The Young Turks - Supreme Corruption

Episode Date: April 7, 2023

Episode summary: Clarence Thomas has been illegally accepting luxury gifts and private jet travel for decades, per bombshell ProPublica report. Students protesting gun violence in Colorado are being spied on by the state’s intelligence command center. Chants of "Fascists!" ring out as Tennessee GOP moves to expel Dems over gun control protest. Despicable: Idaho becomes first US state to restrict interstate travel for abortion care. Candace Owens reveals just how much a famed designer hates her: “I’d rather get beat in the ass with a wooden plank than ever go near either of you." HOSTS: Ana Kasparian (@AnaKasparian) & Brian Unger (@IamBrianUnger) 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. Woo! It's up! Welcome to TYT. I'm your host, Anna Casparian, and joining us today, I'm very excited to note, is Brian Unger, who is best known as the doctor who saved John Dutton's life in Yellowstone. Brian, it's so good to have you.

I'm so exhausted from the procedures I've been doing. You know, first it was the cancer with Dutton and then there were some other things. And the other things I can't talk about because of HIPAA, but I'm so happy to be here. So happy to have you. You're an American hero. No, but seriously, what was it like working with Kevin Costner? There's a little bit of a kerfuffle with Yellowstone right now. We don't have to get into that.

But what is Costner like in real life? I'm glad you asked me this. First of all, there was a moment when we were rehearsing and Kevin Costner and I are alone in the hospital room and he has a shirt off that I actually started to believe I was his doctor. That I could actually like tell him to sit back, lean back, take off your pants and all that stuff. So but but then then there was this real weird moment that now quickly wrap this up where I just went oh wow that's Kevin Costner like like like he's so iconic in that way that he was opposite me and I know other actors talk about that stuff and it's boring but really you do kind of like you have a real moment a wave comes over you and then he yelled at the audio guy really loud and I had to step out it was so awkward it got it got kind of heated yeah the audio guy. I stepped in between me and the heart monitor. And Kevin said something like, hey, man. Like he did it like a slight Christian bail moment. Just like, hey, what are you doing, man? And I, and I, and I, yeah, he just likes to quiet. Let's let's keep the dream alive. And it was a quiet

scene. And I, you know, I respect him. I respect him. Or he's going to kick my butt if I don't. And I'll never be invited back. So. Well, you'll always be invited here at TYT. I was super jealous with. You were on a Friday power panel, which I was not on, but I'm glad you're here today because there's a lot of news to get to, including this bombshell report from ProPublica in regard to the insane luxury gifts and trips. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas took from a Dallas billionaire. So we'll talk about all of that, all the details. It's pretty damning. And spoiler alert, no one's stepping down. This bombshell report will not. persuade Clarence Thomas to do a damn thing. Later in the show, we'll talk about how an intelligence agency within the state of Colorado decided to spy on protesters asking for some common sense gun reform. Maybe they should focus on investigating and foiling potential mass shootings, but we'll talk about that as well a little later. Some big updates in regard to the House of Representatives in Tennessee. So the state legislature there,

is pretty dominated by Republicans, and a few Democrats decided to protest and speak out in regard to the Republican Party's unwillingness to do anything about gun control. And so we'll talk about what the consequences have been for these Democrats in a little bit. But as always, like and share the stream. If you're watching us live, it's a great easy way to get the message out there, let people know about the show. And you can also become a member by going to t.yt.com slash join, or just click on that join button if you're watching us on YouTube. All right, Brian, you ready? You want to talk about Clarence Thomas? Yeah, let's get into it. Let's get into it. Yeah, another horrific sort of epic chapter

in the politicization of our Supreme Court. Yeah, go for it. Absolutely. Well, a bombshell report from ProPublica reveals that Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas accepted luxury vacations and other lavish gifts from a billionaire Republican donor. His name is Harlan Crow, and he's actually a real estate guy. Again, he's a billionaire, very wealthy. And while there was some reporting about this all the way back in 2011 by the New York Times, ProPublica has found some additional details that the American people should know about, including his failure, Justice Thomas's failure, to disclose any of these gifts or these trips on financial disclosure documents, something that the Supreme Court justices are supposed to do.

And so there is potentially a violation of law here. There are calls for Thomas to step down. We'll talk about all of that. But first, a few details from the reporting. A public servant who has a salary of $285,000, Thomas has vacationed on Crow's super yacht around the globe. just as Thomas flies on Crow's bombardier, a global 5,000 jet sounds fancy. He has gone with Crow to the Bohemian Grove, the exclusive California, all-male retreat

and to Crow's sprawling ranch in East Texas. In addition to this explosive report, ProPublica also had a Twitter thread that included all sorts of multimedia, all sorts of videos, photos of the, you know, retreats that they're writing about. Here's one example. At Crow's Invitation Only Resort, guests enjoy boathouses, a clay tennis court, batting cage, a replica of Hagrid Hut from Harry Potter, bronze statues of gnomes and milkshakes at a 1950-style soda fountain for free. Rooms at nearby resorts at about $2,000 a night, so it gives you a sense of just how expensive this area in general is. But, you know, the reason why you don't want Supreme Court justices going to these retreats with billionaire donors of any political affiliation is because of the potential corruption involved, right?

So I've got a lot more details to get to, but I can't wait to hear what you have to say about this, Brian. Well, first of all, this sounds gayer than an episode of Below Deck on Bravo. I mean, and I'm not trying to correct you, but the bombadier plane, okay, that's kind of sexy. Then the super yacht starts to lean into sort of, you know, Andy Cohen, Bravo territory. And then to me, the tipper is just the kind of all-male thing they do on the ranch or whatever, which is like, you know, listen, I've been to the Yellowstone ranch. I know. And, you know, there are women there and there are men there and it's very head. This sounds gay. I, no, this is, why does everything, maybe there's a show here. Maybe, maybe if we got all the Supreme Court justices to go on a yacht together on Bravo and you call that below something, I don't know, below the bench, below the bench and it's a whole thing where all the justices are on a boat together.

No, I am being facetious, of course. Listen, we are reminded each, you know, every so often what a political body this is. And I think we need to come to accept this as a political body as we would like them to be something impartial and free from the entanglement of money and politicization and bias and all of that. They are not. And, you know, the states are so high every election when it comes to picking presidents who last pick these candidates, justices. So we are reminded of this. The Constitution is very, is wearing very thin these days. I mean, there is so little trust in our institutions, and this is part of the reason why. I mean, when you find out about Nancy Pelosi stockport Consistently outperforming the S&P 500 year after year after year?

I mean, is she really that much of an expert on how businesses are going to perform? I mean, they're trading individual stock. And it's not just Pelosi, of course. We've talked about this quite a bit on the show. I mean, members of both parties, congressional lawmakers are investing in individual stocks in companies that they make legislative decisions about, regulatory decisions about. So there's all sorts of corruption in that regard. Of course, we know about money and politics, just the Supreme Court, of course, opening the floodgates and allowing for unlimited corporate

campaign donations towards super PACs. And then now we hear about this. And what's so incredible is why didn't he just disclose these trips and these gifts if there's no issue here, if there's no corruption here, right? And not only was he accepting the lavish trips and gifts, he also failed to disclose it, which he is supposed to do by law. And if you're curious about what kind of investigation ProPublica did to find all the details here, considering Clarence Thomas failed to disclose any of this in financial filings, ProPublica uncovered the details of Thomas's travel by drawing from flight records, internal documents distributed to Crow's employees and interviews with dozens of people ranging from his super yacht staff to members of the secretive

bohemian club to an Indonesian scuba diving instructor. So they- I'm telling you right now, I'm telling you, they're, they're, it's just like, I did not mean, I mean, to be a raunchy. Listen, there's, when you add in the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, docu soap. Look, I, the optics of it are just terrible. I don't know, when was the last time you were invited to go on a yacht on a vacation, let alone go many times. And I'm going to send my plane for you and I'm going to wine and dine you on this boat. And I'm basically going to provide you with a, I know how busy you are as a Supreme Court

Justice. I want to give you this free vacation, not just once, but then I want you to come to a ranch with me and then I want you to go to the club and then I want you to do this. I think the optics are so bad that anyone with any decent would probably have to have some voice in their head that says, you know, I should probably not do this. Thank you, but I can afford my own vacation because I make $285,000 a year. I can swing it. Thank you.

Yeah, something tells me that Justice Thomas in particular and very likely other Supreme Court justices are under the impression that they can get away with anything. And they're, I mean, Justice Thomas's stint in the Supreme Court started with hearings with serious allegations about sexual harassment. Anita Hill, you know, put everything on the line to disclose that. And she suffered the consequences of that. And Clarence Thomas got away with it. Same with Brett Kavanaugh. I mean, when the system messages to these to these justices that they can enjoy impunity, well then, yeah, I mean, remember, the New York Times reported on this back in 2011.

And he still continued taking the gifts, taking the trips, and failing to. to file any disclosures about it. And I wanna give you more details because it's insane. So soon after Crow, remember that is the billionaire here, met Thomas three decades ago, he began lavishing the justice with gifts, including, these are weird gifts, I'm sorry. A $19,000 Bible that belonged to Frederick Douglass, which is kind of cool I guess, which Thomas did disclose to be fair.

Recently Crowe gave Thomas a portrait of the justice and his wife, who, according to the painter who painted it, Crow's foundation also gave $105,000 to Yale Law School, Thomas's alma mater, for the Justice Thomas Portrait Fund tax filing show. And we have some more creepy photos, including an image of the realistic painting of one of Thomas's visits to the 105-acre property in remote upstate New York. The painting shows Thomas enjoying a cigar along.

side Crow and chatting with other conservative power brokers like Leonard Leo. In fact, why don't we talk about that real quickly? Because not only is there the corruption angle having to do with Crow and his close relationship with Justice Thomas, when Crow puts these gatherings together, there are other corporate interests there, right? So even though Harlan Crow says this, we have never sought to influence Justice Thomas on any legal or political issue. Fact of the matter is,

Justice Thomas is surrounded by corporate interest during these trips. Like, why do you think this is happening? You think that this billionaire is bringing these people together out of the kindness of his heart? Or could there be more of an agenda there? During just one trip in July of 2017, Thomas' fellow guests included executives at Verizon and Pricewaterhouse Cooper's, major Republican donors,

and one of the leaders of the American Enterprise Institute, which of course is a pro-business conservative think tank. We know what's going on. Like don't insult our intelligence. And that's what's so infuriating about it. It's just the incessant gaslighting from all of these power players, right? How they insult your intelligence and try to make it seem as though they're doing nothing wrong when it's clear they're doing something wrong. And in this case, Clarence Thomas failing to disclose a lot of this goes against certain laws, which I can tell you about in just a moment.

But thoughts on that, Brian? Yeah, I mean, both sides are guilty of this. There are these confabs that happen in very high-priced resorts, whether it be, you know, Park City or media moguls gathering every year and, you know, political figures joining them and whether they be the CEO of Apple or other media companies. And I mean, this is, this is basically, this exposes the operational, kind of playbook that is to invite these folks and their families to really luxurious venues, wine them and dine them. And I mean, he's not there. Thomas is not there because he's a great

conversationalist or a great joke teller around the campfire or wow, you know, he really knows how to like, his samores are amazing. It's not that. It's, it's, we know what's going on here. And And at least we can see this kind of laid there for us. And let us all be reminded that even the highest court in the land is just not free of this kind of influence. It's money, pure and simple. Now, one final thing that I have to bring up is Clarence Thomas seems to enjoy messaging to the American people that he's just an ordinary guy. He's an ordinary guy. He likes the simple things in life.

He's not one to really aspire to live in the lap of luxury. And apparently, Harlan Crow is financing a documentary about Justice Thomas's life. And there's one portion of it that I thought was revealing, given that he goes to all these fancy trips every year on, you know, Harlan Crow's dime. So let's hear what Clarence Thomas wants you to think of. about him. You know, I don't have any problem with going to Europe, but I prefer to United States. And I prefer seeing the regular parts of the United States. I prefer going across the rural areas.

I prefer the RV parks. I prefer the Walmart parking lots to the beaches and things like that. There's something normal to me about it. I've come from regular stock. And I prefer that. I prefer being around that. Right, Brian. I mean, Thomas just loves hanging out in Walmart parking lots.

That's the kind of guy he is, which by the way, if that were true, that would also be a little weird. But I digress. Well, I mean, there's just anyone I know, I mean, listen, I come from regular stock in Ohio. I live in Georgia now. I live out in the sticks. But the one thing you'll never hear me say to anybody is, hey, I come from normal stock and I love the Walmart parking lot. It is really funny because he has this caricature in his mind of what ordinary Americans are like. Like, I don't know. What do they do to kill time? I think they hang out at Walmart parking lots.

Listen, my neighbors, you know, they don't brag about how much they love the tractor supply parking lot. They go there for feed. They get their chicken feed. They get like their accoutre ma for their hen houses or whatever. But no one likes really the Walmart parking lot. It's really just a stopover because that's the only place where you really don't have to pay to park an RV. And you won't get, you know, held up at a roadside rest kind of situation. So you go to the Walmart parking lot.

But I just, yeah, I don't, I just, the declaration of that. identifying that way. Even those folks wouldn't say that regular, the regular folk thing. Yeah. You know, 100%. I mean, this guy is just such a fraud. And this is a big deal. I think it's a huge deal. If Ruth Bader Ginsburg was still alive and this story came out about her, I would also find that to be unacceptable. But that's the thing. I mean, I feel like broadly speaking, the left has higher standards for people in positions of power on our side. We're quick to immediately, and I think this is a good thing overall. It can sometimes go a little above and beyond, and sometimes we can be overly critical

over minor things, but this is not a minor thing. On the right, though, all you hear today is, this is a political hit job. It's a political hit job. Yeah, except original reporting dated back to 2011. So there's clear evidence here and are you just okay with that? You're okay with, as long as it's a guy on your side, you're okay with the corruption. Okay, great. It could be too, Anna, just on a very basic level of psychology, it could just be someone who wants to hang out with powerful celebrities and or people with money and kind of like, you know, there's a phrase for it out in L.A.

where I live for 20 years where, you know, it starts with an S and there's a hyphen and then an F. But I mean, it's it's a thing where some people just and it, but I'm always uncomfortable when I see a Supreme Court justice, even leaning a little bit into the realm of celebrity, where they become, where, where they're the lot, the details of their lives. It's kind of like I'd rather not know what their their regular stock is or whatever. It's really, really not what I'm interested in. I'm really more interested in their judicial thinking. Thousand percent than I am, you know, kind of like. But I do, I would challenge anyone out there to find him in a Walmart parking lot. I will personally donate some, whatever I have in my pocket

to that person who can provide a picture of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas coming out of a restroom at a Walmart into his RV at a parking lot. It will never happen. Yeah, I totally agree with you. 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. When they fall out 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,

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That and more coming right up. There is nothing normal to preferring Walmart parking lots to beaches. Exactly. Exactly. 100%. All right. Well, let's get into the surveillance state that we're all living in. Not only are we all surveilling one another with our phones, but of course there are

government agencies engaging in this as well, even on a state level. So let's discuss. Student protesters were being tracked and surveilled ahead of a planned, walk out to protest gun violence in Colorado. Now, Colorado, much like the rest of the country, is grappling with endless gun violence. And these students decided, you know what? We're going to plan to walk off campus to essentially have people finally listen to our demands here.

We need common sense gun reform. But this bombshell report from the intercept notes that the state agency known as the state's intelligence command center issued a bulletin to authorities. warning of a planned nationwide school walkout. Now the students demand action has coordinated eight, this is what the bulletin said, has coordinated a nationwide school walkout amongst students throughout the country with similar trends to those seen in Colorado stated the situational awareness bulletin dated April 4th, which was issued by the Colorado Information Analysis Center. Now the Colorado Information Analysis Center sounds super benign.

except it's really not, okay? But first a little more from the bulletin itself. The planned school walkouts are believed to be in response to several recent school shootings. The CIA, and that's the Colorado Information Analysis Center bulletin states, going on to identify over two dozen Colorado schools where walkouts were expected to take place. Now, just to fill you guys in, I know there's been a lot of shootings lately. What are the two shootings that inspired this walk off or walk out? Last month, for instance, two school administrators were shot and wounded by a 17-year-old in Denver's

East High School on March 27th. Six people, including three students were killed when a former student opened fire at a religious school, covenant school, in Nashville, Tennessee. Now, what the hell is the CIA? And what is their true objective here? Well, CIAC's mission is preventing acts of terrorism, taking an all crimes, all threats approach, according to the agency's own website. It's not clear how the student walkouts relate to this mission. Experts have long criticized fusion centers like CIAC for operating with broad authorities and very little oversight. And so it has a benign sounding name, but the whole purpose of this, I guess, government entity in Colorado is to fight terrorism and potential

threats? These students, if you ask me, unless there's information that we're not privy to, haven't seemed to pose any kind of threat. Seems like they just wanted to practice their First Amendment rights and walk off campus to protest and call for more gun regulation, which a lot of people in this country want, but of course lawmakers don't want to listen to that. And in this case, you have like an intelligence agency within the state of Colorado, just keeping tabs on the kids. Brian, thoughts on this? It's a reminder for us all to be very conscious of what it's happening on a state level with our agencies and our legislatures. I've always thought that the scariest stuff that goes

on in America is being perpetrated by, you know, super dominant. supermajorities and state legislatures because one, there is very little oversight. Two, journalistically, there are very few people who cover legislatures. I think like in California, for instance, not that that is a radically, you know, right-leaning kind of legislature. But I heard there was only one reporter in Sacramento covering it for the Associated Press. There's no way for anyone to really be able to monitor what's going on in the states. Three, I'm like, I think that like, grownups are scared and intimidated by the power of social media and this mobilization of young people resisting the pushback on assault weapons. I think people are freaked out and I'm not shocked.

I just wonder what kind of oversight they're doing, like what kind of monitoring are they doing. And who are they, are they selecting out individuals to monitor or are they tapping into phones? Are they, what are they doing? Because the people who need oversight the most are people who already own assault weapons. Those folks should be monitored, presumably. They are the ones who are at most risk of going in and shooting a place up because these guns keep appearing over and over and over in these mass shootings. the data. So I just wonder what they're doing on on like in terms of like their boots on the ground. Yeah, I mean, look, if we had a process in place to do the appropriate vetting

prior to someone purchasing a gun, if we close gun show loopholes, loopholes pertaining to private sellers, then we don't need to have a conversation about a government agency keeping tabs on, you know, gun owners or anything like that. The problem is we just, I mean, look at Florida. Like what Florida just did was so unnecessary. It's, it was already incredibly easy to obtain guns and engage in concealed carry in the state of Florida. But Ron DeSantis, along with the super majority of Republicans in the state legislature, decided to do away with the most laxed gun regulations they have in Florida, including permit.

requirements for concealed carry, training requirements for concealed carry. It's just unnecessary. It's so, it was already so easy to purchase guns in Florida. But in this case, we're not having a discussion about gun regulation. We're having a discussion about the government surveilling Americans who are upset at the lax gun laws and want to practice their First Amendment rights. These students are doing nothing wrong. And it reminds me of what the, FBI did, along with the New York Police Department, after 9-11. They wasted resources in surveilling Muslim students. They would go to various like field trips with Muslim students because, hey, just the very

nature of them being Muslim, I guess, in their minds, automatically posed a terrorist risk in the United States. It was just so stupid. And I see the same thing happening here. We learn no lessons. I mean, it just keeps happening over and over again. And to your question, Brian, we don't know what this surveillance consists of, right? They're keeping their eyes on these kids, but what does that mean?

Are they tapping their phones? Did they get a warrant if they are doing that? I mean, I'd like to see more of an investigation into this, but this is an important story that at least lets us know what, you know, what this government agency is up to in Colorado. And it is also another sign of this hypocrisy about limited government. I just, you know, you hear it as a tenet of like the Republican base. It's just another example of them, you know, not wanting, they want to be your mom, they want to be your dad, they want to be your minister, they want to be your teacher, they want to be your police officer.

They want to basically control every thought that's coming out of your liberal little head and push back on on bad policy. And I think government acts proportionate to the threat that they feel is at foot. And I believe that we're at a moment. Because I mean, look, I'm in my late 50s. And I was debating gun control issues when I remember back in high school. And it was the same debate. It's so depressing. Same debate we would have. We'd stand up and we'd do debates and debate class. And it was the same stuff. And nothing has changed. Nothing will change. It's going to take seismic, crazy levels of protest to make this thing change. And I think that we're fast approaching that. Yeah, I think I think it goes even beyond

massive protests. I mean, we saw massive protests in the summer of 2020 and we still see stories involving, you know, cruel and unusual punishment in our prison systems, you know, people still dying from excessive force. I mean, so it's, it goes beyond just protesting. I think that you need to have a well organized outside pressure campaign that just persistently pressures Congress to do something. Without that, we're going to keep this cycle going, where there's a mass shooting, there's outrage over the lax gun laws. That'll last for about 24 hours. But by the next day, Donald Trump is facing another indictment. And so our attention goes to that story instead. You need to have like an organized group of people that just persistently pressure members of Congress and strategically pressure members of Congress to do something about this.

Otherwise, if they don't feel the pressure, they don't see the incentives. And that's the real problem. Yeah, I also think too, lastly, I just wanted to add that I think the idea what has been effective is being a single issue voter and on abortion has been an example of that. And we just saw that in Wisconsin. I think that when politicians are brave enough to run on an on a on basically an anti-gun sort of thing, anti-assault weapon, that's their main. I think it's time for that. I think it needs to be, you know, to get the change we want, people are going to have to

use that issue effectively when they're running on the left. Yeah, that's a great point. So, I mean, I don't know. I don't see that happening anytime soon, but we'll see, we'll see. But in the meantime, maybe the, you know, local authorities should stop spying on harmless students who are looking to protest and instead focus their attention on potentially foiling some of these mass shootings. That would be great. For now, though, let's move on to what's happening in the state of Ohio. You mentioned abortion, Brian.

Unfortunately, states like Ohio are taking their anti-abortion laws to the next level. I'm sorry, Idaho. Should I say Ohio? My bad. Idaho, it's a different state. The state that begins with a vowel and ends with a vowel. People confuse them. I'm from Ohio.

But, you know, there are two states' names we stole from Native Americans. So go ahead. Okay. Well, let's talk about what's happening in Ohio. Idaho. Jesus, it's just coming out of my mouth that way. All right. Idaho just became the first state to restrict interstate travel for minors seeking abortion access.

Now this was something in the works for quite some time now. Unfortunately, it has passed. authored law, H.B. 242, creates a new crime of abortion trafficking and establishes a minimum two-year prison sentence and a maximum of five years for anyone found guilty of committing it. Now, here's what abortion trafficking is defined as in the legislation. An adult who, with the intent to conceal an abortion from the parents or guardian of a pregnant, unmancipated minor either procures an abortion or obtains an abortion-inducing drug for the pregnant minor to use for an abortion by recruiting, harboring, or transporting the pregnant minor within this state commits the crime of abortion trafficking. So this is interstate travel. It's just a way

to essentially scare anyone who might think about helping a minor who is seeking an abortion. So let me just say, like some of you might think, well, I mean, it's a minor. Maybe you want the parents to know, except what if that minor was raped by a family member and doesn't want to come out and talk about that yet and isn't ready for that yet? I just think when it comes to this particular issue, it's such a sensitive matter that has a lifelong impact on the girls, in this case we're talking about minors, the girl's life, that I can see situations in which the parents can actually make the problem even worse. But I'm curious what you think, Brian, because the fact that this affects only minors

does make it a little more complicated in the minds of a lot of people. I mean, taking the age of the woman out of the equation and the pregnancy, it just feels unenforceable, unconstitutional to prohibit the travel of someone. seeking medical attention or medical care. Like I said, a lot of the scariest things that are happening on these issues, excuse me, are happening at the state level. It's one of the things that Liz Wins did and the abortion access front has been fighting for for almost a decade now.

They work on this state level and some of the stories, this is a horrific, this is a horrific thing. It is. that a mom or a grandmother who is transporting a family member who is trying to get an abortion for whatever reason will go to jail for being a trafficker, an abortion trafficker? This is almost, this is so futuristic and bizarre to even think of like someone could write an abortion trafficker that there are people out there like coyotes picking up women all over the state of Idaho and grabbing them and putting them in cars and

taking them to see doctors. This feels like, you know, we're going full circle here, but this does feel like something that will go to the Supreme Court to Clarence Thomas, who is hopefully not on a yacht and can actually apply some judicial intelligence to this. But this just feels really, really dystopian and scary to me. I mean, it is, it absolutely is. Yeah, I mean, look, it's why states can't, states, this is the very reason states can't make anti-abortion policy on their own. And then they overreach and try to reach across the border to another state.

It's insane. It's insane. It's absolutely insane. And you're right, this is dystopian. This is, I mean, if you want to talk about big government, it doesn't get much bigger than this. I mean, this is the most intimate, important decision that a female can make. And the idea that the government would go out of its way to not only intimidate the girl in this case, but also anyone who might want to help the girl in her time of need. It just tells you everything you need to know. And then they'll turn around and say, let's think about two. Yeah, go ahead.

Yeah, no, I was just thinking too about the enforcement of such a thing. How is it reported? We're so close to the handmaid's tail here, I can't even believe, like women will be traveling in the trunk of their grandmother's car on their way to see a doctor because maybe they were raped or because there's a, you know, a pregnancy where there's fetal distress or some other abnormality that needs medical attention or driving to get an abortion pill, as they call it. I mean, this just feels really frightening and such overreach. I mean, it is, it really is frightening. And, you know, it is interesting because I've been wondering, considering how unpopular this is. I mean, I think that the anti-abortion wave did, in fact, help the progressive Supreme Court candidate win in Wisconsin. The midterm elections were fascinating, especially because abortion did end up being,

or anti-abortion policies did end up serving as a liability for Republican candidates. And look, I know I'm on the left and maybe people won't take my analysis on that as seriously, but maybe you'll take that analysis seriously when it comes from a right winger. Because Anne Coulter is like, can we like maybe stop with the anti-abortion legislation? So she got a little bit of credit for this tweet from Jezebel, but I give her no credit and I'll explain why after I read it. So she had quote tweeted a New York Times piece about the victory for progressives in Wisconsin. And she says, the demand for anti-abortion legislation just cost Republicans another crucial race. Hey, pro-lifers, we won. Abortion is not a constitutional right anymore.

Please stop pushing strict limits on abortion, or there will be no Republicans left. So the reason why I don't give her any credit is, hey, Ann, I mean, I don't think you're stupid, but did you think that that was the goal to just change the constitutional protections for abortion? And then everyone would just stop after that. Like all these red states would just step back and be like, that's all we wanted to do. It was really an ideological thing. And out of principle, we just felt like the, you know, constitution doesn't provide protections for reproductive rights. But after that, you know, we don't want big government, we're gonna let you do what you want to do. No, that was never the goal.

The goal was always to reverse Roe v. Wade to allow for all these insane draconian laws to go into effect. I mean, so many of these red states had trigger laws. So this very second Roe v. Wade gets reversed, those anti-abortion laws come into effect. Why is she surprised by this? Do you not know your own party? Like, it's insane. I think you just hit the nail on my head. I think that they, she doesn't know her own party.

I don't think any of these, she seems like a very anachronistic kind of Republican now in this party today. I mean, I, this is, there's no limit to how far they want to go to make a 50 state ban. These legislatures across the country want to ban abortion and make no exceptions whatsoever. And any Republican who thought that it would stop at a constitutional sort of, hey, Hey, it's not written into the constitution that a woman has a right to an abortion. They have been kidding themselves. And now they're saying these things because, yeah, they are going to continue to lose. But, you know, it's starting to look like the Republicans need to sort of to splinter and form their own political party, separate from their own party.

Just as Democrats have always said, you know, maybe the Democrats should split up and form a second party or, you know, a third party. I'm not being very articulate about this. No, I hear what you're saying. I mean, you have two parties. You have two parties that are big tents. Yeah, no, I hear you. And we've been struggling with that, with the Democratic Party for quite some time now. But look, I think that this is, you know how capitalism is self-destructing?

And I think we're seeing a lot of it right now. The same goes for the culture wars, right? When you have a party that has put all of its weight behind culture war issues because they're economic policies are incredibly unpopular and they certainly don't want to run on those policies, eventually they're going to go too far. And that's where the Republican Party is right now. And people want to be able to make decisions about their own bodies, about their own lives, especially when it comes to something as serious as having children. And they don't know how to stop because what else are they going to do? I mean, what else is their big issue? All they do

is dive deep in culture wars that are increasingly unpopular. Americans are sick of it. especially when there are much more serious economic issues that these lawmakers should be focusing on, right? And by the way, if they genuinely care about human lives, they don't want to do anything about mass shootings. They don't want to do anything about school shootings. They have no problem with the laxed gun laws that kill actual living, breathing human beings. But then they turn around and pretend like, no, no, we're saving human lives because the zygote is way more important than a human being that's already allowed. and outside a womb and is viable outside a womb. All right, we got to take a break.

When we come back, I got to be honest, I want to talk about Candace Owens with you, Brian. So let's lighten things up and talk about this insane Vanity Fair piece that seems to be, well, I like to keep it PG on the show. So I'll just say blowing Candace Owens. That and more coming right up. Welcome back to the show Anna Casperid and Brian Unger with you. Brian, where can our fine audience find more of your work? You know, just on repeat.

always sunny is a god i i'm on history i'm on uh it's always sunny obviously frequently and uh yellowstone where you can catch it love on paramount plus or um peacock or no it's not peacock don't tell the people it's peacock i think it's paramount plus yeah paramount plus because they pulled it from peacock they did they did yeah it's a little complicated but i actually signed up for paramount Plus to watch all of the spinoffs of Yellowstone because I liked Yellowstone so much. And I think I liked 1883 the most, believe it or not. And Kevin Costner is not in 1883. So something to think.

You didn't like that one? What about, I know there are a lot. It was really good. The Taylorverse, as they call it, Taylor Sheridan's that he's writing all of these and producing all of these. But there's so much more coming down the path. I mean, I'm on board. I think that he's been doing a great job so far.

You know, usually spin-offs are not that great, but he's done a great job with these spin-offs. So we'll see what happens. I am sad to hear that Kevin Costner is kind of leaving the Yellowstone show. But it's okay. Yeah, I heard about that. He has his own project that he's doing about the American West. So it'll be interesting to see how that all ends up. Yeah, I'm excited about it for sure.

I wonder as a doctor, as his physician, if I'll go to the new show. That's all I care about. I hope you do. I hope you, and you invite me to go with you. All right. You have no idea how excited I was when I saw you in that scene. I was like, oh my gosh, Brian Ocker. I already loved this show. I love it even more. I like freaked out. Anyway, all right. I put this story in the first hour specifically for you, Brian, because I feel like we'd have some fun with it. Although there is an infuriating angle to this story because it's the, it's a major publication essentially like laundering the reputation of

Candace Owens, if you ask me. So let's get into it. Vanity Fair had one of the strangest, glowing publicity articles for Candace Owens. Candice Owens of all people, like the woman who ran cover for Kanye West after he said some of the most vile anti-Semitic things, that Candice Owens. Now, this comes after she also, by the way, provides cover, continues to provide cover for January 6 rioters. Nonetheless, the piece is Candice Owens, Friends of Kanye, Power Troll, Parlor Tradwife, is playing for keeps. So that headline, I think, is all right. It's really the content of the piece itself that was weird to me because it just seemed to be, like, it seemed like the right. here, Emily Jane Fox was almost like fawning over Candace Owen. So I'll give you a few excerpts,

so you know what I mean. So they quote some of the people that are familiar with Candice Owens, including a former Vogue employee who worked at Vogue at a time when Candice Owens was an intern there. And this Vogue employee was quoted as saying, quote, she never took no for an answer. She was organized and relentless, smarter than everyone and knows that. really smarter than everyone why don't we give you a little taste of just how smart kandis owens is global warming global climate change is definitely real it's happening well but it's always happened yes it has always happened so what are we what is the climate change yes the climate changes it was different weather yesterday than it was today if hitler just wanted to make

Germany great and have things run well okay fine the problem is is that he wanted he had dreams outside of Germany. He wanted to globalize. He wanted everybody to be German, everybody to be speaking German, everybody to look a different way. That's not to me. That's not nationalism. What is death con three? Did he mean death con three, which would be a military defense position, not an offense for those of who that are offended, a military defense position. Is he tweeting this because he's reading the Newsweek headline calling him an anti-Semitic? Is he angry because he can't believe that he's not free to talk about people in his life who happened to be Jewish?

Yeah, that last clip was Candice Owens, pretending to be confused about Kanye West's very clear and obvious anti-Semitism. Now, I want to give you a few other quotes. So Emily Jane Fox also quoted another fellow intern of Candice Owens, also during her, I guess, Vogue era. She was running the show and completely kicking ass, a fellow intern said. There was not some kind of formal hierarchy, but it was very clear that she was running the show. People loved her. And then, okay, those are just comments. Those are quotes from people who are familiar with Candace Owens. What did Emily Jane Fox herself write about Candice Owens? The Daily Wire is where in the conservative fiefdom, she's become the it girl. Enough so that just about everyone,

including Owens herself wonders if she has a future in politics. If you see how her staff stays glued to her as she commands their daily meetings, cracks up at her jokes during taping, how commenters online worship her, how the Republican media powers that be, Sean Hannity, Tucker Carlson, feed off her words, nothing seems far out of reach. I mean, I've got more excerpts for you, Brian, but I got to jump in. And I don't know, maybe I'm being too tough on Emily here. But what do you think?

You know, this is interesting thing on the heels of the 60 minutes interview with Marjorie Taylor Green, too, where there's like this, you know, I think we should get off this question of whether like the media is allowed to or permissible to cover people. They can cover whoever they want and they can write and interview people, whoever they want. And, and whether you, I mean, you can debate her, her like star power or her status, but, you know, you can apply your own test of issue newsworthy. And, you know, that's like a false debate to me. She's clearly on the national radar. She's in the media landscape. People listen to her.

She's got a lot of followers, et cetera. Sure. But the, it's the. It's the tone of the piece, right? It is the tone of the piece. And I feel like, and I feel like a more seasoned older journalist with more historical perspective and context would write a fairer piece, a shorter piece. I feel like one of the things that really bugs me, I'm going to sound super old right now about a newer generation of journalists is that everyone is great. Everything is so great.

everything is so big and everyone is everyone is doing such amazing things and there's just there's lauding of meritorious BS on on people who really haven't done anything except create theater and you know the one thing that young turks don't do is create theater you don't get on here and say provocative things just to be viral and just to say things that are going to sort of like send out electrical current into the, you know, electromagnetic spectrum and get everybody upset. You're actually trying to shine light on things, issues, context, context, context.

She's really just a provocateur. When your own, when your big endorser in the article is Tucker Carlson. I mean, it's not like any other journalist from the, from any other reputable journalistic enterprise came out and said, you know, I really like what she's doing. She's doing something that's really interesting and that's not from a publisher of the Washington Post. I know I'm going to get crap just for saying that because they're the beacon of liberal

sort of journalism. But still, pick any paper in America. Pick the LA Times, pick New York Times, pick the Atlanta Journal Constitution. Is she doing something profoundly innovated in the journalistic space? Or speak to academics. How about professors of journalism, black, white, just anyone. No one's saying that this is like she's the vanguard of journalism. It's just more of this kind of, let's just waste 10 pages on someone and write all about

them stepping out of their black suburban in the morning with their coffee and starting a show bird, you know, and it's just this, it's this attribution. And I'm sure there's going to be, you know, the next thing we know is that HBO will probably do a six-part sort of scripted drama about her. Yeah, no, but that's what I wanted to really focus on here, because that's the frustrating thing about the incentives in our society. Because all of the incentives are to be a bad person, right? To say terrible things for the shock value. It grows an audience, unfortunately.

It then leads to glowing puff pieces. And you're right, it was an insanely long piece. And I decided to stick to it because I'm like, all right, this is long. So at some point the writer here is gonna balance out all of this glowing garbage about Candace Owens. I mean, look, the 60 Minutes interview with Leslie Stahl and Marjorie Green, it's interesting because the first thing I saw when it came to that interview was the interview in its entirety. Whereas I think most people who were complaining about it on Twitter saw one clip that the 60 Minutes page had tweeted. out. And that one clip out of the context of the entire interview made it seem as though Leslie

Stahl didn't really challenge her on anything. Now, I think that there were portions of that interview that were certainly weak, and I wish Leslie Stahl pushed back harder. But, you know, she's a product of an antiquated journalistic model. And so that antiquated journalistic model is basically don't be combative, stay calm, ask the questions. You know, Like, it's polite pushback, but we're dealing with a different stock of politicians now who are combative, aggressive, lie with a smile on their faces. And you need someone who is, who has the ability to push back effectively. But there were moments in that interview that I think Stahl did an okay job, right?

There were weak moments and not so weak moments. With this puff piece from Vanity Fair, no, the whole thing, it's almost as if Candace Owens wrote it herself, it's insane. And to your point, Brian, about, you know, the shock jock nature of Candace Owens. I mean, get a load of this excerpt. Candice is unapologetic and unafraid and keenly aware of how to weaponize talking points to get what she wants. Absolutely, absolute certainty goes viral and no one is more absolute or certain than Owens. But is it all deeply felt or is it the performance of a lifetime?

It's such an easy answer, Owen said, when I asked her witch, smiling and blinking her eyes at me like I was the world's greatest idiot. So is that, like did she say yes there? I mean, what are you trying to communicate there? And what are you trying to communicate to the reader that Candice Owens is saying shocking things that she doesn't believe because she's a grifter who has catapulted to the level of necessary to get a glowing vanity fair piece written about them? I mean, I just, anyway, it's like obvious to people what Candace Owens is doing. But instead of suffering consequences for being a dishonest grifter, she gets rewarded for it. And that's what I'm talking about when it comes to all of the incentives being in the wrong place. I agree, and that's why this defamation case at box is so important. Because when cynicism is undermining the tenets of real journalism and you get to say whatever

the heck you want and you get to be as theatrical as you want for the sake of being provocative, theatrical, and let's just be honest, gathering as much audience as you can in one big tent, you have certain responsibilities and you can be held accountable for them. And I know we're not talking about the Fox case, but when the punitive damages in this case get decided by a jury and they're in the, let's say, possibly hypothetically in the dozens and dozens of billions of dollars, I think you're going to see a different kind of tone come out of some of these people. Because right now, you can pretty much say anything you want and you can lie as much as you want, unfounded, without factual basis. just for the sake of audience gathering. And that's so cynical. And the writer should kind of be ashamed of herself for writing that.

Because the judgment of any writer would be clearly it's only for theater. And it doesn't have any real basis in one's core belief. What those core beliefs are is really undetermined. It's not really clear. Right. Well, Brian Unger, thank you for doing the show with me. It was an absolute pleasure. Always good to you.

And I hope you come back soon. Thanks for having me. All right. I will. Well, we're going to take a quick break. And when we come back, Wozni Lombre will join me for the second hour and the bonus episode. We'll see you in a few. 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.co slash t-y-t. I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.