How The Left Continues To Eat Itself - Cenk Uygur

Cenk Uygur is a political commentator, former attorney and founder of The Young Turks,. The dust has settled after the US election, so what is the post-mortem? As the founder of the biggest Left-leaning show in the world, why does Cenk have so many problems with the way the Left is constructed right now, and how can they improve? Expect to learn if Joe Rogan is more credible than The View, if Elon will give Cenk the resources to run the Pentagon’s budget, whether it's possible for the left to start working collaboratively with Republicans, if the election was more of a right wing victory or a left wing loss, how big of a deal wokeism was in turning the tides of the election and much more… - 00:00 Does Joe Rogan Believe in Dragons? 06:39 Elon Musk’s Role in Government 11:54 How the Left Deals With Dissent 21:24 Does Elon Legitimise Trump’s Campaign? 26:08 How the Left Takes Criticism 36:26 Class Gatekeeping in US Politics 40:59 Do the Bureaucrats Fear Elon & Vivek? 43:34 Cenk’s Postmortem on the Election 47:10 Was Wokeness a Big Issue in the Election? 58:13 Will the Left Reassess Their Strategy? 1:02:34 What’s Next for Cenk? - Get access to every episode 10 hours before YouTube by subscribing for free on Spotify - https://spoti.fi/2LSimPn or Apple Podcasts - https://apple.co/2MNqIgw Get my free Reading List of 100 life-changing books here - https://chriswillx.com/books/ Try my productivity energy drink Neutonic here - https://neutonic.com/modernwisdom - Get in touch in the comments below or head to... Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chriswillx Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/chriswillx Email: https://chriswillx.com/contact/

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Chris Williamson?

  Who is more credible, the cast of The View or a dragon?

• 0:04Speaker 01

  These days, apparently a dragon. So, as you know, Joy Behar said that, oh, you can't trust Joe Rogan, he believes in dragons. Oh, well, Joy Behar believed that Joe Biden was young and dynamic, that he had no cognitive difficulties at all, and that he was the best possible candidate for the Democrats. I can't find anything less credible than that.

• 0:31Chris Williamson?

  Why are these people so out of touch? Like, is it, is it purposeful? Or is it ignorance?

• 0:37Speaker 01

  Oh, it's definitely ignorance. And so, Chris, this is really interesting because I am bilingual. I speak both populist and establishment. And that's because I worked at MSNBC as a host. I worked at Current TV. I went to the, you know, some of the same schools that these folks went to. And so I, I mainly come from their worlds, but I'm a natural born populist. And so they've rejected me 2,000 times over before I even got to the right wing, right? And so, and but I know how they think. And they're in their own bubble. Everybody's in their own bubble. And so in their bubble, they're right about everything and they're objective,

• 1:19Speaker 01

  right? And they truly believe that, right? And so anyone who disagrees with them, they think is not objective, and is to be dismissed and derided and insulted, etc. And so they have no idea how clueless they are. And they, they're not coming at it from bad intent, which a lot of people won't believe, right? But they actually, they, they genuinely believe they have the best of intent. And if you just listen to the establishment one more time, boy, then they'll really deliver, right? And if you cheer for them louder, they'll really deliver. And I swear to God, they genuinely believe it.

• 1:53Chris Williamson?

  Are they well read? Because it seems to me, in order to be able to have that level of self belief, you need to, you need to really know what you're talking about. And I'm yet to see much evidence that that's the case.

• 2:05Speaker 01

  No, that's the other amazing part. They're actually really well educated, really well read. But since the bubbles are so strong and thick, they still, it's like asking a fish, how's the water? And the fish says, what water? Right? So what they don't understand, this is the crux of what they don't understand. Is that the establishment is built to preserve the status of the top 10%. And then, most importantly, the top 1% and then the top 0.1%, right? And since it's built on that, and almost all of the people in the establishment are at a minimum in the top 10%, at least in terms of socioeconomic status, and they grew up, most of them, not all of them, but most of them grew up in that context.

• 2:49Speaker 01

  When Joe Biden provides about 5 to 10%, or Barack Obama provides 5 to 10% change, they think, "Oh, my God, this is amazing. My life was already great, and these saints have given me 5% extra positive change," in their minds, right? Or 10% positive change. How could anyone complain? You guys are nuts. What I'm trying to get them to see is no brothers and sisters, but for the rest of the country, 60% of Americans live patriot paycheck. 5% change ain't gonna get it done. They need 50 to 100% change, and you're not getting it, because you just don't talk to folks like that, and you're not in that context. And when I say that, they think I'm the biggest radical ever.

• 3:32Speaker 01

  And by the way, now, of course, the new theory is, that's it. I've done the pivot, and I'm a right-winger, and I've abandoned all my policies, and, you know, et cetera, et cetera. No, I've been saying the same thing for 20 straight years.

• 3:46Chris Williamson?

  Oh, you're not taking a hard turn to the right?

• 3:48Speaker 01

  No, not at all. So, and here's another thing. I talked about this on Lex's show, and I talk about it in my book, Justice Coming. And whenever we can have an actual conversation, I want people to get this through their heads. I just wrote a piece right before the election for Newsweek about it. There's two political spectrums. There's the left-right spectrum, but there's the one that nobody talks about, the populist versus establishment spectrum. So I am populist left, so you will see me have left-wing positions on many, many issues, the great majority of issues. But I also have a populist position. So that's what discombobulates them. They're like, "No, if you're on the left, you have to be pro-establishment."

• 4:32Speaker 01

  I'm like, "No, that doesn't make any sense at all. The left historically was not pro-establishment. You guys turned them that into pro-establishment through all the corporate donations, et cetera, et cetera." So that's why people are confused.

• 4:46Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, what? That pivot towards defending the people who have the most money, defending the people that have the most power, defending the people who are the most educated, seems to be turning the entire barstool upside down compared with what traditionally were the values of the left, right? Working class, on class, on class lines, not based on really that much else. Is it salvageable? Is it possible to try and bring this back around?

• 5:13Speaker 01

  Yeah, 100%. So, look, first of all, Bernie almost won in 2016 and 2020. I mean, he lost by, you know, the skin of his teeth. And that's only after the entire establishment coalesced and ganged up on him. And not just the politicians rallying around Joe Biden in 2020, but all of mainstream media, most importantly MSNBC. They all said, oh, Bernie's a Nazi, he's going to execute people in Central Park, et cetera, et cetera, which, oh, who else did they call a Nazi? Oh, right, Donald Trump. So, and so anytime anybody's announced a sour. Now, I have massive problems with Donald Trump. And, and I think that what he did in 2020 was unacceptable and un-American. So, we can go back if you want and discuss and debate that.

• 5:58Speaker 01

  But he is trying to be a populist in his own way. I think it's a little fake. We can, again, debate and discuss that. But at least he's going in that direction. And Bernie is clearly a populist. And that is why the establishment hates both of them. But remember, they barely beat Bernie two times. So, it won't be Bernie again, he's too old. But next time around, if we have an actual populist in the Democratic primary, we can recapture the party in the way that Trump has captured the Republican party. And if we don't, we're doomed. That establishment can't win elections. They're too fake, they're too phony, they serve the donor class too much, they're too elite, and, and nobody's interested in that bullshit.

• 6:39Chris Williamson?

  You asked Elon Musk to put you in charge of cutting the Pentagon. How'd that go?

• 6:45Speaker 01

  It's official, I'm now running the entire Pentagon.

• 6:49Speaker 01

  Because that's how it works. No, look, I thought it went great. And but the left doesn't think it went great. So let let me explain. So Elon says, I want to cut 2 trillion from the from the budget. In reality, there isn't 2 trillion to cut. All discretionary spending is only 1.7 trillion. But there is one place where you could have massive savings, and that's the Pentagon. And that's because they never pass an audit. This is their seventh straight audit that they failed. And they say that they generally can't account for half the money, which is over 400 billion dollars. So I said, on X, hey, Elon, put me in charge of the Pentagon. I'll cut 400

• 7:30Speaker 01

  billion overnight. And hey, all of a sudden, you're 20% of the way home to your goal, right? And he said, give me suggestions. So let's pause there. No Democratic leader has ever asked me for suggestions, even though I run the largest left wing media network in the country. They've never asked why. Oh, populist. What would a populist know? He doesn't even support the donors. Terrible. We're never gonna ask him, right? So Elon asked. Already, that's progress. That's already better than what I was getting from the other side. And so then the left goes, no, don't say that. Okay, but what do you want me to do? Lie? Do you want me to tell you that Kamala Harris and Joe Biden call me every other day like, oh, we're really interested in what populist

• 8:14Speaker 01

  left thinks. Oh, we're super interested in what our base wants. They're not at all interested in what their base wants. They pretty much hate what their base wants. So so that's great. And then I and then he said, I gave him a suggestion, which was, hey, listen, if you want to cut in a real way, you'd have to, of course, do it line by line. So if you bring me in, and and we both went to Wharton, we both run businesses, his are, of course, much larger. But hey, I run a top 10 media network in the country. So both of us know how we can go line by line and cut things that are actually wasteful, inefficient. And by the way, some of it is just corruption, just massive pork barrel spending.

• 8:54Speaker 01

  Okay, but for now, I can give you a suggestion of stop having the generals work for defense contractors. Cause the minute they retire, they go work for the military industrial complex. And since they're going to get millions of dollars from those guys, what do they do before they retire? They give those same companies billions of dollars, sometimes hundreds of billions of dollars in contracts. That's an obvious massive conflict of interest that any business person would understand, anyone with common sense would understand. And so then Don Jr. Jumped in and he said, that's a good idea. We're already discussing it. Great. Okay. So.

• 9:30Chris Williamson?

  So you've got Elon certifying and you've got the son of Trump stepping in as well.

• 9:37Speaker 01

  That's right. And then, and then Donald Trump Jr. Came back in and said, again, hey, this is just common sense. And, and we should be going in that direction. So now if the left wants to complain. If now it's if they do it because they haven't done it yet. If Elon and Trump and et cetera, cut the Pentagon or and or. Do a great rule about conflict of interest for the generals that the left has wanted for the last 20, 30, 40, 50 years. If they complain, oh, they did the thing we wanted. Guys, then I can't help you, right?

• 10:11Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 10:12Speaker 01

  If you can't take the win, I can't help.

• 10:14Chris Williamson?

  Does this sense a lot of the time that purity is more important than victory?

• 10:21Speaker 01

  Oh, a hundred percent. And unfortunately, that's one of the defining hallmarks of the modern left that I'm rebelling against. And so what, what, and look, I know, so both sides again, misunderstand each other. And again, I'm bilingual. I, I used to be a Republican. I'm a progressive populist. I've been at in both camps. I understand both camps and I speak both their languages, but they do not speak each other's language. So the left thinks, oh, it's all a trick, right? And there's, there's good valid reasons for thinking that. Okay. But they think, oh, everyone on the right is a fraud and that is not true. And they think, okay, if the minute you agree with them, they're not going to actually do that thing.

• 11:04Speaker 01

  Instead, they're going to use it to cut Medicare, Medicaid, all these other programs that we care about. And they're never going to actually do the thing that they said. Now, maybe that's true. And if that's true, well, okay, then I'll call them out on it. Problem solved, right? It's not like I'm gonna go, oh, okay, they promised it. So I will let them cut all the programs that I care about and I will not say anything. No, man, if anyone hasn't learned yet, I am uncontrollable. Okay, so you're not going to control me from the left or the right, the Democratic Party or the Republican Party. So if they do stuff I don't agree with, I'm gonna not only call it out, probably gonna yell at them, right?

• 11:43Speaker 01

  But if they say yes, and then they do it, I am going, unlike everyone on the left, I'm gonna take the fucking win. Right? I don't think that part is complicated at all.

• 11:54Chris Williamson?

  You've been talking a lot about something that I've been fascinated around the last few years, which is the intolerance of dissent from within the left. There's high hypersensitivity around that. How frustrating is that to try and navigate?

• 12:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, but, okay, so that is super frustrating. And, and there's an extra layer of it for me. But I also want to talk about the right a little bit too in a sec, in a second. So on the left, there's a thesis that if you agree with the right, even 1%, they will abuse it. So never agree with them. Okay, yeah, but that's gonna lead to very unproductive conversations, right? And then there's also a thesis of if you're not at the most extreme maximalist position, your, your strategy is wrong. We should always defend the craziest shit our side has ever come up with in human history. I don't agree. I think that's a terrible strategy. And that's how we wound up at defund the police.

• 12:54Speaker 01

  That's how we found out, wound up with transgender undocumented immigrants getting free surgery, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Like you. I told them that is 98% of Americans are not going to be in favor of that. You are just flat out wrong. Like, and so if you tell someone on the left, they're wrong, they get so hurt by that. They there's they just they cannot stomach that. And and one thing I'll give the right credit for is there's way more debate. Right? And I think in the old days, as in like first Trump term, there was no debate. Trump Daddy Trump says it. Everyone does it. Period. Period. Okay. And the right wing also has this massive intolerance. Right?

• 13:38Speaker 01

  Intolerance for anyone on the left's opinion. Uh, generally speaking, although now we're we're building some bridges. But also intolerance for I don't like that lifestyle. So that lifestyle is bad. Hey, brothers and sisters, do you did you mean freedom or do you not mean freedom? If you if you mean freedom, let anybody do their any fucking lifestyle they like. What is it of your business? Right? So but again, I think these are times are different. I think Trump 2.0 and I and I might be naive and I might be too hopeful. And I grant that to my friends on the left. But I sense an actual right wing populist movement that might even push back against Trump. So and I think the first place that pushback is probably going to come is Israel. But we'll see, maybe I'm wrong, maybe I'm a sucker.

• 14:23Speaker 01

  And maybe you guys will all just say Daddy, I don't mean you, Chris. I mean, right wing populist will just go, no Daddy Trump Daddy Trump, whatever Daddy Trump says we want. Right? We'll see, we'll find out.

• 14:33Chris Williamson?

  Do you think that you're closer to right wing populist or left wing establishment people?

• 14:45Speaker 01

  It depends on how you would define it. Right? Because if I say right wing populist, people will then say, well, right wing populist, some right wing populist believe X, Y, and Z. And those X, Y, and Z positions are awful, and I would never agree to them. Right? Um, but if I say, uh, left wing establishment, they believe a whole bunch of

• 15:08Speaker 01

  I don't agree with. Right?

• 15:10Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 15:10Speaker 01

  So and what I want everybody to understand, both on the left and the right is maybe we are individual human beings and we are not born with an ideology that fits preexisting buckets.

• 15:26Speaker 01

  So there's this bucket of left wing ideology and a bucket of right wing ideology. And those are all on different issues, foreign policy, domestic policy, spending, social issues, et cetera. And they say, no, this was set 100 years ago, 200 years ago, 20 years ago. You have to agree with every position on the left or every position on the right. Why? My number one question to Americans is why? Why do I have to agree to a preset ideology? Why don't I say, hey, you know what? I like that on the left. I like that on the right. I like that in the middle. And that's because I'm a human being. I'm an individual. I'm an American. And so stop listening to your leaders telling you what you have to believe. And especially for right wing populists that, that think and often do, but think that they cherish

• 16:11Speaker 01

  freedom. If you do, brothers and sisters, you have to prove it, not just by cherishing your own freedom, but by cherishing other people's freedoms too.

• 16:21Chris Williamson?

  It's, it's interesting to think about the, the way that the incentives align. You know, I had Anna on the show a couple of weeks ago, really interesting conversation for her too. And I asked her the question, can you see the incentives and the dynamics that cause people to go from left to right? Because I don't see very many people going from right to left. And I think that it's because of this sort of puritanical purity nature that there wouldn't, you wouldn't be accepted with open arms. And it does seem like until the left is prepared to let go of this incredibly high bar, the maxim, maximizing a number that you said it's can't be 98%, can't be 99%, must be 100% agreement with absolutely everything that the party line is saying that you have to agree with.

• 17:06Chris Williamson?

  Whereas the right side, nah, you're most of the way there. Come on over. So yeah, I mean, it, it just seems so obvious to me about why you get this slide to the right. I mean, even you talking to Donald Trump Jr., talking to Elon Musk, like that doesn't happen in reverse. It doesn't happen the other way around.

• 17:24Speaker 01

  Oh, well, that's definitely true. I mean, I, because as you were saying, I, I was laughing inside at the idea of Kamala Harris saying to Charlie Kirk, oh, that's an interesting idea.

• 17:37Speaker 01

  What other suggestions do you have, Charlie?

• 17:41Speaker 01

  Come on. That's never, ever, ever gonna happen. I mean, that's never, she's never gonna say that to me, let alone Charlie Kirk, right? Let alone anyone on the right. And so, and that's because, again, that's not the left, right thing. That's the populist establishment thing. Because the people in the establishment think that the people in, that are populist are dirt. And they think that they're not, they're not in the elites. Why would I listen to them? Right? So like, they, they find the idea-

• 18:06Chris Williamson?

  Uneducated masses.

• 18:08Speaker 01

  Yeah. And they find the idea of taking advice from us, just laughable. You know, you just laughed out loud at the, at their intransigence. And they would, they would laugh at the idea. What would we learn from Charlie Kirk? Or Jake Uygur? Oh, they laugh and laugh and laugh. And that's why sometimes, I'll get into a conversation with somebody who's an establishment Democrat, and they're talking down at me, like, almost every time. I'm, I barely ever had a conversation with anyone who's an establishment Democrat, where they were doing this, looking down their nose at me the entire time, right? Like, who the fuck do you think you-

• 18:48Chris Williamson?

  It's a highly, it's a highly unlikable party. It's a highly unlikable group to be around.

• 18:55Speaker 01

  Yeah. So, look, from their perspective, they would say, well, how about you guys? You guys keep attacking Muslims and transgender people and gay people and black people, etc. From their point of view, I know, I know a lot of the right wing would disagree, right? But as someone who is as close to neutral as it gets in terms of, at least the populist then, no, the right wing does attack those people. And maybe not to the degree that The View says, and maybe not in the same way that The View says, but are there attacks? Are there actual bills passed, etc.? Yes, definitely. Okay? So both sides have reasons to distrust each other. But, but what I'm saying about the establishment Democrats is that

• 19:32Speaker 01

  they don't just distrust the right. They distrust populists that are on their side too. Because they're elitist by nature. And, and by the way, that also is true of Republicans. And but the but why give the populist right credit is because they led a rebellion and a successful rebellion against establishment Republicans. So if I tell a Democrat Mitch McConnell is a piece of shit who took a billion dollars from corporate donors and does anything a corporate donor asks him to do, they'll say, oh, of course, that's true. Yeah, Mitch McConnell is the worst. If I say Nancy Pelosi did the same thing, they're like, oh, how dare you. She's an angel. When she took the same billion dollars, she did it for our well being. I'm like, did

• 20:17Speaker 01

  she? Did she? Because I could show you all of our staffers that worked at health insurers companies and drug companies, and then all of a sudden, we can't negotiate drug prices. And all, you know, and I can go on and on and on, right? But on the other hand, so now when I be in the old past, when I talk to Republicans, they would say the same thing like, oh, how dare you, Mitch McConnell is the beloved Mitch McConnell, who has given us everything we want, including the giant corporate tax cuts we wanted. Well, now, when I talk to right wing populists, they're like, yeah, fuck Mitch McConnell. I'm like, all right, there you go.

• 20:48Chris Williamson?

  We're making ground.

• 20:50Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's right. You don't have to agree with me on the policy, but we, the bare minimum that we all have to get on the same team on is, and by the way, the right's not completely on this team yet. Okay. Which is that the donors control everything. Their politicians serve their donors. They're, that's why they do talking points. They're empty shells. They're almost all crooks. And whatever donor money is given to them, they serve that money 100%.

• 21:24Chris Williamson?

  Does that mean if the donors are so important, and you know, I've heard this, I had Dean Phillips on the show at the start of the year, and he was, I was digging deep into just how much time is spent fundraising and having to schmooze at cocktail hours and so on and so forth. It's like way more time than you spend actually legislating or doing your fucking job. Is there something different now about Elon being a large contributor, financially, strategically, et cetera, operationally, but being out front, being owning it, being like, hey, I'm here, I'm on stage. Does that add an amount of transparency, legitimacy, scrutiny to him that gives you a sense of confidence?

• 22:10Speaker 01

  Um, not yet, no. Uh, proof is in the pudding.

• 22:13Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, okay.

• 22:13Speaker 01

  Okay, and so, proof's always in the pudding. Um, and so, look.

• 22:18Chris Williamson?

  You understand the structure of what I'm saying here, though, right?

• 22:20Speaker 01

  Of course I do.

• 22:21Chris Williamson?

  Yep.

• 22:22Speaker 01

  Yeah. So let me, let me address it in a couple of ways. So first of all, does Trump serve the donors? Sorry, guys, but definitely, yes. So Sheldon Adelson gave him a hundred million dollars in 2016, and then another hundred million in 2020 in campaign contributions through the PACs. And then Miriam Adelson, his, uh, you know, his, his wife, he's, he's now passed away, gave him a hundred and thirty seven million dollars in this, um, uh, cycle. So that's three, over three hundred and thirty million dollars that the Adelsons, let's be honest, bribed Donald Trump. Okay, so legal bribe, and yes, the Democrats definitely do it as well. Both sides claiming only the other side does it is insanity, not remotely true. So what did Donald Trump do for the Adelsons? He moved our embassy because Sheldon asked him to.

• 23:05Speaker 01

  The one, one of the upsides of Trump is that he can't help himself. He just says whatever's at the top of his mind, and that gives us a sense of authenticity. But the downside is he does confession after confession. And so he's like, okay, yeah, Sheldon gave me a lot of money, and so I moved the embassy. No, you're not supposed to give away foreign policy to a donor. Sorry. And then she, he gave Miriam Adelson the Presidential Medal of Freedom. For what, brother? Come on, for what? That's like our highest honor, and you're giving it to a donor's wife? So now, what's important is not the past, but right now. So he appointed four people that are Team Miriam. Marco Rubio at State, Elise Stefanic as UN Ambassador, Mike Huckabee as Ambassador to Israel, and Mike Wallace as National Security Advisor.

• 23:49Speaker 01

  All four of those are neo-cods. They're war hawks, and they want more war, not less war. That is not what the base voted for. That is Team Israel versus Team America. I'm keeping it real. And by the way, I say the same exact things about Kamala Harris and Joe Biden. They totally sold us out, because AIPAC gave over eleven million dollars to Joe Biden throughout his career. It's his number one donor. Uh, they've given, different groups have given over ten million now. Five million from AIPAC, six million from J Street to Kamala Harris. That's why they, they were willing to lose Michigan and the entire election, rather than defy their donors. So now, proof's gonna be in the pudding. So now, so that's one of his donors. I can give you many other examples.

• 24:33Speaker 01

  Now, when you turn to Elon, to your question. Well, so on the one hand, he's more transparent about it. That's good. That's true. Right? The Koch brothers hid in the shadows. And and the right would argue, and I think there's true, some truth to it, that George Soros was in the shadows, right? And a lot of times the right will say, oh, yeah, would you ban George Soros's money from politics? And I'm like, yeah, of course I would. Like, ah, would you ban union money from politics? Of course I would. I would ban all money from politics. That's the point. I don't want to cheat. And so that's the difference between a genuine populist and a partisan, right? So now Elon has a lot of interests, right? Let's keep it real.

• 25:15Speaker 01

  He and one of the people, and when he's doing efficiency in the government, if he gets rid of every regulator who regulates his businesses, that's super fishy, right? So is he gonna do that or is he not gonna do that? And, you know, there's, and even Trump, he said it in one of the rallies because he can't help himself. He said, I used to be against electric vehicles, but Elon gave me a very strong endorsement, so now I'm pro-electric. Brother, you're not supposed to say it out loud. So I'm hoping against hope that right wing populists actually hold them to account. And my side thinks I'm a sucker for that and that right wing populism is not genuine.

• 25:59Speaker 01

  It's all fraudulent. They're all gonna do whatever Trump and Elon says. So we'll find out. And their actions will tell us who was right and who was wrong.

• 26:08Chris Williamson?

  I've heard you talk about just sort of leaning back into the criticisms that occur internally. And I do think that you're right. The right's not particularly good at taking criticism in the past, but recently it seems to be at least prepared to have the argument. But I've heard you highlight something I've noticed too, which is the democratic leadership finding it offensive if you ask them hard questions. This sort of, what are you doing? Like, are we not on the same side? Which obviously doesn't allow you to sharpen your sword particularly well because you can actually do it constructively in a way that's aiming to improve and move toward things, speaking the same language with the same goals, the same outcomes, et cetera.

• 26:53Chris Williamson?

  But yeah, the the fact that it's not taken well. Internal criticism and difficult questions aren't taken well.

• 27:03Speaker 01

  Yeah, there's, there's two elements to that. So one is they believe that the role of the media is to do marketing for them. So anyone who doesn't do marketing for corporate politicians overall, but now it's mainly become corporate Democrats. They find that to be deeply offensive. And unfortunately, they've trained a lot of Democratic voters to find it offensive. So when I criticize the Biden administration, I get pushed back from actual Democratic voters saying, no, Jank, Jank, you're supposed to do only, say only positive things about them. Don't say anything critical because that'll hurt our chances of beating Trump. They've trained their own voters to believe in propaganda as a concept.

• 27:48Speaker 01

  And, and I love Democratic voters and so I'm not, I want to snap them out of it. I want to say, hey, guys, you guys are generally kind-hearted folks who want to look out for other people. But you cannot have this ideology of no criticism. Because if you do no criticism of your leaders, you will have very shitty leaders. Okay, they will get absolute, power corrupts, absolute power corrupts, absolutely. And it, it'll make your side weaker and weaker and weaker. And so for 10 straight years, I've been arguing for stronger primaries, actually way longer than that. But it's, it's, I say the last 10 years because they had the ideology of, no, we will anoint a leader and Democratic leadership is geniuses playing four dimensional chess.

• 28:32Speaker 01

  And I swear to God, they would literally say that to me. They're playing four dimensional chess. Your little mind can't understand it, Jake. Okay? So we picked the, the one who is the most pro corporate and who's, you know, pleasure the donors the most. And that is the anointed leader who is, has the best chance of winning. And then they send every robot on MSNBC, best chance of winning, best chance of winning, best. And then, okay, but Bernie's like, he went from 1% to 48% in a miraculous run with no media coverage. That was unbelievable, right? So how about that? That looks successful. No, he has no chance of winning. He is not a corporate robot, has no chance of winning, right? And they got Democratic voters who are good people to believe that bullshit, right?

• 29:15Speaker 01

  So I'm trying to snap them out of it. And one of the things that I point to is, they're like, no, we should have no primaries. We should just have an anointing and a cheerleading. And you're ruining the cheerleading, Jake. Okay, how'd that work out for us? Because in 2016, the DNC did everything they could, including illegally funneling money to Hillary Clinton's campaign through the state parties to make sure that it was Hillary Clinton and not Bernie Sanders, right? And they did as small a primary as they possibly could. And then on the Republican side, there was a free for all. You remember the old, I don't know if they still do it in WWE, but they, where everybody's in the ring and then they.

• 29:52Chris Williamson?

  The Royal Rumble?

• 29:53Speaker 01

  What's that?

• 29:54Chris Williamson?

  Is it a Royal Rumble or Battle Royale? Yeah.

• 29:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah, both of those. Uh, and in the, what they started calling the Royal Rumble, um, you gotta throw everybody out of the ring, right? And it's one against all. And that's what 2016 was, and Trump came out of it. And I keep asking them like, super simple question. Can you remind me who won in 2016? Oh, right, Donald Trump won in 2016, the Republicans won in 2016, after they had a super tough, and I would argue vicious primary. In 2020, there's no primary on the Republican side, but there's a significant primary with 27 Democrats, uh, on the Democratic side, Democrats win. So in this case, they, again, they canceled the primary. They say the guy with dementia is the anointed one.

• 30:38Speaker 01

  And, and don't tell anyone that his brain is melting. I'm like, guys, he shakes hands with invisible people. We all already know his brain is melting. There isn't enough propaganda in the world to get people to believe that Joe Biden is mentally healthy. And they're like, no, there is. And then he goes out and he's like, oh, my uncle was eaten by a cannibal. I'm like, I mean, if you can't recognize that this brother is in bad, bad shape, you're trying to deny reality and it is such a dumb strategy. Forget that it's wrong and it's immoral to lie like that, et cetera. If you want to win, you don't want your candidate's brain falling out of his ear. Like, this is not complicated.

• 31:22Speaker 01

  And that's why I had such blowups with Alan Lickman. Cause even after the debate, the professor with the keys, he, he came on the Young Turks, he's like, no, Biden's the right guy. I'm like, he said he wanted to destroy Medicare by accident. Do we think that that's the right guy? And he's like, no, the keys decide, always go with incumbent, always go with the establishment guy, Joe Biden. I'm like, okay, look, if you guys are gonna be lunatics, I'm not on board for that, right? And so I challenged Biden in the primary. We had a petition 14 months ago to get him the hell out of the race. So that kind of you must cheerlead, you must do marketing, you must do propaganda. I despise it. And that is why we're oil and water. Like the establishment Democrats probably hate me more than they hate any Republican.

• 32:07Speaker 01

  If they, if you said to them, you're forced to go to lunch with Jenk or Trump. I think every one of them picks Trump. Everyone, they're like, oh, fuck Jake. No, no, no, no. I don't want any piece of that guy.

• 32:19Chris Williamson?

  I was listening to, uh, The Rest Is Politics. They did, uh, a number of postmortems, I guess, after the election, uh, trying to break down what was going on. They had this guy on, I can't remember who it was, but he, uh, worked with Trump, uh, during his first administration. And he was telling this story, you know, sort of one of these classic ones about, um, his, Trump's fragility, uh, uh, around knowing things or not knowing things. This sort of egotism that, that seems to be pretty endemic, although, uh, at least the snappier parts of it are nerfed publicly. Um, and, uh, it, I can't remember what it was. There was some, something about the Middle East. He needed to know this thing about the Middle East and one person tried to teach him something really important that would help to future proof them against the situation that was coming down the line.

• 33:03Chris Williamson?

  And Trump is like, nobody knows more about the Middle East than me. Uh, I already, that's, that's, I've read the book on it. I know all the rest of it. Uh, but he really needed to learn. He really needed this to be, uh, given to him. So this dude that used to work there went in and took a different tack because he seems like quite a canny, shrewd sort of dude. And, um, he said, have you ever seen this movie? Brings up a movie and Trump's like a best movie that's ever been made, maybe the best movie that's ever been made. Uh, and he said, well, interestingly, there's a, there's a backstory to that, uh, that I'd love to tell you about. And he teaches Trump through this sort of odd acrobatic dance that he has to do to sort of get himself to the stage where this information is to be accepted. This is, you know, if there are.

• 33:45Chris Williamson?

  Character flaws in Trump that people really, really do not like and that is sort of out front. This is one of those big ones. This sort of fragility about knowing things, the brittleness around this sort of stuff. And it's wild to me that the very thing that most people on the left would point their finger at around Trump and narcissism, ego, you know, all of the accusations that typically get thrown at him are precisely the thing that they have decided to embody as if you ask me an offensive or difficult question, that's dissent, that's treason, this is mutiny, you can't do it. And I'm like, you are aware,

• 34:26Chris Williamson?

  you're taking for your own playbook, the exact thing you see is the biggest weakness from the other side. There's this weird ironic tragedy around that.

• 34:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, God, that's such a great point. And I hadn't thought of it that way. So it's absolutely true about Trump and it's, it's kind of hilarious. He's often accidentally very funny. So, you know, like the clean coal one is, is an example, but there's like dozens of these. He says, oh, you know, clean coal is when they take out the coal and they wash it. Like, no, it's not. Okay. But that's not the important part that he got that wrong. The important part is, if I was going to give that speech, I would think, do they? Do they take out the coal and wash it? That seems unlikely. Let me ask someone, right? But Trump never thinks, let me ask someone, right? Hey, if you, you know, if you put

• 35:18Speaker 01

  the disinfectant inside the body, no, ask that off air. Don't ask it on air, right? Learn like, and he comes out and he's like, no one knew healthcare was this complicated. No, brother, we all knew healthcare was super complicated. You didn't know it because you didn't study it. And I'm, and like, I get mad at the Democrats for all the things that they do wrong. I'm surprised that the right wing doesn't get mad at Trump for all the things he does wrong. Like, he never does any homework. He's never done a piece of homework in his life. And that's probably because his daddy got him through school. Anyway, but you're right, that the Democrats now have that same kind of imperious attitude. Whereas, yeah, maybe they read books and they went to Ivy League schools and they did all that stuff, but. But if you say to them, hey, I have a suggestion for you, their gut reaction is fuck off.

• 36:04Speaker 01

  Okay, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait, okay, but you said Trump was terrible for not taking any suggestions. Why won't you take any suggestions? Because they find the idea of taking a suggestion from someone who doesn't have status as an anathema, as something deeply troubling that they would never even consider.

• 36:25Chris Williamson?

  This gatekeeping based on background, position, social class, social group, whatever, is a very British thing. Like, it really feels like it's sort of inhabited the posh versus proletariat

• 36:44Chris Williamson?

  discussions that have, they're like, they're just endemic to UK culture, right? I never, I've never once heard an American person use the word posh. In the UK, it is used every single day by every single kid in school because class permeates everything. Everyone is aware of it front and center. And it's so odd to see Americans who, you know, we criticize the left for not uplifting the working class, for not sufficiently focusing on the working class. Also, the fact that Americans kind of almost deny that it exists. It gets all squirrely and it's recently been put into race, or it's been put into sexual orientation, or into the area that you live in, or whatever. And yet, this just sounds like a lot like class gatekeeping, but just coming out in different ways.

• 37:30Speaker 01

  So there's a really good reason for that. You're absolutely right about the observation. And the reason is because establishment Republicans and establishment Democrats for my whole lifetime have been trying to make sure that we don't talk about class. They want you to talk about race and sex and gender and, and, and both sides do identity politics. And if you're a right-winger and you think, no, we don't, you're nuts, and I'll prove it to you in a second. Okay, so, but what they want us to do is they want to divide us on culture war bullshit. So that we don't realize, oh, what we have in common is that we're the 90%. If the 90% realize that we're united on those grounds,

• 38:12Speaker 01

  the top 10% that are all rigging the rules to their benefit would be fucked. And they know that. So they're like, okay, here's some red meat on trans issues. Now masses, go fight each other. Right? So the reason why I tell the right, look, you guys are full of shit too. You do nothing but identity politics on your own rights. So here's an example. Nancy Mace comes out after the election, does a look at me daddy move with the trans bathroom, with bathrooms and go, no trans people in the women's bathroom. That's, that's the big issue in Congress. I mean, we've got thirty six trillion dollars in debt. Uh, you know, we're a mess. We're not funding, uh, we don't have paid family leave. Every other nation on earth has paid family leave.

• 38:56Chris Williamson?

  That's still every time that I fucking hear that stat, it blows my mind.

• 39:02Speaker 01

  I mean, again, but that's because we live under corporate rule and we've had these corporate Republicans and corporate Democrats get, getting us to fight one another for decade after decade and doing mass propaganda through mainstream media. Hey, guys, don't focus on the fact that you're slowly getting crushed by corporate rule. That, that trash compactor scene in Star Wars, we're all getting squeezed and squeezed. So that's why Americans don't even know that the rest of the world gives moms 12 weeks off after they have a baby because they are human beings and they understand that, of course, moms need three ones at least to bond with their baby. That is a very right wing position. That is a very left wing position. That is a very

• 39:47Speaker 01

  human position. And that is why eighty four percent of Americans agree. And these bullshitters in Washington tell us, oh, there's no way we can pass it. And so what I say this about Biden, the same way that I was saying about George W. Bush or Donald Trump, don't tell me that you can't pass a bill that has eighty four percent popularity. And then tell me that you're a good politician because those two things are not possible. If you can't pass that bill, that means you suck as a politician. And the reality is, it's not that they suck, it's that they don't want to pass the bill. Cause corporations would lose a whole seven and a half cents over that. And remember, I run a company. I know how much they're bullshitting you, right?

• 40:28Speaker 01

  It's not that big a deal for companies to give paid family leave at all, especially for trillion dollar companies. They're doing it out of unbelievable cruelty. And so they bought all of our politicians and they get them to go, oh, it's pay family leave is impossible. Higher wages is impossible. Universal healthcare is impossible. Everything is impossible. Anything that helps you is always impossible. And anything that helps the rich, all of a sudden, oh yeah, giant corporate tax cuts. Here you go. All of a sudden, that's the easiest thing in the world.

• 40:58Chris Williamson?

  How much do you think the equivalent middle management bureaucrat, government officials are shitting themselves about having Elon Musk and Vivek breathing down their neck if this thing comes off?

• 41:13Speaker 01

  Well, a lot, but and they should be. So, look, I'm, so if they're talking about actual efficiency and they actually want to cut pork barrel spending. Like I said on X, like I've said on every show and I'll say here, I'm here for it. Okay. Put me in, coach, let me at them. Because these sons of bitches have been wasting our money this entire time. I give them one more example from the Pentagon in 2015, they buried a report. Why? What did the report say? That they had wasted a hundred and twenty five billion dollars. Billion. How do you lose and waste a hundred and twenty five billion dollars? You do it by saying, don't ever cut the Pentagon. You're endangering our security.

• 41:58Speaker 01

  We're all going to die unless you let me steal this hundred and twenty five billion dollars. Bullshit. They've been robbing us blind at the Pentagon my entire life. Now, they're not the only department that does it. And if you find other instances of waste abuse, great, I'm happy to take it out. But what I'm worried about is they're not worried about the abuse, or maybe they are. But on top of that, they also have another agenda, which is, oh, Lena Khan's a pain in my ass regulating my businesses. Oh, she doesn't want me to have monopolies. Yeah, she doesn't want you to have monopolies because monopolies are against capitalism. They destroy capitalism. So JD Vance said he was in favor of Lena Khan. Let's find out, let's find out, because Elon Musk is against them, against her.

• 42:41Speaker 01

  And so is all of Kamala Harris's top donors, Mark Cuban, et cetera. They were all against Lina Khan. That means she's actually trying to protect the average American. Okay, so if you cut Lina Khan, that isn't saving anyone money. It's costing a lot of people money, right? I give that as an example, but we go on and on. But, but what's gonna happen is they're gonna cut until they get to a point where the American people are gonna go, nah, we don't like that. Right? So I think where the rubber hits the road will probably be Department of Education. And if they go to cut the entire Department of Education, as they've threatened to do multiple times, I think the American people are gonna go, no, no, no, we asked you to close the border, we asked you to end inflation, we asked you to care about the average guy.

• 43:24Speaker 01

  We didn't ask you to destroy education and replace it with private education, which you're all gonna get rich off of, right? So let's see how that goes.

• 43:33Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, after, now that the dust settled, you know, we're a few weeks hence from the election. What's your sort of postmortem, being able to tie everything together now the fog of war's fucked off? Do you think this was more a right victory or a left loss? Where's your sort of head fallen on this?

• 43:52Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think it's actually super clear. So people voted for change, they almost always vote for change because the neoliberal system, they sometimes they call it neoliberal, sometimes I call it corporate rule. It's basically the same thing. Corporations have gained so much power, which by the way, in my book, Justice Coming, I explain the founding fathers did the American Revolution, not just against the British Empire, but against the British, British East India Company, right? So the Boston Tea Party was not against the British government, it was against that corporation. They went and threw their tea overboard because they were tired of their bullshit, right? And so the founding fathers kept warning us, be careful with corporations, because

• 44:35Speaker 01

  they will accumulate so much money and so much power, they will use it to choke off democracy. And they were exactly right, right? So that's what's happened all across the world. So people are like, I don't get it, Brazil's going left and right, then left, and Argentina's going extreme left, extreme right. I don't, I don't understand what's happening. I can clear it up for you. They're voting against the incumbents, they're voting against the establishment, they're voting against corporate rule. So and they're doing it all across the world. So in this case, Kamala Harris was actually, people have already forgotten this. There was a brief window where she was up in the polling by about seven points. Now, the polling turned out to be wrong by about three or four points.

• 45:20Speaker 01

  It wasn't off by thirty or forty, it was off by three or four. So in that window, she actually could have won the election if they had held the election that day. So why was she popular back then and then she lost all of her popularity?

• 45:33Chris Williamson?

  Yeah.

• 45:33Speaker 01

  Well, because she came out with populist positions in the beginning. She said, I'm going to end price gouging by these sons of bitch corporations. I'm going to go after what they're doing on housing and I'm going to lower the prices of housing. I'm going to pick Tim Walz and I know a lot of the right wing now have problems with Tim Walz. But Tim Walz was a populist in Minnesota that passed paid family leave, et cetera, et cetera. So she started out in a great direction strategically. And she, Biden was down eight, she's up seven. Holy shit, she gained fifteen points nationally, which is so hard. And then her moron corrupt brother-in-law, Tony West, who's a corporate lawyer for Uber, was like, no, I've got a great idea, let's go kiss corporate ass.

• 46:16Speaker 01

  So he convinced her to put out a letter saying that ninety corporate CEOs were on her side. And he convinced her to put Mark Cuban all over cable news. I got no beef with Mark Cuban, I have agreements and disagreements with him. That's fine, right? But strategically, it was a massive mistake to put Cuban on cable news going, no, she loves big business, no, she loves corporations. No, don't worry, she's not going to do any of that price gouging stuff. She's going to let the corporations keep fucking you, right? And then her lead, poof, evaporated. The whole, and oh, she loves Liz Cheney and Dick Cheney. Are you guys idiots? Dick Cheney's last poll was at thirteen percent. Who the hell do you think you're going to win with Dick Cheney? If they just can't get it through their heads.

• 46:58Speaker 01

  So as soon as she turned around, Anna and I on the Untur started saying, terrible strategy, we're worried, we're doomed, and that's exactly what happened.

• 47:09Chris Williamson?

  How big of a deal do you think the woke stuff has been? Because everybody's heard thirty percent of the Trump campaign budget went on this one ad, the most effective political ad in modern history, talking about they, them, and you and us. Which on the surface probably makes it feel like, well, that was a linchpin issue or the linchpin issue.

• 47:31Chris Williamson?

  How much do you believe that?

• 47:34Speaker 01

  Yeah, so at Young Turks, we have a total open mind. So I have people to the left of me. I have people that are more establishment than me. And so we had this huge debate after the election. I was on the side of it made a difference. We had two other hosts that were more leftist than I am, who said, no, the ad didn't make a difference.

• 47:58Speaker 01

  Okay, I'm gonna have the same debate with my nephew Hassan Piker. On Thanksgiving, we do a thing called Janksgiving on his stream. And he's more of a leftist than I am. And so we fight for an hour or two, and then we go eat Thanksgiving dinner together. Okay, so we're gonna have that same fight. And the essence of that fight is they think, no, go maximalist position. And say that, you know, every other president should be African American, trans, disabled person. And we'll win all the elections. And I'm like, that's not gonna work. It's not gonna work. And I had this huge fight with Hassan earlier about crime. And he's like, no, it's imaginary.

• 48:37Speaker 01

  I'm like, okay, if you'd like to get your clock cleaned, tell the voters that they're imagining being in danger when they're actually in danger. Okay, you're gonna get annihilated. And what happened? Prop 36 was a referendum, basically, on crime in California. In California, with massively Democratic voters, it passed with 70%. That is Democratic voters going, yes, there was crime. Yes, we were pissed about it. And cut the shit out. Okay, move those misdemeanors back to felonies. We're not interested in domestic assault being lightly treated. We're not interested in having our toothpaste locked up at a CVS, right?

• 49:21Speaker 01

  This shit is real. Okay, so now, but it connects, though. It connects with our earlier conversation. Because the end of that trans ad was, okay, so that position is so extreme. And they don't get it. They think it's not extreme. No. Asking me to pay for your surgery when you're not a citizen yet and you're a detainee. Brothers and sisters, I got 1,000 priorities. And maybe we disagree on whether I would pay for that surgery if I had all the money in the world, right? But we don't have all the money in the world. We don't even have paid family leave. What are we doing giving surgery to prisoners or detainees in that case anyways?

• 50:01Speaker 01

  At the end of the ad, it says Kamala Harris is for they them and Trump is for us. See, that connects it back to populism. So Kamala Harris seems to be generically for they them, whether it's an extreme position on on trans rights. And and by the way, I'm, I want to be clear, I'm 100% for trans rights, constitutional rights. I'm, I am not for, hey, I have a right to play in the WNBA. No, you don't. That's not a constitutional right. Okay. Uh, but if you try to take away their actual rights, I'm going to fight you to the end on it. Okay. But but that idea of they're for other people, Democrats, whether these extreme transpositions, whether it's sometimes criminals, that's such bad framing, Democrats, what are you doing?

• 50:47Speaker 01

  Okay. Or it's corporate goons, they're for them and not for you. And the reason why it resonated so much is because that establishment Democrats have proven over and over again, they are for them, not trans people, not black people, not immigrants, but for corporate donors. So they will never ever listen to the people. That's why that commercial resonated so much.

• 51:09Chris Williamson?

  Yeah, it plays into a wider narrative, this sort of skepticism or this suspicion that people have. It kind of feels like that might be the case. And then it legitimates any claim that then follows along that same set of train tracks.

• 51:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, that's exactly right. And so those two things collided in a way that was toxic and and it ultimately proved fatal for the Democratic chances. And by the way, again, on the Young Turks, what did we say? We said, don't go that extreme left. We were right. And don't go corporate. And we were right. And so we did that at the risk of losing some of our audience. And we did, we lost some of our paying subscribers. It hurts financially. But it matters if you're being honest or not. It matters if you're authentic or not. And so what I'm hoping for is at the end of the election. That those, there's three wings of the Democratic Party, the corporate wing, the establishment wing, that's one, they're the dominant ones unfortunately, that's Biden, Harris, Hillary

• 52:06Speaker 01

  Clinton, et cetera. There's the extreme left wing, the identitarian left, et cetera, where you guys, what right wing would call woke politics. And so, but there's a third wing, that's our wing, the populist left wing, right? The Bernie Sanders 2016, take care of the average American wing. So honestly, that wing was the only one that was correct. The other two wings were totally discredited in this election. Now, will we be able to convince Democratic primary voters of that in 2028? That's the big question.

• 52:37Chris Williamson?

  I just had an idea. So that three-pronged layout that you've had, I wonder how much of the Democratic Party, if that's true, let's just assume that that framing's accurate. I wonder how much of the Democratic Party actually likes both the right and the left obsessing over the identity politics woke stuff, because it creates a specter that people can throw stones at that isn't the corporate side, that isn't the establishment side, that allows them to hide behind the much sexier, much more headline grabbing, a little nefarious underling that occurs for the, for the Dems?

• 53:17Speaker 01

  Hundred percent. And guys, what you don't know is that a lot of those culture wars are started by the Republican donor machine. So what they do is they go, okay, let's try to dig up something that the American people will hate that's on the left. So on the trans issue, for example, they started with, okay, if you remember in the first Trump administration, he thought about banning them from the military. And that turned out to be unpopular, because people were like, well, they're risking their lives for the country, that seems nice, that seems good. No, don't do that, right? So then they moved to the bathroom issue. And then eventually people were like, what are we gonna do? Check people's genitals in bathrooms to see which bathroom they should go in? That didn't prove

• 53:58Speaker 01

  to be popular. So then they moved to, okay, trans women in sports. Oh, boom, they got it, right? So why are they doing that? Why are they going through all those things? Because they're trying to find a way to have a wedge between us. That's why they're called wedge issues, right? So they're trying to find a thing that is unpopular on the left, so they could use that against the left. Why? Because of the same reason that the establishment Democrats do identity politics, because they don't want to talk about the economic issues. Because on the economic issues, we're all united against them. So they have to divide us. And so I would ask my right wing brothers and sisters, stop falling for the trick. Okay.

• 54:42Chris Williamson?

  Well, the nut picking, the nut picking occurs on both sides, right? The opportunity for you to find something on the left, which is a ridiculous Marjorie Taylor Greene, whatever she's got up to this week, or, you know, even earlier on today, like you can not pick the nut picking. You can almost use, this is a recursive reactive cycle of story occurs, someone reacts to it. The reaction occurs to the reaction, the meta reaction about what everybody's saying happens. It's so predictable.

• 55:08Speaker 01

  And in fact, we predicted it. So on the Young Turks, we love doing predictions. And so, for example, like I said about 14, 15 months ago, I said Biden has approximately a 0% chance of winning this election. And right before he dropped out, his staff said, we believe he had a 0% chance of winning this election. Okay, so now on this ground, I'm not telling you all this stuff about my disagreements with the extreme left. Now, as a Monday morning quarterback and after the election, we started saying it two years ago. We started saying, hey, guys, this is wrong direction. And we got into huge fights over it.

• 55:49Speaker 01

  And so, and what I was trying to explain to them is, guys, the other side is digging to find something unpopular on our side. They will eventually find it if you dig long enough. And so when they do find it, can you please not help them by falling right into that trap? And their resounding answer to us was, no, fuck off. So. So when they got to trans sports, they like that portion on the left fell right into the trap. They ran into the trap. They're like, yes, no, there's no difference between trans women and biological women. I'm like, guys, a trans woman entered a weightlifting

• 56:32Speaker 01

  contest. She's in her 40s. Okay. And notice I'm saying she I respect all of her choices. I respect all of her rights, but she enters that contest and wins by 200 pounds, even though she's in her 40s. There's a biological difference. Of course there is. And they're like, no, no, no, no, no, we're gonna fall into the trap. And I'm like, okay, so you think I'm like, look, give LeBron every hormone on planet Earth, put him in the WNBA. He scores 200 points a night. They're like, no, he would be an average player.

• 57:08Speaker 01

  Okay, look, I can't. So they wouldn't listen. And I'm asking right wing populist now. Can you guys please listen? Every time they do a culture war issue, they're trying to distract you. It's a fucking squirrel. Okay. Focus on things that matter in your life. Does your daughter have healthcare when she needs it? Are your wages higher or lower? Like here, $15 minimum wage, the right wing was trained through propaganda from corporate Republicans. You should hate the minimum wage. You should hate the minimum wage. And the propaganda is, oh, if you have higher wages, it'll drive up inflation. No, dick, inflation is already here. Higher wages at least allows me to keep up with inflation. So the what you're

• 57:53Speaker 01

  saying, we should move up the price of cars and bananas and and houses. The only thing we shouldn't move up is your wages? No, fuck off. So you can tell me anything you want about trans bathrooms in either direction. But at the end of the day, fight for your wages, fight for your healthcare, fight for your family. Does that make sense?

• 58:12Chris Williamson?

  It does. I mean, ultimately, the job of the political party, first job, the first job is to get into power. Because if you're not in power, you're not really doing shit. So do you think that there will be a reckoning on the left? Do you think there will be a reassessment of the things that have been focused on? Will it result in?

• 58:32Chris Williamson?

  Genuine change of any kind, or you said that you like predictions. What's your prediction for this?

• 58:40Speaker 01

  Yeah, so um, and I'm also one of the few people in media that acknowledge it when I'm wrong, right? So I thought that 2020 online media was already strong enough to beat mainstream media. And then that's why Bernie Sanders would win against Biden because mainstream media is a propaganda machine. And they despise Bernie more than they despise Trump. They hate him with every fiber of their being. Because he's a true populist left person who's actually looking out for the average guy. And nothing bothers the elites more than that. So, but I thought he was online media that was backing him. And the uprising etc would be enough to overcome Biden. And it looked like for the first three primaries that Bernie won, he won all three.

• 59:24Speaker 01

  It looked like we were right, but it turns out, no. When they coalesced and Obama pulled him in and Clyburn pulled him in and said Buttigieg, Globuchar, all you guys shut the fuck up and back Biden. And hey, Morning Joe and CNN, everybody shut up, except just everybody called Bernie the most successful Jewish candidate in American history a Nazi and his followers Nazis, just go do that. Smear the shit out of him. Let's go. And when they did that and Obama gave and Clyburn gave that order. And he didn't, to be clear, he didn't give the order to MSNBC and CNN. That's more group think. Okay. And so, but when that happened, we lost because it turned out mainstream media was still bigger than online media. Okay, so I was wrong about that.

• 1:00:08Speaker 01

  Now in 2024, for the first time, online media has been stronger than mainstream media. And you see that because mainstream media all said in unison, must vote for Kamala Harris, Trump is great danger. Trump is the worst hurt human alive. And look at this, I bunch that I agree with them on about Trump. I think we can get into that another time. He's egomaniac. He should have never said terminate the constitution, et cetera, et cetera. Okay. But don't tell me that Kamala Harris is perfectly fine, where she could barely speak, right? She speaks in talking points. She looks like a corporate robot. So, but those bullshitters,

• 1:00:49Speaker 01

  for the first time in my life, lost, right? Why? Because Rogan, Theo Von, all those podcasts that Trump did, got them more views than all the paid media that Kamala Harris got and all the mainstream media that she got. So that gives me some hope, not because of Trump or Republicans, but because in 2020 primary, that we might be able to win in the primary and have a truly populist left candidate, which would finally give Americans a real choice. Wouldn't that be amazing? Hey, do we go in that direction of that guy genuinely trying to help the American people? Or if you guys come up with a genuine populist, that person trying to genuinely help the American

• 1:01:30Speaker 01

  people, but in a different direction. Now let's let the American people decide. So I hope that our side's online media, including the Young Turks, is strong enough to overwhelm MSNBC and win those primaries, because this is really important. People misunderstand politics. They think, and this is the mythology that television has been putting out there my whole life. Oh, the two sides got together, everyone in the country watched the debate, then they analyzed the policy issues, and then they decided which candidate they liked better. No. One side got brainwashed by one set of media, the other side got brainwashed by another set of media, and then some people broke free of that brainwashing and they're floating out in

• 1:02:12Speaker 01

  online media right now, et cetera. So what decides elections is almost exclusively media. So the media wars are going to determine who wins the 2028 election, as they have throughout. It's just that, for the first time, our side, as in online media, which is more populist, is now winning.

• 1:02:33Chris Williamson?

  Cenk Uygur, ladies and gentlemen, Cenk, I appreciate the heck out of you. Thank you very much for today. What is coming up for you guys next? What can people expect?

• 1:02:42Speaker 01

  So, one of the things that we're doing at TYT.com is we got a populist plank. And I'm super curious to see if the right wing agrees with those positions. And what I'm saying is, let's do a voting block. And so if your side is true and they deliver on these things, I'm not playing around with any of it. I don't care what the teams are called. I don't care if there's an R or a D on your helmet. You deliver paid family leave, anti-war, money out of politics, whatever those positions, then I'm gonna vote for you. And that's what signing that pledge means, okay? Whichever side delivers, I vote for them. And if you don't deliver, fuck off, okay? So I'm not gonna vote for you if you don't actually do the things that we want.

• 1:03:23Speaker 01

  You could tell me how terrible the other side is and you could, both sides fear monger. "Oh my God, they'll let trans people in all the bathrooms, ahhhh!" Right? And the other side's like, "Oh my God, they're gonna turn the country into, you know, the Fourth Reich, ahhhh!" Right? You can say that all you want, but those six policies are all super popular with right and left. So you deliver on this, we deliver our votes. If you don't, again, in unison, we should shout to them, "Fuck off." So, but I don't know if the right wing will like it or not like it. So go check it out on TYT.com. Look at the thing. If you like it, sign the petition. Watch the show. We do live shows 6 to 8 p.m. every day, Monday through Friday.

• 1:04:06Speaker 01

  And every right-winger that watches it goes, "Holy shit, they're honest. I didn't expect that." Right? And we criticize both sides. And by the time we criticize Trump, they're like, "Oh, I get it." They actually give a shit. And they're not criticizing him just to be a dick to Trump, or just to be on the opposite side, or just because their Democrats are on the left. They're doing it because they have genuine concerns. So come check out Young Turks on YouTube or on TYT.com anytime. Sign the pledge if you like it. And, and at least hear our case so you can make an informed decision about which side to go with.

• 1:04:43Chris Williamson?

  Appreciate you, mate. Good to chat.

• 1:04:44Speaker 01

  Thank you, brother.

• 1:04:46Speaker 02

  Mr. President, my company for me of the explosion on our rig. On October 2nd. Causing massive water displacement and triggering a tsunami. They all heap the blame on me. Tom Cruise is. Digger got us into this mess. And Digger's gonna dig us up. From the director of Birdman and The Revenant.

• 1:05:02Speaker 03

  What would happen if I stopped drilling? You stall, you freeze to death, that's what.

• 1:05:06Speaker 02

  With great power comes great deniability.

• 1:05:10Speaker 03

  I'm not the first man.

• 1:05:11Speaker 02

  Digger. See the trailer online. Only in theaters October 2nd. Rated R. Under 17.9. Without parent.