Episode 913: Ohio, We Have a Problem

0:00This message is brought to you by Basic Liberty, publisher of Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito's new book, So Ordered, an originalist view of the Constitution, the Court and our country in his book, Justice Alito reflects on the roles of the law, the Constitution, and the courts in preserving America's spirit of liberty while celebrating theplexity and brilliance of the American Constitution. Our own Ed Wayland says, So Ordered, Quote, displays the powerful intellect, deep knowledge, careful craftsmanship, and rye wit that have marked Justice Alito's two decades of stellar work on the Supreme Court. So Ordered is available now wherever books are sold by yours today. Is the Strait of Hormuz open and would Jesus support James Teleriko? We'll discuss all this more. On this edition of the Editors, I'm Rich Larray and I'm doing this always by the right

1:00animal Charles C. W. Cook, the Good Neighbor, now we're off then and the Sage of Authenticity Woods, Jim Garrity, you are of course listening to an actual podcast. Our sponsor is this episode, or Don't Trust, Ver, and the How the World Works podcast, more about all them and do course. If some reason are not already following us on a streaming service by the way, you can find us everywhere from Spotify to Apple Podcasts. If you like what you hear here, please consider giving us a glowing 5 star view, where if you listen to your podcasts, if you don't like what you hear here, please forget. I said anything. So Jim Garrity, I've generally been bearish about the state of the Strait of Hormuz, but it does look as though through some ingenuity, thanks to Centcom, thanks to the Gulf States. We are getting out substantially more oil than we were at the low point of the war, probably not back up to pre-war levels. Somewhere short of that, but it's really taking away a lot of leverage from Iran. Iran has other

2:00cards potentially to play. Would there be risks to Iran to playing them, but it looks like the Strait isn't better shaped than I would have expected a couple months ago. Yeah, and this comes after the Houthis in Yemen had gained a lot of territory along the coast, and would seem to be well positioned to threaten shipping through the other really important Strait connecting the Middle East and Indian Ocean to the Mediterranean and Europe. So that's kind of a really pleasant development. These sorts of things are kind of cumulative. You have week by week, month by month. Iran has a harder and harder time to get any of its oil out through illicit channels through the state of Hormuz. And Saudi Arabia is sending more out over the pipe lines. They're sending more out over land routes and stuff like that. And also because of USS courts, more ships are getting through the Strait of Hormuz. This is really good news. This is really welcome news. I think if you're a Republican looking at re-election this year, and we'll

3:01talk more about this in this podcast, there might be a part of you that's like, this is great. Wait a minute. We've probably had the ability to do this kind of heavy pressure of basically doing whatever it took to get the ships through safely in defiance of Russian drone. Sorry, you see where my mind is in defiance of Iranian drones or Iranian rockets, things like that. It was obviously going to take some amount of time to get these overland routes and pipelines and other alternative routes going. But you'd also the ability to completely shut off Iran's ability to illicitly ship out its oil mostly to China over the last year or so. Like all of this, the US had the ability to do this. It was just a matter of how much time the Iranian regime was going to be able to hold out. I believe as of this morning, it's like 2.5 million Iranian, you know, or whatever it is to a US dollar. The currency is worthless. It was kind of guaranteed to be the outcome of a war. But the problem is, along the way, we've got, you know, 450

4:04and national average for gasoline here in the United States and 650 a gallon for diesel. And it's had terrible consequences for the economy and the US electorate is really, really peered and Republicans are probably going to pay the price for it in the midterms. So there's a party that's like, why do we have the Vice President and Kushner and Kutner are, you know, all going to Pakistan and going through all of these endless talks and, you know, the other problem with good news coming out of this administration is that the Trump President has announced on true social with metronomic regularity that the state of Hormuz was open and then we find out a couple, you know, then they'd shoot some drone at some ship and we've become very clear. Well, no, the straight isn't really open and the Iranians weren't really keeping their words. So it is really good to see. But there's also this frustrating sense of we probably could have gotten to a point somewhere like this two, three months ago. If we hadn't spent an enormous amount of time negotiating with the world's most duplicitous and untrustworthy regime. Well, this kind of a classic American pattern where we

5:10blunder at the outset and then find our footing. But the problem politically is that people don't really care one way or the other way. The straight-of-hormuz is open. That's an extreme abstraction. Most people, they care what the price of gas and diesel is and that's still elevated because we're still off of pre-war levels. But no, this does give the administration, as I mentioned earlier, more leverage. So Iran is offering various deals. There was one couple days ago that the, I think, for a seven-day ceasefire for negotiations that the administration rejected. So it seems more likely now that that the administration would turn aside an MOU type agreement and would instead go hunting for something better. Right. The foreign minister, Abbas Argachi, is attempting to revive the June memorandum of understanding. Likewise, President Persiax can tell CBS now they'd allow the IAEA inspectors back into Iran. So the nuclear file, which was once completely off the table,

6:12according to the Iranian side, is now back on the table. They're not making these overtures because things are going great. And yes, Trump has rejected them. He should. The president now has something approaching. Escalatory dominance in the form, not in kinetic form, Iran maintains that. But in the form of our alternatives to war that we've been applying really aggressively since the collapse of the June MOU. The news that we're addressing is the Wall Street Journal's report, among other reports, that indicate that crude exports have rebounded to their highest level since the war began back in February, according to data tractors. We're about 75% of the pre-war average at this point, which is where we want to be, because we're deliberately excluding Iranian exports. We don't want Iranian outflows, which have dropped to almost zero. So we're not going to get to the pre-war average. We want to get to those close as we can possibly get absent Iranian exports. And that's consistent with what we were saying a few weeks ago. The indications were that the oil was getting out, that the United States was providing very concrete numbers on this. But those were ignored because the trackers, the private trackers,

7:16couldn't follow these outflows by definition, because the exports were not visible to trackers. These ships had their transponders off. They wouldn't show up in the inventories for a while, and now that they are showing up in inventories, folks are acknowledging the debris to which the blockade has been spectacularly successful. And the estimates are, according to Kepler, one of these trackers, that Iran's stockpiles, which had been husbanding since the blockade began, are set to run out by mid-October about two weeks. According to Scott Besant, they've got about a few more shipments that they can get to. China either be loading it onto other container ships, like Iraqi container ships, or overland routes. Still very difficult. But at that point, they'll be out 100% out. The RGC maintains a lot of levers. It's not completely out of options here. The Houthis were one of its final cards, but the Houthis and Iran had a complicated relationship. And it's action in this conflict that seems to be operating on its own timeline.

8:18It's mostly in regards to the Houthis' hostile relationship with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Yemen is becoming a huge test of Washington's belief that it's a combination of restraint and regional burden sharing can contain this conflict. It doesn't look like that's working out. But the Houthis' behavior since April suggests they do not want a direct conflict with the United States or Israel in their behavior in ways that are calibrated to avoid that outcome. Could Iran escalate beyond what it's already done? Yes. It could strike ports, refineries, pipelines on the region. There's a reason why it hasn't done that yet, though, despite our well-reported deficiencies of our interceptor arsenal, which should suggest to our adversaries that there's a window of vulnerability here that they should exploit. That would be a scorched Earth scenario, but basically cut off the RGC's own notes in terms of its regional relations, its integration with its neighbors, which it needs to evade sanctions. And the global energy market to which Iran is exposed even after the apocalyptic scenario that

9:18it's the RGC is probably envisioning right now, but doesn't want to pull the trigger on. As Jim said, Iran is in a really bad place. Its currency is valueless. Its exports have largely halted. Trade in the region has all been severed. It can't fly its planes out of the country. It can't fly its planes into the country. It's out of oil for export. The political classes basically revolt, Parageshkin, Aragachi. These people are revolting against the RGC position, which is escalate, escalate, escalate. And now we're saying protests break out again, which we have not seen since the slaughter of 40,000 in the streets earlier this year and late last year. There's videos of the besiege, this paramilitary element, threatening to put students in a sack, EG, a body bag, because they're protesting against the regime. But the protesters kept demonstrating. And there are reports of insurrectionary activity now in places like Baluchistan, which is in southern Iran, borders Pakistan, where at least one IRG commander was killed in fighting with rebels. All this, these are all green shoots for the United States. The war is not obviously over.

10:20It's far from one. But I have receipts, and I'm going to bring them later today about how this was talked about, like the streets, the Iran's control of the strait was de facto. It would exist in perpetuity. It had more leverage than even a deployable nuclear weapon. And now that they're losing that tool, we should revisit those takes and examine the consequences that would logically flow from the notion that if the straight of Iran was this trump card, this ultimate trump card, what losing it means. I'm not yet seen many reckon with that outcome. I think we probably have to at this point. So, Charlie, I've mentioned this before, but I think if you look at the military performance in this war and many respects, it's not great. Obviously our defense industrial base, it isn't what it should be, and that's proven to be a big problem. The Air Force is supposed to be eliminating these missiles, but a lot of them were buried, and we just didn't have the right stuff to knock out the bunkers that the missiles were in. The Army was responsible for drone and missile defense. And what's happened to our bases in the region is absolute national humiliation.

11:23And I've oftentimes used that phrase as well for the failure of the Fifth Fleet to keep the straight of our moves open, but to their credit, they've figured that out. Now, the reason why I'm not optimistic necessarily about the regime cracking, I hope it happens eventually, and eventually maybe it will, is at least so far the Iranians haven't lost any territory. I don't know what it was 2011, Assad lost major cities in Syria, and like never got them back. So we haven't seen any of that, at least not yet, and we haven't seen any defections from the regime at least not yet, which points to the likely scenario to your being some sort of deal that hopefully will be much more favorable than what we were talking about with the MOU, but what's your take? Well, yes, is my take, and much of what no outlines is welcome. The problem for the President and his party is that no one cares. No one cares. Who's talking about this? Except people who are plugged in.

12:29This is not a topic of conversation in the United States. It's not like after 9-11, where normal Americans were interested in Afghanistan and Iraq, Middle East, more generally. A lot of people don't even know the correlation between what we're discussing, the initial problems in and now perhaps fix in the state of four moves and gas prices. Well, just no gas prices have gone up. Much higher than they were. And then if they come down again, that will be seen as a restoration of the status quo anti, which will be welcome, but neutral, because there is no national investment in success in Iran, whatever that looks like.

13:33And I would go as far as saying, and I'm not making a normative judgment here, I'm making a political judgment, that even if tomorrow the Iranian regime fell, gas prices turned the clock back to $3. People would go, okay, not well fabulous. What a success by the President. That was worth it, but okay. I totally agree with that. From the beginning, I thought it's all about avoiding political downside rather than getting any outcome. The argument you have to make, and this is a reasonable position, as long as one is prepared to pay for it, the argument that one has to make is that this was ultimately an anti or non or extra

14:35democratic, small, the democratic action. That is to say, the President believed this to be so important that whatever consequences flowed were necessary. Now, I think that if you do take that position, you also have to fault the President and his party for having been semi-silent on the question, and having made no case whatsoever to the public that was comprehensible and widely approved of, but you can make that case. But I just think we have to set this conversation within that context, that for the average person, for better or for worse, all they see is the gas prices. And it would be a bit like if, and he paid a price anyway, in the early 1980s,

15:40Reagan had not said over and over and over again, yes, unemployment is high, yes, interest rates are high, this is because we have to finally beat inflation. If those things had just happened, those numbers were what people had seen. And then in the back rooms, people who were in the know said, well, of course, those two things have to happen because we've had persistent inflation for nearly 10 years, and this is the only way that we're going to get rid of it. Well, I don't think you'd have got the outpouring of relief and support by 1983 when it worked. So I am pleased to hear what Noah says. I just feel as if we're talking about this from the moon. That seems rather downbeat to me. I don't know if the American people are as parochial as you described them, Charlie, the notion that an implacable foe being vanquished after 50 years, we don't have to go back to the 80s to see what the American people are willing to endure. In 2022,

16:43they were willing to endure higher gas prices in order to combat Russian aggression and expansion even if the President himself was afraid of that, didn't mobilize support around that. In fact, tried to blame inflation on the Russian threat. We had no indications that the American people weren't willing to bear the cost of the defensive liberty. And in the Iranian, of course, the Iranian regime, this is a blood-soaked regime, a lot of American people remember, have a living memory of it. On so something. I agree there's a blood-soaked terrible regime, but there's very little input output here. September 11th, we all watched what happened, and then people said I want to go into Afghanistan and Iraq, both were popular, whatever people think. Now, in the 1980s, people could see in 1981 that inflation was a crisis. I agree with you that Iran is a terrible, terrible regime and is a threat and enemy of the United States and all of that, but Trump, although he has in some ways been rhetorically critical of

17:50Iran getting a nuclear weapon for his entire life, ran on the basis that there would be no more wars in the Middle East. So there's no input here. It was all of a sudden in the middle of the night, oh, we're doing this. There's no American outside of those who may have family members in the services who were directly or indirectly hurt by Iranians, which is a very small number. They matter, but they're very small. There's no Americans who in January were saying, my big thing is that whatever it takes, we just have to go and do what they're wrong. They want. I get that. We both agree that the president didn't get into this war with buy-in for me the Congress or the public and didn't even seek that, which is something to be con... There's a consternation there and I share it, but would the American public say, you know, the Iranian regime collapses? And then they say, well, I'm still against it because he didn't consult me. I didn't say they were against it. If the Iranian regime collapses,

18:51then this is a totally different story, but we are still a well away from that. And let's just point out, of course, never mind not going to Congress, never mind just kind of announcing this in the middle of the night at Mar-a-Lago with his hat on. Since this war started, has Trump given speeches about it? Yeah. Has he talked about it as much as say the White House ballroom or the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool or the Victory Arch? It's probably about the same. So if this doesn't seem like a real pressing priority to the president of the United States, why should the American people be more emotionally invested in the outcome of the conflict than he seems to be? Just to be even more... Say, one thing. Another thing. Dower. That was good. Say it. Go ahead. Just to be even more dower, I don't think that if the Iranian regime collapsed tomorrow, it would be totally different. I think Americans might be pleased about it in a vague sense, but I don't think that it would change the game politically. It would because presumably gas prices would go way down. No, fine.

19:53But then isolation would it affect his approval rating in a real measurable way? No, because you returned to the state of Pro-Anti and for that, you have got something that people vaguely want but don't feel invested in, I think it's a wash. I have to say, I've been surprised that there's been very little taco in this conflict. The MOU was basically a taco and he basically described it as a taco, as he was signing it. He wanted to be Herbert Hoover and gas prices were too high and the stock market wasn't going to go up and gas prices were going to collapse. But since then, it's just been just a real stick to itiveness. It may be that he realized it just wasn't any alternative because abandoning the straight-of-from-muse to the Iranians was going to be look terrible. We're strategically awful and also not necessarily to the collapse and gas prices that he wanted. But I think he genuinely thinks this is really consequential. He really wants it for his legacy.

20:54That's not necessarily the best motivation but not an unusual motivation in politics. Then also just doesn't want to be embarrassed. He's been willing, I'm going to bear the price. We're just going to see this through with gas prices above $4 a gallon. Well, yeah. There's definitely some of that. The president deserves credit for sticking to a policy that he initiated and obviously couldn't get out of cleanly. But I can't give him all the credit because the Iranian regime has snatched defeat from the draws of victory at every other turn. They would have kept quiet if they'd have made some semblance of a show that they were going to abide by the terms of the MOU which gave a RAM 90-day window to not charge tolls in the straight and allow traffic to go through the straight. If it had done so after that 90-day window, it could do whatever it wanted with the straight. It would have been a huge strategic blunder from the American perspective. But they didn't do that. They couldn't do that. They charged tolls. They fired on ships in the straight. Meanwhile, the United States was infiltrating the assets that

21:59it needed to impose this blockade which it should have done in the outset. There's plenty of reasons to criticize this administration's approach to the war. I don't know anybody who even supports the war who appreciated how it was conducted after April 8th. Irrespective, the green shoots that we're seeing now are the sort of thing that the Iranians brought on themselves. The Islamic Republic brought on itself. You've got to give them credit for being as millenarian as they actually are. Some of these elements just really want the final conflict with the United States and I think they're going to get it. And guess what? They just might. So Jim Garrity, if there's a Republican shalacking in the mid-chirns, we're going to talk about that more next segment. Let's just take it as a given. How big a role will the Iran war? And it's various effects, most importantly on fuel prices, have played in that shalacking in your view at this juncture from zero. Nothing. It's everything else. Ten. It's all about the Iran war. I guess I'm going to come down around a four. I probably put about a third of the blame there.

23:02I put about a third more general economic cost of living inflation concerns. A lot of that's driven by tariffs. Not entirely, but you know, no getting around it. High gas, high and let-a-guess prices, high diesel gas prices. This is the the backbreaker that's come in the last couple of weeks and months. I'd also say that like about a third is just the natural divisiveness and polarizing nature of Trump. He was never going to go into this midterm with a high approval rating. He was never going to go in beloved by the country. But that's what's turned this from what's probably going to be a garden variety bad midterm year for the incumbent party to probably worse than usual year for the incumbent party. Now, I think if you ask the average voter who's planning to vote against Republicans, just to vote against Republicans, not to vote for Democrats. I think they'd say the Iran war more often than not. So I'm going to give it a six, which isn't to say that it is a six. The president was in a very deep poll by February of this year, by virtue of his tariff policies, his failure to abide by even the appearance of repriding office,

24:10et cetera, et cetera. But it's not nothing and it gives everybody this one focal point to rally around. So I think that that would be on the lips of a lot of people in exit polling this year. And that's going to be the takeaway. Okay. I think it's half of it. And that might be indirect. But I think gas prices are half of it. I think people upset about how much it cost to fill up their car. And they haven't been convinced, I'm not convinced they could have been convinced that it was worth it. So I'm going with about 50% or 5% of 10. I'll go where no is. I'll go with the six. There's our Trump Trump was already following as Noah said in the polls, a little hard to determine that, you know, an Iran and inflection point, you know, maybe wouldn't be quite this low without Iran. I mean, maybe would have kept sliding. I do think Iran played a role in it. And when prices were already concerned to layer on top of it, higher gas prices, when that was one of the good stories the administration had

25:12to tell these catastrophic diesel prices, higher fertilizer prices, not having to ask the have the decency to ask the public through their representatives whether they wanted to do this or not. I think it's really bad. And if I'm underlining if it's a very bad Republican night, I would put the Iran war out of six with that. Let's go to our first sponsor this episode. Donors trust, you support charitable causes through your local community foundation or donor advice fund. Be careful to ensure the institution you're partner with respects your values. In recent years, many conservatives who give the charity have begun using donor advice funds for their simplicity, flexibility, attacks, advantages, but not all donor advice funds are the same. Some will deny grants to conservative and faith-based groups, say, deem unacceptable. Some will even redirect your dollars to progressive causes after you're gone. Choose the donor advice fund that shares your values. Our friends at Donors Trust believe in limited government, personal responsibility, and free enterprise. They specialize in making charitable giving easy and protecting your donor intent. So learn more and download a conservative's guide to securing your charitable intent.

26:17Visit donorstrust.org slash editors. That's donorstrust.org slash editors. Please check it out. So Noah, we got a Senate map that looked at from a certain level of abstraction. You'd say it's very favorable to Republicans to get to a Senate majority when four seats Democrats pretty much have to win in some red states, including Midwestern red states where Republicans have been dominant. Donald Trump has been dominant for a very long time, but everything in rural America at the moment, the farm belt is flashing red for Republicans. We just talked about some of the reasons why one farmer's were already really hurt by the tariffs China buying less stuff and retaliation for our tariffs, etc. Then you get the diesel prices that are a killer and higher fertilizer prices. And you have a lot of these races that not just tight, but Democrats fairly consistently ahead

27:22in some of the polling, especially in Iowa. What do you make of that? Yeah. So if you just look at the Senate map based on the real clear politics averages of the polling at the local level, Democrats would pick up six seats in the upper chamber and take it. Alaska, Iowa, Maine, Ohio, Texas, and North Carolina. And then North Carolina is basically gone. Susan Collins in Maine is actually at a better polling cycle for herself than she had in 2020. She didn't leave a single poll in 2020. She won handily. This time around, she is managing to lead in some polls. And there's some evidence that leftover consternation from the grand platenersaga is weighing down his successor. And Alaska is another story, which is just completely inscrutable by virtue of its rank choice voting. But it does seem like Mary Petola is in the lead there. We're talking about Texas later. But the real acute threat to the Republican Party seems to be in the Midwest, where the bottom is just dropping out for the GOP in states like Ohio and Iowa.

28:25And where there was some green shoots for the party in places like Minnesota and even Wisconsin, which has a contested governor's race there today and the Sierra and Michigan, which has a very problematic Democratic nominee. But you're seeing all the Republican candidates make very loud noises, and wild gestures, and doing their best to distance themselves from the president, which suggests that while it is difficult to poll Republicans in this part of the country, and we've seen that cycle after cycle, the candidates themselves aren't giving us any indication that they see a massive polling out the error out there. Just to zoom in on Iowa for a little bit, we got some news yesterday of the president tried to make some news by touting this big steel mill project that is going to go up in Iowa beginning construction this year, expected to be completed by 2030. It'll create a bunch of construction jobs, only about 350 permanent jobs. But this thing is going to produce a ridiculous amount of steel, about like one tenth of what the US produces and

29:29steel today. This facility alone will put out if it's completed. But we have a mixed picture here, right? Because Trump imposed tariffs on steel and unrelated products, which increase the cost of steel by about 20 percent, which means that the cost of US steel is now one of the highest costs in the world for this product, which means less people are buying it. And even though that this protectionism has generated 40 billion in investments in this sector as vanced by this project, the global market is buying less US steel, and our tariffs are training people who use steel for buildings, for cars, for machinery to use less of it. I think it's gone down by about five million tons from 2021 consumption of US steel down by five million tons from 2021 and nine million from 2017. This isn't going to help. People want urgent relief now. And early voting in October begins on October 14. So there's no more time to shape voters perceptions. Again, you know,

30:32the ANCELS are poll. Iowa Republicans are hard to poll, but they're out there. Nevertheless, all the indications that we have are that the bottom is dropping out for the GOP in the Midwest, and its candidates are doing everything they can, including, it might be really silly stuff, like, you know, doing their best to insist, you know, insisting on trade protections and saying that we should get out, defund the Iran war now, so that would make gas prices better, wouldn't have the opposite effect. But they're just looking to seem like they're as agitated as the voting base, which gives you some clue of where things are going to shape up in November. Yeah, Charlie, that main seat, obviously, is really important. And you wouldn't want to bet against Susan Collins, given the polling error the last time she was up, and that race is really close. Maybe she's a little bit ahead. She's running against a total non-entity rather than a malicious sociopath, the way she was earlier in the year when Graham Platner was the the Democrat nominee. But if Democrats don't take that one, and let's say they don't take Texas, there's no say we're going to talk

31:35about Texas more, but I think Paxen still has a chance there. Then you really got it. You got to win like three out of Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Ohio, Alaska. You really need almost a sweep and rural America. But again, if you look at the polling, especially in Ohio, where Sherrod Brown, the former populous Democrat is looking to make a comeback, the polling is terrible at the moment. The polling is terrible. I think this is quite complicated. The Republicans are in a difficult position. It seems that they're doing better in some ways in blue states. The Midwest is particularly ugly. I suspect that that is partly to do with tariffs, gas prices,

32:36the state of farming, but also to do with the electorates there, which seem often to be less ideological, less partisan, more practical, more open to the appeals to common sense or to fix things without reference to theory. Trump has been in our politics for 11 years now. It's not surprising that people are tired of him, which means the question for most voters who don't have presuppositions is do dislike Trump more or dislike the Democrats more? Now Charlie Cook,

33:38the other one, the one without the E, says that people still... The one that forced you to adopt multiple initials, by the way. The one who does polling in numbers and mathematics, says that the public still loads the Democrats. Loads them. The reputation of the Democrats is dire. As such, he suggested last week that this might not be a blue wave, so much as a red undertow. In other words, people just aren't happy with the Republicans. Now, I could be wrong, but that's going to play out differently in different places. Florida, I suspect, will elect Republicans to the Governors' Mansion and the Senate, because Florida has a lot more Republicans and Democrats. Now, Florida also has a highly motivated

34:42voting group, many of the participants in which moved from other places to be in Florida and are unlikely to give their votes to the Democrats. That ain't true, the Midwest. But can I interrupt you for a moment? There's some polling showing Jolly ahead, right? Yeah, I've seen that. I've seen that. I'm pretty skeptical. Maybe it happens, as I say, maybe I'm wrong. But even if I'm wrong, it will be worse in the Midwest, because the Midwest is not a place that tons of people are moving into or tons of people are moving out. There are some moving out. So, it's evaluating the performance of the president on practical grounds. And whether you think it's fair or not, if we go back to the last segment, the opinion of most people who don't follow

35:44politics obsessively has got to be something like, well, the job market's okay, but not great. Gas is really expensive. Diesel is really expensive. The average mortgage rate is pushing seven and a half percent, which is not high historically. That's actually where it was in the mid 90s. But it is high relative to where it's been in recent years. We've become spoiled by low interest rates. Okay, well, either we won't go out or we'll go for the Democrat. I really think it's that simple. And the reason that I say this, it might sound obvious, is that sometimes politics doesn't work like that. Sometimes politics involves falling in love with the candidate or an idea. It involves shifts in coalitions or a particular issue that motivates people or what are the clever people like Charlie

36:51Cook call it? Exogenous circumstances. I don't think that's happening here. I think this is really boring. I think people are just looking at the country and they're saying, I don't think Trump's doing too well. So that's going to hurt more in the Midwest if it happens than it would, I think, in a place like Florida or maybe even South Carolina. So Jim Garry, both of us have been around elections for a while now. And what's happening in mid late September is important. But very often, you get a last second flip one way or the other. It doesn't have to be huge. But if Republicans, if the landscape tilts a little bit in their direction right at the end, maybe because of the advertising bullets, maybe because Republicans aren't answering polls and they're being a little underestimated, I think they could easily hold the Senate. But if you get a tilt the other

37:54way, an increase tilt the Democratic way, this could be Republicans losing six or seven seats in the Senate. Yeah, I was going to say, if you join politics in the Trump era, you really haven't seen a midterm go really badly for Republicans or really even that much for Democrats in 2022, we were kind of expecting a big red wave and it was a little red splish splash. Charlie's Florida live up to the hype, but everywhere else, Republicans really didn't get the gains that they were hoping for. And so you go back to 2006, you have a year like that. That's when you start losing seats, you didn't even think we're remotely competitive. And there have been times this cycle where it has definitely felt like 2006. Now because of the mid decade redistricting, the ceiling for house seats that are in play is significantly lower. So I don't think you see anything like the 40, 50 type seat flips we've seen in 94, 2010, big wave years like that. But you find yourself losing

38:59just about everything that's in competitive. Now, thinking back to that year 2006, I was here at National Review. And I guess now I can say my mentor, Obi-Wan Kenobi was Tony Dolan, the former Reagan speechwriter who I think at that point was still working for Don Rumsfeld in communications. And he was plugged in and things were looking really terrible for Republicans. And then in the last, I'm going to say three weeks or so, Tony and I were looking at the numbers and he's like, ah, Jim, they're coming back. They said the Republican base is coming back. And I'm like, yeah, but you have to understand folks, this was a very different environment because the country was in an unpopular war in the Middle East. There were a bunch of Republicans involved in sex scandals and people were frustrated with the economy. It's totally different than right now, right? History doesn't repeat itself, but it rhymes. And yeah, there were a bunch of Republicans who were upset about all that stuff. But as they got closer, the bark fully scandal, it's just one of those years where everything was going wrong for Republicans. The Republican base did come back. Now,

40:03Republicans lost 31 house seats if I remember correctly. And I'm pretty sure I went back. There were 19 seats that were within the Republicans won. There were within five percentage points or less. So you can make the argument that, yeah, the Republican base did come back and did vote for Republicans in the end, but it stopped what probably could have been a 50 seat loss into a merely, and those are sarcastic air quotes that you can't see me making, merely 31 seat loss. You could have some sort of dynamic like that. And just when I had, I agree with almost everything that Charlie said, but I don't think it's actually that complicated. On the day he got inaugurated, President Trump announced this was the start of a golden age. And when you say this is a golden age, people start thinking they're going to start, it's going to start feeling like a golden age. And it did it. I think America was still feeling, oh, still reeling from the shock in the jump in cost of living and that 9.1% inflation. Now, let's remember kicked in in June, 2022. So if people were going to

41:03be really upset about this, you figured that would have shown up in those 2022 midterms. And it really didn't, at least not on the races of a Republican's nominated a bunch of weirdos and the bar scene from Star Wars. Now, since then, you look at it the last, I don't know, 19 months or so of the Biden administration. Inflation was around 3% and for the first 19 months or so of the Trump administration, inflation has been around 3%. So people, then you know, then you throw in the jump in gas prices, right? You throw in the jumping diesel prices. Hey, that's really important for farm equipment, which means it's a really bad year to have a whole bunch of important races in a place like Ohio and Iowa. You know, really bad year to have a trade war with Canada in places like Michigan and Maine and Minnesota. Like, you know, there's a bunch of policy decisions that were really bad for the US economy over the last two years. And people aren't happy with it. And every time Trump talks about it, the economy is so hot right now. Everybody with the envy of the world. He can't even

42:06talk about it in a way that feels realistic to the average American. So you'd kind of expect Republicans to get shalact in an environment like this. So throw in, you know, large numbers of retirements in the house, large number of retirements in the Senate. You know, it's probably going to be a pretty darn bad year for Republicans. And to be honest, they don't really have too many people to blame but themselves. So, next question to you first, Noah Rothman, who would you rather be Sherrod Brown or Susan Collins? Be- has it's off one? I think I'd rather be Sherrod Brown. Which isn't to say that he's doing especially well. He's doing fine, but he's way out perform in polls, but he's doing way better than the incumbent Republican. Sherrod Brown might benefit from something like an incumbent see bias because I'm not sure how many Ohioans forget that he lost the election. He was in a Ohio Senator for a very long time. I think he was elected in 2006 initially. So he was on the ballot for four cycles or so. So I think it's a tough

43:10call, but narrowly Brown. Charlie, we have a Sherrod Brown on the tip on the board. I think I'd rather be Susan Collins. Although I said that and as I said it, I thought I think she's going to lose, which I suppose means that I think both of them are going to lose. But still, rather be Susan Collins. Kim Beardy. I would rather be Brown just because I feel like there's less resistance to a populist Democrat running in Ohio in an environment like this. With that said, I believe I was the one who originated the joke that Susan Collins is this nice lady from Maine who sits on a throne of schools of her former opponents because she famously is competitive each year, every six years Democrats like, oh, this is the year we knock her off. She trailed every pole against Saragitian six years ago and she ended up winning by like eight or nine points. So I wouldn't shock me if the same thing happened this year. That having been said, you know, all streaks come to an

44:14end including Cal Ripkins and you know, you don't feel 100% certain about her in a cycle like this. I guess I'll say Collins, but if you just look at the data, you'd say Brown, he's leading as I mentioned pretty solidly and almost all the polls. I'm looking now as we speak at the New York Times poll tracker, which includes more polls than the RCP tracker. And I didn't realize how many polls have columns behind right now losing to this guy. Jackson, I'm still going to say Susan Collins, but man, it is a very close call with that. Let's hear from our next sponsor this episode. Our friends at Ver Watches, we spent a lot of this year talking about tariffs, whether it's still actually possible to make things in America while our sponsor today is putting that question to the test. Ver was founded Los Angeles back in 2016 with the simple but very ambitious mission to revive the American watch industry cut to today. Ver is proud to be the largest independent watch assembler in the United States building watches in California, Arizona,

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46:19and the aforementioned Texas Senate race making big, thought theological statements yet again. So he no longer believes God is non-binary. As we all know, he missed the mark, Charlie. Missed the mark in that statement. But he currently believes he's hitting the mark on new statements about Jesus. He made these at some recent event and posted them on X the other day saying, Jesus, because when Jesus healed people, he did not ask for deductible. That proves that Jesus favored universal health care. So when Tillrico favors universal health care, he's doing it on biblical grounds. Same thing when he takes the bold position that no child in Texas should go to bed hungry. That also is a position mandated approved by Jesus because Jesus fed people without price gouging. And also because the Hebrew prophets were against corruption in office. That shows that also his opposition to Trump is totally, totally, biblically based. We don't ordinarily go to

47:22you for theological analysis. Biblical exo-Jesus, Charlie Cook. But I think even you might spot some flaws in this area. Yes, well, I'm not exactly the expert in this area, although I was raised Protestant, which means I've read the Bible. So James Tallerico is a widow. And this is a widow argument. It is true that Jesus doesn't ask anyone for deductible in the Bible. But Jesus also doesn't create health care subsidies. He doesn't regulate the insurance market. He doesn't nationalize the health care system. He doesn't have any views on Medicare or Medicaid or the children's health insurance program. He expresses no preference for Britain's National Health Service

48:28over Germany's hybrid system. Jesus heals the sick in a series of miracles. So I don't know where Tallerico is concluding that his preferred secular health care system is biblical. Jesus has no view on this. He doesn't talk about politics. He would not make the best guest on the editors because he would find your questions beyond his realm. He'd also totally turn them on me and stump me with some deep theological reference if the New Testament is any guide to how that's how I dealt with people questioning him. Yeah. So what Tallerico is doing here is no different in kind than if a right of center

49:37figure who like to talk about religion suggested that social security would have upset Jesus. Why? This is made up. Now I suppose in one sense this is better than Tallerico's insistence that Christianity, both countenances and approves of abortion or trans-ing children. But doesn't it just show and he may win. So I'm not supposing this is fatal. But doesn't it just show that the democratic party still does not understand what it is about it that turns off a lot of voters, especially religious voters. Republicans do this with African Americans.

50:39They are aware that they don't win many black votes and so from time to time Republicans will just run a black guy and assume that by running a black guy they'll increase their vote share. Even if the black guy in question doesn't appeal to black voters or doesn't address the concerns of black voters. Tallerico seems to believe that if he just says Jesus a lot then the sort of people who don't like the positions that he is promulgating will say, oh well okay then. If you set the normal words that you say, if you take the normal political positions that you take but then you say Jesus then we'll go along with it. This just underestimates the intelligence and dignity of the average person. So I find it annoying and condescending and I think that if he

51:47does win in Texas it's just going to be because his opponent is a corrupt creep and because the national environment is awful and because Hispanic votes has shifted at least for now. Not because James Tallerico has unlocked the key to success in right-leaning states. Yeah so Jim the healing miracles they're not really about medical services. Obviously healing the body is important but you know they show the compassion of God. They reveal the identity and authority of Jesus. They point back to Old Testament scripture. They invite faith and suggest the ultimate triumph over death. None of this is reducible to political positions or policy preferences at all. It just makes it so annoying and people on the right they'll do this too but this is so annoying what he's trying to do here. Gentlemen if I were a first century leper

52:48and I'm wandering through Judea and nothing is going my way body parts are falling off. Nobody wants to touch me. I am socially ostracized and I just happen to run across the guy who claims he's the son of God and yeah I'm sure there's a lot of prop people claiming to be from a prophet's prophet. This guy lays his hands on you and heals me and instantly every eye of fine I am healed and then our Lord and Savior having performed this amazing miracle and everyone around is owing and owing and jaws are dropped and eyes are bulging and people are dropping to their knees and at the end Jesus says there's a $40 quote pay. I don't know about you guys I'm paying that seems like a really good deal. That seems like an exceptional bargain if Jesus had charged a copay. Now here's the thing most doctors most nurses most medical professionals they're exceptional people. God bless them but they don't have the ability to perform miracles and where if you're

53:53comparing human medical technology versus the divine ability to heal to cast out demons to get rid of Legion and you can see to make the lame walk to make the blind see look I got to think we got to give it to God he's really always going to have the technological advantage he's always going to be able to perform you know literal miracles as opposed to our metaphorical miracles. So I feel like Calarico's being a little unfair here and then the thing is everything that we use for our metaphorical miracles MRI machines surgery medications that requires the labor of someone else. So the question is is it unreasonable to ask the people receiving the care to contribute something to the care and let's face it most copays you know I've different plans to get different ones and yeah it's really bad if you have a really high deductible usually you get it done at the end of the year you take the kids to see the doctors you get the eye doctor you're going to the all the kind of stuff you get your deductible done then for the rest of the year

54:54you're taking care of that this seems like like the ovens that health insurance is meant to be insurance it's meant to be covering you know like you get hit by a bus and your it's in traction for six months it's you know it's not necessarily meant for every single expenditure you have and anything that requires taking care of your health it's like car insurance the car insurance is there for every possible you know you get hit by a truck and things destroy your car your cars total needed a new car it's not there for changing the windshield wiper blades it's not there for changing your crack in your windshield or something like that so taleriko's totally wrong on this I'll talk a bit about more about this in my lighter item but I was down in Austin late last week the Texas Tribune Festival got to interview uh Oklahoma governor Kevin Stitt fastening guy but taleriko was on stage after us and I did not cross pass with him but I was leaving as the crowd was going in for this now it's Austin uh you know Texas governor uh Rick Perry once described Austin as a blueberry in a bowl of tomato soup in terms of like the one blue area in

55:57another wise a very red state austiote so it was his kind of crowd it's absolutely they were reacting like Elvis Presley had entered the building and they were teenagers in the 1950s if they could have thrown their underwear at this guy they would have they absolutely going crazy about this and I got to tell you like he needed I'm not gonna say lucky breaks he just needed some things to go his way uh this is what my post column is about today he just needed some things to go his way this cycle and he's got more than he needed republicans are divided john cornyness not on board Ken Paxon is a terrible candidate very under the radar great abbot is not leading the way he usually does I think he's gonna win four four or five points yeah I mean I like usually he's up by like eight nine ten points so if you're counting on abbot coattails they may not be as long as you like to have this year bow French does not help things at any gas prices in a state where everybody drives is not very helpful a lot of a lot of trucking in Texas they all need diesel fuel um just you know like enough things have piled up where uh you know I it feels like oh every two years we hear this

57:00is the year democrats win in Texas but they're the confluence of factors make it feel like it's a real possibility this year so Noah do you understand I'm not saying you feel it yourself but do understand the appeal of james tellerico on the one hand he's he's well spoken he's got he's got a pretty good voice he is uh he's clipable right we're talking about a clip he put it out there to to get people to talk about it and get attention I'm not sure really at the end of the day I've ever heard ken paksten talk I've certainly never seen a clip of him he's just kind of a non entity in in that regard someone who was at the um university of texas game the big one oh the Ohio state game was it was saying that paksten was up there in the the president's booth and tellerico was the one who was working that the crowds working the parking lots and and seem to be doing a pretty good job of it so does he dare I say it have some charisma what what do you think

58:07well I don't see it but I'm not the intended audience here and as you say you know paksten has has demonstrated himself to be a remarkably lazy campaigner and this was Karl roves remark about him in a wall street journal up a few months ago about how he spent his his uh... the summer in in london but not london texas london angland um so you know to answer this question rich and anticipation of your asking it which I didn't know but I'm glad I did uh read a texas tribune article so predictable that's well you know you have your finger on the pulse and just be able to identify where you're going with things um read a texas tribune article dispatch from the suburbs of texas which basically describes the entire state east of i 35 and it's the star of the show is ken paksten i mean yes there are some they apparently they found plenty of people who were willing to hold their nose and vote for paksten in order to maintain the state's right leaning orientation but they didn't give them the reporters didn't give them

59:10very much of focus uh kind of short shrift which makes me skeptical of the reporting's outlook and they talked about people who are willing to um if not vote for for telluriko some did right leaning independence and even republicans said they would vote for telluriko but very few expressed admiration for the guy or um you know appreciation for his character none of them talked about all the cringy stuff he has done and since apologized for him cringy's not my word it's James telluriko's that's how he described his own comments about how god was but non binary how white people spread the virus of racism this is only the latest in a long line of cringe inducing gentry liberal uh sort of familiar comments uh that he typically makes but to a man everybody is saying you know listen i would have voted for cornon but i just i can't do it with ken paksten so i was looking at some of the polling because republicans are dumping cash

1:00:12into texas right now and telluriko's negatives are increasing his favorability rating has declined at least from this latest survey from texas public opinion research um jena hina osa who's the democratic nominee for governor has the highest net favorabilities uh highest net favorable rating because her unfavorable rating is just about 10 points lower than her 45 percent favorability rating the james telluriko is a little more of a narrow proposition he's at 50 percent in his favorability rating but his favorabilities are on the rise by about four points over the course of this advertising campaign and what he needs to do is attract you know republicans can sit out this race but that doesn't get uh telluriko at 50 percent he needs to attract independent voters right-leaning republicans who are nevertheless disaffected with the party and while we don't have a ton of evidence of that we do find ken's paksten at the very bottom of this survey with a negative rating of uh 54 percent to 39 percent 15 points underwater

1:01:17texas voters just don't like this guy they've given us every indication they don't like this guy and if telluriko wins it will not be the strength of his candidacy he'd probably be the most vulnerable member of the senate class coming up in what 2032 um but ken paksten is just a deeply flawed candidate republicans texas voters gave republicans every indication they did not want to pull the lever for this guy texas primary voters ignored him and now they're going to reap the world win it i i'm i'm still not ready to say that telluriko is is the favorite here but at the same time i find no indications in the data that the republicans are going to come out on top if they do it'll only be because republican voters held their nose and voted for a guy they absolutely hate in order preserve the senate majority and nothing else yeah seems a total jump ball at at this point i'm with you charlie x question to you is texas speaking texas the greatest state in the union yes or no

1:02:18no i love texas absolutely love texas one of my favorite places but if we're talking about red states florida of course has the edge and oh texas are going to hate me for this california is a hundred times more beautiful than texas texas is a place you want to be you want to raise a family or start a business or do things but it's not the prettiest state there are many others that you would choose over it but it's definitely up there it's a top five state so wise florida better because the beaches and well the beaches and it's prettier and i would say that it's a better red state few reasons one it has the smallest number of government employees per capita think of any state in the union texas actually has a lot of government employees florida

1:03:21has a lot of property texas florida's attacks base by which i mean things that are taxed is smaller than texas and i think it's probably for now more likely to keep voting in the sort of people who will keep that true than is texas keep your name uh i'm going to rate it's similar to charlie but i have a more specific complaint having just been there late last week previewing my lighter item like there's a lot that i like about texas but it was it's you know it's late september 95 degrees 97% humid and i'm on the panel wearing dark suits yeah less than so and i'm walking to the venues come down dredgian sweat it's a little hot little hot even in even one forget it's your number one let's you're number one state oh it's a tough question because i the thing is is like i'd like to bash virginia where i live but it's actually pretty nice and there's like it like you know

1:04:23charlie can make a strong case for florida until her king comes along the blows away your home you know it turns like pulved fronds into like instruments of death or you know all that kind of stuff plus florida man who's always like trying to like you know shoplift live crabs in his pants and then make a getaway at a golf club cart or something like that so i can make the case for you that's not really that's a misperception i'm sure i know it's not praxis it was the last good crab he was trying to flirt us oh into florida's amazing sunshine laws i mean look there's a small there's a small element of truth to it and also people in this really is the case people come here because it's warm and criminals come here because it's warm homeless people come here because it's warm so there is around the edges probably a little of florida man in this hall but the main reason people believe this about florida is because of its sunshine laws which allow journalists to sit pressing refresh on the criminal justice systems website and find the stories instantly which

1:05:25they can then publish so Jim there's a lot to be said for virginia right northern virginia is a great place to raise kids very very economic economically vital area and then central virginia is gods country and down there in charlesville that that part of part of the state so there's a lot to be said for virginia come i was gonna say you know you think about it it does have mountains it does have beach it does have if you want to count the northern virginia suburbs as a big city or richmen you could probably put in that category i talked about my trip to charlesville a few weekends ago but it's also got wide open spaces a lot of it's kind of like for sheer variety it's pretty high up there and the other argument is that i think for a long time the washton dc area used to be able to deliver let's say like 75% of all the upsides of new york city at like 60% of the cost now i do feel like the cost to benefit ratios getting out of whack but there's still some pretty serious advantages to living in this part of the work so no you're gonna make the case for new jersey here

1:06:30no i will not i'm glad i'm glad i would like i would like everyone to note that my two co-panel ists have indulged a home state bias and noted their own states which renders their answers a little bit suspect and i i think i will choose pennsylvania as the best state in the union tension eagles fans well first of all for for you guys it has the better sports culture than any of your home states or calisthenes excuse me whoa you think pennsylvania pirates flyers penguins you think pennsylvania has a better sports culture than florida i mean i suppose if you like for a batteries that people and boon god it's Santa Claus you kidding me you kidding me you can't any NFL stadium in this country and you can have a good time as an away fan you can meet people they'll buy you a beer you can chat except except Philadelphia it's the one place you can't go as an away fan with that it's the only NFL stadium in the country there's a jail in it and there's

1:07:32a reason for it sounds like commitment no it sounds like they should be committed and you haven't just you haven't even begun describing the history that it beats all of your states with the exception of regina virginia virginia it's very competitive it's not very competitive yeah no wait well we you had civil war battles we had revolutionary war battles quality of life is unmatched the color counties around filidelia are pretty little thing called your town this little bit like nonsense no i love how i've just yeah they they raged against his truth because they just could not exist i mean you you got new york right next to you and you didn't want to make the case for that no but yeah we learned something every episode i didn't realize you're such a partisan in pennsylvania i am if i could it's right over the river and if i could you know make it into new york in a reasonable time i would jump over the river and enjoy their property and in contact as i can't unfortunately but it is the prettiest place on god's green earth in my view books county chester

1:08:32county third spectacular places so i can say text i love uh i love speaking to texas audiences my favorite audience to speak to any group of people that has anything to do with the united states marine or awesome and any pretty much any audience in texas amazing i take all the points people have made it's hot it's it's not to put you state obviously great history incredible self-confidence you know i love the pledge of allegiance to the texas flag before before any event a lot of oil and gas and natural resources economically robust a real powerhouse and just a total totally amazing college football football culture i should say football culture so i'm going to go with texas with that let's hear from a final sponsor this episode i want to tell you about the competitive enterprise institutes how the world works podcast featuring political commentator kevin williams in each episode kevin sits down with a notable guest to discuss the jobs they've had why work matters and the role

1:09:34of working our social lives after all work involves a lot more than paychecks cash so listen to how the world works wherever you listen to podcasts or visit c i dot orc slash podcasts so jim garrity was hit a few other things before we go as you mentioned you were in austin and the great state texas yes and i'm glad that noah was checking the texas tribune they run a fantastic festival and a pretty darn comprehensive website for all things texas before i dive into how much i enjoyed the eight metric tons of brisket that i consumed in my three days of texas i just want to point out in the city of fensalvania when their but but eagles are about to play in the super bowl they grease the poles so that people will not climb them and injure themselves in the post games celebrations i know people gonna say you're a new york jets fan what do you know about super bowl celebrations but i'm just gonna observe that you know how they grease the poles in philadelphia before a super bowl they simply pick up an eagles fan and rub him against it that's my that's my shot

1:10:35it but you know bucks counties lovely my inlaws love there there is you know washington crossing new town there's all kinds of nice stuff over there but you know petzl vany is the best state in the country come on that's awesome wonderful i used your light item to come back at no i am i i just feel this strongly i like petzl vany but come on top the four now that you're better at the two three really you know it james town colonial Williamsburg you know i'm not saying independence halls bad i'm just saying like bet come on clearly the proposition is debatable all right so no you spent a very rainy weekend sitting inside probably thinking about the marvels of petzl vany not really but that would have actually been something to do i didn't know what to do with myself i talked previously that we're in the middle of sports hell where every weekend is dominated by a whole lot of athletic activities but this weekend we had a pretty disappointing nor Easter from my perspective you know we just kind of went south of us so we were expecting a big storm didn't really get it only one big tree limb fell down which i have to cut

1:11:35up later today i need more of them to fall down but i had no idea what to do with myself from most of the morning on saturday and into sunday so we did just spend a lot of the time playing Netflix games on in on the couch with the kids but we hadn't done that in weeks so it was a nice little change of pace owing to a natural disaster that never even happened so it was the best of both worlds Charlie speaking of florida's amazing sports culture you were at a university florida football game i was florida all miss at the swamp i'm ashamed of course to say that it couldn't meet the expectations the pencil vanians have for sporting events but other than that it was fantastic credible atmosphere florida beat all miss by 52 points to 28 demolition all miss was ranked fourth i think florida was 21st that's changed now and i got to watch some of the game

1:12:37from the sideline which was an unbelievable highlight so i had a good sports weekend here in florida now with the gators game and then the jaguars demolished the patriot 35 to 6 in jacksadville so i'm gonna i'm gonna stick with my- at least you somehow managed to have a good time i don't know you do yeah well i didn't have eagles fans throwing batteries at me all right so no i'm sure you i'm not gonna use my light atom to come at you on on pennsylvania i saw the movie the heart of the beast it's Brad pit movie starring Brad pit about being lost in the wilderness with a dog he had a military veteran so his his dog this movie was a little too long it was an hour and 41 minutes should have been more like an hour and 21 minutes my other critique is this kind of survivor movies where it's in one person in the woods or on an island or something they just inherently they they're just kind of monochromatic in and just not enough interaction with real people to make it

1:13:42truly interesting and in my view also there just wasn't quite enough drama to fill all the time of this movie but it has some really enjoyable and memorable moments i'd also say it for some reason Brad pit's charm was was not fully in display in in this film but people who love dogs should definitely go see it because the the german shepherd he stars in this movie is quite extraordinary with that it's time for editors pics jim garry what's your pick and are you gonna use it to slam know it even more on the issue of pennsylvania i have been going through our archives looking for an anti pennsylvania article but regretfully i've not been able to fly one so i'm going to settle and i'm not really settling it all for juneley yang's piece make american democracy great again we've had a lot of good pieces on the trump jie summit including by tereshaean but i just really like to how jang lee yang put goes through the fact that we've largely abandoned the notion of not just democracy promotion but really any democratic values

1:14:46in our interactions with china and we're kind of downplaying the threat that they present i also love recognizing the detail that the u.s. that the white house shared a statement the united states in china were allies in world war two and fought beside by side to win the war jang lee yang points out that this is not an accurate version of history america's formal chinese ally was the republic of china under tranqai shek not the people's republic of china which did not exist till nineteen forty nine war time republic of china survives today as tywan anyway great piece everyone should read it now the two pick james lattox is always a delightful read his latest is extra delightful get government out of the kitchen um he's riffing on this bizarre uh but under recognized result in this poll that made waves last week it made waves because democrats were reportedly and according to this poll results welcoming anything that got trump out of office including a military coup or even an assassination at least a plurality was welcoming assassination all of which would unleash a bunch of consequences that democrats would hate but they can't see beyond their own immediate

1:15:47vexations so in that poll um james found that almost four and ten democrats would also like to nationalize the restaurant industry which he riffs on and it's very funny and enjoyable but is a perfect encapsulation of this uh the effect of rising consumer prices on the gentry level liberal psyche joe well i'm gonna pick jims morning joe what happened at that royal air force base because what happened at that royal air force base i'm so baffled by this i spent half of yesterday trying to get some insight trying to get an answer i i i can't make this make sense and i suppose this is a cathartic pick because jim doesn't know either but runs through all the possibilities like no we know one knows it's not a criticism of jim but he runs through all the possibilities and it's great it's it's it's fascinating i mean it's a very very serious topic but actually people do like a good who'd done it and this is turned into a well not so much of who done it but what the hell's going on it and um i love the post because ah what is going on

1:16:54here so my pick is jeff playhar post on camberge's disgraceful decision now that they had a moment to think about it not to investigate at all why they made the decision to hire jason ardae and this is an appropriately harsh take on what's going on at camberge so that's it for us you've been listening to an actually a podcast in your rebar podcast re-transmission or account of this game without the express written consent of naturally magazine strictly pro hibidit this podcast has been produced by loren vel hyzen thank you charlie thank you jim thank you no thanks to don't trust ver and the how the world works podcast and thanks especially to all the if listening with the editors we'll see next time

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