00:11:10 · Ed Elson
[00:11:10] S4: I'm in total agreement. I mean, you you look back to the beginning of the year, if you were to say that the Democrats were gonna take the house and the senate at the midterms, people would say you were nuts. And and you can look at the the the data on that where it was... I think it's doubled over the course of the year. So there has been a massive sea change, and it's obvious what the problem is. It's inflation, and people know how tariffs affected inflation. We saw that immediately. And then he doubled down on higher prices with the war in Iran. And so when you look at Trump's approval rating, you know, yes, it is hitting all time lows, but the the topics on which he is most underwater are the economy and also inflation. And I just think that this is such a unique situation, such a unique moment because usually when when a... When an economy is struggling or when you're seeing inflation, you're seeing higher prices, usually, it's a little bit of a blame game on, like, who's responsible. And and it's very difficult to pin down who is actually at fault because economics is complicated and it's nuanced and there are multiple factors. You can never really pin anything down, but that's not the case this time around at all. Like, we know exactly who's responsible. We know exactly what caused this. It's Trump. It's his tariffs and his war in Iran, and everyone knows this. Usually, there's debate, but literally everyone on both sides understands what the problem is. And I think your point is an important one, which is the people who are getting most screwed by his decisions are his base. It's the people who have historically supported him. It's the farmers who have to deal with diesel prices being up nearly 80% over the past year, which, of course, is a necessary input for fertilizer and therefore for growing crops, which is why farmers are struggling right now. It's as you say, the rural voters who are the frequent drivers, you point out how much more those those those voters drive compared to, Democratic districts, and gas prices are up 40%. And then I think the other one is is the real crucial demographic, which was so important in 2024, which is young men who have seen their wealth, fall over the past four or so years by about 23%. And, of course, the boomers have seen their wealth rise by about 37%.
00:13:45 · Ed Elson
And this is gonna be a big problem because 55% of young men voted for Trump in 2024, and now the polls are saying that actually this time around, it's gonna be 26%. So all of the key demos have gotten screwed. And, usually, like, I say this all the time because I think that Trump really, really has screwed over the middle class and screwed over poor people, unlike any other president, at least in recent memory. But a lot of people say, well, they don't understand that. Like, the American people try getting the American people to, like, understand the facts. But this time, I think they do because the facts are so obvious. It's so clear what went wrong here. So I'm I'm with you. I I think it's a sweep. I think the Democrats take the house. I mean, certainly take the house. Question is, will they take the senate? I think they will, and we can go into some of the state level data here because that's what's gonna matter here. It's gonna be the... It's gonna basically rest on a few swing states like Maine, like Texas, Michigan. Those are those are gonna be the important states. But I I think the Democrats crush it in all of those states because, again, as you say, they're getting hit the hardest.
00:15:05 · Scott Galloway
[00:15:05] S0: Yeah. When you see Trump campaigning in Kansas or in South Carolina, that's not the map is tilting. The map is imploding. And they're pulling money out of what usually are battleground states because they've just given up on them. What's interesting, and you touched on this, it's really fascinating to see which cohorts pivot from one party to the other in between elections or, in consequential elections or sequential elections. And one of the biggest pivots from blue to red in 2024 was was young people. And now people ages 18 to 29, get this, in 2024, forty six percent identified as Democrats, 47% Republicans, which shocks me. 18 to 29, the majority in 2024 or more identified as Republican. Today, it's Democrats or 54% of eighteen to twenty nine year olds people your age identified with Democrats and 38% Republican. It's... I love this. We're now... It feels like the majority of the pollsters are saying it's a toss-up between a tsunami and a super tsunami. And Fox News even just flipped South Carolina from likely Republican to toss-up. And it's like nothing indicates insecurity like a company or an organization that has a vested interest in things going in the other way covering its ass by saying, oh, this might go blue. So this is... I mean, I'm I'm still holding my breath waiting for what he's gonna try and do next, whether it's, I don't know, offer people a million dollars if the Republicans, hold on to the senate. I'll be curious what he tries to come up with. But this feels... And, again, what's interesting is a lot of the voting... I wonder what it is. I think it's about a third. The voting has already been decided. People like... I've already... Have you already voted? I've already voted.
00:16:58 · Ed Elson, Scott Galloway
[00:16:58] S4: I'm gonna do it after this. [00:16:59] S0: Vivek. That's my new nickname for you, Vivek. Oh my god. We're getting comments for you. Alright. Philip, folks, what is the likely... Is there a nonzero probability that Ed was the Vivek Ramaswamy of his junior class in high school? What... I I think there's a nonzero probability here. I just... I'm I'm putting it out there. Anyways [00:17:27] S4: No. [00:17:27] S0: No. Blue tsunami. Boonami. [00:17:31] S4: Tsunami. [00:17:32] S0: We're gone. Let's get this done.
00:17:34 · Ed Elson
[00:17:34] S4: I mean, just looking at some of these states and and how their economies have been specifically affected, Like, I think Maine is probably the most interesting because you would have expected and the prediction markets did expect that that it would it would be red. But you've got Troy Jackson, the senate candidate, who's democrat at 61% right now on Kalshi. And you just look at the way Maine's economy works and what its strengths are and what its weaknesses are, and it'll... It all makes sense. Like, for for one, they rely on heating oil to heat up their homes more than any other state. It's like 50% of their homes is fuel oil, heating oil. And the cost of that has gone up 83% in the past year. So you're immediately... That's that's half of of the state is watching their energy prices just explode as a result, a direct result of Trump's policies. Then you have the Canada tariffs as well, which is also an issue because Maine sends 40% of its exports to Canada. And so as soon as the Canada trade war breaks out, suddenly you're putting a huge dampener on Maine's economy. Plus, they also have this giant logging industry, which is a huge part of their economy. And then Trump puts 50% tariffs on all of the logging equipment and all of the wood products, which just decimates, the foresting industry in Maine. Like, it's a perfect encapsulation of this is a state that wants to love Trump, that wants to like him, that that identifies with the ethos and the culture of the Republican Party. But he alone has been so economically devastating to to to thousands of people across the state to the point where... I don't know. I mean, I don't know if they're gonna swing blue, but they're probably not gonna show up. They're probably not gonna show up to the polls. I mean, if they're if they're gonna say anything about how gigantic of a disaster the past two years have been in their own lives, this is their moment to say it. So I I do think that that is gonna be like... And I think the same... We see very similar dynamics in Wisconsin, Texas, Iowa, where, as you say, you know, one in five, Iowans is employed by the agriculture industry, which has also gotten hit really, really hard by the increasing oil prices. So it just doesn't look good for the Republicans in any of these key swing states.
00:19:58 · Ed Elson
I think the next question is, like, what are the market implications of various outcomes? Like, if the Democrats sweep, what happens? I think the first two things that we have been seeing already in the markets is that health care stocks could rise because you might see that a lot of these Medicaid cuts will be reversed. But, again, that's already seemingly getting priced in right now because the health care sector is up more than 9% over the past three months. Defense stocks as well could fall. Again, that also happened over the summer. Maybe you see a rise in clean energy stocks. Maybe there is a slowdown in the AI boom. Maybe it could be the Democrats are gonna get a bit more stringent on data centers. That could be one of the directions they go. So I think those are some of the things that we might see. But, again, the fact that we're already beginning to see it in the stock market is indication further that investors really believe that come Tuesday, democrats are gonna win this thing. What do you think?