Alex Wagner

I am heartened to some degree, and we'll talk more about this, by the fact that Democrats are hanging together and for the most part that they've done something differently because I think these abnormal times call for unusual measures.

I think the strategy itself is pretty complicated.

And I worry that the American public, you know, until Yellowstone closes down, we have a history as a country of not caring probably enough about federal bureaucracy and what happens to federal workers.

And they exist in a kind of liminal space, I think, as far as the American imagination.

But I think it's good that all the stories about this shutdown begin with an explanation about what Republicans are trying to do to American health care and that we are having at least the beginnings of a conversation about health care costs and what the big, beautiful Bill Act has done and the sort of priorities of the Republican Party as it concerns the welfare of

So that part seems good.

But I'd like to see a lot.

I mean, I'd like to see a lot more coordination and creativity and ambition as far as, you know, where the Democrats are at, at least from a messaging perspective.

Well, yeah, I mean, and there's the fundamental reality that, like, in the interim, Republicans under the leadership of both Trump and Russell Vogt at OMB are just doing the thing they've always wanted to do.

It's like playing chicken with someone who very badly wants to drive a car off a cliff, whose, like, lifelong dream has been, like, Thelma and Louise style, let's gun the engine and go.

And you've finally been given an opportunity to do that, and they're not trying to stop, you know?

So that's a sort of...

That's a structural problem in any strategy in this situation.

I mean, I don't think it's a great sign that within 24 hours, they've peeled off three Democratic senators, right?

I think it's...

I think the fact that Trump has ordered federal agencies to have sort of banners on their website saying, this agency is not able to operate at full tilt because of a Democrat-led shutdown.

You know, he is doing things that are clear violations of the Hatch Act.

But like, whatever, the Hatch Act went the way of the dodo bird some eight years ago.

But I mean, the lawlessness and the sort of wanton...

The lawlessness and the rules not applying to them are really being, you know, it ratchets up to like a degree that we haven't seen before in typical fights, right?