from WNYC studios. I'm Brian Lerer. This is my daily politics podcast. It's Monday,

March 3rd. For this Monday after the Friday, Trump and Vance versus Selenskyy showdown,

we return to the overarching question of our times. Is this what democracy looks like? Beyond the good and bad of specific policy changes,

are they establishing an authoritarian state? Our series, is this what democracy looks like,

is asking the question explicitly to not

lose the forest for the trees, right? So in this segment, we'll ask that question with the reaction

to Trump and Vance versus Zelensky, and on the way they are punishing the associated press

for not saying Gulf of America. So here is one very stark and very frank framing of Trump

and Vance versus Zelensky that came on Friday afternoon, just practically right after the

exchange, from Congressman Mike Quigley, if you don't know him, he's a Democrat from Illinois,

who is co-chair of the House Ukraine caucus.

Yes, there's a House Ukraine caucus.

It's a rare bipartisan caucus with two Republican co-chairs and two Democratic co-chairs.

So here is Quigley on CNN on Friday afternoon.

No one would imagine that the President of the United States would betray all the things that we fought for.

All the reasons we fought the Second World War that we formed the New World Order, liberal, democratic world war after that great conflict. conflict you know we're on the side of the

bad guys now congressman mike quigley and it's in that context that we ask again today is this

what democracy looks like as it pertains to democracy not just here but around world. Did you hear those words at the end of the clip?

Quigley actually said, we're on the side of the bad guys now. So beyond the questions of Ukraine policy per se,

or whether Friday's confrontation was spontaneous or an ambush, that's a debate the media is having,

it's once again a question of

democracy versus creeping authoritarianism as well. Same with the associated press issue,

...