This is Gavin Newsom - And, This Is How The Media Is Failing Us In 2026 With Alex Wagner

00:00:00.000 First of all, let me just disabuse you

00:00:02.280 of the parallel you're trying to draw

00:00:03.880 between Fox News and MS Now.

00:00:05.360 Fox News pedals lies.

00:00:06.880 This movement has captured the imagination

00:00:09.680 of the American public in a way that has awoken

00:00:12.520 our darkest evolutionary instincts.

00:00:15.240 America is immigrants.

00:00:16.640 Yes. 0.99

00:00:17.480 To be purging the country of all the brown ones 1.00

00:00:20.000 is not going to leave us with much of a country.

00:00:22.480 We as human beings need to go out for cocktails 0.87

00:00:24.840 and have more sex and do things with other human bodies. 0.97

00:00:27.720 This is Gavin Newsom. 0.95

00:00:31.880 And this is Alex Wagner.

00:00:34.720 This is an iHeart Podcast.

00:00:38.720 Guaranteed human.

00:00:40.720 Hola, I'm Jorge Ramos.

00:00:42.720 This week on The Moment, we take a look at Venezuela's

00:00:44.720 uncertain future in a conversation with two people

00:00:47.720 who have directly advised U.S. presidents.

00:00:50.720 Juan Gonzalez during the Obama and Biden administrations.

00:00:53.720 We're really good at invading countries.

00:00:55.720 We're very bad at nation-building.

00:00:57.720 Carlos D. Rosillo during Trump's two terms.

00:01:00.720 I can guarantee you that nobody in the Trump administration

00:01:03.720 likes Delcy Rodriguez.

00:01:04.720 Listen to The Moment with Jorge Ramos and Paola Ramos

00:01:06.720 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

00:01:08.720 or wherever you get your podcasts.

00:01:10.720 Hi, I'm Dr. Priyanka Wally.

00:01:12.720 And I'm Hari Kondabolu.

00:01:13.720 It's a new year.

00:01:14.720 And on the podcast Health Stuff,

00:01:16.720 we're resetting the way we talk about our health.

00:01:18.720 Which means being honest about what we know,

00:01:20.720 what we don't know, and how messy it can all be.

00:01:22.720 I like to sleep in late and sleep early.

00:01:26.720 Is there a chronotype for that or am I just depressed?

00:01:29.720 Health Stuff is about learning, laughing,

00:01:32.720 and feeling a little less alone.

00:01:34.720 Listen on the iHeartRadio app,

00:01:36.720 Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

00:01:39.720 Hi, I'm Ed Zitron, host of the Better Offline Podcast.

00:01:43.720 And this January, we're going to go on the road

00:01:45.720 to beautiful Las Vegas, Nevada,

00:01:47.720 to cover the Consumer Electronics Show,

00:01:48.720 Tech's biggest conference.

00:01:50.720 Better Offline CES coverage won't be the usual rundown

00:01:53.720 of the hottest gadgets or biggest trends,

00:01:55.720 but an unvarnished look at what the tech industry plans to sell

00:01:58.720 or do to you in 2025.

00:02:00.720 I'll be joined by David Roth of Defecta

00:02:03.720 and the writer Edward Ongueso Jr.

00:02:05.720 With guest appearances from Behind the Bastards' Robert Evans,

00:02:07.720 It Could Happen Here's Gare Davis,

00:02:09.720 and a few surprise guests throughout the show.

00:02:11.720 Listen to Better Offline on the iHeartRadio app,

00:02:13.720 Apple Podcasts,

00:02:14.720 or wherever else you get your podcasts from.

00:02:16.720 Hey everybody, it's Michelle Williams,

00:02:21.720 host of Checking In on the Black Effect Podcast Network.

00:02:25.720 You know, we always say new year, new me,

00:02:27.720 but real change starts on the inside.

00:02:29.720 It starts with giving your mind and your spirit

00:02:32.720 the same attention you give your goals.

00:02:35.720 And on my podcast, we talk mental health, healing, growth,

00:02:39.720 and everything you need to step into your next season,

00:02:42.720 whole and empowered.

00:02:44.720 New year, real you.

00:02:47.720 Listen to Checking In with Michelle Williams

00:02:49.720 from the Black Effect Podcast Network

00:02:51.720 on the iHeartRadio app,

00:02:53.720 Apple Podcasts,

00:02:54.720 or wherever you get your podcasts.

00:02:56.720 How many, what is it,

00:02:57.720 four podcasts you have now or something? 0.99

00:02:59.720 How many damn podcasts? 0.98

00:03:00.720 I'm not even kidding. 0.99

00:03:01.720 I have one podcast that I'm very focused on

00:03:03.720 called Runaway Country.

00:03:04.720 Oh, I'm glad you're focused on it.

00:03:06.720 I occasionally dip in with the boys at Pod Save America.

00:03:10.720 And then, you know, I do Friends Podcast.

00:03:13.720 I did Stacey Abrams' podcast.

00:03:14.720 I got an invite to come to the mansion to sit and be, you know,

00:03:18.720 help inaugurate this beautiful studio with perfect lighting.

00:03:20.720 Inaugurate.

00:03:21.720 I, you know, I have ticket will go is what I'm saying.

00:03:25.720 I love a podcast.

00:03:26.720 You love a podcast.

00:03:27.720 I do love a podcast.

00:03:28.720 And what you're just done with cable, cable so yesterday.

00:03:30.720 No, Gov, no.

00:03:31.720 I am still, I'm still a senior political analyst for MSNOW,

00:03:37.720 which you may remember from its earlier heyday as MSNBC.

00:03:41.720 I'm going to get to that in a moment.

00:03:42.720 Oh, good, good, good.

00:03:43.720 I'm going to get to the whole MSNBC versus MSNOW

00:03:45.720 because I'm still struggling with it.

00:03:47.720 We all are.

00:03:48.720 Good to hear.

00:03:49.720 But you're still doing that.

00:03:50.720 I'm still doing that.

00:03:51.720 And then I have a substat called How the Hell with Alex Wagner.

00:03:54.720 And then I also have a book coming out this year that I can't talk about

00:03:57.720 until I'm allowed to, but from my population.

00:03:59.720 How many books have you written?

00:04:00.720 This is my second ill-fated attempt at writing a book.

00:04:03.720 You did one about Future Face.

00:04:04.720 Future Face, which is a story about identity and how we sort of decide

00:04:08.720 and tell ourselves who is American and who isn't.

00:04:11.720 And it's largely autobiographical, so it's insanely boring.

00:04:15.720 I appreciate you saying that for different reasons

00:04:18.720 because I'm coming out with my own book and I'm concerned about similar fate.

00:04:22.720 Yes, but you know you're maybe of slightly more interest in the American public.

00:04:25.720 I don't know about that, but I'm only going to talk about you

00:04:27.720 because I think your background is a lot.

00:04:29.720 This makes me very uncomfortable to talk mostly about myself.

00:04:32.720 I notice your physiology has changed a little bit here.

00:04:34.720 Yeah, I'm like grabbing my neck.

00:04:35.720 Yes, until your arms are crossed.

00:04:38.720 Yeah, okay, I'm going to relax.

00:04:39.720 Just deep breaths, slowly in, slowly out.

00:04:41.720 Is that your recommendation?

00:04:42.720 That's it.

00:04:43.720 It's Wim Hof.

00:04:44.720 I do Wim Hof breathing.

00:04:45.720 Do you do any breathing?

00:04:46.720 Do you do the cold ones?

00:04:47.720 It's 2020.

00:04:48.720 I literally on New Year's Day up there in Olympic Valley, we call it now.

00:04:54.720 Squaw Valley used to be called, but now it's Olympic Valley.

00:04:57.720 I did a hike and just jumped right in the river.

00:05:01.720 Icicles, the whole thing.

00:05:03.720 That was my New Year's Day. 0.92

00:05:04.720 That's beautiful.

00:05:05.720 It was, and I did a lot of breathing, heavy breathing in the water because it was slightly

00:05:08.720 cold.

00:05:09.720 Wim Hof would be proud of you.

00:05:10.720 Yes, three minutes.

00:05:11.720 But jumping in cold water on New Year's Day, Gov, I got to say, is not the most original

00:05:15.720 thing.

00:05:16.720 There's like an entire polar plunge that happens.

00:05:18.720 Well, it goes back almost a few thousand years prior to that, too.

00:05:22.720 I think Seneca did it on an annual basis.

00:05:24.720 Do you do cold plunges other than on New Year's Day?

00:05:26.720 I do.

00:05:27.720 I sadly have.

00:05:28.720 Me too.

00:05:29.720 How often do you do them?

00:05:30.720 I was doing them three times a week when I was really good.

00:05:32.720 I just got a cold plunge.

00:05:34.720 At what temperature?

00:05:35.720 At what temperature?

00:05:36.720 Interesting you should ask.

00:05:38.720 Because I've been reading more signs that women actually need it at a slightly higher 1.00

00:05:41.720 temperature.

00:05:42.720 Higher temperature.

00:05:43.720 Once I was doing it.

00:05:44.720 Need it at the higher temperature, you were forced to raise it.

00:05:47.720 Is that it?

00:05:48.720 Okay.

00:05:49.720 I mean, you couldn't handle it.

00:05:50.720 I thought we agreed we weren't going to be misogynists on this podcast.

00:05:52.720 But the panic response that sets in for women is at a higher, we have a higher, a lesser 0.92

00:06:01.720 degree of tolerance for the pain in part because the pain, I should say, of cold, not pain

00:06:06.720 in general, where we are warriors.

00:06:07.720 Yes.

00:06:08.720 That's right.

00:06:09.720 We're going to go into a much more protective mode quicker because we're responsible for

00:06:12.720 the propagation of human life.

00:06:13.720 So you still haven't told us what degree-

00:06:14.720 So anyway, 53.

00:06:16.720 53 is not even-

00:06:17.720 That's-

00:06:18.720 Are you kidding?

00:06:19.720 That's like- 1.00

00:06:20.720 Don't get into the bullshit. 1.00

00:06:21.720 That's cold. 1.00

00:06:22.720 And for 12 minutes?

00:06:23.720 For 12 minutes?

00:06:24.720 Well, that's-

00:06:25.720 No one suggests 12 minutes.

00:06:26.720 That's actually-

00:06:27.720 I suggest 12 minutes.

00:06:28.720 No, that's not-

00:06:29.720 That's a bad.

00:06:30.720 I was doing 48, 46.

00:06:31.720 That's not a bad.

00:06:32.720 What do you mean at 12 minutes?

00:06:33.720 It's supposed to be two to three minutes tops.

00:06:35.720 Oh, well then that's why you're jumping in and jumping out.

00:06:38.720 No, no.

00:06:39.720 You're jumping in and jumping out.

00:06:41.720 Two minutes, you get nothing done.

00:06:43.720 We're-

00:06:44.720 I think I'm-

00:06:45.720 I think it's a 41, 2, somewhere in there.

00:06:47.720 This is going to be-

00:06:48.720 Not 30s.

00:06:49.720 I tried the 30s.

00:06:50.720 I admit, couldn't do it.

00:06:51.720 Like, could not do it.

00:06:52.720 This is going to be the source of your great humiliation on the internet.

00:06:53.720 The fact that you only plunge for two to three minutes.

00:06:55.720 But anyway-

00:06:56.720 Three minutes.

00:06:57.720 It's actually three.

00:06:58.720 Full three.

00:06:59.720 Yeah, honestly.

00:07:00.720 At what?

00:07:01.720 At 41, 2 degrees.

00:07:02.720 Oh, and now the-

00:07:03.720 And the number seems to be-

00:07:04.720 Is it-

00:07:05.720 You should know.

00:07:06.720 Sure, you should know.

00:07:07.720 It's a year and a half old.

00:07:08.720 It's an older unit.

00:07:09.720 Sus.

00:07:10.720 It's an older unit.

00:07:11.720 Okay, cool.

00:07:12.720 But I will say there was something more-

00:07:13.720 It was much more wonderful to be in nature.

00:07:15.720 Yeah.

00:07:16.720 And to be there.

00:07:17.720 I mean, a little waterfall was right, you know, the central casting stuff.

00:07:20.720 Sounds like a-

00:07:21.720 It was not so beautiful on my toes.

00:07:23.720 Yeah, you made it though.

00:07:24.720 Here you are.

00:07:25.720 One of these.

00:07:26.720 Yes, at a hospital and, you know, I'm down.

00:07:29.720 I still- There's nine left, so I'm fine.

00:07:31.720 What's an- That's why you have extras.

00:07:32.720 Exactly right.

00:07:33.720 No, so let's talk about-

00:07:34.720 I mean, speaking of extras, you have so many extra gigs now.

00:07:37.720 That's the thing that I'm trying to mind here.

00:07:39.720 You've got Substack.

00:07:40.720 You've got- I mean, you did what?

00:07:42.720 Two MSNBC shows, right?

00:07:44.720 I did.

00:07:45.720 Alex Wagner Now.

00:07:46.720 Yes, I did.

00:07:47.720 Now with Alex Wagner.

00:07:48.720 Now with, yes.

00:07:49.720 Order, whatever.

00:07:50.720 That was-

00:07:51.720 That was-

00:07:52.720 And when did you start that?

00:07:53.720 That was 2011.

00:07:54.720 Wow.

00:07:55.720 2011.

00:07:56.720 And then that was at noon, and then it was at 4, and then it was not on the air at MSNBC.

00:08:01.720 And then I was at CBS and The Atlantic and Showtime for a while.

00:08:04.720 Circus.

00:08:05.720 The Circus.

00:08:06.720 And then I was called back to duty at MSNBC in 2022.

00:08:15.720 The years just melt by.

00:08:18.720 And that's when I was hosting the 9pm hour from Tuesday through Friday, until I was not hosting the 9pm hour.

00:08:23.720 And you did that for how long?

00:08:24.720 Three years.

00:08:25.720 Three.

00:08:26.720 That was three years.

00:08:27.720 Wow.

00:08:28.720 Long years.

00:08:29.720 And I'm curious, because I do want to get back, because I am more interested in your early days in DC.

00:08:35.720 Oh boy.

00:08:36.720 But this idea of four days, I mean, it's almost an impossible gig, right?

00:08:41.720 After Rachel on Monday, and then somehow you take the baton on a Tuesday to Friday.

00:08:46.720 Initially, I thought, this is going to be insane.

00:08:51.720 Here's what I will say about that period of my life.

00:08:54.720 Rachel is an extraordinary person to work with.

00:08:57.720 Yeah.

00:08:58.720 In terms of her generosity, and her spirit, and her tenacity, and her brilliance.

00:09:03.720 And really tried to help make that transition as easily as possible. 0.99

00:09:06.720 But Rachel Maddow is Rachel fucking Maddow. 1.00

00:09:09.720 Is it? 0.99

00:09:10.720 And the realities of cable are such that people are very hardcore about the folks they watch.

00:09:17.720 There's a deep intimacy and trust that goes along with it.

00:09:20.720 Right.

00:09:21.720 So, you know, it's hard for anybody to take that baton slash fill those shoes.

00:09:27.720 And I think especially now, if people don't see the people they've always seen, the person that they've invited into their living room for, you know, however many years, they're really kind of not interested in the next flavor.

00:09:37.720 I think that's like a challenge generally.

00:09:39.720 And the audience is getting older, you know?

00:09:42.720 And so once you lose those faces and those eyeballs and those hearts, it's hard to replace it with a different generation. 0.50

00:09:48.720 And that's kind of the conundrum of linear cable right now.

00:09:51.720 What is the average?

00:09:52.720 I mean, do you recall specifically MS?

00:09:54.720 I think it's in the 70s somewhere.

00:09:56.720 Come on.

00:09:57.720 Not that.

00:09:58.720 Is it that old?

00:09:59.720 That's interesting.

00:10:00.720 Yeah.

00:10:01.720 And I think it goes then to the, you know, then what you're, I mean, it goes to precisely then what you're doing and the audiences now you're reaching, which are wildly different.

00:10:09.720 I mean, the average age wide of your audience.

00:10:11.720 Oh, on Crooked Media, I don't actually know, I shouldn't answer this question, but it's considerably younger.

00:10:15.720 I mean, we have lots of people in the demographic.

00:10:18.720 That's good.

00:10:19.720 I mean, it's great.

00:10:20.720 I will say I have like, I get a little bit nostalgic and sad about the fact that more people don't crave institutional media the way that they used to.

00:10:29.720 Because I think there is a value of having like a news outlet with, I don't know, news gathering team, people that are breaking the stories and doing reporting.

00:10:36.720 And like analysis generally is good, but your resources are way more limited in like a podcasting network than they would have been in a place like MSNBC.

00:10:45.720 Give me an example.

00:10:46.720 On Tuesday, you'd prepare over the weekend or on a Monday, you had how many staff for your show?

00:10:51.720 Oh my God, like 25.

00:10:53.720 Yeah.

00:10:54.720 But then actually physically making the show, the floor director and the people in the control room, it's like probably close to 100.

00:10:59.720 I mean, bonkers, which like maybe we could have streamlined that a little bit.

00:11:04.720 But there's so many balls that you're juggling and it's whether it's the graphics department or cutting tape or making sure the facts are actually correct, it's a massive operation.

00:11:13.720 And compare that now.

00:11:14.720 Now it's just like, you know, it's five.

00:11:17.720 It's five.

00:11:18.720 Now I will say they're awesome. 0.94

00:11:20.720 They're totally fucking incredible. 0.96

00:11:22.720 It's great to be in the vanguard of where information and news is going. 0.99

00:11:26.720 Right.

00:11:27.720 But I do think something's lost by sort of just giving up on the infrastructure of like institutional media.

00:11:32.720 I'm not to say that's not to say that legacy media hasn't failed the public in a lot of ways, but there should be rigor.

00:11:39.720 There should be depth.

00:11:40.720 There should be a real sort of machine behind what we're doing because to report the facts and to do them honestly and accurately requires manpower, womanpower, whatever power. 1.00

00:11:52.720 And like that's just not quite the same thing as a podcast, though I love just talking and cursing.

00:11:58.720 Which you can finally do.

00:12:00.720 I mean you can say the word so many times on a podcast.

00:12:03.720 You're expected to.

00:12:04.720 Oh my God, I love it.

00:12:05.720 What, so this whole thing about legacy media, it's interesting.

00:12:09.720 Oh my God.

00:12:10.720 You just, because I know it's, you know, it seems a 90-10 issue to say legacy media has failed us and there's sort of an acceptance of that.

00:12:18.720 In what way, though, do you believe legacy media has failed us?

00:12:21.720 Well, I'm not Tony DiCoppo.

00:12:22.720 I'm not going to tell you here that like.

00:12:24.720 What did you make of that?

00:12:25.720 That was interesting.

00:12:26.720 Listen, Katie Turr is a friend of mine.

00:12:28.720 I know Tony from our work together.

00:12:29.720 And Tony, just for folks that are listening in, is now the new head of CBS.

00:12:32.720 He's the face of CBS Evening News.

00:12:34.720 Yeah, and had a very pointed statement when he started.

00:12:38.720 Said we've been listening too much to academics and elites, among other things.

00:12:41.720 Yeah.

00:12:42.720 I think the issue is not listening, not listening too much to academics.

00:12:45.720 And the reason you reverence Katie Turr is that Tony's.

00:12:47.720 She is married.

00:12:48.720 Yeah.

00:12:49.720 She's a wonderful person.

00:12:50.720 Yes.

00:12:51.720 And I think Tony is as well.

00:12:52.720 Yes.

00:12:53.720 I've gotten to know him a little bit.

00:12:54.720 Yeah.

00:12:55.720 I'm, I'm, I was disappointed by what he said.

00:12:57.720 Interesting, yeah.

00:12:58.720 I imagine a lot of you were.

00:12:59.720 When you say the words, Hunter Biden's laptop and Hillary Clinton's emails, and we've listened too much to academics and elites.

00:13:05.720 Like there may be a lot of other words around there, but those are dog whistles of a very specific sort.

00:13:10.720 And a moment when CBS needs to prove to the American public that it still has integrity.

00:13:14.720 And to me, that's a huge, huge red flag.

00:13:17.720 That the newly installed head of the Evening News, the man who sits in Cronkite's chair, is out there sending dog whistles to a public that, first of all, I don't think they're ever going to, I mean, just from a business standpoint, I'm not sure MAGA is going to flock to CBS Evening News.

00:13:30.720 But like the idea that we've been listening to academics and elites is not what's poisoning our culture.

00:13:35.720 The thing that's poisoning our culture is that people aren't listening to people with scientific information and deep understanding and nuanced understanding of the issues.

00:13:44.720 We're just shooting from the hip. 0.98

00:13:45.720 We're just fucking going with our gut. 0.93

00:13:47.720 And like, this is a time to ruminate and to think more deeply and to be more empathetic and not to just be like, what do you think, Joe Schmue? 0.96

00:13:56.720 Like, I'm someone who loves doing field reporting.

00:14:00.720 I think it's essential to the work of journalism and democracy.

00:14:04.720 But to say that the people who know issues well should be somehow marginalized or silenced or not listened to is not what's wrong with society right now, you know?

00:14:16.720 And like, we can put COVID in its own bucket.

00:14:18.720 But generally speaking, like, my God, on climate, I wish we listened to more academics and elites, you know?

00:14:24.720 I don't know. I thought it was very problematic.

00:14:26.720 I used to work at CBS News and I remember doing pieces for the evening news and the rigor that that required. 0.98

00:14:32.720 And like, it was terrifying to do pieces for the evening news because it was like, you better have your fucking T's crossed and your I's dotted. 0.96

00:14:40.720 And to say nothing of 60 Minutes where we weren't even letting the building. 0.96

00:14:43.720 Like, they'd be like, keep the riprap out.

00:14:45.720 Like, you guys stay over there on the news side.

00:14:47.720 We are 60 Minutes.

00:14:48.720 So I imagine things didn't sit well with you.

00:14:51.720 What happened in 60 Minutes with that report that was delayed was not delayed in other markets.

00:14:55.720 I mean, places like Canada and elsewhere it was shown.

00:14:58.720 In countries with full-fledged democracies.

00:15:00.720 Like, as opposed to this one.

00:15:02.720 I mean, was that a gut punch from your perspective?

00:15:05.720 Whoa, my God.

00:15:06.720 A last-minute decision?

00:15:07.720 So for people who have not followed this story, Barry Weiss, the newly installed editor in chief, a non-existent role like two years ago, spiked.

00:15:17.720 She delayed a story that Sharon Alfonsi, a notoriously rigorous reporter over at CBS, had put together about CICOT and the prisons that we are deporting migrants to and the brutality of those conditions.

00:15:29.720 And at the last minute, Barry Weiss said, we're not going to run it.

00:15:32.720 And she said, it's not ready yet.

00:15:35.720 And as the reporting came out, it became clear that part of the reason the piece wasn't ready is because the White House hadn't weighed in enough.

00:15:42.720 Right.

00:15:43.720 As anyone who has ever tried to get comment from the White House knows, the White House, like, never responds to anything.

00:15:50.720 And if the White House not responding to something is a reason to kill a story, then there's going to be no more news.

00:15:54.720 They will have a veto.

00:15:55.720 Yeah.

00:15:56.720 And if we are now trying to put the White House in charge of greenlighting national news stories on programs like CBS Evening News, that means the Fourth Estate is on life support.

00:16:07.720 So I thought it was super, super distressing.

00:16:10.720 It still didn't run.

00:16:11.720 It still hasn't run.

00:16:12.720 It still hasn't run.

00:16:13.720 It still hasn't run.

00:16:14.720 In the U.S.

00:16:15.720 In the U.S.

00:16:16.720 Yeah.

00:16:17.720 But if you want to go to Canada and watch it, you may.

00:16:18.720 Which again, yeah.

00:16:19.720 Which is just, that alone is sort of, that's deeply remarkable that it was still able to go forward, fully edited, without the additional edits that have been demanded.

00:16:28.720 I guess Canada doesn't have the same requirements.

00:16:30.720 So you say all this, but at the same time you remarked that legacy media, you had your own, not flippant remark, but you made the statement that the legacy media is, you know, deserves a fate of at least some critique.

00:16:46.720 Oh, yeah.

00:16:47.720 At the same time.

00:16:48.720 In what way, though?

00:16:49.720 I mean, in not the way that, again, is expressed necessarily by how you're feeling Barry Weiss and this sort of culture now of CBS is reflecting it.

00:16:55.720 But in what way did the legacy media let us down?

00:16:58.720 Well, listen, I think, not to sound like some weird, like, Marxist who got her show canceled, but the structure of the news is a profit-making enterprise.

00:17:07.720 And, you know, there are very real demands about ratings and advertisers, less and less advertisers, but, you know, cable subscriptions and money is at the essence of the structure of news.

00:17:21.720 And that's problematic, because once you're chasing the money, then the stories that you cover are going to be the ones that get the most eyeballs, right?

00:17:27.720 Right.

00:17:28.720 And the stories that get the most eyeballs are not the most important stories.

00:17:30.720 And there's an enormous amount of pressure to cover stories relentlessly that you know the public is going to just be interested in because they're salacious or controversial or whatever. 0.98

00:17:40.720 And that's a big fucking problem. 0.92

00:17:43.720 It is at the cost of other stories that really matter. 0.99

00:17:46.720 And it is at the cost of, I think, even having voices out there that would shed light on things.

00:17:53.720 You know, I think what we've become is like kind of like these little mini like analysis factories and that we're not really reporting anymore.

00:18:02.720 We're not covering stories just because they matter.

00:18:04.720 I mean, they sent me out on the road for 100 days in the first 100 days.

00:18:08.720 To Trumpland.

00:18:09.720 To Trumpland, which was a podcast I did for MSNBC.

00:18:11.720 Yeah.

00:18:12.720 And it was like this novel idea of sending me out on the road.

00:18:14.720 And it's like I get that it's expensive to go on the road, right?

00:18:17.720 But there's enough money to send people out and have them actually report to be in the world. 0.98

00:18:23.720 Part of the reason Trump hit like a freight train in 2016 is because nobody was fucking out there.

00:18:28.720 And I know there's a lot of hue and cry about like we overly pay attention to red state America and the plight of like white working class. 0.96

00:18:34.720 But like this is our country.

00:18:36.720 And the plight of certain groups of people dictates in large part the course of political events.

00:18:41.720 And to put blinders onto that and to say forsake entire subgroups of people or be incurious about what makes them tick is at our own peril.

00:18:49.720 You know, and I think there's just I don't want to say laziness, but we're cutting a lot of corners in institutional media.

00:18:57.720 And I think in part that's why you see this huge gulf between what's happening in the country and what's being covered on the news.

00:19:03.720 And that feels like a fail to the people all over the country.

00:19:07.720 It was interesting.

00:19:08.720 You said that less focus on advertising more on subscriptions.

00:19:14.720 Yeah.

00:19:15.720 Cable subscriptions.

00:19:16.720 So was that a trend?

00:19:17.720 Did you start seeing that transition?

00:19:19.720 Is that a recent transition in sort of a consciousness?

00:19:22.720 I mean, it seems to me that sort of the business model in the past was just the traditional ad package.

00:19:28.720 Did that shift?

00:19:29.720 Is that a decade, two decades ago or is it a year or two or is it the nature of the consolidation of the media generally?

00:19:36.720 When did you start to see that begin to shift?

00:19:38.720 Well, I'm no Jim Rutenberg or Ben Smith, not a media expert or Brian Stelter.

00:19:44.720 But but essentially once you have an audience that's ages out of the advertising demographic, advertisers are less interested in advertising.

00:19:52.720 Right.

00:19:53.720 Right.

00:19:54.720 And so you're making, I mean, if you watch the ads on cable news, it's like anti-slip bath mats and, you know, shower stalls with guardrails.

00:20:03.720 Listen, I have an aging mom.

00:20:04.720 I'm very interested in that, that, that those consumable, those, those, those products.

00:20:08.720 I still have difficulty getting in my cold plunge.

00:20:10.720 So I'm, some humility here.

00:20:12.720 Wim Hof is the gateway drug. 0.86

00:20:13.720 12 minutes.

00:20:14.720 I still can't take 12 minutes.

00:20:15.720 We're going to get back to that in a minute.

00:20:16.720 It's crazy.

00:20:17.720 That's because you're basically looking, you're looking at a cold body of water and being like, whoo, cold.

00:20:22.720 You dip a toe and then you're out.

00:20:24.720 Anyway, so, so once you don't have those advertising dollars, you become ever more reliant on carriage fees and cable subscriptions and people are cutting the cord, you know, which is why your average audience age is like somewhere in their seventies, potentially.

00:20:38.720 Um, but then you're real reliant on like what gets eyeballs and like what people are interested in.

00:20:45.720 And something like Jeffrey Epstein is a great example of a story that absolutely matters.

00:20:49.720 Right.

00:20:50.720 Absolutely matters.

00:20:51.720 Um, should and deserves coverage, but at the expense of literally everything else, I don't know. 0.99

00:20:57.720 And the way in which it's covered, is it all about Trump and what could be in the files rather than what happened to these fucking women and what they suffered. 0.91

00:21:04.720 I mean, it actually informs the structure of the news coverage itself. 0.98

00:21:08.720 Right. 0.99

00:21:09.720 Like people like, I mean, I don't really want to hear about what happened to them because that's bleak as fuck. 0.96

00:21:12.720 But like, is this going to be a problem for Trump? 0.98

00:21:14.720 Cause I'll listen to that.

00:21:15.720 Yeah.

00:21:16.720 Yeah.

00:21:17.720 That's not good.

00:21:18.720 That is very like, I don't know.

00:21:20.720 I, we, we don't, nobody wants to give tough love to the audience anymore because people are so dependent on the audience for basic survival.

00:21:26.720 What influence did you have in terms of the stories?

00:21:29.720 Was that a staff you walk in and they said, here are the five top stories.

00:21:32.720 Was there, I mean, there's a lot, Sershan and I think a lot of proof points at Fox, it seems to be they'll carry and everybody's sort of driving the same talking point.

00:21:41.720 Uh, and there's more of a top down approach.

00:21:43.720 Is that, was that your experience?

00:21:44.720 Is that your experience?

00:21:45.720 Well, you know, every day I was like, are we leading with French laundry?

00:21:48.720 Are we leading with the French laundry story?

00:21:49.720 Unbelievable.

00:21:50.720 Unbelievable.

00:21:51.720 The good news is we can clip this.

00:21:53.720 We'll edit this.

00:21:54.720 Watch that.

00:21:55.720 We're not going to edit this.

00:21:56.720 It's not even going to be in the podcast.

00:21:57.720 But no, but seriously, that's a perfect example.

00:21:59.720 I mean, is that something that you, so you guys pick up and say, not enough people are focused on this.

00:22:04.720 Fox is kicking our, cleaning our clock on this French laundry thing.

00:22:07.720 Bro.

00:22:08.720 We got to take out Newsome.

00:22:09.720 We're not, oh my God.

00:22:10.720 Yes.

00:22:11.720 No, but is that, I mean.

00:22:12.720 They own the Newsome story.

00:22:13.720 We got to get a piece of it.

00:22:14.720 Yeah, we got to get a piece of it.

00:22:15.720 No, but obviously.

00:22:16.720 So much negative MSNBC coverage.

00:22:18.720 No, but is that, no, but with the point though, is that, I mean, is that a conversation where you're watching or your spouses, what your friends are watching and say, boy, Alex, we're really, you're missing this.

00:22:27.720 Look at these other networks are running this.

00:22:29.720 Why aren't you guys talking more about this?

00:22:31.720 And do you have the influence then to carry that?

00:22:33.720 We look at, we, yes.

00:22:34.720 The, the, first of all, let me just disabuse you of the parallel you're trying to draw between Fox News and MSNOW.

00:22:40.720 No, okay.

00:22:41.720 There is, Fox News pedals lies.

00:22:42.720 Like if we thought something, and by the way, you can.

00:22:45.720 Anyway, I, I certainly believe that it's a propaganda network.

00:22:48.720 It's Pravda.

00:22:49.720 Yes.

00:22:50.720 But, but do you, is that universally a belief system?

00:22:53.720 I mean, is it just without any controversy within sort of the mainstream?

00:22:57.720 Oh, I think, no.

00:22:58.720 People understand.

00:22:59.720 They look, and it's just raw in their eyes.

00:23:01.720 There's nothing about it that approximates quote unquote news.

00:23:04.720 Oh, yes.

00:23:05.720 I mean, people, people, I mean, there are occasionally moments that make their way through the bubble across Sixth Avenue where it's like, oh my God, they said something true.

00:23:12.720 What, what a novelty.

00:23:13.720 But, but the structure of MSNBC, at least when I was there running my show, you know, Rashida Jones was like the head of the network. 0.78

00:23:23.720 And really they were, I'm trying to think of a less derogatory way of saying that, but like fiefdoms, you know, people ran their shows.

00:23:29.720 And I think you see that in the expression of each of these shows.

00:23:32.720 Rachel's show is unlike Chris Hayes' show. Chris Hayes' show is unlike Lawrence O'Donnell's show.

00:23:36.720 Joy's show was very different than my show.

00:23:38.720 And so there were a lot of decisions that we made.

00:23:40.720 But, you know, you are under an enormous amount of pressure to keep your numbers up and to make sure if a story is failing, you don't cover that story again. 0.77

00:23:47.720 And sometimes the stories that fail with an audience are actually really important stories to fucking tell.

00:23:51.720 So, you know, but that's woven into it.

00:23:54.720 Other than that, we do get, we got a lot of leeway to cover what we wanted to cover in the way that we thought was most responsible.

00:24:02.720 And what kind of relationship to the prior anchors, I mean, because you'll do four hours prior, they'll have covered extensively a story you want to cover.

00:24:09.720 Yeah.

00:24:10.720 You start making adjustments on that basis because they got this guest and now all of a sudden we'll seem redundant all of a sudden.

00:24:16.720 Or is it just, you just see the world in these sort of bite sizes where it's just my hour, no context necessarily to the audience of the prior hour or the hour coming after me.

00:24:25.720 Is there a thread that connects all that?

00:24:27.720 I wanted to tell you, Governor, I know you're term limited, so you are maybe looking for something.

00:24:31.720 There are internships where we can take you behind the curtain.

00:24:34.720 You mean I could get answers to my own questions by observing and watching?

00:24:39.720 No, no.

00:24:40.720 We would love to have you, I'm sure.

00:24:42.720 Are these the state secrets of evidence you don't want to tell?

00:24:45.720 No, I'm happy to say, like, I think every show thinks of itself as its own show, right?

00:24:49.720 Like you don't want to be too duplicative, certainly with guests.

00:24:51.720 And if, you know, there were many times, Chris Hayes and I have been friends for 25 years, where the angle he was taking in his A Block was the same angle I was taking in mine.

00:25:00.720 Yeah, that's the point. 0.99

00:25:01.720 And I'd be like, fuck. 1.00

00:25:02.720 Okay, good. 1.00

00:25:03.720 We gotta, we gotta redo it.

00:25:04.720 That's the human response.

00:25:05.720 That is.

00:25:06.720 But also, they would love, the cable news industry would love nothing more than, you know, the former governor of California and just like be helping out, escorting guests to it from the green room.

00:25:13.720 I don't know.

00:25:14.720 I don't know.

00:25:15.720 Consider it.

00:25:16.720 You seem capable.

00:25:17.720 This is a very, this is a humbling year for me, 2026.

00:25:19.720 This is it.

00:25:20.720 Listen, they're paid internships.

00:25:21.720 I should have cleats somewhere around me, not just mitts, sort of hanging up my cleats.

00:25:26.720 Jesus, more symbolic.

00:25:27.720 All right, let me go back a little bit.

00:25:29.720 Please.

00:25:30.720 So it's interesting.

00:25:31.720 This week on The Moment, we take a look at Venezuela's uncertain future in a conversation with two people who have directly advised US presidents.

00:25:40.720 Juan Gonzalez, you're in the Obama and Biden administrations.

00:25:43.720 We're really good at invading countries.

00:25:45.720 We're very bad at nation building.

00:25:47.720 And Carlos D. Rosillo, you're in Trump's two terms.

00:25:50.720 I can guarantee you that nobody in the Trump administration likes Delcy Rodriguez.

00:25:54.720 Listen to The Moment with Jorge Ramos and Paola Ramos on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

00:26:00.720 Hi, I'm Dr. Priyanka Wally.

00:26:02.720 And I'm Hari Kondabolu.

00:26:03.720 It's a new year.

00:26:04.720 And on the podcast Health Stuff, we're resetting the way we talk about our health.

00:26:08.720 Which means being honest about what we know, what we don't know, and how messy it can all be.

00:26:13.720 I like to sleep in late and sleep early.

00:26:16.720 Is there a chronotype for that or am I just depressed?

00:26:21.720 We talked to experts who share real experiences and insight.

00:26:25.720 You just really need to find where it is that you can have an impact in your own life and just start doing that.

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00:26:34.720 Sleep, stress, mental health, and how the world around us affects our overall health.

00:26:39.720 We talk about all the ways to keep your body and mind, inside and out, healthy.

00:26:44.720 We human beings, all we want is connection.

00:26:47.720 We just want to connect with each other.

00:26:49.720 Health Stuff is about learning, laughing, and feeling a little less alone.

00:26:53.720 Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

00:26:59.720 Are you desperately hoping for change in 2026, but feeling stuck?

00:27:04.720 Just spinning your wheels in old routines and bad habits?

00:27:07.720 I'm Dr. Laurie Santos, and in a new year series of my show, The Happiness Lab, I'm going to look at the science of getting, well, unstuck.

00:27:15.720 Unstuck at work, unstuck in your relationships, and even unstuck inside your mind.

00:27:20.720 I am the absolute worst culprit when it comes to getting into these ruminative loops and just driving myself crazy.

00:27:26.720 We'll look at ways to reignite your sense of purpose, rediscover your values, and get more creative.

00:27:31.720 We'll also explore how to design a life that feels more fulfilling.

00:27:34.720 It's sort of like the game of life. I don't know if you ever played that game.

00:27:37.720 Oh my gosh, yes.

00:27:38.720 You take the car log, and you try and get money, and you try and get degrees, and you try and get to the end where either you have a mansion or a ranch or a shack.

00:27:45.720 And once you get to retirement, you're done.

00:27:47.720 What about the whole path along the way?

00:27:51.720 So join me to get unstuck in 2026.

00:27:54.720 Listen to The Happiness Lab on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your shows.

00:27:59.720 I'm Ed Zitron of the Better Offline Podcast, and I want you to join me at this year's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada, starting January 6th through January 10th, 2026.

00:28:08.720 We're doing 10 radio-style podcast episodes about the world's biggest tech conference, and we're going to dig into the latest and weirdest gadgets, gizmos, and horrible AI gear that the tech industry is desperate to sell you, all while covering the biggest stories in Silicon Valley as the AI bubble threatens to burst.

00:28:23.720 I'll be joined by David Roth, Chloe Radcliffe, Adam Conover, Cory Doctorow, Ed Angueso Jr., Robert Evans, and an incredible cast of the greatest talent in the tech media, with over 18 hours of interviews, commentary, and bizarre stories, all told from the Better Offline pop-up studio connected to its own open bar.

00:28:40.720 Today, I did five hours of back-to-back panels on artificial intelligence.

00:28:45.680 It included a number of great moments, including an entire room full of people laughing about people losing their jobs due to artificial intelligence.

00:28:52.820 Will we make it out alive? There's only one way to find out.

00:28:55.860 Tune in starting January 6th through January 10th, 2026, and listen to the literal best tech podcast ever recorded.

00:29:02.000 Listen to Better Offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, wherever you happen to get your podcasts.

00:29:06.580 You hang up your cleats a little bit in terms of having a day-to-day, a nightly cable show, but now you have all of this freedom.

00:29:15.680 You're able to answer your own questions. You're able to respond to your own-

00:29:19.220 Use four-letter words.

00:29:20.780 You can do four-letter words. You don't have to apologize for that.

00:29:23.580 You can answer your own critique about the limitations, the box you're in, and the constraints of that position in this new format.

00:29:32.840 You're able to get out, and that's what you're doing. You talk about the marrow of manga and the fringes of the resistance and how you are able to now navigate that.

00:29:43.520 And so you've been doing this. How many episodes of the new podcast now?

00:29:46.640 It feels like 56. We started in mid-October, and there's been one every week, so I'm going to say like eight or ten. I should know this.

00:29:53.000 So once a week, you dive deep, and you meet with real human beings, real stories. You get out of the noise. You break through the-

00:29:59.540 Well, are we breaking- has anybody breaking through the noise? We try. I mean, I think it's like, how many fucking-

00:30:04.120 Look, everybody has a fucking podcast, right? 0.99

00:30:05.820 Everyone has a podcast. 1.00

00:30:06.780 Literally, you have a podcast.

00:30:08.020 Speaking of noise. I mean, the fact that I-

00:30:09.880 We're here just as two podcasters.

00:30:12.360 A politician with a book coming out February 24th.

00:30:15.180 A podcast with a book coming out September 16th.

00:30:17.000 Yes, your second book. We'll talk about your first book. I haven't forgotten. Yes, we are walking.

00:30:22.520 It's out of print now.

00:30:23.700 Thank you. Difference is, is it out of print? You can still get it in paperback.

00:30:28.220 Maybe. You can get secondhand.

00:30:29.980 Well, again, we're going to talk about that because you do have an interesting past. We're not going to

00:30:34.400 talk about your presence in the future, but let me talk about the current. So you're doing this.

00:30:39.360 You're out and about.

00:30:40.220 Yeah. Runaway Country is the name of the podcast.

00:30:42.340 Yes. Runaway Country with Crooked Media, and you are out meeting human beings, people that are

00:30:48.820 the subject of a lot of the policy in this conversation.

00:30:51.280 So I don't know if you've had these conversations, but I have had many of them since January 20th

00:30:56.360 of this year with people saying, and this is admittedly a position of privilege to be able

00:31:01.660 to not pay attention to what's going on. People feeling like, fuck, there's just, I can't. 0.99

00:31:06.780 It's just too much. It's all so bad. And I thought deeply, or as deep as I'm capable, 0.99

00:31:12.340 of thinking about what breaks through anymore, right? It's a human story. It's emotion. It's

00:31:17.440 feeling like you give a shit about what's happening, whether it's because it's unfolding 0.99

00:31:21.660 on your doorstep, or it's your neighbor that got seized in a dragnet, or it's your sister who lost 0.99

00:31:26.060 her health insurance. Whatever it is, it has to feel resonant personally. And I've always thought

00:31:31.480 that we read these horrible headlines. Some of them are good, but generally in the Trump era,

00:31:35.880 most of them are shit. And you're like, oh, that seems really bad, but it's also abstracted. 1.00

00:31:40.960 And the only way of making things tangible and real and resonant for people is to give you some

00:31:45.840 kind of story of a person who is at the center of that headline. So each week we begin with,

00:31:51.360 you know, that person who is, whether it's an immigration court judge who's telling me about 0.53

00:31:55.900 how fucking terrified she is of ICE agents in her courtroom, or whether it's an Afghan national 0.65

00:32:01.940 who helped the US for 25 years and came here on a green card and is about to get kicked out because 0.98

00:32:07.900 Trump is effectively using a national tragedy to enact a racist repopulation policy,

00:32:13.740 or whether it's a Venezuelan national who's super excited that Maduro is gone and gives context to

00:32:20.560 the complicated political trajectory that we're on right now as Democrats try and figure out what

00:32:24.620 this moment is all about. I just think you got to start with the heart. Oh my God, that's so corny.

00:32:29.480 I just, can we cut that out? I love the heart. I mean, we're cutting out French laundry, not the 1.00

00:32:35.620 heart. Use that in your presidential bid. Anyway, we got to start with the essence of things, which

00:32:40.360 is just the things that connect and bind us together. Human humanity. It's just become like

00:32:45.940 a faceless mass. You're like on your TikTok, you're on your Instagram, but you, it's like the fucking 1.00

00:32:51.160 stranger on the street, the person that just came from a completely different place and has a 0.99

00:32:55.820 completely different life. The fuck anybody knows about that person? So that's the, that's the sort 0.99

00:33:00.900 of thesis of the beginning of the show. And then the second half is like jolly good analysis from

00:33:05.380 all your favorite people, except for governor, governor Gavin Newsom, who refuses to come on

00:33:09.020 the show, but perhaps I've serviced this great debt coming to an augurine.

00:33:12.900 That you will go and visit me on my podcast. Yes. But you know, like I think it's additive,

00:33:24.280 which is not to be too self-promoting.

00:33:26.800 Meaning you're not as proud as the second half of the podcast as you were the first?

00:33:30.100 No, I think it's good. I think it's great. I think the second half of the podcast is important. And I

00:33:34.120 think people love, I will say, you know, one of the things of cable is like every block is like six 0.99

00:33:38.920 minutes long and you're like, shit, I had like 19 more questions I wanted to ask. And the thing I 0.97

00:33:43.920 absolutely love about podcasting, independent of being able to curse, like till I'm blue in the face

00:33:49.140 is the time you can just stretch out and like get into it. And you have time for non sequiturs,

00:33:55.420 but you have time for people to stop and think about their answer to the question,

00:33:59.380 as opposed to as many politicians do staying on talking points to run out the clock on their

00:34:05.220 first of all, I want to thank you for acknowledging that. And I want to thank you as well for this

00:34:08.760 opportunity to engage you today. It's a very safe space. Yes. I have a number of issues I'd like

00:34:13.400 to bring up that I think are important to our audience. Please tell me about Californians and

00:34:17.920 what they need. No. So I, so is this what you were, you felt like you were missing? Look,

00:34:23.160 you did this with Trump land. You did get out. And by the way, I was in front of DC jail on January 20th

00:34:28.100 in the freezing cold at midnight, waiting for inmates to come out. January 6th insurrectionists.

00:34:32.620 That's what I was doing on it. By the way, we're speaking at the fifth anniversary of January 6th.

00:34:36.440 Yes. Where 1,600 were pardoned. Yes. I was out there.

00:34:39.520 They either were convicted or faced charges. And talking to all of them about how they felt

00:34:43.820 about Trump and man, it was eyeopening. About a year later and how they feel about Trump,

00:34:48.660 they feel hasn't been sufficient, even those that have been pardoned. Well, that is true. 0.99

00:34:52.240 Because he hasn't exposed the conspiracy. Well. He hasn't held those people to account

00:34:56.440 that were part of this conspiracy. Well. Which is just how many layers deep we are.

00:35:00.400 Well, we live in deeply paranoid times. And so are you, in the cause of engagement,

00:35:08.500 the cause of heart, of finding the humanity and bringing these policies, these issues,

00:35:13.140 all the noise, the rhetoric, and how it actually affects real human beings,

00:35:16.200 because there's collateral damage. It's real. It's all this is consequential.

00:35:20.160 Do you feel you're servicing that truth in a deeper way? Do you feel like this mission is fulfilling?

00:35:28.620 Why are you smiling? Why are you laughing?

00:35:31.460 Well, just because I feel like mission makes me sound like I'm about to enter the runnery.

00:35:34.460 No, but when you came up with this concept, you had a purpose.

00:35:37.340 I think so. I'm one person. And listen, some weeks are better than others, right?

00:35:41.680 Yeah.

00:35:42.280 It's like you can't be scoring a 10 every week. And every story isn't going to have the same

00:35:47.500 impact as the other, but you don't give up on the work. And I feel it bums me out how lonely it is

00:35:54.140 that there are not more people trying to do this because I'm not in elected office. I'm not

00:35:59.040 interested in elected office, but like the only way the project of America succeeds is if you

00:36:03.740 begin to knit the fabric of the country back together. And like, man, until you can even see,

00:36:10.200 begin to see the perspective of someone else, which is not me trying to be like, 0.98

00:36:14.620 lay your arms down and get in bed with a racist. That's not what I'm saying.

00:36:17.740 Right. But you, the, the empathy or the understanding, or at least understanding how

00:36:22.220 people tick, that's like the beginning of.

00:36:24.520 That's why I started the podcast. That's why we had the first guest was Charlie Kirk. I mean,

00:36:28.360 you know, I know. And I, we texted about this. It is fucking treacherous. It is fucking treacherous

00:36:34.320 to do it at the same time. Like what the fuck else are we supposed to do? Like this is these, 0.99

00:36:41.560 this movement has captured the imagination of the American public in a way that has awoken

00:36:47.380 our darkest, like evolutionary instincts, you know, to punish, to demean, to hurt people who

00:36:56.600 aren't like us. And like, I do, when I say evolutionary, I genuinely believe there's like

00:37:01.140 a darkness of the human spirit that Trump and magazine has awoken. And like, until you tackle

00:37:06.040 that and like bring, figure out a way to get everybody back into the light. Like, I, I don't

00:37:10.760 know. I mean, I don't think just getting a new can't, we talk about all this moment as if it's

00:37:14.680 just Trump's creation. It is not, it is symptomatic of a poison that is within our society. I'm getting

00:37:21.220 all biblical sounding. I love it. No, I mean, he was, I mean, look, it's been over 10 years since

00:37:26.660 he came down the escalator and now 11, I think it's, you, uh, are you surprised it's endured this

00:37:32.740 long? I actually, I mean, I don't know. I, I guess, I guess not because it was so, I went to,

00:37:43.780 okay, here's what I'll say. I was part of the show, the circus, which was a weekly documentary

00:37:47.520 show on Showtime. Yeah. You appeared on it. Great show. You appeared on it. It's a great show.

00:37:51.740 It was a great show. RIP. Yeah. Um, and you'd go to these Trump rallies. I went to a number of them.

00:37:58.200 Yeah. And I think. And it was, I mean, what made that show work is what you describe and what you're

00:38:03.300 describing about your new podcast is you guys were out and about. We were there. You were out there on the

00:38:08.200 stage. By the way, you did a lot of that on your show. I mean, we were out, we were together in the

00:38:12.000 South. Yeah, that's true. I tried to. So you were doing it just for the, for the record. I mean,

00:38:16.740 I think you've got to give yourself a little more grace because you were pushing that. And

00:38:20.040 obviously Trump land reflected that, but continue. I mean, uh, this notion of, of, of, of Trump and

00:38:25.960 during 11 years and the experience of the circus. So I would go to these Trump rallies and I think

00:38:30.400 people largely knew, especially on the left, the vitriol and the kind of nonsense that was spouted at

00:38:37.180 these things. But what they didn't understand and what you wouldn't have understood unless you

00:38:40.840 were there was that it also had this feeling of like an old time revival. Yes. There was so much

00:38:46.060 joy. There was so much community. There was so much camaraderie and like cheap joy in some ways,

00:38:51.300 because it was at the expense of entire groups of people. And it was like, oh, in the lips. Am I

00:38:55.220 allowed to throw the middle finger? You can do middle fingers. I think we've used a few four letter

00:38:59.300 words. One of them was a French. I was one of them. I've reached my limit. Nailed. Um, but like 0.99

00:39:06.060 there is, uh, people are looking for communion. People are looking for community and Trump gave

00:39:14.360 them that and gives them that. And that's really powerful. People see the negative side of it

00:39:19.000 because it was founded on, um, an essentially exclusionary impulse. But at the end of the day,

00:39:25.000 it was like, it's me. It's my, it's my time with my people and I'm okay. I'm an okay person. They're

00:39:31.120 okay. We're okay. What we think is okay. It was validating. It was spiritually, I think, enhancing

00:39:36.260 for people who've been at MAGA from the beginning. And that is something I think Democrats didn't

00:39:41.020 understand too, right? Like there is joy in the camaraderie of MAGA. And that's, I think,

00:39:47.340 proven insanely durable. And I saw that and I felt that with, not my joy, right? Like they're like

00:39:52.000 brown lady with a news camera. I was like, please get me security. But you know, I, I remember

00:39:57.720 thinking this is deeper. This runs deeper than just like, you know, mass deportations now. And so

00:40:04.200 his mismanagement of the COVID epidemic was so profound. His mismanagement of so many things

00:40:09.280 was profound. And the strength of Biden as a candidate in terms of being a unifier and a bridge

00:40:13.780 in 2020 was, I think, strong enough to overcome that. But, but the pull of this movement is like

00:40:20.000 deeply emotional and like, and not all, yes, it's, it's, it's sort of negative from a policy

00:40:25.700 point of view. And, and I guess you would say like an ethical point of view, but the sense of

00:40:31.500 belonging and the, and the, and the, the genuine warmth gives people who believe in it is highly

00:40:39.600 intoxicating. Okay. Everything you described, I couldn't agree more. And it's interesting. It was,

00:40:44.240 we've, we've had other guests on and Kepler on the daily show went to, I mean, how many of these

00:40:48.880 said the same thing? And he even, even, I mean, he had a very honest expression. He said, I kind of

00:40:53.800 miss going to some of these things because I got to know some of the big, they love him in a red

00:40:59.280 sequined cowboy hat. Yeah, no. And I mean, these are some of the legendary interviews. I mean, his

00:41:03.180 interviews, but, and it just, and people wouldn't even break, they could not be convinced. There was

00:41:07.600 no intellectual, because they were so connected to something bigger than themselves. It's a revival.

00:41:11.640 It's a revival. So what's the lesson in that? I mean, what's, I mean, there, I think it's,

00:41:15.520 there's something beautiful in that, this notion of sense of belonging to community. It's important.

00:41:19.460 I mean, we all need to be, I mean, forgive me, I'll pick up on your frame. We all need to be loved.

00:41:23.760 We all need to love. And this notion of, you know, being respected and connected to something bigger

00:41:28.740 ourselves is powerful, always has been. I mean, that's what community is about. That's what

00:41:33.160 volunteerism is about. That's what the Rotary Club's about. That's what church is about.

00:41:36.520 That's what church is about. I mean, that's, and so, and as those institutions begin to fray,

00:41:40.940 hey, we get more lonely, more isolated, more disconnected, and we need that, however we can

00:41:46.220 find it. So what's the lesson in that from a political lens, from your perspective, in terms

00:41:51.380 of healing and addressing this breach?

00:41:53.540 I think one thing Democrats need to do is bring joy back. And like, maybe that starts with humor.

00:41:57.600 I think that some of the memes that you've been posting are absolutely,

00:42:01.220 You did see my Trump signature series knee pads right there available on my Patriot site.

00:42:08.240 But do not fall for the imitations. Do not fall for the imitations.

00:42:11.060 Those are the ones that were originally made in China.

00:42:12.640 I'm waiting for the lawsuit by the Trump, uh, uh, family, family.

00:42:17.000 Oh, bro, you're going to have a lot of lawsuits coming at you, don't you worry?

00:42:20.080 I've engaged in 52 so far myself and to counter the, but yeah, that one's going to be an expensive

00:42:25.960 one, I think. So good. Yeah. But no, I, so this issue of humor, I love what you say.

00:42:29.960 You gotta, you gotta, I mean.

00:42:31.160 Are we humorless Democratic Party? Yes.

00:42:33.980 Thank you for saying that. Fuck yeah, man. I mean, this is, I, yes, of course, 1.00

00:42:37.920 110% is so much. Why is that the case? What is it about?

00:42:40.800 Because people are fucking terrified of offending someone. 0.97

00:42:42.460 That's it. That is one lesson of Trump is that you gotta care less about, 0.98

00:42:47.900 you cannot be everything to everyone. And I think it's driven from a place of trying to be

00:42:53.480 inclusive, which is not inherently a bad thing. Right. And like all these lessons we're learning

00:42:57.620 short order in the 2020s, whether it was the death of George Floyd, Black Lives Matter,

00:43:02.000 Me Too, and then COVID. And it was like, okay, we got to do all these things differently.

00:43:05.760 The institutions have failed us. We need to rethink everything.

00:43:09.320 But it, with the rebuilding was done in such a way that, you know, and I'm not one to usually

00:43:13.540 quote Barack Obama, but he said, you know, we made it for the woke and not the waking.

00:43:17.140 And the sense of you are either with us or you are actively against us is not how you build a

00:43:22.720 national party. And I think part of the thing of humor is it's designed to offend. And sometimes

00:43:28.540 you have to accept that. And you're not going to be very fucking funny if you're not offending 0.95

00:43:32.360 someone. We've, uh, I think we've offended a few people. Some of my social media, forgive me. 0.98

00:43:39.540 It's so good though.

00:43:40.960 But this notion of, I love joy.

00:43:43.100 Well, laughing is important.

00:43:44.780 But joy, that's not a word you hear. It's not a word that's attached to our politics.

00:43:48.980 But it is interesting. You'll find that joy. You found it when you're there at these rallies.

00:43:54.020 Totally. But I also think Democrats need to go into, Donald Trump is a joyful warrior. You know,

00:43:58.700 we focus on the toxic, like cancerous shit he says, but he's making jokes half the time. Like 1.00

00:44:02.880 he's joking about Doug Mills, making him look fat in the New York times. Right. Like he actually

00:44:07.220 does still have adult though. He is. You think new scum is funny? I mean, I think it's lame.

00:44:12.560 I think it's lame too. He's got it. I thought in 2026, he went after me this morning. Uh,

00:44:17.340 some investigative, some latest attack. Um, but, uh, yeah, I just don't think it's, uh,

00:44:22.560 it's not good enough.

00:44:23.300 No, he's got to step up.

00:44:24.440 When you run for president, he'll come up with something else.

00:44:26.060 You think that?

00:44:26.760 Yeah. See, what's good is I just got you at a minute that you're running for president.

00:44:29.780 No, you see, you didn't know where I was going to zig back. Yeah.

00:44:32.120 Yeah, sure. But, but like joyful warrior, man, who's been a joyful,

00:44:36.840 the last joyful warrior was Barack Obama, you know, like, and that translates not just to the

00:44:42.020 candidate.

00:44:42.440 Kamala had it in the beginning of the campaign.

00:44:43.940 In the very beginning. And I talked about this.

00:44:46.140 And I literally talked to her about it. I said, who is this guy? I said, I remember you back

00:44:50.160 20 years ago before we were both in politics. I'm loving this new Kamala, this

00:44:54.180 she had a smile on her face and it was like, let's go get him.

00:44:57.540 No, it really felt, there's something powerful to this.

00:45:00.500 If you have that joy within you, that translates to not just the way you talk to the American

00:45:05.360 public, your campaign will feel it and your supporters feel it. And like, it's palpable,

00:45:09.880 it's real. And people see joy. They see, you know, even if the stakes are extraordinarily

00:45:13.980 high and the work ahead is tough and bruising and backbending, is that a word? Um, people

00:45:20.680 will go with you. You know, they see the reward of camaraderie and, and they feel the high,

00:45:27.240 the elation of being in it together. You know, it's how people get through wars, right? You're

00:45:33.100 in the foxhole with your people and you don't, it's not about being maudlin, even though the

00:45:37.780 times are dark. It's just about, God, I sound like Tony Robbins. It just, I feel like the

00:45:42.400 moment is about going at it.

00:45:44.160 We've established cold plunges and now we have life coaches.

00:45:47.620 Mel Robbins.

00:45:48.540 Mel Robbins.

00:45:48.980 I'm going to be one of the Robbins.

00:45:49.980 Mel Robbins, pretty good podcast.

00:45:51.300 Dude, I need to have her on. 1.00

00:45:52.920 She is next, I mean, next level.

00:45:54.360 She is.

00:45:55.100 Yeah. Sorry, Joe Rogan. I'll take Mel Robbins any day of the week.

00:45:59.340 But, but yeah, I mean, I think that's essential for any Democrat who's going to hold the,

00:46:03.000 like the national stage in the coming years.

00:46:05.480 So let me talk about your years. You mentioned a brown lady showing up with a camera. 1.00

00:46:10.140 There's only a few. Only 30 of them. I love it.

00:46:13.480 You've done a hell of a lot in 30 years.

00:46:15.180 I really have.

00:46:15.960 I mean, just the Atlantic years were amazing. The CBS years, by the way, on CBS, how worried

00:46:20.680 are you about Warner Brothers? How were you about?

00:46:22.920 Big time.

00:46:23.760 I mean, I think, listen, all.

00:46:25.180 How panicked is the news industry?

00:46:28.800 First of all, like I say this is MS Now has been spun off from, from.

00:46:32.780 Yeah, it's already been spun off.

00:46:33.920 All these companies are up for sale at some point, right?

00:46:36.260 Yeah.

00:46:36.440 CNN's up for sale. And what the Ellisons are doing at Paramount is a case study for what they 1.00

00:46:42.380 could do at other media companies, right? They're trying to prove the case by, you know,

00:46:47.180 spiking stories at 60 minutes, by installing an anchor at the evening news who's willing to at

00:46:52.340 least give, you know, credence to paranoid right-wing conspiracies. That is a sign of deep

00:47:00.560 illness within the industry. And I don't understand, like some white knight needs to come to the

00:47:06.860 rescue and maybe buy these companies, but do white knights exist? Jeff Bezos owns the Washington

00:47:11.940 Post and we see what's happened there. I mean, it's a dire moment for the industry and I am very

00:47:16.600 worried.

00:47:20.480 I mean, I pause on that because.

00:47:22.480 You're like, and cut, thank you for joining us.

00:47:24.660 Yeah, no, I mean, it's, but does that extend even if Netflix is the, the succeeds in their bid?

00:47:33.860 Well, Netflix is just trying to buy, as far as I can tell, the library of content. And like all,

00:47:39.640 as I used to hold, I did host a reality TV show on Netflix, which probably didn't make it on,

00:47:44.240 in your like opera research packet on me. It's called The Mole. Yeah.

00:47:47.180 Why didn't I, I didn't know this.

00:47:48.260 It was big. It's actually the, probably the largest audience I've ever had.

00:47:51.400 It was a reality TV show. It was a reboot of the Anderson Cooper reality TV show,

00:47:56.520 The Mole. And I hosted the first season of it. It was on Netflix and I have nothing but positive

00:48:00.720 things to say about Netflix and their shepherding of that show to great success for the first season.

00:48:06.260 But like they, all these multinational corporations have vested in like in China, right? Like the content

00:48:11.260 that Apple's going to make is not going to, we're not going to want to upset Chinese sensibilities.

00:48:15.640 We're in a moment right now where the president of the United States has made it very clear that he

00:48:19.480 will try and revoke licenses or like launch lawsuits or otherwise make life very difficult

00:48:23.740 for any, any media organization, news or otherwise, that pumps out content that's critical of him and

00:48:30.000 his supporters. So like, I am concerned no matter who buys it. We're in a moment of great fear.

00:48:36.560 I had a former spokesperson for the Trump administration, 1.0 Spicer came on and he said

00:48:45.720 he was not worried about all this, that we're our sort of obsession with corporate media, which

00:48:50.740 is, I mean, by definition, profit-making media, which you have established the framework and the

00:48:56.000 orientation around doing what actually sells and the importance imperative of that as a business

00:49:00.800 model. It is at the end of the day of business, um, that the creation, this ecosystem that you are

00:49:06.840 part of podcasts, et cetera. And this sort of disintermediation now, uh, is actually the antidote

00:49:14.360 to maybe some of the negativity and fear that you just expressed.

00:49:18.220 Yes. And I will say, I adore being at crooked media. It is so awesome to be surrounded. You know,

00:49:24.260 like you can be a house cat in the middle of a civil war. You can be a cat that's out there

00:49:27.560 looking for birds and mice to kill and survive on. And I feel like I'm like, I'm like, I just made

00:49:32.720 it up. I'm the house cat that was like maybe forcibly kicked out of the house, but like,

00:49:37.760 nonetheless, like I'm in there in the wild and this is what the landscape's like and you can survive and

00:49:42.240 you can have like a leaner, meaner existence and be alive. And like, I feel so much more alive,

00:49:47.820 right. In this new media landscape at the same time, it worries me that there are like 1000 podcasts,

00:49:54.060 right there. I do think we need some agreed upon pillars of truth and you can have a couple like

00:49:59.900 Mel Robbins, much respect. You can have some really big podcasts, but like, are they going to be as

00:50:05.820 like, what are the terms of engagement for these podcasts? What is the sort of rigor in terms of

00:50:11.180 fact checking and news and info? It's not the same thing. I think the distant, like the idea that

00:50:17.380 this part of the media landscape is like old and perhaps outmoded and is being replaced by a vibrant,

00:50:23.440 exciting new culture of information and analysis is a good thing for human society. But whether it

00:50:29.860 actually solves the problem of disinformation and misinformation that's plaguing our society

00:50:35.660 is like a real open question and I'm kind of skeptical. Interesting. I mean, you can make the

00:50:40.900 argument sort of the Wikipedia version of it that there's sort of enough sort of self-correction and

00:50:46.560 sort of the iteration in that space. But look, I mean, it's an interesting counter argument to what

00:50:52.480 Sean Spicer was sort of asserting. Well, we'll find ourselves often Governor Newsom on the opposite

00:50:56.100 side of Sean Spicer. Interesting. Unbelievable. She'd have Melissa McCarthy on. That's a breaking

00:51:02.460 news. Breaking news. Speaking of breaking news. Hola, I'm Jorge Ramos. This week on The Moment,

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00:54:36.660 Offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, wherever you happen to get your podcasts.

00:54:40.700 You were out there, as I was suggesting a moment ago, I keep going, trying to come back to this,

00:54:46.800 because I am honestly fascinated about your background. You said, you talked, you joked

00:54:51.600 again, I'll create it for the second time, there was brown girl out with a camera, but your history, 0.66

00:54:56.380 your background, you grew up in Washington, D.C. You wrote a book called Future Face,

00:54:59.560 which was about sort of this notion of identity. You traveled around the world, your mom coming from

00:55:05.760 overseas, in war-torn countries, authoritarian regimes, militarization of the streets, your dad

00:55:11.460 from Iowa.

00:55:13.540 Iowa.

00:55:14.000 Yeah, I mean, just that contrast. So talk to me a little bit. You grew up, so remind us,

00:55:17.380 you grew up in Washington, D.C.

00:55:18.380 I grew up in Washington, D.C. proper, which is like the ultimate conversation killer.

00:55:21.460 Yeah, so who is Washington, exactly.

00:55:23.240 People are like, oh, you're from D.C.? I have nothing to say to you.

00:55:24.640 Who's from D.C.?

00:55:24.780 You're from D.C.?

00:55:25.480 No one, me.

00:55:26.100 Thank you.

00:55:26.540 Me and like Lucas-like.

00:55:27.520 You were actually physically born in a hospital in Washington, D.C.?

00:55:29.820 In 2006 at Sibley Hospital on November 27th.

00:55:33.000 Was it safe back then or it's only safe now because of Trump's guard?

00:55:36.420 It's not much more interesting back then.

00:55:37.900 Okay.

00:55:38.800 It was rougher for sure.

00:55:40.460 Definitely was.

00:55:40.960 I was a product of the D.C. public school system, which was not what it is now, and I proudly so.

00:55:46.800 It was, my dad was, you know, he cut his teeth as a field organizer from McGovern in the

00:55:52.240 70s, that's where he met someone named Bill Clinton, and, you know, he was an organizer

00:55:56.480 at his heart.

00:55:57.580 He was the field organizer for Ted Kennedy's ill-fated 1980 campaign.

00:56:02.120 He was always an insurgent, but he was a good Iowa boy at heart, you know?

00:56:06.440 He just was, he came to Washington because he wanted to solve the problem of poverty and

00:56:10.340 hunger in America, you know, he was driven by-

00:56:12.580 What year would he have done that?

00:56:13.680 Is this the Starr-Schreiber years?

00:56:15.220 He was in 72, 70, 70?

00:56:18.080 I love it.

00:56:18.820 But this is when we were solving the vernacular ignorance, poverty, and disease.

00:56:22.240 There was a spirit to our politics.

00:56:24.360 One of the reasons I have so much Kennedy, Bobby Kennedy, and Starr-Schreiber memorabilia

00:56:29.300 around, you know, that spirit, totally get it, late 60s, early 70s.

00:56:32.440 He was obsessed.

00:56:34.200 The Kennedys and the sort of the ideological bent of the Kennedys was so much his North

00:56:39.860 star, you know?

00:56:40.520 Love that.

00:56:41.300 And was so your product of interest in a political frame?

00:56:44.880 Did that come early from him?

00:56:46.040 I mean, my mom was born in Burma, now known as Myanmar, which has been basically at war with

00:56:50.880 itself for the greater part of the 20th and 21st centuries.

00:56:53.860 And our family was being targeted while they were there.

00:56:57.000 And she came over here and got a scholarship.

00:56:58.820 How old was she when she came here?

00:56:59.980 She was 19.

00:57:00.700 Oh, yeah.

00:57:01.360 Yeah.

00:57:01.940 But she'd gone to English schools in Burma.

00:57:04.340 And my parents and my grandparents had both been Fulbright scholars.

00:57:07.380 And so they were part of like the, you know, the learned elite in Burma and thus were targeted

00:57:13.060 by the, you know, the military as it was basically trying to purge the country of any Western

00:57:18.920 influence.

00:57:20.260 And, you know, my mom is like, I think you'll find no greater patriots than immigrants.

00:57:25.120 Love that.

00:57:25.540 Totally agree.

00:57:26.320 Right?

00:57:26.700 Harder workers too.

00:57:27.620 Just so-

00:57:28.440 That entrepreneurial spirit, that patriotic zeal.

00:57:31.180 They just believe so much in this country.

00:57:33.580 They want to contribute to it.

00:57:34.540 They think it's the greatest place in the world.

00:57:35.860 One of the great things, I did it a lot when I was mayor.

00:57:38.580 I haven't done as much since.

00:57:40.080 But swearing in, folks, you go into a swearing in ceremony, the diversity of those, that's

00:57:45.140 just a powerful and spirited thing.

00:57:46.720 It's like, thanks for-

00:57:47.280 And the families and just the emotion, the tears.

00:57:50.500 A sense of patriotism, optimism.

00:57:52.940 I love that.

00:57:53.700 And we've lost that understanding of how deeply and richly immigrants contribute to this country

00:58:00.060 and make it America, make it the place we love.

00:58:02.300 So she came as an immigrant, 19 years old, to-

00:58:05.620 Washington, D.C.

00:58:06.420 Because my grandmother got a job at the Library of Congress.

00:58:09.300 And the Library of Congress basically pulled them out of Burma and then said, you don't

00:58:12.480 need passports.

00:58:13.960 You are a valuable contribution.

00:58:15.480 My grandmother knew Bali, which is an ancient language that she had studied in her Fulbright

00:58:20.940 scholarship.

00:58:21.800 And they needed her expertise at the Library of Congress.

00:58:24.060 So they brought my family over and that debt, I don't think my family will ever forget because

00:58:29.440 otherwise I never would have been born.

00:58:30.940 My mom and dad met working at a labor union in the 70s.

00:58:36.080 My mom went to college and was like, dabbled in sort of like socialism as one did in the

00:58:40.860 early 70s.

00:58:42.120 And met my dad and they hated each other and then they got married.

00:58:45.880 What do you mean they hated each other?

00:58:46.900 Bad first date or- 1.00

00:58:48.180 My mom was like, he's an asshole. 1.00

00:58:49.700 And she was, he, I don't know what he said, but my mom definitely said, he's an asshole. 1.00

00:58:52.800 But they were both, you know, hot young things and they got married and they had one daughter 1.00

00:58:57.380 and that was me.

00:58:58.880 And-

00:58:59.040 And just one, no siblings?

00:59:00.220 No siblings.

00:59:01.100 One and done.

00:59:02.180 And you went to public school in D.C. and where'd you go to college?

00:59:04.920 I went to a place called Brown University.

00:59:07.500 Unbelievable. 1.00

00:59:08.040 I know, what a fucking sellout. 0.99

00:59:09.340 I could give them a, and not as bad, maybe just one knee pad to Brown. 1.00

00:59:14.940 I know.

00:59:15.780 Both.

00:59:16.140 But they did bend down on one knee. 0.88

00:59:18.240 Well, let's just first say, Governor, there was a shooting on the campus.

00:59:20.440 I will, my heart actually broke for that as like a place of great freedom.

00:59:24.500 I can only legitimately imagine.

00:59:25.600 Let's remember that.

00:59:26.700 But other than that, what an extraordinary capitulation we've seen on the part of these

00:59:32.060 campuses.

00:59:32.380 These universities.

00:59:33.120 These universities.

00:59:33.740 And I'm, we've got to hold the line here at the UCU.

00:59:36.420 If they are going to, who is?

00:59:37.920 Thank you.

00:59:38.680 Thank you.

00:59:39.120 Like in Burma, they just closed the universities.

00:59:41.480 Here, we're like allowing them to basically put the chains on the bars.

00:59:44.700 Uh, okay.

00:59:45.540 I'm going to provide two knee pads.

00:59:47.240 Uh, you're, you're much more, uh, you're much more honest, uh, about what Brown did.

00:59:52.340 And then, but I appreciate you as your, by the way, Brown's a special university.

00:59:56.120 It is.

00:59:56.740 There's a unique student body.

00:59:59.220 That's it.

00:59:59.560 It says so much more about you.

01:00:01.500 Uh, it's by the way, explains kind of everything.

01:00:04.440 Oh, that you're one of those fancy Brown people. 1.00

01:00:06.860 Oh my God.

01:00:07.220 By the way, 960 SAT here.

01:00:09.260 So there was no Brown. 1.00

01:00:10.240 That's back when the perfect score was a thousand, right?

01:00:12.200 In 1952, wasn't that the, like.

01:00:14.080 That's what my sister said.

01:00:15.000 Oh, it's just for math, right?

01:00:16.300 No, thank you.

01:00:17.760 Um, but let me ask you about this.

01:00:19.200 You wear it like a badge of honor.

01:00:20.620 Well, I do.

01:00:21.380 I mean, it's, uh.

01:00:22.240 Respect.

01:00:22.860 It's not held you back.

01:00:24.120 It hasn't, hasn't held you back.

01:00:24.720 No, I don't.

01:00:25.380 Maybe it has.

01:00:26.080 I mean, I don't know.

01:00:26.860 I mean, I don't know.

01:00:28.040 I don't know.

01:00:28.420 Ask me in 2028.

01:00:29.580 Ask me, just see, we keep going back to my Rotary Club.

01:00:33.020 But let me ask you on the issue of your education at Brown.

01:00:37.340 Um, what was your passion back then?

01:00:38.980 What'd you want to be?

01:00:39.760 Who'd you want to become?

01:00:40.960 So boring.

01:00:41.540 I always wanted to be a journalist.

01:00:42.760 I was like.

01:00:43.260 Come on, really?

01:00:43.920 Yeah, man.

01:00:44.240 Even early on.

01:00:45.080 In elementary school, I was wrote for the March Monitor.

01:00:47.880 I was the editor-in-chief of The Real Deal.

01:00:49.800 That was my middle school paper.

01:00:51.560 I was.

01:00:51.800 Middle school.

01:00:52.260 One of the editors at the Wilson Beacon.

01:00:55.860 God, I can't even remember.

01:00:56.920 I obviously didn't do that much editing in high school.

01:00:58.740 And then I was one of the editors for the weekly College Hill Independent newspaper,

01:01:03.120 which was the sort of cooler counterpoint to the Brown Daily Herald, which was the daily.

01:01:07.980 Um, but I always was always, I loved writing, you know, and I loved talking to people,

01:01:12.980 loved getting out there.

01:01:14.520 I loved, you know, I just always loved media.

01:01:16.920 And my dad, to my dad's great chagrin, he'd say, kid, why cover the news when you can be

01:01:22.480 in the news?

01:01:23.040 Oh, interesting.

01:01:23.780 And I was like, eye roll.

01:01:26.300 You're so corny.

01:01:26.860 That's exactly, by the way, it sounds like he took your dad's advice.

01:01:30.020 I mean.

01:01:30.760 Because who would look at you now?

01:01:32.160 I don't know.

01:01:32.820 Right?

01:01:33.120 I mean, come on.

01:01:33.580 People are just delivering the news.

01:01:35.120 They're the celebrities.

01:01:36.220 They're the, they're the.

01:01:36.900 It's a very uncomfortable position, as you can see.

01:01:39.540 Yeah.

01:01:39.880 It's weird to be, it's like not actually, I've like violated so much of what we thought

01:01:45.480 it meant to be a journalist by talking so candidly about my own.

01:01:49.180 You guys are hardly anonymous.

01:01:50.460 I mean, you guys are brands, your household names, your celebrity, you have, you have

01:01:54.260 products that you sell there.

01:01:56.000 You have different, you're doing podcasts and this and this, everybody's books and the

01:02:00.280 whole thing. 0.99

01:02:00.800 If you got to survive, you're a house cat out there in the fucking civil war, just looking 1.00

01:02:04.500 for mice and owls. 0.99

01:02:04.920 Did you really make that up the first time?

01:02:06.300 I literally made that up right here.

01:02:07.080 And now you're using it again.

01:02:08.140 Start with the heart, house cat, you can have it all.

01:02:11.260 Yeah.

01:02:11.660 You have to do it all because that's the only way people are going to listen to you anymore

01:02:15.780 now that everything's been so disaggregated.

01:02:17.840 And everything's atomized, nebulized, unless you are a big atom out there, you're, I mean,

01:02:22.800 you're throwing pennies down the well.

01:02:24.360 You should have, I mean, you ultimately did take your dad's advice, which is nice.

01:02:28.540 He passed away in 2017.

01:02:30.200 He never saw, he never saw the madness that has become, but I think.

01:02:34.400 Did he ever say he was proud of you?

01:02:36.260 Oh my God, all the time.

01:02:37.360 You had it, he was that kind of dad.

01:02:38.940 Yeah.

01:02:39.120 When he died, they felt, they were like, oh, there are a lot of your old MSNBC posters.

01:02:44.260 Oh, that's sweet.

01:02:45.500 That's sweet, right?

01:02:46.320 That's creepy, but he loved me, so proud of me.

01:02:49.200 That's your dad.

01:02:50.080 Yeah.

01:02:50.540 But you kind of wanted him.

01:02:51.640 Sometimes I'd be like, what'd you think of that dad?

01:02:53.080 He'd be like, you're great, Poncho.

01:02:54.900 He always called me Poncho.

01:02:56.180 He'd be like, you're a great kid.

01:02:57.160 You did a great job.

01:02:57.920 He really had a raspy voice.

01:02:59.060 Whereas my mom would be like, eh, it could have been better. 0.98

01:03:01.360 So it was a nice balance.

01:03:02.640 And is your mom still alive?

01:03:03.780 Oh yeah.

01:03:04.140 My mom's very much alive and kicking.

01:03:06.060 Does she give you a lot of advice?

01:03:07.580 Career advice?

01:03:08.460 Always.

01:03:08.840 The number one advice, number one advice she'll tell me after she sees this.

01:03:12.220 You need to wear more lipstick.

01:03:13.540 Why aren't you wearing lipstick?

01:03:14.340 Why don't you wear lipstick?

01:03:15.520 You look dead.

01:03:16.980 You look dead?

01:03:17.980 That's it. 0.63

01:03:18.620 That's it.

01:03:19.680 Lipstick, and then occasionally you speak too quickly, Alex.

01:03:22.520 Oh my gosh.

01:03:23.780 Listen, she's not wrong.

01:03:24.940 I probably should, but we are where we are.

01:03:27.800 She doesn't tell you to be, at the same time, be yourself.

01:03:30.280 Be authentic.

01:03:30.820 She does.

01:03:31.340 So she gives you this contradictory advice, right?

01:03:33.760 Exactly.

01:03:34.240 She likes the authentic part, but she just wants it done in a Revlon red.

01:03:38.040 She just wants it done in a Revlon red.

01:03:39.440 Uh, I, I love, and I, may I ask how old she is now?

01:03:42.680 81 beautiful years old.

01:03:44.800 That's amazing.

01:03:45.720 And she's still in DC.

01:03:47.000 No, she's on Long Island. 0.72

01:03:48.460 Oh, Long Island.

01:03:49.200 She is, we are, she is right by my side.

01:03:51.600 I see her all the time.

01:03:53.060 Wow.

01:03:54.020 It's good.

01:03:54.620 She's happy, you know, but I think it's hard for anybody, you know, we're talking about

01:03:58.460 being an immigrant, you know, she came here and she was so, and remains, like she puts

01:04:02.980 up her flag every 4th of July.

01:04:04.420 She's like, they're not going to take the flag.

01:04:05.800 She printed out bumper sticker flags that said, Democrats believe in America.

01:04:10.860 She was like, we are patriots.

01:04:12.740 We care about this country.

01:04:13.860 Don't let them steal that from us.

01:04:15.220 Thank you.

01:04:15.640 Thank you.

01:04:16.100 And she has this institutional memory of meeting John F. Kennedy when she came over with

01:04:19.980 the Burmese embassy in fourth grade, you know, and she has this deep and abiding belief

01:04:24.400 in the fundamental goodness of this country.

01:04:26.220 And she reads the newspaper and watches the news religiously and is bereft.

01:04:30.820 It's like, how could this man be doing these things to our country?

01:04:33.680 And I don't even want to talk to her about the fact that it's not just him.

01:04:37.300 It's a country doing it to itself.

01:04:39.140 And I think it's been, it's hard to be 81 right now, right?

01:04:42.200 You've lived through some really remarkable decades and progress, civil rights, women's

01:04:46.880 rights, and so much of it is being just ripped apart. 0.97

01:04:50.600 And you kind of find yourself at a loss, like, was it all just a fucking dream? 0.97

01:04:54.340 What is this? 0.99

01:04:55.140 What is this place?

01:04:56.320 What do you, you talk a lot about what we're missing and that's been a big part of the podcast

01:05:01.960 and, you know, and what are the stories we're missing with all the noise, the sort of MAGA

01:05:05.460 noise, et cetera.

01:05:06.700 And so we're in a new year.

01:05:07.940 We just turned the page.

01:05:09.600 First week of January.

01:05:11.720 What, I mean, right now, I mean, you know, all the noise, Venezuela, January 6th, again,

01:05:17.680 fifth anniversary today.

01:05:19.100 Epstein, and that's just winding up.

01:05:21.460 Congress is back in session as we tape this podcast today.

01:05:25.720 They're at the Kennedy Center Republicans meeting talking about how they can reconcile the

01:05:30.400 fact that they were complicit with 114% average increase for almost 22 million Americans in

01:05:37.200 their health care bills and whether or not they can get out of Dodge and figure out a

01:05:40.200 way to actually see if they can extend these Obamacare subsidies so that they can somehow

01:05:44.440 salvage their prospects, maybe hold on to power in 2026.

01:05:51.840 What do you make of the moment we're in?

01:05:54.840 What are the stories you think will define 2026?

01:05:57.440 And what are the stories that we should be talking more about?

01:06:01.840 Well, I mean, I think the health care piece is huge, right?

01:06:04.180 And I mean, I think at our own, I think it's misguided to separate affordability from health

01:06:09.740 care.

01:06:09.980 It's all money.

01:06:10.520 Money's fungible.

01:06:11.240 You can either afford your medicine or you can't.

01:06:12.660 You can afford the bacon or you can't.

01:06:14.000 It's all coming from the same pocketbook, right?

01:06:15.500 Well said.

01:06:15.640 Um, I interviewed someone on my podcast who has a debilitating medical condition.

01:06:20.600 Her premiums were $110 a month.

01:06:23.400 They're going to go up.

01:06:24.120 They've gone up to 880.

01:06:25.500 Oh, come on. 0.87

01:06:26.540 That's not tenable.

01:06:27.320 No, period.

01:06:28.280 People are like, oh, it's only 22 million people. 0.98

01:06:30.160 I'm like 22 fucking million people is a lot of people. 0.98

01:06:32.840 22 million families. 0.99

01:06:35.620 Families.

01:06:36.020 Yeah.

01:06:36.240 Extended.

01:06:36.820 With children.

01:06:37.380 With children.

01:06:38.000 Thank you.

01:06:38.240 With old people. 1.00

01:06:38.660 Exactly right.

01:06:39.200 And what it, and I think the connection that Democrats in particular need to make is it 0.97

01:06:45.180 is a statement of fucking, it is a moral statement what they are doing to, it's not about just 0.96

01:06:51.040 can you afford it, it's who can afford what and who deserves to be able to afford to live 0.98

01:06:55.580 in this country and to afford a life in this country.

01:06:58.460 The idea that Trump is doing this, is literally stealing money from the needed money from the

01:07:05.620 pockets of the poor so that he can line the pockets of the rich is the defining sort of

01:07:10.360 thesis of governing.

01:07:11.520 If he has any sort of raison d'etre, if there is any guiding principle to Trump, it is to

01:07:17.080 make people like him wealthier.

01:07:19.640 That's why we're in Venezuela.

01:07:20.840 That's why the healthcare subsidies are going, they're trying to save money on one end to 0.87

01:07:27.240 redistribute it to the richest at the top end.

01:07:29.480 I mean, that is the essence of all of it.

01:07:31.360 And everything needs to be seen through that lens. 0.98

01:07:34.620 Nobody fucking needs oil. 0.99

01:07:36.880 It's $60 a barrel. 1.00

01:07:39.020 Like, there's a surplus.

01:07:42.240 We don't need more oil.

01:07:43.600 It's just oil companies getting more access to underground reserves.

01:07:48.380 You know, I think what needs to happen is for us as a country to better understand the

01:07:54.720 machinations of this president is to really come up with an operating thesis that covers

01:08:00.340 all of it.

01:08:00.840 And the greed and the cruelty is really the point.

01:08:04.620 And Adam Serwer said it best in The Atlantic.

01:08:06.280 But that is what touches on every single story.

01:08:08.780 I mean, even the immigration stuff, it is about repopulating the country with white people. 0.99

01:08:13.340 Yes, it is about racism.

01:08:15.100 It's about being mean to people who aren't like you.

01:08:17.760 It's just about being cruel.

01:08:19.440 It's about comeuppance.

01:08:20.420 And it's about cruelty. 0.99

01:08:21.280 And it's about a harshness that speaks to the, like I said, the darkest fucking demons of 0.99

01:08:27.560 human evolution. 0.98

01:08:28.180 And I think all of this Trumpism needs to be seen in the sort of through the lens of

01:08:33.980 brutality and cruelty because that's at its essence, you know.

01:08:38.300 And we need to bring people back from the sort of lull of economic affordability.

01:08:43.040 And we need them to understand that it's at its root, at its core, these policies are

01:08:48.460 about punishment and greed.

01:08:49.900 So the stories I'm going to be following are certainly health care.

01:08:55.060 Immigration, I think, continues to be an extraordinary story.

01:08:58.320 I mean, it is going to change the face of this country, right?

01:09:01.480 It's changing the face of California.

01:09:03.060 We had legal immigrants.

01:09:04.640 We estimate about 150,000 less than the prior year of legal immigrants.

01:09:09.400 You want to talk about the secret sauce of California from Silicon Valley, not just the

01:09:13.280 central valley is getting first round draft choices from around the rest of the world.

01:09:17.620 That's what separates our game from the game played elsewhere.

01:09:20.320 That's what's built the fourth largest economy in the world.

01:09:23.160 That vibrancy, that energy and daring that you talk about from newcomers that are coming

01:09:27.560 here for riches and new beginnings.

01:09:30.280 Couldn't agree with you more.

01:09:31.360 Forgive me.

01:09:31.940 No, I love it when you talk about the, like, Silicon.

01:09:34.520 We're talking about, like, America is immigrants. 0.90

01:09:38.500 Yes.

01:09:38.980 It's just, we are immigrants. 0.90

01:09:40.420 And to be purging the country of all the brown ones is not going to leave us with much of a 1.00

01:09:46.760 country.

01:09:47.420 And I think, you know, telling the stories of immigrants is really important because

01:09:51.020 people have been able to look away.

01:09:53.020 And so that's something we'll continue to do on the podcast.

01:09:54.940 I think also what's happening to the, you know, to poor women in this country, just in

01:10:00.080 terms of both health care and access to, you know, their, you know, make decisions about

01:10:05.180 their own bodies.

01:10:05.900 I mean, what you see happening in the Deep South, we sort of stopped talking about abortion

01:10:10.080 because it didn't win us a 2024 election.

01:10:12.700 And that doesn't mean that that crisis has gone away and, in fact, maybe is even more

01:10:16.660 piercing.

01:10:18.360 And, like, maybe, gov, maybe, the thing that threatens us all, which you have, like, extraordinary

01:10:24.420 experience with, especially in a month like this, as you think about where we were last

01:10:27.700 year, is climate. 1.00

01:10:28.640 You know, like, we've got to figure out a way to talk about the fact that we stupid-ass, 1.00

01:10:34.460 moronic human beings are still chasing reservoirs of dead, decaying shrimp all over the world 1.00

01:10:39.220 that created petroleum reserves back in the, like, the Jurassic period. 1.00

01:10:42.640 That's our fucking strategy for energy. 0.99

01:10:44.560 That's not a strategy. 0.99

01:10:45.860 Thank you.

01:10:46.760 China gets it. 0.67

01:10:47.860 Bro.

01:10:48.200 Cleaning our clocks, 70% of the EVs of manufacturing, supply chains, building relationships, locking

01:10:54.100 in and loading in the future.

01:10:56.000 And what are we doing?

01:10:56.980 Chasing dead shrimp, dead shrimp, dead Mesozoic shrimp.

01:11:01.620 Let me ask you just on that because it's such a, there were a few topics and you implied it

01:11:06.560 as it relates to the issue of reproductive freedom and it relates to women and girls.

01:11:10.080 And the fact that, you know, it's not as popular to talk about.

01:11:13.300 And certainly if you look at any poll, people say it's a loser and Kamala, you know, Democrats

01:11:17.520 are insufficiently focused on the things that people really, that matter to them.

01:11:21.980 And we talk too much about culture, woke and climate and reproductive freedom and the

01:11:27.080 like.

01:11:27.260 How do you talk about, these things are, to your point, I mean, what more evidence do we

01:11:32.240 need?

01:11:32.980 The hots are getting hotter, the dries are getting drier, the wets are getting wetter, these

01:11:35.840 atmospheric rivers, floods, droughts, wildfires.

01:11:39.420 You've got climate risk is financial risk.

01:11:41.580 Climate risk is impacting our ability to get insurance, which is a home and affordability

01:11:48.080 issue.

01:11:48.600 I mean, this is like code, it's blinking red everywhere, but Democrats aren't even supposed

01:11:55.160 to talk about it.

01:11:56.800 We're just supposed to talk about kitchen table issues, talk about groceries.

01:12:00.540 We're supposed to talk about utility bills, which is important.

01:12:03.040 And boy, wait, utility bills and climate.

01:12:05.360 Never thought about that.

01:12:06.120 Can I forgive me?

01:12:07.740 I just, you get the point.

01:12:09.580 How the hell, how do we break that?

01:12:11.320 All the punditry class.

01:12:13.440 Newsom stopped talking.

01:12:14.560 That's his theory goes again off on these wild eyed.

01:12:17.700 You know what?

01:12:18.480 People don't like to believe that they're fallible, right?

01:12:21.040 Americans don't like to think that they, they want, we want to believe as a country.

01:12:25.540 It's part of the actually awesomeness of America.

01:12:27.440 It's like, we're impervious. 1.00

01:12:28.280 Fuck that. 1.00

01:12:28.740 Go West. 1.00

01:12:29.700 Right?

01:12:30.440 Go West, young man, go West.

01:12:31.860 Horace Greeley.

01:12:32.880 This notion of the pioneer, this individual, I love it.

01:12:35.540 Rugged individualism.

01:12:36.300 Rugged individualism.

01:12:36.940 It's at odds with the DNA of this country to say there is, you know, existential threat

01:12:41.980 that you individually cannot do anything about, but collectively can.

01:12:47.300 It's reweaving the sense of a common good, right? 0.94

01:12:51.340 That's fucking hard to do when the country is so divided. 0.96

01:12:54.360 But Trump has done it. 0.99

01:12:55.540 Isn't that what?

01:12:56.400 Isn't that what?

01:12:56.640 Well, kind of.

01:12:57.380 Sense of community, that sort of organizing principle.

01:13:00.220 Within red states, at the cost. 0.80

01:13:02.320 You know, Democrats need to be very, blue states need to be very careful about not giving 0.97

01:13:07.320 a shit about climate because red states are the first ones impacted, excepting your incredible 0.97

01:13:10.780 state. 0.99

01:13:11.020 Which is extraordinary, isn't it?

01:13:12.380 By the way, no.

01:13:13.340 In this blue state, the most impacted districts are dominantly Trump voting districts.

01:13:19.180 Overwhelmingly.

01:13:19.880 Talk about Paradise, California, not Pleasure, Paradise, California.

01:13:23.520 You talk about some of the most, Grizzlies Flack, Greenville. 0.99

01:13:26.980 All of these are in conservative parts of the state.

01:13:29.180 The folks that he's not helping, and they're consistently punishing all across this country,

01:13:33.980 including Arkansas.

01:13:34.980 I mean, Sanders had to beg his former boss.

01:13:38.520 Tennessee, Arkansas.

01:13:39.380 Tornadoes, hurricanes, floods.

01:13:40.560 All of the South.

01:13:41.360 Texas.

01:13:41.700 People don't like, people don't like believing that the end could be near, right?

01:13:48.700 There has to be a reframing of the issue.

01:13:50.800 I'm not a climate advocate, but I just think-

01:13:53.040 This alarmist thing you're referring to.

01:13:54.760 We talked about it in such-

01:13:56.020 I think people need to believe that some kind of solutions can be had.

01:13:58.280 Yeah, and that's a caution.

01:13:59.240 And also, climate mitigation.

01:14:00.520 Like, it's just going to get fucking warmer, and we got to make choices and changes.

01:14:04.100 And the rich, you know, like, the idea that Miami is just going to become the coastal province

01:14:09.760 of people who couldn't afford to have, you know, rebuild their homes, or that parts of

01:14:13.480 California are just going to become the province of people who can afford to lose their homes

01:14:17.160 every couple of years. 0.96

01:14:17.880 Like, that's not fucking tenable. 0.93

01:14:19.540 Everybody's going to have to pay a price, a steep one. 0.93

01:14:21.860 And, like, people need to show that they're bearing the burden of the cost.

01:14:26.360 I don't know the answer to it.

01:14:27.680 I think it's also a fail of the news media to not be covering this through a climate lens.

01:14:31.080 I mean, I just, I mean-

01:14:32.560 It is the single most-

01:14:33.560 There's nowhere to be found on these issues.

01:14:35.440 It is the greatest shame of my career as a journalist.

01:14:37.740 I mean, why is it?

01:14:38.540 Honestly, why in the cable network, we're talking about the insurance crisis in this country

01:14:41.500 in the context of it being, climate is uninsurable.

01:14:44.400 The financial impacts are off the charts.

01:14:46.780 You want a next big crisis.

01:14:48.220 It is.

01:14:48.780 I mean, connect the utility bills.

01:14:50.880 It's not just data centers, folks.

01:14:52.860 Trust me.

01:14:53.500 I mean, it's so, it's convenient to say that.

01:14:56.780 And there's a political lens when we say that.

01:14:58.680 But look at what's been happening with the wildfire risks and the impacts that have had

01:15:03.020 direct impact on utility bills.

01:15:04.900 I mean, it's, it is, the first thing you have to do is reintroduce it into the conversation

01:15:10.920 because it's gone.

01:15:11.960 It's gone.

01:15:12.720 And-

01:15:13.500 Gun safety's gone.

01:15:14.320 Gun safety's gone.

01:15:15.820 And the shootings keep happening.

01:15:17.580 Abortion's gone.

01:15:18.200 I mean, part of it is my, like, this is kind of where we begin again at the-

01:15:21.880 Epstein and the things that sell and the sort of contemporary, yeah.

01:15:25.100 Catastrophe is hard.

01:15:25.960 People would rather hear about the bad guy going down or salacious, like they want to

01:15:30.180 hear about scandal.

01:15:30.900 And again, it's not that Epstein isn't worth covering.

01:15:33.120 It is.

01:15:33.520 Absolutely.

01:15:34.520 How are we covering it in the right way?

01:15:36.160 And do we need to only cover it?

01:15:37.640 Why didn't you guys cover it four years ago, three years ago at this level?

01:15:40.880 What?

01:15:41.240 Epstein?

01:15:41.640 Yeah.

01:15:41.820 I think, I don't know.

01:15:45.800 I would, I don't know the answer to that question.

01:15:47.600 I would have to think back.

01:15:49.300 I mean, I think every day you have to keep in mind there, and you know, my heart goes

01:15:53.800 out to people who still have to program cable news shows every night. 0.98

01:15:55.880 Like my friend Chris Hayes is like, you know, he's in the fucking foxhole, right? 0.98

01:15:59.720 There's so much that's happening. 0.99

01:16:00.960 Next level.

01:16:01.620 He's incredibly bright, isn't he?

01:16:03.400 Yeah.

01:16:03.760 But I was on the podcast before him, right?

01:16:06.560 I haven't had him on yet.

01:16:07.560 Okay.

01:16:08.500 Jesus.

01:16:10.240 I'm going to test my own theory.

01:16:11.820 Here we're going to compare and contrast a Brown graduate.

01:16:15.600 Where'd he go to school?

01:16:16.840 Brown.

01:16:17.560 Oh, God.

01:16:18.320 He went to Brown with me.

01:16:19.880 Oh, geez.

01:16:20.900 I, I.

01:16:21.660 Did you not know that?

01:16:22.800 See, back to.

01:16:23.560 We used to talk.

01:16:24.320 It's like Lawrence O'Donnell talking about going.

01:16:25.560 Now I don't have one, so I didn't even know that.

01:16:27.280 The cliches of MSME.

01:16:28.960 Oh, God, of course you guys are.

01:16:30.040 Lawrence.

01:16:30.240 See, I'm a simple guy.

01:16:31.920 I don't get all you.

01:16:32.540 960 XAT scores.

01:16:34.040 No, I mean.

01:16:35.060 Academics and elites.

01:16:35.860 I'm just saying, of course.

01:16:37.140 Now I understand this.

01:16:38.020 This Trump phenomenon.

01:16:39.480 Humble dynastic, you know, former mayor.

01:16:41.800 That's right.

01:16:42.280 In Francisco.

01:16:42.880 Well, I mean, I wasn't born as mayor, but that's going to.

01:16:46.000 That's what the book's about.

01:16:47.200 You have to read my book.

01:16:47.920 Oh, my God.

01:16:48.320 I can't wait.

01:16:49.120 I can't wait for my signed copy to arrive in the mail.

01:16:51.480 I'm the invitation to moderate the conversation with the 92nd Street Y.

01:16:54.820 Is that what we're going to do?

01:16:55.660 Yeah.

01:16:55.900 Well, I mean.

01:16:56.620 It's inevitable.

01:16:57.300 By the way, you have to do.

01:16:58.340 Maybe I'm going to ask you to do it in conversation.

01:17:01.060 Who's going to be better?

01:17:02.040 I'm going to ask you for sure.

01:17:03.300 I'm fully in.

01:17:04.440 This is good.

01:17:05.160 This is great.

01:17:05.820 I hope people tune in.

01:17:07.040 I'm servicing the debt.

01:17:08.280 Yeah, I know.

01:17:08.600 When my book comes out.

01:17:10.120 Oh, gosh.

01:17:11.100 You're like, I'm not.

01:17:11.400 Oh, is that what this is about?

01:17:12.980 Unbelievable.

01:17:13.440 We'll have you back on your book.

01:17:15.320 Yes.

01:17:15.720 Which you apparently.

01:17:16.660 But you won't even preview it.

01:17:17.740 I can't.

01:17:18.020 I can't.

01:17:18.320 It's called.

01:17:18.600 It's about the.

01:17:19.240 It's about the.

01:17:19.900 Actually, it's a.

01:17:20.760 It's historical.

01:17:21.660 It's about.

01:17:22.120 It's historical.

01:17:22.880 Yeah.

01:17:23.080 Because it's an historic project.

01:17:24.520 No.

01:17:25.000 Because the magnitude is so great.

01:17:26.940 For 200 years.

01:17:27.640 It will be like the Bible. 0.94

01:17:29.480 Maybe a few more copies.

01:17:31.340 It is about the radicalization of the Supreme Court and the sort of plan that was hatched

01:17:36.080 in the 1980s by a group of unlikely, really super weird, arch conservative right wing activists

01:17:41.560 in the shadow of the Reagan administration. 0.98

01:17:43.760 And there are lessons in it for all fucking. 0.99

01:17:45.640 We're in Reagan's old bedroom. 0.99

01:17:47.060 Wow.

01:17:47.740 I mean.

01:17:48.200 I mean, the ghost.

01:17:49.240 These should be promoted here.

01:17:50.840 It's very small.

01:17:51.800 Well, this is small.

01:17:52.620 It's a small.

01:17:53.120 They were small people.

01:17:54.020 They were small.

01:17:54.420 But they weren't here long.

01:17:55.540 Remember, Nancy Reagan said this was a fire trap.

01:17:58.520 So they left.

01:17:59.460 Smart.

01:18:00.020 That was smart.

01:18:01.040 To definitely do small for you.

01:18:02.780 The point is.

01:18:03.560 The point is.

01:18:05.280 I mean, I guess the point is.

01:18:07.000 I don't remember the point other than to say.

01:18:09.080 No, it's about the Supreme Court.

01:18:10.460 That's good.

01:18:10.780 This is about the Supreme Court.

01:18:11.540 In the radicalization of the Supreme Court.

01:18:12.660 Do you think they're going to get rid of the Voting Rights Act?

01:18:15.680 John Roberts has literally been working on that brief since he was a Department of Justice

01:18:19.520 staffer in the Reagan administration.

01:18:21.000 That's just serious.

01:18:21.740 This is get ready.

01:18:22.900 Put your seatbelt on.

01:18:23.680 We're talking about 2026.

01:18:25.560 Add that to your list.

01:18:26.980 Redistricting.

01:18:27.600 Props, bro.

01:18:28.120 God bless.

01:18:29.100 I appreciate it.

01:18:29.900 It wasn't easy.

01:18:30.760 I mean, you know, to be supportive of something that now I need to be against in the context

01:18:35.940 of.

01:18:36.740 But it's.

01:18:37.420 It's dark.

01:18:38.380 Fight fire with fire.

01:18:39.400 This is a serious sidekick.

01:18:39.900 You're just a house cat getting ready to go out into the wild and find some owls and

01:18:43.640 mice to hunt.

01:18:44.420 We can't continue to do what we've done.

01:18:46.260 We'll get what we've got.

01:18:47.260 Exactly.

01:18:47.780 Old Texas song.

01:18:49.420 But let me let me let me go back a little bit.

01:18:51.340 Just, you know, and we'll go, you know, Earl Warren was here speaking of the Supreme Court

01:18:55.240 and other.

01:18:55.980 I saw that plaque over the toilet bowl.

01:18:57.300 It said Earl Warren.

01:18:58.160 No, I'm kidding.

01:18:58.560 No, actually, we should probably put that in there.

01:19:00.080 You should totally put that in there.

01:19:01.180 No, I think it's pretty amazing.

01:19:02.600 I mean, of course, I reminded he also interned the Japanese.

01:19:05.420 I mean, as Rachel has reminded us, too, with the outstanding podcast series.

01:19:10.200 But let me go back to just the theory of the case with your podcast.

01:19:14.900 So you it's fundamentally about, again, breaking through and trying to find the essence of

01:19:19.100 the why, the why.

01:19:21.260 Humanity.

01:19:21.660 The humanity.

01:19:22.260 The humanity.

01:19:22.880 The things that should connect and bind us all together.

01:19:25.200 And fundamentally, that's the challenge today in our politics.

01:19:28.320 Yeah.

01:19:28.680 Is we're so divided.

01:19:29.800 We're so just, I mean.

01:19:31.260 Alienated.

01:19:31.980 Alienated from, you know, and we're so unhappy.

01:19:36.140 As a consequence.

01:19:37.740 We're so lonely.

01:19:39.020 So miserable, lonely, and unhappy.

01:19:42.320 It is a hell of a thing, isn't it?

01:19:44.160 How much do you think media, in this case, social media, algorithms, what's happening with

01:19:51.780 AI is shape shifting where we are?

01:19:55.240 And how concerned are you about that moving into 2026, 27, 28?

01:19:59.400 Huge.

01:20:00.100 Yeah.

01:20:00.500 Huge.

01:20:00.900 I mean, the social media thing has made us so covetous, right?

01:20:04.400 Materialistic, in a way, right?

01:20:05.680 Yeah, I love that.

01:20:05.980 That's a brown word.

01:20:08.940 960, I don't know.

01:20:09.920 You know what it means, though?

01:20:10.780 No, I have to look it up.

01:20:11.320 Context clues?

01:20:11.740 Context clues?

01:20:11.920 I mean, well, I did read the Bible a few times, so my neighbor.

01:20:15.500 Wait till my book comes out.

01:20:15.860 So I get a version of that.

01:20:17.100 Thank you.

01:20:18.000 So.

01:20:18.320 By the way, Trump clearly hasn't, but that's another conversation.

01:20:21.700 I know, right?

01:20:22.060 He was like, turn to a page, anyway.

01:20:24.860 We've become so proud of it.

01:20:26.140 By the way, my Newsom Bible also sold out on the Patriot site.

01:20:30.220 So if people are looking to purchase that on the Patriot site, it unfortunately currently

01:20:35.460 is sold out.

01:20:36.960 The knee pads are back.

01:20:38.140 They were sold out just like the universities, just like our law firms, just like so many

01:20:42.720 corporate leaders had as well.

01:20:43.880 This is a very good ad roll.

01:20:45.600 Like you are a natural podcaster.

01:20:46.360 I was just trying to go back.

01:20:47.660 No, I mean, I just, this was not, this was brought to you by.

01:20:50.420 We weren't breaking in.

01:20:51.760 It felt like a very natural, like very seamless ad roll.

01:20:54.800 Do you read your own ads on the podcast?

01:20:56.060 Yes, I have to, yes.

01:20:57.260 I do like reading the ads.

01:20:58.300 I feel like it's the 1940s.

01:20:59.700 I'm like, well, listen, Sonny, you too could buy a being an American writer.

01:21:03.020 Hola, I'm Jorge Ramos.

01:21:04.660 This week on The Moment, we take a look at Venezuela's uncertain future in a conversation with

01:21:09.560 two people who have directly advised U.S. presidents.

01:21:12.340 Juan González during the Obama and Biden administrations.

01:21:16.040 We're really good at invading countries.

01:21:17.980 We're very bad at nation building.

01:21:20.100 And Carlos D. Rosillo during Trump's two terms.

01:21:22.780 I can guarantee you that nobody in the Trump administration likes Delcy Rodriguez.

01:21:27.120 Listen to The Moment with Jorge Ramos and Paola Ramos on the iHeartRadio app, Apple

01:21:30.780 Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

01:21:33.120 Hi, I'm Dr. Priyanka Wally.

01:21:34.800 And I'm Hurricane Dabogu.

01:21:36.020 It's a new year.

01:21:37.040 And on the podcast Health Stuff, we're resetting the way we talk about our health.

01:21:40.580 Which means being honest about what we know, what we don't know, and how messy it can all

01:21:44.960 be.

01:21:45.720 I like to sleep in late and sleep early.

01:21:49.260 Is there a chronotype for that or am I just depressed?

01:21:53.360 We talk to experts who share real experiences and insight.

01:21:58.120 You just really need to find where it is that you can have an impact in your own life and

01:22:02.240 just start doing that.

01:22:03.740 We break down the topics you want to know more about.

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01:22:12.080 We talk about all the ways to keep your body and mind, inside and out, healthy.

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01:22:25.660 Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

01:22:30.980 Are you desperately hoping for change in 2026, but feeling stuck?

01:22:36.520 Just spinning your wheels in old routines and bad habits?

01:22:40.080 I'm Dr. Laurie Santos, and in a New Year series of my show, The Happiness Lab, I'm going to

01:22:44.840 look at the science of getting, well, unstuck.

01:22:47.660 Unstuck at work, unstuck in your relationships, and even unstuck inside your mind.

01:22:52.480 I am the absolute worst culprit when it comes to getting into these ruminative loops and just

01:22:57.560 driving myself crazy.

01:22:58.500 We'll look at ways to reignite your sense of purpose, rediscover your values, and get

01:23:03.100 more creative.

01:23:04.080 We'll also explore how to design a life that feels more fulfilling.

01:23:07.380 It's sort of like the game of life.

01:23:08.780 I don't know if you ever played that game.

01:23:10.100 Oh my gosh, yes.

01:23:11.360 You take the car along, and you try and get money, and you try and get degrees, and you

01:23:15.000 try and get to the end where either you have a mansion or a ranch or a shack.

01:23:18.520 And once you get to retirement, you're done.

01:23:20.620 What about the whole path along the way?

01:23:24.120 So join me to get unstuck in 2026.

01:23:26.720 Listen to The Happiness Lab on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your

01:23:31.200 shows.

01:23:31.500 I'm Ed Zitron of the Better Offline Podcast, and I want you to join me at this year's

01:23:35.820 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada, starting January 6th through January 10th,

01:23:40.440 2026.

01:23:41.500 We're doing 10 radio-style podcast episodes about the world's biggest tech conference, and

01:23:45.860 we're going to dig into the latest and weirdest gadgets, gizmos, and horrible AI gear that

01:23:49.960 the tech industry is desperate to sell you, all while covering the biggest stories in Silicon

01:23:53.900 Valley as the AI bubble threatens to burst.

01:23:56.140 I'll be joined by David Roth, Chloe Radcliffe, Adam Conover, Cory Doctorow, Ed Ungueso Jr.,

01:24:02.340 Robert Evans, and an incredible cast of the greatest talent in the tech media, with over

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01:24:10.740 pop-up studio connected to its own open bar.

01:24:12.960 Today I did five hours of back-to-back panels on artificial intelligence.

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01:24:24.540 Will we make it out alive?

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01:24:39.460 Right now is a wild ride.

01:24:41.720 The headlines come fast, but what do they actually mean for people's lives?

01:24:46.100 I'm Alex Wagner, and on my new crooked media podcast, Runaway Country, I'm talking to people

01:24:51.240 across the nation to uncover how political chaos is shaping their everyday realities.

01:24:56.720 Join me and some of the smartest thinkers in politics to ask how we take back the reins

01:25:01.700 of a runaway nation.

01:25:03.520 Listen to Runaway Country with Alex Wagner every Thursday, wherever you get our podcasts,

01:25:08.160 or watch full episodes on YouTube.

01:25:11.700 Anyway.

01:25:12.500 So AI, social media.

01:25:13.900 Social media has made us, first of all, envious, covetous, angry that we don't have as much

01:25:18.460 as our neighbor, right?

01:25:19.360 It's like, I think it goes to this baseline, keeping up with the Joneses thing and puts

01:25:22.820 it on steroids, right?

01:25:23.840 It's like, well, all their kids have matching pajamas at Christmas. 0.99

01:25:26.720 Why the fuck don't I, you know? 0.98

01:25:27.860 On a basic, like, sort of jealousy level, that is bad. 0.98

01:25:30.720 And then when we don't have those things, and we don't have the life that people, you

01:25:34.100 know, show or the looks that people, like, you know, filter on social media, we become

01:25:40.780 lonely, we become unhappy, when we, when we are feeling like conversation could be too

01:25:46.320 awkward, or we don't want to go out and try out for the sports team, or we don't want

01:25:49.080 to fucking go all the way to our neighbor's house, we find our community online with people 0.88

01:25:52.520 that are disconnected from us and don't actually have our true selves at their heart. 0.98

01:25:57.380 You know, I think we've really lost each other.

01:26:00.560 We've really lost each other because of social media.

01:26:02.880 Someone asked me the other day, if you could get rid of the internet, would you? 0.99

01:26:05.660 And I said, yeah, fucking 100%. 0.99

01:26:06.820 The internet, period. 0.99

01:26:07.740 Period.

01:26:08.080 No more.

01:26:08.360 If you had to choose, Sophie's Choice, internet, no internet.

01:26:10.360 I'd say no internet.

01:26:11.360 Things were slower.

01:26:12.480 Things are faster.

01:26:13.460 Things are more mindless.

01:26:15.080 Everything is negotiable or manipulative.

01:26:18.740 What is it?

01:26:19.620 Malleable.

01:26:20.260 I mean, I just feel like we live in dangerously isolating times.

01:26:23.620 And we haven't, and I gotta say, man, I've buried my head in the sand with regards to

01:26:27.880 AI.

01:26:28.340 It's too much for my pea brain to handle.

01:26:30.300 I was like, around for 9-11. 0.99

01:26:32.640 I was like, oh, this is the fucked up thing that's going to happen to me in my, this is my 0.95

01:26:35.600 Pearl Harbor. 0.97

01:26:36.220 Turns out wrong. 0.99

01:26:37.000 Like, it's the whole fucking cascade of shit that's happened in the first quarter of the 0.99

01:26:40.640 21st century. 0.99

01:26:42.100 But AI is going to make it all worse.

01:26:44.780 You know, the search for authenticity and true connection and community gets infinitely 0.99

01:26:50.300 harder when you can marry an AI chatbot and like live in a fucking cone of silence buying 0.98

01:26:55.640 things online and educating yourself about the world through a screen. 0.99

01:26:59.620 This is not good.

01:27:01.100 I mean, you know, there are discreet ways we can combat it, but I think what we need

01:27:05.560 are real thought leaders and real, like, you know, social shifts to move us away from

01:27:11.040 this.

01:27:11.260 With my kids, I'm terrified at them looking at the screen too much.

01:27:14.640 How old are your kids?

01:27:15.560 Seven and, no.

01:27:17.840 Why are you laughing?

01:27:19.540 They're just props.

01:27:20.380 They don't really exist.

01:27:20.960 Did you?

01:27:21.160 Right.

01:27:21.700 I can't believe I said the wrong.

01:27:23.060 Well, no, that's not being edited, by the way.

01:27:24.920 We're sending it to your kids, actually.

01:27:26.520 They'll be like, you don't love us.

01:27:28.940 Yeah.

01:27:29.780 Unbelievable.

01:27:30.420 Yeah.

01:27:30.620 She's living in California lying there.

01:27:32.020 Do you have their names?

01:27:32.860 Six and eight.

01:27:33.580 They're six and eight.

01:27:34.500 No one in the family is seven.

01:27:36.100 I picked a number that no one is.

01:27:37.720 Jeez.

01:27:38.220 Six and eight.

01:27:38.600 They're six and eight and they're boys.

01:27:40.280 Oh.

01:27:40.860 And so.

01:27:41.500 Boys.

01:27:41.980 And that's a unique.

01:27:43.040 Oh, it's a unique kettle of fish.

01:27:43.520 That's a whole another we can then spend.

01:27:45.480 We've spent many hours on this podcast on this particular topic.

01:27:48.260 Talking about boys and loneliness.

01:27:49.380 Boys and men and loneliness.

01:27:50.440 Yeah.

01:27:50.700 And technology.

01:27:52.080 But what, I mean, should we ban?

01:27:53.460 I mean, we ban in school.

01:27:54.680 We're one of the first big states to ban cell phones in schools.

01:27:58.000 But again, these, you said the word discreet ways, which suggests and implies by definition

01:28:04.080 a hardly consequential.

01:28:05.640 Well, I don't know.

01:28:06.740 I mean, I guess I was thinking.

01:28:07.560 What about banning under the age of 16 like Australia did?

01:28:10.000 I mean, I guess.

01:28:11.080 I think yes, maybe.

01:28:13.360 Like, I don't think that that's going to fundamentally solve the problem because people's entire social

01:28:17.560 habits have changed around phones.

01:28:19.540 And it is going to be very hard to pry that from a certain generation.

01:28:23.500 Like, what you need to do.

01:28:25.480 I mean, I think it's like begins almost in utero.

01:28:27.900 It's like you have to start making decisions real early with these kids.

01:28:30.440 And I think the thing we need to do, both as, you know, journalists or politicians or children 0.98

01:28:35.100 of this country, is to get the fuck outside. 0.96

01:28:38.200 Like, people need to physically move their bodies outside of the door. 0.99

01:28:42.660 My kids are now enrolled in like every single sport.

01:28:45.260 I have no time in the evening because I just push them into sports.

01:28:49.280 And we as human beings need to go out for cocktails and have more sex and do things with

01:28:54.060 other human bodies.

01:28:54.960 It sounds so elemental, but it is.

01:28:58.500 One of and every two boys has not asked a woman out in person.

01:29:01.500 They don't even know how.

01:29:02.360 It's so.

01:29:03.340 One out of seven don't even have a close friend.

01:29:05.440 I mean, it's, I mean, literally a friend, one friend.

01:29:08.780 The human body needs to move outside and deal with other human bodies.

01:29:12.100 I mean, literally, it is the most evolutionary, basic homo, homo, sapien, sapien, homo, homo,

01:29:16.900 sapien.

01:29:17.220 I don't remember.

01:29:17.600 Whichever one it is.

01:29:18.340 I mean, if you went to Harvard, you would.

01:29:20.020 Yeah, I wouldn't know.

01:29:20.680 Yes.

01:29:21.040 Like Lawrence O'Donnell.

01:29:22.460 Jeez, okay, with the whole lineup there.

01:29:24.100 Yeah, totally.

01:29:24.600 Maybe that's the issue.

01:29:25.880 That's, well, not this one.

01:29:27.740 No, this kid's not in the lineup anymore.

01:29:29.040 I gotta tell you, where did Rachel go?

01:29:30.180 Where is she?

01:29:32.860 Oh, interesting.

01:29:34.200 I'm just saying.

01:29:34.540 I don't know.

01:29:36.120 Wow.

01:29:36.620 Hogwarts?

01:29:38.640 She's a wizard. 0.99

01:29:39.480 I don't fucking know. 0.99

01:29:40.400 Wow. 0.98

01:29:40.700 That's good.

01:29:41.320 I mean, I appreciate the brag there.

01:29:43.000 I feel like she went to a University of California school or Yale.

01:29:47.180 Or Yale.

01:29:48.940 That's where all the smartest people are.

01:29:49.960 We haven't.

01:29:50.660 We've established Brown Harvard.

01:29:52.100 We just haven't thrown in the Yale here.

01:29:53.020 Oh my God, this is such a gross conversation.

01:29:54.740 Can we please cut it for the podcast?

01:29:56.040 It's unbelievable.

01:29:56.900 But anyway, like literally people are just, I think we may be sometimes overcomplicated.

01:30:01.920 I literally think it begins with take your flesh and bones and move them outside the door.

01:30:07.840 There's not a parent out there that's not just shaking their head, of course, going absolutely.

01:30:11.640 But even as adults.

01:30:12.560 And it's a great struggle.

01:30:13.120 And here's the problem.

01:30:13.880 Even as adults, we need to do that.

01:30:15.400 Here's the adults.

01:30:16.220 They're sitting there on their phone saying, hey, honey, take the phone away.

01:30:19.260 You should go outside.

01:30:20.220 Yeah.

01:30:20.440 Honey.

01:30:20.860 Exactly.

01:30:21.640 No.

01:30:22.020 Honey.

01:30:22.620 Honey.

01:30:23.220 I said, go, go, go outside.

01:30:26.160 I mean.

01:30:27.080 And they say that is.

01:30:28.340 Trying to model some good behavior.

01:30:29.660 That's right.

01:30:30.020 The modeling is everything. 0.99

01:30:31.040 But human beings, guys need to go out and fucking have a beer with their friends. 0.99

01:30:35.860 Girls need to. 1.00

01:30:35.980 You sound like Scott Galloway.

01:30:37.360 It's like he's just promoting drinking.

01:30:39.440 I mean, what are you saying?

01:30:40.140 Like, get to the bar.

01:30:41.500 I mean, just drink. 0.99

01:30:43.040 And then, like, if that's the cost-benefit analysis, I'll take this fucking downside. 0.97

01:30:46.620 It's interesting. 0.97

01:30:46.700 You have a similar.

01:30:48.220 Well, me and Scott Galloway.

01:30:49.440 So are you worried about sort of this nihilism that's sort of creeping in?

01:30:53.480 You've got the first generation in the history of this country. 0.52

01:30:55.760 First ever.

01:30:56.840 30-year-olds not doing better than their parents.

01:30:58.540 I mean, that's code red.

01:30:59.380 And this is why Bernie was.

01:31:00.840 I mean, this is interesting.

01:31:02.040 Trump picked up this populist frame from one side of the other side of the coin.

01:31:05.180 You've got the Bernie frame, which is saying this economy is not nourishing.

01:31:09.580 We are not providing family-supporting jobs.

01:31:11.940 The imbalance of the rich and poor is at historic levels.

01:31:14.700 10% of people on two-thirds of wealth.

01:31:16.440 Those 10% are 50% of our consumer spending.

01:31:19.300 You look at the markets.

01:31:20.340 It's not the S&P 500.

01:31:21.880 It's really S&P 7, of which really one or two stocks that are 15%, 16% of that total.

01:31:28.020 NVIDIA in particular.

01:31:29.180 Then maybe Apple, half that at probably 7% of the S&P's improvement.

01:31:32.960 16%, 15%, 16% of NVIDIA.

01:31:35.260 But the point being, this is not sustainable.

01:31:38.800 No.

01:31:39.600 So do you subscribe?

01:31:42.120 I mean, do you then, I imagine you do.

01:31:44.320 It's sort of, the question's not even a question.

01:31:47.060 It's more of a statement or it's more just an affirmation, perhaps, of a deeper understanding

01:31:51.480 of why these young kids feel like, what the hell's the point?

01:31:55.180 Well, yeah.

01:31:55.580 I mean, we're destroying the earth.

01:31:56.980 We're destroying the economy.

01:31:57.920 We're destroying the democracy.

01:31:58.960 We've been very, very destructive years of our stewardship of this country.

01:32:02.400 Do you feel you're more negative the last few years than you've been the prior five,

01:32:07.260 six, seven years?

01:32:08.160 I'm not.

01:32:08.660 You know why?

01:32:09.600 I take this from one of my friends who said, we're so lucky to be alive when the stakes

01:32:14.660 are so high and to put ourselves-

01:32:16.420 Oh, I love that.

01:32:17.120 ... in positions where we can actually try and change the math.

01:32:20.280 I feel like that is, Governor.

01:32:21.700 What a gift. 1.00

01:32:22.920 What a fucking extraordinary gift. 0.99

01:32:23.220 Instead of screaming and yelling at you, listening to your podcast or watching Lawrence and just 0.99

01:32:27.940 wanting to, you know, having a feeling like I can do something about it.

01:32:31.500 What a gift.

01:32:31.820 I mean-

01:32:32.020 Everyone can do something about it.

01:32:33.500 Yeah.

01:32:33.680 No Kings rally.

01:32:34.420 We all have-

01:32:34.760 People showed up.

01:32:35.460 Yes, people have skin in the game. 0.83

01:32:36.640 People have agency.

01:32:37.000 We are alive.

01:32:38.020 You're not bystanders, people.

01:32:39.220 We are alive.

01:32:40.980 We are alive.

01:32:41.380 So I like this.

01:32:42.080 We need to stay in this space.

01:32:43.900 Yeah.

01:32:44.020 But is that because-

01:32:45.000 It all matters.

01:32:45.780 Was it your friend who said this and then that you sincerely said, I've shifted my mindset

01:32:50.060 or-

01:32:50.500 Kind of.

01:32:51.360 No, really. 0.98

01:32:51.900 I mean, I think you can be on, like, especially in news, you know, you just like fucking getting 0.99

01:32:56.680 beaten, bruised every day, right? 0.99

01:32:58.560 Every day. 0.99

01:32:59.020 And the game is to put on the fucking Band-Aids and get the hell back out there. 0.99

01:33:04.640 Like, this is what matters. 0.99

01:33:06.480 This is our, I mean, not to sound overly, you know, sort of churchy about it, but this

01:33:11.740 is like our time in the light.

01:33:13.060 Like, this is our shot, you know?

01:33:14.980 And you can go through it numb, feeling like a lot less, or you can, like, open yourself

01:33:20.800 up to the elements and surrender to the times in which you were born and, like, fight like

01:33:24.160 hell.

01:33:24.520 And there is no question that everything today has consequences.

01:33:28.280 And if you can be part of a consequence that turns us towards good and delightness and fairness

01:33:32.960 and equity, then, like, in whatever way, you know, whether it's just pushing your kid

01:33:37.600 out the door and making that kid have a better day and a better moment in his sunlight, or

01:33:41.800 whether it's actually doing things like policy and changing the course of the country, all 0.98

01:33:46.160 of it fucking matters.

01:33:46.940 And it is extraordinary to be in times when the expectations are so urgent and the work 0.96

01:33:54.740 is so important.

01:33:55.460 So I don't feel bad. 0.89

01:33:56.940 I genuinely think about it sometimes when I'm like, are you fucking kidding? 0.96

01:34:00.300 War with Venezuela? 0.98

01:34:01.700 Right?

01:34:02.100 But then you think, okay, what are we going to do to sort of make this story live in the

01:34:08.620 way that it should?

01:34:09.840 I mean, I could go to Colombia, Cuba.

01:34:12.040 We can talk about-

01:34:13.840 Greenland, baby.

01:34:14.480 We can talk about Greenland, baby.

01:34:17.180 Greenland, baby.

01:34:18.360 I think that's-

01:34:18.960 The kingdom of Denmark, one of the founding members of NATO.

01:34:21.580 We could talk about the end of NATO.

01:34:22.780 We could talk about Putin and Xi and how they're feeling about all these things that their permission

01:34:27.380 slept sore, or was it a tactical and brilliant move that weakens people like Putin because

01:34:33.500 he's envious.

01:34:34.240 He couldn't take Zelensky out in 30 minutes.

01:34:36.700 He couldn't deal with his proxies in Iran and Syria.

01:34:40.580 He couldn't have their back.

01:34:41.500 And maybe this destabilization has put all of them on notice.

01:34:44.940 I don't know, but we can get into all that.

01:34:46.520 But I want to stay in the positive because I want to focus-

01:34:49.980 Let's not.

01:34:50.240 Let's not.

01:34:50.480 Have Ben Rhodes on.

01:34:51.540 There's a lot.

01:34:52.120 Yeah, we'll have Ben to unpack all of these things.

01:34:55.400 So we'll bring in Jake Sullivan and some of our other friends.

01:35:00.200 We've had Hassan. 0.99

01:35:01.260 We've had Brenner.

01:35:02.160 Remember?

01:35:02.640 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:35:03.560 We've had our share.

01:35:04.700 We'll keep going.

01:35:05.280 Yes, please do.

01:35:05.580 I love all this stuff.

01:35:06.620 But I also love just the practical.

01:35:09.720 And I want to just end because you're being so positive and we all need.

01:35:13.440 It's the new year.

01:35:14.060 I've done it up.

01:35:15.060 It's in the spirit of Tony Robbins.

01:35:17.340 And Mel.

01:35:17.900 New year, new you.

01:35:20.060 Smart at the heart.

01:35:21.600 Smart at the heart.

01:35:22.440 You talked about heart.

01:35:23.420 It's very touchy-feely emotionally.

01:35:26.760 I feel like it's an emotionally.

01:35:27.920 It's a cuddly.

01:35:28.540 It's not cuddly.

01:35:29.580 There's plenty of curse words.

01:35:30.840 But it is a new year.

01:35:32.700 And don't go into it with your head hanging down low, right?

01:35:36.060 Man, come on.

01:35:37.260 No, of course not.

01:35:39.460 And it's a matter of choice.

01:35:40.760 It's whatever.

01:35:41.240 It is.

01:35:41.600 There's a truism in life.

01:35:43.100 Whatever you focus on, you find more of.

01:35:45.020 Whatever you focus on, you find more of.

01:35:47.920 And so start coloring in what's right in your life.

01:35:50.140 Color in what's right in terms of your relationships, what's right in terms of our politics.

01:35:54.000 And I think you'll find more of it.

01:35:55.860 And it's abundant.

01:35:56.800 I mean, so I think that's one of the ways of quite literally, not figuratively manifesting

01:36:01.560 a greater sense of optimism and hope.

01:36:04.480 And this notion that you have agency, that you can shape the future.

01:36:06.900 You're not a bystander.

01:36:08.720 We're not passive victims.

01:36:10.060 We have the ability to shape things.

01:36:11.160 And I think we did.

01:36:11.900 And let me end on this.

01:36:13.100 We did in 2025.

01:36:14.500 I think we ended on 2025 very powerfully.

01:36:16.980 You saw that in terms of the ascendancy of new voices, new leaders.

01:36:21.820 You know, one could quibble about your flavor of leadership.

01:36:24.820 But in places like New York, obviously, in New Jersey and Virginia, and then these smaller

01:36:30.460 races in Bucks County and places in Georgia.

01:36:32.820 And you saw this.

01:36:33.900 You've seen it.

01:36:34.460 And by the way, state houses.

01:36:35.540 One of the biggest stories.

01:36:36.760 Yes.

01:36:37.580 Is how we are dominating.

01:36:40.140 They got the memo.

01:36:41.020 In state center.

01:36:42.220 I'm old enough to remember.

01:36:44.120 Thank you.

01:36:44.540 When it was like, hey, guys, they have like 37 state houses.

01:36:47.800 Republicans have like a vast majority of state houses.

01:36:50.640 Where was I two years ago?

01:36:51.480 I was with you in the South talking precisely about this issue until the Democratic Party

01:36:56.520 focuses on that, which are state houses, and get off this guy and gal on the white horse 1.00

01:37:01.980 to come save the day.

01:37:02.780 Totally.

01:37:03.420 That our obsession with the next Obama, as opposed to obsessing about the hard work.

01:37:08.520 Yeah, it's grit, but it's also progress.

01:37:10.360 And we're seeing that progress now being promoted across the country because people are waking

01:37:14.540 up.

01:37:14.800 The No Kings rally.

01:37:15.600 People are waking up.

01:37:16.520 So in that spirit of optimism, we take back the house.

01:37:20.380 What is it?

01:37:20.700 Ding, bang, boom.

01:37:21.040 90% chance?

01:37:22.220 80% chance?

01:37:23.280 Oh, God.

01:37:24.120 I'm so bad at prognostication.

01:37:25.620 I think it's going to be.

01:37:26.400 Listen, it's going to be tight.

01:37:27.540 It's going to be hard.

01:37:28.260 You think so?

01:37:29.140 I don't know.

01:37:30.000 I just.

01:37:30.540 Well, I don't know.

01:37:31.460 You burst my bubble here.

01:37:32.580 I had a whole.

01:37:33.240 No, I think.

01:37:33.740 No, no, no.

01:37:33.960 A crescendo to end the show.

01:37:36.280 Now, now we.

01:37:37.980 Sorry, folks.

01:37:38.900 We may have to extend this a little bit.

01:37:40.740 No, I think they will take back the house.

01:37:43.060 I think Trump's mismanagement of literally everything is going to redound to his disadvantage.

01:37:48.000 Corruption.

01:37:49.400 And just the clear disinterest in the basic, basic reason he was sent back to office, which

01:37:56.380 was to make life more affordable for people.

01:37:58.180 And he's just doing everything in his power not to do that.

01:38:00.620 It is remarkable.

01:38:01.320 Uh, but and he's like falling asleep and like taking too many aspirin.

01:38:06.140 I mean, it's an adult old man.

01:38:07.520 The physical things are quite real.

01:38:09.440 Yeah.

01:38:10.020 Sleepy Don.

01:38:10.820 Sleepy Don.

01:38:11.380 So, so I, I do think, and I think that that is going to change the dynamic.

01:38:14.440 I think it will be a huge shot in the arm for the country to have a party in power that

01:38:20.200 is acting as a bulwark against the worst impulses of this administration that is going to make, 0.99

01:38:24.480 you know, Republicans vote on some of the hateful shit that they put out there and just 0.99

01:38:29.440 sort of like pretend didn't, didn't exist. 0.99

01:38:32.360 Um, and I just think it will be a real moment for Democrats to circle the wagons and decide 0.97

01:38:37.240 what they're really fucking all about. 0.95

01:38:38.800 And that needs to happen. 0.99

01:38:39.920 It's been too.

01:38:40.500 Meaning what is shape shifting, not just our opposition and being defined by the opposition,

01:38:44.440 but what's our positive alternative vision?

01:38:46.460 What is the vision for the country?

01:38:47.500 So I think it's going to be a huge year, you know, and I think there are going to be

01:38:49.780 a lot of twists and turns, but the, the democracy, the wound is still intact, you know?

01:38:54.580 And it's like, believe in it, be part of it, get out there, do the thing, you know?

01:38:59.080 Do the thing.

01:38:59.720 Well, you're doing the thing, the Swiss army knife in many ways.

01:39:03.800 You didn't like the house cat in the wild?

01:39:05.880 I loved it.

01:39:06.460 And it's the third time you've used it, which is unbelievable.

01:39:08.940 So it's trademarked now.

01:39:10.760 It's yours now.

01:39:11.480 It is, it's officially, no one, no one will dare, dare take.

01:39:16.400 I actually have a house cat who got out the other day and I was like, Francisco, Francisco,

01:39:20.460 come back.

01:39:21.400 Are you, you, you, I wouldn't even bring up J.D. Vance.

01:39:24.920 I could have gone there with the, you know.

01:39:27.100 The mogging? 0.79

01:39:28.300 Oh, what's the mogging? 0.99

01:39:29.180 Oh my God.

01:39:29.980 You need to know about this.

01:39:30.860 I don't know what mogging is.

01:39:31.940 It's a, it's basically a man's beauty, man's beauty.

01:39:34.480 It's an internet thing.

01:39:35.400 And the internet thinks that you're a way better mogger than he is.

01:39:40.580 So that means they don't think you're obese and they would vote for you more.

01:39:44.660 Oh, good.

01:39:45.140 I'm glad it's my 10 point affordability strategy.

01:39:47.780 Google it and you'll be happy.

01:39:49.520 I'll, I'll send you the.

01:39:50.280 Do you still say Google it?

01:39:51.600 Oh, I mean like, I still say we did it, Joe.

01:39:53.960 You said you were 30 years old earlier?

01:39:55.580 Was it 30 you said?

01:39:56.400 I mean, about to be 30.

01:39:57.540 Okay.

01:39:57.820 I was about to be 30.

01:39:58.740 I was just checking, but that would be right.

01:40:00.260 Yeah, I was born in 1995.

01:40:03.120 He's laughing.

01:40:04.400 Were you actually?

01:40:05.720 95?

01:40:06.420 Dude, I'm like almost 50.

01:40:08.720 Are you almost 50?

01:40:09.640 Yeah.

01:40:10.320 That's unbelievable.

01:40:11.260 Deep plane facelift.

01:40:12.580 All right.

01:40:13.100 What a way to end.

01:40:14.240 Alex Wagner, everybody.

01:40:16.940 Thanks for having me on.

01:40:17.980 Hola, I'm Jorge Ramos.

01:40:25.480 This week on The Moment, we take a look at Venezuela's uncertain future in a conversation with two

01:40:30.860 people who have directly advised U.S. presidents.

01:40:33.920 Juan González, you're in the Obama and Biden administrations.

01:40:37.160 We're really good at invading countries.

01:40:39.120 We're very bad at nation building.

01:40:41.200 And Carlos D. Rosillo, you're in Trump's two terms.

01:40:43.700 I can guarantee you that nobody in the Trump administration likes Delcey Rodriguez. 0.93

01:40:48.240 Listen to The Moment with Jorge Ramos and Paola Ramos on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

01:40:52.460 or wherever you get your podcasts.

01:40:54.240 Hi, I'm Dr. Priyanka Wally.

01:40:55.920 And I'm Hari Kondabolu.

01:40:57.120 It's a new year.

01:40:58.160 And on the podcast, Health Stuff, we're resetting the way we talk about our health.

01:41:01.760 Which means being honest about what we know, what we don't know, and how messy it can all

01:41:06.020 be.

01:41:06.220 I like to sleep in late and sleep early.

01:41:10.320 Is there a chronotype for that, or am I just depressed?

01:41:14.660 Health Stuff is about learning, laughing, and feeling a little less alone.

01:41:18.380 Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

01:41:24.260 Hi, I'm Ed Zitron, host of the Better Offline podcast.

01:41:27.500 And this January, we're going to go on the road to beautiful Las Vegas, Nevada to cover

01:41:31.280 the Consumer Electronics Show, Tech's biggest conference.

01:41:33.740 Better Offline CES coverage won't be the usual rundown of the hottest gadgets or biggest trends,

01:41:39.380 but an unvarnished look at what the tech industry plans to sell or do to you in 2025.

01:41:45.040 I'll be joined by David Roth at Defecta and the writer Edward Ongueso Jr.

01:41:49.040 With guest appearances from Behind the Bastards' Robert Evans, It Could Happen Here's Gair

01:41:52.620 Davis, and a few surprise guests throughout the show.

01:41:55.220 Listen to Better Offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever else you get

01:41:58.980 your podcasts from.

01:41:59.760 Hey, everybody.

01:42:04.200 It's Michelle Williams, host of Checking In on the Black Effect Podcast Network.

01:42:09.280 You know, we always say new year, new me, but real change starts on the inside.

01:42:13.580 It starts with giving your mind and your spirit the same attention you give your goals.

01:42:19.080 And on my podcast, we talk mental health, healing, growth, and everything you need to step

01:42:24.640 into your next season, whole and empowered.

01:42:28.260 New year, real you.

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This is Gavin Newsom - January 09, 2026

And, This Is How The Media Is Failing Us In 2026 With Alex Wagner

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