 All right everybody, welcome to Iran Book Show on this Wednesday morning on a weird time to be doing a show, I know, but what the hell, let's do some reaction videos, action Jackson is all excited. But, but yeah, do a little bit more flexible stuff, do some reaction videos and, and respond to current events and things are happening. I've got, don't have a lot of time. So this will not be a regular show. This will be probably 30 minutes of me basically articulating my, my, I guess responses to what happened last night or yesterday in the election front. So we'll talk a little bit about that winners, losers and stuff like that. Of course, it's still early. There are many, many races and maybe the most important races. We have not gotten results yet. They're still up in the air. So we'll be able to update whatever we say today in the, in the days and weeks ahead. It looks like Georgia is going to be, we won't know anything about Georgia and Georgia might be decided the control of the Senate and Georgia will not be decided probably until December because in Georgia you need 50% of the vote. And it looks like both candidates will be just under 50%. Although it does look like in a runoff, if I had a, if I had a guess who's going to win in a runoff, you'd have to give, you'd have to give a slight advantage to the Democrat in a runoff. But we will see, we will see, we will see what happens. Alright, so as usual, we take questions and we take supporters on the Super Chat. I don't know that I'll be able to answer all the Super Chat questions. I only have half an hour to cover this topic. But if you want to express your support for the show, if you want to express support for me doing more reaction videos, then go ahead and use the Super Chat to express that support. It's a great way to show support for what I am trying to, trying to do. Wow, we got quite a few people logging in. I'm surprised this was a last minute decision of mine to do this. And again, I don't have a lot of time and only announced it a few minutes ago. So this is great. Even Catherine is here. Even Catherine is here and a few people have just woken up, I guess, if they're on the West Coast, they're just waking up unless they just sleep in mornings, which is also possible. Oh wait, some bottom line about yesterday, about the election yesterday is that, you know, the biggest loser from yesterday, I think, is Donald Trump. I mean, in that sense, it was a good election yesterday. I think in many other regards, it was a very bad election yesterday. But in the sense that I don't know if this will be the nail in the coffin of Donald Trump. I mean, he keeps coming back. You keep thinking you've killed him and he keeps coming back. I would have thought that losing a presidential election as an incumbent would have been it for Donald Trump. But he came back. You would think that the defeat of Make America Great Again candidates almost across the board, not across the board, some of them won. But, you know, that whole part section of the Republican Party being defeated all across the country in, you know, there'd be no red wave, certainly no red tsunami. Maybe people are calling it a red trickle, maybe a red trickle. But really, Republicans think of beating yesterday, a beating yesterday. The reality is that a midterm election with an incumbent who's this unpopular should have seen Republicans pick up the Senate by two, three, four votes. It should have seen Republicans pick up the House by 20, 30, 40 votes. It looks like the Senate at best Republicans will pick up one. At worst, they will lose one. It looks like in the House Republicans will probably take a majority, but it's not even certain. I mean, that in itself is a shock. The idea that we're sitting here Wednesday morning and we can't say that the Republicans won the House of Representatives was certainty. Wow. I would have never expected that. That is a surprise to me, even though I didn't think Republicans will do as well as some thought. That is a shock to me. I thought they would easily take the House. Almost every indication was that they were easy going to take the House and they did not. A number of races in places like Virginia and elsewhere that people expected Democrats to lose and expected Republicans to gain didn't happen. It didn't happen. So across the board, this is this is about a good in election as one would expect. As good in an election as one would expect from the Democrats in a midterm election where the Democrats hold the presidency. I mean, the expectation is, if you look at all other than the 2002 post 9 11, almost at every midterm election, the president's party loses significantly. And here president's party might lose a little bit, a tiny little bit. And the real question is going to be and has to be the real interesting question. I think is why it's not if that I think is well established, even if you know, somehow Republicans managed to win Arizona, which I don't think they will. They might win the governor of Arizona still. But we will see. I don't think that will in the Senate in Arizona. They'll probably win in Nevada, which will make the Senate basically 50 50 waiting on the result from Georgia. But again, it's going to be underwhelming even if the Republicans pick up a seat. And then of course, in the house, it looks like Republicans will get a majority. But not the kind of majority Kevin McCarthy was expecting. Not the kind of majority a red wave or rich tsunami would suggest. So if you're Democrat, you should be super happy ecstatic today. If you're Republican, got a look in the mirror, something went very, very wrong. Something went very, very wrong. And I think basically that the two issues I think that we're talking about right now, I mean, there's going to be other stuff to talk about in the again in the days and weeks to come. But the two issues are one is Trump and two is abortion. The big winner really across the board of this election was the issue of abortion, pro abortion. The I think it had it mobilized Democrats, it gave them it gave them a topic on a in a year where the Democrats had nothing really to talk about because the economy was going against them, almost on every issue, they weren't popular on the social issues. Other than abortion, the country was moving away from them. And really the only issue they could hammer away at were two. Only issues they could hammer away at with two. One was abortion. And the second was election denial. Crazy Republican candidates. And they did a very good job on both of those. The fact is that every ballot initiative that came to the forefront on the issue of abortion, it looks like was voted in the direction of the pro choice, pro abortion side, the so called pro life, the anti abortion side lost has lost on pretty much every one of those every one of those ballots, abortion matters to Americans, abortion matters to Republican women so in in places where decent Republican candidates ran and won. Republicans Republicans overwhelmingly voted for those candidates, but when it came to the abortion vote, a lot of Republicans voted against their party, if you will. And I think a lot of that is Republican women who I've known for a long time don't hold anti abortion positions. They just stay quiet. They're afraid to voice the pro choice position so they stay quiet. So so the abortion issue played out well for Democrats. I think it motivated turnout, although again, turnout does not seem to be a significant issue in this election. But it it shifted a lot of a lot of Republican votes who typically vote Republican across the board on the abortion issue voted against the typical Republican position. So that's good news. And I think a lot of house a lot of house races that looked close one Democratic because of the abortion issue. You know, I think that's certainly true in place like Virginia in other places. So abortion rights are a significant victory this morning in terms of this election, right? This election. So that's that's one, right? The second is is Trump. Trump is not popular. Trump is not popular. Trump has never been popular. He won in 2016, but then immediately became super unpopular. He is not popular among independents. He's not popular among Democrats. He's not popular among many Republicans. Since Trump won in 2016, Republicans lost the house in 2018, the Senate and the White House in 2020. And now in a year where they should have done phenomenally well, phenomenally well, Republicans should have swept in. They should have been a wave. They should have been a tsunami. Look at the economy. Look at Biden's popularity. I mean, it's just unthinkable how bad Republicans have done in this election, no matter what the outcome of the next few, you know, he's done unbelievably badly. And why is it? Because character matters. And people despise justifiably the character of Donald Trump. Because lying, explicitly lying, provocatively lying, lying in America people's faces in about about things that American care about, like elections, election denialism was thoroughly defeated in this election. Now, again, some candidates were election deniers one. But it's interesting, the governor of Wisconsin who said, once I'm done, Wisconsin will always vote Republican. Republicans will always win the Arizona Secretary of State, who is an election that I also said he would have would have never certified the 2020 election. Of course, in the primaries already in Georgia, all the election denialists lost. So you've got you've got ours losing you've got we'll see what happens in Arizona. That's yet to be defined. But across the board, it seems that well, not across the board, because some election denialists did win. But in the important race is election denialists lost. So American people are not are not ready to accept people who try to steal elections. I mean, look at Stacey Abrams. Stacey Abrams was an election denialist. She claimed she didn't lose the last gubernatorial race. She ran again on an election denialist somewhat platform on the Democratic side. What was the consequence? She lost big time this time. I mean, big time was even close. Americans don't buy it. Americans respect a loser who admits to losing. And you know, is a is a behaves like a man. Maybe that's a sexist comments. But anyway, man's up to the fact that they lost. So you know, so I think that I think that an extra denialist just as I hoped, and I have to say, in that sense, I'm happy about this election. Election denialists seem to have lost big time. We'll see. Again, Arizona is the big question mark. But it seems that across the board, you know, some will still pass like Johnson in Wisconsin will still get elected and others in other places. But in New Hampshire, the guy lost. Where else was it? There were another New York for governor, the Republican lost. So in places where Republicans nominated election denialist, Trump like candidates, you know, unhinged candidates, those candidates lost, or at least so far, we'll see Arizona. So that's great news. That is really good news. The bad news is, of course, the Democrats won. You know, so the question now is, well, the Democrats going to learn from this, is it going to reinvigorate their world culture? Is it going to reinvigorate their status tendencies and economics? Or will they learn the lesson, which I think is correct, that the reason they won is not because of their virtues. American people don't like them. But the reason they won is because of the abortion issue, the Supreme Court basically handed them the issue. And because Republicans were so pathetic. And then of course, what will the Republicans learn? And we'll know this. Trump's big announcement is six days, I guess. Is the Republican party going to call us against Trump in spite of the fact that he is a loser? Or is the Republicans party going to call us around, you know, somebody who clearly won yesterday, and the big victor yesterday on every front, the big victor yesterday was the Santas. He turned Florida completely red. They flipped house seats. They overwhelmingly won the Senate. And he won an overwhelming victory as governor. Not only that, flipping a Democratic county, I mean, Miami Dade has always been Democratic, always, and taken for granted as Democratic. And and went overwhelmingly, I think, both for the Santas and for the Senate candidate. Now again, I'm not. I'm not a big DeSantis fan. Let's let's not get let's get not not get too excited about this, but I'm not. I'm not a big DeSantis fan, but and we'll see how he runs for president what he's like as a presidential candidate. But you know, I am I am not a DeSantis fan, but he sure beats we're seeing the shift in the Republican Party. Republican Party, this election basically has said no to Trump. Yes, to the Santas. Now, whether the hard core of the Republican Party, the people who vote in the primaries, the people who get energized around primaries will hold to that. Whether they'll stick to that and whether in a context between Trump and DeSantis, Trump can still win. I don't know. But yes, this day was DeSantis's day and it was not Trump's day. A lot of the candidates Trump endorsed. A lot of the candidate Trump was most excited about a lot of the candidates who mimicked and Trump's talking points lost. So does the Republican Party learn from this? Does it now abandon Trump? Does it now start coalescing around somebody like DeSantis or having a real primary, having a real competition for president? Does the Republican Party become serious? One of the things that I think that was unique about one of the things that I think was important about this election is Republicans had no positive message. The only message was were not Democrats. The positive message was vaguely will fight against crime. How do you do that? The federal level exactly not clear. The general message was we'll fight against inflation. How? What would you do different with regard to inflation? What economic policies are you going to do differently than Biden? Nothing. Zero. So the Republican Party was basically ran on no platform, no positive ideas, no positive messaging, nothing inspiring. They ran on, but Trump, they ran on whining. They ran on complaining. They ran on anti Democrats and that didn't work. Will the Republican Party now learn from this? Shift and look for and articulate a strong positive message, a pro American message, a pro founding fathers message, a pro Constitution message, or will they continue to be the party of but but but but we're not we're not Democrats. Oh, will they continue to be the party of but we won and they stole the election. Will they continue to be the party of Donald Trump? Mindless, idea less and dishonest. Oh, will they embrace a different direction? And I think we'll know that in the next few days. We'll know that in the response to whatever announcement Trump's make. I think I think this morning, the odds of Trump running for presidents have gone down. I think he expected a red wave and a red tsunami. And in that case, he would have definitely run for president. I think now the odds are down. I don't think they're negative. I don't think they're they're small, but they're down from what they were yesterday. There's a chance that he won't run for president, that he used this opportunity to somehow bow out in in in somehow bow out, claiming he never intended to run. We'll see. But the extent to which Donald Trump now becomes an insignificant part of the Republican Party, that is the extent to which it'll be determined whether the Republicans have learned their lesson or not from this election. I think at the end of the day, we're going to get divided government as I want. I think we're going to get a Republican's House, a very small majority in the House, but enough to basically veto the bad stuff that Democrats want. I think support for Ukraine will continue because I don't think the Republicans will have enough votes to stop that. I think in the Senate, it'll either be 50 50 or 51 49 in either direction, but it doesn't really matter because Republicans will already have veto power in the House. I hope that it's the Democrats don't pick up a seat. That would be I think really bad because that will I mean, ideally what you would get now is 51 49 for Republican Senate. And but that that is so small of a victory that it won't. You know, and hopefully they win Nevada. I don't know what I want to happen in Georgia. I really don't. I mean, Walker's such a bad candidate that you know, there's there's a lot in me that says yeah, just let him lose. And and and again, let him lose so the Republicans learn the lesson. Character matters. Quality of candidates matters. Ideas matter, presenting some vision matters. You know, there was an old saying and then I'll say then I'll go to the chat. There's an old saying that Clinton Clinton coined in 1992 and that is it's the economy stupid. It's not the economy stupid. It never was the economy stupid. And it's not the economy stupid now. It's ideas. It's having a positive alternative. It's projecting positive values. It's not being mindless. In the way Republicans are. I'm not saying Democrats have ideas, but you know, you want to change the status quo. You've got to present a better alternative. You want to defeat the Democrats. You have to present a better alternatives. And the way Republicans embraced zero on abortion, no abortion life at conception that I think was incredibly destructive. The way they embraced denialism about Trump's loss in 2020. That is incredibly destructive and the way they embrace Trump's mannerisms and attitudes and and Trump himself. That was a negative and if those go away, Republicans can win. This is still America is still a right of center country. It is not a leftist country. It does not like woke as you can see in local elections where woke is the issue. It does not like CRT as you can see in local elections with CRT is the issue. It is not like socialism. As you can see in in in the lack of popularity for much of what Biden has done. So Republicans just need to clean up their act and it's going to take a lot for them to clean up their act because all the Republican operatives and all the Republican intellectuals are bought into this corrupt messaging. But this is their opportunity. They got a signal. The markets sent them a clear indication of what they think of the Republican Party. All right. So Alexis says, Hi, Iran. What are the signs to watch for an upcoming D Trump Trump? The station of the GOP something like that. I think I think the reaction to whatever it is that Trump announces a certainly one sign will be if Trump announces he's not running for president. That would be that would be an important signal that the Republican Party is moving on. But also if Republican if if Trump says he is running and the response is lukewarm or even negative or just just uninteresting, then I think that the Republicans are moving on. I think we'll see what happens in Nevada. I think Nevada is a big deal where the Kerry Lake pulls it out. I don't think master says much of a chance, but maybe because it hasn't been called for the Democrats and then the but but Arizona will be a good benchmark if they lose Arizona if the Republicans lose Arizona. Remember, it was a Republican governor in Arizona. That'll be a flip in the governor's mansion. A number of states have flipped Democratic Maryland flipped and Massachusetts flipped. Kerry Lake is still favored to win Arizona, but we'll see. We'll see. It's a lot of people's expectations. A lot of people's expectations about this election have turned out to be wrong. A lot of predicted. I think has not worked out the way people thought it would work out. So we'll see. You know, she's she's she's behind by a little bit, but there are a lot of precincts still reporting that are probably going to be Republican based. So Kerry Lake might win either the Masters will probably lose. And I think the Secretary of State won. They will lose. So whoops. I think what happened? That's not working. Let's try this. We'll get the video back in a second. I hope. All right. We'll get video back in a second. Sorry. So yeah, I mean, I think I think that the the real signs of the response, the response to Trump and, you know, and how and how that goes. No, that is not working. All right, one more thing. And then and and then we'll say sorry, I know I'm supposed to keep talking, but talking and trying to do this is a little hard. So it's going to be again, it's going to be how how the Republican Party starts setting itself up for 2024. You know, who are the leadership of the Republican Party? You know, it takes the fall for this who who survives who leads the campaign for 2024 will know within two, three months whether they are taking the whether they're moving away from Trump or not. You know, who leads the National Republican Party who is going to be the senatorial campaign. A lot of people took a hit this time. But I think the biggest thing that took a hit and this is I don't know that other people are going to talk about this, but Republicans McCarthy and McConnell purposefully ran a campaign that was idea less. They purposefully did not have an agenda with America contract with America. They purposefully ran a campaign that was anti the Democrats. It purposefully made no positive arguments made no, you know, positive claims. So to the extent that they rethink that that might be the most important thing we need Republicans to have an agenda even it's agenda I don't completely like it. This needs to be a battle of ideas, not a battle of personalities that lose on the battle of personalities. At least, you know, they'll lose a significant number because you know, Trump has brought out some of the worst elements within the Republican Party. And we're seeing that now. Okay, Brian asked, do these results restore faith in the American people? Is this an acceptance of Democratic agenda? I don't think it's an acceptance of Democratic agenda. Again, I think the country is still right of center. I think it's it's true that young people are mostly left, but young people are almost always mostly left. These young people are more left than in the past. But I think that changes as they go older. I also think that again, one of the reasons they're left is Republicans have done such a bad job articulating any kind of argument. But look, both political parties are terrible. And I think on the on the issue of the character, the kind of candidates you had. I think states that could have gone easily Republicans like Pennsylvania didn't because who wants to vote for Dr. Oz, or could have gone Republican like Arizona, who wants to really vote for Blake Masters? You know, who wants to, you know, Georgia, which is clearly a red state, who wants to who wants to vote for who show Walker? I mean, look how well the governor of Georgia did. I mean, he basically crushed the Stacey Adams. Why couldn't they take the Senate? They should crush the Democrat because they nominated awful candidate awful. So I think it restores. Well, it doesn't restore my faith in the American people because I don't have that much. Again, ideologically, this country is far, far away from where I think it should be. I think this country is far, far away from the ideas that I stand for. But I think what this shows me is that American people are not quite yet willing to rally around at least the, you know, the complete emptiness, the complete pragmatism, the complete power lust, the complete, you know, we'll do anything, say anything, stand for anything just to gain power kind of Republican Party that they're not going to tolerate. They're not going to tolerate the kind of lying that Trump has elevated through his explicit pragmatism. That is that is a good thing. And that has restored a little bit of faith that I have. All right, I'm gonna have to do these really, really quickly because I don't have a lot of time. I just want to do this quickly. Let me just see. Yeah. Kenny, thank you, says finally a reasonable hour from him. Bash, Branigan says, do you think this is all will keep Trump from running for president? I don't know how to read Trump's mind. I never can. I think it definitely reduces the probability. But I don't know about how much I don't really have an assessment. And again, I think what happens in Arizona is still going to be really, really important. If Kerry Lake ekes it out, he might still interpret this as a positive. So I think Arizona is going to be crucial to what Trump decides. But it does reduce the probability. No question about it. A red tsunami would have guaranteed a Trump run. And this was a red trickle. Hello for nowhere you're on. What is your relation with Craig Biddle? And why aren't you doing more stuff together? Have a great day. I don't like Craig Biddle. I don't trust Craig Biddle. I don't like Craig Biddle. I will have nothing to do with Craig Biddle. Craig Biddle has written some horrible stuff about me. He is supported by a man who has said and done horrible stuff, said horrible stuff about me and done horrible stuff to me. I have no interest in working with Craig Biddle or doing anything with Craig Biddle. And he has no interest in doing anything with me as well. So let him do his stuff. I'll do my stuff. All in that sense, all is good. And you guys evaluate who you think is right on these issues and who you think does a better job for whatever. Wes, thank you, Wes, $50 really appreciated. Glad you got to catch this live. Daniel, I wrote you in for the governor of Minnesota. I'm waiting for the phone call. I'm waiting for the call. I'll rush up to Minnesota. I'll cancel everything and I'll take the position of governor. If, if that becomes a reality. Thank you, Daniel, for, for, for the trust. Michael says Ron DeSantis inherited a purple state and turned it bright red. He is clearly going to be the 2024 nominee. Nothing is clearly in this Republican Party, but it certainly was his day yesterday. So let's see what happens. Michael says Trump just knows how to get attention. He knows what a pain in the ass running for president. He's not going to put himself through it again. I hope you're right. I'm rooting for you, Michael. Joe $75. Thank you, Joe. That's brilliant. Thank you. Love all the work you do. Sorry for an off topic question. I don't usually have a chance to join the live show. Did you ever read American Banker? And if so, did you find it useful in the perspective of any of an investor in financial services company? Do you have? Oh, American Banker is the is a journal, the American Banker, the magazine, the American Banker. I certainly, I certainly do reference it. And I've been interviewed in the American Banker actually had had had my voice in the American Banker. I do find it useful as an investor in banking. I do find it useful. It has interesting stories about banks, interesting stories about CEOs of banks. I don't, I don't think I'm subscribed anymore. It's quite expensive. And I get the same information from other sources. But yes, I invest in community banks in the US. And in that sense, it is, it is, it is valuable. All right, let's see. Bash Branigan asks, I ran expressed a belief in American common sense, would that be playing a part here? Yes, I definitely think so. I don't think American common sense or the American sense of life really is with Trump. I don't think it is. I don't think it's with Biden either. I think the American people have clearly expressed that they don't like Biden, and they don't like Trump. And I think maybe the outcome of this election is that neither Biden or Trump run for president. That would be terrific. Let's get some fresh faces. Let's get some young people. You know, if I had a bet right now, I'd say, we're going to face an election in 2024. But of course, God, I mean, so much can happen between now and 2024. But between the governor of California and the governor of Florida, it'll be an election that has two clear, very distinct visions for this country. It'll have two people you could you could, you know, a lot of the decision making will be based on how they responded to COVID, which I think will be interesting. But also, it'll be just on just a general attitude. Now, there are a lot of things about the Santas I do not like. But I think a race between him and I don't think Kamala Harris has any chance. But a between him and California will be clear cut. It will be a choice. Again, neither one is a good choice, good, overwhelmingly good choice. But at least it'll be much more ideological in terms of the conflict between the two much more ideological in terms of the the content of the race. I think that both there's a sense in which to both stand up people need, you know, that both have ideas and they stand by those ideas and they push for them. Neither one of them is is a is a nutcase. Neither one of them is is a narcissist. Neither one of them is just is is a complete and out of pragmatists. Although I think the Santas, I think both do things pragmatically. But I don't think they are on principle pragmatists like like Trump is. So again, I think that would be an interesting an interesting election. You know, there's always hope for for another candidates on both left and right. I can hope for I can still hope for Nikki Haley, although I think her chances are a pretty minuscule. But again, her chances today are better than her chances two days ago. Her chances post this election are better than the chances of a political party completely and utterly dominated by Donald Trump. Great. Let me just see something here. Okay. All right. Let's see, I think we're done. I have to run for another I've got a I've got another gig in five minutes. So I should prepare for that. Thank you all for listening live. I hope this added a little bit of value a little bit of clarity at least in my view. We'll talk about this again. Once we get more results in particularly the results from Arizona and Nevada are going to be are going to be super interesting. So this is great. As you can see, I'm in a hotel room. I'm speaking later today at the University of Indiana Bloomington at the law school for the Federalist Society. So we're going to be talking about inflation. I'm sure the election might come up as well. So that's going to be fun. Tomorrow I'm driving or being driven to being driven to Akron University while I'll be speaking also to the law school to the Federalist Society over there. So these are kind of right of center law students conservatives and libertarian types. So it'll be fun tomorrow is actually debate on the regulatory state. And then on Friday, I'll be talking to really Republicans. It'll be a dominantly dominantly heavily Republican group in Colorado at leadership program Iraqis that'll be really interesting because I'm sure they'll be eager to talk about the election. And yet my topic is not election related. And I'm not really supposed to talk much about the elections. But I will. So the people who are high, I mean, I might not be happy with me. But anyway, it'll be a really interesting and of course, Colorado will go the other way, Colorado, the Republican Party elected to run for Senate, somebody who is anti anti Trump Republican, and he lost to the Democrat. But I think Colorado now is pretty solidly blue, unless a candidate is super charismatic. Okay, quickly, Michael says, the Florida legislature used to be mixed between Democrats and Republicans. Now it's almost all Republicans, both senators are Republicans. And Florida became the freeest state in the country, according to Cato and Heritage Foundation, Florida has been the freeest state in the country for a long time that is not the Santas is doing. He did not make it the fierce kind of state. It was, and you could correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure that in the index of free states, Florida has been the fierce state for a long time. It doesn't have a state income tax that is true, has been true for a long time. And it has some of the loosest regulatory policies of any state in the country in terms of business formation and other things. And that's been true for a long time. So none of that yet is attributed to the Santas not I'm saying the Santas hasn't done a decent job. In some respect, he has in other respects, he's done a terrible job. But we'll get to that when we get to talk about the Santas in the future, as he runs for president. I'm not a DeSantis cheerleader. And I doubt I will be. DeSantis has played way too much into the cultural wars, way too much into the Trumpist attitudes. But anyway, thanks everybody. I will see you all certainly on Saturday. I might try to do a few more shorter shows or maybe late night shows, depending on the timing and depending on the hotels in the next few days. Bye everybody. See you soon. Thanks all the superchats. This was great. You guys did fantastic for such a short show. Thank you for the support to everybody who supports you on book show. Bye everybody.