Earnings Call - VIVENDI

The Democrats have to learn to walk and chew gum. You gotta do two things at once. You're gonna have a Justice Department, hopefully, in 28, and it needs to go full tilt. You know who else thought we shouldn't focus on retribution? Merrick Garland. And what did that get us? Trump 2.0. Jennifer, first of all, congratulations. You gave birth to a book. I did, I did. How are you feeling? I feel really good about it. I feel like we need camaraderie in the resistance and some people tiptoe around things. And Katie, I'm not a wallflower. I'm Not a good tiptoer. And so the response has been great. I just finished tour and all of the shows were sold out and people were enthusiastic and ready to resist. Are you feeling good about the midterms? I have so much PTSD, as I think we all do, from 2016 and 2024. And so I look at the polls and I'm like, this is great. And then I saw a rally that the vice president did, and there were literally tens of people there. And I'm like, I love that for him so much. But then I remember in 24, Kamala's rallies were packed. Trump's were not very packed. The polls were tight. So I'm excited, but I'm very cautiously and very PTSD optimistic about it. Well, let's talk about you, enough about midterms and politics, although this is going to be a lot about politics. But you have such an interesting backstory, Jennifer. Tell everyone sort of about your upbringing. You're from Oklahoma and how you found yourself in the place you are today. sitting across from Katie Couric, who I grew up with, you know, we all have these people that have always been in our lives and you're one of those people. So it's very surreal. And I have so much gratitude that I'm even sitting here with you, who's been a part of my life forever. And now I'm a small little part of your life in your studio. So that aside, I was born in Dallas and my parents moved us to Oklahoma City when I was seven. And Oklahoma City is a very religious place, very Republican place. My parents were neither. They were neither religious nor Republican. I don't know that we used the word atheist in our home. I don'T think I really started using that word till later, but that's what we were and that's What we are. And so my life was a real split screen of, I would hang out with my friends. I was a cheerleader on the cheerleading squad and they were always concerned for my soul, you know, concerned like, Jennifer, have you been saved? And I'd say, from what? And they would say, have you accepted Jesus? And I'd be like, no. And then they'd tell me about these horrible things that were waiting for me because I hadn't done that in hell with demons and Satan and torture and all sorts of horrific things. So I'd race home to my mother and I'd say, mom, we've got to go to church. We're going to go to hell. We have to get saved. And she would just go, oh, for God's sakes, Jennifer. And should pull out an encyclopedia and would read about the Big Bang Theory or something. And so it was a real split screen where my friends, their worldview was very limited, very black and white. This is the approved script that you can believe in which you can live your life. And then I would go home and the sky's the limit. You can ask any question, we can research anything, we can talk about anything. But peer pressure is such a powerful thing. Did you ever feel, Jennifer, when you were a teenager, like, I just don't fit in? And did you feel like the odd girl out at all? All the time. And I tried. I really tried to fit in with their evangelical culture. They would have like prayers before the flagpole, at the flag pole before school. And my friends would invite me to their churches all the time, but I was introduced to it past the window of indoctrination, which is, you know, around five to seven. And I never really was able to buy into it. And, but I really did feel like the odd man out often, because I could tell they had a lot of camaraderie in their faith. And i didn't share that with them. And their sect of Christianity, where I grew up in the suburbs of Oklahoma City was very fundamentalist, like the Earth is 6,000 years old. Noah literally loaded the animals onto the boat. They believed that stuff to be 100% true. And I couldn't accept that. Tell us about your mom, because she seems like such an empathetic, open-minded person who helped you navigate this by showing you the Big Bang Theory or saying there's another way to think about these things. Yeah. So my mother is, she is a voracious reader. And she's 83 years old now, forever curious about everything. She wants to know as much information as possible at all times. Her best friends are books. And I think that comes from living a secular life in the Bible Belt. But she's really an incredible woman. She never bought into peer pressure ever. And when she was raised, she was raising a child, she raised a child raised by a woman that was very troubled, alcoholic, and probably had borderline personality disorder, my grandmother. And so when my mother was seven years old, she had lost a little purse. And her mother was like, Linda, where's your purse? Where's your curse? And she prayed, God, please help me find this purse. You know how mean my mother is. This is going to be terrible for me. And the purse never turned up. And she got it from her mother. And after that, my mother thought, there's just no way this is real, the religion aspect of it. And so from a very young age, she kind of turned away from religion in Dallas, Texas. And she said she would take the bus to the library all the time to read about, you know, existentialism and different religions. And so she kindof taught me that you should ask every question. And if somebody, if you're in, If your friends are in a group and they get offended because you criticize it, more than likely that group is probably a cult because most groups would welcome inquiry and would welcome criticism and wouldn't be offended by it. And so she really, on top of all of that, she was incredibly compassionate. So we had a trans hairdresser in the 80s, my mother and I, before it was an issue. Before even people knew that word. Yes. So we would go to see this hairdresser. And at the time, his name was Roland, very effeminate gay man. My mother just adored him. We would go get these wretched 1980s perms. You remember? Oh, yeah. Yeah. I never got one, but I remember. We did. And so my mother came to pick me up from school one day and she said, darling, I need to talk to you about something. And I said, what? And she said Roland is changing his gender. And now she will be a she and she will be going by Renee. And I said, Mom, why? Why is he doing that? That's so weird. And she goes, darling, I don't know why, but all I know is that nobody in their right mind would choose to do this in the middle of the Bible Belt. And we just need to be kind and embrace her and love her through this. And so that's the way that I was raised. Just my mother had this radical empathy and acceptance and a complete void of religion because a lot of us think that your morals come from religion. And in my house, it just came by doing the right thing, being radically empathetic towards people that are different. You make a lot of interesting observations, Jennifer, between the church, Christian nationalism, and the MAGA movement. You quote the Brown Political Review writing, in 2020, 49% of evangelicals who went to church once a week, believed that Donald Trump was anointed to be president by God. Explain the parallels you've made between people blindly following church doctrine and people blindly falling in love with Donald Trump. So this was something when Trump first got the evangelical support that didn't surprise me because my friends and my peers in Oklahoma were most comfortable in authoritarian settings. They had very authoritarian parents. Their churches were very authoritarian, and that sets the psychological soil for people to feel comfortable and familiar with an authoritarian government. Trump uses words, phrases like, I alone can fix this. You can't ask why can you fix it? How can you fixed it? You just have to have blind faith. And that was very familiar to me because when I would ask my friends, well, if God's so great and God's so loving, then why is he killing everybody on earth and only saving Noah? That doesn't seem like he's being very, you know, showing that much grace. Oh, well, you can't ask that. You know, you have to have blind faith. You just have to completely trust. And I see the similarities in that and in MAGA so clearly. On top of the fact, Katie, that Trump is just like a televangelist. He looks like one. He sounds like one, the swoopy hair, the slick ties, the promises, the bravado. This was very familiar to me when I would go to my friend's evangelical churches when they were trying to save me from eternal damnation. Who was he like? Like Jimmy Swaggart? Yeah, like that. I remember when I was in junior high, this friend of mine, her name was Shonda. She was on my cheerleading squad. And her mom, Shonda, and her mom said, okay, we're going to go to church and Jenny, you'll be able to get saved. And I was like, okay. So we pull up to 7-Eleven to get gas. And her name was Debbie, the mother. And she had a cup in the car full of coins and a $20 bill on top. And they were very working class family. My family was more upper middle class. And I remember her mother constantly struggling to pay for cheerleading camp or cheerleading uniforms, all the extras that you have to pay voor. And so she said, Shonda, you pump the gas. Jenny, you take the money in and pay $5 unleaded. Remember when it was unleaded and regular, right? Yes, yes. So I grabbed the $20, and I was going to run in and get changed. And Debbie goes, no, no. That's for the church. Count out the quarters for the gas, and that's it. And I remember thinking, these people, they're scraping by. Why on earth are they giving $20 to this church? Well, I figured out rather quickly, because after that, we pull up to a church on the south side of Oklahoma City called Crossroads Cathedral. It's a big, big, holy roller tongue-talking church. And it was terrifying. But before I even go in, Pastor Schaefer and his wife pull up in this white Rolls Royce. They get out of the car, and then he has on this, you know, slick suit. His wife kind of looked like Tammy Faye. We go inside, and it is just the stuff, for me, of nightmares. I mean, they were screaming. There were people running around talking in tongues, a lot of, you know, hellfire, damnation, Bible thumping type environment. And I went home. I was just like, Mom, she was like, I told you you were forbidden from going there, Jennifer. You know, that was that was my childhood. Mom, can I go to church? No, absolutely not. I don't want you to get indoctrinated, which I cannot tell you how in the backdrop of Oklahoma, how different that was. And so Trump to you, I'm fascinated by the fact that, you know, people like him, you grew up with people like Him. Not only the minister who rolled up in his Rolls Royce, right, and his Tammy Faye type wife, but other figures sort of in your life, or is it from like Jim Baker watching TV, just sort of, it really surrounded you at every turn, right? Yeah. What's familiar about it is a person who is kind of mediocre, not that impressive of a person. Trump's not that great of a speaker. He doesn't have really great ideas. Healthcare will be in two weeks. That was 9,000 weeks ago. But he's a great BS artist, right? Showman. Yeah, exactly. And that is a part of that evangelical culture. And this is even the more nefarious part of it. A lot of these men, my friend's parents, that were big church attendees, when I'd go spend the night at my girlfriend's house, the dads would be reading the Bible. But behind the scenes, we knew, as people know the secrets in a house, we knew that this one dad was tapping his secretary. And sometimes I'd go over to a different friend's house, and that mother would have a black eye. But the Bible was always centered, and there were these real dramatic prayers before dinner. But then you knew the dysfunction from there. And Trump is just like that. We know how dysfunctional he is. We know what he did on January 6th. We know that his supporters went to hang Mike Pence, but they sure center their faith as they're lying. You know, now we have a new press secretary. By the time this airs, she might not be the press secretary anymore. But Caroline Leavitt, she centers her Christian Christianity, which I call Christian signaling to say, you can believe everything I say because I'm on your team, even though we know those things are lies and we know these things are not true. Or we know that some of the churches that I would attend with my friends, we knew that the pastors had multiple affairs with people in the congregation. It was a known secret, but nobody talks about it. And that's so familiar about Trumpism. Deep down, these people know this man is so morally flawed. Then why? You know, this to me is the ultimate question. You grew up with so many people who are still Trump supporters, who are part of MAGA world. You know, there are so many people who think this is a five alarm fire, that he represents an existential threat to democracy. He's a clear and present danger. I mean, on and on. And yet the faith they have in Donald Trump is simply unshakable. They do not even want to pick up the phone and call the fire department. And I don't get it. Explain. I think if they were to unravel that, all of it is built on a house of cards. And if you were to take out one card, a lot of it would collapse. Donald Trump is exactly, if you look at his political career, he has had forgiveness without accountability. That key right there, forgiveness without accountability, is exactly at the heart of evangelical Christianity. These pastors do all of these things, or the husbands or the wives do things. Jesus, please forgive me. Pick up the rug, sweep it under, roll it back out. So to acknowledge that something with him is wrong, I think acknowledges something with their faith could potentially be wrong. And that's too difficult for them. That's one issue. Another issue is, and this is so important, the Republican Party brilliantly for decades enmeshed and embedded itself into churches in the South. into evangelical culture. To be a Republican in the South is to be a Christian. To be a Christian, most importantly, is to be a Republican. I remember driving by churches and the marquee would say, God wants you to vote for George Bush today. So there is no separation of church and state. And these people are angry about church and state. So they've bought into this. God uses imperfect vessels. And so and Trump's whole regime has played into that by all of the Christian signaling so much so that even Paula White, the White House spiritual advisor, has said to disobey Donald Trump is to disobey God. And there are messengers all the way down on a local level in churches that do that. So they have brilliantly said, if you disobey Donald Trump, you're not being favorable to God. It's blasphemous. And this started long before Donald Trump. The Republicans injected themselves into the church. And you very rarely meet somebody who would be an uber progressive Democrat that would also be an evangelical. There are some, but it's such a skinny, skinny minority. And as a result, they had propped up Christian nationalism as well. I know your friend Ruth Ben-Ghiat, who is an expert on fascism, helped you write the book. What did she say about the connection between hyper-religious people and fascism? Basically, that it takes the same mentality. It's not really about religion, and it's not Really so much about a way of politics, that it's a cult mentality. that the strong man is propped up, number one, by oligarchs and number two, by the cult of personality. And so if you think about this group of evangelical Christians, they're very easily co-opted. So you have, they've been co- opted by Vladimir Putin that he entered through the National Prayer Breakfast, the NRA, because when you think about, you know, AR-15s, you certainly think about Jesus Christ, right? Well, they have made guns and God, just like they have the Republican Party and Christianity, they have enmeshed those things together. And Jerry Falwell Jr. was so important in getting Trump elected because at first the evangelicals were like, no, you know, the Stormy Daniels, the Access Hollywood tape. But Jerry Falwill Jr., who was the president of Liberty University, who hired a pool boy to screw his wife while he watched in the corner, came out and said, we're going to support Trump. And then they all fell in line. And so you have to have the cult of personality. And this, in our country, the most co-opted group is this far right sect of evangelical Christians who turn out for Trump, like I think it's well over 80%. Even Franklin Graham, you know, I've been surprised because I had the privilege of meeting Billy Graham, you know, who served so many presidents, both Democrats and Republicans. I just can't believe Billy Graham would support someone like Donald Trump. And yet Franklin Graham seems to be in his corner. I think the payoff for them is this. I've thought about it a lot. There is a lot of anger in white evangelical America that there is a separation of church state. They want America to be a Christian nation. And so the bargain that they've made is, okay, he's flawed, but this is God being so masterful. He's given us this imperfect vessel. And that's a part of the whole magical thinking, suspension of critical thinking that is required in order to be an evangelical Christian. That then you, oh, this is all a part of the plan. And he is going to deliver the United States of America as a Christian nation. That's the bargain they've made, that he will be the person to dismantle the separation of church and state. And so far, a lot of the checklist on Project 2025 is ticking right along. And they ignore the other things. They ignore the corruption. They explore the fact that gas and groceries are skyrocketing. They ignore the fact that maybe we didn't have to get into a war. They ignore making his friends and family members rich off the back of the Oval Office. They don't care about any of that stuff. It's familiar, Katie. It's similar to them. Their own evangelical pastors. There's the largest church in the country is a place called Life Church. It's headquartered in Oklahoma City. pastor rides around on a private plane. He has, if you go onto the website, it's Venmo here, pay there, pay here. And he has this business model where he can open up all of these different churches where people tithe, tithe to tithe. And He lives this big life because He preaches this prosperity gospel, which is the pastor's wealthy. If you give to God, the pastor is wealthy. Wealth will trickle down. Who else says that? David Stockman. And then he refuted it, but okay. Yeah. And then the Republicans say that. So this is familiar. This type of broken promises from men is something that is so familiar to them. And they're also very familiar with ignoring the fact that one thing that Jesus Christ spoke out explicitly about was the accumulation of wealth. He didn't mince words. It'd be easy for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to make it into heaven. Yet this group have pastors that are worth hundreds of millions, if not billions of dollars. And that's where capitalism and the prosperity gospel and the Republican Party all intersect. So this is familiar to them. It's a sacrifice. We're sacrificing to pay higher gas prices. And this is where it gets really crazy, because they're also rapture preppers. And this war with Iran is a step in their mind to get closer to the return of Jesus Christ. And they believe that literally. And so as a result, they support this war. Yes. Let's talk about your podcast. You started it four years ago in 2022, your friend Angie. And yet four years later, I mean, you didn't set up to do a political podcast. What did you set out to be. So we set out the original podcast that still is Tuesdays and Thursdays, wherever you get your podcasts, is called I've Had It. And we started out, Biden was president, and we were like, you know, I've had it with these gender reveal parties. It's ridiculous. We're giving out trophies too soon. Now we're giving them out in utero, blah, blah. And it was cathartic. People liked it because it's hard, you now, living and sharing. It was basically a bitch fest. Totally. I've hat it with this. I'v had it wit that. Well, I, as you've gone through my biography here. I have always been a really political person. To be a blue dot in a red state, there's an onus on that that you really have to be engaged. Because if you're not, then the whole state's going to slide into Christian nationalist slop. So I've always spoken about politics. And when the election ramped up, I can't help myself. I mean, foot in the mouth syndrome right here. So, I start talking about politics and the more I spoke about politics, the more the podcast grew. Now, there were a lot of ladies that broke up immediately when I started speaking about politics. But then there was a rush in of people. And I think they found it comforting to see a woman that looked like me, that sounded like me. That came from Oklahoma City. Red State. Yeah. That was advocating for LGBTQ plus rights, that was advocating Black Lives Matter. I don't have a problem saying that. And it was like, I felt hopeful. I think, wow, if this woman who looks so MAG-coded thinks this way, is there a chance that we can get others to think this way? You call yourself or you write that you're not a journalist, but a lot of people have a hard time distinguishing journalists from commentators. So how do you see yourself fitting into that landscape? Journalists and journalism is the gold standard. It is important. we need it. And the work that journalists do has never been as important as it is right now. It's always been important, but right now they're so under attack. And to me, I am in awe of journalists. I need the work the journalists do in front of me to then comment on it. I can comment on it all day long. I'm a natural born, loose lips, sink ships, if you will. But journalism is completely different from what I do, in my opinion. I have a lot of things to say. I have a story that are produced, but I always want to lift up the importance of journalism. Do you think it's confusing for the average person, though, Jennifer, to discern what is opinion, what are facts? I mean, as somebody who's been in this business for more than 40 years, It's just crazy to me how much cacophony there is out there. And I think for somebody who isn't trained or isn't discerning, it is very easy to be influenced by people who have strong opinions, but really have opinions without portfolio, I like to say. Yeah, I think it's very difficult. I think Fox News is a prime example of the degrading, the degradation of journalism and opinion shows in general. That's why I always want to, you know, when we're doing a story on my other podcast, I Hip News, which are kind of daily news drops, give credit to a journalist that found it or to a news organization that broke the story. And I always put that on the screen as I'm telling it, because it's important that people know I'm not just saying this. This is backed up. This was the New York Times reported this or the Washington Post reported this. And there's still so many, even though our media is getting bought up, the journalists that work within those organizations are fighting the good fight. And they're, in my opinion, are truly on the front lines of resistance. And there are a lot of independent journalists who are doing the same thing, you know, who are working day in and day out. Now, they, I think, often have to really rely on legacy journalism because they need somebody out in the field, out on the front lines, gathering the facts and recording what's happening. And then they can interpret it and comment on it. But I find that there are lot of people doing good work as independent journalists. Oh, I completely agree. I can. There's so many great sources. And I think it's been fun to see, like Joy Reid and Don Lemon, people that were in Parnas. Yes. People that worked in, you know, the corporate structure now out in the wild doing their, their work. And I'm doing that. You are doing that, Katie Couric. Yeah. I think that this is where, tell me if you follow this, this is where my interior design job and my podcasting job kind of collide. We should mention that your profession is and still is. Interior design. Which is so funny to me. If you've noticed, we have gotten a lot less formal. And so in my interior designer job, I've noticed if it's a new home, used to the kitchen was kind of hidden from everything. and there was a formal living room. And now it's a big family room that opens up into a kitchen. And the way we live has become less formal. And the news used to be very buttoned up, very polished. And there was no message board to say, you know, hey, Katie Couric, I think you got this wrong, which is probably somewhat nice. But now, even the way people consume news is less formal, it's fine that Aaron Parnas is, the other day he was breaking news and he had his baby's foot in his hand as a microphone. He was like, breaking news, Donald Trump just da-da-da. And it was so great. I was like, I love that he's doing that. And so I think that we have become less formal. And there's a good side to that. The bad side tothat is we're also a little bit less civil in these spaces, too, as you see in the comment sections and all of those things. Right. That's true. You are in this book quite critical of the Democratic establishment in many ways, not today, fascists, is your manifesto about where you think Democrats went wrong. Because it's true, Republicans are very popular. The only group that's less popular than Republicans are Democrats, right? So give us a teaser about why you are so adamantly opposed to the Democratic Party, Democratic sort of more establishment candidates that we're seeing and sort of your take on that. Yeah. So I'm a Democrat and I still love the Democratic Party. I would like to see the Democratic party return to being the party of FDR, a time where the Democrats were enormously successful and delivered for the majority of American people. So successful that the Republicans changed the Constitution to make sure that there were only two terms. That's how successful and popular delivering for everyday Americans. But in fairness, weren't times so different than Jennifer? He was coming out of the Great Depression, World War II. I mean, there were a lot of things that created a setting for him to be emboldened to do the kinds of things he did that I don't think necessarily exist today, although maybe they do. Maybe you could say income inequality is the modern version of you know, what happened in the Depression? I think that the complacency in that question is the problem of where the Democrats' problem exists. We should govern like there is urgency for lower income families. It is obscene that somebody that works at Walmart and makes minimum wage and that's just all the job that they're able to do and that they don't have dignity with that. And then they go and get SNAP or, you know, food stamp benefits or Medicare or Medicaid. And then we are subsidizing these billionaires to not pay their workers enough. And then we're telling this worker that works at Walmart every day they're lazy and parasitic when the way I view it, isn't Walmart, I mean, can't they afford to pay their workers a little bit more? I mean there's five or six heirs, I don't know, but they all are on the Forbes 400 list individually. That's how rich they are. They have a net worth that could choke a bull and they're paying their workers just such an indecent, undignified wage. And it's so patronizing to treat workers that way. And the Democrats need to have an urgency about that, not coming out of a Great Depression, but because for millions of Americans, it is the Great Depression for them. And we need to be a party that, yeah, the consulting class and the politicians, It's not a great depression for them. But my God, I mean, my son played AAU basketball and we would travel all over the country and also into rural Oklahoma. And there's just so much poverty, so many people, so Many Forgotten Americans. And when you don't tend to them, then they can fall prey to a demagogue because neither party is delivering. And then some slick evangelical preacher guy comes through and is an anti-status quo. And then here we are. A big criticism is that you have is corporate dollars. You want to get the money out of politics. I think so many people agree with you. And yet Elon Musk has quietly funneled more than $276 million into Republican groups and a super PAC since the beginning of just July. So how can Democrats have a fighting chance if they can't fight fire with fire? And how do we reverse Citizens United, which to me was probably one of the worst decisions the Supreme Court ever made. Well, we know now that Democrats can win without taking corporate money. And we know that because of the mayor of the city that we're in right now. Zoran Mamdani took on establishment Democrats. He beat Cuomo twice. He took on all of the billionaires. He take on unprecedented and spends against him. And he won. And so the Democrats need to, since we're not going to get that kind of money, we need to make it so toxic that if a candidate is taking money like that and the lobbyists or whoever these dark money donors are, are running so many negative campaign ads against that it immediately is like, oh, this person is bought and paid for. And on my podcast, I'm a little bit more brash. I say they're prostitutes. And so we need to play, you know, triple offense on this and be very aggressive. And I think that we're seeing candidates that are breaking through that aren't spending the kind of money and or getting the kind of donations. They're more people powered. And it's definitely an uphill battle. But I think the second part of your question, when Democrats get in, one thing Trump has shown us in Trump 2.0 is you can take the accelerator and smash it all the way down to break things. And we need to do that to fix things. We can't incrementally just tiptoe to fix this. That's the big question I think that people are struggling with about the Democratic Party, right? Do you go more centrist or do you, what does Mark Zuckerberg say about move fast and break things, whatever, you know, although you probably wouldn't want to use him as a role model. But the New York Times-Santa poll from earlier this year found 52% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning respondents believe the party's 2028 presidential nominee has to bring the party back to the center. I think about this all the time because in my world, I meet Democrats who have very different views. My daughter, for example, who is 30, doesn't believe in that the Democratic Party should be more centrist. She believes, as many young people do, that what was before Trump wasn't working, that big, big institutional sort of policy changes need to happen. And then there are others who say 47% are swing voters, they're independents, right? And you can't do anything too radical or that's going to scare them off. And if you do something too centrist, it's going to make sort of more progressive people sit on their hands and not vote, right. So what do you think is going on with the Democratic Party? I know the answer to this question, by the way, so it's kind of rhetorical, but I struggle with it. So it's a very interesting question, but I think within its framing of the poll, it immediately capitulates to right-wing framing that, oh, God, these people are so crazy. It's so radical. Therefore, we have to move to the center. And this is still Republicans dictating what the center is, and they're moving the country more center right. But I would argue that there are enough Democratic centrists who believe that compromise isn't a dirty word, that they want to be more moderate, that a lot of the DSA is pulled back from some of these concepts, but they don't want to defund the police. They don't want to have open borders. There are things that are just too far left for them. And so I would argue with you that it's not just Republican framing. So I'm a very progressive Democrat, but I will say the the title, the branding defund the police was so stupid. It's probably one of the worst branded movements I've ever seen. I almost I write in the book about even using the word socialism instead of highly regulated capitalism, because the the Republican Party has done so much brand damage to social Democrats so that when the average voter hears that, I think the Democratic Party wouldn't have near the problem about this. Do we need to be center? Do we needs to be left? If we realized wanting health care for people is not radical. You sound like what Bernie Sanders said to me. Exactly. But wanting for people to earn a livable wage is not radical. Wanting to tax Elon Musk, who just since July can throw down three hundred million dollars for sport, wanting to tax him is not even remotely radical. And so I would be interested to see if the Democratic Party were to play offense for once instead of getting pigeonholed in like, oh, we're not radical, we'RE not radical and say and then play offense on it, say we are going to deliver these things. Call us radical, call us commies, call us whatever you want. But we're not the ones who are trying to capture all of the means of production and promising abundance and universal income for everybody like all the tech oligarchs are. Because sometimes I think the call is coming from inside the house with these accusations Republicans make. Maybe they do need marketing help, don't they? Yes, they need a lot. They need to brand a new way of looking at issues and problems and solutions without being pigeonholed in these packages. But they seem like they can't get out of their own way. Well, I think within the party right now, it's important. And I think there's a little bit of a civil war going on. And i think it's a good thing. I think you have corporate Democrats who are comfortable, who service, you know, the people some and they service these corporations some and that's their whole ethos. Fine. It's just simply not working. When corporations get too much power, look at what they do. They have gone to prop up Donald Trump. Imagine these companies that we all spend so much money with saw what we saw when Renee Good got shot three times in the face. Her murderer then called her a fucking bitch, walked off and was transferred to another place to do this, potentially other people. This is disqualifying. Just that one little story is disqualifying on so many fronts. And these companies know that this regime did all of that. Stephen Miller and all of these other people are involved in it. And they go to the White House every chance they can get. Who's fighting for the American people right now? It's egregious. And this is a time if the Democratic Party were to really do bold things and not, oh, you know, let's let's focus group. Are we centrist? Are we progressive? Be a fighter and fight for the most marginalized person in the community at all times with a sense of urgency. Do you think they'll get on the same page and that they'll be more cohesive in their messaging and their the policies they want to pursue? I think that we're in the beginning stages of the Democratic Party starting to shift back to a more people powered party. I think after Citizens United, we bought into the, well, they're taking money, we've got to take money. And I think that it's the beginning of the Democratic Party starting to become more progressive again, more FDR style. And it might take a couple of election cycles, but you brought up Bernie Sanders. And I always take a lot of comfort in the fact that when he's run for president, he never won. But he ran for president more than just him being president. He ran for president to inject ideas into the electorate and into the American psyche. Government's supposed to deliver for you. We're not supposed to deliver für these corporations. Yes, we're capitalists and we're going to do all of these things. But look at these other governments like in Scandinavia and how they operate. And it's been really beneficial that he has done that. At the same time, I remember seeing him at the Democratic National Convention. He looked like he'd been sucking on a lemon and did very little to really galvanize Bernie bros and other supporters behind Hillary Clinton. And look what we got. I don't think that was Bernie's fault, per se. I mean, Hillary, one could argue that Hillary didn't really. No, but I'm not saying it's his fault, but he wasn't very helpful. Let's just put it that way. I kind of I mean I kind of understand because the Democratic Party kind of screwed him over, didn't they, at the convention? I mean, she was the nominee. But there was a path for him. And I voted for Hillary. And I talk about this in the book. I voted för Hillary. I was with her. I still like Hillary Clinton. A lot of my more progressive listeners will be like, ah. But I appreciate that this woman is so accomplished and so intelligent. AndI believe she's earnest in her love and devotion for the country. I believe that. But I do think that she's too much of an establishment candidate. I do. Now I think she is. I mean, and I voted for her at the signs. I went to her fundraiser. I have a picture with her. It's on my Instagram grid. I was a very good, obedient Democrat. I think that the centrist wing of the party, the establishment wing of the party is all about seniority. I Think that Bernie Sanders could have beaten Trump in 2016. in my home state, Katie, he won the primary, not Hillary. I was like, what? Bernie Sanders won? And it was because he was speaking to the same people that Trump was speaking too. There was a lot of overlap of grievance and people feeling left out of the system that both Trump and Bernie appealed to. But I want to say before we move on really quickly, a lot people on the left are very quick to wad up Hillary, Obama, or Kamala. And I don't think this is helpful. I don't. These people have fought, maybe not the way these super critical leftists would have fought for it, but they're in the game and they're trying. And I like the people on the far left having such high standards. I think it's good that we say, no, you can do better. You can do better. But there's a whole nostalgia about the electorate and what we feel about certain politicians. Like when I think about Obama, and I think about him in Chicago, when he won, the little girls, you know, come out in their little dresses. I remember it was like crew cuts from J. Crew. And I remember the faces in the audience. And it's easy to Monday morning quarterback and say, well, he should have done this, he shouldn't have done that. But he is a big source of pride for so many Americans. And, you know, he's campaigning with Abdul El-Sayed right now. And there's been criticism from the far left about that. I just don't think that's helpful. We need to have a big tent. And we are up against a mammoth machine, all the oligarchs, the Trump cult, Trump, etc. And so I I personally have moved further left, but I still have so much admiration for so many of the key players in the Democratic Party. You write about the importance in your book of targeting people who do not vote. And we looked and 63% of eligible voters voted in the 2024 presidential election. How can Democrats engage the 36% of Americans who do not vote, which I just find crazy? It's nuts, right? So let me tell you what it's like being a blue dot in a red state. And there are millions of them. If you are a blue dot in a red state, you immediately know how bad red policies are because you live in pretty much a supermajority, but you are very much forgotten voter. The Democratic Party abandoned a 50 state strategy. And so for years, Katie, I would vote on election day and have my Obama sign, my Hillary sign, My Kamala sign in my yard. I'd earnestly go vote. I'd get my I voted sticker. I'd go sit in front of the TV, MSNOW or CNN. Polls are closing. Oklahoma polls closed up and we have an announcement to make. Donald Trump has won Oklahoma. I'm like, can you not wait five minutes? Can you not make me think for just a second? And nobody you ever vote for wins in your state. The Democratic Party has to go in and play the long game in these states, in Oklahoma, all through the Bible Belt, Montana, Idaho. They need to have a presence and they need to invest in these states because so many people don't vote because the way our system is set up with the electoral college, you're told all the time your vote doesn't matter. My vote didn't matter in the state of Oklahoma. And the Democrats need to start putting in the work and telling all of the blue dots, you matter to us. And I dedicate my book to all of the blue dots and red states, because it's a very lonely existence. Nobody comes to visit you. You don't get to go to some shiny rally. You don't go, oh, this person's coming in town. This is going to be so exciting. They're just, they end up being Republican states where the Republicans out crazy each other. And you're just sitting there going, does anybody care about us here? And that's something the Democratic Party has to tap into. And every time I talk about this on my podcast, and now I'm talking about it on your podcast, the comment section will be flooded. I am a blue dot in a red state. Thank you. Because we're just completely forgotten about. And there's just so many people that have so many great ideas. And I want to say this, blue dots in red states are the toughest people the Democratic Party has because every day having your political opinions is an uphill barefoot walk in the snow. Every single day you're around it and you try to say, no, I don't think that's right. And these are the toughest fighters the Democratic Party has and the Democratic party needs to stop ignoring them. In your rejection of the status quo politicians, you also criticize, we've mentioned legacy media organizations. You said sometimes you read stories in the New York Times and the Washington Post, but you say they have been sanitizing their coverage and you're upset about that. Do you think that that is corporate fear of the Trump administration? Why do you think that's the case? You know, they started sanitizing it long before he has sicked his FCC on the news organizations. It's manufactured consent. You know what we just saw this week, Katie, is a man who went on a bender on his true social posting images of lions and tigers maiming human beings. And the footage is so graphic that even Elon Musk and X had to put, you know, like content warning. It wouldn't just automatically load. And then he goes to these rallies and just says all this crazy stuff about Hannibal Lecter. It's just a master class and sundowner hour. Right. It's Just he's not all there. And then I'll watch the news the next morning thinking, OK, they're really going to say this. We have a problem. they're going to have a psychiatrist on or, you know, somebody who who is an expert in this field to say this man is psychopath. He is, you Know, these things that he is saying. And they pick three or four sentences that he said. It's like Trump is sharpening his language on immigration tonight at the rally. And I'm just like, are you kidding me? He's talking about Hannibal Lecter, who is a fictional character. And, you KNOW, he has like he's like a three trick pony. You know, he's been doing the, I don't know if you've seen where, you know, he has, or then he talks about the batteries and the boats and the whales and then Hannibal Lecter. And this is like, this is a crazy person. If your mother or my mother was behaving that way, you take the car keys away from them and you're like, we've got to get this person in an assisted living center home immediately. And it's not only the media that does it, it's all of the people surrounding him that does it. And I was talking to my friend Ruth Ben-Ghiat, the expert on fascism. And you know how he takes those taxpayer-funded naps in the Oval? And she said, look at all the people around him. He's sitting there snoring, drool, and they're all just continuing to carry on. And everybody just manufactures consent for something that is unacceptable. If you fell asleep right now during this podcast. And while I'm droning on and one of my answers, you're producers. And I'd be like, Katie, hello. Nobody does that. We can't make this normal. We can't lower the bar this low. It's funny because when that Eric Schmidt, right, the congressman tried to get Jack Smith with that gotcha moment and went through this whole elaborate thing about being at a basketball game and all that stuff and was basically made a fool of on Capitol Hill, it wasn't even in the evening newscasts. But they only have, in fairness, they have 22 minutes as somebody who anchored one of those shows. And it's not really enough time to really get into that. And I think that the Steve Bannon philosophy of flooding the zone Yeah. Has been incredibly effective in overwhelming people with so much content, so much outrage. You don't really even know what to respond to anymore. And I think that is part of the plan. Right. Look here. Look there. Forget that, you know, televised execution. Wait, we're going to do this now. We're giving five thousand dollars if you vote Republican. I mean, it's just like your head is about to explode. Right. And and I think I think the media diet is really a problem in terms of either kind of giving people affirmation instead of information. But also just it's so damn confusing for people. I don't know what the answer is. You know, when I think back to 2016, when he first started doing his rallies, I was probably I would have never voted for him. But his speeches were wildly entertaining at the time. He was he was going after all the Republicans, like calling Ted Cruz, lying Ted Cruz. You know. Little Marco. Little Marco, you know, now they're all complete sycophants. But we valued entertainment over decorum. and even i would go watch and what's he doing today what's going on now uh where we we value put like a podium while it's just a podium on live tv waiting in anticipation for his appearances right and and would let him go on just without any critical analysis afterwards i mean yeah he was very good for ratings. Yes. And so again, we end up valuing always money over what's right money over human beings. And you see that manifest in so many different ways. And all of us to some extent have been a part of that problem. And I'm hopeful that this has just been such a bottom and it's so low that we can have such a big turnout and we can see our country kind of light up blue. Just so people feel like, oh, okay, we're decent. I was going to say, I think, make America decent again. Yes. Make America civil again. Yeah. I want that. Make American normal again. I mean, that's, you know, Mata. Mana. Mana, yeah. Mana Mata, and what else did I say? Oh, mana. Yeah, mana, maca and whatever. Yeah. I know that I just finished some stops on my book tour. And I think that there's a desire to feel human connection in person of this resistance. You know, it's you feel it sometimes online. But the sad thing is all of us spend less time with other people now because of our smartphones. You Know, I can sit down on my phone and I'm down some Instagram bender and I look down, I'm like, oh my God, I've been on this for an hour. And I think, God, that is so bad. Preach, sister. That's me. In my case, it's two hours. Yeah. Or you see like, Oh, they're cute. They got married. And then I hit the tag and I, some stranger I'm never going to meet. AndI'm 400 weeks deep into their Instagram feed. It's crazy. Right. And, and I never feel that great after that, but you know what, after sitting down here with you today, connecting with people is so important. And so we see this rise of this technology, AI, which is going to make our connecting with each other even less than the smartphones already have. And you see bipartisan recoiling to data centers, to AI. And I hope that we have leaders rise up in the midterms and after for 28 that talk about the importance of human connection. And I can only just give you anecdotal evidence. I feel like I need a Silkwood shower after I've done a two-hour Instagram bender, right? But if I go out with some friends for an early dinner, because I like an early bedtime, and we giggle and laugh and hug before and hug after, I feel a million bucks. And so I hope that we can in these spaces too, as you're watching this on your space, remember the importance of connecting with people, Because if you talk to a psychologist, if you listen to any TED Talk. I'm doing a series on longevity. I just interviewed somebody on the importance of community. Yes. And it's not just because it's a nice to do. It's need to do and have to do for your own physical and mental health. It's as good as exercise. Yeah. Yeah. It's As Important as Exercise. And so that's one thing I've loved about living in New York so much because we're connected. I mean, you have to walk down the street. you have to cooperate with a lot of people. And so I hope that this is where the politics of what's happening right now, if they win the midterms, it gets even darker because of the plans of these billionaires. Their plans with AI are just so dystopian and so terrifying. And they are using Trump to be able to execute those plans. And it's really dangerous for all of us. We talked about the Democratic Party. If there was one thing the Democratic party could do, and you offer, you're very prescriptive in your book, but if it's just one thing, what do you think it could be or should be? Like legislatively or just messaging? Both. So the messaging, I wish the Democrats would start going to smaller towns and rural places and saying you have been lied to. The Republican Party has used your faith and your love of country against you. They've weaponized it and they've lied to you. If you don't like your life, like let's say you live in rural Oklahoma, for the last 20 years, you've had a Republican supermajority. There's nobody to blame about what's going on in Oklahoma except for the Republican Party. And I wish they would be very blunt. You've been lied too. And they'll get boot out, but keep at it. Keep messaging that these people have been lied to about two things that they hold very dear, which is their faith and their pride in being an American, because there's not a lot of culture in these places. So they cling on to those two identities as a sense of community. Legislatively, I want, I mean, God, this is going to make me sound like a nut, but I really want the, I want us to become the party of law and order. I want the ICE agents, I want ICE abolished and I want those agents prosecuted. You do not get to go shoot somebody with their black lab and their back car and their wife standing there watching and then call them something horrible and walk away with impunity. And it needs to go all the way up to the top. Who ordered that? Who after that decided to call Rene Goethe terrorist? who is separating these kids from their parents. Remember that little Liam and he had that cute little beanie? This is the stuff of nightmares. Keeping them, warehousing them in subhuman conditions, we should add. Yeah, which Stephen Miller explicitly, it broke this week, that he explicitly said he wanted these warehouses to have the most inhumane conditions. Furthermore, When he deports people to countries that they have no affiliation with, he wants the countries to make sure that receive them that they don't, they're not treated humanely. The cruelty is the point. And we have to stamp that out. We didn't, Merrick Garland dropped the ball on January 6th. And I want a Democratic Party that comes back and forcefully repudiates these egregious human rights violations that have happened, that we've watched. And it's not about me. These people that have that have suffered, we have to fight for them. Having said that, I think there is a fine line between retribution and accountability. Right. Because I think that I mean, I can't speak for Americans. But I imagine that many people are not looking forward to sort of a retribution tour if the Democrats take power. Perhaps they want accountability, but I think they hunger for policies that are going to help them at their kitchen tables and at the gas station and give them a sense that they have the possibility of upward mobility. So I worry that too much retribution is not healthy either. I think retribution is us being the party, the Democrats being the Party of Law and Order. These crimes, I believe, are crimes like killing fishermen in the coast of Venezuela, the schoolgirls, the corruption, the stealing of all of the money that's going on right now, the stuff that's Going on behind the scenes that I think we just know the tip of the iceberg with Putin and the gas deal and all of this stuff. The Democrats have to learn to walk and chew gum. You got to do two things at once. You're going to have a Justice Department, hopefully in 28, and it needs to go full tilt. And you know who else thought we shouldn't focus on retribution? Merrick Garland. And what did that get us? Trump 2.0. And so we're going to have to do hard things and we're gonna have to buckle up buttercups because you're gonna to deliver for the American people and try these fascist criminals. You can't just walk away from all of the stuff that has happened and there not be accountability at legal. And I mean this through all legal means. I don't mean, you know, going rogue like Trump is right now with Ilhan Omar and Letitia James and all that crazy stuff. But it's going to have to be a balance, I guess, is my point. It can't all be in one bucket. I know. I just really like that bucket, Katie. You're out for revenge. My audience were all hyper fixated on that bucket because they didn't Merrick Garland dithered. He only went after the low level people on January 6th. It was Supreme Court Justice's wife that was a prime organizer. How did these people get their tickets? Who paid for their hotel rooms? Really rich fascists did. And we didn't go after them because, oh, the country doesn't want retribution. And that doesn't help us. We're going to have to do hard things after this. They're doing horrible things. And мы're goingto have to ду really hard things. And some of us are going to enjoy with our popcorn that other bucket. Jennifer Welch, so fun to talk to you. The book is Not Today Fascist. I'm going to read the second line, the lies that got us here and the truths that will reunite us.