Uncensored - Piers Morgan - 20240903_can-kamala-withstand-the-scrutiny
Aired: 2024-09-03
Duration: 53:51


=== Strength Through Joy Hijacked (04:24) ===

[00:00:00]  The other side's like, oh my God, everybody's the enemy.
[00:00:04]  So go ahead, run your mouth about Kamala Harris.
[00:00:07]  But at the end of the day, Donald Trump's still a lunatic.
[00:00:10]  Emily's a Jewish girl and she mentioned the strength through joy was 100% hijacked from the Nazis.
[00:00:18]  33.
[00:00:19]  I have to read this, Emily.
[00:00:20]  Hold on one second, guys.
[00:00:21]  It was set up as a tool to promote the advantages of Nazism.
[00:00:25]  I'm blaming Joe Biden.
[00:00:26]  I actually want to criticize the puppeteers that are controlling him because I genuinely believe he has one foot in the grave.
[00:00:32]  We don't know who's in charge.
[00:00:33]  All of you know, that's why you're spending all your time going, oh, look at Kamala Harris.
[00:00:36]  She's a slightly normal politician.
[00:00:39]  Ooh, that's so scary.
[00:00:41]  Anthony was fired.
[00:00:42]  What, after 10 days, I don't sound like a bitter ex-employee.
[00:00:45]  Chank has Trump derangement schedule, whether you like it or not, brother.
[00:00:48]  Where are we now with this election, do you think?
[00:00:50]  Our model has the November outcome basically 50-50.
[00:00:54]  So the key question is, who's going to be president of the United States come November 5th?
[00:01:03]  Well, the summer's often a quiet time in news and politics, but the DNC's election-winning machine has been running at full throttle.
[00:01:10]  A month ago, even the most passionate and partisan Democrat would have struggled to pretend that Kamala Harris is anything more than a middling vice president with dubious credentials for the highest office in the land.
[00:01:22]  But almost overnight, she's been manufactured into a cultural phenomenon and a visionary.
[00:01:26]  Most of all, she's apparently a harbinger of joy.
[00:01:30]  The one thing that I will not forgive them for is their try to steal the joy from this country.
[00:01:36]  The joy felt by Americans backing the Harris Walls ticket.
[00:01:39]  We are joyful warriors.
[00:01:41]  Being joyful is part of the American identity.
[00:01:44]  The joy factor.
[00:01:45]  Campaign of joy.
[00:01:46]  You're talking about radical joy.
[00:01:48]  It is downright joyful.
[00:01:50]  It looks like a joyous rally.
[00:01:52]  It looks like a joyous occasion.
[00:01:54]  A real zeal and joy in the campaign.
[00:01:56]  The joy that you're bringing back to the country.
[00:01:59]  Joyful, exuberant rally.
[00:02:01]  Thank you for bringing back the joy.
[00:02:03]  Power of joy.
[00:02:04]  Hope and joy.
[00:02:06]  Something incredibly joyful.
[00:02:08]  She does it all with a sense of joy.
[00:02:11]  Joy.
[00:02:16]  Imagine that.
[00:02:17]  American politics.
[00:02:20]  Oh, the joy.
[00:02:21]  Why am I not feeling quite so joyful?
[00:02:24]  Why did none of them look that joyful as they said all that?
[00:02:26]  The same battery of commentators, strategists, and grandees who conspired to oust the actual president of the United States, Joe Biden, are now working equally ardently over time to ensure they get to choose the next one.
[00:02:39]  Will the American people swallow all this enforced joy?
[00:02:43]  Can Harris withstand the scrutiny that comes with the home straight of a presidential campaign?
[00:02:48]  Or will she simply dodge that scrutiny altogether after 40 days without an interview or a press conference?
[00:02:54]  This is how she answered the easiest, most predictable question of all when she finally sat down with CNN.
[00:03:01]  If you are elected, what would you do on day one in the White House?
[00:03:06]  Well, there are a number of things.
[00:03:08]  I will tell you first and foremost, one of my highest priorities is to do what we can to support and strengthen the middle class.
[00:03:17]  When I look at the aspirations, the goals, the ambitions of the American people, I think that people are ready for a new way forward in a way that generations of Americans have been fueled by hope and by optimism.
[00:03:37]  Oh, come on, Kamala.
[00:03:38]  What does all that mean?
[00:03:39]  It's just word salad.
[00:03:41]  Regardless of your politics, it's not an answer to an obvious question.
[00:03:45]  Now, if Kamala's first command to her team from behind the resolute desk is, do what you can to support the middle class, America's in big trouble.
[00:03:52]  What her campaign is doing successfully is somehow managing to distance Harris from everything she's ever said or done, particularly in the administration in which she has served as vice president.
[00:04:02]  She's apparently flipped positions on everything from the border wall to abolishing private health insurance, imposing electric car mandates, defining the police, and banning fracking.
[00:04:11]  None of this seems to matter.
[00:04:13]  The message is clear.
[00:04:14]  Carmela Harris is shiny, new, and nothing to do with what's happened before, either under Joe Biden or what's come out of her own mouth.

=== Campaign Confidence Lost (02:19) ===

[00:04:25]  A new way forward and turn the page on the last decade of what I believe has been contrary to where the spirit of our country really lies.
[00:04:37]  But the last decade, of course, the last three and a half years has been part of your administration.
[00:04:41]  I'm talking about an era.
[00:04:45]  You've literally been in charge for nearly four years of that 10 years.
[00:04:49]  This is your era.
[00:04:51]  And I use that pronunciation very deliberately.
[00:04:55]  This woman was the vice president of the United States, is the vice president of the United States.
[00:05:00]  It's actually a president who's on the beat somewhere.
[00:05:04]  Well, the cabal which united to force her boss into retirement, meanwhile, is still barely able to contain its glee.
[00:05:11]  The person who should be applauded is the president who did the most selfless thing that anybody's done since George Washington.
[00:05:18]  And that's true.
[00:05:19]  No, whatever.
[00:05:21]  Absolutely they do.
[00:05:24]  Absolutely they do.
[00:05:27]  And I just want to say from the bottom of my heart, thank you so much for what you didn't do.
[00:05:40]  Extraordinary, isn't it?
[00:05:41]  I mean, it was George Clooney with his op-ed in the New York Times and Nancy Pelosi who apparently said to Biden, we can do this the easy way or the hard way, but you're out, sunshine.
[00:05:51]  It was those two who led the campaign to get rid of him.
[00:05:54]  They were the Brutuses to the Caesar.
[00:05:57]  And yet now they want us to think this guy's the greatest guy since sliced bread.
[00:06:02]  Greatest is Washington, the first president of the United States, the founder of the United States, the man that many Americans think was the greatest president.
[00:06:11]  Is that how anyone views Joe Biden?
[00:06:13]  A man who, before he could even serve a second term, had to be bullied and shamed and humiliated out of his position as the nominee for 2024 by his own team, by his own people?
[00:06:26]  There's a lot to call out about Carmela Harris and her campaign.
[00:06:30]  In my view, the Trump campaign also has its problems.
[00:06:33]  It's yet to regain its footing and confidence that it had when Biden was the nominee.
[00:06:37]  Let's be clear, Trump destroyed Biden at that debate and was heading for an easy victory if Biden has stayed in the race.

=== Trump Destroys Biden Debate (10:09) ===

[00:06:44]  It's not quite so certain or easy now.
[00:06:47]  But there's a cautionary note here for Democrats too.
[00:06:50]  The last time Trump took on a woman who appeared to be surging in the polls with the same George Clooney slamming him from a press conference at a movie festival, things didn't quite work out the way everyone expected.
[00:07:01]  It may feel like it began 100 years ago, but the real race for the president of the United States begins now.
[00:07:09]  Would you want me to debate all this?
[00:07:10]  The young Turks founder, Cenk Uger, the former White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci, broadcaster and journalist Emily Austin and from the PBD podcast, the commentator and self-professed angry patriot Vinny Oshana.
[00:07:23]  Welcome to all of you.
[00:07:25]  Wow, I've been away three weeks or so.
[00:07:28]  All hell as normal has broken loose because all hell breaks loose every week in this race.
[00:07:33]  Anthony Scaramucci, great to have you on Uncensored.
[00:07:36]  We've spoken many times over the last few years about all things American politics.
[00:07:42]  You posted on October the 1st, don't be surprised if Donald Trump drops out of the race.
[00:07:48]  Nearly 10 million people viewed that post.
[00:07:52]  Do you stand by it?
[00:07:54]  And if you do, will you accept a $1,000 bet from me right now that Trump isn't going to pull out?
[00:08:03]  Well, I'll bet you $1,000 on the election.
[00:08:05]  I don't know if I'm going to bet on the pullout.
[00:08:07]  I mean, he's got to drop more substantially in the polls.
[00:08:11]  He's down six with the likely voters.
[00:08:14]  If she opens up a lead 12 to 15 points, he's not going to want to lose to her.
[00:08:19]  He's the worst presidential candidate for the Republicans since Herbert Hoover.
[00:08:23]  He's lost the House, the Senate, and the presidency.
[00:08:26]  And if DeSantis or Nikki Haley was running against Kamala Harris, they'd probably be up 10 or 15.
[00:08:31]  So we'll have to see.
[00:08:33]  But on likely voters, he's already down six.
[00:08:37]  And I like her momentum.
[00:08:40]  I understand all the issues that you're raising related to her.
[00:08:43]  But unfortunately, there's only two choices.
[00:08:45]  There's him and her.
[00:08:47]  And I think I would implore people to read H.R. McMaster's book if they get a chance, because he's very honest and very objective about the insanity that is Donald Trump.
[00:08:57]  I mean, Anthony, if I'd asked you to get a lot of money.
[00:09:01]  $1,000 on the election, I got Kamala.
[00:09:05]  You can take a look at the character.
[00:09:07]  We'll make you forget.
[00:09:08]  I'm done on that.
[00:09:09]  We'll make him a charity.
[00:09:10]  I'll take that bet.
[00:09:11]  I still think Trump's going to win.
[00:09:12]  I'm not an American citizen.
[00:09:14]  I don't have a vote.
[00:09:15]  I don't have a horse in the race.
[00:09:16]  I just think reality is going to kick in.
[00:09:19]  And if I asked you, Anthony, before we move to the others, if I'd asked you even two months ago, do you think Kamala Harris would make a great president of the United States?
[00:09:26]  You would have laughed out loud.
[00:09:27]  Be honest.
[00:09:30]  Again, there's two choices in the race.
[00:09:33]  I know I don't want to go back to what we had.
[00:09:36]  I think it was an unmitigated disaster.
[00:09:39]  He embarrassed me by supporting him.
[00:09:42]  And he's actually an embarrassment on the world stage.
[00:09:46]  And he doesn't even understand things like the nuclear triad.
[00:09:49]  The guy is a walking disaster.
[00:09:52]  And so I will take her over him.
[00:09:55]  But you're right.
[00:09:55]  If there were other candidates available, if you were available, Pierce, you're not over 35 yet.
[00:10:01]  But if you were an American citizen and over 35, I would take you.
[00:10:05]  See, this is why you've only got two choices.
[00:10:07]  This is really why I wanted you on the program because I knew that you would flatter me in a way that I would find irresistible.
[00:10:13]  Emily Austin.
[00:10:14]  So look, Kavanaugh Harris was nobody's choice, even on the Democrat side, to be president of the United States two months ago.
[00:10:21]  Suddenly, she's apparently the great, fresh new thing.
[00:10:25]  Despite the fact that she's been Biden's vice president for nearly four years, how can she continue to execute this tripwire of pretending she's not responsible or accountable for everything that's gone on in this administration?
[00:10:42]  The answer is that she can't.
[00:10:44]  You know, there's only so long you could portray this facade that you have everything figured out.
[00:10:48]  But what I hope to see happen sooner than later, because the clock is ticking, is for the emotions to be removed from this election.
[00:10:55]  Kamala could run her Ren and Stimpy, happy, happy, joy, joy campaign all she wants, which sounds strikingly similar to Hitler's strength through joy, but I'm not even going to get into that.
[00:11:04]  But at some point, which will happen likely in this debate, is her policies have to be questioned.
[00:11:09]  She can run on the joy campaign.
[00:11:11]  Trump is the policy president.
[00:11:13]  He addresses it head on, whether it's easy or hard.
[00:11:16]  Kamala can't even face the media.
[00:11:18]  Her pre-taped lied to be what was a live interview on CNN.
[00:11:22]  She couldn't even do it without her babysitter nearby.
[00:11:25]  And she's an embarrassment to the country.
[00:11:27]  And it's not because she's a woman, and it's not because she's a woman of color.
[00:11:30]  I'm sure she's a lovely woman.
[00:11:32]  And as a celebrity, she's quite entertaining.
[00:11:34]  But presidentially, she would embarrass us on a global stage.
[00:11:38]  She's embarrassing us domestically, and it would be disastrous.
[00:11:41]  Everything he just said about Trump, I believe the same to Kamala Harris.
[00:11:45]  All right, Chick Nuger, she's an embarrassing disaster.
[00:11:49]  Your thoughts?
[00:11:51]  Yeah, I mean, this whole thing's been preposterous.
[00:11:54]  Kamala Harris is a very standard normal politician, and you guys are ignoring the 800-pound gorilla in the room, which is that Donald Trump is a lunatic.
[00:12:04]  So you guys are having this conversation.
[00:12:06]  This normal politician, oh my God, she might not be good enough.
[00:12:10]  Wow, she's running with joy.
[00:12:11]  That sounds like Hitler.
[00:12:13]  All these kind of loony things that you guys are all saying.
[00:12:15]  When the other guys are a lunatic, he thinks we should terminate the Constitution.
[00:12:21]  He thinks that all of our crowds are AI-created images.
[00:12:27]  He believes absolutely insane things.
[00:12:29]  Thought that his vice president deserved to be murdered by his supporters.
[00:12:33]  And we're having a nonsense conversation about Kamala Harris running with Joy being a bad thing.
[00:12:39]  And guys, there's a lot of reasons that she does that.
[00:12:42]  But one of the reasons is to juxtapose the hatred from the other side, which you guys are amply displaying.
[00:12:49]  The other side's like, oh my God, everybody's the enemy.
[00:12:53]  The immigrants are the enemy.
[00:12:55]  The Democrats are the enemy.
[00:12:56]  Oh, they're killing babies after they're born.
[00:12:58]  All these lunatic talk.
[00:13:00]  So go ahead, run your mouth about Kamala Harris.
[00:13:02]  But at the end of the day, Donald Trump's still a lunatic.
[00:13:06]  And the country doesn't want an unstable madman like that who doesn't even believe in America.
[00:13:11]  He thinks we should terminate our Constitution.
[00:13:13]  He had no problem trampling our democracy.
[00:13:16]  I'm not letting that clown come in here and destroy this country.
[00:13:20]  All right, Vinny Ashana, he's a clown who'll destroy the country and the 800-pound gorilla.
[00:13:25]  This is apparently the nice, these are the nice guys spreading joy.
[00:13:32]  I have to say this, Piers.
[00:13:35]  Emily, you kind of brushed over it, love, and I think you should have stayed on it.
[00:13:38]  Emily's a Jewish girl, and she mentioned the strength through joy was 100% hijacked from the Nazis.
[00:13:46]  It was in 1933.
[00:13:48]  I have to read this, Emily.
[00:13:49]  Hold on one second, guys.
[00:13:51]  I actually want to read this because Emily's right.
[00:13:52]  Totally.
[00:13:53]  Hold on, they ripped a Nazi, hold on, Chank, I didn't interrupt you.
[00:13:57]  The Nazi labor campaign of 1933.
[00:14:00]  That's it.
[00:14:00]  It was set up as a tool to promote the advantages of Nazism.
[00:14:04]  So whoever's coming up with this joy campaign, they should do a little bit more research.
[00:14:08]  And you know what?
[00:14:09]  Instead of going Trump and talking bad about, I don't know, Anthony, I know Chenk, and I respect Chenk.
[00:14:15]  We disagree politically, but let's talk about the actual state of the union right now, Piers.
[00:14:20]  I don't know if you guys have been paying attention, but an American Jewish hostage was murdered by Hamas.
[00:14:27]  That just happened a couple days ago.
[00:14:28]  And also, the Hell's Angels are en route right now to Aurora, Colorado, to stop a Venezuelan brutal gang.
[00:14:37]  And the gang is called Thren Aragua because they've taken over apartment complexes.
[00:14:43]  They're sex trafficking women.
[00:14:44]  They're doing drugs.
[00:14:45]  The FBI is not doing nothing.
[00:14:47]  The mayor's not doing nothing.
[00:14:48]  The governor's not doing anything.
[00:14:51]  Why is all this happening?
[00:14:52]  You know why?
[00:14:53]  Because Joe Biden is on vacation.
[00:14:55]  He's still on vacation.
[00:14:56]  40% of his administration.
[00:14:58]  Kamala Harris is just going around with herself with her support human being.
[00:15:06]  Who's actually running the country right now?
[00:15:07]  Everybody's worried about the future and Trump and he's such a threat to democracy.
[00:15:11]  Why did he do all that stuff in the four years that he was here?
[00:15:14]  I'm genuinely curious.
[00:15:15]  All this threat and all these problems.
[00:15:17]  Name one thing that was, oh my God, a threat to democracy.
[00:15:22]  What was it?
[00:15:23]  And what is Kamala going to do?
[00:15:24]  I want Anthony and Chank to tell me what's one thing.
[00:15:27]  What's one thing?
[00:15:29]  Hold on.
[00:15:29]  What's one thing Kamala, people are going to vote for Kamala for?
[00:15:33]  Anthony, just random.
[00:15:34]  What are you going to vote for Kamala Harris for?
[00:15:36]  Okay, Vinny, you've asked lots of questions there.
[00:15:39]  I would say clearly what happened personally on January the 6th was an attack on democracy.
[00:15:46]  You know, when a very large mob of people attack the Capitol and start calling for lawmakers to be hung because they're trying to reverse an election decision, that's an attack on democracy.
[00:15:58]  You can spend it any way you like, but it is.
[00:16:01]  But Anthony, let me ask Anthony the second part of that, because I think I'm sure he would say the same.
[00:16:07]  Very interesting question Vinny raised there.
[00:16:10]  Who is running the United States?
[00:16:12]  You know, I felt very strongly when Kamala Harris effectively sailed through as the nominee.
[00:16:16]  It was clearly a party machinery operation to get her the nomination as fast as possible.
[00:16:23]  Would it not have been better for America if the vice president of the United States in that situation, who's now the official nominee, actually replaced Joe Biden as president of the United States?
[00:16:34]  It's very, very odd as a non-American who loves the country, has a home, there I was there for several weeks in August, to see endless pictures of Joe Biden on the beach and Kamala Harris meeting world leaders.
[00:16:50]  It's very odd.
[00:16:51]  It's strange.
[00:16:52]  It doesn't seem to make any sense.

=== Who Is Running The US (14:39) ===

[00:16:53]  Do you think it's right and proper what we're seeing now?
[00:16:59]  Well, listen, what I think is right and proper is actually never going to happen.
[00:17:04]  I have to deal with the world the way it is.
[00:17:06]  But what do you think is right and properly?
[00:17:08]  That implies you agree with me.
[00:17:10]  But to answer Vinny's issue, okay, I don't like seeing what's happening in Aurora, Colorado, but I saw Donald Trump in the situation room, and I understand the mechanisms of his personality and the impetuosity and the lack of curiosity and no executive management skills into what Sank is saying.
[00:17:31]  I would take a more garden variety politician who will follow the rules-based society.
[00:17:37]  I don't want somebody that's currying favor with dictators.
[00:17:40]  I don't want somebody that's going to roll back NATO.
[00:17:43]  I don't want somebody that's going to let Vladimir Putin walk into the Ukraine.
[00:17:47]  So that's me.
[00:17:48]  That's what makes America.
[00:17:50]  Can we challenge you on that?
[00:17:53]  Emily, I'll come to you.
[00:17:55]  Hang on, hang on.
[00:17:57]  Just on that point, Anthony, all I would say is this.
[00:18:01]  Trump didn't go into war with anyone in his four years, whatever you think of him.
[00:18:06]  Putin didn't invade Ukraine or anywhere else on Trump's watch.
[00:18:11]  Those two don't want to stand up.
[00:18:14]  They're just facts.
[00:18:15]  And when it comes to rolling back NATO, I watched and listened very carefully, given that my country is part of NATO, to what Trump actually said.
[00:18:24]  He wanted other member countries of NATO to pay their due.
[00:18:28]  He was sick and tired of America having to pay the vast majority of the costs of NATO.
[00:18:34]  And other countries might try legitimate.
[00:18:37]  By the way, on that, he was 100% right.
[00:18:40]  And many of those countries he castigated are now paying significantly more towards the cost of NATO as a result of what Trump said.
[00:18:48]  So on those two points, I'm not so sure that you're on good ground.
[00:18:54]  Well, I think you've got to give me a chance to respond because this is what Trump does.
[00:18:57]  He says two contrary things at the same time.
[00:19:00]  His detractors hold on to one thing.
[00:19:03]  His people that love him hold on to another thing, his advocates.
[00:19:06]  And so he made it very clear to John Bolton.
[00:19:08]  He made it very clear to General Ketty, Kelly, Jim Mattis, Rex Tillerson that he wanted out of NATO.
[00:19:14]  He made it very clear.
[00:19:15]  He slowed down the arms shipments to the Ukraine.
[00:19:19]  In 1994, we cut a deal with them.
[00:19:21]  They were the sixth largest nuclear arsenal in the world.
[00:19:24]  We got the nukes back in exchange for security guarantees.
[00:19:28]  He slowed down the arms shipments.
[00:19:30]  There's irrefutable fact to that, a result of which gave Vladimir Putin an opening in the Ukraine.
[00:19:35]  Moreover, he moved the embassy.
[00:19:38]  The State Department asked him not to move the embassy in Jerusalem.
[00:19:42]  He moved the embassy in Jerusalem.
[00:19:44]  And you can't tell me that didn't lead to more funding for Hamas because we know from our intelligence agencies that it did.
[00:19:52]  So we can pretend that he didn't start any wars, but he doesn't understand the nature of the world.
[00:19:57]  The State Department told him, don't go to North Korea.
[00:20:00]  The guy's never given up his nukes.
[00:20:02]  He said, no, no, no.
[00:20:03]  I'm Donald Trump, the supreme narcissist.
[00:20:05]  I'm going to North Korea.
[00:20:06]  He's going to give up his nukes.
[00:20:07]  Did he give up his nukes, Pierce?
[00:20:09]  This is insanity that we're talking about a guy that is this intellectually bereft running the country.
[00:20:16]  So you got to ask me.
[00:20:18]  But let me ask you, but before I go to Emily to respond to that, hang on.
[00:20:22]  Before we go to Emily, John has been very honest about it.
[00:20:25]  Who do you think?
[00:20:26]  Okay, but here's a tough question for you before I go to Emily to respond.
[00:20:30]  If you're Vladimir Putin or you're Kim Jong-un or your President Xi, who are you going to be more or less intimidated by?
[00:20:37]  Donald Trump or Kamala Harris?
[00:20:41]  Trump.
[00:20:42]  There's no question, Kamala Harris.
[00:20:43]  It's not even close because he wants to be them.
[00:20:47]  He praises them.
[00:20:49]  He solicits them.
[00:20:51]  He tells Putin from a microphone like this, go ahead and invade the countries that are not spending 2% on NATO.
[00:20:59]  You heard him say that.
[00:21:00]  It's not me saying that.
[00:21:01]  But I knew what he meant by that.
[00:21:02]  I knew what he meant.
[00:21:03]  What he meant was: if the member countries of NATO don't pay their dues, it is more likely that people like Putin will take advantage.
[00:21:10]  That's what he meant.
[00:21:11]  You know that.
[00:21:11]  This is a 2016 analysis, Pierce.
[00:21:14]  Your analysis is a 2016 analysis.
[00:21:17]  He dupes people.
[00:21:18]  He says two things at the same time that are quite contradictory.
[00:21:22]  All right, let me bring it up on both sides.
[00:21:24]  Let me bring it in.
[00:21:25]  And he denounces the Nazis.
[00:21:27]  Emily, you were holding your face in.
[00:21:29]  I know the playbook, Pierce.
[00:21:30]  I've been around it for a decade.
[00:21:32]  Okay, I saw Emily hold her head in horror as you said that the thing.
[00:21:37]  The world's dictators will be more intimidated by Kamala Harris.
[00:21:41]  No question, because she's going to be with NATO.
[00:21:43]  Spinal cord and the international respect that Biden in a million years can never achieve.
[00:21:49]  Donald Trump had every world leader afraid of him.
[00:21:51]  He just said, Anthony, that Donald Trump should not.
[00:21:54]  Excuse me, let me speak.
[00:21:55]  You just said Donald Trump should not have gone to North Korea.
[00:21:58]  If this man has international respect and can go build bridges overseas, he has every single right and a duty as our leader to do so.
[00:22:06]  Let me tell you something about Donald Trump.
[00:22:08]  Like him or not, he is feared.
[00:22:10]  And that is what we need when the world has gone mad and you have Putins invading Ukraine and you have Hamas attacking Israel and kidnapping seven Americans that Biden failed, including like Vinny just said, Hirsch Goldberg, Poland being murdered with Hamas posting a video.
[00:22:26]  And what is Biden's response?
[00:22:27]  Netanyahu didn't do enough.
[00:22:29]  Biden's only response should have been, Hamas will pay the price.
[00:22:33]  Biden should have been more present, not on a beach using Hirsch's poor parents as political tools at the DNC, pretending he cares about the American hostages, not relaxing in Delaware.
[00:22:44]  There should have been more pressure on Iran to put pressure on the proxies, more negotiations with Qatar.
[00:22:50]  Instead, he's this weak leader.
[00:22:52]  But you know what?
[00:22:52]  I actually, I want to pause for a moment.
[00:22:54]  I'm blaming Joe Biden.
[00:22:56]  I actually want to criticize the puppeteers that are controlling him because I genuinely believe he has one foot in the grave.
[00:23:01]  And that actually goes to a bigger problem, which is the entire Democratic Party.
[00:23:05]  We don't know who's in charge.
[00:23:06]  It is not Joe Biden, and it is surely as hell not Kamala Harris.
[00:23:10]  So it goes back to Pierce's question.
[00:23:12]  Who is running the show?
[00:23:13]  And how come we as the American people are not so outraged that this weakness is causing mass chaos, not just here, but all around the world?
[00:23:22]  America is next.
[00:23:24]  The West is the target.
[00:23:25]  The Middle East is laughing at us right now because we have no leadership.
[00:23:29]  Donald Trump would never let that happen.
[00:23:31]  People respected him and people feared him.
[00:23:33]  And I don't care if you like him or not.
[00:23:35]  It may have been Chenk, who's been waiting with unusual patience, it has to be said.
[00:23:39]  I put it down to you, must have had a summer break of some description that's calmed you a little bit.
[00:23:44]  But be honest with me, Chenk.
[00:23:46]  If I, you know, do you really believe that when it comes to standing up to world leaders like Kim Jong-un, like Putin, like Xi and others, do you really believe that Kamala Harris is somebody that will exude an air on behalf of the United States that will be more intimidating to those guys than Trump would?
[00:24:07]  It's not even close, absolutely.
[00:24:09]  And I'll tell you why.
[00:24:10]  You guys are looking at it.
[00:24:11]  It's like all of this foreign policies, emotional vibes in the room.
[00:24:17]  And Kamala Harris walks in and are they like, oh my God, I'm intimidated.
[00:24:21]  Or, oh, it's no big deal.
[00:24:22]  And Trump walks in.
[00:24:23]  They're like, oh, my God, I fear him.
[00:24:25]  No, it's about what you're willing to do, your actions, your policies, etc.
[00:24:29]  So what does Kamala Harris have?
[00:24:31]  Kamala Harris has the might of the administrative state and the U.S. military behind her.
[00:24:36]  And they know she's stable and she represents the general American establishment.
[00:24:40]  Now, a lot of people might say, hey, I don't love the establishment, et cetera, but it is a fearsome entity.
[00:24:46]  And everybody knows that a normal president of the United States speaks on behalf of that entity, and they fear that entity.
[00:24:53]  When Donald Trump walks in the room, they're like, oh, thank God, what a clown.
[00:24:57]  Okay, so easy to manipulate him.
[00:24:59]  Here, let's tell him we like him.
[00:25:01]  Hey, Donnie, we like you.
[00:25:02]  You think, oh, I like you, I like you.
[00:25:04]  I'm going to write love letters to you.
[00:25:05]  So while he was literally, he said he was writing love letters to Kim Jong-un, Kim Jong-un built six nukes.
[00:25:12]  What happened, tough guy?
[00:25:13]  You let him build all those nukes.
[00:25:15]  You did nothing about it because you're an idiot, so easily manipulated.
[00:25:20]  You think Putin doesn't know that?
[00:25:22]  They do a meeting.
[00:25:22]  Trump comes out.
[00:25:23]  He's like, Putin is right.
[00:25:25]  Not our intelligence.
[00:25:26]  The US such.
[00:25:27]  Putin is right.
[00:25:28]  That weak, weak guy just cares about money.
[00:25:32]  You know what he says about the Saudis?
[00:25:33]  They give me $30, $40 million for an apartment.
[00:25:36]  Shouldn't I like them?
[00:25:37]  Obviously corrupt, easily manipulated, a tiny, tiny mind.
[00:25:42]  He's done nothing but encourage our enemies by being so weak and such an obvious narcissist.
[00:25:48]  Do you know how easily I could play that guy if I'm in a room with him?
[00:25:51]  You just go tweak here, tweak there, and he's discombobulated, right?
[00:25:56]  And if you're not going to do it by flattery, which is the easiest thing in the world, you just get under his skin a little bit.
[00:26:02]  Hey, your hair doesn't look good.
[00:26:03]  Oh, what?
[00:26:04]  I'm going to attack you.
[00:26:05]  I'm going to, come on.
[00:26:06]  This guy's a fool.
[00:26:07]  Look, all of you know it.
[00:26:09]  All of you know it.
[00:26:09]  That's why you're spending all your time going, oh, look at Kamala Harris.
[00:26:12]  She's a slightly normal politician.
[00:26:15]  Ooh, that's so scary.
[00:26:16]  Come on.
[00:26:18]  Piers, you're going to ignore the fact that the other guy is totally unhinged and the easiest man in the world to manipulate.
[00:26:25]  No, no, I think listen.
[00:26:27]  We've talked about Trump a lot.
[00:26:28]  I've known Anthony and others, I've known Trump nearly 20 years, right?
[00:26:33]  I've spoken to him many, many, many times, interviewed him 40 times.
[00:26:37]  I know Trump very, very well.
[00:26:39]  Good, bad, and ugly.
[00:26:40]  And I think he has equal measures of all three of those things.
[00:26:43]  But I think that your characterization of him is almost, it's cartoon-esque.
[00:26:48]  And in a way, that plays into Trump.
[00:26:49]  He is a cartoon character.
[00:26:50]  Well, maybe, but it plays into Trump's hands when you over-demonize him.
[00:26:55]  You know, when I hear the left in America just ranting away about Trump morning, noon, and I think you're missing, you're playing him the wrong way.
[00:27:02]  Pierce, he is that bad.
[00:27:04]  He is that bad.
[00:27:06]  You're acting.
[00:27:08]  You know, Piers, you know what he's?
[00:27:09]  Hold on, hold on, hold on.
[00:27:10]  One more thing.
[00:27:11]  You guys, you know what you sound like?
[00:27:12]  You sound like Democrats that were saying that Joe Biden is young and dynamic behind the scenes.
[00:27:17]  Guys, we have eyes and ears.
[00:27:19]  We can see Donald Trump.
[00:27:20]  He's an unhinged man-man.
[00:27:23]  The only reason you don't think so is because you're so biased that you're like, oh, it's normal to terminate the Constitution.
[00:27:29]  You're making a military right now.
[00:27:31]  I'm going to come to Vinny.
[00:27:32]  It's not normal.
[00:27:33]  Hang on.
[00:27:33]  I want to come to Vinny.
[00:27:34]  What I want to say once again, Cheng, you shouldn't misconstrue the fact I've known Trump a long time and say I see the good, bad, and ugly him.
[00:27:42]  You should never misconstrue this for me saying that Americans should vote for him or that I would vote for him or any of those things.
[00:27:48]  You seem to be incapable of assessing the stuff that comes out of my mouth in an accurate way.
[00:27:53]  You want to portray me as a die-hard MAGA Republican.
[00:27:58]  I'm not.
[00:27:59]  People in England listening to this would laugh their heads off.
[00:28:02]  I was editor of the Daily Mirror newspaper for 10 years.
[00:28:05]  Did you see your intro?
[00:28:07]  It was 99% negative against Kamala Harris.
[00:28:09]  Well, no, it wasn't actually.
[00:28:11]  Every time I come on here, exactly my point.
[00:28:13]  Totally in favor of Donald Trump.
[00:28:15]  It wasn't, but you didn't listen properly because all you want to hear is Trump bashing.
[00:28:19]  Let me bring in Vinny.
[00:28:20]  Vinny, look, Trump has got a bit of a problem here.
[00:28:24]  There's no doubt the dynamic of this race changed dramatically.
[00:28:28]  I spoke to Trump the night before it changed.
[00:28:31]  It was just a week after he got shot.
[00:28:33]  He saw me on Fox saying how it was extraordinary that he was back on stage at another rally and we had a perfectly nice conversation.
[00:28:41]  And I said to him, I reckon you've got this election sewn up now because of this assassination attempt.
[00:28:47]  And he went, let me tell you, if I've learned one thing over the last three weeks, it's that four months is a very long time.
[00:28:53]  Anything could happen.
[00:28:54]  And the next day, Joe Biden quit the race and all the momentum has been behind Kamala Harris and the Democrats ever since.
[00:29:02]  And I've detected with Trump that he's really struggled to work out how to attack the new threat.
[00:29:09]  What do you think?
[00:29:12]  Well, I mean, and Chank made a good point.
[00:29:14]  That establishment, the problem is the establishment and Donald Trump.
[00:29:19]  And I don't care how angry, you know, how much hate Anthony has for him because I mean, Anthony was fired.
[00:29:25]  What, after 10 days, you know, sounds like a bitter ex-employee.
[00:29:28]  Chen has Trump derangement syndrome, whether you like it or not, brother.
[00:29:31]  They hate him kids.
[00:29:32]  And what people like you don't tend to understand, Cheng.
[00:29:35]  Chang, you know what people like you don't understand?
[00:29:38]  Everybody is tired of that BS rhetoric.
[00:29:41]  It's one man going against the establishment for us.
[00:29:44]  And you know what, Piers, it's crazy.
[00:29:46]  You mentioned the president of the ex-president of the United States was shot in the head, okay?
[00:29:52]  And then after a week, nobody was talking about it.
[00:29:55]  The legacy media, mainstream media, 98% of it is Trump is this evil man.
[00:30:01]  And there is a problem, Piers, because people are brainwashed into thinking it's all Trump.
[00:30:06]  Because people like me and Emily know, we're thinking even this is bigger than Trump, okay?
[00:30:10]  This is us against that establishment, Chenk, and it's never going to go away.
[00:30:15]  And just to give you a little example, Piers, about how much these people have just hate and disgust for Trump.
[00:30:22]  Last Monday, he was at Arlington National Cemetery.
[00:30:25]  Okay.
[00:30:26]  He was invited by Gold Star families, families of soldiers who were murdered in Afghanistan in 2021.
[00:30:34]  They invited him.
[00:30:35]  They wanted photos.
[00:30:36]  Guess what the media said?
[00:30:38]  He's taking it.
[00:30:39]  This is a campaign ploy and all this BS.
[00:30:41]  You know who else was invited?
[00:30:43]  Joe Biden was invited.
[00:30:45]  Kamala Harris was invited.
[00:30:47]  And none of them showed up.
[00:30:48]  Biden was on the beach trying to use his cell phone and Kamala was in her freaking million, God knows how many million dollar mansion.
[00:30:55]  Okay.
[00:30:56]  Guys, stop.
[00:30:57]  Like, Cheng, this whole Trump talk, we're done with it.
[00:31:00]  Okay.
[00:31:01]  And if they didn't cheat, if they didn't cheat, I know we're going to get into Zuckerberg and FBI and Facebook.
[00:31:06]  If they didn't cheat, you guys would be done with him in November.
[00:31:09]  But that system, that same establishment, we're just tired of it.
[00:31:13]  We're tired of that system.
[00:31:14]  And you're right, Piers, there is a problem because when 98% of the media is he's Hitler, he's this, he's evil, what else?
[00:31:22]  FBI, he's going to use the FBI as a Gestapo.
[00:31:25]  Are you freaking nuts?
[00:31:27]  The FBI has been used as a Gestapo for the past seven years against Donald Trump, okay?
[00:31:31]  And what could happen to him?

=== FBI As A Gestapo (08:33) ===

[00:31:33]  I'm worried about the future of the Republican Party.
[00:31:36]  That's the real talk of the time.
[00:31:37]  Let me bring in Anthony here.
[00:31:38]  Anthony, if you were running the Democratic campaign right now, you've got a bit of momentum with Kamala Harris, although probably not as much as you might have hoped in the polling from the convention, which was a coronation, really.
[00:31:50]  But if you were looking at the key attack lines against Trump, what would they be?
[00:31:56]  Would they be JD Vance?
[00:31:58]  Would they be abortion?
[00:32:00]  Would you play the women side of this strongly?
[00:32:03]  Where do you think he's most vulnerable if you're running a Kamala Harris campaign?
[00:32:10]  Well, I think he's most vulnerable actually on policy, and I think that's going to be her Achilles' heel if she doesn't come out and start speaking about what her policies are and comparing them to his.
[00:32:21]  And she doesn't speak about the 5.7 billion people that are under autocracy right now and what America represents, not only to the people here in the United States and around the world.
[00:32:32]  That's going to be her Achilles' heel.
[00:32:34]  But I just want to just briefly address what Vinny is saying.
[00:32:37]  I don't hate Donald Trump.
[00:32:39]  I was loyal to him.
[00:32:40]  I got fired.
[00:32:41]  No problem with the firing.
[00:32:43]  I was loyal to him for two years after the firing when he started attacking me personally for absolutely no reason.
[00:32:49]  And then he went after my wife.
[00:32:51]  I mean, Vinny's Italian.
[00:32:52]  I don't know.
[00:32:53]  Not allowed to go after my wife.
[00:32:54]  I'm not Ted Cruz.
[00:32:56]  And so I will work assiduously against him for the rest of my life.
[00:33:00]  I think he's a disaster.
[00:33:02]  But I got to tell you something.
[00:33:04]  Two years after my firing, I was loyal to the guy.
[00:33:07]  You can go look at the tape.
[00:33:08]  So I'm not a disgruntled employee.
[00:33:10]  I see it for what it exactly is.
[00:33:12]  I understand his systemic danger to the world.
[00:33:16]  And I will sit here and advocate for anybody other than him.
[00:33:20]  And if you guys put up Ron DeSantis, just really fast.
[00:33:27]  Four years of Trump, besides personal stuff aside, put that all aside.
[00:33:31]  I get it.
[00:33:31]  I understand.
[00:33:32]  Four years of that, okay?
[00:33:34]  And then this four years of Biden and the Democratic Party.
[00:33:37]  Put all your feelings aside.
[00:33:39]  And by the way, I'm a Syrian.
[00:33:40]  I'm Middle Eastern, but I do look Italian.
[00:33:41]  Thank you.
[00:33:42]  Four years of Trump, four years of this Democratic rule.
[00:33:46]  Be honest with yourself and be honest with our viewers.
[00:33:49]  Who would you vote for?
[00:33:50]  You would want?
[00:33:51]  You would want this past four years than Trump's four years?
[00:33:55]  Are you kidding?
[00:33:55]  Like, Anthony, put all that personal stuff aside from the colours.
[00:33:58]  Come on, Anthony.
[00:34:01]  Anthony, I'm not afraid of the.
[00:34:01]  I'm a life.
[00:34:02]  I'm a Republican.
[00:34:03]  I'm a center.
[00:34:04]  I'm a center-right Republican.
[00:34:05]  He does not represent that.
[00:34:08]  It's ironic because Chuck and I are on the same side of this thing, okay?
[00:34:11]  I'm a center-right Republican.
[00:34:13]  Love debating him when we're not dealing with Donald Trump.
[00:34:17]  To his point, Donald Trump is a raving lunatic.
[00:34:20]  He's an extremely dangerous person.
[00:34:23]  You don't want him anywhere near the White House.
[00:34:25]  You've only got two choices.
[00:34:27]  I'm going with Kamala Harris.
[00:34:29]  If you guys want to put up Ron DeSantis or Nikki Haley in 2028, I'll return to my party and I'll do anything I can to help them.
[00:34:37]  But I'm not helping this guy because I know how dangerous he is.
[00:34:39]  I know how bad he is.
[00:34:41]  And just to point out, because you guys were talking about North Korea and he has the right to go to North Korea, actually, we had a 60-year established policy to curb it.
[00:34:50]  All he did was give the North Korean dictator propaganda reels to play inside and outside of his country for the last five or six years.
[00:34:58]  So, Vin, I hear you.
[00:35:00]  But I'm going to tell you something, Vin.
[00:35:01]  I'm just looking at you, man.
[00:35:02]  He's going after your wife on Twitter.
[00:35:04]  I don't see you as Ted Cruz.
[00:35:06]  And by the way, I'm not Dead Cruise.
[00:35:08]  Okay.
[00:35:08]  I'm an Italian kid from Long Island.
[00:35:10]  Don't go after my wife on Twitter after I gave you a million dollars of cash and hundreds of hours of media advocacy.
[00:35:17]  No way, no how.
[00:35:18]  Okay.
[00:35:19]  And I will be camping in the middle until November 6th.
[00:35:23]  Let me bring in Emily.
[00:35:24]  Emily.
[00:35:24]  Okay, I love it.
[00:35:25]  Emily, let me tell you something.
[00:35:26]  You make the election about what you want it to be.
[00:35:28]  I'll make it about what I want it to be.
[00:35:30]  Election is not about happy, happy, joy, joy.
[00:35:33]  This is our security on the line.
[00:35:34]  This is the future of the United States.
[00:35:36]  Vinny posed a very simple question.
[00:35:38]  This is a bizarre election.
[00:35:40]  We've had four years of Donald Trump.
[00:35:43]  It's not his first time.
[00:35:44]  He doesn't need to tell us what he's going to do.
[00:35:46]  We've already seen what he's capable of doing.
[00:35:48]  We've seen 21 million jobs.
[00:35:50]  The stability in our economy did so well fixing that.
[00:35:55]  This is not a joke.
[00:35:56]  Everyone's treating this election like it's Hollywood.
[00:35:59]  They don't understand.
[00:36:00]  We need closed borders.
[00:36:02]  We need controlled spending.
[00:36:03]  We need security.
[00:36:04]  We need laws to become laws again.
[00:36:07]  This lawlessness going around the country and the crime surge is being tolerated.
[00:36:11]  What's happening on college campuses?
[00:36:13]  What's happening internationally?
[00:36:15]  You guys really sitting here telling me that Kamala Harris is going to be respected by international leaders has me laughing out loud.
[00:36:22]  I'm not what you're saying I am, Cheng.
[00:36:24]  I'm not obsessed with Donald Trump and I do not hate Kamala Harris.
[00:36:28]  I do not believe she's presidential.
[00:36:30]  Somebody please tell me why I'm wrong.
[00:36:33]  Somebody tell me what policies she will instate that will make this country a better place than where Trump had it before Biden was president.
[00:36:40]  Someone answer that simple question.
[00:36:42]  She's a great woman.
[00:36:44]  I love you, Kamala Harris.
[00:36:45]  Don't run for president.
[00:36:46]  You can answer now.
[00:36:47]  We're going to bring in a guest briefly and then come back to the panel in a moment.
[00:36:52]  But first of all, Cheng, let me ask you.
[00:36:55]  It's an interesting point about Kamala Harris.
[00:36:58]  I know what Trump stands for.
[00:37:00]  You know, his messaging, he's a very skilled marketer.
[00:37:03]  We know he's about build the wall, make America great, all these other things.
[00:37:08]  He rattles off his greatest hits at every rally.
[00:37:11]  I'm really not sure what Kamala Harris stands for.
[00:37:14]  And after that interview with CNN, and it's no fault of Dana Bash, who I used to work with, I've got great respect for as a journalist.
[00:37:21]  It's not her fault, but Kamala Harris didn't lay out any plan for the country.
[00:37:26]  And if I was a Democrat, I'd be really worried about what's going to happen at the debate if it gets into the meat and drink of policy.
[00:37:36]  I literally don't understand you guys.
[00:37:38]  So Kamala Harris is the most normal politician of my lifetime.
[00:37:42]  Like, and you guys keep saying, look at her.
[00:37:44]  She's so weak.
[00:37:45]  She's so this.
[00:37:45]  She's so many of that.
[00:37:47]  What does she stand for?
[00:37:48]  What does she stand for?
[00:37:50]  Can you answer the question?
[00:37:51]  Can I answer the question?
[00:37:52]  Yeah, give me three things she stands for.
[00:37:55]  She's sane.
[00:37:56]  We got to see them.
[00:37:57]  Okay, so number one, she talked about housing, which is a huge issue in this country.
[00:38:03]  If you block the private equity guys from buying our homes, that would be a massive gain for the American people.
[00:38:09]  What's Donald Trump's housing policy?
[00:38:12]  He says, oh, drill, baby, drill.
[00:38:13]  That has nothing to do with housing.
[00:38:15]  He's such a moron.
[00:38:16]  Okay, then you talk about the prices were out of control.
[00:38:19]  She says, hey, we should have a check on that.
[00:38:21]  That is your grocery store, your gas, et cetera.
[00:38:24]  Things that matter in your life.
[00:38:25]  She at least has a policy.
[00:38:27]  What's Trump's policy?
[00:38:28]  I'm going to give corporations another tax cut.
[00:38:30]  Well, listen, you were in office for four years, to Vinny's point.
[00:38:33]  And what did you do?
[00:38:34]  You didn't even build a wall.
[00:38:35]  You built like 30 feet a wall.
[00:38:36]  He remembered it at the last second.
[00:38:38]  The main thing he did was he took corporate tax rates from 35% to 21%.
[00:38:42]  He gave trillions of dollars to his corporate donors.
[00:38:46]  The problem with the establishment is that they work for those donors.
[00:38:49]  Well, how about Trump?
[00:38:50]  He says, Sheldon Adelson, Miriam Adelson, I'll just give you U.S. foreign policy on Israel, and you said it, and he brags about it.
[00:38:57]  He says, oil companies, I'll let you set oil policy.
[00:39:01]  He is so both systematically, systemically, and personally corrupt.
[00:39:08]  He's the worst of all worlds.
[00:39:10]  And Kamala Harris has these policy positions you guys never talk about while you pretend that Trump has policy.
[00:39:17]  Trump's only policy is another corporate tax cut, down to 15%.
[00:39:22]  So that's why she keeps dropping us.
[00:39:25]  Chang, why can't she sit down one-on-one and have a conversation without another human being next door to help her out and make her feel comfortable?
[00:39:33]  She doesn't have any policies, Chank.
[00:39:35]  This is the establishment that you were talking about.
[00:39:38]  They want to keep us like this.
[00:39:39]  Because, Chank, the average American that doesn't know about politics, that doesn't listen to panels like this, what they're feeling, their gut, their paycheck, their security, the border, all that, they're feeling it, Chank.
[00:39:52]  They don't give a damn who's in charge.
[00:39:54]  They just know that this past four years has been a complete shit show, Chank.
[00:39:59]  And you're educated.
[00:40:00]  For you to sake, Kamala Harris has popped.
[00:40:03]  Chank, either somebody's paying you, because you're smart, Chank.

=== Quasi Random Political Events (09:40) ===

[00:40:06]  I really, like I said again, I respect the heavens.
[00:40:09]  How do you answer that?
[00:40:10]  Somebody has to be paying people because you don't have, you don't have no policies on her.
[00:40:14]  Nothing that she's saying is a valid or it's going to happen, Cheng.
[00:40:19]  You've had four years to do it.
[00:40:20]  Just to jump in, I actually do think that as Bill Clinton, I think it was rightly said, these things usually come down to the economy, these elections.
[00:40:28]  I do think the economy is going to be a massive factor.
[00:40:31]  I think when that debate happens on the 10th, Americans will tune in in huge numbers.
[00:40:36]  I reckon it'll break all records.
[00:40:38]  And they'll look at those two candidates and they will ask themselves one question.
[00:40:42]  The majority of Americans who are feeling the pinch.
[00:40:44]  Which one is going to be better for my economy, my personal family economy?
[00:40:49]  And I think as things stand, unless she can turn that around, Chenk, I'll say this very respectfully to your position on this.
[00:40:56]  I think that more people at the moment will associate Trump with the economy potentially growing better under him and her.
[00:41:04]  I might be wrong, but I suspect that's what that debate will unravel.
[00:41:07]  I've got to leave it there.
[00:41:08]  Thank you to my panel.
[00:41:09]  You've all been terrific.
[00:41:10]  I'm joined in the studio now by the polling stats guru and author of the new book, On the Edge, The Art of Taking of Risking Everything.
[00:41:19]  I'm sorry.
[00:41:20]  Nate Silver, great to see you.
[00:41:21]  Absolutely, man.
[00:41:22]  It's been a while.
[00:41:22]  I don't even know.
[00:41:23]  Have we ever met in person?
[00:41:24]  I've interviewed you many times.
[00:41:26]  CNN back in the day, 10, 12 years ago.
[00:41:28]  Yeah, I remember that stuff.
[00:41:29]  Yeah, yeah.
[00:41:30]  I remember interviewing a lot.
[00:41:32]  You were normally so busy you couldn't come in.
[00:41:35]  You've written this great book, The Art of Risking Everything, On the Edge.
[00:41:38]  And I'll come to that in a moment.
[00:41:39]  But first of all, you're the founder of 5830, one of the great polling companies in the world, particularly for American politics.
[00:41:46]  Where are we now with this election, do you think?
[00:41:48]  If you had the election today, then Harris would have a slight edge.
[00:41:52]  But A, the election's not today.
[00:41:54]  And B, we have to remember the Electoral College.
[00:41:57]  She is up right now by three, three and a half points or so in national polls.
[00:42:02]  There's been about a two and a half point gap, though, three point gap between the popular vote and the Electoral College.
[00:42:07]  So she'd probably have to win by three, three and a half to be safe in the Electoral College.
[00:42:12]  Secondly, she may be on a little bit of a sugar high after the convention, after the VP picks, everything else.
[00:42:17]  So our model has the November outcome basically 50-50, despite the fact that she's ahead by a small amount today.
[00:42:24]  Is it always around 50-50 now in America?
[00:42:27]  In other words, is it going to come down, as always, to 40, 50, 60,000 votes?
[00:42:31]  We are so polarized.
[00:42:32]  We're not going to have elections like you have in the UK, where you have big swings between Labor and Tories.
[00:42:38]  Yeah, if 90% of people are locked in already.
[00:42:40]  I mean, we saw when Biden was 82 years old trying to remember for president until he was 86 and like plainly unable to execute, he still was only four points behind Trump.
[00:42:50]  And, you know, look, if you had a Nikki Haley, it might be a wider margin still.
[00:42:55]  But the party label is all that matters for the large majority of American voters.
[00:42:59]  Trump, it's believed at the moment, has the edge with men, American men.
[00:43:05]  Is that enough to get him over the edge?
[00:43:07]  He also had rising support with Latinos and black Americans.
[00:43:11]  She, Carmela Harris, as a black woman nominee, has paid back a little bit of that, it seems.
[00:43:18]  What's the reality there?
[00:43:19]  I mean, the electorate is 51% women, 49% men.
[00:43:23]  Women are more reliable about most things, including voting.
[00:43:26]  It was funny that in her convention speech, not funny, but interesting, it was targeted at male voters, right?
[00:43:31]  She had a line about AI, which is a very male-coded thing.
[00:43:34]  She talked about like military strength and competition with China, which I thought was smart.
[00:43:39]  I mean, a lot of Democrats try to play to their base, but their base is actually not as large as it used to be.
[00:43:44]  You see, for example, younger voters of color are now maybe more agnostic or neutral about who they might want to vote for.
[00:43:50]  Hispanic voters have gone back to being more 50-50.
[00:43:52]  And so, yeah, I think she was smart to go after men who are obviously a GOP-leaning group in this dynamic.
[00:43:59]  Carlina Harris was pretty unpopular before all this last two months of extraordinary developments.
[00:44:06]  Has she got genuinely more popular, or is it that the Democrats have seized a bit of momentum from it not being the old guy?
[00:44:14]  Enthusiasm can go a long way and kind of fake it till you make it, but she's also gotten a lot of reps in, spending four years touring the world.
[00:44:21]  I mean, remember, all the natural politicians.
[00:44:23]  Bill Clinton, natural politician.
[00:44:25]  Well, not really.
[00:44:25]  His first DNC speech in 1988 was a laugher, a disaster.
[00:44:29]  Barack Obama got decimated in his first midterm, or not midterm election, his first congressional election in 2000 on the south side of Chicago.
[00:44:37]  So you can get better.
[00:44:38]  I feel like the Biden people also were holding her back.
[00:44:41]  I mean, they were very aware that if you have this talented understudy when you're 82 years old and she were allowed to kind of be herself, I mean, the obvious thing would be to hand over the baton without all this drama that actually unfolded.
[00:44:52]  And so, you know, free of the Biden burden, free of, I think also in 2020 when she ran, this was kind of peak, if you will, like wokeness in American society, where there was very little about race and gender in that convention speech.
[00:45:06]  She did not use the word black even once.
[00:45:08]  She used the word woman only once because she knows that Americans actually selling yourself as race blind.
[00:45:14]  Of course, it's implicit in the presentation.
[00:45:15]  It would be historic first, but I think she's been smarter about that.
[00:45:19]  I agree with that.
[00:45:19]  Unlike Hillary Clinton, who put it very well about the glass ceiling and everything else.
[00:45:24]  Yeah, she had Chelsea Clinton introduce her.
[00:45:26]  I think she way overestimated how much love America had for the Clinton dynasty that was more a negative than a positive, and she treated it like a coronation.
[00:45:34]  What are Karmala Harris's big potential pitfalls, do you think?
[00:45:38]  Well, you mentioned the economy.
[00:45:41]  I think that's going to be more important than people realize.
[00:45:43]  Seems because so many Americans, I mean, Anthony touched on the job losses under Trump.
[00:45:48]  It was obviously pandemic, and we had a massive cost of living crisis, and we've had various wars erupt.
[00:45:54]  All of that put together has put a real burden on many American family pockets.
[00:45:59]  For sure.
[00:45:59]  And look, the jobs market is good.
[00:46:00]  It's a mixed picture.
[00:46:01]  The stock market has been good.
[00:46:03]  But take-home pay has not been particularly good.
[00:46:05]  Inflation has abated, but people still remember things are a lot more expensive than they were, you know, four years ago.
[00:46:10]  Ironically, being distanced from Biden, people give her less responsibility, and she'll say, oh, we have to turn around the problems of the past 10 years.
[00:46:17]  Like, okay, who was president for the last four years of those 10?
[00:46:20]  But so far, that message has worked a little bit.
[00:46:23]  The border is a problem.
[00:46:24]  Americans are concerned about immigration.
[00:46:26]  Biden could still be a problem.
[00:46:27]  If he has some senior incident, for example, the media, since the horse race part has been resolved, has not covered his age as much.
[00:46:34]  But if there is some crisis that unfolds again in the Middle East or on the stock market or anything else, then he'll be back in the spotlight and that might be a risk for her.
[00:46:42]  Well, this is why I'm surprised that the Democrats haven't actually tried to maneuver it so that he stands aside and Carmela Harris is the president because it would be helpful to her to be the incumbent president, I think.
[00:46:55]  But secondly, if there is a major crisis that erupts, something really substantial, and Joe Biden simply cannot cope with it, it's all going to fall negatively on her.
[00:47:04]  Well, and for the, I mean, let's talk about governance and not elections for a second, right?
[00:47:08]  There's a new book out on nuclear war that details the American command and control system.
[00:47:12]  If you get the 3 a.m. phone call from North Korea, the president of the United States has six minutes de facto to decide whether to launch back, which will determine the fate of the free world, in fact, the entire world, pretty much.
[00:47:24]  If Joe Biden only has six hours of uptime a day, it's not like North Korea is going to politely only launch a nuclear weapon or a false alarm.
[00:47:32]  That's the important thing.
[00:47:32]  It could easily be a false alarm.
[00:47:33]  There had been false alarms in that six-hour span.
[00:47:36]  And so, yeah, I don't know why he, you know, I thought he had an effective two years, got a lot done in the first two years with Democratic Congress.
[00:47:43]  I don't know why he wouldn't step aside.
[00:47:45]  I think they're afraid to admit defeat or admit failure.
[00:47:47]  It is strange that he's there on the beach as president of the United States and she's de facto in charge.
[00:47:54]  I think he feels like he was underestimated, right?
[00:47:55]  Underestimated by the media in 2020.
[00:47:58]  And once you have that and you have that chip on your shoulder that I beat expectations, then it's very hard to get you to ever, ever, you know, lose that ego boom that you had.
[00:48:06]  I mean, obviously, the Trump win in 2016, I'll be quite smug for a moment because I was writing and saying on air, I think Trump's going to win when nobody thought that was going to happen.
[00:48:17]  Your polling didn't suggest it was going to happen.
[00:48:19]  Well, I'm a modeler, so our model had Trump at 30%, which is way above the betting odds, right?
[00:48:24]  So I'm a gambler at heart.
[00:48:26]  And if you can get Trump at 6% to 1, which was the market price, and our odds say 3 to 1, then I'm a gambler.
[00:48:32]  I bet on Trump and you would have made a lot of money that way.
[00:48:34]  But for sure, lots of people did not see it coming.
[00:48:36]  And you had to kind of like detach yourself from the narrative to even give it a possibility of a chance.
[00:48:41]  How accurate is your polling these days, do you think?
[00:48:46]  So the polling in general, what we do is aggregate other people's polls.
[00:48:49]  We don't have to do polls ourselves, thankfully.
[00:48:51]  The polls were pretty.
[00:48:52]  Builds carry great weight and influence.
[00:48:54]  People think they're extremely credible, obviously.
[00:48:57]  A lot of attention.
[00:48:59]  If Kamala Harris, let's say she's up, Pennsylvania is probably a key state, right?
[00:49:02]  Let's say she's up by two points in every poll of Pennsylvania on election day on November 5th.
[00:49:07]  That's probably only a 60-40 chance of winning, right?
[00:49:10]  So our job is to set realistic odds based on what the polls say.
[00:49:13]  It's not like a football match.
[00:49:14]  If it's 2-1 Arsenal at the end of full time, right, Arsenal has won.
[00:49:18]  It's like they have an audit period afterward.
[00:49:20]  Like, oh, actually, that goal that we thought they scored didn't actually count.
[00:49:22]  And the refereeing was biased.
[00:49:24]  And we missed this other goal that, you know, Liverpool scored, whatever else.
[00:49:27]  Well, there's a good nudge.
[00:49:28]  I mean, I'm an Arsenal fan.
[00:49:29]  And if the odds, you know, you could ask me what are the odds on us beating whoever it is, Tottenham next week away.
[00:49:35]  And I'd say, pretty damn good.
[00:49:37]  You know, but doesn't mean to say they're going to.
[00:49:39]  But yet I would have factored in everything I know about my team and it would make perfect sense what I'd say.
[00:49:44]  Well, and remember, there are things that are kind of quasi-random events in politics.

=== Setting Realistic Election Odds (02:51) ===

[00:49:47]  I mean, Trump, you know, thank goodness for the direction the United States would have taken, chose to look aside at like a billboard of immigration data when a shot whizzed and hit his ear.
[00:49:56]  What would have happened if it had killed him?
[00:49:59]  I don't know.
[00:50:00]  I mean, it's a cliche to say civil war, but violence, I don't think we'd actually have a civil war, but violence tends to beget violence.
[00:50:06]  I mean, that would have been very, very, very bad.
[00:50:09]  Yeah, I think so.
[00:50:10]  Let's turn to your book, On the Edge, The Art of Risking Everything.
[00:50:15]  I completely buy into this, by the way, but I've taken risks my whole life and most of them have paid off.
[00:50:21]  Occasionally, you crash and burn.
[00:50:23]  It's more fun.
[00:50:24]  It's more fun.
[00:50:25]  That's a lot of fun.
[00:50:25]  It's more fun than taking a punt at stuff, right?
[00:50:28]  Yeah, and look, we have lived for many years in a period where we don't have the type of abundance that we have today.
[00:50:33]  So taking advantage of opportunities, and maybe you get three out of every five things right, or two out of every five things right, but the two that hit really big and you have more fun along the way.
[00:50:42]  I mean, I think we should encourage people in their professional lives.
[00:50:45]  I'm not talking about should you ride a motorcycle or take drugs or whatever.
[00:50:47]  That's up to you.
[00:50:48]  But particularly for young people, including, by the way, young women who are often discouraged to take risks, you know, early in your career, take some risks.
[00:50:56]  Hold yourself high to a high standard for what am I doing with my life and how do I derive satisfaction, employment.
[00:51:01]  You have to be prepared to fail.
[00:51:03]  Absolutely.
[00:51:03]  That's what puts people off.
[00:51:05]  I mean, I would say the majority of people are not natural, easy risk takers because they factor in the downside, the negative potential of failure.
[00:51:15]  Whereas I think having failed upwardly quite regularly in my career, I can often see it as an opportunity.
[00:51:21]  And in fact, often it triggers a change in your career plan, which you wouldn't have necessarily done naturally.
[00:51:27]  But when you're forced to, it turns out to be an inspired move.
[00:51:30]  Yeah, I talked to an astronaut, former astronaut named Catherine Sullivan in the book, and she was an astronaut during the Space Shuttle Challenger era, of course, which ended disastrously.
[00:51:38]  Before every mission, you actually basically say goodbye provisionally, conditionally to your family.
[00:51:44]  And she would say, look, they're launching me into outer space.
[00:51:47]  This is inherently not a safe activity.
[00:51:50]  And there's some chance that I might not come back alive.
[00:51:52]  And I want you to know that I understood the risk and I did it for the love of humankind and for my country.
[00:51:57]  And I was aware of that.
[00:51:58]  And so the best risk takers are always aware of the possibility of failure of things going wrong.
[00:52:04]  It is one of Trump's Trump cards that he's prepared to roll the dice quite a lot.
[00:52:09]  I think so.
[00:52:10]  I think sometimes also to his detriment.
[00:52:12]  I mean, I'm not sure that the JD Vance pick was the best pick.
[00:52:15]  They made that pick at a time after the assassination attempt when he was riding very high in the polls.
[00:52:20]  I thought they underprepared for the possibility of Harris taking over the nomination.
[00:52:24]  The Democratic Party is a little bit more quote-unquote rational than the GOP.
[00:52:28]  They're not a cult of personality around Biden like Democrats were around Trump, Republicans were.
[00:52:34]  They made Biden basically in 2020 anyway.

=== Rolling The Dice Again (01:12) ===

[00:52:38]  But look, I think he's found his stride a little bit more.
[00:52:41]  I mean, look, the case for Trump is that Harris had everything that could go right, go right for her, including lots of bad decisions by Trump for a period of a month.
[00:52:50]  And she pulled into like a small lead in the Electoral College, but not much of one.
[00:52:53]  So when you revert back to the long-term mean, I mean, she has been unpopular for parts of her career, you know, and the Electoral College edge for the GOP.
[00:53:02]  That's why you would take the polls that show her a little bit ahead now and I think slide that back toward 50-50 is what our model does.
[00:53:08]  So the key question is, who's going to be president of the United States come November 5th?
[00:53:13]  Yeah, if you gave me a free bet, I mean, I'm not even sure what I would do.
[00:53:18]  I just had a $1,000 bet with Anthony Scaramucci.
[00:53:20]  I put my odds on the line every day, right?
[00:53:22]  So you can bet against me, but we are truly close enough to 50 where we're going to cop out and say, I don't know how I'd bet if you put a gun to my head right now.
[00:53:29]  Fascinating.
[00:53:30]  It's going to be a riveting few weeks.
[00:53:32]  On the Edge, the Art of Risking Everything, a really interesting book.
[00:53:36]  I just love the premise of it, that if you take risks and prepare to fail, actually you'll have, A, you'll have more fun in life.
[00:53:43]  Yeah.
[00:53:44]  And B, you've got a very good chance if you have that attitude of succeeding.
[00:53:48]  I really appreciate that, Pierce.
[00:53:49]  Thank you.
[00:53:49]  Great to see you, Nate.
[00:53:50]  Really good to see you.