YouSaid · the spoken record

Paul Begala

lines on the record: 109
first: 2016-07-04
most recent: 2016-07-04
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“Prejudice against Latinos was no way to run a political campaign. And so he had a very progressive. He was for immigration reform. He was for bilingual ed. Rick Perry signed a law giving in state tuition to the children of undocumented workers. Of course, because you want them to be smart and productive. So that's why Republicans in Texas through the Bush and Perry era reliably got 40% of Latino vote. That's changing now. Now there's a new crew and they're running the same kind of hard anti-Latino policies and messages that the National Republicans have been doing. So I think Texas will come around, but it takes a long time. Maybe you got to go down there.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“We will be able to, I think, turn that. And it also takes the Republicans disqualifying themselves. You know, I used to mock Bush. I used to say at W spoke Spanish so he could be by ignorant. But he knew that”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Out of 50. That's by design. The people who are running text now, the Republicans who have dominated every single race for 20 years, they haven't lost a single statewide race in 20 years. And they're putting in place barriers to voting. Well, some of your proteges, Jen Brown and Jeremy Byrd and some others have gone down there and they're doing the Lord's work of registering folks and trying to expand the electorate. But it is a long and difficult process because people have been cut out and written off for so long that when I was a kid, it was a one-party state for the Democrats. Now it's a one-party state for the Republicans. And the problem with that is the most committed, or they would be committed if we had a fully functional mental health system, the most crazy Republicans can dominate that state in the primaries. And so you're looking for a correction. It won't happen in the cycle, is the short answer. It will take time. But over time,”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“In that state, Texas is not a red state, as the great Jim Hightower used to say, it's a non-voting state. We had in the primaries, Texas had the 49th best voter turnout. 49th. And at one point, there were two Texans running. You know, and Ted Cruz was on the ballot in the Texas primary. And one, the Texas primary, and still voter turnout was 49th.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It's that combination. That really was the breakthrough. And I mean it, I mean 100 years from now, people will study your campaign because. From the beginning of the democracy, we had people to people campaigning. But then, you know, mass communications came around and a lot of us, and I was one of them said, well, we don't really need to do field organizing anymore because we can advertise. And what you guys did was take the best of technology to make that field organizing so efficient and precise and personal and meaningful that when someone showed up at your door, she wasn't just like knocking randomly”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“You think as a strategist, yes, that his path forward has got to be to do better with people with college degrees, women with college degrees, unmarried women and young people. He's pretty much killed himself with people of color. His path has got to be to maximize a white vote, especially among people with a college degree. Those kinds of comets and people”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Especially women, especially college educated women. I mean, you know, if you're thinking as a strategist rather than as a family member who's got family members who are disabled,”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“21% of us either are disabled or have a family member who is. I certainly do. That's a huge part of the country. You've got a side set aside that it's a big voting block. It's just a savage thing. And this is a window into his heart. It is. I think that Dad was right when he said that”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“He did not mock his reporting, which is fair game. You don't like a reporter's report, and you can say, Oh, you know, John Doe is a crummy reporter. And it was cruel. And as you know,”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Who have a little girl named Grace who has spina bifida, and we let them tell their story. We just turn the cameras on. And the mom says All the kids at Grace's school know not to make fun of her disability. How can adults not know that? And the dad says, well, that moment I got a chance to peer in a Donald Trump's heart and soul, and I did not like what I saw.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Path between 13 and 70 is full of people who are not in his base, unmarried women, college-educated women especially, young people, people of color. So I want to build a ceiling. And if you look, we've been advertising very heavily on the outrageous things that Donald Trump has said about women, about national security most powerfully about the disabled. And that's building a ceiling. There's only one national poll that lasts 10 or 12 that hasn't even over 40. He's got to get close to 50, maybe with third and fourth parties he can win with 49. But that's our job. And it begins with simply airing the statements that he's made and how it reacts. I know you've seen it, but there's a family in North Carolina.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“He wants to build a wall. I want to build a ceiling. He's got his 40, not even 40, 30, 35% of the vote, and it is ironclad. And he's right when he says I could go on Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, not lose any of my voters. But that got him to 13 million votes. As you know, you need 65 or 70 million to win.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“He probably knew about Hank the hallucination. Said, I hope Hillary runs and I want to be for Hillary. And almost to a person, I can't think of any Obama donors who we had who said, oh, I don't want her. It was remarkable how seamlessly that turned. So now I'm helping advise the super PAC. We are trying to do for her what we did on the margins, but we helped, I think, President Obama, which is define the Republican early. And with Romney, it was taking his business record and looking at it and giving it scrutiny. And there were some deals there that were really difficult, really savage, really cruel to working people. And those working people spoke out about him. We gave them a voice and a platform. With Trump,”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“An advisor. I'm a consultant to the super pack that's helping to elect Hillary. The same one that helped reelect President Obama. This was an amazing thing. On election night, 30 minutes after CNN called the race for President Obama, I got a call from Jeffrey Katzenberg, our first donor. LA and he says What do we do next? And I said, Jeffrey, I haven't even had time to get drunk. And he said, There's no time for that.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Her numbers took a dive out. Sure. But, you know, the question people have to ask is who's going to fight for me? All of that toughness that sometimes people find off-putting can be... Part of an advocacy plan. In other words, yes, she's tough. She's tough as nails. She's the toughest person I know. And she's going to put that work to work fighting for me and fighting for folks who are poor, folks who are left out. Then that becomes an asset.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“That's right. But it's, I think, behind her now. It's been baked in. It's caused some real political damage. There's no doubt about that.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“There is a different standard. I was on the other side. We try to make that a standard. I know. Why didn't the press pick it up? Why? Well, because Romney is a person of great moral standing, and he is. He's a very good person. So is Hillary. There is this grinding sense in the press, and there always has been that somehow the Clintons are crooked, where they came out of Arkansas. And I hate it, and it's a powerful bias in the press. It really is. And it's something she's had to struggle against every day. Now, was it a mistake to use a private server? Of course it was. Of course it was. She has said that. You know, the question is do we”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Speak at his funeral. This is another Bill Clinton lesson. He would quote Lincoln to me all the time. He'd say, I destroy my enemies, I make them my friends. And that's what Hillary's been able to do with David Brock, who was the most implacable foe. So that, I think, is a pretty impressive thing. But what animates that? First off, I do think it was a mistake to have private email. It was a mistake for previous secretaries of state as well.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“By the way, the guy who funded so much of it, Richard Mellonscafe, wound up an admirer. I know Bill Clinton, I think, Cloke had a funeral. He asked President Clinton who he tried to destroy.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“That may be. I mean, they really are out together. There really was a vast right-wing conspiracy. And, you know, we laugh about it, but it was jaw-dropping. And it's all been well documented now. I mean, there were a couple of shadowy billionaires and a whole cadre of right-wing groups colluding with Ken Starr to try to take out a freely elected”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“The Lewinsky thing when she lost her father, it was early in the Clinton presidency. It's a really, really awful moment. And she's a person of, to my observation, such stellar character. But is this hard for her to peel that back? It's just not, she wants... Politics to be about ideas and about platforms. And she's got a position paper on manufacturing and one on childcare and one on”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Huge challenge. It is not. It's hard to explain how much she hates that. It's not how God made her. And it's a challenge. It's not that there's something terrible there. I've seen it. I mean, I've had drinks with her. I've danced with her. You know, I've had dinner with her, whatever. She's playing with my kids. She was the first person outside my family to call Diane when she had Johnny, our first baby, in the middle of the campaign. So I've seen that part of her and I've seen her frankly in the greatest pain you could be in. And so I am 100% comfortable, honestly, with her heart and her soul.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Yes, she's very deliberate about that. And I do think she should celebrate that in highlight it because it's who she is anyway She's never going to be, you know, her husband would improvise in the State of the Union address. Not her. So you got to be who you are. And I do think that contrast with Trump is really one of the”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“This is why she needs you. No, that's exactly right. Think about Senator Obama, right? At every critical juncture, people said, oh, that's a disaster, that's terrible. He doubled down on that. He didn't have experience. So he said, yeah, actually, but I was right about the war. The most important. Decision of our time, and I was right, so experience doesn't get you anything. When he said he'd negotiate with the Iranians and everybody in the conventional establishment said that was terrible, he doubled down on it. Hillary is who she is. And I had someone, a journalist recently, oh, but Trump never uses a teleprompter, and he's so impromptu. And I said, yeah, you know, Hillary's running for the presidency of the United States of America. And as you have said, those words can launch armies and move markets.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But this is how God made her. You know, it is an MRI this whole part of her soul is that she's a reserved Midwesterner. And I wish that, and I think it will, that the process will strip all of that reserve away. You know, it's interesting.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“When I left her husband, and he was not happy with me, she kept calling, she was passing through Austin. She called me up. She says, I'd like to see you. And we had all these little kids at the time. She said, Bring the boys, bring Diane. And I can still see it. She was in her hotel room. She was on the floor playing with the toddlers. And so, you know, you never see that on a campaign trail. She's much more reserved than her husband”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I was living in Austin, but I believe that that was the case. And so the most important thing, he went with his own values instead of trying to do it was politically expedient. That's a tough thing to do. It wound up working, but at the time it was a perfectly reasonable conclusion that a government shutdown would hurt the party of government more than it would hurt the Republicans.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And he stood firm against that. That was not based on political advice. In fact, he rejected Morris's political advice if the people who were in the room were telling me the truth.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It was, I think, the wrong thing to do But the critical, I'm told, from people who were in the room, the critical advice that he got at the time from his political team was Compromise with the Republicans and cut entitlement so as not to have a government shut down because we're the Democrats of the party government, the government shuts down will be a catastrophe for you and Clinton listened but rejected that and he stood firm against the Republicans' attempt to cut 270 billion dollars, a huge cut out of Medicare.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But to me, that's kind of how he squared that is I was in trouble before, and this guy helped me with a comeback. I'm in trouble again. Maybe he can help me again. And he wasn't crazy. It just wasn't my own approach.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“So to me, it wasn't crazy. It just wasn't an approach that I was comfortable with. And so I was happy to see him re-elected. I helped a little on the debates, but otherwise didn't have much to do with the re-election, as you know, you were central to that 96 victory.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Which all wound up working. I actually think so those were lots of things that he stuck his neck out on and paid an enormous price. So when you lose, as you know, that catastrophically, you're kind of at sea. And so he's looking for other different better, hopefully, advice. I don't think it was better. And Mars had been a guy who'd advised him previously, long before Carl Warren.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Of the 56 seats that NRA's analysis said 19 were because of guns alone. So no, but 19 of them were guns alone. Some of them because he tried to give equal rights to gays in the military. And that caused a huge uproar, right? He wanted gays and lesbians to be able to serve openly and honestly in the military as long as the compromises don't ask, don't tell. But he was standing up for gay rights in the early 90s when it wasn't a very popular position. He also raised taxes, especially on the rich, but some in the middle class. Right. To try to get the deficit under”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Far more than we could get today. The Brady Bill waiting period, a background check. Do you think that's why a fan on assault? Do you think that's why?”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“78 and 1938. I always tell myself that. Well, and so by the way, that part of the answer to the question of what would you lose for? He went way out there on guns. The most progressive gun law we've ever had.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But I also wasn't going to work with an approach that I didn't think was consistent with my own approach. And so that's how I, and by the way, but my question to you is, how is it?”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Because life was too short. It was not an approach that I was comfortable with. But my loyalty, here's how I worked it out. My loyalty to the president was I could never publicly break with him or attack him. It would not be fair given the access to the...”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Right, so I left I moved to Texas. I never publicly broke with the president, but I moved my ass to Texas. I taught at the University of Texas. I went into doing PR with my buddy, Jack Martin, Matthew Dowd. Mark McKinnon. Public strategies called Public Strategies.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“I still talk. Yeah, but I think that Those initial experiences cut, they matter. And I still do think about the guys around the hardware store or Uncle Buster, God Rest of Soul, Mr. Cort who owned the hardware store. His Uncle Buster was our local JP, Justice the Peace. He'd been on the Bataan Death March. Now, he wasn't real happy when people drove a Japanese car up to that hardware store. Didn't make him a racist, okay? But like understanding... I love the coasts, but the real America, it really is important to have that grounding. And so even you're sitting in a White House, you're still grounded in a real place. And I think that helps a lot.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“That's why I think it helps so much that you're rooted in the Midwest. I'm still rooted in Texas. You know, my son is going to school there. All my family and friends.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And I would do that frequently. I'd go and peel off and go to the hardware store on the courthouse square where the candidate of the president is speaking. If you can get out and talk to people, there's nothing like that. And it is a really isolating, as you know.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“But as you know with Senator Obama at the time, you wind up talking, we talked at religion, we talked sports, we talked about life, my wife and I were having our first baby in the middle of that campaign. It wasn't just how can I win New Hampshire. And then you get out there, particularly in a campaign. It's harder in the White House. You're right. I always tried to travel with him as much as I could, even in the White House because... At least I could peel off.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Oh, yeah. Mr. Ports Hardware. In Stafford, Texas. Mr. Court probably taught me more around the nail bin. Yes, that's a big, and it's why in the campaign, the best job was mine. I traveled with Bill Clinton. We went to 48 states. And first, if you get a chance to spend a year of your life sitting next to Bill Clinton on an airplane, I highly recommend it. It's the greatest education.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And Carvel just said, my only question is is he too good to be true? Which actually a lot of voters were saying later on when he first burst on the scene nationally. It's like, slick Willies, he too good to be true. But it really was love at first sight. And then we won the Walker. So he came up with a couple of...”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“It was, I still remember it. So, this is 1991. He's like, you know, my kid is like in fifth or sixth grade, I can't remember. My daughter. And she's going to come of age in this new century that's coming. And I'm really scared to death of what it's going to look like. And he went through the economic problems and the social problems that we had. And he treated us like we loved our country instead of just like we were hacks. And man, it was the best possible way to make me fall in love with him. And we did. And we walked out. And I remember I said to James, usually these candidates are sort of often, these candidates sort of empty vessels. No, no.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“You know, in Washington losing these races So, this is before Harris Wafford made Carvel and I semi-well known. And so Clinton probably just as a courtesy to Zell called us up and we went to see him. My recollection is about September. It was in Washington, D.C. at one of these hotels on Capitol Hill. And we went in and just sat with Clinton and his friend and lawyer, Bruce Lindsay, just the four of us for hours. And it was love at first sight because it's the first time a politician had treated me like a voter and a citizen first and a strategist second. We talked very little about strategy. He did not say, look, Miller's going to move up the southern primary. That'll help. And my wife's from Illinois, so actually I'll do better there than people think. And, you know, none of that.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Zellmiller called us up. First off, Clinton had gone to visit Zell in the governor's mansion. He said, I'm going to run. This is 91. And Zell says, I'll endorse you. I'll move up my primary so the South will have more say early. I'll move up to Georgia primary. And he had the kind of power to do that. And he did. And kind of aside, he said, hire these boys that ran my campaign. Who are they? James Carville and Paul McGallak, since I never heard of them. Zell said, well, maybe that's a good thing. Maybe we've had too many people.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“A great guy, by the way, a fine two-term governor, and the attorney general of the incumbent president, who was at 91% because of the Gulf War. Our last rally. This is where again, being a campaign manager and a hack, Wofford is a visionary. Wofford was speaking in Washington, Pennsylvania, southwest Pennsylvania, which is blue-collar country. And he got up there and he got carried away. And he said, not only are we going to defeat Dick Thornburg, but if I win, it will be the beginning of the end of the Bush presidency. Like, holy shit, Harris! Guys at 91% can we just deal with the beloved two-term governor we're taking on? He said, I just told the truth, Paul. He said, and he did. He said, if I win this, Bush is through.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“Well, we wound up from 47 points behind. We won by 10. It was an upset landslide. Which, if we'd had another week, we'd have won by 20.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source
“And he said, Well, just hear me out. I said, fuck. And finally, he got me to calm down. And he said, an ophthalmologist said to me, You know, Harris, your intellectual forbearers were lawyers, and they wrote the Constitution. That's why there's a right to a lawyer. But if mine had written it, they would have said they were doctors, my intellectual forbearers. They would have said, well, if a criminal has a right to a lawyer, then a working person has a right to a doctor.”
2016-07-04 · The Axe Files with David Axelrod · Ep. 63 - Paul Begala · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT · source