Speaker 1: Hey, guys, Saga and Crystal here.
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Speaker 3: dot com for everybody. We have a great show for
Speaker 3: everybody today, but we have a horrible tragedy here in
Speaker 3: the DC area, which we're going to go ahead and
Speaker 3: start with.
Speaker 4: So go ahead, Chrystal.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So we're going to have breaking news about that
Speaker 2: mid flight collision between a regional JED and a military helicopter.
Speaker 2: Tell you everything we know this morning. We're also going
Speaker 2: to take a look at some of the political news
Speaker 2: coming out of DC. We had the RFK confirmation yesterday.
Speaker 2: Tolcy's hearing is going to be today. We're going to
Speaker 2: give you the latest one whatever's going on with that
Speaker 2: spending freeze. Another judge, wait in there. We're going to
Speaker 2: try to get in a block with the breaking news.
Speaker 2: The show is a little bit scrambled. We're going to
Speaker 2: try to get in a block about Elon's attempts to
Speaker 2: cull the federal workforce. Jeremy Corbell is going to join.
Speaker 2: We got an answer from the White House sort of
Speaker 2: on the new.
Speaker 5: Jersey drone situation.
Speaker 2: Not very satisfying, So Jeremy, I'll do a great job
Speaker 2: breaking that down. And Peter Binard is going to join
Speaker 2: me to talk about his new book, Being Jewish after
Speaker 2: the destruction of goz of It. Let's go ahead and
Speaker 2: break into that horrific news we got last night. A
Speaker 2: regional jet American Airlines Regional jet that was traveling from Wichita, Kansas,
Speaker 2: collided last night with a military black Hawk helicopter that
Speaker 2: was doing a training flight from Belvoir. Sixty four people
Speaker 2: were on board that American Airlines jet. Three were on
Speaker 2: board the military helicopter. As far as we know, search
Speaker 2: and rescue efforts this morning are ongoing in the icy
Speaker 2: Potomac River at this point, you know, it's hard to
Speaker 2: imagine that there would be survivors, but we continue to
Speaker 2: pray for some kind of miracle. Thus far, as of
Speaker 2: eight oh one am, the latest that we have is
Speaker 2: that twenty seven bodies have been recovered of those who
Speaker 2: were known to be on board. And this is the
Speaker 2: first major airline accident that we've had in this country
Speaker 2: since two thousand and nine. I'm going to show you
Speaker 2: a video that was taken from a nearby webcam that
Speaker 2: shows the mid air collision and the explosion. I mean,
Speaker 2: it is horrifying to watch, So just awarding before I
Speaker 2: go ahead and put this up on the screen. But
Speaker 2: let's go ahead and play this so people can see
Speaker 2: what we're talking about. This is the approach and then
Speaker 2: you see this explosion mid air. If you look more
Speaker 2: closely here, you can actually see the jet and then
Speaker 2: the helicopter coming right towards it, and you see the
Speaker 2: moment of impact and this unbelievable flash in the sky.
Speaker 2: You know, people who were nearby at DCA, this is
Speaker 2: literally miles away from where we sit right now, said
Speaker 2: that they were able to see the explosion.
Speaker 5: They heard a loud boom.
Speaker 2: Of course, the airport is completely shuttered at this point
Speaker 2: in time, and you know, there are going to be
Speaker 2: a lot of questions about how the hell this happened.
Speaker 2: But let's take a listen to This is actually an
Speaker 2: Australian News broadcast, but they did a good job of
Speaker 2: breaking down what we know as of you know, relatively
Speaker 2: recently about what occurred.
Speaker 5: Let's take a listen to that.
Speaker 6: This plane was immediately diverted away from the airport, the
Speaker 6: passengers watching the horrifying news unfolding beneath them on their
Speaker 6: in flight screens. The Bitomac splits two states, Maryland and
Speaker 6: Virginia and Washington, d C. The White House is just
Speaker 6: kilometers from the crash site, as well as the Capitol
Speaker 6: Building and some of America's most important national monuments. The
Speaker 6: Pentagon is just across the river.
Speaker 7: It's our deep sorrow about these events. This is a
Speaker 7: difficult day for all of us at American Airlines, and
Speaker 7: the American Airlines Care Team has been activated to assist
Speaker 7: our passengers and their families.
Speaker 2: So that's a little bit of information that was coming
Speaker 2: out yesterday evening. We have a foe that we can
Speaker 2: show you here some of the wreckage that is being
Speaker 2: pulled from the Potomac. You can see the airport there
Speaker 2: in the background. Anyone who's traveled to DC or lives
Speaker 2: in this area very familiar with this airport, very familiar
Speaker 2: with the approach. The airspace around here is tremendously busy
Speaker 2: that something will returned to maybe one of the factors
Speaker 2: that contributed to this, But at this point, you know,
Speaker 2: we're just learning the very basics. And then let's put
Speaker 2: the CNN tearsheet up on the screen as well. That
Speaker 2: gives what we know about what was going on at
Speaker 2: the time of this crash. Through the headline here, FA
Speaker 2: issues groundstop at Reagan National Airport after passenger plane collides
Speaker 2: mid air with helicopter, and they say in this article
Speaker 2: the passenger plane was American Airlines Flight five three four
Speaker 2: to two, operated by PSA Airlines that was traveling from Wichita, Kansas.
Speaker 2: I saw some information this morning also that indicated there
Speaker 2: were a number of kids who were returning from a
Speaker 2: figure skating camp who had been you know, selected to
Speaker 2: get to go to this camp, and they were on
Speaker 2: their way back. The kids and the coaches, some of
Speaker 2: them were the individuals who were on board that plane
Speaker 2: was due to land at the airport outside of DC,
Speaker 2: per CNN Wednesday, even collided midair with that US Army
Speaker 2: helicopter as it approached the runway. Flight records showed the
Speaker 2: plane was expected to land around nine pm local time.
Speaker 2: DC Police that it received calls at eight fifty three
Speaker 2: pm about an aircraft crash above the Potomac River, so
Speaker 2: it was just about to land. The US Army Blackhawk
Speaker 2: helicopter was on a training flight at the time of
Speaker 2: the incident. The twelfth Aviation Battalion, based out of Fort
Speaker 2: Belvoir in Virginia, provides helicopter transportation and technical rescue support
Speaker 2: to the National Capital Region. Remains unclear where the Blackhawk
Speaker 2: took off from before the collision, so that is by
Speaker 2: and large what we know soccer at this point.
Speaker 3: It's just really horrifying, honestly to think about. I drove
Speaker 3: past the crash eye this morning. The airport remained sealed.
Speaker 3: Very eerie morning here in Washington. There's no planes up
Speaker 3: in the sky. As we said, this is one of
Speaker 3: the busiest airports in the entire country, one of the
Speaker 3: busiest runways, one of the most congested pieces of airspace,
Speaker 3: and it's very heavily controlled. Because it is so sensitive
Speaker 3: close to the White House, the National Monuments and to
Speaker 3: gone that's right, you know, you literally can see much
Speaker 3: of it on my entire drive in, and it's horrifying
Speaker 3: to learn from the emergency rescue people. They say that
Speaker 3: no survivors are expected. We're obviously praying for a miracle
Speaker 3: knowing some of what's happened, but yeah, for those who
Speaker 3: aren't aware, you know, coming into this airport, it happens
Speaker 3: right off of a river. It's very similar if you've
Speaker 3: ever flown into San Francisco Airport, a similar type of
Speaker 3: approach that comes where you've come straight off the water,
Speaker 3: right onto the runway. This is a smaller aircraft, a
Speaker 3: regional jet that was coming in, so was coming into
Speaker 3: one of the smaller ones here in Washington, and that
Speaker 3: appears to be right where the collision.
Speaker 1: But the big question mark is how this is all possible.
Speaker 3: I mean, for me, it's genuinely unfathombal that helicopters are
Speaker 3: criss crossing this runway. I'm told by the Transportation Secretary
Speaker 3: who just did a press conference this morning. He says,
Speaker 3: a routine lightpath, of course, of which I had no idea.
Speaker 3: We can only speculate a little bit at this time.
Speaker 3: Some of the aviation experts that I've checked in on
Speaker 3: basically say that it was a perfect storm of horrible
Speaker 3: things that happened where air traffic control called out to
Speaker 3: the helicopter told them to watch out for a RJ,
Speaker 3: which is shorthand for a smaller aircraft regional jet regional jet.
Speaker 3: There was actually a regional jet that was taking off
Speaker 3: at the same time. So the speculation is the helicopter
Speaker 3: pilots are looking over to the right at a taking
Speaker 3: off aircraft. Air traffic control tells them, hey, you need
Speaker 3: to get behind that aircraft. They think that they have
Speaker 3: plenty of clearance for that takeoff, when meanwhile, what air
Speaker 3: traffic control really meant was this incoming regional jet that
Speaker 3: was landing making its final approach. Helicopter pilot's eyes are
Speaker 3: to the right where the jet is coming in on
Speaker 3: the left. The other problem is when you're coming down,
Speaker 3: is that the collision lights apparently on the helicopter would
Speaker 3: have looked just like the landing lights.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of other lights was happening here.
Speaker 3: You know, as you come down, you're literally landing in
Speaker 3: the midst of a major city and there's lights everywhere,
Speaker 3: so it would have been difficult for the pilot to distinguish.
Speaker 3: And also literally coming out on top of something and
Speaker 3: your eyes are trained directly on your landing strip or
Speaker 3: the runway, then you're not necessarily looking for peripheral vision.
Speaker 1: And that's how that happened.
Speaker 3: Because that's the most shocking part about the video is
Speaker 3: that just it looks almost like the helicopter is making
Speaker 3: a bee right there. It For now, keep in mind
Speaker 3: out we don't have you know, look all indications right
Speaker 3: now this was an accident, but you know, there's all
Speaker 3: there's a full investigation that remains to be happened. So
Speaker 3: we have three US Army service members who are on
Speaker 3: board the helicopter. You have some sixty odd passengers. Apparently
Speaker 3: this is the if all are confirmed dead, which is
Speaker 3: very very likely according to EMS and rescue recovery or
Speaker 3: the recovery operation currently going down, this is going to
Speaker 3: be the deadliest crash in the United States in twenty
Speaker 3: four years, even more so than that two thousand and
Speaker 3: nine crash in over New York States.
Speaker 2: And while that is the case, we know because we've
Speaker 2: been covering here closely. There have been so many near
Speaker 2: misses tons in the past couple of years, and so
Speaker 2: many people raising red flags about do we have enough
Speaker 2: air traffic controllers? You know, some of this has to
Speaker 2: do with Also this is unrelated obviously to this crash,
Speaker 2: but that raised a lot of questions about the manufacturer Boeing.
Speaker 2: This has been something that has been an ongoing concern
Speaker 2: because we had narrowly avoided horrible tragedies just in the
Speaker 2: past couple of years, several times, and now everybody's worst
Speaker 2: fears here coming true. This was Sean Duffy, the new
Speaker 2: Transportation Secretary's first day literally literally is first day.
Speaker 5: On the job.
Speaker 2: So now he's having to go out and give a
Speaker 2: press conference about this terrible tragedy. There are going to
Speaker 2: be a lot of questions about how the hell this
Speaker 2: could happen. Let me go and put three up on
Speaker 2: the screen. This is just the official announcement confirming the crash.
Speaker 2: Here from the FAA, they say PSA Airlines Bombardier C
Speaker 2: three J CRJ. Sorry if I could read seven hundred
Speaker 2: regional jet collide in midair with the Sikorski H sixty
Speaker 2: helicopter commonly known as a black Hawk while on approach
Speaker 2: to runway thirty three at Reagan Washington, Nash Airport around
Speaker 2: nine pm local time. PSA was operating that flight as
Speaker 2: American Airlines departed, from WHICHITA, Kansas, FAA, and NTSB will investigate.
Speaker 2: The NTSB will lead the investigation. Saga was alluding to
Speaker 2: the flight path of this regional jet. We have an
Speaker 2: animation we can show you of this specific flight path
Speaker 2: as it was being tracked here. You can see it
Speaker 2: there over Maryland and then it comes across the Potomac
Speaker 2: River and is just about to land there at the
Speaker 2: airport when it crashes and the Potomac River there separates
Speaker 2: Maryland Virginia. You go a little bit further down and
Speaker 2: you're right there in DC. And so that is, you know,
Speaker 2: typical flight path. I did read that this was a
Speaker 2: particularly busy time at the airport. There were a lot
Speaker 2: of planes coming in, going out, et cetera. That could
Speaker 2: have contributed to Saga was eluding because you could have
Speaker 2: had confusion about which regional jet the helicopter was being
Speaker 2: warned about. Apparently, air traffic control was in communication both
Speaker 2: with the regional jet attempting to land and with this
Speaker 2: military training helicopter. As a layman, I don't know anything,
Speaker 2: but it does seem crazy these helicopters were there at
Speaker 2: the time, especially as the airport is so incredibly busy,
Speaker 2: and I'm sure that will be a topic of talking.
Speaker 3: I've been landing at this airport literally since i was
Speaker 3: eighteen years old. It's almost fifteen years. I've never seen
Speaker 3: helicopter out the window. Maybe I'm not paying attention.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 3: But we do have a statement here from President Trump.
Speaker 3: Let's put that please on the screen.
Speaker 1: Quote.
Speaker 3: I have been fully briefed on the terrible accident which
Speaker 3: just took place at Reagan National Airport.
Speaker 1: May God bless their souls.
Speaker 3: Thank you for the incredible work being done by our
Speaker 3: first responders.
Speaker 1: I am monitoring the situation.
Speaker 3: I will provide more details as they arise, And so
Speaker 3: that's really all we know now at this point. Now,
Speaker 3: the big question marks are about some of the things
Speaker 3: that we are going to look at for transportation safety.
Speaker 3: And in the background of all of this, we'll recall
Speaker 3: all of those near misses that were happening in for
Speaker 3: the last four years. Bizarrely, we seem to have weird
Speaker 3: connections to some of these. I mean, we were on
Speaker 3: the ground in Austin. I think the very hour that
Speaker 3: there was one of the nearest misses ever in US
Speaker 3: history happened right there on the runway where they had
Speaker 3: to abort a landing, you know, very very quickly and
Speaker 3: avoid a collision there. But this raises big questions about
Speaker 3: specifically really about the air traffic control which have all
Speaker 3: the near misses have highlighted staffing problems, software issues. There's
Speaker 3: been accusations by the airlines, by the unions, et cetera.
Speaker 3: Nobody really knows anything. They're going to be a spotlight
Speaker 3: now on aviation safety.
Speaker 1: And that's the.
Speaker 3: Question mark now because this is you know, look, you
Speaker 3: know it's not necessarily the Trump administration or whatever's fault,
Speaker 3: but they're going to have to deal with it now
Speaker 3: that this happens. And that's the big question mark is
Speaker 3: what are they going to do, because what I would
Speaker 3: like to say is somebody needs to burn for this,
Speaker 3: Like this isn't just some we're throwing it to the pilot.
Speaker 3: If there is imprecise language that is not drilled into
Speaker 3: the heads of air traffic control, or if some guy
Speaker 3: is tired because he's been on for a double shift
Speaker 3: or something like that. We need to know every single
Speaker 3: thing about this because now it looks like some sixty
Speaker 3: odd people are dead as a result of this accident.
Speaker 3: You know, we need to talk about this helicopter situation.
Speaker 3: It's true there are black Hawks are circling Washington literally
Speaker 3: all the time.
Speaker 1: For what reason. Why you're supposed to be training.
Speaker 3: We're supposed to be doing training flights, which just apparently
Speaker 3: was right there across the airport.
Speaker 1: You know, there's go two miles down the other way.
Speaker 1: Look again, easy, I'm a layman.
Speaker 3: I can only say this, but literally a customer of
Speaker 3: the airport have been landing there millions of times, lots
Speaker 3: of other people in this area, and most importantly they're
Speaker 3: the families of these people. They they will need both
Speaker 3: answers and every passenger. That's what Secretary Duffy said that
Speaker 3: we all learned, like we don't have question marks when
Speaker 3: we fly in the United States. It's a point of
Speaker 3: pride for our FAA, for our country to so see
Speaker 3: something like this, which is almost certainly some sort of
Speaker 3: horrible accident tragedy, there has to be major reforms.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's no doubt about it. And look, Trump's been
Speaker 2: in office a week. I think it will be dipping.
Speaker 2: A lot of people are sharing, you know, some of
Speaker 2: the moves that he's made. We can put the next
Speaker 2: piece up on the screen here for the Huvendon post
Speaker 2: that you know he came in. He got it, a
Speaker 2: key aviation safety committee, fired the head of the TSA
Speaker 2: Coast Guard. Obviously, we're going to try to get to
Speaker 2: a blog later in the show about this. People are
Speaker 2: calling it a bio it's not really a biome. But
Speaker 2: they say that people can continue working from home until
Speaker 2: the fall if they promise to resign at that point.
Speaker 2: But you know, an effort to call the federal government again,
Speaker 2: Trump's been in office for a week. However, I do
Speaker 2: think that this is this will cast those attempts to
Speaker 2: strip the federal government down to bare bones in a
Speaker 2: different light, because it is a reminder that having sufficient
Speaker 2: personnel of high quality is can be a matter of
Speaker 2: life and death. You know, these the air traffic controllers.
Speaker 2: We'll see whether they are to blame or not. That
Speaker 2: continues to be an open question. But the functions of
Speaker 2: the federal government really really matter. One thing that may
Speaker 2: be quite relevant here is some of the lever News outlet,
Speaker 2: David Cerrato's outlet that we always appreciate their reporting is
Speaker 2: out with this report, we can put this up on
Speaker 2: the screen. So months ago before this collision, lawmakers brushed
Speaker 2: off warnings and boosted flights. So despite the fact that
Speaker 2: there had been mid flight near missus dire Plea's airline
Speaker 2: Bankworld lawmakers recently expanded flight traffic at Washington's busy airport.
Speaker 2: Apparently they just added an additional number of flights to
Speaker 2: this airport, and the.
Speaker 5: All the.
Speaker 2: Both senators from Virginia and Maryland, so for senators total,
Speaker 2: voted against this as a protest, saying this airport is
Speaker 2: already too busy. There are already it's already dangerous. There
Speaker 2: are already too many flights going in and out. You
Speaker 2: can't add five more flights to this airport. Everybody else
Speaker 2: voted for this bill. And was this a contributing factor
Speaker 2: to this crash. Nobody knows at this point, but certainly
Speaker 2: potentially the case that the busyness, just the sheer number
Speaker 2: of flights in and out of this airspace helped to
Speaker 2: create the dynamic that led to this.
Speaker 3: Horrific tragicy that's going to be one of the Actually
Speaker 3: was very supportive of those opening slots. But for people
Speaker 3: who want to know why they did that, it's because
Speaker 3: lawmakers don't want to drive figure not from DC.
Speaker 1: It won't make a lot of sense. But there's two
Speaker 1: airports here.
Speaker 3: There's Washington, DCA, which is like a ten minute drive
Speaker 3: from the city, and then there's Washington Dulles, which is
Speaker 3: like an hour drive, maybe more with traffic. And the
Speaker 3: people who represent the state of California and a few
Speaker 3: others who want direct flights from that they can get
Speaker 3: to from Congress open the up these new slots because.
Speaker 1: They want to be able to go home quicker.
Speaker 3: Just so everybody understands what their motivation was for voting
Speaker 3: for that. You a right and actually one of the reasons.
Speaker 3: So I was supportive of that. But one of the
Speaker 3: problems was they didn't increase the number of air traffic
Speaker 3: control and so the safety mechanisms that were at the airport.
Speaker 3: Now actually was not fully aware that that provision had
Speaker 3: not been added or have been extended more fully. Now
Speaker 3: obviously we are so, like I said, somebody when sixty
Speaker 3: some odd people are killed clearly as a result of
Speaker 3: systemic and even if it is pilot error, there are
Speaker 3: systemic things that have contributed to that. You don't need
Speaker 3: to have a full route to branch examination of all
Speaker 3: the problems that happened. It does appear that there have
Speaker 3: been people who have been warning about this now for years,
Speaker 3: about both congestion about DCA, specifically from the new slots
Speaker 3: being added at the airport and all of that, and
Speaker 3: so we should listen to them. We should need to
Speaker 3: have actual hearings. Is one of the least you know,
Speaker 3: things that we should. It's one of those things where
Speaker 3: we really need to for the families of those people
Speaker 3: who have so tragically lost their lives, like actually do
Speaker 3: them service, and also for our own country.
Speaker 1: Yeah, a servation's capital.
Speaker 2: Right well, and to avoid this happening again because as
Speaker 2: of just a few months ago, air traffic control they're
Speaker 2: short roughly three thousand air traffic controllers nationwide, so there's
Speaker 2: been an ongoing shortage. So I certainly hope that no
Speaker 2: air traffic controllers are planning to take the buyout, because
Speaker 2: this is an area where we need more and highly qualified.
Speaker 3: That's capable from home, not it's only for work from
Speaker 3: home employees.
Speaker 1: Doesn't apply to everybody.
Speaker 2: Well they received they receive the same email offering them
Speaker 2: the same thing.
Speaker 1: I think it went to every federal employee. Yeah, in
Speaker 1: terms of eligibile. Look, I have no idea.
Speaker 3: I actually haven't looked specifically to air traffic control. I
Speaker 3: know there were certain areas that were exempt in terms
Speaker 3: of which specific departments, because that when they say it's
Speaker 3: all federal employees, really only half the people who even qualify.
Speaker 1: They blasted it to everybody.
Speaker 3: We'll talk about it more in the buyout, but yes, yeah, listen, yeah,
Speaker 3: please stay and beyond that, let's think about it. And
Speaker 3: you're right, you know, look, some of the federal government
Speaker 3: is extremely superfluous, it's stupid, and some of it is extremely.
Speaker 2: Absolutely life or death critical, and this is certainly one
Speaker 2: of those instances. So we'll, you know, keep an eye
Speaker 2: on anything new that comes out because you know, this
Speaker 2: obviously has immense, immense consequences for safety of air travel,
Speaker 2: which a lot of Americans already rightfully had a lot
Speaker 2: of concerns about, giving all the near Middle of.
Speaker 3: Course, yeah, near missus, Boeing, you know, and all this
Speaker 3: all these questions, I mean, don't forget about all of
Speaker 3: the investigations that happened after those horrible Boeing crashes as
Speaker 3: a result of software.
Speaker 1: And then nobody goes to jail for it.
Speaker 3: You know, this is what I'm talking about, where we
Speaker 3: have you know, if you, if you, if you improperly
Speaker 3: are driving your car and it's your fault, like you're
Speaker 3: going to face consequences for that. But when hundreds of
Speaker 3: people get killed as a result of this, people, oh
Speaker 3: it's you know, they have to pay a fine or whatever. Well,
Speaker 3: I don't think that's satisfactory. And so I'm really hoping
Speaker 3: that somebody gets punished for this, whoever is responsible, not
Speaker 3: a scalp or something like that, but somebody, an actual
Speaker 3: investigation from NTSP on downwards.
Speaker 1: I don't know that we have real with the public.
Speaker 5: Real change.
Speaker 2: You know, yes, if it's a human error, but also
Speaker 2: like you said, it's it is likely to be emblematic
Speaker 2: of a broader systematic issue.
Speaker 1: Human error has occur within it don't occur within a vacuum.
Speaker 1: They occur within.
Speaker 3: This aviation is one of those which were most tightly
Speaker 3: controlled focused on specifically, like you said, because the.
Speaker 2: Stakes well, and there's supposed to be multiple layers of
Speaker 2: fiales taces. It's supposed to be the case that you
Speaker 2: would have to have a whole series of things go wrong,
Speaker 2: mistakes and errors and things go wrong to result in
Speaker 2: this sort of a horrific crash because the stakes are
Speaker 2: so incredibly high.
Speaker 3: So really really just so tragic for the families of
Speaker 3: all these people.
Speaker 4: Are going to learn more.
Speaker 3: I'll keep everybody updated as to all that, but you know,
Speaker 3: just awful for the city, for Wichita, where these people
Speaker 3: were all coming from.
Speaker 1: For apparently there were two world world.
Speaker 3: Class skaters champions who are on the plane from Russia,
Speaker 3: all of them you know, just really really tragically lost.
Speaker 3: Let's go to RFK Junior. So RFK Junior testified yesterday.
Speaker 3: He will testify again before the United States Senate two
Speaker 3: different committees that he appears over because HHS is actually
Speaker 3: split into two the Health and Human Services Department for
Speaker 3: oversight before the Senate. So this was first you did
Speaker 3: see the opening of what's we're likely to see more
Speaker 3: of today.
Speaker 1: Lots of democratic attacks.
Speaker 3: Here on RFK Junior using some of his past statements
Speaker 3: against him. First, we're going to go ahead and take
Speaker 3: a listen to his opening statement where he thanked President
Speaker 3: Trump and basically laid out the Make America Healthy Again movement.
Speaker 3: And we'll get into some of the Q and A.
Speaker 3: Let's take a listen.
Speaker 8: Today, American's overall health is in grievous condition. Over seventy
Speaker 8: percent of adults and a third of children are overweight
Speaker 8: or obese. Is ten times more prevalent than it was
Speaker 8: during the nineteen sixties. Cancer among young people is rising
Speaker 8: by one or two percent a year. Autoimmune diseases, neurodevelopmental disorders, Alzheimer's, asthma, ADHD, depression, addiction,
Speaker 8: and a host of other physical and mental health conditions
Speaker 8: are all on the rise, some of them exponentially. There
Speaker 8: is no single culprint in chronic disease. Much as I
Speaker 8: have criticized certain industries and agencies, President Trump and I
Speaker 8: understand that most of their scientists and experts genuinely care
Speaker 8: about American health. Therefore, we will bring together all stakeholders
Speaker 8: in pursuit of this unifying goal. I want to make
Speaker 8: sure the committee is clear about a few things. News
Speaker 8: reports have claimed that I am anti vaccine or any industry.
Speaker 4: I am neither.
Speaker 9: I am pro safety, pro vaccine.
Speaker 3: Protesters behind rfk JR. By the way, don't worry, he
Speaker 3: was not singled out. It's a Washington tradition to be
Speaker 3: screamed down by protesters in your confirmation hearing for everybody.
Speaker 3: Let's get then to what he referenced their vaccine statements.
Speaker 3: That is where the bulk of a lot of the
Speaker 3: criticism against RFK JR was concentrated by from a lot
Speaker 3: of the Democrats. Let's take a listen to some of
Speaker 3: that questioning.
Speaker 4: So I'm running out of time.
Speaker 10: I think the gist of what you were trying to
Speaker 10: say today is you're really pro vaccine, you want to
Speaker 10: ask questions. You have started a group called the Children's
Speaker 10: Health Defense. You're the original note right now is I
Speaker 10: understand that on their website they are telling me what's
Speaker 10: called onesies, these little things clothing for babies. One of
Speaker 10: them is diled on Facts Unafraid. Next one of the
Speaker 10: sould for twenty six bucks a piece. By the way,
Speaker 10: next one is no vax no problem. Now you're coming
Speaker 10: before this committee and you say you're pro vaccine, just
Speaker 10: want to ask some questions, and yet your organization is
Speaker 10: making money selling a child's product to parents for twenty
Speaker 10: six bucks, which cast fundamental doubt on the usefulness of vaccines.
Speaker 10: Can you tell us now that you will, now that
Speaker 10: you are pro vaccine, that you're going to have your
Speaker 10: organization take these products off the market?
Speaker 8: Senator, I have no power over that organization not You're
Speaker 8: hard of it.
Speaker 4: I resigned from the board that was just.
Speaker 11: A few months ago.
Speaker 4: You founded that. You certainly have power you can make that.
Speaker 10: How are you supportive of this I have had nothing
Speaker 10: to do with Are you supportive of these ones?
Speaker 4: These I'm supportive of vaccines?
Speaker 10: Are you supportive of these this clo which is militantly
Speaker 10: anti vaccine?
Speaker 8: I am supportive of vaccines. Will I want good science
Speaker 8: and I want to protect but you will not tell.
Speaker 10: The organization you founded not to continue selling them. Are
Speaker 10: you lying to Congress today when you say you are
Speaker 10: a pro vaccine or did you lie on all those podcasts?
Speaker 11: We have all of the fund tape by the way.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Senator.
Speaker 8: As you know, because it's been repeatedly debunked, that statement
Speaker 8: that I made on the Lacus Freedman podcast was a
Speaker 8: fragment of this statement.
Speaker 4: He asked me and anybody.
Speaker 8: Who actually goes and looks at that podcast and we'll
Speaker 8: see this. He asked me, are there vaccines that are
Speaker 8: saving effective?
Speaker 4: And I said to them, some of the live.
Speaker 8: Virus vaccines are, and I said, there are no vaccines
Speaker 8: that are saving effective. And I was going to continue
Speaker 8: for every person, every medicine has people who are sensitive
Speaker 8: to them.
Speaker 3: Are you supportive of the onesie being the iconic line
Speaker 3: from the hearing, but basically that I watched the entire
Speaker 3: thing that was basically a taste of all of the
Speaker 3: Democratic questioning. Do you want to weigh in before we
Speaker 3: play the Lex Friedman clip, because that's the one that
Speaker 3: Ron Wyden referenced in his opening statement and then was
Speaker 3: brought up several to more times by Senator Cantwell, Senator Bennett,
Speaker 3: and a few others.
Speaker 2: I mean, listen, I would never support RFKA Junior for
Speaker 2: this position because he has been consistently over the course
Speaker 2: of the past two decades. I would say anti vax
Speaker 2: and so I would never support him for this position,
Speaker 2: But I would respect it more if he would actually
Speaker 2: rep the position that he has held consistently for the
Speaker 2: past two decades. And we'll show you the Lex Friedman thing.
Speaker 2: The thing he says about it is total and complete nonsense,
Speaker 2: not to mention even if you take that out of it,
Speaker 2: Like he founded the Children's Health Defense in twenty eleven.
Speaker 5: He led that organization.
Speaker 2: It has been consistently anti vax. Now what he'll say is, oh,
Speaker 2: I'm not against vaccines. I just think that one of
Speaker 2: the existing vaccines are actually safe. He has his own
Speaker 2: children vaccinated, but he also has said he would do
Speaker 2: anything to go back and have them not be vaccinated.
Speaker 2: So listen, there's a lot of people out there now
Speaker 2: who are anti vacs. Okay, you've succeeded. Your movement has grown.
Speaker 2: I think that that movement is devastating to public health.
Speaker 2: I think it's contra to science. And I think that
Speaker 2: vaccine development has been of one of the greatest inventions
Speaker 2: of modern medicine in terms of reducing extending life and
Speaker 2: reducing debts, et cetera, et cetera. But you have succeeded
Speaker 2: in winning a lot of people over this cause. So
Speaker 2: rep that cause, Like, why are you running away from it?
Speaker 1: Confirmed?
Speaker 2: Well, and that's the thing that's so pathetic is like, Okay, then,
Speaker 2: I mean you, like, one of the most preposterous moments
Speaker 2: here is you guys all know how critical RFK Junior
Speaker 2: was about the COVID vaccine. Many of you out there
Speaker 2: are probably like on board with his criticisms and actually
Speaker 2: believe what he says in this confirmation hearing is like
Speaker 2: Operation Warp Speed was amazing, it was great, The vaccine
Speaker 2: development was spectacular.
Speaker 5: It's like, why should.
Speaker 2: Anyone believe a goddamn word that you have to say
Speaker 2: about anything when this has been the core of your
Speaker 2: views and your life's work for the past several decades,
Speaker 2: and you will just throw it in the garbage so.
Speaker 5: That you can get closer to power. It's just that's
Speaker 5: what I would get.
Speaker 1: It's the only way that you're going to get confirmed.
Speaker 3: So look, it's politics. I'm not saying I forgive it
Speaker 3: no necessarily. I do think you probably should have just man,
Speaker 3: this is part of the problem though, with these confirmation hearings.
Speaker 3: You know, it's like cable news. You know, you only
Speaker 3: have five minutes of question and answer. You can't really
Speaker 3: get into it. In terms of what he said for
Speaker 3: past criticism of MMR and the polio vaccine, his defense
Speaker 3: and the defense of Maha and all those other people
Speaker 3: is basically like the if no vaccine can be one
Speaker 3: hundred percent safe and effective. All vaccines, all medicine has
Speaker 3: side effects.
Speaker 1: Look in general, I don't think that.
Speaker 3: You're wrong that there are a lot of people now
Speaker 3: whose eyes have really been open to the medical system.
Speaker 3: And to be honest, I find myself in that category.
Speaker 3: I mean, I thought RFK Junior was some evil person,
Speaker 3: and then you know, you learn a little bit more.
Speaker 3: I thought, COVID vaccine really opens your eyes. So there's
Speaker 3: a lot of questions here about vaccination schedules and the
Speaker 3: way that we do things, and that even the legislation
Speaker 3: that has been passed I think is a legitimate that's.
Speaker 5: Not his position, but in practice that is not.
Speaker 1: Of how it will look like as a member of
Speaker 1: the United States government.
Speaker 2: And this well, I mean, but that's not really true.
Speaker 2: I mean, he has a lot of power if he's
Speaker 2: confirmed in this position, which there's still a question mark about.
Speaker 2: I don't think that any I mean, I thought the
Speaker 2: democratic questioning here was much more effective with RFK than
Speaker 2: it was with Pete Hegseth for example, for one key reason,
Speaker 2: which is they actually focused on his relevant policy statements
Speaker 2: relevant to policy for this position. So I do think
Speaker 2: that they landed some effective blows here not to mention
Speaker 2: just how how like ridiculous you look to completely change
Speaker 2: your position on a dime with no real explanation. So
Speaker 2: if he was just like, oh, you know, maybe we
Speaker 2: should look at the schedule and other European countries do
Speaker 2: it differently, blah blah blah, that is not what he's
Speaker 2: been out there to it.
Speaker 1: I mean true.
Speaker 2: You know, there was questioning about him and his organization's
Speaker 2: involvement in these deaths in Samoa, of which you know,
Speaker 2: the people who were involved there say that the impact
Speaker 2: that the impact of his lives and his organization's lies
Speaker 2: helped you contribue not one hundred percent, but helped you
Speaker 2: contribute to the death of dozens of kids from not
Speaker 2: getting vaccinated. After there was a you know, horrific human
Speaker 2: error type accident with regard to the MMR vaccine, they
Speaker 2: seized on it and lied and said that the whole
Speaker 2: vaccine was unsafe. People were terrified. They stopped getting their
Speaker 2: kids vaccinated. There was a virulent outbreak of measles and
Speaker 2: dozens of kids died. So I listen, there are things
Speaker 2: that are K Junior says that I actually agree with,
Speaker 2: especially when it comes to food and pesticides and ultra
Speaker 2: process foods in particular, if he was up for AG Secretary,
Speaker 2: I might actually consider putting him in that position because
Speaker 2: I think that his views are more grounded in science,
Speaker 2: and I think he could actually effectuate some of the
Speaker 2: things he cares about with regard to nutrition, healthier lifestyle, etc.
Speaker 2: Be in a better position to do that as HHS secretary.
Speaker 2: I think that he could be incredibly actually deadly for
Speaker 2: this nation, especially as we're heading into the possibility we
Speaker 2: have an ongoing threat of an avian flu pandemic. There
Speaker 2: isn't a vaccine. There is a vaccine, by the way,
Speaker 2: that exists for avian flu. And guess what. RFK Junior
Speaker 2: has gone out and said that he doesn't think it's safe, so.
Speaker 1: In it maybe he's right.
Speaker 3: What do we know about bird flu vaccines? What are
Speaker 3: we going to trust doctor Fauci and the rest.
Speaker 1: Of these people Soccer.
Speaker 3: This is part of what we're getting at here with
Speaker 3: the HHS. How can it be worse than right now
Speaker 3: you're saying it's deadly. We are already living in a
Speaker 3: deadly country.
Speaker 5: It could be worse. It could be worse.
Speaker 2: Vaccination, having plio and me outbreaks and these children.
Speaker 1: Are going to die of diabetes. Answer like the.
Speaker 3: Health Care for All I understand that that's your position,
Speaker 3: but that's not what the American people voted for.
Speaker 2: Clearly, like can you even do about nutrition at HHS
Speaker 2: that that falls under the ad Secretary of better positions
Speaker 2: and deal with.
Speaker 3: Dietary guidelines as he talks about with SNAP, he will
Speaker 3: have immense regulatory authority. I mean, this is part of
Speaker 3: what I'm talking about with this vaccine thing. Look, I
Speaker 3: completely understand, and I used to be really in this camp.
Speaker 3: I just don't see how it could be bad to
Speaker 3: publish the studies and the safety data and then leave
Speaker 3: parents with some choice.
Speaker 9: Like.
Speaker 3: Look, that's what I'm saying though, but that's in practice.
Speaker 3: He said, I will not touch the polio vaccine. I
Speaker 3: will not touch the MMR.
Speaker 2: But he is clearly willing to lie about everything all
Speaker 2: the time when it serves his interests.
Speaker 5: I think that it is Iolo.
Speaker 1: I'm not assuming it.
Speaker 2: I think we should assume that what his life's work
Speaker 2: has been, which is to tell people that all vaccines
Speaker 2: are unsafe and to try to get them to not
Speaker 2: vaccinate their kids as emblemized as you know, emblematic of
Speaker 2: the onesies, right, the fact that even he wants this
Speaker 2: like baby propaganda about them not getting any vaccines. I
Speaker 2: think you should assume that that is the ideology that
Speaker 2: he takes into this position. And like I said, I'd
Speaker 2: have a lot more respect if he would actually rep
Speaker 2: what he has said and what he believes.
Speaker 5: And the fact that he will just.
Speaker 2: Run one hundred and eighty degrees, turn on a dime,
Speaker 2: do whatever he can to get into power is to
Speaker 2: me utterly disgraceful and unforgivable. And when you are in
Speaker 2: that position, he could effectively. So one thing he could
Speaker 2: do is eliminate certain vaccines from being covered by medicaid.
Speaker 2: By the way, he doesn't seem to appear to know
Speaker 2: the difference between medicaid and Medicare, was very confused about
Speaker 2: that during the hearings. But he could eliminate a number
Speaker 2: of vaccines getting covered by Medicaid that in and of
Speaker 2: itself would make it impossible for many poor parents to
Speaker 2: get their kids properly vaccinated. He could also change the
Speaker 2: current structure and make it basically so that it is
Speaker 2: unprofitable and impossible for vaccine makers to continue to distribute
Speaker 2: and sell vaccines. He would have tremendous power in this position.
Speaker 2: And so if you're anti vax and you just think
Speaker 2: that you should let it fly and you're cool with
Speaker 2: measles and pollion whatever coming back, then this is your guy.
Speaker 2: But this is one of the primary things he'll have
Speaker 2: responsibility for. And I think he already already has done
Speaker 2: tremendous damage and has blood on his hands literally in
Speaker 2: the case of Samoa, for the type of lies unscientific lies,
Speaker 2: not legitimate questions, of which that's fine, but unscientific lies
Speaker 2: that he has spent decades At this point, I.
Speaker 3: Think, look, I understand that the Samoa thing is complicated,
Speaker 3: as we know.
Speaker 1: No, I mean, look, I've cided the vena prosad thing.
Speaker 1: I read it.
Speaker 3: It's pretty convincing. Not that it was necessarily one hundred
Speaker 3: percent fall. There's a lot of the questions about MMR,
Speaker 3: But look, I guess where it comes down to is
Speaker 3: that the VAX position is that blood on his hands, etc.
Speaker 1: It's like, well, well, how come there's no smoke.
Speaker 3: If there was a traditional pharma lobbyist here, wouldn't they
Speaker 3: have ten times more blood on their hands and more
Speaker 3: responsibility for all of the chaos that has been wrought
Speaker 3: in our healthcare system. Look, I understand your position universal
Speaker 3: healthcare and all that did not win within the Republican context.
Speaker 1: Honestly, this is as good as it gets.
Speaker 3: As opposed to what who is our previous AHHS secretary,
Speaker 3: that moron who's taken private flights?
Speaker 1: What was his name? Tom Price?
Speaker 3: Using US taxpayer dollars to pay for a private jet.
Speaker 3: You got somebody here who at least can publish some
Speaker 3: safety data.
Speaker 1: Who what did he say?
Speaker 11: Said?
Speaker 3: People should be able to buy whatever they want as
Speaker 3: long as they have the knowledge in front of them.
Speaker 3: You know, look, you got to go to war with
Speaker 3: the you know, with the fighters that you have. This is,
Speaker 3: on balance, I think it's much better than any traditional
Speaker 3: AHHS secretary you could have taken that position. And you know,
Speaker 3: look the vaccine question here about medicaid, et cetera. Right now,
Speaker 3: US government policy and state policy forces you to comply
Speaker 3: with the schedule or for or face immense consequences socially,
Speaker 3: public school and all of that. Do you think that
Speaker 3: that's fair in all of these era of the post
Speaker 3: COVID landscape.
Speaker 1: I don't believe a.
Speaker 3: Freaking word that these people say. I'm serious, I really
Speaker 3: don't after what I've.
Speaker 2: Read, I don't think the polio vaccine is a good thing.
Speaker 2: I think the MMR.
Speaker 1: I think the polio in the fact.
Speaker 3: Okay, but there's sixty three vaccinations that children get before
Speaker 3: what the age four?
Speaker 1: So help me, which one do you think get rid
Speaker 1: of it? I'll tell you right now.
Speaker 3: There's no the HPV or what is the hepatitis B
Speaker 3: vaccine that's given to a child literally the moment is
Speaker 3: birth literally for societal reasons, which only applies to drug addicts.
Speaker 1: No way, not happening.
Speaker 3: Like, and you know the the societal consequences you face
Speaker 3: for this and the medical system and the way that
Speaker 3: they push this stuff.
Speaker 1: It's unbelievable. You brought up vaccine profit.
Speaker 3: It's like, I mean, you know how many times we
Speaker 3: talked here on the show about drug profit and the.
Speaker 2: Ability that the answer to that is not Listen, here's
Speaker 2: my core problem. His diagnosis of them and what's wrong
Speaker 2: with it, I think is completely wrong. The problem is
Speaker 2: not that the vaccines don't work. The vaccines do work.
Speaker 2: We have decades of information showing that the vaccines work
Speaker 2: and have saved huge numbers of lives. That's not the problem.
Speaker 2: The problem is a lack of access to healthcare. The
Speaker 2: problem is a lack of ability to pay for healthcare.
Speaker 2: The problem is a profit motive at the center of
Speaker 2: health care. What he wants to do has nothing to
Speaker 2: do with any of that. It's just a reaction and
Speaker 2: immediately knee jerk reaction against any actual like scientific medicine
Speaker 2: and advancements in favor of some like natural hippie dippy
Speaker 2: woo woo bolsheal, which is way less because why is.
Speaker 5: To not get sick and die? That's why it's bad.
Speaker 1: But this is a straw man argument. Schedule, what do.
Speaker 5: We know about the is a straw man argument?
Speaker 3: Okay, well we have sixty three people were dead from
Speaker 3: in Samoa again with an open question mark whether it's
Speaker 3: one hundred percent RFK Junior's fault or not. There are
Speaker 3: what tens of millions who have died now of chronic
Speaker 3: illness and of a disease here in the United States,
Speaker 3: Like where's this?
Speaker 1: You know, smoke, But.
Speaker 2: What going to do with regard again? If he was
Speaker 2: up for ag secretary, I think there's a lot more
Speaker 2: he could do about lifestyle, diet, pesticide, but.
Speaker 3: HHS guidelines to control that. The SNAP program, as he
Speaker 3: talked about ten I had no idea. By the way,
Speaker 3: the ten percent of SNAP dollars are spent on sugary
Speaker 3: drinks and sixty percent of SNAP dollars are spent on
Speaker 3: processed food. Now again I don't even disagree, And my
Speaker 3: least libertarian opinion is he was like, oh, we shouldn't
Speaker 3: be telling what people what to eat. I'm like, actually,
Speaker 3: we probably should, especially if they're on government assistance. Secondary
Speaker 3: I think question mark not going to happen in the
Speaker 3: Republican Party. But I mean, on balance, the current system
Speaker 3: is a disaster. We talk about it, drug addiction, obesity, cancer.
Speaker 3: I mean when you listen to not even him, go
Speaker 3: listen to the more credible people, doctor Casey means right,
Speaker 3: She's got a rant that's like three and a half
Speaker 3: minutes long of all of the chronic disease markers that
Speaker 3: have gone up. His proposal for NIH is to end
Speaker 3: infectious disease covered great by the way, as we'll talk
Speaker 3: a little bit about with lime disease, and to focus
Speaker 3: on chronic illness like cancer and obesity. I think you
Speaker 3: know one of the big drug company dreams right now
Speaker 3: is to have Medicare and Medicaid cover ozembic for all,
Speaker 3: including children. Maybe, but you know, there should probably be
Speaker 3: some rigorous studies and long term views as to whether
Speaker 3: this is important or even useful for children, and what
Speaker 3: the long term impacts are all of that. In this
Speaker 3: country we go drug first and not lifestyle. I think
Speaker 3: the AHHS secretary does have a lot of impact that
Speaker 3: there is the largest organization in the entire US federal government.
Speaker 3: Even when you accept Medicare and Medicaid payments that are
Speaker 3: gone out of that. I mean, what we look at
Speaker 3: the terms of the coverage like you're talking about with vaccines.
Speaker 3: I had no idea even from the hearing that forty
Speaker 3: percent of births in this country are covered by Medicaid,
Speaker 3: which is insane, which means that the government has total
Speaker 3: authority over payment and control over people's lives.
Speaker 2: I think that's why to me, it's terrifying that. I mean,
Speaker 2: the man is a liar and a quack whose spouts
Speaker 2: all kinds of He's an HIV truther. He doesn't even
Speaker 2: believe that aids's cover is caused by HIV.
Speaker 3: He makes stuff up all the more bris quackery or quackery,
Speaker 3: institution query institutions, and pharmacie.
Speaker 5: A different sort of death.
Speaker 2: I mean, this is the thing, is I listen, I
Speaker 2: will grant maybe there are things he would do that
Speaker 2: I would, you know, support, although I don't know the
Speaker 2: snapchair that's a longer debate, but there I hold out
Speaker 2: the possibility that there are theoretically things he could do
Speaker 2: that I would support. In this position, to me, it
Speaker 2: does not outweigh the risk of confirming him and the
Speaker 2: immense damage that he could do to families and children
Speaker 2: and their health health simply through his consistent anti vaccine views.
Speaker 2: I do want to get to the lex rayment clip
Speaker 2: because one of the things he'll say, oh you heard
Speaker 2: him in that clip that we played a long time
Speaker 2: ago at this point where he was like, oh no,
Speaker 2: I totally didn't say that. It's taken on a context.
Speaker 2: I was going to add, like, no vaccine is safe
Speaker 2: for everyone all the time. If you listen to the clips,
Speaker 2: So we'll play the extended thing. You can hear the
Speaker 2: whole context. That's not what he was saying. He was saying,
Speaker 2: there is no he theoretically may support some vaccine that
Speaker 2: theoretically exists, but he does not support any of the
Speaker 2: vaccines that currently exist. Let's take a listen to what
Speaker 2: he had to say to Lex.
Speaker 12: You've talked about that the media slanders you by calling
Speaker 12: you an anti vaxxer, and you've said that you're not
Speaker 12: anti vaccine, you're pro safe vaccine. Difficult question.
Speaker 4: Can you name any vaccines that you think are good?
Speaker 8: I think some of the live iris vaccines are probably
Speaker 8: of earning more problems than their causing. There's no vaccine
Speaker 8: that is, you know, safe, effective.
Speaker 4: The big words.
Speaker 8: What about Can we talk about the here's the problem,
Speaker 8: here's the problem.
Speaker 4: Yes, yeah, here's the problem.
Speaker 8: The polio vaccine contained a virus called semi virus forty
Speaker 8: SV forty.
Speaker 4: It's one of the.
Speaker 8: Most carcinogenic materials that it's not demand. In fact, it's
Speaker 8: used now by scientists around the world to induce tumors
Speaker 8: and rats and guinea pigs and labs. But it was
Speaker 8: in that vaccine. Ninety eight million people who got that
Speaker 8: vaccine and my generation got it, and now you've had
Speaker 8: this explosion of soft tissue cancers in our generation that
Speaker 8: kill many, many, many, many many more people.
Speaker 4: Than polio ever did.
Speaker 8: So if you say to me that the you know,
Speaker 8: the polio vaccine was effective against polio, I'm going to
Speaker 8: say yes. If I say, if you say to me,
Speaker 8: did it kill more people? That did cause more dessline
Speaker 8: I've heard, I would say I don't know because we
Speaker 8: don't have the data on that.
Speaker 12: So but let's talk. Well, well, you know, so we're
Speaker 12: kind of have to narrow. Why is it effective against
Speaker 12: the thing it's supposed to fight?
Speaker 8: Oh, well, a lot of them are. Let me give
Speaker 8: you an example. The most popular vaccine in the world
Speaker 8: is the DTV vaccine if their tennis and vertusses. It
Speaker 8: was used in this kind of introduce in this country
Speaker 8: around nineteen eighty. That vaccine caused so many injuries that Lias,
Speaker 8: which was the manufacturer, was said to the Reagan administration,
Speaker 8: we are now paying twenty dollars in downstream liabilities for
Speaker 8: every dollar that we're making in profits, and we are
Speaker 8: getting out of the business unless you give us permanent
Speaker 8: immunity from liability. So the vaccine companies and were given
Speaker 8: and by the way, Reagan said at that time, why
Speaker 8: don't you just make the vaccine safe? And why is
Speaker 8: said because vaccines are inherently unsaved. They said, unavoidably unsafe.
Speaker 8: You cannot make them safe.
Speaker 2: You can hear the entire context there him saying, you know,
Speaker 2: no vaccine is safe and effective, and then going on
Speaker 2: to explain why he has an opposition to polio vaccine,
Speaker 2: why he has these other problems with vaccines, And like
Speaker 2: I said before, listen, if that's your view, there are
Speaker 2: some people that agree with you at this point.
Speaker 5: Rep that view, rep that view.
Speaker 2: But the reason he doesn't is because he knows that
Speaker 2: even though there has been an uptick in vaccine skepticism,
Speaker 2: it is still it is still dramatically unpopular to actually
Speaker 2: be blanket anti vaxx, which is why he always runs
Speaker 2: away from the label even though sorry, it does apply,
Speaker 2: and it has applied for a long time. So he
Speaker 2: has to hide the ball about what he actually believes.
Speaker 2: And so you know, I mean that shows you that
Speaker 2: he knows what his views are. What he's articulated over
Speaker 2: decades are so poisonous in terms of how the American
Speaker 2: people would think about it that there's no way he
Speaker 2: could get confirmed if he actually held onto the views
Speaker 2: he's expressing.
Speaker 1: There does look, I don't disagree.
Speaker 3: I think it's probably fair to say that he's been
Speaker 3: skeptical of all vaccines in the past. He doesn't think
Speaker 3: any are safe and effective. Again, I think it's a
Speaker 3: chooser fighter thing. Would you rather have somebody who's deeply
Speaker 3: skeptical of that system or somebody who's.
Speaker 1: Like, yeah, no, it's actually totally fine.
Speaker 3: I mean, you know, using claude, So blame Claude if
Speaker 3: these numbers are incorrect. You know, a child born in
Speaker 3: the United States today will receive forty seven to fifty
Speaker 3: one and up to sixty doses of a vaccine by
Speaker 3: the age eighteen. Before nineteen ninety, that was, it was
Speaker 3: between ten to seventeen.
Speaker 1: So with all with the advances in medicine, the same doses.
Speaker 3: And all of that, do we really believe that the
Speaker 3: public health system which delivered US COVID nineteen and all
Speaker 3: of the death and everything where rigorous safety studies were done,
Speaker 3: and that all of the correlative long term data on
Speaker 3: top of their exemption exists. I do not believe it
Speaker 3: for one second. And this doesn't just apply to vaccine.
Speaker 3: This is the problem. It's not vaccine. There was another
Speaker 3: senator I forget her name. I think it was Cantwell
Speaker 3: who was railing at him for not supporting SSRIs.
Speaker 1: It's like there's a religion in this.
Speaker 3: Country around drugs, around let's just prescribe and move on
Speaker 3: and forget about it. I think that his general disposition
Speaker 3: against that is far more beneficial than any just wholesale
Speaker 3: quote unquote acceptance of whatever bullshit that these pharma companies
Speaker 3: publish in their pre prints and journals, and you know,
Speaker 3: they don't even release all of the data. I mean,
Speaker 3: this was part of the real learning process, I think
Speaker 3: for me, for millions of other people, through the COVID
Speaker 3: net vaccine policy, through all of the justifications you know,
Speaker 3: even today that they're pushing COVID nineteen vaccines on pregnant
Speaker 3: women and flu shots and.
Speaker 1: All this other stuff.
Speaker 3: Again, maybe maybe it's safe, they tell us it is,
Speaker 3: but given how what has transpired over the last five years,
Speaker 3: and I think a lot of this comes back to
Speaker 3: I mean, let's make a political point here. Donald Trump
Speaker 3: is not president without RFK Junior. In my opinion, do
Speaker 3: you agree. I don't think there's chance in Helvit wins.
Speaker 3: He would never win Michigan, no way, considering how tight
Speaker 3: that the margin was there, especially if you look at
Speaker 3: the margin in Pennsylvania and others. We did, we did
Speaker 3: a focus groups of.
Speaker 1: A lot of these people.
Speaker 3: If he had not explicitly endorsed him, a lot of
Speaker 3: them were not going to vote for Donald Trump. He
Speaker 3: is an integral part of the MAGA twenty twenty five
Speaker 3: coalition up there with the Libertarians.
Speaker 5: And he should rop what he actually believes. But I mean,
Speaker 5: he should rep what he actually believes. Yeah, we should
Speaker 5: rep what she actually believes too, I mean, but that's.
Speaker 1: Not how politics works.
Speaker 3: I mean, I look, I agree, I wish it were
Speaker 3: that way. Why are the idiots in the United States
Speaker 3: Senate even get a stay over the cabinet?
Speaker 1: I have no idea.
Speaker 2: So insulting for him to try to claim he's not
Speaker 2: anti vacs, For him to try to oh, well, my
Speaker 2: kids are vaccing. Yeah, and you said you wish that
Speaker 2: you had never done that, you would do anything to
Speaker 2: go back and change that, like for you to just
Speaker 2: brazen lya a lot, I mean, And there were moments
Speaker 2: up there where he'd be they'd ask him a question,
Speaker 2: did you say that the chemicals in the water are
Speaker 2: turning kids?
Speaker 5: Trendsaid, Oh no, I never I never said that.
Speaker 2: Oh really well, here's five clips of you saying that,
Speaker 2: did you compare the rollout of the COVID vaccine to
Speaker 2: Nazi death camps?
Speaker 5: Even though now.
Speaker 2: You're like, oh, operation warp speed was amazing and Trump
Speaker 2: is it was great, it was such a great accomplishment,
Speaker 2: blah blah blah. Oh no, I didn't say that, Oh
Speaker 2: really well. Here's the transcript of you literally saying that.
Speaker 2: So listen, if you have those views which are wrong
Speaker 2: and not based on anything right, you can doubt the
Speaker 2: you know, pharmaceutical studies, but at least there are studies.
Speaker 2: At least we have years of data to back up
Speaker 2: the efficacy of these vaccines and the number of lives
Speaker 2: that they have saved. At least we have that versus
Speaker 2: like what you made up in your head. Because it
Speaker 2: is just as foolish to knee jerk reject all of science,
Speaker 2: which is his posture. It is just as foolish to
Speaker 2: do that as to, you know, accept lockstock and barrel
Speaker 2: everything that a pharmaceutical.
Speaker 1: Company tells you true.
Speaker 2: So if you really want to get at the problem here,
Speaker 2: which I would love to do, you have to take
Speaker 2: the profit motive out of healthcare.
Speaker 5: That's what you really need to do.
Speaker 2: Is there any impetus in that direction with RFK Junior whatsoever?
Speaker 3: No?
Speaker 2: No, And so like I said, listen, for me, obviously
Speaker 2: we're not going to come to agreement here today. For me,
Speaker 2: the theoretical potential possible may be good that he could
Speaker 2: do in this position is vastly outweighed by the longtime
Speaker 2: track record and committed ideological belief which has been at
Speaker 2: the core of his adult work and life that he
Speaker 2: is against all vaccines and that he is a brazen
Speaker 2: liar who will say anything to anyone when it is
Speaker 2: convenient for him and his pursuit of power.
Speaker 3: I think RFK, look, I accepted, we're going to move
Speaker 3: on to abortion.
Speaker 1: I think he's a politician.
Speaker 3: I agree, And I think it's sad what happens to
Speaker 3: these figures whenever they actually.
Speaker 1: Have to get into power.
Speaker 3: So yeah, I agree. I wish you would have actually
Speaker 3: defended a lot of his views. I think if you
Speaker 3: have to take a real politic view of this, would
Speaker 3: you rather have somebody who quote unquot accepts mainstream science,
Speaker 3: big pharma and all that. Again, within the universe of
Speaker 3: options for MAGA, for Donald J.
Speaker 1: Trump.
Speaker 3: You know, would we rather have the billionaire CEO of
Speaker 3: Pfiser or somebody be HHS secretary or somebody who thinks
Speaker 3: that the Visor people have been lying to people for decades.
Speaker 3: I'm going to go with the latter, and I think
Speaker 3: that that's a core to the reason why RFK Junior
Speaker 3: has even become a popular Maga like figure risk of
Speaker 3: a lot of skepticism about the COVID vaccine, which opened
Speaker 3: up a lot of people's eyes now on abortion. I
Speaker 3: think this is where we can say, fairly for both
Speaker 3: a lot of the pro life and the pro choice crowd,
Speaker 3: arguably ten times more of a bigger flip flop that
Speaker 3: has happened. There are a lot of questions about RFK Jr.
Speaker 3: In the AHHS role. The reason why is that he'll
Speaker 3: have jurisdiction, specifically over myth of press Stone, which is
Speaker 3: the abortion drug of which there has been a change
Speaker 3: in Biden administration policy about prescriptions for it, and of
Speaker 3: which the pro life Coalition has been pushing Donald Trump
Speaker 3: to quote unquote study the safety of it and to
Speaker 3: look at the drug and possibly hold it up, which
Speaker 3: of course would dramatically reduce the number of abortions in
Speaker 3: the United States. So we have a lot of the
Speaker 3: questioning that back and forth on this issue, including some
Speaker 3: of the past statements that he's made.
Speaker 1: Let's take a lesson.
Speaker 8: I agree with President Trump that every abortion is a tragedy.
Speaker 8: I agree with them how we cannot be a moral
Speaker 8: nation if we have one point two million abortions the here.
Speaker 8: I agree with them that the states should control abortion.
Speaker 8: President Trump has told me that he wants to and
Speaker 8: late term abortions.
Speaker 13: With a life threatening bleeding from an incomplete miscarriage goes
Speaker 13: to the er and her doctor also determines that she
Speaker 13: needs an emergency abortion, but she's in a state where
Speaker 13: abortion is banned. You would agree, also as an attorney,
Speaker 13: that federal law protects her right to that emergency care.
Speaker 1: Correct.
Speaker 4: I don't know. I mean the answer to that is,
Speaker 4: I don't know if.
Speaker 13: This st well, let me ask you this as an attorney.
Speaker 13: Doesn't federal law preempt state law?
Speaker 8: The federal constitution does. Sometimes not every federal law preempt
Speaker 8: to state laws. It could be unconstitutional. Events are we
Speaker 8: need to understand the safety of every drug and if
Speaker 8: a person own and every other drug, and President Trump
Speaker 8: has made it clear to me that one of the
Speaker 8: things he is not taking a position yet if a
Speaker 8: prison a detailed position, but he's made it clear to
Speaker 8: me that he wants me to look at safety issues,
Speaker 8: and I'll ask nih FDA to do.
Speaker 4: That, thank you.
Speaker 8: So so, in other words, keeping it as is with
Speaker 8: Roe versus weight having been overturned and leaving it up
Speaker 8: to the states to determine if and when a woman
Speaker 8: can have an abortion.
Speaker 4: I wouldn't it to the stage I would.
Speaker 8: He would say completely, it's up to we should leave
Speaker 8: it to the woman.
Speaker 4: We shouldn't have government.
Speaker 14: Involved, even if it's full term.
Speaker 4: Even if it's full term.
Speaker 2: So we can all agree him being there. That was
Speaker 2: the the last clip there was showing what he used
Speaker 2: to say about abortion now.
Speaker 1: Versus things on our show Confirmation times. You know true, Yeah, look,
Speaker 1: I think it is.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 1: That is the biggest hit against him, always has been.
Speaker 3: That's why Mark Mike Lee, not Mike Pence, has been
Speaker 3: campaigning very hard against RFK Junior for being pro life.
Speaker 3: We had we've been talking sorry pro choice.
Speaker 4: Uh.
Speaker 3: James Langford, the person who was questioning for him there,
Speaker 3: that was really important.
Speaker 1: He's the chair of the National prayer breakfast here in Washington.
Speaker 3: He is probably the most pro life member of the Congress. Yeah,
Speaker 3: he's from Oklahoma. Makes sense in terms of the big
Speaker 3: evangelical population. But there are a lot of people who
Speaker 3: fall into the Langford category. It's still actually open question
Speaker 3: mark how some of them.
Speaker 5: Jony Ernst is another one who's very pro life.
Speaker 1: Well, we have a list.
Speaker 3: If we want a six, can we put a six please?
Speaker 3: I'll just read off some of the names. These are
Speaker 3: the Republicans who are currently question marks on RFK junior.
Speaker 1: We've got Mitch McConnell. We've got Bills that's right.
Speaker 3: You've got Bill Cassidy, who's a doctor who actually he
Speaker 3: questioned him a little bit there. Senator Chuck Grassley who
Speaker 3: also questioned RFK junior. Senator Jeremy Ernst. You have Senator
Speaker 3: Tom Tillis, who now has come out as a lean yes.
Speaker 3: And then of course you have Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski,
Speaker 3: who if I had a guess who are probably going
Speaker 3: to be nos.
Speaker 2: On I would think so, yeah, I think he'll probably
Speaker 2: lose those. And then what he can lose one more
Speaker 2: or he can't lose that's.
Speaker 3: Well, he can he can lose McConnell, Murkowski, Collins just
Speaker 3: like Pete hag Seth. Yeah, that's it, because if he
Speaker 3: loses those three then jade Vans can cast the tie
Speaker 3: breaking vote. But there are big there's still I'd give
Speaker 3: him like a sixty five percent chance of getting confirmed.
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure.
Speaker 3: I mean, look, the Magabase right now is behind RFK
Speaker 3: one hundred percent, and Trump is whipping for him.
Speaker 1: JD is whipping.
Speaker 3: For him, the online Maha army against a lot of
Speaker 3: like for these people, you should. I mean, the enthusiasm
Speaker 3: there was crazy yesterday. RFK has got it like a
Speaker 3: genuine constituency.
Speaker 1: We've been waiting. People have been waiting a long time
Speaker 1: for someone like him to actually be in power.
Speaker 3: So you would be surprised, I think, to see one
Speaker 3: of these Republicans turn, especially one who might be up
Speaker 3: for re election. But if anyone could get away with
Speaker 3: I mean, that's like, do we really believe Lindsay Graham
Speaker 3: is going to vote against RFK Junior. This guy's like
Speaker 3: a toad now, you know, in terms of his shucking
Speaker 3: up to Trump. You would really need these Murkowski and
Speaker 3: Collins people there, and McConnell who's never going to run
Speaker 3: again for anything. They're unique for a reason because they're
Speaker 3: really insulated from the political costs.
Speaker 1: Of all the rest of them.
Speaker 3: You really do need the GOP behind you to be
Speaker 3: able to win. So I think what I did take
Speaker 3: away is no Democrats going to vote for him.
Speaker 1: I don't think so.
Speaker 2: Letterman was a possibility, but afterwards he came out and
Speaker 2: was like, I don't know how anybody could vote for
Speaker 2: that dude.
Speaker 1: After that, he also voted against hag Seth.
Speaker 3: You know, he's interesting guy, talks a big game, goes
Speaker 3: to the Lake and Riley thing and all of that.
Speaker 3: Still votes against all of the Trump nominees. So it's like,
Speaker 3: who are you, dude, Like, what are we doing here?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Brain day senator from whom Jerusalem?
Speaker 2: Okay, one other thing I wanted to mention here, because
Speaker 2: you were talking about the political pressure. Nicole Shanahan, who
Speaker 2: was RFK Junior's running mate, who was a billionaire by
Speaker 2: dint of her marriages, she came out and said that
Speaker 2: she would use her billions to primary anyone on the
Speaker 2: Republican side who didn't vote for RFK Junior, and she
Speaker 2: specifically threatened I don't think that this really has any
Speaker 2: particular impact. But she threatened Raphael Warnock of Georgia and
Speaker 2: said like, oh, I gave you lots of money before,
Speaker 2: and that's the only reason you won, which I don't
Speaker 2: know if that's really I mean, I know she did
Speaker 2: give money to super pac that supported him previously. But
Speaker 2: in terms of the democratic context, a Nicole sh Shanahan
Speaker 2: backed primary challenge against a Democrat is not going to
Speaker 2: get very far. And in a general election there's going
Speaker 2: to be tons of money going up against him anyway.
Speaker 2: But in the Republican context, that could be a real threat,
Speaker 2: you know. And so this has become the norm of
Speaker 2: like individual Elon must did it before, threatening with regard
Speaker 2: to non means and with regard to the spending bill,
Speaker 2: like if you don't do what we want you to do,
Speaker 2: I'm going to fund a primary challenge against you. So
Speaker 2: these billionaires are also being used to enforce discipline within
Speaker 2: the you know, the Republican pro Trump coalition. So that's
Speaker 2: another piece of what's going on here. Just the last
Speaker 2: comment on the abortion piece, because they do think that
Speaker 2: is important, just so people know. In the wake of
Speaker 2: Roe versus Way being overturned, actually aren't the number sager
Speaker 2: that the number of abortions have actually gone up. Yes,
Speaker 2: and the reason primarily is because of MiFi pristone, which
Speaker 2: is you know, used very early in pregnancy for an abortion,
Speaker 2: and you know, even if you live in a state
Speaker 2: that's extremely restrictive, mostly allowed the ability to get that
Speaker 2: somehow through the mail. And so there was a court
Speaker 2: case that went all the way up to the Supreme
Speaker 2: Court if I'm not mistaken saying, oh, the FDA wrongly
Speaker 2: approved this and it's not really safe. And the court
Speaker 2: was like, we're not going to go and second guess
Speaker 2: the FDA, like that's their job is to evaluate the
Speaker 2: safety and advocacy.
Speaker 5: There's some forty.
Speaker 2: Around studies that indicate if a persone is in fact
Speaker 2: safe to use in this manner. But this has been
Speaker 2: a primary goal. It was in Project twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2: It's been a primary conservative goal to get control of
Speaker 2: the FDA so that they can say, oh, no, actually
Speaker 2: we don't think it's safe, and this would be this
Speaker 2: would have a massive massive impact on women's reproductive rights.
Speaker 3: Cue.
Speaker 1: Oh, it's the biggest question mark on abortion.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't think any and no one on either
Speaker 2: side of the debate would deny that. That's why they're
Speaker 2: so laser focused on it and why it's you know,
Speaker 2: was so noteworthy and important that RFK Junior in this
Speaker 2: hearing said I will look at the safety of that
Speaker 2: and I will follow Trump's lead on that, which is
Speaker 2: a you know, major goal of the pro life movement.
Speaker 2: So even though he has personally been pro choice, he's
Speaker 2: trying to reassure Republican senators that he will also set
Speaker 2: his sights on rolling back use of myth a pristone which,
Speaker 2: like I said, will have a tremendous, in my view,
Speaker 2: very negative impact.
Speaker 1: If that is impact, it will have a big impact
Speaker 1: no matter what.
Speaker 3: And that's why that was one of the big you know,
Speaker 3: kamalaw campaign points there correctly in my opinion, you know,
Speaker 3: in terms of what the power the federal government can be.
Speaker 1: Yeah, on this just very last thing one. I had
Speaker 1: to get this in here.
Speaker 3: Senator Michael Bennett, whenever he was railing against RFK Junior,
Speaker 3: was like, did you really say that lyme disease was
Speaker 3: genetically engineered in a lab? As if it was some
Speaker 3: sort of conspiracy theory. By the way, I thought everyone
Speaker 3: who knew everyone knew this, but can we please put
Speaker 3: my tweet up on the on the screen just so
Speaker 3: people can understand this lime disease is probably a lab leak,
Speaker 3: and I'm explaining it to people very clearly here if
Speaker 3: you're watching, and you can see this lime disease originated
Speaker 3: in Old Lime, Connecticut in the nineteen seventies, which just
Speaker 3: happens to be mere miles away from Plum Island, the
Speaker 3: US Army bioweapons lab that was studying insects spreading bioweapons
Speaker 3: specifically with ticks in the nineteen sixties. Just so everyone knows,
Speaker 3: a lot of people actually have been suffering from lime
Speaker 3: disease through research of the tragedy and really of how
Speaker 3: decimated they are find themselves across books like Lab two,
Speaker 3: five seven and others. But it really is sad because
Speaker 3: what's happened is that in the Cold War we had
Speaker 3: these literal Nazi scientists and others who were brought under
Speaker 3: from an Operation paper Clip to study bioweapons that we
Speaker 3: could inflict on the Soviet Union, specifically via insects, to
Speaker 3: decimate them, not kill them, but just cause chaos through
Speaker 3: this bacteria. This lime bacteria is exceptionally rare. One of
Speaker 3: the dunks on the lab leak theory is like, oh,
Speaker 3: they found it in oatse the ice man, It's like, yes,
Speaker 3: it's traditional gain of function. You take a rare bacteria,
Speaker 3: you bring it to a lab, you try to weaponize it,
Speaker 3: you try to increase the infection, the infection, the vector
Speaker 3: the way that it will cause disease. And you know,
Speaker 3: there are millions of people now in America, specifically in
Speaker 3: New England who suffer from lime disease. There are multiple
Speaker 3: offshoots and others. It causes devastating consocles. Actually, no, somebody
Speaker 3: wh's suffered lime disease for years. It's really never been
Speaker 3: the same since then. So yeah, it's really unfortunate. Lime
Speaker 3: disease is.
Speaker 1: Probably a lab leak.
Speaker 3: Ebola twenty fourteen was a lab leak, as we covered
Speaker 3: here on the show with Ryan Grim, COVID was a
Speaker 3: lab leak. So we need to figure this stuff out
Speaker 3: and tying it to RFK Junior, that's one thing.
Speaker 1: At least I hope that we cut.
Speaker 3: Let's cut all those We need to cut that NIH
Speaker 3: gain of function budget to zero, and we need to
Speaker 3: do some actual transparency on all this crap that we've
Speaker 3: been funding and hopefully shut a lot of these labs
Speaker 3: down who clearly don't have safety protocols or anything.
Speaker 1: So it's really.
Speaker 3: Sad because a lot of line people reached out to
Speaker 3: me and saying thank you, you know, for highlighting this
Speaker 3: because you know, so we've been suffering now for so
Speaker 3: long and there's still you know, the insurance companies fight
Speaker 3: them on lime disease. The doctors don't believe a lot
Speaker 3: of the people who suffer of lime disease is one
Speaker 3: of the most devastating conditions that's out there.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's very strange symptoms.
Speaker 1: That's what I mean. And so then they just don't
Speaker 1: want to do anything for it. You're on your own.
Speaker 2: Soccer did get community noted on this, but I oh,
Speaker 2: they took it off.
Speaker 5: I was going to say, I looked at it.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's not conclusively proven, but it's not a
Speaker 2: pretty big coincidence, that's right there. So I'll get I'll
Speaker 2: give him that one. It's just like this drugs, the
Speaker 2: drugs turning the kids trans not going to.
Speaker 5: Give you that one.
Speaker 2: Micals h ig oh, I'm sorry. Yeah, chemicals to what.
Speaker 1: You think bird control, chemicals in our water, that zero effect.
Speaker 2: The uh effect, HIV not causing AIDS, not going to
Speaker 2: give him that one either.
Speaker 5: So yeah, there was a lot there going on with.
Speaker 1: Look, there's a lot of shit in our water. Nobody
Speaker 1: even knows what the hell it is.
Speaker 3: Reverse osmost as folks, if you can afford it, you
Speaker 3: should do it.
Speaker 1: I highly recommend.
Speaker 3: All right, let's get to Tulsa Gabbard at the same time,
Speaker 3: speaking of confirmation. We've got a lot of news concerning
Speaker 3: Tulsi Gabbert, who is up today for her confirmation hearing,
Speaker 3: and we're getting a taste of what some of the
Speaker 3: Republican attack against her will be. Let's go ahead and
Speaker 3: put this up there on the screen. Quote at Gabbard's
Speaker 3: confirmation hearing, Edward Snowden may loom large. So a lot
Speaker 3: of very pro national security state Republicans have been very
Speaker 3: upset with quote Tulsi Gabbert's past support for Edward Snowden.
Speaker 3: While in Congress, Gabert introduced legislation that would have offered
Speaker 3: a bipartisan whistleblower protections for people like Snowden accused of
Speaker 3: violating the Espionage Act. She actually co sponsored that legislation
Speaker 3: with Matt Gates that called on the charges against Snowden
Speaker 3: to be dropped. Now, since she will be the DNI,
Speaker 3: there are a lot of questions whether she is, according
Speaker 3: to them, is somebody who would compromise national security. So,
Speaker 3: for example, just a taste, Susan Collins said, missus Snowden's
Speaker 3: disclosures have jeopardized all the people who are helping us.
Speaker 3: They say, one of my greatest concerns is how she
Speaker 3: views Edward Snowden in the light of the resolution that
Speaker 3: she co authored with Matt Gates calling all criminal charges
Speaker 3: against him, which were serious and involved high classification, to
Speaker 3: be dropped.
Speaker 1: So that is the taste.
Speaker 3: But Susan Collins is just one of many people who
Speaker 3: share these views. For example, Senator Tom Cotton, who is
Speaker 3: the chairman of the Intelligence Committee, has called Snowden a trader.
Speaker 3: You continue on down the line, you've got people like
Speaker 3: Mitch McConnell. You've got James Langford who said that he
Speaker 3: was quote spoken with Gabbard about Snowden, and he said
Speaker 3: that their office of the Director of National Intelligence has
Speaker 3: a responsibility to make sure that we don't have our
Speaker 3: secrets leaked out. So this is in addition, this Snowden
Speaker 3: thing to the section seven h two about face that
Speaker 3: she has already made right on Faiza and on spying.
Speaker 1: So I think he said it. They always attack you for.
Speaker 4: The worst thing.
Speaker 2: It's like the only good reasons to put Tulsie in here,
Speaker 2: and she's there like forcing her to change. I mean
Speaker 2: and listen, she has her own will. She's making her
Speaker 2: own decisions here as well. But yeah, that report for
Speaker 2: the New York Times says that she's expected to distance
Speaker 2: herself and say that she believes mister Snowden's disclosures hurt
Speaker 2: the intelligence community and national security. We have always said
Speaker 2: in Glenn Green would always makes this point.
Speaker 5: If what Snowden revealed.
Speaker 2: Had truly hurt national security or compromised our soldiers are
Speaker 2: intel assets in the field, we would all know about it.
Speaker 2: They would have screened that to the high habits a
Speaker 2: million times. They've never provided any evidence of that, something
Speaker 2: that Tulsi Gabbard knows and has no doubt said and
Speaker 2: pointed out herself. But now, in an attempt to, you know,
Speaker 2: appease the Hawks on the Republican side, She's going to
Speaker 2: do this about face and be like, oh, Snowden so bad. Actually,
Speaker 2: I'm seven oh two that we got that all cleaned up,
Speaker 2: no worries whatsoever. So that's where we are with her.
Speaker 2: And there was one Senate aid who told the Washington Post,
Speaker 2: they're not even sure she makes it down a committee.
Speaker 2: So I don't know if that's I don't know if
Speaker 2: that's true. I don't know if that's what's going to happen.
Speaker 2: But I do think that her confirmation, her confirmation is
Speaker 2: certainly the most imperiled and the most in danger of failing,
Speaker 2: because you will definitely have no Democrats vote for her whatsoever.
Speaker 2: Fetterman certainly wouldn't be you know, he's the one who
Speaker 2: would be most likely to cross over, and he's like belligitor,
Speaker 2: insane hawks, so he's not going to be down with
Speaker 2: her either.
Speaker 3: Well, i've got the list in front of you. You've
Speaker 3: got Tom Cotton, so that's probably a no. Maybe, I
Speaker 3: don't know, you know.
Speaker 5: Cotton said something that was kind of open to her.
Speaker 5: He was like, oh, well, we have.
Speaker 2: Our disagreements, but you know, I don't know. He said
Speaker 2: something that was like a little bit conciliatory towards her.
Speaker 1: So, oh no, he said, I support her. Okay. Last
Speaker 1: night he was on Fox support her lead. I look
Speaker 1: forward to working with her. Okay, So that's good. She
Speaker 1: got the chairman.
Speaker 3: You've got James Reisch from Idaho. That's he can be
Speaker 3: a weirdo. Susan Collins that she's already probably no John Cornyn,
Speaker 3: total national security state hawk.
Speaker 1: Jerry Moran. I don't know much about him.
Speaker 3: Langford, he's the guy who already got her to flip
Speaker 3: on seven zero two. So he'll probably vote for Mike
Speaker 3: Rounds the same thing.
Speaker 1: He's wild card.
Speaker 3: Todd Young also a wild card, and Ted but Ted
Speaker 3: Buddle probably vote well.
Speaker 5: And this is a voter out of committee.
Speaker 2: You're looking at a committee, and so if every Democrat
Speaker 2: votes against her, they only would need what one more Republicans. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but I joined the Democratic vote on a committee.
Speaker 3: Can you still get a committee a floor vote with
Speaker 3: an unfavorable report out of committee?
Speaker 1: I think he can.
Speaker 5: I'm not sure I thought they had.
Speaker 2: I thought they had to go through the committee first
Speaker 2: before you could bring them to the floor.
Speaker 1: Test by before the committee.
Speaker 3: I could be wrong, but it's like report, so sometimes
Speaker 3: like a piece of legislation will be unfavorably voted out
Speaker 3: of committee, but it'll still be brought. This is parliamentary
Speaker 3: nonsense that I have no idea about, so please keep
Speaker 3: that in mind. But yeah, that's where we are right
Speaker 3: now with Telsea Gabbert. If you want to taste again
Speaker 3: of the campaign against her, you've got the Wall Street
Speaker 3: Journal editorial board, the voice of Mitch McConnell. Let's put
Speaker 3: this up there on the screen, Telsea Gabbert, Edward Snowden
Speaker 3: is intelligence? Does the US really want a director of
Speaker 3: national intelligence who excuses mass leaking of secrets? So you
Speaker 3: can see there they mentioned specifically Senator Tom Cotton's past
Speaker 3: reservations about her, and they also talk about quote unquote
Speaker 3: the damage that Snowden had done as a result of
Speaker 3: the leaks. But it's parodying a lot of the national
Speaker 3: security state concerns against her. So I think you're going
Speaker 3: to get a real taste of what happened against RFK Junior.
Speaker 3: So with the Democrats, it's going to be all a
Speaker 3: sad all the time.
Speaker 1: It's all going to be like, why did you meet
Speaker 1: with Asad?
Speaker 3: You know all this twenty thirteen rehash about that.
Speaker 1: Apparently there's some story.
Speaker 5: Questions about her cults. It's been a maybe subject.
Speaker 3: Recently, it's been a lot of chatter and Washington about Hezbollah.
Speaker 1: I'm not really quite sure yet what it's about.
Speaker 3: They say a story is coming about some of her
Speaker 3: alleged connections to Hezbola. I believe it when I see it,
Speaker 3: I guess for what that is then snowed in for
Speaker 3: a Republicans see it exactly. That's why the story's being
Speaker 3: plunted seven oh two and snowed in. So those are
Speaker 3: the top four things. But yeah, I would say she's
Speaker 3: the only one who I'm given like a fifty percent shot.
Speaker 3: She's got the lowest chance in my opinion. That doesn't
Speaker 3: mean I still think she won't get confirmed. I think
Speaker 3: she probably will because Trump and Trump and JD have
Speaker 3: really made it, you know. I mean, look with RFK
Speaker 3: and with Tolsi and Hegseat, they have rammed these people
Speaker 3: through committee and they have made it like a real
Speaker 3: zero in against the folks. But you only need four
Speaker 3: and you've got three wild cars already, so you really.
Speaker 1: Only need one. One person to flip who is like
Speaker 1: a traditional person.
Speaker 5: McConnell, Murkowski, Collins would.
Speaker 1: Vote against her almost certainly, pretty sure.
Speaker 2: So then you can only lose one more and with
Speaker 2: the number of national security hawks that are on the
Speaker 2: Republican side, yeah, it's it's definitely perilous. I according to
Speaker 2: Chad GP two, Yes, you are correct. Regardless of the
Speaker 2: committee's vote, the nomination can proceed to the full Senate
Speaker 2: for consideration. The Senate Majority leader schedules the nomination for
Speaker 2: debate and a final confirmation vote.
Speaker 5: So traditionally it.
Speaker 2: Has to go from the committee and they have to
Speaker 2: you know, issue a positive referral, but it's not absolutely required.
Speaker 5: So that's where that stands.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there you go. Let's get to the Medicare Sectionaid. Sorry,
Speaker 1: I'm like a.
Speaker 5: Difference, not a secretary either.
Speaker 3: To be honest, the difference is honestly kind of difficult
Speaker 3: to understand sometimes, like Medicaid and in terms of the
Speaker 3: individual programs, not the senior care.
Speaker 2: They're like, yeah, but you're talking about the way the
Speaker 2: funding works themselves.
Speaker 3: Sometimes I'm like, well, because you know, there's provisions under
Speaker 3: Medicare that sometimes overlap with Medicaid, Like in terms of
Speaker 3: the there's like Medicare advantage, but then there's Medicaid plans
Speaker 3: for people who are born under Medicaid, but sometimes you
Speaker 3: can be covered by Medicare too.
Speaker 1: I was trying to it.
Speaker 3: It's actually like for me to wrap my head around it.
Speaker 3: I'm like, this is a behemoth thing.
Speaker 5: I feel confident if you were up for hh, that's y.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's with that homework, and you would be ready
Speaker 2: to know the difference quite clearly inside.
Speaker 3: I'm just saying as a layman, you know, just entering
Speaker 3: into this, I was like, oh, you know, it's.
Speaker 1: Actually kind of complicated. I had no idea.
Speaker 2: All right, let's get to the funding freeze or whatever
Speaker 2: the hell has been going on, which, by the way,
Speaker 2: continues to be a question. So Ryan and Emily did
Speaker 2: a great job covering this with Jeff Stein, who was
Speaker 2: all over the case when they issued this original memo,
Speaker 2: very broadly wording saying freeze all federal funding except for
Speaker 2: things that go directly to individuals, and they name specifically
Speaker 2: Social Security and Medicare, but not Medicaid. And as I
Speaker 2: said before, the wording was very broad. So they said
Speaker 2: freeze all federal funding effectively, so we can assess whether
Speaker 2: or not these different programs match, you know, meet the
Speaker 2: standards as laid out by Trump's various executive orders against
Speaker 2: green energy and DEI and whatever else he issued. So yesterday,
Speaker 2: after creating a whole disaster and the Medicaid payment portals
Speaker 2: being shut down, and you know, domestic violence shelters and
Speaker 2: addiction programs and meals on wheels and head starred and
Speaker 2: all these programs calling their senators and the representatives freaking
Speaker 2: out like what is going on, they decided to completely
Speaker 2: resend that memo. So let's put B one up on
Speaker 2: the screen. This is the memo rescinding the original memo. However,
Speaker 2: then the White House Press Secretary came out and said, well,
Speaker 2: the first memo is rescinded. However, the funding freeze still
Speaker 2: applies for the programs that are in you know, in
Speaker 2: contradiction of President Trump's executive orders. So continued confusion. Effectively,
Speaker 2: Jeff Stein summed it up. We can put this up
Speaker 2: on the screen as how this timeline all went down.
Speaker 2: This is B two, he says to I have this right?
Speaker 2: What am I missing? Sincere question from the White House
Speaker 2: on Monday? Omb memo will implement full federal pause on grants,
Speaker 2: including but not limited to, and that was the language
Speaker 2: from the original memo here, including but not limited to
Speaker 2: those that violate Trump executive orders on DEI, clean energy,
Speaker 2: trans related programs. Then, on Tuesday, White House issues Q
Speaker 2: and A, saying the pause only applies to dollars that
Speaker 2: violate Trump executive orders. The White House Press Secretary says
Speaker 2: it's a limited freeze that will not affect individuals benefits,
Speaker 2: but major disruptions at medicaid, housing assistants and elsewhere. Wednesday,
Speaker 2: the OMB Offices Management of Budget formally rescinds the Monday memo.
Speaker 2: White House Secretary says on Twitter that the freeze on
Speaker 2: spending that violates executive orders remains in effect. We can
Speaker 2: put up that statement from Caroline Leven She says, this
Speaker 2: is not a recision of the federal funding freeze. It
Speaker 2: is simply a recision of the OMB memo that's confusing.
Speaker 5: Confusing to me.
Speaker 2: At least why to and any confusion created by the
Speaker 2: court's injunction. The President's executive orders on federal funding remain
Speaker 2: in full force and effect and will be rigorously implemented.
Speaker 2: Put in B five guys, skip ahead to be five
Speaker 2: the judge what was just ruled? So this has already
Speaker 2: gone to two judges at this point the first one
Speaker 2: said this is not going in effect. We're putting an
Speaker 2: immediate freeze on this, you know, on the freeze going
Speaker 2: into effect. Another judge wighed in yesterday and said they
Speaker 2: will grant the restraining order, saying the withdrawal of the
Speaker 2: hugely ambiguous omb order is only distinction without a difference,
Speaker 2: based on comments by the president's press secretary. So it
Speaker 2: is still a bit of a jumble and very confusing
Speaker 2: and continues to be put on pause by you know,
Speaker 2: at this point multiple judges who have taken a look
Speaker 2: at this and sager, this is some major Trump twenty
Speaker 2: seven vibes.
Speaker 5: This is major Trump twenty seventeen.
Speaker 1: There's a portion of our audience which is shocking.
Speaker 3: It was actually either in high school or younger whenever
Speaker 3: Trump was first president. So if you all want to
Speaker 3: know what covering the first administration was like, this is
Speaker 3: what it was.
Speaker 1: It was like.
Speaker 3: Orders and then they were rescinded and people didn't know
Speaker 3: what was happening, and then there was chaos, and then
Speaker 3: there was a judge and now we're back to well,
Speaker 3: this is still in effect, except it's not.
Speaker 5: But it's also not an effect.
Speaker 3: Yeah, welcome to Donald Trump America. This is what it's
Speaker 3: always like. Hope you're all enjoyable, enjoying the next four
Speaker 3: year Producer Max.
Speaker 5: He was sixteen when all this was going on last time.
Speaker 1: So fair enough. I saw on the show was sixteen.
Speaker 11: Now.
Speaker 1: I mean, I've met people who were like twenty two
Speaker 1: who watch the show. So I'm like, hold on a second.
Speaker 3: I was like, so, how old are you when Trump
Speaker 3: was They're like, one of my often questions is so
Speaker 3: you were born after nine to eleven.
Speaker 1: That's always a crazy one.
Speaker 3: Yeah. And then it's like, do you remember anything about Obama?
Speaker 3: And they're like, no, not really, I wasn't really paying attention.
Speaker 3: So this is the Trump era. That's that's the thing
Speaker 3: that they most remember, which is kind of crazy.
Speaker 1: But the point is that this is a lot what
Speaker 1: it was like.
Speaker 3: This is also what I would say is what really
Speaker 3: caused him to become more unpopular the first time around.
Speaker 3: You look, I mean, governance is an art.
Speaker 1: It's difficult.
Speaker 3: It's one of those things where is maddening with bureaucracy,
Speaker 3: and it's one of the reasons why I always tell
Speaker 3: people we were going to cover buyouts, so maybe we
Speaker 3: can mention some of this in yere.
Speaker 1: But look for all the talk of run the government.
Speaker 3: Like a business, Like, what do we learn from this
Speaker 3: air traffic control thing?
Speaker 1: It's not a business. It's a life and death stakes sometimes.
Speaker 2: Like if you flash the workforce at Twitter and sometimes
Speaker 2: your DMS.
Speaker 1: Crashed, right, which happens to me all the time. Who
Speaker 1: gives a shit? Nobody died, No one cares. Right when
Speaker 1: the stock goes down.
Speaker 3: Let's say you have a company of stock goes down
Speaker 3: and employees lose their job. Tragic, not downplaying it. Not
Speaker 3: the same as a plane crash. H And this is
Speaker 3: what I always point to where the byzantine nature of
Speaker 3: the United States government and specifically of the welfare state
Speaker 3: is such where it is both maddening, ineffective, bureaucratic, stupid,
Speaker 3: bloated over, et cetera, and is one of the most
Speaker 3: beloved programs in the entire United States.
Speaker 1: So don't screw with it.
Speaker 3: Well, this is one of the main lessons that Obama
Speaker 3: learned in nine with Obamacare and all that is. I
Speaker 3: remember being some of those tea party protests. Those were
Speaker 3: some of my first acts of journalism and being like, hey.
Speaker 1: Why are you all out here?
Speaker 3: And They're like, hands off my Medicaid, hands off my Medicare.
Speaker 1: And we were like, well, you know, it doesn't but
Speaker 1: it didn't matter.
Speaker 3: Like the idea that you were even screwing with old
Speaker 3: people's healthcare, that is, you will send people into a rage.
Speaker 1: Same here, you don't screw with Medicaid.
Speaker 3: And watching the hearing had no clue how many babies
Speaker 3: are born in this country literally under Medica. Forty percent,
Speaker 3: that's nuts of all of the babies in the United
Speaker 3: States were being born under the Medicaid program. I'm not
Speaker 3: to mention the number of people of disability.
Speaker 1: Et cetera, who are affected by this.
Speaker 3: All of the hospitals and the doctors our hospital are
Speaker 3: our whole watch.
Speaker 1: Our RFKA debate.
Speaker 3: Our healthcare system is screwed up enough as it is,
Speaker 3: having to worry about, you know, reimbursement all of that
Speaker 3: while that's going on as a nightmare. So it was
Speaker 3: a one day thing, but it's a taste of if
Speaker 3: you screw this type of stuff up, you really only
Speaker 3: get one shot.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure it was a one day thing because
Speaker 2: at least according to Jeff Stein's reporting, there continue to
Speaker 2: be a lot of you know, local programs funded by
Speaker 2: a federal grant.
Speaker 1: Well, I'm talking about Medicaid.
Speaker 5: Oh, the Medicaid.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so all the Medicaid portals were shut down in
Speaker 2: all fifty states. Those are backup, but there continued to be,
Speaker 2: I mean, questions about what the state of affairs even
Speaker 2: is right now, what the White House actually wants people
Speaker 2: to be doing or not doing within all of these
Speaker 2: federal agencies. What the Press Secretary said in her very
Speaker 2: first briefing was like, oh, well, if you have a question,
Speaker 2: just like you know, Russ Vote's line is open. Who's
Speaker 2: not even confirmed at omb by the way, And I
Speaker 2: think part of the reason they decided to rescind this
Speaker 2: first memo was because he is up, I believe tomorrow
Speaker 2: his hearing start, and I'm sure this was throwing his
Speaker 2: potential confirmation in to a little bit of chaos as well,
Speaker 2: just because listen, it doesn't matter if you're a Republican
Speaker 2: or a Democrat. Like every single senator and representative was
Speaker 2: fielding calls from the head Start program, the Meals on
Speaker 2: Wheels program, the domestic violence program, like all the addiction
Speaker 2: recovery programs, all sorts of you know, veterans homelessness, all
Speaker 2: of these problems. Say, what the hell is going on? Like,
Speaker 2: are we going to get our funding or not? If not,
Speaker 2: we're gonna have to lay people off. We can't open
Speaker 2: our doors, the kids can't come to class, et cetera,
Speaker 2: et cetera. So truly, you know, both parties were quite
Speaker 2: concerned about what was going on here, regardless of what
Speaker 2: they were saying publicly. Now apparently, as best we know,
Speaker 2: the backstory here is that and again this is very
Speaker 2: trump twenty seventeen, the memo was written. Steven Miller sort
Speaker 2: of directed that this memo be written. Russ Vote writes
Speaker 2: the memo and puts it out but without going through
Speaker 2: any sort of like review process to recognize the fact
Speaker 2: that your language and here very clearly indicates all federal
Speaker 2: grant funding is frozen, not just like whatever trends or
Speaker 2: DEI or whatever stuff they're not happy about. By the way,
Speaker 2: the fifty million dollar Gazacondum thing was total incomplete bullshit
Speaker 2: and nonsense, just so you know, as an aside, but
Speaker 2: to your point, soography could now put before up on
Speaker 2: the screen because this kind of gets to what you're
Speaker 2: talking about. So if you ask, people should you cut spending.
Speaker 2: The federal government spend too much? Is it inefficient? They'll
Speaker 2: be like yes. But then when you're like, okay, well
Speaker 2: what should they cut? You know, should they spend more
Speaker 2: on Social security or less? They're like, definitely spend more.
Speaker 2: What about education? Definitely spend more. What about assistance to
Speaker 2: the poor. Definitely spend more. Medicare yes, Medicaid yes. Border
Speaker 2: security is where you get to fifty to fifty military,
Speaker 2: They're like, we're probably spending plenty there.
Speaker 5: We're good there in federal law enforcement. Same thing.
Speaker 2: But you know, by and large, if you go down
Speaker 2: the list of budget items, when it comes to these
Speaker 2: programs are very popular. So Republicans oftentimes run into this
Speaker 2: where you know, in theory, people are like, yes, the
Speaker 2: government's spending too much, but that when it actually comes
Speaker 2: down to these social safety net programs, they don't. They
Speaker 2: do not want to further strip our already threadbare safety
Speaker 2: net even further. And you know, typically defense, the defense
Speaker 2: budget only ever goes up, so that's not on the
Speaker 2: table politically, even though actually the American people would probably
Speaker 2: be most open to cuts. There One other thing I
Speaker 2: wanted to get to here is we can put b
Speaker 2: six up on the screen. So even though this was
Speaker 2: chaotic and continues to be chaotic and unclear and not
Speaker 2: done in an effective way, it's not like it was
Speaker 2: done haphazardly. The Huven and Post was able to actually
Speaker 2: get their hands on some internal documents that proved that
Speaker 2: this was This was a plan to provoke this constitutional challenge,
Speaker 2: to try to directly challenge the What's it called the
Speaker 2: Impoundment Control Act of nineteen seventy four, which says that effectively,
Speaker 2: you know, Congress has the power of the purse. If
Speaker 2: they pass funding, then the executive is obligated to spend it.
Speaker 2: This was a Postwatergate reform had that Nixon administration didn't
Speaker 2: want to spend money that was appropriated by Congress on
Speaker 2: something I can't remember exactly what, and so this was
Speaker 2: put into place to codify into law. No, if you
Speaker 2: if the Congress appropriates the money, we have the power
Speaker 2: of the purse, use an executive branch. Don't forget to
Speaker 2: say like, well, I don't like that program, so I'm
Speaker 2: not going to spend money on that particular thing. Except
Speaker 2: for rare instances, like if there's some new technological gain
Speaker 2: that creates efficiencies, then there might be a loophole there,
Speaker 2: but very very limited as part of Project twenty twenty
Speaker 2: five and something that Jeff Stein has been telling us
Speaker 2: about and we've been reporting on here, and it's also
Speaker 2: part of the plan with DOGE. They want to challenge
Speaker 2: that and basically be able to say that Congress's appropriations
Speaker 2: are just a basically suggestion, and then the executive branch
Speaker 2: gets to be like, we like that, we don't like that,
Speaker 2: and have I mean, this would be this would almost
Speaker 2: be rendering Congress completely irrelevant effectively and making it so
Speaker 2: that the executive branch really has near monarchical powers to
Speaker 2: do everything that they want. So that was revealed in
Speaker 2: terms of these internal documents, which many people have been
Speaker 2: speculating about, but sort of confirmed by having a post.
Speaker 2: Last thing I'll say, I don't get your reaction to
Speaker 2: the saga is Lever News had a good report about
Speaker 2: just looking at Okay, well, how might the Supreme Court
Speaker 2: rule on such a question. This is a very conservative
Speaker 2: Supreme Court number. These individuals were put on the bench
Speaker 2: by Donald Trump, so you know, there's certainly possibility that
Speaker 2: even though this has never been the understanding and it's
Speaker 2: pretty clear in the constitution power of the purse with Congress,
Speaker 2: et cetera. There is certainly a possibility that they would
Speaker 2: side with the Trump White House on this. But let's
Speaker 2: put B seven up on the screen. This could end
Speaker 2: up being relevant. Apparently, John Roberts wide in back in
Speaker 2: a nineteen eighty five communicate weight in.
Speaker 5: On a question.
Speaker 2: This is classic David sort to be able to find this.
Speaker 2: By the way, weide in on this very question with
Speaker 2: regard to whether the executive branch can just you know,
Speaker 2: say no, we don't want to do that. Sorry, Congress,
Speaker 2: we're not following the law that you passed. He said
Speaker 2: that no area seems more clearly the province of Congress
Speaker 2: than the power of the purse and discouraged going in
Speaker 2: the direction of questioning that whatsoever, so that could potentially
Speaker 2: become relevant. I think it's almost certainly that the almost
Speaker 2: certain that this will end up at some point of
Speaker 2: the Supreme Court.
Speaker 3: Not only that Justice Gorsich is a much more libertarian,
Speaker 3: much more skeptical of executive power, and just Barrett.
Speaker 1: Also very much in that camp. So there's big ideological divides.
Speaker 1: I'd be curious to see.
Speaker 3: Okay, Katan is usually more of a big power guy
Speaker 3: like executive branch. They've definitely got Thomas Rdy, Thomas Alito,
Speaker 3: Kavanaugh likely to go on the side of the Trump administration.
Speaker 3: But yeah, you could conceivably see a six ' three
Speaker 3: on something like this. Yeah, I'd be curious to see
Speaker 3: how it breaks down. I asked around and they told
Speaker 3: me the same thing. They're like Kavanaugh or they said, Gorsich, Cony,
Speaker 3: Barrett are both big question marks. A lot of it,
Speaker 3: remember comes back to implementation as well. This chaos does
Speaker 3: not help your case, because that's something that they've written
Speaker 3: about often in Supreme Court opinions, is that.
Speaker 1: You have to follow the letter of the law and
Speaker 1: the process.
Speaker 3: That's what specifically came back to screw them on the
Speaker 3: census back in twenty eighteen when Justice Roberts ruled against
Speaker 3: the Trump administration. So he's got a long history of
Speaker 3: not buying some of this stuff, you know, going all
Speaker 3: the way back to Obamacare and others like novel conservative
Speaker 3: legal theories. So they really could have issues before the
Speaker 3: Court with this one. It's all about testing the limits
Speaker 3: of power. This was very basically laid out by a
Speaker 3: lot of people incoming in the Trump administration. They want
Speaker 3: to be able to do as much as they possibly can,
Speaker 3: and they're trying to get it done early to figure
Speaker 3: out what they actually can do going forward.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, no, that's right.
Speaker 2: And I will say, like Democrats have been utterly pathetic
Speaker 2: and responding to this time and are generally utterly pathetic
Speaker 2: and disappointing, et cetera. But it is also true that
Speaker 2: it is easier to like dismantle, cut and destroy than
Speaker 2: it is to like build new programs.
Speaker 5: So you know, I mean.
Speaker 2: That's what they're they're with this with the buyouts that
Speaker 2: we mentioned, which aren't really buying whatever.
Speaker 5: Put that semantic difference aside.
Speaker 2: But you know, they're trying to cut some ten percent
Speaker 2: kind of randomly broad swath of the federal government. All
Speaker 2: of those you know, all of those attempts to they
Speaker 2: want to they've talked about they want to demoralize the
Speaker 2: entire federal workforce. They want to use these sorts of
Speaker 2: truly unprocessed and extraordinary powers to just you know, take
Speaker 2: a hatchet to all sorts of things within the federal government. So, yeah,
Speaker 2: the wrecking ball has arrived, and they're doing everything that
Speaker 2: they possibly can with it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that makes sense, all right, we will let's get
Speaker 3: to Jeremy Corbell standing by UFOs joining us now is
Speaker 3: my friend Jeremy Corbel to react to some of the
Speaker 3: news around the New Jersey drones.
Speaker 1: It's great to see you, sir. Thank you for joining us.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, Jeremy, we want your reaction here to the White
Speaker 3: House coming out with a statement on the New Jersey
Speaker 3: drone phenomenon.
Speaker 1: Let's take a listen and we're going to get your reaction.
Speaker 15: And before I turned to questions, I do have news
Speaker 15: directly from the President of the United States that was
Speaker 15: just shared with me in the Oval Office from President
Speaker 15: Trump directly an update on the New Jersey drones. After
Speaker 15: research and study, the drones that were flying over New
Speaker 15: Jersey and large numbers were authorized to be flown by
Speaker 15: the FAA for research and various other reasons. Many of
Speaker 15: these drones were also hobbyists, recreational and private individuals that
Speaker 15: enjoy flying jones. In meantime, in time, it got worse
Speaker 15: due to curiosity. This was not the enemy.
Speaker 3: A lot going on there, Jeremy. So, in your expert opinion,
Speaker 3: what do you make of this?
Speaker 14: Yeah, I mean the explanation is fundamentally nonsensical. I think
Speaker 14: we all had high hopes for a new era of transparency.
Speaker 14: Look for me on the UAP topic, but also just
Speaker 14: on a bunch of topics, we're not seeing it in
Speaker 14: that statement. Let me just give you a little breakdown here.
Speaker 14: The FAA would not approve research flights without communication with
Speaker 14: facility heads, and same with military bases. You know, did
Speaker 14: the fa authorize the ones that buzzed Langley seventeen nights
Speaker 14: in a row. Did they authorize the untrackable drones that
Speaker 14: infiltrated three US and UK air bases and that was
Speaker 14: going on for weeks? You know, did they did the
Speaker 14: FAA authorized flight restrictions if they if they had originally
Speaker 14: authorized these drones, It's absolutely non sensical. And I'll tell you,
Speaker 14: I get reports from people that are actually guarding these
Speaker 14: critical infrastructure sites what they're seeing through their flear and
Speaker 14: through their thermal It's not just traditional drones. And so
Speaker 14: this is an issue of transparency. We had high hopes.
Speaker 14: We're not getting it. Remember, these drones were not affected
Speaker 14: by anti drone technologists, so these just weren't approved tasks.
Speaker 14: It's just a blatant flat out line.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean research and various other reasons. Like listen,
Speaker 2: I'm a skeptic personally, so I would be open to
Speaker 2: an explanation that's like research and here's exactly what's going on,
Speaker 2: and here's why it's confusing to people, and here's why
Speaker 2: the drone detection technology didn't work and why the flight
Speaker 2: space wasn't authorized, blah blah blah. But I don't think
Speaker 2: anyone skeptic, not skeptic, whatever your thoughts are about the
Speaker 2: situation is going to be satisfied with research and various
Speaker 2: other reasons.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 14: And look, this is not necessarily something that we have
Speaker 14: to be, you know, skeptical about where they come from.
Speaker 14: This is just a matter of fact that we have
Speaker 14: unidentified craft that are loitering over sensitive military and nuclear
Speaker 14: installations and also power stations. So this is something that
Speaker 14: we should address face on and we should be honest
Speaker 14: about it. Just the answer that they came up with
Speaker 14: is absolutely nonsensical, and that's the problem, right, especially when
Speaker 14: you consider all of the authorities involved the military bases.
Speaker 1: And that's what I want to talk to you about here, Jeremy.
Speaker 3: Can you put this answer in the context of all
Speaker 3: of these other UAP incidents that we have seen over
Speaker 3: military bases. And then the subsequent explanation somewhat month and
Speaker 3: a half later, that vague you know, Oh it was research,
Speaker 3: it was authorized. Does this fit with a pattern from
Speaker 3: the US government.
Speaker 11: Yeah, it does.
Speaker 14: And this is something back in twenty nineteen when we
Speaker 14: had ten navy warships over one hundred mile radius swarmed
Speaker 14: by over one hundred unidentified And that's where George app
Speaker 14: and I provided so many different types of footage showing
Speaker 14: that this is an issue everybody on the ships we've
Speaker 14: spoken with that we've brought forward. This is something where
Speaker 14: you have these incursions and this has been going on
Speaker 14: for a long time. You know your history, you guys,
Speaker 14: you know the shutdown of nuclear based shutdowns of airports.
Speaker 14: We're not getting truthful answers, and that's what we were
Speaker 14: all hoping for. Again, this answer is just so nonsensical,
Speaker 14: it's almost comical if it wasn't a serious issue.
Speaker 2: You know, right, what are some of the ongoing transparency
Speaker 2: issues that you're hoping are going to be resolved ultimately
Speaker 2: under this administration?
Speaker 14: Jeremy Well, you know that I'm obsessed with the UFO
Speaker 14: and UAP issues. So I'd like that to be resolved,
Speaker 14: and we tried to do that in Congress a number
Speaker 14: of times. You know, I think the American public deserves,
Speaker 14: or not even deserves, it is our right to have
Speaker 14: transparency within government, and we're just seeing I hope we're not,
Speaker 14: but it appears we're just seeing the kind of same
Speaker 14: status quo as things unfold. Lot of promises are made.
Speaker 14: Remember back in the day, the Clintons tried to get
Speaker 14: this information out, John Podesta, try to get this information out,
Speaker 14: ground truth on what uap UFOs are, what they represent
Speaker 14: to humanity. And it's just we're not seeing that right now.
Speaker 14: That's a fact.
Speaker 1: Jeremy. Could you also give us your reaction.
Speaker 3: This must some more whistleblowers and others that have come out,
Speaker 3: you know, government psionics and others. I'm just curious for
Speaker 3: your take on the matter and how that fits in
Speaker 3: the broader scheme of whistleblowers coming forward trying to give
Speaker 3: information to Congress and to the government. And then at
Speaker 3: the very same time, we have the White House here
Speaker 3: with a traditional obviously BS explanation about the New Jersey drones.
Speaker 14: Right, and so that's what we're seeing. What we're seeing
Speaker 14: is we're not going to get the answers through the
Speaker 14: traditional means we were hoping. Unfortunately, you know, through through
Speaker 14: the Senate, through the House, just through through the White
Speaker 14: House in general. We're not going to get those answers.
Speaker 14: So how are we It's going to be on journalism,
Speaker 14: and that's okay. That's what we're all doing is trying
Speaker 14: to get to the bottom and core truth on all
Speaker 14: of this. So I'm very hopeful for journalism right now.
Speaker 14: A lot of people are throwing down or a lot
Speaker 14: of people are getting involved with this issue. So we
Speaker 14: have to do good journalism no matter what the White
Speaker 14: House does.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, So we'll end it there. Jeremy, thank you so much.
Speaker 3: And listen, Jeremy me us. We tried to warn you
Speaker 3: we could do it the easy way, but catastrophic is
Speaker 3: the way that you guys want to.
Speaker 1: Go, So be it right. I mean, we try to
Speaker 1: see that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we've tried to give them the option of coming
Speaker 3: forward of disclosure. They are leaving it to the whistleblowers
Speaker 3: and the eyewitnesses and other staff to come forward and
Speaker 3: to force the hand. If that's the way they want
Speaker 3: to play it, fine, we can continue to fight if
Speaker 3: we need to.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much, sir, We appreciate you.
Speaker 4: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Very fortunate to be joined this morning by Peter Binart.
Speaker 2: He is editor at large of Jewish Currents. He is
Speaker 2: author of buyne Art notebook on Substack, and also author
Speaker 2: of a brand new book that we can put up
Speaker 2: on the screen, being Jewish after the Destruction of Gaza
Speaker 2: a reckoning. Great to see you, Peter, Thanks a lot. Yeah,
Speaker 2: So my typical first question is what prompted the writing
Speaker 2: of the book, But I think that much is pretty obvious.
Speaker 2: But maybe you could start off by talking a little
Speaker 2: bit about what this period has been like, the post
Speaker 2: Ox October seventh period has been like, specifically for you
Speaker 2: and for your relationship with the Jewish community.
Speaker 16: So one of the central metaphors in Jewish tradition is
Speaker 16: of a family, kind of imagined extended family. Weaving used
Speaker 16: the term, you know, bene Israel, the children of Israel
Speaker 16: to describe all of us, even though Israel is the
Speaker 16: name that was given to Jacob after he wrestles with
Speaker 16: the angel in the Book of Genesis, and.
Speaker 11: So there's something there.
Speaker 16: And it's also a family that has imagined family that
Speaker 16: has been through a lot of trauma and then experienced
Speaker 16: another tremendous level of trauma on October seventh, which was really, say,
Speaker 16: for many of us, one of the worst days of
Speaker 16: our lives. It's very in those moments. What families want
Speaker 16: is solidarity and support. But the tragedy to me is
Speaker 16: that the way in which the organized American Jewish communities,
Speaker 16: rarely government asked for that solidarity is unconditional support for
Speaker 16: the brutal oppression of Palestinians and now the destruction of Gaza.
Speaker 16: So for me, I think the emotions that led me
Speaker 16: to write this book were this struggle to show that
Speaker 16: I do feel a sense of solidarity and love for
Speaker 16: people and a tradition that is at the center of
Speaker 16: my life, and yet something has gone profoundly wrong when
Speaker 16: we take that tradition and that sense of obligation to
Speaker 16: one another and it becomes an excuse for doing just
Speaker 16: the most horrifying things to another group of people.
Speaker 2: So you talk about how the Jewish community needs a
Speaker 2: new story. Talk a little bit about what the current
Speaker 2: story is and what are the problems with that current story,
Speaker 2: and what a new story that may better served not
Speaker 2: just the Jewish community about the world at large what
Speaker 2: that might look like.
Speaker 16: I think Jewish public discourse tends to be dominated by
Speaker 16: a narrative of Jews as kind of history's permanent virtuous victims.
Speaker 16: The truth is the Jewish sacred texts actually tell a
Speaker 16: much more complicated story than that, but that becomes the one.
Speaker 16: I think that is often in the kind of folk
Speaker 16: the folk kind of narrative that exists. And then so
Speaker 16: you hear this even in the description of October seventh.
Speaker 16: Right to be clear, October seventh was a horrifying act
Speaker 16: of violence, including against many many Israeli civilians, but it
Speaker 16: gets called a poe grown. So what happens then, is
Speaker 16: you are linking this to violence against Jews in the
Speaker 16: Russian Empire in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century.
Speaker 16: Is if basically the Jewish condition is the same, because
Speaker 16: they're always going to be these these vicious anti Semitis
Speaker 16: who are going to try to kill Jews wherever they are,
Speaker 16: right or that people say it's the worst killing of
Speaker 16: Jews since the Holocaust, Right, But the truth is the
Speaker 16: conditions that exist for Palestinians in particularly Palacines in Gaza
Speaker 16: are nothing like the conditions that exist in the Russian
Speaker 16: Empire in the early twentieth century or or during the
Speaker 16: Nazi period, because you can't understand European anti Semitism and
Speaker 16: violence against Jews without under staying Jews is a legally
Speaker 16: subordinated group of people. But in Israel Palestine it's the reverse.
Speaker 16: Jews have legal supremacy. It's Palestinians who are legally subordinates,
Speaker 16: who live without basic rights. And if you want to
Speaker 16: understand Palestinian violence and you want to make sure that
Speaker 16: it doesn't happen again, that everybody is safer, you have
Speaker 16: to face that reality of the oppression that Palestinians exists
Speaker 16: for palties, not to justify God forbid what happens on
Speaker 16: our pobrase seven, but to understand the conditions so you
Speaker 16: can ensure that doesn't happen again, which means responding to
Speaker 16: the desire of Palestinians to be free.
Speaker 2: You have a quote in here you say, treating a
Speaker 2: state as a God is a very frightening endeavor. It
Speaker 2: confers upon mortals a level of veneration that we do
Speaker 2: not deserve and will always abuse. Leibowitz called it the
Speaker 2: essence of fascism. How did support for the state of
Speaker 2: Israel not just you know, broadly the state of Israel existing,
Speaker 2: but even the specific policies effectuated by an extremely far
Speaker 2: right I would say fascist government under bebing at Yahoo.
Speaker 2: How did that get tied up so much with Judaism
Speaker 2: to the extent that, you know, the ADL and other groups.
Speaker 2: The definition that the US government is working with now
Speaker 2: will say that if you criticize this state, you are
Speaker 2: actually yourself anti Semitic.
Speaker 16: You know, I don't think I really understood. I don't
Speaker 16: think I know the answer to that question and Begause,
Speaker 16: But I think it's actually a global thing that's happening now.
Speaker 16: When I look at the way some white evangelical Christians
Speaker 16: in Trump's talk about the United States, it seems to
Speaker 16: be almost a parallel in which that in Trump's America,
Speaker 16: it's in Trump support. It seems to be if you
Speaker 16: don't have an American passport, if you don't have the
Speaker 16: right documentation, you are worthless. Your life is meaningless. The
Speaker 16: worship the state is all that matters, and whether you
Speaker 16: have citizens anything. I mean, I'm not an expert on Christianity,
Speaker 16: but my understanding is that Christianity has a message about
Speaker 16: the universal dignity of all human beings, irrespective of what
Speaker 16: passport you have right, And I think something parallel has
Speaker 16: happened in much of the organized American Jewish community in
Speaker 16: which Judaism's message of the universal dignity of all human beings.
Speaker 11: Because Todah does not start with a story of Jews.
Speaker 16: The first according to Jewish tradition, Adam eve Noah, the
Speaker 16: first characters in Torah are not Jews. They're universal human beings,
Speaker 16: and they are symbols of the infinite value of all
Speaker 16: human life. And yet what happens when we talk about
Speaker 16: Israel and Gaza is that the first thing that's demanded
Speaker 16: is that people accept Israel's right to exist. Jewish tradition
Speaker 16: does not think in terms of states having rights to exist.
Speaker 16: It thinks in terms of human beings having rights to exist.
Speaker 16: States are mere instruments for the protection of human life,
Speaker 16: and if they do a really terrible job of protecting
Speaker 16: the lives of the people under their control, they should
Speaker 16: be reimagined, recreated. And yet instead it's inverted. So the
Speaker 16: lives of the children of Gaza and the other people
Speaker 16: of Gaza are considered not to be precious, but the
Speaker 16: right of the existence of Israel as a Jewish state
Speaker 16: with a political certain political system is considered sac percent
Speaker 16: And to me, that's idology.
Speaker 2: It's funny you make that connection because I was thinking
Speaker 2: about that same connection too, in the context of the
Speaker 2: freak out over what the bishop had to say about
Speaker 2: mercy for migrants, mercy for LGBTQ people, and how there
Speaker 2: was such a vociferous reaction against that from the right.
Speaker 2: You know, obviously the President was upset, Jade Vance was
Speaker 2: tweeting about it, and you know, it was a subject
Speaker 2: of primetime programming on Fox News, et cetera. Even though listen,
Speaker 2: I'm also not a Christian, but I do have reading
Speaker 2: comprehensions and skills, and I have a basic understanding of Christianity,
Speaker 2: and I know that, you know, humanity for the foreigner
Speaker 2: is kind of a key theme throughout the whole thing,
Speaker 2: even the Old Testament, New Testament. Jesus like whoever you
Speaker 2: want to look at that was that is a key message.
Speaker 2: And I think Tim Alberta has done he's I think,
Speaker 2: probably done the best job writing about this connection. Yes,
Speaker 2: but I really it did actually help me to understand
Speaker 2: also the societal process that has gone on in on
Speaker 2: within the state of Israel. And I think, you know,
Speaker 2: more broadly with many exceptions, but more broadly within the
Speaker 2: stridently you know, Zionist Jewish community that has led to
Speaker 2: this place where the state itself is sacercanct and that
Speaker 2: that is put above even you know, the religious texts
Speaker 2: that are supposed to be so central. You know that
Speaker 2: that really did kind of hit home for me as well.
Speaker 4: Thanks.
Speaker 16: Thanks, Yeah, I mean it's interesting if you look at
Speaker 16: you know, if you look at Jewish religious thinkers in
Speaker 16: the early you know, in the early decades of Zionism,
Speaker 16: there's a great fear actually of nationalism, as of secular nationalism,
Speaker 16: that secular nationalism actually doesn't that the seculars will undermine
Speaker 16: and threaten the kind of ethical principles in Judaism.
Speaker 11: And I think that's exactly what's happened.
Speaker 16: That nationalism has become a religion, not just nationalism, but
Speaker 16: ethno nationalism has become a religion. And you know, and
Speaker 16: you see it among you see it in the United States,
Speaker 16: you see it among Jews, you see it in India
Speaker 16: right where where Hinduta kind of is kind of has
Speaker 16: become a version of Hinduism or replaced Hinduism, in which
Speaker 16: basically the rights of Muslims now are considered to be
Speaker 16: you know, you know something that don't doesn't need to
Speaker 16: be respected because this is a Hindu nation. It's a
Speaker 16: very dangerous thing that I think is happening globally.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's a really important point. I did
Speaker 2: want to ask you a little bit about some some
Speaker 2: current events and Elon Musk in particular, because it certainly
Speaker 2: it directly relates to your book. I mean, you know,
Speaker 2: this is a person who has shared and spread the
Speaker 2: quote unquote great replacement theory, which is brazenly anti Semitic.
Speaker 2: He had to go and like pay you know, do
Speaker 2: penance with the ADL and go on this trip.
Speaker 5: To Israel, et cetera.
Speaker 2: But routinely, you know, as algorithm on Twitter boost my
Speaker 2: feet is filled with a bunch of Nazis kind of
Speaker 2: constantly like amplifying their talking points, goes now and speaks
Speaker 2: to the far right German AfD party.
Speaker 5: Absolutely reaction.
Speaker 2: Era did what sure look to be, in my humble opinion,
Speaker 2: like a Nazi salute twice on Inauguration Day. And yet
Speaker 2: you know, the ADL, which is supposed to be the
Speaker 2: arbiter of what is and what is an anti Semitism,
Speaker 2: comes out and is like just an awkward jet we
Speaker 2: understand tensions are high, just an awkward gesture and not
Speaker 2: just them bb not Yahou himself comes out and says,
Speaker 2: Elon's a.
Speaker 5: Friend of the Jew.
Speaker 2: I mean, how do we explain this whitewashing of Nazism
Speaker 2: directly from the organs that are supposed to be repelled
Speaker 2: by such an ideology.
Speaker 16: Well, first of all, it's just sheer cowardice, which we're
Speaker 16: seeing where there's an orgy of cowardice happening across American institutions. Right,
Speaker 16: people are afraid of Elon Musk and they're afraid of
Speaker 16: Donald Trump. So that's just I think on one broader
Speaker 16: thing which is happening, which is the ADL is doing
Speaker 16: as well. But it's also because the struggle against a
Speaker 16: certain kind of bigotry, in this case anti Semitism, has
Speaker 16: been proundly corrupted by the equation of a struggle against
Speaker 16: bigotry with the defense of a state, and indeed with
Speaker 16: the defense of a state that itself is practicing state
Speaker 16: sponsored bigotry. Right, Israel's own leading human rights organizations say
Speaker 16: that Israel is practicing apartheid. So you can't be an
Speaker 16: anti bigotry organization if you define your mission as defending
Speaker 16: a state that's practicing bigotry, right, and so, you know,
Speaker 16: I sometimes imagine what would happen if the NAACP defined
Speaker 16: its struggle against anti black bigotry as also including the
Speaker 16: defense of Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Sudan, and a bunch of
Speaker 16: other African governments. Right, they would be lobbying accusations at
Speaker 16: progressives all the time who were criticizing these governments for
Speaker 16: their human rights abuses.
Speaker 10: Right.
Speaker 16: It would completely distort and undermine their effort against anti
Speaker 16: black racism. And this is really what's happened with the
Speaker 16: ADL and other American Jewish organizations since the nineteen seventies
Speaker 16: when they redefine themselves as Israel defense organizations.
Speaker 2: What do you make of some of the developments that
Speaker 2: we've seen here early in the Trump administry, even before
Speaker 2: he comes into office, they're able to secure what is
Speaker 2: at least a temporary cease fire deal in the Gaza strip.
Speaker 2: We see people who have just recently been able to
Speaker 2: return to their homes. At the same time, a lot
Speaker 2: of question marks about what is going to happen next.
Speaker 2: You see increasing mass violence in the West Bank, both
Speaker 2: by violent settlers but also very much backed by the IDF.
Speaker 2: You know, VVN at Yahoo has already seemed to promise
Speaker 2: that they're going to go back to the war and
Speaker 2: the atrocities as soon as this phase is complete. What
Speaker 2: do you sort of make of where we are, What
Speaker 2: are your hopes and fears for what happens next?
Speaker 16: I think that look, obviously it was a good thing
Speaker 16: that there was a cease fire, that some of those
Speaker 16: hostages are coming home, that Palestinians at least can get
Speaker 16: some aid in so they're not starving to death. But
Speaker 16: the trajectory overall looks incredibly bleek. If you had to
Speaker 16: ask me what I think is the most likely scenaire,
Speaker 16: you know, trajectory that we are headed on and it
Speaker 16: will take decades maybe to be head But this is
Speaker 16: unless we change US policy and Europe changes policy, and
Speaker 16: Israeli impunity ends. I think we are on a path
Speaker 16: towards the destruction of the Palestinian people. Not that every
Speaker 16: last Palestinian is going to die, but something analogous to
Speaker 16: what the United States did in the nineteenth century with
Speaker 16: Native Americans. Right, we didn't create a two state solution,
Speaker 16: you know, we didn't stop along when we stop at
Speaker 16: the Mississippi River and say you can have the land.
Speaker 11: Right.
Speaker 16: Basically, the US just continued and continued until Native Americans
Speaker 16: were destroyed as a political entity that could resist. And
Speaker 16: I think that what we are seeing is that things
Speaker 16: that we did not believe were possible in the twenty
Speaker 16: first century, we believed were relegated to an earlier era
Speaker 16: in human history, are very much possible. And I don't
Speaker 16: think they will stop with Palestinians, and I don't think
Speaker 16: they will stop with Gaza unless we can stop it
Speaker 16: through a mass political movement that can change the political.
Speaker 11: Dynamics in the United States.
Speaker 16: I think that's the only thing that's going to because
Speaker 16: Donald Trump is not going to stand in the way
Speaker 16: of this. In fact, he's going to He's going to
Speaker 16: applaud this. He said the people of Gaza should go
Speaker 16: to Jordan and Egypt. I mean that statement alone should
Speaker 16: have him sitting in the Hague before the International Criminal Corps.
Speaker 11: Is a call.
Speaker 16: It is a monstrous call for mass ethnic cleansing. The
Speaker 16: United States has, with our weapons, destroyed this piece of territory,
Speaker 16: destroyed most of the hospitals, the schools, the agriculture, the buildings,
Speaker 16: and now Donald Trump says, oh, it looks like it's
Speaker 16: really awful there.
Speaker 11: Not that we're going to rebuild it.
Speaker 16: Not that those people deserve freedom, not that they should
Speaker 16: be able to return to Israel, which is where their
Speaker 16: families are actually from, and we're expelled in nineteen forty eight,
Speaker 16: but that they should go and become stateless refugees in
Speaker 16: a foreign country unless we can change the politics through
Speaker 16: a mass movement.
Speaker 11: This is where things are headed.
Speaker 2: I fear, and I think that your right to point
Speaker 2: out that even if even if this was quote unquote
Speaker 2: only this treatment was only reserved for Palestinians, obviously that
Speaker 2: would be horror enough. But to me, the implication is
Speaker 2: much broader, because once a complete genocide and ethnic cleansing
Speaker 2: is on the table, with the backing of the world's
Speaker 2: superpower and our weapons and the parts of the United
Speaker 2: States saying hey, this is the solution I want going
Speaker 2: forward that doesn't just stay in that corner of the world,
Speaker 2: that opens up a Pandora's box.
Speaker 5: Of new horrifying.
Speaker 2: Possibilities that we really haven't fully I mean, not that
Speaker 2: the world has ever been perfect, not that the post
Speaker 2: World War two order has been not that the US
Speaker 2: has been benevolent, not that we haven't fallen down, but
Speaker 2: it truly opens up a new order of pure might
Speaker 2: makes right barbarism that has ramifications for the entire world.
Speaker 2: The United States of America included absolutely.
Speaker 11: You know what I think we forget.
Speaker 16: Actually we could be entering a real new age of
Speaker 16: ethnic cleansing. I mean, there was it was ethnic cleansing
Speaker 16: of Armenians that actually happened in the summer of October
Speaker 16: twenty three that people don't remember so much. But countries
Speaker 16: learn from each other. Governments learn from each other, right,
Speaker 16: and they see what's possible, they see what you can
Speaker 16: get away with. And so there are a lot of countries,
Speaker 16: country governments in the world. You think of Orandra Modi
Speaker 16: with Muslims in India, there are a lot of governments
Speaker 16: to say, we have disposable populations, We have populations that
Speaker 16: are that are a nuisance for us and our vision
Speaker 16: of the state that we want right and if we
Speaker 16: if Israel can do this to the Palestinians, and Israel
Speaker 16: is also exporting this technology all over the world. That's right, right,
Speaker 16: it's testing and exporting this dystopic technology of surveillance and death,
Speaker 16: and it will be used in it will be used
Speaker 16: all over the world in populations that their governments consider
Speaker 16: a nuisance.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, that's right. Palestine, you know, Gaza has truly
Speaker 2: been a sort of laboratory for AI driven death and destruction.
Speaker 2: The drop site and nine seventy two plus magazine both
Speaker 2: revealed Microsoft's biggest AI customer now in this open AI's partner,
Speaker 2: biggest AI customer now is the Israeli government post October seventh,
Speaker 2: and you know, our own government obviously pushing huge amount
Speaker 2: of dollars in their direction and celebrating this sort of development.
Speaker 2: And so it's not just obviously we already have nuclear webs,
Speaker 2: we already have the capability to destroy the world. But
Speaker 2: the level of barbarism that will be enabled by these
Speaker 2: AI tools also ups the stakes, just insane levels that
Speaker 2: we can barely comprehend.
Speaker 16: Absolutely, you know, And and in the in the you know,
Speaker 16: in the in the Torah idolatry is linked to barbarism
Speaker 16: again and again because it means idolatry is that you
Speaker 16: don't respect the dignity of the human being. And I,
Speaker 16: you know, you were referring to that to the woman
Speaker 16: I'm forgetting her name, who spoke out in you know,
Speaker 16: at the Episcopal Church, you know, for it to Donald
Speaker 16: in front of Donald Trump and J. D.
Speaker 11: Mann.
Speaker 16: And when I looked at her, I thought, where are
Speaker 16: our equivalents of that woman in the Jewish world? People
Speaker 16: who are willing to risk being publicly attacked, people who
Speaker 16: are willing to risk violence against peopleho are willing to
Speaker 16: risk their jobs. Abraham Joshuahshel, one of the greatest American
Speaker 16: Jewish figures of the twentieth century, said that during the
Speaker 16: Vietnam War, he could not pray, he could not open
Speaker 16: the prayer book because he saw images in his mind
Speaker 16: of children being napalm. Where are our rabbis that are
Speaker 16: speaking that way about the about the fact that Goza
Speaker 16: now has more child amputees than any place in human history.
Speaker 16: I feel like there's a huge moral absence there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, you're not a rabbi, but your voice has
Speaker 2: been really important, not just with this book, but you know,
Speaker 2: with your track record is speaking out and risking significant consequences,
Speaker 2: both in terms of your personal and professional life. So Peter,
Speaker 2: tell people where they can where they can get the book,
Speaker 2: and we can put the book back jacket back up
Speaker 2: on the screen too.
Speaker 11: Thank you. You can get it.
Speaker 16: You can just get it online that any of the
Speaker 16: online booksellers are hopefully your local bookstore. And I'm really
Speaker 16: really grateful to have the opportunity to talk about it
Speaker 16: with you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's absolutely our pleasure and it's always an honor
Speaker 2: to get to speak with you, Peter, Thank you so
Speaker 2: much for taking the.
Speaker 5: Time at all.
Speaker 2: Right, guys, thank you so much for watching jam pac day.
Speaker 2: We did not, in fact get to that promised blog
Speaker 2: about bioce because there's just too much to say about
Speaker 2: too many other topics. But thank you guys so much
Speaker 2: for sticking with us and trusting us in this very
Speaker 2: very busy and consequential news cycle. And we'll see you
Speaker 2: guys again next week.