David Pakman

We see it in the approval ratings and they're kind of trying something different.

Well, no, I don't buy that either.

Not at all.

I don't buy that at all.

I think that there's another aspect to this, which is, is Trumpism even conservative by any traditional threat?

I mean, the discussion of what's conservative at this point, I don't think...

I don't think there's much conservatism left anywhere in that movement.

But no, the idea that that it's left wingers that are watching this stuff as as kind of rage bait or for for entertainment.

I don't think that that's the case at all.

In fact, most of my a lot of my audience even says, hey, a lot of this stuff isn't even really worth reacting to because these people are increasingly on the margins of what we consider to be kind of like the valid political discussion.

And we don't even care to hear from them that much.

Yeah.

I think there's a few characteristics at this point to Maga.

I mean, one of it is it relies on what I call faux populist rhetoric.

You might just call it populist rhetoric because it's not policy, it's rhetoric, but I call it faux populist rhetoric is number one.

Um, it is reactionary at its core and it's quite authoritarian as well.

So if you think about libertarian Republicans like Rand Paul,

and authoritarian Republicans like Trump, they land in very different places on policy.

So I think that when we actually look at policy within MAGA, it's extraordinarily authoritarian.

It's authoritarian when it comes to its regulation of businesses.