This Is What Trump Is Plotting Instead of Death

0:00If he died suddenly and in office, that might well transform Donald Trump into an iconic historic figure. Would Donald Trump prefer to die in office and be remembered as a president who died in office? He is not thinking that that's the only options. He's thinking that the options are he's going to go on for indefinitely. And he is no doubt already plotting how from Mar-a-Lago he continues to be the dominant figure in American politics. It's like when you remove any dominant figure, dictators or I think people breathe a big sigh of relief. The quiet will be extraordinary. People will go, they'll breathe again.

0:46History starts over again.

0:52Michael. Michael. Joanna. We are recording this in the middle of Lindsey Graham's ceremonial lying in state. We are. I'm trying to think what that's called. It's not his funeral, but his coffin is being placed in the rotunda, I believe, of the Capitol. And this is a ceremony privilege accorded, I think, definitely, well, actually, I don't know who it's accorded to. I think great man. Great man. I mean, is this, I mean, I would not have expected this for Lindsey Graham, frankly. Well, death turns out to be a great PR coup. Sudden death. Sudden death. Sudden death, yeah. Unexpected death. Lingering Mitch McConnell, yeah, forget about it.

1:51But no, but literally two weeks ago, when did he die? Last, two weeks ago. Three weeks ago, I think. Well, whenever. The last time he was alive, Lindsey Graham was largely regarded as a, you know, as a hopeless sellout suck up. I mean, an embarrassment. I mean, here was a person who, I mean, we know all of the things that he said about the genuine things he said about Donald Trump. And then in order to maintain his own relevance, and also certainly quite a number of people in the Trump orbit have suggested to me in order to avoid Trump's slurs against gay people, he sucked up to Donald Trump. But Donald Trump does slur gay people.

2:47But not Lindsay. That's the point. So in order to avoid that, in order to avoid getting on Trump's bad gay side. Okay. So to avoid exposure, in fact, he sucked up to Donald Trump. It's not even exposure. Trump does this thing that suggests, he calls people and he said, you know, I hear there's a lot of funny stuff about Lindsay. A lot of stuff. You hearing that? than everybody. So that's how he gets the information. That's how he spreads the slur. Well, in death, Lindsey Graham is getting a lot of solemnity. We've got Presidents Netanyahu and Zelensky coming into town. They're both having meetings with Trump today.

3:38But are you actually saying that this is a PR coup for Lindsey Graham? Yeah, no, of course it is. Literally. So he has gone from a person in embarrassment. And I think that he was widely seen as this. I mean, he was shameless in his suck-upperie. And now here he is, a statesman of our time. a statesman of our time, and his sister, 11 years younger, whom he adopted after both her parents died, is sitting there ready to... I find this absolutely remarkable, this Nepo dynastic politics. I mean, she's going to inherit his Senate seat, it looks like. It seems somewhat ironic that a Brit would find Nepo...

4:27No, that's why I moved here. That's why I moved here. I mean, to get rid of that stuff. And then, of course, you have the Bushes, you have the Clintons. You know, politics always has been, always in this country, a strong dynastic theme. Well, do you think Darlene Graham is going to win the seat? Because now we've got Mark Sanford, the former governor of South Carolina, is coming out to run for Senate seat. I don't know what he's done since he stepped down as governor. I mean, he needs a job. He needs a job. He wants to be back in power. He wants the fun of it all. Yes, I think that she probably will.

5:08I mean, there are two steps here. There is the first step of the primary in which if she gets 50%, then she doesn't have to go to a runoff. That'll be the interesting thing. But the Trump endorsement is very powerful. Why did Trump endorse her so early? Why didn't he see who the field was going to flush out? I think he liked the story, actually. I think that there's, you know, Trump is a movie of the week guy. Right. You said that last week. Yeah, you said that on Saturday. So this is the hallmark movie of the week. Yeah, the sentimental aspect of this. I think it works for Trump. Now, remember, it works for Trump's now.

5:58Might he shift on this? Might, if she is not obsequious in the way that her brother was? Right. Yeah, he could. I mean, I think it's yet unclear, because we hardly know this person, Darlene. She's just sort of, she just entered the stage with a little shock on her face. And could she blow it? Yeah, easily. America has always built its way forward through disruption, through reinvention, through people overcoming the challenges before them. Today, the ideas shaping America's future are being built collaboratively by communities, innovators and entrepreneurs all looking in the same direction. In storefronts, community centers and towns, most people drive through without stopping.

6:50People are using technology and creativity to solve real problems in practical ways, building opportunity, optimism and momentum from the ground up. We're already writing America's Next Chapter. We're building what's next now.

7:09So when we were watching, we had the prayer and then a lady from South Carolina got up and you said, I can't watch these people. And I said, when you say these people, what do you mean? And you said. I said, morons. Please extrapolate. I don't know who this woman was, but I was just signaled, by the way, that by our producer that she's a congresswoman. But there are. Congresswoman from South Carolina. I'm sure. I'm sure. But it doesn't matter. I mean, she, you know, and she came up and she spoke with everything she said out of her mouth was valueless. And expected. Lindsay is not only a saint and has ascended to heaven, but he is the everyone in every one of our little cities was loved.

8:06He's gone up to that great golf course in the sky, I think. He's probably playing 18 rounds, looking down on us and laughing in that fruity laugh. Yeah, I mean, I think most people, when they speak at funerals, default to a moron setting. I have not spoken at very many funerals, but... I've spoken at a lot of funerals. Do you descend into that? No, no, no, no. I'm fantastic. I get them laughing. Oh, you do? That's what you have to do. I spoke at Helen Gurley Brown's funeral because she died shortly after I became editor of Cosmopolitan. And it was an unbelievable lineup of speakers. Now, just let me interrupt because I actually believe Helen Gurley Brown, from a good part of my life, was probably one of the most famous women in America.

8:55She is now, I suspect, an utterly forgotten woman. But she was. And she was famous for writing a book in the early 1960s called Sex and the Single Girl. And then she went on to make Cosmopolitan magazine one of the most successful magazines. in the country, but she was a - Are you mansplaining Helen Gurley Brown to me? You are mansplaining HGB to me. Well, you were not. You just were assuming that people knew who she was. Oh, I was going to go on and explain who she was. And I was pointing out that she is entirely forgotten. Well, she probably is entirely forgotten. Except by me. Except by you.

9:35And I haven't forgotten her because she did an incredible job with Cosmo and she took over. It was a small literary magazine, and when she took it over, it was the same year that the pill was sanctioned or whatever and came onto the market, really. So she rode that wave and created a phenomenal magazine. I've always thought she didn't quite get the credit she should have done for creating the template for the modern magazine. She was a super sex person. That's what she was. She was a super sex person, had a lot of sex of all kinds. I often wonder if she actually had a lot of sex. She was married to David Brown, the producer of Jaws.

10:16Who himself was having a lot of sex. Yeah, it was a sex positive time. I think the term now is sex positive, not super sex. But I remember Liz Smith, the then gossip columnist, spoke, and so did Barbara Walters. I had to follow Barbara Walters, and Barbara Walters was absolutely brilliant, and her last line was - A lot of other people have had a lot of sex. Well, right. Good point. Yes. Very good point. Okay. Well, and I got up there, and I had been given a letter. She used to write loads and loads of letters, and I'd been given one of her letters that she wrote home to her mom about how she had met Jacqueline Suzanne, the novelist, who at one point was very famous, and now everybody's forgotten.

11:06Speaking of a lot of sex. Also a lot of sex. And I got up and I read the letter. And as I got up there, I thought there's no way in hell I am able to follow Barbara Walters because she'd been hilarious. And so I had to completely change the tone. And so I read this little letter. And by the end of it, I almost choked up. And I never choke up. I haven't cried for years. I'm just not a weeper. And by the end of that, I had almost cried. Well, that's what funerals are, you know, as I say. When I met her for lunch for the first time. A good PR coup. Yeah, a good PR coup. It was a very good... It brings everybody to the Alice Tully Hall for her.

11:43So when, if... You die. Well, when, not me, but more likely Donald Trump. You know, that's interesting. I mean, if he died suddenly and in office, that might well transform Donald Trump into an iconic historic figure. So would he like that? Does Donald Trump just want to go on and on and on? Or does he want a long, slow decline like Mitch McConnell? Mitch McConnell, by the way, released another photograph of himself this week yesterday. And nobody believed it. Everybody was like, just put out a video, man. Just say. Ten second video. Everybody's got an iPhone now, Mitch. Or an Android phone. Everybody has a phone.

12:37You can do a little video on it. All you have to do is say, thank you for your well wishes. I'm working hard at rehab. I'll be back soon. He can't do it. He can't speak. Do you think that's true? Yeah, I think he's probably, I think he's had a stroke and the impairment is substantial. So why don't they just say that? Why are they pretending? Is it to get the August the 3rd deadline after which they don't have to put someone new in? I don't, I mean, I don't know. It seems ridiculous to me, but it also seems like, I don't know. I don't know the answer. Nobody knows the answer. Okay, so let's go back to Donald Trump.

13:19Would Donald Trump prefer, given his druthers, as if we have any choice over this, to die in office and be remembered as a president who died in office? Because most of them don't. He is not thinking that that's the only options. He's thinking that the options are he's going to go on for indefinitely. He's going to leave office. he's going back to Mar-a-Lago and then and he is no doubt already plotting how from Mar-a-Lago he continues to be the dominant figure in American politics. I just realized that we haven't told people what else we're planning to talk about. As usual, we just got straight into it.

14:02We forgot to tell them, please subscribe. We forgot to tell them who we are because we have lots of new people who come to the podcast every week. You're Michael Wolf, you write books about Trump. I'm Joanna Coles. I am the chief content officer at the Daily Beast. And we're going to discuss J.D. Vance's book. We're going to discuss Laura Loomer's bizarre 180 on Ukraine and the discovery that she is, in fact, Ukrainian. Her roots are Ukrainian. Where should we start? Trump's death. Well, let's finish off on Trump's death. Yeah. We had Kurt Anderson on the show on Sunday, who's written a new novel.

14:40In it, he imagines Trump's death. He's coming down the escalator at Trump Tower. This takes place in 2035. He's 90. He has a massive stroke and just collapses. All his MAGA fans think he's been assassinated and roar onto the street on Fifth Avenue and start smashing cars. It's the beginning of the civil war. Well, that's interesting to think that Trump could go on for another 10 years, almost 10 years after he leaves office. That would be eight years after he leaves office. Yeah, and it's interesting that he might. I mean, that would certainly be the Trump plan. I'm going to leave office in 2028, 2029, and return to Mar-a-Lago.

15:38And I am going to do from Mar-a-Lago what I did from the last time they sent me back to Mar-a-Lago, which is to continue to dominate the American political landscape. Is that possible? Well, I mean, the truth is, thank God for old age. It creeps up on all of us. As a matter of fact, somebody somewhat off topic here. I just was asked by a publication that will go nameless to write a piece, a short piece about something that I am optimistic about. and good lord what could that possibly be and i said i'm optimistic about donald trump's death um and um and i and i actually disagree with kurt i think i think um i think when that happens that that that moment and it's like when you remove any dominant figure um dictators or or i think people breathe a big sigh of relief a big exhale yeah i think it's like the world clears it suddenly and with trump you know all of this the quiet will be extraordinary people will go they'll breathe again i'll say it's a it's a kind of like okay yeah let's let's history starts over again well we'll see won't we we'll see you know who i think there's a saw bell alliance says death is good for some people.

17:19That is a good line. I went to interview Saul Bellow once up in Vermont, and I asked him if he had any regrets because he was in his 80s at this point, and he said his regrets were around women. I was going to say, did he make a pass? No, he didn't make a pass, actually. I think he was too old to make a pass. Well, as a matter of fact, that makes sense. If you've ever read a Saul Bellow novel, I have re-read them many times. Very dense. Oh, yes. No, I find them like it's just bliss. I was wondering if I'd made a pass at him, actually. No, no, I'm joking. I didn't. I didn't. But I enjoyed meeting him.

18:01We had a sort of five-hour lunch, and his much younger wife was sort of hovering in the background. And I remember we ate blueberries from his garden. Anyway, I'm digressing. Anyway, he's my favorite writer of all modern American writers. And I would proffer a man who's completely gone out of fashion now, John Updike. I would have John Updike over Saul Bellow any day. Completely out of fashion. Well, they're all out of fashion. They're all out of fashion. All right. So let's come back to, you know who I think is thinking very hard about Donald Trump's death? I don't. J.D. Vance. Oh. J.D. Vance.

18:40We can now talk. Finally. That's such an interesting thing about vice presidents because, you know, they live for the death of the president, but they can't think about that. I mean, they can't. They certainly can't give any intimation that they are thinking about it. Of course not. And in their own minds, it must be a weird thing to be wishing for the death of someone. I mean, also. Well, I've always thought that was the weirdest thing about King Charles, actually, that King Charles' entire life was wishing for the death of his mother so he finally could get to be king and be the boss of everybody.

19:20And yet you're wishing for your mother to die at the same time. Very odd situation. Long live the king. With him, though, you could really see it. Let's go. Let's move it along. I know. He was 74 by the time he took over. And then poor man, two years later was diagnosed with cancer. And we don't know what kind of cancer, but we know he can live with it, even if it's not curable. Strange. Anyway, I think J.D. Vance is thinking a lot about Donald Trump's death. And what I found most extraordinary about his book Communion, and I know you've read it now too, because we were texting about it, is how little there is about Donald Trump in this book.

20:02It's the most remarkable absence, as is his political life. There's a whole range of things that are not in this book. There's very little about his his kind of curse skirting over his marriage and absolutely not addressing the fact that his wife's family is an immigrant family amidst his general sourness about all immigrants. I mean, which is also another point about his conversion to Catholicism, which in itself, he kind of skirts over, although the book is actually about his search for God. So what is the book about? Because I got to the end of it and I thought, what is this book about? I think you're completely right that everybody who's running for president has to write a book.

21:00I can't wait for Pete Hexeth's book. Come on, Pete. I want the full story of Bill Maughes. It is just a straightforward campaign book. And every issue that you can think of, he ticks off a position on. Right, economics, values. Yeah, screen time, elder care. Did you just say spring time? Screen time. Oh, screen time. I thought you said spring time. And I was like, oh, he's going to change spring. Yes. So all of those things. But the stated purpose of the book is as though he wants to do something more. I mean, let's remember, J.D. Vance is a, you know, super look at me, best boy, hot dog, you know, full of, you know, I got to be the best.

21:50I got to be the top of the class. I got to be the president. And in this, so it's like I got to write a campaign book, but I got to make it somehow more meaningful than a campaign. Well, than anybody else's campaign book. So I will talk about, I will write a campaign book, but it will be under the rubric of my search for God. Right. Which also is a good campaign. That gives me a campaign advantage too, because I'm going to have to win over the God people. And I mean, I can't - Well, you're going to talk to the base, the evangelicals, right? Slash people that believe in God. So that's there. And it's a weird thing because this is a real book.

22:37This is a kind of at least one thread through this book is the searcher's book. I am looking. I'm not satisfied. I am not. I mean, this is essentially what he's saying. I'm not satisfied with what the meaning I have found in life. I am an unhappy person. You know, and there's briefly talks about he could go to a therapist, but no, he doesn't want to do that. And he goes to a therapist briefly, right? And then decides that the therapist isn't helpful enough and that it's whiny to talk about yourself and that the therapist somehow lets him off and sort of is understanding actually of what his background has been, which has been up and down, family of addicts living with his grandmother, et cetera.

23:23And what he wants is more responsibility for self in a way. He writes a lot about that.

23:59The juxtaposition, and it's an awkward juxtaposition, is my search for spirituality at the same time and in the same context that I'm really climbing up the greasy pole of success. And that's what also he is opposed to. I mean, essentially, the message, maybe the central message is here is I, J.D. Vance, the most ambitious person in America. I'm against ambition. Yes, and ambition will make you miserable. Ambition does not bring you happiness. And what brings you happiness is a good domestic, you know, a nice domestic life, a nice church going domestic life. Now, I don't have that. I mean, I don't have that, but J.D.

24:57Vance doesn't have that. As a matter of fact, I can't think of anything probably more at odds and remote from that than having a serious political career. I mean, a serious political career means you do not have a domestic life. Your church-going life is a phony church-going life. So it's, again, this sense of a guy who is at odds with himself at every turn. Well, and what I found most extraordinary about it, and you're right that this is a campaign book, is that what he's trying to do incredibly, incredibly, obviously, is separate himself from Donald Trump. So I was going to read a couple of bits from it.

25:44So he picks up, there's a chapter called When in Rome. He's been at the Munich conference where he's basically announced that he doesn't really believe in Europe as it is. And he goes, if Munich was a whirlwind, what came after I returned was a category five hurricane. Though I had heard that President Trump might be interested in having me join his ticket in the national campaign now underway, I figured it was a long shot. I only had a year of political experience as a white man from Ohio. I added no diversity to the ticket and didn't deliver a swing state. Okay, cut to the most fascinating part of the process was also the most absurd.

26:26The in-person vetting with me, my wife and a campaign attorney. You never cheated on your wife? He asked. I haven't, but I assume that people who have don't just admit it to a stranger. Sorry, I have to ask. Yeah, I know. Now, of course, this is for, you know, to be the vice president to Donald Trump who's cheated on everybody and everything, including his taxes. Anyway, the next paragraph. On the morning of the 2024 Republican National Convention, President Trump called me and asked me to join him on the ticket. My family's lives changed instantly from the media spotlight to the ever-present Secret Service detail.

27:06The weekend after I was nominated, I tried to go to the grocery store. But if anyone there didn't already know who I was, they surely noticed the 40 armed guards surrounding me. That's about as much as you get. I mean, most people would go into this in real detail. Hold on, let me just finish. It's almost as if it's not really that big a deal that Donald Trump selected him to be his vice president. We know this is to date the crowning glory of this unbelievably ambitious man's life. And what he realizes now, it is a millstone around his neck if he is going to run in 2028. And he is trying to do what Kamala Harris failed to do with Joe Biden, which is put a wedge between them.

27:47Absolutely. But let me just fill in, this is, This isn't what happened. Okay, go on. So the Munich conference is in February. Right. He's not selected to be the vice president until July. So actually, what is happening, it's not a whatever word to you.

28:13What's happened to you? You're making Mitch McConnell noises. Yes. I just forgot the word. Well, he says, I heard that President Trump might be interested in having him join his ticket. No, no, no, just after he gets back. In this, as he tells the story, after I got back from this. Oh, ask him to join him. Ask me to join him on the ticket. Well, no, after I got back from the security conference in Munich, it's a maelstrom or, you know, as though everything is starting to happen. Oh, Category 5 hurricane. Yes. Okay, there. That's not true. Actually, what happens is he gets back and then begins the serious campaigning to get this job.

28:55It's not things that happened to him. He's trying to make this happen. And his people, Peter Thiel, foremost among them, are beginning to lobby the set of people around Donald Trump. So this is all completely disingenuous. Completely. And it doesn't happen until, as I say, until July. And it's unclear that this is going to happen to him at this point. Trump is not particularly convinced. Trump doesn't, you know, he would not be, I would say, among the top three people yet. And then by a process of elimination and by the process of who wants it and who doesn't, I mean, he does get it. I mean, he's always sort of been a contender.

29:49He's the candidate of, well, Peter Thiel and the technology people, but also of Trump's son. Don Jr. Yes. So he is certainly in the mix, but that doesn't happen. So his life does not transform. The category, the hurricane doesn't start. until that happens in July. Well, and also that he's part of trying to make the hurricane happen, that he's behaving as if it's all done to him, as if he has no agency. Actually, yes. But in fact, he's hustling as hard as he possibly can, because the other thing you learn from this book is he is a hustler. He's always hustling to get the best priests available.

30:28I mean, he wants to go to the fancy church. Totally. I mean, he's using the Catholic church in this case to elevate himself. And this is something else from the point of view of the theology in this book. I mean, so J.D. Vance grows up in an evangelical household and is a devoted evangelical himself, and then becomes disillusioned and then becomes an atheist. I mean, kind of a militant atheist. And then that doesn't work for him. And he goes to law school, he goes to Yale. And I think he thinks that the Ivy League might save him. And that doesn't quite work. He's still not satisfied, not happy, not requited in his soul.

31:20And he becomes a venture capitalist. And so I guess it's then I'll get rich. Money will give me salve and solve my issue. Right. And then he goes back to being, and then he goes back to religion, but he doesn't go back to evangelical religion or to being a Protestant. He becomes a Roman Catholic. And there's no real explanation. You're looking for God. Why would you choose? Why would you, an evangelical someone whose political career is about to be invested in evangelicalism and essentially the white South, why would you pick a Roman Catholic god to be yours? And it's not clear. He doesn't really explain this.

32:20And it's one of those other contradictions. I mean, the Roman Catholic Church, again, amid all of his sourness about immigrants, the Roman Catholic Church is an immigrant church. He doesn't deal with this. The Roman Catholic Church, actually, then curiously, his models, his religious model, chief religious model, remains Charlie Kirk. Right. I was just going to say that, yeah. And I can't think of anyone more at odds with Catholicism than Charlie Kirk. Charlie Kirk is an evangelical, charismatic, I speak to God, I speak on behalf of God, exactly what the Roman Catholic Church is.

33:14I mean, the formal hierarchical Roman Catholic Church could not be more at odds with that charismatic evangelical. Well, think of the odds of it, too. I mean, you know, the confession booth, the sort of darkness, the formality of the Catholic service against the fireworks that they had for the memorial for Charlie Kirk in the Arizona Stadium. I mean, it's a show. It's performative. I mean, let's assume that maybe at some point there is something in the Roman Catholic Church, and certainly J.D. Vance would not be the first person to find something there, something unique, something that speaks to him, something that worthy of this conversion in his life.

34:05But he can't say that because he doesn't want to antagonize the evangelicals who he will need. I mean, the Catholics are much more unreliable in terms of a coalition. He needs the evangelicals. So therefore, it's not, it's really, yes, I converted to the Roman Catholic Church, but I'm really a Christian, which is a complete misunderstanding. I mean, the history of Western history is a battle between Protestants and Catholics. I mean, you can't just smooth this over. Well, it's also, as you were pointing out before we sat down to discuss this, it's the church of the Hispanic community, the Latin community, who he is literally rounding up with masked ice agents and throwing in the back of the fans.

34:59And how he tries to square that is completely unsatisfactory in the book. And the whole thing is like he's got one side of his life compartmentalized over here, which is I'm wrestling with why are we here? What are we doing? and all these priests who appear to be sort of father figures to him, giving all this advice. And then on the flip side, he is the vice president to Donald Trump, who is the cruelest, most unpleasant man you can imagine. I think you could call Donald Trump a heathen. Well, you could definitely call him a heathen, right? The way he holds the Bible upside down. I mean, it's laughable how he's trying to swear the circle.

35:40No, and then there's, you know, within this book, you're as a man, I'm questioning. I have tons of questions. I'm a questing. I'm a searcher for this. But in real life, J.D. Vance, I mean, what we've seen of him, he's a complete dickhead, full of certainties. And, you know, and anybody who deviates from MAGA or Trump doctrine is, you know, he insults and dismisses. Well, and he closes up to Stephen Miller, who's the architect of what's going on with immigration right now. And then he basically attacks the Catholic Church, too, for not having a realistic view of what immigration is. Then he attacks modern economists saying that they don't understand what immigration is.

36:30I mean, he has his Ayn Rand moment as well. Let's not forget that, where he talks about the fountainhead, and that's his brief kind of venture capital moment. And it's all about the markets. The markets will save us. And then he decides that's not true. But I just wanted to read this bit here because it says, so this is how he describes the campaign. We traveled around the country. I gave speeches and interviews to the media. Usha found outings in new cities with the kids. The president and I won the election, and I became the vice president of the United States. We moved into a giant house at the Naval Observatory in northwest Washington.

37:10We arrived around noon on January the 21st to a delicious meal cooked by our new team of chefs. Father Henry came to offer a blessing for the new house, and the kids explored their new rooms and playrooms. I mean, this is the man that wrote Hillbilly Elegy. I mean, how could he possibly have written that? There's no detail in it. What did they have for lunch? Well, I mean, it makes no sense as a book. We drove around the country. We rode around the country. We won the election. That's all it gets. Okay. Just to understand, I mean, Hillbilly Elegy, which is a pretty good book. Oh, it's well written.

37:44And he wrote it. I mean, he didn't have anyone else to write it. Right. When you're a political figure, when you're at that level, I mean, you have a huge staff, you don't have the time, you don't have the mental calm to write a book. So what do you do? You get other people to write. And that's partly what this book feels like. So there is the part of the book, which is J.D. Vance, I am searching for something. I'm an unhappy person. I would expect he's a kind of a depressed person. Well, then he grew up with no structure. Yeah. So he's looking for structure, I think. And that is there. And I think that he said to AIDS, okay, this is a book about my search for meaning.

38:38I want that. But it's also the other things. And you're farming this out to AIDS. You're giving a kind of top line, this is what I want, but you do the research on this topic and you do the research on that topic and then I need an outline and then I'll fill in some of it. Right, because it doesn't flow as a book. There's no flow to it. I mean, there's a chronology to it, but there's really no flow. But again, what is interesting is there, I mean, everybody who's running for president writes a completely bullshit book, which no one reads and no one is expected to read. Except Obama's books. Obama's book, The Audacity of Hope.

39:21But that was before he was a… Right, but I think he was always thinking of running for president, right? He was just looking for his time. Yeah, but again, that's a book that he wrote at a given point in time. And the books that came after that is not particularly readable. But I was just going to say nobody reads these books and nobody really buys these books. But so I go into the bookstore to get J.D. Vance's book. And J.D. Vance's book in the bookstore that I went to. Did you go to Bookhampton? Yes, is right next J.D. Vance and then Mike Pence's book. Oh, how funny. really nobody's going to read Mike Pence's book.

40:06Well, no, so I see. So I'm looking at this and thinking, do I have to buy this book? And then a guy comes along in East Hampton and picks up Mike Pence's book and takes it to the cash register and literally buys it. I'm like, oh my God. And it took everything within me not to say, can you explain yourself? Are you really going to read this? Maybe he's buying it as a joke for a friend. Maybe. Well, I told you my difficulty of finding J.D. Vance's book. They didn't have it in McNally Jackson. They definitely didn't have it in The Strand. And they made a point of telling me that they hadn't ordered it.

40:47And then I got it at Barnes & Noble with this$5 off sticker. So at least my walk got saved. Okay, so I have a passage that I want to read. Okay. Okay. All right. and he's writing about his um about usha and he says one night she told me about a book she'd read by joan didion called the year of magical thinking i'm really freaked out by death she said she told me and i found it to be cathartic this is the book to be she's saying that yes Wow, I replied. I'll pick it up from the library tomorrow. Notice the library. Yeah, of course, the library. The libraries that, you know, with all their cuts are being closed all over the country.

41:38Yeah, and you don't think J.D. Vance is just going if he wants to read a book to Amazon like the rest of us? Right. I told her goodnight and that I loved her. And I guess he's not getting into bed. Well, I think she may be working in Washington at this point. I told her good night and that I loved her. And then I went to the online Oxford English Dictionary to look up cathartic. And then in the text, he actually reproduces the dictionary definition of cathartic. Now, cathartic is a nice word. I mean, he knows what cathartic means. I mean, he went to college, everybody. If you went to college and you don't know what cathartic means, you have failed college or college has failed you.

42:29He was writing press releases for the Marines. That's what he did. He was in communications. Of course he knows what the word cathartic means. Well, he's already written Hillbilly Elegy by this point. Well, that's absurd. I mean, this is absurd. So he is doing this thing. It's also a kind of… It's not that complicated a word. No, and it's also a kind of a weird… Also, frankly, if you're… Condescending way to stroke his wife. Well, I think it might be more… You know, he's obviously trying to reach down to people who are struggling to read his book, but it's bizarre he wouldn't know the word. First of all, he worked in communications.

43:11But secondly, church is full of catharsis. They talk all the time if you go to a church service about how cathartic it is to confess your sins or to listen to or to pray. The whole point of prayer is cathartic. So this makes no sense. And why did nobody pick it up? Why is nobody editing this book? And can I just add, this cover is dreadful. And when I look to see what the church is, this little sort of church, maybe it's in Ohio. No, it's Adobe stock photo. They couldn't even come up with a personal church to him. Well, they never take a photo for a – I mean, I've written a lot of books, and one of the things that distinguishes all of the books I've written is terrible covers.

43:54Because at some point in the – I don't think that's true. I remember the cover of Fire and Fury. It's got a thousand strikes on it. Not only is it one of the terrible covers of all time, it became actually an online meme. Can you make a better cover for this book? It's just a generic cover. It's like, you know, here's a Macintosh. They say to some kid in the office, you know, you can work the Macintosh, right? Okay, that dates you. I don't think anybody's saying you can do the Macintosh. That is very 1990s. No, but that is literally where the book business is. Well, nowadays you could come up with a better one on AI.

44:37In fact, this should be a challenge to anybody watching. Could you come up with a better cover for J.D. Vance's book than this? We have so many creative people who listen to us. Please send it to us because this is literally stock photo. It's Adobe stock photo. Okay, all folks, nobody ever gets a picture. They don't even take – when I first started to write books, they sent a photographer to take your picture. No, no, no, no, no, no. Can you send us a picture now? Right, you have to take a picture of yourself. All right, well, is there a picture of J.D. Vance in here? Yes, there is. I think it's his official portrait.

45:10Yeah, it is. They just... I mean, anyway, it's the book business. And I actually wonder how much he got for this book. I don't know how much he got for it. We should find out, because we should remember Andrew Cuomo got$5 million for his, and he made some of his staff write his book, right? Oh, yeah. It was very opportunistic of him, American leadership. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, the thing, though, that I want to... emphasize here is that this isn't just a phony baloney campaign book, even though catharsis. This is a book of a guy who really feels like, I mean, it really feels like he is, there is meaning out there which he is searching for and he hasn't found.

45:59And his life is full of so many contradictory parts that it feels like he could come apart at any moment. I thought that too, that this is a man on the edge of either jumping into the abyss or about to fragment in so many places. And I'd go for another point, and maybe the most important one, is that it's really unclear what kind – were he to become the president of the United States, what kind of president he would be. or what he would stand for.

46:35I couldn't even tell you actually projecting, would he be a good president? I mean, good and bad in the sense of what a liberal person would think of him. You can't tell where he will go. Right. Also, can I just point out that this is a man who certainly doesn't understand what the word cathartic meant. Then one of his chapters is called Semper Y. But I did want to read one of the priests that he has analyzes his relationship with Usher and says that, well, I can't find the actual quote now because I was underlining everything going through. Oh, that's right. There was a great line where he goes, I had unconsciously absorbed the biases of America's educated class.

47:29What is he talking about? But one of the priests says to him that he's putting far too much pressure on Usha and that he's taken his essential desire for security and structure from his grandmother, Mormor, and put it onto Usha. And then there's a whole debate about how does the priest know, because the priest is essentially without relationship experience. It was just an interesting point. I found the Usha thing interesting too because it's – I mean, the suggestion is that Usha is without religion and without belief, which is – and yeah, but we don't know this because this is really quite a blank there.

48:20Right. I was going to say Usha is a blank in the book. Yes. But then the children are being raised, we are sort of prompted to assume, as Roman Catholics. So was there a discussion with the wife? There must have been a discussion with the wife. I mean, this is not an insubstantial thing in a marriage and in decisions you make about your children, but we don't get any of that. No, we don't. And then here's the bit I wanted to talk about in terms of therapy. And for those of you who are in therapy or have therapy or have ever had therapy, this is his thing. There was a deeper problem with therapy as I encountered it.

49:03The first thing is the framing turned me into a victim rather than an actor. I'm sure that therapy helps many people, but the thought of being a victim made me want to puke. No matter how bad the things that happened to me, I didn't want to see myself as a helpless bit character in my own life. The person to whom things happened, I wanted to be the author of my own destiny. Our trauma did not write us a moral blank check. And I thought that he misunderstood what therapy was, actually. And then he goes, I was searching for a more satisfying accounting of wrongdoing and responsibility, of temptation and willpower, of virtue and guilt.

49:42It was equally wrong to wallow in trauma and pretend it controlled us, or worse, deprived us of our agency. There had to be a third world. But most of all, I wanted to be a better person. I wanted to be worthy of the woman I was madly in love with. There's a kind of thing in which the premise of the book is meant to be bold. I'm going to get out there. This is about God, about my search for God. This is what is most important to me. bold, you know, and I'm, you know, I'm out there. I'm going to say this. I'm going to admit to this. I'm going to reveal myself. But at the same time, he goes, everything about the book goes out of its way to be non-controversial.

50:31Right. And the Charlie Kirk thing is also interesting because because Charlie, who of course isn't here to contradict any of this, becomes his sort of bro in a way that he talks to about the whole thing. And you just feel that that's totally unconvincing to me. I just don't believe that he had that much in common to talk to Charlie about. Well, I think that's true. And also, as I say, the Catholicism of it all, the Catholic Church of it all, I find it impossible to imagine Charlie Kirk having any kind of sympathy with the Roman Catholic Church. Well, let's hope that J.D. Vance does go to confession every Sunday, because I think J.D.

51:22would find it helpful. Yeah, no, and actually, he might, again. And I don't want to entirely make this about making fun of this guy. No, no, because you don't want to be a little someone spiritual. Well, yes, I do, usually. All right, well, I do. I don't want to fully do that. But I do find that there is a genuinely divided personality here. I mean, and that's what I usually find interesting in a character. Donald Trump doesn't have a divided personality. Most politicians don't. And J.D. Vance does. And that could be, in so many ways, that can be interesting. In so many ways, it's actually even more interesting than just a searcher.

52:10It's a searcher who at the same time is desperate for worldly success. And recognition. Yeah, these two things, these two contradictory things exist within this guy. And what happens? I don't know. Maybe we'll see. Yeah, well, it's definitely his campaign book. And I cannot wait. How is Pete Hegseth going to best this? How is Marco Rubio going to best this? Because what he's doing here is setting himself up as a serious man. Well, they don't have to. They'll just do a campaign book that they won't even read. Right. But how does Pete Hegseth explain his previous marriages and his intoxication? You don't have to do this in a campaign book.

52:58First thing, you don't have to do it because you have a staff to do it. And that's it. So it'll be Pete Hegseth, and Pete Hegseth will be on the cover of the book. Yes, because that part of it is. Yeah, so it's interesting here that JD is not on the cover of this book. But anyway, Pete Hegseth will be on the cover of the book. And it will just be a book that no one, least of all Pete Hegseth, reads. So this is turning into a sort of cultural, it's almost like a review episode. The other thing I wanted to talk to you about, which, again, someone I really don't understand is Laura Loomer. So Laura Loomer has had a 180 on Ukraine.

53:41She's been out there saying forever that the Ukraine war should be brought to an end, that Trump should, you know, finish it. and that essentially she now says that she swallowed Russian propaganda, that she's been talking nonsense. She went to Ukraine. She met Vladimir Zelensky, and she's made a strange little documentary about it. This is a Ukraine moment which is suddenly catching everybody, including Donald Trump, in the headlights. I mean, and it catches J.D. Vance in the headlights too. I mean, remember, all of these people were Russian, if not sympathizers, you know, they were Russian leaners and they were Russian leaners because Russia was going to win.

54:31Right. So, you know, they were all on the side of the winner here and Putin was, you know, this and, you know, it was opportunistic for all of them, including Donald Trump. to be a Russian supporter. Yeah. And clearly that was a bad call. I mean, JD in the book is kind of like a little sheepish about this. I mean, we have Ukraine at this historic moment in time is the pivot. I mean, it has thrown everything into, I mean, I don't think anybody knows how to quite deal with this. Well, and of course, Lindsey Graham, just coming back where we began with his lying in state in the Rotunda, died after coming back from his 10th visit to Ukraine.

55:29And despite his sort of suck-uppery, the one thing he was consistent on was, we should be supporting Ukraine, We should push Russia back. Russia cannot be allowed to walk into Europe. So Lindsey Graham, you know, is kind of continues that neocon thread that as much as he was sucking up to Trump, he was in the background. And now that becomes a justification, by the way. And perhaps it was. He sucked up to Trump because he was preserving his neocon beliefs. And slightly Cold War beliefs. Against, you know, well, yeah, against against the MAGA people who were, you know, I mean, Tucker was going to Russia.

56:18Tucker is, you know, we shouldn't spend a dime on Ukraine. All of that kind of thing in which everybody is. How do you now reconcile this? This with the fact that Ukraine. certainly has Ukraine has changed the nature of war. It's changed our understanding of who can of the power equation in war, which we are Donald Trump is experiencing firsthand in Iran. And it certainly looks like at this point that Ukraine is going to, the result is going to be an historic reversal, really. Russia is fucked. So how important is Laura Looma in Trump's circle? Because she's really, she's an influencer, but what does that mean?

57:16We know that she's spent a lot of time going back in social media feeds of people that Trump has hired and pointing out things they've said that were disloyal to him. This is an easy answer. Laura Loomer is not important in the circle, but she can be important to Trump himself. She has Trump's phone number. She can get Trump on the phone. Trump likes to talk to her. I mean, she was traveling with him a lot at one point. And that seems to have calmed down. And she is actually, this is the important hinge here. She's a Natalie Harp person. Did Natalie Harp bring her in? Well, yes. And certainly during the campaign, Natalie Harp was the person who approved her getting on the plane.

58:09So she has contacts within the Trump circle. And then Trump likes her. So and she gets Trump on the phone and she goes his, you know, does her thing. And he's the last person he talks to. So fine. She wants so-and-so fired because so-and-so fired, so-and-so is not loyal to him. He might well do that. So is her 180 on Ukraine going to be significant to him? Or is it already going on anyway? It's already. Obviously, I mean, Zelensky is now in town for Lindsey Graham's funeral, but he will get time with Trump. And Trump is, yeah, how could you miss the fact that Ukraine is, the advantage at this point is profoundly with Ukraine.

59:15And Trump himself is now, as we've said, in an Iranian standoff, which it's unclear how it's going to resolve. And the Iranians are now in control of the straight of course. Yes, in a broader sense, the foreign policy aspect of this administration, of the second Trump administration, has been a complete disaster. Apart from Venezuela. Apart from, yes. But even now, and by the way, even Cuba is not going well. The Cubans are hanging on, and he can't make that happen. The Iranian thing is a complete disaster. The alignment with Russia, obviously a bad call. Remember, he kicked Zelensky out of the Oval Office.

1:00:09Well, and another thing that's very hard to square with J.D. Vance's apparent piety, the way they humiliated Zelensky when he was in the Oval Office. Well, he was a loser then. Now he's a winner. They're, you know, Netanyahu now in, you know, trying to get time with Donald Trump and some question about whether he's going to get that time, whether Trump is going to really diss him. Right, really humiliate him. Because, and I mean, that's a bad call, you know, coddling up to Netanyahu and then getting stuck in Iran. Everything is a bad call here. I mean, a profound, I mean, a terrible call. So Greenland, let's not forget Greenland.

1:00:59Right. So within this context, he really needs a success. Yes. So, and Ukraine is beginning to look like it could be his, you know, he's going to - He could piggyback off Lindsey Graham's funeral to a more successful strategy with Ukraine. Bingo. Yes. Okay. Michael, such fun to sit in the studio with you. We'll be back on Thursday. We will. We will be back on Thursday. And the Thursday after that, and the Tuesday and the Saturday. God willing. God willing. We don't want to die in podcast. We don't want to die mid podcast. If you have been, thank you for joining us. Don't forget to subscribe to The Daily Beast.

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