What up, what up, Michael Steele. This is the Man of Steel podcast. So glad you guys could be with us. We're coming to you live from Politicon here and out in the LA and this is my fourth Politicon. I've got my boys in the corner.

We are joining today with a great conversation here with two guys that I have a great deal respect for and one of whom I've spent a lot of time working with over the years.

Bill Crystal is the editor at large of the weekly standard. He's a regular in ABCs this week on ABC special events and election coverage and appears frequently on other leading political commentary shows. I certainly get a chance to be with him from Tom to Tom over at MSNBC which is always a real pleasure. Also we are very happy to have with us. His brother has been out there kind of rocking and rolling. Let's have him doing his thing here and there right?

Just a little bit. Michael Singleton is a Republican political consultant contributing host of Vox Media's Consider It on at Facebook Watch which is a new gig for you right?

I know Bill is on a tight schedule so we want to get Maximars out of time with Bill Crystal and just to kind of kick it off. Politicon is all about political activists coming together. This is sort of the common kind of politics where really engaged folks come out and particularly having two weeks before a general election.

What's your assessment of the political culture and climate right now in the country among activists and how does that translate coming up in two weeks?

Good question. I don't know the answer. Activism doesn't always correlate with electoral success. I was a kid in 64 watching the Goldwater campaign and I was 10 years old, I love it.

I knew people who are young conservatives, extremely excited about Goldwater and he lost 60-40. You do need to get independent voters, you need to get people who aren't activists. A key for any successful political party is mobilizing the activists and winning the independence at the same time.

I think it has to challenge for Democrats in two weeks. They need to get swing voters, they need to get young voters to turn out. I think the single biggest differential.

If you look at the polls, I'm sure you've done this Michael too. It's amazing how different the poll results are if you assume the universe of voters is the traditional universe which means young people not voting much or not disproportionate.

It beginning to be proportionate, number of young percentage of young voters actually voting. Some of the minority voters too. So the Democrats have a huge interest in expanding the electorate and getting more young people to vote.

That's a very good job on point because right now what we're seeing, I like the way you put it, I think it's important for people to understand that traditional polling view of the electorate versus the potential polling experience, meaning those folks who may turn out.

We saw that in 2016 that under counted, unrepresented vote that suddenly showed up. The expectation is under the traditional model that younger voters are still somewhat apathetic despite all of the marching in the bravado that at the end of the day as it was recently showed on our air on MSNBC when the question was asked to like 15 or 20 Jinxers that they were going to vote.

So how does that play in for parties in terms of get that turnout model when you have this part of the electorate that's so irrational when it comes to voting. They don't take it from a rational perspective.

I'm going to be fair to them, I mean think about it, this is an off-year election, you're voting for senators or congressmen or women. Often if you're a younger voter, certainly if you're a student, but maybe if you're a young 24-year-old, 27-year-old, you just move to the area you move to, you're going to move from it in a year, you're in, I don't know, graduate school, medical school, and you're just temporarily living nearby the school.

You don't have the same attachment to your local area as a typical middle-aged person with kids who's lived there for 10 or 15 years, your kids are in the schools and so forth.

So it makes sense in a way that when you get away from a presidential election, which is a national election, to California 49, if you're a 25-year-old who happens to be renting an apartment, because it's convenient to your job in California 49, you don't really think necessarily I have a huge interest in who our representative is.

But given that it is important for the country, what happens this November, it's a challenge for Democrats, for liberal activists to mobilize those young voters, get them out, but it is important obviously in terms of the Trump administration.

I mean, it will be a huge victory for Trump if they increase seats in the Senate and hold the House. I think it's unlikely, but I don't think it's impossible. And even in the Senate races, there are a lot of them in play, so it will be a big interesting question whether you can get voters to see it as important to vote in the midterm.

What's your Michael? You're a young voter? Yeah, true. What's your assessment in this particular space? When you look at your generation and the generation behind you, the Gen Xers, who are that 18 to 20, 25-year-old group, what's your expectation in terms of their participation?

I mean, I think the biggest issue has been, I mean, beyond voter apathy, what's the reason for those younger voters to turn out? If you're in the middle of college, you're in the middle of trying to find a job, you're in the middle of trying to pay out student loans, etc.

You're trying to figure out what the next step is going to be. You're not necessarily focused on elections as your parents might be or your grandparents who are pretty much solidified and sort of set wherever they reside.

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