00:07 Charlie Sykes Oh, my God. 00:08 OK, so I was thinking this morning that someday historians are going to ask, what was it like waking up on the morning of October 2nd, 2020? 00:15 They probably won't actually ask that because there'll be so much worse shit happening, but but they really should. 00:21 So welcome to the Bulwark podcast. 00:24 I'm Charlie Sykes, joined by Tim Miller, who was up to like 3 a.m. writing about Donald Trump's terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week. 00:33 Good. 00:33 Good to talk with you again, Tim. 00:36 Tim Miller Yeah. 00:37 So you woke up to it? 00:38 You were not awake last night? 00:40 Because we're on the West Coast, so I got the news just right after I was settling in for my evening bourbon. 00:48 The text chains were flying out here in the Pacific time zone, let me tell you. 00:52 Charlie Sykes Well, I actually was was being just pounded by the news cycle and everything that was happening last night. 00:57 And I actually sort of tongue in cheek said, hey, could we just put the news cycle on pause? 01:02 Can we just, you know, you know, call a lid on this because I have to go to bed and I've already got too much material. 01:07 And I was kind of it was kind of a little bit snarky about that. 01:10 And then and then I did. 01:12 And I wake up. 01:13 It's like, OK, OK, now my wife says, don't don't use the phrase on your bingo card because it's become too hackneyed. 01:21 But, you know, last week we're going. 01:23 So who had RBG dying on your bingo card? 01:27 And then the next week it's like, and what if the president comes down with coronavirus? 01:32 So I don't know. 01:33 You got any spaces left in this other than the asteroid of death? 01:38 Tim Miller Oh, you know, just the looting and riots that follow the contested election, I guess. 01:43 Charlie Sykes Okay, so let's just back up and take a deep breath why this is so extraordinary. 01:48 And even by our standards of Trump world where the news cycles have been insane. 01:54 So this comes at the end of a week. 01:56 We'll get to last night. 01:57 You know, Trump's tax dodging is is exposed, you know, including all those massive ugly debts. 02:03 He spent the week losing in the polls. 02:05 He's actually being outspent by the Democrats, which is amazing. 02:09 How bad is it? 02:09 Lindsey Graham is tied with his Democratic challenger in South freaking Carolina. 02:15 Then we had the debate. 02:17 Trump was bullied. 02:18 You know, I'm sorry. 02:19 Trump bullied and hectored his way almost to political oblivion by being such a complete jerk. 02:25 And what may be the well, it was the first and maybe the last presidential debate. 02:29 We'll talk about that. 02:30 He had to be shamed into that token and belated condemnation of white supremacists. 02:36 And then we get to last night where the first lady is is tape saying basically and pardon it because apparently, you know, her English is a little bit shaky, but she knows how to drop F-bombs, doesn't she? 02:47 I mean, she's, you know, this, you know, who gives a fuck about Christmas stuff and decorations and everything and comments about the kids at the border. 02:55 And then we get that story about his son's grifty girlfriend who faces allegations of sexual harassment just all around, just being a totally awful person. 03:05 This is Kimberly Guilfoyle. 03:08 And because our card wasn't quite... 03:10 Quite yet full. 03:11 We find out, you know, the Brad Parscale, the former campaign manager who threatened suicide, is tackled by cops and involuntarily committed, says he's under federal investigation for Lord knows what sort of corrupt grifting. 03:26 And then... 03:28 And this happens. 03:31 And Tim Miller, you write about it in the bulwark today. 03:34 You said this all felt massive and chaotic. 03:36 The historic tax return leak, the SCOTUS fight barely married a mention in yesterday's news as the cascading scandals unfolded. 03:45 And then just sort of 10 p.m. Pacific time. 03:49 Your phone began to buzz. 03:50 Take it from here. 03:53 Tim Miller Yeah. 03:54 You know, at first it was just the simple text message of the of the tweet. 03:59 Obviously, in this era, it gets announced by tweet that Donald Trump has the has the virus. 04:04 And I just I was on Brian Williams last night, the humble brag. 04:07 And, you know, I got getting bumped. 04:11 And so I sat there watching about a half hour of MSNBC news. 04:16 after the news first came around nine pacific time that that hope hicks had the virus um we thought that was the big story of the night yeah and and they're showing this video these videos this b-roll that i'm sitting there of hope and 04:31 Jared and Scavino and Stephen Miller and the adult children and Melania, all walking in and out of airplanes, no masks, all close to each other, laughing, glad-handing. 04:47 spittling on one another. 04:48 And I'm just sitting there watching this going, this is, you know, if this was not a rapid error test mistake on Hope's part, this is obviously going to infect the entire White House. 05:04 And so then, you know, it was only about an hour until it was clear that it had. 05:11 We didn't discover at that time, but we've now known this morning that 05:15 I think really the most astonishing, but also the most telling part of the story is that they knew. 05:23 Yeah, they knew. 05:24 They knew that Hope had, I guess, symptoms or maybe a pre... 05:31 I don't know if she got any official word, but they left on Thursday anyway for Bedminster. 05:39 Some people didn't go, so they were worried enough to keep a few people back. 05:42 This was the fundraiser, yeah. 05:43 Yeah, for an indoor fundraiser, an indoor maskless fundraiser with Trump's own supporters. 05:50 It's just like, you know, this guy was unwilling to manage his own inner circle. 06:01 Yeah. 06:01 attitudes about a highly contagious disease because of his pathologies. 06:09 So how could we have expected him to manage this virus for the whole country? 06:15 The most basic thing happened that any normal human in any circumstance would have been like, 06:22 Oh, I've been with somebody in close quarters quite often who appears to have this contagious virus. 06:31 I probably shouldn't get on a plane with a bunch of my other close associates and travel to an indoor event with a bunch of other allies and friends of mine and breathe all over them. 06:48 This seems like just the basic human put aside the president, but he couldn't do that, Charlie. 06:53 He can't do that because he is a narcissist at such a level that he couldn't even imagine. 06:59 I think maybe he thought that he was unable, that Hope couldn't get this. 07:03 He says that this doesn't affect young people. 07:05 I'm sure he thought that young, pretty women couldn't get this. 07:07 Who knows? 07:08 So how could he manage this and help all of us contain it when he couldn't even do the basics? 07:12 Yeah. 07:13 Charlie Sykes Well, this is, you know, karma meets Darwin here in a rather dramatic way. 07:17 So I'd actually written my newsletter in my head and I put together all the notes and I was going to talk about Trump's recklessness with the coronavirus in coming to Wisconsin. 07:28 Because here in Wisconsin, he's planning on coming to Green Bay, which is now one of the nation's highest hotspots. 07:33 And he was going to go to La Crosse. 07:35 And there was a lot of speculation. 07:37 Is he really going to come here at this particular moment? 07:40 Won't the outbreak of the coronavirus be a huge distraction? 07:44 And are people going to show up without masks? 07:46 And the mayor of La Crosse asked him not to come, and they're moving it around and everything. 07:51 Well, obviously, he's not going to be coming. 07:53 But, you know, the story locally is that he... 07:56 was going ahead with his plans for these rallies here in Wisconsin, even after they knew about Hope Hicks and they were going to keep that. 08:03 They were going to keep that quiet. 08:04 Look, you know, I'm, you know, hopes and thoughts and prayers and for for the president's rapid recovery, but also, you know, seriously, you know, thoughts and prayers for any any lingering irony. 08:18 Because, I mean, two days, just two days ago, he's on stage mocking Joe Biden for wearing a mask, mocking just last night at that Al Smith dinner. 08:29 He's saying that the pandemic, you know, the end of the pandemic was was in sight. 08:34 So and as you lay out in the in the bulwark, you know. 08:37 He now has contracted. 08:40 And this is where it's like the 2020 is like trying to tell us something. 08:46 This is the virus that in January he was dismissing as under control. 08:50 It was shut down in February, stopped in March, would go away with the heat in April, would be back to normal by Easter, really rocking by July. 08:57 We were dealing with it until August. 09:00 He's been mocking the safety protocols. 09:03 And now he's in isolation in October. 09:06 Tim Miller 30 days you just listed at the top all of the news stories yeah and we don't even talk about the fact that he's holding these rallies anymore yeah right i mean like this is the thing this is again the most fundamental um advice that you would give in dealing with a contagion is to not get a 09:32 shouting and yelling and this is in the CDC guidelines but he continues to do this he's continued to do it for weeks and it was this massive story when he did it in Tulsa and then it was kind of a big story when he did it in Nevada because of the fight with the governor but then after that 09:47 He's continued to do it, and we just lose our ability to be outraged because of this whole other litany of things that's going on. 09:55 Charlie Sykes And he's encouraged people not to take it seriously. 09:57 I mean, he has encouraged his supporters to think that it's done, it's over, it's a joke, it's a hug, whatever. 10:05 So Amanda Carpenter has a really brutal piece of it. 10:08 Tim Miller I was just about to say, she was much less sympathetic than me, and she's right. 10:11 Charlie Sykes No, no, I think she is. 10:13 You know, she says, look, this is this is not an accident. 10:17 You know, unlike untold numbers of Americans, such as medical workers and first responders who contracted the virus despite taking precautions. 10:25 Trump ignored science and prudence and common sense. 10:28 He taunted medical fate. 10:30 Trump and his White House staff have ignored the most basic public health best practices, masking, social distancing, avoiding crowds. 10:37 I mean, he really kind of rubbed our faces in it. 10:39 You know, the president has held indoor rallies. 10:42 He's gathered masses of people on the White House lawn multiple times. 10:45 He's mocked people wearing masks. 10:47 In order to avoid unknowingly spreading the virus, he badgered states to open up despite not having contained the coronavirus. 10:54 President Trump did not unwittingly contract coronavirus. 10:58 He courted it. 10:59 And Republicans, eager to demonstrate their loyalty, followed his lead. 11:04 They similarly held indoor events. 11:05 They posted pictures to social media themselves, maskless in crowds as if to prove the defiance of basic science. 11:13 So as you point out, 11:15 He really did think he was going to – that this con was going to work for him, didn't he? 11:20 Tim Miller Yeah, what do you expect? 11:21 I mean, what do you expect? 11:23 And so that's the angle that I went at this is trying to get inside this man's head that unfortunately we've all had to – has consumed so much of all of our brain power over the last five years to a point where I think he's not that hard of a guy to psychoanalyze. 11:42 Right. 11:42 And here's the deal, Charlie. 11:44 His entire life, he's been a con artist. 11:48 His entire life, he has been a snake oil salesman. 11:51 And he has run up against challenges or humiliations or defeats back to when he was in high school. 12:01 And couldn't get into a good college and got into Fordham and then had to have somebody cheat on his SATs. 12:06 Right? 12:07 All the way through all of his bankruptcies. 12:09 All the way through all the times where he had to lie to creditors and stiff people that worked for him. 12:15 All the way through when his popularity was getting down in the 80s. 12:19 And so he played these tabloid games where he'd call the tabloids pretending he was John Barron and talk about how great his sexual prowess was. 12:27 All the way through Trump University. 12:28 Although through the apprentice, which was a con pretending like he was a big businessman all the way through becoming the damn president of the United States. 12:36 Everything has been a fake the whole time. 12:39 And all he's been good at is the PR is the spin is the bullshit. 12:44 And so when he gets faced with this crisis, he's, 12:48 And should we be surprised that what he thought the solution was, was to tell everybody that it wasn't a big deal? 12:55 I mean, isn't that the same thing that he's done his whole life? 12:59 Is lie to people about how serious the problems are and try to put a big, great orange lame sign on it and say, this property is great, actually? 13:12 Like that's just him. 13:14 That's all he is. 13:15 He's a branding guy. 13:16 He's a BS-er. 13:18 And so that's what happened with this. 13:21 That's what he did with this. 13:22 And, you know, as I said in the thing, the virus doesn't care about his charms. 13:28 The virus doesn't care about his BS. 13:29 JBL has gone into this in many newsletters at great length. 13:32 And so and but yet he never this never sunk in with him because because it just goes against his entire nature and everything that he's been all of his muscle memory through his whole life was to just care about the PR and just care about the con. 13:49 And so. 13:49 Should it be a surprise that a guy that took this with the minimum amount of seriousness has now contracted it? 13:57 I mean, this virus obviously contracts people who, you know, people contracted who take it seriously. 14:01 So, you know, it shouldn't be a surprise that somebody who didn't give a crap got it. 14:07 Charlie Sykes No, but I do think that he does think he's immune or that he was, you know, that maybe the people around him, the people who came to his rallies might might get it, but that he was going to be protected because, of course, he had a different set of rules for himself. 14:23 Speaking of a different set of rules for for himself. 14:26 Yeah. 14:26 How are the anti-anti-Trumpers going to spin this? 14:30 We know how the pro-Trumpers are. 14:32 I noticed that the folks who've managed to ignore or rationalize all of his insults, brutality, cruelty... 14:43 For the last four years are now becoming the civility police. 14:48 How dare you blue check marks say bad things about him because America should be on bended knee empathizing with the president in this in this terrible moment. 14:58 It's so interesting the number of people who have defended or gone along with everything he has done. 15:04 his utter and complete lack of caring and empathy for other people who have suffered from this now demand that sort of civility for him. 15:13 You notice that? 15:14 Have you noticed that? 15:15 Tim Miller Charlie, I know we have a family audience, and so I'm just going to take a deep breath. 15:19 We'll get the explicit rating. 15:21 I'm taking a deep breath right now. 15:22 Because I, so this is, you woke up to Trump's death, or not Trump's death, geez, to Trump getting the coronavirus. 15:30 I woke up, I already knew, right? 15:33 So I took a brief nap after that late night article. 15:35 And, you know, I woke up to seeing people like Ben Shapiro talk about how mean the liberal blue check marks have been this morning on the East Coast to the commander in chief. 15:49 And 15:50 You know, fuck these people, Charlie. 15:53 Like, honestly, somebody had replied to me on this. 15:57 And so I'm going to steal this from Elizabeth Picutio. 15:59 She said, the man whose greatest praise for Trump is how much he makes the libs upset is now surprised by the extremely upset libs aren't more sympathetic. 16:10 The man who spent, who gleefully mocked Hillary Clinton's pneumonia for months and months, Donald Trump, Fox News, Ben Shapiro, all these guys. 16:22 As I tweeted this morning, Ben Shapiro appears to have a calendar reminder for Trayvon Martin's birthday because every year he tweets about happy birthday to Trayvon Martin. 16:32 You'd still be alive if you hadn't tried to attack George Zimmerman. 16:36 I mean, this is a, these people are despicable. 16:40 Donald Trump is despicable. 16:43 And so, and Donald Trump is the president of the United States and he has acted with just the most grotesque cruelty that you could possibly imagine when John McCain died. 16:56 You know, when, you know, 17:00 Others contracted the virus. 17:01 He made fun of Mitt Romney. 17:03 He's acted cruelly towards immigrants, cruelly towards victims of violence. 17:10 Like, are you kidding me? 17:12 So anyway, here's what's going to actually happen is that all the Democratic politicians are going to act like responsible human beings like they are. 17:22 And they are going to wish the president well, wish him speedy recovery. 17:28 And Joanne already did. 17:29 And they are going to, you know, point out rightly that this shows why you should take this virus seriously. 17:37 So look, if there's somebody to be outraged about it this morning, it's the people in this White House who have put others at risk by their own negligence because all they gave a shit about was Donald Trump's reelection. 17:51 What about the people that work in the White House kitchen? 17:54 Charlie, what about the military folks that have to staff them on these flights who Donald Trump blamed for Hope Hicks getting the virus last night when he called into Fox News, right? 18:06 What about Joe Biden, by the way, who had to be 10 feet away from him while he shot spittle at him and interrupted him and yelled at him and bullied him two nights ago? 18:17 These are the people that we should feel bad about, the people that were endangered by the reckless behavior of this White House and 18:23 Not like some random blue check who send a gleeful tweet. 18:27 It's just it's maddening. 18:28 Charlie Sykes Well, but that's the that's the go to strategy for the anti anti Trumpers, which is that you take the focus off of Trump and you find someone else who's behaved badly. 18:37 Although I did see this morning going through that litany. 18:40 I think it was like four years ago, almost to the day that Donald Trump is out there mocking and making fun of Hillary Clinton getting pneumonia. 18:49 So spare me some of the piety here. 18:52 Tim Miller Up on stage, hunched over. 18:55 Go watch the video. 18:56 I tweeted it. 18:57 Listeners, go watch this video. 18:58 And he's like hunched over, making fun of her, calling her weak, making a lot of the same motions that he made when he was making fun of the reporter who had a disability. 19:09 Screw these, screw this guy. 19:11 Okay. 19:11 So I hope he gets better and I hope we kick his ass in November, but like, but please spare me your fake righteous indignation. 19:19 I just cannot take it. 19:21 Charlie Sykes You know, under normal circumstances, Donald Trump would love a distraction this week. 19:25 Right. 19:26 I mean, because this has been a terrible, terrible week up until this, you know, but this is the worst possible distraction because it really does shift the focus back on everything you just mentioned is his own failures at the exact moment. 19:39 When he was in peak denial, I mean, he is gearing up his whole thing is, you know, good news about the coronavirus. 19:46 We reopened the economy. 19:47 We've beaten this thing. 19:48 I see some of the the usual fluffers on Fox News saying he'll come back stronger than ever when he beats this thing and strides onto the stage. 19:56 And no, I I agree with with I should have written down the name of the author from The Atlantic that that Trump's mishandling of the coronavirus defines his presidency. 20:06 You know, for the reasons you mentioned, he downplayed the severity of the disease. 20:09 He misled the country. 20:11 He tried to put the blame on local governments. 20:13 He famously said he did not take responsibility for the response. 20:17 He held those rallies. 20:19 He bullied the states into reopening. 20:21 He rejected all these safety measures. 20:22 He undermined trust in public health institutions. 20:26 And now the karma has come back and it has, you know, and this is the only thing. 20:31 Look, everybody in America is talking about this today. 20:34 You know, we could have had gone back and forth. 20:35 Like what percentage of Americans know about the New York Times story about taxes? 20:39 Big percentage. 20:40 But today we're at the I don't know. 20:43 This is we're at the 90 percent, you know, by the end of the weekend. 20:46 Right. 20:47 And here in Wisconsin, deaths, hospitalizations, infections are surging. 20:52 Republican politicians have been out for the last week saying the stupidest damn things about the coronavirus, and it's all just coming around on them. 21:01 I'm sorry. 21:02 It is one of those frustrating moments. 21:05 Tim Miller The amazing thing, Charlie, talking about these, not just the anti-anti-Trumpers, but the Republicans in Congress, the thing that I just have been marinating on this morning, 21:14 is like just this unbelievable human power to prevent yourself from admitting that you made a mistake. 21:26 Yeah. 21:26 You know, all of these incentives, this, this magnet that pulls all of us into not admitting that we made a mistake. 21:33 And I just, it's been, I know you feel this way. 21:36 It's been so freeing to just be like, you know what? 21:38 I was wrong about a few things. 21:39 And now I can actually tell people what I really think. 21:42 Because it is just, can you imagine, I know we play this game all the time, but can you imagine saying to somebody five years ago that, hey, Ben Sasse or somebody that we respected, Cory Gardner, you know, in five years, the president is going to be refusing to condemn white supremacists. 22:00 and presiding over a massive catastrophe that he lied about for months and months and refused to come up with a plan to deal with. 22:10 Over 200,000 people are dead, and now he has contracted the virus that's been the cause of these deaths himself through his own reckless disregard. 22:18 And you're going to just sit there silently and be like, yeah, I think we need the white supremacist candidate who managed this disaster for five more years. 22:28 Like, really? 22:28 None of them? 22:29 None of them have just want to just let it off their chest and be like, yeah, no, Joe Biden seems fine. 22:37 Charlie Sykes Let me come back to that, the white supremacist thing in a moment, because there have been some developments on this. 22:42 But my wife will yell at me about this, about the bingo card. 22:47 Among the possibilities here, and I'm going to give credit to Matt Lewis for pointing this out. 22:54 If Donald Trump was sick, has been sick for some time now, everybody that he's been in contact with is potentially at risk, including, are you ready for this? 23:06 Amy Coney Barrett and her whole family. 23:11 So think about that. 23:13 Last night, the president did make a sort of goes through his pro forma condemnation of the Proud Boys. 23:19 But this is the thing. 23:20 And I think I was actually on one of the shows last night and I was sort of inspired by something you had tweeted out. 23:26 Donald Trump generally has no problem making himself clear when he wants to insult somebody. 23:31 He does it. 23:32 I mean, if he wants to go after Mexicans or or, you know, Muslims, if he wants to attack the media, if he wants to go after John McCain, if he wants to 23:39 imply that Joe Scarborough is a psycho. 23:44 He has a way with words, right? 23:46 He seldom believes his meaning in doubt when he wants to say something negative about you. 23:51 The only times when he gets tongue-tied is with Russia, Vladimir Putin, and with white supremacists. 23:58 And it is interesting watching some of the folks going. 24:02 But he did condemn them. 24:03 He said the word sure, you know, because and that should be enough. 24:06 Right. 24:07 One sentence should be absolutely enough to to push back on all of these violent extremists that are out there. 24:13 These vigilantes, by the way, who are online posting videos threatening violence of the election. 24:21 I see. 24:23 I think there's there's there's two related stories here. 24:25 One is the issue of white supremacy, which he has botched over and over and over and over again. 24:31 That's number one. 24:32 Number two is his tacit encouragement of groups like Proud Boys and other violent thugs out there because he thinks that he might... 24:42 need them at some point. 24:44 I mean, and the recklessness and irresponsibility of that is off any chart that I can think of. 24:50 But, you know, it is interesting listening to Republicans. 24:54 Well, actually, you can't listen to them because they're silent. 24:57 But apparently they whisper to Robert Costa of The Washington Post, who's an excellent reporter, that they are troubled about this. 25:03 And they wish that the president would be clear about white supremacy and 25:09 Tim Miller, because I knew you were coming on the podcast. 25:11 I pulled this. 25:12 You've already had a rant on this. 25:13 I'm not going to ask you to repeat your rant. 25:15 You were on the Nicole Wallace show yesterday and you're commenting on Republicans who are clutching their pearls over the possibility that this president might actually have a soft spot for white races. 25:29 Let's play that. 25:30 Tim Miller you need to comment on something that that bob said here and that was in that new york times story i'm just so sick and tired of these people who are expressing unease privately on background to bob like honestly i wish they would just say that they like it 25:45 Because it's been five years now. 25:47 You know exactly what you're getting with this president. 25:49 He's defended white supremacists time and time again since he came down the damn escalator. 25:56 I can't tolerate this sense of, oh, I'm being uneasy, or oh, I wish in the next debate he would phrase things better. 26:04 This is Donald Trump. 26:06 If Donald Trump wants to condemn somebody, he'll condemn them. 26:10 He calls us human scum, Nicole. 26:12 He calls Joe Scarborough a psycho and a murderer. 26:16 Saying sure is not a condemnation. 26:17 Saying there are fine people on both sides is not a condemnation. 26:21 You know who he is. 26:22 If you want to condemn them, you would. 26:24 He doesn't want to condemn them because he likes them, because they're voting for him. 26:28 So so that's it. 26:29 If you want to be on board with him and on the white supremacist, the white supremacist, then be on board. 26:34 But don't like whisper to Bob that you're uneasy. 26:37 Give me a break. 26:39 Charlie Sykes You know, this would be the moment for all of those Republicans that are waiting for him to leave so they can come forward and say, you know, I was one of those who was always troubled, you know, really kind of screw that. 26:50 This would be the moment to actually speak up, wouldn't it be like now? 26:53 Right. 26:54 Tim Miller What is the argument for this guy at this point, Charlie? 26:57 There's no argument. 26:59 He's a disaster. 27:00 He's an unmitigated disaster. 27:02 And I just want to bring one point home. 27:04 You don't want to Costanza and get a second try after a rant like that. 27:08 Those words, by the way, that he uses about us and Joe Scarborough. 27:12 Human scum. 27:13 Those are all pretty great words to call white supremacists. 27:16 Human scum. 27:17 That's what they are. 27:18 I pulled up this Washington Post article that lists all his favorite insults. 27:22 Disgraced, terrible, diseased, psycho, stupid, lightweight, wacky, weak, little, sad, racist. 27:32 Hater. 27:33 Those are all great words for white supremacists. 27:35 He never seems to come up with them, though. 27:37 Isn't that interesting? 27:39 He comes up with, sure. 27:42 Charlie Sykes Sure. 27:43 Tim Miller Or they're like, I get these tweets sent at me from people who are like, here's a YouTube video of all the times Donald Trump has condemned white supremacists. 27:49 And it's like... 27:50 He's getting badgered by Jake Tapper on CNN, and he's like, fine. 27:55 Or they have one or two where they show him standing behind a podium, looking very stiff, awkwardly reading something off a teleprompter that you can tell that he's read for the first time. 28:07 It's like, why don't you show me a video of him actually showing some passion? 28:12 Because it's pretty easy for him to condemn people when he wants to. 28:16 And these are some people that deserve some condemnation. 28:19 You would think so. 28:20 Charlie Sykes Okay, so let's just circle back on the debate, which feels like now 100 years ago. 28:25 Is this going to be the longest month ever or what? 28:30 What day are we on? 28:32 We're only on... 28:33 Oh, God, it's only the second. 28:35 We're only the second of October. 28:38 I really loved Gary. 28:40 Do you see Gary Kasparov's tweet? 28:42 Crosstalk I did. 28:42 Charlie Sykes Which I thought was really good. 28:44 Let me see if I can just find it here. 28:47 What did I do with this? 28:48 Hold on. 28:49 Come on. 28:49 It was really good because he's been watching this for a long time. 28:54 Well, he said something like, oh, he said, it takes a lot to impress a Russian with surprises in October, but this one is off to a rather impressive start. 29:02 You know what the amazing thing about that was? 29:04 He actually tweeted that before we found out about Trump and Melania having this. 29:08 Tim Miller Well, literally, this happened to me. 29:10 I did a list of all the crazy things that had happened yesterday on MSNBC last night. 29:15 And I tweeted that with like, I wish I'd become a shepherd instead of going into politics. 29:21 And that was before Donald Trump contracted the virus. 29:25 And it's been that kind of month. 29:28 Charlie Sykes Well, let's go back to the to the debate, which seems so, so long ago, because so you were on MS. 29:35 I was on Hacks on Tap with David Axelrod and Robert Gibbs, humble brag. 29:39 And we were talking about the debate. 29:42 And, you know, I had a number of takes from the debate, obviously, the ones that people, you know, focused on the. 29:48 But as I get further away from it, the one that really sticks in my mind is something that that that. 29:57 it's something that sort of fed back to me. 29:59 And Adam Serwer in The Atlantic has a piece about it as the most illuminating moment. 30:03 It was when Trump interrupts Biden talking about his dead hero son to attack his other son as being a deadbeat, the lack of any sort of empathy whatsoever. 30:17 And Joe Biden is talking about his son, what he had done. 30:20 And 30:21 And clearly Trump had no connection, no interest in talking about it, interrupts a grieving father. 30:27 So here you have this moment, which I think a lot of Americans, of all political persuasions, you know, this is a country that's had a lot of grief, is seeing Joe Biden talk, you know, a grieving father talking about his son. 30:42 And all Trump can do is use that as an occasion to pivot, to attack Trump. 30:47 Hunter Biden for having a drug problem. 30:49 And then Joe Biden turns to the camera and says, I still love my son. 30:55 You know, like a father. 30:57 He did what most parent would do or wish you would do. 31:02 So, you know, Trump's the kind of guy who 31:05 You know, and then he tells the story when when Donald Jr. was was born. 31:11 Trump apparently asked, well, you know, what you know, what should we name him? 31:16 And Ivana, his wife at the time, says, well, how about Donald Jr.? 31:20 And and Trump says, well, what if he turns out to be a loser? 31:23 So, I mean, you want to talk about just the different, the crudeness, the lack of empathy on something that I think people can relate to. 31:30 You know, we tend to focus on the political stuff like, well, you know, is he going to accept the result of the election or what is he saying about this or the white supremacist? 31:38 I think that hit people at a very visceral level. 31:42 Tim Miller I think it might have as well. 31:44 It certainly hit people who have been affected by this. 31:46 And this is another thing. 31:49 There are a lot of people out there that have had real life impacts when it comes to both the opioid crisis and substance abuse and have had real life impacts as a result of this virus, obviously, with 200,000 plus and having lost a family member. 32:03 And so those folks do look at this stuff differently and do listen and hear them differently than those of us who are kind of in this political morass. 32:13 Yeah. 32:15 And then who don't have that kind of close relationship with these kinds of tragedies. 32:20 So I do think that's possible. 32:22 Yeah. 32:23 Charlie Sykes It was a very human moment. 32:25 Tim Miller Just really quick, I have one other debate thought, because I've done a bunch of post-debate podcasts, and we did one that night where we'd all had a couple cocktails, and then me and Sarah and JVL did one, and now here we are three days later, and I don't have any data yet. 32:44 We are doing some polling on the Republican voters against Trump side, which we should have next week, but... 32:49 But I'm starting to wonder if maybe I do have TDS a little bit, but in the wrong way, like where I've just been so beaten down by Trump and by the last the result of 2016 that maybe I don't kind of see clearly what the swing voter, what the casual observer of politics, how they see this is. 33:12 Because there are just some signs, I don't want to get everybody too excited yet, but there are some signs based on the public polling and what I've heard from friends who are on campaigns, that there has been a really negative effect for Trump and Republicans over the last three days, even before yesterday's craziness. 33:30 And I do wonder if there are people who are low info voters who have just been really tuning them out for three years. 33:37 And they're like, I voted for him. 33:39 I wanted something to happen. 33:40 It sounds like all this crazy stuff's happening, but it isn't really affecting my life much. 33:44 And I'm not really paying that close of attention. 33:46 And, you know, I think the media is over does it with how crazy he is. 33:50 Their hair's on fire all the time. 33:52 And then they watched him actually for the first time for like an hour and a half. 33:56 They really sat and watched him and are like, 33:59 I just can't do this anymore. 34:01 I think that there was some of that. 34:06 Charlie Sykes I think this is a really important point because I think there are millions of Americans that think that, oh, Trump's crazy because of these crazy tweets, but there's probably a wink, wink, wink behind it. 34:17 And so we are shocked that they are shocked to see who in fact he is, right? 34:22 So what what happens before I get on? 34:27 This is the big unknown. 34:29 What happens? 34:29 Will there be other debates? 34:30 He's going to be in isolation for 14 days. 34:33 Allegedly, there's going to be a lot of questions about how he's handling it. 34:38 So, I mean, what happens in the in the campaign? 34:40 I quoted one of these early responses, you know, people going. 34:46 You know, what does this mean for the campaign? 34:49 I mean, he's 70, you know, he's 74 years old. 34:52 He remains. 34:52 He's got some mild symptoms. 34:54 At least we're being told he's going to have to withdraw from the campaign trail and stay isolated in the White House. 34:59 If he becomes sick, it could raise questions about whether he should remain on the ballot at all. 35:03 I'm reading from The New York Times. 35:05 I mean, okay, reality check, he's going to be on the ballot. 35:08 There's no way he's not going to be on the ballot. 35:10 Tim Miller Yeah. 35:10 And just, again, I'm not an actuary really quick, but as we consider these options, I just want to just throw this out there. 35:15 My understanding is that, you know, even somebody at his age that has comorbidities, you still have a 95% survival, right? 35:27 And it's not as if that this is, you know, this guy's on his deathbed. 35:30 So I do think we should consider that context when thinking about what the impact is. 35:37 Charlie Sykes Right. 35:37 No, I think that's important. 35:38 The odds are that he will recover. 35:43 There are risk factors and there are many people that survive this who still are impaired in a variety of ways. 35:52 There are a lot of people. 35:53 I have relatives who live in the New Rochelle area in New York and a lot of people there were really hit early on. 36:00 and many people in his neighborhood were on ventilators. 36:04 All of them survived. 36:06 All of them were severely damaged by this disease. 36:10 So we got to throw this out. 36:11 So politically what happens, we go into yesterday, 36:15 Donald Trump is down by seven or eight points nationally. 36:19 He's fighting on defense in states that should not even be contested. 36:23 Amazingly, and I wanted to sort of underline that word amazingly, he's being outspent heavily by Joe Biden and the Democrats, who now are in the position of having so much money that they're having a hard time figuring out how to spend it all. 36:38 So what what what is the state of the race going to be a week from from now? 36:44 I mean, obviously, nobody knows. 36:45 Tim Miller Yeah. 36:46 Can I give the terrible pundit answer to that, which is who the hell knows? 36:49 Well, that's right. 36:50 Charlie Sykes That's the honest answer, too. 36:51 Tim Miller Yeah. 36:52 Charlie Sykes But it's not. 36:53 It can't be good for Trump unless unless people just decide, oh, that poor man. 36:58 Tim Miller I don't think that you're going to get that. 37:00 I don't know that you'll get this rally around Trump effect. 37:05 I think that it's possible. 37:07 Again, you have to think about who these voters are that are moving the polls at this point. 37:11 It's mostly people that voted for him last time that don't really like him. 37:16 And so could a percentage or two of them feel some sympathy or whatever and slide back in polls that pop next week? 37:25 Certainly. 37:27 Could some percentage of those people say this is just the final straw and I just can't with this guy anymore. 37:35 It's just too crazy and it's just too chaotic. 37:38 Yeah. 37:38 And could he drop a couple more points? 37:41 Yeah. 37:42 You know, I don't think, you know, not we're not going to see a five point swing either way. 37:45 This is Donald Trump. 37:46 He's been within a four point favorability rating his entire presidency. 37:51 So I could see it going both ways. 37:54 But it's hard to know what the outside impacts are. 37:57 Just as another political impact, as you look at the Amy Coney Barrett thing, which you mentioned earlier. 38:01 I'm just seeing right now, Mike Lee put out a tweet saying that he has tested positive for coronavirus as well and that he'll remain isolated for the next 10 days. 38:13 Charlie Sykes Republican U.S. senator. 38:15 Tim Miller Yeah, he'll stay isolated for the next 10 days. 38:17 So he did add that he still looks forward to advancing Judge Amy Coney Barrett. 38:21 I still suspect, look, Mitch is not going to let a little contagion prevent him from getting his judge, especially with the negative writing on the wall about the post-election. 38:32 So I still, this is not an area where I would have our liberal listeners getting their hopes up, but... 38:37 Charlie Sykes you know crazier things have happened and and depending on like in the last 12 hours yeah i mean that that's that's the thing i mean we're living in a moment where think of the craziest thing you possibly can imagine and it happens so i you're right i mean i i assume that she's going to be pushed through particularly um as they begin to realize that donald trump you know is going to lose this election um they they don't want to do it in a lame duck session i mean they want to 39:02 They want to bank the win and then whatever happens, happens here. 39:06 But I mean, this is one of those those moments where I mean, I remember very distinctly the night of October 7th, 2016. 39:15 Remember October 7th, 2016? 39:17 I bet you even know what happened on October 7th. 39:20 Was that the tape? 39:22 Yep, absolutely. 39:23 And we're all sitting up late at night going, oh, my gosh, this campaign's over. 39:27 Is Donald Trump going to withdraw? 39:29 Reince Priebus, chairman of the Republican National Committee, is telling Donald Trump that day. 39:36 that he had two choices, that either he stays on and suffers an historic defeat or he steps aside and maybe somebody will be able to take his place and win this election. 39:46 And as we know, less than a month later, he's elected president of the United States. 39:50 So this is a guy. 39:52 However, this is a guy who can come back. 39:55 On the other hand, it's you can't use the same playbook to come back from this. 40:01 that he used four years ago, right? 40:03 I mean, he can't troop in a group of women because the coronavirus just is not as spinnable as Hillary Clinton was. 40:10 Tim Miller Yeah, I mean, I guess the Russians could hack Ron Klain's email or something. 40:14 So yeah, I mean, I guess that could happen still. 40:16 People are waiting on that. 40:17 Okay, no, you mentioned- And the debates though, to your point, I mean, he could bring Hunter's baby mama to the next debate, but who knows if he even can make it to the next debate. 40:25 It's on the 15th, which is just outside of the isolation window. 40:29 Charlie Sykes I do wonder what what I mean, look, I think there's there's a 90 percent chance that he's going to show up for the debate. 40:35 I'm sorry. 40:36 I said this yesterday. 40:37 There was a 90 percent chance because, you know, Donald Trump doesn't like to give up the possibility of being seen by 70 million people. 40:44 So for him to walk away from that would be very off brand, except that, remember, he has boycotted debates in the past. 40:50 And remember when he when he didn't go to the Fox News debate because of Megyn Kelly. 40:55 We leave that aside for a moment. 40:57 And then he held his own rally for for veterans. 41:00 So it's not totally out of the realm of possibility that he could say, play the victim card, the grievance card. 41:06 If they want to change the rules, come up with some sort of excuse and then hold an event that puts him back in his own comfort zone. 41:12 So I don't know what's going to happen here. 41:15 I will tell you. 41:16 And this this this is a huge story. 41:19 But it's like number 12 now that clearly there's not going to be a coronavirus, a pandemic stimulus package. 41:30 The House voted. 41:31 The negotiations fell apart. 41:33 It's not going to happen. 41:35 Jobs numbers came out today. 41:37 We're below expectations. 41:39 A lot of people are falling off the cliff. 41:40 Massive layoffs at Disney and the airlines. 41:45 This is amazing to me, Tim. 41:47 Because I'm glad you wrote this up, Charlie. 41:49 OK, because this is amazing to me. 41:51 Again, I've used the word amazing so many times because I'm so constantly amazed. 41:56 This was very much in Donald Trump's interest to get a deal done, even if it was a lousy deal from his point of view. 42:01 So I find it remarkable that that he did not basically say, yeah, let's just take whatever the Democrats are offering. 42:08 I'm going to take it. 42:10 I'm going to claim credit for it. 42:11 I won't invite them to the signing ceremony. 42:13 I'm going to put my name on all the checks, but I'm going to get them out. 42:15 How did this not happen if you're Donald Trump? 42:18 Tim Miller Yeah. 42:19 This was another thing I wrote for the Bulwark earlier this week, maybe last week. 42:22 Who knows? 42:23 What is time? 42:24 Time's a flat circle. 42:25 It was about the fake populism of Donald Trump, about how he sold the public on this. 42:32 He'll raise taxes on himself maybe even, and he'll go after the big banks and the big tech companies and 42:40 The globalist elites and like he didn't really do any of that unless you consider mean tweets to be going after them. 42:47 And all he did is cut their taxes and make life better for them. 42:51 And while he spent like zero time caring about infrastructure and other jobs packages or things, coronavirus safety precautions that might help working class people. 43:01 And this is just another example of how big of a fraud it is. 43:05 But it's not only an example of the fraud, but I think the more interesting thing is just the degree to the level of political malpractice. 43:16 I mean, Donald Trump has literally no reason in the world to follow... 43:22 Larry Kudlow, supply side economics. 43:25 He ran, he won the primary by giving the stiff arm to all those guys. 43:30 So say what you want about whether you think the government's spending too much and think we need lower taxes and less stimulus and the fact that you're an anti-Keynesian. 43:41 Trump ran on not caring about any of that. 43:45 And so he had a mandate that 43:47 to put through a massive Trumpy stimulus package where he could put his big name on the check and give everybody free money. 43:55 And the Republicans would have went on board with it and gone through with it. 43:59 I mean, this is, you know, this was a huge problem. 44:02 missed political opportunity and it's just mind-boggling to me and it just shows how um you know this is not a person that thought about any of this in any coherent manner and he's just so obsessed with his own little grievances and of whatever made him mad on cable news that day that he couldn't even bully around steve mnuchin and larry kudlow and be like what are you nerds doing like let's give people money 44:28 Charlie Sykes Well, again, this is this is such an obvious play. 44:33 Now, one argument is that, well, Mitch McConnell said that there there was no support. 44:39 They wouldn't be able to deliver the Republicans in the Senate because suddenly they've become born again fiscal conservatives. 44:45 At this moment in history with this president, it's hard for me to imagine that if he sat down and said, look, we absolutely have to do this. 44:54 We are in this together. 44:55 We cannot allow millions of Americans to go under. 44:58 You know, this is the kind of thing that has real world consequences right now. 45:03 God damn it. 45:03 Get it done. 45:04 And yet he didn't. 45:05 He maybe tweeted out we ought to do something about it. 45:08 But so now the optics of and I don't want to spend a lot of time talking about the Supreme Court here. 45:13 But, you know, there's gonna be high drama of the Senate's going to come back together to confirm a Supreme Court justice. 45:19 You know, every Democrat's got a talking point now. 45:21 Right. 45:22 That that this is a Senate that was able to rush through this Supreme Court nomination, but they couldn't get their act together to help you out. 45:30 The average American who's sinking in this pandemic recession. 45:36 And that strikes me as a killer talking point. 45:39 Tim Miller A gift of a talking point. 45:41 Right at the core of this Trump, Obama, Trump voter base. 45:48 Yes. 45:48 And so, you know, again, a lot of times people think about groups like this like they're a monolith. 45:52 Like all of the Obama Trumpers are just these kind of racist white guys in red hats who had had enough and are now Republicans forever. 45:59 Yeah. 45:59 It's not that. 46:01 Like some of these people have gone full MAGA. 46:05 Yeah. 46:05 But a huge portion of them are just, you know, swing voters, but the opposite of kind of what you think of, which is like the suburban moderate, right? 46:15 Like they're the opposite kind. 46:16 They're anti-immigration, but also are pro-Obamacare and pro-choice. 46:22 So for them, it's like a double whammy. 46:24 You're going to jam through the Supreme Court justice that might take away the ACA and that might take away Roe v. Wade, while at the same time not giving me any relief for this pandemic. 46:36 And it is the anti, it's the most anti-populist combo of things imaginable for the Senate to do in the last month before the election. 46:47 So yeah, I think that it's 46:49 um a very very big uh political um risk but more than that it's just a screw up it's a it's a screw up and i think that it's going to be a gift to joe biden i i completely agree okay uh one other thing i wanted to talk about uh since we've been sort of on rolling outrage is um 47:07 Charlie Sykes The governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, did something really amazing yesterday. 47:11 I don't know how many counties are in Texas. 47:14 They have a lot of, what, like 500 counties or something like that, right? 47:17 I mean, it's just like, but that limits each county to just one drop box for absentee ballots, which would include Harris County. 47:27 So you have these vast counties with millions of people the size of the state of Delaware, and the governor is saying you can only have one drop box. 47:36 I don't know what his rationale for this is, but from where I'm sitting, it just seems breathtaking in sort of just the audacity of his willingness to suppress the vote. 47:52 We've kind of moved the Overton window. 47:53 See, a guy like me, I've been in conservative politics for years, and for years I would argue, no, it's not true that Republicans want to suppress the vote. 48:00 That's exaggerated. 48:01 We don't do this. 48:02 We just want to protect the integrity of the vote. 48:06 And now that window key has moved to, yeah, I guess we are going to suppress the vote to, yeah, screw it. 48:12 We're not even going to pretend that we want to have as few people. 48:15 We want to make it as hard as possible to vote. 48:18 And they're doing this in the state of Texas. 48:21 which in theory shouldn't be a scary place for Republicans. 48:25 So what is going on in Texas? 48:27 I mean, it just looks on the outside as just this pure, raw, arrogant vote suppression move. 48:34 Tim Miller Is there another side to that story? 48:36 I think the most interesting thing to your point is that this is Texas and that they're worried. 48:40 And I think they're not necessarily worried about Biden and Trump because if Biden wins Texas, he'd already won anyway. 48:46 But they're worried about losing the state legislature. 48:48 And this is the downstream effect of Trump. 48:51 And so if you look at... 48:53 Oh, man, I need my coffee. 48:56 Harris County, which is where Houston is. 48:58 Yeah, right. 48:59 You know, as you're saying, which is like the size of Delaware, Rhode Island or whatever. 49:02 Now they have one drop off place. 49:03 This is where a lot of these swing districts are in the state house and state Senate races and in the house race. 49:09 It's like where Chip Roy's district is. 49:10 He might lose. 49:11 And so I think that I think it's pretty clear that this is what they're doing. 49:15 They're looking for any possible advantage to 49:18 lessen the turnout in these blue areas of the state. 49:25 I mean, it's truly alarming. 49:27 And I think, Charlie... 49:30 That we've gotten to this nihilistic point with this where they really are just going to own it. 49:36 Republicans are just going to own this now because it's going to be part and parcel with how they stay in power. 49:41 It's part and parcel with why you don't want to reconsider any reapportionment. 49:47 It's part and parcel of the Senate breakdown of the Electoral College. 49:50 It's just part of the deal now. 49:51 Like this is the game. 49:53 This is the game that's been set. 49:54 We set up this little Rube Goldberg system. 49:56 It's worked forever and we can't do anything to change it. 49:58 And we're within our rights to do everything we can to to to maximize our advantage here, that there's no there's no interest in promoting democracy writ large. 50:07 That's a that's a silly norm for just, you know, people in Washington care about. 50:13 But but this is all about winning. 50:15 Charlie Sykes I do think that that word nihilism is appropriate here because there is a belief in sort of nothing other than, okay, we can do it, so let's do it. 50:24 We win, you lose. 50:25 It's all about power. 50:27 But it's also part and parcel of this retreat from any sort of politics or persuasion. 50:38 You know, they're not trying to reach out to people. 50:42 It is just sort of like we're just going to, you know, pound our base and we're going to suppress the other guy's base. 50:48 And then we will litigate. 50:49 We will do whatever it takes to hold on the power. 50:52 So but the Texas thing just struck me as as being just so naked. 50:57 You know, we were going to talk about the naked ballots. 50:58 Oh, by the way. 50:59 People ought to check out Tim's fantastic new feature on Snapchat where you talked about naked ballots, the naked ballots in Pennsylvania. 51:08 But this just seemed like a naked power play. 51:10 Tim Miller Yeah, it is. 51:11 It's the Not My Party show, which feels so out of date. 51:15 It's like, how am I supposed to make this show? 51:17 That's why I'm trying to focus on big topics that are interesting to people because it's like you can't tape something on Tuesday and air it on Thursday and have any hope of being even in the ballpark of what's on the news. 51:27 And so I talked about this Pennsylvania situation. 51:29 This is crazy, Charlie. 51:30 And, you know, in this case, I guess you can blame the Republicans for litigating about this rather than just kind of letting it go. 51:37 But it was a judge and I think a Democrat appointed judge. 51:41 who ruled on this. 51:43 So it is the letter of the law. 51:44 It just needs to be changed in Pennsylvania. 51:45 But people in Pennsylvania who mail in their ballots in one envelope rather than also in the safety envelope, the second envelope, those ballots aren't going to count. 51:55 And they said that could be as many as 80,000 votes. 51:58 That is insane to me that somebody who is... 52:01 where their intention is clear of who they're trying to vote for, that you would sue to try to stop their vote over some ridiculous technicality. 52:11 And so if this race does tighten and, you know, we end up with a close race in these states, this is what we're going to be spending all of December and January talking about on this podcast, the Count Act. 52:24 And how we litigate these sorts of things. 52:26 Charlie Sykes And I can imagine doing that. 52:27 I really can. 52:29 So if you're in Pennsylvania, no nude ballots. 52:31 Just make sure you don't do that sort of thing because it's – I just don't want American democracy to be held hostage by naked ballots. 52:39 That's the – 52:41 That's, you know, that's it. 52:42 Oh, and then, of course, one of the highlights, if, you know, if all this other stuff hadn't happened, was that exchange at the White House about who is they and what is the river? 52:52 Because the president talked about they found all these ballots in a river somewhere. 52:56 And a reporter, I think from Fox, was asking Kelley, 53:01 Never mind. 53:02 Yeah, I'm always burned out. 53:04 The press secretary whose name I have like intentionally not learned to pronounce, Kayleigh McEnany, whatever, and saying, you know, well, who was they and where's the river? 53:16 And it's obvious the president is just making shit up. 53:19 And, you know, about these ballots. 53:22 And he's going to continue doubling down on all of that so that you not only have the litigation, you have just the overlay of disinformation with the president being the vector, you know, the most effective vector. 53:34 I mean, we don't need Vladimir Putin or Russian interference, right? 53:37 Because we have the president of the United States throwing this stuff. 53:39 Tim Miller This is everything. 53:39 I mean, I just, I hate sounding like a resistance cliche, but it's just everything Vladimir ever dreamed of. 53:45 That's all he wanted was to discredit our system. 53:50 That was the whole purpose of all this, to create chaos, to increase the internal tensions within the country and to undermine the credibility of the system. 54:02 It's like check, check, check. 54:05 And the president of the United States is out there doing this. 54:08 And again, it's just like you can't, nobody even makes a big deal out of it. 54:14 This is like the most unimaginable action by a president. 54:18 When all of us, Charlie, we're going to these conventions and we're talking about how much we cared about democracy and how great America was and American exceptionalism, to think that a president from our party would be out here spreading garbage lies about how our democracy is phony and sounding like Russia today. 54:36 It just is unimaginable. 54:38 Charlie Sykes And yet it is. 54:40 Now, you and I are going to be talking. 54:41 We're uneasy in private. 54:43 Yeah. 54:44 So you and I are going to be talking about Andrew Weissman next week sometime on the podcast, who was one of Bob Mueller's deputies who has a book out now about the inside the Mueller investigation, which I am reading. 54:54 And I have to tell you, it is a hard read. 54:57 I mean, it's an easy read, but I have to actually put it down every once in a while because I have to like go, go take, you know, take a deep breath and walk around. 55:03 I mean, it's so it is it is so bad. 55:04 And I know he's getting some pushback. 55:07 People say, well, he betrayed Bob Mueller. 55:09 No, you know what? 55:10 He's he's explaining what happened. 55:12 And this is this is important to understand this for for people who are tempted to get numbed about all of this. 55:18 So. 55:19 Oh, so. 55:20 Tim Miller I was going to save it for this weekend, but I don't know if my blood pressure can handle it, Charlie. 55:24 Maybe could you just give me the best pages to read or something? 55:27 I don't know if I can do the whole thing. 55:29 Charlie Sykes My poor heart rate is too high already. 55:32 I know. 55:32 Okay, so just read the beginning where he's driving in the car. 55:36 And he's going from New York to Washington. 55:40 And he's sort of relaxing because they've finished up the work. 55:43 They've turned in the report and everything. 55:45 And he knows that, you know, Bill Barr is going to say something, you know, but he's cruising along listening to the radio. 55:51 And then the report comes on CNN. 55:52 He must have been listening to Sirius XM or something. 55:54 And the report comes on that Bill Barr has issued a four page letter. 55:58 He goes, well, I can't be right. 55:59 And that and that basically, you know, does the Bill Barr thing about, you know, exonerates the president. 56:04 And he says, oh, this this can't be CNN is going to retract this soon. 56:07 Right. 56:08 Because I know what we actually wrote and what we actually did. 56:12 And it starts with how shocked. 56:15 He was by the flagrant lies and dishonesty of the attorney general of the United States. 56:22 And if that's the point where you're going, OK, because we live through this and it's all flashing back on us. 56:28 But you know what? 56:29 This weekend's outrages are sufficient. 56:32 We'll worry about that. 56:33 Next week, we ought to let people know you have stepped up and you are doing a special Sunday newsletter for Bulwark Plus. 56:42 You've taken over, so you're going to spend your Saturday writing a newsletter that if people have signed up at the Bulwark for our newsletters, you will get that in your email box on Sunday. 56:52 Tim Miller Um, you know, and it's every week I'm like, I don't know how many, you know, I said, I'll do this till the election, till a national emergency is over. 56:59 Um, I'm like, you know, I could use it as it could be an outlet, you know, maybe where I could, cause it's like the triad style, like JBL's emails, if you get them where it's one or two important matters. 57:07 And then third, the third thing is maybe, you know, something of interest. 57:11 I thought it would be this great outlet for me to expose the Bulwark fans to all of my other varied interests. 57:20 I think it will be mostly about the tumbling collapse of this White House and of our democracy instead. 57:30 It will be an uplifting Sunday morning read for everybody with their coffee. 57:33 It's worth your $10 a month. 57:35 Charlie Sykes Yeah, no, it's interesting you mentioned that about all of your other interests and everything, because I have a lot of other interests as well, but I have a hard time being interested in them these days. 57:43 So I actually have to force myself to be interested in those other things, because we want we look forward to going back to being well-rounded individuals, don't we? 57:52 Sometime. 57:53 I can't wait, Charlie. 57:54 I can't wait. 57:55 Your lips to God's ears. 57:56 Yeah. 57:56 Tim Miller, thank you so much for joining me for this. 57:59 So it's going to be our special Bulwark Weekend podcast. 58:02 We will be back on Monday and we will do this all over again. 58:06 There are, what, 32 days to go until Election Day. 58:10 And how much more can we take of this? 58:12 Thanks, Tim. 58:13 Appreciate it. 58:14 See you, Charlie. 58:15 Okay.