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Speaker 1: Hey, guys, ready or not, twenty twenty four is here,

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Speaker 1: and we here at Breaking Points, are already thinking of

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Speaker 1: ways we can up our game for this critical election.

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Speaker 1: Breakingpoints dot com. Hy Good morning, everybody, Welcome to Counterpoints.

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Speaker 1: We've got a big show to get through today. We're

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Speaker 1: going to be talking about Voladimir Zelensky coming here to Washington, DC.

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Speaker 1: But first while we have him in the studio. Very

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Speaker 1: excited to welcome my colleague from the Intercept, Lee font Lee.

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Speaker 1: Welcome to the Counterpoints. Hey, thanks for having me. Great

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Speaker 1: to be here. So I'm Ryan Graham. This is Amily Jashinsky.

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Speaker 1: We're going to be I think moving away from the

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Speaker 1: whole Counterpoints Friday thing. So ignore the fact that it

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Speaker 1: says that behind there probably do more Wednesday shows TBD TVD.

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Speaker 1: We'll see. It's the end of the year. We're rethinking everything,

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Speaker 1: making resolutions, all that sort of thing, right, right, And

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Speaker 1: a great example of why is what Lee's been up

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Speaker 1: to all week? Yes, yes, And if you guys have

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Speaker 1: been following Lee's reporting, you know why he's here. I

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Speaker 1: had a huge scoop yesterday, what I guess Series eight

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Speaker 1: of the Twitter files. So talk a little bit about

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Speaker 1: what you uncovered in the kind of in the vault. Well,

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Speaker 1: it's kind of two simultaneous stories. One it's the Pentagons,

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Speaker 1: and we can put a one up here. It's kind

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Speaker 1: of two simultaneous stories. It's this Pentagon's psychological influence operations,

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Speaker 1: their efforts on social media, creating news portals, memes, fake

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Speaker 1: personalities throughout the Middle East and all over the world

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Speaker 1: to shape public opinion around US adversaries, kind of pushing

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Speaker 1: fake news or certain narratives that demonize Iran, Russia, other

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Speaker 1: enemies of the US military. And the story also looks

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Speaker 1: at the kind of hypocritical promises and pledges by Twitter.

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Speaker 1: Twitter since twenty sixteen, has promised to crack down on

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Speaker 1: state backed influence operations, to shut down covert propaganda, and

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Speaker 1: they brag all the time about shutting down Russian or

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Speaker 1: Venezuelan or even Thai secret Twitter accounts that are run

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Speaker 1: by the military. Yeah, Azerbaijan, Yeah, Asari's are always doing

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Speaker 1: this as well. But really the US is doing this.

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Speaker 1: And Twitter, even though they promised to shut down all

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Speaker 1: state backed influence operations, they've worked hand in glove with

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Speaker 1: the US military, giving them special privileges for their fake

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Speaker 1: Twitter accounts, these fake personalities that kind of make organic

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Speaker 1: looking conversations in Yemen or Syria or rock promoting US

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Speaker 1: narratives in the region and working with them. And Twitter

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Speaker 1: is well aware of what was going on and did

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Speaker 1: not shut these accounts down for many years. Some of

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Speaker 1: them were suspended earlier this year, but this has gone

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Speaker 1: on for three, four or five years. And one thing

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Speaker 1: your story does so well is kind of disentangle what

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Speaker 1: those special privileges are that the United States military had

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Speaker 1: access to Twitter, and folks that Twitter, they had a

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Speaker 1: pretty easy line of communication. And I want to ask

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Speaker 1: what you found basically when you were looking into the

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Speaker 1: US military. You can see this in least story that emails.

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Speaker 1: Some of the are just incredible what they're asking of Twitter.

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Speaker 1: So what are some of those special privileges you found? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: So one example of this, they kind of had concierge

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Speaker 1: service the US military. At one point in twenty seventeen,

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Speaker 1: someone from Centcom US Central Command emails a list of

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Speaker 1: Sentcom controlled Twitter accounts. These are accounts in Yemen and

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Speaker 1: Syria or you know, purportedly really they're in Florida, but

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Speaker 1: I say that they're in these places, and they ask

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Speaker 1: for whitelist privileges. Now this is a special tag. I

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Speaker 1: was able to go into some of the Twitter tools

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Speaker 1: in the back end and see how they kind of

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Speaker 1: manipulate the reach of various Twitter accounts. And this is

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Speaker 1: a tag that especially that essentially gives verification blue check

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Speaker 1: privileges without the blue check, so you don't see the

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Speaker 1: blue check on the account, doesn't say verified, but as

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Speaker 1: all the same power, so it doesn't get flagged for spam,

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Speaker 1: doesn't get flag for abuse, it doesn't get the n

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Speaker 1: s f W tag for some of the kind of

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Speaker 1: more graphic content, and it's more likely to trend on

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Speaker 1: hashtags and in the region kind of participate and you know,

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Speaker 1: going viral. And the same day that Suncom sent that

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Speaker 1: email with the list of accounts that they control and

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Speaker 1: used to push narratives, someone at Twitter went into the

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Speaker 1: back end and added that tag, so it was immediate service.

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Speaker 1: And then some of the some of the accounts at

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Speaker 1: the time referenced some connection to the Pentagon right, and

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Speaker 1: but then after they got their white list privileges, that faded, right,

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Speaker 1: That's right. So most of these accounts in this particular list,

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Speaker 1: there were several lists of you know, Pentagon accounts that

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Speaker 1: were sent to Twitter, but and some of those were

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Speaker 1: never identified as Suncom control, but some were. And after

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Speaker 1: receiving the whitelest privileges, you can see through the wayback

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Speaker 1: Machine and other archives that these Twitter accounts started shedding

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Speaker 1: their disclosure. You know, originally they kind of operated under

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Speaker 1: these rules of public disclosure. This account is controlled by Sentcom,

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Speaker 1: it's based in Florida. But then over time, you know,

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Speaker 1: you see these bios changed that they get deleted and

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Speaker 1: changed to Euphrate's pulse. This is just an unbiased account

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Speaker 1: for Iraqis and Arabs, you know, several other types of

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Speaker 1: bios and the location is cleaned. And then for some

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Speaker 1: of them, they actually used deep fake images, using artificial

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Speaker 1: intelligence to create fake images of people that don't exist

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Speaker 1: but look very realistic, and then slapping that at in

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Speaker 1: as the kind of face of the profile. Did you

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Speaker 1: get the sense that the psyops as you refer to

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Speaker 1: them accurately, were directed at shifting public opinion in America,

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Speaker 1: in the West more broadly or globally. What's the sort

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Speaker 1: of thrust? What is the Pentagon doing with most of

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Speaker 1: the communications you found? You mentioned Yemen on Twitter. I

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Speaker 1: think that was particularly interesting. What was their goal? It

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Speaker 1: looks like they were mostly focused on shifting public opinion

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Speaker 1: in the regions where they were targeted. But this is

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Speaker 1: the Internet. For information that might be released with a

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Speaker 1: targeted audience or demographic, it can then trickle into other

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Speaker 1: markets and come back to influence in the US. Actually,

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Speaker 1: first looking up the archives of some of these tweets,

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Speaker 1: I noticed that a lot of American outlets when they

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Speaker 1: needed to learn about information regarding drone strikes in Yemen

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Speaker 1: or in Syria, they didn't have much much, you know,

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Speaker 1: local reporting. They had to reference to these Twitter accounts

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Speaker 1: because they were on the scene, you know, kind of

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Speaker 1: celebrating US drone strikes or other military actions. And for

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Speaker 1: US reporters trying to understand what's going on in the region,

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Speaker 1: they might not have, you know, a person on the ground.

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Speaker 1: The only place to reference are these Twitter accounts that

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Speaker 1: look like authentic locals talking about these drone strikes. So

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Speaker 1: it does trickle back to the US, though these were

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Speaker 1: virtually all non English accounts, so you know, I think

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Speaker 1: that the you know, reasonable inference is that they were

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Speaker 1: focused largely on shaping local opinion. And again, like Yemen

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Speaker 1: or Rock or Syria, I wanted you to get to

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Speaker 1: unpack this classification piece real quickly. So you have an

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Speaker 1: email here from Yul Roth, head of trust and former

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Speaker 1: head of Trust and Safety at Twitter, and he writes,

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Speaker 1: Facebook have had a series of one on one conversations

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Speaker 1: between their senior legal leadership and DoD's general counsel inauthentic

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Speaker 1: activity like one of these bought network type things. DoD

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Speaker 1: have indicated a strong desire to work with us to

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Speaker 1: remove the activity, but are now refusing to discuss additional

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Speaker 1: details or steps outside of a classified conversation. And then

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Speaker 1: Stacia Cardial, an attorney at Twitter, writes back that the

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Speaker 1: Pentagon may want to retroactively classify its social media activities

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Speaker 1: quote to obfuscate their activity in this space, and that

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Speaker 1: this may represent an overclassification to avoid embarrassment which is

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Speaker 1: the kind of thing we do see a lot in

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Speaker 1: the classic. It's just that we screwed up. Let's classify that. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's fascinating because I think that's something as reporters, you assume,

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Speaker 1: why is everything classified here? Is it actually top secretor

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Speaker 1: are they just trying to avoid any disclosure around something

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Speaker 1: that might embarrass the government. Here they seem to be

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Speaker 1: discussing and exactly those turns people, even the Twitter people,

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Speaker 1: are like, there's no reason this should be classified, right,

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Speaker 1: And if you look at the previous sentencom emails, they're unclassified.

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Speaker 1: And then once they kind of reached some kind of

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Speaker 1: boiling point. We don't know exactly why, they start thinking, hey,

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Speaker 1: we need to hide some of our tracks. We need

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Speaker 1: to classify all of this. Everyone has to sign non disclosures.

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Speaker 1: You need special national security clearances. Let's go to a skiff,

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Speaker 1: meaning you know, no outside phones or whatever. You know.

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Speaker 1: We don't know exactly what's going on, but there's a

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Speaker 1: few interesting dynamics here. One Twitter again promises to invest

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Speaker 1: so many resources into quickly identifying these Twitter accounts state

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Speaker 1: back influence operations and shutting them down. Here they are saying, hey,

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Speaker 1: we shouldn't shut them down too quickly because then people

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Speaker 1: might know what the US government is doing. Let's work

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Speaker 1: carefully with the d DoD to make sure we don't

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Speaker 1: shut these down in a way that lets maybe foreign

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Speaker 1: governments or the public or the reporters know that this

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Speaker 1: was going on. So they're helping kind of manage the

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Speaker 1: secrecy of this campaign or to at least, do you know,

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Speaker 1: provide some kind of service to the Pentagon. And the

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Speaker 1: other kind of larger issue here is that you know

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Speaker 1: they were aware of this kind This email shows that

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Speaker 1: they were aware of this covert network. Maybe they did

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Speaker 1: recognize that these accounts did violate their terms of service,

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Speaker 1: but this is in mid twenty twenty. If you look

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Speaker 1: at the history of these accounts that they're referencing, they

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Speaker 1: keep tweeting. The next year, they're still around, the following year,

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Speaker 1: they're still around. So you know, they're clearly aware of

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Speaker 1: what's going on. We don't know exactly what happened in

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Speaker 1: these classified meetings. We know they met with Chris Miller,

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Speaker 1: who you know, was a Pentagon official with the Trump administration,

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Speaker 1: and some other dd attorneys. Don't know what was discussed there,

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Speaker 1: but they were clearly going back and forth and trying

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Speaker 1: to help the Pentagon figure out how to deal with

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Speaker 1: this mass. There's an amazing exchange in email that you

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Speaker 1: have where one of I think it's a Twitter lawyer

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Speaker 1: or somebody who works it's a higher level Twitter person

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Speaker 1: sends an Excel spreadsheet of the names that they know

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Speaker 1: and then the names that they've identified as they si

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Speaker 1: up fake personalities, and sends them to the Pentagon basically

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Speaker 1: for verification. Yeah, it looks like they say, hey, look,

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Speaker 1: there's here's two lists. Why is this list that you

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Speaker 1: guys send us? And then they're saying, hey, wait, here's

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Speaker 1: a much longer list of another one hundred and fifty

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Speaker 1: accounts that we identified that are probably you guys, like

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Speaker 1: what's going on here? So you know, there's a lot

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Speaker 1: of back and forth here, and you know, to be

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Speaker 1: perfectly fair to Twitter, it looks like, you know, at

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Speaker 1: least some of these Twitter perhaps low lower level lobbyists

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Speaker 1: and engineers who are working with the Pentagon on this,

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Speaker 1: maybe they were deceived too because they thought that this

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Speaker 1: was something a little bit more above board. And there's

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Speaker 1: a lot of kind of figuring this thing out. But

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Speaker 1: it's clear from some of the emails that Ryan just

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Speaker 1: mentioned at very top levels, the high level lawyers and executives.

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Speaker 1: They knew this was covert, they knew this was violating

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Speaker 1: the terms of service, they knew that this was highly secretive.

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Speaker 1: And one of the messages was like it was like, hey, fyi, Pentagon, Like,

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Speaker 1: if we can find these accounts, then your adversaries are

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Speaker 1: going to be able to find them too, So you

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Speaker 1: might want to step up your bot game. Yeah, exactly,

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Speaker 1: like actually like helping them, you'll kind of break their rules. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: If you juxtaposed that email with what Twitter testified to

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Speaker 1: Congress several times, including in twenty eighteen twenty twenty, they're saying, hey, look,

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Speaker 1: we invest so many resources into spotting and shutting down

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Speaker 1: these networks as soon as we can. It's like no,

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Speaker 1: they knew, and they were moving very slowly and shutting

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Speaker 1: them down. And so can you talk a little bit

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Speaker 1: about how this came about and what's it like? So

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Speaker 1: for people who don't know, Lee is based in San Francisco,

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Speaker 1: where the Twitter headquarters is. So what do you do?

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Speaker 1: Do you bring your own laptop into the office, Like,

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Speaker 1: how's it work? Yeah? So we went in there, you

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Speaker 1: might have to make any agreements or how does it work? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: great question. I signed nothing. I made no agreements. They

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Speaker 1: gave me a badge. I walked into the office and

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Speaker 1: a Twitter lawyer helped come talk to me, and you know,

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Speaker 1: I gave them certain parameters for searches for different tools,

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Speaker 1: and another engineer came and helped run a few other

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Speaker 1: searches on some of the more specific tools there are

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Speaker 1: very like the profile viewer that I mentioned. They required

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Speaker 1: a little bit more technical expertise. They ran some searches,

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Speaker 1: they would kind of disappear and come back and then

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Speaker 1: kind of show me on a on a Twitter laptop

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Speaker 1: and that was basically it. You know, we went back

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Speaker 1: and forth again for about three days, and you know,

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Speaker 1: I made no agreements, They made no editorial input. They

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Speaker 1: didn't even know what I was looking for reporting on.

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Speaker 1: You know, Again, since there was kind of an in

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Speaker 1: between these engineers and lawyers who were running the searches,

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Speaker 1: potentially what I saw was kind of limited. I don't know,

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Speaker 1: but because they could have seen something and been like,

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Speaker 1: don't share that. That's certainly possible, but it didn't seem

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Speaker 1: like when I was getting doing it. Basically in front

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Speaker 1: of you. No, they would do it in another room

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Speaker 1: and come back. But you know, I was able to

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Speaker 1: authenticate all the emails and documents that we reported on.

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Speaker 1: We've had more context. I talked to several former Twitter

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Speaker 1: employees over the weekend in the last few days while

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Speaker 1: reporting this piece, just kind of correspond all the facts here. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: how did you land on this as what you were

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Speaker 1: interested in? Right about? What struck you like looking through documents?

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Speaker 1: Were you like, there's got to be some sy ups

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Speaker 1: going on here? Well, you know, the Stanford came out

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Speaker 1: with the report in August that really peauked my interest

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Speaker 1: into this issue, looking at various US propaganda efforts on

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Speaker 1: social media. So I've been thinking about this for the

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Speaker 1: last few months, and I actually interviewed a few people

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Speaker 1: hoping to report on that report back in September, So

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Speaker 1: you know, this was kind of fresh in my mind.

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Speaker 1: And I've reported similar stories, mostly about US special interest

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Speaker 1: in corporations running kind of their own version of this.

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Speaker 1: So something I've reported on for years, but in this

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Speaker 1: particular issue, Yeah, that Stanford report got me interested. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: So are you going back, like, what's your Well? I

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Speaker 1: hope so, TVD. I mean I love the idea. I

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Speaker 1: wish every corporate I've been critical of Busks kind of

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Speaker 1: pivot lately the way that he's been Now we'll talk

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Speaker 1: about that later on the show, but I love the

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Speaker 1: idea of him opening up the corporate records list. It's like,

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Speaker 1: did you chat with them at all? I did not

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Speaker 1: meet Musk, but you know, I think I'll have a

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Speaker 1: lot more stories working on a few others, and I'm

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Speaker 1: excited to see what other folks are doing. Barry Weiss

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Speaker 1: as an excellent team working on stuff, and Michael Schellenberger

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Speaker 1: and Mate you b so you know, I'm interested to read.

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Speaker 1: Just as a viewer, it's so much fun to watch

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Speaker 1: everyone to sort of pick at the you know, it's

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Speaker 1: and your insights into the process are really helpful because

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Speaker 1: what we're seeing from the public perspective are these fascinating drops,

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Speaker 1: you know that are just drip dripping out over the

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Speaker 1: course of several weeks. But to see the background and

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Speaker 1: how you guys are doing the heavy lifting here is fantastic.

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Speaker 1: Thank you so much, and you know, it's been fun

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Speaker 1: to participate, and it's really unusual. But I hope you

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Speaker 1: get some public interest information that can help enlighten the

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Speaker 1: debate and maybe more corporations will open up their front

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Speaker 1: be nice, Yeah, that would be grateful. Yeah, So you

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Speaker 1: can check out his reporting over at the Intercept. Lee

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Speaker 1: also started a substack we we'll be sending out kind

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Speaker 1: of additional reporting and background. I think it's just called lefong, right, yeah,

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Speaker 1: leefong subsec dot com. There you go. All right, we'll

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Speaker 1: stick around. We've got to go catch train. We'll be

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Speaker 1: back with more. Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelenski is coming to

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Speaker 1: the capital today, as first reported by punch Bowl News. Emily,

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Speaker 1: what's what's your read on the timing of this visit.

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Speaker 1: It's funding. I imagine there's a lot of money being

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Speaker 1: debated right now, being negotiated over in the Omnibus spending

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Speaker 1: and so it seems to me like Zelenski is coming.

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Speaker 1: He's going to the White House, and then potentially it

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Speaker 1: looks like a joint addressed to Congress at seven thirty

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Speaker 1: pm this says they're debating the Omnibus bill. This is

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Speaker 1: the which which would include a lot more money go

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Speaker 1: into Ukraine. So I think he's coming here to make

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Speaker 1: the case to make that vote a little easier for

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Speaker 1: some Senators whose constituents and members from Congress in general

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Speaker 1: whose constituents may be getting a little wary of all

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Speaker 1: the money going over there. And we can put up

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Speaker 1: that first element here. But yeah, so you're you're I

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Speaker 1: think you're exactly right. The context here is that Congress

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Speaker 1: is debating a one point seven trillion dollar on the

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Speaker 1: spending package where they're trying basically, they're trying to clean

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Speaker 1: clean the slate, like get everything that they can get

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Speaker 1: through through during the lame duck. The White House had

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Speaker 1: requested thirty seven billion dollars for Ukraine as part of

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Speaker 1: that package, as we've seen since you know, the Obama administration,

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Speaker 1: the Trump administration, and again the request then gets upped

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Speaker 1: by Congress. Whether for military spending. You never you never

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Speaker 1: see Congress say, you know what, you're getting a little

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Speaker 1: greedy over there. Thirty seven sounds a bit much. How

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Speaker 1: about thirty plus. We're going to put these conditions around it.

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Speaker 1: There's going to be inspector's general that are going to

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Speaker 1: make sure that it's spent accurately. Instead, Oh, you mean

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Speaker 1: not a blank check? Not a blank instead blank check?

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Speaker 1: You want thirty seven billion? Aha? How about forty five

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Speaker 1: billion dollars. So Congress and a bipartisan fashion has responded

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Speaker 1: with forty five and I think and without the types

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Speaker 1: of guardrails and the types of ig restrictions that people

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Speaker 1: like Rand Paul have called or before. And I think

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Speaker 1: that what's happening here is that the kind of triumvirate

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Speaker 1: of Pelosi, Schumer and McConnell are pushing this through now

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Speaker 1: and perhaps and I'm curious for your taking on this,

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Speaker 1: perhaps with the kind of quiet, the quiet agreement of

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Speaker 1: Kevin McCarthy to get this through now so that the

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Speaker 1: House Republicans don't have to deal with this for a

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Speaker 1: very long time, right, And we're going to I think

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Speaker 1: flesh this out a little bit more in the omnibus segment.

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Speaker 1: But that's what a lot of Conservatives, that Freedom Caucus

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Speaker 1: aligned folks are really upset about, is that they could

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Speaker 1: have passed a CR basically a one month CR that

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Speaker 1: would avert the shutdown. McConnell could have pushed for that.

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Speaker 1: He could have said, this is what we're doing and

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Speaker 1: that's it, and then Republicans could have set the spending

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Speaker 1: priorities on the House side when they have control in

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Speaker 1: the new conguer starting in just a couple of weeks,

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Speaker 1: and that would have been the preference. And they're saying,

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Speaker 1: why on earth are we going along with this when

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Speaker 1: it's got all the spending priorities of Democrats. So that's

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Speaker 1: absolutely a sticking point for the kind of Freedom Caucus

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Speaker 1: aligned folks. So did Democrats get a lot of their

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Speaker 1: priorities into this omnibus? Because enough of the national security

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Speaker 1: establishment wants Republicans to agree to this forty five billion

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Speaker 1: dollars And so McConnell's like, Okay, we really want this

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Speaker 1: forty five billion for Ukraine, and in exchange, you know,

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Speaker 1: we will agree to do an omnibus. Right. I think

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Speaker 1: that's probably part of it, because you've seen this happen

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Speaker 1: many times before when the national secuity, when you're able

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Speaker 1: to invoke the Pentagon spending, when you're able to invoke

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Speaker 1: a cause as tragic and serious as this one, it's

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Speaker 1: a little emotional blackmail. And obviously it's not purely emotional blackmail,

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Speaker 1: because there's a lot of money that is involved here

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Speaker 1: in the DC area particularly, but it makes it again

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Speaker 1: easier to take that vote for anyone, And Sager tweeted,

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Speaker 1: a great thing yesterday where he shows on a chart

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Speaker 1: that with the additional forty five billion dollars I'm quoting

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Speaker 1: him to Ukraine, the United States will have given nearly

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Speaker 1: twice as much as the entire European continent combined. So

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Speaker 1: when you think about that and you wonder why Zelenski

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Speaker 1: has a suddenly announced trip to the United States as

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Speaker 1: forty five billion additional dollars are being debated, and as

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Speaker 1: you have even people that are as mainstream in the

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Speaker 1: Republican Party like Kevin McCarthy saying we don't want to

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Speaker 1: blank checked to Ukraine, and there's a freak out over

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Speaker 1: him even saying that, it's a pretty clear reason why

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Speaker 1: you would want Zelensky to come and make the case

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Speaker 1: emotionally personally in Washington, DC, And the strategic case from

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Speaker 1: the US perspective is clear that Putin was hoping. I

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Speaker 1: think that with a Republican takeover in the House of Representatives,

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Speaker 1: that would be more difficult to get American money into

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Speaker 1: Ukrainian hands, to get basically American weapons into Ukrainian hands,

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Speaker 1: which could then give him give Putin a better bargaining

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Speaker 1: position to try to maintain, you know, significant swaths of

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Speaker 1: territory that they've that they've occupied as part of their invasion.

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Speaker 1: But by getting the the not just thirty seven billion,

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Speaker 1: but forty five billion dollars worth of spending through Congress,

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Speaker 1: if they successfully do it, then what whatever the House,

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Speaker 1: whatever House Republicans want to do, whatever debt ceiling crisis,

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Speaker 1: you know, they want to filment over the next year.

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Speaker 1: Whatever hostility or skepticism they have towards the conflict, it's

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Speaker 1: not going to matter because the money will already have

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Speaker 1: been appropriated and can and you'll see it then just

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Speaker 1: dribbled out like we're sending another five hundred million dollars

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Speaker 1: worth of javelins, We're spending another five hundred million worth

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Speaker 1: of you know, anti tank et cetera, et cetera. And

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Speaker 1: so that sets that sets Putin's war effort back because

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Speaker 1: he's like, Okay, well, now my hope of using the

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Speaker 1: winter leverage against this these kind of allies of Ukraine

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Speaker 1: isn't going to work because the money's the money has

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Speaker 1: already been appropriated. You expect to hear from Zelenski anything

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Speaker 1: in particular you think will he sees as making his

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Speaker 1: case the most strongest. I mean, he is a he's

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Speaker 1: a performer like he as everybody knows. That's how he

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Speaker 1: came to power as a not just a comedian but

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Speaker 1: kind of uh, you know, an actor, and and it's

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Speaker 1: you know, hit shows in Ukraine. He's he's an extraordinary Uh,

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Speaker 1: he's an extraordinary performer, which turns out probably to have

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Speaker 1: been a saving grace for Ukraine. If they had some

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Speaker 1: kind of corrupt old stewge of oligarchs up up there

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Speaker 1: like they like they used to have, you could you

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Speaker 1: I think, yeah, I think I think that even if

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Speaker 1: it was like one of the pro Western ones, I

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Speaker 1: think you'd have a lot more skepticism among the American public.

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Speaker 1: Americans so many of them just love this guy. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Remember when he made an appearance at the it was

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Speaker 1: it was a it was a video appearance. This is

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Speaker 1: actually his first visit physical visits the United States since

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Speaker 1: the war. But he did teleconferences to the Grammy Awards

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Speaker 1: to your point, precisely because the theater is where he excels.

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Speaker 1: And he's done a lot of interviews with American media too. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: And if if he if they started polling him in

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Speaker 1: the Democratic primary for president, he'd be at the he'd

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Speaker 1: be near the top, like it says, well, not only

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Speaker 1: do you have to be a citizen, you have to

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Speaker 1: have been born in the United States, so not eligible. However,

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Speaker 1: it's seriously, if they put him in the polls, he'd

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Speaker 1: probably be pulling ahead of Biden. I don't know about that.

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Speaker 1: I mean, he polls really well here in Washington, d C.

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Speaker 1: Where all of the defense. But I think among Democratic

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Speaker 1: primary voters who like read the New York Times, yes,

428
00:22:39,480 --> 00:22:42,520
Speaker 1: oh yeah, watch Colbert and I like, maybe not in Iowa,

429
00:22:42,720 --> 00:22:47,439
Speaker 1: but that's it's a nationalized electorate at this point. But anyway,

430
00:22:48,240 --> 00:22:50,120
Speaker 1: we will We'll never get an answer to that because

431
00:22:50,160 --> 00:22:52,760
Speaker 1: it won't. It won't never happen. But so I think

432
00:22:52,800 --> 00:22:57,480
Speaker 1: he will. I think he'll lean into the cause of freedom,

433
00:22:57,760 --> 00:23:01,280
Speaker 1: I think of liberty. I think he'll try to flatter

434
00:23:01,760 --> 00:23:05,000
Speaker 1: the United States for its generosity and support of freedom

435
00:23:05,000 --> 00:23:07,960
Speaker 1: and liberty historically as well. And he's going to probably

436
00:23:07,960 --> 00:23:12,200
Speaker 1: invoke the United States historical support for all of the right.

437
00:23:12,320 --> 00:23:14,080
Speaker 1: And if I had to guess, I would think that

438
00:23:14,440 --> 00:23:17,879
Speaker 1: Pelosi had a significant amount to do with this trip,

439
00:23:18,240 --> 00:23:20,480
Speaker 1: Like she understands the politics of the House well. And

440
00:23:20,520 --> 00:23:23,080
Speaker 1: I think what he's going to try to do is

441
00:23:24,240 --> 00:23:29,000
Speaker 1: make it as politically painful as possible for Republicans to

442
00:23:29,080 --> 00:23:34,200
Speaker 1: express skepticism about the endless spending to support the war effort,

443
00:23:34,320 --> 00:23:37,560
Speaker 1: and virtually impossible for Democrats. Well they're not even trying,

444
00:23:37,800 --> 00:23:40,440
Speaker 1: so he doesn't really need to appeal to them. Well, yeah,

445
00:23:40,480 --> 00:23:43,919
Speaker 1: they're not even trying now. But eventually, you know, this

446
00:23:44,000 --> 00:23:46,600
Speaker 1: makes it even harder when you're again just being you

447
00:23:46,720 --> 00:23:48,840
Speaker 1: know that they're going to call in the big guns,

448
00:23:49,160 --> 00:23:52,360
Speaker 1: so to speak, when when you have more forty five

449
00:23:52,400 --> 00:23:55,879
Speaker 1: billion more dollars on the table. Have you seen that

450
00:23:55,960 --> 00:23:58,119
Speaker 1: show that's on Netflix now serving to the people. I

451
00:23:58,119 --> 00:23:59,800
Speaker 1: haven't watched it, have you. I've seen the first couple

452
00:23:59,840 --> 00:24:02,440
Speaker 1: of so it's really good. Really, it is really good.

453
00:24:02,480 --> 00:24:04,440
Speaker 1: You're gonna have to do a full monologue reviewing it.

454
00:24:04,560 --> 00:24:07,800
Speaker 1: I well, I lost my glasses, you know, as you know,

455
00:24:07,920 --> 00:24:11,439
Speaker 1: so I can't read the subtitles anymore, so I had

456
00:24:11,440 --> 00:24:15,800
Speaker 1: to stop watching it. But the first several episodes are

457
00:24:16,080 --> 00:24:20,680
Speaker 1: are just it's great. It's like and it's also poignant

458
00:24:20,880 --> 00:24:25,280
Speaker 1: to see kind of Kiev before the destruction, and also

459
00:24:25,320 --> 00:24:28,879
Speaker 1: to see him as just an actor. It's kind of weird.

460
00:24:28,920 --> 00:24:32,280
Speaker 1: It's like, it's jarring to watch, but the show itself

461
00:24:33,320 --> 00:24:35,240
Speaker 1: if for people who on't know the premise. He's like

462
00:24:35,240 --> 00:24:37,840
Speaker 1: a school teacher who does a rant about all the

463
00:24:37,880 --> 00:24:40,960
Speaker 1: corrupt oligarchs that run the politics of Ukraine that his

464
00:24:41,080 --> 00:24:44,320
Speaker 1: kids like secretly film and post on YouTube. It goes viral,

465
00:24:45,600 --> 00:24:48,840
Speaker 1: they demand he runs for president, and he shockingly wins presidency.

466
00:24:49,320 --> 00:24:52,160
Speaker 1: He may have to revisit some of those popular sentiments

467
00:24:52,160 --> 00:24:57,240
Speaker 1: anti corruption sentiments. If peace ever comes. There's going to

468
00:24:57,240 --> 00:24:59,800
Speaker 1: be a lot to look under the hood of wh

469
00:25:00,080 --> 00:25:02,840
Speaker 1: money went. Oh, for sure, and we're going to be

470
00:25:02,880 --> 00:25:07,199
Speaker 1: dealing with these weapons probably for decades. Yes they're not.

471
00:25:07,840 --> 00:25:10,040
Speaker 1: It's not going to stay in Ukraine, all of them.

472
00:25:10,600 --> 00:25:13,200
Speaker 1: That's right. Well, and now Victor boots Out, had Victor

473
00:25:13,200 --> 00:25:16,000
Speaker 1: boots Out work for Victor boot There you go? Yeah,

474
00:25:16,040 --> 00:25:18,520
Speaker 1: all right. Well, we'll obviously be following this story very

475
00:25:18,520 --> 00:25:22,240
Speaker 1: closely as it develops, so we'll surely have more news

476
00:25:22,240 --> 00:25:25,240
Speaker 1: on the Iran nuclear deal front this week. As President

477
00:25:25,240 --> 00:25:29,320
Speaker 1: Biden even responded to somebody just in a photo handshake

478
00:25:29,400 --> 00:25:31,840
Speaker 1: line about whether or not he would announce that it

479
00:25:31,880 --> 00:25:33,640
Speaker 1: was dead. We can go ahead and throw b one

480
00:25:33,920 --> 00:25:38,040
Speaker 1: up on the screen so you can see there, Biden

481
00:25:38,480 --> 00:25:41,000
Speaker 1: is saying that it's it is dead, but he's not

482
00:25:41,040 --> 00:25:43,560
Speaker 1: going to quote announce that it's dead because it's a

483
00:25:43,640 --> 00:25:46,000
Speaker 1: long story. Again, that's a quote. Why don't we just

484
00:25:46,119 --> 00:25:48,480
Speaker 1: roll the clips so you can judge for yourself. This

485
00:25:48,520 --> 00:26:07,200
Speaker 1: is B two No, Why we just don't want to

486
00:26:07,280 --> 00:26:15,920
Speaker 1: deal with no deals? Right? I want to read a

487
00:26:15,960 --> 00:26:18,320
Speaker 1: quote from you from the Axios report. It says in

488
00:26:18,400 --> 00:26:21,200
Speaker 1: late October, US Envoy for Iran, Rob Malley said the

489
00:26:21,240 --> 00:26:24,160
Speaker 1: administration is not going to quote waste time on trying

490
00:26:24,160 --> 00:26:26,760
Speaker 1: to revive the Iron Nuclear Deal at this time, considering

491
00:26:26,840 --> 00:26:31,280
Speaker 1: to Iran's cracked down on protesters, Iranian support for Russia's

492
00:26:31,280 --> 00:26:34,800
Speaker 1: war in Ukraine, and Iran's positions on its nuclear program.

493
00:26:35,240 --> 00:26:37,600
Speaker 1: This is an argument. It's a version of the argument

494
00:26:37,600 --> 00:26:42,560
Speaker 1: that was made against proponents of the the JCPOA for

495
00:26:42,720 --> 00:26:45,280
Speaker 1: years on the right, which is that you are doing

496
00:26:45,720 --> 00:26:49,480
Speaker 1: business with a regime that has countless human rights abuses,

497
00:26:49,760 --> 00:26:54,080
Speaker 1: is aligned against the United States, aligned against Israel. And

498
00:26:54,200 --> 00:26:59,520
Speaker 1: they're now invoking very similar arguments, very similar points, because

499
00:26:59,560 --> 00:27:02,119
Speaker 1: it has been come politically less convenient for them to

500
00:27:02,160 --> 00:27:04,000
Speaker 1: pursue the j c p o A right now. Isn't

501
00:27:04,040 --> 00:27:07,960
Speaker 1: that essentially their argument, you're you got them, I mean

502
00:27:08,320 --> 00:27:11,360
Speaker 1: fair enough. That's that's a clean shot. It shows that

503
00:27:11,560 --> 00:27:13,920
Speaker 1: it's a matter of degrees, that it's all relative here

504
00:27:14,320 --> 00:27:17,080
Speaker 1: because it was, like you said, it was already the

505
00:27:17,080 --> 00:27:21,280
Speaker 1: case that Iran was supportive of actors around the region

506
00:27:21,640 --> 00:27:25,879
Speaker 1: that were hostile to the interest in the United States. Uh,

507
00:27:26,200 --> 00:27:29,639
Speaker 1: whether that's Hamas has bel the you could argue that

508
00:27:29,680 --> 00:27:33,480
Speaker 1: who the is like, Uh, the elements within within a

509
00:27:33,560 --> 00:27:37,440
Speaker 1: rock that are are hostile to kind of US allies

510
00:27:37,440 --> 00:27:42,800
Speaker 1: inside of rock, Uh, running hostility to to Israel, refusing

511
00:27:42,800 --> 00:27:47,520
Speaker 1: to recognize it, constantly threatening it with obliteration. Uh. That

512
00:27:47,560 --> 00:27:51,080
Speaker 1: has that has been a condition of the Iranian Republic,

513
00:27:51,160 --> 00:27:54,000
Speaker 1: you know since the revolutionary that that that's that's accurate

514
00:27:54,920 --> 00:27:57,760
Speaker 1: and so uh yeah, to say that, well, now they've

515
00:27:57,800 --> 00:28:02,000
Speaker 1: gone too far. And also domestically, it's not as if

516
00:28:02,119 --> 00:28:05,080
Speaker 1: they've been kind of bastions of liberty, right like have

517
00:28:05,800 --> 00:28:09,400
Speaker 1: you know, they haven't been engaging in these types of crackdowns,

518
00:28:09,400 --> 00:28:14,439
Speaker 1: although in twenty nineteen there were extraordinary domestic there's an

519
00:28:14,440 --> 00:28:19,240
Speaker 1: extraordinary domestic crackdown of popular unrest, and during the Obama

520
00:28:19,240 --> 00:28:21,440
Speaker 1: administration that happened as well. In two thousand and nine

521
00:28:21,520 --> 00:28:24,680
Speaker 1: very early, right, there was that Green Revolution that was

522
00:28:25,200 --> 00:28:29,879
Speaker 1: suppressed violently as well, and so right, what Mally is

523
00:28:29,880 --> 00:28:33,359
Speaker 1: saying here is that, Okay, now it's gone too far,

524
00:28:33,920 --> 00:28:37,200
Speaker 1: because you know that the support of the support of

525
00:28:37,280 --> 00:28:41,640
Speaker 1: Russia and the extent and length of the crackdown is

526
00:28:41,680 --> 00:28:45,480
Speaker 1: too far. So they are, in fact, like you said,

527
00:28:45,840 --> 00:28:49,480
Speaker 1: legitimating that argument that they're too that they're too bad

528
00:28:49,960 --> 00:28:53,480
Speaker 1: to work with. Whereas the people who are on the

529
00:28:53,520 --> 00:28:55,480
Speaker 1: side of the deal, if they're going to be principled

530
00:28:55,480 --> 00:28:59,280
Speaker 1: about it, ought to argue, yes, they have always been bad.

531
00:29:00,040 --> 00:29:02,920
Speaker 1: This is about a nuclear deal, and it is about

532
00:29:03,040 --> 00:29:07,479
Speaker 1: keeping nuclear weapons from a bad and dangerous regime. And

533
00:29:07,600 --> 00:29:12,040
Speaker 1: in fact, the worse they are, the more reason there

534
00:29:12,120 --> 00:29:14,240
Speaker 1: is to strike a nuclear deal with them. Because we're

535
00:29:14,280 --> 00:29:17,520
Speaker 1: not striking a nuclear deal because we love them, because

536
00:29:17,520 --> 00:29:19,360
Speaker 1: we're good friends with the Mulas and we just want

537
00:29:19,400 --> 00:29:22,680
Speaker 1: to like reduce sanctions on them. We would be doing

538
00:29:22,680 --> 00:29:25,160
Speaker 1: it so that they don't have a nuclear weapon, so

539
00:29:25,200 --> 00:29:28,920
Speaker 1: that the world is a safer place, and so gas

540
00:29:28,920 --> 00:29:35,360
Speaker 1: prices are cheaper. But that's incidentally, but yeah, it's not so.

541
00:29:36,280 --> 00:29:39,680
Speaker 1: Maleley's kind of argument there recasts it a little bit

542
00:29:40,000 --> 00:29:44,280
Speaker 1: as a favor to Iran, which now I think what's

543
00:29:44,320 --> 00:29:48,240
Speaker 1: actually going on here is yes, And I think just

544
00:29:48,320 --> 00:29:52,479
Speaker 1: the domestic politics are too extreme, Like if you're if

545
00:29:52,480 --> 00:29:54,960
Speaker 1: you're if you're a bad regime, but you're but you're

546
00:29:55,000 --> 00:29:58,040
Speaker 1: not on the front pages, then the US can strike

547
00:29:58,080 --> 00:30:00,800
Speaker 1: a deal with you domestically and get away with it

548
00:30:00,880 --> 00:30:03,040
Speaker 1: Haiti for instance. If you're yeah, you can do whatever

549
00:30:03,080 --> 00:30:06,160
Speaker 1: you want Haiti, because nobody's going to cover that. But

550
00:30:06,280 --> 00:30:08,280
Speaker 1: if they're on the front pages, then it's more difficult

551
00:30:08,320 --> 00:30:11,440
Speaker 1: politically for you for you to strike, for you to

552
00:30:11,440 --> 00:30:13,680
Speaker 1: strike that deal. So that's what I think is going on.

553
00:30:13,760 --> 00:30:16,760
Speaker 1: And so I think by them saying it's dead, that's

554
00:30:16,880 --> 00:30:20,200
Speaker 1: an acknowledgment of that political reality and also is leveraging

555
00:30:20,240 --> 00:30:22,840
Speaker 1: the negotiations, like because Iran does want this, and nothing's

556
00:30:22,880 --> 00:30:25,880
Speaker 1: ever dead when it comes to diplomacy, ask ask Mansin,

557
00:30:25,920 --> 00:30:27,640
Speaker 1: and the build back better than I was dead in

558
00:30:27,680 --> 00:30:30,760
Speaker 1: the past. That's right, Well, it was because you said

559
00:30:31,080 --> 00:30:33,560
Speaker 1: it is a concession, really, that Iran wants this, that

560
00:30:33,600 --> 00:30:36,560
Speaker 1: Iran obviously sees that there's something good for Iran in this.

561
00:30:36,560 --> 00:30:38,160
Speaker 1: This is not just a clear cut win for the

562
00:30:38,240 --> 00:30:40,560
Speaker 1: United States, And that's not the argument that proponents of

563
00:30:40,600 --> 00:30:43,160
Speaker 1: the JCPOA are making sort of in the honest sense.

564
00:30:43,640 --> 00:30:46,160
Speaker 1: And the last point I think we should absolutely touch

565
00:30:46,200 --> 00:30:48,400
Speaker 1: on here is the role Russia has played in all

566
00:30:48,440 --> 00:30:51,320
Speaker 1: of this. It was a very strange situation when they

567
00:30:51,320 --> 00:30:54,280
Speaker 1: were really this was heating up earlier this year the

568
00:30:54,280 --> 00:30:57,720
Speaker 1: negotiations of their own nuclear deal and Russia is basically

569
00:30:57,960 --> 00:31:02,040
Speaker 1: mediating because of some the parameters from the original deal

570
00:31:02,120 --> 00:31:05,520
Speaker 1: during the Obama administration, which Trump scrapped. It was a

571
00:31:05,600 --> 00:31:08,240
Speaker 1: huge part of his campaign actually was just scrapping the

572
00:31:08,280 --> 00:31:11,680
Speaker 1: around nuclear deal and he did it. Biden administration has

573
00:31:11,720 --> 00:31:15,640
Speaker 1: been trying to bring it back, and Russia has been

574
00:31:15,680 --> 00:31:18,400
Speaker 1: in the middle. So how much of this is is

575
00:31:18,480 --> 00:31:21,800
Speaker 1: also the Biden administration just saying, listen, this is basically

576
00:31:21,840 --> 00:31:26,800
Speaker 1: impossible right now anyway because our middleman, we're basically at

577
00:31:26,840 --> 00:31:29,200
Speaker 1: war with them. We're we're in a proxy war with them,

578
00:31:29,720 --> 00:31:31,920
Speaker 1: right and and they're also and we could put up

579
00:31:31,920 --> 00:31:37,040
Speaker 1: the third element here, they're also engaging in public displays

580
00:31:37,080 --> 00:31:43,280
Speaker 1: of atrocities, which again like makes it relatively that much

581
00:31:43,320 --> 00:31:46,640
Speaker 1: more difficult for any for the Biden administration to kind

582
00:31:46,640 --> 00:31:50,080
Speaker 1: of deal with the with a government that is out here,

583
00:31:50,360 --> 00:31:54,200
Speaker 1: you know, publicly executing people for participating in these in

584
00:31:54,240 --> 00:31:57,760
Speaker 1: these protests. So they have they have started. This is

585
00:31:57,840 --> 00:32:00,560
Speaker 1: NBC news here around the government has spent months cracking

586
00:32:00,600 --> 00:32:02,160
Speaker 1: down a protest group in the country. Now it has

587
00:32:02,200 --> 00:32:06,040
Speaker 1: started hanging people in public and approach some demonstrators and

588
00:32:06,080 --> 00:32:08,520
Speaker 1: experts see as a desperate attempt to crush the descent

589
00:32:08,840 --> 00:32:11,600
Speaker 1: that has posed an unprecedented challenge to the clerical regime.

590
00:32:11,680 --> 00:32:16,480
Speaker 1: So US media is still framing this as as a

591
00:32:17,040 --> 00:32:20,600
Speaker 1: desperate move from the from the Iranian regime here. Either way,

592
00:32:21,240 --> 00:32:26,240
Speaker 1: it's aterocious. Yeah, and again it is quite interesting to

593
00:32:26,280 --> 00:32:31,920
Speaker 1: see that leveraged in the JCPOA negotiations, which actually, yeah,

594
00:32:32,240 --> 00:32:34,520
Speaker 1: I get what, I get the point that nothing's ever

595
00:32:34,720 --> 00:32:38,680
Speaker 1: really dead and that this is obviously, I think probably

596
00:32:39,280 --> 00:32:43,800
Speaker 1: partially in some way a ploy to nudge the negotiations

597
00:32:43,800 --> 00:32:46,080
Speaker 1: if they can be nudged. But I just don't see

598
00:32:46,080 --> 00:32:49,280
Speaker 1: this budget at all for now. And the biggest player,

599
00:32:49,280 --> 00:32:52,920
Speaker 1: and that really seems to be the war in Ukraine. Yeah,

600
00:32:52,960 --> 00:32:58,000
Speaker 1: and so there, executions by hanging are far from rare,

601
00:32:58,080 --> 00:33:01,400
Speaker 1: are rare, and Iran NBC report Amisy Internash says it

602
00:33:01,480 --> 00:33:04,080
Speaker 1: put three hundred and fourteen people to death last year,

603
00:33:04,280 --> 00:33:05,920
Speaker 1: the most in the world after China, although the United

604
00:33:05,960 --> 00:33:09,680
Speaker 1: States does continue to execute people at a pretty pretty

605
00:33:09,680 --> 00:33:12,680
Speaker 1: fierce clip as well. So that's our company is China

606
00:33:12,720 --> 00:33:15,040
Speaker 1: and Iran when it comes to when it comes to

607
00:33:15,080 --> 00:33:18,720
Speaker 1: the death penalty, although there's a matter of due process

608
00:33:18,800 --> 00:33:22,080
Speaker 1: and trials, I imagine that differs. It's true. I'm sure

609
00:33:22,120 --> 00:33:24,960
Speaker 1: that I'm sure that our bureaucrats are making no mistakes

610
00:33:25,800 --> 00:33:28,160
Speaker 1: on the march toward on a march toward death row.

611
00:33:28,280 --> 00:33:32,400
Speaker 1: Believe me, I will never defend that is atrocious. And

612
00:33:32,760 --> 00:33:36,600
Speaker 1: in Iran, these in a lot of cases are what

613
00:33:36,760 --> 00:33:42,400
Speaker 1: mirror protesters have been, supportable women against the regime oppressing women.

614
00:33:43,240 --> 00:33:47,880
Speaker 1: So just unbelievable story as it continues to unfold, and

615
00:33:48,200 --> 00:33:50,160
Speaker 1: I like the JSPO. Yeah, and the last piece we

616
00:33:50,200 --> 00:33:52,240
Speaker 1: can put up the fourth element. What we're seeing is

617
00:33:52,280 --> 00:33:56,840
Speaker 1: an increasingly tight relationship developing between Russia and Iran. You know,

618
00:33:56,880 --> 00:34:01,280
Speaker 1: they have been soft allies for for a long time,

619
00:34:01,760 --> 00:34:05,080
Speaker 1: partly enemy of my enemy kind of situation. But now

620
00:34:05,120 --> 00:34:10,120
Speaker 1: you're seeing the military cooperation ramp up as Russia is

621
00:34:10,520 --> 00:34:14,319
Speaker 1: cornered and has few few outlets and allies this you know,

622
00:34:14,400 --> 00:34:19,440
Speaker 1: here's the guarding reporting that they're boosting military links, exchanging

623
00:34:19,920 --> 00:34:24,200
Speaker 1: military technic Russia, exchanging military technology with Iran in exchange

624
00:34:24,239 --> 00:34:27,960
Speaker 1: for the help with the drone their drone war effort. Right,

625
00:34:28,000 --> 00:34:30,399
Speaker 1: And so you can see why the Biden administration is

626
00:34:30,480 --> 00:34:37,520
Speaker 1: invoking that in again the JCPOA negotiations precisely because they're saying,

627
00:34:38,000 --> 00:34:41,160
Speaker 1: why are we dealing with, first of all, somebody that

628
00:34:41,280 --> 00:34:43,560
Speaker 1: is we are fighting a proxy war against to the

629
00:34:43,600 --> 00:34:46,120
Speaker 1: tune of billions and billions of dollars? Why are they

630
00:34:46,160 --> 00:34:49,399
Speaker 1: negotiating this deal for us? That's making it impossible to do?

631
00:34:49,840 --> 00:34:53,960
Speaker 1: And secondly, we don't want it to be a reward

632
00:34:54,320 --> 00:34:56,960
Speaker 1: for a regime that is sort of actively engaged in

633
00:34:57,000 --> 00:34:59,160
Speaker 1: bad things. But at the end of the day, from

634
00:34:59,160 --> 00:35:03,319
Speaker 1: my perspective, all of that is a concession that it's

635
00:35:03,320 --> 00:35:05,920
Speaker 1: a concession that they've just decided to draw the line

636
00:35:05,920 --> 00:35:10,040
Speaker 1: on Iran being bad here, when all along that was

637
00:35:10,080 --> 00:35:12,480
Speaker 1: the argument that they were saying, Oh, don't worry about it.

638
00:35:12,560 --> 00:35:14,879
Speaker 1: There's a much more honest stance, and it's the one

639
00:35:14,920 --> 00:35:16,759
Speaker 1: you laid out at the beginning of the segment. That's

640
00:35:16,760 --> 00:35:18,520
Speaker 1: not the one that they've taken, right, And it's not

641
00:35:18,640 --> 00:35:21,960
Speaker 1: my job to give advice to the American Empire. But

642
00:35:22,600 --> 00:35:26,920
Speaker 1: it is interesting that their inability to create normal relations

643
00:35:26,920 --> 00:35:30,600
Speaker 1: with Iran over the years is now complicating their war

644
00:35:30,640 --> 00:35:35,840
Speaker 1: effort in Ukraine in multiple ways, both because it's complicating

645
00:35:35,840 --> 00:35:38,600
Speaker 1: their effort to wind down the war in Yemen, but

646
00:35:39,080 --> 00:35:43,520
Speaker 1: also now pushing Iran and Russia into tighter cooperation. You know,

647
00:35:44,320 --> 00:35:48,320
Speaker 1: if you're going to be waging wars in Yemen, in Ukraine,

648
00:35:49,000 --> 00:35:54,000
Speaker 1: saber rattling around to Taiwan, you would rather, i think,

649
00:35:54,360 --> 00:35:58,680
Speaker 1: not have Iran allied with Russia at this moment. And

650
00:35:58,719 --> 00:36:02,719
Speaker 1: if instead of this kind of hostile, saber rattling relationship

651
00:36:02,800 --> 00:36:04,520
Speaker 1: that we've that we've had with them over the decades,

652
00:36:04,560 --> 00:36:08,279
Speaker 1: they had instead taken the Iran Deal from twenty to

653
00:36:08,320 --> 00:36:10,719
Speaker 1: fifteen and then and then built on top of that,

654
00:36:11,239 --> 00:36:16,880
Speaker 1: you know, new diplomatic advances. Because Iran, unlike Saudi Arabia,

655
00:36:16,960 --> 00:36:19,880
Speaker 1: has a you know, as an educated middle class that

656
00:36:20,040 --> 00:36:24,239
Speaker 1: remains pro American. It's an utterly bizarre situation where in

657
00:36:24,280 --> 00:36:28,359
Speaker 1: which a significant amount of the population is favorable toward

658
00:36:28,360 --> 00:36:31,360
Speaker 1: the United States. If you remember, after nine to eleven,

659
00:36:32,160 --> 00:36:34,600
Speaker 1: there were which you know, which where a bunch of

660
00:36:34,640 --> 00:36:38,560
Speaker 1: Saudis were involved, and Saudi government officials were you know,

661
00:36:38,600 --> 00:36:41,280
Speaker 1: seem to also have been involved. Those are our allies,

662
00:36:41,480 --> 00:36:44,960
Speaker 1: our enemies. There were candle light vigils all over Iran,

663
00:36:45,840 --> 00:36:48,600
Speaker 1: you know, in sympathy with with what had happened on

664
00:36:49,080 --> 00:36:52,160
Speaker 1: nine to eleven and in the United States. If we

665
00:36:52,200 --> 00:36:57,719
Speaker 1: had developed that into normal relations, our war effort in

666
00:36:57,920 --> 00:37:01,040
Speaker 1: both in Yemen and in Ukraine be strengthened. Like I said,

667
00:37:01,080 --> 00:37:03,440
Speaker 1: not my job to help the US war effort, but

668
00:37:03,640 --> 00:37:06,640
Speaker 1: it's like you got to pick your battles at some point,

669
00:37:07,120 --> 00:37:10,400
Speaker 1: and we just just and I think partly significantly this

670
00:37:10,520 --> 00:37:13,160
Speaker 1: was related to our relationship with Israel. Is Israel and

671
00:37:13,200 --> 00:37:18,319
Speaker 1: Iran absolutely you know, mortal enemies, and so we kind

672
00:37:18,320 --> 00:37:25,800
Speaker 1: of outsourced our our diplomacy there. Speaking of saber rattling

673
00:37:25,880 --> 00:37:28,319
Speaker 1: and Taiwan, we should move on to China because there's

674
00:37:28,480 --> 00:37:31,279
Speaker 1: huge news. Again this is a headline from NPR. We

675
00:37:31,280 --> 00:37:33,240
Speaker 1: can go ahead and put the first element up here.

676
00:37:33,400 --> 00:37:38,720
Speaker 1: We're talking about eight one hundred million possible COVID infections

677
00:37:38,760 --> 00:37:41,440
Speaker 1: in China, and as NPR puts it, that means about

678
00:37:41,480 --> 00:37:45,160
Speaker 1: ten percent of the planet's population may become infected over

679
00:37:45,200 --> 00:37:47,840
Speaker 1: the course of the next ninety days. This is coming

680
00:37:48,040 --> 00:37:51,320
Speaker 1: as China we've covered it here, took a couple steps

681
00:37:51,360 --> 00:37:56,040
Speaker 1: back from its lockdown mentality or its policies that were

682
00:37:56,120 --> 00:37:59,560
Speaker 1: zero COVID known as zero COVID by Shijinping. A huge

683
00:37:59,719 --> 00:38:03,680
Speaker 1: threat of his broader policy was zero COVID. We're locking

684
00:38:03,719 --> 00:38:07,640
Speaker 1: everything down. In some cases that means sealing people into buildings,

685
00:38:08,760 --> 00:38:12,759
Speaker 1: and the result is that this is not a population

686
00:38:12,960 --> 00:38:18,200
Speaker 1: prepared to weather surges, and what's happening exactly right now

687
00:38:18,440 --> 00:38:22,600
Speaker 1: is a surge that China really doesn't have the ability

688
00:38:22,760 --> 00:38:26,280
Speaker 1: to safely deal with, or even the will to safely

689
00:38:26,320 --> 00:38:30,280
Speaker 1: deal with. What do you make of this development? Because again,

690
00:38:30,520 --> 00:38:32,719
Speaker 1: there's going to be new COVID variants, and we've made

691
00:38:32,760 --> 00:38:35,239
Speaker 1: peace with that here in the United States. It was

692
00:38:35,280 --> 00:38:39,320
Speaker 1: I think difficult. It took politically culturally, it took about

693
00:38:39,360 --> 00:38:44,000
Speaker 1: a year of omicron and other variants to say this

694
00:38:44,080 --> 00:38:45,960
Speaker 1: is not something that we can control, but it is

695
00:38:46,000 --> 00:38:49,359
Speaker 1: something that we can mitigate with responsible policies that allow

696
00:38:49,400 --> 00:38:52,680
Speaker 1: people to live their lives, not to exacerbate addictions and

697
00:38:52,760 --> 00:38:57,360
Speaker 1: suicides and loneliness and mental health problems and economic problems

698
00:38:57,440 --> 00:39:00,080
Speaker 1: downstream of all of that. We can have policies that

699
00:39:00,160 --> 00:39:04,200
Speaker 1: control and mitigate it. China has no experience with that right,

700
00:39:04,239 --> 00:39:08,640
Speaker 1: and zero COVID was demonstrably unsustainable because it led to

701
00:39:09,239 --> 00:39:12,400
Speaker 1: the types of protests that were threatening the regime itself.

702
00:39:12,480 --> 00:39:17,000
Speaker 1: Because the restrictions had just gone into such absurd and

703
00:39:17,080 --> 00:39:21,279
Speaker 1: draconian directions that people were standing up against them. You

704
00:39:21,320 --> 00:39:24,040
Speaker 1: know that that you would take a toddler away from

705
00:39:24,080 --> 00:39:27,640
Speaker 1: their away from their parents based on secondhand exposure, like

706
00:39:27,760 --> 00:39:32,320
Speaker 1: just absolutely extreme measures. And so at the same time,

707
00:39:33,400 --> 00:39:36,640
Speaker 1: the Chinese government did not use the time that they

708
00:39:36,680 --> 00:39:39,879
Speaker 1: effectively built with their zero zero COVID strategy to get

709
00:39:39,880 --> 00:39:45,279
Speaker 1: the elderly population vaccinated. There there was a a It

710
00:39:45,360 --> 00:39:48,239
Speaker 1: seems like the data shows that the Chinese vaccines have

711
00:39:48,320 --> 00:39:53,520
Speaker 1: been less effective than the American vaccines are preventing kind

712
00:39:53,520 --> 00:39:57,200
Speaker 1: of illness, severe illness, and death, but also there's been

713
00:39:57,320 --> 00:40:01,440
Speaker 1: even less uptake among the elderly Chinese population. And it's

714
00:40:02,400 --> 00:40:07,080
Speaker 1: curious that you can have an authoritarian government that can

715
00:40:07,120 --> 00:40:10,880
Speaker 1: weld somebody into an apartment but can't get their elderly

716
00:40:10,920 --> 00:40:13,840
Speaker 1: population vaccinated. There's some type of gap there that I

717
00:40:13,880 --> 00:40:18,200
Speaker 1: can't quite figure out. And so they go into this

718
00:40:18,280 --> 00:40:23,560
Speaker 1: relaxation of zero COVID with an already aging population more

719
00:40:23,680 --> 00:40:27,120
Speaker 1: vulnerable than they would be otherwise had they been vaccinated.

720
00:40:27,160 --> 00:40:30,560
Speaker 1: What's your read on why an authoritarian government like this

721
00:40:31,520 --> 00:40:34,440
Speaker 1: can't do the thing that you would think an authoritarian

722
00:40:34,440 --> 00:40:37,160
Speaker 1: government could do. There is the easiest thing, right, just

723
00:40:37,800 --> 00:40:40,960
Speaker 1: the jabs like that's yeah, I mean, I think in

724
00:40:41,000 --> 00:40:45,080
Speaker 1: general it was this problem politically was zero COVID was

725
00:40:45,200 --> 00:40:50,000
Speaker 1: just dogging a hugein pang and if you're I mean,

726
00:40:50,239 --> 00:40:53,279
Speaker 1: so when you look at how that's handled right now,

727
00:40:53,320 --> 00:40:55,680
Speaker 1: you have a population that doesn't have a lot of

728
00:40:55,719 --> 00:40:59,640
Speaker 1: natural immunity period because people have just plainly not been

729
00:40:59,800 --> 00:41:04,360
Speaker 1: in affected to any degree. They haven't gotten over smaller

730
00:41:04,360 --> 00:41:07,759
Speaker 1: COVID infections. They really just like most people have not

731
00:41:07,880 --> 00:41:10,440
Speaker 1: been infected with COVID, And so now they have a

732
00:41:10,640 --> 00:41:14,240
Speaker 1: very transmissible variant spreading. They have a few variants spreading,

733
00:41:14,880 --> 00:41:17,440
Speaker 1: but you have this really transmissible one that to the

734
00:41:17,440 --> 00:41:21,239
Speaker 1: point where even zero COVID may not have prevented a

735
00:41:21,400 --> 00:41:25,000
Speaker 1: huge surge and a huge spread of the virus. And

736
00:41:25,040 --> 00:41:28,960
Speaker 1: you have a population with a vaccine that's perhaps not

737
00:41:29,040 --> 00:41:31,520
Speaker 1: as effective as people hope that it would be. No

738
00:41:31,680 --> 00:41:37,719
Speaker 1: natural immunity and exhaustion with intense lockdowns. So I think

739
00:41:37,760 --> 00:41:40,280
Speaker 1: it was just a botched response all the way around,

740
00:41:40,320 --> 00:41:44,600
Speaker 1: that there was no expectation or anticipation that this type

741
00:41:44,600 --> 00:41:47,239
Speaker 1: of thing could happen, because if we can always have

742
00:41:47,360 --> 00:41:50,400
Speaker 1: zero COVID, we can weather the storm for several years

743
00:41:50,480 --> 00:41:53,600
Speaker 1: until COVID goes away, we can pop back out like

744
00:41:53,760 --> 00:41:58,440
Speaker 1: hibernation and you know, mostly be fine. Then you're not

745
00:41:58,640 --> 00:42:02,879
Speaker 1: as the incentive to push for that third shot isn't

746
00:42:02,880 --> 00:42:05,759
Speaker 1: as high, especially if it's not preventing infection, which as

747
00:42:05,800 --> 00:42:09,800
Speaker 1: it came to be realized, is that it prevents severe

748
00:42:11,000 --> 00:42:13,200
Speaker 1: it can help mitigate the severity, it's not going to

749
00:42:13,200 --> 00:42:15,400
Speaker 1: prevent infection. So I think it was probably just not

750
00:42:15,520 --> 00:42:18,520
Speaker 1: as high of a priority because zero COVID was seen

751
00:42:18,640 --> 00:42:20,520
Speaker 1: as the ticket, like this is what is going to

752
00:42:20,600 --> 00:42:23,359
Speaker 1: take China out of this. And there are now implications,

753
00:42:23,719 --> 00:42:26,920
Speaker 1: significant implications for the US population. One of them, and

754
00:42:27,200 --> 00:42:30,000
Speaker 1: if you've been sick lately, you have probably realized how

755
00:42:30,040 --> 00:42:34,120
Speaker 1: difficult it is to find cold medications, to find ibuprofen children,

756
00:42:34,239 --> 00:42:39,520
Speaker 1: both children's an adult. And there are images coming out

757
00:42:39,560 --> 00:42:45,040
Speaker 1: of China of Chinese people kind of mobbing ibuprofene factories

758
00:42:45,920 --> 00:42:49,160
Speaker 1: and they're also going So just aside from that, you're

759
00:42:49,160 --> 00:42:53,440
Speaker 1: going to see I think, a diversion of cold medications

760
00:42:53,440 --> 00:42:56,400
Speaker 1: that otherwise would be exported to Europe, to the United States,

761
00:42:56,400 --> 00:43:00,680
Speaker 1: to other countries used for domestic purposes because because there

762
00:43:00,680 --> 00:43:03,399
Speaker 1: are so many people getting sick that need them, and

763
00:43:03,480 --> 00:43:07,120
Speaker 1: we're now facing a situation where you have what's it

764
00:43:07,120 --> 00:43:10,800
Speaker 1: called RSV, other viruses that are circulating in the population,

765
00:43:11,960 --> 00:43:17,160
Speaker 1: COVID variants still going through the American population, flew ripping through.

766
00:43:17,920 --> 00:43:22,040
Speaker 1: All of it, layered on top of people's diminished immunal

767
00:43:22,080 --> 00:43:25,480
Speaker 1: capacity as a result of lockdowns and the pandemic just

768
00:43:25,480 --> 00:43:28,600
Speaker 1: from people not getting sick as much from twenty twenty on,

769
00:43:30,440 --> 00:43:33,840
Speaker 1: they're now getting hit harder. And so there's been a

770
00:43:33,920 --> 00:43:38,000
Speaker 1: run on advil, ibuprofo motor in Thailand, all of the

771
00:43:38,000 --> 00:43:42,000
Speaker 1: different cold medications to the point where some drugstores are

772
00:43:42,080 --> 00:43:45,080
Speaker 1: rationing them. And I would suspect that that's going to

773
00:43:45,080 --> 00:43:47,600
Speaker 1: get worse before it gets better because of the situation

774
00:43:48,760 --> 00:43:52,200
Speaker 1: in China. There's eight billion people on this planet that

775
00:43:52,239 --> 00:43:55,680
Speaker 1: are all going to be getting sick together. Yeah, and

776
00:43:55,719 --> 00:44:00,000
Speaker 1: again with no real clear idea of what a balance

777
00:44:00,040 --> 00:44:02,520
Speaker 1: and seeing mitigation policy looks like. And here in the

778
00:44:02,600 --> 00:44:05,279
Speaker 1: United States, it took us a while, and especially in

779
00:44:05,320 --> 00:44:07,480
Speaker 1: certain states, to figure out what that should look like,

780
00:44:07,520 --> 00:44:10,239
Speaker 1: how you can keep people safe in terms of their

781
00:44:10,239 --> 00:44:13,560
Speaker 1: mental health, in terms of their physical health, and in

782
00:44:13,680 --> 00:44:17,080
Speaker 1: terms of their economic health. What does that look like,

783
00:44:17,120 --> 00:44:19,480
Speaker 1: What do those policies look like. And again, China has

784
00:44:19,560 --> 00:44:22,879
Speaker 1: had zero COVID to the point where they lock down

785
00:44:22,960 --> 00:44:26,239
Speaker 1: places that are seeing waves, contain the wave geographically, and

786
00:44:26,280 --> 00:44:28,200
Speaker 1: life goes on as usual. In other places where there's

787
00:44:28,200 --> 00:44:31,600
Speaker 1: no COVID, then there's COVID like a switch get shut down,

788
00:44:32,120 --> 00:44:37,600
Speaker 1: and so that's not They haven't had experience really allowing

789
00:44:37,640 --> 00:44:41,600
Speaker 1: their population to exist with some semblance of normalcy while

790
00:44:41,640 --> 00:44:45,080
Speaker 1: also trying to mitigate the spread of something that could

791
00:44:45,560 --> 00:44:50,480
Speaker 1: knock a whole lot of people into hospitals and possibly worse,

792
00:44:50,680 --> 00:44:54,799
Speaker 1: tragically worse. So again, you know, the NPR reports that

793
00:44:54,800 --> 00:44:58,640
Speaker 1: there's some actually vaccine hesitancy in China as well. Some

794
00:44:58,840 --> 00:45:02,719
Speaker 1: doctors have been nervous about administering it to elderly patients,

795
00:45:02,719 --> 00:45:05,239
Speaker 1: and China's healthcare system, depending on whether you're in a

796
00:45:05,280 --> 00:45:08,000
Speaker 1: city or a rural area, is very, very different and

797
00:45:08,040 --> 00:45:10,680
Speaker 1: that will I expect affect all of this as well.

798
00:45:11,360 --> 00:45:15,480
Speaker 1: But also they just didn't have the incentive to go

799
00:45:15,680 --> 00:45:19,600
Speaker 1: super hard on those third shots and on the shots

800
00:45:19,600 --> 00:45:22,400
Speaker 1: in general, because zero COVID was seen as a lot

801
00:45:22,400 --> 00:45:25,560
Speaker 1: of zero shots. So I mean, it was seen as

802
00:45:25,680 --> 00:45:28,279
Speaker 1: like this was the policy, this was taking care of it,

803
00:45:28,360 --> 00:45:34,640
Speaker 1: So it wasn't necessarily the demand from the government wasn't

804
00:45:34,680 --> 00:45:37,080
Speaker 1: as high because they really thought that they were on

805
00:45:37,120 --> 00:45:39,400
Speaker 1: top of it. Yeah, they had a chance to do

806
00:45:39,440 --> 00:45:42,839
Speaker 1: it like New Zealand. Basically New Zealand pursued a kind

807
00:45:42,840 --> 00:45:46,040
Speaker 1: of zero COVID type of approach, but their effort was

808
00:45:46,320 --> 00:45:48,040
Speaker 1: to keep it off their island. I was gonna say,

809
00:45:48,680 --> 00:45:51,239
Speaker 1: it's tiny country to compared to China, right, but they

810
00:45:51,239 --> 00:45:53,640
Speaker 1: were effective at keeping it out. But then once the

811
00:45:53,719 --> 00:45:58,040
Speaker 1: vaccine came out, they used that opportunity to vaccinate their

812
00:45:58,160 --> 00:46:02,279
Speaker 1: elderly population and then they were able to relax their

813
00:46:02,400 --> 00:46:05,640
Speaker 1: restrictions and get to a place. It's more like where

814
00:46:05,680 --> 00:46:08,320
Speaker 1: we are where you know, you're still seeing COVID ripping through,

815
00:46:08,920 --> 00:46:13,399
Speaker 1: but you're not seeing the cataclysmic fatality rates that you saw,

816
00:46:14,000 --> 00:46:19,880
Speaker 1: you know, in twenty twenty. Anyway, here in Washington, Congress

817
00:46:19,920 --> 00:46:23,280
Speaker 1: is putting the finishing touches on a one point seven

818
00:46:23,440 --> 00:46:26,759
Speaker 1: trillion dollar omnibus spending package, and we're going to talk

819
00:46:26,800 --> 00:46:29,239
Speaker 1: first a little bit about the politics of that, and

820
00:46:29,239 --> 00:46:31,759
Speaker 1: then also what's in it and what did not get

821
00:46:31,760 --> 00:46:35,239
Speaker 1: in it. So emily the Freedom Caucus, and I was

822
00:46:35,280 --> 00:46:37,759
Speaker 1: over on the Senate yesterday talking to some of the

823
00:46:37,800 --> 00:46:42,000
Speaker 1: Senate Republicans who were getting asked about the threats from

824
00:46:42,200 --> 00:46:44,719
Speaker 1: the Freedom Caucus, and there's kind of a lot of headshaking,

825
00:46:45,520 --> 00:46:48,040
Speaker 1: and it's an interesting kind of both cultural and political

826
00:46:48,080 --> 00:46:51,040
Speaker 1: divide on the two sides of the Capitol here between

827
00:46:51,040 --> 00:46:53,479
Speaker 1: the Senate Republicans and the House Republicans. So there were

828
00:46:53,560 --> 00:46:57,080
Speaker 1: what thirteen members I think of the Freedom Caucus who

829
00:46:57,200 --> 00:47:02,520
Speaker 1: sent out a letter saying, if if anybody votes for

830
00:47:02,560 --> 00:47:05,799
Speaker 1: an omnibus, and that includes the leader of the Senate Republicans,

831
00:47:06,560 --> 00:47:08,960
Speaker 1: we will make we will go out of our way

832
00:47:09,000 --> 00:47:12,040
Speaker 1: to crush any of their priorities over the next two years.

833
00:47:12,080 --> 00:47:14,520
Speaker 1: Don't even bother sending us any legislation, because we will

834
00:47:14,560 --> 00:47:17,120
Speaker 1: kill it no matter how much we like it. And

835
00:47:17,680 --> 00:47:21,600
Speaker 1: Senate Republicans kind of shrugged and said, okay, whatever, yeah,

836
00:47:21,640 --> 00:47:24,600
Speaker 1: and are sending it over anyway, So where did where

837
00:47:24,600 --> 00:47:28,759
Speaker 1: did this? Why are they making this threat, and why

838
00:47:28,800 --> 00:47:32,640
Speaker 1: are Senate Republicans kind of shrugging it off. Well, that's

839
00:47:32,719 --> 00:47:37,040
Speaker 1: the question. And what happened basically is that House, the

840
00:47:37,120 --> 00:47:40,120
Speaker 1: House which largely controls the purse strings, is going to

841
00:47:40,160 --> 00:47:42,879
Speaker 1: have Republican control by a slim majority, but is going

842
00:47:42,920 --> 00:47:45,440
Speaker 1: to have Republican control in just a couple of weeks.

843
00:47:45,480 --> 00:47:48,319
Speaker 1: And so funding the government by omnibus at the end

844
00:47:48,360 --> 00:47:50,799
Speaker 1: of the year is a terrible American tradition, but it

845
00:47:50,840 --> 00:47:54,319
Speaker 1: is tradition. Nonetheless. The way House Republicans see it, though,

846
00:47:54,760 --> 00:47:58,440
Speaker 1: is that you can pass a stopgap bill, a CR

847
00:47:58,760 --> 00:48:02,080
Speaker 1: that would fund the government from month, and then Republicans

848
00:48:02,160 --> 00:48:05,439
Speaker 1: can come in in that month the first Congress and

849
00:48:06,160 --> 00:48:10,160
Speaker 1: prioritize Republicans spending items, so that a bill full of

850
00:48:10,320 --> 00:48:14,040
Speaker 1: pork for the political establishment here in Washington, d c.

851
00:48:14,400 --> 00:48:19,200
Speaker 1: And priorities that the left wants. You know, they're saying, listen,

852
00:48:19,280 --> 00:48:21,759
Speaker 1: we took control of government back and here's an opportunity

853
00:48:22,000 --> 00:48:24,759
Speaker 1: to punt the ball for us to run with. And

854
00:48:25,000 --> 00:48:28,600
Speaker 1: Senate Republicans say, we actually got you the best possible

855
00:48:28,640 --> 00:48:31,480
Speaker 1: deal that you could want. We have extra funding for

856
00:48:31,640 --> 00:48:34,360
Speaker 1: all of these priorities that you have in this bill.

857
00:48:34,680 --> 00:48:37,480
Speaker 1: So just sort of swallow the bitter pill. Take it.

858
00:48:37,480 --> 00:48:39,960
Speaker 1: It's the best you're going to get. And the Freedom

859
00:48:40,000 --> 00:48:43,480
Speaker 1: Craccus House Republicans are flexing a little bit and saying,

860
00:48:43,800 --> 00:48:46,960
Speaker 1: screw you. This is not, you know, what you were

861
00:48:47,000 --> 00:48:49,400
Speaker 1: elected to do. It feels, you know, like shades of

862
00:48:49,440 --> 00:48:55,200
Speaker 1: the Tea Party. So but again like this is this

863
00:48:55,280 --> 00:48:57,040
Speaker 1: is our tea party folks, a lot of them, right,

864
00:48:57,080 --> 00:49:00,760
Speaker 1: they're tea party folks, or sort of tea party post

865
00:49:00,760 --> 00:49:05,560
Speaker 1: tea Party Trump, Yeah, tea party. Well it's already the

866
00:49:05,600 --> 00:49:08,759
Speaker 1: neo neo tea party, you know. But it's one of

867
00:49:08,840 --> 00:49:12,080
Speaker 1: the things that honestly, like the squad should learn from,

868
00:49:12,320 --> 00:49:14,879
Speaker 1: I think, because if you look at back at how

869
00:49:15,000 --> 00:49:17,359
Speaker 1: the Freedom Caucus has been able to flex its own

870
00:49:17,440 --> 00:49:19,799
Speaker 1: muscles in different battles, and this one, I think is

871
00:49:19,840 --> 00:49:22,560
Speaker 1: going to end up being a good example. It's true,

872
00:49:22,719 --> 00:49:25,440
Speaker 1: and people populists on the left of the right, just

873
00:49:25,600 --> 00:49:28,640
Speaker 1: average voters, they see that stuff and they're like, that's

874
00:49:28,719 --> 00:49:33,320
Speaker 1: the reasonable position. Mitch McConnell forcing the bitter pill of earmarks,

875
00:49:33,320 --> 00:49:34,839
Speaker 1: and you can have a debate like we could have

876
00:49:34,840 --> 00:49:39,080
Speaker 1: that conversation about what is more reasonable, But most people

877
00:49:39,080 --> 00:49:42,000
Speaker 1: are like, are you freaking kidding me? Are you kidding me?

878
00:49:42,080 --> 00:49:46,040
Speaker 1: Mitch McConnell, you're making us take all of this when

879
00:49:46,120 --> 00:49:48,960
Speaker 1: when you could, you know, punt it over to Republicans instead.

880
00:49:49,640 --> 00:49:52,760
Speaker 1: It also, though, shows the limits of their power, because

881
00:49:52,800 --> 00:49:55,640
Speaker 1: I think that they're going to get steamrolled. They're absolutely

882
00:49:55,640 --> 00:49:57,280
Speaker 1: going to get it, and I think it'll be interesting

883
00:49:57,320 --> 00:49:59,719
Speaker 1: to see if they can, if they can stick to

884
00:49:59,800 --> 00:50:03,279
Speaker 1: their threat next year, because what does that mean that

885
00:50:03,640 --> 00:50:06,960
Speaker 1: anything that said anything? I just I think that Senate

886
00:50:07,000 --> 00:50:10,080
Speaker 1: Republicans just don't believe their threat because they're saying, wait

887
00:50:10,120 --> 00:50:13,000
Speaker 1: a minute, So next year, we're going to send over

888
00:50:13,239 --> 00:50:17,080
Speaker 1: whatever a defense bill and you're going to block it.

889
00:50:18,320 --> 00:50:20,200
Speaker 1: And your argument to the public is going to be,

890
00:50:20,239 --> 00:50:22,200
Speaker 1: you're going to block it because we did this thing

891
00:50:22,239 --> 00:50:24,680
Speaker 1: six months ago that you don't like. Like that doesn't

892
00:50:25,160 --> 00:50:28,040
Speaker 1: work with the public. Public wants to know right now

893
00:50:28,560 --> 00:50:30,560
Speaker 1: why it is that you're doing something. But it shows

894
00:50:30,600 --> 00:50:32,799
Speaker 1: that they I don't blame them for making that threat

895
00:50:32,800 --> 00:50:34,799
Speaker 1: because that's the only threat they had left because they're

896
00:50:35,160 --> 00:50:37,719
Speaker 1: in the minority right now, and so they can threaten

897
00:50:37,760 --> 00:50:40,200
Speaker 1: to vote no, but nobody needs Nobody needs their votes,

898
00:50:40,200 --> 00:50:43,440
Speaker 1: which is a problem that squad often runs into you.

899
00:50:43,680 --> 00:50:48,040
Speaker 1: Sometimes their votes can be pivotabal, pivotal percent of the time,

900
00:50:48,400 --> 00:50:50,239
Speaker 1: it's like, oh, that's nice that you're voting. No, don't,

901
00:50:50,280 --> 00:50:52,759
Speaker 1: we don't need your votes. What's so revealing to me

902
00:50:52,880 --> 00:50:55,360
Speaker 1: here is that it does. It very much feels like

903
00:50:55,920 --> 00:51:01,880
Speaker 1: Senate Republicans looked at two negotiating partners, one pre January

904
00:51:01,920 --> 00:51:06,960
Speaker 1: third House Democrats, the other post January third House Republicans, right,

905
00:51:07,400 --> 00:51:09,839
Speaker 1: and they chose door number one. Yes, they would rather

906
00:51:10,200 --> 00:51:14,520
Speaker 1: work with House Democrats and Senate Democrats than they would

907
00:51:14,520 --> 00:51:17,879
Speaker 1: work with these Freedom Caucus folks. So here's what Rachel

908
00:51:17,880 --> 00:51:21,160
Speaker 1: beauvard Over at the Conservative Partnership Institute said, These House

909
00:51:21,239 --> 00:51:24,240
Speaker 1: ours are using the only leverage they have. She's referring

910
00:51:24,280 --> 00:51:26,479
Speaker 1: to the thirteen who send the letter you mentioned rian

911
00:51:26,800 --> 00:51:30,280
Speaker 1: opposing future votes and in a narrow majority, that's meaningful

912
00:51:30,320 --> 00:51:32,800
Speaker 1: to the point you just made. Meanwhile, a single Senate

913
00:51:32,840 --> 00:51:36,319
Speaker 1: Republican can block the consents necessary to pass this thing

914
00:51:36,320 --> 00:51:39,600
Speaker 1: by McConnell's deadline of the twenty second. Yet just watch

915
00:51:39,640 --> 00:51:42,400
Speaker 1: and see if anyone does. Because McConnell is able to

916
00:51:42,440 --> 00:51:46,520
Speaker 1: sort of whip them into order easily, and they're even

917
00:51:46,600 --> 00:51:49,040
Speaker 1: sort of going taking shots back and forth with Kevin McCarthy.

918
00:51:49,120 --> 00:51:52,920
Speaker 1: Kevin McCarthy has been pretty favorable to that position, the

919
00:51:52,920 --> 00:51:55,239
Speaker 1: position of sort of Freedom Caucus people, And of course

920
00:51:55,239 --> 00:51:57,200
Speaker 1: he needs to do that right now because he needs

921
00:51:57,239 --> 00:51:59,960
Speaker 1: their support in order to secure it the speakership, because

922
00:52:00,040 --> 00:52:03,080
Speaker 1: some of them are kind of bulking and saying no,

923
00:52:03,320 --> 00:52:06,520
Speaker 1: absolutely not. So it makes sense politically what Kevin McCarthy

924
00:52:06,600 --> 00:52:09,800
Speaker 1: is doing here. Although it's very rare for Republican leadership

925
00:52:09,800 --> 00:52:11,840
Speaker 1: in Washington to talk the way that Kevin McCarthy is.

926
00:52:11,880 --> 00:52:14,480
Speaker 1: It's much more common to hear the Mitch McConnell line,

927
00:52:14,480 --> 00:52:17,719
Speaker 1: which is that don't be naive, don't be silly. This

928
00:52:17,760 --> 00:52:20,360
Speaker 1: is how we have to do it. We can't have

929
00:52:20,400 --> 00:52:24,360
Speaker 1: another shutdown, et cetera, et cetera. So really really interesting

930
00:52:24,680 --> 00:52:27,640
Speaker 1: preview of I think the power dynamics that to come

931
00:52:27,719 --> 00:52:30,840
Speaker 1: because there are a whole lot of people after the

932
00:52:30,840 --> 00:52:34,640
Speaker 1: Trump administration on the right who are sick and tired

933
00:52:34,680 --> 00:52:37,600
Speaker 1: of getting steamrolled. They saw the January sixth Committee, for instance,

934
00:52:37,600 --> 00:52:42,040
Speaker 1: which used unprecedented subpoena power by its own admission, was

935
00:52:42,120 --> 00:52:45,719
Speaker 1: using unprecedented subpoena power taking phone records from members of Congress.

936
00:52:46,400 --> 00:52:49,560
Speaker 1: They see that and they say, you're just going to

937
00:52:49,680 --> 00:52:54,360
Speaker 1: continue letting yourself be bowled over. And this is another

938
00:52:54,760 --> 00:52:57,279
Speaker 1: sort of dust up in that larger fight. Rachel's point

939
00:52:57,280 --> 00:53:00,200
Speaker 1: is an incredible one to absorb, which is that any

940
00:53:00,320 --> 00:53:04,080
Speaker 1: of the fifty Republicans in the Senate could stop this

941
00:53:04,760 --> 00:53:07,799
Speaker 1: and because like you said, it has to get done

942
00:53:07,840 --> 00:53:11,040
Speaker 1: in the next couple of days. And that deadline Thune said,

943
00:53:11,080 --> 00:53:14,160
Speaker 1: has actually creeped up a little bit because he was saying,

944
00:53:14,800 --> 00:53:18,360
Speaker 1: this is South Dakota Republican. He was saying that because

945
00:53:18,560 --> 00:53:21,520
Speaker 1: of the Arctic blast, you know, ripping through a huge

946
00:53:21,560 --> 00:53:25,880
Speaker 1: swath of the country right now, that you're getting senators

947
00:53:26,080 --> 00:53:28,719
Speaker 1: like even more antsy to get home. They always want

948
00:53:28,760 --> 00:53:31,239
Speaker 1: to be home for the Christmas holiday, but they now

949
00:53:31,239 --> 00:53:33,839
Speaker 1: they're like, can we like hustle like we need to go.

950
00:53:34,040 --> 00:53:38,640
Speaker 1: And if one person were to say I object to

951
00:53:38,760 --> 00:53:43,200
Speaker 1: this bill going through, that makes you drag it out

952
00:53:43,520 --> 00:53:46,080
Speaker 1: to the thirty hour filibuster procedure and you could still

953
00:53:46,080 --> 00:53:48,680
Speaker 1: get it done, but it punts you close to Christmas.

954
00:53:48,719 --> 00:53:50,000
Speaker 1: And at that point they might say, you know what,

955
00:53:50,239 --> 00:53:53,680
Speaker 1: just do a cr But it does, and Rachel seems

956
00:53:53,680 --> 00:53:57,280
Speaker 1: to be cynically predicting that not a single one will

957
00:53:57,400 --> 00:54:01,000
Speaker 1: will do it, and I think that she's right. Yesterday

958
00:54:01,040 --> 00:54:03,799
Speaker 1: talking to reporters was pretty confident. He's like, yeah, we're

959
00:54:03,800 --> 00:54:06,040
Speaker 1: gonna get this done. Yeah. And Mike Lee has been

960
00:54:06,080 --> 00:54:09,320
Speaker 1: extremely critical of this entire process and is on the

961
00:54:09,360 --> 00:54:13,200
Speaker 1: same page essentially with the House Republicans here. But it's

962
00:54:13,239 --> 00:54:16,200
Speaker 1: a question of whether this is ultimately defeatist, right, So

963
00:54:16,440 --> 00:54:19,080
Speaker 1: what are we holding people back for? Is it because

964
00:54:19,280 --> 00:54:22,040
Speaker 1: we actually can can do something meaningful, even if it's

965
00:54:22,040 --> 00:54:25,480
Speaker 1: a sort of pr thrust that says, we come out

966
00:54:25,480 --> 00:54:28,319
Speaker 1: of this showing exactly how corrupt Mitch McConnell is, and

967
00:54:28,360 --> 00:54:32,320
Speaker 1: it's worth it. We will keep these these members in Washington,

968
00:54:32,400 --> 00:54:36,040
Speaker 1: d C. Until the twenty third, whatever it is. It's

969
00:54:36,040 --> 00:54:40,200
Speaker 1: the least they can do. That kind of mentality, maybe

970
00:54:41,200 --> 00:54:43,560
Speaker 1: that might be part of the calculation there. But if

971
00:54:43,560 --> 00:54:47,000
Speaker 1: it's ultimately just you know, it's going to look bad,

972
00:54:47,400 --> 00:54:50,160
Speaker 1: then maybe it's not worth it for anyone anyway, because

973
00:54:50,160 --> 00:54:51,480
Speaker 1: there's not going to be enough if it is just

974
00:54:51,560 --> 00:54:55,000
Speaker 1: one person or two people that are you know, in

975
00:54:56,040 --> 00:54:59,200
Speaker 1: that position of not just voting against but actually trying

976
00:54:59,200 --> 00:55:02,880
Speaker 1: to stop then you know, maybe it's it's not worth

977
00:55:02,880 --> 00:55:05,439
Speaker 1: the not worth the push. Well, let's talk real quickly

978
00:55:05,520 --> 00:55:08,560
Speaker 1: about what's in this one point seven trillion dollar omnibus

979
00:55:08,680 --> 00:55:11,840
Speaker 1: spending package and also just as importantly what's not in it,

980
00:55:11,880 --> 00:55:15,080
Speaker 1: because this was the this was the moment for legislation

981
00:55:15,239 --> 00:55:17,359
Speaker 1: that didn't make it through over the last two years

982
00:55:17,360 --> 00:55:19,279
Speaker 1: to kind of like what they call the last train

983
00:55:19,480 --> 00:55:21,120
Speaker 1: out of town. So if you didn't get a ticket

984
00:55:21,160 --> 00:55:24,359
Speaker 1: on this train, you're finished, and if you needed any

985
00:55:24,719 --> 00:55:27,760
Speaker 1: House Republican support, then you're finished for the next two years.

986
00:55:28,120 --> 00:55:30,640
Speaker 1: And so a couple of the things that got blown

987
00:55:30,680 --> 00:55:34,200
Speaker 1: up on the on the way out here would be,

988
00:55:34,800 --> 00:55:39,760
Speaker 1: I think, most controversially in an Afghan piece of legislation,

989
00:55:39,800 --> 00:55:43,600
Speaker 1: where it was heavily pushed by the Pentagon and also

990
00:55:43,719 --> 00:55:48,279
Speaker 1: by kind of you know, people who served in Afghanistan.

991
00:55:48,760 --> 00:55:52,800
Speaker 1: It was a measure that would help facilitate the safe

992
00:55:52,880 --> 00:55:58,840
Speaker 1: evacuation of Afghans who aided with the American occupation over there,

993
00:55:59,200 --> 00:56:02,719
Speaker 1: and that was blocked by Chuck Grassley basically and some

994
00:56:02,800 --> 00:56:06,080
Speaker 1: other and a and a handful of other Republicans in

995
00:56:06,120 --> 00:56:09,680
Speaker 1: the Senate. Uh an odd an odd look for Republicans.

996
00:56:10,640 --> 00:56:15,880
Speaker 1: Grassley's concerns were about vetting. That's that's what he conveyed

997
00:56:16,160 --> 00:56:20,319
Speaker 1: to the as as he pushed through his opposition. But

998
00:56:20,360 --> 00:56:22,959
Speaker 1: it had a lot of bipartisan support, and it also

999
00:56:23,000 --> 00:56:27,200
Speaker 1: has a lot of public support. But what what what

1000
00:56:27,200 --> 00:56:30,840
Speaker 1: what do you accounts for the kind of some senate

1001
00:56:30,880 --> 00:56:35,640
Speaker 1: Republicans willingness to block that, you know, these amabust negotiations,

1002
00:56:35,800 --> 00:56:37,600
Speaker 1: And they were talking for a little bit about putting

1003
00:56:38,280 --> 00:56:43,000
Speaker 1: the open app bill in, and so the Omibus negotiations

1004
00:56:43,000 --> 00:56:46,000
Speaker 1: anti trust legislation named a big tech would yea open

1005
00:56:46,080 --> 00:56:48,759
Speaker 1: up app stores from the daopoly, which I don't even

1006
00:56:49,040 --> 00:56:52,480
Speaker 1: I don't even consider it. Daopoly considered individual monopolies between

1007
00:56:52,520 --> 00:56:55,080
Speaker 1: Google and Apple and their app stores, which is just

1008
00:56:55,120 --> 00:56:57,040
Speaker 1: a huge piece of legislation that was briefly in the

1009
00:56:57,080 --> 00:56:59,720
Speaker 1: omnibus bill and then taken out. And that's what's fascinating

1010
00:56:59,719 --> 00:57:02,759
Speaker 1: about I'm the true Schumer's Schumer saying that McConnell was

1011
00:57:02,800 --> 00:57:08,160
Speaker 1: the one that took it out despite having Grassley's support. Yeah,

1012
00:57:07,800 --> 00:57:11,200
Speaker 1: but also Pelosi MacArthur, you're both against it. Yeah. So

1013
00:57:11,320 --> 00:57:13,799
Speaker 1: what's interesting is you you find out what's truly a

1014
00:57:13,840 --> 00:57:16,280
Speaker 1: poison pill in these types of negots, they're sort of

1015
00:57:16,320 --> 00:57:18,840
Speaker 1: against it. They're not for it publicly, and you can

1016
00:57:18,880 --> 00:57:21,520
Speaker 1: suspect that they're privately against it and that it's not

1017
00:57:21,760 --> 00:57:25,880
Speaker 1: worth again. But that's what omnibus negotiations are, an interesting

1018
00:57:25,880 --> 00:57:29,680
Speaker 1: sort of glimpse into DC like where people really stand,

1019
00:57:29,680 --> 00:57:31,720
Speaker 1: where the parties actually are on these issues, because you

1020
00:57:31,760 --> 00:57:34,880
Speaker 1: find out what is an absolute non starter when a

1021
00:57:34,960 --> 00:57:38,680
Speaker 1: shutdown is on the line. And so those two things,

1022
00:57:38,800 --> 00:57:41,480
Speaker 1: I mean, the sort of you have to swallow some

1023
00:57:41,520 --> 00:57:44,400
Speaker 1: better pills, and it's just where it is. But it's

1024
00:57:44,440 --> 00:57:50,160
Speaker 1: also just like these earmarks that are appropriations that create earmarks.

1025
00:57:50,200 --> 00:57:53,920
Speaker 1: There's one for you see the la Hey won the

1026
00:57:54,000 --> 00:57:57,720
Speaker 1: Patrick Lahy Lake Champlain Basis Program thirty five million dollars

1027
00:57:57,760 --> 00:58:00,280
Speaker 1: a year from twenty twenty three to twenty twenty seven.

1028
00:58:00,720 --> 00:58:04,040
Speaker 1: Richard Shelby, who already has tons of things just to

1029
00:58:04,080 --> 00:58:07,840
Speaker 1: clean up the lake, or what's the basis program? Is

1030
00:58:07,840 --> 00:58:11,320
Speaker 1: what I'm seeing right here. That's a good question. But

1031
00:58:12,320 --> 00:58:16,440
Speaker 1: it's renaming. And he's a outgoing appropriations chair, so Baky

1032
00:58:16,560 --> 00:58:19,640
Speaker 1: lay he can have the checkbook renaming it the Patrick

1033
00:58:19,760 --> 00:58:24,000
Speaker 1: Lahy Lake Champlain Basis Progner. And then yeah, so Richard

1034
00:58:24,000 --> 00:58:27,440
Speaker 1: Shelby gets the facilities at the FBI Redstone Arsenal to

1035
00:58:27,520 --> 00:58:29,680
Speaker 1: be known as the quote ch Richard Shelby Center for

1036
00:58:29,720 --> 00:58:34,120
Speaker 1: Innovation and Advanced Training. And then we have the Presidential

1037
00:58:34,200 --> 00:58:37,840
Speaker 1: Museum for Jimmy Carter seven point twenty five million upgrade

1038
00:58:38,080 --> 00:58:41,360
Speaker 1: six million dollars to Ulysses as Grant Museum. And this

1039
00:58:41,400 --> 00:58:43,520
Speaker 1: is a good one one point five million for the

1040
00:58:43,520 --> 00:58:47,360
Speaker 1: COVID nineteen American History Project, which I'm sure will be

1041
00:58:47,640 --> 00:58:52,120
Speaker 1: very flattering to Dr Cratchie. Interesting one my favorite is

1042
00:58:52,680 --> 00:58:56,080
Speaker 1: they're putting in money to direct to the Army Corps

1043
00:58:56,080 --> 00:59:01,760
Speaker 1: of Engineers to find suitable beach spaces on the Potomac

1044
00:59:01,800 --> 00:59:05,080
Speaker 1: here in Washington. So I am a partisan in favor

1045
00:59:05,120 --> 00:59:08,240
Speaker 1: of more beaches here in Washington, d C. So I'll

1046
00:59:08,240 --> 00:59:11,600
Speaker 1: take that along. And this is the same package people

1047
00:59:11,640 --> 00:59:15,480
Speaker 1: should understand that includes forty five billion dollars for the

1048
00:59:15,560 --> 00:59:19,400
Speaker 1: Ukrainian war effort and roughly eight hundred and fifty billion

1049
00:59:19,440 --> 00:59:22,840
Speaker 1: dollars for the Pentagon, you know, approaching the largest spending

1050
00:59:23,280 --> 00:59:28,080
Speaker 1: basically in American history on our on our military. It

1051
00:59:28,160 --> 00:59:31,760
Speaker 1: includes the Electoral Count Act, which is this which is

1052
00:59:31,760 --> 00:59:35,040
Speaker 1: a piece of legislation that tries to smooth out the

1053
00:59:35,240 --> 00:59:38,720
Speaker 1: transition process so that you don't need the same type

1054
00:59:38,720 --> 00:59:44,240
Speaker 1: of kind of complicated January sixth type situation that could

1055
00:59:44,240 --> 00:59:48,680
Speaker 1: get disrupted. It did not include the Safe Act, which

1056
00:59:48,760 --> 00:59:53,360
Speaker 1: is the basically weed banking, and people thought that it

1057
00:59:53,400 --> 00:59:57,880
Speaker 1: had a very very strong chance of getting in Chuck

1058
00:59:57,880 --> 01:00:01,360
Speaker 1: Schumer blamed Pat Toomey mainly. I asked thuone, if it

1059
01:00:01,400 --> 01:00:03,520
Speaker 1: was true that it was Pat Toomey, who's an outgoing

1060
01:00:03,800 --> 01:00:07,120
Speaker 1: Senate Republican, would be really obnoxious if an outgoing Senate

1061
01:00:07,160 --> 01:00:09,760
Speaker 1: Republican as a lame duck kills the wed think and

1062
01:00:10,240 --> 01:00:12,800
Speaker 1: Thune said there were a handful of other Republicans who

1063
01:00:12,800 --> 01:00:14,720
Speaker 1: were against it as well. But this basically would allow

1064
01:00:15,920 --> 01:00:22,560
Speaker 1: would allow pot shops to legally use banking services. And

1065
01:00:22,720 --> 01:00:25,120
Speaker 1: I asked Soon what, like what do the opponents think

1066
01:00:25,160 --> 01:00:27,440
Speaker 1: that there that this is just like a fluke and

1067
01:00:27,480 --> 01:00:30,960
Speaker 1: that eventually they're going to re ban pot everywhere, like

1068
01:00:30,960 --> 01:00:33,840
Speaker 1: it's this ship has sailed, like wake up people, And

1069
01:00:33,880 --> 01:00:36,120
Speaker 1: he said the argument is, well, let's do it more

1070
01:00:36,200 --> 01:00:39,880
Speaker 1: rationally and like let's actually create a regime of taxation

1071
01:00:40,000 --> 01:00:43,160
Speaker 1: and regulation that that kind of marries up across federal

1072
01:00:43,200 --> 01:00:46,040
Speaker 1: and state policy. Okay, fine, but we live in the

1073
01:00:46,080 --> 01:00:50,800
Speaker 1: real world, so let's do what we can. Now. What

1074
01:00:50,840 --> 01:00:52,680
Speaker 1: else didn't get, Oh, the Press Act, which I talked

1075
01:00:52,680 --> 01:00:57,360
Speaker 1: about last week, Tom Cotton arguing that the Pentagon Papers

1076
01:00:58,080 --> 01:01:02,520
Speaker 1: is a reason that we ought not to have press freedom, defense,

1077
01:01:02,920 --> 01:01:06,280
Speaker 1: and whistleblower protections. That argument won out. Yeah, well it

1078
01:01:06,320 --> 01:01:08,160
Speaker 1: went out because, as we were talking about earlier, when

1079
01:01:08,160 --> 01:01:10,440
Speaker 1: you asked about the Afghan question, you find out what

1080
01:01:10,640 --> 01:01:13,120
Speaker 1: really is a non starter, what is the absolute like

1081
01:01:13,200 --> 01:01:15,800
Speaker 1: worst case scenario for some senators, because then they go

1082
01:01:15,840 --> 01:01:18,800
Speaker 1: into the office and say, this is it. This is

1083
01:01:18,880 --> 01:01:21,440
Speaker 1: my red line. And so what you end up getting

1084
01:01:21,440 --> 01:01:24,800
Speaker 1: into these bills is things that are not anybody's red line.

1085
01:01:25,080 --> 01:01:28,520
Speaker 1: And to prevent something from being somebody's red line, you

1086
01:01:28,600 --> 01:01:33,240
Speaker 1: get things like federal buildings named after Nancy Pelosi, three

1087
01:01:33,240 --> 01:01:37,280
Speaker 1: point six million dollars for the Michelle Obama trail. You know, again,

1088
01:01:37,360 --> 01:01:39,240
Speaker 1: like this is if you live in the real world,

1089
01:01:40,000 --> 01:01:42,080
Speaker 1: this is just how it works, right, This is you

1090
01:01:42,080 --> 01:01:45,000
Speaker 1: can have Republicans come in and funder the government and

1091
01:01:45,040 --> 01:01:47,600
Speaker 1: you will get plenty of this stuff too. If they

1092
01:01:47,640 --> 01:01:52,240
Speaker 1: were to negotiate spending later in next year, you're gonna

1093
01:01:52,240 --> 01:01:54,320
Speaker 1: get plenty of this stuff too. It's sadly how the

1094
01:01:54,400 --> 01:01:57,000
Speaker 1: system works. And you know, there should be an overhaul.

1095
01:01:57,320 --> 01:01:58,840
Speaker 1: We talked about it a year after year. I mean,

1096
01:01:58,880 --> 01:02:02,080
Speaker 1: how many Tea Party conservatives railed against the way that

1097
01:02:02,120 --> 01:02:05,120
Speaker 1: we fund the government here and they had full control

1098
01:02:05,520 --> 01:02:09,120
Speaker 1: in twenty seventeen, and we're still here. There's incredible structural

1099
01:02:09,240 --> 01:02:13,040
Speaker 1: changes that need to happen to prevent our government from

1100
01:02:13,040 --> 01:02:15,800
Speaker 1: being funded in this utterly corrupt way, but there's really

1101
01:02:15,840 --> 01:02:18,240
Speaker 1: no will to do a damn thing about that. So

1102
01:02:18,360 --> 01:02:21,680
Speaker 1: we're stuck picking apart these omnibus bills and well, and

1103
01:02:21,720 --> 01:02:24,160
Speaker 1: at least we might get some nice clean beaches and

1104
01:02:24,200 --> 01:02:27,840
Speaker 1: some cleaner Potomac and Ancostia rivers here in Washington, d C.

1105
01:02:28,000 --> 01:02:30,000
Speaker 1: So take that. I guess that's not the end of

1106
01:02:30,000 --> 01:02:34,560
Speaker 1: the world. It's something. So first of all, thanks to

1107
01:02:34,960 --> 01:02:37,440
Speaker 1: a lot of the readers who sent in pieces of

1108
01:02:37,640 --> 01:02:43,040
Speaker 1: JFK documents and flagged for me different you know, hey,

1109
01:02:43,440 --> 01:02:45,880
Speaker 1: check this out, search this, here's the document number. It

1110
01:02:45,920 --> 01:02:48,400
Speaker 1: was really helpful. Yeah, it was. Yeah, you guys, you

1111
01:02:48,400 --> 01:02:51,160
Speaker 1: guys did your homework assignment. You did it well. So

1112
01:02:51,280 --> 01:02:54,320
Speaker 1: we have another segment if we can put E one here.

1113
01:02:54,680 --> 01:02:57,640
Speaker 1: The CIA really has long claimed that it had no

1114
01:02:57,760 --> 01:03:00,960
Speaker 1: contact with Lee Harvey Oswall before President Kenny assassination, but

1115
01:03:01,040 --> 01:03:04,400
Speaker 1: that claim is undercut by a new document released last

1116
01:03:04,400 --> 01:03:07,920
Speaker 1: week by the Biden administration, which involves George de Merenschildt,

1117
01:03:07,960 --> 01:03:10,840
Speaker 1: who's a known CIA asset. Now, it's long been known

1118
01:03:11,120 --> 01:03:13,560
Speaker 1: that the two became close friends in the months before

1119
01:03:13,640 --> 01:03:17,440
Speaker 1: the assassination, but skeptics have called that a coincidence. But

1120
01:03:17,520 --> 01:03:20,640
Speaker 1: in spring nineteen sixty three, De moorn Schildt traveled to

1121
01:03:20,760 --> 01:03:24,760
Speaker 1: New York, Philadelphia, and Washington. According to the documents found

1122
01:03:24,760 --> 01:03:27,720
Speaker 1: in the newly declassified files, at the same time as

1123
01:03:27,720 --> 01:03:31,960
Speaker 1: his trip, the CIA's Domestic Operations Division ran a search

1124
01:03:32,080 --> 01:03:37,240
Speaker 1: on Demorenschildt quote exact reason unknown, according to these documents

1125
01:03:37,320 --> 01:03:42,360
Speaker 1: created by a CIA analyst included in last week's declassification. Now,

1126
01:03:42,560 --> 01:03:44,960
Speaker 1: we talked about those documents briefly last week, and we

1127
01:03:45,000 --> 01:03:47,600
Speaker 1: could put up B two here, but didn't have time

1128
01:03:47,680 --> 01:03:50,240
Speaker 1: to dive into their significance. But now we can. So.

1129
01:03:50,280 --> 01:03:54,000
Speaker 1: I talked to Jeff Morley, who runs a substack JFK Fax,

1130
01:03:54,320 --> 01:03:56,960
Speaker 1: and he noted that it was known that Oswald had

1131
01:03:57,000 --> 01:04:00,680
Speaker 1: told de Moorenschildt he'd soon be traveling to New Orleans.

1132
01:04:00,880 --> 01:04:04,280
Speaker 1: Oswald's time in New Orleans is critical to understanding how

1133
01:04:04,280 --> 01:04:07,080
Speaker 1: a conspiracy may have unfolded, and there's a reason why.

1134
01:04:07,160 --> 01:04:09,600
Speaker 1: It was Jim Garrison, the New Orleans District Attorney who

1135
01:04:09,640 --> 01:04:12,280
Speaker 1: later tried to prove the conspiracy in court, which later

1136
01:04:12,280 --> 01:04:15,440
Speaker 1: turned into Oliver Stone's drama JFK, which itself led to

1137
01:04:15,480 --> 01:04:18,240
Speaker 1: the JFK Records Act of nineteen ninety two, which is

1138
01:04:18,240 --> 01:04:20,960
Speaker 1: the law under which Biden released these documents. Now, it's

1139
01:04:20,960 --> 01:04:24,240
Speaker 1: also worth knowing that the covert arm of the division

1140
01:04:24,360 --> 01:04:27,360
Speaker 1: mentioned in this memo was run at the time by E.

1141
01:04:27,520 --> 01:04:30,920
Speaker 1: Howard Hunt, a black ops specialist who actually confessed and

1142
01:04:31,200 --> 01:04:33,320
Speaker 1: that we can put this element the Rolling Stone article.

1143
01:04:33,480 --> 01:04:36,200
Speaker 1: He confessed later in life to learning ahead of time

1144
01:04:36,280 --> 01:04:39,560
Speaker 1: of a conspiracy to assassinate Kennedy that involved high level

1145
01:04:39,560 --> 01:04:43,440
Speaker 1: figures in the CIA. So the CIA memo reads, we

1146
01:04:43,440 --> 01:04:46,640
Speaker 1: could put up this next element. It is interesting that

1147
01:04:46,720 --> 01:04:51,720
Speaker 1: Gail Allen's interest in Demornschildt Mornscheld coincided with the earlier

1148
01:04:51,760 --> 01:04:54,720
Speaker 1: portion of this trip. The memo concludes, referring to Gail Allen,

1149
01:04:54,720 --> 01:04:58,040
Speaker 1: who's a case officer with the CIA's Domestic Operations Division

1150
01:04:58,040 --> 01:05:02,000
Speaker 1: at the time, and the inform would suggest that possibly

1151
01:05:02,040 --> 01:05:05,440
Speaker 1: Alan and de Mornshield were possibly in the same environment

1152
01:05:05,480 --> 01:05:10,160
Speaker 1: in Washington, d C. Circa April twenty sixth, nineteen sixty three.

1153
01:05:10,400 --> 01:05:13,760
Speaker 1: So that's a critical new detail to add to this puzzle.

1154
01:05:14,280 --> 01:05:17,440
Speaker 1: And this week Tucker Carlson's Fox News show added at

1155
01:05:17,440 --> 01:05:20,160
Speaker 1: another piece of the puzzle. Let's roll that we spoke

1156
01:05:20,160 --> 01:05:23,480
Speaker 1: to someone who had access to these still hidden CIA documents,

1157
01:05:23,520 --> 01:05:26,880
Speaker 1: a person was deeply familiar with what they contained. We

1158
01:05:26,920 --> 01:05:30,160
Speaker 1: asked this person directly, did the CIA have a hand

1159
01:05:30,280 --> 01:05:32,880
Speaker 1: in the murder of John F. Kennedy, an American President?

1160
01:05:33,480 --> 01:05:37,160
Speaker 1: And here's the reply we received, verbatim quote The answer

1161
01:05:37,360 --> 01:05:40,919
Speaker 1: is yes, I believe they were involved. It's a whole

1162
01:05:40,920 --> 01:05:43,880
Speaker 1: different country from what we thought it was. It's all fake.

1163
01:05:45,720 --> 01:05:48,400
Speaker 1: It's hard to imagine a more jarring response than that. Again,

1164
01:05:48,520 --> 01:05:51,600
Speaker 1: this is not a quote conspiracy theorist that we spoke to,

1165
01:05:52,000 --> 01:05:55,480
Speaker 1: not even close. This is someone with direct knowledge of

1166
01:05:55,520 --> 01:05:58,680
Speaker 1: the information that once again is being withheld from the

1167
01:05:58,680 --> 01:06:02,800
Speaker 1: American public. The answer we received was unequivocal, Yes, the

1168
01:06:02,880 --> 01:06:05,880
Speaker 1: CIA was involved in the assassination of the president and

1169
01:06:05,920 --> 01:06:08,560
Speaker 1: so Emily. Why why this new clue is so interesting

1170
01:06:08,640 --> 01:06:11,480
Speaker 1: is that there's been a lot of questions about who

1171
01:06:11,520 --> 01:06:13,800
Speaker 1: did Oswald talk to in New Orleans? You know, how

1172
01:06:13,800 --> 01:06:16,800
Speaker 1: did he how did did he interact with CIA assets?

1173
01:06:16,880 --> 01:06:19,600
Speaker 1: Is this is this where he was kind of roped

1174
01:06:19,600 --> 01:06:24,360
Speaker 1: into this this November plot? Uh? And now if it's

1175
01:06:24,400 --> 01:06:27,760
Speaker 1: the case that this c I A asset to Morenschild

1176
01:06:28,160 --> 01:06:33,760
Speaker 1: went to Washington and hung out with c I A people, Uh,

1177
01:06:33,880 --> 01:06:36,120
Speaker 1: that would that would make the link, that would explain

1178
01:06:36,240 --> 01:06:40,040
Speaker 1: how the CIA would have known that there was this figure,

1179
01:06:40,080 --> 01:06:43,040
Speaker 1: this interesting figure of Oswald who's going to New Orleans

1180
01:06:43,120 --> 01:06:46,919
Speaker 1: over the over the summer. And because why like why

1181
01:06:46,960 --> 01:06:50,400
Speaker 1: else would the d o D, the Howard Hunt's Division

1182
01:06:51,240 --> 01:06:54,240
Speaker 1: uh be be running this search if they if there

1183
01:06:54,320 --> 01:06:57,840
Speaker 1: wasn't some interaction between people in the d D. And and

1184
01:06:57,480 --> 01:06:59,920
Speaker 1: and actually last week when I was when I was

1185
01:07:00,000 --> 01:07:04,120
Speaker 1: reading this document, I thought DoD was Pentagon, as you know,

1186
01:07:04,200 --> 01:07:07,800
Speaker 1: it's a reasonable assumption, but no, it's Domestic Operations Division,

1187
01:07:08,480 --> 01:07:13,600
Speaker 1: which itself is an extraordinarily controversial operation because the CIA

1188
01:07:14,000 --> 01:07:18,720
Speaker 1: should not have a domestic operations division, and they certainly

1189
01:07:18,840 --> 01:07:22,040
Speaker 1: shouldn't have a goon like Howard Hunt running it, who

1190
01:07:22,320 --> 01:07:25,240
Speaker 1: later became the Watergate Watergate guy, but before confessing on

1191
01:07:25,360 --> 01:07:28,760
Speaker 1: his what he thought was his deathbed to knowledge of

1192
01:07:28,800 --> 01:07:31,080
Speaker 1: this conspiracy. There's a great line in your story for

1193
01:07:31,120 --> 01:07:35,200
Speaker 1: the intercept where you say Oswald's next few years make

1194
01:07:35,480 --> 01:07:38,960
Speaker 1: more sense with a CIA connection than without it. They

1195
01:07:39,000 --> 01:07:41,680
Speaker 1: make much more sense with the CIA connection than without it.

1196
01:07:41,720 --> 01:07:45,200
Speaker 1: And I think this new evidence suggests that the CIA

1197
01:07:45,280 --> 01:07:48,760
Speaker 1: connection in and of itself makes much more sense now

1198
01:07:48,800 --> 01:07:53,240
Speaker 1: that there's just much more. It's becoming a much clearer picture.

1199
01:07:53,440 --> 01:07:56,040
Speaker 1: His relationship with the CIA is becoming a much clearer picture,

1200
01:07:56,040 --> 01:07:59,160
Speaker 1: which is an enormously helpful thing to have from our

1201
01:07:59,200 --> 01:08:01,720
Speaker 1: vantage point und decades and decades in the past. And

1202
01:08:01,760 --> 01:08:04,320
Speaker 1: the Tucker segment is interesting too, because it's like the

1203
01:08:04,400 --> 01:08:07,440
Speaker 1: Hunt article and Rolling Stone that you pointed to. The

1204
01:08:07,560 --> 01:08:10,080
Speaker 1: dam has to break, right, like the facade, at some

1205
01:08:10,200 --> 01:08:12,680
Speaker 1: point you just see these little cracks where they're not

1206
01:08:12,720 --> 01:08:14,840
Speaker 1: little cracks, they're actually huge cracks where people come out

1207
01:08:14,880 --> 01:08:18,479
Speaker 1: and say, yeah, hey, you know, but it's one person, right,

1208
01:08:18,520 --> 01:08:21,519
Speaker 1: and then the CIA shuts it down and you get it.

1209
01:08:21,600 --> 01:08:25,040
Speaker 1: Someone talks to Tucker. Someone says they themselves had knowledge

1210
01:08:25,040 --> 01:08:28,280
Speaker 1: of this, but it's still right, like the government still

1211
01:08:28,280 --> 01:08:30,800
Speaker 1: doesn't tell the full story, so you can still just

1212
01:08:30,840 --> 01:08:34,240
Speaker 1: sort of dismiss that. And so the big question is

1213
01:08:34,800 --> 01:08:39,920
Speaker 1: what evidence remains in these files? And one the person

1214
01:08:39,920 --> 01:08:42,160
Speaker 1: who would know that is somebody who has run the

1215
01:08:42,280 --> 01:08:45,439
Speaker 1: CIA before. And so let's roll a second part of

1216
01:08:45,560 --> 01:08:49,120
Speaker 1: this Tucker segment. And people have known this for a

1217
01:08:49,160 --> 01:08:52,639
Speaker 1: long time. The people who knew would include every director

1218
01:08:52,680 --> 01:08:55,680
Speaker 1: of the CIA since November of nineteen sixty three, and

1219
01:08:55,720 --> 01:08:59,320
Speaker 1: that list would include Obama's CIA director John Brennan, one

1220
01:08:59,360 --> 01:09:02,439
Speaker 1: of the most sin and dishonest figures in American life.

1221
01:09:03,280 --> 01:09:05,679
Speaker 1: That list would also include we are sad to say

1222
01:09:06,040 --> 01:09:08,840
Speaker 1: our friend Mike Pompeo, who ran the CIA in the

1223
01:09:08,920 --> 01:09:13,400
Speaker 1: last administration. Mike Pompeo knew this. We asked Pompeio to

1224
01:09:13,479 --> 01:09:15,280
Speaker 1: join us tonight, and though he really turns down a

1225
01:09:15,320 --> 01:09:18,880
Speaker 1: televised interview, he refused to come. We hope you will reconsider.

1226
01:09:19,200 --> 01:09:23,360
Speaker 1: It's just such an effective barb. It's subtle but poignant,

1227
01:09:23,520 --> 01:09:27,000
Speaker 1: you know, even though he rarely turns down a televised interview. Right, Hey, Mike,

1228
01:09:27,040 --> 01:09:29,240
Speaker 1: you want to come on to the Tucker Show. Absolutely?

1229
01:09:29,280 --> 01:09:33,920
Speaker 1: What are we talking about? JFK yeah, no, Wow, yeah,

1230
01:09:34,000 --> 01:09:36,840
Speaker 1: really just slammed tonight. Can't I can't make it the

1231
01:09:37,240 --> 01:09:40,720
Speaker 1: big picture question I think. I mean, obviously there's a

1232
01:09:40,800 --> 01:09:45,280
Speaker 1: huge question about our involvement historically in world affairs that

1233
01:09:45,439 --> 01:09:48,880
Speaker 1: this is in domestic affairs to your point about the

1234
01:09:48,960 --> 01:09:53,440
Speaker 1: DoD that this case reflects. But in terms of implicating

1235
01:09:53,479 --> 01:09:56,559
Speaker 1: Mike Pompeo, it does raise a really interesting question, which

1236
01:09:56,600 --> 01:10:01,200
Speaker 1: is how are these things still funk? How are all

1237
01:10:01,240 --> 01:10:03,960
Speaker 1: of these mechanisms that we like to pretend and hide

1238
01:10:04,000 --> 01:10:06,519
Speaker 1: we're not functioning the way that it seems very clear.

1239
01:10:06,560 --> 01:10:08,080
Speaker 1: I mean, again, this is from the memo that you

1240
01:10:08,560 --> 01:10:11,439
Speaker 1: plocked from this new stack, Ryan. It says chef phone

1241
01:10:11,479 --> 01:10:13,720
Speaker 1: to say that James wilk got a finance clerk with

1242
01:10:13,720 --> 01:10:16,280
Speaker 1: the agency from fifty seven who served in Tokyo sixty

1243
01:10:16,360 --> 01:10:19,719
Speaker 1: to October sixty four, has told HSCA people that CIA

1244
01:10:19,920 --> 01:10:25,160
Speaker 1: hired Lee Harvey Oswald when Oswald served in Atsugi at Sugi,

1245
01:10:25,160 --> 01:10:29,320
Speaker 1: a Japanese naval base which may have been your grandfather's,

1246
01:10:31,640 --> 01:10:36,400
Speaker 1: but he served in Japan. But you say that this

1247
01:10:36,680 --> 01:10:40,080
Speaker 1: overlaps or this is interesting because it overlaps with a

1248
01:10:40,120 --> 01:10:41,920
Speaker 1: lot of your work on drug policy and with the

1249
01:10:42,000 --> 01:10:46,640
Speaker 1: United States military's record on drug policy because he Oswald

1250
01:10:46,920 --> 01:10:50,000
Speaker 1: is then part of that program. Well, he may have been,

1251
01:10:50,160 --> 01:10:51,960
Speaker 1: and there are people who suspect that he was, and

1252
01:10:52,000 --> 01:10:54,280
Speaker 1: this titans the link. There are two things going on

1253
01:10:55,280 --> 01:10:58,120
Speaker 1: at this CIA base. It was both a naval base

1254
01:10:58,160 --> 01:11:00,680
Speaker 1: and CIA base that are of importance. One, it was

1255
01:11:00,720 --> 01:11:03,679
Speaker 1: a CIA base because they were launching YouTube biplanes over

1256
01:11:03,880 --> 01:11:09,559
Speaker 1: the Soviet Union. Two, it was a central component of

1257
01:11:09,680 --> 01:11:14,760
Speaker 1: the CIA's experimentation with psychedelics, with LSD in particular. And

1258
01:11:14,800 --> 01:11:19,120
Speaker 1: so you know, did Oswald participate in this? We don't,

1259
01:11:19,200 --> 01:11:23,160
Speaker 1: you know, we don't know for certain, but like you

1260
01:11:23,200 --> 01:11:26,439
Speaker 1: were saying, everything he does after this makes more sense

1261
01:11:26,680 --> 01:11:29,040
Speaker 1: if he did make a CIA link at this point.

1262
01:11:29,080 --> 01:11:31,720
Speaker 1: So he goes from there to a base in California,

1263
01:11:31,760 --> 01:11:36,200
Speaker 1: where he appears to have then, through a joint kind

1264
01:11:36,280 --> 01:11:41,960
Speaker 1: of intelligence and military school in Monterey, learns Russian. He

1265
01:11:42,000 --> 01:11:46,240
Speaker 1: then gets a completely bogus discharge where he claims that

1266
01:11:46,320 --> 01:11:50,080
Speaker 1: his mother is ill. That turns out that that wasn't true.

1267
01:11:51,040 --> 01:11:55,360
Speaker 1: But if you're moving into kind of agency work, covert

1268
01:11:55,360 --> 01:11:59,480
Speaker 1: agency work, often you can get a facilitated bogus discharge.

1269
01:12:00,080 --> 01:12:02,880
Speaker 1: So he gets his discharge. He then Within nine days

1270
01:12:02,880 --> 01:12:05,080
Speaker 1: of getting his discharged, with two hundred and three dollars

1271
01:12:05,400 --> 01:12:08,760
Speaker 1: in his bank account, he sales for England. His wife

1272
01:12:08,840 --> 01:12:10,840
Speaker 1: later tells, I think the warrant comission that he took

1273
01:12:10,840 --> 01:12:14,000
Speaker 1: a hop which is a military basically a military flight

1274
01:12:14,400 --> 01:12:17,760
Speaker 1: from England over to Helsinki in Finland with his two

1275
01:12:17,880 --> 01:12:20,479
Speaker 1: hundred and three dollars bank account. He then stays in

1276
01:12:20,520 --> 01:12:24,800
Speaker 1: two of the fanciest hotels in Helsinki before having enough

1277
01:12:24,840 --> 01:12:28,800
Speaker 1: money to then book a overnight train to Moscow, where

1278
01:12:28,840 --> 01:12:32,720
Speaker 1: he then shows up at the American embassy and announces

1279
01:12:32,760 --> 01:12:38,599
Speaker 1: that he has flipped and he's he's becoming a follower

1280
01:12:38,600 --> 01:12:41,800
Speaker 1: of the Soviet Union, and the embassy staff later said

1281
01:12:41,800 --> 01:12:46,120
Speaker 1: that his entire speech sounded weird and rehearsed, and so

1282
01:12:46,160 --> 01:12:47,639
Speaker 1: then he spends the next two and a half years

1283
01:12:47,640 --> 01:12:52,200
Speaker 1: in the Soviet Unions as this defector and then comes

1284
01:12:52,200 --> 01:12:57,280
Speaker 1: back just it's cool, come on back, goes winds up Mexico,

1285
01:12:57,320 --> 01:13:02,480
Speaker 1: then Dallas, where he then is befriended by the CIA asset,

1286
01:13:02,680 --> 01:13:07,120
Speaker 1: who then the CIA asset travels up to after learning

1287
01:13:07,160 --> 01:13:11,880
Speaker 1: he's going to New Orleans, travels up to Washington. In Washington, E.

1288
01:13:12,000 --> 01:13:14,880
Speaker 1: Howard Hunt's division, who reported right up to Allan Dallies,

1289
01:13:14,960 --> 01:13:17,840
Speaker 1: runs a search on this guy's name. They make connections.

1290
01:13:18,560 --> 01:13:21,599
Speaker 1: Connections are made with Oswald and New Orleans and then

1291
01:13:21,640 --> 01:13:25,160
Speaker 1: Oswald in November nineteen sixty three, is somehow involved with

1292
01:13:25,200 --> 01:13:28,639
Speaker 1: this assassination. We don't know it's you know, we don't

1293
01:13:28,680 --> 01:13:31,599
Speaker 1: know you know precisely how his what his role was.

1294
01:13:31,680 --> 01:13:34,960
Speaker 1: Warren Commission says he was the loan gunman who got

1295
01:13:35,040 --> 01:13:37,000
Speaker 1: him down. If but if you were, if you were

1296
01:13:37,000 --> 01:13:40,439
Speaker 1: to concoct some type of conspiracy, you'd want a guy

1297
01:13:40,520 --> 01:13:43,160
Speaker 1: like this who would take the fall for it, to

1298
01:13:43,200 --> 01:13:46,280
Speaker 1: be at the scene. Right before he's killed by Jack Ruby,

1299
01:13:46,320 --> 01:13:48,960
Speaker 1: he's telling the press, I'm a Patsy, I'm a Patsy,

1300
01:13:48,960 --> 01:13:52,519
Speaker 1: I'm Patsy. Yeah. And this again, the document that you

1301
01:13:52,560 --> 01:13:56,240
Speaker 1: flag here is this creates a clearer picture of how

1302
01:13:56,280 --> 01:13:58,760
Speaker 1: that could have been the case. It's plausible. So here's

1303
01:13:58,800 --> 01:14:02,880
Speaker 1: some more jfk declassification files. Because they push people out

1304
01:14:02,880 --> 01:14:05,920
Speaker 1: of the woodwork like Tucker source and you get closer

1305
01:14:05,920 --> 01:14:08,040
Speaker 1: and close to the truth. And the reason Pompeo was

1306
01:14:08,040 --> 01:14:10,760
Speaker 1: mentioned is in twenty seventeen was a year that they

1307
01:14:10,760 --> 01:14:12,839
Speaker 1: were supposed to release a lot of documents they released.

1308
01:14:12,840 --> 01:14:17,920
Speaker 1: Some Pompeo fought internally extraordinarily hard against basically people like

1309
01:14:18,000 --> 01:14:19,920
Speaker 1: Roger Stone, who had Trumps here on the other side,

1310
01:14:19,920 --> 01:14:24,320
Speaker 1: saying release this stuff, man. But you have to put

1311
01:14:24,320 --> 01:14:28,960
Speaker 1: yourself in the perspective of an American president who isn't

1312
01:14:29,000 --> 01:14:33,240
Speaker 1: sure but believes that the CIA may have done this

1313
01:14:33,240 --> 01:14:35,880
Speaker 1: to Kennedy, and then you start wondering yourself, well, if

1314
01:14:35,920 --> 01:14:39,479
Speaker 1: they And that is what is so transformative about this act,

1315
01:14:39,840 --> 01:14:42,080
Speaker 1: whether they even did it or not, the fact that

1316
01:14:42,640 --> 01:14:45,479
Speaker 1: presidents since then have believed that they did it. And

1317
01:14:45,520 --> 01:14:49,680
Speaker 1: there's a great article about Richard Nixon in Politico years ago.

1318
01:14:49,960 --> 01:14:54,000
Speaker 1: Nixon completely believed that the CIA did this and pre

1319
01:14:54,200 --> 01:14:59,040
Speaker 1: and basically pressed the helms at the CIA to saying,

1320
01:14:59,120 --> 01:15:01,680
Speaker 1: if you don't protect me around Watergate, out, I'm going

1321
01:15:01,720 --> 01:15:04,040
Speaker 1: to expose your hanky panky with the Kennedy and the

1322
01:15:04,080 --> 01:15:07,400
Speaker 1: Bay of Pigs and what all happened there as rich

1323
01:15:07,520 --> 01:15:09,800
Speaker 1: as Richard Nixon said, who shot John? The whole who

1324
01:15:09,840 --> 01:15:12,000
Speaker 1: shot you? Want to go into the who's shot John? Question?

1325
01:15:12,080 --> 01:15:16,559
Speaker 1: That's Nixon kind of you know, blackmailing the CIA. But

1326
01:15:16,600 --> 01:15:20,080
Speaker 1: that's another point as to why they're so sensitive about

1327
01:15:20,120 --> 01:15:22,120
Speaker 1: these records. I mean, there are million reasons, of course,

1328
01:15:22,160 --> 01:15:25,080
Speaker 1: but there are so many of the people that could

1329
01:15:25,080 --> 01:15:28,439
Speaker 1: be implicated whose names aren't involved yet, and it could

1330
01:15:28,479 --> 01:15:31,560
Speaker 1: be tangentially through things like that, like the soft blackmail

1331
01:15:31,640 --> 01:15:35,040
Speaker 1: for Richard Nixon about quote who shot John. So there's

1332
01:15:35,040 --> 01:15:36,639
Speaker 1: some things that have sort of seeped through the cracks

1333
01:15:36,640 --> 01:15:39,920
Speaker 1: over the years that are tangential or implicate people that

1334
01:15:40,000 --> 01:15:43,479
Speaker 1: are randomly involved whatever. Someone knew this, someone knew that.

1335
01:15:44,400 --> 01:15:46,320
Speaker 1: But we I mean, you don't know what you don't know,

1336
01:15:47,000 --> 01:15:50,040
Speaker 1: and so that's the big lingering question mark. What we

1337
01:15:50,080 --> 01:15:51,840
Speaker 1: do know is that there are a lot of things

1338
01:15:51,920 --> 01:15:54,280
Speaker 1: we don't know, and we continue to fill in the

1339
01:15:55,160 --> 01:15:58,639
Speaker 1: sort of lines as best we can. But the Mike

1340
01:15:58,680 --> 01:16:02,120
Speaker 1: Pompeo angle is a really interesting one. It reminds me

1341
01:16:02,160 --> 01:16:06,839
Speaker 1: of Pompeo and Trump's disagreements over Rossange that ultimately Pompeo

1342
01:16:06,920 --> 01:16:10,760
Speaker 1: won out on. You can understand where hawkish sort of

1343
01:16:11,040 --> 01:16:15,000
Speaker 1: conservatives and Democrats even like Pompeiu would come down on

1344
01:16:15,080 --> 01:16:18,320
Speaker 1: that question and say this utterly, you know, will obliterate

1345
01:16:18,360 --> 01:16:20,439
Speaker 1: the credibility of the the United States and the world stage

1346
01:16:20,520 --> 01:16:22,679
Speaker 1: if it gets out. It's not worth it, et cetera,

1347
01:16:22,720 --> 01:16:26,760
Speaker 1: et cetera. But obviously the American people deserve to know

1348
01:16:26,800 --> 01:16:30,639
Speaker 1: how their money is being spent in heinous ways like this.

1349
01:16:31,120 --> 01:16:34,360
Speaker 1: And same invitation to Mike Pompeiu, welcome to come on

1350
01:16:34,400 --> 01:16:39,600
Speaker 1: counterpoints anytime, absolutely and talk about this. Oh and the

1351
01:16:39,640 --> 01:16:49,160
Speaker 1: Warren Commission run by Alan Dallas that I'm concerned. What's

1352
01:16:49,200 --> 01:16:53,360
Speaker 1: your point today? Okay? Well, naturally, with Christmas and Hanukah

1353
01:16:53,439 --> 01:16:55,519
Speaker 1: here many of us are spending even more time than

1354
01:16:55,600 --> 01:16:59,160
Speaker 1: usual on faith traditions. Both holidays, like many others, have

1355
01:16:59,240 --> 01:17:02,439
Speaker 1: been secular in recent decades, but even so, nobody can

1356
01:17:02,560 --> 01:17:06,120
Speaker 1: escape mentions of Christick, Christmas, or the Maccabees during Hanukkah.

1357
01:17:06,520 --> 01:17:09,240
Speaker 1: During this year's Christmas season, the Supreme Court heard oral

1358
01:17:09,360 --> 01:17:11,880
Speaker 1: arguments in the case of three h three Creative, which

1359
01:17:11,960 --> 01:17:16,280
Speaker 1: challenges a Colorado public accommodations law. After Thanksgiving, Congress pass

1360
01:17:16,280 --> 01:17:18,679
Speaker 1: to the Respect for Marriage Act and President Biden signed

1361
01:17:18,680 --> 01:17:20,880
Speaker 1: it into law just last week. We talked a bit

1362
01:17:20,960 --> 01:17:23,719
Speaker 1: here about the three oh three Creative case earlier this month.

1363
01:17:24,040 --> 01:17:26,519
Speaker 1: It raises an interesting legal question, and it's one that

1364
01:17:26,680 --> 01:17:30,719
Speaker 1: liberal democracies and constitutional republics like ours have basically grappled

1365
01:17:30,720 --> 01:17:33,240
Speaker 1: with since the Enlightenment. The owner of three or three

1366
01:17:33,240 --> 01:17:36,200
Speaker 1: Creative as an artist named Lourie Smith who creates websites

1367
01:17:36,240 --> 01:17:39,800
Speaker 1: for business, event, businesses and events. She wants Colorado to

1368
01:17:39,920 --> 01:17:43,040
Speaker 1: protect her from celebrating marriages that fall outside of her

1369
01:17:43,040 --> 01:17:46,680
Speaker 1: faith tradition. She's a Christian. Put another way, Smith is

1370
01:17:46,720 --> 01:17:49,680
Speaker 1: happy to serve LGBT customers, but she doesn't believe the

1371
01:17:49,720 --> 01:17:53,040
Speaker 1: state can compel her to create wedding websites for same

1372
01:17:53,080 --> 01:17:56,280
Speaker 1: sex marriages. Laurie's position on same sex marriage puts her

1373
01:17:56,320 --> 01:18:00,439
Speaker 1: in a clear minority of Americans. There is no question that,

1374
01:18:00,760 --> 01:18:03,160
Speaker 1: which is why it's no surprise at all that Congress

1375
01:18:03,200 --> 01:18:06,799
Speaker 1: passed the RFMA with enough Republican support and then Biden

1376
01:18:06,840 --> 01:18:09,720
Speaker 1: signed it into law. America went from disapproving of same

1377
01:18:09,760 --> 01:18:13,360
Speaker 1: sex marriage to overwhelmingly supporting it in about a decade.

1378
01:18:13,560 --> 01:18:16,960
Speaker 1: Congress represented the consensus position then by passing the bill,

1379
01:18:17,280 --> 01:18:21,519
Speaker 1: which was pushed especially by Democrats after Clarence Thomas's concurring

1380
01:18:21,560 --> 01:18:24,920
Speaker 1: opinion in the Dobbs decision, since he mentioned that Obergefel

1381
01:18:25,000 --> 01:18:27,880
Speaker 1: may not be on solid legal footing like he thought

1382
01:18:27,920 --> 01:18:31,320
Speaker 1: Rowe wasn't. But the bill had a wrinkle that incensed

1383
01:18:31,439 --> 01:18:34,639
Speaker 1: some Republicans. Senator Mike Lee offered an amendment that would,

1384
01:18:34,720 --> 01:18:38,080
Speaker 1: in his words, quote, prohibit the federal government from retaliating

1385
01:18:38,120 --> 01:18:40,920
Speaker 1: against any person or group for adhering to sincerely held

1386
01:18:40,960 --> 01:18:44,760
Speaker 1: religious beliefs and moral convictions about marriage. Because of the bill,

1387
01:18:44,920 --> 01:18:48,320
Speaker 1: Lee said, many religious schools, faith based organizations, and other

1388
01:18:48,400 --> 01:18:51,760
Speaker 1: nonprofit entities adhering to traditional views of marriage would be

1389
01:18:51,800 --> 01:18:54,600
Speaker 1: at risk of losing tax exempt status and access to

1390
01:18:54,640 --> 01:18:57,799
Speaker 1: a whole wide range of federal programs that would include

1391
01:18:57,840 --> 01:19:00,800
Speaker 1: wedding vendors like Kosher caterers, for instance. That was one

1392
01:19:00,840 --> 01:19:04,120
Speaker 1: of the examples Lee provided. Ultimately, the law was passed

1393
01:19:04,280 --> 01:19:09,240
Speaker 1: with Republican support and without Lee's additional protections. Now, I've

1394
01:19:09,320 --> 01:19:11,200
Speaker 1: never believed that the federal government should have a role

1395
01:19:11,240 --> 01:19:14,360
Speaker 1: in marriage period, precisely for all of these reasons. But

1396
01:19:14,479 --> 01:19:17,320
Speaker 1: as support for same sex marriage became a consensus position,

1397
01:19:17,720 --> 01:19:21,080
Speaker 1: clashes like these became more and more common and more

1398
01:19:21,160 --> 01:19:24,760
Speaker 1: and more difficult for Orthodox Jews, Christians, and Muslims. In

1399
01:19:24,800 --> 01:19:27,240
Speaker 1: Smith's case, at three or three creative, the question is

1400
01:19:27,240 --> 01:19:31,080
Speaker 1: not whether she would serve LGBT customers like segregationist business

1401
01:19:31,080 --> 01:19:34,040
Speaker 1: owners in the Jim Crow South, she will serve any customer,

1402
01:19:34,080 --> 01:19:36,080
Speaker 1: but she does not want to be compelled to create

1403
01:19:36,160 --> 01:19:40,599
Speaker 1: speech that violates her beliefs. Now, that is a reasonable position.

1404
01:19:40,960 --> 01:19:43,479
Speaker 1: I don't think her critics are unreasonable either, But I

1405
01:19:43,520 --> 01:19:46,000
Speaker 1: do think the lack of interest in Mike Lee's RFMA

1406
01:19:46,040 --> 01:19:49,879
Speaker 1: amendment to strengthen the bill's protections indicates we are hurtling

1407
01:19:49,960 --> 01:19:54,760
Speaker 1: towards a future of more and more religious religious classes,

1408
01:19:55,000 --> 01:19:57,599
Speaker 1: which is really interesting actually, in a world where Catholic

1409
01:19:57,680 --> 01:20:01,120
Speaker 1: churches are seeing surgering interest in the true additional Latin mass,

1410
01:20:01,400 --> 01:20:05,120
Speaker 1: secular women are questioning the sexual Revolution, and people like

1411
01:20:05,280 --> 01:20:09,200
Speaker 1: Jordan Peterson, for instance, are finding huge audiences. People are

1412
01:20:09,200 --> 01:20:12,920
Speaker 1: looking for something, some source of meaning and purpose. Some

1413
01:20:12,960 --> 01:20:16,360
Speaker 1: people are landing in traditional faiths. Others, like the Real

1414
01:20:16,400 --> 01:20:19,080
Speaker 1: Housewives of Salt Lake City, believe they're quote more of

1415
01:20:19,120 --> 01:20:21,840
Speaker 1: a free spirit without the Holy Spirit, but still want

1416
01:20:21,880 --> 01:20:26,000
Speaker 1: to sing hymns and acquire to connect with their spirituality.

1417
01:20:26,080 --> 01:20:28,920
Speaker 1: An interesting little plotline on this season. The world has

1418
01:20:29,000 --> 01:20:31,640
Speaker 1: changed a lot in the last century. It's changed a

1419
01:20:31,720 --> 01:20:34,040
Speaker 1: lot in the last several centuries at a face a

1420
01:20:34,120 --> 01:20:36,960
Speaker 1: faster pace than any other time in human history. We

1421
01:20:37,080 --> 01:20:41,120
Speaker 1: are all living through an extraordinary change in our species

1422
01:20:41,200 --> 01:20:43,240
Speaker 1: right now. So what does any of this have to

1423
01:20:43,240 --> 01:20:46,760
Speaker 1: do with Christmas or Hanukkah or Kosher wedding vendors. Well,

1424
01:20:46,840 --> 01:20:49,920
Speaker 1: these traditions and holidays are a very good reminder of

1425
01:20:49,920 --> 01:20:53,400
Speaker 1: something that sounds very basic. As a Christian, for instance,

1426
01:20:53,640 --> 01:20:57,200
Speaker 1: I don't merely believe Christmas celebrates a story. I believe

1427
01:20:57,240 --> 01:21:01,200
Speaker 1: it celebrates a true story history. It is absolutely a

1428
01:21:01,360 --> 01:21:05,040
Speaker 1: thousand percent fine with me. If you think that sounds insane,

1429
01:21:05,120 --> 01:21:07,960
Speaker 1: I don't think you're being unreasonable. But because I believe

1430
01:21:07,960 --> 01:21:10,200
Speaker 1: God sent his son in human form to be born

1431
01:21:10,280 --> 01:21:13,439
Speaker 1: miraculously to a virgin and was literally resurrected from the dead,

1432
01:21:13,680 --> 01:21:15,600
Speaker 1: I believe he is the creator of all things. So

1433
01:21:15,800 --> 01:21:19,440
Speaker 1: I don't get to change what he said. Nancy Pelosi

1434
01:21:19,439 --> 01:21:22,000
Speaker 1: made a wonderful accommodation for members of Congress to wear

1435
01:21:22,000 --> 01:21:25,160
Speaker 1: head coverings, allowing ilhan Omar to become the first member

1436
01:21:25,240 --> 01:21:28,360
Speaker 1: to wear a religious headscarf on the floor. That's not

1437
01:21:28,439 --> 01:21:30,840
Speaker 1: the case in every context. In every European country, They've

1438
01:21:30,880 --> 01:21:33,559
Speaker 1: been dealing with these questions a lot, and I understand

1439
01:21:33,560 --> 01:21:37,160
Speaker 1: why many people find head coverings to be misogynistic and outdated.

1440
01:21:37,520 --> 01:21:40,360
Speaker 1: But I believe ilhan Omar believes her religion is fact,

1441
01:21:40,720 --> 01:21:43,879
Speaker 1: not a nice story or one of many relative truths

1442
01:21:43,920 --> 01:21:45,680
Speaker 1: that we all just sort of pick and choose. I

1443
01:21:45,720 --> 01:21:48,840
Speaker 1: believe she believes her God is God, just as I

1444
01:21:48,880 --> 01:21:52,559
Speaker 1: think the same. The less popular these beliefs become, the

1445
01:21:52,640 --> 01:21:56,439
Speaker 1: less our system of government is going to work, unless,

1446
01:21:56,439 --> 01:21:58,840
Speaker 1: of course, we can find a way to respect that.

1447
01:21:58,880 --> 01:22:01,760
Speaker 1: Some people will continue to worship faith traditions that are

1448
01:22:01,800 --> 01:22:04,920
Speaker 1: more similar to what people generally believe for thousands and

1449
01:22:04,960 --> 01:22:09,360
Speaker 1: thousands of years before modernity and postmodernity and technology made

1450
01:22:09,360 --> 01:22:13,080
Speaker 1: those beliefs seem less plausible to many many people. Religion

1451
01:22:13,120 --> 01:22:16,720
Speaker 1: may fade, but it will not disappear. Our liberal democracies

1452
01:22:16,760 --> 01:22:20,200
Speaker 1: can't erase these faiths or their texts. But we can't

1453
01:22:20,240 --> 01:22:23,680
Speaker 1: adjust to changing public opinion by protecting the balance of

1454
01:22:23,720 --> 01:22:31,000
Speaker 1: our freedoms. All right, Ryan, what is on your mind?

1455
01:22:31,040 --> 01:22:34,160
Speaker 1: What is your counterpoint? This Wednesday? We're running up, we're

1456
01:22:34,200 --> 01:22:36,240
Speaker 1: running up against our deadline. You're going to run through

1457
01:22:36,280 --> 01:22:38,479
Speaker 1: this pretty quickly. I've got a little thought experiment for

1458
01:22:38,560 --> 01:22:41,719
Speaker 1: people out there. So imagine that the New York Posts

1459
01:22:42,000 --> 01:22:45,200
Speaker 1: somehow winds up in possession of a laptop belonging to

1460
01:22:45,320 --> 01:22:49,200
Speaker 1: Elon Musk and begins publishing articles based off of what

1461
01:22:49,280 --> 01:22:51,240
Speaker 1: it finds in there. Now, some of it is a

1462
01:22:51,240 --> 01:22:55,240
Speaker 1: bit risky, but other revelations are clearly newsworthy, relating to

1463
01:22:55,320 --> 01:22:58,639
Speaker 1: deals he made with, say Saudi princes or American political

1464
01:22:58,720 --> 01:23:02,559
Speaker 1: leaders or Chinese government officials. What have you? Now? Ask yourself,

1465
01:23:03,000 --> 01:23:06,280
Speaker 1: how do you think Elon Musk would react? Go ahead,

1466
01:23:06,360 --> 01:23:08,639
Speaker 1: sit with that for a second. You think he would say,

1467
01:23:08,640 --> 01:23:10,880
Speaker 1: you know what, I'm an absolutist when it comes to

1468
01:23:10,920 --> 01:23:13,439
Speaker 1: free speech. And while this is painful for me, my

1469
01:23:13,560 --> 01:23:16,360
Speaker 1: principles required that I allow this to be published and

1470
01:23:16,479 --> 01:23:20,520
Speaker 1: shared on Twitter dot com. So I posed this hypothetical

1471
01:23:20,600 --> 01:23:23,799
Speaker 1: on Musk's website yesterday, and I got a fascinating response

1472
01:23:23,840 --> 01:23:27,519
Speaker 1: from some of his defenders. They didn't argue that Musk

1473
01:23:27,560 --> 01:23:30,200
Speaker 1: would follow his free speech principles and allow the documents

1474
01:23:30,200 --> 01:23:33,000
Speaker 1: to be published. Instead, they argued that he would be

1475
01:23:33,160 --> 01:23:36,639
Speaker 1: right to step in and censor the articles. After all,

1476
01:23:36,640 --> 01:23:40,080
Speaker 1: he said, it's a private platform, he's not running for president,

1477
01:23:40,120 --> 01:23:43,960
Speaker 1: and the real problem is government censorship. Now, Twitter users

1478
01:23:44,000 --> 01:23:46,439
Speaker 1: are mostly adults, so it's strange that I have to

1479
01:23:46,439 --> 01:23:49,360
Speaker 1: make this point. But let's be clear about something. Two

1480
01:23:49,400 --> 01:23:52,920
Speaker 1: wrongs do not make a right. Saying that Musk would

1481
01:23:52,960 --> 01:23:56,080
Speaker 1: be justified in censoring a New York Post story because

1482
01:23:56,120 --> 01:23:58,439
Speaker 1: the previous version of Twitter censored a New York Post

1483
01:23:58,520 --> 01:24:01,920
Speaker 1: story violates that basic rule that we all learned as kids.

1484
01:24:02,479 --> 01:24:05,200
Speaker 1: It is also wrong that the FBI and DHS have

1485
01:24:05,240 --> 01:24:07,600
Speaker 1: put pressure on big tech to police speech, as my

1486
01:24:07,640 --> 01:24:11,599
Speaker 1: colleagues Lefanng and Ken Klippenstein recently reported, and yesterday Michael

1487
01:24:11,600 --> 01:24:15,000
Speaker 1: Schallenberger published another edition of the Twitter Files, which included

1488
01:24:15,000 --> 01:24:19,000
Speaker 1: evidence of FBI pressure of Twitter, including something sent to

1489
01:24:19,040 --> 01:24:21,360
Speaker 1: them the night before the New York Post story ran.

1490
01:24:22,000 --> 01:24:24,040
Speaker 1: We don't know what was in those files that were

1491
01:24:24,040 --> 01:24:26,639
Speaker 1: sent the night before, but Twitter attorney Jim Baker, who

1492
01:24:26,680 --> 01:24:29,400
Speaker 1: was former General Counsel for the FBI, also had a

1493
01:24:29,439 --> 01:24:31,959
Speaker 1: call the next day with an FBI attorney on his calendar.

1494
01:24:32,520 --> 01:24:35,200
Speaker 1: There's no smoking gun yet that the FBI told Twitter

1495
01:24:35,360 --> 01:24:37,800
Speaker 1: specifically to censor the Hunter Biden's story, but there was

1496
01:24:37,840 --> 01:24:41,760
Speaker 1: clearly general pressure. But more importantly, even if there was

1497
01:24:41,920 --> 01:24:45,040
Speaker 1: zero pressure for Twitter on its own to censor the

1498
01:24:45,040 --> 01:24:48,840
Speaker 1: New York Post story was wrong and troubling. Another argument

1499
01:24:48,880 --> 01:24:51,680
Speaker 1: people made is that I personally have no standing to

1500
01:24:51,720 --> 01:24:54,200
Speaker 1: make this point because the intercept where I worked blocked

1501
01:24:54,200 --> 01:24:56,800
Speaker 1: Glenn Greenwald from publishing a story on it. But as

1502
01:24:56,800 --> 01:24:59,479
Speaker 1: Glenn has said repeatedly, I had zero to do with that,

1503
01:25:00,000 --> 01:25:02,240
Speaker 1: didn't even learn he was quitting until after he'd quit,

1504
01:25:02,479 --> 01:25:04,800
Speaker 1: and I was publicly critical of the decision at the

1505
01:25:04,840 --> 01:25:08,400
Speaker 1: time to censor the post reporting. Glenn meanwhile, has had

1506
01:25:08,439 --> 01:25:12,360
Speaker 1: some fun by mocking Democrats who have suddenly become champions

1507
01:25:12,439 --> 01:25:15,320
Speaker 1: of free speech, but he's also been critical of Elon's

1508
01:25:15,360 --> 01:25:18,519
Speaker 1: suspensions of them. What's important when you hold a principle

1509
01:25:18,560 --> 01:25:21,200
Speaker 1: is to apply it equally to your friends and enemies alike.

1510
01:25:21,280 --> 01:25:24,040
Speaker 1: In fact, it's more important that you apply it to

1511
01:25:24,040 --> 01:25:26,799
Speaker 1: your enemies, because it's easy to be nice to your friends.

1512
01:25:27,400 --> 01:25:30,160
Speaker 1: And that's what's been so disappointing about Elon Musk's turn

1513
01:25:30,240 --> 01:25:33,439
Speaker 1: away from free speech, and that he has maintained the

1514
01:25:33,479 --> 01:25:37,200
Speaker 1: support of so many of his fans while he has

1515
01:25:37,240 --> 01:25:39,960
Speaker 1: done it is even more discouraging, Like, you don't get

1516
01:25:39,960 --> 01:25:42,920
Speaker 1: to call yourself an independent thinker if what you think

1517
01:25:43,040 --> 01:25:46,080
Speaker 1: depends on what Elon Musk says at any given moment.

1518
01:25:46,560 --> 01:25:49,240
Speaker 1: Oh and by the way, there's just as much evidence

1519
01:25:49,240 --> 01:25:52,200
Speaker 1: that Elon is being pressured by governments, as there is

1520
01:25:52,240 --> 01:25:54,360
Speaker 1: that the old Twitter was. When he was at the

1521
01:25:54,360 --> 01:25:57,599
Speaker 1: World Cup, for instance, leaders of the governments of Qatar

1522
01:25:57,760 --> 01:26:02,040
Speaker 1: and Saudi Arabia, which are major in Twitter, were overheard

1523
01:26:02,040 --> 01:26:04,679
Speaker 1: telling Musk that he had to stop being so erratic

1524
01:26:04,960 --> 01:26:08,320
Speaker 1: and hire a stable CEO to run Twitter. Shortly after that,

1525
01:26:09,120 --> 01:26:11,719
Speaker 1: he published the poll asking if he should step down?

1526
01:26:12,120 --> 01:26:14,960
Speaker 1: What's that if it's not government pressure. Sure it's not

1527
01:26:15,040 --> 01:26:18,040
Speaker 1: the US government, but is that somehow better? And then

1528
01:26:18,040 --> 01:26:20,800
Speaker 1: when fifty seven percent of nearly twenty million people said

1529
01:26:20,880 --> 01:26:23,960
Speaker 1: yes he should step down, he started complaining about the vote,

1530
01:26:24,000 --> 01:26:26,320
Speaker 1: and his supporters urged him to do a new one

1531
01:26:26,560 --> 01:26:30,120
Speaker 1: that only people who pay can participate in. One of

1532
01:26:30,160 --> 01:26:33,320
Speaker 1: his most vocal supporters even started arguing that the Founding

1533
01:26:33,360 --> 01:26:37,479
Speaker 1: Father's vision of democracy was that only propertied landowners ought

1534
01:26:37,520 --> 01:26:40,720
Speaker 1: to be able to vote, so therefore, restricting the franchise

1535
01:26:40,760 --> 01:26:43,360
Speaker 1: for Twitter polls to people who pay for Twitter Blue

1536
01:26:43,439 --> 01:26:47,280
Speaker 1: was basically the vision of the Founding fathers. By the way,

1537
01:26:47,320 --> 01:26:49,720
Speaker 1: this is neither here nor there, but that's a misunderstanding

1538
01:26:49,760 --> 01:26:51,839
Speaker 1: of the Founding In many states, you did not actually

1539
01:26:51,840 --> 01:26:54,639
Speaker 1: have to own property to vote after seventeen seventy six,

1540
01:26:54,880 --> 01:26:57,040
Speaker 1: though you did have to be mail in any event.

1541
01:26:57,600 --> 01:26:59,960
Speaker 1: If you want to understand the collapse of Musk's free

1542
01:27:00,080 --> 01:27:04,040
Speaker 1: speech revolution, just go reread your copy of George Orwell's

1543
01:27:04,080 --> 01:27:08,680
Speaker 1: Animal Farm and remember how quickly the revolutionary animals reinstituted

1544
01:27:08,720 --> 01:27:11,760
Speaker 1: the old farms rules and hierarchies after they'd taken over,

1545
01:27:11,840 --> 01:27:15,240
Speaker 1: and even invited the humans back on the farm, as

1546
01:27:15,240 --> 01:27:19,719
Speaker 1: the Vox popular watched the increasingly authoritarian Twitter CEO implement

1547
01:27:19,840 --> 01:27:22,519
Speaker 1: new rules on a whim, even within twenty four hours

1548
01:27:22,520 --> 01:27:24,759
Speaker 1: of promising not to implement new rules on a whim

1549
01:27:24,840 --> 01:27:27,880
Speaker 1: without a new vote. It's a reminder of the great

1550
01:27:27,960 --> 01:27:31,960
Speaker 1: last line from Animal Farm, in which Orwell writes, spoiler alert,

1551
01:27:32,800 --> 01:27:35,519
Speaker 1: the creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from

1552
01:27:35,560 --> 01:27:38,400
Speaker 1: man to pig, and from pig to man again. But

1553
01:27:38,520 --> 01:27:44,280
Speaker 1: already it was impossible to say which was which. So

1554
01:27:44,960 --> 01:27:49,280
Speaker 1: as were And I'm constantly reminded of that, of that

1555
01:27:49,360 --> 01:27:52,639
Speaker 1: last line. As people kind of move in and out

1556
01:27:52,640 --> 01:27:56,720
Speaker 1: of different contexts in their lives, it's one thing to

1557
01:27:56,720 --> 01:28:05,040
Speaker 1: hold a position, say with regard. All right, we're joined

1558
01:28:05,080 --> 01:28:08,280
Speaker 1: now by Devin Mans, who's a TrackMan. H tra TrackMan

1559
01:28:08,960 --> 01:28:12,559
Speaker 1: foreman with BNSF Railway, which is the UH which is

1560
01:28:12,600 --> 01:28:17,080
Speaker 1: the Warren Buffett owned railroad company. And Devon is actually

1561
01:28:17,160 --> 01:28:20,960
Speaker 1: joining us from North Dakota where, good lord, what is

1562
01:28:21,120 --> 01:28:23,679
Speaker 1: what is the windshill where you are right now? Devon?

1563
01:28:25,400 --> 01:28:29,240
Speaker 1: I believe it's right around thirty below at the moment.

1564
01:28:29,280 --> 01:28:32,360
Speaker 1: It should get older overnight. Good Lord, all right. So

1565
01:28:32,680 --> 01:28:35,040
Speaker 1: the reason Devon that we wanted to have you on

1566
01:28:35,200 --> 01:28:38,760
Speaker 1: is that. So Devon featured in an article that I

1567
01:28:38,800 --> 01:28:43,080
Speaker 1: wrote for The Intercept about the the organizing, the union

1568
01:28:43,160 --> 01:28:47,360
Speaker 1: organizing that went into the recent railroad fight that went

1569
01:28:47,400 --> 01:28:52,080
Speaker 1: through Congress. Devon, you're you were you helped pull together

1570
01:28:52,439 --> 01:28:55,720
Speaker 1: what's what's called BMWD Rank and File United, which is

1571
01:28:55,760 --> 01:28:58,479
Speaker 1: kind of a a kind of a caucus of rank

1572
01:28:58,520 --> 01:29:01,639
Speaker 1: and file workers that is designed to kind of put

1573
01:29:01,680 --> 01:29:05,680
Speaker 1: pressure on the company, put pressure on union leadership to

1574
01:29:06,479 --> 01:29:10,000
Speaker 1: make sure that they are responding to the needs of

1575
01:29:10,479 --> 01:29:13,760
Speaker 1: rank and file workers. Is how would you put what

1576
01:29:13,880 --> 01:29:18,960
Speaker 1: BMWD Rank and File United does? Well, that's exactly what

1577
01:29:19,040 --> 01:29:23,120
Speaker 1: the point of the caucuses. We're form caucus that just

1578
01:29:23,160 --> 01:29:26,240
Speaker 1: began because we saw that there needed to be a change,

1579
01:29:27,320 --> 01:29:30,280
Speaker 1: There needs to be that constant pressure from below, and

1580
01:29:30,360 --> 01:29:32,040
Speaker 1: we want to give that voice to the rank and

1581
01:29:32,120 --> 01:29:34,679
Speaker 1: file members, and that's what we're trying to do. Also,

1582
01:29:34,800 --> 01:29:37,800
Speaker 1: we're trying to help out doing some education. A lot

1583
01:29:37,800 --> 01:29:41,719
Speaker 1: of union members don't know really about trade unionism at all,

1584
01:29:41,960 --> 01:29:44,280
Speaker 1: and it's a tough thing to learn how to do

1585
01:29:44,360 --> 01:29:49,800
Speaker 1: when you're going through union bureaucracy and the normal conservative

1586
01:29:50,200 --> 01:29:53,040
Speaker 1: union stuff that we always do, claims and grievances and

1587
01:29:53,080 --> 01:29:55,640
Speaker 1: that kind of stuff. And so we're just trying to

1588
01:29:56,040 --> 01:29:58,800
Speaker 1: uplift the rank and file members and let them know

1589
01:29:58,840 --> 01:30:02,439
Speaker 1: that they have a in their workplace. And so for background,

1590
01:30:02,439 --> 01:30:05,040
Speaker 1: people can check out the piece I did over at

1591
01:30:05,080 --> 01:30:09,800
Speaker 1: the Intercept. But basically in mid November, about twenty five

1592
01:30:09,920 --> 01:30:12,400
Speaker 1: workers came, you know, straight from the tracks to Washington,

1593
01:30:12,880 --> 01:30:16,160
Speaker 1: met with more than one hundred members of Congress at

1594
01:30:16,200 --> 01:30:19,400
Speaker 1: the time. You met with staff for Jamal Bowman, and

1595
01:30:19,439 --> 01:30:23,439
Speaker 1: then once Biden you know, dropped the hammer and sent

1596
01:30:23,560 --> 01:30:26,040
Speaker 1: the contract over to Congress be ratified. You were one

1597
01:30:26,080 --> 01:30:28,360
Speaker 1: of the workers who was in touch on the house

1598
01:30:28,400 --> 01:30:32,880
Speaker 1: side with with Bowman putting together the strategy of how

1599
01:30:32,880 --> 01:30:36,280
Speaker 1: you were going to try to salvage something from from

1600
01:30:36,320 --> 01:30:39,439
Speaker 1: this wreckage. Didn't want didn't want to have you on

1601
01:30:39,479 --> 01:30:42,639
Speaker 1: to rehash all of that. What I wanted to hear

1602
01:30:43,400 --> 01:30:46,680
Speaker 1: is how the company has been has been treating you

1603
01:30:46,760 --> 01:30:52,040
Speaker 1: since then. Yeah, it's really interesting they uh. You know,

1604
01:30:52,240 --> 01:30:55,040
Speaker 1: railroads have been known for a long time to do

1605
01:30:55,240 --> 01:30:57,840
Speaker 1: different sorts of retaliation, and I'm sure a lot of

1606
01:30:57,880 --> 01:31:00,439
Speaker 1: different corporations do the same kind of stuff. But right

1607
01:31:00,479 --> 01:31:05,639
Speaker 1: now I'm under an investigation for kind of some bogus charges,

1608
01:31:07,320 --> 01:31:09,840
Speaker 1: and you know, I could possibly be fired here in

1609
01:31:09,880 --> 01:31:15,640
Speaker 1: the next few weeks or be penalized and beyond probation

1610
01:31:16,040 --> 01:31:19,439
Speaker 1: for a year, in which within that year they can

1611
01:31:20,280 --> 01:31:24,680
Speaker 1: fire me for the silliest little things. Fortunately, I do

1612
01:31:24,720 --> 01:31:27,320
Speaker 1: have a good union rep who is on my side

1613
01:31:27,360 --> 01:31:30,160
Speaker 1: and trying to fight to get rid of those charges.

1614
01:31:30,240 --> 01:31:33,920
Speaker 1: They're all trumped up, and you know, Vena Steff knows

1615
01:31:33,960 --> 01:31:39,439
Speaker 1: that it's it's all bs, and that if it goes

1616
01:31:39,439 --> 01:31:41,920
Speaker 1: to arbitration, which it will, if I do get fired

1617
01:31:42,080 --> 01:31:45,360
Speaker 1: or if I get that probation, then it'll be dropped.

1618
01:31:45,520 --> 01:31:48,360
Speaker 1: You know, the arbitrator is going to agree with us.

1619
01:31:48,600 --> 01:31:51,000
Speaker 1: But you know that's two years away, so I might

1620
01:31:51,000 --> 01:31:53,240
Speaker 1: be out of a job here for the next two years.

1621
01:31:54,160 --> 01:32:00,280
Speaker 1: So if anybody's looking for an organizer. Well, has to

1622
01:32:00,320 --> 01:32:02,200
Speaker 1: have a chilling effect on other members of the rank

1623
01:32:02,200 --> 01:32:06,679
Speaker 1: and file and people who who might be considering speaking

1624
01:32:06,720 --> 01:32:12,160
Speaker 1: out against BNSF over for very reasonable purposes over ridiculous

1625
01:32:12,160 --> 01:32:15,800
Speaker 1: policies going forward. So if they make an example out

1626
01:32:15,840 --> 01:32:18,880
Speaker 1: of you, Devin, how do you think that affects, you know, people,

1627
01:32:19,000 --> 01:32:21,880
Speaker 1: whether it's a probation or being fired, how do you

1628
01:32:21,880 --> 01:32:26,760
Speaker 1: think that affects the sort of momentum among your colleagues

1629
01:32:27,760 --> 01:32:30,000
Speaker 1: that are sort of fed up and ready to be

1630
01:32:30,040 --> 01:32:33,439
Speaker 1: public about a lot of those Yeah, that's a really

1631
01:32:33,479 --> 01:32:38,639
Speaker 1: great point. It's really cheap for them to do. I mean, look,

1632
01:32:39,720 --> 01:32:41,720
Speaker 1: I know I'm a pain in there, but I know

1633
01:32:41,840 --> 01:32:46,040
Speaker 1: that if you know, arbitrator comes back in two years

1634
01:32:46,080 --> 01:32:48,200
Speaker 1: and they have to pain back all my you know,

1635
01:32:48,280 --> 01:32:50,519
Speaker 1: lost wages for the last two years or three years,

1636
01:32:50,600 --> 01:32:54,559
Speaker 1: or however long it takes, it's still cheaper than what

1637
01:32:54,600 --> 01:32:56,920
Speaker 1: it is for me to be out there. Right, Like,

1638
01:32:57,200 --> 01:33:00,320
Speaker 1: I know, I'm a pain, but yeah, I mean that

1639
01:33:00,400 --> 01:33:03,479
Speaker 1: is a chilling effect on them that I would hope

1640
01:33:03,520 --> 01:33:06,479
Speaker 1: that that that would lift them up a little bit

1641
01:33:06,479 --> 01:33:08,960
Speaker 1: more and get people to talk a little bit more

1642
01:33:08,960 --> 01:33:11,280
Speaker 1: to each other and say, you know, this guy got that,

1643
01:33:11,400 --> 01:33:13,720
Speaker 1: so we need to stick together. And so that's so

1644
01:33:13,760 --> 01:33:16,840
Speaker 1: you need to keep a positive spin on it and

1645
01:33:16,880 --> 01:33:20,080
Speaker 1: not go to the everyone hush, I won't be quiet,

1646
01:33:20,800 --> 01:33:23,560
Speaker 1: don't bring up anything because you know you're worried you

1647
01:33:23,640 --> 01:33:26,600
Speaker 1: might get fired just like Devin did, or or get penalized.

1648
01:33:27,080 --> 01:33:31,880
Speaker 1: You know, I'm if this happens, I'm definitely gonna put

1649
01:33:31,920 --> 01:33:35,639
Speaker 1: that word out there that that that they should still

1650
01:33:35,920 --> 01:33:38,800
Speaker 1: keep fighting, they should band together, and that's the only

1651
01:33:38,800 --> 01:33:40,760
Speaker 1: way we're going to win this thing. And I want

1652
01:33:40,760 --> 01:33:42,800
Speaker 1: I don't want to get to how you're a pain

1653
01:33:42,840 --> 01:33:45,800
Speaker 1: in their ass in a moment, But first I think

1654
01:33:45,840 --> 01:33:49,160
Speaker 1: it's important for people to understand the kind of the

1655
01:33:49,280 --> 01:33:54,479
Speaker 1: kind of banal ways that this retaliation works. So how

1656
01:33:54,560 --> 01:33:57,320
Speaker 1: much because you and I were talking last night about

1657
01:33:57,360 --> 01:33:59,320
Speaker 1: the details of this, and I think it's really interesting

1658
01:33:59,360 --> 01:34:03,879
Speaker 1: to a window into the way the corporate retaliation against

1659
01:34:03,920 --> 01:34:07,840
Speaker 1: workers actually plays out in the workplace. How much can

1660
01:34:07,840 --> 01:34:09,040
Speaker 1: you talk about it? Can you tell us a little

1661
01:34:09,080 --> 01:34:12,599
Speaker 1: bit about you know precisely what these what these trumped

1662
01:34:12,640 --> 01:34:15,160
Speaker 1: up charges are, and the timing and when they slap

1663
01:34:15,200 --> 01:34:20,920
Speaker 1: you with these. Yeah, So basically it's kind of I'm

1664
01:34:20,920 --> 01:34:22,840
Speaker 1: gonna try to explain it as easy as I can,

1665
01:34:22,880 --> 01:34:26,240
Speaker 1: because every industry has their own little things. But basically,

1666
01:34:26,400 --> 01:34:28,560
Speaker 1: we're told to put our time in. We do it

1667
01:34:28,600 --> 01:34:31,240
Speaker 1: all on the computer, we do it all on application,

1668
01:34:31,479 --> 01:34:33,479
Speaker 1: and we put our own time in. And we're told

1669
01:34:33,479 --> 01:34:36,880
Speaker 1: to do our time for the day, the day before

1670
01:34:37,360 --> 01:34:40,479
Speaker 1: or the morning before, and then change it the following day. Now,

1671
01:34:40,920 --> 01:34:43,320
Speaker 1: they want us to do that because on their scorecards

1672
01:34:43,320 --> 01:34:47,600
Speaker 1: they get bonuses for on time performance. Right, So if

1673
01:34:47,680 --> 01:34:49,519
Speaker 1: you put your time in, that's what we call it.

1674
01:34:49,520 --> 01:34:52,599
Speaker 1: It's just putting in the time that you worked on time.

1675
01:34:52,800 --> 01:34:54,680
Speaker 1: Then they get a better bonus at the end of

1676
01:34:54,680 --> 01:34:56,280
Speaker 1: the year. So why wouldn't they want you to put

1677
01:34:56,280 --> 01:34:59,959
Speaker 1: it in early. So anyways, without going into all the details,

1678
01:35:00,160 --> 01:35:04,240
Speaker 1: essentially I did that and my job had ended. I

1679
01:35:04,280 --> 01:35:07,280
Speaker 1: wasn't able to change my time the next day, and

1680
01:35:08,920 --> 01:35:11,040
Speaker 1: I had asked a timekeeper. I had sent an email.

1681
01:35:11,080 --> 01:35:13,559
Speaker 1: This is a very common thing to do, just send

1682
01:35:13,560 --> 01:35:16,920
Speaker 1: an email to a timekeeper and asked them to change

1683
01:35:16,920 --> 01:35:19,559
Speaker 1: the time, and they did it. Three days later, I

1684
01:35:19,640 --> 01:35:22,600
Speaker 1: get an investigation noticed that I was stealing time, and

1685
01:35:22,640 --> 01:35:26,280
Speaker 1: I'm like no, and I talked to my union rep.

1686
01:35:26,360 --> 01:35:29,040
Speaker 1: I talked to my manager and they're all like, oh no, sorry,

1687
01:35:29,240 --> 01:35:30,640
Speaker 1: but then you can do with my union rep. Is

1688
01:35:30,680 --> 01:35:34,280
Speaker 1: like this is vs. This happens all the time we

1689
01:35:34,960 --> 01:35:37,280
Speaker 1: you know, we get cut letters all the time, constantly,

1690
01:35:38,680 --> 01:35:43,240
Speaker 1: they're trying to take time away from us, and it

1691
01:35:43,680 --> 01:35:46,120
Speaker 1: happens like three days later that I get this this

1692
01:35:46,320 --> 01:35:49,080
Speaker 1: charge And it's just so silly because this happened to

1693
01:35:49,120 --> 01:35:51,839
Speaker 1: me about three years ago once too, when I explained

1694
01:35:51,840 --> 01:35:55,360
Speaker 1: the situation and my manager's manager who was in charge

1695
01:35:55,400 --> 01:36:00,760
Speaker 1: of these these investigations, says, oh, yeah, no sense, that's fine,

1696
01:36:01,400 --> 01:36:04,040
Speaker 1: we'll drop it. So they dropped it because they understand,

1697
01:36:04,160 --> 01:36:08,439
Speaker 1: like now, the same exact manager is still coming after

1698
01:36:08,479 --> 01:36:11,360
Speaker 1: me for the same exact thing that happened three years ago.

1699
01:36:11,880 --> 01:36:17,080
Speaker 1: And it's a total common thing to happen. So yeah,

1700
01:36:17,120 --> 01:36:20,599
Speaker 1: it's really unfortunate that it's going down that way. But yeah,

1701
01:36:20,640 --> 01:36:23,240
Speaker 1: and so basically the way it could unfold is they

1702
01:36:23,240 --> 01:36:25,760
Speaker 1: would fire you and say you stole time, and then

1703
01:36:25,880 --> 01:36:29,240
Speaker 1: force you to go to arbitration, and then, like you said,

1704
01:36:29,280 --> 01:36:31,840
Speaker 1: even if you win an arbitration two years from now,

1705
01:36:31,840 --> 01:36:34,000
Speaker 1: three years from now, they would owe you, you know,

1706
01:36:34,120 --> 01:36:37,120
Speaker 1: every penny of lost wages over that period of time.

1707
01:36:37,760 --> 01:36:40,599
Speaker 1: But like you said to them, it's it's worth it

1708
01:36:41,120 --> 01:36:43,320
Speaker 1: to have to have you out of there. And can

1709
01:36:43,360 --> 01:36:44,960
Speaker 1: you talk about that a little bit, like what what

1710
01:36:45,080 --> 01:36:47,280
Speaker 1: are the types of things And you're a shop steward

1711
01:36:47,320 --> 01:36:49,960
Speaker 1: as well for your you know, for your uh uh,

1712
01:36:50,640 --> 01:36:52,960
Speaker 1: for your your shop, and so what what are the

1713
01:36:53,040 --> 01:36:58,000
Speaker 1: kinds of things that an active shop steward does that

1714
01:36:58,040 --> 01:37:01,479
Speaker 1: would make make it so that a company like BNSF

1715
01:37:01,479 --> 01:37:03,920
Speaker 1: would say, you know what is actually cheaper cheaper for

1716
01:37:04,000 --> 01:37:05,559
Speaker 1: us to pay this guy for a couple of years

1717
01:37:05,600 --> 01:37:10,479
Speaker 1: just to not show up to work. Yeah, So, as

1718
01:37:10,520 --> 01:37:12,680
Speaker 1: you said, I am the shop steward. We call them

1719
01:37:12,720 --> 01:37:16,160
Speaker 1: local chairman where I come from on the railroads. But

1720
01:37:17,400 --> 01:37:19,600
Speaker 1: essentially what you do is you try to force the

1721
01:37:19,720 --> 01:37:23,480
Speaker 1: railroads to abide by the agreement. And sometimes it's management

1722
01:37:23,680 --> 01:37:27,559
Speaker 1: just doing whatever they want, and sometimes it's the corporate

1723
01:37:27,560 --> 01:37:30,160
Speaker 1: side of things doing whatever they want. And either way,

1724
01:37:30,320 --> 01:37:32,679
Speaker 1: if it's against the agreement, we have to file claims

1725
01:37:32,840 --> 01:37:34,800
Speaker 1: or we try to get them done right away. I

1726
01:37:34,800 --> 01:37:36,760
Speaker 1: mean I go into the manager's office and talk to

1727
01:37:36,800 --> 01:37:39,800
Speaker 1: them and say, hey, like, this isn't right. You've got

1728
01:37:39,800 --> 01:37:41,639
Speaker 1: to do it this way. This is what the agreement says.

1729
01:37:41,960 --> 01:37:45,800
Speaker 1: Sometimes they they're like, oh, okay, we'll fix it, or

1730
01:37:45,840 --> 01:37:48,599
Speaker 1: sometimes you have to. It may cost them a little

1731
01:37:48,600 --> 01:37:51,679
Speaker 1: bit more money now, but sometimes you have to file

1732
01:37:51,680 --> 01:37:54,519
Speaker 1: all these claims a grievances and those can take two

1733
01:37:54,560 --> 01:37:57,479
Speaker 1: to three years to get paid or not get paid.

1734
01:37:57,479 --> 01:37:59,360
Speaker 1: It depends on the arbitrary that you get. It's kind

1735
01:37:59,400 --> 01:38:02,400
Speaker 1: of a crap shoot, to be honest with you, and

1736
01:38:03,320 --> 01:38:06,519
Speaker 1: so that's years down the road. And so what ends

1737
01:38:06,560 --> 01:38:08,960
Speaker 1: up happening is if you keep finding these claims, is

1738
01:38:09,760 --> 01:38:14,040
Speaker 1: you get a steady income of thousands of dollars being

1739
01:38:14,040 --> 01:38:17,799
Speaker 1: put in your members pockets by the railroads. And sometimes

1740
01:38:17,800 --> 01:38:20,000
Speaker 1: it's you know, they're paying contractors to do our job,

1741
01:38:20,080 --> 01:38:22,800
Speaker 1: and those are claims like we should be doing those

1742
01:38:23,040 --> 01:38:25,920
Speaker 1: jobs and we're able to write, we're trained to do them.

1743
01:38:26,640 --> 01:38:28,400
Speaker 1: But then they're going to have to pay twice. And

1744
01:38:28,600 --> 01:38:30,800
Speaker 1: like that's how much money these railroads have. Is they

1745
01:38:30,800 --> 01:38:33,519
Speaker 1: cut all these positions, but then they hire contractors, and

1746
01:38:33,560 --> 01:38:36,240
Speaker 1: then they end up paying now for the contractor, which

1747
01:38:36,280 --> 01:38:39,000
Speaker 1: is more expensive, and then they end up paying in

1748
01:38:39,160 --> 01:38:42,679
Speaker 1: two to three years after the arbitration's all done, and

1749
01:38:42,800 --> 01:38:46,599
Speaker 1: so they end up paying double. And so I try

1750
01:38:46,600 --> 01:38:48,560
Speaker 1: to abide by our agreement as much as possible, and

1751
01:38:48,880 --> 01:38:51,080
Speaker 1: I try to help our membership do that too. They're

1752
01:38:51,080 --> 01:38:53,800
Speaker 1: doing an excellent job at letting me know what's going on.

1753
01:38:53,880 --> 01:38:56,400
Speaker 1: But you know, when you bring up these issues, they

1754
01:38:56,400 --> 01:38:58,600
Speaker 1: don't like it because it's not as easy for them, right, Like,

1755
01:38:58,640 --> 01:39:00,720
Speaker 1: they just want to do whatever they want, even if

1756
01:39:00,720 --> 01:39:03,679
Speaker 1: it's against our agreement. And so I'm fighting to keep

1757
01:39:03,720 --> 01:39:06,519
Speaker 1: that all the time. And so if that costs them

1758
01:39:06,560 --> 01:39:08,760
Speaker 1: a lot of money, then it is what it is.

1759
01:39:08,800 --> 01:39:12,000
Speaker 1: But that's what I'm talking about, is where it would

1760
01:39:12,040 --> 01:39:14,760
Speaker 1: be easier for them just to fire me because money

1761
01:39:14,760 --> 01:39:17,960
Speaker 1: doesn't mean a lot to them. Yeah, except when it

1762
01:39:18,080 --> 01:39:23,800
Speaker 1: would require a total rethinking of precision tactics because they

1763
01:39:23,800 --> 01:39:26,200
Speaker 1: would have to actually hire more people instead of just

1764
01:39:26,320 --> 01:39:29,439
Speaker 1: giving sick days. Amazing, how steep that uphill battle is

1765
01:39:29,479 --> 01:39:31,680
Speaker 1: for you guys, just to get those dis Yeah, And

1766
01:39:32,680 --> 01:39:36,479
Speaker 1: while you're here, you've been kind of roped into this

1767
01:39:36,560 --> 01:39:39,320
Speaker 1: kind of debate that's been going on among what they

1768
01:39:39,400 --> 01:39:42,880
Speaker 1: kind of call the independent left about the whole strategy

1769
01:39:43,520 --> 01:39:46,880
Speaker 1: to get Jamal Bowman to push for the seven days

1770
01:39:46,880 --> 01:39:49,760
Speaker 1: sick leaves. The strategy has been called by a lot

1771
01:39:49,800 --> 01:39:52,960
Speaker 1: of people naives saying that there was no chance that

1772
01:39:53,040 --> 01:39:56,120
Speaker 1: Senate Republicans ten Senate Republicans were ever going to go

1773
01:39:56,160 --> 01:39:58,280
Speaker 1: along with this, and then it's just a giant kind

1774
01:39:58,280 --> 01:40:01,559
Speaker 1: of cover for the squad who is just a sellout

1775
01:40:01,600 --> 01:40:05,479
Speaker 1: to Democratic Party leadership. Wanted to kind of quickly get

1776
01:40:05,479 --> 01:40:08,240
Speaker 1: you get your response to that, and also what's it

1777
01:40:08,280 --> 01:40:11,400
Speaker 1: been like to kind of see yourself as you know,

1778
01:40:11,479 --> 01:40:16,679
Speaker 1: become part of this online debate. Well, it is really

1779
01:40:16,680 --> 01:40:22,000
Speaker 1: interesting to see this national news and national audience people

1780
01:40:22,439 --> 01:40:25,280
Speaker 1: talking about this kind of stuff. So it very odd

1781
01:40:26,120 --> 01:40:28,240
Speaker 1: just coming from the tracks and just doing my everyday

1782
01:40:28,600 --> 01:40:33,360
Speaker 1: job to something so nationally recognized. But so it's really interesting.

1783
01:40:33,439 --> 01:40:36,040
Speaker 1: So I appreciate that article, especially because that's pushed a

1784
01:40:36,080 --> 01:40:37,680
Speaker 1: lot of that out there. But you know, I've been

1785
01:40:37,680 --> 01:40:41,439
Speaker 1: in contact with Bowman's office, with Corey Bush's office, and

1786
01:40:41,479 --> 01:40:45,080
Speaker 1: a couple other progressives to it. It's been it's been

1787
01:40:45,160 --> 01:40:48,120
Speaker 1: really great, really cool to see it all happen, and

1788
01:40:48,120 --> 01:40:50,960
Speaker 1: they've been awesome and wanting to help. I remember Cory

1789
01:40:51,000 --> 01:40:53,320
Speaker 1: Bush's office was like, well, why can't we ask for

1790
01:40:53,360 --> 01:40:56,000
Speaker 1: fifteen days? You know, like they wanted more, and it

1791
01:40:56,240 --> 01:41:00,799
Speaker 1: just it didn't line up with this strategy that National

1792
01:41:01,200 --> 01:41:03,320
Speaker 1: had pushed for in the first place, and you need

1793
01:41:03,320 --> 01:41:05,920
Speaker 1: to push as one. You can't just change it up

1794
01:41:06,000 --> 01:41:09,320
Speaker 1: and ask for twenty different things. I mean, I'm sure

1795
01:41:09,880 --> 01:41:12,559
Speaker 1: all their offices would have rather given us way more,

1796
01:41:12,600 --> 01:41:15,760
Speaker 1: but that's just not the reality of what we do.

1797
01:41:16,400 --> 01:41:19,160
Speaker 1: And as far as you know, the left bashing on

1798
01:41:20,439 --> 01:41:24,360
Speaker 1: all these progresses are helping us out. I just I

1799
01:41:24,479 --> 01:41:28,200
Speaker 1: understand their point, I really do, but it's just not

1800
01:41:28,400 --> 01:41:31,080
Speaker 1: our reality. It's not what we have today. Now. Should

1801
01:41:31,160 --> 01:41:34,040
Speaker 1: we try to fix that for the future? Absolutely, Like great,

1802
01:41:34,080 --> 01:41:38,479
Speaker 1: do we want to put timelines on the Railway Labor Act? Great?

1803
01:41:38,600 --> 01:41:40,200
Speaker 1: I would love that. You know, I don't want to

1804
01:41:40,200 --> 01:41:44,680
Speaker 1: wait three years for my contract. But you know that

1805
01:41:44,840 --> 01:41:46,960
Speaker 1: was our strategy and that is what we asked them.

1806
01:41:46,960 --> 01:41:50,240
Speaker 1: I specifically asked them for that. And telling us that

1807
01:41:50,280 --> 01:41:53,120
Speaker 1: we're naive because we didn't think that or you didn't

1808
01:41:53,120 --> 01:41:55,840
Speaker 1: think that some Republicans were going to come with us. Well,

1809
01:41:55,840 --> 01:42:00,559
Speaker 1: i mean, look at Ted Cruz did, yeah, exactly, I

1810
01:42:00,600 --> 01:42:04,639
Speaker 1: mean that's right, like he sees he sees that, hey,

1811
01:42:04,800 --> 01:42:06,519
Speaker 1: you know, you might be able to get some workers

1812
01:42:06,560 --> 01:42:09,240
Speaker 1: actually with the GOP right now, right, So, and they

1813
01:42:09,280 --> 01:42:13,120
Speaker 1: saw that Marco Rubio, right, like these odd people came

1814
01:42:13,160 --> 01:42:16,880
Speaker 1: out and actually supported us. So to say that we're

1815
01:42:17,000 --> 01:42:19,280
Speaker 1: naive or we're dumb, we don't know what we're doing

1816
01:42:19,320 --> 01:42:22,160
Speaker 1: because we didn't think or we knew it was going

1817
01:42:22,240 --> 01:42:25,400
Speaker 1: to fail in the Senate, that's incorrect. That's that couldn't

1818
01:42:25,439 --> 01:42:28,960
Speaker 1: be more far from the truth. Actually, a lot of

1819
01:42:28,960 --> 01:42:33,360
Speaker 1: our members are conservatives and they vote for these people, right,

1820
01:42:33,439 --> 01:42:36,559
Speaker 1: and they know that, right, these representatives know that they

1821
01:42:36,680 --> 01:42:39,360
Speaker 1: vote for him. So now that they're on record saying

1822
01:42:40,840 --> 01:42:43,679
Speaker 1: saying that they didn't support our sick days, I've actually

1823
01:42:43,720 --> 01:42:48,160
Speaker 1: had people say, hey, look, Bernie Sanders, Jamaal Bowman, wow,

1824
01:42:48,240 --> 01:42:52,040
Speaker 1: and these are conservatives, right, like these are Midwest flyover

1825
01:42:52,120 --> 01:42:56,679
Speaker 1: state conservatives right in the past. Yeah, absolutely, and they're

1826
01:42:56,720 --> 01:42:59,240
Speaker 1: saying wow, like they actually stood up for us. I

1827
01:42:59,240 --> 01:43:00,840
Speaker 1: have a lot of respect for these people now, and

1828
01:43:00,840 --> 01:43:02,800
Speaker 1: they're actually moving a little bit more to the left.

1829
01:43:03,120 --> 01:43:05,360
Speaker 1: So the people that are far to the left and

1830
01:43:05,400 --> 01:43:08,639
Speaker 1: are trying to push these progressives that actually helped us out,

1831
01:43:09,040 --> 01:43:11,440
Speaker 1: I think you're doing a giant disservice. And I understand

1832
01:43:11,560 --> 01:43:13,200
Speaker 1: your point and what you're trying to get at, but

1833
01:43:14,040 --> 01:43:16,840
Speaker 1: it's really coming from the wrong place. And I really

1834
01:43:16,840 --> 01:43:19,800
Speaker 1: think that you need to rethink and talk to some

1835
01:43:19,840 --> 01:43:22,720
Speaker 1: actual workers. I think you had. You guys had a

1836
01:43:22,800 --> 01:43:26,080
Speaker 1: much better pulse on the situation. The Republican Party is

1837
01:43:26,160 --> 01:43:28,920
Speaker 1: as corporate does. The Democratic Party is just as many

1838
01:43:29,000 --> 01:43:34,000
Speaker 1: problems with corporate corruption, but they also represent the working

1839
01:43:34,000 --> 01:43:38,200
Speaker 1: class increasingly, especially in some swing states, you know, like

1840
01:43:38,320 --> 01:43:41,800
Speaker 1: Wisconsin and Ohio, Pennsylvania, et cetera, et cetera. No, what's

1841
01:43:41,840 --> 01:43:44,680
Speaker 1: in their best interests and are responding to that. And

1842
01:43:45,040 --> 01:43:47,639
Speaker 1: you picked up on that. Obviously your workers know that

1843
01:43:48,160 --> 01:43:50,240
Speaker 1: in a way that I think people in the sort

1844
01:43:50,240 --> 01:43:52,880
Speaker 1: of progressive movement professional I think the independent left might

1845
01:43:53,000 --> 01:43:54,800
Speaker 1: have to figure on the pulse of the Republican Party.

1846
01:43:54,840 --> 01:43:58,759
Speaker 1: Is it shocking? I don't know, it's just an yeah.

1847
01:43:58,760 --> 01:44:02,439
Speaker 1: Oh and one and one quick fun story. Devin and

1848
01:44:02,439 --> 01:44:04,479
Speaker 1: I were in touch a lot throughout this in my

1849
01:44:04,479 --> 01:44:06,880
Speaker 1: capacity of reporting on this for the Intercept, But then

1850
01:44:07,000 --> 01:44:09,720
Speaker 1: at the very end, Devon's like, wait a minute, you're

1851
01:44:09,800 --> 01:44:14,000
Speaker 1: the guy on Counterpoints. So Devin has been a viewer

1852
01:44:14,040 --> 01:44:17,320
Speaker 1: of Breaking Points for a while and didn't make the

1853
01:44:17,320 --> 01:44:20,720
Speaker 1: connection till the very End'm proud proud to have you

1854
01:44:20,920 --> 01:44:23,800
Speaker 1: as as somebody who watch watches the show, and we're

1855
01:44:23,840 --> 01:44:27,360
Speaker 1: going to keep following your case because we're not gonna

1856
01:44:27,640 --> 01:44:30,240
Speaker 1: let them retaliate against workers who are just asking for

1857
01:44:30,280 --> 01:44:34,160
Speaker 1: their basic rights without at least facing some public shame

1858
01:44:34,240 --> 01:44:37,040
Speaker 1: for it. Well, I appreciate it. Thank you very much

1859
01:44:37,040 --> 01:44:39,880
Speaker 1: for having me on. Appreciate you guys a lot. Thank you, Devin,

1860
01:44:39,960 --> 01:44:43,519
Speaker 1: and please stay warm and safe during the crazy weather

1861
01:44:43,680 --> 01:44:46,280
Speaker 1: hit in the Midwest this week. Yeah, it's insane. Yes,

1862
01:44:46,320 --> 01:44:48,200
Speaker 1: it's it's just going to get colder out there. So

1863
01:44:48,240 --> 01:44:50,800
Speaker 1: he's in he's in North Dakota. I'm heading straight into it. Later,

1864
01:44:50,840 --> 01:44:55,679
Speaker 1: did I minus thirty? Yeah, you know, And he was saying,

1865
01:44:55,720 --> 01:44:58,680
Speaker 1: like they're gonna like so it's an hour earlier. He's

1866
01:44:58,760 --> 01:45:03,240
Speaker 1: working today. Later they were trying to get them. He said,

1867
01:45:03,240 --> 01:45:05,280
Speaker 1: to do a bunch of routine maintenance. And he's like,

1868
01:45:05,760 --> 01:45:08,800
Speaker 1: somebody could die out there now if there's but but

1869
01:45:08,880 --> 01:45:11,840
Speaker 1: if attract breaks and the tracks do break, he's going

1870
01:45:11,840 --> 01:45:14,280
Speaker 1: out there. There's a lot of well, yeah, and I've

1871
01:45:14,320 --> 01:45:16,200
Speaker 1: seen a lot of people saying, listen, real workers are

1872
01:45:16,200 --> 01:45:19,320
Speaker 1: already really highly compensated. They're not the biggest case study,

1873
01:45:19,360 --> 01:45:22,000
Speaker 1: like they're not the best SOB story for workers, right,

1874
01:45:22,040 --> 01:45:26,240
Speaker 1: now and it's like no, real workers are relatively on average,

1875
01:45:26,360 --> 01:45:29,280
Speaker 1: they make good money, they make decent money, but it's

1876
01:45:29,320 --> 01:45:34,360
Speaker 1: a very high risk, dangerous, vulnerable to the elements type

1877
01:45:34,360 --> 01:45:38,000
Speaker 1: of job. That explains exactly why. First of all, you're

1878
01:45:38,000 --> 01:45:40,200
Speaker 1: gonna have hard time recruiting people to do those jobs

1879
01:45:40,920 --> 01:45:44,559
Speaker 1: and a hard time obviously maintaining them. But like that

1880
01:45:44,640 --> 01:45:48,800
Speaker 1: money is hard earned because of exactly conditions that we

1881
01:45:48,800 --> 01:45:52,960
Speaker 1: were just talking about. Yeah, and I should have given

1882
01:45:53,000 --> 01:45:54,880
Speaker 1: him credit for this while he was while he was here.

1883
01:45:54,920 --> 01:46:00,400
Speaker 1: But one of the reasons that these companies are sous

1884
01:46:00,439 --> 01:46:02,760
Speaker 1: at people like him and are so willing to pay

1885
01:46:02,800 --> 01:46:04,400
Speaker 1: so much to get rid of them. A lot of

1886
01:46:04,400 --> 01:46:06,880
Speaker 1: people have talked about how how crappy the contract was,

1887
01:46:06,920 --> 01:46:10,400
Speaker 1: and the contract was crappy, zero six days and one

1888
01:46:10,680 --> 01:46:15,360
Speaker 1: little personal day, awful. It's still planned. But his particular

1889
01:46:15,479 --> 01:46:18,639
Speaker 1: union bmwe D won something that they had lost three

1890
01:46:18,720 --> 01:46:22,960
Speaker 1: years ago, which is basically expenses for when you when

1891
01:46:23,000 --> 01:46:26,839
Speaker 1: you're on the road. So because he fixes the tracks,

1892
01:46:27,320 --> 01:46:30,439
Speaker 1: obviously the tracks don't break next to his house, you

1893
01:46:30,720 --> 01:46:33,160
Speaker 1: could have to travel six hundred miles and be there

1894
01:46:33,200 --> 01:46:37,040
Speaker 1: for several weeks, and they won concession that ends up

1895
01:46:37,520 --> 01:46:41,240
Speaker 1: at being estimated eighty million dollars a year two for

1896
01:46:41,800 --> 01:46:45,720
Speaker 1: mileage and for lodging, because you had people who were

1897
01:46:45,720 --> 01:46:49,519
Speaker 1: sleeping in their cars and were basically working for free

1898
01:46:50,120 --> 01:46:53,080
Speaker 1: because of the expenses that it cost them to get

1899
01:46:53,120 --> 01:46:55,519
Speaker 1: to where they had to go. They talked about people

1900
01:46:55,560 --> 01:46:59,240
Speaker 1: who were going from Illinois to northern Nevada like regularly

1901
01:46:59,760 --> 01:47:04,479
Speaker 1: and so now and the Presidential Emergency Board said, look,

1902
01:47:04,840 --> 01:47:07,559
Speaker 1: this is the business model that you the railroads have chosen.

1903
01:47:08,200 --> 01:47:10,360
Speaker 1: If you want to make Devon drive five hundred miles

1904
01:47:10,840 --> 01:47:14,880
Speaker 1: rather than hire somebody who's closer, then you have to

1905
01:47:14,920 --> 01:47:17,160
Speaker 1: compensate him for doing that. So that's a big win.

1906
01:47:17,240 --> 01:47:21,599
Speaker 1: And it comes because the BMWD in particular was more

1907
01:47:21,680 --> 01:47:24,960
Speaker 1: mobilized and organized, and particularly thanks to people like Devin

1908
01:47:25,000 --> 01:47:27,200
Speaker 1: who have been organized in the rank and file. And

1909
01:47:27,240 --> 01:47:28,439
Speaker 1: I know we have to run, but I was just

1910
01:47:28,439 --> 01:47:30,120
Speaker 1: thinking as we were talking to him from a thirty

1911
01:47:30,160 --> 01:47:33,519
Speaker 1: thousand foot view of how ridiculous the sort of basic

1912
01:47:33,680 --> 01:47:39,080
Speaker 1: contours philosophically of shareholder capitalism are where you say, well,

1913
01:47:39,280 --> 01:47:42,000
Speaker 1: if somebody doesn't want to do this job, they'll go

1914
01:47:42,080 --> 01:47:44,759
Speaker 1: find another job. It's not the responsibility of this company

1915
01:47:44,800 --> 01:47:48,800
Speaker 1: to provide a decent, reasonable lifestyle for its workers, a

1916
01:47:49,120 --> 01:47:52,120
Speaker 1: quality of life for its workers. If they don't want

1917
01:47:52,160 --> 01:47:54,519
Speaker 1: to pay out of pocket for expenses to get from

1918
01:47:54,520 --> 01:47:58,559
Speaker 1: point A to point B, screw it, right Like, screw them,

1919
01:47:58,800 --> 01:48:01,240
Speaker 1: We'll find someone else. We are just trying to maximize

1920
01:48:01,240 --> 01:48:03,760
Speaker 1: the value of this company. That might involve buybacks, it

1921
01:48:03,840 --> 01:48:07,280
Speaker 1: might involve extreme compensation for people at the very very top.

1922
01:48:08,000 --> 01:48:11,120
Speaker 1: And if people like if our rank and file doesn't

1923
01:48:11,200 --> 01:48:13,639
Speaker 1: like it, screw them. They'll go find a job somewhere else.

1924
01:48:13,680 --> 01:48:16,559
Speaker 1: And there are enough desperate people who need cash that'll

1925
01:48:16,560 --> 01:48:19,840
Speaker 1: take this position that we can continue to exploit them

1926
01:48:19,920 --> 01:48:22,240
Speaker 1: and not allow them to have a normal family life

1927
01:48:22,280 --> 01:48:25,800
Speaker 1: and keep money that is rightfully theirs. It's just it

1928
01:48:25,880 --> 01:48:28,840
Speaker 1: is so on its face, insanely ridiculous. And when you

1929
01:48:28,920 --> 01:48:32,720
Speaker 1: even have people like Ted Cruz, as Devin said, recognizing

1930
01:48:32,760 --> 01:48:36,559
Speaker 1: that because they're workers, their voters recognize it because they're

1931
01:48:36,560 --> 01:48:40,160
Speaker 1: dealing with it, I mean, it's the farce is exposed.

1932
01:48:40,680 --> 01:48:43,320
Speaker 1: And so not only is Mike Pompeio welcome to come

1933
01:48:43,360 --> 01:48:46,559
Speaker 1: on to the show, BNSF open invitation to come on

1934
01:48:46,640 --> 01:48:51,600
Speaker 1: and justify the charges that you're trying to level after

1935
01:48:51,720 --> 01:48:55,160
Speaker 1: the work that devmestic open invitation, come on, please come on,

1936
01:48:55,240 --> 01:48:58,599
Speaker 1: defend it and our that's our show for today. Hopefully

1937
01:48:58,600 --> 01:49:00,639
Speaker 1: we'll have more on this in the future. Be ANXF

1938
01:49:00,680 --> 01:49:02,680
Speaker 1: does want to come on, maybe Mike Pompeo wants to

1939
01:49:02,720 --> 01:49:06,320
Speaker 1: come on. Great, a great panel. That's right. Of course.

1940
01:49:06,360 --> 01:49:08,640
Speaker 1: We will be on top of both of those storylines

1941
01:49:08,680 --> 01:49:10,920
Speaker 1: going forward, and we hope we're set. We're signing off

1942
01:49:10,920 --> 01:49:13,120
Speaker 1: for the year. Texan's right, We'll see you in twenty

1943
01:49:13,200 --> 01:49:15,840
Speaker 1: twenty three, twenty twenty three, maybe with intro music. Now.

1944
01:49:18,160 --> 01:49:20,240
Speaker 1: What a great time it is to be here. We're

1945
01:49:20,400 --> 01:49:22,600
Speaker 1: so lucky to be here with this team. We're so

1946
01:49:22,720 --> 01:49:25,559
Speaker 1: thankful to all of the viewers, all the subscribers, and

1947
01:49:25,600 --> 01:49:28,120
Speaker 1: to Sager and Crystal and all of the team here

1948
01:49:28,439 --> 01:49:30,280
Speaker 1: and the crew that we make scramble at the last

1949
01:49:30,280 --> 01:49:32,800
Speaker 1: minute with all our changes. So thank thank you to

1950
01:49:32,840 --> 01:49:35,400
Speaker 1: everybody out there. Appreciate it. I hope everyone has a

1951
01:49:35,439 --> 01:49:37,559
Speaker 1: great holiday season and a great end of the year.

1952
01:49:37,960 --> 01:49:38,439
Speaker 1: See you later.