Pod Save America - "Card-carrying badass."

Episode Date: February 20, 2017

Katie Couric joins for a freewheeling conversation about Trump's attacks on the media, persuading Trump voters and the future of the Democratic Party.

Welcome to Pod Save America. I'm Jon Favreau. I'm Jon Lovett. I'm Tommy Vitor. On the pod today, we have a very special guest, the one and only Katie Couric. We're going to do a little special episode today where we go through the news and all the craziness of the day of the last week with Katie. That wasn't even the plan, guys, but it was such a good conversation that that's what just happened. It's just what happened.

We talked about everything. We're going to do a few more housekeeping things before we get to the interview with Katie. But don't fast forward. But don't fast forward. Because we'll make it fun. We'll make it fun. Tommy?

Yes. What do we have on Pod Save the World this week? This week on Pod Save the World, it's the Scare the Hell Out of You episode with Obama's former Homeland Security Advisor and Chief Counterterrorism Advisor to the, Lisa Monaco, who is a very interesting person. She comes from DOJ and was in the National Security Division over there and just left the White House. So tune in. Do you have a little bit of a cold? I do.

I don't feel very well. But I think you sound okay. Thank you. That's great. Also. Making radio magic. Tomorrow night, Tuesday night, we are going to go live on Facebook Live with our friends at Funny or Die. And we're going to do a little live show.

Yeah. We're going to talk about stuff. So anything that happens while this pod's going on, breaking news, we'll be able to talk about it tomorrow night. Will we get paid for that? Would there be a way for that money to get transferred to us if we were to demand payment? No. I mean, I think we should pay Lovett for his time because his time is valuable. It's so hard to pay people.

We have a very special guest, Yahoo's global anchor, Katie Couric. Katie, welcome to the show. Thank you very much. And Jon Favreau, Tommy Vitor, and Jon Lovett. And Dan Pfeiffer's here, isn't he? No, Dan's not here. Oh, sorry. Let me do that again. Okay. I think we should leave this in. Where the hell is Dan?

Who cares? Dan, I love you. Just kidding. Just kidding. So, hi, fellas. Nice to be here. I'm excited to be on your show. I know it's doing really well. So mazel mazel,

good things on that. And lots to talk about. So you guys want to go first? Sure, sure. So we'll start with Trump's burgeoning relationship with the news media. Last week, the big news was Trump tweeting, the fake news media is not my enemy. It is the enemy of the American people. So my question to you is, how dangerous do you think it is for Trump to cast the media as the enemy of the American people? Or do you think it's dangerous? I thought you were going to say, how dangerous are you, Katie Couric? Okay, that's the first question. My nickname is Katie Danger. No, I think it is incredibly dangerous.

I think we've seen him go down this road, but I think it was brought to a new level with that recent tweet. It's gotten sort of progressively worse in terms of his relationship with the press. Clearly, he's trying to delegitimize the press just as he's trying to delegitimize the judiciary and the entire electoral process, you know, these democratic institutions, because it gives him more credibility. It makes it harder for people to take criticism of his policies or what he's doing seriously, at least a certain portion of the population. So I find it really depressing, dispiriting. And I think the press is still trying to figure out the media writ large, how to handle and when you talk about the media writ large, of course, you're talking about very bifurcated media organizations, because you have the conservative press on one side and

a more progressive press. And, you know, I think there are fewer and fewer that can be considered sort of straddling both worlds. So I think people are scratching their heads saying, how do we deal with this as news organizations? How do we regain the trust, if you will? Because one thing he said that was accurate in his press conference is the approval rating for the media is lower than the approval rating for Congress. And I think, you know, how do you handle a problem like Donald Trump, to quote, you know, the sound of music, Maria von Trapp, or whatever. So I think, I don't know what the solution is. I think that the media has to resist getting sucked into these personal battles and has to try as much as it can to really focus on the policy positions he's taken and some of the things that he needs to be held accountable for, the relationship with Russia and what that means and get to the bottom of that. I don't think investigative reporting has ever been so important as it is now. And I think that, you know, they need to spend less time focused on his tweets and his style and more time focused on the substance of his policies. I mean, I think you see this sort of challenge, which is when Trump says something like, you know, the media is the enemy. I mean, there's nothing that a lot of the press corps likes to do more than kind of navel gaze and discuss their own relevance and role.

But yet at the same time, it is important to figure out what you do and how you cover a president who says these things about the press. So I guess the question would be, you know, how do you respond and hold the line against a president who declares the media the enemy, while at the same time, not letting it distract from the importance of that kind of investigative role, policy role, substantive role? Well, I think, yeah. And I also, you know, I was thinking, it's a great time to do a documentary on the role of the media in a democracy democracy and go to a country where there isn't a free press and what that's like and remind people of some of the basic principles that this country was founded on. You know, I think that's really important. I think to your point, too much navel gazing starts to feel like too much navel-gazing. So how do you also deal with all this fake news?

You know, during the campaign, I had very well-educated friends sending me articles saying, did you see this? And I would be like, where did you see that? This is complete bullshit. And my friends would be like, oh, it's all over the internet. Oh, it's all over the internet. So I think that the technology has moved faster than sort of our ability to consume it with some kind of discernment. And I think maybe news organizations need to get together so that consumers can know what a legitimate news organization is that adheres to certain principles and practices, you know, almost like a good housekeeping seal of approval. So when they read something,

they can appreciate and understand that this has been, you know, double sourced, that it's been edited. Now, of course, the problem is fewer and fewer outlets do that now because of the demand for speed is superseded the demand for accuracy. So, I mean, I think there are all sorts of issues entailed in this conversation. Yeah. And another complicating factor is the blurring line between fake news and partisan media, because you have, you know, the former CEO of Breitbart sitting in the most powerful office in the White House right now, and they're sort of his his handpicked go-to news outlet who, you know, they had the only seat reserved in the front row at the first press conference. I'm wondering, you know, how can a press corps work with a White

House when they're going to their favorite news sources and there's this clear partisan slant of the press corps that's growing. It's not getting more objective. I think it's getting actively less objective through these Skype interviews and the other things they're doing. No, I agree. And I think that the media just has to continue to stay on top of these stories. I think part of the problem is that there was always this fine line between access and accountability. You know, you do a

tough interview with a political leader, a president, a cabinet member, and this happened to me in my career. And then you get blackballed by that White House because they don't like the hard questions you ask. They didn't like your quote unquote tone. And that happened to me several times in the past. And I think these networks still, you know, it's this kind of struggle because they want the ratings that would come with an interview with a high ranking official or even the president. But the minute that you really come down on that president, which is hard to imagine not doing in the current administration, you will never have access again. So I think people need to realize that these news outlets, that they're probably going to have to give up access because already, I think,

the administration recognizes publications and networks and whatever who are going to be predisposed to be easier on administration officials. Right. I mean, I'm wondering what you think of, you know, there's like this, there's this half hour in the morning, you know, network news shows that is hard news. And I feel like at certain points of time that that half hour has been longer. It's been 45 minutes or an hour. If you watch CBS this morning, it's a little longer. I'm wondering what your take is on sort of watching that block shrink over time or the sort of sensational or commercialization of tabloidization of some of these morning news.

Look at Tommy asking. You know, it's interesting. Well, you know, it's interesting. has gotten less and less. I think part of it is, you know, with a shrinking audience, you need to appeal to a mass audience. So there's fear, I think, that you're going to turn people off by doing too much hard news. I think Good Morning America started sort of being lighter. And then I think the Today Show sort of followed suit. I think the Today Show has self-corrected to a certain degree. But, you know, it's tricky, isn't it? Because, you know, it's sort of some of the same things that these companies are dealing with, you know, whether

it's Under Armour, LL Bean, or Nordstrom's. Once you get politicized at all, you turn off a big segment of the population, right? And it's tricky, I think. But if I were, you know, in charge, I would certainly devote more time to big issues. And they don't, it doesn't have to all be politics. time to big issues. And they don't, it doesn't have to all be politics. You know, it could be explaining NAFTA and talking about the controversy of the wall. I had dinner, I went to a dinner this weekend, and the Mexican ambassador to the UN was kind of talking to us about the wall and how humiliating that was for Mexicans and the fact that many fewer Mexicans are coming to the United States because of NAFTA,

because it has been so important to the Mexican economy that many people are staying in Mexico where they can find good jobs. Things like that, I think that we get so sort of caught up in the superficialities of who did what, who said what, the outrageous behavior, the crazy tweet, that we don't really dig into these issues that I think educate and help illuminate some of the big, big policy challenges that we're facing in this country. Whether or not they would, you know, abandon a morning show in droves if that kind of thing happened. I'm not sure, but I would like to see much more of it, frankly. Do you have a question for us? Yeah, I'm sorry. Yeah. We just took the first five.

I have so many questions for you guys. First of all, I know that part of your mission in doing Pod Save America and Cro media is to encourage activism. And I'm curious, I read a piece in the Times this weekend that said, as liberals and progressives become more politically active and kind of stand up against some of the policies that are being enacted by this administration, moderate Republicans are being pushed closer to Trump because, again, this divide is so intense and the rhetoric is so harsh on both sides. And I'm curious, do you think we're forever going to be a polarized nation, a polarized media? Is there any way to cross this divide at all? John, I'll ask you first, and I'd love for the

other guys to weigh in. Yeah, we were just talking about that article. We're not fans. I'm being very restrained, but I hate that article with the fire of a thousand suns. Really? Okay, good. Tell me why. And not because the question you're asking isn't important,

right? Like, I think the question about this polarization is really important, but that article was a bunch of garbage because it conflates a bunch of different things. Like, is activism, protest and Hollywood liberals? Are they alienating Trump voters? By the way, you know, first of all, I can't even I can't. The article was so outrageous because it asked these Trump people like, you know what? I used to like Meryl Streep and now I don't even know if I can go to the movies.

Shut up. And then also this guy being like, you know i i might have supported a democrat but then i saw a mean tweet about donald trump and now i don't know what to think anymore i think i think there's a lot i think that sometimes you see these that that first of all i think that there are people who answer these questions in a way that they think pundits want them to answer them and they're not speaking to their actual feelings about like what the actual way in which they make decisions about politics are they're they're asked a question are liberals alienating you and then the answer is very easy to say yes i don't know i'm rambling what about the pew poll that showed what 70 percent of moderate republicans think donald trump is doing a good job were you surprised by that

well so i wasn't because um since those, since they may call themselves moderate Republicans, but they ID as Republicans. And so if your party ID carries more of a weight than whether you identify as moderate, liberal or conservative, right? So in that same poll, independents gave them a 35% approval rating and a 59% disapproval rating, right? So they sort of, they kind of, they shaded it to fit the narrative of the story. The other thing is, you know, the two people, or the three people that they interviewed for that story, one of them had been in the New York Times before, interviewed by the same reporter wearing a Make America Great Again hat. And then one of them said that, you know, said that she was more scared of Democrats than Islamic terrorists.

So these are not like persuadable Republicans. Right. No, but your larger point, the question about polarization is a good one and a right one. I think what that article does is it sort of conflates what this is what a lot of analysis has been doing these days. Trump fans with Trump voters. And I think those those two groups are different, right? The Trump fans, which I think they interviewed a few Trump fans in that piece, and not just Trump voters, reluctant Trump voters, they are getting their news from Fox and Breitbart and all these very

conservative media sources and sometimes fake news sources and trying to pierce their bubble, right? And try to persuade them why Trump isn't good for the country or Trump is lying or Trump is doing X. I think that is extraordinarily difficult and that is a huge problem that we have to deal with. And I'm not sure how we deal with that because it's hard to reach people like that who are getting all this news like that. Well, what is Crooked Media? What is your goal? Is it sort of a Fox News on the left? It's not. I mean, it's weird because I don't want to say that it's Fox News on the left, but I think it is a progressive.

We want to be a progressive media company that sort of inspires activism. Right. And so I think that there is, especially there's a younger generation out there right now, and there is a gap between their enthusiasm and their engagement. So you have a lot of young people who are really excited. They want to do something. They want to get involved, but they don't know how and they haven't been involved in politics before. And we want to maybe tell them to vote. That's the start. And yeah. And one big difference too, is that I think we're trying our best to kind of like have like an honest conversation. And look, we have a very strong point of view. You know, we obviously come from, we are Democrats, but, you know, we're not,

we're trying to do our best to say what we think, how we feel, being honest about that. And I don't think that's true. Just getting back to your initial question. I mean, I think there's certainly the case during the election that there was a lot of people, this show included, where the tone was, Donald Trump is an idiot.

If you vote for Donald Trump, you're an idiot. And that came through loud and clear to a lot of people. We've done a lot of soul searching on that. And I think that was unhelpful to say the least. I think it's your God given right as an American citizen to say whatever the hell you want about any elected official in the language that you feel is most appropriate. That said, I don't think we're going to persuade people unless we're being a little more thoughtful about how we talk about him sometimes. I think this is true for liberals and I think it's true for politicians too.

It's never a good idea to play sociologist when you're talking about voters, right? Because when you talk about like people feeling this divide or feeling that they're like put upon by, you know, Clinton supporters or the elites or stuff like that. We often talk about people like we're anthropologists studying an ancient culture. What do the white working class voters think? Like Sir Richard Attenborough with a pair of binoculars. And politicians

have been like, Obama has done that a few times when he did the guns and religions comment. Hillary Clinton did that with deplorables. It is never a good idea to talk about voters. Well, isn't that part of the problem, you guys? I interviewed Doris Kearns Goodwin after the election and on this podcast, and she basically said it. And I think Bryan Stevenson talks about this a lot as well, being proximate. And part of it is geographical. I mean, that we have these rural and exurban voters oftentimes. And people in these big cities, coastal cities, have very little interaction with people.

I was having dinner with my husband on Friday night, and we were sitting next to a very nice couple from Memphis. And they recognized me despite the fact I had no makeup on and I looked really scary. And so we started chatting. And we were talking about Trump, of course, because you can't go anywhere without – there's no place that is safe. There's no Trump-free zone these days. And he basically said, you know, I voted for Trump and I was screaming at him on the television saying, please shut up. And I said, but do you still support him? He said, yeah. He said, I have a family furniture business. The Chinese, the Asians are killing American manufacturing when it comes to furniture.

The time it takes to build a new factory in this country is crazy. There are too many regulations. We want the best for our employees. And we really hope that he's going to be more hospitable to small businesses. And, you know, my husband, who's in finance, basically says, you know, Donald Trump could do a lot that's good for the economy. Would you concede that there are some positive things that he could do and maybe some corrections from overregulation that might have been put in place during the Obama administration? Yeah, I think there's plenty of positive things he could do. I mean, look, what's interesting about that conversation with the guy is that I think where we should be opposing Donald Trump or debating Donald Trump is on those issues, right? Because I could make a case that Obama's policies or liberal democratic policies would do a better job of helping small businesses and bringing manufacturing back or educating people for the next generation of high-tech manufacturing, right?

And so I think getting back to those, I think those arguments are probably the best way to actually persuade people and not, oh my God, did you see his tweet? He's awful and terrible and that's it. Because I think the bigger gap, the bigger bubble here is between people who are super engaged with the media and consume media every day, every minute of the day. And that goes for people on the left and people on the right. And then many, many more Americans who are just very casual observers of the media and casual consumers of the media. And they're not paying as close attention to a lot of these debates as we are. And therefore, when they aren't as outraged about everything as Donald Trump does as we are, we're often like, well, aren't you paying attention? And it's like, well, no, people are busy. They're leading busy lives and they don't want to spend every five seconds trying to like correct Donald Trump's lies.

And aren't a lot of these arguments or discussions very nuanced and complicated? You know, not everybody is reading The Economist where the whole issue was on globalization or automation. You know, I think one of the problems, and you all can certainly respond to this, is I think President Obama had a hard time communicating in simple terms what his policies would do. And you've heard this before. He was often sort of professorial and almost too sophisticated in the way he expressed himself. And I think, of course, you have the polar opposite in Donald Trump, you know, in terms of how simplistic he is in explaining his positions. So how do you get even those two arguments out there and discussed in an intelligent way? Yeah, I mean, I think so. I think there's sort of there's two pieces to that. There's communicating the policies and then there's whether or not these policies, this

consensus around economic policy has been accepted, because what's interesting about what you're saying about this person you met at the restaurant is actually, you know, Tommy and Johnny roll their eyes, but it's actually similar to the kind of thing my dad says. You had a factory and, you know didn't roll your eyes at your dad. I'm mad that you accused me of rolling my eyes. The eyes have been sitting right here looking straight ahead. Katie, I want you to know they've been great and I was wrong. But what I was going to say is that I feel like there's been this, especially Trump's actually adopted some of this Paul Ryan language around taxes and regulation.

And there has been a really big divisive debate in Washington for a long time on taxes and regulation. But what Trump came in on was actually kind of breaking up a consensus around things like immigration and trade that it turns out were incredibly resonant issues with people. And I think if there's one good thing that's coming out of what Trump is doing is, first of all, I think he's, you know, turning over a bunch of dogmas on the right. But also, I think he's forcing Democrats to confront a lot of these policies, which, you know, I think Barack Obama, Democrats generally have talked a lot about a communications failure. And I think that's true. But I think what the Bernie Sanders rise, what Trump's rise is showing is there's actually bigger policy questions that we maybe need to answer in a different way. This is Pod Save America. Stick around. There's more great show coming your way.

What are the Democrats going to do to get their mojo back, guys? I mean, I think it's going to start. I think it has to start from the grassroots. I think it's starting in a lot of these protests. I think it's starting with a lot of these town halls. Like, I do not think it starts in Washington with a lot of the leaders we have there. I think it has to start from the grassroots. I think it's starting in a lot of these protests. I think it's starting with a lot of these town halls. I do not think it starts in Washington with a lot of the leaders we have there. I think already a lot of the Democrats in Washington are playing catch up to what's going on around the country. And that's a good thing, because I think if we're going to reinvent the party you referenced to bring it back, which is, look, Hollywood people, you know, sounding off about love, Trump's hate. Like, I think that that can be useless. But to conflate that with an incredibly exciting and inspiring moment of activism and protest and people precise enough tool. Because I think that this activism, whether or not there are some protesters who go too far and say things that maybe bother some people, on the whole has been one of the only things that has successfully taken the microphone away from Donald Trump. It is funny, like on the national level, you have Democrats with like simplistic slogans like love Trump's hate. And then at these town halls, you have Democrats with like simplistic slogans like love Trump's hate. And then at these town halls, you have average voters with an incredibly sophisticated understanding of the

Affordable Care Act, asking their congressman questions about lifetime limits and caps and stuff like that. And it's really inspiring to see that. And it's also a lesson that, you know, people know a lot more than just the people are more than the simplistic slogans. Well, isn't that, you know, I remember watching those town halls after that summer when President Obama first introduced the Affordable Care Act. And, you know, I think it was a very organized effort to protest this program. Remember, and people would be like, on page 38, paragraph two, you state. So I think that our people at those town halls following that model that we saw early on in the Obama presidency, you think?

So far, yeah. I mean, so far, it looks like there's a very active, very well organized, very well educated, respectful campaign to go to these town halls to demand that members of Congress hold them and to ask some very specific questions, both about the Affordable Care Act, but also sort of the Russia scandal and other things going on. So it seems like that playbook is being followed. Although I do think these town halls have gotten shy of being quite as intense or caustic as maybe the Tea Party ones were back in the day.

But that was because those people legitimately thought that there were going to be death panels and things that were lies. Well, I remember watching those and thinking how woefully uneducated the members of Congress were when they faced their constituents. It was shocking to me. Shocking. Was it to you? No. Look, approval rating of Congress amongst the American people is somewhere around 10 percent. Approval rating of Congress among people who have worked at Congress is about zero percent. You know, we know that we know these people and it's the worse, the closer you get. Some of them are great.

That's lovely. That's so depressing. But so what? So, OK, so we got we have the educated people at town hall meetings who have people protesting. So what is this realistically going to accomplish? I read David Brooks a couple of days ago, and he said, basically, there's nothing that really can be done for the next four years. I mean, what do you think? What is the road forward in your view for people who oppose Donald Trump? The midterms don't look super promising.

No, I would just, I think that the midterms do. I think there's, Democrats need 24 seats to take the House back. I think there were something like 30 seats where Hillary Clinton beat Donald Trump in a district where a Republican is sitting in the district right now. So I think that's the first target. But the Senate looks pretty dubious. Senate's tough. I don't think we can win the Senate back because I think you can pick off at best. You could pick off Dean Heller in Nevada and Jeff Flake in Arizona at best. And then you're still a couple. You're basically got a tied Senate at that point. And we have a lot of Democrats. Yeah. Yeah. The best case scenario is a tied Senate and then the Democrats taking the House back.

But if the Democrats take the House back, then they have subpoena power. But if the Democrats take the House back, then they have subpoena power, then they can investigate, then they can legislatively stop a lot of Donald Trump's domestic policies. So it would be huge. And when I say hold Trump accountable, I mean impeachment, but I don't say it. Well, let's go there. I mean, I think you can. I don't think it's a good idea to like throw around the word impeachment unless there's an impeachable offense that you are. I don't know that we know yet, but I don't I do think no one should discount how unbelievably distracting these ongoing investigations are going to be. I mean, you know, depending on who you read, there are multiple FBI investigations going on on a variety of Trump associates or aides or what have you. And this White House is going to be more bogged down than they could ever possibly imagine.

And it's just begun. And possibly for good reason. I mean, it might not just be a distraction. Right. Seemingly for good reason. In all seriousness, I think holding them accountable means investigating, means actual hearings, means doing the job that people like Jason Chaffetz and Paul Ryan refuse to do. Whether or not there's grounds for removing Donald Trump,

I don't think we can say yet. But you have a lot of people who aren't refusing to do it, right? Mark Warner, people like that who are coming forward and saying that, you know, John McCain saying, you know, others claiming there should be an independent bipartisan committee or even an outside committee, right? Yeah, I mean, look claiming there should be an independent bipartisan committee or even an outside committee, right? Yeah. I mean, look, the fact that James Comey met with the Intel committee chaired by Richard Burr, Republican, and Mark Warner, and all of those members went into that, they canceled

their recess plans for a little while. And these people love their vacation. And they love their vacation. And they took that meeting with Comey and they walked out of that meeting and they didn't say a word. Except Marco Rubio who tweeted, I'm now more confident than ever

that we're going to investigate this. Marco Rubio, not a fan of courage, usually. So that's actually something. I mean, he's voting with Trump 100% of the time, but yeah, once in a while he tweets, okay. Yeah, and the intel committees have now told the administration to preserve all records to Russia. I mean, that's a serious,

for a committee, for a bipartisan committee there, that's a serious step. Well, what do you think the Democrats should do in Congress, the people you hold in such high regard? Should they do to Trump what the GOP did to Barack Obama? I mean, I think they should oppose every policy they disagree with, which seems to be many, you know, I mean, I don't think he has put for like, if, if, if the Paul Ryan repeal and replace plan, which basically just like takes Medicaid and healthcare subsidies away from millions of people is the plan that absolutely they should oppose it. You know, I think that every time a plan comes up or a proposal or a policy comes up, Democrats should decide, you know, would you support it on the merits, right? And it doesn't seem... But should they pick their battles? In other words, I mean,

should they put up a fight against Neil Gorsuch? Because if they really do that, it's going to pretty much hand Donald Trump a big fat victory, is it not? I think he's going to get Gorsuch on regardless. Yeah. Because he's got the votes. But I do think, But I do think hearings are important for Gorsuch, which is what Merrick Garland didn't get. And I think let's hear him out. Let's ask him really tough questions. And if it seems like he's a judge that's not in the mainstream, which we believe Merrick Garland was, then vote against him. And if you do think he's in the mainstream, then vote for him. In the mainstream. I mean, look, that's, that's, whether or not Democrats should vote to confirm him is shouldn't, it will really ultimately have nothing to do with whether or not he's in the mainstream. They've already made up their minds and it's totally a political decision. The thing I would say about that political decision that's important to me is we need to give people a reason to vote for Democrats. And there's a lot of people out there that want to see that Democrats are

fighting. And the fact that Gorsuch will that Gorsuch will get on no matter what is almost beside the point, like showing that we're willing to fight is going to get people excited about sending more Democrats to the House and to the Senate. Let's talk about Hillary Clinton, if we could. John, I'm just curious, you know, I heard so many people say if the Hillary we saw in the concession speech would have surfaced more during the course of the campaign, it might've turned out differently. Does that gall you when people make that observation? What do you think, Levitt?

I think people have been saying that if only the Hillary that showed up after she lost, uh, were around, she would have won. They said that, um, after her 2008, uh, defeat, I think they said that again, again, this time, I think that there is some truth to it. I think there's some truth to the fact that there's some kind of a political instinct that she has and that the people around her have over the years that has nothing to do with an individual team, because it repeats over and over again, that there's a kind of control that ultimately is self defeating. And I think that's absolutely true. Look, this is so is that what happened? Do you think that's what went wrong? She was too

cautious and controlling? Or the campaign itself? That sounded over-personalized, but the sort of ethos of the campaign was too cautious and controlling? Look, you mentioned that about the concession speech. People have said that about John Kerry after his concession speech. They said it about Mitt Romney after his concession speech. They said it about Al Gore after his concession speech. They said it about John McCain. They said about John McCain. There are certain brand of politicians who are too cautious during a campaign and are less cautious after the campaign's over. And that is because they run with an overwhelming fear of losing. And that fear of losing makes them more cautious and calculated. That's true.

My sister was running for lieutenant governor of Virginia with Mark Warner when she was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. And she was a real rising star in the Democratic Party. And a lot of people said she was going to be the first female governor. And unfortunately, tragically, she passed away. But she told me when she was running, you know, for as this first state senate, etc. She said, when you run for office, you have to be willing to lose. And I think what she meant is, it sounds so simple, is that you have to be true to yourself and to your core values and principles and let the chips fall where they may. It's absolutely right. It does sound simple, but it is incredibly hard, and a lot of people don't do that. Yeah. I mean, it's just this, people, it's like,

there's so many advisors and there's so many polls and, you know, but ultimately people don't do that. Yeah. I mean, it's just this people. It's like there's so many advisors and there's so many polls. And, you know, but ultimately people don't make a decision based on like how you met 10 different metrics. You have to get them to vote for you. You as a person have to get someone else to vote for you. And look, I think ultimately it's actually probably not that helpful to worry about what Hillary Clinton's individual liabilities were when we need to figure out who the next person is and how they're going to win. And the truth is everything mattered in this campaign.

You know, we lost by, what, 100,000 votes across three states. Comey mattered. The email mattered. The hacks mattered. The leaks, everything mattered. But I think that— Well, what about a coherent message to blue-collar Democrats? I know that you all have said that there was that message, but somehow it just didn't come through.

And saying go to my website just doesn't cut it, fellas. I mean, look, Y, or Z voter. That said, I think the bigger problem we all made was the lesson of Bernie Sanders and of Donald Trump was that every voters across the country were screaming, we are sick and tired of Washington. And then we handed them someone that they've been seeing in Washington for 30 years as a nominee. And that was just summarily rejected on a million questions that are probably values-based,

more so than they were policy-based. Do you think Bernie Sanders would have beaten Donald Trump? Yeah, we talk about this a lot. It's the, look, yes. Listen to these dodges, these artful dodges. No, I'll say yes. I think yes. My position is yes.

My position is Bernie would have won. I say yes, but I hate counterfactuals because it's so like evidence free. Right, right. But I have this feeling now that he would have. Yeah. And look, we've talked about this before. And this actually goes back again to that article. Like liberals aren't helping Trump, but liberals do need to think very carefully about the language we use and the way we talk to people that are really suffering.

And I think that that was a failure, not of the Hillary Clinton campaign, but of democratic politics generally. fighting Donald Trump that you have to be aware of and, you know, just in some ways stay away from where it's almost class warfare. I think that we're seeing. Do you guys? Yeah, I mean, we sell patronizing and dismissive by the pound here on Pots of America. It's part of our brand. Proudly, apparently. Look, you're absolutely right i mean they're a good message is inclusive

and disciplined and proactive and positive and focused on the future and it's a lot easier and more fun to criticize the the dust above the day also we've noticed like small things we've talked about this where uh democrats often say uh you know the working class feels left behind by the last 20 years of inequality and blah, blah, blah. And it's like, well, they don't feel left behind. They have been left behind. You know, but it's like it's little comments like that that are more like I said, they're more it's analyzing people as opposed to advocating for people. Sort of that anthropological approach. And I think one thing Bernie Sanders does really well is he advocates for people in a real simple way. And it's not quite and it's ideology aside here. Right. It is just it is speaking to people's real frustrations and anxiety. Complicated policies that we're trying to sell. You know, people want good health care.

You know, they want good like they want simple, elegant solutions to problems that they can understand. And I think a lot of sort of democratic insidery, the conversation got very complicated. It got very much like I'm like, I don't know, like a policy paper. Yeah, like a white paper. Yes. Like I remember, you know, there was all that talk during the campaign. Like, we've got so many more pages of white papers in that dumb guy Donald Trump. It's like, if I ever hear anyone brag about the length of a white paper again, I'm going to lose it. You know, one thing that you mentioned earlier that people did call Obama aloof or professorial and all these things.

The one thing that I always noticed about him, because I spent a year with him in Iowa watching a bit, literally in backyards and every Iowa cliche you can imagine, I will spout. But like, the thing that was true about him and about the first lady was that it was more recent that they were paying off student loans than that they had become famous politicians. And like that, that reality allowed them to connect with people in a way that was authentic. And that is perishable, right? Because you spend long enough in Washington being told you're great and everything is brilliant and things get paid for by so-and-so at Bistro B or wherever you're going for lunch. You get lost.

Great steak frites there. This is Pod Save America. Stick around. There's more great show coming your way. This is Pod Save America. Stick around. There's more great show coming your way. So what happens when Donald Trump doesn't or do you think he will bring manufacturing back? I mean, first of all, only 13 percent of the jobs lost in manufacturing between 2000 and 2010 were lost to trade. The rest were lost to automation. I read an interesting piece today that said Bill Gates wants to start taxing companies for their use of

robotics to sort of slow the progression, this transformation we're witnessing from an industrial to a technological society. I mean, A, do you think he's going to bring manufacturing back? And B, what happens if he's going to bring manufacturing back? And B, what happens if he doesn't? Go. Yeah, I mean, look, the most frustrating part of Donald Trump's, you know, vision that he's selling people is that it's largely fiction, right? Is that a lot of that most manufacturing jobs aren't coming back, right? Now, that's something that, you know, Bill Clinton was saying back in 1992, when he was running for president. He was honest with people about that. Barack Obama used to be honest with people about that. Now, there are companies that are, you know, we saw this over

the last eight years, there's a trend towards insourcing where a lot of these companies are moving production back to America. So that's good. But it's still a tiny, like you said, is a tiny fraction of the jobs that we've lost. The largest challenge we have as a country that we have to talk about is, and Obama was telling us this when he was on the podcast too, is automation. Right. What are we going to do? But why didn't anybody talk about that during the campaign? It infuriated me. You know, well, one, they should have.

Two, it's a complicated issue. I don't think anybody knows the answer. That's why. That is why. That is huge. I think no one knowing the answer where the next generation of jobs is going to come from is left an opening for someone like Trump and other. To lie about it. Yeah.

I mean, look, if the solutions of the center left and the center right are not going to answer the problems of regular people, it's going to open the door to monsters. I would say we we all should be rooting for Donald Trump's success because this is the biggest challenge we're going to face. It's going to get worse. It's going to get harder. I hope to God he can figure out a way to bring back jobs. Are you really rooting for Donald Trump? I am on the policy level. But the reason I don't have a lot of manufacturing, the reason I don't have any. But the reason I don't have a lot of hope that he's really going to work on this and make progress is that he filed for reelection five hours after he was sworn in. And this weekend he hold a campaign rally. And the guy loves the crowds and the big promises and the bluster and bravado. And we have not seen him spend a lot of time at the White House getting to work doing stuff. And yes, he can make press releases and repackage announcements from companies that had already pledged to create some sort of jobs here in the United States.

But like it's it's governing by press release. There's not a dedicated, thoughtful process in place to actually fix this. And even that is kind of a band-aid, although he is very, very good at making hay over small accomplishments like the carrier jobs, right? Great at that. And that was actually an incredibly effective part of his pitch. So he's got this narrative he's writing about how he's renegotiating these little things and he's going to renegotiate the deals, right?

That's not going to solve America's job problem. Then, you know, they go back and forth. You know, some days they're talking about some trillion dollar infrastructure project. The next day you hear from the Hill that that's not possible. You know, that's actually something that could make a difference. Of course, these are the same Republicans who fought tooth and nail against a Democratic stimulus measure when the president came in and when we were in crisis. of manufacturing, which seems to be like threatening individual companies, promising an infrastructure bill that hasn't materialized yet and thrown up tariffs, are not, you know, policy-wise, are not great solutions. And just one more point, too, that right now the economy is growing and adding jobs.

That won't necessarily be true over the next four years. You know, he is sort of riding a long trend of job growth, which he can say, oh, look, a new factory here, a new factory there. But at a certain point, you know, it's live by the polls, die by the polls. Taking credit for the stock market is a dangerous game, buddy. It goes up and it goes down. Why we didn't do it. Well, let me ask you guys about President Obama's relationship with President Trump. Do they talk? I mean, you guys probably know this. I can't imagine President Obama being like, yo, Donald, let's talk, given some of the stuff that Trump has been saying in recent days about, you know, he inherited a real mess, blah, blah, blah, right? that stuff off than his hack aides who are on the phone right now are, you know, and I think he can sort of see through that and try to have a constructive relationship because they, you know,

when they're alone in the Oval Office, like nobody's tweeting, make America great again, you know, it's a conversation about how hard the job is going to be. And I think he's tried to have a constructive conversation with him about the realities of how hard this is, the things he thinks he should protect and preserve, you know, the political traps, the challenges of building a good team. So I think he's really tried to help him in a constructive way. Clearly. He hasn't really popped off in response to any of the provocations you mentioned. Well, let me ask you, though, at some point, does he become a voice of those who are opposing Donald Trump?

And is that how he becomes an effective former president? I mean, I think on big issues, he may. I think that it's his belief, and it's been his belief long before Trump, that the most important thing he can do is sort of inspire the next generation of voices to go out and lead, right? Because he knows that he's not going to run for office again, he's not going to be president again. But we do need leaders who aren't afraid to stand up and speak out and take up the fight. And so that's a perfect segue to my next question. Who are who are this is going very seamlessly. So who are the who are the future stars of the Democratic Party and really for maybe a more moderate Republican Party as well, if that exists?

So there's Tommy. There's John. I'm here. We'll start there. I think that's an important group. But beyond that, I'm actually not sure. I don't really follow politics. California's got the maybe the best bench for the party, period. Garcetti. Garcetti. Gavin Newsom. Yeah. And then Jason Kander. Jason Kander, friend of the pod.

Pete Buttigieg. Jason Kander, is he the one that did the great ad where he put together the automatic weapon blindfold? Yes. Blindfolded, yeah. And he lost, but he's still a very strong and much-followed progressive voice, right? Yeah, and he did so much better in that race

than he had any right to do. He's a card carrying badass. But we also, you know, obviously Elizabeth Warren is like an emotional leader. I want to be a card carrying badass. I think you have been for a while. You just have to apply. Anybody can get one.

It's like actually just like a, it's a scam really. All right. Who else? Who else do you see as, and what about, well, go ahead and tell me and then i have a follow-up go ahead who else uh who else do we say i like pete budaj the mayor of south bend indiana who's running for dnc i interviewed him what about michael bennett love michael

bennett i i remember seeing him at a fundraiser once when i was traveling with with uh obama and i like wasn't paying attention because it was a long day. And I just heard this speech. I'm like, who is delivering that speech in there? And it was Michael Bennett. The weird thing is, you know, you start to you think of these politicians as like people who are adults and you're senior. And then all of a sudden there's this generation of leaders like Jason Kander or like Seth Moulton, who's a member of Congress. I've heard his name a lot. Yeah, who are like, you know, 35, the next generation of leaders that are really, really

impressive. What about Cory Booker and Andrew Cuomo? Do you see them running in 2020? I don't know, but Booker I could see. I don't know of Cuomo. I feel like he's got a lot of baggage. Who doesn't? Who doesn't?

Katie, we don't like to criticize people until after they've been on the podcast. So you're kind of getting us in trouble. I basically sounded like an uninformed voter there. What about someone outside the political realm? You know, we've seen with Donald Trump, a businessman can get elected. What about someone like Howard Schultz? And I know people sort of have jokingly suggested somebody like Tom Hanks. I mean, do you see this opening the door to a new breed of,

you know, the non-politician running for president? I would say that we should probably not try to learn too many lessons like that from Donald Trump, who is, I think, a unique figure. But I think the more the merrier. I mean, if there are people who are smart and charismatic and have good ideas and are expert, I mean, I don't know about famous actors. What about Mark Cuban? I thought you were going to say Zuckerberg. Oh, well, what about either of them? Actually, let's discuss both of them. Let's start with Mark Cuban. He appeared at that all-star celebrity game in New Orleans on Saturday in a jersey emblazoned with number 46.

I think Donald Trump then tweeted that he wasn't smart enough or has in recent days. Mark Cuban isn't smart enough to be president. I mean, honestly, you guys cannot make this shit up, can you? It's ridiculous. Am I allowed to say that on a podcast? Oh, yeah. You can say whatever you want. We have an explicit rating on our podcast.

Yeah, we have that E. Okay, good. But yeah, I mean, I like Cuban just clearly Cuban gets under Trump's skin. So as long as Cuban's out there doing that, I think that's great. And what about Zuckerberg? I mean, I just don't, like, I think what we've all been hitting on in this conversation is that authenticity has become

the coin of the realm. And I don't know that Zuckerberg seems to be approaching this as cautiously as humanly possible. Yeah, it's like, Mark Zuckerberg seems like he's spent 30 years in Washington when he speaks. The way forward is not 6,000 word letters. It's, you know, talking to people. Do you think he's charismatic enough? I mean, do you think he's charismatic enough? Because I think the thing is with Trump, you know, like him or not, for whatever reason, his bravado and his bluster

and his kind of unconventional way of speaking. Trump is charismatic and he is charming and he is funny. And we ignore that at our peril. I've always felt that he has a great sense of humor when he brings up his if you watch his rallies. Look, it's hard to put it aside because he's racist and despicable and he's lying all the time. But if that's not how you other than that, other than that, how is the play? But the but but but if you could put that aside or if you didn't approach it with that

sense of of who he is, he's great. He's an entertaining guy. That rally brings up a guy. Everybody's laughing. He's like, we know our people. He's an entertainer. He's a showman and it works. It seems like he's running the White House like an episode of The Apprentice, too, right?

I mean, kind of encouraging people to compete and to, I don't know. That's sort of what I've heard from people who are covering this White House. Didn't he say it was a well-oiled machine or what? Fine-tuned, fine-tuned machine. And but but it seems like I mean, what do you guys hear about what's going on at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue? at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Exactly that. I mean, I think that's his Achilles heel is that competence and the ability to run the biggest organization in the world

is what the job is. And he has shown no capacity to do that. He's put in a place, a team that's over its head at best, if not constantly knifing each other. And I think that there will be repercussions. We haven't seen them yet because nothing really bad has happened. But it will because, you know because the world's a dangerous place.

Things happen. I heard he doesn't really have a schedule. He sort of wanders around a lot. Reporters tell us that, you know, in years, many reporters who I've spoken to never ran into Barack Obama in the hallway. And they'll just see Trump wandering down to lower press or they'll walk into the press secretary's office and he'll just be sitting there with the chief of staff watching cable TV. And that's just – it's not a good use of time. Well, before we go, because I know you guys have given me more time than you schedule, which I really appreciate. This is better than me.

I know you all have more time. You've given us the time. But let's talk about – with Crooked crooked media are you trying to convert people to the cause are you just preaching to the choir we want to do a lot of converting here we want to do a lot of brainwashing no we do we think like i i would love this company to uh expand its audience right and to reach more people who are who might especially people who might not have been as engaged in politics as they want to be now, right? Because there's a, like you said, you can't escape Trump, right? We

are in a moment in our history now where more people are paying attention to politics than they have been in quite some time. And for that new audience that's tuning in, you know, that, that's who we want to reach. And I think mostly they're younger too. Yeah. I mean, I think there's, there's, there's, I think there's arming people with information and resources. And I that that's who we want to reach. And I think mostly they're younger, too. Yeah, I mean, I think there's there's there's I think there's arming people with information and resources. And I think that's hopefully a role we can play. I think that there's taking somebody from being less engaged to more engaged. And then I think there is also room for people who may not have heard a kind of I don't know. I mean, look, it sounds like branding, but like kind of a no bullshit conversation that maybe has a liberal perspective, but might be accessible to somebody who isn't sure what their politics are, maybe thinks are Republican or maybe has been conservative in the past.

But, hey, you know, we're pretty OK, guys. I'm hilarious. That helps. I find that one of the most depressing aspects is the fact that so many people didn't vote or voted for, you know, threw their vote away by voting for Gary Johnson. Although I saw Bill Weld the other night, and he said 75% of their voters were actually Trump voters. I'm not sure if that's true. I know. So anyway, but do you think that that more people will get out and vote? Because of all the people protesting, I'd like to walk around and ask all of them if they voted. I think it's entirely incumbent upon the Democrats to put forward a candidate that inspires people and gets them out there. Because I think we did learn that demonizing someone, even when they deserve it, is not an incentive to get people out.

And we need to inspire them and get them to the polls. And Barack Obama did that incredibly well. And we need to find that next leader that can help do that. And by the way, even before 2020, I think the single biggest challenge that Democrats have is taking this energy, this enthusiasm for protest, this fear and this anger and this anxiety and translating it into votes in 2018 to win the House so that we can begin the process of actually having a government that holds these people accountable. Do you think there's any appetite for Hillary Clinton to run again? We've already started hearing rumblings about that, that she's positioning herself to go for it in 2020.

Thoughts? Literally none. I would be shocked if shocked. I would be more shocked than Trump winning. I don't think she would want to do that. She would punch the staffer in the face who recommended that she do that. I don't think that's, I don't, first of all, I can't believe that's real. I think that probably if this group of people were being honest, we'd say that we would be very much opposed to that

because we need new people. We need a new voice, somebody that can challenge Trump from the outside. So as fascinating as you three are, don't you want to ask me some questions about my podcast and why we're doing this and yada, yada, yada? Katie, tell us about your podcast and why you're doing it. Well, thanks for asking, John. You know, I thought it would be really interesting to have these kinds of conversations. First of all, I'm able to express myself during a podcast in a way that I can't in any other venue. We love that. And I think people are hungering for deeper, more kind of meaningful and spontaneous conversations, and I think that is what a podcast affords.

I do this with my friend and someone I admire a lot, Brian Goldsmith, who worked with me at CBS. We sat for five days in the den of my apartment coming up with questions to ask Sarah Palin in that 2008 interview. And Brian is one of these really serious – well, he's like you guys. You guys should have him as a guest because he's sort of a carbon copy of the three of you. And so it's fun for me to talk with him. And oftentimes he reads everything, so he's able to break – I read a lot too, but he's able to break things down. And so we just have a lot of fun.

We've interviewed so many cool people from Samantha Bee. We've interviewed Alec Baldwin. We've just interviewed Bill Browder who wrote Red Notice about Putin. So it just – it's an opportunity. I'm sort of endlessly curious about all kinds of things. So it's just, I think it's a really fun outlet and people seem to respond to it. I was buying bananas at this little neighborhood market the other day and this woman came up to me, she said, I can't believe it. And she had her phone. She said, look what I'm listening to.

I was like, do, do, do, do, do, do, do. That's really weird. So it's fun. No, we enjoy the form of podcasting. It's a medium that lets you do a lot that others don't. Yeah, and it's intimate. I listen to podcasts, and it feels like you're kind of sitting at the table with the people that are talking. Yeah, definitely. I feel like we're having a slumber party. That's right.

I am in sweatpants. That doesn't have to do with the party. So everyone that's listening from Pod Save America should go subscribe to Katie Couric's podcast, guys. That's right. Listen to Katie and Brian. Thank you guys for the plug. And this was really, really fun. I love talking to you all.

And I think, you know, I don't know if you've found this to be so, but you can't really go anywhere where we're not talking about the state of the country and what's going on in Washington and President Trump. And I find it still endlessly fascinating. And why do you think that's the case? And I don't think it's just people who love politics either. Do you? I think it's a mixture of fear and fascination. Yeah. I mean, look, you know, the fact that this happened this way, I think is incredibly, I think everybody's surprised and everybody's still trying to figure it out. And

I think certainly, you know, I happen to think we're in the middle of a national crisis. And I think that that crisis is if there's one good thing coming out of it is that people are talking to each other and trying to figure it out and thinking about politics in new ways. And it's kind of you even see this with journalists. You see like people kind of getting back to first principles, you know, like, what do I do? Why do I care about it? What is important to me? I mean, that's part of the reason we did this company, because the election of Donald Trump, I think, forced us to confront what we cared about and what we if we cared about it enough. Do you think there's a risk that Democrats are just repeating Hillary's mistakes by attacking Donald Trump and not coming up with a clear and cohesive message for their own

mission? I think that could be a risk. I don't know if it's happening yet. But I think if we do not have a coherent vision to sell voters in 2018 and 2020, then yeah, then we very well could repeat those mistakes. So I think it's important that we do that. And something we've talked about a lot here is that, you know, I think that we, that especially, and this is the point that you were making about kind of talking just to ourselves, it can't just be about how bad Trump is. And it can't just be about how he insults our values, our norms, the way we think politics should sound, vulgarity and all the rest. It has to be about how Trump's policies will hurt you,

right, how it will actually affect your day-to-day life. And we need to make sure we're constantly talking not just about how we have the right values, how we care about freedom of the press, how we care about these institutions and norms, but why they matter and why they'll make your life better if you follow the policies you care about.

I alluded to this question earlier, and I don't think you all really answered it. How long will it be? I guess I think we veered off into a whole conversation about manufacturing, but how long will it take before people who think that Donald Trump voted for him because they believed he would make their lives demonstratively better, how long will it take before they say, hey, you have to pay the piper, we voted for you, and our lives aren't better? Or do you think that he'll take enough incremental steps,

and their lives will be sufficiently improved? I think the odds are that he will hurt them, because they will not necessarily realize that the Affordable Care Act was benefiting them, or that certain tax policies will be changed that will overly benefit the wealthy. So I can't put a ballpark time frame on this because some of it is going to have to do with the implementation of policy and the way people get their news about it. But I think that what he's going to do is going to cost him electorally. I genuinely do. I will say that elections help focus the mind. So I think when we get to 2018, if there has not been any policy that helps working people out of this White House, I think people will respond accordingly at the polls. Yeah, I mean, it's not a camp, you know, being president isn't a campaign. You actually have to do things. You have to do the things you say. You can't just complain. You can't just whine. You can't just pick a target. People will actually see what happens in their world.

And I know you aren't betting men, but do you think he's going to make it all four years? And maybe you are. I don't know. I don't know you guys well enough. We are out of the prediction business. All right, because- We suck at it. Because I still think Hillary's going to win.

Well, that's a nice way to end this conversation. Really fun talking to you guys. Can we do this again in six months? And talk about sort of what has happened to journalism, Really fun talking to you guys. Can we do this again in six months? Yeah, let's check in. We'll check in and see if the country's still here. What has happened to journalism? What's happened to policy? And what's happened to the Democrats and the Republicans?

For sure. We'll call you from the Gulag. Yeah, right. If one of us can use our phone call of the day. All right. This was really fun. Thanks so much, you guys. Take care, Katie.

Bye-bye. Bye. That is our show for today. Thank you to Katie Couric for joining us. And we'll see you again soon. I feel like we got like a new side of Katie. Yeah. You know, if you were to tell me in high school that I was going to hang out with Katie Couric

for 45 minutes, I never would have believed you. I mean, she was in a studio in New York, but it was like kind of like... You ruined the illusion, asshole. No one thinks she's here. Friend of the pod, Katie Couric and card-carrying badass. Card-carrying badass. I think we just got a name of the episode guys that was awful

that little clicking off leave all this in I want this in he fucking clicked it off like a horse fine tune machine I want it all I want to hear that song and I want this to be happening I'm turning off

my mic