Why Can't We Have Nice Things with Ezra Klein | The Weekly Show

JON STEWART: Is that the result of their $5 million. planning fund, this initial proposal. EZRA KLEIN: I assume, but then what was the five-year plan? JON STEWART: And what the fuck did they apply for? What was their NOFO? God. EZRA KLEIN: If the five-year action plan. isn't the initial proposal, then what's. the five-year action plan? JON STEWART: Forget NOFO. Mofo. These are mother--. [THEME MUSIC PLAYING]. Hey, everybody. Welcome to The Weekly Show podcast. My name is Jon Stewart. We are taping this on Wednesday, March 26.

You'll probably get it Thursday, March 27. Who knows what will be revealed in the secretive group. chats of our nation's most powerful. people between now and then? Perhaps lunch orders-- an egg salad with onions and celery. on a nice pumpernickel. Perhaps that's the order that went around. I've got to stand up on this situation for just one moment.

A, this is why I don't do group chats. They're so fucking annoying-- not even. when you're, obviously, planning. on bombing another country. But just in this sense, I think their group chat must have had, what, Pete Hegseth and the Department of Defense, and the national security advisor, Waltz, and generals and a journalist from The Atlantic. There must have been 16 or 18 people. The notifications alone would make.

me want to launch missiles. Every fucking thumbs-up emoji, or bicep arm, and fist pump, and fire, and every little-- you. got that, right? I agree. And your phone-- ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. I would have thrown my phone out the window. It's maddening. There's got to be--. four people on a chat room or whatever they call them-- text.

chain, all that other shit. (LAUGHING) Really? And Donald Trump. Like, this is when he is at his best-- when he gets. that quick-onset dementia. Anytime he gets caught in a situation that would require. some accountability, he immediately goes into the "I. don't even have a text--. I've never heard about it. This is the first I've heard about it.". You know, they confronted him on it.

There's classified information going on-- text exchange. And it's not secure. They're on fucking Snapchat or wherever they're on. And they've got a journalist on there. And he's like, I don't know what you're talking--. hey, man, that's not me. I do everything Goodfellas style. I go outside. I go to the phone booth. I talk to one person on the phone, or we pass notes. I don't do any of that kind of stuff. He did the same with, I think, the deportation orders, you know. These deportation orders that the Justice Department. says that they were legal. Oh, well, whoever did them is in a lot of trouble,

and I'll make sure to talk to them about it. if I ever figure it out. I didn't sign it. I don't even know what a pen is. I don't have a pen. I don't use writing. I don't have hands. How could I have done it? It really is just a remarkable game of, hey, man, wasn't me. And the one thing nobody's actually really talked about. is the crazy arrogance in this text chain and confidence--. this whole, like, fuck Europe, fuck these freeloaders-- like,

all these countries. What did they ever do for us other than sign up to go fight. in a war that we started over an event. that didn't happen to them? Fuck them. I mean, it's just the most myopic, selfish, arrogant--. and then this whole idea--. I guess we gotta bail these fuckers out again. By what? Bombing the Houthis? How many years are we going to be bombing the Houthis?

You didn't solve anything. Maybe the new attacks on shipping in 2023 or 2024--. maybe they'll chill that out for a little bit. But, I mean, the Saudis have bombed the shit out of them. They did a blockade against them. They're acting like, OK, finally, Daddy's home, and he's going to throw a couple of missiles at them, and that'll cure everything. Like that hasn't been the solution to everything. we've been doing over these past 30, 40 years.

We'll just throw a few cruise missiles into Libya. That should fix it. God. It's just-- man--. arrogance. Here's what I like about the show we're going to do today. Today, we're going to be talking about Ezra Klein. And I love his podcast, and I always learn a ton. But he's written a book that has. angered some people on the left because it is self-critical. It is looking at the things that the left can do to maybe.

improve their case for people. And it couldn't be more timely. And people are talking about it. And I'm happy to have him on because I think. it is a fascinating-- and the beauty of it. is in the specificity of it. This is not some broad polemic about--. this is a deep and interesting dive. into just the mechanics and guts of how a government. accomplishes something. And it's really-- for me, at least--.

for somebody who, you know, loves this kind of stuff--. is fascinating. So I'm going to get to him, and we'll. get this thing damn started. [MUSIC PLAYING]. We're so excited to have this gentleman. as a guest on the program. We're going to get right to him. New York Times podcast host of The Ezra Klein Show, co-author of Abundance with Derek Thompson, staff writer at The Atlantic, it's Ezra Klein. Ezra! EZRA KLEIN: Jon!

JON STEWART: Man, I feel like this book-- first of all, congratulations on the book. EZRA KLEIN: Thank you. JON STEWART: A fabulous reception. People are really interested in it. I think there's a real thirst for this kind of a blueprint. and the type of things. But I have to tell you. The first thing that pops to mind. is you are like the Timothée Chalamet of the book world. right now. This press tour--. EZRA KLEIN: [LAUGHS]. JON STEWART: --it is the complete unknown. of economic blueprints for a path forward.

EZRA KLEIN: I am mostly following this analogy. JON STEWART: His press tour was ubiquitous. Are you pleased with the way that this. has entered the world--. it has entered the chat? EZRA KLEIN: Oh, man. I'm, like, beside myself--. thrilled, right? Look, you write a book, and you spend years on it. And mostly, you spend those years wishing you had. not decided to write a book. That is the story of both of my books. JON STEWART: [LAUGHS] EZRA KLEIN: Right? I signed the book. I'm like, oh, no, I have to write this thing. And I spend a year being like, I had a good life.

I didn't need to do this to myself. JON STEWART: So just a lot of self-reflection. on, why did I undertake this? EZRA KLEIN: Yeah, it's a lot of rumination. And then what you want is for that thing. you put all this time and energy into to not just slip. soundlessly beneath the waves. This is different, though. I've never-- I mean, I have people write books on my show. I'm pretty familiar with the book-publishing process. I think the way you know your book is doing well. is the number of people who haven't read it,

who have developed a strong opinion on it. JON STEWART: [LAUGHS] I don't get Severance! Have you watched it? I have not watched it. EZRA KLEIN: Right? What you're trying to create with the book is. a discourse-generating object, right? Some subset of people are reading the book. More will read the book, hopefully, over time. But it has become a huge object of argumentation. for people who haven't read the book. And in a weird way, I think that's a big part. of what books do. They are artifacts that ground a conversation. people already want to have. They are an excuse for people to begin.

thinking about something and debating something. You know, The Anxious Generation by John Hite, I think, was a version of that. It wasn't like nobody had thought of-- maybe having. all these phones in schools are bad before he wrote that, but it created a structured way to have that debate. And I think this has, to our delight, along with some other books--. Marc Dunkelman's Why Nothing Works, Yoni Appelbaum's Stuck. There's a kind of moment here that people are apprehending. in different ways. And, yeah, I mean, to write a book that people care.

about in the year of our Lord, 2025--. like, what a goddamn gift. JON STEWART: A book. A book? What is-- is that a podcast that you turn manually? What is a book? EZRA KLEIN: [LAUGHS]. JON STEWART: But it's fascinating to me. When did you start this project? Three years ago? Two years ago? EZRA KLEIN: It's honestly hard to say when it really started. The piece I write that I think kicks this off in a way. is in 2021. And it's called "The Economic Mistake the Left. is Finally Confronting.". But I can also see a lot of early threads of it.

in some earlier pieces I write about California in the couple. of years before that. I have a piece--. I forget what that piece is called, but where I make this--. this can be like when I said orthogonal. to you on my podcast. JON STEWART: [LAUGHS]. EZRA KLEIN: But I make this point that I always. really liked, which is that there's. an old political-science idea that gets talked about all. the time, which the political science version of it, is that Americans are symbolically conservative. and operationally liberal. And the version of it people know.

is the Tea Party person with the sign. that said, keep the government's. hands off my Medicare. And the idea is Americans often like, in national politics, talking like conservatives. They like the rhetoric of personal responsibility, and freedom, and so on. JON STEWART: Right Bootstraps. EZRA KLEIN: Yeah. And then they want Medicare, and Medicaid, and spending. on social insurance. And I had this realization for a bunch of different reasons--. I was living in California, where I'm also from, so I know that state very well. And I love it. And I'm talking to you from it. But that in a lot of California, the politics were symbolically liberal and operationally.

conservative-- that you had all these yard signs, like kindness is everything. No human being is illegal. We believe in science. JON STEWART: Hate has no home here. EZRA KLEIN: Hate has no home here. And it was all in yards zoned for single-family housing--. JON STEWART: [LAUGHS]. EZRA KLEIN: --where the working class had been driven out. of the city, where, at least in San Francisco, the Black population, for all the BLM stickers, had been going down in census after census after census. And at the core of that was an unwillingness.

to let things change--. the willingness to symbolically--. JON STEWART: Sure. EZRA KLEIN: --state your liberal values was very high. But the willingness to instantiate them--. in change, that might mean something. for you personally-- not mean you tax some other rich guy, but for you personally was very, very limited. And so so, you know, it was something. I've been trying to work through around what was going. on in California and then over the Biden administration. as I began to think about what was going. to be required to build all this green energy we.

were funding. I began to see some resonances across these two projects. So, yeah, early 2020s to now. JON STEWART: But it's this disconnect. between we have a value system that we espouse--. certainly on Facebook or in our Twitter handles--. and yet, operationally, we can never live up to this value. system because you really don't want that value system. anywhere near your house.

EZRA KLEIN: Yes. I have this line at one of the pieces. I did this piece at--. it's actually partially in the book, about what it takes to build affordable housing. in Los Angeles, right? The housing that all of us on the left, in theory, agree on. What do we do when we trigger that public money? And there's a line in there that's. like, the politics of this are, when. do we want affordable housing? Now. Where do we want it? Definitely somewhere else. Not right here. JON STEWART: [LAUGHS] Somewhere down the road. The crazy thing to me is that the moment that it drops--.

because it's this really interesting theory of there's. this absurdity at the heart of some of the liberal idealism. that comes in-- the difficulty of making it actionable because. of liberal resistance to some of it--. forgetting about regulation or various things that go into it. But nobody a few years ago is really thinking about--. that The Democratic playbook might be obsolete. It drops in this moment when there is such confusion.

and chaos as to the direction, or the foundation, or the blueprint. What you're starting to conjure before any of all this "Project. 2025 becomes evident" is maybe a building block for that, some kind of cornerstone. And do you think that's part of why this has. generated such an interest? EZRA KLEIN: I do.

And I want to say very clearly, because I do think. sometimes people get this piece of it. wrong, not the only cornerstone. JON STEWART: Sure. EZRA KLEIN: There's a lot in the liberal agenda. that we're just not trying to edit here, right? My view is that liberals have a lot of good ideas. And I've covered many of them over the years. JON STEWART: Are you suggesting you've been criticized. for not including everything that could. ever possibly be a wish list? EZRA KLEIN: There's a funny-- reviews have. a real quality of, we read the book not as a book is. but as we are. And I am sure I have done this as a reviewer, but there is-- sometimes, I'll read reviews.

and I know who's writing them. And it's like this beautiful thing. where it's like, this book is great, great, great, great. And then right here, it diverges. from my personal politics. And that part isn't great at all. I have some real problems. JON STEWART: [LAUGHS]. EZRA KLEIN: So there's a lot in the liberal agenda that works. and we get right. But I think there is a--. look, man, it didn't work. Right? JON STEWART: Right. EZRA KLEIN: There was a theory of the Biden administration. And that was a couple of things.

But what were the Biden Administration's-- at least. in terms of what it was able to pass, what were its major--. what differentiated it-- maybe is the best. way to say this-- than Obama? JON STEWART: Green energy, baby--. green energy and investment. EZRA KLEIN: Green energy and infrastructure. JON STEWART: Sure. EZRA KLEIN: This was a building liberalism, right? JON STEWART: Yes. EZRA KLEIN: The main achievements of Obama--. if you go down and list them, you'll. say the Affordable Care Act. You'll say the Dodd-Frank regulations. It'll be a bunch of things like that. And what's interesting about those. is that they are all etched into regulation. They didn't require a lot to happen in the physical world.

Right? Bank capital requirements does not require the laying. of a lot of transmission line. But Biden-- it wasn't like that. You know, Lunchpail Joe, Scranton Joe--. they had an agenda. I mean, they lost a lot of their care. agenda because of Manchin. JON STEWART: Right. EZRA KLEIN: But they had then an agenda. that was very much about building--. building rural broadband. JON STEWART: Maybe even back better. They didn't want to just build it, Ezra. They wanted it back better. EZRA KLEIN: Maybe. Oh, wow. Man, there's something about throwing me back to that moment.

that hurts at this moment. JON STEWART: [LAUGHS]. EZRA KLEIN: Right? Like, the optimism. It was a simpler time. JON STEWART: It was a simpler time. But you make the point in the book, which I think. is really interesting, that that moment of optimism. actually crystallized in some ways the failure. EZRA KLEIN: Yes. JON STEWART: And you make it very stark in terms of--.

for instance, the Chargers, which I think. is a great example. EZRA KLEIN: So, right. So, liberals pass $7.5 billion for a nationwide network. of electric vehicle chargers. We also get $42 billion--. and this is a big thing they tout a lot--. to do rural broadband. There's a lot of parts of this country that are. not hooked up to broadband. And in both cases--. and these were passed early in the administration, particularly the rural broadband money--. it by the end of the administration--. by the election, by the time I'm fact checking the book--.

they just have not happened. And you look into why. And we did look into why. And what you get are these incredibly. Baroque internal processes. I'll focus on rural broadband for a minute. here because that one was a good idea. JON STEWART: Still a good idea. EZRA KLEIN: And they liked it. That was the one-- they went around. When they talked about the infrastructure bill, they were like, roads and rural broadband. And if you look into what happened, they created--. not in the bill, but this is really important. We have this whole little Schoolhouse Rock song about,

like, how a bill becomes a law, and it's sitting on the steps--. JON STEWART: I'm not going to ask you to sing it, Ezra. EZRA KLEIN: I've been practicing. JON STEWART: [LAUGHS]. EZRA KLEIN: I have been practicing. We don't have the song about how the law becomes reality--. how the law becomes a series of implementation rules, then a notice of Funding Opportunity. Then there's a comment period. JON STEWART: [LAUGHS]. EZRA KLEIN: Then there's a challenge. period for the comments. Then there's a series of court cases. And so, for rural broadband, for instance, what you end up.

having is a 14-stage process. There's a period where the Commerce Department needs. to draw up a map of which parts of the country. don't have the right amount of broadband. And then there's a challenge period on the map. And da da da da. And da da da da. And 56 states and jurisdictions try to apply for this money. And, again, this passes at the end of 2021. They have time. By the end of 2024, three have gotten.

to the end of the process. They were trying. JON STEWART: Three-- three of these 56? EZRA KLEIN: Yes. JON STEWART: End of the process, meaning they've. actioned it, they've built it, or now they've got the--. EZRA KLEIN: Oh, no, of course not. I didn't mean they built it, Jon. Sorry, I was so--. I confused you. JON STEWART: Oh, dear god. EZRA KLEIN: They just got to the point. where, in theory, they could get the money to build it. JON STEWART: They had been approved for the money. EZRA KLEIN: Yes. Yes, basically. JON STEWART: How many of these obstacles. are-- let's try and tease it out a little bit, because I think the more specific you get here, Ezra,

I think the more helpful it is for everybody to understand. EZRA KLEIN: And I will say, in the book, we try to get-- not on this particular issue, but we get very specific on how these things work. JON STEWART: You're very granular, and it's fascinating. So, I want to tease out how much of this. is also local and state issue. How much of this is litigation. How much of this is kind of the liberal instinct of nothing. can get--. you can't solve anything unless it also solves everything,

meaning it also has to be carbon neutral. and hire only disabled contractors. and also small businesses. You know. What is the percentage of this that. really affects what you think is a blueprint. forward for Democrats? And what is other kind of noise? EZRA KLEIN: I'm trying to see if I. can pull up where I actually have, to get granular with you. JON STEWART: Right. EZRA KLEIN: Somewhere I have from Derek the actual--. JON STEWART: Derek, by the way, the co-author--.

EZRA KLEIN: Yes. JON STEWART: --who should--. and, again, this is not in any way a criticism-- grow. a beard because it really--. he does in the interviews appear to be. your enthusiastic intern. He looks 17. EZRA KLEIN: I will neither laugh at this. nor agree with it. Derek is a beautiful man. JON STEWART: [LAUGHS]. EZRA KLEIN: It was sometimes distracting for me. in the writing of this book. And he is currently perfect in every way. JON STEWART: His youthful visage, I find, a little bit distracting.

as a grizzled veteran. EZRA KLEIN: Ah, here it is. Perfect. JON STEWART: All right, here we go. Ezra's googling as we speak. And he's pulling it up. I'm going to do this like a golf announcer. Ezra Klein. He is coming up on the 18th green. He is pulling up. Examples. EZRA KLEIN: OK, the issue--. action number one. JON STEWART: Yeah. EZRA KLEIN: This is all running through the NTIA, the National. Telecommunications and Information. Administration, which I know you're all big fans of.

JON STEWART: Sure. They've done fabulous work. EZRA KLEIN: Yes. So step one is the NTIA must issue NOFO--. a Notice of Funding Opportunity-- within 180 days. I want to note, by the way, that within 180 days. is already kind of something interesting. here because you look at, say, the Works. Progress Administration. JON STEWART: Uh huh. WPA-- what is that, the 30s? EZRA KLEIN: Yeah, the New Deal, right? And Harold Meyerson has a great piece. on this back from the 2010s. And that was employing people by then. I mean, 180 days is--. I could do some quick math here.

It's about half a year. JON STEWART: The 180 days is just them notifying. They have to notify people that there. might be this opportunity. EZRA KLEIN: Yes. Medicare-- when we passed Medicare in this country, it gave people Medicare cards one year later. So we are taking half a year here just to tell people. that there is going to be an opportunity. to apply for grants. JON STEWART: And I hate to even break this down even. further because this is just--. EZRA KLEIN: I'm so glad we're doing this. This is my shit, man. This is like-- I didn't expect we'd go here.

JON STEWART: Ezra, I think it's so important for people, though, to really get an understanding of just. what is the bureaucracy. It's this faceless thing. Right now at DOGE, it's demonized as though the people. that are running the bureaucracy. are the evil ones, like they're just executing what they've. been told to do by Congress. These are just hard-working, smart people. trying to do the right thing by what's been legislated. EZRA KLEIN: I want to say, this is a big part of the book. We talk a lot about how hard it is to be a civil servant.

We get incredibly talented people. to come into the government. Then we make it incredibly hard for them to do their jobs. I'm a huge fan of this book by Jen Pahlka called. Recoding America, which--. JON STEWART: Absolutely. EZRA KLEIN: It absolutely shows like how the bodies are buried. and how frustrating this is. But OK, so what I'm reading off of here is testimony that was. offered by Sarah Morris, who was. part of the Commerce Department to Congress in March 4th--. on March 4, 2025.

So everything I am telling you is. valid post-Biden Administration, right? March 4, 2025. OK, so we have to issue the Notice of Funding Opportunity. within 180 days. That's step one. Step 2, which all 56 state applicants completed, is states who want to participate must. submit a letter of intent. After they do that, they can submit a request for up to $5. million in planning grants. Then the NTIA-- step 4--. has to review, and approve, and award,

again, planning grants-- not broadband. grants, planning grants. JON STEWART: And it's still at the NTIA. It's still at the first step of the. EZRA KLEIN: Yes. JON STEWART: Just out of curiosity, what is the half a year? What's going on in the 180 days between when this is passed. as legislation and when they're going to notify people. it's been passed, and it's an opportunity? EZRA KLEIN: So the NOFO is being-- the Notice of Funding. Opportunity is being written. And in the book, I actually spent a lot of time.

on the Notice of Funding Opportunity. for the CHIPS and Science Act because that's. not a small thing. And I don't have the NOFO for this in front of me. But the Notice of Funding Opportunity--. JON STEWART: NOFO. EZRA KLEIN: --for the grants that. will go to semiconductor factories-- or, I'm sorry, manufacturers to locate semiconductor fabs, as they're called, in America. That NOFO was long. I read it. And it is just full of stuff. Look, I call this everything-bagel liberalism--. the tendency-- like, an everything bagel, you put a little bit of stuff on the bagel, and it's great.

And you put too much-- and if you saw the movie Everything, Everywhere, All at Once, it becomes a black hole. from which nothing can escape. So Notice of Funding Opportunities. can make a project very complicated. When CHIPS and Science passed, I, a naive and idealistic. policy reporter, thought, oh, good, we're going to give a bunch of semiconductor companies. money to locate their plants here. And then I read the NOFO because somebody. alerted me to it. And there's a part that's like, in your application, explain how you are going to attract.

more women into the construction industry--. JON STEWART: [GROANS]. EZRA KLEIN: --which is a totally fine goal. But does the Taiwanese semiconductor. manufacturing corporation know a lot about that? Or how are you going to diversify. your subcontractor chains? And there's a seven-step process. And one idea is maybe you can break deliveries. into smaller subcategories. It's all this stuff. JON STEWART: This is for your application. EZRA KLEIN: Yeah, this is for your application. There's a thing about showing your plans.

to put child care on site in the factories, which, again--. I want child care. It's great. But you're trying to do something really hard. We have lost semiconductor manufacturing to Taiwan, to South Korea, to, at a lower level, China. And we are trying to get it back. And one reason we've lost it is we. made it very expensive to do here. And so now we're putting more than $30 billion. to make it cheaper to do here. And in the NOFO, to get people to apply for the $30-plus.

billion, we are putting in a bunch of things that are going. to make it more expensive. And they're going to make it harder to do the thing. Eventually, that money did go out, I want to say. But, you know, we'll see how it works out. JON STEWART: And also, by the way, going to make it impossible--. impossible-- for anyone other than larger corporations. to comply because the expense that. it would take for smaller, more agile, more local businesses--. they would not have the manpower, the financial resources.

You are excluding an enormous amount of the American economy. in terms of building things, by laying. on compliance costs that would drive most. companies into the ground. EZRA KLEIN: Yes. That is very true. I will say, on the semiconductors, you don't have a lot of small semiconductor manufacturing. JON STEWART: Right, but in other areas. EZRA KLEIN: --in general, what you were saying. is completely right. OK, back to rural broadband. So, the NOFO that comes out can have a lot of things in it. that you wouldn't expect. It's going to try to achieve a lot of different goals.

What are the workforce standards? What are the equity standards? What are the subcontractor approaches? JON STEWART: Meaning you can't apply. unless you live up to those? EZRA KLEIN: Yes. JON STEWART: OK. EZRA KLEIN: This is what's going to have. to be in your application. They are setting out a series--. you might think that, basically, what they're setting. out is, here's how to persuade us. you are going to be the best at building whatever we're. trying to get you to build. Again, I don't have this NOFO in front of me, so I don't want to say things that may not be true about it. But having read other reporting on this, my sense is all this stuff was in the NOFO because--. and I have a bunch of examples in the book. It's all in every liberal bill now, right?

They pass bills, and then in the process. where the different interest groups and players can come in. and shape how the bills are turned into regulations, and grants, and so on, that's where. it's much easier to say yes to all these other members. of your coalition. And by the way, it's not like Republicans are great here. It's just their circling interest groups are, like, the oil companies and so on. There is a lot of bad stuff that. happens after a bill passes, in part because most of the system.

stops paying attention. When we're fighting about it in Congress, there are reporters. There are members of Congress. There's a lot going on. The regulatory process, which is very, very. powerful and important, does not have. that level of attention on it. It's more complicated. It's slower. It's annoying. There's less conflict. OK. JON STEWART: I'll give you something else, Ezra. EZRA KLEIN: Yeah, please. JON STEWART: This, I think, is also an important part. of the process. Congresspeople are very busy. And so the space between what they have the capacity.

to do to delineate these things versus what lobbyists. in these industries have to do-- in other words, a lot of what's in these wish lists are industry wish lists. The lobbyists who have the time--. industry is writing a lot of what's in these bills. EZRA KLEIN: Yes. Yeah. And this goes to something that we. talk about throughout the book because it affects. housing and everything else. It happens at the local level. We have created, with all good intention,

a lot of processes meant to expand. the role of citizen voice. You know, regulatory notice and comment. periods are, in theory, something. that anybody can show up to. But how many regulatory notice and comment periods. have you shown up to? Possibly, actually, you specifically--. JON STEWART: I actually have gone to a few. EZRA KLEIN: You've shown up to a couple? But you're--. JON STEWART: But I know how it works. EZRA KLEIN: --a special flower, right? JON STEWART: Yes. EZRA KLEIN: So, these things get captured. Who knows when the planning meeting is happening? It's the people who have houses down.

the block from the potential affordable housing complex. It's not the people who might benefit from living. in that complex in the future. All right, so the NTIA must issue a NOFO within 180 days. States who want to participate must. submit their letter of intent. Step three, they can request up to $5 million. in planning grants. JON STEWART: Just planning. EZRA KLEIN: Just planning. Step four, the requests are reviewed, approved,

and awarded by the NTIA. Then--. JON STEWART: How long is step four, by just out of curiosity? EZRA KLEIN: I actually don't know. It's a great question. JON STEWART: OK. EZRA KLEIN: This process we are talking about, which, currently, all 56--. three years later, all 56 applicants had passed. through at least step five. It took more than three years, so it's a long time. States must submit a five-year action plan. JON STEWART: Oh, my god. EZRA KLEIN: So the state's got go back, and they think about how they're going to do this. And they don't just say, OK, thank you for the money.

We're going to spend it, and you can. see how It worked out later. We're like, here's our five-year action plan. Then the FCC must publish the broadband data maps. before NTIA allocates funds. So, this one is, I think, a little funny, at least. So these maps, right? This is supposed to show you where you. don't have enough broadband. But it then says in parentheses, "and states needed opportunities to challenge. map for accuracy.". JON STEWART: [LAUGHS]. EZRA KLEIN: So, having done the NOFO, the letters of intent,

the request for planning grants, then the review, approval and awarding of the planning. grants, then the five-year action plans-- in between that, the federal government has to put forward. a map saying where it thinks we need rural broadband subsidies. And then, of course, the states need. an opportunity to challenge the map for accuracy. And you can imagine this doesn't all happen in, like, a day. OK. JON STEWART: Oh, my god. EZRA KLEIN: So then the NTIA--. step 7-- has to use the FCC maps.

to make allocation decisions. Then, having already done their letter of intent, their request for planning grants-- it's hard even. to talk about this, man. JON STEWART: Ezra, I just want to say, if you were going to design a machine that would keep people. from getting broadband--. EZRA KLEIN: Yes. JON STEWART: If you were to design a machine that would--. it's almost as though they have designed this to make sure that. people in rural areas never--. by the time this is around, Musk will already.

have the chips in our brains. We won't even need it. EZRA KLEIN: Well, that literally. is happening, by the way. By the time this could have gotten off the ground, Musk is taking it over for Starlink. JON STEWART: Right. EZRA KLEIN: OK. Step 7 is NTIA must use the FCC maps. that were already challenged for allocation decisions. Then, having submitted all this--. I think this one is actually quite amazing--. having submitted their five-year plans or letters. of intent, step 8 is states must. submit an initial proposal--.

an initial proposal-- to the NTIA. Then--. JON STEWART: Is that the result of their $5 million. planning fund, this initial proposal? EZRA KLEIN: I assume, but then what was the five-year plan? JON STEWART: And what the fuck did they apply for? What was their NOFO? EZRA KLEIN: Like, if the five-year action plan. isn't the initial proposal, then what's. the five-year action plan? OK. JON STEWART: Forget NOFO. Mofo. These are motherfuckers, these--. this is crazy. EZRA KLEIN: Step 9--. NTIA must review and approve each state's-- again--. initial proposal.

By my read, we have had at least. two initial proposals here, but that's a different issue. JON STEWART: Oh, my god. EZRA KLEIN: Step 10, states must publish their own map. and allow internal challenges to their own map. So the government has published a map. They have invited the states to challenge the map. Then states have submitted initial proposals, and they then have to publish their own map. and allow challenges. JON STEWART: Wait, who's challenging it. within the state? EZRA KLEIN: Well, organized interest. groups, environmental groups.

I don't know who specifically. JON STEWART: Oh, my god. EZRA KLEIN: But literally anybody. JON STEWART: Right. EZRA KLEIN: I want to say something because it's. very important I say this. This is the Biden Administration's. process for its own bill. They wanted this to happen. This is how liberal government works now. JON STEWART: This is something they instituted for this bill. EZRA KLEIN: For their bill. JON STEWART: They wanted this. EZRA KLEIN: It's so important to say this. This is not how Republicans handicapped a liberal bill. This is a bill passed by Democrats. with a regulatory structure written by.

a Democratic administration. OK. JON STEWART: Right. EZRA KLEIN: So the thing I'm looking at-- it tells me, as of March of 2025, how many of the players. had gone through everything. So until what I just said, states. must publish their own map and allow challenges. Three years plus into this, all 56 had done that. But now you begin to see players falling out. Step 11-- the NTIA must review and improve the challenge. results and the final map. So the NTIA has put forward a map.

The states have challenged that map. Then the states have put forward their maps, had other challenges. And now the NTIA must review and approve the challenges. to the state maps. OK, at this point, it's 47 of the 56. So we've just lost nine of the applicants. JON STEWART: My hair was dark when we started this process. EZRA KLEIN: [LAUGHS]. JON STEWART: I was a young, healthy man. I had the bone density of a stainless steel. EZRA KLEIN: Your VO2 max was amazing.

JON STEWART: I didn't need any supplements. And by the way, I want to make sure. that everybody understands-- each. one of these steps, I'm sure--. and pardon me if I'm being presumptive here--. or presumptuous. Each one of these steps has an amount of time--. EZRA KLEIN: Yes. JON STEWART: --that they write into it. So, in other words, it's a 90-day waiting. period for these challenges. It's a 120-day review process. There's already, without anybody even submitting.

anything, that they could have seen on a macro level, two and a half years of nothingness. built into the plan. EZRA KLEIN: Yes. I mean, I can't say because I haven't looked. at every regulation here. But yes. JON STEWART: I feel confident. EZRA KLEIN: Yes, yes, yes. JON STEWART: I feel confident knowing what. the public comment times are. Like, you always have 90 days, 120 days. They have a 30-day review process. They have an 800-day--. you know, it's all of this.

EZRA KLEIN: So, remember, we've now lost in the--. oh, by the way, this whole thing I'm looking at--. this testimony-- this is a member of the Commerce. Department who is part of this, coming to testify in March 4, 2025, before the House Committee on Energy. and Commerce, their subcommittee on communications. and technology, in a hearing called Fixing. Biden's Broadband Blunder. JON STEWART: Oh, my god. EZRA KLEIN: So this is somebody trying to defend what they're. doing to a Republican Congress is trying.

to take their money away. So I just want to note that because it's. interesting for them, what gets said, ultimately. OK, we've done step 11, NTIA must. review and approve challenge results and final map. We've lost nine of the applicants at that point. Step 12-- states must run a competitive. subgranting process. JON STEWART: Oh, my fucking god. At step 12? After all this has been done? EZRA KLEIN: Yeah. None of that could have happened along the way here.

We have now lost 17 more applicants. So now, 30 of 56 have completed step 12. Step 13-- states must submit a final proposal. All the proposals weren't enough to NTIA. Now that goes to three of 56. So we've gone in the last couple of steps. from 56 had gotten to this point to three of 56. Step 14-- JON STEWART: [GROANS]. EZRA KLEIN: --the NTIA must review and approve. the state's final proposal.

And that is three of the 56 jurisdictions. And states are there. And then I will just tell you, Jon, because it will break your heart, as it breaks mine--. as this very, I am certain, hardworking and well-meaning. public servant stares down a hostile Republican Congress. that is peppering them with questions, the next line, which is in bold, says, "In summary, colon, states are. nearly at the finish line.".

And it says, "to stop their progress now, or worse, to make them go backwards, would be a stick in the spokes. of the most promising broadband deployment. plans we have ever seen.". End scene. JON STEWART: I'm speechless. Honestly. It's A, far worse than I could have imagined. But the fact that they amputated their own legs. on this is what's so stunning.

Just for fairness' sake, I'll give you the flip side of that, which is the PACT Act, right? EZRA KLEIN: I'm going to say to you, as you said to me about orthogonal, what's a PACT Act? JON STEWART: Oh, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. It's--. EZRA KLEIN: You Washington types. JON STEWART: Burn Pit Bill, where. soldiers who had been exposed to toxins, who had slept. near there, were getting all these illnesses, for the VA. to cover them presumptively for these other illnesses. It took, you know, a few years. They let us write it. They literally-- the committee in Congress was like,

could you guys write that? So, with the help of some people and all the VSOs, they wrote this bill that would cover all these veterans. Then it went through House Veterans. Affairs, Senate Veterans Affairs, put together. They come up with this bill. The big Republican complaint was, once they realized. they were going to get strong armed on having to help. veterans who were sick--. really?-- was-- well, geez, all these new people that are.

dying, isn't that going to flood our hospitals. at the VA and create a lot of lag times. for people getting in there? So the VA, to their credit, in a very short amount of time, came up with an action plan about what they would need. to do to hire people to create the capacity. so it wouldn't have that. They implemented it. They did it within six months. They put it all together.

Hundreds of thousands of veterans. were helped because of that. The lag times didn't happen. And it worked. It's working. And what did the Republicans do? The first thing they did when they came in, is they fired all those people. EZRA KLEIN: Mhm. JON STEWART: So understand there. are two sides to this coin. There is this incredibly frustrating, over-complicated. Rube Goldberg machine that keeps. people from getting broadband.

And then on the flip side is a group of legislators who don't. want to give you anything. EZRA KLEIN: We are caught between a party that wants. to make government fail and a party that. does not make government work. That is my very simple version of politics. JON STEWART: Yeah. EZRA KLEIN: Look, I want to give a different-- not. a different, but a take on why this is. such a problem for a minute. There's a line from Jake Sullivan, I think it was. Fact check me, but I'm pretty sure it was him.

And it was one of the Biden retrospective pieces, I believe, in The Washington Post. And he said, look, the problem here is elections. happen in four years. And Joe Biden's policy agenda is measured in decades. JON STEWART: [LAUGHS] It's epochal. You can't expect Methuselah to get in there. EZRA KLEIN: But I've heard this in different ways. from a bunch of people. Gavin Newsom said a version of it to me when I was on his show. that I just taped the other day.

And I want to say two things about this. What actually upsets me the most about the way liberals. govern is that they excuse it all away like this. I mean, it's such a shame. Election cycles are short. We can't do anything about that. JON STEWART: We only had four years. EZRA KLEIN: We are choosing this. All those things I just read to you are chosen. JON STEWART: Yeah. EZRA KLEIN: There is nothing in the history. of this country that would say that we. can't figure out how to put--. like, you probably got broadband set up in your house. Did it take you four years? JON STEWART: They did give us some times that they.

said they would be over. It did take a while. EZRA KLEIN: The problem with getting into this mode, where you've persuaded yourself that, for the government to do anything, it's going. to be a 6-to-10-year timeline. Like the infrastructure bill-- most of the road projects that. have a completion date, have a completion date in mid-2027. for a bill passed in 2021. So, except for being annoyed that there is construction, nobody's going to feel that anything. good was done for them. And the reason this really matters. is that if you stretch the timeline of liberal democracy.

like taffy--. so it gets longer and longer and longer--. what you've broken is the fundamental way. people can feel that they benefit from liberal democracy. And it would be one thing if there was just. no other way to do it, right? But you look at the history of this country. I mentioned earlier, when Lyndon Johnson passed Medicare, it gave people a Medicare card in a year. The Affordable Care Act took four years.

Negotiating down the prices of a limited number of drugs. under Medicare, which is arguably. the most popular policy the Biden Administration passed--. more than three years, just to agree on the prices. So they couldn't run on anything. JON STEWART: And by the way, just the idea that. the government, the largest customer to drug companies--. the same people that give those drug companies subsidies. and billions of dollars--. can't just go in there and go, and by the way, give us 20% off this shit because it's so much cheaper.

in every other country. It's not even just a question of liberal democracy. writ large. It's, you can look at democracies around the world--. Western democracies-- that build. shit faster, cheaper, and better. It's unconscionable. EZRA KLEIN: I always say, in the time it took California. to not build 500 miles of high-speed rail, China built 23,000 miles of high-speed rail. JON STEWART: State-run Capitalism. is hard to match it to.

EZRA KLEIN: Europe has it too. JON STEWART: Yes. That would be my point. EZRA KLEIN: You know, like, Spain builds it. And we have this joke in the book. It's like, they have a government. We checked. They have higher union density than we do. JON STEWART: They nap. Ezra, they nap! Spain is building it. But yet, between 3 o'clock and 5 o'clock, they're all asleep. EZRA KLEIN: [LAUGHS]. JON STEWART: How is that possible? EZRA KLEIN: One of the things I'm trying to shake people. on with this book is that Democrats, liberals--. people who believe in government--.

have entered into a kind of learned helplessness about. how government works, as if the way. they have ended up doing it--. I call this a culture. It's not an ideology. The culture of how Democrats govern has become like this. I was talking to Jon Favreau the other day. of Pod Save America. We were doing an event. And I will yell about high-speed rail. forever in California. But high-speed rail was one of three headline projects out. of the stimulus in 2009, because they.

had the whole part where they were just trying to pump. money into the economy. But then they had this idea of the infrastructure. of the future. And the three they always talked about. were high-speed rail, that Obama talked about, a smart grid, and a national network. of interoperable electronic healthcare records. JON STEWART: [LAUGHS]. EZRA KLEIN: And I said this. And like Jon's like, well, 0 for 3. JON STEWART: They couldn't get the computers at the Department. of Defense to talk to the computers.

at the Department of Veterans Affairs for 10 years. EZRA KLEIN: Yeah. So the idea that they get all the private computers to talk. But we keep failing at getting--. we're good at moving money around, right? If we tell you we're going to do social insurance, we're going to expand the Earned Income Tax Credit, you're going to get a bigger child tax credit--. the IRS, which Musk and Trump are gutting, was, actually, in a million different ways, a model of efficiency. JON STEWART: Right. EZRA KLEIN: What it has been able to do in terms. of like building out a tax and transfer state that was never. actually designed to run-- and particularly.

what it did during COVID-- is, for whatever. failures are there, actually quite remarkable. JON STEWART: The fact that they got checks out. to people in the amount of time that they got them out there, and they distributed those funds efficiently. It can work, but it doesn't. And I have to tell you-- so, some people may. listen to this conversation. And they may go, well, how the fuck are. you two still believers in a government. that accomplishes things? And I think, for me, it's the question of because we're.

doing it wrong. This is not the method by which to accomplish things. And I have examples of doing it right. EZRA KLEIN: Yes. JON STEWART: And if you have analogs that can show you. that that can be done, then it still. fills you with perhaps misguided idealism. or a misguided optimism. But I know it can be done because it's been done. EZRA KLEIN: Well, I'll say a couple things here, because it is easy to get so focused on failures, you don't see successes, as you said.

So, one is I do get this--. well, if you hate government regulations so much, and you think Texas is building housing so well, why. aren't you just a Republican? It's like, are you asking me why, in my fury, that we are not building the liberal future. I think we deserve? The just, humane, green future? Why don't, instead, embrace a vision of a future. that I think sucks? A future where I'm choking on dirty air, and the world is in a heat trap, and nobody's even trying to build high-speed rail? That's your big question for me?

Like, that's your gotcha? Yeah. I'm Allied with the people trying. to create a vision of the future. that I think is a good one. And two, look, it's not that nothing ever happens. It happens too slowly. But in fact, the Inflation Reduction Act. has set off a huge boom in building solar and. battery manufacturing. It could be happening faster if we had better. laws for building things. But it is happening. The Affordable Care Act took four years. to deliver health insurance to people, but people have the health insurance now. And if we had never passed that bill,

they wouldn't have the health insurance. And what's fucking Donald Trump trying to do? He's trying to gut Medicaid. JON STEWART: Right. EZRA KLEIN: So, yeah, government. does do some things just fine. JON STEWART: There are differences. But I think that's where--. where do people on the left get angry at you? Because what I find is--. I can tend to be critical about those delays because of my fear. that it puts the entire idea that government can be a force.

to ease some of the struggles. Look, the operating system that we've chosen to use. is capitalism. And it generates wealth better than any of these other systems. that has been operated. But there's no question there's collateral damage, sometimes. by design, sometimes by externalities, sometimes. by the idea that, as money begins to accumulate, well, then people can rig the system more easily. Government is the only influence that is large enough. to provide a check or a balance to that kind.

of rapacious or destructive wealth building, right? If that isn't functioning appropriately, that is my anger. How do they criticize you for criticizing that, if that is not too convoluted? EZRA KLEIN: I want to be kind to criticisms. here, some of which I think are well-founded, and some of which. are not. I guess here's what I would say. One, I just really want to co-sign what you just said.

and add one thing to it, which is that part of the problems. of capitalism are that it is rapacious, that it will ship its own mother off onto an ice floe. to make a buck. It just doesn't know. It's impersonal. Capitalism is an impersonal force. It is not immoral. It is not moral. It is amoral. JON STEWART: Right. It's like being mad at a great white shark. EZRA KLEIN: It's something. Yeah. JON STEWART: Yeah. EZRA KLEIN: And so there are things it does. that create collateral damage. And then there are things that just doesn't.

do, because those things are not connected. to a profit motive at all. There is a huge amount of public good provision. Capitalism-- I mean, can you imagine. creating the libraries today? The public libraries? Of course, capitalism creates bookstores. It's never going to create a library. JON STEWART: Right. Public utility. EZRA KLEIN: Not because it's rapacious and terrible-- just. because it's not what it does. It's like asking a great white shark to scramble. you some eggs, you know?

It's not what a great white shark does. JON STEWART: Oh, boy. That would be a show I would watch, though, if that was on YouTube. I think Mr. Beast could probably. make that happen for us. EZRA KLEIN: [LAUGHS] So, that's one thing about capitalism. But then the other thing about the critique on the left. is that I genuinely believe that nobody should be angrier--. like, conservatives are delighted by. government failure. You could see in the cards, like, ooh, another government failure to run on, to attack you on,

to weaponize. If you are a liberal, or you're on the left, you should be rip shit about government failure. because it is striking at your project. You should be rip shit about high-speed rail, rip shit. about the rural broadband initiative, rip shit about how. long everything has taken compared. to what it took in the past. If you look at-- like, AOC came out. with a really big, ambitious public housing. bill a couple of years ago, where she was saying, look, the people who are all out there saying--.

the NIMBYs, et cetera, saying, we don't have enough housing, they're right. But let's do a lot of it through public housing. And people don't know this, but one of the things. we've regulated very heavily--. and that's partially why some of these projects. are so broke--. is we've regulated the government very heavily. When people talk about deregulation, they think of the market. For me, I have to think of the need to deregulate. the government itself. But it was made functionally illegal. for the federal government to build public housing. It really can't do it. JON STEWART: Right. EZRA KLEIN: But in order for it to build public housing well, you would have to make a lot of changes to how it builds,

all across the board, because it layers so many standards. I mean, look at that rural broadband process. You're not going to fix the housing problem with--. like, if that's what they came up with for rural broadband, just fucking imagine what a nationwide public housing. project would look like. But other countries do it. Singapore-- I think, what is it? 80% of people live in some kind of social housing there? There are countries that do a lot of this well. And one thing I think that the left--.

and for that matter, liberals-- often just. don't pay enough attention to is what stands in between them. and their agenda that is not Republicans because they can. really see when Republicans stand between them. and their agenda. And Republicans often do. But one reason a bunch of this book. is focused on governance failures in California, and New York, and places like that. is because these are places where Republicans hold. no power, so you can't say, oh, if only. the mean Republicans will let us do it, we'd get it done. JON STEWART: Boy, that's a good point. EZRA KLEIN: You're actually left looking in the mirror,

thinking, why haven't I made my own bed here? And if you want to do what AOC and Bernie Sanders want to do--. if you want to do a Green New Deal of the size. of their Green New deals--. we just flatly do not have the laws. that will allow you to build that much green infrastructure. And we definitely-- nobody disagrees. We definitely don't have the fucking laws that will let you. lay down transmission lines across the country. to get all that new clean energy you're generating.

to the places it needs to go. And if we don't have those laws, then your bill will fail. One thing that liberals get very--. and leftists get very stuck on is the price tag. The economist Noah Smith calls this chekism, where it's like, we sort of judge how. good or ambitious legislation is on how big the estimated. price tag on it is. It's like, we got $300 billion for green energy. I mean, good, but that was bullshit compared. to my $900 billion plan. JON STEWART: Right, right. EZRA KLEIN: But money--.

look, you could spend a lot of money. on California high-speed rail and build nothing, right? Money isn't the end goal here. It's, particularly when you're building things, built infrastructure, right? It's the number of people hooked up. to rural broadband, et cetera. Our provocation in the book--. what we're telling all these stories for--. is not to come down on one set of policy solutions, because, honestly, the problem in transmission lines. is different than the one in housing. The problem in housing is different than the one in.

supply of health care, right? There's all these things here--. but is to force try to get people. to ask a question much more regularly than we do, which is simply this. This is the whole book boiled down to one question. What do we need more of? And why is it so hard to get it? That's the whole thing that we just don't ask well. And I think some of the criticism that isn't as strong. comes from a tendency that we all. have to just group certain means into ideological buckets. Deregulation-- that's the thing Republicans do.

Spending money, that's the thing--. JON STEWART: We did that in finance, and look what it did to the world economy. Right. EZRA KLEIN: --that's the thing Democrats do, right? Critiquing government Republicans do. critiquing government, right? Thinking the private sector can solve some things--. that's the thing Democrats do. But sometimes, you need to flip it, right? A bunch of the things we're talking about here--. like, I want to deregulate the government enough that it can. build high-speed rail itself. So I am trying to make a much stronger government. And it just kind of scrambles people's. ideological categories a bit.

So I just did this podcast with Governor Newsom. And we were talking about high-speed rail, which, like, he walked into office, and it was already fucked. And he's the one who came in and said, we are going to shrink this from LA to SF, which we. have no money and no capability to do, to Merced to Bakersfield. And you can critique him for not. scrapping it because I'm not sure Merced to Bakersfield. is worth doing. But the thing that I was talking with him--. because the book is very critical of California. governance, and he was, very interestingly to me, positive on the critique.

He was like, this is right. This is what's going wrong. But what he said is, look, we cannot build. under this level of lawsuit. JON STEWART: He put it in the litigation terms. EZRA KLEIN: Well, that's a big part of it. One difference between the way we do government in America. and the way they do it in Europe. is we restrain government through litigation here. A huge amount of the bills passed by both liberals. and-- you know, I mean, there were sort. of liberal-ish Republicans then, too--. but a lot of the bills-- the big environmental bills--. were passed by Nixon. The EPA was created by Nixon.

The National Environmental Policy Act, the Endangered Species Act--. That's all Nixon's stuff. But it's done with Democrats. JON STEWART: And a lot of it is also, to be fair, state and local. Even without the federal government intervention, state and local zoning restrictions, environmental law-- all these different things--. are also there. Ezra, I want to ask you, what do. you think about even stepping back a bit further than that, which is, we're talking a little bit about the priorities. of a more progressive agenda--. the things that they want to build.

Is there even a more basic step that. needs to be addressed first? Because one of the issues that I think. afflicts maybe more progressive policies, which is we. need $500 billion to build this. We need to tax billionaires to get the money to do this. But the public does not trust that that money will. be attached to a value that directly impacts. their lives, because they haven't seen it.

for a couple of decades or so. And on the flip side, the Republicans come in. with a scythe, and they're chopping. it in the name of efficiency but, again, with no eye. to value. Do Democrats have to almost take even a step further back. and simplify the case for value and making that case. to people-- and competence?

EZRA KLEIN: Let me say this one as clearly as I possibly can. Democrats have to be the party that owns government reform. JON STEWART: Right. EZRA KLEIN: One thing is, if they don't, then what you're. going to get is something like DOGE, which. is the destruction of the government. under the guise of reform. But, two, the politics of reform--. it is one of the most powerful streams of politics. that exists in American life. I think if you just go back over recent elections, you can basically predict the winner, just on who. owns the politics of reform.

So, Obama runs as a good government reformer. I mean, people forget this now about him, but his big pitch was not post-racialism. It was--. JON STEWART: Yes, we can. EZRA KLEIN: --the special interests and the lobbyists, they're dicing us up into red and blue. And they're fooling us, and they're. fucking up our politics. We're going to get them out of here, and we're going to have a government for you. Obama was very much a reformer. Trump, in his own way, in 2016, he runs as a reformer.

JON STEWART: Sure. EZRA KLEIN: Drain the swamp is a reform line. And Hillary Clinton is very much--. she's been in Washington forever. She took all this money from Goldman Sachs, right? She embodies--. JON STEWART: Status quo. EZRA KLEIN: The status quo. People always say status quo and change. And I think this is a place where Democrats often don't. want to see part of what that implies because they're like, we're not the status quo. We have all these big projects, just as you're saying, Jon, to give people money. But status quo is also about this question of, will you change the way the thing works?

JON STEWART: Yes. EZRA KLEIN: So Trump runs as a reformer. In 2020, in a way, during the pandemic, when the Trump Administration is fucking up government. left and right, I wouldn't really say Biden. runs on an agenda of reform. But he does run on agenda of trying to make government work, and believe science, and things like that. JON STEWART: And we were in a very unusual moment in 2020. EZRA KLEIN: And then in 2024, Harris. has this very unusual problem of running. as sort of the incumbent but not the incumbent. She runs as the defender of the institutions, not the reformer of that. JON STEWART: That's right.

EZRA KLEIN: The politics of government reform--. like, Bill Clinton ran on government reform--. reinventing government. Al Gore on with David Letterman, talking about how expensive the ashtray at the Pentagon. JON STEWART: Cass Sunstein in the back room. writing on the thing. EZRA KLEIN: So the politics of reform are very important. But it also reminds me of something else. Look, you live in a relatively high-tax, liberal state. I lived in California, and then I now live in New York. I hear a lot of people complain about taxes, but I never--. what I don't primarily hear them say. is just that my taxes are too high.

It's that my taxes are too high, and I get nothing. JON STEWART: That's everything. That's everything. That is the exact crux of what we're talking about. And it even-- when we talk about the great examples. of Democratic revolutionary legislation. over the past 20 years-- even when you talk about the ACA. I pay a lot of taxes. Oh, so you get health care? Well, no.

I get maybe a stipend that'll buy me insurance. Oh, so the insurance is health care? Well, no, it's actually, like, a ticket, and you have to go up to the counter, and they'll say, well, yes, you can have a little bit of health care, but you can't have this health care. There is a disconnect. It reminds me of the education conversation. There was once a sort of-- it went viral. It was a list of the 10 ways that people learn best. And then they put the 10 ways that things are taught, and they were exactly contradictory of how things--.

We have designed a system that is, in many ways, government has just become the trough for big business. to come in and give nothing away, only extract. And I think nobody has demonstrated. to people in recent times that it doesn't have to be that way. EZRA KLEIN: OK, but I want to do the one. uncomfortable thing here--. JON STEWART: Please.

EZRA KLEIN: --because I want to say, yes, and. Are JON STEWART: We improv? We're improving this bad boy. EZRA KLEIN: We're improving. We're improving. JON STEWART: Bring it. EZRA KLEIN: Liberals are really comfortable. when the government-- when the enemy is big business. And it often is. JON STEWART: Yes. EZRA KLEIN: But in a lot of what we are talking about--. that 14-stage rural broadband thing I just went through--. that wasn't business. JON STEWART: That's a good point. EZRA KLEIN: Well, I bring this up. because we're actually pretty comfortable saying no.

in some cases--. not as many as would be ideal--. to business. We have a politics of that. What we have a lot more trouble saying no. to is ourselves, our allies--. or, if you're in a local government, a bunch of homeowners who never want the affordable housing. JON STEWART: Our idealism. EZRA KLEIN: Yeah, and sometimes our idealism, right? You can imagine, if I unwound those NOFOs and everything, how all the things that get in there--. the subcontractor, diversity requirements, and everything--. for the people in the room, it's like, I.

don't want to say no to that. The people asking for that are good people. They're our friends. They're trying to do something good in the world. And all the things that are making all. the building more expensive. Look, there's a big--. I report on this affordable housing. project in San Francisco. And it has an interesting fight tucked inside of it. It has a lot of interesting fights in it. You should read the book. JON STEWART: Was that the one where they bought--. every unit cost, like, $400,000? EZRA KLEIN: Yeah, instead of the double. that it usually costs, which it still sounds like a lot.

But it was finished for half the cost and half the time. JON STEWART: That's right. EZRA KLEIN: And one of the big reasons. is that they use modular housing construction--. offsite-factory-built housing. First affordable housing to do that, either in San Francisco. or in, to my knowledge, California--. though I'd want to fact check that, but I think that's right. Anyway, there's a big fight with the unions on that. But it's interesting because it's a fight in two directions. You have the construction trades who try like hell. to kill that project. And the only reason they can't kill it.

is that it uses private sector money. But the factory that was doing the modular housing. construction was unionized. So there is a union benefiting on the other side of this, too. But you get into these local political power fights, which. are-- you know, I know California. politics really well, and it's really significant there. And it's not that you can't work with some of your allies. I tell at some length the story of Josh Shapiro. rebuilding the I-95 bridge in 12 days, as opposed to 12 to 24 months. JON STEWART: 10 years, yeah.

EZRA KLEIN: And he does that with union labor. But those unions are working 24/7. And what he also does is put down an emergency declaration. that wipes out all these other procurement, and environmental review, and contracting--. JON STEWART: The 14 steps. It takes away the Al-Anon 14 steps. EZRA KLEIN: It's actually a great counter example. because here's something. So, this tanker rolls over, catches on fire, and the bridge falls down. And this is one of the major arteries. of the Northeast Corridor.

So it's a huge problem. And the first day Shapiro comes out--. Governor Shapiro-- and says, look, this is a huge disaster, and people are going to need to be patient. This is very likely to take 12 or more months to reconstruct. But they wipe out all the rules. And what the Department of Transportation had does, is he goes-- and remember all that stuff we. just did with rural broadband. He goes that day. And on the bridge nearby, working. on just normal maintenance projects.

that had already been in play, are two different contractors. And he basically grabs one and says, you're the demolition guys now. And he grabs another and says, you're the rebuild guys. JON STEWART: Oh, leadership. EZRA KLEIN: And the contractors are on the job. at the end of the first day. And I talked to him. It's in the book. And I say. how long would that normally have taken? He said, under our normal process, with the bids, and the challenges to the bids, and et cetera, it takes 12 to 24 months to do. the build and contracting. JON STEWART: Just to get ready to start.

I think, ultimately, the point is this--. I look at government as we need to use it to harness. the power of business, not let citizens. be exploited by the rapaciousness of business. And they are two very different things. That is not to say you're anti-business, but it's to suggest that you have. to be some kind of a bulwark against those kinds.

of instincts that they have there. And that is the way--. Do you remember, there was a book called--. shit-- The Death of Common Sense? Does that ring a bell to you? EZRA KLEIN: That sounds like a book. JON STEWART: Howard, who wrote about--. it's not that we don't necessarily have, you know, regulations thing. It's that we don't interpret them with any common sense. We don't allow leadership, whether it's. within the judiciary, or whether it's in the regulatory. That we allow the bureaucracy of it to become almost sentient.

and forget that it's a tool. And I almost wonder-- you know, you talked earlier. about what man is capable of. We put somebody on the moon. Maybe we need a kind of bureaucratic moonshot--. a Manhattan Project. EZRA KLEIN: We have begun--. it's such a absolute fucking shame what we've done. We have made bureaucrat into this dirty word. But we've done it by making the job miserable. JON STEWART: Because it's adversarial in many respects.

EZRA KLEIN: It's adversarial. We don't give them any latitude. So Elon Musk wants to fire all the bureaucrats, right? Thinks are all lazy and non-productive. I wanted before this, and I want now, to have. genuine civil service reform. I want it to be easier to hire, easier to fire, easier to manage. I want them less bound by rules. I want to trust their discretion. No system of government works, at some basic level--. JON STEWART: No system of anything. EZRA KLEIN: --if you have so little trust in it. that you won't allow people to make decisions.

It just doesn't. This is a big part of Jen Pahlka's book. I have, again, a really pretty interesting interview. that's in the book about-- this part's about LA public housing. So in LA, they pass this bond measure. more than a billion dollars to build public housing. in whatever it was. Six years later, when I'm writing, they built--. I don't know-- a couple thousand units. And many of them were, like, $700,000 per unit. And it was like, why? I ended up talking to a woman named. Heidi Marston, who had been running the homelessness. services in LA.

And she had quit written this letter. about why she was quitting. And she said something I think about a lot. She was like, I had a billion dollars. And if you had just allowed me to spend it, I could have really done something with it. JON STEWART: Oh, it's fucking heartbreaking. EZRA KLEIN: And I'll just give you. an example from this project. So we passed this bond measure. And what we do in the bond measure. is we put in rule regulation or whatever. But you're basically supposed to use the public taxpayer.

money to seed the project--. not to build it--. to seed it. And then you're supposed to cobble. together, like, five more sources of funding to build it. And the idea was that this is going to save taxpayer money. We're going to leverage taxpayer money, right? A great word from finance. What it ends up doing is making it. really, really, really difficult to finance a project. And you're getting-- I mean, it's affordable housing, right? So it's not like Blackstone is giving you the money. So you're like, here's a tax credit program.

to house homeless veterans. But then I need to, like, put in these particular things. for homeless veterans. And I need to find them. And here's another thing for survivors of domestic abuse. And I get some money from that. And I was talking to people who work on affordable housing. And they all said the same thing. And I talked to the LA comptroller, a guy. at that time named Ron Galperin. And what he said to me was, look, you would think I'd be all in favor of this. I'm the person watching LA's money. And I am telling you, this was absolutely insane because how. much we slowed everything down as we were trying to show we.

were saving taxpayer money--. we added that much cost just in what. we were adding to the project. JON STEWART: Right. EZRA KLEIN: And we and we made it not happen, and we slowed it down, and whatever. And I want to say, at the core of this we were never doing, was trusting the civil servants--. giving them the room to run, giving them money, saying, you spend it. And we're not going to audit you 27 times, and run you in front of a keyring, and yell at you. We're going to treat you like you're. good at what you fucking do.

And we're going to let you do it. And if the public doesn't like how this is all being managed, they can vote the mayor out in the next election. JON STEWART: Here's the final pitch, Ezra, because I. think that is dead on. And it reminds me of something that--. what happens is they're so afraid of waste, fraud, and abuse, which are very legitimate things. to be concerned about, that they build into the system. waste fraud, and abuse. EZRA KLEIN: Yes. JON STEWART: That the waste, fraud, and abuse of the system. that is there to prevent waste, fraud, and abuse.

is waste, fraud, and abuse. I know we're going down a rabbit hole. EZRA KLEIN: And, you know, Elon Musk is saying this right now. He keeps saying this. He says, at a certain point, waste is. indistinguishable from fraud. Incompetence is indistinguishable from fraud. It's a line he keeps using on the right. And I don't like it because I think. it totally misunderstands the problem, and his solution is terrible. But his point on a certain level--. that the way we are running the government. has made the government incredibly wasteful--. JON STEWART: Right. But they're doing it because Republicans are so mistrustful.

EZRA KLEIN: Right. But then he wants to light the whole fucking thing on fire. and privatize it. JON STEWART: So here's the flip side of it. Make government programs more accessible, less adversarial. You would streamline all of those processes. and then, on the back end, build in a more. robust fraud enforcement. So in other words, you flip it. I can tell you this, at the VA, that would. transform that organization.

If they didn't, in their search for the 3% of those that were. abusing the system, force 97% of the people. into this hellish labyrinth, they would save. a shit ton of money on that. They would save a shit ton of lives. and just have more robust, streamlined fraud. enforcement on the back end. It's just a simple flip of how we're viewing it. And I think it would be profound.

EZRA KLEIN: Yeah, I'll say it even simpler. The measure of government is the people it helps, not the processes it follows. JON STEWART: Boom. EZRA KLEIN: That's it. JON STEWART: Bars. Bars! Ezra Klein. EZRA KLEIN: If you just really kept that in mind--. if that was your only governing model, and you. just said to yourself--. the only thing I wish liberals would learn from Musk. is this kind of relentlessness of the middle--. not lawlessness. And you're going to have to change a bunch of laws. to do the kind of government you and I want to see happen. But this recognition that, in the middle,

you might make a lot of people upset. You're going to say no to a lot of people. It's going to be politically painful. And it's going to be worth it if you achieve the hard thing. you're trying to achieve. The measure of government is outcomes, not process. And we treat government-- and, again, whole section on the book in this--. liberal legalism has evolved in a way where it. believes government is legitimate based. on the processes it follows--. that it is legitimate and also, by the way, protected. from adversarial lawsuit, if it can show that, at every point, it checked every single box. JON STEWART: Yeah.

It's so self-protective. Yeah, yeah, yeah. EZRA KLEIN: And the point of government. is not to check the boxes. It's to help the people. JON STEWART: It's to get the shit out there. One other thing I wanted to ask you about-- what I'm seeing. in the Trump Administration is that they've got historians. and legal scholars combing through the history. of this country, finding whatever Byzantine. or abstract emergency power. It's the Illegal Enemies Act. It's the-- oh, we use this once in 1813, trying to get some Native tribes off of land.

They're using powers that have been. granted under emergencies to do sort of day-to-day. governance things. And I don't like it, but is there. anything to be learned from this. for people who have more liberal. aims and progressive aims? EZRA KLEIN: There very much is. And I do want to say, to be fair, that Democrats do this, too. If you look at things like Obama's immigration. executive actions--. if you look at things like the student loan actions--.

Democrats are actually pretty good at this move as well. You go, and you find a sort of--. JON STEWART: Emergency power. EZRA KLEIN: --vaguely written word in a law, right? Like, yeah, we had something to deal with public health, and now you're using it to change immigration law. OK, but an interesting thing that I noticed while reporting. a case studies here--. and then I have this whole thing about Josh. Shapiro and the N95. And he uses an emergency declaration. JON STEWART: Mhm. EZRA KLEIN: This also happens around a recent disaster. in Maryland with Wes Moore.

And then I was talking with Gavin Newsom on his podcast. He's like, you talked about the I-95. What about the I-10? We did that in 10 days. It wasn't even 12 days. And we were talking-- JON STEWART: Oh, my god. EZRA KLEIN: I was like, if you guys are all. so proud of the outcomes you get--. and now they're doing rapid rebuilding under emergency. declarations after the fires--. if you guys are all so proud of what you can. do under these emergency authorities. that wipe away all of this process, and you can get these things done fast, and people like it--. I mean, this is the fundamental basis on which.

a lot of Shapiro's political renown is built. He's not known so much for policies as he is. for getting things done fast. His whole line is get shit done. Well, then what does that say about. the non-emergency procedures? When emergencies happen to me, I typically. am not happy about them. I don't like it. I don't like it. I don't like what happens after it. I don't like what happens during it. I'm not saying they like the emergencies. They don't. But the amount I am hearing governors--.

and, as you said, at the federal level, too, you see this-- brag about what they can do when something. triggers the emergency rules--. JON STEWART: That's right. EZRA KLEIN: --should actually make people really. rethink the non-emergency rules because, also, the public. likes seeing things done fast. They're impressed. Look at that. Government rebuilt this in 12 days. That shit's amazing. People like it when their government works. JON STEWART: And they don't realize, Ezra, every problem. is an emergency to someone. EZRA KLEIN: Yes, I have a line like this in the book,

that emergencies are not just crises that happen fast. They are also crises that happen slow. Climate change is an emergency. It's actually a much bigger deal than part of a bridge. fell down. We are not treating it as one. JON STEWART: Ezra Klein, fantastic. EZRA KLEIN: Jon, I've loved this. This has been one of my favorite interviews by far. Thank you. JON STEWART: I will never say mofo. again without thinking NOFO. EZRA KLEIN: [LAUGHS]. JON STEWART: That's what you've implanted into my brain. EZRA KLEIN: I've incepted this in you.

That's the memetic endpoint of this. JON STEWART: I really appreciate. you spending the time. Congratulations on all the things. It's Ezra Klein. New York Times podcast, The Ezra Klein Show, co-author of Abundance with 11-year-old Derek Thompson, who is a prodigy. EZRA KLEIN: (LAUGHING) Derek Thompson. I can't get on board with this man. JON STEWART: [LAUGHS] Please come back and talk again. Add me to your group chats. EZRA KLEIN: I will. I will add you to our "we're going to bomb Jon Stewart--". JON STEWART: There you go. EZRA KLEIN: You'll be there. JON STEWART: Ezra, pleasure.

I hope to get a chance to talk to you soon. EZRA KLEIN: Thank you, man. Me too. [MUSIC PLAYING]. JON STEWART: Man, I'm exhausted. I just spent an hour and a half in that dude's head, and I'm--. the amount of information, the amount of specificity. No wonder he had to google a couple of things. But wow. I will never take Wi-Fi for granted ever again, knowing the 14-step program that has been put in place just.

to get to the starting line. For me, that will ultimately be the takeaway. But really appreciated the gentleman. coming on and explaining all those various things. And get the book. It's called Abundance, and it really does give an awful lot. to think about as far as--. you know, there's an opportunity. for the next iteration of what that type of governance.

will look like. And I think this is a great start in picking that apart. But anyway, thanks, everybody, for listening. We went long, so we're going to rush things out. As always, thank our lead producer, Lauren Walker, producer, Brittany Mehmedovic, video editor and engineer, Rob Vitolo, audio editor and engineer, Nicole Boyce, researcher and associate producer, Jillian Speer, and our executive producers, Chris McShane and Katie Gray. And I am Jon Stewart and we will see you next week.

[MUSIC PLAYING]. The Weekly Show with Jon Stewart. is a Comedy Central podcast that's produced by Paramount. Audio and Busboy Productions.