Heidi Heitkamp (00:04):
Welcome to the Hot Dish, comfort food for middle America. I'm Heidi Heitkamp.
Joel Heitkamp (00:10):
And I'm Joel Heitkamp. Your baby brother.
Heidi Heitkamp (00:11):
Baby brother. Honest to God, when we're on people say, "Which one of you is younger?" And they never guess you Joel. Come on. Get real.
Joel Heitkamp (00:20):
Yeah, exactly. That's just a maturity thing. But I spoke at the Democratic Convention, which we're going to talk about in just a little bit, and I spoke in front of a group where I said that you were my aunt and they all believed it. So there.
Heidi Heitkamp (00:36):
They did not.
Joel Heitkamp (00:37):
They did too.
Heidi Heitkamp (00:38):
You're such a jerk.
Joel Heitkamp (00:38):
They did too. And that's the God's honest truth.
Heidi Heitkamp (00:39):
Before we start the show, I want to express just how much we love hearing from our listeners. We love to know just what you think, answer your questions or hear your suggestions about who you'd like to see or in our case here on the Hot Dish. We have a packed episode for you today. Joel and I will be debriefing the Democratic National Convention from Chicago. There is so much to cover and we're excited to share our thoughts with you. But first, I'll be speaking with Chuck Corra co-founder and co-host of Appodlachia podcast. We'll be talking about the Republican VP pick, J.D. Vance's impact on rural America as well as his viewpoint on their shared community. But before that, I want to share something special with you. Connie Garner, Senior Policy Director, is with us to talk about a topic that's close to my heart, mental health in our rural communities. Connie is a fierce advocate for mental health parity and her insights are invaluable. She wants to discuss some important legislation coming up with all of you, so let's hear what she has to say.
Connie Garner (01:52):
My name is Connie Garner, and the reason I'm involved in this has to do with my work with mental health parity. This bill went through in 2006, and I represented the democratic perspective on this bill in this Senate working for Ted Kennedy, and Democratic senators that cared about it. The administration has put out a regulation. It's not a rule that's finished yet. It hasn't gone through yet, but if implemented I think does not meet the intent of what the law was, and given that I was there negotiating these pieces, I'm pretty clear on what the intent of mental health parity was. And the intent of it was to say, okay, we have mental health traditionally defined, and then we have substance use disorders, and what we want to try to do with those two pieces is put them on par with each other from a financial point of view and from an access point of view, and then put those two pieces on par with physical health.
(02:53):
Do they need to be the same? No, but they need to be on par because for quite a while, and even in some places mental health is not treated the same way that physical health might be treated, and it's a difficult task. When we first did the bill and the negotiation on this, we worked very hard to make it bipartisan. We had groups that we would normally work with that worked with us, and we spent two days a week for almost a year putting that piece of legislation together. So it was really important in order to execute it, for people to execute it at the community level that the intent of the law is seen through. The rule that the administration has put out is onerous, is asking for information that you don't need to do this work well. And this is a huge rule that you're proposing to put out. 90% of it's fine, but keep the other 10% that really needs continued discussion. Put the right people around the table and continue to do it for that piece.
(03:55):
If you take away all of the excess conversation, what it really is targeting is medical management, and that's where the insurance company decides whether you're going to get a service or whether you're not. It's there in everything that we have, but this happens to be mental health, which is a little bit harder to do, so it's not as easy as it would be if you had an appendectomy or a surgery that you know what it is. You know it has to come out. You know how long it takes. I mean, that's a lot more quantifiable. This is non-quantifiable because mental health and the services are a little harder to capture and a little harder to define. But what this rule does is essentially take away the ability for medical management to really keep an eye on what's going on.
(04:39):
Besides working with Senator Kennedy, I'm also a pediatric and a neonatal nurse practitioner, so I do know about the healthcare system and most of the time do not like medical management where they say, you can do this or you can do that, but you can't have nothing. And that's where this would take this down to almost nothing with a lot of work involved. And you'll see in the news, there was a whole story about teen mental health centers that are out there, and that's for people who need a place to go, more like day treatment and all that kind of stuff. They had a research project done on it and they found that it was a mess. It was terrible. The care wasn't any good. Nobody was watching what was going on. That's why you have to have some belts and suspenders somewhere, and unfortunately or fortunately, however you think about it, that's the job of the insurance companies because we gave them that when we in Congress and we as a country said, we're going to do managed care.
(05:35):
Now, we may not agree with it. I certainly don't agree with it a lot of the time, but we did ask them to manage care. Well, they can't do it if you make it so difficult that they can't really get it done. If this rule goes through, then let's say young people, adolescents that have eating disorders, that have treatment programs that happen at home, well, this would not make that available. You would have to go to a place in order to get the treatment. We keep talking about the fact that we want integrated healthcare. It's almost like we're saying two different things at the same time.
(06:07):
This bill was so important to so many people across the country. It was so important to Ted Kennedy as a Democrat. It was very important to Pete Domenici from New Mexico as a Republican. They both had family experiences with mental health, and I just feel like we need to maintain what the intent of that law is all about. Being a nurse and delivering patient care as a nurse practitioner, this problem goes across the continuum and across the lifespan. So mental health, it starts with even postpartum moms as you know, and then that affects what the relationship is with the newborn, and that affects the child over time.
(06:47):
The other thing that's important is you don't want to lose the issue of telemedicine, particularly with the population of the rural folks. They want to be able to have good support at home. They want to be able to have that telemedicine option. So as one rule falls, other things will fall as well. And we trying very hard to protect all this. We are headed towards an interesting time, and I think it's going to be okay. I mean, somehow in this country things become okay, and I think we should mobilize for the things that make United States and the people here who they are and fight for the equity that people have been arguing about for so many years.
Heidi Heitkamp (07:29):
Next on The Hot Dish, we have a special guest and a fellow podcaster, Chuck Corra. He's the co-founder and co-host of Appodlachia. Again, notice the thing. Appodlachia and he is a West Virginia native, has been doing a lot of work to, I wouldn't say expose, but to have a dialogue with the rest of the country about your part of the world. And so before we get into politics, tell me a little bit about your podcast, why you started it and what your goal is Chuck. If you could write a scenario in five years because of your podcast, I believe the country knows X.
Chuck Corra (08:11):
Yeah. Well, thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it and I'm always happy to talk about Appalachia, anything about it. To answer your question, we started this podcast back in late 2019. I did it with a friend of mine. He was a roommate in college, but also ran for House of Delegates in West Virginia. His name is John Isner, and I ran his campaign in 2018 for that. He ran in a very rural part of West Virginia, very difficult environment for a Democrat to win in. He did better than any other Democrat, whoever ran in that district at the time and the issues that we were talking about through that campaign, we really wanted to continue that conversation more broadly about Appalachia. And when we thought about it, there's a perception about Appalachia that we think is just unfair and biased and full of stereotypes, and we wanted to be the counter narrative to that.
(09:01):
Lots of people have one opinion about Appalachia, maybe they view it as a bunch of red states or a lot of people think it's just populated with a bunch of racists or backwards hicks and all that kind of stuff. And we wanted to provide a different perspective to that and one that came from a more progressive angle. So we started that back in 2019 talking about the issues that we found to be really important to us but also important to the region. And one of those issues was J.D. Vance and Hillbilly Elegy, and that's where we really started to see a lot of our listenership tune in or people find us around that book and the anger that resulted from it being published.
Heidi Heitkamp (09:39):
Chuck, I think that now the narrative is trying to be written that this was somehow a love letter to where J.D. Vance grew up, and it was just explaining how these are hardworking folks who fell on hard times, but yet the narrative that you're painting and actually if you've read the book, is really quite different in terms of how his home area was described, don't you think?
Chuck Corra (10:03):
Absolutely. And what people miss a lot of times about Hillbilly Elegy is there's two big components of it. One is the personal narrative about his life and his life story, which great. It's his story to tell, not anybody else's. Everybody has a right to tell their own story, and it genuinely is a compelling one when you look at it in many ways. But there's also another part where it's this critical analysis in his view of the place where he grew up, which is right outside of Appalachia, but also in Appalachia, Jackson, Kentucky. And the problem that a lot of people had with it is when he stopped talking about things in terms of himself, me, I, and shifted to this first person, plural, pronoun uses of we, describing it collectively as a region.
(10:46):
And he talks a lot about how people are lazy, often refers to people that are on welfare as lazy, not willing to work, characterizing the stereotypes that we all know and are familiar with. And a lot of the perception was it was a love letter to Appalachians, to the people we grew up with, but really it was insulting to them. He often would just rely on his own personal generalizations about different situations he encountered, like people who looked overweight or unhealthy and would use that to characterize the culture of the region when really it was only his individualized experience.
Heidi Heitkamp (11:22):
So tell us a little bit about the counter narrative. Obviously you love your home state and you love the people who live there and you want to tell a much more complex and meaningful story. So what do you say to people who say he tells it the way it is and you tell it the way you want it to be?
Chuck Corra (11:38):
Yeah, that's a great question because we get that a lot. And what I'll say is that places are complicated and people are complicated. I always view things in terms of rejecting broad labels for a place, right? California, for example, is viewed as a blue state, but it's a very complex state. There's parts of California that are deeply Republican voting just as there are parts of Appalachia that are deeply Democrat voting. So it's more about telling a nuanced and complex version of that story that's accurate, but that also talks about the stories that don't often get told, and that's often something that's papered over. So what I would say to that is that we're telling stories that exist. What we're trying to do is amplify them and give them a bigger, broader platform than what they currently have.
Heidi Heitkamp (12:23):
It really is the jump-up point where I want to talk about this contrast that we have now in our presidential ticket. You and I both come from rural places. We come from places that frequently are described in ways that we shake our head and say, "Have you been there? Do you talk to anybody who's there?" It's interesting because I think there is such a juxtaposition between J.D. Vance and the narrative that he's going to be the rural whisperer. He's going to be the kid from this part of the world who came and made good. And then there's the narrative that we're telling about the governor of Minnesota who I know pretty well, who literally looks like everybody's social study teacher that you grew up with, the guy who's the coach who's given a lot of hope to a lot of kids over time and was encouraged to run and went to school on the GI Bill so he could become a teacher, lost his dad to cancer.
(13:19):
There's just all of this kind of narrative. But to me, the biggest difference between these two, which hasn't been highlighted, is that Governor Walz sees the problems and puts a smile on his face and opens up his arms and says, let's fix it. And then there's J.D. Vance who, man, it's like a big black cloud just follows that guy. Everywhere he goes, he's just always so negative. What do you think drives that dynamic?
Chuck Corra (13:49):
Yeah, first of all, Governor Walz has this radical idea that government should help people, and I really do subscribe to that, so I love that about him. J.D. Vance, I don't want to be an armchair psychologist or anything, but I have seen some interviews where people have brought up, you have a lot of unresolved childhood trauma and you haven't really dealt with it. I'm sure that's probably part of it, but to me, reading his book is a window into his worldview. He has a chip on his shoulder, and I believe this to be true. He views himself as better than the people he grew up around, and he never really had a vested interest in helping build up that part of the country. He had the opportunity to do something really great with the platform he had even after the book, and instead he squandered it and turned it into a political career.
(14:32):
And I think that's really the key difference between these two people. It's this weird type of resentment that has manifested itself now in him cultivating power in any way he sees fit. He used to be a quote, unquote never Trump guy. We've talked to many people that we've had on our show who, there was a couple of comedians from Tennessee sat down and had a beer with him after one of their shows that he came to. And he was very much like in your bulwark type line of thinking. And now he shifted, and it's because he sees power as something that he ultimately wants, whereas someone like Governor Walz views government as a vehicle to improve people's lives, which is what it should be, and which is what, when functioning properly, what it is doing. I can't remember who it was that put this out somewhere in the world on the internet, but said it best is that Tim Walz is what J.D. Vance thinks or wants people to think that he is, like that type of person. And I think that is 100% accurate.
Heidi Heitkamp (15:29):
Yeah, I mean, it's interesting because the knock on the Democratic Party, coastal leads, intellectualizing everything. They are only trying to make you feel stupid. And then you look at the various pedigrees and you look at the bio pieces, Yale, he went to Yale, then he went to Silicon Valley, which I would argue is one of the reasons why he is in fact the nominee, is because he was able to make friends in very high places, friends with a lot of money. And I think Trump was attracted to this guy. But if you translate that into the character of somebody who could clearly see the danger that Donald Trump presented and be so willing to abandon that view basically for power.
Chuck Corra (16:17):
It's really scary how someone like J.D. Vance can rise to power so quickly. And I think he really embodies what people dislike the most about politics, just someone who is wanting to do it for power or for personal reasons not to help people. It validates the cynicism that I grew up with. My dad was a steel worker for about 40 years, and every time you talk about politics, he's always, "Oh, there are a bunch of crooks." And then Sherrod Brown came around and walked the picket line with my dad, and he changed his perspective on him and him alone. And I'll give Senator Brown tremendous credit for that. But that's the type of cynicism that so many people have about politics. And J.D. Vance is a validation of that cynicism. Tim Walz is a rejection of that cynicism. And I think that the two contrasts couldn't be more clear.
Heidi Heitkamp (17:06):
Just right after Walz was named, J.D. Vance ended up on the same tarmac as Vice President Harris. And if I were advising the Republican ticket, I just think there's so many missed opportunities. And by that, if I had been advising him, I have said, "Go wait respectfully. When she comes off the plane, shake her hand and say, look forward to a vigorous debate about the direction we're going to lead the country, Madam vice president. And it's important that we have this dialogue about the future of the country," but yet they keep making that mistake of being so incredibly negative. And when you look at Tim, I think it was so interesting because right after the governor was named, huge bounce again in fundraising. I think he gave a great speech and has had a great rollout. But guess what? 40% of the donors that came, they were school teachers.
Chuck Corra (18:02):
Wow.
Heidi Heitkamp (18:02):
And that's the thing, is that J.D. Vance may have lived an experience for the first 18 years of his life, but his experience after that is pretty damn elite.
Chuck Corra (18:12):
100,000%. Yeah. He is nothing like the humble roots that he wants to portray. My mom worked as a secretary to Title one elementary school for a really long time, so I have a soft spot for public education. But Tim Walz, one of the things that he has going for him is that his net worth is closer to mine than it is to J.D. Vance. He doesn't own stocks, he has vested pensions from being a teacher. And that's pretty much it. And somebody who understands what it means to have a working-class job and not have millions of dollars padding you throughout your life or have a trust fund or something like that, that really matters.
(18:52):
And I really hope that's something that they lean into on the campaign trail because so many people, especially my generation, so I'm a millennial, so many people were promised something about the American dream and are struggling to get there and are struggling to make ends meet. And I think that we need to see from the Democratic Party that they understand that and that they're willing to do something about it. And I think he is definitely a symbol of that.
Heidi Heitkamp (19:16):
Yeah. And before we go, I just want you to give us some insight in terms of how you see politically Appalachian. I mean, it used to be a solid blue district, it used to vote overwhelmingly for the Democrats, and now it does not, obviously. How do you see that changing? What messages do you think the Democratic Party could deliver that would change that trajectory?
Chuck Corra (19:42):
Yeah, that's a great question. I know the Senator Manchin quite well in West Virginia, but he's part of a dying breed of Democrats in West Virginia where there used to be a supermajority in the legislature 20 years ago almost, if you can believe it. And same for Tennessee, Kentucky. So Appalachia is complex. It's hard because you have things like gerrymandering and other adverse voting laws that make it difficult for there to be very competitive elections. But what I will say is I think that people are energized, especially locally. When there are people that run and care about the issues and are representing them in a way that matter to them, those people break through. And I think that's really important. One thing we learned when John was campaigning my co-host, is that he was really good at connecting with people, converting Republicans to vote for him, but he didn't campaign on being a Democrat. He campaigned on issues.
(20:34):
And I think that's really important for candidates at every level in Appalachia to do. But I also think that it will help if the Democratic Party is able to shift the narrative about communities like places in Appalachia that's primarily rural and underserved. I think that those two things are really important because you can ask anybody, especially in West Virginia, where I'm from is the national Democratic Party's reputation is just in the toilet there, and they feel like it's populated by elites, and there is some truth to that. But I think that bringing more people into the fold, like Tim Walz is going to really help. And I think getting more people that have a vested interest in helping their community to run at every level is also what's going to help. So I'm not going to sit here and say that all these states are going to flip Democrat overnight, but I think that there are a lot of people that are doing very important organizing work. And I wouldn't be surprised if we start seeing the dial shift in the coming election cycles.
Heidi Heitkamp (21:29):
Yeah. Just a 5% movement in rural America back to the Democratic Party takes away the pressure of those 50, 60,000 people in those swing states and so,-
Chuck Corra (21:40):
Absolutely.
Heidi Heitkamp (21:41):
Chuck, thanks so much. I hope you come back especially after the election.
Joel Heitkamp (21:44):
Yeah.
Chuck Corra (21:45):
Thank you so much for having me. This has been a pleasure and I've really enjoyed our conversation. Would love to come back. You can find us Apodlachia, A-P-O-D-L-A-C-H-I-A on all podcast platforms and all social media. Really easy to find us that way and check us out. And even if you're not from Appalachia or don't have a lot of interest in it, I think you'll still find it interesting and you might learn something. Thanks so much.
Heidi Heitkamp (22:11):
Well, let's talk about the Democratic convention. You were there. I was there. We both spoke at the rural caucus, but there's something that happened at that convention that I haven't seen at a Democratic convention, and that is all of a sudden rural was front row center. I ran into Secretary Vilsack, he said, "We're talking rural now, aren't we?" And I said, "Yep, finally." And so what impact do you think that'll make Joel, with rural voters?
Joel Heitkamp (22:37):
Well, I think that oftentimes people don't realize that there's rural voters in swing states. For example, Wisconsin is a rural state, Michigan, there's a lot of voters in rural states, Pennsylvania, the same thing. And so I think that they're finally waking up to that Heidi. And the one thing that I would add to it is what's helped that was Tim Walz. Bringing Tim Walz into this discussion has done nothing but help small towns and rural towns.
Heidi Heitkamp (23:07):
Well, they always say, well, what does the rural voter want? And I say, they want to be represented. They want to see people on a national ticket that looked like them, that lived their experience. Maybe they won't always agree with their policies, but dang, if they thought that the Democratic Party was just a party of coastal elites, I'd say that Wednesday night dispelled that myth, as you saw those football ball players out there cheering him on, you saw an incredibly happy and loving family on the stage, and you heard a life story that we all can relate to. I think before on this podcast, I have told people yes, I know Tim pretty well, but not as well as you do Joel.
Joel Heitkamp (23:47):
Yeah.
Heidi Heitkamp (23:48):
You spent a lot of time with Governor Walz since he's been the governor of Minnesota. When I think about kind of his politics, I think about you.
Joel Heitkamp (23:56):
Yeah. Well, thank you for that because I'm a big fan of Tim Walz. I have gotten to know him pretty well through the years. He's the kind of guy that will call your cell at about 10 o'clock at night and say, hey, what do you think of this, what are you hearing, kind of a governor and now to see him on the national stage. Tim Walz and his family are the kind of family that knew they had to buy a suit for Gus and a dress for Hope.
Heidi Heitkamp (24:21):
Yeah.
Joel Heitkamp (24:22):
And they said, all right, let's go get one. And they didn't exactly shop at the same place that Ivanka Trump did. You know what I mean? So they are my kind of guys. And when you see football players in uniforms that are too tight for them, I can relate.
Heidi Heitkamp (24:39):
Well, I mean, so let's talk about the Republican reaction to Tim Walz. They have tried to pick apart every part of his resume because I think they see him as somebody who can resonate with rural voters. And so first thing that they tried to do is say, oh yeah, he was in the National Guard for 24 years, but who cares because of when he left the guard.
Joel Heitkamp (25:01):
I had tried on my radio show recently by the former governor of North Dakota. We get on once a month and we have a little debate, and he brought that up right away. But what I would argue is if you're going to criticize someone for 24 years of public service in the National Guard, then you've got a losing argument overall. And one other thing I'd add to that Heidi is I've been hearing because he was a school teacher and because he was in the National Guard, that all he was doing was living off the government dole. I mean, are you going to, I mean, really? So he was teaching and defending and he was getting paid by some source of government, and that makes him a product of the government. Give me a break. If that's what they're going to run against, game on.
Heidi Heitkamp (25:52):
Yeah. Well, and they also have looked at his financial statement, which looks like more of America than Donald Trump's or J.D. Vance's financial statement. Right. I mean, this is a guy who has been a public servant. He's never gone to the private sector necessarily to make money and to capitalize. He could have done that as a congressman when he left Congress. Could have gone to a law firm. He could have done a ton of things that would've been much more lucrative. Instead, he went home and ran for Governor of Minnesota to continue to serve.
(26:23):
And so when people say he doesn't own a single stock, I'm like, who do you think America is? You guys spend all your time talking about how middle America isn't appreciated or understood by the Democratic Party. And then you pick on things like his National Guard service, his service as a male schoolteacher, which quite honestly, we need more male schoolteachers. I will say that clearly, and the work that he did with students and the kind of love that comes from students. He could have gone a lot of places and made a lot of money, but chose instead to serve.
Joel Heitkamp (26:56):
Well, and let's go backwards on what you just said, which is he couldn't have gone to a law firm. He's not an attorney. And I think America's going to like that with all due respect to your education. I mean, you can have highly educated people, incredibly intelligent like yourself that are attorneys, but I don't think it's going to hurt America's feelings whatsoever to not have an attorney represent them. So it plays into that as well. This is a guy that was a football coach. And oh, and get this, and you're going to criticize him for not being the head coach. Really? Maybe what you need to criticize him for then is you couldn't make the team. Here's the thing. When you're sitting there and you've got two very different people like Kamala Harris and Tim Walz, what you've got when they like each other clearly as much as what they do and when they respect each other as what they do, you've got something that's really intimidating to opposition. And I think we're seeing some of that already.
Heidi Heitkamp (28:05):
Well, I want to turn to Gus, Tim's son, who I think had the moment of the convention. When I go to conventions, yes, there's great speeches. They're typically scripted, they're written out ahead of time. The performers know exactly what song they're going to perform. There isn't a lot of ad-libbing at a national convention, and then there's an event where you just see a family that cares so much for each other and a pride that a young man has in his dad. I mean, Tim's son, Gus who stood up, and when Tim was talking about his family and pointed to the stage and said, that's my dad. I mean, to this point, I still get a little teary when I think about it, about the pride that he had in his family and the love he had for his dad. Then Ann Coulter says, "Talk about weird." I want to say, I don't know where you're from, but loving your dad is not a weird value, right?
Joel Heitkamp (28:58):
Well, she pulled down the post pretty quick, and all that followed was that roast where they fried her at the Rob Lowe Roast. Gus has special needs, and that doesn't change the fact that they all love each other a lot and Hope his daughter, if you want to see it folks and want to see what Heidi's talking about, just go look at the video of Tim and Hope at the Minnesota State Fair and just look at how they both agreed to do something at the fair. And he tried to get her to eat meat, and so she wouldn't eat a corn dog. And then he said, "Well, you'll have some Turkey." She said, "Dad, I'm a vegetarian. That's meat." "Not in Minnesota. That's special." That's who they are.
Heidi Heitkamp (29:39):
So let's turn to the reality that we're in right now. This is an even race. And I mean, yes, Democrats are jubilant, they are excited, they are happy, they are in some ways, I'd argue a little overconfident coming out of this convention, but they see that there's a real chance. And I tell everybody who wants to listen, if you could do 5% better in rural America in Pennsylvania, Arizona, North Carolina, Virginia, you can dominate. And so let's just cut to the chase. If you were designing the Harris, Walz campaign right now, where would you send Tim?
Joel Heitkamp (30:16):
Oh, I would send him directly to Wisconsin and directly to Michigan. Those would be the two states where I'd have him really focus, and I would do exactly what you just said, which is to recognize areas that you're not going to win, but you don't want to lose as much. What he's got to do in Tim's case is connect with that very crowd he put up on stage. If you put, I don't know, what was it, 10, 12 football boys up on the stage, they're not all Democrats. Those guys were not all Democrats. In fact, they made up such a huge percentage of the team, and yet they all did the same thing. They got up there, put on that old uniform and they supported their coach, which the more he can connect that way, talking, hunting, and fishing and just being Tim Walz, the better it's going to be.
Heidi Heitkamp (31:06):
The one thing people don't understand is there's a lot of Democrats in rural America who feel like they don't count. And so now all of a sudden there's somebody who's going to be out there asking them to once again organize to get their neighbors and friends out, maybe people who haven't voted out. The fact that the Republican Party seems so hell-bent on criticizing Tim's record not as policies, but who he is. And guess what? The reason why they're trying to do that is because he's a kind of a scary guy for them. He's somebody who has reversed the narrative and they thought they were getting that with J.D. Vance. I point out J.D. Vance hasn't lived in rural America since he was 18.
Joel Heitkamp (31:50):
If you look at J.D. Vance just walking up trying to talk to people while he gets his team a donut, I mean, this guy is so incredibly uncomfortable where Tim Walz would be walking in there and half the people that were going to vote against him would like him when he leaves. And you and I know that this game of politics is so professional by now, they've done focus groups, they've done internal polling, and there's a reason they're attacking Tim Walz because they know America loves him.
Heidi Heitkamp (32:19):
Well, and think about this. Every mom who saw that young man stand up and say, that's my dad. Those all important suburban women, they may not be rural voters, but they're family voters. They want to see somebody who is loved by their family. And I wanted to point this out, and it sounds maybe mean. When you think about family and who represented their family, and you think about Kamala Harris's family up on the stage and Tim Walz's, and then you think about every major Democratic president and leader came out, and I know Jimmy Carter would've been there had he not been 100 to support her. And then you compare it to the other side and you got to ask yourself, why aren't the former presidential candidates speaking at Donald Trump's convention? Where is his wife? She came out very briefly, really said nothing, and kind of quickly faded back into the background.
(33:12):
I got a question Joel recently, which is, well, the Democrats have stole patriotism and middle America from us. And I'm like, we didn't steal anything. We were always about patriotism. We were always about middle America. But the other thing that we took back is we are the party of family values. I'm not saying Republicans aren't. I'm saying that all of that image stuff that they've been able to talk about over the last 20 years kind of dissipated with this convention. Want to just quickly touch on the other big political news. Robert Kennedy Jr. withdrew and endorsed Trump. I don't think there's any surprise there.
Joel Heitkamp (33:49):
It won't hurt the Republicans, but it won't help them. It depends on how much they put them out there, which I don't think they will. If they put Robert,-
Heidi Heitkamp (33:59):
Not a good idea.
Joel Heitkamp (34:00):
Yeah, here's my cheap shot of the day, but my accurate shot of the day, they put J.D. Vance already out there. He can't buy a doughnut. So Robert Kennedy is like Pluto. He's quite a ways out there.
Heidi Heitkamp (34:12):
Well, Robert Kennedy, I don't know, for our listeners, if they know the whole story with the bear, just Google it, the worm in the brain, just Google it. And if you thought that the Trump team was weird before, it's just going to get weirder if they put that guy out there. And here's the guy who when he announced was at 20%, he was definitely a threat. He was moving. And the more people got to know his full number now nationally is around three, 4%. So if they have him be a surrogate, that's dangerous territory because he's got plenty of weirdness himself.
Joel Heitkamp (34:47):
See, I think it plays into one of the things that is going to be a problem for Donald Trump and his campaign, which is they don't know how to run against someone younger. They don't know how to run against that generation. I mean, in Donald Trump's case, he doesn't know how to run against Kamala Harris. He doesn't know yet. That's for sure. And if he did, he wouldn't have put Robert Kennedy front and center. He would've thanked him for his endorsement. He wouldn't have let him sit up there and talk.
Heidi Heitkamp (35:20):
The movement, I think is in the right direction, but make no mistake, this is a dead even race. A guy that I followed, Nate Silver, I worked with him on ABC, but he puts Kamala Harris, her chances of winning at 54%. I think that's right. I think she now has a slight edge on Donald Trump, but Donald Trump is not helping himself. He has not adapted, as you said, Joel to the new circumstances. And the question is, can he adapt?
Joel Heitkamp (35:47):
Was Nate's numbers post-convention?
Heidi Heitkamp (35:50):
No, but he's waiting for the convention bounce. Per our listeners, he does a bulletin. If you want the more detailed analysis you have to pay, but it's called the Silver Bulletin, as in Nate silver, and a lot of his initial analysis is free. He also wrote a really good column for The New York Times on where the race is. And I recently interviewed him, Joel, and I did have to poke him a little bit because in 2012 he got every race right, but one.
Joel Heitkamp (36:18):
Yours.
Heidi Heitkamp (36:18):
And that would be mine.
Joel Heitkamp (36:19):
Yeah.
Heidi Heitkamp (36:19):
Yeah.
Joel Heitkamp (36:20):
Yeah. No, I remember that.
Heidi Heitkamp (36:22):
Yeah.
Joel Heitkamp (36:22):
I remember that really oh, well, as somebody who worked a lot on that campaign, but I think that we can say it's tied. It's tied. It's tied. I think America post-convention is going to find out. Donald Trump's going to have to pull it closer to tie it.
Heidi Heitkamp (36:40):
And if I can point out just one other kind of inside baseball thing, Joe Biden was not going to spend money in Arizona. He was not going to spend money in North Carolina. He was not going to spend money in Georgia. What's interesting is now there's other pathways rather than just winning Pennsylvania. She's opened up other pathways for victory, and that means guess what? Investment. That means money. And she clearly at this point has a financial advantage. And oh, by the way, I think Elon Musk said he was going to give him 20, 45 million a week or whatever. I don't think that materialized either, Joel, so.
Joel Heitkamp (37:18):
Well, the other thing I would add is because of the states you just mentioned, there's going to be yes, an investment, but it'll be made in the rural areas too.
Heidi Heitkamp (37:27):
Let's see how it plays out. I think the next big event is going to be that debate, and I don't think he really wants to debate her because he doesn't want the split screen. He thought, I can compete with Joe Biden because Joe Biden's older than I am. He didn't want the split screen of somebody younger, obviously attractive. I mean, I don't think I'm saying anything out of school next to Donald Trump. I think he doesn't like that matchup.
Joel Heitkamp (37:51):
Well, the only thing he's got going for him in that matchup Heidi, quite frankly, is as he put it, he's better looking than her.
Heidi Heitkamp (38:00):
Yep. I'm sure that's what America thinks. Listen, Joel, thanks so much for joining me again. We got lots more to talk about, but this has been a good couple of weeks for rural Democrats.
Joel Heitkamp (38:11):
You bet. Thank you, auntie Heidi.
Heidi Heitkamp (38:15):
Jerk. You're a jerk.
Joel Heitkamp (38:16):
But I'm consistent and it ain't my fault you look the way you do. Thank you for joining us today on The Hot Dish, which is brought to you by the One Country Project, making sure the voices of the rest of us are heard in Washington. Don't forget, you can always learn more about us at onecountryproject.org. Don't hesitate to contact us via email at podcast@onecountryproject.org, and you can learn more about what we're up to over at One Country Project.
Heidi Heitkamp (38:54):
This has been such an enlightening episode, and I hope all of you found it as engaging as we did, except Joel's obnoxious comment about me being his aunt. We'll be back in two weeks with more Hot Dish, comfort food for middle America.
