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$10 per order, additional term supply. Aloha

0:42

and namaste everyone. I'm John Heilman down

0:44

in Atlanta, Georgia for the first and

0:47

after what transpired here tonight,

0:50

almost certainly the only 2024

0:52

general election debate between President

0:54

Joe Biden and former president

0:56

and of course convicted felon

0:58

Donald Trump. To mark

1:00

this historic occasion, I have joined forces

1:02

with my puck super friends Peter Hamby

1:04

and Dylan Byers to create a special

1:07

post debate combined episode of

1:09

In Politik with John Heilman, my twice weekly

1:11

podcast for Odyssey and puck and the powers

1:13

that be Peter's daily podcast

1:15

for Odyssey and puck. Almost

1:17

exactly one hour after Biden and Trump delivered

1:19

their closing statements, the two of us and

1:21

Dylan got on the blower and dove

1:24

right in, offering our impressions,

1:26

observations, analyses and assessments,

1:29

as well as emptying our notebooks and

1:31

reading out messages from our text threads,

1:33

which you will probably not be surprised to

1:35

learn. We're essentially overloading

1:38

and melting down due to

1:40

the deafening, wailing, gnashing, howling

1:42

and crying of Democrats

1:44

collectively freaking the fuck out

1:47

over Joe Biden's performance and wondering what

1:50

in God's name are they going

1:52

to do now. And so without

1:55

further ado, let us

1:57

dive into the wit and wisdom

1:59

of trio that would make only

2:02

a mildly less alarming law firm than

2:04

beat em, cheat em and how that

2:06

would be buyers, Hamby and Heilman coming

2:08

at you in three, two,

2:11

one. Making

2:15

sure that we're able to make every

2:17

single solitary person eligible

2:20

for what I've been able to do with

2:22

the COVID, excuse

2:24

me, with dealing with

2:27

everything we have to do with what

2:32

if we finally

2:34

beat Medicare. Thank you, President

2:36

Biden, President Trump. Was

2:38

right. He did beat Medicare, beat it to death.

2:43

So that exchange took place pretty

2:46

early in this debate. Peter Hamby, Dylan

2:48

Byers here. And we really have a host of

2:50

this of the show right now. But I'm just

2:52

just to kind of just to kind of get

2:54

to the beginning, this can be on Peter's show,

2:56

the powers of being is going to be on

2:58

mine. But I will just because I

3:00

would love to hear what you guys have to say about

3:02

this to begin with that was early in the debate, Biden

3:04

came out tonight. And I

3:07

spent the first like few minutes going like I

3:09

can't understand him. His voice was so faint and

3:11

weak that I was like having a hard time

3:13

actually like just understanding what he was saying. But

3:15

Peter, we'll, we'll start with you and then

3:18

go Dylan just give us your like your overall thoughts. The

3:20

beginning of the debate was horrible for Biden. There's no question

3:22

about it. And so but just give us your sense of

3:24

like the whole night to start with. Yeah,

3:26

I mean, I remember

3:29

that like 2012 debate back when you

3:32

were in your double down era, when we were

3:34

in Denver and Obama came out

3:36

and, you know, really shit the bed against Mitt

3:39

Romney and Mitt Romney got a lot of energy

3:41

and you know, incumbent presidents

3:44

often with in the first debate that clearly

3:46

happened tonight. But in the social media era,

3:48

I remember like our mischief maker friend Ben

3:50

Smith posted within the first 30 minutes

3:52

like Romney has won the debate. Tonight,

3:55

I felt that

3:57

way within the first five minutes and even before

4:00

or he had that mental flub.

4:02

The split screen of Biden versus Trump. I mean,

4:04

Trump was scowling most of the time, but Biden

4:06

had that vacant look on his face that he

4:08

often does these days. My first

4:11

texts, I know we are all getting

4:13

texts from panicked Democrats. My first text

4:16

was from a anti-Trump person

4:18

saying, I'm gonna be calling my accountant tomorrow

4:20

to make sure I don't have any problems

4:23

with an audit. And then right

4:25

after that, eight minutes into the

4:27

debate, Jesus Christ, where can we move? This is

4:29

a disaster. I mean, this was like within the

4:31

first five minutes of the debate and then Biden

4:34

sort of had that Rick Perry oops moment. And

4:38

again, just to go back to people rendering

4:41

verdicts very quickly, I think most people tune

4:43

into this debate, like probably watch

4:45

the first 20, 30 minutes and then they

4:47

kind of zone out, tune out, to the

4:49

extent people are watching this in great detail. And

4:52

it was just over in the first 10

4:55

minutes in my opinion. It was a Titanic level

4:57

disaster for Biden. And I

4:59

will not play his closing statement, which was I will say

5:01

if anybody happened to tune back in, just to hear the

5:03

closing statements, Biden's closing statement was utterly, like it was terrible.

5:05

I mean, it's hard to believe that you could do a

5:07

prepared closing statement as bad as the closing statement. He didn't

5:10

even use the full time. I know. Dylan,

5:12

go ahead. What's your thought about the whole thing? Yeah,

5:14

I mean, just to pick up on Peter, you

5:19

can't really contextualize this

5:21

debate relative

5:23

to previous performances,

5:25

because what happened is he

5:27

confirmed the worst

5:30

suspicions that

5:32

everyone had about his

5:34

age and his ability to step up to the

5:36

plate in a pivotal moment. And

5:38

you can't, there's no, you know, the

5:42

reaction is unanimous. It

5:45

is one thing to have someone go out and

5:47

give a debate, like Peter, you mentioned Obama in

5:49

2012, and

5:51

then have a few surrogates

5:53

sitting around the panel afterward trying to

5:55

spin it in his favor. No one,

5:58

no self-respecting person. on

6:00

the Democratic side of the aisle

6:02

in the media, certainly, it

6:07

sees any way to spin this. And

6:09

so the moment that debate ends,

6:12

you go to Van Jones, you go

6:14

to Axelrod, you go even to Kate

6:17

Bedingfield, his former communications

6:19

director. Long time. Long

6:21

time. Long time. And loyalist and

6:24

a great Biden loyalist. And

6:27

just all the way down the line, everyone

6:30

is saying this is bad for him. I

6:32

look forward to an effort on

6:34

the part of like the really, really,

6:38

really diehard supporters here who

6:41

try to remind us that yes, Trump

6:44

lied through his teeth and

6:46

that it was just falsehood after falsehood. And by the

6:48

way, Biden had some falsehoods as well. They might not

6:50

have been quite as intentional, but that he certainly had

6:53

them. I certainly look forward to the

6:55

people who try to pin this on CNN and say,

6:57

if only Jake Tapper and Dana

6:59

Bash had like fact check Trump, I'm

7:02

sorry, but Jake Tapper and Dana Bash are not running

7:04

for president. Biden is,

7:06

it's his responsibility. Like

7:08

the over, we all know how this

7:11

narrative and how these news cycles are gonna go.

7:13

It's not gonna be trying to figure out

7:16

who won or trying to argue on behalf of Biden.

7:18

It's gonna be a conversation about whether or not he

7:20

should step down and let someone

7:22

else come in to take his place. That

7:24

is going to be the dialogue for at

7:26

least the next 48 hours, if not the next

7:28

two weeks. I

7:32

will say that being here, one

7:34

of the ways you obviously know over the years, when

7:37

a campaign has had a bad night is when they take

7:39

a long time to get to the spin room, because if

7:41

they think they've won that the Trump people were on the

7:43

spin room floor, or at least if Fonnick was holding forth

7:45

within 37 seconds at the end of

7:48

the debate, and they had people all over the floor, everybody who's trying

7:50

to get to be Trump's vice presidential nominee was, we're all there. You

7:52

had Doug Burgum down there early and then I saw him Scott as

7:54

I walked out the door. The

7:56

Biden people took a long time to come out. Their plan had

7:58

always been to bring out brought out Warnock and

8:00

Newsom and they would do a group thing. They would, they

8:02

were going to, whether they won, when out of what they

8:05

were going to do, a group thing, make statements, take a

8:07

few questions and leave. That was their plan either way. But

8:09

they did not plan to come out there as late as

8:11

they did. And people were getting very restless waiting for them

8:13

to show up because they were the only ones they may

8:15

want to talk to. It was, it was so, to your

8:18

point, Dilla, about unanimity. You know, no one,

8:20

no one was confused

8:22

about how bad this was for

8:25

Joe Biden and Peter, to your

8:27

point about those early, he really

8:30

was, you know, Frank

8:33

Lentz, who is unreliable in a million ways, but I don't

8:35

think he's wrong about this. The way he said his focus

8:37

group was, was troubled

8:39

by Biden's, his

8:42

voice, how weak it sounded, how, how the, you know,

8:44

all of these things playing to the, into the, these

8:46

are the things that kill you, right? Things that play

8:48

into the existing narrative. Is the guy too old? Is

8:50

he, have the energy to stand up? You know, all

8:52

those things, you could come out there and have a

8:54

hoarse voice and you're not driving a

8:56

clear or any kind of real message. And then

8:59

you have this thing where you have, you know,

9:01

what the, what the right will say on Twitter

9:03

was the Biden glitch. And, you know, listen to

9:05

that thing again, the sound we just played it

9:08

actually, but play it, play it again and just

9:10

listen to what happens while he's not, because there's

9:12

this thing where he's making these, I'm not trying

9:14

to be cruel here, but like, this is going

9:16

to be a 30 second ad and there are

9:19

probably thousands of TikToks already with this. Listen to

9:21

the sound of his voice when he gets lost.

9:23

Listen to it. Like the one his throat sounds

9:25

like right here. Making sure that we're able to

9:27

make every single solitary person eligible

9:30

for what I've been able to do with the

9:33

COVID, excuse me, with dealing

9:36

with everything we have to do

9:38

with, look, if

9:43

we finally beat Medicare. Thank

9:46

you, President Biden. President Trump. Well,

9:49

he's right. He did beat Medicare. He beat it to death.

9:51

And I'm not trying to be cruel. I'm just trying to

9:53

say this, this is a guy for whom the question of

9:56

is he too old to serve has always been at the

9:58

core of it. And, you know, you mentioned. David

10:00

Axelrod before Dylan. It's like when Axelrod said early

10:02

on, is it really tenable for someone to say

10:05

to the American people, I want to be reelected me for a

10:07

second term when I will leave, I'll be closer to 90 then

10:09

80. That

10:12

was a very clear kind of way of thinking about

10:14

on some level, the, I don't want

10:16

to say preposterousness, but the kind

10:18

of chutzpah of putting yourself forward in the

10:21

circumstance. And Peter, you talked about

10:23

text message you're receiving. Just say

10:26

a little bit more. I, you said everybody's getting

10:28

them. I'll talk about some of mine in a

10:30

minute, but, but like, what's your, because this is

10:32

the story. You know, you had John King on

10:34

CNN coming out of the debate and saying right

10:36

out of the debate, Democrats are in full panic

10:38

mode now. They have been, I would say since

10:40

the, since that moment of the glitch was when

10:42

the panic really started. People were like, I can't

10:44

believe what I'm seeing. And the text messages were

10:46

flying at every level of the

10:48

party fast and furious. What, what's like your, at

10:50

this point, what's the, you know, give the, the

10:53

kind of a, the log line for

10:55

your, uh, you're sending Hollywood, give it a log

10:57

line for, uh, for the, uh, for the, uh,

10:59

for, for your text threads or your texts on

11:01

this debate. Uh, I'll

11:03

read one right now. He has to drop

11:05

out like you should have fucking dropped out a long

11:07

time ago when every fucking person said that he should

11:10

have. Um, that's

11:12

one thread I think that's interesting is, uh,

11:14

and by the way, speaking of timing, this

11:16

was, uh, six

11:18

30 West coast times. So nine 30. So

11:21

like, so that was just 30 minutes of

11:23

the debate. Again, uh, people were already at

11:25

this, uh, you know, Defcon one level

11:28

panics. This thread devolved into the,

11:30

uh, he

11:32

should drop out before the convention. He should

11:34

freeze delegates that are committed to him from

11:36

the primaries. They should figure this out. And

11:38

then that turned into, uh, make,

11:41

what if it's Kamala like Kamala can't win. I

11:43

mean, if there's just like a total rabbit

11:46

hole of panic that erupted tonight. And I

11:48

think there's something else to

11:50

think about too, which is what

11:53

you mentioned about not being able to understand him.

11:55

I was just watching at home on television. It

11:57

was really hard for me to understand what

11:59

he. because

14:00

hats and buttons made up that said pricks

14:02

for Biden to capitalize on that. Okay.

14:05

And then you've got this whole

14:07

thing with the Biden White House,

14:09

the press shop is

14:12

just irate with the New York Times

14:14

because they feel like the New York Times have done

14:16

too many stories on Biden's age. And

14:18

then the Her Report comes out in February. And

14:20

when the Her Report comes out, I

14:22

went and I talked to a lot of members of the White House press

14:24

corps. And I said, you

14:27

know, tell me like you guys

14:29

have had a front row seat to

14:31

the president. What are

14:33

you thinking now? And now that the conversation,

14:35

the news cycle is squarely focused on this

14:38

issue. And what they

14:40

told me, the vast majority of them, I've

14:43

got like quotes right here. It

14:45

was something that we felt indelicate to talk

14:47

about. They felt like there

14:49

was a lot of pressure not to

14:52

write any more stories than they had to

14:54

write. One reporter told me the amount of

14:56

time we spent talking about it, as in

14:58

amongst ourselves versus the time

15:01

we spent reporting on it was not the

15:03

same. And there should have been tougher, more

15:05

scrutinizing coverage of his age earlier. And yet

15:07

from February up until now, every time people

15:09

talked about Biden's age or every time the

15:12

RNC put out those videos, the issue

15:14

was that it was unfair and it was the wrong

15:16

thing to focus on. Well,

15:18

like I'm sorry, but you can't make that

15:20

argument after tonight's debate. And again, it doesn't

15:23

matter how much Trump lied, because the issue

15:25

is, are you putting up a candidate who

15:28

is actually capable of winning against Trump? If

15:31

that is your concern as a

15:33

Democrat or an independent, and there's no way to skirt

15:35

that issue now. I think that

15:37

John, what was the body language of the Biden

15:39

team and their surrogates? Like, well

15:42

the body language was they were surrounded by press

15:44

and those people like Gavin, you know, Newsom will

15:46

step right up to no bank, a bank of

15:48

microphones and he'll sound just as confident as ever.

15:50

And Warnock, they all, you know, here's the Jenna

15:52

Mallie Dylan statement, which is basically what they, what

15:55

they, what they echoed, which is tonight, president Biden presented

15:57

a positive winning vision for the future of the United

15:59

States. America, one of which every Democrat has a fair

16:01

share of the American dream. On the other side, I'm

16:03

condensing you on the other side was Donald Trump, dark

16:06

and backwards window. Women are forced to beg for healthcare.

16:08

They need a former president who not once, but twice,

16:10

three times failed to promise who would accept the results

16:12

of a free and fair election. Trump's

16:14

performance, America, Romain in America, why they fired him four

16:16

years ago to reinforce the South stakes of our in

16:18

this November for the future of the country. And they

16:21

made various points. You know, at

16:23

one point when they finally

16:25

took questions, uh, Warnock said

16:28

kind of tacitly acknowledging,

16:30

uh, how bad, uh, the

16:33

performance was and politically, uh, uh,

16:35

uh, devastating it was, he sort of said, I would

16:37

be really worried if it didn't, if Joe Biden didn't

16:40

have a record to run on, which was essentially saying,

16:42

yeah, this performance is really terrible, but we're going to

16:44

fall back. And I mean, you can, I can pick

16:46

full up. I can pick that argument full of holes,

16:48

but that was the kind of the posture. Gavin Newsom

16:50

was just, you know, and, and if you get a

16:52

bunch of Democrats wired up on the notion that Trump's

16:54

a pathological liar and he lied a lot, they can

16:57

all front of that for a few minutes. That's why

16:59

they kept that, that briefing short, right? Because that was

17:01

like, you know, let them make basically each one of

17:03

them surrogates made a statement. They

17:05

got all, they made their, they made the same points

17:07

they would have made in any circumstance. And then they

17:09

took a few questions, which are all basically like, because

17:12

the press are idiots. Um, um,

17:15

do you support, there are people talking about Joe Biden

17:17

stepping down. Do you endorse that view? Like as if

17:19

Gavin Newsom in front of this group, this business, the

17:21

press file was going to say, yes, actually I've now

17:24

determined on the basis of the performance that I would

17:26

in fact like to have the nomination and Joe Biden

17:28

should step down. I want to

17:30

play a piece of Trump sound. Uh, but first,

17:32

uh, let's take a quick break to sell some

17:34

sub flakes here. And we'll be right back with

17:37

more of this very special post-debate puck, super friends

17:39

edition of in politic with John. So,

17:50

uh, so Dylan and Peter, um, I was saying,

17:52

uh, before the break guys, uh, it's interesting if

17:54

you looked at what the Biden press shop was

17:56

putting out over the course of the night and

17:58

the Trump press shop, but the. lot

26:00

of people, a lot of smart people, a lot of

26:02

media executives who feel like it is their responsibility. And

26:05

that is the responsibility of a news organization

26:08

to fact check in real time. I

26:13

sympathize, first of all, CNN made clear

26:15

from the very beginning that they were

26:17

going to act as facilitators, not as

26:19

fact checkers. And I

26:21

think that there's a very strong argument for that being

26:23

the way it is. And in fact, if you look

26:25

at the history of American debates and you go back

26:28

far enough, that really was the it's

26:30

the job of the candidates to have a debate. And

26:33

if again, just to say it one more time, if

26:35

Jake and Dana had been trying to do that, it would

26:38

have become a three

26:40

on, you know, not even a three on one, because Biden didn't

26:42

show up, it would have been a two on one thing, it

26:44

would have been an entirely different narrative. It is

26:46

not their job to do it. How is Mark Thompson feeling? How are

26:48

the folks at CNN feeling? I think they're

26:50

feeling really, really good about

26:52

how they handled this. I

26:56

think they know that they're going to have to contend with some of

26:58

that scrutiny on the left. I don't

27:00

think they're terribly worried about it. I think Mark

27:02

Thompson is somebody who does not

27:04

spend a lot of time navel gazing or

27:06

looking over his shoulder or worrying about whether

27:08

he did something the right way or wrong

27:10

way. I think he looks at this. He

27:13

put two candidates on stage. He let them debate each

27:16

other. It's nobody's fault,

27:18

but Biden's that it went so poorly for

27:20

him. And I

27:22

think he's content with I think they're going to

27:24

be very content with how they perform. There's a

27:26

whole different discussion about how their business is going

27:28

to look two weeks from now when that audience

27:30

isn't there anymore. That's a different subject for difference.

27:33

So let me play two more quick places, Sam. They're

27:35

both on the question of abortion. This is one thing

27:37

where you asked Peter before about

27:39

the Biden spin room. There was a

27:41

lot of discussion. This is something they're going

27:43

to lean into because they feel as though Democrats feel as

27:45

though they have a, that this is Trump's weakest issue. This

27:48

is their strongest issue. Trump said

27:50

some things and Biden said some things on

27:52

abortion. I'm curious about what you guys think

27:54

about how well, how badly Trump, badly

27:57

or well, Trump handled his worst issue and

27:59

how bad. is

36:00

over. Now, you can say

36:02

that's hair on fire. I'm reporting

36:04

though, what I'm trying to say here is I

36:06

have at least a half a dozen Democratic senators

36:08

in my techs thread and probably about 15 members

36:11

of the house, a

36:13

bunch of really rich Democratic

36:15

donors, all of them,

36:17

what options do we have? How would

36:19

this work? This is

36:22

a complete calamity. Bedwetting

36:25

in the Democratic Party happens all the time.

36:27

It does not often happen at this level

36:29

where it's like senior figures. I

36:31

will point out the Daily Mail wrote a piece a

36:33

couple of weeks ago that said the Clintons, the Obamas,

36:35

Nancy and Chuck had had a conversation about going

36:37

to Biden to try to get him to step down

36:40

if he shit the bed in the debate. I

36:42

regard the Daily Mail as not a credible media

36:44

outlet, but I've had four or five sources say

36:47

to me that at least part of that is

36:49

true. And that I think mostly revolves around Nancy

36:51

and Chuck. We're starting to freak out about what

36:53

might happen to Democrats in the Senate and Democrats

36:55

in the house. And there's

36:57

one last thing. Another Democratic

36:59

donor, someone I know who gave an extraordinarily large

37:01

amount of money to Joe Biden recently, a amount

37:03

that you would not think would be legal, but

37:06

the way they parcel these checks out, you can

37:08

get away with it, who said to me the

37:10

other day that the character of the bedwetting, which

37:12

is perennial in the Democratic Party, the character of

37:14

it is different. And this goes to something that

37:16

one of you said earlier. The donors

37:18

who are bedwetting this time are bedwetting. I

37:20

don't know if there's such a thing as

37:22

angry bedwetting, but they are mad. They're

37:25

not just nervous. They're angry in

37:27

some sense that they feel like

37:30

they've been put in a hostage situation where like Biden

37:33

made them by forcing himself by

37:35

saying he was the only one who could want one.

37:37

Then they had to back him and there's no way

37:39

to get him out. They felt like they kind of

37:41

were tied down to the train tracks. And again, you

37:43

can credit that or not credit it, but that is

37:46

a different feeling. It's not just like nervous Nelly. There's

37:48

this other thing of anger

37:50

and resentment. And

37:52

I raised all of it just to say, and

37:55

to get to the question, which is, this

37:57

is different in a variety of ways that

37:59

other episodes of bedwetting. wedding I've seen and

38:01

and for all the reasons I just said

38:03

that doesn't mean that it's gonna meet and

38:05

you know Biden's gonna step down it doesn't

38:07

I don't know where this goes but

38:10

I want to ask the two of you what

38:12

you imagine happening now and Peter

38:14

you know you've you know we both have covered

38:16

these things do you imagine not like predictably like

38:19

Joe Biden will step down you know but do

38:21

you feel like it does it feel different to

38:23

you as it does to me and do you

38:25

imagine a scenario and what would that scenario obviously

38:27

this zero has to start with Biden stepping

38:30

aside but is that a thing where like

38:32

you think you know after tonight not

38:35

guaranteed but there's an appreciably greater chance that that

38:38

could actually happen is that where your heads at

38:40

right now yeah I do

38:42

and I'm before getting on this podcast I'm really

38:44

glad you said this it

38:47

is important to step back and think about all

38:49

the previous pet wedding cycles we've

38:52

all witnessed before in past elections in

38:54

this cycle the

38:57

level of anger I felt again and that was

38:59

coming from like normal sort of Democrats not like

39:01

a professional Democrats like people who just want to

39:04

vote against Trump and get this over with even if they're

39:06

not in love with Biden who were texting me their anger

39:09

it's because so much feels

39:11

at stake it's because Biden

39:15

sort of he but he never said I will

39:18

be a transitional president he hinted at it a

39:20

lot of people took that to heart and

39:23

I think after the midterms he could have walked

39:25

away like you know Michael Jordan

39:28

after hitting that shot against the jazz

39:30

and just been a hero forever to

39:32

Democrats the

39:34

the issue is like this

39:37

is what should have happened after he won in 2022

39:41

is Jill and his

39:43

sister Valerie and clean

39:46

and Donilon and Kaufman should have been

39:48

like hey man like you did your

39:50

duty like you're a historic figure like time

39:53

to pass the torch he

39:56

doesn't have the best relationship with

39:59

Barack Obama And he has

40:01

certain good relationships with Democrats

40:04

who are probably in your texts. But

40:06

is JP Pritzker gonna go to him

40:08

and say, time to

40:10

step aside, sir? The problem is

40:12

that people he would listen to

40:14

in this scenario are his family.

40:16

It's Jill, Mike Donilon, like, Klain

40:20

Kaufman, like, Val, maybe Anita Donne. He's

40:22

like very inner circle group of people

40:24

that he relies on.

40:26

And that's been his core group,

40:29

as you know, for decades. And

40:32

unless one of them or a group of

40:34

them comes and says, hey man,

40:36

you gotta pull the plug, I don't see

40:38

it happening. There will be

40:40

some members of the House who will go on cable news

40:43

this week and this weekend and I'll meet

40:45

the press and say he should step aside.

40:47

They'll tweet it, Julian Castro, who doesn't like

40:49

Biden very much anyway, tweeted that tonight

40:51

that this was a disaster. The

40:55

problem is, like, it has to happen now. Like,

40:57

the convention is in

40:59

August, okay? Like, you're right. Biden

41:01

would have to say, I am

41:05

stepping aside, I am freeing my delegates. Then

41:07

there would be this, like, very

41:09

interesting jousting between all the

41:12

wannabes, the Kammas and the Pete's and

41:14

the Newsoms and the Whitmers, et cetera,

41:16

to sort of, like, somehow wrangle delegates.

41:18

Or the DNC could come together

41:20

and put together some kind of, like, sprint

41:23

caucus system in, like, a bunch of

41:25

states over the next couple months before

41:27

the convention. You

41:29

know, I remember when there was talk about Biden stepping

41:32

aside or being pushed out or, like, open convention, all

41:34

the 1968 stuff a few months ago, I,

41:38

like, did my best to understand the, you

41:40

know, Siamese of the

41:42

DNC rules and bylaws. You

41:45

know, the, if

41:47

Biden is the nominee after the convention,

41:50

like, there's nothing he can

41:52

do. There's really nothing he can do.

41:54

If he, like, dies, if there's a

41:56

health issue, like, then the committee. Yeah,

42:00

the committee, the DGA, Congressional leadership, they

42:02

get together, figure something out, in that

42:04

case it's probably Kamala Harris, but the

42:08

starting moment for this would

42:11

be that inner circle of

42:13

advisors and family responding

42:17

to what feels very different, a

42:19

very different level of pressure right

42:22

now and a very different level of bedwetting

42:24

and making it happen between

42:26

now, the end of June, and

42:30

basically August,

42:32

and that's a very tight window. It's

42:35

tough. Dylan, you talked to

42:37

a lot of people at Hollywood, they're some

42:40

of the most deluded people in the world

42:42

about this stuff, about how democratic politics actually

42:44

works, and I'm always like, guys, hey, it

42:46

doesn't really work that way, but

42:49

I do wonder whether there's

42:51

some world in which this just all, there

42:54

is a world where we go

42:56

through this thing, and a month from now we're all kind

42:58

of going, whoa, that was like a little fever dream we

43:00

had. There was a fever dream there where people have obviously

43:02

freaked out for good reason about the debate, but there's not

43:04

real plausibility here. Is there some world where you think, where

43:06

you look at this and go, maybe this isn't just a

43:08

fan, that it's gotten to

43:10

the point where, maybe? Yeah,

43:14

well, look, I mean, I don't have as

43:16

many high-level

43:19

campaign insiders in my rolodex as you

43:21

do, but one high-level campaign insider who

43:24

I meet with on occasion,

43:27

I'm always like, how worried are you about November?

43:29

How worried are you about the age question? And

43:31

what he always comes back to, which is more

43:33

or less the same thing that Jen O'Malley-Dillon said

43:36

to you in your recent interview with her, which

43:39

is like, look, this election is going to come

43:41

down to six, maybe seven states, and in those

43:43

states it's gonna come down to a few counties, and

43:46

we know the math, and the

43:48

polling we see, we

43:51

know we can win this. So

43:53

I think what's gonna happen here is, I

43:56

think they're gonna wait for a beat, and they're gonna

43:59

look at the polling. and they're going to look at how

44:01

the polling changes in the wake of this debate. And

44:04

they're going to parse the sort of

44:06

national freak out and the national narrative

44:08

away from how it's playing in

44:10

those very specific states and those

44:12

very specific counties. And

44:15

then if it's bad and if

44:17

the movement in the polls reflects

44:22

the Def Con freak

44:24

out that we've seen tonight in

44:27

the last sense of debate, then

44:32

that inner circle that you mentioned, Peter,

44:34

Jill, and Donnellan, and all those

44:36

guys, they saw the same debate we

44:38

saw. There's

44:40

no delusion about that. And it would be

44:42

far more deluded than anyone in Hollywood to

44:44

pretend like that didn't just happen. And

44:47

so I actually feel a little bit more

44:49

confident that that conversation could

44:51

happen, and we could see a change come to

44:54

convention. I will end

44:56

by just saying one thing, which is, this

44:58

is obviously a time before social media, and it

45:00

shows how old I am or whatever. But Bill

45:02

Clinton back in 1995, when

45:05

he did the State of Union after

45:09

the Republicans took control of the House of Representatives for the

45:11

first time in 40 years in 1940, did

45:13

a hour and 20 minute long State of

45:15

the Union that everybody who watched it in

45:17

Washington DC, in the media, all people like

45:20

us, smart people, media people, political people, reporters,

45:22

pundits, electives, donors, they all went, that. He

45:24

talked about school uniforms and cell phones in

45:26

urban neighborhoods. And people said, this is the

45:28

most boring, tedious State of the Union of

45:30

the history of the world. And then they

45:32

polled it, and it turned out the public

45:34

loved it. And it turned out to be

45:36

the launching pad for Clinton's reelection. And

45:38

I'm not saying that's going to happen here, but I will

45:40

say this. If you're on the Biden

45:42

campaign and you know what this conversation is, you

45:44

are thinking about what your strategy is to get through

45:46

the next week. And what

45:48

will help them is if they

45:51

get through to Tuesday and you get some polling out

45:53

that says that Biden's numbers

45:57

didn't change very much, and they can point to

46:00

that. and say, and I'm not saying this will

46:02

happen, I'm just saying they need a strategy right

46:04

now to deal with this. The

46:06

State of the Union solved their problem the last time

46:08

there was Democrats were in bedwetting

46:10

mode. Now the bed's on fire and

46:13

this didn't save them, it actually made it

46:15

worse. And they need a strategy.

46:17

And part of their strategy is going to be, is going

46:20

to pray that the polls just don't

46:22

move very much and that they can look up and go,

46:24

to your point, Dylan, hey, you know what? The

46:27

polls moved, you lost a point in Michigan. We

46:29

can make that up. He lost,

46:31

you know, he didn't lose any ground in Wisconsin. Like

46:33

what do you got? You guys are all just, you

46:35

know, insiders while the American people don't care or, or

46:39

for the small slice of the electorate that's going to

46:41

make the difference. They didn't move them. And so we're

46:43

in exactly the same place we were before the debate.

46:46

Everyone just calmed down. And if they have data on

46:48

their side, that's the way to kind of, that's a

46:50

strategy for getting through. But man, it is

46:52

going to be an ugly and ugly

46:54

fucking weekend in Biden town

46:56

because that man, it's that there is

46:58

not a, there are not a lot of,

47:01

there's no one who's walking around right now going, Hey everybody, it's

47:03

not as bad as you thought. You

47:05

guys want to meet up in Wilmington on Friday

47:07

night? Just go far off. Go

47:12

back and watch that, that, that, that Denver debate

47:14

with Obama. You watch that debate and

47:16

you go, people freaked out over this. I mean,

47:19

he wasn't great in it. He wasn't

47:21

great in it. He was, he was a little,

47:23

he was a little professorial. Romney was a little

47:25

energetic, but it was like the Denver debate. It's

47:27

like, can I go? And the polls barely moved.

47:30

You know, there were other things that happened later.

47:32

But you're like that compared to this, holy shit.

47:34

I mean, can I just add one point to

47:36

what you're saying, John, which is just to just

47:38

a book and this to the, the sound you

47:40

played at the top. It

47:43

is tempting to think about this as one night

47:45

and there, there's a lot of time to go

47:47

till November in June, get through. You

47:50

know, but I would just

47:53

to your point about that 30 second

47:55

spot that we are going to

47:57

see run over and over and over again. This

47:59

is not. a narrative that is going to

48:01

last a week. This is a narrative that

48:03

is going to be front and center as

48:05

hard as the Republicans can push it for

48:09

as long as they can push it. So

48:11

I don't, you're absolutely right. They need a strategy

48:13

to get to, I would say probably to July

48:15

4th, but it's not

48:17

like we're gonna come back and everyone's gonna

48:19

be like, well, on to the ABC News

48:21

debate in September. Age is

48:24

the overwhelming issue now for Biden and

48:26

I don't see that going away anytime soon. There will

48:28

be no debate in September. Donald Trump would be out

48:30

of his mind to do a second debate at this

48:32

point. I mean, he's not as bad of his mind.

48:34

And I will say to your point, one

48:37

of the things to go back to my various donor friends,

48:41

something that in the course of the last six months has come up

48:43

a bunch of times with donors who have had Joe Biden at their

48:45

house, they are all freaked

48:48

out by one thing that you guys will understand. He

48:51

shows up and it's a group of people, the friendliest people

48:53

you can imagine. They're already in big checks. He speaks for

48:55

about 15 minutes. On

48:58

prompter at

49:00

every little donor event. He never

49:02

ad libs, he never just off prompter.

49:04

This thing tonight, I mean, you're

49:08

sitting with a bunch of like, with 40

49:10

multimillionaires who are writing you giant checks, you

49:12

have 15 minutes of remarks to give over

49:14

dinner and you're on prompter. Again,

49:16

does that make him a bad president? No, does that make

49:18

him unfit to be president? No, does

49:20

it freak donors out that

49:22

he needs to be on prompter? It freaks them

49:24

out. And this thing tonight, you think about the

49:27

state of the union, man, he's

49:29

on prompter and you can even free him up

49:31

to ad lib when Republicans said things about him,

49:33

he could kind of banter with them or whatever.

49:35

This was an hour and a half off prompter.

49:38

That's what it looks like right now. And

49:40

he got better as the debate went on, but in

49:42

its worst moments, it was like, that is what people,

49:45

that's why they keep him on prompter. And that is

49:47

not an issue that's gonna go away to Dylan's point.

49:49

That's an issue that's going to, the

49:51

underlying issue is there. It's

49:54

what it is. It's the reality. It's

49:56

not a nice situation. byers

50:00

the greatest that's puck super friends. We're

50:02

gonna talk for half an hour. We've

50:04

talked for almost an hour, but

50:06

this was kind of a big night because it wasn't like a

50:08

debate. I was like, I don't think it was really gonna happen.

50:10

Probably it's gonna change very much. And then about 15 minutes in,

50:12

I was just going, oh. Same. Dear

50:15

fucking Lord, Jesus Christ.

50:18

Politics, it's surprising. You

50:20

guys are awesome. Peter Hamby, Dylan

50:23

Byers, I read your dare check. Thanks

50:26

for having us. Ciao. In

50:32

politic with John Heilman is a

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50:38

Dylan for coming on the show. And

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