Robert and Gare cover a protest at the Israeli Consulate, and Sophie time travels back to 2008 to see Obama.
Chicago Community Jail Support (and bail fund): https://www.instagram.com/chicommunityjailsupport/
Cool Zone Media, Kamala Harris and Tim Walls. Little John didn't mention anything about sweat dripping off his balls.
He sure did not, And that's the greatest act of you know, amongst all of the genocide denial, it takes a lot of cowardice to really stand up in this crowd. But Little John refusing to talk about sweat dripping down his balls in the middle of the DNC was a horrible mistake here.
I'm sorry. I didn't know he was going to start that way.
I knew I was going to start that way. I think it was in pain. Garrison, do you know the song we're talking about? What Welcome to What happened here?
I'm Garrison Davis, annoyed with my bosses, Sophie Lichtman and Robert Evans.
Very old, very old. Remember when Lil John was slightly not He was never really that transgressive. Little John's always been pretty family friendly. I guess.
Somebody replied to the video I post of Little John saying maybe the best lil and you.
Know, ah, there's I had a soft spot in my heart for Lil Wayne, not that he was good, but because he's really funny, Like missus officer. That's that's a fun song. That's a fun story about pretending he had sex with a police officer.
The Democratic National Convention continues inside Chicago, Illinois.
Lil Wayne not yet present, but maybe night. People say Swift might show up soon.
She well, she she had a couple shows and she could potentially get here by tomorrow.
Oh okay, that's great, that's great. I was actually about Jonathan Swift. Oh okay, author of a modest proposal.
But yeah, but in my heart, I really don't think she's coming.
No, why would she? What does she gain from that?
Yeah?
So Tuesday we spent the day split up, mostly with me and Robert going to a protest and Sophie entering the United Center to watch the lib Utopia unveil, complete with an appearance.
I'm so happy Lil John I believe is what he's referred to as.
Yes, that is that is correct?
Thank you?
Yes, just checking as someone currently wearing a mesh shirt. He is in your line of descendants, like this is one of your one of your saintedt ancestors.
I don't know how I feel about that.
And we will we will get to the Little John anticks Uh specifically with the State of Georgia, which made quite a show. Later on in the episode we will be talking about that, but first we will be talking about what me and Robert spent a good I don't know, four hours yesterday doing.
I was out for closer to eight because I went out earlier to look at some stuff I went to. There was a pro Israel Free the Hostages event that I went to and looked around. Briefly, not a whole lot to say about it other than some art that I don't fully know how to think about yet. They had a massive one of the young women that was abducted by Hamas that very famously had like blood on her grace sweat pants. They had just like a massive two story tall pair of gray sweatpants covered in blood. But it wasn't really clear until you got up close what it was trying to be. So it was just kind of like it was odd, odd visuals for the event, I'll say that, but mostly pretty tame. There was maybe thirty or forty people there, and that was about two three blocks down from the plant side of the protest that you and I went to, which was the Centsure Tower, which is apparently it's like a mall on the inside and a metro station and also several floors mini floors of office space. So I'm guessing that the Israeli Consolate is a couple of small offices in this big building.
Yeah, so there was a purchase plan for later this evening. As me and Sophie were going to get lunch, I saw.
Like Sophie and I.
I saw they both just looked at me, deciding who I was going to give a turney look to.
I know.
You were the United Kingdom and me correcting Garrison's grammar, was the German arm marching into Belgium.
I saw a whole bunch of police vans driving through downtown Chicago on the way to the Israeli Consulate. And we showed up a few hours later for the for the protest planned that evening. Like usual, we tried to arrive early and there was a few kind of characters bumping around the area that a lot of media was just fascinated by.
Yeah, the start of it was there was the same There was had been a Nazi lady out at the protest the day before as well. She has like bright purplish hair carried and on the first day, just a cardboard sign covered in racial slurs, loved shouting the end word. Today, she had a friend. They unveiled a sign. People confronted them.
It was like it was like a white genocide, white like white replacement, great replacement type sign with a URL to a telegram channel.
I believe, Yeah, you had a channel. Yeah, I think she had a friend today.
Did someone else with her?
Yeah?
It was shocking news.
Yeah, I mean they usually have at least one, right, maybe, and and then uh, I mean kind of the at one point, sort of while we were all waiting around, because it was initially just a shitload of press, some lookie loose from the local area, and a bunch.
Of cops, well, a bunch of private security, a lot.
Of private security, mostly for the media. There's a fun game of spot the concealed handgun, because none of these guys are very good at concealing their fucking handguns. But at one point, I'm standing and talking to another media and I see this like massive circle of cameras fill up around, and so I'm wondering, Okay, maybe something's happened. I get over there, and I didn't even think to like stop myself from you know, using my outside voice. I just shouted as soon as I got close, Oh fuck, it's the MyPillow guy. There's is the least news anything could possibly be. But for some reason, there was like maybe like forty cameras. It's just like huddled around this guy trying to get whatever picture or whatever, letting you talk. Yeah, a couple of protesters kept engaging him about Gaza, which I just don't think that there's anything to be gained from engaging them pillow guy. With the exception of Garrison, the way you chose to engage the MyPillow.
Guy, I think there's really only one way to handle this, and well there's maybe two ways. You can just completely ignore him, which is probably probably probably the best.
Ask what I did, because.
There's there's no reason to engage with this. There's no reason to give him what he wants. The other option is just to completely baffle him, just be really confusing. So I went up and I didn't even ask a question. I just I just said you said Mike first, which I left so funny.
I just want the listeners to know that after a fourteen hour day yesterday, I get I get back to the hotel Garrison and Robert have had several drinks in Garrison is like, did you see my video? Did you see my video? And what was that video?
We'll play the audio here. Mike skimbity Biden, skimmity.
Biden, skimmity Biden, gimty skimmity Biden.
So no, I was able to get Mike. You know, we're pretty.
Let's how you guys talk now, it's around to say s giveny by, because that's the only way to handle these guys. It's just like just like just really you're not even like annoying them, You're just kind of baffling.
Because all he wants.
Is attention to take his little piece and trying to attract whatever media attention, and you just got to kind of fuck with them.
And it's it's kind of a good sign that he did that, because this is not if you think about where he was in like twenty seventeen, twenty eighteen, him showing up alone, no visible security escort to just kind of stand around before a protest and bullshit, is like, that's a man whose life has fallen apart, like he has nothing.
Left, no everything he was saying I'm able to hear him say at four am on Fox News. Yeah, and that's that was pretty much the little pre show circus, and you know, people starting to trickle into the area slowly, you know, people in Kefia's you know, protesters, medics started to slowly, slowly enter enter this little like you know, block radius, and then very very suddenly, from like the opposite side of where everyone else was stationed at, we saw a group of maybe like fifty march in.
All at the same time.
Yeah, and this was kind of the start of the main of the main protests.
And I would say at that point there were maybe fifty protesters scattered around within the clumps of media, most of whom ran over and joined that group. So it was probably around one hundred or so, maybe as many as one hundred and fifty.
And it probably grew to about like two hundred over the course of the next few hours, although they started to kind of bleed numbers as well. And I was I was taking notes on my little personal recorder during this time, and we put together a little kind of compilation to hear about what went down, and I'll probably cut in with some extra narration to kind of fill in the gaps, so to clarify the audio. You're about to hear was recorded over the course of like two and a half hours. We've cut this down for efficiency and clarity. So some of the sections you're about to hear, you know, may have happened a minute or two apart, but they're just being mushed together to kind of help the action move along a little bit faster, not including you know, the sections of the protest where there's ten minutes of nothing happening. Here's a first hand look at what happened during the protest at the Israeli Consulate back all right, it's just from the it's just past seven. The behind enemy lines Israeli Consulate protest basically just started. A whole bunch of people in some form of block showed up in front of the building, started marching up the street.
Very quickly. A three or four.
Or five layered line of Chicago PD came to block Clinton Street, so the march could not advance there now retreating back towards the building, and they might try to march the other direction. I'm going to be on the move here, trying to take notes as this progresses. A central tower is kind of a tricky spot for this sort of protest. Although it does house the Israeli Consulate. From the outside, there's no obvious indicators that this building is linked to the Israeli government, and it's about two miles away from the DNC, so this is gonna be very little impact on DNC attendees. All the way over here in the West Loop area of Chicago. Chicago, ped is set up across the other street as well, walking both ways in essentially kettling this entire protest. There's a loud speaker, people are talking in front of the building.
The purple haired.
Wig lady from before has moved her Nazi banner closer to this core of protesters right in front of the entrance of the building housing the Israeli Consulate. All right, some of the protesters just announced that they have a couple of speakers that are going to talk in.
Front of the Israeli Constant building. As people are now.
Sandwiched in between two streets right in front of the entrance. Speeches discussed the genocide in Gaza and the US arms Deeels sending weapons and bombs to Israel as part of continuing US imperialism. As the speech is carried on, more and more police began to arrive. All right, it is seven pm, About nine or so white vans just showed up with tons of chicaga pad and ryagear, helmets, gas masks, now thicker sleeves, not just the blue button ups that the.
Regular cops wear.
All right, we're gonna run into a line of police. People have banners, bring the war home, shut down the DNC for Gaza Palestine flags. As they are marching towards a massive line of riot cops. There's too much media in the way.
And a clash has started. Pushing up against lines.
Police pulling apart the signs and banners. Sounds familiar, I bet to anyone who was at twenty twenty. The first clash lasted about a minute, as protesters tried to march forwards into the street and police pushed them back. I was off to the side, but the sheer of mount of cameras and media in the middle of this scuffle prevented either side from gaining or losing much ground. All right, there was kind of a little bit of a back and forth. The protest line got pushed back slightly, but still in the middle of Clinton Street. Protesters telling the press to get out of the way as many press are in between. As press moved slowly out of the way, police were able to successfully push the protest.
Back Chicago pedis I mean redirecting some of their push towards the south. Now looks like some of the protesters are trying to move onto.
The sidewalk to get out of this massive, massive sandwich of police, and there's maybe three or four cops trying to prevent them from moving on the sidewalk. Here.
We'll see if they get pasted.
Police have tacklics and people. Police are going in for a lot of arrests. It's very combative. Police with batons out attacking people, hitt him on the ground, tackling them. Police preventing all forward's movement on the sidewalk as well, not just the street.
People are people are trying to get out and police are.
Police are really trying to trap them.
Police are squashing. We can't we can't move dude, we can't move back.
We can't, we can't move back.
Police are telling people to move back into nothing. They have us trapped by this building.
Eventually, police realize that they cannot push all fifty people into a flat wall and eased off, directing people back in front of the consulate. Police is pushing us into a very tiny corner. A small line of police is separating two crowds, mostly on the sidewalk.
All right, they're pushing us back towards the building.
Action now paused for a few minutes as both sides figured out their next move. Protesters chanted for the release of detained comrades.
All right.
Some of the crowd is trying to regroup as police continue to push people off.
Of the sidewalk and back into the street.
I guess the crowd has kind of been split now into four sections, police keeping them separate, not letting them reconvene. The section from the building, there's a section on the corner, the section behind the police line, and there's a section close to where people tried to march that it has now been cut off from the rest of the crowd, So we have these kind of four groups. A smaller group is reforming in the street in front of the building. This is kind of the section that got trapped by the building as the rest of the march tried to move forward, and some of the people from the side have linked up with them as well, but still mostly kind of four sections separated up by police. People channing to get back in the street. We have little squads or AG's linking up with their mates again, linking arms, holding hands, kind of regrouping.
Right now, Chicago p D is kind of doing the same.
They're reforming their line, going back more into the middle of the street. If they did get any detainments or arrests, probably sorting those out right now as they decide what to do next. During this loll period, I was able to hear a decent amount of police comms chatter coming from their walkie talkies as the police decided on.
Their next move.
All right, I just heard on police comms that they're going to be asking for media to leave. Interesting, Yeah, they are calling for transport vands. So if they're gonna start doing arrests, they might try to get media to leave first then really move in. It sounds like to me on the comms they're calling out specific people to do targeted arrests. On the comms, they're calling out specific outfits, specific what people are wearing, what people are holding, to move in and do targeted arrests on the crowd. Some of the descriptions are very general like black hoodie, red hat, that kind of stuff. I really did not want to get a face full of mace, So as soon as I saw police carrying mace cans, I perhaps a bit prematurely decided to don my full face gas mask, which I then took off like ten minutes later as it became clear that we weren't in immediate danger of amazing, Well, I don't think I'm gonna see Barack Obama today. There's been enough of a cause that the anticipation keep from growing. Does everyone knows what's about to happen. We're just waiting for it to happen, all right.
The fast time protesters that in front of the building are not moving towards the Israeli.
Counter protesters on the other side. As things started to heap back up, some folks in the crowd opted to exit the area via a small EVAC route on the northwest corner of the street. Considering the talk of targeted arrests on the police scanner, police may have been eyeing up certain people in the crowd who then got the hint about what's about to go down next.
You see that doesn't block just bounced?
Yeah, No, I think they could spot that they were about to get targeted for arrests. Be guys, they were being followed up by some of some of the sergeants because I honestly.
I can't name any law breaking other than quote unquote shoving.
With the path.
Sure, but I mean, you know they can get you on some The.
Protest did not stay still for too long, and a little less than hour since the last big confrontation, the crowd once again attempted to march. All right, it is nearly eight twenty. The crowd that remained in front of these early consolt building is now moving up again towards Clinton Street to re engage the confrontation that happened nearly an hour ago. Look, there's less cameras in between the two factions, but not no cameras. The crowd of protesters is still approaching, and they're turning.
They're turning. They turned down Clinton Street.
This is the movement they tried to make before, but police prevented them from doing so. And now they're so far able to exit. The section of the protest that was still facing down the riot line split up into two smaller groups and then made this same movement down the sidewalk away from the police. The people that were traveling down the sidewalk and Clinton have now reformed on Moreau Street and they are now marching. The police are now caught behind the protesters in the march, but sure enough police quickly arrive to contain the mobile protest. All right, bike cops have beat most of the crowd to the intersection, but they're still slowly arriving. The intersection up here is a T shape, so only two directions to go.
Please are going to try to get them to take a right. It looks like.
Yep, all right, more please catch it up. I'm gonna say. You can hear bike cops coming in from both sides. Well, this is quite the pickle. Unfortunately, because of the T shape of this intersection, this is now a little bit of a tighter pinch. They can still get out via one path on the side of but they might prefer a confrontation with some of these police.
We'll see.
The march paused at this T shaped intersection for a few minutes as they decided their next move. All right, the crowd is standing in front of this very thin lineup bike cops. The police not not very thick because they had to move kind of impromptu to adjust to the movements of the crowd. Small groups of the protests keep peeling off. They're slowly bleeding numbers, people chanting let us through as the police yelled to move back. Police have the remaining crowd in a pretty tight squeeze the moment.
Smaller groups keep.
Peeling off, but now the remaining march is moving forward as the bike cops slowly back up. Looks like most of the crowd has been moving onto the sidewalk to move down the street.
They don't really have many more move to make.
There's just a saturation of police in this area that the cops can adapt to any movement this shrinking crowd makes.
Police are piling into the sidewalk. Police are making arrests.
Police are doing targeted arrests. They're grabbing people on the sidewalk. Farm numbers of arrests are being made. There's at least at least five from where I'm standing. Police ordering media out of the way. The protesters are now moving back on the sidewalk, backtracking.
Away from the police.
The remaining crowd attempted to move away from the police who were making arrests on the sidewalk, but the only way left to move was back where they just came from.
People are linking up with their AG's.
Arm in arm, trying to move through this very, very tricky environment.
Right now. There's so everywhere we go, I see.
A new battalion of cops. People really just have nowhere to go. There's just police everywhere. We're just at this point moving in circles, but not like the regular march circles, just on the sidewalk, going back and forth, backtracking, looping around.
They're trying to find somewhere just to get out of this area.
Mostly out of options on where to go, the protest entered a small patio terrace on the corner of the street. Protesters are now getting into the terrace of this building at five point twenty five West Monroe. That's probably not going to end great at this point. Police have the remaining much smaller crowd maybe fifty, squeezed in in this little building terrace corner. They are not letting any protesters leave. A shoving match just started. Police are moving in and they're tackling, pushing people on the ground. It's almost nine pm. Police have one arrest now They just drag someone out by their hair from the crowd that is currently just completely kettled. For the first time tonight, they're providing no evacuation ruts for protesters. They are trapped on this street corner, completely surrounded, not letting anyone leave. Eventually, a small hole opened up, letting a few protesters leave this kettled patio. Robert was able to exit with this group, but many people were not able to make it through, and this little patio was where a number of arrests were able to take place as others slowly dispersed throughout the West Loop neighborhood of Chicago. According to NBC, the police superintendent Larry Sneeling, which is kind of a great name for a cop, praised his officers for quote unquote showing restraint when no one else did, saying that they quote did an excellent job responding to violence and vandalism. He made a similar comment on Wednesday, saying that the protest quote showed up with the intention of committing acts of violence and vandalism unquote. Now, there was no vandalism that was actually committed during this protest. That did not happen. I'm not sure how the superintendent was able to infer the intention of this protest exactly as no vandalism took place and the only violence that happened was when police started pushing people who were trying to march forwards in the street.
Wow, Garrison, that was a gripping story that we're going to talk about.
After these services, services, products, okay, products and services.
Yeah, well maybe we can't know. It's impossible to say we're back, so I don't know. I guess we should probably just kind of give some final thoughts on how we felt about this protest. My overwhelming impression, and I really am not saying this to try to be mean, is that the crowd came with a lot of rhetoric about this is the protest that matters, We are going to shut down the DNC, we are going to throw our bodies upon the machinery of empire. And then after the first couple of hand to hand clashes with the police, which were mostly just kind of shoving, people just wanted to get home, they wanted to leave, and most of the night was us following people attempting to get home and disperse and not being allowed to buy the police every time they would like do a big push in where they're all shouting move in unison. They're telling you to go back, They're telling you to do this or you'll get arrested. And there's always you're always surrounded on every side by cops and you know, sometimes by gaggles of media. But like it was impossible to comply. I can't say that I saw any law breaking really, aside from assuming the cops called an unlawful assembly, which I did not hear. I don't know how you would have heard in most of the product protests, but assuming they did, as that's the law breaker.
Yeah, there was no like property damage, there was no there was no no real light activity. Yeah, you know, people people tried to march and police prevented them with their bodies. Yep, and you know there's a confrontation that ensues, like at that point where where the two groups meet. But besides that, it was it was it was people trying to march and the cops that prevented them from doing so.
And it was a lot. I got stuck at one point with a group of twenty or so people, a handful of protesters, couple of media, and then maybe a dozen or more like I think they were locals. I guess it's possible they were tourists, but people who had just seen the march going down the street and thought that they might follow along and watch for a little And then the cops moved in so fast. We all got walled off in the courtyard of a hotel that didn't actually have street access, but it wasn't clear that it didn't, and the police repeated said they were going to arrest all of us. I had like a discussion with one about my credentials because he was like, those are press credential. Eventually they got a cop who could read, but another journalists got arrested. I think there were at least four arrested.
E mean, at least four journalists were arrest at least.
Four journalists were arrested. Yeah, because after I got out, they let most of the people in our kettle out, but they pulled one guy with a helmet that said press on it out of the kettle. I think his name was Josh Pacheco. I believe it was Josh that I was filming. Josh was definitely arrested, and he is going to be raising money because his camera was broken. They tossed his linen like cameras lens first onto the ground. It did significant damage. If you want to find Josh's info online at jp Underscore OTG you can find his information. I'm sure he'll be doing a fundraiser at some point.
And obviously there were many more protesters arrested. The actual final number is kind of up in the air. Police that are saying that twenty two people at least were arrested and is saying it's closer to admit.
Being the National Lawyer's Guild, they show up at protests to protect people's rights, primarily in the event of arrest.
Yeah, so there's kind of some confusion here on how many people were actually arrested. I'll try to get confirmations and i'll add that in later tonight. I'll also look for a bail fund, yeah, to donate as well, because it is always unfortunate when journalists are arrested, but yeah, it's equally as unfortunate when people who are protesting, especially for a cause like this, get arrested as well. Like this is I think something that it's worth stating.
Especially since again I can't say anything anyone did to precipitate arrest. It's not even like they were closing down streets, because the police had closed down every street they were on before they showed up. I think the police very clearly were under orders to keep things peaceful as long as possible, largely because they didn't want the DNC and the city government didn't want the embarrassment of anything really ugly. So there were no weapons used. There's no mace used. I didn't even really see the sticks used much.
They were mostly used like push.
There was very little in terms of like like like overhand hitting.
But they didn't need any of that stuff because there was no point at which they had less than a two to one numerical advantage, usually more like three or four.
And the people that were organizing this protest in the in the days prior were like announcing part of their intention was to specifically get beat up by police and like beat up badly and have this like generate news coverage, have this you know, this slight Stare organization as well, Yeah, invoking Chicago nineteen sixty eight, and police largely like denied them that option. And you know, many of the participants also opteds to to not continue, you know, in an hour's long physical confrontation with police and instead opted to try to move around them, try to evade them, instead of trying to you know, push through police lines. You know, there was a few points where the police lines that were blocking the street was very sin after people started to move move around the this kind of area, around around the consulate building, and then you know, other times the police lines were very thick, but consistently people opted to not continue a long physical engagement with police.
Yeah, it was a discretion is the better part of valor kind of night, and I think that's the point at which the police decided we are going to arrest people. There was a degree to which it felt like they were just kind of like trying out tactics. A lot of what they were doing was splitting up the crowd then doing targeted arrests and kind of separating, calving off chunks of it. I don't know. The whole thing I kind of couldn't stop myself from being drawn back to the whole time is like, what is the actual utility of this really? Because it didn't get attention, not much. You know, there's some news coverage and stuff, but it's not a Chicago sixty eight moment. I don't think this is going to move any needle for anybody, and obviously that's the goal, right, is to have some kind of an impact. I mean everyone was saying, like the stated goal at all of these protests shut down the DNC, and the only time that kind of happened was at the less radical protest police protests yesterday, right, and largely kind of by accident. I don't know like that. I'm not trying to be like down on anyone. It just is one of those what when you're seeing the sheer weight of police and the numbers of protesters being generated is one hundred or two hundred, it just feels like you're asking people to get fucked up and damage their lives in a situation in which that's unlikely to actually lead to any of the things they want to see.
Hey, this is gare cutting in again.
The exact number of arrests is still a little bit unclear, but we have a clearer idea than what we did a few hours ago. The official number as of Wednesday evening is that fifty six people were arrested. I'm going to quote from the AP quote thirty of the people detained by police were issued citations for disorderly conduct. According to Chicago Police, one person was arrested on a felony charge of resisting police, while nine were charged with misdemeanors including disorderly conduct, resisting officers, battery, assault, and criminal damage to property. Police said, unquote for the record, neither myself nor Robert witnessed any criminal damage to property.
I guess to kind of conclude a protest that's going to actually like move the Needler change. Anything has to overwhelm like the capacity of the state system to deal with it. It has to be something that the state is not. We saw this in twenty twenty right like just over I'm just talking about Portland, just like overall, the George Floyd up rising was beyond what the state was prepared to handle for at least a sizeable chunk, especially of the early days. It like overwhelmed the capacity of the resources the state had to respond adequately. The state, at least everything I've seen so far at the DNC has been perfectly prepared for everything that people brought to bear. And that's really the summary I've gotten.
We're going to go on a quick break and then be back to hear from Sovie about the Obama festival inside the Democratic National Convention. All right, we are back and as as this protest was happening in this area around like I think it's called the West Loop, Sophie was inside the d n C and there was also people similar to the first day of the DNC who who snuck in like banners into the DNC and unfurled them like pro Palestine disarming as royal banners. I believe the banner from last night just read free Palestine and Sophie. What was it like in there exactly? Was it easier to get into than the than the day previous.
Well, it was more, it was it was it was is what I'll say. It wasn't as organized as the R and C, but it was. It was better than the day prior. That's a win is a win at this point. But yeah, the energy was electric, as once I heard multiple people say throughout the night in the unass press area that I was in.
It felt like, at least from watching online afterwards, it gave really big, like two thousand and eight energy.
Yeah.
Yeah, And obviously you know, Michelle Obama Barack Obama are both speaking, so that that kind of carries with it a little bit, but even just like the general vibe just felt it felt very two thousand and eight, like that style of like two thousand and eight optimism.
Yeah, yeah, I would agree with that. I've been asked a lot like what the energy is compared to the rn C, and like the RNC was more like a WWE event and this was more like a you know, B level pop star concert, sure where everyone was very excited to be there, where I only knew a couple of the songs.
Sure was.
That was the general vibe. But the main speed section of the event started off with Center Majority leader Chuck Schumer.
And I watched his speech. It was not very good.
He came out and and was what some would describe as dancing on stage.
He was quesetable. His speech was very like robotic. Yeah it was. He was not good.
Well, he's the head of the dim Crypto Caucus, so like he's part robot.
But it was like people were not super into him. He was whatever. But then Bertie Sanders came up and I was actually surprised at the crowd was as into him as they.
Were, but not super into No, no, no, oh.
Don't get me wrong with nothing like nothing like the Obama's later and then.
Nothing even like AOC. It seems no, they.
Definitely loved AOC a lot more than Bernie. I enjoyed his speech.
Yeah, he gave like one of the more like economically sound speeches talking about actual issues facing working people.
Correct. I would say, you know, a lot of the other journalists around me were talking during that time. They were not thoroughly paying attention to him, which was interesting to know.
It was the same speech that he's been giving since twenty sixteen. Essentially, I feel like, fortunately, the economic situation in the States has not changed all that much.
I feel like Bertie Sands has been giving the stay of speech his entire career.
Sure, Yeah, and like the same stuff he was calling for back then, with the with the one percent and the billionaire class and healthcare and all these things that are still real issues, and in some ways I feel like they were more talked about back in like, you know, twenty seventeen, and the fact that they aren't just talked about now is maybe, you know, to some degree, like a failing. But no, he gave the speech that he was expected to make, and yeah.
He called for an end to his words horrific war in Gaza and called for a ceasefire. One of the few this entire week that we've heard actually say that. AFC said it yesterday.
Well, and an AOC's specific line was crediting Harris for working around the clock to make a ceasfire deal was specifically like the phrasing that AOC used.
Yeah, I don't buy that, super well.
No, well, I'm not afraid to admit is that.
Because I was at the protest, I had the intention of just watching all the speeches in my hotel afterwards, and I got up to my room, I turned on CNN. They were replaying the whole night, and after Bernie's speech, I completely fell asleep. And then and then I woke up at eight am. CN was still on my television.
That is so cursed. I turned it off and I went back to Staarson.
You had some nightmares on spooling.
I don't know what was being subjected to my sleeping body.
You're never recovering from this.
After Bertie, you know, i'd say, the only other person until we get to the second gentleman, Doug m Hoff and then the Obama's later that I was, you know, the governor of Illinois, Pritzker.
Pritzker.
He he just was very very well received, obviously by by the crowd, as we are.
One of the democrats favorite and one of their favorite boys.
Early on, a favorite for the VP slot. Yeah, he's very.
Good at attacking Trump and his speeches. He said Trump is only rich in one thing, stupidity, and the crowd went fair.
Yeah, he was definitely the most like a mean out of many of the speech gis.
I would say though, like last night was the roasting nights.
Last night was the roasting Okay, for sure they did.
Bamba made a dick joke.
Obama made a dick John. We'll get to We'll get to that. But yeah, so just like visually, they have like those light up things that you have at concerts.
Yeah, you know I do.
Before I get into taking this back into time to two thousand and eight, talk a little bit about the role call sure.
Sure, And this is where they formerly like ceremonially nominate Harris and Walls to be the president and vice presidential nominees.
Correct, And let's just say it was a little bit different than the RNC. At the RNC, you have speaker Johnson just telling the delegates that we need to keep order and there's a proper way to do things. And then you had people from each state come up and make speeches like this.
Fighting for liberty since sixteen seventy where the revolutionary and all was one. We're in twenty sixteen. Donald Trump won his first primary victory ever. Let's ring in the Trump Carol of American histories, the great State of South Carolina, Crown cares all fifty of its fops.
Okay, come on.
And on the flip side at the DNC, and I had several friends that were watching on TV say it was translating very well on TV.
It was.
It was a little bit more chaotic in person, and certain states didn't match the same energy. But each state had had a song. There was a whole playlist thing and that is now going around and the energy was of a I would say Teen Choice Awards is brand. It was a Teen Choice Awards vibe with Garrison. The state of Georgia doing this.
Wow, So that's very cool, Sophie.
I will say the state of Oregon did not.
Well, No, that's because organ is allergic to fun.
Oregan in Wisconsin. Boy, howdy, did they not bring the good vibes.
Well, that's because all you can do in Wisconsin is drink, and all in organ you can do is smoke weed.
So there you go.
After the roll call, they cut to VP Harris and Governor Tim Walls streaming live from Milwaukee.
The Pfizer Forum, where we all suffered through last month.
Yes, that was where the RNC was held last month, to be like, look at us, Donald.
We're able to fill both venues at the same time.
We are so hip and cool and of course the crowd lost their minds.
Ate it up.
They love they love so.
Pretty good. Burn it's it's.
It's not a bad is this was You're getting kind of a glimpse. Ever since, like the Republicans are weird stuff, they've been realizing that it's actually really useful to be kind of mean in politics. Yeah, for so long this party has been like linked to when they go low, we go high. You know, we're gonna we're gonna make a compromise, We're gonna gona We're going to reach across the aisle.
Yeah, I mean last night it was not they go low, we go high. It was definitely they go low, we also go low, and you know that was interesting to observe because the crowd loved it.
It plays very well.
It plays very well. Before the Obamas, we got a speech from the second Gentleman, which is very fun to say, Kabla Harris's husband, Doug. Doug, I like that.
Let's let's keep trying that again.
You can't.
But they introed him with a video from his son and it was very TV movie of the Week, heartwarming. And then he came out on stage and introduced his dad and there was hugging La La Lah and the crowd was allowed, as it did Ben that night, and I was like, wow, I love families, but I was like, wow, the crowd is so loud. And then like ten minutes later, Michelle Obama came out and I was like, the crowd was very quiet for Doug and Poff. In comparison, she is by far the most popular Democrat in the world.
There is an Obama derangement syndrome. It ignites something in millennials and.
Makes them really love the Obama.
They really love their mamas, lose their minds.
Doug's speech primarily focused on painting a picture of his wife as a family, family woman, and talking about how great she is with their with their kids. He has two kids from his first marriage and they call her Mama La.
But she's not a real mom, you know, Robert Roberts. Look, I've been listening to a lot of Matt. This is a real scandal. They're not her born children. You know, you can't adopt kids.
You gotta stop listening to Matt Walsh podcasts when you're doing your workout.
I do love that the right has entirely chosen the line of attack on Kamala to be that like.
She's a fake mom.
She's a fake mom. She raised Pamala.
No, because we're quoting Matt Wall.
Oh okay, that's how he says.
That's absolutely by the way, Matt Walsh was like in a disguise.
Also, they're all in disguise walking around the.
DNC doing something that doesn't matter.
See that Matt Wall showed up in his like what is a woman liberal disguise with the with the little pony tails, Dude, Harry, I showed up.
I showed up kind of it.
Well, my disguise just being a regular black suit, which I also wear regularly all the time. I'm pretty sure whals she was trying to get some extra clips for his new like how racism Isn't real documentary that they're playing ads for in theaters in front of like queer and trans movies, like specifically to like fuck with people. So I'm pretty sure they're they're here collecting some kind of some kind of some kind of foot for that because he had a little love mic attached to his attached to his lapel, so he's doing some kind of hijinks.
But Yeah, it's interesting to me how much of the attacks on Kamala right now are focused on her family not being a real family. It strikes me as kind of a sign of desperation because I'm not saying it get any traction. It's the same as like the tim Wall stuff, where it's like nothing sticking that they're trying right now, And I think they've just gotten so far into their own fever swamps that they have completely forgotten how to connect with a hit, which is an interesting place for the Republicans to be because that's all they have.
Yeah, Duck, read the teleprompter. It's fun being able to see the teleprompter because you can see where they have bolded words or underlied words or capitalized words, and any bold or capitalized word. He really went for it, and I personally thought that was funny to observe. But the crab liked him, and I was like, wow, they really like Doug m Hoff. Wow. And then I was like, no, that's not who they actually like, because then Michelle Obama came out and the crowd standing ovations. I can't even tell you it was louder than like I've seen Beyonce concert, same exact amount of loudness, but yeah, it was just very two thousand and eight, very twenty twelve. Her speech was incredible.
What did she actually talk about?
Nothing, but it was incredible, is what I'm saying. She just basically talked about how important it is to do things without saying anything. She was able to resonate with every single person in the crowd. Every single person in the crowd was just enamored.
What it's been so many bad months in a row of news and just getting constantly beat down in every news cycle and war and genocide overseas, and a lot of people. As soon as Biden stepped down, it was like a rubber band breaking and everyone just went from what this was host did not happen as a convention. They were serious efforts by the DNC when Biden was still a candidate to like, we don't even need to do a real convention because like, what is the benefit of sticking him in front of people for longer? And they broke a pinata full of party energy and that's that's what this has all been inside and honestly not a lot of energy outside in the streets, you know, energy from the people who were there. But like, I think there would have been much larger crowds if Biden had stayed.
I one hundred percent agree with you. You know, Michelle Obama brought back, you know, one of the key things from two thousand and eight, Hope. She said, Hope is making it come back, and the crowd lost it.
Yeah.
I think that's really part of what made last night have so much of that two thousand and eight energy beyond you know, like all of like all of like the pop songs beyond like the Obamas. It's like this this messaging of like there's actually there's actually like a good future to look towards, like hope, you know, that's.
As long as we defeat Donald Trump. Sure, Hope is available was the mean theme of the night, and then she introduced President Obama. He came out, hammed it up, told his little jokes. He was so excited. You could tell he was like so excited to be able to tell his material to that larger crowd. He was like very excited to be up there. We got yes we can chance, then later yes she can chance. At one point the crowd started chanting thank you Joe, as they do when Joe Biden was referenced, and he directly said that the torch has been passed. There we go, and that is generally the summary of the night. Lib Topia, as I'm calling the DNC was very excited.
Yeah that sounds thrilling. It's really making me optimistic about the future.
Yeah, I mean I am more optimistic of the future than I was. But also what I do foresee from this is that we are heading into a future assuming the dims win, especially if they win by a sizable margin, where they get meaner to everyone. The thing they learned from Trump is you should call people names and be shit. And you know that'll get turned on the left because the left it already has, Yeah, as it already has. But also the left is going to continue not having much of an impact on the broader situation until people have any sort of ability to actually get folks out and have a clear understand like a clear plan for something to do that the system cannot easily easily contain and withstand right like little marches and demonstrations. Not only is the police prepared for them, but the Democratic Party, I think is increasingly prepared for how you isolate and sort of deflect attention from that sort of thing, like a lot of what we've seen on the floor at the DNC with the Yeah, we'll have Bernie come up and he'll talk about a ceasefire. We'll have AOC have or ceasefire like Joe, we'll say that the protesters have a point. You should listen to them now, not going to He's not going to draw any other attention if you were to like come down an attack or you know, the protesters for you know, whatever bad piece of messaging or something happened outside that actually does draw some attention, you know, Like the DIMS have not just been smart in what they've signaled, but in how they've made sure that that really hasn't become part of the story of the DNC and heading into this that was a huge fear a lot of people had, and a huge expectation a lot of people had. It was part of the planning that a lot of the protests that came in with that we are going to disrupt and damage this kind of coronation process in order to make it very clear that the Democratic Party has not made any meaningful movement on Gaza. And I think what we've seen here is the start of a replicable strategy that, unless there's an alteration in how people are organizing, is going to allow the DIMS to continue to sideline radical voices pushing for things that matter.
Yeah, and I think one trend that we're going to see continuing, especially if someone like Kamala wins, I'm starting to see a growing kind of reclamation of liberal patriotism.
Yes, there were USA signs last.
Night and USA chance and I think this will be something I'll proably talk a little bit more tomorrow or the next day after, like Kamala's like big speech, and if.
They do win, I think this.
I think there actually is a decent bit of like two thousand and eight energy and like, yes, people are excited. There's the quote unquote vibe shift. But things didn't go great after Obama was elected. Famously, like everything just kind of yeah, like the hope was mostly unfounded, like a.
Lot of war crimes.
There's a lot of war crimes and just not that much good stuff.
Yeah, I mean, the the ACA mattered. There are some things that got better after it, but the whole fight to get there was so dispiriting, and I think that that kind of broke Obama the actual like interested in pushing radical change, and then the Republicans absolute lutely swept midterms to such a catastrophic extent, and I foresee Kamala getting stuck in the same thing that Obama did in terms of like it is actually very hard to make any substantive progress that helps people. I don't know that she's going to have to deal with a Republican party that is capable of doing what the Republicans did during like the Tea Party mini terms.
That's just that's a very different Republican party. And then the one that exists now.
The one that exists now has been lobotomized by Trump, and well, he's going if he's alive, he's going to run in twenty twenty eight. Yeah.
But this, this kind of this growing reclamation of like patriotism. We've already seen it with how like you know, the NFL is gone woke. All these things that have kind of been more affiliated with like you know, conservatism or like you know, like traditional Americana is slowly getting swept up more with like the liberal majority, and you know, those types of things that have kind of been gate kept from liberals for a while, especially especially that kind of style of patriotism. And this isn't this isn't necessarily a good thing. That's not what I'm saying. I'm just saying that this is gonna be a trend that I think is going to be increasing, and it will also lead to, I think a bit more open hostility from liberals towards people that are more progressive, towards people more on the left, especially protesters, especially protesters who are not just doing protests that are big parades and marches. And we've already seen that here with a decent bit of conflict between you know, more radical attendees and the big coalitions with their safety teams. We were seeing a lot of fighting over you know, who is more justified, what's more valid what should you be allowed to do at a protest like this? And those debates are going to continue. I think we'll seeing more pressure on that front, even from liberals as well. And that's kind of the big the big trends that I'm seeing right now as we're about like halfway through the DNC.
Yeah, well, I'm going to finally go to the DNC tonight, so that'll be fun.
I'll show you around.
Yeah, you can show me around.
We're gonna meet Daddy Walls.
I'll take my my anti PTSD meds, all overdose on those meds. You can take me to the hospital. Gonna be a nice night, Sophe.
The good news is there's two more days of this.
All right, as news i've heard in a while.
I'm turning off this record.
I'm gonna go leap out of the window.
Yeah all right, bye, bye bye.
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