Democrats Rocked By Good News

Speaker 1 it or leave it is brought to you by Bombas this time of year. It's sensory overload everywhere.
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Speaker 1 On the night before Halloween in 1975, 15-year-old Martha Moxley was murdered, but police failed to make an arrest. Until, in 2000, her one-time neighbor, Michael Skakel, was arrested.

Speaker 1 He was also a cousin of the Kennedys. The Kennedy connection is the reason that most people know about this case.
But the deeper I dug, the more I came to question everything I thought I knew.

Speaker 1 Search Dead Certain the Martha Moxley murder to listen now, wherever you get your podcasts. And follow to get new episodes every week.

Speaker 1 Hey, everybody.

Speaker 1 I wanted to do something special for our New York show. It is great to be here in Brooklyn.

Speaker 1 So, now with a special musical performance, please welcome to the stage Victor Jones.

Speaker 1 All right, this song is called I Get Hurt.

Speaker 1 Sometimes I see nothing in people.

Speaker 1 Here is the church and here is the steeple. I'm sending you an invite to a networking event.

Speaker 1 I'm in your building and I'm crawling through the fence.

Speaker 1 I am a product of time and motion.

Speaker 1 I know the best spot for beer in Brooklyn. I'm in the garden and I'm eating all the dirt.

Speaker 1 I get hurt.

Speaker 1 There's a guy on the subway on the saxophone.

Speaker 1 He's got nothing waiting for him back at home. He sees a big green beanstock blocking the sky.
I got my foot in the door. He's got his foot in the door.

Speaker 1 I got a barbecue Bible and southern charm. I got skin in the game, but none of my arm.
I'm at the funeral home trying not to flirt.

Speaker 1 I get hurt.

Speaker 1 Chandelier comes down.

Speaker 1 She went back to the bag

Speaker 1 with the bullet. Chandelier comes down.

Speaker 1 She went back to the bag.

Speaker 1 I get hurt real bad.

Speaker 1 I close my eyes.

Speaker 1 Chandelier comes down.

Speaker 1 She went back to the bag with the rain on the hudson.

Speaker 1 It's too bad.

Speaker 1 I start to shiver.

Speaker 1 I don't want your hurt.

Speaker 1 Whoa.

Speaker 1 I start to shiver.

Speaker 1 I get hurt.

Speaker 1 I get

Speaker 1 hurt.

Speaker 1 Thank you, guys.

Speaker 1 Enjoy the show.

Speaker 1 What's up, Scrutin?

Speaker 1 One more time for Victor Jones.

Speaker 1 Such a fan.

Speaker 2 So glad they did this.

Speaker 1 Getting that guy in the fucking rise. You're going to think I was there when I saw Victor Jones play.

Speaker 1 Welcome to Love It or Leave It, live at the Crown Hill Theater.

Speaker 1 We have got a great show for you tonight. David Crumholt is here.

Speaker 1 Anna Gastire is here.

Speaker 1 Tonight, we're going to let out some battle cries, rank some cranks, and in the spirit of New York, rant our asses off.

Speaker 1 But first,

Speaker 1 let's get into it.

Speaker 1 What a week.

Speaker 1 Very good.

Speaker 1 In a development that has rocked the corporate establishment, confounded the stodgy notions of what is possible in our politics, sent a shiver down the spines of Republicans across the country.

Speaker 1 Moderate former CIA officer and member of Congress, Abigail Spamberger, has won her race for governor of Virginia.

Speaker 1 And here in New York, there was a municipal contest that's also

Speaker 1 garnered some attention.

Speaker 1 Yes, Zoran Mamdani's improbable campaign

Speaker 1 has ended in victory. He will be the next mayor of New York City.

Speaker 1 All right.

Speaker 1 Could you imagine if Cuomo had won and had to walk out here?

Speaker 1 What a god-forsaken episode that would have been.

Speaker 1 Look, Cuomo winning, it would have been bad for New York, but it would also have been bad for me.

Speaker 1 But we'll never know that world. Here's Zoron in his victory speech.

Speaker 1 Too many among us have turned to the right for answers to why they've been left behind.

Speaker 1 We will leave mediocrity in our past.

Speaker 1 No longer will we have to open a history book for proof that Democrats can dare to be great.

Speaker 1 But there are still a lot of good lessons in there, said Doris Kearns-Goodwin

Speaker 1 to the television at her friend's house, because you know she's one of those people

Speaker 1 that doesn't have a television.

Speaker 1 Now, Republicans are going to use this victory by Momdani to try to dump all over this city. And you know what? They're welcome to it because New York is just one big genderless bathroom now.

Speaker 1 I think the New York Post put it best: the red apple on your marks gets set zoo. Socialist Mom Dani wins race for mayor.

Speaker 1 The fear-mongering disgusts us. The wordplay delights us.

Speaker 1 Also, it's pretty good, but 90 Lennon was right there.

Speaker 1 I'll just, I saw it move slowly across. Nine O Lenin.

Speaker 1 New York not only elected Mom Dani, New York rejected Andrew Cuomo.

Speaker 1 I was thinking about this, and genuinely, I'm open to hearing what the alternatives would be, but I think there's a good case to be made that Andrew Cuomo ran the most cynical political campaign in any of our lifetimes.

Speaker 1 Like not just Democrats, like Democrat, Republican. Like I can't think of a campaign as cynical as the one he ran.
And so I am very glad that New York said fuck off to that.

Speaker 1 Cuomo was working working so hard to bury his opponent, you think Zoron lived in a nursing home in April of 2020.

Speaker 1 Here's a video Cuomo posted on Halloween. Where's your costume? Duh.
I'm a socialist. Hey, man.
God, that guy was crazy. Socialists are terrifying.

Speaker 1 In fairness, Cuomo can't stand when someone grabs out a woman without first threatening her job.

Speaker 1 Or let's look at Cuomo's other AI ad in which all the evils of Earth get together to vote for the guy.

Speaker 1 I'm a criminal. I'm a criminal.
I'm a criminal. I'm a criminal.
Yep.

Speaker 1 I'm a criminal. For Zoron.
For Zara and Mom Dunny.

Speaker 1 It's funny now.

Speaker 1 It's amazing how far we've come technologically.

Speaker 1 Only yesterday, it felt like ads like this were only made the old-fashioned way with just a lone cartoonist drawing ethnic stereotypes for a right-wing German newspaper.

Speaker 1 Congressman Andy Oggles

Speaker 1 tweeted literal footage from 9-11 with the message, wake up, New York. Of Of course, someone with the name Oggles supported Cuomo.

Speaker 1 Cuomo also won the endorsement of Alderman Jack Fondle and Governor Hansie McSqueezum.

Speaker 1 And this is serious. When Dick Cheney saw

Speaker 1 that 9-11 was being politicized for a reason other than regime change in the Middle East, he died.

Speaker 1 Fucking chill out.

Speaker 1 It's not fair because one of Dick Cheney's final public acts was, unlike a lot of Republicans, voting for Kamala Harris. In a statement, he said,

Speaker 1 Trump can never be trusted with power again. As citizens, we each have a duty to put country above partisanship to defend our Constitution.

Speaker 1 That is why I will be casting my vote for Vice President Kamala Harris. And then one year later, I will freeze solo El Capitan.

Speaker 1 Sadly, Dick Cheney died of food poisoning shortly after free soloing El Capitan.

Speaker 1 But back here in the city that never sleeps, and you can kind of see it in your faces,

Speaker 1 I'm sorry, you're right.

Speaker 1 You're right.

Speaker 1 I could have done a pander there.

Speaker 1 You know, a city that never sleeps and stopped electing creeps. That was an option.
Should have done that. That's the mood.
Andrew Cuomo himself laughed at the idea of Mom Dani cheering 9-11.

Speaker 1 God forbid another 9-11. Can you imagine Mom Dami in the seat?

Speaker 1 I could. He'd be cheering.

Speaker 1 It's another problem.

Speaker 1 Cuomo was doing Islamophobia in a city with 1 million Muslims Muslims as if voting is haram.

Speaker 1 And speaking of haram, on Monday, Trump came out of the closet as a Cuomosexual,

Speaker 1 saying, Mamdani's principles have been tested for over a thousand years, and never once have they been successful.

Speaker 1 And of course, we all remember what happened in the year 1022 when Emperor Basil II, nicknamed the Bulgar Slayer, led the Byzantine army to victory over the Georgians at Swindax, thus allowing him to enact his free buses policy.

Speaker 1 Added Trump, whether you personally like Andrew Cuomo or not, you have no choice. You must vote for him and hope he does a fantastic job.
He is capable of it. Mom Dani is not.

Speaker 1 Trust me, Trump continued. I know a great New York mayor when I see one, as through the window he watched Rudy Giuliani,

Speaker 1 fully nude except for a flapper's bando around his forehead, running from secret service at the Mar-a-Lago Pool, laughing and shouting, I'm Gatsby, I'm Gatsby, I wasn't driving, I wasn't driving.

Speaker 1 Now, Trump also said flat out he will do everything in his power to block funding to New York if Mom Dani won, posting, if Mom Dani wins, it is highly unlikely that I will be contributing federal funds other than the very minimum as required to my beloved first home.

Speaker 1 Now, how did Cuomo respond to this? And to me, this is the capstone. The Islamophobia, the fear-mongering, the outside money, it all led to what Cuomo said next.

Speaker 1 Now, he could have said, we're all New Yorkers and nobody in this city should be bullied into voting for me or anybody.

Speaker 1 But no, he said, if you want President Trump to try to take over the city, National Guard on streets, choking federal funding, vote for Zoran Mamdani. He told New York to give in to the threat.

Speaker 1 That, for me, alone was a reason to treat elected office like any woman in your life you care about, making sure Andrew Cuomo never again got within 100 miles.

Speaker 1 Back in the 1970s, when Cuomo's father, Mario Cuomo, was running for mayor against Ed Koch, posters started showing up around the city with the slogan, vote Cuomo, not the homo.

Speaker 1 Because Ed Koch was rumored to be fabulous.

Speaker 1 Many believe that Andrew was the one responsible for those posters, though he denies it. Mario Cuomo lost in the primary to the homo, then ran in the general

Speaker 1 and lost again.

Speaker 1 And now,

Speaker 1 Mario Cuomo catching strays. And now, here we are all these years later, and Ed Koch and Mario Cuomo are in heaven kissing

Speaker 1 because everybody is into everything up there.

Speaker 1 Nothing else makes sense. Think about it.
Cuomo Trump and wealthy backers like Bill Ackman wanted New York to be afraid of a caricature.

Speaker 1 Some of that caricature is based on Mamdani's actual past comments. Some of it is created by exaggerating or lying about what he has said in the campaign or what he's promised to do.

Speaker 1 But most of it requires just ignoring who Mamdani actually is.

Speaker 1 Mamdani built a massive enthusiastic base of support in this city, and at the same time, he has shown a genuine willingness to listen to and bring in more skeptical voices into the coalition.

Speaker 1 When he faced hard questions, I asked them myself. He answers those questions without defensiveness or hostility because he is in the game of persuasion, of addition.

Speaker 1 That is to say, he acts like a person. More Democrats should try this.

Speaker 1 The truth is, whether or not Mamdani makes buses free or builds five grocery stores, that alone won't determine whether or not he succeeds.

Speaker 1 The job of mayor is a role that requires attending to disparate parts of a coalition.

Speaker 1 It requires finding ways to adjust and negotiate and persuade and get to yes in those few precious moments between attending parades.

Speaker 1 The job is mostly parades.

Speaker 1 MmAM Dhani has tried to do that, not to the satisfaction of everyone, but he has certainly tried. In conversation, he is animated.

Speaker 1 by top-line policies, yes, but also by a project that should unite every part, not just of the Democratic coalition, but of the pro-democracy coalition, which is making government work again.

Speaker 1 He came out in favor of the housing reforms, which passed.

Speaker 1 He talks about fixing ridiculous and onerous processes that stymie construction and business development. He talks about what it will take to make transit faster, safer, and easier to expand.

Speaker 1 What was clear going into election day is that the outcomes under a mayor Cuomo would be pretty limited and familiar.

Speaker 1 But what's exciting about Zoran Mamdani, even for those who have skepticism, is it is possible to imagine an outcome far more terrifying to people like Cuomo and Trump and Stephen Miller, which is that he can succeed.

Speaker 1 Which is why Trump's out there right now, depressed, trying to process his feelings by making Scott Besant do his gay voice

Speaker 1 while driving a bulldozer through a wall of the Roosevelt room.

Speaker 1 And by the way, the fact that Zoran has excited so many people isn't just about electoral success. A vision that captivates people, that doesn't just earn votes, but earns genuine loyalty.

Speaker 1 It gives you space to govern, to operate, to make hard calls. Trump actually gets this instinctively.
Many Democrats do not. Here's Chuck Schumer when asked who he was voting for.

Speaker 2 Today is Election Day in New York City.

Speaker 1 Did you vote for Mondani or Comho? Look, I voted, and I look forward to working with the next mayor to help New York City. Leader Schumer.

Speaker 1 He then said, what's that? While throwing a bag of loose day-old bagels at Brian Schatz

Speaker 1 to create a diversion.

Speaker 1 But he walked away so slowly, he was still there. I was like, ha ha!

Speaker 1 Not a magician.

Speaker 1 Now, Schumer is worried about Republican attacks, and I get why. When you lead a party that the country sees as aimless and weak, it is far easier to be defined by your opponents.

Speaker 1 But it means in a moment like this, you're afraid of attacks from both the left and the right, and so you stand for nothing. And boy, does that look aimless and weak.

Speaker 1 The New York Times had a piece about the 90,000 New Yorkers who volunteered for Mum Donny's campaign, a number in which I assume many of you are included.

Speaker 1 Especially the hot ones.

Speaker 1 The Times described the campaign as an antidote to loneliness, about the meaning and connection and community politics can create. That is a lesson for Democrats across the country.

Speaker 1 Schumer doesn't seem to understand that his job is proving to those young people that he is on their side instead of being afraid of Republicans saying that Zoron is on his.

Speaker 1 AOC put it best last night.

Speaker 3 We have a future to fight for, and we're either going to do that together or you're going to be left behind. And I think that that is not a partisan issue.

Speaker 3 It's not about progressive, it's not moderate, it's not liberal. This is about do you understand the assignment of fighting fascism right now?

Speaker 3 And the assignment is to come together across difference no matter what.

Speaker 1 And boy, did a lot of New Yorkers come together last night.

Speaker 1 When Zoron was asked if there should be room for more moderate candidates, as we saw in New Jersey and Virginia, he said, quote, absolutely.

Speaker 1 I think that it has to be a party that actually shows Americans to see themselves in it and not just be a mirror image of just a few people who are engaged in politics.

Speaker 1 To me, what binds us all together is who we are fighting to serve, and that is working people. That is the lesson of the 2025 elections.
Who is the future of the Democratic Party? We all are.

Speaker 1 Centrist candidate Abigail Spanberger, in a nice change of pace for a former CIA officer, successfully overthrew a regime in America

Speaker 1 and

Speaker 1 will be Virginia's first female governor.

Speaker 1 State Senator Ghazala Hashmi won the lieutenant governor's race, making her the first Muslim woman elected to statewide office in Virginia.

Speaker 1 An amazing accomplishment because based on an AI video I just saw, she was also apparently the architect of Girl 9-11.

Speaker 1 That is.

Speaker 1 Meanwhile, the Virginia Attorney General's race was rocked this fall by a scandal.

Speaker 1 Democratic candidate Jay Jones sent texts in 2022 in which he imagined shooting the Republican Speaker of the Virginia House in the head and urinating on the graves of other Republican politicians.

Speaker 1 And I am sorry that I did not reply to those texts, Jay.

Speaker 1 I was in the middle of a breakup. We had the midterms.
2022 was like a wash for me.

Speaker 1 Jones apologized profusely for the text, as well as for a reckless driving conviction in which he drove 116 miles an hour. I know.
Honestly, I feel like the tech's got the focus.

Speaker 1 The driving is insane. 116?

Speaker 1 That's too fast, Jay.

Speaker 1 It's too fast.

Speaker 1 But he is on track to win Virginia by a greater margin than Kamala's victory last year, which suggests that Kamala would have fared better with voters if she had threatened to murder Joe Biden on the view rather than say she would would govern like him.

Speaker 1 In New Jersey, Democratic Congresswoman and former Navy pilot Mikey Sherrill won the governor's race.

Speaker 1 This marks the first time New Jersey voters elected two governors of the same party in a row since the 1960s. The last time New Jersey was perfect.

Speaker 1 Any people from New Jersey here tonight?

Speaker 1 Oh, wow.

Speaker 1 California voted to redraw our congressional maps to help Democrats improve our chances of winning the House despite Republican gerrymandering.

Speaker 1 And if Arnold Schwarzenegger doesn't like it, he can fight me. And you can tell him where to find me.
Podcast host Tommy Vitor.

Speaker 1 Democrats also won two Georgia commissioners races in a blowout. The largest margin in the state in 20 years.

Speaker 1 We won a mayor's race in Miami, picked up two state Senate seats in Mississippi, won judicial contests in Pennsylvania, and passed that constitutional amendment to make all cybertrucks gay.

Speaker 1 Now they're all swishing around out there.

Speaker 1 And despite a lot of cope online, Trump said it pretty clearly when meeting with Republican senators at the White House. I don't think it was good for Republicans.

Speaker 1 Whoa, sir, slow down. Your mind works too fast.

Speaker 1 We can't keep up.

Speaker 1 Trump Trump once again urged Senate Republicans to abolish the filibuster, claiming that Democrats would do so if they retook the majority. They're going to do it the first day.

Speaker 1 They're going to pack the court. They're going to make D.C.

Speaker 1 a state.

Speaker 1 And they're going to make Puerto Rico a state. So now they pick up two states.
They pick up four senators. Okay?

Speaker 1 You think you have problems? They're going to do all of the things. They're going to pick up electoral votes.
It's going to be a very, very bad situation.

Speaker 1 From your weird, tiny lips to God's perfect giant ears.

Speaker 1 One part of why there's a reluctance, I think, on the part of Senate Republicans to get rid of the filibuster, which they're obviously not going to voice, is

Speaker 1 if there's no filibuster, it's no longer Democrats that are stopping the craziest shit House Republicans can pass. It's the least conservative Senate Republicans.

Speaker 1 Suddenly, all the political pressure that now kind of spreads diffusely across the Congress will land just in the emails of like Susan Collins and like whoever else is going to, you know, consider themselves the what we used to call Republican right-wing conservatism, but now represents sensible moderation.

Speaker 1 Like it'll all fall on those types. And they don't fucking want that.
They want to be able to blame Democrats. They want to stop some of the craziest batshit, bat, dumb, ding-dong, fuck, fuck,

Speaker 1 bat, wing, wing-bat, ding-bat

Speaker 1 stuff

Speaker 1 that comes from the worst House Republicans. So that's a little bit of something that's protecting the filibuster.
It doesn't mean they won't kill it in the end, but it's nice to see

Speaker 1 Trump explaining what we could do.

Speaker 1 And now, let's live out.

Speaker 1 New York will remain a city of immigrants, a city built by immigrants,

Speaker 1 powered by immigrants,

Speaker 1 and as of tonight, led by an immigrant.

Speaker 1 So hear me,

Speaker 1 President Trump, when I say this.

Speaker 1 To get to any of us, you will have to get through all of us.

Speaker 1 Yeah, said Chuck Schumer, wriggling into a hot girls for Zoron t-shirt, trying to act like he'd been there the whole time.

Speaker 1 We believe in standing up for those we love.

Speaker 1 Whether you are an immigrant, immigrant, a member of the trans community,

Speaker 1 one of the many black women that Donald Trump has fired from a federal job,

Speaker 1 a single mom still waiting for the cost of groceries to go down,

Speaker 1 or anyone else with their back against the wall, your struggle is ours too.

Speaker 1 Whether you're trying to haul a granny cart full of dirty laundry up the steps of the seven train, or stuck behind the person hauling said granny cart, your struggle is ours too.

Speaker 1 Whether you're a Miranda who thinks she's a carrier, or a Charlotte who thinks she's a carry,

Speaker 1 whether you're asking the bagel place to scoop out the bagel, or you're behind the person in the line thinking, oh, yeah, that's your problem,

Speaker 1 the bagel's interior,

Speaker 1 whether you're a rat fighting a pigeon

Speaker 1 or a pigeon fighting a rat, we're all in this together. So way to go, New York.

Speaker 1 And now let's remember this feeling because one year from now, we've got midterms to win.

Speaker 1 But first,

Speaker 1 we've got a great show tonight.

Speaker 1 Next up, Anna Gastire has a wicked attitude.

Speaker 1 Kate, don't go anywhere. There's more of Love It or Leave It coming up.
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Speaker 1 And we're back!

Speaker 1 Please welcome to the stage, SNL Legend, star of stage and screen, and one of the best alphabas to ever leave green grease paint all over Broadway. It's the wickedly talented Ana Gasdyer.

Speaker 1 Hi. Thank you for being here.

Speaker 1 Come on.

Speaker 1 So nice to meet you.

Speaker 2 Thank you. And also with you.

Speaker 1 I think you're the first Alphaba I've ever met.

Speaker 2 You've never been to Mass, evidently.

Speaker 1 No,

Speaker 1 I've been to a confirmation. Okay.
And I've been in a lot of European cathedrals.

Speaker 2 Yes, that counts. That counts.
It's all good. We're moving on.
It was just a, thank you. Go back to your compliment, please.

Speaker 2 Your transitional compliment.

Speaker 1 You were Alphaba. I was.

Speaker 2 I'm not sure that was a compliment, but

Speaker 2 it was a statement.

Speaker 1 You know that everyone says, there's a, people say that comedians want to be rock stars and rock stars want to be comedians. Yes.

Speaker 1 I think because you are known for being so funny, I don't think you get enough credit for being an amazing singer. And when I tell people, do you know that Ana Gastar was an amazing alphabet?

Speaker 1 People are like, she was? I'm like, get your heads out of your goddamn asses.

Speaker 2 I'm impressed that you know. It was pre-bootleg because it was so long ago now, which is shocking because I was like the third or, I don't know, fourth alphabet or something real early.

Speaker 2 It was before the producers knew that it was helpful for people to bootleg their performances for ticket sales.

Speaker 2 So like the second that someone would bootleg something and you would see like the maybe the picture of like a bottom of a duffel bag and like a little bit of your face and go up and down, they would pull it off the internet.

Speaker 2 So just like in the last, because of the movie, more old alphabet tape has resurfaced. And so it's, yeah, I feel like people are just kind of maybe figuring it out.

Speaker 2 It's just weird because it's a totally,

Speaker 2 it's understandably confusing is what I'm trying to say. Because if you're known from television and then you're accidentally a really good singer, it's upsetting to people.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 You know? God doesn't give with both hands, they say.

Speaker 2 I mean,

Speaker 2 I was going to be a vocalist. I was a voice major.
That's how I started my life. Like, that was the first thing that I did well.
My parents wanted me to be an opera singer, which was a bad fit.

Speaker 2 But, you know, I, so I went to Northwestern to be a voice major and then GoKats and then, thank you, Rao. And then, um,

Speaker 2 but then, you know, Chicago is the birthplace of improv comedy and I met the funny people and some, you know, things happened that I started inappropriately laughing in a couple of lectures, you know, ethnomusicology lecture, and I was asked to leave.

Speaker 2 And so I

Speaker 2 called my parents, I transferred to the school theater, and then I kind of never looked back, but because in comedy, you use your toolkit, like whatever is available, you're going to use it

Speaker 2 in sketches or whatever. So I always kind of sang.
And so I came to it in a really backwards way.

Speaker 2 So by the time I was in New York and I was doing SNL and I was kind of singing in character, you know, casting people would call me in.

Speaker 2 And then when I left SNL, I was like, okay, in earnest, I'm going to start studying again. And because, as I'm sure you know, the human voice doesn't really mature until your 30s.
Really?

Speaker 2 Yeah, it's one of those weird,

Speaker 2 yeah, it's like marathoning.

Speaker 2 Like you don't really get good at marathoning until you're a little bit older if you're a guy like really after 25 same thing with the human voice so i knew i was like young enough to go back and study and then those shows that i did you know uh alphaba and three penny opera and sondheim's passion like i did all these shows that it's a very olympic experience eight times a week your voice just gets better What is that like?

Speaker 2 You can wake up now.

Speaker 2 A gentle slumber came across the audience.

Speaker 1 No, that's that. See, that's the comedian you.
You want them to be laughing. But you're saying something so interesting.

Speaker 2 I just, they were so gentle. It was a gentle feeling.

Speaker 1 They were a sweet and gentle feeling. It was a late night last night.
They're very superficial.

Speaker 2 It's Brooklyn. They had a rough, a big, fun night.
So,

Speaker 1 people cheered themselves up at the Cuomo HQ, you said? Yeah.

Speaker 1 It was like sort of gallows humor.

Speaker 2 Gallows humor.

Speaker 1 I have so much I want to talk to you about. So you brought up your child.
You brought up your childhood. You were friends with Amy Carter.
I was friends with her.

Speaker 1 And you used to go to the White House. I did, did you go to the parts that were torn down?

Speaker 2 They're gone.

Speaker 2 I was in the, it was in the movie theater, the beloved movie theater that they were just talking about.

Speaker 1 It's a historic place.

Speaker 2 I know, because we, the first time I ever went to the White House was to see Pete's Dragon starring Helen Reddy. Yeah.
Because, and I mean,

Speaker 2 you probably read this, and it is weird to talk about, but it is now that I used to not talk about it at all because it was, it felt gross and braggy. I don't know why, but

Speaker 2 anyway, so because i was at the camp david accords and as you can tell as i literally was and that obviously it worked middle east peace has been accomplished um i went to the camp david accords i like to say jimmy carter loosened it

Speaker 2 for trump i went to the camp david accords i was there I was there.

Speaker 2 If you look it up in the paper, it's insane.

Speaker 2 It's like Zelig, where they're like, the first day they couldn't report on anything, they were like, you know, Menachemegan and Anwar Sadat and the president watched Amy and friend Anna Gastire play lightly row on the violin like we both played some like Suzuki that was the because it wouldn't report on anything and then that night Mrs.

Speaker 2 Carter came in and said girls brush your hair the Sadats are coming over to watch Star Wars

Speaker 2 And that is a true story. And what's really sad is that I didn't, it didn't really spark a lifelong interest in the Middle East.

Speaker 2 I was just fascinated that you could see Star Wars in your house.

Speaker 2 It was so mind-bending in whatever, 1977, to have a movie in your house. It was insane.

Speaker 2 Anyway,

Speaker 2 as you can see, I left Washington.

Speaker 1 Okay, now back to Broadway. Sure.
Anyway, you're on Broadway. Yes.

Speaker 1 I saw Wicked at the Kennedy Center.

Speaker 2 I'm so excited that you're into this. I would never.
No one ever guessed this about you.

Speaker 1 Oh. Yeah.

Speaker 2 Anyway, are you from Washington?

Speaker 1 I can't think of why not. What? Are you from Washington? I worked in D.C.
Right, of course. But I'm not from there.
I'm from New York.

Speaker 1 But I saw Wicked for the first time with my mother because the president has a box at the Kennedy Center.

Speaker 1 And if the president isn't going to use the tickets, you can get into like kind of like a lottery or to get the tickets. And I got them.
I took my mother to see Wicked.

Speaker 1 And sitting to my right was the late Senator Harry Reid, who did fall asleep. Sure.

Speaker 2 I have a good story after this.

Speaker 1 And I stood up applauding at Defying Gravity, and then I looked over and Harry Reid out called. I was like crying and applauding.

Speaker 2 But I was going to say, it's very, very hard to fall asleep during defying gravity.

Speaker 1 It's very loud. So he was, Harry Reid was very good at it.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 But I've seen it a couple times and it is, I can't imagine the stress of having to try to hit that, the battle cry night after night.

Speaker 2 Yes. I mean, it's insanely Olympian and exhausting, and that's all you do is worry about that and worry about your voice.
And you're just an annoying person who worries about it.

Speaker 2 It's like being an athlete. You just, whatever, sleep and water and all the things.
And you're very mean to people with children who might have colds, you know, that kind of thing.

Speaker 2 But more than that, it's very physically challenging. I mean, above and beyond the actual vocal pyrotechnics, it's really in Defying Gravity.
What's so hard is like that,

Speaker 1 you've got the

Speaker 2 broom, and you're flying, and you're supposed to look like you're flying, and the green, and all of the costumes.

Speaker 2 I guess Adina Manzel must be like a very method actress because everything is very real in the show. And once it's set on Broadway, it's set.

Speaker 2 So, like, the second act costume is, that costume is 40 pounds. Somebody, it's so heavy.
I was so skinny when I was doing the show. I was, it was so Herculean.

Speaker 2 Like, all of the, the, the buckets really heavy, the, the stupid spell book. Like, if it were, it's like a phone book, you know? Like, I, I'm serious.

Speaker 2 I, my, like, fifth or sixth performance in Chicago, my, my, my fascia blew up, and I had sort of like a triangle of bloat between my ear and my shoulder. And I ran me to the ER and everything.

Speaker 2 And it turns out it was just from the weight of the phone book, spell book in the backpack, in the book bag, like pushing against my neck for eight shows.

Speaker 2 And I came, I came back, and I was like, can we just do balsa wood? That's what we did in our town in high school. But anyway, they just replaced it.
It was very, very heavy. That's what's hard.

Speaker 2 That's actually what's hard.

Speaker 1 Was there ever, so there, there are rarely shows, but it happens where the lift doesn't work and you have to do it.

Speaker 2 The best. It's the funny, this is my favorite thing in the world.
I don't know if, is this entirely audio?

Speaker 1 No, there's video.

Speaker 2 Is there video? Okay. Because, you know, it's Broadway.
So they're pros. And it's great.
So since you seem to be interested in wicked, I'll tell you about it.

Speaker 2 So the way that it works, you know, most people think, oh, is it like a harness or whatever, you know, all the flying techniques. It's a cherry picker.
So it comes out from the back wall.

Speaker 2 It's hidden by curtains and so forth. And it's a long arm that comes in a little sort of,

Speaker 2 it clasps around you. I don't know what to call that.
A clasp.

Speaker 1 What?

Speaker 2 A claw. Yes.
Like a claw sort of goes around your waist with a faux skirt. So your own skirt.

Speaker 1 I was telling them, never ever do that again. Okay.
You never correct on a gas dyer in my presence. Hey, help me.

Speaker 2 He'll help me.

Speaker 2 So it comes together like this. And actually, I thought it was just you throwing your voice.

Speaker 2 And you're kind of running forward. And then the idea is like in The Wizard of Oz, those big scary guards come up and they hold their

Speaker 2 spears up at you and they go, seize her, and whatever. They run up.
And just at that moment, you fly up in the air. The whole thing elevates, right? So it's Broadway.
It's the big leagues.

Speaker 2 They've got to be planned, obviously.

Speaker 2 They're not going to fuck around with this, right? So it happened once in the Chicago production I did, and it happened once on Broadway. You're coming out,

Speaker 2 you're running away.

Speaker 2 It's me.

Speaker 2 It's mm, and you're not moving. You can feel that it's starting to come up.
So, what these guys do, it's theater, they're tall, they got big hats, they got spears, they go,

Speaker 2 and they lay on the floor,

Speaker 2 and they go, Jesus.

Speaker 2 So then you stand.

Speaker 2 You stand like this and you fly over.

Speaker 1 And the whole time, the whole thing, so any camera from me, we just do it like that.

Speaker 2 And you're sitting there thinking,

Speaker 2 these people spend so much money.

Speaker 2 And they are now seeing what basically amounts to the same kind of show your family would force you to watch in the basement on Thanksgiving. You know what I mean?

Speaker 2 When When kids are like, come see our wicked, you know? One of them,

Speaker 2 it's so

Speaker 1 hilarious. Well, for the true freaks, their dream is to be there on a night.
A no-fly night. A no-fly night.
No fly night. I was there.
I was there. I saw my guards lie down on the ground.

Speaker 1 It's so funny.

Speaker 2 I also had one where the elevator didn't come up in No Good Deed because it comes up through the pit. And I'm actually out of breath, which is not a great sign for my physical fitness.

Speaker 2 Because I just did a very light impression of someone lying down.

Speaker 1 Right.

Speaker 2 Which is upsetting. But anyway,

Speaker 2 back in the day, so you start eleganomanom and nom, but you like crazy that, right? No good deal.

Speaker 1 I'm freaking out. Okay, so yeah.
You're what? I'm being cool, but this is awesome. All right.

Speaker 2 So you're down there and you're singing, and then the elevator comes up, right?

Speaker 2 And it's all smoky, and you've got this kind of lectern with your spell book, and you're making spells, and it just didn't go up. And so it's so great because you're the music had already started.

Speaker 2 There's a little monitor. I'm way under, I'm a whole floor down there in the pit.

Speaker 2 And it's the greatest thing when things go wrong because for every actor that's keeping their cool, there is a dresser losing their shit. And somebody's going, My light's not fucking going.

Speaker 2 The old man is not fucking going. And it's like, people are melting down.
And you're just, I like a non and non-trained, like a non.

Speaker 2 you're singing and singing so it's starting to come up and at a certain point they're like go you gotta run like just

Speaker 2 so you're sprint i sprinted the length of the football field size theater to a cinder block you know stairwell where there was no monitor so you have no idea if like you're in pitch if you're on rhythm whatever and then and then they're just like repeating this vamp like

Speaker 2 you know over and over and then you run on and like my lungs are on fire at this point because it's 700 of those basically where I lay it down. And then there's just a bunch of monkeys like,

Speaker 1 fuck.

Speaker 2 I've been here for an hour.

Speaker 2 It's fantastic.

Speaker 2 I love mistakes.

Speaker 1 Bravo. I live for them.

Speaker 1 So

Speaker 1 you're in a show of your own. Yes.
On December 15th at Town Hall. It's called Sugar and Booze, A Holiday Spectacular.

Speaker 2 Yeah, I mean, it's really just Sugar and Booze, but I had to make it sound fun. So it is fun.
It's my holiday album. It's a collection of seasonal secular favorites.

Speaker 2 A lot of songs from the songbook, you know, all the great Christmas songs written by Jews in America.

Speaker 2 And a few originals, the titular song I wrote, Sugar and Booz. And we have a great time.
It's a holiday spectacular. There's a horn section.

Speaker 2 There will be giveaways and prizes for people who wear ugly sweaters and a white elephant and all kinds of things. You must come.
I would love to come.

Speaker 2 If you enjoy holiday fair, if you enjoy seasonal secular favorites.

Speaker 2 And I do.

Speaker 1 And if you're lucky, I'll bust out the fiddle.

Speaker 2 I'm not going to make a promise. I'm not going to make a promise.

Speaker 1 You know what's interesting about the fiddle? Go on.

Speaker 1 What makes it a fiddle is the song you play on it.

Speaker 2 That's right.

Speaker 1 And so if you take it out and say it's a fiddle, that's a lie if you start playing Mozart.

Speaker 1 But it's true if you play something.

Speaker 2 No, if you play Mozart, you call it your axe.

Speaker 1 It's your axe.

Speaker 2 This is my axe.

Speaker 2 A couple years ago, so I was a very nerd violinist and very sad, a very sad, nerdy violinist growing up before I sang. And or probably at the same time that I sang, but I didn't know yet.
And

Speaker 2 when I turned 50, I turned to my whole family.

Speaker 2 They were all like, hey, what do you want to do? Like special big day. You want to go to Italy? You want to learn how to make pasta? And I said, no, I want to go to Country Western Fiddle Camp.

Speaker 2 And they went, no, all of them.

Speaker 2 But I went anyway, and I had the best time. I had the best time because it's like improv to, you know, opera.

Speaker 2 It's like just letting it rip a little bit and learning not to be so tied to the page. I really wish I'd fiddled at Camp David.

Speaker 2 Because you know what? We might be in a different position today.

Speaker 1 And that's a lot to think about. Everybody, go see Anagas Dyer at Town Hall for Sugar Boo.
This is so good.

Speaker 2 Sugar boost. Thank you so much for having me.

Speaker 1 We'll be right back.

Speaker 1 Hey, don't go anywhere. There's more of Love It or Leave It coming up.

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Speaker 1 And we're back!

Speaker 1 My next guest is an incredible actor who gives off pure uncut New York energy, which I am not using as a euphemism for Jewish, but maybe I am.

Speaker 1 I don't know anymore. Please welcome to the stage the incredible David Crummeltz.

Speaker 1 Hey. Hi.

Speaker 1 Thanks for being here. Thanks for having me.
Hello.

Speaker 1 Yeah, there I am.

Speaker 1 I'm not even Jewish.

Speaker 1 I have no interest in being Jewish.

Speaker 1 I'm an individual.

Speaker 1 I can adapt.

Speaker 1 Yes.

Speaker 1 Hello.

Speaker 1 Good to you, Ju? Am I? Yes. Oh, fuck.
All right.

Speaker 1 Let's get through this.

Speaker 1 All right. I'm already having fun.
I like you. Yeah, we'll be fine.
So you're in the Bruce Bringstein movie. Yeah.

Speaker 1 It's called Deliver Me from Nowhere. The what? Deliver Me Me from Nowhere.
I thought you said the little kite from nowhere for a second.

Speaker 1 I swear that's what I heard. The little kike from nowhere.
And that's what I said. Deliver me from nowhere.
That's right.

Speaker 1 Now, you're in the Bruce Springsteen biopic. You live in New Jersey.
Do people even let your feet touch the ground anymore?

Speaker 1 Nobody cares.

Speaker 1 Nobody cares. Have you met Bruce? I did meet Bruce when I was filming the movie, and he was a very, very nice person.

Speaker 1 That's the whole story.

Speaker 1 He was very nice, and,

Speaker 1 you know,

Speaker 1 he came to the set, and everybody, you know, greeted him, and they treat him like, you know, a god.

Speaker 1 And I walked over and I said, and what is your involvement with this?

Speaker 1 And he liked that. That's good.

Speaker 1 That's a good joke. Yeah.
That's a good joke, David Crumholtz.

Speaker 1 Thanks so much. You guys want to know something something you have in common?

Speaker 1 Okay.

Speaker 1 Anna, you were in an episode of a show called Running Wild, but Wild

Speaker 1 has an E at the end of it

Speaker 1 because it's the character's name. Sure.
And David, you were in a show called Lion's Den, but Lion was spelled with a Y

Speaker 1 because that was a name.

Speaker 2 I feel like this is a question for a diagnosis for you.

Speaker 2 I say that with no judgment. It's just an observation, as my mother likes to say.

Speaker 1 Next question.

Speaker 1 So I was thinking about,

Speaker 1 so I first, you were in a very formative role for me, which was Adam's family values. Okay.
Thank you. Well, that's nice.

Speaker 1 Yeah, that was me.

Speaker 1 And I think it's interesting because to me, like when I think of you, and you can tell me how this, this, how you react to this,

Speaker 1 there are times when you are

Speaker 1 a smart outcast

Speaker 1 who's kind of nebbishy and nerdy and put upon. Sure.
There are times where you are dashing and handsome. God damn right.

Speaker 1 Then there are times where you go between the two. Like in Freaks and Geeks, you were a former nerd who comes back and is like, there's a future for you.
In college, you can be confident. Right.

Speaker 1 That's called range.

Speaker 1 Something I specialize in.

Speaker 1 Without makeup, I'm the Lon Cheney of my generation.

Speaker 1 What?

Speaker 1 For the young people, Lon Cheney was the, ah, forget it.

Speaker 1 God help us.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 That's interesting. Well, thank you.
I don't know. Emma, I don't know.
Should I thank you? Thank you. I don't know what

Speaker 1 I'm thanking you for. Well, what I was going to ask is, do you feel like your character in Adam's Family Value was Jewish-coded?

Speaker 1 Oh, 100%. Because his name was Glickman, I believe.
Yeah, Glicker. Glicker.
Yeah, 100%.

Speaker 1 And it feels like that camp is like, they don't ever come out and say it, but they seem like they're kind of anti-Semitic. Well, they're Aryan.

Speaker 1 They're Aryan. So,

Speaker 1 no, obviously. Yeah.

Speaker 1 I actually played up the Jewishness in that one,

Speaker 1 which is something I have to do quite often

Speaker 1 because

Speaker 1 this really isn't enough.

Speaker 1 No, I was saying backstage, all the

Speaker 1 Jewish friends I have that don't, this is, how do you say this, that don't look typically Jewish, that may pass for something that's not, are really religious.

Speaker 1 I have done enough. My name is David Crumholtz and I look like this.
I'm so not religious at all. I have no interest.
I've never been. This is plenty.
I am, I carry the cross.

Speaker 1 In the show numbers. Yes.

Speaker 1 The E

Speaker 1 in numbers

Speaker 1 was a three.

Speaker 2 Careful.

Speaker 1 That's right. Because the show is about numbers.
Right.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 Put down the card.

Speaker 2 Put down the cart.

Speaker 1 In the original, they fucked it up because in the original pilot,

Speaker 1 it said three, and it would go to a two and a one, and the show would start. Because like, here's the thing.
And that was brilliant. I was like, let's go.

Speaker 1 And then they kept the three, but never did that again.

Speaker 1 In the movie seven. Yeah.

Speaker 1 The V is a seven. Which makes no sense.

Speaker 1 But it does because it's about seven. I get that.
But V and seven don't look like

Speaker 1 rotated. Three could be an E backwards.

Speaker 1 But the seven is rotated. One is

Speaker 1 reflected through a vertical. It's going to be okay.
It's going to be okay, John. You're all right.
Don't get emotional about it. Do you think,

Speaker 1 hey.

Speaker 1 Do you ever think sometimes you've been typecast as a curmudgeon?

Speaker 1 That's another veiled Jew question. You know, do you typecast as a Jew? Yes, I've played rabbis.
It's a nightmare. But

Speaker 1 no, do I ever get typecast as a curmudgeon?

Speaker 1 No, I get, you know, lately I'm an agent in everything.

Speaker 1 And you're great, by the way, in the studio. Well, and that's true.
This is, thank you so much. The truth is, and this is real, for many years in Hollywood, I would go to,

Speaker 1 you know, they'd tell you, hey, go to the parties,

Speaker 1 be seen, you know. And I would go, and people would think I was an agent's assistant because I'd wear a suit and look nice.
And people were like, so what agency do you work for?

Speaker 1 And I'd say, I, well, I'm with,

Speaker 1 you know, whatever, C U T A.

Speaker 1 And they would say, in what department?

Speaker 1 And I'd say, well,

Speaker 1 fuck you.

Speaker 1 This is a traumatic life I've lived, yeah.

Speaker 1 It's cozy to rest my mouth on this phone.

Speaker 1 I just want to say that.

Speaker 1 Have you have any experiences with some classic curmudgeons?

Speaker 1 Yes.

Speaker 1 I worked with... They're both dead, so I can bash them.

Speaker 1 It's Dick Cheney, you're telling me about Chengdu.

Speaker 1 What's that? Dick Cheney. Dick Cheney, yeah, I worked with him very closely.
What up?

Speaker 1 Just constantly complaining about his back.

Speaker 1 No,

Speaker 1 I don't know. I worked with Alan Arkin, who was quite curmudgeony and hilarious and lovely and way funnier when he was angry than when he was trying to be funny.

Speaker 1 You ever around someone where they get super duper angry? and it's the funniest thing you've ever seen and you have to hide your laughter? He would note it. I see, it's not even funny.

Speaker 1 I don't know why you're laughing.

Speaker 1 I was standing on a bridge in Nova Scotia looking out over a lake, and I thought, I should kill myself. So I'm going to throw myself in the lake.

Speaker 1 Instead, I decided to spend the rest of my life working on myself.

Speaker 1 He's like, wow, thanks for that.

Speaker 1 And then

Speaker 1 Ed Asner.

Speaker 1 Oh, boy, was Ed Asner. I mean, literally

Speaker 1 the talk about type, curmudgeon type. And I did,

Speaker 1 I was telling on a backstage, I have done eight failed multicam series, multicam comedies, meaning none of them made it past 13 episodes. We all got canceled.
They all got canceled.

Speaker 1 I did eight of those motherfuckers. There's nothing like bombing

Speaker 1 in front of a live audience with someone else's bad jokes, you know, that you know are bad. We call it turd polishing.
Oh, God. And I did one with Ed Asner called The Closer.

Speaker 1 It was Tom Selic and Ed Asner.

Speaker 1 Was his last name Closer or is it just a different?

Speaker 2 You know what's weird? I'm sorry.

Speaker 1 The E was a three. The E was a three, yeah.

Speaker 1 Both Es, the Closer, both E's. Two threes.

Speaker 1 And so what happened was, you know, I remember, you know, Ed was really depressed sometimes, and some older actor came and did a guest spot on the show and said, hey, Ed, how's it going with a big smile on his face and it said how can it be going for any of us and wanted the older actor to commiserate like let's face it we're old and it's terrible and the older actor was like i feel fine um

Speaker 1 but what happened was we got canceled and they came down and and they

Speaker 1 from I don't know why I say came down, but they came over to the set and we were in the middle of rehearsing a scene and said, guys, we've been pulled off the air.

Speaker 1 We're just going to finish this episode. We're going to film this this episode, but basically that's it.
So why don't we take a 20-minute break?

Speaker 1 Everybody take a break and process this horror that the show has been canceled. Meanwhile, half of us were like, thank God.
But so Ed took off.

Speaker 1 And 20 minutes later, the director of the episode was an older man named Alan Rafkin, who had directed a bunch of Mary Tyler Moore and the Lou Grant show. So they were old friends.

Speaker 1 And 20 minutes later, we're all back on set. We're going to rehearse this scene, And Ed is gone.
And 10 minutes, 15 minutes, we're like, did Ed leave? Everybody's looking for Ed.

Speaker 1 And finally, Ed came moseying towards set with a large bowl of hot oatmeal. And he's walking slowly and he's just eating this oatmeal.

Speaker 1 And Alan Rafkin did the whole, hey, thanks for joining us, Ed, thing.

Speaker 1 And Ed Asner had a mouthful of oatmeal and spit it all over Alan Rathkin's head, his face. It was like in his nails.
And Alan Rafkin,

Speaker 1 oh, God, Ed, oh, geez. And we're all like, oh, Ed, man, taking us too far, man.
It's not that big a deal. And then we started rehearsing.

Speaker 1 And in the corner of our eye, I just see like people coming over with towels and wiping down this old director. And Ed was, man,

Speaker 1 that's a real thing that I saw.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 Wow.

Speaker 2 I love that he bothered to come back to do that.

Speaker 1 He did.

Speaker 2 I mean, I would have been at the smokehouse on my third martini, I think. That's the thing about getting old and cranky.
You'd be like, whatever, we're going to get paid. I'm not going to get fired.

Speaker 1 Let's go get fucked up.

Speaker 2 Yeah, let's get fucked up.

Speaker 1 You know,

Speaker 1 he had a piece of toilet paper on his shoe, and I'm glad I didn't say anything. Yeah, I am too.
I'm glad I didn't say, hey, yeah, you got a piece of, I would have got a caught a face full of oatmeal.

Speaker 2 Like, that's what you're going to go for is the oatmeal?

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 2 Like, I feel like you got to look for the most expensive craft service item and pack it up.

Speaker 1 Or it's donut time. Or it's donut time.
Or it's just donut time. Yeah.
That's show business.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 And now it's time for a game we're calling Arma Kamudjigeddin.

Speaker 1 Here's how it works.

Speaker 1 I'm going to name her Khmudjin, who's either from New York or really seems like they should be.

Speaker 1 David and Ana, you're going to blind rank that mudge on a scale of one to five with one being the most mudgeonly,

Speaker 1 but you won't know who the next curmudge will be. Ooh, this is ranking them from one to five, but you may you have to be careful because you don't know who will be next.
Okay, okay, first up.

Speaker 1 Yeah,

Speaker 1 I'm checking to see if she understands it as well. Yes, okay.
I just want to make sure everyone's comfortable. I'm fine.
This is fun. Remember Oppenheimer? Yeah.

Speaker 2 Math, math, math, math, math, math, math, math, math.

Speaker 1 Do you know that the show Numbers is about math yeah

Speaker 1 okay

Speaker 1 i'm ready

Speaker 1 yes we have vermont senator and brooklyn's native son bernie sanders oh man

Speaker 1 wow here's the classic photo from biden's inauguration

Speaker 1 yeah

Speaker 1 uh i was once interviewing bernie sanders and mid-question he went he leaned back and looked to his aide and went

Speaker 1 That's real. That really happened to me.
It was a real blow. It was a real blow.
That's curmudgeon behavior. That's curmudgeon behavior.

Speaker 1 Where do you think you're going to rank? Okay, I'm just going to say he has messages of hope that are veiled under

Speaker 1 messages of doom and dread.

Speaker 1 So I'm going to say he's a three. I'm not going to give him the number one spot.
One is the most curmudgeon. I'm going to say three.

Speaker 2 I think I was actually going to say the exact same thing. So much of it is about hope and optimism.

Speaker 2 So I'm actually going to go pretty high i'm going to go six or seven um i know i know i don't isn't it one to five because there's veiled kindness there's veiled kindness

Speaker 1 i asked you if you understood ranking him on a scale of did you know

Speaker 2 that if you turn a you upside down

Speaker 2 it's a horseshoe

Speaker 2 wow and that represents luck to a lot of people

Speaker 1 Now, some people would say that a movie like Too Fast, Too Furious also uses numbers, but that's using numbers in a different way.

Speaker 2 So, so true. So true.
And also, sometimes people refer to a song as a number.

Speaker 1 Oh, that's true.

Speaker 1 Why do they do that? All right. Well, let's say, can we say three? Feel good about three?

Speaker 2 I'm in a, yeah, so five is our top?

Speaker 1 Five would be the least curmudgeonly. Yes, I'm going to say three.

Speaker 2 I'm in consensus here.

Speaker 1 Next up, we have... Fran Leibowitz.

Speaker 1 Oh.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 One thing about leaving your apartment is that there's so many other people out there.

Speaker 1 The great thing about my apartment, aside from the fact that it's a great apartment, is that I control if there are other people in it.

Speaker 1 A classic curmudgeon sentence, if I'd ever heard one.

Speaker 1 I'm going to go. You know what? She's really...

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 1 I'm going to say number one. I'm going to take a risk and say she's the most curmudgeony

Speaker 1 New Yorker. Well, are there any non-Jews on this list? Yeah.
Okay. I thought about that.
I thought about that. Not, I'll tell you something.
Not when we first made the list. Yeah, I bet.
I bet.

Speaker 1 It's hard. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 Wait a second. Wait a second.
Am I doing it? Am I a part of it? Am I? Wait, wait a second. Yeah.

Speaker 2 I'm going to just say two because we got to do the math. You like math.

Speaker 1 I do.

Speaker 1 I do like math.

Speaker 1 Okay, a two from Anna. Next up, we have the character George Jefferson.

Speaker 1 George Jefferson. What do you mean you're kidding me?

Speaker 1 That is a classic curmudgeon. Are you kidding me?

Speaker 2 This is how you diversify it.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I guess. In hindsight, is it for Jews and George Jefferson?

Speaker 1 I think it might be.

Speaker 1 And that's something we can talk about after.

Speaker 1 I don't know how it happened, but let me.

Speaker 2 There's a fabulous list of Jews and George Jefferson.

Speaker 1 But the reason I wanted to include George Jefferson,

Speaker 1 because Sherman

Speaker 1 Hemsley is so funny. And

Speaker 1 he was also, he never came out of the closet, but he's rumored to have been gay. Okay.
You know, he was also a big psychedelic tripping hippie guy. Really? Yeah.

Speaker 1 True story.

Speaker 1 Yeah, he was a big,

Speaker 1 you know, counterculture guy. I'm going to say.

Speaker 1 Because he would dance on the show and he loved Wheezy.

Speaker 1 He loved him some Wheezies.

Speaker 2 Kindness and hope, kindness and hope. They always take the number.

Speaker 1 Yeah, you should have gone Red Fox, man. Yeah.
You blew it.

Speaker 1 I'm going to say five. I'm going to say five, yes.

Speaker 1 Thank you.

Speaker 2 I don't want to get canceled, so I'm going to agree.

Speaker 1 Smart. Andy Rooney.

Speaker 1 He's not Jewish, I don't think. Ah, we're good.
Yeah, we're good.

Speaker 1 He's a curmudgeon, right? Not Jewish, I don't think. Is he? Google it.

Speaker 2 He's an an Irish grump. Yeah.

Speaker 1 Yeah, he's an Irish grump. You're right.

Speaker 2 An old salty Irish grump.

Speaker 1 Oh, you buy stamp me feet.

Speaker 2 You know the thing.

Speaker 1 That's how he spoke.

Speaker 1 Imagine the Jewish version of that.

Speaker 1 You just saw it. I did too.

Speaker 1 I just saw it. I just saw it.
So where are we ranking Andy? Now wait, wait, wait. We don't need a go.
I say two.

Speaker 1 Two.

Speaker 1 Someone shouted he was an atheist. Okay.

Speaker 1 What's his nationality, though?

Speaker 1 I say two.

Speaker 2 But he also made a living of curmudgeonliness. Like he actively sought out stuff to be bummed out by.
You know, that was the whole point of that section. Who needs bird clocks?

Speaker 2 You know, like whatever it was.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 2 I don't need a cardinal to tell me it's 2 p.m.

Speaker 2 I mean, that would be like walking through your day, just like,

Speaker 2 you know. Why take the pulp out of orange juice? It's not a good example.
But you know what I mean.

Speaker 1 I got a pedicure the other day, and I gotta tell you, I could do that at home for myself with my teeth.

Speaker 2 Yeah, so it actually takes the, it takes, it adds something considerable to the story. Even if it's like, even if he's, you know,

Speaker 2 just a, you know,

Speaker 2 functioning dry drunk Irish

Speaker 2 crank, then, you know, it's still, it's an act, there's active work there. There's not just

Speaker 2 I'm not participating, which I think is the bottom, like the Bernie camogenliness is I'm not, I'm too old. That's, I'm not participating.
You guys take care of this. You handle it.

Speaker 2 And then if you're like going up, anyway, I've said so much.

Speaker 1 I think Andy Rooney thought he was speaking for the youth.

Speaker 1 No, he did. I think it was very much.
Did you ever?

Speaker 1 He's trying to get through to like 18-year-olds.

Speaker 1 You ever just put your penis down

Speaker 1 and think it's lonely, maybe I should pick it back up?

Speaker 1 Last up, we have Larry David.

Speaker 1 Where are we on the, Caroline, where are we on the rankings to this point? Because we're going to have to put him in a slot.

Speaker 1 Well, that makes sense to me. Because it's all a joke.
It's all a bit.

Speaker 1 His mind works. He's a comedy machine.
It's all a bit. Do I think he's like that in real life? Probably to some extent.

Speaker 2 He's very much that in real life.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 2 I saw the fake orgasm for four hours on a car rig driving around Park Avenue up and down because I did an episode of Curb where my running board of my car was broken and we were on a date.

Speaker 2 And by the time we pulled up in front of my apartment, he was like, Do you want to go up? And I was like, no, I'm good. So

Speaker 2 that's like a long time to chat with someone in between fake orgasms, four hours just going around and around. And he's hilarious, but he's a crank.

Speaker 1 Yeah.

Speaker 1 I sat behind him at a premiere. Yeah.
And he was, his guest, he was Greg Kinnear. And it was obviously that

Speaker 1 this was like a blind date business thing. He had never met Greg Kinnear.
Unbelievable. And Greg Kinnear was attempting to sort of make fun of him.
And he seemed incredibly annoyed by Greg Canille.

Speaker 2 Incredible, like yeah, and he's he's got the he's he's got the high bar of like not he true.

Speaker 2 He's got, I guess he's got the Bernie thing a little bit where he just, it's not important to him to worry about the niceties of explaining his curmudgeonliness.

Speaker 1 What an amazing achievement to make, I don't feel like talking to people, and sometimes I'm in a bad mood, your delightful brand.

Speaker 1 And he can just walk out of any room he wants at any time, and everyone's like, classic Larry. Yes.

Speaker 1 Brilliant. Yeah.
What a genius.

Speaker 2 And to take everything insane he's ever done and make an incredible piece of television out of it.

Speaker 2 I mean, he, you know, he really did famously storm out of Saturday Night Live, which absolutely everybody has at one point or another wanted to do, and several people have, but where he like threw his pages and stormed out.

Speaker 2 He famously tells this story. He was one of the things we talked about.

Speaker 1 We were driving around the bluff.

Speaker 1 Have you ever quit a job?

Speaker 2 No, I'm the worst. I just

Speaker 2 put up with abuse. Take it on and have a lot of extra therapies.

Speaker 1 I had to quit one once. You did? Because of a curmudgeon.

Speaker 1 Okay, go on.

Speaker 1 Absolutely hated me. And every time I told him I loved him, it made him hate me more.

Speaker 1 And you have had him on this show.

Speaker 1 And he fucking loathes me and I was lovely to him. I worship the guy.

Speaker 1 I would have combed his hair if he asked me to. And he's been on this show? He has, goddamn it.
That's it. And he's curmudgeonly.

Speaker 1 One of his most iconic characters is an incredibly curmudgeon-y person. You know who I'm talking about.
I don't. Okay.

Speaker 1 Now maybe we should leave it that way. We'll leave it there for that's where we'll leave it.

Speaker 1 Oh, you want that? No, I'll say it. Danny DeVito fucking hated me.

Speaker 1 And it was so bad that I had to quit.

Speaker 1 What happened it was unbelievable i don't want to tell the story but it was unbelievable look he had just gotten sober and gone vegan at the same time that's a mistake

Speaker 1 too many changes it's too many changes too many changes too many changes

Speaker 2 and meat proteins you got to have a big mac and an and a beer

Speaker 1 he cursed me out one day so bad for the I said there was a line we're doing this play and I was doing the we were in rehearsals, and there was a line where I say, hey,

Speaker 1 you know, you could go to the

Speaker 1 actors' home in New Brunswick is the line. I don't know if you guys know what play that is, and I'm not going to tell you, but anyway, and I said, in rehearsal, you know,

Speaker 1 I said, well, there's the actor's home in New Brunswick. And he said, wait a second.

Speaker 1 Is there a question mark at the end of that line? And I said, I said, well, no. Then why do you say it like a question? I said, I don't know.
I just, I mean, a rehearsal.

Speaker 1 And he says, say the fucking line.

Speaker 1 And that was after a long string of abuse. And I thought, and my wife was pregnant with my first child.
And I had like all this insecurity. I was like freaking out.
And I was like,

Speaker 1 I said, I need a break and I went outside and I called my dad. And my dad was a New York City mailman, worked his ass off,

Speaker 1 had to be at work at 2 a.m. every morning for 30 years.
Wow. And he was always the guy that was like, take the money and don't complain about anything.

Speaker 1 So I knew and I called him and he was like, you quit. He was so upset.
And then I told him the story and he said, good for you, son. Don't take shit from anybody.

Speaker 1 And I went back in and I said, I'm sorry, but this is not for me. And I'll never forget he was sitting on a bed and he got up.
which wasn't much of a change.

Speaker 1 And he looked at me and he said, the fuck?

Speaker 1 and i said i can't make you happy man fucking nasty you hate me cursing me out in front of everybody i fucking say in a line what the fuck

Speaker 1 yeah this is broke my heart

Speaker 1 really truly

Speaker 1 yeah but you did the right thing you did the right thing i would have cried too but you would have you did the right thing i did the right thing yeah yeah really you did yeah

Speaker 2 thank you because by the way too it's eight a week yeah it's rehearsal like that's not gonna get better and look he's probably a lovely guy he was going through a very difficult time.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I kind of wanted to be a recognition. And I just want to say that, although no one, if this ever gets out, no one's going to see this part.
And no one's going to include the podcast.

Speaker 1 I have compassion for the curmudgeon. And I'll tell you why.
No doubt Fran Leibowitz is incontinent. No doubt.

Speaker 1 And if you were walking around with a giant shit

Speaker 1 between your ass cheese.

Speaker 2 80% of these people have IBS.

Speaker 1 That is true.

Speaker 2 It just goes with the territory.

Speaker 1 Right.

Speaker 2 there's a reason they call it a sour stomach.

Speaker 1 And we'll be right back.

Speaker 1 Hey, don't go anywhere. There's more of Love It or Leave It coming up.
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Speaker 1 And we're back!

Speaker 1 One note before we get back to everything.

Speaker 1 Sorry, I didn't mean to laugh at you.

Speaker 1 I've been doing this for so long, and I have so much practice, and yet it seems like in some ways I don't. But is that part of it? Am I doing a character? Yeah.

Speaker 1 Fascinating. You're amazing at this, though.
I mean, really.

Speaker 1 Thank you. You're excellent.
Very sweet, funny, and engaging, warm.

Speaker 1 I love you.

Speaker 1 Everybody does.

Speaker 1 We've got a brand new episode of our limited series, Bravo America, on the Love It or Leave It feed. Next week's guest, Dorinda Medley.

Speaker 1 Her Roni Origin story, lessons politicians can learn from reality TV, which politicians are better suited to reality TV. TV.

Speaker 1 I talked to Dorinda about what I felt is something beautiful about her as a person on reality TV, which is she seems to be both vulnerable and at times can be mean, at which point her eyes changed and I realized,

Speaker 1 just remember the first part I said.

Speaker 1 It's a really great conversation. So that'll be out on Tuesday.
Listen on the Love It or Leave It feed or watch on YouTube. Okay.

Speaker 1 New York does a lot of things best, most recently electing mayors, but you all treat ranting like an Olympic sport.

Speaker 1 So we're going to wrap things up with our favorite segment, the rant wheel, or as you'd say here in New York, hey, we're ranting here.

Speaker 2 What's with my Melania hair?

Speaker 1 What's with any of it?

Speaker 1 Let's spin the wheel.

Speaker 1 It has landed on David. You have 60 seconds to rant about a topic.
topic. Okay, you ready? Yeah.

Speaker 1 It seems that we are in a period of chronic dissatisfaction in this country because we confuse freedom with abundance.

Speaker 1 You see, we see 26 flavors of Pop-Tarts at the grocery store and we think we're free, but really, it's just a lot of stuff. And what ends up happening is it's never enough.
Where's the 27th flavor?

Speaker 1 Where's the 28th, right? Right. And so now what we've become is this

Speaker 1 drama, like desperate for drama desperate for chaos a nihilistic culture

Speaker 1 where every candidate uh who might take you know control of the like momdani or even trump is like going to destroy the fabric of the world now wait a second democracy is not so so thinly spread it's not fragile.

Speaker 1 It's not sensitive. It's actually the strongest form of government that's ever been created.
And no, I'm sorry, but not one man or even ten men can undo the foundation of democracy.

Speaker 1 But when we tell ourselves that and when we hit social media and tell other people that, we are engaging in our own nihilism, which we are responsible for solely, I don't care how badly it scares you, okay?

Speaker 1 At the end of the day, they prey on the fear. So perhaps be strong, be positive, send encouraging messages.
I'm not saying lie down and don't do anything. I'm saying maybe calm the fuck down.

Speaker 1 Thanks.

Speaker 1 It's an important message. You're talking to a group of people whose phones haven't actually successfully gone into lock mode since Trump was elected in 2016.

Speaker 1 Just been glued to them. So it's an important, important word.
I think so.

Speaker 1 Thank you.

Speaker 1 David Crumholtz.

Speaker 1 In Oppenheimer, an Italian man played Einstein, which I think is fine. I like when Italians play Jews and Jews play Italians.

Speaker 2 What about Greeks? What about Greeks?

Speaker 1 They're not part of it. Killian is Irish.

Speaker 1 Killian is Irish. Killian is Murphy.
And Oppenheimer was Jewish. That's right.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 Let's spin it again.

Speaker 1 Oh, no.

Speaker 1 Oh, no.

Speaker 1 That's me. Uh-oh.

Speaker 2 I did not prepare very well for this.

Speaker 2 But the thing that, the person that makes me the maddest on planet Earth right now, and it's very, it's not really the point, but it's Mike Johnson. He's so fucking smug.
You know what?

Speaker 2 He drives me crazy because he's the super unpopular guy who gets cast in the play and you're like, you weren't the choice, man.

Speaker 2 Like, nobody wanted you to be playing, you know, like, I know you you played Rumpel Stilskin in fourth grade, but apart from that, you, no, nobody thinks that you're good as Curly.

Speaker 2 Like, you're just the only guy that has the tenor range, right? So, he got, and guess what?

Speaker 2 You're running around and you're collecting the money for the director's gift for everybody, and that's not like a cool position to put yourself in.

Speaker 2 And now, he's like the guy that thinks he's like landed in like, you know, big, big, big, big dick of Cock Island. And it's so enraging because no one wants to date him.

Speaker 2 Everyone's vagina dries when he walks into the room.

Speaker 2 I think some fellas here discovered they have dry vaginas too.

Speaker 1 You guys remember MASH, the show MASH, some of you?

Speaker 1 He's like the radar of our government. He gives off exactly what he's doing.
No one wanted to fuck radar. No.
Ain't nobody trying to fuck radar? Nobody wanted to fuck radar.

Speaker 1 Let's spin it again.

Speaker 1 Oh, God, there's more? Or it's yours? It's just me. Okay.

Speaker 1 So I want to talk about whatever the fuck is going on with the rehabilitation of Marjorie Taylor Greene. Oh!

Speaker 1 But I don't, I actually don't,

Speaker 1 I want to understand

Speaker 1 why it's working.

Speaker 1 Like, it's like people are like, haha, broken clock.

Speaker 1 It's more than a twice a day now. You know what I mean? It's like, I'm sorry, but like, broken clocks aren't right this often.
What's happening? Right? And it's like,

Speaker 1 like, what? Like, and it's also like, wait a second, I didn't realize you were capable. Like,

Speaker 1 you know, there's like David Axrob had this expression, which is like, when you see a bear on a unicycle, you don't judge his technique, you're just amazed.

Speaker 1 That's it.

Speaker 2 I have a theory, though. Do you want to hear my theory?

Speaker 2 I mean, and you probably already thought of this, but basically, the thing about conspiracy theorists is you just have to think of another conspiracy to dismantle the first conspiracy.

Speaker 2 And I think that's what's happened with her.

Speaker 2 I think that she's actually, like, we threw Epstein in there, not that that's a conspiracy, it's real, but all the things about it are suddenly making sense to her.

Speaker 2 So, suddenly, all the other conspiracies that she's had, she's suddenly waking up and saying, like, wait, the moon landing was fake, and like having lots of other things like that.

Speaker 1 Right? It's like you know what I'm saying? Yeah, it's like the political equivalent, like the Armageddon date didn't happen.

Speaker 1 So, she went back in and recrunched the numbers and came up with a new date that's further away. And it's like, yeah, I guess it is more reasonable for it to be far away.

Speaker 1 Yes, that's what Jehovah's Witnesses do. Really?

Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah, they just do the math again.

Speaker 1 Yeah, it's so cool.

Speaker 1 David Crumhold, thank you so much for being here.

Speaker 1 Thank you so much. We made it.
Thank you for having me.

Speaker 1 The Bruce Springsteen film

Speaker 1 is out on a show at Town Halls, December 15th.

Speaker 2 December 15, Town hall.

Speaker 1 We'll be right back.

Speaker 1 And we're back.

Speaker 1 Come on out, guys.

Speaker 1 Before we go, I want you guys to hear Victor Jones one more time. But before we do,

Speaker 1 Victor,

Speaker 1 I reached out to you just via Instagram. Yes.

Speaker 1 Because I was being served your music via TikTok over and over again, and I really loved it. And you have such a fascinating way of associating and writing.

Speaker 1 And there were people that were accusing you of using AI. And I want you to have an opportunity to respond.

Speaker 1 Yeah, so I had a whole response plan, which was inclusive of, you know, points like AI

Speaker 1 being generative from lots of sources, which would turn out something a lot more lowest common denominator and generic than the whole idea that you hear something weird and quirky and you're like, oh, it must be AI.

Speaker 1 It's just a, shows a fundamental misunderstanding of what AI is capable of in the modern era. But I thought it would be a lot more fun to just pull up my notes app

Speaker 1 and to prove that this is actually how my brain works. So I'd like to show John, just so this is not a magic trick.
These are many different dates from over the course of years, correct?

Speaker 1 Yeah, and that says January 6th, be there, will be wild.

Speaker 1 We're not talking about that. That's weird.

Speaker 1 A little nerve-wracking, just see. Of course, of course, but we won't won't get into that today i just want to really quick uh

Speaker 1 brush through a few of these we've got some good ones some that are actually going to end up in songs like i love you happy birthday i think i am an island which is going to be a song and maybe the title of a song we've also got some ideas like evil dr doolittle uses powers for murder but gets away with it because no one believes he really told the animals to do that um

Speaker 1 Wait more more lyrics that'll probably end up we've got heaven hot damn and seven pipers piping I don't know what that means I have OCD. I get intrusive thoughts, like genuinely diagnosed OCD.

Speaker 1 So I get like thoughts that I don't know what they mean, and they go on paper and they go into a song. We've got one that I love.
I don't know, it just says a dozen guys.

Speaker 1 We've got crab haircut. Oh, that became a sketch.

Speaker 1 This one says crab haircut, too short, too long, crab riddle. And that actually turned into,

Speaker 1 and then, yeah, I'll just end with this one, which is a line, two lines that are going to be in the same song. One of them is, she told me that her cousin is a cop, but he's actually really nice,

Speaker 1 which is, I thought, kind of political and interesting.

Speaker 1 Which is half myself like, oh, it's political. What is it? It's political.

Speaker 1 And then the other one is, my heart is my own goddamn property, which I am going to show up in a song next year. So, not AI, my notes app, everybody.
And

Speaker 1 where can people find you? Oh, you can find me on any of the socials at Victor Jones Music.

Speaker 1 But if you're just kind of the kind of person who listens to music, you can find me on any of the streaming services, Victor Jones. I'm the first search Victor Jones.

Speaker 1 And as of two weeks ago, if you Google me, I have ousted a 60-year-old linebacker as the top Victor Jones on Google.

Speaker 1 All right, everybody, one more time.

Speaker 1 Thank you. Victor Jones is going to sing a song.
Love it. And I'll be right back.

Speaker 1 So, yeah, this one

Speaker 1 is called Shoulder Song. We're dialing it in for you.
Let's hit it, Marcus.

Speaker 1 Sometimes I feel like I'm just a hot air balloon, lifted up by the things that I want out of life.

Speaker 1 Like what?

Speaker 1 Like

Speaker 1 I want to be famous,

Speaker 1 famous and happy in that order, and also sometimes I kind of want to die.

Speaker 1 Does that count?

Speaker 1 I want to get your number,

Speaker 1 I want to touch your shoulder,

Speaker 1 I wanna get close to you.

Speaker 1 I wanna get your number.

Speaker 1 Touch your shoulder

Speaker 1 and get close to you.

Speaker 1 I like mean women,

Speaker 1 I like soft men.

Speaker 1 Sometimes I need to be alone.

Speaker 1 I like mean women,

Speaker 1 I like soft men.

Speaker 1 I hold it down to die. Sometimes I need to be alone.

Speaker 1 Ah, yeah,

Speaker 1 be alone

Speaker 1 to be alone

Speaker 1 so I can get your number.

Speaker 1 I wanna touch your shoulder.

Speaker 1 I wanna look for

Speaker 1 you.

Speaker 1 I wanna get your thunder,

Speaker 1 touch your shoulders.

Speaker 1 I wanna get close to you.

Speaker 1 You slide like a marrow

Speaker 1 from a broken bone

Speaker 1 Tell me what to do

Speaker 1 Tell me what to what to what two three four

Speaker 1 You got your hands in your pockets

Speaker 1 You got your eyes on the floor

Speaker 1 you got your digits on doorsteps,

Speaker 1 you got your brain in a jar. I got you under me.

Speaker 1 You kept up with the noose.

Speaker 1 I don't know how you stayed strong

Speaker 1 if I kept up like you do.

Speaker 1 my best, worst enemy.

Speaker 1 You leave me laid out, can't take you anywhere.

Speaker 1 I got a friend, got a friend, and she's not from here.

Speaker 1 I wish you'd tell me what you do when you're not around.

Speaker 1 Yeah, I wish you'd tell me.

Speaker 1 I wish you'd fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, barrel like a tiger and heat.

Speaker 1 I got fear dripping off of my teeth.

Speaker 1 You leave me laying out, little

Speaker 1 you leave me laying out.

Speaker 1 You leave me laying out.

Speaker 1 I wanna get your number.

Speaker 1 I wanna touch your shoulder.

Speaker 1 I wanna get close to you.

Speaker 1 I wanna get your number.

Speaker 1 Touch your shoulder.

Speaker 1 I wanna get close to you.

Speaker 1 I wanna get your number.

Speaker 1 Wanna touch it on your shoulder.

Speaker 1 Wanna get close to you.

Speaker 1 I wanna get your number

Speaker 1 and touch your shoulder.

Speaker 1 I wanna

Speaker 1 Thank you, everybody. Have a good night.

Speaker 1 One more time to Victor Jones.

Speaker 1 Thank you to Alan Gaster and David Cromos. Thank you all for coming out.
Thank you to Crown Hill Theater. Thank you, Brooklyn.
Way to go, New York.

Speaker 1 Let's keep it going because we have 360 days until the midterms. Have a great night and have a great weekend.

Speaker 1 If you're already scrolling endlessly, which we know you are, don't forget to follow us at Crooked Media on Instagram, TikTok, and all the other ones for original content, community events, and more.

Speaker 1 You can also find Love It or Leave It on YouTube for videos of your favorite segments and other YouTube-exclusive content.

Speaker 1 And if you want to type our praises or rip us a new one, consider dropping us a review.

Speaker 1 Finally, you can join Crooked's Friends of the Pod subscription community for ad-free Love It or Leave It and Pod Save America episodes, subscriber exclusive pods, and more.

Speaker 1 Sign up at crooked.com/slash friends. Love it or leave it is a crooked media production.
It is written and produced by me, John Lovett, and Lee Eisenberg. Kendra James is our executive producer.

Speaker 1 Bill McGrath is our producer, and Kennedy Hill is our associate producer. Hallie Kiefer is our head writer.
Sarah Lazarus, Jocelyn Kaufman, Peter Miller, Alan Pierre, and Suba Agarwal are our writers.

Speaker 1 Jordan Cantor is our editor. Kyle Seglin and Charlotte Landis provide audio support.
Stephen Cologne is our audio engineer. Our theme song is written and performed by Schersher.

Speaker 1 Thanks to our designer Sammy Koderna-Rees for creating and running all of our visuals, which you can't see because this is a podcast.

Speaker 1 And thanks to our digital producers David Toles, Claudia Shang, Mia Kalman, Delan Villanueva, and Rachel Gaeski for filming and editing video each week.

Speaker 1 Our head of production is Matt DeGroote, and our production staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East.

Speaker 5 That are the 50s

Speaker 5 guaranteed XFID. Finally,

Speaker 5 and with our

Speaker 5 included. 5

Speaker 5 Wi-Fi queues the velocidad en los dispositivos que más la necesitan para todo to gaming. Incluso cuando todos están connectados.
Los 5 años depreciófijo guarantisado de Xfinita.

Speaker 5 Manten unpreciofico y destat un mundo de possibilidades. Xfiniti y imagina te lo.
Si aprica perception eso solo implanes selectos.

Speaker 1 A massage chair might seem a bit extravagant, especially these days. Eight different settings, adjustable intensity, plus it's heated, and it just feels so good.

Speaker 1 Yes, a massage chair might seem a bit extravagant, but when it can come with a car,

Speaker 1 suddenly it seems quite practical. The all-new 2025 Volkswagen Tiguan, packed with premium features like available massaging front seats, it only feels extravagant.