WEBVTT - It Could Happen Here Weekly 139 0:00:02.160 --> 0:00:05.560 Zone Media. Hey everybody, Robert Evans here and I wanted 0:00:05.600 --> 0:00:08.639 to let you know this is a compilation episode. So 0:00:08.680 --> 0:00:12.080 every episode of the week that just happened is here 0:00:12.200 --> 0:00:16.119 in one convenient and with somewhat less ads package for 0:00:16.200 --> 0:00:18.320 you to listen to in a long stretch if you want. 0:00:18.800 --> 0:00:20.840 If you've been listening to the episodes every day this week, 0:00:20.880 --> 0:00:22.639 there's going to be nothing new here for you, but 0:00:23.000 --> 0:00:24.720 you can make your own decisions. 0:00:27.040 --> 0:00:30.280 Welcome to Krapan here, but you know, very few things 0:00:30.320 --> 0:00:34.920 actually happen. I'm adre Siege of the Ju Channel Anthraism. Now, 0:00:35.200 --> 0:00:40.519 indigenousity is a contentious topic, no more than ever, not 0:00:40.600 --> 0:00:42.720 when it comes to flora and fauna. Of course, as 0:00:42.760 --> 0:00:44.600 far as I know, it's a pretty simple amount of 0:00:44.640 --> 0:00:47.519 being considered indigenous to an ecosystem when they haven't been 0:00:47.560 --> 0:00:51.800 introduced through human intervention or manipulated by human cultivation. As 0:00:51.840 --> 0:00:53.960 over millions of the years, these living things have become 0:00:53.960 --> 0:00:57.320 well suited to their habitats carefully adopts the region's soil, 0:00:57.640 --> 0:01:00.560 climate and food web. When it comes to to people 0:01:01.000 --> 0:01:04.520 who're talking politics, they quick some confusion about what it 0:01:04.600 --> 0:01:07.840 means to be indigenous, especially when questions of land rights, 0:01:08.080 --> 0:01:12.560 autonomy and reparations, and the equation. Most people understand that 0:01:12.640 --> 0:01:17.240 Native American nations and Aboriginal Australians are indigenous, but they 0:01:17.280 --> 0:01:20.559 don't really know what that means. Some might then ask, well, 0:01:20.600 --> 0:01:23.720 if indigenous just means originating from a place they're on 0:01:23.840 --> 0:01:27.199 all Homo sapiens indigenous to Africa, why should one group's 0:01:27.200 --> 0:01:30.880 claim of indigenity take precedence over any other. Others may 0:01:30.920 --> 0:01:33.640 ask the question, if a group occupies a region for 0:01:33.680 --> 0:01:37.600 several generations, does that then make them indigenous? A White 0:01:37.600 --> 0:01:40.080 Americans indigenous if their family has been there since the 0:01:40.120 --> 0:01:43.319 founding of the US. A French fupial indigenous to France, 0:01:43.720 --> 0:01:47.000 and if so, does that somehow justify there's enophobia towards 0:01:47.000 --> 0:01:51.000 refugees When generations of martialized groups have been struggling to 0:01:51.040 --> 0:01:56.840 retain their social, cultural, economic, and political sovereignty and achieve justice, reparations, 0:01:56.880 --> 0:02:01.720 and liberation after centuries of oppression and attempting annihilation, we 0:02:01.920 --> 0:02:06.080 to stand in informed solidarity. Thus, it is vital for 0:02:06.160 --> 0:02:10.079 us to understand what it means to be indigenous from 0:02:10.120 --> 0:02:12.440 what I gather through my research, which was focused on 0:02:12.440 --> 0:02:14.920 the work of just a few North American indigenous scholars 0:02:15.160 --> 0:02:18.239 Taiyaki Alfred, Jeff cord to Cell, and Robin wild Chimera. 0:02:18.720 --> 0:02:22.559 Additionity can be interpreted as a matter of colonial relationship 0:02:23.120 --> 0:02:26.600 and or as a matter of a land relationship, a 0:02:26.680 --> 0:02:31.560 relationship to place. These two definitions are, of course, highly overlappened. 0:02:32.120 --> 0:02:35.160 You really can't get away from how colonization informed the 0:02:35.240 --> 0:02:39.040 land and vice versa. Let's start with the first interpretation 0:02:39.240 --> 0:02:44.480 of indignity. According to Taiyaki Alfred and Jeff Gordicell, indigenousness 0:02:44.520 --> 0:02:48.760 is an identity constructed, shaped, and lived in the politicized 0:02:48.800 --> 0:02:53.480 context of contemporary colonialism. It is an existence oppositional to 0:02:53.520 --> 0:02:57.440 colonial societies and states, and a consciousness of struggle against 0:02:57.480 --> 0:03:02.480 such forces of colonization. No two indigenous groups are exactly alike. 0:03:02.560 --> 0:03:06.440 Of course, there are significant diversity in their cultures, contexts, 0:03:06.480 --> 0:03:09.560 and relationships with colonial forces, but they do share that 0:03:09.639 --> 0:03:13.840 struggle to survive as distinct peoples in an environment hostile 0:03:13.880 --> 0:03:18.840 to their existence. Efforts to marginalize and eradicate indigenous peoples 0:03:19.080 --> 0:03:21.240 may not always be as avoid as they once will, 0:03:21.600 --> 0:03:27.040 with some noticeably overt exceptions, but the historic and ongoing 0:03:27.040 --> 0:03:31.320 dispossession of Indigenous peoples, the erasure of Indigenous histories, geographies, 0:03:31.320 --> 0:03:35.760 and languages, and the current situation of deprivation persist. Nonetheless, 0:03:36.480 --> 0:03:40.000 even so called reconciliation efforts are tainted by the reality 0:03:40.240 --> 0:03:44.560 that Indigenous peoples remain, as in earlier colonial eras fundamentally 0:03:44.600 --> 0:03:48.720 occupied and disempowered peoples, stripped of autonomy in their own 0:03:48.760 --> 0:03:53.240 homelands and pressured into surrender and cooperation with an inherently 0:03:53.400 --> 0:03:57.320 unjust colonial order just to ensure their basic physical survival. 0:03:58.280 --> 0:04:01.000 By this understanding of indigenoity, it can be set up 0:04:01.040 --> 0:04:05.000 without a colonizer, without systems in place and actions being 0:04:05.040 --> 0:04:09.640 taken to marginalize, disempower and destroy their societies in favor 0:04:09.680 --> 0:04:12.800 of a colonial replacement. There's no need for the concept 0:04:12.960 --> 0:04:16.920 of indigenous. Without colonialism, there will be no status of 0:04:16.960 --> 0:04:19.840 indigenous to be imposed upon the groups of people whose 0:04:19.960 --> 0:04:22.800 very existence and claim to the land is an obstacle. 0:04:22.960 --> 0:04:26.080 It is that colonial endeavor. The un work in group 0:04:26.080 --> 0:04:29.920 of Indigenous issues, drew partially from this understanding when attempting 0:04:29.960 --> 0:04:35.200 to define indigenous peoples in nineteen eighty six, quote Indigenous communities, peoples, 0:04:35.279 --> 0:04:38.640 and nations are those which have in a historical continuity 0:04:38.680 --> 0:04:41.560 with pre invasion and pre colonial societies that developed in 0:04:41.560 --> 0:04:45.480 their territories, consider themselves distinct from other sectors the societies 0:04:45.560 --> 0:04:49.320 now prevailing on those territories or parts of them. They 0:04:49.400 --> 0:04:52.920 form at present non dominant sectors of society and are 0:04:52.920 --> 0:04:56.680 determined to preserve, develop, and transmit to future generations the 0:04:56.760 --> 0:05:00.400 ancestral territories and the ethnic identity as the basis of 0:05:00.440 --> 0:05:03.680 their continued existems as peoples in accordance with their own 0:05:03.720 --> 0:05:09.240 cultural patterns, social institutions, and legal systems. By this definition, 0:05:09.640 --> 0:05:14.520 Amerindians in the Caribbean, Aboriginal Australians, Adivasis in India, Native 0:05:14.520 --> 0:05:20.279 North and South Americans, Siberians, Ainu, Goods, Syrians, Yazidi, Palestinians, 0:05:20.480 --> 0:05:29.279 amasaf Sami, Basque, Samei Basques, Hawaiians, Mari, san Guti, Papuans, Chams, 0:05:29.360 --> 0:05:34.719 and many more are all indigenous peoples. There are layers 0:05:34.760 --> 0:05:38.560 of nuance yet to be highlighted. The colonial situation is 0:05:38.600 --> 0:05:42.440 not a simple binary of indigenous and colonists. For example, 0:05:42.760 --> 0:05:46.080 in much of the Americas, Africans who were indigenous to 0:05:46.120 --> 0:05:50.359 their own homelands were displaced and enslaved under the colonial regime. 0:05:51.000 --> 0:05:54.000 They may not be indigenous to the Americas, but they 0:05:54.000 --> 0:05:58.320 weren't trivants attla colonial society either. In fact, someone slaved 0:05:58.320 --> 0:06:01.880 for inditionous people as well. At the same time, some 0:06:02.000 --> 0:06:05.200 members of the African diaspora would join existing indigenous societies 0:06:05.400 --> 0:06:08.040 and later create their own, such as the Garifuna of 0:06:08.080 --> 0:06:13.039 Saint Vincent, Honduras and Belize. Meanwhile, in modern day Africa, 0:06:13.600 --> 0:06:17.080 so all African ethnic groups can technically be considered indigenous 0:06:17.080 --> 0:06:20.880 to the continent. The concept of specific indigenous peoples within 0:06:20.920 --> 0:06:24.840 Africa refers to those groups whose traditional practices and land 0:06:24.880 --> 0:06:28.000 claims have been placed outside of the dominant state systems 0:06:28.320 --> 0:06:31.320 and exist in the conflict with the objectives and policies 0:06:31.360 --> 0:06:36.720 implemented by post colonial governments, companies, and the surrounding dominant societies. 0:06:37.839 --> 0:06:40.880 Such a definition can similarly be applied to modern day Asia, 0:06:41.279 --> 0:06:45.839 where governments like Indonesia, India, China, Vietnam, and Bangladesh have 0:06:46.000 --> 0:06:50.359 infamously refused to recognize the existence of indigenous peoples within 0:06:50.400 --> 0:06:54.359 their territories. These countries, like most countries in the world, 0:06:54.760 --> 0:06:58.839 did not ratify the International Labe Organization Convention one sixty 0:06:58.920 --> 0:07:01.839 nine in nineteen eighty nine, known as the Indigenous and 0:07:01.880 --> 0:07:06.280 Tribal People's Convention concerning the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The 0:07:06.360 --> 0:07:09.240 UN's Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples passed in 0:07:09.240 --> 0:07:12.560 two thousand and seven, would however, be voted on approvingly 0:07:12.600 --> 0:07:15.160 by most of the world, including the same countries that 0:07:15.200 --> 0:07:19.400 haven't recognized the Indigenous peoples within their borders. All four 0:07:19.400 --> 0:07:23.520 of the countries have rejected that particular resolution. Canada, America, 0:07:23.800 --> 0:07:27.040 Australia and New Zealand would later change their vote in 0:07:27.120 --> 0:07:30.440 favor of the declaration, of course, with their own tact 0:07:30.480 --> 0:07:35.280 on interpretations an emphasis on the declarations legally non binding nature, 0:07:35.840 --> 0:07:40.040 as is to be expected from settler colonial societies. There 0:07:40.040 --> 0:07:43.640 are approximately two hundred and fifty to six hundred million 0:07:43.720 --> 0:07:47.720 Indigenous peoples around the world today, each facing the reality 0:07:47.760 --> 0:07:51.720 of having their lands, cultures, and forms of organization attacked, 0:07:52.040 --> 0:07:56.880 co opted, commodified, and reconstructed by various states, regardless of 0:07:56.920 --> 0:08:01.520 their legal recognition. Inditionous peoples themselves have long understood that 0:08:01.560 --> 0:08:04.440 the endurances of people will continue to depend on their 0:08:04.440 --> 0:08:08.880 connection to land, culture, and community, which brings us to 0:08:08.920 --> 0:08:12.760 the second interpretation of indigenity, closely related to the first 0:08:13.200 --> 0:08:16.800 as an identity rooted in a relationship to place, whether 0:08:16.880 --> 0:08:20.280 that be physical as with land, social as with community, 0:08:20.720 --> 0:08:25.040 or cultural as with culture and justus. Relationship to land 0:08:25.120 --> 0:08:28.680 must be reciprocal, with give and take, based on a 0:08:28.760 --> 0:08:30.640 view of the land and water as a gift that 0:08:30.760 --> 0:08:35.520 must be cared for over generations. According to Hodenosuni mythology, 0:08:35.640 --> 0:08:38.880 as recounted by Robin waal Chimura in Breadain Sweet Grass, 0:08:39.640 --> 0:08:42.559 the mother goddess Skywoman came to the land as an 0:08:42.559 --> 0:08:46.800 immigrant from the heavens, but became indigenous by listening to 0:08:46.840 --> 0:08:49.760 the land, learn from other species to understand how to 0:08:49.800 --> 0:08:53.080 live on it, given as she received, and caring for 0:08:53.160 --> 0:08:55.400 the earth and its keepers for the sake of those 0:08:55.400 --> 0:08:58.920 who would inherit it when she passed on. In their view, 0:08:59.400 --> 0:09:04.240 the land is identity, It is ancestral connection, It is pharmacy. 0:09:04.360 --> 0:09:06.920 It is a library, and it is home, the source 0:09:06.960 --> 0:09:09.800 of all that sustains, and the sacred ground upon which 0:09:09.840 --> 0:09:14.200 those would observe their responsibility to the world. By this understanding, 0:09:14.600 --> 0:09:16.880 it can be said that indigenity is born out of 0:09:16.960 --> 0:09:22.920 land connection, established through observation and relationship. Indigenous peoples have 0:09:23.080 --> 0:09:27.040 historically been mobile, either by choice or by force, but 0:09:27.120 --> 0:09:30.160 regardless of where they might find themselves home land or not, 0:09:30.760 --> 0:09:33.679 even if there were other indigenous peoples in their new environments, 0:09:34.280 --> 0:09:37.360 as long as they observed the processes and ceremonies of 0:09:37.440 --> 0:09:42.320 generational relationship building based on mutual respect, understanding, and love 0:09:42.320 --> 0:09:56.880 for the land in common, they remained indigenous. So then 0:09:57.240 --> 0:10:01.199 the question might arise, why aren't settlers to place if 0:10:01.200 --> 0:10:04.800 their family has lived in land for generations. The answer 0:10:05.320 --> 0:10:09.920 lies in relationship. Settler society as a whole is based 0:10:09.960 --> 0:10:13.520 on an extractivist capitalist relationship with the land, focus on 0:10:13.559 --> 0:10:17.280 exploiting the land and its resources. Without a relationship with 0:10:17.360 --> 0:10:20.400 the land that extends reverence to a deeper understanding of 0:10:20.400 --> 0:10:25.439 its complex interdependence, settler society can never become indigenous to place. 0:10:26.440 --> 0:10:29.520 Of course, it goes without saying that every indigenous group 0:10:29.640 --> 0:10:33.880 or indigenous practice is perfectly sustainable. Some have been rather 0:10:33.960 --> 0:10:37.720 destructive and even speciocidal. But if we are to work 0:10:37.720 --> 0:10:40.560 with this definition, to conceive of being indigenous is something 0:10:40.600 --> 0:10:44.360 based on cultivating a long term relationship to place. That 0:10:44.440 --> 0:10:49.040 indigenity must be contingent on maintaining the health and longevity 0:10:49.200 --> 0:10:55.120 of that relationship. Without community, there cannot be indigenity, much 0:10:55.200 --> 0:10:57.720 like the trees in a forest are interconnected by subterranean 0:10:57.840 --> 0:11:01.040 networks of my curacy which enable them to share resources 0:11:01.080 --> 0:11:04.040 and survive as a whole. In order to be indigenous 0:11:04.040 --> 0:11:07.360 to place, community must exist to sustain that web of 0:11:07.400 --> 0:11:11.920 reciprocitude the land so that it all may flourish. Inditionity 0:11:11.960 --> 0:11:15.320 to place extends to culture as well, which is deeply 0:11:15.360 --> 0:11:19.199 tied to the land. It develops on cultural ceremonies. According 0:11:19.200 --> 0:11:24.800 to Chimera, focus attention, attention becomes intention. If you stand 0:11:24.800 --> 0:11:28.080 together and profess a thing before your community, it holds 0:11:28.120 --> 0:11:32.760 you accountable. Ceremonies transcend the boundaries of the individual and 0:11:32.800 --> 0:11:37.800 resonate beyond the human realm. Such practices should be reciprocal, 0:11:38.480 --> 0:11:42.360 as ceremonies create communities, and communities create ceremonies as well 0:11:42.400 --> 0:11:46.920 as organic, not appropriate and existing cultural celebrations or attending 0:11:47.040 --> 0:11:51.920 toward the commercial. Our social fabric has become withered and 0:11:52.240 --> 0:11:55.800 fragmented by the pace of modern life, leaving little room 0:11:55.840 --> 0:11:59.679 for ceremonies outside of religion or rights of personal transitions 0:11:59.679 --> 0:12:04.400 such as birthdays, weddings, and funerals. But ceremonies and the 0:12:04.440 --> 0:12:07.960 shared emotions they generate are part of what builds community. 0:12:08.400 --> 0:12:13.480 When we gather for graduations, for example, a sense of pride, relief, nostalgia, 0:12:13.559 --> 0:12:17.280 and excitement build in the social atmosphere, hopefully fuel in 0:12:17.320 --> 0:12:19.320 the conference and strength of those who are going on 0:12:19.480 --> 0:12:23.120 to pursue their passions. But Kimura wants us to imagine 0:12:23.160 --> 0:12:26.280 standing by a river flooded with those same feelings as 0:12:26.280 --> 0:12:30.840 the salmon margins the auditorium of their estuary. Being indigenous 0:12:30.840 --> 0:12:34.880 to place means cultivating cultural ceremonies that honor the land 0:12:35.200 --> 0:12:38.360 and all the cycles and seasons of life within it. 0:12:39.880 --> 0:12:41.800 Now that we have a clearer understanding of these two 0:12:41.800 --> 0:12:45.760 distinct yet related understandings of indigenity as both an identity 0:12:45.840 --> 0:12:48.520 formed as part of a cluar relationship and an identity 0:12:48.559 --> 0:12:51.360 rooted in a relationship to place, I believe that we 0:12:51.400 --> 0:12:55.040 should explore how this understanding can be applied to decolonization 0:12:55.559 --> 0:13:01.840 and social revolution. Decolonization is the process of unsettling clonial 0:13:01.920 --> 0:13:05.560 power structures, whether that be through overturning acts of inclosure 0:13:05.600 --> 0:13:09.160 by building new commons, overturning acts of possession by reclaiming 0:13:09.160 --> 0:13:13.240 our spaces and identities, or overturning acts of administration through 0:13:13.280 --> 0:13:21.439 social revolution. Social revolution is a complete transformation of our society, economy, culture, philosophy, technology, 0:13:21.640 --> 0:13:27.920 relationships and politics, an ongoing and heterogenous change in people's powers, tribes, 0:13:27.960 --> 0:13:32.040 and consciousness through practical education, as well as a progressive 0:13:32.080 --> 0:13:36.959 breakdown and transformation of existence, systems and institutions, punctuated by 0:13:37.000 --> 0:13:40.840 major ruptures and advances or with the aim of self liberation. 0:13:41.640 --> 0:13:44.840 It takes confrontation with the powers that be, non cooperation 0:13:44.920 --> 0:13:48.079 with the established order of things, and prefiguration of new 0:13:48.160 --> 0:13:52.360 social relations, institutions, and infrastructure and practices in the here 0:13:52.520 --> 0:13:56.760 and now. If we maintain the interpretation of additionality as 0:13:56.800 --> 0:13:59.960 based on one's position and including relationship, then the deco 0:14:00.040 --> 0:14:04.199 organization process will entail the abolition of that relationship as 0:14:04.240 --> 0:14:08.400 the premise of identity and therefore the abolition of indigeneity 0:14:08.760 --> 0:14:13.679 as a status. Colonial legacies have effectively left indigenous communities 0:14:13.760 --> 0:14:19.119 legally and politically compartmentalized and culturally, socially and spiritually weakened 0:14:19.280 --> 0:14:22.040 within the narrow parameters of the state, where they end 0:14:22.120 --> 0:14:25.160 up diverting the crucial energy necessary to confront state power 0:14:25.480 --> 0:14:28.960 and develop the process of the econization toward mimicking the 0:14:29.000 --> 0:14:33.840 practices the dominant non indigenous legal political institutions through for example, 0:14:34.280 --> 0:14:40.320 land claims and self government processes. What the deconalization movement needs, 0:14:40.600 --> 0:14:44.960 according to Maya Yucateco poet Fliciano Sanchez Chan, are zones 0:14:45.000 --> 0:14:49.560 of refuge, places where intitionous knowledge can be guarded, exercised, 0:14:49.600 --> 0:14:54.400 and sustained. In Mesoamerica, these zones of refuge represent safe 0:14:54.440 --> 0:14:58.120 spaces where the diverse cultural expressions of the region can 0:14:58.160 --> 0:15:00.680 persist in spite of state for us to create a 0:15:00.720 --> 0:15:05.760 homogenized Mexican national identity. The concept of zones of refuge 0:15:05.880 --> 0:15:08.840 is consistent of the traditional objectives of cultural preservation and 0:15:08.960 --> 0:15:13.080 autonomy or the social revolutionary aims of prefiguration, which seeks 0:15:13.080 --> 0:15:16.600 to sow the seeds of future relationships, institutions and practices 0:15:16.920 --> 0:15:20.000 in the here and now. To the expansion of zones 0:15:20.000 --> 0:15:23.320 of refuge and other institutions of resistance and autonomy, we 0:15:23.400 --> 0:15:28.440 can realize declonization in reality. But again, this idea of 0:15:28.480 --> 0:15:33.280 addigenerative econization is just one understanding of the term, waiting 0:15:33.400 --> 0:15:37.280 to explore another approach to the declonization one that recognizes 0:15:37.320 --> 0:15:42.000 the power and potential of indigenous relationships with the land. Globally, 0:15:42.480 --> 0:15:45.840 the UN recognizes that ADDITIONALUS people to protect eighty percent 0:15:45.960 --> 0:15:49.360 of the world's remaining in biodiversity, and scientists have shown 0:15:49.600 --> 0:15:53.800 that indigenous management practices in Brazil, Canada, and Australia provides 0:15:53.800 --> 0:15:57.040 the same level of ecosystem support and protection as any 0:15:57.120 --> 0:16:02.160 imposed protected area, which makes it abundantly. Theclonal approach of 0:16:02.320 --> 0:16:06.880 conservation via dispossession removes the very people who take care 0:16:06.920 --> 0:16:11.360 of our most important ecosystems. Over the course of Braid 0:16:11.400 --> 0:16:15.360 and Sweet Grass, Robin wall Chimer highlights the reciprocal relationship 0:16:15.360 --> 0:16:19.240 with the earth that many indigenous groups, including her Potwatomi culture, 0:16:19.520 --> 0:16:23.840 have cultivated over generations. The principles of the gift economy 0:16:24.120 --> 0:16:26.960 is an essential aspect of this relationship, which forms the 0:16:26.960 --> 0:16:31.000 basis of indigenity to place. The gift economy is a 0:16:31.040 --> 0:16:34.400 system of exchange where resources and services are shared without 0:16:34.440 --> 0:16:39.080 expectation of remuneration or quit broquo. The gift economy extends 0:16:39.120 --> 0:16:42.600 not just the people, but also our non human can 0:16:42.840 --> 0:16:46.080 caring and being cared for. In turn, if we want 0:16:46.120 --> 0:16:50.000 to restore that relationship, we can start by planting a garden. 0:16:50.920 --> 0:16:53.840 A garden could be a heathen for native flora, arrested 0:16:53.840 --> 0:16:57.440 in place for varius fauna, a feast for dangered pollinators, 0:16:57.800 --> 0:17:00.680 a sustainer of local water table, and a hub of 0:17:00.720 --> 0:17:04.119 thriving soil. Not only does it benefit both our health 0:17:04.200 --> 0:17:06.800 and the health of the planet, but is also anurstry 0:17:06.840 --> 0:17:10.120 for nurture in a connection that extends beyond that small 0:17:10.160 --> 0:17:13.159 patch of dute. I don't believe that merely building a 0:17:13.200 --> 0:17:16.199 connection of the land can make someone indigenous, but not 0:17:16.240 --> 0:17:19.080 being indigenous doesn't exclude us from aiding the renewal of 0:17:19.080 --> 0:17:22.440 the world. Kimer uses the example of the broad leaf 0:17:22.480 --> 0:17:26.399 planting or son as the white man's footprint. Despite not 0:17:26.440 --> 0:17:29.240 being indigenous to the Americas, it has become an honored 0:17:29.280 --> 0:17:31.879 member of the plant community because it thrives as a 0:17:31.880 --> 0:17:35.840 good neighbor instead of as a destructive invader, while other 0:17:35.840 --> 0:17:39.679 invasive species poison the soil or overrun the land. The 0:17:39.680 --> 0:17:43.120 white man's footprint to call a strategy of helpful co existence, 0:17:43.800 --> 0:17:46.560 even sharing some of its healing properties with those who 0:17:46.680 --> 0:17:50.320 ask of it. It is not indigenous, but it has 0:17:50.400 --> 0:17:55.840 become naturalized. Quote being naturalized to a place means to 0:17:55.880 --> 0:17:57.919 live as if this is the land that feeds you, 0:17:58.400 --> 0:18:00.679 as if these are the strains from which you to 0:18:00.720 --> 0:18:03.960 build your body and fill your spirit. To become naturalized 0:18:04.040 --> 0:18:07.640 is to know that your ancestors lie in this ground. Hey, 0:18:07.640 --> 0:18:10.600 you will give your gifts and meet your responsibilities. To 0:18:10.600 --> 0:18:14.240 become naturalized is to live as if your children's future matters, 0:18:14.680 --> 0:18:17.000 To take care of the land as if our lives 0:18:17.280 --> 0:18:20.120 and the lives of all our relatives depend on it, 0:18:20.400 --> 0:18:25.280 because they do. Decononization requires to uproot invasive, irreverent and 0:18:25.320 --> 0:18:29.320 destructive individuals, capitalist settlers, societies in order to rebuild in 0:18:29.320 --> 0:18:31.840 a way that treats the land like the home that 0:18:31.880 --> 0:18:35.240 we share and are responsible for. It will require us to 0:18:35.280 --> 0:18:38.160 receive an honor the knowledge in the land, to care 0:18:38.200 --> 0:18:41.200 for its keepers and pass on that knowledge to the next generation. 0:18:42.000 --> 0:18:45.879 And it is crucial that we elevate indigenous voices, knowledges, 0:18:45.920 --> 0:18:50.160 and pedagogical approaches in pursuit of this aim or power 0:18:50.240 --> 0:18:54.280 to all the people. This has been a graper peace. 0:19:09.119 --> 0:19:11.520 Hello, welcome, this is it could happen here and I 0:19:11.560 --> 0:19:15.360 am shreen And today is another silly little episode. Well 0:19:15.359 --> 0:19:17.480 it's not silly well, it is silly, but I think 0:19:17.480 --> 0:19:21.800 it's actually also interesting, so maybe you will too. If not. Oops. 0:19:22.160 --> 0:19:25.080 But the point of this is I do not like 0:19:25.160 --> 0:19:27.640 being on my phone. I hate being on my phone. 0:19:27.680 --> 0:19:30.400 I've always hated being on my phone. I waited until 0:19:30.400 --> 0:19:33.040 the last possible moment I could, until I even got 0:19:33.080 --> 0:19:37.200 a smartphone, but I just hate it. I hate texting. 0:19:37.440 --> 0:19:41.320 I hate it all. And so especially the last several years, 0:19:41.320 --> 0:19:45.440 I've been trying to read more and it's been great, 0:19:45.760 --> 0:19:49.480 but sometimes my brain just needs a task for me 0:19:50.040 --> 0:19:52.760 to do, like with my hands. So I can trick 0:19:52.840 --> 0:19:55.760 myself to thinking I'm being productive just because I'm physically 0:19:55.800 --> 0:20:02.040 doing something, and recently that's something puzzles. And look, I 0:20:02.200 --> 0:20:05.320 like all puzzles. You can't show me a puzzle that 0:20:05.320 --> 0:20:08.800 I won't at least try physical jigsaw puzzles that can 0:20:08.840 --> 0:20:11.760 take hours or days to complete, like sign me Up. 0:20:12.280 --> 0:20:14.680 But ever since getting a cat, it feels a little 0:20:14.720 --> 0:20:17.520 too precarious to commit to one of these jigsaw puzzles 0:20:17.680 --> 0:20:20.240 for the fear of her prancing around on the pieces 0:20:20.359 --> 0:20:23.720 or knocking them over under furniture to ever be found again, 0:20:24.080 --> 0:20:27.000 or chewing on them or eating them, and so the 0:20:27.000 --> 0:20:29.720 puzzles I have been increasingly turning to recently, which I 0:20:29.720 --> 0:20:34.200 have always loved are word and number puzzles, Sudoku, can 0:20:34.280 --> 0:20:39.760 can classics, incredible crosswords, cryptograms, code breakers. I can do 0:20:39.800 --> 0:20:43.520 those for hours. I will say, though I do find 0:20:43.640 --> 0:20:47.159 word searches pretty tedious and boring, But if I was 0:20:47.240 --> 0:20:49.600 completely out of options, I would probably do those two. 0:20:50.760 --> 0:20:54.439 There's just something really satisfying about physically putting pen to 0:20:54.520 --> 0:20:58.120 paper and solving something. And yes, I always use pen 0:20:58.200 --> 0:21:00.840 because I live on the edge, and as I said, 0:21:01.320 --> 0:21:04.560 I do not like being on my phone. So I've 0:21:04.560 --> 0:21:06.920 been buying puzzle books so I can have a physical 0:21:06.960 --> 0:21:10.160 thing to write on. I've had puzzle books for years, 0:21:10.520 --> 0:21:14.040 but recently it's become a bit of a problem. I 0:21:14.119 --> 0:21:16.560 bought four different puzzle books in the span of like 0:21:16.600 --> 0:21:19.360 two weeks, and not because I completed all the puzzles 0:21:19.359 --> 0:21:21.919 in them per se, but because I just completed the 0:21:21.920 --> 0:21:25.040 ones I wanted to do, usually skipping the word searches 0:21:25.119 --> 0:21:28.840 or long riddles or whatever. And honestly, a much better 0:21:29.000 --> 0:21:31.800 use of my fricking time could go to something like 0:21:32.240 --> 0:21:35.800 learning literally anything else, like picking up a new skill, 0:21:36.280 --> 0:21:41.080 learning a new language. But no my smooth brain wants 0:21:41.119 --> 0:21:45.200 to do a fucking puzzle, so I do a puzzle, 0:21:45.880 --> 0:21:46.680 multiple puzzles. 0:21:46.800 --> 0:21:47.119 Usually. 0:21:48.000 --> 0:21:51.240 Maybe you have noticed a trend, dear listener, in my 0:21:51.320 --> 0:21:54.160 episodes that are not about Palestine or the so called 0:21:54.160 --> 0:21:57.560 Middle East. Most likely you haven't noticed, only because I 0:21:57.560 --> 0:22:00.800 think about myself far more than anybody else does. But 0:22:01.200 --> 0:22:02.879 in order to not want to jump off a cliff 0:22:02.880 --> 0:22:05.520 every day, I've realized I need to write and learn 0:22:05.560 --> 0:22:10.680 about things that I like. Wow, incredible discovery, But for real, 0:22:11.119 --> 0:22:13.440 I think we all need a balance of making sure 0:22:13.560 --> 0:22:16.520 we're informed about the world and connecting with our humanity, 0:22:16.920 --> 0:22:19.800 as well as doing things as human beings that allow 0:22:19.960 --> 0:22:22.679 us to continue to want to be informed about the 0:22:22.720 --> 0:22:27.000 world and connect with our humanity. So one day I 0:22:27.040 --> 0:22:30.080 won't need this big preamble before every episode that's not 0:22:30.119 --> 0:22:34.639 about Palestine. But today is not the day anyways, Because 0:22:34.680 --> 0:22:38.160 I love puzzles. I wanted to learn about puzzles. How 0:22:38.200 --> 0:22:41.320 long have humans been putting together word and number games 0:22:41.320 --> 0:22:44.400 for the sole purpose of exercising our minds or dare 0:22:44.440 --> 0:22:49.000 I say, have fun? I needed to know it's truly 0:22:49.040 --> 0:22:53.000 one of the most wholesome things this species has ever done. 0:22:53.119 --> 0:22:56.520 So I did some research. This episode is going to 0:22:56.520 --> 0:22:59.119 be about the crossword. That's where I wanted to start. 0:23:00.000 --> 0:23:02.199 Most of us would agree that the crossword is the 0:23:02.240 --> 0:23:05.440 most popular or well known word game or word puzzle. 0:23:06.240 --> 0:23:08.320 I will admit that every time I see a random 0:23:08.359 --> 0:23:12.040 newspaper in a cafe or hotel, lobby or something, I 0:23:12.240 --> 0:23:16.560 always steal the crossword and I ignore everything else because 0:23:16.600 --> 0:23:19.600 now is simply not the time. But how did the 0:23:19.640 --> 0:23:24.639 crossword come to be as this ubiquitous, normal thing. The 0:23:24.720 --> 0:23:28.879 crossword is a fairly recent invention, born out of desperation. 0:23:30.040 --> 0:23:33.080 Arthur Wynn is regarded as the inventor of the modern 0:23:33.119 --> 0:23:37.560 crossword puzzle. He was born in eighteen seventy one in Liverpool, England, 0:23:37.760 --> 0:23:40.439 and his father was the editor of the local newspaper, 0:23:40.680 --> 0:23:45.159 the Liverpool Mercury. When Arthur was nineteen, he immigrated to 0:23:45.200 --> 0:23:48.640 the United States, settling for a time in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. 0:23:49.080 --> 0:23:52.879 While in Pittsburgh, Winn worked on the Pittsburgh Press newspaper, 0:23:53.040 --> 0:23:56.640 and he played the violin in the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra 0:23:56.920 --> 0:24:00.800 We Love a Well Rounded chap He later moved to 0:24:00.840 --> 0:24:03.199 New York City, where he worked as an editor for 0:24:03.320 --> 0:24:07.560 the New York World newspaper, and then in nineteen thirteen, 0:24:08.119 --> 0:24:12.159 he invented the crossword puzzle. While working at the New 0:24:12.240 --> 0:24:14.879 York World, he needed something to fill up the space 0:24:14.960 --> 0:24:19.000 in the Christmas edition of the paper's fun supplement Fun 0:24:19.080 --> 0:24:22.200 in all caps, so he took advantage of the new 0:24:22.240 --> 0:24:25.640 technology at the time that could print blank grids cheaply, 0:24:25.880 --> 0:24:29.159 and he created a diamond shaped set of boxes with 0:24:29.320 --> 0:24:32.080 clues to fill in the blanks smack in the center 0:24:32.200 --> 0:24:36.280 of the Fun supplement. So for the December twenty first, 0:24:36.560 --> 0:24:40.240 nineteen thirteen edition of The New York World, he introduced 0:24:40.240 --> 0:24:43.359 this puzzle with a diamond shape and a hollow center, 0:24:43.800 --> 0:24:47.800 with the letters f un already being filled in. He 0:24:47.920 --> 0:24:53.159 called it a word cross puzzle, and nearly overnight the 0:24:53.200 --> 0:24:57.119 word cross puzzle went from a space filling ploy to 0:24:57.200 --> 0:25:00.639 the most popular feature of the page. A few weeks 0:25:00.680 --> 0:25:03.679 after the first word cross appeared, the name of the 0:25:03.720 --> 0:25:06.840 puzzle was actually changed to crossword, but this was only 0:25:06.880 --> 0:25:11.000 a result of a typesetting error. However, these puzzles have 0:25:11.080 --> 0:25:15.679 been known as crosswords ever since. Arthur Wynn didn't necessarily 0:25:15.720 --> 0:25:19.800 invent word puzzles, though ever since we've had language, we've 0:25:19.800 --> 0:25:24.080 played games with words. Crosswords are basically where two long 0:25:24.160 --> 0:25:29.680 standing strands of word puzzles interconnect, the first being word squares, 0:25:29.760 --> 0:25:32.760 which demand visual logic to understand the puzzle but aren't 0:25:32.760 --> 0:25:37.680 necessarily using deliberate deception, and the second being riddles, which 0:25:37.800 --> 0:25:41.359 use wordplay to misdirect the solver but don't necessarily have 0:25:41.440 --> 0:25:45.360 any kind of graphic component to work through. Maybe you're 0:25:45.400 --> 0:25:48.760 wondering what's a word square. Maybe you're not wondering that, 0:25:48.760 --> 0:25:51.240 but I'm going to tell you anyway. The word square 0:25:51.480 --> 0:25:55.359 is the direct precursor of the crossword grid. It's a 0:25:55.400 --> 0:25:58.680 special kind of acrostic puzzle in which the same words 0:25:58.680 --> 0:26:02.479 can be read across and down. The number of letters 0:26:02.480 --> 0:26:06.520 in the square is called its order. While two squares 0:26:06.560 --> 0:26:09.760 and three squares are easy to create in English, by 0:26:09.800 --> 0:26:12.560 the time you reach order six, you're very likely to 0:26:12.560 --> 0:26:16.359 get stuck. An order ten square is a holy grail 0:26:16.560 --> 0:26:21.679 for those who are regarded as logologists, that is, wordplay experts. 0:26:22.680 --> 0:26:26.399 So a word square is a puzzle requiring the discovery 0:26:26.440 --> 0:26:29.520 of a set of words of equal length, written one 0:26:29.640 --> 0:26:35.119 under another to read the same down as a cross Apparently, 0:26:35.520 --> 0:26:39.719 the ancient Romans loved word puzzles. The first known word square, 0:26:39.920 --> 0:26:43.479 the so called Sadder square, was found on a slab 0:26:43.560 --> 0:26:46.840 in the ruins of POMPEII. The sadder square, which I 0:26:46.880 --> 0:26:48.560 don't know if I'm saying that right, but it's spelled 0:26:48.680 --> 0:26:52.719 sat r. It's also known as the rotess square, depending 0:26:52.760 --> 0:26:56.359 on which way you read it, because rotess is satur backwards. 0:26:56.680 --> 0:26:59.359 And I say this because word order apparently doesn't matter 0:26:59.359 --> 0:27:02.000 in Latin. But this square that was found is a 0:27:02.040 --> 0:27:06.840 five x five five word Latin palindrome. I'm gonna say 0:27:06.880 --> 0:27:08.440 it in Latin, but I'll tell you what it means, 0:27:08.520 --> 0:27:12.920 so apologies on this pronunciation. But satoor a repo, tenant 0:27:13.080 --> 0:27:17.760 opera rotus the farmer, a repo works, a plow a palindrome. 0:27:17.880 --> 0:27:19.800 Just a reminder that it's something spelled the same way 0:27:19.800 --> 0:27:22.960 forwards and deck. So that's not necessarily the English translation, 0:27:23.040 --> 0:27:26.560 but in Latin that's what it is. Author Adrian Raffel 0:27:26.720 --> 0:27:30.880 described the Sadder square as the quote Kilroy was here 0:27:31.040 --> 0:27:33.960 of the Roman Empire for those who don't know or 0:27:34.000 --> 0:27:36.359 need a refresher. Not going to pretend I neew this either, 0:27:36.680 --> 0:27:39.800 but kil Roy was Here was a popular American graffiti 0:27:39.840 --> 0:27:43.800 that was seen overseas throughout World War II. The words 0:27:43.920 --> 0:27:47.080 Kilroy was here were accompanied by a cartoon drawing of 0:27:47.119 --> 0:27:50.040 a man looking over a wall, and this became a 0:27:50.080 --> 0:27:53.199 popular piece of graffiti that was drawn by American troops 0:27:53.240 --> 0:27:56.320 in the Atlantic theater and then later in the Pacific theater. 0:27:57.000 --> 0:28:00.600 It eventually came to be a universal sign that American 0:28:00.680 --> 0:28:03.480 soldiers had come through an area and left their mark, 0:28:04.200 --> 0:28:07.800 and then during the Second World War, Kilroy became so 0:28:08.000 --> 0:28:12.159 popular that this graffiti could be found everywhere. It was 0:28:12.200 --> 0:28:15.720 on shipholds, bathrooms, bridges, and it was painted on the 0:28:15.760 --> 0:28:19.760 shells of Air Force missiles. Its origins most likely come 0:28:19.840 --> 0:28:22.560 from a British cartoon and the name of an American 0:28:22.640 --> 0:28:27.280 shipyard inspector. The myths surrounding it are numerous, and they 0:28:27.320 --> 0:28:30.280 often center on a German belief that Kilroy was some 0:28:30.400 --> 0:28:34.679 kind of superspy who could go anywhere he pleased. Apparently, 0:28:34.720 --> 0:28:37.720 there are two Kilroy inscriptions hidden in the World War 0:28:37.760 --> 0:28:41.120 II Memorial in Washington, d c. And these were found 0:28:41.200 --> 0:28:44.280 tucked in the corners of both the Atlantic and Pacific 0:28:44.360 --> 0:28:48.200 sides of the memorial, and so the Satter Square was 0:28:48.320 --> 0:28:52.360 essentially the Kilroy was here of the Roman Empire. The 0:28:52.440 --> 0:28:56.120 square was found scrawled from Rome to Corinium, which is 0:28:56.160 --> 0:29:00.160 in modern England, to Dura Europos, which is modern Syria. 0:29:01.040 --> 0:29:04.640 It's unclear why this ancient meme was such a thing. 0:29:05.200 --> 0:29:07.560 Maybe it was the first meme ever. I guess it 0:29:07.600 --> 0:29:10.240 depends on what your definition of a meme is. To 0:29:10.320 --> 0:29:13.000 repeat what the square says. The words in the square 0:29:13.400 --> 0:29:18.320 are sator arepo, tenant, opera rotas the farmer arepo works 0:29:18.360 --> 0:29:21.400 on a plow. A repo is what's known as a 0:29:21.440 --> 0:29:25.400 haypax legomenon, which means it is a term of which 0:29:25.520 --> 0:29:28.720 only one instance of its use is recorded or can 0:29:28.760 --> 0:29:32.040 be found. This means that the Satter Square is the 0:29:32.120 --> 0:29:35.520 only place where the word arepo shows up in the 0:29:35.720 --> 0:29:39.959 entire corpus of Latin literature. The best working theory as 0:29:40.040 --> 0:29:42.840 to why this is is that it's a proper name, 0:29:42.920 --> 0:29:47.400 invented only to make the square work. But the Satar 0:29:47.440 --> 0:29:51.240 square has more tricks up its sleeve. If you reshuffle 0:29:51.280 --> 0:29:53.960 the letters around the central end, which was in the 0:29:53.960 --> 0:29:57.800 word tenant, you can make a Greek cross that reads 0:29:58.240 --> 0:30:02.360 pator noster in both the and This means our father 0:30:03.160 --> 0:30:06.880 I mean, come on, so clever, and then the four 0:30:06.960 --> 0:30:11.080 leftover letters, the two a's and two o's. Those stand 0:30:11.120 --> 0:30:15.480 for alpha and omega. Early Christians might have used the 0:30:15.520 --> 0:30:18.480 square as a discreete way to signal their presence to 0:30:18.480 --> 0:30:22.120 one another, and the Satar square stuck around for a 0:30:22.280 --> 0:30:25.600 very very long time. In the Middle Ages, it was 0:30:25.640 --> 0:30:29.240 regarded as a magical object, gaining a reputation as a 0:30:29.280 --> 0:30:34.360 talisman against fire, theft, and illness. The devil apparently gets 0:30:34.400 --> 0:30:38.520 confused by palindromes, so with the devil not knowing which 0:30:38.520 --> 0:30:42.440 way to read, a five x five two dimensional palindrome 0:30:42.600 --> 0:30:46.840 is an extra powerful devil repellent. The Satar square also 0:30:46.880 --> 0:30:50.960 appears etched into tablets as a prevention against mad dogs, 0:30:51.080 --> 0:30:54.640 a snake bite cure, and a charm to protect cattle 0:30:54.720 --> 0:30:59.960 from witchcraft. While word squares have maintained their quasi mail 0:31:00.040 --> 0:31:03.760 magic reputation for hundreds of years to come. Other visual 0:31:03.760 --> 0:31:07.320 word games also became popular during the nineteenth century. In 0:31:07.360 --> 0:31:12.280 the Victorian era, visual word games became extremely popular. These 0:31:12.400 --> 0:31:16.040 visual word games include double acrostics, which paved the way 0:31:16.080 --> 0:31:20.040 pretty directly for the crossword. Queen Victoria I guess was 0:31:20.080 --> 0:31:25.720 regarded as a crucioverbialist, which apparently means a person skillful 0:31:25.800 --> 0:31:30.600 in creating or solving crossword puzzles. In researching all of this, 0:31:30.800 --> 0:31:33.360 I have learned many English words. I had no idea 0:31:33.720 --> 0:31:37.880 or even words to begin with. So crucioverbalist Queen Victoria 0:31:38.000 --> 0:31:41.239 constructed what's known as the Windsor Enigma to teach her 0:31:41.360 --> 0:31:45.040 subject how to bring coals to Newcastle. In her eighteen 0:31:45.120 --> 0:31:49.720 sixty one book Victorian Enigmas, author Charlotte Eliza Cappell a 0:31:49.800 --> 0:31:53.040 tribute to the Windsor Enigma puzzle to Queen Victoria. The 0:31:53.120 --> 0:31:56.000 Queen was known to be fond of riddles and enigmas. 0:31:56.400 --> 0:31:59.680 One hoax apparently kept her occupied for half a week. 0:32:00.400 --> 0:32:03.280 From a passage from the Private Life of the Queen 0:32:03.560 --> 0:32:06.600 by quote one of Her Majesty's servants, written in eighteen 0:32:06.680 --> 0:32:11.920 ninety seven, quote, her Majesty, Queen Victoria takes delight in 0:32:12.040 --> 0:32:15.920 a clever riddle or rebus, but on one occasion she 0:32:16.080 --> 0:32:19.200 was very angry at having been hoaxed over a riddle 0:32:19.520 --> 0:32:21.520 which was sent to her with a letter to the 0:32:21.560 --> 0:32:24.520 effect that it had been made by the Bishop of Salisbury. 0:32:25.200 --> 0:32:28.760 For four days, the Queen and Prince Albert sought for 0:32:28.800 --> 0:32:33.080 the reply. When Charles Murray, controller of the household, was 0:32:33.120 --> 0:32:35.960 directed to write to the bishop and ask for the solution. 0:32:36.720 --> 0:32:39.720 The answer received was that the bishop had not made 0:32:39.720 --> 0:32:41.800 the riddle nor could he solve it. 0:32:42.440 --> 0:32:43.000 End quote. 0:32:43.920 --> 0:32:48.080 Okay, Queen, we love feminism anyway. The Windsor enigma was 0:32:48.120 --> 0:32:50.320 basically like a riddle. And this is what it said 0:32:51.400 --> 0:32:56.080 the Windsor enigma. The initials of the following places formed 0:32:56.120 --> 0:32:59.240 the name of a town in England, and the finals 0:32:59.520 --> 0:33:03.360 read up words what that town is famous for. And 0:33:03.400 --> 0:33:06.920 these are the nine clues in this enigma. A city 0:33:06.920 --> 0:33:10.560 in Italy, a river in Germany, a town in the 0:33:10.680 --> 0:33:15.320 United States, a town in North America, a town in Holland, 0:33:15.880 --> 0:33:21.840 the Turkish name for Constantinople, a town in Bosnia. I 0:33:21.880 --> 0:33:23.959 wasn't saying that with the list. It's not Bosnia. It's 0:33:23.960 --> 0:33:29.920 spelled Bothnia, just fy. A city in Greece, a circle 0:33:30.080 --> 0:33:33.680 on the globe. So when you solve these nine clues, 0:33:33.760 --> 0:33:36.440 the nine letters which are on the left hand side 0:33:36.520 --> 0:33:40.320 of these answers, it spells out Newcastle, and then on 0:33:40.360 --> 0:33:43.280 the right side it says coal mines. When you read 0:33:43.320 --> 0:33:45.680 it from the bottom to the top, as the riddle 0:33:45.720 --> 0:33:49.680 says to do so, Newcastle's famous for its coal mines. 0:33:51.000 --> 0:33:53.280 You know what else is famous for its coal mines? 0:33:54.560 --> 0:33:56.400 I can't actually answer that question. I have no idea, 0:33:56.520 --> 0:34:11.880 but here's some ads. Okay, we're back. So. Another old 0:34:11.920 --> 0:34:15.000 word game, which was a precursor to the crossword, is 0:34:15.040 --> 0:34:19.680 a game called doublets. It was invented by Oxford mathematician 0:34:19.960 --> 0:34:24.200 Charles Dogson, who was better known by his pseudonym Lewis Carroll. 0:34:24.960 --> 0:34:28.120 In this game, you transform one word into another of 0:34:28.160 --> 0:34:31.719 equal length, changing a single letter at a time, using 0:34:31.760 --> 0:34:35.359 as few moves as possible. All the linking steps also 0:34:35.480 --> 0:34:38.880 have to be legitimate words. A lot of modern puzzle 0:34:38.880 --> 0:34:41.120 books have doublets in them, including a bunch of the 0:34:41.120 --> 0:34:44.040 ones that I have, and they're pretty fun. As in 0:34:44.080 --> 0:34:47.600 a crossword, the process of moving stepwise letter to letter 0:34:47.880 --> 0:34:51.320 forces you to think about all the possible word combinations, 0:34:51.800 --> 0:34:54.560 and each doublet has a theme, a kind of mini 0:34:54.600 --> 0:34:57.879 alchemy that keeps the words all somehow related to each other. 0:34:58.719 --> 0:35:02.600 And Charles Doxon's are Lewis Carroll's eighteen eighty book Doublets 0:35:02.640 --> 0:35:05.520 a word Puzzle. There are examples of this where he 0:35:05.600 --> 0:35:11.040 says to quote, drive pig into sty raise four to five, 0:35:12.040 --> 0:35:17.120 make wheat into bread. So the idea is that those 0:35:17.640 --> 0:35:19.960 words become the other one with a couple of changes. 0:35:20.719 --> 0:35:24.560 A classic classic word puzzle. And we're inching closer and 0:35:24.600 --> 0:35:27.400 closer to how the crossword came to be, and the 0:35:27.440 --> 0:35:32.040 crossword came about when riddles entered the grid. Crossword clues 0:35:32.200 --> 0:35:36.520 trace their origins to riddles. Riddles have been around since 0:35:36.560 --> 0:35:38.760 the dawn of time and can be found in basically 0:35:38.760 --> 0:35:41.880 every religious book, in ar scene, in mythology, in literature 0:35:41.920 --> 0:35:46.120 for centuries and centuries. The Exeter Book is an eleventh 0:35:46.120 --> 0:35:49.720 century Old English manuscript and it's the largest and perhaps 0:35:49.880 --> 0:35:54.200 oldest known manuscript of old English literature, containing about a 0:35:54.280 --> 0:35:57.640 sixth of all the Old English poetry that has survived 0:35:57.680 --> 0:36:01.600 until today. That's a lot. And it has about one 0:36:01.680 --> 0:36:05.799 hundred riddles of all types. They say there are quote 0:36:05.880 --> 0:36:09.319 unquote about one hundred because these riddles still to this 0:36:09.480 --> 0:36:14.160 day drive people crazy. In the ten centuries since their composition, 0:36:14.480 --> 0:36:19.400 scholars haven't conclusively solved every riddle. There are four basic 0:36:19.440 --> 0:36:25.440 ways that quote riddle logic operates. One true riddles, two wordplay, 0:36:25.840 --> 0:36:31.040 three neck riddles and four anti riddles. The enigma, which 0:36:31.080 --> 0:36:34.160 is a metaphorical statement that's designed to feel like it 0:36:34.160 --> 0:36:38.440 has one solution but actually contains unresolvable multitudes, is different 0:36:38.440 --> 0:36:41.520 than this. The word enigma comes from a Greek word 0:36:41.560 --> 0:36:45.000 that means quote to speak in riddles. It applies to 0:36:45.120 --> 0:36:49.120 things as well as people that puzzle one's mind. Examples 0:36:49.120 --> 0:36:52.040 of enigmas can be Egypt's ancient pyramids and how the 0:36:52.040 --> 0:36:55.480 hell they were built, Amelia Earhart going poof, or the 0:36:55.640 --> 0:37:01.080 Bermuda Triangle being weird. Plenty of enigma occur in modern 0:37:01.120 --> 0:37:04.120 times too. One example that people point to of this 0:37:04.400 --> 0:37:07.600 is the twenty fourteen disappearance of the Malaysia Airlines Flight 0:37:07.719 --> 0:37:12.400 three seventy. On March eighth, twenty fourteen, the airplane departed 0:37:12.480 --> 0:37:16.840 Kuala Lumpur. It was bound for Beijing, China, but thirty 0:37:16.920 --> 0:37:21.360 nine minutes after takeoff, the plane disappeared. It quite literally 0:37:21.480 --> 0:37:26.040 vanished without a trace, becoming one of aviation's greatest mysteries, 0:37:26.840 --> 0:37:30.480 and over a decade later, investigators still do not know 0:37:30.560 --> 0:37:33.280 exactly what happened to the plane and its two hundred 0:37:33.320 --> 0:37:36.439 and thirty nine passengers. But just a few months ago 0:37:36.440 --> 0:37:39.440 In March of twenty twenty four, Malaysia's government said it 0:37:39.520 --> 0:37:42.640 may renew the hunt for MH three seventy after an 0:37:42.680 --> 0:37:45.800 American marine robotics company that tried to find the plane 0:37:45.800 --> 0:37:50.840 in twenty eighteen proposed a fresh search. A massive multinational 0:37:50.880 --> 0:37:53.600 search at the time in the southern Indian Ocean where 0:37:53.640 --> 0:37:57.800 the jet is believed to have crashed, found nothing apart 0:37:57.840 --> 0:38:02.800 from some small fragments that later won. Nobodies or wregage 0:38:03.040 --> 0:38:08.600 have ever been found spooky, so that's an enigma. Examples 0:38:08.640 --> 0:38:11.640 of enigmas with word puzzles could be something like what 0:38:11.760 --> 0:38:15.480 is the sound of one hand clapping? These are logic 0:38:15.560 --> 0:38:20.560 knots that want to stay knotted or not solved. Uh huh, 0:38:21.239 --> 0:38:25.440 there's another little pun for you or riddle anyway. Riddles, 0:38:25.440 --> 0:38:28.400 on the other hand, do want to be solved. A 0:38:28.480 --> 0:38:31.800 true riddle one of these four basic ways that riddle 0:38:31.800 --> 0:38:37.520 logic operates transforms think a into solution B. True riddles 0:38:37.560 --> 0:38:41.000 rely on a logical connection that's not obvious on the surface, 0:38:41.480 --> 0:38:43.600 so you need to think more deeply about it and 0:38:43.719 --> 0:38:47.399 maybe a non conventional or non literal way in order 0:38:47.480 --> 0:38:51.520 to reach the solution. When riddles become baked into culture, 0:38:51.719 --> 0:38:55.960 they can turn into like inside jokes. Riddles have been 0:38:56.000 --> 0:38:59.800 around for millennia, and the best riddles have been repeated 0:38:59.840 --> 0:39:03.799 for just as long. One quote unquote famous riddle, if 0:39:03.840 --> 0:39:07.480 you will, is the sphinx's riddle in Greek mythology. Just 0:39:07.520 --> 0:39:10.120 some background on the Greek sphinx, because I personally found 0:39:10.120 --> 0:39:13.600 it fascinating and very interesting. But the Greek sphinx was 0:39:13.640 --> 0:39:17.680 clearly inspired by the Egyptian sphinx, but the Greeks modified 0:39:17.680 --> 0:39:21.000 the sphinx and made it their own. The Greek sphinx 0:39:21.480 --> 0:39:24.480 had a woman's face and breasts and a lion's body 0:39:24.640 --> 0:39:27.920 with bird's wings, while the Egyptian sphinx had a male 0:39:28.040 --> 0:39:31.319 head which could be either human or animal. The word 0:39:31.400 --> 0:39:35.840 sphinx is Greek and it means quote strangler, perhaps stemming 0:39:35.840 --> 0:39:39.000 from the fact that lionesses usually kill their prey by 0:39:39.040 --> 0:39:43.319 strangling it. Since sphinxes were seen as very intimidating, the 0:39:43.360 --> 0:39:46.799 Greeks frequently put them on gravestones to frighten a way 0:39:46.880 --> 0:39:52.160 would be grave robbers. This use is called apotropaeic, meaning 0:39:52.400 --> 0:39:56.040 causing someone to turn away. Most of the examples of 0:39:56.120 --> 0:39:59.760 ancient Greek sphinxes that we have today are from ancient 0:39:59.760 --> 0:40:03.840 Great Gavestones. So in Greek mythology, there was one famous 0:40:03.880 --> 0:40:07.359 sphinx who turned up in Thebes shortly after its king 0:40:07.760 --> 0:40:10.720 Lias had been killed. While on his way to consult 0:40:10.760 --> 0:40:14.560 the Delphic oracle. This sphinx flew on top of the 0:40:14.600 --> 0:40:18.040 city walls and asked all the theban youths a riddle. 0:40:18.960 --> 0:40:22.640 When they could not answer it, she ate them. Feminism 0:40:23.360 --> 0:40:27.080 strikes again. At the time, Creon was the region in 0:40:27.160 --> 0:40:30.480 Thebes since Lias had died, and he was so desperate 0:40:30.480 --> 0:40:32.640 to get rid of the sphinx that he promised the 0:40:32.760 --> 0:40:36.319 kingship and the hand of the widowed queen Jocasta, who 0:40:36.400 --> 0:40:39.600 also happened to be his sister in marriage to anyone 0:40:39.640 --> 0:40:43.760 who could solve the sphinx's riddle. This was the sphinx's riddle, 0:40:44.520 --> 0:40:46.520 which you may have heard before, which is why I 0:40:46.520 --> 0:40:50.160 said it was quote unquote famous. What goes on four 0:40:50.239 --> 0:40:53.800 feet in the morning, two feet in midday, and three 0:40:53.840 --> 0:40:57.880 feet in the evening In the myth around this time, 0:40:58.000 --> 0:41:02.080 Oedipus came into Thebes and he solved the riddle. Oedipus said, 0:41:02.400 --> 0:41:05.960 the answer is man, because a man crawls on all 0:41:06.000 --> 0:41:08.160 fours in the mornings of his life, he walks on 0:41:08.239 --> 0:41:10.440 two feet in the mid day of his life, and 0:41:10.480 --> 0:41:13.120 then he uses a cane for extra support when he 0:41:13.239 --> 0:41:16.719 is old. The sphinx was so upset that Oedipus had 0:41:16.760 --> 0:41:19.640 answered the riddle correctly that she threw herself down from 0:41:19.680 --> 0:41:24.040 the walls of thieves and she died. You know what, else, 0:41:24.120 --> 0:41:28.680 died my soul when I realized we need ads to 0:41:28.719 --> 0:41:43.880 make money. So here you go. Okay, we're back. We 0:41:43.880 --> 0:41:47.160 were talking about types of riddles again. There are four 0:41:47.200 --> 0:41:51.760 basic ways that riddle logic operates, true riddles, wordplay, neck riddles, 0:41:51.760 --> 0:41:54.480 and anti riddles. And we talked about the true riddles 0:41:54.480 --> 0:41:57.240 before the break, and so now let's talk about word 0:41:57.239 --> 0:42:00.520 play riddles. A word play riddle does this same thing 0:42:00.600 --> 0:42:03.400 as a true riddle, but it adds an extra layer 0:42:03.440 --> 0:42:07.080 of trickiness to it. So it's thing A turning into 0:42:07.239 --> 0:42:10.160 solution B. But there is a slight catch in between 0:42:10.200 --> 0:42:13.759 that has to interrupt the pathway between those things. First, 0:42:14.320 --> 0:42:18.680 wordplay riddles include puns and other bits of linguistic gymnastics 0:42:18.800 --> 0:42:21.960 to take the anticipated answer to the next step. A 0:42:22.080 --> 0:42:25.160 ribis is an example of a wordplay riddle which uses 0:42:25.280 --> 0:42:28.120 letters as part of the clue. A ribis is a 0:42:28.120 --> 0:42:31.520 puzzle device in which words are represented by combinations of 0:42:31.600 --> 0:42:36.120 letters and pictures. A neck riddle gives a solution that 0:42:36.120 --> 0:42:39.879 would be impossible for the solve to arrive at without context, 0:42:40.000 --> 0:42:45.400 so question mark equals b. The term neck riddle comes 0:42:45.400 --> 0:42:48.239 from stories in which the hero of the story uses 0:42:48.280 --> 0:42:51.840 an unsolvable riddle to outwit a judge or a monster 0:42:51.960 --> 0:42:56.360 and save himself from being hanged. So a neck riddle 0:42:56.840 --> 0:42:57.719 saves your neck. 0:42:58.520 --> 0:42:58.800 Wow. 0:43:00.000 --> 0:43:03.760 This is one typical folk tale example. As I walked 0:43:03.800 --> 0:43:06.520 out and in again from the dead the living came, 0:43:07.120 --> 0:43:10.440 six there is, and seven there'll be. So tell me 0:43:10.480 --> 0:43:14.359 this riddle or set me free. You're probably never gonna 0:43:14.360 --> 0:43:16.000 get this answer unless you've heard it before. But the 0:43:16.040 --> 0:43:20.480 answer is a horse's skull that contains a bird hatching eggs. 0:43:20.880 --> 0:43:25.719 Six have hatched, but one is still to come. What. 0:43:26.760 --> 0:43:29.560 So a neck riddle has an answer that's so specific 0:43:29.719 --> 0:43:35.359 it's deeply unsatisfying, because that's precisely the point. After all, 0:43:35.440 --> 0:43:38.279 it's not meant to actually be solvable. It has to 0:43:38.320 --> 0:43:40.600 stump the other person or in this case a judge 0:43:40.640 --> 0:43:43.280 or a monster to ensure that you or the hero 0:43:43.440 --> 0:43:47.680 gets off scot free. Often that's achieved through over precision, 0:43:48.040 --> 0:43:50.919 but sometimes a change in perspective will do the trick. 0:43:51.760 --> 0:43:55.400 In the Hobbit, our hero Bilbo Baggins best Scullum in 0:43:55.440 --> 0:43:58.799 a riddle contest by asking him the unknowable what's in 0:43:58.840 --> 0:44:02.760 my pocket? And then there's the anti riddle. An anti 0:44:02.840 --> 0:44:05.360 riddle is one that tricks the reader because it looks 0:44:05.400 --> 0:44:07.960 like a riddle, but it's actually not a riddle at all. 0:44:08.480 --> 0:44:12.560 It's basically a equals a For example, why did the 0:44:12.680 --> 0:44:15.680 chicken cross the road? Seems like a riddle, but the 0:44:15.760 --> 0:44:18.319 answer to get to the other side is just the 0:44:18.440 --> 0:44:24.200 literal answer. So, in conclusion, a word grid and a 0:44:24.239 --> 0:44:28.200 bunch of riddles. Those two things are what evolved over 0:44:28.280 --> 0:44:30.640 time and over the centuries to bring us what we 0:44:30.719 --> 0:44:35.319 know today as the crossword puzzle. Authorn Adrian Raffel, who 0:44:35.400 --> 0:44:39.319 wrote the book Thinking Inside the Box Adventures with Crosswords 0:44:39.320 --> 0:44:42.200 of the puzzling people who can't live without them, wrote 0:44:42.239 --> 0:44:46.200 in The Paris Review in twenty twenty quote, if you're 0:44:46.239 --> 0:44:49.600 a piece of artificial intelligence software, you might have a 0:44:49.600 --> 0:44:52.880 hard time solving a crossword, you'd have to separate the 0:44:52.880 --> 0:44:56.080 puzzle into two separate strands of problems to tackle the 0:44:56.160 --> 0:44:59.880 issue how to figure out what a clue was saying, 0:45:00.200 --> 0:45:03.640 or rather what it's precisely not saying, and how to 0:45:03.680 --> 0:45:05.719 fill the letters in the grid in the way that 0:45:05.840 --> 0:45:10.040 makes the most sense. Crosswords force the brain to cross 0:45:10.040 --> 0:45:14.000 wires and solve both these problems at once, balancing the 0:45:14.080 --> 0:45:16.919 visual spatial part of the brain with the logic run 0:45:17.120 --> 0:45:20.120 part of the brain. This is part of the reason 0:45:20.239 --> 0:45:23.360 why even the best crossword solving AI in the world 0:45:23.560 --> 0:45:27.279 isn't yet better than the best human. The AI can 0:45:27.360 --> 0:45:30.279 fill in the grid pretty quickly, but in terms of 0:45:30.360 --> 0:45:34.440 resolving that grid through riddle logic, humans are still a 0:45:34.480 --> 0:45:38.600 step ahead. The most innovative aspect of the crossword is that, 0:45:39.000 --> 0:45:42.640 through braiding together tasks the mind already wanted to do, 0:45:43.160 --> 0:45:46.279 it created an itch we didn't know we had, and 0:45:46.400 --> 0:45:51.080 yet we've always been primed to solve them. End quote. 0:45:52.480 --> 0:45:55.520 And that is just a beautiful way to end this episode. 0:45:55.960 --> 0:45:59.600 So that's it. That's the crossword. I'm going to go 0:45:59.600 --> 0:46:03.239 do a cross word right now, because why not. I 0:46:03.320 --> 0:46:05.759 told you I needed things to do in the beginning 0:46:05.760 --> 0:46:07.319 of this episode, and this is my thing to do 0:46:07.840 --> 0:46:10.760 that does not include scrolling on my phone and wanting 0:46:10.800 --> 0:46:24.880 to die. So will that bye? 0:46:29.239 --> 0:46:32.480 Welcome to it could happen here a podcast about it 0:46:32.920 --> 0:46:37.000 happening here. It being the slow crumbling of the old 0:46:37.040 --> 0:46:41.000 world and the painful birth of the new. And here 0:46:41.040 --> 0:46:43.760 to talk about the painful birth of the new world 0:46:43.880 --> 0:46:46.560 is someone who was compared to me very recently born, 0:46:46.760 --> 0:46:49.560 Garrison Davis. How are you doing, gare good? 0:46:49.680 --> 0:46:49.919 Good? 0:46:50.239 --> 0:46:52.640 As a new member of the KHive nation, I have 0:46:52.719 --> 0:46:54.040 a new life under me now. 0:46:54.719 --> 0:46:59.000 Yeah, you've embraced the kamala of it all and are 0:46:59.120 --> 0:47:01.840 now just a are now just vibing? Yeah, it's a 0:47:01.840 --> 0:47:02.759 beautiful place to be. 0:47:03.400 --> 0:47:03.640 Yeah. 0:47:03.719 --> 0:47:08.160 Unfortunately it might be just as a delusional as Biden's 0:47:08.160 --> 0:47:10.479 own insistence that he should be the one to run. 0:47:10.760 --> 0:47:13.120 And that's kind of what we're talking about here today. 0:47:13.640 --> 0:47:16.560 Oh good, I love delusion and its impact on American 0:47:16.640 --> 0:47:17.440 political life. 0:47:18.600 --> 0:47:23.640 So our initial post debate comments were a little bit frenzied, 0:47:23.680 --> 0:47:27.120 a little bit chaotic, as was the debate, I suppose, 0:47:27.680 --> 0:47:31.360 and post debate polls were also just kind of a 0:47:31.400 --> 0:47:35.240 mess initially, with wildly differing results from source to source, 0:47:35.760 --> 0:47:38.920 but over time they have since stabilized and kind of 0:47:38.960 --> 0:47:42.840 synced up to like seccifically put it, essentially, the debate 0:47:43.160 --> 0:47:46.920 undid most of the pro Biden shifts that had happened 0:47:46.920 --> 0:47:48.680 in the wake of Trump's felony conviction. 0:47:49.400 --> 0:47:53.280 Yeah, and I've seen some polls have shown it tightening 0:47:53.360 --> 0:47:56.359 up a little bit again, but it's very I mean, 0:47:57.280 --> 0:48:01.799 I always wonder, like how much you've got kind of 0:48:01.880 --> 0:48:05.080 two camps, broadly speaking in terms of the people who 0:48:05.120 --> 0:48:08.920 seem like they're not completely insane. One of them is 0:48:09.360 --> 0:48:12.280 kind of the Nate Silver side of things, which shows 0:48:12.520 --> 0:48:16.600 Biden as having fallen fairly far behind and having you know, 0:48:16.840 --> 0:48:19.680 he's got Biden about a thirty percent chance, which is 0:48:20.200 --> 0:48:24.040 where Trump was in twenty sixteen, so that doesn't mean zero. 0:48:24.840 --> 0:48:27.759 Whereas the new five thirty eight polling average, and I 0:48:27.920 --> 0:48:31.600 kind of have been following their new head of statistics 0:48:31.680 --> 0:48:34.800 for a while, has it still close to a dead heat. 0:48:35.239 --> 0:48:38.480 And then obviously, you know, there's arguments that people will 0:48:38.520 --> 0:48:41.600 make that trumpet or that Biden is actually very far behind, 0:48:42.200 --> 0:48:44.760 which have more to it than the arguments that Biden 0:48:45.000 --> 0:48:47.640 that Biden is going to win in a landslide the 0:48:47.719 --> 0:48:50.680 kind of democratic like the polls are wrong entirely. I 0:48:50.719 --> 0:48:53.359 don't think that's likely, but I think we're looking at 0:48:53.880 --> 0:48:59.560 somewhere between Biden as a definite like underdog, or more 0:48:59.680 --> 0:49:03.360 or less tied. I guess that's where it seems to me. 0:49:03.520 --> 0:49:05.440 Like the evidence still is yep. 0:49:05.680 --> 0:49:09.360 A USA Today Suffolk University poll conducted immediately after the 0:49:09.400 --> 0:49:13.240 debate gave Trump a four point boost. The week after 0:49:13.400 --> 0:49:16.240 the debate, a New York Times Siena poll found Trump's 0:49:16.280 --> 0:49:19.120 lead had increased by three percent, now leading by six 0:49:19.160 --> 0:49:22.040 points with lately voters. Other questions were pulled in the 0:49:22.040 --> 0:49:24.840 wake of the debate. A CNN poll found that seventy 0:49:24.840 --> 0:49:26.799 five percent of Democrats believe the party would have a 0:49:26.800 --> 0:49:29.080 better chance at defeating Trump with a candidate to other 0:49:29.160 --> 0:49:33.200 than Biden. And overall, yes, his number dropped or kind 0:49:33.239 --> 0:49:37.080 of coasted with what it had been in like, you know, April, 0:49:37.600 --> 0:49:41.920 March February, and according to Politico, other than Trump in 0:49:41.960 --> 0:49:45.799 twenty twenty, no incumbent has trailed this far behind in 0:49:45.960 --> 0:49:49.440 horse race polling since Jimmy Carter's reelection bid forty four 0:49:49.520 --> 0:49:52.360 years ago, which does not make me feel super optimistic. 0:49:52.880 --> 0:49:57.320 It's not great, and man, it would be. I suspect 0:49:57.400 --> 0:49:59.720 the polls are still over emphasizing it to a degree 0:49:59.719 --> 0:50:02.279 because if if Biden losing by six percent would be 0:50:02.360 --> 0:50:05.240 like the big the worst performance of a Democrat totally, 0:50:05.840 --> 0:50:08.759 like a generation, like in a long, long time, and 0:50:08.800 --> 0:50:12.160 I just don't believe it's going to be that far off. 0:50:12.280 --> 0:50:15.800 But like it is. Definitely things are a lot uglier 0:50:15.840 --> 0:50:19.160 than they were when we recorded our last horse race episode, right, 0:50:19.239 --> 0:50:23.240 Like the debate was somewhere between pretty bad and catastrophe 0:50:23.440 --> 0:50:25.720 in terms of its impact on the polls. 0:50:26.040 --> 0:50:30.120 Absolutely, but Trump, what Trump actually gained himself as a 0:50:30.120 --> 0:50:33.399 candidate is not very much. It's mostly it's mostly, it's 0:50:33.400 --> 0:50:37.400 mostly decreases on Biden. And five pollsters did pre and 0:50:37.480 --> 0:50:40.720 post debate polls, and Trump is gaining on the margin, 0:50:40.960 --> 0:50:43.880 but in none of the polls did he gain anything 0:50:43.880 --> 0:50:46.320 more than a four point swing. So they're all pretty 0:50:46.360 --> 0:50:49.360 consistent and it's not all the end of the world 0:50:49.360 --> 0:50:52.120 here either. A poll released last Saturday by Bloomberg and 0:50:52.160 --> 0:50:56.440 Morning Console showed Biden narrowing Trump's post debate lead, specifically 0:50:56.480 --> 0:50:59.560 in swing states, with only a two percent difference between 0:50:59.600 --> 0:51:03.000 all seven in swing states, with Biden being ahead in 0:51:03.040 --> 0:51:06.720 Michigan and Wisconsin. Yeah, two percent is within that margin 0:51:06.760 --> 0:51:09.480 of error, So things are also starting to level up 0:51:09.520 --> 0:51:09.959 over time. 0:51:11.080 --> 0:51:14.160 Yeah, And I think some of this may have to 0:51:14.200 --> 0:51:17.000 do We're going to talk a bit about Project twenty 0:51:17.080 --> 0:51:20.640 twenty five, which I tend to think, and we've been 0:51:20.680 --> 0:51:24.160 chatting about this online all week in our work chat. 0:51:24.719 --> 0:51:28.240 People are overemphasizing as opposed to what Trump is because 0:51:28.480 --> 0:51:32.840 Agenda Project twenty twenty five is basically a blueprint for 0:51:32.880 --> 0:51:35.880 a Christian fascist takeover of the US, published by the 0:51:35.920 --> 0:51:38.359 Heritage Foundation, and a lot of people who have been 0:51:38.360 --> 0:51:42.520 affiliated with Trump, who were in his administration last time, 0:51:43.040 --> 0:51:46.040 have are on board with it, have talked about it, 0:51:46.080 --> 0:51:49.359 have boosted it, So people are obviously scared of it. 0:51:49.880 --> 0:51:53.200 I think what Trump is actually promised to do in office, 0:51:53.320 --> 0:51:55.279 which is the Agenda forty seven, we did a whole 0:51:55.320 --> 0:51:59.160 week of stuff on it, is a more realistic thing 0:51:59.239 --> 0:52:02.040 to be afraid of. But either way, I think that 0:52:02.120 --> 0:52:05.560 some of that tightening is probably a mix of you've 0:52:05.560 --> 0:52:08.000 got everywhere, you had a bunch of kind of on 0:52:08.040 --> 0:52:11.240 the fence, voters swing away from Biden because he performed 0:52:11.239 --> 0:52:14.840 so badly in the debate, and then it has dims 0:52:14.840 --> 0:52:18.400 have done a pretty intensive job of spreading out a 0:52:18.440 --> 0:52:20.320 lot of you know, what you might call fear porn 0:52:20.480 --> 0:52:23.120 over a fascist takeover of the country, and I think 0:52:23.120 --> 0:52:26.120 that's part of why things might be tightening back up. 0:52:27.160 --> 0:52:30.080 I mean, it would be nice to eventually, one year 0:52:30.719 --> 0:52:34.040 vote vote for something instead of just be voting against something. 0:52:34.239 --> 0:52:36.120 But again, I'm not sure if we'll ever get to 0:52:36.160 --> 0:52:39.480 that point to get yeah. 0:52:38.440 --> 0:52:41.000 Hasn't happened yet. Well no, no, no, I mean I was. 0:52:41.200 --> 0:52:43.640 I remember I got to vote for Obama the first 0:52:43.719 --> 0:52:46.279 time he ran, and it was hard not to be optimistic. 0:52:47.640 --> 0:52:50.040 So immediately after the debate, we had a whole bunch 0:52:50.120 --> 0:52:53.759 of like friends of Biden, kind of upper level democrat, 0:52:54.520 --> 0:52:57.560 not like online influencers, but like actual like influential, like 0:52:57.560 --> 0:53:01.239 like pundits and people you know, call for perhaps Biden 0:53:01.239 --> 0:53:04.040 should step down, perhaps we should find somebody else. And 0:53:04.080 --> 0:53:07.080 this has kind of been the ongoing post debate ever 0:53:07.160 --> 0:53:11.520 since the debate has been this question and we'll we'll 0:53:11.560 --> 0:53:13.520 kind of get to this a little bit more later. Honestly, 0:53:13.560 --> 0:53:15.560 I think we had a stronger chance at this possibility 0:53:15.800 --> 0:53:18.759 a week or two ago. I think by now Democrats 0:53:18.760 --> 0:53:21.800 have largely kind of closed ranks around Biden, but this 0:53:21.920 --> 0:53:25.120 is definitely still developing. And I've been keeping up with 0:53:25.160 --> 0:53:28.240 all of Biden's appearances in the media since the debate 0:53:28.320 --> 0:53:30.160 just because I've been interested to see how he will 0:53:30.160 --> 0:53:34.080 handle this kind of universal flub. I watched his ABC 0:53:34.200 --> 0:53:38.480 interview and his recent phone calls into various morning news shows. 0:53:39.320 --> 0:53:42.040 In all of those, he did not perform especially well 0:53:42.760 --> 0:53:45.520 as expected. They were slow and sometimes kind of like mumbly, 0:53:46.120 --> 0:53:48.400 But neither have they been like the death blow to 0:53:48.440 --> 0:53:53.520 his campaign needed to finalize the shift to an alternative candidate. Instead, 0:53:53.560 --> 0:53:56.600 we're just kind of coasting along with this general uncertainty 0:53:56.880 --> 0:54:01.120 regarding the Democratic candidacy, and meanwhile, Biden is just continuing 0:54:01.160 --> 0:54:03.480 to affirm that he will be the one to lead 0:54:03.480 --> 0:54:05.759 the ticket. I'm gonna quote from Washington Post here. 0:54:05.840 --> 0:54:06.200 Quote. 0:54:06.280 --> 0:54:09.720 As of Sunday, nine House Democrats, four privately and five publicly, 0:54:10.040 --> 0:54:12.080 had called for Biden to exit the race. In addition, 0:54:12.080 --> 0:54:15.279 at least to eighteen current and former top Democrats as 0:54:15.320 --> 0:54:18.279 of Saturday had publicly raised concerns about Biden's fitness for 0:54:18.360 --> 0:54:22.799 office and his ability to defeat Trump. Unquote, and it 0:54:22.880 --> 0:54:26.400 has remained the same since then. There's gonna be meetings 0:54:26.440 --> 0:54:28.520 in the next few days, including the day after we 0:54:28.600 --> 0:54:31.000 record this. We're recording this on Monday, so there's gonna 0:54:31.000 --> 0:54:33.480 be meetings in the Senate and in the House about 0:54:33.600 --> 0:54:35.880 kind of this issue. So this is definitely still developing, 0:54:35.920 --> 0:54:38.479 but you're starting to see more and more politicians fall 0:54:38.520 --> 0:54:40.920 into rank. AOC just put out a statement saying, no, 0:54:41.000 --> 0:54:43.839 we're gonna We're gonna all support Biden. So like there 0:54:43.920 --> 0:54:45.759 was this uncertainty for a while, and now I think 0:54:45.800 --> 0:54:47.640 people are kind of being told to, like, come on, 0:54:47.840 --> 0:54:52.200 get on the platform. Yeah, but Biden hasn't been handling 0:54:52.280 --> 0:54:55.320 this well like personally either. He's come across like very angry. 0:54:56.360 --> 0:54:59.400 No, the emails I've been getting from the Biden campaign 0:54:59.440 --> 0:55:02.320 have been he's been blaving podcasters. 0:55:02.360 --> 0:55:03.520 He's been blaming. 0:55:03.200 --> 0:55:06.000 Yeah, the media, and I'm kind of bummed that it's 0:55:06.000 --> 0:55:06.520 the pods. 0:55:06.600 --> 0:55:07.240 Save guys. 0:55:07.280 --> 0:55:10.120 He got angry. Yet we've been shitty to Joe Biden 0:55:10.160 --> 0:55:12.080 for so much longer than those assholes. 0:55:13.120 --> 0:55:15.799 Yeah, he's been treating it very weirdly. He's been doing 0:55:15.880 --> 0:55:18.200 a lot of like a denial of the polling he's 0:55:18.200 --> 0:55:20.719 been doing revisionist. 0:55:20.160 --> 0:55:22.439 History, very magical thinking. 0:55:22.600 --> 0:55:25.399 Regarding like twenty twenty polling. I think, I think kind 0:55:25.440 --> 0:55:28.360 of referencing the Democratic primary, but still the way that 0:55:28.400 --> 0:55:30.680 he's talking about it, it's making it sound like he, 0:55:30.880 --> 0:55:32.560 you know, like he was behind in the polls in 0:55:32.600 --> 0:55:35.600 twenty twenty. That was that Democrats were behind in the 0:55:35.640 --> 0:55:38.120 poles in twenty twenty two, which just wasn't true. The 0:55:38.160 --> 0:55:42.080 red wave comment was was certain pundits and Republicans trying 0:55:42.120 --> 0:55:44.640 to conjure a red wave, but the actual polls were 0:55:44.719 --> 0:55:47.240 very accurate in twenty twenty two. And he's also crediting 0:55:47.320 --> 0:55:50.719 himself for that red wave not happening in twenty twenty two. 0:55:50.960 --> 0:55:52.920 So he's been having a lot of weird statements, like 0:55:53.040 --> 0:55:57.040 blaming media and blaming the elites for trying to replace 0:55:57.080 --> 0:55:59.799 him on the ticket. I'll include one clip here from 0:56:00.160 --> 0:56:02.800 Morning Joe, come on, give me a break. 0:56:03.239 --> 0:56:05.600 I'm getting so frustrated, but by the Leaf. 0:56:06.080 --> 0:56:07.799 Now, I'm not talking about you guys, but about the 0:56:07.960 --> 0:56:09.920 Leaf in the party, who. 0:56:10.040 --> 0:56:11.480 They know so much more. 0:56:12.080 --> 0:56:14.080 With any of these guys, I don't think I should 0:56:14.360 --> 0:56:15.120 run against me. 0:56:16.800 --> 0:56:17.800 Announced for president. 0:56:18.320 --> 0:56:19.880 Challenge man the convention. 0:56:20.640 --> 0:56:24.080 Kind of his continuous line to justify his own candidacy 0:56:24.480 --> 0:56:28.560 is has been him claiming that he won the primary, 0:56:28.920 --> 0:56:31.400 which is a ridiculous thing to say as an incumbent, 0:56:31.520 --> 0:56:36.200 because like, come on, come on, and he has repeatedly 0:56:36.200 --> 0:56:38.920 said that that Democratic voters in the primaries have quote 0:56:38.960 --> 0:56:42.120 spoken clearly and decisively. They've chosen me to be the 0:56:42.120 --> 0:56:45.120 nominee of the party. That is not how it worked. 0:56:45.600 --> 0:56:46.080 Quote. 0:56:46.280 --> 0:56:49.239 Do we now just say that process didn't matter, that 0:56:49.400 --> 0:56:52.480 the voters don't have a say I declined to do that. 0:56:52.680 --> 0:56:53.880 How could we stand. 0:56:53.600 --> 0:56:55.759 For democracy in our nation if we ignore it in 0:56:55.800 --> 0:56:58.080 our own party. I cannot do that. I will not 0:56:58.200 --> 0:57:02.120 do that, unquote, which is just absurd, right because especially 0:57:02.120 --> 0:57:04.680 there was many people who actually voted in the Yeah, 0:57:04.880 --> 0:57:08.400 like a false primary for like the like other option. 0:57:08.920 --> 0:57:11.960 Yeah, I mean, but like poles, just like them. Seventy 0:57:12.000 --> 0:57:14.400 five percent of Americans would prefer to vote for someone 0:57:14.440 --> 0:57:15.280 besides Biden. 0:57:15.520 --> 0:57:16.800 Like it's it's. 0:57:16.680 --> 0:57:20.200 Absurd, especially when you're running like an uncontested as an incumbent. 0:57:20.440 --> 0:57:22.600 If you want people to challenge you, you could have 0:57:22.640 --> 0:57:26.000 said so, like it's come on, like this is there 0:57:26.120 --> 0:57:27.800 was there was no pretty goofy. 0:57:28.040 --> 0:57:30.800 No real primary for the dims, and there usually isn't. 0:57:30.840 --> 0:57:33.720 That's not abnormal with an incumbent, but in this case, 0:57:34.160 --> 0:57:37.480 people have severe questions about the incumbent's fitness to do 0:57:37.520 --> 0:57:40.080 the job in a physical way. Like I hate to 0:57:40.160 --> 0:57:44.320 say it, but like Trump might physically be better able 0:57:44.400 --> 0:57:47.560 to survive a four year term than Biden. Is you know, 0:57:47.680 --> 0:57:51.320 not that I think he's mentally a better president. Sure, 0:57:51.360 --> 0:57:54.160 I don't think honestly. Part of what we are accepting 0:57:54.160 --> 0:57:57.520 here is that, like that's so that doesn't really matter, right, 0:57:57.640 --> 0:58:00.479 Like we're all kind of acknowledging if you're on team 0:58:00.840 --> 0:58:05.080 anything but Trump because he might end the concept of 0:58:05.120 --> 0:58:08.280 democracy in this country, then you're accepting that, like, yeah, 0:58:08.440 --> 0:58:10.480 I am not. I am voting for a guy who 0:58:10.560 --> 0:58:14.160 probably can't really do the job anymore, and just assuming 0:58:14.160 --> 0:58:16.320 that the people around him will not be as evil 0:58:16.640 --> 0:58:18.680 like you do. Kind of have to accept that otherwise 0:58:18.720 --> 0:58:20.840 you're just lying to yourself about the state that Joe 0:58:20.880 --> 0:58:24.280 is in because he's not all there. He's not all 0:58:24.280 --> 0:58:25.640 there the way he was in twenty twenty. 0:58:26.360 --> 0:58:28.000 No, but do you know what still is here just 0:58:28.080 --> 0:58:29.760 like it was back in twenty twenty. 0:58:29.680 --> 0:58:32.480 Capitalism, Baby, We didn't manage to take it out even 0:58:32.520 --> 0:58:37.600 though we elected this our communist leader, Joseph Biden, chairman Joe. 0:58:39.440 --> 0:58:46.320 Enjoy these capitalism sponsored ads. 0:58:52.080 --> 0:58:53.280 All right, we are back. 0:58:54.160 --> 0:58:56.720 Yeah. So there was a report that came out from 0:58:57.320 --> 0:59:02.040 CHIP fifty, which is like an analytic project. It's like 0:59:02.080 --> 0:59:05.000 the Civic Health and Institution Project, So it's like a 0:59:05.040 --> 0:59:09.840 survey of all fifty US states, And they did a 0:59:09.920 --> 0:59:14.920 survey on like opinions of voters before and after the debate, 0:59:15.400 --> 0:59:19.160 and there showed like fairly small movement, like very little 0:59:19.280 --> 0:59:22.280 was changed at all in terms of like and primarily 0:59:22.280 --> 0:59:25.240 what was changed wasn't people going from Biden to Trump, 0:59:25.280 --> 0:59:29.960 but from people preferring from preferring Biden to preferring other right, 0:59:30.160 --> 0:59:34.440 like that someone else someone else right. And so that 0:59:34.480 --> 0:59:36.479 does kind of go back to what we're like, people 0:59:36.560 --> 0:59:39.800 are not making their minds up about Trump, like, and 0:59:39.880 --> 0:59:42.280 I think what the dims can do if Biden stays 0:59:42.280 --> 0:59:44.040 in and he doesn't seem like he's leaving. It seems 0:59:44.080 --> 0:59:47.640 like the primary thing that will make progress for them 0:59:47.840 --> 0:59:50.640 is hitting on how dangerous Trump having a second term 0:59:50.680 --> 0:59:54.440 will be. That seems to be what moves the needle, which. 0:59:54.240 --> 0:59:55.600 Is part of their current strategy. 0:59:55.640 --> 0:59:58.080 But the strategy is kind of all influx right now 0:59:58.640 --> 1:00:00.920 because of the poor performance the debate. They're trying to 1:00:00.960 --> 1:00:03.720 save face on Biden's part, as well as emphasizing that 1:00:03.760 --> 1:00:08.800 Trump is like a dangerous possibility. And again, like, even 1:00:08.800 --> 1:00:11.320 if Biden does decide to drop out or step down, 1:00:11.720 --> 1:00:13.920 He's going to keep saying he's running until literally the 1:00:14.000 --> 1:00:15.520 day that happens, right, because that is that is what 1:00:15.560 --> 1:00:17.520 you do as a politician. You were gonna you were 1:00:17.520 --> 1:00:20.160 gonna keep insisting it until one day you are no 1:00:20.240 --> 1:00:22.680 longer doing that, And that's just kind of how politics goes. 1:00:23.200 --> 1:00:27.400 But he has made continuous, continuous gestures towards the fact 1:00:27.440 --> 1:00:29.520 that he is he is going to stay. He has 1:00:29.520 --> 1:00:32.800 no plans on stepping down. He wants to win in November. 1:00:33.280 --> 1:00:36.120 This Monday, he personally made twenty calls to congressional members 1:00:36.320 --> 1:00:38.400 trying to convince them that he is going to be 1:00:38.440 --> 1:00:39.400 the one on the ticket. 1:00:40.000 --> 1:00:42.200 No, really, guys, it's going to be me again. 1:00:42.320 --> 1:00:45.240 Really, And I think part of what he's doing here 1:00:45.320 --> 1:00:47.920 is like he does not have to demonstrate at the 1:00:47.920 --> 1:00:53.480 moment that he will like survive until like November. All 1:00:53.520 --> 1:00:55.360 he has to do right now is run out the 1:00:55.360 --> 1:00:59.040 clock until the convention, and then it'll be too late 1:00:59.120 --> 1:01:01.200 to swap him for anyone else. There's a few other 1:01:01.240 --> 1:01:03.920 people kind of saying this, and I believe that is 1:01:04.000 --> 1:01:06.240 kind of what is what is happening, that all they 1:01:06.240 --> 1:01:08.960 need to do is just keep delaying this question, keep this, 1:01:09.320 --> 1:01:11.640 keep this uncertainty until the convention, and then it's going 1:01:11.720 --> 1:01:13.680 to get locked in there. And that's all he needs 1:01:13.680 --> 1:01:16.920 to do. He doesn't need to demonstrate his viability come November. 1:01:17.120 --> 1:01:19.280 He just needs to make sure that he gets that 1:01:19.400 --> 1:01:23.919 he gets the official nomination this August. And I don't 1:01:23.920 --> 1:01:27.040 know biden supporters reactions to this have been really weird, 1:01:27.480 --> 1:01:29.840 including we've kind of had like a new upgrowth of 1:01:29.920 --> 1:01:35.800 a pro Biden personality cult among liberals. Wcause I feel 1:01:35.840 --> 1:01:40.200 like largely like a culmination of like MSNBC Russia Gates, 1:01:40.320 --> 1:01:43.640 like bluing on type stuff that people are just now 1:01:43.920 --> 1:01:46.600 convinced there's like a secret conspiracy to take down Biden 1:01:47.080 --> 1:01:50.360 and any attempts to question Biden's legibility as a candidate 1:01:50.520 --> 1:01:52.920 could only be rooted in some secret agenda to get 1:01:52.960 --> 1:01:54.920 Trump elected. So I think this is why they're so 1:01:55.000 --> 1:01:57.640 volatile about this is that they think like the only 1:01:57.640 --> 1:02:01.320 one who would ever propagate questions over Iden's like legibility 1:02:01.520 --> 1:02:03.520 would be someone who secretly wants Trump to be in 1:02:03.560 --> 1:02:06.240 office again, and that is such a threat to them 1:02:06.280 --> 1:02:09.080 that they they're lashing out very very oddly and very 1:02:09.080 --> 1:02:14.920 conspiratorially against anyone raising questions about maybe Biden's not the 1:02:14.960 --> 1:02:18.240 best guy actually, and they're spinning this into like actually 1:02:18.280 --> 1:02:21.280 being secret Trumpers. It's odd because even the way Biden 1:02:21.320 --> 1:02:25.160 talks about his own drive to beat Trump is kind 1:02:25.160 --> 1:02:29.120 of wishy washy, certain like more polished statements will be like, yes, 1:02:29.160 --> 1:02:30.800 this is like a threat to democracy. We have to 1:02:31.080 --> 1:02:33.480 we have to do this to keep Trump out of office. 1:02:33.480 --> 1:02:37.080 This is an existential threat. But in that ABC interview, 1:02:37.320 --> 1:02:39.840 he gave a really kind of soft answer to this question, 1:02:39.920 --> 1:02:41.400 saying that all that he needs to do is just 1:02:41.480 --> 1:02:42.200 give it his all. 1:02:42.720 --> 1:02:43.160 And if you. 1:02:43.120 --> 1:02:46.960 Stay in and Trump is elected and everything you're warning about. 1:02:46.680 --> 1:02:49.400 Comes to pass, how will you feel in January? 1:02:50.600 --> 1:02:52.720 I feel as long as I gave it my all 1:02:53.040 --> 1:02:55.360 and I did the goodest jobs I know I can do, 1:02:56.160 --> 1:02:57.160 That's what this is about. 1:03:00.280 --> 1:03:01.880 It was that's not convincing. 1:03:02.880 --> 1:03:06.520 That's such like a like ninth like cartoons for a 1:03:06.600 --> 1:03:09.080 ninth grader's way of saying it, like, well, what matters 1:03:09.120 --> 1:03:12.720 is that I tried put all my best work board. No, man, 1:03:12.960 --> 1:03:14.160 that doesn't matter at all. 1:03:14.920 --> 1:03:17.920 Yeah it is. It's not great, it's it's it's not 1:03:18.080 --> 1:03:21.160 it's not reassuring because it doesn't matter if you give 1:03:21.200 --> 1:03:23.640 it your all. People's lives are are on the right 1:03:24.440 --> 1:03:25.240 and you're just like. 1:03:25.200 --> 1:03:27.120 Eh, I'll give it the old college try. 1:03:27.320 --> 1:03:28.280 You're like okay. 1:03:28.680 --> 1:03:31.360 It means one of two things. He's either he either 1:03:31.520 --> 1:03:35.400 is completely delusional to the point where he doesn't realize 1:03:35.400 --> 1:03:38.520 how nonsensical that is, or he doesn't really think that 1:03:38.560 --> 1:03:41.760 Trump is a threat to democracy in people's lives. And 1:03:41.880 --> 1:03:44.080 I guess the third option would be he doesn't care, 1:03:44.240 --> 1:03:46.760 like if he loses re election, fuck everybody, if he 1:03:46.760 --> 1:03:49.360 doesn't get to keep being president. Like maybe he is 1:03:49.480 --> 1:03:52.120 just that kind of person. I do have a feeling 1:03:52.160 --> 1:03:54.800 that only that kind of person can become president of 1:03:54.880 --> 1:03:55.840 the United States. 1:03:56.160 --> 1:03:58.320 Yeah, I mean, like that was kind of my read 1:03:58.400 --> 1:04:01.240 after the ABC interviews that he seemed just kind of 1:04:01.280 --> 1:04:05.640 like delusional and narcissistic, like he really believes after twenty 1:04:05.680 --> 1:04:08.200 twenty that he's the only one that can beat Trump. 1:04:08.240 --> 1:04:10.840 And this feels like like a very genuine view of 1:04:10.920 --> 1:04:13.680 himself that he's the only one strong enough to beat Trump. 1:04:14.160 --> 1:04:16.080 Yeah, And the more and more. 1:04:15.960 --> 1:04:19.080 That there's been pushback against his legibility, the more he's 1:04:19.080 --> 1:04:21.720 been digging his heels in. And I think if things 1:04:21.760 --> 1:04:25.040 continue like this, I don't think the Democratic Party will 1:04:25.040 --> 1:04:26.880 be able to organize and unite enough to do like 1:04:26.920 --> 1:04:29.600 a soft coup and convince Biden to step down. And 1:04:29.720 --> 1:04:33.439 without a complete united front against Biden, he himself would 1:04:33.560 --> 1:04:35.720 need some kind of like excuse to allow himself to 1:04:35.720 --> 1:04:38.800 step down without sacrificing his pride and showing weakness both 1:04:38.840 --> 1:04:41.760 in himself and the party. This could be like a 1:04:41.840 --> 1:04:46.200 convenient medical diagnosis, right, although the increasing number of calls 1:04:46.240 --> 1:04:50.440 for him to undergo thorough neurological examination will probably have 1:04:50.480 --> 1:04:53.280 the same backfire effect of Biden attempting as much as 1:04:53.280 --> 1:04:57.000 he can to avoid any in depth medical and neurological testing. 1:04:57.320 --> 1:04:59.800 He's been making these comments like every day I take 1:04:59.800 --> 1:05:04.120 an rological test by doing my job, and like, come on, man, 1:05:04.560 --> 1:05:07.400 we we're watching you do your job. It's not that's 1:05:07.600 --> 1:05:08.040 part of. 1:05:08.040 --> 1:05:10.840 The problem, bro, Like you got up in front of 1:05:10.840 --> 1:05:14.320 the like again, refer to the last episode you and 1:05:14.360 --> 1:05:16.280 I did on the horse race. Our attitude was like, yeah, 1:05:16.320 --> 1:05:19.120 things have really improved for Biden. I think he's probably 1:05:19.160 --> 1:05:23.400 the smart money bet. And like sitting down and watching 1:05:23.480 --> 1:05:27.880 that it was horrifying, Like, yeah, there's no dinner. That's 1:05:27.880 --> 1:05:31.120 part of why this. You have to if you're still 1:05:31.120 --> 1:05:32.920 on team, Like, I don't think it's fair what people 1:05:32.920 --> 1:05:35.400 are saying to Joe if you're on team. This was 1:05:35.440 --> 1:05:39.000 bad strategy from the beginning expressing any kind of doubt. Well, 1:05:39.040 --> 1:05:41.240 maybe that's right, but I don't know what else people 1:05:41.240 --> 1:05:44.240 are supposed to do if you don't if you really 1:05:44.280 --> 1:05:47.280 think that this is he has not demonstrated, Like it's 1:05:47.360 --> 1:05:53.800 seriously concerning incapacity for the work. Think about how unprecedented 1:05:53.960 --> 1:05:56.920 having this degree of open challenging of him as the 1:05:56.960 --> 1:05:59.520 candidate this close to an elections. I've never seen anything like. 1:05:59.480 --> 1:06:05.160 That, especially especially on like an incumbent, yes, the president, yeah, 1:06:05.200 --> 1:06:08.840 and an incumbent who's served two times as vice Like 1:06:09.000 --> 1:06:15.080 that's ridiculous. And like the last real neurological medical examination 1:06:15.280 --> 1:06:18.600 that he undertook was last February, which for an eighty 1:06:18.640 --> 1:06:21.240 one year old is a very long time, especially if 1:06:21.280 --> 1:06:23.560 you can bear like news clips of him from like 1:06:23.720 --> 1:06:26.680 the debate, two clips of him from last February or 1:06:26.760 --> 1:06:29.760 last year. There actually is like a decent difference, And 1:06:29.840 --> 1:06:32.400 I don't know, it seems it seems kind of absurd 1:06:32.840 --> 1:06:35.840 that he that he keeps harping on this line. For 1:06:35.880 --> 1:06:38.840 his ABC interview, he declined to take a cognitive test 1:06:38.840 --> 1:06:41.080 and make the results public in order to reassure voters 1:06:41.120 --> 1:06:43.240 that he was fit to serve another term, saying that 1:06:43.480 --> 1:06:46.760 I have a cognitive test every single day doing this job. 1:06:46.880 --> 1:06:49.360 Everything I do is a test. 1:06:50.280 --> 1:06:51.720 No, not great. No. 1:06:52.480 --> 1:06:55.920 He also said that only the Lord Almighty could persuade 1:06:56.000 --> 1:06:58.440 him to change his mind and drop out of the race. 1:06:59.440 --> 1:07:01.240 What the fuck? What the fuck is show? 1:07:01.560 --> 1:07:02.120 There we go? 1:07:02.880 --> 1:07:10.240 Seriously, man, So that's again not super reassuring. But do 1:07:10.280 --> 1:07:12.640 you know what I can be reassured by Robert. 1:07:12.800 --> 1:07:16.200 The fact that sweet lady capitalism is always there for us. 1:07:16.440 --> 1:07:19.800 It's always there, like a good uncle or something. 1:07:19.840 --> 1:07:22.840 I don't know, Yeah, yeah, yeah, something something that state 1:07:22.880 --> 1:07:23.440 farm mad. 1:07:23.760 --> 1:07:37.080 I agree, all right, we are back. It is certainly 1:07:37.120 --> 1:07:40.720 feeling like nineteen sixty eight all over again, isn't it? 1:07:41.760 --> 1:07:46.800 Yeah, uh yeah, I mean, and that's obviously having an 1:07:46.800 --> 1:07:49.919 open convention in sixty eight. The chaos around that did 1:07:49.920 --> 1:07:53.000 not help the Democrats. They did not know in that election. No, 1:07:53.160 --> 1:07:57.240 we got fucking Dick Nixon. So that's not good. 1:07:57.480 --> 1:08:01.400 No, it's not granted with with campus protests and everything, 1:08:01.440 --> 1:08:03.560 it all is starting to feel like sixty eight over here. 1:08:03.720 --> 1:08:06.720 So yeah, a lot of people are saying, if Biden 1:08:06.760 --> 1:08:08.960 does step down before the DNC in Chicago this August, 1:08:09.200 --> 1:08:11.600 we could have ourselves an open convention to nominate a 1:08:11.640 --> 1:08:14.120 new candidate. The last time this method was used by 1:08:14.480 --> 1:08:17.639 Democrats was in sixty eight at the also Chicago DNC, 1:08:18.240 --> 1:08:22.480 after the leading candidate, Senendate Robert F. Kennedy, was assassinated 1:08:22.479 --> 1:08:24.880 weeks before the convention by twenty four year old Palestinian 1:08:24.880 --> 1:08:27.639 man for his support of Israel during the Six Day War. 1:08:28.080 --> 1:08:31.280 So again, there is a lot of parallels here. And 1:08:31.720 --> 1:08:33.439 if it's not going to be Biden, then who is 1:08:33.439 --> 1:08:35.759 it going to be? Right, This was a bigger question 1:08:35.920 --> 1:08:37.960 last week and it still is kind of a lingering 1:08:38.040 --> 1:08:40.920 question in a lot of people's minds. Who's it going 1:08:40.920 --> 1:08:44.720 to be? Probably Kamala I don't know, Yeah, I. 1:08:44.680 --> 1:08:47.240 Mean, there's really for a lot of reasons in terms 1:08:47.240 --> 1:08:49.439 of including like I think, what would have to happen 1:08:49.479 --> 1:08:51.439 with like the donations, like if it would to be 1:08:51.439 --> 1:08:56.559 a totally new group of people, that would cause insurmountable bullshit. 1:08:56.640 --> 1:08:59.960 And also like if you're talking about from a war 1:09:00.080 --> 1:09:04.960 gaming this out perspective, you know, Kamala does not look 1:09:05.080 --> 1:09:08.080 bad in the polling and might might in fact be 1:09:08.400 --> 1:09:11.679 just for a variety of reasons, one of the better choices, 1:09:11.720 --> 1:09:14.559 Like I can in my head think, wow, I sure 1:09:14.600 --> 1:09:16.840 wish it was you know, Pritzker and Whitmer maybe, but 1:09:17.000 --> 1:09:20.320 like I think that a lot of what I've seen 1:09:20.360 --> 1:09:22.160 in the polls has kind of convinced me that Kamal 1:09:22.320 --> 1:09:26.200 is probably our best all around bet and if you 1:09:26.280 --> 1:09:29.120 include practicality and actually like beating Trump. 1:09:29.520 --> 1:09:32.120 Yes, in the polls, she is consistently higher than any 1:09:32.200 --> 1:09:36.000 other potential Democratic replacements and doing, if not as well, 1:09:36.760 --> 1:09:41.360 often better than Biden against Trump, usually closing that race out. 1:09:41.400 --> 1:09:41.599 I think. 1:09:41.840 --> 1:09:44.439 A CNN poll from last Wednesday showed that she's in 1:09:44.439 --> 1:09:47.519 the margin of error against Trump nationally with forty five 1:09:47.600 --> 1:09:51.200 to his forty seven, which is much better than Biden 1:09:51.280 --> 1:09:53.439 is doing nationally. And she's projected to do much better 1:09:53.680 --> 1:09:56.880 in an electoral college race than Biden specifically. 1:09:57.320 --> 1:09:58.400 So there we go. 1:09:58.479 --> 1:10:01.679 I'm gonna quote from CNN here quote An anonymously written 1:10:01.760 --> 1:10:05.120 Google doc titled Unburdened by What has been the Case 1:10:05.120 --> 1:10:09.200 for Kamala, written by self described senior operatives within democratic 1:10:09.200 --> 1:10:12.560 political institutions, has been popping up in group chats of 1:10:12.600 --> 1:10:15.840 Democratic donors and leading coalition groups. It lays out a 1:10:15.840 --> 1:10:21.519 detailed argument and plan for a campaign. So this doc 1:10:21.600 --> 1:10:23.759 I was able to get a hold of a copy, 1:10:23.960 --> 1:10:27.640 and parts of it definitely read like an aaronsor counscript 1:10:28.320 --> 1:10:30.800 like that is that is the closest thing I can 1:10:31.120 --> 1:10:33.760 I can describe this thing as But I think it 1:10:33.840 --> 1:10:36.120 is worth digging into here for our last section. So 1:10:36.120 --> 1:10:38.920 I'm gonna I'm gonna read some small parts of this 1:10:39.080 --> 1:10:42.280 doc and Robert, I'm curious to hear what your thoughts 1:10:42.280 --> 1:10:45.879 are on this. It starts by saying, we are currently losing. 1:10:46.120 --> 1:10:49.120 We need to do something different to win. The number 1:10:49.160 --> 1:10:52.639 one most important priority above all others is defeating Donald Trump. 1:10:52.840 --> 1:10:55.320 Nothing is more important, and we need to be very 1:10:55.360 --> 1:10:58.840 real that we are currently losing. So off to a 1:10:58.840 --> 1:11:04.519 good start, that is I would I would argue accurate quote. 1:11:04.560 --> 1:11:07.880 Biden's debate performance, the campaign's defensive response, and the total 1:11:08.000 --> 1:11:10.000 lack of plan to reassure his base and the voters 1:11:10.000 --> 1:11:13.600 about his about his capability should shake everyone's confidence that 1:11:13.640 --> 1:11:17.040 he can win this election. Now we have three possible options. 1:11:17.360 --> 1:11:19.320 Biden can take the necessary step to demonstrate that he 1:11:19.360 --> 1:11:21.120 is up to the job, he can step aside for 1:11:21.160 --> 1:11:25.200 another candidate, or Trump will win. The discourse around potential 1:11:25.240 --> 1:11:27.960 alternative candidates in the event that Biden does step down 1:11:28.200 --> 1:11:32.320 is increasingly detached from reality. Donors, pundits, and democratic elites 1:11:32.360 --> 1:11:35.920 are freely slinging around wild ideas about dream tickets. This 1:11:36.040 --> 1:11:38.599 chaos is used as a shield by stay the Course 1:11:38.640 --> 1:11:42.920 advocates who frame the choice as Biden or chaos. The 1:11:42.960 --> 1:11:45.560 swirl over different possible candidates is obscuring the fact that 1:11:45.560 --> 1:11:48.320 there's a single clear path forward. There's one path out 1:11:48.320 --> 1:11:51.640 of this mess, and it's Kamala unquote. And this is 1:11:51.680 --> 1:11:54.400 one of the interesting things I found about this doc 1:11:54.479 --> 1:11:56.400 is that the way that they view this kind of 1:11:56.439 --> 1:11:59.360 current chaos as we win just as a deliberate strategy 1:11:59.360 --> 1:12:02.040 and as an as a deliberate tactics just to continue 1:12:02.400 --> 1:12:05.840 this uncertainty all the way to the convention, and a 1:12:05.840 --> 1:12:07.960 lot of the what this dock advocates for is that 1:12:08.960 --> 1:12:11.320 we need to call this as soon as possible to 1:12:11.479 --> 1:12:14.840 give whatever option we're going to go forward with the 1:12:15.160 --> 1:12:18.439 most amount of success, whether that's Biden, whether that's Kamala, 1:12:19.280 --> 1:12:21.080 it needs to we need to decide what it is 1:12:21.160 --> 1:12:23.240 so we don't spend the next few months doing weird 1:12:23.320 --> 1:12:26.880 like democratic party infighting and instead actually like lock down 1:12:27.160 --> 1:12:30.519 what's happening, so there's a cohesive strategy. And they argue 1:12:30.600 --> 1:12:34.120 that Kamala has the strongest claim to democratic legibility among 1:12:34.240 --> 1:12:37.640 all other alternative candidates. Quote, she's the only candidate that 1:12:37.640 --> 1:12:39.679 can take the reins right now instead of in late 1:12:39.720 --> 1:12:41.880 August with less than three months ago. To be clear, 1:12:41.920 --> 1:12:44.479 this isn't an argument about deservedness or why should personally 1:12:44.479 --> 1:12:46.960 love Kamala. It's about strategy and winning in the face 1:12:46.960 --> 1:12:48.920 of unimaginable electoral stakes. 1:12:49.479 --> 1:12:50.160 Yeah. 1:12:50.280 --> 1:12:53.120 Now, the doctors point out that only Biden himself has 1:12:53.160 --> 1:12:57.040 the power to drop out and choose to head off 1:12:57.160 --> 1:13:00.960 chaos by anointing Harris. But Biden does listen to people, 1:13:01.040 --> 1:13:03.799 and the people that he listens to listens to other people, 1:13:04.200 --> 1:13:06.719 and that is the audience for the people reading this doc. 1:13:06.760 --> 1:13:09.920 That's what this is circulating among. That was like the intention, 1:13:10.600 --> 1:13:12.759 and they argue that if Biden does drop out, Democrats 1:13:12.800 --> 1:13:16.400 have to unite quickly behind the elected successor, as opposed 1:13:16.400 --> 1:13:21.160 to inviting this extended period of chaos. And although Kamala 1:13:21.320 --> 1:13:25.240 has limitations in polls regarding her name recognition, she currently 1:13:25.280 --> 1:13:29.240 wins any poll of alternative Democratic candidates by a very 1:13:29.280 --> 1:13:32.320 wide margin. This doc dos pointed out that Kamala is 1:13:32.320 --> 1:13:35.280 by no means a perfect candidate. She does have real deficits, 1:13:35.720 --> 1:13:39.439 but they are mostly addressable. The doc mentions her Biden 1:13:39.520 --> 1:13:42.920 level approval, rating her involvement with Biden's immigration shortcomings, and 1:13:42.960 --> 1:13:46.559 her kind of awkward camera moments reminiscent of a drunk 1:13:46.600 --> 1:13:50.080 aunt and quote. After years of a relatively low profile, 1:13:50.160 --> 1:13:52.599 voters don't see her as a strong leader for the country, 1:13:52.800 --> 1:13:55.040 but running as a presidential candidate will allow Harris to 1:13:55.040 --> 1:13:57.519 present herself in a more commanding light. She'll be a 1:13:57.520 --> 1:14:00.799 prosecutor going up against a convicted felon, a woman fighting 1:14:00.840 --> 1:14:04.479 against the man who ended Roe v. Wade unquote, and 1:14:04.520 --> 1:14:06.360 that is a lot of the tight sort of messaging 1:14:06.439 --> 1:14:10.240 that they are promoting if Kamala does end up being 1:14:10.280 --> 1:14:13.400 the option. A Morning consoled political poll on the vice 1:14:13.400 --> 1:14:16.679 president from June reflects a number of advantages she would 1:14:16.720 --> 1:14:18.719 have over Trump in a head to head match based 1:14:18.760 --> 1:14:21.960 on his greatest vulnerabilities. A majority of voters ci Kamala 1:14:22.040 --> 1:14:25.320 is mentally fit, level headed, and prepared contrast to Trump 1:14:25.320 --> 1:14:28.200 and even Biden, and a majority of voters trust Kamala 1:14:28.240 --> 1:14:32.920 on jobs, abortion, climate change, and LGBTQ rights. Public opinion 1:14:32.960 --> 1:14:35.800 is already moving towards Harris over Biden. Forty three percent 1:14:35.800 --> 1:14:38.400 of voters indicate Harris is fit to run, compared to 1:14:38.479 --> 1:14:41.840 Biden's thirty five and while the issue is complex and 1:14:41.880 --> 1:14:44.640 the distance here is relative, she's broadly considered to be 1:14:44.720 --> 1:14:47.600 on Biden's left on Israel Palestine, an issue where he 1:14:47.640 --> 1:14:51.360 has major vulnerabilities. Kamala also has advantages with the younger 1:14:51.360 --> 1:14:54.840 and POC voters that the Democrats are currently bleeding in 1:14:54.880 --> 1:14:57.479 the dock. Here they contain some stats on this, saying 1:14:57.560 --> 1:15:00.000 Biden won the twenty twenty election by just forty four 1:15:00.000 --> 1:15:03.000 one thousand votes, and most of those are votes that 1:15:03.080 --> 1:15:06.280 he is bleeding. A New York Times cenpol in February 1:15:06.280 --> 1:15:08.559 found that Harris is nearly ten points ahead of Biden 1:15:08.640 --> 1:15:11.479 with black voters, and fifteen points up with Latino voters, 1:15:11.800 --> 1:15:15.440 twenty points up with young voters. These are massive advantages. 1:15:15.720 --> 1:15:19.520 Now that is older data, but it's probably worth some consideration. 1:15:20.320 --> 1:15:22.840 Part of the reason why she's also favored among other 1:15:22.920 --> 1:15:26.280 Democratic contenders is that she has direct access to the 1:15:26.320 --> 1:15:29.599 Biden Harris campaign war chest of over ninety one million 1:15:29.640 --> 1:15:32.479 dollars in cash, which would create a smoother transition. 1:15:33.360 --> 1:15:36.800 Yeah, and is probably I mean again, just given the 1:15:37.040 --> 1:15:39.839 amount of chaos that would be inherent in a totally 1:15:39.920 --> 1:15:43.000 open convention, it just seems like the only feasible option. 1:15:44.040 --> 1:15:48.200 And what they're advocating for is that if Kamla takes 1:15:48.200 --> 1:15:51.320 a position now or soon to now, she'll have an 1:15:51.320 --> 1:15:55.400 extra month and massive structural advantages. Quote, if we can 1:15:55.479 --> 1:15:57.679 unite behind Harris in July, we have an extra month 1:15:57.680 --> 1:15:59.840 of party unity and message unity. That's a month where 1:15:59.840 --> 1:16:01.559 we can and keep the media focused on Donald Trump, 1:16:01.640 --> 1:16:05.559 Project twenty twenty five and mega extremism instead of waiting 1:16:05.600 --> 1:16:08.360 in dread for the next Biden misstep or talking about 1:16:08.360 --> 1:16:12.400 democrats fighting it out to win delicate count fear of 1:16:12.479 --> 1:16:15.519 racism and sexism is playing an outsized role not supported 1:16:15.560 --> 1:16:18.000 by data. The impact of sexism and racism on the 1:16:18.080 --> 1:16:20.879 vote is marginal compared to the potential to make gains 1:16:21.000 --> 1:16:23.120 in the crucial block that will decide the election. 1:16:23.479 --> 1:16:23.840 Right now. 1:16:23.880 --> 1:16:28.000 This race hinges on alienated and unenthusiastic double haters who 1:16:28.000 --> 1:16:31.439 dislike both Biden and Trump and want an alternative choice. 1:16:31.680 --> 1:16:33.559 Some polls put the size of this group at twenty 1:16:33.600 --> 1:16:37.520 five percent nationally, or even higher nearly thirty percent amongst. 1:16:37.320 --> 1:16:39.920 Basically for every one I know well. 1:16:39.920 --> 1:16:43.000 Especially among inconsistent voters who are who are likely to 1:16:43.000 --> 1:16:46.519 decide the election in key battleground states. For these double haters, 1:16:46.760 --> 1:16:50.200 vote choices being driven not by prejudice but by anti 1:16:50.360 --> 1:16:53.400 enthusiasm for the two currently eighty year old white men 1:16:53.439 --> 1:16:55.240 presented here as the only options. 1:16:55.640 --> 1:16:56.679 Yeahs more likely. 1:16:57.160 --> 1:16:59.599 These voters are also more likely to be young, Hispanic, 1:16:59.720 --> 1:17:03.600 black back and women in urban or suburban areas, the 1:17:03.640 --> 1:17:06.720 exact kind of voter profile that Kamala is gaining appeal with. 1:17:07.360 --> 1:17:08.479 Yeah, and I find. 1:17:08.280 --> 1:17:10.760 This little bit to be the most compelling statement in 1:17:10.800 --> 1:17:14.519 this entire document. Because that lays out an actual map 1:17:14.600 --> 1:17:18.839 towards how Kamala would have a better election viability than Biden, 1:17:19.120 --> 1:17:21.360 especially in the voters that he's been bleeding dramatically in 1:17:21.400 --> 1:17:22.920 the past six seven months. 1:17:23.160 --> 1:17:23.439 Now. 1:17:23.680 --> 1:17:27.519 The doc does close by saying, if Biden stays the course, 1:17:27.760 --> 1:17:30.400 we need Kamala to be strong. The most likely outcome 1:17:30.439 --> 1:17:33.360 is that President Biden declines to step back. In that case, 1:17:33.439 --> 1:17:36.160 Kamala's role is more crucial than ever. She will be 1:17:36.200 --> 1:17:38.960 the strong communicator on the ticket, especially on our most 1:17:38.960 --> 1:17:42.559 important issue abortion. Second, many voters will understand her to 1:17:42.600 --> 1:17:46.160 be Biden's near guaranteed successor, and we will need to 1:17:46.200 --> 1:17:49.200 feel comfortable with her potential assent to the presidency to 1:17:49.280 --> 1:17:52.680 vote for the Biden Harris ticket. For anyone in the 1:17:52.880 --> 1:17:55.960 Biden's nominee, we must rally around him camp. It's essential 1:17:56.000 --> 1:17:58.360 that we project confidence in his selection of a running 1:17:58.360 --> 1:18:01.879 mate by one pushing the administration to stop sideline and Kamala. 1:18:02.280 --> 1:18:05.120 By two promoting Kamala as the leader of the party 1:18:05.160 --> 1:18:08.840 and country. Three be prepared to align with political and 1:18:08.840 --> 1:18:12.200 financial support, and three debate over and ultimately organize around 1:18:12.280 --> 1:18:15.840 a new running mate. Consolidation around Vice President Harris will 1:18:15.840 --> 1:18:18.200 not guarantee victory in November. No option is free of 1:18:18.240 --> 1:18:20.439 risk at this point. But this is our clearest path 1:18:20.479 --> 1:18:22.439 to win. We should take it. And that's how the 1:18:22.479 --> 1:18:26.120 document ends. And I like some of the arguments they 1:18:26.120 --> 1:18:28.400 make here. I don't like Kamala as a person. I 1:18:28.479 --> 1:18:31.400 think she is many many issues both the person and 1:18:31.479 --> 1:18:35.400 I don't like cops, but absolutely, especially if their messaging 1:18:35.479 --> 1:18:38.839 will be like Kamala the prosecutor against Trump the felon, 1:18:39.120 --> 1:18:40.519 which I personally don't like. 1:18:40.640 --> 1:18:41.679 But that could work. 1:18:41.960 --> 1:18:44.479 That's not going to lose her important voters. That's not 1:18:44.479 --> 1:18:46.559 going to lose her all of the anarchists who already 1:18:46.560 --> 1:18:47.479 aren't going to vote. 1:18:47.960 --> 1:18:52.320 That might be a really good strategy because Americans do 1:18:52.360 --> 1:18:54.960 not feel the same way about prosecutors as I do, 1:18:55.120 --> 1:18:57.040 and these you who do right like we have to 1:18:57.080 --> 1:19:00.200 accept that at a certain point. I think so I 1:19:00.200 --> 1:19:03.240 I and I think that's most frustrated to me about 1:19:03.280 --> 1:19:05.640 the fact that it doesn't look like Biden's going to 1:19:05.720 --> 1:19:09.880 step down, is that like the smartest thing they could 1:19:09.920 --> 1:19:12.840 do strategy wise would be to drop that announcement on 1:19:12.960 --> 1:19:15.840 like Monday of next week and utterly like cut the 1:19:15.880 --> 1:19:18.880 wind out of the sales of the rnc ye, Like 1:19:19.080 --> 1:19:23.120 suddenly the biggest story is that and not you know, 1:19:23.200 --> 1:19:25.360 everything that the Republicans are putting out, like you could 1:19:25.360 --> 1:19:28.200 actually really do some damage to them, because there's there's 1:19:28.200 --> 1:19:31.680 not really anything that they could do in response. 1:19:32.680 --> 1:19:35.919 And so much media attention right now is being focused 1:19:35.920 --> 1:19:39.800 on Biden very clearly not being fit for office, and 1:19:40.000 --> 1:19:42.439 all of that would go away if Kamala gets put 1:19:42.479 --> 1:19:45.160 into the spot, then then then everyone will start focusing 1:19:45.200 --> 1:19:48.120 once again on how bad Trump is. And I can 1:19:48.200 --> 1:19:52.160 understand some of like the Biden camps like upsetedness at 1:19:52.320 --> 1:19:53.920 at like the fact that currently there is just so 1:19:54.000 --> 1:19:56.559 much attention on Biden and everyone kind of is ignoring Trump, 1:19:56.800 --> 1:19:59.280 but that just is due to how poorly he himself 1:19:59.320 --> 1:20:02.360 has been behaving like that, Like that is ultimately the 1:20:02.360 --> 1:20:05.640 Biden campaign's fault that they didn't plan for this contingency, 1:20:05.920 --> 1:20:08.799 And if they want all of that like discourse to stop, 1:20:08.920 --> 1:20:11.360 they have a very easy option to And it's just 1:20:11.400 --> 1:20:15.480 reliant on Biden not being too personally prideful and acknowledging 1:20:15.520 --> 1:20:17.760 that he's just too old for office and there are 1:20:17.760 --> 1:20:20.519 better candidates out there. So yeah, that is that is 1:20:20.560 --> 1:20:23.479 the current, that is the current situation on the rise 1:20:23.520 --> 1:20:26.800 of the k Hive, something I at this point am 1:20:26.920 --> 1:20:30.400 very skeptical to think will actually happen. But it may 1:20:30.439 --> 1:20:33.040 be actually a viable strategy for the Democratic Party. 1:20:34.080 --> 1:20:38.000 Yep. I mean, we'll see what they actually do. Probably 1:20:38.880 --> 1:20:43.479 keep running Joe Biden and hope that Americans panic enough 1:20:43.520 --> 1:20:47.000 about Trump to but you know, we can all dream. 1:20:47.200 --> 1:20:50.479 Now, I'd agree to that point. We could also dream 1:20:50.479 --> 1:20:52.640 that like that, that like the delegates will just like 1:20:52.800 --> 1:20:58.320 rebel against their like polite duty. Yeah, by by not 1:20:58.320 --> 1:21:01.680 committing to their to their no'm binding promises. Although that 1:21:01.720 --> 1:21:05.000 would be extremely unprecedented and it would make the DNC 1:21:05.200 --> 1:21:05.880 a lot more fun. 1:21:06.160 --> 1:21:08.639 Oh, we would have a great DNC if that were 1:21:08.680 --> 1:21:10.080 to go down. Yep. 1:21:10.479 --> 1:21:13.040 Anyway, well, we're gonna have fun at the RNC instead. 1:21:13.560 --> 1:21:16.000 Yeah, we sure will. Garrison, You and I are going 1:21:16.080 --> 1:21:20.200 to be on the ground in the exclusion zone and 1:21:20.280 --> 1:21:25.040 at the convention itself where we cannot have backpacks or gas. 1:21:24.720 --> 1:21:27.680 Masks or canned food. 1:21:27.720 --> 1:21:29.880 But I might be able to carry a gun. Let 1:21:29.880 --> 1:21:34.160 me see if they do reciprocity. What is this is Minnesota? 1:21:34.800 --> 1:21:35.959 No, this is not Minnesota. 1:21:36.000 --> 1:21:36.800 This is Wisconsin. 1:21:37.040 --> 1:21:39.799 Oh, Wisconsin, this. 1:21:39.720 --> 1:21:41.120 Is Milwaukee, Milwaukee. 1:21:41.160 --> 1:21:45.599 We're gonna see how well prepared I am. Let me see. 1:21:46.360 --> 1:21:48.960 That could make a fun episode all its own. 1:21:51.360 --> 1:21:53.479 I do have an idea for an episode that I 1:21:53.520 --> 1:21:57.840 will mention to you off air that I really want 1:21:57.840 --> 1:21:58.680 to do for the rn C. 1:22:00.800 --> 1:22:04.600 Wait, it looks like yes with restrictions. 1:22:05.960 --> 1:22:07.680 Yeah, I love I love restrictions. 1:22:07.880 --> 1:22:09.320 That's great, we'll see what those are. 1:22:10.120 --> 1:22:11.719 Stay tuned to the restriction. 1:22:11.760 --> 1:22:30.280 Stay tuned everybody e sports. 1:22:31.240 --> 1:22:34.000 Oh god, Okay, that was not a great intro. They 1:22:34.000 --> 1:22:37.960 conpen here. The podcast that we do I be a 1:22:38.040 --> 1:22:41.120 log with me is James. We're doing it another be 1:22:41.160 --> 1:22:41.960 a James episode. 1:22:42.320 --> 1:22:45.559 Yep, we're back. We would have a theme for our episodes. 1:22:45.640 --> 1:22:47.880 I feel like, yeah, maybe it is Petro dollars. 1:22:48.080 --> 1:22:48.720 I guess it is. 1:22:49.240 --> 1:22:52.320 Yeah, yeah, we vote to you today by Big fossil Fuel. 1:22:52.640 --> 1:22:55.519 You know, this entire episode is is the what do 1:22:55.560 --> 1:22:58.400 you do with your fossil fuel muddy episode? So we 1:22:58.439 --> 1:23:02.679 did an episode like a year ago about sports washing, 1:23:02.760 --> 1:23:06.120 and it has gotten much worse since then, you know. So, 1:23:06.280 --> 1:23:08.559 so the big kind of sports washing thing that's happening 1:23:08.640 --> 1:23:11.799 right now is this thing called the Esports World Cup 1:23:12.320 --> 1:23:15.360 that the Saudi government is putting on. It is going 1:23:15.400 --> 1:23:18.840 on right now. Barring unfathomable disaster, it will still be 1:23:18.880 --> 1:23:21.519 going on by the time this episode comes out. We 1:23:21.800 --> 1:23:23.559 kind of talked about in the last episode how the 1:23:23.600 --> 1:23:25.880 Saudis have been getting into sports. I mean it sort 1:23:25.880 --> 1:23:28.120 of starts with soccer, they said, they start to WWE, 1:23:28.360 --> 1:23:31.559 they get into tennis, they're in golf, they're in boxing, 1:23:31.560 --> 1:23:33.519 they're in Formula one, and in the last like two 1:23:33.640 --> 1:23:38.519 years specifically, they've gotten really really deep into esports. In 1:23:38.560 --> 1:23:42.320 twenty twenty two, they spent one point five billion dollars 1:23:42.680 --> 1:23:46.200 wow to acquire face It in EESL Gaming, which were 1:23:46.240 --> 1:23:49.840 two organizations that ran esports leagues. Esports, by the way, 1:23:49.880 --> 1:23:54.760 are professional video game competition. Yeah, the people who didn't 1:23:54.760 --> 1:23:56.400 spend their youth waking up at five in the morning 1:23:56.400 --> 1:23:58.400 to watch Korean StarCraft tournaments like I did. 1:23:58.840 --> 1:24:00.880 Yeah, that's me, I thought to that category. 1:24:01.000 --> 1:24:01.200 Yeah. 1:24:01.360 --> 1:24:03.320 I feel like on this episode we have both the 1:24:03.360 --> 1:24:06.479 sports washing angles covered, because you have the sports washing 1:24:07.080 --> 1:24:09.839 like regular sports angle, and I've had. 1:24:09.680 --> 1:24:12.000 To do the sportswa washing e sports angle. 1:24:12.560 --> 1:24:14.519 Yeah, I don't know what you call them. P sports 1:24:14.520 --> 1:24:20.120 like physical sports, meat space sports. Yeah, I've been privy 1:24:20.120 --> 1:24:23.120 to a decent amount of sports washing. Like I raced 1:24:23.120 --> 1:24:26.439 a lot against Iranian teams when I was cycling those 1:24:26.479 --> 1:24:28.639 dudes one. So much sports washing has just straight up 1:24:28.680 --> 1:24:37.439 like national state sponsored doping programs. But then the UAE, Bahrain, Dubai, 1:24:37.960 --> 1:24:42.679 all these different Petro states and emirates will sponsor cycling teams, 1:24:42.760 --> 1:24:45.720 very very common. Ry, Brunei another one. Yeah, I raced 1:24:45.760 --> 1:24:47.960 for Quebec once, which is not not a Petro state. 1:24:49.200 --> 1:24:50.679 Well it's not I guess it's not a petro state. 1:24:50.880 --> 1:24:54.040 Yeah, yeah, they got big maple syrup behind them. Yeah, 1:24:54.200 --> 1:24:56.800 in Catalonia, which again not a Petro state. But yeah, 1:24:56.960 --> 1:25:00.599 it's very common in all kinds of professionals sports. Right, 1:25:01.400 --> 1:25:05.160 because as sports has become more like an entertainment industry, 1:25:05.200 --> 1:25:08.559 it's become unfathomably expensive to own a sponsor a team 1:25:08.640 --> 1:25:15.080 for like enthusiasts, and the value proposition isn't really there 1:25:15.240 --> 1:25:18.360 for brand I don't think the amount that it costs 1:25:18.520 --> 1:25:21.600 now to even a sport like cycling, which is not 1:25:21.720 --> 1:25:25.040 a massive sporting global terms, right, it's not football soccer 1:25:25.320 --> 1:25:28.080 for the Americans out there, it's not worth it for 1:25:28.160 --> 1:25:31.080 many brands to sponsoring entire cycling team millions and millions 1:25:31.120 --> 1:25:34.240 of euros. But like, if you can use that cycling 1:25:34.280 --> 1:25:38.600 team to launder and normalize your state's reputation, if that 1:25:38.720 --> 1:25:41.280 cycling team can be what people think of when they 1:25:41.320 --> 1:25:44.680 hear about your country, then maybe that is worth it, right, 1:25:44.840 --> 1:25:47.000 And when you have a bottomless pot of oil money, 1:25:47.040 --> 1:25:48.439 you don't have to worry so much about whether it's 1:25:48.439 --> 1:25:48.800 worth it. 1:25:49.080 --> 1:25:50.600 Yeah, So the thing I want to do with this 1:25:50.680 --> 1:25:54.000 episode is to get into why specifically the Salus are 1:25:54.040 --> 1:25:56.640 doing this right now, because again, like most countries do 1:25:57.600 --> 1:25:59.519 sort of versions of this, right, but again, you know, 1:25:59.600 --> 1:26:02.800 that is one point two billion dollars they've thrown into 1:26:02.920 --> 1:26:05.479 two StarCraft leagues that I primarily known them for StarCraft. 1:26:05.520 --> 1:26:07.400 They do a bunch of stuff, but those things were 1:26:07.400 --> 1:26:10.479 not worth one point five billion dollars, Like, there's no way. 1:26:10.560 --> 1:26:12.240 But most of the money that had been sponsoring this 1:26:12.240 --> 1:26:15.120 stuff was crypto money, right, Okay, you know, but I 1:26:15.120 --> 1:26:17.759 wanted to get into why this is sort of happening. 1:26:17.880 --> 1:26:20.639 Something I think is very important to note going into 1:26:20.680 --> 1:26:23.080 this is that the sort of league thing that's being 1:26:23.120 --> 1:26:25.840 run right now is being run directly out of the 1:26:25.880 --> 1:26:28.320 Saudi Sovereign Wealth Fund, which is called Public Investment Fund, 1:26:28.400 --> 1:26:32.800 So this is directly state money. So the Esports World 1:26:32.800 --> 1:26:36.280 Cup that's happening right now has sixty million dollars in prizes, 1:26:36.360 --> 1:26:41.479 which is unreal is an extraordinary amount of money split 1:26:41.520 --> 1:26:44.479 around twenty one esports. There are thirty sports teams involved, 1:26:44.479 --> 1:26:45.920 and I am going to read the names of every 1:26:45.920 --> 1:26:47.560 single fucking one of them, because fuck you. 1:26:48.160 --> 1:26:49.080 Okay, let's do it. 1:26:49.200 --> 1:26:53.240 Fanatic, G two Sports Guildy, Sports, car Mine Corp, Movie 1:26:53.240 --> 1:26:54.040 Star KOI. 1:26:54.080 --> 1:26:56.320 Actually I've never heard of those ones, uh og not 1:26:56.560 --> 1:27:01.479 as muviy stides. I'm guessing it's Spanish Spanish telephone network. 1:27:01.960 --> 1:27:04.120 Yeah, probably, you know, there's a couple I don't know. 1:27:04.160 --> 1:27:05.880 But like, these are like the largest esports teams in 1:27:05.920 --> 1:27:06.280 the world. 1:27:06.560 --> 1:27:10.439 Okay, Nija's and Pajamas or NIP Team Liquor, which I'm 1:27:10.479 --> 1:27:12.160 really sad about because I was a Team Liquid fan 1:27:12.200 --> 1:27:15.400 for a fucking decade and I'm no longer one now 1:27:15.880 --> 1:27:19.320 because fuck this shit. Team Secret Team, Vitality, tuns of Esports, 1:27:19.400 --> 1:27:23.120 Vertus Pro one hundred Thieves, Cloud nine, Phase Clan Game 1:27:23.200 --> 1:27:28.440 in Gladiators, Energy Esports space Station Gaming, TSM Blacklist, International, 1:27:28.960 --> 1:27:33.799 LGD Gaming, Jenny Sports, t One Talent Esports, Webo Gaming, 1:27:33.840 --> 1:27:37.200 for Real Esports, Loud Team, Falcons, Twist and Minds. Fuck 1:27:37.280 --> 1:27:40.519 all of you for fucking doing this and doing the 1:27:40.560 --> 1:27:44.439 super pr thing. There's been a backlash, and the backlash 1:27:44.479 --> 1:27:49.520 is largely focused on you know, Saudi's institutionalized state homophobia 1:27:49.800 --> 1:27:51.920 and you know, I mean the fact that women are 1:27:51.960 --> 1:27:55.200 not full citizens. Yeah, like miss such Yeah, I mean 1:27:55.240 --> 1:27:56.960 just are just straight up owned by their husbands, right 1:27:57.000 --> 1:27:59.559 like that. That's that's how the sort of legal conservativeship works. 1:28:00.120 --> 1:28:03.519 I'm not very familiar with esports, so I can be 1:28:03.600 --> 1:28:08.360 there the podcast Grimace. Here are competitions in esports, like 1:28:08.479 --> 1:28:11.759 gender segregated? Do people all compete together? 1:28:12.120 --> 1:28:16.800 Basically No, there are like women's leagues, but like if 1:28:16.800 --> 1:28:18.640 you just if you want to compete, you can just 1:28:18.640 --> 1:28:20.640 compete assumeing you gift, you don't get forced out by 1:28:20.640 --> 1:28:22.280 sexist And this is actually a kind of big deal 1:28:22.320 --> 1:28:24.360 for StarCraft because you talked about this be four, but 1:28:25.000 --> 1:28:27.320 like probably the number two or number three best StarCraft 1:28:27.320 --> 1:28:29.280 player in the US is Scarlett, who's a trans woman, 1:28:29.680 --> 1:28:32.200 and I mean she's just in the regular league, right, like. 1:28:32.400 --> 1:28:35.439 Right, yeah, other turfs mad about it. 1:28:35.560 --> 1:28:37.800 You know, It's funny inside the StarCraft community, this was 1:28:37.840 --> 1:28:40.240 a huge thing for a long time, and eventually the 1:28:40.320 --> 1:28:42.920 tides just turned against them because everyone likes her because 1:28:42.920 --> 1:28:45.880 she's really good and she's also just like a good person, 1:28:46.360 --> 1:28:48.120 and so they kind of I got a watch over 1:28:48.120 --> 1:28:51.240 the years as they just kind of got obliterated. Weirdly, 1:28:51.320 --> 1:28:53.640 the like regular turfs haven't really found out about this, 1:28:54.160 --> 1:28:57.720 probably because StarCraft is, I don't know, too good of 1:28:57.720 --> 1:28:59.760 a game for them to be fucking dealing with. 1:29:00.600 --> 1:29:02.760 Not understanding things has not stopped this. 1:29:02.840 --> 1:29:03.840 That's true. That's true. 1:29:03.920 --> 1:29:06.519 It's kind of too obscure by this point. But you know, 1:29:06.600 --> 1:29:08.599 like there's been a lot of real concern for sort 1:29:08.600 --> 1:29:10.320 of queer players. There are a lot of these teams, 1:29:10.479 --> 1:29:12.360 like right as they were announcing they were going to 1:29:12.400 --> 1:29:15.479 the fucking Esports, well kup, we're doing all of these 1:29:15.680 --> 1:29:17.840 fucking Pride posts and talking about how they're gonna let 1:29:17.840 --> 1:29:19.840 their players wear Pride jerseys, and it's like, are you 1:29:19.920 --> 1:29:20.680 fucking kidding me? 1:29:21.760 --> 1:29:22.000 Yeah? 1:29:22.080 --> 1:29:23.960 You know, so are they physically pressed in Saudi Ara 1:29:24.000 --> 1:29:24.519 able to play? 1:29:24.600 --> 1:29:24.800 Yeah? 1:29:24.840 --> 1:29:28.280 Yeah, These these tournaments are happening physically in Riod. Okay, yeah, 1:29:28.840 --> 1:29:30.280 you know this is this isn't the first one they've had. 1:29:30.320 --> 1:29:33.200 They've had some other events before this too there, but 1:29:33.320 --> 1:29:36.280 you know, like yeah and yeah, things are very very bad. 1:29:36.400 --> 1:29:38.400 There was a well, a story that was. 1:29:38.400 --> 1:29:41.880 Famous among trans people, but I don't ever think broke containment. 1:29:42.320 --> 1:29:45.240 Was there's a Saudi trans woman named Eden who was 1:29:45.280 --> 1:29:48.280 tricked into going back to like see her family, and 1:29:48.360 --> 1:29:50.320 her family just kidnapped her and locked her up and 1:29:50.400 --> 1:29:51.840 she killed herself Jesus. 1:29:51.920 --> 1:29:54.320 And this is not an uncommon thing. 1:29:54.720 --> 1:29:57.320 It happens to sist women too sometimes when they try 1:29:57.360 --> 1:29:59.280 to like get out of the country, sure is, they'll 1:29:59.320 --> 1:30:01.360 be kidnapped and like renditioned back. 1:30:01.800 --> 1:30:04.519 Yeah, there have been some pretty good reports on that. Yeah, 1:30:04.560 --> 1:30:06.479 well linked amost something because it's too it'll be too 1:30:06.680 --> 1:30:07.639 lankly to go and do here. 1:30:07.800 --> 1:30:08.120 Yeah. 1:30:08.160 --> 1:30:11.240 But I think I think kind of the weakness of 1:30:11.320 --> 1:30:14.240 the backlash is that it doesn't it doesn't really quite 1:30:14.320 --> 1:30:18.240 understand exactly why the Saudis are doing this. You know, 1:30:18.280 --> 1:30:22.479 they understand that the Saudi government is incredibly repressive and 1:30:22.479 --> 1:30:25.519 that it's you know, institutionally homophobic, and it's institutionally sexist. 1:30:26.160 --> 1:30:30.240 It does not understand like just exactly how fucking bad 1:30:30.280 --> 1:30:32.840 these people are. Like this is like the most feted 1:30:32.920 --> 1:30:34.479 up state in the entire world. 1:30:34.560 --> 1:30:37.280 It is like it is. It is the fucking CIA state. 1:30:37.920 --> 1:30:40.519 And the rest of this episode is going to be 1:30:40.640 --> 1:30:44.240 us running through the exact sequence of stuff that caused 1:30:44.240 --> 1:30:46.120 the Saudis to need to do all of this fucking 1:30:46.120 --> 1:30:50.160 PR bullshit and how the sort of structural economic cycle 1:30:50.240 --> 1:30:54.559 of funneling petro dollars around has led to genocide and 1:30:54.600 --> 1:30:57.840 then also the stupid fucking esports tournament for PR. 1:30:58.080 --> 1:30:59.280 Two things which I'm not to say. 1:30:59.439 --> 1:31:02.240 But first, do you know who's probably not a large 1:31:02.320 --> 1:31:05.880 enough company to have sponsored this tournament? Although I can't 1:31:05.920 --> 1:31:08.040 promise that it's not KitKat or whatever. 1:31:07.840 --> 1:31:10.280 The fuck, hopefully it's kit Kat. I would like some 1:31:10.360 --> 1:31:12.479 cake cats, if that is any they're one of the 1:31:12.479 --> 1:31:15.360 sponsors of this fucking Esports World Cup. You keep your 1:31:15.400 --> 1:31:18.040 way for a biscuit cake cat, you'll hate cookie. I 1:31:18.320 --> 1:31:20.000 don't want you to hate Jocobar anymore. 1:31:20.720 --> 1:31:23.120 Yeah, it's the products and services of this podcast, which 1:31:23.120 --> 1:31:26.880 hopefully are not supporting a genocide. But good god, we 1:31:26.960 --> 1:31:39.800 copy show YEP, so we are back and we are 1:31:39.840 --> 1:31:44.040 going to talk petro dollars. So Saudi wealth takes a 1:31:44.040 --> 1:31:46.960 form of what are called petro dollars. Petro dollars are 1:31:47.880 --> 1:31:50.640 in some sense, they're very very simple, right, It's dollars 1:31:50.760 --> 1:31:53.760 that you get from selling oil. This is important for 1:31:53.760 --> 1:31:56.360 a number of reasons. Though technically speaking you can sort 1:31:56.400 --> 1:31:59.960 of sell oil in other currencies now, but like most 1:32:00.120 --> 1:32:03.640 oil in the world is sold specifically in dollars, and 1:32:03.640 --> 1:32:05.400 so around the world, dollars are one of the things 1:32:05.400 --> 1:32:07.439 that if you are an economy, you need dollars in 1:32:07.520 --> 1:32:10.600 order to get oil from people. So huge sinks of 1:32:10.640 --> 1:32:13.240 American dollars from all across the world, you know, from 1:32:13.280 --> 1:32:14.960 the US of the US imporce, a lot of oil 1:32:15.840 --> 1:32:18.639 flow into these sort of oil producing countries. 1:32:18.680 --> 1:32:19.839 These are called petro dollars. 1:32:20.439 --> 1:32:23.120 The most obvious manifestation of this in Saudi Arabia is 1:32:23.360 --> 1:32:26.559 the country's solving Wealth Fund, which has nine hundred billion 1:32:26.640 --> 1:32:31.880 dollars of assets. Right, this is an unfathomable amount of money. 1:32:32.000 --> 1:32:34.440 It is so much money that it is a structural 1:32:34.479 --> 1:32:37.519 problem for the global economy trying to figure out what 1:32:37.560 --> 1:32:40.360 the fuck you do with this money. This is a 1:32:40.360 --> 1:32:43.240 problem that has caused disaster around the world. Is something 1:32:43.240 --> 1:32:44.880 where I'm fond of talking about on this show, but 1:32:44.920 --> 1:32:47.040 we're going to talk about again because it's important here. 1:32:47.200 --> 1:32:50.280 In the seventies and eighties, as sort of Opek realized 1:32:50.320 --> 1:32:51.920 that it could, you know, use its sort of political 1:32:51.960 --> 1:32:55.360 power to gain enormous amounts of wealth and power and 1:32:55.400 --> 1:32:58.120 gain enormous amounts of petro dollars by controlling the price 1:32:58.120 --> 1:33:00.760 of oil. Suddenly they had, you know, that you have 1:33:00.880 --> 1:33:03.800 hundreds of billions of dollars floating around and because this 1:33:03.840 --> 1:33:05.680 is capitalism, you can't just sit on that money. You 1:33:05.720 --> 1:33:07.200 have to find a way to turn that money into 1:33:07.240 --> 1:33:09.519 more money. But again, you know, I mean just a 1:33:09.560 --> 1:33:13.599 sovereign wealth fund is almost a trillion dollars, right, and 1:33:13.640 --> 1:33:16.400 so this is extremely hard, and it means that this 1:33:16.520 --> 1:33:19.439 money is constantly flowing around the world trying to find 1:33:19.479 --> 1:33:20.920 a way to get returns on it, you know. And 1:33:22.000 --> 1:33:24.840 in the modern era, these are things like people remember 1:33:24.920 --> 1:33:27.600 we work, oh yeah, but incredibly stupid dune. From the 1:33:27.600 --> 1:33:31.639 beginning office space rental scheme that went under that that 1:33:31.760 --> 1:33:33.920 was a lot of that was funded by Saudi money 1:33:33.960 --> 1:33:36.200 because Tuddy's had put an enormous amount of money in 1:33:37.000 --> 1:33:39.080 this Japanese bank called soft Bank, and soft Bank was 1:33:39.120 --> 1:33:41.240 trying to figure out what to do with this unfathol 1:33:41.240 --> 1:33:43.080 amount of money, and they were like, Okay, what if 1:33:43.120 --> 1:33:45.040 we fund the dumbest project of all time? 1:33:45.600 --> 1:33:47.519 Yeah, And it became a thing where they could fund 1:33:47.560 --> 1:33:50.519 it and like just buy them funding it. Its stock 1:33:50.600 --> 1:33:52.479 price would go up even if it was like we 1:33:52.520 --> 1:33:54.320 work a really shit idea. 1:33:54.760 --> 1:33:55.000 Yeah. 1:33:55.160 --> 1:33:57.400 And this is something about global capital that I don't 1:33:57.439 --> 1:34:03.240 think has been fully processed really. But the sheer, the 1:34:03.240 --> 1:34:06.360 sheer extent of capital concentration, right, the amount of money 1:34:06.400 --> 1:34:08.400 that the richest people in the world and the riches 1:34:08.479 --> 1:34:09.880 sort of families in the world in the sort of 1:34:09.880 --> 1:34:12.960 Saudi case, right, you know, the Saudi Arabia is a 1:34:13.000 --> 1:34:15.280 country where a family has access to the resources of 1:34:15.320 --> 1:34:20.240 extremely wealthy nation state. Right, And that being true has 1:34:20.320 --> 1:34:22.880 structural effects on the entire rest of the economy because 1:34:22.920 --> 1:34:25.240 you know, we've been seeing the consequences of this for 1:34:25.280 --> 1:34:27.439 a long time in the tech sector, right, where you 1:34:27.439 --> 1:34:30.679 don't have to fucking make money, like your revenue stream 1:34:30.760 --> 1:34:33.800 can just be investor money and you can coast for 1:34:33.840 --> 1:34:37.240 a decade off of just taking money from the Saudis 1:34:37.280 --> 1:34:38.920 who are like trying to find some way to turn 1:34:38.960 --> 1:34:39.240 this money. 1:34:39.240 --> 1:34:39.800 And the more money. 1:34:40.320 --> 1:34:42.560 I think this has downstream effects that we don't we 1:34:42.600 --> 1:34:47.000 haven't even begun to really understand yet, right, But very famously, 1:34:47.080 --> 1:34:48.880 in the seventies and eighties, there was all this money 1:34:48.880 --> 1:34:53.160 floating around and what it was poured into was the 1:34:53.160 --> 1:34:55.920 Third Book debt crisis. People bought state debt with it, 1:34:56.479 --> 1:35:00.480 and then these loans were on it were on adjustable rates. 1:35:00.520 --> 1:35:03.640 So when the vulgar shock hit and the US like 1:35:03.720 --> 1:35:06.479 massively increased interest rates, the interest rates on these loans 1:35:06.520 --> 1:35:08.719 like skyrocketed and suddenly you know, you're paying like fifty 1:35:08.720 --> 1:35:11.800 percent interest on a loan of like cephal billion dollars. 1:35:11.840 --> 1:35:15.000 And all of these countries are just systematically looted. Their 1:35:15.000 --> 1:35:18.960 economies are destroyed. I mean, David Grab rememorably talks about 1:35:19.320 --> 1:35:23.760 this thing in Madagascar where Madagascar had eliminated malaria. You know, 1:35:23.840 --> 1:35:26.960 but the way you eliminate malaria is through mosquito extermination. 1:35:27.160 --> 1:35:28.960 Like programs are not that expensive, but they are a 1:35:28.960 --> 1:35:32.520 little bit expensive. And when the fucking government of Madagascar 1:35:32.640 --> 1:35:34.519 had to like pay off this IMF debt, they had 1:35:34.520 --> 1:35:34.840 to get. 1:35:34.800 --> 1:35:36.639 Rid of the they. 1:35:36.600 --> 1:35:38.559 Got rid of this mosquito programs, and there was a 1:35:38.560 --> 1:35:41.240 malaria outpick and it killed unfathomable numbers of people, and 1:35:41.280 --> 1:35:44.040 stuff like this happened all over the world. And the 1:35:44.120 --> 1:35:46.000 source of all of this, right, partially the source of 1:35:46.000 --> 1:35:47.680 this is these loans. And partially the source of this 1:35:47.920 --> 1:35:51.559 is this these enormous piles of petro dollars that you 1:35:51.640 --> 1:35:53.400 have to find some way to sort of turn into 1:35:53.400 --> 1:35:57.160 more capital, right, and you know, so there are sort 1:35:57.200 --> 1:36:00.120 of trademark things you can do with this money. Of 1:36:00.120 --> 1:36:03.040 them is buying a bunch of a military equipment. Mostly 1:36:03.040 --> 1:36:05.200 what you're doing with that is sort of buying American patronage. 1:36:05.280 --> 1:36:07.639 If you spend enormous amount of money buying American tanks, 1:36:07.680 --> 1:36:09.040 and this is you know, something the Saudi has been 1:36:09.040 --> 1:36:11.559 doing for ages, right, you spend a bunch of money 1:36:11.600 --> 1:36:13.720 on American defense contracts. You know, you can sort of 1:36:13.760 --> 1:36:16.799 buy us protection and guarantees that you know, for example, 1:36:16.800 --> 1:36:18.640 as it is gonna happen later in this episode, you 1:36:18.680 --> 1:36:21.200 can buy a guarantee that an invading army won't sack 1:36:21.240 --> 1:36:24.360 your capital. But the thing with the Saudis is that 1:36:24.360 --> 1:36:27.719 they have a lot of equipment but Saudi Arabia cannot 1:36:27.800 --> 1:36:31.200 maintain a strong functional army, right if they were, if 1:36:31.240 --> 1:36:33.479 they had an actual serious army, there would be a 1:36:33.479 --> 1:36:38.360 coup tomorrow. So their army is extremely well equipped kind of, 1:36:38.439 --> 1:36:40.960 but it's trained like shit and it's run by like 1:36:41.120 --> 1:36:44.760 just dipshits intentionally so that it sucks. But you know, 1:36:44.800 --> 1:36:46.200 so that's like sort of one thing you can do 1:36:46.240 --> 1:36:48.519 with this money. A lot of this money ended up 1:36:48.520 --> 1:36:51.559 going into real estate, and there are sort of cycles 1:36:51.560 --> 1:36:54.400 of this happening. The one that ain't that's of concern 1:36:54.479 --> 1:36:56.479 to us is what happens after two thousand and eight, 1:36:56.760 --> 1:36:59.280 in the sort of aftermath of two thousand and eight. 1:36:59.320 --> 1:37:04.439 There are bill places in the world where, you know, 1:37:04.560 --> 1:37:08.040 you can park an extremely large amount of money in 1:37:08.120 --> 1:37:11.960 real estate and have it be a relatively liquid asset. 1:37:12.439 --> 1:37:15.320 If you have like property in a market that is, 1:37:15.360 --> 1:37:17.080 you know, where the housing market is really hot and 1:37:17.120 --> 1:37:19.439 prices are increasing rapidly, you can pretty quickly get rid 1:37:19.479 --> 1:37:21.080 of it. And you can also there's liquidity. There's sort 1:37:21.080 --> 1:37:23.760 of financial instruments you can do based off of your 1:37:23.800 --> 1:37:26.879 ownership of real estate, and this is something that drives 1:37:26.920 --> 1:37:30.000 the Saudis into a bunch of very very I don't 1:37:30.000 --> 1:37:31.760 know if risky is exactly the right word, but a 1:37:31.760 --> 1:37:36.280 bunch of moves in ye Many real estate that really, 1:37:36.320 --> 1:37:38.559 truly we're about to not pay off. 1:37:39.120 --> 1:37:40.360 There's a very good book about this. 1:37:41.000 --> 1:37:45.559 It's by Lisa Bloomy called Destroying Yemen, which is about 1:37:45.960 --> 1:37:47.639 like a lot of the factors that start the war 1:37:47.640 --> 1:37:49.240 in Yemen, and this is one of them. 1:37:49.320 --> 1:37:49.479 Right. 1:37:50.000 --> 1:37:53.200 We can't really do a full recap of the Many 1:37:53.240 --> 1:37:57.960 Civil War because that's its own seven hundred episode podcast, Like, 1:37:58.680 --> 1:38:02.800 oh god it is. Yeah, it's on a surface level, 1:38:02.840 --> 1:38:04.760 it's not that complicated, but the moment you get any 1:38:04.800 --> 1:38:07.960 granular detail on it, it's like the most complicated conflict 1:38:08.000 --> 1:38:08.679 I've ever studied. 1:38:09.040 --> 1:38:11.760 Yeah, I mean there's so many conflicts like this, right, Like, yeah, 1:38:11.920 --> 1:38:15.280 civil war appreciates us. When I was studying Yemen in college, 1:38:15.320 --> 1:38:18.800 I longed for the simplicity of the Spanish Civil War, 1:38:19.160 --> 1:38:23.200 Like this conflict is nuts, Yeah, but for simplicity's sake. 1:38:23.880 --> 1:38:27.600 There's roughly ish two factions. There are the sort of 1:38:27.600 --> 1:38:29.960 forces allied with what's called the Coalition government, which is 1:38:29.960 --> 1:38:33.040 the government backed by the Saudis, and then there are 1:38:33.200 --> 1:38:35.679 what's sort of in the West become called the Huthis. 1:38:35.800 --> 1:38:37.680 I mean it's more complicated. It's all of this is 1:38:37.760 --> 1:38:40.840 enormously more complicated than that. These are all alliances. A 1:38:40.840 --> 1:38:44.360 lot of these alliances are extremely tenuous. But one of 1:38:44.400 --> 1:38:46.560 the things that happens is that when a government that 1:38:46.680 --> 1:38:49.200 is hostile to the Saudis, which is like you know, 1:38:49.280 --> 1:38:51.439 the sort of like unterer a law like that whole 1:38:52.040 --> 1:38:54.879 coalition is very awso to the saudiast because the Saudis 1:38:54.920 --> 1:38:57.720 sucks shit. You know, Suddenly the Saudis are looking at 1:38:57.760 --> 1:39:00.639 an enormous amount of capital they've sunk in real estate 1:39:00.640 --> 1:39:02.880 that they are you know, based on these like incredibly 1:39:02.880 --> 1:39:05.479 corrupt land deals with the previous administration, which have been 1:39:05.479 --> 1:39:09.200 friendly to them, they are looking at suddenly losing all 1:39:09.200 --> 1:39:11.599 this land. The Saudis weren't the first people to come 1:39:11.640 --> 1:39:13.479 into sort of the m many real estate market right 1:39:13.479 --> 1:39:15.720 on the uae Omah and a bunch of other states 1:39:15.720 --> 1:39:18.080 has sort of been in there before. And so part 1:39:18.080 --> 1:39:19.519 of what a big part of what this sort of 1:39:19.520 --> 1:39:21.920 this like what was called the coalition is is this 1:39:22.640 --> 1:39:25.439 like basically a bunch of these assholes trying to protect 1:39:25.439 --> 1:39:28.400 their housing assets. Look, that's a lot of what a 1:39:28.400 --> 1:39:30.559 lot of wars are. If we're on it, it's people 1:39:30.600 --> 1:39:34.679 trying to protect xoy assets, right like unfortunately. 1:39:34.840 --> 1:39:38.439 Yeah, and it's not really seen in these terms in 1:39:38.479 --> 1:39:41.240 the way that's covered. But that's that's a lot of 1:39:41.840 --> 1:39:46.679 what's going on. And this produces one of the worst 1:39:46.720 --> 1:39:49.200 wars of the twenty first century, which is saying something 1:39:49.200 --> 1:39:50.519 because the twenty for centuries had a lot. 1:39:50.439 --> 1:39:51.800 Of really really terrible wars. 1:39:51.880 --> 1:39:52.919 Yeah, we've had some reference. 1:39:53.520 --> 1:39:55.479 Yeah, and we're going to get into what the Saudis 1:39:55.479 --> 1:40:08.280 were doing during this war. After these products and services 1:40:09.000 --> 1:40:10.120 you have returned and. 1:40:10.080 --> 1:40:11.280 The thing we're returning. 1:40:10.960 --> 1:40:13.040 Into is a really really bleak war. 1:40:13.240 --> 1:40:15.720 So we said this kind of from the beginning, right, 1:40:15.720 --> 1:40:19.519 the Saudi military is not very good. The Saudi's attempt 1:40:19.640 --> 1:40:21.960 to sort of end the war by like rolling a 1:40:22.000 --> 1:40:24.680 tank column over the border. It's like, I think it's 1:40:25.600 --> 1:40:28.479 twenty fourteen, twenty fifteen, in like the early period of 1:40:28.479 --> 1:40:30.439 the war, they try to end up by just rolling tanks, 1:40:30.439 --> 1:40:34.080 and tanks get obliterated because the Saudi army isn't worth shit, right. 1:40:34.760 --> 1:40:38.439 All of their ground forces are a joke, but their 1:40:38.479 --> 1:40:41.559 air force is very very well equipped with a bunch 1:40:41.600 --> 1:40:44.240 of like incredibly modern US warplanes that we sell them 1:40:44.280 --> 1:40:46.840 all the fucking time, and so you know, they don't 1:40:46.840 --> 1:40:48.720 really have good infantry. What they have the ability to 1:40:48.760 --> 1:40:51.880 do is just obliterate people with air strikes. The kind 1:40:51.920 --> 1:40:54.439 of like terror air campaign that they're waging is something 1:40:54.439 --> 1:40:56.680 that I think we're all familiar with from Palestine. But 1:40:57.280 --> 1:40:59.960 they're doing air strikes on school buses full of children, 1:41:00.080 --> 1:41:02.880 and they're taking the American thing. They're doing double tap 1:41:03.000 --> 1:41:06.240 drone strikes on weddings where they're they're hitting a wedding 1:41:06.280 --> 1:41:08.200 and then when rescue workers come up, they hit they hit. 1:41:08.080 --> 1:41:09.400 The rescue workers with their strikes. 1:41:09.479 --> 1:41:09.639 Right. 1:41:09.840 --> 1:41:11.160 I'm pretty sure it was young when they had the 1:41:11.160 --> 1:41:13.640 triple tap fucking airstrike where they did an airstrike on 1:41:13.640 --> 1:41:16.160 someone's funeral. They didn't airstrike on the rescue workers, and 1:41:16.160 --> 1:41:17.640 then when they had a funeral for those people, they 1:41:17.680 --> 1:41:18.680 did air strike on fucking that. 1:41:19.240 --> 1:41:19.360 Right. 1:41:19.920 --> 1:41:21.840 This is a just. 1:41:21.840 --> 1:41:24.519 Unbelievably brutal war. And you know, I want to get 1:41:24.520 --> 1:41:26.880 which we talked about, right, like there are some there 1:41:26.920 --> 1:41:32.320 are some parts of the Saudi coalition that can you know, 1:41:32.479 --> 1:41:36.080 field ground forces, right, that stuff's mostly the sort of 1:41:36.160 --> 1:41:41.240 southern secessionist groups and those people are not really that loyal, 1:41:42.000 --> 1:41:44.559 so you know, so they have to start importing infantry 1:41:44.600 --> 1:41:47.160 to try to fight the who thies, and so they're 1:41:47.200 --> 1:41:49.800 importing a bunch of Columbian mercenaries. So these are guys 1:41:49.840 --> 1:41:52.559 who've been like desk squad guys in Columbia. 1:41:51.960 --> 1:41:55.200 The Columbian guys, the new I was going to say, 1:41:55.200 --> 1:41:58.240 the new Rhodesians that it's a dog shadowt to cost 1:41:58.280 --> 1:42:01.479 and a group of human beings. Yeah, it used to 1:42:01.520 --> 1:42:05.160 be that when you were running into private military contractors abroad, 1:42:05.439 --> 1:42:10.000 it would be people white folks from Africa, right, Like 1:42:10.240 --> 1:42:14.040 they call themselves Rhodesion South Africans, what have you. Now 1:42:14.400 --> 1:42:16.679 you'll see a lot of like a lot of private 1:42:16.680 --> 1:42:20.320 military contractors, like at the boots on the ground, you know, 1:42:20.400 --> 1:42:21.800 infantry level of Colombians. 1:42:22.680 --> 1:42:24.880 Yeah, and so so that that's one of the sources 1:42:24.920 --> 1:42:27.720 they went to. But then you know, part of the 1:42:27.760 --> 1:42:31.360 Saudi coalition is the UAE, and the UAE has a 1:42:31.400 --> 1:42:34.639 lot of very very close ties to militant groups in Sudance, 1:42:34.680 --> 1:42:38.519 specifically a group of militias that's now known the West 1:42:38.560 --> 1:42:41.679 of the Rapid Response Forces but these are the people 1:42:41.680 --> 1:42:43.760 who did the genocide and are for yeah, and they 1:42:43.760 --> 1:42:47.280 are like right now like doing a genocide in like 1:42:47.400 --> 1:42:49.360 in Sudan as they attempt to sort of seize control 1:42:49.439 --> 1:42:52.840 of the country. And because the UAE is very very 1:42:52.840 --> 1:42:54.880 well connected to these one of the ways that the 1:42:54.920 --> 1:42:59.880 coalition tries to get ground troops is by using troops 1:43:00.160 --> 1:43:03.000 were you know, kidnapped by these militias. And when I 1:43:03.040 --> 1:43:05.680 say troops, I mean child soldiers. What the forces that 1:43:05.720 --> 1:43:08.080 they are deploying in Yemen in an attempt to use 1:43:08.080 --> 1:43:13.000 as cannon fodder are Sudanese child soldiers. It is unbelievably believe, 1:43:13.000 --> 1:43:15.000 I mean kind of funnily. A lot of these people 1:43:15.040 --> 1:43:17.280 end up not fighting because they you know, they get 1:43:17.280 --> 1:43:19.200 handed a rifle, will get thrown into Yemen and they 1:43:19.200 --> 1:43:24.040 just immediately sell their guns and I to fight. But like, 1:43:24.280 --> 1:43:25.960 you know, but like that, that's the kind of shit. 1:43:26.120 --> 1:43:29.320 Like again, the kind of pure evil we are dealing 1:43:29.360 --> 1:43:32.200 with is we are having the guys who did the dart, 1:43:32.240 --> 1:43:36.719 who did the fucking Darfur genocide, kidnap fucking villagers from Sudan, 1:43:36.840 --> 1:43:39.559 like child soldiers from Sudan and attempting to use them 1:43:39.560 --> 1:43:42.080 as cannon father in their fucking war in Yemen, so 1:43:42.120 --> 1:43:44.200 they can like defend their fucking real estate assets. 1:43:44.280 --> 1:43:47.080 Yeah right, I think Friend of the Show Eric Prince 1:43:47.320 --> 1:43:49.920 makes a uh makes an appearance in Yemen as well 1:43:50.320 --> 1:43:53.920 his Triumvira of companies, which are the same company, right, 1:43:53.960 --> 1:43:54.800 Black Quota Z. 1:43:55.320 --> 1:43:55.679 Yeah. 1:43:55.720 --> 1:44:01.240 Probably, I quite frankly don't remember that part, but probably also, Yeah, you. 1:44:01.280 --> 1:44:03.519 Can rely on EP to show up in a situation 1:44:03.600 --> 1:44:03.960 I is. 1:44:04.640 --> 1:44:04.920 Yeah. 1:44:05.000 --> 1:44:06.479 I mean the part of this we haven't gotten to 1:44:06.600 --> 1:44:09.519 yet is the worst part of it, which is so 1:44:09.560 --> 1:44:13.160 this the Saudis and the sort of coalition government they 1:44:13.320 --> 1:44:16.479 you know, they do okay in the sort of southwest 1:44:16.520 --> 1:44:20.120 of the country because the Southern Yemen secessionst groups are 1:44:20.360 --> 1:44:23.679 well organized and are good soldiers, even if they eventually 1:44:23.720 --> 1:44:26.080 sort of rebel. There's this whole it's it's a whole mess. 1:44:26.120 --> 1:44:30.679 But in the west of the country everything is completely different, 1:44:30.720 --> 1:44:32.720 and you know, they're basically getting their shit kicked in 1:44:33.200 --> 1:44:37.800 and in that theater, the Saudi's plan is we are 1:44:37.840 --> 1:44:40.920 going to starve the country, so, you know, and the Saudi, 1:44:40.960 --> 1:44:44.360 the Saudis have naval assets nobody else really in this 1:44:44.439 --> 1:44:48.160 war does, right, and they just set up a blockade 1:44:48.280 --> 1:44:50.080 on like all of the ports on that side of 1:44:50.120 --> 1:44:52.960 the country. We do not know how many people get 1:44:53.000 --> 1:44:56.240 starved as a result of this. The last good mortality 1:44:56.240 --> 1:44:58.040 figures I could I could find, this war is still 1:44:58.080 --> 1:45:01.080 going on, by the way. I mean, fighting has gotten 1:45:01.200 --> 1:45:03.880 a lot less intense since of twenty twenty one, twenty 1:45:03.920 --> 1:45:06.680 twenty two, but I mean it's it's still going The 1:45:06.760 --> 1:45:09.599 last good numbers that I can find suggest three hundred 1:45:09.600 --> 1:45:13.680 and seventy seven thousand dead, and it's probably way way 1:45:13.760 --> 1:45:16.080 worse than that, because again, we just don't know how 1:45:16.080 --> 1:45:18.519 many people died in the famines that you know that 1:45:18.520 --> 1:45:21.360 that the Saudi set off, and this was you know, 1:45:21.400 --> 1:45:24.320 this was explicitly there. Their plan here was was to 1:45:24.479 --> 1:45:26.799 just kill off the population of this part of Yemen 1:45:26.880 --> 1:45:29.880 by starving them to death. You know, this is the genocide, right, 1:45:29.920 --> 1:45:31.880 they were trying to do genocide. It doesn't work, and 1:45:31.920 --> 1:45:34.760 it doesn't work because, I mean there's a number of 1:45:34.760 --> 1:45:38.280 reasons why it doesn't work. They basically they get defeated militarily. 1:45:38.880 --> 1:45:43.120 Kuthi troops like take several cities like inside of Saudi Rabia, 1:45:43.160 --> 1:45:44.840 and like they like they march across the border and 1:45:44.920 --> 1:45:47.559 take them. And you know, I mean, it's it's bad 1:45:47.680 --> 1:45:49.400 enough for the Saudis that like the there's a moment 1:45:49.439 --> 1:45:51.040 where it like it looks like they're going to lose 1:45:51.120 --> 1:45:53.479 ri Odd and the US has to step in and 1:45:53.520 --> 1:45:56.080 be like no, like okay, you guys need to fucking. 1:45:55.880 --> 1:45:56.679 Pull out of this shit. 1:45:56.840 --> 1:45:58.680 But that you know that, and that that makes the 1:45:58.720 --> 1:46:04.800 war less bad, you know, like the blockades not still 1:46:04.800 --> 1:46:07.120 in place. But this is the situation in twenty twenty 1:46:07.160 --> 1:46:09.240 two that we walk into when when suddenly there's they're 1:46:09.240 --> 1:46:12.000 buying all these esports companies that they have just attempted 1:46:12.000 --> 1:46:15.720 to commit a genocide, right, they have just attempted to 1:46:15.880 --> 1:46:18.880 exterminate a vast part of the population of Yemen. That's 1:46:19.000 --> 1:46:21.360 I think, like really the true sort of heart of darkness, 1:46:21.400 --> 1:46:24.360 evil shit, right, Like I don't know, it's like US 1:46:24.360 --> 1:46:25.439 and Cambodia is shit. 1:46:26.000 --> 1:46:28.320 But you know, there's stuff that got. 1:46:28.160 --> 1:46:30.559 More media attention too, which was like in a lot 1:46:30.560 --> 1:46:33.240 of ways more harmful to them because that the pr 1:46:33.280 --> 1:46:34.599 from it. But one of the things I think people 1:46:34.600 --> 1:46:37.320 have forgotten now because this was six years ago, is 1:46:37.360 --> 1:46:41.400 that in twenty eighteen they kidnapped and then killed a 1:46:42.200 --> 1:46:45.880 Washington Post columnist named Jamal ka Shogi by tricking him 1:46:45.920 --> 1:46:49.679 into going into a consulate, killing him, carving his body 1:46:49.760 --> 1:46:50.800 up with a bone saw. 1:46:51.560 --> 1:46:53.400 And we're pretty sure the way. 1:46:53.280 --> 1:46:55.000 That they got the body out of the consulate was 1:46:55.000 --> 1:46:58.280 by stuffing the fucking again bone saled parts of his 1:46:58.360 --> 1:47:02.040 body into see bags in a diplomatic community and walking 1:47:02.080 --> 1:47:02.919 them out of the embassy. 1:47:03.680 --> 1:47:06.559 Yeah, this is one of those things that I should 1:47:06.640 --> 1:47:09.600 never be forgotten, right, Like, yeah, he was a citizen, right, 1:47:09.720 --> 1:47:10.759 was he a green cod hode? 1:47:11.680 --> 1:47:16.439 I'm not one hundred percent sure, but this is obviously 1:47:16.840 --> 1:47:20.240 like a fucking unbelievable crime. I think I wish that 1:47:20.960 --> 1:47:23.520 you know, the fact that they were doing fucking airstrikes 1:47:23.560 --> 1:47:26.559 on school buses had gotten as much attention as this did. 1:47:26.760 --> 1:47:29.720 But you know, for for a long time, right, like 1:47:29.760 --> 1:47:32.519 in the late twenty tens and the early twenty twenties, 1:47:32.520 --> 1:47:34.639 and this this was an issue in the twenty twenty 1:47:35.200 --> 1:47:38.040 presidential campaigns because you know, I mean, Trump fucking went 1:47:38.080 --> 1:47:41.120 and touched the orb with Muhammed bin Salman, who's the 1:47:41.400 --> 1:47:45.639 Crown Prince of now Well at the time, was known 1:47:45.680 --> 1:47:49.040 as Mohammad Been bone saw because she just straight up 1:47:49.120 --> 1:47:52.080 ordered this guy to be fucking bone salved, you know, 1:47:52.120 --> 1:47:53.679 but like that it was. It was a real sort 1:47:53.680 --> 1:47:55.439 of issue. And this is the reputation that the Satuda 1:47:55.439 --> 1:47:59.759 government has that causes them to kind of go really 1:47:59.760 --> 1:48:02.200 really hard into the into this esports angle. And there 1:48:02.320 --> 1:48:04.479 there's one last kind of angle to this, which is 1:48:04.520 --> 1:48:07.960 like the worst kept secret in the of the oil 1:48:08.000 --> 1:48:09.679 market is that the Saudis are running out of oil. 1:48:10.360 --> 1:48:13.040 It's like it's it's technically a secret, but it's like 1:48:13.200 --> 1:48:16.800 everyone knows this, Like every everyone knows that a lot 1:48:16.800 --> 1:48:20.400 of sort of oil that's technically sold by Saudi Ramco 1:48:20.840 --> 1:48:24.280 is not their oil, it's their labels and other people's oil. 1:48:24.640 --> 1:48:26.640 And people have known this for a long time, and 1:48:26.680 --> 1:48:29.519 the Saudis obviously know it. And so the trick they 1:48:29.560 --> 1:48:31.600 have to pull right in order to continue to be 1:48:31.760 --> 1:48:36.599 this fucking like nightmare dictatorship state propped up by the CIA, 1:48:37.360 --> 1:48:39.880 is to find something else to base their economy on. 1:48:40.080 --> 1:48:42.599 And their plan has been a lot of like they're 1:48:42.600 --> 1:48:45.120 trying to do just tech bullshit we're not going to 1:48:45.200 --> 1:48:47.160 get into because that's its own thing. 1:48:48.000 --> 1:48:51.160 I'm so sad. I'm so sad to be talking about 1:48:51.200 --> 1:48:52.160 the line. 1:48:52.280 --> 1:48:53.599 Sorry, the lines. 1:48:53.760 --> 1:48:55.040 Yet they're trying to build a city that is a 1:48:55.040 --> 1:48:58.360 lot of that is also a city, a really really 1:48:58.400 --> 1:49:00.960 long city is a line that's to be their tech thing. 1:49:01.360 --> 1:49:03.960 You may sound like we're ever simplifying this, We are not. No, 1:49:04.080 --> 1:49:05.439 it is that they are trying to build a city 1:49:05.479 --> 1:49:06.000 that is aligned. 1:49:06.040 --> 1:49:06.880 It's not going to get built. 1:49:06.920 --> 1:49:10.840 What it has done is they've absolutely destroyed the lives 1:49:10.880 --> 1:49:12.880 of a bunch of sort of people who are just 1:49:12.920 --> 1:49:16.640 like farmers and cattle like herders, like some of the 1:49:16.680 --> 1:49:18.280 metic cattle herders, and people who've been there for a 1:49:18.280 --> 1:49:20.559 really long time have had their land taken away from 1:49:20.560 --> 1:49:21.360 them and their lives have been. 1:49:21.280 --> 1:49:23.000 Destroyed by it. So you know. 1:49:23.920 --> 1:49:25.280 But the thing is that in order for them to 1:49:25.320 --> 1:49:27.240 try to do their tech pivot, they have to fix 1:49:27.240 --> 1:49:30.200 the reputation people. They cannot be the state that is 1:49:30.200 --> 1:49:35.280 you remembered for like bone sawing a journalist and attempting 1:49:35.320 --> 1:49:37.400 to start of an entire population and doing air strikes 1:49:37.439 --> 1:49:39.640 and school buses. Right, this can't be the reputation they have. 1:49:39.720 --> 1:49:42.639 This is it Vision twenty thirty or Planned twenty thirty 1:49:42.680 --> 1:49:45.519 or some big yeah yeah, for their like rehabilitation and 1:49:45.600 --> 1:49:50.080 diversification of their income. But like posts Jamal Kashogi, a 1:49:50.280 --> 1:49:53.320 lot of big companies like we can't be like like 1:49:53.439 --> 1:49:56.760 companies like Google, right, and like big big tech companies, Yeah, 1:49:56.840 --> 1:49:58.880 kind of took a noticeable step back. 1:49:59.240 --> 1:50:01.400 And so this has been why they've been going into 1:50:01.400 --> 1:50:04.200 sports because they can throw around, like we're talking nine 1:50:04.320 --> 1:50:07.080 hundred billion dollars of assets, right, they can just swamp 1:50:07.160 --> 1:50:10.760 a sport, right, especially something like esports where people are 1:50:10.880 --> 1:50:13.080 not very well paid, there's not that much money, sources 1:50:13.080 --> 1:50:16.360 of income are tenuis. They could just sort of buy 1:50:16.400 --> 1:50:18.599 off these entire industries and it's kind of and it's working. 1:50:18.680 --> 1:50:20.599 And part of the reason that it's working is that, 1:50:21.400 --> 1:50:24.000 you know, the focus is on and like, I understand 1:50:24.040 --> 1:50:26.400 why people are doing this, but the focus has been 1:50:26.560 --> 1:50:30.040 on the fact that set like the Saudi government is, 1:50:30.640 --> 1:50:32.160 you know, is sexist and homophobic. 1:50:32.960 --> 1:50:33.879 And that's true. 1:50:34.240 --> 1:50:36.400 But if that's the reputation that the Saudis have, that 1:50:36.600 --> 1:50:39.200 is a win for them because A they'll be able 1:50:39.200 --> 1:50:41.040 to find people who agree with those views, and B 1:50:41.640 --> 1:50:43.840 nobody's talking about again the fact that they they they 1:50:43.920 --> 1:50:47.480 fucky they did an airstrike on a school bus, like 1:50:47.479 --> 1:50:50.559 like the bodies of children and their fucking school bags 1:50:50.560 --> 1:50:53.800 were flying over like they they've been able to sort 1:50:53.840 --> 1:50:58.400 of avoid any kind of more reckoning with this because 1:50:58.439 --> 1:51:02.000 people are off talking about other stuff, and if this 1:51:02.120 --> 1:51:04.800 keeps working like it's going to work, there going to 1:51:04.840 --> 1:51:07.160 be a country that killed three hundred and seventy thousand 1:51:07.240 --> 1:51:09.040 people and probably more. 1:51:09.479 --> 1:51:11.800 I think also like one of the reasons they've been 1:51:11.800 --> 1:51:14.720 able to get away with this is that ah media 1:51:14.920 --> 1:51:18.360 has normalized massive amounts of death and dying of Muslim 1:51:18.400 --> 1:51:21.360 people in the Middle East. Yeah, for twenty plus years, right, 1:51:21.400 --> 1:51:25.560 so a lot of people's entire life of media consumption. 1:51:26.000 --> 1:51:29.559 Every day, we've dropped bombs and killed hundreds of people 1:51:29.560 --> 1:51:31.439 in the Middle East, and it's just, yeah, it's the 1:51:31.479 --> 1:51:33.559 background noise in US media. 1:51:33.680 --> 1:51:35.439 Yeah, I want to watch one more thing they did 1:51:35.520 --> 1:51:37.960 that wasn't the script, but I need to fucking talk 1:51:38.000 --> 1:51:40.599 about because it's one of my formative political experiences. Was 1:51:41.280 --> 1:51:43.400 So when the Arab Spring started, one of the biggest 1:51:43.439 --> 1:51:45.400 uprisings was in Bahrain. This is one of the earliest 1:51:45.439 --> 1:51:48.080 up rising in twenty eleven. There's an attempt to knock 1:51:48.120 --> 1:51:50.720 off the monarchy of Bahrain, and they probably could have won. 1:51:51.640 --> 1:51:53.760 The kids in the streets in Bahrain are probably the 1:51:53.800 --> 1:51:56.479 bravest on of the bravest people I've ever seen. And 1:51:56.560 --> 1:51:59.760 the Saudis rolled tanks into Bahrain to crush the protests 1:51:59.840 --> 1:52:02.680 and fucking keep the government intact. And for I mean 1:52:02.920 --> 1:52:05.840 years for you, I mean like a decade afterwards. Every 1:52:05.840 --> 1:52:08.160 once in a while, you'd get a video coming like 1:52:08.240 --> 1:52:10.320 that came out of like the of these kids dressed 1:52:10.320 --> 1:52:12.479 in all black chasing down an armored vehicle that's shooting 1:52:12.520 --> 1:52:15.000 at them with molotovs. Right, I've never seen anything. I've 1:52:15.040 --> 1:52:16.720 never seen anything like it. Like, they're some of the 1:52:16.720 --> 1:52:19.639 bravest people in the world, and the Saudis fucking rolled 1:52:19.640 --> 1:52:22.920 tanks into their country to fucking crush them. The fucking 1:52:23.000 --> 1:52:25.160 esports companies, sure, those are the people whose money you're taking, 1:52:25.439 --> 1:52:28.240 right you you were, you were taking the money of 1:52:28.280 --> 1:52:30.559 a bunch of people who rolled tanks into the country, 1:52:31.200 --> 1:52:32.880 whose people wanted fucking democracy. 1:52:34.560 --> 1:52:36.680 And yeah, that's that. That's all I got about this. 1:52:36.840 --> 1:52:41.439 I'm extremely angry about all of this, and. 1:52:43.439 --> 1:52:45.200 Yeah, fuck them. 1:52:45.400 --> 1:52:47.960 Yeah, if I can say from a perspective of someone 1:52:48.000 --> 1:52:51.240 who's been paid to do sports for a decent amount 1:52:51.240 --> 1:52:54.559 of my life. Yeah, you make shit money, but like 1:52:54.680 --> 1:52:57.160 it's so much better to not make shit choices as well, 1:52:57.320 --> 1:53:00.360 And like that goes way beyond like not cheing in 1:53:00.760 --> 1:53:03.519 the manifest ways of people cheating in in sports, but 1:53:03.640 --> 1:53:06.000 also just like you don't compromising to the way more 1:53:06.000 --> 1:53:10.360 important than like playing right, Like sports is supposed to 1:53:10.360 --> 1:53:12.080 be fun, and if you allow yourself to be a 1:53:12.160 --> 1:53:15.200 vehicle for things that are terrible, like you're gonna be 1:53:15.240 --> 1:53:17.400 miserable in your fucking forties anyway, because your body will 1:53:17.400 --> 1:53:19.680 fall apart. Like, don't make yourself feel guilty for this 1:53:19.720 --> 1:53:20.120 as well. 1:53:20.600 --> 1:53:22.760 Yeah, and one last thing I want to address because 1:53:22.800 --> 1:53:24.880 one of the defenses that Saudi people have been rolling 1:53:24.920 --> 1:53:27.519 out is this like, oh, you guys don't respect Muslim culture, 1:53:28.360 --> 1:53:30.880 like because because the main line of complaint has been 1:53:31.000 --> 1:53:34.519 about sort of about homophobia and sexism, and it's like, yeah, man, 1:53:34.560 --> 1:53:36.760 those fucking children in their school bosses were Muslim to 1:53:37.080 --> 1:53:37.800 like fuck you. 1:53:38.680 --> 1:53:42.120 Yeah, the people in Bahrain are Muslim too. Regularly the 1:53:42.160 --> 1:53:44.519 people who yeah, bodies are all over the streets because 1:53:44.520 --> 1:53:46.760 they asked for a chance to have some say and 1:53:46.800 --> 1:53:48.800 how the country was run like that, there's just you 1:53:48.800 --> 1:53:49.519 don't get to do that. 1:53:49.800 --> 1:53:51.280 Yeah, so this has been nic could happen here? 1:53:51.520 --> 1:53:53.800 Fuck every single one of the scenes that's fucking doing 1:53:53.840 --> 1:53:55.200 this shit fucking call. 1:53:55.320 --> 1:54:11.120 Yeah all right, hello, welcome to the podcast It could 1:54:11.160 --> 1:54:11.639 happen here. 1:54:12.200 --> 1:54:16.800 Podcasts for me and Cheren talk about vegetables or terrible things, 1:54:16.840 --> 1:54:19.880 depending on the week. It's me, it's uine and today 1:54:19.880 --> 1:54:23.200 it's a terrible thing. It's not a vegetable or a 1:54:23.200 --> 1:54:26.160 cea animal. How are you Cherene, how are you doing? 1:54:26.720 --> 1:54:29.320 I'm good. That's honestly a great premise just for a 1:54:29.320 --> 1:54:33.240 show in general, Like we talk about either food or 1:54:33.240 --> 1:54:34.000 something terrible. 1:54:34.400 --> 1:54:37.400 Yeah, like and you never know, you know, Yeah, it's 1:54:37.440 --> 1:54:39.919 just in your playlist. And then is it a fucking artichoke? 1:54:40.040 --> 1:54:41.720 Is it genocide? You don't know. 1:54:41.960 --> 1:54:42.760 You have to find out. 1:54:43.560 --> 1:54:45.000 Yeah, the only way is by listening. 1:54:45.280 --> 1:54:47.920 Yeah, but Hi, I'm good, Thanks for having me. 1:54:48.200 --> 1:54:50.880 Good. I'm glad to hear it. Sreen. So, what I 1:54:50.920 --> 1:54:54.760 wanted to talk about today is what is happening in Turkey? 1:54:54.840 --> 1:54:58.280 Why are they like this? What is going on? Specifically? 1:54:58.320 --> 1:55:02.400 I want to talk about some these attacks on Syrian 1:55:02.480 --> 1:55:05.200 refugees in Turkey. The people may have seen, they may 1:55:05.240 --> 1:55:08.400 not have seen. I see them in my timeline, but 1:55:08.480 --> 1:55:11.280 maybe that's because of the people I follow. I think. 1:55:11.480 --> 1:55:16.240 To start off with, to understand what's happening in Turkey, 1:55:16.280 --> 1:55:19.600 you have to understand the relations between Turkey and Syria. 1:55:19.680 --> 1:55:22.840 Since the Civil War began in Syria, which is more 1:55:22.880 --> 1:55:26.480 than a decade ago now, thirteen odd years ago. So 1:55:26.480 --> 1:55:29.920 from the start of the war, Turkey has backed anti 1:55:29.960 --> 1:55:33.480 a SAD factions, right, so those are the rebels in Syria. 1:55:33.960 --> 1:55:35.800 This is a big change. In two thousand and eight, 1:55:36.280 --> 1:55:41.200 A Sadden Herdigan's family went on holiday together really Yeah. Yeah, 1:55:41.240 --> 1:55:43.760 they went into southern Turkey and a little little beach 1:55:43.760 --> 1:55:44.560 holiday together. 1:55:45.600 --> 1:55:46.160 Disturbing. 1:55:46.320 --> 1:55:50.000 Yeah, yeah, what a time. Yeah, just to do to 1:55:50.080 --> 1:55:54.240 rarking by the beach. But unfortunately they're no longer holiday together. 1:55:54.240 --> 1:55:57.440 They might be holding again soon, as we'll see. 1:55:57.600 --> 1:55:58.720 Yeah that's what it sounds like. 1:55:59.320 --> 1:56:04.240 Yeah, they are becoming tight again, and again referenced their 1:56:04.280 --> 1:56:08.480 family holiday in his most recent comments on really yeah, 1:56:08.920 --> 1:56:10.680 it's like our relations have been familial. 1:56:10.840 --> 1:56:11.680 I like that at all. 1:56:12.960 --> 1:56:15.480 Yeah, yeah, you know what'd be going on holiday with 1:56:15.560 --> 1:56:19.839 Marshal Lasad. Just as a moral principle, I think. 1:56:19.280 --> 1:56:22.000 It's just crazy to be because you're right they I 1:56:22.040 --> 1:56:26.720 feel like we're very open about supporting the anti Assad forces, 1:56:26.880 --> 1:56:29.800 and so to be like suddenly, why can't we have 1:56:29.880 --> 1:56:33.280 diplomatic friendliness, Like come on, it's just like the weirdest 1:56:33.440 --> 1:56:34.240 plot to us to be. 1:56:34.800 --> 1:56:36.400 Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of it comes 1:56:36.440 --> 1:56:39.240 from anti migrant sentiment in Turkey, which I want to 1:56:39.240 --> 1:56:42.919 get into. I think it's so like we are witnessing 1:56:43.240 --> 1:56:46.400 this global crackdown on migration on refugees. We see it 1:56:46.440 --> 1:56:49.160 in Europe, we see it here at southern border, we 1:56:49.200 --> 1:56:52.560 see it here in Turkey, We're seeing it in North Africa. 1:56:52.600 --> 1:56:55.720 We're seeing it all over. So this is hasn't always 1:56:55.720 --> 1:56:57.200 been a case like at the start of the war, 1:56:57.320 --> 1:57:00.280 Turkey Thrope and it's bordereds to s Syrian refugees, right, 1:57:00.360 --> 1:57:04.320 They built camps to house them. They were strong backers 1:57:04.360 --> 1:57:07.920 of the revolution. They spent forty million dollars carrying for 1:57:08.000 --> 1:57:12.040 their refugees. The Nationally Intelligence Organization, the MIT, actually trained 1:57:12.080 --> 1:57:15.760 parts of the FSA, the Free Syrian Army, and then 1:57:15.880 --> 1:57:20.440 later they brought together the SNA. There will be many acronyms, right, 1:57:20.560 --> 1:57:23.280 like every civil war loves a three letter acronym. And 1:57:23.400 --> 1:57:24.680 the Syrian War is no different. 1:57:24.800 --> 1:57:26.840 But they were really open. They were really public about 1:57:26.880 --> 1:57:31.360 being like we welcomed the refugees. I remember that was like, 1:57:32.080 --> 1:57:34.480 I don't know, as a Syrian, I was like, oh, 1:57:34.480 --> 1:57:37.040 that's nice. 1:57:38.200 --> 1:57:39.800 It was nice, nice thing to do. 1:57:40.080 --> 1:57:42.120 Like I mean, like at the time, no one gave 1:57:42.160 --> 1:57:43.880 a shit for the most part. So to have like 1:57:43.920 --> 1:57:46.880 a country out loud be like we welcome the refugees, 1:57:47.000 --> 1:57:50.880 come over here will help. And now they have the 1:57:51.000 --> 1:57:54.640 largest population of Syrian refugees like in the world. I 1:57:54.680 --> 1:57:57.040 don't know if you're gonna mention this coming up, but 1:57:57.080 --> 1:57:59.720 I feel like the only thing that changed, not the 1:57:59.760 --> 1:58:01.160 only I think one of the only things. The main 1:58:01.200 --> 1:58:03.440 thing that changed is that no one in Turkey thought 1:58:03.440 --> 1:58:04.400 it would last as long. 1:58:04.880 --> 1:58:06.240 Yeah no, yeah, absolutely not. 1:58:06.560 --> 1:58:06.760 Yeah. 1:58:06.960 --> 1:58:09.160 Yeah, we'll get into that because the nature of their 1:58:09.200 --> 1:58:13.440 legal residence there is very temporary. Yeah, okay. So Turkey 1:58:13.480 --> 1:58:16.000 has used the SNA as Syrian National Army right, which 1:58:16.040 --> 1:58:19.680 is it's more explicitly Turkish backed faction, as a directly 1:58:19.760 --> 1:58:22.680 linked proxy force. They've used it in their operations against 1:58:22.680 --> 1:58:27.040 the STF. So the Syrian Democratic Forces another acronym for you, 1:58:27.320 --> 1:58:31.160 the organization which includes the Yepige right their YPG, the 1:58:31.240 --> 1:58:35.640 YPG the other elements of the military forces of the 1:58:35.680 --> 1:58:40.080 Autonomous Areas North and East Syria, sometimes called RISHABA. They 1:58:40.160 --> 1:58:43.800 have also used the SNA outside of Syria, right in Azerbaijan, 1:58:43.880 --> 1:58:47.480 Libya and Nizier like just as a private military right 1:58:47.560 --> 1:58:50.160 as a mercenary army more or less, and you'll you'll 1:58:50.160 --> 1:58:53.640 hear them refer to sometimes as mercenaries, certainly like when 1:58:53.640 --> 1:58:55.440 they're being used outside of Syria, it's hard to argue 1:58:55.440 --> 1:58:58.280 that they're not, and other times, like when they're being 1:58:58.320 --> 1:59:00.879 used in Syria. A lot of these folks were previously 1:59:00.880 --> 1:59:03.440 parts of other groups that have kind of been repackaged 1:59:03.480 --> 1:59:06.320 and bundled up together by Turkey, and there are still 1:59:06.320 --> 1:59:12.680 many factions within these broadly speaking Turkish supported Arab rebel 1:59:12.720 --> 1:59:15.440 forces in Syria. There are some Kurdish groups as well, 1:59:15.480 --> 1:59:18.560 but not so many, and there are some Turkic groups 1:59:18.560 --> 1:59:21.240 that are not Arab. So these property forces are really 1:59:21.320 --> 1:59:24.440 vital to the Turkey strategy in Syria. I wanted to 1:59:24.480 --> 1:59:28.440 get a sense of how numerous the redirected or re 1:59:28.440 --> 1:59:31.240 recruited Jahadis were from other groups, so I reached out 1:59:31.240 --> 1:59:35.280 to Zagros Hiwa. People are not familiar with Zagros. He 1:59:35.400 --> 1:59:39.640 is a spokesperson of the Kurdistan Communities Union's Foreign Relations Commission. 1:59:39.960 --> 1:59:42.520 If you're not familiar with the Kurdistan Communities Union, it's 1:59:42.560 --> 1:59:47.080 the umbrella organization for the several democratic confederalist political parties North, South, 1:59:47.160 --> 1:59:50.520 East and West Kurdistan which are inspired by the ideology 1:59:50.560 --> 1:59:52.840 of Abdullah Asient. So we're going to hear more from 1:59:52.920 --> 1:59:56.040 Zagoros next week. I have a number of questions about 1:59:56.080 --> 1:59:59.440 the ongoing Turkish bombing there in the in the Kandil 1:59:59.520 --> 2:00:03.040 Mountains in the in the north of the Kurdistan Autonomous 2:00:03.040 --> 2:00:04.960 Region of Iraq. But we're going to drop a little 2:00:05.000 --> 2:00:08.320 quote here where he talks about the interactions at the 2:00:08.360 --> 2:00:10.800 SDF and the EPIGAY and the other other units Right 2:00:10.920 --> 2:00:15.840 hPG have had with the Turkish Army's Arab Syrian elements. 2:00:16.120 --> 2:00:20.280 When you hear Zagros here talking about DASH, what he's 2:00:20.280 --> 2:00:23.400 talking about is the so called Islamic State, the Islamic 2:00:23.440 --> 2:00:25.800 State of Iraq and the levant Right. It's just the 2:00:25.840 --> 2:00:29.160 Arabic acronym of the same organization. So if you went 2:00:29.200 --> 2:00:30.400 aware that's what he's talking. 2:00:30.240 --> 2:00:36.640 About, invading Turkish Army is that many Jajaradists have been 2:00:37.800 --> 2:00:43.360 incorporated into the Turkish Army. They are acting as units 2:00:45.080 --> 2:00:48.360 with the Turkish or separate units with the Turkish Army. 2:00:48.400 --> 2:00:52.080 They have been embedded with with the with natal second 2:00:52.240 --> 2:00:56.839 largest army. I can say these Jajadists are x DAJ members, 2:00:56.920 --> 2:01:00.640 ex Nostra Front members, x Alpaider members. They are from 2:01:00.680 --> 2:01:06.520 many nationalities, according to pu K officials Patriotic Union of 2:01:06.640 --> 2:01:11.520 Kdistan officials, they say that they have learned the names 2:01:11.560 --> 2:01:15.680 of three hundreds of these DASH members in the Turkish 2:01:15.760 --> 2:01:17.960 Army ranks. 2:01:18.560 --> 2:01:20.600 So also. 2:01:21.800 --> 2:01:28.920 Underground Kedystan Freedom guerrillas themselves have observations about the inclusion 2:01:29.560 --> 2:01:36.040 of jihadist members in the ranks of the Turkish Army 2:01:36.880 --> 2:01:42.200 and many of the close range classes blanket point classes 2:01:42.240 --> 2:01:48.080 with the Turkish Army. Kurdistan Freedom Guerrillas here some of 2:01:48.120 --> 2:01:51.240 the soldiers speaking Arabic, shouting. 2:01:52.560 --> 2:01:54.800 Yearning in Arabic. 2:01:55.760 --> 2:01:59.320 To understand further what's going on in Turkey, I think 2:01:59.440 --> 2:02:03.440 you need to understand the phenomenon of Turkish ultra nationalism 2:02:03.480 --> 2:02:07.160 and social Darwinism. This is not just endemic in Turkey, 2:02:07.240 --> 2:02:10.040 but also in European countries. With a large Turkish diaspora. 2:02:11.000 --> 2:02:13.560 The most extreme and concerning example of this is a 2:02:13.600 --> 2:02:16.600 group called the Gray Wolves. The Gray Wolves are the 2:02:16.600 --> 2:02:19.640 military street wing of the Nationalist Movement Party in Turkey 2:02:20.080 --> 2:02:22.160 and they've been involved in political violence there since the 2:02:22.200 --> 2:02:28.360 nineteen sixties, with their primary target being curved Greeks, Alavis, Arabs, Christians, 2:02:28.440 --> 2:02:33.200 Jews and Armenians. These are all minority ethnic groups, I guess. 2:02:33.400 --> 2:02:35.960 To understand this further, you have to be able to 2:02:35.960 --> 2:02:41.640 differentiate between race, state, and nation. Right, which is getting 2:02:41.640 --> 2:02:44.000 into things that I lecture about. But the idea of 2:02:44.000 --> 2:02:48.840 a race is effective biological link, right, This isn't born 2:02:48.920 --> 2:02:53.280 out necessarily, but the idea of a shared biology. The 2:02:53.520 --> 2:02:56.680 idea of a nation. A nation is an imagined community, right, 2:02:56.760 --> 2:03:00.320 which are can have many races. It could have a 2:03:00.400 --> 2:03:03.840 state aligned to it or not. Right, So the Turkish 2:03:04.240 --> 2:03:07.160 nation doesn't necessarily align with the Turkish state. There are 2:03:07.200 --> 2:03:10.040 like other groups within the Turkish state. You have Turkish citizenship, 2:03:10.040 --> 2:03:13.120 but do not see themselves as nationally or ethnically Turkish. 2:03:13.640 --> 2:03:18.240 For what the gray Wolves believe is the superiority of 2:03:18.240 --> 2:03:21.840 a Turkish race, and they strive for a monoethnic Sunni 2:03:21.920 --> 2:03:26.920 Islamic Turkish nation. They're pan Turkic organizations, so they want 2:03:26.960 --> 2:03:30.120 to join together all the Turkic peoples in one kind 2:03:30.120 --> 2:03:34.120 of renewed Turkish empire. Right after clap to the Soviet Union, 2:03:34.520 --> 2:03:38.240 they called for this revived empire that would unite Turkic people. 2:03:38.800 --> 2:03:42.760 They like many of these extremely right wing violent organizations 2:03:42.760 --> 2:03:45.800 have their roots in anti communism right in the Cold 2:03:45.800 --> 2:03:48.920 War and specifically and something called Operation Gladio, which was 2:03:48.960 --> 2:03:52.760 a sort of anti communist guerrilla training supported by the 2:03:52.800 --> 2:03:58.440 CIA and other groups. They began as government condoned and 2:03:58.480 --> 2:04:01.360 a sort of sort of deny government forced to use 2:04:01.400 --> 2:04:04.560 against the left right. I'm not going to be able, 2:04:04.680 --> 2:04:06.280 like I can't detil every think the Gray Wolves are down, 2:04:06.360 --> 2:04:08.040 and this isn't what that episode it's about. I do 2:04:08.120 --> 2:04:12.040 want to explain one incident. It's maybe one of the 2:04:12.080 --> 2:04:14.400 most heenous things that they're known for, and it's called 2:04:14.440 --> 2:04:17.480 the Marush massacre. Are you familiar with this? Sharene? 2:04:17.680 --> 2:04:18.240 No, I'm not. 2:04:18.280 --> 2:04:21.520 Actually, Okay, a little little history for you. So in 2:04:21.520 --> 2:04:25.720 December nineteen seventy eight in Karaman Mirash Karaman Marash in Mirash, 2:04:25.760 --> 2:04:29.360 you'll hear those two terms used both right, like Karaman 2:04:29.440 --> 2:04:31.560 I think means hero in Turkish. There was a battle 2:04:31.600 --> 2:04:34.760 there in the early part of twentieth century. I think 2:04:34.760 --> 2:04:36.640 it was in the First World War, and so they 2:04:36.640 --> 2:04:39.520 added like hero to the start of the town. But 2:04:39.640 --> 2:04:42.480 Alavi people don't tend to use that when they talk 2:04:42.480 --> 2:04:44.920 about the massacre because it seems a little weird to 2:04:45.240 --> 2:04:48.960 be like a great town where this horrible massare occurred. 2:04:49.360 --> 2:04:52.640 So you're here both it's mrs, but s has a 2:04:52.640 --> 2:04:56.840 little diacritical mark, so it's ah noise. The massacre starts 2:04:56.840 --> 2:04:59.440 in seven ninety seventy eight, when an anti Soviet movie 2:04:59.800 --> 2:05:01.840 is being shown in a movie theater in town and 2:05:01.880 --> 2:05:05.000 someone throws a bomb into the theater. Right Communist brouts 2:05:05.040 --> 2:05:07.160 were blamed for this. It's a little unclear if it 2:05:07.200 --> 2:05:10.040 really was them or someone who who wanted to start 2:05:10.120 --> 2:05:13.560 some drama by pretending to be them, if that makes sense, right, 2:05:14.440 --> 2:05:17.280 So many Alavi's Alavis are a group of kurd Are 2:05:17.280 --> 2:05:18.200 you familiar, Sharen? 2:05:19.000 --> 2:05:22.120 I was actually just trying to rhy myself because I'm 2:05:22.120 --> 2:05:25.160 really not familiar with this sect because I know it's 2:05:25.480 --> 2:05:28.520 completely separate from Sunni Islam. Is shea Islam? Is it 2:05:28.560 --> 2:05:31.560 more like Sufiism. Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's what I thought. 2:05:31.840 --> 2:05:37.160 They're like a twelve Sufiist with syncretic elements from like 2:05:37.400 --> 2:05:39.680 uh like veneration of nature, and they have this sort 2:05:39.720 --> 2:05:42.440 of idea of sainthood. Right. I probably used a lot 2:05:42.480 --> 2:05:44.320 of words that people aren't super familiar with. So can 2:05:44.360 --> 2:05:48.640 you explain to Sufism and then Sunni and Shia maybe. 2:05:48.680 --> 2:05:51.600 So maybe you're familiar with the two different main sects 2:05:51.640 --> 2:05:54.640 of Islam, which are Sunni and Shira. The main difference 2:05:54.920 --> 2:05:57.120 between the two, if you want to really boil it down, 2:05:57.440 --> 2:06:01.320 is who they believe these cessor should have been to 2:06:01.520 --> 2:06:07.400 the prophet Muhammadu. The shi has believe that his cousin 2:06:07.440 --> 2:06:10.000 and his son in law Aidi should have been the successor, 2:06:10.200 --> 2:06:13.280 versus the Sunnis don't believe he needed a successor at all, 2:06:13.400 --> 2:06:16.080 and it was more just like passing down his teachings. 2:06:16.640 --> 2:06:18.240 There's a lot of history behind that, and there's a 2:06:18.240 --> 2:06:21.920 lot of drama and violence, but that's like the most 2:06:21.960 --> 2:06:23.720 simple way to put it, and it kind of grew 2:06:23.760 --> 2:06:28.800 from there. The Sufism sect, on the other hand, is 2:06:28.800 --> 2:06:32.760 a little different. It's described as a contemplative school of Islam. 2:06:32.760 --> 2:06:36.839 That aims to develop an individual's consciousness of God through chanting, 2:06:37.000 --> 2:06:40.960 recitation of litanies, music, and physical movement. Maybe you know 2:06:41.280 --> 2:06:45.960 or you've seen the Sufi like whirling dervishes. It's basically 2:06:45.960 --> 2:06:49.200 a form of like physical active meditation for them. So 2:06:49.240 --> 2:06:53.000 it definitely differs from both Sunni and Sushia Islam. It's 2:06:53.040 --> 2:06:55.640 more in a way spiritual. Is that is that a 2:06:55.680 --> 2:06:56.320 decent summary? 2:06:57.240 --> 2:06:59.480 Not for me? Yeah, I think I think you've done 2:06:59.520 --> 2:07:02.839 a great job. And Sufi's are like broadly Sunny, I guess, 2:07:02.920 --> 2:07:08.040 and Alavites are like there are twelves and seven is 2:07:08.080 --> 2:07:10.000 which is like to do with the amount of people 2:07:10.040 --> 2:07:13.200 you think are the the imam's successes to Ali, which 2:07:13.200 --> 2:07:14.800 we don't need to go into I don't think a 2:07:14.880 --> 2:07:17.880 very great depth, but I guess Alavites would would fall 2:07:17.920 --> 2:07:22.040 into the twelve a camp in not traditional twelve Shia. 2:07:22.760 --> 2:07:25.440 That's what the V you're saying, the V al yes. 2:07:25.440 --> 2:07:28.600 As opposed to Ala whites, right, another ship al whites 2:07:28.720 --> 2:07:29.760 is very different? 2:07:30.040 --> 2:07:32.360 Yeah, yes, Like I feel like it's very confusing because 2:07:32.480 --> 2:07:36.720 they sound so similar. But Ala whites they're they're considered 2:07:36.760 --> 2:07:41.840 disbelievers by the classical like Sunny and Shia theologies. They're 2:07:42.160 --> 2:07:45.880 their own separate group. It's like a religious sect that 2:07:45.920 --> 2:07:49.400 like kind of splintered off from early Shi'ahism in the 2:07:49.480 --> 2:07:50.640 ninth century. 2:07:50.800 --> 2:07:54.440 And they are the sector which the Asad family yes belongs, 2:07:54.840 --> 2:07:59.480 and many other military families in Bathistsiria belonged, right. 2:08:00.120 --> 2:08:04.920 Yeah, when the Bathist party like led by half said 2:08:04.920 --> 2:08:08.760 Bashar's dad, when he took power, the Alo Whites in 2:08:08.840 --> 2:08:11.120 the military sect or the Alo white sect in the 2:08:11.160 --> 2:08:14.280 military were really supportive of that regime. And I feel 2:08:14.280 --> 2:08:16.560 like it's a big reason why he gained popularity and 2:08:16.800 --> 2:08:20.400 was able to like overthrow the government. 2:08:21.360 --> 2:08:24.920 Yeah. But yeah, Okay, so that's a little breakdown of Islam. 2:08:26.120 --> 2:08:26.920 I know, it's good. 2:08:27.200 --> 2:08:30.240 There's just so much like like little details that I 2:08:30.280 --> 2:08:33.080 know I will miss, and it's just it's so much 2:08:33.120 --> 2:08:37.920 more complicated. But yeah, there's just many sects that stem 2:08:38.000 --> 2:08:41.360 all from the one religious book of the Quran, and 2:08:41.400 --> 2:08:44.600 then just shit happens. I don't know what else is. 2:08:46.200 --> 2:08:48.160 Well, maybe we'll explain it in another day for people 2:08:48.200 --> 2:08:50.080 because they do think like I went to school at 2:08:50.080 --> 2:08:52.320 a very woke time in the United Kingdom's history where 2:08:52.360 --> 2:08:55.600 you could do Islam as your like religious studies. Wait 2:08:55.680 --> 2:09:01.000 really yeah, yeah, it's because Tony Blair in the wokness crazy. Yeah, No, 2:09:01.040 --> 2:09:02.440 it's cool, it's really good. I land a lot. 2:09:03.200 --> 2:09:05.680 Well, so what did what did I miss? You tell me? 2:09:05.840 --> 2:09:08.600 No, I'm not, I'm not. I'm not here to fucking 2:09:09.320 --> 2:09:13.680 I'm serious. I am absolutely not here to tell you 2:09:13.720 --> 2:09:15.600 what you go right around. I think you did an 2:09:15.640 --> 2:09:18.640 excellent job. Shia comes from like the party of Ali, right, 2:09:18.640 --> 2:09:20.000 That's what the word means. 2:09:20.000 --> 2:09:23.400 And I think that's the main reason why Sufism is 2:09:23.440 --> 2:09:25.800 more associated with Sunni Islam. F I'm being honest, because 2:09:25.920 --> 2:09:28.600 that's like the main tenet of being Shia is that 2:09:28.680 --> 2:09:31.560 you believe that Ali was the successor. And so I 2:09:31.560 --> 2:09:34.200 think anything that is not that usually is more under 2:09:34.200 --> 2:09:35.080 the Sunni umbrella. 2:09:36.080 --> 2:09:38.640 Yeah. I think sometimes you'll see it like as a 2:09:38.680 --> 2:09:41.760 third like Sufism is his own thing. Yeah, Germany, like 2:09:41.880 --> 2:09:44.840 more Muslims in the world are Sunni than Shiah. I'm 2:09:44.880 --> 2:09:46.480 not going to do a thing that people do where 2:09:46.480 --> 2:09:48.840 they go around naming the governments which are one or another, 2:09:48.960 --> 2:09:53.000 and like, I don't think that's very useful. So let's 2:09:53.000 --> 2:09:56.120 go back to nineteen seventy eight in Marash right these 2:09:56.480 --> 2:10:00.440 Alavis for reasons that we have just explained up as received. 2:10:00.760 --> 2:10:04.240 A they are Kurdish right, so they're not Turkic, and 2:10:04.480 --> 2:10:08.760 B they are perceived to be heretical by people with 2:10:09.120 --> 2:10:11.520 a more conventional Sunni Islam or some people, I should 2:10:11.560 --> 2:10:15.160 say so. The day after this bomb, guys of a 2:10:15.200 --> 2:10:18.800 left wing cafe in town is bombed and two leftist 2:10:19.040 --> 2:10:22.360 teachers are murdered on their way home from school. Later, 2:10:22.560 --> 2:10:26.839 at their funeral it's attacked by a mob of Turkish nationalists. 2:10:26.920 --> 2:10:31.640 Right later that week, exes start appearing on the doors 2:10:31.720 --> 2:10:34.880 of the Alavi homes in this area of town, which 2:10:34.920 --> 2:10:39.200 is predominantly Alavi right. They made announcements to the mosques 2:10:39.440 --> 2:10:42.200 saying that communists and Alavis are burning your mosques. You 2:10:42.200 --> 2:10:44.960 should attack them and kill them well. And on the 2:10:44.960 --> 2:10:48.360 twenty thirty December, crowd stoked buying comprised of the gray 2:10:48.360 --> 2:10:52.080 Wolves rampaid through all the neighborhoods. Children, women and men 2:10:52.120 --> 2:10:53.960 were murdered in their homes and their bodies were thrown 2:10:54.000 --> 2:10:57.320 in the street. Women were raped, an injured people removed 2:10:57.320 --> 2:11:01.160 from the hospital beds and murdered were burned alive in 2:11:01.160 --> 2:11:05.480 the furnaces of their own homes. Estimates of the amount 2:11:05.560 --> 2:11:08.360 of people who were murdered vary from like one hundred 2:11:08.360 --> 2:11:10.800 and eleven, which is the official government number, to one 2:11:10.880 --> 2:11:13.680 hundred and fifty which is sort on the British Alaviu society. 2:11:14.480 --> 2:11:17.440 Five hundred and fifty something houses were burned to destroy 2:11:17.720 --> 2:11:21.760 nearly three hundred businesses were looted. Writer as is Tunk 2:11:22.560 --> 2:11:24.840 my oppointing, I got that wrong. I'll try my best, 2:11:25.040 --> 2:11:29.080 who's written a book about the massacre, believes that the 2:11:29.120 --> 2:11:32.280 Alavis were killed for refusing to assimilate to the Turkish 2:11:32.320 --> 2:11:35.200 language and culture, and he adds occurs to not the 2:11:35.240 --> 2:11:38.160 only victims of the attack, progressive and leftist Turks who 2:11:38.160 --> 2:11:42.240 had opposed the official policies of Ancro Wolves included. The 2:11:42.320 --> 2:11:46.040 trials for this massacre actually continued until nineteen ninety one. 2:11:46.240 --> 2:11:48.640 So it happened in nineteen seventy eight, right now, it's 2:11:48.640 --> 2:11:51.320 a long time. A total of eight hundred and four 2:11:51.360 --> 2:11:53.240 people were put on trial, which kind of shows you 2:11:53.280 --> 2:11:55.960 the scale of the mob that you have. 2:11:56.560 --> 2:11:58.480 Was it mostly the gray Wolves? 2:11:58.720 --> 2:12:00.920 Yeah, So it comes out of the HP, which is 2:12:00.920 --> 2:12:04.120 this Turkish nationalist party, right and it's generally attributed to 2:12:04.120 --> 2:12:07.600 the Gray Wolves as like causality. And when you get 2:12:07.640 --> 2:12:10.320 these massive crowd violence things, it's not like everyone's a 2:12:10.320 --> 2:12:14.080 card carrying member necessarily. You'll hear people say that they 2:12:14.120 --> 2:12:17.920 consider there to be like state or organizational complicity beyond it. 2:12:17.920 --> 2:12:20.480 It wasn't a spontaneous thing, right, and that that's an 2:12:20.480 --> 2:12:24.400 allegation that's sometimes made. Twenty nine people were sentenced to 2:12:24.480 --> 2:12:27.400 life in prison for this by nineteen ninety one. 2:12:27.520 --> 2:12:29.480 Out of eight hundred and four or twenty nine percent. 2:12:29.760 --> 2:12:32.360 Yeah, and all of them were released in nineteen ninety two. Okay, 2:12:32.560 --> 2:12:35.240 it's part of an anti terrorism law. Now it's a 2:12:35.240 --> 2:12:37.480 good time shream. Do you know who will not commute 2:12:37.520 --> 2:12:43.400 your life sentence? Oh my god, they won't do it. 2:12:43.480 --> 2:12:44.640 Well, whatever it is. 2:12:44.800 --> 2:12:56.600 Yeah, all right, we're back. 2:12:57.160 --> 2:13:00.680 We're moving on from massacres thankfully. So we're talking about 2:13:00.680 --> 2:13:04.080 the Gray Wolves, right, that's where they come from. Today, 2:13:04.160 --> 2:13:06.920 the party that they were sort of founded by their 2:13:07.000 --> 2:13:10.760 MHP is allied with Erligan's party, and they've continued their violence, 2:13:10.800 --> 2:13:13.720 and particularly they've begun to focus on Kurdish people. Right 2:13:14.080 --> 2:13:16.160 last year, groups of them in that Diaspa could be 2:13:16.200 --> 2:13:19.120 found in Belgium attacking Kurds who they found to be 2:13:19.160 --> 2:13:22.520 celebrating the Kurdish New Year right, celebrating the year often 2:13:22.560 --> 2:13:25.320 with fire outside. It's pretty fucking easy to see who's 2:13:25.360 --> 2:13:28.000 doing it right, and they were attacked. You could see 2:13:28.280 --> 2:13:30.240 videos of this if you scroll far enough back on 2:13:30.280 --> 2:13:32.800 my Twitter timeline you'll see I've shared some of them. 2:13:32.840 --> 2:13:36.440 Twenty fifteen, they protested and burned Chinese flags and attacked 2:13:36.480 --> 2:13:40.200 people who looked Asian, to include Korean folks and folks 2:13:40.240 --> 2:13:43.000 who certainly were not Chinese, in response to the Chinese 2:13:43.040 --> 2:13:47.200 government span on Turkic wigas fasting during the month of Ramadan. 2:13:47.800 --> 2:13:50.920 They also opposed Russia due to its collaboration with a 2:13:51.000 --> 2:13:54.280 SAD and its attacks on Syrian Turkmen. Some Gray Wolves 2:13:54.280 --> 2:13:57.600 have gone over to Syria to fight. They're fighting against 2:13:57.640 --> 2:14:01.440 a SAD right with Turkmen units. I guess perhaps their 2:14:01.640 --> 2:14:05.800 most famous incident in the war was in twenty fifteen 2:14:05.880 --> 2:14:10.280 when they shut down a Russian plane was shut down 2:14:10.440 --> 2:14:13.960 and the pirate parachute out and then they machine gunned 2:14:14.040 --> 2:14:17.200 him while he was parachuting down. WHOA yeah. So they 2:14:17.400 --> 2:14:20.400 pretty strongly opposed to the Russian support of the assad rasion. 2:14:20.440 --> 2:14:22.720 Yeah, I mean there are one of the many reasons 2:14:22.720 --> 2:14:25.440 why I really get frustrated with all these different sects 2:14:25.480 --> 2:14:29.160 that are like anti Assad, and I am also anti Sad. 2:14:29.240 --> 2:14:32.480 But then they make it so complicated because they're terrible people, 2:14:32.720 --> 2:14:35.240 and so it's not just the rebels and these citizens 2:14:35.280 --> 2:14:39.440 of their own country trying to stand up against their government. 2:14:39.640 --> 2:14:44.920 It becomes this larger political clusterfuck that gets hard to 2:14:45.000 --> 2:14:47.120 keep track of, and I think that's why it's gone 2:14:47.160 --> 2:14:49.640 on for this long. It's not simple. It's not just 2:14:49.720 --> 2:14:55.000 like government versus people anymore. It's just too many elements. 2:14:54.600 --> 2:14:57.920 Right that you have people fighting within their revolution and 2:14:58.640 --> 2:15:02.920 the government constantly exploit those divisions, right. Yeah. So yeah, 2:15:02.960 --> 2:15:05.360 as I said, the Wolves have significant support in the 2:15:05.360 --> 2:15:07.680 Turkis Jasper, and they represent the largest right wing movement 2:15:07.680 --> 2:15:11.720 in Germany, which is pretty impressive when you consider like Germany. Yeah, 2:15:12.360 --> 2:15:15.200 like Germany is not known for not having much right 2:15:15.200 --> 2:15:17.000 wing Go ahead, Green, you're looking. 2:15:17.200 --> 2:15:19.720 I can see there's a question inside you. I'm just okay, 2:15:19.800 --> 2:15:23.360 because so the Gray Wolves believe in the superiority of 2:15:23.400 --> 2:15:26.960 the Turkish race, correct, that's correct, And you're saying that 2:15:27.040 --> 2:15:31.480 they are also big in Germany. I feel like Germany 2:15:32.280 --> 2:15:36.080 for a time also considered themselves to be the. 2:15:38.400 --> 2:15:42.200 True Sine. There are some things that they share. Yeah, 2:15:42.240 --> 2:15:44.440 it does feel a little bit on the nose, doesn't it. 2:15:44.560 --> 2:15:47.200 Yeah it does, Yeah, it does if it makes a difference. 2:15:47.240 --> 2:15:50.600 In Austria, the gray wolf salute is banned. Oh whoa, 2:15:50.680 --> 2:15:53.280 we're going to get into the gray wolf salute. Imagine 2:15:53.320 --> 2:15:55.520 making a little wolf with your hands. Right, you're right, 2:15:55.600 --> 2:15:59.000 that's they took that. That's like a shadow puppet. Yes, yeah, 2:15:59.240 --> 2:16:03.920 really that's not fair. Yeah no, yeah, you're no longer 2:16:03.960 --> 2:16:06.600 you do. We're gonna learn about the solution. So far, 2:16:06.640 --> 2:16:08.880 if not familiar, your big finger and your a little 2:16:08.920 --> 2:16:11.320 pinky finger up in the air. Your other two fingers 2:16:11.360 --> 2:16:12.440 are touching your thumb. 2:16:12.600 --> 2:16:15.720 It's almost like the six six to six rocker sign, 2:16:16.040 --> 2:16:19.040 like yeah, but yeah, it's not it's such a shadow puppet. 2:16:19.200 --> 2:16:20.920 I feel like I've done that as a kid. That's 2:16:20.960 --> 2:16:24.320 not fair. They can't take a shadow puppet. Whatever they've 2:16:24.360 --> 2:16:25.120 done worse. 2:16:25.600 --> 2:16:28.680 Sharene's hard right youth that is coming out. So if 2:16:28.680 --> 2:16:31.400 you weren't familiar with the Grabels before and their salute, 2:16:31.440 --> 2:16:35.000 you might have become familiar with them this week when 2:16:35.040 --> 2:16:37.720 a Turkish footballer received a two day band for flashing 2:16:37.720 --> 2:16:40.720 the salute after scoring when the team beat Austria in 2:16:40.800 --> 2:16:44.440 Euro twenty twenty four. Turkish fans responded to the band 2:16:44.480 --> 2:16:46.959 by giving the salute on mass at the quarterfinals. So 2:16:47.000 --> 2:16:49.440 that was the next game, right, Yeah, yeah it was. 2:16:49.879 --> 2:16:53.400 It was a scene. Like people have obviously drawn the 2:16:53.400 --> 2:16:56.480 comparison to the previous German movement, which thought one race 2:16:56.560 --> 2:16:58.280 was better than the other races. Right, but seeing a 2:16:58.280 --> 2:17:03.160 whole crowd of people doing that disturbing. Yeah, it's concerning. 2:17:03.760 --> 2:17:05.480 They did it in a game in Germany, so the 2:17:05.480 --> 2:17:08.280 salute's not banned in Germany, but right. And then the 2:17:08.280 --> 2:17:12.360 Turkish president Rep. Type Herd Gun postponed his plans to 2:17:12.400 --> 2:17:15.880 visit asba Jahan and attended the game after the suspension 2:17:15.920 --> 2:17:17.959 to show his support for the team. Right. He defended 2:17:17.959 --> 2:17:21.720 the player, saying he'd merely expressed his excitement after scoring. 2:17:22.000 --> 2:17:24.959 Germany was big mad about this. In the defense, they 2:17:25.000 --> 2:17:28.400 summoned the Turkish ambassadors to Foreign Ministry to explain what 2:17:28.440 --> 2:17:31.120 the fuck was going on? And it has resulted in 2:17:31.160 --> 2:17:35.480 considerable amounts of violence across Europe. Right, we saw in Austria, 2:17:35.560 --> 2:17:37.400 we saw in Germany, we saw in Belgium where there 2:17:37.480 --> 2:17:41.320 is a large Turkish and often a large Kurdish yeaspora. Right, 2:17:41.879 --> 2:17:44.720 because of the tensions between these two groups, which the 2:17:44.760 --> 2:17:48.240 football has increased, then we saw like street fighting between 2:17:48.280 --> 2:17:52.160 these two groups in predominantly migrant neighborhoods. Right. But I 2:17:52.160 --> 2:17:54.360 don't want it's episode to just be about the football 2:17:54.640 --> 2:17:57.600 or the Turkish participation in the Syrian civil War. I 2:17:57.600 --> 2:18:00.600 want it to be about what's happening to Syrian refugees 2:18:00.640 --> 2:18:04.959 in Turkey today. So many Turkish people have come to 2:18:05.000 --> 2:18:08.640 recent the Syrian refugees who relocated there since the started 2:18:08.680 --> 2:18:12.160 the war. Estimates range from three point one to three 2:18:12.200 --> 2:18:16.240 point five. I've seen four million, evidently, Like they have 2:18:16.320 --> 2:18:18.320 a land border, right, Turkey and Syria. So some of 2:18:18.360 --> 2:18:21.440 the people crossing will have come without being documented, whereas 2:18:21.480 --> 2:18:24.080 others will have come in the more formal process and 2:18:24.320 --> 2:18:28.480 be documented. Right. So whatever, it's millions of refugees, I 2:18:28.480 --> 2:18:33.680 think that's what matters. They are largely baselessly and evidently 2:18:33.720 --> 2:18:36.880 baselessly in some cases accused of causing the economic troubles 2:18:36.879 --> 2:18:40.400 and include low wages and inflation inflation exceeded seventy five 2:18:40.400 --> 2:18:43.720 percent in Turkey in May. They have also been blamed 2:18:43.720 --> 2:18:46.080 for the earthquake that happened if every twenty twenty three, 2:18:46.080 --> 2:18:50.000 which I'm not quite sure how like who or what 2:18:50.760 --> 2:18:53.440 the process exactly that they're postulating is there. 2:18:54.040 --> 2:18:54.760 That's crazy. 2:18:55.360 --> 2:18:58.720 Yeah, yeah, you just clear things that people generally can't make, 2:18:58.760 --> 2:19:03.400 earthquakes happen. So across the political spectrum, we've seen support 2:19:03.480 --> 2:19:09.720 grow for sending these refugees home. In twenty sixteen, Turkey 2:19:09.840 --> 2:19:13.400 began to accuse the SDF of ethnically cleansing Arab areas 2:19:13.440 --> 2:19:17.680 in Syria, and the UN refuted these accusations. Right, But 2:19:17.879 --> 2:19:20.680 in twenty eighteen and twenty nineteen, and in twenty nineteen, 2:19:20.720 --> 2:19:25.080 with the explicit approval of President Trump, the Turkish military 2:19:25.080 --> 2:19:29.400 and its proxies attacked the SDF and seized territory inside Syria. Right, 2:19:30.080 --> 2:19:35.520 Operation Peace Spring and Olive Branch. In these areas, Turkey 2:19:35.560 --> 2:19:37.960 has attempted to resettle Arab refugees. 2:19:38.040 --> 2:19:38.160 Right. 2:19:38.200 --> 2:19:42.360 This is why we can't understand anti Syrian sentiment in 2:19:42.440 --> 2:19:46.360 Turkey without understanding Turkey's involvement in the Syrian Civil war. Right, 2:19:46.400 --> 2:19:49.000 it's trying to create what it calls a safe zone, 2:19:49.680 --> 2:19:51.600 and in this safe zone, it's trying to take the 2:19:51.680 --> 2:19:54.760 refugees that it's people have decided they don't want and 2:19:54.840 --> 2:19:57.680 relocate them back into a country which is at war. 2:19:58.360 --> 2:20:01.640 Turkey has already resettled Syrian rec Fujis in this safe zone. 2:20:01.680 --> 2:20:04.280 But obviously some of them have been in Turkey for 2:20:04.320 --> 2:20:06.720 more than a decade. Their children have gone to school 2:20:06.720 --> 2:20:10.120 in Turkey, they speak Turkish, they've learned a new language, 2:20:10.120 --> 2:20:12.920 they've learned a new alphabet. Right, they have lives there. 2:20:12.959 --> 2:20:14.879 So not all of them are just taking the chance 2:20:14.920 --> 2:20:17.320 to Yeah, let me get straight back to Aleppo. For 2:20:17.400 --> 2:20:20.119 very obvious reasons, people don't want to go back. Since 2:20:20.120 --> 2:20:22.560 twenty eighteen, a cost of living crisis in Turkey has 2:20:22.640 --> 2:20:25.359 been leveraged by the right to stoke anti Syrian sentiment. 2:20:26.080 --> 2:20:28.720 Research found that in twenty twenty, only twenty three percent 2:20:28.760 --> 2:20:31.879 of Turkey citizens would accept a Syrian bride or groom 2:20:31.879 --> 2:20:34.640 into their family or consider having a Syrian as a 2:20:34.640 --> 2:20:37.320 business partner, and only thirty one percent would want to 2:20:37.320 --> 2:20:39.800 have the child educated in a class with a Syrian 2:20:39.840 --> 2:20:40.080 in it. 2:20:40.600 --> 2:20:43.720 That is yeah, that makes me so fucking mad. 2:20:44.080 --> 2:20:46.480 One of the things I've come across with is doesn't 2:20:46.520 --> 2:20:48.680 by any means apply to all Turkish people. I've met 2:20:48.680 --> 2:20:51.400 some very cool Turkish people who I like very much 2:20:51.520 --> 2:20:56.200 that people who are ultranationalists in Turkey. America has its 2:20:56.240 --> 2:21:00.000 fair share of bigots, right generally, they know that it's wrong. 2:21:00.440 --> 2:21:03.440 They're like, say it with your whole chest of the 2:21:03.560 --> 2:21:07.520 certainly the anti Syrian sentiment that I've heard expressed online 2:21:07.560 --> 2:21:11.640 from Turkish people, it's not something that like it's considered shameful. 2:21:11.840 --> 2:21:15.400 They'll just they'll just fucking say it, which is kind 2:21:15.440 --> 2:21:20.080 of wild. No, it's scary, Like, yeah, it's very scary. 2:21:20.640 --> 2:21:23.320 Like if you've raised your child in Turkey and that's 2:21:23.360 --> 2:21:26.039 the only that's their first language essentially, or that's the 2:21:26.080 --> 2:21:29.080 only thing they know, that's just one of the most 2:21:29.160 --> 2:21:31.879 unsafe places for them to be there. Yeah, that's scary 2:21:31.920 --> 2:21:32.520 and not fair. 2:21:32.640 --> 2:21:34.840 Yeah, And like I know, I've met lots of Kurdish 2:21:34.840 --> 2:21:37.920 people who, like, you know, they come in and to 2:21:38.040 --> 2:21:40.760 the United States right where I'm helping out the border, 2:21:40.760 --> 2:21:43.000 and I'll greet them in Kurdish. And like I was 2:21:43.000 --> 2:21:44.680 talking to a guy the other day and mc Curdish 2:21:44.720 --> 2:21:46.160 is by no means great, but it took a little 2:21:46.160 --> 2:21:49.120 class and can say some words. And then also a 2:21:49.200 --> 2:21:51.800 dude walked around the market with me every morning in 2:21:52.160 --> 2:21:55.400 Cambichelow and just pointed at vegetables and shouted. So I'm 2:21:55.400 --> 2:21:58.320 pretty pretty good when it comes to like the eggplant spectrum. 2:21:58.959 --> 2:22:03.600 So I'll greet them in command gee and they will. 2:22:03.640 --> 2:22:05.320 They only speak Turkish, right, Like, it's not that they 2:22:05.360 --> 2:22:07.160 could just drop back. And I'm sure that's true for 2:22:07.600 --> 2:22:10.080 kids who would have grown up speaking Arabic in Syria 2:22:10.280 --> 2:22:11.320 if they went to school in Turkey. 2:22:11.320 --> 2:22:14.680 So that's a language, and it's also like not necessarily 2:22:14.720 --> 2:22:17.240 something they wanted to happen. I think that's something that 2:22:17.360 --> 2:22:20.600 really frustrates me. It's like Bashar started attacking as people 2:22:20.800 --> 2:22:23.800 and they needed somewhere to go. Turkey welcome them. Yeah, 2:22:24.000 --> 2:22:26.720 And when you resettle and you make a home somewhere, 2:22:27.320 --> 2:22:30.360 it really feels like, especially now in this world, like 2:22:30.400 --> 2:22:32.600 if you're a refugee, it feels like you're always going 2:22:32.640 --> 2:22:37.039 to be kind of displaced in one way or another. Heartbreaking. 2:22:37.600 --> 2:22:40.320 Yeah, best you're like temporary. 2:22:40.480 --> 2:22:40.680 Yeah. 2:22:40.720 --> 2:22:43.279 After the earthquake in twenty twenty three, which folks will remember, 2:22:43.360 --> 2:22:46.600 we did a little fundraiser for World Central Kitchen. Syrian 2:22:46.680 --> 2:22:50.320 refugees were accused of fluting a lot on social media. 2:22:50.760 --> 2:22:54.200 Turkish Twitter had trending slogans like immigrants should be deported, 2:22:54.680 --> 2:22:57.800 just straight up saying it. Syrian refugees were kicked out 2:22:57.840 --> 2:23:01.880 of like tent camps and left homeless. They faced verbal abuse, 2:23:01.920 --> 2:23:04.960 which trying to act as services. Separate shelters were set 2:23:05.000 --> 2:23:09.480 up for Syrian refugees, like literally like they couldn't be together, right, 2:23:09.959 --> 2:23:14.359 Resentment simmered amongst the groups. Yeah, I read some NGO reports. 2:23:14.400 --> 2:23:16.120 One of the things they say is that like women 2:23:16.160 --> 2:23:18.880 who were refugees, especially women who run their own preferred 2:23:18.920 --> 2:23:20.680 not to drink water because they didn't want to go 2:23:20.760 --> 2:23:23.640 to the bathroom, like they were afraid and they wanted 2:23:23.680 --> 2:23:26.840 to stay in their tents. And like, well, yeah, that's 2:23:26.840 --> 2:23:29.720 something I've seen in other settings too, but like it, 2:23:29.800 --> 2:23:33.600 it's obviously that's a pretty fuck situation to be in, right, Yeah, 2:23:34.000 --> 2:23:36.920 in a hard place and you're choosing to dehydrate yourself. 2:23:37.720 --> 2:23:40.959 MNGOS later reported that refugees did not receive mobile container 2:23:40.959 --> 2:23:44.520 homes until displaced Turkish residents received them, and that refugee 2:23:44.520 --> 2:23:47.879 women in particular experience violence in these container camps, right, 2:23:48.200 --> 2:23:51.280 that's when they're they're dropping like chipping containers for people 2:23:51.280 --> 2:23:52.760 to live in because all the how they's filed down 2:23:52.760 --> 2:23:55.600 because of the earthquake. Many Turkish refugees have a sort 2:23:55.600 --> 2:24:00.480 of temporary protected status, so that temporary protected status only 2:24:00.520 --> 2:24:03.640 allows them to live in the provinces that they arrived in, 2:24:04.280 --> 2:24:06.959 and many of those provinces are obviously border provinces. 2:24:07.040 --> 2:24:07.240 Right. 2:24:07.720 --> 2:24:10.720 Initially, many folks had come Syrian folks that come to 2:24:10.720 --> 2:24:12.959 Turkey hoping that they could then continue right. Turkey kind 2:24:12.959 --> 2:24:16.320 of bridges between Asia and Europe, right, so they had 2:24:16.360 --> 2:24:19.440 hoped that they could go through Turkey right from east 2:24:19.480 --> 2:24:21.680 to west and then and then continue into the European 2:24:21.760 --> 2:24:26.120 Union preps and you live there. But that didn't work, right, 2:24:26.200 --> 2:24:28.240 Many of them found themselves stuck in Turkey and not 2:24:28.280 --> 2:24:30.400 even able to leave the province that they lived in. 2:24:30.920 --> 2:24:34.080 After the earthquake, Turkey lifted those those restrictions on movement, 2:24:34.120 --> 2:24:37.560 and you saw tons of Syrian folks traveling around Turkey 2:24:37.560 --> 2:24:40.520 and being like, whoa like is Stumbul, How cool is 2:24:40.560 --> 2:24:42.560 this like? Having lived there for ten years? Right, But 2:24:42.560 --> 2:24:45.840 they couldn't leave their province before for this generation of 2:24:45.879 --> 2:24:47.720 Syrian some of them, like I was reading some of 2:24:47.760 --> 2:24:50.560 their like social media, Like some folks I think meaningfully 2:24:50.600 --> 2:24:53.440 became felt more Turkish when they were able to access 2:24:53.440 --> 2:24:56.520 so things. But other folks they went back to Syria 2:24:56.560 --> 2:24:58.360 to visit family, they were briefly allowed to do that. 2:24:58.440 --> 2:25:01.520 They weren't allowed to do that before. But it also 2:25:01.600 --> 2:25:04.119 broadened the resentment against them. I think it's fair to say. 2:25:04.400 --> 2:25:08.240 And in the twenty twenty three presidential election, there wasn't 2:25:08.400 --> 2:25:11.440 really an option that wasn't hostile to refugees. At Agam 2:25:11.480 --> 2:25:16.039 was probably the least hostile, but still hostile. Neither did 2:25:16.280 --> 2:25:21.640 the TURKEYEU deals to prevent further migration westward help right, 2:25:21.760 --> 2:25:24.600 So all of this just continues to turn up the temperature. 2:25:25.360 --> 2:25:28.640 Between January and December twenty twenty three, over fifty seven 2:25:28.680 --> 2:25:32.879 thousand Syrians were deported. According to Human Rights Watch, these 2:25:32.920 --> 2:25:37.240 deportations took place with the authorities quote pressuring the border 2:25:37.280 --> 2:25:40.879 authorities to list the majority of border crossings as returnees 2:25:41.000 --> 2:25:45.320 or voluntary. Turkey's voluntary returns are often coerced returns to 2:25:45.400 --> 2:25:48.200 quote unquote safe zones that are pits of danger and 2:25:48.240 --> 2:25:51.480 despair that's quote from Adam Kogle, who's a deputy Mid 2:25:51.560 --> 2:25:53.680 East North Africa director at Human Rights Watch. 2:25:54.000 --> 2:25:54.600 It's weak. 2:25:54.959 --> 2:25:57.080 Yeah, that's pretty bleak, right, like, oh, look, we're going 2:25:57.120 --> 2:25:59.120 to volunteer you to go back to Aleppo or a 2:25:59.160 --> 2:26:02.279 free do you know who'll not force you to return 2:26:02.879 --> 2:26:06.360 to a country that is well decade long siver to 2:26:06.400 --> 2:26:06.959 be bes surprised. 2:26:07.000 --> 2:26:07.680 I'm not gonna lie. 2:26:07.760 --> 2:26:10.600 Yeah, that's what I strike to do. Shrine. Just when 2:26:10.640 --> 2:26:12.040 you think it couldn't get any worse, to hit you 2:26:12.080 --> 2:26:26.560 with a terrible ad pivot. We're back and I want 2:26:26.560 --> 2:26:30.119 to talk about the most recent outburst of tension. There 2:26:30.120 --> 2:26:32.959 have been outburst of attension, outbursts of violence against Syrian 2:26:33.000 --> 2:26:36.920 refugees before in Turkey and twenty twenty one springs to mind, 2:26:37.040 --> 2:26:40.800 but recently this all came to a head in early 2:26:40.920 --> 2:26:43.560 July when a Syrian man was accused of molesting his 2:26:43.640 --> 2:26:46.520 seven year old cousin in a public toilet in central Turkey, 2:26:46.879 --> 2:26:49.600 which is a pretty fuck thing to do. The guy 2:26:49.720 --> 2:26:53.199 was arrested, the young girl was taken into protective custody 2:26:53.200 --> 2:26:55.840 I think, along with her mother, but it didn't stop 2:26:56.000 --> 2:26:59.880 violence exploding. Then the town whard has happened. That night, 2:27:00.080 --> 2:27:02.920 cars were destroyed, Syrian shops were attacked, and homes were 2:27:02.920 --> 2:27:05.920 set on fire. The next night, the violence spread in 2:27:05.959 --> 2:27:09.120 the border city of Gaziantep, which has like a twenty 2:27:09.120 --> 2:27:13.400 five percent Syrian population. A man was stabbed. I've seen 2:27:13.480 --> 2:27:16.959 the videos of like teenage boys, like I don't know 2:27:16.959 --> 2:27:21.200 if they're dead or unconscious, but they're certainly not capable 2:27:21.240 --> 2:27:23.400 of responding, and mobs of people are stamping on them, 2:27:23.600 --> 2:27:26.080 kicking them, and it's pretty horrible stuff. 2:27:26.560 --> 2:27:29.720 Yeah, the videos I've seen of the the riots and 2:27:29.760 --> 2:27:31.080 the moms are really terrifying. 2:27:31.360 --> 2:27:34.120 Yeah, Like it's petrifying to think of like a mob 2:27:34.160 --> 2:27:37.320 of people coming for you because of who you are, 2:27:37.400 --> 2:27:40.879 where your parents came from, with nothing you can do 2:27:40.959 --> 2:27:44.560 to defend yourself. Right. Turkey's Interior minister said that four 2:27:44.640 --> 2:27:47.400 hundred and seventy four arrests have been made, and Urdigan 2:27:47.520 --> 2:27:50.920 did condemn the violence, but also blamed the opposition rhetoric, 2:27:50.959 --> 2:27:54.080 which like the opposition to him, Yes, the opposite to him. Yeah, 2:27:54.000 --> 2:27:55.680 when he himself has said it is they're going to 2:27:55.680 --> 2:27:59.920 try and send a million more people back to Syria. Right. Unsurprised, 2:28:00.400 --> 2:28:03.800 several nights of these programs have led to anti Turkish 2:28:03.840 --> 2:28:06.360 sentiment in areas of Syria that are controlled by Turkey 2:28:06.400 --> 2:28:10.280 and its proxy forces. Right. Indeed, there's very proxy forces 2:28:10.320 --> 2:28:13.200 in some cases turned on their Turkish backers, and you 2:28:13.240 --> 2:28:15.640 could see on social media. Again I shared some of them, 2:28:15.720 --> 2:28:19.800 like numerous videos last week of SNA so that Syrian 2:28:19.879 --> 2:28:24.760 National Army fighters firing on Turkish positions, tearing down and 2:28:24.800 --> 2:28:28.959 burning Turkish flags, and even like mobs attacking Turkish civilians 2:28:28.959 --> 2:28:31.480 in a Frien right, which is one of the cities 2:28:31.520 --> 2:28:34.120 that Turkey captured from the SDF. You can say in 2:28:34.120 --> 2:28:38.680 another Turkish occupied areas too, demonstrators tried to storm the 2:28:38.720 --> 2:28:43.000 headquarters or Turkish backed administration. SNA fighters withdrew from their 2:28:43.040 --> 2:28:45.800 frontline positions to set up roadeblocks and tack Turkish bass. 2:28:46.520 --> 2:28:48.840 Dozens of people stayed to sit in in the Al 2:28:48.920 --> 2:28:55.400 Hayya Square in Afrene. Again, these are not tensions have 2:28:55.440 --> 2:28:59.000 popped up overnight, right, This just happened because mobs in 2:28:59.120 --> 2:29:02.320 Turkey attacked Syrian refugees. But this was kind of the 2:29:02.840 --> 2:29:06.240 cork popping, if you like, and one of the things 2:29:06.280 --> 2:29:08.400 that has caused tensions to increase in recent weeks is 2:29:08.440 --> 2:29:13.320 this sort of detente between Asad and Turkey, Right, So, 2:29:13.360 --> 2:29:16.760 in response to these protests, Turkey shut off the internet, 2:29:17.000 --> 2:29:19.960 closed border crossings, and it sent more troops into the area. 2:29:20.400 --> 2:29:22.520 Masses of people were arrested and people were charged with 2:29:22.600 --> 2:29:26.480 things like desecrating national symbols of Turkey, which like again 2:29:26.520 --> 2:29:30.000 that this is not in Turkey, right, this is in Syria. Yeah, 2:29:30.040 --> 2:29:31.840 but in the area occupied by Turkey. 2:29:32.200 --> 2:29:36.280 I think anytime a government or an occupying power like 2:29:36.560 --> 2:29:39.840 shuts off Internet, that is terrifying to me. Yeah, because 2:29:41.000 --> 2:29:43.520 you know, they're trying to do something they don't want 2:29:43.560 --> 2:29:43.920 you to see. 2:29:44.120 --> 2:29:47.920 Yeah, totally. Fortunately, it's twenty twenty four and like there's 2:29:47.920 --> 2:29:50.200 only so far that they can go. Like I've seen 2:29:50.240 --> 2:29:52.160 lots of videos from those protests, but yeah, they're trying 2:29:52.160 --> 2:29:54.640 to stop people organizing. They're trying to stop them and 2:29:54.680 --> 2:29:55.400 the world seeing. 2:29:55.480 --> 2:29:59.680 It's more so the act that that power like choosing 2:29:59.680 --> 2:30:03.040 to do so purposeful and that's like a choice. 2:30:03.120 --> 2:30:08.280 Yeah, totally, Like, yeah, everyone knows what you're going for there. Yeah. 2:30:08.360 --> 2:30:11.279 On the fifth of July, detainees who arrested during protests 2:30:11.280 --> 2:30:14.680 in northern Aleppo, including a child, were forced to film 2:30:14.680 --> 2:30:17.440 themselves with a Turkey flag behind them and apologized to 2:30:17.480 --> 2:30:20.680 the Turkish government and people for burning the Turkish flag. 2:30:21.480 --> 2:30:23.680 One of the videos obtained by the Syrian Observatory for 2:30:23.800 --> 2:30:26.600 Human Rights showed a child under pressure admitting to quote 2:30:26.680 --> 2:30:29.520 burning the turkeysh flag and apologizing to the Turkish people 2:30:29.520 --> 2:30:33.640 before kissing the flags. Chris, Yeah, again, when people kiss 2:30:33.680 --> 2:30:36.440 the flags on TV, it's not a great sign. I 2:30:36.440 --> 2:30:38.960 did see videos of some of the SNA who appear 2:30:39.000 --> 2:30:42.400 to have captured some Turkish soldiers making them kiss their 2:30:42.480 --> 2:30:47.840 flag as well, like the Syrian Revolution flag. So I 2:30:47.879 --> 2:30:51.240 want to talk about these Turkish safe zones, right, so 2:30:51.360 --> 2:30:55.240 called safe zones, I guess they're anything but safe. They've 2:30:55.240 --> 2:30:58.960 been seized through military incursions and their rife with corruption 2:30:59.040 --> 2:31:01.160 in human rights abuse. It is both by Turkish back 2:31:01.200 --> 2:31:05.080 forces and Turkish forces directly. And you'll be familiar with 2:31:05.120 --> 2:31:07.680 some of this stuff from what Israel does in Palestine, 2:31:08.360 --> 2:31:12.240 specifically the destruction and theft of ancient olive orchids. You 2:31:12.280 --> 2:31:14.240 can see it like listed on the Syrian Observatory of 2:31:14.360 --> 2:31:17.000 Human Rights if you go to like they organize the 2:31:17.040 --> 2:31:19.400 areas by the name of the Turkish Mission, so like 2:31:19.480 --> 2:31:24.080 Operation Peace Spring Area or Euphrates Shield or Operation Olive 2:31:24.080 --> 2:31:27.920 Branch is a real fucking on the nose name. And 2:31:27.959 --> 2:31:30.400 you can see like ten olive trees were cut down 2:31:30.440 --> 2:31:34.240 and sold for firewood, or like people reselling homes that 2:31:34.240 --> 2:31:38.080 were sees from civilians. Right wow. And I've spoken to 2:31:38.240 --> 2:31:41.240 people who have left a free in my time in 2:31:42.400 --> 2:31:46.320 KURDISTWN and Syrian Kurdistan and in the United States, and 2:31:46.360 --> 2:31:49.920 I've spoken to people who were there as part of 2:31:50.120 --> 2:31:53.360 the SDF and flat backwards, and like a lot of 2:31:53.400 --> 2:31:56.000 them have confirmed the same stuff, right, destruction and property 2:31:56.520 --> 2:31:59.680 theft of homes and houses, and then like there's evidence 2:31:59.680 --> 2:32:04.520 of there's evidence of corruption in these areas today, right, 2:32:04.680 --> 2:32:09.800 sexual violence, even torture. So it's pretty bad. There are 2:32:09.800 --> 2:32:11.280 a ton of links that will be on our sources 2:32:11.320 --> 2:32:13.000 page if you want to read more. I don't want 2:32:13.000 --> 2:32:15.039 to sort of traumatize you all on your way to 2:32:15.120 --> 2:32:20.720 work here. I'll just traumatize Serene. Yeah you're working, that's. 2:32:20.560 --> 2:32:21.320 Another day at work. 2:32:21.400 --> 2:32:24.640 Yeah, it's a normal day. Most of the protests seem 2:32:24.640 --> 2:32:27.000 to have died down now, but the situation doesn't really 2:32:27.440 --> 2:32:30.320 seem to have become any more stable in Turkey, just 2:32:30.320 --> 2:32:33.080 Like many other countries, politicians have rented a right response 2:32:33.120 --> 2:32:35.960 to an economic crisis and blame refugees for problems caused 2:32:36.000 --> 2:32:39.800 by capitalism. Reports abuse of Syrian refugees caught crossing the 2:32:39.840 --> 2:32:42.360 border of Rife and some of their data appears to 2:32:42.440 --> 2:32:44.959 be leaked in the last few days. I can't confirm this, 2:32:45.040 --> 2:32:46.760 but I've seen this from a few places right that 2:32:47.640 --> 2:32:50.120 data from a registry of refugees has been leaked, which 2:32:50.120 --> 2:32:53.320 would obviously be very concerning, like if we look at 2:32:53.360 --> 2:32:55.959 things like the Marash massacre, we look at like the 2:32:56.040 --> 2:32:59.400 totality of this sentiment and the people doing it. Tensions 2:32:59.400 --> 2:33:02.400 in the Turkish occupied areas of Syria remain high, with 2:33:02.480 --> 2:33:05.440 people there strongly opposed to the Turkish oppression, seizure and 2:33:05.520 --> 2:33:08.720 sale of their landed homes, and the potential of at 2:33:08.720 --> 2:33:12.080 a time between the two countries. This weekd Agan said, 2:33:12.440 --> 2:33:16.279 we will extend our invitation to a sad With this invitation, 2:33:16.520 --> 2:33:19.240 we want to restore Turkey Syria relations to the same 2:33:19.320 --> 2:33:22.400 level as in the past. Our invitation may be extended 2:33:22.440 --> 2:33:25.720 at any time. That's a readout of an interview by 2:33:25.760 --> 2:33:27.840 Turkish media that's obviously translated. 2:33:28.120 --> 2:33:30.800 That's some vague. It's like, at what point in the past. 2:33:31.080 --> 2:33:34.360 Yeah, yeah, I mean, look, I think it's the correct 2:33:34.440 --> 2:33:36.920 number of relations to have with the side is non yeah, 2:33:37.160 --> 2:33:40.440 and so like any more than that is bad. There 2:33:40.480 --> 2:33:43.279 are also reports that Turkey is going to open crossings 2:33:43.320 --> 2:33:46.680 between the territory it is controlling and regime territory, right. 2:33:46.680 --> 2:33:48.400 There are protests about that. I saw in a lepo. 2:33:49.360 --> 2:33:53.320 Syria has said that normalization can only happen after Turkey 2:33:53.320 --> 2:33:56.560 agrees to pull out the troops that it has. Turkey 2:33:57.440 --> 2:34:00.480 is opposed to this because it doesn't want the SDA, 2:34:00.520 --> 2:34:02.320 which it believes to be an extension of the p 2:34:02.520 --> 2:34:05.160 k K, which it considers to be a terrorist group, 2:34:05.680 --> 2:34:08.959 to have territory along its border, right, And the FDF 2:34:08.959 --> 2:34:10.960 still does already have territory along its border. Right, Like 2:34:11.040 --> 2:34:13.440 Cami Shlow where I was, you can go on top 2:34:13.480 --> 2:34:16.240 of a torp building and look across the border. But 2:34:16.560 --> 2:34:17.879 that does seem to be kind of a red line 2:34:17.920 --> 2:34:20.080 for Turkey. So I don't know where that leaves us, but. 2:34:20.400 --> 2:34:23.520 Yeah, that does seem something that they would never want 2:34:23.600 --> 2:34:27.440 to do. So but shar really called their bluff there, Yeah. 2:34:27.320 --> 2:34:30.080 Yeah, yeah, yeah, which is which is kind of funny, 2:34:30.080 --> 2:34:33.480 given that he's not exactly in a strong position to negotiate. No, 2:34:34.000 --> 2:34:36.640 but maybe Turkey has given up on the revolution in 2:34:36.680 --> 2:34:40.840 Syria and it just wants to join with US at 2:34:41.160 --> 2:34:43.480 and as long as they can both say fuck the Kurds, 2:34:43.560 --> 2:34:47.600 and that's enough for both of them, right, But like 2:34:48.520 --> 2:34:50.320 if they can both get together on a state level 2:34:50.320 --> 2:34:54.119 and be like, fuck these cords, and therefore, I guess 2:34:54.280 --> 2:34:57.320 the cost of that would be sending these refugees home 2:34:58.120 --> 2:35:00.440 for Turkey, which is I guess not because it's to 2:35:00.440 --> 2:35:03.640 be a cost by some of them. And that's millions 2:35:03.640 --> 2:35:06.440 of people, right, millions of people who like something. In 2:35:06.440 --> 2:35:09.359 some cases, people are worried about having a citizenship removed, 2:35:09.959 --> 2:35:12.680 like they went there to be safe. And of course 2:35:12.720 --> 2:35:14.640 it's a violation of international law, and of course that 2:35:14.720 --> 2:35:17.760 doesn't matter because international law is as real as unicorns. 2:35:18.520 --> 2:35:22.800 But it leaves millions of people in limbo, right. Urdigan 2:35:22.879 --> 2:35:26.520 said he's promised to send another million refugees back, but 2:35:26.760 --> 2:35:30.240 that's not possible without the cooperation of the regime. Really, 2:35:30.280 --> 2:35:32.320 I guess he could just pump them all into like 2:35:32.800 --> 2:35:35.200 a free or whatever. But he's pumping people into a 2:35:35.200 --> 2:35:38.480 situation where people are already actively opposed to the Turkish 2:35:38.520 --> 2:35:41.640 occupation there. Right, if he pulls out his troops, he's 2:35:41.640 --> 2:35:43.560 going to have to accept that there will be Kurdish 2:35:43.600 --> 2:35:46.920 forces on his border, which he hates. So it's a 2:35:47.000 --> 2:35:49.760 question of, like what value does he assigned to the 2:35:49.760 --> 2:35:52.640 safety of these three million refugees, And it doesn't seem 2:35:52.720 --> 2:35:57.600 to be very high. And like every time when we 2:35:57.680 --> 2:36:01.320 talk about migration, that people are eaving terrible things, right, 2:36:01.320 --> 2:36:03.279 that that's why people tend to end up as refugees. 2:36:03.320 --> 2:36:06.119 But there's never been a I don't think a more 2:36:06.160 --> 2:36:09.840 pronounced global crackdown than I've seen right now. It's not 2:36:09.879 --> 2:36:13.560 like these Syrian refugees, they can't leave their province, right. 2:36:13.640 --> 2:36:16.600 I've spoken to hundreds of people who have left Turkey 2:36:16.680 --> 2:36:19.440 in the last six months year. It's very hard, it's 2:36:19.520 --> 2:36:21.960 very expensive, and lots of the people who have fled 2:36:21.959 --> 2:36:24.480 from Turkey only went there for a few months, right, 2:36:24.959 --> 2:36:29.240 and then kept moving. Every country has made it harder 2:36:29.240 --> 2:36:32.120 than it ever was to immigrate. Like even you know 2:36:32.120 --> 2:36:34.680 that we talk about the Syrian refugee crisis in twenty fourteen, 2:36:34.720 --> 2:36:39.760 twenty sixteen, unleashing three million people, right that they need 2:36:39.800 --> 2:36:42.400 a safe place to go. If you try and force 2:36:42.440 --> 2:36:45.120 them back to Syria, it's either going to be an 2:36:45.160 --> 2:36:48.680 absolutely terrible humanitarian disaster or we're going to have more 2:36:48.800 --> 2:36:54.640 refugees entering the refugee system at a time when governments 2:36:54.680 --> 2:36:57.560 all around the world are indifferent at best to the 2:36:57.560 --> 2:37:01.240 survival of refugees, right, including the fucking buying government in 2:37:01.240 --> 2:37:05.840 this country. Yeah, yeah, it's uh, it's pretty big. 2:37:07.120 --> 2:37:10.000 Yeah, but uh, that fucking sucks. 2:37:09.760 --> 2:37:14.240 Dreams it does, fucking sucker. I will be back in 2:37:14.600 --> 2:37:16.720 two weeks to talk to you about what Turkey is 2:37:16.760 --> 2:37:20.720 doing in the Kurdistan Autonomous Region of a ruck where 2:37:20.720 --> 2:37:24.640 they are bombing Curtis Dan freedom gorillas, they're setting up 2:37:24.720 --> 2:37:27.959 roadblocks and again like making massive incursions into another country. 2:37:28.480 --> 2:37:30.160 So that'd be great, we can you can all look 2:37:30.160 --> 2:37:33.960 forward to that over the weekend. Yeah, I guess I 2:37:34.040 --> 2:37:37.840 guarantee that there are refugees, probably refugees from Turkeyosyria in 2:37:38.080 --> 2:37:40.800 the town where you live, or in the nearest big 2:37:40.840 --> 2:37:42.920 town to where you live, and you can do something 2:37:43.040 --> 2:37:45.360 nice for them this weekend if you want to. 2:37:45.600 --> 2:37:48.360 Especially if you live somewhere where it's hot as shit, 2:37:48.800 --> 2:37:52.600 you can I don't know, help out, drop off water 2:37:52.760 --> 2:37:53.680 somewhere or something. 2:37:54.000 --> 2:37:57.960 Yeah, Like and I've just been talking to Kurtis refugees 2:37:57.959 --> 2:37:59.760 who are in like the Northeast, you know, I spoke 2:37:59.800 --> 2:38:02.240 to and they're not Kurdish or or Turkish, but talk 2:38:02.280 --> 2:38:05.040 about to Some refugees are in Scranton, famous for Joe 2:38:05.080 --> 2:38:07.440 Biden always talking about it. But yeah, there are folks 2:38:07.440 --> 2:38:09.520 everywhere who need your help. You can make a difference. 2:38:09.520 --> 2:38:11.880 I guess the fucking government isn't going to Joe Biden, 2:38:11.920 --> 2:38:15.760 isn't going to Kamala Harris isn't going to either, and 2:38:15.879 --> 2:38:18.160 neither is fucking Hillary Clinton. I'm damn sure of that. 2:38:18.400 --> 2:38:22.920 So it is only you, and that doesn't need to 2:38:22.959 --> 2:38:26.480 make you desperate. You can do something. I spoke to 2:38:26.560 --> 2:38:29.760 so many, Like another of our podcast listeners was at 2:38:29.760 --> 2:38:32.040 the border on Monday and I met them and they 2:38:32.040 --> 2:38:34.280 were lovely and we drove around and help people, and like, 2:38:34.959 --> 2:38:38.600 you just need to take that yourself, and like, you 2:38:38.640 --> 2:38:41.760 can do something. But the first step is, you know, 2:38:42.080 --> 2:38:45.600 lugging off Twitter and getting out there. And like I 2:38:45.640 --> 2:38:49.800 promise you you will feel less hopeless if you start helping. 2:38:49.800 --> 2:38:51.800 Even though it's only one person, it makes a difference. 2:38:52.440 --> 2:38:55.360 Yeah, that is something that James did tell me that 2:38:55.400 --> 2:38:57.959 I think about is because I get really overwhelmed with 2:38:58.040 --> 2:39:00.920 the idea of how many people need help in this world. 2:39:01.160 --> 2:39:03.840 And I'm just like a big softie and I really 2:39:04.680 --> 2:39:07.000 just overwhelms me, like what can I what can me 2:39:07.200 --> 2:39:11.520 little me do to help anything? But Dreams is right. 2:39:11.560 --> 2:39:14.200 If you change even one person's life, that's one person's 2:39:14.240 --> 2:39:17.080 whole life. That's a big deal. And so I think 2:39:17.120 --> 2:39:19.800 it has to start there. And if there are many 2:39:19.800 --> 2:39:21.600 more of you doing the same thing, then that's how 2:39:21.680 --> 2:39:25.760 actual change happens. Because yeah, our government is useless. But yeah, 2:39:25.879 --> 2:39:28.279 listen to Dreams. Dreams is wise and. 2:39:28.160 --> 2:39:32.840 British, please, I listen to because I'm British, because that 2:39:32.840 --> 2:39:35.080 will lead you down some dark paths in terms of 2:39:35.120 --> 2:39:35.920 gender ideology. 2:39:36.840 --> 2:39:39.080 I mean maybe I meant that you sound wise because 2:39:39.080 --> 2:39:39.600 you're British. 2:39:39.640 --> 2:39:41.480 Yeah, yeah, that's what I got get for me. But 2:39:41.600 --> 2:39:43.920 just be nice to people and they take by someone 2:39:43.959 --> 2:39:46.520 fucking lunch this weekend if you have the money, if not, 2:39:46.560 --> 2:39:48.800 make them lunch, you know, make some rice. It's cheap. 2:39:49.920 --> 2:39:52.199 And yeah, you can make a difference. No one fucking 2:39:52.200 --> 2:39:55.320 else will if you want to talk about being a leftist. 2:39:55.520 --> 2:39:57.440 That's great, But like I have so much more respect 2:39:57.480 --> 2:40:00.400 for people who want to do stuff, So do stuff 2:40:00.440 --> 2:40:02.360 and the rest will sort itself out. Like you don't 2:40:02.400 --> 2:40:04.080 have to argue with people about the mind you share 2:40:04.120 --> 2:40:07.600 of ideology. It doesn't matter. Like help helping people matters. 2:40:07.640 --> 2:40:10.960 Making the world better matters. Say do that. It's Friday. 2:40:11.440 --> 2:40:13.200 Hopefully you can use your weekend to do something nice 2:40:13.200 --> 2:40:13.600 for someone. 2:40:15.680 --> 2:40:18.840 Hey, we'll be back Monday with more episodes every week 2:40:18.920 --> 2:40:20.800 from now until the heat death of the Universe. 2:40:21.400 --> 2:40:23.880 It Could Happen Here as a production of cool Zone Media. 2:40:24.000 --> 2:40:26.680 For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website 2:40:26.680 --> 2:40:28.920 cool zonemedia dot com, or check us out on the 2:40:28.959 --> 2:40:32.520 iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. 2:40:32.760 --> 2:40:34.880 You can find sources for It Could Happen Here, updated 2:40:34.959 --> 2:40:39.000 monthly at cool zonemedia dot com slash sources. Thanks for listening.