shine a bright light on the issue and have Pelosi take a lead on the messaging will pay dividends in the polls. Spoiler alert, it will not pay dividends in the polls. Nancy Pelosi was just at a conference specifically saying that the country needs strong. Republicans, the same party that has stripped women of their reproductive rights. And to be quite honest with you, she actually has a pretty long streak of failure when it

comes to women's reproductive rights. Let me give you one of those examples right now. To save the Affordable Care Act, Nancy Pelosi had to give into abortion opponents in her party and allow them to propose tight restrictions barring any insurance plan that is purchased with government subsidies from covering abortion. This is, by the way, a piece that was written in 2009, okay, when the debates over the Affordable Care Act were taking place. So rather than use her expertise, remember, she's supposed to be a master tactician. What she did was cave to the conservative elements within her own party and essentially ensure that there were very few protections, if any, for women and their reproductive rights in the Affordable Care Act.

In fact, she got a lot of criticism about this from women's rights activists, one who said this. If enacted, this amendment will be the greatest restriction of a woman's right to choose to pass in our careers, said representative, oh, Deanna DeGette. So this is actually a lawmaker at the time, a Democrat from Colorado. One of the lawmakers who actually left Pelosi's office angry after she tried to persuade Pelosi to not cave in to allegedly conservatives in the Democratic party. But let me also be clear about something. It's being reported or it was reported that it was Democrats that kind of persuaded her to have these anti-abortion measures in the Affordable Care Act. In reality, she caved immediately after meeting with the Pope. And the Pope urged her to,

you know, strip the Affordable Care Act of these types of protections to ensure that there wasn't any support for women seeking abortions. And she did exactly that. I mean, that's insane. Who cares what the Pope has to say? He's not American. I don't know if you know that. And we're not in theocracy.

We're not supposed to establish a religion. And today she's bragging about, oh, no, Joe, I can convince him because he's Italian and Catholic. Well, okay, where is it then? Why didn't you convince him on voting rights or $15 minimum wage or Roe? Why haven't you convinced them on anything? Guys, the poofs in the pudding. There are verifiable facts in the world.

So the nonstop ass-kissing by reporters like this. She said, we need more Nancy Pelosi. To do what? Okay, show me a major piece of legislation she's passed in her three decades. There's only one. Romney Care. Yeah, that's what Obamacare was called. Because before they called it Obamacare, it was Mitt Romney who passed it in Massachusetts when he was the governor there.

It was written by a right-wing think tank, the Heritage Foundation. So her only major legislative accomplishment in three decades is passing a piece of legislation that, by the way, mandates that you buy from private health insurers companies who are the Democratic Party's donors, written by a right-wing think tank. These are all verifiable facts. But in Washington, they go, no, her not passing anything except that one right-wing piece of legislation. Yes, the right has moved further right, and now they don't like Obamacare.

but it was originally their idea. And so that's her major accomplishment. And what is she done on Roe? Nothing. We just lost Roe on her watch. And when you ask, hey, what's your plan to convince mansion? We showed you the quote earlier in the show. She's like,

where I tell you, we're Catholic, there's a pension, there's mind workers. No answer at all. Totally incoherent, babble. So look, you have eyes and you have ears. You can tell who's right and who's wrong. Then the question is, why does the mainstream media filled with reporters and journalists write nonsense like this, especially on a day when she's saying, oh, I wish the Republicans were stronger? I think I'm going to persuade them to be pro-choice. You'd have to be a lunatic to believe that.

Yeah, exactly. And look, we're critical of Nancy Pelosi. Sometimes I feel like it's a little, a little bit unfair, not necessarily to. Pelosi, but because we tend to hyper focus on her. And the fact of the matter is there's Democratic leadership in the Senate. And I think Chuck Schumer deserves a ton of heat, a ton of backlash for his failures as well. Now, I think Chuck Schumer is a little smarter in that he avoids going to conferences to call for a strong Republican party. Like how stupid do you have to be to say that, especially right now. But Chuck Schumer is the person who's supposed to essentially

ensure that Democratic senators fall in line. And I mean, he's just so, it's he's so impotent. Like it's just, it's so, it's so sad. It really is sad to see. Yeah. And so it's not just Pelosi, it's Democratic leadership overall. And it's not just because they happen to be weak politicians, no, they're paid to be weak, right? When it, when it comes down to it, if they have to choose between serving the best interests of their constituents or carrying out the priorities of their donors, they're going to go with their donors every time. And we've seen that play out over and over and over again. There's many different cases I can point to, having nothing to do with reproductive rights, that prove it. When it comes to defense spending,

There is no problem. There isn't any Democrat, with the exception of like Bernie Sanders in the Senate, who's willing to go against authorizing the National Defense Authorization Act. When it comes to funding for Ukraine's military, oh, there's a lot of agreement there. In fact, there's a story later in the show about how Joe Biden has agreed to basically put COVID-related funding aside, put it on the back burner, meaning it'll never pass. So he can prioritize tens of billions of dollars in funding for Ukraine. I'm sure that'll play out real well for you, Biden, communicating to the American people that a foreign

country takes priority over your own people. Good luck with that. We'll see how that plays out. But I'm sure the Democrats and the corporate media will blame progressives for their failure because why? Is it progressives that decided to abandon the American people or is it the mainstream Democratic Party. Okay, so I'm going to read you a number of headlines from 2017. The cut had this headline, Pelosi, Democrats shouldn't focus on abortion access. Washington Post. Winner.

Democratic candidates should not, Pelosi, colon, Democratic candidates should not be forced to tell the party line on abortion. I'm going to read you one last one, but there's dozens of these. Pelosi, of quote, of course, Dems can be against abortion. No, she has not been a champion of abortion access. She's been the exact opposite. As recently as 2017 telling everybody, it's okay, nobody cares about abortion. And in fact, she in some of her previous comments said, it's hurting the party to focus on abortion.

And she opens with welcome arms abortion opponents, including right now. Today, she's campaigning for Henry Quayar, who is an abortion opponent, and by the way, voted to defund Planned Parenthood. She's trying to get him reelected so he can defund Planned Parenthood. Those are facts, and you could all look it up. But in Washington, they say she is the true champion of women's rights and fighting for abortion access. I mean, it's as close to a bald-faced lie as you can get. Now, to Schumer, Anna, look, we beat up on Schumer all the time. In fact, in this case, he deserves even more blame.

So Pelosi is rhetorically horrific, okay, just like literally saying, I would like to help the Republicans. But Schumer's the one actually helping them with his actions. He's not even going to bring up the filibuster for a vote again. So the voting on abortion right now in the Senate is a joke. They know they don't have 60 votes. They won't even vote on a thing that could get them to 60 votes. I'm sorry, they can get a win with 50 votes,

which is getting rid of the filibuster. And he's not even doing it. So all of this, the Democrats are nothing but theater. They're never, they're not helping you. They have a 20 year history. These exact leaders, Schumer, Pelosi, Biden have a history of not helping you. And the corporate media has a history of lying to do marketing on their behalf. You can look up to actual facts.

And so, and Anna, the reason why I get most animated about Pelosi, if that's the case, I would argue that I get quite animated about Biden and Schumer too. is that that's where the mainstream media does the most gaslighting. Like no one's ever called Schumer, no one's ever called Schumer a master legislator. They think he's employed as a leader. They have to kiss his ass. That's not your job as a reporter. Your job as a reporter is the challenge power, you losers.

Okay. God, you pathetic, absolutely pathetic, so-called press corps in Washington. But for Pelosi, they go out of their way. They're like, oh, just a brilliant, brilliant. legislator, okay, just stop lying. The gaslighting is just unbearable. Well, we got to take a brief break. When we come back, we've got more news for you. Actually, this whole show is pretty fiery and fun. Okay, so later in the show, we'll discuss a little bit about what we didn't know about Trump's administration, including his conspiracy theory

about China sending hurricanes over to the United States as a weapon. We'll get to the that, don't miss it. Take a brief break and we'll be right back. you guys forward t yt.com slash join for everyone else come be part of the change be part of the actual news in america anna well let's talk about joe biden and his losing strategy it seems like he's desperate to lose it's pretty pretty sad so let's discuss president joe biden decided to cave into pressure from right wingers in the senate to decouple a bill that would have included military spending for Ukraine, but also I would venture to say more importantly, it would also appropriate some funding for COVID related matters. Well, he's now decoupling it to ensure that

we prioritize military spending for Ukraine. And it's very unlikely that there will be any new funding allocated for COVID, which is an issue considering the fact that we are now having yet another wave of COVID. I would know since I got it again. But nonetheless, let me give you the details. Biden and Democratic leaders had hoped to move a coronavirus aid package alongside the Ukraine aid using the Ukrainian assistance as leverage to secure additional COVID funding. But Republicans balked. And you know what happens when Republicans balked. Democrats run away and cry about it. Republicans balked saying they would not approve new money to fight the pandemic without a vote on Biden's decision to end a Trump-era border policy known as Title 42. So Republicans, of course, are like, oh, yeah, oh, yeah, you want COVID-related funding included to make sure that people get tested, to make sure that people have access to monoclonal antibody treatments without going bankrupt.

Yeah, we're not willing to do that unless we involve yet another issue, and that has to do with expelling people at the border immediately and not allowing asylum seekers in. But remember, at the heart of this is funding for Ukraine, which is really, listen, we've said it a million times, we're not necessarily against helping Ukraine. I am against helping Ukraine in lieu of helping the American people. So let me be clear about that. And also the money, we all know what happens, right? It's a way of redistributing taxpayer money from the bottom to defense contractors. We know that Republicans love that because Republicans, much like Democrats, are heavily funded by private military contractors. So they want to do this for their donors.

If Biden was willing to play hardball, he could have gotten what he wants. But he's not willing to play hardball. So apparently he had a conversation with Mitch McConnell, I actually want to go to that graphic next. So Manu Raju reported that McConnell says he called Biden last week and asked them to separate out Ukraine aid from COVID aid. He said Biden told him he would think about it and called back just 15 minutes later and said he agrees.

I think we are on the path to getting it done, McConnell said of Ukraine. Loser. Okay, total loser, total loser. How, like, Biden and Democratic leadership, how do you think this plays out for you to essentially message to the American people that we are willing to send tens of billions of dollars in military aid to Ukraine, but we can't even appropriate a measly 10 billion for COVID-related spending to make sure people can get tested, to make sure people can get treated. It's just, it is unreal. They are absolute losers. Now, I'll tell you what Biden's strategy is to win in a second. But, Jake, I want to open this up to you.

Yeah, so let's be clear on a bunch of things. So they're going to help Ukraine before they help America. We want to help Ukraine, but we also want to help American citizens. Doing it at the same time, perfect. But if you're going to prioritize, you could go with what Republicans say, What's the phrase? America first. Now, what Biden could have done if he was a strong leader and if he actually believed anything he says is he could have said, no, Mitch, go ahead and eat it. And here's what I mean by that. You go publicly and tell the American people, you do not

want to give them COVID relief. I'm asking for one third to America, I'm sorry, one quarter to America out of the 40 billion, and three quarters of Ukraine. And you're going to say no to the one quarter, one quarter that's going to America. Go ahead, do it. I dare you to do it. And I'm going to kick the living crap out of you in the elections and say, Mitch McConnell didn't want you to get relief. He wanted you to get more sick. He wanted you to get COVID. All of our COVID problems are because of Mitch McConnell. He wouldn't do the funding. He wouldn't do the goddamn funding. It's so simple. And then, by the way, Mitch, you're blocking the Ukraine funding, which I know you don't want to block because that's your defense contractor donors and they're

going to kick your ass if you block that funding, right? But hey, have that it, host. I'll go on TV and say, Ukrainies need our help, and Mitch McConnell's helping Russia by blocking the funding to Ukraine. What a monster. Those are two giant wins. Instead, Biden, like the absolute pathetic weakling that he is, called back 15 minutes later. Okay, Mitch, I'll do it. I'll do anything to us, and by the way, that is the career of Joe Biden. And we told you during the primaries. And mainstream media is like, you are so rude for pointing out the actual history of Joe Biden. We're all supposed cover for him. No, we're not. No, we're not. We're supposed to be reporters and tell people the truth. What is Biden done his entire career? Cave into Mitch McConnell. I can give you dozens

of examples, but the one that I point to because even corporate Democrats were like, Joe, Jesus, Christ, this was a bridge too far, was he when he made 94% of the Bush tax cuts for the rich permanent under Obama. Biden negotiated that with McConnell and gave him everything he wanted. Biden is a Trojan horse for Republicans. You put him in, pretend he's a Democrat, and his job is to call back 15 minutes later and go, yes, sir, you're my actual boss, sir. I'll do anything you say. Remember all this stuff and they're still saying it. Oh, Biden, listen to Bernie too much. Okay, name a policy of Bernie's that passed. None, zero. The bare minimum was $15 minimum wage. Voting rights, none of it passed. None of it passed. Name a policy

that McConnell likes? I can show you a dozen that passed. I can show you two dozen that. that past. We don't have a Democratic president. We have a Democrat who's a servant of Republicans like Mitch McConnell. These are obvious facts. By the way, later, you know what the Republicans will do? They'll say, can you believe that Biden did the aid for Ukraine, but not for America? No. That's exactly right. That's exactly right. They'll just use it against them. They'll say, they'll say that they're America first. Exactly. That they would have ensured that Americans got everything they needed and that Americans would be prioritized before any other foreign country. I mean, they would lie because fact of the matter is Biden caved to the Republican Party

and cave to military contractors who serve as donors for both parties. But it doesn't matter. Republicans succeed in lying. They succeed in lying and they can point to exactly what Biden was willing to do today. By the way, let's go to graphic four here. Biden's decision to separate the two bills should help clear the way for congressional approval of nearly 40 billion dollars in funding for Ukraine, but leaves in limbo a $10 billion pandemic relief bill. So even by the way, even if they did succeed, if Biden did succeed in getting this bill passed without decoupling those two provisions, it still doesn't look so great when you're allocating $40 billion for Ukraine, another round of funding, by the way, it's not like this is the first

round of funding. And then you compare that to the 10 billion that would go to the American people for coronavirus. Yeah, I just, it's bad. So let's let's go ahead. Can I just say one quick thing there? And just so in case you're wondering, like, wow, man, they care so much about Ukraine. Yeah, sure, there's, they do care a little bit about the Ukrainians. They care about weakening Russia, et cetera. But mainly the reason why they're all animated is because all of money is going to the defense contractors. And so when Biden says we had to pass it right away, that's why I couldn't delay. I had to agree with McConnell. That's actually not true. The weapons are already made and being sent to Ukraine. What we're paying for is weapons that are going to be

made later to replenish our stocks. So there's no emergency at all. Every part of it is a lot. Now, what is Biden planning to do to win re-election, to ensure that Democrats don't take a beating during the midterm elections? We'll get a load of this. This is a headline from the Hill. Biden seeks to frame election as choice between Democrats and MAGA GOP. Oh, wow, that sounds like a totally new strategy that Democrats have never tried before. I wonder if it'll work. So in other words, we didn't get you anything except for some coronavirus relief early on in my presidency and a bipartisan corporate handout bill that has some provisions that might benefit you a little bit in the coming years. But vote for us because GOP bad, Orange Man, bad, which by the way is true. But I would venture to say, and we have case

studies from the past to refer to, to prove my point here, people don't get excited to show up to the polls to prevent another party from winning. People get excited to show up, to take time out of their day, to use up their own resources to go to the polls and vote because they're excited about a party or they're excited about a particular candidate. But even that, Jank, Even that strategy, he's not even really going to do that strategy. No. Because like he's making calls, he's like home boy McConnell, what do you think I should do with decoupling this, you know, defense industry handout versus COVID relief? Yeah.

And then he'll take orders for Mitch McConnell as if he's not the president, as if Mitch McConnell's the president of the United States, the unelected leader of the United States. Things are actually a little bit worse than you just stated. So let me explain why. First, on that COVID bill, it's gone. It has no chance of passing now. Its best chance of passing was forcing the Republicans to defy their donors in the defense industry. Without that leverage, well, then obviously it's not going to get any Republican votes and

we can't break the filibuster, so it has no chance of passing. So he gave up on it. Let's just be super clear about that. And by the way, Republicans want COVID to get worse so they can blame Biden for it. And by a lot of the press is helping him now. I've seen a lot of articles about like, well, COVID, there's another round of it. It must be Biden's fault. Meanwhile, Mitch McConnell blocked aid going to help on COVID response, and Biden agreed with

him. And now there's going to be no help for COVID. And McConnell's laughing his ass off of what an idiot Joe Biden is. It was so easy to block the COVID response, and they're going to blame Biden for it. Now, the part where Anna explained that this is a new strategy where Biden is going to fight the GOP. Think about that, guys, and it's not an exaggeration. You could read any Main Street media article today, almost anywhere. And they're like, Joe Biden taking a risky move.

He's now going to frame things as Democrats versus Republicans. Well, what the hell was it? Of course it's Democrats versus Republicans. For him to actually dip his toe into fighting Republicans, they're like, whoa, big move by the Democratic leader. He's thinking about representing his own party during the elections. And maybe even fighting a tiny bit, tiny, tiny, tiny bit against the Republicans. And by the way, he's not wrong to be scared in the sense that what did the mainstream media do? A lot of the articles are like, well, I don't know.

He said he was going to unify. He said he was going to do bipartisanship. Is this breaking his promise? I mean, he promised to be right in between Mitch McConnell and Donald Trump's ass cheeks. And it looks like he's not fully in. God damn it, right? the lunatics in Washington think that the Democrats shouldn't fight the Republicans, that it's uncivil.

They want Democrats to take on GOP messaging. So final thing on this, Mike Mori, who's a Democratic strategist, a real winner, had this to say about Biden's strategy and what he needs to do to win. quote, Biden needs to make sure every American knows that Republicans have a plan to raise taxes on your small business. So basically co-opped right wing messaging about taxes. Okay, he continues, Biden needs to be aggressive in telling every small landscaper, home bakery, Etsy-based business, and home child care company that Republicans don't think you pay enough in taxes. If they take control of Congress, they will raise your taxes. That is word for word, Republican campaign

messaging, word for word. So is Mike Mori a Democratic strategist or is he a Republican strategist? And also, it doesn't matter exactly. I mean, it's same thing at this point. And also, it's probably not going to work when, because look, that's messaging that would theoretically appeal to small business owners, small vendors who sell on platforms like Etsy. He apparently doesn't know that the IRS under the Biden administration decided to target not wealthy corporations that are evading taxes, but specifically small businesses and vendors who allegedly aren't paying enough in taxes. That didn't happen under Trump. That happened under Biden. Yeah. And so like the messaging, like it just, it wouldn't even work for the people that

specifically trying to target here and besides which it's just GOP messaging. It's not going to work. How about you give people something, right? Something substantive, something that materially improves their lives. Why don't you do that? But that's that's a no go because that would actually mean that Biden would have to go against corporate donors, possibly raise taxes on corporations and the rich to help fund for programs that actually are incredibly popular among the American people. And even when it comes to reproductive rights, guys, I mean, codifying reproductive rights isn't going to take much money, if any money at all. They're not even willing to fight for that, even though 70% of Americans support Roe v. Wade and do not want to overturn it.

Now, Democrats love to lose. They're addicted to it, addicted to it. I mean, I've never seen addiction like this in my life. And just if you're wondering, why are business owners have to be tiny, tiny percentage of the electorate, why are they framing all their message towards business owners? That's because they're the top donors. That's why the Democratic strategist is like, now here's our plan to make sure that we please all the business owners in the country. Okay, but how are you going to win the election? The election, I know how you're going to raise money and stuff it into your pockets. They're just, they're the worst of the worst. So okay, and there's, you know, still people who believe in New York Times and

MSNBC and CNN and they'll say, no, Jake, you guys are being really rude. Biden and Pelosi and Schumer are doing four-dimensional chess. That's the, you say that about Obama too. Oh, at the end, at the end, we're going to win on all of our policies. We've won on none of them. And we're not going to win on any of them. And Joe Biden and Pelosi and Schumer are going to absolutely butcher this 22 election. It's going to be, even with Roe, with 70, of the country on our side, that's their opportunity to make a comeback and actually win these elections. And they're going to blow it because they're losers. They're weak. And they actually work for the Republicans. So they're going to find a way to bungle it when 70% of the

countries on their side. They're the worst of the worst. Well, when we come back from the break, don't worry. There's plenty of criticism for the Republican Party as well, including some of the more unhinged revelations involving Donald Trump, don't miss it, we'll be right back. For everybody on YouTube, you know the button's right below to join. Everybody else, t.yt.com slash join. Anna. We've heard many stories about Donald Trump and his willingness to use pretty questionable methods to retaliate against people who criticize him. We've got another example. This one also pretty extreme.

Donald Trump apparently wanted to court-martial, a retired Navy seal. In fact, a Navy seal who led the Bin Laden mission, and it's all because he had the audacity to criticize Trump publicly. Now, Trump apparently wanted to take the extraordinary step of reactivating retired U.S. Navy Admiral William McRaven so that he could court martial the former Navy SEAL commander for criticizing him. In fact, this is one of the latest revelations that we're now learning about through former Secretary of Defense Mark Esper. Esper also writes that he and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, General Mark Millie, had to talk then President Trump out of a plan to recall both retired U.S. Army General Stanley McChrystal and McRaven

to duty, to active duty, as a way to open the two former senior military officers up to court-martial proceedings. Now, Esper told him, listen, this is not a good idea, it's going a backfire, we shouldn't do it. Esper also writes that Trump was spun up by media stories in Breitbart claiming that McChrystal was advertising Democrats on how to use artificial intelligence to track down and counter Trump supporters. So I got more on this story, but it did remind me of an interview that Trump had with Chris Wallace, who was at Fox News at the time before he jumped ship for CNN. And he was very triggered by McRaven. Let's hear what he had to say at the time. Bill McRaven, retired admiral, Navy SEAL, 37 years, former head of U.S. Special

operations. Special operation. Special operation. Excuse me. Hillary Clinton fan. Who led the operations, commanded the operations that took down Saddam Hussein and they killed Osama bin Laden. It says that your sentiment is the greatest threat to democracy in his lifetime. He's a Hillary Clinton. backer and an Obama backer. And frankly, it's a Navy seal. Wouldn't it have been nice if we got Osama bin Laden a lot sooner than that? Wouldn't it have been nice? Backer? Backer. Like Trump always sounds like he's climaxing when he's talking. It's very uncomfortable. But anyway, no, I mean, wouldn't it be better if we caught Osama bin Laden faster?

I mean, did you think that you would catch him faster? I mean, like, what kind of critique is that? It's hilarious. By the way, to be fair, there was a moment, if I recall correctly, during the Bush administration where they could have captured Osama bin Laden, but they let that opportunity go. But putting that aside completely, no, this is a guy who can't handle any criticism and will turn to any type of questionable method to retaliate against those who do. dare cross him. And honestly, I wish that we could bottle that up and inject like one third of that into the Democratic Party. Just keeping it real. Yeah. Well, thank you for putting that uncomfortable thought into our heads. Look at the backer. Backer. Norway. Norway. Okay. Anyways.

So, look, guys, in the old days, if you had anyone saying the head of Navy SEALs that captured bin Laden should be court-martialed because he dared to criticize me. By the way, again, from the party that says they're for free speech, hilarious. In the old days, that would have been incredibly damaging. That would have ended a politician's career, especially if it was a Democrat. Now is it going to make a difference? Of course not. It's just so easy.

The MAGA guys will believe anything. Before they're like, Navy Steel Team 6, that's a real man, okay? Now these people are going into the wrong bathrooms. Oh, they're Neil Seel Team 6. Now Trump says, I don't like them. They're Hillary Beckers. Now all the Magger goes to be like, oh, Navy Steel Team 6, man. They're going to the wrong bathrooms.

They're the worst. We should block them. Oh, hey, Navy Shield Team 6. Oh, yeah. They're the worst. They're betas. They'll do it. They'll flip on a dime.

It doesn't matter. All he has to do, anything that comes out of that idiot's mouth, the other idiot's parrot, Nothing matters. And now, and look at where he got the theory about McChrystal, the other general. McChrystal, by the way, was fired for criticizing Obama publicly. I see a TYT contributor, Michael Hastings, broke that story. And McChrystal was, like, relieved of duty.

Like, so McChrystal is no liberal at all. He's just, he's like, hey. No, no, no. I mean, you're talking about Obama here. But McChrystal, he's a big Hillary Clinton. Back guy. That's nice. So he's referring to McRaven on that one from McChrystal.

Like there's nothing to say that he, but Breitbart. Brightbart wrote an article about how he's actually using artificial intelligence to help the left track Trump supporters. Really? They tracked them to what? When did that ever happen? No, it's amazing. It's amazing. Sorry, Jake, I know I'm interrupting you too much.

I'm playing your role today. role today. But no, let me just make a quick point. Sorry, let me just make a quick point. Like Breitbart and all of these right wing publications and, you know, the shows, like they know they're doing propaganda and they know they're deceiving right wing voters, right? But like, Trump isn't smart enough to know that. So he takes what they report at face value. And it's just so hilarious. No, that's actually exactly what I was going to get to. Trump is the original conspiracy theorist. And guys, it's like, it's not a strategy.

He actually believes it. You give him any conspiracy theory, and he'll believe it. I mean, later in the show, we're going to tell you one of his own staffers said that he thought that China might be firing hurricanes at us from a hurricane gun. Remember, he's their original. He's the original birther when Obama, you know, the whole asking for the birth certificate, the long-form bursor, that was Donald Trump. And he genuinely believes it.

He's cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs. So, yeah, of course he believes this stuff. And it's outrageous that he's attacking the guy who got bin Laden, but Magan will not be outraged. They will flip all their positions instantly. But one more thing about that, Anna. And you remember how the press told us our whole lives that the Republican voters cares about care about the deficit, they care about free trade,

and they care about all. That was all made up. That's what the donors and the corporations cared about. And they put that on Republican voters. Republican voters never cared about any of that stuff. All they wanted was an authoritarian leader who would say absurd things and hate the other side. That's exactly what Trump is. One of the dumbest guys in the world and the Republican voters are like, that's it.

That's my guy. That's my guy. The only thing they care about is hating the other side. Well, I mean, look, Donald Trump provides entertainment for them. They love going to his rallies because they find it entertaining. Donald Trump has created this reality show atmosphere in politics, which, you know, usually overwhelmingly Americans are not paying attention to politics. But he like radicalized and politicized a bunch of people and honestly made them far more extreme on the right. And

what is the Democrat response to that? The Democrat. I mean, but that's the point. That's the point that I'm trying to make, right? So it's one thing to be critical of right wing voters, but right wing voters are getting something from their party. Whereas on the Democratic side, like what are we getting other than, sorry, we can't do anything for you because we have all of these like random arbitrary like roadblocks that we refuse to do anything about. We just like to use them as excuses. Also, oh my God, the election is coming up. So magabad, vote for us. Okay, good job.

Anna, you know, I really got to disagree with you on this one. Because the Democrats also have dynamic leaders in Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden. I know, Jenk, but you know, the other thing that you failed to mention is that Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer and Joe Biden are Hillary Clinton backers. Backer. So something to think about. But they really are, actually. And I meant they even like Norway. No, do not like Norway.

They're like, stop telling us about how great things are in Norway. We're not going to do any of that for you. Buzz off. That's true. That's the message from the Democratic Party. Anyway, all right, well, we, you know what? I'm going to break all the rules. Ashwarya, I'm breaking the rules.

I'm going over. Okay, we're going to do one more story right now. We're breaking it. By the way, Ashwari is looking at me like, okay. Right, well, we all are actually, to be honest. Wow, big rule breaker doing another story. Okay, go ahead. Big break energy.

All right. Rule breaker. Rule breaker. All right, so let's take a trip to Hurricane Trump. Donald Trump was apparently concerned that China was going to send some serious weapons to the United States. And the weapon would be hurricanes, literally. He believed that China had the capacity, the ability, the capability to send hurricanes to the United States. This was during the beginning of his term.

Of course, we're learning about this now, thanks to former Defense Secretary Mark Esper. And here's what we know. Trump's question to other officials was whether China had the technology to create manmade hurricanes and then to deliberately send them to the United States. The repeated inquiries led to some in the administration referring to it as the then president's hurricane gun thing.

In fact, one former official who spoke to Rolling Stone said this. It was almost too stupid for words. I did not get the sense he was joking at all. Another source also said, I kept it together until I got back to my office. I do not know where the then president would have heard about that. He was asking about it around the time, maybe a little before. He asked people about nuking hurricanes. And he did in fact think of nuking hurricanes.

That was something that we covered at the time. But he believes in all sorts of crazy things, including the idea that wind might actually lead to severe consequences for your health. If you don't remember that, let's take a look. If you have a windmill anywhere near your house, congratulations. Your house just went down 75% in value. And they say the noise causes cancer. You tell me that one, okay?

You know, the thing makes it. And of course, it's like a graveyard for birds. I just want to apologize for misinterpreting what Trump had said years ago. It's not that the wind from the windmills caused cancer. It's that the sound from the windmills cause cancer. Yeah. It's not to clarify. It was really ironic too because he accidentally gave cancer to all of his supporters there

because he said, wow, wow, and the same noise. on the same noise. What are you doing? That's a super spreader event for cancer. Okay. To be fair to Trump, you know I'm not going to be fair to Trump. Okay, so let's just skip that part. No, by the way, I actually will be later in this story.

But how would China make hurricanes? He's like, I don't know. Everything's made in China. What if a billion people, they got a billion people? What if a billion people got together and we're like, Would it make a hurricane could? It could. All right.

No, seriously, I will be friendly Trump in that notice, like everybody's saying hurricane gun, but Trump never said hurricane gun. Read this story carefully. His staffers started calling it Trump's hurricane gun thing. Trump had the theory that China was manufacturing hurricanes. He was sending it over to us, but he can call it a hurricane gun. But on the hurricane nuke, that is now multiple sources confirming. He's like, descending to hurricanes, we don't like the hurricanes, can we nuke them?

And in case you don't remember that story, his staffers had to explain to the moron. Sir, if we launched a nuclear missile into a hurricane, the only thing that it would do is it would release the radiation inside a hurricane, headed towards us and then it would swirl the radiation around and then spread it all across America. So that's why it's not a great idea. So you're saying we shouldn't do it. Yes, Mr. President, we are saying you shouldn't nuke a hurricane that will not help. It will be counterproductive. But look, you know, it's easy to make fun of the guy, but man, he won the presidency once. And then he nearly wanted a second time. So a lot of a lot of Republicans saw that and thought, that's my boy.

I know. And right now, I mean, a million things could change from now till 2024. But it looks like he's poised to win again. God helps. I know, I know. All right. Well, that fun story helps to wrap up our first hour. But when we come back for the second hour, we're going to dunk on.

A felon, Dinesh D'Souza, and some of the infighting that's now taking place within the right wingers. He's mad that he's not getting appropriate kudos and airtime for his sham documentary. So we've got that and more coming right up. Wind, windmills, whey, backer. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks. Support our work, listen to ad-free, access members, only bonus content, and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple. I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.