Vivek's October Surprise: Being Disgusting

Crooked Con is coming up right after the election, and we have just added a bunch more great names to the lineup. We've got Governor J.B. Pritzker coming, Senator Chris Murphy, and then over from the House side, Ilhan Omar, Robert Garcia, Sarah Jacobs, Jamie Raskin, Sarah McBride. We also have Carlos Eduardo Espina, Simone Sanders Townsend, Eugene Daniels, David Pakman, Jessica Tarloff, Heather McGee, and then all the other people that we've announced on the website, plus more to come. Great list. Check out the full lineup and get tickets right now at CrookedCon.com. We'd love to see you there. That's CrookedCon.com. What's up, Los Angeles? Welcome to Love It or Leave It Live from Hollywood. I'm Jon Lovett, and we've got a great show for you tonight, but first, let's get into it. What a week. The new Washington Post poll found that just 33% of Americans approve of the job Trump is doing, while 66% disapprove, 52% now disapprove strongly. Of course, Trump isn't just taking this news lying down, at least not without his CPAP machine. He's already lined up a series of rallies with the 33% who approve to cheer himself up. Additionally, the Washington Post poll found that two-thirds of Americans now believe Trump is using the presidency to enrich himself. I know. The remaining one-third of Americans are what pollsters describe as. Yes, the wool has fallen from Americans' eyes, which is good because Americans are going to need that wool to stay warm this winter. Americans are not only furious about the state of the country, but also the ways in which the president is using his office to profit, which has not stopped J.D. Vance from offering this. Ridiculous defense. It's laughable to me, the idea that Donald Trump has somehow been enriched by political office. He nearly had his life destroyed by his quest to become president. I don't think there's evidence that the Trump family has become enriched by politics. He's like a Westworld robot. You know, it doesn't look like anything to him. Trump has made billions of dollars through crypto as his administration has deregulated cryptocurrency. His family got at least $75 million from a crypto executive fighting an SEC fraud suit, which the SEC. SEC later dropped among the many, many, many donations and payments tied to pardons and dropped investigations for wealthy Trump allies. Trump got a $400 million Boeing 747 from Qatar, which as of now is still being given to his foundation after he leaves office. Melania Trump got $40 million from Amazon for a fake documentary, not to mention the massive settlements, bribes all from ABC, Paramount, and Meta. And none of this scratches the surface of the corrupt international dealings of Trump's sons and son-in-law, and the real estate projects in Qatar, in the UAE, Vietnam, and India, not to mention the reports of insider trading and the Trump-themed amusement park being built in Dubai as a joint project of the Emiratis and the Ellison family, which I just made up. But you believed. Vance's plan. You gasped. Vance's plan for 2028 is to pretend that Donald Trump never existed, like how kids today think Helen Keller was made up, which kind of makes sense because, like Trump, Helen Keller was also a messy eater who was afraid of stairs. But for the midterms, facing terrible polling and even worse facts, Republicans have turned to their old friend, the monger of fear. For example. For example, this week, Trump weighed in on the ongoing protest in France, blaming immigrants for recent anti-government riots. Oui, oui, we never rioted. Until the immigrants got here, we think it was their idea, said a French person, fetching their great-grandfather's heirloom pry bar to rip a cobblestone out of the ground. Young people across France have clashed with police during protests against deteriorating school conditions, with others demonstrating against the high cost of living. The French economy has been hit hard by rising fuel prices and the fact that American tourists on Ozempic are eating way less fromage. J.D. Vance also chimed in, posting a video of buildings on fire in Limoges and warned that. that this is the future Democrats want, which is ridiculous. In the future Democrats want, the burning town hall has a pride flag in front. Vance tweeted alongside the video, Western liberals imported the third world into France and other countries in the name of diversity and compassion. They were told it would lead to this, and they didn't listen. Again, this is France. Are you familiar at all with France? Saying the French imported riots is like blaming immigrants in America for mass shootings and type 2 diabetes. That's homegrown, baby. They're as American as the apple pie our doctors say could kill us. Vance continued, I pray that France will stop this madness before more of its landmarks burn, and I hope Americans are paying attention. This is the future Congressional Democrats seek for your country. Sure, right now it's just French landmarks, but one day it could be happening right here in our own country, to the Kennedy Center, or the White House, or the White House East Wing, or the Reflecting Pool, or the National Parks. And then there's this French couple sitting at a cafe while the fire rages beyond them. That's France, baby. That was still a less smoky option than sitting indoors. Meanwhile, during a Michigan town hall on Saturday, Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed was heckled by a man who asked whether he would disavow the Muslim Brotherhood. I have one simple question. Will you disavow the Muslim Brotherhood? Sure, yeah, absolutely. But I want to ask the question that you're asking. Why are you asking the question? Well, because they're a terrorist group. Okay. No, no, but what are you implying? Do you assume that I wouldn't? Yes. Why not? Because I have not heard you disavow them yet. Have you disavowed them? I haven't heard you disavow them yet. Sharia law fan says what? Of course, this is all ridiculous. Abdul, has been very clear. He has repeatedly disavowed the Muslim Brotherhood for not being sufficiently pro-trance. El-Sayed continued. I'm going to swear an oath to the Constitution of the United States. And that Constitution guarantees us all the right to practice whatever faith we want or don't faith at all. And I'm going to ask you, do you disavow any attempt to read any religious doctrine into the laws of our country? I do not. You don't disavow that. So I think it's you who needs to understand the Constitution, not me. Yeah, that's right. Honestly, a huge fumble by the Muslim Brotherhood to lose this guy is very, is very compelling. Also this weekend, Vance went after Abdul while visiting Minnesota, calling him a little weasel who should shut his mouth and show a little gratitude, a sentiment he echoed in an interview this week. But the lack of gratitude he shows for the United States of America, the fact that he was raised by a couple of white step-grandparents, but seems to have a real sense of revulsion towards native-born Americans, I don't get it. I don't know where it comes from, and it makes me think that there's something very dark going on. So Abdul is a native-born American, and Abdul and JD Vance were actually both born at roughly the same time, one state apart from each other in the Midwest, both raised by grandparents, two very smart, very ambitious men seeking big lives in the public eye. And I say this because what is useful about, JD Vance, is that his inability to hide the space between who he actually is and who he wants to be is revealing. We all get to see his therapy in the same way you get to see my therapy. JD Vance is talking about his own revulsion. You can find it in his book where he talks about how people spend their way into the poor house and cast blame anywhere but on themselves. You can find it in his "Changing Politics" where he went from decrying politicians, relieving people of their own agency by offering easy scapegoats, to becoming exactly that kind of politician. He goes from being an honest appraiser of Trump to a complete embrace of Trump. And you can also see it in his natural state, which is total condescension, like this moment at the CBS Town Hall. - I will say, Tony, you did me a huge disservice by reminding a crowd of Michiganders that I'm from Ohio, but hopefully they will hold it against me. - Not only that, we've got a medallion back there for the Ohio State Buckeyes. - Oh, wow. - It might be stolen before the night is over. - I just lost the crowd. - I know. - That laugh, you hear that? That little ha, ha, ha. That is a laugh of pure contempt of seeing the people in that room as objects of his own ambition. Like how I see you. You know this guy gets it. Now clap. Stop it. And now, like Vance once said to Usha, "Sorry, but I have to take you to Ohio." In the governor's race, in the governor's race between physician, Amy Acton, and tech slime, Vivek Ramaswamy, Republicans began sharing an attack ad in which you hear from Amy Acton's own mother. - I'm Amy Acton's mother. I love my daughter, but when I saw her lying about her opponent, it's not easy for a mother to say this, but Amy has a serious problem. She is a liar. - And look, your reaction to a semi-coherent woman attacking her own daughter on a political ad is probably not, wow, this mother must be great, and I'm sure there's nothing more to the story. But the truth is actually far more than that. more horrible than you could imagine. Amy Acton has not seen or spoken with her mother since they last saw each other in court in 1978 when Amy was legally removed from the home, a home in which she disclosed being sexually abused from age 9 to age 12. Amy Acton's stepfather was charged with rape and was indicted by a grand jury before he fled the state. Acton's campaign quickly responded to the ad on Tuesday morning with a statement from her brother, Philip. It reads, quote, It's not surprising that Vivek Ramaswamy has stooped to such a despicable low as to attempt to turn the sexual abuse Amy endured at 12 years old from our birth mother's husband into a political talking point. After he was arrested and Amy and I were removed from their custody, our birth mother stayed married to Amy's rapist until he died. This desperate, disgusting attack reveals exactly who Vivek Ramaswamy is at his core, a pathetic excuse for a man who is willing to hurt anyone as long as it gets him what he wants, which is the most honest campaign. slogan of this election cycle, Vivek Ramaswamy, a pathetic excuse for a man who is willing to hurt anyone as long as it gets him what he wants. While it's still unclear who exactly is behind the ad, the Ramaswamy campaign refused to deny involvement and released a statement doubling down, claiming, quote, we don't know what happened between Amy and her mother, but they do know that Amy is a fabulist. It's hard to shock me these days, but a Republican politician siding with a sexual predator? Who isn't rich? Don Jr. also reposted the ad, writing, yikes, Ohio, watch this and think about what it means. And for once, I agree with Don Jr., yikes, Ohio, watch this and think about what it means. Later on Tuesday, Amy Acton responded directly in an interview. I won't normalize somebody who has said that my childhood is something I'm just complaining about, who today just released an ad using my birth mother, who I was removed from, at the time. At the age of 12, for severe abuse and neglect and sexual abuse, my brother and I were removed. On the other hand, congrats to Vivek on locking down the incestuous hill people caucus. The hills have eyes and they vote. As of this recording, it's not clear who made this ad, though the Ramaswamy campaign embraced it rather than denounce it. Certainly suggests that they were either responsible or at the very least on board. And I cannot think of a more vile political ad in my entire life. Jane's here. We didn't even get to see her today. I can't think of one. I mean, people are saying, is this one of the worst? This is the worst ad we have ever seen. And obviously, it means that Vivek Ramaswamy isn't worthy of being governor of Ohio. He isn't really worthy of being part of a civil society. But it also reveals a weakness. That spokesperson for the Ramaswamy campaign who put her name to that statement, endorsing the attack and using childhood sexual abuse in this way, I looked up her bio out of curiosity. She says that she's a proud member of a church, presumably one that worships Jesus and not the devil, though it doesn't specify. But all of these people haven't just lost their moral compass. They've lost their political judgment. Of course, this is going to backfire because not everyone is so sadistic or cruel or impressed by winning at all costs. That's the bubble that they're in. Just before we came out here, Vivek was confronted by a protester at one of his events by someone shouting angrily about this ad and the fact that he'd be willing to exploit this childhood sexual abuse. And I think that's a very, very important thing. I think that's a very, very important thing. And I think that's a very, very as righteous, and so they have to seek external validation, which is why you try to win at all costs, right? Like, if you don't see yourself as a good person anymore, at least having integrity clearly isn't as important to you as you imagine, well, there's only external validation left. So you better win. You better do anything you can to win. But you start to see the world that way and you assume others do too. And then you're shocked that people are offended by your conduct or that whatever concerns people have about trans athletes or the border or immigration, they don't want communities terrorized. They don't want there to be discrimination, right? They want to live in a place that respects difference, even if they have concerns that can be exploited in a campaign. And so it's our job to pop this bubble that that these conservatives are in, that this MAGA world is in, not just by making sure Vivek loses, but making sure that everyone who has embraced Trump in this kind of politics loses, too. And if not, well, maybe we'll have to learn from the French after all by smoking, by smoking, by picking up smoking. In Canadian city council news, a Canadian man won a city council seat after running a campaign with slogans like, I barely want to do this. Fine, I'll do it. And how hard can it be? It's actually not that hard, responded L.A.'s city council before passing an ordinance to improve equity in city infrastructure by adding more potholes in richer neighborhoods. And finally, Elon Musk debuted a prototype for Tesla's flying car roadster, complete with rocket thrusters. A car that practically screams, can your ex-wife's new boyfriend do this? Let's take a look. Tonight, Elon Musk's Tesla, failing what it calls a flying car. Wow. It used to be the only way to see a car fly like that was to let Tiger Woods drive. important thing. important thing. important thing. there have been times where I feel like even the idea of saying like, in a, like kind of in a debate, like having to deliver an attack, right? Like it just doesn't seem like it's your instinct. Is that right? Yes. I mean, I would say that part of the challenge here is that I, I'm, I hate being mean to people. Um, and I've been mean to people during the course of this campaign and that has caused me great pain, personal pain. Um, and yes, like I, it takes me, I, I really worry about, about going out there and on the attack. I worry about, um, I worry about hurting people's feelings. Like I want to talk about my vision for Los Angeles and I want Mayor Bass to talk about her vision for Los Angeles. And I want people to compare them on a scale and see whether which one they like better. And we can all be very respectful, but that's not how campaigns are run. It turns out. Yeah. And so it's just a little harder. And I will say like, after we had a debate the other night and I walked off the debate stage and this reporter came up to me and said, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know. And she came up to me and was like, tell us your, what, where you felt you were the strongest tonight and where, where you really felt like you were the weakest. And I, you know, like I had just gotten off this kind of stressful thing. And so I was like, I don't know. I was in a fugue state. And then the California post is like mayoral candidate confirms she has brain disease. Well, the Bass camp, you were attacked for like, Oh, she didn't even know she was at a I, I just was like, I don't know how to answer this question. Like right this second, maybe like after an hour I could like chill out and have a glass of wine and we could talk about this, but like not right now, you know? But yeah, I don't know, like a more traditional politician maybe would have been like, yeah, here's where I really made the point. And what have you learned about yourself as a, cause you are now a politician. Um, yeah. And I have been for six years. Well, yes, but like you, I, but I feel like you, you, you like the policymaking part of the job. It is something that you have to do to get to the governing part. Yes. But also the campaigning part is like the most special part of the job. The campaigning part is where everyone steps up and also tells you that they like you when you're governing, you only get complaints. Being a local government official is a customer service profession. People only call you when something is broken. So 100% of the time people are telling you that everything is broken. And so the campaigning is nice because people are actually out there being like, oh yeah, you know what? I agree with your vision. And then the rest of the four years you try and hold onto that as you get mean email after mean email in the council office. Yeah. That's a little bit like hosting this show. So there are a lot of undecided people in LA. If you look at these polls and I think polls are very unreliable local level, but you know, take them directionally. And it does seem like right now there are people that would say something like they're either unsure about their votes in part because they're extremely unhappy with the leadership of mayor Bass, but they have deep concerns about voting for someone who's affiliated with the DSA. Yes. What is your message to those voters who I think would probably be primarily concerned about homelessness, about disorder and crime and about just the city's inability to do basic things like keep the streets clean and bright. You know, I'm here, like I'm a mom from Silver Lake. I have 10 year old twins. I really care about the city. I really care about cities working for people. And I feel like my political ideology is really, is I have a progressive political ideology, but I really want to get shit done. I want people to be able to trust their local government because I believe in it so wholeheartedly. And so for anyone who has qualms about the DSA or qualms about, you know, oh, she's, I don't know, to the left of me, like there is no right or left. There is no left way to fix a broken streetlight. And under mayor Bass, the time it has taken to fix a broken streetlight has gone from one month to over one year on average in the wealthiest country in the world. It takes a year to fix a broken streetlight in this city. And to me, that feels unacceptable. I don't know what side of the political ideology that's on or whether that's a DSA position, but really what I would say is that's unacceptable to me. And I want people to feel like they can get their streetlights fixed and they can get their streetlights fixed and they can get their potholes repaired and they can call in about a person who's experiencing homelessness on their street and know that the city is going to respond quickly and with the best solution for that person to be able to get indoors. Like that's what I want for the city of Los Angeles. That's what I've tried to deliver for my district. And I think we have done it. We've had incredible results on homelessness, gotten so many people indoors during that time. And I want that for every block of this city. So if I were to make the best case for Karen Bass, it would be something like she inherited a mess across a variety of fronts. There's been a failure to approve housing for years. There's a legacy of fiscal mismanagement that required budget cuts for basic services. There was complacency around the film industry as jobs left for Atlanta, New York and Vancouver and London. And by the way, just a ton of just mismanagement of the department. Permitting, building, all the rest. And that is a morass that, of course, will take years to clean up. And we've begun to clean it up. And that you are cynically exploiting the space between acknowledging the crisis and the hard work of fixing it because no one could possibly have fixed it in these four years. What is your response to that? election because she ran towards the issue of homelessness rather than running away from it. I remember I talked to a politician, an old, old time politician here in the city of Los Angeles, who told me, you know, homelessness is an issue that everyone should stay away from because nobody ever wins. And Mayor Bass ran towards it, you know, and she had courage and I give her real credit for that. But I feel like the real test of mayoralty is, did you take actions to try and resolve those crises? And I feel like if you look across the issues that we're facing, whether it's our housing crisis, whether it's our homelessness crisis, whether it's Hollywood jobs, whether it's just jobs overall and our economic activity here in Los Angeles, the city has not done what it needs to do to solve those problems under her leadership. And I would say so many of the decisions that she has made in City Hall have actually fallen in line with the same political system that led us to this moment of crisis in the first place, where you essentially make decisions with billions of taxpayer dollars and exchange that for political support in your next election, not for what matters for, you know, the residents of Los Angeles. And, you know, I think the biggest example of that is the convention center. You know, another big example of that is how we've done contracting for our police union. But this is not the way that we can make decisions anymore. We cannot make decisions that way and function as a city. We cannot make decisions that way with so little money in our city and in our city budget. We cannot make decisions that way and continue to lose the trust of Angelina's. So. Sure. Now, one of the reasons that we've seen. So there was eight months last year where they weren't really repairing roads at all. There's the streetlight issue, the pothole issues. A lot of this is because she did this deal that increased the police funding and then made cuts all around it, right? You're inheriting that deal, right? 100%. And then I'm inheriting the convention center deal after that. Can that be stopped? Can the convention center be stopped? And it's actually going to get worse because, so this was a deal for people who may not know, after the city dealt with a billion dollar budget deficit, that was the result of contracts we couldn't afford for basically, for Mayor Bass exchanged that contract for the support of the police union, which is spending millions to reelect her in this election. opposed her last time. Just a few months after that, the city is broke. The city has a billion dollar budget deficit. We are thinking about cutting 1,600 staff. We barely stave off those layoffs, but we've cut every single city service down to the bone. We're not paving roads. We're not filling potholes. We're not addressing graffiti. We're not picking up trash. It is bad out there. And I'm sure you can feel it when you're walking around this city. We then approve a $6 billion, with debt service, $6 billion convention center expansion that, you know, I've been walking around this city for a long time talking to a lot of constituents. I have never heard anyone say what my priority is to expand the convention center right now. Like, literally, that has never been mentioned. But that convention center expansion was approved. It's going to take $100 million in the rosiest financial projections out of our budget for the next 30 years, and we're going back to voters and asking them to approve higher taxes to get streetlights fixed, to get essential infrastructure funded here. And so for me, it was like one of those decisions which just blew my mind. How can we justify this at this time? And it was one of those things that really undermined my faith in this mayor's leadership. But then. Oh, and by the way, she did it because the downtown business interests and the vested interests that wanted that to happen are now supporting her to the tune of millions of supporting her to the tune of millions of dollars in her re-elect. When you're mayor, you will. I'll have to deal with it. Right. So you're making promises about getting those times down on street light repair, fixing the roads, planting 100,000 trees. I love trees. I said I would hit that. Are you going to be able to do that within these constraints? How much of this is going to be. How much of this is management and how much of this is going to be about having to reorganize the budget? So some of it is definitely management. And I think a lot of times on this campaign trail, I've been actually critiqued for not having more of an expansive vision for how I think the city could change. Like I'm not saying making all these promises for people that I don't think the city can deliver on. What I have been saying is that we can do better at delivering the essentials. We can do better at actually managing our city and cutting red tape, making it easier for you to deal with the bureaucracy, making sure that the things that you expect us to do. That we're going to deliver on. And to me, a lot of that is management and some of that is budget. And we will not be able to solve these problems in overnight or in four years. But what I think Angelenos expect is a plan and honesty. What can we expect in these streets over the next four years? What can we invest in? How are we going to identify the places that are going to give us the biggest liabilities and make sure that we're tackling those first so that we're not paying out hundreds of millions of dollars? Annually for liability payouts that requires management, that requires communication with the public. And I want to do all of that as your mayor. I don't feel like I get that right now from our mayor. So one other part of this is road repair. I've seen people talking about this. I see this myself. Even the repairs that happen in the city of L.A. when they happen, they're just bad. They just don't do that great. No, they're not. But you know what I mean? They're ugly, right? Like they don't they're not. There's no pride. And the work, right? They're not like they're like we're so behind and say fixing us. Like if you go to like other parts of other cities that are other municipalities that are connected part of the county, but not in the city, like they're not just they're not just sort of paving a pothole. They're going to or just filling a roundabout like they're going to put bushes there. They're going to make it a nice and beautiful place to live. And I guess I like is this about leadership within these institutions? Is it about institutions that take a long time because they get overtime? For doing projects like what? What do you think is actually happening when you say management? So part of it. So what you're talking about and the feeling that you're getting that other cities look better than ours is partly a budgetary issue, right? We are just not investing in holistic street improvements in the way that other cities are when they're doing a road repaving. They're also going to do some other things which are going to make this street easier to move on or or or better to better to travel through. We're actually supposed to do that. The voters passed a measure called HLA, which actually mandates that every time we do a street repaving, we're actually supposed to make it safer for people to use, potentially safer for bicyclists, safer for pedestrians, depending on what road it is. And so there is actually a bunch of mandates that we're supposed to meet. The city of Los Angeles hasn't just ignored the HLA rules. They've also ignored ADA compliance that they were. We're supposed to do for a very long time. So every single mile of street that we repave now is going to cost us so much more than what it would have cost us if we'd done it when we were actually supposed to. So, yes, there is going to be a backlog. But I really believe in the city of L.A. Like, I believe in our workforce. I believe that, you know, a lot of times now when people think about L.A. City, they shrug and they're like, oh, it's L.A. City. It's going to be a pain in the butt. I want you to raise your expectations. I want you to believe in cities. City Hall again. I want you to think of this city as the city that created its own municipal utility because it believed that it could, you know, make sure that power and water were being provided to residents at affordable rates. A city that brought water from another place because it wanted to exist. A city that did big things and is full of people who come here and dream big dreams like that takes a change in culture. And I think we just have to figure out a way to match our existing budgets with that change in culture that says believe in the city again, believe in what City Hall can do. Yeah, I am thinking of one example. And on the list of things that a mayor would have to deal with in Los Angeles, I am saying I agree. This is it was just a small example to me, which is they fixed. So the on I'm going to just be let's get specific. You're my council member as well. They fixed the sidewalks have been horrible. It's a big problem in Los Angeles. Part of this is related to this compliance. Also, then we pay a lot of money to people who sue because they fell. We pay more for the slip and falls than we do to fix the sidewalks. That seems done. Seems like we should fix the sidewalks. I agree. But they they were placed at the corner of like I think it's Vermont and Los Feliz Boulevard. They finally fixed it. And then at where the button is for the crosswalk, they just used a pipe, just a metal pipe. And then the buttons on the pipe. It has. It is as if there's no aesthetics in the world. It's a crosswalk that tons of people that go to the Greek that way. Tons of people cross and it's just a fucking pipe. And to cross the street is just an ugly pipe popping out of the fucking ground. What are we doing here? I feel personally attacked. I don't think you picked out the pipe. I'm glad it got fixed. Yes, this is in my district. So I'll take a look at it. All right. Making some progress. All right. Now, if you are going to be the mayor of Los Angeles, it's important. It's important that you know the city's lore, its myths, its fables, the alligators in its toilets. Let's see how well you know the legends of Los Angeles in a segment we're calling Nith Busters. I'm going to read a legend about Los Angeles. You'll tell us if it's a myth or a true story. First up, Walt Disney's head is cryogenically frozen and stored underneath the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland. I think that's a myth. Okay. Yeah. Yes, it is a myth. Yeah. It was started in January of 1967 by a reporter for the National Spotlight who claimed he snuck into Burbank St. Joseph's Hospital following Disney's death and saw Disney's body suspended in a cryogenic cylinder. In reality, he's buried in Forest Lawn. Oh, interesting. Right there. Yeah. There are a lot of weird things that happen in L.A., so I wouldn't be like totally. No, I think it's totally possible. Yeah. Anyway. Well, maybe this is just the official story. Maybe the head's really there. Next myth or supposed myth. Los Angeles has 91 abandoned tunnels under the city, which were used as speakeasies during Prohibition. There were speakeasies during Prohibition. I don't know about these abandoned tunnels. Myth? It's true. Oh, my God. I did not know that. L.A. apparently maintained 200 pedestrian tunnels built in the 20s and 30s, most of which were decommissioned and abandoned upon the rise of the American automobile. But not before people had a lot of great times down there. Now, there is a myth. There is a myth. I knew about the tunnels. I just didn't know they were used for drinking. Yeah. Well, you know. Yeah. What isn't, you know, a hole in the ground. All right. Yeah. But there is the myth that there are secret tunnels beneath Los Angeles that the celebrities drive around on. Right. Yes. Which I don't think are real. I don't think. Yes. No. Unless maybe the show will get bigger and then I'll find out. I've actually, yes. I've actually shut down a tunnel, a pedestrian tunnel that is unused in my district, so I know very well about the tunnels. And then I have watched a lot of Bosch. I don't know if people watch Bosch. Huh. A Bosch head. Wouldn't have thought of it. And I just really like to reward shows that are shot in L.A. Oh, yeah. And a lot of murders happen in these pedestrian tunnels on the show Bosch. Thank you for sharing that. Next up, L.A. invented jaywalking. I don't know any of these. Like, we did. We did it in style? Or we invented the term jaywalking. True? Yes. Okay. Lawmakers passed the first major anti-jaywalking law in 1925 using legislation drafted by automakers attempting to shift blame for pedestrian deaths from the new booming car industry to jaywalkers, jay being slang for a fool or a drunk. We did that. Hey, a question that was asked was about what we, about kind of repairing roads for pedestrian safety. And, you know, bike lanes and kind of repairing some of the, like, for example, like, we don't repaint our crosswalks in Los Angeles like we used to. No, we don't. But it's a lot of that has to do with budgetary decisions. So I talked a little bit about fiscal mismanagement. And we have actually defunded almost every non-police salary payment from the city. And everything is invested in less than what we used to. Before. And so a big part of the reason why we don't pave as many streets as we used to, why we don't trim as many trees as we used to, why we don't fix as many sidewalks as we used to, is because of the fiscal mismanagement of this mayor. And I will, over time, push that if I become the mayor. Next up, president of NBC Entertainment, Bob Greenblatt, had 1600 Penn canceled because he was jealous of my success. I think this is true. Yes, it is true. It is true. Thank you. you need the ramen. Election day is November 3rd. Uh, if you're in Los Angeles, I would suggest voting and we'll be right back. Hey, don't go anywhere. There's more of love it or leave it coming up. Love it or leave it is brought to you by Zazzle. You know, that feeling when you're three days out from someone's birthday and you have no idea what to get. And then you end up with something generic that you're not even sure they'll like. That's where Zazzle comes in to save the day. 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Hungry Root stands out from other meal services because it actually gets to know your taste. It creates your weekly box with everything you need to whip up healthy, delicious food at home. You can even add snacks, supplements, and everyday pantry staples to your delivery. You're going to love Hungry Root as much as we do. For a limited time, get 40% off your first order, plus get a free item in every box for life. Go to HungryRoot.com and use code LOVEIT. That's HungryRoot.com. Code LOVEIT to get 40% off your first box and a free item of your choice for life. And we're back. Please welcome to the show, you know him from Dropout, Dimension 20, and the internet writ large. It's Brendan Lee Mulligan. Hello. Hello. These lovely faces, all these beautiful people here tonight. It's great. Hi. Nice to meet you. We're meeting in this moment. In this very moment because you got here, but I'm so glad you did. Skin in my teeth. I came here. Everyone can blame Sam Rice. Game Changer is shooting right now. And so I'm here from that. It was his devilry that's the reason I'm late. So I love that show, Game Changer. The Dropout's this amazing kind of little kind of it's its own little universe, like this alternate reality that exists in its own play. How's it going over there? It's great. I mean, talk about independent, cool, progressive, comedy, media, little empire. And also Sam Rice's dad, former labor secretary, Robert Rice. Right. There you go. So someone made a really polite, oh. Yeah. Boy, tip that Thanksgiving. Yeah. Exactly. No, it's great. But Dropout is it's a really wonderful place for anyone who doesn't know. Dropout is an independent streaming platform that emerged like a phoenix from the ashes of college humor, the old YouTube channel. And we do a lot of awesome improv and sketch comedy and we have improv game shows. And I run a show there called Dimension 20, where comedians play Dungeons and Dragons. And we do it to tell funny stories with wacky characters. So I want to talk about Dungeons and Dragons because people assume I am familiar. They just all the time. It's just like like often it's just like, oh, and of course you must play Dungeons and Dragons. I do not. OK. And it's just and there's nothing I just there's something about my energy that would suggest I would, but I don't. It could be that it could be that you have a suave, dashing demeanor. That's probably what it is. Because, of course, Dungeons and Dragons is extremely cool these days. Yes. It was not when I was a kid. But the whole. Yeah. The whole if you wait long enough, the whole world I've found will move glacially towards your hobby, which is really delightful. Yeah, I hope so. I hope so. But is there some part of you like I love cooking and every once in a while I'll think, oh, you know what, I should film a fun video of myself cooking. And sometimes I've done that. But then I think, oh, no, I'm a little bit minding the thing I love and turning it into content. Do you ever feel that that you've turned this thing you love into content? I mean, a million percent. And that's a great question, because I think that like the the Internet really encourages us to perform our lives. And I think that that is part of what's what's so funny about it is especially people will ask that question of me because I do it professionally. But the reality is even a lot of people I know find a way to turn into a profession their hobbies and things they love doing. You know, if you do anything with any level of skill or proficiency, probably a friend or loved one will remark. You could do this as a channel. You could do this. It's not even like a mean spirited thing. It's just part of what our culture is doing right now. But to your point, I now only have time to play D&D professionally. I my home game that I've been running one game of D&D with my close friends for 14 years, and it ended a couple of months before I became a dad. I said I said the time has come to put away all forms of hobby. You almost said put away childish things in the Bible, as it says in the Bible. Put away childish things. Were you thinking of that? I was saying put away childish things in my head. Were you? I was. You were thinking of the Bible, but you didn't want to call it childish. I'm often thinking of Christ. Yes, yes, yes, yes. But no, but I totally it was a so now I do exclusively play for work. But it's only just because life has become, you know, any any downtime is spent with family and with little kids. Huge mistake. You're going to regret that at the end. You're going to get to the end and say, I wish I'd spent more time at the office. Yeah. And monetizing. And monetizing. You could have been monetizing more of your time. So here's my thing. So when you ended that D&D game after 14 years, did you did the did it end in universe? Yeah. Did everyone die? No, we miraculously it ended. So the 14 year home game was a group of wonderful heroic adventurers who were opposing an evil empire and a wicked. God of death and winter, who was also up in the mix, classic fantasy stuff. And at the end of 14 years, they were all 20th level. They were all as powerful as the game lets you get. And we had this shift towards the end. You know, we've been playing for many years and we sort of had this thing of, oh, God, imagine if this ever ends. It would be heartbreaking. And we got to a point where we said, oh, imagine if it doesn't. Imagine if we don't get to end our story and give it the ending it deserves. And we all kind of shifted our mentality. And we spent. A week in a little cabin in upstate New York, and we played for a week straight and we ended the story and they won. It was beautiful. They beat they beat the bad guys, which is great. Hooray. So I might I might ask this in a slightly impertinent way. Yeah, well, this is the thing that has kept me away from D&D, which is so I like competition and I like knowing the rules and I like I like knowing how how the game works and trying to win within the structures of the game. I was my friend, Guy Branum, and I did a David Kwong show and he had us on. It's a very fun, charming, no stakes competition show. I became insane with the devil of competition. Yes. And just sitting in a studio for no purpose, not no money at stake, no stakes whatsoever. And and I started sputtering about how I had hit the buzzer first. That's my nature. And I could fix it, but I don't want to. Yeah, because that's the. That's the drive in me. Because the second you try to fix it, they're going to snake you and get the points. Yeah, I got you. I don't want to be a guy that's happy and losing. Yeah, totally. Because then because I mean, now seeing the idea of myself losing. Yeah, I hear you. I mean, the the I fully agree. But so my the reason I say all that is aren't the rules being made up as you go? So the rules are written down in anywhere from five to 40 books. They are not made up at all. I'm not saying I'm sorry, that is unfair and I'm sorry the way I phrase that, I'm not saying that the rules are made up, but the bounds and what happens is using those rules are shaped by a dungeon master who can make determinations about who succeeds and who fails. Sure. In other words, there is this weird thing where the rules exist, but the rules exist within a shared story. So, like, I might not as a dungeon master be really faithfully following the rules. If I say you're fighting a dragon and it's in. Invincible and you can't hit it, but nothing's stopping me from going, yeah, you can hit the dragon, but he's here with 30 other dragons, right? Right. There's always another dragon behind the drag behind the dragon. You could have as many dragons as you like the it does a really good job, I think, of combining competitive play with cooperative play. And I think that you have to embrace sort of both halves of the brain there, so to speak, when I'm playing as the dungeon master. I get to, you know, be this harsh arbiter of consequence if a mistake is made. But then also I'm often rooting for them to succeed. And that's a fun dichotomy to play either side of. But to your point, yeah, it's not hard. It's not hard competition in that, you know, you do have to have some good faith with each other, but I'd argue that the same is probably true for sports. Like I could go on a soccer field and be like, surprise, I've got a chainsaw. I'm about to win at soccer, right? Like you could do something that was poor faith and be like, wow, everyone's fled the field and now I can score as many goals as I like. So you bring political people into your dungeon? Sure. Yeah, yeah. What's an example of incorporating a political person? I've played Dungeons and Dragons with the incredible Estuardo Mazariegos, who is a DSA endorsed candidate running here in wonderful Los Angeles. I've played with DSA endorsed Nithya Raman, who was here earlier this evening. She's incredible at D&D. She's an amazing D&D player. I've played with Marissa Roy. Yeah. A bunch of other DSA, Ugo and Eunice. That's all that I've played with. I've played with a shocking amount of politicians this year in a taped capacity in front of an audience as fundraisers. And it was really fun and good. It's amazing how big of a following D20 has. I mean, you've been at the Hollywood Bowl. Hollywood Bowl. That's incredible. We did the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. We sold out Madison Square Garden. I think it was wrong when they got rid of those lions. What happened to the lions? They don't let them live in that little cage anymore. And I think that's wrong. I liked that they were there. I liked seeing them. And I think it's wrong. And bring back the lions to Las Vegas. There you go. Exactly. Yeah. But nobody agrees because of woke. So you're the child of a comedian and a comic book writer. Were they a source of advice when you were growing up? Or is it the kind of thing where you don't talk that way? No, totally. My mom is an incredible. Author and science fiction writer. She wrote a graphic novel series called Starstruck. Brilliant, brilliant writer and author who worked in speculative fiction. My dad was a stand up comedian for many, many years and had a highly improvisational style. He would bring a guitar on stage and make up songs about people in the audience. He was, you know, you know, 20 years ahead of the crowd work surge. You know, he was way ahead of the curve. So they're brilliant. And I ended up doing it. It's very funny because my my folks. I'm. Doing such a weird midpoint of the Venn diagram of the two of them. I had a comedian father and a science fiction author, mom, and I do funny, improvised fantasy sci fi stories. Wow, that's so interesting. Again, awesome noise from the audience. A little. Ah, it's good. Really good. Thank you for that. Is what I'm doing half of a box factory? I don't think so. One of your folks work at a box factory. Yeah, that's cool. What did what did your mom or dad do at a box factory? It was a family business and it was folding boxes for shirts and hats and pizzas when we had it was before before the corrugated. Gosh, so the way so the raw cardboard comes and they make it into the boxes. Remember, there was a time I remember I remember when the corrugated pizza boxes came along. I can't support it. Unnecessary. It was better when it was like, oh, no, what's going to happen? Remember? When those pizza boxes were like, oh, no, what's going to happen? That's that that sent me to college. I think that's awesome. Yeah, it is pretty good. Hey, you're in a new show created by Mike Schur called Dig. Yeah, isn't that cool? And Amy Poehler's in it. That's cool. I got to meet Mike Schur and Amy Poehler, and it was nuts. I love seeing fellow podcasters make it. Finally, a break for Amy Poehler to get out of the podcasting game. Have you seen Digger? Oh, the Tom Cruise movie? Yeah. I have seen nothing other than every episode of Bluey every day. Wow. I am a new dad, and so we must understand that my media consumption habits are me haunted eating one chicken nugget in a dark corner looking at Bluey. Chicken nuggets? Are they like McDonald's, or do you make them yourself? Well, we just got fish sticks. And anybody out here who has kids knows that fish is a brain food, and if they give it in a little panko-crusted format, and getting any new food to a toddler, huge, huge win. If you told me right now, bigger achievement, Madison Square Garden or kid now eating fish sticks, it's fish sticks by a mile every day. Do you think you could blend the fish sticks and turn it into a sauce for chicken nuggets? Blending stuff into smoothies is how this child has, consumed every vegetable in her life. Yeah, I'm a big believer in the blending. The smoothie is our friend. Strawberries are doing some heavy lifting for kale every day. And you haven't seen Digger? I have not seen Digger. But you're on a show called Dig. I'm on a show called Dig. It's hysterically funny. Amy Poehler is unreal funny in it, and there's incredible, Geraldine Viswanathan is in it, Fina Strasa, Antonia Thomas has been in it. It's a really incredible cast, and Mike Schur, amazing writers, Cassia Miller, my old, uh, uh, Herald teammate is one of the writers on it and it's great. It's, it was a dream come true and I play a real Muppet in it. It's going to be a delight. I can't wait for it to come out. That's awesome. I'm excited about that. Now, speaking of Digger, uh, in the spirit, oh, Dig, damn it. Uh, in the spirit of Dungeons and Dragons, we'd love your help sorting some big names in the news on the alignment grid, uh, in a game we're calling Gridfellas. Man, look at that. Look at that. That's it. That's pretty good. You got a real Canva wizard back there. Yeah. How about it? We, uh, we, uh, lifted the moratorium on using my face in these graphics. Uh, so you'll decide which category each person is in. And for the listeners at home, those categories are lawful, good, lawful, neutral, lawful, evil, neutral, good, true, neutral, neutral, evil, and chaotic, good, chaotic, neutral, chaotic, evil. I love that. Uh, first up we have Pete Hegseth. Uh, Pete Hegseth is your classic lawful, evil, classic lawful, evil, um, someone who does that mean I got it right? Wait, who's the moral authority? Is God judging this right now? Always. You nailed it. That is how I have weighed his immortal soul. Uh, next up, JD Vance. JD Vance, uh, uh, neutral, evil, true opportunist. Yeah. Uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, definitely wants to advocate for harm, but has no real ideological pin down anywhere else on that ethical spectrum. I think that's right. Next up, Chuck Schumer. Chuck Schumer. Uh, I would say at the, uh, which, which alignment is, is, has been, if there was an alignment for, has been here for a very, very, very long time. Yeah. That would be the alignment I would choose for Chuck Schumer. It does seem true. Neutral. Like that to me is where I feel like true neutral, maybe lawful. Yeah. There's a, I would say for me that the, the time, the timeline on Chuck is true neutral at best. But again, I would say that like the, the, it just feels all over the place. It's, you know, it's one of those things that as people age, they, or, or their political relevancy moves on. It's just not this moment. And I think that, uh, this answer is quickly becoming not so funny. I'm too upset. It doesn't need to be funny. Too upset in real life. Uh, I just want to say, I disagree. I think he's only getting better with age. Uh, and that's the official position of love it or leave it. Chuck Schumer aging like a fine wine. Uh, next up, Nathan Fielder. Nathan Fielder. Oh, chaotic neutral. Absolutely. You think he's chaotic neutral. Chaotic neutral. I look at, I look at Nathan Fielder and I feel as though my conception of reality is unraveling. Yeah. I look at Nathan Fielder and I'm like, oh, I don't have a beat on what's going on at all. Right? Like, that's what he feels like to me. Sam Reich. Sam Reich. Sam Reich is the architect of every moment of my life's misery. Ah. Sam Reich is, um, a constant thorn in my side. He has visited more woe upon me than any other individual. I hate to hear visiting woe is happening to you. This motherfucker visits woe constantly. Wow. Wow. It's also like, hey, voe, stop wizarding. Stay a while. You know what I'm saying? Take your coat off. Uh, and I would say, I would say, that was a sleeper. I got you a little bit later with that one. Um, uh, I would say for Sam Reich, uh, I would say for Sam Reich, with all of that said, uh, neutral good. Neutral good. Neutral good. I thought maybe you could get him into chaotic good. He, he gave me, he gave me my first shot in this business. My life in this industry would not be what it is without him believing in me when few else did. So as much as he has tormented me, I love him. I love him very, very much. Wow. It's so, it's so interesting the different way people talk on mic versus off mic. I'll get you, Sam. Thank you, Brennan. Check out Dig on Peacock on November 23rd. Check out the dropout and we'll be right back. Woo! Love It or Leave It is brought to you by Willie's Remedy. 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With a delicious blend of passion fruit, lemon, and lime, enjoy as a shot over ice or mixed into your favorite mocktail. Willie's is the number one THC infused beverage in the U.S. with over 350,000 happy customers and 1 million bottles sold. Order now at drinkwillies.com and use code lowly for 20% off your first order, plus free shipping on orders over $95. That's code L-O-L-I at drinkwillies.com or use the store locator to find Willie's on shelves near you, like your local Total Wine, Specs, ABC, or local liquor store. Long plan. Today, our docuseries exploring the people and forces shaping the South is back. Newsflash, the South is the new political epicenter of the country. Democrats are way on their heels in this region, but Republicans are going through their own reckoning in the South, too. We're in the final stretch of the midterms, and the political map has only gotten more competitive with new states and districts emerging as potential flips. So we thought it was time to get back out on the road and take a closer look at what's actually happening on the ground. I'm Erin Haines, journalist and expert on all things Southern politics. And I'm Jennifer Palmieri, former White House communications director. Tune in on Mondays to Long Play series on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back! We're once again joined by Councilmember Nithya Raman. Round and round the rant wheel we go. Where will we stop? Only our producers know. That's right, time for the rant wheel. We'll spin wherever it lands. If it lands, you get 60 seconds. Let's spin the wheel. That's me. It's landing on Brandon. What do you got? 60 seconds. 60 seconds to rant about anything at all that I like? That's right. Putting people on the spot is rude. I got out of a van, I want to say 90 seconds ago, okay? I have no control over my own life. I wake up in the morning and Sam Rice tells me where to go and who to be. I have no control over what's happening. So to put me here on the spot and make me rant about something I don't know about without even a prompt? Is the height of impropriety? I'm looking at numbers. The numbers are different colors. What's that supposed to do for our neurodivergent guests? I'm feeling distracted on a level I never have before. And here I am coming from the heart about something that is genuinely panic-inducing. Folks, you got to get out there and vote for Nithya Raman for mayor of Los Angeles. You got to get out there and vote for Nithya Raman for mayor of Los Angeles. I could not be more excited for our next mayor here. And I'm very, very excited too as a Los Angelino because I'm raising a family here and there's so many great plans for our next mayor. So I'm going to vote for our neighbors, both those that are trying to make a family work here and trying to make the city all that it can be. And it's a very exciting future. And once again, how dare you put me in this position? Next time, just a cue card or anything I would love and I'll take it. We'll take that under advisement? No. Let's spin it again. What if it's him again? Oh, here's the thing. It's the thing is the wheel is what? What function does it really serve? We'll each get to go and it lands in just basically an order. It's also digital. So there's no accountability. This could all be pre-programmed. Is the wheel rigged? Yes. It's the wheel serves no function. It doesn't even make sense. It originally was conceived of having topics on it and then it would land on a topic and you'd have to rant about that topic. That's at least a logic to it. Now it just has our fucking faces on it and every guest goes once. So what are we doing here? And yet without it, something is missing. We've tried it without it. Doesn't work. It doesn't work. You have 60 seconds. Okay. So there are mosquitoes in Los Angeles now. And I really hate mosquitoes. I really hate them. But the thing that I really want to rant about as someone who comes, I'm from Kerala, rainforest climate, a lot of mosquitoes. People do not know mosquito etiquette here. They just don't understand. My husband just opens the door and leaves the door open for long periods of time. Mosquitoes fly in, then they wake me up at night with their bloodthirsty greed. It is so frustrating. I hate it so much. We can do something about these mosquitoes. It involves releasing a lot of sterile mosquitoes, millions of them. They then copulate with the existing mosquitoes and then they have babies, eggs that don't. form new mosquitoes. And that's how we get rid of the mosquitoes. But if you're living in Los Angeles and there's mosquitoes, close the goddamn door. Wow. Oh my God. That's incredible. Oh my God. I also recently discovered that mosquitoes are actually the deadliest animal in the world. I had to memorize a list of the deadliest animals in the world. What's the second most deadly? Humans. And that's a bummer. But 13th is hippos. They're so mad. I'm actually really surprised that humans are less deadly than. Than mosquitoes. Yeah. It's kind of, I won't lie. I also, I didn't want to share it, but I was heartened by it. I was like, because I would have said like, of course, the most dangerous animal, the least conscientious is man. And mosquitoes are like, what the hell, dude? I'm right here. I'm so deadly. We kill so many people, said the mosquitoes. Yes, exactly. Look at the board. Yeah. A hundred percent. Yeah. Oh, you see, you see, yeah. You think you're tough? Scoreboard. Scoreboard. Mosquitoes. Nasty. Let's spin it again. I wonder who it's going to be. It's landed on me. Here's my topic. It's a very specific topic. It is the phrase, for those of you who don't know me. And it is because having gone to many, many weddings over the years, and as someone who is a former speechwriter, I take issue with the phrase, for those of you who don't know me. First of all, it is always said in the exact same way. For those of you who don't know me, and the fact that it is unnecessary. By definition, everyone who knows you knows they know you. Everyone who doesn't know you knows they don't know you. The introduction takes care of all who don't know you and is of no consequence to those who do know you. But then I think, why does it bother me? And it bothers me because it's unoriginal. And I associate being unoriginal with being, not being genuine, which is my aesthetic, bias towards requiring originality from people who just want to express their love at an event in which they're not normally comfortable, which is speaking in front of groups, right? And so maybe they are genuinely unoriginal and unoriginally genuine. And I ought to respect that. This is really a rant about my judgment. For those of you who don't know me, you know that, you know, that phrase. We'll be right back. And we're back. Our evening together is drawing to a close, but we still have just enough time for my producers to open up a can of whoop-ass on me in our final segment, Second Thoughts. Nithya Brennan, here's how it works. Our team of intrepid producers have written down everything they think I did wrong this episode. And I'm going to read them to you and you'll tell me if I did anything you regret from the show. This is also your time to share it. Let's see what they've got. From the monologue, Helen Keller catching strays, I could have committed harder to a French accent on wee-wee. I think that regret is healthy and positive. So I would say regret it. Yeah, regret it. Okay. Wow. Let's see. I also told the audience I see them as objects. I think honesty is wonderful. No regrets. Thank you. Okay, great. Oh, wow. This is, it said, I didn't say I love you to Ari when Ari arrived. Per Ari. I think I did. No, regret that. I think. So do you also regret the gaslighting that you're doing right now? Or is that? No, no, that's core to our relationship. I said, I said, and I quote, do you agree with this? Tell me. We're going to have a moment. Did I not say hello, my love? Ah, Tessa. Hello, my love. Ha ha. Ha ha. The key is winning. Nithya, I compared hosting this show twice a week to a career in public service. Don't regret that. And I may have gotten too heated about that ugly pipe. Regret that. Okay, great. Do you have any final thoughts or regrets before we hit the road? For myself, you know, I think my only regret is we did not get more time to talk. I'm leaving a short interaction with Councilwoman Nithya, already excited for my new sterile mosquito neighbors. And I wish we'd had more time to talk about more amazing plans for Los Angeles. And I think that regret is positive and good. And everybody that I've ever heard say in person or personally, I live my life without regrets, always has personally wronged me at least one time. That's a beautiful place to leave it I have only one regret that the show must end And that's our show So thank you so much to Nithya Raman and Brenna Lee Mulligan There are 13 days until the midterms We'll be back Friday with Punky Johnson and David Kwong Have a great night Love It or Leave It is a Crooked Media production Our show is produced by Kendra James, Bill McGrath, Kelsey Gante And me, John Lovett Our production team includes Hallie Kiefer, Sarah Lazarus, Raman Borsellino Peter Miller, David Toles, Claudia Shang Jay Banks, Raul Calderon, Gavin Purcell And Matt DeGroote And our production staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East So we thought it was time to get back out on the road And take a closer look at what's actually happening on the ground I'm Erin Haines, journalist and expert on all things Southern politics And I'm Jennifer Palmieri, former White House Communications Director Tune in on Mondays to Long Play Series on YouTube Or wherever you get your podcasts