00:09 Soundbite So what does it mean to live a good life? 00:16 These are the questions we explore on the top-ranked Good Life Project podcast, which has been downloaded and viewed over a hundred million times. 00:32 On Good Life Project, we sit down with leading voices and legends in health, art, science, spirituality, entertainment, industry, and culture. 00:49 Check out Good Life Project wherever you get your podcasts now. 01:15 Emily Bazelon Hello and welcome to Slate's Political Gab Fest, the welcome to the kleptocracy edition for December 1st, 2016. 01:23 I'm Emily Bazlan. 01:25 John and David are off somewhere. 01:27 I'm not sure where, although I did have a great time doing a live show with them last night that listeners, you will hear just before New Year's that we can take a look at. 01:35 Take a break for the holiday. 01:36 And today I am joined by, at the moment, three people. 01:41 Ruth Marcus, who is a columnist and deputy editorial page editor for The Washington Post. 01:46 Hey, Ruth. 01:47 Hi there. 01:48 And Adam Davidson, who is a staff writer at The New Yorker. 01:51 Adam Davidson Hey, Emily. 01:52 Emily Bazelon Hey. 01:53 And Jacob Weisberg, who is the chairman of The Slate Group and the host of Trumpcast, the show that is going on for at least four years. 02:02 Jacob Weisberg Don't remind me. 02:06 Emily Bazelon But very much worth listening to. 02:08 So we're going to talk about three topics. 02:10 Adam is going to join us for the first topic. 02:12 We're harnessing his finance and economics expertise, and then we're going to let him go because he has a busy day. 02:18 And on this week's show, we will start by talking about Trump's business entanglements and conflicts of interest. 02:25 They abound. 02:27 What does that mean about how to think about this presidency? 02:30 And 02:31 Then we're going to talk about Trump's recent cabinet appointments, in particular his selection of Tom Price to head the Department of Health and Human Services and what that means for repealing and replacing Obamacare. 02:44 And then we're going to talk about what I've come to think of as Trump's Twitter spasms, his way of communicating with the public, sometimes full of 02:52 falsehoods and really seeming like propaganda, sometimes purely self-promotional, not the way in which we're accustomed to get communications from our elected leaders. 03:02 And for Slate Plus, we're going to talk about a great question we got from listener Michael O'Shea about our reading habits. 03:09 OK, so, Adam, conflicts of interest are flying around this president-elect. 03:15 A few of the countries to be named Turkey, Argentina, India, Japan, the Philippines, Ireland, Scotland. 03:24 This is a businessman with property interests and developments all over the world, increasingly selling his name and his brand to projects that he's not necessarily having ownership of, but has an interest in their success. 03:39 just give one of the examples that has struck me. 03:42 In Turkey, there are these Trump towers in Istanbul. 03:46 And after Trump called for a ban on Muslims entering the United States, the president of Turkey said that Trump's name should be taken off of these towers. 03:55 This was insulting to Turkey. 03:57 Then later in the campaign, Trump said that the president of Turkey had the right to crack down harshly on dissidents. 04:04 And all of a 04:08 went away. 04:09 Trump has recently this week talked about soon enough, he'll hold a press conference, he'll talk about how he's not going to be involved in their day to day operations, but he said nothing about giving up their ownership. 04:20 So how reassuring do you think this is? 04:24 Adam Davidson Well, I think you can assume it's very unreassuring. 04:26 But let me I think what's helpful is to understand the 04:30 how Trump's business has evolved in the last decade or so, because it really highlights what a unique set of challenges he represents, as opposed to some other business person with links all over the world. 04:43 So one thing to know about Trump's business is it's not Boeing. 04:47 This is not General Electric or McDonald's, you know, a multi, multi, multi-billion dollar company with huge assets all over the world. 04:56 It's a fairly light company. 04:58 You know, it's 04:59 14 hotels. 05:00 He has, you know, depending on the count and what's opened, you know, a dozen or so or residential towers around the world. 05:07 I mean, it's not nothing, but there are blocks in Manhattan that have more real estate than Trump has. 05:14 And, you know, he doesn't count as a major figure in either global hotels or global real estate, although that's partially why I worry about him, because that means that a million dollars here, a million dollars there means a lot to his business. 05:28 And the way his business works, and part of this is true for every business like his. 05:34 So if you think of the Four Seasons or the Hyatt or whatever, when there are five-star hotels, particularly in developing economies or economies with some degree of corruption, basically the business model is you partner with someone local who has really great connections to the leadership so that they can 05:53 get the building done, get through all the permitting and stuff, but also crucially, especially for the kind of five-star hotel market that Trump tries to play in, so that they can make it a destination. 06:05 The Four Seasons and Marriott's and Hyatt's of the world have enormous due diligence practices to kind of monitor this and stay on the right side of the law. 06:12 That's not something Trump has. 06:14 Also... 06:15 Emily Bazelon So what does this all mean? 06:18 Adam Davidson the thing he is selling is his name. 06:21 And that's problematic for several reasons. 06:22 One reason it's problematic, you know, you can't, I mean, he can't disassociate himself from his name. 06:29 So when he leaves the presidency, hopefully in four years, maybe in eight years, the value of the Trump name will be his value. 06:36 That will be the thing he owns. 06:38 So no matter who runs it for the next four to eight years, he is still accruing value to his name. 06:44 So that's something he can't disassociate unless he 06:47 truly sells the company, it takes on a new name, but then it has no value at all because the only asset it has is the Trump name. 06:54 Secondly, you know, these are private transactions that occur between the Trump organization and some developer in a developing country. 07:04 And these are very easy to manipulate. 07:06 So, you know, let's say he starts doing a business deal with somebody in, you know, Haiti or some other country that's known for being corrupt. 07:13 How would we know what they're paying, the Trump Organization? 07:17 How would we know if we find out that they're paying $10 million a year? 07:20 Is that the right price, or was the right price really $1 million, and they upped it to $10 million? 07:25 Because what the Trump Organization is selling is that ephemeral idea of the value of the name. 07:32 And they're selling it to precisely the people who are going to want to communicate to the higher-ups in their country that they have a direct pipeline to the president. 07:41 His partner in Indonesia, this guy Harry Tano, seems to be really reaping the benefits of being the conduit to Trump. 07:48 The guy in Turkey, who is a bit on the outs, the family in Azerbaijan, who is a bit on the outs, are able to parcel their relationship with Trump for power within their country. 07:58 That's upsetting in and of itself, but then it also has a huge signal all over the world, hey, if I want to get ahead in my country, if I want to get construction contracts from the president, if I want to 08:09 Get more power, get my brother to be the minister of, you know, energy or whatever. 08:14 All I need to do is one of those Trump hotels. 08:17 Emily Bazelon Does this just mean that he gets really rich or does this fundamentally change the way corruption and favor seeking work around the world? 08:24 Jacob Weisberg For the reasons Adam has just been explaining, this problem is essentially unfixable. 08:30 I mean the solution to it was not to nominate Donald Trump, not to elect Donald Trump. 08:33 We now have to seek some solution that is in the realm of possibility. 08:39 The only real solution at this point, as Adam explains, would basically be for him to close his business and for nobody to be selling the Trump brand while he's president. 08:48 That's – 08:48 That's not going to happen. 08:49 Ruth Marcus He doesn't have any intention. 08:51 If I can interrupt for half a second, I'm going to just – it is not unfixable. 08:58 It is just that he has declined to fix it. 09:02 The businesses could be sold. 09:05 It would take a while. 09:06 They could be sold along with the Trump name. 09:09 Let others profit off of the Trump name. 09:13 He is just choosing not to opt for that – 09:16 difficult and possibly costly to him solution to fix it. 09:20 Now I'm going to let you proceed, Jacob. 09:23 Jacob Weisberg But I think you've hit on the nub of it. 09:25 I don't see how he can sell his name and let somebody else do what they want with it. 09:29 I mean, his name, yeah, it would that brand value attached to the hotels, but indirectly attached to him or fairly directly attached to him has some value. 09:38 If you auction that off right now, globally, somebody would buy it. 09:41 And if he put no restrictions on it, they could use Trump's name in all sorts of ways that would be very disturbing, ways that he might not like, ways that would suggest conflicts of interest. 09:51 But the issue would be out there. 09:54 He might not be profiting personally from it. 09:57 But it's just – That's a big difference, right? 09:59 I mean, I think we have to ask him to do something that's in the realm of fair possibility. 10:05 I think that would involve selling off assets, disclosure. 10:09 But when it comes to the name, the Trump branding business, I just don't think it's realistic to ask him to shut it down. 10:15 Emily Bazelon Really? 10:16 Isn't it reasonable to ask them to take a four-year pause on marketing this brand? 10:21 I mean, they're incredibly rich people. 10:23 He's the president. 10:24 If he really cared more about the country, wouldn't that be an – 10:27 Also, he gets a huge tax break if he sells these assets because of a law that encourages government officials to avoid exactly these kinds of conflicts of interest. 10:35 Jacob Weisberg I think that's true of everything except this the name, the branding business. 10:39 I mean, when you're when you have brand value attached to your personal name. 10:43 I mean, yes, I would like him to close down his business for the length of his presidency. 10:47 I think that would be the best solution. 10:49 I don't. 10:50 I think that's not only unrealistic but a little bit unfair. 10:53 I'm saying what can we ask him to do that is in the realm of plausibility? 11:00 Ruth Marcus Ruth? 11:02 Well, it was unfair to ask Hank Paulson to sell hundreds of millions of dollars of Goldman Sachs shares at a loss. 11:09 But he did it because it was more important, he thought, for him to be Treasury Secretary. 11:15 And that was what the law required. 11:16 I am not at all. 11:17 I mean, I think that we should talk about what's in the realm of the feasible and doable formula. 11:23 just for a different reason, because he is not going to sell the businesses and evaporate the Trump brand. 11:31 So we should sort of speak going forward about what he then should do and what the second best solution is. 11:37 But I'm just not backing down on that as the first best solution. 11:41 Adam Davidson Yeah, I'm actually going to disagree with both of you and say this is intolerable. 11:47 It might continue and we might have to tolerate it, but it is 11:51 It is hard to convey how intolerable this is. 11:54 Emily Bazelon So tell us why. 11:55 Adam Davidson These are just like the things off the top of my head that are intolerable. 12:00 His partners in Indonesia, Turkey, and Azerbaijan are all, they share some things in common. 12:07 They're wealthy people who don't, extremely wealthy people who don't seem to particularly care about Islamic extremism, but are making uneasy pieces with Islamic extremists. 12:18 in both their relative countries and also internationally. 12:23 His dealings in South America are deeply problematic. 12:27 This aborted Dominican Republic deal, his basically Ponzi scheme deal possibly in Uruguay, his relationship with Georgia. 12:36 His business is intimately tied up with crucial global national security concerns. 12:44 And there is 12:45 Zero question that at some point in the next four years, there will be some something, and maybe I don't know what happens in the presidential daily briefing. 12:55 It might happen every day. 12:56 It certainly, I'm sure, happens every month. 12:58 Emily Bazelon Well, he's not reading it, so there's that. 13:00 Adam Davidson Yeah, he's not reading it, which is lucky. 13:02 But the idea that any time we talk about Islamic extremists in Indonesia, Turkey, Azerbaijan, we... 13:13 we have an inherent conflict of interest that the way the president acts could cost him millions of dollars. 13:20 Even if he sells the business, even if he gets rid of it, even if someone else owns the Trump name, you know, he, he probably thinks he's immortal. 13:28 Certainly his kids have a long life to live and their asset, they have one asset, the value of the Trump name. 13:35 That's still what they're going to have in 2020 and 2024. 13:39 On top of it, the U.S. has been the leading force in global anti-corruption initiatives. 13:46 We have transformed since 9-11 the flow of money around the world. 13:50 It is the most effective tool against terrorism and organized crime and sexual slavery and a million other really deep problematic issues. 14:00 And as I talk to experts on this, the thing we have is moral clarity. 14:05 The thing we have is we are less corrupt than you. 14:08 And when you talk to those same people now in developing countries, they have a big smile on their face. 14:14 So I would say, don't run for president if you have a business like this and you're not willing to give it up. 14:20 It is intolerable. 14:21 And any discussion about, well, what would be reasonable to ask 14:24 I love you, Jacob, but that to me is not our job. 14:28 Jacob Weisberg Our job. 14:29 Hang on a second here, Adam, because I think I mean, look, I agree with you 100 percent that it's 100 percent intolerable. 14:35 And I think these will be the articles of impeachment if we ever get a Congress that wants to hold him accountable because that Congress, you know, but in the absence of that, you know, Ruth has to write Washington Post editorials asking him to do something that will make the situation better, or at least I think she should. 14:52 Ruth Marcus or to stop making it worse. 14:54 Jacob Weisberg Right. 14:55 And I think she can, until she's blue in the face, say, close down your business. 14:59 But I don't think that's going to happen. 15:01 And I guess what I'm asking is, what can we demand that he do, short of shutting down the Trump business, that could plausibly happen, and that would reduce the apparent and real conflicts of interest that he's got? 15:15 Adam Davidson I would say literally nothing. 15:17 I honestly think there is no way, if you're talking about 15:21 You have this brand, the Trump brand, and it's worth whatever it's worth. 15:26 It is now worth a lot more. 15:29 And he will be making choices as president on a daily basis that will influence the value of that brand. 15:37 I think it's safe to say this is not the world's most introspective man. 15:41 This is not a man... 15:42 who questions his urges and emotional feelings. 15:46 So, you know, he doesn't even need to sit there and say, you know what, I'm going to let al-Qaeda get away with this because, you know, or let the Islamic State get away with this because I got that business deal in Turkey. 15:57 It's just he'll say, yeah, you know, I mean, look at President Obama. 16:01 He's made a bunch of decisions in Syria and Iraq and Afghanistan that reasonable people disagree with. 16:07 These are tough, tough calls. 16:09 And what if we knew that 16:12 He was either directly or in four years would directly benefit to the tunes of tens of millions, maybe billions of dollars by those decisions. 16:20 We cannot trust those decisions. 16:22 It doesn't need to be explicit corruption. 16:25 It doesn't need to be. 16:27 We are talking about the most difficult decisions the president faces in the most difficult, morally unclear parts of the world. 16:34 And we have no ability to be confident. 16:37 And there is no structure short of there is no longer a business called Trump that works. 16:42 And they have no assets. 16:44 I mean, they have some assets. 16:46 So that is not their business. 16:48 Ruth Marcus I think that there's a distinction between intolerable and even more intolerable. 16:55 All right. 16:56 Let's find that one. 16:58 So I think that we can operate in the realm of, OK, let's explore how we can make it less – still intolerable but whatever, less – more intolerable. 17:08 So and one of them, one of the exactly one of them is that Trump instead of being and the Trump transition instead of being ready for this was because it was a big, huge, honking problem of. 17:24 corruption and conflict staring us in the face. 17:27 Trump announced it to Steve Bannon when he talked about his towers in not one, but two towers in Turkey and said, I have a conflict of interest in talking about this. 17:36 Yeah, duh, which continues. 17:38 So A, they were just appallingly unprepared. 17:41 B, 17:42 He is now, we'll see what he has to say that won't solve the problem in two weeks, but just not oblivious, but absolutely heedless to the things that he's doing to make the problem worse. 17:54 And those are twofold. 17:55 One is that he's simultaneously telling us that he's going to solve, and I'm doing air quotes, the problem by giving the business to his children, or at least, you know, assigning the responsibility for running it to his children, even as he is inviting his children into 18:11 into the transition and possibly in the form of Jared Kushner, son-in-law, into the administration. 18:17 And he is inviting them in the transition, sitting in on these meetings. 18:22 So that's huge problem, number one, that his incoming White House counsel needs to tell him to stop right away, in all caps. 18:30 The second part of that is the flip side of this. 18:33 He needs to stop when he's having conversations with foreign leaders to raise 18:37 things of business interest. 18:38 Don't talk to Nigel Farage about your honking windmills that are interfering with the view on the golf course, for goodness sakes. 18:47 Don't have a meeting with Indian business people who, as the president-elect, 18:54 who have business interests with you. 18:57 Just stop making it worse. 18:59 OK, it's like the Hippocratic oath of hotel owners. 19:03 Emily Bazelon Yeah. 19:04 You know what I worry about, though? 19:05 I worry that all of this has been very sloppy this beginning. 19:08 You know, he's taking these pictures, thumbs up with the Indian businessman. 19:11 Ivanka is sitting there in her super high heel stilettos with the prime minister of Japan. 19:17 They'll just stop doing it so obviously and publicly. 19:20 And it'll be going on – it'll be buried one more layer and we won't even know about. 19:25 Like at least we can – No, I think if you – I'm sorry to interrupt you, Emily. 19:27 Ruth Marcus I'm just so worked up here. 19:29 I apologize. 19:29 We're all about interrupting. 19:31 But I think if you do put some structures in place, some written rules of – 19:36 These guys are not going to do this, and my children aren't going to do this, and I'm not going to do that. 19:42 I'm sure Adam is about to explode here because it won't be adequate to solve the problem. 19:48 But if you brought in an outsider to run things and kept everybody out of it, you can mitigate harm even if you can't eliminate it. 19:56 It's like having a chronic disease. 19:58 Jacob Weisberg Well, you know what he's going to do. 19:59 He's going to run the business through Ivanka. 20:01 It's called a blonde trust. 20:04 Adam Davidson But Ruth, I think you're awesome, Ruth, and I don't mean to single you out, but if you wrote a column— That's okay. 20:08 Ruth Marcus I can take it. 20:10 Adam Davidson All right. 20:10 Here are the six things you could do to make this less intolerable. 20:12 Ruth Marcus Less intolerable. 20:12 Adam Davidson I mean, the Wall Street Journal already wrote that op-ed, by the way. 20:15 Right. 20:16 And then he says, I did the Marcus plan. 20:19 Now, obviously, he's going to do a watered-down version. 20:21 It's not going to be quite—it'll be like his, you know, showing his health history to Dr. Oz. 20:25 Ruth Marcus Chances Donald Trump announces that equals zero. 20:29 Adam Davidson Right. 20:29 Understood. 20:30 Understood. 20:30 But— 20:31 Once we set a standard that is less than the clear standard, which is he should have no conflict of interest, then we are giving him license for these shenanigans. 20:42 I mean, I know there's like Andrew Russ Sorkin saying, oh, Ken Feinberg, everyone trusts that guy. 20:46 He could run the business. 20:47 Still, if he runs it well, the Trump name is worth something. 20:51 And Trump will know because these are big, you know, there'll be big articles about it. 20:56 Oh, boy, Ken Feinberg just opened a big business in Hong Kong or Macau or wherever. 21:01 And he will know that. 21:02 And he will know that the Trump Organization has announced a big pivot towards Asia, towards the Middle East. 21:08 That's where they see growth. 21:09 And so he knows that. 21:12 So it's 21:13 I my feeling is it's just intolerable. 21:16 It's like, you know, let's say he joined ISIS and we're like, yeah, well, it turns out the president's allowed to join ISIS. 21:22 Ruth Marcus Yeah. 21:23 Yeah. 21:25 Jacob Weisberg Adam. 21:25 Adam's right. 21:26 I capitulate. 21:27 Adam's right. 21:28 Ruth Marcus I'm going to give you one plank of the Marcus plan. 21:31 OK. And, you know, TM Ruth Marcus. 21:34 Right. 21:35 I'm going to have it all over the plan when he enacts it. 21:39 OK. 21:39 So he it's too encumbering. 21:42 And difficult for him to get rid of the businesses. 21:45 But because he cares more about the country than his businesses, they can put a pause on using the Trump name and going forward with their plans. 21:56 I think it's for hundreds of additional hotels in the next several years. 22:00 It's a big expansion of their hotel business. 22:02 Plank one of the Marcus plan is, let's put a pause on that. 22:06 They don't need to sort of hurt themselves by divesting properties that are liquid and taking huge losses, but they also can take steps to not appear to further profit off the presidency. 22:20 Adam Davidson But they have this other brand, Scion. 22:22 It's not the Trump name, but everyone knows it's Trump. 22:24 It's going to be in the interest of potential partners to 22:29 You know, make a big, loud noise. 22:30 Hey, we're doing a Scion. 22:31 Yeah, we love Scion. 22:32 Ruth Marcus They can operate. 22:34 Plank 1A of the Marcus Plan is actually, I mean, all hotels. 22:39 I don't mean just hotels that have the big T on them. 22:42 I mean, they can run their business, but they don't. 22:45 There's nothing in the, like, laws of physics that requires them to expand it for the next four years or, God forbid, eight years. 22:52 Emily Bazelon What Adam has convinced me is that there is no way to solve this. 22:57 And also that we shouldn't wait to see the clear conflict of interest where we say, ah, now Trump is pro ISIS because he wants to open a hotel and, you know, whatever. 23:08 Jacob Weisberg Damascus. 23:08 Emily Bazelon Thank you. 23:09 Damascus. 23:11 I mean, in other words, I started with this example from Turkey because it seemed kind of shockingly clear cut. 23:17 But we don't need to amass a lot of those examples to know that this could be 23:21 warping and distorting for policy in ways we can't see. 23:25 And so, yes, like we should keep it. 23:27 We should look for those examples to make the case even starker. 23:30 But really, this is about Congress doing its job. 23:33 It's about either impeachment under the emoluments clause, if that's directly what's at issue, or just a recognition that this corruption and conflict of interest is, as you say, intolerable. 23:44 Adam Davidson I think that our target is Paul Ryan. 23:47 That is. 23:48 Emily Bazelon Oh, good. 23:49 Good luck. 23:50 Adam Davidson Good luck, but I think we as journalists... We have to try. 23:54 I mean, we are in an intolerable situation, and the only person who can make it go away is Paul Ryan. 24:03 And we need to provide him with as much detail and as much information. 24:09 A good comparison example for me is Bloomberg's dealing with China. 24:16 where Bloomberg reporters did an amazing investigative report on China, and it was stifled because I think this has been well documented, but my understanding is because China was Bloomberg's main target for growth, and they can't have the Chinese telling them you can't sell Bloomberg terminals here. 24:35 That was... 24:36 outrageous, but it was a private company. 24:39 And it was with a lot of the same elements. 24:41 You know, Mike Bloomberg was making a decision. 24:46 I have heard, I can't say this with 100% certainty, that very quickly other projects with other government leaders in the Bloomberg organization were stifled. 24:55 A friend of mine worked on a major Bloomberg report on another country where they were about to bring down a leader and it was stifled. 25:03 And then word got out within Bloomberg Organization, hey, the big boss doesn't want us messing with these corrupt leaders where there's growth. 25:11 What happens at the Department of Justice? 25:13 What happens at U.S. embassies around the world when... 25:18 you know, let's just say for the sake of argument that Donald Trump is the most honorable man in the world, I'm laughing, and owns all these businesses, and you are the ambassador in one of those countries, and you learn that Donald Trump's partner is doing some pretty shady stuff. 25:35 What do you do about that? 25:36 You call the, you know, it is fully, outrageously, unacceptably intolerable 25:45 no matter what they do other than they're not in this business anymore. 25:50 And I need to spend the next four years making that point over and over and over again with as many detailed examples as possible.