RNC Censures, PPP Loans, and Disproportionate Stress Responses

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Sarah [00:00:00] So we have a study from the National Bureau of Economic Research that set out to answer some questions about, like, how did it go? Where did this money go, basically? And they asked sort of a three part question. Did it go to workers? Did it go to pay the bills of these businesses? Meaning, like, did it go to service providers, utilities, landlords or did owners and shareholders get this money? And were they have been able to meet most of their obligations without the PPP? 

Sarah [00:00:35] This is Sarah Stewart Holland. 

Beth [00:00:37] And this is Beth Silvers. 

Sarah [00:00:38] Thank you for joining us for Pantsuit Politics. Thank you for joining us here at Pantsuit Politics, where we try to take a different approach to the news. On today's show, we're going to talk about the state of the Republican Party. We're going to take a look back at the Paycheck Protection Program. And outside of politics, we're going to talk about disproportionate stress responses. You are going to have to trust me, you want to stick around for it. First off, Ya'll, we got to a thousand reviews of our first book on Amazon. I'm so excited. Thank you to every single one of you who left a review. That was so kind. It really helps our book, not just the first one, but the second one we have coming out on May 3rd. So, seriously, thank you. It really, really, means the world to us. 

Beth [00:01:35] Thank you so much. And now you don't have to listen to me keep asking, which I'm also really excited about. I appreciate all of you. We're also excited because our quarterly live event with premium members is coming up Tuesday night, the 22nd. Maggie is really excited that it's on 2/22/2022. 

Sarah [00:01:53] Oh, yeah. 

Beth [00:01:54] We're having our little chat with our members where we do ask us anything kind of conversation. Sarah, I have learned something about you and every one of these. You would think at this point that I know all the things about you and I've heard all the stories. But every time we do one of these, someone asks a question and I learn something new and it's really fun. And it's also really fun to just get to put names and ideas together and be in community. So if you subscribe through Apple podcast subscriptions, please make sure that you let Alise know what your email address is so we can get you connection information. And if you've been on the fence about joining our premium community either through Patreon or Apple Podcasts subscriptions, this is a great time, so links for both of those will be in the show notes. 

Sarah [00:02:47] The Republican National Committee recently had its winter meeting, Beth, and they decided the best and most productive way to conclude that meeting was censuring two of its own members representatives Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger, for participating in the House's January six select committee. I thought  it was a bold choice. It was a bold choice. Ronna McDaniel, who's the RNC chair, called the January six committee  "Persecution of ordinary citizens who engaged in legitimate political discourse that had nothing to do with the violence at the Capitol." Fascinating. That's a fascinating description. 

Beth [00:03:30]  I got a few messages about this people feeling really distressed, and I understand that response. I feel strangely, cautiously encouraged. 

Sarah [00:03:45] Mm-hmm. That's where I'm at. That's where I'm at. 

Beth [00:03:47] Because I think that the more everything just gets put on the table, the more it is going to force people to say, "Here's where I stand as to these issues." And you're already seeing some of that. Our Senator Mitch McConnell said, actually, that was not, in fact, legitimate political discourse. It was a violent insurrection. He used the word insurrection. Mitch McConnell said, "No, that's not what happened." And then, you know, you saw Larry Hogan this weekend on the Sunday Shows hinting at a presidential run and saying he does think there is a lane for sane Republicans. That's about as blunt as you can be as to what's going on here. There was a fabulous open letter to Ronna McDaniel from a former RNC chair who's also governor of Montana. So, you know, pretty conservative dude saying you are miscalculating because there is a great middle of Americans who do not like this and do not want to see more of this. I understand that you've got primary voters that you think want to be fed this all the time, but that is not where most Americans are. And so I think that the more they just put it out on the table, the more opportunity we see for things to start to turn from where we've been for the past few years. It's a cautious optimism that I have, but I feel a smidgen of hope. 

Sarah [00:05:12] I agree. First, let me say, as a Democrat, I read this described as an unforced error. And I think that's right. I think that's right. So there's just the purely Partisan part of me that's like, good job. Keep it up. Like, you have a lot of headwinds, but if you want to put up a barrier like this and focus on something that is divisive and not motivating for independent voters, then I'm fine with that as a Democrat because we have some stuff to overcome in the midterms. But if you guys want to help us out with this, as Larry Hogan so aptly described a circular firing squad, then I'm fine with that. I'm fine with that. So like, that's just a purely Partizan part of me. The citizen who values our democracy and wants Donald Trump, as far away from it as humanly possible, is also optimistic. Because this, to me, shows Discord. This, to me, shows that his, you know, iron grip on the party is not as strong as we thought it was. And look, we're a two party system. So even though I am a Democrat, I'm invested in the health of our other major party. 

[00:06:29] And so seeing this, seeing this like bubbling up to the surface to me is really promising. And look, you know, forever and always the best thing I've ever read about Donald Trump specifically with regards to politics is that he never misses an opportunity to miss an opportunity. And that is going to continue to be true. That is going to continue to be true. He is going to continue to hurt himself by going after people only because he's mad and they were disloyal, whether or not it makes political sense by continuing to litigate 2020, when literally everyone -- Okay not literally everyone. Unfortunately, a lot of people do want to continue to litigate 2020, but it's certainly not the smart political move under any rubric. And so fine, keep doing it. Keep pushing people like Mitch McConnell who hasn't been exactly consistent when it comes to January six and his statements regarding it. Like, further in the corner. Like keep supporting Right wing dingbats, I don't know another word for it, that maybe can win in a primary but can't win in a general. Go for it. Fine. Keep at it, my friend. Because I think you're just hurting yourself, which is why I'm optimistic. 

Beth [00:07:50] Your point about it being a two party system and needing healthy two parties because of that system is something I've been thinking about a lot. We have a 14 year old dog, so it's not really accurate to say that I walk her as much as we do sort of a step and survey situation. 

Sarah [00:08:05] Bless it. 

Beth [00:08:05] She takes one step and then she stops there and she looks around at everything for a while. It gives me a lot of thinking time. So on a recent step and survey with Lucy, I was thinking about whether I would vote for Adam Kinzinger or Liz Cheney or Lisa Murkowski or Mitt Romney, people who I think have been on the wrong side of a number of votes, but on the right side of votes that really matter in terms of our institutional integrity. And I was thinking about this hard because on the one hand, there are moments when I think it's important to just say loudly, none of this is acceptable. And if you've been party to any of it, it doesn't work. You know, I have a whole list of things that I'm mad at Mitch McConnell about, but I am not mad that he made this statement. I wish that he had backed it up with an impeachment vote. And I hope he regrets that every day. But I appreciate that he made this statement. 

[00:09:01] As much as I would like it to be 435 to zero in the midterms, just to send that message, it's not going to be. And so I want to lean into the Larry Hogan's and the Krista [inaudible] and the Lisa Murkowski's and even the Mitch McConnell's to the extent that they are voicing what's true. And I think that it's correct. You know, a lot of political analysts who I listen to and respect, I think they are correct in saying January six is not a midterms issue. The average voter is not going to be deep into the January six committee when they vote. But I also think it's true that the overall tone of things matters to people and that people don't like the overall tone going in the January six positive direction. David French had a really great piece about extremism being fomented in churches over the weekend. And a point that he made that I thought was so good was that Trumpism, as a movement, is emotional and spiritual in nature. You can't fight it with logic and reasoning and policy arguments because that's not what it's ever been about. 

[00:10:18] So if I take that in the opposite direction and I look at what the RNC did here and the way that hard core base Republicans increasingly talk about January 6th, I think it could lead us in the swing of like, maybe I don't care about the details and maybe I don't want to hear about a threat to democracy all the time, but tonally, this is not where I want to be, either. Emotionally, this is not how I want our country to feel. I hope so anyway, and I think the leadership matters. You know, I can get depressed and tell myself somebody like Larry Hogan has no chance in a primary. But it didn't take a whole lot for people to start accepting things that I thought were totally unacceptable from Donald Trump. Maybe it won't take a whole lot to influence people in a in a new direction, and I appreciate anybody who's trying. 

Sarah [00:11:06] Well, the interesting thing to me about Larry Hogan and Kristi Noem is that they bowed out of the Senate races that they said, "Oh, we see where this is going or we see how this is being handled and we don't want any part of it." That, to me, is the less optimistic part of this whole situation. Is that you do have moderates being recruited for Senate primaries and they're saying, no, thank you. And that's hard because only one person can be the Republican nominee for president. I hope it's Larry Hogan or somebody like him. It is hard to think that we're going to have even fewer of those people in the United States Senate. 

Beth [00:11:45] But if you take a longer term view, I think that might be a form of pain that the party needs too. I think Mitch McConnell might need the pain of getting turned down by extremely popular Republican governors when he calls them to ask them to run for senate. 

Sarah [00:11:59] And, again, as a Democrat, it doesn't bother me. I hope they pick someone extreme when they lose in Pennsylvania. Not a problem for me. 

Beth [00:12:05] I don't feel that way. I would like to see good Republican candidates on the ballot just because over the long term, I want to see things improve. But maybe this is part of things improving. And I mean, it is consistent with like old school conservative philosophy to say exactly what they've been saying. You're more impactful as a governor. I mean,  that's certainly true in the age of the pandemic. 

Sarah [00:12:27] And there's a part of me that thinks Mitch McConnell sees this pain, and that's why we're seeing more bipartisan legislation. We're seeing fixes for the United States Postal Service. We're seeing that incredible forced arbitration ban that went through over the weekend under the leadership of primarily Gretchen Carlson. But I'm willing to give Congress a small amount of credit. You know, I think the reporting has been this is all about the Democratic Party saying they can do stuff, but it is in the Republican Party's interest as well to say, look at us doing bipartisan legislation. If they're going to have to balance out the more extreme rhetoric surrounding January 6th and the committee. 

Beth [00:13:08] Yes, I mean, it's hard to say, "Boy, this is a feel-good story," when the two people who I think are doing the right thing get slapped down by their own party. But I choose to view it as an opening in a system that has felt very closed for too long. 

Sarah [00:13:24] I think that's a great way to think about it, and we're not done thinking about it. We're not done seeing what's happening and where the movement will continue to be inside the Republican Party. Next up, we're going to talk about another bipartisan program passed under both a Republican president and a Democratic president. The Paycheck Protection Program. All right, the Paycheck Protection Program, let's do a little review. It was originally signed into law by then President Trump in April of 2020 and then extended by President Joe Biden in March 2021 and has distributed 800 billion dollars. It's a lot of money, a lot of money, and I think it's really, really, important as we begin this conversation just to just remember what that felt like in April 2020. And nobody is anxious to go back and revisit the emotional environments of the early pandemic. 

[00:14:30] But when this first round was signed into law, it was really bad. We had revenues plunging. I will never forget that statistic about Disney losing like $3 billion a day and thinking, oh, I don't understand big corporate business and how they work. And it was just like a massive amount of money every single day. Credit was really hard to get. We talked about that a lot on the Five Things You Need to Know About the Federal Reserve, about what was happening at this particular moment in time. If you want to go back and listen to that episode, but credit was hard to get. And you had layoffs and closures, really big ones, all over the country. And so everybody was a little panicked 

Beth [00:15:08] And knowing that everybody was a little panicked and that 47 percent of workers in the United States are employed by what qualifies as a small business. Now, small business is a huge umbrella term, as I'm sure we'll discuss more in this conversation, but knowing that so many small businesses drive the state of overall employment, congress enacted this program, the Paycheck Protection Program, to give loans to small businesses, but loans that were low interest that did not require any collateral. You didn't have to promise anything in exchange for the loan, except that you would meet some conditions to have the loan be forgiven. So if you were saying: I commit to keeping my workforce levels at roughly the equivalent they were before the pandemic. I commit to spend, I think,  it's 60 percent of this money on payroll. I commit to spend the rest of the money on things like utilities and rent, and I commit to keeping wages at about 75 percent of pre-pandemic level. If you met those commitments, then you got to just keep the money. So they functioned more like grants at the end of the process. Assuming that you stayed with those parameters. 

Sarah [00:16:17] And people took advantage of the program, it was like 94 percent of eligible firms applied for the Paycheck Protection Program. So we have a study from the National Bureau of Economic Research that set out to answer some questions about like, how did it go? Where did this money go, basically? And they asked a sort of a three part question. Did it go to workers? Did it go to pay the bills of these businesses? Meaning like did it go to service providers, utilities, landlords or did owners and shareholders get this money? And were they have been able to meet most of their obligations without the PPP? 

Beth [00:16:55] Can I ask you a question about how you felt about this before we go through what they found? As I was reading it, it felt so weird to me to read about the beginning of the pandemic as like so definitively in the past and to be talking about the results of this as though we are definitely in a new moment of time, like the whole thing has shaken out and now we can review it. And I just wondered how that felt to you. 

Sarah [00:17:19] I feel like economically that is a fair way to discuss it post-vaccination. I think economically been past the point where the risk of massive fallout or the level of impact that we were seeing at the beginning of the pandemic and the level of unknown because we didn't know when we get vaccines, we didn't know how effective the vaccines were. Cause, I mean, I feel we've talked about this so much when it comes to the economy. It's really about knowns and unknowns. And for better or for worse, when we entered the known period with the vaccines, that does feel like  that's a very, very, different phase. So they set out to answer these questions. And, I mean, I think that -- I don't know if you felt this while you were reading, I felt the authors went out of their way to be extraordinarily nuanced and extraordinarily fair. Like they were trying to say, this was hard and there were benefits -- before they give us some statistics that will make you mad. 

Beth [00:18:16] One hundred percent. I thought this was a very well done, robust after action review. I think it deserves probably to be updated in a couple of years when we have even more benefit of hindsight. But I liked that they said this is not a thumbs up or thumbs down. This is a what can we learn moment. 

Sarah [00:18:33] Yeah. Yeah. So they say it definitely prevented job losses. They measure it in what they call job years, which is basically like one job for one year, like that's how they measure it. And they say it prevented 1.98 to three million job years of employment that was saved through the PPP loan. So that's a lot that's nothing to, you know, write off. Jobs were saved because of this program. 

Beth [00:18:55] They also said that most of the money did not ultimately go to payroll. So remember that if I'm a business and I get this, I have to commit that 60 percent of the money goes to payroll in order for my loan to be forgiven. Very difficult to reconcile that condition with the finding that only between 23 to 34 percent of Paycheck Protection Program dollars went directly to workers who might have otherwise not lost their jobs. Three quarters of these funds were sent to the top quintile of households because those are the households that are going to be shareholders in companies. So the authors found that the program was highly regressive in this way. 

Sarah [00:19:40] And they spent a lot of time talking about the government administration side of this. So why did this happen? I love the analogy they use. They say the United States chose to administer the emergency aid using a fire hose instead of a fire extinguisher with the predictable consequences that virtually the entire small business sector was doused with money. And so what they talk about is that in other high income countries like, let's say, Canada, where they were doing basically wage subsidies, they already had a very good like administrative system for monitoring worker hours already in place. And so they were able to target the money. They were able to use a fire extinguisher to go in and say, "Okay, where are the biggest fires?". 

[00:20:24] Like,  you're obviously going to think like the tourist section or the restaurant section. So they're going to go in and be able to subsidize those wages because they're already monitoring the hours and they have the information to do that. We don't have that system. So Congress was faced with this choice. Do we want to be able to respond quickly or do we want to be able to respond in a targeted manner because we cannot have both.  We cannot have both. We are going to have to trade off. Do we want to get the money out fast or do we want to get the money out like in a very specific way? And they chose to get it out quickly. And the authors are clear, like it was a fair trade off. That was real. 

Beth [00:21:03] I think part of what is so helpful about this report is the reminder that there are trade offs in the program, and I would love to see this framework apply to a lot of our after action review on the public health side as well. Like decisions have been made, policy decisions have been made at certain points. And we're going to have to look at some of those as legitimate in hindsight, even if they didn't produce the optimal outcomes with the benefit of more information.  

Sarah [00:21:29] And they're clear. They say like very clearly, this should not be seen as a programmatic failure. Like, we just want to describe what happened. We're not saying that this program was a failure, and I'm about to have some real harsh critiques of the PPP program. And I agree. Like, I can critique it and say this part went badly. It's not even that. My critique is actually not even a critique, it's just a request for awareness. Which is that, you know, they specifically compare it to the stimulus checks and the unemployment insurance extensions. And they say like those were applied more equally. That's what we know. That went to people who needed it. It was not as regressive as this. And what bugs me so much as we take this sort of like look back at the PPP program, is that it's just silent. 

[00:22:19] All these conversations about the money the government put out there, all these sort of assumptions and implications that the government poured money out to the system and that's why we have inflation. It is the government, government, government. I feel like those are coming from places and people that received PPP money. And that's what makes me so angry. Is it just feels like there is -- you know what I think they're sort of programmatic look back is so fair. I feel like what's happening among the American people? Not fair. It's not fair. It's not being, you know, we're not being clear eyed about the money that came from the government's response to COVID. We're focusing all of the stimulus checks and the unemployment insurance and just forgetting this massive amount of money that, oh just so coincidently, went to the top income earners. 

Beth [00:23:09] So just to make sure everyone is tracking with you here, you are saying that we have a lot of people who have the biggest stake in the overall economy because they have the most money criticizing government programs, that they willingly participated in themselves, for pumping too much money into the economy. You put too much money in my hands and now what shall I do with it and there goes inflation. 

Sarah [00:23:35] Not even like overly critical. It's like it doesn't exist. I feel like nobody even talks about PPP anymore. It doesn't come up in these conversations.

Beth [00:23:44] But it comes up for tiny businesses still. I mean, this had a massive impact.in non-profits, religious organizations. 

Sarah [00:23:50] Yeah, my church. Listen, I'll say that. I'll say like, it doesn't come up except for we just had our annual meeting in our church. And we talked, and our treasurer came up and said, we got this money from the government. It was hugely impactful. And I hope that lands. But it still feels a little bit to me like there's individual stories about how this program was good and impacted people. But there's not an equivalent to like we're quick with the stories of people who abuse the unemployment insurance, we're quick with the stories of stimulus check corruption, right?  That's the leading narrative about those programs; whereas, the PPP, there's no conversation of like -- and again, I'm not saying it shouldn't have happened. I'm just saying I do want some opened eyed like people on unemployment or people like criminals using the stimulus check weren't the only people getting money that they didn't need. 

[00:24:44] And, again, I'm not even mad at the people who applied. I'm really not.  I have lots of businesses in my community who got PPP money, and maybe it helped a little and they ended up not needing it. But it's like they didn't know that when they applied. I just would like a little more open and transparent conversation postdoc and a little more like, you know, instead of just ongoing criticism of the government. I feel like this is like a really good moment where we can talk about like the complexities of government programs  where it's not always just bad actors are, you know, lazy or corrupt bureaucrat. Sometimes it's just, we're trying. It didn't work and I benefited, and I just want to be honest about that, you know. 

Beth [00:25:21] I think it's hard to do a complete retrospective on this because of that dynamic that people applied for the funds with a certain set of assumptions about what was going to happen. And then not a lot of those assumptions panned out. I think that some of the businesses that most needed these dollars, the dollars were not enough for. The local restaurants, local exercise facilities, places that really, really, hurt. This didn't do enough to get many of them, child care facilities, it couldn't get them over the hurdle. And I'm like you, I don't begrudge anybody who said, "Well, this is being offered to me. I'm going to take it." I think that is a perfectly reasonable stance. At the same time, how do you then assess the effectiveness of that money if you took it and then had a completely different set of needs? Part of what really struck me here is that if you look at Paycheck Protection as an attempt to preserve the status quo through a crisis, and when I look at those conditions for getting the money without repayment, that's what it feels like to me. 

[00:26:28] We want to preserve the status quo best we can through a crisis. We had a flaw in our reasoning from the beginning because the status quo was unpreservable  with any amount of money.  So is it better to let some of the fallout happen? Is it better to recognize we really did need to remobilize a lot of people's labor during the pandemic and we didn't do it. We let things pretty well stay and then we let our logistics sector collapse under the weight, you know. Would it have been better to have something that wasn't focused on preserving the status quo? It was focused on shifting people and resources where they needed to go as this thing evolved. I think that's a really hard question, but it's one that I'm interested in talking more about because I don't think this is the last crisis that will have where preserving the status quo might be the wrong goal from the beginning. 

Sarah [00:27:26] Well, and that's what I think bugs me about it. Is it feels like this was so different and so many people got so much money that there is a real opportunity to disrupt, in particular, the status quo around how we talk about government and money and how we think about government programs and money. Because it wasn't just poor people getting this money and it was widely accessed, I guess, in a way that other programs haven't been. And it feels like, well, this is the moment, like, let's acknowledge.  Like, it's these narratives we tell ourselves about government funding are a little more complex than we want to acknowledge. And but I'm worried that's not going to happen because what politician is going to want to stand up and say, "Oh man, we passed all this money to rich people. Let's talk about how we can do better next time." I just think that's unlikely. 

Beth [00:28:14] That's another tough thing about assessing it, though, because it's a fair critique to say this program is highly regressive. But we have a highly regressive economy on every dimension. We have a highly inequitable economy. So where we putting this program in place both to preserve the status quo, but also to shift it and make it a little bit fairer? We have miraculously done that with some of the pandemic programs. We've made progress in that direction. But that is a steep ask for an emergency program that's supposed to be temporary in nature. So, you know, I just don't know if that's a fair critique of it or not. It met the economy it found. 

Sarah [00:28:54] Yeah. Well, and I better not hear that narrative coming out of Josh Hawley's mouth. No, I mean, I don't want Democrats and progressive resting on this waiting for Republicans to point this out, you know, the new like sort of populist Republicans. Especially since it was the Biden wave of this relief that actually was targeted where they came in and said, "Okay, you need to show us revenue loss and then you can have the money." And I feel like that is also not something people know or not something people talk about. And that's a lost opportunity coming from Democrats. 

Beth [00:29:24] I think that's right. There is a ton to talk about here, and I just want to encourage everybody to stay in the mindset of this study because I think it talks really fairly. 

Sarah [00:29:34] Yes, they're so fair. And that's the thing. It's like no one's trying to Monday morning quarterback a pandemic. I mean, some people are and sometimes it's dessert. But you know what I mean, in this particular circumstance, I think the idea of like we just didn't know. And honestly, the at the end of the day, the best, most powerful tool the government often has is just to throw a lot of money at stuff. And I know people don't like to hear that, but it's the truth. We threw a lot of money at the pandemic. And so I don't think there's anything wrong with going like, "How did that turn out? Do we like it? Do we not like it?" Without it turning into another like sort of battleground or Partisan warfare? 

Beth [00:30:10] When I was a lawyer doing family law, you know, I was in these crisis situations and people would call and talk to me for hours about their emotions, which were very real. And I'm a pretty empathetic person and so I could get sucked into that pretty fast. And I often had to pause and say, "I just want you to understand that I have to charge you for the time we're spending together. And all I can do is money." And ultimately, the reason that was not a sustainable profession for me is because all I could do is money, and those situations cried out for a lot more than money. 

[00:30:46] Money was really important, but it was almost never the most important thing happening in those dynamics, and I think that's been true about the pandemic. And so as you evaluate especially the federal response, I think we just have to remember that limitation. I think you're right. The federal government can mostly direct funding. And so saying, how can they do that most effectively is hugely important. But I think we also in terms of just approval, disapproval, right track, wrong track kind of questioning, have to remember that there were a million factors here that had nothing to do with money and that any amount of money could not have changed. Yeah. 

Sarah [00:31:23] Yeah. So where are you at on the PPP loan program here in the year of our Lord 2022, on Valentine's Day, as we're recording? 

Beth [00:31:31] I think knowing what we knew at the time that it was initiated, and I'm talking about under the Trump administration, I think it was the right thing to try. And I think that the way that it got kind of re-tooled under the Biden administration was good, and those were steps in the right direction. And I do think there is a whole lot to learn from here. And whether that is a whole lot to learn about infrastructure, as the authors describe in this report, or about just in a public policy conversation, like what should our goals be in the next crisis? I hope that we follow both of those lines of questioning. What about you? 

Sarah [00:32:11] I feel a little bit better. I feel a little less angry. I was running really hot on the PPE program because I just felt like, you know, it's public information. I know who got it. And then I know what you're saying about stimulus and people not wanting to work, and it was just making me mad. And so I really, more than anything, I just wanted to stay front of mind. I just don't want this to fade away because it's politically convenient for people. And because I do think it presents an opportunity to really open up some room and movement around how people think about government and government funding, and I just don't want that opportunity to pass us by. 

Beth [00:32:47] And if I could just make a suggestion about how to do that, if I were representing a district, I would come back to my district and talk with businesses that made it through the pandemic successfully, businesses that were really harmed, businesses that closed and talk through like what kind of decisions were you making and where did this help you and not help you? Because all we can do is learn from it now. Like, I think that there is a real way to connect within your community because everybody did this. There is not a company on earth, including Pantsuit Politics LLC, that didn't have to sit down and have hard conversations. Okay, what are we going to do differently now? And how did that go for us in retrospect? And who did that serve and who did it leave behind? I think everybody can understand the situation that Congress was in here, if they put it to us on those terms. 

Sarah [00:33:33] I do want to clarify we had car conversation about the pandemic. We did not apply for PPP funding. 

Beth [00:33:38] We did not. 

Sarah [00:33:39] So and, again, no judgment if you did. I know it [Inaudible] to businesses. I just want to bring as much as we can as we move further and further out lessons learned, clarity and just transparency to PPP and what it did in so many communities. But the other excellent idea for us to have a conversation about, disproportionate stress responses because we both experienced those last week. 

Beth [00:34:14] We did. It's funny because if you had asked me how I was feeling, I don't think I would have said that. I felt particularly stressed. But I think that like everybody in my way, my string just keeps tightening. And I felt the full impact of that last week. But you had a really dramatic tightening of the string last week. So you want to tell that story first? 

Sarah [00:34:37] Well, first, let me ask you. What finally got your attention? 

Beth [00:34:40] So I spent last Friday substitute teaching. If you missed our first conversation about that, just a little recap consistent with the discussion Sarah and I just had, where I mentioned we probably needed a redeployment of human resources during the pandemic. We both had felt for a while like we needed to contribute more to the education system, which like logistics and health care, it also was not adequately supported over the past couple of years. So we both applied to be substitute teachers. The process moved fairly quickly, probably not as quickly as anyone would have liked in my school district. But district did a great job. It's just an onerous process under state law. And I was in a classroom on Friday, first grade classroom. And it was a fine day. I would not have described the day as stressful other than just getting acclimated to a setting I hadn't been in before. 

[00:35:30] Kids were good. It was a fun day. They were all jazzed about Valentine's Day and the Super Bowl. If I needed to get their attention, I could just say, "When I say Bengals, you say who dey."  And they loved it. And so everything went fine. I was not as exhausted as I expected to be at the end of the day. I was on my feet the whole time. I was interacting with little people. But I feel like my HR experience prepared me for this because it was a lot of they basically know their routines and what they need to do. And I'm just there to make sure everybody's okay. And someone needs something every second, but adults do too. So it was the same kind of energy. But I got home and then kind of settled in to look at what I had missed from my normal workday, and there was a whole lot of feedback coming in about the Olympics episode. 

[00:36:13] And I did not handle it well. And what got my attention is that there was a point where I said out loud in my office, "Maybe I don't want to do this anymore," which I have said not once since we started the podcast, not once. And it's not like it was about what it was about because we get feedback about like abortion. And I mean, there are moments when the feedback is much more intense than what we saw on Friday. But it just hit me so hard and I realized, you know, Beth, you need to take a pause here and just kind of examine what's going on because clearly there's something unarticulated that is creating this tension inside you. 

Sarah [00:36:56] You had a similar experience. My stress had been stacking up. I had a really hard week last week. I was coming off a long visit. My father had been in town for 10 days. My dad's a great houseguest, but it's still a long visit. We had had some really difficult family situations. Not mine to share, but they were really hard and they were really stressful. I had another cold. I fell on the ice. And I got to the point on Tuesday where I woke up and thought I just felt really down and weepy and depressed. And I'd been sort of blaming my disruptions in sleep for weeks on like either caffeine or hormones. And I'd cut caffeine and I knew where I was with my hormones and I thought, okay, I think that you need to acknowledge that this is not these, you know, external issues, but just stress. Your body is really stressed. You are really stressed.  

[00:37:46] So I took a mental health down Tuesday and I was feeling better. But, you know, we recorded several things over the course of the week where I was coming in hot. I was coming in hot and I acknowledge that. You know, it's so funny our audience is like either, you know, there's the Enneagrams ones are like [Inaudible]. They like it when I come in hot. But there are people who don't. And there were people who felt probably, I think, like rightfully so, like, this is out of character. Like, this feels a little like a swerve from what you're sort of normal content. And I thought a lot about that. Like, I thought about it a lot about like the power of social relationship that like people don't know what's going on in my life. Like that Tuesday, I had such a terrible day and I was trying to get it together. 

[00:38:34] And I sat down and somebody had written a comment on the blog that was like, "You say, like, too much. I read transcripts and it's even worse. You need to work on that." And I just burst into tears. Like I just can't take this anymore. But also, it's weird because there were real positive parts of that. I think so many of our listeners who I know love and care about us saying, like, "You're coming in hot." Like, they didn't know what was going on. But I think in a way they did know like that something was up, you know, because I do feel like it was a little bit of a swerve. And so enough people saying, "Hey, this this feels different," sort of, you know, got my attention. Well, but let me just share -- Beth already heard the story. Let me share the most dramatic moment of a disproportionate stress response of my week last week. 

[00:39:23] Oh my god, I can't believe I'm telling the entire of this story, but here we go. On Wednesday, I went out for Galentine's Day. Things for fun. Everything's getting better. And as it does around a table of women in their late 30s, 40s, late 40s, it took a turn to, you know, skincare, plastic surgery, botox. Beth knows. Beth have been curious about Botox for a while. Pretty curious. I'm interested. I got some elevens. I look at my face every morning on the news brief. I'd like for them to be less steep. Okay, so I've been curious. And just like on a whim, which my husband's like you always do this, is probably another part of the stress response. I was like, I'm a do it. I'll go do it tomorrow. So on Thursday, I went and got a sprinkle, just a tiny little amount of Botox first time. But it's nerve racking, right? Was this perhaps the best mental state for me to be in to have something injected into my face for the first time?  Probably not. But I did it. 

[00:40:15] I did it just the same, but I was nervous. I got through it. It was fine. And I start texting a fellow podcaster who has a passion for skin care, but whose name I won't name, even though she names my name on her podcast all time, it's fine. And she was like giving me advice about aftercare,  good, fair advice, whatever. But I had not done any of it. In fact, I had done some sort of what the internet like contraindicated. Like, you're not supposed to exercise. And I've been on this long walk. And she was like, [Inaudible] smear sunscreen on your face. Oh, I did that, too. So I'm like in a panic. I start to panic, feel myself a little bit blacking out have to sit down. And it's like, I think back on it, I'm like, okay, so when I started to black blackout, what was I thinking? It's not like I thought I was like having sudden onset botox death. Like, I don't know what I thought was going to happen, but I just felt -- I mean, Beth knows this. We've talked about this. 

[00:41:09] I have what some might describe as a hyper vigilance about my body. Like, I know I'm going to die, but it's not going to be because I ignored something. You know what I mean? Like, this is my like the fundamental principle in life, okay? And so I'm like starting to panic and so ya'll I had to get up off my bathroom floor. I walked into my bathroom and fully fainted like one of those fainting goats just out over to the side. This has never happened to me before. I have never passed out for my anxiety, but I did. And I thought, how much -- like, you know that Oprah has that thing like first life sends you a tap on the shoulder and then life sends you like , you know, a tiny pebble to the side of the head. And then it gives you a brick upside the face. And I thought, "Well, this is like the fullest physical manifestation of my body being like, girl, you need to calm down. Calm down." 

[00:42:02] I was fine. I put my legs up. My doctor was like, "Oh my goodness, gracious. Like, the worst that could happen is bruising. Chill out as long as you didn't like, lay down take an app for like several hours afterwards. You are fine. Everybody's fine, everything's fine." And I calmed down, but I was like, I could not get over the fact that I fully fainted. Just like I've blacked out a little bit when I was pregnant, cause I had low blood pressure. But when I tell you I was unconscious and then woke up and it took me a second to figure out where I was, like some Victorian lady, it was totally wild. Totally wild. 

Beth [00:42:42] And just let me just underscore, Sarah is perhaps underselling her commitment to discovering what ails her. And she is very serious about immediately identifying the cause and rectifying it so that feels 100 percent again in all circumstances. 

Sarah [00:43:03] Yes. 

Beth [00:43:04] So I can imagine the stress level about the Botox, but then also that stress level magnified by the fainting. That's a lot for you to process in one day. 

Sarah [00:43:14] Yes. It's so much. And I think there was a sense of like, I can't. It was probably the loss of control. Like whatever I've done wrong, I've already done. The Botox is already in my face. But it was just like when you said disproportionate stress response, I was like, "Oh, I think I  have a good example of that." Me over here like a fainting goat. Ya'll, it was a scene and I could not stop talking about it. My husband was like, "I do not want to hear another word," and I was like, "I fainted. We have to talk about this for at least three more days." 

Beth [00:43:44] It is a really difficult thing to talk about because number one, we do share so much of ourselves in public spaces that it is sometimes difficult to remember that there are things that we don't share in public spaces and to process for us what do I share and not share? And so there's that layer. For me, the other thing, though, is again, I really cannot make a good list of why I'm stressed right now. There's an ambient quality to it. It is almost like I am stressed because what else would we be? And then on another level, I'm stressed about being stressed because I can't make that list. Like, it feels unearned or undeserved or like I'm so aware of everyone else's stress and the reasons for it and mine seems to pale in that sort of Olympics of who gets to feel, that I kind of feel like I need to issue a disclaimer anytime I say something about how I'm feeling. And that winds me up tighter. 

[00:44:44] And I think that after spending all day so dialed in to how kids were feeling, I just I was dialed all the way up for myself too. And because I spent all day teaching myself to take it seriously that this little girl's sore on her arm really is very distracting for her. That this little girl's experience of the boy who's more interested in Pokémon than her is very distracting. That for this little boy that skin that won't come off his index finger is very distracting. Like, I spent all day saying, "Do not minimize what they're feeling." And so then I came home and I didn't minimize for myself either. And it turns out that I do a lot of minimization for myself. And things really come undone when I don't. 

Sarah [00:45:31] Yeah. I can't name one thing that I realize has been stressing me out. I don't know if like stress is the right word. Just like affecting me that I've been meaning to talk to you about as well. And it's very related to the the Botox, which is I got old over the pandemic and it was like I was shielded from the impact of that. Listen,  I don't use old pejoratively. I take every day. I don't take a single day for granted. I have friends that aren't here. I don't forget that. But like I turned 40 over the pandemic. My youngest child went to kindergarten over the pandemic. And that's fine. Those are like big, important milestones. But I didn't get that like external reminder of like, hey, like you're in a different phase of life now. And what I mean is like now that things are getting a little bit back to normal, like we went to two big community events which we had not been to in basically two years. 

[00:46:23] I rolled into the first one and a girl that used to babysit for me was at the bar. And I'm like, wait, what? What's happening? She's not legal. She can't drink. And then the second one we went to, we were the oldest couple at the table. And like, you know, the other couples were like having babies and getting married. And I thought, but I'm in that group. Oh, I'm not in that group anymore. I'm not in that group. It happened over the pandemic in  secret, and now it's like hitting me in the face constantly. And I'm not mad.  I have no great aversion to aging. I really don't. I realize I just told  the story about myself getting botox. But I swear to you like I'm very happy to age. But it just kind of  hit me all at once and dealing with all this stuff like, you know, the parenting issues get harder and more difficult. We're dealing with that. You know, caregiving and family relationships get harder, and we're dealing with that. And and just imagine it stacks up on you until you're fainting, literally on your chair in your bedroom over some botox. 

Beth [00:47:18] Yeah, it is tough to hold on to both things that I have such an abundant life that makes me so happy. That is everything I would choose if I had chosen all of it consciously. In terms of its effect on what it feels like to be me every day, it's wonderful. I have no complaints. And also I  I'm wound up right now, and I've got to work on it. But I am wound tight right now. 

Sarah [00:47:43] And so that's just what I want to say. Like, if you sensed in our shows and our premium content that we're wound up a little tight, you're correct. I appreciate your love and support. Like I really did feel like there was a big part of our community that was like, "Hey, I see you, you wound up a little tight." And I just kind of wanted to be like, "Yes, thanks for noticing and sticking with us through it." 

Beth [00:48:03] As you talked about the aging, I'm experiencing that to some of those places where it hits you in the face. Oh, friend, you crossed a threshold at home. But I think the other thing that is easy to forget, especially because we do work in isolation still most days, not having anything to do with the pandemic, it's just the nature of our work. It is easy to forget that everybody else is wound up tight too, because I don't see that constantly. And so just reminding myself others feel this too. You are not alone, this is the condition of people right now. And so where you're wound up and where others are wound up, they're not always going to intersect in a neat and supportive fashion. That's okay. 

Sarah [00:48:44] Yeah, right. 

Beth [00:48:47] I think this is a good place to bring in something we learned from listeners this week. We got a lovely message on all accounts from Julia, but Julia ended it with just the perfect phrase for this moment which was, "I hope life this week has been more joy than sorrow." Which I think is perfect. So, Julia, wound up version of me is going to be looking for that calculus where if I had more joy than sorrow. And that's a gift. Thank you. 

Sarah [00:49:12] Thank you for joining us. We hope your days are holding more joy than sorrow right now. Thank you for being with us in our wound up tightness. We will be back in your ears on Friday and until then, keep it nuanced ya'll. 

Beth [00:49:33] Pantsuit Politics is produced by Studio D Podcast Production. Alise Napp is our managing director. 

Sarah [00:49:38] Maggie Penton is our community engagement manager. Dante Lima is the composer and performer of our theme music. 

Beth [00:49:44] Our show is listener-supported. Special thanks to our executive producers. 

Executive Producers (Read their own names) [00:49:49] Martha Bronitsky, Ali Edwards, Janice Elliot, Sarah Greenup, Julie Haller, Helen Handley, Tiffany Hassler, Emily Holladay, Katie Johnson, Katina Zuganelis Kasling, Barry Kaufman, Molly Kohrs. 

[00:50:05] The Kriebs, Laurie LaDow, Lilly McClure, Jred Minson, Emily Neesley, The Pentons, Tawni Peterson, Tracy Puthoff, Sara Ralph, Jeremy Sequoia, Katy Stigers, Karin True, Onika Ulveling, Nick and Alysa Valelli, Katherine Vollmer, Amy Whited. 

Beth [00:50:24] Jeff Davis, Melinda Johnston, Ashley Thompson, Michelle Wood, Joshua Allen, Morgan McHugh, Nichole Berklas, Paul Bremer and Tim Miller. 

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