We're back with another edition of the Federalist Radio Hour. I'm Emily Jasinski,
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 as well. Today I'm
joined by Christopher Bedford, executive editor over at the Common Sense Society. Last
week he was traveling and drinking, and this week he's sick. You'll be
shocked by this turnout events, Chris, welcome back. I'll tell you what,
It's a good thing that I got sick traveling with Sarah, because if
she had left me to my own devices at home when she had come home
and I was simply sick from drinking, I think I'd be in trouble.
But now she kind of has to feel bad for oh the dreaded Man cole
Well. As promised all summer, we've been teasing that we're going to do
an episode where we answer some of your questions and you sent them over to
radio at the Federalist dot com, So stay tuned for that. Before we
get into that, though, Chris has a new a new piece out for
the Telegraph, and it's actually kind of timely. On the one hand,
just what we saw today as we were recording, Mitch McConnell, Senate minority
leader, longtime leader of Republicans in the Upper Chamber, had another very public
medical situation where he had, you know, not a senior moment, but
a moment of abject sinility. And I wish him, certainly, we'd both
wish him the best, but he is the leader of Republicans in the Senate,
and it seems to be completely incapable of performing his duties. Chris No.
I mean, I'm not a doctor, but I've known a lot of
we all of us have known a lot of people who've gotten through the process
of aging. I've never quite seen what we've seen these two times with Chris
McConnell, which is where he just freezes in the middle of talking to someone
and kind of reversed, staring straight ahead and just stars off to the distance.
It doesn't look like this normal senior moment. Looks like a deeper brain
problem, and it's it's sad to see. I mean, we've talked a
lot on the show about how old our leadership is. I mean, even
yea even if CNN grilling the White House now on just how you Americans think
that Joe Biden is young enough to be president? Still I think it was,
I mean the majority of Democrats and Republicans at this point, I think
he's too old for the job. I assume that the number might be eaten
higher, possibly for Miss McConnell. He's not as exposed as Joe Biden is.
The public breaths, but he's the least popular politician in America. Nancy
Pelosi finally stepped aside. She's still in Congress, but she stepped aside.
It's it's an increasing embarrassment to the country to have leaders who are wandering the
hall of senile who don't know what they've voted for, who don't know where
they've been, as in the case of the fine Stein, who lose track
in the middle of a press conference. Like Mitch McConnell. We talked about
the I've talked about the polop hero before and the Soviet premiers, because there's
a constant joke amongst the Reagans and his staff that he couldn't even meet with
get to know Soviet premiers before they died. There was a string who died
repeatedly in office in the eighties. But if you're now Russia or she zingg
Ping, and you're looking towards the United States, you're seeing new kind of
incidents. What would you think? I mean, imagine if we looked at
that and we saw the Chinese leadership is freezing in the middle of a press
conference, you probably would never see it because they've covered it up somebody.
But we saw Pudin having a medical emergency like that, you'd say their leadership
is trail and I think there'd probably be probably be a correct assumption. So
that's that's the image that we project. And I've been reaching out to people
since this episode happened, with McConnell asking Dennis Staffer, is what they think
happens next? And you No one so far has said that they expected him
to simply step aside as as I certainly I think would if I was having
the embarrassment of moments like this, I don't think I'd want to be in
the public guy anymore. I'd rather be at home with my wife. Actually,
we hear this argument often trotted out. It made me think of this
Chris during presidential elections. I can think of Obama. Certainly with Trump there
was this argument from the other side. In fact, actually we saw a
little bit with Vivek Robin Swami and Nicky Haley is back and forth this fear
or this attempt to kind of fear monger about whether this person is capable of
representing the United States in foreign negotiations in times of foreign crisis, meaning on
the precipice of or And sometimes I do think it's fear mongering. I think
with Donald Trump there were legitimate concerns, but there was also fear mongering.
But I actually think these are This is a really serious question because it's the
question of like respect from foreign leaders and something that women who are negotiating,
female American negotiators who go into the Middle East and have to decide how to
present themselves deal with that question of condoles or ice. Famously is one person
who dealt with those challenges. But like, actually these are hugely consequential questions,
and whether a person is competent to complete a sentence present an accurate version
of the United States's position on an issue. One thing you didn't have to
fear with Donald Trump and Donald Trap was completely unpredictable and some people sort of
saw him as the Madman theory or fitting the Madman theory of politics that was
applied to Reagan. You know, you never knew what he was going to
do. The Soviets feared that Reagan was volatile and would you know, take
drastic measures in response to whatever they were, whatever they were up to,
that they couldn't They felt they couldn't predict exactly how he would counter. And
there was some of that with Donald Trump, and I almost did the Obiden
thing, like those those kind of cringe bumper stickers from like two thousand and
eight. But I will say with Obama there was a lack of experience,
absolutely, But with Joe Biden it's something completely different. It's it's none of
those things. It's an inability to give to garner trust from a world leader.
How can they trust someone who doesn't seem to know, who doesn't seem
like he will know what he's saying to you? You know? Ten minutes
later he said this week, he honest to goodness, said this week that
he was the guy who got strom Thurman to vote for the Civil Rights Act.
Joe Biden was twenty one at the time, nowhere near the Senate and
strom Thurman did not vote for the Civil Rights Act. I mean, now,
now it's sort of holds that onto foreign negotiations. What is happening behind
the scenes like that actually terrifies me. I assume it's all just a staff
and the Obama White House, which is has long been rumored to kind of
have a big impact on what's actually going on in the White House. President
Obama is one of the very few people under the very few former presidents who
didn't leave the city when he was done, lives up in Calorama and still
takes frequent meetings, it seems, reportedly with White House staff and senior staff,
but also they will be I mean, I assume that if you're a
Russian leader or a German leader or a French leader, in your meeting with
Joe Biden on camera in the background, you're you're having your top staff talk
of their top his top staff to get the actual assurances you need from someone
who doesn't fall asleep trying to photo shoot. And it makes me kind of
wonder who's running things in the Senate now. For a long time, Mitch
McConnell had an iron kind of grip on the Senate he's a master of it.
But when he had his medical leave of abens absence after falling in at
a DC hotel, reportedly the Senate grand brother smoothly and people found that they
didn't actually need need him there. And it seems like he's always he's he's
always been rather soft spoken, even once stern. He's not been allowed fast
talker for any point of time or I've ever followed his career. So maybe
he's actually really still quick and with it in between these episodes. But everything
I can see in the press conferences, it's clear that he's not quite as
forceful as he once was. And it makes me wonder how exactly the Senate
is being run and if he's if he's just kind of leader in name only.
And this also makes me think of your I mentioned your Telegraph article on
the Vike Rumaswami or earlier, and you've written in the past about dam Feinstein
and others, but in the Telegraph, but in this case you actually bring
up this perceived unseriousness of vavac Ramaswammy, which, by the way, I
think probably hit the belt Way, And when he struck that nerve with Nicky
Haley, I think he struck a thousand nerves and the doucers up nip zip
code. I said, dip nip zip code. It took me a while
to get there. And I'm not a good say Chris, you sound like
Joe Biden ironically, but Vavike Rama Swammy has this exchange with Nicky Haley and
Foreign policy where she basically calls him un serious. He has this I thought
incredible exchange with Mike Pence. For Mike Pence turned to him and said,
in the most hone def way, it's time for you know, it's not
time for a novice. It's time to put someone in the games who's been
there before, basically, and the way that lands on the American public.
I mean, this is interesting, Chris, because on the one hand,
you have these aging leaders who are not able to get through sentences to prevent
themselves from drifting to closed eye whatever Joe Biden was doing in Maui, which
was just embarrassing on an international scale. Diane Feinstein, Miss McConnell, I
mean, the list goes on and on. Nancy Pelosi is the only one
that had had some decency to take a step back, even though she's still
in Congress. But all of that said, there's also this discustion of like,
well, do we have people in positions of power, I mean that
on the corporate level, the government level, the media level to step in
and be serious. What's your take on whether the vakee can do that?
I don't have a lot of confidence that he could well tell us what you
wrote about, tell us what you wrote about. So he's impressive. There's
no doubt that he's intelligent, incredibly so there's no doubt that he's extremely hard
working. He's an hustler. He goes he doesn't turn down any media hit.
It didn't really spent that much money in his campaign, and he's a
but he just hasn't said no to podcast, the Fox Business, to Fox
News, is the NBC at CNN and these channels. But half him on
repeatedly because you know, unlike a normal Republican candidate, profess who goes through
that normal speech of on my first day in office, I'll and they list
off like six unrealistick things. I'll just stand the Department of Education. I'll
make it so that the Constitution is enforced. He actually thought I was going
to talk about whatever idea is up and he'll debate them on anything, and
he's good at that. And he's also got he likes storing rocks at orthodoxies.
And it reminds me a lot of Donald Trump, who's of course much
older, but who earned, like really earned his earned media. Who would
who would get the booze of the people and the audiences the debates by challenging
America's wars abroad or challenging America's free trade regime and calling for more protectionist measures
tariffs at center. Remember the meltdowns over his NATO stands. Yeah, I
mean to see people who I used to work with and then worked at that
point, I worked in the corporate media, people who probably couldn't have told
you before Donald Trump talked about NATO what NATO stood for, explaining like with
this extremely competent tone, how Donald Trump's move was endangering NATO and endangering global
security was just shocking. I mean, jeez, I just I just saw
one of those reporters who lecturing Veka Ramas farming on nine to eleven the other
day, who like was in first grade during nine to eleven. It didn't
seem to have any kind of deep understanding of that day last time we spoke
about it a few years ago. But they're the gatekeepers. Now you're talking,
of course about your good friend on Lemon. Yeah, we used to
hang out in those long island bars. You know. Don't tell my wife,
she knows so. But so rebeccas all the interesting things. He throws
things out in Ukraine. I mean, if, like all carn and Garry
experts in the room, we have to fight Russia and Ukraine so that we
don't have to fight China and Taiwan or else, we'll fight them here,
which is just like it reminds me Oft used to call the European conflict the
Great Game between England and France Spain. And it's like if the Great Game
was played by people who grown up under power lines, eating lead paint and
just have worn't that intelligent. Maybe a couple of knocks off the head,
and there's like Ukraine did finish Taiwan or otherwise Russians were on Dade DC,
and like just because Chris Christy says it loudly, well you know, little
miss Afghan women's rights Snicky Hailey says it solidly, it doesn't mean it's true.
It's like kind of a I think it's honest face silly opinion. But
they're all attacking Veg for saying, hey, maybe this isn't something we should
be pushing for, or when he talks about I mean, we're at a
point in America right now where after lockdowns and the eyes about the vaccine which
didn't work and actually turned out to be kind of dangerous, and the lies
about the Hunter Biden laptop and those lies about UFOs, and there's really just
there's no stomach in the American people to take the well, this is the
party line, how dare you question it? Approach, which folks in corporate
media and a lot of Republican and Democratic candidates politicians they're still doing. They're
still saying, how dare you question this? But they've got no credibility.
So some of like Vivekas perfectly situated if they work hard and they're intelligent and
they're willing to debate, to question it, and kind of in the tradition
also of like a Tucker or John Stewart, are are even a Chris Christi
back of the day. He's willing to go into the lions den and debate
these people face to face and often comes out on top. And whether you're
a Bernie Sander supporter or Donald Trump supporter, you'd like to see your guy
win against the people you watched on TV every day and the people you get
angry at. I'm really glad you went in that direction and also finish your
thought because I was going to launch into a tear rate. Well, so
I was like, all that comes together? Does that mean that? Like?
So, I think that back Ramaswami would have come naturally to the conclusions
you have of a the American political moment if this was not hot fire right
now. No, not at all. I don't think that you would be
saying this stuff if you're running for president twenty twelve, which is why I
answered in the negative at the beginning of this. But yeah, the formidable
and interesting, intelligent person who's steal in the spotlight from stupid politicians and is
that really upsetting them? Yes, and I'd like to see it. Hey,
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Carter. Yeah, well, this presents of a pretty legitimate problem for populists,
and not just populists, people who are sincerely focused on the problem of
the political establishment, which could potentially include centrists and independents and those coalitions,
which is that it's a much smaller problem. I'll preface this by saying,
than the root problem here, which is that you have a vacuum that is
being created by elites. Like when you were talking, I was just trying
to organize my thoughts and I wrote down un serious populism is a direct response
to insistent and persistent elite failure. So if elites continue to prop up,
if your best candidate is Joe Biden in twenty twenty, a dude who is
completely compromised by foreign entanglements, c nile and a serial liar, somebody who
has dropped out of previous presidential campaigns because he simply couldn't cut it in voters
minds. But you're propping up you know, Republicans are offering Donald Trump,
who's flawed in a million different ways from some voters perspectives. Right, there's
some who are they're so polarized by the figure of Donald Trump, and for
some understandable reasons. You know, we're talking about those suburban women who have
have moral sort of quandaries with Donald Trump or other people. I don't mean
to, you know, be a female misogynist, but there are people that
have the majority of Americans think Donald Trump is too old and possibly a criminal
work too old, but he's got a lot of negatives. Yeah, yeah,
yeah, you're right, and that's yes. But if your two options
are widen and Donald Trump for for changing the country, what you're gonna get
is the fake Ramaswamy. And if you're Mike Pence, and again the campaign
that Mike Pences is running, he absolutely has to respond to the vake,
same with Nikki Haley in the way that they did. But that way I
think is really telling misread of where the Republican elector it is not just the
Republican base, but going back to Ross Perot, there is this, uh,
there is this curio and kind of hunger among a big group of American
voters for political outsiders that have different experience that actually, when Mike Pence is
touting his bona fides as an insider are going to be turned off and not
turned on politically by what you're offering. And so I think it's a challenge
for populists too to present serious ideas and to present serious people with those serious
ideas. But that task is made significantly more difficult by elites who, like
Mitch McConnell is another fantastic example, by elites who cling to power do nothing
with that power other than essentially enrich their friends and perpetuate the system. If
that's the case, then you are going to get on serious people stepping into
that vacuum, because you are making people angrier and angrier and angrier. And
for the rest of us that are just sort of squeezed in the middle,
it's like, well, I have like the bike may be a silly guy,
even though he does. I think Chris's he's very He's running a very
smart, sort of savvy media campaign. He may be silly as a presidential
candidate, right as though, like he's not going to be the nominee.
I think we all get that. But at the same time, Republicans just
throwing Chris Christie and the media throwing Chris Christie and Nicki Haley and Mike Pence,
the's bones that they don't deserve. I mean, you are making this
situation so much worse. You are basically what is the phrase of, like
I'm not even gonna try to I'm gonna batch it. But you're you're you're
going to be You're pointing a load of gun at yourself, basically like this
is going to come back to you. Yeah, they put up bad people,
the Democrats and Republicans alike put up bad people, and they get surprise
candidates because of it. I mean, I don't I think the Trump presidency
could have been significantly more successful. It was still great success in a lot
of different ways, and I really like the way that he pushed the goop
in twenty sixteen. But there's no shot you would have had a Donald Trump
presidency if you had a competent Conservative party that actually entered American people. There's
no way you'd have had a Bernie Sanders. Socialists nearly take over the Democratic
Party if you did kind of face have felt listened to by their leaders.
And there's a populist There's a problem the populists have, which is they're young,
and they're prone. They're looking for champions so they're more probably prone to
get behind an operator who may not share all of their views. But all
the political parties do suffer from that. I think if you're you know,
I wrote the story for the Telegraph because they were looking to try to explain
Ramaswami as he part of the new h what's the word us where the parties
are just kind of changing realignment? Is he? Is he a realignment candidate?
Yeah? Realignment. By the way, I'm not going to cut that
out, but Chris was about to ask for a pause so that he could
remember the word realignment. Just let that be on the record. Yeah,
a couple of days of blue medicine, I had him a connel moment,
So you didn't say nip nip zip code like I did earlier. So but
you know it is Rebecca realignment candidate. No, I mean, is he
like JD. Vance out there working with Elizabeth Warren to try and push different
kinds of new regulations on banks. No, he's not really doing any of
that stuff. But did you read it, and it's interesting. Did you
read his piece in The American Conservative this week where he laid out essentially the
Ramaswami doctrine as I saw one person put it where he really came out hard
on the against the foreign policy establishments, census on Ukraine and even on China.
He basically said, I would immediately seed territory that Putin has won to
Putin. It was pretty it was pretty hardcore and interesting. I don't know,
I don't know what you make of that. Yeah, I think it's
foreign policy stuff is very interesting. It goes against the blob completely, but
a lot of it does seem really it echoes a lot of what Tucker has
been saying over the years, and it infurious people in DC and in my
opinion, infuriates all the right people. I like it. Yeah, well,
no, actually that's a really I think it's a good take because it's
not like in twenty fifteen, twenty sixteen, if some of those Republican candidates
and people who I think have gotten who have been changed. Now if you
look at Marco Rubio's book, and we had him on the podcast last year
or talk about some of this, but his most recent book, he talks
about how the twenty sixteen campaign really changed him. And you've seen, I
mean in the policies, his policy agenda and the bills that he's proposed to
the way he talks. The things that he's worked on since then has substantially,
I would argue, changed. I don't think it's gotten any less conservative.
If anything, I think you can argue it's gotten more conservative and more
thoughtful. But that really changed some of those candidates. On the other hand,
it actually made a lot of other people like dig in further and further.
But you don't get the potency that Donald Trump had in twenty fifteen,
the electricity that Donald Trump had in twenty fifteen. If you have people talking
like DeSantis and Vavec are talking now, which is when DeSantis was given that
question about Oliver Anthony, he came out and said America is in decline.
They would not have talked like that. Trump was the only one talking like
that that wasn't trying to channel the sunny optimism of Ronald Reagan's reelection campaign in
nineteen eighty four, which they all some of them still seem to be doing.
It's another and interesting change between Vavec and Mike Pence from the debate,
But none of them were talking that way back in twenty fifteen. In twenty
six team and some of them are now but you never would have gotten Donald
Trump. So to the establishment, sort of many years of whining, what
have they done to prevent populists, imperfect populists, not populists in general,
but sort of imperfect populists that may veer into a genuinely questionable territory? What
have they done to prevent that? They have actually made it so much worse
because they have started using all of the technological and government tools at their disposal
to spy on average Americans. Instead of actually trying to address these problems,
they've just said, we need more control, we need to trust voters less,
we need to spy on them, control them, sensor their language,
a sensor what they're able to share and post. And that's been their response.
And we're in a dangerous spot. I mean, my fear as a
Donald Trump is and Joe Biden are going to be the nominees. And Trump's
got a pretty hard cling for us the votes he's able to get, which
probably means that America stays with Joe Biden, which is going to be eight
years of a country that's ready to blow having no release for that pressure.
I mean, that's a good point. It's obvious that pressure started to push
out and really release in twenty sixteen race Bernie Sanders a surprise near win and
Trump's surprise primary win and then shocking election win. And I didn't feel like
at the end by twenty twenty that the pressure in this country had gotten any
kind of relief. And now we're just bothering it up with an old dusty
cork and it's going to get worse before before it get better. Anything else
you want to mention on this Before we get to the questions, Chris,
we want to thank everyone first for sending their emails over to Radio the Federalist
dot com. And I'm going to start with one from Victoria and Mike Pasco
in Jupiter, Florida. I love those two. All Right, there you
go, Chris, they say, fan of the pod, and I have
an upcoming. I have a question for the upcoming Chris Bedford Ama, if
he could create a new federal holiday holiday, what would it be and when
would it be? Easy? Election day? Better a holiday no one has
work. Also, there's no early voting. I agree with that completely,
Wow over completely. Yeah, that's that's that is such a good answer,
because I thought you were going to go with something funny, and you went
with something serious, so serious and accurate that it became funny. No.
I mean, we could have volunteers to help the elderly of your vote in
the second vote, and we could have volunteers. It's like there's certain mandatory
infrastruct that needs to be maintained, and those people wouldn't beble to get the
day off, like bus drivers, subway drivers from the city. They would
need to find some way to get the vote to them. But we need
to just end this three month voting bs and have that. I could not
agree more beautifully better answer for Michael Victoria, their old neighbors of mine in
right front and listeners, the poor people. I thought you were going to
say the airing of the grievances. That's a great holiday. But I kind
of do that a lot. I don't know if it should be right ugly
quick thought. I mean the other option is you could have said something Catholic.
Yeah, I think, I mean, obviously the across the Tiver Submit
and Repent day, I'm sorry, I can't, like I can't do your
dentists appointment that day. It's across the time verse submit and Repent day.
I celebrate the Federal across the type, submit and repente. The Amish market
in Annapolis is closed on the feast of the Ascension, and I don't know
that was a pretty good one. Make ascension great again. You could even
keep just the MAGA right there. I have another question here from Jack in
Massachusetts, your home state, Chris. Jack says Emily, as always,
I thoroughly enjoyed your August fourth Federalist Radio Are with Chris Bedford. That weekly
show is always worth a listen for the many insights you should provide, as
well as for all of the labs. But I want for sure I thank
you Jack. That's so nice. Jack continues, but I want to elaborate
on something Chris talked about American exceptionalism. When Barack Obama opined that America is
no more exceptional than any other country, he missed the point, and I
think Chris did as well. That's my favorite point part of the email.
American exceptionalism is not a superlative, despite Obama spin. It is not saying
that our country is better than any other, although I think it is.
But that's beside. Think of the core words of the Declaration of Independence.
We hold these trees to be self evident, that all men are created equal,
that they're endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these
life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. In the eighteenth century,
and most countries were ruled by kings who were the final arbiter of their people's
rights. The people were beholden to the king and restricted in what they could
and could not do without us leave. Our forefathers turned that notion on its
head and said, no, people derived their natural rights from God, not
a king. Then they built on that notion in the founding of the country,
the creation of the Constitution, and in particular the Bill of Rights,
which laid down the clear right line between people's rights and what the government could
not do and could not take away. In that sense, in the era
of kings reigning over their people from on high, to build a new nation
on natural rights was the exception to the rule of the day, hence American
exceptionalism. That's a good point. What do you make of it, Chris?
I think it's a great point. I wish I had said it as
clearly as Jack did. Thanks JACKO. Yeah, they we came together at
a country given to us by God. I think with people who God lined
up, I don't think that. I don't think Kamas Jefferson self could have
could have delivered the form of government had nor Hamilton himself or Adams himself.
They were all integral people, and they were brought together importantly to figure this
out and to put together a nation that was self governed, where rights were
derived from God, not from the States. So yeah, I agree with
Jack. Can we keep it, of course yes, of course, really
well tailored for creating government that works with good men, but it seems less
well tailored to creating good men themselves. Yeah, And I think you can
also interestingly make an argument for British exceptionalism on that count too, although just
in the way that you know, the our forefathers were were British for the
most work, and they were exceptional British, Yes exactly. I was gonna
say. They were the inheritors of a tradition that was becoming what it was,
a germ of what it became in the United States of America. But
of course we have the claim to is that exception, as Edmund Burke would
probably grant Chris, English had it all backwards. They had a lunatic feeble
king running around giving orders the gencium account that everyone worth. We have Donald
Trump and Joe Biden, at least now, at least now we do then
we had George Washington. Probably probably, I don't want to make any again,
I don't want to speak in generality, so but I would say probably
a better president than Joe Biden. I think. I think one of the
greatest men who ever lived, the the lunchman that finally made the whole thing
work, the surrendering of the Continental Army to the Congress and then the surrendering
of the presidency of the people. On a scale, would I make it
all the way to his house on my bike because I'm not direct? In
your little shorts, they make a good drink over there. So on a
scale of Franklin Pierce. On a scale Franklin Pierce to George Washington, where
would you put Joe Biden? Probably top? All right, This is a
question for Gregory, who coined the Big Bee, by the way, the
nickname for Chris that I simply can't get enough of. Gregory asked for the
best Wisconsin food, and I'll answer that because it's been on my mind since
the debate was in Milwaukee recently, and I had a lot of friends in
media and the conservative movement more broadly that we're asking me for recommendations. And
I get a lot of people who ask me for the recommendations for best cheese
curds, like cheese curds in Wisconsin, and I give the same answer every
time. People are always expecting me to give them like some dive bar.
And it's true, you can get really good fried cheese curds at a dive
bar. But my answer is honestly the best, the consistently best cheese curds
in the state of Wisconsin. All Right, Calvers, go to a Calvers.
You don't need to go tuck into some interesting actually secretly Wisconsinantia possibly able,
like the real local place is a chain. It's a chain that's you
can also find them in like Arizona or Florida, but it is a Wisconsin
company. It's a great Wisconsin company. And I'm telling you they're really good
about locally sourcing their food. If you've wondered why Calvers generally taste better than
other fast food for one of the reasons is that they're they're pretty good about
sourcing their food locally, but it's in all sincerity. The the Wisconsin cheese
curds at Calvers, those are some of the best that you can that you
can get. I haven't had them in other states, so I don't know
if this applies to you. If you're states, I'm sure there are no
bags of cheese at Ature, but these are deep fried. These are deep
fried. So I'm not sure if the Calvers and other states have the cheese
curds on the menu, but I'm saying I haven't tried them. If they
do have them on the menu, I've only tried the men Wisconsin and they
are delicious. So ill said the Wisconsin steak clubs, Yeah, the Wisconsin
supper clubs. There's still a video on the internet. We only did that
like last year, Chris of the Wisconsin supper club menu that you and I
are prepared and man, by the end of that preparation was everybody drunk.
It took so long the Wisconsin why, yeah, no, exactly, it
was perfect. We have another question for you from Gregory. This is actually
pretty interesting. You are in and around political groups and politicians a lot.
How many are quote in the hot tub? How many? Not any attribute
like personal wealth, religions, state of resident attribute seemed to be determinations to
engage in hot tubury and Gregor here is referring to since Chris and I are
both involved in the National Journalism Center, which was founded by Stan Evans,
the famous writer. I'm sent Evans the phrase that Evans coined, which is
that DC is like a hot tub basically, right, what's the exact phrase.
I need to look it up. Politicians come to DC calling it a
swamp and then they find it's a hot tub. Yeah, they find it's
more of a hot tub. So, Chris, what is your take on
how many of people in the Beltway are actually kind of in the hot tub?
I would say the majority, the majority of people here. They enjoy
their lives there, they have they raise their kids here. They're disconnected a
lot of the times from home here have some of those politicians who do go
back and forth every single weekend. But I mean, look through the list
of US senators just pulled up on Wikipedia and read through it and tell you
and ask yourself how many of those names you even like? How many of
those people would you recognize in the street, even if you follow a politics
all the time. Wait, less than half would you actually know? And
so who are those people? What are they doing? You know, why
are they here in Washington, DC? Is because they get to be a
senator. What's the last thing they did? When when whenever you see a
politician resigning or leaving office, and you see all these lootics coming their way,
which are like, yeah, you know they did so much, they
really cared for veterans, but you don't actually hear something that's like specific,
or they cared for the four the downtrodden, but there's no actual bill.
You have to ask yourself what were they doing here the whole time? And
if they're that kind of person, then you can say, well, they're
probably a hot top person as opposed to some other senators. I think maybe
Holly Vans. A couple others come to mind, who are just don't You
don't see them out of the parties. The parties are over in general anyways.
You see them traveling home, you see them with their families, and
you see them trying to pass bills. Those are the ones who I think
actually here to make a difference. Yeah, and you're a good person to
ask this question too, because you've been here for a while, not just
because you're old, but also, like me, you went to school here
and so you've you've really that gives you a different perspective too, because you
meet all kinds of people when you go to school here that end up working
in the city that you wouldn't if you just work on sort of one side
of the so the proverbial aisle, if you're on the left or the right.
But I want to actually even add a different, like a tag on
question to this question, which is about how many good people you know that
are in the hot tub? And I feel like one thing that was clarifying
about the Trump era is it became very obvious. You know an Applebama wrote
a whole book about this from the other direction, like she she wrote a
whole book this woman who like routinely gets facts wrong, but wrote a whole
book about all her friends how all her friends like went crazy. But on
that note, you know, it is interesting that it's very easy even for
decent people, I think, to get sucked into bad work here. And
I feel like I see that all the time, even if you sort of
win o your social circle, and it's it has been clarified sort of in
the Trump era because the Apple bombs exposed themselves for what they really were all
along. But at the same time, you know, it's a spectrum,
right, everything is. You know, there's a spectrum of compromise involved.
Well. Politicians and journalists and congressional staffers and the like. They live here
in Washington, DC are among the only people in America who interact far outside
of their own class. I mean, most people who aren't billionaires don't meet
many billionaires kind of running their own circles. If you're like a bartender and
Jackson Hole something like you're a lift operator and aspen, you don't really meet
these people and actually talk to them, are going to their homes ever,
And even those guys don't. In DC, you do. And DC have
all these rich suburbs around in the whole area. You don't realize it until
you take off in an airplane. I don't really not cloudy day and not
hazy day, or have you ever had the opportunity to have My friends are
pilots licenses, so you can hop in with them sometimes take a little prop
plane up and you see it just half an hour forty feminists inside of DC.
You can't see it from the road or the highway really, but just
the unending golf courses anxious and the pools, and those aren't really owned by
senators and politicians. Really, those are owned by lobbyists and arms dealers and
literally and different people who made their fortune here in DC. And those other
people, the journalists and the staffers and the politicians who are constantly rubbing hands
with these guys, don't to wonder why aren't I rich? I mean,
all these rich people want to talk to me. All these rich people need
my attention. Why aren't I rich? And they look around for ways to
get rich? And there are ways to do it. If you're willing to
sell yourself, you can get if you've got a good experience, years of
experience in journalism, your experience politicking, you can sign up with a pharmaceutical
company and Mike and you're willing to work hard. You can make a lot
of money really quickly, as long as you don't really care what you're actually
selling. And I think people fall into that trap. It's just it's very
humans. It's envy. I mean, it's their whole songs about it,
mister and missus SMI you know, the movie about it, but the comparison
Johnny Cash Willie Nelson Excuse Me has a song about this in the song Looking
Back Texas. But you don't really compete with things. You don't rub against
it, you don't see for very few people do. And if you're constantly
exposed to the wealth and other things, I think the temptation is stronger,
and it's very strong in in DC and and the devil's just waiting there with
the contracts. A sign here like basically around every corner looking Back Texas,
by the way, is whalon I think Willie's on the song That's so Whalen
and Willie You're right, yeah, Willie and Willie and the boys. The
other part of that question I want to ask, because actually this is actually
kind of an important question as a tag on to Gregory's question, is how
you personally prevent yourself from going down that road, because I do think,
you know, I remember what it was like to sort of grow up in
Wisconsin and look at everything that was happening in New York and DC, and
you know, it's it's much easier to sort of attribute some of these things
to like shadowy conspiracies when you like don't see up close so much of it
as incompetence and numbers. It's, yeah, exactly like they're conspiring, but
they're just too dumb to do anything that's like a great conspiracy. So how
do you ensure that you don't become, you know, the sort of type
of person you criticize all day. There's a couple of ways my sin of
pride is worse than my sin of envy. I like my job. I
like what I do more than I've got the bug for greed. I also
looked at Peter pan lifestyle for most of my early years, where I haven't
had to provide until very recently. That's like the first time I've ever heard
you make that point. That is a really beautiful moment of a poignant moment
of self reflection. Chris, Yeah, I've I mean, it's not like
I've needed to add an extra room out of my house. I'm taking care
of myself, which is not a bad thing, by the way, something
a lot of good people tended to not do but end up doing. Never
added a room for your family. I'm a seven year old back then.
And also here's another thing that's a really good guard of it. I'm not
very good at it. That's true, but I didn't mean it's true of
you. I think you actually are good at it. Like you used to
throw these Christmas parties. I would have hundreds of people. Granted they were
mostly like anti establishment type of folks, but I think you're good at it.
But yeah, I feel like maybe you're not good at keeping up a
facade. I could do the socializing easily. I can walk into a bar
and make friends with someone at the bar within moments if I want to,
or I can. I can get along with a group of people who I
don't like or don't even respect and not really let them know it. But
could I could I sit across from a corporate client at a board meeting and
say all the right things and not get really annoyed and then actually put my
heart and grow press release. I don't know that'd be hard. I really
really writing in palms and things that don't come naturally, so like, yeah,
I have to actually really care about it to want to do it,
And yeah, no, I think that's fair. I'm just thinking of my
own situation. I would say. Also, looking at fame in the era
of like twenty fifteen, too, now that you know, really the era
of social media and cancel culture and everything and sort of seeing it up close
and personal in DC makes you want no part of it, which is another
thing. I mean, I think that sort of desperate thirst for fame drives
people to do irrational and immoral things in Washington, DC. And that could
be media fame, it could be political fame, it could be a claim,
you know, as an essayst whatever it is, those sorts of as
fame. Always, as the cliche goes, it does push you to to
compromise. You know, not everybody, but it does create incentives to compromise
your values. Of course, yes, I always tell our journalism of students,
you know, don't sell out. Now, why would you. You're
not responsible for anyone. You're at an age where you can live in an
apartment with two of your friends in a single bedroom, like and figure it
out, Like you can take that low paying job that actually does put you
in the career path you want when you're older. You don't have that option.
I mean, even if he was reelectant, For example, Senator Rick
Santorum couldn't provide for his amily, especially with some of the special needs they
have some of the children. As a US senator, it's like no longer
an option. Now it's gonna shield for big tech. And he's doing that
to take care of his family. So sometimes like that's not always the worst
reasons. Some people just can no longer do it by the realities of having
to provide for and he's got some special special needs and his family and other
politicians have also done the same where they're like, oh, yeah, I'd
love to people keep on doing this, but I've got eight kids and some
of them need constant care or thank you like that, And I don't know
the specifics are of that, but it's tough to walk that line once once
you leave the straight Now, yeah, it's tough to like actually exist in
American politics. That's a sort of in a in DC in New York and
continue to like be be batting, you know, or let's just say going,
uh, you know, ten for ten on not compromising your values.
That would be boreal and impossible. And sometimes there are reasons that you know,
you can go in either direction. But that's actually a good reminder Chris
not to you know, from the outside judge everybody's circumstances, because I do
know people who work for places that I would never ever ever think it's possible
to work without compromising, who are changing those institutions from the inside out in
ways that they desperately need. This is a huge point of contention during the
Trump administration, where you know, there was this whole idea that it was
you you're serving an evil master if you go to work for Donald Trump.
But there's some really smart, talented people that went and worked for that administration
that prevented bad things from happening, that created good things that did happen,
created the conditions that allowed good things to happen. I longed to tell to
people who work for Trump, be he needed more of them, right,
all the right ideas. Most of the staff were savage, telligent and left
the rights. Yeah, that's anonymous people. That's a fair point. But
also I think for both of us answer to that too is faith. We
are constantly reminded as practicing Christians that money isn't gonna get you anywhere at the
end of the day, and we have a much more important purpose than fame
or money or the acclaim of the current political establishment. That's that's on the
line. When you say you can value a staying glass window. But you'd
better include the part we're to ask people to cry for you, because there
you go. All right, we have two more. One is just a
comment from Dennis who this is for Molly and me, says Molly and Emily,
you should do a segment on your show called PSA for Times readers dedicated
to the important work of helping readers in the New York Times and viewers of
CNN et cetera keep up with all the news that they have. Is Dennis,
this is a great idea. Someone should do it. I personally,
there aren't enough hours in the day, I don't think taking and to give
the readers of the New York Times all of the accurate information that they would
have liked, the half of the thing you should read about today that you
really should have. That's true. John Ferry writes in and says he really
liked an episode that we did on ESG, but also says you should consider
doing a video podcast. And I wanted to answer this comment because Chris,
for a while we did do basically every early in the pandemic, basically every
episode of Federalist Radio Hour was on video, and you and I spent the
last two years doing a video podcast at least once a week. But I
have to say we are shadow band on Google and so you know, this
is like pretty decent content for YouTube, and Federal Stradio Hour could be pretty
decent content for YouTube if we put the time into it that we would need
to, because you know it, actually the threshold is a little bit lower
now and to kind of do a really high quality product and make it work.
But A, we're shadow band, and B. I think one of
the things that people don't totally realize about the Federals is that we're tiny.
We don't even have We have like one of the most popular politics podcasts in
the country, and we don't even have a full time producer. It's we
don't even have like a professional audio person. We have chairs and a table
on a liquor cabinet exactly. We have our very hard working producer, Jordan
Boyd, who does a fantastic job. But yeah, we we don't have
a full time social media digital person audio person. We are and we like
it that way. I would say, Chris, because it gives us,
I think, an edge and may you know, everybody is really in it
for the purpose and nobody's well Madeline did it before. Jordan's so outsourced.
What do you think about that, Chris, you want to get back on
video more? Yeah? Sure, there actually are a lot of Chris Bedford
fans out there. Well, this is our way to sort of close out
the summer. We thank everybody for listening, Thank everybody for sending their thoughts.
Again, you can always send those over to radio at the Federals dot
com. We do check them pretty regularly. Chris. Any final thoughts as
we head into Labor Day weekend we close out this summer. Anything on your
mind? No, I think that. I think we're ready to go.
I'd love to have recorded how to prepare for Labor Day sort of video,
but I don't think. I don't think we can do that in this I
actually completely forgot. I'm going to a wedding this Labor Day on the Eastern
Shore. I'm really excited about. I'm going to drive home from it.
We're halfway home, and then the next morning I'm gonna wake up and you're
gonna have for breakfast on both of the crabs. Oh. I did Blue
Crabs in Annapolis last weekend. Fantastic, Mylan I'll be in Annapolis. Yeah,
beautiful, there you go. Well, on that note, we also
we did a Labor Day grilling podcast not that long ago, so you can
look that up if you're curious for Chris's grilling tips, which I recommend taking
because he is quite good. But thank you so much for listening to another
edition of The Federalist Radio Hour. I'm Emily Jasinski, culture editor here at
the Federalists, joint today by Christopher Bedford, Executive editor over at the Common
Sense of Society. We'll be back soon with more. Until then, the
lovers of freedom and anxious for the frame heard the fame voice the reason,
and then it faded away.