0:03

Welcome to Let's Find Common

0:05

Ground from the Center for the

0:07

Political Future at the University

0:09

of Southern California's Dornsite College

0:12

of Letters, Arts, and Sciences.

0:14

I'm Bob Shrum, Director of

0:16

the Center. And I'm Republican

0:19

Mike Murphy, co-director of the

0:21

Center. Our podcast brings together

0:23

America's leading politicians, journalists, and

0:26

academics from across the political

0:28

spectrum for in-depth discussions where

0:30

we respect each other. and

0:33

we respect the truth. We

0:35

hope you enjoy these conversations.

0:37

I'm Bob Trump, Director of the

0:40

Center for the Political

0:42

Future here at USC Dornsite.

0:44

Welcome to everyone in our

0:46

audience, both virtually and to

0:49

those attending our live watch party

0:51

on campus. And let me

0:53

welcome to today's conversation,

0:56

an old friend of the Center.

0:58

Anthony Scaramucci was our guest

1:00

when he was a staunch defender

1:02

of President Trump during

1:04

the president's first term and he

1:07

was serving as the communications

1:09

director in the Trump White

1:11

House where he had served. He returned

1:13

to the center after he became a

1:15

Trump critic. In both incarnations,

1:17

he has been one of our

1:19

favorite people. He is always

1:22

candid, lively, and refreshingly in

1:24

sight. He's also the co-host of

1:26

a terrific podcast. the rest is

1:28

Politics US, and an entrepreneur

1:30

who leads Skybridge, a global

1:32

investment management firm. And in connection

1:34

with that, I'm going to have a

1:36

bonus question for him at the end of

1:39

our discussion, after which we'll take

1:41

questions from our audience as well.

1:43

Anthony, let me start with this.

1:45

Is the second Trump administration

1:47

different than you expected better or

1:50

worse? I would say not, first of

1:52

all, thank you Bob, for having

1:54

me and all of my different

1:56

iterations and incarnations and we've been

1:59

all on the Trump journey. And

2:01

since you're a political science professor,

2:03

I'll say this and let them

2:05

react to it, I think Trump

2:08

is the looming figure of our

2:10

time. He's eclipsed other political figures.

2:12

I would say in the last

2:14

quarter century, he is the guy

2:17

and he's changing the landscape of

2:19

American government for better or worse.

2:21

And whether we like him or

2:23

dislike him, we have to at

2:26

least acknowledge his significance. But what

2:28

I would say about him is

2:30

that Joe Biden accidentally empowered Donald

2:32

Trump. There was a shadow presidency

2:35

going on for four years that

2:37

was Trump's presidency, almost like a

2:39

shadow cabinet like they have in

2:41

the UK. And I gave Donald

2:44

Trump an opportunity to organize. And

2:46

that organization has led him to

2:48

have different people. He always has

2:50

a carousel of people because he

2:53

burns through people, but he's got

2:55

different people and more of these

2:57

people are political operatives and they're

2:59

more cunning than his first team.

3:02

And then the second thing that

3:04

happened, which is quite ironic, he

3:06

was indicted and he ended up

3:08

becoming a felon, but I think

3:11

the indictment changed the landscape of

3:13

that campaign and so he was

3:15

more detached from the campaign defending

3:17

himself in the criminal court system

3:20

in New York. And he let

3:22

people like Susie Wiles, who I

3:24

know for a long time, and

3:26

Chris Lasavita, run the campaign, organize

3:29

the campaign, and obviously they were

3:31

very successful. And of course, we

3:33

have to talk about the missteps

3:36

that the Democrats made, which led

3:38

to his success. But it's more

3:40

organized. And Susie, as an example,

3:42

his White House chief of staff,

3:45

Susie Wiles, he's had, she worked

3:47

for him in, you may remember

3:49

this Bob, in 2016, she ran

3:51

Florida. for Donald Trump. And so

3:54

she's worked for him. She was

3:56

sort of the head of his

3:58

office when he was in asylum,

4:00

if you will, or in exile,

4:03

and he's sort of in exile

4:05

in Marilago. And so she goes

4:07

back. six, seven, eight years. That's

4:09

very unusual. John Kelly didn't really

4:12

know Donald Trump. Mick Milvani didn't

4:14

really know Donald Trump. Wright's previous.

4:16

Didn't really know Donald Trump. Mark

4:18

Meadows. These are his former White

4:21

House chiefs of staff. None of

4:23

them really knew Donald Trump. And

4:25

so she's got working experience with

4:27

him. And so yes, it's more

4:30

organized. And then the last part

4:32

of this. is the people at

4:34

Project 2025 that want to alter

4:36

the American government, expand the executive

4:39

branch is powers, and effectively on

4:41

a relative basis liquidate and weaken

4:43

the judicial branch of the United

4:45

States and the legislative branch. They

4:48

put out something called Project 2025.

4:50

Trump disavowed it during the campaign.

4:52

pushing it. If you go down

4:54

his list over the 33 days,

4:57

it's one project, the 2025 initiative

4:59

after the next. And so yes,

5:01

way more organized, less dissent, less

5:03

organized dissent. The Democrats are in

5:06

disarray. He weakened and effectively took

5:08

out the former Republican Party. A

5:10

historian years from now will say

5:12

that Donald Trump actually was a

5:15

third party insurgent. He hijacked. the

5:17

party formerly known as the Republicans,

5:19

he decapitated it, and he installed

5:21

what I would refer to as

5:24

magga in that party. That is

5:26

not a party that I grew

5:28

up in, Bob. It's not a

5:31

party that I currently recognize. And

5:33

we can go down the list,

5:35

whether it's terrorists, our attitude towards

5:37

our European allies, the notion of

5:40

we're going to wall off America

5:42

literally and physically, from the rest

5:44

of the world will be repugnant

5:46

to somebody like Ronald Reagan. And

5:49

so we're here now with this

5:51

new party, the former Republicans, currently

5:53

known as the Republicans, but basically

5:55

MAGA. And so yeah, he's more

5:58

organized, he's more dangerous. And if

6:00

you saw the AI rendition of

6:02

what he would like to do

6:04

with the Gaza strip and him

6:07

calling it Trump Gaza, I would

6:09

suggest that people go to True

6:11

Social and take a look at

6:13

the video that he posted, you'll

6:16

see that he's not well. I

6:18

mean, and I think that's something

6:20

that we all have to be

6:22

honest about. You don't have to

6:25

be a psychiatrist to know someone

6:27

isn't well. If you watch an

6:29

American football game and somebody's bone

6:31

is coming out of the skin,

6:34

you don't have to be an

6:36

orthopedic surgeon to know that the

6:38

person has broken a leg. And

6:40

so he's just observationally not well.

6:43

And yet first grade literature comes

6:45

into play here, Bob, because we

6:47

all read in the first grade,

6:49

the emperor has no clothing, and

6:52

now we're watching that play out

6:54

in our political life with his

6:56

courtiers. You said something that concerns

6:58

me about the people around them.

7:01

Ted Kennedy once told me that

7:03

President Kennedy had said that you

7:05

always have to have three or

7:07

four people, if you're president, around

7:10

you, who can tell you when

7:12

you're being a dumb SOB. It

7:14

sounds to me like he doesn't

7:16

have anybody around them who's going

7:19

to say that's wrong. And I

7:21

think that might be perilous. Well,

7:23

listen, I mean, I... I've gone

7:26

through the roster, again I know

7:28

most of these people, they were

7:30

former republic, worked with them. He

7:32

doesn't. You know, there's nobody in

7:35

his airspace. I think that there

7:37

are intelligence profiles of him, personality

7:39

profiles of him, that have been

7:41

made by various intelligence agencies around

7:44

the world, and everyone has a

7:46

different formula in terms of how

7:48

they want to handle them. I

7:50

think McCrone, the president of France,

7:53

has taken the playbook that he's

7:55

a petulant child, and so scolding

7:57

him is just going to make

7:59

things worse, praising him, getting in

8:02

his airspace and trying to make

8:04

him feel better about himself, seems

8:06

to be the... the launch codes

8:08

that the French are using. Kier

8:11

Starmer is coming into town. I

8:13

think he's going to have a

8:15

difficult time dealing with Donald Trump,

8:17

knowing their two personalities. And yeah,

8:20

there's nobody inside the wheelhouse. Macron,

8:22

frankly, is the closest we've gotten

8:24

so far to somebody publicly saying

8:26

that the Ukraine did not start

8:29

that war. publicly saying things that

8:31

we all know is true. You

8:33

know, you can't get Hexeth or

8:35

Walsh to say that now. That's

8:38

his court. And they know that.

8:40

I mean, Rubio looks like he's

8:42

in a hostage crisis. I mean,

8:44

if you saw the body language

8:47

of Rubio on the couch in

8:49

the Oval Office, and I know

8:51

Marco a long time on a

8:53

former donor of his, it's almost

8:56

like his tongue comes out of

8:58

his mouth like a twisted pretzel

9:00

when he's trying to explain Trumpism.

9:02

which is totally diametrically opposed philosophically

9:05

to everything that Rubio has stood

9:07

for in the Republican Party. You

9:09

know what I mean? Yeah. You

9:11

recently retweeted or re-exed, I guess

9:14

I should say, the following Liz

9:16

Cheney post. Quote, Trump with his

9:18

devotion to Putin, abandonment of Ukraine,

9:21

and lies about history, is the

9:23

antithesis of everything Ronald Reagan stood

9:25

before. He's aligning America with the

9:27

enemies of freedom. In your view,

9:30

why is the president apparently pursuing

9:32

a Trump-friendly peace in Ukraine, and

9:34

what impact does this policy having

9:36

on our allies or our erstwhile

9:39

allies in NATO and elsewhere? Well,

9:41

I retreated that because I believe

9:43

that and she said it better

9:45

than I could say it, so

9:48

I retreated that. I think that...

9:50

He's made a decision that he

9:52

likes strong people. He has told

9:54

people that he wants the universality

9:57

of cheering, that a dictator gets,

9:59

he wants the lack of dissent,

10:01

he likes the lack of negative

10:03

public opinion. He wants that squelched.

10:06

You know he's brought lawsuits against

10:08

various media establishments. He's bullied Jeff

10:10

Basos into turning the Washington Post,

10:12

I guess, into a right leaning

10:15

publication at this point. And so

10:17

there's a combination of fear and

10:19

intimidation. and things like that. And

10:21

so these are things that Vladimir

10:24

Putin does the people, and these

10:26

are things that authoritarians do. Trump

10:28

in his private moments at this

10:30

point in his life, I think

10:33

he would like to have a

10:35

North American sphere of influence, which

10:37

would attach into South America. So

10:39

we'll call it a Western hemispheric

10:42

influence, but primarily North America. And

10:44

he would like Putin. to leave

10:46

him alone in that airspace and

10:48

he's more or less would tell

10:51

Putin we'll leave you alone. You

10:53

could do whatever you want in

10:55

Eurasia except the part of Eurasia

10:57

that includes China. We'll let China

11:00

have that. And so if you

11:02

see the way Trump thinks it's

11:04

three polls, sort of a tri-polar

11:07

world, perhaps maybe with Modi at

11:09

some point involved with it, but

11:11

right now it would be those

11:13

three. And so he wants to

11:16

break the... North American, North Atlantic,

11:18

alliances, and he's sort of signaling

11:20

to Putin that he's willing to

11:22

do that for him. and he

11:25

wants to cut a deal. Now,

11:27

I don't know what will be

11:29

included in that deal. The decimation

11:31

perhaps of the Iranian mullahs, obviously

11:34

that could be included in the

11:36

deal, a protectorate for Israel, could

11:38

be included in that deal, a

11:40

takeover of Greenland, a takeover of

11:43

Greenland, could be included in the

11:45

deal. I know this is a

11:47

very dramatic thing to say and

11:49

it seems unlikely now, but there's

11:52

a lot of things that have

11:54

happened. that are unlikely with Donald

11:56

Trump and he's much more sure-footed

11:58

in 2024. than he was in

12:01

2017, or 2025, I should say.

12:03

And you have to remember something.

12:05

Not taking him seriously, not taking

12:07

him seriously, has been a perilous

12:10

idea for Democrats, former Republicans, and

12:12

people in opposition. Like if they

12:14

were really taking him in seriously,

12:16

Professor, what they would do is

12:19

team up with each other. And

12:21

you and I both know the

12:23

death of the Whig Party, which

12:25

took place in the 1850s, you

12:28

got the Republicans that were created

12:30

in 1856, they peeled off some

12:32

Democrats that were abolitionists, they peeled

12:34

off wigs that were abolitionists, and

12:37

they weakened the Whig Party, and

12:39

effectively put the Whig Party out

12:41

to pasture, and obviously the first

12:43

Republican president. Abraham Lincoln rose to

12:46

power in 1861. They should do

12:48

that. If they were smart, they

12:50

would give up their grievances towards

12:52

each other and their ideological differences,

12:55

an AOC would team up with

12:57

a Chris Christie and a Liz

12:59

Cheney for that matter, and they

13:02

would reform a new party coalition

13:04

that would put the current wig

13:06

party, this current nativistic racially tinged

13:08

party out to pasture like the

13:11

wigs were put out to pasture

13:13

in the 1850s. But it would

13:15

require people to drop their egos

13:17

and hold their noses and get

13:20

on with each other the way

13:22

the way Churchill did in the

13:24

war. You know that was a

13:26

coalition government at Churchill formed and

13:29

the the Tories didn't agree with

13:31

the labor on everything but they

13:33

got together to make it happy.

13:35

You know there was a moment

13:38

when the king was deciding and

13:40

those days the king could decide

13:42

who was going to be prime

13:44

minister and there were large factions

13:47

of the conservative party that wanted

13:49

Halifax, Lord Halifax, and climate athlete,

13:51

the leader of the Labor Party

13:53

was called in by the king

13:56

and he said we will not

13:58

serve under Halifax, we will only

14:00

serve under Churchill. So I think

14:02

your point is a very interesting

14:05

one. Some of Trump's supporters I

14:07

think would say that what you're

14:09

outlining with maybe the possible exception

14:11

of Canada is not a bad

14:14

future for the United States, where

14:16

it reasserts its power, claims that

14:18

we live in a world that

14:20

can't live any longer, by the

14:23

rules of the post-World War II

14:25

international order, and so he is

14:27

trying to establish a kind of

14:29

American, if not dominance, at least

14:32

pre-dominance in a large part of

14:34

the world. What do you say

14:36

to that? I say that it's

14:38

tremendously misguided, as somebody that studied

14:41

history, and unfortunately for me, I'm

14:43

accidentally an aspirant in the politics

14:45

of in a life... long entrepreneur

14:47

and I think I told this

14:50

story to some of your classes

14:52

over the years I got accidentally

14:54

involved with politics because I didn't

14:57

have a network. And I knew

14:59

if I went to these political

15:01

fundraisers, I could meet wealthy and

15:03

successful people and develop relationships and

15:06

bring them into Goldman Sachs in

15:08

the early part of my career

15:10

as clients. And so I wrote

15:12

my first check to Rudy Giuliani

15:15

in 1993. Young Republicans for Giuliani,

15:17

and that started my political fundraising,

15:19

which ultimately led to me having

15:21

that ill-fated stay in the White

15:24

House where I was fired after

15:26

11 days. But I would say

15:28

to you that to understand our

15:30

history. to read the writings of

15:33

Jefferson or Abraham Lincoln, whatever the

15:35

flaws were, and these men, or

15:37

what Reagan would say, or your

15:39

colleague Ted Kennedy, or his brother

15:42

Jack Kennedy, would say that America

15:44

represents something to the rest of

15:46

the world. America is this huge

15:48

experiment. It's a multi-ethnic, multi-racial idea.

15:51

It's not a idea or a

15:53

country that tied to a bloodline

15:55

or to a border. It was

15:57

a created country and it got

16:00

created during the Enlightenment and the

16:02

idea behind it was that we

16:04

would have a decentralized form of

16:06

government and protect ourselves from autocracy

16:09

and tyranny. And I would just

16:11

suggest to the people listening right

16:13

now, we have 5.7 billion people

16:15

around the world that are living

16:18

under some type of authoritarian structure,

16:20

some type of autocracy. And the

16:22

great leaders in the West, Franklin

16:24

Roosevelt, Ronald Reagan, Jack Kennedy, Teddy

16:27

Kennedy picked the people, understood that

16:29

American needed to stand shoulder to

16:31

shoulder and alongside of the free

16:33

people around the world to protect

16:36

those people and to protect the

16:38

light of that freedom. And so

16:40

I would say to you that

16:42

that strategy would be a disaster,

16:45

particularly at this time in our

16:47

nation's history. That strategy would require

16:49

a suppression of the free press,

16:52

a disorganization, disambulation of the press.

16:54

It would cause the fear factor,

16:56

the intimidation factor. These are things

16:58

that are unnatural to Americans. And

17:01

when you take away the free

17:03

press, you actually also lose your

17:05

economic innovation because you're stymying young

17:07

people. You know, I always tell

17:10

people the free press is there

17:12

to protect us from tyranny. But

17:14

it's also there to tell our

17:16

second graders that they can speak

17:19

and think freely. They go on

17:21

and create Facebook or they create

17:23

Google or they make an Apple

17:25

iPhone. And all the things that

17:28

we're talking about, Trump would be

17:30

moving us much more towards a

17:32

Russian way of being governed as

17:34

opposed to the way America's been

17:37

governed. And let me leave you

17:39

with this thought before you ask

17:41

another question. This is a rhetorical

17:43

thought. But let's say you have

17:46

a blue collar family. Everyone is

17:48

poor in the family. but because

17:50

of America one person rises in

17:52

the family and becomes wealthy and

17:55

a result of which they take

17:57

care people. They pay some college

17:59

tuitions. They buy a house for

18:01

somebody or they buy a few

18:04

cars or they look after people

18:06

if they get hurt in a

18:08

labor accident. That's one family. And

18:10

then the second family, you have the

18:13

same situation. One person rises to

18:15

a high level of riches and

18:17

they have a big mansion and

18:19

a beautiful swimming pool and they

18:21

want to charge their family members

18:23

to come to their swimming pool.

18:25

So I say to you and

18:27

the people listening, which family would

18:29

be doing better? Family number

18:31

one or family number two where

18:33

the person is going to charge

18:35

you to enter the swimming pool.

18:37

And I think you get the point.

18:40

We're too big to not

18:42

care about others. We're 4%

18:44

of the world's population, 26%

18:46

of the world's GDP. And

18:48

we primarily, we've made mistakes,

18:50

Vietnam, Iraq. We can list

18:52

all of our mistakes, segregation.

18:54

But we have primarily been

18:56

a force for good over

18:58

the last 250 years. And

19:00

I would reject wholeheartedly what

19:02

Trump is trying to do

19:04

with Putin and with possibly

19:06

President Xi. Yeah, I want

19:08

to turn to domestic policy

19:10

because you just touched on it in

19:12

an important way. But I have

19:14

to say, I think that when you

19:16

describe family one, you're

19:19

describing yours. And to a

19:21

lesser extent, you're describing mine.

19:23

Because many many families, you know,

19:25

I'm not pat on my own. Yeah,

19:28

we grew up in an America where

19:30

there was opportunity and I think one

19:32

of the things that has helped

19:34

Donald Trump is this sense

19:36

of hopelessness in whole squaws

19:38

of the country. I mean,

19:40

I was born in Southwestern

19:42

Pennsylvania. My parents moved to

19:44

California when I was young. Thank

19:47

heaven. And that area

19:49

which my grandfather actually

19:51

represented. in the Pennsylvania

19:53

legislature and he was

19:55

a New Deal Democrat is now

19:57

solidly Trump. So there is some

20:00

wrong in the country in the sense

20:02

that we left a lot of people

20:04

behind and I think that's become an

20:06

important base for what Trump

20:08

has been able to do. Well if

20:10

you don't mind because I've done a lot

20:13

of work on this I'll just share with

20:15

you my theory and get you to react

20:17

to it. I think that there was

20:19

a seismic change in the public

20:21

servants at the federal level after

20:23

Ross Perot entered American politics. You

20:26

know, what the hell is he

20:28

have to do with it? I'll

20:30

tell you what he did. He

20:32

scared the daylights out of the

20:34

Republicans and the Democrats. And for

20:36

the young people listening, Rossboro ran

20:38

in 1992, 33 years ago. He

20:41

got 19.9% of the vote. Bill

20:43

Clinton became the president with 43%

20:45

of the vote. And I don't

20:47

know, maybe it was an even

20:49

split where he took the votes

20:51

from Democrats and Republicans where they

20:54

got scared. And if you look

20:56

at the law changes... After the

20:58

1992 election to suppress third

21:00

party movements, they went up

21:02

exponentially. Lots of more signatures,

21:04

a lot more code and

21:06

process to start a third

21:08

party. So that protected the

21:10

duopoly. When you have a

21:12

protected duopoly, you have some

21:14

indifference to your consumers. Second

21:17

thing that happened is we

21:19

went very hard with the

21:21

gerrymandering and I submit to

21:23

everybody here listening rhetorically, are

21:25

we in a real democracy

21:27

when the politicians are picking the

21:29

voters? I thought in the democracy the

21:31

voters are supposed to pick the politicians,

21:33

but in our democracy they create these

21:36

jigsaw puzzles of districts. They used to

21:38

look like geometric shapes that you and

21:40

I could recognize from ninth grade geometry,

21:43

but they don't anymore. And so

21:45

we've rigged the system. We've solidified

21:47

the duopoly. Let me just

21:49

provide more evidence. You've got

21:51

the House members. There's a

21:53

14% approval rating. They're down

21:55

by Kim El-Jong in terms of

21:58

the North Korean dictator. in terms

22:00

of their approval rating, okay, but yet

22:02

95% of them are getting reelected.

22:04

So it's like having a chef

22:07

at a restaurant in LA. He

22:09

has one star yelp ratings, but

22:11

he never gets fired. And so

22:13

what's happened here, they've grown indifferent.

22:15

That that district that you were

22:18

talking about, if it was a competitive

22:20

district of Democrats and Republicans,

22:22

people would have returned to the

22:24

district and talk to people and

22:27

and try to figure out what

22:29

it is they need. And so

22:31

the Democrats left those people behind,

22:33

the Republicans left those people behind.

22:35

They both in many ways championed

22:38

those people, Bob, and they've now

22:40

left them behind. You then had

22:42

Citizens United come into play in January

22:44

of 2010. And so I'll just take

22:47

a look at the legislative agenda, sir,

22:49

over the last 15 years. It's skewed

22:51

to big business, big pharma, the protection

22:54

of monopolies, no breakups of

22:56

the mag seven. and it's

22:58

created a separate but equal

23:00

democracy. Okay? And there's haves now

23:02

in the society and there's habnhasa,

23:05

a very stark contrast. And those

23:07

people you're talking about, they voted

23:09

for Jack Kennedy or their grandparents

23:12

voted for Franklin Roosevelt. They don't

23:14

vote for these people now anymore.

23:16

They don't know who to vote

23:18

for. In comes Donald Trump. Now,

23:21

adding to everything I just said

23:23

is the global financial crisis where

23:25

the fat cats were paid out

23:27

by TARP, and even Bush has

23:29

admitted at this point, George W.

23:31

Bush, that he should have hived

23:33

off some money for lower and

23:35

middle-income people in the bailout.

23:37

He didn't do that. All the

23:40

bankers kept their jobs. Nobody went

23:42

to jail. All the low-income people

23:44

got their houses taken away. And

23:47

it started the... Occupy Wall Street

23:49

movement, that morphed into the Tea

23:51

Party movement, and then you had

23:53

sort of a Frankenstein concoction of

23:56

those two movements creating MAGA. And

23:58

so all of this has happened. on our

24:00

watch over the last 15 years.

24:02

And if I could be very,

24:04

very honest with you, there's been

24:07

a dereliction of duty by our

24:09

public servants, not seeing this

24:11

and not filling that vacuum.

24:13

And your pal Joe Biden,

24:16

frankly, was trying to do that

24:18

with legislation like the inflation

24:20

reduction act. He was trying

24:22

to do that with the

24:24

CHIPS Act. He had that

24:27

reshoring, the 250 billion dollars

24:29

of... manufacturing. And so he

24:31

actually had some pillars of

24:34

legislative and executive policy

24:36

that were working for those

24:38

people. But unfortunately, the president

24:40

was too frail. And let's

24:43

just be honest with everybody,

24:45

he was cognitively impaired in

24:47

the middle to late part

24:49

of that term. And he

24:51

was not able to artfully

24:53

articulate the value that he was

24:55

adding from the legislative process. And

24:58

so the inflation was actually coming

25:00

down a little. Things were getting

25:02

better. Real wages were up during

25:05

the Biden administration. There was a

25:07

compelling case to be made, but

25:10

you didn't have an advocate. And

25:12

of course, he bombed that debate,

25:14

sir. And they swapped him out.

25:17

And they didn't give the vice president a

25:19

long time to build our network, a long

25:21

time to get verbally trained for this fight,

25:23

because this is a real fight. And even

25:26

with all that, sir, they only lost by

25:28

one and a half percent of the votes.

25:30

So I don't understand why the Democrats

25:32

are in this much disarray. Trump's telling

25:35

you that he won by a landslide.

25:37

He's very good at confabulation.

25:39

He tells so many lies. You can't

25:41

even keep track of what the truth

25:44

is anymore because he's he's moving. He's

25:46

literally playing a shell game with you

25:48

every day verbally. And the Democrats are

25:51

sitting there. He didn't win by a

25:53

landslide. He won narrowly. He's got a

25:55

fractious situation going on in the house

25:58

right now. He's got people. returning

26:00

to their districts and going

26:02

to town hall meetings and they're

26:05

getting lit up by their

26:07

constituents. And the Democrats with

26:09

the right narrative and the right

26:11

person could seize the advantage on

26:13

him and put Trumpism out to

26:15

pasture. But, you know, they've got to move.

26:18

You know, he's not clear to me

26:20

that he's leaving. Okay, so I think it's

26:22

very important that people know

26:24

that. Okay, it's not clear that

26:26

he's leaving. And if you say,

26:29

well, it is clear, no, it

26:31

isn't, because you don't understand what

26:33

happened on January 6th of 2021,

26:35

if it's clear to people that

26:38

he's leaving. You see, there's

26:40

a certain complacency in America,

26:42

because we've done things a certain

26:45

way nobly for so long. This

26:47

is not some of the things

26:49

nobly about our traditions or our

26:51

customs. and just think about what

26:53

he perpetrated on the 6th of

26:56

January 2021. When you're thinking about,

26:58

well, he's leaving on January 20th,

27:00

20th, 20th, 29th. Is he? Now, maybe

27:02

he is, but look at what happened. You

27:05

know, I'm a securities analyst. I

27:07

get paid to analyze permutations of

27:09

potential outcomes that happen. There are

27:11

certain outcomes that are unthinkable, that

27:14

would make people that are listening to

27:16

me scoff at those outcomes. So I

27:18

would just submit to you. They're not

27:20

zero percentage. Okay, he's circulated out

27:23

the military, he circulated

27:25

out people that are loyal to

27:28

the Constitution, he's going through

27:30

people and personnel, not with

27:32

the loyalty to the Constitution,

27:34

but a loyalty to him, whether

27:37

it's our FBI director, the

27:39

director, the Secretary of Defense,

27:42

the new chairman of the joint chiefs of staff.

27:44

And so, you know, we can't sit there

27:46

and look at him and say, okay, yeah,

27:48

we'll hold our nose and we'll get through

27:50

this with him. Yeah, well, I hope you're

27:52

wrong about this, but I know you're right

27:54

about a couple of things you just said.

27:56

I want to be wrong. You know, you

27:58

and I made a bet in... 2016. I

28:00

told you he was going to win. You

28:02

told me he was going to lose. I,

28:05

in hindsight, Bob, I wanted you to be

28:07

right about that. Better off. The world would

28:09

have been better off. I'd be lost. I

28:11

want to be wrong about what I'm saying.

28:14

But here's the thing. By not saying it

28:16

and not putting it into the public

28:18

commentary, it increases the likelihood

28:20

that it could happen. You know,

28:23

there's reflexivity in the world. We

28:25

have to say it. 1% chance, a

28:27

5% chance, I don't know what

28:29

the chances are, but we have

28:31

to say it and get people

28:33

like Adam Schiff and others to

28:35

think about it and then think

28:37

about what they would do to

28:39

protect the country, the traditions, the

28:41

norms, and the constitution of the country.

28:43

But what I was going to say

28:45

is you were really right about a

28:47

couple of things there that I think

28:50

are important. One is that

28:52

Richard Newstaff the Harvard

28:54

professor, presidential power, and

28:57

presidential power, right, wrote that the

28:59

greatest power of a president is

29:01

the power to persuade. And I

29:03

think what happened to Joe Biden

29:06

was that while he was passing all

29:08

these bills, he no longer could

29:10

persuasively communicate to people what

29:12

they meant. Yes. Pete Buddha judge

29:15

might do it, but he didn't

29:17

have the bully pulper. Yes. That's

29:20

correct. You took me back 65 years

29:22

because when JFK was running for

29:24

president and thought he was going

29:26

to lose in West Virginia because

29:29

he was Catholic, he was back

29:31

in Washington DC, didn't want

29:33

to be in West Virginia for the

29:35

defeat, went to the movies, there were

29:37

no cell phones. So no one could call

29:39

him and say by the way you won by

29:42

a lot. But that day he told

29:44

Ted Sorenson, one of his closest

29:46

aides. I have never seen anything

29:48

like I've seen in West Virginia.

29:51

The poverty, the hollows, the

29:53

terrible conditions in which

29:55

people live, I've been

29:57

down in the minds, and if

30:00

somehow I get to be president despite

30:02

what I think is going to happen

30:04

there. I'm going to help those people.

30:06

And the first thing he did as

30:08

president was proposed the Area

30:11

Redevelopment Act, which put lots

30:13

of money into Appalachia. And he talked

30:15

about it. He went back to

30:17

West Virginia. And West Virginia

30:20

for all the way from then

30:22

until 2000, with the exception of

30:24

Ronald Reagan, a solidly democratic state.

30:27

I mean, people thought he cared. and

30:29

somehow or other Democrats

30:31

lost the capacity or the

30:33

willingness to communicate with

30:35

people how much they care about

30:37

them. Which is the single most

30:39

crucial question you can find

30:42

out a poll. Who cares about

30:44

people like you? But I would

30:46

say that it was reinforced by

30:48

these mechanisms talking about the tighter

30:51

duopoly, the gerrymandering.

30:53

And they just decided, hey, we

30:55

don't need to be as

30:57

focused on this anymore. Let's

30:59

focus on where the money

31:01

is. We're getting lit up

31:03

with unlimited amounts of campaign

31:05

financing from fat cats and

31:07

big business. And let's do

31:09

their bidding legislatively. And again,

31:11

I would implore your students

31:13

to take a look at

31:15

the legislative agenda from 1965.

31:17

back in the Civil Rights

31:19

Act, the Kennedy legislative agenda,

31:21

go look through presidential legislative

31:23

agendas, get to 2010,

31:26

and then go look at

31:28

the legislative agenda. And what

31:30

you'll find, it's heavily skewed

31:32

last 15 years towards big

31:34

pharma, big business, big tech,

31:36

big oligarchy, big, big, and

31:38

I think the not to

31:40

press constitutional law into this

31:42

conversation, but I think the

31:45

Citizens United case is the

31:47

Plessy versus Ferguson for the

31:49

democracy. And so just to

31:51

remind people in the Plessy

31:53

case, the Supreme Court said

31:55

that blacks and whites, you can

31:57

have separate but equal facilities. And

32:00

that damned blacks to eight decades

32:02

of harsh segregation in the

32:04

South. It wasn't until Brown

32:06

versus Board of Education repealed

32:08

effectively Plessy that we started

32:10

to see some more equity

32:13

and more fairness. And I

32:15

submit to you tonight that

32:17

the Citizens United case is

32:19

the Plessy versus Ferguson of

32:21

the democracy. That case has

32:23

created a separate but quote

32:25

unquote equal democracy. It's

32:27

fairer for Elon Musk. It's also

32:30

fair for Bill Gates. Pick the plutocrats

32:32

on either side, you know, because I

32:34

don't want to be hypocritical. There

32:36

are billionaires leaning on the left

32:38

and there are billionaires leaning on

32:41

the right and they're getting favors

32:43

done as a result of their

32:45

riches. And the little guy who

32:48

represents a vote but doesn't represent

32:50

billions of dollars has been stiff

32:52

by these politicians and they feel

32:54

it. They feel that, and Donald Trump,

32:57

again, liking him or disliking him,

32:59

has resonated with those people. Now,

33:01

the great irony is he's done

33:03

nothing for them. The great irony

33:05

is he's favored tax cuts for

33:07

the rich. The great irony is

33:09

he's further hollowed out the mechanisms

33:12

and the platforms of safety that

33:14

the American government has provided

33:16

and things like Medicaid, Medicare,

33:19

etc. He's hurting those things.

33:21

And, you know, we can talk about this,

33:23

but I'm for... equal opportunity in our country.

33:25

I didn't pick my birth, I didn't pick

33:28

my location of the birth, I didn't pick

33:30

my family. It's a rich enough country

33:32

where we should have a platform of

33:34

opportunity for people where we get people

33:36

to the starting gate with a base

33:39

level of health care, base level of

33:41

education. I'm not for equal outcomes. I

33:43

have no problem having Elon Musk's

33:45

and Jeff Basis in the world.

33:47

I'm not a socialist. I am

33:49

a capitalist. I want these people

33:51

to earn excessive economic rent for

33:53

their hard work and their risk-taking

33:55

and their job creation. But we've

33:57

got to help people that work.

34:00

born, we have to help

34:02

the West Virginians metaphorically. The

34:04

West Virginians that you're describing

34:06

in the 1960s, we have

34:08

to help those people metaphorically

34:10

here in America today. And

34:12

the irony is those people are

34:14

voting for Trump and Biden wasn't

34:16

competent enough verbally at the time.

34:19

You know, a 65-year-old Joe Biden

34:21

would have been, but a 79-year-old

34:23

Joe Biden wasn't. and he wasn't

34:25

able to articulate what he was

34:28

doing and the facility of what

34:30

he was doing and why it was

34:32

beneficial to them and he lost

34:34

the plot and it's a shame

34:37

because had there been a proper

34:39

intergenerational transfer in the American Democratic

34:42

Party had that been a proper

34:44

transfer had he dropped out in

34:46

September of 23 opened up the

34:49

primary process and I'll say two more

34:51

things provocative before he asked another

34:53

question. How the hell do you

34:56

let Elon Musk and Bobby Kennedy

34:58

go from the party? And whether

35:00

you like those people or you dislike

35:03

them, you know, you keep your

35:05

enemies closer than your friends, don't

35:07

you Bob? It's politics. How do

35:09

you, how do you let Elon

35:11

Musk go? Because the UAW president

35:13

tells you not to invite him to

35:15

the EV summit? How do you do

35:18

that? You know, you got to

35:20

know that he's got a $44

35:22

billion dollar bullhorn. He's a sensitive,

35:24

self-admitted, How do you let him go? And

35:26

he single-handedly helped Trump

35:28

win Pennsylvania. The strategies he

35:30

designed, the money he deployed,

35:32

and Bobby Kennedy helped Trump.

35:35

These were extra drops in

35:37

the bucket that helped Donald

35:39

Trump, and the Kennedy named

35:41

lifelong representation of the

35:43

Democratic Party, they could have figured out a

35:45

way to keep him in the party, and

35:48

they didn't. Now they don't like him and

35:50

a guy says some crazy and kooky things

35:52

and things like that I know. I know

35:54

Bobby for 30 years, I like Bobby, but

35:57

I'm just saying they they dropped the ball

35:59

on those. to, in my opinion, among

36:01

other things that they did. And

36:03

so the rise of Donald Trump

36:05

is concomitant with the

36:07

misfiring of the Democratic Party.

36:09

How does Barack Obama tell

36:11

Joe Biden, you can't run

36:14

in 2016? How is the

36:16

Democratic Party the full robust

36:18

champions of the democracy when

36:20

they're curbing their primaries, and

36:22

then Biden drops out, and

36:24

then there's no democratic process

36:26

to replace him? There's a

36:29

hand-selected process. And again, by the way,

36:31

I get that, I get the rationale

36:33

for it, but you're helping Donald Trump

36:35

with that. Now, he's way worse than

36:38

them, but you are helping and

36:40

providing space for him. When

36:42

you rapidly pardon everybody in

36:44

your family and conditionally pardon

36:46

people for past crimes going

36:48

back decades, you know, you

36:50

are creating the appearance of

36:52

some unfairness and some arbitrary capriciousness

36:54

in the system. And of course,

36:56

somebody like Trump that doesn't have any

36:58

morals at all will blow a bigger

37:01

hole in the system and use

37:03

what you're doing as fodder to enable

37:05

him to do that. So we got

37:07

to get, we got to restate what

37:10

we're doing and we got to recoless

37:12

an oppositional party to Donald Trump.

37:14

They're way more organized, sir, and

37:16

they're way more dangerous. Right. You know,

37:19

I would, and I mean if respectfully

37:21

disagree with you about Bobby Kennedy, who

37:23

I think is utterly unqualified on qualified.

37:26

for the job he's been appointed to and

37:28

that kid who died from measles in Texas

37:30

today because he was unvaccinated I

37:32

think is a real warning signal to us but

37:34

I'd like to to ask you about but let's

37:37

agree let's agree on that for a second sir

37:39

but why not figure out a way to keep

37:41

him in your party? You didn't have

37:43

to make him the HSS cabinet secretary.

37:45

He was getting a lot of pressure

37:47

from his family to stay in the

37:49

party. He had reached out several times

37:52

to the Harris campaign looking for some

37:54

type. They didn't have to promise him

37:56

anything because we both know that's illegal,

37:58

but they could have washed his back.

38:00

little bit. My point is don't

38:02

underestimate, you may you may

38:04

dislike him and I accept

38:06

he's incompetent on the vaccines

38:08

and so on and so forth, but he

38:10

did have, and again, forgive me, you

38:12

know, he did have bro power with a

38:15

lot of voters and and and he

38:17

took voters from the Democrats that

38:19

didn't need to be taken from.

38:22

Yeah, I don't want to be

38:24

misunderstood. This is not personal.

38:26

I'm not commenting about whether

38:28

or not He should be in the

38:30

job he's in, but I want to

38:32

move on to a couple of substantive

38:34

issues before asking you my

38:36

bonus question. Talk about Trump's

38:39

tariff policy and its likely

38:41

impact. Is it just a negotiating

38:43

ploy or is he actually going

38:45

to do this? And then talk

38:48

about his immigration policy, mass

38:50

deportation, and the potential

38:52

impact of that on the economy.

38:54

So let's talk about the

38:56

tariffs first, I'm talking about

38:58

the deportation, but the tariffs

39:00

are the great irony of

39:02

Donald Trump. So there's semblance,

39:04

there's notional things that he's saying

39:07

that have semblance of truth and

39:09

veracity. So if you're saying that

39:11

you're worried that the waterways in

39:13

the Arctic Ocean are warming and

39:15

there are naval vessels from Russia,

39:18

naval vessels from China up in

39:20

those waterways, and you want to

39:22

protect North America, Canada, and the

39:24

United States, and you want to

39:27

protect the mining output potentially

39:29

of Greenland, you know, there are things

39:31

that he's saying that you could get

39:33

it done diplomatically and you could get

39:35

it done through our alliances. You don't

39:37

have to take Greenland. That's where he

39:40

takes a bridge too far, okay? There

39:42

are things that he's saying about Panama,

39:44

that are true. You don't want the

39:46

Hong Kong. port authority to take over

39:48

the ports in Panama. It's a potential

39:50

national security risk for the United States.

39:53

And so, but you don't have to

39:55

take the Panama Canal. And so with the

39:57

tariffs, some of the things he's saying are true.

39:59

I don't want to bore people

40:02

with a 65-year or 80-year

40:04

rendition of our trade policy,

40:06

but Robert Lighthouse wrote a

40:08

great book called No Trade

40:10

is Free. And basically just

40:12

explained, when we started GAT,

40:14

the US had 2% of

40:16

the world's population, 65% of

40:18

the world's output, and so

40:20

we accepted untethered. goods

40:23

and services flowing into the country in

40:25

the post-World War. I mean we didn't

40:27

allow for tariffs. We let all these

40:29

countries send their stuff in. We didn't

40:32

tariff anybody. We then accepted on their

40:34

side tariffs because we were trying to

40:36

protect their markets and we were trying

40:39

to raise living standards in those

40:41

countries and the wisdom of these

40:43

neo-Victorians that ran the post-World War

40:45

II government, Republicans and Democrats, recognized

40:47

that we had to do that.

40:49

That was sort of the anti-versi.

40:51

Versailles Treaty approach to the end

40:53

of the Second World War. And

40:55

then we followed it up with

40:57

the Marshall Plan and other things.

40:59

We built the architecture of peace

41:01

with the different acronyms of the

41:03

post-World War II organizations. But we

41:05

left certain things unchecked. One of

41:07

them was when we turned Gata

41:10

into the World Trade Organization, we allowed

41:12

the Chinese in, which I agreed with,

41:14

but we never checked the Chinese at

41:16

the door. And so we allowed them

41:18

in as an emerging market. when they

41:20

became a competitive market to the

41:22

United States, we never adjusted their

41:24

profile in the WTO. So Trump

41:26

is right about that. You have

41:28

to accept that, and even the

41:31

Democrats now have agreed to that.

41:33

There is a bipartisan commitment to

41:35

checking the Chinese. But here's the

41:37

problem with what Trump is

41:39

saying today. Trump wants reciprocal

41:41

tariffs around the world. So Trump

41:43

is saying that the way we did

41:45

things 80 years ago, we can't do

41:47

now, and if you've got to tear

41:49

us up against us, we're going to

41:51

put the same tariffs up against your

41:53

goods and services. There are

41:56

too many fragile free countries.

41:58

Economics drives freedom, Bob. You

42:00

know this and I know this.

42:02

If you have a robust economy,

42:05

you can set up the platform

42:07

of decentralized freedom. If you

42:09

have people starving, they have a

42:12

tendency to go towards strong people.

42:14

We were just lucky that we

42:16

had Franklin Roosevelt in the 1930s

42:19

and not Benito Mussolini or Adolf

42:21

Hitler. And so you have to

42:24

protect these fragile economies that are

42:26

democratic and free. by allowing

42:28

them to have an asymmetrical relationship

42:30

with the United States. And the

42:33

MAG of people will argue that

42:35

I'm wrong about that, but I'm

42:38

telling you, as I use that

42:40

example about families, I am right

42:42

about that holistically if you want

42:45

to project freedom and you

42:47

want to push back totalitarianism in

42:49

the world. And so he's right

42:52

about certain things, and I'll tell

42:54

you where I think he's right,

42:56

and he's wrong specifically about that.

42:59

But if the Chinese are teaming

43:01

up, the government is teaming up

43:04

with their companies, and they're

43:06

creating predatory pricing, and they're dropping

43:08

prices way low, and our non-subsidized

43:10

private companies can't compete with that

43:13

pricing, then the Trump administration, the

43:15

Biden administration, you pick the administration,

43:18

they have to put tariffs on

43:20

those goods to equalize it and

43:22

make it fair for the

43:24

American company. So surgical tariffs. is

43:27

something that we should be deploying,

43:29

and surgical tariffs are successful. But

43:32

this hammer approach, 25% tariffs indiscriminately,

43:34

reciprocal tariffs around the world, very,

43:36

very dangerous. It will put the

43:39

United States in a position 10

43:41

or so years from now

43:43

that we don't want to be

43:46

in. Some of these economies will

43:48

fall. They'll fall into totalitarian regimes.

43:50

Other economies will realign. I

43:53

know Trump wants Europe to, I

43:55

guess, realign or seek its own

43:57

independence. I don't want that. You

43:59

don't want that. I'm telling you,

44:02

this is a billion person combined

44:04

market. We don't want that. And

44:06

so, and so, no one's, no

44:08

one's giving the counter narrative and

44:10

explaining to the American people why

44:12

they don't want that, that the

44:14

America first situation, which means Europe

44:17

last, may put America, may exacerbate

44:19

America's decline. And let me just

44:21

say this one last thing about

44:23

this, then we can go to

44:25

deportation. Ronald Reagan 1982, 4% of

44:27

the world's population, 26% of the

44:30

world's output. 43 years later, Bob,

44:32

4% of the world's population, 46%

44:34

of the world's output, 43 years

44:36

later. So that's providing you evidence

44:38

that these policies, these very well

44:40

thought out grounded and bipartisan committed

44:43

policies have worked for the United

44:45

States. Now, we have a deficit

44:47

problem that we have to resolve

44:49

and it is resolveable. We have

44:51

issues that we have to resolve,

44:53

but the way we're doing this

44:55

right now is going to damage

44:58

our relationships around the world. The

45:00

deportation, if you want, I can

45:02

spend some time on that as

45:04

well, because I think that that

45:06

is another classic mistake that we're

45:08

making. We're not xenophobic by nature,

45:11

and yet we have now somebody

45:13

running the country that's a nationalist.

45:15

He's a xenophobia. and he's an

45:17

isolationist, and he wants to wall

45:19

off the country from the rest

45:21

of the world, literally and physically.

45:23

And I can just tell you

45:26

that that doesn't work. Now, could

45:28

we have more controls at the

45:30

border? Certainly, you need controls at

45:32

the border because we have a

45:34

welfare state. But one of the

45:36

things that you could do is

45:39

you could create more economic development

45:41

in Central America and in the

45:43

Yucatan Peninsula. And you know this.

45:45

We had a good neighbor policy

45:47

under Franklin Roosevelt. He called it

45:49

a good neighbor policy. He created

45:52

space for economic development in that

45:54

region. When that aid got cut,

45:56

it started the flood of immigrants

45:58

to the border and people seeking

46:00

asylum. But I would tell you

46:02

it's a pound of prevention by

46:04

pushing out that economic development versus

46:07

20 pounds of cure trying to

46:09

deal with these people at the

46:11

border. So that's number one. And

46:13

then number two, you know this

46:15

in California. I know this in

46:17

New York. These people are doing

46:20

jobs in the country. that nobody

46:22

else wants to do. And they've

46:24

added to our GDP, they've added

46:26

to our tax base, they've added

46:28

to our Social Security trust, and

46:30

it's a total lie that they

46:33

vote Democrat. Total lie. A lot

46:35

of them are in conservative Roman

46:37

Catholic families and go take a

46:39

look at what happens when they

46:41

assimilate. They look like every other

46:43

American. Some of them are right

46:45

leaning and some of them are

46:48

left leaning. And some of them

46:50

are left leaning. They're flooding. The

46:52

border to create a blue-ified America

46:54

is a bunch of nonsense. It

46:56

doesn't work like that. So, you

46:58

know, Rubio knows this. He was

47:01

part of the group of seven

47:03

or the group of eight that

47:05

tried to come up with a

47:07

immigration solution, right? He knows this,

47:09

but now they're sitting there with

47:11

Donald Trump. And by the way,

47:14

and I think you know this,

47:16

we lost in 2012, the Republicans

47:18

did, the Republican National Committee put

47:20

out a white paper. and said

47:22

that we needed to come up

47:24

with a more pro-immigration strategy and

47:26

that we needed to find healing

47:29

in America and we went from

47:31

that sentiment to Donald J. Trump

47:33

who's way over here and I'm

47:35

telling you it sounds good on

47:37

paper a lot of Americans want

47:39

deportation a lot of Americans want

47:42

this sort of stuff but I'm

47:44

telling you they actually really don't

47:46

want it. Because when they come

47:48

into their neighborhood and ice is

47:50

showing up in their neighborhood people

47:52

are unnerved by it We

48:00

hear about violence all the time in the

48:02

news, yet we rarely hear stories

48:04

about peace. There are so

48:07

many people who are working

48:09

hard to promote solutions to

48:11

violence, toxic polarization and authoritarianism,

48:13

often at great personal risk. We

48:15

never hear about these stories, but

48:17

at what cost. On making peace visible,

48:19

we speak with journalists, storytellers, and

48:22

peace builders who are on the

48:24

front lines of both peace and

48:26

conflict. You can find making

48:28

peace visible wherever you

48:30

listen to podcasts. You know

48:32

there are a couple of things

48:35

I'm going to get to that

48:37

I think students care about

48:39

and they're asking about,

48:41

but first I want to

48:43

do our bonus question. You

48:45

are and have been anyone

48:47

who follows you knows this, a

48:49

staunch advocate of cryptocurrency.

48:51

A lot of folks don't

48:53

understand how cryptocurrencies were and

48:55

a lot of critics contend there

48:58

are perilous investments ultimately likely to

49:00

collapse. From your perspective can you

49:02

educate us on this? I know

49:04

it's not politics but I thought

49:06

it would be an interesting question.

49:08

Yeah, say the question again is

49:10

I want to think of giving

49:12

you a little bit more time

49:14

to think about it. Say one

49:16

more talk about cryptocurrencies. Explain to

49:18

people what they are and are

49:20

they in fact a perilous dangerous

49:22

investment. Okay, well, for your demography

49:24

and for my demography, they're in

49:26

perilous, dangerous investment. None of our

49:28

people in our world really

49:30

understand it. But for my

49:32

children and for their generation,

49:34

I think they've got their

49:37

arms around understanding what a

49:39

digital asset could be and

49:41

that there would be value in

49:43

a digital asset. And so I

49:45

had my awakening to Bitcoin. And

49:47

again, I am more Bitcoin specific.

49:50

I do own some other coins,

49:52

but I'm not in, you know,

49:54

there's 20,000 coins. Many of these

49:56

points Bob are worthless. I think

49:58

what ends up happening is. When

50:00

Trump puts out a meme coin, which is

50:02

a disaster in so many different

50:04

ways and unethical, and he takes

50:06

$500 million out of it, and

50:09

then he rug holes, everybody that

50:11

bought it, and now they're all

50:13

sinking in that coin, which is

50:16

absolutely worthless, it hurts the entire

50:18

industry. But if you really sat

50:20

down and read the Bitcoin white

50:23

paper, and you understand that what

50:25

Bitcoin is, is a decentralized ledger.

50:27

It is effectively a spreadsheet that's

50:30

hardened. and it's immutable, it's not

50:32

hackable, it has value to it

50:34

because if you read Neil

50:36

Ferguson's book The Assent of

50:39

Money, Bitcoin ticks off all

50:41

the boxes of what the world

50:43

has thought of in terms of

50:45

money. You know, it's scarce, it's

50:47

easy to trace, it's transferable,

50:49

it's permissionless. And so for

50:52

those reasons, I am a

50:54

believer in Bitcoin long term.

50:56

I think Bitcoin will scale

50:58

and it will be adopted.

51:00

And if you really understand

51:02

what the blockchain is, the

51:04

blockchain is basically hundreds of

51:06

thousands of nodes that will help

51:09

verify transactions. So right now, we'll

51:11

use the banking system for that.

51:13

You know, we'll use... JP Morgan and

51:15

we'll use Bank America or you pick the

51:17

system, but all that is is also a

51:19

spreadsheet, right? Your bank is a spreadsheet. If

51:22

you're a car dealer and I want to

51:24

buy a car from you, the digits in

51:26

my account go down. I wire those digits

51:29

to your account, they go up, you send

51:31

me a car. And so Bitcoin has been

51:33

able to create a network. where you don't

51:35

have to use a third party to create

51:38

that value transfer. And so let me give

51:40

you just two examples of how that could

51:42

work. I could be in a restaurant with

51:44

you instead of taking out my credit card

51:47

and paying a three and a half percent

51:49

fee to the credit card company that's

51:51

going to verify that transaction and prove that

51:53

I have the money to pay the restaurant

51:55

door, I could take out my wallet on

51:57

my phone and I could move either a

51:59

state. which is a digital dollar,

52:01

or I could move Bitcoin to

52:04

the restaurant tour over the blockchain

52:06

and save him and me the three and

52:08

a half percent. And so there's

52:11

a wave of financial technology that's

52:13

upon us that will make things

52:15

cheaper for us, make it more

52:18

seamless, make it less hackable, and

52:20

so a result of which I

52:22

think this stuff has value. But

52:24

older people. They think it's financial

52:26

blather, they don't really understand it, but

52:28

I've spent two years of my life.

52:31

Before I made my first Bitcoin investment,

52:33

I spent two years of my life

52:35

working on it. I will send you

52:37

a book, a copy of my new

52:40

book, The Little Book of Bitcoin, which

52:42

is stories about people that didn't understand

52:44

Bitcoin and came to Bitcoin, did the

52:46

homework on Bitcoin, and they moved towards

52:49

it. That could be Stan Druckenmiller, a

52:51

name you may know, or Ray Dalio.

52:53

or Paul Tudor Jones or Michael Nova

52:55

Grass. These are people that are

52:58

way smarter than me in financial

53:00

services and they've drawn the conclusion

53:02

that I have that Bitcoin represents

53:04

value. Now it's volatile, it's definitely

53:07

not a perfect instrument today, but

53:09

as it gets adopted I think

53:11

it's going to be very successful.

53:13

So students asked me all the

53:15

time and I think a lot of

53:17

people watching this actually have this question

53:19

too, you kind of touched on it. Why

53:22

aren't... Don't Democrats seem to be

53:24

an effective opposition? Do you think

53:26

James Carville is right that they

53:28

should just sit back and wait

53:30

for Trump to destroy himself?

53:32

James says over the next 30 or 60

53:35

days. I think he's right because

53:37

they don't have an organized

53:39

narrative of dissent. You know, I don't

53:41

know who said it. You know, it

53:43

could have been Will Rogers. Somebody once

53:45

said, and I'm paraphrasing, you know, I'm

53:47

a member of six disorganized parties. I'm

53:49

a Democrat. I don't know who says.

53:52

Yeah, it's what Rogers. I'm a I'm

53:54

not a member of any organized party.

53:56

I'm a Democrat. Right. Okay. That's what

53:58

he says. So I'm paraphrase. But my

54:00

point is the Democrats are

54:02

very disassembled, they're very disorganized,

54:05

and they don't have a

54:07

galvanizing leader. Now, Jack Kennedy

54:09

perhaps represented that, Bill Clinton

54:11

for a time, represented that.

54:13

Barack Obama certainly... built a

54:15

very broad coalition and represented

54:17

that. But for whatever reason,

54:19

you know, sort of the older

54:21

people in the party have

54:23

stuffed down the younger people.

54:25

And so there hasn't been

54:27

a lot of product development,

54:29

if you will, candidate development

54:31

of younger people. But so

54:34

Carville's probably right because you don't

54:36

have anybody, you know. Please

54:38

forgive me. 80 something year old

54:40

Bernie Sanders, not the right answer

54:42

for the character narrative. Chuck Schumer,

54:44

a lovely guy, but he's in

54:47

the twilight of his career. Nancy

54:49

Pelosi, intermittent 80s. You know, these

54:51

are not people that are really representative

54:53

of where the party needs to

54:55

go. And I will point this

54:58

out to you and you know

55:00

this. Your party, the Democrats, do

55:02

better when they have people below

55:04

the age of 50. Jack Kennedy,

55:06

Bill Clinton, Barack Obama. Republicans have

55:09

typically done better when they've had

55:11

people over the age of 50,

55:13

Dwight Eisenhower, Ronald Reagan, Donald

55:15

Trump. And so you have to

55:17

find younger leaders, cultivate younger leaders,

55:20

but I think Carvel's right until

55:22

you have a narrative. Now, what

55:24

I would propose, they would

55:26

never accept, and that tells

55:28

you about their ideological anchoring

55:30

and their egos. I would

55:32

say, hey, you're in trouble,

55:34

team up with the dissident

55:36

Republicans. form a new coalition,

55:38

get as many people under

55:40

the tent as possible, and

55:42

destroy, destroy and put to sleep

55:45

the Republican Party. The Republican

55:47

Party in its current iteration

55:49

is very dangerous for the

55:52

world, it's very dangerous for

55:54

this country, it is the

55:56

Whig Party of the 1850s,

55:58

and it needs to be. upsized

56:00

by a coalition, a new coalition of

56:03

people that should be willing to

56:05

work. If the people really

56:07

understood the danger, and I really

56:09

still, I do see systemic danger,

56:12

Bob, if they really understood the

56:14

danger, they would do what Atley

56:16

did and what Churchill did with

56:18

team up. Team up to defeat

56:21

the existential danger of something

56:23

that's right here, right upon

56:25

us. Well, look, this has been a

56:27

terrific discussion. and your

56:30

insights are often original

56:32

and sometimes provocative

56:34

and the discussion is as

56:36

entertaining as is enlightening. If

56:38

I could say this Anthony

56:41

you're irrepressible. Well,

56:43

listen, it's a big honor for me

56:45

to be with you. You know, you're

56:47

one of the real geniuses in politics.

56:49

You know, I followed your career when

56:51

I was a student and I've been

56:53

very proud to be affiliated with you

56:55

and have a personal relationship. So I'm

56:57

grateful to be invited into your classroom

56:59

over Zoom. I hope I can get

57:01

out there and do it in person again

57:04

soon. But listen, I hope we don't

57:06

feel like I'm exaggerating. I'm not saying...

57:08

It's 50% or anything like that, but

57:10

I do see a possibility or a

57:12

lane that he may take, which could

57:15

be very disruptive to our society, that

57:17

I don't, I think we need an

57:19

American renewal of our democracy, and perhaps

57:21

we need some protective amendments to

57:23

the Constitution. And remember, this

57:26

Constitution's got 27 amendments. If

57:28

you divide that by 210,

57:30

it's roughly eight amendments a

57:32

year, yet we haven't had

57:34

a new amendment of any

57:36

real consequence since the 65

57:38

Voters Act. The 93 amendment

57:40

was a procedural one. And

57:42

so for me, we need

57:44

to get back into the room,

57:47

okay, and put some new

57:49

planks in that constitution that,

57:51

you know... perhaps end-citizen-united

57:54

or create an AI-generated

57:56

congressional districts that are

57:59

not based upon gerrymandering,

58:01

but are based upon demography

58:03

and trying to balance these

58:06

districts. You know, again, something

58:08

has to change to make this thing

58:10

less tribal. Yeah. At any time

58:12

you're invited back to the

58:14

Center for the Political Future.

58:16

So thank you again. I appreciate

58:19

it, sir. Thank you. Let me

58:21

thank everyone who's joined us on

58:23

Zoom or Facebook Live. There are

58:25

all those who will hear this

58:27

section. on our podcast Let's Find

58:29

Common Ground. Thank

58:31

you, Anthony Scaramucci.

58:33

Good to be on with you,

58:36

sir. Thank you again. Thank you

58:38

for joining us on Let's

58:40

Find Common Ground. If you

58:43

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58:45

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