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Hello and welcome to the Americano podcast, a series of discussions about American politics and now the Joe Biden presidency.

We will be looking at how a 78-year-old president will change America and will be asking if normalcy, which is what he promised to bring, has returned to American politics. The answer, of course, is no.

I'm joined today by Matthew Contenetti, who is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

And we're going to be asking if President Joe Biden's chief of staff, Ron Clayne, is actually in charge of America.

Matthew, I think next week, I think August 8th, Ron Clayne will celebrate his 60th birthday. And there's going to be a very, very big

bash, a huge party that all of Washington, aka the Swamp, is talking about. Can you tell us a little

bit about it? Well, sure. Ron Claim, like many of us, has a habit of throwing a larger party than usual whenever he hits a round-numbered birthday.

So when he turned 50 years old in 2011, he actually held a party resembling a state fair in a farm in the state of Maryland, where he invited hundreds of guests.

And basically, everybody who was anybody in the Obama administration, where Clayne worked at the time,

attended. And there were corn dogs and rides and apparently many tributes

to the birthday boy himself.

So I find nothing wrong with throwing a big bash

for your birthdays.

I just hit a numbered birthday myself

and had a party with my friends.

But as I read about Ron Clayne's birthday's past

and future in the New York Times, I was just

...