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Speaker 1: I almost prefer you over zoom to in person.

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Speaker 2: Harsh ask not what your country can do for you,

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ask what you can do for your country.

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Speaker 1: Mister girl. But you'll tear down this wall, read my lips.

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Speaker 2: Welcome everybody to the Ricochet Podcast number seven hundred and

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thirty five. This is Steve Heyward sitting in James Lylyc's

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chair on top of a booster seat, and I'm joined

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with Peter Robinson today with a special guest who is

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Steve Hillman.

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Speaker 1: So let's have ourselves a podcast.

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Speaker 3: I agree, you'll never get bored with when and we

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never get bored?

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Speaker 1: Well, Peter, here.

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Speaker 2: We are without the dulcet tones and firm hand of

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James Lylac for episode seven thirty five. That's pretty amazing,

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isn't it.

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Speaker 1: Staggering? Absolutely staggering. Oh here's the good news. And having

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done seven hundred and thirty five, if we just keep

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doing these things, John pot Horritz and the boys and girls,

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that commentary will never catch up. I think that's right.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, although I have to imagine there, how do they

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ever go back to get a magazine out?

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Speaker 1: Oh wait a minute, And of course they will catch up.

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Of course they will of course they will. They do

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it five days a week. In fact, they've probably done

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ten thousand already.

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Speaker 2: It could be, but I figured you were pard of

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the new Math, Peter, which you know, Yes, I don't know.

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Speaker 1: Right, in the New Math, I'm always a step ahead

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of John.

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Speaker 2: Right right, Well, now, you know, I guess we should

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start with two old Reaganites like you and me. Remember

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that Reagan fought a v a valiant effort while he

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was president to fend off protectionism and defend bolaires. He

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was a free trader. Now he did concede a lot.

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I went back into research on this recently.

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Speaker 1: You know, Oh yeah, you would know, you of all

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people would know, you'd be the authority they were, go ahead,

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do you do the history. But here's my memory is

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he made tactical retreats. Yes, only in the interest of

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a strategic position, right, yeah, yeah.

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Speaker 2: The point is he compromised to stave off worse from

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his first days in office.

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Speaker 1: Right.

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Speaker 2: But I was startled to find out some particulars. For example,

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in nineteen eighty six, Reagan threatened Spain with a two

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hundred percent tariff across the board in order to get

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Spain to relax its restraints on American farm imports to Spain,

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and they did right. So Reagan was not a verse

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to playing hardball with the trade measures. There were literally

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hundreds of bills introduced in Congress, many of them by

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Republicans for tariffs and protection, and some of the trade

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bills that Reagan vetoed were by Republicans, one of them

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by strom Thurmon in his diary talks about how I

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had a veto at trade bill. It's a bad bill.

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I called up strom Thurman. He took it better than

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I thought he would. He said, so, yeah, that's the

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point is that you had a you might say, a

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trumpest bipartisan majority in favor of protectionism in the eighties.

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And and you know, I get impatient my libertarian friends

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who say, yeah, Reagan talk like a free trader, but

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he was a hypocrite because they ignored that he was

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a working politician at a principal man, but a working politician.

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Speaker 1: You put the two of those together, and if you

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can't distinguish between tactics and strategy, you'll just not You'll

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make a hash of the Reagan record. You just won't

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get it exactly.

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Speaker 2: And so now the odd thing is there is I

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think you'd say a week bipartisan majority now in favor

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of liberalized trade, maybe not complete free trade. I think

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Democrats are still protectionists at their core.

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Speaker 1: But I mean I asked question when you talk about

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the when you talk about the weak majority in the

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old days of weak protectionist majority versus a week free

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trade majority today, are you talking about I hate the

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term elites, but are you talking about the hill essentially

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or are you talking about the general population? Because I

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have been very struck that in poll after poll after poll,

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the American people are against the majorities very but they're

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quite sizable majorities. It's two thirds or so. Thiniffs are

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a bad idea. Yeah, you know, what do you have

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in mind when you.

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Speaker 2: I think it's both. I think there's a weak majority.

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I think it was a strong majority for protection in

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the eighties. I think it's a weak majority. I mean, look,

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you know the n After Treaty got through with a

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lot of Democratic votes. You know, Bill Clinton had to

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break arms to get it through and so forth, and

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reel out al Gore to debate Ross Paroe.

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Speaker 1: You remember that.

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Speaker 2: Famous moment thirty years ago. Yes, but so I think

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it's a weak majority. And then I think the public.

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You know, my hunch about that, Peter, is that people

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like getting inexpensive consumer goods. They say, the maid in

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China made in Vietnam on the labels, And I think

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in an unsophisticated way, they recognize the benefits of liberalized trade.

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It's benefited especially lower in common working class people, right,

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and I think they understand that tariffs could blow up

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and make their lives more expensive. Again, I don't know

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that's a I'm surprised there are more surveys that try

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to get at that more deeply because I've seen the

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same numbers that you have that people oppose it. But

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that may be an odd combination of Republicans who don't

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like trade protection and Democrats who are opportunists. So I

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think right now there's a lot of opportunists. I mean,

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my joke is this boy Trump is a genius. Think

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of the things Trump has accomplished in the last several months.

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He's made Democrats hay to Kennedy, We've been trying to

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do that for sixty years, right, Yeah, what else has

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he done? The other one now is that he's made

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Democrats come out against a tax increase, which is what

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a terriff essentially is, and in favor of free trade.

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I mean, there's you know, I don't go in for

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the three D chess stuff very deeply, but I do

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wonder sometimes what the political thought behind all this is,

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because it certainly confused the scene.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it has confused the scene at a minimum. So

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let's rehearse the argument, shall we? Very briefly? Excuse me?

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What I mean is, let me rehearse the arguments and

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then you tell me where I'm right or wrong, as

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I understand it. First. So, first of all, we have

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that we can grant. I think we can stipulate that

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even a very cursory examination of American history shows that

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the protectionist impulse, I would almost call it a protectionist temptation,

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is permanent. It is always with us. You are always

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going to find political figures, major political figures, at any

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given time, who are willing or insist on putting up

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protectionist barriers. Item one. Item two. You have the counter

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argument of Milton Friedman. For example, Milton had what I

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would call the strong free trade position, which is that

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it is always in your favor to engage in free trade,

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even if your counterparties are not we hear a lot

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about I can remember Milton saying, as you know, I

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knew Milton Friedman in his final years when I overlapped

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him for a few years at the Heritage at the

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Hoover Institution. In fact, his office was down the hall

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from so Milton would say, we hear a lot about

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Chinese dumping products in the United States. What that means

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is they're willing to give us their products for less

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than it costs them to produce them. If they intend

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to make us a gift, why should we object Over

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the longer term, the people who are out are the Chinese,

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not us. Okay, So that's the strong argument. The counter

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argument is that if you're going to engage in a

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welfare state. Actually I had this conversation with an economist,

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my friend Tom McCurdy, who argued the point with Milton

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Friedman himself, and Tom argues that if you're going to engage,

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if you're going to set up a welfare state, then

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you have to think twice about free trade, because you

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have two ways of helping the poorer people. One is

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income transfers and that runs through the tax system. The

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other is to increase their wages and that would imply tariffs.

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And if you use tariffs to increase their wages and

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benefit workers, you don't have to run it through the

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federal government. In a certain it is a tax, there's

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no doubt about that, but you don't have to send

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it to the IRS and get bureaucrats involved who will

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take the viig so to speak. And Tom said, in

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a certain sense, you could even argue that tariffs are

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a more efficient way of benefiting workers, the less privileged,

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less privileged persons in the United States. Okay, So you

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put all that together, and there's some pros and there

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are some cons. What do you make of it? Of

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the artica, I'm not yeah, I'm not sure I buy that.

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Speaker 2: I think there are better arguments, one for in favor

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of tariffs.

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Speaker 1: Better arguments in favor. Okay, give me your best argument

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in favor of tariffs.

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Speaker 2: Well, let me just say make one comment about that,

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the argument you just gave, which is, tariffs may protect

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domestic workers' wages, but only at the effect of lowering

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the wages of workers overseas. And it takes a lot

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to explain why that's true. And I think that makes

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her stability in trading relations and so forth and can't

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be sustained over time, which is why it's likely a mistake.

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I think the argument in favor of tariffs is not

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their intrinsive sweet goodness or whatever Trump is saying about them.

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It's that they are an important tool for two reasons.

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One is when other nations are practicing predatory trade, which

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certainly would be the case of China, and they do

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that two ways, either by dumping or in the case

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of China, currency manipulation, which means that the basics straight

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up econ one oh one flows of currencies that would

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adjust their values, and then the currency we send overseas

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to buy stuff comes back here in the form of

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investment capital. It distorts all that badly. And then remember domestically,

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the theory about why trade protections that could be justified

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is the same as antitrusts. Right, we prosecute predatory pricing

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where someone credibly uses predator rate. That's right, Yeah, you

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want to crush your competition. Then you have a monopoly

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and you get monopo rents. As the economist would say,

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I think those are both sort of limited, and the

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basic idea the trade deficit is in and of itself bad.

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Is just I think economically illiterate and totally Trump seems

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to have bought into that.

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Speaker 1: I don't know whether he is. It possible that he

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doesn't know better himself. I mean, the argument is Jonah

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mentioned someplace in the web the other day that if

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you go into whatever, you go into McDonald's and buy

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a hamburger. On the Trump argument, McDonald's is stealing from

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you unless they buy your Jeanes in return.

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Speaker 2: Yes, John, you and I have been talking about how

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we need a tariff against McDonald's for their untrair trade

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advantages over us, especially with that predatory product that mcribb

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that he loves so much. Yeah, you know, Look, I

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think Trump's instincts and its policies are mostly fantastic. But

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I have joked over the years that I don't think

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he knows the difference between Friedrich Heydrich and the Selma

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Hayaks the problem.

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Speaker 1: Right.

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Speaker 2: It pains me to say this, but it's very worrying because,

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again going back to the Reagan example, the Reagan people

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knew from day one that if they didn't fix the economy,

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they couldn't accomplish anything else they wanted to do. And

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now the hazard for Trump, who I think has made

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the biggest bet of any president ever perhaps is that

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if he screws up economy, it's going to crush all

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the other great things that he's doing.

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Speaker 1: So I think a correct as far as that goes.

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But b if you're going to try to save the economy,

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if you know, if you screw it up, you can

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get nothing else done, then you say to yourself in politics,

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as you know, Steve's sequencing matters, and this guy has

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decided to impose tariffs, caused turmoil in the market, shrink

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everybody's four O one K, and then extend his tax cuts.

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He only has a margin of three or four seats

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in the House on a good day. All you have

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to do. He's already lost four Republicans in the Senate.

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He has already he's got four Republicans McConnell, the usual

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suspect mckowski, Collins, but also Rand Paul have now voted

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against Trump to reduce or eliminate the tariffs on Canada.

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You just get this slight stirring in the Senate of

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the constitutional position of the Congress, which is that the

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Constitution gives Congress authority over tariffs and taxation, not the president. Well,

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if you lose rand Paul, you're in a position to

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lose three four or five a dozen in the House.

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And if you do that, as you're coming up on

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an extremely complicated, huge bill, to the centerpiece of which

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is to extend the tax cuts, and that fails, or

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it gets hung up, or it gets turns into a

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long protracted process, he will get wiped out in the midterms.

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It is to me, it is just a sa right,

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and then he's done. Then he's just done. Well, my

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big worry immediately, not the midterms, is this could screw

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up the tax bill. You can see things on that

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next right. Yeah, exactly what I'm saying. Exactly what I'm saying. Well,

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let's get out with I'll give you two more quotes, Peter.

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You'll like our instances that I'm getting animated on. I'm

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getting animated on the anti tariff side. But I mean

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as you are. I was about to say, gamely pointing out,

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but you're doing it more than gamely. You're granting real

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credence to the pro tariff It's particularly if he's using

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them just as a tool for if the idea is

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imposed tariffs to get to a world without tariffs. All right,

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that's sensible. You can argue about sequencing and how you

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do it and so forth, but at least there's a

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at least there he has tariffs become tactics in the

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interest of a larger and sensible strategy. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Well, let me give you three quick quotes to get

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us out, because we're going forever on this one. Is

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you know, here we are, as we're talking, the stock

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market is crashing for a second day. And I remember

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there's a moment in the fall of nineteen eighty one

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when the stock markets started going down after Reagan's tax

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cut pass tax cuts passed, and a reporter, you know,

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a typical antagonistic border said, gee, mister President, wall Street

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doesn't seem to think very much of your economic policy.

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And Reagan's response was, I've never found wall Street to

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be a very good source of economic advice, which I

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thought was terrific.

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Speaker 1: Right boom.

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Speaker 2: But then I got to thinking about something a little older,

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back in the nineteen twenties, when Churchill was Chancellor of

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the Exchecker and facing a decision that is parallels this

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one in some respects, and it was when and at

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what valuation to return to the gold standard, which they botched. Yes,

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but he had a line that it sounds very trumpy,

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and he said I would rather see finance less proud

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and industry more content. That is, in substance what the

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Trump pro tear people say.

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Speaker 1: All right, they want to, except that industry doesn't seem

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to be content at all. I correct winging and whining

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and re shoring, as the term now goes very grudgingly. Well,

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in particularly these tariffs. Some there are industries that over

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the last couple of years has made a real effort

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to get their supply chains out of China, so they've

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put them in places such as the Philippines and Vietnam.

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Boom Trump puts on them as well. Yeah, all right, well,

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I'm sure, I'm not sure contented industry is quite the

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right way to put it.

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Speaker 2: Well, no, I mean there's evidence that capital investment is

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pausing right now, which is a bad thing. Yeah, because

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of the uncertainty.

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Speaker 1: But I did dust off.

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Speaker 2: It's very rare that I would say anything nice about

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John Maynard Keynes, but he wrote a pretty good essay

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at the time called the Economic Conquences Economic Consequences of

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mister Churchill, And after going through a very coach and

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explanation about why they made a mistake in their valuation

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point for gold, he has a sentence which you can

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use right now. He said, what now faces the government

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is the ticklish task of carrying out their own dangerous

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and unnecessary decision. I have a hard time running away

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from that right now, but I'm hoping for the best.

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There's a lot more illumination we can bring to the subject, Peter.

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But right now, that reminds me that speaking of illuminating

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things are sponsored Lumen.

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Speaker 1: Well done, well done, well done. I mean, right up

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until the last moment you had me wondering where you

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were going.

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Speaker 2: Did you know that when your metabolism is working properly,

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you will feel that benefits in literally every aspect of

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your life. We have found a valuable tool that gives

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us insights to create a healthy metabolism for our bodies.

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It's called Lumen. Lumen is the world's first handheld in

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metabolic coach. It's a device that measures your metabolism through

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00:16:25,679 --> 00:16:28,320
your breath, even if you have bad breath, I think,

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And on the app it lets you know if you're

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00:16:30,399 --> 00:16:33,759
burning fat or carbs and It gives you tailored guidance

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to improve your nutrition, workouts, sleep, and even stress management.

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All you have to do is to breathe into your

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lumen first thing in the morning, and you'll know what's

323
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going on with your metabolism, whether you're burning mostly fats

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or carbs. Then Lumen gives you a personalized nutrition plan

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for that day based on your measurements. You can also

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breathe into it before and after workouts and meals, so

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you know exactly what's going on in your body in

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real time, and Luhman will give you tips to keep

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you on the top of your health game. James, Robin,

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00:17:05,440 --> 00:17:08,160
Peter all use Lumen. I've got mine on order because

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00:17:08,160 --> 00:17:11,039
I certainly need help in the carbs and proteins department.

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00:17:11,519 --> 00:17:15,359
And so we thank Luman for sponsoring this the Ricochet Podcast.

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00:17:16,519 --> 00:17:18,960
Steve Hilton joins us. Now you may know him well

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from Fox News, but you should know him now for

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his brand new book called Cali Failure and Boy. For

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a native of California like me, and for a transplant

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00:17:28,000 --> 00:17:30,000
like Peter. This is a subject near and dear to

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our heart and about which we have lots of thoughts.

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But we want to hear yours. So, Steve Hilton, welcome

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to the Ricochet Podcast.

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Speaker 4: It's fantastic to be with that. I'm so happy we

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could do this.

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Speaker 1: It's great.

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Speaker 4: I don't know what you know. I feel terrible, Peter,

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you know, it's so why haven't I done this before?

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Speaker 1: It's exactly exactly, and we see each other quite often.

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Actually we only live a few miles apart. We should

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simply start recording our own conversations. Oh, Steve, let me

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ask you the large question. Yeah, I'll give you the

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large questions. A touch of biography here so you can

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see why I really care about this question.

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Speaker 3: So.

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Speaker 1: I grew up in the Northeast. I had relations who

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had moved to California and written at the end of

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the nineteenth century, as it happens, and in the family

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collection we have letters that they wrote back to the

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men who are still farming northeastern Pennsylvania, and they said,

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come to California. You don't go through another winter again

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with just they were describing paradise. I worked for Ronald

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Reagan in the White House. Reagan his old California hands

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ed Meese Linnofziger. They spoke about California as if it

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were paradise. They really loved it. It meant everything to them.

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Ronald Reagan himself used to say that if the Pilgrims

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had landed in California instead of back east, nobody would

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ever have bothered to discover the rest of the country.

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The state was that beautiful, It was that much of

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a paradise to ordinary working people, which, by the way,

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the families of Ed Mees and lindov Sigger and Ronald

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Reagan were when they went to California. What went wrong?

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How could you take a state so blessed with talent

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and beauty and natural resources? What went wrong? Well?

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Speaker 4: I first want to underline how much I agree with

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all those sentiments, and I'd add or add to it.

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It's not just the physical beauty, their magnificence of our

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landscapes and the diversity of them, and the weather and

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all those things. There's also something magical and inspirational about

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the idea of California, the ideal of what California represents.

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And to me, there's a spiritual, emotional, intellectual dimension to it.

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It's not just it's the most amazing place to live

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in that sense, or should be. It's that it represents

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the best of what I think of as America. And

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there's a line, right, I think it's actually the first

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line in the but I can't recall now, But which

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is this? I I feel very strongly about this. California

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means to America, what America means to the world. And

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what I mean by that is that I had this

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love for California even before we moved here, and it

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represented to me the best of what I thought of

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as America. And we can throw around words, but I

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think we all kind of have a feeling for, you know,

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innovation and energy and optimism and ambition and swagger and

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start up hustle and this sense of anything is possible,

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and also another dimension which is less referred to, but

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I feel it very strongly, and it very much connects

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to where things have gone wrong, the rebel spirit. That's

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why we've got so many people creating in this incredible industry.

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You know that's Hollywood, you know, centur Aco or Silicon

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Valley and so on. Inventions and just the rebels and

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the builders and the dreamers and the creat that's what

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it's all about. And I felt that very strongly. I'll

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just tell a very quick story, which is that back

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in the day when I was working for David Cameron

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before he was Prime Minister, there was a story, a

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cover story in the Spectator magazine and which of the

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print edition.

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Speaker 1: I remember.

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Speaker 4: I know people in America read the Spectator online, but

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it's I think it's the oldest political magazine in the

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world printed. And the cover story, the headline was California

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Dreaming and the theme of the article was Steve Hilton,

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David Cameron's policy guru, as he's developing the ideas that

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will drive the Cameron administration, is inspired by the notion

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of making the UK more like California. And that was

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I mean, you know, twenty years ago. Yes, that seemed

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like a good idea at the time, and now as

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we all we love thing because there's not a single

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policy advisor to a single political leader anywhere in the

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world that would want to make their country more like California,

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which just tells you how far and fast we've fallen.

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And we could go through the details, but the real

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answer to your question, I think I'll just very quickly,

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you know, get to that, which is the combination. The

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headline is why it's all gone so wrong in California

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is the combination of one party rule and really bad ideas,

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and that's what we've had. The one party rule has

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been achieved over the last couple of decades with a

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couple of that's mechanical and structural things. The building up

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of the government unions is a dominant funding block for

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Democrat politicians. This seriously hard to beat Democrat machine has

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emerged funded primarily by government unions. And I mean the

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other aspect of that, there's very important of the lawyer,

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the trial lawyers. Then there's a real issue there, but

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there's really the government unions that control them. So you've

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got this big machine that wins elections because they've just

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got a lot of money and activism and union members

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that go out and phone bank and work and all

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the rest of it. Secondly, very important and not discussed enough,

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is because of the fact that the policies that have

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caused this decline, that have given us these absolutely catastrophic

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outcomes in California, the highest poverty rate in the country

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for most of last year, the highest unemployment rate. Imagine that,

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the highest rate of unemployment of all fifty states. Right

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now in number two. You know that great progress the

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highest cost for every essential housing, gas, electricity, water, the

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worst business climate in America ten years in a row.

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So it's spectacularly bad outcomes. And the thing that's not

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discussed enough is that a lot of that, a lot

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of the policy that has led to that, which I'm

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sure we'll discuss, emanates from the legislature. And so what

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you've had is is a legislature that since twenty twelve

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has had a supermajority for Demo over two thirds majority,

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which means that they can pass whatever they want with

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no Republican input, no real constraint, and they've had no

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constraint from the governor because you've you had a governor

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that just simply hasn't pushed back on that. Jerry Brown

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a little bit did. That's why the decline has accelerated

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so much under Gavin Newson, because he really hasn't pushed

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back against what's coming out of the legislature at all.

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Speaker 1: Too busy with podcast.

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Speaker 4: Well exactly, and then you've got so why, But the

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supermajority is very important. It is not a legitimate supermajority,

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is the direct result of jerry mandering. Is very important.

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Everyone understands this California is a much more republican state

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than people think. People look at the supermajority and the

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way people talk about it outside of California. Oh, it's

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so deep blue. Caln never be Republican again. Well, actually,

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if you look at the average share of the vote

468
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in statewide elections since the last time Republicans won, which

469
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was twenty two thousand and six Arnold Schwarzenegger's reelection, the

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average share of the vote for Republican candidates is forty

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one point seven percent. So that's not fifty, but it's

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not twenty either. But twenty percent is the number that

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for many years was the representation of Republicans in the

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state legislature. Because in two thousand and eight, voters passed

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a ballot initiative on independent inverticomas redistricting. That was the

476
00:25:19,920 --> 00:25:22,519
process was hijacked by Democrats. They're very good at that,

477
00:25:23,000 --> 00:25:26,519
and they completely distorted the intent of that ballot initiative.

478
00:25:26,759 --> 00:25:29,440
The superficially, yes, it was an independent commission with equal

479
00:25:29,720 --> 00:25:33,400
numbers of Democrats and Republicans. But now for this book,

480
00:25:33,400 --> 00:25:35,920
I spoke to people involved in that process. The maps

481
00:25:35,960 --> 00:25:40,240
were drawn up by government union members. The staff of

482
00:25:40,279 --> 00:25:43,240
the audit Department and whatever in Sacramento, and then they

483
00:25:43,279 --> 00:25:46,519
inserted all these criteria. One notorious one that they inserted.

484
00:25:46,680 --> 00:25:49,839
The original tent of the ballot initiative was to have

485
00:25:50,000 --> 00:25:54,680
districts formed around existing city county boundaries and so on.

486
00:25:54,839 --> 00:25:58,720
They added a new thing called communities of interest, which

487
00:25:58,839 --> 00:26:01,839
enabled them to in the English phrase, driver coach and

488
00:26:01,839 --> 00:26:05,039
horses through it. So you end up with this jerrymanned legislature.

489
00:26:05,079 --> 00:26:08,240
Instead of forty percent representation in the legislature, which is

490
00:26:08,279 --> 00:26:12,640
what roughly speaking, Republican support would would entail, it's not

491
00:26:12,759 --> 00:26:15,759
thirty five, thirty twenty percent right now, it's up by

492
00:26:15,799 --> 00:26:20,240
a little bit. So the supermajority pushes through whatever it wants.

493
00:26:20,359 --> 00:26:22,599
And then you combine it with the bad ideas, which

494
00:26:22,640 --> 00:26:25,599
is this ideology that has just gone has been let

495
00:26:25,839 --> 00:26:28,920
run rampant. And that's really what I try and define

496
00:26:28,960 --> 00:26:31,200
in the first chapters of the book. What does it

497
00:26:31,240 --> 00:26:33,839
mean when the phrase that I use is that California

498
00:26:33,880 --> 00:26:36,720
really has been treated like the Wuhan lab of far

499
00:26:36,799 --> 00:26:40,160
left extremism. They've been cooking up this.

500
00:26:40,160 --> 00:26:42,200
Speaker 1: Experiment the same results too.

501
00:26:42,359 --> 00:26:45,119
Speaker 4: Yes, right, And so what I've tried to do in

502
00:26:45,160 --> 00:26:48,480
the book is unpack what that is, because it's not

503
00:26:48,640 --> 00:26:51,440
enough just to say, oh, it's democrats. California is bad

504
00:26:51,440 --> 00:26:53,599
because we had democrat put it's worse than that. The

505
00:26:53,680 --> 00:26:57,000
outcomes are worse than anywhere else in America. So what

506
00:26:57,279 --> 00:27:00,400
really has been driving it? And so the the main

507
00:27:00,440 --> 00:27:03,960
trust of the book, the first part is to understand

508
00:27:04,039 --> 00:27:08,799
this ideology, this new leftism that has had these calamitous results.

509
00:27:09,200 --> 00:27:11,200
Speaker 1: So Steve, I'm going to turn you over to Steve

510
00:27:11,240 --> 00:27:14,720
Hayward in just a moment to discuss the ideology and

511
00:27:15,200 --> 00:27:18,799
the policy. But first it occurs to me that there

512
00:27:18,799 --> 00:27:22,440
are people hearing you for the very first time who

513
00:27:22,480 --> 00:27:25,200
want to know why am I listening to a man

514
00:27:25,359 --> 00:27:27,759
who's written a book on California who has a British access.

515
00:27:27,839 --> 00:27:30,160
So I mean, your story is in all kinds of

516
00:27:30,200 --> 00:27:33,000
ways of California story in the sense that, like me,

517
00:27:33,400 --> 00:27:35,839
you're an immigrant. But briefly so that we can get

518
00:27:35,880 --> 00:27:37,519
to Steve and get back to the book, but briefly

519
00:27:37,599 --> 00:27:40,200
you'd better explain to you start in Hungary and get

520
00:27:40,200 --> 00:27:43,640
yourself here, get your family here, what was doing exactly?

521
00:27:43,680 --> 00:27:46,039
Speaker 4: By the way, very beautiful moment, I had two lovely

522
00:27:46,119 --> 00:27:49,759
Hungarian moments. Why Hungry because my parents are Hungarian, both

523
00:27:49,839 --> 00:27:53,920
my parents, my stepfather is Hungarian. Everyone's Hungarian, the whole family.

524
00:27:54,119 --> 00:27:56,079
Most of my family still lives in Hungary.

525
00:27:57,279 --> 00:27:59,079
Speaker 1: Finally they live Hungary for what reason?

526
00:27:59,559 --> 00:28:05,319
Speaker 4: Well, my father and step My father was a sportsman

527
00:28:05,319 --> 00:28:07,519
in Hungary, pretty well known. He was the goalie for

528
00:28:07,519 --> 00:28:10,920
the national ice hockey team, played in the Olympics, pretty

529
00:28:10,920 --> 00:28:16,279
well known anti communists, got targeted by the regime, defected,

530
00:28:16,319 --> 00:28:18,240
I think that's the right way. He was playing in

531
00:28:18,240 --> 00:28:20,880
Berlin and actually went to the British embassy and ended

532
00:28:20,920 --> 00:28:26,119
up in Australia. My mother came in a less dramatic fashion.

533
00:28:27,160 --> 00:28:31,440
She was able to get to London for an English

534
00:28:31,559 --> 00:28:34,359
or something with English, learning English or studying something like that.

535
00:28:34,559 --> 00:28:38,880
Met my father actually working at Heathrow Airport in the

536
00:28:39,000 --> 00:28:42,920
restaurant there, the cafe. That's where they met in the

537
00:28:42,960 --> 00:28:46,359
early sixties. But my stepfather has the most interesting story.

538
00:28:46,400 --> 00:28:50,240
He actually really did. He was from a small village

539
00:28:50,319 --> 00:28:52,839
in the western side of Hungary, and he tells the

540
00:28:52,839 --> 00:28:55,680
story about how they when the Russians, when the Soviets

541
00:28:55,720 --> 00:29:02,000
came and crushed the revolution in nineteen fifty six, they

542
00:29:02,039 --> 00:29:04,160
heard on the radio the Russians are coming. The Russians

543
00:29:04,160 --> 00:29:05,880
are coming, and they said, okay, so we're going, and

544
00:29:05,880 --> 00:29:09,000
they literally ran. He and his brother and some friends

545
00:29:09,039 --> 00:29:11,799
they ran for the border with Austria. They climbed barb

546
00:29:11,839 --> 00:29:14,519
by fences. Half of them were killed in the attempt.

547
00:29:14,680 --> 00:29:16,839
Ended up in a refugee camp in Austria, and thence

548
00:29:16,880 --> 00:29:19,920
to England, where I was born, So that's the Hungary part.

549
00:29:20,240 --> 00:29:23,759
We moved here in my family and I twenty twelve.

550
00:29:25,279 --> 00:29:28,680
My wife who you know very well, Peter Rachel. She

551
00:29:28,759 --> 00:29:32,359
and she was then working for Google, had a big

552
00:29:32,400 --> 00:29:36,680
job at Google, running global communications and public policy for Google.

553
00:29:36,759 --> 00:29:39,000
I was working in ten Downing Street, a senior advisor

554
00:29:39,039 --> 00:29:41,920
to David Cameron, he's the Prime Minister at the time.

555
00:29:42,039 --> 00:29:45,440
And it was really the when our second son was born.

556
00:29:45,880 --> 00:29:48,839
It was just very you know, the traveling for Rachel

557
00:29:48,880 --> 00:29:51,319
back and forth California, the time difference. So we just

558
00:29:51,359 --> 00:29:55,799
decided to move and we really didn't have an intent

559
00:29:56,000 --> 00:29:58,480
of staying. Well, we didn't really think long term about it.

560
00:29:58,519 --> 00:30:00,599
We just thought, let's see how it goes. But there

561
00:30:00,640 --> 00:30:04,400
was a very, really, really moment I remember very clearly,

562
00:30:04,400 --> 00:30:06,200
which is four years in. We'd been living in the

563
00:30:06,200 --> 00:30:09,000
Bay Area to be close to Google. I was teaching

564
00:30:09,000 --> 00:30:10,799
at Stamford. That's the first thing I did, and then

565
00:30:10,799 --> 00:30:13,960
I did a tech startup and whatever. But twenty sixteen

566
00:30:14,680 --> 00:30:16,799
I went back to the UK to campaign in the

567
00:30:16,839 --> 00:30:19,519
Brexit referendum, which I felt very strongly about it. I'd

568
00:30:19,519 --> 00:30:22,599
always been especially since working in ten Downing Street and

569
00:30:22,599 --> 00:30:25,720
seeing the impact of the EU. I was very in

570
00:30:25,759 --> 00:30:28,319
favor of leaving and back there for a couple of

571
00:30:28,359 --> 00:30:30,680
weeks doing that, and I remember really clearly landing in

572
00:30:31,000 --> 00:30:35,039
at San Francisco Airport straight after the referendum and we

573
00:30:35,039 --> 00:30:37,519
were just taxing to the term. I really remember this,

574
00:30:37,640 --> 00:30:40,240
just looking out at the hills and I just thought

575
00:30:40,559 --> 00:30:43,519
to myself, Oh, it's so nice to be home. And

576
00:30:43,559 --> 00:30:49,319
then I thought, oh, that's interesting home. And really that's

577
00:30:49,359 --> 00:30:53,480
the moment when I realized and actually really de facto

578
00:30:53,680 --> 00:30:55,839
is all, you know, we really had no intention of

579
00:30:56,240 --> 00:30:59,319
moving but moving back to England. But it really is

580
00:30:59,400 --> 00:31:02,559
home in the deepest sense, not just literally where I'm

581
00:31:02,640 --> 00:31:06,200
raising our family with my wife and establishing our life here.

582
00:31:06,200 --> 00:31:09,039
We've now been here thirteen years, but just spiritually I

583
00:31:09,160 --> 00:31:11,160
used that word a lot. I just feel so connected

584
00:31:11,599 --> 00:31:14,279
to California. I feel at home here in a way

585
00:31:14,319 --> 00:31:18,079
I never have anywhere else. And then just to bring

586
00:31:18,079 --> 00:31:20,559
everyone up to date, yes I still have the accent,

587
00:31:20,599 --> 00:31:22,720
but I am an American now. I want to reassure

588
00:31:22,799 --> 00:31:26,720
listen views. I became a citizen in twenty twenty one.

589
00:31:27,279 --> 00:31:31,079
Very proud American, but a proud Californian as well. You

590
00:31:31,079 --> 00:31:33,920
know this is there's nowhere better than California, and we've

591
00:31:33,960 --> 00:31:38,640
just got to stop this disastrous ruining of it, which

592
00:31:38,720 --> 00:31:41,960
is effecting us here but the whole country because California

593
00:31:42,000 --> 00:31:43,279
means so much to the country.

594
00:31:43,920 --> 00:31:45,559
Speaker 2: Yeah, in spite of it all, you can say that

595
00:31:45,759 --> 00:31:47,960
I'm glad to hear that I'm a native Californian. But

596
00:31:47,960 --> 00:31:53,200
there's actually a deeper personal parallel. My British grandfather, who

597
00:31:53,279 --> 00:31:55,240
struck out from London as a young man to the

598
00:31:55,240 --> 00:31:57,559
some of the far eastern colonies, somehow made his way

599
00:31:57,599 --> 00:32:03,000
to Los Angeles in nineteen ten and never left. You know,

600
00:32:03,039 --> 00:32:05,920
he bought a little house and watched the Hollywood sign

601
00:32:06,039 --> 00:32:07,839
go up in whenever that went up in the thirties,

602
00:32:07,880 --> 00:32:10,680
whenever it was right, sort of seen it all, and

603
00:32:10,720 --> 00:32:13,400
you know, I grew up, you know, came of age

604
00:32:13,400 --> 00:32:16,319
in the sixties and seventies, back on that era. Maybe

605
00:32:16,359 --> 00:32:18,200
I don't know if you know the famous article worth

606
00:32:18,200 --> 00:32:21,880
finding James Q. Wilson from nineteen sixty seven in commentary

607
00:32:21,960 --> 00:32:24,640
on a guide to Reagan Country, and he said, you know,

608
00:32:24,720 --> 00:32:27,799
Long Beach is Iowa by the sea, and I can

609
00:32:27,880 --> 00:32:29,519
go on a long time about the importance of the

610
00:32:29,559 --> 00:32:32,640
aerospace industry, and it's declined at the end of the

611
00:32:32,640 --> 00:32:35,640
Cold War for being one important factor. And how we

612
00:32:35,680 --> 00:32:38,839
got to this point that I think is an important part.

613
00:32:39,319 --> 00:32:41,920
But you're onto the more important enduring parts, which is

614
00:32:41,920 --> 00:32:45,759
one party rule, bad ideas, unions and all the rest

615
00:32:45,759 --> 00:32:49,240
of that. You just said something there at the end,

616
00:32:49,599 --> 00:32:53,640
which is California is important to the country. Here's an

617
00:32:53,680 --> 00:32:56,599
odd thesis for you. California is what has brought the

618
00:32:56,640 --> 00:33:00,480
Democratic Party nationally to its lowest public approval ratings in

619
00:33:00,480 --> 00:33:02,440
its history of the history of polling right. And the

620
00:33:02,440 --> 00:33:05,640
reason I say that is California has always been the future.

621
00:33:06,160 --> 00:33:08,119
We always used to like to say that when California

622
00:33:08,160 --> 00:33:11,079
was conservative or at least voted for conservative ballot measures

623
00:33:11,119 --> 00:33:15,279
and elected conservative governors. And I think Democrats looked up

624
00:33:15,400 --> 00:33:18,119
at some point in the last twenty years. Remember, Democrats

625
00:33:18,160 --> 00:33:22,920
were anti illegal immigration until very recently, even Obama made

626
00:33:23,519 --> 00:33:26,319
tough statements about immigration, right. I think they looked up

627
00:33:26,400 --> 00:33:29,960
and they made a simple conclusion that was wrong. It was, Oh,

628
00:33:30,240 --> 00:33:32,720
California flipped from being, you know, a red state to

629
00:33:32,759 --> 00:33:35,359
a blue state really fast because of immigration.

630
00:33:35,839 --> 00:33:37,200
Speaker 1: Let's do that everywhere.

631
00:33:37,400 --> 00:33:39,480
Speaker 2: And they said, we're going to flip Texas the same way,

632
00:33:39,519 --> 00:33:41,359
We're going to flip the whole country the same way.

633
00:33:41,880 --> 00:33:43,720
And it turns out that not only was that an

634
00:33:43,799 --> 00:33:47,359
unpopular policy, turns out a lot of those population groups

635
00:33:47,400 --> 00:33:51,279
that immigrated don't like it either. And we've seen this shift, right,

636
00:33:51,359 --> 00:33:53,880
And so I think that, you know, in an odd way,

637
00:33:54,000 --> 00:33:56,880
the fetish for California among liberals, it's what explains a

638
00:33:56,920 --> 00:33:59,079
lot of their current travel.

639
00:33:59,200 --> 00:34:01,160
Speaker 4: I mean, that's why I use the analogy of the

640
00:34:01,599 --> 00:34:06,720
Wuhan lab and the virus, because it has infected the

641
00:34:06,759 --> 00:34:08,559
rest of the country, and so many of the bad

642
00:34:08,599 --> 00:34:12,000
ideas that have caused being a misery in destruction across

643
00:34:12,000 --> 00:34:14,800
the country really did start here. Whether that's you know

644
00:34:16,000 --> 00:34:20,119
what it's called global the climate legislation in California that

645
00:34:20,119 --> 00:34:22,920
we've been stuck with that. It's been so disastrous for

646
00:34:23,280 --> 00:34:27,320
you know, our economic competitiveness and jobs and people's living standards.

647
00:34:27,920 --> 00:34:31,400
That is the model for the Green New Deal, banning

648
00:34:31,480 --> 00:34:36,840
gas stows, gas cars, all that stuff that all started here.

649
00:34:35,480 --> 00:34:40,280
The race and gender ideology, the extremism there that started here,

650
00:34:40,679 --> 00:34:43,199
the ballot harvest. You know, you know, you can go

651
00:34:43,239 --> 00:34:45,880
through all of these things. Is actually pretty much all

652
00:34:45,920 --> 00:34:50,639
the bad things started here, but from this ideological kind

653
00:34:50,639 --> 00:34:52,559
of mindset. And I think actually it is connected to

654
00:34:52,599 --> 00:34:55,639
the one party all because when you are in that

655
00:34:55,840 --> 00:34:58,360
position of complacency, like you think, well, I'm never going

656
00:34:58,400 --> 00:35:02,079
to be beaten by the other side, and it just

657
00:35:02,159 --> 00:35:05,920
makes you open to take over by the extremists and

658
00:35:05,920 --> 00:35:09,119
the activists because you're not paying attention to your voters

659
00:35:09,119 --> 00:35:12,480
and your constituents. You're only thinking about the party and

660
00:35:12,320 --> 00:35:16,840
and and and and pandering to what they want, and

661
00:35:16,880 --> 00:35:19,079
so it throws up a one party rule like that

662
00:35:19,159 --> 00:35:24,400
throws up I think this an increasingly weak and useless mediocrities,

663
00:35:24,440 --> 00:35:27,000
these machine politicians. You see that now, and what California

664
00:35:27,039 --> 00:35:30,679
is producing on the Democrat sides, people like Newsome and

665
00:35:30,400 --> 00:35:34,280
and and Kamala Harris and Karen Bass, and I want

666
00:35:34,280 --> 00:35:36,320
to give you a really this may sound like a

667
00:35:36,360 --> 00:35:39,280
small example, but I think it's really significant in terms

668
00:35:39,320 --> 00:35:43,800
of why everything is a disaster. Karen Bass, classic California

669
00:35:43,880 --> 00:35:49,280
machine politician. Just the other day I saw her You're

670
00:35:49,360 --> 00:35:54,800
a post on X and it was I think, I'm

671
00:35:54,800 --> 00:35:57,199
getting this almost exactly right. I have just signed an

672
00:35:57,199 --> 00:36:02,280
executive order streamlining pers for rebuilding in Los Angeles. This

673
00:36:02,320 --> 00:36:05,840
is like a week ago. I think, oh, great, okay, fine, good.

674
00:36:06,199 --> 00:36:10,000
I mean four months too late, but I'll take it anyway.

675
00:36:10,039 --> 00:36:12,239
Then I just but the post was above a video

676
00:36:12,320 --> 00:36:16,960
clip from her press conference making the announcement. So on

677
00:36:17,000 --> 00:36:20,199
the principle of you know, do your research, I thought, well,

678
00:36:20,239 --> 00:36:23,800
I'll watch what she actually said. I did watch it.

679
00:36:24,119 --> 00:36:26,920
This is what she actually said. Remember, the post is

680
00:36:27,039 --> 00:36:30,840
I just signed an executive with a streamlining What she

681
00:36:31,000 --> 00:36:35,159
said was, I have just signed an executive order tasking

682
00:36:35,920 --> 00:36:46,239
agency heads with developing paths forward towards streamline. This is it.

683
00:36:46,639 --> 00:36:50,719
This is the problem because you have people, and that's

684
00:36:50,800 --> 00:36:56,840
the attitude and the mindset that is everywhere in California

685
00:36:57,239 --> 00:37:00,519
and explains because the root cause of all of the

686
00:37:00,880 --> 00:37:03,320
you know, when you look at the unemployment, the poverty,

687
00:37:03,400 --> 00:37:06,800
the housing costs, et cetera. So much of that category

688
00:37:07,280 --> 00:37:11,119
of problem, which really are the foundational problems, because housing costs,

689
00:37:11,119 --> 00:37:14,920
for example, are the number one reason people are leaving California.

690
00:37:15,400 --> 00:37:18,559
We lost representation in the Congress for the first time

691
00:37:18,599 --> 00:37:20,679
in our state's history. The projection is we're losing another

692
00:37:20,719 --> 00:37:26,119
three or four seats in twenty thirty. So because nothing

693
00:37:26,280 --> 00:37:29,320
is done, nothing gets done. You can't build anything. You

694
00:37:29,360 --> 00:37:32,440
can't build the water infrastructure. That's why our farming industry

695
00:37:32,519 --> 00:37:36,679
is being crushed. We don't build energy infrastructure. That's why

696
00:37:37,119 --> 00:37:40,480
electricity prices are so high, gas prices, that's why industries

697
00:37:40,559 --> 00:37:42,800
cost go up, and that's why they're leaving. Because you've

698
00:37:42,800 --> 00:37:47,000
got this bureaucratic mindset. You've got people who think that

699
00:37:47,239 --> 00:37:52,800
doing something equals tasking agency heads with developing paths forward

700
00:37:53,079 --> 00:37:55,320
and they sincerely believe that is action.

701
00:37:56,199 --> 00:37:58,639
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean that would have made Sir Humphrey Apple

702
00:37:58,679 --> 00:37:59,920
be very proud here that state.

703
00:38:00,000 --> 00:38:03,119
Speaker 1: And if you know the old reference right, well, let

704
00:38:03,119 --> 00:38:05,360
me uh.

705
00:38:04,679 --> 00:38:07,119
Speaker 2: So I mentioned growing up in the sixties in California

706
00:38:07,119 --> 00:38:09,159
with aerospace. That was my dad's business. But it was

707
00:38:09,199 --> 00:38:14,840
also when liberals built things. Pat Brown built water projects, dams,

708
00:38:14,960 --> 00:38:18,159
lots of schools, and abundant housing was allowed. That was,

709
00:38:18,199 --> 00:38:20,880
by the way, usually below the median price for the

710
00:38:20,960 --> 00:38:21,719
national average.

711
00:38:21,760 --> 00:38:26,519
Speaker 4: It was the most affordable. It's unimaginable today, but California

712
00:38:26,519 --> 00:38:30,840
had the most affordable housing in the country. Exactly the

713
00:38:30,880 --> 00:38:34,480
typical house price in California, the median is this is

714
00:38:34,519 --> 00:38:38,559
the real number. So half of the houses homes in

715
00:38:38,599 --> 00:38:42,440
California are more expensive than this nine hundred and nine thousand. Yeah,

716
00:38:42,519 --> 00:38:44,800
that's unbelievable, it's insane.

717
00:38:45,000 --> 00:38:48,440
Speaker 2: Well, here's a two part question for you, and I

718
00:38:48,440 --> 00:38:51,280
think they go together. I think I know which one

719
00:38:51,320 --> 00:38:53,559
you want to talk most about. I'll do in reverse order.

720
00:38:54,480 --> 00:38:57,719
I'm following great interest these abundance liberals who have come

721
00:38:57,760 --> 00:38:59,880
along like as reclined, and you know, we talked about

722
00:38:59,880 --> 00:39:00,960
it on this show last week.

723
00:39:01,000 --> 00:39:02,039
Speaker 1: I wasn't on, but I you.

724
00:39:02,000 --> 00:39:04,400
Speaker 2: Know, and then also, you know, in my time in

725
00:39:04,440 --> 00:39:07,280
the Bay Area, like you, I've become aware to spend

726
00:39:07,360 --> 00:39:10,719
some time with the Yimbi movement to progressives, I said, gosh,

727
00:39:10,719 --> 00:39:13,920
we're over regulated. And what I find in both cases

728
00:39:14,000 --> 00:39:17,119
is well this you may remember this, Peter, the abundance

729
00:39:17,159 --> 00:39:19,920
liberals we have now remind me of the Atari Democrats

730
00:39:19,920 --> 00:39:21,800
of the eighties, you remember them, Peter. They were going

731
00:39:21,840 --> 00:39:24,880
to be the They were struggling to compete with Reagan

732
00:39:24,920 --> 00:39:26,639
and his pro growth policy. So we're going to be

733
00:39:26,679 --> 00:39:29,559
Atari Democrats. And within months Atari moved to the Philippines

734
00:39:29,599 --> 00:39:32,199
and then ceased to exist. So I think the Abundance

735
00:39:32,239 --> 00:39:34,280
Liberals are not going to get very far with their

736
00:39:34,400 --> 00:39:37,239
unions and all the interscripts you know about. But part

737
00:39:37,239 --> 00:39:39,079
two is and you can skip that if you want,

738
00:39:39,079 --> 00:39:41,039
but part two you can't. What do you make of

739
00:39:41,079 --> 00:39:44,320
Gavin Newsome trying to change his tune so radically right.

740
00:39:44,440 --> 00:39:50,559
Speaker 4: I'll put them together. So I'm very so abundance, Yes, agree,

741
00:39:50,800 --> 00:39:54,480
that's what we need. But who caused the scarcity? They

742
00:39:54,519 --> 00:39:57,559
did with their bad ideas and the ideology and the

743
00:39:57,599 --> 00:40:01,280
incompetence and the bureaucratism and all this that I detail

744
00:40:01,320 --> 00:40:03,760
in the book. If you look at the two years

745
00:40:03,760 --> 00:40:09,119
ago started a policy organization focused on California's policy problems

746
00:40:09,159 --> 00:40:12,239
and how we turn them around, called Golden Together, And

747
00:40:12,320 --> 00:40:14,440
if you look at the policy papers that we published,

748
00:40:14,519 --> 00:40:17,400
it basically is the abundance agenda. I mean, we literally

749
00:40:17,440 --> 00:40:20,719
have Our policy paper on energy is called Energy Abundance.

750
00:40:20,920 --> 00:40:23,519
Our policy paper on water is called Water Abundance. So

751
00:40:23,639 --> 00:40:26,920
no argument that we need that. Then you look at Gavin.

752
00:40:26,960 --> 00:40:29,400
I'm going to bring in Gavin Newsom so on this

753
00:40:29,480 --> 00:40:33,840
kind of fake rebranding tour in this podcast announ where

754
00:40:33,840 --> 00:40:35,800
he had Ezra Client on his podcast to talk about

755
00:40:35,800 --> 00:40:39,880
a bundle, and it was just it reminded me of

756
00:40:39,239 --> 00:40:43,199
the time a few years ago. Do you remember when

757
00:40:43,239 --> 00:40:47,599
you had those shocking scenes of the railway theft, the

758
00:40:48,000 --> 00:40:51,800
looting of the railway the trade trains in Los Angeles

759
00:40:52,119 --> 00:40:54,119
and we had that do you remember that and packages

760
00:40:54,159 --> 00:40:55,199
all over the railway lines.

761
00:40:55,320 --> 00:40:56,280
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, yes, of course.

762
00:40:56,360 --> 00:41:00,880
Speaker 4: And Gavin Newsom goes down there, he's the governor, literally

763
00:41:01,280 --> 00:41:04,480
does oppress availability in front of all this chaos and

764
00:41:04,559 --> 00:41:09,639
mayhem and says, what the hell's going on here? It

765
00:41:09,760 --> 00:41:13,760
looks like a third world country. I would say, yes,

766
00:41:15,039 --> 00:41:16,000
who's in charge?

767
00:41:16,800 --> 00:41:17,199
Speaker 3: You are?

768
00:41:18,800 --> 00:41:21,280
Speaker 4: So it reminded me of that, but this time with

769
00:41:21,400 --> 00:41:23,719
even less excuse because that was three years ago and

770
00:41:23,719 --> 00:41:25,840
he'd only been governor for I know three years. Now

771
00:41:25,880 --> 00:41:27,960
he's been governor for over six years. So he's sitting

772
00:41:28,000 --> 00:41:30,440
there with Ezra Clent and they're talking about abundance, and

773
00:41:31,320 --> 00:41:34,440
in this hilarious he says, yes, terrible the regulation, it's

774
00:41:34,519 --> 00:41:37,159
so bad, it's really terrible. On and on like this,

775
00:41:37,719 --> 00:41:41,119
Gavin Newsom is agreeing, and then at one point he said, yeah,

776
00:41:41,280 --> 00:41:46,480
that's on us, the sort of fake accountability. He's expressing

777
00:41:46,480 --> 00:41:49,599
that it's on us. No, well, who's this nebulous us?

778
00:41:49,639 --> 00:41:53,039
It's not on us, it's on you. You're the governor.

779
00:41:53,199 --> 00:41:53,719
Speaker 1: It's you.

780
00:41:54,400 --> 00:41:56,960
Speaker 4: And so that's what I think about the Gavin us

781
00:41:57,000 --> 00:42:01,639
to think there's this extraordinary detachment of himself from any

782
00:42:01,800 --> 00:42:06,239
kind of agency in these matters. So he says the

783
00:42:06,400 --> 00:42:10,000
party is toxic without any kind of acknowledgment that he

784
00:42:10,159 --> 00:42:15,079
drove a huge proportion of the agenda that made them toxic.

785
00:42:15,400 --> 00:42:21,119
He said on another podcast, we've become too judgmental, without

786
00:42:21,159 --> 00:42:25,199
actually acknowledging that he's the one that constantly smeared people

787
00:42:25,440 --> 00:42:27,960
who I mean, do you remember when he talked about

788
00:42:28,360 --> 00:42:34,079
people who didn't take the vaccine, didn't comply with vaccine mandates.

789
00:42:34,079 --> 00:42:38,079
It's like drunk driving, do you like killing people? Totally

790
00:42:38,800 --> 00:42:43,320
disgraceful smear right, And he's now saying we're too judgmental.

791
00:42:43,559 --> 00:42:46,199
I mean, it's just unbelievable and so and then of

792
00:42:46,199 --> 00:42:49,440
course the obvious and hilarious if it wasn't so terrible.

793
00:42:49,440 --> 00:42:52,559
One about agreeing with Charlie Kirk that the biological men

794
00:42:52,559 --> 00:42:55,119
and girl sports is deeply unfair and then doing absolutely

795
00:42:55,119 --> 00:42:56,920
nothing about it. Even in the week where you have

796
00:42:56,960 --> 00:43:01,639
two Republican state legislators bringing forward legislation in Sacramento to

797
00:43:02,400 --> 00:43:05,199
you would to deliver what Gavin Newsom just told us

798
00:43:05,280 --> 00:43:05,960
he agreed with.

799
00:43:07,960 --> 00:43:12,039
Speaker 1: Steve the future. It looks hopeless to me. And here's why.

800
00:43:12,679 --> 00:43:16,480
Super majority Democrats holding a supermajority in the legislature for

801
00:43:16,519 --> 00:43:21,480
more than a decade now Republicans the middle class leaving

802
00:43:21,519 --> 00:43:24,000
the state, fleeing the state. It has benefited some states.

803
00:43:24,000 --> 00:43:27,360
The state of Idaho has moved into the firmly into

804
00:43:27,360 --> 00:43:29,760
the Republican column. I have a friend who's in the

805
00:43:29,760 --> 00:43:32,280
state government in Idaho, and he said, it's really very simple.

806
00:43:32,920 --> 00:43:35,280
All the bad Californians moved to Colorado, and all the

807
00:43:35,280 --> 00:43:38,880
good Californians moved here to Idaho. Well, good and bad,

808
00:43:39,079 --> 00:43:46,280
they're not here anymore. You've got the unions running raising

809
00:43:46,440 --> 00:43:49,400
the union which you just described that is now enshrined

810
00:43:49,519 --> 00:43:55,239
in law and longstanding political practice. Here we have a

811
00:43:55,280 --> 00:43:59,000
Democrat demographic shift. Steve was talking about this that the

812
00:43:59,039 --> 00:44:02,679
Democrats found it so appealing that the large influx of

813
00:44:02,840 --> 00:44:06,599
Hispanics tend to vote Democratic that they tried to replicate

814
00:44:06,599 --> 00:44:11,360
that on a national level. That's a separate problem. Okay,

815
00:44:11,440 --> 00:44:17,199
it all looks pretty hopeless to me, and yet Steve

816
00:44:18,000 --> 00:44:21,599
has titled the second half of his book, Cali Future,

817
00:44:22,280 --> 00:44:25,239
What can we do well?

818
00:44:25,519 --> 00:44:29,679
Speaker 4: The Cali Future is the policy plan turning things around,

819
00:44:29,960 --> 00:44:35,119
replacing this ideological extremism with positive, practical solutions that address

820
00:44:35,159 --> 00:44:36,920
all the things and more that we've been talking about.

821
00:44:37,079 --> 00:44:39,480
People can read that in the book. I am very

822
00:44:39,480 --> 00:44:42,039
proud of it. I think it's a really serious, comprehensive

823
00:44:42,039 --> 00:44:46,119
plan that, if delivered, would restore California to the glory

824
00:44:46,159 --> 00:44:48,840
that we all understand and that basic idea of the

825
00:44:48,880 --> 00:44:52,280
California dream, which is not complicated. It is a good

826
00:44:52,360 --> 00:44:55,440
job that pays enough to raise your family in a

827
00:44:55,480 --> 00:44:57,960
home of your own, in a safe neighborhood with a

828
00:44:58,000 --> 00:44:59,960
good school, so your kids have a better life than you.

829
00:45:00,360 --> 00:45:02,800
That's it, and we can get back to that with

830
00:45:03,159 --> 00:45:06,400
sensible policies, but they won't be implemented if we don't

831
00:45:06,440 --> 00:45:09,519
win elections and achieve power. So that's what you're really

832
00:45:09,599 --> 00:45:12,719
driving out. Let's address that I think that it is.

833
00:45:13,199 --> 00:45:14,960
First of all, let me just say very clearly, I

834
00:45:14,960 --> 00:45:17,239
think twenty twenty six, the next round of elections here

835
00:45:17,239 --> 00:45:20,519
in California, is our best shot at winning power in

836
00:45:20,519 --> 00:45:24,639
California for at least twenty years, without question. And here

837
00:45:24,719 --> 00:45:27,639
are the ingredients. I'm not saying it's easy or inevitable.

838
00:45:27,719 --> 00:45:30,519
It's going to be very difficult for the reasons we've discussed,

839
00:45:30,599 --> 00:45:33,480
but it is not completely impossible, and it seems to

840
00:45:33,519 --> 00:45:36,880
me it's looking more likely with time, not less. So

841
00:45:36,920 --> 00:45:40,239
if you look at the ingredients, first of all, the

842
00:45:40,320 --> 00:45:44,199
baseline is higher than most people think. It's not twenty percent,

843
00:45:44,280 --> 00:45:47,639
it's call it forty percent. That's already the gap is

844
00:45:47,719 --> 00:45:51,800
less than people think. Secondly, the gap is growing less

845
00:45:51,840 --> 00:45:55,000
all the time. In twenty in the last election, you

846
00:45:55,079 --> 00:45:59,480
saw really interesting signs of progress for Republicans. Ten counties

847
00:45:59,480 --> 00:46:02,960
flipped from blue to red, including but you know, Fresno County,

848
00:46:02,960 --> 00:46:09,000
the fifth biggest city. You saw ballot initiatives. Just to

849
00:46:09,079 --> 00:46:13,280
be partisan about it, Republicans won on all the key

850
00:46:13,760 --> 00:46:17,239
policy based ballot initiatives. So the big one that a

851
00:46:17,280 --> 00:46:20,199
lot of people paid attention to Proposition thirty six, which

852
00:46:20,280 --> 00:46:23,199
reversed the worst successes of Prop forty seven, the legalized

853
00:46:23,199 --> 00:46:25,519
crime up to legalized theft up at nine hundred and

854
00:46:25,559 --> 00:46:27,920
fifty dollars a day. Carmla Harris won Prop thirty six,

855
00:46:27,960 --> 00:46:32,360
which didn't completely reverse that, but did some good work

856
00:46:32,400 --> 00:46:35,519
on it past seventy percent, including in every county, a

857
00:46:35,559 --> 00:46:38,920
majority in every county. George Gascon defeated in LA. The

858
00:46:38,960 --> 00:46:41,800
mayor and da in Oakland and Alameda County defeated. Mayor

859
00:46:41,800 --> 00:46:44,639
of San Francisco defeated, and so on. You saw signs

860
00:46:44,679 --> 00:46:48,760
of progress elsewhere locally. So Huntington Beach is really interesting story.

861
00:46:49,039 --> 00:46:53,360
Huntington Beach not a huge city in Norwich County. It's

862
00:46:53,400 --> 00:46:55,679
like number thirty I think in the league table in California,

863
00:46:55,719 --> 00:46:59,320
but iconic surf city USA. So just over four years ago,

864
00:46:59,360 --> 00:47:02,280
the council in Huntington Beach was six to one Democrat

865
00:47:02,440 --> 00:47:05,800
Republican six to one. A friend of mine, Tony Strickland,

866
00:47:05,840 --> 00:47:08,679
put together a slate of candidates in twenty twenty two

867
00:47:08,920 --> 00:47:11,079
they called themselves the Fab four. They ran on a

868
00:47:11,199 --> 00:47:15,400
very very strong conservative common sense message, very trumpy, you

869
00:47:15,400 --> 00:47:18,960
could use that term. And they won control four to three.

870
00:47:19,159 --> 00:47:19,480
Speaker 1: Wow.

871
00:47:19,559 --> 00:47:23,920
Speaker 4: And they went ahead and implemented a very direct and

872
00:47:24,239 --> 00:47:26,400
they did what they said they would do. They cleaned

873
00:47:26,800 --> 00:47:32,320
homeless encampments, They prosecuted low level crimes, they addressed the

874
00:47:32,360 --> 00:47:34,280
books in the library that parents were concerned about, They

875
00:47:34,320 --> 00:47:36,800
introduced about initiative for voter ID, etcetera. They did the

876
00:47:36,840 --> 00:47:39,159
things they said they would do. Just now, in November,

877
00:47:39,400 --> 00:47:43,199
they ran a bigger slates seven can. They called themselves

878
00:47:43,400 --> 00:47:47,599
the Magnificent seven. So for those who say won't win

879
00:47:47,760 --> 00:47:50,039
in California's room, but you have to detach yourself from

880
00:47:50,079 --> 00:47:53,880
President Trump, these guys literally called themselves the Magnificent seven,

881
00:47:54,039 --> 00:47:57,320
they won seven zero. So you've now got a clean suite.

882
00:47:57,840 --> 00:48:05,119
And just this week Huntington Beach rated by by wallet

883
00:48:05,119 --> 00:48:09,280
dot com or whatever best run city in California. So

884
00:48:09,639 --> 00:48:14,159
you've got a combination of political energy policy results being

885
00:48:14,159 --> 00:48:16,920
delivered and a city that was that's gone from six

886
00:48:17,039 --> 00:48:20,159
to one Democrat to seven zero Republican in four years.

887
00:48:20,320 --> 00:48:22,719
So these are ingredients. Then you look at the Latino

888
00:48:22,800 --> 00:48:25,280
vote exactly as you said, there's the largest group in

889
00:48:25,320 --> 00:48:30,239
California were now forty Latino thirty five percent White, fifteen

890
00:48:30,280 --> 00:48:34,239
percent Asian, five percent Black, five percent other. It's not

891
00:48:34,320 --> 00:48:36,800
true that Latino is a Democrat. It's more true that

892
00:48:36,800 --> 00:48:40,599
they're just disengaged and so don't know. I mean, if

893
00:48:40,639 --> 00:48:44,000
you just think about the lot of it, and in California,

894
00:48:44,440 --> 00:48:49,840
particularly hammered by these policies, especially the climate extremism that

895
00:48:50,320 --> 00:48:52,760
dries up the cost of everything. You know, telling people

896
00:48:52,760 --> 00:48:55,320
you can't have a single family home when that's your dream,

897
00:48:55,519 --> 00:48:57,840
you have to live in some apartment like we're North Korea.

898
00:48:58,639 --> 00:49:01,039
You can't have that truck that you been aspiring to

899
00:49:01,119 --> 00:49:03,000
because you've got to have some electric thing that you

900
00:49:03,079 --> 00:49:05,480
hate and doesn't make sense for your job. All of

901
00:49:05,519 --> 00:49:09,960
these things really really coret messages that can bring into

902
00:49:10,039 --> 00:49:13,840
the Republican fold working class Latinos. And that is the

903
00:49:13,880 --> 00:49:16,440
opportunity I think. And there's one more aspect to this.

904
00:49:16,559 --> 00:49:19,199
I think it's important for people to understand because sometimes

905
00:49:19,199 --> 00:49:21,639
you look at the percentage totals and you think, well,

906
00:49:21,639 --> 00:49:23,880
that's an insurmountable gap. But you know, even if you know,

907
00:49:23,920 --> 00:49:27,199
we're looking at it more positively, it's forty percent Republican

908
00:49:27,280 --> 00:49:30,119
sixty percent Democrat. That the gap is less than some

909
00:49:30,159 --> 00:49:31,960
people might assume, but it's still a very big gap.

910
00:49:32,280 --> 00:49:34,840
Big swing would be needed. But here's another way of

911
00:49:34,880 --> 00:49:37,119
looking at it that's particularly struck me after the twenty

912
00:49:37,159 --> 00:49:41,920
twenty four election in California, which is the number of votes,

913
00:49:42,239 --> 00:49:45,639
the total number of votes that you would need to win.

914
00:49:46,039 --> 00:49:50,079
So twenty twenty six is a midterm election, and midterm

915
00:49:50,119 --> 00:49:54,280
elections have a lower turnout, and political people tend to,

916
00:49:54,519 --> 00:49:57,400
when they're projecting what the turnout would be, take the

917
00:49:57,440 --> 00:50:00,119
average of the last two and if you do that,

918
00:50:00,360 --> 00:50:03,639
the number you get for a reasonable assumption of how

919
00:50:03,679 --> 00:50:06,519
many votes will be cast in California in twenty twenty

920
00:50:06,519 --> 00:50:09,840
six is eleven point seven million. That's the number. So

921
00:50:09,920 --> 00:50:13,639
to win with fifty plus a little bit percent, five

922
00:50:13,719 --> 00:50:16,599
point nine million votes, that's your target to win five

923
00:50:16,639 --> 00:50:19,920
point nine million in California in twenty twenty six. In

924
00:50:19,960 --> 00:50:23,440
the presidential election just now, without even campaigning in California,

925
00:50:23,480 --> 00:50:26,599
not really doing anything, not spending any money, President Trump

926
00:50:26,920 --> 00:50:30,679
got six point one million votes in California. And so

927
00:50:31,320 --> 00:50:35,440
when people say there are no they're not enough Republican

928
00:50:35,519 --> 00:50:38,280
votes in California. You've got to convert all these Democrats.

929
00:50:38,320 --> 00:50:40,280
How are you going to do that? All these independent

930
00:50:40,320 --> 00:50:42,800
how are you going to convert them? There are enough

931
00:50:42,880 --> 00:50:47,039
Republican voters in California. To put it in a simple way,

932
00:50:47,079 --> 00:50:52,039
if every person who voted for Donald Trump in California

933
00:50:52,039 --> 00:50:55,920
in twenty twenty four votes for the Republican candidate for

934
00:50:55,960 --> 00:51:00,599
governor in twenty twenty six, that Republican governor candidate will win. Now,

935
00:51:00,639 --> 00:51:03,519
of course that is a big if because it's hard

936
00:51:03,599 --> 00:51:06,800
to get presidential level turnout in an off year. But

937
00:51:06,920 --> 00:51:10,599
that's a solvable problem. That's something you can do with

938
00:51:10,679 --> 00:51:14,400
a good campaign. You can and actually Republicans and in

939
00:51:14,480 --> 00:51:19,159
twenty twenty four really accelerated ahead of Democrats in their

940
00:51:19,199 --> 00:51:22,679
ability to turn out votes and the whole delivery of those.

941
00:51:23,119 --> 00:51:25,960
You know, the swing state suite for President Trump was

942
00:51:26,000 --> 00:51:29,519
based on really good work turning out, registering and turning

943
00:51:29,519 --> 00:51:33,400
out voters, especially what they call low propensity voters, voters

944
00:51:33,400 --> 00:51:37,199
who tend not to vote. Latino voters come into that

945
00:51:37,239 --> 00:51:40,199
category from California. And so you put all that together

946
00:51:40,199 --> 00:51:43,519
and you say it's absolutely doable. We just got to

947
00:51:43,599 --> 00:51:46,079
get to those people who voted for a president. True,

948
00:51:46,119 --> 00:51:50,039
of course, it'd be wonderful to persuade Democrats and persuade independence.

949
00:51:50,039 --> 00:51:52,239
And that's true, you are on a big tent. But

950
00:51:52,599 --> 00:51:55,960
the argument that is impossible because they're just not enough

951
00:51:56,039 --> 00:52:00,000
Republicans in California has just been comprehensively disproved.

952
00:52:00,199 --> 00:52:03,199
Speaker 2: Well. I think, Steve, you may know the numbers from

953
00:52:03,199 --> 00:52:06,199
this Democratic analyst David Shore, who I've met is very

954
00:52:06,360 --> 00:52:09,519
very good, and Peter, you're oblivious to these nerdy number things,

955
00:52:09,559 --> 00:52:12,199
I know, but you know he had report recently that

956
00:52:12,440 --> 00:52:15,800
noted that Trump won not because of higher numbers among

957
00:52:15,800 --> 00:52:16,400
white voters.

958
00:52:16,440 --> 00:52:18,440
Speaker 1: It's been flat for Republicans for twenty years.

959
00:52:18,800 --> 00:52:21,840
Speaker 2: All of his gains came from minority groups, every single

960
00:52:21,880 --> 00:52:25,320
one and beyond all that. But Trump won the popular

961
00:52:25,400 --> 00:52:28,840
vote by one point seven percent. Shor's analysis was I

962
00:52:28,840 --> 00:52:32,639
think his bulletproof says, if you'd had turnout of all

963
00:52:32,760 --> 00:52:35,639
eligible voters in the country, Trump would have won the

964
00:52:35,639 --> 00:52:39,480
popular vote by five percent, and some of his biggest

965
00:52:39,519 --> 00:52:42,599
gains were here in California, many of them in Los

966
00:52:42,599 --> 00:52:45,519
Angeles County. This is causing night sweats among Democrats who

967
00:52:45,519 --> 00:52:47,880
pay close attention and the rest want to ignore all this,

968
00:52:48,079 --> 00:52:51,199
So I think you're onto something there, Steve.

969
00:52:51,400 --> 00:52:55,039
Speaker 1: Could you began we began this conversation by talking about matters.

970
00:52:55,159 --> 00:52:57,880
Really you use the word spiritual. Since then, you've been

971
00:52:57,880 --> 00:53:00,960
talking about practical politics and bolts of policy, and of

972
00:53:00,960 --> 00:53:03,559
course that's what you have to do to accomplish anything.

973
00:53:03,960 --> 00:53:05,719
But I wonder if I could ask a question. This

974
00:53:05,880 --> 00:53:08,199
is just occurring to me for the first time, so

975
00:53:08,239 --> 00:53:10,800
I'm not even sure that I can formulate it correctly.

976
00:53:11,559 --> 00:53:14,559
But we have forty percent Hispanic. I talked recently to

977
00:53:14,679 --> 00:53:18,039
my old friend Chris Cox, who served sixteen years in

978
00:53:18,079 --> 00:53:22,079
Congress from Orange County, a district in Orange County, and

979
00:53:22,119 --> 00:53:23,920
I said, how does the GOP come back? And he said,

980
00:53:24,199 --> 00:53:27,159
there's one answer to that question. Right now. The GOP

981
00:53:27,239 --> 00:53:34,079
in California is a white party doing reach out to Hispanics.

982
00:53:34,239 --> 00:53:36,199
It needs to become the other way around. It needs

983
00:53:36,199 --> 00:53:39,519
to become a Hispanic party reaching out to Anglos. So

984
00:53:39,559 --> 00:53:43,599
there's this problem that politicians' longtime political figures here understand.

985
00:53:44,440 --> 00:53:50,639
Archbishop Gomez of Los Angeles once made a remark to

986
00:53:50,719 --> 00:53:54,360
me that struck me as very beautiful. But I don't

987
00:53:54,400 --> 00:53:57,960
quite know what to do with. But you, Steve Hilton,

988
00:53:58,280 --> 00:54:00,960
being the creative figure that you are, might know what

989
00:54:01,079 --> 00:54:03,119
to do with. There may be some kind of opening

990
00:54:03,239 --> 00:54:06,400
or some Archbishop GM has made this remark. Now, of

991
00:54:06,400 --> 00:54:10,039
course he was born in Mexico. A huge proportion of

992
00:54:10,079 --> 00:54:13,239
his people, the Catholics in the Diocese of Los Angeles,

993
00:54:13,320 --> 00:54:15,559
which is by the way, the largest Catholic diocese in

994
00:54:15,599 --> 00:54:20,400
the country, are of course Hispanic. And he said something

995
00:54:20,440 --> 00:54:24,280
beautiful can arise from this, and he spoke of the

996
00:54:24,400 --> 00:54:30,079
double founding of America. We all know, of course that

997
00:54:30,159 --> 00:54:34,639
the Declaration of Independent States from seventeen seventy six. That's

998
00:54:34,679 --> 00:54:39,000
when Mission San Francisco was founded seventeen seventy six. So

999
00:54:39,079 --> 00:54:42,719
there's a kind of what was taking place, the European

1000
00:54:43,519 --> 00:54:48,440
Anglo founding of America on the East coast, which of

1001
00:54:48,440 --> 00:54:51,519
course built the country. All our great institutions are fund

1002
00:54:51,599 --> 00:54:56,000
arise from that. But there is something something wonderful that

1003
00:54:56,079 --> 00:54:59,639
at the same time there was a Hispanic founding here

1004
00:54:59,639 --> 00:55:03,760
in cal and there's maybe there's some It feels to

1005
00:55:03,800 --> 00:55:06,159
me as though this is one area where California could

1006
00:55:06,159 --> 00:55:09,360
once again be the future for the country somehow or other.

1007
00:55:09,800 --> 00:55:15,800
An openness a fundamental openness to the to Hispanic culture.

1008
00:55:17,039 --> 00:55:22,079
But as expressed through practical politics, there is no recent

1009
00:55:22,119 --> 00:55:25,559
immigrant from Mexico who doesn't want all the things that

1010
00:55:25,599 --> 00:55:29,280
you just described. Schools that work, the ability to buy

1011
00:55:29,320 --> 00:55:31,639
a car so that he can travel from the central

1012
00:55:31,679 --> 00:55:34,679
Valley over here to do his job as a gardener

1013
00:55:34,800 --> 00:55:38,559
or construction work, all of that. But there's some It

1014
00:55:38,599 --> 00:55:40,159
feels to me as though there's some Anyway, I just

1015
00:55:40,239 --> 00:55:42,519
put that to you, because you're so creative in these matters.

1016
00:55:43,079 --> 00:55:47,760
Speaker 4: Well, I agree completely, and I would say I've you know,

1017
00:55:47,880 --> 00:55:52,159
personally been spending a lot of time really understanding that,

1018
00:55:52,440 --> 00:55:55,400
you know, literally living with families over you know, in

1019
00:55:55,440 --> 00:55:57,360
East La of the weekend, so I'm going to church

1020
00:55:57,400 --> 00:55:59,360
with them and going to the baby shower, you know,

1021
00:55:59,400 --> 00:56:01,440
and really unders standing it. And we know, it's really

1022
00:56:01,480 --> 00:56:04,679
interesting to me. It reminds me totally. I mean, it

1023
00:56:04,760 --> 00:56:07,800
really does remind me of the immigrant experience that we

1024
00:56:07,880 --> 00:56:10,840
had in England as Hungarian immigrants. It's the same, it's

1025
00:56:10,880 --> 00:56:13,920
exactly the same thing. You just want to work hard

1026
00:56:13,920 --> 00:56:17,199
and climb the ladder of opportunity. And the Democrats who

1027
00:56:17,159 --> 00:56:20,920
have been in charge, who've patronizingly assumed that these people

1028
00:56:20,960 --> 00:56:23,280
are always going to support them. Have smashed the wrongs

1029
00:56:23,320 --> 00:56:27,880
of that ladder one by one. The good job that

1030
00:56:27,960 --> 00:56:31,280
pays well, well, we have the highest unemployment and we

1031
00:56:31,480 --> 00:56:33,639
tax you so much that you don't keep enough to

1032
00:56:33,760 --> 00:56:36,280
raise your family in a comfortable manner, a home of

1033
00:56:36,280 --> 00:56:38,719
your own, and that's totally out of reach to people,

1034
00:56:38,719 --> 00:56:42,280
A safe neighborhood. Don't make me laugh. A good school Latina.

1035
00:56:42,400 --> 00:56:45,039
Do you know the proportion of Latino kids in students

1036
00:56:45,039 --> 00:56:48,440
in our schools who who read at grade level about

1037
00:56:48,480 --> 00:56:51,719
thirty percent. It's just unbelievable. You know, it's a crime

1038
00:56:51,760 --> 00:56:54,440
what's being done. And so you know, all of these

1039
00:56:54,480 --> 00:56:59,000
things are just that it's almost that it's not like

1040
00:56:59,000 --> 00:57:01,079
their Latino it's just that they happen to be the

1041
00:57:01,119 --> 00:57:03,480
largest group in our state, and so of course have

1042
00:57:03,639 --> 00:57:06,639
to be central to everything that we do. But it's

1043
00:57:06,679 --> 00:57:11,440
a universal message and Republicans get it and Democrats seem

1044
00:57:11,559 --> 00:57:15,679
not to because they've crushed it. And I think that

1045
00:57:16,119 --> 00:57:19,400
it's going to be a really really exciting moment when

1046
00:57:19,400 --> 00:57:21,880
we can, like you know, make those two things come together,

1047
00:57:22,559 --> 00:57:26,480
and it's just restore that California dream that is so

1048
00:57:26,599 --> 00:57:31,679
simple and basic and beautiful. It really is, and you

1049
00:57:31,960 --> 00:57:34,800
just it's and that's what this state is all about.

1050
00:57:35,119 --> 00:57:38,519
And when people think of the American dream, I think

1051
00:57:38,559 --> 00:57:43,239
for many, for decades, they thought of California, and that's

1052
00:57:43,280 --> 00:57:45,440
what we need to get back to. I'm very confident

1053
00:57:45,519 --> 00:57:50,400
that we can and hopefully before people, you know, sooner than.

1054
00:57:50,280 --> 00:57:53,840
Speaker 1: People think we will, before everybody leaves the state. Right.

1055
00:57:53,960 --> 00:57:56,760
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm glad Peter you asked that question about the

1056
00:57:56,800 --> 00:57:59,559
second half of the book because you know, people only

1057
00:57:59,599 --> 00:58:02,079
think about the main title, Cali Failure, to think it's

1058
00:58:02,119 --> 00:58:04,119
only doom and gloom and how did we get in

1059
00:58:04,159 --> 00:58:06,719
such a mess, But the second half Cali Future. So

1060
00:58:06,800 --> 00:58:11,039
the whole title for listeners is Cali Failure, Reversing the

1061
00:58:11,159 --> 00:58:14,079
ruin of America's worst run state. Steve Hilton, thanks for

1062
00:58:14,119 --> 00:58:16,119
doing this book. Good luck, Thank you so much. Great

1063
00:58:16,119 --> 00:58:16,559
to be with you.

1064
00:58:17,119 --> 00:58:17,760
Speaker 1: Thank you, Steve.

1065
00:58:18,519 --> 00:58:18,639
Speaker 3: Well.

1066
00:58:18,679 --> 00:58:21,440
Speaker 2: You know, Peter, we could spend hours talking to Steve Hilton.

1067
00:58:21,480 --> 00:58:23,760
I know you probably have, and hopefully we'll get him again.

1068
00:58:24,159 --> 00:58:26,320
There was one other part of his personal story that

1069
00:58:27,440 --> 00:58:29,800
resonated with me. You know, I mentioned how, you know,

1070
00:58:29,840 --> 00:58:33,000
my British grandfather came to California never left, but I

1071
00:58:33,000 --> 00:58:36,079
didn't know about his Hungarian background. And you know, I

1072
00:58:36,119 --> 00:58:39,679
never tired of mentioning my late friend Peter Shram, who

1073
00:58:39,880 --> 00:58:43,079
left at exactly the same time after the Revolution of

1074
00:58:43,119 --> 00:58:45,760
fifty six, and his father said, we're out of here,

1075
00:58:45,800 --> 00:58:48,239
We're going to America. Why are we going to America, dad?

1076
00:58:48,639 --> 00:58:50,760
And his dad said, because we were born American but

1077
00:58:50,800 --> 00:58:54,199
in the wrong country. But his story of getting out

1078
00:58:54,280 --> 00:58:56,239
is exactly the same. They might have been in the

1079
00:58:56,280 --> 00:58:59,079
same group of people walking across the plain to get

1080
00:58:59,119 --> 00:59:04,280
to Austria, having to dodge, you know, army troops firing

1081
00:59:04,320 --> 00:59:06,400
at them, having to ditch their weapons at the border,

1082
00:59:06,480 --> 00:59:09,199
climbing a fence, and then being in an Austrian refugee

1083
00:59:09,199 --> 00:59:12,320
camp before coming to California. So I don't know, it's

1084
00:59:12,360 --> 00:59:15,480
funny how small the world can be sometimes and yet

1085
00:59:15,519 --> 00:59:17,800
here we are. So anyway, I was thrilled to hear

1086
00:59:17,840 --> 00:59:20,519
all that. That was great stuff. That's a cheery note

1087
00:59:20,559 --> 00:59:24,559
on which to end this week of tariff turmoil and trouble.

1088
00:59:25,960 --> 00:59:29,360
And for listeners, you know what comes next. You're supposed

1089
00:59:29,360 --> 00:59:32,119
to give us a five star review on Apple or

1090
00:59:32,320 --> 00:59:36,159
Spotify or wherever you source your podcasts and please we

1091
00:59:36,239 --> 00:59:38,199
want to hear from you in the comments section at

1092
00:59:38,280 --> 00:59:39,480
Ricochet four.

1093
00:59:39,320 --> 00:59:41,360
Speaker 1: Point Oh, Peter, great to see you. I hope we

1094
00:59:41,400 --> 00:59:45,079
have you back again soon. Steve A pleasure, And I'm

1095
00:59:45,079 --> 00:59:49,599
feeling I'm feeling encouraged about our beloved Golden State. Yeah,

1096
00:59:49,639 --> 00:59:52,000
and it's not easy to make me feel encouraged about

1097
00:59:52,000 --> 00:59:53,320
this place, all right.

1098
00:59:53,199 --> 00:59:55,000
Speaker 3: It's hard to take your times right right Bye bye

1099
00:59:55,079 --> 01:00:02,000
next week, guys. Oh, I'm James Lonnix and I'm at

1100
01:00:02,000 --> 01:00:06,320
the diner. You know, classic American diner chrome long boomerang

1101
01:00:06,360 --> 01:00:09,360
pattern for my cocounter with little jukeboxes. We love these

1102
01:00:09,519 --> 01:00:11,760
and you can join me here every Saturday, where we

1103
01:00:11,760 --> 01:00:13,840
talk about whatever happens to spring into my mind at

1104
01:00:13,880 --> 01:00:16,639
the moment. There's no predicting where it will go, except

1105
01:00:16,639 --> 01:00:18,840
that it'll be done in about thirty minutes. Join me,

1106
01:00:18,920 --> 01:00:21,679
won't you, Every Saturday from the Ricochet Audio

1107
01:00:21,760 --> 01:00:25,760
Speaker 1: Network Ricochet Ye, Join the conversation