Explicit

VA Schools Reinstate Confederate Names | Nick Offerman & Helen Rebanks

Published May 17, 2024, 7:30 AM

Desi Lydic provides an update on Trump’s criminal trial, where his lawyers’ attempts to discredit Michael Cohen turned into a roast of the former president. Plus, Sen. Menendez throws his wife under the bus at his corruption trial, and Josh Johnson weighs in on Virginia schools reinstating their Confederate namesakes. Turn your anxiety about the 2024 election into a toned bod with Joe Biden’s Build Bods Better, the only full-body workout that utilizes the stress of watching the President speak to help you burn calories. Farmer and author Helen Rebanks and her farmhand, who happens to be Emmy Award-winning actor Nick Offerman, discuss Rebanks’s book “The Farmer’s Wife,” which celebrates the often-invisible work carried out by women around the world. They chat about the origins of their friendship, their favorite recipes, and how Offerman reconnects to his roots on the farm.

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Welcome, Henry Jo.

I'm Henry Lenek. We've got so much to talk about tonight. Everyone is debating about the debate. Bob Menendez has found a new way to get divorced. And you're not going to believe this. The South did something racist. But first breaking news, Donald Trump is still on trial. Let's get into it with another edition of America. He has most tremendously wanted.

The whole things are scammed.

Day eighteen of Donald Trump's porn star hush money trial was another star turn for Michael Cohen, former Trump fixer and all of Long Island distilled into one man. Cohen is the lynchpin of the government's case because his testimony directly ties Trump to the falsification of business records, which, remember, is the actual crime here. The porn star hush money part is just a little thing we keep saying because it's fun. So for the last few days, Trump's defense attorneys have been doing their best to make Cohen seem less credible than a Boeing in flight safety video, and they have a lot to work with.

Today, Trump's defense has pressed Michael Cohen, Trump's former lawyer and fixer. The defense has also highlighted some of the various insults that he has lobbed against Trump over the years, painting him is a man out for revenge after their relationship fell apart. At one point, the defense played this clip from Cohen's podcast in October of twenty twenty.

I truly hope that this man ends up in prison. It won't bring back the year that I lost or the damage done to my family, but revenge is a dish best served cold, and you better believe I want this man to go down and rottenside for what he did to me and my family.

Wow. That is an angry podcast. It must be hard to keep that level of anger when you also have to read podcast ads. I'm hungry for vengeance and also for when a Blue Apron's delicious home cooked me a little. I mean, honestly, I feel bad for the jurors. As if jury duty isn't bad enough, now they have to listen to a dude's podcast, And who is Michael Cohen's podcast? Even for do the people who hate Trump not have enough content? Is there some guy who's like, I love MSNBC, but it's only on twenty four hours a day and it's not just his podcast. Trump's lawyers are dredging up all the nastiest things he's ever said about Trump, and right in front of his face.

You referred to President Trump as a borish, cartoon misogynist, didn't you? Defense attorney Todd blanchast? It sounds like something I would say. Cohen responded, a cheeto dusted cartoon villain. That also sounds like something I said.

You're referred to President Trump as dictator.

Dbat didn't you?

Cohen says, sounds like something I said.

Damn Trump is just sitting there while his own lawyer roasts him. And did you also call the president mister bitch tits?

Yes?

How about resting bullsack face? That's a good one. Commander in cheese Dick, You never said that, but you could? Is that true? Look get the defense's argument that you can't trust Michael Cohen because he hates Donald Trump, But to be fair, everyone who's ever worked with Donald Trump hates Donald Trump. At some point, you gotta be like I think it's Trump. Let's change gears because Trump's not the only politician on trial right now. There's also Bob Menendez, New Jersey senator and grown up cabbage patch kid. He's facing corruption charges and now we know he's going with the borat defense. My wife.

Lawyers for Senator Bob Menendez trying to shift the willame for his alleged corruption onto his wife.

An FBI search of the Menendez home in Englewood Cliff's, New Jersey in June of twenty twenty two turned up more than four hundred and eighty thousand dollars in cash along with gold bars.

And the Menenda's defense suggesting his wife, Nadine, was responsible for the gold bars found in their home, saying they were in her closet, have a key to that closet, and did not know of the gold bars in that closet.

The defense attorney said, this is shocking. Okay, this tall blonde woman who lives in New Jersey and has a locked closet full of goat gold bars is not a real housewife, Andy Cohen, wake up. So Bob Menendez's argument is that his wife was secretly orchestrating a corrupt international bribery scheme and hoarding gold bars in his own house and he never knew it. And that, gentleman, is why you need to ask your wife about her day.

Okay, ask your wife about Jayat.

It's a little things. Seriously, though, the balls on this guy to throw his own wife under the bus. Is anyone buying this? Menandez's lawyers are actually arguing that his wife had the gold bars because she's of Lebanese descent and the Lebanese love gold, which is a stereotype I did not know even existed. Like, doesn't every culture like gold, No one's ever Like, oh, I couldn't possibly accept your gold bars. My parents are Canadian. Let's turn to some news from the culture war. Back in twenty twenty, towns across America decided to take down Confederate statues and monuments because it was time to move on. Well, now they've decided it's time to go back.

Two schools in Virginia are getting new names. Actually they're old names, the names of Confederate officers. The Shenandoah County school Board is the first in the nation to revert to names from before the racial reckoning of twenty twenty.

Mountain View High School will be renamed for Confederate General Stonewall Jackson Well Honey Run Elementary School will bear the names of two Confederate rules, Robert E. Lee and turnaroush Beat.

Guys, Come on, after all that effort to remove that disgusting legacy, we're just putting the Confederate names back. Now. It's like asking your doctor to reattach that hairy mole. Oh, like, I'm the only one who's ever had a harry mole. You know you're out there and if you're wondering who are the people who would support this type of move well, they're exactly the people that you think it would be.

Tear down statues, a monuments and the racing history while indoctrinating children is exactly what Adolf Hitler did.

What are not rasis have been We have been tagged that we are just because we want a name back on the school.

Please do what's right for center O County or store our irrigage, our history in our school names.

Okay, let's be honest here. This isn't about restoring your hair heritage. If it was, then you would name it. Hey, my cousin's kind of hot high school. I could make that joke because I'm from Kentucky and my cousin is kind of hot. We know what you really mean by this, But if you want to honor white people, why can't you at least pick white people that everybody likes? What about Paul Rudd High or Dolly Parton Elementary? Okay, we'll even be happy with white people that are just not Like how was graduating from Justin Long High? It was fine, wasn't great, but it was fine. For more on the Confederate name change, we go live to Stonewall Jackson High School with Josh Johnson. Josh, what is the what's the there?

Uh?

Does he have been talking to a lot of people who want to change the name back to the confarisee in Osley.

I think we should let him have it.

But let him have it?

Yeah, I mean, have you seen the guys who are arguing for the name change, Like, look at them. They look like they've just lost a civil war.

Like this morning.

Plus, if you're a middle aged man trying to unrename your old high school, you don't have much. These men are at school board meetings like we gotta go back to the glory days when I want state, Do you guys remember that? Anybody please remember that?

Yeah?

But they have to accept that the culture has changed.

Yeah.

Sure, but the culture has changed, whether they accept it or not. I mean, these people are living in a time where all the best musicians are black, all the best athletes are black. The only living president with a functioning brain is black.

What black people do.

Is literally called the culture.

All right.

The only place these guys feel like they're winning is the first half of a civil rights movie.

Okay, having a school named after a Confederate general.

Is racist, exactly, It's just racist enough. Look, America is always going to have some baseline of racism. You just have to direct it towards stuff that doesn't really matter. Okay, if you keep them squabbling over school names, they're not going to have the energy to go march in Charlottesville again. For example, while they were fighting out for a black little Mermaid, I was able to slip into a bank and get a mortgage.

Don't pretty joke.

Okay, So you're okay with Stonewall Jackson High.

Yeah, I mean Stonewall Jackson sounds pretty black anyway. Like, if you didn't know history, you think that he was the one who got all those snakes off that mother plane.

Okay, so I guess going back to the old name is good.

Wow, DESI that's racist. Sorry, but just a little the right amount.

Okay, why Judy, no job Johnson everyone. When we come back, we'll learn about joely have exercise programs to don't go away.

Welcome back to the Daily Show. Joe Biden and Donald Trump shook up the presidential race yesterday by agreeing to two debates, which was pretty surprising. I mean, the only thing these two have ever agreed on is that Eric Trump is not their son. But what was especially surprising was how quickly Trump agreed to the debates despite all of Biden's stipulations. He jumped at the offer like it was a plea deal with no jail time. And now some of Trump's friends are concerned he may have been a little too eager.

Excluding Trump from any input is beyond unfair. It is beyond insulting the media mob and Joe Biden. They don't get to collude and choose radical Biden's supporting hosts in the moderator's chair. That means no fake Jake Tapper.

Is this a trap for Donald Trump?

And is he walking right into it?

How do you feel about it? I worry that it's a trap.

Oh, come on, this isn't a trap for Donald Trump. A trap for Donald Trump would be more like asking him to play for Mary Kill with Milania, Avanka and Jessica Rabbit. But as worried as Team Trump might be about these debates, Biden's friends might be even more worried.

I have to talk to some Democrats who do see a downside in this, right, Can he actually win a debate with somebody like Donald Trump?

Definitely some people in the Biden camp that don't see that, that basically see this as more risky than than not. I myself would never recommend going on the stage with Donald Trump, but the president has decided that's what he wants to do.

Listen up, mister President. When you get advice from Nancy Pelosi, you take it. That's what I always tell my stockbroker, what time. There's no way around it. These debates are going to be incredibly stressful for Democrats. But maybe there's a way to use all that stress to your advantage.

Hey guys, Michael, here today to introduce you to an all new killer workout routine called Joe Biden's Build Bods Better. This is the only full body workout that utilizes the stress of watching Joe Biden talk to get you looking good and most importantly, I'll feeling great and.

I don't want to.

I don't want to.

Maybe choose my words okay, and clinch your ass the opposition and release Let's go again.

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Let's get through a goddamn sentence. Man, order Joe Biden's Build Bod's Better for DVD workout.

Now we'll throw and Pamela is laughing up the calories Volume one.

It's time to get Jack, Jack.

And Helen Raymonde joining me on the JOHNO Jove Away.

All the mac Lady Show.

My guest to Night.

Helped run her family farm in England. She has a new memoir called The Farmer's Wife, My Life in Days, and she's brought one of her farm hands tonight, who you might know from other stuff. Please welcome helenry Banks and Nick Afferman. Oh my god, what a treat it is to have you both here. This is thank you for being here so much. Nick. I think most people knew you from your brilliant comedic work. You just won your first Emmy for the Last of Us, you played the president in Civil War, and now somehow on this side, you're also a master woodworker.

I'm an aspiring master woodworker. I know some the masters that I take classes from. Would bristle to hear you describe me that well?

I doubt that. I think it's pretty safe to say that you were officially a renaissance man.

I'll take competent.

Okay, we'll settle for that. So how did the two of you meet? How did this friendship get started?

Well?

I guess social media kind of connected as up initially, didn't it. I mean, we were both huge fans of the writer Wendel Berry's work, and when we were over in Kentucky we did an event my husband was speaking with him in Louisville Public Library. And you've been connected with the work of Wendell for a long time, you know, sharing his work and stories about looking after the land and food and farming for a while, and then you came to stay when you were in the UK working on a project.

That's right.

Yeah, so all of this started on social media.

That's right. If you want if you want good farming content, you go to Twitter.

Some people go to Twitter for other things. Check my mentions.

But yeah, I love the great Kentucky writer Wendell Berry is the subject matter that drew us together because we're all very interested in knowing about our farmers and knowing where our food comes from and who's growing it and if they care about our health or not, or if they care about their profits. And so it was through Twitter I befriended them, and I had an acting job in Manchester, England with Alex Garland, a show called Devs, and that took me very close to them, and I started spending weekends there, had some of Helen's cooking and here.

We are.

You're cooking that good? I enjoyed your book so much. You really walk us through a day in your life, all of the daily work that you do taking care of a family of six. You're heard of sheep dogs, fifty chickens, five hundred sheep. I can barely keep my kids goldfish alive. How much coffee and drugs do you have to take to get all of your work done? That's my main question.

Oh, it's a way of life on a farm. It's I mean, I guess this to me is the hard work, like being on doing all this, all the interviews, et cetera.

It's totally different. I love it.

I love it from on untill night. It's a completely sort of immersive thing to be on a farm. You respond to the weather, the livestock, the kids, whatever needs doing. And I wrote the book to celebrate the people that do that daily kind of mundane work. Really, but to me, it's like really important.

It's such important work, and it really is such a beautiful tribute to all the invisible work that so many women do all over the world. Was that your intention when you came into the book, or were you just kind of wanting to tell your personal story, a.

Bit of both. Really, It's arted off with personal stories and recipes and I wanted to leave a collection for the kids of what mum makes. And it soon developed into kind of a really deep kind of dive into like what society tells us women. You know, it's really hard, isn't it to figure out a path through and navigate how do we have kids and run business and do all the things? And I kind of through the stories through the writing. It's just been absolutely brilliant to share it with readers that have resonated with it and feel seen. You know, there's not many books that I felt seen in. I read a lot, and I love stories, and yeah.

It really accomplishes that. And I love how you talk about when you were growing up. You grew up on a farm, and you always thought this is not what I'm going to do, and then you chose differently. You chose to follow in the footsteps of your mom and your grandmother. Why did you change your mind?

Oh?

I think love changes a lot of things.

I felt in love with the farmer. That's how it happens, against.

All my better judgments. And here, yeah, yeah, yeah, here I am. And it wasn't it wasn't initially kind of I want to just do the things that my grandma and mum had done.

It's like.

I'm making art.

As well through this writing and working and thinking about life through the creative projects that I'm doing. So it's not just I'm just doing one thing. And I think we're all lots of different things, aren't we.

Yes.

I love when you when you say in the book, I choose this life. I choose this life. And that's how I feel as a New Yorker when I see someone masturbating on the sixth train, I say, I chose this life. This is funny, and I had to live with those choices.

Nick, you.

You're probably you know, when you're acting and you're on set, people take really good care of you. I assume you're at this point in your career, mister Offerman. Can I hold your umbrella for you? What can I get you from?

I'm fully molly coddled. It's a contract.

So was it when you went to do real work on Helen's farm? Was that like a was that a rude awakening?

Well? No, that's actually the strange thing that attracted me to them, And this subject matter is I grew up in a wonderful family in small town Illinois. My mom and dad both grew up on farms a few miles to each side of where I grew up, and they have these incredible work ethics and family values. And so even though my life led me to like show business and Chicago and then Los Angeles, I still gravitate towards like it's like my Disneyland. I crave can I just please go to a farm and do the dishes or help you shovel some sheep muck? And so, I mean, it wasn't something that I like cognitively sought out. It happened more more organically, or I said, and I'm really attracted to this family. And I showed up and they have four kids. I come from a family of four kids, and I just tried to subtly adapt myself into the family.

Didn't work, And he's pretty much did.

And we had no clue who Nick was when he first arrived and he was working on a show call.

It actually makes me feel really good because I know that they're not going to tweet about me.

They had a big beard and he was bald, and he'd been filming on devs so that was, you know, a sort of strange look that you were pulling there. And then my mom she called in for something and she said, who is this guy, Helen?

Who is this guy?

He looks like an escape convict. Are you safe tonight? You know, are you going to be saying American?

Yeah?

Yeah, And you know she's not too keen on your first look, but she's since warmed up peasant shay.

Thank you. Yeah, yes, she's I've graduated to now I look like an escaped invalid.

Yes, congratulations. So you you worked on Civil War playing the President. I imagine that was an incredibly intense film to shoot. The second you wrap, did you run to the farm immediately?

Pretty close? Yeah, I mean it's it is very medicinal. The thing that I love about the life I grew up with and then the life that I experience on Helen's farm is is that, in this world of too much information and too much fast paced attention deficit, when you get into the subject of this book and just raising food with your family, preparing that food with your family, and just going about the daily life on a farm, you suddenly don't need modern distractions like video games or bullshit television program Oh yeah, we need.

Who needs basic cable late night exactly?

And so for me, I just find that to be incredibly palliative. That it's like reading a really good book where suddenly the way they live is like a work of art and you can you can curate it. And it never has to involve shopping for anything online or going to the mall, but instead it's just how good are your Yorkshire puddings? Suddenly, like, why aren't we all living like this?

Well, if you ever tried my Yorkshire pudding, you would know it would be better to just shop online too. There are so many incredible recipes in this book. What's your favorite recipe to cook?

I think I like making something that's gonna last us for a long time. So I'll cook up a big part of like a broth or like a Hamhok broth. You've had that before? Having you.

Please get us? Can we just stop and me a sandwich?

Get a sandwich?

Pass out?

But yeah, something that's going to warm us up after a day working outside. I mean, it's old fashioned to talk about this kind of thing, isn't it. You know, meals around the table and caring for each other and connecting and having conversations around a meal. But that's the stuff, that's the good stuff. To me, that's like so important that we try and encourage our kids to learn how to cook, make things and so they can survive out there in the world and understand where it's grown, how it's grown, and let's ask the questions, the important questions about how we're looking after the planet that this food comes from.

Has it changed the way that you look at food and how it's produced and what you choose to eat.

Absolutely. I mean my fascination with agrarian material, starting with Wendell Berry and the books of Michael Pollen and Elie Waters and many more, are what led me to my life with the Rebanks and getting to like help them with lambing and actually you know see lambs being born, reaching in and doing some assisting. Were we have a beef herd that I am an investor in, Yes, and so it's the most gorgeous grass fed beef. And so not only are these things delicious, but we're trying to.

Okay, now I need a sandwich.

Striving to work against the modern idea that our problems can be solved with technology instead of just working in concert with Mother nature, and so this grass fed beef is answering the question of how can we keep the soil the most healthy, it holds the most carbon. All of these things work together to answer a lot of the questions that are plaguing us in modern civilization, and you get the most beautiful ribbis at the end of the assignment.

What life solves that. It's a beautiful book. Congratulations and congratulations to you on everything. Thank you, so I really really enjoyed it. Thank you for being on The Farmer's Wife Bill.

The Available dot com.

On May twenty four, Hellenry, thanks and Nick Afferman, we're going to.

Thinking that's tonight.

Now here is your.

Senator to be expelled? Menandez? Should he be expelled?

Senator Mendez? And he gets convicted?

Yeah, look, I'm really glad he's not a Republican.

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