Good News Is Never Pure

TOPICS DISCUSSED

  • Good News in the US

    • Raphael Warnock Victory in Georgia

    • Donald Trump’s Legal Troubles

    • The Supreme Court

  • Good News Around the World

    • Brittney Griner Released

    • Ukrainian Advances

    • China

    • Lessons From Covid

  • Outside of Politics: Our Favorite TV of 2022

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EPISODE RESOURCES

RECOMMENDED VIEWING

  • The White Lotus (HBO)

  • Succession (HBO)

  • The Crown (Netflix)

  • She-Hulk (Disney+)

  • Station Eleven (HBO)

  • The Last Movie Stars (HBO)

  • Dune (HBO)

  • The Vow (HBO)

  • The Great (Hulu)

  • Good Luck to You, Leo Grande (Hulu)

TRANSCRIPT

Sarah [00:00:07] This is Sarah Stewart Holland. 

Beth [00:00:08] And this is Beth Silvers.  

Sarah [00:00:10] Thank you for joining us for Pantsuit Politics.  

[00:00:26] Thank you so much for joining us on pantsuit politics, where we try to take a different approach to the news, including good news. There has been a fair amount of good news in the U.S. and around the world recently, and we wanted to speak to that on today's episode. From Brittney Griner release, to changes in China, we wanted to discuss positive developments and our reactions about these stories. Also, last week we talked about loneliness and how Americans have replaced social time with screen time. We said on that episode that not all screen time is bad and we're going to back that up today by talking about our favorite television and movies from 2022 at the end of the show.  

Beth [00:00:57] Two quick notes before we get started. One, our premium holiday party is coming up on December 15th. We're going to be dressed in sparkles. We are going to play a version of The Newlywed Game to answer some of your questions. It is going to be a really good time. If you subscribe through Apple Podcasts subscriptions, please make sure that you've shared your email address with us so that we get you access to the event. The link is in the show notes for that. If you subscribe on Patreon, you will see all of the information in your feed. And if you are not a premium member in either place, there is still time to join us and we hope that it will be well worth your investment. Additionally, I just wanted to mention that one of the very best presents that you could give to us this season of giving is a review of the podcast. We got some amazing reviews on Apple during our birthday month. We would love to continue those good vibes. It is truly helpful to putting the podcast in front of more people and giving them a sense of why they might enjoy being here with us. So thank you if you've already done it. If you are inspired to do it again or for the first time, thank you in advance as well.  

Sarah [00:01:54] Up next, we're going to tackle some good news. Beth, every week on our premium channels, I do a Good News Brief on Thursday. And for two weeks in a row, I've had to split the good news into two parts because there has been so much. We've had to do good news on both Wednesday and Thursday.  

Beth [00:02:21] No one's complaining.  

Sarah [00:02:22] No one. Zero people. It's incredible. There has been so much good news. Let's start domestically, shall we? Raphael Warnock won the runoff election in Georgia. This man has now won. What did we say?  

Beth [00:02:42] Four elections in two years.  

Sarah [00:02:43] Four elections in two years. Let's hear a little bit of audio from his victory speech.  

Raphael Warnock [00:02:48] Wow! I often say that a vote is a kind of prayer for the world we desire, for ourselves and for our children. Voting is faith put into action. And Georgia, you have been praying with your lips and your legs. With your hands and your feet, your head and your hearts. It is my honor to utter the four most powerful words ever spoken in a democracy. The people have spoken.  

Sarah [00:03:58] He's quite the orator. I could listen to him talk anytime.  

Beth [00:04:01] I think we should also be more specific. He has, as a Democrat in Georgia, won four statewide elections in 2020 and 2022. It's a very big accomplishment. It's been interesting to read about their strategy, how they ran the campaign, how they both really made this appeal to independents and Republicans, but also brought in the Gen Z representative, Representative Frost, newly elected from Florida, to really turn out young voters. So just a very strategic operation that they put together for this election.  

Sarah [00:04:40] Well, Alise shared this beautiful moment too. I believe it was like a Korean business and they were talking about how they voted for Warnock because he had translated all of his campaign literature, which showed just a lot of care and appreciation and awareness of the communities that he was reaching out to. And not only has he won these four races, he improved his voter share in this race, which is pretty impressive.  

Beth [00:05:02] I think you can see some of the pastoral experience coming to play in the way the campaign was put together. And it's interesting to see, like, I think we forget that ministers have to be pretty brilliant tacticians too, and that has come across here.  

Sarah [00:05:19] Yeah. If you don't know, Raphael Warnock is the minister at Ebenezer Baptist Church where Martin Luther King Jr was a minister and continues, I think, to serve as one of the senior ministers there, even as he's been a senator from Georgia.  

Beth [00:05:33] Now, all that said, it is still hard for me to look at the number of votes that Herschel Walker received in this race, but I choose to just be relieved. I'm just relieved for Herschel Walker and for all of us that he is not a member of the United States Senate.  

Sarah [00:05:47] And I'm relieved for Georgia. They deserve a break. That's a too many elections.  

Beth [00:05:51] Too many.  

Sarah [00:05:52] They're like Israel over there or Britain-- just election after election, after election. It's exhausting mentally, physically, spiritually. It's just exhausting to be making those type of high stakes electoral decisions every, I don't know, 11 days.  

Beth [00:06:08] I send blessings for their email and for their television viewing. I feel like I would be dreaming campaign ads if we had had four senatorial elections in this media market.  

Sarah [00:06:20] Of course, this election does not just have consequences for the state of Georgia, it has consequences for the United States. Now, we had already gotten to 50-50 in the midterms, but now we are 51-49, which means Democrats hold a clear majority. That's going to make committee work a lot easier. It's going to make judicial appointments a lot easier. I'm here for a functioning Senate. I think it functions smoother with a clear majority. So even though I'm a Democrat and I have lots of other reasons to be excited about this news, I do think it's just positive generally for the  work flow of the United States Senate.  

Beth [00:06:55] We got a really interesting question about how Democrats had a very narrow majority in the House, but this person felt that there has been more coverage of how narrow the Republican majority will be in the next Congress. And I said, well, I think that's because it's leadership election time. And I do remember a lot of writing about the narrowness of this majority as Nancy Pelosi was seeking her next term as speaker. I also think on the Senate side, even 51-49, an absence becomes a very big deal. A health condition becomes a very big deal, a death becomes a very big deal. And especially when you're at 50-50, just the circumstances of life make that pretty unwieldy for any party to manage and for the chamber to manage as a whole. So I think you're right that that clarity is helpful. It still doesn't get us to a filibuster proof majority. So if you're a person who likes divided government and thinks that those checks are important, the check is definitely still there.  

Sarah [00:07:54] But hopefully we're just going to hear a lot less about Joe Manchin, who I think is also thrilled about this development. I feel like I saw some writing this week where he was, like, "Great, leave me alone."  

Beth [00:08:03] He's been a lot quieter and very focused on one specific policy that he would like to see enacted in connection with any large piece of legislation. He just keeps coming back around permitting reform. Can we do it with the budget? No. Okay. Can we do it with the NDAA? No. Okay.  He just keeps trying. So he's he's really pushing for that, which tells you that Joe Manchin is the senator from West Virginia and that, too, is how it's supposed to work.  

Sarah [00:08:28] Now, Beth, on the News Brief, specifically the Good News Briefs, I have embraced a strategy in which I openly and unapologetically celebrate bad news for Donald Trump as good news for everybody else. I know that's not the most nuanced take, but it is one that I have embraced.  

Beth [00:08:48] The take that I keep coming back to as I cover in depth all of the Trump legal issues on More To Say is that our system continues to be tested and sometimes it stumbles, but it overall holds. And that feels like good news to me.  

Sarah [00:09:03] And we had two pieces of good news surrounding that system. First, the Manhattan district attorney has been pursuing tax fraud charges against the Trump Organization. And this week the jury returned a guilty verdict on all 17 counts. All 17 counts. Beth, I commend you on following all these legal proceedings because it requires a great deal of organization and memory. So for those of you who don't have a whiteboard where you can keep track of all this, this was the case involving former Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg, and it was in particular focusing on the fact that the Trump Organization often paid employees in illegal ways, such as paying their child's tuition. We have tuition checks signed by Donald Trump, giving them cars, giving them apartments, and then not reporting that, so they don't have to pay taxes on it. P.S. You're not allowed to do that, guys. You're not allowed to do that. And that includes the Trump Organization, which I believe is why the jury found them guilty.  

Beth [00:10:12] I was surprised to see how quickly the jury came back. So 12 hours of deliberations over two days to convict on 17 counts of tax fraud. Like not clear cut we're all familiar with the laws kinds of issues. It just seemed to me that the evidence must have been very compelling. I was also interested to read that that prosecutors, while not charging Trump individually in this case, presented evidence particularly at closing argument that he personally approved the plans that were the subject of these charges. So you can sense a theme and that we are dropping breadcrumbs that are going to culminate in something at some point.  

Sarah [00:10:56] Well, how do you hold the complexity of that? Like, this is good news. They got a conviction, but there's also been wide reporting that the fine is like $1,000,000. It's nothing to a company like the Trump Organization. He wasn't personally charged. It is kind of hard to hold a guilty verdict for an organization, even though Allen Weisselberg did plead guilty to several counts and will be going to prison. So how do you hold that complexity when the good news is not 100%?  

Beth [00:11:23] I think it's still good news because, look, I don't think that our criminal system being used at maximum speed and intensity against former politicians would be good news. They should charge what they have and that they can secure a conviction on and the penalty should be what it is under the law. That's good news. If we we're seeing the criminal justice system used in excess of what it would do to anyone else, even though it's Donald Trump, that would be very bad news. And he would be correct that that it was being weaponized and politicized. I think how buttoned up all of this work has been and how narrowly some of it has been charged, you could contrast that with Letitia James, who I think has really thrown the kitchen sink at him in the matters that she's pursuing against him personally. And I think there might be a little bit of overreach there and a little bit of politicization. But, to me, calibrating the system as you would for any other defendant is both good news as to Donald Trump and good news as to how that system functions for all politicians.  

Sarah [00:12:29] And that wasn't even the only piece of legal news. We also had a ruling from the 11th Circuit concerning the search at Mar-a-Lago, where they threw out the ruling that required a special master to review the documents the FBI took from Donald Trump.  

Beth [00:12:43] The big picture good news here is that Donald Trump went into a court and from the district judge got everything he wanted, absolutely everything with the exception that she required him to pay for the special master. And he did. He wanted to split that cost with the government. But for the most part, complete victory from her. And it went through several rounds of reconsideration, going back to her modification of orders, etc.. And then you get to the 11th Circuit and they walk all the way back to jurisdiction. The gating issue, do you get to be in federal court about this matter or not? And said no. And it was a panel of judges, all appointed by Republicans, two of whom Trump had appointed, and they wrote an opinion that was a full throated repudiation of what that district judge did that I think lays out a very detailed permission slip for Jack Smith to charge in the Mar-a-Lago documents cases. I just think the system is working the way that it's supposed to, even if it has some speed bumps along the way.  

Sarah [00:13:50] Yeah, I totally agree. I think this sort of slow march to justice-- we see Jack Smith increasing his subpoenas, not just surrounding the search at Mar-a-Lago, but also with regards to the false elector scheme. You see the January six committee saying we're probably going to have some criminal referrals. This is what I was talking about. Everybody was, like, are you sure he's not going to get away with it? And I'm, like, no, there's too many things. There's too many things all at once. And he's too sloppy. If you've ever read anything about Donald Trump and the way he behaves in both business and politics-- and we're going to get to the political part in just a second-- there's too broad of an array of both bad and illegal behavior for it not to inevitably catch up with him. And I think it's so fascinating to watch as it catches up in both ways at the same time. I think why this feels so different from even post January six or post previous election losses is that you're seeing the consequences come to bear simultaneously. And so you have Republicans who could maybe ignore the legal ramification if the politics were great or could ignore the political ramifications if there wasn't all this legal processing finally coming to bear. And to me, it's like you see it all happening like with the results in Georgia. I thought it was so interesting that Herschel Walker's son came out and tweeted, "Donald Trump begged my father to run for three months, even though everyone in his life was saying this is a disaster for you. Do not do this." And I thought, man, I hope every other candidate that Donald Trump ever tries to convince to run hears this warning story. That he doesn't care about you. It can be terrible for you and really terrible for him, and it's still not going to stop him from pursuing things that are terrible for him. The only thing I found surprising in all Donald Trump coverage this week is that he finally sort of ceded to legal advice and had his lawyer search for further confidential documents at Mar-a-Lago, because that seems like a smart thing to do, which is not usually his path. You see that. I feel like you just see it all coming to bear.  There's even another round that he was photographed with some prominent QAnoner at Mar-a-Lago. And I thought, well, that makes perfect sense, because who's left to hang out with them? No self-respecting Republican, considering the both legal and political stories over the last two weeks, is going to be seen with them. So who's left is the Nick Fuentes  and the and the QAnoners  of the world.  

Beth [00:16:27] Yeah. On a scale of 0 to -10, how surprised are we that they have found more classified documents and not yet turned over in response to that may subpoena? I'm not ready to completely write him off because I think that attributes to Republicans in positions of leadership, of moral fortitude that I have no evidence to support at this point. I think if something turn for him, they would turn with it. And that makes me really sad, but I think that is the reality. Putting this in the category of goodness, though, I think the clear theme is that Donald Trump is a prisoner to his own ego.  

Sarah [00:17:04] Mm-hmm.  

Beth [00:17:04] And I don't know what needs to happen to him financially, legally or otherwise. I have for a very long time just detached myself from the idea of justice around Donald Trump. I don't know what universal justice for Donald Trump looks like, but it is clear that he is such a prisoner of his own ego. And so while $1.6 million as a penalty to the Trump Organization is fairly insignificant, it does atop this pile of everything else say to potential investors, potential partners, potential lenders. Not a good plan, not a good partnership that I want to be in. And I hope that matter after matter in courts unfolding around Trump says to voters, not a good plan. This person is a prisoner to his own ego. He cannot serve us as a collective population. Whatever else you think, he cannot hold elected office again. He cannot be entrusted with that incredible power and responsibility because all he can manage is figuring out who he is as a person and how he has worth. And I'm so sorry that that is the situation, but that is the clear situation.  

Sarah [00:18:14] I've said multiple times on the podcast, the second he was elected, I thought there will be nothing that can happen that will force him into my version of justice, which is seing the harm that he has perpetuated and taking responsibility for it that is unavailable to him. And so I'm going to release that as something that I want. But I do want consequences. And  it's not a lot of money, but it'll beat him up. He hates losing and he lost on all 17 counts and is going to have to pay a fine. And he hates that. That's good enough for me for now. Now, Beth, I want to pivot and I want to ask you, are you sitting down?  

Beth [00:18:48] I am.  

Sarah [00:18:49] Because I am having a small amount of positive feelings towards the Supreme Court.  

Beth [00:18:59] Interesting. I would like to hear more about that.  

Sarah [00:19:02] Okay. So there's been lots of oral arguments this week. And here at Pantsuit Politics, we don't usually do the bated breath processing of the oral arguments. We like to wait for the decisions, but it's been out there and I think it's been affecting people. There were oral arguments surrounding the case in Colorado of the website designer and the balance between religious liberty and discrimination towards LGBTQ people. There has been the oral arguments surrounding the case Moore V Harper in North Carolina. That's about the "independent state legislator theory". And looking at the arguments, I at least see a Supreme Court that is struggling. They're struggling to figure out how they're going to balance these competing interests in the Colorado case. They seem genuinely perplexed by how to set that standard on independent state legislator. There was a lot of pushback on what the state of North Carolina was arguing that it should be able to do, which is basically just ignore state courts when it comes to election law, which is an interesting theory. And I thought, gosh, if nothing else, I'm encouraged to see a little bit of struggle, which to me indicates a little bit of humility, which I certainly hope they have post Dobbs. Not to mention the recent story we heard about like the influence campaign inside the Supreme Court way back in the Hobby Lobby case. And so I just thought I'm going to put all this together, I'm going to give it the most gracious reading I can, which is that at least we don't see this energy that was coming from the court-- the last session-- which was blow it all up. Who cares?   

Beth [00:20:40] Well, I applaud your graciousness.  

Sarah [00:20:42] Thank you.  

Beth [00:20:42] And choose to reserve judgment myself until these opinions come out. I will say all of the reporting about Reverend Rob Schenck, the evangelical minister who had been involved in these influence campaigns with the court and has now told his story to multiple media outlets. And most tellingly to me, Jodi Kantor wrote a piece about it. And I think that Jodi Kantor is very careful and meticulous in her work. And so I was impressed by that reporting. All of that brought me back to the commission that Biden set up to think about the Supreme Court. And I thought, I wonder what they did. And I went back to their report, which was issued last December. It is lengthy. It has chapters. It was put together by a very impressive group of people. And you can tell that a tremendous amount of work went into it. And it recommends almost nothing. It is an analysis, not a set of recommendations, it says court expansion is certainly possible. We've done it before. It's totally constitutional and there are really good arguments to do it and to not do it. It's hard. I don't know. And that's how the whole report goes. It explores a lot of ideas that people have, and it embraces the notion that we do get to continue to think about and work on the court, that it's not fixed forever. But the only thing it really seems to say with a lot of support from all of the people who worked on this, is that the Supreme Court needs to do something to adopt even an advisory code of ethics. That the Supreme Court needs to change the way it governs itself, which right now just doesn't happen much at all. And I don't mean to be unfair by saying much at all. I am sure that there are so many norms and processes and traditions and modes of respect within the court. But it's not enough, clearly.  

Sarah [00:22:46] Right.  

Beth [00:22:47] And I think everything that's happening around the court right now counsels that the public needs to understand when must a justice be recused from a case? How is the court functioning? How is the court being influenced by outside forces? Are these justices accepting invitations, gifts and subjecting themselves to kinds of pressure that would not be tolerated in other federal courts and in state courts across the country? So that's really where I am right now. I want to see this court meet the challenge that it has partially created itself and that might exist even if it hadn't. But these justices have done themselves no favors whatsoever in engendering the trust of the public. And I think this is a moment when they could say, you know, probably we need to be a little bit more transparent and a little bit more accountable as we make decisions in some very hard cases.  

Sarah [00:23:39] I have to say the takeaway from this report being it's hard, but we have to try to meet the challenge is really the lens I bring to good news. That's all I'm looking for. It's hard. I don't know if this is the right thing. We're just trying to meet the challenge here. So we're going to take a beat and we're going to turn to some good news we've been reading from around the world with that particular perspective. As we are recording on Thursday, December 8th, we woke up to the news that Brittney Griner, who is the All-Star center for the WNBA's Phenix Mercury and a two time Olympic gold medalist, has been released after nearly 10 months of captivity in Russia. She was serving a nine year prison sentence after she was stopped at airport security and found to be in possession of some hashish oil. This was a prisoner exchange (now we're getting to the it's hard part of the story) with an arms dealer named Viktor Boot. Eric Holder once called him the world's most prolific arms dealer. He had been charged and convicted of supplying arms to Al Qaeda, the Taliban rebels in Rwanda. He was so famous his story was turned into a 2005 film called Lord of War with Nicolas Cage. So this was a one-for-one prisoner exchange, which leaves Paul Whelan, a former U.S. Marine who was working as a corporate security executive and was arrested in Moscow in 2018 still in Russia. So it's hard. I am thrilled that Brittney Griner is being released. And also, I had a couple exchanges with family members over Thanksgiving break who were like, well, she broke the law. And I'm like, What? What are you talking about? But I think people are really struggling with this one-for-one exchange, considering who we are releasing back to Russia.  

Beth [00:25:36] Yeah. My husband asked me about this this morning. What did I think about this particular Russian prisoner being released in exchange for Brittney Griner? And I said "Chad, I just have to acknowledge that sitting here in our Kentucky living room, I don't know the details of what Mr. Bout is capable of at this point in his life. I don't know the significance of an exchange like this on the Ukrainian invasion and Russia's continued hostility there. There are too many chess pieces for me to make a snap judgment about whether this was a good deal or a bad deal." So for today, I can say, one, I am thrilled that this American citizen, who I think was unjustly imprisoned-- and to say she broke the law so she deserves prison camps and the kind of treatment that Russians do to a high profile American overseas who happens to be a black and queer woman. No, there is no justice in Russia's actions towards her, and I'm happy that she's being returned to her family. I am sad that Paul Whelan is still there. I am sad that there are Americans unjustly imprisoned by foreign governments all over the world. And I just cannot take responsibility for making an informed assessment of the million factors that go into any diplomatic decision like this one.  

Sarah [00:27:02] Yeah, there's no pure diplomacy. There's no pure diplomatic deal. And you know what, I don't care. I think so many of the situation where there's an American held and there's an exchange comes down to like the P.R. of the situation, the politics of the situation, and how good the family is at manipulating those wheels of the media in the P.R.. And you know what, that bothers me not at all. Because you bet what I would do if it was my child or my partner, I would use every thing available to me to get them out. And I don't begrudge those families that. I really, really don't. And I think that is the reality of our global diplomatic situation, is that there is no purity. We're going to talk about some more foreign relations stories. There is no purity. We're going to talk about the Ukrainian invasion and the Ukrainian war and some changes we're seeing there. There is no purity and I don't need it. I don't need it to celebrate it as a move in the right direction.  

Beth [00:28:01] I am concerned that for Americans who don't follow the news super closely, we are not still convincing people that Putin's Russia is different than Gorbachev's Russia. I don't think the depth of depravity of Putin's regime is fully understood. And it troubles me when people say, like, well, she broke the law. Well, I mean, let's think about that.  

Sarah [00:28:29] What law? Right.  

Beth [00:28:30] This is not a rule of law country. Now, I will say, and this contradicts some of our wonderful discussion that we had with Rick Steves and I think about this a lot. I think travel is becoming increasingly complex, especially for high profile Americans. I think what country you're willing to walk into with your cell phone is becoming a much harder question. And what country you're willing to play a game in is becoming a much harder question. So could there have been more care on the front end here? I don't know. But that doesn't make anything about the consequences that she has endured since just, or even on the table for discussion about whether our government should have done everything that it could to get her out. And it speaks not at all to the justness of the treatment of Paul Whalen. I wish everything in the world operated one-for-one, but it just doesn't. I really wish I did. I don't understand why the release of Bout was not enough to secure Whalen's release too. It sure seems to me like we put out a substantial offer compared to what the Russians did. But again, there are just so many pieces here that I don't have access to to be able to analyze fully and fairly.  

Sarah [00:29:43] And honestly, I don't need access to the full background to see that Brittney Griner is high profile in the same way Viktor Bout is. Like, she's not just a Paul Whelan and so we should get both. She's much more high profile and that matters. And I'm sure it matters considering that Putin passed more anti LGBTQ legislation. Again, pass legislation is probably not the right language. He issued another edict further repressing that community in Russia. And I don't think it's an accident that this happened right as Zelinsky in the spirit of Ukraine was named the person of the year, right as Zelinsky is taking the fight into Russia. They used three drones to go into Russia and attack bases that we're seeing as staging areas for these attacks on their infrastructure, which I'm not even a little bit mad about. I'll be really honest about that. That seems very positive to me that they are using this new long range ability to strike back, because I don't know how he's going to push Russia out of Ukraine without ever crossing the border of Russia. But I'm sure that had something to do with it.  

Beth [00:30:49] I think that's right. I really usually am kind of ambivalent about the person of the year, but I thought The Time got this right.  

Sarah [00:30:56] Yeah, that's an easy one.  

Beth [00:30:56] That's an easy one. I was really compelled by some reporting that the Lithuanian Prime Minister has said it is well past time for the United States or European countries to give Ukraine long range missiles and this ability to be more aggressive and not just stay on defense. She met with Vice President Kamala Harris and some members of Congress in Pennsylvania and she said keep calm and stay the course on supporting Ukraine, but do a little bit more. It kind of takes me back to that quote from Zelensky earlier in the year where he was, like, I need missiles not a ride. Like I need to be able to defend this country. I am certain that decades from now, when the history of this is fully unearthed and written, he will have made calls that I don't agree with. Or there will be pieces of information about him that take down this heroic image of him that we have right now. I am also convinced that right now that heroic image has really helped this country have a fighting chance in a war that they were supposed to lose in like a week. And so, yeah, I just take the good news where I can find it in a situation that is horrific, that is absolutely horrific and remains so. And that will continue to be so probably well into the future and has hurt people for generations. Where can I find some good news? I will accept it.  

Sarah [00:32:17] To me, the trend here that I find so encouraging and why I feel like Zelinsky is different because the the way he behaves, even the propaganda that he uses-- and I'll even use the verb manipulates-- is so founded in standing on a steady foundation of the people of Ukraine. It's all about keeping them engaged, paying attention to how the people of Europe are feeling, he seems so clear and motivated by these very  democratic populist principles. Like it's not this sense of this is about me. It's always about the generals. It's always about the military. Even that moment at the very beginning, when he stood on the street, he wasn't standing by himself. He had a crew of military guys behind him. This is where the power comes from, that it is this focus on morale. He gets it. And, to me, watching him in contrast to Putin and the drafting, in contrast to what we're going to talk about next, which is China and the COVID safety measures, and even in Iran, this fundamental and deliberate turning from the fact that at the end of the day there's a lot of people out there in your country and they need to be on board.  

Beth [00:33:42] I think embedded in that is a sense that people are real to him.  

Sarah [00:33:47] Yes  

Beth [00:33:47] And that is the contrast with Putin. I don't think Brittney Griner is real to Vladimir Putin or that Paul Whelanis real to Vladimir Putin or that Americans imprisoned in Syria or in China are real.  

Sarah [00:33:59] Or even gay Russians, hell.  

Beth [00:34:01]  Exactly.  I feel like every place that I get moral messaging from right now, the through line is let other people be real to you. You go off course when you stop holding up other people in their realness. And the way that Zelensky, even through those propaganda techniques, says, look at people hurting-- that commercial where he says 'was' over and over again. This was my dog. This was my father. This was my house. I cannot watch it every single time. I just fall apart. It is that particularity, though, of how much individuals have lost. And I think on the other side where he says, "But we are going to rebuild. Ukraine is going to be better because of your willingness to continue this struggle, it is extremely powerful and such a contrast to authoritarian governments.  

Sarah [00:35:01] And especially China where it feels like how could you not see this deal that you have struck, that we will give up some freedom in exchange for prosperity and security? And the fact that she cannot see that you have broken the deal, even this lessening of COVID safety measures, which they have taken a dramatic turn on. They've halted mass testing. They're narrowing the lockdowns. They're allowing people with asymptomatic cases to quarantine at home. I was listening to a reporting that this has been a dramatic and confusing shift to where you'll have schools that require the testing and know where to get the test. I think the protest absolutely increased the pressure as I think the economy did. But I think more of it is just COVID was not going to allow the Zero-COVID to exist. It has evolved. The strains are more contagious. And so it was just going to be a failure. Whether you were going to respond to the real suffering that these measures were causing or the crying out from the people, it was just like, well, it can't look like a failure on the books. And so to me, it's like you're not even learning that you've broken this deal, that it's not working, that it's harming your economy, it's harming your people, but still there's no fundamental acknowledgment of that.  

Beth [00:36:19] The other piece for the Communist Party right now is that change has a momentum and that the protesters see that so quickly. You can change these COVID requirements so quickly that it's dizzying and confusing. What else can be changed so quickly? And why is it that I need to be out here protesting with a blank sheet of white paper because you've created such a repressive environment? And what exactly am I getting in exchange for that? I don't see it right now. And so I do think that we are in for a very interesting 2023 as it pertains to China and its governance. And I'm hopeful, I feel really inspired by the bravery of the people who have made their voices heard in a country where you just don't even get to use that expression, right?  

Sarah [00:37:02] Yeah. Well, and I think I'm encouraged not only by the changes around the measures, but I'm encouraged by a global economy that says, ooh, maybe we should put all our eggs in that Chinese basket after all. I mean, you see the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company tripling their investment in the United States. You see Germany saying we're going to start supporting business interest in sub-Saharan Africa to diversify us. And I kept thinking, well, it's not only the people who are investing in China that are seeing the economy differently, I think what about all these Chinese citizens? What sparked it for me is I saw a photo on The New York Times and it was this photo essay about what it's like under these measures in China. And you saw this woman up in her high rise apartment in China exercising from her home. And I thought, what about all these citizens who, yeah, they're done. They don't want to be home anymore. But you're talking about a society where work was like ten hour day, six days a week, and now they've had all this time at home to think about what they want their lives to look like. Do we think that everything's going to go right back to the way it was now that not only has the global economy moved on, but I have to believe that the Chinese citizens themselves have some very different ideas about how quickly change can come to China, what they'd like to do with their lives, what they'd like those lives to look like with regards to work? This is going to continue to change dramatically, I think.  

Beth [00:38:29] And it won't change as fast as anyone would like. When we talk about the world economy moving on, it is very incrementally. We still are inextricably linked to China and so many facets. It kind of goes back to the conversation about Trump though, and about the war in Ukraine. Like you just have to take the good pieces where you find them in the midst of these long, very complex problems that just don't have a solution. They can only be improved upon. You're just making progress. And I feel like acknowledging that progress is a really good practice for our spirits. I look at the Supreme Court, just to go back to the independent state legislature issue for a second. I'm not going to use that term about that theory, because that theory is nothing other than slashing at our system of checks and balances, is an attempt to erase the power of courts over legislatures. And I'm not going to entertain that as a theory. It is a fundamental suggestion that we alter the careful constitutional balance that our whole American experiment is about preserving. So the fact that a few justices were, like, that sounds bad, it's hard to take as good news. But I will take it. And this is just the constant tension and challenge of being a person. All I want to talk about really is White Lotus right now in my life. And there was this fantastic scene where-- and this has come up a couple of times, but a really poignant scene where one of the characters said the world's just going to hell in a handbasket, basically. And another character was, like, so you'd rather live in the middle ages? Are you kidding me? And I think that perspective is the one that you do such a good job with on the Good News Brief. And I hope that this episode kind of brings forth too that, yes, things are really bad and hard and there's tremendous suffering, and we're willing to acknowledge bits of progress.  

Sarah [00:40:25] Well, I sent you an article from Rebecca Jennings over at Vox this week, and the title from the newsletter was The Discourse Isn't Fun Anymore. Which is somebody tweets, like, :"I had a nice breakfast with my husband. It's my favorite part of the day." And there's the inevitable chorus of, "Yeah, well, that's a real privilege situation."  We had a friend expressing some real suffering to us and even she was doing this, "I know it comes from a place of privilege." And I said, "Hey, hey, hey, we don't need that here. We're not having this conversation on Instagram. I don't need you to make all these 'Yes but, yes but yes but'" And I think we get so in that mode and we can hear that chorus of 10,000 voices with their inevitable critiques of our positivity or good news. And we bring it to everything and we say, "Oh yeah, there's this once in a generation Inflation Reduction Act that's going to invest in climate change, but are we really still going to make the Paris Accords?" Like, just don't do that. Our brains do enough of that just on their very own. And the Internet is accelerating, I think, that instinct. And I think you have to really be aware of it and watch it and nip it in the bud every chance you get.  

Beth [00:41:33] Well, I was thinking about this as I read the Supreme Court Commission report too, because what I take away from that report is that the court is like a plant or like a dish cooking on the stove. And that's everything in American governance for sure and really in life in general. You cannot leave it alone entirely. It must be cared for and it must be altered. And also you can overdo that easily. And finding that right place of like this is just enough seasoning and stirring and heat is challenging. But I think that recognizing that it's challenging has been the work of this generation where we went from that kind of toxic positivity-- everything's fine leave alone-- and we've kind of overcorrected now to everything's terrible and irredeemable. And it's just kind of looking for that space of like, okay, this is what we have to work with, so how do we tend to it appropriately? We're going to disagree about that all the time. And that is okay because part of what we tolerate is that this is a stew that lots of people have to eat from. It's just hard.  

Sarah [00:42:40] Well, I've been doing that in my own life. I share on Instagram this week that during the afternoons I have roped off my upstairs so that my children cannot run upstairs the second they get home from school. And then I just lose it. I'm screaming for everybody to come home. What's your homework? It's done. But I can't really check it because they're upstairs. It's just a truly terrible situation. But the truth is, keeping them all downstairs in the afternoon is also an enormous amount of work. And what I've had to remind myself is it's just an enormous amount of work upfront. The care that is required to attend this to is not a consistent level, right? It ebbs and flows. And sometimes like the increased attention, then we realize, oh my gosh, there is so much work here to do. And I think like COVID was a little bit of that moment. Like, oh my God, we just looked around and it was like everything is broken, all the institutions are in trouble. But that first investment, that sort of first flow of attention and care and stirring and tending feels like so much, but it doesn't stay like that. That has been my experience with the Good News Brief. When I started doing it, it was kind of hard and it felt like a lot of effort. But Katie on Patreon captured this so well and I wanted to share it as we wrap up. "As I listen to the news each week, I have caught myself thinking on more than one occasion, add this to the good news day, and that moment of taking special note of good news is good for my soul." And I hope this has been good for everyone's soul. And Beth, hold on just a few more minutes because up next we're going to talk about television and you can talk about The White Lotus. Beth, I said at the opening we're going to give screen time its due. And it sounds like of all the screen time that you've used this year, White Lotus is rising to the top.  

Beth [00:44:30] I love White Lotus. I loved the first season. I love this season even more. I don't know that I can say that it is at the top top. I haven't kind of put my list together. Like I really enjoyed Succession too and I had to go through a lot of seasons of Succession this year to catch up with the rest of the world. And I've enjoyed a bunch of screen time, like a bunch of movies this year, but I do love The White Lotus.  I could go this whole conversation about it if you wanted me to.  

Sarah [00:44:56] Well, I haven't watched Season two yet, but it's on my list. I'm going to watch that and The Crown. I'm very excited about it. I do have a careful list because let me tell you what I did. There's this narrative at Pantsuit Politics that I say I don't watch a lot of TV and everybody's, like, but you've watched everything; so I do think you watch a lot of TV. So this year, during 2022, I wrote down everything I watched, every movie and every television show, and then I tallied it up. So the average American watches anywhere from 1 to 4 hours of television a day, which is about 141 hours of television a month and 1,692 hours per year. Okay. So I tallied up my watching time and including the movies that we streamed, I watched 150 hours. Now, let's say I just forgot some. I'm underestimating which people inevitably do when they keep up with their time. Let's say it's 250 hours of television this year. I am still far below the average, as I suspected I would be.  

Beth [00:45:52] Well, I was thinking about this when you said you wanted to talk about it. And it just to me reflects the changing nature of television because the White Lotus, which I am currently obsessed with, is seven episodes. It's just different from watching something that is on basically all year, except for maybe rerunning in the summer. And so you do watch a lot of the prestige shows, but they're short seasons and you often binge them. So it seems like how'd she do that so fast? So many hours at one time. But I think that it's possible to consume a lot more content now because it's not like when we were watching Cheers and it was just on every week.  

Sarah [00:46:30] No, I agree. I mean, a season of E.R. was like 20 something episodes, even though if you were not watching the commercials, I wonder how it would really pan out time wise now. I will say I think a lot of people watch even more. My husband watches way more TV than me because he watches it on his phone at night. Like when I'm reading, he'll be watching something on his TV. I bet his total viewing time is twice what mine is, if not triple what mine is.  

Beth [00:46:55] Chad also watches. He has something on his iPad when he's on the treadmill. If he's on a plane, he's watching something. Lots of times when I would choose a book or reading email newsletters or whatever, Chad is watching something. So he definitely gets a lot more than I do too.  

Sarah [00:47:08] Yeah. He watched a lot of the Marvel series this year. I've given up. I'm done with the Marvel Universe. I'll watch a couple of things if everybody's talking about them, but I've lost track.  

Beth [00:47:18] Okay, I think that's too bad because I did really like She-Hulk. I really liked it. I did not expect to like it. I rolled my eyes so hard at the whole concept. It was like a super fun feminist, didn't take itself too seriously, exploration of the Marvel Universe, And I do not regret a single second of that time.  

Sarah [00:47:39] Well, maybe if I have some time over the winter break, I'll watch it.   

Beth [00:47:42] It would a good like between Christmas and New Year kind of thing.  

Sarah [00:47:44] Okay. So because I have this list, I can't tell you what really rose to the top for me. The two things I could not stop thinking about that just stayed in my brain forever. I watched Station 11 at the beginning of the year, along with rest of humanity, and it really did stick with me. I thought it was beautiful and well-acted and kept me thinking and it just stayed with me and stayed with me a lot. You watched station 11, right?  

Beth [00:48:09] I have not, no.  

Sarah [00:48:10] Oh, I thought you watched it. It's good. I know it's about a pandemic, and people are like, really? Why? But it's really fascinating. And it's a safe pandemic because it's not one that could really happen in real life the way it falls out. And the other thing that I thought, man, this is the one I can't stop thinking about is The Last Movie Stars, which was a documentary from Ethan Hawke about Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward. And I think a lot of the reason I don't watch as much TV as I used to is the older I get, the more complexity and truth I require around the human existence. And that's just hard to capture in a television show. So I'll watch things and I'll sort of be, like, this is fine, but fine is about all I can give it. I think that's why I stay true to The Crown, because it is following a real life experience and so it can sort of slow down in the way real life does or not have a neat ending in the way real life does. And so I think the reason I love the Last Movie Stars is because  it's a true story. Obviously, it is the story of their life together. And I thought it was the most beautiful, interesting reflection on marriage and love. My husband and I will celebrate 20 years of marriage next summer. And I just thought this is this story that we've all told ourselves about these two people that supposedly had a perfect relationship when in reality they very much did not. There was infidelity. There was addiction. But there's this scene and I can't stop thinking about at the end where one of their daughter says at the end, when Paul Newman was dying, that she thought none of us should have been in the room, it should have just been her because they were each other's people. And I just cannot stop thinking about that moment and how beautiful that is. And I've thought about it a lot. My own marriage. Highly recommend it. I really loved it. So those are the two I couldn't stop thinking about as far as television I watched this year.  

Beth [00:50:00] I really liked Dune. I probably spent more time thinking about Dune than anything else I saw in a movie later this year. I thought it was really interesting. [Crosstalk]. 

Sarah [00:50:09] I love that wich mama, I want a whole movie about her. I love her.  

Beth [00:50:13] That whole society. Like, I think there's just a lot going on there that I'm ready for-- I came with no previous knowledge of Dune whatsoever, so I'm excited to see what comes next.  

Sarah [00:50:23] Agreed.  

Beth [00:50:24] I also really like The Vow on HBO. We're watching season two right now. It is about Nxvim, the cult led by Keith Raniere. I think I like it because I recognize that if I were susceptible to being in a cult, this one might have gotten me. It started with this sort of be your best self almost corporate training. And there are components of it that I hear and think, yeah, 28-year-old Beth would have been real down with this. And the community that formed around that, I could see myself having gotten real excited about. And so it feels a little like it works on me in that way, creates a little uncomfortable friction in me. And then it went very dark and bad as cults do. And now seeing, I think, the questions of justice presented about it are very interesting because part of Keith Raniere's  defense when he was on trial for like a lot of bad things that went down was, if there were crimes here, how did they hurt society? Maybe they hurt the people within this organization, but how did they hurt society? I think he's wrong about that and ultimately [Inaudible} there were some crimes here that hurt society. But it's an interesting question, and it's one that I keep kind of neutering on. So I've enjoyed that. But the White Lotus is my current obsession to the point where I'm like reading about how the stars all love each other. And now Aubrey Plaza played tricks on everybody because they filmed in this hotel that they thought was haunted. It's a delight for me.  

Sarah [00:52:01] Now, as far as delight, I will say I watched the second season of The Great, which I love, which is a historical, fictional account of Catherine the Great, who I've always loved. And Succession, which we are going to follow live on our premium channels when the next season comes out-- if it ever comes out. Hurry, hurry, please hurry. Because those are both entertaining but also interesting in a really, really exciting and delightful way. And I have to say, movie-wise, I think the best film I watched all year long was Good Luck to you, Leo Grand, which is a movie with Emma Thompson. She is a widow who has never had an orgasm and she has an escort played by Daryl McCormick, who was the star of my year. He was also on Bad Sisters. I love this man. That's it. That's that's all of it. I love him. I just love him. This movie is fantastic, just so good and thoughtful and vulnerable and empathetic and interesting. It went straight to streaming. And it sucks because I don't think she can be nominated for anything, even though I think it's one of the best performances of Emma Thompson's career. And that's saying something because Emma Thompson doesn't do anything but good performances. I hate that it kind of got lost because it went straight to streaming. But, oh man, if you have some time, find some time for Daryl McCormack and Emma Thompson. And good luck to you, Lil Grand. Of course, we will be on social and we want to hear from all of you what your favorite shows and movies were of 2022. As we wrap up the year, thank you so much for joining us for this discussion of good news. We hope that it has brought some perspective and nuance to your understanding of many of the trends taking place in our country and around the world. We will be back in your ears on Tuesday. And until then, keep it nuanced y'all.  

Beth [00:54:08] Pantsuit Politics is produced by Studio D Podcast Production. Alise Napp is our managing director.  

Sarah [00:54:14] Maggie Penton is our community engagement manager. Dante Lima is the composer and performer of our theme music.  

Beth [00:54:20] Our show is listener-supported, special thanks to our executive producers.  

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