I’m so behind and I just listened to this today. But the universe’s perfect synchronicity allowed me to see this connection, given that last night was the SNL 50th Anniversary special. When Beth said, “Trump has allowed him [Elon] to have the keys and drive” my mind went straight to the Instagram rabbit hole I went down, watching clips of old, old SNL skits. I saw one of my way back favorites, “Toonces, the Cat Who Can Drive a Car”. It’s about just what you think it might be, and concludes with the couple saying, “Toonces really can drive…just not very well”.
I haven’t finished the episode yet and I’ve had to listen to it in chunks today. In between chunks, I found my way to the Under the Desk News chat and saw a link to a YouTube video that gives a pretty plausible explanation about what’s going on with Musk and all the breaking of things.
I did some cursory googling to see whether there’s any credibility to what the video says (I’ve never heard of the group that put it out and it is, in fact, their only video on YouTube right now). What I found was some really interesting stuff about a man they site in the video, Curtis Yarbin.
The TL;DR of the video is that Musk is fulfilling the plans of some Silicon Valley elites and, honestly, I see it. So putting that against the backdrop of the first 50 or so minutes of the episode, I got to a place where I’m wondering if we’re conflating what the voters wanted with what’s actually happening.
To be transparent, I’m in the camp of “we’re sliding quickly toward fascism and I’m not entirely sure the system is going to hold and that’s scary af.” So as I listened to Beth and Sarah talk, it sounded like their frame of reference is looking at what voters wanted - change, mixing things up, fixing the “broken” government.
But I would argue that looking at what the voters wanted and framing the current issues with that in mind is missing a giant point: Elon Musk doesn’t care what the voters want. And Trump is too dumb to realize that he’s being manipulated by Musk. What Musk wants is the power and the ability to make himself richer. He doesn’t care whether what gets done makes voters happy. He doesn’t care if it makes Trump look bad. He saw an opening to essentially install himself as a dictator and he’s running with it.
I fully believe Trump is as much in the dark as the rest of us in terms of what doge is doing. I also think that the people around Trump are actually trying to fill their roles in a somewhat normal way and that no one wants to tell the emperor he has no clothes. That Elon is running away with all the power and all the money.
So I think talking about what’s going on from the perspective of “what did the voters want and how can Dems give it to them” is a lost cause right now. Because Musk is doing what Musk wants, and nothing else.
This is the video I watched about the Silicon Valley plan:
Beth - when you can bring yourself back to it mentally, can you please deep dive the Project 2025 plans for the Dept of Education & esp Section 504. Seeing a lot of chatter about the lawsuit brought by 14 states & that seems to be something they could easily win. I am very concerned for the disabled community & the thought that kids could be shoved back into institutions or whatever nice corporate spin they are putting on that term. I have a non-verbal, completely disabled child that is so social and LOVED being at school with her peers. She is at the end of her schooling years, so I know this won’t affect her, but it breaks my heart that special education is being targeted in this matter.
I'm sure you listened already and just want more detail, but this is the episode where she covered the Project 2025 plans for the Department of Education:
As a federal employee myself and a military spouse to an active duty service member who has also lived overseas before, these stories coming out about USAID employees, our foreign service officers, and diplomats are heart wrenching for me. As a federal employee still currently on probation I will feel even more heartbroken and betrayed and anguish if I’m terminated. Feelings I know too many federal employees are also facing from this move fast and break the federal govt trauma. That being said I’m here in the US. We have a home. we have support systems in place enough to figure this worse case scenario out. What embassy families overseas are having to now endure, having to get themselves and their families home with no pay, no financial support, no guidance is an unspeakable betrayal of American public servants living all over this world serving their country and humanity. 💔
We expect government to be perfect. We won’t say that, but we behave that way. When any small to medium (let alone large) mistake could end up at the top of the news, that is telling government workers that nothing less than perfection will do. Empowering workers to streamline processes is fine, but it won’t do anything as long as the implicit standard is perfection, and mistakes are punished publicly and repeatedly.
I’m a professional organizer (and therefore also a therapist at times 😅). People are so interesting in what objects they assign value to and why. And our stuff and how we keep it in our homes is so tied to morality for many. So much shame and “should”s to work through for a lot of clients.
Also, I never watched the Hoarders show, but I’m so glad to hear they always had a psychiatrist with them. True hoarding cases absolutely need a trained mental health specialist! And I would probably cry through every episode, just I would through the play Beth talked about 😭
Dem diversity: Kentanji Brown Jackson—wildly qualified…a resume to match the position.
MAGA diversity: Kash Patel—doesn’t have a resume. Isn’t hired because he’s Indian American, but because he’s MAGA loyal and is about to put my brother and his colleagues in grave danger.
Dem diversity: Lloyd Austin—resume to match the position, experience that lifted him ALONGSIDE his race.
MAGA diversity: Tulsi Gabbard—hired bc she loves autocrats and kissed the ring, not because she’s a woman.
I’m still struggling with the Substack format, but this random recommendation sort of relates to this episode so I’m tossing it here - I just listened to a short interview with Representative Sarah Mc Bride from Delaware… & the whole time I was thinking, I want to hear Sarah & Beth interview her. She is extremely common sense & eager to work across differences & find common ground. She is somebody I really want to hear more from as she continues to work in Congress. Anyway - maybe she would be a great one for the White board conversations!!
I want to tread lightly here, so as not to come across as overly aggressive or defensive and also, I feel like it needs to be said that some of the very real consequences from this administration are bearing down on some of us more aggressively than others. In the "FAFO" and "let the red states feel the pain of their decisions" points that I have heard on many political podcasts, it honestly is a little painful for me. I live in a supermajority red state and I asked for nor voted for any of it. But, because of my poor life choices (becoming an educator and marrying an educator), I am now in a very precarious position as I watch both my state and federal government attack my profession and put my entire existence as it currently is in jeopardy. I am a 28 year teaching veteran and I don't know if I will have a job next year nor if I will experience massive pay and benefits cuts. I can't just look at impending change as being a potentially good thing when I may have trouble paying my bills next year and I may be working alongside my students at a local restaurant at night to stay afloat. (Please note that I am in far better financial shape than most of my colleagues and yet this is what is foremost on my mind. The teacher next door to me has been having panic attacks because he doesn't know how he is going to maintain his current situation and is wondering if he is going to have to uproot his family and move across the country to live in his in-laws' backyard tiny home.)
Beth did mention that she feels great empathy for the people who are being more impacted by these changes but I think it needs to be very clear--this is going to be very hard for some of us while others barely notice a change in their day-to-day lives. It needs to be foremost in the minds of both professional and armchair analysts that this is going to hit some segments of the society a lot harder than others so the FAFO model is not a great way to approach it.
OK, I feel a little dumb. I want to call/contact representatives. All of my reps are Republicans (freaking Utah). "Call someone who cares." So I'm not sure what to say? Ask them to rein him in? Ask them to reach across the aisle? Even if I could contact Democrats (how would I do that?), what would I say? Quit discrediting him and just biding time for the next election? I like action items and want some guidance. Sorry if that's a bit basic, but that's where I am.
I (Maggie) have called my Republican representatives a couple of times and my specific ask is
1) Can you assure me/check on/ensure that Elon Musk and the DOGE people have appropriate security clearance for all the data they're accessing.
2) I think you should have Elon testify before Congress and report what the DOGE is doing since...it's our money that he's spending/slashing/not spending. He's an unelected bureaucrat now, make him accountable.
AOC has been helpful I think with calls to action. She’s echoing the ‘don’t freak out’ and ‘focus on what they do not say’ message while admitting it’s all scary and insane.
I would remind them that, like it or not, they do represent you and other constituents who don't agree with what's happening. And I think it's fair to ask them for a response as to what they are doing and if nothing, why.
While I understand and appreciate waiting for these appeals to get to SCOTUS… do we not already know what they’re going to say? It’s hard to imagine otherwise and I think adds to the urgency that we are already here (in a Constitutional crisis). The path forward feels so grim.
I was listening to the Bulwark yesterday, and Sarah & JVL were talking. If you aren't familiar JVL is the eternal pessimist of the group and pretty much has decided all hope is lost already. Sarah's question was, if you have truly given up and think all is lost why are you listening to/hosting a political podcast? Go fishing or something. We can't be tuned into things like Pantsuit Politics and then also, want to take the posture of, "All hope is lost." I really struggled with this prior to the election. On one hand, I had people who I respect as truth tellers (The Obama's for instance) saying if he won the election here's all the awful things that would happen. And then also, was expected to get up, send my kids to school, and work my job like all was well in the world. I told my family, I get up everyday, and it's like the news says, "An asteroid is headed toward Earth that will kill us all, also here's your local weather in 30 seconds." WHICH IS IT? So I think that's why I am so annoyed/exhausted with all the five alarm fires and constitutional crisis talk/articles. I guess I am almost in the boat of, I'll believe it/deal with it when I see it. Which might be a very dumb/scary place to be, I don't know, but I've been in the other boat since 2016 and I am tired of being in that one too.
I tend to relate more to him also. When they asked him one day why he was so down because he hates people and dislikes most people outside of his small inner circle he just said, "I wanted to be wrong about people." I felt that. I too wanted people to disprove what I generally think about the public at large and so far I'm spot on, and it's sad.
Great episode! I had to laugh at outside of politics when Sarah started talking about cheese. I get her point but it slipped into what I call “vibe mode” where you’re just saying things that *feel like* they’re true. It’s a common phenomenon when left leaning Americans go to Europe and start making some pretty broad generalizations. I see your larger point but I sometimes get bogged down in the details that aren’t completely true.
I agree 100%. I am in Paris usually once a year for work, and there are many things I enjoy and perhaps prefer to their alternative at home, and others that I don't. There are aspects of culture that are appealing, and others that I find kind of annoying. The cheese is good! And, I can get good cheese, right here in New York. Though I will go out of my way for an Ispahan croissant at Pierre Herme, which I cannot easily find here. (This just led me down a rabbit hole of finding places in the world where there are Pierre Herme shops...there are 14 in Japan which intrigues me. And also two in Doha, and I have a 12-hour layover in Doha on Tuesday...and now I'm wondering if I can figure out how to get an Ispahan croissant in Doha...)
I lived in France for 3 years and I hear what you’re saying. I also think good cheese might be easier to come by in New York than Paducah though (which I guess comes back to Amberlee’s point about Wisconsin vs Georgia).
As someone who is nicked named a Mouse by my husband due to my cheese consumption I cannot pass this up. I grew up in Western Ky, and it was not until I moved to Wisconsin at the ripe age of 18, that I learned cheese is a damn world not a food. I go visit my best friend in Savannah, GA and when we go to the grocery, I ask, "Where is the cheese?" She is always confused when I'm clearly standing in the cheese section of Kroger but it's just a million packages of maybe 6 kinds of cheese. Now, Savannah is a tourist city, I am sure there are cheese shops but come stand in my Pick N Save (Kroger) and cheese is almost the equivalent of an entire aisle. So I def think it depends on where you live in the US as to what you think we have regarding cheese. I eat great cheese, all the time, more daily than not. My old hometown in Western Ky, I'd be willing to bet dollar to donuts, still does not have access to the kind of cheese I do. I've never been to Europe so I can't honestly compare, BUT I assure you, we have chef's kiss cheese here in my lil SE WI burb :) I love cheese.
I’m so behind and I just listened to this today. But the universe’s perfect synchronicity allowed me to see this connection, given that last night was the SNL 50th Anniversary special. When Beth said, “Trump has allowed him [Elon] to have the keys and drive” my mind went straight to the Instagram rabbit hole I went down, watching clips of old, old SNL skits. I saw one of my way back favorites, “Toonces, the Cat Who Can Drive a Car”. It’s about just what you think it might be, and concludes with the couple saying, “Toonces really can drive…just not very well”.
Summed up my view of Elon perfectly.
Tad Stoermer seems to think we are in a constitutional crisis and I tend to agree. And also that this is not new either.
https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZT2AQwVcr/
I haven’t finished the episode yet and I’ve had to listen to it in chunks today. In between chunks, I found my way to the Under the Desk News chat and saw a link to a YouTube video that gives a pretty plausible explanation about what’s going on with Musk and all the breaking of things.
I did some cursory googling to see whether there’s any credibility to what the video says (I’ve never heard of the group that put it out and it is, in fact, their only video on YouTube right now). What I found was some really interesting stuff about a man they site in the video, Curtis Yarbin.
The TL;DR of the video is that Musk is fulfilling the plans of some Silicon Valley elites and, honestly, I see it. So putting that against the backdrop of the first 50 or so minutes of the episode, I got to a place where I’m wondering if we’re conflating what the voters wanted with what’s actually happening.
To be transparent, I’m in the camp of “we’re sliding quickly toward fascism and I’m not entirely sure the system is going to hold and that’s scary af.” So as I listened to Beth and Sarah talk, it sounded like their frame of reference is looking at what voters wanted - change, mixing things up, fixing the “broken” government.
But I would argue that looking at what the voters wanted and framing the current issues with that in mind is missing a giant point: Elon Musk doesn’t care what the voters want. And Trump is too dumb to realize that he’s being manipulated by Musk. What Musk wants is the power and the ability to make himself richer. He doesn’t care whether what gets done makes voters happy. He doesn’t care if it makes Trump look bad. He saw an opening to essentially install himself as a dictator and he’s running with it.
I fully believe Trump is as much in the dark as the rest of us in terms of what doge is doing. I also think that the people around Trump are actually trying to fill their roles in a somewhat normal way and that no one wants to tell the emperor he has no clothes. That Elon is running away with all the power and all the money.
So I think talking about what’s going on from the perspective of “what did the voters want and how can Dems give it to them” is a lost cause right now. Because Musk is doing what Musk wants, and nothing else.
This is the video I watched about the Silicon Valley plan:
https://youtu.be/OC629l-wZBQ?si=GivtXRqgM5Uq8wIZ
And here are two articles about Yarvin - both of which mention his influence on a lot of far right people, but specifically JD Vance.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/dec/21/curtis-yarvin-trump
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/18/magazine/curtis-yarvin-interview.html?unlocked_article_code=1.wk4.SuvW.zmsj74vCS2dv&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare
(This should be a gift link)
I think you’re probably right. His families roots are in colonizing South Africa during apartheid and trying to create a technocracy.
Sarah mentioned an article in the Christian Science Monitor, but it isn't linked in show notes. Any help finding it?
Sorry!
https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/2025/0204/musk-doge-treasury-usaid-congress
No apologies needed. Thank you!
Beth - when you can bring yourself back to it mentally, can you please deep dive the Project 2025 plans for the Dept of Education & esp Section 504. Seeing a lot of chatter about the lawsuit brought by 14 states & that seems to be something they could easily win. I am very concerned for the disabled community & the thought that kids could be shoved back into institutions or whatever nice corporate spin they are putting on that term. I have a non-verbal, completely disabled child that is so social and LOVED being at school with her peers. She is at the end of her schooling years, so I know this won’t affect her, but it breaks my heart that special education is being targeted in this matter.
I could be wrong, but I don't think the Section 504 lawsuits are related to Project 2025 or the DOE.
I'm sure you listened already and just want more detail, but this is the episode where she covered the Project 2025 plans for the Department of Education:
https://www.pantsuitpoliticsshow.com/p/project-2025-section-3-the-general-251?r=2cbqu4&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false
I shared this episode with a college friend of mine who’s a federal employee in DC. She said it was a good episode to hear right now. 💙
Sending love and virtual cobbler to all the Federal Employees <3
As a federal employee myself and a military spouse to an active duty service member who has also lived overseas before, these stories coming out about USAID employees, our foreign service officers, and diplomats are heart wrenching for me. As a federal employee still currently on probation I will feel even more heartbroken and betrayed and anguish if I’m terminated. Feelings I know too many federal employees are also facing from this move fast and break the federal govt trauma. That being said I’m here in the US. We have a home. we have support systems in place enough to figure this worse case scenario out. What embassy families overseas are having to now endure, having to get themselves and their families home with no pay, no financial support, no guidance is an unspeakable betrayal of American public servants living all over this world serving their country and humanity. 💔
https://www.cnn.com/2025/02/12/politics/usaid-employees-congo-lawsuit-trump?cid=ios_app
The way you are being treated and talked about is awful. I'm so sorry. -m
We expect government to be perfect. We won’t say that, but we behave that way. When any small to medium (let alone large) mistake could end up at the top of the news, that is telling government workers that nothing less than perfection will do. Empowering workers to streamline processes is fine, but it won’t do anything as long as the implicit standard is perfection, and mistakes are punished publicly and repeatedly.
I’m a professional organizer (and therefore also a therapist at times 😅). People are so interesting in what objects they assign value to and why. And our stuff and how we keep it in our homes is so tied to morality for many. So much shame and “should”s to work through for a lot of clients.
Also, I never watched the Hoarders show, but I’m so glad to hear they always had a psychiatrist with them. True hoarding cases absolutely need a trained mental health specialist! And I would probably cry through every episode, just I would through the play Beth talked about 😭
I saw that play at the Roundabout off Broadway. Danny DeVito played the lead and his daughter, Lucy, played his daughter.
Dem diversity: Kentanji Brown Jackson—wildly qualified…a resume to match the position.
MAGA diversity: Kash Patel—doesn’t have a resume. Isn’t hired because he’s Indian American, but because he’s MAGA loyal and is about to put my brother and his colleagues in grave danger.
Dem diversity: Lloyd Austin—resume to match the position, experience that lifted him ALONGSIDE his race.
MAGA diversity: Tulsi Gabbard—hired bc she loves autocrats and kissed the ring, not because she’s a woman.
How’s that?
I’m still struggling with the Substack format, but this random recommendation sort of relates to this episode so I’m tossing it here - I just listened to a short interview with Representative Sarah Mc Bride from Delaware… & the whole time I was thinking, I want to hear Sarah & Beth interview her. She is extremely common sense & eager to work across differences & find common ground. She is somebody I really want to hear more from as she continues to work in Congress. Anyway - maybe she would be a great one for the White board conversations!!
I want to tread lightly here, so as not to come across as overly aggressive or defensive and also, I feel like it needs to be said that some of the very real consequences from this administration are bearing down on some of us more aggressively than others. In the "FAFO" and "let the red states feel the pain of their decisions" points that I have heard on many political podcasts, it honestly is a little painful for me. I live in a supermajority red state and I asked for nor voted for any of it. But, because of my poor life choices (becoming an educator and marrying an educator), I am now in a very precarious position as I watch both my state and federal government attack my profession and put my entire existence as it currently is in jeopardy. I am a 28 year teaching veteran and I don't know if I will have a job next year nor if I will experience massive pay and benefits cuts. I can't just look at impending change as being a potentially good thing when I may have trouble paying my bills next year and I may be working alongside my students at a local restaurant at night to stay afloat. (Please note that I am in far better financial shape than most of my colleagues and yet this is what is foremost on my mind. The teacher next door to me has been having panic attacks because he doesn't know how he is going to maintain his current situation and is wondering if he is going to have to uproot his family and move across the country to live in his in-laws' backyard tiny home.)
Beth did mention that she feels great empathy for the people who are being more impacted by these changes but I think it needs to be very clear--this is going to be very hard for some of us while others barely notice a change in their day-to-day lives. It needs to be foremost in the minds of both professional and armchair analysts that this is going to hit some segments of the society a lot harder than others so the FAFO model is not a great way to approach it.
OK, I feel a little dumb. I want to call/contact representatives. All of my reps are Republicans (freaking Utah). "Call someone who cares." So I'm not sure what to say? Ask them to rein him in? Ask them to reach across the aisle? Even if I could contact Democrats (how would I do that?), what would I say? Quit discrediting him and just biding time for the next election? I like action items and want some guidance. Sorry if that's a bit basic, but that's where I am.
I (Maggie) have called my Republican representatives a couple of times and my specific ask is
1) Can you assure me/check on/ensure that Elon Musk and the DOGE people have appropriate security clearance for all the data they're accessing.
2) I think you should have Elon testify before Congress and report what the DOGE is doing since...it's our money that he's spending/slashing/not spending. He's an unelected bureaucrat now, make him accountable.
AOC had a really good IG story about why it's important to call Republicans. Someone shared it on substack: https://substack.com/@jesscraven101/note/c-92447836
5Calls app is as helpful as people say at making it really easy to do, providing a script, etc. Call about a specific issue. Good luck! ♥️
I just discovered 5Calls! Thank you.
AOC has been helpful I think with calls to action. She’s echoing the ‘don’t freak out’ and ‘focus on what they do not say’ message while admitting it’s all scary and insane.
I would remind them that, like it or not, they do represent you and other constituents who don't agree with what's happening. And I think it's fair to ask them for a response as to what they are doing and if nothing, why.
While I understand and appreciate waiting for these appeals to get to SCOTUS… do we not already know what they’re going to say? It’s hard to imagine otherwise and I think adds to the urgency that we are already here (in a Constitutional crisis). The path forward feels so grim.
I was listening to the Bulwark yesterday, and Sarah & JVL were talking. If you aren't familiar JVL is the eternal pessimist of the group and pretty much has decided all hope is lost already. Sarah's question was, if you have truly given up and think all is lost why are you listening to/hosting a political podcast? Go fishing or something. We can't be tuned into things like Pantsuit Politics and then also, want to take the posture of, "All hope is lost." I really struggled with this prior to the election. On one hand, I had people who I respect as truth tellers (The Obama's for instance) saying if he won the election here's all the awful things that would happen. And then also, was expected to get up, send my kids to school, and work my job like all was well in the world. I told my family, I get up everyday, and it's like the news says, "An asteroid is headed toward Earth that will kill us all, also here's your local weather in 30 seconds." WHICH IS IT? So I think that's why I am so annoyed/exhausted with all the five alarm fires and constitutional crisis talk/articles. I guess I am almost in the boat of, I'll believe it/deal with it when I see it. Which might be a very dumb/scary place to be, I don't know, but I've been in the other boat since 2016 and I am tired of being in that one too.
I actually really enjoy JVL’s perspective or at least the dynamic between the two. I don’t know what that says about me 🤣
I tend to relate more to him also. When they asked him one day why he was so down because he hates people and dislikes most people outside of his small inner circle he just said, "I wanted to be wrong about people." I felt that. I too wanted people to disprove what I generally think about the public at large and so far I'm spot on, and it's sad.
Great episode! I had to laugh at outside of politics when Sarah started talking about cheese. I get her point but it slipped into what I call “vibe mode” where you’re just saying things that *feel like* they’re true. It’s a common phenomenon when left leaning Americans go to Europe and start making some pretty broad generalizations. I see your larger point but I sometimes get bogged down in the details that aren’t completely true.
I agree 100%. I am in Paris usually once a year for work, and there are many things I enjoy and perhaps prefer to their alternative at home, and others that I don't. There are aspects of culture that are appealing, and others that I find kind of annoying. The cheese is good! And, I can get good cheese, right here in New York. Though I will go out of my way for an Ispahan croissant at Pierre Herme, which I cannot easily find here. (This just led me down a rabbit hole of finding places in the world where there are Pierre Herme shops...there are 14 in Japan which intrigues me. And also two in Doha, and I have a 12-hour layover in Doha on Tuesday...and now I'm wondering if I can figure out how to get an Ispahan croissant in Doha...)
I lived in France for 3 years and I hear what you’re saying. I also think good cheese might be easier to come by in New York than Paducah though (which I guess comes back to Amberlee’s point about Wisconsin vs Georgia).
As someone who is nicked named a Mouse by my husband due to my cheese consumption I cannot pass this up. I grew up in Western Ky, and it was not until I moved to Wisconsin at the ripe age of 18, that I learned cheese is a damn world not a food. I go visit my best friend in Savannah, GA and when we go to the grocery, I ask, "Where is the cheese?" She is always confused when I'm clearly standing in the cheese section of Kroger but it's just a million packages of maybe 6 kinds of cheese. Now, Savannah is a tourist city, I am sure there are cheese shops but come stand in my Pick N Save (Kroger) and cheese is almost the equivalent of an entire aisle. So I def think it depends on where you live in the US as to what you think we have regarding cheese. I eat great cheese, all the time, more daily than not. My old hometown in Western Ky, I'd be willing to bet dollar to donuts, still does not have access to the kind of cheese I do. I've never been to Europe so I can't honestly compare, BUT I assure you, we have chef's kiss cheese here in my lil SE WI burb :) I love cheese.
I'm going to Paris in a couple of weeks and I look forward to cheese. I like all the cheeses everywhere I go, though, even the fake ones.
Same here! And we make some good cheese here in the good ole USA! (And some good fake cheese too lol)
mmm cheeeeeeese