Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Munkerick podcast. I'm Jared Y. Sexton here, as always, with Nick

Houseman. We have a real, real special treat today. Before we get to that, a little bit of house

cleaning, an announcement on December 16th. That is a Thursday at 7 p.m. Eastern. We're going to have the Muckrake Community Holiday Show, a live taping of the Weekender edition.

You are invited. Go over to patreon.com slash muckrake podcast.

I've heard a rumor that I myself started that I'm going to make Nick eat a milkshake

with french fries, which anybody who listens to this show knows that this is a big deal. I'm going to

make peer pressure work. But before we get to that, one of our most requested returning guest

is here. That is right. That is Chauncey De Vega

of salon politics as well as the Chauncey DeVega show on the best podcast out there.

Chauncey, thanks so much for coming over. Thank you for having me.

All right, Chauncey. So let's go ahead and get this thing started and see where it goes.

First things first, I got to say, man, we've been talking now for a couple of years.

One of the things that we talk about a lot is that regardless of how much the writing is on the wall

and how obvious the threat within this country is of rising authoritarianism and fascism among

the right. People have continued to stick their heads in the sand. They've ignored all the warnings,

lived in pleasurable delusion because a lot of these people are going to make out just fine if this

comes to pass. I have noticed in the past few months, I assume you have as well, that all of a

sudden some of the people and some of the larger publications, media places, have started to

talk about this a little bit, but they're still hedging their bets. It's disturbing, frustrating,

infuriating. How does it look from your corner of the woods?

It's funny you say that. I was reading an essay at a very prominent place that's being circulated

today where everyone is falling all over themselves about this person's vision. And they're not saying

...