# Geopolitics, AI Ethics, and the Future of US Governance

**Podcast:** Pivot
**Published:** 2026-04-10

## Transcript

support for this show comes from mongodb if you're a developer stuck fixing bottlenecks instead of building the next biggest thing then you need mongodb mongo is the flexible unified platform that gets out of your way it's acid compliant enterprise ready and built to ship ai apps fast and it's trusted by so many of the fortune five hundred with their most critical workloads developers have a word for that kind of reliability actually five words it's a great fucking database start building at mongodb dot com slash build if you're tired of endless scrolling to figure out where to eat same i'm stephanie wu editor in chief of eater we've just launched the new ish and way better eater app it has all the restaurants we love gives you personalized picks wherever you are and serves up smarter search results just for you you can find my list of the best places for martinis and fries in new york city and save your favorite spots share lists follow editors and book right in the app download to eerapp at eerapp com it's free for ios users what should we make of the iran war ceasefire announcement and where do things go from here if anything has surprised me over the last twenty four hours it's that iran agreed to a cease fire and particularly that iran agreed to a ceasefire after that outrageous message that president trump put out i'm jake sullivan and i'm john fininer and we're the hosts of the long game a weekly national security podcast this week we break down the latest news on iran and share our net assessment of where things stand for the u the episode's out now search for and follow the long game wherever you get your podcasts i would like to say you have dropped the f bomb three times i'm at zero just for the record hi everyone this is pivot from new york magazine and the box media podcast network i'm carara swisher scott is off still i don't know where scott is he's just off rambling around actually i'm going to see him tonight at the premiere of my new series for cnn but i brought on another incredible co host he's been ambassador to japan and the mayor of chicago it seems like he's running for president it's rm emanuel hey rom how you doing i'm good how are you good good you have been everywhere what's happening try to tell us what's happening besides lecturing the democratic party which we'll get to in a minute but what are you doing well first of all i'm listening to the american people i've been out and talking to them about things like how to make sure they get ahead their families get ahead on the community college plan but also you know like a young man i met in spartanburg who's going to community college he's got a job waiting at ge for thirty three an hour the benefits and he was unemployed and what they're doing at that community college is exactly what i want to see us do everywhere something similar to we did in chicago something similar lacrosse but also you know listening to the nurse in iowa who's talking about that she now spends close to fifty percent of her time arguing with the insurance companies so and about how to make sure that people get the health care that they're actually her and the doctor are prescribing so that's what i'm about doing you've always been a public figure but often in the national way you've been a sort of behind the and you've been a congress person but how do you how is it different what you're doing here in terms of running for president or trying or thinking about running for president yeah i mean that's fair well i mean i've been a congressman i've been a mayor of a not insignificant pri facing facing yeah also chairman of a leadership in congress but that said i mean you're evaluating and one of the things i know about running for office is you got to make sure your head your heart and your gut are all aligned i'm going to just say it up front i don't need a title i got more titles i can auction them off i'm also i'm about getting stuff done like take something i'm very proud you know this because from our many conversations we raised our graduation rate from fifty six to eighty three percent ninety eight percent of our kids had a plan post high school college community college branch of the armed forces vcation school'm not i'm about getting stuff done not about getting another title and do i think i actually understand what it takes to move this country and move help the american people get ahead and their kids get ahead and do i have the fortitude to do that and so that's what what i'm looking at i'm not i don't need as i said titles is for other people getting crap done is what we did in chicago twenty thousand kids went to community college for free every child had a plan post high school on education we started pre k in kindergarten so i'm into moving stuff and as i we like to say in chicago taking the garbage out getting stuff done you evaluate that right but you know this also takes i jokingly said when i was recruiting candidates for congress takes a little level of a little kind of irrational act because you're jumping over without any nothing below and nothing above so if you're like mom emmanuel evaluating you as a competitor what would be your biggest asset and your biggest negative from your perspective if you were like i'm going to get this rom guy oh whoa this is going get this good i'm getting on the couch and we get to make sure blue cross covers that yeah we are yeah yeah yeah so at one level on the positive side and here's how i stand it is putting out ideas from like we did on elementary school and learning and reading and addressing the fifty percent of our kids can't read went to mississippi how to reform our high school so they're less about dilahoma more about college career planning and community college and vocational ed to social media ban basically a wealth of ideas i am tired of having a debate about how to restore past and about how to build a future and that is what i'm like so on that point get an a on the kind of strength and energy that is determined not only for the job bringing there an a game as well id agree and i also think more importantly telling people the truth i'm not going to tell you what you want to hear i'm tell you what i think you need to know and we're in this together rather than trying to fight each other all the time and that's a rare moment for a middle child to say that on the other side is you have a campaign which is slightly about it's not slightly there's a big debate about generational change and i've been around now the good news of that is i think i know the family room i know what i call the classroom the break room the boardroom the situation room and i want the democratic party to get out of the bathroom i'm tired of being there sure right is it i'm just curious is it do you ever worry about like you and i are both i would say difficult people in a good way necessarily and i'm saying that about myself too and let's just let's do it smoother we're ac quired case right that'sired do you i mean because you know there's there's a there's a likeability kind of thing and i like you but do you think about that or is that changed no you know no because first of all i know how i am out with i'm out about people where i was in lacrosse wisconsin in grand rapids michigan in franklin new hampshire or in the what is referred to as south carolina as the corridor of shame and abbeyville ec all the black counties that were ignored by columbia south carolina so i know that on the other hand i am i am i mean again this gets back to this is true for you is true for me it's true for everyone which is your strengths or weakness i'm direct i'm forthright nobody walks away from me go boy was he subtle we didn't really know what he said not very real char what yeah that guy that one level that works at another level it doesn't and but here's the thing i'm at a point in my life this would be the last race i'm going tell you what i think has to happen as i said in twenty twenty four you didn't have a choice twenty twenty eight it's going to be baskin and robbins and i being rocky road right rocky road i'm going to say this is in this moment of where i'm with my therapist miss dr swisher yeah that's me i am liberated in a different place than i've been as president obama's chief of staff or his mayor or ambassador or whatever i'm this is it final race i'm leave it on the field in the sense of we as a country literally have hunger games'm this is about the future we've had two presidents who've argued about restoring a past that's not coming back and either we're going to build that future or we're going to talk about america in past tense and i don't want to do that and i'm not going to sit here on the sidelines commenting about it yeah yeah you've run out of fuck but you never had fucks rom so that's that's kind of an interesting situation this is really interesting i really em fas that you know a lot of people ask me about you i'm like i don't know maybe it's appealing to people right you don't have to be slick you don't have to be likable you know and obiously trump has turned from he had a charisma to something else that's really i you know the one thing i know about presidential politics president obama was an answer to george bush george bush was an answer to bill clinton bill clinton was an answer to the reagan bush years not where's donald trump you're interested in clickes i'm not at that i'm interested in kids knowing calculus you're interested in social media posts great i'm interested in making sure we know our social studies so that's not it and i think where the puck will be in twenty twenty eight isn't about how do you imitate donald trump it's actually how do you act like an adult and i think if we're all honest with ourselves i do look president biden and build back better donald trump's maga is about restoring something that is not coming back the sooner we get to figuring out a future and then how to work together to get that done will will actually matter and the reason all the things i happen to think education is a ticket to the middle class and to families making it and your kids making it the reason i've been so focused on it is you're not getting there with fifty percent of our kids not able to read at grade level you're not getting there when we don't have a plan how to make sure that we have the electricians the carpenters the sailors the nurses or the chemical engineers not just people who know how to do fast trading on the stock market but the engineers that know how to actually build something for the future that to me is more important and if it's not rejected my ego is not hurt i'll have done what i think i think is important to shape the debate and get us focused on the future in a way that i think the last twenty years we've been refocused on the past that' certainly be anti donald trump it can be a little bit as you said i remember you said let's make to twenty twenty six anti donald trump and then we leave him behind in the dustbin like if they win if the democrats yeah i mean twenty twenty six as we' just coming in in the shadows of wisconsin itber it is a referendum on donald trump and a rubber stamp for republicans twenty twenty eight is a choice election and unless we have a compelling story to tell about the future and what we're going to do we won't win that we have to have a compelling story and that is my focus not only for the campaign but more importantly for the country and that also i can tell you from being all over the country we have to make common cause with the largest party in america which is independence non alliance stop talking to ourselves and start talking to the people that will determine because in the last three presidential elections seven states seven hundred thousand voters have determined who's president of the united states and if we don't find common cause with quote unquote independent voters we will continue to be a minority party and that has been my political take you know that was exactly what tom tillis just told me in an interview i did with him last week same thing so let's get to the news then let's talk about what's happening right now and we'll talk a little bit more about the future after that but as it's recording the iran this is an important thing for the future the iran war ceasefire is looking a little shaky there's confusion around the status of the strait of hormuz and the disagreement over whether the truce includes lebanon trump announced a two week ceasefire on tuesday night two weeks is always his magic number he backed down from his threat of the whole civilization would die if the deal wasn't reached jimmy kimmel called it the taco tuesday of all taco tuesday and then of course you know it's you walk back wednesday essentially meghan kelly i'm going to play her i don't usually do it because she gives me a headache wasn't too happy either but listen to this listen to this let's play it now as you can imagine that post did not go over well with the iranians or with many americans i mean i don't know about you but i am sick of this shit i'm just i'm sick of it can't he just behave like a normal human i mean honestly like the president three eight yes shut up fucking shut up about that shit you don't threaten to wipe out an entire civilization we're talking about civilians just casually in a social media post i don't often agree with megan but there you go i think she's sort of articulating what talking on the donald trumpps bringing people together rather than them you like mean kelly thing on the upside in this a new level of humanity in you that's been found towards people you disagree with humanity it's like are you trying to fucking agree with her and i find common cause with marjorie taylor greene right until i talking about some other topics but pope leo is also weighing in calling threat against iranian people truly unacceptable he's in for some reason trump's gotten in a beef with the pope which is terrible in terms of what happens next vice president jd manance is traveling to pakistan for peace talks this weekend along with steve woodkoff and jared kushner dumb and dumber trump says that all u s military personnel and assets will stay near iran until real agreement is reached talk a little bit about this you've been in these rooms like what is it seems like he's not playing chess he's eating the pieces like or something or maybe he's not getting good advice or else he's cognitively has some problems yeah i don't want to i don't want to just say about the room but it's clear there isn't the situation room they've moved it into the oval office and whoever walks in there's a couple doors there's four doors there there's one outside there's one to the where the assistant sit there's one to goes to the roosevelt room and there's one that also goes to the first president's library they've moved it all in there there's not a serious analysis think about this you have secretary vance rather vice president vance is going there you have wykoff and jared kushner with no diplomatic support go back when they were meeting in geneva there was no experts around the nuclear capacity or everything wyckoff and kushner were winging it and it clearly showed because the uk intel officer who was there said iran was actually offering us something very serious in the sense of concessions to avoid the military confrontation and neither kushner or wyckoff understood understood it now i said this jokingly but i'm very serious if they ever do a sequel to dumb and dumber there's going to be a lot of competition for who gets to play the lead in this administration right now the other pieces and you've reled on this and we're talking about what megan kelly said look there's a lot of different roles to the president there is the moral voice for the presidency when the challenger goes down bringing the country downb or nine eleven like president bush there is the commander in chief which is the most solemn position of the president of the united states the commander in chief roosevelt understood it when he said america would be the arsenal of democracy lincoln understood it at the beginning of the war he understood it midway when he did the emancipation proclamation changing the definition of the war we have a president of the united states who has asked fifty plus thousand servicemen and women not counting all the other pieces that are supporting those fifty thousand on the front line to achieve a mission of national security importance for the united states and he's talking about obliterating a civilization you owe the troops a definition of why you owe the servicemen and the country you are the servicemen here's what victory will look like so we've accomplished our goals and here's how it's going to end and this is how we know we have succeeded in one and two none of that by the commander in chief has been accomplished and so when you say to me i have been declaring victory over and over and but this is what i say but here step back underneath what you just said you know and everybody else in the world knows except for people at sixteen hundred pennsylvania nobody believes our president now this has been overused as an anecdote when stevenson goes to see de gaulle during the cuban missile crisis and he's about to take photos out de gaulle says i have the word of the president of the united states i don't need those photos nobody would do that here everybody is looking at our keystone cops at sixteen hundred pennsylvania they know a president of the united states who literally truth is the most flexible thing he's ever seen he doesn't believe in truth he believes in spin and so this is the degradation of the word the credibility and the mantle the president of the president of the united states and more importantly the united states of america because this is a baton that gets handed off so at every level not only did they start not knowing that they actually had accomplished something they were too foolish and stupid and arrogant to know that b they go into a war without clear objectives and then they literally talk about a victory here now i have i thought about the there's two points i would make right now because they went into a war to obliterate to degradate whatever word you want to use the nuclear capacity of iran they already had even tilles was like we obliterated and then we obliterate it again and then now we're going to obliterate it he was even making fun of it iran discovered they have a nuclear operion called the strait of harormuz so first and foremost declare a policy either all ships get out or no ships get out that would cut off iran's economic lifeline to china and would put pressure on both of them two medium term the united nations international maritime group would the strait of hormuz in the sense of a fee that would be split between iran bahrain u kuwait saudi arabia all the countries affected so they don't collect it the united nations an international association does and it's split because the war affected both parties not one party third and doesn't allow iran to control the strait of hormuz which is an international body of water body long term take the abraham accord for the united states is a party to and do three things and use it which doubles down on america as a permanent power in that part of the world which is iran's goal which is to get us out to build pipelines for bahrain kuwait iraq uae and other countries in that region out to the strait of hormuz to the red sea or to oman gulf the gulf of oman that would have a short term medium term long term plan and would also reinforce that the abraham accord the united states has is the vehicle for our gulf allies in countries that don't become now subjugated to iran's blackmail andion coion to me that is the most important now i don't think in fact i can tell you this since i haven't seen a single idea where except for the president says well iran's ten points are pretty good i can't believe a president of the united states a commander in chief a leader of the free world a person with the military instruments that he has just said the other party their term sheet is the term sheet we're going to work off of everybody in the quoting art of the deal you don't use the other side's terms you do not so at every level i find this incredibly dangerous reckless right what's occurring here because his own people are like he doesn't know like what was really interesting about the new york times piece is like they're all running for the hills because they're all telling him wasn't men't me it was him they're pointing fingers at him directly not or at bi netanyahu but they're certainly trying to say i thought it was farcical that's obviously from the head of the cia i thought it was wrong szie wiles et ceter et c yeah no're they're going to let one guy we the guy with the dunce cap gets to keep the dunce cap at the end of this process here's what i would say to you is there are four tools in your national security toolbox military power economic statecraft political persuasion and cultural attraction and you will assemble them differently in different parts of the world in different areas et cetera somewhere in the second term now the president degraded the first three but in the second term as opposed to the first term he's decided military power is the most not only the most important tool the tool he's most comfortable which was not true in the first term he is degraded through tariffs he's degraded through belittering our nato allies and not consulting them and the brand of america from a cultural standpoint so all three of the four tools have been totally drained of any capacity and a person who was risk averse in the first term is now reduced america's national security to a single tool and made it the toolbox and what is dangerous about that is obviously the servicemen and women are becoming literally a play tooy for the commander in chief with no respect for what he's asking of them who have volunteered to serve the national interests of this country and more importantly the other tools are atrophying at this very time and we economically politically culturally as you can see the way he's banging out on nato are more isolated than leading you can't be a leader if nobody is following that was the casualty here our nato allies and our gulf allies and our asian allies are not following the united states they're distancing themselves no they're not so what happens then in that case is what happens next because his own people are distancing themselves also speaking of leaders those all those leaks were fast well and watch what he does now he's going to blame somebody he's now going to the next thing is who he tries to blame and that's kind of a palace coup type palace intrigue game i'm into not that and i understand the lore of that my thing is what do we do to take a generational approach to restore the trust credibility and the capacity of this country how can we with him in the seat he's in the seat and this is my argument both to democrats but also republicans as a country we're americans there's no reset button at the resolute desk i try to lay out a different scenario by different parts of the world how do you assemble these different tools into different kind of stacking orders of priority there's no reset sone when prime minister carney in canada says this is a rupture you're not getting superglue and reassembling we have to earn not only the trust we have to build our strengths that have been atrophying where's the political power where's the cultural persuasion how do we recreate the economic statecraft where again the american economy is central to the world not sidelined and i do think the last twenty five years when you look at this war if you look at covid you look at different things that have happened in the last twenty five years this will be the era of supply chain and will be known as the era of supply chain you took oil take ammonia take petrochemicals of the region you take what happened during covid medical gear etc and the pharmaceutical products to deal with the vaccines this is the era of supply chain chains little things that hold the entire whether it's the strait of hormuz or whether it's the products coming out of the strait of hormuz or whether it's medical supplies and vaccines little things take the entire global economy to a halt and they'll move a drone thousand doll mean i said this the other day and i'll just repeat this you have two countries with no navy but they control both waterways ukraine and iran without a navy we have a theory in america's national security being able to fight two wars simultaneously we're going to have to rewrite it to be able to fight two different wars simultaneously one conventional and one unconventional that said he's still president for a long time even you know you've got maybe to the midterms where he loses a lot of power or three more years what happenens what from your if you had to guess what happens next because they're not these people look like they're not going to keep you have megan kelly saying fuck you you have people in the cabinet clearly leaking saying not us something's got to give or does it i mean someone did stop nixon right someone walked up to pennsylvania republicans i mean yeah yeah i mean i don't want to look i didn't listen to the podcast with senator tillis but you know this is a criticism you were the you were the key vote for hegset becoming secretary of defense i'm sorry well you know okay you don't have to but fact is you have a person with a drinking problem and other types of problems who's now the head of a military who's involved right now in a military political purge of the military the greatest turnaround in american history was the armed forces post vietnam i've worked with the head of the seventh fleet head of indopecom these are incredible men and women amy and i i just want to side note we do a rotc scholarship named after lisa frenchetti the former cno of the she's an incredible capacity fired out of political retribution this is stuff you read in china right and senator tillis who obviously has found his conscience and that's good but you confirmed this person that you knew in your gut was not right now i want to say one thing when i was chief of staff i was an employee when i was senior advisor to presidentint i was an employee how many times i walked into the overval office daily and said no and here's the consequence of you you're a us senator you're independently elected you're your independently elected congressman you have your own voting card you have your own pin for security what are you doing do you imagine they'll do it or are they just waiting for the end i think what's going to happen is the united states congress is going to flip the senate's fifty fifty and you're going to finally have the third branch of government that has been basically in deep freeze for the last two years i said this once privately after a couple months republic right that's yes i said this privately to a republican senator i said you're going to want a democratic president he goes no no i said yeah the reason is you put your manhood in a lockbox and you're finally going to take it out in about three years from now that's what's going to happen you i can't believe these individuals who know better and say it privately under cloaked voice of course and what will happen is elections have as to quote my good friend and my former boss president obama elections have consequences yes we got x months till november republicans is' hear the hear the sound of the footbeat coming you saw that in wisconsin you're going to see it in indiana saw it in north carolina the other day you saw it in georgia and the fact is you're going to have the third branch of government co equal branch finally exert its responsibility and hold this administration accountable you are so you are so you it's just it's a matter of time we're going to move on this but i would agree with you they're suddenly appearing on my podcast so you know what i mean like suddenly they're like hey hey girl i wanted i just so frustrated take take a look at the senator louisiana you confirmed a guy for health and human services can you as a doctor you know is wrong the president turns around flips on you and you try to do that to encourage favor or you know bring favor to yourself and he's going to mess with your reelection and you knew kennedy was not right senator tillis i'm glad he's speaking up i'm glad he found his voice but when your vote was needed he decided you decided to go somewhere now maybe you're making up for lost time but the rest of us most importantly the men and women in uniform have to deal with a secretary of defense who is never qualified for that job and so now for therefore do it again i mean he certainly did the and i hate to use the term kill shot know him but he did he did and some people are like it's too late i'm like but he did it so he has to keep doing it is what you're saying no i mean like that yes yeah yes and you have and you not only have to say that you have to work with others to finally get your vote and your voice to cut a line your vote was not where your voice is or your conscience yeah reach down and grab itway ok rom let's go on a quick break when we come back democrats keep the momentum going with another string of election wins hi i'm brene brown and i'm adam grant and we're here to invite you to the curiosity shop a podcast that's a place for listening wondering thinking feeling and questioning it's going be fun we rarely agree but we almost never disagree and we're always learning that's true you can subscribe to the curiosity shop on youtube or follow in your favorite podcast app to automatically receive new episodes every thursday support for the show comes from mongodb if you're tired of database limitations and architectures that break when you scale it's time to think outside the rows and columns because let's be honest you didn't get to tech to babysit a broken database you got into it to actually build something mongodb lets you do that it's flexible developer first asset compliant enterprise ready and built for the ai era say goodbye bottlenecks and legacy code start innovating with mongodb there's a reason it's trusted by so many of the fortune five hundred and that's because it's a platform built by developers for developers they swear by it literally they call it a great fucking database start building at mongodb dot com slash build how is trump's psychology having an impact on the great power conflict there were folks who for years could never imagine the u s carrying out limited strikes on iran right if you go back to the twelve day war he dropped those bunker busters right and you had presidents through multiple administrations who never would have gone to full scale war with iran and here they are i'm preet berara and this week cnn's chief national security analyst jim shuto joins me to discuss the iran war our fraying alliances and the rise of russia and china the episode is out now search and follow stay tuned with preet wherever you get your podcasts ron we're back democrats notched their biggest shift yet in the house special election dramatically narrowing the gap in georgia's fourteenth trump carried the district by thirty seven points in two thousand and twenty four but even in the race the margin shranked around twelve points a major swing even though the republicans took the win democrats also expanded their majority on wisconsin's supreme court very significant from four to three to five to two and that'll last for a decade i think for something like that or a very long time you recently wrote a piece in the wall street journal titled how democrats can use their coming majority you say investigations of trump won't satisfy voters and that energy will be better spent on a positive agenda you and i have talked about this talk about your ideal plan you just sort of vaguely mention it up to the midterms and assuming they have a strong showing without any nonsense from trump or any highijinks or whatever he's trying to do but it doesn't seem like it's going work in recent days over seventy lawmakers have said trump's cabinet needs to invoke the twenty fifth amendment he's supposed to be in a coma apparently for that but we we'll see don't i don't see them doing that they can hardly speak up in any way talk about the distraction of it because one of the things is if you spend all your time investigating and certain people by the way should be investigated for corruption christy noome corey lewandowski etc as i said in that piece i said there's a difference between corruption and dishonesty right i'm for absolute investigation of all the corruption this is crony capitalism run amok people trading on inside information they have normalized corruption a hundred percent for that you cross the line when it's all about retribution vindication and not addressing what i think is not only the affirmative agenda but i do believe the their corruption i've said it two years ago that's the backdrop so i'm a hundred percent for what did christy gome do at dhs i'm a hundred percent for everything the inspector general have reported and all the type of corruption both inside outside members of famil or the trump guards a lot of the trump a hundred percent for that don't get caught in a game of politics or retribution where then the people go it's just more washington now on the affirmative i think on the affirmative and this was part of that piece if you go back to the presidentials of both president clinton and president obama first terms oh eight in onein ne hundred ninety two what george mitchell does in onein ne hundred ninety forcing president bush to raise taxes and break his pledge on read my lips and what we've did in forcing bush to veto the children's health insurance initiative in two thousand and seven sets up nineteen ninety two bill clinton and sets up president obama two thousand and eight twenty twenty seven and i look at the kind of landscape of all the issues from minimum wage to predictive markets s to health care cost control and or a ratepayers bill of rights i lay out a number of pie ideas in that piece now a part of this politically is determine and you have the senate or not is get a bill on the desk that one creates divisions within the republican party and two either force the president like bush does in one nine hundred ninety or signs a bill or vetoes a bill like president bush does in two thousand and seven on children's health insurance program that creates divisions inside the republican party and advance your agenda that you're ready to take and secure the future so i do think democrat let's just fast forward democrats win both the house and the senate what they do in twenty twenty seven will be as determinative as who we nominate in twenty twenty eight my view this is mine is go to those predictive markets and put a piece of bill legislation on the president's desk that ban all members congress senate executive branch judicial branch staff family from participating in the predictive markets and that there's a division of the criminal justiceies and polyarkets and the reason is and first of all all that can be done by executive order president will not do it because his two sons are investors in it and you drive right there because republicans are there independent voters are there the president united states is not there and i would take that bill and run it right down through one end of pennsylvania avenue to the other and put it on his desk because everybody and i can tell you this from lacrosse wisconsin to franklin new hampshire to abbeyville partner everybody in their gut knows that these prediction markets are being played and manipulated with inside information and yes and people other people are putting their lives at risk while a little nepo babies in palm beach are making money most importantly don jr and the rest of the family and lutni's kids and wick offs kids put it on his desk make him pick his wealth or the american people's democracy and political and economic ob well i already know the answer to that and that's what i mean you asked me that's what i would do because he's going to veto it you were talking about things that you wish would happen probably won't pass you should do like like twenty five dollar minimum wage whatever it happens to be it doesn't have to win you just have to make a stance is what you're talking about right well in one thousand nine hundred in one thousand nine hundred n president bush signs the bill actually does help reduce the deficit but it creates pat buchanan and a republican revolt and twenty republican senators support that but the other twenty five do not in two thousand and seven when we do the children's health insurance bill president bush forty three vetoes it but sixty republican in the house and senate align themselves with democrats what brings us together what divides the other side and whether it's signing or vetoing as i would say to quote that great philosopher when you get to a fork in the road take it and that's what you want to do to the republicans right and you want to constantly be saying what you're for and that says what you're for and even if you fail right is what you're for who you're going to fight for and what the other side is willing to do and i think this president is running a crony capitalist system it's from everywhere it's how much you pay and how much he gets and what you want to do is drive your car right to that division point inside the republican party and the republicans know they're not in on this prediction market in a sense of financial gain the way the trump kids are and the president and i would also talk them sign an executive order yeah do something like that for mr president you've signed all these other executive orders are meaningless here's one that you can do and he won't do it and so drive right there what do you make of these shifts in the democrats have done rather well all over the place right even including in palm beach speaking of palm beach number babies they now have a democrat actually think one thing that slightly didn't get the coverage i mean i went up to wisconsin six weeks ago for the supreme court for rebecca cook in the third district southwest corner in wisconsin battleground state first of all the supreme court candidate does better than any of the other two from a year ago there were democrats in wisconsin in the important county outside of milwaukee that's the republican base that counters the milwaukee vote we now have the county executives the supreme court nominee in the third congressional district the southwest corner where lacrosse is etcer that ron kindn used to represent and is a republican there that trump won the supreme court demor not democratic but the progressive candidate takes fifty seven percent donald trump won that with overwhelming amount that tells you if you win that seat you're winning the majority so when you look at wisconsin at the top all the way down and all the races between it's a unbelievable victory and it says the same thing that you're seeing it's the independence massive energy in the democratic vote base and republican turn out depressed the two the election in north carolina when donald trump endorsed a state senate majority leader the most powerful republican and he loses the republican primary that was more important than mar a lago i get the value of mar a lago's kind of just president i get it but but the fact that he doesn't have power over the republican primary voters that's you want to call liberation day that's liberation day so all you republican congressmen and senat senator tell us that you were scared of your shadow for the last four a year and four years ago you don't have to be scared of your shadow what about texas obviously that well let me see now in the senate in texas i think that you have a republican primary that ends up it doesn't matter who wins in one level they're going to both be a weakened candidate for the general election that's what i think and you know and i happen to one thing i would also say to my fellow democrats when you look at the health care for president obama or the ira the the climate bill under president biden under the health care bill senator nelson from nebraska helps us pass that it's the sixieth vote and the senator from west virginia helps pass the ira if you don't win in purple to red states as a democrat we're not going to get the type of economic and politicalisl social legislation we want the two most significant pieces of legislation democrats passed in the last twenty years they clinch the vote with a senator from a state that is not quote unquote safe blue so winning in ohio winning in north carolina winning in texas winning in iowa winning in places democrats have not presidentially won is how you secure the type of legislation and the majority you need yeah i think it's really interesting and i just met ta rico i call him the baby jesus anyway one of the things of course look democrats are not slathering themselves in perfection right now has trump wited into the california governor's race this week by endorsing former fox news host steve hilton who we know very well actually mostly as a husband of someone i know very well but i actually know steve my favorite steve thing is he was lecturing me on populism and the elites when he was staying at the bel air hotel and i was like i can't afford this fucking place my friend like and you're telling me about like elites anyway he's a funny guy actually there might be good news for democrats the trump backing there but democrats have been worrying about a doomsday scenario with the state's jungle primary if people don't know it's's there's not primaries as who the top two are if the two gop candidates hilton and sheriff chad bianco and exactly what he sounds like first and second in the primary democs to be locked out in the general election it's a concern and there's eight democrats in the race with no clear front runner but by consolidating gp support behind hilton trump may have helped reduce the chances and i've noticed both jane vnd and ro khanna are backing the billionaire which is unusual tom steyer which is fine like all the left went crazy but i'm like well he's he's different he's not like he's not mark zuckerberg let me just be clear but that said there's all kinds of you know issues there with what's happening there and you've got you know a number of candidates that each have a little chunk it's not like one has the biggest chunk so i'm sitting there i'm like where's nancy pelosi hitten heads or where's newsom or what's what is happening there and you i'm sure you've spoken to them if you're running the democratic part what'sing in the democratic party what has to happen there in order to like knock people out they don't seem to be leaving any of them it looks like yeah i don't well you know california is not chicago right right we something wrong with their signatures and not some that right yeah you know you're not going on the ballot on this one you want another race that's but you know i don't you know i have no idea what i think the leadership of the party has stood back i part of me wonders whether kamala harris thinks again like maybe i made a mistake i should have gone for that office etc gi when you look at the field i think this is a jump ball you got to i look at it from a distance but about four candidates all kind of hovering within two points from each other and so my guess is the leadership of the party doesn't want to put their thumb on the scale prefir looking like they don't have the leadership that they thought they did so what happens it could be is that a bad thing for you know i do buy the conventional wisdom that the president's endorsement of mr hilton is a kiss of death and i think that will bear out and i what happens eventually there's a coalescing that trigger hasn't happened yet but i instinctly believe it will happen well how the papers endorse what something will happen that will tr that will be a conversion that will convert the moment it will be a catalytic conversion of the moment and ' be a coalescing around a singular or two candidates that catapult to the front of the class right now they're kind of bunched together possibly it's really intoind do you remember the movie face off where they're all pointing guns at each other that's what it feels like someone's got to put the gun down you know and then the pigeons fly it's a little early for that but you'll get that you'll get that you'll get is there any candidate you think will emerge of all those candidates i'm not close enough to that race to i mean in the back of my head i'm it will be a democrat and you know there's ninety percent of them agree on the same thing so it won't matter now i could you know obviously this is electoral politics so it could be totally wrong but so far i believe that there will be a coalescing at the very end at least around one if not two candidates and the rest will really be seen as a wasted vote the one good news is the president's endorsement is going to force the democrats to kind of shape up real quickly shape up really quickly interesting it's a real it's a real wrinkled s steve is like are they hitting i mean my thing my thing is look take iowa and take ohio and then take florida and georgia and i'll tell you why on those is ohio the democratic nominee for governor which was in governor dewines's public health official she's ah head in iowa you have an open senate also an open governor and the state auditor in iowa is in a very strong position been elected twice already statewide for the governor's raates and we're going to have a pretty competitive nominee i think for the senate and i think what's happening because of what the president did to the rural economy the corn soybean wheat farmers they're going out of business and they're going out of business the rural economy is really hurting this war has really touched them down fertilizers etc you're going to see something in the midwest in the prairie states that's going to come bite the republicans right where they need to be bitten and kicked in then you go down to georgia and florida in both cases in the democratic primary are former republican elected officials who've decided that the republican party under donald trump iss not their home anymore the democrats are whether they get out of the primary or not i'm not sure but there is a ten to twelve percent of republicans and i've also seen this going all over the country who don't identify with donald trump not sure about the democrats they all you know they say way too left for them culturally politically economically but you have a fraction of voter i call traditional republicans that rather than look at this election or the future elections as transactional we should look as transformational they have chosen those two candidates in florida and georgia to see themselves and their future politically more at with a democratic party than republicans at least for now right to the beginning right well that is the first steps towards a realignment of coalitions and we as a party have to look at these elections and i'll give you onealysis okay in twoenty twenty you had what i call joe biden republicans and the real question was are we going to govern with the idea of making that transformational or transactional and one of the mistakes i think made in the biden administration was rather than try to unite the country a lot of my time was spent trying to unite the party and we lost the bigger narrative in that process right that's a very fair point i'm going to move on to some business stuff lots going on in this area of ai have something that you've written about a lot and you and i have talked about social media and everything else now in this case elon musk wants to have openai ceo sam altman and president greg brockman removed from the company as part of a case claiming the company deceived him into donating thirty eight million dollars i was there when that happened actually meanwhile open i sent a letter to the california and delaware ags alleging mesk has been working to undermine openai through various attacks including by working with mark zuckerberg i mean this is true s jury selection begins in this high profile trial where the tech is sort of eating each other like it's a really interesting time and while we're talking about ai hopefulness among ai among young people has dropped to eighteen percent from twenty seven percent last year you're welcome every at tech i'm glad to help it do that almost a third of young adults say ai made them feel angry and speaking of young shortly after he filed his spacex ipo last week speculation is growing about a merger with tesla i've been saying this would happen let's listen to a clip from last april it looks like he's not interested in making cars anymore or he's making other things he wants to shift tesla and i think you're going to merge xai x and this together in a big tesa alliance yeah yeah i had already predicted that he would put twitter into grock and then they would bring into spacex and it made sense for a lot of things so meaning a roll up yeah and actually there's a storyian wruters are going to possibly make a cheaper ev which he should have done four years ago but that's another issue that's the only answer for tesla given how the numbers are declining he has to either have a great car or he has which he's not seemingly interested in a really great car that sort of wins everything or he has to merge them alether and then he can hide the losses pretty easily in this spectacular ipo that's going to happen with spacex so which is hugely overvalued but that's all right people are going to buy into it so talk a little bit about what's happening here in ai because there's a whole shift of people not trusting these people you know it's sort of like a pox on all their houses which side do you want to pick altman or musk or these people or david sachs who's like pushing the president even as the numbers are declining i think there's three categories that i kind of take back from this week one is the tech bros all basically urinating on each other's leg was telling you the other guy it's raining outside and americans aren't going to stand for sit on the sidelines literally while altman and dario and elon musk all play and fight with each other like little kids in the sandbox with without adult supervision the second is both open ai and anthropic withhold product because it's too risk dangerous right i was going to mention that too these are these are new products that they have coming that they're worried about security issues and now they brought a coalition together to try to patch things but quite dangerous but go ahead and then the third thing which is whether forget the motivation sam altman puts out a kind of updated ai new deal i sa social contract to compete in my but again i shouldn't do that because i said don't put aside the motivation with dario owns view which is this is going to be so disruptive we have to figure out not only the product and the industry but also how we include the american people in this so it's a net win rather than three guys win and three hundred and thirty three million lose those three boxes are they're all overlapping now i step back also as a former mayor and chief of staff to a president in massive changing times the government is set up to kind of set up a regulation wait thirty years to see if it work which is an industrial model and you're in the post analog post digital into something totally different and i do think when you look at dario and openai deciding not to put a product out forget the boys acting like boys they are begging for oversight and rules and they're making it up as they go the government needs industry leaders academics and economists in real time to be making decisions in real way we can't rely on two ceos social conscience to say i'm withholding a product because it's dangerous while i appreciate that they did that that is not how this is going to work so we're going to have to have a board that is required to update its rules and regs and oversight in real time with an industry that's changing at a pace the government's not used to there's going to have to be principles that guide it now is the threat from china real a hundred percent it's real from a competitive standpoint which i find one side note we're a country with a lot of social whether you think it should be expanded social insurance our country is fearful from ai china has none of the social infrastructure underneath it so if you fail to get support health care unemployment etc and yet they're hugely optimistic about ai the countries are in different places given the support that the public sector and i find that justit as a student they do a lot more monitoring of it the government does much more monitoring than we do that confidence that somebody's going to control and that you're not going to be left out on the sideline so to me we're going have to have a real and i do think this regardless of whatever my personal view the two sam altman's kind of social contract dario's view that foranthropic that we need a kind of a new agreement which is the difference between kind of capital versus labor but how ai will what i say democratize the benefits of ai to more people from both skills but also jobs and economic opportunity and if you don't american people are going to call data centers rebellion against that is just minor compared to what's going to happen and the government's going have to step in and do this from an executive branch standpoint but te the tech people are still aside from those guys like david sachs was like how dare you do this this is our greatest thing and is pushing trump even as this is happening and he has been integral to what i think has been a disaster for the tech industry in terms of their imagery right they look like villains now they're villains now they're the villains and young people get it i mean they're villains and they're actually also they want to take all the benefit and you're just going to live in their world now i'm sorry that's not how a democratic capitalist system works there is real opportunity look given the competitiveness with china this is going to be one like fusion like quantum computing etc like life sciences one of the dominant technologies of the future but it's not going to be three winners and three hundred thirty three million losers that's right not how we're keeping score and in the end of the day like everywhere else industry likes regulations because it sets rules guidelines and princies correct when you go back to what's happening like insider training that for the fact that businesses are not calling that out this is going to come back to bite you right in the butt that's what i said i you know it's interesting when i saw those statistics and then david sechs yammering on about it i was like you know david sit the fuck down because the american people don't like what you're doing so and trump is stupid to listen i would like to say but you have dropped the f bomb three times i'm at zero just for the record i'm sorry i know i know i know i know you can do it any time that's all your brotherers thing that's more your your elderly broth's thing you will never find me ever saying it publicly i know i hope we're do i know you don't i'm just telling you that's your brother i have a tape of him yelling at me like because i know even though my mother even though my mother is deaf she'll hear it and coming back scared to grab me i have a voice scared of your brother saying cares fuck you so i'm gonna keep it for the rest of i make think you were making it it was probably a term of endearment it was it was it's because he didn invite me to some party anyway i don't want to go to his parties it doesn't matter but happy birthday all right rom let's go on a quick break when we come back we'll talk about rfk getting into the podcast game up yet p delt to ala cart onvana house itpt afana cantun kasen kalter on their shop apppputeer app comanaa schrebuns flisting medidicam and direct suit i'm for e eln ktun kasen kalter met ireceptra andhightiten onmitum e sepra about automato swituitsant medidicam andpan a suits are along and u mit pus dela productor n shmi d then proious y house in their shop apppputeer app rom we're back with just one more quick story i regret to inform you that rfk is launching a podcast you know it's trouble now the pod will focus on telling the truth especially when it's uncomfortable in confronting the spiritual malaise let's watch a clip of the announcement i guess it's not quite as bad as his strange porn movie with kid rock but let's go if we want a healthy nation we have to confront the lies that have made us spiritually morally and physically sick the time for half measures is now over we're launching a new era of radical transparency and government here at hhs i hope you'll join us in our mission to make america healthy again oh my goodness and of course just as there is news in the washington post that they're trying to suppress a cdc report that vaccines are good for you covid vaccines so just transparent bobby yeah was going it gives a whole new meaning to what transparency is not yeah so is he just preparing for his next career when he gets bounced or what what is happening and i hope are you co hosting his podcast now look first of all two things one is he's preparing that but it's also to airbrush his past he has been an absolute horrible secretary of health and human services on every measure outside of what's happened with opiates and he has nothing to do with it yeah best friend to measles is what i call him best friend to me yes measles the lack of confidence in the american cdc our other types of our life sciences our capacities our health care costs everything that he has touched in the great tradition of this administration is broken it needed repair it needed to be strengthened and across the board you cannot walk from a single agency or department and he's been the kind of a point of the spear it's the largest domestic agency in the united states health and human services and he has made a mess of it and the people he's appointed have made a mess of it from cdc to nih to medicare and medicaid and they have done nothing to measurably improve the health of the american people and i will say say having dealt with this as both chief of staff but more importantly when i helped pass aaca or president clinton's children's health insurance but as mayor of the city of chicago eight percent of our workforce was driving seventy percent of our health care costs around chronic illnesses heart obesity etc he could have focused on something that actually moved the needle in both dropping health care costs and improving public health and rather than bring the c together like everything in this administration never lose an opportunity to divide americans have they have from the president to his cabinet have found multiple opportunities to divide people and literally repressed examples where they could actually bring people together of different political views to work on a common issue and shame on doctors and the senate who voted for him i mean not just the republican well that gets back to you know it senator cassidy is going to pay the price like senator tillis for having basically taking your conscience and put it in a lockbox when the vote came and you knew what was right you took the politically expedient case and i don't want to draw this to myself but since i'm on i'll draw it to myself i can't tell you how many times i used to walk into clinton's office or president obama was well i said you're out of your mind if you do this this is the christ i'm going let you lay it out to you you'll have a debate about it they understand the consequence of this i was an employee get out of here you're an independent u senator i was a congress i was a man you got elected you have a responsibility to what the trustm gave and i'll tell you what till has told me you know what a martyr is he's dead like he was he was like you can't you can't operate from a position of dead and i still was like i don't care be dead then you know what i mean because you'll you'll have inspired someone well that he may say that politically he may say that politically but that vote gave a license to a guy to do a political purge or the greatest military forces this country did the greatest turnaround this country did i've worked with these men and women at all levels the amount of dedication the amount of understanding of politics culture history working diplomatically working militarily excess doesn't hold a candle yeah neither same thing with rfk so you won't be listening to his podcast in other words anyway no all right one more quick break we'll be back for predictions okay ron let's hear prediction there's so many things keep it brief we got just a little time i want to play one thing at the end from nasa from the artemis but what is your prediction prediction that nobody will be held accountable for playing the games in the prediction market with the decider okay so the ftc the sec the justice department not only are asleep they're in on the scam nobody for now nobody for now under this administration until they're held accountable can i do one thing personally sure please absolutely all right my son runs a two hour thirty nine minute marathon he did it in bostonz he's going to run the boston marathon again i think he'll have a personal best oh he ran it two hour thirty nine which was incredible it is marathon i think i think this coming boston journey again he's going to get a personal best oh that's very sweet it's both a prediction a hope and a wish and i'm very proud of them oh that is amazing you should run with them no i'm not no that amy runs marathon and i would say we're going to have to do a test because i don't know who your father is i have no idea about this man the kids are an incredible runner okay and that rights i want to leave of thing of hope speaking of hope that's wonderful i one of the things i did feel i think americans really start really watch this artemis flight that done by nasa it was sort of a wonderful moment all americans it was the numbers are quite high which is wonderful nasa and they did a great job on social media and this crew is just so wonderful men hugging and crying and saying wonderful things and laughing and it just has been a real it's a wonderful group of people up there and it sort of represents the best of america in that regard kind and good hearted nasa is preparing for the return of artemis i after this historic moon fly by these pictures are delightful and amazing and astonishing and it also makes you appreciate earth let's listen to a clip from crew member christina cook after the spacecraft passed by the moon we will explore we will build we will build ships we will visit again we will construct science outposts we will drive rovers we will do radio astronomy we will found companies we will bolster industry we will inspire but ultimately we will always choose earth we will always choose each other just what you were talking about rom mak her the head of nasa i actually think it was a perfect an tyifical spirit to what you're seeing out of this administration we'll choose earth and we'll choose each other and we'll do things period where we did a war of choice yeah it was and it touched look i do think there's this yearning out there to actually not see our fellow americans as the enemy or the it could be an opponent but from a political standpoint but it's not your enemy and i thought she touched that human kind of spirit and also most importantly for the united states that's something we can unify around i don't know about you i get on the you know open my ipad first thing i do is see the pictures they're sending they're beautiful and look at the i looked at the earth from that eclipse photo which i thought was most beautiful shot and then it was also complimmentary the web telescope put out new pictures of the galaxy and it's just there's it kindles and it's and it has that little light that illuminates in you of something that you can as you said hopeful proud and optimistic about and i thought her message was just beautiful to beifily like the pope's we have a beautiful planet anyway we want to hear from you send us your questions about business tech or whatever's on your mind go to nymag dot com slash pivot submit a question for the show called eight five five five one pivot elsewhere in the karen scott universe this week my new cnn show carara swisher wants to live forever is premiering this saturday april eleventh at nine p m eastern scott is actually going to interview me at the premiere in new york tonight and also your brother zeke is in it and he's hysterical he and i are wearing colonial garb together and we had a ball he god he he's really good it's the making of a star anywayre all you're all fascinating the emmanels anyway thank you so much for joining me today there's never a dull moment that's the show thanks for listening to pivot and be sure to like and subscribe to our youtube channel willll be back next week scott will be back from wherever the hell he's gone and we're excited to have him back but all the guest hosts kristen saltz anderson rom and anthony scaramucci have been amazing and i really appreciate it i'm going to read us out today's show was produced by lara naman zoe marcus and taylor griffin ernie edot engineered this episode manolo moreno edited the video nashat kerwa is vox media's executive producer of podcasts make sure to follow pivot on your favorite podcast platform thanks for listening to pivot from new york magazine and vox media you can subscribe to the magazine at nymag dot com slash pod we'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business rom for president