What's Good with What's Next

[00:00:16] What's up Sarah? What's good? How are you doing?

[00:00:19] Hey James! We had to take a little break. We weren't fully ready to do this the week following the election.

[00:00:27] No, definitely not. Definitely not. Yeah, for our listeners, what's good y'all? What's good Ohio?

[00:00:32] We are recording this on Thursday, November 21st, a couple weeks after the election on November 5th

[00:00:40] and figured we'd take some time just to process together and process with you all some of our thoughts and reflections and emotions and how we're feeling, how we're doing.

[00:00:52] There's a lot, lots to talk about Sarah. Lots to talk about. Yes, I have a zillion thoughts and feelings of which I will share a portion in this episode.

[00:01:04] Yeah, without a doubt. So I figured maybe we could just get started. Where were you at on election night?

[00:01:08] What have you been thinking about? What have you been asking yourself and questions have come to you? What answers are coming to you, if any?

[00:01:15] I didn't do anything special. Like I was just at home alone, but I did stay up until like one or two.

[00:01:20] And that was kind of when the tides started. You know, everyone was saying, what was it like the red mirage and the blue wave or whatever that like, oh, it'll be red first.

[00:01:31] And everyone was just waiting for like, OK, so when is this going to change?

[00:01:35] And once it got to like one or two, I was like, this isn't looking good and I'm going to bed.

[00:01:41] And then when I woke up, I was greeted with that news, took the whole day off. There wasn't much going to get done, especially, you know, not just the presidential election.

[00:01:52] It was, I think, if issue one had passed or something like. But the fact that it was just this full sweep was really, especially coming off of the last few years, I think, for progressive movements in Ohio.

[00:02:05] Right. Like we had a lot of wins and I feel like a lot of things felt possible.

[00:02:10] And that was the wind was taken out of my sails personally, very abruptly.

[00:02:17] My biggest thought and the thing that is sticking with me the most is that this is the time that we need to stand by our trans comrades and by other marginalized groups where I've seen people on the left and progressives claiming that, oh, we played too much into, you know, identity politics or whatever.

[00:02:39] I don't think that we did. I think that it is the other side bringing it up and that at most we respond.

[00:02:48] I'm pretty sure the campaign actively avoided all of those things.

[00:02:52] And to have people on the progressive side of politics, like be convinced that that wasn't what happened.

[00:03:00] It really does feel like being in an abusive relationship where the one side starts like questioning their reality.

[00:03:08] Right. Because I watch these campaigns and that's not what happened.

[00:03:12] They did not play up trans rights or reparations or any supposedly radical views.

[00:03:21] And then they're still saying we did because they will say that no matter what.

[00:03:26] And so my one big takeaway, the thing I keep ruminating on is just how we need to stand together instead of starting to be like, what did you do?

[00:03:36] What did you do? Or blaming even talking about trans people?

[00:03:41] That's insane.

[00:03:43] No, facts. Facts. Yeah.

[00:03:44] No, there's a lot of scapegoating and punching down.

[00:03:48] And that's one thing I'm really worried about is that whole narrative.

[00:03:51] I see starting to really solidify itself that the reason that Harris lost is that nonprofit professionals are too woke and have an outsized influence on the narrative and direction of politics.

[00:04:03] And like you said, I think Jon Stewart did a great job breaking down what the campaign ads actually look like that Democrats ran on, what narrative was actually being shared with people.

[00:04:13] I remember someone coming in town in October and they were staying in a hotel and, you know, had the TV on and they're asking me, they're talking about we're talking about all the political ads that were on.

[00:04:23] And they saw an ad from Sherrod Brown and they were talking about it.

[00:04:27] And when I said that he was a Democrat, they were surprised because they were like, what?

[00:04:30] I thought he was the Republican based on that.

[00:04:33] The ad, I think it was focusing on the border and immigration stuff.

[00:04:36] And one thing that some of us have been talking about was listening to Sherrod Brown's concession speech and the contrast that that had with the rhetoric and a lot of the ads and the campaign rhetoric.

[00:04:49] You know, it was just like, this is like who I remember, you know, from back in the day.

[00:04:54] But like, I don't know, for whatever reason, folks are afraid to run on those things.

[00:04:58] And really incede power on the issues and don't gain any votes and just lose people.

[00:05:03] And, yeah, you know, on election night, I was at a watch party and I had my son with me.

[00:05:10] My wife was at a different watch party that she had organized and I couldn't stay too long.

[00:05:16] But that whole day, really like a couple of days leading up to that, I just felt like things were not going as strong as I'd hoped.

[00:05:23] And, you know, there was a lot of stuff about the polling, you know, actually Harris should be doing better.

[00:05:28] You know, based on the polling and that kind of stuff.

[00:05:29] And I was just like, I don't know, based on some literally just conversations I was having with some people in my life and realizing how deep a lot of the right wing messaging around the economy had sunk.

[00:05:44] And trying to explain to people like Trump doesn't care about you, doesn't care about anyone.

[00:05:50] But I think what's been sticking to me is like you can't eat democracy.

[00:05:53] And I think a lot of people are open to the idea of even a dictator who might be able to get some things done over a so-called democratic process that hasn't.

[00:06:06] And I really feel like, you know, like we every election cycle, people just kind of want to recriminate what happened, you know, in that last cycle, you know.

[00:06:14] So I've been less 170 days. I haven't last four years, you know.

[00:06:18] And I just really feel like it's to me, it's a moment for deeper reflection about the generational failure that brought us to this moment.

[00:06:26] I feel like it's a moment that's really been coming for a long time.

[00:06:29] You know, I first started doing this work as a young organizer.

[00:06:33] We were critiquing U.S. democracy for not being complete, not being enough, talking about how we'd only offered full enfranchisement since the 60s.

[00:06:43] You know, now the Voting Rights Act has been struck down and all these different things.

[00:06:47] And so, you know, it was just like, but once Trump came on the scene, it was kind of like we have to protect democracy.

[00:06:53] We have to save democracy.

[00:06:55] And I think that only works for so long, you know, like being against something, you know, like we have to offer people something, you know.

[00:07:02] And Barack Obama won Ohio twice, and then Trump has won the last three times.

[00:07:06] And they're both very different people.

[00:07:09] Couldn't find two different men, probably.

[00:07:11] But I think what they share in common that made them popular in Ohio as candidates is that they kind of represented something different from the way things have been done.

[00:07:22] And I think that's because the way things have been done, really going back about like Reagan and deindustrialization and then the Clinton era kind of really doubling down on Reagan's politics.

[00:07:32] And economics and economics and how that's impacted Ohio, how that's impacted the whole country.

[00:07:37] And then the economy bottoms out in 2008.

[00:07:40] I just feel like ever since then, we've just kind of been in this era where there's sort of like this zombie neoliberal consensus that wants to try to keep going and say everything's OK.

[00:07:52] You know, we just we're going to keep getting better bit by bit.

[00:07:55] In reality, people aren't feeling that progress.

[00:07:58] And then you have on the left, you've had movements emerge, you know, with progressive visions for what could come next.

[00:08:04] But haven't had the power and structure needed to really articulate those things.

[00:08:09] And then we've had on the right another vision that's crystallizing right now.

[00:08:13] So we see what the cabinet picks.

[00:08:15] Oh, my Lord.

[00:08:16] Oh, my Lord.

[00:08:18] My favorite joke I've seen on it was and for the Department of Not Killing Your Wife, O.J. Simpson.

[00:08:25] Oh, my God.

[00:08:26] Yeah.

[00:08:27] Oh, my.

[00:08:28] The cabinet picks.

[00:08:29] I saw one of my I think my sister in law said a thing.

[00:08:32] It was like, it's not a cabinet.

[00:08:34] It's a junk drawer.

[00:08:35] But it is it's going to be a special time.

[00:08:37] And I think there's a lot of folks who are going to wake up in six months and realize where we're going.

[00:08:44] And that's kind of what gives me hope for the future is I think the ingredients for a transformative movement are still here.

[00:08:50] I think the conditions are not going to get better.

[00:08:53] I think people are still looking for an answer, a narrative that explains how we got here, who to blame.

[00:09:02] And that's the main thing I think that Trump does really well is he gives everyone people to blame.

[00:09:10] And like you said, he's blaming trans people.

[00:09:12] He's blaming immigrants.

[00:09:13] He's blaming black people.

[00:09:15] He's blaming poor people.

[00:09:17] Well, actually, he doesn't really blame poor people.

[00:09:19] Right.

[00:09:19] Like his message is that being poor is a moral failing without ever like literally saying it.

[00:09:26] But it's baked into every other thing that he does.

[00:09:30] Yeah.

[00:09:31] And again, he gives you some of the people to blame.

[00:09:33] You know, it's the Democrats.

[00:09:34] It's the Democratic elite.

[00:09:36] It's the cultural elite.

[00:09:37] But on our side, all we do is blame Trump.

[00:09:40] And all we do is blame Republicans.

[00:09:43] And we're not getting at who's actually to blame.

[00:09:46] You know, I think of all the people elected, Bernie probably does the best in terms of like trying to specify that there are people who are making money off of us.

[00:09:54] You know, like billionaire wealth has exploded since the pandemic.

[00:09:59] One of the things I never understood when the whole inflation narrative is like I remember early on, like people were talking about how so much of that was corporate profits.

[00:10:09] You know, it was like 40 percent of inflation was just literally.

[00:10:12] I was like, you know, how is that not being addressed?

[00:10:18] You know, and the tension with the donor class and the inability for the Democratic elites to go to offer people something that really would shift power and take money away from the people that fund them is one of the fundamental issues that they're dealing with.

[00:10:34] You know, it's not enough to blame Trump.

[00:10:36] We have to give people something.

[00:10:37] We have to offer people something.

[00:10:38] It's also talking about framing the entire Democratic campaign on like Trump is a threat to democracy.

[00:10:46] And then we get to after the election and we're not even 15 days, 20 days past.

[00:10:54] And it's like, well, what are you going to do?

[00:10:56] Like he won fair and square.

[00:11:00] So is he a threat?

[00:11:02] He was a threat to democracy before.

[00:11:03] But now there's literally nothing we can do between now and January to like help.

[00:11:09] It's like the absolute just like ineffectual not doing anything.

[00:11:14] And I think that really does hurt the Democratic Party so incredibly much.

[00:11:19] Because what do you mean?

[00:11:20] You needed us to vote because democracy was on the line and you needed my $40 and you had to text me every three days.

[00:11:26] Hey, this is X, Y, Z.

[00:11:29] And now it's just over.

[00:11:32] That's one of the main issues that I feel like I've seen really even since 2008.

[00:11:37] Because like there was a huge grassroots infrastructure built up around the Obama campaign that was completely demobilized after the election.

[00:11:45] You know, so many people who just stepped up organically wanting to help the campaign and would have stayed involved to try to like move certain priorities forward, keep organizing.

[00:11:56] And we see so much money being spent on these election cycles.

[00:11:58] I just think about how much cheaper it would be to invest in organizing and building up grassroots power sort of in a permanent basis rather than trying to just like dump cash on ads and digital targeting and all the texts and all the calls and all the different things.

[00:12:18] My real most popular take, I think, that everyone could get behind is we outlaw campaign ads altogether.

[00:12:29] We outlaw campaign spending somehow.

[00:12:31] And we just we cut a check to every American that votes nonpartisan.

[00:12:37] We don't care who you vote for.

[00:12:38] Just turn out to vote and you get a check because the amount of money we spend to get people out to vote and the amount of people that turn out to vote, it's not a it's not a great investment.

[00:12:49] And that's the other thing that gives me hope is just like the number, the turnout, you know, and it's like when you look at 2020.

[00:12:54] I think turnout was helped in some ways by just the fact that it was 2020.

[00:12:59] There was an uprising.

[00:13:00] It was a pandemic because of the pandemic.

[00:13:04] Access to mail-in ballots were expanded.

[00:13:05] There were certain things that made turnout and just like there was a lot of energy coming off of the murder of George Floyd and all the protests that swept the country.

[00:13:14] I think Democrats fully appreciated that that energy was a big part of what got them across the finish line of 2020.

[00:13:21] Sort of going back to this, let's blame the woke left and blame all these issues.

[00:13:27] It's like, actually, these are the people and this is the energy you need to tap into in order to win, I think is an important takeaway.

[00:13:34] But and so I think we look at the turnout numbers from this year and even looking at 2020, it's like half the country just doesn't vote.

[00:13:42] And I'm not going to assume that they would all vote in a way that I would agree with by any means.

[00:13:47] But I feel like there's a real remember there used to be that term, the silent majority.

[00:13:52] And that meant, you know, like racist white people.

[00:13:55] I feel like we need to take that back.

[00:13:57] They're not silent anymore.

[00:13:59] They're very loud.

[00:13:59] They're out.

[00:14:00] They're proud.

[00:14:01] They were walking around the short north the other day.

[00:14:03] But we got to find a way to reengage the real silent majority, which is all the American people that don't believe this system works enough to participate in it.

[00:14:14] And we got to find ways to make policy and politics and civic engagement organizing relevant to the problems people are going through.

[00:14:25] So I feel like making Trump the sole villain isn't quite enough, especially without having really anything to offer.

[00:14:31] You know, because even if you win, it's like things are the same.

[00:14:36] Yeah, we kept everything the same.

[00:14:39] It's like that's fucking sucks.

[00:14:41] Like, that's not a great sales pitch.

[00:14:43] People got to go back to the drawing board and really try to understand, like, what happened?

[00:14:47] Because there was a time, 1964, Lyndon lynching Baines Johnson is elected with 60% of the white vote.

[00:14:56] Last time, the Democrat got a majority of the white vote in the country.

[00:15:00] And he was campaigning on a promise to end poverty in a generation using the government, like using government programs.

[00:15:08] And then, you know, he signs this little rights act.

[00:15:11] He signs the voting rights act.

[00:15:13] Nixon uses racial resentment to win the White House.

[00:15:17] Eight years after 1964, Nixon wins a larger majority of the white vote and has kind of successfully employed the Southern strategy and flipped people that historically had voted for Democrats to voting for Republicans along using racial resentment.

[00:15:32] And starting the war on drugs, you know, which, you know, all that picks up really full scale with Reagan.

[00:15:38] And so we just really got to go back to, like, how do we get back to that project, you know, of the 20th century of actually trying to build a great society?

[00:15:46] You know, we're here in the 21st century.

[00:15:49] We have so much more capacity to meet people's needs, to educate everyone, to house everyone.

[00:15:55] And we also know so much more about, you know, what's going on with our environment than we did back then.

[00:15:59] So, like, there's just – and that's the thing I keep coming back to, you know, when I get really dark, my rabbit hole is this four years.

[00:16:06] So far back on environmental stuff, and we were already so far behind where we needed to be.

[00:16:12] It's really scary.

[00:16:13] And putting people in positions that want to get rid of EPA, that don't believe in climate change, it's pretty wild.

[00:16:20] So, anyway, I'm rambling again.

[00:16:22] No, no, I think that's the point of this episode is just some of our ramblings.

[00:16:28] I mean, I'm fully prepared.

[00:16:29] Every time I order food and I'm like, I shouldn't be ordering food, then I'm like, but you're probably eventually going to have to escape to Wisconsin and live off the land with your family.

[00:16:38] So, you should order food today.

[00:16:41] Like, I don't think we are 100% for sure on track to that, but I see it being a very plausible thing in my lifetime, which is so scary.

[00:16:52] And just the difference, too, between these people, the older people in power who started hearing about climate change in their 20s and 30s, right?

[00:17:03] Like, they had a childhood largely unburdened by every other day being told the world is dying.

[00:17:11] It's also so frustrating to be part of the first generation that, like, sat in our classes and was forced to watch an inconvenient truth at, like, age 13 or 14.

[00:17:22] And to then fast forward to now where we are going to have an administration, like you said, where literally the people in charge just say it's not happening.

[00:17:31] The comment sections on any video about it are filled with, it's just the natural, the earth gets warmer and cooler.

[00:17:39] That's what happens.

[00:17:40] And I'm like, oh, yeah, where's your degree from?

[00:17:42] Like, where'd you study environmental science, man?

[00:17:46] You have to be careful even asking for a degree, especially these days.

[00:17:49] Like, I was reading about Linda McMahon, who is going to be taking over the Department of Education.

[00:17:55] And at first when I was reading it, I was like, oh, this kind of sounds not too bad.

[00:17:59] It doesn't have to be terrible, but I always find the way to make it terrible.

[00:18:02] But they want to make it so you can use, like, Pell Grants and federal education funding for going to more private institutions that are for-profit schools or say they're, like, training people for trades and vocations.

[00:18:16] But I imagine a lot of these things are scams.

[00:18:20] Oh, yeah.

[00:18:20] It's, I mean, similar to Ed Choice Vouchers.

[00:18:22] Like, it is a way to take public funds and tax dollars and to siphon them into private institutions that do not have to abide by the Americans with Disabilities Act, do not have to, like, literally don't have to adhere to, like, non-discrimination, like, don't have to accept LGBTQ students, like, and those public dollars going directly to them.

[00:18:47] I mean, I think right now in Ohio you can get up to $8,000 a year for a high schooler to go to a private school and up to making 400 percent above the federal poverty line.

[00:19:01] So most people who apply for these vouchers just already send their kids to private school and then they just apply for an additional, like, eight grand a year.

[00:19:09] Yeah, and it made me think about a friend of mine who did a CDL program that the city of Columbus paid for.

[00:19:17] It was, like, a six-week program.

[00:19:19] Everyone's supposed to get a certificate and be able to, like, get jobs and stuff.

[00:19:22] And then, like, the fifth or sixth week, the person just ghosted.

[00:19:27] And they just never got their certificates.

[00:19:30] And I was like, but they got paid?

[00:19:32] I was like, oh, my God.

[00:19:33] This is absolutely insane.

[00:19:35] So it's going to be a country full of grifting.

[00:19:38] You know, I think grifting is the new American way.

[00:19:41] On TikTok, which is also just the home shopping network now.

[00:19:48] A friend of mine has a bunch of celery that he grew, and he was like, I don't know what I'm going to do with this.

[00:19:53] I might just start making some sort of supplement and see if I can get RFK to pick it up, and we can make a bunch of money.

[00:20:00] That's another thing that I've been thinking about a lot is specifically the Make America Healthy Again movement.

[00:20:08] The connections from that to, like, the increase in fat phobia that we are seeing.

[00:20:14] The connection of that with the increase in available, like, GLP-1 medications, like Ozempic.

[00:20:22] So people think, oh, it's just easy to lose weight or whatever.

[00:20:25] The connection to, like, trad wife content on TikTok and such.

[00:20:31] Like, the crunchy mom to alt-right pipeline that exists.

[00:20:36] These people who are, like, feeding their children raw milk and doing things like that.

[00:20:43] That, I feel like that was the canary in the coal mine, like, four, five, six years ago.

[00:20:51] And also it being in response to the pandemic, right?

[00:20:55] Like, this eugenics response to a mass disabling event is as predictable as it could have possibly been.

[00:21:04] And that makes me sad.

[00:21:06] Like, we could have had this amazing response to COVID that included caring for our disabled comrades and, like, coming together.

[00:21:16] And instead, we have gone the full other direction of, like, individual responsibility.

[00:21:22] Health is your fault.

[00:21:24] I think we got to talk more about that because for a long time I felt that there was a huge opportunity missed in coming out of the financial crash of 2007 and 8 to just, like, do more.

[00:21:35] You know, especially since the first Obama administration, they had all three houses, what the Trump administration does now.

[00:21:42] And I feel like Trump is going to show what you do when you have all three houses.

[00:21:47] They were so concerned on, like, being, we're going to reach across the aisle and be conciliatory.

[00:21:53] And he surrounded himself with Larry Summers and all these different, like, old neoliberal fucks who, like, this is how you have to do things, you know.

[00:22:01] But I feel like COVID was such a missed opportunity.

[00:22:05] And the fact that in 2020, Biden wins.

[00:22:10] And there's a lot of good things, especially domestically, that the administration did or whatever.

[00:22:15] But it's hard to, like, point to anything, really, you know, that you can, like, talk to anyone about.

[00:22:21] And I just think it was an opportunity to really radically think about how do we approach caring for people, our medical system?

[00:22:30] How do we push the economy?

[00:22:31] I mean, we saw very clearly, like, there are people, there's a class of people who are at home and locked down.

[00:22:37] And then there's a class of people who are essential and have to care and do work to keep everything going so that everyone can stay home.

[00:22:44] And those are the folks that either aren't voting or are being peeled off increasing numbers to the right wing, you know.

[00:22:51] We never really addressed, you know, in any real way over the last four years, like, the real just, like, precarious situation that people are in in their lives.

[00:23:00] And a lot of the big policy stuff, it's, like, good stuff, but it's not tangible.

[00:23:05] It's not something you can feel and spend and at least not immediately.

[00:23:10] That's what's hard, like, because the big two things are the infrastructure, bipartisan infrastructure law and the Inflation Reduction Act, which have given billions to states for clean energy, for fixing roads.

[00:23:24] You don't notice that your road doesn't fall apart.

[00:23:27] You don't notice that the bridge doesn't crumble.

[00:23:30] No, exactly.

[00:23:31] But you notice when it does.

[00:23:33] And obviously, there is a lot more that could have been done.

[00:23:36] But the few things that are, like you said, aren't tangible things that people, like, get excited about.

[00:23:44] Yeah.

[00:23:44] But also, I just want to say, one thing that's been driving me crazy is the, it's the eggs, right?

[00:23:50] That's always the talking point is, like, I want to be able to afford eggs.

[00:23:54] Are these not the same people that tell everyone else to get a better job?

[00:23:58] Are these not the same people that tell everyone, like, well, pull yourself up by your bootstraps?

[00:24:04] Like, maybe you're not budgeting.

[00:24:05] Cut out the avocado toast.

[00:24:07] Like, ah!

[00:24:10] The hypocrisy is sort of central to a lot of the American politics.

[00:24:17] I feel like these narratives of personal responsibility have fallen.

[00:24:21] And so what Trump gives people is, like, well, it's not your fault.

[00:24:26] It's these people's fault for giving away shit to undeserving people.

[00:24:30] And so we're going to cut every department of the government, basically.

[00:24:35] Which is what I heard Elon Musk wants to do.

[00:24:37] And it's somehow going to benefit you.

[00:24:39] I was talking to this guy I know, a black dude.

[00:24:42] He's a little bit older, I think, than me, but I don't think he voted for Trump.

[00:24:46] But, you know, he was, we were talking about some of this stuff and he was just talking about cutting taxes is good.

[00:24:51] You know, like, we need to cut taxes.

[00:24:53] And I was just like, look, man, like, when people are talking about cutting taxes, they're not talking about your taxes, really.

[00:25:00] They're talking about rich people's taxes.

[00:25:02] I'm like, we used to tax the shit out of people.

[00:25:04] And we had public education and all these different things.

[00:25:07] Like, I was reading an article that popped up on my phone about this piece of art that recently sold for $125 million, I think.

[00:25:17] I showed it to a friend of mine and he was like, damn, I need to go get some paint.

[00:25:21] I could do this.

[00:25:23] Then the article, there was a piece that was talking about the art world, like this world of high art and how it's been tough over the last couple of years.

[00:25:33] But people are really excited since the election because of the promise for tax cuts.

[00:25:40] And so the art dealers are like, yes, people are going to be able to spend their millions with us by art that my friend thinks he could do.

[00:25:49] So, you know, it's like that's what tax cuts bring us is like a plot for a Danny Ocean movie.

[00:25:55] Well, and to bring it back to Ohio, with the great Ohio tax shift, your average person pays more in taxes than they did 25 years ago.

[00:26:04] Well, the top 5% get an average of $52,000 less a year that they pay in taxes.

[00:26:12] And that's the part that just kills me, right?

[00:26:15] It's never been cutting taxes for lower middle class individuals.

[00:26:20] So why would any middle class individual think that's going to be what happens?

[00:26:26] It's just tough, you know.

[00:26:27] But I think, you know, part of it's because like locally, you know, Columbus, we've recently seen property taxes go up a bunch, you know.

[00:26:34] And we've seen some of these things that are really impacting people.

[00:26:39] You know, we just pass another school levy to try to support our schools.

[00:26:42] That is going to have a disproportionate impact on especially older homeowners and stuff.

[00:26:47] That's why Policy Matters Ohio is supporting a circuit breaker.

[00:26:51] That has been one of our biggest things this year, a circuit breaker where if your property taxes exceed, I want to say, 5% of your income or something, basically you get a tax credit or rebate or whatever that would cancel that out.

[00:27:08] And the bill is put forward by Republican Representative Blessing.

[00:27:13] So that was a shot.

[00:27:14] Got a chance.

[00:27:16] I've always also come back to, I remember being in a room with a lot of comms professionals a few years ago.

[00:27:37] And we were talking about campaign ads and like specifically the focus groups surrounding them where they're like, oh, people love when there's a football field that moves them.

[00:27:50] The American flag, right?

[00:27:51] And like this group I was in.

[00:27:53] And like this group I was in was kind of being like, we on the progressive side need to figure out how to do those things too.

[00:28:00] But my takeaway is just, no, we need to cultivate people who do not decide who or if they will vote based on a football field.

[00:28:10] We need to actually cultivate people who can take this information in and make decisions based on what is happening.

[00:28:18] Because then all they need is the next ad to send them to the other side.

[00:28:24] And I think some of the stuff with ads and the whole is like it all becomes messaging that is pretty contentless.

[00:28:33] And a lot of it is done, it's like overproduced.

[00:28:37] It looks a certain way and feels a certain way that doesn't feel authentic really most of the time.

[00:28:42] We have to have content.

[00:28:44] I think that's like the basic gist is like there has to be a real substance to the narrative.

[00:28:51] You know, the difference between narrative and messaging, in my opinion, is you have narrative is more complete in that it tells you a story of how we got here.

[00:28:59] Who is to blame?

[00:29:00] Like who is the actual enemy that is in the way of progress?

[00:29:04] You know, like who is the enemy of progress?

[00:29:07] And then who is us?

[00:29:08] Who are we?

[00:29:09] I think people are spending so much money on stuff that really, it really just doesn't matter.

[00:29:13] The other thing we have to grab, I was reading this article.

[00:29:15] It was an interview.

[00:29:17] I was reading the transcript.

[00:29:18] But he was talking about how the digital landscape has changed so dramatically since 2016 even.

[00:29:25] He was saying that there's a lot of takes, you know, about the election that echo things that have been said since 2016.

[00:29:32] You know, I think I've echoed some of them here today, you know, hopefully a little bit differently or should more develop than I was back then.

[00:29:39] But he was saying that one of the things that has certainly shifted is just like how much things have been monopolized, the power of monopolies in our digital space and like the power of the algorithm and stuff.

[00:29:51] And it's got me thinking to your point about how do we cultivate people that are capable of really like discerning like what is best for them?

[00:29:59] And I'm just like, I'm just really worried that that's just going to be very, very difficult given how much our realities are being shaped increasingly so by the social media and these companies.

[00:30:11] And so I don't know.

[00:30:13] But yeah, he was talking about how like back in when Facebook started, Mark Zuckerberg, MySpace was big.

[00:30:19] It was, you know, especially in the early days of Facebook, MySpace was the main thing.

[00:30:24] And so to convince people to leave MySpace, hey, he promised not to spy on you.

[00:30:28] They're not spying on anyone.

[00:30:29] That was the early Facebook.

[00:30:31] Then they created a bot so that you could get your messages from MySpace would show up, would be scrubbed from MySpace and show up in Facebook so that you could respond to your friends who hadn't yet transferred over to Facebook.

[00:30:44] But now that is illegal.

[00:30:46] That has been made illegal.

[00:30:47] So like anybody who tries to build a platform and then do a similar thing to Facebook, you will be sued.

[00:30:53] There's a lot of stuff in the weeds of tech regulations and laws that I don't know about.

[00:30:59] But it made me appreciate because I've been thinking, yeah, just like how much some of the people I've talked to who've been down some of these rabbit holes, you know, how difficult it is to talk to them about really fucking anything.

[00:31:10] Because, you know, up is down and down is out.

[00:31:12] The advice is always valid sometimes.

[00:31:16] I think about you always get competing advice, right?

[00:31:19] So if we're talking about like if you have a Republican family, there's the side of like you shouldn't just cut off your family members.

[00:31:25] You should be having conversations with them, X, Y, Z.

[00:31:28] But then there's also the reality and like my family is kind of a split, but like they don't take me seriously.

[00:31:35] I'm the insane liberal child that left.

[00:31:39] Like I am never going to be the messenger that these people listen to ever.

[00:31:45] Like and always just balancing like what the next best step is.

[00:31:51] And it's different for each person, for each situation.

[00:31:53] And people are always looking for like this prescriptive, this is what you should do to be good or to do good or whatever.

[00:32:00] And it's kind of like you got to look inside yourself and make those decisions.

[00:32:04] Like discernment, I feel like is the word of the year or of this time.

[00:32:09] We need people with discernment to like where when someone says something, but it has a different meaning.

[00:32:16] We need to be able to pick that out, you know?

[00:32:19] Yes.

[00:32:20] Yeah, we do.

[00:32:22] Yeah.

[00:32:22] It's tough.

[00:32:23] All right.

[00:32:23] Well, I'm running out of momentum.

[00:32:26] Yeah.

[00:32:26] Do you all feel really good now?

[00:32:28] Do you all feel, do we make you feel better?

[00:32:31] I didn't take us down the deepest of the scenarios.

[00:32:34] So you started to get on a little bit.

[00:32:36] You're like, yo, we might have to live off the land.

[00:32:38] Might have to escape.

[00:32:40] Might have to get back out there.

[00:32:41] But I got an emergency pack just in case.

[00:32:44] Like I'm ready to go, man.

[00:32:47] Maybe I won't end there.

[00:32:49] We'll try to end a little positively.

[00:32:51] And I do think that we're going to see a lot of resistance to this agenda.

[00:32:57] I think the agenda is not going to be popular.

[00:32:59] I think a lot of people are going to realize that things haven't gotten better.

[00:33:04] I think those of us, like you said, we have to stand with the communities that are going

[00:33:07] to be the most under attack.

[00:33:09] We know like deportations are going to begin quickly and on a scale we haven't seen before.

[00:33:15] It's not clear what is really possible.

[00:33:18] But if they're able to do what they want to do, it's going to be horrific.

[00:33:23] We know there's going to be intense attacks on our queer communities, on trans youth.

[00:33:28] We have to be prepared to stand with people on a personal level and also politically and

[00:33:34] make statements.

[00:33:35] I've just been grieving that this is the time that I have to live in.

[00:33:41] Right.

[00:33:42] I want to live in a time of academic enlightenment.

[00:33:45] And but this is what we have.

[00:33:48] And mourning that reality and moving forward is important.

[00:33:54] And that's really it dawned on me the other day that like any major, major things that would

[00:34:01] require the Supreme Court to not overturn them were virtually like not going to happen in

[00:34:07] my lifetime, probably at this point.

[00:34:09] So one note, one positive note I want to share with folks is that I think 2028, I think could

[00:34:16] be a time that we'll see a very transformative candidate emerge or potentially could.

[00:34:21] It reminds me just like as I'm looking back at the 2008 election, I feel like there's

[00:34:25] a lot of similarities or could be a lot of similarities where you have a deeply unpopular

[00:34:31] president.

[00:34:32] And I think part of the reason Obama won that primary is because he hadn't supported the

[00:34:37] war in Iraq and was a critic of the war.

[00:34:39] And I think we're going to see something similar because like Hillary was supposed to win that

[00:34:44] primary.

[00:34:44] It was like set up for her to her to be the candidate.

[00:34:47] And the only reason she didn't win is because she had voted for the war in Iraq.

[00:34:51] And people held that against her.

[00:34:52] And I think we're going to see something similar where anyone who wasn't a critic of what's

[00:35:00] happening in Gaza is going to have a hard time being the standard bearer in 2028.

[00:35:05] And I feel like it's going to be a chance for us to see somebody who we might not expect

[00:35:11] to emerge.

[00:35:11] And I just hope that our movements and our organizations are ready to sort of push that

[00:35:17] person in a way that we weren't ready in 2008.

[00:35:19] I think if we were more ready to hold the line, we could have got a lot more done in

[00:35:25] that time period.

[00:35:26] And obviously we still have to get there.

[00:35:27] That's many years in the future.

[00:35:29] But it's something I'm just sort of like clinging to, I guess, as I think about how dark these

[00:35:34] next years are going to be.

[00:35:35] It's like that's the light I kind of see at the end of the tunnel is we could see somebody

[00:35:40] we don't know right now come out and become a leader that could help articulate the vision

[00:35:45] that's necessary.

[00:35:46] And I think a vision that could really mobilize those folks who haven't turned out that new

[00:35:50] silent majority that we talked about.

[00:35:52] And my little bit of hope is that this is an extinction burst.

[00:35:56] If you've heard that concept of like there are 20 percent of Gen Z identifies as LGBTQ,

[00:36:03] right?

[00:36:04] That doesn't disappear.

[00:36:05] We have a significantly more racially diverse country than we literally ever have.

[00:36:13] So we're still here.

[00:36:15] And my hope is that this is just the final dying kicks of insane bigotry.

[00:36:23] Yeah, we could talk more about that because I definitely feel like what happens when you

[00:36:27] corner a wild animal?

[00:36:29] It lashes out.

[00:36:30] I feel like we've been winning and you kind of look at the long arc of history, but I'm

[00:36:34] not sure it's guaranteed, you know, in the ways that we were kind of told growing up,

[00:36:39] like things will always get better bit by bit.

[00:36:43] Not all the time.

[00:36:44] Not if we don't deal with these like in these like real contradictions that are not sustainable.

[00:36:49] But I do think that I feel that hope as well that you said and I hope listeners leave

[00:36:53] this conversation not thinking Sarah and I are too crazy.

[00:36:57] We hope you're going to follow the ramblings as we're just kind of processing, thinking

[00:37:00] out loud in this moment.

[00:37:02] And you stay tuned.

[00:37:03] We'll be back with another season next year.

[00:37:07] There will still be lots of things to talk about.

[00:37:09] Lots of good work happening in Ohio.

[00:37:12] Angela's asking if we will be back.

[00:37:14] That's a good question.

[00:37:15] I think we'll be back.

[00:37:16] And even if we don't come back, we can always leave them hanging.

[00:37:19] It'll be fine.

[00:37:21] There's always lots of good things to talk about with the work that people are doing in

[00:37:25] Ohio and there still will be across Ohio at the local level in our cities.

[00:37:29] And we've talked so much about the national kind of picture.

[00:37:32] We didn't want to talk a lot about sort of issue one.

[00:37:34] You mentioned the failure of issue one, but I'm sure we'll be talking more about the

[00:37:37] next steps of the democracy movement next year.

[00:37:40] Heck yes.

[00:37:50] As always, visit whatsgoodohio.com for show notes and links and subscribe to What's Good

[00:37:54] Ohio wherever you get your podcasts.

[00:37:56] We'll see you next time to keep talking about what's good here in Ohio.

[00:38:00] What's Good Ohio is a production of Ohio Voice and Policy Matters Ohio, hosted by James Hayes

[00:38:17] and Sarah Rodenberg, produced by Angela Lynn, with production support from Ben Stein, editing

[00:38:23] and engineering courtesy of Sean Carter at Breakthrough Sounds Recording Studio in Cleveland, Ohio.