The Young Turks - U-N-I-T-WHYYYY!??!?

Episode Date: January 22, 2021

Climate Dummy Ted Cruz, auditioning to be the next Trump, stupidly complains that the Paris Climate Agreement is about protecting Paris. The Biden Administration is going back to square one as officials are surprised to discover there were no plans for vaccine distribution. 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. On July 18th, get excited. This is big! For the summer's biggest adventure. I think I just smurf my pants. That's a little too excited.

Sorry. Smurfs. Only theaters July 18th. I don't know I don't know I don't know I'm going to Well, hello, everyone. Welcome to TYT, Anna Casparian, and Wozni L'Ambre with you.

Wozni is a writer over at The Athletic. He writes about the NBA, among other topics, and is the host of wokebrose, along with Nando Villa. Also, of course, a very regular fill-in host over here at TYT. Was, I guess I'm having a hard time talking today. I don't know why I'm having a hard time getting the words out. Not a great intro, but thank you for being here. Yes, I appreciate your general excitement to see me. And I see that you're at a loss for words. It's very flattering. Trust me, I appreciate it. And I also appreciate the intro music. When I was young, I used to be a big WWE fan. And that music sounds like I should be watching the wrestling highlight reel to it. So appreciate that music. Yeah, that music never gets old for me. So I really like it too. Never really thought about wrestling when I hear it. But I get it. I get it. I was watching. The viewers will get it, Anna, trust me. Yeah, probably. I was watching an old WWE video that someone randomly posted on Twitter yesterday.

And it was just insanity. Like obviously incredibly entertaining for a lot of people, but just pure insanity. But I guess that's par for the course when it comes to entertainment here in the US. But we're going to have a fantastic show here today where we're going to discuss various political issues that have come up in the last 24 hours. last 24 hours, including Senator Ted Cruz continuing to embarrass himself, something that he's an expert in. And later in the show, we'll discuss Democratic lawmakers in the Senate who refuse to use the power that they have been given by their constituents, which is incredibly frustrating. We'll discuss the filibuster, the possibility of using something called

reconciliation in order to pass robust economic relief that people definitely need right now. And later, possibly in the post game for our members, we will toss to a video featuring Tucker Carlson pretending as though nationalism and white supremacy isn't a problem on the right, because of course he doesn't think it's a problem. So lots to get to. But as always, please like and share this stream. If you're watching online, it's one of the easiest ways to help support the show and get the word out.

But for now, why don't we get started with Ted Cruz, one of the, I guess, your stories of the day, if you think climate change is funny. But anyway, so President Joe Biden, it's weird to say it after four years of President Donald Trump, but President Joe Biden will be rejoining the non-binding Paris climate accord, something that Donald Trump, of course, pulled the United States out of back in 2017. Now, before I get into the details of how Ted Cruz is whining and crying about it, let me just warn you, warn you guys and remind you in case you might have forgotten that it is a non-binding international agreement with more than 200 different countries signing on to it, agreeing

that they are going to try hard to lower carbon emissions in order to help at least mitigate the impact of climate change. Now Ted Cruz doesn't like this and is either pretending to be stupid or is incredibly stupid by saying, by rejoining the Paris climate agreement, President Biden indicates he's more interested in the views of the citizens of Paris than in the jobs of citizens of Pittsburgh. This agreement will do little to affect the climate and will harm the livelihoods of Americans. So I'm going to let you take it away for a minute, Awaz, because I'm curious what you think about this argument by Senator Cruz. I mean, it's stupid, but the only thing interesting about how stupid it is, is because it's coming from Ted Cruz, the guy before he decided he wanted to be president of this country, was considered to be the sort of intellectual arm of the Republican Party, right?

Like, he was supposed to be part of that, like, you know, Ivy League sort of buttoned up. I'll kill you in a debate. Ted Cruz was always the guy that certain types of conservatives would be like, Oh, they don't want to get in the ring with Ted Cruz, he'll eat him alive because of his, you know, alleged superior intellect. And, you know, ever since he decided to run for president, he's thrown all of that out the window and decided to eat the monkey brains, man. Like, this guy has completely lost his mind, right? Publicly, anyway, in his shamelessness and willingness to do or say anything that he thinks will curry favor amongst the Republican base. So it's like you just can't take anything he says seriously anymore. And it's a shame because this is one of the 100 guys we have in the United States Senate.

It's it's sad. It's incredibly sad, absolutely. And so obviously the Paris Climate Accord isn't about France, it isn't about Paris, it's about climate change. And it involves an international negotiation that took place in Paris, which is why it's called the Paris Climate Accord. This is something that Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez pointed out in response to Ted Cruz's insanely stupid tweet. She writes, nice tweet, Senator Cruz. Quick question, do you also believe the Geneva Convention was about the views of the citizens of Geneva, asking for everyone who believes U.S. senators should be competent and not undermine our elections to incite insurrection against the United States? So what she's implying with that last part is that Ted Cruz had absolutely no problem disenfranchising

voters from places around the country, including Pittsburgh. So in addition to voting against the certification of Pennsylvania's electoral count, he also tried to get the Supreme Court to toss out the state's vote. It's also worth mentioning, by the way, that Pittsburgh is incredibly supportive of the Paris Climate Accord. Pittsburgh invoked by Cruz and previous, by Trump as an example of a city that would be harmed by the agreement has itself joined the Paris Agreement. And its mayor tweeted this. Pittsburgh has exceeded our Paris commitments, recognized by U.S. mayors as national environmental initiative of 2020. We've met our 2030 goal by 100% renewable energy for city operations 10 years early. If we can do it in a city

that is slash was fueled by coal slash nuclear, you can too. And I absolutely love that response. But like the thing that I also want to bring up real quick is when Trump got elected, there were, I think understandably a lot of people who were upset. Some people were hyperbolic in their rhetoric. They were hyperbolic in, you know, the devastation they were feeling at the time. But we're certainly seeing the same, not just from Trump supporters, like your average voter person who was part of his base, but by someone like Ted Cruz, who's one of the most powerful people in the world when you really think about it as one of 100 U.S. senators, right? And he's being so hyperbolic about a non-binding agreement that just wants to lower carbon emissions. So we have, you know, a place to live 100 years from now. Yeah, Ted Cruz, like I said, the guy has absolutely no credibility at this point, right? It's almost like he grew the beard as a way to like do one of those fake disguises, right? You know, somebody puts a mustache on and the glasses and the nose and it'll be one of those fake disguises.

That's what Ted Cruz is doing. Like he used to be, you know, his identity was he was one of these godbotherers, right? Like the God people loved them, you know, fake Christian conservative stuff. that he was hawking. And again, the intellectualism stuff that he swore by, right? And again, he was another one of these frauds, one of these sort of Josh Hawley type of frauds, who was complaining about the elites all day, every single day. Again, this guy went to nothing but Ivy League schools, got a Supreme Court clerkship. Like, this dude has done nothing but swim in elite circles. Basically, his entire adult life. And, you know, all he's done has been a fraud.

Like when he ran for president, people said he was the most unlikely, single most unlikable person within the Senate because his ambitions were so naked and just so shameless and gutless. And Ted Cruz is just, you know, he is the embodiment of what naked ambition in D.C. gets you specifically on the conservative side, right? Like some of this happens on the other side too, but this is, man, this is just shamelessness at its peak right here. Yeah, it absolutely is shamelessness. And I want to be clear about one other thing. While I do commend Joe Biden for rejoining the climate Paris Accord, you know, it's been a few years now where we can now look back at how other countries are doing. Obviously the United States pulled out of it.

So I'm not going to give the United States much credit in abiding by some of the commitments. But, you know, there's been some analysis showing that many countries who agreed to be part of this, haven't really been able to meet their own commitments and goals. Although analysts say the pact has helped make progress toward its goal of preventing average global temperatures from increasing by two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, the effort is also shadowed by ample evidence that many countries aren't living up to those promises they made in 2015. And even nations that had kept those promises, some researchers forecast that global temperatures would rise by 2.6 degrees Celsius by the end of the century underlining the need for stronger

action. And I absolutely agree with that. In fact, one climate scientist from Princeton University said this in an interview with Science Magazine. If a grade is awarded to the Paris Pact based on whether we have any prospect of meeting a 2 degree Celsius target, from that point of view, it's probably a D or an F. So I'm not saying that because I want to minimize the importance of these types of international negotiations and deals, they're important. But it is to say that it's not robust enough, partly because it's non-binding in preventing, you know, the damage that we're going to experience through climate change. So just some, you know, updates and information on that. But why don't we move on now to COVID relief and also more importantly

COVID vaccinations because this is something that Biden has chosen to focus on on his first full day as president. So President Joe Biden is, President Joe Biden is focusing his full first day as president on the COVID effort or the effort to distribute the coronavirus vaccine. So his response to the coronavirus and how different it's really going to be from the Trump administration. Now, what we're learning now is that the Trump administration left absolutely no vaccine distribution plan. I don't think that the Biden administration should be surprised by this, but they do say that they have to begin from scratch.

So as CNN reports, they let the press know there's nothing for us to rework. We're going to have to build everything from scratch. And this is according to one administration's source. Another source described the moment that it became clear that the Biden administration's would have to essentially start from square one because there simply was no plan. And this person said, wow, just further affirmation of complete incompetence. But the reason why I say they shouldn't be surprised is because the Trump administration, of course, has been misleading throughout this entire pandemic.

They were incredibly misleading when it came to the vaccine itself and whether we had reserves of the vaccine. So it turns out that they totally lied. totally lied. They did not have reserves. So let's quickly hear from a Biden coronavirus advisor who spoke about that specifically. We were quite surprised last Friday when we learned that, in fact, there weren't these extra doses of vaccine being held back for a second dose. Something that's significant, only to find out last Friday, makes you very concerned that there's still more to be learned that you don't know that is going to create a real challenge

as we go forward over the weeks ahead. So just to remind you all, we passed a pretty devastating milestone with 400,000 Americans who have died from the pandemic. Also around 16.5 million vaccine doses had been administered by January 20th, and that is far short of the last administration's goal of administering 20 million vaccine doses by the end of 2020. So Operation Warp Speed has been anything but, and this is what happens when you don't have a centralized approach to distributing a vaccine in response to an international pandemic. Trump really left it up to the states, and that has been a complete and utter disaster. You know what's so fascinating about this? Several things about this fascinates me. One,

you mentioned at the top of the show, the sort of panic that set in amongst people, Democratic Party, voters, members, et cetera, et cetera, when Donald Trump was elected that somebody this obviously, grossly incompetent, unqualified for the job is very dangerous. But what we saw for three and a half years was that like the apparatus of the government is so huge and the and the boat is so big that it's going in one direction. It's pretty hard to throw a snag in it, right? Like Trump didn't do anything and it was fine until there was a bona fide actual emergency. And that's when Trump's incompetence actually, you know, showed its effects, right? And so we see that in the response to the pandemic and, you know, getting out aid and help to people where Trump's, you know, lack of,

just as indifference towards doing the basic needs of the job costs so many people. lives, got so many people sick, just ruined sort of everything. So I don't know that an incoming administration should be surprised by Donald Trump's lack of preparation or lack of planning for this. It's obvious if you were paying attention to his campaign, excuse me, his presidency that that would be the case. What I would hope is that, you know, this incoming administration would use this as a way to tie this around the republic. when they go around them to help everybody else, right? It's like these guys were in power for four years and they clearly did not care one way or another about helping people out, right?

And so the idea that they need to come to the table with these same people who did absolutely nothing from April to right around the election. did nothing. They rushed in some little $600 thing because their arms had to be absolutely twisted to do it. And now we're supposed to believe that the incoming administration is supposed to share power and want to be bipartisan just for bipartisan's sake. It just doesn't, it baffles me. It doesn't make sense. I would hope that the administration will use Trump's example as an example of what Republican leadership on this issue actually is. They don't care. Right. You're absolutely right about that. And when you take a closer look at some of the thinking among Senate Democrats regarding bipartisanship, like their insane willingness to cout to the

desires of Mitch McConnell, right? But more importantly, look, Republicans are gonna Republican. Like that's what they're gonna do, right? They know how to flex their muscle. They know how to just lie, not only to the American people, but to their own constitution. to their colleagues in Congress, they do it and they do it with the straight face. It's not a problem for them. But what is a problem is that we just went through four years of devastating actions by congressional Republicans and by the Trump administration. At the same time, we had a lot of hyperbolic rhetoric coming from Democratic lawmakers, really

pointing to how disastrous Trump's administration was, how disastrous the actions of Mitch McConnell were. And then after all of that to come to us and say, well, you know, we could use the power that we have right now, right? We could, you know, throw out the filibuster in the Senate. You only need a simple majority for that. We could use reconciliation, you know, to pass COVID relief through a simple majority. Instead of doing all that, they're like, no, let's just, you know, Biden really, really wants us to approach this in a bipartisan way. So that's what we're going to do. We're going to approach it in a bipartisan way. We're going to fail a bunch of times. And then what? Like this isn't this isn't some like fun patty cakes game. People are desperate for real economic

relief right now. The system is broken and, you know, under-resourced, meaning that if you want to distribute the vaccine appropriately, effectively, you need funding for that. And that funding is wrapped up in the latest COVID relief bill that was proposed by Biden. Let me tell you something. That bill is not going to pass if you're trying to play this bipartisan game with congressional Republicans. They're not interested in helping them pass anything robust. And so they need to understand the seriousness of the moment.

They need to reflect on their own rhetoric over the last four years. And they need to prove that they were serious about what they were saying about the Trump administration and congressional Republicans. I just, it's a very strange time for them to play these games. I get the need to want unity in the country, but the unity should be about creating a better country for people overall. So it's not easy for their anger to get exploited by fascists. That is a big problem.

That's what Donald Trump did. He spoke to their economic issues, even though he wasn't actually being sincere about it. And what he did is he exploited their anger, exploited their rage to push all sorts of disgusting nationalistic narratives. And it worked, it worked. So if you care about division, the best thing you can do is pull the country out of the economic disaster that they've been experiencing, not just during this pandemic. I mean, the pandemic compounded it.

But it's been going on for a long time now and accelerated after the 2008 economic collapse. Yeah, it's, you know, it's the Democrats being Democrats as usual, right? It's, I wonder to myself sometimes. You have to wonder, it's like, what is it really, right? How can you in good faith as a Democrat come out and say, well, we can't do this because what if the Republicans, no, there is no, what if we've seen it? We saw it with Merrick Garland. We saw what they did to jam through their ridiculous tax cuts for the wealthiest people

in the country. Like, just try to imagine for one second that there was something as simple and easy as D.C. statehood. And Mitch McConnell had a place with millions of guaranteed Republican votes that would guarantee two senators in the Senate, two Republican senators in the Senate. And it was laying right there for him. And Mitch McConnell said, no, we can't do that. Because then the Dems might do something. No, he would do just that. And he would know that the next time the Democrats would be in power, they would be cowed and be scared to do the things that hundreds of millions of Americans need want and are asking for, right?

Nobody wanted that tax cut. And I know we're going to talk about, you know. 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, poor sleep, low energy, bloating, and more. With over 40,000 reviews and a bottle sold every 24,

seconds, the results speak for themselves. A survey found 86% of women lost weight, 77% saw an improved mood, and 100% felt like themselves again. Start your next chapter feeling balanced and in control. For a limited time, get 15% off your entire first order at happy mammoth.com with code next chapter at checkout. Visit happy mammoth.com today and get your old self back naturally. How they're trying to go about this, but Bernie came out and he said, look, they use reconciliation for tax cuts. for the wealthiest people in the country, a minute percent of the population, unpopular. That's what they went out and used reconciliation for.

We're trying to get out money and relief and vaccines to people who desperately need it. We'll not use reconciliation for that. And he's the only one saying it out loud right now. Yeah, you're right. So we'll talk about that in more detail when we come back after the break. So let's do that. Let's take a break. When we come back, we'll talk about the discussions that are currently taking place among House Democrats and Senate Democrats regarding the possibility of passing a more robust version of economic relief. Come right back. 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-F-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. Thank you. Hey, everyone, welcome to our first social break of today. I'm going to start off with some member comments as I usually do.

writes in and says, we don't have to spend a whole hour on the stupid things that Trump did and said today feels so good. I totally agree. Totally agree. Lid dragon or no, led dragon. Anyway, you know what I'm talking about. I wonder what percentage of American right wingers believe the country's emissions affect only their country. I'm convinced Trump did. They don't seem to realize the United States benefits from the efforts of the rest of the world. Exactly. I mean, the United States has been the top polluter. And so our actions are incredibly important. Trump pulling out of the Paris Climate Accord, it's part of the reason why it was so disastrous, right? Because we've been the top polluter, and for the United States to pull out of that

non-binding deal sent a pretty awful message to the rest of the world, right? We're trying to persuade other countries to also take part in this. And it's hard to do that when we're not you know, keeping our part of this commitment. The progressive defender wrote in and said day two, still no immediate $2,000 as we were promised. And they already made it $1,400, not a good start. They have no immediate prospects for how to get this passed. It's awful. How can you promise this and not have a plan? I don't think people realize how damaging it is when those kinds of promises are made and then they're not fulfilled, right? So it's so important that they pass real economic relief. And we'll have a longer discussion about that in just a few minutes.

The infamous Mr. Joy Boy, awesome, purposely and maliciously ineptitude. And they complained slash lied about Obama's pandemic plan. You know, I'm glad you brought that up because Obama did have a pandemic plan, right? So if the Trump administration didn't have a plan for this pandemic, couldn't they just bring back their playbook, the one that they allegedly had in response to the Ebola virus and use that. So we'll see how that goes. But again, even if Trump had his like plan, if I were the new president or the incoming administration, I'd be like, oh, oh, this is this was your plan. Okay. Thanks. I'm not interested. Let's move on. So we have 45 seconds left. A few super chats for you. Michael Goldman writes in and says,

I don't know if TYT plans to cover this story, but it seems the proud boys have now decided to abandon loser Donald. We will be talking about it later in the show, saying he's a total failure. All right, we got to get back to the show. So why don't we do that? And make sure you write in your super chats and your comments because we love reading them during our social breaks. So we're looking forward to hearing from you soon. For now, let's get back to the show. I'm going to be able to be.

Welcome back to TYANT , Welcome back to TYT, Anna Kasparing and Wozni-Lombay with you. Let's talk a little bit about the economy and what our new president, Joe Biden, proposes we do about it. New data indicates that Joe Biden has inherited a disastrous economic situation. Turns out that Donald Trump boasting about how great he was for American jobs was just lying. Wow, what a shocker. But the new numbers are pretty devastating. Another 900,000 people filed new unemployment claims just last week.

And that was, of course, President Donald Trump's last week in office. An additional 423,000 people in 47 states filed new claims for pandemic unemployment assistance. Altogether, nearly 16 million people were claiming benefits as of January 2nd. And by the way, the benefits had expired for many people. And thanks to the latest version of coronavirus economic relief, that 900. billion dollar bill, which of course didn't come close to addressing the issues that need to be addressed, that will extend the unemployment benefits and people will reapply for the unemployment benefits. I'm mentioning that because the disastrous numbers that I shared with you are actually an

underestimate. Now weekly jobless claims are now near what they were at the beginning of September. So this upward trajectory that Trump's economists were claiming we were going to experience is not really happening. It's the 44th straight week that initial claims remain higher than the worst week of the Great Recession. And this is something that economist Richard Wolfe talks about on a regular basis, because while the elite love to point to the stock market as an indicator of how well the economy is doing, clearly that is not a realistic indicator of how the economy is

performing for the vast majority of Americans. And that's why real economic relief, a new stimulus package is desperately needed. And we've talked about what Biden has proposed. He has proposed another $1,400 direct check to Americans, a one-time direct check, in addition to $400 in unemployment benefits every week through the, through September. So, it's better than what I think most people expected. I still don't think it's enough, but what is the likelihood that Biden's plan gets passed, even though Democrats now have a slim majority in the Senate and have held their majority in the House of Representatives?

Meaning, look, there really is no excuse at this point. They can pass Biden's bill and they should be able to pass something even more robust than what Biden is proposing. And I'll make my case for that in just a second. But Wozni, I wanted to get your thoughts. Yeah, it's exactly as we thought. The situation is dire, right? There are a bunch of people on the brink of eviction, a bunch of people on the brink of foreclosure.

And that's not to even address everyday needs, right? Like paying for your car, like putting gas in your tank, like feeding yourself. It's dire out here. And yes, the response needs to be robust. Right? Like there are some economists who think the stimulus should be as much as five trillion bucks, right? Like that 1.9 billion trillion isn't enough. And at the same time, we can recognize some level of progress, excuse me, and understanding that this is better than 09 when Barry couldn't even get through 700 billion without people acting like the world was about to end and the sky was going to fall and the economy was going to crash. inflation was going to, you know, creep in and choke out children's in their sleep and none of it ever happened, right? And so although this is better than I expected, like you said from Joe Biden, it's not nearly enough to cure the ills and to address just how horrific the conditions are right now.

Exactly. I mean, just to juxtapose what we saw from, you know, FDR's New Deal, in response to the Great Depression, to what Biden is proposing in regard to federal jobs, I didn't even know the number was this high, but FDR created 12 million federal jobs as part of the New Deal. Now, Biden is also, through his proposal, you know, trying to get a new deal. some federal jobs and, you know, to provide some employment for people. And so what's the number? 100,000 and it would be jobs connected to the vaccine distribution, right? Which is important. But let's increase that number, especially when you consider that the unemployment rate currently sits at 6.7%. 16 million Americans are claiming benefits, unemployment benefits now. I mean,

it's just absolutely disastrous. We need a better response. But I do also agree that it is that it is better than what we saw from Obama following the 2008 economic collapse. The Biden administration seems less concerned about deficit spending during this time crisis, which is important. That is an important difference. So there is some improvement, and you're right, we want to be accurate in how we analyze this. But Democrats in Congress are going to be a problem, and they need to be held accountable. So political reporting this, In recent days, Democrats on the Hill and incoming administration officials have been privately discussing several potential paths to bringing legislation to the floor quickly. One of the leading options is a powerful budgetary maneuver that would allow Democrats to evade a Senate filibuster, which of course requires 60 votes, and muscle their package through both chambers with virtually no support from Republicans.

That tool known as reconciliation would be a device. I don't think it would be divisive. They're referring to it as divisive over Politico, but they're saying that it's a divisive first move for a Biden administration insistent upon bipartisanship. It's also an imperfect process. Any bill would likely be limited in scope to comply with strict budget rules and Democratic leaders would have zero room for error to secure the 51 votes for passage in the Senate. They passed Trump's tax cuts for the rich with reconciliation.

And it was not referred to as divisive. It was not referred to as divisive because when Republicans have power, they're not afraid to use it. And they're not afraid of words like divisive. They know their power and they use their power. And Democrats should try that. Now, there's one representative who had a statement about bipartisanship that I want to share with you. So it's Representative Raja Krishna-Murthy, who says this, I feel like there's got to be the, I feel like that's got to be the very last resort.

We've got to do everything we can to make this bipartisan. And was unfortunately, Biden is pushing them in that direction. I'm not excusing it, but Biden's messaging is pretty awful on this. Here is his press secretary talking about bipartisanship during her first press conference yesterday. How long are you willing to try to work to get Republican support before you decide to go through the budget reconciliation process instead? We hope and frankly we expect Republicans in Congress and Democrats too will support assistance that will bring relief to the people they represent. This is a conversation. He, of course, gave a prime time address. As you all know last week, it seems like a long time ago. but it wasn't, to announce his specifics, and he has already had a number of conversations with

Democrats and the Republicans. Those will continue. His clear preference is to move forward with a bipartisan bill. There's no question about it. But we are also not going to take any tools off the table for how the Senate, House and Senate can get this urgent package done. So we're at the beginning of the process. And as we continue, there'll be conversations with members of both parties of what will be in a final package. And rarely does it look exactly like the initial package that is proposed? No, disaster. Disaster. Already lowering expectations. Jesus Christ. You notice what never happens when people are spewing this bipartisan crap. They never say why, you know, a turd sandwich with the label bipartisan on it tastes better. They never explain that to us.

They just throw it out there and assume that people just understand, like, bipartisan is great because we keep telling you that it is. But they never say why, and there's a reason for that, because it's nonsense. It's always used that as an excuse to screw people over, right? And, you know, I don't want to get negative out here, but I will say anybody who watches this show probably shouldn't be reading political for exactly the reason that Anna just stated, like political's calling by the record. reconciliation maneuver as divisive. To who? And why? What is your proof of this? Who's going to be divided by this? Certainly not the people whose lives are going to be materially changed by these things. It's, you know, it's insane. And they keep saying bipartisan and with absolutely, just offer me some proof that the Republicans have any interest in this. Show me the proof.

Show me the proof that they have interest in a robust, you know, a robust response to the pandemic, to the economic crisis. Show me the proof and we'll be cool with chatter about bipartisanship and reaching across the aisle and, you know, patting this guy's back because he's a senator like me. All right, we'll be cool with it, but show me proof that these people have any interest in this. There's just none. They have no credibility here. Well, it's funny because just today, one of Donald Trump's economic advisors came out in support of Joe Biden's $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief plan. And so I'm not saying it because this is a person who's currently in a position of power where he can do something

about it. I'm mentioning it because you still have Republican lawmakers who are terrified of Donald Trump's base. And you also have someone who worked closely with Donald Trump saying, No, no, they should totally pass Biden's relief package. It makes a lot of sense. It's desperately needed. So, I mean, yeah, you can apply, first of all, just normal campaigning, messaging, you know, holding Republican lawmakers accountable for abandoning the American people over and over and over again on like the one thing that the federal government is supposed to be used for.

Like if you can't have the federal government help the American people during a pandemic, then what's the point of the federal government, right? It's just, it makes no sense. But anyway, so there's that. But also, you're absolutely right. There's no, when we talk about unity, we do need unity in the country. But the unity is about the American people. It's not about repud, like, at TYT, we frequently talk about all the ways that big tech

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Publican and Democratic lawmakers like singing kumbaya, like if we had rational people, who weren't corrupted by their donors, then maybe that's a possibility, but that's just not going to happen. Mitch McConnell doesn't care about anyone's feelings. Mitch McConnell does what Mitch McConnell wants to do. Mitch McConnell uses his power, and we need Democrats to think the same way. We need Schumer to think the same way. And if you want the American people to be united, one of the best ways to do that is to make sure that their material needs are met so that when they hear fascists, like Tucker Carlson using rhetoric that's specifically meant to appeal to people economically and then flips the script and talks about all the hatred that we need to have for people of color, for immigrants, for this. That's not going to be appealing anymore. It's not going to be

appealing because it's really hard to point to the scary others as the scapegoat for people's economic concerns when their economic concerns have been dealt with. That's how to deal with unity. And so here's part of the problem too, Anna, is that the Democrats and the corporate media's insistence upon treating the Republican Party as legitimate. As a legitimate party that has like these legitimate goals that they want to achieve and that, you know, they genuinely partake in this stuff in good faith. When, one, when they, when they're they're in power, they don't treat the Democrats as a legitimate party. And two, when they're not empowered, like back when Barack Obama was elected, they don't treat the Democratic Party as a

legitimate party, right? Like, just the idea of Democratic Party legitimacy is a joke to them, right? And, you know, in those years when they controlled the House, the Senate, the presidency, in the beginning of Trump's presidency, they didn't go out and ban abortions everywhere. They didn't go out and put a wall up. They didn't go out and do any of the crap that they claimed to be about, right? All they did was gin up so fear within the base in order for them to achieve their main ends, which is shoveling wealth right back up to the people who already have all of it anyway, right? Like these people aren't legitimate. And the more that establishment Democrats and places like freaking political, treat this party as legitimate in any, you know, real sense of the word, that's the more we're

going to have these problems. Like, just the idea that, like, are we just going to pretend that these people did nothing before Joe Biden was inaugurated to help anybody? Like, they did nothing. Where's the proof? Yeah. No, I mean, yes, you hit the nail on the head. And the one Democratic Senator who is strongly in favor of reconciliation is the Senate budget chair, Bernie Sanders, who said, yeah, we'll reach out to the Republicans. Here's a direct quote. I think we've got to reach out to Republicans. I hope many of them understand the crises that we're facing. But if they don't, we've got to move forward with reconciliation. And he's absolutely right about that. And as the chair of the Senate Budget Committee, he has the power to do that when it comes to this coronavirus relief

Bill. So I highly encourage him to flex his power because Bernie's got it and he's been fighting for the same things for decades. It would be wrong to, you know, hold back now. And I hope he's not planning to. If you can use reconciliation, do it, do it, do it immediately. And it be nice and it'd be nice. And it'd be nice. Anna, to hear some other prominent Democrats actually backing Bernie up on this and saying, look, if y'all want to get bipartisan, Let's get bipartisan, but if y'all not serious, we're going to do this without you. It's kind of like when my friend's dad used to take us to drive us to school every single day. And if we weren't outside by 750, at 751, he was gone, right?

That's how the Dems need to treat these cats. Like if y'all not ready, it's time to go. Yep, absolutely. All right, well, we're going to take a break. And when we come back, George Bush has some thoughts on who Clyburns. who Clyburn decided to promote and endorse during the Democratic primary. You know, George Bush, that super intelligent guy who knows how to read the tea leaves. Anyway, we'll give you that story and more when we come back.

You know, I'm going to be able to be. I'm going to be. I'm going to be able to be. Hey everyone, welcome to our social break. A few announcements and I'll read some of your comments. You should be using a VPN to protect your online activity. And one of the best ways to do that is through pure VPN. You can actually get a seven day trial for only 99 cents by going to tyt.com slash pure VPN. That's tyt.com slash pure VPN. Also the shoptyt store is celebrating Biden's inauguration by giving you 15% off every item.

at their site. So go to shopty.com, pick your item, and use the promo code, bye, B-bye, B-U-H-B-Y-E. Again, that's bu-bye at B-U-H-B-Y-E. And there's some new stuff there as well to, you know, the United in Progress merchandise over at the ShopT-YT-T store. It's pretty bomb. You got to check it out. Make sure you see if you like it, buy it. And it not only supports the ShopT-YT-T-Store, obviously it helps to support this show as well. And let's move on to some comments from the super chat section. We have TSL who wrote regarding conflict of interest clause on pardons. That's the topic that this comment is about. There should be a conflict of interest clause on pardons. You can't pardon former business partners or former slash current party members. I mean,

there are conflicts of interest everywhere, okay? So the new head of the Office of Management and Budget, Nero Tandon, or who will be the head of the OMB pretty soon, she would get to decide whether or not there are ethics issues with, you know, certain elements of Biden's administration. She's a giant ethics issue. Like she is, she's a conflict of interest. Like her existence, in the office of management and budget, as someone who was the head of a think tank that was funded by corporations and foreign governments, she is a conflict of interest, but she will be the arbiter of what is and is not ethical. Like, it's insane. I can't stand it. Okay, I'm going to also read from Sir Smoke It Right, who says, Ted Cruz said that because he knows the base

will fall for, said it because he knows the base will fall for it. How can that many people be so clueless, crazy. I don't, do they fall for it? Maybe, yeah, maybe. But he is shameless. Like, I don't think he's legitimately that stupid. But he will say whatever he can to mislead his own constituents. That's the kind of guy he is. Grilled hot dog also writes in and says in our member section, Trump is an extreme idiot, but don't give too much credit for all the failures. The Republicans had a super majority for two years. Give much of that credit to McConnell and Ryan. Oh, they get a lot of credit for that kind of stuff, for sure. All right, well, we got to get back to the show.

So we'll see you in our next social break in the next hour. I'm going to be. Ah. Ah. And... ...andah. Hey, everyone. back to TYT, Anna Casparian and Wozni Lombray with you. Make sure you check out Waz's work.

He's an NBA writer over at The Athletic, and he just hosted a fantastic episode of Wokebrose with Nando Vila about the inauguration. I was listening to it this morning, Waz, and it was just so good. You guys are a good team, entertaining, funny, but also informative. So everyone check it out. Yeah, I know. Nando's all of those things, and I just show up, you know, just Just keep the change moving on time. You're great. Believe me, I would not have someone who doesn't know what they're talking about on this show. So you're one of my faves.

I think what we just try to do, man, is present the facts to the people in such a way that's just different than the lens, if you will, that they generally get on the corporate media side, right? And, you know, whatever, you can have your own conspiracies about why mega, multinational conglomerate media entities might present the facts a certain way and why two normal guys might present it differently. But hey, and, you know, who am I to say? All right. Well, I can't wait to hear what you have to say about this next story, which was infuriating. But let's discuss. It's going to take a us back to the Democratic primary for the 2020 election and what some Republicans were thinking about endorsements that were being made. So House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn shared the

details of a fascinating conversation that he had with former president and war criminal George W. Bush. And it had to do with the fact that Representative Clyburn decided to endorse Joe Biden in a critical moment during the Democratic primary. And that really did help Biden increases numbers in the polls. And that was a turning point during the primaries. So as they witness President Joe Biden take the oath of office, Representative Clyburn said former Republican President George W. Bush lauded him as a savior for helping get Biden elected. Now, George Bush also allegedly said, you know, you're the savior because if you have to be able to, had not nominated Joe Biden, we would not be having this transfer of power today.

And what he's referring to, of course, is that if Bernie Sanders had been the Democratic nominee, then there's no way there'd be a transfer of power. Come on, come on. So how do you interpret that statement, was? There's just so much to unpack there. One, nobody asks you guys, specifically to come out and call George Bush and his cronies, Dick Cheney, Rumsfeld, the rest of them, war criminals, which they are. We don't even ask that of you to come out in the public square and shun these people and shame them for the horrific acts that they committed upon both this country for the people had to go out there and die and maim themselves and injure themselves mentally, emotionally,

physically, on behalf of those two insane wars. We don't even ask you to do that. The least we ask you to do is to not come out and shine George Bush's shoes. Yes, I just said it. Clyburn is up there acting like a damn Tom. Shining George Bush's shoes. For what? He won't credit for what? No Republican would ever get up there and say, you know, that one time I met, you know, Jimmy Carter, it was great. That would never, ever freaking happened.

Yet Clyburn is so proud of himself for what he did. He's willing to suck up to George Bush. That's disgusting, dude. In service of what? being so proud that you took down Bernie Sanders and his crazy, scary agenda to help working in normal people. This is horrific. Yeah, I mean, strong. What you just said is strong. And I can say it because I'm black. I'm sorry. I would never say. So my thing, my thing, I don't ever want to go against influential public black people in a public way, especially amongst, let's face it, non-blacks, right?

Because it always gets used as ammunition to be like, look, even the black guy is saying it, except in the cases that people are behaving in disgusting fashion. Like, this is just horrible. To cite George Bush as some reason why you should patch yourself on the back, this guy is the most destructive president of our lifetimes, like even more destructive than what Reagan did to poor minority communities during his reign, right? Like, this dude got millions of brown people killed in the Middle East and countless other American people maimed, killed, et cetera, et cetera. As I previously mentioned, he's deplorable. Yep.

That's the only thing you should be saying about George Bush in public. Instead, this dude is shining his shoes. It's disgusting. I'm sorry. I mean, what you also have to understand. what happened under Bush's watch, right? The largest terrorist attack in U.S. history happened under his watch. So, yes, there are the war crimes. You know, people very rightly bring that up and criticize him for it. But just the amount of failure during the Bush administration

toward the American people, in like what Republicans claim they do best, you know, they're the best at national security. They're the best at keeping people safe. Bush and Cheney did everything but that. And, you know, there's, there are different ways to interpret what Bush said, right? So maybe one, I would say, generous interpretation is that, you know, Bush thinks that he can read the tea leaves and really genuinely believe that someone like Bernie Sanders had absolutely no chance of beating Donald Trump, which I don't believe at all. And if you do give him that more generous interpretation, just consider how incredibly dumb George Bush was. Okay, all the people who are, no, no, but for all the people who are now helping to rehabilitate his reputation,

don't forget how disastrous his policies were both abroad and here in the United States. and don't forget how easy it is to make a compilation video highlighting just some, just some, not all, just some of his stupid moments in his eight years in office. Let's watch. Travel sovereignty means that, it's sovereign. You're a, you've been given sovereignty and you're viewed as a sovereign entity. And you're working hard to put food on your family. I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully. I heard somebody say, where's Mandela?

Well, Mandela's dead because Saddam Hussein killed all the men tell us. We got an issue in America. Too many good docs are getting out of business. Too many OBGYNs aren't able to practice their love with women all across this country. There's an old saying in Tennessee, I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee that says,

fool me once. Shame on you. If fool me, we can't get fooled again. Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we. No, you may not. Thank you, sir. Thank you, sir. Thank you, sir.

By the way, obviously at the time he made those statements about Mandela, Mandela was not dead. He was still very much alive. And that statement was insane. But if you want to give the less generous interpretation of what Bush is saying, you know, there's always been some suspicion that the powers that be would do whatever it takes to prevent someone like Bernie Sanders from winning. And certainly some of the rhetoric coming from Democratic lawmakers made it seem as though they saw Bernie as more of a threat than Trump was. So that was the feeling that I got. And I don't know specifically what Bush meant through that statement. But I agree with you was that Clyburn kind of bragging about that interaction that he had and feeling good about Bush,

of all people calling him a savior. It's just not a good look. Yeah, I'm not going to walk back what I said specifically because basically I'm not asking you two was no no no no not I know because some people get triggered oh he he called him a time no why are you bragging about this man pat and you on the head why what makes him so special and important aside from the fact that he was once the worst president of modern times aside from that accomplishment what makes him somebody worthy of you bragging about him praising of you, praising you. It doesn't make any sense. It's just another dude suckling at the power teat with just no backbone, bro. Like you, like, I just could never imagine Newt Gingrich bragging about an interaction with

President Clinton. He just would never do it. He just would never say, oh, man, President Clinton gave me profit. It's insanity. man, and it speaks to the depraved nature of a lot of these establishment deems, right? Like these people are just so obsessed with power that power is just an end unto itself. It doesn't matter whether you actually do anything for anybody that you achieve power is the achievement. Well, Bernie has also kind of weighed in on this, and he did so through a photo shoot. It's a photo shoot that makes a lot of sense to me.

Let's take a quick look. Here he is on a college campus with his arms crossed saying Medicare for all, change my mind. No, I can't get enough of these memes. It's the one super fun thing that came out of yesterday. So obviously, that's Photoshop. It's a meme from Bernie's. appearance during Biden's inauguration. But I love, look, I think that you're absolutely right, was. And let anyone who's engaging in rehabilitating George Bush, please stop.

Please stop. Leave the room. You're not doing anyone any favors other than the Republicans and George Bush's reputation. Well, we got to take a break. When we come back, we'll give you the details on what Senate Democrats are thinking about the possibility of ending the filibuster. The filibuster essentially requires 60 votes to pass anything in the Senate. It's a disaster. So what are Democrats going to do about it? That story will surely infuriate you. And then later in the show, we'll discuss how the proud boys have turned on Donald Trump. It's one of my favorite stories of the day. We'll be right back. 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. podcast at apple.com. I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.