Gold Bars, Hoodies, and School Car Lines

TOPICS DISCUSSED

  • Senator Menendez Indictment

  • The Senate Dress Code

  • A Looming Government Shutdown

  • A Deal in Hollywood

  • The Auto Workers Strike

  • Outside of Politics: School Lines

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EPISODE RESOURCES

TRANSCRIPT

Sarah [00:00:09] This is Sarah Stewart Holland.  

Beth [00:00:10] And this is Beth Silvers. Thank you for joining us for Pantsuit Politics.  

[00:00:14] Music Interlude.  

Sarah [00:00:34] Hello and welcome to Pantsuit Politics. Today we're going to do a good old fashioned roundup, you guys. We're going to talk about the Senate and their dress code. We're going to talk about Senator Bob Menendez. We're going to talk about the writer's strike coming to an end. We're going to talk about government funding. We're going to talk about the agony of the school drop-off line. We got a lot of things coming at you this episode. We're excited.  

Beth [00:00:56] I hope what that communicates to you is that we're comfortable with range and that's how we approach our speaking events as well. We are very focused right now on our 2024 schedule. We also might be able to get in another event or two this fall. So just reach out if you've ever wanted us to come to where you are. We will do our best. But we love getting in a room and listening and learning and just responding to whatever the room wants to hear. We appreciated so much the feedback of Maryville College's president Bryan Coker, who said that we are incredible listeners and that we were very attentive to the questions and perspectives of the students and community. That's what we're about. We want to come to your place and be in your space with your people and be helpful there and be immediately relevant to what's going on for you. So if you would like to have us come speak to your business or school or organization, you can check out our website Pantsuitpolitics.com or just reach out to Alise at Hello@pantsuitpolitics.com  

Sarah [00:01:55] Up next, we're going to talk about Bob and Nadine.  

Beth [00:01:58] Sounds like a country song.  

[00:01:59] Music Interlude.  

Sarah [00:02:16] Beth, I feel ethically obligated to begin this conversation with a very important disclosure. From 2008 to 2009, I worked as a legislative correspondent in the office of Senator Bob Menendez. It seems like very important information I should disclose before we begin the conversation about Senator Menendez's most recent indictment, which you spent a lot of time with this weekend.  

Beth [00:02:50] I did. And so I can tell you that the conduct relevant to the most recent indictment does not concern your tenure in his office. 2018 to 2022.  

Sarah [00:03:00] That's right. I did not get paid in gold bars, you guys. That's not what was happening when I was in the office of New Jersey's at that time. Junior senator. That's how long ago it was. He was the junior senator at that time.  

Beth [00:03:11] I think those are important things to think about, like the fact that when this indictment happened, he was the senior senator from New Jersey but has been in politics for most of his adult life.  

Sarah [00:03:22] Long time.  

Beth [00:03:23] From mayor to New Jersey legislature, to the House of Representatives, to the Senate.  

Sarah [00:03:30] Started in the school board I think, like right out of college.  

Beth [00:03:33] Now sitting as the chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. And that is very important to understanding how it came to be that he entered into a relationship with a woman who had a friend who has very close ties to the Egyptian government. And Egypt is one of the top five nations receiving the most foreign aid from the United States in the whole world.  

Sarah [00:04:01] Wow. So other important background-- this is not his first indictment, that's why I very specifically used the words, most recent indictment. He was indicted in 2016 under allegations involving a relationship with one Dr. Melvin. There was allegations of corruption. It ultimately ended in a hung jury and Dr. Melvin went to jail for Medicaid fraud. But Senator Menendez live to fight another day, was re-elected. I do not anticipate that result with this indictment.  

Beth [00:04:37] Well, and before that, Chris Christie as U.S. attorney spent six years pursuing him over a nonprofit renting a house that Senator Menendez owned that never resulted in charges. But I would not want to be investigated by Chris Christie for six years. I bet that was unpleasant.  

Sarah [00:04:52] Now, listen, I know we have a lot of listeners in New Jersey. New Jersey is a special place and New Jersey politics are also special.  

Beth [00:05:02] Unique in their own way.  

Sarah [00:05:04] Unique in their own way. And, look, Senator Menendez is unique in his own way. He came from a family of Cuban immigrants. He truly worked his way up this political ladder in a very tough political environment. For a long time, he was like the poorest United States senator. He doesn't have the wealth of somebody like a Mitt Romney or a Mark Warner. I had enormous respect for him when I worked for him. He was hardworking. He was smart as a whip. He was good to his staff. So this is a tough one for me. It's a tough one because while I think that he creeped up to the line in these previous situations, I don't think it was so far out of the realm of the entire United States Senate or even particularly New Jersey politics. But this one, this one seems really different to me.  

Beth [00:05:47] Well, there are pictures in the indictment of his Senate jacket with cash all over it. Cash found inside the jacket just spread out all over the embroidered jacket. There are pictures of the gold bars that he received. There are Google search results showing him looking at how much those gold bars were worth. It's all pretty blatant. I mean, I know everyone is presumed innocent until proven guilty. He is certainly entitled to his rights and to mount a credible defense. And I will await what that defense is, because this looks very transparently transactional. That you took meetings without your professional staff in order to have conversation about what would scratch the backs of the folks who would also be scratching yours. It's the worst of what you think of when you talk about dirty politics unfolding on these 39 very well-documented pages.  

Sarah [00:06:42] Well, and I think what's tough-- and I'm going to try to choose my words carefully because I am not trying to absolve him of responsibility, but he is a smart, capable operator. So to get out of 2016 and engage in this way so blatantly, to me, something changed. And the most obvious thing that changed is that he met Ms Nadine and got married. And this was not a good or productive partnership where both people were flourishing and making good choices.  

Beth [00:07:14] The other thing that may have changed is that he got out of it.  

Sarah [00:07:17] Yeah. You want to think people will learn and do better, but maybe not. That was a good point.  

Beth [00:07:22] But sometimes they learn a different lesson.  

Sarah [00:07:25] That's so true.  

Beth [00:07:27] Here's where I have real impatience with Democratic leadership. After all of that, he was formally admonished by the Senate Ethics Committee. He should not have been chairing Senate Foreign Relations. I understand you can't do anything about the fact that the people of the state of New Jersey elected him again very shortly after the hung jury in that last trial. But he should not have been chairing this committee, this committee of all committees, where he has a lot of opportunity to put holds and to sign off on millions of dollars of aid that very few people understand.  

Sarah [00:08:06] Yeah. And it's not like from 2016 to today, particularly like 2016 to 2020. We weren't being exposed to all these news stories about like Rudy Giuliani meeting people from Ukraine, or people meeting with representatives of other countries in Africa who were looking for arms deals. There was lots of exposure to the risk of corruption inside this particular area of policy and politics. So, yeah, no, I think you're right. But I think it's hard when a politician gets out of a scandal like that and then is elected by such a wide margin, it feeds on this narrative that they are not just impermeable, but very powerful that gives a certain kind of power that you don't want to cross. And especially not to lean on stereotypes, but particularly in New Jersey politics, there's this sense of don't cross them. Don't cross them.  

Beth [00:09:03] And he clearly felt that he had that power because in this indictment he talks about how-- it kind of sounds like a casual act for him to pick up the phone and call somebody at the Department of Agriculture and say, you need to stay out of this situation with the meat certification. And he picks up a phone and calls a prosecutor and says, can't you make this go away for my friend's friend? And I just wonder how many of those instances have happened throughout the course of his career and not been documented in a federal indictment, but it's gross. And it's gross especially when for the past few years we have all spoken, me included, very sanctimoniously about George Santos just being a lying liar about everything. Well, this is a level of corruption that to me is even worse than someone lying to get elected. Because he is entrusted with such responsibility over how the United States interacts on the global stage and you wield that responsibility so carelessly for a Mercedes and an exercise bike and a recliner. I mean, it's like the price is right showcase showdown in this indictment, like, the things that are listed that he got. And it really upsets me. And I am so grateful that the Department of Justice was like, no, we are not going to be done with this. We are going to get this guy.  

Sarah [00:10:37] See, that's what leads me to a different conclusion. We don't have to compare them. We don't have to pick who's worse. They're both terrible. But I think with George Santos lying to voters when there's just not a great process to correct that, to me is really problematic as opposed to lying inside a process where everybody's watching you very closely to say we don't do that. It was kind of interesting to a week ago read the New York Times and about all these arms deals about how Prigozhin operates in Africa and get in my head and think, see this is how much worse it could be. And then you read this Bob Menendez indictment you think, are we better? But yeah, we are, because he's going to go to jail because we had a process to catch this level of corruption. The presence of corruption does not mean the institution is broken or failing or where nothing good is going on inside the United States Senate. What you're looking at is a process to catch that corruption. And, look, law enforcement is going after George Santos too. And Bob Menendez is still senator. So maybe they're really not that different at the end of the day.  

[00:11:45] It's not like we're still at this point depending on whether he'll resign or if he'll be able to be removed from office, which is a difficult process as it should be. But it is encouraging to me that they did. They went after him and they said, no, you're not going to get-- we don't do this in America. We might do it, but you're going to get caught and you're going to get stopped and you're going to get in trouble. And you have to believe that somewhere Merrick Garland is, like, throw the damn book at him. They're not going to accuse me of partisanship anymore. But, of course, the Republicans are not even responding in a reasonable manner. We had a listeners say that they're out there going, "This is just a distraction from Hunter Biden." You guys, do you need a nap? What is wrong with you that you think that this level of corruption and crime and the pursuit of justice in the face of it, that is really about a distraction from Hunter Biden and his tax fraud? Give me a break.  

Beth [00:12:38] There's a level of obsession with Hunter Biden that is unhealthy in a way that I can't wrap my head around. I also saw that the former president and current Republican front runner has, in light of these events, called on all Senate Democrats to resign. All of them.  

Sarah [00:12:57] Oh, wait, wait, wait. Walk me through this slowly.  

Beth [00:13:02] Well, in an all caps Truth Social posts.  

Sarah [00:13:04] Oh, well, I assumed that. Okay.  

Beth [00:13:07] He says that everyone would have known about this. So all Senate Democrats should resign. They should resign from office. And Bob Menendez, can you imagine what a small fish he is in the grand scheme of the corruption in this party? Imagine if they searched all of Joe Biden's homes what they would find. They kind of gave Joe Biden a heads up that they were going to search all of his homes. In other words, get rid of the gold and the cash. This is what he does, right? There's like a thing. And he goes, well, that now is everything.  

Sarah [00:13:41] But now it's about him, not it applies to him. Opposite.  

Beth [00:13:44] He definitely did not include a footnote about the corruption that he has facilitated.  

Sarah [00:13:51] I am laughing to keep from crying.  

Beth [00:13:53] I know.  

Sarah [00:13:53] Mother was on vacation with some friends and she was like, "What about Trump?" And they said he's done nothing wrong. She's like, the four indictments, nothing? They're like, he's done nothing wrong.  

Beth [00:14:05] Okay.  

Sarah [00:14:07]  Beth, help. Help.  

Beth [00:14:07] Look, if that's what you believe it's because you want to.  

Sarah [00:14:11] Yeah, okay.  

Beth [00:14:12] That's all I can say about it. If you look at Donald Trump and you say this man has done nothing wrong, that's because you really want to believe it. And I think that if you look at Bob Menendez and say this man has done nothing wrong, it's because you want to believe it.  

Sarah [00:14:25] But no one's saying that.  

Beth [00:14:25] And I am not equating the two.  

Sarah [00:14:27] That's what's so frustrating. The Senate Democrats are like, you got to go. Look, that's not going to work.  

Beth [00:14:33] And better than that is that Democrat Andy Kim, who represents New Jersey in the House, came out over the weekend and said, "I never thought I would run a primary campaign against him, but that's what I'm going to have to do because New Jersey deserves better than this." This is the correct response. That is what you should do if you are trying to be part of a healthy party that takes public trust seriously. On the flip side, I just can't even articulate it. I can't. I can't.  

Sarah [00:15:07] If you all listen to our premium channels, you know that that's a valid and important response here at Pantsuit Politics- I can't even. I'm trying to can, but I can't. Oh, you guys. Well, all the way from gold bars to gym shorts, we have another very important debate happening inside the United States Senate. Chuck Schumer changed the dress code. I have so much to say about this. But here's the first thing that I think was a mistake. He went all the way to you can wear whatever you want, which I think was a miscalibration. Maybe we could have gone to business casual will be acceptable in certain situations. Maybe it was too much too soon because people have lost their minds. There are 48 Republican senators and murmurings of a few Democrats willing to join them to strike down this rule change. This was reported to be a concession to John Fetterman, who prefers denim shorts and hoodies because he's very tall. It's hard to find tall people close to all my friends. Let's all say just a moment of silent reflection and goodwill. And I bet y'all are good resources for this. Beth, my friend Diane has an eighth grader who wears a 28/39. I want you to think about that in a bit.  

Beth [00:16:21] Wow.  

Sarah [00:16:22] A 28/39. And that's where I've got lots of grace for John Fetterman. When you are that tall, it is hard to find clothing. So I see that and I acknowledged that. But I think it might have been a little too much too soon. I'm trying to channel my inner best so we don't have to say this was all good or all bad, but maybe we could have just calibrated it a little better.  

Beth [00:16:44] What I think is tricky for Senator Schumer or anyone in 2023 setting any kind of dress code is that I'm not sure what business casual means anymore.  

Sarah [00:16:57] That's a good point.  

Beth [00:16:59] I think even business is a hard dress code, especially for women. And you see that playing out in the Senate. Senator Sinema often, I think, pushes the line of what falls under the heading of business apparel. And I if I were a guy who had this kind of uniform definition of what this means, that would probably bug me. At the same time, because we don't have a uniform as women of what business means, then you get all this extra scrutiny. And so that is why I don't care about this at all. I don't even mind that Senator Schumer was like, whatever, just do whatever. Use your judgment. I think use your judgment is an appropriate thing to say to a group of only 100 people who represent 330 million people to make our laws. Surely they can use their judgment about their clothes.  

Sarah [00:17:53] Do you feel that good about JD Vance's judgment?  

Beth [00:17:56] I don't feel good about a lot of their judgment, but I care a lot more about them taking the office seriously, not taking bribes, not doing extortion, reading their briefing books, not spending all their time podcasting. There's just a long list of things I would rather them focus on than their apparel.  

Sarah [00:18:16] But I think that's what a good dress code does. I don't even know if this is achievable, but in theory, I think the idea is, like, we've made this decision for you, this is what you're going to wear. And we've talked about dress codes before at schools. And one of our listeners emailed and said my new favorite phrase, which is clothing communicates. And I do not want JD Vance wearing Let's Go Brandon t-shirts on the floor of the United States Senate. I do not want that. I do not want that.  

Beth [00:18:49] I would not mind for the dress code to say you cannot wear clothes with words on it. I think that would be fine. Because I also don't want a new level of corruption wherein Senator such and such becomes the Vineyard Vines model every time he's on C-SPAN or whatever. There are a lot of ways that this could go very wrong. At the same time, I don't like how the Senate especially it has become all about the optics, like it is all that they look really nice and they travel in entourages and they do their press hits. And it sounds, especially from that recent McKay Coppins piece about Mitt Romney, like very few of them are carrying the workload, the substantial workload of the United States Senate.  

Sarah [00:19:45] Which they're getting done as we transition to our next conversation.  

Beth [00:19:49] They're doing a lot better job than their compatriots in the House of Representatives, that is for sure.  

Sarah [00:19:53] Right. They got all the 12 bills. They they did the spending. They did their job. So I want to make sure they get that shout out. I just struggle.  

Beth [00:20:02] But, look, I do not think we are better off as a nation because John Fetterman is wearing a suit, even though he has never been a guy who wears a suit, and he has been elected to many offices by people who know that he is not a guy who wears a suit.  

Sarah [00:20:14] In my mind and the theory, I really don't like the increasing informality with which Americans just generally treat life.  

Beth [00:20:23] You don't like that in the world, though, right? It's not just the Senate. You don't like that in the world.  

Sarah [00:20:27] I don't like that in the world, because here's what I think. This is not going to be a controversial take. I think the way in which people are increasingly acting ugly and hateful to retail staff and white staff and just generally, as we say in my house, showing your butt, is related to the fact that some people show their butts literally. I think they're related. I think that there is a formality. This is how I teach my kids about church clothes. This is a sacred space, we communicate that with our clothing, with the effort in our clothing. So it's really about the effort to me, it's really not about the clothing because your effort might be jeans and your best t-shirt. That's fine. But I want to see some effort because I think in getting dressed. That's why people wanted to dress up for the Eras Tour, right? Because when you exude effort, it builds the experience. It places importance on the occasion. That's just a part of the whole in which we say this is important, this is something we prioritize. And I think when everywhere is pajama land, we don't dress differently when we leave the house, then we think we can act how we act in our house. Which is why we talked about on our premium event that people are pooping in dressing rooms and it's an actual issue out in the world. I don't think they're disconnected. I just don't. I'm sorry.  

Beth [00:21:55] So sometimes people confuse our voices. Everybody, that was Sarah. Okay? That was all Sarah.  

Sarah [00:22:01] How dare you.  

Beth [00:22:01] And now this is Beth. And I will say I just don't agree because some of the worst behavior and the most consequentially worst behavior I've ever seen in my life has been done by guys in suits.  

Sarah [00:22:13] But I'm not saying it causes it. I'm just saying it's related. It's not X then Y. I think it's not a one way street. Absolutely. But I don't think they're completely unrelated either.  

Beth [00:22:23] I do not think that everyone dressing a little better right now would shift the overall impatience, ugliness, meanness that's happening in a lot of places. Because I think that some of that impatience, ugliness, meanness is just part of like a bunch of pent up stuff that we haven't dealt with yet. And I don't think we can deal with it through our clothing. I just don't. Now, do I want the Senate to be conducted in pajamas? I do not. If I were elected to an office like that, would I have on a jacket every damn day of my life? I would. I was raised a certain way. I went to work in a place where I could not wear open-toed shoes for several years, so I get it. And it's not that I think clothing does not matter at all, but these folks have been dressing this way for an awfully long time and the conduct in the Senate has still degraded. So whatever it takes to shift them to a more collegial work environment, I am for experimenting with.  

Sarah [00:23:27] See, I don't think it's necessarily degraded. I've cited this several times on this podcast where I don't even remember who it was who retired after many years, and he was like, "When I got here, like 20 people came to work drunk all the time." It's gotten better. And I think they passed a lot of bipartisan legislation in the last term. They've done a good job on this budget. Yes, I was horrified by some of the reports coming from Mitt Romney. Absolutely. It's definitely not a reflection on everybody. Listen, Dick Durbin's out there doing everybody's jobs. But I just don't want to get in a cycle of like they're the worst, they're just getting worse. Because I don't think that's consistently true. I think it's a more complicated story. I'm not saying you're saying that, but I think it's easy to get in that space. No, I don't think if we all started wearing trousers-- although something's going on, because that is the fashion trend. The fashion trend right now for this fall is everybody dress up trousers, blazers, blouses, which I think is fascinating. That's fascinating. So why is that? There's something going on there. We've all seen The Devil Wears Prada. The blue is never just a blue. And so I think that's interesting. At the same time, everyone is out there trying to elevate that we have this moment in the Senate where they're telling John Fetterman basically-- and I think that's probably some of the difficulty of this. Of course, nobody wants to make John Fetterman's life harder. We all want him to be in his best mental space. I like him a great deal. I think he's a great senator, but it's just tough. Even understanding his wardrobe choices and understanding why, and I understand they elected him, I don't really even want to see him in gym shorts and a hoodie on the floor of the United States Senate. I just don't. I'm sorry.  

Beth [00:25:11] And dress codes are a part of making places more inclusive. They just are. And so if this leads to a world where people are more comfortable coming to work as their authentic, full selves, I think that that's worth experimenting with. Again, they should just be able to use their judgment. They're senators, for God's sake.  

Sarah [00:25:35] Some of them have bad judgment. Well, it was really interesting because The New York Times did a whole piece on the new generation of congresspeople like Max Frost and all these really young state legislators and what they're choosing to wear. And it was fascinating because their thing was, I don't want to be the cookie cutter, I want to use my clothes because clothing communicates. To communicate authenticity. Like this one state legislator, really young female state legislators, was like, I never want to match. I don't want my suits to match. I want them to be different. And I just think there has got to be a place, and maybe we just need to whiteboard dress codes and start over, where we allow people. Because this is a dumb thing. But if we can get it right in this dumb thing, maybe we can get it right in bigger spaces where we can find the balance between you are an individual as a part of the whole. We want you to be comfortable expressing yourself and conveying what you would like to convey with your clothing, and also finding that space where everyone in this institution or in this organization is going in the same direction and feels comfortable.  

[00:26:37] Because, look, I think we tell ourselves that clothing is just individual choices. But our clothing-- not just because it communicates-- I really do think it affects other people because human beings are comparison machines. It's what we like to do. And so I'm sure you're right. I think when Chris and Sinema was pushing the bar, you know that there are some people that are like, well, I'm following the rules. It's like Mary Martha from the Bible. That's why that story is so impactful. And so I think we do have to find that balance with dress codes. You're not our podcasters and go, what do we when we get together? What are you wearing so it works together? There's always that balance of like me wearing what I want to wear and making sure our clothing is not working together, but just heading in the same general direction.  

Beth [00:27:20] Yes, because I never want to be distinguished by my clothing. I want to be distinguished by my work. And when I have found in my career is that your clothing, if it is distinguishing you, often inhibits your ability to be distinguished by your work. As a woman, if you are noticed for what you're wearing in professional environments, that is what's going to be discussed, good or bad, instead of the quality of the work that you're doing. And I would just prefer more of our senators distinguish themselves through their work, that's all.  

Sarah [00:27:53] Well, John Fetterman said, "I'll wear a suit if those bozos in the House get the government funded." And that's what we're going to talk about next.  

[00:28:01] Music Interlude  

Sarah [00:28:13] So, Beth, we're going to talk about a deal in Hollywood in the absence of a deal in D.C. Maybe by the time the good people of the Pantsuit Politics community are listening to this episode, there will be a deal. You never know.  

Beth [00:28:26] I hope so.  

Sarah [00:28:27] Kevin McCarthy is a mystery wrapped in an enigma sometimes, so maybe he'll get a continuing resolution. I do think that's probably the best we can hope for at this particular moment in time. I do not see a scenario in which there funding the government by the end of this week.  

Beth [00:28:41] The entire thing hinges on Kevin McCarthy deciding that he is willing to have a few Democrats vote with him. That's what this is about. Are we going to keep the government open or not based on whether the majority of the majority of Republicans will accept something that they can get a few Democratic votes on instead of continuing to be held hostage by their far right wing? That's it.  

Sarah [00:29:05]  The chaos caucus says if you get Democrats, we're going to call a vote of no confidence and you're going to lose your job. That's what Matt Gaetz's position is.  

Beth [00:29:14] And I think Kevin McCarthy is getting closer to cool, who's going to replace me? Because that's the question.  

Sarah [00:29:20] Right. Go for it. Here's how I feel about this. I've been thinking a lot about this chaos caucus as I head to the national parks next week.  

Beth [00:29:29] You have a disclosure to make in every story this time.  

Sarah [00:29:32] I do. I do have disclosures in all these news stories. I feel like these chaos caucus members who have safe seats and are just like I win if I cause chaos, I feel like if they shut the government down, we should all show up in those districts and make those towns feel the chaos. You should stop being able to send these members to Congress with basically no consequences for yourself and all the consequences for the rest of us. I'm ready to, like, roll into whatever floor to district Matt Gaetz rolled out of and like chain myself in the middle of their freeways and say, "How do you like it? How do you like chaos when it shows up on your door because that's what you keep sending to Congress and you don't ever have to suffer the consequences?" It makes me mad.  

Beth [00:30:16] You know things are kind of out of control when they're listing the members of Congress who are causing trouble, and mine doesn't make the list. I am represented by Thomas Massie, who used to be the king of the chaos. He doesn't even get a mention anymore.  

Sarah [00:30:32] It drives me crazy. I'm going to national parks and that will suck. But this is really disruptive to people's lives. People don't get paid. Military members spouses don't get checks. People can't make rent. Like, it's so frustrating.  

Beth [00:30:51] It is fiscally irresponsible too.  

Sarah [00:30:53] It's fiscally irresponsible. It's politically bad, but not for them. That's the problem. I was just thinking in my head, like, how do we make this politically impactful for the Chaos Caucus? That's why I was thinking like, well, hell, maybe we should go to their districts make their lives miserable like the voters because they're not getting the message.  

Beth [00:31:10] Yeah, I don't think that it's obvious how expensive a government shutdown is, but it is expensive when you put anything in pause and you don't know that the pause is coming and you don't know when the pause is going to be over. Remember COVID and the supply chain and all the lessons that we learned about how going into pause and then restarting costs a lot of money? That same thing happens with our government. It costs the macro economy money. Some of it we get back, but not all of it. And for people who work for the government and there are millions of them doing all kinds of different jobs, even though they get back pay, which again, is expensive for the government to handle, money has a time value for them.  

Sarah [00:32:00] Yeah. Just to ask people to work for free.  

Beth [00:32:02] Yes.  

Sarah [00:32:02] You look at millions of people and say, "Hey, because you work for free, because we don't want to agree to the deal that we negotiated under the debt ceiling that's already been passed through the Senate. So could you just work for free for a while why we make people mad?  

Beth [00:32:15] We heard from someone who said, yes, I'll get my back pay, but my power company doesn't care that I haven't gotten a paycheck yet. Like, I will still be charged interest on my bills that are occurring while I'm working without getting paid. It's terrible. And I put so much blame for the possibility of this turmoil on Speaker McCarthy shoulders because he continues to allow this very small group within his majority to hold the reins. I always think about the beginning of Taylor Swift's song Bejeweled with him. They are walking on his peace of mind in shoes he gave them as a present. And he keeps putting them first when he's not in their top five. Come on, guys. They don't like him. They want to oust him. They want to provoke the shutdown. They want to do the motions to vacate because this is how they get all of the attention on them. And attention is their whole deal. And I just wish he would tell them to take a long walk, try their best, bring whatever emotions they want to bring, put up whomever they want to put up for speaker. But in the meantime, he is going to keep the government open. And I truly hope that that's the decision he will have made by the time you hear this.  

Sarah [00:33:28] Yeah, agreed. Well, listen, we have some good juju out in the universe because the studio heads seem to have mostly followed that general direction and done the right thing. They have reached a deal with the Screenwriters Guild and the Screenwriters Guild through a press release was like, it's exceptional. And the studio's press release was like, we have a deal. So I think that sounds great. I didn't even need to read it. I just read the press releases and thought, I think this sounds great.  

Beth [00:33:56] I couldn't find a lot of detail as we're sitting down to record because it's pretty new information that they've reached agreement, but I'm excited to learn especially what they have done on AI, and I am excited to see what impact, if any, this will have on the actors strike.  

Sarah [00:34:12] Well, I just keep thinking about Chelsea Devantez saying unless you want all your media written by nipple babies. And I'm not saying that as a character judgment, but that's all. The only people who could afford to do it, could afford to work their way up the reigns and work in these writers rooms were rich people. And I don't want all my media written for rich people. I don't want none of my media written by rich people. But I don't want all of it written by rich people. And so the idea that now we have a minimum size of the writers room, we have minimum seasons, we have better negotiated pay through streaming. This is all excellent. And I have to think it's got to be a really great sign for the actors as well.  

Beth [00:34:53] And I also think that it is a better long term move for the studios to invest in people than technology. Because if you think about how quickly a lot of the sort of age me, look at me in these fantastical scenarios, like the way that we have applied AI to content creation on social media in my mind has already kind of flamed out as being interesting or discussion worthy. So in the long run, having people writing the stories is the way for stories to continue to be something that we really treasure and that will continue to spend money on. And I'm glad that the studios were not so shortsighted as to dismiss that.  

Sarah [00:35:36] Well, I think that they were just feeling the heat. I mean, I don't think they just decided to be nice. But it sounded like the negotiations moved forward when the actual CEOs came to the table and they had investors saying we don't want to stomach this costs. This is going to be expensive and it's going to have a long tail. So let's get this wrapped up. And I'm really, really, really glad they did. I want people to be paid fairly, especially in creative work, but all work. Now, we still have the auto strike going on. Did you read that they're getting closer with Ford, so they didn't expand the strike into the Ford distribution centers and factories, which I thought was very interesting that we've got a little divide and conquer going on among the big three.  

Beth [00:36:16] I would think it's very much in the interests of different automakers to distinguish themselves around this strike because it has been bad, I think, for the studios to be the studios, instead of these individual businesses that have their own goals and pursuits and way of interacting with their employees. So I think Ford made a really smart decision to separate from the pack a little here.  

Sarah [00:36:39] Well, and I think that they just have really high stakes. Everything I read about Ford is like they are putting all their chips on electric, and they have to get it to the market, and they have to make it successful, and they have all these preorders for the F-150. And I just think that they saw the writing on the wall. And I just think it's so interesting that you see these common threads that you see technology, electric vehicles, artificial intelligence disrupting these industries. And the optimist in me, the sort of always seeing the positive things-- it's not that I think like, oh, my God, thank God for the pandemic. But it is an interesting confluence of events where you have these important technological innovations and these really disruptive transitions that just so happened to take place during this pandemic, which really, really accelerated a lot of the labor forces, where you have labor in such a strong position in the midst of these really intense transitions. It's a historical accident. I would go back and obviously undo the pandemic if I could and save millions of lives obviously. I do think it's important to recognize sometimes pieces get moved and they're painful, but they lead to these really interesting moments that can have positive impact.  

Beth [00:38:05] I also think things are cyclical. We like change. That's why I think we're getting dressed up again. We wore a comfy clothes for a couple of years, we're tired of it. We're going to get dressed up again for a while. Then we'll probably go back to the comfy clothes again. And you see that throughout history there are these surges in labor movements, followed by periods where we go, oh, that went a little too far. We're going to tighten this back up. Deregulation, tight regulation. I mean, we just do this in a lot of different areas. And so if you are feeling like, whew, this labor stuff is kind of gotten out of control, just wait. It will probably change again. I think having that seasonal perspective on things helps me not get too concerned in one direction or the other. But I do think that the conversation, especially about the use of technology, is productive and important and like adds a chapter to this part of human history where we're saying we've kind of stumbled into a lot of technological innovation, perhaps we should not keep stumbling.  

Sarah [00:39:06] Well, that's interesting, though. That's against Elon's observation that all technical innovation comes through massive effort. Sometimes you just stumble into it.  

Beth [00:39:14] I think both things are true. That some people exert massive effort to get these new products to us and the rest of us go, oh, that's cool. And we don't think, how could this destroy us? What did this take from us? What will the cost of this be? And I am glad that at least in entertainment, they're stepping back to say what will the cost of this be? And the auto strike too is a lot about what will the cost of these technological changes be?  

Sarah [00:39:39] Well, I'm encouraged by all of this. I don't feel like there's too much labor movement, too much labor strikes, too much any of that going on. Because for years on this podcast we said over and over and over again and continue to say we need to have a conversation about this. We need to talk about this as a society. And I think this is one of the best ways that we can actually "talk" or have a conversation as a huge multicultural democracy. I think these industries, very huge influential industries, literally coming to the table and saying, "What does this mean for you? What are the costs and benefits?" is hugely, hugely important because of the nature of these strikes and the way they affect all of us. And, look, this is even true to a certain extent with government funding. It just includes all of us. We all have a certain amount of skin in the game which makes these conversations productive and important, where we're really thinking through what does this mean? What is the impact of electric vehicles? Do we have enough charging stations?  

[00:40:42] If we're going to have a massive amount of government spending on this infrastructure, what is that going to look like for the people building it? What is that going to mean? Where how do these pieces fit together? And I think it's complicated in-depth thinking, which I think is why you see a little bit of exhaustion among the American populace. But I actually don't think what we're feeling right now around politics, you see all these polls, people are exhausted, they don't want to listen to politics, they don't want to listen to the news, I don't think it's that they don't want to think about it. I think they realize that we have some real in-depth things and they don't see that depth in the coverage. That I think there's this imbalance between what we understand to be happening in our economy and our government and our institutions like this intense transition and the fact that a lot of the news and politics coverage is like Lauren Boebert, Beetlejuice, you know what I'm saying?  

Beth [00:41:41] And Bob Menendez. And Trump tweeting that everybody should now resign. I mean, a lot of it seems outlandish and silly and built for a different purpose than the purpose in front of them if they are trying to tackle these things that a lot of people are trying to tackle every day in their work.  

Sarah [00:41:58] And I just think that that's just the coverage, because I do think that stuff is happening. There was good work done in the Senate on a bipartisan level to get all 12 spending bills through. That's incredible. We've done that a long time. And they did it. And there was a once in a generation investment in climate change that now they're translated into things like the American Climate Corps. All this stuff is happening. And so it just bums me out because I think there is real work being done, including at these negotiating tables with the writers and at the negotiating tables with the big three auto manufacturers. And I think people feel that and they see that. And I just hope that translates into some positive outlook and some encouraging, hopeful understanding of what's happening in our country and not just the crappy surface level coverage of corruption and politics as usual.  

[00:42:51] Music interlude.  

[00:43:10] Beth, I sent you an article from The Atlantic by Angie Schmitt. It's called The Agony of the Car Line. And I thought that would make an excellent Outside of Politics as everybody's officially back to school now and officially back in the car line. Another important disclosure. Neither you nor I spent any time in the car line.  

Beth [00:43:31] No. The only times that I have spent in the car line were truly exceptional circumstances, and I vowed to never do it again unless it was absolutely necessary. And now I schedule everything in our lives with a good buffer for the bus to be late because I will not be in the car lot.  

Sarah [00:43:51] Okay, so your kids take the bus to and from school.  

Beth [00:43:54] To and from school. Yes, they do.  

Sarah [00:43:56] So in a continuing theme of disclosure on this podcast, my children take the bus home one to two days to three days a week, depending on the child, because I have a child in elementary school, middle school, and high school. Because of just a lot of luck in city planning and business placement, my children walk to their extracurricular activities a majority of the days. Everybody. Elementary, middle and high school, they all walk to their music lessons. Amos walks to his art lessons. Now my mom takes Felix to some doctor's appointments once a week, but she gets him off the bus and takes him because he gets off the bus so soon. That's part of it. He gets off the bus, he's like the first stop. So he does not spend much time on the bus. But now my children do get taken to school in cars in the morning. And this is a missing piece of this article, which is we carpool. At the very least, if there is some component of your life that just does not work with the bus. I get it. The bus comes super, super early here. I think Griffin and Amos would have to be out there at like 6:30 in the morning, and that seems unnecessarily harsh.  

[00:45:01] I hate school start times anyway, but we carpool with the neighbor so I don't ever have to do it. My neighbor takes the littles to elementary school and Nicholas takes the bigs to middle and to high school. And so I'm super spoiled because I really do hate the car lot. I don't even understand it. I don't understand why people get there so early when it really saves you like 15 to 20 minutes. Last year, a couple of days, I would pick them up for the car line-- Felix In particular. And I would pride myself on being the last person to roll through so I don't have to wait. But it does seem like complete inefficiency, terrible design people are sitting there idling their motors for like truly hours. I will go drop something to offer Felix at the elementary school and there will be people already waiting at the front of the car line at 1:00 and they don't get out until 2:50.  

Beth [00:45:56] It happens here too. Now, I try to remember that everybody school is different. Neighborhoods are different. Kids are going to school under vastly different circumstances than mine are. Maybe there are places where getting there and being the first line matters a ton. And certainly when I was commuting into Cincinnati from northern Kentucky every morning, a 10-15 minute shift in when you left could save you an hour because of rush hour traffic.  

Sarah [00:46:25] That's so true.  

Beth [00:46:25] And so it can really affect things.  

Sarah [00:46:28] That sucks that that's the choice you have to make.  

Beth [00:46:30] It does suck.  

Sarah [00:46:31] That's not on you. That's a bad design. If the choice is get there an hour early or be an hour late for work, we've messed up America.  

Beth [00:46:38] And truly, I don't know how people who have to be at a place at a time-- like not the works from homes like we are-- deal with the variability around buses and with the spread. So my middle schooler gets on the bus a few minutes before 7 a.m.. My elementary student now does not get on the bus until 8:50, is after the school day has already started. They split her route into two because there were too many kids and not enough bus drivers. And so she is missing 20, 30 minutes of classroom time every single day. That is the plan. This is not a temporary.  

Sarah [00:47:23] Surely they're going to tighten that up, Beth.  

Beth [00:47:25] I hope so. And I'm not complaining. I understand they're doing their best. Everybody is trying to solve this problem. No one wants this. We have principals in our school district who are starting to regularly drive buses because there are not enough bus drivers. And I can see just in the email and the Bloom's communication that principals are spending huge portions of their day on transportation logistics. I am not mad at anybody. I'm not blaming. I'm not criticizing from the sidelines. If I could drive a school bus, I would. No one wants me to drive a school bus. I cannot do it. 

Sarah [00:48:01] No, y'all, I've been on a car with her. I don't mean to be ugly. You don't want to [inaudible]. 

Beth [00:48:03] I am not a great driver. I am not a confident driver. I cannot do it. But it is a real problem.  

Sarah [00:48:09] There's a lot of spatialness that goes on the school bus.  

Beth [00:48:12] Yeah, and I have no spatial ability whatsoever.  

Sarah [00:48:14] I do want to plead my case for carpooling because I do think this might be at least a medium term solution. If we all just looked around and said, "Who could I carpool with either direction so that there aren't so many cars in the carpool lane, so we're cutting down on some of this difficulty?" If the bus is just not a solution for you or if you could carpool to a bus stop, I don't know. There's a lot of pieces here. I think if we could get together as communities, this is a lot of what we love here, right? We want to work together as a community. And I love that my kids spend their morning with other adults. Just that short car ride. A lot of happens in a car. You're going to have some really good conversations with kids in a car. You know what I'm saying? And so, I like it that my neighbor Courtney is in their life every morning and they're listening to her music on the radio and talking with her about things.  

[00:49:04] I think there's a lot of extra benefit to this. And we also shouldn't forget walking and biking. Everybody used to walk and bike to school. My husband gets really upset cause he's like, "I biked two miles school what's the big deal?" I love the Japanese solution where the kindergartners they walk, but they all work together in their little yellow hats. So everybody knows that's what's happening. They're walking. I think we could have a lot more space and room for other ways to get there as well. But this is not working. We need to again start brainstorming because I don't think it's serving the schools. I don't think it's serving the parents. I don't think it's serving the students. There has got to be a better way.  

Beth [00:49:42] It all gets even more complicated if your school district has really prioritized socioeconomic diversity in the schools. Both of my girls really go to true neighborhood schools, and so their bus rides are very short. Jane could walk or bike to and from her middle school. The roads are not such that that is an option for our elementary school. There are not sidewalks. It would not be safe for kids to try to walk or bike to their elementary school.  

Sarah [00:50:08] But that's a choice too. We could make it safer for kids to bike.  

Beth [00:50:11] Yes, absolutely.  

Sarah [00:50:13] Like, that is the thing we could do. My community's added a ton of bike lanes. We could really prioritize a way that they would not be biking alone. I mean, that's the danger of biking is often when you're by yourself. And maybe I should work on this in my own community. There's a way for Griffin, I think, to bike to school with his friends. But a lot of that is like he's dragging a violin to school. It does not lend itself. We tried it a little bit in middle school. He biked, but it was the violin. Getting the violin on the bike and back was really difficult. But I think some of this problem-solving, maybe we just need to focus on a little bit because I think we use cars to solve problems so often and they're not really solving problems.  

Beth [00:50:53] I just wonder if staggered start times are more of an answer. Like within an elementary school, if the schedule staggers a little bit, that's terrible for parents too. But if we're not going to have enough people driving buses, we are going to have to shift things in pretty significant ways that are going to be shocking and a big adjustment. And everything that happens at school that's different than when you went to school you think it's horrible. Like that's your first reaction. Like, oh, this was so much better when I was a kid. But we are all going to have to walk back from that because this is such a mess in so many very different communities across the United States right now.  

Sarah [00:51:31] Well, it's not a very uplifting note, but I think you're right. And we look forward, as always, to hearing about how this is affecting you guys. We want to hear if your community in particular has found a good solution to the agony of the car line. We want to hear about your thoughts on everything we discuss in this episode. Please do not be too mean to me about my opinions on the Senate dress code. You know my heart is in the right place, guys. Now, before we wrap it up, we are still working on our speaking schedule for 2024. We're filling up. We've got some really exciting opportunities. It does look like we're heading to Indianapolis finally. We've had many people interested in bringing us to Indianapolis. We're excited about that. So if you want to get on that schedule, please, please give Alise an email at Hello@pantsuitpoliticsshow.com. You can also go to Pantsuitpolitics.com and check out our website which has lots of interesting testimonials from people that we've spoken before and more information. So check that out. We will be back in your ears on Friday and until then, keep it nuanced y'all.  

[00:52:33] Music Interlude.  

Sarah: Pantsuit Politics is produced by Studio D Podcast Production. 

Beth: Alise Napp is our managing director. Maggie Penton is our director of Community Engagement. 

Sarah: Xander Singh is the composer of our theme music with inspiration from original work by Dante Lima. 

Beth: Our show is listener-supported. Special thanks to our executive producers. 

Executive Producers: Martha Bronitsky. Ali Edwards. Janice Elliott. Sarah Greenup. Julie Haller. Tiffany Hasler. Emily Holladay. Katie Johnson. Katina Zuganelis Kasling. Barry Kaufman. Molly Kohrs. Katherine Vollmer. Laurie LaDow. Lily McClure. Linda Daniel. Emily Neesley. The Pentons. Tracey Puthoff. Sarah Ralph. Jeremy Sequoia. Katie Stigers. Karin True. Onica Ulveling. Nick and Alysa Villeli. Amy Whited. Emily Helen Olson. Lee Chaix McDonough. Morgan McHugh. Jen Ross. Sabrina Drago. Becca Dorval. Christina Quartararo. The Lebo Family. 

Sarah: Jeff Davis. Melinda Johnston. Michelle Wood. Joshua Allen. Nichole Berklas. Paula Bremer and Tim Miller.
 

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