Speaker 1: Hey guys, Saga and Crystal here.
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Speaker 1: Good morning, everybody, Happy Tuesday. We have an amazing show
Speaker 1: for everybody today. When do we have, Crystal?
Speaker 4: Did we do?
Speaker 2: We got a bunch of updates for you coming out
Speaker 2: of the court system in the battle against Doge, including
Speaker 2: a court ruling that the Trump administration is defying one
Speaker 2: of the previous court orders. So things are getting very interesting.
Speaker 2: We also have some comments do comments from Trump with
Speaker 2: regard to Gaza, saying that all hell will break loose
Speaker 2: and the ceasefire deal will be over if Hamas doesn't
Speaker 2: comply with what he wants, so will break all of
Speaker 2: that down for you. Also have a number of developments
Speaker 2: coming out of the AI world. The biggest one of which, though,
Speaker 2: is that Elon Musk has put in kind of I
Speaker 2: guess a trolley bid to buy open Ai out from
Speaker 2: under Sam Altman. The details are a little complicated, but
Speaker 2: it is an interesting development.
Speaker 1: In important story. It is a very future of.
Speaker 2: AI, absolutely absolutely important story of the future of AI.
Speaker 2: We also want to take a look at so Google.
Speaker 2: Wasn't there original motto like don't be evil?
Speaker 1: Yes, wasn't that Google's? They took that away.
Speaker 4: That's been gone for a while now.
Speaker 2: But they had a list of AI principles, one of
Speaker 2: which was like, we're not going to use AI to
Speaker 2: murder people.
Speaker 4: That one has been taken there.
Speaker 1: To be fair, it's been fake forever.
Speaker 3: They have always lied about that there's a health Chinese
Speaker 3: weapons system program back in twenty seventeen.
Speaker 1: So now they've just decided to say we're actually gonna.
Speaker 4: Coming out of the call over that one. Yeah, so
Speaker 4: well update you there as well.
Speaker 2: Interesting story coming out of China that major automanger from
Speaker 2: China byd is now out with a fully self driving
Speaker 2: electric vehicle for less than ten thousand dollars. We'll show
Speaker 2: you what the car looks like, also some of the
Speaker 2: other vehicles that they put out. I mean, they have
Speaker 2: become quite a juggernaut in the entire automobile space. When
Speaker 2: you think about just not that long ago, you would
Speaker 2: have sort of scoffed at the idea of a Chinese car,
Speaker 2: and now they are a major, major global player. We're
Speaker 2: going to try to get to the stephen A segment
Speaker 2: that we tried to do yesterday with then Saga and
Speaker 2: I talked too much. As per usual, he is floating
Speaker 2: around for president. Kind of interesting at least these charismatics.
Speaker 2: So we'll take a look at some of his positions,
Speaker 2: and then SOA Bamari is going to stop by. He
Speaker 2: is talking about a sort of a warning for MAGA,
Speaker 2: a little bit similar to the topic guy broached yesterday,
Speaker 2: but he's coming from the right, saying basically like, you're
Speaker 2: trading your ideology for a really bad deal, and you
Speaker 2: know you're falling prey to this sort of like culture
Speaker 2: war division and accepting that over Some of them were
Speaker 2: substantive changes that were supposed to be at the heart
Speaker 2: originally of the MAGA movement, so really interested to hear
Speaker 2: from him.
Speaker 4: He's always a thoughtful guy.
Speaker 3: SARV was very smart dude, and I encourage people to
Speaker 3: sign up for his newsletter and others. We're going to
Speaker 3: have that in the description of that.
Speaker 2: Yes, Srev and Emily are doing a newsletter together.
Speaker 4: They're both over it unheard.
Speaker 3: Now, so excited for both of this's very well, he's
Speaker 3: very thoughtful dude, and he's always an interesting person to
Speaker 3: talk to. So why don't we get before we get
Speaker 3: to that. Thank you to everybody who's been subscribing to
Speaker 3: the show. We really appreciate you. Breakingpoints dot com if
Speaker 3: you can. But why don't we go off with the courts?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 2: So Trump was asked recently about whether or not he
Speaker 2: should abide by court orders and his reaction to some
Speaker 2: of the court decisions that were coming down against him
Speaker 2: and against DOJE. Let's take a listen to what he
Speaker 2: had to say.
Speaker 3: So from the couple of coourt loss with mister President
Speaker 3: and Jadie Vance said judges aren't allowed to control the
Speaker 3: executive power.
Speaker 1: What's your take on that?
Speaker 5: But we're going to see what happens. We have a
Speaker 5: long way to go and we're talking about fraud, waste,
Speaker 5: abuse and what a president can't look for fraud and
Speaker 5: waste and abuse. We don't have a country, So we're
Speaker 5: very disappointed with the judges. That would make sense you're ruling,
Speaker 5: but we have a long way to go.
Speaker 1: We have to look.
Speaker 5: We have to find all of the fraud that's going on.
Speaker 5: We have tremendous fraud, tremendous waste, and tremendous abuse and theft.
Speaker 5: By the way, and the day you're not allowed to
Speaker 5: look for theft and fraud, etc. Then we don't have
Speaker 5: much of a country. So no judge should be No
Speaker 5: judge should, frankly be allowed to make that kind of
Speaker 5: a decision.
Speaker 2: No judge should be allowed to make that kind of decision.
Speaker 2: Those comments coming a couple of days ago, but very
Speaker 2: important in light of the messaging coming from Jadie Vance
Speaker 2: and Elon and others suggesting that they could just potentially
Speaker 2: ignore court decisions that go against them that they don't like.
Speaker 2: Here is one of the latest developments, quite significant here
Speaker 2: in terms of the court battles. We could put this
Speaker 2: up on the screen. So a judge has ruled that
Speaker 2: they are in defiance. Right now, the Trump administration is
Speaker 2: in defiance of one of the previous court orders telling
Speaker 2: them to unfreeze federal funding. So a judge directs Trump
Speaker 2: administration to comply with order on frozen funds. That judge
Speaker 2: ordered them to restore federal funding they had tried to freeze,
Speaker 2: saying the White House was not fully complying with an
Speaker 2: earlier ruling against it. After the judge issued that decision,
Speaker 2: the States asked him to issue a follow up order
Speaker 2: enforcing the earlier restraining order, saying the States continue to
Speaker 2: be denied access to federal funds. The States said, and
Speaker 2: court filing still frozen funds included about seven billion dollars
Speaker 2: in grant money for solar panels, five billion that supports
Speaker 2: greenhouse gas reduction measures, and court filing Sunday, Justice Department
Speaker 2: lawyers said the administration had made good faith, diligent efforts
Speaker 2: to comply. They said the funds at issue were frozen
Speaker 2: because of a Trump executive order signed hours after he
Speaker 2: was sworn in that paused tens of billions of dollars
Speaker 2: in federal climate spending. Okay, so what seems to be
Speaker 2: going on here is this one goes back to you guys,
Speaker 2: Will remember all the chaos around, like the executive order
Speaker 2: that's issued comes out or its actually wasn't any second order.
Speaker 2: It was a memo that was issued by the OMB
Speaker 2: saying we have to freeze all federal grant spending. And
Speaker 2: there was a caveat in there that said nothing that
Speaker 2: goes to individuals, okay, but that means medicaid would be frozen.
Speaker 2: And that means that head stars frozen. That means meal
Speaker 2: on wheels is frozen. That means all sorts of things
Speaker 2: across society that are important to people would be frozen.
Speaker 2: There was an almost immediate injunction issued against that, and
Speaker 2: the administration also tried to walk it back, rescinding that
Speaker 2: order but saying you still have to comply and make
Speaker 2: sure that none of these federal grant funds are going
Speaker 2: to programs that violate the president's other executive orders with
Speaker 2: regard to DEI or quote unquote Green New Deal and
Speaker 2: those sorts of things. So right now there's sort of
Speaker 2: a scattershot approach where certain things, including a bunch of
Speaker 2: funds that are supposed to go to farmers as part
Speaker 2: of the Inflation Reduction Act, including just some random things
Speaker 2: across society. So, like I think rural health claim in
Speaker 2: some areas have continued to see their funds frozen. There
Speaker 2: been hot meal programs that continue to see their funds frozen,
Speaker 2: just sort of like a scattershot of programs across society
Speaker 2: that have not seen those funds released. And so now
Speaker 2: this judge is coming in and saying, you have to
Speaker 2: even the things that you were saying are under the
Speaker 2: Inflation Reduction Act and it's subject to these other executive
Speaker 2: orders whatever. No, my order applies to everything, and it's
Speaker 2: not an excuse that you're trying your best.
Speaker 4: You need to do what you.
Speaker 2: Need to do to make sure that all of these
Speaker 2: funds are unfrozen.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so it gets to the heart of the executive
Speaker 3: authority and to the court challenges that they're trying to
Speaker 3: invite there to the Supreme Court around the executive's ability
Speaker 3: to determine which is under their own scrutiny and which
Speaker 3: is not.
Speaker 1: I'm looking here.
Speaker 3: Just late last night, the Trump administration filed a reply
Speaker 3: I sent it to our group in support of their
Speaker 3: request to vacate their injunction, and they are claiming a
Speaker 3: constitutional violation. They say, quote a court order commanding that
Speaker 3: a segment of an executive agency be cordoned off from
Speaker 3: properly named political appointees while giving access to select civil servants.
Speaker 3: The government is aware of no example of a court
Speaker 3: over ever trying to micromanage an agency.
Speaker 4: It is about the treasury.
Speaker 3: This is about treasury. But it gets also in response
Speaker 3: to apparently as a usaid and says, this court should
Speaker 3: not be the first the existing tro cannot stand. So
Speaker 3: this gets to what you're talking about, not just in
Speaker 3: terms of the farmers and the IRA, but to the
Speaker 3: overarching theme that they're trying to as I understand I
Speaker 3: talked to a lawyer friend of mine yesterday, is that
Speaker 3: they're trying to get one of these cases up to
Speaker 3: the Supreme Court to get an answer for judicial review
Speaker 3: on their ability because it actually gets previously back to
Speaker 3: the repeal of the Chevron doctrine around the administrative state
Speaker 3: and the bureaucracy's ability to make rule changes. It's actually
Speaker 3: interesting case because again as they were explaining it to me,
Speaker 3: was that they might have actually been better off if
Speaker 3: they had more of the administrative review and rule process
Speaker 3: that they had previously under Chevron, as opposed to now
Speaker 3: where it's much more about the letter of the law
Speaker 3: that's coming out of Congress. I genuinely have no idea
Speaker 3: how they'll rule, because what we talked about yesterday with
Speaker 3: the CFPB is remember Clarence Thomas writing for the Majority
Speaker 3: that CFPB is not unconstitutional because it was created by
Speaker 3: Congress and it's that funding mechanism set up by the Fed.
Speaker 3: They may in fact actually defer to Congress's ability and
Speaker 3: shut down all of this executive review that the Trump
Speaker 3: administration is claiming right now.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's certainly possible. And I mean the other big
Speaker 2: development here is, right now, while this judge is saying
Speaker 2: you are in open defiance of a court order, there's
Speaker 2: still a story around like, oh, we're trying to figure
Speaker 2: it out in good faith, and we interpreted it different.
Speaker 2: And you know, it's hard to use the federal governments
Speaker 2: not just a switch you can flick on and off.
Speaker 2: And so we fully intend for rural health clinics to
Speaker 2: get their funding, et cetera, et cetera. We're doing our
Speaker 2: best with this order. You're starting to move closer to
Speaker 2: things coming to a head where if they say, continue
Speaker 2: to not release funds to farmers who've signed contracts with
Speaker 2: the federal government to not release those funds to you know,
Speaker 2: various clinics and things that have been affected across the country.
Speaker 2: There's no longer a story about how this is just
Speaker 2: like a good faith misreading of the ruling. Then it
Speaker 2: becomes brazen defiance of a lawfully issued order from the judiciary.
Speaker 2: And that's when you get into, you know, the things
Speaker 2: that Jadie Vance has been saying, the things that Elon
Speaker 2: Musk has been saying, the things now that Trump has
Speaker 2: been saying, the things that frankly were floated even in
Speaker 2: Project twenty twenty five and are of course part of
Speaker 2: the Curtis Yarvin Butterfly revolution plan of when the courts
Speaker 2: stand in your way, you just ignore them and just
Speaker 2: do what you want to do. And so what I
Speaker 2: found significant about this ruling is it seems to be
Speaker 2: inching us closer to that place where there will be
Speaker 2: decision point to see whether or not the Trump administration
Speaker 2: is actually going to comply when the court say you
Speaker 2: can't do that. So we may be finding that out
Speaker 2: very soon. Let me go ahead and put this next
Speaker 2: update on the screen too, because this is relevant as well.
Speaker 2: USAID employees are also complaining that the administration is not
Speaker 2: complying with the previous order saying that you can't dismantle
Speaker 2: this agency. So that was you know, a temporary injunction
Speaker 2: that was also issued that says, you know, we're evaluating
Speaker 2: this case and in the meantime, you can't just destroy
Speaker 2: this agency. The court process has to play out. And
Speaker 2: you know, they present as evidence here, first of all,
Speaker 2: thousands of USAID employees have been.
Speaker 4: Furloughed and sent home.
Speaker 2: They also point out things like they went and took
Speaker 2: down the USAID sign from the building and brought up
Speaker 2: statements I believe from Trump and Elon and others that
Speaker 2: are like USAID is dead, it's being fed into the woodchipper,
Speaker 2: it's etc. So they are also claiming in the suit
Speaker 2: that the administration is not complying with that order. So
Speaker 2: another place where things could be kind of coming to
Speaker 2: a head in terms of this battle between the Trump administration,
Speaker 2: Executive branch, Elon, musk, Doje, etc. And the judiciary, which
Speaker 2: is effectively the only real obstacle in their path at
Speaker 2: this point.
Speaker 3: What I'm actually interested in is what we're about to
Speaker 3: get to with the farmers, because this is one of
Speaker 3: those areas where this could be the first political flashpoint.
Speaker 3: We've talked previously, and I know many people are very
Speaker 3: concerned about USAID and others, but you know, we've debated
Speaker 3: here I think many times. A lot of that is
Speaker 3: about process arguments and how it could impact major impact
Speaker 3: for millions in the future. But the farmer's case that
Speaker 3: I was reading about and you're beginning to see some
Speaker 3: organic pushback on is one that I'm very curious to
Speaker 3: see how that will affect Trump's support and not only that,
Speaker 3: but invite some pushback from inside of the Senate. This
Speaker 3: happened with the tariff program that was on soybeans and
Speaker 3: other agricultural products last time around, where people like Chuck
Speaker 3: Grassley and others, Tom Cotton, a few other very agricultural
Speaker 3: states really were dissenting from some of the tariff program
Speaker 3: or at least asking for tariff related assistance.
Speaker 1: So I actually think that this one that.
Speaker 3: We're about to get to with the USDA funding the
Speaker 3: IRA and farming contracts, could be the first sign of
Speaker 3: some actual intra GOP conflict around the issue. And you know, look,
Speaker 3: everybody likes in principle to say, oh, well, the government's
Speaker 3: going to cut spending, and I'm talking with Republicans in particular,
Speaker 3: but it's like, well, when it's your own funding, it's
Speaker 3: a different story. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Well, USAID runs up against that as well, because there's
Speaker 2: you know, one hundreds of millions of that they buy.
Speaker 4: A lot of food from farmers.
Speaker 2: The USAID, you know, buys a lot of food from
Speaker 2: American farmers, shifts around the world to places that are
Speaker 2: you know, having hunger, food and security famine its and
Speaker 2: so that is also an issue that perhaps you know,
Speaker 2: may come to a head as well. But let's put
Speaker 2: a four up on the screen to what Sager is
Speaker 2: referencing here. So you've got farmers who are now reporting
Speaker 2: missing millions of dollars in funding that they were promised
Speaker 2: by the USDA. This was money that was brought about
Speaker 2: by the Inflation Production Act, which of course passed through
Speaker 2: Congress in a bipartisan fashion. So effectively, what happened here
Speaker 2: with a lot of these individuals is they signed contracts
Speaker 2: with the federal government to upgrade. They might do a
Speaker 2: solar installation to make their farms more energy efficient. There
Speaker 2: are various upgrades to their farms that they pledged to
Speaker 2: to commit to and the US government was going to
Speaker 2: be on the hook for maybe half of the cost
Speaker 2: of that.
Speaker 4: And now with the.
Speaker 2: Trump administration saying, you know, we're just not going to
Speaker 2: send those that grant money out, a bunch of these
Speaker 2: farmers have already spent you know, eighty thousand dollars, one
Speaker 2: hundred thousand dollars or more expecting that they were going
Speaker 2: to be reimbursed.
Speaker 4: And if you know anything.
Speaker 2: About the family farm world, at this point, the margins
Speaker 2: are non existent. I mean, these these folks are really
Speaker 2: up against. Everything has to fall into place, The money
Speaker 2: has to come in when it's anticipated, or else they're screwed,
Speaker 2: I mean, or else they are really in danger of
Speaker 2: losing those farms. And so the Washington Post talked to
Speaker 2: a number of farmers who were facing this situation. A
Speaker 2: flower grower in Maryland they talked to. They also talked
Speaker 2: to this guy, Skyler Holden. He's a cattle farmer in
Speaker 2: eastern Missouri. He says he signed a two hundred and
Speaker 2: forty thousand dollars contract in December under the Environmental Quality
Speaker 2: Incentives Program to share costs on investments for his farm.
Speaker 2: With the funding, he erected new fencing, installed a well,
Speaker 2: had planned further improvements to his water system, spent eighty
Speaker 2: K on materials and labor contracts that he expected We're
Speaker 2: going to be partly paid back by the government. This month,
Speaker 2: the USDA representative told him the funding was pause because
Speaker 2: of Trump's executive order. He says, quote, I asked her,
Speaker 2: is there any word on when they're going to be unfrozen?
Speaker 2: Is it going to be frozen indefinitely? She did not
Speaker 2: have any answers for me. And again, this is funding
Speaker 2: that was appropriated by Congress, passed through bipartisan legislation that
Speaker 2: the Trump administration is now claiming the right to just
Speaker 2: unilaterally say.
Speaker 4: We're not doing that anymore.
Speaker 1: Yes after.
Speaker 2: And there's also just like basic contract law at plates
Speaker 2: here too, Like just because you're the federal government doesn't
Speaker 2: mean that you're not also subject to contract law. Where like,
Speaker 2: if you tell this farmer and you sign a contract
Speaker 2: saying we are going to reimburse you for part of
Speaker 2: this eighty k, you are still legally obligated to that
Speaker 2: even outside of the you know, the questions around congressional appropriations,
Speaker 2: power of the purse, etc. So again, it seems like
Speaker 2: a pretty brazen violation of the law. And obviously, you
Speaker 2: know Skuylar, I was about to show you a video
Speaker 2: in a minute after I Getzager's response. Skyler voted for Trump,
Speaker 2: like most of these farmers voted for Trump, and you know,
Speaker 2: thought that you would benefit them economically, and the reality
Speaker 2: so far for these individuals quite different.
Speaker 3: Well, let's play it, because that's what I'm curious to see.
Speaker 3: If this actually takes off and becomes a thing. Let's
Speaker 3: take a listen.
Speaker 6: I might lose my farm because of the government. I
Speaker 6: got in bed with the government. I was promoting getting
Speaker 6: bed with the government because I thought it was a
Speaker 6: good idea. So in RCS conservation planning, so they had
Speaker 6: a program out there called the EQUIP program. And what
Speaker 6: the EQUIP program is is it's cost sharing on stuff
Speaker 6: like fencing, different seatings, water lines, waters wells, and stuff
Speaker 6: like that to better conserve farmland for agriculture use. They
Speaker 6: called me today and said, hey, I know we have
Speaker 6: this signed contract. We're renegging on it. We're not going
Speaker 6: to pay out on it. What do you mean You're
Speaker 6: not gonna pay out on it? So I've got all
Speaker 6: that stuff bought and whenever I install it, you're not
Speaker 6: going to pay out. We had this contract. I made
Speaker 6: business decisions based on this contract. So now I have
Speaker 6: eighty thousand dollars out of my pocket that I didn't
Speaker 6: have to spend. So that eighty thousand dollars we have
Speaker 6: is supposed to go to our farm wom in the fall.
Speaker 6: If we don't have that money, that's our hay money,
Speaker 6: that's our farm money, our farm payment money. If we
Speaker 6: don't have that money, we will lose this farm.
Speaker 4: So amazing.
Speaker 2: There's another TikTok where he says, I voted for Trump,
Speaker 2: and it's just it is amazing the way he frames it.
Speaker 2: It's the problem is the government, not the president you
Speaker 2: voted for. Who is the explicit reason who signed this
Speaker 2: executive word is the explicit reason that the pl are
Speaker 2: not going out?
Speaker 3: That is what's the matter with Kansas in a nutshell,
Speaker 3: is you have a person here who voted for Trump.
Speaker 3: And I mean, maybe he couldn't have predicted that they
Speaker 3: were going to cut farming benefits or all that, but
Speaker 3: what do you notice in his rhetoric and in his language,
Speaker 3: what is he saying. He's saying it's the government. The
Speaker 3: government is don't get in with the government. Get in
Speaker 3: bed with the government. It's like, well, okay, you didn't
Speaker 3: think about that whenever. You know, look, it's hard. I
Speaker 3: don't like to dunk on regular people, but I mean,
Speaker 3: guess he put it out there. It is emblematic of
Speaker 3: a big problem that we have in this country, which
Speaker 3: is that when you are in the cult like you
Speaker 3: are unable to really either grapple with your own decisions
Speaker 3: or a total lack of like wanting to save face whenever.
Speaker 3: It's a problem that really is one. It's not on you,
Speaker 3: per se, but the way that you're communicating it is
Speaker 3: just fundamentally different than if it would have been the
Speaker 3: Biden administration. And that's kind of what you know. We
Speaker 3: were talking yesterday about the rural health in Virginia, and
Speaker 3: I was looking at all these counties yesterday because I
Speaker 3: was curious for all the places that are most effective
Speaker 3: and where they voted for Trump. I'm talking like eighty
Speaker 3: five fifteen engines in any of these places. I hate
Speaker 3: to say it, but you know, as we all know,
Speaker 3: if we go down there, who are they going to blame?
Speaker 3: They'll be like, Oh, it's those idiots up in Washington.
Speaker 3: I'm like, oh, well what about Trump. No, No, he
Speaker 3: would never do that. And it's like, well, can you
Speaker 3: really change their mind? I mean, I just I my framework.
Speaker 3: It's just so profoundly I'm sad really to see the
Speaker 3: country as it is right now because I've seen a
Speaker 3: lot of this. We talked yesterday about the CFPB and
Speaker 3: we're going to talk to that about Sora. But there
Speaker 3: is just so much like cultish behavior and thinking right
Speaker 3: now that I genuinely I think it'll be like Obama
Speaker 3: where you know, Obama presided over you know what was
Speaker 3: at the loss of the House and the Senate and
Speaker 3: the thousand state houses. I'm not predicting that necessarily for
Speaker 3: the GOP, but he personally did not ever incur a
Speaker 3: lot of those political consequences because people really.
Speaker 1: Felt they could trust him.
Speaker 3: Even though you know, objectively, you lose your house under Obama,
Speaker 3: you know, her wages continue to go down. He ultimately
Speaker 3: is a man in charge, but for some reason, nobody
Speaker 3: was ever willing, you know, to really blame him. Even
Speaker 3: to this day, he's got some fifty eight percent approval rating,
Speaker 3: and so Trump, I mean, these politicians, they just have
Speaker 3: a halo effect around them where people like that will
Speaker 3: never criticize them. But I mean, where is the guy
Speaker 3: from do we know, you know, okay, so Missouri. I
Speaker 3: guarantee you he'd be willing to call out you know,
Speaker 3: Josh Holly or whatever the other senator from Missouri. Like
Speaker 3: that same halo effect doesn't exist for you know, mere
Speaker 3: mortal politicians. But Trump somehow is able to escape that.
Speaker 3: And I just I don't know if there's a world
Speaker 3: where people who are affected by like this and others
Speaker 3: will ever actually connect the dots, even if you explicitly
Speaker 3: tell them that You're like, no, this was cut by
Speaker 3: so and so. I could be wrong, you know, I
Speaker 3: totally could be wrong that it could be like, oh,
Speaker 3: it's Trump and Elon and be like, Okay, I'm voting
Speaker 3: for Kamal or whoever Pete Boodaje edge the next time around.
Speaker 1: I don't see any data in the back then.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I mean certainly for like probably thirty percent
Speaker 2: of the country, I think that's true. I mean, this
Speaker 2: has always been the Trump you know, I could show
Speaker 2: someone on Fifth Avenue fucking he's absolutely right about that.
Speaker 2: And I think Obama is the best analog on the
Speaker 2: Democrat side. But I actually think it goes further with Trump,
Speaker 2: because with Obama you at least had I don't know,
Speaker 2: I'm sure you do. Remember, you know, during the Tea
Speaker 2: Party era, Democrats were perfectly happy to criticize Obama, throw
Speaker 2: him under the you know, an Pelosi. Absolutely, they were
Speaker 2: totally willing to do that. And the grip that Trump
Speaker 2: has on the Republican Party now is really, you know,
Speaker 2: it's quite unique. It is outside of anything I've seen,
Speaker 2: certainly in my lifetime. Maybe there's some examples going back
Speaker 2: through history, but certainly unique in terms of modern history.
Speaker 2: And yeah, you see it in real time the way
Speaker 2: people things that they you know, if it was Biden,
Speaker 2: they would be I mean just even if you just
Speaker 2: think about the inauguration image of Trump with the richest
Speaker 2: people on the planet standing there behind him, like if
Speaker 2: it was a Democrat, like that would be a hair
Speaker 2: on fire kind of a moment. But because it's their guy,
Speaker 2: and they're like, oh, I like, these these billionaires are
Speaker 2: saying the things I want to hear right now because
Speaker 2: they're using you because they're then it's fine. I mean
Speaker 2: on the Gaza stuff too, the level of cope with
Speaker 2: regard to Trump floating, the US occupying Gaza, finishing the
Speaker 2: ethnic cleansing or potentially genocide on behalf of Israel, getting entangled,
Speaker 2: getting our men and women entangled, and yet another insane
Speaker 2: Middle Eastern war, And the level of spinning cope is
Speaker 2: just incredible, Like some of them out right by like, oh, well,
Speaker 2: it's great for America, we'll get something out of it,
Speaker 2: and it'll be beautiful waterfront prop like they actually buy
Speaker 2: that bullshit. Or the other cope is well, this is
Speaker 2: just his open opening negotiating position. And I don't know
Speaker 2: why you're taking you take him too seriously. It's like
Speaker 2: he's the president of the United States. He's a big boy.
Speaker 2: He's floated this quite like he read from a prepared statement.
Speaker 2: It's not like he was just freewheeling here. He's now
Speaker 2: said it multiple times. I don't know why we wouldn't
Speaker 2: take him seriously, especially when Kushner suggested something very similar earlier.
Speaker 2: And what makes you think that this is out of
Speaker 2: character for him whatsoever. So yes, with a certain core
Speaker 2: part of the base, they may never leave him no
Speaker 2: matter what. But that's thirty percent of the country. There
Speaker 2: are a lot of people who voted for him, who
Speaker 2: were on the fence, who voted for Biden last time,
Speaker 2: who didn't don't love him, but thought he'd be better
Speaker 2: for them economically or whatever. Those are the ones that
Speaker 2: you could see shift away and shift away pretty quickly
Speaker 2: if things go south, or if they see direct impacts,
Speaker 2: which they're likely to direct impacts in their communities on
Speaker 2: things that they care about. I mean, I just saw
Speaker 2: this morning. I sent you this elon who's changed his
Speaker 2: Twitter name to something weird.
Speaker 3: By the way, it's Harry Balls.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is the man that's running our country right now.
Speaker 2: That's awesome anyway, posting about how there's more fraud in
Speaker 2: entitlements than anything that we've seen ever before.
Speaker 4: And we're supposed to.
Speaker 2: Believe that he's not going to go after Social Security, Medicare,
Speaker 2: and medicaid. Trump yesterday says the defense spending is going
Speaker 2: to go up, and meanwhile, we're we're supposed to be
Speaker 2: cheering like them canceling the Politico pro subscriptions, like that's
Speaker 2: some real cost saving, like cost cutting measure, like give
Speaker 2: me a break.
Speaker 4: This is all preposterous.
Speaker 3: This is what I'm saying is, you know, in the
Speaker 3: media environment, and maybe people have noticed that I feel
Speaker 3: particularly black built lately, But in the media environment that
Speaker 3: I swim in this political thing, you would think it's
Speaker 3: the greatest scandal in American history. You genuinely would think
Speaker 3: that this is like an insane it's and you know,
Speaker 3: it's funny.
Speaker 1: Obviously, I agree it's bad.
Speaker 3: And in terms of government subsidizing these media companies, and
Speaker 3: that is a story in and of itself, but the
Speaker 3: blinders stop right there, right and it doesn't get to
Speaker 3: anything bigger. And I really try to keep like a
Speaker 3: calm head and look, even on the Social Security thing,
Speaker 3: I think he's probably correct in terms of Medicare fraud
Speaker 3: in particular because the estimate I have seen is fifty billion.
Speaker 3: If anything, fraud is likely to be the biggest fraud
Speaker 3: in history, only because these are the biggest programs in history. Now,
Speaker 3: is he saying that to, you know, to the end
Speaker 3: of like cleaning it up, or is it thing that's
Speaker 3: paired with a cutting entitlement. I think that we know
Speaker 3: at least at where Elon is. Trump is said he
Speaker 3: doesn't want to cut that at all. But yeah, explaining
Speaker 3: the magnitude and difficulty of this is very different in
Speaker 3: this ViBe's information system, where again, where I've tried to
Speaker 3: communicate this in terms of USAID, it's er point seven
Speaker 3: percent of the federal budget, and yet people are saying
Speaker 3: that this is like the greatest American Revolution. It's like, okay,
Speaker 3: so even if you cut half of USID, there's point
Speaker 3: three five percent of the federal budget. Now they're talking
Speaker 3: about auditing the Pentagon. I supported one hundred percent. But again,
Speaker 3: like you just said, they're talking about increasing defense spending.
Speaker 3: It's like, to what end for what? Because the current
Speaker 3: system is completely screwed up. If you really you could
Speaker 3: spend two thirds of the Defense Department, and if you
Speaker 3: redid our procurement systems, you could have more equipment and
Speaker 3: more lethal and a better military and spend way less
Speaker 3: money because probably one third of that entire budget is
Speaker 3: just outright total corruption and stealing from these defense contractors.
Speaker 3: But that's the issue is that they don't necessarily want
Speaker 3: to do that. So it's like, now, what, yeah, what
Speaker 3: are we doing here?
Speaker 2: Not to mention, if you're going to do that in
Speaker 2: a serious way, you're going to use Elon Musk, who
Speaker 2: is one of the Pentagon's top contractors, Like who are
Speaker 2: we kidding?
Speaker 4: Who are we kidding.
Speaker 2: About this being some sort of like free and fair. Yeah,
Speaker 2: Elon might cut the contracts to his competitors, you know
Speaker 2: that we're going to talk about as we're going to.
Speaker 1: Talk competitors genuinely are also criminals.
Speaker 2: Like sure, but like yeah, and then funnel that money
Speaker 2: to his buddies a Palenteer right as we're about to
Speaker 2: discuss later. I mean, Palenteer's stock is.
Speaker 4: Through the roof. That's why.
Speaker 2: Because everyone assumes Elon is going to go in there
Speaker 2: and funnel the money to his friends and partners. So
Speaker 2: that's I mean, that's the reality of what we're dealing
Speaker 2: with here. Let me go ahead and move on to
Speaker 2: the next piece about NIH funding because this is also
Speaker 2: really significant in another area where there's some you know,
Speaker 2: red state Like mmmm right, not sure, not sure about
Speaker 2: this one. So let's go and put this up on
Speaker 2: the screen. We've had a federal judge now has stepped
Speaker 2: in to halt the Trump administration cuts to NIH research
Speaker 2: payments in twenty two states, So attorneys general across the
Speaker 2: country Democratic attorneys general sue the Trump administration, asking them
Speaker 2: to temporarily block that major policy change. So basically what
Speaker 2: the Trump administration said is We're just going to come
Speaker 2: in and whatever the you know, administrative facility costs, the
Speaker 2: like overhead costs that we subsidize through the NIH, whatever
Speaker 2: that is, We're going to just cut it down to
Speaker 2: fifteen percent. And you know, again, this is pretty clearly
Speaker 2: illegal based on the fact that Congress actually specifically in
Speaker 2: legislation specified that these contracts cannot be changed and shifted. Obviously,
Speaker 2: this gets back to the separation of powers, power of
Speaker 2: the purse, et cetera, et cetera. And so Judge is
Speaker 2: now stepping in and saying, whoao, you cannot do this
Speaker 2: until we know have this all go through the court
Speaker 2: system and figure out what is going on.
Speaker 4: So, you know, I think also this is.
Speaker 2: Part of the ideological project of like, they know this
Speaker 2: is going to be very hard on all kinds of universities,
Speaker 2: right they love to name check Harvard, the UC system.
Speaker 2: They'll certainly be in Johns Hopkins, they'll certainly be impacted.
Speaker 4: But it's not just.
Speaker 2: These Ivy League liberal institutions that will be hurt. Any
Speaker 2: sort of university that does this type of research is
Speaker 2: definitely going to be harmed by this. And I also
Speaker 2: would say, you know, that is not to say that
Speaker 2: there isn't you know, waste in there. There are reforms
Speaker 2: that could be made, et cetera, et cetera. But if
Speaker 2: you squeeze funding out on the public side and you're
Speaker 2: no longer doing nearly as much public research, guess who
Speaker 2: fills in the gap. I mean, then you become really
Speaker 2: reliant on industry funding, which means certain research is just
Speaker 2: not going to get done. Things that they don't see
Speaker 2: there's going to be an immediate profit on, Like they'll
Speaker 2: fund your you know, innovations in viagra research all day long.
Speaker 2: But if you're talking about some sort of illness, let's say,
Speaker 2: a rare cancer that may not be that profitable because
Speaker 2: there aren't that many people that have it.
Speaker 4: Like that is not going to get funded.
Speaker 2: If you're talking about something where there's a higher risk
Speaker 2: that it may not actually pan out and it's you know,
Speaker 2: a bit of a longer shot, that probably won't get funded.
Speaker 2: Not to mention all of the obvious problems with conflicts
Speaker 2: of interest when you have industry directly funding research, So
Speaker 2: you know, of all the new drug molecules that have
Speaker 2: been discovered over the past two plus decades. All of
Speaker 2: them have come from public research dollars. They've all been
Speaker 2: linked in some way to public research dollars. So this
Speaker 2: is really, you know, it really is important and could
Speaker 2: very much in the immediate term impact things like you know,
Speaker 2: developing cancer cures and all kinds of research that is
Speaker 2: very important.
Speaker 4: But like I said, I.
Speaker 2: Think it's pretty clearly the sagaad bite suspect you would
Speaker 2: back me up on this part of an ideological project
Speaker 2: to undercut universities that the you know, Curtis Jarvins and
Speaker 2: Jade Vance's and Elon Musk's of the world think sort
Speaker 2: of like indoctrinate people and make them liberal and need
Speaker 2: to be effectively destroyed.
Speaker 4: And Yarmin's words, I think he.
Speaker 2: Said it needs to be like blown up down to
Speaker 2: the atoms or something like that.
Speaker 3: This is very Curtis, Yeah, I mean, I don't think
Speaker 3: there'll shock people. I actually agree with this one. And
Speaker 3: I'll tell you why. Is that this was specifically about
Speaker 3: those budget cuts to the quote unquote indirect administrative cost.
Speaker 3: It's acted at fifteen percent. My parents are in academia,
Speaker 3: love them, but I mean my experience in academia is
Speaker 3: extremely bureaucratic, bloated, that there are tons of make work
Speaker 3: jobs that are just everywhere where people try to justify
Speaker 3: their existence. I mean, this is part of what we
Speaker 3: talked about with the RFK thing. I mean, one of
Speaker 3: the reasons that I am so both repulsed with the
Speaker 3: National Institute of Health is not just doctor Fauci and
Speaker 3: I'm blanking on his name. The previous director that was
Speaker 3: at the head of that was that it was clear
Speaker 3: that it became this slush fund of billions of federal
Speaker 3: dollars for whatever the pet projects of these top epidemiologists
Speaker 3: and infectious disease specialists wanted it to be, and they
Speaker 3: would cut these checks to all of these different labs.
Speaker 3: And then when the time came to cover up lab leak,
Speaker 3: they're the ones who are who came out and said, no,
Speaker 3: it's not possible, specifically to protect their own cartel of funding.
Speaker 3: Now this is bigger than that, because this is the
Speaker 3: entire National Institute of Health, but it does get to
Speaker 3: the basic question of like, okay, well, what have they
Speaker 3: been doing the federal government. Now this is apparently a
Speaker 3: seventy nine year old project. Well in the last seventy
Speaker 3: nine years, you know, America has become more diabetic, more cancerous, fatter,
Speaker 3: more sick.
Speaker 1: I mean, what is actually happening?
Speaker 3: The healthcare costs of skyrocketed to what end are these
Speaker 3: public dollars being used. I don't disagree with what you said,
Speaker 3: per se in terms of how federal dollars.
Speaker 1: And all that should be spent.
Speaker 3: Much of this is a legacy of the post World
Speaker 3: War two system where we would cut checks to these
Speaker 3: different science departments in the theory that that would eventually
Speaker 3: roll up into benefit for the American people.
Speaker 1: But I see, yes, I.
Speaker 2: Mean the return time at US for every dollar invested,
Speaker 2: you get multiple dollars back in.
Speaker 4: Terms of innovation.
Speaker 2: And I mean, personally, I think a lot of this
Speaker 2: should be instead of spun off to the pharmaceutical companies,
Speaker 2: I actually think it should be the production distribution should
Speaker 2: also be handled by the federal government. I mean, what
Speaker 2: you're pointing to is a real problem. But I would
Speaker 2: say the issue isn't because we're funding cancer research. The
Speaker 2: issue is because we have a for profit healthcare system
Speaker 2: that profits off of people being sick. And so guess what,
Speaker 2: we have a lot of people being sick. This does nothing.
Speaker 2: I mean, this actually pushes things more in the direction
Speaker 2: of the for profit industry funded system where the only
Speaker 2: thing that gets developed, the only thing that gets researched
Speaker 2: is you know, things that have an immediate profit generating possibility.
Speaker 2: And so, like I said before, are the things that
Speaker 2: I'm sure there are things that could be cut, but
Speaker 2: research doing research properly is also really like to have
Speaker 2: these because they're because it costs a lot of money
Speaker 2: to have these facilities, to have the specialized equipment to
Speaker 2: be able to run the multiple trials that you need
Speaker 2: to have, the trained professionals that you can that you
Speaker 2: need to be able to do this properly.
Speaker 4: Like, these things all cost a lot.
Speaker 2: Of money, and so you know, we do in a
Speaker 2: certain sense, like we subsidize this area because look, you know,
Speaker 2: maybe it's an unpopular opinion, but I personally think like
Speaker 2: research into cancer is a good thing that we should
Speaker 2: be investing war money in.
Speaker 4: And again, if we look at the big picture, it's
Speaker 4: a freaking drop in the bucket.
Speaker 2: They're saying, even with this, which is a draconian cut,
Speaker 2: I think you would agree across the board, you know,
Speaker 2: with a hatchet not a scalpel, right, which did administrative
Speaker 2: cost me?
Speaker 1: How many HR?
Speaker 4: It's not h it's not HR directors.
Speaker 2: We're we're talking about specialize it why we're talking about
Speaker 2: the facilities that you need. You're talking about nurses, you're
Speaker 2: talking about doctors, you're talking about flebotomus. Like, so, again,
Speaker 2: is are there cusse that could be sure? Is this
Speaker 2: the source of federal government deficits? No?
Speaker 1: Yes, fair?
Speaker 2: Even with this, they're talking about a grand total of
Speaker 2: four billion dollars being saved. That is like an ant
Speaker 2: on the ass of the United.
Speaker 4: States federal budget deficit. It's preposterous.
Speaker 2: And so that you know, again, things that are investigating
Speaker 2: more rare diseases, things that have a longer timeline to development,
Speaker 2: all of this will fall by the wayside. And so yeah,
Speaker 2: I think, I mean, I think it's a bad idea.
Speaker 2: I also think the way they did it is illegal.
Speaker 2: And if they went there's a reason that they don't
Speaker 2: go through Congress for this, and it's because it would
Speaker 2: never pass because if Republicans actually had to vote on
Speaker 2: stripping funds from cancer from researching cancer cures, they would
Speaker 2: never go along with it. And I think we see
Speaker 2: some indications of that. Katie Britt down in Alabama, one
Speaker 2: of the major recipients of this type of funds is
Speaker 2: the University of Alabama at Birmingham put a seven up
Speaker 2: on the screen.
Speaker 4: She expressed some very much old.
Speaker 2: Concern here, you know, very very tupid, but an indication
Speaker 2: that she was not really comfortable that. She said she
Speaker 2: was going to work with RFK Junior to try to,
Speaker 2: you know, deal with these cuts and try to mitigate
Speaker 2: the damage that's being done here. They University of Alabama
Speaker 2: Birmingham has received more than a billion dollars in NIH
Speaker 2: funding in recent years. Like I said before, it really
Speaker 2: is one of the top recipients.
Speaker 4: She said. Quote.
Speaker 2: While the administration works to achieve this goal at NIH,
Speaker 2: a smart targeted approach is needed in order to not
Speaker 2: hinder life saving, groundbreaking research at high achieving institutions like
Speaker 2: those in Alabama. This university is also top employer in
Speaker 2: the state, a very important economically prestige wise, et cetera,
Speaker 2: et cetera. So she's concerned about that. Tommy Tuberville, on
Speaker 2: the other hand, is all the board with it. He's
Speaker 2: not concerned.
Speaker 3: See that actually kind of highlights my point and that's
Speaker 3: part of the problem with all of this is that
Speaker 3: these are jobs programs like NIH and especially No Offense Alabama.
Speaker 3: But you know, you're incredibly reliant on the federal government
Speaker 3: in terms of spending coming in there. One of the
Speaker 3: reasons why these senators and all of them don't want
Speaker 3: to vote against it is that they create a lot
Speaker 3: of jobs in their area, and the hospitals, unfortunately, this
Speaker 3: gets to the heart of it, are some of the
Speaker 3: biggest employers in the entire United States. And you actually
Speaker 3: if you pull the employment data and really, unfortunately, if
Speaker 3: you look at growing areas, one of the main drivers
Speaker 3: of economic growth in a lot of states that are
Speaker 3: non technology, non oil based is healthcare because so many
Speaker 3: Americans are sick. So there's just there's filthy, rich amount
Speaker 3: of money to be made around this. And I don't
Speaker 3: disagree with you. Four billion is nothing, okay, And I
Speaker 3: know I'm sure people will clip it and make fun
Speaker 3: of you. Oh four billion, how daries say? It's like, guys,
Speaker 3: we're talking in proportions, and I understand it sounds ridiculous,
Speaker 3: but we have a fifteen trillion dollar, you know, economy,
Speaker 3: the world's largest economy in the world. I guess I'm
Speaker 3: just talking more at a principled level, where it comes
Speaker 3: down to what the LAB leak showed me was again
Speaker 3: the slush fund, the corruption for the jobs program. But
Speaker 3: at a higher level it is important to say what
Speaker 3: are we getting out of this? And the truth is
Speaker 3: is that if anybody is getting rich or benefiting from
Speaker 3: a lot of this research, it appears to be the
Speaker 3: drug companies. To me, now, I'm not saying Trump and
Speaker 3: all these other people are going to crack down on
Speaker 3: spending for these drug companies or any of that. If
Speaker 3: anything is likely the opposite for what we're going to
Speaker 3: see out of CMS and others, I would hope that
Speaker 3: we don't. But at a principal level, I do think
Speaker 3: it is fair to say, and this is from my
Speaker 3: understanding looking at some of humans and others talk about
Speaker 3: the NIH as well, is that the current system very
Speaker 3: clearly does not seem to be working. Now, how we
Speaker 3: do that and how we change it is very important.
Speaker 3: Do I trust necessarily there's some grand arching plan, but
Speaker 3: it does seem as if there is just this runaway
Speaker 3: not even runaway. There does seems to be a thoughtlessness
Speaker 3: in the way that we just cut checks to all
Speaker 3: of these different things. That does not fit with a
Speaker 3: concerted strategy for the United States. So like we should
Speaker 3: start with a couple of presumptions. It's like the United
Speaker 3: States should. It's not about it's not just a cancer,
Speaker 3: it's like, well, what is causing cancer? Now, obviously there's
Speaker 3: research behind that, but as you just pointed out, with
Speaker 3: the profit incentive in others, it all comes down to
Speaker 3: like these crazy drugs which cost tons of money. What
Speaker 3: RFK has said at least, and part of the reason
Speaker 3: I liked a lot of things he said for AHHS
Speaker 3: was because it gets down to these chronic disease and
Speaker 3: these factors that lead to the need for all of
Speaker 3: these drugs. And it doesn't seem that all of our research,
Speaker 3: our healthcare spending is in that direction.
Speaker 2: But the problem isn't. So problem has been identified correctly
Speaker 2: by you, that the NRFK that these chronic diseases are
Speaker 2: you know, are literally killing us, big part of the
Speaker 2: reason our life expectancy is going down, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker 2: But the purported solution here will only make that issue
Speaker 2: worse by pushing things away from public funding and towards
Speaker 2: private industry funding. If you actually want to deal with that,
Speaker 2: if you're actually serious about dealing with that, you have
Speaker 2: to deal with the fact of the four of the
Speaker 2: profit mode of being at the center of our healthcare system.
Speaker 2: That is the root of all of this, I mean,
Speaker 2: and that's why it's you know, we're the only developed
Speaker 2: country that doesn't have universal health care and we get
Speaker 2: horrible results because it is.
Speaker 4: Profitable for people to be sick.
Speaker 2: So while I totally agree with your diagnosis as the problem,
Speaker 2: this purported solution pretty clearly to me makes things worse
Speaker 2: because at least, you know, with the public research, as
Speaker 2: I said before, every new drag molecule that's been discovered
Speaker 2: has been publicly funded research.
Speaker 4: Okay, the private.
Speaker 2: Industry, they like what counts for research and development there
Speaker 2: is literally like figuring out how to gain the patent
Speaker 2: system so that they can extend their patent monopolies on
Speaker 2: whatever their most profitable product is. That's what counts for
Speaker 2: research and development over there. So with this sort of change,
Speaker 2: you're pushing things more in that direction. And this is
Speaker 2: and this is again sort of the the elon anarcho
Speaker 2: capitalist ideological direction. And he's said outright like he wants
Speaker 2: to privatize the entire federal government. He wants to his
Speaker 2: ideal utopian state is that there are no public sector workers,
Speaker 2: that they're all quote unquote higher productivity private sector workers. Well,
Speaker 2: we know there are certain things that if they're not like,
Speaker 2: if they're not profitable, the private sector is just not
Speaker 2: going to do.
Speaker 4: And certain things that are really important that the.
Speaker 2: American people count on and depend on that have to
Speaker 2: be housed under the federal government. So I see it
Speaker 2: very much in the direction of mass privatization of public resources.
Speaker 2: And I see it very much in the direction of
Speaker 2: just trying to use whatever cugel you can to undercut
Speaker 2: the university system.
Speaker 4: Not to mention that.
Speaker 2: Listen, sympathy for them, well I'm sure you don't, but
Speaker 2: I mean that you have to not like that is
Speaker 2: part of the ideological project here. So if so, the
Speaker 2: other piece is like the way they did it is
Speaker 2: brazenly illegal. And so if you want to cut the
Speaker 2: research for cancer and other disease funds, you have to
Speaker 2: go through Congress. You have to go through Congress. It's
Speaker 2: really quite simple, not only because these grants have already
Speaker 2: been written. It's in literally in the law, and actually
Speaker 2: we could put a nine up on the screen because
Speaker 2: this was pointed out by Susan Collins was the other person.
Speaker 2: So she's objecting to the move to cut the NIH.
Speaker 4: She told Robert F.
Speaker 2: Kennedy about her strong opposition to arbitrary cuts. I think
Speaker 2: she's still voting for him, though, but she said she
Speaker 2: called him to express her strong opposition to these arbitrary
Speaker 2: cuts and funding for vital research at our main institutions,
Speaker 2: which are known for their Excellency's promised as soon as
Speaker 2: he's confirmed, he'll reexamine this initiative that was implemented prior
Speaker 2: to his confirmation.
Speaker 4: And if you think that RFK.
Speaker 2: Is gonna be running the show, I mean, I think
Speaker 2: it's pretty clear who's holding the reins in the federal
Speaker 2: government right now, our new CEO, Dictator King. But in
Speaker 2: any case, there's specific legislative language that says pretty directly
Speaker 2: like once these funds go out, you cannot change the
Speaker 2: ratios of the nature of the contracts that we've signed
Speaker 2: and agreed to with these institutions. So you know, I
Speaker 2: object to it on principle because I think it's a
Speaker 2: foolish place to cut I think it leaves us worse
Speaker 2: off in terms of health. I think it pushes things
Speaker 2: more in the direction of private industry.
Speaker 4: Et cetera.
Speaker 2: But I also think it's brazenly illegal, which is what
Speaker 2: the court case obviously is about, and why the courts
Speaker 2: have this hasn't reached a final decision yet, but why
Speaker 2: the courts have come in and.
Speaker 4: Said you, whohoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
Speaker 2: You cannot go forward with this until we this goes
Speaker 2: through litigation and we figure out what's going on.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, it's been a right, it's already been shut down.
Speaker 3: The NIH director Jay Baticharia actually still has not been
Speaker 3: confirmed in the Senate, and as I understand that this
Speaker 3: is something that they're going to try and put into
Speaker 3: the legislation. Yeah, I mean, look, I actually be curious
Speaker 3: because what I want to know is how is factly
Speaker 3: you spent sixty percent on administrative on administrative budgets because
Speaker 3: from what I was reading, it seems that the sixty
Speaker 3: percent to fifteen what they were claiming in terms of
Speaker 3: well be cut. They cited some of the things that
Speaker 3: you did, but it's like, well, how much of this, though,
Speaker 3: is administrative costs?
Speaker 1: Because that's one of those.
Speaker 3: Where if you look at overall growth and healthcare spending,
Speaker 3: it's not just about the cost of services. A huge
Speaker 3: reason why so many of our bills are so high
Speaker 3: is directly tied to so many of these hospital administration costs.
Speaker 1: It's not one to one.
Speaker 3: I'm just giving an example of like, it's clear that
Speaker 3: quote unquote administrative costs has become a huge segment of
Speaker 3: spending and that there just seems to be this endless
Speaker 3: money printer from the federal government for a lot of
Speaker 3: this stuff. So we could get back to just funding
Speaker 3: research or whatever, I'd be totally fine.
Speaker 1: Not even that.
Speaker 3: We just need a concerted national strategy and I'll give
Speaker 3: it to you.
Speaker 1: It's true.
Speaker 3: I mean, I don't feel like there's you know, some
Speaker 3: great big hand on the wheel. And that's probably the
Speaker 3: big difference from how this program and all of that.
Speaker 1: Was originally conceived.
Speaker 3: It's part of the reason why the instinct today is
Speaker 3: to cut, cut, cut, is just simply it's like better
Speaker 3: than just simply funding a bunch of make work jobs
Speaker 3: and all that.
Speaker 2: But well, I would say the instinct is to cut cut,
Speaker 2: because that is Elon's specific ideological and cap project. You know,
Speaker 2: to render the federal government effectively irrelevant, small unable to
Speaker 2: check him and his ambitions, like that is his ideological project,
Speaker 2: and so he'll use whatever legit, you know, truly legitimate
Speaker 2: problems there are to justify accomplishing his goal of stripping
Speaker 2: the federal government down to the bones. In all areas,
Speaker 2: areas you'd agree with, areas you wouldn't agree with, et cetera.
Speaker 2: He will, you know, he'll say, so security is full
Speaker 2: of fraud. That's why we have to cut entitlements. He'll say, Medicare,
Speaker 2: Medicaid also full of fraw. That's why I have to
Speaker 2: cut entitlements. Obviously with this one. Oh, you know, nih
Speaker 2: it's this is preposterous. These administrative overhead it's all a
Speaker 2: push towards privatization. It's a push towards stripping down the government.
Speaker 2: It's a push towards and we can see this in
Speaker 2: some of the agencies that he specifically targeted that have
Speaker 2: investigated him or gone after his business interests, or that
Speaker 2: are just simply strategic in terms of making the case
Speaker 2: that like, oh, we can just cut an entire agency
Speaker 2: like USAID and not involve Congress, and it's perfectly fine.
Speaker 2: So you know, to me, it's about his overall ideological
Speaker 2: project that he is pursuing because you know, he's decided
Speaker 2: that he should be king