Michigan's Senate Showdown: El Sayed vs. Rogers

0:00Welcome to Real Clear Politics on the Megan Kelly Channel, Syria's XM 111 Welcome to Real Clear Politics For Thursday September 17th, I'm Andrew Wallworth and joining me are our CP Washington Bureau Chief Carl Tannen and RCP White House correspondent Carolina Lumetta Let's start with a look at the RCP Senate map from this morning Right now our map shows 45 seats for the Democrats that are either safe or not up of This cycle 47 for the GOP gives us eight toss-ups that eight toss-ups are Alaska, Iowa, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, Ohio and Texas And as of this morning Carl the RCP average of polls showed Democrats with leads in seven of those toss-up states

1:02Iowa is the only state where the Republican candidate is ahead For the most part these leads are very slim This so everything could change but I want to focus for a minute on Michigan In particular where Mike Rogers the Republican is running against Democrat Abdul Al-Sahed and Al-Sahed was on the hill Yesterday where he was asking again about his relationship with Hassan Piker Here is his response to that question and then this is a bite from this morning from Hassan Piker who is being interviewed by Politico listen to this Do you want to shift more to the middle to think it's in this general election even you know disavow and Hassan Piker I'm shifting to the middle to do that stuff This this conversation is so far removed from what people are talking about every day in Michigan People sit at their kitchen tables and ask how am I going to make this work next month? That's not a middle Right left issue. That's a basic affordability issue Dead that America is the top dog in terrorism. Yes Do you think America then is worse than al-Qaeda

2:05Pound for pound as far as the number of deaths. Yes, we've caused tremendous terror all around the world I think that that is not only terror that we are waging on regular civilians and nations in the periphery But it's also having consequences on ourselves. It's it's having dramatic consequences on the home front So uh coral let's start with that Hassan Piker bite Is al-Qaeda right when he says the Michigan voters don't care about this relationship he has with him And Piker certainly isn't helping him out here by saying she's saying shit like this right? Yeah, well Piker's an extremist and anti-American extremist at that He's born in the United States so he can't be deported but he was raised in Turkey He's imbued anti-American attitudes and expressed him espoused him all his adult life Well, he's not that old so it's not that long But he's he's never done anything in life except go around criticized the America and he's an extremist if

3:07if You know he's the equivalent you know Republicans have been saddled with people like this over the years I mean they they tend to disavow him outside does want to disavow this guy That what he says that I've heard it him say it 10 times now. It's how he parries reporters questions. You're asking the wrong question I don't want to disavow this guy. I don't want to associate myself with Mark But don't don't look over here look look at what's going on the economy and under president Trump People in Michigan are suffering economically That's what he should be saying and it's true And Trump is uh Trump carried Michigan two or three times he ran there and he and so he's why he's president The first time but he's you know six out of ten Michigan Michigan voters now Give him a give the president um negative job approval rating So Elside wants to focus on that He ought to be able to distance himself from this guy and I think it's a lack of character that he hasn't But that's that's his story he's sticking to it and it's working for him

4:08He's still leading there now he's probably too far left for most people in Michigan and most people in Michigan Know this there there's an interesting Washington poll out where um he's running significantly behind the Democratic gubernatorial Canada and Michigan and people asking you know do you want this guy to be in the Senate? Do you believe his season and that really but do you want the Senate to go Democratic? Yeah, they do And so this you know he leads by three or four points there And what's he's and he's really gets pretty good candidate mic Rogers who's got a pretty good record And he's a he's a normal person in every way But he too but he's been saddled with Donald Trump's tariffs, which are not popular particularly in Michigan and What what say ed is is trying to do is just is is ecap this wind based on Antipathy for Donald Trump and so you know expanding the map and you mentioned all these other states I had a frit republican friend of mine called me last night just off-the-record conversation said is

5:10How bad is it? I said well? There's there's you want the good news of the bad news he said yeah, what's the good news? You're not losing by many points in any of these states these races are close The bad news is you're losing in all of them except Iowa and that shouldn't be close and You know you've gone from now having to run the table That the the republicans now have to hold have to win in one or two states where they're not expected to win in hold places Like Alaska that should never been in play in the first place And this is and this is all because of Donald Trump He said is there any other bad news? I said yes Trump's job approval rating We don't know that it's at the bottom yet. There's seven weeks to go in the campaign six and a half weeks left And I guess what's let's say Thursday. Yeah, so um And he's he's sort of steadily inching down and he could help these people he said Uh Carolina covers the beat so that they're going to this you know He promised at that midterm convention. He'd do an ungodly number of events Uh, I'll do events in every one of your states and now we turn out he's gonna get they're gonna get five minute phone calls

6:14He's not you know, he was in North Carolina state that they've already conceded so he's not helping on the campaign trail And his job approval rating is is an anchor right now for these public and so it's a tough map Hmm Carolin. What do you think? Well on the Michigan side and as our resident Michigander. I do think the Elsaid is right in that These aren't necessarily the issues that voters in the state are thinking about and you know We talked to you even a bit about this on the Republican side last week. It's hard to run on an ideology It's much easier to run it on what we call those kitchen table issues Groceries gas For Michigan specifically what's going on with Canada what are our relations there and I think what we're seeing from Elsaid and What we even saw yesterday when he was on the hill meeting with democratic uh Senators and congress members of congress is that he's is trying to stay away from more of the culture war and the ideology type things

7:15Except he's not distancing himself from Piker and I don't entirely understand why because it keeps Getting him all these questions that he doesn't want to handle that he wants That takes him off of his message. He's really good at getting back on message And I think that's what voters are spawned to but again, it's really hard to tell what exactly Michigan voters want um And yeah, I'm not at all surprised that we have yet another very close Michigan race. I do think that on the microadgers side Republicans do have their best possible candidate that they can be running there. He's well known He is a known entity for the party and for voters. He came very very close to beating slotkin during the last cycle so It's not surprising to me that it's a closer matchup in terms of President Trump's schedule. Yes, he is doing a lot of tala rallies coming up. He was in North Carolina last night flew back to Washington um

8:16I think what we heard from him at this rally for Michael Watley in North Carolina last night was very similar to what we've heard at the Convention stage last week and even before just when he talks to the press But he does keep changing his answer on Iran Which he still doesn't call war but he was saying last night. Well, you know gas prices might Get better even before the election or maybe it gets after I think it's gonna wrap up soon But maybe not until after the election but maybe before the election And it the more he talks about the more it doesn't view this just uncertainty We're for voters who are going to be the deciding factor this election which are the independence and North Carolina Especially has a lot of independence You know Andy I was thinking watching Trump last night It reminds me it seems like a much different issue. It is a much different issue foreign policy is difficult for any president And there's no easy answer in Iran, but when when George W. Bush was president and he and feet out that disaster hurricane Katrina hit

9:16What what happened then was it was in his second term Was that a critical mass of American voters decided Bush wasn't they began to question his competence And even people who had not agreed with all his policies and remember he'd he'd won re-election with about 51% of a close We thought that was a close election. We didn't know what's in the future for us these razor thin elections But there were people who didn't He didn't even support the war in Iraq But believe that George Bush was competent that he was doing and that and that he was authentic and that he was sincere And when he went down there at famous clip, you know, you're doing a great job brownie to the beleaguered FEMA Had a FEMA People began to question does he is he really nobody's doing is that is what the administration is doing Gonna work in Iraq and elsewhere and I think that's what's happening in the Trump presidency even people didn't really maybe Think tariffs they weren't automatically thinking tariffs were a great idea But when when Trump goes back and forth on Iran and tariffs and sort of sounds like he's thinking allowed making it up as he goes along

10:22I think what has kicked in here is questions about whether Whether he knows what he's doing and I think that's what's dragging these Republican candidates down Well, I think that's part of it. I think I just want to get back to this as a sunpiker thing for a second because there I have a somewhat different theory on this which is that the reason he doesn't disavow Assam piker is because piker represents a core part of his constituency in Michigan and maybe within the Democratic Party largely I think that there really is a large sort of dsa component in Michigan in other places. We demonstrated their power In elections up to this point and he doesn't want to alienate them and he doesn't feel he has to And he's playing a longer game. He thinks that he can That he needs those people and he he doesn't see any sort of And he's sort of immediate reason for him to disavow Well, he wanted to that makes sense out. I'll add one thing to it Andy He doesn't really disagree with piker. Yeah, that's the other thing

11:24He is truly dsa adjacent. I am sort of shocked because I just think he's Too far left for Michigan That he's doing so well speaks to what you're talking about Carl, which is and Carolina that there all these other issues the price of gas Interest rates just going up so people are going to see that in their credit cards diesel fuel Trade world with Canada the the war in Iran You put it all together and maybe that swamps All the things that the Republicans have going for him for Michigan because I agree I think that They've got the right candidate there for that race. He should be he should be winning this by a couple points And instead he's two three points behind he's and he's not running a bad campaign I mean he's he's running a pretty good campaign Well, wait, but stay with that for one second. I don't ask Carolina something about that. He should as the Michigan Resid So Yeah, I think the even people disagree with with sciad on Israel think he's too hard on Israel and they're more pro-Israel

12:26They also think what does Trump have against Canada? I mean Michigan people don't hate Canada. I think that's hurting him there What do you think about that that this tariff war and the war of words and the 51st state and all that jive about Trump and Canada? Yeah, I mean Michigan hates Ohio far more than So it doesn't I think the White House does have reason to be addressing its trade relationship with Canada And I think that the president has had this very fraught relationship with Prime Minister Karney The problem that we're now seeing is cannabis trying to join the European Union And they're trying to become a new state of that as opposed to Building up this relationship with the US. It's hard to tell exactly what all that would mean for The United States, but all the border states especially Michigan Would be very affected by that and I think it's the uncertainty more than the drama itself

13:28That's most concerning for voters um and yeah like sia is very very far left And but he does have that constituency especially in the Detroit area which has changed dramatically in the populace and majority Muslim But I do think what sia does also grappling with is that there's a difference between Online and real life And you've seen that in a lot of his campaign ads, you know, what he'll post on tiktok is very different from The TV ads that he will air because he has to bridge all these different divides I think when it comes to Piker. Yes, maybe he does agree with him And he doesn't want to disavow him because of that It's also very likely I think that he's listening more to the voices online than he is on the ground I'm very curious to know what happened in this meeting In DC yesterday with all of these senators who came out very tight lift But just said oh we really like else. I had There was one sender Chris Murphy who said I think he has a great opportunity to unite various factions

14:32I haven't really seen else. I had as a very unifying figure But I'm very curious to know if anyone kind of took him to task on that And I think if he does win his election and he actually comes to Washington He knows he has to shore up his relationships here which are not the Hassan Piker crowd They're not the tiktok crowd and the let's Ride a trend and I think he's starting to learn now Those are very different gulfs that he has to learn how to navigate Well, we'll see how many dsa Jason candidates 30 the house and senate may look somewhat different When he when he gets here if because if he wins That means probably a lot of dsa adjacent candidates are gonna wait I just go I believe this for you break before you break I want to make an observation Carolina does not follow sports, but and I but I told her you'll learn it by osmosis She just made her first mischugano house state football On this podcast

15:33She's a true mischugano the fact that I don't follow sports and I still understand the mischugano high-end speaks to how prevalent it is Yeah, and we should say um You know the GOP has this huge cash advantage right now and that's sort of just kicking in Um, and we've got state like states like Texas that may return to their sort of What they've done traditionally we've got new hampshire where just sanunu was a pretty good candidate We've got and mischugan may turn out differently than we think and then of course in Maine Susan Collins You know has been counted out before and she comes back So the map still may favor The republican so I don't want it to be all doom and gloom today I'm sure I'm gonna hear about this on the in the comments section Hey, we've just got a minute or two left here, but uh, Tony General Todd blanche gave a press conference this week Carolina you were there in the rose garden, right? What happened? Yes, uh very strange location. We've moved out of the James Brady briefing room

16:35I told some people around me it kind of felt like let's have class outside today uh, we just sat in the renovated rose garden so it's all paved and we were in these very large very comfortable white and yellow chairs But we still had our seating assignments similar to the briefing room and the new media on the side So I'm not really sure why we moved outside we were right outside the obel and we were really hoping the president will come out But alas he did not and yeah the attorney general just talked about Uh, nonsense voting different fraud efforts um, he took some questions on the president's post about Supreme Court justices and his recent frustrations with them and In turn it was this was the first time that he has kind of subden as press secretary And I think his questions were or sorry his answers were fairly short and to the point But he wasn't quite as easy going as we've seen from secretary Rubio or vice president jadey vans He made a joke that um, you know, it was kind of warm

17:38It was the sun was shining he said oh are you all kind of sweating in your seats? Sorry about that. Well, I'm not sorry. That's hilarious But then he said it two more times and I was like okay, you practice this live this doesn't feel very organic Yeah, it was about 30-minute briefing the first one we've had in a few weeks so This might be the new norm I don't know if the rose garden is the new norm, but I think these sporadic briefings with some member of the administration Is what we can expect until the president decides to hire a new press secretary? Well, that that is my question. What's going on with the Replacement of time nothing nothing we are we are not hearing any rumors about new names thrown into the ring There was some hype around Scott Jennings for a little bit that seems to have died down I don't think the attorney general was auditioning for the role so um Yeah, it's it's unusually quiet in the discourse around the next press secretary Which leads me need to believe that the president is in no rush to fill that role

18:41Interesting. All right. Well guys, we're gonna take a break. You're listening to real clear politics son Sirius XM. I've got Carolina to matter with me and Carl canon and we'll be back with more right after this don't go away This is real clear politics on the Megan Kelly channel Sirius XM 111 Do you have diabetes? I'm sure you've seen the television commercials on the new CGM devices from all the top brands And how well they can help you manage your diabetes Do you have the latest and newest in diabetes technology? The Diabetes Solutions Center carries most of the top brands and the great news is your insurance may cover most of the cost Call our special CGM hotline today and our friendly representatives will help see if you qualify You could get a new CGM from the top brands at little or no cost to you Make living with diabetes easier. You are just one free phone call away to learn if your insurance covers the cost So make this free call today to the Diabetes Solutions Center and learn for free how to get your new continuous glucose monitor

19:46800 438 1391 800 438 1391 800 438 1391 If you like YouTube you'll love YouTube Premium. It's destroying athlete creator and YouTube Maxer YouTube Premium enhances how I use YouTube with awesome features like offline downloads So I could download my favorite training videos before I hit the gym So no i5 doesn't turn leg day into loading day plus I get ad free videos background play and so much more YouTube Premium is like YouTube got some extra gains try YouTube Premium for two months free at youtube.com slash premium Trial eligibility varies terms apply cancel anytime Real clear politics a neutral even handed arbiter of political data you're listening to the Megan Kelly channel unserious xm 111 Welcome back to real clear politics on serious xm i'm Andrew Walworth I read Carl Canon and Carolina Lume met her with me

20:54And we are joined now by Scott Gibbs He is the author of a new book from Columbia University Press. It's called towards the turning rethinking the meaning of 9-11 the clash of civilizations and a post Modern world. He is also a psychotherapist which maybe just the right training for understanding today's Geopolitics um Scott welcome to the program Thanks Andrew appreciate you having me So uh this is a pretty heady book and you write in it that uh tribalism and ideology are just scapegoats when it comes to analyzing the world politics Use 9-11 the world on terror is examples of that So what do you mean by that and is there really a better lens through which to understand modern geopolitics than the ones we usually use including on this program Yeah, so um I guess the the traditional way of looking at What happened with 9-11 and tends to be what I call a perpetrator victim construct right it chooses one side

21:58And it looks at the causes from that perspective And what that ends up doing is alienating that person or that group And ends up participating in the conflict itself because the other group feels accused or criticized or blame and that Ultimately a better way to think about this is as a a A feedback loop or a dance sort of an iterative dance that happens over time that escalates and then kind of settles down Potentially but that continues on and until we start to really understand it that way We're doomed to sort of repetitively continue Hmm Scott, I you know on that day. I was I was here in Washington and um And the Pentagon was bombed people were you know care rescued people burned a death in New York City 3000 nearly 3000 people all of them civilians were killed

22:59Um shanks filled Pennsylvania 140 people killed how else could you possibly look at this instead of the I mean first of all people were They were victims and they were angry and and to say that And I'll kind of say credit for it. They didn't they didn't hide that they had done this they were trampants so What's the response? What what is a response that you think would be better than Than the normal human response Well, great. Yeah, so I get that kind of question a lot Get used to it because Well, it's it's I mean, I think of it as responsibility versus causation right and Doing your best to try to to step back and take the uh The moral judgment out of it which which I get or where human and it's difficult to do But if you step back and then and start to look at the causes without that uh Through a different lens or or that that non-judgmental lens different um

24:05Different issues start to come to the fore and by and the other thing I would go back to is when you don't when you look at it strictly through the lens of um, you know I'm morally right you're wrong. What that does is it triggers something in the other group That responds to justify defend right and then we go round and round and ultimately this kind of stuff just continues I mean we're back and around to some degree because of you know, this kind of repetitive dance and until we start to really unpack the Issues or the causes below the surface that aren't being talked about we're not going to be able to deal with them So I'm wondering it go ahead. Sorry if I can ask real quick A lot of the linchpin of your book is 9-11 and how that changed but sounds like the You know victim perpetrator mentality you're describing is a very human function You know, I can think of medieval wars that started over the same thing

25:07So how did you see that change or how's that different because of 9-11 or what have you seen differently after? I guess I would say I haven't seen anything different I mean, I think it's sort of textbook right in a way I guess what I would say is It's really easy to see in our domestic politics which you guys could probably you know Talk a lot about right bad known and then see a lot, but it's that it's not you know, it has gotten violent right? I mean Charlie Kirk assassination attempts Violence in the left It's but it's that same kind of iterative dance that occurs where somebody feels threatened Right, they think that what they're saying or doing is necessary The other side because of that feels threatened and they react in each side hardens and polarizes and gets driven to the extremes And what ends up happening is we stop having connected conversations that are problem-sol And you know either one side's got a win completely or neither side wins and you know

26:13We get a 40-chillion dollar debt because nobody can say no Well, Scott I covered I covered the White House when 9-11 I covered president Bush and he He made he made it clear that he wanted Retribution he said at the smoldering towers the people who did this will hear from us soon But he also made a very explosive point that I think you would you would Would approve of he said is Islam is a religion piece this doesn't reflect on Islam even though the killers said they did it in the name of their religion Bush rejected that and he sort of moved them aside and said that they're an outlier and and and try to do some of what you're talking about But if you had been an advisor to Bush and he had spiritual advisors he had people that he sought there What else would you have told him to do that he didn't do? Yeah, good question. So I mean so what's the what's the overlying or underlying principle? I think it's basically

27:13Do your best to minimize the drama and what do I mean by that? I mean the reactivity right as as opposed to methodical responsiveness with an eye toward protecting yourself and dealing with the terrorists today, but not creating you know the two terrorists tomorrow if that makes sense And so I agree with you like that religion of peace Feels to me like an attempt to deal with that he also however used a lot of rhetoric that fits in the um sort of the liberal Internationalist sort of vein of you know march or freedom right? I think was a was a phrase to use and when you start to using dead or alive or You know you're with or with us or you're with the terrorists it that kind of division starts to get into shaky ground and the last thing I would say is going into a rack is a huge problem. So yeah, yeah I turn up but But would you and let me follow that one one more thing so he president Bush said

28:17Um a couple of times and I was told that this was his formulation not Mike Gerson's um not david from That he as he was thinking through what the implications are should be of American foreign policy Bush came up with this formulation that I think reflected his philosophy and most of Americans philosophy and he He said it was sort of a modern reinterpretation of natural rights and he said Freedom is not got America's gift to the world. It's God's gift to every man and woman in the world now That's a core belief of most Americans if you think that he shouldn't say that What would be how what would be the rebuttal to that because that struck me as a very aspirational view Even other implication for foreign policy that led us to places like Iraq right well, I mean if The if what you're if I understand you I think what you're where you're saying is Freedom is God's gift and therefore it is somehow It's some level justified to try to be supportive of that in Iraq

29:22No, I'm not talking about a rep. I'm saying Let's just stipulate that was a mistake. What I'm saying is that we think our systems better. Yeah You can't you gonna you're gonna try and talk your fellow Americans out of that I'm not you know, no, I wouldn't try to talk anybody out of that because I actually hold that belief I'm just recognizing that certain parts of the world right don't necessarily have that same construct and to some degree pushing that construct is not altogether different than them wanting you know To push Islam throughout you know the entire world um, and I don't think it works well when you try to do stuff like that right so even if you think it is A better way for humanity. It you need to be thoughtful about how you Impose that if that makes sense

30:23Um, we're talking about Scott Gibbs. He's the author of this new book from Columbia University Press. It's called towards the turning, rethinking the meaning of 9-11 the clash of civilizations and a post modern world And I want to go to that term postmodern which is in your title um, and I'm wondering The problem that a lot of us have with postmodernism is it seems that it's it's It's releasing us from any sort of moral judgment or it's it's creating a world view that is based on moral equivalence Um, and when you say that you know, oh, you know, we shouldn't freedom is not a universal um Value or it's not universal enough that we should actually try to encourage in place That sounds to me like sort of the definition of postmodernism How do you how do you deal with that? I mean is is and is are you're obviously Comfort on with the term postmodern what does postmodern mean to you? I mean it in a um Doned modernity sense not in an ideological sense which is

31:27Something I'm hoping will arise out of modernity and what do I mean by modernity it's uh, you know um Begins with the scientific revolution the enlightenment right it's really focused on understanding It's really focused on control sort of how do I control resources? How do I get the world to behave the way I would like it to It comes up in our our our political systems right our economic systems and that There are challenges to this way of being That I think I mean if we're really going to go down the philosophical rabbit hole are are a bit inconsistent with how We actually are in terms of human being So what do I mean by that? We can I'm uh the way we look at it now is I'm uh, I'm an agent. I sit across from a series of objects I control them to get what I want right The way we actually really operate is we're relational in terms of our

32:32Connections to other people and to uh the world outside of us and that nothing is ever Said in stone nothing is ever uh fixed and that we need to start understanding the relationality of living Right? It's got it's got really let me just stop there because What When you look at pop politics that you look look at the Russians and Ukraine They feel they need a buffer with the west it is not a matter of identity per se it is a matter of geopolitics It's the way they as a nation state view the world They don't want NATO troops on their border. I understand that um the immigration crisis that we're facing today That is economically driven that is people coming to the west Because they're stable economies where they can live a better life. I understand that um Trump you know to turn around he's in Venezuela because he wants oil uh, he wants a natural resource These are the things that are driven politics

33:32For years before the modern uh era and they're the things that i think still drive politics today So i'm just wondering Can you really sort of wish us past that because that sounds like what you're what you're kind of hoping for Well, I mean, I appreciate the extension there first of all i would say At some level it's all identity I mean you don't understand those things that you're talking about in terms of natural resources Without identity because if somebody's got a different identity that doesn't care as much about that stuff It doesn't matter right So let's take the United States and oil It's like we look at oil and we think well our economy you'd be ground into the you know dirt so you speak But it's much more complicated than that It's about we you know if our our our system grinds to a halt Our sense of purpose as individuals goes down right We lose it potentially because we're not going to work our sense of worth is is harmed

34:33because we're not you know Being as successful our sense of security is is impacted by that so it's you know It's all wrapped up with identity you can't have group difficulties without at some level without some sense of identity Us and them and It gets more and more complicated as the values and beliefs get different So that i guess that's how i would You said go ahead go ahead Carolina. Sorry. I had a so if a lot of the Argeopolitics and how nations relate to each other are based on our identity which makes sense we all have identities How do you see this artificial intelligence advent changing our sense of human identity and how would you anticipate that changing across different cultures as well? You know, we're in this Sort of AI arms race and we're expecting that to be a big topic of conversation next week when Chinese president juzhin pink comes to the white house, but it kind of strikes me that

35:36In what you've described maybe it would be simpler if we just have AI running What needs to be you know geopolitical decisions take the sense of human identity and the infestation out of it but I don't know what where do you see that going? Well, the last piece is cross my mind from time to time that you know To what degree can we outsource things to take the the human friction out of it? Right On the other hand, I don't think it you know we can do It's unclear to me that humans wouldn't ever need to be involved, but you know There's a lot of hyperbole out there You know, there's a broader question. I think you asked earlier about You know, what does it mean to have AI for identity and I guess You know in the in the context of a postmodern world meaning not Relativistic, but just beyond where we are something new is really what I'm trying to get at here is You know what to what degree is having this kind of

36:38Understanding this kind of power in AI going to change the way we operate As human beings the way we see ourselves and the way we see the worlds we live in Because right now it's based very much in a you know uh Our sense of education and understanding and our ability to predict things and control things And what a lot of that is sort of super charts and or removed from us What does that mean in terms of our purpose or our value and all the things that are wrapped up with identity? So do you think it high level? Do you think it would solve the problem of war? Uh But do I think it would solve the problem or I mean I think you still have the human Reactionary element right it could potentially give you an arbiter But you know we're reactive and in this part of what I'm getting out with the book is we need to we get caught up in these moral You know debates that disescalate right when we're so divided here in this country in particular that you know

37:43That's that's something we just need to pay attention to right we need to figure out how to regulate and be more and respond rather than react A carol got me in the left here. We got a last question for us. Yeah, Scott briefly and I know it's not a brief subject but see you you probably spent years writing this book and Came out of your your career as a therapist and and you have a history degree from Princeton So you're coming at this from both first who cares about history and cares about psychology But since and you focused on 9-11 but since you began writing this book Another attack happened October 7th in Israel and I guess I want to take another stab at this Suppose you were an advisor to Benjamin Netanyahu How would you have asked I what what would you would you have suggested a possibly different response and what what would that have been Yeah, you got a minute to do this good life. I got I mean I go back to the same principle right

38:43The first of all it's pretty unclear to me that that parts of Certain groups in Israel are particularly interested in this principle Maybe controversial. I don't yeah, but you're the advisor just telling what you think. Yeah, I mean it's the same principle It's sort of like we got to protect ourselves. We need to like there needs to be some sense of justice here But we need to think about the collateral damage We need to think about the rhetoric we're using and we need to give people an off ramp so that we can you know again Get you know take care of the enemies today, but not create more tomorrow And I think that's part of the challenge of what's happened In Gaza specifically when you see the images things and and I fundamentally don't believe that you can kill your way toward destroying An ideology. I don't I don't think it works out. You can minimize it hopefully over time But I just don't think you can kill it off so speak all right Well Scott we're gonna have to leave it there is we've been talking to Scott Gibbs is the author of this new book

39:43It's called towards the turning rethink re rethinking the meaning of 9-11 the clash of civilizations and a post-modern world Scott great to have you on the program. We appreciate it I'm Andrew Wallworth. I've got Carl Canon Caroline Lume matter with me and we'll be back with more right after this don't go away This is real clear politics on the making Kelly channel serious XM 111 If you like YouTube you'll love YouTube premium. It's destroying athlete creator and YouTube Maxar YouTube premium enhances how I use YouTube with awesome features like offline downloads So I could download my favorite training videos before I hit the gym So no i5 doesn't turn leg day into loading day plus I get ad free videos background play and so much more YouTube premium is like YouTube got some extra gains try YouTube premium for two months free at youtube.com slash premium trial eligibility varies terms apply cancel anytime

40:44Inform viewpoints spanning the ideological spectrum you're listening to real clear politics on the Megan Kelly channel serious XM 111 Welcome back to real clear politics on serious XM. I'm Andrew Wallworth. I've got Carolina Lume matter and Carl Canon with me And we're gonna talk a little bit of DC politics today the Judge ruled on September 15th The downtrums name could not be added to the Kennedy Center without congressional approval That prompted the board to vote to close the venue President thinks his name is vital to any effort to repair the building and most people agree that the Building does need massive renovations So here's the president talking about the way he views the situation So for the justice administration to lead to His balls and to take that on long term And to garrison or to raise money to carry I think that the Trump administration You can certainly have breakfast

41:45But frankly if we don't do that It's going to close and let them think ripped out of very very bad shape very He's still falling Plastor falling off deal a lot of It's very badly maintained So he was on Tom Rack there so a little hard to hear exactly what he was saying But basically Carl his point is that uh, he's the only guy who can save this And to do that he deserves recognition Yeah, well this is this is Probably the best metaphor for his presidency. He he comes in here. There's no problem He invents a problem. He points himself. He fires the board. He fires David Rubenstein He was making was bringing all this money in He insists that he's going to be in charge. He's going to determine what the acts are Uh, the act you know the the actors in the theater and The programs that put and he objects that they had I think they had a couple of what do they call those things?

42:47Dancing Transgender people drag queen story hour or whatever They did a couple of times and so he's going to take it over points the board points himself the president Then the the people who the artist quits and we don't want to work under those circumstances Then the place goes bankrupt Then he tries to put his name on it says only he can save it the building that he wrecked the institution that he wrecked And he wants to name it after himself and when he doesn't get that he threatens to tear it down It's a you know if this if he looped if the republicans take a bath In November and people aren't going the polls and voting on the Kennedy Center Andy But not one person who voted for Donald Trump and I think he got more than 70 million votes Not one person voted for him thinking he would tear down the Kennedy Center if you couldn't name it after himself And he never mentioned it during the campaign and this is you know Tom Tom was here. He'd say yeah, he'd rather Trump talking about the economy What's too late for all that the cake is baked people formed an impression of Trump and one of the impressions

43:51They formed is he's a petulant he's a child and he's destructive and he has these impulses that you You know he acts like Washington DC official Washington is a casino that he owns and he's gonna change I'm gonna paint this statue. I'm gonna put an arch here. I'm gonna do this on a payover the Rose Garden He's gonna all these things. Oh, I'm gonna tear down the east wing and dump it on a golf course a public golf course We're middle class people in African-Americans play golf Because some point down the road. I want to you know turn that into a exclusive golf club for rich people Oh, and by the way the seawalls failing there. It's gonna cost a billion dollars to fix it Which I didn't know about because I just led with my chin so All right Carl. I there's a rant from Carl. Carol. I am Tom isn't here. It cut me off and say I don't care about that. So I thought I just had free reign Um I can't wait. What what's happening in the White House over this are they are they pleased that this is happening to think this is a winning issue

44:53What's going on? Well, I think the White House and what we're learning in general is that you do not get between the president and the building project and The Kennedy Center has just been a really interesting and strange element on this timeline because You know the president came in and did exactly what Carl said he changed the entire board going to himself chairman And it is possible that it does need repairs. It's an older building Every building in these things repairs at some point The struggle with covering it for reporters has been that the new board has really just cut off access You know, I remember some time last year They start sort of yelled at the media saying hey, we were vandalized and nobody's covering it and the proof that they had of this vandalism was a photo of some sort of like black oil or paint or something That was spread across some of the marble steps and but the Kennedy Center wouldn't allow any reporters to come and see it

45:57They just sent this photo around and said hey, we've been vandalized to go cover and Maybe it's true. Maybe it's not but for any reporter What you need to do is to receive information and be like okay, where's your proof? Yeah, how can we ensure that this actually happened The same thing is kind of happening with this video that the president posted he posted Several times on Monday about a lot of different topics mostly about AI and the Supreme Court He also made a couple posts about the Kennedy Center And he posted this video of the grand foyer And showed a portion of the ceiling coming down and crashing onto the red carpet And there was a security guard off in the distance. There was already one of those Yellow like danger cones on the floor before it fell and he said hey This building is unsafe. We have to shut it down to do repairs But also we can't do repairs unless my name is on the building But the Kennedy Center is not allowing people to come in and see that and so it's really difficult to cover From a journalism perspective the scene outside is you know since the judge said

47:02Last month or month before that The president couldn't just add his name to the Kennedy Center that would require an act of Congress They've just put up a tent over the whole name and there are crowds of people in DC who came out and there were live streams going People were waiting to see his name come off the building now. They can't see anything now the whole every entrance is boarded up with tents There are fences outside and there's this email sent out to staffers. I think yesterday say hey We're gonna close for a week to figure out this leaky roof ceiling situation It's not connected to the president's overall message about shutting down the entire thing So we'll see but there have been no concerts there have been no events Um people come wander in just to see the building Except now that it's closed What concerns me the most and I I said on the show before I got engaged on the rooftop of the Kennedy Center I really love the building Uh, it's been one of the great things about living in DCs just having this artistic outlet and you can go you can go and see free concerts

48:04In the foyer once a week and movies on the lawn and all these different touring shows Some of the photographers last night Took a photo of the president in his plane where he was looking at this big sheet of paper that said Kennedy Center demo Yeah, the words cut off and so he might be planning to raise this to the ground. I um I have two thoughts on this one. I disagree. I think the Kennedy Center is pretty ugly building I've never liked it. I think it's beautiful. Well, that's why we have beauty kind of I just don't think it's a great piece of architecture But I also think uh there there's a fundamental question here is would why do we need the Kennedy Center at all? Why do we need federal funds funding and art center in Washington DC? Just for people in DC who get to go to it I mean why the rest of the country paying for this we've got the cargy hall in New York that gets city funds and gets Private donations. We got the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in LA Uh, so I think as far as I know I don't even think they get city funds. I think it's all privately funded

49:07um, you know get get the federal government out That's ridiculous. So that's not ridiculous It's you could privatize the Kennedy Center tomorrow get a new board uh and probably uh One of the people that's not but that's not but Andy it's not that's not what's on the table That's that's a legitimate libertarian that's what I'm saying Maybe but that's not what Trump's ever proposed. He proposed. I'm I am himself he may surprise you Karl, but I actually Actually have some ideas that have nothing to do with Donald Trump and so that's what I think It does raise the question though. What do you do with the Kennedy Center now and I'm offering that a solution? Well, won't you hold on to your fire if the building survives his presidency then we could talk about that Andy The main thing is to not have in Destroy it well, okay one quick thing sure yes We have a lot of artistic like museums and centers for arts all across the country One of the benefits of DC is that we have the Smithsonian's we have museums that

50:11Anybody can come to for free your tax dollars. We pay for it. Yes, but that is a beautiful outpouring of the way that the government funds culture and society The Kennedy Center as a building could be much more pretty. I fully agree with that I hate the brutalist architecture, but it's very impressive to be around the foyer is gorgeous and also DC in general we don't have a lot of large theaters the whole problem with all of these Concert venues moving away from the Kennedy Center is nothing else is big enough We don't have a huge stadium. We don't have a huge you know concert hall. That's it So if it were privatized, I feel like it would become much less accessible And I think that would be very sad not just for people who live in DC lots of tourists go there Um, well lots of tourists go to New York and LA and they manage to get to Carnegie Hall had been there many times myself. So um anyway, look um I wanted to talk about my mom would Khalil suing Columbia. We really don't have much time left here, but Carl give us 20 seconds. This is a good thing that

51:16uh Khalil is suing his alma mater Well, he's uh, yeah, he says they weren't sufficiently um defend defending Palestinians Well, they were they kept hiring you know pro-Palestinian professors, which is why those Why Columbia students were so radical uh Marco Rubio wanted to deport him now. He wants to sue Columbia um I guess the point is is that maybe he isn't American because he's obviously overlitigious That's a good one. All right, we're gonna have to leave it there. You're listening to real clear politics then Sirius XM. I'm Andrew Wallworth. I would Carolina, LeMeta and Carl Canon with me. We'll be back with more tomorrow. Have a great day One big home for all these voices that you've come to really trust The Megan Kelly channel series XM 111