Most Americans agree that our politicians are too old, with the average age of lawmakers in the Senate being 64 – that’s one year away from retirement age. But new, slightly younger leadership could be on the way after this year’s election. Mike Papantonio & Farron Cousins discuss more.
Transcript:
*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.
Mike Papantonio: Most Americans agree that our politicians are too old. You think? With the average age of lawmakers in the Senate somewhere being around 64, that’s a year away from retirement age. But new, slightly younger leadership could be on the way to change all that. What do you think?
Farron Cousins: You know, I really like this story. Politico put this out, said, hey, we got two almost octogenarian guys running for president here, but hey, don’t worry.
Mike Papantonio: Old man. Old man versus old man. I mean, that’s just the truth. One of ’em is orange. The other one’s bumping into walls. I mean, look at these guys. McConnell. Is he alive? You look at the guy, is he really alive? Pelosi, Jesus, she has been shellacked or I don’t know what she’s done to stay preserved. But the point is, this is it. This is it. And the story says there’s younger people coming, but they ain’t that young.
Farron Cousins:: Exactly.
Mike Papantonio: They’re in the sixties. And that’s young. Right?
Farron Cousins:: Right. They’re like, hey, don’t worry. We’ve got people in their mid fifties to mid sixties to usher in this younger generation of politicians, which I guess technically it’s still better. But at the same time, we need the 30 year olds. We need the 40 year olds. We need the people to represent a majority of the people that went through the same things coming of age that they did. And that’s the difference. These are the people who sat in office, except for Trump because he didn’t get into 2016. They oversaw the financial disaster of 2007, 2008. They got us into Iraq. They got all of these endless wars. All of these financial problems. All of this deregulation.
Mike Papantonio: Climate change.
Farron Cousins: Exactly. They were all in office while these disasters were shaping our lives. And we don’t really have voices in there.
Mike Papantonio: Have we been unfair or are these, have we doctored these pictures at all?
Farron Cousins: A little bit. A little bit, little bit. Yes, we did.
Mike Papantonio: Yeah. The truth is this is who they are.
Farron Cousins:: It is.
Mike Papantonio: And we’re looking at it and we’re saying, this is the future. Oh, but don’t worry about it, we got some 60 year olds coming too. What about the 30-year-old? What about the 40-year-old or the 50-year-old that says, you know, I got some good ideas? Get outta the way Pelosi. Get outta the way Biden or McConnell, get outta the way. Let us try something new because we sure couldn’t screw up as bad as you have. Isn’t that kind of the argument here?
Farron Cousins: Exactly. And what’s remarkable too is that when you get to those younger generations, there actually is a lot more agreement than you have with some of these folks. You’ve even got younger conservatives that say, yeah, I’m for all of these traditional conservative things. But I also think climate change is a very big threat and we should do something about it. So there’s more common ground with these younger generations than there is with the older ones.
Mike Papantonio: What do you think these people have in common with a generation Z or millennial that can’t even afford a house? Okay. That the goal, their big goal, God, I hope I can afford a house. Instead, they’re living with mom. They’re living with mom and pop. What do you think they have in common with that person? Nothing. And so that new blood has got to come in and people have to say, I gotta listen to what this young person, this young woman is saying, this young man is saying. And I guess what we thought is we thought, well, we’re gonna revolutionize politics if we just let women in. Well, it did help. But now we need to move to the next stage. We gotta revolutionize politics by letting some young women, some young men, some more people of color in. And let’s mix it up a little bit. because these folks, they’ve created a disaster.
Farron Cousins: They really have. And part of the reason we don’t have many more young folks there is because these people are all still here.
Mike Papantonio: Why do they.
Farron Cousins: All four of ’em.
Mike Papantonio: Why do they stay? What is it that possesses McConnell and Pelosi and Biden and Trump to come in and say, this is so important to me?
Farron Cousins: See, that’s what I really don’t get other than just, I want power. Because you look at everybody up here, these people could have retired decades ago.
Mike Papantonio: Oh, 20 years.
Farron Cousins: And lived a lifestyle that we could only imagine. Just been happy and free the rest of their lives, playing golf, out on the water, fishing, doing whatever.
Mike Papantonio: Is it a sickness of some kind, do you think? Maybe.
Farron Cousins: It’s gotta be some level of narcissism.
Mike Papantonio: I was just gonna say, it sounds a lot like narcissism to me. You know? Anyway, Farron, thanks for what you do. You keep the important stories out there and I know you come on this show and sometimes I disagree with what you’re saying and you disagree with what I’m saying. But we’re always gonna land at the end of the show to say that was a good discussion.
Farron Cousins: Really, it was.
Mike Papantonio: And that’s all we can hope for. Thanks a lot.
Farron Cousins: Absolutely.
Mike Papantonio:: That’s all for this week. But all these segments are gonna be posted right here on this channel in the coming week. So make sure you’re subscribing. I’m Mike Papantonio, and this has been America’s Lawyer, where we tell you the stories that corporate media won’t tell you because their advertisers don’t let ’em tell the story. Because if they do, the advertiser’s gonna pull the money. Or their political connections, they don’t allow for it because God almighty, if you’re Republican, you better color within the lines. Or if you’re Democrat, you better color within the lines. Well, I gotta tell you something, we forgot around here how to color within the lines. Hopefully we’ll see you next time.
Suspicious Activity: That it had helped dirty money flow through its branches around the world, including at least 800. Plaintiffs allege that the defendants provided money and medical goods to terrorist groups, Hezbollah and Jaysh al-Adl. This is a well organized business for these individuals that carry out these attacks. Terrorism is a business and they run it like a business. They knew about what was going on for a decade. They absolutely, absolutely no question about it knew that HSBC was washing money. They had every reason to understand it was for terrorism and it was for drug cartels. Took no action whatsoever.
These banks are involved, their accounts are connected, and they’re using them to mask the transactions. The more complicated they can make the transactions, the more distance they could put between the bad guys and a seemingly legitimate purpose of these funds. They pay $1.9 billion, which is a drop in the bucket compared to what they’ve made. And nobody goes to prison. These CEOs, these bankers that made this decision, they’re safe at home. They know what they’ve done. They know it’s resulted in the death of Americans, contractors and soldiers, not just hundreds but thousands. And we look the other way because they don’t look like criminals. The die cast, the people that are responsible for it, are on Wall Street. And they don’t look like criminals. It’s almost a suspension of disbelief. Sometimes I’ll have people call me and say, is this, is this real? Do they really get away with this? Yeah, they do.
