Hello there.

Happy Wednesday.

It's Chuck Todd.

Another episode of the Chuck Todd cast.

So, as some of you know, I have a new weekly substack.

It's basically a weekly column. And this week I used, I used that space to talk

about two issues that I actually get a lot of questions about that I don't talk a lot about here

because, frankly, they're what I call dead rail issues. And what do I mean by a dead rail issue?

Well, as you know, we talk about third rail issues and politics a lot. And what do we mean by a

third rail? Well, it goes back to the whole idea of electrified rail and subway systems.

It's an issue that you're not supposed to touch,

or it will literally electrocute you, politically speaking. So for a long time, the most famous

third rail issue was Social Security. You touch it, you die politically. I would argue Medicare

has joined that club. And I think after the 26 midterms, we will say Medicaid is also a part of that.

That Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid are all now third rail issues.

But we'll get a final confirmation on Medicaid after the 26 midterms.

They're untouchables.

They're basically popular across the board.

They got 60 to 70 percent acceptance rates with the public. They're seen, you know,

if you want to call them entitlements, safety nets, but they're seen as things that they're no

longer nice to haves, there must haves as far as the public is concerned. And any serious talk

about reform usually ends up with somebody losing an

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