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Music

This Conversation Between 2 Chainz and John Kasich Is a Shakespeare Play

The Ohio governor name-dropped Bono, 2 Chainz responded with insightful comments about trap music, and Whoopi Goldberg tried to fix a collaboration.

Though we live in what often appears to be an absurd and chaotic world, it is still possible—essential, even—to be confronted and shaken by moments of unlikely poetry. The video of 2 Chainz speaking to John Kasich, above, is one such moment. Though no one person wrote the script in advance, the Universe offered it to us as high literature. This was a Shakespearean drama. We at Noisey intend to treat it as such.

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Dramatis Personae:

2 Chainz: Also known as Tity Boi. Quietly one of the very best rappers alive. Born in Georgia. Good chance of becoming President of the United States. Could probably form a government with DJ Khaled. Once famously rapped, "My wrist deserve a shout-out, I'm like 'What up, wrist?' / My stove deserve a shout-out, I'm like 'What up, stove?'"

John Kasich: An anti-union politician who dislikes women's rights about as much as his Republican colleagues but covers it up with some Bush-esque, I'd-share-a-Michelob-Ultra-with-that-guy blandness. Not President of The United States of America; still the 69th (nice, I guess) Governor of Ohio. Possibly a piece of chalk. Once famously said something about being moderate.

Whoopie Goldberg: Host. Winner of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation Vanguard Award and the Hans Christian Andersen Award for outstanding achievement by a dyslexic person. Honorary member of the Harlem Globetrotters; possibly still just a regular member of the NRA. Star of Sister Act and Sister Act 2: Back In the Habit. Unjustly passed over for awards after starring in Rat Race.

Joy Behar: Host. Born in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Remembers what it was like before indie rock. Author of five brilliantly-titled books: Joy Shtick: Or What Is the Existential Vacuum and Does It Come with Attachments; Sheetzu Caca Poopoo: My Kind of Dog; When You Need a Lift: But Don't Want to Eat Chocolate, Pay a Shrink, or Drink a Bottle of Gin; Sheetzucacapoopoo 2: Max Goes to the Dogs; The Great Gasbag: An A-Z Study Guide to Surviving Trump World. Someone who'd definitely be better to share a Michelob with than John Kasich.

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Sara Haines: Host. Used to be an NBC page. Now owns two chihuahuas.

Scene:

A TV show called The View that you accidentally pay attention to while doing laundry. It is apparently run by geniuses who want to put John Kasich and 2 Chainz in a room together. A conversation has just concluded about 2 Chainz's charitable giving and community organizing. We are four minutes into the interview. Kasich has suggested that Chainz drop the "Yo" if he intends to run for political office, which sounds unpleasant and probably is. 2 Chainz wears the world's greatest shirt—a shiny, multi-blue number undone down to his bellybutton. Nobody cares what everyone else is wearing because 2 Chainz's shirt is consuming its surroundings.

Kasich: You know, 2 Chainz…

Kasich's political career begins to flash before his eyes. He must now drop a name.

Kasich: I've been friends with Bono for a long time and he uses his platform to do many great things around the world, so it's great to hear you do it as a rapper.

Kasich seems proud of the name-drop, though the audience remains silent. 2 Chainz stares back at the Governor through his sunglasses. They are better than Bono's sunglasses. His expression is a blend of dignity and disgust, a mirror of the eagle tattooed on his chest.

Kasich: Now let's talk about music just for a second.

2 Chainz: Oh no.

Muffled, anxious laughter from all in attendance.

Kasich: So, you've worked with Lil Wayne and Kanye—and my daughters and I used to really love to listen to Kanye…

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Behar, sitting betwixt the two, turns her head back and forth, attempting to grasp the situation at hand. The effort is admirable but futile.

Kasich: You worked with Nicki Minaj who seems to be working with everybody, including Ariana Grande. So first of all, how do you pick who you want to collaborate with and secondly, is it hard to get some of these folks?

2 Chainz: Nicki and I have been friends probably for a decade now. We met through Lil Wayne who's a great friend of mine who, besides God and a few other situations, I attest Lil Wayne for me being in this situation that I'm in now. And so, for me, I'm someone that I'm easy going and I'm very transparent and I'm very professional—I show up for work on time, do what I'm supposed to do. And people like working with me. I'm fans of people still.

Kasich nods.

2 Chainz: I enjoy listening to new music every week. I enjoy learning new things every week. So I think it's just a mutual thing with me.

The panel introduces the trailer for 2 Chainz's forthcoming Pretty Girls Like Trap Music. The daytime TV audience is thrilled.

2 Chainz: Trap music is kind of defined as low socio-economic background music where you have to hustle to get out. And it's a situation where a lot of good girls used to like the bad guys.

Haines: They still do, 2 Chainz. They still do.

Goldberg: Well we didn't do our track.

Chainz appears baffled.

Goldberg: So at some point you and I will have to drop a track.

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Still baffled.

Goldberg: Don't worry about it.

Off-screen, Kasich realizes that he may one day lose a presidential debate to 2 Chainz. Chainz, in turn, wonders what a track with Whoopi Goldberg might sound like. Behar considers writing a book about the scene.

Fade to black.

Alex Robert Ross would do his laundry more often if he got to watch this every time. Follow him on Twitter.