NTK: Jen Welch Gets It! It’s Time for Us All to Become ‘Dark Woke!’

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2:02Hello, welcome to Need to Know. I'm David Rothkopf, your host, and this week, as every week we're going to talk to a newsmaker, a smart person who's going to help make it all make sense for you. This week we've got our friend, Jennifer Welch. Jen is the host of the I've had it podcast, which is Vital Therapy for all of America. And it's sort of burgeoning into a bit of an empire with lots of different kinds of podcasts. How are you doing today, Jen? I'm doing well. The weather's nice. I just look for simple things. President's bat shit. I just saw a little meeting he had with his cabinet and that was just his bonkers as it could ever be. It was crazy. It was crazy. What stood out to you? I mean, I was watching my head was exploding. Couple of things stood out where he said that he doesn't care about the war.

3:04And then the other thing that always stands out to me is the constant bragging about the cognitive test, which tells me he failed it. And he failed it miserably. And he is constantly trying to get ahead of it and provide cover for it. It's just, I think it's, I get a singular crazy person. You see a singular crazy person. You have a singular crazy person in your family, et cetera. The people, the bottom feeders that signed up to work for him that tell him how great he is. Mike Johnson just made up a neutrophie to give to him. And the collective shamelessness of these people is what's so stunning to me, David. Yeah, and it just doesn't stop. You know, I mean, at one point during this thing, you know, there's just, it's not just the cognitive test. There's the character flaws manifest themselves. It's not just that they say nice things to him. He apparently demands it. You know, and he got a question, why did you vote by mail

4:08when you're against voting by mail? And he said, because I'm the president of the United States. And then he turned to Steve Whitkoff and he said, well, can I tell him what the Iranians did for us? He was referring to apparently a deal to let H ships through as a sign of their good faith. And Whitkoff said, well, you can do anything he wants, sir. And it's like, how needy is this guy? That there was another comment also in the whole thing. I think he was talking to Doug Bergen. And he said, when will the Venezuelans put up a statute to me? Oh, my God. Have you seen how he's really picking on Hegseth a lot and kind of blaming him for the war the last couple of days? And then today at this cabinet meeting, he said, yeah, somebody told me, right, to Hegseth, he's like, yeah, somebody told me that you were a bad hire, that I shouldn't have hired you, but you were born to do this job. And I think that this humiliation ritual

5:09is just part and parcel for what autocrats do. He just wants to humiliate Hegseth and divide and rule. Well, this could give you a chance as an autocrat because I've heard you humiliate Hegseth a few times. Yeah. I mean, yeah. And, well, I mean, he's very humiliatable. And he's such a religious fanatic. Have you seen this prayer thing that he did recently? I think he did it yesterday. It's beneath. Yesterday, I didn't see it as I've seen earlier because he seems to want to turn this whole thing into like a crusade, a holy war. And he's got, of course, his tattoos, but what was yesterday? He was at the Pentagon and he did, he started quoting scripture and it was all the Old Testament, Hellfire, Brimstone. God is with us as we go destroy. It's just some really dark age, iron age shit that I feel dumber for having heard. But, of course, I watched the full clip

6:10and he's just such an insane person. And I think the larger story with Pete Hegseth is the Christian nationalist movement. They are the most co-opted group in the United States. When Russia wanted to enter into the United States, they go to the prayer breakfast. And so we have these Christian nationalists like the Speaker of the House who claims that he talks to God and God tells him he's Moses. We have another one that's the Secretary of Defense. I refuse to call it the Secretary of War just for spite. And I think it's ridiculous. But the Christian nationalist something is, I hope the Democrats really start addressing how benign as that is. Well, J.D. Vance is also, you know, sort of glommed on to that and including up to lingering hugs with Eric Kurt, which is, you know, I mean, he's put his, you know, he's not just talking, he's walking the walk,

7:13but it does worry me because, you know, let's face it. Trump looks terrible. He's old, his ankles, his hand, his head is sort of sinking into his chest. He's rambling this and that. And you go, this guy's an old dying. If this was your uncle, you know, you'd be like, you know, get your act together, you know, get your house in order because it doesn't have long to live. But it does raise the question of what's next. And wherever you look in the Republican party, you've got this kind of Christian national stuff, even nationalist stuff, even Marco, little Marco, who, you know, is supposedly the sainter one in the room. You know, prior to Trump coming in, all he did was tweet out Bible verses. I mean, it's a, it's a, it's a little word. You come from the Bible belt. Does this resonate there still? Or do they realize what a scam it is? No, it absolutely resonates. And if the right accuses us of virtue signaling

8:15and the left needs to start accusing rightfully, not accusing pointing out the Christian signaling that these men do. And a huge concern is JD Vance because he's young and he has a very wealthy benefactor, Peter Teele, whose side hustle is doing speeches around the world about the antichrist. We're in, he sounds like he's describing himself. But the dismantling and the brand damage that needs to be done to the air appearance of MAGA needs to start now, JD Vance is a layup. There's all the rumors, obviously, about the couches and all of that. But aside from that, this man has changed his name three times and changed his religion three times. And the Democrats need to start hammering it. Any potential air apparent because what Trump is incubating is going to be worse. And they need to start attacking Tucker Carlson as well who claims that he was attacked by demons

9:16in his bed while simultaneously admitting that he sleeps with three large dogs. And so the problem with these, the air appearance of MAGA in 30 second clips, they can sound really focused on something. You're like, yeah, Tucker sounds pretty good here. March, March, Taylor Greenshire has changed. And so we have to start playing offense and really rough these people up in the American psyche so they have, so they're constantly playing defense. And I can't for the life of me, David, find our leader that's leading this charge because it seems like the opposition is rather disjointed. But so let me ask a hard question about that because I was with a bunch of sort of senior dams the other night and they were going, well, you know what the answer is, is that we need to own religion in our own way. And they said, well, look at James Talleriko in Texas or look at Andy Beshear,

10:17a governor who's just put out a book talking about his relationship with faith. And I'm not saying people shouldn't have a relationship with faith, but it is a choice, right? One choice is to say, well, let's get a little bit more like them in all of this. And another choice is to call them out. And maybe that's regional, but where do you come out in all of them? Think that the pandering or trying to appeal to these people is a fool's errand. The people that triple Trump that live in Bible belt countries will quadruple Trump if he's able to, you know, go around the constitution. They might say, I'm mad right now, I was an idiot, but when it comes down to it, the Republicans have done an incredible job branding all Democrats as demon rats and lib tarts. And I know that is not deep and it isn't deep. And that's why we, the play that we need to take out

11:20of their playbook is not to go, oh, we're going to be fake Christians now. The play that we take out of their playbook is damaging their brand for being the hypocrites that they are. If we want to talk about faith as Democrats, then let's talk about how hypocritical the party of family values is with Elon Musk, fighting with baby mamas online, and God only knows how many kids the man has. I mean, I've read articles that some people suspect that he's doing IVF stuff in Japan and other countries as well. And if we would just call out that they have weaponized the one thing in rural America or in Bible belt states or in flyover states, the one thing they have is their church. And the Republican party has weaponized the one thing they hold dear against them. And that is diabolical and they are liars. They need to call them liars and explain you hurt and you're in pain right now because the Republican party has lied to you.

12:20Wealth never trickles down. The billionaires are not your friends. The immigrants were never gonna take your jobs. It's always been the oligarchs with the robots. And instead, see that just makes me so fucking mad, David, to know that you're sitting there like, well, maybe we need to be more Christian. Attack on Sudner. No, no, the friends, the senior Democrats, not you. The senior Democrats, you had a chat with. Instead of believing something, call them out for being the hypocrites that they are. That will resonate more if there are independent voters because on some level, people in the Bible belt know when they go to their mega church and there's a coffee shop and a gift shop and the pastor pulls up in a new Mercedes, they know they're getting grifted a little bit. That's the thing. Like are you, that's the argument. Are you gonna let everybody get theirs and lie to you? On their way to getting it. And I just, I get frustrated with Democratic messaging because it always seems like they want to somehow get

13:23this elusive Republican voter to vote for them. Somehow that will make them whole. Yeah, no, I totally agree with you. The whole, the worst impulse of Democrats is to say, well, we need to meet them halfway. We need to, you know, split the difference with them because if you're splitting the difference with an autocrat or you're splitting the difference with somebody who is just fundamentally a bad person, you're losing, right? And I think one of the, I quote you all the time because you use this expression that, we shouldn't be woke, we should be dark-wook. In other words, we should own who we are. And I agree with that 100%. And there are also opportunities. Like it looks like in Texas, you're gonna have a Senate race in which the president said he was gonna choose size and then he sort of chickened out on that. And you know, Paxson could win. And Paxson, like Trump is an example of somebody

14:26that these churches should be excoriating, isn't he? I mean, and yet what's the strange appeal? I mean, they're originally from Texas. What is the weird appeal there? So for me, I understand this perfectly. This form of Christianity, this evangelical mega church, very white nationalist form of Christianity is all about forgiveness with no accountability. So when Trump got the evangelicals via Jerry Falwell, Jr., to the one who was hired the pull boy to bang his wife, that one. He got his voter, just a true story listener. When he got him on board, it didn't surprise me that the evangelicals went along with this where my friends that are on the coast were like, how can these Christians support this? And I'm like, Trump is an evangelical preacher to his core. He is a grifter, he's sleek, he's a liar.

15:27You know, he has all of the affairs, he has the divorces, there's forgive me, but no accountability, zero accountability. And so for him to be president, it makes all of the stuff that itches in their brains a little bit, like did the pastor really bang a secretary and have a kid with her? And now he's up here snotsling and we're just moving on from it like it's no big deal. It gave them all a permission structure to say, oh, everybody's as screwed up as we are. And the grifting, if you dive into like Donald Trump's website, all the grifting that he does, that is textbook, mega church, prosperity gospel stuff. So this is familiar to them. This is a passive form of familiarity where the person that they look to for moral guidance is a crook, is a liar, is a snake oil salesman, but they think if they don't trust the pastor, they're gonna burn in hell. And so the mirroring of evangelical Christianity

16:29and Donald Trump, to me as a non-religious person who grew up in the Bible belt, I'm like, oh, this makes perfect sense. Donald Trump is exactly the way these people are. That's interesting because it's a special kind of a deal, right? They say, we will give you just enough Jesus or we will give you just enough church. And once we do that, we can do whatever we want. That gives us the license as you talk about, no, accountability. I saw somebody on the social media yesterday or the day before, I think we see yesterday, say something to the effect of, or maybe it was this point, say something to the effect of, well, it seems like if you give them just enough racism, then you can do all the grifting you want. Because they're out there and they're feeling bad for being a racist. And then somebody comes along and says, oh no, it's okay to be a racist. And they're like, well, that's relief. And I'm with that guy because he makes me feel better about myself.

17:29So I don't care if the next thing he does is a crypto deal with whomever. Or he's, the Trump campaign is selling America 250 paraphernalia. They're literally making a profit off of the 250th anniversary of the United States, which is amazing. And so I guess it, I mean, is that the transaction? You give people just enough to feel good about themselves and they'll let you have a pass on everything else? Yeah, I think that's a part of it. And I do think to the, the part thing you saw on social media in the Bible belt, racism is still very prominent. It really is. And I think even Megan Kelly said it on her podcast a few months ago. We haven't felt normal since Obama. And something about Obama ascending to the executive branch broke them.

18:32And then their racist instincts were, they really had to suppress them, right? And maybe we started getting better. Maybe things were getting better in that regard. And then comes the dog whistles. He's not from here. He's not one of us. Donald Trump the way he did that. And I think that the worst thing about Donald Trump is he has unlocked in the followers of him, the cult base, that everybody caves to their worst impulses. Like all of the worst stereotypes about Americans is him. And then his followers just all cave to their worst impulses where we all have had moments as human beings where it's like, God, I really want to do this thing. It will be, you know, instant gratification. It'll feel great. But if I play the tape through, I really can't do this thing. I need to delay gratification. And this is a long term deal, but it's going to be more painful. Donald Trump is right now instant gratification,

19:33the worst stereotypes of all of American culture into this blistering horrific orange zit. And I think he's just, he's provided a permission structure for a mass moral collapse on a huge scale. And I think David, I just get so pissed when I think about these Republicans that I've been friends with in Oklahoma City, that are all, we're all about national security. We're business people and we like the decorum of the office and that they have excused this behavior and that all of the Republicans in the Senate and the House that get so sanctimonious to us about the dignity of the office and national security and support the troops. And then it's, it was all bullshit. It was all bullshit. It was always just all about power and owning the Libs and the thing that's so depressing about the whole thing is that's their ethos. I think Koma, representative Koma was on the news

20:34a couple of days ago and he said, boy, I spent at the airport sure it's going to piss off the Democrats and that makes it all worthwhile. And I thought that's it. That's it, even if his own supporters are suffering standing in line missing their flights for three hours, as long as it pissed off a few Libs when when. Yeah, well, you know, you know, you know, I'm a kind of a national security guy and so you trigger something when you say they're supposed to be good at national security because here we have a war with Iran going on right now which is the stupidest war we've ever gotten into it. Literally, there was no planning, there was no thought it goes against everything that any planner has ever thought before and it's all because the guy in the White House acts without advice and is an idiot. And, you know, he doesn't seem to care about anybody else. But when you take a step beyond that, you see that the entire Republican myth of national security competence is belied by the facts,

21:36whether it's the Iraq war or the global war on terror or spending $6 trillion, $8 trillion over the past 25 years while the Chinese were investing it in building their society. We were throwing it away on wars that we ultimately lost, they're bad at it. And the same is true, by the way, about the economy. They say, well, we're good at the economy and Democrats create jobs, Republicans don't. Democrats create surpluses, Republicans create deficits. The Republicans are bad at the economy. Stock market actually goes out more when Democrats are presidents than when Republicans are presidents. And at a certain point, even we get, you know, beyond the superficiality, the reality is their Republicans are lousy at all the things they say they're good at. They're good at making inequality worse, getting more money for the people who don't need it, taking money from the people who do need it, more power to the people who don't need it, taking it from the people who do need it. And so where does that leave us?

22:37Well, on the one hand, it's like, let's go on attack. But I think the other side of the coin, and I'm just interested in how you see this evolving in the context of this upcoming election, is the Democrats auto sort of own who they are, because actually they're better at economics, they're better at making the country work better, they're better at national security. You know, Democrats are always apologizing for who they are. And the record says something very different. And yet somehow our first reaction when we get attacked by a Republican is to say, oh, well, you know, maybe you're right, there may be some point, you know, it just drives me bananas. And I'm just wondering what your reaction to all of this. Hey, everybody, welcome to your 32nd laughing session brought to you by The Laughing Cow. Ready to laugh? In three, two, one, and...

23:38Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, great job, everybody. Ha, ha, ha, now unpeel a wedge of The Laughing Cow Light Spreadable Cheese, a delicious snack with two grams of protein and 25 calories per wedge. Feels good to have a cow, huh? Starting a business can seem like a daunting task, unless you have a partner like Shopify. They have the tools you need to start and grow your business. From designing a website, to marketing, to selling, and beyond, Shopify can help with everything you need. There's a reason millions of companies like Mattel, Heinz, and Allbirds continue to trust and use them. With Shopify on your side, turn your big business idea into... Sign up for your $1 per month trial at Shopify.com, slash special offer. So everything you said is 100% true. But this is the important thing for us to know, and it's very simple. The Republicans are better messengers, even if that message is a lie. They have done decades of messaging,

24:39especially where I'm from. There's no Democratic Party in Oklahoma anymore. So the Republicans just out-crazy themselves. Oklahoma was MAGA 1520 years ago, before Trump ever made the MAGA movement. Just Christian nationalists out-crazying each other. That's why what we spoke about at first, if there was a populace, whether they're Christian like Tallerico or not, but a populace, like let's take two different examples, Zoran Mamdani and Tallerico, that went in, laser focused, and said, particularly in flyover states and Bible wants. If somebody said they have lied to you, they are liars. And David, this is what I think about all the time. When Trump came to run in 2015, 2016, nobody wanted him. Fox didn't want him. The Republican establishment didn't want him. But what set him apart? He bashed everybody on the stage. He bashed the status quo. He said, little Marco, lying Ted.

25:42He dismantled the entire Republican party debate after debate. And the Republican party finally came to heal and finally came to support him. Some of their some-never Trumpers and the Lincoln Project or whatever. But the majority all switched, even though every Republican I knew in Oklahoma City, I would say, good country club Republicans. Oh, never vote for Donald Trump. This is during the primaries. Well, what did he do there? He lied, but he what he attacked the status quo. And he took the Republican party that George W. Bush sent off to the pasture. And he resurrected it. And the Democrats, the lesson in that is not to be a pathological liar. The message in that is to have the ability to step in and criticize your own party right now and say, Merrick Garland fucked us. You know it. I know it. That was disgraceful. You know, Joe Biden served us for a long time, but we cannot keep doing the same thing and expecting a different result.

26:42The people in middle America, Donald Trump and the Republican party lies to you. They weaponize your faith against you. Here is the facts. Here is the data. But like you said, they're playing defense all the time instead of offense when we really have the ball. So it boils down for me to a messaging issue in that we have to start damaging the Republican brand in the same way that they have falsely via lies and propaganda damaged the Democratic brand. And I don't know for the life of me, like we have serious problems in what's incubating right now, Tucker and Nick Fuentes. And if we do not start actively damaging that brand, we are leaving an incubation center for people that have been left over that are just look craving an anti-status quo candidate. And a lot of times that comes in the form of a demagogue, like Trump did and like Fuentes or a Tucker could.

27:43Yeah, but you know, you also have this other phenomenon, which is one that we've dealt with. You know, I was in the Clinton administration and there were a bunch of well-intentioned people there, but you know, the neo-liberals who were essentially owned by Wall Street took over, put in a place, a bunch of policies that ultimately rewarded Wall Street, rewarded Silicon Valley as it was growing and really drove inequality in the United States. Same thing happened under Obama. Those people are aligning up right now and you hear them on talk shows all the time and they're saying, the place to win this is in the middle. Let's find common ground. Let's find a way to get along with those nice billionaires. Let's not criticize the billionaires and all of this. And it drives me a little crazy because I know that essentially that is just Reagan light. That is mega light. That is just sort of the center playing it's for its checkbook

28:44and ignoring all these things that you're saying. And that's gonna peel away at some of the Democrats right now. We've got a midterm election coming up and I wish I could talk to you for hours, but in the last couple of minutes we've got, how does it look to you? How does it look to our Democrats getting the message or are you seeing this out there? Or are you worried that we're gonna end up kind of back where we were four years ago where there's a bunch of institutionalists and there's a bunch of neoliberals and there's a bunch of sort of corporate dems saying, okay, well, let's meet him halfway. So all of those people exist but the base is different. And if you go back to 2016, Trump took everybody by surprise, but the right wing media ecosystem was not surprised at all and everybody dismissed them. As oh, they're fringe, you know, we go by what Fox or what the RNC says. And I think the DNC is gonna be in for a huge awakening

29:46when they realize that what we're doing right now in our media ecosystem, how much it's grown, how much it's multiplied, and how many people in fly over states. Women that I know that were maybe independent leaning Republicans are now woke as liberals like I'm not voting for somebody who takes A-PAC money and I'm like, okay, Debbie, I didn't even know you knew what A-PAC was. And so a lot of millions of people are off the corporate tit and these leaders that you're speaking about, they do not have the luxury any longer of feeding people incremental propaganda on corporate cable news anymore because people are now in the spaces that we're in. And so I think the DNC and the Democratic establishment, if we have free and fair elections where ICE isn't terrorizing people, they're gonna learn very quickly, oh shit, our base is different. And I don't think that's clued into them yet, but I know it, you know it,

30:49everybody in these spaces know it, and you know who knew it in 2016? The Trump supporters knew it. They're like, this is a movement, things have changed here. And that's what's happening on our side right now. And I think we're going to see the establishment go, oh shit, they have really changed. They're not tolerating this. Look at what Zoraundin New York, he took on billionaires, Cuomo twice, the DNC. And they're still not quite getting the message yet, but I think they're gonna get it soon. I certainly hope you're right. I certainly think you're right. I, you know, Zoraundin is a good example. There are other examples out there of people who are willing to stand up, willing to tell the truth, willing to call them out for what they are. And who understand that the Democratic agenda is the agenda that actually plays to and motivates the rising class of voters. You know, the millennials and the Gen Z that will be the majority of voters in 2028.

31:49And we're seeing a change. And the only people who don't seem to see it, I think, are the leaders in the Democratic party, the DNC, the Chuck Schumer's, and the others who are living in a fog or who are married to the olden days where you don't criticize APAC, or you don't criticize Israel, or you don't criticize big institutions in the United States. And right now we gotta do it. And so that's why I really, I implore everybody who's listening to this. If you don't go and listen to Gen, and I've had it, you're making a big mistake. She is really one of the most important voices that have emerged out there. And I'm so delighted to see the attention that you are getting. I mean, at times in New York, very fancy. There are not people read those in Oklahoma City. I do. I'm like, holy macro. This is, you're having an impact. But it's a coast to coast impact. And it really hits where we need to hit. So I'm so glad you could join us.

32:50I hope we can coach you back here again to continue the conversation. But everybody, the first thing you do as soon as you get off is you go, subscribe, follow what Gen is doing. It's really, really important. But now thanks, Gen. Thanks everybody for listening. And we'll see you next week or see every day on each of the bots that we've got. Until then, bye-bye.