The Young Turks - Getting Licht

Episode Date: June 6, 2023

Democrat Senator says Biden "teed up" 2024 win by signing debt bill with nothing good for "anybody in America." "He couldn’t escape!" Alex Witt raves over a reporter trying to "corral" DeSantis and get an answer to an uncomfortable question. "Not ruling anything out," says Manchin of 2024 third-party presidential run. In an effort to prove that Silicon Valley CEOs are actually massive idiots, Jack Dorsey endorses RFK and claims he can beat Biden , DeSantis and Trump. Incredible Atlantic profile on Chris Licht, CNN’s new CEO, who bungles things, but also has some agreeable thoughts on the state of journalism. HOSTS: Cenk Uygur (@CenkUygur), Ana Kasparian (@AnaKasparian) SUBSCRIBE on YOUTUBE: ☞ https://www.youtube.com/user/theyoungturks FACEBOOK: ☞ https://www.facebook.com/theyoungturks TWITTER: ☞ https://www.twitter.com/theyoungturks INSTAGRAM: ☞ https://www.instagram.com/theyoungturks TIKTOK: ☞ https://www.tiktok.com/@theyoungturks 👕 Merch: https://shoptyt.com 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. All right, well, the Young Turks, Jane Canana with you guys. Today is a theme, misconceptions. We're going to straighten out a ton of misconceptions that the Democratic Party has, certainly the media has. CNN is in a world of trouble. Their leader is in a world of trouble.

We're going to break that down like you won't believe. And we're going to give you the literally. Like you'll never believe it. You wouldn't believe it. I don't know why you'd watch it if you won't believe it. Anyways, seriously, guys, we're going to give you a perspective on that that you definitely, literally will not see anywhere else. And I think obviously it's the right perspective.

And it answers the unanswerable question. So stay right here for that. Casper. Well, we begin with some of the after. from the debt-sealing negotiations and Biden signing that legislation into law, so let's get into it. In the world of policy and of families and of people going to work, there was nothing in that bill that was very good for anybody in America. Democratic Senator Sheldon White House confessed that the debt-sealing bill that Biden signed into law did nothing to improve the lives of ordinary Americans. In fact, it was pretty negative for ordinary people.

However, as we've shared with you before in the past, in regard to this whole negotiation, Sheldon White House agrees that this was actually a great move for the Biden administration, which makes little to no sense to me, but why don't we hear them out? Democrats would appear to be operating from a place of strength right now. How do you expect that to impact priorities across both chambers? going into the upcoming of election year? Well, I think if you look at the quiet signing ceremony that Joe Biden had, he did not take a big victory lap. I think he understands that in the cage match of Washington, D.C. politics, he gave the Republicans

one heck of a thrashing. But in the world of policy and of families and of people going to work, Now, there was nothing in that bill that was very good for anybody in America. But what he did do was he teed us up for 2024 quite well by showing that the Republicans were extremists by putting the entire House Republican caucus on record, voting for a bill that would cost 700,000 jobs and provoke a recession, and being unwilling to change one crooked tax loophole in the tax code. What? So if you look at who actually voted in favor of the legislation, you have a ton of Democrats who voted in favor of the legislation. How exactly is this debt ceiling bill going to bode well for the Democratic Party considering how many of them voted?

And I'll give you the numbers in just a moment. But one other thing I want to just quickly mention, he's likely referring to the extreme bill that the House GOP had voted on. and he's hanging his hat on that, arguing that is exactly, that is precisely what the American people are going to look at and judge Republicans by, except most Americans don't know about that bill that House Republicans voted for. They have no idea. And when they look at this, the bill that actually passed and Biden signed into law, they'll see that there's a ton of Democrats who voted in favor of it. In fact, I'm going to go to a quote from House Speaker Kevin

McCarthy, a Republican after the passage of the bill, after Democrats signed on to it. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy could barely hold back his glee with reporters. He said, quote, I think it's wonderful that Democrats voted for it because they are now on record, McCarthy said. Let's get the rest of the IRS agents. Let's get the rest of the work requirements. Let's cut more because we are in a big debt. Yeah.

So I used to get frustrated with Democrats, but I've basically given up. I think they're hopeless. And that's a perfect example of it. Guys, you saw it with your own eyes. He says, it won't help one American. It was a big win for us Democrats. Well, there's something very wrong with that sentence. So let's break it up. So there's first part of that's wrong is obvious, which is we don't really care what helps you. We care what helps us. So we thrashed the Republicans in Washington, D.C. And Biden did a great job for the Democratic

Party. By the way, that's not true. That's the second part I'm going to get through. Okay, but we great job for us. Oh, you guys got screwed, but I'm celebrating here. I'm celebrating, okay? So that's problem number one. Not a good look to say the least. Number two, he's wrong. It's not a win for the Democrats, and he didn't, they didn't thrash the Republicans.

No, the Republicans kicked their ass. They didn't have to negotiate anything. They didn't have to give up anything. Biden wanted to give those things up. And by the way, now that he has cut defense and all the things that Kevin McCarthy said in his glee were unfortunately correct. Now they're going to say, okay, you own it. Nobody's going to remember, and it's 100% right. Nobody's going to remember the bill that didn't pass that Republicans voted on in the House.

And the Democrats aren't going to run their campaigns on one stupid proposal. They're not even going to mention it ever again in their lives. 100%. So all they're going to remember is Biden's the president, and Biden passed the bill that cut spending, that cut benefits, that cut from the average American. And then even Democrats agree doesn't help a single. American citizen. What a terrible, stupid, dumb idea. But that is very standard for the Democratic Party. Not the voters. The voters are screwed beyond recognition, right? But the Democratic Party

leadership and their politicians are the worst of the worst. The only people I can imagine being worse are Republicans and conservatives. Why? The Republicans are laughing their ass off. We got to screw the American people and put it on the Democrats. So it was their intent and they want to do it. The guy who wrote an article about this in the first place that drew attention is also a conservative writer. So conservatives are now gloating. Like, ha ha, we got you to do all of our dirty work, you idiot Joe Biden. Now we're going to blame you for the thing we came up with. So, I mean, it's a parade of horribles. They're just, everyone involved in Washington is disgusting. I know, Jank, but did you consider the fact that Democrats are operating from a place

of strength? A place of strength. No, place of strength is 14th Amendment. I'm done with it. I dare you to try to ruin the debt ceiling and crash the stock market and watch your donors absolutely eviscerate you. I dare you. That's a place of strength.

Yeah, I get the most of what they wanted, but I didn't get the money we wanted. And we screwed the average American. It's just going to work out for us. Not a place of strength. And by the way, the thing that particularly discussed me about this is Sheldon White House is a smart guy. And on other issues, he can be pretty effective. But the Washington virus will rot anyone's brain. Even a smart guy like Sheldon White Houses, okay? Total brain rot. Like losing is winning. Is it? Is it? No. You guys are all in an alternate reality.

And I can't, I'm just telling the audience, because you can't tell them, they have brain rot. They won't listen. They're in a cult. Sheldon White House might be smart. He might even be a good dude. But he runs with a bunch of bad dudes. He does, I don't know corn pops among them. All right, so let's break down the numbers real quick. Because if you look at who voted for the debt ceiling bill, which did nothing to raise taxes on the rich, which did nothing to cut spending or even free spending on defense, but certainly did implement work requirements for the poor, certainly did implement spending cuts, they call it a spending cap, but with inflation, spending cuts on social spending programs. that help ordinary Americans. I mean, Democrats should not have voted for this, but they did.

So in the House, the final tally was 314 to 117, and it would suggest rather easy passage in the upcoming vote in the Senate. This was written by the Washington Post before the bill passed in the Senate. And it was incredibly easy in the Senate, of course. Yep, and I'll get to that right now. The legislation passed the Senate by a vote of 63 to 36. They didn't have to worry about the legislative filibuster there. Can I just say one thing about those numbers?

Do you know the parties back. Corporate Democrats and Republicans. It's always been there. Yeah. It's always been there. Yeah, that's right. And so those, that's the essence of Congress. That's the two-thirds of Congress that is irrevocably corrupt.

The rest of it has a lot of corruption too. But that two-thirds center is what the media celebrates by partisanship because it's corporate rule defined. And there is in economic issues between the corporate Democrats and corporate Republicans, As we've told you a hundred times and this proves clearly, there is no difference at all. They both gladly walk right into this and did something that they didn't need to do at all. And it's in the numbers, indisputable. In fact, let's stay at the Senate numbers, because if you take a look at who voted in favor of the legislation in the Senate,

you'll see a pretty significant majority of Democrats voted in favor. In fact, more Democrats than Republicans voted in favor of the bill. That's also, by the way, true in the House. led by the Republicans. So Joe Biden's the president, he owns it as we talked about before. And now more Democrats voted for this garbage of a bill that helps the rich, that helps defense contractors, hurts the average American. More Democrats voted for than Republicans.

You can't be a better sucker. Okay, so that means, and it was we've told you a hundred times, they're not suckers. They're paid to lose. So this is also incredibly depressing, although given the recent history with the progressive caucus, I guess unsurprising. So 66% of Congressional Progressive Caucus members voted for the deal, including Progressive Caucus. Including Representative Ilhan Omar.

Are you aware of that? Yeah, I know. Yeah. So yeah, who cares? Ilhan Omar is not my cousin, it's a terrible vote and it was a disastrous, ill-advised, awful vote. Who cares? Why would I care that Ilhan Omar voted for it? So, and by the way, the ones that voted against it, I'll be honest with you, I'll go further.

Tons of them voted against it. because they were released from the vote. Well, in fact, why don't we give you an excerpt from one of David Dayan's recent pieces on this issue? And, you know, his argument is that this is not going to bode well for Democrats. And here's what he writes. What has Representative Pramila Jayapal, remember, she's the head of the Progressive Caucus, concerned is that so many Democrats affirm the agreement, quote, our strategy was to not give them one more vote or one vote more than what they needed to.

passed, Jaya Paul told the American prospect in an interview last Friday with enough of a strong no vote to make clear that it was not a good deal. Pramila, the only thing that matters is if the bill passes. Yeah, and that's, that's all that matters. That's it. That's all that matters. Okay, all these like cute little games that they're playing mean nothing to the ordinary voter. It's worse than that in it. She just told on herself. Yeah, she did. She just said, we would have voted for the deal if they just, if they needed the votes. But we did a show vote, A fake vote, voting against the deal, because they didn't need the votes. But trust me that we would have sold out, given the opportunity and the need for it.

The worst leader ever, like makes Joe Biden look strong. So this is not the leader of the Progressive Caucus, but to be honest, with two-thirds of the so-called progressive caucus voting for this junk, corporate, awful deal, it's not really a progressive caucus. But everything in Washington is fake. All of it is fake. All of it is theater. And so of course they screwed you. That's their job. And then the media rushes in with pom-poms going, yay, what a great deal.

You guys got screwed again. Our corporate bosses are so happy. So they're giving pats on the head to all the corporate Republicans and Democrats. This is the unit party absolutely screwing you. We've shown you 100 times now what's in the deal. What's in the deal hurts you in every imaginable way. And thank you, Senator Sheldon White House, for admitting that. You weren't supposed to admit that, but you slipped up.

and went, oh yeah, this doesn't help any American at all. Wait, did I say that out loud? Yes, you did. We were right all along. Republicans, beginning with Ron DeSantis. What does you say that Donald Trump is not here? I'm just happy to be here. I love the people here. I think this is a great event. And, you know, there's a lot of friends now that we've developed, but we'll make a lot more friends.

And so that's what it's all about. There's nothing more amusing than watching Florida Governor Ron DeSantis try to skirt any question having to do with Donald Trump. That's a good example of it. You know, he gave an answer while walking as quickly as he can away from the MSNBC reporter asking him that question. But what was also interesting was that during this past weekend, he was asked by another reporter to opine on Donald Trump's statements in favor of North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un, and he was a little more salty in that response. Let's watch. What did you make a Trump congratulating Kim Jong-un? I was surprised to see that. I mean, I think one, Kim Jong-un is a murderous dictator. They just imprisoned for life of

family, including an infant, which is just outrageous. And then the world health organizations, a bankrupt organization like Kim Jong-un's bad, but then joining that, we need to be getting out of that and rejecting the WHO lockdown treaty and not congratulating about being involved in the WHA. Do you think Trump has the temperament? So I think that was actually a good answer. And if you're wondering what he's referring to when it comes to the World Health Organization. So the news is that North Korea has been.

admitted to the World Health Organization's executive board. And so that's what he's speaking out about. Trump actually decided to congratulate Kim Jong-un on that. And he did so in the form of a truth post, two social post. Congratulations to Kim Jong-un, his best friend that writes love letters to him, of course. Yeah. So look, here's the deal. Politicians don't want to answer questions that are uncomfortable for them.

So they're usually slimy in how they avoid it. So obviously he answered the Kim Jong-un one because he thought it was helpful to him. And that was a layup because everyone who isn't mentally unbalanced knows that Kim Jong-un's a dictator, a communist dictator. It's not really communist, but theoretically communist and communist in name, right? And brutal, concentration camps, murders, abnauzia, right? And one of the most unstable and developed nukes under Trump's watch. So that's an easy one to target because like what is Trump doing? I mean, I don't even think MAGA is like, oh yeah, you're a communist dictator.

I mean, if he can get MAGA to treat like applaud a communist dictator, then I got hats off to him, biggest, most successful cult in world history. I mean, it is, it is miraculous. Like it is shocking how he can convince his supporters to support things that historically they've been pretty aggressively against. And in fact, just to go back to your point about like, you don't know how he does it, how many, how many MAGA voters support this ideology or this take on Kim Jong-un. Let's bring that truth back up, that truth post backup.

Because if you look at it, at the time that we grabbed that screenshot, more than 6,000 people liked it. Like, oh yeah, let's go communist dictators. Let's go, by the way, there's no freedom in North Korea. No. None. None. You cannot ever say anything against the dictator. You can't do what you want in life. You can't, every part of your life is controlled by a literal tyrannical government. It's the exact opposite of what Maga claims, but the minute the cult leader says it, okay? So I'm curious, I don't know if it'll become a big issue, but if it becomes a big issue, do more Republicans side with DeSantis or Trump on this? And usually they've shut off their minds. So whatever. occult leader says, we are now in favor of communist dictators. We now hate freedom. Maybe, maybe it's an open question. But anyway, as far as politics goes, it's an easy layup for DeSantis to hit up on that. But I will say this, DeSantis is wrong about one thing, the World Health Organization. They are wildly imperfect. They've gotten many things wrong, okay? But what are we're going to do,

not have a World Health Organization? So then when there's pandemics and epidemics that are affected, all of humanity, we're like, no, we're not going to coordinate. That's insane. And that's a typical insane reaction that the right wing has. So I want to go back to Trump's statements about Kim Jong-un, because after he received some backlash from other GOP candidates, by the way, it wasn't just Ron DeSantis who said what he said there. Nikki Haley also condemned Trump statements. A Trump campaign spokesperson came out to, of course, defend Donald Trump and get a load of this.

He said this, President Trump achieved peace through strength. And, I mean, peace through strength. He talked about how he fell in love with Kim Jong-un. We fell in love. He is on tape saying that. He talked about how they write love letters to each other, literally. You can look it up, guys. It's literal.

And since it comes from the mouth of the cult leader, you should believe it, right? Because we didn't say, you could see on tape him saying it. And by the way, strength, he developed nukes under Trump's watch. That's right. That's actually the definition of weakness. So he continues to say in this statement, as a result, no new wars were started under his presidency. That's because you didn't push back at all. I mean, good, I'm glad I don't want wars, but I mean, you didn't push back against his nukes, 1%.

Right, I mean, he brought us, Trump did, brought us to the brink of war with North Korea, with his social media posts. And then gave up and said, oh, never mind, developed the nukes. And then, and then he took a trip to North Korea. They hung out. They started sending each other love letters. Holding hands. Okay, so that's peace through strength? Okay, all right. On the other hand, Ron DeSantis is a puppet of the establishment warmongers and doesn't have the strength, fortitude, or will to stand up against America's adversaries.

In Iowa, there were far better candidates than DeSantis who didn't come across as an awkward and wouldn't swamp-like knockoff of Jeb Bush. That part is correct. Yeah, that's pretty funny. I appreciated that very last sentence, but that was about it. Fair show in America. We just say, like, advantage Trump, we'll say advantage Trump. Advantage DeSantis will say it, right?

But look, the more we do these segments, the more, unfortunately, I become convinced that they can't be Trump. Because I'm picturing a Magna guy listening to us, and he's getting triggered left and right. Every time we insult Trump, right? And then that insult of Trump is then put on to DeSantis. And you cannot criticize, like, it's like an apostle criticizing the mass. it's not gonna work.

It's you're just gonna be considered adjudice, right? They're not gonna knock off their profit. So, God damn it, unless something like terrible, unexpected, actually in jail with handcuffs, etc. No, even that. Even then, even then. But Jake, I'm- Yeah, Trump is big time favorite on the Republican side.

I think part of the issue with the left, especially when Trump was president, was just this hyper focus on trying to persuade hardcore fanatics of Trump that he's a bad guy. I think the only thing you can do on the left is fight to ensure that you have a good candidate. And we're not doing that. Well, and when I say we, I don't mean here at TYT, I mean the Democratic Party as a whole has decided that no, no, obviously Joe Biden needs to not only run for re-election, but win re-election. And we're not having a conversation about any other primary candidates at all. We're not going to have any debates.

That is an issue because you can't control the other side, but you can strategize when it comes to your own side. And there's very little of that happening, if any at all. Yeah, well, that's definitely true. But to be fair, nobody's running. So that's our fault. I mean, Jesus, Biden is the worst candidate sitting at 35%. He's a sitting duck.

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And he almost lost the last contest in the swing states. We are right as things stand, we are in massive trouble. We're going to take a break. When we come back, we have an update on someone who might enter the presidential race as a third party candidate, and that's Senator Joe Manchin. That and more coming up after the break. join. We appreciate you, Marcy. You could do likewise by hitting the join button below the video on YouTube. And everybody else, t.yt.com slash join. We appreciate your help. You make us stronger.

Anna. Well, Mansion has some news for us. So why don't we get to that story? I always ask you, you have not ruled it off and taken it off the table. Is a third party run still in the realm of possibilities? Shannon, no labels has been moving and pushing very hard of the centrist middle, making common sense decisions. Conservative Democratic Senator Joe Manchin would not rule out a possible presidential run in 2024 as a third party candidate. And behind the scenes, a group that we have talked about on the show before known as no labels has been eyeing Manchin as their possible choice for a so-called centrist candidate to run against Biden and Trump. Trump. Now, we'll remind you of exactly who funds the organization, No Labels, what their real agenda is. But first, here's a little more from Joe Manchin's evasive, chaotic, and awful

answer. No labels has been moving and pushing very hard of the centrist's middle, making common sense decisions. People that basically expect us to do our job and not put the political party of head of the policy in our great country. That's what we've seen happening. And there's more noise and more extremism coming from the far left and far right. They've been pushing this middle. If the middle has pushed what we just saw happen, that was the middle pushing. So that's basically a movement where no labels has been proposing for a long time, 10, 11, 12 years. It sounds a lot like the way Joe Mansion says too. It's always what I believe. I believe that basically that's where you make the decisions.

You listen to the left and the right. You make sure you leave nobody behind and you listen to to the different persuasions that they might have and concerns. But when it comes, you've got to make common sense. I love that he's pretending like he has any concern for what the left has to say about policy related issues. Because the fact of the matter is no labels is a pro corporate organization that is essentially threatening Joe Biden with a potential third party ticket in order to get him to bow his head because they don't think that he's been pro-corporate enough.

That is what's really going on here. Now Harlan Crow, the guy who's been giving all sorts of lavish gifts to Supreme Court Justice, Thomas Clarence is one of the big backers and funders for no labels. And this next video will also shed some light on the other individuals who are funding this effort. Coca-Cola, General Electric, pharma giant Johnson & Johnson, and oil and gas company pioneer natural resources have all made five-figure donations to the labels over the years.

So has the Consumer Technology Association, whose members as of 2020 included Amazon, AT&T, Google, Humana, Navidia, Verizon, Walmart, and others. Private equity firms, you know, the people gutting hospitals, nursing homes, and driving up your rent, love Kirsten Cinema. And it turns out they're big fans of no labels too. Puck News recently revealed that Stephen Schwartzman, the billionaire CEO of private equity

giant Blackstone, is a major donor to the group. So, Jank, I mean, I've heard from many people that money in politics doesn't make any difference at all, that these kinds of organizations don't really have any sway over the decisions that politicians make. In this case, it would be Joe Biden. What do you think? Yeah, well, of course, that's a joke. So look, right after they voted against minimum wage,

Kristen Sinema and Joe Manchin went and picked up checks from the National Restaurant Association, the top group lobbying against a higher minimum wage. They're rubbing it in our face. Joe Manchin has gotten millions of dollars from fossil fuel companies. He has his own fossil fuel company. He makes money through the campaign contributions and the power associated with that fame, et cetera. He makes money directly. everything is about corruption. And so the part, as usual, the folks that I'm most mad at are the

media. Why? Because Mansion is an extremist in supporting corporate positions that are deeply unpopular with the American people. That's not my opinion. It's the opinion. It's the facts based on the polling of Americans. Take Manson's positions and you look at where it stands in the polling and it is a disaster. Almost no one agrees with them. And what does all of mainstream media call him all the time. What's the number one word, moderate? Well, how could it be moderate if he's representing an extreme position? Because in the Washington world, corporate media world, since they're all owned by corporations and serve corporations, they do this amazing, and you've got to hand it to them, brilliant trick of just co-opting, kidnapping the word moderate.

There's actually nothing wrong with being a moderate overall. I'm a progressive and you've seen me fight quote unquote moderates my whole life, my whole career, because I'm not fighting actual moderates, actual moderates care about balancing of interest on policy positions and are generally at the center of the country. That's not a bad thing in a democracy. But what Washington calls a moderate is a corporate extremist who gives away the store. So now let's talk one real quick about no label strategy. There's only three possibilities here. One is they live in an alternate reality and they think Joe Manchin might be able to pull it off and then they got perfect corporate rule, he will do everything that they asked for, he's 100% owned by these donors,

okay? And they might think, hey, Biden's so weak, Trump is so weak, maybe he could do it. Now, I've seen the polling, there's a 0% chance, but everybody's got brain rotten, and everybody lives in their own alternate reality, okay? But a second possibility, it would the most logical one, the one that Anna pointed out, they're just trying to pressure Biden, which doesn't take much, Biden just needs an excuse because he largely agrees with them to give them more things before he loses, and they all know he's going to lose, okay? And the third thing is, well, just in case he's not going to lose, there's an insurance policy to make sure Trump wins. Because if you're on a third party guys, MAGA is not going

to all of a sudden go, oh, maybe I should vote for a Democrat like Joe Mitch. No way. There's a zero per se he'll pick up zero MAGA votes. And 93% of Republicans voted for Trump in 2020. They're all MAGA, okay? So he's not going to pick up a. single Republican vote. It's going to take just votes away from MSNBC viewers who are like, yeah, moderate Democrats are the greatest. Corporate rule is awesome. So it's like, look, I get mad at Cornell West for running, he announced today is this, in this terrible so-called party that they was run by terrible people. And he's going to take away votes from the Democratic. He's not going to take a single vote from a Republican.

Every third party guy, including Joe Manchin, every one of them knows they're not going to say take a single vote from Trump, okay? So this is all an effort to make sure Trump gets elected. That's exactly right. Now, I want to show you a vomitous video. I had covered this about a week ago, two weeks ago maybe, and it features two of the prominent individuals who are running this no labels organization, Joe Lieberman and Pat McCrory. And they were asked like, what's the plan here? What are you guys really trying to do?

Get a load of this. I think that part of what we've done is because we're actually going to do this. And the two parties, the Democratic Party, seems most anxious, nervous about what we're doing because we're challenging the political status quo. Listen, I know the game. I've played the game. I've been a part of the game. I've been played by the game. And the fact of the matter of the game wants to keep the status quo. They want to keep the power, regardless of the pragmatic circumstances on the ground. And we're challenging the status quo. And maybe by even challenging the status quo between now and Super Tuesday, we can have an impact on the two parties. Don't you just love it when corporatist co-opt, anti-corporatist rhetoric and use it for their own purposes?

No, I mean, they're text. It's amazing. Their textbook, there was a hilarious video. In my lifetime, there's no one who's wanted to protect the status quo more than Joe Lieberman and Joe Manchin. So they like one of them is named status, the other one is named quo. Okay, now these jokers understanding that the country hates the establishment and hates the status quo coming with like this guy. Ha ha, hey, we are there are you freaking joker? Okay, one of the most corrupt men ever to be in politics.

So the idea that these guys are an anti-establishment group, just trying to find the middle of the country, or maybe the middle of the donors. The donors are beloved donors. Shut up and go do whatever you're going to do to private equity owners. Go pleasure them in private. You're disgusting. You don't have to tell them to go do that. They're doing that as we speak.

So let's get to where the hearts and minds of American voters actually lie, because they would have you believe that, you know, know, Biden and the Democrats aren't pro-corporate enough, except let's take a look at health care. In 2022 or a-2020 AP poll, Associated Press, reveals that public satisfaction with the U.S. health care system is remarkably low, with fewer than half of Americans saying it is generally handled well. Only 12% say it's handled extremely or very well, but about two-thirds of adults think it is the federal government's responsibility to make sure all Americans have health care coverage, with adults ages 18 to 49, more likely than those over 50 to hold that view. The percentage of people who believe health care coverage is a government responsibility

has actually risen in recent years, ticking up from 57% in 2019 to 62% in 2017. Okay, I'm going to jump in there. So if every poll shows you the same exact thing, progressive positions poll at two-thirds of the country, that's chapter one on my book, Justice is coming, there's dozens of polls in there, and it doesn't matter, you don't have to worry about the book, you don't have to worry about the book, You don't have to worry about anything. Just look at polls when they come out on policy issues going forward. And you will see that same two-thirds number comes up every time on almost every issue.

Yet, there's no one in Washington that represents that two-thirds. Trump was against universal health care. Joe Biden is against universal health care. No labels is against universal health care. Everyone is against universal health care in Washington, even though two-thirds of Americans wanted. Where the F are the moderates? Let's get to taxing the rich. So a New York Times poll conducted in November of 2020

found that about two-thirds, two-thirds of respondents supported higher taxes on those making $400,000 or more per year. Two-thirds. A Politico-Slas morning consult poll released in February of 2019 showed that three-quarters of voters said that the wealthiest Americans should pay more in taxes. 76% to be exact. And that's not, hey, you shouldn't cut their taxes. That's, no, you should increase their taxes.

And that's sorry, that's not two thirds. That's three quarters. Have you heard a single person on cable news say, oh yeah, do American people want taxes increased? I've never seen it in my lifetime. One more, one more, other than me when I was on cable news. One more poll to get to because I just like to give you guys a variety of sources to show the receipts. So about six and ten adults now say that the, that the feeling that some corporation don't pay their fair share, 61% bothers them a lot, while a nearly identical share say this

about some wealthy people not paying their fair share, 60% according to a 2023 Pew Research Center survey. But you know, we should listen to Joe Manchin who argues that the country absolutely loves the tax cuts for the rich, you know, for people like himself, and that, you know, we don't want them to pay their fair share. That's where the country is, according to Joe mansion and no labels and all of the billionaire funders, millionaire funders who back the organization. And last thing is that just one of their funders, Stephen Schwartzman that they mentioned there that runs private equity group. One of the richest men in the world, multi-billionaire. Do you think he might care about the tax cuts? No, come on. The tax cuts literally, literally

save him not millions, billions of dollars. I'm sure that doesn't make a difference. No, but he added the goodness of his heart because he cares about the average American. The moderate American, that's why he's backing Joe Manchin, who says that even though three quarters want tax increases on Steve Schwartzman, who should do tax cuts for Steve Schwarzman, because he's the moderate, he's the moderate. So this is why people are disgusted with every institution in America. This is why they have lost faith in the media and the politicians, and we have the two most unpopular people, almost in American history, political history, Joe Biden, Donald Trump,

running for president and everyone's saying, you have no choice. And when you say, oh, can I have a choice? They go, Joe Manchin, which is the only person arguably worse than those two. When we come back from the break, we're going to get into this pretty epic profile on Chris Lick, the new head over at CNN. All right, back on TYT Jankana with you guys. More news. Well, let's get to this fascinating profile on Chris Licht.

The Atlantic published a lengthy, but I will admit, fascinating profile on Chris Lict. He's the relatively new head of CNN, and there's a lot to dig into. So let's get started with what motivates his vision for CNN? What's his vision in the first place? And is he succeeding in carrying it out? Spoiler alert, no, he is not succeeding. However, according to Tim Alberta, who wrote this profile in the Atlantic, he writes that

when he took the helm of CNN in May of 2022, Licked had promised to reset with Republican voters and with their leader, meaning Donald Trump. He had swaggered into the job telling his employees that the network had lost its way under the former president, Jeff Zucker, that their hostile approach to Trump had alienated a broader viewership that craved sober, fact-driven coverage. These assertions thrust licked into a two-front war, fighting to win back Republicans who had written off the network, while also fighting to win over his own journalists, many of whom believed that their new boss was scapegoating them to appease his new boss, David Zazlov, who'd hired Licked with a decree to move CNN toward the ideological center. I'm going to pause for comment from Jen, because I know you have a lot to say about that.

Yeah, every part of this story is wrong. And it's not to say that the story is not helpful. It's actually a really good journalism. He exposes what's going on behind the scenes is very helpful. Okay, so don't get me wrong. It's just that he lives in the same bubble as everyone else in Washington. So he assumes these things that should not be assumed. So for example, Zaslop wants to move people to the idea is CNN to the ideological

Senate? No, he doesn't. The ideological center, according to the polling, is very progressive on economic issues, right? So instead, he wants to move it to the center between the extremist Republicans and the corporate Democrats, which is actually an extremist position. There's a reason why CNN is not popular. They think, oh, if we just did objective jobs, but you don't, you never did objective.

journalism. You did journalism to help the status quo and to maintain corporate power. So every assumption is wrong. They're like if we just move to the center that isn't the center and we just represent corporations better, that'll help me with my ratings. No and no and no. So Chris Lick was sent on a mission that is impossible. He didn't do himself any favors with the way that he has conducted himself. But no person could do that job. And it doesn't matter because when they fire them and they put the new person in, I will guarantee you ahead of time. They will also suck in the ratings because the mission is wrong. Also, it's, so there are two things happening simultaneously, right? Because I remember during this era, I watched

a lot of CNN. I always had it in the background as I was working on the show, just to make sure I didn't miss something that would break in the news. I literally can't even do that anymore. It's unwatchable. But back then, it was still unwatchable. But it was still unwatchable. But it least I had a better sense of news that was breaking as it was breaking. Now, what I noticed was they were very critical of Donald Trump, extremely critical, and everything was an emergency, everything was a disaster, everything was worth getting panicked about. But then at the same time, they went out of their way to provide jobs, contributor roles to various Trump figures, right? Cory Lewandowski is a perfect example.

Cory Lewandowski was working as a contributor over at CNN as he was simultaneously working on Trump's campaign. And by the way, that was not under Lake. That was under Zucker. Yes, yes, exactly. So like, oh, Zucker is a great guy who challenged Trump. Is he? No, he ran on what's called a swarm strategy where they swarm around one topic. Remember the plane and they wouldn't get off the missing plane, right?

So in this case, Zucker had a mandate to talk about Trump endlessly. And at the time, remember, in 2015, 2016, they were not critical. They weren't even critical. They're the patient zero in platforming Trump and making him what he is today. And that was not under like, that was under Zucker. That's right. So this apologist's thing about like, oh, Zucker was so tough on Trump, my ass he was. There's no one more responsible for Donald Trump than Jeff Zucker who also picked him out of, he took a,

failed businessman Donald Trump was six bankruptcies that he knows and pretending he was an incredibly successful businessman on a show called The Apprentice when Zucker ran NBC. Zucker also hired Jeffrey Lord, who was a zealot right-wing lunatic and made it seem like Trump was perfectly fine. Now he's leaking all over and trying to bury Licked. Look, I got no love for Licked. I got no love for any of these guys. But Farris Farrin's right is right. Zucker, who is the worst of the worst, not pretending, oh, Licks too, nice to Trump. Trump, please, that is an affront of the truth.

That is definitely a fair point. Now, the question is, does Lick want to coddle Republicans? He's certainly been accused of that, both externally and even internally. And here's what he had to say about that. So when he'd warned Audie Cornish, journalist Audie Cornish, during a company town hall about taking a condescending tone toward Republicans, surely it sounded to some reporters like he wanted them to coddle the crazy right wingers who would use their platform to destabilize the country's democratic institutions. Licked, looked annoyed. We are not an advocacy network.

And if you want to work for an advocacy network, there are other places to go, he told me. You can find any flavor of advocacy in the news organization that suits your need. We are providing something different. And when the crap hits the fan in this world, you're not going to have time for that advocacy anymore. You need an unbiased source of truth. That's what he argued. See, that makes no sense. Okay, why does it make no sense? Everybody says, oh, look, this wrong, and then they never answer, okay, what's the correct thing to do? So let's be constructive, okay?

So when you're looking for an unbiased source of news, would you go to someplace that says, no, we are going to cater to Republicans and cater to Democrats in order to get neutrality and balance? No, you would not go to that place, because they're declaring to you, we're not going to be honest with you. We're just going to appease the Republican and Democratic politicians. We're going to appease the people in power. That has nothing to do with the truth or news. No, if you want to go to a place that has unvarnished news, you would go to a place that challenges both Republicans and Democrats.

Totally agree. Yeah, that's the difference, right? But when you're in a situation where you're hyper obsessed with ratings and you're more concerned about alienating half of the country by telling the truth, well, then you're going to engage in this weird false equivalency cover. which to the credit of some reporters over at CNN, they're very concerned about, which is why they're pushing back against what Lict is trying to do. They think it's actually incredibly damaging because they don't believe that the two sides

are equal in every situation, right? They want to be able, according to my read of this story, they want to be able to call out Republicans or Donald Trump when they engage either in bad behavior, in the case of Trump, criminality. And again, I respect that. But I do think that what CNN screwed up on, and Chris Licht gets to it in this next quote, is true, right? They hyperventilated about too many things and treated everything like it was an emergency,

and eventually people just stopped believing CNN. Right, let me give you his exact quote, and then I'll go to you real quick. Lict said Trump had goaded the media into outrage porn, provoking journalists to respond with such indignation so often that audiences began to tune. out. When everything is an 11 on a scale of 10, Lict said, it means that when there's something really awful happening, we're kind of numb to it. That was a strategy. And I felt like the media was falling for that strategy. What do you think about that quote, Jank? So that quote is true, but the problem is that it needs much more context. If you just take

it by itself, then it's going to be misleading. So here's what I mean by that. So no one hates false equivalency more than I do. I've been fighting against it for 25 years now, okay? So So yes, unfortunately on a lot of economic issues, Democrats and Republicans agree and there's theater around it, right? But they don't agree on judges, they don't agree on social issues. Every once in a while the Democrats do something positive, like fund more IRS agents so that the rich can't cheat on their taxes, et cetera. So you have to be clear about what is true and what is not true and put aside your partisanship.

On the other hand, I have no sympathy for the CNN reporters, producers, editors, et cetera, that say like, oh, we can't do false equivalency, so we have to make sure we challenge Donald Trump. Well, that sounds like I should have a lot of sympathy for that, right? Yes, but did you ever challenge anyone else in politics? Good point. So did you ever challenge Joe Biden when he lied about wanting to cut Social Security six times? He did want to cut it six times, but you covered for him, right? Did you challenge Joe Biden when he had an outrageous lie about getting arrested with Nelson Mandela

while protesting apartheid? I mean, if Trump had said that lie, we'd never hear the end of it. That's true. And we shouldn't hear the end of it. The idea of letting Trump off the hook is maddening. That is not the correct strategy. And CNN is partly doing that because of Zaslov and Malone, who runs the board, who's their biggest investor. And those guys are right wingers.

And so they want to let Trump off the hook. That's not the answer. The answer is also hold other corporate politicians accountable, whether they're in the Republican or Democratic Party. But no one, no one in the building at CNN is prepared to do that. You tell them to be aggressively challenging all those Democratic politicians, they're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, no way. Now in terms of the outrage, yes, Trump creates a thousand outrages. In a day.

In a day. Now, you do have to cover all those. So, but why do I agree with that quote? And this MSNBC is way more guilty than CNN. Anytime like, oh, Trump's about to go to jail. Trump's about to do us. Trump's bad, Trump's bad. And about everything.

And so they cried so much wolf when you don't need to cry wolf. He actually is really bad. He already does a thousand bad things. Why did you bother to embellish an extra like 50 that, like you turn to MSNBC. They're like, Trump sneezed. And his second cousin once removed is really angry. about it. Like I don't care about his cousins. I don't care. Like this is nonsense. Focus on the policies that are killing this country, but they don't want to do that either.

By the way, did MSNBC really disagree with the giant tax cuts for the rich or all the money sent to the defense contractors? Because I haven't seen a lot of segments on MSNBC complaining about the Pentagon budget. Listen, at the end of the day, what this is really about what his vision is, I don't even think it's ideological, okay? They need high ratings for advertising to make a profit and make their investors happy. This is for profit media, it's a for profit media model. Now there's a way to implement a for profit media model where you're not constantly hyperventilating about potentially alienating people. I think we do a good job, we're not a nonprofit.

We're also not publicly traded, and I think that makes a huge difference, right? But just going back to LICT, I want to give you one more statement from him, him in regard to his vision for media, but more importantly, then pivot to an example he provides for good journalism. And if you think Jank is already animated, just wait till you see his reaction to this. Lick said Trump, sorry, he says this, if something's a lie, you can call it a lie, okay? You know what you're dealing with now, I think he changed the rules, meaning Trump, of the game, and the media was a little caught off guard and put a jersey on and got into the game as a way of dealing

with it. And at least at my organization, I think we understand that Jersey cannot go back on because guess what? It didn't work. Being in the game with the jersey on didn't change anyone's mind. So that's what Likt is saying in regard to CNN putting a jersey on as opponents to Donald Trump and then going at it, okay? But then he provides an example of who he thinks is a great journalist and wait for it, wait for it, it is Jake Tapper. So the new boss told people inside CNN that Tapper's The 4 o'clock show, the lead was the model. I told you. Was the model?

When he moved him to 9 o'clock, I told, and even when he first came in, I said, oh, he's gonna love Jake Tappen. No, you get a load of this. He called him tough, respectful, inquisitive. Yeah, of course. What? So look, Jake Tapper is the one, all right, I don't want to get into personalities. The bottom line here is, guys, the Jersey comment is more important, okay? Because they view challenging a politician as putting on a jersey.

No, that's the jersey of the referees. You're supposed to do that at all turns. That's not putting out a jersey. If you don't challenge the president of the United States when Donald Trump was president, well then you're obviously not a journalist, right? The refs, the journalists are supposed to be the refs. They're supposed to challenge both sides. They're supposed to call fouls on both sides.

But the reason they actually have the jersey on is because they never challenge corporate politicians. It's not just Democrats, like they'll challenge AOC, they'll challenge Bernie Sanders. Those are outsiders, those are rebels, anti-establishment figures. But the establishment figures, Mitch McConnell, Nancy Pelosi, Joe Biden, Joe Manchin, moderate, moderate, moderate, master legislator, amazing, wonderful. No, you're putting out a jersey there for corporate rule. And it's never mentioned in any of these stories. Right.

Because they all assume it. You ask him, hey, you ask a fish, how's the water? They say, what water? And that's like Tim Alberta does a really interesting, good piece of journalism. But even him, if you asked him, he would have said, what water? Look, I have a theory on why that is, right? Because if you look at the media today, I would say the bulk of the coverage tends to focus on the very shallow differences between Democrats and Republicans and those tend to be culture war issues. Let's just keep it real, culture war issues or manufactured conflicts about legislation like the debt ceiling bill.

Let's keep it real. Corporate Democrats and corporate Republicans were in cahoots the whole time. They both loved what the end result of that legislation was. They wanted to cut spending that impacts positively ordinary people and continue increasing spending on things like defense. That's exactly what they did. They're in cahoots. When it comes to those issues, there's virtually no difference between corporate Democrats and corporate Republicans. The only way they differentiate themselves is through manufactured culture wars. And that is what the media takes their lead.

and that is what the media covers. So there's this like lie about how different both parties are. And it's like, are you rooting for blue or you're rooting for red? It's just, and that's what's missing from it, Jank. That's why there's no mention of corporate power in this piece. That's why there's no distinction between Democrats and Republicans, blue versus red when it comes to corporate issues. That's why there's no mention of corporate money.

That is not even in the mainstream media's consciousness. And that is a problem. It's a giant like iceberg of a problem. So look, you'll see in, in the article things that show you what the problem is, but he never explains it because he doesn't know it himself. So like for example, he'll talk about, oh, well, they need access to Republicans. Wait, why? Why did they need access to Republicans? Why is it like a journalist, if you want to get good sources of information, okay, fair, right?

But if you want to put them on television for your ratings, and so you're gonna sell out the truth by appeasing them to put them on air as they did with Trump in the town hall. But as they do with every politician in every instance, well, you're not really doing journalism. You're just doing access to power. But no one mentions that because it's too uncomfortable because that's what they all do. And then one other word that's like a key word in the article and you'll see throughout in all this coverage is tone. Well, what should the tone be? The tone should be respectful of politicians. Why?

Though press is supposed to be the fourth estate. They're supposed to challenge the powerful. They're supposed to challenge the government. But everyone, including the good guys, assume, no, their job is to kiss as much ass as humanly possible. And so we're having a debate about whether Chris Lick kissed enough ass and the right ass. The whole debate is wrong. Yeah, I mean, journalists are supposed to be muck rakers, they're supposed to rake the muck. Instead, they engage in the mucky behavior themselves, and that's the huge problem that has led to a huge portion of the American public, just rejecting and failing to believe in our institutions.

And I don't blame them for that, given what the press has turned into. Believe it or not, we're not done with that story. There are other elements to it, spicier elements to get into, including the firing of Don Lemon. We'll get into that when we come back from the break. See you then. 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 at apple.com slash t-y-t.

I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.