Knowledge Fight Interactive Search Tool

Nov. 8, 2022 - The Muckrake Political Podcast

01:02:49

A Guide To The Key Midterm Races

Co-hosts Jared Yates Sexton dive deep into the key races for both the House and Senate, including in Arizona, Georgia, and Pennsylvania. Find out why so many of these elections are crucial to maintaining democracy as we know it. Don't miss tonight's LIVE analysis of the midterms: https://youtu.be/GK-0QVss1h0 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Large

Audio Only |

Scroll

Time	Text
	Hey everybody, welcome to the Muckbrick Podcast.
	I'm Jared Yates Sexton.
	I'm here with Nick Halsman, by the way, who is ready for our election night show.
	He got a sweet new haircut.
	I'm just going to go ahead and break the news.
	I did.
	You know, it was needed to be done.
	I twirl my hair when it gets too long and it needs to be... I can't do that anymore.
	Well, he is ready.
	I am ready.
	Tomorrow night, that is Tuesday, November 8th, election night, the midterm elections.
	A reminder, we are going to be broadcasting live at 8 p.m.
	Eastern, along with Democracyish.
	We're going to have that on the YouTube channel, and we will send out more information on that, links, all that good stuff.
	Plan on coming out.
	This right here, this episode, which is going to come out on Tuesday, Is going to be the official Muckrake Podcast midterm election preview show.
	Nick, can you can you feel the excitement, the lightning, if you will?
	If you want to call it that, OK, I know it doesn't feel like that.
	Now, let me just, you know, full disclosure, I did a three day, three day juice cleanse last week.
	I am now eating really clean, so I'm feeling really weird.
	I don't know if you've ever done this and feel strange.
	I just feel like, have you ever fasted for like 24 hours?
	I have.
	I almost have that feeling, not that it's like starving, hunger feeling, I just don't feel right.
	And I haven't introduced red meat, I haven't introduced any kind of complex, actually not the complex, the bread kind of carbohydrates, so I haven't done any of that.
	My body is like, what the fuck man?
	And on top of that, you're dealing with existential dread of the political, socioeconomic situation.
	Yes.
	The list keeps going, but let's stop there.
	It keeps going.
	So what we're going to do on this show, we're going to go through the major races.
	When I say major races, listen, we're not going through House races.
	We're political sickos.
	Some could even say, based on the research and analysis we do and the focuses we do, that we are sadomasochistic.
	We do not hate ourselves that much.
	Is that fair, Nick?
	Right.
	Because otherwise we'd have to be studying Boebert's race and Marjorie Taylor Greene's race, and I don't think we could do that.
	Marjorie Taylor Greene's going to win her race.
	Lauren Boebert, man, would it be great if she lost.
	Oh my God, would that be wonderful.
	I don't see it happening, but it would be great.
	Yeah.
	Listen, we don't wish ill on anybody, but that would be nice.
	Yeah.
	And I'll go ahead, and before we get into the Senate and the gubernatorial races, Nick, my feeling is that the Republicans are probably going to win the House.
	And we can talk in a second about what the ramifications are of that.
	What's your initial feeling in terms of the House?
	Well, Nate Silver told me that's what's going to happen.
	Don't listen to Nate Silver!
	OK.
	I don't feel good only because generally from an anecdotal version of this, if the polls say that the Democrats are going to win by like two points, they're going to lose.
	They need to be up by like 10-12 to make this actually work.
	And it's nothing scientific.
	So don't don't hold me on that.
	But that's how the feeling is.
	And but there is some depressing numbers that I looked at from the Siena New York Times poll when you kind of pull out some of the other things that are not related to just the candidates that make you really concerned.
	Yeah, I'm really concerned about it, too.
	There's a couple of things happening here.
	And listen, before we get into the analysis of this, I just want to go ahead and say we are living in a completely new political environment.
	Polls, schmolls, you name it, whatever.
	This is a weird, weird time.
	We've talked about it before.
	Historically, the sitting leading party loses seats, happens, like clockwork.
	Also here, Joe Biden currently is sitting on an approval rating around 40%.
	Those are not good conditions.
	A bad economy, you know, a bad situation all the way around.
	With an approval rating hovering around 40%, it doesn't bode well.
	I'll just go ahead and say that.
	If somehow or another things shift, we're going to be talking like on the weekend or about a brand new, completely unpredictable political model that is, and by the way, this is one thing that's going to be a reoccurring theme on this conversation, which is the links between different races and different figures, right?
	It stands that if the party in power gain seats in the midterms, they're doing it on the coattails of the leader of the party.
	If this happens with Biden at about 40 percent, That's pretty amazing.
	You know what I mean?
	Like that's a brand new sort of an environment we got to talk about what that means for the Democratic Party moving forward.
	But I am looking at the Republican Party gaining control of the House of Representatives.
	I also and I sent you this link to this article on Axios.
	Which was basically like a blind item talking about how Wall Street executives and so-called moderates were really excited about the possibility that the Republicans might not only take over control, but they needed to win overwhelmingly in the House in order to get past the debt ceiling.
	That is one problem.
	It speaks to a larger troubling trajectory right now, Nick.
	But also another part of this is if the Republicans do win back the House, you've said it before yourself, It's going to be sheer hell for at least two years if not more because they are going to double down on absolutely destroying Biden's agenda and are more than willing to more or less sort of destroy the government economy society itself if it means possibly retaking power.
	Do you agree?
	Yes, but then there's also the benefits of getting some titillating tidbits from Hunter Biden's computer.
	That could be, for some people, might find that interesting.
	By the way, Nick, if you are tired of hearing about Hunter Biden's laptop, and if the listeners are tired of hearing about Hunter Biden's laptop, if the Republicans gain control of the House of Representatives, go away.
	Go get a house in the woods, because that is, it's going to be 24 hours a day, nothing but Hunter Biden laptop.
	And the guy filmed a lot.
	He's prolific in the documentation of his troubled life.
	It's actually somewhat impressive.
	Let me just say one thing about the 40% approval rating for Biden.
	That's actually pretty good, I think, in these times that we're trying to wrap our heads around.
	Where the other thing that we have to deal with is that the candidates don't matter.
	The character of the candidates don't matter.
	At some point, we should just have robots running and we'll just vote for them because it's a rubber stamp.
	And certainly the GOP doesn't care, right?
	They just want a rubber stamp for their agenda.
	I kind of think that the Democrats are moving that way, too.
	It hasn't quite moved that way all the way because a guy like Al Franken would never have quit the Senate if we truly just didn't care except for what the vote is going to be.
	But Al Franken, we know now, would never have done that in 2022.
	So this is what we're moving towards, where it's like it's almost like some Elon Musk, you know, fever dream where it's just going to be robots running and we'll just, you know, rubber stamp our vote for them and they'll rubber stamp their votes for the policies.
	And then we'll have, I don't know what that's called, a crypto... A technocracy?
	Yeah, there you go.
	Well, Nick, I got to tell you, man, there is no better Like, lead in and segue into talking about, like, the major races that are going to define things.
	Unfortunately, the McCrae Podcast, stamp it down.
	We are predicting that the Republican Party takes over the House.
	I'm sorry.
	I don't know what else to say.
	You're going to have the most batshit election denying people possible.
	But what you just described, Unfortunately, that technocracy is exactly what people like Peter Thiel are interested in creating, which is basically a sort of a techno-feudal state in which, you know, you have like weird right-wing quote-unquote Marxism socialist ideas, redistribution of wealth, particularly to white families, evangelical white families, controlled by technical elites.
	And the number one poster boy for that is none other than Blake Masters.
	So we're going to go out to Arizona, which by the way is where the crazy comes from now.
	It feels like that's like the gates of hell.
	At this point is where that state sort of like sits.
	And by the way, I think Florida is a little bit jealous of that.
	You know what I mean?
	Like, that's where the brains are getting nice and baked.
	But I don't know if I feel like they're any more crazy than anywhere else.
	Honestly, I'm in California and I don't think it's any more crazy than California.
	Because A, California is so big that you're just going to find it.
	But like, you know what I mean?
	I don't know if we can say that anymore.
	I just saw a little bit of state pride Peek through.
	And that was fun.
	That was enjoyable.
	It was like, don't tell me that California is out crazy.
	California, by the way, is moving to the right in so many different ways.
	And the crazy that used to be like California crazy is absolutely being co-opted by QAnon and election denying and you name it.
	It's really interesting you bring that up, though, because it feels like that sort of a matrix, that sort of a of an ideology is sort of linking a lot of this stuff.
	And for what it's worth, just so you know, I'm not a rubber stamper for the Democratic Party.
	I went against Gavin Newsom's recommendation and voted for a proposition that will fund more electric cars and more charging stations based on the backs of people who make two million dollars or more.
	And if I ever get to that level, I'll be more than happy to subsidize those things.
	Please.
	Well done, class traders!
	I love it.
	But it was some sort of money grab by Lyft, apparently.
	That's what Gavin Newsom was calling it.
	I'm like, I don't care.
	Let those millionaires pay for it.
	There you go.
	So in Arizona, and listen, here's the thing, man.
	I got to tell you to go ahead and set the tone of this conversation and probably our coverage on Tuesday.
	I'm getting ready to say something that I'm really not happy that I'm saying.
	The race in Arizona has shifted.
	We have talked for the past couple of months about the fact that Blake Masters, who is an absolutely abhorrent candidate, like he's the kind of person like he'll put on a rally and it makes people physically uncomfortable because this is a repulsive person with a repulsive ideology.
	It seemed like hero Mark Kelly was going to pull this thing off.
	It was going to be a pretty easy ride.
	Right now, the polls show that Mark Kelly has a slight, slight lead.
	It has shrunk.
	It has shrunk really, really in a major way.
	And my opinion of it, and I'd love to hear what you have to say, I think it has everything to do with Kerry Lake in the governor's race.
	And we'll talk more about that in a second and get into that race.
	But Blake Masters is now in contention to win the race in Arizona.
	I think Mark Kelly is going to win.
	But if we're talking tomorrow night, Tuesday night, And Blake Masters isn't getting beaten by at least five points.
	And if this thing is too close to call all night, that worries me.
	And that says something about the tone and tenor of the country, because Blake Masters is an abysmal candidate.
	By the way, I'll say that a couple times in this show.
	But he is in contention at this point.
	I think that says a lot about how the national scene has changed.
	Well, also, don't forget, there's just a massive, massive amount of early voting, right?
	And I got to check to see if Arizona lets them count it beforehand, but I don't think they do.
	So remember, there's that delay, right, where all of a sudden Mark Kelly will be down by a lot and then come back, come back, and then that's when the Republicans start tearing their hair out and saying it's a fraud.
	But so I'm not, I don't know.
	I mean, the polls look like me right now.
	New York Times, CNN poll, which, whatever, you can take.
	All these polls are, at least this one has some methodology.
	Kelly's up by, what does it say? 51.45.
	that's probably out of the margin.
	That's the outlier.
	That's the outlier.
	Okay.
	So yes.
	Kelly being up six is the outlier.
	Everything else shows him up one, two, or three.
	Okay.
	So either way, the bottom line is it's going to matter about the early voting there.
	Across the country, it's going to matter there.
	So I do wonder if it's related to the fact that I've gotten, having never gotten an email from Mark Kelly, he's emailing me now a lot in the last couple of days.
	And I've never seen this before from him, from anybody really.
	All of a sudden my inbox is being flooded.
	So that is interesting, perhaps concerning.
	Well, you know, and we talked about this on a previous episode, the Blake Masters campaign was in such a free fall that the Republican Party was like, we're done with any funding here.
	You know, Peter Thiel, take care of your boy.
	We're done.
	This is off the books.
	The fact that this is now a contested race, it says something about how things have shifted.
	I mean, this guy was dead in the water.
	The fact that he could, and by the way, if he wins, that's it.
	That's it.
	The Republicans take control over Congress.
	We really don't need to talk much else about anything else if this loser gets it.
	But yeah, the fact that this campaign has come back to life, I think, says a lot.
	The silver lining, or I'm always looking for something that could be good out of all that, would be, in theory, that it doesn't matter if you don't spend money.
	You can still win a race.
	And if we can ever get to that point, then hallelujah.
	I would love to get to a point in our political situation where whoever spends the most money is guaranteed to win, which is kind of like what we've been happening for a long, long time.
	Well, and this would be, if Blake Masters pulls this off, it would be more or less a case of an oligarch funding an entire campaign, which is really troubling.
	You know what I mean?
	That's like crossing a certain point in the road.
	That would be a real problem.
	So what's your instinct when it comes to the Masters Kelly race at this point?
	I mean, it feels to me like, again, I just refuse to believe a guy as bad of a candidate as that can win.
	But the other problem is, I'll say that about four or five other races in the Senate, Yes.
	And we know that they're not all going to sweep Democrat, right?
	It's not going to happen that way.
	So someone is going to end up winning at least one of those races.
	And that's the problem here.
	But I feel like Arizona is safe.
	But the other problem is, is that they had a stronger governor candidate that might have helped buoy this a little bit better.
	And I don't know if you want... Was that a good enough segue?
	That's the next thing we have to talk about.
	I want to say really quickly that if we look at a situation where the Republicans have control of the Senate, and both Blake Masters and J.D. Vance have won, Peter Thiel's little puppets dancing on strings, if the two of them win, that is a really bad scenario.
	Like, that's a real problem with that sort of block in the Senate, because that's the way national conservatism, and you get them along with Cotton, you get them along with Howley, like, you start moving towards that direction, that's a problem.
	Well, let me ask you this really quickly, then.
	Does McConnell maintain control over the Senate if they have control?
	That's a hell of a question.
	Because one of the things, and we've talked about it on this show, there is a battle between the old, small-C, conservative, neoliberal Republican wing that McConnell rep- I know, it's so gross.
	That McConnell represents having that power struggle.
	You're talking at least four if not five or six senators coming together to form that wing?
	That's a great question and I don't know where it leads.
	Well let me interrupt on that one because McConnell could very well be, if he's in control, he would ultimately torpedo probably some of these impeachment proceedings.
	But if they get him out of there, then you can guarantee they're going to make a show trial and they're going to bring in witnesses.
	They'll do everything they wouldn't do for frickin Trump and make it a complete mockery.
	So that's the other worry.
	Yeah.
	And here's the thing.
	We've talked about this on this podcast, like the fact that the Congress has and even the presidency presidency to a certain extent has sort of been put on a leash.
	By the wealthy and the powerful.
	What they can do, what they can't do.
	This is a case where they wouldn't be on the leash.
	These people would, it's like an old Looney Tunes episode where it's like they've got a remote control, you know?
	That's like where it's just like, oh, Blake Masters is in there?
	Oh, let me get out this remote control and see what we can do.
	You would see, and this is the real fear with national conservatism, Nick, is you're going to get, like, not only government corrupted, but government basically co-opted.
	You know what I mean?
	Like, and you'll get to see what actually happens when these people have control, the gears completely.
	But that brings us to the, I think, and this is why we started with Arizona, I think one of the more consequential races on Tuesday period.
	And that is the gubernatorial race in Arizona between Democrat Katie Hobbs and Republican Carrie Lake.
	What I'm afraid of here, it looks like Carrie Lake is going to win this.
	Carrie Lake has been trending in an incredible direction, gaining a ton of steam.
	Everybody's showing Carrie between three to six points ahead.
	There's barely any sort of like recommendation of Hobbs being ahead.
	It does feel like the momentum has moved towards Lake.
	We're not just talking about the 2022 midterms now.
	We're talking about 2024 and moving forward.
	We're talking about somebody at the gears who is an election denier.
	And has already basically said they're willing to overturn a presidential election.
	It's a really concerning race for me.
	And the coupling of that is the Secretary of State, which looks like it'll be won by the Democrat, which sets up all sorts of interesting dilemmas here because you can have maybe a potential governor trying to override an election with a potential Democrat Secretary of State who's trying to keep the election But Nick, luckily there aren't like armed paramilitary groups like intimidating election officials in Arizona, right?
	No, that would never happen.
	Oh, okay, that's cool.
	Judges would never let that happen.
	That's great.
	That's good.
	But Carrie Lake's interesting.
	Again, if you if you wanted to become a politician in these days, you get on TV or become a social media star and ride that wave.
	This is what she did as an anchor.
	And she's much more glamorous than her opponent.
	And again, I used to say this before, like, just put a picture up of the candidate and the name.
	That's it.
	Don't let them speak because they're going to lie.
	Right.
	That used to be what I said back in the day before.
	Before we're at where we are now.
	And this whole robot thing where we're just going to vote for rubber stamps, like this is sort of what we have to do.
	And she wanted to win.
	She pivoted so completely.
	She was relatively progressive.
	Yes.
	She was a liberal.
	So completely pivoted as a cynical power grab.
	But then again, that's the rules.
	The rules dictate you want to win and you're going to run Republican because there's an opening.
	These are exactly the things you have to do and say.
	And as long as you don't care about that, you know, and you might not even govern that way.
	You can say the things, but I got to tell you, you say them enough times, right?
	You kind of get held to those things.
	You're going to have to govern that way.
	Carrie Lake is a rising star in Republican politics.
	And that's a really concerning thing.
	She's very good at this.
	She actually really is.
	It's the TV.
	It's the TV and her ability to sort of dance around.
	We've talked about this with Tucker, right?
	And Tucker went completely over the, like, you know, ass end over teacup.
	In this case, Carrie Lake is very, very good, very polished in terms of like communicating this stuff.
	I have to tell you the rumors, of course, have been that Trump is going to announce his candidacy and is immediately going to be with Marjorie Taylor Greene.
	My God, Trump and Carrie Lake.
	I mean, that's a match made in hell.
	This is her audition, isn't it?
	This is her audition, yes.
	And the question at this point is whether or not she can win convincingly and then do what the MAGA world wants her to do.
	And I gotta tell you, you're exactly right.
	It's her audition.
	And here's the thing about this, is that she might have calculated, you know what, it wouldn't be worth selling my soul to run for governor of Arizona to do this.
	If I win, I can become vice president, I can become fucking the first woman president in the United States.
	Now that, I mean, listen, it would be enough as governor to sell your soul, I would imagine, but still, there's no question that was a calculation on her part, right?
	And, you know, she's a freaking Karen.
	I can't believe a Karen is going to be able to get into this, win this race, when we, you know, people make fun of people like this all the time, but man, here we are.
	So, I will go ahead.
	I think Cary Lake is going to win this.
	I think that's going to suck.
	I'm not looking forward to it.
	But I do think, and by the way, the next state works the exact same way.
	I will say that a lot of what happens in Arizona is going to be determined on whether or not Carrie Lake's coattails brings along Blake Masters.
	Yeah.
	By the way, maybe people mistake Carrie for Katie and then vote for Katie instead.
	Maybe!
	Let's hope so!
	I think that's the thing.
	It's really going to depend on whether or not she can drag Blake Masters' absolutely disgusting corpse over the line.
	Well, let me ask you this real quickly about this race, because Katie Hobbs refused to debate Carrie Lake.
	And she kind of was saying it was because she didn't want to give a voice to such outrageous MAGA lies.
	That's noble, but was this a mistake in your mind?
	Yeah, absolutely.
	You get on the stage and you debate every single time.
	You go after them and especially and I'm sorry, but if you're a Democrat, you have to because the knock against you if you're a Democrat is that you're weak every time.
	Go on the stage and knock their ass around.
	That's the only thing you can do.
	Let's just narrate his voice.
	They're going to call him weak anyway.
	But yeah, right.
	But, like, maybe Katie isn't a good debater.
	Like, I can't quite figure out the calculation there on her camp, like, why they made that decision.
	Because it can't possibly be, oh, we don't want her to spread lies on a bigger platform, right?
	Something is going on there, and I don't know what it is.
	But, you know, in this poll I'm looking at for New York Times-Siena, it is tied.
	You know, I'm sure it's a bit of an outlier, too, but you never know.
	Crazy things could happen tomorrow.
	I'll tell you what, if Katie Hobbs pulls out an upset over Carrie Lake, then all of a sudden we're talking about a completely different election.
	That's one of the things.
	And that's why we're talking about Arizona.
	I think Arizona is going to be a big bellwether here.
	Speaking of, we've got to go to my stomping grounds, Georgia.
	And we're going to go ahead and we're going to start with the gubernatorial race because that is pretty telling here.
	Of course, we've got the incumbent, Brian Kemp, who basically stole the election in 2016, running against Stacey Abrams.
	Listen, I don't know how to tell everybody this.
	Brian Kemp is going to beat Stacey Abrams.
	That's done.
	The cake is baked.
	Abrams is not going to be the governor of Georgia this time around.
	I don't know if ever.
	There's a lot of things that have happened here.
	We can get into the analysis of it.
	The question in Georgia is this.
	How much is Kemp going to win by, and is he going to bring Herschel Walker along with him?
	But before we get into the Senate race, I mean, I think you agree with me about Kemp over Stacey here, right?
	Yeah, yeah.
	I mean, even this poll I'm looking at is she's down by five.
	I mean, when you break it out into, like, even gender, for instance, not that, like, every woman would vote for a woman candidate, but she didn't even get, you know, half of the women electorate to commit to her.
	And that's, I mean...
	I don't know what's happening in Georgia, but that's a telling sign.
	Do you have a couple hours?
	I mean, we could like start to get into it.
	I mean, well, I guess you talk about race and ethnicity, I suppose.
	Well, it's a lot of that, man.
	It's Georgia, and I know that everybody always thinks about the South as sort of like a homogenous zone.
	Everybody's of the same mind.
	The South is very different.
	The South, depending upon where you go, what you're looking at, very, very different.
	And Georgia is what you would always call the most forward-facing state in the South.
	They want to believe that they're, you know, tolerant.
	They want to believe that they're progressive and that they're more cosmopolitan, except for, you know, the more rural parts.
	When it comes to this situation, They really want to believe that they are a purple state.
	Like, it's actually baked into the identity of Georgia as is right now, but they don't want to reckon with the larger parts.
	When they talk about somebody like Stacey Abrams, they think mass change, redistribution, racial politics.
	That's what they say.
	That's what Warnock has been able to push aside, right?
	And it's actually shown a pretty incredible talent for it.
	Stacey Abrams's campaign has never gained its footing.
	This time around, there are multiple reasons for that.
	One is that she publicly auditioned for the vice presidency.
	She said out loud, you're not supposed to do it.
	You're not supposed to say I want it.
	Second of all, and I know people are going to roll their eyes.
	Her cameo on that Star Trek show as president of the earth was one of the worst cultural pop culture mistakes I've seen in politics in a very long time.
	It it fed into every narrative of her, which is she's not running to be your governor.
	She's running to be the president later.
	And it went into everything that they thought.
	They're very concerned about quote unquote crime.
	Right.
	And they they they like where things are going economically.
	They like the corporations that are using Georgia, particularly from your neck of the woods.
	California has become the California of the East.
	They don't want to upset that boat.
	And Brian Kemp has been able to.
	And by the way, Oh my God, it makes me sick, Nick.
	Oh God.
	It hurts my stomach so bad while I'm getting ready to say it.
	Are you ready?
	I'm ready.
	He's not a talented politician, but he's done a good job of straddling MAGA and moderate, quote-unquote, Republicanism.
	I'm sorry, you've got to talk for a minute.
	I've got to recover.
	Yeah, he's been quiet.
	It's kind of representative of the Walker and Warnock race.
	I don't know if you've ever watched Trump's show.
	The Apprentice.
	But a lot of times when people start to fail on the show and they're really doing badly, the people who are competing against them shut up.
	Don't say anything.
	Let him do it!
	Let him do it!
	And this is what's happening certainly in the Warnock race with Herschel Walker and that's why it seems to me like Warnock's going to win.
	And Kemp is sort of straddling that in the same way where he's just kind of quiet.
	He hasn't been vociferously MAGA.
	And by the way, For good reason.
	He was threatened by Trump as well for not overturning the election in 2020.
	He was Trump's enemy number one.
	People forget that now.
	That is what Kemp has been able to do.
	He was in Trump's crosshairs immediately after 2020.
	And listen, Kemp gestures towards the MAGA people, but when he's in a fundraiser, when he's in public spaces, it's the, oh, I'm in awe shucks, Georgian, regular Republican.
	He knows how to code switch those things depending on times.
	He weathered the storm of Trump.
	That is what is going to get him reelected.
	And Stacey Abrams, incredible organizer, incredible fundraiser, it's not going to happen.
	And I hate to be the person to tell you this, but Nick, I will tell you.
	I think Warnock's going to pull this off.
	And I think part of it has to do with the fact that Georgians are complicated voters.
	They really are.
	I think you're going to have a shit ton of Kemp-Warnock voters.
	And I think it's going to be close.
	In fact, and I hate to say this, I think it could lead to a runoff in December.
	I think there's a real possibility that occurs.
	But my instinct right now with how this race has been run and the way that it has moved, I actually think Stacey Abrams is going to help Warnock, and I think that people voting for Kemp and wanting to modulate their vote are going to vote for Warnock.
	I think he wins.
	I think he keeps that seat.
	Yeah, and by complicated, you're right.
	Look at these numbers and you start breaking them out by race.
	I have to be a little cynical here.
	One of the reasons why they chose Walker, right, is because he's black.
	In a statewide hero, yes.
	Yeah, and they wanted to run against another black candidate.
	And it's telling that of the black vote in Georgia, 92% are favoring Warnock, right?
	Whereas Stacey Abrams actually got less than that.
	which is another interesting thing that maybe speaks about women.
	You know what I mean?
	How we break that out.
	So I think you're right.
	I think Warnock wins.
	I think it's going to be crazy.
	But yes, you're going to have that split vote there.
	And man, would it be suck if we have to deal with like Trump in the middle of his campaign all of a sudden.
	And then there's a recount of the Senate race or something like that.
	That would be horrible.
	So let's just hope he can get it, you know, 1% high or more.
	Can I say one quick thing about the possibility of a runoff?
	Going back to the interview I did with the Democratic strategist consultant James.
	There are so many people who are rooting for that who know that Herschel Walker is a dangerous person.
	And who know that a runoff can break either way.
	Who the hell knows what's going to happen?
	There are tons of Democratic strategists who are like, yeah, get that runoff!
	Because they remember what happened in 2020.
	They remember how much money there was.
	It just flooded into Georgia.
	And that's disgusting.
	In all of this, I think the political class has shown itself to be corrupted and decayed.
	And I hope, like hell, they avoid a runoff.
	I hope that Warnock wins that in a walk.
	Can I jump in here for one quick second?
	Because of the top races across the country, there is a theme, which is why I think we're both a little bit pessimistic about winning the House.
	And the theme is, there's a question they had on this poll, which was, you know, thinking about who you're going to vote for, what issues are most important to deciding your vote?
	And one was, you know, abortion, guns, and democracy.
	And the other side was economics, economic issues.
	So the abortion thing was supposed to be catalyzing all everybody here but you look across these states like Georgia and like Pennsylvania and where we were before in Arizona when you look at those the women who favor issues like abortion It's only, where is it, 35% female, for instance, in Georgia feel like that's what's going to decide their vote.
	35%.
	It doesn't get higher than the 40s.
	This is a problem, right?
	We thought that women were going to come out and vote and use this as their catalyst, and they are, but I don't think it's enough to sway or hold back this red wave.
	I want to say something, and I want to say it in the most judicious way that I possibly Right.
	I don't want people to take a walk with me for a second.
	This is always something that turns a little contentious, but listen, we have to understand that it's true.
	There is a politics of performance where you and I can say what matters to us, right?
	Like what our principles are, what it is that we want to see in the world.
	You never know what those principles actually mean until they're tested, right?
	It costs nothing to sit there and say that the main driver is the idea that women should have bodily autonomy, right?
	All of a sudden you're there and your pocketbook is in danger, the economy feels a little weird, things feel like they're sort of swooning or in decline.
	All of a sudden then you have a choice, which is, do I care more about myself?
	And by the way, maybe you're a person who worries about your own bodily autonomy, or maybe you live in Georgia where you don't expect abortion to necessarily be taken away full stop, right?
	And then all of a sudden you have to question, do I want to cast a vote for other people, or do I want to cast a vote for myself?
	And the politics of selfishness in this country are, it's almost uncountable.
	You know what I mean?
	You can't, that's one of the reasons why polls don't necessarily work.
	And because you, you have to, you have to reckon with who you are and what you want and what you think.
	And you think something about yourself that isn't always true.
	You know, like there are a lot of people in blue states who can sit there and say that abortion is the number one thing, but they're not going to have their rights taken away.
	Right?
	That doesn't matter.
	But then the message that something's going to happen economically or whatever, it turns into ... It's a shadow game that we don't really appreciate, I don't think.
	The only problem I have with that is that it's not really apples to apples in a way that ... Obviously, everybody wants money.
	They want to be able to make more money, save more money, not pay taxes, have a better economy.
	But it kind of comes down to the principle that it has nothing to do with whether you would get an abortion or not.
	This is all about you telling somebody else in some other part of the land that they can't do that.
	And that's really, you know, such a strange concept to me, why I would be able to have any kind of power over someone like that.
	I mean, listen, we already have some basic laws in here, though.
	I think we can all agree with it.
	Everyone should be held to.
	But this is not one that, you know, and there's a couple of these hotspot issues like gay marriage that should not be.
	What does it matter if, you know, why should I be able to have dominion over somebody else on that?
	That's the problem here.
	I guess people would argue that is democracy, but again it's the mindset that you can.
	I can tell everybody else in the whole country that they cannot do what I think is an abomination.
	That is the thing I can't wrap my head around.
	So, real fast before we move to Pennsylvania, Nick, you think Warnock's going to win this?
	Do you think he wins it outright, or do you think it's going to turn into a runoff?
	I feel like he can get more than 1% of the lead.
	I think so, too.
	I think so.
	He's just a terrible—Herschel Walker is just the absolute worst.
	If I—and listen, I hardly ever do this.
	I hardly ever put a number on it, right?
	But I'm going to go ahead and put this out there, and it doesn't matter.
	The prediction business, I've said this before, you can be wrong on television every day for the rest of your life and they'll still have you on TV.
	But I'll go ahead and put this out there.
	My guess is Warnock wins it 53-47.
	That's my guess.
	OK, I'll take it.
	I was thinking maybe a point and a half, but OK.
	I think a lot of people are going to go to the polls and they're going to reject Herschel Walker.
	And I could be wrong.
	I hope I'm not.
	OK, so let's go to Pennsylvania.
	First of all, because we've got to talk about the gubernatorial race and then we'll get into the big one.
	Doug Mastriano, I think, is going to get just absolutely beat to hell by Josh Shapiro.
	And I want to point out, and this is important that we talk about this before the Senate race, because so many of these races are linked.
	Josh Shapiro is not a perfect candidate whatsoever.
	He has not run a perfect campaign.
	Doug Mastriano is one of the most abhorrent candidates that we have had this side of somebody who has been, like, accused of harassing young girls at malls.
	He is a disgusting person.
	And everything that I see shows that people have recognized that, which means I think Shapiro's gonna win.
	I think he's gonna win it handedly.
	That tells us, and this is going to be something we're going to be able to learn from the John Fetterman-Mamet Oz race, What happens in that race is going to tell us exactly how much the health thing has played into this, and how much the media narrative around it has played, and also ableism.
	Straight up.
	Like, how is it that those voters are processing this thing?
	But I think Mastriano eats shit in this election, and rightfully so.
	He has earned it.
	And what happens then with Federman and Oz, I think, is going to be sort of downstream from that.
	I think this actually, the results, are going to be something that political scientists are going to be able to look at for a very long time.
	There's going to be a lot of published articles and research on this.
	Sure.
	I mean, Mastriano has religious beliefs that will make most religious people cringe as well.
	He's even gone over the board on that side.
	So he really is a terrible candidate.
	It sucks that we have to even be in the situation where he gets to have a platform and run.
	Yes.
	Pennsylvania is an interesting place, right?
	I don't know what the word is, but they're very protective of their state and their mindsets, right?
	And again, Ahas has been really beaten over the head of the fact that he doesn't really live in this state.
	He doesn't really live there!
	And that's a big one.
	I mean, and he continually makes the mistake.
	Did you see the thing where he said, you know, before the Steelers game tomorrow, call 10 people, and it turns out the Steelers have a bye.
	Had a bye on the end of the day.
	And if you don't know that, that's a big affront to a state that's really into their sports.
	If this untalented elitist charlatan, who by the way doesn't understand what Wawa and Sheetz are about and doesn't understand like anything having to do with Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania culture.
	And you're exactly right.
	The people of Pennsylvania are very protective of their state.
	They love that state.
	They have their own weird culture.
	I love people from Pennsylvania.
	Keystoners are the best.
	They're so strange.
	If somehow or another Mehmet Oz squeaks this thing out, it says so much about what that stroke has meant.
	Right?
	And I've got to tell you, and I'm going to be very honest with you, I have no idea what the hell is going to happen in this race.
	I don't.
	And none of the polls or trajectories or any of that, I think, tell us what's going to happen in this race.
	But I will say, and I hate to say it, Americans make bad decisions quite a lot of the time.
	I really don't want to think that Oz pulls this off.
	But it worries me.
	I'll just say that.
	Yeah.
	I mean, again, especially because Pennsylvania is another one of those Rust Belt states that's going to be really key to 2024.
	And again, the prism isn't like, oh, you know, God darn it, Republican won.
	This is, oh shit, Republican won and they're going to change the votes and send new electors to the Electoral College.
	And that's really the problem.
	This is the big enchilada.
	It really is.
	Yeah, because I think down ballot, there's other local races that are going to be also affecting the votes in 2024.
	So we've got to make sure you get as many of these Democrats in the top spots as they possibly can.
	So what's your feeling on this one?
	Oh, so I think, I feel good about Fetterman, even though, I mean I don't feel great about Fetterman because he had to have a stroke of all things.
	This is going to be the one thing, otherwise he would have won by 12 points.
	Like he would have destroyed him.
	No, and I feel perfectly fine having seen him since the stroke and despite needing, you know, closed captions.
	So what?
	It's like having a hearing aid or whatever.
	That didn't affect me at all.
	I feel like his mind can function well enough to, you know, be in the Senate.
	So I feel good about him.
	And yeah, I think Mastriano is still, he's just, you know, maybe in the next governor's race, Maybe he could win, you know what I mean?
	I don't know if we're going somewhere different, but it still seems like, at least for Pennsylvania, there is some semblance of normalcy where he's just too extreme and he's not going to get, you know, within five points.
	Yeah, I agree.
	And if Shapiro walks away from this thing, or walks away from Ostriano and Federman goes down, I mean, what a commentary.
	I will say, and I know that this isn't like some sort of breaking news or whatever, tomorrow night when we're, or I guess it's tonight when people are listening to this, This is probably the race I'm watching as much as any other, right?
	I think it's a real bellwether, which, you know, Pennsylvania always is.
	Another race I'm going to be watching simply because of personal dislike for one of the candidates, we've got to go over to Ohio.
	I'm going to say this, J.D.
	Vance against Tim Ryan, I have enjoyed greatly watching Tim Ryan beat the shit out of J.D.
	Vance and pull his pants down on the stage everywhere he goes and expose him.
	I hate J.D.
	Vance.
	I think he is a class traitor.
	I think he is a grifter.
	I think he is a dangerous person.
	Nick, I also think he's going to be the next senator from Ohio.
	I'm sorry, J.D.
	Vance was going to be?
	Yeah, unfortunately.
	You know, it's funny, because I was thinking, I had lost track of the polls for a little while, but I just did real clear politics.
	Yeah, he's up big.
	He's up big.
	I didn't realize that.
	You know what?
	I should have been paying attention to that poll itself, because I'm just so overwhelmed by how bad Vance has been.
	Although, in some respects, Vance has kind of quieted down and spoke less in the last little minute.
	He's done nothing!
	Yeah.
	And so that kind of helps him, right?
	The less you speak when you're such a bad candidate, the better it is.
	When you're detestable.
	Yeah.
	When your face makes people physically ill, it's better not to go out in public.
	You know, I noticed you didn't say you like anybody from Ohio like you did from Pennsylvania.
	I like Ohio fine.
	It's a border state with Indiana.
	You know how it goes.
	You gotta have a little bit of problems.
	But I will say, I think Tim Ryan has done the best with what he's been given.
	J.D.
	Vance is, I mean, Ohio, Ohio's not a toss-up state anymore.
	It's just not.
	The Democratic Party failed in Ohio.
	I mean, and anybody in the Democratic Party you talk to, strategies, comms, fundraising, they know that they failed there.
	And a lot of people have given up on it completely.
	J.D. Vance is an awful, detestable candidate.
	He's had a ton of money from Peter Thiel flowing in.
	Of course, McConnell has wanted that seat.
	He's more than fine with it.
	I will say this.
	If we're broadcasting tomorrow and this race doesn't get called very quickly, that speaks to something larger.
	That speaks to the possibility that a lot of these numbers, a lot of these expectations could very well be off.
	I'll just say that.
	Okay.
	Now, let's not forget, I think I quickly mentioned earlier, though, that whatever the polls that have been flooding from the GOP in here, again, are just going to be used as more evidence for them that the elections are fraudulent.
	Yes.
	And you have to worry about that in all of these races.
	In theory, Ohio won't have to deal with that, but that is a thing that just frightens me because If these polls are way off like that, then that's just going to, you know, I'm telling you, it's a tipping off point for weeks of just chaos.
	And who knows how these are going to result.
	Even if the Republicans sweep control of Congress by like record numbers, they're still going to say there was fraud.
	It's the biggest golden ticket that you can keep in your pocket.
	It's going to happen.
	But a lot of this stuff, I'm sorry, but we're not going to know the results of some of this stuff for a couple of weeks.
	We just aren't.
	But yeah, so are you with me?
	You think Vance probably gets this?
	Yeah, it looks like it.
	I've never had a personal enemy in the Senate.
	Wow.
	I've never had a personal enemy of mine in the Senate.
	I do not look forward to that possibility.
	I'll say that.
	He's a detestable person, and the fact that he is this close to the reins of power, I think it just speaks incredible volumes of where this country is at this moment.
	For sure.
	Alright, let's head on down to Florida, speaking of terrible people.
	Listen, Ron DeSantis is going to beat Charlie Crist.
	Charlie Crist has been an absolute embarrassment, but I needed to talk about something.
	Nick, can you very, very quickly, can you give the people like a little bit of a taste of this new Ron DeSantis propaganda that is circulating?
	And by the way, for anybody who doesn't know this, and we'll talk more about it, it spawned a Trump nickname that we have to discuss, and I gotta tell you, it's a little lacking.
	And on the eighth day, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, I need a protector.
	So God made a fighter.
	God said, I need somebody willing to get up before dawn, kiss his family goodbye, travel thousands of miles for no other reason than to serve the people, to save their jobs, their livelihoods, their liberty, their happiness.
	Now, if you haven't seen this, this is a new ad put out by the Ron DeSantis campaign, and it basically is pictures of Ron DeSantis as this voice, which is sort of plagiarizing the God Made a Farmer speech that is pretty iconic for some people.
	Basically, it's suggesting that God created Ron DeSantis to protect the people and to protect the country, which is Incredible!
	And if this is any indication, that and his top gun bullshit that he did about like fighting the media and flying in jet planes, if that's any indication of what a Ron DeSantis presidential campaign would look like, I'm tired already, man.
	Oh, lots of cosplay for him.
	Yeah, you know, he is... By the way, I just read an article about him as a teacher.
	Do you know he was a teacher for S. Jeff out of Yale?
	First of all, I know we had to do an election preview show.
	How have we not talked about that article yet?
	Because it is a problem!
	Yeah, I mean, you know, he was teaching in the South at a really nice boarding school in Georgia, right?
	And basically, it sounds to me like he was Civil War denying.
	He went out, he was talking about how the Civil War was about property, which it was, That also obscures what that property was, which is human beings.
	Right.
	So he did that.
	Also, and if you want to know who Ron DeSantis is, it's like all the students are like, I don't know, he just kept showing up at all of our parties.
	And we don't have to say anything else because this is a podcast that doesn't want to get sued, you know, into the earth.
	Yeah, that's interesting.
	Yeah.
	Well, and then the next year they had the Institute of the New Rule.
	It said teachers couldn't fraternize with the high schoolers.
	And everyone was like, yeah, that's that's the Santis rule.
	And every time that he was in the classroom, he talked about how the job wasn't good enough for him.
	And he was destined to be a political leader, possibly even the president.
	This person is deranged and dangerous.
	And we know that, but this is further proof.
	I wish we could do a couple hours just on that.
	Just on that article.
	Wild.
	But Donald Trump, who has set his sights on DeSantis as he's getting ready to launch his new campaign, he went after Ronny Donnie, and he called him Ron DeSanctimonious.
	I gotta tell you, I don't know who Donald Trump is talking to these days.
	Somebody needs to get in his ear and tell him to go back to the workshop.
	That ain't gonna cut it.
	Yeah.
	They need to workshop that again.
	But it's not hard.
	You'll be able to find some other things that they can do with that name.
	I'm sure.
	You gotta do something else.
	That ain't doing it.
	Yeah, it's a personality thing, right?
	A lot of times, again, until we get to robots where there is no personality and it's just a rubber stamp for the party, we still have these people who think that they need to have a certain, you know, mindset or certain personality to do this job.
	You know, Matt Gaetz is in that same...
	It's a personality... I can't call it a disorder.
	It's a personality trait, I suppose, or a style, you know?
	There's a similarity there, and it's so off-putting, but, like, give me some insight, because obviously people rally to this guy.
	There's something, you know, enticing about that.
	It's immediate when I see him speak that I can't take it, but what is it?
	Nobody capitalized off of the pandemic more than him.
	That's what it was.
	He was the first person who came out of the gates and said, I'm not doing this.
	I don't care how many people die.
	This is what we're doing.
	He then became a conservative icon.
	And basically what happened is that was his audition for all of the ideologues, plus also the infrastructure of the party.
	And he basically, because Trump, we talked about this on the podcast, Trump knocked everything down to the state level.
	And DeSantis was like, absolutely, I'll take it.
	Yeah, give me all the power you want to give me, and he made himself there.
	Abbott, and by the way, we're not going to talk about the Texas race.
	Beto's going to lose.
	Right.
	That's going to happen.
	And by the way, if you just want to understand what's going on there, take a look at the Stacey Abrams part that we already talked about.
	It's more or less, you know, similar.
	And with DeSantis, he took control.
	I will say, to put this, because, you know, it was like, we talked about this during the conventions.
	Sort of the quiet parts of politics that you know if you're on the inside.
	Tomorrow night, go ahead and put this on your calendar, DeSantis will win this race early.
	My guess is the networks will call it 9.15, 9.30, pretty quick.
	DeSantis will give a speech before primetime is over.
	We will watch that.
	On our show, right?
	And what we're going to watch, and this is what experts like this do, a governor who overperforms or wins handedly who has desires for the White House.
	Their victory speech is a preview of the early workings of the presidential campaign.
	So what we might watch tomorrow, and this is one of the reasons, by the way, that Trump might announce either tonight or tomorrow, except for the fact he's a narcissist, is you are probably going to get the launching of the Ron DeSantis presidential campaign.
	Not officially.
	But the rollout of it.
	That'll probably happen tomorrow while we're broadcasting.
	Okay, well let's put on our hats then because there's going to be some keywords, right, that must come out of that speech that would signify that.
	Anything, I don't want to put you on the spot, but I feel like you might have some ideas.
	Yeah, so one of the things, it's going to be about strength, it's going to be about needing, and by the way, I don't want to give Ron DeSantis anything approaching free advice, but if anybody around him is worth a shit, They would focus on serious leadership, like the the the woke left is is threatening your children.
	They're coming after your jobs.
	They're coming after your careers.
	They're coming after your your good name.
	You need a serious conservative in there.
	And that right there, it goes ahead and says that he is above the Trumpian sideshow circus.
	That's what he should do if he has instincts or if people around him have instincts.
	We'll see what happens.
	But I also think he'll probably try and dunk on California.
	100%.
	Because he also might sense that Gavin Newsom might want to move in on this turf as well.
	Absolutely.
	I think you're exactly right.
	I think probably take some shots at California, depending upon what's happening in these other states.
	Like Pennsylvania, right?
	If Josh Shapiro wins immediately, like before DeSantis does, or around the same time, maybe you take a shot at him, you start bringing into the alliances.
	There's a lot of stuff they can have, but tomorrow night is probably the spiritual beginning of Ron DeSantis 2024.
	Yeah, so the point we're making is you'll hear national stuff that talks about the whole country versus just what he could do for Florida, which is nothing.
	Yes, exactly.
	He'll roll out his vision of the Republican Party, and that noise you'll hear will be basically every Republican who doesn't have, like, a Trump tattoo on their lower back, screaming out in, you know, glorious agony, is what you'll hear.
	Yeah, I had a much worse, inappropriate... And by the way, I want to go ahead and put this bug in your ear.
	We're going to watch the Ron DeSantis speech, and then I want you to immediately put it on Fox News, and basically watching these people just, like, blissing out.
	Because that's where it's going to happen.
	Yep.
	All right.
	What's our next race?
	We got to go to Wisconsin.
	I got to tell you, everybody, Ron Johnson, who is another detestable, unlikable asshole, he is going to beat Mandela Barnes.
	And I don't know what else to tell you.
	It's unfortunate.
	The Democrats should have picked up the seat.
	Should have.
	But they're not going to.
	Um, you know, Mandela Barnes is a troubled candidate and I was in Wisconsin last month and, you know, at the bars, like, it was non-stop, never-ending attack ads against him.
	It was crazy.
	It was almost literally, like, every ad in between, you know, SportsCenter, whatever it was, was just an attack ad.
	You know, he did OK, but he has a troubled history as well.
	And it was it was going to be an uphill battle.
	And it's unbelievable that a guy because Ron Johnson is is theoretically as bad as like Herschel Walker in my mind.
	Well, so a real fast and I just want to go ahead and beat this drum because it's important.
	And everybody has been saying to me, they're like, why don't you believe the hype about the idea that the Democrats keep both the House and the Senate?
	Right.
	This race right here is tailor made for the Democrats to win.
	Ron Johnson's detestable, unlikable, doesn't have really anything even approaching skills.
	The state doesn't even really like him.
	Mandela Barnes is not a good candidate, but if it's a movement election, what you need is a party platform.
	We keep talking about this.
	What does being a Democrat stand for as opposed to not being a Republican, right?
	Okay, you need more representatives?
	What are you going to give me?
	The Democrats have not given that to anybody.
	They haven't said how they would codify Roe.
	They haven't said how they would change the economy.
	They haven't said shit.
	Mandela Barnes is the type of candidate that a party program would drag over the finish line.
	It's not going to happen.
	And that, I think, tells us everything about what's going on in this election.
	Right.
	I mean, the fact that it's as close as it is, you know, three points, four points, whatever it is, is a testament to how bad Ron Johnson is, I think, versus anything else.
	And let's not forget, Wisconsin is Madison and Milwaukee are the two bastions of
	of leftism but once you get out of there it gets radical really fast and we see you know militias and we see way out in the woods people who are just you know are rural you know deep red Republicans and it's really it didn't used to be that way Wisconsin was was pretty blue I think for a long time yeah I gotta check that but I'm pretty sure it was and so nonetheless you know this is what we're moving towards and it's it's that's one of the seats that really was ripe and I can't believe they couldn't have done a better job on that
	Listen, I don't want to give everybody like an overdue history lesson, but one of the reasons 2016 turned out the way it did was because the Democratic firewall fell apart.
	And it fell apart because the Democratic Party basically took for granted its old constituency.
	They thought they didn't have to worry about labor unions, they didn't have to worry about working class people, and as a result, Michigan went, Minnesota, Wisconsin.
	The fact that they, and Ohio by the way, they just said goodbye Ohio, we don't need you, right?
	You want to talk about JD Vance.
	It is the collapse of the Democratic New Coalition.
	That's what's happened.
	The Democrats have taken for granted a lot of voters that they're losing.
	The Republican Party, by the way, for people, and listen, I know our listeners aren't siloed people.
	I know they're interested.
	I know they look beyond just sort of like standard sort of things.
	The Republican Party is making inroads not just with traditional Democratic voters in those circles.
	They're making inroads with black voters.
	They're making inroads with Hispanic voters.
	Like those types of things are happening because the Democratic Party has lost its bearings.
	And it has become reactionary as opposed to, you know, productive.
	And that is the problem and that is why we don't even have to talk about what's happening in Wisconsin.
	Well, I mean, we kind of need to do it in the sense that that was ground zero for where they wanted to try and disenfranchise many people in a very systematic way from 12 years ago, going back.
	Oh, and by the way, all of it was right-wing donor money that made it happen.
	Scott Walker was not a good politician.
	It was Koch money that went in there.
	That's exactly what happened.
	And as a result, you have like the governor, the guy running for governor, Tim Michaels, who's basically saying, if I win, a Republican will never lose another race again.
	And they're able to change the constitution of the state itself to basically manipulate these ballots from now on, and they could probably do that.
	And then, by the way, it wouldn't stop other states from trying to do this as well.
	That's the scary thing.
	So Wisconsin is going to be, on a local level, a ground zero for a really problematic thing in terms of we're talking about, you know, we're so scared for democracy as a whole.
	What they can do in Wisconsin, if the governor wins for the Republicans, could very well be a blueprint for a lot of other states and that would just be, you know, there goes democracy again.
	Exactly.
	And by the way, this conversation that we're having about why this has happened and what we're sort of taking a look at, this is the reason why we even have to talk about the governor race in New York.
	I mean, my God, Nick.
	My God.
	The incumbent governor of New York is going to get re-elected.
	Lee Zeldin very well could lose by maybe three or four points.
	The Republican nominee in New York.
	I'm sorry, but the Democratic Party is sending heavy hitters into New York and New Hampshire.
	That's a sign.
	Something has to shift.
	And I'll go ahead and I'll say.
	After all this conversation, everything that we've talked about, I do feel like the Republicans are going to win the House and the Senate.
	I think that's what's going to happen.
	You know, maybe I'm wrong and I hope that I'm wrong and maybe something goes one way or the other.
	But Nick, the determining factor of the next two years is whether or not Joe Biden and whether or not the Democratic Party with their backs against the wall can do something better than what they're doing now.
	And I haven't, I've seen little glimpses of it here and there that they can, but the jury still remains out because a Republican-controlled Congress, along with Republican-controlled legislatures in the states, Republican-controlled Supreme Court, that's a recipe for disaster.
	And you have to basically spend the next two years making the argument, this is a mess, this is an absolute crisis, how do we put it right?
	Here's where we go.
	And I don't know yet what that looks like.
	Yeah, I don't know if the Senate's going to go, because I believe that Fetterman and Warnock are going to win.
	And if they can get those two, it kind of feels like they could at the very least be another 50-50.
	But then you're right, because Vance is going to win, and then you have a real problem in Arizona.
	Obviously, if Arizona goes Democrat, then I really feel good about them having control of the Senate.
	And by the way, if that's the trend, if that's the trend is Republican governor, Democratic senator, that is a fascinating glimpse into the electorate.
	You know what I mean?
	That's not sustainable, right?
	Do what?
	That's not sustainable, right?
	No!
	No, that is not sustainable at all!
	That's not.
	And that speaks to, like, a real Fisher.
	And by the way, the American electorate has done done shit for years.
	Nick, we know that.
	I mean, like the idea of divided government has always been so stupid.
	But like that sort of move to have states that are controlled by Republican ideology, but sending people to Washington, D.C., who are Democrats, it speaks to a misunderstanding of how politics works, but also really misplaced priorities.
	I'll just say that.
	So you're talking about Elon Musk tweeting today how he thinks everyone should vote Republican to have a balanced government.
	Did he do that?
	Here's a guy who's the owner of the most influential social media platform of all times and he's literally weighing in the day before the election and he says it's much better when you have like a Democratic White House and the Republican Senate or Congress.
	Now you tell me by him doing that you convince me that he's not a puppet of Putin.
	Oh, God.
	Or China, or Saudi Arabia, or all of those.
	I can't see how he is anything other than a sowing discord, you know, and trying to create more chaos, which is Putin's agenda.
	I can't see any other role that he would have.
	I didn't know he did that.
	It was just like, that just made me feel very sick.
	Man, he sucks.
	Yeah, and I won't tell you how many likes that tweet got, because it got a lot.
	I assume it did.
	That, and by the way, the fact that we haven't talked about Musk and Twitter, basically that needs to be in every conversation we have about politics right now.
	Like, it does.
	It defines so much.
	I mean, all of this is happening at the exact same time.
	The conversations I'm having with other experts and analysts, it's grim.
	And the Twitter part is a major component of it.
	I mean, the fact that they completely dismantled their misinformation teams, everything around elections and I talked to one person today in the know who told me that the flow of bots and misinformation campaigns from both Russia and Russian-affiliated groups, what's going on right now makes 2016 just look like a tea party.
	It's just full bore.
	It's pedal to the metal.
	I'm sure you saw that, you know, a lot of people they fired, they were like, um, whoops, can you come back?
	They misfired a whole bunch of people in different groups of programs they've wanted to continue to develop.
	And they had fired the entire team on those projects.
	So, this is not a smart person.
	This is not a person who knows how to manage anything.
	And a pathetic person.
	A pathetic person.
	The way he is wielding power so far is not just troubling, it's really repulsive.
	I'm a troubled, troubled person, and the fact that he has this much power and sway I think is terrible.
	But that being said, listen, I want to go ahead and make the case, and this is something we've talked about on this podcast before.
	This, what we do, and what people like Democracyish do as well, there aren't many of us, there aren't many podcasts who, I would say, Nick, people get into the minutiae of things, but they kind of shy away from the harder realities of it.
	You know what I mean?
	Like, unfortunately, there are harder realities we have to deal with.
	I'll say this.
	Tomorrow night, or tonight, when you're listening to this on Tuesday, is going to be a tough night.
	It just is.
	Even if the Democrats somehow or another pull victory from the jaws of defeat, the coverage of it, the normalization of candidates like Walker and Vance and all these people, it doesn't go away.
	This is going to be hard.
	I think people should come out.
	I think they should watch our coverage starting at 8 p.m.
	Eastern on Tuesday night.
	Because we're going to be having conversations that other people are not, and maybe they're not capable of.
	I don't know how you feel about that.
	It's like they've shown themselves incapable or unwilling, and I don't have much room for that anymore.
	I don't know about you.
	You don't have much room for people who are incapable of having that discussion?
	Yeah.
	Yeah.
	I don't.
	Right.
	You want to have discussions with people who can think deeply, right?
	And have empathy.
	Listen, we're not going to have an 18-person panel, and we're not going to have holograms that, you know, Wolf Blitzer's going to walk into, but yeah.
	I hope y'all can come out this 8 p.m.
	Eastern this Tuesday night for the midterm elections.
	I don't know.
	We haven't talked about this.
	This is actually pulling back the curtain.
	How long are we going?
	What are we doing tomorrow?
	Oh, geez Louise.
	Well, it's early for me at least, so, you know, it's probably more up to you, I guess, how long.
	But, you know, probably like Two or three hours?
	Okay, listen.
	I'm in, man.
	I'm ready to do this.
	This is what we're made for!
	This is what we do this for.
	So hopefully we see you 8 p.m.
	Eastern.
	We're putting it on the YouTube channel.
	I will tweet out links.
	Nick will tweet out links.
	We'll send it out to the Discord.
	We'll send it out to the Patreon.
	All that good stuff.
	If you haven't already, go over to patreon.com slash muckrakepodcast to support the cast.
	People are doing it more and more because they know that this is stuff that they need and this is a show that needs it.
	It keeps us editorially independent and having real, actual conversations.
	patreon.com slash muckrakepodcast.
	We will see you tomorrow night, 8 p.m.
	Eastern.
	YouTube channel, check it out.
	And yes, before then, you can find Nick at Can You Hear Me?
	SMH.
	You can find me at J.Y.
	Sexton.

▲