S22.E32: Megyn Kelly, Jared Polis & Van Jones

[Mr. R0b0t]

That was one heckuva opening interview (sparring session?).  Megyn is so lost in the maga sauce it was difficult to watch.  I long for the days when we could disagree on tax policies and agreed on basic facts.

Bill throws out Israel not committing genocide as if it was an indisputable fact.  We should certainly discuss the culpability of Hamas in the retaliatory actions, but it is hard to dispute the textbook definition of genocide is happening.  

[DoctorAtomic]

I'm clearly not a Kelly fan, and I know it's not fair to criticize someone's appearance, especially women in the media, but she does not look well to me. If she has an illness, I applaud her for overcoming it and putting in her work. I Was legitimately taken aback when she entered the stage. Does she have a show? Podcast or something? It sounded like Bill was on her show, so she came on Real Time.

However, like I said last week, good for Bill for booking conservatives to come on the show, but like 'Buck' (which, really dude, you're a grown man) Kelly wasn't there in good faith. She said Hillary Clinton was the original election denier. I've heard that on the show many times, so I actually looked it up. Clinton gave her concession speech on Nov 9 2016. There's pictures, quotes of her actually saying, "Let's have an open mind for the Trump Administration" from multiple sources. That was the day after the election. So it's not like it was a month later.  

And, if I'm being fair, sure, I do think any candidate should avail themselves of any legal means to make sure all the votes were counted, or, really, whatever they want to check. I think Congress should fix a time on it, like 75 days or something, and then that's it. Also, to be fair, Abrams should have conceded. She lost the election.  She handled it poorly. Bill has said the same many times. I don't get the reasoning behind two wrongs make a right legitimizes not conceded that you lost an election. 

I don't really get Bill's logic in having these people on. The governor of New Hampshire? I get that. Even when he was doing a deal, like Bill said, he can take punches and likes the sparring. Or when Christie was on. The rep from Florida was overall ok even though I thought he was dead wrong on abortion. 

Coulter, I get is his girl, and her last time on the show she was actually toned down. Last week, Joe is conservative, but he made reasonable points, and had good back and forth with Cuban. I don't know if Bill has people like Kelly on to show his left leaning audience, hey, these people are out there. I agree with him that there's not really red states and blue states, and no one is self deporting, but I don't see what the contribution is here. Bill always says we have to live in the year we're living in, but we also have to live in objective reality too. Kelly either is not, which is disturbing, or is being deliberate, much like everyone texting in 2020 at Fox how they knew Biden won and still lied about it, which is just not helpful, and frankly, damaging. If you want people to listen to opposing viewpoints, she's shooting herself in the foot.

[heatherchandler]

I love Megyn’s podcast, I think she is really smart.  I don’t agree with everything she says but she does her homework.

Van Jones is also really smart and I do usually agree with him but why would Trump’s plan to lock up gang members be bad??  And he said that is something Kamala is going to de-criminalize?  What?

And to say that no one can figure out why she is not popular with black men.. she fought (even defying Supreme Court orders) to keep men, mostly black men in prison.  She kept non-violent offenders in prison when it was recommended that they be released!  Has no one looked at her time in SF attorney general office??

Edited October 27 by heatherchandler

[Avaleigh]

1 hour ago, DoctorAtomic said:

However, like I said last week, good for Bill for booking conservatives to come on the show, but like 'Buck' (which, really dude, you're a grown man) Kelly wasn't there in good faith. She said Hillary Clinton was the original election denier. I've heard that on the show many times, so I actually looked it up. Clinton gave her concession speech on Nov 9 2016. There's pictures, quotes of her actually saying, "Let's have an open mind for the Trump Administration" from multiple sources. That was the day after the election. So it's not like it was a month later.  

What's frustrating to me is the way people like Megyn minimize January 6th here. They make it seem like people are somehow overreacting when they suggest that Trump might not concede the election. The talking point they push is that Biden was able to be inaugurated on the 20th with no issues, so that whole thing on January 6th? No big deal because Biden was ultimately able to take office. It's maddening the way they want to pretend that wasn't a literal threat to democracy. 

I cringed when Megyn said it didn't matter to her because she's more concerned about border security and trans issues. Even if those are hot button issues for a voter, I don't see how that cancels out the importance of having a leader who genuinely believes in democracy. Bill is 100% right that the entire process is threatened when one of the people running continually puts forth the idea that the only way it's a free and fair election is if they win. 

As for why Megyn was invited on the show, I think it's for no other reason than she's a conservative people are familiar with. She didn't have anything new to offer we haven't already heard from other conservative guests. I think it would have been better to have her on the panel, so that the other two could push back more because Bill mostly didn't seem up for countering her points. 

I wish Bill would have come at Megyn with facts regarding how the Trump administration handled border security. Trump keeps claiming that his administration built nearly 500 miles of border wall when in reality it was just over 50 miles of new barriers. (Everything else was either replacement or repair of previously existing structures.) Or how ICE arrests went up after Trump took office, but were still lower than they were during most of the years of the previous administration. Or how apprehensions at the border doubled in 2019. I would have been interested if Bill's team had done more research so that he and Megyn could have a more in depth discussion. I'd be curious to know how she'd have responded if Bill had challenged her more.

[DoctorAtomic]

24 minutes ago, Avaleigh said:

As for why Megyn was invited on the show, I think it's for no other reason than she's a conservative people are familiar with. She didn't have anything new to offer we haven't already heard from other conservative guests.

I would counter that with Bill should be bringing on conservatives that we don't really know. We know what Kelly is going to do, and we tune her out. What's the new information? There's none. I think it was more that Bill wanted to get on her show, which might be better for hard right conservatives to listen to an old school liberal. The price was that he had to agree for her to come on Real Time. I take the trade off, but I wouldn't have agreed to 20 minutes. You got Van Jones, who is always exceptional, and an actual Governor, regardless of what state. Maximize the panel and give her ten minutes tops. 

My congressman is generally right of center, but has to run hard right locally. He's on the energy and water committee. I met the guy in person. He's fine; he's kind of witty and good speaker off the cuff. There's a conservative no one really knows, but he would bring a palatable discussion and actually crack a few jokes. 

Bill has had Sarah Isgur on two times. Have her on more. You're not lacking reasonable conservatives to join the show. 

Given the information on Trump giving Putin covid tests and Musk chatting with Putin every other week, get Fiona Hill on. I'd rather listen to her for 15 minutes than Kelly doing her patter. 

[Soapy Goddess]

If a Rep. has something to offer (a different perspective, etc), what difference does it make if we "know" them or not??

[aghst]

I think Van Jones said Harris would de-criminalize marijuana.

Bill didn't go after Megyn on the trans thing because he believes it as well.

Megyn kept talking about chopping off body parts and that teens were too young to have such procedures.

Well when are they old enough?  How much longer do they have to suffer through gender dysphoria, which she acknowledged is a real thing?

In any event, it's a tiny portion of the population and conservatives like to punch down on minorities.  Nobody pointed out that it can't be a big campaign issue because it affects so few people but Megyn is implying that teens who don't have gender dysphoria are getting gender reassignment surgery in their teens.

Show your work bitch.

AFAIK, trans rights or taking away their rights is not among the top 10 campaign issues.

[Shrek]

11 minutes ago, aghst said:

I think Van Jones said Harris would de-criminalize marijuana.

Bill didn't go after Megyn on the trans thing because he believes it as well.

Megyn kept talking about chopping off body parts and that teens were too young to have such procedures.

Well when are they old enough?  How much longer do they have to suffer through gender dysphoria, which she acknowledged is a real thing?

In any event, it's a tiny portion of the population and conservatives like to punch down on minorities.  Nobody pointed out that it can't be a big campaign issue because it affects so few people but Megyn is implying that teens who don't have gender dysphoria are getting gender reassignment surgery in their teens.

Show your work bitch.

AFAIK, trans rights or taking away their rights is not among the top 10 campaign issues.

It might not be on yours or mine but I would bet that it's in the top 10 campaign issues for 90% of Republicans that she preaches to & watch her. If only because most couldn't even get to 5 campaign issues never mind 10 and they hear it A LOT.

[DoctorAtomic]

3 hours ago, aghst said:

Megyn kept talking about chopping off body parts and that teens were too young to have such procedures.

Well when are they old enough?  How much longer do they have to suffer through gender dysphoria, which she acknowledged is a real thing?

I thought trans minors couldn't get surgery anyway, so it's not even an issue to debate, no? Unless they were talking about hormone blockers, but it's my understanding that they're reversible anyway, and I also thought you have to have some therapy first. So it's not like you can just go by them at CVS. 

The hate is just so derivative and pathetic too. "Groomers" and "going after kids" are literally what they were saying about gay people in the 80s. So these people are too stupid to know anything about history or too stupid to come up with something new. So maybe just shut up because it's not your business. People got beat up and worse in the 80s because of this and it's happening again now. 

3 hours ago, Shrek said:

It might not be on yours or mine but I would bet that it's in the top 10 campaign issues for 90% of Republicans that she preaches to & watch her. If only because most couldn't even get to 5 campaign issues never mind 10 and they hear it A LOT.

It might not be, but I saw anti trans Trump campaign ads during the World Series Friday night. Precisely because they don't have any real issues to run on.

[Shrek]

35 minutes ago, DoctorAtomic said:

 

It might not be, but I saw anti trans Trump campaign ads during the World Series Friday night. Precisely because they don't have any real issues to run on.

I can't figure out if you're agreeing with what I said or disagreeing with it because I was giving my opinion on something someone else said. Just a little confused what you are saying because your evidence of the campaign ad would tend to make me correct in my assumption.

[DoctorAtomic]

I was agreeing with you. 

[Tara]

Van Jones annoys me. I remember when Trump won in 2016, he said on his show, “The white people did this.” I find nothing about him intelligent or reasonable.

Megan went over the top, to the point of making everything she said suspect.

A President of this country is not in a position to make this country facist. No one politician has that power in the US. So when Bill says that, I have to believe it is nothing more than TDS. 

[Shrek]

12 hours ago, Tara said:

 

A President of this country is not in a position to make this country facist. No one politician has that power in the US. So when Bill says that, I have to believe it is nothing more than TDS. 

If only it was that simple but the first time was like a dry run. Now he knows what he can get away with (anything & everything) nothing will be off the table & although most people think like you the rest of us think differently & are genuinely worried because it's not just the one politician, it's half the country & 95% of republicans. 

[Severin]

Kelly's "most important issue" trans kids is all nonsense.  Minors cannot have sex reassignment surgery, so no, they are not getting their parts chopped off.  This is just another right wing scare tactic, like, killing babies after they're born.

[heatherchandler]

10 hours ago, Severin said:

Kelly's "most important issue" trans kids is all nonsense.  Minors cannot have sex reassignment surgery, so no, they are not getting their parts chopped off.  This is just another right wing scare tactic, like, killing babies after they're born.

From Reuters:

The Komodo analysis of insurance claims found 56 genital surgeries among patients ages 13 to 17 with a prior gender dysphoria diagnosis from 2019 to 2021. Among teens, “top surgery” to remove breasts is more common. In the three years ending in 2021, at least 776 mastectomies were performed in the United States on patients ages 13 to 17 with a prior gender dysphoria diagnosis … This tally does not include procedures that were paid for out of pocket.

Edited October 30 by heatherchandler

[sistermagpie]

I couldn’t say for sure there’s never been gender-affirming surgery done on a trans minor in the US ever, of course, but most of what anti-trans care activists are asking for is what we’re already doing. It’s probably a good idea to look into the details of any particular surgery if we want to know what’s being done and why. It's rare.

For instance, apparently about 97% of top surgeries done on minors is—no surprise—being done on cis males. You don’t have to go to therapy to get breast reduction if you’re  cis boy who doesn’t want breasts. Or if you’re a cis girl who wants a breast reduction because of physical discomfort. Or probably even if you’re a minor cis girl who wants breast augmentation. All gender-affirming care was created originally for cis people.

It's Megyn Kelly’s #1 issue because she feels very strongly about strict gender identities and has a problem with trans acceptance in general.

Edited October 29 by sistermagpie

[DoctorAtomic]

I've said before I don't think Project 2025 will be able to do nearly as much as they think, but we have a different scotus now as well, and could have a fully gop Congress. Something like tax cuts may not seem like much, but the last ones drove up the deficit. Tariffs could tank the economy as well. So that 1% could really be damaging. There's enough executive action that Miller could tell Trump to do. 

[Shrek]

4 minutes ago, DoctorAtomic said:

I've said before I don't think Project 2025 will be able to do nearly as much as they think, but we have a different scotus now as well, and could have a fully gop Congress. Something like tax cuts may not seem like much, but the last ones drove up the deficit. Tariffs could tank the economy as well. So that 1% could really be damaging. There's enough executive action that Miller could tell Trump to do. 

He's already been told by scotus that he can do whatever he wants if he becomes president again without any repercussions & I don't understand how people in general think that the old way of doing things & the guard rails in place will make any difference at all, they haven't so far.

He's even gone as far as ignoring the laws in place & when brought to account for his actions the judges who are sympathetic to him have thrown out attempts to bring him to court. The classified documents case is the short end of the wedge.

As I keep saying, his first (& hopefully only) term was a test run to see what it was possible to get away with and the answer to that question is whatever he wants.  

[Anela]

16 hours ago, Tara said:

Van Jones annoys me. I remember when Trump won in 2016, he said on his show, “The white people did this.” I find nothing about him intelligent or reasonable.

Megan went over the top, to the point of making everything she said suspect.

A President of this country is not in a position to make this country facist. No one politician has that power in the US. So when Bill says that, I have to believe it is nothing more than TDS. 

He was apparently +20 with white women (I wasn't one of them) in 2020. I don't know about 2016. This year, I've heard that he's +4 with white women. 

When SCOTUS handed out those decisions in the Spring, but damn it feels like a few years ago now - I also thought that, but I was thinking like a person who isn't trying to make this country, her very own country. TDS doesn't exist. It's so dismissive of people's very real concerns. 

10 minutes ago, Shrek said:

He's already been told by scotus that he can do whatever he wants if he becomes president again without any repercussions & I don't understand how people in general think that the old way of doing things & the guard rails in place will make any difference at all, they haven't so far.

He's even gone as far as ignoring the laws in place & when brought to account for his actions the judges who are sympathetic to him have thrown out attempts to bring him to court. The classified documents case is the short end of the wedge.

As I keep saying, his first (& hopefully only) term was a test run to see what it was possible to get away with and the answer to that question is whatever he wants.  

Yes, all of this. 

[Anela]

4 hours ago, Severin said:

Kelly's "most important issue" trans kids is all nonsense.  Minors cannot have sex reassignment surgery, so no, they are not getting their parts chopped off.  This is just another right wing scare tactic, like, killing babies after they're born.

I saw something on social media, the other day. Something like, "If you dropped a son off at school, and picked up a daughter, take them back to school. You picked up the wrong kid!" 

We've apparently had a lot of anti-trans ads here in my State. I don't have ads on my streaming services, but I've seen them on youtube. 

Edited October 29 by Anela

[Hanahope]

I have to say, top surgery is at least more reversible to some extent, and knowing some trans women, none had bottom surgery.  So Megan Kelly can suck it.  She has no idea what she is talking about.  And Bill is a coward for not calling her out better on the lies.  There are clearly decent republicans out there he could interview.  He doesn’t need that trash.  

[sugarbaker design]

2 hours ago, sistermagpie said:

For instance, apparently about 97% of top surgeries done on minors is—no surprise—being done on cis males. You don’t have to go to therapy to get breast reduction if you’re  cis boy who doesn’t want breasts.

This is new to me. I would've thought the vast majority of top surgeries is done on trans males.  Is it because the cis boys are overweight and have developed breasts?

Edited October 29 by sugarbaker design

[heatherchandler]

7 hours ago, sistermagpie said:

I couldn’t say for sure there’s never been gender-affirming surgery done on a trans minor in the US ever, of course, but most of what anti-trans care activists are asking for is what we’re already doing. It’s probably a good idea to look into the details of any particular surgery if we want to know what’s being done and why. It's rare.

 

I just posted above you.  Maybe you have me muted.

[sistermagpie]

40 minutes ago, heatherchandler said:

I just posted above you.  Maybe you have me muted.

No, I can see it. I don't think it contradicts anything.

[heatherchandler]

Just now, sistermagpie said:

No, I can see it. I don't think it contradicts anything.

It confirms that there has been gender-affirming surgery done on a trans minor.  Reuters is trustworthy, I think.

[sistermagpie]

4 minutes ago, heatherchandler said:

It confirms that there has been gender-affirming surgery done on a trans minor.  Reuters is trustworthy, I think.

Right, that's why I'm not saying it's never been done. Just that since it's so rare I'd feel like I'd need to know the details of the times that it has been done before assuming it's a sex change for a minor, even if they had prior gender dysphoria.   

The important point, imo, isn't that it's never happened under any circumstance, but that U.S. surgeons are appropriately following international guidelines, making it very rare. So not the problem it's made out to be. 

[Tara]

On 10/26/2024 at 8:40 PM, DoctorAtomic said:

She said Hillary Clinton was the original election denier.

Hillary Clinton is the most despicable, disingenuous politician out there today and she is responsible for many life-long Democrats turning into Trump supporters. True, she gave her concession speech timely, but then she went on to say that Russian interference could have rigged the election. The Democrats had a special counsel spend months and months trying to prove that. She accused Tulsi Gabbard of being a Russian puppet, now Tulsi is a Republican.

In 2000, the Democrats refused to accept Bush as the winner. They filed lawsuits, demanded recounts, and held up the election for 35 days.

Point is, politics is dirty. Always has been, always will be. Trump isn’t the first politician to not be the good, honest, wise politician we wish they all were. And yeah, yeah, but Bill says Trump is Facist, Trump is a modern Hitler, blah, blah blah. That’s just noise, IMO.

I thought Megan was direct, no-nonsense, and made some excellent points. Bill has a habit of saying things as if they were facts, then building off of that.  But I applaud Bill for having Megan on; she held her own very well and I’m sure Bill knew she would.