Bridgers vs. Dividers: The Report Card That Could Change the Midterms
Most of us don’t actually want “our side” to win. We want the country to work. We want less chaos, less theatre, and fewer people getting rich off outrage while nothing gets fixed.
But the way we talk about politics makes that almost impossible. Everything gets flattened into teams, labels, and loyalty tests. Red vs blue. Us vs them. And once you’re in that frame, you stop paying attention to behavior and start defending the jersey.
This week we welcomed Brad Porteus from Bridge Grades back onto the podcast. He created a report card for Congress that doesn’t measure ideology. It measures collaboration. It’s a simple shift, but it’s a big one. Instead of asking “what do they believe,” it asks “how do they govern.”
What hit me most is how much this challenges the way we’re trained to vote. Most people don’t vote based on effectiveness. They vote based on identity, fear, habit, or revenge. And if you’re already deeply loyal to a party, a report card probably won’t change your mind. Brad was pretty realistic about that.
The real opportunity is everyone else. The people who are exhausted, turned off, or so disgusted they’ve stopped participating. There are a lot of Americans who don’t vote in the last election (100 million of them!). It’s not because they’re lazy, but because they don’t see the point. They don’t trust anyone. They feel like it’s all rigged. They don’t want to pick between two options that both feel like a headache.
Bridge Grades is trying to be an on-ramp back in. Not by telling you what to think, but by giving you one more piece of information that isn’t a partisan talking point. A way to look at a name you’ve never heard of and get a quick read on whether they tend to build, or tend to blow things up.
And yes, we also talked about the obvious problem. People can perform. They can “act nicer” when it suits them. They can say the right words during election season and then go right back to the usual nonsense. That’s not a reason to give up, but it is a reason to be smarter about what we reward.
The bigger idea here is cultural. If we want a healthier politics, we have to stop rewarding the worst behavior. We have to stop treating cruelty like strength and collaboration like weakness. We have to stop letting the loudest person in the room define what leadership looks like.
This is not about becoming bland or “meeting in the mushy middle.” You can hold strong beliefs and still work with other humans. You can fight for what you think is right without turning every disagreement into a personal attack. That’s the kind of grown-up energy we’re trying to normalize.
If you’re curious, go look up your lawmakers on Bridge Grades just to get a second lens. Then pay attention to what happens in your own head when you see a grade you didn’t expect. That reaction is kind of the whole story.
Because if we keep voting like it’s a tribal loyalty test, we’re going to keep getting tribal outcomes. And we’re all going to keep sitting here, wondering why nothing works.
RESOURCES MENTIONED:
Brad's Good for the Soul:
Owen Cutts Old Music Friday: https://www.instagram.com/owencutts/?hl=en
LINKS:
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[00:00:00] nicole: She's conservative, and I'm liberal, and yet we've been friends for almost 40 years. Everyone says you shouldn't discuss politics, religion, or money, and we say that's exactly what friends should be talking about. Join us as we tackle the conversations you're having in your head but are too scared to say out loud.
[00:00:19] Welcome to We've Got to Talk. Welcome Brad Porteous of Bridge Grades. Jolene, take it away
[00:00:26] Jolene: Brad Porteus is the executive director of Bridge Grades, a congressional report card that evaluates lawmakers based on whether they work across the aisle or contribute to political division. Think of it as a Rotten Tomatoes style rating system designed to encourage collaboration and promote a healthier, more effective legislative branch. you are playing our drinking game, welcome Brad Porteus. You now must drink twice
[00:00:52] nicole: because I think we've said his name twice. And if you're not familiar, we've had Brad on before[00:01:00]
[00:01:00] Jolene: and we reference Brad Porteus and Bridge Grades all the time because of the work that you do. and so now we just, we're like, "And Brad Porteus, Bridge Grades," and so now we've just made it into a drinking game.
[00:01:10] Brad Porteus: Here it comes. Here it comes. Drink, everybody
[00:01:12] nicole: you, Brad, for being here again. You are our first repeat guest, and we are so excited to have you back on
[00:01:19] Brad Porteus: truly honored to be your first repeat guest 'cause you've had some stellar guests, uh, and I think you should invite some of them back. But, uh,
[00:01:24] nicole: We will
[00:01:25] Brad Porteus: me be the first. And, uh, I really love talking to you guys, so... And I love what you're doing. So thanks to both of you, Jolene and Nicole, and, uh, this should be fun
[00:01:32] nicole: let's pretend that people don't know who you are. They don't know who Brad Porteous, they don't know the drinking game, they don't know bridgegrades.org. So can you give us, our audience, a backstory of who you are, what you created, and then we'll go and dig deep
[00:01:48] Brad Porteus: thanks for the opportunity. So Bridge Grades is a report card for Congress, like Jolene said, but instead of measuring the ideological positions of our lawmakers, we've created a new scale, and the new scale [00:02:00] is based on how collaboratively or how divisively one governs. And the way you should think about it is it's a bit like a polarization score.
[00:02:07] And what we do is we bring third-party data, nonpartisan data, we aggregate it together, and we calculate a score between zero and 100 for every member of the House and every member of the Senate. And the people who get the highest scores earn As and Bs, and we call them bridgers. And the people who get the lower scores get Cs and Fs, and we call them dividers. And there are bridgers and dividers in both parties.
[00:02:28] nicole: So you did not start in politics,
[00:02:32] Brad Porteus: No
[00:02:33] nicole: right? And we wanna make it clear to everyone on either side of the aisle and in between that Bridge Grades is not partisan, nor does it want to be. It doesn't lean one way or another, correct?
[00:02:45] Brad Porteus: Correct.
[00:02:46] nicole: So how did you find yourself... Can you tell that origin story? 'Cause I think it's important about why you made this happen, like not living in this country and
[00:02:56] Brad Porteus: Yeah, so great. So thanks for that. So I, I was living overseas for [00:03:00] 14 years with a family, and we returned to the US in early '24, and we knew we were coming back for a couple of years, and I got to thinking about what I was going to do, and I, and I started to feel really stressed about coming back to the US because every time I would visit, I started to pick up on just how divided we were.
[00:03:15] And, and I found it really annoying actually, because when you're living overseas and you're seeing your home country sort of stuck in the slow lane because people are fighting about stupid shit, then it's actually maddening. Uh,
[00:03:26] nicole: Yes
[00:03:26] Brad Porteus: to thinking like, you know, the issue isn't that we don't have things in common.
[00:03:30] The issue is, is that we've been tricked into playing an ideological game of left versus right, and we're stuck in these polarized tribes and, uh, gosh, isn't there something we could do about it? Um, and the, the, that's sort of the, the mindset that I had. And when I came across, um, in particular the media bias chart, which I know you've mentioned on this show a few times, Ad Fontes Media, they do a great job of, uh, assessing the, the, let's say, the political bias of the, our news sources on a left to right basis, but they also have a vertical [00:04:00] axis which they measure like the credibility, the reliability of that news source on fact-checking and that kind of thing. And what I saw was is like, wow, it shows the different dimensionality within the right-leaning, uh, press and the left-leaning press, and it was useful to know which ones are more fact-oriented and which ones are not. And I thought, "Man, why can't we do this for our legislators?" Because we're so stuck into thinking that it's red versus blue and left versus right that, um, I know that there are, there is nuance within each of the different respective parties, and can't we use data to figure out who's who?
[00:04:30] And the goal ultimately is, is to sort, uh, what I consider to be the pragmatists from the dogmatists.
[00:04:36] Jolene: Hmm. I love that. D- okay, so how many times in each session do you come out with the Bridge Grade scores?
[00:04:43] Brad Porteus: so you're talking about during the term of the service, right? So we're, d- right now we're in the 119th Congress, and I think what's
[00:04:48] nicole: Угу
[00:04:48] Brad Porteus: things that's super cool about, uh, what we're doing is, is that the grades are limited and, and the scores are limited to the time being served by each of our respective representatives. So at the beginning of [00:05:00] the 119th Congress, which was last January, everybody started at zero. So we were
[00:05:04] nicole: Okay
[00:05:05] Brad Porteus: uh, everything started zero. And so what we did is we began to aggregate and collect data for the first eight months of the first year of their term. By August, they had a recess, and after the recess, we came out with their, their first scores or their first grades.
[00:05:18] Sometimes we refer to those as, like, your midterm grades, but it's too confusing if you call midterm grades ' cause we have midterm elections and it's ah. think of it as a two-year... You're, you're, they're in a class for two years, and we
[00:05:28] nicole: Okay
[00:05:29] Brad Porteus: grades last August, and ever since then, we've been updating them approximately once a month.
[00:05:34] So now we are, when we're, as of recording this, what, we are in September, so we're nine months of the way through the second year, so there's 24 months in two years, or 21 24ths of the way through. And then at the end of this year, we'll be done. We'll make the c- last final calculations. We'll figure out who's on the honor roll, who gets the A's and who gets the B's, et cetera, and then we will once again wipe the slate clean, and then we'll start all over again for the 120th Congress.
[00:05:59] Jolene: [00:06:00] Wow. Okay, so then how can we use Bridge Grades to help us during these, this upcoming midterm election?
[00:06:07] Brad Porteus: Well, I think it's, um, the, the goal of Bridge Grades is to be like a resource, right? It's supposed to be like an extra lens that we offer the public. Uh, so let's imagine you are thinking about, or even let's say you're reading the news and you read about somebody who you had never heard of before, uh, and there's a position that they take that you might agree with or disagree with, and then you're curious about that person, and you can go to Bridge Grades and look them up very easily and, and at a glance you can understand are they, you know, extremely dogmatic?
[00:06:37] Are they very pragmatic? Are they somewhere in between? And keep in mind, of course, that these scores are relative to each other. So all we're able to do is say, "We can tell you who's more collaborative than their peers, and we can tell you people who are less collaborative than their peers." We can't tell you someone's doing a good job of being collaborative, because that's sort of an arbitrary, uh, level, for example.
[00:06:56] So when it comes to the g- general public, uh, I think the [00:07:00] way to think about this is it's like, uh, giving you 3D glasses, if you will, right? So you go to the, uh, remember we went to J- was it Jaws that had Super 3D when we were kids? And you, where you wore the 3D, 3D glasses?
[00:07:11] nicole: I was, I wasn't allowed to see it.
[00:07:13] Brad Porteus: and, and the, and the shark was like twice as scary 'cause you could see it. Um, think of it like this, like it's a, it's a lens now which you can then see this dimensionality, which otherwise before all we knew was R versus D, red versus
[00:07:25] nicole: Right
[00:07:25] Brad Porteus: So this gives you a second look. That, that's the way to think about it.
[00:07:29] nicole: So you're measuring, uh, with like what they say and what they do, correct?
[00:07:36] Brad Porteus: Yes. So what we do is we blend, uh, data from multiple sources on multiple dimensions. And essentially, the way it works is we s- we get this data from other sources. As you say, some of it's upon legislative record, some of it is on rhetoric analysis, and I can go into a little bit more about that. I think there's some interesting things we've learned about that as well.
[00:07:55] nicole: Oh, that'd be great
[00:07:56] Brad Porteus: we rank each member against each other. So, like, in the House, you have [00:08:00] 435 House reps, so one of the things we look at is, uh, a big one that we look at is, is how often are you authoring bills that have earned a co-sponsorship from a member of the opposite party? And we can just count how many times you've done that, and we rank people who have done it, like, lots of times to people who have done it exactly zero times.
[00:08:17] And then you have a, a ranking, right? And then we can, we take that ranking and we apply a little weight to it, and then we go to the next measure. Uh, another one we look at on the legislative record side is how often you're co-sponsoring bills that have been written by a member of the opposite party.
[00:08:30] Jolene: Hmm.
[00:08:31] Brad Porteus: So we, we count that a little bit less 'cause it's a little easier to co-sponsor than, to, to, to co-sponsor a bill than to write the bill. And then we add that to the, to the tallies, right? And so we just keep adding whatever we can find that's non-partisan, we just keep adding to the tally. Um, and so you did mention rhetoric analysis, and, and we do that as well, uh, again, using data coming from a third party.
[00:08:51] Jolene: Okay, let's talk about that because I, and I haven't gotten to talk to Nicole about this yet, but there was something that I just listened... I, I, I literally an hour and a [00:09:00] half ago went to go get the mail, and, um,
[00:09:03] Brad Porteus: You're back already? Okay. Okay.
[00:09:05] Jolene: and I, a- and I'm back already. Yes. so I have it on Fox News in my car, and they're doing a story on a certain member who said some really inflammatory things at a congressional hearing that did not have any relevance to what the person that they were interviewing. So brought up something in their past.
[00:09:27] what happens with bridge grades, with, with that type of rhetoric then?
[00:09:30] Brad Porteus: the reason we're not talking about names is we don't name and shame people, uh, unless we have to. And we te- tend to avoid shaming people mostly.
[00:09:37] We actually love to tell peop- brag about who's getting As, but, um, I'm not here to, to rag on people who are getting low grades. But to answer your question, uh, to the extent that the Polarization Research Lab, uh, is able to collect the of the text of those statements, and those statements are on public record, then those get aggregated into their pool of data.[00:10:00]
[00:10:00] And what they do is, among a lot of other things, is, uh, is they look at and analyze all of the public statements that are being made by every representative. And, and these are things like, um, press releases and statements that they're making, but also their official account, accounts on things like X Twitter, uh, and, and other sources that they're using. I have to believe, and I can't fact just, I don't know in real time, but I have to believe that the floor statements or committee statements are also part of that public record. So, um, I l- don't, don't quote me on that, but that's the idea, right? Then, then what happens is they run their own processes on these statements, and then they do their own rankings on five different dimensions, and we use two of those dimensions.
[00:10:39] The two that we use, one is how often are you talking about bipartisanship? Uh, and the second one is how often are you engaging in personal attacks? And I think what you're describing is, sounds like it was a personal attack. So in that situation, what should happen is, uh, that representative will start logging personal attacks based on that speech.
[00:10:56] So, and by the way, what I've learned is it's like sentence by [00:11:00] sentence. So if that person went on a ti- a tirade and
[00:11:02] Jolene: gosh
[00:11:02] Brad Porteus: did like nine, you know, um, personal attacks in a row just 'cause they lost their temper, then they're gonna get nine. It's not gonna be one. So,
[00:11:10] Jolene: cow
[00:11:11] Brad Porteus: I mean, look, we can argue about whether that's smart or not.
[00:11:13] I don't know. I, I have to think about it more myself. But again, we're using third-party data. We just use whatever we can get our hands on. Uh, and that's what we get for now.
[00:11:21] Jolene: God, that's so
[00:11:22] Brad Porteus: the bi- the bipartisan one, I think while we're skirting this topic and people are listening to the, this around thinking about the rhetoric analysis, the bipartisan meant comments were the ones that is the second thing that we use.
[00:11:32] And this one caused, uh, me a little bit of heartburn over the last couple of months because when we updated our scores and looked at updated scores, uh, in August, I suddenly saw like, uh, a bunch of weird numbers. And I was like, "Uh-oh, I think something is not working here." And, you know, I'm not gonna put out numbers unless I'm feeling that confident that they are what they, they say they are.
[00:11:52] And so, as eager as I was to put out our, our August numbers, I, I ultimately didn't because I was, uh, unconvinced that we had the correct data. [00:12:00] I'm now convinced that we have the correct data, and the, the issue was, is that the number of comments that got tagged by Polarization Research Lab as bipartisan just went way up suddenly. And, you know, when you look at it, it's like, well, it's election season, and we were exiting the primary season, and suddenly we have, you know, uh, candidates who have survived their primaries, where they have to be deep-throated and, and very loyal to the party to get through their first round. And then the second round, they have to pivot suddenly to appeal to the v- full voting population, and bipartisanship is obviously a topic that, you know, you would pivot to.
[00:12:31] So it was actually really, at the one point scary that we saw these weird numbers, and then it was like, "Oh wow, this is actually pretty cool." Uh, and, and I think one of the-- It's cool that, that our systems were able to pick that up and see those changes. But of course, it makes me think, well, how are we gonna handle this for next time?
[00:12:46] Because honestly, I don't think it's cool that you can game the system suddenly, like become an A just because you're, now you're like on the stump and you're talking about bipartisanship. So, you know, it gives us a chance to go back and, and reconfigure and re- t- you know, look [00:13:00] back honestly at what's going well and what isn't. Uh, and so that's what we'll do as we get prepared for the 120th.
[00:13:05] nicole: ' that was one of our questions was like, how do we trust? 'Cause we were seeing those Instagram posts about like the, the numbers are changing and talking about... We talk a lot about how, how important it is to vote in your primaries, like more important than anything else, and how divisive peop- the language can be during that time, and then all of a sudden everyone's playing nice because they want to then, you know, get elected.
[00:13:31] Brad Porteus: and
[00:13:31] nicole: And
[00:13:32] Brad Porteus: we all knew intuitively that they did it. It was just
[00:13:34] nicole: Right. And now you have data to show that it's true, right? And so I guess, yeah, so then it gives you information to figure out how to, to...
[00:13:44] Brad Porteus: Calibrate
[00:13:45] nicole: how, how, yeah.
[00:13:46] Brad Porteus: you
[00:13:46] nicole: Yeah
[00:13:47] Brad Porteus: I, I mean, we don't want to reward performative bridging. Like, let's
[00:13:52] nicole: Exactly
[00:13:53] Brad Porteus: So performative bridging occurs not only with rhetoric, but it also happens on the legislative record side. So you have, [00:14:00] uh, people who are getting involved in cross-partisan, bipartisan initiatives that, um, are like, you know, today's National Postal Carrier Day.
[00:14:08] It's like, "Oh, yay," you know? I-- Woo-hoo, I'm so, I'm so... But, but, but honest-
[00:14:14] Jolene: pro postal carriers. Yay
[00:14:17] Brad Porteus: some people think, "Oh yeah, we should throw that kind of thing out altogether." My point of view is to say, you know, it should be, it should count for something, not nothing, and that's because I think the whole purpose of Bridge Grades is to re-normalize cross-partisanship.
[00:14:29] So even if it starts with something as flimsy as, you know, can we both support our postal carriers? I mean, it's a start. It shouldn't
[00:14:37] nicole: Ja,
[00:14:37] Brad Porteus: as much
[00:14:38] nicole: ja
[00:14:38] Brad Porteus: that's more substantive to the people, but then the question becomes, well, what is substantive and what isn't? And, and that's something we're gonna have to think through as we take this further.
[00:14:47] nicole: Well, it's been interesting, I mean, from getting to know you, I guess we-- I think we interviewed you at the end of January, and you aired in February. And, and learning about what you do and was so excited about, like, your [00:15:00] dreams of, like, I don't want it to be D and R anymore, I want it to be A and Bs. Like, that's who you vote for, and that concept was so revolutionary to me personally.
[00:15:10] But then, you know, doing this podcast and, and I teased Jolene that I now watch C-SPAN for fun 'cause I watch the hear- I do, I do things I never thought I would do. But when I watch these C-SPAN hearings, like whether it's the Se-Social Security Solvency Budget Committee or Fi-Finance Committee, which I've watched both,
[00:15:28] Brad Porteus: You need to
[00:15:29] nicole: I then...
[00:15:30] What, say that again?
[00:15:31] Jolene: seriously,
[00:15:32] Brad Porteus: need,
[00:15:32] nicole: Seriously, she's so cool. I know.
[00:15:33] Brad Porteus: to get out more.
[00:15:34] nicole: Dude, dude. But I have to say
[00:15:37] Brad Porteus: I
[00:15:37] nicole: Bridge Grades, Bridge Grades helps because I'm looking at these people, I don't know who they are for the most part,
[00:15:43] Brad Porteus: neither, by the
[00:15:44] nicole: and... Right? And then I look them up, and it makes my research a little bit more fun. And sometimes, you can tell who a bridger is, and then you can tell who a divider is, just in terms [00:16:00] of...
[00:16:00] Like, I want you to be able to give points or take points away for snarkiness, 'cause there's so much snark. It's so, so exhausting and annoying, but it is what it is. Um, but sm-snark, snark is hard to measure.
[00:16:16] Brad Porteus: you send me a data source, I'll be happy to look
[00:16:18] nicole: Yeah, exactly. But, but,
[00:16:21] Jolene: scale
[00:16:21] nicole: uh, Jolene and I were curious, cause you're still relatively new, how many congresspeople are aware of Bridge Grades?
[00:16:30] And, if they become aware, do they start to behave better?
[00:16:35] Brad Porteus: I don't know the answer, obviously, but,
[00:16:37] nicole: Okay
[00:16:37] Brad Porteus: least a, a few dozen because,
[00:16:40] nicole: Угу
[00:16:41] Brad Porteus: we have reached out to... Well, hopefully at least 90, because, uh, we reached out to every A earner, uh, a couple months ago and basically said,
[00:16:50] nicole: Mm-hmm.
[00:16:50] Brad Porteus: nice job. You're on your way. You gotta keep
[00:16:52] nicole: Oh, that's great
[00:16:54] Brad Porteus: But, um, actually, we did it at the very beginning of August, so it was during their summer recess. But subsequently [00:17:00] to that, um, something like, I don't know, at, at our last count, 15, 18 of them have publicly bragged about their grades. Uh, so I mean, obviously it's their teams and whether the members... Uh, although Chuck Grassley, your, your, your, is
[00:17:15] nicole: Iowa
[00:17:15] Brad Porteus: mater, right? So he put out this, uh, big old press release, and he had an audio recording of him bragging about his A on Bridge grades.
[00:17:24] nicole: That's awesome.
[00:17:26] Brad Porteus: I know. so anyway, the people who are obviously bragging about their grades, I mean, they'll brag about anything, so let's just be honest.
[00:17:32] I mean, if you you know, so...
[00:17:34] Jolene: Just
[00:17:34] nicole: But that's a good thing to brag about
[00:17:37] Brad Porteus: Yeah.
[00:17:37] nicole: ' I know that the, the midterms are coming up, and so people are and you're seeing in the numbers are starting to, quote-unquote, "act nicer." Jolene and I are, are finding ourselves maybe in a tiny bit of a bubble because we're around all these people that also want to change the way things are.
[00:17:56] Brad Porteus: OK
[00:17:56] nicole: Are you finding that, that there are a lot [00:18:00] of, uh, the exhausted middle that also wants more bridging to happen, or are you seeing it just as,
[00:18:08] Brad Porteus: It,
[00:18:08] nicole: just as divided as always?
[00:18:11] Brad Porteus: feels like it to be. So I feels like the tide is going that direction, but I
[00:18:16] nicole: Mm-hmm.
[00:18:17] Brad Porteus: to admit, like you, I have doubts about whether what I'm seeing is
[00:18:21] nicole: Yeah
[00:18:22] Brad Porteus: seeing. So I try to ask people who are, who don't have the same algorithm that I have, because now
[00:18:26] nicole: Mm-hmm.
[00:18:27] Brad Porteus: is very wholesome.
[00:18:28] nicole: Mm-hmm.
[00:18:29] Brad Porteus: it's not really, it's not
[00:18:31] nicole: Everybody gets along.
[00:18:33] Brad Porteus: you guys are all over my algorithm, so that's, that's how wholesome my algorithm is. Um, s- so I don't, I don't honestly know the answer, but I do
[00:18:43] nicole: Yeah
[00:18:44] Brad Porteus: do feel it. I think people are honestly tired of it. And it, and of course, I'm seeing the data that is corroborating that from the standpoint of, you know, if you look at the number of people who now identify as being independent first, that
[00:18:55] nicole: Right.
[00:18:56] Brad Porteus: creeping up.
[00:18:57] And I mean, I, I do think the signs are there. And, and I [00:19:00] also think that, um, both parties continue to demonstrate themselves to be unreliable and, um, hard to, hard to align with wholly. So
[00:19:12] nicole: yes
[00:19:13] Brad Porteus: are, people are getting more confident to say, like, "I'm conservative, but I don't, you know, necessarily love the Republicans," right?
[00:19:20] Or, "I'm, you know, progressive, but the Democratic Party is corrupt." Like, I
[00:19:24] nicole: Yes, yes
[00:19:26] Brad Porteus: can be true. But I think it, two or three years ago when I was starting to get into this, you would have to have a lot of courage to say that out loud. And I think now people are feeling like that's more of a flex in some ways.
[00:19:36] It,
[00:19:36] nicole: Ja, ja
[00:19:37] Brad Porteus: identifies, "Hey, I'm a free agent." And so I think the, the, the, for me, the most important way to think about this is, like, I really want people to start talking about where their ideological positions are, not which party they're associated with. So I'm, I'm
[00:19:49] nicole: Yes
[00:19:50] Brad Porteus: I'm often saying like, "Hey, look, my, my worldview is, uh, center left, but, uh, I hate the Democratic Party."
[00:19:56] Jolene: Okay, so then with that, with Trump not [00:20:00] on the ballot for these midterms, is that better for Bridgers? Because people are maybe more apt to, um, like they're, they're not threatened by, by Trump anymore
[00:20:13] Brad Porteus: Well, l- let's take Trump out of the equation 'cause I honestly don't know. I mean, he's such a wild card that, you know, there's
[00:20:18] nicole: Yeah
[00:20:18] Brad Porteus: really know exactly, to be honest. The polling is, is, is like unreliable, uh, even the, you know, the, the prediction markets are unreliable. I don't think we totally know.
[00:20:29] Um, I, I don't really know how to answer that question, but what I will say is that, We did an analysis and looked at the, uh, As and Bs, so the bridgers and the dividers, uh, facing this upcoming election. And one of the interesting analyses that we did was that, uh, the people who are-- There, there's 52, 52 House members who are in competitive districts who have a real election out of 400 something, right?
[00:20:59] So there's [00:21:00] 400 something districts, and only 50 of them are actually competitive. So of the 52, 43 of the incumbents are As and Bs. that just means like, holy crap, those As and Bs are at risk of losing, right? Um, and wow, if we lose institutional skill around collaboration because those 43 of those 52 As and Bs lose, it's a disaster for the American people, right?
[00:21:26] That's, that's the, what the thing that's hard. And so, you know, some people say, "Well, look, it's totally normal that you have bridgers who are in those seats because the ones that are competitive are the ones that are not gerrymandered to the hilt." So the, the districts that they're representing are a little bit more, uh, moderate, and so therefore, you end up with, um, essentially politicians and representatives who are tasked with representing a more moderate population, and therefore, we-- it shouldn't surprise anybody that they're more collaborative than their peers.
[00:21:55] And I agree with that. I think all of that makes sense, but that doesn't make it any nicer that they're [00:22:00] actually out there on a limb. So it's hard for them because they've got to survive their primary,
[00:22:04] nicole: Угу
[00:22:05] Brad Porteus: to survive the general, and it's really lonely. You know, the, the fact is, is that it's really hard work and lonely for them because they're getting their butts kicked by their own team first and then by the other team second. and honestly, these people are not very famous. So if you look at the list of the names, these are not people getting global, you know, n- national donations. They're not on the, the, the, uh, the TV shows and all this kind of stuff. So life is hard for them, and, and our-- you know, I think my goal and our goal is, is to try to give them, uh, th- some, you know, to have their back.
[00:22:33] And the way we can have their back is by identifying who they are, giving them good grades, and then hopefully giving, uh, other people incentive to say, "Hey, these are the kinds of people we want representing the population, uh, on, on Capitol Hill."
[00:22:44] nicole: I know that you don't wanna talk about who is an A and who is an F. Have you thought about, uh, on your social media, just highlighting the As and Bs no matter what they are for the next two [00:23:00] months before the midterms,
[00:23:01] Brad Porteus: Yeah,
[00:23:01] nicole: so people start to understand, "Wait, what's this, what is this A thing?"
[00:23:05] Brad Porteus: Well, and so the answer
[00:23:07] nicole: Not shame the other people, but just like h- like lift up the ones that are doing great work
[00:23:13] Brad Porteus: And, and the, the answer to that ultimately is yes and. And the yes
[00:23:18] nicole: Mm-hmm.
[00:23:18] Brad Porteus: part is, is that we have to be really careful because,
[00:23:22] nicole: Yeah
[00:23:22] Brad Porteus: a nonprofit organization, we're eligible for tax-deductible donations, and tax-deduc- deductible donation organizations can't be seen interfering with political
[00:23:32] nicole: Uh-huh.
[00:23:32] Brad Porteus: So, uh, if,
[00:23:34] nicole: Okay
[00:23:34] Brad Porteus: other people go out and talk about them getting As and Bs, amen. Like, uh,
[00:23:39] nicole: Right
[00:23:40] Brad Porteus: is we're just providing the, rubric and the data and the assessment. Uh, but if we go out there and say we're doing the rubric data and the assessment, and we say, "These are the people you should vote for," that's going too far
[00:23:51] nicole: Well, that's-- then that makes me think about one of our other questions was, do you have any assignments for the American citizen in regards to [00:24:00] bridge grades? Could they do that for you?
[00:24:02] Brad Porteus: yeah, absolutely. Th- this is the, the goal ultimately is, is to build something that has this trustworthiness and track record that people begin to recognize it and then begin to understand that it is, know, there is no thumb on the scale. This is an objective process and so forth. And then once that trustworthiness, and track record gets good enough, then people will and should begin to use it in lots of different interesting ways and to promote it, uh, ideally as a, particularly, in particular as, as an on-ramp for those people who have been disillusioned with voting. There's 100 million Americans who didn't vote in our last election who are eligible, 100 million. So we don't need very many of them to come back into the voting booth. They just
[00:24:45] nicole: Right
[00:24:46] Brad Porteus: they think, "Who the hell am I gonna vote for? I hate both parties. You know,
[00:24:49] nicole: Yes
[00:24:49] Brad Porteus: This is not for me.
[00:24:51] They're all a bunch of crooks." You know, whatever it is. So if, you know, if, if we can bring back even a couple percentage points of those people back into the booth and [00:25:00] have the backs of these A earners, it can really be meaningful and powerful.
[00:25:04] Jolene: But I think you also, uh, uh, I mean,
[00:25:05] nicole: That's interesting
[00:25:06] Jolene: who don't, who want to vote for the dividers,
[00:25:09] Brad Porteus: Yes
[00:25:10] Jolene: the fringe on each side who are saying, "I don't, I don't want compromise. I don't want collaboration. I want, I, I want a fighter in
[00:25:17] Brad Porteus: Definitely
[00:25:18] Jolene: my fighter to fight everybody and, and to
[00:25:20] Brad Porteus: Definitely, definitely. So, I mean, uh, you're absolutely right. And so there's gonna be people who are sure proud of their Fs, and they're gonna be touting their Fs and say, you know, "I'm your F, so vote for me." And, and that's, uh, that's...
[00:25:32] Jolene: Oh God. Wow
[00:25:34] Brad Porteus: No, but, but, but that's, that's real truth, right?
[00:25:37] I
[00:25:37] nicole: Yeah. I mean, but that's, I mean, Brad, that's where we are right now. Like, the negative machine wins. They make the most money. They make the, get the most clicks. And so it seems like the three of us are trying to put the cog in the wheel and say, "No, there's, there can be another way."
[00:25:55] Brad Porteus: Okay, so I
[00:25:55] nicole: it doesn't make you compromise your, your morals or your [00:26:00] ethics or your beliefs
[00:26:01] Brad Porteus: that's a, that, that's an important point, right? This is that you're able to maintain your ideological positions,
[00:26:07] nicole: Yes
[00:26:07] Brad Porteus: and still collaborate with your neighbor, right? Both are-- both can be true, and it's not an or. You can do
[00:26:14] nicole: Right.
[00:26:14] Brad Porteus: So I think that is the key, that this is an and. It, you know, hold your ideological positions.
[00:26:19] Sure, adjust them as you learn, because we all should. But y- this isn't about having to, you know, cede a position and, and go into the mushy middle. Not at all. This
[00:26:29] nicole: No
[00:26:29] Brad Porteus: saying, like, I, I often talk about the idea that we all have individual Venn diagrams that overlap, so rather than focusing on the part that is outside the overlap, which is what politicians do today, why not just figure out the parts where we do have commonality and let's just do stuff in there?
[00:26:43] There's a lot to do.
[00:26:44] nicole: There's a lot to do
[00:26:45] Brad Porteus: so that, that's sort of the idea. But, you know, but th- there's a, something I wanted to, um, test on you because I just thought of this today, so let's, let's see how this one goes.
[00:26:53] nicole: Ooh, hot off the press
[00:26:55] Brad Porteus: which is, you know, to your point about the fact that some people are gonna want to vote for an [00:27:00] F, fair, fair enough.
[00:27:01] Like, this isn't meant to be something for everybody. And so I got to thinking, like, this is for peop- you know, the, what I, what we're doing and you're doing, this is for, for people who wanna eat their vegetables. I mean, we don't love our vegetables, but some, uh, some, some vegetables are more vegetable-y than other vegetables.
[00:27:17] And so somebody else can come in and say, "Oh man, kale sucks. It tastes terrible." I'm like, " Yeah, but you know, on the spectrum of vegetables, it's more vegetable-y." So I mean, it is what it is. So if you believe in vegetables are healthy, then here are your vegetables. if you're don't, then this isn't for you.
[00:27:30] Move on and go vote for your F. So there's something in there that I'm, uh, experimenting with.
[00:27:35] Jolene: I like
[00:27:36] nicole: You do?
[00:27:37] Jolene: Yeah.
[00:27:37] nicole: don't
[00:27:38] Jolene: it
[00:27:40] Brad Porteus: Tell me why,
[00:27:41] Jolene: I
[00:27:41] nicole: Here's, here's what I'm thinking.
[00:27:43] Brad Porteus: have Jolene go first. Jolene
[00:27:44] nicole: Yeah, Jolene, go first
[00:27:46] Jolene: No, because it, deep down you know that kale is good for you. Like, you're like, "Ugh,
[00:27:50] Brad Porteus: Right.
[00:27:51] Jolene: wanna eat it,
[00:27:51] nicole: I love kale
[00:27:52] Jolene: if I put it
[00:27:53] Brad Porteus: You would. You would
[00:27:54] Jolene: and I put it in with a lot of fruit and some yogurt and some protein
[00:27:59] Brad Porteus: And [00:28:00] chase it with a, a
[00:28:00] Jolene: know,
[00:28:00] Brad Porteus: chocolate chip cookie dough bar
[00:28:02] Jolene: it, it,
[00:28:03] nicole: There you g-
[00:28:04] Jolene: Brad.
[00:28:05] nicole: dibble doe, doe
[00:28:06] Brad Porteus: deu. Tipo deu
[00:28:07] Jolene: So I, I have to consume it.
[00:28:09] Like, I know I have to, um, because it's good for me and I can get through it." I mean, that, I think that's a, I think it's a great analogy
[00:28:16] Brad Porteus: All right, now let's roast me, Nicole. Roast me. Thank you, Jolene
[00:28:19] nicole: It's not the roast. It's not the roast. It's a, like, uplifting and a different perspective. Government is not working now. Government is like the toxic slop vegetable patch that rotted and is disgusting and doesn't work, and no one wants to step in it, and no one wants to eat it, and no one wants to touch it.
[00:28:43] We all, doesn't matter if you're right, left, center, all the way fringe, we all truly do want a better America.
[00:28:51] Brad Porteus: Yeah
[00:28:51] nicole: want a better country. It's not working. Those, like, fighters, they just like their clicks. They're making [00:29:00] money off their clicks.
[00:29:01] Brad Porteus: I
[00:29:01] nicole: Why don't we, why don't we make money off of the good stuff? So it might sound pol- Pollyanna-ish, but I'm thinking, hey, you're pr- providing a platform that really...
[00:29:12] Do we want government to work? Do we want to spend less money? We have a $40 trillion debt. Like, it doesn't work. So let's try something else. So I mean, here's the thing. I love vegetables, so this is a horrible analogy for me. But what-- But if you don't love vegetables, maybe you love ice cream. Like, let's make Bridge Gray's the best and most amazing ice cream
[00:29:35] Brad Porteus: kale sorb-
[00:29:36] nicole: can eat.
[00:29:37] Brad Porteus: kale sorbet. How about that?
[00:29:39] nicole: Kale sorbet for the vegans.
[00:29:42] Jolene: Oh my gosh, there you go. A little something for everybody.
[00:29:46] Brad Porteus: But by the way, Nicole, Nicole, you're not wrong. The, the problem is, is that, um, oh my God, how many times are we gonna hear that same,
[00:29:54] nicole: I know
[00:29:55] Brad Porteus: pitch, you know, fist shaking? Um, it, it just becomes noise now. I mean, I, I'm [00:30:00] not saying the vegetable analogy cuts through the noise.
[00:30:02] nicole: Yeah。
[00:30:02] Brad Porteus: But I do think that we, we have to come up with other things that people can
[00:30:07] nicole: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm
[00:30:08] Brad Porteus: more than this sort of like, um, you know, I don't know, pitchfork, uh, burning thing.
[00:30:14] I don't know. So, so another one that comes to mind for me, and, and this is another one I'll, I'll, I'll share with you and your audience, which is something I've been thinking about, and that is, so I get asked a lot because, especially as we head into an election, about, "Well, what about the candidate?" I mean, what about the challenger, right?
[00:30:28] So you have an incumbent
[00:30:30] nicole: All right
[00:30:31] Brad Porteus: and then you have a challenger who's brand new and is an unknown, and so what do you do about that? Um, and you know, our point of view is, is like, well look, if somebody earned an A in the 119th Congress, well they earned-- It's like, it's like being on the pool table and winning.
[00:30:44] Like, you know, it's your table. You stay. You know, you, you've earned your A. You're good. if you lose, uh, I mean, if you're a F, then you're out. And so people say, "Well, well how do you know that the F is gonna be, you know, w- is worse than the person who's challenging [00:31:00] them? What if they look like they're even worse?
[00:31:01] What do you do about
[00:31:01] nicole: Hmm.
[00:31:02] Brad Porteus: I said, "All right, well this is the new analogy," which is, uh, if you play poker, uh, and you play five card draw or something, and you have, you look at your hand and you have two cards that are crap and you're like, "Okay, I'm gonna throw these cards away and take two new ones," you don't know if those new cards are gonna be worse than the cards you're discarding.
[00:31:16] But you do know that the cards you're getting rid of suck, and you have a chance of getting a better one. And if you could keep discarding and keep getting new cards until you're happy with your hand, then you're gonna have a good hand. And that's what I want the American public to do, which is discard the cards that are bad every two years, keep the cards that are good every two years, and gradually we're gonna have a better hand of cards that's representing us.
[00:31:36] Jolene: Dang. Now
[00:31:37] nicole: That's good.
[00:31:39] Jolene: Yeah, I like that one a
[00:31:40] nicole: Mm-hmm.
[00:31:41] Jolene: You know, as, as we take a look at a certain Senate race that's going on in a certain large state, mean, you've got, um, you've got someone on one side who, um, is really changing some of the things that he said,
[00:31:59] Brad Porteus: Are we talking about [00:32:00] Texas? Yeah. Okay
[00:32:02] Jolene: And so you've got Talarico, who has, has kinda had to step back some of the things that, that he has said in the past to make him more attractive, because there are a lot of Republicans who are going, "I'm not voting for Paxton.
[00:32:14] So I mean, maybe I'm gonna have to, you know, hold my nose and vote for the Democrat because I do think that he's a better person, a, a better person." you got Paxton, who's going, "Hey, y'all. I am who I am. I mean, you... Here I am." I mean, he's
[00:32:29] Brad Porteus: Yeah
[00:32:30] Jolene: don't think he's making any bones about who he
[00:32:32] Brad Porteus: True
[00:32:32] Jolene: So but isn't it gonna be difficult though for people to say if he's changing, if Talarico's kind of changing some of the things that he's said in his past, how do we trust him? How do
[00:32:42] Brad Porteus: Hmm.
[00:32:42] Jolene: he's going to, that he's not gonna get in there, that he's saying... A- and this is true for any politician.
[00:32:48] How do we
[00:32:49] Brad Porteus: Right
[00:32:49] Jolene: get in there, all the things that they've campaigned on are out the window and you're gonna get, you know, a, a different person?
[00:32:56] Brad Porteus: And, and the thing about it, Jolene, is we don't know. That's, that's a big problem. But [00:33:00] if, if there were collective determination by the citizens to throw out the poor performers and keep
[00:33:08] nicole: Mm-hmm.
[00:33:10] Brad Porteus: then it wouldn't matter what they said because they would have to do it. And if they didn't do it, they're gone. it would be nice if it was as simple as that. It's obviously way more complex than that. But, you know, the case of Paxton and Talarico, the good news, I mean, like we can talk about them because I don't have grades for either of them 'cause neither of them are sitting
[00:33:25] nicole: Oh, that's true
[00:33:26] Brad Porteus: of the H- of the House or the Senate. but we don't know, right? We don't know, uh, much about either of them. Well, sorry, I shouldn't say that. We, we know what the media is telling us about them and what they're saying, but we don't know how they're gonna actually govern. Of course, I mean, a lot of people can point to, you know, the past is, is the best representative of the future, et cetera, et cetera.
[00:33:45] But a, from a Bridge Grades perspective, the way I would look at that will be whoever wins now will be a six-year term Senate senator, and then six years from now, if they don't have an A, then we're gonna put in the next person. Like, that would be, that would be [00:34:00] the dream. And then we can, uh, we can-- frankly, we can like care a little bit less about the, you know, all of the promises and all that because in the end, the, the behaviors and the, the governance will take care of itself.
[00:34:10] That would be ideal.
[00:34:11] Jolene: Yeah. Yeah. See if they can walk the walk.
[00:34:14] Brad Porteus: Yeah. But the key, the key there though is, is that the population, um, delivers the stick as a punishment when the, when that representative doesn't perform
[00:34:24] nicole: ' Cause we're still so stuck in the tribalist
[00:34:27] Brad Porteus: Right
[00:34:27] nicole: movement, which makes, I think, it even more difficult for some people to even maybe, wrap their brains around bridge grades.
[00:34:35] Brad Porteus: Right.
[00:34:35] nicole: Like, I don't wanna see that that Republican has an A. Like, this is
[00:34:40] Jolene: Hmm.
[00:34:42] nicole: I'm just play acting. Like, this is confusing my-- I'm not supposed to like any of you.
[00:34:47] You know, s- we're still so entrenched that it is, like, in some way, you're asking society to sort of like turn its, like, like
[00:34:58] Brad Porteus: So
[00:34:58] nicole: turn, like blow [00:35:00] up or...
[00:35:00] Brad Porteus: I know. And the way I
[00:35:01] nicole: Which is, I, I'm glad you're doing it, but it's, it's a big, it's a big thing you're, you're doing
[00:35:07] Brad Porteus: it's, it's, it's literally rotating your worldview by 90 degrees, right?
[00:35:11] nicole: Right, exactly
[00:35:12] Brad Porteus: left to right, you're now thinking about up to down. So it's
[00:35:14] nicole: Oh yes, you've talked about that before
[00:35:16] Brad Porteus: pivot. But, but I think, um, you know, the, the challenge really is when I've talked to people, the challenge is extremely hard for the people who are partisan. So if you're
[00:35:24] nicole: Yes
[00:35:26] Brad Porteus: and you're used to voting for a party, there's nothing I can say today or any time that will get you to change your vote.
[00:35:32] nicole: Yeah.
[00:35:33] Brad Porteus: about that, right?
[00:35:34] nicole: Right
[00:35:35] Brad Porteus: can happen is those 100 million people who are not voting can find their way back into the voting booth, and they're the ones who have the power. And bring- bringing them back and getting them
[00:35:45] nicole: Right
[00:35:45] Brad Porteus: and voting for the people who are in-- who are governing with our common interests ahead of party, that is the game changer
[00:35:51] nicole: And that's ironic because they probably feel the most powerless, not knowing that if they came together, they could change, they could change the [00:36:00] country
[00:36:00] Brad Porteus: it is ironic because that is the case. It's doubly ironic at this stage of our own journey because the people who care about or are interested in bridge grades are people who are switched on around politics, and 99.9% of anybody who's paying attention to politics has a side, um, to be honest. Even though 45% of us say we're independent, the reality is, is that we still have a favorite team. Um,
[00:36:24] nicole: Right
[00:36:24] Jolene: Yeah
[00:36:25] Brad Porteus: and it's really very, very difficult to, to walk away from that loyalty to that team because of a statistic or a letter or a number.
[00:36:32] nicole: how could we help or how do you approach these 100 million that are disengaged?
[00:36:37] Brad Porteus: Like, we're not realistic about the idea that people are gonna come to Bridge Grades to look up, uh, their scores or grades. We have to be where they are. And so
[00:36:45] nicole: Right
[00:36:45] Brad Porteus: ultimately is to, uh, make it as easy and seamless as possible for any number of sources around the web to integrate what we have into their environment.
[00:36:56] So whether it's voting guides or whether it's, you know, news articles or, [00:37:00] Sub Stack posts or whatever else, our goal over the next couple years will be to begin to build up those integrations, and essentially Bridge Grades starts appearing in lots of different places. And
[00:37:11] nicole: Mm-hmm.
[00:37:11] Brad Porteus: the people will hopefully begin to, begin to say, "Oh, that's interesting.
[00:37:14] I've seen that now two or three times. I wonder what that is," enough to
[00:37:17] nicole: Right
[00:37:17] Brad Porteus: okay, that is something a little bit different." And, and for that 45% of people, whoever it is, who are a little bit pissed off at both parties, this could be an en- entry point for them. So I think to, to answer your question about what you can do and what people can do, number one, I'd say people who are listening can just get in the habit of essentially when you see a name of somebody and you're curious, pop over to Bridge Grades and do take a look.
[00:37:41] Uh, and if you click on their name and you do a little search, you'll find a, we call sort of a b- a baseball card, and, uh, it, it flips over and it'll show you the composition of why they're earning the score that they're earning. absolutely get in touch and you can challenge some of the methods we're using 'cause we wanna improve them also.
[00:37:58] But the data is the data. So I
[00:37:59] nicole: Mm-hmm.[00:38:00]
[00:38:00] Brad Porteus: um, uh, that, that's the nice part about it. So have a look and, and begin to get in the habit of that. And then I think, um, use Bridge Grades as a, as a stepping off point from, um, political, identity, like, uh, party, partisan identities. So,
[00:38:15] nicole: Угу
[00:38:16] Brad Porteus: let's all begin to start to nudge people to say, um, "Oh, is that guy a Republican?"
[00:38:21] Uh, why don't c- I, I've, I've started correcting people when someone says, "Oh, is that guy a Republican?" I said, "Well, I don't know if he's a Republican or not, but, uh, he is, he is conservative." Right?
[00:38:28] Jolene: Oh, good one. Okay. right
[00:38:33] Brad Porteus: So I think n-- I think shifting the c-- the dialogue to ideology versus party identity is, is
[00:38:40] nicole: Mm-hmm.
[00:38:41] Brad Porteus: step
[00:38:42] nicole: You don't, you don't say, "Oh, I don't know, but he's an A." And they go, "What?"
[00:38:46] Brad Porteus: No, no, but, but, but for, for, for a member of Congress, yes, I would do that. And, and by the way, what you'll see in our materials is that we deliberately downplay the party identity of every person who is, um, earning an A. All you'll see is, is they're the darkest purple. [00:39:00] And if you look really hard, you'll figure out whether they're a Democrat or a
[00:39:02] nicole: Oh, interesting
[00:39:03] Brad Porteus: keep it extremely, like, down low and low-key because in the end, we don't care
[00:39:08] Jolene: that's great. That is awesome
[00:39:10] nicole: So Brad, before we get into the fun game stuff, do you have anything else you want our listeners and viewers to know about you, to know about Bridge Grades, dreams, hopes for the future?
[00:39:23] Brad Porteus: eat your vegetables and,
[00:39:26] nicole: Okay. And go to bridgegrades.org.
[00:39:29] Brad Porteus: your, discard your shitty cards and take
[00:39:32] nicole: Yes
[00:39:33] Brad Porteus: Um, and I would say normalize cross-collaboration, cross-party collaboration, um, and yeah, and, and s- and step away from the partisan identities. I think all of those things are healthy, uh, and follow the journey. If you, if you come to bridgetrades-grades.org, please do, uh, sign up for the newsletter.
[00:39:54] I don't spam you very often, but, um,
[00:39:56] nicole: No, you don't
[00:39:57] Brad Porteus: a while there's interesting stuff that's happening that, that you should know about. [00:40:00] Uh, and yeah, those are... That's my final pitch.
[00:40:03] nicole: That's awesome. That's awesome. That was good post
[00:40:07] Jolene: gonna be, there'll be one more, uh, bridge grades
[00:40:10] Brad Porteus: October. Yeah, October. And I'm
[00:40:12] nicole: Ooh.
[00:40:13] Jolene: okay.
[00:40:13] Brad Porteus: un- unless there's really-- like, look at this stage of the game, like think of it as the way I described it earlier, we had 21 months out of 24,
[00:40:19] nicole: Right.
[00:40:20] Brad Porteus: 22 months out of 24. Have the candidates really been doing a lot of legislation at Capitol Hill the last month?
[00:40:26] I don't think
[00:40:27] nicole: I was gonna say, Brad, they're about to go like, they have like four days and then they're taking another six-week break or something, or five week...
[00:40:35] come on
[00:40:36] Brad Porteus: not expecting a lot of movement. If there is movement, it'll be to- totally, fascinating in terms of why. So I'll, I'll be diving deep into figuring that out. But, um, yeah, we're, we're getting close to the end. And, um, uh, so at the end, what I'm gonna do is I'm going to create...
[00:40:51] I've just decided this, this last week. I'm gonna manufacture and create, um, playing cards that has like, uh, the kings and queens and j- [00:41:00] jacks of the people who have the highest grades, and then, uh, the jokers will be the two worst grades
[00:41:04] nicole: I love it.
[00:41:06] Brad Porteus: I'll send you guys, uh, a
[00:41:08] nicole: We want them. Yes. I'm, we're...
[00:41:12] Jolene: then we'll play poker
[00:41:13] nicole: Yeah, and we'll play poker
[00:41:15] Jolene: yep, we'll get rid of the bad cards
[00:41:17] nicole: right. I'm, I'm liking this, this image for you, Brad. This is good. This is good.
[00:41:22] Brad Porteus: Cool. Cool, cool. All right, I'm ready
[00:41:25] nicole: Oh my gosh. Okay, that's so good. All right, let's start with your good for the soul
[00:41:34] Brad Porteus: so my good for the soul is a guy, he's a, he's a British music producer. He's gotta be in his early 30s. His name is Owen Cutts. Uh, I s- I see him on Instagram. He's probably everywhere as well. But, um, has this, uh, feature called New Music Friday, and he basically reveals and plays songs from... A lot of it's soul, like old school American, like, um, soul music.
[00:41:59] [00:42:00] But then, uh, and then he just like, he goes mental for it. It's really amazing. He, he's super enthusiastic. He just did, uh... You remember Rich Girl, Hall & Oates?
[00:42:09] nicole: of course
[00:42:10] Brad Porteus: yeah. Oh, yeah. So go and check out Rich Girl, Hall & Oates.
[00:42:14] nicole: Okay
[00:42:14] Brad Porteus: Owen Cutts. Um, it's... it's C-U-T-T-S. C-U-T-T-S,
[00:42:20] Jolene: okay
[00:42:21] Brad Porteus: one word. Owen Cutts, New, New Music Friday.
[00:42:24] His most recent one was, uh, yeah, Hall & Oates. And, and I learned a lot about that song, but he is very funny.
[00:42:31] nicole: That will go in the show notes
[00:42:33] Brad Porteus: All right
[00:42:35] nicole: All right
[00:42:35] Jolene: a would you rather for us? you do
[00:42:39] Brad Porteus: I have a would you rather for Nicole, not for Jolene
[00:42:46] Jolene: What? Brad, Brad Porteous
[00:42:46] nicole: Brad Porteous, what are you talking about?
[00:42:54] Brad Porteus: Nicole, would you rather be the default AI voice talent for [00:43:00] ChatGPT f- into eternity, So you've given up your voice for... You become now the voice of ChatGPT. Or would you rather be the public address announcer any of your fav- any sports team, your favorite sports team or your favorite venue for as long as you want? imagine the gigs pay the same amount.
[00:43:20] So like a, I don't know, if you're a Knicks fan, you could be the
[00:43:23] nicole: I, first of all, was not gonna talk about this on air, but I'm going to talk about this on air because you're bringing this up. You've used some AI voices on your t- on your, uh, posts.
[00:43:34] Brad Porteus: Oh
[00:43:35] nicole: Yes, sir.
[00:43:37] Brad Porteus: I don't
[00:43:38] nicole: And I was like, Brad Porteous... Hold on, I gotta drink.
[00:43:43] Brad Porteus: Okay.
[00:43:43] nicole: My friend Brad Porteous, I am more than happy to help you voice those spots because human voice is way better than the AI voice.
[00:43:53] So that, so the, so to answer your question, and plug, I do the National Women's Soccer League [00:44:00] stuff, so I love sports. I do s- weirdly, I do a lot of sports stuff.
[00:44:04] Brad Porteus: I know. That's why
[00:44:05] nicole: I don't know why. So wait, what?
[00:44:08] Brad Porteus: That's why I
[00:44:09] nicole: What'd you...
[00:44:09] Brad Porteus: That's why the or is would
[00:44:10] nicole: I would do that, I would do that for eternity.
[00:44:13] Brad Porteus: Okay
[00:44:14] nicole: Jolene teases me, the AI and the ChatGPT and the whole t- no, no.
[00:44:19] but yes
[00:44:20] Brad Porteus: you for calling me out. To be honest, I had no idea, honestly, 'cause I have somebody helping me with that, and so
[00:44:25] nicole: Well,
[00:44:26] Brad Porteus: with you on
[00:44:26] nicole: I don't mean to call that out, like, publicly, but I s- it was actually, w- I was just-- I went to go see Jolene. I was just in the Ozarks, and we had a wonderful, wonderful weekend together. And the post came out, and I was like, "Do I tell Brad?"
[00:44:41] Jolene: into the kitchen
[00:44:43] nicole: like, "Oh my God,
[00:44:44] Jolene: to
[00:44:44] nicole: listen to this." And I was like, "I'd be happy to help him.
[00:44:47] This sounds horrible."
[00:44:51] Brad Porteus: Excellent
[00:44:52] nicole: thing. I'm also aware that a lot of people don't care, right? Like, it's my business, but I do think, and I am noticing, [00:45:00] this is a lot of s- uh, side notes here, but I have noticed since this AI hysteria, literally we're recording, uh, September 16th, viewers and listeners, and this will be coming out...
[00:45:12] Jolene: dead by the
[00:45:12] nicole: Right, we might be dead in two weeks.
[00:45:15] Jolene: yeah
[00:45:15] nicole: but there's, like, a lot of hysteria, as we all know, and I have noticed commercials literally in the last, like, three or four days, TD Bank, all these things, they are, uh, it's all about being human again.
[00:45:28] Brad Porteus: to human. Back to
[00:45:29] nicole: Mm-hmm.
[00:45:29] Brad Porteus: good,
[00:45:30] nicole: I'm like, well, maybe the voiceover people that will, will get some more work.
[00:45:35] I, I still doubt it, but, but I, but I hope so.
[00:45:38] Brad Porteus: so.
[00:45:38] nicole: I hope so.
[00:45:39] Brad Porteus: I think people, people want that. I think,
[00:45:41] nicole: Yeah.
[00:45:41] Brad Porteus: there's a backlash happening and
[00:45:43] nicole: I mean, you know, I--
[00:45:45] Brad Porteus: it.
[00:45:45] nicole: Yeah.
[00:45:46] Jolene: Yeah,
[00:45:46] nicole: all that backstory
[00:45:47] Jolene: yours.
[00:45:48] Brad Porteus: Okay
[00:45:48] Jolene: Brad Porteous
[00:45:50] nicole: Hold on
[00:45:54] Jolene: Would you rather have a drinking game named after
[00:45:58] Brad Porteus: Oh my God[00:46:00]
[00:46:00] Jolene: have every member of Congress wear a T-shirt with their bridge grade on it?
[00:46:05] Brad Porteus: Oh
[00:46:10] Jolene: We,
[00:46:10] Brad Porteus: gonna have to,
[00:46:10] Jolene: which
[00:46:11] Brad Porteus: I'm gonna, I'm gonna have to think hard about that one, Joey. Can you clarify the first one? Would everybody know about it?
[00:46:20] Jolene: A- and everybody has to play
[00:46:21] Brad Porteus: And everybody has to play?
[00:46:22] Jolene: name
[00:46:23] nicole: whole world, not even America, the whole world knows Brad Porteous
[00:46:27] Brad Porteus: our whole village, our whole to- whatever, our whole town growing up played a s- a, a dice game, and when four -two came up, it was Ronnie Lott's, uh, number.
[00:46:35] He, he was a San Francisco 49er,
[00:46:37] nicole: Yeah
[00:46:37] Brad Porteus: everybody had to drink. So I mean, if I could be in the same, uh, conversation as Ronnie Lott, I mean, like, it's pretty hard to say no to that. I'm just kidding.
[00:46:46] nicole: Wow. I was like, I was like, "Really?
[00:46:49] Brad Porteus: I'm
[00:46:49] nicole: You don't want Congress to have a T-shirt?" I was like, "This is amazing."
[00:46:53] Brad Porteus: I'm kidding.
[00:46:54] Jolene: This is not how we
[00:46:54] Brad Porteus: I'm kidding.
[00:46:55] Jolene: go.
[00:46:56] Brad Porteus: I'm kidding, and I'm gonna send T-shirts to every single member of Congress[00:47:00]
[00:47:00] nicole: Oh my God. Do, like as a, but as the deck of cards. Oh
[00:47:06] Brad Porteus: Okay. Oh, look
[00:47:08] nicole: Listen, bridgegrades.org merch,
[00:47:11] Brad Porteus: I
[00:47:11] nicole: and it switches every term.
[00:47:14] Brad Porteus: That's the thing.
[00:47:15] nicole: So then you have vintage. You have, like, vintage Fs and vintages, vintage As
[00:47:19] Brad Porteus: You gotta collect the sets. So the 119th set's gonna come out, and then the 120th, and the 119th is gone.
[00:47:24] nicole: Listen, this is good, Brad.
[00:47:28] Brad Porteus: Okay.
[00:47:29] nicole: good.
[00:47:29] Brad Porteus: cool.
[00:47:30] nicole: Oh my gosh.
[00:47:31] Brad Porteus: Thank you, Jolene.
[00:47:32] I'm gonna go up, I'm gonna go with the T-shirts. Uh, I'm trying to drink less anyway, so we're gonna go with the dr- the T-shirts. Yep.
[00:47:38] nicole: All right. I think that's good
[00:47:40] Jolene: We so appreciate you coming back on,
[00:47:43] nicole: Thank you, Brad Porteous
[00:47:45] Jolene: we, uh, always value your insights. We always value your content, so please go to bridgegrades.org and follow Brad and all of the information that he provides. It's so valuable
[00:47:58] nicole: It's super valuable.
[00:47:59] Brad Porteus: a [00:48:00] real pleasure to talk to you because both of you just totally get it, and it's really easy for me to then go deeper into the nuance of it, which I think is
[00:48:07] nicole: Mm-hmm.
[00:48:08] Brad Porteus: parts live. So kudos to you for, uh, being such supporters and getting it so, so s- quickly, and thank you for, uh, revealing it to, uh, more people
[00:48:17] nicole: Absolutely. We will put all this stuff in the show notes. We adore you, we consider you a dear friend, and we're just really happy for you too. So
[00:48:26] Brad Porteus: that
[00:48:26] nicole: you
[00:48:27] Brad Porteus: uh, re- Instagram reel. I think you're gonna like it. Yeah, it's good. It's good
[00:48:31] Jolene: Yeah.
[00:48:31] nicole: All right. Uh, everybody, thank you so much. Please thumbs up, like, subscribe, and most importantly, share with somebody that m- you might not be able to talk to. I think that would be very helpful. All right, guys. Bye.
[00:48:47] Jolene: Bye everybody
[00:48:48]
