We're back with another edition of The Federalist for radio hour, Memily editions key
culture editor here at The Federalist. As always, you can email the show
at radio at the Federalist dot com, follow us on exit fdr LST,
make sure to subscribe wherever you download your podcasts, and of course to the
premium version of our website as well federals dot com. Once again, just
a reminder on that our staff interacts with our premium subscribers on the website,
so commenting on our articles, commenting on your comments on our articles, it's
a lot of fun. So head over get a premium subscription. The websites
also add free if you have a premium subscription, which personally I love,
so you can go to federals dot com and do that as well. Another
reminder because I always forget, so I'm sure our producer Jordan will be happy
for the reminder here, but if you go to if you listen on Apple
and you leave us a five star review, that's super helpful for the show.
Again, I always forget to do this because we're just in such a
rhythm here and I think it's the coolest thing in the world just to be
able to do this every day and to be able to be in conversation with
so many of you who email Radio at the Federalists dot com. It's just
awesome. But it does really help the show. If you go over there
and leave a leave a five star review, that's the best way to help
the show out. So I know other shows like make a note of that
every day. I try not to, but when I remember it's it's probably
not a bad thing to ask for some five star reviews. They are super
helpful with a lot of different things on the back end of the podcasting systems.
And so we're your emails to radio at the Federalis dot com. We
do read them. If you've done it before, you know that we email
you back, we interact with you. We're happy to hear everyone's feedback,
take questions. When we get enough questions, usually I'll sit down with Chris
and answer those two. Chris Bedford is the guest on today's show. He
actually had to run to confession right after we recorded this, So I'm recording
an intro so that Chris can get to confession because, as our frequent listeners
know, Chris has plenty to confess, So Chris Is on the show.
We talk about two things. We talked first about the speakership of Mike Johnson,
which is now in peril here on Capitol Hill. There's a lot of
tension. There's a huge vote yesterday and Section seven oh two temporarily blocked basically
from the reauthorization. They kind of like vote, they vote, have done
a rule to get parliamentary, But basically this was a win for kind of
House conservatives. Chris and I talked a little bit about the arc of the
conservative movement on that question of seven oh two. We also talk a little
bit about the abortion drama that's played out in the conservative movement just over the
course of the last week. After Donald Trump put out his statement on Monday,
same We're kicking things back to the States, he said yesterday that the
Arizona decision from the Supreme Court went too far. One thing I do think
that has gotten lost in the conversation about Arizona is the Supreme Court of Arizona
said basically, we think it was almost Trumpian, which was funny because it
came the day after his big statement that made ripples all through It made waves,
I should say more than ripples all through the conservative movement. One thing
that was interesting about that is they said, you know, this is such
an important question that it should be decided by the people of Arizona, not
by the courts, by the elected representatives of Arizonas. And it's looking now
like there will be abortion on the ballot in Arizona in November, which is
another sort of politically interesting question in and of itself. Chris and I don't
get into that, but some quick thoughts now, I would say this is
going to happen likely in Arizona. They have to collect some like three hundred
and eighty thousand signatures by July fourth, which I think at this point after
the Supreme Court decision will be pretty easy. The reaction was sort of similar
to what happened after the Alabama IVF reaction. It just reminded me of that
you had a lot of Republicans who are probably putting their electoral and I'm not
saying that this is wrong, but putting electoral consequences ahead of these hard corporal
life stances. And I'm saying I don't necessarily know that's wrong, because there
is an I don't need to get into the argument right now. It is
the big argument essentially about incrementalism among pro lifers, that you have to in
order to make any policy victories, to win any policy victories, you have
to be in power. And if you're never in power, then you'll never
do anything to sort of reverse course. I have a thought on that.
I know I've shared this before, but I really think it's incumbent on pro
life leaders. And I'm not necessarily talking about politicians here, although I think
this applies to some politicians to talk about this issue like they mean it,
like they mean that life begins at conception, because otherwise people don't believe you.
I was talking to somebody on the left today actually who made the point
that if Donald Trump truly believed and I don't think anybody thinks that Donald Trump
believes us, but if Donald Trump truly did believe that life begins at conception,
going to that position, defaulting to that position, that it's sort of
back to the states. You're saying, you know, essentially we will let
the States decide on the question of killing human life. And I do think
that sends a signal to people that you don't believe life begins at conception,
and that feeds this narrative of the Handmaid's Tale Republican Party that they care more
about controlling women's bodies, that this is this idea that life begins at conception.
You know, it's foolish. We all know, everybody believes that this
is just a clump of cells, that you know, living, breathing,
human being outside of the womb is worth so much more. But this,
I'm just saying that fear into the narrative of the left, and I think
that narrative is really persuasive with a section of voters who haven't really you know,
gotten a fair version of the conservative argument, the pro life argument in
many many cases because the media suppresses it and silences it and doesn't want to
hear it. But at the same time, that's a real uphill battle in
the culture arena. And in my conversation with Chris, I do comment to
everybody at Roger Airpiece on this, but just you know, again some thoughts
on that is, you know, he's basically saying, while this fight is
essentially unwinnable on the national level and in some of these races and the state
of a cultural emergency when you have you know, children's bodies being mutilated and
the state allowing for it, the state making the way for it in some
cases. The Biden administration, by the way, is just about to come
out with a Title nine ruling that we'll likely thrust campuses back into their kangaroo
court status, and nobody is talking about it. We saw what happened.
The experiment failed during the course of the Obama administration, and Biden oversaw a
lot of the Title nine policy, and the Biden administration took credit for a
lot of it. We saw what happened when the Obama administration ruled by a
dear colleague letter basically legislated for every school that got public funding, threatened to
revoke all of their important public funding if they didn't comply with a dear colleague
letter that read gender identity into Title nine on the basis of sex slash gender
identity is basically what they turned Title nine into at the flick of a pen.
So there is a serious level of cultural emergency here. And Rodre's argument
is essentially that means, while these these battles on life, and I'm paraphrasing
him, you should read the piece yourself. I don't want to put words
in his mouth, but in the case of life. When these battles are
are clearly unwinnable at the national level, that's when the time comes for the
changing of hearts and minds on a sort of longer term basis. And obviously
the pro life movement has been working doggedly to do that over the course of
decades and had some real success I think before the Dobs decision came out and
the media went in a hyperd drive. But I'm kind of looking forward to,
honestly, this opportunity, and I hope others are too. Other sort
of pro life people are looking forward to this opportunity because the media's power is
waning every month. The gatekeepers get less powerful every single month. Twenty sixteen
was a really big wake up call for a lot of people about that post
COVID, the gatekeepers have lost more and more power. Just explosions and substack
subscriptions. Barry Wise actually announced this week that her substack, The Free Press,
which I absolutely love, is I think the top substack in the country.
They have a crazy readership. I think they released their subscriber numbers too,
and it was stunning. And so this sort of elite media, the
corporate media, those gatekeepers are less powerful every month, and that's a real
opportunity for the pro life movement, is a real opportunity for people who oppose
the surveillance state, all of these issues that we talk about on today's show.
I just wanted to kind of open up by mentioning that sort of expounding
on that point going forward, when political battles do feel unwinnable, doesn't mean
Republicans shouldn't fight tooth and nail. Doesn't mean pro life politicians should lie about
what they think. I mean, I think it just made an argument against
that actually, so that's not at all what I believe. But it does
mean that it's you know, incumbent on the rest of us not to be
dismayed by what happens on the policy level, but to work extra hard and
understand that so much of this isn't going to change until the culture changes,
until there's an appetite for that kind of change in the culture, and that's
a long term battle. And Daniel Davidson's book Pagan America It's out right Now
John basically says like these this is auctually a similar argument. This is not
going to uh, this will only get worse therefore we have to sort of
buckle down and strengthen our culture, strengthen our communities and our families, and
and focus on living virtuous lives. Well, you know, the the public
sector gets less and less virtuous in and of itself, and hopefully that persuades
other people to, uh, you know, see the virtue in doing so.
Maybe it will, maybe it won't. But this is a really really
dark time. I think there's there's no question about that. So, without
further ado, this is my conversation with the great Christopher Bedford on today's edition
of Federalist Radio Hours. Hope you enjoy else a chain for anything protect.
We're back with another edition of the Federalist Radio Hour. I Emily Dashinski,
culture editor here at the Federalist. As always, you can email the show
at radio at the Federalist dot com, follow us on exit fdr st.
Make sure to subscribe wherever you download your podcasts, and of course to the
premium version of our website as well. Today I am joined by Christopher Bedford,
who is eager to record the podcast so that he can get to confession.
That's true, all right, we'll confess the thoughts I thought that you
are so late to our meeting. She blames so Doshinsky's new to having a
car. I'm not new to I've had a car for a while. She's
near to having a car. Yeah, this car and quotation mark and uh.
And now she thinks that traffic in a city is a reasonable excuse to
be thirty minutes late. Well, it wasn't just traffic, it was you.
Okay, we don't need to get into this. He finished a meeting
early. But anyway, it's fine. We're gonna move right along, Chris,
because Capitol Hill where we are right now, is a buzz with the
possibility. Can you feel it in the air, the possibility that there might
once again be a battle for Speaker of the House. I don't want to
think about it. It hangs heavy in the spring air. But it's true.
I mean, it's actually true. And there are a lot of different
things on the table as we're recording this. On Thursday. Actually, there
was a very big victory for the kind of Freedom Caucus type people who were
able to kill a really bad reauthorization of FIZA section seven oh two. There's
been heated debate about seven oh two for years, and it wasn't until recently
that more mainstream conservatives started. I think they're really opposed. It used to
be kind of like Rand Paul types, but it's essentially I know, we've
covered it in FLA well. People were complaining about it when it was unfashionass
ability that this could happen, when it was a hypothetical that it could happen,
or when it had happened to people who folks in DC didn't really care
about. Yeah. Yeah, and then it started to happen to Donald Trump's
psisdential campaign yep. And you know, but remember you have to remember back
to twenty sixteen. Most normal Republicans at that time, most people at that
time, mostly American people, I think, were kind of just the position
to believe that the FBI was investigating you, he must have done something wrong.
A reflective sense of trust. Yeah, yeah, there was a lot
more trust there in American intel and people. I mean, it still kind
of exists a little bit with Donald Trump. But by the time they were
rating mar A Lago, you had, you know, like Marco Rubio out
there recording on his back porch within an hour saying the deep state has gone
too far. Whereas in twenty sixteen, there was a lot of well,
let's wait and see, because this sounds really bad. And once the dust
had settled, it just became really clear that Faiza had been abused to surveil
domestic political opponents. And they're like, oh, it's just caught up in
the net and say, okay, well, the reason that this is set
to be reauthorized by the Congress is to stop abuse, and you have abused
it. So the trust that you demand and under the gate and under the
auspices of patriotism is no longer granted, and we need to start over on
this. You need to rebuild this trust. Yeah, well, we made
access to your Twitter accounts, to your cell phone. One of the reasons
that I saw for and this was from a conservative and I'm blanking right now,
and who gave this reason. I think it was like a group.
But one of the reasons, oh, it was the Wall Street Journal editorial
board. They said, you know, listen, the FBI actually lied on
the FISA warrant for Carter Page and so reforming seven oh two and like actually
basically curtailing seven oh two powers wouldn't have done anything to prevent that. It's
like, okay, you're telling me that the FBI is littered with liars and
so we should keep their power at the same level. Brilliant argument. But
seven oh two for We've done a full podcast on this before, so if
you need like kind of a primer on that, I recommend listening to the
full length section seven oh two one that we did with an expert on it.
There's just a couple of months ago, but basically seven oh two sweeps
in communications with foreign between Americans and foreign people. That means that they can
query a database of all of those things that are swept into the drag net,
and sometimes they query them illegally for Americans, sometimes it's perfectly. One
of the things with this is that it's technically legal. There's abuse of the
database in the tens of thousands every single year. The Wall Street Journal editorial
board said that that had gone down Okay, great, still like tens of
thousands a year, and the reauthorization would require a warrant and it would not
allow government to buy from third party data brokers the data. That's a that's
kind of a different conversation. I feel like we need to have a much
deeper conversation about our data in order to say like, if private companies can
have it, then the government can't. I mean, it's kind of an
interesting question, but the warrant requirement is really the heart of the matter,
and they do not want to give that up. Bitterly do not want to
give that up. Yeah. Tucker released a good video on this last night
where he was talking about his own suspicions of having been targeted five fize when
he was talking with Russian government officials about his interview with Putin journalist, and
how those interactions were leaked to the press in order to embarrass him and to
undermine his journalist's efforts. And that's just kind of basic stuff that they've been
doing. Got the crowded, Hello, thank you for listening to The West
Is collisted podcaster Sarah Carter, and I would like to tell you about your
new best friend on Friday night, ze Biotics. Let me tell you.
If there's a surefire way to wake up feeling fresh after a night of drinking,
it's with z biotics. Z Biotics pre alcohol probiotic drink is the world's
first genetically engineered probiotic. It was invented by PhD scientists to tackle rough mornings
after drinking. Here's how it works. When you drink, alcohol gets converted
into a toxic byproduct in your gut. It's this byproduct, not dehydration,
that's to blame for your rough next day. Z Biotics produces an enzyme to
break this byproduct down. Just remember to make z biotics your first drink of
the night. Drink responsibly and you'll feel your best tomorrow. Every time I
have z biotics before drinks, I noticed a difference the next day. Even
after a night out, I can confidently plan on waking up with a smile
on my face, ready to face the day. Go to zbiotics dot com
slash radio r adio to get fifteen percent off your first order when you use
radio r adio at checkout. Z biotics is backed with one hundred percent money
back guarantee, so if you're ever unsatisfied for any reason, they'll refund your
money. No questions asked that zbiotics dot com slash r adio radio and use
the code radio r e d io at checkout for fifteen percent off. Thank
you z biotics for sponsoring this episode and our good Times Long Horn Dinner.
Her sister words there, and she knew we'd founder she said, you don't
hear this from me? All I says, Mama's cats that please sell in
mom read. I mean, remember this was kind of a conversation, uh,
after Joe Biden was elected. But the Church Committee and the early Senate
trying to get ahold the first Senate attempts to really get a hold of America's
domestic spine with the FBI, which the FBI was extremely active politically in the
Hoover days. They were they had spies and bugs throw Barry Goldwater's campaign in
the CIA. Remember so, oddly enough, Lyndon Johnson, you're the first
person who'd caught my attention with us. It's in Lee Edwards biography of Barry
Goldwater. It was the CIA that Lindon Johnson tapped to spy on the Goldwater
campaign and h and FI I forget part of the but I remember I remember
a friend talking to uh Hoover and this isn't written about and saying, why
did you do it? And Hoover's response was, well, when the president
asks you to do something, you do it, which is obviously not true
for for all the presidents, all the different times. Boy Scott James Comy,
Yeah, so they kind of got it under control, and they had
all these movies that would come out to make us show like, I look,
the FBI is like just kind of stopping cannibals and child sex traffickers,
and I look at all these heroes, and it was largely depoliticized. And
then that really changed after some eleventh and the starting thing had to get back
involved in shadowing a lot of these domestic groups and took on less of a
law enforcement and much more of an intel kind of posture that had been gotten
rid of by the Church Committee. And that's what we've been dealing with the
last twenty three years has been a increasingly increasingly increasingly put a sized FBI.
And you know, the folks in DC are very different from the folks in
the field offices, for sure, but it's a serious problem that DC refuses
to tackle. And while they're sabotaging American political campaigns and leaking to the press
and lying in warrants, Congress is just saying, oh, yeah, you
can have this much money to expand your campus. Oh yeah, you can
get a renewed And it's just it's really pathetic behavior. Nothing is changing.
Yeah, So it's just refreshing to see. It probably won't last. They'll
probably figure it out. They'll probably drag a couple more members into their skiffs
where they tell them all the scary things, Oh what happened? I think
Tucker had a good line last night where he was talking about to how the
skiff is kind of a leash where you've got your intelligence handler who just tells
you what they want you to know and how they want you to know it,
and can pull you around to vote for different things based on that leash
and scare you. And it's a very effective tool for putting members in line.
But if you understand, if you understand what it is, and you
go in with that credulity to say, oh, you're going to tell me
a bunch of secrets about how you saved my life and I don't even know
it, but I'm not allowed to talk about it. It's I need to
change my vote. If you go in there saying I'm not particularly trusting of
this, then it's helpful. Well. So the other thing to note is
this was there's a deadline to like April nineteenth, visa was seven to two
was extended because there have been a couple of flare ups where that group of
similar people, similar group to the people who took down Kevin McCarthy, have
threatened Mike Johnson. But now everybody, even beyond the people that were frustrated
with McCarthy, are frustrated with Mike Johnson. So Chip was big critic,
Tripper was a huge critic of Kevin McCarthy. Didn't vote to oust Kevin McCarthy,
and I think would make a very good case that they would have progressed
more on genuine conservative victories and on the House side at least, and potentially
even into the Senate if Kevin McCarthy had remained Speaker. But all that aside,
he's really coming down hard on Johnson. Even Mike Lee was coming down
really hard on House Republicans that wanted to just go along with Mike Johnson said
this Rissa R I S A A, which was the reauthorization version that in
a parliamentary move they kind of voted down a rule yesterday, defeated it.
Basically, he said, listen, if you don't if you don't vote for
this, you're just going to get a clean reauthorization with zero changes whatsoever from
the Senate. And it's like well, in effect, this piece of reform
is zero changes whatsoever. So okay, like thanks for the absolutely nothing.
And that's what happens over and over again, is I don't doubt that Mike
Johnson. I know, Mike Johnson is in an incredibly precarious position. He's
an incredibly difficult position. I know you can tell that because every single meeting
he has, and every speech he gives and every talk he has is whining
about how he's got a slim majority, which is true, but the Democrats
are in the minority and there seem to be governing, so that's funny.
So yeah, but this is he This was became a big battle. Martin
Taylor Green earlier this week released a letter, a letter to that you'd written
to Mike Johnson with seven points that you probably would agree with most of.
Chris. It was kind of an she aired her grievances against Mike Johnson,
and it was a lot of you know, you are You said at least
that omnibuses were no way to run a government, and we keep now governing
with omnibuses, even if they're minibuses, which is the most ridiculous semantic maneuver
ever they're omnibuses, and they include all of these fundings for the last priorities
abortion, immigration, et cetera, et cetera, and there's been no This
is an interesting thing about Johnson, Chris, like, having watched this over
the years, Johnson was sort of in Freedom Caucus adjacent world, Like he
wasn't in the Freedom Caucus, but he would kind of hang out with them.
He knows them well. Uh, and they were like, this is
the most conservative Speaker of the House, and I guess on paper that was
true when he became Speaker of the House. I was. But he correct
opinions on Faiza, he had the correct opinions on the Ukraine War, he
had the correct opinions on social conservatism. But this is like the reverse ke
McCarthy. The reverse of Kevin McCarthy is that McCarthy himself had a lot of
different positions from the Freedom Caucus on policy questions. I'm sure I don't know
where McCarthy was on seven oh two, but like that's a good example of
somewhere where he'd likely be on the other side of it. It's just his
temperament was much more like vinership. For years and years and years and years.
I mean, how long he's probably been dealing with Kevin McCarthy since you
started in journalism. He was never id assume a back bencher. Maybe he
was at first, but he when I interviewed him, what this is almost
two years ago now, when I interviewed him, he said he learned from
watching Paul Ryan, so having that perspective of being a young gun right in
the kind of leadership friendly area he wanted. He's so ambitious that he learned
he could have similar policy positions to a Paul Ryan, but he needed to
have the temperament of a Chip Roy. He needed to have the temperament of
a Matt Gates, and he did. I mean, he was constantly out
there, like absolutely excoriating Nancy Pelosi, skewering the Democrats, and whether or
not that would have translated into substant of policy victories open question. But Mike
Johnson isn't doing any of that, and that I think is part of what's
really puzzling people, is in the negotiations where you at least have to present
like you're on the side of your own party that's asking for basic things.
I just think he's overwhelmed and doesn't have the experience. I mean McCarthy have
the experience. I think it's true Kevin McCarthy, and he would tell you
this had a long time to like observe and learn. But Chris, I
just want to ask about the like, uh successful shutting down at least for
now of the rule yesterday on seven oh two, like substance of seven oh
two. Aside, there's a real there's a real chance that Mike Johnson is
not Speaker of the House in the next couple of weeks. You know,
if we're sitting here a couple of weeks from now, Mike Johnson maybe the
shortest slip Speaker of the House in recent history that I can think of,
maybe all Speaker of the House history, but this was sort of him.
Who is that speaker Tempore? Oh right, right, right right right?
Banks now, no, no, no, not Banks, Patrick McHenry with
the bow tie. Yeah, although he was speaker pro temps so not technically
speakers. So I don't know if that that counts. But what I will
say is it's is it, Chris, that this is a victory? Is
this just temporary? Is this let's trust was giving speeches in DC recently?
Really she sees like a there like talking to heritage and stuff. Is it
a shout across the bow for Johnson that this failed doesn't mean anything? What
do you read? Do you think we sit here two weeks? He's lucky
it failed. I agree, I think I agree completely, he's lucky.
It's the American people are lucky. I think he'd be more likely to be
facing revolts if if it had not failed right now. But I don't know.
It's it's been exhausting. It's just also stupid. Yeah, I mean,
well, Chip Royan other folks are completely right that you know, why
would the kind of behavior of the Republican Congress be rewarded by voters? What
exactly would people are we voting for here? What's your policy positions? It
seems to be a center left coal issue with Democrats. Well, I get
that frustration. I don't know how close to Minutia a lot of American people
really are paying attention. But what they do notice and will know is another
stupid food fight, another cripple fight between the Republican Party over a speaker,
and more dysfunction. I mean, it's like it's kind of like how if
your parents your kids don't know if there's like something like maybe something on the
side, like your wife didn't felt the gas. It never does, or
like these an argument about person where you want to go vacate? Saturs in
drive so it's we're good. Uh, there's an argument over where they want
to go to vacation. Like they don't really notice a lot of these different
things, but they do notice if mom and dad are yelling at each other.
They do notice that. I mean, I think that's not just it's
just not to call the voters children, but they're just not paying attention to
a lot of the my new show of what's really ticking off conservatives. But
that's what I said running into this election. They will notice if like Marjorie
Taylor Green's out there shrieking and trying to call for a new speaker, which
has been a disaster from the very start. I know that the Gates stream
and I was trying to pretend like whoa, it was actually our intention to
get a socially conservative speaker Johnson, so who no one expected forty yess Yeah,
you hated Kevin McCarthy, Yeah, Kevin MacCarthy. Actually just it was
yesterday, the day before it came out and said that essentially, he was
like he was at a Georgetown event and he said, I am not Speaker
of the House right now because Matt Gates was mad about an ethics complaint that
he like slept with a seventeen year old girl. And McCarthy said, I
don't know if it's true, but that's why I'm not Speaker of the House
now. There is truth to the fact that that's why he's not Speaker of
the House. But on a much was so obviously personal, On a much
more important note, uh, this is a really interesting question because it speaks
to how conservatives that have been used to the kind of Freedom Caucus model that
I think the Squad learned from and took some examples from. I think the
Squad would benefit from being more like the Freedom Caucus. But the Freedom Caucus
also has to, I think, start recognizing what the end goal is.
Start like getting on in the same page about what the end goal is.
And if the end goal is chaos, actually just be honest about that.
That's fine, you know, like I don't know that I agree with it,
but if the end goal is just saying, have you ever been able
to sit in on a meeting of the members of the Freedom Congress, not
the staff the congressman, and they don't agree on a lot. Yeah,
I mean it's kind of like it's like a club of people who don't like
leadership as opposed to a club of people who have like the same values.
But this is this is when it's like the American people who represent the Republicans
who are not in the Freedom Caucus would prefer if they knew what happened in
Washington. I think this is what Trump sort of blew the lid open on
most Republican voters. I'm not talking Republican leaners, but like Republican voters,
Republican base would side with the anti establishment members if they knew what was happening
in Washington, d C. If they think it was their job. And
a lot of what's going on in Washington, DC is intelligent and there's some
reason for it. It's so nice, Jeff another day. Debt. It
keeps you tossing and turning at night. You just can't get away from it.
But the truth is the system is actually designed to trap you in debt.
Insanely high interest credit cards and loans make it nearly impossible to pay off
your debt. But there's a new way out of the debt trap Pivotal Debt
Solutions. Pivotal Debt Solutions isn't like the old school debt relief companies that string
your debt out for years. They have new, aggressive strategies that can end
your debt faster and easier than you thought possible. Pivotal Debt Solutions can cut
or even eliminate interest, find programs to write off your balances so you owe
less, stop those threatening phone calls without bankruptcy and without a loan. The
bottom line is they find every solution possible to end your debt permanently. Before
you do anything, contact Pivotal Debt Solutions first. Talk to them for free.
Find out how fast they can help you get out of debt. Visit
zapmdebt dot com. That's zapmdebt dot com. Zapmdebt dot com. So I'm
just saying, if you are, if you're sort of like the if you
are the representative of a huge swath of the Republican base. If not,
you know, the Republican Base as an organization, If you're that kind of
mouthpiece, I don't mean that in a pejorative sense, like if you're actually
representing them here in Washington, DC, a group that has very virtually no
representation in the media, virtually no representation in the lobbying sector or among special
interests, then here you go. It's there has to be some sort of
like agreement on what the ultimate end goal is. And I actually understand.
I didn't think it was the biggest deal in the world that they got rid
of Kevin McCarthy, and I'm still not convinced it was the biggest deal in
the world. I think there would have been. I think that actually would
have gotten some small wins. But the question becomes are the small wins worth
continuing to go along with the establishment to get along? And that's I think
the cost benefit analysis they're grappling with right now. It's just you have to,
yeah, you have to wonder what would you get from a new speaker,
Why would it be better, how would a new speaker be any stronger?
It's cathartic, yeah, right, it's yeah. At this point,
it's kind of like French revolutionary activity. It's not there's a couple of guys
in the in the interim who probably didn't quite deserve the guillotine. And it's
like Kevin McCarthy doesn't have a fancy job title anymore. Like that's basically the
He's still quite a present. But I'm saying it didn't scare. I don't
think that had the effect of like terrifying the of terrifying leadership because guess who
was in a really good position to take that spot, Steve Scalise. Guess
who Mike Johnson is dealing with right now, leadership like the leadership before him,
that type of group with Democrats, and this is closer to the center
than he is with Jordan. Yeah, I think that's right. And but
also, I mean, you look at this and you wonder why any Republican
would want to be I mean, it's it's been like this since Bayinner went
down, But why would any Republican want to be speaker? Yeah? I
mean I agree with it. Why would anyone want to be speaker? Yeah?
Nancy Pelosi wielded the gavel pretty powerfully, though she still seems to have
quite an influence on Democratic leadership in the House, even though what was it
Patrick McHenry as when he was pro tim he took away her little hideaway office
it's like the first thing, you know, I'll tell you what, of
all the speaker activities, I know he's like not a huge winger, but
all the speaker activities that have happened, that one was my favorite. But
I also think this is why, to your point, people don't want to
see another speaker change. Like even the Republican base is kind of exhausted with
it. I'm not saying up till two in the morning again to watch it.
I don't care anymore. It's because it's because the presidential election. I
think when you're talking about what these victories actually are, so the Wall Street
Journal editorial board being like, listen, this doesn't do anything to stop the
FBI from lying, it was like, that's why voters want Donald Trump to
come in and like gut the administrative state, you know what I mean.
I just think that's why the energy is so outside of Congress right now.
Where do you remember in the tea party days where the Bayner drama was Bayner,
Jim Jordan and Mark Meadows. That drama was all over the networks constantly,
the cable networks constantly. It was kind of early days of Twitter,
so we were sort of all hanging on it in a way that just nobody
is right now. Yeah, I think maybe I wonder why that is.
Actually, I don't know, because I feel like it's so it feels like
what happens in the House. I mean, obviously Democrats have the Senate.
There's such just some majority in the House. It feels like anything is also
futile. I mean the Kevin McCarthy coup was covered pretty closely. Yeah,
that's true, that's true. I mean maybe they maybe they don't think they
actually are going to do it. I don't think they actually The news love
Republican dysfunction and Republicans are eager to please, but they do want like that's
what I was just going to say that I get the sense that they do
actually really want to do it. There are two or three of them that
are very serious. Marjorie Taillergon already filed the motion of a Kate, so
all they have to do is call for vote on it. I mean,
I think it's it's serious. I don't think it's If I had to bet
on it, I would say it's probably not going to happen because of what
you said. But I do also think there's might happen in spite of what
I said. It's just going to be very stupid because of what I said.
Well that sounds right, Yeah, I mean I don't. I don't.
I I don't trust them to do the right thing, even the people
I agree with. It's a disaster. The thing I was going to say
is like this this question of futility. Ultimately, it actually reminds me of
the abortion back and forth this week where Trump comes out, puts that big
statement on Monday, his kind of ninety five thecs that he's nailing to the
twenty twenty five wall, saying ninety five. It was classic Republican thought.
I don't want to talk about this. Well it was. It was sort
of a block and a block and bridge. You know, I did Row
and so now it's up to the states. It's the most republican thing he's
ever done. Yeah. I just feel like, yeah, I'll just live
it to the States. Yeah. But I mean, I don't think the
instinct politically he knows that pro life voters are going to stick with him,
because again, everything else feels like an emergency. We're in a state of
cultural emergency. So I don't necessarily know that politically, it's the worst life
voters. It's more like block voters. The Democrats accept pro lifers actually have
no other political home, whereas like that's just kind of a felt and become
cultural mainsteam block voters, so there's no the political home. But they're actually
it's fine in the gb pro life voters have no other home and they're not
really welcome, and it's extremely I mean, it doesn't matter how unpopular a
tax cut is, doesn't matter how unpopular some corporate handout is, it doesn't
matter how unpopular a war is. Those guys always get another shot. The
pro lifers are always blamed. And I guess this is the brilliant strategy.
I'm not really convinced of it. A lot of my friends who are very
smart on this say it's a really smart strategy for Trump, But I look
at it as well. Don't you think that the Democrats are still going to
paint him us an extreme mess? Do you think they're gonna if Trump Trump
has like a moderate Clintonian view on abortion, that they're not going to say
he's a crazy person. They always do that. And also regardless of what
Trump says, this battle is going to the States because Democrats know, just
like some kind of a bizarro Carl Rove did, every ballot they put abortion
on ups their votes amongst crazy pro abortion people, amongst white college educated women,
especially single ones. And this is not something where it's like, hey,
we're winning, so what is the Clara Truce or hey we're even losing.
It's like the Clara Truth because the Democrats are not going to declare truth.
They're not going to agree to that. It's smart of them. Why
would they. They're going to put it on every state bellut regardless, so
we can Republicans can either fight in DC and the fifty states, so they
can see in DC and still fight in the fifty states. And Democrats,
by the way, never think like this. They never come back and say,
you know, we'll getting sixty votes impossible, so we don't want to
talk about it anymore, like ever, And why can Republicans just try some
Democrat strategies for once, be like we are these people are for unrestricted abortion,
we're for sensible abortion reforms like they do with guns, and just try
to battle it out. And I mean, Republicans say it's impossible to possibly
get to sixty votes. Sure, but Democrats, are not going to think
like that, and I bet you in my lifetime they'll get to sixty votes
and pass something awful. So I was just, yeah, it was just
usually just going to say, I think that sense of futility on the life
question. So Trump came out and said basically that the Arizona Supreme Court decision.
I think he said it went quote too far. It's in eighteen sixty
four, before Arizona was a stay based as Arizona by the way, So
Arizona, these guys, it's like a territory for two years. Their capital
is one year old, and they're like those babies take over this land,
by the way, before gold before the gold Rush, Like, why would
you want to live there. It's not like your doctor said, go to
move to Arizona. It's good for your lungs. Yet you know, no
pool step two, no golf courses, yeah, step two like Indian War
step one, Indian War step two. Safe babies, Yeah, stop killing
the baby. And Trump's like the too far, Yeah, man, we
have one if an Americans are so weak, of course that's what Donald Trump
said. No, I mean, I again, I just think there's Rodre
had a good take on this basically that the cultural arena right now is the
place for Republicans to wage this war. And I think a lot of that
has to do with why don't Republicans act like Democrats? I agree, although
I also think that question of the entire corporate press being controlled by Democrats maybe
it's so number one hundred times harder to the public. You can't sell policies
to the public about what Ralph Northam is doing when the media is lying about
it to them, and your message is treated as crazy and framed as insane,
like Christian nationalism. But that's changing, and I think that's it.
That's the good news is that's changing. But these some of these battles,
like the same pro life coverage at Fox. It used to be a rule,
the Roger Al's rule, which is abortion doesn't sell right, so they
didn't like to talk about it, and that was kept. But you're starting
to see it change. The only other thing I'll add Senna, you gotta
go to confession, and I imagine that takes you a long time, but
not when you're a frequent customer. You know it takes forever. As the
old ladies. If you ever get in line for confession behind like a seventy
five year old woman, eighty five year old woman. Is it because they've
done so many bad things or they feel so guilty about the day? I
think that it's like camp out and talk to the priests. That sounds nice.
It does unless you're in line. But again, like for the American
people that have the APPETI for things like Trump coming in and gutting the administrative
state, even when the media is panicking and saying, as the New York
Times did that like thank God for the deep state and that peace they ran,
like they run the EPA and they keep the they love the deep state.
I would love the deep state if the deep state was like foiling communist
goals left and right. But they're not. They are communists. So anyway,
all I'm saying is like, there's this obviously, this sounds so obvious,
but like the cultural arena right now, in the face of some of
these incredible, deeply rooted political opposition, political challenges, you know, it's
politics is not always going to be the policy is not always going to be
realistic in the realm of the politics of the possible. And that's a you
know, it's fertile ground for conservatives to go change hearts and minds, even
when it's it's not possible to do that in Congress or in state legislatures.
Yeah, go confess, Chris. Thanks And by the way, why are
we going to do a podcast on the Bachelor? Because I now have to
watch it all the time. I hate the Bachelor. I have to watch
it. But you're people sometimes assume that I like the Bachelor because then because
you watch white woman who loves reality television the Bachelor. I think I've we've
done podcasts and why. I think the Bachelor is the worst version of reality
TV. So we should do it. We should do it next week.
It's it's kind of secretly conservative standards. Yeah, no, I think you're
right. We can debate that though. Sure. Stay tuned, stay tuned,
let's do it. You've been listening to another edition of the Federalist Radio
Hour. Emily Treshenski, culture editor here at the Federals Joint Today by Christopher
Bedford, will be back soon with more. Until then, be the lovers
of freedom and anxious for the Fray