I am joined today by Jack Cochorella. He is a progressive political commentator. He's been in a really bad mood because of all of the impending with Donald Trump and all of the morons surrounding him. So he texted me and I said, come on, let's talk. Let's have a cathartic talking session. So viewer and listener join Jack Cochorella in me and just ripping it up. Jack, how are you today? Do you feel better already? I feel better already knowing that we're just going to talk some shit. It's in the shoulders and it's just like, I feel it. I've had enough. I can't even enjoy curling at the Olympics without Kash Patel busting down the door, humiliating the entire nation, the tiny little goober that he is. I just want a moment of peace. I don't know where we're going to find it, but maybe it's right now. I don't know. I've been hoping all week that we were going to find it in this video. Well, okay. First, I'm going to start with bad news. All right. The bad news is that NPR has released the following today. Aaron Blake posts, the Justice Department has withheld some Epstein files related to allegations that President Trump sexually abused a minor in NPR investigation fines. So you brought up Kash Patel and he was there with the hockey team. And one of the hockey team players, while he was celebrating was with Kash Patel. Kash Patel, who has seen the Epstein files, made a whole podcasting career that he was going to release the Epstein files and hold the pedophiles accountable, is celebrating with all of these people. And then they're calling and FaceTiming their daughters. And I just, this sort of moral rot that is existing in America right now is really pissing me off. It's disgusting, not just on like the cover-up that's happening at the government level, but then you also think about the media level of it all, because it's two parts of the game, right? It is Cash Patel, Pam Bondi, Todd Blanche. They're hiding files, deleting files, telling us files don't exist. But then they're also sending their surrogates out. And nothing has upset me more than when I see members of the mainstream press say, oh, well, we have to make it clear that any given billionaire or Elon Musk, we have to stress as much as possible that just because they're in the files doesn't mean they're implicated, doesn't mean they committed crimes. They're billionaires. Do we think they got all that money by following the law? And it's what Kash Patel is doing as well, trying to go out, be a celebrity because he's so insecure. and that's what everyone in this administration really is. They're just like insecure little, and I'm going to steal your word, but they're insecure little titty babies, all of them. It's why they're covered in makeup and, you know, Christine Oam's bad, whatever she's got going on. But Kash Patel is trying to do the PR work for the Epstein files. Oh, we don't even need to pay attention to it. It's all done because I'm partying with Team USA. It's just despicable to watch. It's just so infuriating. It's really disgusting. I think, you know, when I saw Howard Lutnick email Epstein and say, hey, we're going to swing by in our yacht. And I'm like, okay, if you're rich enough to have a yacht, you fuck you money. You would tell a convicted pedophile, fuck you, I'm not having lunch at your island. Instead, he's like, hey, I'm swinging by your island and here's my kid's ages that are coming. It's nuts. It's nuts. And then Mark Zuckerberg is in the files. Bill Gates is in the files. Elon Musk is pathetic, the most pathetic whining, pick me, I want to be a cool kid in the files. My thing about Mark Zuckerberg is this, this guy, he goes on, I think it's Joe Rogan. And he says, you know, I've just felt like the last four years that I've been neutered in the works. And I'm like, okay, dude, if an 82 year old Joe Biden made you feel neutered, there isn't a bottle of Viagra big enough. It's not going to do it. it can get that thing up it's like all of these guys i i don't know what it is that they decide that like something and this is like a fascination of the right as well it's always like the the meme of someone like sitting in like shallow water it's like one foot deep and like they're just like trying to submerge themselves in it pretending that like they're being oppressed mark zuckerberg has an infinite amount of money that he spends on getting like the perfect like muck beans to feed his cattle on his singular Hawaiian island. You can live the life that you want. There is nobody holding you down. And if you have to self-actualize through language, which is just blatantly antisocial and weird, if you want to say a bunch of slurs, it is not Joe Biden coming to get people upset about it. It is funny that they both in their minds have this thing where Joe Biden was falling apart, can't walk straight, but also the puppet master controlling our culture. Like, they have both of these things playing out at once. They are just whiners, and they're insecure, and they'll never get over the fact that they were stuffed in lockers, and people didn't like them, and that people don't like them. This is ultimately what it comes down to. They're just not popular. Nobody wants to be around these guys, unless, I guess, if you're a pedophile, and then they really want to kick it with them. All right. Speaking of popular, let's talk about the mayor, Zoran Mamdani. He is the highest ranking politician favorability wise in the United States right now. And he governs and he markets his governing. And there were these memes that came out that was like New York got 16 inches and it just said 16 inches. And it had a picture of mom, Donnie. If you don't think that I have that on my phone, ready to pull up. I haven't been. So here we go. We got our, we have 16 inches. Yes. I love it. I'm not going to say what context that has been shared, but we're just going to, we're going to leave it there. We're just going to say we have it and it's fine. Okay. So he's been like plowing and he's been shoveling. With 16 inches, I would hope so. Yeah. Someone's got to. My gay triads will love that. So he's been doing all the stuff and he also said, hey, if you guys want extra money, you can come and you get paid $30 an hour to shovel. Right wing had a meltdown about that, that he's offering extra work for people. So on the one hand, like you say, they're pissed off that people aren't working. And then when somebody offers them work, then they have a stage five meltdown. But Andrew Cuomo particularly lost his mind yesterday on Twitter because there was a big snowball fight in Washington Square Park and the cops showed up to break up the snowball fight. And then people start throwing snowballs at the cops, which all of the people that are totally fine with cops getting beaten with clubs and fire hydrants and flagpoles and taking a shit in the Capitol and then getting pardoned for it, they're fine with that. But the snowball is stage five meltdown. So Andrew Cuomo tweets the following, and I want us to talk about this. This is disgraceful but with a mayor who has a history of calling the police racist evil wicked and corrupt he set the tone words have consequences we are seeing that in growing disrespect for law enforcement just as we've seen it in the rise and anti-semitism which i don't know why he's throwing that in there real leaders understand that the mayor does not how we go from snowballs to anti-Semitism is the exact psychosis that is going on where you have like corporate dims that find alliances with hardcore right-wingers. And Andrew Cuomo, I mean, when I read that tweet, I was like, bitter party of one, your table's now available. I mean, he just looks so unhinged. Isn't he in the Hamptons? Can he just like enjoy it? Like, do we need to hear from him? And I love that like the Mamdani, just the historic, like an incredible success. Like every time you look at what's happening in New York, I'm sad that I'm not still living there. But you just seen like right wingers try to get upset or pick it apart by being stupid. Like one, it's a snowball fight. Like there's snowballs and it's snow and everyone was having fun. But you brought up the shoveling thing. Did you see the same like radical, like brain broken Zionist lady who like stuffed an Israeli flag into Spike Lee's mailbox also go and be like, I'm going to try to I'm going to try to get a job as a shoveler. And she's trying to pretend like it's this process that's broken. And it's such it's all oh, it's in flames because Zoran and oh, no. And I think the right tries to pick apart government programs or try to undermine them in the public space by just going and being stupid. I don't know if you've seen this video, but she's like, oh, so I just come and I shovel? And they're like, yeah. And she's like, so I just get to shovel? And they're like, yeah, but that's not the right shovel. And she's like, oh, and then they told me my shovel wasn't right. And so they gave me a different shovel. That seems weird. I'm like, no, it seems like a pretty well put together program to make sure the strengths are safe. They just like blowing things out. It's like the Nick Shirley thing. And that kid, he's got some stuff. I'm going to put it politely, but he's got some fucking stuff. All these people do. That is their response to government programs working. It's like, oh, so people just get social security checks? Yeah, yes, that is how it works. It's almost like government can work when we want it to. I just fucking, I can't, I can't deal with this. Well, I remember during, I think Obama was running against John McCain. And I remember there was a rally and Obama was talking about Medicare and healthcare. That was his big thing. And there was a sign that said, keep the government off my Medicare. You know? And so it's just, these people believe in nothing. They're soulless. But there's a guy in New York yesterday that the local news was interviewing and the discipline of this guy on message. So he's in the bomb cyclone, right? And I don't know if the... I want our viewer to watch how the reporter, she keeps pulling the microphone away from him. But the match that Momdani has ignited to move the base of the Democratic Party more towards helping more of us, working class people, taxing the rich, is really getting a lot of momentum. You guys watch this clip. There's still people out in doorways looking for shelter. And I think a lot of people think this is why we shouldn't allow hedge funds to own residential property. And so what we were talking about earlier, too, is a little bit of the nostalgia aspect, right? How this feels kind of like back in the 90s when we were growing up. Yeah, like you were saying, yeah, it was much, much more snow, colder winters. And again, private equity didn't own so much of the housing. I love that guy. Can you primary Chuck Schumer? Oh, my God. I need to talk to you about the establishment Democrats, Chuckles and Hakeem. I just, I can't take it. I really cannot take it for one more second of one more day. I can't hardly take it because they are supposed to be in charge of the resistance and their fascist collaborators, both of them. Well, we've been having this kind of – it's been like a two-week conversation since the clip with you and Hassan talking about Gavin Newsom and then the whole conversation about harm reduction. And sometimes you just got to vote for the person in the center. You just got to show up and vote for Democrats. And it's interesting to have a conversation about harm reduction at the same time as Jeffries and Schumer are doing like the waited out bit. They're just like, OK, well, we'll wait it out until the midterms. And then we'll wait it out into the presidential election. And then when we have Democrats, we can start doing things to maybe kind of protect people a little bit and means test our child tax kind of credit, but not really. And you fucking figure it out from there. We don't really care. We're going to keep the status quo. It's just weird to have the harm reduction conversation when they're saying, let's be polite during the State of the Union. This time next year, maybe we can do something. If you want to be the, oh, at least we're better, you need to do something. And there's been nothing. And I am going to, I'm going to be on the Hill today doing, doing just like, you know, rapid response with members of Congress who are going to stop by after I do a little live stream of the speech and after and just, I'm just like, I don't really know what to say or ask of anyone who doesn't already, who hasn't already proved that they actually care. Like, am I supposed to be pushing you to do your job? I don't know if you saw the clip of Jared Moskowitz talking about how, you know, he wished he'd told his younger self to go to Wall Street and like do coke. It's like, dude, you can leave. You don't have to be there. Like there are lots of people who want that job. So you don't have to be there. And that's and it feels like so many of them are both so self entitled, but also being held against their will somehow. It's like, well, You don't have to be there. There are lots of people who will happily fill your seat and do a much better job, and they will be younger, and they will be progressive, and they will care, and they will be able to communicate. So you do not need to stay. But it does just feel weird to be having this conversation when we're in a moment in which you think that there should be some organization of a response, and there's just not. I'm glad you brought this whole thing up because I come from a state where for 50 years I lived in Oklahoma City and I've seen what Republican super majorities do for MAGA. And it's brutal. It's brutal. The last time we had a Democratic governor in Oklahoma, education was 17th. And then since then, we've had a couple of decades of MAGA super majorities, Republican super majorities that even predate Trump. And now education is 50 years, abortion ban. It's just, it's awful. And so I really struggle with this awakening that I've had. I had a real awakening since Kamala lost that I bought into a lot of the democratic establishment propaganda And I was a good foot soldier in that And I felt like I couldn criticize Democrats because I think my thought of that was pretty arrogant, thinking that voters couldn't see that for themselves, that I had to be a part of the hoodwink to lie to voters. And so, and my husband would always be like, oh, this person sucks, that person sucks. I fucking hate Joe Biden. He's not, you know, Merrick Garland's not doing a good a job on it. Don't criticize. Don't let anyone know. We can't let people see what they're already seeing. I was that person. Okay. And so I've had this real awakening and I'm still processing it, but where I am right now is this. Number one, establishment Democrats are failing us. Democrats that take corporate money. It's been revealed that Hakeem Jeffries, we know he takes APAC money. He's going to continue to take APAC money. And he's also taken money from Palantir. Chuck Schumer sucks. I mean, we can go into all of the reasons, but we can just say Chuck Schumer sucks and that just covers it as an umbrella. And so I really had this betrayal that I felt by the Democratic Party in taking advantage of my vote and my support and also treating the rest of the electorate in such a patronizing way in which I even participated. And so I'm all about like, we have to elect the most progressive candidates, period. Full stop. We have to really, really go hard in the paint for them. Now, when it comes to if it ends up being some nauseating corporate Democrat that is the 2028 candidate and everybody's like, don't talk about it two years in advance. Well, we're fucking podcasters. What else are we going to talk about? You people brought it up. We have to have shit to talk about. All right. And I'm never going to be a third party voter because I have seen how dangerous Republican supermajorities are. But I am 100% in the progressive plank right now to call out establishment Dems, to have difficult conversations, to use my voice and my personal evolution to enlighten more people. And I think that's where I'm best at doing that. And I think my conversation with Hassan was helpful. I think that his answer was very eye-opening to me. And because he said, don't you think they know that? And he was like, yeah, they do know that. And they're taking advantage of you. What was your thought on all of that, Jack? Well, I just, not to flip the show, the host in me is kind of coming out, but I listened to your conversation with Medi and it was, I loved, that was a great hour. I wish y'all had done five. But- Thank you. You brought up the, like, of course, the platform that you now have, the huge platform, well deservedly so, that you have. And you brought up like, okay, well, we are going to push people who come on. And it's something that I increasingly think about more, is like, what questions do we need to ask to push? What don't they want you to ask? Like, how do we shape? How do we use our platform to shape even what they're thinking about? When you're talking about your platform specifically, though, I know you don't care if Cory Booker never wants to come on and get humiliated again, because like, fuck off. Like we don't really care. But how do you think about not necessarily like a balance, but the success that you can have pushing people when it is that face to face? And do they ever get too scared to come on? I know you're never going to stop being you. But like, how do you think we make sure as people in the independent media, who these staffs and these members and these electeds and whoever, maybe don't think that they have to give us the same time of day? How do we make sure that they're still coming back so we can hold their feet to the fire? Or do you think it's like, fuck it, we don't care if they come on, we're just going to talk about them anyways, and the message is going to get to them. You either come on and hear it from us or you hear it in your comments. Is that kind of your approach? No, I think we publicly shame them. I think we invite them to come on and they say no, and then we invite them again, and then we start having a conversation with our audience. Like, hey, Hakeem, my listeners are taxpaying Americans. A lot of them live in your district. They want me to ask you these questions. Are you a Democrat that believes in transparency? Do you believe in the First Amendment? Or are you going to play patty cake with centrist and or MAGA light podcasters? And I think we publicly shame them. And I think that one thing Trump did is he went in all of these spaces and Democrats are going to have to do that. Now, here's the difference. When you get like I spent an hour with Ro Khanna in New York a couple of weeks ago and he was wonderful. Like I could ask him anything because he has conviction. He's not servicing corporations first. And I think the Democrats that refuse to come on my show or your show or somebody else's, I think we have to unite and kind of publicly shame them and call them out because I think public shaming is effective. And if you want to be a public official, then you need to come to places where your voters are and where your voters are most hurt. and establishment, former establishment democratic supporters are more and more what my base of my listenership is. So if you want to be a good politician, come listen and come hear what we have to say. And if you're, and my thing is like, if you're going to service your corporations first, get on a podcast and just fucking say it, just say it, just say it. Wear your jacket with all the sponsors and just be like, on the back, just the Jersey name, just be like, I'm about it. Palantir, Alex Karp, the dude with doing all the blow and whatever. Yeah, no, I think that I just like, I think people, and I don't, I hope, I don't think you ever could, you're a superstar, have any like imposter syndrome about any of this. But I think the kind of the folks in the independent media coming up feel like maybe sometimes, I've heard this from friends who, if they talk about who they can and cannot get, they kind of feel like it's a bit of whining, like, oh, why aren't you coming on? But like, no, they should be coming to these places where real questions are asked. If you're going to do the 2 p.m. hour at MSNBC, no shade to the friends over at there, I think you're getting more viewership per minute than they are per hour, per whatever the metric you want to use. So it just makes sense to come to these places. And I think maybe airing out some of those no's is a smart thing to do, to say, oh, this person said no to coming on when I was going to ask them about this. Because people just need to know who's not willing to talk about that. And I will say, like, I asked this person five times, they wouldn't come on, but I have have all these clips of what they've said in other, and they're going to, they're going to be on my podcast, whether they come and defend themselves themselves, or I find their clips and then I critique their clips, but either way they are going to be on, I've had it. So it's up to them. Are you going to be a big boy and come sit in the big boy chair? Are you going to, you know, neuter it, Mark Zuckerberg out? Okay. I want to move on to our last point today, which I went to your Twitter feed before you logged in so I could see what you're tweeting. And you were all over the Graham Plattner. Oh, that's, that's my guy. Fucking love him. Okay. So listener, for those of you that don't know, Graham Plattner is this great, like former vet totally progressive working class calls a spade a spade you know talks about the blank check to Israel and how you know the genocide in Palestine with moral clarity When he was younger, he got a tattoo and everybody's like, that's a Nazi tattoo. And he's like, I had no idea it was. And because it's not like the obvious swastika, had it covered up and owned it. Like I said, here it is. I got it covered up. And he's continued. And the Democrats have endorsed like an 80 year old woman named Janet Mills. Is she the governor right now? She's the governor right now. Yeah. Okay. She's 80 and she takes a pack money, probably Palantir. I don't know if that's true or not. Somebody can fact check me in the comments, but she's a corporate Dem. And Plattner, he has not dipped at all. So tell us your take on this race in Maine, because I think it's super important because Maine has always elected moderates and the horrific Susan Collins. Well, we just have actually like, well, we'll get to the breaking news right now because I do not want to misquote was just such an incredible poll. But it shows that in the primary right now, Graham Plattner, just in the primary is up 38 points. But when you go to head to heads in the general, he's beating Susan Collins by 11 points and Janet Mills would be by one. So all the people who want to talk about who's electable and who we can actually get through, oh, and oh, sometimes you got to hold your nose and vote for that. It's Grant Plattner. If you want to win that seat, it's Grant Plattner. And you talk about Zoran or someone like AOC or Bernie or Rowe, these are people who it's so easy for them to answer questions because you know they're speaking from just a value set that is incredibly obvious. Bernie is always coming back to the billionaires, right? Zoran is always going to be talking about affordability, not because that's like the messaging points that he has, but that's just what he cares about and wants to talk about. Something that I think Graham does very well is a very normal guy, which we need more in the Democratic Party, not just normal, like as a 23-year-old dude, like we need more normal guys, is that he brings the conversation a lot back to freedom and not freedom in the abstract way that we've described it when it's like, we got to get out in democracy. And people are like, corporations buy our elections and my vote doesn't really matter. What the fuck do you mean democracy? But he talks about real freedoms, the freedoms to have time to go out and create and build community and to love and to not feel the fear of you will be bankrupted by a medical bill or you can't afford to eat or live. And I think that's real tangible freedom that is not just like, oh, at the DNC, we had more American flags, so we are patriots. But no, we are after giving you the life that you deserve in the wealthiest country in the world. And I think talking about freedom that way, and a life that you can envision that is aspirational, is something that he clearly recognizes, at least because of the service that he gave to this country, he is able to enjoy and deserves. But Graham believes, as anyone should in the wealthiest country in the world who loves it, that everyone should enjoy those freedoms. So I think he speaks about that. And I think that specifically, and I don't want to speak for his campaign in its entirety, because I think everyone should go check out his clips. He's fantastic. He's a great guy. He's a very, very nice dude. But I think that is when you're talking about Graham Plattner, why he resonates is because he is both real, but cares deeply about the real parts of your life. So that's my little Graham Plattner stump speech for why he's fantastic. I'm sure your viewers and listeners like him as well. But I just think that's what's so smart about his campaign. Then in the way, Zoran is always going back to affordability. Bernie's talking about the oligarchs. Graham is real and really cares about the freedoms that you should have. I really like him. We had him on a while back and then before the tattoo brouhaha. And then I kind of followed that closely and I thought he really handled that well. And I told my listeners, this is going to sound crazy, but Like my husband has, I don't know, 20 tattoos. He got all of them after he got sober. So all of them he got like age 33 and up. And then he'd have a relapse and get sober again. And then he'd get more tattoos. And he has like these Chinese symbols and all this shit. And he has a fucking tramp stamp in like Sanskrit or something. And people ask him all the time, what does that mean? He goes, I don't know. I was at the, I don't know. I was at the tattoo par book. And he goes, I don't know. I like to think that this means diversity in Chinese, but I genuinely don't remember because I was literally five days sober. And so I kind of get that, but I think he handled that very well. Let me ask you this. I think there's one of my husband's political philosophies is very simple. And if you watch the Medi show, you know this. Like my husband, he's a criminal defense attorney. He's like, I don't really know what the fuck's going on in Israel and Palestine. I just know everybody that I hate supports Israel. And I think that we can take something simple like that by like, who is Chuck Schumer endorsing? So Chuck Schumer, he is, he endorsed Janet Mills. Okay. So I think that sometimes we can just simplify things because there's so many things like you felt so overwhelmed right now, Jack. And you're like, oh my God, I'm so stressed about all this mega shit. We need to simplify things. No, I totally agree. Chuck Schumer endorses somebody. And for our listeners feel overwhelmed too. We're not going to vote for them. Yeah. And I think that's what's going to pan out in all of the primaries. I think Peggy Flanagan is running away. And I went so – talk about someone who I was just berating on Twitter. Twitter, I have people who for some reason have my notifications on, which is just like such a mistake. I'm like you don't need – I tweet for fun. I tweet for hate. I tweet for the love of the game. Turn those off. But Angie Craig is one of the worst Democrats out there. I don't know if you know that Angie Craig, she was speaking at a crypto conference last year and introduced Eric Trump. And she voted for the Lincoln-Riley Act. She is just like such a corporate dam. Who's running against her? Peggy Flanagan, who's the Lieutenant Governor Progressive, endorsed by Tina Smith, endorsed by Bernie and Elizabeth Warren. Just incredible. But Angie Craig, like after voting for the Lake and Riley Act, was like carrying around this little poster board that was like, impeach Kristi Noem. There's never been a better representation of the do-nothing corporate dem than voting to allow what the fifth largest standing military in the world fucking ICE is, and then pretending that your cardboard sign for your campaign is going to do shit. But she's handpicked by Chuck Schumer. She's going to fucking lose. Haley Stevens, hopefully as well. In Michigan, it's looking like it's one of the least charismatic people in the world. We have a lot to feel good about on the Senate side. I don't know. That makes me feel a little better today. I love that. Jack, thank you so much for your time. I want to have you back on again. When you're feeling down, call me, and then we will have a therapeutic bitch session and try to solve this country's problems. We talked some shit, and we got to talk about Zoran's inches. So it was a little good, a little bad. Bye, Jack. Thank you.
