This isn't a story about Mitch McConnell. It's a story about an American political system that refuses to make room for the next generation.
Hi everyone, this is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher.
Scott, I want to understand why you took Ed to the game and not me. Explain where you were. I'm teasing. I don't...
Well, it's because I like Ed more.
I figured. Yeah. Yeah. Explain where you were.
No interest in World Cup.
I would have gone. Had I been asked, I would have considered it. In any case, do you want to go on Wednesday to Atlanta?
Well, okay. So don't give me that then. Do you want to fly me there? Well, I, you know, last minute I can't get places like you can. Explain to me what you did to tell people where you were, because you were quite... you look the happiest I've ever seen you, I have to tell you.
I might have been the happiest I've ever... or I've been in a while. Look, I have no interest in sports. I decided consciously... I used to play a lot of golf because when you're in your 30s and trying to run a strategy firm and you're basically renting your brain to old white guys known as CEOs, you have to play golf every weekend, right? That's the only... Anyways, and I decided about 20 years ago I was going to pour all the time I was spending on golf into fitness. And I played sports in college, but I have no interest in professional sports. I think it's mostly a waste of time. Every four years I go crazy for the World Cup. And this one has been the most special of the three because the way I describe the World Cup right now is it's a bunch of cousins who just love each other and their parents are out of town and they're doing a sleepover despite the fact their parents don't get along.
And I think when you're sitting in that stadium... and I went through a lot of logistics and costs to get from Italy to Hard Rock Stadium in Miami and find seats...
Miami. I didn't know where that was. Yeah, Miami.
It was Miami. It was me, my two friends, and my youngest. But when you're in that stadium and 70,000 people are singing in harmony, Sweet Caroline, which is associated with Team England, and then we all, including English fans...
Sweet Caroline at the beginning of the game, Hey Jude at the end in honor of Jude Bellingham, which is in my opinion the man of the tournament. But...
And then everyone, including the Team England fans, start rowing, which is a Norwegian signature. Yeah.
And when Norwegian Airlines, living up to their bet, changed their logo to British Airways.
It's like all of the goodwill that is resident in the world appears to be bubbling up in the World Cup.
Also, good men. I mean, the Norwegian guys. I miss... I'm sorry they didn't win because I liked his whole act, his whole manly act.
Bellingham. Every time he leaves the field, he honors his mother.
Talking about mental health. I mean, I'll do this... I'll do a longer dive on this next week, but I struggle, as a lot of people do. You know, it's like healthy masculinity. It's like porn. We know it. We just don't know how to describe it.
What's happening in the World Cup right now, and you referenced this with the Knicks, is pretty damn close.
Yep. It is. No, 100%, same thing.
Strength, generosity, understanding how to lose...
You know, talking about mental health, talking about the privilege...
Yeah. Affection with each other, getting along with their enemies, you know, it just...
It's just cooperation, excellence.
You know what I call it? I call it un-ugly. There's not a bit of ugliness in it. I have to say I can...
Un-ugly. There's so much ugliness, and we'll be talking about a lot of that today. But I just... it's really lovely. I mean, I'm only going to miss the Norwegian. That's all. I just think he's... what's his name? Haaland or...
Haaland. Yeah. He's amazing. I have to say he looks like he could kill... like he'd be the person on the bad end of a mace if you were living in the medieval times, but he actually is just like so adorable in really lovely ways. Just so kind, like just a kind large man, which is really a great juxtaposition, I think. Anyway, I'm glad you had a good time. So, you're going to the semis and the finals.
I don't know if I can get to the semis. I'm going to try. I'm trying to see if I can just work it out logistically because it's in Atlanta, but I'm going to the final. But you're talking about Haaland, who plays for Man City.
When you're watching, if you know anything about football and you're rooting for the other team, you can't relax because this guy's like a great white shark.
He also hangs around and looks like he's doing nothing and all of a sudden he likes...
Yeah. And then he does. He's like a shark.
Fantastic. And we have our own guy on Team England, this enormous guy who was able to neutralize him. But yeah, it's just fantastic. I'm enjoying it so much.
I'm glad. You looked very happy. You looked very happy.
Had a great time. Great time.
Relaxed is what I perceived it. I perceived it. There's some other not-so-happy things going on. We're going to get to the attorney general's... 12 attorney generals suing Paramount against the Paramount merger, which just dropped. We're going to talk later, and I'm going to talk to Attorney General of California Rob Bonta later. But we first have to start with South Carolina Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, who died from a tear in his aorta. Apparently, according to preliminary findings from the DC medical examiner, Graham passed away on Saturday night at age 71. President Trump spoke to Graham hours where he died, noting he said he was tired but wanted to pass the Save America. Of course, I'm sure he did not say that. The scramble to replace Graham in the Senate, and the short-term and long-term, is underway. We're recording this before the South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster announces who is appointed to the seat. That's happening in a few hours. Trump wants it to be Graham's sister. Nancy Mace says she's not pursuing an interim appointment, but would be remiss if she didn't look at running for the seat. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is also reportedly fielding calls to run. They can't really use House people because the House is such a thin margin if they pull someone from the House. It was pretty shocking because everyone was sort of focused on Mitch McConnell, who offered proof of life on Sunday after weeks of speculation of his whereabouts and health. McConnell released a statement and a photo where he's holding...
Isn't that proof of near death?
A lot of people don't think that photo is... they think it's AI. I would tend to agree. I've talked to a lot of experts. He said a fall led to his hospitalization. He's in rehab and won't be returning to the Senate quite yet. As you say, biology is undefeated, but there's still so much sus around this guy, like what's happening with him. He's not running for reelection, and I think he wants to stay around at least so that the Democrat...
Republicans get to appoint as opposed to the Democratic governor.
No, no, the Democratic governor has to appoint a Republican. The Democratic governor gets to appoint. It just has to be a Republican, as they passed this law that now the Democratic governor might push back on and say it's unconstitutional, by the way, FYI, which would be something. So I don't think, you know, it's just... what a mess. I mean, obviously Lindsey Graham was not that old. 71 is not old. I talked to Jeff. I had dinner... I'm in San Francisco with Jeff last night, and he said, you know, he apparently had some chest pains and was ignoring them for a little bit, or had some discomfort, and this is something that just happens. It's what John Ritter died of. And certainly if he had been diagnosed, they could have done something about it. But a lot of people... this can kill people really quickly. I have a lot of thoughts here. Look, the internet's gone crazy with conspiracy theories. So I have what technically qualifies as a conspiracy theory because it's in the fringe now, because social media can't make money off of it. And that is a 71-year-old male who was out of shape, traveling, and under constant stress had a heart attack and died. I just don't... that's my theory here. And the larger point, and I'm going to come back later in the show to Senator Graham when we do wins and fails, but the larger point is that one of the things that really curses the world right now and causes chaos, oppression, authoritarianism can be reverse-engineered to really old people that won't leave.
71 is old. I mean, I wouldn't necessarily... it is okay. You could fly to Ukraine and back and understand TikTok. I mean, for God's sakes, go home.
Yeah. He didn't want to come.
The average age of an American is 38. The average age of our senator is 65. Watching Mitch McConnell freeze up or talking about a 71-year-old man having a heart attack as if it was clearly done by the Russians or the Iranians. This isn't a story about Mitch McConnell, right? That... for people who don't know, one of the conspiracy theories was Russia. It's a story about an American political system that refuses to make room for the next generation.
If we got rid of... tomorrow, if we decided globally anyone over the age of 70 has to announce a retirement, oh, you'd get rid of Netanyahu, you'd get rid of Putin, you'd get rid of Trump, you'd get rid of Biden, you'd get rid of these people on the Supreme Court that aren't even writing their own briefs anymore. They're just political ideologues. I work with the best faculty in the world. A third of them should be put on an ice floe.
So what? Like 65, you're saying, right? Because the 65 is for the New York Times, 65 is for generals, I think. I'm just curious. I'm curious what you're...
72, 77. Well, I want to find a group of neurologists. Mitt Romney had it perfectly. The guy looks 50 years old. He looks like an Abercrombie & Fitch model, but he's about to turn 80. And he cited that by the time you're 80, key parts of your brain have shrunk by 10 or 15%. We don't need presidents falling asleep in briefings. Do you remember the... the same... I watched... I get served the clips because I know it outraged me of that CNN show, I Feel Stupid with Abby Phillip. Basically the pattern is they figured out they have a cheat code for massive viewership. They have essentially the chief propagandist for the Trump administration say something just ridiculous, and then a bunch of off-Broadway progressives go insane, and they get... I think it's the highest-rated show on CNN. They have Scott Jennings say something ridiculous, right? And incendiary and stupid. He said... I had a conversation with him. Scott, you are lying. The same conversation I bet he had with Senator McConnell is the conversation I had with my father in hospice the last 14 months. And that is, I would say something, and my dad didn't know who I was or where he was. It is so... think about it logically, for God's sakes. All this tumult, all this doubt. If he managed to... if he could... if they were capable of pumping him full of stimulants and just getting a 15-second voice recording honoring his friend Senator Graham's passing...
He didn't say anything. They're very close. That was unusual.
Because clearly he can't. Kara...
Yeah, the picture was odd. I have to say, let's discuss the... I would agree. I would agree. I think the issue is... it was astonishing and some of it funny. I hate to say it was all the memes and everything around Lindsey Graham. Obviously, there's a lot of talk about his sexuality, which was, you know, people are like, 'It's too mean.' I'm like, 'Oh, just let the world do what it wants.' But the memeing that's going on here and then the conspiracy theories are really heavy. Like they're somewhat heavy with Graham about whether he was killed by the Russians or poisoned or this and that. And then McConnell, forget it. It's now like open. It's really fascinating. I'm curious if you think it's a good thing or a bad thing, like these... the memeology and those... the conspiracy theories, and everyone looks at the picture and is, 'Where is his thumb? Is it really AI? Is it AI generated?' Like it really just... nobody believes anything. Nobody believes, and even the believable stuff is unbelievable, if that makes sense.
Unfortunately, we've attached a profit incentive to conspiracy theories, which feels harmless and fun, but it essentially... it attacks our institutions, that there's no one that's believable anymore, and we don't defer to our institutions. And so I think there's an underlying... because the problem with these conspiracy theories that mRNA vaccines alter your DNA is that if you see it enough, because it's novel and the algorithms elevate it beyond its organic reach... you should have the right to say conspiracy theories. The issue is, should social media companies that have a profit incentive to elevate it beyond its organic reach... you then normalize conspiracy theories, they then become less outrageous, and then they become self-evident. And that's the problem, that a lot of these fringe theories become normalized when they ordinarily wouldn't have, because we've attached a profit incentive to conspiracy theories.
That's a really good point. The broader point about Mitch McConnell and Senator Graham is that this isn't about... in these memes, it's not about mocking an aging man. Aging comes for all of us. The failure belongs to us, the people and the institutions that keep insisting that octogenarians should be making the highest-stakes decisions in the world.
And leadership in both parties increasingly resembles the board of a company that forgot that succession planning is part of the damn job. And every CEO is told in their final responsibility that they need to leave the company stronger than they found it. And we fire CEOs who don't build a bench and announce their retirement at some point. And in politics, we've somehow decided the goal is to die with your hand on the steering wheel and take people out with you. And experience matters. Wisdom matters. But so does energy, cognitive sharpness, the willingness to pass a game here. It's a game to keep him in place even if he's Weekend at Bernie's, right? Even if he's like...
That's why we need age limits, Kara.
That's right. No, I agree. But that's what's happening here because the numbers... he's not going to be able to pass the SAVE Act now because it's so tight, right? And it's just... nothing's going anywhere. And that's what they're doing here, is trying to like game the system, whether not letting Bessent do his job or whatever. And in the House, the same thing. And you know, it's all gaming. It's all gaming. And it doesn't matter if you have to prop up an old man. But... and you do start to believe it. I looked at that picture and I was like, 'Looks funny. He looks like he had a facelift. They're right.' Like... but then is it true or is it not true?
I'm going to be clear. I'm part of the tin foil. I think it's fake.
Okay. I don't know. I just... I definitely am like, 'Huh, sus.' You know, I actually... I literally was like, texted Harvey Levin and said, 'The republic is up to you to get in that hotel... I mean, that hospital room and get us a real video of something.' I mean, I can't believe no reporters can figure this out and we have to rely on Scott Jennings. I agree.
Let me just ask you an honest question. Let me ask you just a question that would require any semblance of logic. Given the tumult, given the doubt, given the... given the power, if he just recorded... not even a video, a 10-second voice memo...
It's gone too far. He's got to be wheeled out in front of him.
It would... it would solve so many of his and the Republican Party's problems. And clearly he can't even do that, right?
I would agree with you. I think if they wheeled him out in front of... or in the hospital and he said, 'I'm really sick and I'm trying to get better,' and that would solve it. But they won't do it. You're right. Because they can't do it. That's exactly right.
To me... let me just wrap up because I do think that if the world would be such a better place if Netanyahu, Trump, Ginsburg, Biden had been forced to leave at a certain point, right? And the thing about America is we don't have an age problem. We have an incentive problem. We reward incumbency, celebrity, and fundraising over renewal. And the result is a government that too often looks like it's being run by people who remember the Cold War better than they understand AI.
And if you want democracy, you have to believe in the importance of turnover. The best leaders don't prove their greatness by never leaving. They prove it by building a bench that's ready to replace them. Enough. Think about how much... for God's sakes. What would the world look like if we had more Zelensky and... I'll even go... and we had more youth, for God's sakes.
I would agree. And then they could duke it out, right? Then they could duke it out. That's...
Let them have at it. Let them have their conspiracy theories.
I agree. Speaking... I'm going to move on because we have to go to that. Graham Platner, speaking of young... trying to get a young, vibrant person, has officially withdrawn from the Maine Senate race following the accusation of sexual assault among other troubling revelations from his past, which we had discussed. We did not... there was a point where he said if it goes further than this then forget it, but Democrats have until July 27th to name a replacement to challenge Republican Senator Susan Collins. Actually, the Democrats' chances went up with Platner coming out because he was declining. The Maine Democratic Party will hold a convention on July 25th where candidates can make their case to delegates for a nomination. Let's hear a clip we got from Axios reporter Holly Otterbein, who's been covering the race and how things stand. Now that Graham Platner is finally out of the race, Maine Democrats are scrambling to find a new nominee by the end of the month. A whole boatload of candidates have jumped in, about a half dozen, and most of them either ran for governor or Senate earlier this year and lost. One of my biggest takeaways from the race as it's been shaping up so far is that Graham Platner is still having an enormous influence on the race. Now granted, nobody wants his endorsement, but a lot of them, almost all of them to a person, sound like Graham Platner. One of the biggest examples that I can point to is a man named Dan Kleban. He's a brewer. He's actually centering his campaign around voting against Chuck Schumer for majority leader, a promise to do that. So I think that this shows that the Maine Democratic candidates have really internalized that the Democratic base is furious. They're angry at the economy. They're angry at Trump. They're angry at their party. And that's what this Platner mania was all about, and that in order to win, that's what they've got to replicate. Oh, that's very smart. What do you... what... obviously we were wrong about Graham Platner. We were... we basically, Scott and I said that the Maine voters should decide this, but if more came out, it would be a real problem. That's exactly what happened in this scenario. How... what... it matters because it is about control of the Senate, and they have a very good chance of grabbing this seat if they do it right.
Look, I don't... as Democrats do, we're more interested in self-flagellation than actually figuring out how to take control of the Senate. And I would argue... I would argue the Democrats largely got it right here. When he had a Tottenham tattoo come to light, as a Jew, I found that really troubling. Having said that, a guy in the military dodging IEDs had made a mistake, and I saw no pattern of anti-Semitism. I wasn't willing to disqualify him and say he's an anti-Semite because I saw an errant mistake. I didn't see a pattern. Then a woman said he was physical with her. Very disturbing. She, in the middle of a campaign, was a Republican operative. All right. I think it was fair to say there's an asterisk around that accusation. When I was on holiday last week and I heard about this additional accusation of rape, I immediately went to YouTube and watched it within about 5 seconds. I'm like, 'She's telling the truth. He needs to drop out immediately.' I mean, it was just... quite frankly, it was just... and he did. Or... let me put it this way. He's still trying to hold on to his power. Basically, Democrats now are saying, 'How do we find Graham Platner minus the rape part?' They're all trying to find a rough, you know, like a... you know, an oyster brewer, you know, whatever.
One of them is a logger. I think one's a logger that does, you know, that drinks Pabst Blue Ribbon or whatever.
But now what we're doing is the following. We're instead of... instead of focusing our energy on how we actually hold ourselves to a higher standard and will exit and off-ramp people like this. Again, I'll go back to my favorite show on CNN. Scott Jennings said they asked him, 'Do you think Platner should have resigned from the race?' And he said, 'If there's corroborating evidence around this type of activity, sure you should resign.' Okay. The ultimate corroboration in our society around situations that have dramatic gray areas, context, nuance, you weren't there, is the following. We put them in front of 12 people from different backgrounds, different viewpoints. We let the prosecution have input into the jurors. We have the defense. The president of the United States was found civilly liable for sexual abuse. So the notion that Democrats are spending more energy with this weird self-examination as opposed to focusing their energy on how we will actually ticket people who run a yellow light versus the double-murder homicide of plowing through stop signs, that is the Republican Party, including... I find comical.
Okay. So what do they do here? What... it looks like they're going to pick one of these, a logger or a brewer or whoever. They're going to get one of these people. What is the move here from... from...
Jackson? I... I'm... in a weird way, all this... all this ridiculousness around holding on to the land of the dead with McConnell and the fact that it's not unusual for a 71-year-old man who's out of shape to drop dead. That happens, folks. I think it's going to help us. I'm more optimistic about the seat because I think they're going to find somebody who has a lot of chest hair, who says the right thing, who can tap into this movement. Hopefully, Platner... Platner started or tapped into this movement. I actually think he might be powerful on the campaign trail for the new person or whoever that is.
But you think just keep him out?
No, keep him out. I mean, especially and including his advisers. Did you see that interview with the two?
Oh my god, was that cringe?
They're going out. What's that voice called where they affect the voice?
Oh my god. I'm like, this is... is this the... is this a Democratic Party?
At the first when I... it's so... when I saw those two, I'm like, oh my god, we're... that's who's running the Democratic Party now.
It was just like, oh my... how they just decided on this guy and didn't do any vetting that looks like any vetting whatsoever. I mean, this guy seems to have just, you know, at one point a friend of mine, Lulu Garcia-Navarro, had interviewed him for The New York Times, and she goes, 'Is there anything else?' And he goes, 'No.' Like... and of course there was lots else. Like... and that was pre the second part, which was a lot of people saying he was, you know, a pig. And then there was a third part. This guy's...
You're right. You should just exit the stage. You should just go away right now and get some help. I think the aging, quite frankly, is going to shine a light on Susan Collins, who is 76 and quite frankly looks 86. It... I mean, enough already.
Why don't you go up there? Do you have chest hair? I don't recall. You don't have chest hair, do you?
Oh my god. Are you kidding? They need to find a candidate that like that has big, you know, pieces of more masculine men in their camp than me.
They need to find a dude.
This is a problem. The Democratic Party.
Well, here's the problem. The Democrat... going to be very honest, Kara.
I know that. I agree with you. I agree with you. I agree with you. It has to be a guy.
