We're back with another edition of The Federalist Radio Hour. I'm Emily Drishanski,
culture editor here at the Federalist. As always, you can email the show
at radio at the Federalist dot com, follow us on Twitter at fdr LST.
Make sure to subscribe wherever you download your podcasts, and to the premium
version of our website as well. Today I'm joined once again by my colleague
Eddie Scary. He is at The Federalist. You'll see him on TV and
you can even read his books. Eddie, where can people read your books?
You can? The best place to go is always, always, always
Amazon dot com. Just search for my name and the list of books will
come up, and that's always the easiest way to do it. But the
Amazon. I'm actually surprised when you said the bet, because usually when people
come on and they've written books, they say the best thing to do is
go right to the publisher's website or go to your local book score You,
Eddie, you're just like give your money to Jeff Bezos. Huh. I
wonder why, Actually I wonder why people say that because I think it because
of Amazon. Oh, because like just because of being Amazon, I guess
that's true, but I would imagine that so many of so many of the
listeners and just people in general, just like they Amazons was, they get
so many things. So that's just what I know where I direct people.
I feel like that's the easiest thing. Also to say, I've been adjusting
the levels on the microphones as we started here because I'm so I'm not used
to somebody who actually talks into the microphone. I'm used to Chris Bedford who's
always the three feet away from the microphone, and I have to like try
to adjust it on the fly as he's just moving around. Well, actually
I went back and listened to the podcast. Actually was the video I was
looking at. It was me, you and Chris, So like this was
like was this last summer or two summers we were in the old office.
Yeah, but something was wrong with my I'm Mike, and so I just
like I feel like I have to like be right on top of it right
now. But no, it's it's it's actually what people are supposed to do
when they are using microphones. You actually try to speak into the microphone.
Doing it right. So far, so good. No, I wanted to
talk to Eddie about who By the way, Eddie says he's barbied out,
so I won't drag him. And although it may happen, we don't know,
But we haven't really done a big sort of overview of what's happened in
twenty twenty four in a while. Um, And that's I think useful.
As we're three weeks away from the debate the debates on August twenty third.
Today is what August third, so we're twenty days away from the first debate.
It looks like the foreign President isn't going to speak. His margin or
isn't going to debate. His margin with around de Santis has grown in the
wake of the three indictments and continuing law fairs. It's not just those three
indictments, it's threats of more indictments. It's Fanny Willis in Fulton County threatening
all kinds of stuff too. So as that's happened to the bafflement of Dana
Bash. Did you see the of Dana Bash. She was talking to Frank
Lentz on CNN this week and was like, who are these people that continue
to support Donald Trump after watching what he did on January six? And she
just couldn't ever hid around it. Yeah, I saw that there was so
I saw that he she was interviewing Frank Lentz. And actually that is the
reason I did not click that video because I do not like Frank Lentz.
And it was like when I saw that clip, it had nothing to do
with her and everything. It was just like his assessment of things, and
he's been wrong for so long now and so many things. If you remember,
going back to twenty sixteen, he got the Trump stuff wrong all the
time. I remember it was after one of the debates. This is a
Republican primary debate going into twenty sixteen and immediate I don't even remember what the
what the reason for this was. But when he when the debate was over,
Lunch is on Fox and says, what I just saw was a campaign,
the Trump campaign just completely implode on Live tell of Vision and We're like
and this was like several debates in but I'm just thinking, like, what,
why are you saying that? And of course he was wrong. He
was just wrong so many times. So anyway, that kind of beside the
point. But that's why I didn't watch that clip. But I have heard
since that she had this you know this whole amused expression about there are actually
people who still like Donald Trump. Well, and it's also like it's so
backwards, it's that's the reason you're wondering why people still support Donald Trump,
is exactly why they are continuing to support Donald Trump, or by the way,
are deciding they have to go with Trump over somebody like de Santis.
And this is where I was going to take it, because the more oxygen
Trump gets in the media for being the target of now three indictments and whatever
other lawfair comes his way, and honestly just continuing to be the single target
of the left's ap program, the left's political focus. He is the political
focus of the left right now, continues to be and so long as that
is the case, so long as he is dominating the media, first of
all, people are going to say, I'm not voting for anybody else because
this is the guy that is their enemy. Therefore he's the only person.
I'm not endorsing that argument, but that's the logic, like, therefore he's
the only person that should be the nominee he had. It has to be
him because he is the symbol of everything and he's the only one that can
stand up against it. But on the other hand, it's also just like
man, you continue to talk about him every second of every day. Of
course, he's pulling away in the polls, right, And I think it
is in large part these the the continued persecution of Donald Trump, which Donald
J. Trump, Donald J. Trump, that his supporters rightfully see as
an attack also on them, because I look at these indictments that are there,
you know, it's one after the other. And I think that didn't
just this week or last week we visited and revisited an older one to add
more charges. Didn't that just happen with the Florida records thing? They added
like another like Jack Smith added charges of tampering with evidence. I think allegedly
deut it's just suching so ridiculous, which is a hilarious thing to do,
right Yeah. But I think that people look at that and say, which
which I keep doing, is say, is the juice really worth the squeeze
on this with with with going after Trump and what the charges are. And
I think that the logical end to that is this isn't really just about Donald
Trump. It's about everything he represents and all the people he represents. So
I think, yeah, there's a big dig in among his supporters and among
Republican voters who say, no, I'm definitely sticking by this guy. In
addition to also feeling like he was robbed of a second term, they want
to see that second term, if for no other reason than just for the
principle of it. And then, of course, a really big thing is
that even his closest competitor, which would be run de Santis, is just
not campaigning in any standout way. I would say, for me, someone
who really had who continues to have high hopes for him, but really did
it has been such a disappointment so far. And so if you're you're looking
at that, I mean I looked at I was just looking at the five
thirty eight, like I stay average poles, kind of like our real clear
politics does. And just from the time that the Santis had declared that he
was running, you look back, there was like a seven point gap between
him and Donald Trump. Since then that it has not changed whatsoever in terms
of like there hasn't been no up and down or anything. It's just been
down. The gap has just continued to grow and grow and grow. It's
probably at its biggest point today. The trend has just been just a gap
growing Donald Trump pulling away. He's now at what above around fifty fifty one
percent support him on Republican voters nationwide. So if he has no real competition
to speak of, of course he's going to be the front runner. Yeah,
And that's what's that's actually really interesting because on the one hand, I
do think it's true. Round to Santis could run a perfect campaign. He
could run the campaign that he ran for real election in Florida, which was
a great campaign. He took a bear a sort of a slim margin of
victory the term before or on his first election and turned it into huge growth
in Florida by policies and by the campaign, and it just he could do
that. He could replicate that on a national scale if that were possible.
I'm just speaking about the sort of hypothetical fantasy here he could have done that,
And I still think, you know, maybe he would have it up
to ten points, the gap you know between him and Trump, up to
ten points instead of whatever it is now, which is like sixty to twenty
is something crazy like that. And on the other hand, the campaign,
a lot of people probably saw the news that it shut about a third of
its staff, although none of that staff seems to have been the very highest
level, right, And that to me is the craziest thing. It makes
sense if you're cash strapped and you have to save some money on the staffing
level. It does not make any sense to me that you are, what,
two months into your run and you're cash strapped, that you are having
the opposite trajectory of what you said you wouldn't what you wanted to have on
top of being cash strapped, and you are getting rid of nobody at the
top, right, Like, that's a situation where the only thing that seems
to me can rescue the campaign. And by the way, I did think
his economic agenda roll out this week was good. I think what he put
out there was interesting. And we'll talk about this in a second, but
I thought a pretty good bridge between sort of old right and new right that
said, if you're not getting rid of any of the people that steered you
into the ditch, how should anybody have faith that this is going to get
better? If Trump's not even going to get on the debate stage because he
doesn't feel any pressure to debate you, right, And I think that he
has a perfectly f in good economic platform. I watched his speech, not
a good speech giver. Um, he's pretty he's pretty stiff and boring,
and you can see the crowd is not super engaged with you, you even
really see, which is probably the you know, the kind of biggest letdown
is that they seem very unsure of when they should be clapping, or if
they should clap at all. You might hear a smattering and then he kind
of waits to see if there's going to be more, and than there really
isn't. But otherwise, what does he do? And I predicted this,
and maybe maybe it was already scheduled and I just didn't know it or hadn't
seen it. But I wrote how because I got his campaign email that said
he was gonna that morning at eleven forty five that morning, he was going
to be giving his economic speech. And I went to tweet, Um,
yeah, he'll give an economic speech, then he'll go do an interview on
Fox And oh, absolutely no attention paid to this thing whatsoever. What did
he do? His interview was with Brett Baer. Then I watched the interview
had actually had some some good moments. Trump freaked out about it too,
which is always a sign that you got under someone's skin. Yeah, because
actually, of the two parts, I can't remember what the second one was.
But what I found most notable about that that interview was when he talked
about He's I'm paraphrasing a little bit, but he basically said during COVID he
was like, I was fighting against the administration to keep Florida open. That's
what he said. I was like, that's the contrast that people need to
hear, and that you know, it's it's newsy because it's conflict between two
people who right now it's kind of going between them. But that's the kind
of thing we need to hear. But when you hear it on Fox,
and it's the Fox audience that already knows Ronda santiss I just don't think it
matters. But yeah, he back to your other point about the campaign.
You know, we're reading all this stuff about the shakeups. That has blown
my mind as well. He when these news stories first started coming out,
I believe it was political that was reporting on this big donor retreat that they
had I think in like Colorado or something, and they were quoting his campaign
manager as having told attendees. Again, these are all big donors having told
them, yeah, we spent too much money, but we're going to turn
things around right now. And it's like, well, whose call was that?
Is the campaign manager? Why why are you still there? And this
isn't a thing that has happened within We're like, when didn't he launch in
like March? No, DeSantis, I think he launched in June? Really
was it June? Or let me it wasn't that long ago? Or I
feel like it was a little bit further back. But but either way,
that's you know, we're what two months into it or so, and I
mean that's two months that we've been going in the wrong direction. Whose call
is that? June fourteenth? Was it June fourteenth? I'm sorry? May
twenty fourth? Okay, May okay? What did I say? March?
So we were in between there? Yeah? So yeah, But again,
like so, this isn't a super super fresh, brand new campaign where there
was a like a few days of missteps. This was something that's been going
on for several weeks now, and for her to go on and say that
one of the biggest things we spent too much money. That is your call,
right, You're the person who should be who should be fired, and
I hate to see anyone lose their job. And I mean, I will
say that some of the layoffs that I saw happen, I am in favor
of them. I felt like there were certain people who were hired by this
campaign that they I don't know. I honestly, there was like this,
I don't want to get into too many names. I don't think most people
care about, like a twenty five year old who was very known for being
a journalist kind of in DC, but obviously was of that of that segment
of Twitter that gets a kick out of, you know, the memes and
the trolling, and I think that was kind of what what did him in
with the campaign. So I supported some of these layoffs. But I mean,
if you're really going to do it and make a difference and needs to
be that, it needs to be the top don't get rid of the twenty
five year old memers, right yeah yeah? Or who's telling them to do
the means to both I guess well, but they're still getting in direction from
the top down, right yeah yeah. And then and speaking of the top
down, a lot of this is also DeSantis his fault in that this incredibly
safe, take no risks media strategy that he has where he wants to go
nowhere outside of the people who he already knows likes him. He wants to
stay at Fox, he wants to do what Joe Rogan he wants to do
Russell Russell brand. Which it was a really good interview I did. I
did listen to that podcast. You thought that I didn't listen. How did
it go? It was good. I was listening on my way back driving
from driving back from South Carolina. It was good. I didn't think it
was. Again, this is the problem with these It wasn't super newsy.
If you would ask me like the one thing I remember, I can't.
I don't remember much from it, but it was. It was a good
chat. And so like he's better in the podcast format necessarily perhaps than he
is giving a speech. Oh for sure. That was what I meant by
Yeah, he doesn't give a good speech, but he is really interesting to
watch when he is being challenged on something and being challenged from somebody who it
actually matters. What I mean by that is what people What he became legendary
for was doing these press press briefings with adversarial reporters. They'd ask him questions
and he would totally shut it down, mastery of the material, understands the
facts, would completely refute the premise of the question, which is something that
is so important for every Republican anymore. That's like the rule number one to
being a Republican, an effective Republican anymore, is completely refute the premise of
anything that comes from from the press. He was great at that, and
now he's completely lost that because he doesn't engage with any media right now.
We saw him what he did Jake Tapper. It wasn't live. That was
the weirdest decision I ever saw. He did the Jake Tapper interview and it
wasn't live. So instead, what did we get? We would get a
minute of clip with the Jake Tapper taped interview, then there'd be two minutes
of Trump indictment news, and then another thirty seconds or a santence, then
three more minutes of Trump of Trump indictment news. And how do you think
CNN's gonna Do you think they're going to edit it to give to Santis the
best edit against Tapper? Probably not right? Yeah, And I mean it
was also again I think it was. That was also just not a very
newsy interview to these things anymore. If you're going to agree to do these
things, they have to be done live, and you have to you have
to do them outside of Fox. It needs to be CNN, and it
needs to be MSNBC, and it needs to be the network. Otherwise,
just no one's going to pay attention, because that's where he excels is really
when he's challenged and he can prove no, listen, you're you're wrong,
the facts are on my side. Well, and that's what was so weird
about the entire curriculum, like black studies curriculum backlash, is that, first
of all, de Santis his gut reaction was I mean, maybe his actual
reaction wasn't his gut reaction, but the reaction he went with instinctively was hey,
I wasn't in charge of this, Like I didn't, you know.
He kind of punted instead of leaning in and saying, you know, as
he has done in the past, seeing this as an obvious political opportunity.
It's like it's basically a layup for him to go in on the media,
and what happens in that gap is media just went even like doubly as hard
on run de Santis to the point where even some Republicans clearly believed the lie
about that curriculum, believe bad argumentation about that curriculum. It just opened up
this vacuum. And it's weird because I think this is fundamentally the problem with
a Desantist campaign is that the never Trump establishment Republicans see DeSantis as their guy
to take down Trump, and real conservatives, genuine conservatives, see DeSantis as
a guy who can take down Trump. And so both of those groups of
people and I'm saying this, like you Eddie, as somebody who did like
a lot of what Santas and still do like a lot of what DeSantis does.
You you have those two groups in a tug of war in the Desantist
campaign. So you have some people that are genuine conservatives who want him to
gut the administrative state, take down the surveillance state, and you know,
go improve our education system, get the economy back and track etc. Etc.
But they're in this tug of war with the establishment Republicans who still don't
know how to campaign, who still think that campaigning is like getting a real
win against Donald Trump is getting a Brett Bear one on one that doesn't make
any news, but like, this is a real win for us, and
I wonder if some of it, I'm curious for your take on this comes
from that what was maybe traumatic for the campaign leadership the botched rollout with Elon
Musk and David Sacks, And I actually, to this day don't think that
was a bad decision. I think what was bad is that the campaign was
too dumb to couple that announcement was something bigger, you know, with like
a rally or some type of cool photo op with his family in Florida or
something like that. And I wonder if his sort of he seems like he's
not the same guy. He seems like he's lost his mojo, And I
wonder if some of that comes down to just those establishment Republicans of the Desantist
campaign, the professional consultant class, getting really freaked out by that one little
new thing they tried and just saying, listen, we're not running this like
new media campaign anymore. We're clamping down and we're controlling him. Yeah.
I mean, it's interesting because, like you said, it is it is
almost like and I was I've been kind of like teasing on Twitter these past
few weeks where I would go find one of those old, really badass clips
of de Santis just really hammering some reporter. Mostly it was on like the
lockdown and lockdown and the COVID stuff, but also the the I know what
they called it, don't say gay bill, but it was really the parental
rights parental rights legislation that was passed in Florida, where he would just completely
own the dim wet reporter asking these questions, and I would say, like
with the tweet, I would kind of retweet the clip and say missing forty
what does he like forty five or something? Forty five year old Florida man.
If you if you know where this man is, contact your local authorities,
because really it's like he's he's completely disappeared. Is that I'm not sure
if he's gotten into his own head. You've heard a lot about how kind
of what you're talking about the two different factions within the Republican Party there.
There's been a lot written about that in terms of he's trying to marry two
two factions that are not really compatible. So is he just completely losing it
there? That could be the case, Um, I like you. I
didn't. I didn't think there was anything wrong with them. The spaces,
the Twitter spaces launch campaign launch. It was fine. And people had been
talking, especially in that moment, a lot about Elon Musk and you know,
buying Twitter. I thought that was an interesting decision. It was obviously
botch for technical reasons. The feed kept get dropping, they couldn't keep it
up. But yeah, I think not I expected this kind of blowing,
this like this bowl coming out of the gates with his campaign, that would
be he would be everywhere after it. And I mean, and it is
a long campaign. I know that we're still a little bit early in the
actual twenty twenty four UM election. However, to close a thirty point gap,
that's not something that happens over the course of even just a month.
I mean, I guess, I guess stranger things have happened, but that's
something that you're going to have to eat away at very very like methodically deliberately.
And I mean, I think like you have to sustain that and over
an extended period of time. And so for him not to be doing that,
and you know, and I think that was that was kind of Trump's
understood the way he kind of understood things back when he was going to run
because he was pulling down at like nine percent or something when m Jeb Bush
was in like the thirties. But what did Trump do when he came out
of the scene. He called like if he couldn't be there in person for
an interview, he would call in. He would do it live, or
he would do it whatever you wanted. I mean, I that was back
when I was such a young reporter working at the Washington Examiner. I could
get on the phone. Yeah, but very very young. I'm still very
young twenty four. Um. But so I could get on the phone with
Donald Trump. I could text one of his who is the guy at the
time, Sam Nunberg, Oh wow, Yeah, yeah he could. I
could text him and ask her comment. He'd say, you know, actually
he's here and he wants to talk to you right now. And I could
get I could talk with Donald Trump on the phone because he would be everywhere,
and just to stantists make Having not studied that, I guess I don't
know or listening too much, maybe it is to these consultants. I mean,
we see that going back to kind of the point with his campaign manager,
who's still around after admitting her by her own admission, she has screwed
this whole thing up, and yet she's still there. So your guess is
as good as mine. But every way you kind of whatever angle you look
at it, it's bad. Well, this is what happened with the media,
and Eddie is being uncharacteristically monster. He wrote a piece for the Federalists
that I think I actually quibbled with before you wrote it in our staff chat,
because with the Santist he had this really I think moral position on cooperation
with corporate press, which is that he didn't do it. And he had
these like Sunshine State summits where he invited basically an honest, fair journalists to
cover him, and that was a lot of conservative media, maybe too much
conservative media, but I loved that concept and it didn't bother me so much
that the corporate press was being shut out of their access because they'd have to
earn it back. And so I've always really liked that, and he got
a lot of praise for doing that in conservative media, and I wonder if
that led his campaign management when they launched a national campaign to say we're going
to keep on with that track instead of as you wrote, the guy has
to do hostile interviews because it's where he thrives. He's absolutely best in conversation
with media hacks. That is his brand, it's his bread and butter.
It's what rocketed him to meteorc success. And it clearly gave him a sense
of he gave him like his mojo. He was. I actually hate that
word. I don't know why I've used it twice, but like it really
gave him fire. And after you wrote the piece, they change course.
Yeah, yeah, pretty quickly. I would love to take credit for that.
Um. Yeah. That The headline was It's time for destantists to do
it live, which is a reference to you know, the Bill O'Reilly Inside
Edition video. Look it up on you Tube if you haven't seen it,
because you Edward Bill o'reiley. I'm add too. I'm gonna start calling William
Um anyway. No, but I respect that position because yeah, you and
you and I, well we as a staff, we're kind of going back
and forth on this before I wrote the piece. The whole point of the
piece being the distantist does have to get out of his his his Fox News
cocoon and make news and the way the surest way to make news, and
nobody knows that better than Donald Trump is through conflicts. That is journalism.
One on one where there's conflict, there is a story. That's where the
attention is. Um. And you know destantist has him been doing that.
He's been going on Fox News with Jesse Waters and eating pizza, playing catch
with Brian Kilmead. These are not interesting things and it doesn't show any kind
of um what people are looking for and have been looking for. But what
they know they have, at least in Donald Trump is a fighter. Yeah.
Um, that's just something that is that that that's a quality you have
to demonstrate that you have and you can demons. You demonstrate that best and
at the biggest scale by doing these national interviews with hostile media. But I
do respect like you, you know, as we were talking before I wrote
that piece among ourselves, I respect the idea that you know, we do
not owe anything to dishonest, corrupt media, which all of them are.
You know, they don't deserve access, they don't deserve a comment from you,
they don't deserve the time. I respect that UM on a you know,
as a standard operating procedure. But the circumstances become very different when you
have Donald Trump, who's shown that yes, he will confront you on your
territory. And when he can do this on your home playing field, Um,
if you're going to go up against that, which is what De Santists
and everyone else in the Republican field is doing it, you have to show
you can do the exact same thing. So while I respect the that Mo,
it's just the circumstances change when you're going to run for the twenties twenty
four nomination. Yeah, when you're running for national office against Donald Trump,
It's just it's a totally different ball game. And I think that's one of
my biggest criticisms are the campaign is that it's really funny you mentioned the baseball
and the pizza, because first of all, yes, Rond De Santis is
a former Yale baseball player, and I'm sure he does genuinely like pizza.
But it reminds me so much of what both Mitt Romney and Jeb Bush.
And also you could probably make the same criticisms of the Cruise and Rubio campaigns
in twenty sixteen. Did you have these like Beltway consultants getting they're scoring that
pizza conversation on Fox News or that catch with Bryan Kilmeade, and they think
this is a big win, and you're running against Donald Trump. And the
thing that Donald Trump did that no other Republican candidate has done before him is
he did not take his suit off when he went to the Iowa State Fair.
He didn't roll up his sleeves to try and bs people because he's not
a politician. He gave helicopter rides. People would always be like, well,
how's this sort of gilded billionaire going to do an Iowa It's like,
well, he handled it way better than every highly paid Washington consultant ever has,
just by being Donald Trump and going there and saying I'm not going to
roll up my sleeves. I remember this this Mitt Romney package, I think
it was on sixty minutes before the twenty twelve election, of him talking about
how he loves Fluffer Nutter sandwiches. He's like in his kitchen on the lake
in New Hampshire making a sandwich. And this is clearly for the consultants that
run the campaign, a huge win they got. They got CBS to watch
Mitt Romney, this private equity baron make a Sandwich. He's just like you,
and they're still stuck in this cycle where they think that works, let
alone against Donald Trump, it is. I mean, maybe it works if
your opponent, as Joe Biden, to just run a safe, traditional campaign
like that, but it does not work if you're running against Donald Trump,
because, if anything, it's going to make you seem less authentic to people
because they're contrasting it with somebody who is nothing but authentically himself in every single
interview. And so to think that that still works is honestly mind boggling to
me. It is, and you know, I don't. I'm not one
of those people like I just read there was a headline. I think it's
still open. I haven't ready yet, but the headline was something like,
um, the desantist hype is now now that the desantist hype is behind him,
or something like that. But I'm not going to I'm not ready to
write, you know, write him off. I think we still have time.
There's still things that he can do. There's still a lot that can
happen that even even if it's not him that does it, it can still
lead to his numbers going up. That can that can very well be true,
but it is possible. I've been keeping in the back of my mind
is that maybe he's really not good at this. Maybe he's not cut out
for for any of this. Um. I mean he's a great governor.
Obviously the record is there, but maybe just when it comes to the whole
like national level and campaigning, there's there. There are certain things that you
have to do. You have to make news, you have to get attention,
people have to know your name. Maybe he just can't do it.
Yeah, I have been thinking that, Um, but no, it's I
will say, like, um to your point about the authenticity when I when
I tune into the live feet of his economic speech, which was earlier this
week, right a two weeks yea, they were playing country music at the
top of it, and I don't know, to santists, maybe he is
a country fan. But it just kind of takes you back to like all
these Republicans that feel Donald Trump plays what has been years for decades known as
a gay anthem at his events because he likes the YMCA. He's a gay
icon. He has a gay icon. He does that because he likes the
song. He doesn't I've never heard a country song play I know he likes
to play a tiny dancer, and like, you know these songs Lee Greenwood.
Okay, so maybe there's one or two, but I was watching,
I don't know, and I know that the santist likes wearing these boots all
the time. And then I see just like I'm often just thinking, okay,
if we have to. And also I heard him say he said something
like I'm I'm born and raised in Florida, which I suppose, I guess
that's true. But the thing is, my impression was actually that he came
from Ohio, because I think that he had said in a previous speech that
his parents are from Ohio, so he's actually someone of the Midwest. And
I was thinking of those two things in my head. I'm just like,
oh God, here we go again. He's he's going to be one of
these Republicans and the things he has to be something to everybody. And it
reminded me, actually sadly, depressingly of Joe Biden, who I swear to
God, no matter who he is in front of, he will tell you
that he shared the same last name, or he grew up around the same
boat. Like if he's in front of Italians, oh, I had all
these Italians in my neighborhood. When he goes to like the Polish's, I
grew up around nothing but Polish people. It's just like, you know,
there's seven eleven or so, right, which you can't even go into a
seven eleven. He was talking to and this is like two thousand and seven
when he was campaigning in that primary, if I remember correctly, and an
Indian voter came up to him and he said, in my state, you
can't even go into a seven eleven without hearing somebody without speaking with a slight
Indian accent. It's exactly what you're saying. That was good, But yeah,
no, that's the thing is, like I swear it, there's nobody
he can't get in front of that night. I think someone should something.
Maybe they have like cross reference. He's like, where did you grow up?
It was supposed to be what scrant Pennsylvania or something or what even says.
But it's always like he somehow was around all the whoever it is he's
around, He's known those those types of people wherever he grew up at anyway,
I'm seeing a little bit of that in the Santis and it's it's really
depressing me. This is the thing. So I was actually gonna say,
you know, there's somebody who if the Veca Ramaswamy had a show on Fox,
I would probably watch it a lot. I think he's interesting and dynamic
and he does have charisma. Uh Um. I don't know that I would
entrust him with the responsibilities of the Oval office. But that is to say,
he's made a couple of just really interesting new media campaign moves in the
last week. One he filed foyas about the Trump indictments, and that used
it as a public relation to push you know, so he immediately has his
campaign file for it fy US or he personally filed for US about the indictments
of Donald Trump the Special Council investigations, and goes on TV and his campaign
clips his Fox hit and pushes it out there. And then he did another
thing which was really interesting. Um. And again it's just like this,
it's all there for the taking, like you can do this. Um he
what was I thinking of? I feel like Rick Perry right now? Did
you see the other thing that he did this week? No, I don't
pay that much attention to his campaign though I agree. I think that he's
really thoughtful. Um, which is because I saw that he had put out
that Um. Sorry, I'm not trying to like wind no please do and
I'm looking up now. Yeah, so I saw that he put out a
thing that was you know with FPI. Yeah, that's what I was thinking,
which was like around a certain several thousand or something agents that he could
repurpose two different things just to shrink the agency. And it's super specific.
Yeah yeah, yeah, then he get like the exact numbers that he had.
He's outside of the courthouse in DC. Sorry to interrupt you, but
like there's there's a crowd outside the courthouse in DC right now today as we're
taping this and he's talking about the foyas he like taped a video about filing
these foys outside the courthouse here in DC. And that's what like Ron de
Seintes could have done. He could have been running as like the Trump defender
who thinks he's just you know, different for this moment. Yeah, you
know, Trump is great, Like this is again, I think he could
be if he was running against another candidate, any other candidate other than Trump,
if Donald Trump wasn't running for president right now, I think we would
still all have some complaints about his campaign, but the fact of the matter
is he is running against Donald Trump and he's just blowing it. Yeah,
so now that you bring that up, I do want to get this out
there because this is something I really want the Decantis people, who if any
one of you was listening, this is a free idea I put on Twitter,
I put it in an article. I'm saying it now in the federal
He's taken his advice before. Yeah, you have to do this, Like
if you don't want to talk, which I don't. This this for sure.
When I say do media that's you know, outside of your comfort zone
that I do mean live and on TV, Like that's the only way to
do it because otherwise they throw up these fact check graphics, they interrupt with
their own little stupid fact checks, and you know, they get to have
the last word, and that's not the way it should be. But so,
if you don't want to deal with print media like the New York Times
the Washington Post, when they write articles about you and they ask you for
comment, you don't have to answer. But put a camera in front of
the Santis in his office, have him with the newspaper article, reading through
it and debunking each one line by line and saying what's wrong with it.
This is what they got wrong, this is false. That would be an
instant hit on Twitter, like you were saying that, a vivid Gramaswami he
went out to that, you know, you can do things. It doesn't
have to be huge. You can do things like that that people will love.
I would watch every single one of those. I would find that really
compelling to watch. And again it would just be another way of showing that
you have them, which I think that is his strongest as far as being
an elected official, just a real mastery of the material, familiarity with material.
Matt Gates does his own podcast now, which I also think is interesting,
and it's one of those things that again like in the Trump era,
you know, not typically like a huge fan of Matt Gates, as his
foreign policies occasionally very interesting to me, but in the Trump era, especially
if you're running against Donald Trump, to have these like Beltway consultants who let's
get back to the boots question, because we all know the type in DC,
the freaking consultant who has lived in McClane and Fairfax for thirty years and
maybe is from Texas or Tennessee, Louisiana originally but doesn't ever go back there.
Or maybe he's actually just from New York. Well, maybe they're from
California and they walk around in cowboy boots. It is the most painful thing.
I actually think that it's it's become in the last ten years, like
sort of a conservative virtue signal. Yeah. Yeah, the people who grew
up in the suburbs of Dallas, like never on a ranch, Like you
don't need cowboy you've never needed cowboy boots in your right, just stopped wearing
them with your suit. Yeah. Now, that's exactly how I feel.
And I some people, I mean, and I will say, there there
are I'm sure some people who just they just I've met people it's like,
oh, I just like cowboy boots, that's why I wear them. I
have, I've met those people. I think I had a roommate who was
one of those people. I always thought it was weird, um, but
he genuinely, genuinely just liked wearing you know, a certain you know type
of clothes. Or some people. There are some people who really like country
music. Maybe Ronda Santa's is that person. It just seems doesn't feel right.
And then especially because he's like, you know, from Florida, and
it's just like you, I don't know, there's nothing about him that screams
you know, Garth Brooks to me or Shania Twain. It's just like kind
of weird. Well, so if you were to your point, like again,
if Ronda Santa is really good in podcasts, really good at attacking the
media, really good at defending his record in Florida, there are ways to
do that that don't even involve the corporate press. Like you can do all
of this stuff on your own. You can do it in a way that
feels really authentic and natural. And this is a kind of broader, thirty
thousand foot question that I was gonna toss your way, Eddie, is that
one of the silver linings of twenty fifteen and twenty sixteen seemed to me that
it shook Washington to its core in a lot of ways, but particularly when
it came to how to run a campaign. And I get that nobody else
is Donald Trump, but I understand that. But at the same time,
one of the big lessons of twenty sixteen is that you don't have to run
campaigns with the same playbook that goes back to nineteen ninety. You really don't
have to do that anymore. You don't have to have George H. W.
Bush checking himself out at a grocery store in the line like you don't,
or being checked out by the cashier at a grocery. So you just
don't have to do that stuff anymore. You can do it. It's not
just about doing you know, conservative podcasts or whatever. It's not really just
about doing that. It's about having a candidate who turns their iPhone on and
starts recording a video, even if the campaign manager approves it ahead of time.
Just even on the most basically like look like you're trying to run a
new playbook, please like. And I think you see some of that in
the economic agenda he rolled out again. I said earlier, I thought it
was sort of a cool bridge between old right and new right, and that
it didn't essue the importance of having a limited government rolling back regulations, just
slicing and dicing the bureaucracy here in DC, both for like fiscal reasons and
for cultural moral reasons because of what it's done to the country. It has
all of that in there, and then it has some really cool stuff too,
about being able to support a family on one income, being able to
decouple from China, and he talks about the ruling class in ways that would
have been terrifying. So I'm glad his campaign at least let him do that,
because they sure as hell wouldn't have been twenty twelve or two thousand and
eight or anything before twenty sixteen. But it's just not fully he's like the
transition candidate, you know, and it's like the story of his campaign the
lesson that the Republican Party takes from it, whether it's successful or not.
I agree, we're three weeks out from the first debate, so some of
this conversation, you know, we both acknowledge your things can change. Not
ruling him out, but whatever happens is to his campaign, I think really
should be a lesson for the Republican Party. It's just a matter of how
they take the lesson. Right, do they ever learn a Republican ever learned
their lesson? Like? Have they ever? That's the thing? I mean,
Like he's as we've just been sitting here talking about Donald Trump. He
didn't he didn't write his own playbook or rewrite the playbook. But he definitely
said, I'm not following that old thing that you guys did. I'm going
to have fun doing this. And I think that's how you can always tell
when someone's when someone is having fun, they're generally doing well, and it's
I don't think it's really the other way. It's like, oh, I'm
doing well, so now I'm going to have fun. Obama and Hillary Yeah,
yeah, sure for sure. And you remember, like um that it
was a fun time, just a little bit hectic. Was two? Was
that two thousand? Was two thousand and twelve? Herman Kane? Yeah,
yeah, yeah, Like he was up briefly at the top of the poles
for a while. You could tell he was having fun. Though when nuke
Ingrid was at the top of poles, he looked like he was having a
bust. Yeah. Yeah, But I think it's they're at the top because
they're having fun, yeah, and not the other way around. And I
think that has always been true for Donald Trump. I will say during the
twenty twenty election, I didn't feel like he was having fun. Admittedly,
it was a very depressing year between the mostly peaceful rioting UM and the lockdowns
that kept everyone at home and away from their loved ones. But you know,
you could tell that he was just not having fun. It wasn't the
same spirit the twenty sixteen had um And that was for me a sign that
this was, you know, in big trouble. They're obviously many many,
many other facts that led to the twenty twenty outcome, but that was just
something that has all that I've always thought about. And I think that Ron
de Santis there is this this problem with his campaign that I can see and
that we've been talking about here, is that he's trying to do things that
he does not enjoy, you know, every And I don't want to like
knock him for this because I'm sure if you put if you put me in
a crowd of people and a camera on me, it may not be there
might be some awkward moments there. But he goes in and he's supposed to
be the focal point of you know, going into a diner, going into
a restaurant, and these these conversations, these conversations he has people are so
stiff. If you can't have If he doesn't enjoy doing those things, he
should not be doing them. You can tell that Donald Trump will he went
to dairy queen or something. He didn't know what a blizzard was. He
was like, what the hell is a blizzard? Oh yeah, yeah,
but he's like making fun of himself and yeah, how he's having a good
time. Ron de Santis goes in and there was the really good one the
other day that um, I forget what the event would but there was people.
He was saying high too, and there was a little girl where she
had like a slushy drink. Then he said, oh, what she got
there? And she said a slushy. He goes, it's got a lot
of sugar. I bet no, this is DeSantis. It's got a lot
of sugar. I bet it doesn't sound like Trump. It was just like
yeah, very awkward, stilted, and those are always his I think his
interactions. Again, I don't want to knock him for that because it's you
don't have to be like this. This this performer. Not everyone's a performer,
obviously, like Donald Trump is a natural performer. He's not. But
if you don't enjoy these things, you don't have to do them. Don't
force yourself, don't be uncomfortable because it reads it reads very very easily well
and Desantus. Actually, when he beat Andrew Gillam was up against the Canada,
the media was saying, what is the future of the Democratic Party was
extremely charismatic. And so it's not as though, at least from what we've
seen in Florida, De Santis is ain't capable of the sort of retail politics.
Obviously he knows how to do it. Yeah, you know, he's
not that off putting. You know, he can do it. But I
think to your point, it just his rhythms off. And part of me
does wonder if that's because it would be extremely difficult and he's a very smart
man to be pulled. And I think, by the way, not only
is he very smart, he has good instincts about what Republican voters want,
and I just think he has too many elite sort of political consultants chirping in
his ear and it's tearing him away from sort of what his real instinct is
telling him to do in a bad way. And to bring it full circle,
because we didn't plan less to be a what's wrong with a run to
Santa's campaign podcast, but to bring it full circle, I think that really
the fact that no top people of the campaign have left. Is not a
good sign for sure. And also, just like you said, yeah,
he's not off putting personally. I don't know him personally. He just but
like there was a big moment, and this was this big controversy back during
the lockdown era when obviously which Florida had resisted, and the media had run
articles about how he had beer with he had stopped for beers with some of
his supporters and then you know there's a note you weren't supposed to be gathering
with people, but he was like, oh yeah, hell yeah, I
had a beer with people, and like that was like amazing. Everyone loved
that, and I'm sure there's people who enjoyed being around him having a beer.
I guess it's just a matter of finding like the right the right venue
for him, the right opportunities, and he's just yeah, And I think
it has so much to do with not getting not clearing house. And that's
what I don't understand that so many of these articles that have come out about
his campaign, the problems with it, have been about the campaign signaling oh,
well, we're reorganizing, we're laying off the third of our staff,
we're restructuring. Okay, can you does any does any of that touch the
top people? Does any of it to touch the top most person? I
know his campaign manager. I'm sorry, I don't know her name. It's
like something difficult Genera Pack to Nara Pack. She was she was on this
podcast. I think back in twenty twenty. What was she before? I
think she's a consultant. I was reading about something she did. I just
can't believe it. I can't believe that she's still there. I'm sure she's
a fine person. Yeah, I think she was on the podcast right before
the twenty twenty election talking about suburban the suburban women vote being motivated by like
education issues and I think crime even too, and that turned out to depression,
some races um And I guess that told me at least, you know,
this is a consultant who's at least kind of following the trends or trying
to. But at the end of the day, if you if you don't
fundamentally and I'm not saying this about her personally because they don't know, but
I think it's true if the broader kind of consulting class you don't fundamentally respect
the dignity of you know, the the Iowa Trump voter who finds his off
color humor, who would laugh fat grabber by the like. If you don't
fundamentally respect that person, you're not going to be able to run a successful
campaign against Donald Trump. Yeah. Yeah, that's that's Um, that's insightful.
I'd say, though, I want to talk about the debate because you
were I think you were talking about this as Chris earlier. Um, I
was reading how Trump was talking with Fox executives who are still trying to get
him to come to the debate. He was talking with them right after he
got right after the news broke of this this indictment. He met with Fox
executives who are trying to get him still, because I think right now he's
still very much like I'm probably not doing it whatever. I actually I don't
really see I would like for him to do it, but I don't see
an upside doing it. Yeah, I mean, I think it's better for
the country if people debate, Like someone was joking earlier about, I think
to Santas and Gavin Newsommer set to debate and they're like, are you ready
for that? And I made a joke about like, haha, just what
the country needs right now. But then I sort of took a second thought
about and I was like, listen, when people are debating in public,
this is an old ben dominant take about Crossfire. Then I'm reheating here.
When John Stewart had that famous argument with Tucker Carlson on Crossfire or gave that
famous lecture, I should say that Tucker Carlson bagala on CNN that basically got
cross fire cancer as a canceled as the legend goes, and said, you
know, you're killing the country blah blah blah. That was wrong. The
idea that we can have, even if they're dramatic and theatrical, open public
debates between polarizing people, people that are on the left, people that are
on the right, and if they can hash it out in public, that's
a healthy sign, right, And so I think it is overall better for
the country if we can see the contrast between Donald Trump, If the Republican
voters can see the contrast between Donald Trump and all the other candidates, what
they're like in conversation, what they're like when challenged by by each other.
I think that's a good thing From a pure political campaign standpoint, I wouldn't
do it. There's no upside for whom Yeah, I mean because I think
people have tried to find a downside and maybe they're just trying to provoke him
into showing up. Um. But I you know, I heard some different
ones like, oh, he needs to prove that he can. You know
that he's not entitled to the nomination. He needs to prove that he can
take on his closest rival being run to Santists. He needs to prove.
But I'm thinking he doesn't. Really, he's been president, he's running for
a non consecutive term. Um, he's all the polls indicate that he's on
his way to the would it's almost like still being president and agreeing to debate
these people who want your job. I just feel like, yeah, I
don't. I don't think there's any upside. I hope he will do it,
and I will say I do hope that the Santist does it, because
I think there's a word that maybe he won't do it. If if Donald
Trump doesn't, well that's really interesting. Yeah, I've heard that maybe those
were just reports based on rumors. I don't know. I have heard that
that he's that it's possible he won't show up if Donald Trump doesn't um.
But if Donald I hope it's the more than are I hope they all show
up. If Donald Trump doesn't, I hope everyone will still show up.
But yeah, I was I was just thinking to myself, I've really concluded.
I guess it wasn't It didn't take much thought, But really I concluded
that there isn't much ineffor Donald Trump to debate. No, especially not in
the first one. I could see a scenario, and I think we both
agree that, you know, there's so much that can happen that we sitting
here aren't able to predict right now, and just part of the battle is
knowing that I could foresee if scenario where I don't know, maybe just Santis
or Christie or somebody goes viral for mocking Trump for not being at a debate,
you know, just calling him whatever and making like emasculating him for not
showing up at the debate. I guess I could see something like that that
starts eating away at his numbers with The New York Times did a good breakdown
of different three different groups of Republican voters in this primary thirty seven percent or
what they call MAGA voters. So you die hard Trump people thirty seven persuadable
voters and what was this one? Like twenty four percent? I don't know
that are just not open to Trump period, And so I guess I could
see some of those persuadable voters getting finding that persuasive yeah at some point,
and then but what happens? Then Donald Trump just shows up at the next
debate and crushes everyone. It's impossible for him to lose a Republican debate,
right, Yeah, No, it's funny. You're definitely ahead of me on
this because I wasn't even thinking about, well, let's like get the scenarios
of him not showing up and then what happens going forward. I think that
probably the for someone who does come to the debate and let's say Donald Trump
doesn't show up, the best option for them would be basically to just relentlessly
attack Donald Trump's record while he was in office. And I do think that
Donald Trump would not be able to resist that. He would definitely show it
well, first of all, he'll go on his true social or whatever in
any other interview and just completely like just just cut into whoever it was they
was attacking him, which I'm sure they all will on the at the first
debate, But then I think he would definitely feel like he needs to show
up and defend himself to their face. And then I think you're right,
it's like it's difficult. Everybody had difficult difficulty debating Donald Trump. I don't
think anyone found it easy. And I think mostly because he's very quick,
and I think that's really under like an underappreciated aspect him. He's someone who's
so quick on his feet. If you remember, it was what was the
line that Hillary when they were debating, and she said, we better hope
that Donald Trump is never in charge of or a law enforcement He said,
yeah, because you'd be in jail. The iconic. Yeah, that was
so great. And he didn't care about interrupting her. I think this is
why he always wins. A. He just has a chrismal but B he
just like fundamentally does not care about the rules. Yeah. So if you're
somebody who's running as an opponent to Donald Trump, you're trying to pitch to
the public like I do care about the rule rules, And that's why you
know, I'm Mike Pence. I Pench just put out too Honest merch because
that's included in that Trump told Pence he was too honest, which I found
amusing. But if that's your if that's your pitch, um, you're you're
sort of going to mimic that tonally in your participation in the debate, meaning
you're gonna follow the rules and Donald Trump is not. So you can never
beat a guy who doesn't follow the rules. He's not playing by the same
rules he's gonna win it him. Yeah, yeah, which also I think
Donald Trump knows that there is no when you're Donald Trump and what he has
come to represent, there is no winning anyway if you do follow the rules,
because you know that the almost always the moderator, whoever is going to
it's almost two against one. Every time you look back at Chris Wallace,
UM, the Chris Wallace debates with Joe Biden and Trump, and you just
you just knew that that that's not someone who's that's someone who's there to run
defense for the Democrats or the or the whoever is not Donald Trump. Um.
So his his intuition that there's no there's no nothing for him to gain
and following the rules. It's true, however, when he knows that everyone
else is completely at his mercy. This is another frustrating thing about what I've
seen from the Descantist campaign. And I think still, I think we're picking
on the Descantist campaign here a lot. Although a lot of the criticism is
just of the kind of elite Republicans who have bad motivations for supporting for supporting
Desantists, but it also applies to other campaigns they're running. It's like we
had Donald Trump. Like, if you can take a silver lining away from
Donald Trump from your perspective, it should be the recognition that you don't have
to do what you do with the traditional media anymore. You don't have to
run the old campaign still campaign playbook anymore. Like these are all good things,
and they were very obvious lessons. And if you still haven't learned them
and you're still obsessing over corporate press's coverage and you're upset, I mean,
it's just it is so frustrating to see the lack of understanding there. Yeah,
and I will echo you on the Desantists. Though everything we say comes
from love, a place of a love. I would like to see Ronda
Santist do very very well whoever is the nominee. Between the Santist I mean,
I consider this really just a two man race, but maybe maybe not
from much longer. You're a misogynist, think Nicky Haley's pastor? Yeah,
I don't. Yeah, I don't know who's Caddier Eddie Scarier, Don Lemont.
I think that was a catty comment. But I'm a woman's natural.
But no, I think I considered a two man race. I would between
the two of whoever gets the nomination, I will be thrilled with um one
more so than the other. But I when I criticized the santiss Rondo Santis
and in his campaign more accurately, more specifically, it is because I would
like to see him do very well. There are people but a little bit
maybe Like shortly before he got into the campaign, I was writing a lot
of things because I was very impressed with what he's done in Florida, what
his message has been. As he was gearing up to to running campaign and
national campaign, there were Trump people who really didn't like the things I was
saying about Rhonda Santis. They really they would talk to me in private or
DM me on Twitter. Um the second I became more critical of Ronda Santis,
which is for the purpose of again wanting to see him do well and
knock off this nonsense that's going on right now. The Trump people quieted down
quite a bit, but just they should understand it's not because I've I've turned
onto Santis. I don't consider myself on to Santis's side. I don't consider
myself on Trump's side. I would like both of them to do well.
But yes, all the criticism comes from comes from a place of love.
What a great place to end on, Eddie sounds good. Is there anything
else you feel compelled to the air? No, don't I want to talk
about Barbie? That's right, you've had kenne f Yes, I've had kenneff
O skinny A little cringe, all right, Eddie's scary DC calmness at the
Federalist. You can also make sure to pick up Eddie's books over at Amazon
dot com. There are several of them now, so a lot of betreads
for you if you're heading to the pool or heading to the ocean this summer.
I'm Emo Edaciensi culture editor here at The Federalist, would be back soon
with more until then, be lovers of freedom and anxious for the friend,
I heard the fame, vice a reason, and then it faded away.