Speaker 1: Hello the Internet, and welcome to season three thirty five,
Speaker 1: episode two of Days Day Air production of iHeartRadio. This
Speaker 1: is a podcast where we take a deep gut in
Speaker 1: New America share con and it's also an ASMR podcast.
Speaker 2: Officially. Okay, all right, ying Yang in this Tuesday, April
Speaker 2: twenty third, twenty twenty four. Hey, a lot of things
Speaker 2: going on to school bus driver Appreciation Day. Yes, thank
Speaker 2: you for being sober or at least my eyes sober
Speaker 2: as you drove for example, functionally sober. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 2: giving me something to aspire to. National Lost Dog Awareness Day.
Speaker 2: All that's said, National Cherry Cheesecake Day, National Take a
Speaker 2: Chance Day, National Picnic Day, and national talk like Shakespeare
Speaker 2: my Lord Day. That's all I could do. I don't
Speaker 2: I can't speak an Iambic pantameter.
Speaker 1: But I can't say my Lord like the vegas of accents,
Speaker 1: talk like Shakespeare will He was doing a hand curl
Speaker 1: the front of his hat. So we're just on the
Speaker 1: end of No.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it is.
Speaker 1: Shake Spirit Day, Spirit Days Miles. Speaking of days, I
Speaker 1: would be remiss not to mention that we skipped right
Speaker 1: over because it was a weekend. We didn't record because
Speaker 1: we're lazy that we skipped over four twenty.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Bro, I know, Bro, Yeah, it's talk about it's
Speaker 2: about June ninth, Bro, sixty nine. You know we're we've
Speaker 2: moved over from four.
Speaker 1: Twenty, so we moved on from four to twenty.
Speaker 2: Fuck it?
Speaker 1: Yeah all right, I mean.
Speaker 2: Honestly, and I've said this on the show more and
Speaker 2: more like it's it's diminishing returns after you hit the
Speaker 2: heights of eighteen years old on four twenty, Like yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: it'll never matter as much as it does when it's.
Speaker 1: It's like what New Year's is to alcoholics, that is,
Speaker 1: to people.
Speaker 2: Who smoke weed. Yeah, it's like it doesn't matter. I'm
Speaker 2: drinking it every day. Any Yeah, well okay, yeah, amateur Hour.
Speaker 2: I am a functioning alcoholic. I drink where I get
Speaker 2: to work, to school. Yes, my name's Jack O'Brien. AKA.
Speaker 1: I saw the news today. Oh boy, I had it
Speaker 1: printed from the internet. Can't bring my phone into a trial.
Speaker 1: Go get me a big mac and then I'll take
Speaker 1: a nap. We're alternately, go get me a big mac
Speaker 1: and now we know how many diet coach it takes
Speaker 1: the heart to stop that AKA. Courtesy of Shawny Pawne
Speaker 1: on the discord the alternate version the four thousand Holes
Speaker 1: in Blackburn, Lancashire verse from Steaming Chuck on the discord
Speaker 1: on a bit of a roll, Steaming Chuck on a
Speaker 1: bit of a roll. We shouts out to you both
Speaker 1: and for z Gang in general. Someone was telling me
Speaker 1: how like British soccer anthems, like British soccer crowds like
Speaker 1: get together and do like loose, weird allification of songs
Speaker 1: to like represent their players. Oh yeah, And I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: we do that on our podcast. Yeah, our dumb podcast.
Speaker 1: Our brilliant listeners make less dumb by doing that for us.
Speaker 2: Oh no, these are this is just terrorist culture. It's
Speaker 2: terrorist culture from the UK. That's what we're thinking. Yes,
Speaker 2: it's all yeah, that's right, Ultras. Yeah, because for Arsenal
Speaker 2: there is our our most famous manager, Arsen Wenger. We
Speaker 2: did it to the tune of one time of meta Benga.
Speaker 1: There's only one awesome Benga.
Speaker 2: There's be and it's like easy because it's I think
Speaker 2: that's everybody knows that. That's why that's why I gravitated
Speaker 2: more towards European soccer, because like, I'm like, bro, they're
Speaker 2: doing more ship than like defense. They're like talking about
Speaker 2: the like who's the wanka and the green because the
Speaker 2: referees wear green shirts, and it's just like, you know, anyway,
Speaker 2: it's all, it's all fun, It's all anyway.
Speaker 1: Shout out to the gang. Yeah, I'm throw to be
Speaker 1: joined as always by my co host, mister Miles Ground Miles.
Speaker 2: Break, Freckle Freak, freakl freak, I lovesw Okay. Shout out
Speaker 2: Cleo Universe because Yeah, I told you I'm a bit.
Speaker 2: I'm a bit of a I stand for the freckle,
Speaker 2: you know what I mean, And I'm not ashamed. So yeah,
Speaker 2: thank you for putting that into a Rick rick jamification.
Speaker 1: Of that Rick jammification. I had fried pickles over the
Speaker 1: weekend at a foot team match at l A f C.
Speaker 1: And they were bad.
Speaker 2: They're not good.
Speaker 1: They promised cheeto, what's the spicy cheeto?
Speaker 2: Flaming hot, flaming hot.
Speaker 1: They promised flaming hot Cheetoh, and they were flaming hot
Speaker 1: Cheeto in color only, Yeah flavors.
Speaker 2: Look, we'll do a Frickle tour eventually. You know the
Speaker 2: places I trust. Yeah, the Frickle Tour. All right, Miles,
Speaker 2: we are thrilled to be joined by one of the
Speaker 2: hosts of the incredible podcast five four, a show about
Speaker 2: all the ways the Supreme Court is a complete disaster.
Speaker 2: It's also a supervising attorney at Texas Law has worked
Speaker 2: the public defender in Rio Grande City, Texas. Please welcome
Speaker 2: to the show, Rihann and home on.
Speaker 3: Hello do I sing? Am I gonna do like a
Speaker 3: little jingle for myself?
Speaker 1: One?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm here, you're great, hot girl, summer coming up?
Speaker 2: Yeah, right predicted here here here. My shoulders started moving
Speaker 2: a little bit. Yeah. I was like, shit, yeah, I'm
Speaker 2: feeling that. One. What's your what's your the thing I
Speaker 2: always ask people and they're like, should I sing it?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 2: What's your karaoke go to?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 1: I do have?
Speaker 3: The go to karaoke is always TLC no scrubs. Shit,
Speaker 3: you start there right like you can. The sky's the
Speaker 3: limit after that. Yeah, but once you get going on that,
Speaker 3: the vibes are going on that, your power is sort
Speaker 3: of centered in a no scrubs direction. Yeah, karaoke is boundless, and.
Speaker 1: That's brave because karaoke bars are usually full of so
Speaker 1: many scrubs. I can't imagine that's very popular.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, they're like.
Speaker 1: They start booing and hissing, she's.
Speaker 2: Talking about me. But I just think I do think
Speaker 2: I'm fine and people. I'm also known to be a buster. No, no, no, sometimes.
Speaker 3: I hang out the passenger's side of my best friend ride.
Speaker 1: I did get fully hanging out the passenger side of
Speaker 1: my best friend's ride the whole time. I just did
Speaker 1: get in the car and I'm hanging out the whole time.
Speaker 2: I had a friend who and then when the first
Speaker 2: song first came out, they could have swore they were saying.
Speaker 2: It's also known as a bus stop. I was like,
Speaker 2: you need to hang out around different people.
Speaker 1: That's like a that sounds like a Joe Biden slang,
Speaker 1: like yell the bust up.
Speaker 2: He's one of the scrubs.
Speaker 1: He's also known as a bus stop.
Speaker 3: Corn Pop was always hanging around the bus stop.
Speaker 2: I'm serious.
Speaker 1: He was a cannibal and I'm serious man, I'm serious.
Speaker 2: Man.
Speaker 1: No, we know you think you're serious.
Speaker 3: Rather, no, you're not a serious person in your brain.
Speaker 3: You're serious.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but I mean that was what I mean. Is
Speaker 2: I mean what I'm saying, you know, we.
Speaker 1: Know we want to do though we wish you didn't,
Speaker 1: but yeah.
Speaker 2: Because your ice cream is melting all over your suit, sir,
Speaker 2: it's just really unemly. Forget about his ice cream too, imagine.
Speaker 2: I feel like that would do a lot of damage
Speaker 2: to his campaigns, just sloppy, melted ice cream all over
Speaker 2: his suit. He'll be like, oh, you know what, that
Speaker 2: was it for me somehow, I think.
Speaker 3: That's how they They need that damage on top of
Speaker 3: like genocide or yeah, oh okay, okay, okay, the ice
Speaker 3: cream is gonna yeah, he'll.
Speaker 2: Do yeah, maybe he'll do that to distract from his
Speaker 2: lack of action there. And he's like, but I got
Speaker 2: his ice cream all over Oh most sloppy for me.
Speaker 2: But secretly I'm really mad at BB really secretly, not.
Speaker 3: Out Yeah, yeah, no, of course.
Speaker 1: All right, Rhann, And we're gonna get to know you
Speaker 1: a little bit better in a moment. We're first we're
Speaker 1: gonna tell our listeners what we're talking about five four
Speaker 1: Just what one of my new favorite podcasts I want.
Speaker 1: I want Deep on the Federal List Society with you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so we're going to talk about just the Federalist Society.
Speaker 1: I was aware of them, but I didn't I didn't
Speaker 1: know just how brazen and evil. I didn't know the details.
Speaker 1: So I do want to go into the Federalist Society,
Speaker 1: and then we're going to talk about some just like
Speaker 1: what the Supreme Court that brought this Supreme Court brought
Speaker 1: to you by the Federalist Society is up to this.
Speaker 2: Week and just in general.
Speaker 1: But first we do like to get to know our
Speaker 1: guests a little bit better by asking you, what is
Speaker 1: something from your search history that's revealing about who you are?
Speaker 3: Okay, you know, listen a lot of these personal questions
Speaker 3: about like what's on your mind right now, what do
Speaker 3: you think's underrated? That kind of thing. It's tough. I
Speaker 3: am Palestinian. There is a genocide happening, so like my internet,
Speaker 3: my like media intake, all of that is real focused
Speaker 3: on all of that. But something that I did see
Speaker 3: in my Google search that is really relevant and maybe
Speaker 3: not directly genocide related, Adida's traits. Okay, ready, I'm ready
Speaker 3: to be suited up in the three stripes, down the arms,
Speaker 3: down the legs. I want it to be a bright
Speaker 3: color red, yes, maybe a popin kind of lime green.
Speaker 3: Kind of thing. Yeah, you know, I just it's it's uh,
Speaker 3: it might not be every hot girl summer vibe, but
Speaker 3: it is my hot girl summer vibe distract suit.
Speaker 2: Wait, what brought you? What brought you around on? Like
Speaker 2: the breakdancers uniform, like the real og hip hop outfit.
Speaker 3: You know, it is also a kind of Palestinian uncle
Speaker 3: vibe is Adida's tracksuit, right, that kind of thing. And
Speaker 3: so yeah, just uh, going back to my roots, I
Speaker 3: guess we could say, hey, yeah.
Speaker 2: We all become our uncles at the end of the day.
Speaker 2: I played.
Speaker 3: I played soccer too. I played soccer really seriously for
Speaker 3: my youth, and so yeah, that was the brand, you know, yeaheah.
Speaker 2: For sure, for sure.
Speaker 1: I started putting my seven year old in a just
Speaker 1: black Adidas tracksuit like the one you're describing, and it
Speaker 1: like the way that it transforms his energy. It's all
Speaker 1: stolen valor. He doesn't he doesn't play.
Speaker 2: Soccer, boy, right, where'd you come up at?
Speaker 1: Yeah, it doesn't play soccer, doesn't break dance yet, but
Speaker 1: it's really like the that is a powerful, powerful article.
Speaker 2: I feel like I've always been a coward. I've only
Speaker 2: gone pant or jacket, like I've never actually bought a
Speaker 2: full blown like one of my favorite I remember eighth grade,
Speaker 2: I wore the fuck out of these gray Adidas three
Speaker 2: stripe pants that I had, like to the point they
Speaker 2: were just gnarly. But then I remember I didn't have
Speaker 2: money for the matching jacket. So then later on when
Speaker 2: I was like, dude, am I a full track suit? Guy?
Speaker 2: I then I fell back because I knew a lot
Speaker 2: of breakers, and I was like, they're gonna just flame
Speaker 2: me because I'm not a breaker. Yeah, and now now
Speaker 2: you know what I need to embrace. I need to
Speaker 2: embrace the energy that is the old head three three
Speaker 2: stripe suit. But I feel like it's coming back anyway.
Speaker 2: Like it's just because everything's so cyclical, like it's it's.
Speaker 3: All right, and everybody's wearing sambas. The sneakers, Yeah those
Speaker 3: are It's crazy. I was wearing those in seventh grade,
Speaker 3: like not as a cool kid.
Speaker 2: Right, that's you know the soccer nerd kids where they're
Speaker 2: like yo, yes, not even on the pitch, and they
Speaker 2: wear it. They can't. Yeah, kick the shoe game, okay.
Speaker 1: Yeah, next snap bracelets coming back.
Speaker 2: Then we're going to be all the way back.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what is something you think is underrated?
Speaker 3: Okay, you know I gave a lot of thought to
Speaker 3: this as well, and I'm going to say having a
Speaker 3: crazy cat underrated. I'm not a cat person, didn't think
Speaker 3: I was a cat person, but just recently got my
Speaker 3: first cat. She's orange, her name's Petra. She is psychotic,
Speaker 3: She's truly psychotic. I can't say it's a rewarding experience,
Speaker 3: but there is something to it. A certain Jena se
Speaker 3: Quah to coming home and there's a little critter climbing
Speaker 3: up the wall, right, just free sola claws in the
Speaker 3: dry wall.
Speaker 1: Oh wow right.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, there's It really adds a little something to
Speaker 3: your day. So yeah, I would recommend everybody get a cat.
Speaker 3: Mix up your mix up your daily routine. Maybe the
Speaker 3: you know, the chaos is coming from inside the house.
Speaker 2: Right for sure? The climbing up the walls, that sounds like, uh,
Speaker 2: I just saw the security deposit goal poof thinging about.
Speaker 2: I didn't know.
Speaker 3: I didn't know that orange cats are in particular crazy.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, apparently they are and I am living it,
Speaker 3: so yeah, right right, Scaling the curtains, scaling the walls.
Speaker 2: Wow, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: So not Garfield crazy, but crazy in a different way,
Speaker 1: a little bit more energy. There's.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's a little bit more chaos to it rather
Speaker 3: than the kind of four to twenty Garfield right right, right?
Speaker 1: Have you?
Speaker 2: Like? Because I have cats too, and they were just
Speaker 2: shredding up like our furniture, so like people were like,
Speaker 2: you know, like you could declaw them, Like, I'm not
Speaker 2: doing that, are you kidding me?
Speaker 3: No, no way.
Speaker 2: But we did put the little rubber finger tip things
Speaker 2: on the claws, and I don't know if it was
Speaker 2: worth the effort of trying to basically give a cat
Speaker 2: a manicure. Drank cats manicures on like both of their
Speaker 2: front paws, But yeah, we gave up on that pretty quickly, Like,
Speaker 2: you know what, maybe just fuck the couch up. That's
Speaker 2: what you want to do.
Speaker 3: Couch is yours now, you're right for you.
Speaker 2: That was stupid to me to have this air.
Speaker 3: I've discovered that double sided tape. She really doesn't like it.
Speaker 3: But then your couch has double sided tape on it,
Speaker 3: you know, so there's.
Speaker 1: Just a little trim of popcorn around the bottom of
Speaker 1: your couch like it's Santa's suit. Yeah, cover the popcorn
Speaker 1: and pennies. I don't know why pennies, but.
Speaker 2: Just good couch stuff. That's couch stuff. That's stuff you
Speaker 2: find a couch.
Speaker 1: What is something you think is overrated?
Speaker 3: My answers for this, I don't want people to scream
Speaker 3: at me. You know. I was like, instantly, my body,
Speaker 3: my heart, my mind went Taylor Swift. I can't say
Speaker 3: that we're gonna be so so mad at me on
Speaker 3: the internet. But yeah, all right, so you know Taylor Swift. Obviously.
Speaker 3: Then I was like, no, I can't say that. Well,
Speaker 3: what's the next thing that's like overrated? Well, Democrats, the
Speaker 3: Democratic Party, they fucking suck right now. People who like
Speaker 3: them are weird. But then I don't want people to
Speaker 3: yell at me about that either, you know.
Speaker 1: So they're pretty cool about that. They take they take
Speaker 1: criticism pretty well.
Speaker 2: I feel like, what do you mean? What is blue?
Speaker 3: And so, you know what, I've landed on overrated podcasting
Speaker 3: sitting in my damn closet once a week speaking into
Speaker 3: a zoom.
Speaker 1: You know, that must suck.
Speaker 2: You must not have much going on.
Speaker 3: That's the thing too, overrated podcasting. I have. I have
Speaker 3: a podcast. I also have a job, so yeah, it's
Speaker 3: a lawyer job on top of that. So so yeah, man,
Speaker 3: I'm I'm exhausted.
Speaker 1: That's a lot. That is a lot, but it also
Speaker 1: makes your show so great, like the all the hosts
Speaker 1: have legal backgrounds.
Speaker 2: And yeah, functional ones, yeah, not just fun.
Speaker 1: I could have I could have passed the bar, but I.
Speaker 2: Was like, dude, I don't need to do this. My parents.
Speaker 2: I could go to law school anyway, but.
Speaker 1: That three times to my legal pot.
Speaker 2: Don't worry about it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I never did as good as I thought
Speaker 1: I should.
Speaker 2: Have to me and amicus brief is when my homies
Speaker 2: text me what's up tonight? You see, Oh, I know
Speaker 2: what's up, dude. That's wrong. Legally, that was really good.
Speaker 2: I did feel it.
Speaker 1: So where are we on the pronunciation of amicus brief?
Speaker 1: I've always gone as but okay, I feel like, yeah,
Speaker 1: one of the hosts pronounced it in a different way
Speaker 1: on you know what.
Speaker 3: For Yeah, for plural, so plural amicus is amaici, but
Speaker 3: some people say amichi, that's.
Speaker 1: C i and.
Speaker 2: Yeah, harsh, yes, Yeah, We're all over the map on
Speaker 2: this one.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I've always heard it amaki, but I think who
Speaker 3: you're talking about on the podcast my co host Michael,
Speaker 3: who sometimes comes with Latin pronunciations that are just yeah
Speaker 3: from outer space, never heard of before.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but this is how I was pronounced in ancient Rome.
Speaker 1: So yes, that's where we're going. We're not going to
Speaker 1: get laughed out by them.
Speaker 2: I'm telling you that I'll be laughed at by everyone,
Speaker 2: but not my Latin professor, but not Cicero.
Speaker 1: No, yes, all right. Should we take a break and
Speaker 1: come back and talk about the fed sock is which
Speaker 1: I now know that fed sock means the Federalist Society. Yeah,
Speaker 1: let's do that.
Speaker 2: We'll be right back, and we're back.
Speaker 1: We're back, and and I highly recommend everybody, upon completing
Speaker 1: this go check out the five to four and specifically
Speaker 1: the Federalist Society history.
Speaker 2: It's it's. Yeah, I'm just gonna keep going.
Speaker 1: It's it's it's And I think that communicates plenty, but
Speaker 1: I guess so.
Speaker 2: I always found it.
Speaker 1: Amazing, mind blowing that there was in the earliest twenty
Speaker 1: century something called the Business Plot, where a bunch of
Speaker 1: industrialists and business people tried to recruit a US general
Speaker 1: to overthrow FDR's government and just be like, now we're
Speaker 1: we fucking fascism and like we want better conditions for businesses.
Speaker 1: And it was unsuccessful, but it was so brazen, so
Speaker 1: out in the open, and just so like counter to whatever,
Speaker 1: like what America is supposed to stand for that it
Speaker 1: just seemed like wild to me when I learned about that,
Speaker 1: like ten fifteen years and now I feel like this
Speaker 1: the Federalist Society just was that, and they just stuck
Speaker 1: with it and have basically succeeded in doing what those people,
Speaker 1: like what those the uber wealthy were trying to do
Speaker 1: in the earliest twentieth early twentieth century, Like even early
Speaker 1: funders of the Federalist Society were like the melon like billionaires,
Speaker 1: you know, like that gilded like literally Gilded Age money
Speaker 1: monsters who were probably involved in the business plot got
Speaker 1: the Federalist Society off the ground, and now we live
Speaker 1: in basically like what the business plot would have liked
Speaker 1: America to look like.
Speaker 2: It feels like.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, absolutely so the Federal Society. I think people
Speaker 3: like listening to this, like you might be familiar with
Speaker 3: like the term. They know that the Federal Society is
Speaker 3: an organization, especially when Trump was president and was making
Speaker 3: his nominations to the Supreme Court. It like came out
Speaker 3: that Trump was saying explicitly, Yeah, the Federal Society is
Speaker 3: providing me with these names. Right, I got the I
Speaker 3: got the shortlist for Amie Cony Barrett, right for Amy
Speaker 3: Cony Barrett and Neil Gorsich and Brett Kavanaugh. Those came
Speaker 3: to me from the Federal Society. So I think people
Speaker 3: like have a sense of like, well, who the fuck
Speaker 3: are these guys? Right?
Speaker 1: You know, yeah, right, yeah, they do listicals.
Speaker 2: That's right. Number three will make your heart flutter.
Speaker 3: But what we talk about on five to four is
Speaker 3: how the Federal Society is really kind of like the
Speaker 3: judicial wing of the Republican Party.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 3: The Federal Society as an organization, it bills itself, kind
Speaker 3: of presents itself. They call themselves a debate club. They
Speaker 3: say they're a network of conservative attorneys, judges, conservative legal academics, professors, right,
Speaker 3: And they say that they're just there to like talk
Speaker 3: about ideas, debate ideas in you know, conservative legal spaces.
Speaker 3: That kind of thing. Bring together all kinds of conservatives
Speaker 3: so we can debate, and sometimes we bring liberals in
Speaker 3: two so that we see the other side and stuff
Speaker 3: like that's how they talk about themselves, right, and the
Speaker 3: Federal Society, this organization, they have student chapters at law
Speaker 3: schools all around the country and where in fact ostensibly
Speaker 3: kind of started as a student organization at Yale and
Speaker 3: the University of Chicago in the early eighties.
Speaker 1: But eighties Student one of those grassroots student organizations funded
Speaker 1: by billionaires.
Speaker 3: That's right, exactly, So they have all.
Speaker 1: The best food at their meetups.
Speaker 3: Right right, You peer behind the curtain one step and
Speaker 3: you see that, like, this is not a student organization,
Speaker 3: This is not a debate society. This is, like I said,
Speaker 3: this is the judicial wing of the Republican Party. This
Speaker 3: is the legal services provider for the Republican Party and
Speaker 3: for the conservative legal movement. So any conservative legal mission
Speaker 3: like goal right, overturning Roe v. Wade, you know, the
Speaker 3: crushing of the administrative state. Federalist Society lawyers, Federalist Society professors,
Speaker 3: Federalist Society judges are all on the same page about
Speaker 3: all of this stuff and working in this network to
Speaker 3: bring those cases to the Supreme Court and effectuate those
Speaker 3: kind of like conservative legal goals. Because the Republican Party
Speaker 3: has realized over the past fifty years, the Republican Party
Speaker 3: has realized that its policy goals are minoritarian, They are
Speaker 3: not popular. They actually wouldn't win if real democratic processes
Speaker 3: were in place to vote on what they want. So
Speaker 3: they have to use the judicial branch to reach their
Speaker 3: policy goals.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and they're doing it to an extent, an extent
Speaker 2: where I mean now like everyone's just like, what is
Speaker 2: what is the Supreme Court? Now? I mean I get
Speaker 2: that there were ideologues in the Supreme Court in years past,
Speaker 2: but I think obviously now that it's like there's no
Speaker 2: breaks on the conservative side. Now, we're just getting like
Speaker 2: decision after decision where I feel like every time people
Speaker 2: are like, is is it legitimate? Do we how do
Speaker 2: we contend with it? And yeah, Like to your point,
Speaker 2: it's they're basically once some freaky billionaires like how do
Speaker 2: I get this? Doney're like, oh, yeah, we'll figure out
Speaker 2: a way, even if we have to make up a victim, yeah,
Speaker 2: to bring to the court. And they won't even really
Speaker 2: you know, really pry into that. I mean the last
Speaker 2: few cases, we're like, this person isn't even a web designer,
Speaker 2: and they're trying to act as if like she's suffering
Speaker 2: damages or something by this law, and you're like, fucking
Speaker 2: how and you get that there's a whole machine. This
Speaker 2: is an apparatus, a machine, a whole thing pushing this all.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's the case. Three ZHO three creative, really really
Speaker 3: good example of how like the Federalist Society, the conservative
Speaker 3: legal movement, and now six fucking maniacs on the Supreme
Speaker 3: Court are are dealing with their issues that they you know,
Speaker 3: it's like we call it results. It's oriented, like they
Speaker 3: know the result that they want out of a case
Speaker 3: and they'll get there no matter what.
Speaker 2: Yeah, brains, yeah exactly.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah I thought they I thought they called balls strikes.
Speaker 1: That's what. Wait what Yeah they call ball strikes. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's right.
Speaker 3: They call it a strike.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a strike.
Speaker 1: The only aspect of the story that made me hopeful
Speaker 1: was like how successful they they've been, Like the the
Speaker 1: history of the Federalist Society shows how quickly things can change.
Speaker 1: Now granted, like things have changed for the worst, like
Speaker 1: in huge way, like just compared to the seventies when
Speaker 1: this takeover kind of first started, Like guns were not
Speaker 1: mentioned in the Republican Party's like platform until like seventy six.
Speaker 1: Prior to that, everyone was kind of like, yeah, no,
Speaker 1: the Second Amendment is about militia's like it like it
Speaker 1: says in Constitution, which we're supposed to be like into
Speaker 1: I guess as a party. And like there's a quote
Speaker 1: from a conservative justice who calls, like the Second Amendment
Speaker 1: thing that we're all familiar with and like I came
Speaker 1: up assuming was like a permanent part of the Republican Party.
Speaker 1: There's like a conservative justice who's like calls it the
Speaker 1: greatest fraud they've ever heard. Like if they can so
Speaker 1: I don't know, Yeah, it just if they can shift
Speaker 1: things that far that quickly, like maybe we can shift
Speaker 1: them back to where they were like in the seventies,
Speaker 1: like in some of these cases where it's just gotten
Speaker 1: so much worse because of them. But I don't know that.
Speaker 1: That was like the thing that I found one of
Speaker 1: the most startling things I found about it was just
Speaker 1: how much they have changed and how quickly it's happened.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Like it shows the power the federal of society's success,
Speaker 3: the success of the conservative legal movement more broadly, Like
Speaker 3: it shows the power of like building a movement, like organizing,
Speaker 3: like taking courts seriously, right, Like it's not it wasn't
Speaker 3: like magic that did it. It was that, like people
Speaker 3: coalesced around their common interest in opposing the New Deal,
Speaker 3: the civil rights movement, the women's rights movement, and movements
Speaker 3: to expand democracy. We can say, right, they didn't like that,
Speaker 3: and so they started to organize against it. They made
Speaker 3: connections with politicians all of that stuff, and over like
Speaker 3: I said, over the past fifty years, like they are now,
Speaker 3: you know, kind of living in the world that they built,
Speaker 3: like living with their successes. And unfortunately they're still full
Speaker 3: steam ahead because they're an incredibly powerful movement now. But
Speaker 3: I think you're exactly right, Jack, Like people will, especially
Speaker 3: law students, will ask us when we like go to
Speaker 3: law schools and talk about this stuff. Law students will
Speaker 3: ask us like they're like hopeless, They're like despondent, right,
Speaker 3: They're like, what, like this world is unacceptable? How on
Speaker 3: earth do you like fight back against the federalist society?
Speaker 3: And I think that's because like a lot of young
Speaker 3: people like you, just you have come up into your
Speaker 3: adulthood in like a Trump presidency, like everything awful, like
Speaker 3: institutions just completely illegitimate on their face, corrupt, and you're
Speaker 3: just like, how do you fix this?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 3: But taking a step back, it's exactly like you said, Jack,
Speaker 3: like politics can actually move quite quickly, and it just
Speaker 3: means that, like movements need to be built, we also
Speaker 3: can organize ourselves against what they're doing, right, And there
Speaker 3: are lots of different methods that actually, like it's not
Speaker 3: about like building a response twin organization of the Federalist
Speaker 3: Society to oppose the Federalist Society, right, it's about like recognizing,
Speaker 3: like you know, if you're interested in social justice, if
Speaker 3: you're a movement lawyer, all of these people, like we
Speaker 3: have power that is very very different from a billionaire
Speaker 3: funded my case to go to the Supreme Court, right,
Speaker 3: and we should be using it, right, And those things
Speaker 3: can happen very quickly in politics. Historically they've happened very quickly.
Speaker 3: So this is not like, you know, the end is
Speaker 3: not written, Like the federal society as it is today
Speaker 3: is not the world that we live in forever now,
Speaker 3: like we can do something about it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like things EBB and flown right now, I think
Speaker 2: if you're younger, then you've been caught up like you've
Speaker 2: only known peak federalist society power exactly. I don't know
Speaker 2: how the fuck does this change, but like anything, yeah,
Speaker 2: things opinions change, and movements begin to form. And yeah,
Speaker 2: I think this is I mean, I think because of
Speaker 2: the like depravity of the Supreme Court, it's it's doing
Speaker 2: the thing of like naturally beginning to radicalize people or
Speaker 2: at least bring people into a level of consciousness about Okay,
Speaker 2: so wait what how Okay? And they are able to
Speaker 2: get there why because their corporations are now treated as
Speaker 2: people and can also spend unlimited sums of money that
Speaker 2: is actually affecting the legislative products. Okay, okay, okay, okay.
Speaker 2: And I think yeah, to that end, I feel like
Speaker 2: we're just I mean, we talk about this all the
Speaker 2: time when we look at younger people, and like when
Speaker 2: I was in college, I was like I was engaged,
Speaker 2: but not to the degree that I even see people
Speaker 2: that are in high school are now because the stakes
Speaker 2: are just completely different for them. So there is like
Speaker 2: this double edged sword thing here where with the fuckery
Speaker 2: comes increased knowledge. But yeah, it's it's it's definitely a
Speaker 2: difficult time could be existing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly, And I think it's about like seeing where
Speaker 3: where power is right now and how we can transfer
Speaker 3: power right so right now, it's like not about like
Speaker 3: building the most powerful liberal legal organization to counter the
Speaker 3: federalist society. It's actually about saying, like, the federalist society
Speaker 3: has too much fucking power in our politics and in
Speaker 3: our law making and in you know, in the judiciary
Speaker 3: the Supreme Court has too much fucking power. And so
Speaker 3: you know, things like structural reforms, movement building that shift
Speaker 3: power to the people, should who should have it, workers, consumers,
Speaker 3: the people, right, democratic structures of government. That's where that's
Speaker 3: where our focus should be.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I was thinking about that too, right, Like you know,
Speaker 2: I guess I was. We will talk about like what
Speaker 2: we could do later on, but it's come up pretty
Speaker 2: naturally now. Is like, you know, most people look at
Speaker 2: it and go, what can we do? Like if it
Speaker 2: like like all these people are screaming and shouting that
Speaker 2: they don't want X, Y or Z, but they just
Speaker 2: don't care, And I get that, Like, you know, one
Speaker 2: version is to build up the people power to do
Speaker 2: something like that. And then the other version too, is
Speaker 2: like if we want things like term limits or like
Speaker 2: if we want to pack the courts, we need legislators
Speaker 2: to do that, and that means like we have to
Speaker 2: count on them, because based on what I've seen, our
Speaker 2: legislators move at a pace that could be described as
Speaker 2: heroin snail And so that does make me a little
Speaker 2: bit weird. But how you look at that, because I
Speaker 2: think that is one of the ways too, Like we
Speaker 2: do need legislation that actually arises like that intersects with
Speaker 2: the justices out of place that they know they're like, oh, okay,
Speaker 2: these are new rules now. Yeah, but how like how
Speaker 2: do you sort of look at that and what do
Speaker 2: you see as being like more effective versus the other
Speaker 2: or if we should just be like no, no, no, like
Speaker 2: for patient maybe this will work.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, No, it's not about patients. It's about like
Speaker 3: like doing some real shit, right and doing some real
Speaker 3: shit kind of like across the board, across all of
Speaker 3: We should be using all of the tools that we
Speaker 3: have for this. So when like I said, we should
Speaker 3: be decreasing the power of the Supreme Court, how do
Speaker 3: you do that? There are lots of ways. Some of
Speaker 3: the things that you've just described are really good ways
Speaker 3: that like we should be pursuing. So packing the court,
Speaker 3: making the court bigger, making the number of justices bigger
Speaker 3: on the Supreme Court decreases the power that each individual
Speaker 3: justice has, right, it spreads power over a bigger body,
Speaker 3: meaning Sam Alito, the fuck face, Brett Cavanaugh, the psycho,
Speaker 3: Clarence Thomas don't have that like that the power that's
Speaker 3: currently consolidated in them right now. Packing the court is
Speaker 3: a really really is a really great way to decrease
Speaker 3: that power. And that's kind of like what you're talking
Speaker 3: about with this kind of like short term, long term thing, right,
Speaker 3: we should be using like the short term avenues that
Speaker 3: are available to us in building a long term where
Speaker 3: the Supreme Court, the federal society, corporations have less power
Speaker 3: over all of us, right, term limits, that's a really
Speaker 3: good idea. I think there are tons of ideas for
Speaker 3: structural reform of the Supreme Court, and we should be
Speaker 3: like talking about all of them. That's when it comes
Speaker 3: to the politicians, right, it's a failure of the Democratic
Speaker 3: Party that the Republicans and the federalist society, the conservative
Speaker 3: legal movement has taken the court so seriously for decades now,
Speaker 3: and they've won what they've won, and they are like
Speaker 3: rolling around in the pig sty shit that they've created
Speaker 3: and then love it. They're partying, right, and Democrats still
Speaker 3: are not taking the Supreme Court seriously, still not saying, hey,
Speaker 3: we need to reform this, Hey we need to we
Speaker 3: need to be doing our politics around this too.
Speaker 2: Yeah right, what like what's the fear of the Democrats
Speaker 2: to legislate the courts? Like what you know? I mean,
Speaker 2: because I get part of it too. Is like, at
Speaker 2: the same time, both parties still serve corporate interest to
Speaker 2: a certain extent, so like obviously they're like, hey, you know,
Speaker 2: like maybe go that. Maybe they's just the will of
Speaker 2: the donors, aren't there or what, or is just historically
Speaker 2: that there's just this like aversion to it. But that's
Speaker 2: the one thing all I see is like things happen
Speaker 2: and then you'll see people like Chuck Schumer or Nancy
Speaker 2: Polsy're like, you know what, we got to do something
Speaker 2: about the Supreme Court, just not now, and I don't
Speaker 2: know when, but I'm gonna say that out loud because
Speaker 2: that's what we do as a party. I mean.
Speaker 1: I also, thing I always hear them say is that
Speaker 1: if they packed the if Democrats pack the court when
Speaker 1: they're in office, won't the Republicans just pack the court
Speaker 1: back at them? And if so, it like who does
Speaker 1: that benefit overall?
Speaker 3: I guess yeah, yeah, okay, So I have two thoughts
Speaker 3: about this. One is like the historical thing in history,
Speaker 3: pressure on the Supreme Court by the other branches of
Speaker 3: government works. So most famously, probably the most famous example
Speaker 3: is FDR in the nineteen thirties, early nineteen forties, and
Speaker 3: with Congress is passing all of this New Deal legislation, right,
Speaker 3: getting people jobs, right as a communist, getting people jobs,
Speaker 3: getting people to work, outlying child labor, you know, more
Speaker 3: rights for workers, supporting unions, all of that kind of stuff.
Speaker 3: And the Supreme Court at that time was conservative and
Speaker 3: was striking down all of that legislation left and right.
Speaker 3: What did FDR do. FDR threatened to pack the court.
Speaker 3: He was like, I'm about to add justices if you
Speaker 3: guys don't get in line. And what did the Supreme
Speaker 3: Court do? They got in line. They started, they stopped
Speaker 3: striking down that legislation so that New Deal legislation could
Speaker 3: actually go into effect. So there are historical analogs here,
Speaker 3: like we could be looking at that or historical analogs
Speaker 3: for Democrats actually using the fucking political power that they have, right,
Speaker 3: And so there's that. And then the other thing that
Speaker 3: I was going to say to your point Jack about
Speaker 3: like this counter argument that Democrats will be like, well,
Speaker 3: Republicans will pack the court if we pack the court,
Speaker 3: and then it will be all Republicans. The thing that is, like,
Speaker 3: the thing that people don't stop and realize is that
Speaker 3: Republicans have packed the court. We live in a reality
Speaker 3: that is a Republican packed Supreme Court and federal judiciary.
Speaker 3: When Trump was in office, he nominated twenty five percent
Speaker 3: of the current federal bench. All federal district court judges
Speaker 3: were nominated by Donald Trump. That's because that Republican president
Speaker 3: took the judiciary seriously and was like, oh, we have
Speaker 3: all these spots to fill, let's go, right. So we
Speaker 3: live in the world that is already a Republican packed court,
Speaker 3: a Republican packedjudiciary, and so Democrats should be taking that
Speaker 3: seriously as as sort of a method again one of
Speaker 3: the tools that they have, and because the result would
Speaker 3: be that when Republicans pack the courts, the results are
Speaker 3: power is consolidated in the wealthy in corporations, et cetera.
Speaker 3: If Democrats would pack the courts, the results would be
Speaker 3: people have more power, workers have more power, women have
Speaker 3: more power, minorities have more power. That's very hard to
Speaker 3: take away once it's given. Right, So the threat, but
Speaker 3: I don't know a generation to generations from now that
Speaker 3: then Republicans would come back and pack the court. And
Speaker 3: if Democrats packed the court first, that is so remote, Like,
Speaker 3: let's actually do something with the power that we have
Speaker 3: to give power to more people, and that is doing politics,
Speaker 3: that is doing good governance, right, And yeah, I'm not
Speaker 3: worried about Republicans packing the court in fifty years. I'm
Speaker 3: worried about the Republican packed court right now.
Speaker 2: Right because it's there. It's like it's more the Democrats
Speaker 2: are unpacking than packing.
Speaker 3: You're just letting it being packed.
Speaker 2: Really, yeah, for sure. Yeah.
Speaker 1: The last thing that I just wanted to cover on
Speaker 1: the federal society is there's been this narrative of, well,
Speaker 1: the Conservatives now that they overturned Row, are kind of
Speaker 1: like the dog that caught the car, and it's kind
Speaker 1: of this hopeful thing of like, yeah, but that that
Speaker 1: was all they cared about right, and now they accomplished
Speaker 1: that it's unpopular. They're kind of fucked what what are
Speaker 1: they going to do? And I think you specifically framed
Speaker 1: it as like the Federal Society is a service provider
Speaker 1: to the Republican Party, like they will move in accordance
Speaker 1: with whatever the Republican Party wants. Like the gun thing
Speaker 1: didn't start with the Federalist Society. It started with like Reagan,
Speaker 1: and you know, the Republican Party kind of adopted some
Speaker 1: of the NRA and then the Federalist Society is like,
Speaker 1: all right, well we are the judicial wing, as you said,
Speaker 1: of the Republican Party, so we're just gonna get in line.
Speaker 1: So they are going to be you know, as Trump
Speaker 1: you know, continues to wheel power or you know, let's
Speaker 1: say he wins the next election, they are going to
Speaker 1: be a fascism machine like that. It's not going to
Speaker 1: be a thing where they're like, all right, well this
Speaker 1: is the bridge too far. I think like January sixth,
Speaker 1: the fact that they wouldn't like ratify a separate set
Speaker 1: of electors like the Supreme Court, I think made misled
Speaker 1: me to be like, so the Supreme Court like ultimately
Speaker 1: is not going to just go along with Trump's bullshit.
Speaker 1: But like a lot of people in the Federalist Society
Speaker 1: who like put those justices on the Supreme Court were
Speaker 1: like guns blazing, like January sixth, like election overturning, like
Speaker 1: conspiracy theorists like that. One of the founder was like, guys,
Speaker 1: this is too much like Trump shouldn't be allowed to
Speaker 1: run for president. And they were like, you can't call
Speaker 1: yourself the founder anymore. The title, yeah, this quest title.
Speaker 1: And he was like, I'm sorry, I like Donald Trump again.
Speaker 1: Juary six was tight, but it's just like I do
Speaker 1: think the near future is just as dangerous, and you know,
Speaker 1: there there are a lot of really dark possibilities with
Speaker 1: the Federalist Society just as much as like the recent past.
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, you know, we said that the Federalist Society,
Speaker 3: you know, provided the list for Trump for who he
Speaker 3: was nominating to the Supreme Court. Those justices. In fact,
Speaker 3: the six conservative justices on the Supreme Court right now
Speaker 3: are currently members of the Federalist Society or have been
Speaker 3: at points in their past. Just want to make it clear,
Speaker 3: like this is this is a network that is like, uh,
Speaker 3: this is a network that's promoting from within its own ranks.
Speaker 3: These are their own people, right, and there's not a separation.
Speaker 3: There's not a separate There is not a separation between
Speaker 3: the Federalist Society and the people on the Supreme Court.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I think January sixth is like a really interesting like
Speaker 3: moment in history. I guess you could say for the
Speaker 3: Federalist Society because I think that if we're kind of
Speaker 3: calling the Federal Society like a party, a political party,
Speaker 3: it's it's not officially, but if we think about it
Speaker 3: like that, they learned lessons from January sixth, right, And
Speaker 3: I think a really big lesson they learned was that
Speaker 3: you know, they can, as they were in January sixth,
Speaker 3: leading up to January sixth and afterwards, in all of
Speaker 3: the litigation, whether it was Trump's fraud claims about votes,
Speaker 3: whether it was about you know, states certifying their electors,
Speaker 3: all of it, Federal Society lawyers had their hands on
Speaker 3: all of that. We're directing all of that. There are
Speaker 3: Federalist Society lawyers who were actually took part in planning
Speaker 3: the January sixth stuff like specifically. But I think the
Speaker 3: lesson learned was that the public at large probably was
Speaker 3: left with a bit of distaste about the actual coup part, right,
Speaker 3: the actual invasion of the capital part, right, whereas the
Speaker 3: Federalist Society could have and I think now has learned
Speaker 3: the lesson that it can still be behind the scenes
Speaker 3: doing all of the legal machinations, all of the legal stuff,
Speaker 3: the legal work that needs to be done to effectuate
Speaker 3: the result that they want, which is Trump winning the
Speaker 3: presidency next time. Right, And so yeah, I think they've
Speaker 3: learned that lesson, and they know that the messy coup
Speaker 3: literal riot part was maybe something that would like kind
Speaker 3: of made it overall unsuccessful. But they know that they
Speaker 3: have allies on the court up and down the federal judiciary.
Speaker 3: The lawyers have been working on this stuff for years,
Speaker 3: meaning like what kind of cases to bring their red
Speaker 3: for the litigation, and yeah, they're the Federalist Society has
Speaker 3: always been really good at at this exactly the behind
Speaker 3: the scenes work where they're not saying like the Federalist
Speaker 3: Society is bringing this case. The Federal Society isn't suing anybody.
Speaker 3: It's people in this network.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they don't give up. They've been they try and try,
Speaker 1: and you know, they were trying to overturn Row for
Speaker 1: decades and then they just kept trying different things until
Speaker 1: they found a strategy packing the court with Federalist Society
Speaker 1: people that actually worked exactly. So, yeah, this isn't going
Speaker 1: to stop until an alternate force is put to work
Speaker 1: that stops it in counterbalance that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and you know, like a lot of legal analysts
Speaker 3: or journalists media at the time that Dobbs came down,
Speaker 3: which overturned Roe v. Wade, a lot of commentators were like, oh, well,
Speaker 3: what's the Republican Party going to do?
Speaker 2: Now?
Speaker 3: What's the Federalist Society going to do? Now? Like they
Speaker 3: they won, they got their like big achieved their big
Speaker 3: project of overturning Row, and now it seems like they're
Speaker 3: going to be like kind of disorganized and they don't
Speaker 3: really know what they're working on now false false false
Speaker 3: false false.
Speaker 1: So right, it's like their was like check made assholes.
Speaker 1: Wait wait, you just took it after I embryos yet,
Speaker 1: right exactly, Like.
Speaker 3: Right, So it's like, again, if we're thinking of them
Speaker 3: as kind of like a political party, like now it's
Speaker 3: more like a normal political party where there's different bowls
Speaker 3: of interest, less focused on the one single issue that
Speaker 3: they did coalesce around over you know, since since Roe v. Wade,
Speaker 3: since the early seventies. But they have tons of energy,
Speaker 3: tons of political will, and and again what they're working
Speaker 3: on is even more fascist stuff coming down the pipeline.
Speaker 3: And it's all centered not just their opposition to Roe v.
Speaker 3: Wade and abortion rights. It's all centered on their opposition
Speaker 3: to the New Deal, to the civil rights movement, to
Speaker 3: the women's rights movement, and to expanding democracy. So the wildest,
Speaker 3: most fascist shit you can think of, legally, they're working
Speaker 3: on it right now. It's absolutely coming down the pipeline.
Speaker 3: Whether that's like rolling back protections for women and queer people,
Speaker 3: whether that is saying you don't have a right to contraception,
Speaker 3: whether you know we're talking about like prisoner's rights, the
Speaker 3: rights of criminal defendants, all kinds of stuff. They are
Speaker 3: absolutely still working on it. They are not disorganized now
Speaker 3: that they quote unquote one overturn at Robi ways.
Speaker 2: I think the only part that I think they're like
Speaker 2: conflating what the aims are of the federalist society and
Speaker 2: like the broader conservative judicial movement with like the electoral
Speaker 2: politics of people that are a down ballot of Trump
Speaker 2: who are like, ooh, I don't know what to do now.
Speaker 2: It's like yeah, sure, in that narrow sense, yes, exactly,
Speaker 2: it's difficult now to campaign. But in terms of like
Speaker 2: a movement, like we're already saying, it's like they want
Speaker 2: to basically, they really want to go back to the
Speaker 2: nineteenth century at best, you know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, and that's the Federal Society being that service provider.
Speaker 3: So you best believe they are hooking up with Republican
Speaker 3: and conservative politicians and being like, here's what you can
Speaker 3: campaign on. We're working on this. This is what donors
Speaker 3: care about right now, right yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Sarah Marshall from the podcast You're Wrong About talks about
Speaker 1: how the right wing takeover of media and of politics
Speaker 1: over the past like fifty years has been very similar
Speaker 1: to like the panics that the right wing was having
Speaker 1: about like communism, like the Red Scare, and like Satanism
Speaker 1: and stuff like it's been this you know, smaller like
Speaker 1: minority group that has imposed its ideals through. Yeah, just
Speaker 1: like behind the scenes infiltration and all the shit that
Speaker 1: they were worried about.
Speaker 2: Like I feel like their.
Speaker 1: Concerns around the Satanic panic and like the red scare.
Speaker 1: We're just like them telling on themselves or giving them
Speaker 1: some of ideas about like how to do this ship. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 3: The Republicans, conservatives in general, especially social conservatives, they'll they're
Speaker 3: they're really good at making the issues they care about
Speaker 3: into culture war bullshit, right, like really firing up a base,
Speaker 3: really like, yeah, firing up this moral panic about stuff.
Speaker 3: And then when you like take a step back, you're like, hey,
Speaker 3: people voting, like you're talking about mail in ballots, like
Speaker 3: what you know? So yeah, yeah, that's as tried and
Speaker 3: true tale, as old as time for sure.
Speaker 1: Yeah, all right, let's take a quick break and we'll
Speaker 1: be back to talk about what's happening on the Supreme
Speaker 1: Court this week.
Speaker 4: We'll be right there a lot, and we're back.
Speaker 1: We're back, And I keep seeing the stories about what
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court's up to. It seems bad, not good.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this week and who bettered. I'm like, I'm like,
Speaker 2: just I want to pick Rihanna's brain with a few
Speaker 2: cases that we've seen kind of begin to bubble up
Speaker 2: over the last few months. The first one is Grant's Pass,
Speaker 2: the City of Grants Pass in Oregon. They're basically arguing
Speaker 2: and please correct me if I'm wrong. Essentially that cities
Speaker 2: will have the ability to punish people for having nowhere
Speaker 2: to sleep as like to say that like if you are,
Speaker 2: if you have a if you're sleeping outside or putting
Speaker 2: up a tent, whatever that is. Now that's there's nothing
Speaker 2: to protect you, not even the Eighth Amendment, which I
Speaker 2: guess I mean, I was like, which cruel and unusual
Speaker 2: punishment was that protecting us from? Because it's not us
Speaker 2: capitalism for sure, but like is that? I mean I
Speaker 2: feel like the very distilled version of that I get
Speaker 2: is the Supreme Court is now going to basically come
Speaker 2: down on whether or not sleeping outside is a crime.
Speaker 2: I think that's maybe pretty broad. But how should we
Speaker 2: be looking at that, because this feels like this has
Speaker 2: a lot of ramifications for many people who live in cities.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, I think that's exactly right. Like that that
Speaker 3: is the essential like distillation of what's happening here. So, yeah,
Speaker 3: people who are unhoused sleeping outside and in some cities
Speaker 3: states what have you, you can be criminally charged for that. Now,
Speaker 3: I think in Grant's past it's a ticket, right, Like
Speaker 3: it's not necessarily that you you know, can go to
Speaker 3: prison for this. But it is a ticket, a citation
Speaker 3: that is under the law a punishment. If you have
Speaker 3: to pay a fine for something, that's a punishment, right.
Speaker 3: So the Supreme Court here is deciding, you know, if
Speaker 3: you are punishing somebody for being unhoused, is that cruel
Speaker 3: and unusual? And I think the specific setup actually in
Speaker 3: this case is, you know, there are cities where maybe
Speaker 3: you can get a ticket for they call it a
Speaker 3: lot of places to call it public camping, right You're
Speaker 3: camping on public grounds, in a park, under a bridge,
Speaker 3: that kind of thing. There are cities where you can
Speaker 3: get a ticket for public camping, or the police can
Speaker 3: come and take down your tent and trash your belongings.
Speaker 3: And that's super super messed up obviously. But in a
Speaker 3: lot of cities they have shelter beds, there is enough
Speaker 3: sort of emergency housing or housing for unhoused people that
Speaker 3: people aren't forced to do public camping in grants pass
Speaker 3: and in the cases from the Ninth Circuit that are
Speaker 3: the ones going up to the Supreme Court. In this case,
Speaker 3: the issue, for example, like in San Francisco, is that
Speaker 3: San Francisco has police go tear down homeless encampments, but
Speaker 3: there aren't enough beds in San Francisco, for there aren't
Speaker 3: enough shelter space. There isn't enough shelter space where those
Speaker 3: unhoused people can go. So it's in that kind of
Speaker 3: like specific legal situation that is like, is this cruel
Speaker 3: and unusual? Because you are literally criminalizing them for taking
Speaker 3: the only option that they have, right there is no
Speaker 3: other choice. They don't have another place to sleep, right,
Speaker 3: So is that cruel and unusual? Now, unfortunately, I hate
Speaker 3: to break the bad news, but the Supreme Court sucks.
Speaker 1: When I thought you said the Supreme Court, Yeah, it is.
Speaker 2: How they like.
Speaker 1: How they got away with the Supreme thing. Supreme always
Speaker 1: means superior, means all the top things, all the topings.
Speaker 3: Unfortunately, Supreme sucking in this in the in this realm.
Speaker 3: But yeah, no, there's no expectation here that the Supreme
Speaker 3: Court is going to be like, yeah, this is cruel
Speaker 3: and unusual punishment. You are violating these people's constitutional rights
Speaker 3: when you punish them for essentially being unhoused, right, yeah.
Speaker 2: Because you hear what the proponents say, and it's like
Speaker 2: such like just inhumane bullshit where they're just like, well,
Speaker 2: I mean it's really quite simple. It's like we need
Speaker 2: to help our lawn enforcement figure out if they even
Speaker 2: have the ability to help keep our cities safe. And
Speaker 2: and then like completely skirting and then you hear that
Speaker 2: really bad talking points, like some people just want to
Speaker 2: be out there, like even if they have help, without
Speaker 2: actually talking about like the conditions some shelters are. And
Speaker 2: for some people it's like, yeah, I'd rather take my
Speaker 2: chances on the street than go to the shelter because
Speaker 2: an X, Y and Z threat I have there. But
Speaker 2: again it's mostly lost and like do you want to help,
Speaker 2: like police make our city safer? And it's really just
Speaker 2: about that, Like it's really.
Speaker 1: The chamber of commerce and right people local businesses when
Speaker 1: in doubt they're going to I mean, especially now following
Speaker 1: Citizens United, where like corporations are have more rights than
Speaker 1: individual people. Anything that's like, well, this lowers our property
Speaker 1: value or our ability to god really yeah, yeah, I.
Speaker 2: Didn't scare you want, but oh my god, your property value?
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, like that is more important under the current rules.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think like a big kind of takeaway of
Speaker 3: the case, or not even a takeaway, but like this
Speaker 3: case is a good example of something which is that
Speaker 3: social problems, the problems in our society, often end up
Speaker 3: going to the Supreme Court, where, you know, if you're
Speaker 3: on the side of social justice, if you're on the
Speaker 3: side of welfare for people, if you're on the side
Speaker 3: of equality and justice, that's that's the Supreme Court is
Speaker 3: a dead end. Right, Supreme Court is not going to
Speaker 3: solve our social problems. Here. The social problem is policing,
Speaker 3: the idea that public safety quote unquote is about tearing
Speaker 3: down unhoused people's tents, right, and the existence of homelessness
Speaker 3: to begin with. The housing crisis in America is a
Speaker 3: social problem, right, that is not going to be solved
Speaker 3: by this case. And yeah, it's a good example of
Speaker 3: politicians and people not coming together to work on actually
Speaker 3: solving those issues and just making it a you know,
Speaker 3: a police a law enforcement issue, taking it up and
Speaker 3: down the federal judiciary to the Supreme Court and back again,
Speaker 3: and nothing really gets solved. Right, people are still unhoused,
Speaker 3: that's a problem.
Speaker 2: Yeah, But then for them it's like, well, at least
Speaker 2: legally now we can brutalize them. However, exactly exactly, the
Speaker 2: guys of we're actually keeping them safe because some of
Speaker 2: them don't, you know, it's like it's so unserious. And
Speaker 2: then this, I mean, this next one I think is
Speaker 2: probably gonna get the most attention, even though there's also
Speaker 2: obviously the Idaho abortion ban is something that the court
Speaker 2: is gonna hear. And also like Starbucks, like like, well
Speaker 2: you help with a union bust, amongst many other things,
Speaker 2: which I'm sure they're gonna be like, oh, yes, my good, Yeah,
Speaker 2: my good? Is Starbuck?
Speaker 1: Yeah up there? Yeah, like Starbucks versus a union, Like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, is.
Speaker 2: The National Labor Relations Board go off their fucking rockery?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: I think so. I think we need to yank Delicia
Speaker 2: a little bit today here. But the other one is
Speaker 2: that Trump immunity is Trump immunity. God, you know that
Speaker 2: was I think like with this one from from I'm
Speaker 2: guessing right, especially everything I've heard, this case really isn't
Speaker 2: gonna go anywhere because Trump's team is essentially arguing a
Speaker 2: president cannot face charges for anything without first being impeached
Speaker 2: and convicted by Congress. If that doesn't happen, they can kill,
Speaker 2: they can do murders. Resealed Team six and it's like,
Speaker 2: what but I feel like here the victory for him
Speaker 2: was the fact that they were like, okay, but we're
Speaker 2: gonna delay our decision so that can come up the
Speaker 2: rest of your legal trials here. That kind of what's
Speaker 2: going on.
Speaker 3: That's one hundred percent right. And it's also not just
Speaker 3: his legal team delaying, right, the Supreme Court is helping.
Speaker 2: Right exactly, yeah, right, because they would have right normally,
Speaker 2: it would have been opening, like even the Supreme Court
Speaker 2: be like, come on, fam because that means Joe Biden
Speaker 2: could do whatever the fuck.
Speaker 3: He wants now, right exactly exactly. So, yeah, this all
Speaker 3: has to this. This actually does come out of January sixth.
Speaker 3: You know, Jack Smith, special counsel, brought an indictment against
Speaker 3: Donald Trump, criminal indictment for the coup plot basically, and
Speaker 3: this lawsuit Trump's laws are saying, well, no, you're actually
Speaker 3: immune from being sued or from criminal prosecution any legal
Speaker 3: actions against you while you are president. Right, that is
Speaker 3: obviously a wild argument because again, like you just.
Speaker 1: Said it, Okay, so because nobody can touch me.
Speaker 2: I.
Speaker 3: Can the president murder?
Speaker 2: Like? No?
Speaker 3: Surely not right, Like the president is not absolutely immune.
Speaker 2: That's what the lawyers are kind of saying, because I
Speaker 2: remember what was the lower court that first heard them.
Speaker 2: They're like, hold on, let me get this right. You
Speaker 2: just so he could he could hit up Seal Team six,
Speaker 2: just snuff somebody out.
Speaker 3: And they're like, yeah, this is like getting in the weeds.
Speaker 3: But you know, the president does violence of course, nature
Speaker 3: being the president, right, like Obama ordering drone strikes, was
Speaker 3: Obama doing murder. They're all war criminals. But yeah, this
Speaker 3: this this lawsuit kind of like on its face, Yeah,
Speaker 3: the Supreme Court. I don't think anybody thinks the Supreme Court,
Speaker 3: even these Supreme Court justices, I don't think anybody thinks
Speaker 3: they're going to be like, yep, you're right. The president
Speaker 3: is immune from everything while the president is in office.
Speaker 3: But the little tricks they're doing is about the delay
Speaker 3: so that this case doesn't actually get decided at a
Speaker 3: time when it really matters, right, which is to say,
Speaker 3: before the election. So the Supreme Court granted cert, which
Speaker 3: means they accepted the case, They said they would hear
Speaker 3: the case. They granted cert months after they could have,
Speaker 3: and then when they said they would hear the case,
Speaker 3: they scheduled the oral argument for the end of April.
Speaker 3: When they could have heard the case much earlier there
Speaker 3: were dates available. Scheduling it for the end of April
Speaker 3: means we likely will not have a decision until late June.
Speaker 3: And then if that means if the decision is no,
Speaker 3: he's not immune from every thing, he can be taken
Speaker 3: to trial, then that means the trial would still have
Speaker 3: to happen. Right, You're talking about months and months and months,
Speaker 3: if not years, And then you know, you got the
Speaker 3: election coming up in November, like Trump is going to
Speaker 3: be the president or he's not. But this decision about
Speaker 3: whether or not he is convicted of a crime for
Speaker 3: the January sixth coup attempt, you know that it by
Speaker 3: that time it will be irrelevant because it will either
Speaker 3: win the election or not, right right, right.
Speaker 2: That's just yeah, it's fun to see. It's fun to see.
Speaker 2: I'll play it like I keep saying, November, take your time,
Speaker 2: Please take your time, you know, let me just be
Speaker 2: so present throughout here, all.
Speaker 1: Right now, just give us, like a ESPN talking head,
Speaker 1: take is Trump gonna win the presidency or not?
Speaker 2: Just yeah, what do you think? You hear?
Speaker 1: This guy's the bet?
Speaker 2: No. One last question as relates to Scotus because I
Speaker 2: feel like there's always these moments right before we go.
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, I had to I had to ask you this,
Speaker 2: why I have you here. There's always these moments right
Speaker 2: where you're like, man, I know how I know Kavanaugh
Speaker 2: was gonna send it what coney barretts about sending what
Speaker 2: Neil's about to say, and then like they they switch
Speaker 2: it up like and find their spine in like the
Speaker 2: weirdest ways, Like specifically Neil Gorsich, who's like tribal rights, Man,
Speaker 2: I'm telling you don't fuck with that, and you're like,
Speaker 2: but but fuck everyone else's rights, Like like how do
Speaker 2: you how do you sort of view these like like
Speaker 2: you know, I've heard some theories like he's so conservative
Speaker 2: that like it intellectually brings him to a point where
Speaker 2: he's like he has no choice but to defend tribal rights.
Speaker 2: Others like well he grew up in the Southwest and this, this,
Speaker 2: that and the other. But how do you see like
Speaker 2: these flashes of like when you're like somehow like Amy
Speaker 2: coney Barrett had a half decent opinion, is that them
Speaker 2: being like I gotta kind of edge with the wacky shit.
Speaker 2: So they don't think I'm a total scumbag, so I
Speaker 2: just do it here and there or is there just
Speaker 2: like how do you view this sort of like the
Speaker 2: vacillation between like they're the being moral or not giving
Speaker 2: a fuck at all? That's right?
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, I think I think you just have
Speaker 3: to remember that they're individuals, like they're beings.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 3: Gorsic on tribal rights. Yeah, he spent a lot of
Speaker 3: time I think, coming up as a lawyer and as
Speaker 3: a judge in states where tribal rights were something being litigated, right,
Speaker 3: or like tribal jurisdiction federal Indian law was an issue, right,
Speaker 3: And so he just knows a lot about it, and
Speaker 3: I think he can it's not about like caring about
Speaker 3: the rights of minorities or people of color. I think
Speaker 3: he just knows a lot about the law and has
Speaker 3: totally kind of like he's totally like brought that into
Speaker 3: his conservative legal approach.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: He's a textualist, so he's able to say things like, look,
Speaker 3: the treaties with tribes say this, this is the test.
Speaker 3: I'm a conservative, I'm a textualist. This is how I
Speaker 3: interpret it, right, yea, And yeah, so they're they're they're
Speaker 3: all individuals sometimes with kind of like a little surprise
Speaker 3: here and there, but to them, they're always working within
Speaker 3: and for the conservative legal movement for sure. And I
Speaker 3: would say the thing that is more pronounced, more than
Speaker 3: like an occasional surprise half liberal take from a conservative
Speaker 3: justice is actually that they're getting more conservative while they're
Speaker 3: on the bench. So Clarence Thomas, sam Alito, John Roberts especially,
Speaker 3: they are talking about things, writing about things in twenty
Speaker 3: twenty four in their opinions that there they would not
Speaker 3: have said, thought put down on paper in opinions, you know,
Speaker 3: twenty years ago when they were earlier more junior justices.
Speaker 1: Right, because they have this little club that they go
Speaker 1: to call the Federalist Society, where they like give speeches
Speaker 1: and they're like, uh, it's nice to be somewhere where
Speaker 1: people aren't protesting outside my house. And everyone's like.
Speaker 2: God, yeah, yeah, Hey, Harlan, come out with the money
Speaker 2: with the money cannon. Harlen, come up with Harley Crow
Speaker 2: about to hitch out with the money cannon?
Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, all right, Well, Rihannon, what a pleasure haveing you.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for spending some time with us.
Speaker 1: Where where can people find you? Follow you, hear you
Speaker 1: all that good stuff.
Speaker 3: Yeah, this was really fun. Thanks y'all. So the podcast
Speaker 3: is called five to four. That's the number five dash,
Speaker 3: the number four. We're on all social media at five
Speaker 3: to four pod, all spelled out. I'm on Twitter. Refuse
Speaker 3: to call it the other thing.
Speaker 1: At Awa in this household.
Speaker 3: Absolutely not. At a Wa rhiannon. That's Aywa Rhannon And yeah,
Speaker 3: come check us out five four pod dot com. We
Speaker 3: are talking about all this shit and more weeke in
Speaker 3: and week out.
Speaker 2: There you go.
Speaker 1: Is there a work of media, social media or otherwise
Speaker 1: that you've been enjoying?
Speaker 3: Oh, you know what, I've been watching the Gaza Freedom Flotilla,
Speaker 3: the ship that is set sale for Gaza. People from
Speaker 3: all over the world are on this ship. They have
Speaker 3: tons of humanitarian aid and they are going to attempt
Speaker 3: to break the seventeen year siege of Gaza by landing
Speaker 3: at the port in Gaza.
Speaker 1: So God bless Yeah, amazing miles Where can people find you?
Speaker 1: Is there a working media you've been enjoying?
Speaker 2: Find me where they have? The social media is at
Speaker 2: miles of gray. I'm on most of them, you know,
Speaker 2: So just search there. And also you can find Jack
Speaker 2: and I on our basketball podcast, Miles and Jack And
Speaker 2: if you like to play on ninety day Fiance. You
Speaker 2: know where we get into the nuances of immigration reform. No,
Speaker 2: we don't. We're just talking about trash reality. Uh, check
Speaker 2: me out on four to twenty day Fiance. Any tweets
Speaker 2: I like, Nah, I haven't been on the tweet thing,
Speaker 2: but I just what did I start watching recently? Oh?
Speaker 2: I was watching. I was just watching the rest of it. Actually, no,
Speaker 2: I don't even recommend it. Never mind. I'm not even
Speaker 2: gonna like, I'm like, I just have that thing that
Speaker 2: I was gonna trash. But no, continue doing what you
Speaker 2: do for your social media's. But yeah, I have no
Speaker 2: no suggestions.
Speaker 1: Your owner, no further suggestions. You're no further suggestions my owner.
Speaker 2: All right, Uh yeah, workimedia. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Just a twet from Christy Mgucci Man at the Wopple
Speaker 1: House on Twitter, who tweeted, don't text right now, just
Speaker 1: learn to the high school from Ten Things I Hate
Speaker 1: About You is a real high school called Stadium High School.
Speaker 1: And I don't know if you remember that high school,
Speaker 1: but it's like it looks like like a cat like
Speaker 1: Arkham Asylum, but then there's like a big stadium in
Speaker 1: the middle of it. There's like a field with like
Speaker 1: this big castle in the background.
Speaker 2: It's like one of the.
Speaker 1: Wildest things I've ever seen. Anyways, I'll link off for
Speaker 1: that in footnotes for worth your time. You can find
Speaker 1: me on Twitter at Jack Underscore O'Brian. You can find
Speaker 1: us on Twitter at daily Zeitgeist, where at d daily
Speaker 1: Zeitgeist on Instagram. We have a Facebook fanpage and a website,
Speaker 1: daily zeitguist dot com where we post our episodes and
Speaker 1: our footnotes where we link off to the information that
Speaker 1: we talked about in today's episode, so well as the
Speaker 1: song that we think you might enjoy. Miles, what's song
Speaker 1: do you think people might enjoy?
Speaker 2: This is a song from a duo called Tandy Thha
Speaker 2: and DII and there from the UK. But they're like
Speaker 2: studio musicians that used to play with bands like Michael
Speaker 2: Kiwanuka or like Salt or Cleo Soul, little sims like
Speaker 2: groups that I definitely fuck with, and they just have
Speaker 2: like their own project together and it's called Candy and
Speaker 2: it's got this like DIY like sexy Rick James kind
Speaker 2: of shit going on in this track. It's called Big
Speaker 2: Boys Don't Cry and it's just some nice bedroom funk
Speaker 2: I think is what I'll call this one. So this
Speaker 2: is from Tandy. Check it out all right.
Speaker 1: We will link off to that in the footnotes. The
Speaker 1: dailies Like Guys is a production by Heart Radio. For
Speaker 1: more podcasts my Heart Radio visit there, Heart Radio Wrap,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast. That's gonna
Speaker 1: do it for us this morning, back this afternoon to
Speaker 1: tell you what is trending and we'll talk to you
Speaker 1: all then Bye later