Hello listeners. Today is Thursday, January 4th, 2018 and I am your host,

Politico magazine reporter Tim Alberta, and you are listening to Politico's neurocast.

For our first podcast in 2018, we've got a lot on the agenda. We'll be discussing

the frayed relationship between President Trump and Steve Bannon. That relationship came to a head

this week when a book excerpt was released and it was not pretty.

That was quickly followed by a scathing statement from President Trump blasting Bannon.

We'll also be discussing Utah Senator Orrin Hatch's retirement and what that means for Trump, hint it's bringing another

rival to Washington DC, most likely Mitt Romney. Plus we'll dive into the

Iranian anti-government protests and the White House's response.

And to close the show, we'll talk about my own piece,

surprise surprise, on how the Trump presidency

drove a wedge between a two decades long friendship

between Senator Jeff Flake and Vice President Mike Pence. But before we get

started a reminder please subscribe to the nerdcast on Apple Podcasts or on your

favorite listening app please rate us and write that written review. Today we are joined by Senior Politics

Editor Charlie Mathesian. Hey Charlie. Hey Tim. And White House reporter

Andrew Restusha. Hi Andrew, first time around the program. Yeah, first time. How

excited are you? A full ten, I'd say. How about you? How excited are you to be

hosting for the first time? You feel the pressure? A lot of pressure, actually actually although Scott needs to look up Wally Pipp in the sports dictionary because he's in trouble

Scotty we love you. We hope you have a great couple of months with your little boy Sam. Let's jump right into this. Our

first data point today is 266 and that is the total number of words in

President Donald Trump's official statement responding to Steve Bannon's fiery controversial

...