Hello and welcome to the board podcast. I'm your host Tim Miller. Holy shit. The holidays are over and we've got a lot of news. Pete Hegseth uprated by his own mother, more whistleblower reports from his co-workers.

Foreign conflicts intensifying in Georgia, Ukraine, Syria. The by his own mother, more whistleblower reports from his co-workers,

foreign conflicts, intensifying in Georgia, Ukraine, Syria.

The president pardoned his own son.

We're going to get to all that eventually with our next guest, Bill Crystal, your usual Bill Crystal Monday.

He'll be in segment two.

But first, we've got to cover the chilling choice for FBI director from the president of like Donald Trump.

And to do so, I've got Fave of the Pod, Elena, Plot Calabro, staff writer at the Atlantic and author of the man who will do anything for Trump, oppression profile of that very nominee, Cash Patel.

What's up, Elena?

Welcome back to the pod.

Hey, Tim.

Thank you for having me.

I want to do all cash with you. And I should mention that this isn't the type of thing that you nominate somebody for because Chris Ray, the sitting FBI director's term doesn't end until 2027. But we'll

get into all of that with Bill. With you, I want to focus mostly on Cash's background. But first, I just, I can't help

myself because the last time you're on, we're talking about your Kamala Harris profile.

And, you know, there's just been all of this kind of autopsy stuff like that obsesses over,

you know, tactical things like should she have gone on Rogan, et cetera. You know,

some of that stuff gets a little tiresome. And I'm curious, though,

from your vantage point, like having spent time with her and covered her about whether you had

any impressions now with the distance of the post-election on the way that Biden might have

not set her up for success or the personal kind of background that

you wrote about and how she was kind of navigating, making herself more vulnerable and more

...