The Young Turks - Senate Showdown

Episode Date: March 9, 2023

The Dominion lawsuit has uncovered that Tucker Carlson said he passionately hates Donald Trump. DeSantis is taking money from Florida energy companies and making ordinary Floridians’ lives worse. Jerome Powell feuded with a Republican Senator over interest rate hikes. Union leader Sean O'Brien spars with Republican senator Host: Ana Kasparian 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. Woo! It's up! Welcome to TYIT, I'm your host Anna Kasparian, and I'm not going to lie, today's show is beyond substantive, a lot of vegetables thrown at you during today's show. Look, Bernie Sanders is really making excellent use of his chairmanship in the Senate.

He's the chair of an incredibly important committee having to do with pensions and labor and education. He had an incredibly important hearing today having to do with unions and workers' ability to organize their workplace. And there was a lot of sparring going on between the president of the Teamsters Union and some Republican senators. So we're going to cover that story a little later. In the second hour, we'll have John Iderola on, of course, to discuss a pretty devastating

report that was done by a special counsel on the Sheriff's Department in Los Angeles. And the conclusion is that, yes, in fact, there are active gangs within the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department. Stick around for the details on that, you don't want to miss it. And Katie Porter feels the need to suck up to Benjamin Netanyahu at a time when he's trying to weaken Israel's Supreme Court at a time when hundreds of thousands of Israelis have taken to the street to protest him. It's an unfortunate story, we'll get to that in a little bit as well.

And Marjorie Green is as moronic as ever, so she'll make an appearance, but you'll have to stick around for that. For now, though, just want to encourage you to like and share the stream. If you are watching us online, you can also click on the join button if you're watching us on YouTube to become a member. Members allow me to be the loudmouth that I am on this show. I wouldn't be able to do it without you, so I just want to thank you for making that happen. You can also become a member by going to t-y-t.com slash join.

All right, let's get started. The protesters were angry. They believed that the election they had just voted in had been unfairly conducted. They were right. In retrospect, it is clear the 2020 election was a grave betrayal of American democracy. Given the facts that have since emerged about that election, no honest person can deny it. Oh, Tucker. While he recently said that publicly on his show on Fox News, we just keep getting more and more information.

Just this slow and steady drip of revelations in regard to what Tucker Carlson and his colleagues over at Fox News really thought about Donald Trump and his allegations that the election was stolen from him, that there was widespread voter fraud at play, which ended up putting Joe Biden in the White House as opposed to Donald Trump for a second term. Now, the latest revelations are fascinating because Tucker Carlson said something pretty definitive. Quote, I hate him passionately, Tucker Carlson said of Donald Trump. And of course, we know this, we're getting these revelations as a result of Dominion's $1.6 billion lawsuit against Fox News for what it believes was defamatory statements during their broadcasts. Now, let's get to some other details. In one January 4th, 2021 text, Tucker wrote to a colleague, we are very, very close to being able to ignore Trump most nights. I truly can't wait.

Which, by the way, seems to be an admission that Homeboy lost the election. Tucker internally had accepted that. But just yesterday, just yesterday, or I should say two nights ago, he said, this. Cushers were angry. They believed that the election they had just voted in had been unfairly conducted. They were right. In retrospect, it is clear the 2020 election was a grave betrayal of American democracy.

Given the facts that have since emerged about that election, no honest person can deny it. Get a load of Tucker Carlson talking about honest people. Yeah, spare me your commentary about honesty, Tucker. Let's go back to some more of the statements that he texted to a colleague, quote, referring to Trump, I hate him passionately. What he's good at is destroying things. He's the undisputed world champion of that. He could easily destroy us if we play it wrong.

Now, maybe his terrified nature is what leads him to suck up to Trump and kiss his ass during his nightly broadcasts, maybe that's what causes him to literally lie to his audience when behind the scenes, it's clear that he has completely different opinions. I can't stay, I hate him passionately, Tucker Carlson says, of Donald Trump, can't wait till we can finally stop talking about him most nights of the week. By the way, that's what I said. Now I don't know if that's going to come to fruition. It seems like Donald Trump, after announcing his 2024 bid, is doing pretty well with the

Republican base, but nonetheless, it is fascinating that we shared that commonality. I also was looking forward to no longer having to talk about Donald Trump on a regular basis. Now Carlson, in his text exchange with a colleague expressed his ultimate frustration with Trump's administration, quote, we're all pretending we've got a lot to show for it. Because admitting what a disaster it's been is too tough to digest, he wrote. But come on, there really isn't an upside to Trump. So why are you lying on his behalf? Why are you perpetuating this myth that the election was stolen, that there was some foul play,

that there was fraud? I mean, why would you repeat that lie when you know it's a lie? The only thing that I can come up with is he is so terrified of both Trump and his own audience. This is what audience. This is what audience capture looks like when. When you, You don't trust your audience enough to tell them the truth. And so you tell them all the sweet little lies they want to hear. So you don't have to challenge them or their preconceived notions. Now here at TYT, oftentimes, you know, when we cover stories, we might have analysis or

a perspective that could lead to a little bit of backlash from the audience. But ultimately, we trust the audience. Ultimately, we believe that the audience can think for themselves, that they are critical thinkers. And even if in the short term, they might feel a little uncomfortable with hearing an opinion that's different from their own, I genuinely believe that all of you guys, every single one of you watching this video right now, will do your due diligence and will come up with your own reasonable opinion on matters. But Tucker Carlson believes that his audience is full of temperamental children who will have a temper tantrum the second he says something negative

about Daddy Trump. And look, maybe there's a portion of the audience. that will abandon Fox News to go to a more extreme right-wing outlet. But, you know, if they weren't a publicly traded company, maybe they wouldn't be as concerned about that. But that's the thing. When you have a profit model, for-profit model associated with news, you're already at a disadvantage in a democracy where the public needs to be accurately informed in order to make the best decisions for themselves through the electoral process. But what makes matters even worse for outlets like Fox is that they're traded on the stock market. So like any other business, the number one priority is the shareholder, period.

And we know from previous revelations that we've reported on, Tucker Carlson, along with his colleagues, were terrified about a dip in the stock. Now let's go back to Rupert Murdoch, of course, because he seemed to, to speak out against some of the analysis and commentary on Fox News, you know, basically the enabling tone that you saw on Laura Ingram show, Sean Hannity show. For instance, he did write at one point in a message to the Fox News CEO, Suzanne Scott, maybe Sean, meaning Sean Hannity and Laura, meaning Laura Ingram, went too far. No, not maybe, definitely, you're now facing a $1.6 billion lawsuit as a result, but I'll

continue. All very well for Sean to tell you he was in despair about Trump. But what did he tell his viewers? What did he tell his viewers? He lied to them. That's what he told his viewers. Play stupid games, win stupid prizes. Now not long after Murdoch agonized over whether his hosts had gone too far, one of the most high-ranking news editors, Bill Salmon, texted a colleague and said, in my 22 years affiliated with Fox, this is the closest thing I've seen to an existential crisis, at least journalistically. The crisis was the network's continued focus on what Salmon called supposed election fraud. You guys are seeing the trend, right?

Internally, there was a consensus that the claims of election fraud were insane and unfounded. But publicly, the story was very different. His colleague, Chris Steyerwalt, then a politics editor who played a key role in Fox's decision to call Arizona for Biden, replied, what I see us doing is losing the silent majority of viewers as we chase the nuts off a cliff. And it does appear that they went in the direction of chasing the nuts off the cliff because this defamation lawsuit is not looking good for Fox. and they also decided to fire Chris Steyerwalt and, or at least push him out, and Bill Salmon as well. So what's also interesting is how Rupert Murdoch went out of his way to provide intel

to Jared Kushner and Trump's campaign in the lead up to the 2020 presidential election. So six weeks before the election, Murdoch tried to help Trump by reaching out to Jared Kushner to say, you know, you guys are slacking on your political ads. Your political ads, not creative, not good. Biden's ads seem to be packing a punch. You guys got to step your game up. And apparently Jared Kushner responded the next day, assuring the media mogul should have some new creative out this week.

I did a review and like what I'm seeing. So, I mean, it's amazing because Trump also got assistance in the lead up to the election. But since, you know, there were a few moments where they might have been wavering a little bit in spreading the election lies that Trump wanted them to spread, he turned on Fox News. He also turned on Fox News when they accurately called Arizona for Biden and happened to be the first network to do so. And even though privately Laura Ingram knew that the election denial was absolutely insane, she seemed to be more upset with the network for calling Arizona for Biden. Here's what she said. We are all officially working for an organization that hates us, Ingram wrote in one text thread with Carlson and Hannity, in another in mid-November of 2020, as they watched

Fox viewers flip to more conservative upstart channels, Ingram wrote to the group, my anger at the news channel is pronounced. I don't, do you guys like talk like that in your real life? I mean, I get it if you're broadcasting and you have to have a certain tone and use certain rhetoric, but okay, so this is what we're knowing, this is what we're hearing and this is what we know now as a result of this defamation lawsuit. Like I said earlier, there's this slow and steady drip of information about what transpired behind the scenes, some of the internal conflict on how to handle the matter. But the through line, the trend that you'll notice as you consume all this reporting on the defamation lawsuit, is that these media hosts, management, doesn't matter. All the people involved in this seem to be more concerned about the profitability of what they were doing, about their performance in the stock market than anything else. because even though they knew the claims were insane,

they had to look out for the investors, they had to make sure that they didn't take a hit in the markets. How is that inherent conflict in this media model ever going to bode well for ordinary Americans? So this is a broader comment that I think a lot of us miss because we're so, the partisan politics is so ingrained in our culture, right? the tribal nature of everything that happens in the news, everything that happens in politics. But put that aside for a second, how is this media model at all beneficial to ordinary Americans

when all of the incentives are meant to essentially misinform you, tell you what you want to hear? We're not winning with the system. I've talked about the importance of bringing back a modernized version of the fairness doctrine, but if you're consuming your news from a place that is publicly traded in the stock market, just remember what the real priority is. And whether or not informing you is what they genuinely care about. All right, well, let's move on to Ron DeSantis. FPL is also one of the biggest political spenders in the state. And that is how FPL has been able to gouge working class Floridians over $1.5 billion in rate increases over the next couple of years.

Just keep in mind that Florida's utility companies couldn't do this without the help of the state's Republican Party and Ron Swampdweller DeSantis. Let's watch more. And FPL can't blame these high bills on inflation because the company also leads the nation in shareholder and executive profit. Well, when Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida, announced his campaign for the governorship back in 2018, much like Trump, he pledged to drain the swamp in the state of Florida. And then he proceeded to do the exact opposite, just like Donald Trump. Just like Donald Trump.

Let's be clear about that. Now, shortly after he was elected, DeSantis aggressively began raising money from businesses and business interests before his, you know, before actually entering the office. So he's campaigning, he's collecting all this money from business interests, while simultaneously claiming he's going to drain the swamp. So what did he actually do once he was legally bribed by these business entities? In particular, what did he do when it came to the, you know, utility companies within Florida? Oh, that's right.

He assisted them in price gouging ordinary Floridians. So let's get to the details. In November of 2021, Florida's public service commission, PUC, issued a memorandum allowing electric utilities to stop disclosing their shutoff data. Now, the memorandum reverse the commission's September 2020 decision to collect the data to track the pandemic's effect on utility customers. And that was an important thing to track because clearly the coronavirus pandemic had an economic impact on ordinary Americans. There were closures, there were layoffs, all of this happened through no fault of their own.

And so in September of 2020, they decided we're going to go ahead and track this to see just how much of an economic impact this has had on Floridians, because if they're not able to pay their utility bills, that's a big, big problem. Well, they reversed that, okay? They reversed that with the help of Ron DeSantis. But more importantly, that happened at a time when less than a month after the commission members approved the electric rate hike in Florida's, the largest rate hike in Florida's history for the utility companies, right? So electric companies within Florida were like, we want to increase rates by as much as 20%.

And the commission with the members, of course, who were appointed by Ron DeSantis himself, like they help them out. They're like, sure, yeah, go ahead and do that. We're going to stop tracking the number of Floridians who are dealing with shutoffs. as a result of their inability to pay these astronomically high utility bills. And then on top of that, we're going to green light the utility company's plan to increase rates by as much as 20%.

So what you have is a double whammy. You have the pandemic hurting Floridians and Americans overall, by the way, but this is a story about Florida, hurting Floridians economically, and the utility jacking up prices regardless of that. And they've enjoyed record profits in Florida as a result. Now to avoid backlash, the utility gets to withhold the information on shutoffs. And Ron DeSantis, along with the individuals he appointed for this, you know, government agency aided and abetted this effort, okay?

And the end result is Floridians paying way more than they should for electricity. So with that said, I do want to go to the next video because more perfect union did a fantastic job tracking the story, covering the story. And it gives you a sense of who butters Ron DeSantis's bread. Let's watch. Many of Florida Power and Lights political contributions are shuffled through shady LLCs and big business packs. But even just from the public numbers, we know that FPL has spent over $18 million on political campaigns in Florida since the 2018 election cycle. And it's probably a lot more than that. 2018 was a blue wave across the nation, but here in Florida, thanks to millions of dollars

from FPL, Republicans were able to secure a stronghold on the state, putting Governor Ron DeSantis in the governor's mansion and securing a supermajority in the state legislature. FPL also spends millions on lobbying to make sure that that company gets more than its money's worth from DeSantis and the legislature. We're about to get real specific about the campaign money that Ron DeSantis and his cronies accepted from the utility companies in Florida. Before we do though, what about those shutoffs? How widespread were they and which companies are at play?

Let's get to the details reported by the lever, of course, because they're one of the only outlets that actually does journalism these days. But let's get to it. Next era, the parent company of Florida's largest utility, Florida Power and Light, disconnected 738,000 Floridians in 2021 and get a load of this, 1.1 million Americans nationwide since 2020, according to a report from bailout watch last month. Now, that is the information, that is the type of information that the utility companies don't want you to know, which is why the reporting standards were changed by Ron DeSantis and his cronies. But let me continue, there's more. If that disconnection rate continued, noted the report, Next Era, would have shut off 1.2 million customers in

2022. But we do not know the total because the DeSantis appointed Florida PUC allowed them to hide the data. One of the hardest parts of getting older is feeling like something's off in your body, but not knowing exactly what. It's not just aging. It's often your hormones, too. of balance, everything feels off. But here's the good news. This doesn't have to be the story of your next chapter. Hormone Harmony by Happy Mammoth is an herbal formula made with science-backed ingredients designed to fine-tune your hormones by balancing estrogen, testosterone, progesterone, and even stress hormones like cortisol. It helps with common issues such as hot flashes, poor sleep, low energy, bloating, and more. With over 40,000 reviews and a bottle sold every 24 seconds,

the results speak for themselves. A survey found 86% of women lost weight, 77% saw an improved mood, and 100% felt like themselves again. Start your next chapter feeling balanced and in control. For a limited time, get 15% off your entire first order at happy mammoth.com with code next chapter at checkout. Visit happy mammoth.com today and get your old self back naturally. Something else you should know about, and of course the lever reports this as well, another utility company operating in Florida, Duke Energy, has cut off power to over 600,000

customers since 2020, nationwide utilities shut off power 1.7 million times since 2020. I mean, they got to make their profits. Utility companies, especially private companies that seek to make a profit, don't care about your economic troubles. They don't care about this pesky little pandemic that might have put you out of work. And so they don't want to deal with the backlash either as they are seeking profits. And so they, of course, legally bribed politicians to provide cover for them to do away with reporting standards on their behalf. And that is exactly what happened. So let's go to the next video. And actually, no, before we go to that, let me give you some more details on some of the bribes that took place. So of the 9.5 million that has flowed into

the Republican Party of Florida from electric utilities and their affiliated packs since 2019, $2 million has come in the past nine weeks as DeSantis preps a widely anticipated run for the presidency as the main GOP primary opponent to former President Donald Trump. Now roughly 1.5 million of that total amount flowing to Florida Republicans came from the Associated Industries of Florida AIF, a utility-backed political committee. Florida utility companies Next Era or Next Era, Tampa Electric, Gulf Power, and Duke have funneled more than 1.6 million to AIF since 2019. So that gives you a sense of just how much the utility companies are involved in this

organization that funnels more money, more legalized bribes to various politicians, including Ron DeSantis. By the way, there's more. I'm not done yet. Since the 2020 election, Next Era and Duke have additionally contributed more than 760,000 and 180,000 respectively to the Republican Governors Association, which donated more than $21 million to DeSantis' re-election campaign, Florida campaign finance records show. So this is how the game is played, right? The person who ends up or the people who end up paying the price are ordinary Americans, in this case ordinary Floridians. And by the way, when it comes to what else these utility companies do with their profits, of course they do the stock buybacks, of course they do the dividends, all of that stuff.

That's, do I even have to share that with you? I mean, that should just be common sense at this point. But the other thing that they do is destroy the campaigns of politicians who might actually look out for ordinary Americans, in this case, Floridians. And more perfect union had an incredible. report on that. Let's watch. Back in 2019, FPL's CEO, a guy by the name of Eric Szili, was furious with a Democratic state senator from Miami named Jose Javier Rodriguez. He was an environmentalist. After Rodriguez filed yet another solar power bill that Szili didn't like,

Solaji personally emailed his lobbyists and told them to make Rodriguez's life a living hell. And that's exactly what FPL's paid consultants did. They provided the money for what's become known in Florida as the ghost candidate scandal. Growing list of investigations into ghost candidates. A scheme to run sham candidates in three Senate races. These FPL consultants and other Republican operas ran hundreds of thousands of dollars through dark money organizations to advertise these random people who had been put on the ballot as spoiler candidates, allowing the Republicans to swoop in and win all three races.

we're ruled by companies and corporations. Let's just keep it real. As long as we allow for this system to move forward where corporate money is considered political speech, we're done. I mean, how are you supposed to persuade any lawmaker who takes legal bribes to look out for your best interest as opposed to the best interests of the companies that are bribing him? And how is this draining the swamp in Florida, Ron DeSantis? You are aiding and abetting the utility companies in your state as they price gouge the very people who voted for you, by the way. But that's the thing.

I mean, do Ron DeSantis' supporters know it? I would venture to say they don't. How many media outlets cover the scandals that we just shared with you? How many news outlets cover the legalized bribes? and what Ron DeSantis is really up to. There's a lot of attention on the culture war stuff for good reason. What DeSantis pushes for in Florida, what right wingers push for in other red states is horrifying. And it brutalizes certain communities that are already powerless.

So I don't want to minimize that. But while the national focus seems to be on the culture war issues and nothing more than that, what ends up happening is Americans end up getting screwed over by private companies that have legally bribed these politicians. And finally, there's a reason why they do it. It's because they're greedy and it's because they want to maximize profits and you can see it in the numbers. Top executives at Nextera gave themselves a 59% raise between 2020 and 2021.

Both Duke Energy and Nextera spent 8.3 billion on dividends. from 2020 through the third quarter of 2022, according to the bailout watch report. So if you want to make a difference, help to uplift this kind of reporting, help to amplify videos like this one, share it with people who might not know about what's really transpiring, help people understand how this system really works, because when they get that energy bill and they're wondering why all of a sudden it's far more expensive than what they previously paid, they should know why. They should get some answers. They're not going to get the answers from elected officials in their state. But there are decent journalists out there, like those at

the lever, who draw attention to stories like this. And so let's not only help them out by spreading the work that they do, but help out ordinary Americans who are constantly abandoned by their elected lawmakers by elected officials who care far more about the companies that are bribing them than they do about the ordinary Americans who actually voted them into positions of power in the first place. We got to take a break. When we come back, we've got more news, including the Federal Reserve's latest statements about how we need to mess around with the job market, you know, to deal with inflation. It's an incredible story. Don't miss it. We'll be right back. Welcome back to the show, everyone.

We have some updates on what the Federal Reserve is up to with its fiscal policy. Let's get to it. When you're slowing the economy, you're trying to put people out of work. That's your job. Is it not? Not really. We're trying to, we're trying to sort of price stability. No, you're trying to raise the unemployment rate. There are a lot of them. That means, I know you don't like the phrase, so let me strike it.

You're trying to raise the unemployment rate, aren't you not? No, we're not trying to raise you. We're trying to realign supply and demand, which could happen through a bunch of channels, like, for example, you know, just job openings. No, no, we're not, no, we're not trying to mess with jobs. We're just trying to realign supply and demand, which euphemistically means we want to lessen demand by doing a way with consumers having disposable income and money to spend, meaning we're going to mess with their jobs. Like, let's just keep it real. I don't know why Jerome Powell was hiding from that.

In previous hearings, in previous speeches, he made it pretty clear that in increasing, Interest rates, people are going to lose their jobs. And I'll explain why that is in just a moment. But I also want to note that Senator John Kennedy does not deserve any cookies for his hard line of questioning. Because there's a lot more to that video and to his line of questioning that we're going to get to in just a moment. But before we do that, turns out that Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell was speaking before senators in the banking committee. committee. And you know, they're asking him about inflation, whether or not the quick pace of rising interest rates is really the right way to go. They're concerned about a recession.

And I do want to go to one more snippet of his interaction with Senator Kennedy because Jerome Powell knows this is about jobs. And in this clip, I think it's kind of clear. in order to get inflation down from 6.4% to, let's say, 4.4% and the unemployment rate's going to have to rise to 7% based on history. That's what the record would say. Yeah, that's what the record will say. Now, as I mentioned earlier, we'll go back to Kennedy's exchange with Powell in just a moment, because there was an agenda behind what Kennedy was doing, and it's not a good one. Now, the agency does plan on raising interest rates. The central bank, I should say, is planning on raising interest rates higher than they previously expected. And that is something that Jerome Powell was open about because inflation, it's so stubborn.

I mean, we thought we were doing a good job in controlling it, but it seems pretty stubborn. And we need to go even further when it comes to increasing interest rates. Let's watch. Although inflation has been moderating in recent months, the process of getting, inflation back down to 2% has a long way to go and is likely to be bumpy. As I mentioned, the latest economic data have come in stronger than expected, which suggests that the ultimate level of interest rates is likely to be higher than previously anticipated. If a totality of the data were to indicate that faster tightening is warranted, we'd be prepared

to increase the pace of rate hikes. Now, Powell also noted that the feds fight against inflation was very likely to come at a cost to the labor market. He said that. Don't believe me? Why don't you watch? There's a little sign of disinflation thus far in the category of core services excluding housing, a category that accounts for more than half of core consumer expenditures. To restore price stability, will need to see lower inflation in this sector. And there will very likely be some softening in the labor market conditions. No, I love that I love that he's speaking in euphemism, softening, softening in labor market conditions.

So it sounds so lovely, soft, I love it. Except what he means is we're trying to do away with the leverage that workers currently have in this incredibly tight labor market. The unemployment rate is very low, and there are a lot of job openings. In fact, there are 1.9 job openings for every unemployed American. You know what that means? That means Americans have some leverage. Ordinary workers have some leverage. It means they can negotiate for higher wages, and they don't like that.

When I say they, I mean the Federal Reserve, I mean corporate America, they don't like workers having that leverage. They don't like workers getting paid more. They want to squash that because that is exactly what will do away with some portion of the demand side of our economic system. So that's the thinking. This is definitely about doing something about the earnings of ordinary Americans in order to respond to inflation. So let's get to some details. What has the Federal reserve done so far and what does it plan to do moving forward when it comes to increasing interest rates? Well, the Fed has raised interest rates last year at the fastest pace since the 1980s pushing borrowing costs above 4.5% from near zero. That initially seemed to be slowing

consumer and business demand by helping inflation to moderate. Powell even opened the door to faster rate increases if incoming data, which include a jobs report on Friday and a fresh inflation report due next week, remain hot. The Fed repeatedly raised rates by three quarters of a point in 2022, but slowed to half a point in December and a quarter point in early February. Now, what are the interest rates looking like now? What could happen in the near future? Well, Fed officials projected in December that rates would rise to a peak of 5 to 5.25%, with a few penciling in a slightly higher 5.25 to 5.5%. Powell suggested that the peak rate would need to be adjusted by more than that, but he didn't specify by how much. Now Powell also, you know,

it's just really interesting because I think he's starting to catch on to the fact that the way this system works is incredibly unfair and screwed up when it comes to ordinary people, when it comes to ordinary workers. Because all the focus has been on the earning power of workers rather than, well, let's just keep it real, the price gouging that's been taking place by companies. Now, the Federal Reserve doesn't focus on that at all. The Federal Reserve deals with monetary and fiscal policy. That is their mandate, that is what they're supposed to do. And so when we talk about monetary policy, that's when we talk about things like quantitative easing, where they buy assets from companies to provide liquidity to these corporations.

When it comes to fiscal policy, that's when we talk about the interest rates. And so with the interest rates increasing in order to tamp down inflation, that is the Federal Reserve's efforts in engaging in fiscal policy. Now the fear is that Powell is trying to drive up unemployment, of course, and that's a legitimate fear. And we should be concerned about that. However, there are, again, currently 1.9 job openings for every unemployed American, meaning that they have a lot of leverage. So it could be that the Federal Reserve is just trying to significantly decrease the number of jobs available. But how would that happen by increasing interest rates?

Well, it happens in two different ways. So when you increase interest rates, it's far more expensive to borrow money, meaning business owners will have difficulty getting approved for loans that are just far more expensive to pay back as a result of the higher interest rate. A lot of companies, if they're not able to finance their operations, they might end up shutting down. So that hurts the number of jobs that are available. It does away with some of the leverage that workers currently have. The other issue is, well, when it becomes more expensive to borrow money, consumers are less likely to get approved for various loans. And so if you don't have access to financing,

if you don't have access to capital, you're not able to purchase things within the economy. And if you're not able to purchase things within the economy, certain businesses might go out of business, thus hurting jobs, thus doing away with the earning power and the options for ordinary Americans and workers. So this is how the system works. This is how the system is supposed to work. I know it's screwed up. It's incredibly screwed up. But you can't get mad at a system that is working the way that it's supposed to work, right? When they talk about supply and demand, how this is just the best free market system. Is it really a free market system when you literally have government agencies? When you have a central bank that gets to manipulate the economy this

way, gets to have an impact on the leverage that ordinary workers have. And look, to be fair, there are conservatives who are not fans of the Federal Reserve. I had a conversation with Ben Shapiro recently, and when I talked about the Fed printing money and how that led to inflation, especially in the housing market, he agreed. In fact, I've seen him do segments about that as well. Also, there is some bipartisan support for maybe reining in the power and control that the Fed has in manipulating our entire economy. But the real issue here is who would regulate the economy? Who would look out for ordinary Americans?

Would it be members of Congress who are bribed by the very corporations that have a leg up over everything in this country? They have no interest in regulating companies. They have no interest in providing oversight to ensure that these corporations. Corporations are no longer price gouging us. And we know that they're price gouging us because you look at the profits of various corporations and they're bringing in record profits as the country, as everyone else is dealing with inflation and having difficulty purchasing bare necessities for survival, things like groceries. And we've talked about the oil and gas companies.

They've certainly been price gouging. And they've been making record profits. And if you think that it just impacts you at the pump, you'd be. mistaken because think about the transport of various goods that we need. That's going to inflate the cost of the goods due to the shipping that that needs to take place. Now with that said, I do want to go back to Senator Kennedy because while everyone seems to want to give him kudos for asking Powell a tough line of questions, there was really an agenda here that many missed. So let's go to the next video and I think you can hear it.

I know you're reluctant to admit it, and you don't want to get in the middle of a policy dispute. But I think it's undeniable. It's undeniable that the only way we're going to get this sticky inflation down is to attack it on the monetary side, which you're doing, and on the fiscal side, which means Congress has got to reduce the rate of growth of spending and reduce the rate of growth of debt accumulation. Do you guys catch that? Congress says Congress needs to do something about spending. Congress needs to do something about debt accumulation. What do you guys think that means? That means we need cuts to Social Security and Medicare.

Don't make a mistake about that. That is exactly what Kennedy's agenda was when he asked those questions to Jerome Powell. So it's amazing. It is incredible because it seems like it sounds like He's excoriating Powell for moving forward with an effort that's going to impact the number of jobs available. But he's not on the worker's side, because while he acknowledges that this might lead to unemployment among some workers, he wants to hit them with spending cuts on social programs that help ordinary Americans who might be struggling because they lost their jobs.

or cuts to social spending programs that are universal and wildly popular like social security and Medicare. That is what the line of questioning was really about for Senator Kennedy. Don't make a mistake in ever thinking that a corrupt politician would ever give a damn about you. They don't. And Kennedy, with his fake southern accent, is a great example of the disgusting and pathetic dysfunction that we have in our system.

We got to take a break. When we come back, we've got more, including the ongoing war on women. And hopefully, if it's ready, there's a late breaking story about a teamster president sparring with a Republican senator. It's an excellent story. I hope we have that ready. If we don't, we'll do it later in the show. But stick around. We've got a lot more to get to. We've got bangers in this segment. So if you're watching live, you're welcome. With that said, let's do it. You've asked the question.

You're out of line. Don't tell me I'm out of line. Don't tell me I'm out of line. Well, you frame the statement. You frame the statement. You're going to shut your mouth. Yeah, because you don't know what you're talking about. Yes, I did.

Hold it, hold it. Tough guy, I'm not afraid of physical. Senator, hold it. But don't sit there and tell me I'm out of line. That was incredible. And if you're wondering, what did I just watch? Well, that was International Brotherhood of Teamsters President Sean O'Brien sparring with Republican Senator Mark Wayne Mullen of Oklahoma,

which really throws cold water on the notion that Republicans, have now sided with this economic populist message. No, they haven't. I think it's abundantly clear because Mark Wayne Mullen is not a fan of this union president, not a fan of workers having the ability to organize their workplace and got offended real quickly in this hearing. Now, what is this hearing? Well, the exchange happened during a hearing convened by Senator Bernie Sanders, who's now

the chair of the Senate committee on health, education, labor, and pensions. Now, clearly, Bernie is making good use of his new role. Let's watch more from the exchange, and then I'll fill you in on what exactly they're discussing. Greedy CEOs like yourself accountable. You call me a greedy CEO. Oh, yeah, you are. You want to tack my salary. I'll attack you up. What did you make? What did you make when you owned your company? I made my company. I kept my salary down at about 50,000 a year because I invested every penny into it. Okay.

All right. You mean you hid money? No, I didn't hide. Oh, hold on a second. Okay, call it. He said that's out of line. All right. We're even.

We're even. We're not even. We're not even close to being even. You think it's smart? You think you're funny? No, you're not. You think you're funny. No, I never said.

Did I smile? You frame your opening statement. Hold, hold. You frame your opening statement. Senator, continue. Senator, please continue your statement. But, sir, this is a behavior. But, sir, this is a.

I think it's great that you're doing this because this shows their behavior on how they try to come in and organize a shot. And they say about intimidation, and it's not about intimidation. This is they show your behavior here. Stay on the issue. I think it's great that you're doing this. Me too. Me too. No, no, it's fantastic. I love that Bernie is the chair of this committee. And I love that he's making good use out of it.

Because what you just watched is the tension that exists between representations for workers and the owners and executives of various companies. That is the tension and that is, I think, a good representation of what it's like to have someone look out for you if you happen to be a worker, right? This is what the benefit is of having representation and a seat at the table as an ordinary worker and that's what you get when you can organize your workplace and be part of a union, especially if we're talking about a massive company like let's say Walmart or Starbucks or Amazon. And so this labor, sometimes I hesitate to say labor militancy because union membership

is still incredibly low in the country. However, we are seeing more and more stories of various workplaces organizing, places like Starbucks, hundreds of Starbucks stores voting to unionize. And I think with what Bernie is doing here, it can continue to fuel the momentum that we've seen. And we certainly need that. That's really the only way that we're going to see change when it comes to the power of labor in this country, to be quite honest. So let's get to some details about what Mark Wayne Mullen, which is not a fun name to print. I got it's Mark Wayne as one name. That is his name.

It's Mark Wayne, but there's no, there's no space. It's just smushed together as one name. I think it's weird, no offense of the Mark Wains that might be watching. But nonetheless, what O'Brien was asking him had to do with, you know, how much money he made through his plumbing businesses. And there was some controversy about that. As you can tell, Senator Mullen wasn't being honest. In 2013, then Representative Mullen reportedly pocketed more than $600,000 from the companies in violation of House ethics rules and federal laws limiting how much outside income

members of Congress are allowed to receive. Although Mullen transferred ownership of the companies to his family, he continued to serve as a board member and chief advertiser while raking in hundreds of thousands of dollars. Hmm, interesting. In fact, as O'Brien pointed out on social media, Mullen also saw his reported net worth skyrocket. So in the tweet, he says, for the record, Senator Mullen saw his reported assets balloon from a range of 7.3 million to 29.9 million at the end of 2020 to a range of 31.6 million to 75.6 million. Man, so big increase in your net worth as you, you know, act as a public servant in Congress, Senator Mullen. Now, uh, uh, you know,

Sean O'Brien also tweeted this because I think it's absolutely true. Don't let them distract you. Unions create jobs, make work safer, and put more money in workers' pockets. Most importantly, everything we do is to improve the lives of our members. I wonder if some others can say the same about their constituents. Well, why don't we take a look at what Sean O'Brien said about this in particular during the hearing? Last week alone, and I wish Senator Mullins didn't run out of here, we created a thousand jobs partnering up with United Airlines, where we are taking low wage earners at our entry

level, giving them an opportunity through an apprenticeship program to better their wages, their benefits, but also to give them a career path to a higher middle class living. So it's not just focusing on the apprenticeship programs out of high school, but it's also partnering up with the employers to facilitate their needs, their employees, to create these programs to give our members that much more opportunity in a better life. Where else are ordinary Americans going to get that message? They're not going to get it in a corporate media debate. They might get it in independent news outlets like TYT, the Lever, The Intercept, possibly.

you know, but in terms of mass media, in terms of corporate media, no one's going to hear that message, which is why I love that this hearing happened. Now, I didn't have the time, unfortunately, to watch the entire hearing today, but I can't wait to watch the entire hearing. Maybe we do more coverage on it tomorrow. But this is exactly the kind of information that ordinary people who aren't familiar with the impact of unions need to hear about. And by the way, Just gotta give Bernie more credit. I love the title of this hearing, which was defending the right of workers to organize unions free from illegal corporate union busting. Love it, great title.

And also Sanders for his part, declared at the conclusion of the hearing that there's a class war going on whether we want to recognize it or not. People on top have the money, they have the power, said Sanders. they're spending hundreds of millions of dollars to try to prevent ordinary workers from coming together to fight for dignity. And he's exactly right about that. I love that he said it. I love that he held this hearing. And I love that Shot O'Brien is a badass and does not stand down.

It's so good to see it because all we've been seeing for decades is mealy-mouthed Democrats, refusing to fight back against Republicans and their distorted logic, their distorted arguments, and their lies. So to hear someone speak out against them and call them out for what they are and who they are, I got to say that's pretty satisfying. We got to take a break. When we come back, we've got more news for you. John Ida Rola will be joining me. And I do really want to talk about this lawsuit against the state of Texas over their six-week abortion ban. It is important to understand the ramifications to women's health, which I don't think has talked about enough. So we'll talk about that and more coming right up. Don't miss it.

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