Dem Midterm Sweep

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1:37This is the Bloomberg Surveillance Podcast. Catch us live weekdays at 7 a.m. Eastern on Apple CarPlay or Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business App. Listen on demand wherever you get your podcasts or watch us live on YouTube. Patrick McHenry has been doing this out of his youth. I give him immense credit for starting young in the national political game. I see forever you're going to be Congressman McHenry. Get over it. Of course, head of international economics with Bloomberg News. Patrick McHenry, I see Pat Harrigan fighting for his life in the 10th district of North Carolina against Ashley Bell.

2:20I mean, right there is a shock alone. Describe how close that vote is in Hickory in the 10th and North Carolina district. Hundreds of votes. And it looks like Pat Harrigan's one of the rare Republican survivors in the congressional delegation in North Carolina. What we do know is it confirmed six Republicans lost their congressional seats in North Carolina, including the Rules Committee chairman, my friend and classmate, Virginia Fox, who is a tenacious fighter on the campaign trail, and the chair of the Congressional Committee. My friend, dear friend since since college, Richard Hudson, he lost that Pinehurst base base seat.

3:10He was the head of the House Campaign Committee for Republicans. Devastating night for my party in North Carolina, the likes of which we've not seen since, frankly, 1996, when Jim Hunt, Governor Jim Hunt, legendary Democrat, was on the ballot. But, you know, North Carolina didn't become a Republican state until 2010. Right. This is a truly devastating night. Patrick McHenry, I look at this and I'm going to take it back. Somebody actually emailed me yesterday about Barbara B. Conable of Western New York, who was one of the heroes of moving the Republican Party forward after Watergate. Patrick McHenry, how do Republicans in North Carolina and indeed across a traditional Republican landscape, How do they pick up the pieces?

3:58Do they wait 2027 or can they start this Wednesday morning? They have to start this Wednesday. You have to register the message that the voters sent. And they sent a very clear message in North Carolina. Roy Cooper has won a nearly 18 to 19 point victory. His last polling had him up 10 points. He was elected five times statewide, never by a margin like this. But to the U.S. Senate, he brings in a Democratic control of the statehouse, something he couldn't do as governor. You have to acknowledge what the voters have sent a message on. And it's not simply President Trump. It's a question of independence and actually delivering on your word and the principles you campaigned on.

4:51And you've got to go back to them and understand what they want and make sure you deliver for them. Across America, we welcome all of you commercial free across the arc of Bloomberg surveillance. This morning, a special post-election coverage with many, as John Tucker said, many of the contests, including North Carolina 10 undecided right now. Tom Keene and Paul Sweeney, a great set of conversations as we look to Texas, Paul, now North Carolina and the nation with Patrick McHenry. Absolutely, Tom. Patrick, what is President Trump or how does the Republican Party work with its president over the next two years, given what just happened in the last 12 hours here?

5:33How does this party work with its president? Well, long term, this president still has mastery over the Republican Party, not just the mechanics of it. But even at this stage where the president is not popular with the voting electorate, you heard that like a siren sound like 1994, 1974. That is the magnitude of what we saw last night. But he still, at this stage of the game, is one of the most popular presidents Republicans have ever had within their own party. That gives him an enormous stick to say, you cannot run away from me, even though we had a very, very bad night. The challenge is going to be in the short term because we've got to go back.

6:20Congress has to go back to session next week for the rest of the lame duck. You've got a set of issues you have to wrestle with there And you're going to see this in the Senate We knew this with the likes of Senator Tillis Leaving the chamber They're going to make their voices heard But now we have this in the U.S. House Where you're going to see a group of We're sitting now at over 240 Democrats in the U.S. House. This is a massive majority that the Democrats will have. A lot of people are going to lose their jobs and they're going to be out of their offices within days of returning back to Washington.

7:09The mood is going to be insanely sour for Republicans when they go back. That's going to be the first speed hump, which is this first coming to grips that you had a job. You thought you had a job yesterday until the votes started getting counted. And now you've got no job and you have no staff and no office now in Washington. Chairman, I make a joke about it, folks. He's congressman because I think he started out running for office when he was 15. Yeah, exactly. I think it was something like that. He was chairman of the House Financial Services Committee looking at our military budget. Now, in this lame duck, I believe somehow we have to pay the sailors on board three aircraft carriers.

7:54We've got to play fighter pilots in Iran. Give us a window into the debate in a lame duck session over defense appropriations. Sure. You have the president asking for a trillion and a half dollars of new spending. You have the Secretary of Defense who has faced impeachment charges in the House with a few Republicans being willing to side with Democrats on those charges. You have the senators that appointed him having buyer's remorse and wanting to take action against Pete Hagseth. And at the same time, you have a continuing resolution that the government's operating under that expires December 11th and a defense policy initiative that we've passed successfully every single year since Truman was president.

8:47Yeah. Called National Defense Authorization Act. This is tough. This confluence of events and election results makes it tough to pass the policy and the dollars to keep the government open. That's going to be the first pressure point. I think what will happen is a continued resolution. You'll not see a defense plus up, but you'll see the defense policy in the AA bill get signed into law barely by Christmas because much of that can be bipartisan and limited in nature. So I think that's what we'll see. Permitting reform is the next thing on the docket. We'll see about the mood here among Democrats on whether or not they want to continue those negotiations.

9:28Paul, on the oil barometer here, we're trying to bring the markets into the discussion this morning. Oh, yeah. Brent crude down to one on one ninety six down a dollar sixty four. Call that the Iran barometer. Yes. Post election. I think you're right, Tom. Patrick, give us a sense just with this, you know, 12 hours of kind of perspective here. What's the status of the MAGA movement within the Republican Party? Shaken, shaken. But, you know, they didn't show up. I think the key thing we see yesterday is that they didn't vote. Why didn't they vote? Is it a level of exhaustion or are they not a movement anymore?

10:07You know, all these political these political parties here in the United States are coalition parties. They are. That's just that's what they are. MAGA is a is is a new coalition, electoral coalition built around the president. The president was on the ballot, even though he said you have to treat it like I'm on the ballot. And the MAGA coalition did not come out. Part of it got fragmented because of the focus on illegal immigration by Kristi Noem, which inflamed the Hispanic community that voted in President Trump in key states like Texas. They stayed home. So part of it was the president's people and their initiatives broke up the MAGA coalition.

10:53The other part was they just stayed at home. So how do you get them back out? Are they done with the experiment of voting for Republicans? A lot has to be determined there. Let me get one more in here, Chairman McHenry, if I could. And it's just as simple as I can. There's always a turnover. Do you expect cabinet officials, other senior Trump officials to resign in the coming days and weeks and just move on in a normal format? I think this is their last chance. I think you're going to see a turn in the cabinet because otherwise they have to ride it out for the next two years. and with a solidly Democratic Senate, it's going to be very difficult for the president to get any confirmation through the Senate.

11:43I have to ask a selfish question. It comes up in our conversations off mic all the time. What is your basic take on the state of the Pentagon and the officers, the senior officers relationship with the secretary of defense? Oh, look, I mean, we've heard more about this, the politics of the Pentagon in the last two years, have ever heard. And so it is a it's a fractious relationship. And the president certainly is is is shown that he has confidence in Secretary Hague, Seth, and supports the initiatives that he's taking. That's not the case on Capitol Hill where there's bipartisan opposition. We'll see what what takes place in the next six weeks on action there.

12:28And we'll see whether or Secretary Higgs had six round for the rest of the ride. It is something about public participation. As a junior in college, Patrick McHenry ran for the North Carolina House of Representatives. I wasn't doing that. I was looking for the marginal Jenny Kremel. Patrick McHenry was getting it done. Thank you so much for your work with Bloomberg, Patrick McHenry, and your perspective this post-election day. Stay with us. More from Bloomberg Surveillance coming up after this.

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14:00You're listening to the Bloomberg Surveillance Podcast. Catch us live weekday afternoons from 7 to 10 a.m. Eastern. Listen on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business App or watch us live on YouTube. Libby Cantrell is with She brings a prodigious narrowness in a look at the step by step move of our legislation in Washington. So we have a lame duck legislative deadline, December 11th. Within the media, to me, it's cursory. It's like, yeah, there's a phrase lame duck. Give us the inside baseball feel of Republicans in a lame duck session having to pay soldiers and sailors. just as one idea.

14:46Yeah. I mean, this is going to be, I mean, a very busy lame duck. At least that's one scenario. The other scenario is that nobody shows up because they've lost their seats and it's really difficult to come back to Washington. They literally lose offices, right? Yeah. Yes. Yeah. And oftentimes they're working out of there. It's in January where there's a holdover. Oh, so they lose the office in January. Yeah. Okay. What do they do with their apartments or like their families? Well, then, I mean, there's going to be a lot of kind of recoupling, if you will. A lot of members of Congress live together as roommates.

15:15This is sort of like a dirty little secret in Washington because they have to afford two homes, right? Like back in the 19th century. Basically, Tom. They also, I mean, no apologies for members of Congress here, but they haven't gotten a pay raise since the early aughts. So this is, you know, they're not necessarily making a lot of money on a real basis. So I think it could be a very busy lame duck session where you, of course, have the blocking, tackling the NDAA, government funding, as you alluded to. But I also think you could see something like permitting reform actually get some traction.

15:44That is a huge bill that has been for people who are sort of traditional energy advocates advocating for basically allows for more sort of traditional energy assets to be built, reduces red tape, but then also reduces red tape for renewables and electricity. Oh, come on. To cut to the chase, Republicans going out the door want to drill in Alaska and they're going to get it done before the Democrats show up. Yeah, but by the way, they still need to have a bipartisan vote in the Senate. So I think you could get Democrats on board, too, because I think Democrats are going to want to clear the decks here.

16:16I mean, this is this is such a rebuke. This is not 2006, which is what we were saying to our clients in the last couple of weeks, that this could look like a wave that you saw in 2006 where Democrats took back both the House and the Senate. This is 1974. Yeah. This is a total referendum against the executive branch. And so you're going to have, I mean, the fact that you were talking about potentially 40 to 50 seats flipping for Democrats. I mean, Democrats are winning in places that they did not even know that they were competitive. They look like they're going to win in Nevada, Congressional District 2.

16:51There's never been a Democrat there, right? That was a district created in like 40, 45 years ago. There's never been a Democrat represented. So, again, they are winning in places that they didn't even know that they were competitive. So they are going to want to, I think, clear the decks to the extent that they can to try to then really focus on the things that they were actually elected to do, which is to try to do something on affordability and then also to try to provide some oversight to the executive branch. OK, so let's go to the, you know, given this mandate that the Democratic Party has received here, what can they realistically do?

17:24So there are obviously still constraints. President Trump is still in the White House. They're going to have big majorities, but nothing close to a veto-proof majority. So of course they can't overturn a veto. So there is going to be some sort of constraint. However, with 55 potentially in the Senate, I mean, you're going to have a Democratic Party that is going to have to have, they're going to have to show the voters that they can also govern. So this can't just be an opposition party. They can't just be doing oversight and impeachment of Pete Hegseth or what have you. They're going to have to show that they can govern.

17:56And I think that means that there is some window for a deal. The one thing I think that's really important to point out here for the markets is this is going to be a more moderate group of Democrats than we have seen for a long time. There are going to be more blue dogs. This is like, be still my deficit hawk heart, because they're winning in places that are, again, sort of more traditionally Republican. So I'm going to rip up the script. How did Jeffries and Schumer bring this more moderate Democrat party into the stereotype of the liberal left Democrats? What a what a thread of needle exercise.

18:31Yeah. Well, I mean, again, I think this is what the voters really did. And, you know, I think to Schumer's great credit in particular, you know, love Schumer, hate Schumer, however you feel about him or dislike him or what have you as a as the future majority leader again. I mean, he he really focused on candidate quality and he focused on candidate quality that didn't pass the purity test at the national level, but actually were bespoke to their local dynamics. I'm going to do a shout out. Brett Baer last night on Fox as they were picking up the disastrous pieces. He was brilliant on this. And Brett really focused on candidate quality.

19:09I mean, look at what's happening in Mississippi, right? You know, Tallarico in Texas, Annie Andrews in South Carolina. These are not folks who are necessarily running on the national Democratic platform. They're running on a very localized platform. I'm so intimidated by Libby Cantrell. I have to take notes. Yeah. That bill's on my lap. OK. I didn't know this. A veto proof is both houses. Yes. 290 House members, which is way away from 258 or whatever. Yeah. And in the Senate, 67 senators. Yeah. So the president's got a rock solid veto pen. Yes, except I will say on maybe a couple of issues. One is on tariffs on Canada.

19:50That has a huge I mean, look what happened right in the upper Midwest, like massive rebuke on the tariff agenda or what have you. I could see that actually getting that to that veto proof majority. Also, Russia sanctions. That is something that really upset Republicans on the Hill. Also, Democrats. I could see that actually getting to a veto proof majority. But outside of that, I mean, it's going to have to require both compromise to the president, but also compromise the Republicans. Because remember, Tom, you also need a filibuster proof majority for most legislation. The filibuster is not going anywhere.

20:24That means Democrats need to actually compromise with Republicans on some things. So there's definitely going to be a constraint. But I would be very surprised if Democrats don't pivot to compromising with the president, at least on some things. Did you see Taylor Swift at the game when the Broncos beat KC? Can we talk about that game? God, that game was ugly. But you know what? I really do appreciate that you bring up the fact that the Broncos record belies how ugly these games have been. You know what? We will take it. A W is a W in the words of my 15 year old. We're migrating from Broncos type to Kansas City Chiefs.

20:56Joining us now in Portland. Libby Cantrell, thank you so much. Thanks so much. Brilliant with Simcoe. Stay with us. More from Bloomberg Surveillance coming up after this.

21:12You're listening to the Bloomberg Surveillance Podcast. Catch us live weekday afternoons from 7 to 10 a.m. Eastern. Listen on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business App. Or watch us live on YouTube. This could be a normal conversation, but I don't think anything's normal this morning. Mara Carlin with us with her public service as U.S. Assistant Secretary of Defense for Strategy, Plans, and Capabilities. Please. Mari, I just got to rip up the script here this morning. You're having a cup of coffee with Secretary Hegseth. And what do you say to him as a grizzled operative about what to do next?

21:52What would you advise? Look, I'm guessing other things are on Pete Hegseth's mind right now. But if he wanted to talk about how war is changing, I would tell him he needs to stop obsessing over technology. that fundamentally there are elements of war that haven't changed. Thinking about who kills, who dies, who decides, figuring out what our objectives are and our theory of victory for actually achieving those, that all still matters a lot. And whatever cool whiz-bang gizmo he brings into the military, that's not going to be the thing that wins the war. How has maybe, do you think the U.S. policy as it relates to Iran in particular, maybe even Ukraine, do you expect any changes now that there's been this seismic change in Congress with Democrats taking control?

22:43Do you think the policies of this White House will be impacted? It's hard to predict this White House, to state the obvious. But I sure hope that there is a different set of conversations about what the U.S. is trying to achieve in Iran. Look, I can make up a bunch of objectives, but it was entirely unclear when this war started. Was it to deal with the nuclear program? Was it to deal with the missile program? Was it to support the Iranian public who had gone through this kind of massive and quite lethal uprising in January? It's not clear what objective they were trying to achieve other than fundamentally to collapse the regime.

23:24So I expect a lot harder questions coming from Congress and Congress will have the ability to do things like take away resources for a war that's just profoundly confused. I look at this. Is it true that you work for six defense secretaries? I did indeed. That's extraordinary. An arch question. I say this with immense respect for Republicans, Democrats and independents listening. If I'm talking to Admiral Stravitas or General Kimmett, General Hodges and others that we speak to, members of the CIA, this is the money question, folks. Mark Harlan, with that experience, do you suggest after this we can get back to a normal Pentagon or is it forever shattered?

24:12I think you can go back, but it will be very difficult. It will require serious and thoughtful leadership. It will require an effort to re-infuse professionalism and discipline into the force. It will be difficult, but it's possible. I remain optimistic. The U.S. military is composed of extraordinary human beings who join because they're often inspired by something much bigger than themselves. But look, in our system, we have a system of civilian control of the military. And we've seen a whole lot of bad behavior by civilian leaders. And that needs to change. I will say this, folks, for all of you, Republicans, Democrats, independents.

24:56Maybe that was the most important minute and a half of the morning. Yeah. Because I just say to myself, those people are at immense risk. Yeah. Three aircraft carriers, all the people deployed. I believe it's off the top of my head, 40 ,000 people. OK, that's you know, that's an important moment. Mark Harlan, thank you for joining our election coverage this morning. We need to speak to you soon. Former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Defense for Strategy, Plans and Capabilities. Stay with us. More from Bloomberg Surveillance coming up after this.

25:38You're listening to the Bloomberg Surveillance Podcast. Catch us live weekday afternoons from 7 to 10 a.m. Eastern. Listen on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business app. Or watch us live on YouTube. It's a great honor and something that we've been remiss not to cover this morning. We've spoken to the Secretary of Defense, Leslie Vinge-Murray, is one of the great transatlanticists I know. Out of Wesleyan, all of her work, Columbia and LSE as well. Dr. Vinge-Murray, thank you so much for joining us. this morning here from your purview in Chicago. I have to ask Leslie about the future of Secretary Rubio.

26:21I mean, we talk about Hegseth and there's this and that and the others and other, but Rubio just seems to be removed. How does the Secretary of State, Leslie Vindgerberry, react to this titanic moment. I mean, look, this is, you know, he's he's in the rear view at the moment. But this is, you know, in my to my mind, this these midterm results were certainly about the Iran war, but it was only because they impacted so deeply on people's everyday lives. I don't see this as a huge foreign policy election. We know it was about, you know, driving your car across the Midwest is much more expensive now than it used to be.

27:05We know that corruption mattered. And people, I think, generally haven't been pleased with foreign policy because it's been disruptive and it's affected them. But Marco Rubio, you know, he might just glide right through this because he hasn't really been the face of the Iran war. And I don't think that the election was so much focused on the Western hemisphere and the policies there, regardless of what people might feel. But, you know, you ask a super interesting question, Tom, as you always do. Leslie, as it relates to Iran, should we expect any differing policy in the short term as it relates to Iran here now, what's happening in Congress?

27:49Yeah, I mean, here, you know, we've been hovering over this. Will there be a new round of decisive strikes. And even before last night's results, there were several kind of signs that maybe Trump wasn't so sure, pushing down on those negotiations, scheduling talks even about Russia and Ukraine to take place in the Middle East not long from now. Not a location you would choose if you were planning to bomb hard. That surprise announcement yesterday that funding for Israel, military assistance for Israel would be stopped. And this is a president that we know isn't so keen despite his actions. He doesn't love war, doesn't love disruption, but he is still facing a super hard moment.

28:36Congress is going to work hard when they come back, when that new Congress is sworn in, which isn't for some time, but it's looming large now, to restrict appropriations, hold money back, make it harder to do things, create more noise. But the president still has tremendous executive authority. I mean, one thing that I'm curious about is whether President Trump uses this moment to do things that maybe he actually would otherwise like to do, which is to dial down some of those that Connecticut, kinetic action in the Middle East, because it's not really clear what it's going to achieve for him. And breaking news, Leslie, we're going to have to go, but thank you so much.

29:16Too short a visit. We look forward to seeing you again. Love to get Leslie Vinge-Murray into our New York studios here as well. Great set of conversations coming up, folks here. Leslie Vinge-Murray, I should say, at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs. Stay with us. More from Bloomberg Surveillance coming up after this. with chat gpt you can do more than get answers you can get things done when you're running a business and looking to expand you need a clear view of the landscape before making any decisions chat gpt can help you prepare connect your google drive point to relevant files and reports and ask chat to research competitors industry forecasts and market signals it can turn the findings into a strategic deck in your team's template that you can review before presenting to your leadership team.

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31:30moments ago, just a blistering look back at this election. I'm not going to quote it right now to save time for the wonderful Joe LaVornia, but it's going to be amazing, Paul, to see how everybody reacts over here the next week. This is the single most important document I have on the Bloomberg Terminal. SMBC, U.S. Macroeconomics, Joseph LaVornia, phone number, all the usual. The title was A Blue Tsunami. But here's the money thing. October 27, 2026. Nobody I know Nailed this. Like Joe LaVornia. Did you see something in the LaVornia crystal ball because you worked within the White House? Did you have a leg up that the pundits didn't have?

32:24Thank you, Tom. Well, first of all, there are some people I follow that I actually think are very, very good. There are a couple of very good pollsters. Richard Barris, the big data poll, is outstanding, as is Mark Mitchell, who used to formerly be at Rasmussen and now is at the Honest Pollster or is the Honest Poll, rather. They're really important. Another constitutional scholar, polymath lawyer, Robert Barnes, also I've tracked and followed. So these are sort of like the peripheral people, but really should be more mainstream. they've been phenomenal. So they certainly helped. From a fundamental perspective, as I mentioned, just looking at it from the macro side, which is what I'm better at or good at, is that the generic ballot, the intensity ratio or intensity gap, and the net approval ratings all looked to me like it was going to be 06.

33:11What helped me being in the administration was seeing, one, how things got done, and also thinking at the time that the market, many investors were complaining the president's potential taco in Iran as making this crisis not last as long as it ultimately would. And I knew that this could be much more complicated. And that matters because from an affordability perspective, which I mentioned yesterday and I've told many folks, has been a real problem because it's helped collapse real wage growth. It's been negative. So I'd like to think, yes, some of it was certainly me. Some of it was knowing who to follow and track.

33:45And it is what it is, but it's It's not good. And we'll see if the party course corrects. I don't know if they will, but we'll see. In hindsight here, given what we know now, were tariffs just a really bad policy? No. No? The implementation was bad. OK, explain that. If they put in, they, the administration, they put it in before I got there. But if they did a 10 percent across the board tariff on national security grounds, we need to get supply chains back to the U.S., sensitive materials. We're going to put a 10 % tariff on everybody but China, which is going to put a 20 % tariff on. And it was phased in gradually.

34:26And it was done by the law. And IEPA, which was about 6 % of the tariffs, it was done with what the letter of the law said. It would have been fine. Tariffs aren't a bad thing. Tariffs are neither good nor bad. It's the kind of what they're used for. But this is perfect. Joe, you nailed it. If there'd been a responsible process, we can argue from two to three percent blended tariff out to 10 percent, whatever. Instead, we got an April Rose Garden. Emotional. It was we were we were tariffing Mexico and Canada in February. I mean, there was no the implementation. The process was terrible. Will we see that Trumpian behavior forward here through the lame duck and frankly into the next two years?

35:12That's certainly a risk. I don't know. The president's nontraditional and it's possible that tariffs, you know, he's got executive orders and he's got veto. So it's possible on the tariff on the geopolitical side, there are things that are done to distract and deflect from what's happened domestically. That's certainly possible, but I don't know the answer. One of the things we're seeing oil move around, we're seeing it come down over the last several sessions here, maybe expecting we'll get a little bit of resolution here. I mean, how is that going to play out as it relates to inflation? So I think that the Democrats are effectively going to control the Perth Springs.

35:48They, like the public, have not viewed the Iran war favorably. The approval ratings, I think, were at 47 % when we went in, and every war of the approval goes down, not up. I'm going to make a guess that we're out by the end of the first, whatever out looks like, but we basically pulled out by the end of the first quarter of next year, which will push energy prices lower. That also, I think, could be a good excuse to Fed not to be more aggressive than what I'm thinking. You know, 100 basis points in total hikes because oil moves lower. That might be an excuse to wait. But I think we get out, which for me, as a citizen, I think that's good.

36:22I'd like to get out. Yep. So, again, do we expect any meaningful economic policy out of this Congress? No. No, you can't. I mean, it's a lame duck. The president won't be a lame duck because, again, he could be very aggressive through executive order. But no, there won't be any policy. I mean, the policy that will get, you know, the farm funding and defense reauthorization. Those are sort of mandatory things every year. A budget, you got to extend the continuing resolution of a budget that'll eventually get done. We've got to do the debt ceiling. So there's certain things that have to get done.

36:54But on the debt ceiling, maybe the president uses that as leverage against the Democrats. So it's going to be really messy. And I think, as I mentioned yesterday, this is like dysfunction that's not healthy. It's not good for risk assets. So what are we doing here? What's the what's the conversation you're having with your clients today and presumably for the next several weeks? Well, so I think the message is, look, the U.S. economy is very dynamic, very innovative. And, you know, we've we've been through more chaotic times in the past. And, you know, relative to the rest of the world, we're doing very well.

37:27And I do think AI is going to bring about strong productivity. I like the fact that the Kevin Moore-Sled Fed is trying to change some things and monetary policy doesn't look like it's going to be too overboard on tightening. But, you know, it's you know, we're in an interesting time and, you know, we're not going to get a break from the politics. Look at the presidential election is going to heat up soon. But, you know, I'm an optimist. No, no, Joe, it's already started. Well, it's already. Well, in terms of declared candidates will happen soon. But you're right, Tom. Right. OK, Joe, thank you so much.

37:58Two days. It's too much. Two days. Two days in a row, Joe LaVornia. Perfect. It's too much. I agree with you. Joe, congratulations on your October 27th. Thank you. Hugely pressing. Joseph LaVornia is public service to the nation, of course, with SMBC. This is the Bloomberg Surveillance Podcast, available on Apple, Spotify, and anywhere else you get your podcasts. Listen live each weekday, 7 to 10 a.m. Eastern, on Bloomberg.com, the iHeartRadio app, TuneIn, and the Bloomberg Business app. You can also watch us live every weekday on YouTube and always on the Bloomberg Terminal.

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