Tim Wirth on Protecting Our Republic and Joseph Serna on the Toll of California's Wildfires

Whether you’re convinced that nothing stands between Trump and another four years in the White House, or you manage to keep faith in the hope Biden’s campaign provides, it behooves all of us to be fully prepared as to what might happen once the vote counts come in on Election Night. United Nations Foundationvice chair and former U.S. Senator Timothy E. Wirth shines a light on all kinds of clandestine efforts the President might pursue in order to obfuscate or nullify a Democractic victory. But as the nation focuses on the election, Los Angeles Time Joseph Serna reminds us that the threat of climate change creates all kinds of future problems, not the least of which have  been manifested by the recent California wildfires.

Show Notes:

01:00 - Intro
02:00 - Election Night concerns
09:45 - Keeping things fair and fully counted
13:00 - Undoing the damage to our reputation
17:00 - The President’s secret powers
20:30 - Bi-partisan efforts
30:30 - Firefighting in a pandemic
33:00 - A warming world
38:00 - Forests need managements
39:30 - The human story
45:00 - A tightening race?

Transcript:

Al Hunt: [00:00:00] And the podcast, nice white parents reporter Hahna jockey wall. You may know her from this American life. Started looking into this one school in her neighborhood after her kids became school age in New York city, Hannah examines is public middle school, traditionally filled with black and Brown students.

After a number of white families arrived and then not satisfied, fully understood what she was seeing. She went all the way back to the family of the school in the 1960s, and then up to the present day again. Eventually Hunter realized she could put a name to what was getting in the way of making the school better.

All these years. White parents. Nice white parents. Fascinating. Listen. That's deeply relevant today. It's made by serial productions in New York times company. Same people who made the hit podcast, serial and S town. All episodes are now available wherever you do. Get your podcast.

Hello and welcome to 2020 politics war room with James Carville in Virginia somewhere. And I'm Al hunt in Washington. We're proud partners with the sine Institute at American university. We'll get back there someday. Thank you for listening to this podcast, please subscribe, rate, and review on Apple podcast, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever ever.

You get your podcast. James sympathy worth has been a major figure in American public life for almost as long as Joe Biden. He was a member of the house, the United States Senator from Colorado for 18 years. High ranking state department official. And for years, president of the United nations foundation, he's now part of an important group called keep our Republic, a small collection of former high ranking administration, officials, and members of Congress preparing for a chaotic and perhaps deeply dangerous election day and aftermath instead of mr.

Ambassador or Senator. Let's just say welcome Tim.

Tim Wirth: [00:02:00] Thank you, Al. Great to be with you again, and James, always a treat.

Al Hunt: [00:02:04] Tell our listeners, what keep our Republic is worried about and warning about okay.

Tim Wirth: [00:02:09] Group of, uh, or four or five of us got together beginning about five months ago out, uh, concerned about, uh, what we're learning about the election and about some of the president's emergency powers and looking carefully at the electoral college legislation.

We thought that, uh, this was really boated in addition to. Uh, what we thought was going to be Trump's desire to stay in office no matter what, uh, this voted, uh, not only chaos, but some real trouble for our Republic. So we came together and, and, uh, members of the group include a Dick Gebhart you'll remember, and Gary Hart and, uh, two or three high ranking people from treasury and, and, uh, and the state and elsewhere.

And we began to look at the legislation and look at their situation. And, uh, were particularly alarmed in particular by two phenomenon. One which very few people know about the president has vast emergency powers. He can declare an emergency for any number of reasons. These power started to be granted to the presidency at the time of, uh, Eisenhower and the nuclear threat, and it was understandable then to have, uh, emergency powers for the president, but they've expanded since, uh, and, uh, during, uh, an examinations of, of chemical warfare and biological warfare.

And then of course terrorism. And now the pandemic, the president has as a whole suite of these powers, which the public knows almost nothing about. Oh, the Brennan center, New York has done the best work on this, but they're largely secret powers. There've been no hearings on them that we know about that have been ever able to find.

And, uh, they grant him authority to make all kinds of decisions. Now, just think about that as background for this election. And for a president who may feel very threatened and may decide that, uh, he has to invoke some of these emergency powers, uh, if he is losing or thinks that he has lost the second part of our concern related to the 12th amendment and the electoral college, you look at the electoral college and, uh, it is, uh, pretty straight forward in its simplest form.

But when you get inside of the electoral college and began to begin to examine what happens in each state, you begin to find that there's lots of room in there for mischief and mischief is maybe a nice word for saying, uh, uh, Dick Gephardt likes to talk about it being the devil's playground. For example, uh, the election will be held on the 3rd of November.

And it's not clear to us that, uh, uh, anybody will necessarily be elected then that that count is going to go on. Well, beyond the 3rd of November is now pretty well known, uh, because of all the right imbalance. If the, uh, if the president is losing. Uh, in the right, well, let's take it back a step. The president may declare that he is winning, uh, because of the, uh, bouts that are cast on the same day.

And, uh, uh, we'll say I won the election and announced that on the night of the third or the morning of the 4th of November. But in fact, uh, that election margin will dwindle and maybe disappear. When they, uh, uh, absentee ballots come on, this is so called a red Mirage versus the blue wave, the red Mirage of immediate victory, the blue wave coming in, uh, with the coming in from absentee ballots.

So then at that, that creates a period of time from the 3rd of November into the middle of December. At which time the president can do all kinds of things. And we're worried about many of those, uh, ranging from, uh, really encouraging violence in the streets to, um, really pushing on various state delegations, uh, challenging, uh, what electricity in the various States may decide to do.

So we think it's potentially going to be a very, uh, chaotic time. And most importantly, in all of this, the public has to be reassured that votes can be counted in a safe way of full and fully counted, fully counted that it's safe to vote and your vote will be counted. We've had challenges to voting in the past.

We've had challenges to the system in the past. We can, we can, uh, we can certainly, uh, succeed this time around, even though we are hearing, hearing a lot of bad things from the administration.

Al Hunt: [00:06:50] I get what you're saying is that, uh, we are your worry is that the in person voting in some places may favor Trump, but we know the male votes are likely to swing it to Biden.

And you, you think that Trump and bar could even go so far as to try to impound or invalidate mail ballots while claiming victory.

Tim Wirth: [00:07:10] Well, I could be one of the things that they do. And other thing that they might do would be they're shut down, get, get allies. And one of the swing States, you have the allies and the state legislature in a swing state, uh, too, to invalidate the results.

Alton declare their own slate of victors, which would be for Trump, even though the popular vote in that state would be for Biden. And then we get to the timing electoral college meets in December, and we're really in a mess. And, uh, I think it's very likely that there'll be challenges, uh, in a number of States by the president.

Uh, if in fact they are losing and he will claim that a lot of these votes were say when the blue wave starts to come in, they're invalid. We should count them immediately. They're infected with the virus. They were Chinese votes. I mean, you can imagine a whole variety of, of, uh, Of statements that he might make to challenge those votes.

So we're, I think we're in for a real rodeo, I think in, um, in late November, early December,

Al Hunt: [00:08:11] you and James can discourse on this, Tim, but if Biden wins decisively in reality, and he carries early States that report mail, uh, at the same time, as in person, North Carolina and Florida, doesn't that if not eliminated, at least mitigate the problem.

Tim Wirth: [00:08:29] No question about it. And, but I think it's a. Would be foolish of us to believe that everything's okay. When we first started this, uh, four or five months ago, and we were told by pundits and politicals and leadership everywhere, or you're just exaggerating, nothing like this can happen. And so on, people are now catching on to the fact that this own fact, we may have very, very significant problems and we better be prepared.

Uh, we were not prepared in 2000 during the Bush Gore. Uh, burning during the Bush Gore events in Florida, which went on for you'll remember more than a month. Uh, I think our, our view that record would show that the Democrats, uh, uh, had a number of opportunities in which to win that election. And didn't because they didn't know the rules and didn't know what was going on with the kind of care that, uh, James Baker and the Republicans did, and they got out foxed and we can't allow a.

So what we would call whistling past the graveyard. The Democrats are often very good with think. That's the graveyard ignoring the dangers. We think we have to be prepared. I hope you're right. It'd be great if the election were too big to rig, but I think it's would be a major error for us to count on the fact of the election being too big to rigs

James Carville: [00:09:44] hope for the best and prepare for the worst.

That's right. Um, what is something he might try before the election? It's a power that he has, that our listeners don't know about.

Tim Wirth: [00:09:57] So we haven't, I don't think that it's likely that he's gonna, uh, exercise these powers before the election. Um, uh, I think that, uh, the election is probably going to go ahead, even though he may, uh, Attempt to send a, they, they have said the Republican party has said that they are recruiting 30,000 poll Watchers.

Now I don't imagine that those poll Watchers are going to be there to help little old ladies across the street. I would suspect that they're going to be there. They're going to be their precinct by precinct, uh, trying to, uh, perhaps discourage the vote challenge, votes, and so on. Um, the Democrats have to respond and have said that they, uh, uh, Biden campaign has said that it hopes to have a lawyer, at least one lawyer in every precinct in the, in the swing States.

So we're gonna maybe have a battle going right through election day as to. Who is, who is, who is discouraged from voting, whose voting has to be protected and so on. And we just have to, again, yeah. Say over and over and over again, you know, this is going to be okay to tell people, vote, your vote is going to be safe and we have to do everything we can to protect and assure that that vote will happen and be fully counted.

James Carville: [00:11:11] Well, you know, just to make you feel a little bit better. I did an event Harris County Democrats, and they told me they had seven, seven Houston. They've had 700 lawyers volunteer to help with. Valid issues, anything. I mean, they are sent, there's so many people around this country that are doing so much on the ground.

And I mean, the good thing about your site is you can, you know, tell them what to look for and you know, but we're not going to get my sense is we were asleep in 2016, you know, they're going to try, but we were pretty woke.

Tim Wirth: [00:11:45] Yeah. Well, that's good to hear about Paris Kenny week. We call this the people's firewall.

You know, there are no formal offenses against the presence use of these emergency powers that Congress, uh, doesn't know about them. And doesn't have any authority we're ready to change him. He can do just about anything once, uh, but won't in the face of vast public pressure and we've seen that. So we call out the people's firewall.

Uh, the people, the country has to be alerted and it has to be committed to having a fair, full answer, fully counted election. You know, that's at every level of government and that's businesses, certainly don't want to see chaos, uh, uh, in the economy and in the country. It's gotta be obviously all of the political class and the universities.

Everybody has got to be thinking about, about this at every level. And its citizens have to be alert and aware as well. So one of the things that we're happy is slowly but surely happened, is that a, the television and so on are slowly but surely catching onto the fact that people we'll have to be alerted and have to be aware of what's happening.

And. Um, uh, the more that happened, some more pressure that will be less likely that we'll see some kind of a massive effort by the Trump people. I think there'll be limited efforts and there'll be, it'll be less effective if we have. This major citizens firewall.

James Carville: [00:13:06] You've been barking. You've worked with Senator a Congress on the UN.

How much, how long is it going to take to, you know, to CDC, to w H O treaties, the Iran treaty to Paris Accords. How long is it going to take, even for Joe Biden to remotely fix this?

Tim Wirth: [00:13:29] Well, I mean, when summer domestic and summer are international, we can immediately join WHL and supported again, as we should.

And they, uh, institution that I headed for awhile, the UN foundation, for example, helped to raise a little over $200 million for who, because of the budget shortfalls. It's the most important public health agency in the world. And, uh, been absolutely maligned in a bad fashion where you can join that right away.

We can rejoin the Paris Accords right away, uh, that can be done. And that opening will start, will be there, uh, in January, uh, related to the Iran nuclear agreement, which was extremely important. Europeans want to go back to that? And I think that the, uh, the Russians want to go back to that everybody it's in everybody's interest to return to a limitation on the Iranian nuclear capabilities.

And I think Iran wants to do that. More than they want to be a rogue without any support from the outside world. So those are things, for example, James, that can be done quickly and well. And, uh, I would expect that the, uh, uh, Biden administration, which is, has a very, very deep and experienced foreign policy bench, uh, they'll be coming back quickly.

I think that's almost easier to do than rebuilding the institutions and our own backyard, uh, under the current administration, uh, the. Uh, public health service and the, uh, the, uh, uh, FDA and, and the public health entity center for disease control have all been badly compromised and corroded, uh, by fundamentally by the corruption of this administration.

So it's, uh, it's going to take a while to rebuild those. That effort has to go on immediately. The CDC is like who it's a, it also sends a lot of staff to who around the world or people from the center for disease control. I mean, it is our domestic. It's the premier public health group in the world. And, uh, you know, it is now I think, okay, pretty shabbily led and, uh, and thoroughly politicized.

And that is absolutely unnecessary. That's been one of the causes of, uh, so many people dying in the United States. We have to remember that, uh, you know, the ministration is to be responsible for, for, uh, for, uh, uh, just an awful lot of people dying. Friend of mine used to say about Russia and they talked about various parts of the leadership in Russia.

You know, various leaders had quote blood up to his elbows. And so I always think about that when I watched those numbers of mortality and deaths in the United States due to COVID unnecessary and, uh, you know, a terrible, terrible situation. And that's. In a public health failure, but mostly a political failure that has to be rebuilt.

That's going to take longer. But I think we have an awful lot of very good and public health professionals in the country and in the world. I'm always impressed. Every time I see a public health office or from one of the States speaking or from one of the big cities speaking, we have a lot of very well trained people and, uh, They've gotta be reorganized, recalibrated new, a new energy, new direction, and new enthusiasm so they can get back on the job that we're so good at.

Al Hunt: [00:16:49] Tim, let me take you back to the James. I mean, it's okay. Just let me take you back to these powers. Cause we we've talked to some very high ranking former justice department officials. I suspect some of the people you've talked to and I guess what they say is, yeah, it's a real, dangerous, not so much enumerated powers is what a president is willing to claim Dick Cheney with John, you and Dave Addington for instance said in the fight against torture or for short to torture terrorists.

Really laws don't apply. Uh, that was beyond what was supposed to be legitimate, a more benign example currently, but one that just as kind of a, the CDC Outlaws evictions, I think that's a good idea, but where did the CDC get that authority? And if you look at that, Tim, Donald Trump, uh, Mike, make Dick Cheney look like James Madison and what he's wanting to do, and you thank bill bar would be an enabler, right?

Tim Wirth: [00:17:44] Of course. You know, there are two parts of this. I mean, your question is a very good one, a very important one. Uh, let me just, as an aside, we've been working with various parts in the Congress trying to get the Congress to hold hearings on these emergency powers so far, not with any, any success. Yes, but the public doesn't know anything about this.

We are a democratic society. And the present has been seated or claims of powers and it's not discussed it's. Uh, so two, the two main themes. One is congressional oversight. The Congress has, as you know, from everything from war powers to looking at the emergency powers to spending has really seeded its authority dramatically.

And, and Trump has, has taken a look at the. A battle over the wall and the funding of the wall. It used to be when you and I were in this business together the same time, 40 years ago, it used to be that, uh, it was very clear that the, uh, President of proposes, but the Congress disposes now the president proposes and the Congress let us down and said, yes, sir, whatever you want us to do, it's a terrible situation.

And certainly counter to, uh, the intent of the founders and to the framework and the way in which the constitution has worked. In addition, the president's claims these vast article two powers, which may be. Uh, one of the routes for the Unitarians authority, uh, uh, claims by bill BARR are, and his, his Federalist group of lawyers.

The president certainly is enabled by bar. I can't imagine that during these times when we may have emergencies arising, I can't imagine that the president wouldn't be going to bar and say, is it legal for me to do this? And bar would say, yes, sir. It's of course that's legal for you to do it. So the president would then be claiming this is all legal and a would be moving ahead.

So again that the lack of any kind of control over this and, and the Congress has no oversight over it. It's a terrible situation. And, uh, we have to get into it situation in 2021. Of examining these emergency powers and examining, you know, what the Congress believes its authority is. We read the, there are article one authority and article two authority.

The Congress is the first branch of government article one. Uh, the president has lots of power in article two, but it's checked by the Congress and we've not seen the Congress exercising that responsibility. It's a remarkable story of the, uh, Of, uh, of the lack of backbone somewhere on, on Capitol Hill, particularly in the Senate, obviously.

And then that has to be corrected if our democracy is going to survive.

Al Hunt: [00:20:23] I could not agree with you more on that. Let me just, again, a little bit more short term in this, in this potential power grab and elicit, uh, activity that's Trump might engage in and try to seal this election. You're working with some Republicans, I think like Tom Ridge, do you think there are any Republicans who might stand up to this?

There've been very few Mitt Romney stood up to somebody, Wisconsin state Supreme court judge last week. But do you think any of these Republicans might give a conscience and C-spine enablers?

Tim Wirth: [00:20:56] Well, we have so far, I really am. And I think that obviously everybody always mentions Mitt Romney. I think Lisa Murkowski is somebody who's got a conscience, obviously, and she's been very thoughtful about how, about how she is, how she votes and how she thinks.

And she's chairman now of a major committee, that energy committee in the Senate. So that's extremely important, you know, from time to time you get up. I'm positive word from Thom Tillis and North Carolina. Although he's up for an, a very tough reelection this year.

Al Hunt: [00:21:27] He, wherever he could go, just to, just for a second, let me interrupt.

He was the one that offered and wrote an op ed about the president could not take funds from the Pentagon and devote them to the war. And so this was a matter of principle and then the white house. You know, crack the whip on him and he caved and voted to let the president do that. I think his backbone is somewhat tempered.

Tim Wirth: [00:21:49] Well, I mean, I'm not, I'm not saying I'm not, I'm not listing a lot of backbone. I'm not defining Mitt. Romney's the one where you all, everybody always speaks about it and it's hard to find otherwise. No, we have a in Colorado, for example, a Cory Gardner, the freshman Senator there is up for election. This year is a very talented politician, a very good candidate.

And, uh, you know, he has been on 99% supporter of Donald Trump, even in Colorado, which is moving from when it was red. When I was first elected to purple and now it's becoming blue. And, uh, I think that, you know, we'll see if, if, if he can survive as a skilled politician in the face of a blue wave in Colorado, then we're in for some really deep troubles in various parts of the country.

And, and, you know, uh, getting control of the Senate will be really hard.

James Carville: [00:22:44] So I guess I'll look at this, like, You look at the civil war. There were three outcomes that the South can win are the South could basically tie that would have produced peace agreement, equity, protect safety of the North wood. When date would have started putting Panadol on me.

Well, the third thing happened. Thank God. I think their strategy in their brain Judas ratio is a small. Yeah, it'll go from a Trump electoral narrow electoral wins to Biden by double digits. Okay. Where do you, why at what point on understand, this is just, we're just making a fun guest she had. At what point do you think it becomes untenable for them to try to, you know, take over these electoral

Tim Wirth: [00:23:34] voters?

Okay. Well, it's the electoral you're going in. You're putting your finger right on the troubling spot. Which is the electoral college and the electric account of electors. And that goes back of course, to the swing States. And what's going to happen in Pennsylvania. What's gonna happen in Wisconsin, I think are the two most problematic of all of the States.

And, uh, we may well have conflicts there. We may well have a situation in which, uh, say Biden wins, Biden wins the popular vote.

James Carville: [00:24:03] I'm going to ask you a little bit of a dual question. Yeah. Obviously, if it's close, They'll try it. Yeah. Alright. Suppose, suppose that Biden has carried Florida, but theoretically yeah.

You know, w w we're working on it only works if the election is really, really close to fool around with Michigan or Pennsylvania. That's right. Because, you know, even them, the main public would just go.

Tim Wirth: [00:24:35] Well, I think the public it's going to be challenging. The result from either side, I suspect they've already, you know, a lot of these militias and the people that Trump has genning up are gonna, if Biden wins, they're going to, they're going to be in the, in the streets in some fashion anyway.

And that's sort of a lot of these poll Watchers and so on are going to be doing, I really worry about that. Uh, I hope we have a great big win, but I think it's a, as I said before, I think it would be terrible of us to think that it's going to be too big to rig. And so we don't have to worry. We have to be prepared and we have to understand what happens in the electoral college.

What happens in that vote and the delegations? How does the delegation get chosen in Pennsylvania? How does it get chosen in Wisconsin? Who's influencing that. And then what happens when they all come together in January? Which is the big rodeo.

James Carville: [00:25:24] What site should our listeners go to? Do you have a site posted?

Tim Wirth: [00:25:29] Well, if they go on our website, which is keep our republic.com, there's lots of information about where to go. It's key. It's key for our Republic. One word you remember of Benjamin Franklin at the end of the constitutional convention was asked what was created and he said a Republic. If you can keep it, which is why we name our group, keep our Republic.

It's one word. Keep our republic.com. There's lots of information there on how to vote, how to be sure to count your vote, what you can do as a citizen. And, and that we're expanding that all the time and many, many people asking, just the question you ask, what can I do? And it's terribly important that citizens take action.

And it's terribly important that all of us do everything we can do. Assure vote can be counted. Let me note one other thing. Dick Gephardt has been leading our efforts with the former members of Congress. I don't know if you've dealt with that group, but there are about 200 Republicans and Democrats, absolutely bipartisan effort to make sure that votes are fully counted all the way through safe and fully counted.

And they are, they have launched a campaign called the patient's campaign to make sure that people are patient, that networks and newspeople and authorities and so on. Don't demand an immediate vote. An immediate count on November 3rd or fourth, but understand it's going to take a long while for all these votes to come in.

So it's absolutely imperative that we all exercise patients that we preach, patients that we understand the patients it's necessary and we're not going to be stampeded by whatever kind of violence might occur in the streets or whatever it might be said in the white house or where are. Attorney general patients while all the votes are being counted.

And that's a very important, uh, a nonpartisan or bipartisan effort that is, uh, you know, Leon Panetta is involved in it and, and, uh, uh, Tom Ridge is involved with it. Uh, uh, just, uh Chertoff, which is a lot, a lot of very, very good senior people are involved in this. Former Senator from Tennessee, who was the, uh, Senate, uh, leader, Republican leader is involved.

So they're all working on this patient's campaign. So that's a byword as well to keep in mind for you guys all the time and during your podcast. Very welcome to have you. On the air doing this and patient pay. Bob preaching patients is going to be absolutely essential.

Al Hunt: [00:27:53] Jen, this is a very important message and I would, again, all you listeners out there is keep our Republic one word.com.

Keep our republic.com. Uh, it really is important. And Tim work, you're doing great work. Thank you so much for being with us and you and Ren you and Ren stay safe.

Tim Wirth: [00:28:11] Thank you very much for inviting me to be with you. Bye. Bye

Al Hunt: [00:28:22] Joseph CRNA is a prize winning staff writer for the Los Angeles times and has led the coverage of wildfires that are ravaging the West. Some 5 million acres, I think have been decimated. Uh, Joseph you and your paper have done a terrific job, and this is a terrible and a very sad story. Give us some idea of the scope of the tragedy.

I think the worst fires in California history. Uh, the cost of losses loss in life.

Joseph Serna: [00:28:49] Yeah, well, um, it has been, uh, a bad year, a decimating year, uh, especially compared to history. Thank you for having me. Um, the scale. It's really hard to grasp for people, not in the West end for not in the States. Um, Our digital team has done a good job of trying to, to illustrate some of this for us.

What we've experienced this year, uh, would equate to, you know, maybe six, uh, of downtown LA is burning in one year. Um, that's 5,000 buildings over and over and over again, burning, uh, more than 5 million acres that you mentioned. Um, It's in the billions, the damage is going to be in the billions, um, just two years ago, um, which was the most expensive, uh, destructive year in the world.

Um, California led the way and, um, while we don't have the number of buildings destroyed again this year, um, yet. It's still early in the season. We've lost thousands of homes, uh, displaced, tens of thousands of people. And just California, when you bring in Oregon and Washington into the West, uh, into that whole picture, um, like you said, it's almost a 5 million acres.

Um, It's kind of hard to put your mind around it, but it's going to be a toll that we pay in the immediate sense, uh, through FEMA funds through local funds. But then in the long term, um, insurance industries, people who lost their jobs, lost their businesses are going to recover. So these kinds of things have ripples that go go on for years.

And on this scale, across this, this amount of people in these three States, um, we're going to be paying for it for a long time.

Al Hunt: [00:30:24] Joseph, you have California, Washington, Oregon have had to evacuate thousands of people. There are hundreds, maybe thousands of brave firefighters out there working around the clock and it's okay.

All being done in the middle of a pandemic. How, how much has, has has the coven, uh, affliction affected,

James Carville: [00:30:44] affected this effort?

Joseph Serna: [00:30:46] You know, that's a good question. It's really on the logistical side and kind of in the background, that's where you'd see covered play out on the fire lines. When it comes to how firefighters I'm actually going to go out and do their, their job of fighting flames with, you know, hose, water, um, digging containment lines, where they're, you know, use hose and bulldozers to scrape through the dirt.

That stuff has stayed the same because the fundamentals of firefighting do not change, but like I'd said, the logistics sides are different. Um, the way they set up to go fight a fire is different. Um, there are camps where you'd gather hundreds, thousands, possibly of firefighters. Um, those don't really exist in the current form, the way they used to where you'd get these long shower or, uh, stalls for showers, uh, chow lines, people sleeping in bunks that are.

You know, 50 or 60 people. Um, it was a really centralized location. So a communication was there, uh, food was there, um, equipment, was there a medical aid? Was there, um, that's not happening anymore. It's really more old school broken up into small parts. Um, so what that requires sometimes, um, is more vehicles.

Um, when there's more vehicles on the road, that's an increased risk for firefighters. Um, That also means more costs. Um, and that's on the backend, um, on the front end. Uh, one thing that strange because of COVID we wrote about this earlier this year as, uh, the federal government tried to take a more aggressive posture with firefighting this year, obviously.

Uh, I don't think anyone anticipated getting this many fires at once, but the plan going in was to be extra aggressive, uh, the federal side, uh, I think, uh, Lisa Murkowski had written about this, um, And, uh, had called for this from Alaska Cal fire, the same thing. They wanted all fires to stay as small as possible by attacking it from the air with helicopters, uh, fixed wing aircraft to dropping return.

They wanted to keep everything small so they could keep people in their homes and not in evacuation centers, not where they would gather and spread the virus. Um, But in lieu of that, um, the red cross has had to do a, a larger job of getting people into hotel rooms. Uh, so they don't gather. And that's kind of a long answer for that, but there's, it, it plays a role in a lot.

Al Hunt: [00:33:00] Yeah. I can just imagine, I'm going to try to turn it over to James and just a sec, but there look, there are multiple causes of why this is bad. Why's maybe worse than it should be overcrowding, maybe poor stewardship, but central to this problem. Isn't despite the presence of denial, Joseph, uh, is climate change.

Joseph Serna: [00:33:18] Well, I, I guess we have to define what the problem is because, um, I mean, fire has been around forever. Fire was here before a man was here. A fire was here before Europeans settled it. Uh, the indigenous people who lived here, they used fire. Um, it serves a purpose. Yeah, it does. It serves a purpose. So when we talk about, you know, the problem, um, It's really, it's our problem with fire.

And, um, so let me change. Does it play a role in that in the fact that it sets the table for fire to be easier, to live, easier to grow? Um, it's just, everybody would have the common sense that when it's hotter, it's easier for things stubborn. Just go out to a campfire, you know, go camping on a, you know, a cool, cool morning where it's moist harder to get that fire set than it is on a hot blazing day.

Uh, when it's dry outside. So it plays a role in that regard, but that's not the only, the only issue. And I think other people, you know, have spoken to this, but, uh, you know, the wild land, urban interface, where, where people move closer into the foothills, into the mountains before you get full on into the forest, um, those kinds of uh, development are expanding.

Um, Especially in California, our utility grid, uh, or infrastructure is getting old. It's very old in a lot of places. Uh, so that's more vulnerable. The wind events are getting, um, while there say they're getting more extreme yet, but the ones that are extreme are playing a larger role. Um, so it's a really combination of the table is set more often for fire.

Uh, it seems because of. These cause of the heat and the drought. Um, and at the same time, we're getting closer. We're, we're putting humans more on that table where they're more vulnerable to fire. Um, and those are just two, two of the many elements that go into, uh, the predicament, uh, ourselves, Oregon, and Washington find ourselves in.

James Carville: [00:35:14] So, so what's the, what the Trump people say. And. Conservative radio and television is looking on a manage these forests, right? The environmental going to let them clean out the underbrush life they should do. And if you send them out and it's really all environmental movement, that's causing this because of blah, blah, blah.

Is there some truth to that?

Joseph Serna: [00:35:35] There is, but it's all a matter again of degrees and nuance and, you know, When I talk to most environmental groups, when I talked to firefighters, there is something to be said for forest management. Um, I mean, the truth is, and the ironic part is a lot of this is on the federal government.

It was the us forest service after 1910, which was the big burn. Um, if anyone Googles a big burn, um, 1910, 3 million acre fire across three States, uh, the world was a lot different than so for fire to go across 3 million acres, um, In one shot. Um, there was a different layout back then, especially with the timber industry.

But when that happened, um, it really reset, uh, the standards for the forest service. They came up, came away with a posture of all fire is bad. Um, it killed a lot of people. Um, and ever since then, uh, the posture was we have to put out fires where they begin and what that led to was, um, This overgrown forest and a lot of parts of the Sierra and lots of parts of the West.

Um, and it wasn't until the last few decades, a couple of generations where, um, people started to notice that, Hey, we're not getting new trees in the forest, uh, new ones to replace these, these old ones. And they started to revisit how to do it anyway. Long long answer for that question. Is it plays a role?

Um, cause it is out there. There's an overgrown forest. Most of California's forest is managed by the federal government, by the way. Um, so they do have a significant, uh, role in if it's overgrown or not. Um, so it plays a role. It makes fires more extreme. Um, But you can't burn them everywhere. Some of them are just too inaccessible, but again, um, we're also closer to a lot of these overgrown areas.

We're developing a lot of these overgrown areas. We're running, uh, you know, electrical utilities through these overgrown areas and across these mountains. Um, and we're not always doing the best job of preparing for that and the way we design our, our, our towns or our homes. Um, so it's really, you know, There's many sides to that issue.

Um, but having an overgrown forest is certainly a part of it, but it is not the cost for it because again, fires were here before us and there'll be here long after us, you know, as long as we have it.

James Carville: [00:37:53] Well, I was reading this morning that worldwide fires are setting records. I mean, have fires in Siberia.

Yeah. So there's a lot of bad foster around the world, but I think if you want to believe that

Joseph Serna: [00:38:10] here's a lot of bad forestry management around the world, and it's also, again, what's going on with the climate and the heat. Um, when I was in Australia, um, and Siberia is another example of this. I mean, these forests, our drought stricken they're, they're more dry than they were.

sometime, if not ever. And then you just get a mother nature doing her thing, which is coming through with lightning strikes and basically just the landscape is primed to burn. It is waiting for something to set it off. And, you know, maybe 50, 60, 70 years ago, um, you know, if you had a hundred lightning strikes, these are just numbers.

I'm just. Hypothetically throwing out there, but if you had, you know, a one in 20 chance of a lightning strike, igniting a forest fire, it's a much greater chance today. Uh, the dicer kind of, we did it in the favor of starting fires these days. Um, And so Siberia is another good example of that. It's, they've had fires there in the past, but what we're seeing now is things are bigger.

Um, things are spreading faster. Um, and that is, um, from every expert I talked to a direct correlation to the fact or our world is, is warmer and dryer.

Tim Wirth: [00:39:23] Uh,

Al Hunt: [00:39:24] and you know, this is the, the macro story is awful 5 million acres that billions of dollars of cost. But the human story is also, you know, a tragedy I saw on your paper this morning, Joseph, uh, just a touchy story about a very Creek California up in the North little town of less than a thousand people.

The Syrian immigrants. And started a, he owns a gas station and a convenience store, his young daughters in order for the Chico newspaper, they were the linchpin, they were the centerpiece of that community. All gone. Uh, and I don't know how they recover. And there were probably thousands of stories like that.

Joseph Serna: [00:40:06] There are non probably there are certainly, um, thousands, tens of thousands of stories like that. And bury Creek and Butte County overall, um, is a real example of, um, You know, what a really kind of worst case scenario can be like for a community kind of on the edge, on the leading edge of the impacts of not just climate change again, but a lot of our decisions in California in the West and the way we've built out, uh, our state with where we put our people, how we put them there and how we maintain the land around them.

Um, Bury Creek loss. Uh, you know, at least I believe, uh, 15 people. Um, if you combine that with what happened in 2018 and the campfire, uh, which is also in Butte County, we have at least a hundred dead in just two years and two fires that one County alone, um, that County is okay. And bury Creek in particular are indicative or symptomatic of a lot of California.

You get these rural homes or these rural places. With with people, um, you know, of all political stripes of, uh, all colors, creeds, races, um, it's just a diverse it's California. So it's very diverse. You can't really, it's hard for people to put politics in it. Um, because when you go down to these places, I mean, politics don't play a role fire doesn't doesn't care.

And, um, in these places, You're surrounded by forest. You have resilient communities, uh, who are self-reliant, um, and you know, they're vulnerable to fire. And so what you saw in Berry Creek and recover, this was when they were told to evacuate, uh, they were given seven hours to evacuate in some, some places, not everybody got the evacuations, but, uh, those who did had to make a choice and, and many leave.

Uh, and many did leave because of the campfire two years ago, but some didn't, um, either by choice or because they couldn't. Um, and so people died and that's what happened two years ago, people died, um, and it's going to happen again. And, um, it's terrible.

James Carville: [00:42:14] How long was this fire season last?

Joseph Serna: [00:42:16] Well, it started earlier, um, Usually, I mean, usually in Southern California, well, we're talking about Northern California.

So if we stick with Northern California, that that fire season actually usually begins in like June or July, um, and is supposed to be calming down about this time. Um, but now our fire season is almost, I would almost say your year round. I mean, we haven't had major fires in January, February or March. Um, April, um, for some time and I've been covering fires here for the time since, uh, 2013.

Um, we haven't had major fires then, but, uh, 2018, we had big fires in July. Um, and 2017, we had fires in December. Um, so really there's only like a few months where we're not sitting by our desks. Uh, wondering if there's a fire or where these communities. Are are sitting there vulnerable, uh, wondering if there could be a fire there.

Um, it's a lot longer than it used to be. And, um, that just has cascading effects for the way that people live their lives and what it costs the state to be there.

Al Hunt: [00:43:21] Well, we, Joseph, we really appreciate all of our listeners out there. If you're interested in this. A vitally important, but tragic story, uh, you know, read the LA times and look at that story about that Syrian immigrant and the little, a gas station, convenience store and bury Creek.

Cause it just breaks your heart. I hope some people will, will, will help that family. Joseph, you, you're doing a terrific job under very trying circumstances. Thank you so much for enlightening us today.

James Carville: [00:43:49] Thank you, man. You really, you know, your subject matter. Wow.

Joseph Serna: [00:43:54] Thank you very much. I appreciate it. Have a good one.

Al Hunt: [00:44:06] Oh, wow. James, uh, you know, I mean, You've suffered down in the, uh, in the Bayou, down in new Orleans with hurricanes, uh, there's fires out in California. Uh, it's just, it's just, you know, a lot of tough stuff and, uh, the hurricane has already hit, but hit mobile. Uh, you're going to avoid it this time, but

James Carville: [00:44:27] yeah, Alabama and Northwest Florida, but this get the problem is it's moving at two miles an hour and it's going to just dump water everywhere.

You know, a lot of water get dumped, Alabama, Georgia. You know, it's just, it's a slow moving foam and that's the problem. The storms move slow in their wetter,

Al Hunt: [00:44:48] James, before we, I thought Tim Wirth was really interesting today. And Joseph Cerner really enlightened me about that forest fires. Um, Joseph of course, is with the LA times and it's keep, keep that republic.com for Tim worst group.

Let's just spend a couple of minutes on politics before we go, you know, you and I both. Hear from friends, they're saying, Oh my God, this race is tightening. Oh, well, I'm worried. I saw some survey, you know, looking over everything, everything, there's no indications that this race is really tightening.

James Carville: [00:45:22] No.

And people like call me in everything so much. They actually started scaring me. And then I just go back and say, what, what are you afraid of? I mean, everything you would have now. And you know, that thing he did last night. I hope more people watch that, but it, he doesn't even, he doesn't relate to voters.

Al Hunt: [00:45:45] Well, who was it? Michael Cohen or so much. So he really didn't like these people.

Tim Wirth: [00:45:48] I mean,

Al Hunt: [00:45:49] he doesn't, he has contempt for him. He

Tim Wirth: [00:45:50] plays

James Carville: [00:45:51] how assert, because he hates his own people.

Al Hunt: [00:45:53] Yes. But you know, on this, I went and NPR had a piece about four or five days ago. Minnesota is in play. And Corey Lewandowski said, you know, you watch we're going to win Minnesota.

And there were Republicans who said, you know, yeah, we might lose one or two that he won, but Minnesota is at the top of it. Well, I know ABC poll was perfectly credible ball came out. Uh, today, uh, with a 16 point lead for by now, I think that's probably exaggerated, but three others have an eight or nine point lead.

I just don't see. What's, what's changed to Trump's benefit, uh, in the last three

James Carville: [00:46:27] or four weeks, you know, that they are so depressed in a so desperate, poor story. And did the Democrats so climb on any bad news story? So if they put a story like that up there, Everybody's going because the Republicans are going to say, ha ha look at it.

We're coming back in a democratic, Oh my gosh, 2016 all over again. And you got to see the same thing going to happen in Nevada. But gee thing that they say that'll. Make it more competitive where you get one poll. Remember the mom poll in Pennsylvania was up three and everybody went. I, so of course he had the mouth polar just came out and

Al Hunt: [00:47:06] hard.

Was it mama at the Cisco Hannah, but whatever it

James Carville: [00:47:09] was assessed, go ahead. I'm sorry. I stand corrected for the mamas comes out, showing it by points in Florida and everybody kept saying far to slipping away. No. And did you, you know, you're just going to get variation on some of these polls, but you know, Monmouth is one of the, one of the better of those, uh, nationwide folks.

Al Hunt: [00:47:35] So right. You and I both remember we got both, I had a reaction from people. There was a headline. How about a week ago for this was the Marquette law. Paul

James Carville: [00:47:46] Paul,

Al Hunt: [00:47:48] you said a Biden lead and was, is slipping to four points. Well, when you look at the poll and Milwaukee journal covered this correctly, it was 49, 44, three or four weeks ago.

It was 47 43. That ain't slipping that's stability. That's staying the same.

James Carville: [00:48:05] Right? And so our listeners understand when you see these numbers, they're rounded them. So you could be ahead, you know, you could have fight at 45.4 and somebody has 44.6. That's going to get reported at 45. So you mean somebody has won out of North case in this poll, but some of it can be a rounding error and it's just hard for polling.

That kind of consistency probably tells you where it is now, which is you're up five, you know, take that, undecided him on the side. Don't generally break.

Al Hunt: [00:48:41] Well, yeah, I'd make one more point, which I hear from. Some democratic friends. This has been a absolutely horrible

James Carville: [00:48:49] two weeks for Trump,

Al Hunt: [00:48:50] between Bob wood words, revelations, uh, you know, your Senator John Kennedy said, that's just a gotcha book.

Huh? I'm sorry. Senator Kennedy. That was an interview. You were the president. That's his own words and Jeffrey Goldberg's totally. Credible story about him coin, uh, slain, military, uh, heroes, losers, it's been terrible and it, he doesn't seem to have had much effect. Well, that may be true, maybe, but it may be human.

But on the other hand, if he does something supposedly big or good like that, what I think is largely overhyped and semi phony. A Mideast peace conference at the white house. That's not going to help him either. He's just rock, you know, he's just rock solid at a low point.

James Carville: [00:49:33] And you know, this is, as of right now, you know, there's a lot of events that are coming up in his campaign, but you know, people, I don't mentally, I don't know if some of these people can make it till election day it's people are just so nervous and just glom on to any piece of bad news I can find.

And. You know, it's in, when people say it doesn't have an effect and it would, would come out, you know, it's going to happen. A fact, it's going to add up to a hundred on election day. And right now I would describe myself as, but I would love for this election to be tomorrow. BP, it'd be, it'd be a blowout.

You could just see it.

Al Hunt: [00:50:08] Well, Yeah, I agree with you. And also it would be 47

Tim Wirth: [00:50:13] more days that

Al Hunt: [00:50:14] you don't have to worry and go through any kind of average each at 47 days, I haven't translated that in hours. It's probably over a thousand hours

Tim Wirth: [00:50:23] each day. James.

Al Hunt: [00:50:25] Seems like a, uh, like a decade.

Tim Wirth: [00:50:27] I mean, it's just a

Al Hunt: [00:50:28] week that does not go easily.

No, but, well, we haven't, we had another good show today and, uh, we're going to have, I have a special show on Friday. Uh, uh, we're going to have a, it's actually may air Saturday, but late Friday, early Saturday, James Palo. So I think maybe one of the most important. Uh, public and journalistic intellectuals of our times, uh, has written a piece on how the media is handling this election and perhaps repeating some of the same mistakes made in 2016.

And we talked to Jim and Deb Fallows. It is always a fascinating, and it's like book, conversation. So this will be another special this week and we're looking forward to it. And I, I, let me just say to everybody out there, I want to thank you for listening to 2020 politics war room. Follow the show on Twitter at politics war room.

Uh, email us, uh, politics war room@gmaildotcomaspoliticswarroomatgmail.com. Thank you for subscribing, please rate the show. With a five star review and we'll be back next week as we count down 47 days to go in an election that really, this is no longer a cliche, the most important of our lifetime. So please vote early the well James be safe and we'll be back in 48 hours.

James Carville: [00:51:46] Good. They don't

Al Hunt: [00:51:46] man. .