Make Sense of the Mad 2024 American Elections

Rwy'n gobeithio y byddwn yn gweithio'n fawr iawn, ond rwy'n gobeithio y byddwn yn gweithio'n fawr iawn, ond rwy'n gobeithio y byddwn yn gweithio'n fawr iawn, ond rwy'n gobeithio y byddwn yn gweithio'n fawr iawn, ond rwy'n gobeithio y byddwn yn gweithio'n fawr iawn, ond rwy'n gobeithio y byddwn yn gweithio'n fawr iawn, ond rwy'n gobeithio y byddwn yn gweithio'n fawr iawn, ond rwy'n gobeithio y byddwn yn gweithio'n fawr iawn, ond rwy'n gobeith Welcome to the podcast. With me is Christopher Rochelle. He's been on our show before and he's back here again. As you know, he spent 11 years on Capitol Hill. He spent some time in the Pentagon. He ran for Congress in Texas, so you know he's a Republican. He's red and he'll give us as impartial a view as a red, defeating Texan can. Totally impartial. On the US elections, what are we going to do today? We are going to make sense of the crazy 2024 or the mad 2024 American election. Christopher, welcome. Thank you. It is nuts, isn't it? You and I have been watching some of the news for the last several nights, so we've been hanging out. It's been a real drama. Exactly. It's a psychodrama. It's a soap opera. It is a reality TV show. It's all of that and more. And to make sense of it all, let's get the facts straight. You know, there's inconvenient, unfashionable in the post-truth world we live in. So Joe Biden has dropped out of the presidential race. You apparently had some source who told you about this on Saturday. So we knew it was going to happen on Sunday, thanks to your source. And you were right. So you can run an intelligence agency. Maybe you do. Intelligence agency, may I say. And Kamala Harris is now the anointed heir. Walk us through how we got here. Well, we can go through her whole history, but in the immediate, she was chosen as Joe Biden's running mate. I mean, first we have to talk about how Joe Biden fell out of the sky like Icarus. Yeah, so he did. Well, he had that disastrous debate and which, if you watch the video, seemed to shock even Donald Trump on the stage. It astonished the donors, the voting base, demoralized them. Legendary line about Medicare. Yes. Yeah. We defeated it, right? Yeah. Yeah. So it was stunning. And panic set in with the Democrats and particularly the base. And they realized they had a candidate who wasn't up to snuff. The media, in my opinion, feigned astonishment. They quickly went on the offensive. The media, you mean, as in the left-leaning media, because surely Fox News didn't faint. Right. Fox News, Wall Street Journal. Rupert Murdoch has now made up and is making out with Donald Trump. All right. Well, I haven't seen that footage. That would be news-breaking. Sure, man. Oh, I'd like to look for it. For those of you who haven't seen the movie and you want to understand America, you really must see this movie. If he ain't first, you're last. Right. Exactly. Exactly. Everyone gives you love because you're a winner. That's true. That's true. No one loves a loser. That's right. Yeah. We've got that trademark. So Biden fell out of the sky. The administration staff, one could argue, Ms. Harris herself had been covering up these infirmities that seemed clear and clear to others. As I told some of my Democrat friends, I said, you guys are mugged by reality. It was pretty apparent to everyone else. So he has that disastrous debate, then tries to shore up support with a press conference at the NATO summit, which was uneven. It wasn't poor, but he flubbed a lot of important things. For example, saying he created 2,000 jobs last month instead of 200,000 jobs. He, earlier in the day, had introduced President Zelensky as President Putin. And he referred to Kamala Harris as Vice President Trump. Right. Yes. I don't know if that happened during the NATO conference or shortly after. That happened during the press conference. I see. Yeah. So there were too many slips of the tongue. After the debate, he had to look 100 percent solid. And he didn't. And apparently he met donors and they were horrified by what they saw. They were withholding their money. Especially the Hollywood donors. Yeah. Well, George Clooney ran a fairly devastating op-ed in the New York Times. Past members started calling for his resignation. Sitting members of Congress in the House and Senate started calling for his resignation. And supposedly, had Biden not resigned when he did, Nancy Pelosi had orchestrated a cadre of sitting members and influential Democrats who were going to collectively call for him to leave today. We're here Monday. And she's a youthful 84. A youthful 84, but she knows the levers of power and is quite cutthroats. So he, I think, in the collective. Didn't the Italians invent the Cosa Nostra? Yes. Yes. We have a video on the latter, by the way, made by someone from Calabria, the place where this wonderful criminal gang exists. By the way, Cosa Nostra was popularized in America through the Godfather movies and is known generally as the Mafia. But the Mafia now is no longer the Mafia. It has fallen from grace. And Indangretta from Calabria is more important than Cosa Nostra from Sicilia because they control the cocaine trade. Now, moving on. Well, to use another Italian term, what is it called? Omerta or whatever? The Vow of Silence? That was broken with Democrats. Once that happened, the dam was broken and- Nancy Pelosi, like a good Italian, put the knife in. Well, she wasn't alone. She wasn't alone. She was the ringleader apparently. There are rumors that former President Obama was involved and there's no lost love between Biden's crew and Obama's crew. So- Apparently there are three factions right now in the Democratic Party. So the Financial Times tell me. I don't know how reliable they happen to be. They say there is the Barack Obama faction. There is the Bill and Hillary Clinton faction. And there is the Joe Biden faction. I think that's fair. I think there's less daylight between Clinton and Biden just because, first of all, temporal removal. And second of all, the Biden folks don't much care for Obama because he felt that they kind of shivved him and have said not nice things. But they also apparently had some internal polling data and they did not see a path forward over the weekend as that data came in. I see. So Joe Biden melted away like a Himalayan glacier or an Andean glacier. Poor chap. You know, the aging glaciers are melting and so did Obama. Sorry, so did Joe Biden. And Kamala Harris was waiting in the wings to conveniently take over. And has done so quickly. She has consolidated her support very quickly among the donors, among the political supporters, the Hill, the delegates. She's she's cleaning up. So she's like Nikita Khrushchev after the death of Stalin. Yeah. Along with her competitors are falling in the line. The people who were thought would run against her, like the Gavin Newsom, governor of California. And who's rather good looking. Well, you know, hey, whatever floats your boat, buddy. But he was going to get all the girls votes because he's so good looking. And apparently he's had numerous affairs. He's very much the Clinton figure in their Democratic Party. So I'm told I have. I have a young American. I'm just a brownie fuzzy. I have a young female Republican friend of mine who said she would vote for him if he won the nomination. That tells you that tells you where her family are. Yeah. Yeah. Apparently so. So also, it's interesting, his ex-wife, Kimberly Guilfoyle, is the fiance of let me get it right. Is it Eric? Eric Trump? I have no idea. Battle of the X's as far as Guilfoyle is concerned. So, yeah, he was he was pushed out to see Kamala. Sorry. Is it Eric or is it is it Don Junior? I don't remember. Eric's wife is probably the head of the RNC. Oh, that's right. So yeah, the RNC. She gave a speech with her with her fantastically toned biceps. Someone told me she was she is in excellent shape. So at any rate, she was well poised, has consolidated the base. Her presumed Kamala Harris. Correct. Yeah. Her presumed before you get confused with the lady goodbye. Her presumed opponents have all fallen into line and generally almost to a one have endorsed her, thinking, I imagine, that if she wins, then they can run next time around. If she doesn't win, they would be blamed for dissent amongst the ranks. So they've all fallen in pretty quickly, along with the donors. They had a hell of a hell of a haul in the last 24 hours. We'll get to that. Let's talk about Donald Trump. Donald Trump has been riding high after his debate performance. Miraculously dodging a bullet, actually, and a reality TV style Republican National Convention. That was Hulk Hogan. To those of you who are not American, he was a wrestler. He has big muscles. He was wearing a jacket, which she took off. He's the Hulkster. When I was a kid. And ripped his waist to reveal another way of saying Trump man. So the kids who liked Hulk Hogan in my day, they were called Hulkamaniacs. And he was a huge thing. So Hulk Hogan was there. And then, of course, there was this rock star, raging rock star, revealing his midriff. Kid Rock. Kid Rock, also revealing flesh. And he was belting out a song. Kid Rock is known as the American Badass. The American Badass was there. Yeah. And then there was Dana White, who's the head of the worldwide... No, no, no. The Ultimate Fighting Championship. The Ultimate Fighting Championship. Whatever. They beat each other to fuck. Okay. So you had all these stars. You had basically a full Americana panorama. And you, by the way, you also had a Sikh lady finishing a speech on Monday. You had... You're talking about J.D. Vance's wife? No, no, no. J.D. Vance's wife was there as well. There was a Sikh lady from California. That's right. That's right. Yeah. There was Donald Trump's granddaughter. It was very much worthy of a chavismo show straight out of Latin America, without the Spanish, of course. Which you'd think Trump would put on, right? You know, family-oriented, you know... His family, exactly. Yeah, yeah. No one else's family. But the important thing is that that went off very well. And you could see the reaction amongst the Republican base, especially Trump's core base. It seemed to go off very well. So what happens now? What happens now? Let me say, of course it would. I mean, at that moment, with Biden still hanging on, it had to be the greatest Republican convention since 84, when, you know, Reagan was pretty much assured. I mean, there was an enthusiasm that Republicans haven't had at a convention in 40 years. Okay, I'm sorry. What was your... What happens now? Well, also, I mean, now that we are talking about the context, we must also talk about the image of his fist clenched, saying, fight, fight, fight, and the American flag in the background. That that picture of him bloodied with the bullet going through or going... Which was in the background when he spoke. Yeah, when Lincoln is here, is worth a million votes, if not a million dollars. It was a big deal. The first... Maybe worth a billion dollars and a million votes. Maybe. It's going to be an expensive election. The first, I don't know, third of his speech focused on that. It was very un-Trump speech, very humbled, quiet. The rest of it turned into, you know, sort of campaign rally. It deviated and meandered. But on the whole, the convention went very well. Now, to your point, where do we go from here? Well, obviously, a lot has changed since Sunday. Ms. Harris is in the Catbird seat for Democrats. She is rallying support. Trump has an entirely new candidate. So they will have to adapt their campaign message. Although Ms. Harris has the same baggage that Obama had. She can't exactly... Obama or Joe Biden? I'm sorry, Biden. I'm doing it now. Biden had with unpopular policies. I mean, the slogan of finish the job always struck me as nuts. That was Joe Biden's slogan, because it assumes that, one, people liked the job you did. And he's underwater in his numbers, as is Kamala. And two, it's backward looking. Well, let's, we'll get to that in a bit. Let's talk about how much money Harris has raised in just 24 hours and how much money Trump has raised. Because as we know, as a legendary congressman from Texas once said, congressmen are not elected by voters. They are elected by donors. And mine are in New York, in Florida, in Hollywood. And I'm Israel's guy on the Hill. And it was none other than the great Charlie Wilson. You love Charlie Wilson. We are hoping you will be the next Charlie Wilson. I love that. And there'll be slave auctions in Texas. Well, you talked to me about the hot tub parties you want to be invited to. No, but on both sides. No, no, no. I'll invite you to the hot tub party. Don't you worry. You won't be in a position to do so. You'll have to be squeaky clean. But you can always claim it was an accident because you were with a crazy Indian. I have used that one before, man. You didn't see it for the first time. You didn't know what you were getting into. I rarely do. So the money chase. So in the wake of Trump's conviction, money rolled in. I heard different numbers, but a lot in excess of to various places, maybe probably more than 100 million dollars. He's he's fine with in excess of 100 of 100 million of his own dollars. In the last 24 hours, Kamala has raised 81 million dollars. So they say we haven't seen the filings from eight hundred and eighty eight thousand people, 60 percent of whom are fresh donors for this election cycle. And I think it's forty four thousand of them committed to recurring donations, some some as frequently as weekly. So there is a great deal of rejuvenation in the base, in the funding for Democrats right now. But also we are standing here with a four dollar copy of the FT Weekend. And the big read this weekend was how Silicon Valley went maga, maga meaning make America great again. And Elon Musk is going to be putting in forty five million dollars a month. The Winklevoss brothers have promised dollops of money to Peter Thiel. I'm sure it's also putting in some in the kitty. So suddenly now you have all these entrepreneurs who are backing Donald Trump openly. It was thought that after Biden's debate performance, it became more acceptable to openly support Trump. Incidentally, Silicon Valley wanted J.D. Vance as the veep pick for Trump. They got that. But I see that was big money talking. Well, supposedly the money was going to come through regardless, but they did want J.D. Vance. I don't fully understand that because he was a venture capitalist. He worked for Peter Thiel. He was. And I don't want to get too inside baseball, but he likes Lena Kahn, who is in favor of greater regulation. The crypto bros in Silicon Valley want less regulation. It's a contradiction. I don't fully understand it. But you're right. Vance was the protege of Peter Thiel, and they trust him. In fact, that's that's one of the ways that Vance became senator. Well, Vance is a man who can change his colors. He went from a failing Donald Trump as a false prophet to propitiating and groveling at Trump's feet, and is now the anointed heir to Donald Trump at age 39. So he could change his colors again and and be all for crypto tomorrow. He might. He might. I think that's what Silicon Valley, or at least the people backing Trump, believe they will get from J.D. Vance. Or at the very least, he won't forget his friends, so to speak. Brilliant. So now let us, J.D. Vance is the vice presidential pick. Let's have a little bit of color about this chap. He has an Indian wife. We have a very interesting photograph circulating. Spoofed off an imperial portrait of a rather seductive Indian girl wrapping her arms around the legs of a British imperialist. I've seen it. So J.D. Vance has a Brahmin wife from the Telugu-speaking Andhra Pradesh, I believe, if I'm not if I'm not incorrect. And apparently this is one in the backing of a lot of Indian donors as well. He's adopted a vegetarian lifestyle as well. Oh, well, that makes him even more popular. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But give us a little bit of color beyond his opting for hybrid vigor for his children. So J.D. Vance grew up in a very difficult situation. His mother was addicted to opioids. You saw this featured in his speech. That was also the subject of his book, Hillbilly Elegy. He wrote a book that that really propelled him. He was, you know, finance guy for Peter Thiel. And he then ran for Senate. He was a venture capitalist, which is slightly different to a finance guy. They're all finance bros to me, dude. Finance comes in many shapes. The pure finance people, in a way, are investment bankers and traders. He's sort of a VC, which is more of a punter in some ways. Yeah. You know more than I do. No, no, no, I don't know anything about anything at all these days. Yeah, but he is generally considered pretty articulate. He adds youth to the ticket, which is now a more pressing concern or interest given that Biden is no longer running. So it helps offset Trump's age in the narrative that it's two old white men running for office. But Vance has really come from nothing. And, you know, I don't know if there are riches, but, you know, rags to riches in the sense of his career. All right. So much so about Vance. Tell us, especially a lot of our listeners who are outside the U.S., who supports Trump, Donald J. Trump, and why? I think, you know, people say that the Republican Party has been appropriated. I think that's a little bit unfair. I think Trump represents the concerns that the elites have not paid attention to their needs. You look at the Rust Belt where J.D. Vance will be able to speak compellingly, given his narrative in the book he wrote. You have people who feel that the social issues have consumed too much bandwidth, too much oxygen, and that they're concerned about kitchen table issues. They're concerned about. I mean, very quickly, I want to point out that I have a number of older friends. I don't know what it says about me. In America, I tend to have either very, very young friends who come and write for us or listen. Oh, thank you. Listen to us. Or much older friends who are retired. And a number of them were Republicans. One of them actually has been one of America's most distinguished diplomats. And he was very much someone who looked up to George Bush, Sr., met him, obviously respected Ronald Reagan, obviously venerates Abraham Lincoln, and has a huge degree of respect for Dwight D. Eisenhower. And he has said consistently that Donald Trump has brought in a populism that takes the Republican Party away from its roots. And he said, what are the roots of the Republican Party? This is a party for free markets, free trade, international norms, normative order, post-war order. And he thinks that, and he resigned from the Republican Party, just so you know. He thinks that Donald J. Trump does not befit or behove the dignity of the high office once held by George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. So this is not something that I'm hearing from Democrats per se. I'm hearing this very much from the old Republicans. It sounds to me like you're talking to the old Never Trump WASP-y groups. And I understand where they're coming from. I mean, I'm talking, I'm not just talking to the WASP-y groups. This person is Italian-American, but yes, WASP-y culturally, perhaps. I think there are two principal things where Trump represents a departure. One is in foreign affairs, where Trump's brand is a little bit more Fortress America. Everybody, you know, sort of like in Casablanca, a lot of people have problems, yours may work out. And also the sense that we don't have the money to do this anymore, and that a lot of other countries have been free-riding for a long time. Okay, so that's point one in terms of the internationalism. Point two is the free trade, where Trump renegotiated NAFTA, pulled out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, and has introduced tariffs, which the Biden administration has only increased on China. I think in terms of that international trade construct, both Democrats and Republicans have moved away from it. Have moved away, certainly in terms of China. Yeah, no, actually, that's not true. So Donald J. Trump did move away from it, but Joe Biden has doubled on it. And we have talked to a number of our European friends who are diplomats, and they've all complained, without exception, about the Inflation Reduction Act. Sure. And that is protectionism. You're talking about the subsidies in the IRA. Well, that is protectionism through the back door. Yeah. So we certainly are now living in a very different era to the post-war era created in 1945, the Bretton Woods Conference. So there's certainly been a departure from that. And frankly, Donald J. Trump is going to be a historic president for making that departure. For making the departure, yes. But in terms of distinguishing the political choices right now, they're somewhat similar in that respect. So answer the question. So who supports Trump and why? So, you know, Middle America, the forgotten middle class, to borrow the coin. OK. Middle America and the forgotten middle class. OK. So what is Middle America? A lot of people on the coastal elite areas would say flyover country. There are people who... Name us the states and where are they. I mean, remember, a lot of people don't really know the map of the US. So the Midwest, some of the Central America. You're talking about some of the Northeast, what is often called the Rust Belt, where a lot of the steel and industrial jobs have dried up. This is where J.D. Vance will help Trump. So you mean Pennsylvania, especially as you get into Western Pennsylvania? Yeah. And Ohio, you mean? Yeah. You mean Michigan? Advances from Ohio. And let's brass taxes. Two things worth pointing out. Pennsylvania will be one of the swing states. We'll get into that later. But yes, it will be one of the two. Which is the other one? There are several. But also I want to point out where did Trump get shot in Pennsylvania or almost shot in Pennsylvania? That's true. So I think there's an emotional factor there. You know, you're going to have Southwest, you know, Arizona, Nevada. One more than the other. Arizona, of course, is more Republican. I don't know off the top of my head. I just don't know. But there are only a few swing states and they vary, but not very much depending on who's up, who's down in the path to victory. So states that comprise Middle America and you said the forgotten middle class. Wouldn't you say working class as well? Absolutely. Particularly working class white voters who feel that they have been completely forgotten. There's been a shift in blue collar workers as well as minority workers who oftentimes aren't in white collar jobs. They feel that Trump fought for them and in some cases have abandoned their their unions position. Unions are oftentimes petty donors to Democrat candidates, and in some cases they're bucking their own unions saying, you know, this is not what I feel when they look at inflation. They think of the illegal immigration problem as taking, quote unquote, their jobs. They feel Biden hasn't staunched the immigration and Trump wants to build the wall, as he always says. So, yeah, and they know that that their wages don't go as far as they used to. There's a cost of living crisis. Cost of living crisis. You know, there's just a feeling amongst a lot of kitchen table. Hardworking, you know, blue collar or even, you know, upper middle class, they're squeezed too. Now, I don't want to boo hoo about them, but they are squeezed. They remember the Trump economy. They don't have much good to say about the Biden economy. And I won't get into real wages, for that matter, even stock market gains. And those who have union pensions need to remember a lot of that's invested in the stock market. Those gains are flat. Wages for a while were declining, but over the course of Biden's time in office are dead flat. They they're feeling the pain. Well, but this is a longer term economic malaise that is going on. You can't just blame Biden. Over a period of time, American economy has seen an outflow of jobs to Asia, manufacturing jobs and the China shock to China shock and also services jobs to other countries, including India. In fact, I met militia members in West Virginia just before the election in 2016, and they talked about this. Sure. I said, look, the factories have gone to China and a lot of jobs are being done by Indians. And there was a lot of heartburn about it. Sure. So this is this goes back. This is a phenomenon you can argue that happens right after the collapse of the Soviet Union, because, of course, at that time, American leaders felt that the free market would solve everything. The entire world was a global market and labor became very cheap. They did not take into account the fact that when the labor pool expands dramatically, then returns to capital rise. Sure. And part of the reason you have borders is to protect your labor. And so in a way, capital benefited, labor didn't. And and what some of our friends called the left behinds of the or what the British in particular called the swamp monsters, a very, very upper class thing to say. Trump popularized the phrase drain the swamp, which is DC is built on a swamp. So, yes, they are angry. But without going into the exact specifics of where this went and where that went, what matters is how they feel about it. It's this is not an election about about what people think it is an election about how people feel. Well, but at the same time, you know, some of these things are practical. You go to the grocery store and you think, my God, you know, groceries are five percent or whatever. They're they're ten dollars more than they were. Now they're fifty dollars more than they were. Well, my paycheck is roughly the same. You don't have to be a genius to know at the end of the day there's less money. And let's also talk ever so briefly. Mortgage rates are up. Young family formation is likely down. People can't afford housing. All right. So a classic storm when it comes to economics and partly, of course, the Russia-Ukraine war gave that shock to just the China shock. There was, of course, the war shock and that would set inflationary pressures in motion. It was it was partially responsible. You and I have a good friend who told us about the Biden. Yes, we have a very good friend who was an economist in the Treasury who found very early whilst running his models that Bidenomics would lead to inflation and won the administration. But the administration didn't listen. Yes. So there was there were a number of contributing factors. So we know who supports Trump. Now we've talked about Trump. Let's talk about Harris. Tell us who supports Harris. You're going to have base Democratic voters on green energy. Biden has spent an enormous amount of money on green energy transitions to transition to electric vehicles with mixed success. That is good for Elon Musk, isn't it? Well, did you see recently his percentage of the U.S. electric vehicle car sales dip below 50 percent for the first time in a long time? I don't know when. But yeah, I mean, it would be. So he spent a lot of money. That's maybe because others are cashing up. I think so. I know. Others have joined the party. Reversing to the media. Yeah, exactly. He was he was first to the party and he had a good time. Sure. And that's maybe just because of competition. He's worried about whether or not he's broke. Obviously, he's got enough money to spend 45 million a month on politics. But I mean, he may be hurting his own brand in the long run because, as someone pointed out, the people who buy his cars, the green tree hugging voters do not like his politics. So this is a case where his economic interests and his political inclinations might be clashing. Yeah. Longer story for later. I always thought he was never a Democrat. He was a guy who figured out how to make a bunch of money at something. He's more libertarian in my in my view. Well, he certainly is libertarian, as is Peter Thiel, as is a large number of that Silicon Valley mob. In fact, they are called the PayPal mafia for a reason. Yeah, yeah, yeah. OK, so who else likes Kamala? You certainly those for whom Roe v. Wade, the abortion law that was or the abortion standard law, really, that was overturned. She has a strong stand on reproductive rights. Yes, she believes abortion should be legal, plain and simple. They have accused the Trump administration of, you know, wanting to take over women's bodies. Trump has been very straightforward about this. He said, you know, it went back to the states. It should stay there. J.D. Vance has said he would like some kind of limitation. He's painted as a complete kook who wants to tell women what to do with their bodies. I don't think that's ever what he meant. He's Catholic, but he only has three children. Yeah, yeah. So there's probably some birth control there. So the abortion issue will resonate with a lot of voters. So what do we have? We've got green. We've got abortion. Anybody for whom social issues, you know, gender pronouns and that sort of thing. Obviously, that's not my cup of tea or kettle of fish, but there are certain more liberal factions who for whom that will be a big deal. The Black Caucus, I'm sure. In James Clyburn, a very instrumental congressman who one could argue got Biden elected last time from South Carolina, they did not want line jumping where Kamala would be passed over. And they have been quite vocal. They are hopeful that they will get they will regain ground with Black and Hispanic voters where they have lost quite a number of votes of late. So they're hopeful they can get some of those back. And just people who are looking for youth and vitality. One question that is quite interesting is who she Kamala would choose for her vice president. And if she chooses somebody from a swing state who's young, probably want to go with someone male to offset it, probably white just for the politics, then she can make a horse race of this. She's got the money. Identity politics played as necessary. There is a certain group that will vote for her. And this is this change up has reinvigorated the Democrats, although I have to admit it's about the least democratic process I've ever seen. And it's worth noting somebody was covering down for Joe Biden in his dotage and Democrats of Republicans are going to hit her on covering up Joe Biden's condition. She was a big cheerleader for him. She's going to get hit hard on the border because she was the sort of the, quote, unquote, border czar. And that has only grown more messy. I mean, there's a lot of firepower. She has the exact same record as Biden. I see. Basically, what you're saying is she is a flawed candidate. That's what the FT says as well. Every every election, her presidential election. She never got her first vote. It blew up. It was apparently a disaster. Yeah. And there are doubts about her discipline and focus when it comes to issues. She's obviously good at raising money. She apparently is a decent debater. But yeah, but in his the challenge she faces is she famously saw her campaign implode last time around and her reputation as a manager is not that great. Having said that, the candidate opposite her. That sounds good. You want to talk about discipline and focus? I knew we were going to agree on that. 3M tweets and his vice president is not endorsing him or his former vice president is not endorsing him. And no one lasted in that White House for too long. That is true. That was a madhouse. That was a chaotic White House. Yes. So it's it's not exactly Abraham Lincoln running against Kamala. Well, can I go just briefly? You said who else supports Trump? A lot of people will say, and I would be one of them, that while the Trump White House was chaotic, a lot of the people he appointed sort of ran the various portions of the bureaucracy like old line Republicans. Frankly, this was a surprise to me, a pleasant one. But while his White House is sort of famous for a degree of chaos, his administration, to the extent you could stay in it and not get fired, was a little bit old guard. I don't know if I buy that, to be honest. That's a Republican hat going. But, you know, we'll we'll take it. I mean, as a friend of mine just said, he got a few things right. Maybe the Abraham Accords. Who knows? NEPA reform. Yeah, but but yeah, of course. But a lot wrong as well. But two regulations out for every one in. I mean, there's there's stuff to like if you are a Republican, small government person. Exactly. And you're you are certainly. And I am. Yes, exactly. Exactly. Although you have not found favor with Trump and you're not J.D. Vance, mate. No, I'm neither. You're a Ronald Reagan Republican put out to pasture. Thanks for the pick me up. Box print animals. OK. Elections in the US are different to almost anywhere in the world. You have a system of electoral college votes. So states have been assigned electoral. Wait, wait, basically a number of electoral college votes. And it's generally a winner takes all system. Yes. So this leads to strange results. In 2000, George W. Bush won the presidency, but he didn't win the popular vote. In 2016, Donald J. Trump became president. But Hillary Clinton got more votes. So what really matters is not who gets more votes, but who gets more electoral colleges. Yes. Yes. And so given that reality, who is the poll position today? Well, this goes back to what we were discussing about swing states and the states that, quote, unquote, matter. So, yeah, because Texas will always be Republican. And you're going to get you get all of those. Yes. And you bleed red if I touch you. True. Bleed Texas red. Bleed Texas red. And California will bleed blue. Yes. Yes. And because it's winner take all, that means the path to victory typically goes through very few states. So. And it's a few swing voters in a few swing states. Someone says as little as 300,000 voters. Oh, I'm sure. Yeah. Who decide the fate of this country of over 300 million or 30 million. Yeah. Yes. And just to reiterate, the popular vote is bollocks. It doesn't really it doesn't matter at all in the end. So you have to take your states, whether Democrat or Republican, get all of those electoral votes. And then you have to come up with a map, as they say, a path to winning. And that is usually dependent upon seven or eight states and how they go. And depending on who's up and down, those paths, those states you need change. Now, in this election, and it's all in flux right now. I get that. But people have been saying that Pennsylvania is the most important state. Both parties need Pennsylvania. So walk us through the key swing states. People talk about, obviously, Pennsylvania. In the past, it was Florida that won the state that swung the election in favor of George Bush. There's, of course, Wisconsin, Michigan, when Donald Trump won, Ohio. Am I missing any? You're missing a few. What do we go? What do we say? Do we do Arizona, I believe? Arizona. Isn't Arizona red now? It's Arizona or Nevada. I forget which one where it's a major state. And then Pennsylvania, which we've already listed. There's the famous blue wall where Republicans don't do well. And if Democrats, and that's in the upper Midwest, kind of. Minnesota. Minnesota is one. I'd have to look at a map. This is getting too much inside baseball. This is not where I'm great. That's you're very honest, which is why it's great to have you. But fundamentally, it is the swing voters in the swing states who matter. And who's in the pole position? Well, boy, that has changed. I can tell you the Cook Political Report, which is a bit of a Bible in terms of who's up and who's down. A lady who was quite senior there was giving an interview the other day. And they asked her how many paths to victory did Trump have then against Biden? And she said, we stopped counting at 25. Now, the shakeup with the Democratic candidate changes a lot of that. I don't know what it means. But I'll put it to you this way. Even given this shakeup, I would still rather be in Trump's shoes than Kamala Harris's shoes. And you're being utterly unbiased, of course. Well, I am. I'll give you a totally unbiased reason. The punchers betting with their own money right now. Pegged it as of early this afternoon when I looked at it, 60-40 Trump. OK, so the living martyr, the man who's doshed a bullet, the man who apparently had Jesus's hand on his head, the man who is apparently the second coming of Christ. Well, if you did vote, we know where you'd vote. Yeah, apparently he is in bold position. And I think as of now, it is for Kamala to make the best of the 107 odd days. She said she has 107 days a day. And let's say, give or take 100 odd days by the time this website by the time this podcast comes out, 100 odd days. Sure. And she's got 100 odd days to turn it around. Yes. I mean, part of it got turned around immediately, right? The frustration and disenchantment with Biden as the candidate, that switched. And money is flowing. Money's finally flowing. I think, you know, an $81 million day is huge. But at the same time, I feel that represents a lot of pent-up money that was going to go. I mean, they've run pretty dry for a few weeks now. But the money is roughly equal. You know, Trump's got that roughly, what, $200 million coming from Musk. At the very least, this staunches the bleeding. The Democrats have a candidate that the party supports, even though it seems like this came together rather hastily. It does not have even the patina of a truly democratic process, right? Well, I know some Democrats who were confiding to me at the National Press Club, a democratic stronghold, that they would have preferred a primary. They would have preferred this to be decided in the Democratic National Convention. And they would have preferred someone like Gretchen Whitmer, the governor of Michigan, or many of the Democrat young stars rising up. They wanted a cleaner, fresher start during this campaign. There's something important for the listeners to know. There was in excess of about $100 million that could be transferred, that will, in all probability, be transferred to Ms. Harris. This is Joe Biden's money, right? Correct. Well, yes. Well, it's their campaign money. Yeah. And were the candidate not, the presidential candidate, Kamala Harris or Joe Biden, that money could not be transferred. I see. So there's a financial imperative for them. For Kamala Harris to be a presidential candidate instead of, say, the good-looking Californian. She lost out. Yeah, he did. Well, he threw in the towel. He endorsed her, what, today or yesterday. Got it. So Gavin Newsom has been beat by his former attorney general and his senator. Yeah. And he's no doubt hoping to be secretary of something or maybe even vice president and hopefully lived in... No, he can't be because apparently you can't have the president and vice president from the same state. This is the Marco Rubio, Donald Trump thing. All you have to do is just switch where you technically live. It's possible, but... It's possible, but unlikely. Unlikely, but he's bucking for a promotion one of these days. He's young enough. He has years to sit on the sidelines or sort of in the fray a little bit for another four years, build up his profile. Okay. So he wasn't going to go to the mat and potentially be blamed for a Democrat loss, Democratic loss, or create havoc in this moment of what Democrats feel must be unity and unity fast. All right. So we have an even matchup or what seems to be an even matchup as of now. What are the issues that will decide the election? I keep pounding, when you look at the polls and you say, what is your number one issue? You don't get electric vehicles. You see the same things. You see inflation. Actually, Gallup, we've been looking at Gallup polls. Immigration is coming as the top issue. Immigration has for months. And I've never seen that before. Illegal immigration in particular is worrying, not just Republican voters, but also now independents and Democrats too. So that is major. And we've been following this for months. It's been, I've never seen, I mean, I'm not ancient, I'm not old as Methuselah or the hills, but I've never seen immigration. But you did work with the Methuselah on Capitol Hill. I did. A lot of inherited knowledge. I did. I did. And he was a wonderful, wonderful person. But they're worried about immigration. They're worried about inflation. They're worried about the economy overall. I just don't see those issues changing. I mean, you know, for a certain group of, you know, abortion for certain people, you know, green energy and saving the planet, whatever, those will motivate certain people. But the issues that have been one, two, and three for months and made outside of immigration since time immemorial are pocketbook issues. Pocketbook and kitchen table. Yeah, pocketbook and kitchen table. Now, aside from that, what could also motivate? Well, do they like Trump's personality? He doesn't do well there. But, you know, do they do they end up just biting their fist and pulling the Trump lever? Maybe. The other question is, who out there is like genuinely, totally stoked and enthusiastic to vote for Kamala? I don't see many of those people. And that's not just because I'm a Republican. I just don't see where there's an issue outside of abortion, outside of the social issues where you have a base sufficient to grant you a victory on Election Day. I still think she could win it. Not definitely could win it. But I just think the the core issues that will motivate a lot of voters are unchanged. And she's not in a very good position to talk about inflation, jobs, certainly not immigration. Republicans are going to hang that albatross around her neck. They are going to talk about the cover up of Biden's infirmity. Well, she was in charge of the border and that didn't work out so well. Root causes. Yeah. As well as she hoped for. And this is where, you know, people like me shake our heads. She at one time attributed the immigration problem to climate change. I don't know. Maybe there's a bank shot argument to be made there. But what I can tell you is saying that climate spending is going to improve the border when it's fallen apart over three and a half years is not going to resonate with your average voter. Yeah. And it won't in the short term. It means the long term, maybe. But, you know, but in the short term, yeah, I'm saying your average person voting is like climate change is why we have this border mess. Just not going to follow that. So you talked about personality and in terms of personality that Trump is not the most attractive personality and Kamala is not the most inspiring personality. And there you referred to identity politics. And there is some of that going on already. A lot of the white working class vote will go to Donald Trump. Kamala wears her African-American identity. She went to Harvard University. Parents were academic parents, one Indian mother, one African or rather one African-American, exactly a Caribbean father of African-American roots who was a professor, I believe, at Stanford. I think that I may be wrong, but academics grew up partly in Canada as well. Yes, yes. And her grandfather was an Indian administrative service officer. I love them. Yeah. Kamala Bramman, the highest of the high caste, the I.S., who actually served around Africa in the first flush of India's independence. There was a lot of support for African countries independence. And he helped. He helped in the he helped in the independence or rather development of Africans. So she comes from a rather international as well as immigrant educated, international and immigrant roots. And that may inspire a few people. And she has a Jewish husband. Yes. And she she obviously would have some Jewish support as well. So she had a multi-ethnic appeal. Yeah. She she. Yeah. The the Israeli situation. I don't know if that's a guarantee. Some of the Jewish. Yes, yes. Even Schwarzman has gone over. The founder of Blackstone has gone over to Trump. The protests, the the giving weapons to Israel, somewhat grudgingly criticizing Israel for the diaspora in America. That's not a good thing from there. Yeah. I mean, and even the Indian diaspora is divided because they see Kamala as left leaning. Yes. And they see Kamala as rather anti-Bharatiya Janata Party, the BJP, led by Narendra Modi and a lot of Gujaratis in the U.S. And, you know, some of them in Texas. They have moved over to the Republican side. And J.D. Rantz's Indian wife has certainly helped swing some Indian donors, at least. We'll know about the voters later. Yes. Yes. I agree with all that. I mean, but but still she has a multi-ethnic identity and she has some appeal for immigrants. She does. That's a big part of her story. You know how that shakes out. It's just really hard to tell right now because of this seismic shift that's occurred in the last, you know, 36 hours. Got it. So we don't know enough as of now, in your estimation. Donald Trump is in the lead, but Kamala has a fair shot of unseating him in the joust. The steeds have been mounted. The lanterns are drawn and the bish bash wash is about to begin. Yes, it is. Indeed. Yeah, should be. Hey, it's already been interesting. Who the hell thought it was going to turn out this way? But yeah, here it comes. On that note, as the Chinese said, may you live in interesting times. And it is interesting times indeed. Thank you very much, Christopher Ruppershell. It's not completely objective, but as objective as the Texans are perfectly fair. Thanks for having me at all. We'll talk soon. Absolutely. 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