We ARE going back!
en
January 27, 2025
TLDR: Talking about Jan 6 pardons, Trump's cabinet, FEMA funding and possible Third term. Panel members: Robert George, Rachel Semigan, Joe Killian, Rachel Niswander. World's Youngest Stand-up Comedian discusses his rivalry with his dad.

In this lively episode of Electoral Dysfunction, host Tom Brennan and a dynamic panel explore the implications of Donald Trump’s re-election as the 47th president. From January 6 pardons to FEMA funding and a potential non-consecutive third term for Trump, the discussion is rich with insights from various perspectives. The episode features guests Robert George, Rachel Semigan, Joe Killian, and the world’s youngest stand-up comedian, making for an engaging discourse.
Key Topics Discussed
1. Trump’s Return and Its Consequences
- The panel reflects on Trump’s inauguration and the significance of returning to a familiar presidency. Tom highlights the ease of not needing to learn new names.
- Trump’s administration is marked by controversy, particularly surrounding his pardons for those involved in the January 6 insurrection. The panel debates the implications these pardons have on justice and accountability.
- Robert George expresses concern that Trump’s implementation of laws suggests a backlash against civil rights initiatives established since the 1960s, indicating a desire to revert certain social progress.
2. Trump's Cabinet Appointments
- The panel discusses Trump’s cabinet choices, such as Kristi Noem for Homeland Security and Pete Hegseth as Secretary of Defense. Joe Killian questions the credentials of these nominees and whether they truly qualify for their roles.
- The conversation touches on the politics surrounding these nominations, with some members discussing the implications of Democrats voting for controversial figures to maintain political stability.
3. The Role of FEMA and Disaster Management
- The conversation shifts to Trump’s comments on FEMA, where he suggests reforms or even its elimination. The panelists worry about the repercussions of such changes, emphasizing that bipartisan support for FEMA has historically been crucial during disasters.
- Joe Killian shares insights on the aftermath of hurricanes in North Carolina and questions whether the public would support abandoning FEMA, leading to a broader discussion of disaster recovery policy.
4. Cultural References and Humor
- Amidst serious reflections, the youngest stand-up comedian provides comic relief, utilizing humor to highlight observations about family dynamics and contemporary parenting issues. This segment drives home the juxtaposition between humor and heavy topics, providing a lighter touch to the serious discussions.
- The panel celebrates the unifying power of sports, particularly football, and how it offers a temporary escape from political and personal stressors.
Expert Opinions
- Rachel Semigan shares her insights into the normalization of extreme behavior in politics, pointing to recent events such as Elon Musk’s Nazi salute and its implications for American values.
- Robert George reflects on the GOP’s shift over time, concluding that while the political landscape is tumultuous, there may still be checks on how far certain ideologies can go.
Conclusion
This podcast episode delivers a thought-provoking discussion on the current political climate in America under Trump's presidency. The panelists dissect serious issues with a mix of humor and alarming realities, making it clear that understanding the implications of these political shifts is crucial for all citizens.
Key Takeaway: As the nation navigates the Trump administration's return, awareness and vigilance regarding the potential regression of civil rights and societal norms is essential for fostering a more equitable democracy.
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from a bunker in beautiful Parkchester of the Bronx. It's electoral dysfunction.
Now, here's your host, Tom Brennan. Hey, everyone. Welcome back to Electoral Dysfunction, the show where comedians and experts debate the news of the week from the safety of a Zoom screen. I'm your host, Tom Brennan. Thanks for being with us for another week, and it's official. Electoral Dysfunction has now entered its fourth presidency that we're doing shows with, and boy,
We're thrilled for it to be one we knew before, because you don't have to remember names this time. We're real excited. Donald John Trump is president that has never gotten easy to say in almost a decade. But we're doing this again, so welcome back. And great show today, wonderful panel. Before we get there, just a quick reminder to our fans in the Philadelphia area. We are doing a live show Saturday, February 15th at Plays and Players Theater with our old pals from
Crossroads comedy. Yeah, that's their name. Sorry, Mike, that I forgot the name of your theater for a second. It's gonna be a great show. I don't want to talk about the panel yet because as people who do shows and have seen the show know people sometimes cancel at the last second, but man, if these people don't bail on me, it's gonna be one of our best shows ever.
So check it out February 15 tickets on sale at the link in the show notes. And as mentioned, you know, it's a brand new administration. The future of the country is on our mind. And there's one thing we love to do in this show. It's give opportunities for new and upcoming talents. We're very excited to have with us all it says on my notes from the producers, but I'm very excited. The the youngest stand up comedian alive. Hello. Welcome to the show. Mama.
no, I'm just playing Google Gaga folks. How you doing? How you doing Tom? Great to be here. Great to be here. Oh my goodness. You are in fact a baby. But all right. Well, welcome. Please thrilled to have you take it away. Youngest stand of comedian on the planet.
Thank you so much for that introduction, really means a lot. You know, really excited to be doing something at a new venue like this on a podcast. You know, normally I typically perform at the open mics in the R. Kelly, not that one day care. So it's really, really excited to be here for this. Now a little bit about me. I just turned two last week. Yeah, just turned two. Terrible twos, they call it, but a terrible two.
I call my parents. Oh, man. Yikes burn on them. Happy birthday to you, by the way. Oh, thank you so much. Thank you so much. Actually, for my birthday, I just got this. I got this new notebook. Oh, my goodness. That's the blues clues notebook. I remember that. I got to watch an episode of homicide life on the street where Steve was the murderer.
Exactly folks. This guy knows what's up This is my yes my new notebook. I actually stole this from the actual blues to his guy Okay, it's just the real one, you know, yeah, I was watching him on the on the TV, right? He keeps asking me all these questions and he just sits there for way too long, you know, he's like what do you think? I can't thank it anymore. He's staring at me making weird eye contact, you know, it's like and I get this fancy little uh Nope book for my for my little jokes, you know, folks
You know what's up. I feel, please continue. Now, you know, Tom, audience folks listening at home, you know, I'm sure you're wondering, you know, how did such a tiny, skinny, gorgeous baby develop such an interesting vernacular, you know?
Let me tell you, some parents play Mozart when they're kids in the womb. Not my my folks. She played Rodney Dangerfield. I was literally conceived when my mother was getting no respect. That's dark as hell. You know what's up my guy. Let me tell you folks.
Mommy days, I'm crazy stuff's been happening to me folks. Okay. The other day, you're not going to believe it's Tom. Okay. And the other day, crawled in on my dad, sucking my mom's tits. It's like, get your own set pal. Okay. Literally a dips on those since I was born. All right. Talk about some mommy milkers. Am I right big guy? Hey. Oh, Lord.
Let me tell you something else, okay? Something the other day really starting to get under my soft wrinkle-free baby skin, all right? I overheard my parents talking about wanting to hire a babysitter. You hear about this? I've heard of them, yeah. You hear about babysitters?
Yeah, I've heard I've been a while, but yes. You're a very smart man. You're a very smart man. But, you know, baby, babysitter, I'm going, well, you're going to hire some broad to sit on me? At least wait until I'm old enough to enjoy it. Hey, hey, folks, man, I can't eat salads, but eat that. You know what I'm saying? You're an old subject. You're an old subject. About time. Sadly, I do.
Man, this guy knows his stuff. Folks, now Tom rattled me this, OK? Rattle me this, OK? When I came out of my mom.
I was 20 inches. Came out of my mouth. 20 inches. Now, how's that possible? Because only five inches went in. Hey, talking about my dad's little feet is a boy. But for the ladies listening on the line, the five inches isn't genetic. You know what I'm saying?
Okay, good board. Now folks, I gotta, I gotta tell you something. Okay, I actually, I actually just pooped my diaper. It's one of the wet ones. It's up your back. So I think I got a blast, but thank you so much for having me on the show. Thank you so much to the youngest comedian alive. My goodness.
And, you know, what more can be said to that with that Ned Thorne, let's kick it over to the panel. And join me in welcoming this week's panel. First up, we're very excited to have him back from the great state of North Carolina. He is the Greensboro editor for the assembly. Joe Killian's with us. Joe, how are you? I'm doing well, thanks.
Thank you for being here. Also with us, first of all, I mean, by the time this pod is dropped on Monday, this could be a statement of glory or a statement of refusal to give in. And that's what this week's all about. Go birds themselves. Rachel Santa-Grands with us. Hey, Rachel, how are you? I am feeling very go birds. Good. Excellent. Hey, my dream of a Philly versus Buffalo Super Bowl, you know, it could be in reach.
I am sick of the Chiefs. I mean, we love Andy Reed, no shade there, but they're done. It's time for the popular guys to get their come up in the high school rom-com that is the NFL right now. And I live about two blocks away from a South Philly Chiefs bar. And those guys, they could also use a little bit of humbling, so I'll just say that.
Well, meanwhile, you got the commander's fans taking over the Philadelphia hard rock. You know, I thought all the clowns in the Washington circus were in the Capitol sounds like they were at the Philly hard rock. Speaking of want one, our last panelists rogue, punted at large, a man without a country himself, Robert George, Robert, how you doing?
I'm doing okay, Tom. You know, interesting week for everybody, but yeah, I'm doing okay. And sorry to get in Rachel's face, but I'm kind of rooting for the Chiefs over the bills. So interesting. I'm a bandwagon hopper. Yeah, wow. That's interesting because there's only one New York football team and you're rooting against them. That's interesting, Robert. There you go. There you go.
I mean, the only thing that I'll give the Chiefs is I hate Tom Brady so much. Like, I hate Tom Brady with every fiber of my being. And I'm like, okay, if Patrick Mahomes can outgoat him, fine. I don't like Patrick Mahomes either, but I hate Tom Brady and his stupid face. It's at the same transit, Paul.
policy proposition for me. Property, thank you, transitive property. I'm a Jets fan and Brady has humiliated us, Brady and Bella check and so forth have humiliated us for like the last 25, almost 25 years. And so anything that can like push Brady down a little bit further in the rankings is okay by me.
I don't know if you guys saw this, but the University of North Carolina just procured Bill Belichick. So on-brand for a university right now. I think he was actually sentenced to your university. I don't know that he was appointed. Have fun with him down there. You take him.
with that speaking of have fun with him you take him on Monday January 20th Martin Luther King Day itself Donald John Trump became the 47th president of these United States sorry Grover Cleveland you are now no longer
a unique historical president and that's the only important thing that happened this week in history being changed. Donald Trump in what can best be described as a awkward and meandering speech upon his inauguration in the Capitol, the scene of the crime as it were from January 6th.
Uh, uh, you know, like called, uh, called, said forever, January 20th, uh, 2025 will be known as liberation day. So we're liberated guys. We're back. We're out. We're free. Uh, a rush of executive orders, uh, came through limiting DEI, limiting, uh, LGBTQ trans rights allegedly limiting, uh, you know, immigration, uh, all kinds of stuff, uh, a flurry of action, more, more things than a hundred hours.
than most presidents doing a hundred days according to his Instagram feed. And one of those top things, to me, as much as January 6, we learned this past election does not resonate with the voters. He pardoned a large majority of the January 6 hostages, people who violently assaulted cops, people who, as far as I'm concerned, are directly responsible for the death of Officer Brian Sicknick.
you know and because hey they did their time and they were treated unfairly. Rough week for the rule of law. Robert set the tone for us. I asked you this several times during the first Trump administration and I'm excited to ask you this now. Are we going to die?
Yeah, I think we are. Well, let me, just to put it in context, we are all going to die, whether it's going to be under something directly connected to Donald Trump, or whether it's through our own life experience. But that's just, I just want to put that out there. So we are all going to die eventually.
Ah, hot take for Robert George. Wow. I know that's a hot take. So I would say this. Trump definitely went with the shock and awe.
approach for this first week. The other way of looking at this is contrary to Kamala Harris' campaign slogan, folks, we are going back. We are going back not just in the context of overturning
For example, his executive orders overturning DEI didn't just go back over to say the lifespan of DEI, which maybe, which somebody could suggest is like the last 10 years, the last 15 years, you know, however you want to interpret that.
But he overturned an executive, a presidential executive order that had been in place since Lyndon Johnson. So that suggests that
Trump and MAGA, and this particular iteration of the conservative movement, has basically moved the goalpost, if you were, to basically attack on, say, the 1964-1965 racial civil rights reforms. So that's one area where they are definitely wanting to go back.
And the other one is, I think it's important to note that because that executive order is rescinded, while he's still a Supreme Court justice, Clarence Thomas also now has to work the door at the Supreme Court. So that's what happened. It's pretty rough stuff. I'm going to put that one aside.
And also, but also part of that is his asserted interpretation of the 14th Amendment that it does not cover a birthright citizenship exclusively, which would also account for the children of undocumented
individuals in the country. That was challenged immediately in the courts, and that is going to be, that will be one of the most watched court cases when it eventually gets to the Supreme Court. That's going to be probably the biggest case, that's going to be the biggest case this year. Yeah, and I think just to quickly set the context there, at this point, I believe the Massachusetts federal court was the first one to
rule it unconstitutional so it is currently that order is currently not in effect. Right. All that aside, I think all of these policy, I mean, there were a lot of other things, you know,
taking the United States out of the Paris Climate Change agreement, or taking us out of the World Health Organization, all these kinds of things. All that said, and I don't want to sound like I'm a one-trick pony here. I am actually going to still go back and say that Trump's
pardons, basically an almost comprehensive pardon slash communication for everyone involved in January 6. I think that ultimately is the biggest takeaway from this week because combined with that, take that and combine it with the removal
of security protection from former officials, John Bolton and former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. It sends this. Anthony Fauci also.
And in fact, as well, it sends the message that if your if your writer die with Trump, even to the level of committing violence in his name, you're going to be protected at the federal level by this by this president. If on the other hand, you've crossed him in any in any kind of
even minor in minor way. Now I can understand the John Bolton thing because Bolton has been pretty far out there in terms of going against Trump. Mike Pompeo was Secretary of State at the end of the last Trump administration. As far as I could tell, he never went out
to attack Trump in the way, say, Nikki Haley did or other former. So this animosity towards Pompeo, which we started to see at the end of the campaign, is really peculiar. But again, this is a combination that they will take away
protections, security protections of people who serve this, who serve this country, country, whether you agree with them or not, they serve this country. Bolton has been threatened by Iranian operatives.
And just the fact that he has targeted these individuals as no longer in the fearless leader's favor. Meanwhile, all these people who many of the people who have been convicted of violent acts have now been freed and have been part and have been pardoned. And how many of them might think, oh, well, you know, these people who are bad and evil, whether it's Fauci or whatever,
Oh, maybe we should take maybe we should just take a shot at them as well. So one of the part in January sixers was immediately picked up on gun charges the next day after his pardons. Yeah, it's very likely. I do want to say without without minimizing the threat of this, you're just curious, like, why does he hate Pompeo? All of a sudden a reminder that this is Donald Trump, who despite not knowing either of them, took a real strong stance against Kirsten Stewart when she broke up with Robert Pattinson, it doesn't take a lot for this guy to get mad at you.
It does not take a lot, particularly if you're a woman. So good luck out there. Speaking of Rachel, how do you feel about this?
Boy, oh boy, what year this week has been. It's been a real weird one. So I am Jewish with a name like Rachel, right? Crazy. And so for me, the thing that stuck out, I mean, obviously all of the horrors, the horrors persist. There are so many of them.
But obviously one of the things that stuck out for me was Elon Musk doing a Nazi salute at a presidential inauguration. That happened and it was immediately normalized. People are out there saying like, oh, he's autistic. No, that's a Nazi salute. It's a Nazi salute. When you see a Nazi salute, it's a Nazi salute.
And the weird response to, I'm trying to think about like the mental gymnastics and the cognitive dissonance you have to have to see that and say, let me tell you that that's not what that was. Whoof, dark times. So that was a hard thing to observe and swallow and be like, this is the world that we're in.
So just kind of unnerving and unsettling in that regard. And I had the real pleasure and honor of listening to a talk by Dr. Bernice Kang this past Friday night at Swarthmore College. And she said a lot of things that I had been thinking and feeling for a long time, but to have someone of her
caliber, just the real history that this woman holds for her to say, like, we're not waiting for it anymore. It's here. Authoritarianism in the United States is here. She said, we are seconds away from becoming Nazi Germany. And again, these are things that, of course, I have felt and I've thought and I've observed, and we've all been like,
This is the direction, and we tweet funny jokes about it, but it was really grounding, I guess, to hear her say it, and also terrifying, because if anybody knows, she knows. So that that's just been a lot of what I've been sitting with. It's this weird kind of swing, like you can get really
Stuck and scared like I was driving to work the other day and I was just thinking about you know Trump introducing third terms or no term limits and things like that and I just started going down the rabbit hole in my own mind about how scary this all is and it's it's not like.
far away, it's here. It's here. It's right now. It's happening. It's in our faces and, you know, it's the same with climate change. It's here, right? Like the wildfires in Los Angeles, all of the flooding, it is here. It is happening. It is no longer future generations. It's here.
um and so that's the immediacy of it is hard and and i have to kind of pull myself out of it to not just spiral um and and be full of doom and gloom all the time um and part of that and i mean this genuinely the eagles being in the playoffs has been like a real respite and i was talking to a friend who has like absolutely no interest in football and she lives in ohio and i was just like
Girl, I need you to root for the Eagles because I need two more weeks of this safety because I live in South Philadelphia. There's plenty of Trump voters down here and it's this thing where we all have the birds in common. We don't need to talk about the horrors or the world burning around us. We can talk about the Eagles. We can talk about Saquan Barkley. We can talk about Jalen Hertz.
You see somebody in our green hats and you say, go birds. And it's just been this safety zone for my own mental well-being. And I just wanted to last a little bit longer. So yeah, that's where I'm at.
I'm really excited because this drops on Monday, so by the time people listen to this, they'll have an idea of how bad or good your Monday is. Exactly. It'll be like Rachel, good for her. She's got two more weeks or oh, poor thing. She's not doing well. Or they've switched hats in South Philly. I just want to jump in.
quickly, a friend of the show, Eton Levine calls the Elon Musk gesture a German Shalom, which I think is
I just think it's just kind of perfect. He's very nuanced as to whether the musk did it intentionally or not. He did. He assessed the German shalom.
I never feel a bit bad about you retreating into something that is comforting and crazy in a bad time. I mean, like, Brett is delicious and circus is entertaining. You know, I like, yeah, I'm a big Star Trek nerd. And right now they're being like a streaming movie with Michelle. Yo, Star Trek section 31 is keeping my mind off of dystopia. You know, I've got a friend in Los Angeles who she had to evacuate her apartment and we were checking in on her and we were like, what, where are you? What are you doing?
I went to Disneyland to disassociate. And I was like, I can't blame you. I can't blame you. And I'm generally anti Disney, but if it's helping you disassociate right now, by all means. Yeah, nothing wrong with it. Joe Killian, your take on the first weekend. Well, you know, so I was thinking about that Nazi salute a lot because years ago when I was a daily newspaper reporter, one of the things that they tasked me with was doing these Sunday features. And I decided that for
the weekend of Independence Day, I would do a feature on the Pledge of Allegiance, because there had been some controversy over it in classrooms in North Carolina. And I sort of went through the history of where it came from. It was originally used to sell flags to schools through a magazine called Youth's Companion. It was put together by a Baptist minister who didn't want the word God in there. It made its way in over his objections, you know, a lot of stuff like that. But
while doing that, we were looking for historic photographs that had to do with the Pledge of Allegiance. And I found one that I believe was an AP photograph, and it was a bunch of kids in a classroom giving the Pledge of Allegiance, and they were all doing this. And the capture of the listeners, it sure looked like a Nazi.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and the caption said, uh, helpfully to us in the archive, it said, uh, you know, uh, children, uh, giving the Pledge of Allegiance and offering a Roman salute, which was discontinued, uh, for obvious reasons, uh, after World War II. And my thought is like, yeah, for obvious reasons, for obvious reasons, in the 40s, we decided that that was not a good idea. And so for now, but what was strange was after that was published, I got a bunch of people.
all over me via email and social media at the time, all argument. Well, there's nothing wrong with a Roman salute and the Roman. And all of these people, if you looked into their social media, it was like they had weird Nazi stuff in their feeds. They had weird Nazi stuff on their profiles. And I don't think anything's much changed. I don't think anything's arguing that this salute is not a Nazi salute, but a Roman salute if they don't have a very good reason for
You know, wanting, wanting to argue for that. I don't, yeah. 19, 1947 must have been a real rough year for fans of the Roman salute and anyone named Adolf, right? Just real rough. Also that year for mustaches. That little mustache, right? Yeah. I think it's important to note that like I stand by us. I said this on Twitter and I want to repeat it here. The only person in history who has ever done something that looked like a Nazi thing and wasn't doing it to endorse the Nazis is when Michael Jordan had the Hitler mustache when he was doing the Haynes commercials.
And I guarantee you, he had a Hitler mustache because someone said, even you couldn't make the Hitler mustache normal again. And Michael Jordan took that personally and decided to do it. And he was like, yup, he shaved it off at a certain point. And I guarantee you, that was him being like, yeah, I tried, man, I can't save that mustache. Sorry. And because he's Michael Jordan, he lost $150,000 bet on it. Yeah. Didn't made it back in endorsements the next day. He just had that in his wallet. He's like, yeah, here you go. Elon.
Uh, yeah, it's, you know, I, I, and I think it's easy to kind of fall down the conspiracy theory rabbit hole on some of these things. And like that is a thing I've been talking with people in my orbit about responding to Trump and like what we've learned from last time around. And I do agree broadly with the idea of like, you can't chase every single fight. You'll get exhausted. We're not going to win every single fight. Uh, but I don't think there needs to be a fight over this question about Elon Musk. Like it seems,
I'll put it this way, like either it was a Nazi salute or the Nazis think it was a Nazi salute and he has not said no it wasn't to the Nazis. So, you know, in my opinion, everything times Nazi equals Nazi. So it doesn't really matter what the motive is. The math checks out on that one.
Yeah, well, listen, between that and transitive property, can you tell that I took a math class in college? It was the math class for art students that they made us take freshman year. You know, my thing is like politics is politics. You guys will probably remember that during the first Trump administration, there were some of these far right figures who were doing Nazi salutes and saying, Hile Trump, Hile, our country, all this shit.
And, you know, that got smacked down by a lot more Republicans than are criticizing Elon Musk now, obviously, because those people were nobodies. But it's like, you know, politics is politics. But I like to live my life in a way where every single thing I do, a Nazi isn't happy about.
You know, just the very, the very idea that there are so many Nazis that are happy about this, I think would give me pause, but then again, you know, I'm not in politics. Yeah, or the, I was gonna say, or the fact that like, if any, like you would, you would hope that if someone ever accused you of doing something like, hey, BT Dubbs, that's a, that's a whole Nazi thing. You would be like, I'm so sorry, I'm so embarrassed at like, no idea. Oh, never again.
Yeah. We say never again so much. Yeah. The Overton window is a thing. But the Overton window is a thing. But this reminds me of like when all these folks were pictures of them were coming up in blackface and people were like, well, which of us didn't at some point probably in college get into blackface. And I was like, me and every fucking buddy I know. Blackface. Yeah.
Yeah, and I have to admit I did partake almost almost completely white college. I did
Once or twice show up and present myself as a black person with a face. I can write. Robert, you're about to be canceled. I'm getting canceled. I do want to point out this is a fun moment of privilege for lack of a better word for Joe Rachel and me that we're like, oh, who could ever have done that? Like, Robert, you went to college in the 1970s in a border state near the South. Did you ever see what gets to be a college?
I went to college at a border state in the 1980s, you schmuck. Yeah, sorry. Great use of schmuck. Yeah. Well, thank you very much. You'll allow it. You can appropriate that. So I think, yeah, I think to the point about like the creeping fashers, and I think the thing that is hard for people, like, yeah, it's here, you know, America is so large and, you know, like non homogenous that like
feeling the realities of it will be difficult, right? Like Robert and I can still insult this administration, you know, in the case of Robert two Thursdays a month at the grizzly pair, check them out for tickets. And we're not gonna be like, you know, you know, bags aren't gonna be thrown on our heads and we're not gonna be thrown onto islands. But, you know, Jeff Bezos is front row at the inauguration and he's gonna make decisions on what content goes up on his platform. And then people creating content with potentially problematic views,
got to find new jobs like that's kind of how i assume it's going to hit around these parts uh... and and with that mind uh... let's jump into uh... who he's you know who are our fearless leader has appointed will talk a little bit because this week he he started the of the cabinet boats can't uh... began and there's a little bit of anger and pushback in some circles because you're seeing democrats you know i get a case a marker review marker review uh...
gotten to the state department ninety nine to zero vote and there's a little bit of pushback all white democrats do anything now right off the bat if i had the opportunity to not work with marco rubio anymore i'd take it in a heartbeat and vote yes but also like there's another argument to be made that like
I'm not a fan. I'm not going to like anyone he points to the cabinet. You know, some I can't argue that Marco Rubio is unqualified for that job as opposed to say, you know, RFK Junior or Tulsi Gabbard. Uh, but the conversation that becomes like over the course this week, you know, like, uh, uh, uh, Kristi Noem was just a point, just a confirmed Saturday night, uh, for
Secretary of Homeland Security, you know, 11 Democrats, including, you know, Andy Kim, who is sort of a darling of the progressive left, Federman, who was a darling progressive left, voted for her. I'm a little torn on that one because I do think the Homeland Security Department is pretty much useless. So people like Ishi qualified. I'm like, I don't know, the department borderline shouldn't exist. I don't really care. There's an argument to be made, though, similar to what we've been talking about. Like if you pick every single fight, they tend to have no meaning.
There's an argument to be made that if you're a Democrat, personally, I'm a believer if I were a Democrat in the Senate, I just vote no on all of them, because the public doesn't care. People seem to believe like, oh, I couldn't vote no on Secretary of the Interior. It might make my voters angered. No one cares. The question is, do you need to pick a huge fight over it every time? No, you can just vote no and move forward. That brings us to the first contentious, technically the second contentious cabinet pick. The first contentious cabinet pick was,
Matt Gaetz, who I guess once they realized the Department of Justice building was within 20 feet of a school, they realized he couldn't work there legally anyway, so his nomination was tacked. But Pete Haggseth was confirmed on a 51-50 vote with JD Vance breaking the tie, Senators Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, and Mitch McConnell voting with the Democrats against Pete Haggseth. Haggseth was pretty, I think, accusations about his past that were very problematic in terms of drinking, in terms of abuse of women.
came up. But even if none of that had come up, it's a fair argument that he has no qualifications to be leading the Defense Department. He's a TV show host who famously got whacked in the grind on a skateboard while trying to do a stunt on Fox and France, which I think we should have posted more because that I think would have gotten Trump to pull the nominee. But this was a close contentious vote. He also threw on Fox and Friends Sunday
I forgot what the occasion was. He threw an axe at a target, missed the target, and nearly seriously injured the person in the marching band that was just on the other side of the target, which when you're kind of thinking that you're voting,
for a guy to run the Pentagon. And he like, misses the target. I don't want to say there's a metaphor there, but yeah, there's a metaphor there. I think it would have been smart of them politically to have Matt Gaetz for every one of these positions. You put somebody forward, you know, it's just going to be like, Paulie Shore for defense. Not Paulie Shore. Okay. And it's going to be what about Pete Hexett. Fine. Fine. He's not Matt Gaetz. Right. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah.
Well, you know, I will say, well, I just want to, yeah, to transition to talk about this, I think with HEGSIT, I think we saw, you know, McConnell voting no was interesting to me now. I think important thing to remember about the rules of the Senate. Nothing goes to the floor that usually the majority leader doesn't already know he has the votes for. You know, three Republicans were able to vote no on Pete HEGSIT because they knew they weren't going to tank the nomination.
I have a lot of friends like, oh, if Bob Casey had just won, this wouldn't have happened. Like, if Bob Casey had just won, Mitch McConnell would have voted yes for eggs. I think you share it for me. Bob Casey didn't win. Oh, he's so nice. It's such a hard one. He's like such a reliable dentist, you know, like he was so boring and effective. I just. Well, but that one hurt. That one hurt.
Now you have a giant muppet monster who believes in for legalized weed and raining hell fire down upon the people of Gaza. Robert, your thoughts on feet exit and the process for him getting confirmed and what it says for the future. I think there's something to be said.
for, and you hinted at this before in the intro, there's something to be said for strategically approaching these various, the various nominees. And I say this, I'm the token closest to Republican on this panel. And what Tom said previously, if you're in the opposition, it's usually,
Usually, the safe bet to vote no just across the board against the president. If you're a Republican, you vote no against Democrats, nominees, because from your point of view, anything that they're going to do is going to be bad. If you're a Democrat, you do the same thing with a Republican. I think the interesting thing, and this is where we have to think about, regardless of how we think that Donald Trump is crazy or a man of, you know,
for ethics and morality and things like that. He did narrowly when the popular vote. He swept the swing of the swing states. And this is after he'd been out of power for four years. He faced multiple criminal cases and
essentially beat them beat them all back. He is at the he's at the height of his political power right now. And we hate it. We hate it when we have to recognize it, but politicians are going to politician and they are they recognize
the results of a recent election. They recognize, particularly if they are in a swing state, particularly if they're facing the voters two years from now, or if they were in a blue state, but
Trump's margin increased, his numbers increased, as did happen. I was going to say, I want to fact check you really quickly. He swept the swing states that we knew of. He did not win the apparently new swing states of New York, New Jersey and Rhode Island.
Well, yeah, and I mean, or, and, and, and New Hampshire is, is, is, New Hampshire has been a blue state for a while, but it's usually, it's not, it's usually kind of a single, you know, a single digit swing state. Anyway.
That's a factor. That's a factor in here. Also, I would say post-Bret Kavanaugh, I think Democrats would be better off making arguments against nominees, unless it's an extreme case like Matt Gates. I think they'd be better off making arguments
that focus on competence rather than just saying, oh, he's potentially a sexual harasser. Unfortunately, Donald Trump has proven that the voters now
back to route these charges legitimate or not, because they're deemed as political. So going after a guy- Well, if you're a he in government, odds are you're a sexual harasser, so it's like we already know. If the guy had a drinking problem or he was maybe a sexual harasser, that's not going to register.
I think, well, and I do think that's important. I was going to say with Hex if that stuff got brought up, but I think in general, most of the focus was on qualifications and like some of that stuff played into his qualifications. But, you know, that, and I think that's probably why it ended up being as close as it was is because they did keep the fire pretty firmly on like, yes, all this stuff is boiling and it's not unimportant. But, and then on top of it, he wouldn't be good at the job. Like,
Well, exactly because the Pentagon is the second, the second largest bureaucracy in in the federal government I think only HHS I believe is larger, but of which we'll get to in a moment.
So, and that was the thing that McConnell primarily zeroed in on. McConnell hardly brought up the personal stuff at all. He focused on the fact that this guy, even if you say that he
served with distinction when he was in the army. It is the case that he's never run an organization in the size of this, and there's no evidence that he would be good at it.
Robert, I'm interested around the qualifications piece that you bring up because I honestly don't know what we go with anymore, because what qualifications, what right did Donald Trump ever have to be elected in the first place, right? Like man had absolutely no background in civil service and public service.
not a sill other than like being a business man who like old so many failed businesses so many bankruptcies um your reality tv star my guy so like what uh you know i i even think qualifications are out the door and in 2016 a lot of you know hillary's campaign was all based in facts and
People don't care about facts anymore either. It's frustrating because you're like, yeah, rationally, realistically, these are the things that matter. So many people in this country don't give a shit if a man assaults women is a grifter. Just don't care, and in some cases often celebrate it.
I hate being alive right now. Uh, you know, so yeah, I just, I, I don't know where we go from here. Cause I don't think any of it matters. I want to jump off of that quickly. I also think like there's just a weird part when, to your point, Robert, like, like it or not, he did when he gets to pick his cabinet. There's a weirdness, you know, like over politicizing these cabinets. I mean, they're all a hundred percent politicized, but what I will kind of get
thrown by, like, when Matt Gaetz was pulled and they put him Pam Bondi, everyone's like, oh, isn't this worse? And I'm like, I guess so. It's not like once we tanked Matt Gaetz that Trump was going to be like, all right, I'll appoint Tish James. Like he's going to appoint who he wants to appoint. You know, like the question, I think, you know, the big fear we're all feeling right now in America, you know, talking about this sort of the, the fascist and being here is like the hope, like you look at someone like Marco Ruby as a good example. Like I don't think particularly highly of him.
But do I think he is someone who will sell the entire, who will sell his future out?
for Trump's ends. I don't know. Someone like Hagg said, yeah, 100% that guy's going to sell his future out for Trump's ends. This is the lesson he learned from his first administration. I'm not going to turn around and say, oh, Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell were heroes, but they were people in positions of leadership who weren't going to sell their party and themselves out to benefit Trump. Mike Johnson will.
Pete Haggseth will. Well, it remains to be seen with the new Senate. What's his face? The tall, handsome guy who's now leading the Senate Republicans. The one will do. But, and Joe, I want to turn to you, not just your thoughts on this, but we'll start on your thoughts on this. And then also, a guy you're familiar with, Tom Tillis played a little bit of a role in this debate, too. Senator from North Carolina.
For me, this continues to be really surreal because I think it was PJ Rourke who said that Republicans tell you the government doesn't work and then they get elected and prove it, to prove it. And I think that that's generally true with almost everything but the military. With the military, Republicans tend to say we have the greatest, mightiest, most lethal military in the world.
And, you know, I grew up in the military. My dad was a career marine. My grandfathers were sailors going back to when my country, my family got to this country. There's this long, you know, tradition of military service and I've lived in military places most of my life. And if anyone in any of those places had said any of the things out loud about the military that Donald Trump or Pete Hegsef has said,
out loud in any of those places, they would have taken them behind the VFW and beaten five states to change the shit out of them. I mean, it's just, it's amazing to me that now we're electing an appointing people who are saying these things out loud that our military is, you know, a wreck and it's not lethal. And, you know, and there are all these, you know, the problems with it, they go back to his service.
Um, that is, you know, that's not what I'm used to hearing from people who want to lead people in the military. Never mind to be the commander in chief. Uh, certainly not from Republicans. Uh, so that's, that's real weird. Uh, we did have a, yeah, Senator Tom Tillis, who, you know,
is looking at a primary anyway. And I think he's just sort of doing the math now. There are a lot of sort of MAGA Republicans who have not been happy with him for quite some time. But I think there was some hope primarily among Democrats in the state that he would end up voting no on some of this. And when he came out and made what I thought was a pretty strong statement against these pardons,
Um, I think, I think that people were given hope that that would happen, but, you know, ultimately with Tillis, there's what he says and then there's how he votes. And, uh, you know, with very few exceptions, uh, you know, if his party's going to vote that way, he's, he's going to be on board. And to that point about, you know, the, the, the MAGA voters, particularly North Carolina, but a thing, a, a common thread is that their writer died for their guys. Mark Robinson just got blown out, uh, in a general election.
Martin Luther King Jr. on steroids, I believe Donald Trump referred to him, and he is already considering a run against Taylor's, and they'll show up for him in the primary. And that means, and if that happens, like Roy Cooper, you should consider running for U.S. because there might be an opening for you. That's gonna be, that's gonna be really interesting when I think, but like my publication, The Assembly, was the first to write about Mark Robinson's years, haunting Greensboro, porn shops, and to open up that whole part of his life. I did the first article on that with a guy named Jeff Hill. Thank you for your service.
It was a terrific reporter. He called me up and said, what do you know about Greensboro porn shops? And I said, I'm your guy. And, but the, it's a college here that I work here now. Yeah. And it turns out that I knew a lot of people in college who were working in those porn shops, all of whom got in touch with me.
But the thing with Robinson that's so interesting, immediately after his gubernatorial loss, he purchased
websites purchase domain names to run for senate so yeah it's not a that question of if but when i think um but republicans in the state are really in this state anyway are are really divided because while there were some people who were on that ship all the way down uh they also blame him for a lot of down ballot uh trouble that that uh republicans in this in this state had i mean we you know democrats actually you know
beyond the presidential vote ended up doing really well in this state, you know, governor, you know, head of public education, you know, the number of general and lieutenant governor and lieutenant governor is voted separately there. And that was a big problems like Roy Cooper, a good governor, had
Mark Robinson, a lunatic, who would take over the state anytime Roy Cooper had to leave the state. So that's a good thing for Democrats there. I'm curious, and Robert, I'm going to go back to it. And this is this dovetails with everything. We're talking about qualifications and the like. I had a theory I texted you about this, Robert. My theory is Mitch McConnell voting no on HAGSIF was as much not liking HAGSIF as it is. Perhaps, again, I want to be clear. I am not counting on the courage and decency of Senate Republicans.
But I think they're not huge fans of Tulsi Gabbard for Director of National Intelligence, and they are not huge fans of RFK Jr. for head of Health and Human Services. And I took Mitch McConnell no vote. Again, as we said, if it had been a closer margin, I think McConnell probably votes yes, because he's not going to go against his party.
But I took that as a sign of saying, I'm willing to vote no, and I still got some game. I might be, you know, I might no longer be the leader, but I'll get some. I'm able. He still has influence and sway, like even, you know, he might not be the leader anymore. He's gotten most of those people elected. He got them the money to get elected in a lot of cases. They were being challenged by Trump.
support Trump, you know, endorsed candidates and primaries, and Mitch helped knock those people out and get them to the Senate. And I don't think they're fans of Chelsea, and I think they might not be fans of RFK Jr. What do you think? Robert, we'll start with you as a observer of the GOP politics on what this could mean.
No, I would agree with that. I would say at this point that of those two, I think, Tulsi Gabbard's chances are most are most imperiled. It was not.
surprising. It was not completely surprising this week that National Review came out with a pretty scathing editorial against her and most traditional Republicans and even a number of
you know, MAGA sympathetic types, MAGA sympathetic conservatives think she's bad. I mean, and for different reasons. Some of them don't like her because they see her as, you know, a berniacalite, which she was for quite some time. So two left, you know, two left for them. The more traditionalist
more traditionalists see her as being cozying up to Vladimir Putin, and, you know, being a big fan of a side of Syria. And that's the other thing too.
one of her biggest patrons in the Middle East has been kicked out of his own country. So, I mean, do we really need her? So, yeah, I would say that this point, it's, I think it's 40, I think it's 40 to 60 percents, not Senate votes, 40 to 60 against term making it, which as we were talking about in the HEXATH situation, if it's
clear that you need four Republicans to basically say that they're against the nomination for it to be tanked. You will have a situation where four or five or six will whisper quietly to Thune to say, I can't do this and Thune will then go to
to the White House and say those votes on those votes aren't there. It would never actually get to the floor. The Kennedy thing is a little bit more complicated. There are a lot of conservatives who hate him because not only is for reasonable things like the fact that he's completely batshit crazy. Yes, of course, we're at a podcast. We can say batshit crazy.
Uh, the whole, you know, the killing the bears thing, the killing of other creatures. Uh, his, his own, his own really crazy and complicated personal personal personal history. But in terms of conservatives,
Uh, he is, um, one of the most, um, throw choice nominees that any Republican president, uh, has, uh, uh, has nominated has nominated. And it, and it's, and he wants kids dead up to 15 years old. So yeah.
And and he's in a and he it would be it's running it's running the agency that has a even though technically speaking abortion is now at a state level HHS has control over a lot of abortion related related things including
including having a say, if not complete authorization, but having a say in things like Miffa, Pristone, approval and things and things and things like that. So a lot of conservatives, social conservatives hate the fact that he would have such a role at HHS. So he would be next to none. I still think it's around 50-50 though that he gets through and it could be, it could end up being another 51-50
uh, confirmation vote. Rachel, I'm curious your thoughts just broadly about, uh, as we just discussed, pro-choice hero RFK who is, of course, you know, as Cheryl Heinz's husband, a deeply beloved member of the comedy community. So we stand with you. You do. My thoughts on RFK are bad. Right. Bad. It should not have this job. Yeah.
Uh, yeah, he's gonna be a big pro choice hero if he's appointed. I'll put it that way. Well, if you have influence on that topic, I sincerely doubt it. Um, I have to, I mean, the RFK of it all is very like, it's appealing to this kind of.
Mountain State, Western, trad wife thing that's happening. You know, people are moving to Idaho and homesteading and they don't want to
get their kids vaccinated, but they're eating raw meat. It's like very, it's appealing to that demographic, which is a deeply unsettling one. And becoming more and more popular. And it is kind of chilling when you think about these like micro kind of
movements because they're all having like 12 kids. And you're like, Oh, this is the future of the country. This is who's having all the children. Unlike, you know, childless cat woman women like me living in our smug Northeast cities.
Well, I mean, the disturbing thing to me about that is that I think that that sentiment that you're describing is absolutely strong, and it is also sort of trans-partisan. I know lesbian couples who are like, you know, what we're going to do is buy a farm and take the kids out where we can feed them raw milk, not get them vaccinated, and live our lives according to Taro.
So I, you know, it's, as we talked about in this show, I have some sympathy broadly to the notion of, you know, I don't like being told what to do by the government. I, you know, I understand the path. I understand the first step that leads you down that crazy path. Just, you know, usually I am then offset by the fact that I was raised with vaccines and that as an asthmatic who was a child who was sick with everything, probably alive right now because of them.
So that's where it gets thin. But it's exactly that. Transpartisan thing is exactly right. The path is there from every side of the spectrum. Rachel, sorry. Good. Oh, no. I was going to say that the great facade that the GOP has done around like, oh, we want the government out of things, deregulate. But actually what they're doing is they are tying our hands in so many ways. There are so many things we cannot do.
Um, and I, and I always go back to this, that I was talking to a more conservative family member and it kind of true, and to his, to his credit, uh, is an open-minded person and isn't just this like, no, these are my opinions. I'm gonna change them. Um, the thing that I saw to him that he kind of didn't argue with me on was like, I don't know why I pay taxes to pay the salaries of people who are taking rights away from me. And he was like, fair point.
Yeah. Well, yeah, and it's that distrust of government played both ways. It's a big part of why Harris lost. There's a lot of people out there who probably aren't fans of Trump, but either didn't vote or they're like, man, government can't get it done for me at the end. So, Joe, you're about to say.
Well, no, I was just saying, and that goes, that swinging into wild directions that you don't necessarily see coming ideologically is so weird for me. I mean, the number of my youthful punk rock heroes who are now weird, conservative.
guys is totally and women staggering. It's staggering is staggering. And I also know here in North Carolina, anyway, I'm sure it's much the same everywhere. The number of people I know who are like, you know, real hard lefties who are now like making excuses for Vladimir Putin is strange for me to not see that one coming. You know, it's it's it's very it's a very weird weird world.
Yeah, it is. Let's move one last thing, which I think will really, you know, it still continues on this threat. President Trump made his first two visits to, you know, first two flights on Air Force One to visit North Carolina and California this week, North Carolina.
to look at recovery from this past summer's storms. California to take a look at the situation with the ongoing wildfires. And in that, talked about how it's time to take, get rid of FEMA and replace it with some sort of federal government agency, which FEMA is a federal government agency. But this, you know, it kind of pushed into
It then led to a little bit more of Trump talking, like what we talked about, the fear that he's going to put the priority for effective governing on who makes him happy and who's nice to him. North Carolina voted for him, so he presumably cares a little bit more about North Carolina, but also it was close.
Meanwhile, in California, he's already starting to talk about various strings attached to disaster support. Talk to us broadly about, I think because the storms are over, there's a certain amount like, all right, North Carolina is fine again. Still pretty rough down there.
The Asheville Fringe Festival that I submitted for is not taking out of town guests right now because they're like, we can't guarantee your safety of a place to stay. So we'll talk a little bit about that and the role of Phoenix play.
Hurricane Helene, you know, that was really devastating. And the weird thing about the weirdest thing for us in North Carolina about this, you know, where I grew up on Eastern Eastern North Carolina on the coast, we're used to storms. There is a storm season. People evacuate. They don't evacuate. It's just part of life in the mountains, not so much. And they really were not prepared for this. And it just devastated and completely
eliminated and destroyed whole communities up there. And in a place where you're used to having storms of that magnitude and that destructive ability, there are not a lot of people, even Republicans, who are like, let's get rid of FEMA. It's certainly not elected Republicans. I mean, there were people up there who had guns out talking about shooting FEMA as they came up there. But those people also have illegal whiskey stills. They're not in office.
So there's a difference. That was the mayor of Asheville, North Carolina. And particularly if a lot of your economy is dependent on tourism and in Asheville and the mountains, it is.
And also on the coast where I grew up, it is. Then, yeah, you don't want to hear, you know what, we're going to rethink this and maybe privatize it because you haven't had great luck with private insurance companies and private solutions to these things in the past, whereas you have seen over the course of generations, I mean, my mother.
uh, you know, when she was a child, the federal government was coming in and cleaning up and taking care of and putting money into storm recovery. And so that is a, that's a big part of something we're used to here. So I don't know, you know, the degree to which that's actually going to, going to happen or if it's, if, if like many things with Trump, it's a, you know, what I'd like to do is write my name on the moon. And then what we end up doing is like looking at the NASA budget a little closer.
We don't know where we are in this new term. Yeah, we put a mug up of our sticker on the next satellite going out. Yeah, it's very early. Also, Robert, your thoughts, FEMA, obviously Trump will never be up for reelection, so it kind of doesn't matter. But he's going to be staring down a midterm. Or will he? That's true.
That's true. He's staring down a midterm next year and going back in time in history, 20 years, FEMA's mismanagement of a certain situation in the great state of Louisiana probably played a pretty big role in costing Republicans the House and Senate in 2006. FEMA is a thing to be careful about in politics. Am I wrong?
Well, FEMA is a thing to be wary of in politics. But the thing is, though, you're citing of Hurricane Katrina and related time.
goes to prove that FEMA in and of itself is not above reproach. I would say I brought it up real quickly. It's like particularly when it is managed by a government that leans a little more on the side of private enterprise rather than public.
No, fair point. So FEMA's not above, FEMA's not above reproach, and yes, there may be reasonable reforms, but I'm not even sure Trump really has an idea of what that means. I think the more disconcerting statements coming from Trump
related to disaster assistance are the kinds of demands that he has been putting out there for California. Now, if you want to say that the California needs to do
needs to do better in terms of preventive measures for wildfires and things like that. That's perfectly fine. And even if you say in the context of authorizing aid, saying you need to do x, y, and z over that's fine. But Trump gave us a performance improvement.
Trump, on the other hand, is leaning towards, well, we may make disaster aid contingent on Trump passing voter ID. That, I think, is something that, regardless of what your political persuasion is, that's not—I forget who the Democratic congressmen who made
who made this comparison in the last couple of days. He said, look, I don't like Louisiana as abortion policy. If there's a hurricane that goes through Louisiana and they need assistance, should I be out there demanding that Louisiana adopt a pro-choice policy or they're not going to get disaster aid? Of course not. You're right, of course not, of course not, sorry.
That's outrageous. So that's the thing. I mean, if you want to have a debate about disaster aid and things like that, it's fair to say if something going on down in Florida that's it.
you should not be rebuilding right in the middle of the hurricane pathway or the flood zone or what have you. That's an area where policy demands raise legitimate questions. But bringing in a completely peripheral
policy goal and you're going to use the disaster aid to twist people's arms. No, that doesn't work. We're only seven days in. What a...
and only four years minus seven days to go again, if we're lucky. One way or the other. In the time we have left, I'll do a quick lightning round, because we brought it up. A couple of congressmen have brought up legislation to allow Donald Trump to run for a third term. It's worded to suggest that if he didn't serve a consecutive term, he should be able to serve one more term.
Constitution currently forbids that you get eight years total no matter where they're set and then you're out
Yeah, exactly. We call him for a third term if I could. Well, here's the thing. He's not a citizen, so could he run again? I'm curious in the line around, like, do you think, like, I think this is always something to be worried about. I worry about everything that comes through Congress, because who knows? Like, how many times? I bet there are so many situations problems we had in our history that were caused by something that everyone thought was a goof case in point.
Donald Trump came down a golden escalator. I thought it was hilarious. A month later, Robert George, after Donald Trump made fun of John McCain, Robert George said it was the beginning of the end of the Trump campaign. That was almost 10 years ago, and we're still waiting on the end. But I am also more inclined to believe, again, not in the decency of Republicans in Congress, but in the ego of
Republicans in Congress, all of whom look in the mirror and see a president saying, I'm not going to vote to put myself in a position where I can't run for president someday. What do we think? Joe Killian, what do you think? Do we think this is a thing to take very seriously or?
or only have. I'm past saying, well, history of history is any guy. I was a poly-side major in college and I walked out like most people do when they're 21 years old and just studied something thinking I knew some stuff and particularly this president and this second presidency now has just made me realize that
Most things are norms and even things that are actual policy can be changed if there is the will or people will allow it and I don't I'm done betting against People doing outrageous things that I thought were impossible. So yeah, I think I think it's definitely something that everyone you should be concerned about. Yeah, Rachel you worried
I think they're all boot liquors and they're going to let him do it. I think he's I think it's a done deal. I I'm just totally nihilist like I was
anybody out there who's like, but the courts, the checks and balances. That shit is out the window. It's done. Robert George, what do you think? Do you think a third term of Trump is looming or do you think history will save us?
It's not, it would not be able to get through the Congress, first of all, there are not the votes there. That I am about as sure of that Trump's insulting John McCain was the beginning of the end of his campaign. So I'm not sure. However, what I would say,
is that if somebody like, and I'm not sure exactly who would have standing to do this, but if somebody raises a court case, challenging the interpretation of
whatever the whatever the whatever the two term amendment is in the in the Constitution just to to try and get the Supreme Court to weigh in on whether it should be read as consecutive terms or does a non consecutive term allow for
That is the one area. I don't think I don't think that there would be five votes on the Supreme Court, but that is the one area where it's it's it's almost impossible to
There might be, I don't know, there could conceivably be three or four that might entertain that argument. But as I said, it's not something that it's not something that can get through the Congress as it is presently constituted. Now, 2026, if
You know, for whatever reason, there is a further shift to the right that brings in even a stronger Republican Senate and a stronger Republican House, maybe, but unlikely. Okay. Oh, good. So yet again, we're all just
living on a wing in a prayer and hope that McDonald's filled diet does its thing. With that, Secret Service can find me at 392. Anyway, with that, we're going to call it a week for electoral dysfunction. Thank you so much, panelists, and outstanding conversation. Joe Killian, where can folks find more of your works online and follow you if you'd like them to?
Well, I'm over on Blue Sky, Joe Killian in C, and the Assembly in C.com is where you can read my writing. Thank you. Rachel, where can folks see you making the people laugh in the great city of Philadelphia, Gopert?
Uh, go birds. Uh, hopefully you'll see me tonight. Climbing a grease pole on South Broad Street. Uh, you can also see me with crossroads comedy. Uh, just go to xroadscomedy.com. I do a show called study hall, uh, where we bring college lectures in and we do improv based off of that. Um, and I will also be doing this show live in February in the great green city of Philadelphia. Go birds.
Fantastic. Yeah, I did. Oh, man, I got to do study all right before election day. I did a lecture on the friendship between Jimmy Carter and Gerald Ford who reminded all of us that unity is important, but more importantly, a beautiful friendship can come together if you both hate Ronald Reagan. Robert George, where can folks find you online?
I had to ask Rachel if climbing the greased pole in Philadelphia. All right, watch yourself, pal. That was a feudalism or something. I just didn't know. No, we greased our poles with Crisco because people famously climbed the light poles. But now it's just a feat of strength. Because there's a greased pole climbing competition every summer in the Italian market festival. So they greased the poles, but it's supposed to stop us from climbing them.
Yeah. James Hasky said, if you really want to stop people from climbing the poles, you should coat them in Gorilla Glue, not in. That would get people to stop. Robert George. Yeah. On X and Blue Sky, I'm at Rob George. On Instagram, I am Robert George Comedy.
My sub stack, which I will actually be reactivating this weekend, is the pun stack. So you can find me there. As Tom mentioned, I host a comedy show at the Grizzly Pear Midtown in Manhattan.
Our next show is this coming Thursday, January 30th at 9 p.m. So please check it out, go to the WhisleyPayer.com website.
Thank you very much, Robert. Thank you again panel. I'm Tom Brennan. You can find me on Twitter at Brennanator on Instagram at Brennanator Graham on blue sky at Brennanator. You can see me do and stand up this coming Thursday, January 30th as part of Kim Chi comedy confessions over sugar mouse in downtown Manhattan.
And yes, as Rachel mentioned, electoral dysfunction coming back to the great city of Philadelphia, Saturday, February 15th, plays and players theaters with our pals at Crossroads Comedy, tickets in the show notes for this. Come on out again, as I said at the beginning,
If the panel holds and they all don't cancel on me it's gonna be a great show Thank you again panel. Thank you again to Rachel nice wanders who stopped by earlier And thank you to Ned Thorne who helps me put these together every single week We will be back in two weeks if there's still a country take care
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The Musk Administration!

Electoral Dysfunction: Quarantined
President Elon Musk kicks Donald Trump to the curb and takes charge. Karen Bergeen and Andrew Heaton join Robert George to talk about the week that was as DOGE doled out the pain, while Tom skips out on the chaos by going on vacation. GO BIRDS! Produced by Tom Brennan and Ned Thorne. PHILLY! Go see Electoral Dysfunction on Saturday, February 15!
February 09, 2025
Happy January 6!

Electoral Dysfunction: Quarantined
The panel discusses H1-B visas, Stephen Miller is compared to Urkel, highlights of Mike Johnson's Speaker career are reviewed and Department of Comedy Efficiency visits.
January 06, 2025
Crisis of Infinite Mirth!

Electoral Dysfunction: Quarantined
Astrologer Ellie Pyle discusses potential future history of America with Robert and Tom on Electoral Dysfunction podcast, suggesting the beginning may be as close as the end.
January 01, 2025
Shut Up-a You Face, Shut Down-a the Government!

Electoral Dysfunction: Quarantined
Discussion on nearly government shutdown, revenge porn, and congressional pay raises; plus special guest Momma Ricotta offers advice for political conversations at holiday dinners.
December 23, 2024

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