The Young Turks - Dubya.T.F. Bro

Episode Date: July 15, 2021

Democrats propose a $3.5 Trillion budget to advance the Infrastructure deal. Lawmakers grapple with nagging infrastructure details, like how to pay for it. George W. Bush says ending the U.S. military mission in Afghanistan is a mistake. Biden’s DHS Secretary tells pro-democracy Cubans DO NOT COME to the United States. A Fox Business guest calls it “troubling” that wages have gone up. 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 friends. You're watching The Young Turks. I'm your host Anna Casparian and we have a bonanza. It's a bonanza show. You're going to love it. You're going to love every minute of it. We're going to talk about infrastructure, we're going to have a historian on to help us break down George Bush's hurt Feefees over the Afghanistan withdrawal and also the fact that suddenly the GOP is concerned about the cruelty toward Cuban refugees. It's one of my favorite stories. We'll get to that a little later. In the

second hour of course John Ida Rola will be joining me to you know break down some serious stories but I do promise you we're gonna have a lot of fun in the second hour, including a Fox co-host who apparently has a difficult time telling the difference between China and Japan because it's Fox, so I guess we shouldn't be that surprised. But as I always try to do, please remember to like and share the stream if you're watching us online. It's a good way to smash that like button, help TYT out with the opaque, sometimes opaque algorithm and get the message out about this show and what we're trying to do in spreading the progressive message. So with that said, why don't we move on to our first story.

I do want to give you guys some updates on the infrastructure bill, both the bipartisan bill and the reconciliation version of the bill. And unfortunately, we do start off with what appears to be good news, but I'm gonna be a little bit of a Debbie Downer. So let's get started. A dozen Senate Democrats have reached a $3.5 trillion infrastructure deal. This is the reconciliation version of the infrastructure deal, which is supposed to pass in the Senate with a simple majority, meaning that you wouldn't need to deal with the filibuster that requires 60 senators to vote in favor of it. Now, this is the bill that's supposed to have all of the provisions that the by

bipartisan group did not want in the bipartisan version of the bill. So all the good stuff is supposed to be included in this version of the bill. And to be quite honest, we don't have too many specific details about what's included. I do have some vague details to share with you. But for the purposes of this discussion, I think it's important to focus on the likelihood of this passing, even with a simple majority in the Senate, and also what the strategy is for Senate Democrats in getting this done. Now as I mentioned, it's just 12 Senate Democrats who have reached a deal on this $3.5 trillion infrastructure plan. And it was not clear, this is important,

it was not clear if all 50 lawmakers in the Democratic caucus, which includes centrists unafraid to break with their party like Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Senator Kirsten of Arizona have signed off on the blueprint. And that's really. the most important part of this story. Now, President Joe Biden met with a group of Senate Democrats today urging them to support this bill. The so-called moderate Democrats, I prefer to call them corporate Democrats or just conservative Democrats, have not committed to approving or voting in favor of this bill.

So that's an important part to focus on, because this legislation can include everything we've ever dreamed of. If the Senate Democrats don't have a strategy or plan in place to apply the necessary pressure to get the Joe Manchin's of the Senate to vote in favor of it, it's not gonna pass. You literally need every single Democratic senator to approve it. Now with that said, unfortunately we've already gotten a bit of a statement from Senator Joe Manchin. He tweeted the following.

My statement on the Senate Budget Committee's $3.5 trillion infrastructure package. I know my Democratic colleagues on the Budget Committee have worked hard and I look forward to reviewing their agreement. I'm also very interested in how this proposal is paid for and how it enables us to remain globally competitive, I will reserve any final judgment until I've had the opportunity to thoroughly evaluate the proposal. So that's not a good sign because Joe Manchin is using the exact same talking points that he used in essentially serving as an obstacle in other Biden agendas, other parts of Biden's

agenda, including the coronavirus relief package. Remember, it's always how are we going to pay for this? Is he really concerned about how they're going to pay for it? Or is he providing various obstacles to ensure that his corporate donors are happy with his stalling and with his blocking of these types of bills. We'll see, but it doesn't look good with Joe Manchin as part of this equation, but he's not the only one. Obviously, Kirsten Cinema is a problem. Chris Coons is another corporate Democrat in the Senate who could serve as a problem. As we all know, eight Senate Democrats voted against a $15 an hour minimum wage. So right now, as it stands, there really isn't a full proof agreement among Senate Democrats on this $3.5 trillion bill.

Now, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, the liberal chairman of the Budget Committee, and Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, who's pretty, he's a corporate Democrat himself and is a key moderate negotiating the details of this bipartisan framework also confirmed their support for the agreement. In fact, why don't we go to this video of Senator Sanders announcing that they've reached this agreement. This was late last night. Let's hear what he had to say. This is in our view, a pivotal moment in American history. And for a very long time, the American people have seen the very rich getting richer and government developing policies which allow them to pay in some cases, not a nickel in federal income taxes. They've seen

corporations make huge profits. In some cases, they have paid a nickel. with taxes. And what this legislation says among many, many other things, that those days are gone, the wealthy and large corporations are going to start paying their fair share of taxes so that we can protect the working families in this country. But are they? Are they going to pay more in taxes? Because we do hear from some of these corporate Democrats who are kind of pumping the brakes in that regard. Warner, Senator Mark Warner, said the plan would be fully paid for, though Democrats did not offer specifics about how they plan to do so. Discussions of how to raise that money are expected to continue in the coming days. And that's really the question that Senator

Joe Manchin is concerned about. The wealthy do not want to see an increase in their tax rates. Corporations do not want to see an increase in their tax rates. And really the only way to pay for this without implementing regressive taxes that harm lower income workers is to ensure that you raise taxes on the rich. So some of the things that have been floated so far, an increase in the capital gains tax rate, raise the taxes on, you know, inheritances, so estate taxes, also raise taxes on oversee profits, which I think is incredibly important, right? Because it not only provides revenue for the federal government to pay for this more robust reconciliation version of the infrastructure package. It also discourages corporations from

shipping jobs abroad, right? It would be potentially more affordable for things to be manufactured here in the United States as opposed to other places. And also shift tax incentives away from fossil fuel companies and reward. renewable energy companies with these tax incentives instead. So the climate action is certainly baked into this more robust version of the infrastructure bill. It also calls for an increase in what's covered under Medicare. So the dental and vision would be included. There are all sorts of wonderful parts of this infrastructure deal.

But the question is, will it pass in the Senate? Again, you need every single Democrat to vote in favor of it, and then you need Vice President Kamala Harris to also break the tie in the Senate if we hopefully get there. And so one thing I also want to note is there is one specific senator that I'm gonna call out, a Democratic Senator Robert Menendez, who is clear in wanting to protect very specific donors, and that's the pharmaceutical industry. Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey, whose state is home to many big-name pharmaceutical manufacturers, including Merck & Company and Johnson & Johnson, has objected, objected to using the industry

as a, quote, piggy bank, end quote, to fund other priorities. In fact, he says, we keep taking money from the pharmaceutical industry, and then we never see the reduction in the cost of prescription drugs. How is that solving the problem? I'll let you guys decide whether or not that statement makes any sense at all, but Senator Menendez probably thinks that no one's paying attention and that he can say whatever he wants to protect his corporate donors and no one will ever punish him for it electorally. But just know that there are a handful of Democratic senators who will serve as a problem moving forward in regard to this infrastructure bill, and they should be known. Robert Menendez is certainly one of them. Now, a few other details I want to share with you in regard to what this bill includes.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said that the resolution would call for an expansion of Medicare to provide money for dental, vision, and hearing benefits. Incredibly important. It is also likely to extend a temporary provision in the president's pandemic relief law that greatly expands subsidies for Americans purchasing health care through the Affordable Care Act. One other thing that it does, which is also incredibly important, is it makes permanent the child tax credit that was implemented for one year in the Biden coronavirus relief package. Biden working with Sanders wants to make pre-kindergarten access

universal for two years. Pre-access, I'm sorry, let me say that again, Biden working with Sanders wants to make pre-kindergarten access universal and two years of community college free to all Americans. He should also cancel all federal student loan debt at a minimum. I mean, it's just, it's insane that he hasn't done that yet. It would make him a wildly popular president if he just did that alone. But of course, we don't want him to do just that alone. We want to get this package passed. And unfortunately, what we're seeing so far from the dozen Democrats who have reached this agreement for the $3.5 trillion infrastructure plan, they just have. haven't expressed any type of strategy.

There might be some negotiating happening behind the scenes, maybe carrots and sticks are being utilized behind the scenes, but so far I personally don't feel very confident about this package passing, because you already have very public statements from corporate Democrats who are allegedly concerned about the cost or the pay-for's. No one was really that concerned about how much it would cost

to cut taxes for the rich as part of Trump's tax cuts in 2017. That cost the federal government $2 trillion, nearly $2 trillion over the next 10 years. But no one was worried about that. They passed that bill through reconciliation. Because when Republicans want something, they get it. And they'll stop at nothing to get what they want. I mean, I know it's a completely different situation, but you look at the state of Texas and how they're trying to pass incredibly restrictive voting laws there.

And, I mean, Governor Greg Abbott is ready and willing to arrest Democratic state lawmakers who fled the state in order to prevent the quorum necessary for a vote on that piece of legislation. Like, they'll stop it nothing to ensure that they get what they want. The question is, are Democratic senators who are in favor of this deal going to hold members of their own party accountable and apply the pressure necessary to ensure that they vote in favor of this. Joe Manchin's got super thin skin. All it took was Kamala Harris going to West Virginia and doing a few interviews in favor of the coronavirus relief package. And he shouldn't even

name Joe Manchin during those interviews. But it was clear that she was rallying support for the coronavirus relief package, something that Senator Manchin was serving as an obstacle for in terms of its passage. And he was crying and whining about it because it doesn't like to be held accountable. So hold him accountable and don't stop until he agrees to vote in favor of the bill. And do the same with other corporate Democrat lawmakers

who think they can get away with serving the best interests of their corporate donors as opposed to their constituents who happen to find the human infrastructure component of Biden's agenda wildly popular, Upwards of 70% of Americans are in favor of those provisions. So get it done. You've got the public support.

Now you've got to play hardball. Well, moving on to the bipartisan version of the infrastructure bill. Looks like there are quite a few obstacles in the passage for that legislation as well. So I want to talk about that quickly. GOP senators who took part in the bipartisan Senate negotiations for the bipartisan, and infrastructure deal, you know, the deal that only includes physical infrastructure like roads and bridges, they're having a hard time getting the 10 Republicans necessary in the Senate to vote in favor of that bill so it can pass. So this is different from the reconciliation

version of the bill, the reconciliation version, which costs about $3.5 trillion, includes all the goodies that we really, really want the human infrastructure components of Biden's proposal. That, if it passes, could pass with just a simple majority in the Senate. This bill, because Biden's obsessed with the illusion of bipartisanship, needs a total of 60 senators to vote in favor of it. And despite the fact that the bipartisan negotiations took place and they seem to be successful, they reached a deal, the GOP can't find a total of 10 Republican senators to vote in favor of it.

Why? Because they don't want to increase taxes. So there's a very good chance that the bipartisan bill fails, and to be quite honest with you, considering the scheme to privatize $100 billion worth of public infrastructure, I think I'll be fine with that. In fact, I would like to see the bipartisan bill fail, and I would like Democrats to just completely brush off the GOP and the Senate and get a more robust version of the infrastructure bill passed through reconciliation. But no, they wasted all their time with this garbage,

and I want to give you the detail. So conservative groups have begun a pressure campaign to scuttle a crackdown on tax cheats by the Internal Revenue Service that proponents say could produce as much as $100 billion to help pay for the plan. Now this is something that we've talked about on the show before the Biden administration initially called for funding the IRS or increasing funding to the IRS to the tune of $80 billion. And the whole idea is, look, there's a bunch of wealthy people who are dodging their taxes, they're evading their taxes. If we just invest a little more into the IRS, we can ensure that people are paying their

fair share of taxes, particularly those at the highest brackets, those who have the more complicated tax filings that the IRS would need additional resources to audit. But unfortunately we have the Grover Norquist of the world who have dedicated their entire adult lives in cutting taxes for the rich and ensuring that lawmakers keep taxes low for the wealthy. So he has already begun threatening Republican lawmakers and I would argue that this is unfortunately persuading Republican lawmakers to vote against the bill. Norquist says, quote, this is going to be a real vulnerability now until election day. If you put your fingerprints on audit more, everyone who gets audited, fairly or unfairly, is going to think, you did this to me. Your fingerprints are on the murder weapon.

Okay. So I don't know, I would venture to say that Republican voters, the vast majority of whom are not incredibly wealthy, the majority of whom dutifully pay their taxes every year, are not going to hold Republican lawmakers accountable if they finally fund the IRS to ensure that tax sheets at the very top of the tax brackets end up paying their fair share. I don't know, I might be wrong, right? But I don't, I have a feeling that the populist rhetoric used by the Tucker Carlson's of the world are being used for a reason. That Republican audience is sick and tired of the elites getting away with not paying their taxes,

getting treated as individuals who are just above the law who don't have to pay their fair share. But it doesn't matter, Grover Norquist's threats terrify Republican lawmakers. And I'm sure some Democratic lawmakers as well. Norquist said that his weekly, weekly meeting with conservatives in Washington, A power center during the George Bush and Barack Obama presidencies has grown as it went virtual during the pandemic. And just to give you a little taste of how influential Norquist is. I mean, he's doing weekly meetings with conservative lawmakers. How insane is that?

Senator Jerry Moran, a Republican, says this. It bothers lots of Republicans, and I'd like to have lots of Republicans vote for this. So I hope it can be something modified, narrowed, or different. Yeah, let me unpack that for you. Let me decode that for you. Can we find a way to ensure that the wealthiest tax evaders can continue evading their taxes? Because with an underfunded IRS, all of the focus for audits has been on lower income working Americans. Because it's easier to audit them.

You don't need as many resources to do it. So the system is intentionally set up to put lower income individuals at a disadvantage, just like everything else in our economic system as it stands today, and essentially allow the wealthy to get away with tax evasion, literally criminal tax evasion, because the IRS doesn't have the funding necessary to do the proper audits and investigations. I don't know, I feel like conservative voters wouldn't find it unpopular. to provide additional funding to the IRS to make sure that these tax dodgers pay their fair share.

But, you know, Grover Norquist not only has these meetings, he's also a donor. And so when push comes to shove, these GOP lawmakers are going to be far more concerned about their corporate donors than passing a bipartisan version of the infrastructure deal. And again, if it does fail, number one, Democrats wasted their time. Joe Biden wasted his time and engaging in these bad faith negotiations, so let's put that aside. But number two, if it does fail, great, then let's recalibrate the situation and pass a robust version of the infrastructure deal, don't deal with the Republicans anymore, and just get it done. Get it done through reconciliation where you don't need a single Republican to vote in favor of it. But again, that other obstacle is still in the way, and that is the corporate Democrats,

people like Joe Manchin, Kirsten Cinema, Mark Warner, you know, they don't like raising taxes on the wealthy either. But I think that Democrats might be more easy to convince or persuade than these Republicans who don't want to help Biden out at all when it comes to his agenda and certainly care far more about protecting their corporate donors and low income tax for those very corporate donors. All right, well, that does it for our first segment. When we come back, a good friend of mine will be joining us to break down some foreign policy stories. So don't miss it, we'll see you in just a few minutes. Welcome back to TYT, that's Bart Kyle on the ones and twos.

I hope you guys are enjoying the music today because I definitely am. And I'm gonna enjoy the next conversation I'm about to have with a good friend of mine, a historian by the name of Daniel Bessner, Daniel is the co-host of American Prestige, a podcast about U.S. Foreign Affairs and the Hanauer Associate Professor in Western Civilization at the University of Washington. Daniel, thank you for joining us. Hi, Anna, thanks so much for having me. It's an honor, a first time, long time, as you know very well. Yes, yes. We just had a great conversation in a pre-taped episode of weekends for Jacobin. So everyone check that out. It airs on Saturday morning. But I'm really glad that I get to talk to you two days in a row, not only about your podcast,

which I want to hear about in just a second, but also to help me break down some of these foreign policy stories in the news today. Before we get to those stories, though, tell the audience a little bit about American prestige and where they can find it. Sure, well, you could find it anywhere that podcasts are found. And my co-host, Derek Davidson, who is the founder of the Foreign Exchange's newsletter, really one of the best foreign policy international affairs newsletter, newsletters today, we just decided the world needed another podcast with two people jabbering about the news. And so we felt that we would contribute to that effort. And so what we wanted to do was to basically promote a type of left-wing

analysis of foreign affairs. It's kind of difficult for many people to get a real handle on what's going on in the world and to see how it connects to their lives. And so what we want to do with this podcast is to really make those deep connections between domestic politics and international affairs, between the relationship about what goes on in the world and how that affects Americans, where they live and where they work. And we find a lot of the discussion in D.C. itself to be very status quo, implicitly pro-imperialist, and very damaging, not only to the world, but to the United States and the people within it itself. And so what we want to do with the podcast is to provide, you know, an acerbic look at U.S.

foreign affairs and to question a lot of the shibbolists that have defined U.S. foreign policy since certainly the end of the Cold War in 1989, but even I would say since 1945, if not before. Yeah, your first episode was on Afghanistan and Nando, Vila and I were talking about it and we both learned a lot. And we've both been following that story, you know, the Afghanistan war from the beginning. So I think that the nuances and the context that you provide is incredibly important, especially when, you know, on the left, and in media in general, I would argue, a lot of the discussions

lack that nuance. And also the historical context necessary to really fully understand these foreign policy issues, right? And also what motivates a lot of the foreign policy in the United States. So with that- Exactly. Yeah. And I would just say that a lot of the assumptions and a lot of media are really damaging.

For example, the idea that the United States needs to run the world. The idea that the United States always needs to, quote, unquote, do something in the world. And so when your assumptions like that guide your coverage, it's going to have a particular slant. And what we want to do is try to begin new discussions and new ways of thinking about what should the United States' role in the world be. 76 years after World War II ended and the nation assumed what is euphemistically called global leadership or what might more accurately be called a hegemony or even empire. Absolutely. Well, let's talk a little bit about what's happening in the news regarding foreign policy today because there is a story involving Afghanistan and I know that you've got

a lot of important points to make about it. So former president George Bush recently was interviewed by a German outlet, Deutsche Vela, and he was asked about the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan, something that Joe Biden has actually committed to and is executing. All troops and U.S. personnel should be leaving the country by August 31st. But George Bush is not happy about it. In fact, it makes him very sad. And he explains why in this clip. Let's watch. It's unbelievable how that society changed from the brutality of the Taliban and all of a sudden, sadly, I'm afraid Afghan women and girls are going to suffer unspeakable harm.

Is it a mistake? Is it a withdrawal? You know, I think it is. Yeah, I think because I think the consequences are going to be unbelievably bad. And I'm sad. I spend, Laura and I spend a lot of time with Afghan women and they're scared. And I think about all the interpreters and people that help, not only U.S. troops, but but NATO troops.

And they're just, it seems like there's just gonna be left behind to be slaughtered by these very brutal people. And it breaks my heart. So it breaks George Bush's heart, even though we've spent a trillion dollars in Afghanistan, we had been there for 20 years straight, and there was really no end in sight. So Daniel Bessner is here to help me break down this story.

He's a historian and also a co-host of the podcast, American Prestige. You can check it out anywhere you get your podcast. And his first episode was actually about Afghanistan. Daniel, what's your first reaction to the clip we just showed? Well, I think the first thing that it's important to appreciate is that what Bush is essentially advocating is a permanent military force in Afghanistan. That's essentially equivalent to the so-called Indian wars that define the United States' early history. And if you recall, even recently, someone like Max Booth was arguing that that's what essentially the United States should do in the world. They should do permanent military garrisons in the frontiers of empire to what ends is a little bit unclear.

Sometimes you hear the type of liberal women's rights arguments made by George W. Bush. Sometimes you hear the security arguments that you need a base in basically Western, Southwest Asia, in order to combat China. And so there's a diversity of explanations that are given. Bush right there is trying to appeal to people and then pulling their heartstring. But what he's essentially advocating is a permanent military force, that the United States becomes the permanent imperial presence in Asia for now and forever. And in 300 years, maybe there'll be a liberal democratic regime that will mirror what happens, what happened in the United States 100 years ago or what happened throughout the North Atlantic countries in the last 100 plus years in terms of women's, right?

So I think that's important to recognize and not to get lost in the, in the, what he's literally saying as opposed to what he's structurally demanding, a type of permanent garrison military force, an endless war in Afghanistan to inchoate ends. It's unclear when women's freedom would be realized, when the liberal political economy, when the liberal constitution would be actually working and things along those lines. So I think it's important to see what he's really saying there. Yeah, you're absolutely right about that. And it's clear that the military generals who had an incredibly negative reaction to Trump wanting to begin this troop withdrawal certainly believed that a permanent U.S. presence there was the right

way to go. But not only do the American people refuse to support that, from what I've read, the people of Afghanistan also do not want that. They saw the United States as an occupying force and that they wanted to get rid of. And so, you know, what, what? What is it with former presidents, current U.S. lawmakers who use various issues like women, for instance, or the treatment of various groups of people as the reason for invading or occupying a country when also like simultaneously, the U.S. has decided to ally with all sorts of countries who are awful to their citizens. I mean, the example that's always used is Saudi Arabia Arabia because yeah, yeah, Saudi Arabia should be used as an example. I mean, they ordered

the murder and, you know, dismemberment of a Washington Post journalist in the, in Istanbul. Remember, that was Jamal Khashoggi, and Mohammed bin Salman was never held accountable for that. Biden said he would. He never did. So why do they think they can kind of get away with using these kinds of talking points to garner support for these forever wars? Well, I think what you're saying is exactly right. It's instrumental and it's obviously a hypocritical argument. And I don't think these leaders really care about what's going on in Afghanistan in relation to the women there. I think it's just an argument made for other purposes.

And I think the reason that they feel free to make these arguments and frankly aren't embarrassed by them is that they frankly have a contempt for the American public. There's no real interest in listening to what the American public thinks. There's no real interest in listening to what's happening in what people in Afghanistan themselves think. And so it's just a profound contempt for the workings of democracy. And this has been true in a lot of American war making for decades now. Famously, of course, the U.S. Congress has not declared war since 1942. And, of course, the United States has intervened throughout the world since that war was declared. This is the statistic I like to give is that the United States tried to covertly overthrow regimes 66 times during the Cold War.

And I believe 44 of those cases, it's supported authoritarian forces. And that comes from the book covert regime changed by the political scientist, Lindsay, your work. So the United States is not a country that has demonstrated in its actual actions, any concern for people on the ground. And it's frankly a bit rich for someone like George W. Bush to argue this given what he personally is responsible for in terms of Afghanistan, the war on terror and the various violations of civil liberties that engendered, and of course the invasion of Iraq, which at its maximum point probably deracinated upwards of 37 million people. So it's just a completely hypocritical argument with no basis in any actual politics that shows, contempt for regular Americans and what they might think about the world. Do you believe that that contempt for Americans and just this refusal to listen to their concerns about these forever wars created an opportunity in which Donald Trump can exploit the failures of people like George Bush to garner support among Republican voters?

Absolutely. I mean, throughout his campaign, what Trump showed was that you could criticized terrible foreign policies like the war in Iraq, and essentially just get away with it. I think that was a big, not the sole reason, but a big reason why he was so popular, particularly during the Republican presidential primaries. It separated him from other candidates. It made him seem like he was actually telling the truth that he wasn't trying to BS them. And I think that was a big part of his appeal. Now, of course, in actual office, Trump really didn't do very much different. He maintained what I would refer to as the imperialist status quo. But certainly, the contempt that quote unquote mainstream Republicans, and I might add many mainstream Democrats,

display toward the American people almost necessarily opens up a space for charismatic demagogues like Trump to come in, tell a truth that everyone recognizes is a truth, and to gain the political benefits of that. Absolutely. Well, even though Trump, I mean, even though Bush shows absolutely no remorse for that awful forever war, luckily Biden did follow. through on this commitment to withdraw troops. And the U.S. marked one of the final phases of its drawdown on Monday of this week with the departure of General Scott Miller, the top general in Afghanistan, who was among the last of the American forces in the country. Now, going forward, what can the people of Afghanistan expect in terms of U.S. involvement? They have kept

open the possibility of using airstrikes in order to keep the Taliban in check, which is concerning. So there is that caveat to keep in mind. Also going forward, General Frank McKenzie, the head of the U.S. Central Command, will oversee the mission in Afghanistan from his headquarters in Tampa, Florida, equipped to authorize airstrikes against the Taliban in support of Afghan security forces through the end of August. So as that story develops, If there are any changes in U.S. foreign policy toward Afghanistan, of course we'll let you know. But so far, it does appear that Biden is following through on his promises and withdrawing the troops. And I do believe that's a good thing. With that said, let's move on to our second story.

You know what? Actually, why don't we take a quick break? We got to take our second break. But Daniel, if you're okay with it, stick around because I'd love to talk a little bit about Cuba with you, if you don't mind. Great. And what we do, we'll especially discuss the GOP now pretending to be concerned about immigration. Only from Cuba, though. So we'll give you those details and more. We'll be right back. Welcome back to TYT, Anna Casparian, and Daniel Bessner with you. Please check out Daniel's new podcast, American Prestige, wherever you get your podcast. And I wanted to read a few more member comments about the conversation we just had about Afghanistan. Mickey C. The Silver-Haired Dragon writes in and says George Bush wasn't too concerned about women and girls in Afghanistan when he lied to start war with them.

How many hundreds of thousands of their deaths is he responsible for just further trying to whitewash his history? Well, the biggest lie was that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. And when you think about the, I mean, the number of civilians who died, not just in Iraq, but also in Afghanistan, and how they were just referred to as collateral damage, you can totally. It's unimaginable. Yeah, you can totally see through the line. It's really unimaginable. Yeah, and it's especially ridiculous when there's been this rehabilitation of Bush recently under Trump. And you saw it with the passing of the candy to Michelle Obama, but you even saw it more recently.

I believe in the C-SPAN poll about the ranking of the presidents where Trump was worse than than W, which I think is ridiculous by any stretch of the imagination. Trump was obviously a horrible president and an awful guy. But in terms of the pure destruction that one individual person actually caused in the world, it's really incomparable. George W. Bush is just one of the worst presidents in American history and probably one of the worst leaders of the last 100 years. And I think it's important that we don't forget that.

the sheer damage that he caused both at home and abroad is almost unimaginable. And Lord Wolf 91 writes in and says, I was a soldier who was in Afghanistan in 2011. They didn't want us there then. And I can guarantee that feeling has only grown in the past decade, referring to the citizens of Afghanistan. And I think you're right about that. All right.

Well, let's move on to our next story. And I've been looking forward to discussing this with you, Daniel. So, conservatives are losing their minds over DHS secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, telling Cuban and Haitian, by the way, asylum seekers to avoid coming to the United States as refugees by sea. So let's first hear his statement, and then I'll give you a little taste of conservatives freaking out about it. Allow me to be clear, if you take to the sea, you will not come to the United States. The time is never right to attempt migration, I see, to those who risk their lives doing so, this risk is not worth taking. Again, I repeat, do not risk your life attempting to enter the United States illegally. he will not come to the United States.

So that statement was honestly reminiscent of what Kamala Harris told the Guatemalan people during her trip to Guatemala. She very clearly said, don't come, don't come if you're seeking asylum, which was pretty disgusting. And I want to be clear that for me and for I think most people on the left, we don't pick and choose which immigrants or which asylum seekers we want to accept into the country. country, you know, it doesn't matter if they're Mexican, Central American, it doesn't matter if they're from Cuba, Haiti. We have a system in place for asylum seekers. That system was essentially squashed under the Trump administration citing coronavirus as a reason for denying entry for all asylum seekers. And unfortunately, Joe Biden continued on with that policy, which I think is just completely wrong, given what we've done to destabilize many of the countries that refugees are coming in from or asylum seekers are coming in from.

Now with that said, I mentioned that conservatives are freaking out about this. Why? Well, this morning I noticed that the word Mexicans was trending on Twitter and I'm like, Mexicans, why? So I click on it. And it's a bunch of conservatives who are like, oh yeah, you know, they'll let all the Mexicans in. But what about, what about these communist hating pro-democracy Cubans? Why can't we let them in? I'm okay with letting them in, but like, can we not pick and choose based on ideological reasons? This screenshot is from Sean Hannity's website, must see, Biden's DHS secretary tells pro-democracy Cubans do not come to the United States. And so, Daniel, I want to bring you in. Daniel Bessner is a historian and the host of American Prestige, a foreign policy podcast that you guys should check out. Daniel, it's interesting because while conservatives are like panicking about that

statement, if you really take a step back and look at U.S. policy toward Cuban immigration versus immigration from everywhere else, there has been a lot of favoritism for Cubans. So can you talk about that a little bit? Well, yeah, I think it's important to recognize within the United States. There's a lot of different powerful ethnic lobbies that are associated along ethnic lines and often organized around diasporic communities. And for decades since the Cuban revolution, there has been a powerful generally conservative leaning right-wing Cuban lobby in Miami and in Florida. And so there's generally that that lobby has been powerful

in basically affecting how the United States treats Cuba. And I just want to emphasize that the United States had never treated Cuba or Haiti or the Dominican Republic, particularly well ever in its history from various occupations and military interventions. But the power of that lobby did inform U.S. policy toward the island for a long time. And what's particularly galling about the Biden administration's approach to it. And the Republican stuff to me is just classic political hypocrisy. I'm not particularly a surprise about it. But what's particularly galling about the Biden administration's approach is that the one thing this country has is a lot of land. And the one thing that it could actually do in foreign policy that that isn't some sort of intervention or manipulation

of economics or politics is to allow people into the country. It's fairly low cost. It could actually be connected to jobs programs for, you know, American citizens here, you know, relocation programs, resettlement programs, things along those lines. But to just dismiss it like that, see, well, first, it seems to indicate that the Biden administration is trying to protect its right flank on immigration. It's basically promoting a more xenophobic nationalist foreign policy. And you see that not only with this case, but also with how it's talking about China. And so we see this basically moved to the right that I think has defined a lot of the Biden administration's foreign policy, which I would say is defined by the maintenance of hegemony. That is really the goal of the early

administration. It recognizes that it can't overstep like it did under Bush or to some degree under Obama, particularly with regards to Libya. But it's trying to still maintain the hegemonic principle of U.S. global empire. And again, this is one of the many reasons. It's a shame that Bernie didn't win. He would have done something different. But I think Biden is a very status quo person, and this is a very status quo foreign policy. For the audience members who might not be as steeped into, you know, political literature or political science. What do you mean when you say hegemonic? The idea that the United States, which has about 750 military bases,

basically controls a lot of the international institutions and has an international economy organized around the American dollar, just means that the United States is able to, in very serious and direct ways, govern what happens internationally. And so I think what the Biden administration is trying to do in the face of relative American decline, it's not in 1945, for example, the United States doesn't have 50% of world production. It's not even 1991 when the United States is the sole superpower. There's the rise of China, the rise of India, Russian revanchism, et cetera. What the Biden administration, I think, is trying to do is to make American hegemony possible for this new, not quite multipolar. but no longer unipolar world. And I think if you read a lot of the administration's actions through that lens, they become very understandable. So I don't think Biden, for example, will intervene in Cuba, but I think he'll do what he can to maintain total U.S. dominance of Cuba, or U.S. control, not dominance, obviously, because of the revolution, but U.S. control of the region without actually putting much on the line.

Right. And, you know, keeping the embargo and sanctions in place, I would imagine, is part of that equation. I also want to just go back to the broader story about Cuba this week, which of course involves thousands of protesters taking to the street to protest a variety of issues, including the handling of COVID. Some, I'm sure, are unhappy with the authoritarian nature of the government and also some of the suppression of, speech. But what's interesting is, you know, the overwhelming commentary that I've seen from the protesters is their frustration with food shortages and the lack of coronavirus vaccines. And those are two things that could easily be alleviated if the United States were to lift these sanctions and lift the embargo. The embargo and the sanctions, the sanctions specifically indicate, this is what was implemented during the Trump administration, that Cuba is a state sponsor of terrorism, right? And so as a result, international banks are afraid to do business with Cuba. They're afraid to finance any of Cuba's domestic policies or projects. And so it actually

has had an incredibly negative impact on Cuba. And it also prevents the transfer, wire transfer, of American currency to Cuban citizens, which, you know, there were Cubans in America, sending money to their family in Cuba. They're no longer able to do that as a result of these sanctions. So it has been crippling for them. Now with that- And that's an example, just very quickly, that's an example of how hegemony works, right? The U.S. government has some sort of designation for Cuba based again on this war on terror logic that George W. Bush initiated. And through that logical hegemony is actually able to really harm the island, really harm people on in Cuba itself. And this is how hegemony works without, you know, direct military intervention. You could still

have disastrous effects on local politics throughout the world by virtue of the United States' sheer and enormous power. Right, and these sanctions aren't just implemented in in Cuba, of course. The same tactic is being utilized in Iran, in Syria, and the people who bear the brunt of these sanctions are the citizens, and intentionally so, because the whole thinking, the idea behind it is people will be so crushed economically speaking and so desperate that it might spark an uprising against the very regime that the United States would like to topple. So the attempt to hurt people economically is very much an intentional effort. Exactly, and I think it's important to underline that sanctions are not a form of so

called clean war, which is how they're often presented. They have disastrous and direct effects on people's lives, the denying of medicine, the denying of access to capital, and things that really make people's lives demonstrably worse. And I think that one of the sort of falsehoods of the 1990s and even parts of the 2000s, where that sanctions were, you know, a substitute and ethical, humane substitute for military intervention. And I don't think that's true. And I think people are beginning to recognize that they have disastrous effects. I want my team to get the last video ready. It's the last clip in this story because I think it's worth talking about.

So, you know, a lot of the messaging toward the protests in Cuba coming from conservatives in the United States, but not just conservatives. I think the media narrative in the United States has been one that focuses solely on the economic system implemented in Cuba. and of course that's communism. And I thought that this line of questioning during a recent press conference was really fascinating because there was a lot of outrage at how Jen Saki, the White House press secretary, responded to this question. Take a listen to what the question is and let's discuss, you know, what the intentions are here. Do you think that people are leaving Cuba because they don't like communism?

I think we've been pretty clear that we think people are leaving Cuba or not, leaving Cuba or protesting in the streets all as well because they are opposed to the oppression to the mismanagement of the government in the country. And we certainly support their right to protest. We support their efforts to speak out against their treatment in Cuba. So Daniel, there was some outrage on Twitter over the way she answered that because she didn't give a straight answer condemning communism. But I wanted you to react to it. What are your thoughts? Well, that's some hard-hitting journalism. I mean, let me tell you, that's exactly what White House reporters should be asking.

I mean, it's absolutely absurd and just shows how the problems with a press that essentially needs to rely on these types of sources for their access and therefore for their livelihood. I mean, it's an absolutely absurd question. I mean, one could equally ask, are they leaving because the United States had made it impossible to live in Cuba for decades, you know, or something as equally a leading question from the other side. And then to me, that exchange just reveals the problems at the heart of access journalism of the type that really defines a lot of White House coverage, which is just not very critical. That takes a lot of the assumptions of American imperialism and American hegemony for granted. And that is one of the major reasons, and the media is one of the major reasons that, you know, for example, this country got into Iraq and this country has provided cover for numerous interventions and for things like dollar hegemony throughout the world. And so to me, it just highlights the problems with journalism in that way. Absolutely.

All right, everyone, check out Daniel's podcast, American Prestige. I promise you you're going to love it. You can get it wherever you get your podcasts. And Daniel, thank you so much for being generous with your time and joining us today. Thanks so much, Anna. Really had a great time. All right. All right, everyone.

That does it for our first hour. We're going to take a short break. And then John Ida Rola will be joining me to break down some other stories, including how the coronavirus pandemic led to more inequality, not just in Americans' finances, but also their living situation. Come right back. We've got that and more.

Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks. Support our work, listen ad-free, access members-only bonus content, and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.com slash t-y-t. I'm your host, Jan Hugar, and I'll see you soon.