The Cornell Scandal

Dave Smith opens the episode with a rare moment: he's found something he can actually defend Donald Trump on. The clip in question shows Trump saying, regarding the war with Iran, that "they can take out a city, let them take out Los Angeles, let them take out San Diego" — a statement that many online interpreted as Trump being willing to let American cities get nuked. Smith argues this is a misreading. Trump wasn't inviting an attack; he was making a rhetorical point that the cost of the war is worth it compared to the hypothetical alternative. "He was saying, you think this war's costing a lot, but if I hadn't fought this war, the cost would have been nuking LA," Smith explains. "He wasn't actually saying let them do that."

But the defense is narrow and immediately qualified. The real problem, Smith argues, is that Trump is lying to sell a disastrous war — using a fantastical scenario nobody actually believes. "The nukes are all made up, guys. That's the lie. He knows they're not gonna — he wasn't inviting them to use the nukes they don't have that they can't deliver to LA. He was just lying you into a war." The deeper issue, for Smith, is that this is a terrible midterm pitch: "I know things are bad, but you gotta vote for us because they would have been even worse" — and the "even worse" is a scenario no one thinks is real.

The Shapiro Trap