\n<\/p>\n
Oh, I love it when you get the war manual out. Oh, who doesn\u2019t love that. I just carry it with me to parties. You\u2019re both in my town this week. How\u2019s D.C. treating you. Have you. Have you popped down to the White House yet to check out Melania\u2019s infamous Christmas decor. Come on, I hope you\u2019re well. When am I not in the White House. I mean, really, I mean, you are a man of the Trump era. I just walk in, I walk into D.C. and they\u2019re just there with open arms. So the gold is beautiful. They rolled out the gold carpet for you. Well, I would only say the problem is not enough gold. If there was just a little more gold, I would be I would feel happy. O.K, note I don\u2019t know anything about this Christmas display I have not paid a lick of attention to it. Melania every year has put up some vaguely disturbing one year it was blood red trees. One year it was like the White witch of Narnia with everything, kind of dead and crystally, so I always look forward to what she\u2019s doing. I kind of admire that. I admire her being weird about Christmas. Well, well, there you go. Jamelle is firmly on the let\u2019s get weird about Christmas train. All right, so let\u2019s get down to it this week. In addition to Christmas, we\u2019re talking about the president\u2019s popularity among the American people, but also specifically within his own party. So I want to start with this week\u2019s special election for the House in Tennessee\u2019s seventh district. David, it\u2019s right in your backyard. Last year, as you know. Trump easily won it by more than 20 points. But then earlier this week, the GOP candidate won by just nine. And this was after the party sank millions into shoring him up. What does this tell you about what\u2019s going on. Like it\u2019s being seen even though the Democrats lost, its being seen as a very bad sign for the president and his party. Yeah, for good reason. But before we start, let me establish my Tennessee seven street cred here for a minute. Please do. O.K, so that\u2019s my old district. It was my district until late May of this year. So this is where I spent a lot of time. My sister-in-law was the campaign manager for the current Republican mayor in the town, Franklin. That is part of that district. My brother-in-law is the chairman of the school board in Williamson County, which is a big part of the district is Williamson County. I\u2019ve been living, eating, breathing these local politics for a while now. And I think here\u2019s a good way to understand what\u2019s going on. What you\u2019re looking at is the beginning of the fragmentation of the G.O.P. after the Trump era. So if you look at the presidential numbers, that district overwhelmingly Republican loves them some Donald Trump. So plus 22 I believe in 20 and in 2024 for Trump. And I think if you had Trump on there on the ballot right now, it would still be close to that. At this point, supporting Trump is just a matter of identity for a lot of Republicans. It\u2019s beyond normal political debate. But if you lift up the rock here, you will know that in Tennessee. There have been vicious Republican on Republican fights for years. And really, it\u2019s the fight is between the more establishment what you might call Reagan Bush wing of the party and the new insurgent part of the party. And those two factions don\u2019t get along locally at all. So Moms for Liberty, for example, when it was trying to ban the book, \u201cRuby Bridges Goes to School\u201d from the elementary school curriculum. A lot of the people who resisted that were Republicans. When Moms for Liberty had a big slate of candidates that it was running in local elections. And when you had more radical candidates running for, say, mayor, you had big, intense fights. And these were not between Democrats and Republicans. There\u2019s not a ton of Democrats there. I mean, my neighborhood was 85 percent Republican. It was gerrymandered. Last go around. Oh, totally. And so what you\u2019re seeing, I think, is the beginning of the Division of the Republican Party post-Trump. Now you\u2019re getting into I don\u2019t like these MAGA guys. I\u2019m tired of this. And I think that that\u2019s one of the real stories going forward. Jamelle, what do you think about it as far as the election results go. Two things really strike me. The first is just the swing. Like a 13 point swing for a special election. That\u2019s like. That\u2019s striking. And what\u2019s even more interesting is that it\u2019s more or less the exact same swing that happened in New Jersey and Virginia as well, of course, because those are Democratic leaning states. It resulted in big Democratic wins, but they have having these same swing in a kind of a suburban district in a very different political environment suggests that actually just might be where the nation is right now, a 13 point swing away from Republicans, especially in suburban areas. And I\u2019ll say, the Republican Party nationally is basically being sustained by overwhelming dominance in rural areas. And then being able to win majorities in conservative suburbs. But if the second part of that equation begins to deteriorate, then it\u2019s big trouble everywhere. At the end of the day, most Americans live in suburbs. It\u2019s just a numbers game. And you really cannot sustain a big national majority. And so if I were looking at this from a 30,000 foot viewpoint, that is the thing that would really be keeping me up. Away, up, keeping me up at night. If I were a Republican strategist, what\u2019s going on in these suburbs. And are Democrats simply mobilizing more voters, or was this some persuasion. Is this some people switching sides. And the fact that turnout appears to be about 90 percent of the 2022 midterm turnout, which is insane. Typically, special election turnout is among the lowest turnout you can get. That\u2019s why they\u2019re not particularly representative of future trends. But if you\u2019re getting general election esque numbers in a special election and then you\u2019re getting a 13 point swing on top of that, then that does suggest a good amount of persuasion happening that people who voted for Republicans in the 2022 cycle voted for the Democrat in this special election cycle. And that. If it\u2019s like a big national swing and then there\u2019s persuasion happening as well. Persuasion just general term for people switching sides, switching sides. Then that\u2019s like early retirement. That\u2019s like if I\u2019m a Republican lawmaker, it\u2019s like I\u2019m going to after Christmas announce that I intend to spend more time with my family going will be interesting to see what kind of retirement announcements we get that always kicks up after they\u2019ve gone home and spent some time. But one of the things that I am interested in as well is if you\u2019re talking about a 13 point swing, this could make life very interesting in those places that Donald Trump has been pushing to redistrict. So then we get into lots of dummy mandering. If you\u2019re talking about a big swing, what starts out looking like you\u2019re rigging things for your team could wind up meaning that you\u2019ve actually rigged yourself out of some seats. Because if you\u2019re looking at a really big swing the way they gerrymander is they take these safe seats and they shuffle things around so that you still have a red district, but it\u2019s not quite as red. So maybe instead of being plus 10 Republican, it shrinks down to plus 4 Republican. But if you\u2019ve got a big national swing, then you could lose some of those seats, which I think would be really just kind of magic karma. That would be sweet. The other thing I\u2019ll say is that in a lot of these gerrymandered districts, you have lawmakers that just aren\u2019t used to competitive elections, competitive partisan elections, right. But if you\u2019ve been coasting along in a gerrymandered district and you all of a sudden have someone out for blood on the other side or someone really hungry and you\u2019re the winds are against you as well, then it\u2019s like you\u2019re in, you\u2019re in a bad place. Well, I\u2019m glad you said that, Jamelle, because if you look at the dynamics in the race in Tennessee, Afton being the Democratic candidate, she worked hard. She worked really hard. So she leaned into the race. And I think that that\u2019s one of the things that led to this sudden alarm from the National Republican Party that, wait, what. This race could be close. And then trust me, they poured in. The results came in on both sides. Oh, I mean $3.5 million, I think, for the Republican candidate. Yes it was nuts for special. It was unreal. I mean, my phone I\u2019m still on all these text. Donald Trump personally texted me multiple times to urge me. Yes, I felt \u2014 Yeah, absolutely. But the other thing is that\u2019s very I think, ominous for Republicans here is that they were down 13 points running against a left wing Democrat. This is somebody who\u2019s called locally the A.O.C. of Tennessee Yeah that\u2019s not a good. That\u2019s not a compliment in Tennessee for those that\u2019s not a match. She wasn\u2019t a match for the district. So what happens if you have Democratic candidates who are closer matches for the district. Does that eke out another 4 percent to 5 percent Maybe we\u2019ll see if the Democratic Party is, which is a big ask. Thinking strategically like next time around, find someone who\u2019s a better fit for the district. Like actively recruit and run again. You\u2019ve kind of just softened the ground for a potential flip in the next cycle. And so they can play everywhere. Next they need to play everywhere. I\u2019m a big believer in this thing of it\u2019s actually important to lose in ways that lay the ground for future wins. You\u2019re not going to win all the time, but you can but running good campaigns on a regular basis builds up an infrastructure. It builds up familiarity and creates the conditions oh, maybe I can win in this next thing. So what we\u2019re looking at now is a loss that nonetheless a Democratic loss that nonetheless has the Republican Party, especially those in Congress, super nervous. And when that happens, people start assessing, well, what do I need to do to survive next year during the midterms. Trump\u2019s not going to be on the ballot. Trump\u2019s popularity is in the toilet. A lot of things not really going his way. How much do I start. Need needing to distance myself from him. So we\u2019ve been seeing some splits. Like most notably, this boat strike kerfuffle this week has prompted not one, but both chambers of Congress to announce investigations with the Armed Services Committees. The chairmen of those committees saying, we got to get to the bottom of this. Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of War, is taking a lot of heat on this. And I want to know how you guys think about this. I mean how serious a problem is this, either the individual issue or just what it portends? I would say if you\u2019re looking at this, there are a couple of there are a couple of factors here. One is if you are a Republican for 10 years now, the main and especially a Republican member of the House, the main threat to your career has been the disapproval of Donald Trump. But if you have a situation where they\u2019re looking at potentially a 12 to 15 to 18 point group swing in the Democratic direction, then all of a sudden you get to numbers like 50, 60, 70, 80 Republicans who the primary threat to their career now begins to shift to become the general election voter. And if the general election voter is the primary threat to their career, then you\u2019re going to see more people standing up. Because once now, their career is at stake in a different way. And it\u2019s not that now they may have re they\u2019ll cast it as I am outraged morally. Cast it in these moral and strategic terms. But for many of them, it\u2019s just the career. Calculus is shifting. So Jamelle, how have you been viewing this boat boat strike dustup, which for those who may not pay attention. Trump has been the Trump administration has been blowing up boats in the Caribbean saying that they are running drugs, which this is not necessarily an unpopular move with a lot of his voters. But there is one episode where there was a second strike that may or may not have been ordered on some survivors, which may or may not constitute a war crime. And so that\u2019s what\u2019s got everybody completely up in arms. So what have you been looking at in particular with all this, Jamelle. So I want to say real quick, just on the substance of all of this, that this is reprehensible. I\u2019m laughing, but. We\u2019re not at war with Venezuela, right. We\u2019re not at war with Venezuela. Like, there\u2019s none of that. The administration has provided no evidence that these boats are trafficking drugs. And these boats are in international waters. So the administration presents it as we\u2019re destroying terrorists, but take away their spin. What\u2019s actually happening is the U.S. Navy, under orders from the president, is blowing up random boats in the Caribbean and saying, oh, they\u2019re terrorists, which on a broad scale, even under the most expansive vision of the Unitary Executive. Article II does not grant the president the right to make a unilateral designation that someone is a terrorist going to be murdered by the state. That\u2019s not a power the president has. So like, I\u2019m sorry. I\u2019m getting animated. I feel I like the passion, I like it Yeah, I am at this point right now where I won\u2019t even describe these as potential war crimes. This is criminal murder. Like if you were and this alleged double tap, if it is the case that we did an illegal strike first of all, and blew up this boat. We have no idea who these people were. They could have just been innocent fishermen. And then there is a second strike at two survivors, which is a no no, David, which is you\u2019re the expert, which is total. No, no, I mean, all respect to David and I will defer to his expertise, but I\u2019ll say this has been a no no since there\u2019s been war. This is like if you go back to antiquity, you\u2019ll have people observing. You can\u2019t do that. It\u2019s recognized as a part of human civilization, that if there are survivors floating in the water, you have an obligation to at least not kill them. I just watched the second Pierce Brosnan James Bond movie, \u201cTomorrow Never Dies,\u201d and in that film, one of the inciting incidents by the villain is exactly this the villain has his soldiers blow up a ship and then kill the survivors. And it\u2019s a huge international incident in the world of the film, as it should be. And so I just I really want to say how absolutely morally reprehensible this is. And if it is the case that Pete Hegseth ordered that second strike, that in my view, he should be arrested and held criminally liable for homicide because that\u2019s what it is. So my suspicion is that there were plenty of Republicans who were very squishy about this, but they were still kind of going along. Again, you don\u2019t want to get Trump upset with you. And this just gives them an opportunity, combined with all of the other softening of his popularity and getting their clocks cleaned in the November elections, this is just their opportunity to separate themselves from something they were really unhappy about anyway. And I think your suggestion, Michelle, that if Trump were not if this were February of this year, you might not have. So much speaking up. It\u2019d be much more maybe behind the scenes like, we should be doing this. But the fact that polls are consistently showing Trump in the mid seconds to the very low 40s. it\u2019s like this guy. For comparison\u2019s sake, when George W. Bush left office in 2009, his approval was about 33 percent right. So like Trump right now is in late stage W territory. Well, this is one of the things I\u2019m thinking about in general. I think the calendar has come into play here. He is a second term president. He is a lame duck. And you combine that with his kind of sliding popularity. He\u2019s underwater on pretty much all the issues, even immigration, which he was doing pretty well for a while there. That was the last thing to go. And then they had that very upsetting kind of off year November election that is always seen as a referendum on the president. So yeah, if we were back in February or if he were popular or if he were not a second term president, all of those things could make a difference. But because we are where we are, I think he is entering a phase that\u2019s just going to be increasingly frustrating for him because there is, on balance, going to be more and more impetus for Republican lawmakers to try and separate themselves. So it is telling to me that in all of this, 99 percent of the heat is being aimed at Hegseth and not Trump. And so we\u2019re still in this dynamic where the permission structure allows Republicans to fight each other. One layer below Trump, but still not really about Trump. But just to Jamelle\u2019s point. And I\u2019m very glad that Jamelle interjected and brought this point in. And you\u2019re very kind to say that I have expertise, but I will say that expertise here is not necessary in the slightest. Just literacy. Literacy O.K, so let me read. Let me read from page 1088 of the Department of Defense law of war manual. Oh, I love it when you get the war manual out. Oh, who doesn\u2019t love that. I just carry it with me to parties because people are fun at parties. Oh, I\u2019m the best. So the requirement to refuse to comply with orders to commit law of war violations applies to orders to perform conduct that is clearly illegal, or orders that the subordinate knows, in fact, are illegal. For example, orders to fire upon the shipwrecked would be clearly illegal. What are we doing here. That\u2019s just black and white stuff right there. And I agree with everything that Jamal said about the underlying legality of the actual strikes themselves. There\u2019s no congressional authorization. There\u2019s no act of war. Crime is not war. Suspected criminals are not terrorists. And if you want to see the absurdity of it all, you\u2019ll see that the administration is saying, well, the second strike was fine because these terrorists or these drug runners, whatever, were, quote, still in the fight. What fight to a boat. What fight. And it\u2019s interesting how you can see how this just doesn\u2019t fit within the war paradigm. So for example, if you are in war at the high seas and a ship is burning, you can keep firing on that ship until it ceases fire or it strikes its colors. So this is designed for Navy on Navy combat. What\u2019s the equivalent here. I mean, the speedboat is going down, and then all of a sudden it blows up. It\u2019s one of the surviving members of the crew supposed to say, strike the colors, lads. The Navy has bested us. No. What are we doing here. And so this is being treated with summary executions that we would call murder in America. If you\u2019re in America and you see somebody running away and you think that they have drugs, you can\u2019t gun them down. You can\u2019t even gun them down if they have drugs. With crime and traditionally we have used we have used the Coast Guard. We have used military assets for drug interdiction in the past. But what we do. We stop, we search and we arrest, and then we prosecute. And guess what. That\u2019s better. That\u2019s better than just blowing people up because you can\u2019t question a dead person. I want to expand this back beyond just the boat strike incident to he. President Trump is taking an awful lot of heat over his Ukraine peace plan. People have gotten from his congressional team. People are pushing back on that. The Jeffrey Epstein mess was an abject disaster for him. There are a few cracks that he can\u2019t quite control. Mike Johnson had to tell the White House, the speaker had to tell the White House that the president\u2019s idea for expanding Obamacare subsidies was not playing in the House. And these things they can always come back to this and visit again. But people are starting to say, no, I don\u2019t think I\u2019m just going to go along immediately. We\u2019re going to fight this out a little more. And I do think that while you\u2019ll see it targeted at one level below Trump, resisting Trump\u2019s will or complaining about Trump\u2019s policies is going to become a more common thing. And I don\u2019t think that it helps that there\u2019s this sense that Trump, in addition to being a lame duck, is also slipping. I mean, there have been another story about how he keeps falling asleep during the Oval Office meetings, things like that. I think once people start smelling blood in the water or little virility slippage, that just is going to accelerate this whole process. I\u2019ll also say, presidents, able, capable presidents. This is a good one capable ones can respond to events. They can make course adjustments to try to recover their public standing because they recognize that they need public opinion, public support is an important resource that they have to Marshal in order to pursue their agendas. And part there\u2019s a couple I mean, there are many problems with Trump. One of the. Just political problems is that because he isn\u2019t really that interested in governing, because he\u2019s mostly interested in self-aggrandizement and lining its pockets, it seems like he\u2019s not so responsive to public opinion in the way that a president with an actual governing agenda might be responsive to public opinion, and he has no desire or sees no point in trying to recoup or save or Marshal those resources for future agenda items. And then he himself personally is like as a personality does not have any other mode, but relentless escalation. And so if he\u2019s entering a situation where his popularity is on the decline, where he seems to be a lame duck, there are precedents right from past presidents for how you might handle that situation. He can\u2019t do it like on a very basic level, he can\u2019t do it. And so one thing I think to look ahead. There\u2019s going to there will be crises. There will be challenges. Is the president equipped either politically or psychologically, to handle them in a way that might bolster his standing with the public. And I think the answer is no. And so I\u2019m not going to make any predictions, but I will say it feels as if right now is the most popular he\u2019s going to be. Well, I have A.I. have a basic question going backwards. Do we think he knows what the situation is like. Who\u2019s going to tell him. I mean, is JD Vance, who basically is sucking up as hard as he can at any given moment. Is he going to March in there and say, sir, we have a problem. I mean, who\u2019s in that position. I mean, is he even aware. That\u2019s a great question. And I would say no. He\u2019s so much about being president. I wrote about this last year before the election, and it was just like one of my frustrations about election coverage, which is that we talk about the presidency in terms of policy. But like in a real sense the president can\u2019t do that much policy wise, directly. The president should have a legislative agenda, should have some sense of what they want to do with the executive agencies. But the job of the presidency isn\u2019t a policy job. It\u2019s a management job. And all management jobs, all management jobs are fundamentally information jobs. They\u2019re about cultivating information. They\u2019re about filtering information. They\u2019re about processing information, and they\u2019re about getting the best information you can to make decisions. And the presidency in particular is bombarded with information. But also good presidents are aware that the best kinds of information they can get is often political information, how the dynamics of the agencies are looking how the dynamics in Congress are working, how everything looks from a political standpoint. And Trump has created this bubble for himself where none of that information gets in. Like, none of it whatsoever. He\u2019s completely he\u2019s like blind to so much of the necessary information for just being a barely competent president. So I think you\u2019re right, Michelle, to suggest that stuff about public opinion stuff about his standing, he just may not even be aware of it. Does that make him like, if he has any sense of this as he goes along as a lame duck, or if he just gets vibe that he\u2019s being handled differently in Congress, does this make him more or less dangerous. Do we think as he enters this New phase. Oh, I think he\u2019s going to be more dangerous, but with the possible ameliorating effect of Congress being less loyal. And so if Congress is less loyal, they can temper his worst impulses. But how we\u2019re in a race. We\u2019re in a race between Trump\u2019s danger and congressional revival. And these two things go hand in hand. But one thing about the Trump bubble, I would say, is that number one, I think it\u2019s just true that all presidents are in a bubble to some degree Yeah and it\u2019s a bubble that it just exists naturally, because we human beings have weird reactions to both fame and power. And so a president is both the most famous or one of the most famous people in the world and the most powerful simultaneously. And so they\u2019re used to interacting with human beings who are impacted by that presence. And so there it is difficult to live in a Truth based environment in that circumstance, just normally. So you have to actually try to encourage people to speak truth to you, to disagree with you. And this is one of the reasons why there\u2019s this long recent history of incumbent presidents not doing very well in their first debate, their first presidential debate. 84 Reagan kind of falls on his face in front of Mondale. 2012 Obama doesn\u2019t do his best job against Romney. And so, in both circumstances, \u201884 and 2012, they righted the ship the second time. I think the Biden debate is partly a product of that. Who does this debate on those terms and those timing, if they\u2019re living in a Truth based environment. But then with Trump turn it as you do with all things. You just turn it to 11 because look at the cabinet meeting. Is he living in a truth based environment. By no means, by no means. And so this idea that what he\u2019s doing might not be popular, that people are rejecting it, that his legacy could be in ruins in a relatively short order. All of that, I think, is just alien to him right now, just alien and compounding. It also is that MAGA is, believe it or not, more online than the wokest wokes people on the left in 2019 and 2020 that they have taken the problem that Democrats had years in the recent past to being too online and they\u2019ve turned that one to 11 to the point now where you have major figures in the Trump administration who are much more focused on what obscure angry podcasters on the right say about them. Then they are concerned about a 38 percent approval rating in the larger public. And so they\u2019re constantly tacking towards the pet angry issues of the MAGA podcasting base. And that\u2019s just going to make all of this worse. That just reinforces the walls of the bubble. Well, on that magical note, I say we land this plane. And before we go, I need to hear from you. It\u2019s recommendation time. What you got for me. I\u2019ve been reading a very interesting book. It is called \u2013 It\u2019s by the great Civil War historian James McPherson Dean of Civil War historians. His Pulitzer Prize winning volume, I believe, won the Pulitzer Prize, the Bancroft Prize, one of the two on the entire war \u201cBattle Cry of Freedom.\u201d I still recommend to people like as the one thing you should read about the Civil War. I recently finished a collection of essays he wrote in the mid 90s, drawn with the sword, which are great, but I\u2019m recommending more recent work from 2014. It\u2019s called \u201cEmbattled: Rebel Jefferson Davis and the Confederate Civil War,\u201d and it\u2019s a study of Davis as president of the Confederacy, as leader of the Confederate military effort, and trying to offer a nuanced and balanced perspective on Jefferson\u2019s conduct or Davis\u2019s conduct. Conduct as Confederate president. I think it\u2019s fascinating. I suppose some viewers, listeners may be surprised that I\u2019m interested in reading this stuff, but I\u2019m interested in the Civil War generally, and I\u2019m interested in both sides of the conflict. And McPherson\u2019s part of McPherson\u2019s argument is that Davis is often blamed for the Confederates defeat, but he tries to make the case that Davis, more than pretty much any other political leader in the Confederacy, always understood that the goal of the fight was winning Confederate independence, not necessarily beating the union militarily, and that this singular focus more likely than not, actually kept the Confederacy in the fight longer than it should have been based off of its resources and its standing at the outset of the war. So it\u2019s a revisionist take on Davis\u2019s leadership during the Civil War, and I just find that really interesting. Excellent if that kind of thing sounds interesting to you, recommend the book. All right. David well, Jamelle, that kind of thing sounds fascinating to me, and I can\u2019t and I can\u2019t agree more on McPherson\u2019s \u201cBattle Cry of Freedom.\u201d When you grow up in the South like I did, I was in college before I was taught anything other than the lost cause story. And if you have grown up steeped in lost causes, battle cry freedom will blow up that paradigm. Just annihilate that paradigm. So I\u2019m going to depart from my normal streaming recommendation, which pains me because I have one, but I\u2019ll save that. I\u2019ll save that for next week. I\u2019ve got a book recommendations. It\u2019s not a brand new book. It\u2019s called \u201cFrance: The Dark Years\u201d by Julian Jackson, a British historian. And it\u2019s tracing France, Vichy France, 1940 to 1944. And it is so fascinating and it\u2019s so fascinating on a very particular basis. And that is when you read it and you read the ideology and crucially, the theology of Vichy France and the petain government. It will sound eerily like parts of the MAGA Christian nationalist right. Eerily in other words, much more concerned about the leftist enemy within than the enemy. Without much a great deal of focus on recreating the religious household as the centerpiece of the society. A doubling down on religion and work, as opposed to liberalism and liberty. And so there was it\u2019s very fascinating. And you realize they had this very coherent ideology and theology that allowed them to accommodate themselves to Hitler while believing they\u2019re being good people by purging the worst elements of what they deem to be the worst elements of French society. And it is chilling and shockingly relevant, so I really recommend it. O.K, that\u2019s just can I throw in some supplementary material that is, I guess, something of a streaming recommendation, which is the 1969 documentary \u201cThe Sorrow and the Pity,\u201d which is about the Vichy France and Nazi Germany and the collaboration and involves, since it\u2019s 69. It involves a lot of interviews with collaborators and people who were involved in the regime. It\u2019s four hours long. It\u2019s long, but it\u2019s a real masterpiece of documentary filmmaking. And I highly recommend it. Isn\u2019t that what Woody Allen is always talking about in \u201cAnnie Hall.\u201d Maybe. it\u2019s been many years since I saw \u201cAnnie Hall.\u201d All right. Well, I am going to take David\u2019s streaming gap and fill it. I am a huge Landman fan. For those who don\u2019t watch Taylor Sheridan did \u201cYellowstone.\u201d I got tired of the \u201cYellowstone\u201d universe after a few seasons, hugely popular. But he also has moved his attention to West Texas. And Billy Bob Thornton plays an oil landman. He\u2019s out there dealing with the cartels the environmentalists and all of this. And we\u2019ve just started season two. It is the best I\u2019ve ever seen Billy Bob Thornton in anything over the years. That\u2019s saying something. And he\u2019s been good in a lot of things and now they\u2019ve promised me some Sam Elliott who I\u2019ll just watch Sam Elliott do anything. I\u2019m sorry. Like, I don\u2019t even care. He can just read the phone book to me and I\u2019ll watch it. So I\u2019m just saying we\u2019re about, just a few seasons in, but it makes West Texas oil fields, the roughnecks and wildcatters. It\u2019s so entertaining. I have to highly recommend. I mean, if you talk about Sam Elliott, you can\u2019t talk about Sam Elliott without talking about one of the greatest classics in American cinema. \u201cRoad House.\u201d \u201cRoad House.\u201d Thank you. Yes, Michelle. Best bad movie ever. You\u2019re my best friend, Michelle, for knowing that. In fact, when we\u2019re done here, you\u2019re just going to come over and we\u2019re going to spend the afternoon watching \u201cRoad House.\u201d Jamelle, you\u2019re invited. I was going to suggest we go to the White House, but this is better. I was just going to say \u201cRoad House\u201d isn\u2019t a bad movie, though. It\u2019s good. Jamelle, it\u2019s unambiguously good. It\u2019s magic. That\u2019s what we\u2019re going to say. It is. All right, guys, with that, I\u2019m going to free you. Thank you so much, as always. Let\u2019s do it again. Always a pleasure. Thanks, Michelle. Bye.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Oh, I love it when you get the war manual out. Oh, who doesn\u2019t love that. I just carry it with me to parties. You\u2019re both in my town this…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6986,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[57,2264,6257,1333,30],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\n