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OT: American Politics

MindzEye said:
It's a bad idea. It's no different than Sam Seder debating 20 young nazi muppets. It's a bad communications strategy for a bag of reasons:

- You have to win...every...fucking engagement
- You need a high functioning level of knowledge on every topic that they bring up, no matter how stupid it is
- You have to be able to fact check everything they say, in real time, and a lot of their knowledge base is a mixture of propaganda, half truth, and straight lies

I don't want to hear Gavin Newsom debate tariffs with a drunk in a format that requires Newsom to be an avatar for the left. I want Stieglitz, Piketty, Krugman, etc to dumb fuck the drunk on tariffs, wealth inequality, etc with Newsom acting an impartial referee if we must have this format. I want a climate scientist fist fucking Ben Shapiro about climate change, etc. Except we know these right wing goofballs won't sign up for that.
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To play devil's advocate, if you are trying to reach anyone on the right, they are not going to be listening to a conversation between Gavin Newsom and Paul Krugman.
 
hockeylover said:
There's a... pretty long laundry list of crazy racist shit Charlie Kirk has spread and conspiracies he's peddled.

You're not trying to reach Republicans by engaging him and Bannon, you're going straight to the extreme right.
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the extreme right is the governing party now, though. That is exactly who you are trying to reach.
 
MindzEye said:
It's a bad idea. It's no different than Sam Seder debating 20 young nazi muppets. It's a bad communications strategy for a bag of reasons:

- You have to win...every...fucking engagement
- You need a high functioning level of knowledge on every topic that they bring up, no matter how stupid it is
- You have to be able to fact check everything they say, in real time, and a lot of their knowledge base is a mixture of propaganda, half truth, and straight lies

I don't want to hear Gavin Newsom debate tariffs with a drunk in a format that requires Newsom to be an avatar for the left. I want Stieglitz, Piketty, Krugman, etc to dumb fuck the drunk on tariffs, wealth inequality, etc with Newsom acting an impartial referee if we must have this format. I want a climate scientist fist fucking Ben Shapiro about climate change, etc. Except we know these right wing goofballs won't sign up for that.
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So much of it is easy to debunk. A guy like Kirk is looked up to by young males across the country. I was perfectly fine with interviewing him. And quite frankly it's easy to shred him when you have your own platform (Charlie just talks over people on his platform and wins by screaming the loudest).

He didn't even try though. As you say, he's just platforming them and their ideas to a different, more liberal audience. He agreed with him, sucked his balls relentlessly and didn't even try to debate most of the time. It was sort of shocking to listen to. Almost sabotaging the dems tbh.
 
axlsalinger said:
I guess what I'm saying is, gives away what game? He's trying to launch a podcast, perhaps by starting out with some provocative guests. It's free to say you don't agree with that strategy. I just don't see it as some kind of betrayal.

Newsom is highly skilled at spitting out numbers and facts in a charismatic way, by not being antagonistic to these folks maybe he thinks he can convert some of their fans. And we could use a few of them, quite frankly. There are millions of people walking about believing in fairy tales. They can see the Trump shitshow in real time, but there's a certain cognitive dissonance at play. Telling them that they're idiots does not work. You have to first get their attention, and then explain to them exactly how the facts are on our side.
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I’ve already said “what game”.

I think that, like others before him—for example, Elon Musk, Joe Rogan or even fucking Trump himself—Newsome’s decided that the easiest path forward towards increasing his own power and influence is to reject progressive politics & empirical reality and fully embrace the world of far-right populism and disinformation.

That’s the only plausible reason I can see for someone as smart and politically savvy as Newsome to sit down, yuk it up and find common ground with complete monsters like Kirk and Bannon. These are his first steps down that path.

You’re free to disagree or think I’m reading too much into this, but we’ll see how this plays out. If I’m recalling correctly, you were Joe Rogan’s last, strongest defender when some of us warned you a few years back that he was heading down this same path.
 
axlsalinger said:
To play devil's advocate, if you are trying to reach anyone on the right, they are not going to be listening to a conversation between Gavin Newsom and Paul Krugman.
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Yeah Charlie was good to bring on. But unfortunately all he did was promote and normalize Charlie's ideas. Just poor execution on a not so terrible idea imo.
 
axlsalinger said:
the extreme right is the governing party now, though. That is exactly who you are trying to reach.
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You're trying to reach the people you're talking about - the ones who are being sold fairy-tales, not the ones peddling them for grift/power.

You don't let them sit there and peddle more fairty tales.
 
Preston said:
Yeah Charlie was good to bring on. But unfortunately all he did was promote and normalize Charlie's ideas. Just poor execution on a not so terrible idea imo.
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I mean if some Charlie Kirk and Steve Bannon fans do appreciate that Newsom was willing to engage and decide to listen to his podcast from time to time, then you bring on Paul Krugman, who knows .. maybe you start to change a few people's minds based on the facts.
 
axlsalinger said:
To play devil's advocate, if you are trying to reach anyone on the right, they are not going to be listening to a conversation between Gavin Newsom and Paul Krugman.
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Why are we trying to reach people on the right though? Anyone who knows Bannon or Kirk, and is persuaded enough by them that you think you can brainworm them by talking to Bannon or Kirk, is fucking gone bro.

Stop fighting the culture war, and start fighting the class war. The right won because they've co opted victims of the class war who convinced themselves "oh, those crazy fucks aren't talking about me, I'm one of the good ones".
 
axlsalinger said:
I mean if some Charlie Kirk and Steve Bannon fans do appreciate that Newsom was willing to engage and decide to listen to his podcast from time to time, then you bring on Paul Krugman, who knows .. maybe you start to change a few people's minds based on the facts.
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Yeah, I think this is pure fantasy. We've seen this movie. The opposite happens. You normalize extremism.
 
axlsalinger said:
I mean if some Charlie Kirk and Steve Bannon fans do appreciate that Newsom was willing to engage and decide to listen to his podcast from time to time, then you bring on Paul Krugman, who knows .. maybe you start to change a few people's minds based on the facts.
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Honestly I think all the Charlie Kirk interview accomplished was change the mind of some libs to join the dark side. I say that as a guy that hates Charlie aggressively. He came off really well in that interview and Gavin came across weak and often without any response for all the crazy shit Charlie said. I have no data to support this. I just think it was a shitshow for Gavin.
 
Preston said:
So much of it is easy to debunk. A guy like Kirk is looked up to by young males across the country. I was perfectly fine with interviewing him. And quite frankly it's easy to shred him when you have your own platform (Charlie just talks over people on his platform and wins by screaming the loudest).

He didn't even try though. As you say, he's just platforming them and their ideas to a different, more liberal audience. He agreed with him, sucked his balls relentlessly and didn't even try to debate most of the time. It was sort of shocking to listen to. Almost sabotaging the dems tbh.
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Did you listen to the whole thing though? not that I would wish that upon anyone, but if I'm interviewing someone I am going to be nice, and try to find some common ground, at least in the beginning.

I may have to actually watch the Bannon one now, thanks a lot motherfucker.
 
axlsalinger said:
Did you listen to the whole thing though? not that I would wish that upon anyone, but if I'm interviewing someone I am going to be nice, and try to find some common ground, at least in the beginning.

I may have to actually watch the Bannon one now, thanks a lot motherfucker.
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I listened to the Charlie Kirk one yeah. It made me feel icky. My Twitter feed is full of Nazis so the bar is high for that.
 
Preston said:
I listened to the Charlie Kirk one yeah. It made me feel icky. My Twitter feed is full of Nazis so the bar is high for that.
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Was there any point in the interview where you thought hm this is good, this is convincing for Gavin? Or is it what it seemed like?

The clips people are talking about seem... pretty ungood.
 
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