Senator Joe Lieberman & How We Can Make The Government Work Again
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All right, boys and girls, we are back with another edition of the Ben Dominich podcast brought to you by Fox News. You can check out all of Fox News' podcasts at foxnewspodcast.com. I am talking today with Senator Joe Lieberman. The former senator has a new book

called The Centrist Solution, How We Made Government Work and Can Make It Work Again. We talked about what it means to be a centrist. We talked about the difference between moderation and centrism. And we talked about the failed promise of Joe Biden's early presidential tenure in terms of bringing Americans together again. Senator Lieberman was kind enough to talk about a number of different other aspects as well of his commitment

political career. His book is The Centrist Solution. Senator Joe Lieberman, coming up next. The world of business moves fast. Stay on top of it with the Fox Business Rundown. Listen to the Fox Business Rundown every Monday and Friday at foxbusinesspodcasts.com or wherever you download your favorite podcasts. Senator Lieberman, thank you so much for taking the time to join me today. Ben, it's great to be with you. I'm an admirer, so I look forward to the conversation.

We are speaking on a day in which a bit of news has broken that relates to your book that I have to ask you about. Yes. And whatever you think of, of, of David corn over at mother Jones, he's someone who has been around for a long time and occasionally is ahead of the curve on a couple of things. And his latest report is that Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, um,

is seriously considering leaving the Democratic Party, potentially becoming an independent. It's unclear who he would caucus with.

But Manchin is at the center of a conversation in Washington today. And I wonder about your perspective on his position, both given the topic of your book and given that it was a position that you essentially used to occupy yourself at being at the center of the maelstrom of conversation about such things.

Yeah, so I'll get to the David Korn story. It's funny, I was talking to somebody just within the last hour, and they didn't mention the story, but maybe that's what was in their mind, because they said this was a Republican trend. They said, wow, there's an interesting rumor going around that Joe Manchin might become a Republican. What do you think? I said, I have no idea. It's possible, but...

And Joe's a strong guy and a tough guy and very confident of himself and also able to sort of negotiate in a political setting. However, the things that the...

people on the left really have been saying about him, particularly from the House, it's just, it hurts and it makes you angry. I remember it. You know, you'd like to say, oh, I'm a grown up, so this is politics. But it gets pretty nasty. And the people in your own party begin to talk to you, talk about you as if you're a traitor.

And even though basically Joe and I, certainly more than half the time, vote with most of the Democrats, it's a real mistake. Look, Ben, you know from history, in America we've always had differences of opinion in our political leadership. But generally, for most of our history, most of that has been expressed in a respectful way.

And it never got really nasty. Or if it did, it didn't last for long. And we seem to be now, for a lot of reasons, in a time of perpetual nastiness. And Joe Manchin, strong as he is, experienced as he is, you know, he's a human being. And people don't like to be unfairly accused of being traitors when they're just doing what they think is right for their countrymen.

country for their for their uh state so um uh i you know i have no idea what he's gonna do i i i've been through some party changes in my time in the senate um uh jim jeffords it was actually a 50 50 senate just like now uh and i guess it was uh what was it 93 maybe

And I may be confusing it, but I think it was actually. And after Clinton was elected and Jeffords switched and all the chairmanship switched. No, that might have been he did that later. Yeah, that was after the 2000 election.

So, but it was 50-50 in 93. And Arlen Specter switched a little later when he, in the beginning of the Obama term, he was one of three Republicans to vote for, with the Democrats, for the Economic Recovery Act.

not Obamacare yet. And he got so excoriated, he got angry and he became a Democrat and that put Democrats in range of getting, we had 60 for a while. So, I mean, it's a long story, but what Joe Manchin does at West Virginia, I don't know. I think he's very popular and he can do about what he wants to do. He's in a, however, he's in a state that is certainly trending Republican voted Republican.

as I recall, overwhelmingly for President Trump last time around. But let me go to your larger question. Look, this is the

sickness that is afflicting our political system and making it so unproductive that it really motivated me to write this book called The Centrist Solution in the hope that I could tell some stories both from American history, beginning with the Constitutional Convention when there was a lot of differences of opinion, but they worked together to resolve them so the country could begin and get going right through

My 24 years in the Senate and a lot of work across party lines in the center that led to, I think, great results. I mean, the Clean Air Act of 1990, the Balanced Budget Act of 97, all the post-9-11 Homeland Security intelligence community reform that made us safer since then, and repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell in 2008.

nine or 10. Uh, and all of those happen only because there was bipartisan support in the center. Uh, and that's the way it's always been. So I, this is a, this is a book that I hope will give readers some hope that it's not so hard to do this. If people have an elective office in Congress and the white house have the will or desire to do it. And I hope people will read it on Capitol Hill. We'll, um,

say, hey, you know, we could do this and it would make our lives a lot more satisfying because after all, that's why we ran for Congress or the White House than the other. But it's hard to do. And the counter pressures today are much greater than when I left the Senate just eight and a half years ago. Well, I want to talk about those pressures and incentives, because one of the things that we discuss fairly regularly on this podcast and that I've talked about for a while is

The degree to which the nature of representation has changed in the past couple of decades, thanks to a number of different factors, including social media, including the rapid nature of the media process, including the highlighting of anyone who really breaks with the herd.

in terms of going along with various proposals that are backed by the majority of a party. And you see kind of contrasting responses to that in the response from Senator Manchin and also from Senator Kyrsten Sinema, who has been one to keep her own counsel. She doesn't talk as much as Manchin does. And I was thinking back

I've no animosity toward Ezra Klein. He and I have done many appearances together. But I was thinking back to a particularly nasty piece that he wrote about you when you were weighing which way to go on Obamacare votes. And I think of that as being kind of a seminal moment because it was a new kind of targeted attack on someone

who wasn't even saying definitively, I don't think you were saying definitively at the time, where you were going to end up on the issue, but basically just saying, I think there need to be some changes made in order for me to be able to support this. And now it seems like the expectation for a representative is essentially, you know, representative meaning either a member of Congress or the Senate, that when you arrive in Washington, you are supposed to be a rubber stamp

for the agenda of the national party, whatever that is, uh, backed by the media conglomerates and by, and by, you know, writers and, and pundits and the like. And that if you run afoul of that, even in small ways, uh, you will be called out on it and made not just someone, uh,

who is critiqued, but someone who becomes a target, someone who people are motivated to, as they did with Senator Sinema, follow them into a bathroom and excoriate them in ways that seem, you know, just utterly anathema to the way that politics used to work. How has that changed? How has those expectations changed? And did you witness them changing during your time in office? Yeah, well, it's a great question. And, um,

I did witness some changing during my time in office and not changing for the better. I mean, let me go way back to when I was a college student and I studied political science. And I always remember that

we learned that, you know, America has two political parties. That's been throughout most of our history. I would add, coincidentally, that it doesn't say anywhere in the Constitution or in our law that there can only be two political parties, but that's what our history has produced. And I remember the political science professor saying, so the value of the two

political parties is that to form a majority, they have to create a working coalition of minorities. It wasn't all about ethnic or racial minorities or anything else, but it was people of different points of view.

And, or as Leah O'Hunter from the Republican Party's great past would say, every party was supposed to be a big tent, you know, with room for everybody. That's how you won elections. And what's happened now, for some of the reasons you've said, though,

The increasing partisanship of the media, the gerrymandering of the districts, the sort of timidity of incumbents about facing a primary within their own party, particularly in the House, the impact of money, all of that on people's freedom of action, the impact of money through the parties, all

has created a kind of, you've got to go our way, the way of the party, or no way. And the parties are increasingly...

intolerant of exactly the kind of diversity that political professor, science professor of mine said was a great reason for being of the American political parties. And I want to pick up your example, and I'm struck by it. Sometimes you go through things yourself that may be

the beginning of something or give a message about larger trends. And because you're in the middle of it, you don't see it. But, you know, I got challenged in 2006 for the Democratic nomination for the Senate in Connecticut, and I lost. And it was based on one issue, which was the Iraq war.

More than half the Democrats in the Senate supported the Iraq war, but when it got tough, a lot of them said we ought to pull out. And they even were using a phrase a little differently. People today talk about defunding the police. In those days, Democrats were talking about defunding our military on the battlefield.

And on one of the votes, I'm proud to say my vote made the difference. I simply wasn't going to do that. I was outrageous. And we would have been forced to retreat and defeat. So, OK, one issue, even though my record was pretty good on other things for most Democrats,

I lost the primary. I was lucky enough in Connecticut to be able to run as an independent and win. But what's really fascinating to me, Ben, is that over the years, that Iraq war thing seems to have faded. And on the left of the Democratic Party, what stays alive and is on blogs, et cetera, et cetera, all the time is that Lieberman killed the public option. Well,

Lieberman, I mean, I'll never forget, I was a big supporter of health care reform. I thought we ought to do something to try to cover the millions of Americans who didn't have health insurance, and I thought we needed to regulate the insurance companies better for some of their unfair practices toward the health care consumers. I'll never forget, President Obama called me into his office. It was just him and me in the Oval Office, probably in February of

And he said, Joe, I need you on health care reform. And I said, Mr. President, I've been in one way or another fighting for it, usually with bipartisan groups since I got here. And I'll do anything I can to help you pass a good bill. And I did. But I didn't.

Some of my left colleagues in the Democratic caucus really wanted a national health care, national health insurance program. Well, I didn't think that was right for America, and I thought it could bankrupt America because of all it would cost. So they knew that they couldn't get it in there really what they wanted. So they came up with this idea of a public option, which was the foot in the door. And I was opposed to it. I thought it was a good bill.

And I wasn't the only one in the Senate Democratic Caucus. Ben Nelson from Nebraska certainly wasn't.

My two friends and colleagues from Arkansas, Blanche Lincoln and Mark Pryor, were also. And Max Baucus, who was head of the Finance Committee, had said during the year that if the public option is in the bill, it's not going to pass the Senate. It's not going to get elected. Anyway, I was opposed to it. And I said on a TV show, I was face to nation on Sunday morning and Bob Schieffer asked me.

If the public option stays in, will you not vote for cloture to end the filibuster? And I said, yes, I feel that strongly about it. And, you know, it was the way it's supposed to work. Harry Reid called me right after I left the TV station on my cell phone and said we were still voting on a Sunday that year, needless to say. I think it was on budget. And

And Harry says, can you come to my office after the first roll call? So I came. And, you know, Harry was there with Chuck Schumer, Dick Durbin and Rahm Emanuel, the president's chief of staff. So Rahm says, are you really that strongly against the public option? I said, yes. And I told him why. And he said, so you won't vote for Kohlscher if it's in there? I said, yes.

So he said, if we take it out, will you vote for the bill? I said, I'll vote for it enthusiastically because I support it. And he said, OK, it's out. That was it. Then I got instantly. And this is my opinion. I never felt that the public option was a priority for President Obama. Yeah. I.

I thought he had a good bill and he wanted it. Anyways, but that still lingers there. I've still made a double by the left. And it's just not fair in the case of that bill. I'm sorry it went on so long, but it was –

It was quite therapeutic for me to tell the story again. But it's typical of what happens now. Not only is there no latitude to differ in good conscience, which I did,

But even when you support the underlying bill, it wouldn't arguably say I was the 60th vote that enabled Obamacare to pass. People not only go at you then, which they really froze me out for a while, but here we are, 2009 to 2021. They're still talking about it. And it's just, it's bad for our country. Forget me. I just laugh at it now. But it's bad for our country.

Well, I think that there's a couple of aspects of centrism that I want to ask you about. One is there is sort of this lower level definition, which to me encompasses the capability to work together or to sit down together in a room and not have that itself, just that fact of meeting together.

become something that is anathema. I think, for instance, of the incident that played out a while back where Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was criticizing something. I can't remember the exact context of it, but Ted Cruz kind of quote tweeted her and agreed with her. This was back earlier this year.

And basically said, I agree with you, this is a problem. You know, I have slightly different solutions, but I'd be happy to talk to you about it. And of course, AOC and her followers responded by, you know, biting the hand off, essentially, in social media terms. And just say, you know, we'll never work with you. You're horrible. You're evil. You're Satan. You know, as you might expect.

So that's one sort of lower level definition of centrism that I feel has gone away. But I also think that there's another definition of centrism, which I'm curious about from your perspective, which is Washington and I would say corporate America have a definition of centrism that doesn't actually seem to be borne out in the polls in the sense that if you actually look at where people agree on certain things,

they aren't necessarily the things that Washington agrees about or that the lobby, large lobbies on either side of an issue agree about. There's that whole horseshoe theory of politics that says that basically the far left and the far right agree about certain problems. And whether they have different solutions or not, they both identify, they both have the same boogeyman or bad guys, you know, that they point at for it.

To what degree is the big problem with centrism in politics today, that lower level, the inability to even be able to sit down and work with somebody who has a different party alignment than you? And to what degree is it that Washington tends to get the things where you could find unanimity on a subject just backwards, that they don't really find a way to deal together on things

certain subjects where, you know, the left and the right might find places of agreement because they're not necessarily a priority for either party's donor class or for the lobbies that are involved there. I think you're right on both counts. So that story about Ocasio-Cortez and Cruz is a telling story. Hey, I was just saying to somebody the other day, we always say that Biden, Joe Biden worked across party lines and

in his 24 years in the Senate. He did quite often, but let me just be more explicit about who he worked with. He was chairman of the Judiciary Committee

for some time or the ranking Democrat. And two of the people I know he worked with were Strom Thurmond and Orrin Hatch, both quite conservative Republicans, because they would isolate. First off, they got on with one another. They enjoyed each other. You know, they didn't let their differences dominate.

blocked them from being friends. And in an interesting way, they developed a kind of trust so they could get together and say, okay, on this big one, whatever it is, children's health insurance or criminal justice reform, let's sort of make a list. We agree on these issues, so let's pass them. Let's get them in the bill. We disagree on these, so let's forget them for now. And then there's this other group in the middle that

and let's see if we can negotiate an agreement. This was great stuff. And, you know, there are historic ones. I mean, President Johnson and Everett Dirksen on the Civil Rights Act,

President Reagan and Tip O'Neill and Social Security reform really saving Social Security. Of course, Reagan and O'Neill really liked each other. That was important. It's important to like somebody and trust them if you're going to make an agreement. Clinton and Gingrich is another one. When you start to say, I'll never talk to that person, even if you have some possibility of

of agreement, then, boy, that slams the door. And that's, in a way, that's the first big thing I'm saying about centrism. And in the book, Ben, I really try to be very clear about the fact that

Being a centrist is not the same thing as being a moderate. A centrism is not an ideology, it's a kind of strategy for political success. It means that whether you're Republican, Democrat, liberal, conservative, are you prepared to come to the center

Sit down and talk civilly with colleagues who disagree with you, negotiate, talk about compromises and see if we can actually get something done. I mean, that's the way it's worked. And today, a lot of people just will not get in a room together. That's incidentally why the bipartisan infrastructure reform bill, which is tied up right now,

by the $3.5 trillion social service human infrastructure program demanded by the left of the Democratic Party, particularly in the House, but Senate too, Bernie Sanders, and apparently supported by Joe Biden. But the bipartisan infrastructure reform bill really did come from the congressional grassroots in the House and Senate. A lot of encouragement and support from Democrats

a group I'm privileged to chair, which is called No Labels. And, you know, I got 69 votes in the Senate. Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell voted for it and then got to the House and got blocked by

by the left of the Democratic caucus. So we're back to struggling now. As you know, negotiations are going on right now. But if you can't get in a room and trust somebody and at least listen to them, the prospect of achieving anything falls pretty close to zero. And that is a real problem in our politics today. I'll have more of my interview with Joe Lieberman right after this. You know, there's a...

there's an aspect of this that I wanted to talk about as it relates to foreign policy. And that is regarding the attitude, a bipartisan attitude toward China that played out over, you know, the, in the post cold war era in a very apparent way. There's a lengthy essay in the latest foreign affairs criticizing China's

that consensus that I saw Elbridge Colby sharing around today. And, and, you know, I think that part is at least part of the problem with trying to achieve centrist solutions today, that the American people don't trust those solutions because they think that they, the lesson they've taken away from previous ones that were branded along those lines toward them is that they are

either didn't deliver on their promise or that they delivered bad things that they didn't expect along with them. And I think particularly of, you know, the idea that

China should enjoy most favored nation status or that it was something that ought to be worked on from a capitalist perspective in order to, you know, achieve, you know, multiple goals, not just, you know, trade advantages, but obviously trying to influence them in a positive direction was one that was shared, you know, widely by Republicans and Democrats, you know, in the 90s. And yet you, you know, fast forward,

15 years or so. And there is this emerging, you know, criticism that plays out, you know, most, most apparently in the, in the 2016 process where criticism of that after the fact, but, you know, becomes not just, I think a, you know, prevalent political view on the American right, but the dominant view. And I think is actually shared by a lot of Democrat voters as well, that this was a mistake and,

It's part of the problem that when you take a stance that might be centrist at the time, that if it goes sideways or negative outcomes that you could not have expected from it,

That that is itself used as a criticism of the idea of a centrist consensus to kind of malign that whole approach to the way of doing policy and to instead endorse essentially monopartisan solutions to the problems that we have.

Yeah, so yes, that's a risk, but of course we're imperfect beings and we're dealing in foreign policy with, in that kind of situation with China and most favored nation, et cetera. We're dealing with very complicated issues. So, in fact, the big breakthroughs on trade with China occurred during the Bill Clinton administration, which he strongly supported.

and there was bipartisan central support, and I supported it strongly, we felt two things. One is that that kind of relationship with this rising economic power, you know, over a billion people now, over a billion, 400 million people, well, that made good business sense. So we could do a lot of business there that would create jobs in America. And incidentally, that was a little less fashionable to say,

If we were importing from them a lot of products, a lot of working class people, lower income people could buy things less expensively at places like Walmart and Target and all the rest, which did in fact happen. And I think economically, those trade agreements with China worked out to our benefit, but

And maybe we oversold it. We also argued that the most favored trade nation status for China, bringing them into the World Trade Organization, would also bring them into the community of nations and in a more civil and less combative way, and would naturally, as a middle class developed in China,

mean that China would become more open politically. And unfortunately, that's what failed. And what we were basing it on at the time was the memory of the transformational

Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping, who really, I think, if he had been able to, because he was old when he was in office, but lived about 20 more years, this would have worked out better. But changes occur. And, you know, there were some relatively bureaucratic leaders that followed that didn't make much of a change, Yang Zemin, Hu Jintao. But then came the current president, Xi Jinping. And

He has a whole different point of view, and he's basically turned around any of the openness in the society and compromised freedom there, and of course taken off after the Uyghurs in an awful way. And so...

That hope that we had that economic growth from trade would make China more democratic, obviously, was a big mistake. And what can you say? But it doesn't mean that...

And this is where leaders in both parties hopefully will step forward. I mean, it just doesn't justify saying, well, forget it. Foreign policy is a nuisance. And any kind of bipartisan foreign policy is bound to be a mistake. But the truth is, during the Cold War against Russia, we did have a bipartisan foreign policy. And the Republican chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Arthur Vandenberg,

said the famous when he basically supported President Truman. He said, I'm a Republican. The president's a Democrat. We're both

loyal partisans, and he said, I paraphrase, partisanship must end at the nation's shores. In other words, foreign policy, of course we're going to have differences of opinion, but if they break on party lines, we weaken ourselves and we strengthen our enemies. And we pretty much held together through most of the Cold War, and I think it's part of why we prevailed over the Soviet Union. And

And right now, there looks like there could be the beginning of a bipartisan consensus on China, though it's not quite clear how they want to deal, how we can deal with it most effectively. But I still believe, of course, there'll be differences of opinion on foreign policy, but

It's at least as important on foreign policy as domestic for people in both parties, different points of view, to come to that center meeting place and try to work on a foreign policy that particular problems against particular nations, friends or enemies, that can be bipartisan because the country is always going to be stronger, safer and more prosperous as a result.

You are looking at a presidency right now that was largely sold to the American people as promising a return to unity for the nation, a return to normalcy and adults in the room following four years of, of upheaval and, uh, and angry tweets and people, you know, having heart palpitations over whatever was happening in the white house on a, on an hourly basis. Um,

The early poll data, I say early because I do think that this is relatively still early in this administration, is very negative for the president, particularly on some major issues that he ran on, including the economy. And it seems to me that I think a lot of people who...

supported him or were certainly sympathetic to the idea that he could be a unifying force are now questioning that and perhaps having some buyer's remorse in terms of the way that I read the polls. If there was one piece of advice that you would have

for this White House or this administration, not even for Joe Biden necessarily, because I don't necessarily think that it's his approach that is the biggest problem, but you may disagree. What would it be to change his priorities around, to sound a different note, to pursue different policy aims? What would it be to turn around what, for Democrats at this point,

is a major item of concern, not just for the Virginia elections next month, but for the midterms a year from now. Yeah, well, first, Ben, let me say that I totally agree with your analysis, both about why Joe Biden got elected. Elections are still mysterious, notwithstanding polling and exit polling. But you look at the exit polling, it seems like there was a major shift

among self-described moderates who voted a little more for Hillary than for Trump in 2016, went overwhelmingly for Biden in 2020. And if you look at the polling now, they've pulled back because they don't feel that Biden has vindicated their hope that he would unite the country.

And just unite Washington as a starter. So that's a real problem. And I would say to Joe Biden, just to answer your question, that he's got to really take hold of the party.

and then of the Democratic Party and tell them they got to work together, that Bernie Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez can't treat, you know, Joe Manchin and Josh Gartenheimer in the House as if they're enemies. They were part of the same party. We got to work together and see if we can work out a program

And then Joe Biden has to really appeal to the Democrats in Congress, beginning with Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi, to reach out to the Republicans and try to find some common ground. And I don't know if they can do it, but you want a little bit of hopefulness on that bipartisan infrastructure reform bill that got 69 votes in the Senate.

there were a whole bunch of Senate Republicans, some sort of moderate like Susan Collins, Mitt Romney, others more conservative that were part of the negotiations. And President Biden got involved in those negotiations. He didn't start them, but he got involved and brought them to a conclusion. I wish that he had basically said to the House, progressives,

Come on, let this go through. This is going to be a big accomplishment for our country and for our administration and for our party. But that didn't happen. And so what I'm saying is grab the agenda. It can't be what it's seen as now, I think, as a left-left agenda, almost a socialist agenda on democracy.

on domestic policy and the kind of far out stuff that only a handful of Democrats in Congress have really talked about, but it gets broadcast and it scares people in our country, like defunding the police or in another way, I don't know, taking down a statue of Thomas Jefferson. Good God. So that's just not where most of America is.

And it's not easy for Biden because he's got to take on members of his own party. But he also has to remember that he got this nomination because basically the moderates looked around and said, oh, my God, looks like Bernie Sanders could be our nominee.

And he's going to definitely lose to Trump. So they rallied in South Carolina with a lot of African-American involvement around Biden. And as you said, that's why he won the general election among moderates as well. The Democrats are not going to win majorities in Congress next year if they keep this up.

And my guess is they're not going to elect the president again if they keep this up as well. So it takes leadership, takes political power brokering. In a way, the president needs some help. I mean, I mentioned Rahm Emanuel before.

The most productive two years of the Obama administration were the first two. Okay, wait a minute. Can I interrupt you for this? I have not talked to you about this before. As someone who was very much on the opposite side during that time,

during that period around Obamacare and Rahm, Republican staffers to a man told me that same thing, and that if Rahm had remained in charge beyond that point, they were worried what he could have been able to achieve. That's really good. They were very happy he lost that, whatever it was, internal power struggle or whatever.

Yeah, no, he knew Congress, but he was a very good political operator. And I remember at one point, it didn't always work out as I wanted. At one point, John Kerry, Lindsey Graham and I

were working on a climate change compromise bill. And we went at one point to the White House for a meeting with Rahm, and he basically said, this was in 2009 or 10, probably. And he said, he said,

It's just not going to go. I mean, we've used all our capital on the economic recovery bill and health care reform. So, you know, my heart is with you, but forget it. And, you know, we were not happy with that, but he was right. So I think Biden needs somebody around him. Was that kind of

professional who knows how the system works and can crack heads on the Republican side. I use that term metaphorically, of course, not literally. Though I think, though I think Rom could, could also do it literally. Rom definitely could. I mean, I always, I always have had, I'll tell you, I, uh,

you know, I was, I was a speechwriter for John Cornyn, as you know, for several years. And at the time that I was there, you know,

Pete Olson, who went on to be a member of Congress, was his chief of staff. And Ron rather famously saved Pete's life. He collapsed in the Capitol Hill gym and Ron was the first to reach him. He was up on the hill for meetings or something like that. And so I have to have respect for the guy, even though he's definitely someone who

you know, could metaphorically crack some heads. He could, he could. And you know what? The other thing we missed is a lot of nastiness on Capitol Hill, but Rahm was the last great foul-mouthed political leader. And it was more like the kind of foul-mouthed vulgarity that you hear among, you know, your friends on the streets.

And it wasn't directed at you. It was just an expletive that he used to describe the situation. And that's a good reminder as we close out that, you know, being centrist minded and wanting to achieve your aims is

you know, doesn't require you to necessarily be, you know, a dovish, you know, soft handed person. You know, you can still bend arms to do it. I give you an example of both of us are pretty close to John McCain was a conservative, really look at the record. He was a conservative Republican. Yeah.

But, you know, he came to the center when he wanted and was a great centrist. And nobody would say that John was timid, shall we say, or that one only saw him with a kind of flatline personality. No, that wasn't him. You know, the other one on the other side was Ted Kennedy, classic Lester.

Democrat, but a real centrist when he wanted to be, like Biden was. And Teddy could also pop his cork when he wanted to and get angry or laugh like hell. So that all made it interesting, really. And it also made it productive. And that's what I hope and pray for a return of in Congress and in the White House. Mm-hmm.

Let's look forward to a future where people are less polite in green rooms and can still find ways to get along together when it comes to getting things done. I think you'll remember. I just want to tell a quick story that...

Obama once said at one of the gridiron dinners or something, I think you know that Rahm lost part of his first finger in some kind of accident earlier in his life. And Obama said, thank God it wasn't his second finger or he wouldn't be able to communicate as he does. That's classic. Well, thank you so much for being so generous with your time. It's always a pleasure to talk to you. Thank you. Be well.

I was disturbed to read an essay in Common Sense with Barry Weiss, a sub stack that I've recommended to you before by Susie Weiss about the general nature of anti-baby sentiment among the current generation of younger Americans. The title of it is First Comes Love, Then Comes Sterilization Inside America's Baby Bust. Meet the Young Women Who Never Want to Have Kids.

It reads in part,

On the aspiring actor's TikTok, one finds short, funny videos about Diamond's job working the register at a cafe near Union Square and updates on her rescue pit bull, Rue, who has anemia. Mixed in are the clips extolling her child-free life.

They have titles like Sterilization Attempt Number Three and Being Child Free. We do know what we're missing. It's been five months since she had her fallopian tubes cut, not tied, and she has 64,000 followers.

Growing up near Hershey, Pennsylvania, Diamond always assumed she'd have a family of her own. Then came college at Arcadia University, her political awakening away from her conservative roots and toward progressivism, and a therapist who she found online a few months after graduation who made her realize that being spanked as a child was deeply traumatic and that it made her fear authority figures like her father.

She decided she never wanted to be one herself. Never, ever, ever. Looking back, I never pretended that my American Girl dolls were children. They were always my sisters, she says. There were little things showing that I wasn't preparing myself for motherhood. I think for me, it's as the natives say, I've always wanted to be a mom.

Diamond is hardly an outlier. Americans are making fewer babies than we've made since we started keeping track in the 1930s. And some women like Diamond are not just putting off pregnancy, but eliminating the possibility of it altogether. Last year, the number of deaths exceeded that of births in 25 states, up from five the year before. The marriage rate is also at an all-time low, at 6.5 marriages per 1,000 people.

Millennials are the first generation where a majority are unmarried, about 56%. They are also more likely to live with their own parents, according to Pew, than previous generations were in their 20s and 30s. They also aren't having sex. The number of young men ages 18 to 30 who admit they have had no sex in the past year tripled between 2008 and 2018.

Cities like New York, where young, secular Americans flock to build their lives, are increasingly childless. In San Francisco, there are more dogs than children.

It used to be that people wanted to make babies, women especially, but also men. That was a healthy young person's default position, and our existence depended on it. We wanted to do other things, of course, and the great post-feminist challenge was how to have it all, the proper work-life balance, the career and the baby, the supportive husband, and the adventurous life. But now, for an increasing number, the question isn't how to have it all. It's why do it at all?

This psychological reversal didn't just happen. It took place inside the hurricane of spiritual, cultural, and environmental forces swirling around us. But the message from this young cohort is clear. Life is already exhausting enough. And the world is broken and burning.

Who would want to bring new innocent life into a criminally unequal society situated on a planet with catastrophically rising sea levels? I encourage you to read this essay and to be depressed by it is only natural. But I do think that there's going to be some interesting political ramifications that are going to touch on a number of different aspects of American life to emerge from such a cohort of childless Americans.

We don't know how it's going to change the country. It's probably not going to change it in a good way. Make everything clear in your own head. It is going to change the way that we do, the way that we live, the way that we work for decades to come. I'm Ben Domenech. You've been listening to another edition of the Ben Domenech podcast brought to you by Fox News. We'll be back soon with more. Until then, be lovers of freedom and anxious for the fray.

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