The Young Turks - TYT Extended Clip - February 18th, 2020
Episode Date: February 19, 2020Bernie isn't putting up with any of Bloomberg's lies. Ana Kasparian and John Iadarola, hosts of The Young Turks, break it down. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more ...about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Transcript
Discussion (0)
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.
Hey, guys, you've heard of the Young Turks podcast because you're listening to it right now.
But make sure that you subscribe and give it a five star rating if you like it.
Thank you for listening.
Welcome to the Young Turks, Anna Casparian, John Ida Rolla with you.
What's up, John?
Who are you?
I don't know, who am I? I don't know, we're gonna find out though. That's what we all ask ourselves
through this journey called life. What happened to you in Europe? She goes on a European
vacation, she finds herself, and suddenly she's all zen. Let's be clear. I didn't know. Not a vacation.
It was far from a vacation. I had a great time, but there was a lot of work that went into it.
It was a resort security conference, like so many people do these days. Right, yeah. But we will
talk about that a little bit in detail later in the show. Also, something I've been wanting
to do on the show on a regular basis, we're going to have a guest on in the second hour.
And not a panelist guest. We're going to Skype in with Farron Cousins from Ring of Fire.
And so I'm looking forward to that discussion. We're going to talk about how Bernie is doing
in the latest national poll, how Bloomberg is doing in the latest national poll, and how
much of an issue that is considering his behavior during this primary election.
And by behavior, I'm not talking about his decorum or anything.
I'm talking about his attempts to buy his nomination.
Let's be careful with our language saying someone's trying to buy an election.
Right.
That's fighting words.
That's abuse.
Not going to accept that.
We've all been engaging in because telling people the truth about what's going
on is apparently very abusive.
That is true.
Yeah.
But before we get to that, let's talk a little bit about.
about how Bernie Sanders, someone who doesn't really like to attack his opponents, is coming
out swinging against Bloomberg.
So let's get right to it.
Michael Bloomberg has been attacking the Democratic frontrunner Bernie Sanders, and he did it pretty
viciously by first showing that there are people on Twitter who aren't nice to him or nice
to Bernie's opponents.
And by not being nice, I mean, they just do rebuttals of accusations against
Bernie Sanders, and people in positions of power hate that.
But then there was something else that Bloomberg's campaign put out.
They put out a statement about how Bernie's new bro is Donald Trump.
Okay?
So I'm going to read you what his campaign had to say about this.
It's a shameful turn of events to see Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump deploy the very same
attacks and tactics against Mike.
But the reason is clear, at this point, the primary is Bernie's to lose and ours to win.
Bernie knows this, Trump knows this.
That's why they are united in the campaign against Mike.
Now, let me be clear about something.
It's the best sentence.
Trump has been attacking the DNC for changing its rules to accommodate Mike Bloomberg for the debates.
And he's doing what you can expect Trump to do.
He's an agent of chaos, right?
So he wants division within the Democratic Party.
He knows that that actually helps him with his re-election campaign.
And by division, I'm talking about true, you know, antagonistic behavior, not the kind of
division that Bernie haters claim is going on within the Democratic Party.
Now, Trump is exploiting this for his own political purposes.
He's not doing it because he's looking out for Bernie or thinks Bernie is great.
No.
He sees Bernie is a huge threat.
And I go insane when people pretend to not understand that and think that, hey, Trump is finally
being nice. He cares about me as a Bernie supporter. No, he wants Bernie to lose the election,
lose everything to be penniless and broke in the streets. He doesn't give a damn about Bernie
or you. No, he doesn't. I, look, I haven't seen a lot of those comments. But for anyone
who thinks that Trump is looking out for the best interests of progressives, no, that's just not
in his. Donald Trump looks out for Donald Trump. We all know this. We've covered it from
the beginning of his 2015 presidential campaign announcement.
He just looks out for himself.
But let's get back to what Bernie Sanders did in response.
So Bernie put out a tweet that only contained a photo, and this is what it was.
But wait.
Yeah.
That is cold that Donald Trump would hang out with Bloomberg behind his bro Bernie's back.
Yeah.
He didn't invite Bernie.
It's weird, very weird.
But they're supposed to be bros.
Now there was one other picture that the New York Times found of this event, this golfing event
that Michael Bloomberg and Donald Trump attended together.
And just for some context, it was from back in 2009, it was a charity golf event called
the Mayor's Cup golf tournament.
And yeah, it was a charity event, but it wasn't just Bloomberg and Trump.
All these people who pretend like they can't stand each other, who pretend like they can't stand each other,
who pretend like they don't get along, pretend like they're politically opposed to one another,
like to hang out at these kinds of events.
And so if you look at this next picture, you'll see Rudy Giuliani, Donald Trump, Bloomberg,
Bill Clinton, the guy from the Yankees, Joe Torre, and then Billy Crystal is the last person.
No.
Yeah.
I suspected that that was Billy Crystal, but it can't be Billy Crystal.
Yeah, and by the way, let me be clear about one thing, I'm sorry, that was a separate event in 2009.
My point is, like, Bloomberg's like golfing it up with Donald Trump.
I haven't seen a single picture of Bernie Sanders golfing with Donald Trump.
I haven't seen a single picture of him golfing.
Yeah, like, I don't know if he golfs.
It doesn't sound like something he does.
But I just think it's so fascinating how Bloomberg just puts out straight up lies.
He's very Trumpian in that way.
Like, he has been vicious to the black community in New York.
And then he puts out these ads, making it appear as though he created all these wonderful
opportunities for African Americans in New York? No, he didn't. The only opportunity he created
was racial profiling, harassment, and incarceration. Yeah. Yeah. So the thing about Bloomberg's
campaign is we don't know for sure that he has in any way been involved in literally anything
that his campaign has put out. That's right. Like that tweet, the press release, the ads,
the memes. Presumably it was him holding the ice cream. And I'm fairly sorry.
It was him that honked that dog's snout.
But other than that, I don't know if he's done anything.
Like he's got a million memeers or whatever that he's paying 100 grand for six months.
So they're putting out stuff for him.
But how do we know that he has anything?
It seems a little bit more likely that someone who is not Bloomberg would have put out
the Bernie's new bro thing, knowing that the photos would immediately come flooding in.
Bloomberg would know that.
And that's why, like, so you alluded to the DNC change in the rules, which is obviously
frustrating in a lot of ways and emblematic of a problem we've been talking about for some
time. But I'm also, the silver lining is that he's going to be there.
I know.
And so finally we're going to have some direct questioning of him.
Listen, the only thing that I'm, I want him on that debate stage.
I want to be honest with you guys, I think it's important for him to be there.
And this like notion of, oh, if we ignore him, he'll go away, has been disproven.
I mean, he is now coming in at second in national polls.
So he has been able to spend $350 million on ads.
He's flooding, it's more, I'm sure it is.
I mean, he's just flooding the airwaves with all of these ridiculous, you know, deceptive ads.
And he's not facing any challenges on a debate stage.
So while it is frustrating, I mean, it's a nuanced opinion.
While it is frustrating that the Democratic establishment is really going out of its way
to prop him up and accommodate what.
what he wants, I think it's also important for him to be on that debate stage so he can
get challenged.
My only issue is, will he get challenged?
Because remember, it took forever for Bernie, for instance, to attack Buttigieg.
And so he can't- I don't think this is gonna be the same thing.
I hope you're right.
I mean, he started attacking Buttigieg when Buttigieg started to do a little bit better
and was getting more aggressive towards him.
Buttigieg was not doing well for the first 11 months out of last year.
Bloomberg has not only, like, there's two sort of things that'll qualify for an attack and one that necessitates it.
One is that he is doing much better.
But the second, especially for Bernie, is he doesn't like to attack people until they attack him.
And Bloomberg has been going after Bernie.
Bernie is very comfortable attacking people who viciously and dishonestly attack him in this fashion.
And so I hope he does that on the debate stage.
Not only when it comes to the fact that he's a billionaire and hasn't really been
someone who would want to or has in the past looked out for the working class.
But I think Democratic voters should be aware of the sexual harassment allegations against him.
Because look, the big argument is we got to defeat Trump, we got to defeat Trump.
Okay, fine, I understand the importance of that.
But we're dealing with a Democratic candidate now who has very similar accusations when it comes
to sexual misconduct, who has a history of saying and doing incredibly racist things,
who has a history of saying incredibly transphobic things.
So all of these issues that we have with Trump could be, are also true of Bloomberg.
So why are we propping up?
And when I say we, I don't mean us, but like the democratic establishment.
Why are they propping up someone like the democratic version of Donald Trump?
That's a disaster.
Well, because he's a Democrat for the last 90 or so days.
I don't know.
Is it like a hundred?
Has he been a Democrat for a hundred?
I don't even know.
It's ridiculous.
And look, I think, I think Bernie is definitely gonna go after him.
I think that Warren has no reason not to either.
I think honestly, you know one person that might lob some real bombs his way, and I've
been predicting this now for a couple of weeks, Pete Buttigieg.
Because Buttigieg, there is not a single non-white person's country that is enthusiastic
about Pete Buttigieg.
And he's been trying to come up with one scheme after the other to generate that.
You know what the easiest potential like way is attack the guy who's more eye.
obviously racist than you and just lob some grenades at him over stop and frisk and the quotes
he said about this community. I think, and people to judge, you know, like he preps for these
things. Yeah. I think he is going to go after Bloomberg. And also Bloomberg is getting
into his lane. Yeah. Like Bloomberg is more of a threat to Buttigieg in the short term than he is
to Bernie Sanders. That's a really good prediction. And so we will see because he is now qualified
for the Nevada debate, something that we will be doing a special show for, special coverage of
tomorrow, so make sure you check that out at tyt.com slash live.
All right, so let's move on to our next story because, as we all know, even a broken
clock is right twice a day, and Megan McCain in this story is right.
And Joy Behar is wrong, okay?
It's a topsy-turvy world we're living in.
So, Megan McCain and Joy Behar sparred recently on the topic of Mike Bloomberg.
But while it's unsurprising that they disagreed with one another, what was surprising was to see
that the person who typically has the wrong opinion had the right opinion. Take a look.
I think you can throw a stone and find someone with less oppo because he's been in public
office so long. I am so glad he's finally going to have to man up and be on the debate stage
because I want to see how he performs against the other candidates. And so far, he's sort of been
getting by on just doing ads, releasing statements and doing rallies, which is like, you know,
I think it's kind of a cheap way to run for president because he's opted out of all the primary
is however you feel about the process.
I think the idea that Mike Bloomberg is just going to sail into this and land really easily,
and he's just going to be the nominee and all of these activists on the far left.
Well, I think he and his supporters, and his supporters in the media are acting like he's just being
an easy billionaire, and he's going to walk right in, and it's going to be easy.
And some of the stuff I saw over the weekend and some of the comments he's made,
and I don't want to get in your way, Sonny, but I believe you have a clip that I was shown
that is particularly at least problematic, I think, for.
most Americans. I think this is going to be a lot harder than he thinks it is.
So she's 100% right about that. So she touched on, I know you dislike her, but you have to
put your feelings for her aside and judge her comments. That's not in my contract. I don't have
to. Okay, well, I'm going to, to be fair, because when someone's right, you should call them out
as right. Yes, yes, she is right. She touches on the money issue. But more importantly,
she touches on all of these vulnerabilities that Michael Bloomberg has as a candidate, the racism,
the sexism, the sexual harassment allegations, everything. It's all there. And she makes a good
point. Remember, Megan McCain is not a fan of Donald Trump. So it's not like she's been an
apologist for Trump's behavior while condemning the same behavior on the Democratic side. She says
later in the segment that she is not going to vote for Trump. But I think that she's right in
calling out Bloomberg's vulnerabilities. Go ahead.
Yeah, she, yeah, I want to give her exactly as much credit she deserves and not a bit more
because she's just absolutely the worst.
Well, okay.
And she's a poster child for under success and mediocrity and all that, all the stuff that
we've made clear in other cases.
Yes, she's right here.
What made it most jarring was that Joy Behar, who, look, I'm not like a Joy Behar fan
or anything like that, but she could occasionally be reasonable and some of her values are in the right
place.
She used to be right about a lot of things.
Yeah, no, I agree, but she, from what I saw and understand, I don't watch the view.
The articles and little clips like this is my only, you know, taste of it seems to have just
totally bought exactly what Bloomberg's team wants you to believe about who he is, why he's
the only one that could win.
And it's like, it's like normally Megan McCain is the person who sits down without
exercising a single second of critical thought before speaking, but I guess you're only
allowed to have one person at the table that does that on any given day?
It seems like it. In fact, to your point, let's go to the next clip where things get super spicy.
There's a lawsuit the Washington Post dug up where he was sued for saying there was a woman who was having trouble finding a nanny for her child.
And he said it's a blanking baby. It doesn't know the difference between you and anyone else.
All you need is some black who doesn't even have to speak English to rescue it from a burning building.
You know, all I have to say, this is, but I'm just saying, you want to go up against Trump and you want to take the moral high ground Democrats?
I don't know if this guy is going to be the way.
I don't have to say there are very five people on both sides that was in Charlottetton now.
He said that removing Confederate monuments was trying to take away our folks.
But you want to take them more high ground.
belittled the Black Lives movement.
He questioned whether Barack Obama.
I'm not defending Trump because I'm attacking.
What are you saying that?
I'm saying that you're shiny sparkly.
I'm saying you're shiny sparkly guy who is surging right now, which by the way,
everybody surges in primary politics.
I remember when Gingrich did and Henry Kahn did, every candidate surges at one point in another.
He still thinks the Central Park 5.
Because he's a sparkly little, because you know what, I just think it's so interesting that you have a problem that we are talking about a candidate the way we would any other candidate.
He just happens to be at the top getting the attention right now, which is why we're talking about right now.
What, I'm supposed to give Bloomberg a pass, not on this show, not with this hub.
I'd like to know who you're going to vote for.
Who are you voting for?
Who I vote for is none of your business, but I am not voting for Trump, and I'm sure as hell not voting for Bloomberg.
By the way, okay.
It's 100%.
You're a political host on an advocacy opinion show.
Yeah, it's kind of your opinion, your business.
Everyone's business.
Sure, okay, but that segment was insane.
Like, what happened?
Yes, it was insane.
And look, honestly, I can't believe I'm saying this.
And I want to be clear that this is a very unique time when talking about the view.
Joy Behar interrupting Megan McCain was not okay.
Did not care to listen to what she had to say at all and was super annoying talking over
her.
And I watched the full segment, you know, we can't show you the full segment because it's so long.
And they look, I get the knee jerk instinct to like immediately ignore what she says or minimize
what she says.
McCain.
Yeah.
Because we've seen some of her points in the past.
But what she's saying there actually makes a lot of sense.
How are you as the Democratic Party going to condemn the behavior of Donald Trump?
when Mike Bloomberg has done very similar things.
You have no moral ground there, you have no leg to stand on.
And why would Americans vote for Michael Bloomberg as Trump Light when you already have Trump?
Yeah, the fact that she interrupted was annoying in its own way.
But that's the show, I guess.
It's the substance of what she thought she was trying to say when, like, I'm not trying
to be disrespectful, but she didn't think at all about what she was actually saying.
When Megan McCain points out all of the terrible things that Bloomberg brings to this race,
and you just respond by listing off Trump controversies, yeah, Trump is terrible, we get that.
We want better.
You presumably want better, Joy Behar, she's been saying that for years, right?
Right.
So all of a sudden now, because you think maybe he can beat him, all of the things that you hate about Trump,
you're okay with, or the vast majority, 90%, or whatever number you want to ascribe to that,
then suddenly you don't care about those things anymore?
What a ridiculous Dodge to start listing those.
And also, I mean, it was so crazy.
The point that sort of frustrated me was at the end where she's like, you expect me to give
him a pass, which is perfectly fine, but she went on and said, not in this show, not with this host.
I know, I know.
What a low bar that's been set for you only by the fact that no one else in that table would
do the reasonable thing, which is criticized Bloomberg.
She gets to like ascend into the heavens as this arbiter of reasonableness.
No, but I mean, look, they created- Everyone should be doing what she is doing.
You're absolutely right, you're absolutely right.
They created the environment for her to shine and she's right in what she said.
Don't do that.
And look, I don't care, I don't care who's making the point.
The point needs to be made and if it's being made by someone on the right, on a show like
the view, it's important and I want to give her credit for that and I want to be fair, okay?
And look, I have been pretty vicious toward Megan McCain in the past.
So it's not like I'm, you know, soft on her, but in this case, she is right.
And the way that they dismissed her, I thought, was troubling.
Well, and by the way, you're so right to point out that if someone on the right is going
to make the case and people who are not on the right, please pay attention to this because
right now, Megan McCain is.
If he becomes the nominee, they're all going to do that.
They're all going to point out the same things Megan McCain is.
supposedly not doing it to help out Trump, although she seems to be indicating pretty heavily
that she's gonna sit out the election because she's perfectly fine with Trump still being
president. Let's bear that in mind. Don't give her too much credit. But they're all, Trump
can't wait to run against Mike Bloomberg. Because he gets to, Bloomberg gives him the, gives
like the illusion that all the terrible things that Trump has said and done suddenly, I guess everybody
does them. Trump is not some sort of unique, horrible threat. It's just, ah, that's politicians
Now, they've all sexually harassed a bunch of women.
They all say that wages should never go up.
They're all racist, they're all homophobic and transphobic.
Let's not allow him to pretend that that's the case.
It shouldn't be the case, it isn't the case.
We have candidates like Bernie Sanders, who as far as I know, has never been accused of
sexual harassing literally anyone.
Right, I mean, he's been accused of sexism, but I mean, we all know how that goes, right?
Like they've failed to provide any evidence of that, they just throw, and it's amazing,
Because the same people who are defending Michael Bloomberg and like the 60 plus allegations
against him from women are the same ones who will make horrible accusations of sexism in
regard to Bernie Sanders, but refuse to provide any evidence of that.
It's just because they don't care.
I think this whole Michael Bloomberg situation has been illuminating and has really shown, I think,
voters who are paying attention, the Democratic establishment doesn't actually care about the
issues that they purport to care about, right?
When they talk about sexism or racism or homophobia or transphobia, they do so with political
gain in mind.
They don't do it because they actually care about offering reforms or protections for
disenfranchised groups.
They just don't.
And it's so depressing.
I saw that Bernie's Press Secretary Brano has been on the show.
She was quoted as saying Bloomberg is facing more than 60 accusations of sexual assault.
And a journalist was like, that's not true.
That was the quote.
Because she meant harassment, she said assault.
And Jennifer Rubin responded, the Washington Post opinion writer, responded shockingly untrue.
But like he is facing 60 accusations of sexual harassment.
Like are you, do you not care about that?
Jennifer Rubin just today, Jennifer Rubin just today put out a tweet saying that members of Bernie Sanders' campaign staff, like on the high levels, are engaging in abusive behavior on social media.
And I asked her, can you provide one example, just one?
Because I want to see what they qualify as abusive behavior.
She fails to provide a single single example of that.
That's all they have, which tells me, look, his message is so powerful and his record is
so consistent that they've got nothing against Sanders.
The only thing they can do is cry about their feelings getting hurt.
Look, class war isn't called class war because it's like class chucky cheese, right?
It's not fun and it's not nice, but people have been dealing with this rigged economic
system for so long and when you're having difficulty putting a roof over your children's heads
or put food on the table for your kids, you don't really care too much about being nice on Twitter.
Okay, so I don't know what else to tell you about that.
Yeah, it's also frustrating.
They're also fake, everybody is so fake, nobody thinks before they say anything.
Because the incentive is not to do so.
Their fan bases don't care fundamentally.
They don't.
Jennifer Rubin, like 60 counts of sexual acts, I know that it bothers you.
you about Trump, right? I'm sure you've written op-eds about that. If it's anyone other than
Trump does it bother you? Presumably not. I didn't say anything in that tweet about it.
Well, it bothers me and it bothers us regardless of who's doing it, whether it's a Democrat
or Republican. This is what hyper-partisan politics is, and it's disgusting. This type of behavior
should be condemned, even if it's a Democrat doing it. And he was a Democrat, what, two days
ago? You know, Republican before that. Anyway, we gotta take a quick break. When we come back, we'll
discuss Stacey Abrams and her views on Michael Bloomberg. And then later in the show, we'll
talk a little bit about foreign policy and some of the interviews that I did while I was
at the Munich Security Conference. We need to talk about a relatively new show called
Un-F-The Republic or UNFTR. As a young Turks fan, you already know that the government,
the media, and corporations are constantly peddling lies that serve the interests of the rich
and powerful. But now there's a podcast dedicated to unraveling those lies.
debunking the conventional wisdom.
In each episode of Un-B-The-Republic or UNFTR,
the host delves into a different historical episode or topic
that's generally misunderstood or purposely obfuscated
by the so-called powers that be.
Featuring in-depth research, razor-sharp commentary,
and just the right amount of vulgarity,
the UNFTR podcast takes a sledgehammer
to what you thought you knew
about some of the nation's most sacred historical cows.
But don't just take my word for it.
The New York Times described UNFTR as consistently compelling and educational,
aiming to challenge conventional wisdom and upend the historical narratives that were taught in school.
For as the great philosopher Yoda once put it,
You must unlearn what you have learned.
And that's true whether you're in Jedi training or you're uprooting
and exposing all the propaganda and disinformation you've been fed over the course of your lifetime.
So search for UNFDR in your podcast app today and get ready to get informed, angered, and entertained all at the same time.
We'll be right back.
Welcome back to TYT, Anna and John with you.
Feels good to be back.
I'm a little rusty.
Whenever I'm gone for a week, I feel super rusty on the main show.
because we don't have prompters, and I feel like I get tongue-tied.
But lots of nice comments from you guys in the member section.
Thank you so much.
Mondo says, Wilkomen.
I think I said it right.
So I think that's welcome in German.
East Southern says, I missed TYT yesterday because I was at Bernie's rally.
Worth it.
That's not an excuse.
What the hell?
At the Tacoma Dome in Washington.
It was great seeing and hearing Bernie Sanders in person.
I wish I'd been there.
Oh, the video is so amazing.
He's incredible.
Dr. Doctor says, I want Bloomberg on that debate stage two, but I think the candidates should call out the DNC for changing the rules for the oligarch, but not for the other candidates.
Completely agree with you.
This is a great opportunity for-
They should point that out too.
Right, exactly.
So this is a great opportunity for the other candidates to hit Bloomberg where it hurts.
I've got a few ideas.
Yeah, okay.
Policy-wise, yes.
I bathe in the DNC's tears, writes in.
And again, this is member section.
You can become a member by going to t-y-t.com slash join.
In the debate, Warren will take the lead in attacking Bloomberg.
Sanders will probably be put, oh, Sanders will probably put in some jabs, but I see Warren
pounding him into the ground.
This will also result in a bump in polls for her.
Yeah, I think that that's definitely possible.
Warren's strength is going after corporate greed, you know.
know, some of these bankers and billionaires.
I mean, Bernie at the last debate, he like pointed to Pete Buttigieg when he talked
about all the billionaires, like, and they've been really vicious to Bernie.
I think he's angry, I think, I think he's going to have the strongest blows.
But I do think Pete is going to try the hardest.
Salty Bernie is my favorite Bernie.
Super chat comments, 083 says, good to see you back, Anna, thank you, it's really good
to be back.
Brentekorn says Bloomberg isn't one of Bernie's congressional buddies, so he feels no
need to hold back to avoid hurting a personal friend.
I mean, look, even his personal friends apparently have no problem attacking him viciously.
I'm talking about Bernie.
But yeah, you're right.
Yes.
And a person who wrote in in the super chat section with a name that I cannot pronounce
as, hey John, did you get the book?
Happy birthday.
I got a check for the book.
Wait, which book?
I have no idea.
I'll put you in touch with this gentleman.
Okay, thank you.
All right.
And then finally, just a quick announcement, programming announcement.
The Nevada debate will be taking place tomorrow, and I encourage you guys to check out our special coverage of it.
It'll take place tomorrow, Wednesday, February 19th at 11 p.m. Eastern Time, 8 p.m. Pacific.
So you can watch by going to t.t.com slash live and for extended members only coverage, which is about 30 minutes of extra exclusive members coverage, you can go to t.com slash join and become a member.
Look, guys, members make this entire company happen.
We wouldn't be able to do it without them.
So we want to make sure that we give you some exclusive content and some more analysis and fun videos.
So check that out.
And it should be spicy.
It should be, yeah.
I really do think so.
By the way, the last debate was the best debate so far.
The most interesting, the most happened.
And I expect this will probably follow in that same trend.
Definitely.
Well, let's talk about Stacey Abrams because she's been in the news lately about, you know,
in regard to Bloomberg, and I'm a little concerned about what's going on, so let's talk about it.
Former gubernatorial candidate from Georgia, Stacey Abrams, has been in the news quite a bit
because there are some rumors that Mike Bloomberg might announce her as his running mate.
Now, she was asked about whether she would be open to serving as VP previously, and she said no,
but she's changing her tune a little bit.
But before we get to what she has to say about it, I do want to go to this.
this clip from the view where Sonny Hosten makes a point about how Bloomberg's problematic,
he's done and said racist things in the past, but she would be willing to vote for him
if he made one important decision.
Take a look.
I think if we keep taking the Democrats down Trump is going to win.
So I say be careful about that because what you've got, the Democrat is standing between
Trump and fascism.
But if Democrats don't take him out, Republicans will.
Right.
information one way or another. You can't stop Oppo from coming out.
While he may be able to meet Trump, because in my view, he's been a Republican, he's been an
independent. He needs a vice president that understands the community. If he were to announce
Stacey Abrams as his vice presidential pick, he would be able to convince me. And generally,
vice presidential picks don't mean a lot to me, but for him, he needs that. So I'm saying
it if he were to announce that kind of pick early on, I think that would be a winning.
Well, as I said the other day, he did a lot for the black community, too.
I just, oh my God, I wanted to immediately go to the next video, but I can't help myself.
What did he, what did he do for the black community?
I mean, he's notorious for stop and frisk, which profiled, you know, black people, black men
specifically, pulled them aside, you know, stopped and frisked them.
more than 90% of the time, they had nothing on them.
They weren't doing anything wrong.
It was just a way of allowing police to just go out there and harass people of color.
What exactly has he done?
Anyway, I don't want to get too caught up on that because we've talked about it so much on this show.
But I do want to go to this next clip because there's a reason why Sonny Hosten brought up
the chance for Stacey Abrams to serve as Mike Bloomberg's VP pick.
because they had this conversation previously with Stacey Abrams on the show.
Take a look.
First time I was on here, I got the question about running as VP during the primary.
And I very apparently famously said, no, because you don't run for second in a primary.
However, because that conversation started, I'm now getting the question a lot from folks.
And the answer is, of course, I would be honored to run for vice president with the nominee.
And I think it's a bit disconcerting because it seems really obnoxious for me to say that out loud since I'm not, you know, no one's asked me.
But what I want people to understand is that.
You're not in the media.
Exactly.
The issue is as a woman of color, especially as a black woman, this is an unusual position to be in for someone to be considered possibly the next vice president.
And it would be doing a disservice to every woman of color, every woman of ambition, every child who would.
wants to think beyond their known space for me to say no or to pretend, oh, no, I don't want
it. Of course I want it. So look, I'm going to be super honest. It's uncomfortable talking
about whether she should, if Michael Bloomberg offers her that VP pick position, it's uncomfortable
to comment on what she should do because who are we to tell her, right? But when you look at Michael
Bloomberg's record, I just don't, I don't get it, I don't get it.
When you look at how he governed as, as, you know, the mayor of New York and how he treated
communities of color, how he has made these disgusting statements about women, how he's said
incredibly transphobic things, referring to transgender women, for instance, as men with skirts
on or dresses on.
I mean, it's just, how.
Yeah, but that was all the way back in 2019.
Yeah, I mean, like a lot of these comments were recent.
It's not like he said these things decades ago and the culture has changed.
No, this is stuff that he's recently said, things that he's recently done.
Yeah, I was, I mean, look, we could, we could list a billion things.
Like, you know, Rick Snyder, the governor who presided over the Flint crisis, he gave him $3 million to win to see.
That's crazy.
He goes into, you know, various communities and offers money in order to get.
these endorsements and it's gross.
That's what we're talking about.
Or because he supports Republicans governing in America.
He wants a Republican Senate, he wants a conservative Supreme Court.
He has spent countless millions of dollars to make sure that we have the Senate that we have
now, that they choose the justices that they've chosen.
And a lot of the focus has been on his stop and frisk policy, but one issue that our intern
Jordan brought up today, and I'm so glad that he did, remember how vicious Bloomberg
was toward the Muslim community in New York.
New York.
I mean, he worked alongside the CIA in order to allow federal agents to track Muslim college
students with no probable cause, no cause at all.
There were agents following these students on their class trips.
Yeah.
I mean, that's the kind of person that Michael Bloomberg is.
So do you really want to associate yourself with him, his campaign especially?
Yeah, she's right, it is important for representation of women of color.
in the executive branch especially but at what cost do you associate yourself with
someone who's demonized your community you know while he's been in power I mean
obviously she has to make that choice rightfully a lot of people continue to admire
for the previous work that she's done and she's done a lot of great work she'll
make that choice I guess it would bother me as an outsider like I I can't read
minds I can't say what people's motivations are but I know why he would be
choosing her and it's to bamboozle people. It's to fool people. We know who he is. Not just
what he did, although that should be enough, but the way that he continued to defend stopping
first up until like last weekend effectively. And the vicious things that he can see, we know
who he is. He's a thousand years old. It's not like he's going to change later on in life.
This is who he is. The same way that we know Donald Trump, we know who Mike Bloomberg is.
And it's frustrating too to see people on the view who would be so easily fooled by it.
And when the announcement comes out, there's going to be great coverage of it, and people in the media are going to be fooled by.
And it would be good for her, yes.
It's better than other choices he could make.
But we know why he would do it, and we know who he is, and we know what he would be as president.
And I feel like we've come full circle, because remember, the reason why Barack Obama chose Joe Biden, as his running mate, was to ease the nerves of white people within the Democrat, not Democratic Party, but Democratic voting.
voters who didn't know if it really made them comfortable to vote for a black candidate
or a biracial candidate, I should say.
And now if Bloomberg chooses Stacey Abrams as his running mate, I mean, it's the other
way around.
That shows some good evolution.
I guess, but he's using her in that case.
And I don't think that that's an important thing to do for women, especially women of color,
as she says.
So he's gonna choose who he's gonna choose, they're gonna go or not.
What we need to do, what the media hopefully needs to finally do is take all of this stuff
that we've found over the past few weeks.
Some of it's been news in the past, 15 years ago, a year ago, whatever.
But people are really talking about it now, he has not had answer for it.
Those moderators, and I think one of them might be Chuck Todd, if they give him a pass on
this, it's gonna be the most expected thing in the world, but it will be, it'll be deeply
disappointing because, you know, like we've had a year race more than a year at this point.
And up until very recently, it was relatively drama free, not much happening.
And they like to try to get drama.
They like try to get people to attack each other.
Like what more do you want?
You've been handed all the material you need for every question you need to ask Mike Bloomberg.
And if they don't do it, and the only way that people in the view are going to start asking
these questions about him other than Megan McCain is for it to become a thing on the
CNN and MSNBC and all of that.
People need to know.
When they hear Bloomberg, they need to know his record because I don't think the vast majority
people know that yet.
They like to frame the drama and the way that the drama has been handed to them on a silver
platter isn't the way that they wanted to be framed.
That's my speculation.
But I think that there's a way to get around the biased moderators and I think that the one
upside or the one advantage that someone like Bernie Sanders has that he's been through
this. And he knows what the spin is like. He knows what the framing is like. And he's gotten
better and better at, you know, just bypassing their framing to get to the point. And look,
the point is the policies. The point is, hey, what are we going to do to help the American
people? And what I thought was so fascinating about the discussions in regard to Mike Bloomberg's
racist actions and comments in the past is that when they're discussing it on cable news,
they're discussing it in the context of this horse race. Is it going to hurt him?
Or, let's say, Klobuchar, not knowing who the president of Mexico is, right?
All they're thinking about is, is it going to hurt her?
No, let's have a discussion about whether you're qualified to be president of the United States.
Well, she's just a senator.
When you don't know who the leader of Mexico is, it's Mexico.
But it's so far.
It's so far.
It's like, it's not Kazakhstan, okay?
It's Mexico.
I know.
And you're running to be president.
How do you not know?
It blows my mind.
Anyway, there's one other angle to this story that we'll get to after the break.
John McCain, not John McCain, Megan McCain, I don't know, has kind of been on fire.
You know, that's actually your dad.
I didn't know.
I didn't know that.
Shocking.
No, but she asks Stacey Abrams a very important question, and we're going to give you that question and her answer when we return.
At TYT, we frequently talk about all the ways that big tech companies are taking control of our online lives, constantly monitoring us, and story is.
selling our data, but that doesn't mean we have to let them. It's possible to stay anonymous
online and hide your data from the prying eyes of big tech. And one of the best ways is with
ExpressVPN. ExpressVPN hides your IP address, making your active ID more difficult to
trace and sell the advertisers. ExpressVPN also encrypts 100% of your network data to protect
you from eavesdroppers and cybercriminals. And it's also easy to install. A single mouse click
protects all your devices. But listen, guys, this is important. ExpressVPN is rated number one
by CNET and Wired magazine.
So take back control of your life online
and secure your data
with a top VPN solution available, ExpressVPN.
And if you go to ExpressVPN.com slash TYT,
you can get three extra months for free
with this exclusive link just for TYT fans.
That's EXP-R-E-S-V-N dot com slash T-YT.
Check it out today.
We hope you're enjoying this free clip
from the Young Turks.
If you want to get the whole show
and more exclusive content while supporting independent media, become a member at tyt.com
slash join today.
In the meantime, enjoy this free segment.
Welcome back to TYT, Anna and John with you.
Make sure you check out John's show The Damage Report every morning.
I'm pretty sure everyone does.
Your show's killing it.
That would be awesome.
Yeah, you're knocking it out of the park.
Thank you.
Which is a baseball reference, I think.
Whatever.
You sound like Buttigieg asked about Kobe Bryant.
It's not even close.
I found out who the, is it the coach of the Yankees is?
That Torre guy?
Tori, okay, never mind.
Let's move on, let's move on now.
Let's talk a little bit about the members because members make the show happen.
You can become one by going to t.yt.com slash join.
No veg reg says Mike Bloomberg has done as much for the black community as David Hasselhoff has done for feminism.
Why the hate for David Haselhoff?
No, I know.
I know, I know, because I've been around this network for so long that we actually talked
about it on the show.
Oh, I don't remember anything about him.
There have been some, you know, sexual misconduct allegations against him.
Oh.
I don't know the update to that story, so I don't want to get into details.
So let's move on.
No more trigonometry, I love your name, you're already winning.
How can anyone be so dull to think that a billionaire oligarch is the one to represent us?
He's literally a comic book villain.
L.O.L. This is ridiculous. And then opinionated says, I think it would be smart on Sanders part
to get ahead of this. Offer Stacey a cabinet position in the area she's fighting for right now.
Stop election rigging. So let's talk a little more about-
She should just say who she supports. Rather than just the courting of her, like she supports
someone presumably. I just hate this like game of, oh, let me appeal to a certain demographic
by choosing a VP who happens to share the same identity or skin color. Well, it's like it's an
updated version. Like for a long time it was I need a person who's good in this state. Like
this guy will be great in Virginia. I don't know if I've ever seen any evidence that that has ever
actually produced the outcome. But that's for decades. That's what they've been doing. I think this
a version of that?
I just know that as a woman, if I knew that I was being like floated as a cabinet
member or a VP or whatever just because of my identity that I have nothing to do with.
Like I was born a woman, I didn't make that decision.
It's not something I can change.
But that identity is being exploited for someone else's political gain, I just wouldn't
be happy about it.
Yeah, you might not be totally happy.
But if you're qualified and if you think, well, okay, I hate that this is a
part of the calculation, but if I get in there, I can do good things, that's still going to be
appealing.
That's true, it gives you some power, some ability to make changes that you care about.
That's a good point.
And potentially sets you up for a future presidential run that can be much better than the weirdo
who selected you for VP.
Yeah, well, okay, look, let's move on to something that you can help us out with if you're
interested, we are looking to sign up more members so we can keep this company sustainable
and funded by members. So if you'd like to help us out, if you're looking for ways to support
the show, you can actually become a TYT affiliate and help us sell membership. So to learn more
about that, just go to tyt.com slash win-win. TYT.com slash win-win. Well, we have one more story
on Stacey Abrams that I think is relevant to the Bloomberg discussion. So let's get right to it.
Cain asked former Georgia gubernatorial candidate, Stacey Abrams, a fascinating question about
some of the funding that her organization has received from Michael Bloomberg. Take a look.
2020 candidate Mike Bloomberg recently donated $5 million to your organization Fair Fight,
and that's the biggest donation you've ever received to date. I've been asking this question
about Mike Bloomberg a lot to a lot of people, but I think it's an important question.
Given that your goal is to make elections fair, like you just said, with the hundreds of
million dollars Bloomberg is spending on campaign ads and sort of bypassing primaries and caucuses
right now, which is his choice, but I think it's looking like it's not that much of a fair
fight. And I think to a lot of people, it looks like if you have billions and billions
dollars, you can buy your way in to popularity into the election. How would you respond to
that? I would separate these out. First of all, I am grateful to any person who contributes to
fair fight. We have more than 100,000 contributors. His check just had a few more zeros on it.
And we appreciate that because, as I said, I'm not endorsing anyone.
What we are focused on is making sure that the infrastructure of democracy works.
My job is to make sure no matter who shows up that they get to vote for whom they want.
Mike Bloomberg is running in the same primary with, I think we're now down to 11 candidates.
But the reality is the people who are making the decision will decide if they think he needed
to run a different race.
So I want to have a discussion about our answer and whether or not you're satisfied with
it.
But before I do, I want to make sure the audience has some more detailed.
details about the donation that he made to Stacey Abrams' organization.
So back in November, a spokesperson for Abrams told ABC News that the funding goal for the
teams in all 20 states was $5 million, and billionaire Democratic presidential candidate
Mike Bloomberg made a donation of that amount to Abrams's Fair Fight Political Action Committee
PAC on December 20th.
And remember, the whole point of this pack is to push for fair elections.
Abrams also defended Bloomberg's colossal campaign spending saying, quote, I think that for once
we actually know where the money is coming from.
So she's arguing that since he's self-financed, then it's fine.
But look, there are two issues with the way our elections happen.
I think the overarching issue is that you have to be wealthy.
You have to have a ton of money in order to even have a chance.
That's the number one problem.
But then you can divide that into two camps.
If you don't have the money on hand, then you have to rely on legalized bribery to raise
that money, right?
And if you do have that money on hand, well, then you are an incredibly wealthy individual
who gets to, you know, wield your power through money.
And that's an issue, because that puts everyone else in a huge disadvantage.
And that doesn't really mean that you're gonna have, I mean, no, it means the opposite of
what Stacey Abrams is fighting for, which is a fair election.
A few more details, she also said every person is allowed to run and should run the race they
think they should run, and Mike Bloomberg has chosen to use his finances.
Other people are using their dog, their charisma, their whatever.
I think it's an appropriate question to raise, but I don't think it's disqualifying for anyone
to invest in fixing America, John.
Yeah, I guess with the $5 million for her group, that is true.
The money that he's spending these ads is not investing in America.
That's just simply not true.
To the point about when she said we know where the money is coming from, yes we do, but
not in the way that people are using that term.
I don't want to speak for her because she made it as just a one comment thing.
But I've seen pundits on TV shows saying, well, look, at least he's not beholden
to anyone, that's not what it means at all.
Okay, so he wasn't handed that money to run the way that politicians are frequently bought,
but how did he get that money?
Like, imagine if I wrote Harry Potter and became a billionaire because I wrote Harry Potter,
and then I ran as president, would you be worried that the money coming from teens who read books
would corrupt me?
No, you probably wouldn't.
Okay, but what if I made that money from Wall Street and international businesses,
including business that I have with the Chinese government and all these different
groups, okay, that wasn't donated to you, but you got it as a result of all of those things
that could be just as corrupting or maybe even more directly corrupting, because you would
be choosing regulations and policies that are involved with all of those things.
It's the same thing as if they gave you that money.
That is the best way.
No, it's worse.
Yeah.
Because he cares about his own wealth way more than a politician cares about their campaign
war chest.
He is just as corrupted, except it's already happened.
He's been corrupted through his entire life because of where he's got.
that money from.
And also, I mean, think about it.
When you're in the position to enter the race late, you don't have to do any campaigning.
The only thing you've done is just flood the airwaves with these ridiculous commercials and
go online with all these ridiculous ads that young people have only made fun of so far.
By the way, he's buying social media influencers.
He's taking up all of these staffers that would typically work for a lot of people.
other campaigns, but Bloomberg is so wealthy that he's just buying off as many people as possible,
which is actually hurting other campaigns that need more staff.
And I think that that is a very purposeful strategy for Bloomberg's campaign.
But nonetheless, look, everything that you just said is right.
I mean, just because the individual is self-funded, I mean, this is so Trumpian too.
This is the kind of stuff that Donald Trump would say in 2016, I don't need that legalized
bribery because I've got my own money, I can fund my own campaign, right?
And now you hear people making similar defenses for Michael Bloomberg, but it's not just about
how they raise money for their campaign.
It's about how they got that money if they're self-funded, right?
And what they stand for, what their character is, what they stand for, what they would do
as president.
And when it comes to social issues, not looking good.
When it comes to financial issues, also not looking good.
I don't trust him to do anything to fix this person.
broken economic system.
I agree.
So there you have it, that's what Stacey Abrams has to say, but it is kind of depressing
to see people who typically are viewed as progressives defend someone like Michael Bloomberg
who's very obviously trying to buy this Democratic nomination, it's really sad.
Anyway, let's move on to one other story before we take a break.
I interviewed legendary economist and Nobel Prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz
at the Munich Security Conference.
I was away for a little bit, and the reason why I was away is because I was asked to
attend that conference and interview various politicians and people like Joseph Stiglitz.
And so I wanted to share a few snippets of that interview with you.
You can watch the full interview on our channel, and it was a good discussion.
I want to be clear, Stiglitz has so many great ideas when it comes to.
to the economy, the importance of progressive economic policies, to help the working class.
But there was a portion of the interview that I think, well, I definitely disagree with him on,
and I wanted to discuss. So let's take a look at the first clip.
All the Democratic candidates differ, their differences are small compared to the differences
between them and Trump.
I mean, that's a low bar, though.
That's a little bar.
It's a very low bar.
You're absolutely like, but no, let me emphasize, though, that if you ask a set of
principles, okay, they're all in favor of access to health care for all.
They're all in favor of gun control.
They're all in favor of reproductive rights.
They're all in favor of giving opportunity for everybody.
in our society.
You think Mike Bloomberg is in favor of all those things?
Yeah.
And he actually has come out and support of more progressive taxation.
And I think he really means it.
Not as progressive as Elizabeth Warren.
Not even close.
Yeah.
But it is still very progressive compared to anything that's happened on the other side.
It's really hard to do my job in someone else's house.
I'm just gonna be honest, because I'm, yes, I'm there representing TYT, but more importantly,
I'm invited by, you know, non-TYT people to do this, and I'm just gonna leave it there.
Just because I would have liked to push back a little more aggressively, but I think, I
think I was clear.
You pushed him to, he was clear.
Yeah.
Yeah.
This has been a depressing show.
It's been such a depressing show.
We gave credit to Megan McCain.
And Joseph Stiglitz, like Joseph Stiglitz is great.
Like he's actually, look, I know I'm showing you the part that I disagree with him on.
Please watch the full conversation on our channel, YouTube.com slash the Young Turks,
or watch all the interviews that I've done if you go to YouTube.com slash your MSC.
He had great things to say.
He's very much concerned about climate change.
He thinks the Green New Deal is awesome.
Like he's right on a lot of issues.
Maybe he's not paying close attention to the primaries.
I don't know.
Or he's coming out of from a different perspective.
And look, obviously, like, we understand fundamentally that we don't agree 100% with literally anyone.
There's a great line, I think, from Conair, and it's, there's two people I trust.
One's me, and the other's not you.
And I feel that way about agreeing.
I agree with myself most of the time.
And, like, maybe, like, I don't know, Bernie and the O.C.
Other than that, like, we're going to have some big differences between me and pretty much anyone.
And so, like, on its face, what he was saying was absurd, especially once you brought up Bloomberg.
Like he's talked about how minimum wage should literally never go up.
He's been quoted in the last decade saying it should literally never go up.
He said just a couple of years ago, Social Security and Medicare, they both need to be cut,
the age needs to be raised.
Like these are not small distinctions.
You're right.
Between him and Klobuchar, let alone Bernie Sanders or someone like that.
Yeah, you're absolutely right.
And that's why it was so shocking that he framed the discussion the way that he did.
I do want to go to one more clip though, and in this clip we kind of break down issues with
Bloomberg a little further.
Can you argue that someone's really in favor of progressive policies when he's literally
exploiting one of the biggest viruses in our democracy right now, which is money in politics?
He is entering this race late and he's attempting to buy this election.
Is that acceptable?
You know, we live in what economists call it the world of second best.
And clearly, I think all of us would prefer a reform in our politics.
And one of the chapters in the book, I tried to describe the imbalance of political power
where we've moved to a system of $1, one vote, then one person, one vote.
And you're seeing that very viscerally in the idea of possibly having two billionaires,
or at least one alleged billionaire, one real billionaire, duking it out.
But as I said, we need that reform.
I hope whoever gets in office on the Democratic side, that's going to be one of the first things they do.
So he's hoping that even if someone like Bloomberg gets elected, one of the first things that he would do is try to get money out of politics.
I disagree with him completely.
I don't think that that's likely to happen if Bloomberg ends up getting elected.
I think that if Bloomberg gets elected, he's going to want to set up a very strict system of public financing of campaigns for his reelection, where everyone has the same amount of money, we're on a level playing field. I think he'll do that.
This is a depressing show that you've set up, not in general, it's important news, but.
No, Trump did something to the Democrats, yeah, because like I said, I don't want to unfairly paint Stiglitz as this terrible person who's, you know.
Of course, yeah, because he's not, but at the same time, he's just wrong.
He's wrong about Bloomberg, 100%.
And I think it's because there is this obsession, this obsession with beating Trump that they're willing to do it at all costs,
even if the person who ends up beating Trump is a lot like Trump.
And the thing is, like, I'm even sympathetic to a let's beat him at all costs strategy in general terms.
He's so obviously not the guy who could do that.
I mean, you literally just like if you, I know that polls aren't supposed to mean anything,
but like how many years of head-to-head polls do we need to see that they just reject and
reject and reject and reject and bury that one and then, oh, Bernie beaten Trump for three years
will pour some dirt over that.
Ah, Bloomberg, let's get him.
We've got no evidence.
We've got no actual data-driven reason to believe that he can beat Donald Trump.
And Donald Trump is already delighting on social media of antagonizing Bloomberg.
Right.
So if that was actually your motivation was just let's beat Donald Trump, no matter what,
how could you possibly have ended up believing that Bloomberg was a good idea?
And I want to be clear, Stiglitz wasn't making the case that Bloomberg is best suited to be Trump.
That wasn't what he was saying at all.
I think he wants to be his VP.
No, he was not.
Don't do that.
But he was trying to make a point about how anyone would be better than Trump.
And I don't think that's necessarily true.
I think that there are a lot of concerning similarities between Trump and Bloomberg.
And I know if the Democratic establishment is watching this, their heads are exploding,
I don't care.
It's true.
When you have more than 60 allegations of sexual harassment against Bloomberg, when you have
Bloomberg's record of racism and transphobia, when you have Bloomberg's unwillingness
to really offer anything to do, to fix this broken economic system, I mean, he's
exploited it for himself.
I mean, he had, he worked alongside the CIA to spy on.
innocent Muslim students with no cause.
How is he any better, really?
So if you condemn Donald Trump for all those reasons, you have absolutely no reason to defend
Mike Bloomberg and prop him up as the best Democratic candidate.
And again, that's not what Stiglitz did, but I think it is important for Stiglitz and
other Democrats who I respect to draw distinctions between people like Bloomberg and the
rest of the Democratic field.
We gotta take a break.
When we come back, Farron Cousins from Ring of Fire will join us,
and we're going to talk a little bit about how Bernie's doing in the national polls.
Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks.
Support our work, listen ad-free, access members, only bonus content,
and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.com slash t-y-t.
I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.