 Aloha, it's Wednesday, it's 11 o'clock, it's May the 12th. I'm Tim Apachele, your host, and welcome to What Now America. And today's title is GOP Votes to Outs, number three leader, Liz Cini. You know, I was thinking about the title of this show and quite frankly, I think it's not the right title. Maybe the title should be Fighting for the Heart and Soul of the Republican Party, because that seems to be where we're at with Liz Cini, the number three house leader, being ousted by her own peers. Now, it's interesting because it wasn't long ago, and she was one of 10 house representatives, GOP representatives, that voted to impeach Donald Trump. And her peers went into a secret meeting and basically about 60% said we're going to retain her, 66%. Let's retain her leadership. So really what's happened since then. Yesterday on the House floor, and I'm going to read this quote, Liz Cini said in front of the house, and before she spoke these words, all the GOP members, except for a few, walked out the door. So that would kind of give you an indication, either people are running scared or they just didn't want to hear it and feel guilty. But here's what she said. Every one of us who has sworn the oath must do to prevent the unraveling of our democracy. This is not about policy. This is not about partisanship. This is about our duty as Americans. Remaining silent and ignoring the lie that emboldens the liar, I will not participate in that. I will not sit back and watch and silence why others lead our party down a path that abandons the rule of law and joins the former president's crusade to undermine our democracy. Jay going to you, first I'd like to introduce our guests. Today we have Jay Fidel, we have Jean Fidel, Stephanie Dalton, and Winston Welch. Welcome everyone and thank you for attending What Now America. Jay, given Liz Cheney's speech at the House floor and the recent oust of her position as a leader in the GOP House, where are we? What happened? What happened since the time that she had a confidential private support from her peers? Now she doesn't. What happened between that time and today? Things got much worse. You know you use the word unravel and I think the country is unraveling because everything is unraveling. You know the Congress has already unraveled, it's incapable of doing anything and the Republican Party now is unraveling and to some extent the Democratic Party has its fragmentation as well. And if you think that Liz Cheney is going to be you know a viable candidate in the 2024 election, forget about it. That's not going to happen. So what we what we have is what Vladimir Putin loves to see, we have fragmentation. And I suggest to you that at the end of the day we're going to have fragmentation all over the place, especially around the Republican Party and about voting in 2022, which is only a year and a half away. And this is going to, this fragmentation will be in my perception, it will be violent. And that's where we're going to have you know a sort of violent conflagration maybe in some places like Georgia but also in other places around the country. I don't know how we escape this but I will cede the rest of my time to my brother Gene and he can tell us how we're going to escape violence. Well yeah Gene by all means go ahead and address that but also in a second part of that please tell us what in your opinion where the GOP is headed. Is it going to be a mandatory requirement that you buy into the big lie whether you know it's you know it's not true but you have to buy into it to please Donald Trump. Where is the GOP headed? Is it headed for a split? Is it headed for violence? Your opinion please. Right well let me let me begin by saying that Jay and I are the product of a mixed marriage. My father was one of the few Republicans in our election district in Queens New York. He never had to wait online very long to cast his vote because there weren't any Republicans. So I take you know I have a sort of funny vantage point on all of this. Republicans were rare in our in our community growing up. I think the Republican Party is not going to split. I think what it what's happening is it shrinking into a very hard base. It's it's just they're offloading a different different image. They're offloading people who are not willing to commit all of their values and their lives the sacred honors their fortunes to Donald Trump former president Trump. And what you're going to be left with is a very lean a very cohesive group of people. It's going to be the hard of the the hardest of the hard or what else is going to happen you know a new party can arise. I mean it's not it's not unprecedented in American history that new parties arise when old parties just become so rotted. Do you think that's why Liz Cheney has taken the position she has speaking outright and and very forcefully against against the sick offense of Donald Trump. Is she going to be that person that tries to split the party off? Well Tim actually what you're really saying what you're really asking me if I can rephrase your question is you say Jean that a new party might arise don't you mean one or more new parties might arise because I don't believe that Liz Cheney who has you know on a certain level done the right thing here but maybe on on a very important level has done the right thing. I don't think she is the person who is going to you know attract every pre-floating former Republican in American political life. There are a lot of people who are going to say hey where that have a good time Liz and we're glad you're off off former President Trump's bus but we're not getting on a bus with you because we really don't agree with you and Liz Cheney not withstanding her good deed let's say civic good deed of yesterday you know has has a record and her record is really hard right. No she voted with Donald Trump 93 percent of the time. That's correct that's what you get that's loyalty for you ironically the person who is I guess the leading candidate to succeed her as number three in the Republican constellation Pantheon voted with Trump less than that 78 percent 78 percent of the time yeah yeah she's no prize either but but my point is that I don't think Republicans former Republicans non-Trump Republican are going to come to attention and fall in behind her some will and some won't I mean for example you know there were people the whole there was a rump group that was very effective they had some fabulous ads for example over the last six months or a year of ex-Republicans and they're not going to follow her I believe now who are they going to follow and there's a spectrum there really is a spectrum and where does what is a Mitt Romney what is Governor Baker of Massachusetts Governor Hogan of Maryland I don't think well I don't know about Mitt Romney I don't he says he's very conservative we'll find out but Baker isn't and Larry Hogan in Maryland so what where did they go they're not going to become Democrats that's for sure well I guess at least all other that's a whole other question what's a Democrat what yeah well at least the question is what is a Republican required to do in order to be a Republican these days one thing take the oath take the oath yep to Donald Trump or the Constitution well they've all on paper taken the oath to the Constitution but you know oath Schmoath what what we're looking for is basically the pure oath sorry to say it but that's what we're talking about yeah okay thank you Gene hey Stephanie you know after January the 6th for a brief time 24 hour period you had Lindsey Graham you had Mitch McConnell Kevin McCarthy all throwing down the you know the the horrible thing that happened at the Capitol and rejecting it outright saying it was wrong and Donald Trump was definitely responsible for it and then lo and behold within 48 hours that had changed they were back in Donald Trump's um corral if you will how is that now transformed itself to the day where Liz Cheney voting 93% with Donald Trump on everything he he wanted following his policies almost to a T yet she's still ousted how does this transformation occur is it hypnosis is it um peer pressure it what what is it in your opinion what what can transform such an a firm position about how something's wrong and now it's proven fact and nothing's wrong well i think we've discussed before that there may be some mortal threat behind all of this but the fact that we were deprived today of the secret ballot vote for Liz Cheney leaves us without the the information we'd like to have which is uh of all of these republicans who is uh perhaps uh not bending the knee to our former president and that would have given us some notion of where um the the split was because it seems that Liz Cheney in contrast to her peers is has considerable uh courage and maybe the only pulse on the hill up there to come straightforward and stay with you know what it is that is her her understanding and belief about the circumstances so let me hit that point let me hit that point for a second um does that courage uh translate to votes in her reelection in 2022 well i think that she's counting on that that that we have the two games going on now so so um McCarthy thinks he's on his way to speaker and he's got all the debris out of the way now and's got everything under control well how long does that last so uh and whereas Liz is willing to step out enormously brave on top of stating her her conviction and making it clear giving us a lesson and reminding us of the constitution and democracy and now she's stepping out on the plank uh waiting to see um how things play out and her bet is probably on uh people's good sense and and the people that she works with who are too who who are too what is it uh too weak to state their case so they're trying to play both sides until it's clear which one's coming up but but we know which one is going to come out because we can't go forward on that lie so that's what's bothering me a lot and I think that's what Cheney is is is uh banking on is that we can't build this uh community um and this government on a lie it's what's what's to say about 74 million people who that potentially will go along with this lie well eventually uh that that's true we had we have that but we also know the data is coming in not that way the data is coming in that 50 percent are not good with Trump's performance and 44 percent still are so we've got where it is 51 and 44 something like that so I think uh that may be um you know supportive of what Cheney is doing and maybe that's given her some you know reason to be optimistic because it's beginning to change and the and the news said that McCarthy and those few people at the last call because we've never mentioned that data that data is not in in the last couple days but that data says specifically that 15 percent of his unapproved you know non-approval rate was 15 percent higher than his approval rate and they kept that from the from the politicians that you know they need that information for their own home districts for their reelection and if they're gonna you know they're now being tagged on to someone who's far more unpopular than they were led to believe what does he about the leadership of the GOP party to hide this information from him right and and showing him to be the loser that he is there there he's a he's a tremendous loser hasn't won anything and as this starts to see through into the the newscasts from our our uh not cnn and not msnpc program that is utterly impossible um eventually they they'll have to tell the tale so i think that um the worm is turning as we say i guess in the in the literature because um the line will not hold the us government well oh all right thank you Winston do you agree with Stephanie that lie will not hold that um wiser minds will see through this and say it's a lie it's always been a lie and and uh the emperor's closed syndrome is over we're done with donald trump well that's a good question and uh first sorry i've got roofers here so this is the working from home roofing edition and premieres you would have said welcome to our new friends in the world who are watching the show here in hawaii i agree for our friends who are watching from europe our think tech show we would like to welcome you and also welcome to jean as our special guest on tim show i think that i would like to hope that our peoples into their senses and learn the truth about what's going on i also am um saddened that that you have to have this this fealty to uh donald trump in promoting the big lie especially when they were when you had these these same people you know the speaker of the house mitch mcconnell going right against it that said i think that um we may look back on this day and just say that was a really bad day because it forced the republicans like jean was saying or or stepping that is they're going into this ideological purity model of just those folks i would disagree as far as them becoming democrats so when i was suggesting this to jay that the democrats extend an open arm to uh these that's all the principle republicans and say if you want to caucus with us as an independent because you're going to be primaried anyway so you might as well make the most of your last 18 months in office and you can say i'm a principle republican they're going to have to do some deep uh dives inside of their own states and see where their people are but there is a possibility that they will then reach that i noticed the governor of arkansas no stellar friend of a liberal was supporting this jay today and i think there's a lot of other people out there there's 30 percent of the party that will go with them so um the other 70 percent gradually it'll erode but um i do i do recommend that people watch uh chris cuomo uh he had a good piece about it said almost the entire GOP walked up before cheney's speech on cnn yesterday and also that they uh look at the new york times.com the trump's GOP plot against this cheney and our democracy and finally the one that's uh jeff flake and washington post in today's republican party there is no greater offense than honesty so these are some things that i've been troubled this week to see this while we've been sort of happy that our society didn't collapse in the last two months we've had a mass tsunami of uh bills in these legislature you have arizona maricopa county republican party counting the ballots first the chain of custody etc etc so there's a lot going on in the last couple months while we just breathed sigh of relief um on some level but the damage is continuing to be done jean you have a comment one thing that uh and i'd be interested in other panelists reaction to this events are going to move uh outside of outside the beltway as a former washington yeah i'll say that uh in ways that are going to impact dramatically on things inside the beltway as well as across the country specifically uh the criminal justice system which is intact in our country is functioning uh people are being prosecuted and are going to be prosecuted and sent to jail because of january 6th and the federal district court in washington dc is moving as fast as circumstances permit the department of justice under america garland is on the case uh that that is a functioning independent as as things go agency of the government in addition in new york state you have the new york attorney general who's pursuing criminal charges and related matters tax uh issues uh in the state system and in new york county the Manhattan district attorney's office has uh been working for months and they've been successful ultimately in getting a subpoena enforced uh and and therefore i think there are going to be developments that will dramatically affect the um credibility and clout and standing of former president trump and he will be uh radioactive in ways and for people who do not yet consider him radioactive so there's there's going to be change here that will that will potentially alter the political uh array let me ask you because the fact that he doesn't have social media at his beck and call um doesn't that hasn't that already started to happen and maybe isn't that what's translating into his unfavorable percentage ratings his percentage ratings are still pretty good they're better than mine i mean you know for a person who who doesn't uh i don't i don't tweet except very infrequently but you know for a person who has been cut off from important social media he's still pretty good uh in that department so i yeah he he'd probably be somewhat stronger but you know his people are there they're there you know why while gene is here him he's a foremost um expert national expert in military justice and uh i i think there's one area we should cover with him while he is here and that is where does the military fit in all of this and all this environment we've been talking about so for example you know trump tried to try to sidle up to the military during his time in office he spent money on them he made it seem like he was their friend even even with a bone spur problem and at the end of the day the military is sort of mostly largely on the right side of things if you talk to people in the service both enlisted in officers there was an issue back at the time of the church remember the bible at the church and all that about where the military stood and more recently just within the last couple of days there was a letter by some retired military and senior officers generals and admirals what have you um you know siding up to the right side of things and siding up to trump um and that is kind of revealing maybe it's the top of the iceberg but in there somewhere is a right leaning military we don't have the draft um and it's career military largely and I think it kind of to the right side and they will play in my in my scenario of violence they will play um somebody's got to call them the national guard somebody got to call in you know who knows who else in the military to quell disturbances if if they happen so I wonder what gene's comments would be because he's really close understands the heartbeat of the military and can tell us where exactly did they did they swing and where do they fit well it's been a tough period for the military uh and uh you know the military has other fish to fry that are kind of more close to home I mean there's a whole controversy that's right now coming to a head what to do about sexual assault in the military and should we modify the military justice system that's got a lot of people spun up that's another show which we've already done but but in terms of the the cultural aspects and the role of the armed forces in American life American civic life probably uh if you were making a movie about this period you'd probably have a general mark milley as the central character so who's mark milley he he's an army four star general who's the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff unusual man uh he's a princeton graduate uh you know how does that happen you know anyway there he is uh he he doesn't present particularly as an intellectual he's not a you know not one of the phd admirals or generals but he had a moment of truth uh where if as j referred there was the photo op outside st john's piscopal church uh in washington the so-called church of presidents uh where he was used as a uh as a photo op backdrop by former president trump in a way that was appalling and uh general milley wasn't quick enough quite quick enough on the trigger to realize that he was being set up in a horrendously improper way about 24 maybe 36 hours later of course he uh issued a statement that was polite but unmistakable saying don't ever do that again and you know a message to the troops now as far as the uh the retired admirals and generals and the ones who signed this letter of basically kind of altacockers i mean these are people who retired as generals 20 years ago uh some of them are uh basically uh you know quite uh strange and uh at at the far end of things politically one of them i i'm not going to mention any names but but if you if you take the names and run them through your google search you'll you'll find out who we're dealing with here it's extraordinary that uh they would uh weigh in on something like this because they're supposed to be dedicated to the constitution not that they have not that military personnel shouldn't vote i mean general george marshall made it a point of honor that he didn't vote that that was supposed to be a good thing i don't think that's a good thing i want people to have some skin in the game politically but uh this is this is these people have the wrong skin in the wrong game and uh the danger that they might what they have to say might resonate with people who are on activity or are in the reserves or a national guard i mean that that is a little jean didn't we have um didn't we have several ex-joint chiefs of staff write a letter was it back in january of this year uh after the insurrection or even before that um of a list of prominent general generals recent generals and joints chiefs of staff didn't was there a letter produced uh i i think there was but i'm i'm reaching for the uh the sit yeah me too yeah but it was on the the other you know the opposite uh spectrum of of not supporting a president blindly right it was it was a letter basically supporting the rule of law and so you know these letters are important but you're right they're you know they're they're awkward so jay what what do you think about that other previous letter um did that have any impact to republicans and and trying to remember the rule of laws they're trying to support the big lie apparently not none of us remember exactly what was said so i i don't i don't i don't think it had as much effect as the one the other day and i think you know it's in play i think the military is in play if you talk to a listed or officer you'll find a lot of them are kind of on the right side of things um and they have a certain connection with the base they come from rural areas such as the base comes from and so i mean if i were trump strategizing for um you know what he wants to do in the election or the run up to the election in 2022 and 2024 um and given the fact that you know as we have discussed you know the republican party will be a card court and a lot of people will have left it but they may not be actively involved they may not flock to the democratic party uh there may be no really dispositive other party and so uh query you know this will be in play and if there is violence they have to call in the military when that happened on january 6th it did not work very well at all jean you want to say something yeah i i just want to not to divert the the conversation but i also i think it's important to uh ponder whether we're dealing with something that is more than a trans a transitory problem uh we we all know that uh there are problems with the u.s constitution everybody by the way everybody in sight says well i'm supporting the constitution you know even even the people at january 6th they said well i'm doing this for the constitution trump trump was the commander i'm doing this for the constitution uh there are real issues in the 21st century with a constitution that gives states equal representation in in the senate i mean that's a real problem and by the way if you tie the equal representation of the states in the senate which is a wild violation of one person one vote i mean that's that came later uh tie that to the filibuster there's a toxic combination you get two bad ideas and they turn into a single really terrible idea and that a lot of what we're dealing with right now in terms of the paralysis uh and rot in the american political system is a combination of those two uh building blocks yeah Stephanie go ahead well briefly i i've heard read that the founding fathers and on their behalf they had a massive uh challenge and they weren't able to work everything out and um i think that uh what's considered about where they couldn't work everything out and get it into the constitution those are the problems that we have had for through the centuries and at half and at one point culminating in the civil war so that all of this traces right back to the list that the founding fathers are trying to move through and and bless their hearts they got through it as much as they could but they didn't get it all done now how it is that we deal with that um i don't know and i uh constitutional convention is probably far from anything we can see in the near future but anyway just on behalf of the founding fathers it was a mighty effort but they couldn't do it all and here we are so now we have the obligation to work it out and a lot of it had to do with race yeah i think most of it had to do with race well a lot with states rights yeah exactly what is the issue here okay we are out of time but i want to go around the the table here uh winston your last comments about this discussion or things of next week to come uh i've been a little pessimistic this week i don't like the republican party of maricopa county counting the elections the very action of it is um it it just speaks volumes as to what's going to be happening coming up in the future they've already counted and recounted and hand counted and had cameras now they're looking for bamboo fragments it's it's so dumb it's it's hard to say anything but i do feel i've been pessimistic this week but now after hearing some folks i'm a little bit optimistic jay's been a lot of pessimistic stepney sounded optimistic cnn had a nice article as well uh biden's edge over trump and it talks about how popular joe biden is and that this may be a that it may be you have these folks that are going to support donald trump but you also have a lot of that are saying we like saying people in government we don't care if he's giving away the the farm if he's printing money whatever it is he's doing or they like that he's doing that it doesn't matter we have an adult an office who is uh leading our government and uh making our nation feel uh secure and sane again and i think that that portends well for the future so i'm going to leave with that thought a little bit of optimism on a weak pessimism we could use it thank you winston jay your last thoughts well i i go back to the metronome as you know the days tick by and the infrastructure bill is dead there's no gun control there's no immigration reform and other things that should happen aren't happening congress is is non-functional it goes beyond dysfunctional and what happened with list chain he demonstrates that that's going to continue and maybe get worse and the country is exposed it's vulnerable to so many things including covid and climate change and and geopolitical issues and contentions so i am sorry winston i am not optimistic um but i would say this the jeans point which i really appreciate uh and stephanie's point she started it in fact is the founders you know really didn't cover all the ground and there were issues that really need to be corrected reformed what have you and and i hope that at some point in the not too distant future i mean maybe on a slow news week although it doesn't ever seem to be a slow news week these days maybe on a slow news week we could get together and talk about how we would reform the constitution and maybe jean who'll be back in connecticut or massachusetts can talk to us again by remote we can include him in that conversation i really like that great jean what are your last thoughts and what do you think's on the horizon i'm afraid that uh what we're going to see is an effort to uh emasculate the uh the biden administration despite it is and its popularity at the front end of the administration uh former president trump and his pals uh sliced off two or three months by screwing around with the transition so the transition actually happens after inauguration day rather than before inauguration day thanks now your term is three months shorter and i think uh there's every reason to fear that the administration's of political effectiveness will end in about a year so he's got to be working right now as if he was elected not for four years but for one that's a hell of a thing and that's the reality that unfortunately i see well that goes to your comment about filibuster reform because that's going to what it's going to take think nuclear yeah deafening oh you get the last you get the last word well briefly i am i i continue to be astounded at at the president the former president ability to to postpone and delay and and have no consequences and and so i appreciate gene's points about so many people that are in the process of the the justice system but it's taking so long and he has demonstrated how that kind of delay and postponement it can work it out and and leave the issues unattended and certainly consequences not experienced and then they then they get to be so far from where they're needed to be addressed it's meaningless for the general public who can't keep up with these extended timelines so i i that i deplore and that under that erodes some of my my optimism in the in the cause that we have to be america all righty well i wish we had another hour another half hour to discuss the future of democracy in the united states and where we're going with our democracy but we've run out of time so i'd like to thank jay fidel gene fidel stephanie dalton and winston welch thank you for joining us on what now america please join us next week wednesday at 11 o'clock i'm tim appachel your host aloha