Speaker 1: Ah from me historic Lemonard Park in Los Angeles, California.
I'm Tavist Smiley and I'm so glad to see you
and me back in stride again. Before we get started
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com or wherever you get your podcast and listen to
the Tavismoley podcast version of this live program at your leisure.
Another great show on tap for you today. It's Monday,
so we'll check in with dot Cornel West on the
top side of our two as per usual, on the
B side of our two, Karen Audiam is a bad girl.
She was on this program when she was summarily dismissed
by The Washington Post last year for what you ask
doing her job. Today, an arbitrator ordered the Washington Post
to reinstate Karen after she posted about white men who
espouse hatred and violence following Charlie Kirk's killing of victory
today for the right kind of Karen, we'll talk about
it with my colleague and White House correspondent in the
quarterlot quote on the b side of our two, plus
Hakeem Jeffries is hanging out with Jared Kushner. What's that about?
Lots to cover on the backside of our two in
our third hour, two more conversations. First, we'll take the
political prediction market to task with Galen Druke of the
gd Politics podcast, and then on the b side of
our three year conversation with the Emmy nominated veteran actor
Ernest Harden Junior. Ernest is nominated for his outstanding guest
appearance on the HBO Max hit medical drama The Pit.
So Ernest comes live and stud do today in our
third and final hour on the backside at least, but
in this first hour, let's talk politics and more with
former White House speech writer and Emmy winner himself Eli
Addie Eli, How are you, sir?
Speaker 2: Great? How are you to man?
Speaker 1: If I can play man's good to have you, I
can plain that being ingrade, you know me, let me
let me. I mentioned South Carolina, and I want to
go there right quick.
Speaker 3: Here.
Speaker 1: Pete booda judge, was in South Carolina over the weekend.
He's thinking about another run and so he was there
this weekend. Made made some natural news, of course, and uh,
we may talk about that a little bit later in
today's program. But I want to go to South Carolina
because Donald Trump was just in South Carolina, uh, and
had this to say about what he expects of Democrats
if and when they take back the House this fall
years ago.
Speaker 3: They're gonna flee our country. I'm going to be impeach.
They're gonna do a peach me. They have no idea.
Why I saw it today A congressman said on one
of the shows, We're going to a peach person or Trump,
We're going to a peach Oh really? Why the person
was saying a neutral commentator for a change.
Speaker 1: I like neutral commentator. Oh, I see, you're gonnapeach him? Why?
Speaker 3: Uh, well, I don't know, I don't know.
Speaker 1: I mentioned earlier that we'll talk to new Cord lack
Quarte about Jared Kushner and Hakim Jeffries and the meeting
they had in the context or that is the backdrop
here comes Donald Trump saying they are going to impeach me.
I am not so sure about that. Uh, let me
just let me just well, let me do this. I
got thirty second shit, I wouldn't be fair. I want
to hear what Eli has to say about that when
we come forward. I do not believe that haw King
Jeffries has the stomach to do that. I don't think
the Democrats went back to the House, Hakim Jeffrey is
gonna be jumping up and down to impeach Donald Trump.
So Trump feels that way. Clearly there are those in
the House who want to see Donald Trump impeached. I
just don't know if impeachment sits anywhere near the top
of the Democratic agenda, if they can pull this off
coming November. But the president, he's bracing him himself for
effects if the Dems take back the House. We'll talk
about it with Eli Addi when we come forward on
Tavis Smile. So Donald Trump is is concerned or feigning concern,
that Democrats are going to impeach him if they get
to the gavel back come November. What say you?
Speaker 2: You know, it's a complicated question because I'm a parent
of young kids and as a lot of people with
young kids will will tell you there have to be consequences. Right,
we do have a justice system. I think there's been
unbelievable corruption, self dealing, flouting of laws left and right
in this administration on a scale we've never seen. But
at the same time, I think if Leader Jefferies is
reluctant to make the next two years about impeachment or
even frankly about investigating you know, Trump in his cabinet,
his highly corrupt cabinet, I would say, you know, up
and down, it's for good reason, which is that I
think this country right now is exhausted by inflation, you know, war,
a government that seems to only want align its own
pockets and to not you know, to be kicking people
off of you know, Medicaid and not expanding health care,
and in fact, you know, Obama Care premiums have been
tripling in some cases. I think they want I think
I think people in this country want a government that
addresses their problems. And if we spend, if Democrats take
back the House, which I think will almost certainly happen,
I mean, we have a good chance at the Senate.
It's hard to say whether that's going to happen, a
lot of things have to line up correctly. But I
think what we should do is use those two years
to try, in the Congress at least to focus on
making life more affordable for you know, working families in
this country, and expanding health care instead of cutting it back,
and expanding paths to come to this country legally instead
of restricting them, and make this a place of opportunity again.
Speaker 1: You do realize, eli, with all due respect, that if
we were talking about Barack Obama having done what Donald
Trump is doing, no Republican guest on this program would
be saying anything near what you're saying right now. You
do realize it.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, look, I mean Obama, who I you know,
love and got to meet, didn't really know personally, but
you know, he he His big scandal was that he
wore tan suit in the Oval office one day. I
don't know if you remember the weeks of Republican outrage
about the tan suit. It's just another level of hypocrisy, frankly,
And you know, there have been plenty of Democratic presidents
who have had their you know, versions of corruption and
self dealing. I think you know, Barack Obama was a
particularly morally upright person in that regard.
Speaker 1: But still, but see that, I'm coming back to your word.
I let you have to eli not that easy, brother,
not that I'm gonna put that hypocrisy word on you.
And I say it respectfully and lovingly, of course, because
because because this is the point. If Barack Obama with
his black self in his tan suit, we're in the
White House right now and it done what Donald Trump
has done, There's no way that any Republican guest on
this program would be saying to me, we shouldn't focus
on the president. We ought to focus on the people's issues.
They'd be going after Barack Obama every day, all day
for the tan suit and everything else he's guilty of.
And here you come now suggesting, well, other people want
the Congress to focus on their issues, and so we're
gonna let Donald Trump get away with literally no.
Speaker 2: Look, I'm not I'm not for letting him get away
with anything. Yeah, You're making a very good point here,
Bern Tavison, and I'm not for that. But I think
at a certain point you have to be coolly strategic
and realize that you know, I think Trump likes everything
to always be about Trump, and if we are attacking
Trump and tearing down Trump and impeaching Trump and investigating Trump,
that will be satisfying to some portion of the electorate.
And as I you know, began my answer by saying,
it may be what is morally and legally required, but
at the same time, I think this whole country is
exhausted by Trump and everything to do with Trump, and
a little disgusted. Look, his approval rating is now. I
think thirty three percent of the country in a Rutter's
poll that I saw this morning approve of his performance
as president. Sixty four percent disapproved. I mean, those are
you know, Richard Nixon may have had numbers that bad
days before he resigned from office. That's, you know, the
blinking red alarm. He doesn't care at all because he's
a lame duck, despite the fact that he wears these
you know, twenty twenty eight hats all the time, and
he doesn't really care about his own party. He doesn't
care about anybody, even hisself really, and he's out the
door and all he wants to do is build monuments
and put more you know, gold, you know, paint on
the walls of the Oval Office. Which apparently he's been
doing some gilding of the Oval office himself. That's what
he thinks is the good use of his time as president.
You know, talk about a metaphor. It's Marie Antoinette. You know,
he just doesn't have any connection to what people are
going through in this country and does not care, and
is making everything worse and is lining his own pockets.
So I think, and all of that, I suppose is
making the case for impeaching him or trying to investigate
him and you know, stir up all kinds of civil
and criminal cases against him again. But I think what
the country needs, after a decade of this madness, you know,
other than the Biden years, is somebody who will put
their problems first. So I mean, the danger of an
impeachment proceeding or all these investigations, and maybe they need
to happen, but the danger of them is that it
just drags us into another Donald Trump rabbit hole where
it's Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump Trump until people.
Speaker 1: I guess, no, I hear you, and I don't want to.
I don't want to make light of the argument that
you're making. I understand that the point you're making is
a strategic point or is George W. Bush would say strategery.
I get it. I get that, And yet I don't
think it has to be either or it can be both.
And we can have some new elected leadership in Washington
that plays by the rules, that doesn't violate the law
every day, it doesn't a lot of the American people
every day. We can do that and at the same
time both and not either or hold Donald Trump accountable.
And yet I'm sensitive to your point about the strategy
that the Democrats need to figure out how they're going
to employ. Here's what I'm bothered by. I hear your
point that people are exhausted by Donald Trump, no question
about it. But are we not exhausted by a chief
executive who breaks every law on the books? Are we
not exhausted by a president who's engaged in a grift,
a big grift? Are we not exhausted by et cetera,
et cetera, et cetera. And here's the thing, at the
end of the day, if we don't make some effort,
some attempt to investigate and to hold him accountable, then
what you have is another white male getting away with
high crimes and misdemeanors. That's what you have, another white
male and in the most multicultural, multiracial, multi ethic America ever,
that absolutely sends the wrong signal. Number one, let me
still go back to your babies, your precious babies you
referenced earlier. That's the wrong message to your kids. You
can get away, becames man.
Speaker 2: I'm of two minds about this, right because I do
think there have to be consequences, and I do think
we have to become a nation of laws again in
a way that we aren't right now, you know, for
you know, in too many ways because of this trend
and because of this president. But let's say we take
back just the House, which seems like the most likely outcome,
though I think we have an increasing shot of taking
back the Senate. You know, there's a limit to what
a speaker Jeffreys will be able to do. He's not
going to be able to enact a legislative agenda almost
at all. Despite this meeting with Jared Kushner, which we
could talk about, you know, he's he's gonna it's mostly
going to be trying to show some voters at the
margins what the difference is between the parties after two years,
where there's basically been no Congress, and Congress has just
you know, laid down and abdicated their job and let
Donald Trump do whatever he's wanted to do because Republican
members of the House and Senator are scared of him.
They're scared of what he can do to them in
Republican primaries. So I think if if the danger is
that if a speaker Jeffries is seen as focusing primarily
on impeachment investigations, and even if he does thirty percent
that and seventy percent the other stuff, you know that
right and left, the press will largely focus on the
source of conflict, which is the impeachment in the investigations,
I think it'll just seem like Park's on both their houses.
It's just they're all just you know, in a sandbox,
you know, fighting with each other, even though we're trying
to you know, meet out some kind of justice. I
would love for the contrast to be We're actually focused
on the problems of the American people, and he's trying
to you know, line in his own pockets and do
these horrible things. You know, there's an old theory of
presidential politics that my old friend David Axelrod likes to
talk about that the country for presidents doesn't elect replicas,
they elect remedies. And I don't. I don't think the
path forward for Democrats is a pugilistic, extremist democrat. I
think it's somebody who is a more successful version of
a Joe Biden, somebody who can be seen as someone
wants to govern, someone wants to solve problems, someone who's
a little bit of a conciliator. Can heal the country
after all of this horrible toxic damage that's been done.
Speaker 1: Yeah, a couple of minutes on this, and I'll push
for you, but let me just let me let me
lean on it one way time here. So Democrats have
been promising that if in fact they take back the House,
they're going to investigate Donald Trump for X, Y, and Z.
They've been saying that on the record for months now,
and that's part of the appeal, as you well know,
to get to vote for them, that if we get in,
we're going to investigate this fool. So what is the
point of investigating Donald Trump if you're not prepared to
take it the full length, which is to say, if
it calls for impeachment then you ought to be impeached.
I don't understand why we'd be investigating him if that's
not what if that's not the end and aim once
he's found guilty, which we all know he is, of
these crimes. And mister Meanors, as I said a moment ago,
the other point I'm raising is to use your back
to your word pugilistic. I think there's gonna be some
pugilism inside the Democratic Party. We see every day the
intra party fighting, as it is at the Democratic National
Committee level. Even inside the House we see Democrats not
always on the same page. What happens when a fight
breaks out openly, because as you well know, there will
be Democrats who will demand that Donald Trump is investigated.
They will demand that Donald trum impeached. And whether Hakim
Jeffies goes along with it or not, he's got a
fight on his hands inside of his own party the
minute he becomes the historic black Speaker of the House.
Speaker 2: Eli ADDI, you know, look, I get that there's going
to be a lot of energy, a lot of juice
in the fall elections about taking Trump to task, investigating
him and peaching him. And on the merits, I agree
with you, he completely deserves that. It's going to depend
on what happens in the Senate, because let's say we
don't take back the Senate. Let's say we do and
we have a one seat margin, which I think is
the realistic option. You know, if we take back you know,
take back the Senate at all, we're never going to
convict them Trump in the Senate. We're just never going
to be able to do that. That's not going to happen.
So then it's you're a prosecutor deciding do I prosecute
this case that I actually can't win a conviction on.
Do we want to How much time do we want
to take up doing that when we could instead take
up time trying to, you know, get Obamacare subsidies back
in place, so people whose health insurance costs have tripled
and who now you know, have to use emergency rooms
as crisis care because they don't have doctors. You know,
how much time do we want to spend you know,
actually trying to have an infrastructure policy in this country
that creates jobs, trying to you know, get inflation under control,
trying to expand affordable housing. You know, I would rather
do that then, and again, I'm no fan of Donald
Trump's and I think he deserves, you know, whatever the
worst punishment is. But we're not going to convict him.
We're not going to convict him. So do we want
to spend all that time? It's it's satisfying emotionally, but
is it really going to achieve anything?
Speaker 1: True Responses Two Responses will move on to Jared Kushner
and Harakeen Jeffrey speaking of Vakueen Jefferson as being the
ad I've said more times I can count, and with
the course on my career that if you really want
to know whether or not there's any real justice at
the epicenter of whatever issue you're discussing, if you wonder
if there's any if there's any real justice embody therein,
all you have to do is to flip the frame.
Flip flip the frame. By that, I mean just switch
out the colors. I repeat what I said earlier. If
Donald Trump were black and doing this, we know exactly
where this conversation would be leading us, Just as if
those insurrectionists on January sixth were black, we know how
the outcome would be very different. All you got to
do is to flip the frame. Just switch out the color,
and that tells you whether or not it's a legitimate conversation.
That tells you whether or not there's any real modicum
even of justice at play when you flip out the colors.
That's the first point. If Donald Trump were black, we'd
be having a very different conversation. Number One, I don't
mean eli, I mean the country.
Speaker 2: Yeah. No, and there's no question. And we know with
you there is no question.
Speaker 1: The second point is I said earlier, it sends the
wrong message in so many ways. I'm thinking of all
these black and brown people in this country right now
who have been caught up, who are in fact caught
up right now, many of them innocent, but caught up
right now in our system of injustice, our system of jurisprudence.
Who would love to hear somebody saying, you know what,
we ain't gonna We're not gonna charge you, we're not
gonna prosecute you, We're not even gonna investigate you, because,
you know what, the American people have real problems that
we need to be addressing. And Jamal and Letitia, we
you know, and and and and and Jose and Maria
we not We're not gonna spend time. We're not gonna
waste time hemming you up for the crimes that you
allegedly committed, because we have other problems we need to
focus on. I know black and brown folk who would
love to hear that kind of commentary, that kind of analysis,
and they never will. But because he's Donald Trump, because
he's a rich, powerful white male, because of strategory, we're
gonna let him off the hook because we got better
things to do. And again I digress, but I think
you take my point last word to you, ELI on
this issue, will move forward.
Speaker 2: Look, there's nobody who would be happier if Donald Trump
were impeached and remove from office. I think he's unworthy
of the job. I think he's highly corrupt. I think
we're going to be spending decades finding out the full
scale of the way he's looted our government. I think
they're going to find half the China missing when that
guy finally leaves the building, and his fingernails, you know,
in the doorway as they pull him away. But I
try to, as I said, be coolly strategic. I try
to step back and think what am I actually hoping
we achieve in this country? And I want to make
you know, I want a government that makes people's lives
better in measurable ways. And you know he's he's just
one of these people who tends to slip through your
hands just when you think you've got him, and maybe
you know, we should just let him go off into
the sunset. And if you look at the guy walking around,
that may not be long.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you point, that's why he's Anemy winning TV writer.
Fingernails in the in the in the doorways, they're pulling
him out half the china missing. That's why Eli Aaddi
is an Emmy winner himself. Let me close on this note.
I think we started this half hour playing this Donald
Trump clip and mister President, you ain't got none to
worry about. Democrats ain't gonna do nothing. They're gonna they're
not gonna come anywhere near trying to impeach you. I
don't believe, and I believe that's why Donald Trump is
making a mockery of Democrats in saying what he said
in South Carolina. He knows they ain't coming for him.
He knows that, and so he's leaning into this making
fun of Democrats because he knows that they're not gonna
impeach you. They ain't got the temerity to do so.
I digress from now. You're listening to Eliaddi on Tavisli Addy,
Emmy Award winning TV writer from a speechwriter in the
White House, specifically for Vice President Al Gore as delight
to have Eli on the program in case you just
and then we had a spirited, uh, spirited debate, not
really a debate, but we would it were spirited them
in the first thirty minutes.
Speaker 2: We mostly agree, yeah.
Speaker 1: We mostly agree, Yeah, but it was spirited. We've been
talking about Donald Trump, who was in South Carolina a
couple of days ago, and I think made a mockery
of Democrats in South Carolina when he suggested they're going
to impeach me. There, Miles, you got you got to
think you do up again if I can't mind my down.
Trump imprestonation is not really that good. It's only twenty
eight seconds. Listen to it. Listen to it yourself.
Speaker 3: Years ago, They're gonna flee our country. I'm going to
be impeached. They're gonna impeach me. They have no idea
Why I saw it today, A congressman said on one
of the shows, we're going to a peach person or Trump,
We're going to a peach Oh?
Speaker 1: Really?
Speaker 3: Why the person was asking a neutral commentator for a change?
Speaker 1: I like neutral commentator. Oh, I see, you're gonna peach him? Why?
Speaker 3: Uh, well, I don't know.
Speaker 1: I don't know. Eli. I think you may be slightly
younger than I am. But do you do you remember
Gary Hart?
Speaker 2: Sure?
Speaker 1: Absolutely so you're recalling Gary Heart challenge reporters to catch him.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that was a different time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, But my point of being, I'm being some
of a tongue in cheek. Gary Hart challenged reporters to
to to catch him, and they did as I recalled.
They were hiding out in trees trying to catch Gary
Hart because he sort of challenged them. You never want
to do that to the press. Donald Trump is doing
the same thing to Democrats. They're gonna impeach me. He's
begging them to impeach him, but he knows they won't.
And that's what I meant by reving this in their face,
making a mockery. You don't think I'm right about that?
Speaker 2: Well, I think the difference. I mean, look, I think
Donald Trump is kind of pathological. He may think he's
innocent of everything. I think there's something just off in
his brain. He certainly has no shame, no remorse about anything,
and I think he sees his own behavior differently. I
think he thinks he's a dictator or a king and
kind of above the law, you know, just by his
mere existence. Really, it's really on a level we've never seen.
Speaker 1: I think you get out front and you say they're
going to impeach me, and you dare them to do. So,
that's what I think is at work here. I digress
right now, All right, Hakim Jeffries and Jared Kushner, this
is all over the news. They got together for a meeting,
and I don't know that they expected it to get out,
but he got out, and everybody's trying to figure out
what it means. So what does it mean, Eliadi?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's hard to say that it means anything. Really.
I guess they had worked together on some legislation criminal
justice reform in the first Trump term and had a
bit of a relationship, and at least what they're telling
the press as well, they keep in touch anyway, which
I have hard time believing in any serious way. But
you know, there's a very good chance. I think there's
an almost one hundred percent chance the Democrats take back
the House. The White House knows that they're thinking to themselves,
is there some way we can keep a channel open
to Jeffries so that, you know, if he's the speaker,
we can work together on things that we agree on. Uh,
you know, and Kushner is the person that they sort
of dispatch for these tricky missions. But if you look
at Jared Kushner's record on you know, piece in the
Middle East, on ending the Iran War, pretty much everything
on on ending the war, you know, between Russia and Ukraine,
anything he is dispatched to do ends up a gigantic failure.
And they tend to be impossible tasks. It's like the
old Steve Martin joke about you know he's gonna now
he's gonna inhale a grand piano through straw. Well, basically
Krishnan has been asked to inhale a grand piano through
restraw and you know, establish some kind of common ground
with a guy Trump has insulted a hundred different ways,
and whose agenda He's tried to sabotage her every conceivable way.
I don't really see them working together. Yep, if and when.
Speaker 1: Jeffy speak, let me let me just set Jared Kushner's
side for the second, for a second, He's less important
to meet hockeym Jeffrey's for all the obvious reasons more important.
And I want to just ask you a point blank, direct,
forthright question about Hakim Jeffreys and whether or not he
is the right man for this moment. And historically we
could ask this question of any number of people. I mean,
clearly bb Net and Yahoo is the wrong person at
this moment. Some could argue that y'all Sair air Fat
back in the day was the wrong person at that moment.
We could do this all day long. If if we're
friends of history, as you and I are, we could
ask these questions historically whether or not these persons were
the wrong people at the wrong time. So this Hakim
Jeffreys question, I wrestled with it all the time. I mean,
I like Haiking personally, never done anything, never done anything
to me. Happens to be one of my fraternity brothers.
He's been a guest on this program. Oh cool, Yeah, yes,
he's been a guest on the program. So I mean
I get along with Hakim Jeffries. And yet, and yet,
and yet, I see all the ways, I see all
the issues on which Haiqim Jeffries seems not necessarily to
be in step with the base of the Democratic Party. Yeah,
when you talk to members of the House, they swear
about Haikim, They love Lakimen Jeffy. I never talked to
anybody or in the House who doesn't like Hakim Jeffries
a likable god, and many of them think he's a
good leader, and they understand what he's up against. And
so you know, there's no dislike per se of Hakim.
And at the moment, I don't see anybody or know
anybody who's gonna put their name out front volunteer themselves
to run against top King Jeffries. That could change between
now November, if they went back to the House, we
shall see. I'm saying all that to ask whether or not,
for a variety of reasons, you believe history making he
will be if they pull this off, whether or not
that makes Hi Kim Jeffries the right person at this
moment to lead Democrats. Many raids the same question about Schumer.
You take my.
Speaker 2: Point, Here's what I would say to that. I like
him a lot, I respect him a lot. I started
my career in Washington actually working for a House minority
leader to get parts, so I understand that job a
little bit from the inside. And what you really are
in his job, Hakiem Jeffrey's job, you're a class president.
So the fact that you can't get a single Congressman
to say a bad thing about him, that's why he's
the leader of the Democrats, because those are the people
who elected him. He's not a national you know, elected official.
He's not a president. He won't have that megaphone. He's
not somebody we pick to go toe to toe with
the president. He's picked to serve the needs of his
members by his members. The fact that he may be
out of step with the base of his party, and
I suppose you're talking about the more sort of activist
progressive left that's been powering a lot of recent primary victories,
and it is the source of a lot of energy
in the party right now. But I think, you know,
Jefferies represents the mainstream of the party. He represents the
party broadly speaking, and he represents I think the kind
of leadership you need to bridge all these different factions.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 2: Tip O'Neil, Democratic Speaker of the House in the eighties,
always used to say, if this were Europe, the Democratic
Party would be five parties, and I think that's still true.
It's an almost impossible job. So I think expecting him
as Speaker to suddenly be this charismatic national leader who
goes toe to toe with Donald Trump, he won't really
be doing that. He'll be letting his members do press
conferences instead of him. Many times, that's part of that job.
Members of Congress all have egos. They don't want somebody
to be their leader who's going to boss them around
and tell them what to do and overshadow them. It's
why our expectations of a democratic House have to be
pretty limited. There's nobody in that job, even somebody like
Nancy Pelosi, who I think is unbelievable and an incredible leader,
who can, you know, day after day after day, really
go toe to toe with the President and potentially take
them down. It's the legislative leader's role is different, and
I think will be limited. And he can set an agenda,
and he can build a consensus, and it's going to
be a broad consensus that includes every part of the party,
and it won't satisfy the sort of fire and brimstone left.
It's driving a lot of energy right now in the party.
Speaker 1: Speaking of fire and brimstone left. As I said earlier
in this program, there's always an intra party squabble up
inside the Democratic Party about one thing or another, multiple things,
usually all at once. It's always in fighting inside the
Democratic Party. So here's the latest. Democrats have now narrowed
their twenty twenty eight convention. Speaking of the twenty twenty
eight race, they've narrowed their convention finalist cities to three Boston, Denver,
and Philly. Boston, Denver, and Philadelphia. I've been at conventions
in all three of those places during my career covering
the Democratic Party. So those are three finalists, Boston, Denver,
and Philadelphia, which did not make the black mayor of
Atlanta happy. He has said that the DNC has snubbed
black voters by not choosing the atl And now there's
a fight inside the party about where they're gonna have
their convention. There's some Democratic Party insiders who have slapped
the mayor back and spanked Tire for even suggesting such
a thing. That just because we didn't choose Atlanta, that
does not mean that we're disrespecting black voters. So here's
yet another squabble up inside the Democratic Party. I used
to think years ago that these cities actually made a difference.
I don't think they matter one hour older right now.
I don't think it matters what city you could be
in Compton, you could be in Alaska. I don't think
it matter in Anchorage. I don't think it matters what
city Democrats go to in twenty twenty eight. I'll tell
you why we come for and see if Eli Addid
deagrees or disagrees you're listening to Tavismart. You aren't even
Eli Addy. So here's my read of this, and I
could be wrong. If I am, you feel free to
disabuse me of this notion. I used to think these
cities mattered because there was some strategicy. There's that word again,
Thanks George W. Bush. There was some strategy that went
into how these decisions were made, and there still is.
But at the end of the day, we know the
South Carolina is the first date in the Democratic primary process,
and more importantly, we know that these elections come down
to a handful of swing states, and as you well
know as well as I do, not just a handful
of swing states, but a handful of districts inside of
those swing states. That's how tight these races have become.
For president, You're looking at a few swing states and
frankly a handful of districts inside of those swing states.
I don't know that Philadelphia is the answer to the prayer,
because it is one of the swingiest of swing states,
and so that thing can still go the other direction
even if you meet there for your convention. Denver ain't
no part of the Democratic base in Denver. I ain't
hating on Denver, but it ain't no part of your
base in Denver. And in Boston, Eh, don't get me started.
So I'm not so sure the mayor of Atlanta, the
black mayor, is right when he says it's a snub
to black voters. But you could make the argument about
black voters. You can make the argument about the South,
make the argument about rafaol Warknock and John Also, if
putting off the impossible, you can make the argument about
Kisha Land's bottoms, a black woman from a mayor of
Atlanta running for governor. You can make a lot of
arguments for why Atlanta would be a decent place, perhaps
the best place to have the convention. But here's why
it doesn't matter, because it's all about those swing states
and those handful of districts. Who cares where the convention is?
I digress Elid de Micah's yours.
Speaker 2: No, I completely agree with you, and thank you for
saying that it's meaningless where the convention is held. I
think if the convention were held on zoom from you know,
a fishing vote in Thailand, I don't think it would
make a difference. There's no voter who cares where it is.
By and large, you know the sorts of low information
swing voters who really decide elections, These harder to reach
voters who have swung back and forth in the last
couple of elections, you know, younger voters, certain non college educated,
you know voters, Latino voters. They're not even watching the
convention at all. It's a TV commercial. It's like saying
a boy member of General Motors is upset because they're
filming their next TV commercial in Philly instead of you know, Atlanta.
It doesn't really make a difference. Now, all due respect
to the Mayor of Atlanta. What it does bring is
economic activity, tourism. All your hotels will be booked for
a bunch of days. But honestly, conventions need to be
significantly rethought. They used to be the place where nominees
were chosen and you'd have, you know, eight, ten, twelve
rounds of balloting before you know, Andrew Jackson would emerge
as the nominee or whoever. But it doesn't work that
way anymore. And it's a kind of a traditional exercise
in a country that has lost its patients with traditionalism.
And I think we need to give it up, and
I think we need to stop caring. And maybe the
next convention should just have different speeches and events from
nineteen cities and give everybody a piece of the pie,
and you know, stop the squabbling.
Speaker 1: In our remaining moments, Eli Addie, I will ask you
whether or not this Republican mid term convention, which has
never happened before, is going to make a difference in November.
You're listening to Savage Smiley and the Eliaddy with three
minutes to go when this first hour and we'll talk
to out to corn O West top of the second
ey as we do every Monday and Thursday. So stand
back for that just a few moments. So Donald Trump
announced some time ago Elis you know, that they were
gonna do something they've never done before Republicans. That is,
I have a midterm convention to rally the troops. They
chose Dallas as the site of their convention. Speaking of
convention sites, it will be September ninth and tenth. Will
it have an impact? Will it rally the troops? Will
it would it energize the base? Might Donald Trump pull
off an upset here? We thought there's gonna be a
big red wave in the mid terms for Joe Biden.
That red wave never materialize. Might Donald Trump's convention in
Dallas slow down this predictable or predicted blue wave in November.
Speaker 2: No, I don't think so. And the reason it won't,
I mean, for that to happen, I think Donald Trump
would need a brain transplant because he's incapable of doing
anything that drives an actual message that voters care about.
I mean, Republicans in Congress and around the country have
been you know, sounding, you know, the alarm for months
now that that you know, inflation, the wars, the rising
cost of healthcare, that voters, including many Trump voters, have
real concerns about their pocketbooks and their lives, and none
of that is being addressed because it's all how can
he build his ballroom? What new monument can he build
over here? Can you name ten things after himself? Because
he knows no one else is going to do it
after he's gone, and that and whatever they write for him,
whatever they stick on a teleprompter, is not what he's
going to say at that midterm convention. And I think
it's going to be a great big bust. You heard
it here first.
Speaker 1: There you go. Let me close on this note that
you raised a moment ago. And I think you're right
about this. I never heard anybody say it so clearly
and so plainly. That's why again, he's an Emmy Award
winning TV writer. This, this pinchion that Donald Trump has
for naming stuff after him, he's not just born of
his ego. I think you're right, though, it is born
of the fact that he knows it. Once he's gone,
ain't nobody gonna do it?
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right. I mean this, you know somewhere, you know,
deep inside himself, he must have some awareness that he
is in Ireland in many ways. And I think we're
going to be reckoning with this presidency for many decades
to come. How we let it happen? How all the
china's missing, all the door knobs are gone in that building,
and all the gold gilded things he's putting there he's
going to try to stuff into a suitcase. I mean,
you know, it's it's this is this is who we chose.
Speaker 1: No, And just just because I'm petty like this, We're
also gonna be wrestling Eli with how we let him
get away with it? See what I did there? See
what I did?
Speaker 2: For sure? I agree with you. You did it well
as you always do.
Speaker 1: Go wrest with that too. How we let him get
away with it because Democrats chose not to go after him
for all his crimes. But I doctor right, all right,
Eli Addie, you're the best man. Good to have you on.
Well do it against you?
Speaker 2: Goodtime, my friend. I love being on here.
Speaker 1: I love having you on. Thanks for your time. When
we come forward to Cornell West, who I also love
having on this program. You're listening to Tavishment