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Speaker 1: Let's talk about TikTok. It is big. I mean, this
Speaker 1: is just too perfect. I mean, I'll say this. I
Speaker 1: was prepared for this.
Speaker 3: I knew it was going to happen. I've made my
Speaker 3: piece now long ago. Let's go ahead and put this
Speaker 3: up there on the screen. This is from Donald Trump
Speaker 3: two days ago before he took office. He says, I
Speaker 3: am asking companies not to let TikTok stay dark. Will
Speaker 3: issue in executive order on Monday, which has been issued
Speaker 3: by the Way to extend the period of time. It's
Speaker 3: approximately ninety days before the laws prohibition takes effect, so
Speaker 3: that we can make a deal to protect our national security.
Speaker 3: This order will also confirm there will be no liability
Speaker 3: for any company that helped keep TikTok from going dark.
Speaker 3: Before any order, Americans deserve to see our exciting inauguration
Speaker 3: on Monday.
Speaker 1: As well as other events and conversations.
Speaker 3: I would like the United States to have a fifty
Speaker 3: percent ownership position in a joint venture. By doing this,
Speaker 3: we save TikTok, keep it in good hands, and allow
Speaker 3: it to stay up without US approval, there is no Tiktalk.
Speaker 3: With our approval, it is worth hundreds of billions, maybe trillions. Therefore,
Speaker 3: my initial thought is a joint venture between the current
Speaker 3: owners and or new owners, whereby a US gets a
Speaker 3: fifty percent ownership and a joint venture set up between
Speaker 3: the US and whoever purchase we choose.
Speaker 2: So this tops like the new NPR is that well yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean, I don't think nobody really knows what is
Speaker 2: meant by this, including probably Donald Trump. But you know,
Speaker 2: if we're going to have state ownership of media, there
Speaker 2: are models that can be successful that provide editorial independence.
Speaker 4: You know, we could buy up TikTok. We could buy Twitter,
Speaker 4: we could buy Facebook.
Speaker 2: You know, have them run by an independent consortium, have
Speaker 2: independent funding sources, take the profit motive out of it.
Speaker 4: Saga. This is the type IDA I can get on
Speaker 4: board with. Yeah, something tells me that's not what he does.
Speaker 1: Possibly go wrong with all of it.
Speaker 3: Here's the thing about the whole TikTok thing. Basically Trump
Speaker 3: was pro banning TikTok. It's like bitcoin pro banning Bitcoin
Speaker 3: pro banning TikTok leaves for four years. Remember what I
Speaker 3: said about being gone for four years. Well, what happened
Speaker 3: in four years? TikTok became massively more popular. I think
Speaker 3: it doubled its users.
Speaker 1: Want.
Speaker 3: An ex engineer on the platform actually revealed one hundred
Speaker 3: and seventy million people log onto the app I think
Speaker 3: once a month, and I think or eight ninety or
Speaker 3: one hundred million are spending an average of fifty three minutes.
Speaker 1: Per day on TikTok.
Speaker 4: Is this just in America?
Speaker 1: In the United States?
Speaker 3: Yeah, in the US, that's one third of the US
Speaker 3: population and probably, god I'm terrible at math, maybe like
Speaker 3: forty fifty percent of the US adult population. Just for context,
Speaker 3: so you can see here what it means and how
Speaker 3: much time people are spending on TikTok.
Speaker 4: It's not to mention this anymore, No, it's everybody.
Speaker 1: I mean.
Speaker 3: I was on the Metro today and some guys scrolling
Speaker 3: TikTok right next to me, and I was like, I
Speaker 3: was like, oh, how'd you download that?
Speaker 2: You know?
Speaker 1: I was asking hibout. I was like, how does it work? Now?
Speaker 3: I was like, oh, He's like, oh yeah. Dude went
Speaker 3: off like he had no idea what I was. It
Speaker 3: was like, oh yeah, it went off and then it
Speaker 3: came back.
Speaker 1: I was so excited. It was interesting.
Speaker 3: So the TLDR of all of it is it's a mess.
Speaker 3: Because the law that banned TikTok was supposed to go
Speaker 3: into effect on January nineteen. That law would impose ruinous
Speaker 3: fines on Apple, Oracle and all other US providers of
Speaker 3: any services to TikTok. Now, the thing is is that
Speaker 3: for the Apple and all these other companies to believe
Speaker 3: this executive order is lawful, which I don't believe it's
Speaker 3: lawful at all, is to believe that they will not
Speaker 3: go through with the position of the fine. Now with
Speaker 3: Tom Cotton, who is the I think chairman or one
Speaker 3: of the high ranking members on the Intelligence Committee in
Speaker 3: the Senate has said is like, no, no executive order,
Speaker 3: delaying action is legal and will face scrutiny and could
Speaker 3: impose backfines on these companies. That's part of why I'm
Speaker 3: still not one hundred percent sure the way that it's
Speaker 3: working with the app store, with Oracle and all these
Speaker 3: other I know Oracles resume service in terms of its
Speaker 3: ability to scroll. I think it was working if you
Speaker 3: have the app pre installed, but I'm still not sure
Speaker 3: if it's on the App Store right now. It's the
Speaker 3: same with the play Store for Google for these people.
Speaker 3: If these companies are in complete legal limbo. And the
Speaker 3: real thing that actually kind of ties Trump's hands is
Speaker 3: you can do as many executive orders as you want,
Speaker 3: but this is an Act of Congress at the end
Speaker 3: of the day, and so the ability for trade organizations,
Speaker 3: even a Facebook, honestly anybody, to be able to file
Speaker 3: suit against them and actually have the court system impose
Speaker 3: this block is very possible. I think what's clear to
Speaker 3: me is that Trump all only cares about being popular,
Speaker 3: and he knows TikTok is massively popular, and that he
Speaker 3: himself is massively popular on TikTok, and so because of
Speaker 3: all of that, his sole goal is to try and
Speaker 3: save the program and or save the company, but also
Speaker 3: use some geopolitics in terms of his negotiations with China
Speaker 3: to get it done. So that's something that I've seen
Speaker 3: happen with him in the past. He's reportedly spoke with
Speaker 3: President She or Premier She in China.
Speaker 1: They talked about TikTok.
Speaker 3: I think he's going to be going to China probably
Speaker 3: in the next couple of months. That's apparently one of
Speaker 3: the first trips that he wants to make as president
Speaker 3: to discuss the issue. So he could pursue a forced
Speaker 3: sale and it could be like some sort of negotiation.
Speaker 3: It is just objectively crazy though, for the US government
Speaker 3: on fifty percent of TikTok, it's like and by the way,
Speaker 3: I mean, you know, would it be a victory for
Speaker 3: the pro palestin Indian side.
Speaker 1: We're like, well, we save TikTok, But.
Speaker 3: Now the government, the government, what do you go mitt Listen,
Speaker 3: Gaza people, what do you think is going to happen
Speaker 3: if the government owns fifty percent of that? You know,
Speaker 3: good luck with your BLM and trends and Gaza stuff
Speaker 3: under the Donald Trump administration or if Jade Vance wins
Speaker 3: the presidency next time, what's the first thing I would
Speaker 3: turn off? If you didn't want something in your culture
Speaker 3: to be happening, That's the immediate thing. So I don't
Speaker 3: think it would be the best solution, but you guys
Speaker 3: do what you want.
Speaker 1: If you're spending fifty three.
Speaker 2: Minutes, well, I mean we already have the model of that,
Speaker 2: which is Elon Musk's ownership of Footer. It would look
Speaker 2: very much like that, you know, where certain things are
Speaker 2: very much prioritized and certain things are very much d
Speaker 2: ranked and actively censored, including you know a lot of
Speaker 2: pro Palestinian phrases and content, et cetera. So yeah, I
Speaker 2: mean the whole thing is just what do you even
Speaker 2: say about it? Like from the looking at it from
Speaker 2: the democratic perspective, like, these people are total and complete, pathetic,
Speaker 2: embarrassing morons, morons like you couldn't predict that this would
Speaker 2: be wildly unpopular. So Trump is the person who really,
Speaker 2: you know, in his first term, towards the end of
Speaker 2: his first term, he starts pushing this issued some other
Speaker 2: executive order that it gets struck down, it doesn't happen,
Speaker 2: blah blah blah, but he starts pushing it. Democrats are
Speaker 2: such idiots that, you know, the police starts to move
Speaker 2: on this where there was some nominal majority theoretically in
Speaker 2: favor of a TikTok ban in.
Speaker 4: Oh, I guess we better get on board with this.
Speaker 4: I guess we better pass a law.
Speaker 2: So they pass it, Joe Biden signs it into law,
Speaker 2: and then here, you know, in the waning days of
Speaker 2: the Biden administration, they're freaking out like, oh my god,
Speaker 2: I can't believe we did this, Like we don't want
Speaker 2: this to happen, No, this shouldn't go away, blah blah blah.
Speaker 2: It's like, what is wrong with you? You couldn't predict
Speaker 2: the way this was going to play on. And also,
Speaker 2: by the way, do you have a single principle that
Speaker 2: you actually care about and are willing to stand by
Speaker 2: because polls can move around, you.
Speaker 4: Know, you could actually just have a value.
Speaker 2: You could actually just have a principle that you care about,
Speaker 2: and whether it's in favor of TikTok or against TikTok,
Speaker 2: you could just stand by that thing and argue for
Speaker 2: that thing. But no, no, they're just like blown around
Speaker 2: in the winds of wherever public opinion happens to be
Speaker 2: sickly led around by the nose by Republicans. I mean,
Speaker 2: Trump leads them into this thing, and then Trump leads
Speaker 2: them out of this thing, and they have no ability
Speaker 2: to set the messaging or the agenda themselves. It's so
Speaker 2: utterly pathetic that it is completely insane.
Speaker 1: That's you know. I also think it's a crisis of competence.
Speaker 3: So the law passed and the Biden administration basically didn't
Speaker 3: do anything about brokering for sale. I mean, if you
Speaker 3: were being real, because the way to save it and
Speaker 3: for the Democrats to get credit, they could have gotten
Speaker 3: credit from the national security hawks and from the voters
Speaker 3: for saving TikTok.
Speaker 1: You passed the bill.
Speaker 3: Biden should get to China, right, he didn't have anything
Speaker 3: else going on, right, He literally wasn't even running for president.
Speaker 3: He should have flown to China, sat down with Sihinping,
Speaker 3: brokeered some sort of deal or sale or whatever.
Speaker 1: They are multiple willing buyers here.
Speaker 3: We have a shit ton of leverage on China if
Speaker 3: we wanted to be and then they could have saved
Speaker 3: it in they could have had it, and instead they
Speaker 3: kind of just bumbled their way in to a de
Speaker 3: facto ban. I mean it was hilarious too where I mean,
Speaker 3: how long we've been covering this story. I actually I
Speaker 3: know in terms of my monologues from twenty nineteen. In
Speaker 3: recent months, we're like, hey, the deadline's on January nineteenth,
Speaker 3: looks like nothing's going to happen. And then you would
Speaker 3: see like Chuck Schumer the day before be like, well,
Speaker 3: we're going to try and delay it. It's like, dude,
Speaker 3: you're lawmaker, Like how did you not even know that
Speaker 3: this was happening? We're doing nothing behind the scenes. So
Speaker 3: I think there's a major competence of governance in terms
Speaker 3: of actually trying to execute the ban or even the
Speaker 3: forced sale. And also, yeah, it's like this weird, like
Speaker 3: what do you guys? What are you guys trying to
Speaker 3: do here? And that's kind of what I'm That's the
Speaker 3: thing I'm still confused about.
Speaker 1: Why did you guys all vote for this in the past.
Speaker 1: That's understand thing.
Speaker 2: And that's the thing, and it's such a core problem
Speaker 2: for the Democratic Party, which is that under neoliberalism, they
Speaker 2: outsourced any core values to basically market logic, right, And
Speaker 2: a corollary of that is this idea of popularism, which
Speaker 2: is just like, let's take a poll and see what
Speaker 2: thing pulls the best, and that's what will run on
Speaker 2: and that's where we'll be. And again, polls change people's opinions.
Speaker 4: Guess what.
Speaker 2: But Republicans really successfully change their opinions on immigration, as
Speaker 2: one example, because they were willing to have, you know,
Speaker 2: something that they cared about and make the case for
Speaker 2: it over and over again and saga. I know the
Speaker 2: reality also helped them make that case, but the point
Speaker 2: still stands. They were willing to have a fight, even
Speaker 2: on things that were unpopular and to move public opinion.
Speaker 2: If you have no values, nothing you're willing to fight for.
Speaker 2: Everything is finger in the wind, everything is market logic
Speaker 2: and testing it.
Speaker 4: Then like it's just this is.
Speaker 2: The sort of pathetic situation that you end up in
Speaker 2: and you never are going to be the primary mover.
Speaker 2: You're always just going to be chasing your tail or
Speaker 2: chasing Trump's tail or reacting to what the Republicans are
Speaker 2: throwing at you in the way that they're shaping the culture.
Speaker 2: And so that's why this story is so important outside.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's important on its own right because TikTok
Speaker 2: is such a massive platform and it is an influential
Speaker 2: part of the culture, etc. But it's also important because
Speaker 2: it is indicative of one of the core failures of
Speaker 2: the Democratic Party and failures of like really meeting the moment.
Speaker 2: And so you know, for example, Trump's will see how
Speaker 2: long Trump's like newfound relative popularity lasts where he was
Speaker 2: flirting with a majority approval ratings, something he has never
Speaker 2: had before. And I genuinely think a lot of that
Speaker 2: is just this sense of like, he makes decisions and
Speaker 2: he takes actions.
Speaker 4: And even if you know.
Speaker 2: Those are things that some of them I agree with
Speaker 2: or some of them I don't agree with. I'm talking
Speaker 2: about from like an average voter perspective, Like, at least
Speaker 2: he's taking action, he's making decisions, and he's doing things.
Speaker 2: The Democrats never can make a decision. They never know
Speaker 2: what they stand for. They never are willing to just
Speaker 2: say like, yeah, I'm I'm gonna make that thing happen.
Speaker 2: That thing is important, I'm going to.
Speaker 4: Make it happen.
Speaker 2: Right now, there's always got to be twelve committees or
Speaker 2: a parliamentarian that says I can't do it or whatever,
Speaker 2: and so, you know, I feel like all of that
Speaker 2: is sort of tangled up in this TikTok story and
Speaker 2: just illustrates their utter this and why they're now in
Speaker 2: minority and just lost the popular vote to freakin Donald J.
Speaker 4: Trump.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's I think that's all well said.
Speaker 3: I see it a lot, not only with a TikTok issue,
Speaker 3: but in terms of like what they're how they're dealing
Speaker 3: with Trump. I really think that they were just so
Speaker 3: unprepared for the collapse and lack of the resistance, and
Speaker 3: they just don't know what to do now for what
Speaker 3: it looks like, and all of the sensible things that
Speaker 3: they would want to do would be so detrimental to
Speaker 3: the Democratic Party establishment that they don't know how to
Speaker 3: deal with it, right.
Speaker 1: I mean, the good.
Speaker 3: Billionaire thing is the best example where they're like, Okay,
Speaker 3: so what are we doing here?
Speaker 1: You know, I don't know.
Speaker 4: People who don't get that reference.
Speaker 2: Ken Martin, who is the leading candidate for the DNC
Speaker 2: new DNC chair, get asked about like taking money from billionaires.
Speaker 2: He's like, well, of course we're going to take money
Speaker 2: from good billionaires, which is not the bad billionaires. And
Speaker 2: of course his definition of a good billionaire is someone who
Speaker 2: gives money in the Democratic Party. And it's like, you know,
Speaker 2: maybe just having our country or run by billionaires is bad,
Speaker 2: whether you think they're good or bad billionaires. Maybe that's
Speaker 2: just a bad thing that you should consistently stand against.
Speaker 2: But that would require having a principle and actually caring
Speaker 2: about Yeah, And it would, like, to your point, would
Speaker 2: be incredibly detrimental to the existing Democratic leadership, whose primary
Speaker 2: skill is sucking up to rich people and raising a.
Speaker 1: Lot of money.
Speaker 3: From what I have noticed most about many people who
Speaker 3: are new Republicans in the last four years, specifically new
Speaker 3: vibee based Trump supporters, Yeah, is if you ask them
Speaker 3: about hypocrisy whatever, they're going to be like, look, I
Speaker 3: don't even disagree with you, but and what are they
Speaker 3: gonna list I don't like George Soros, or I don't
Speaker 3: like you know, Mark Zuckerberg before his previous turn to
Speaker 3: the day. They're like, I've lived under oligarchic, democratic, liberal
Speaker 3: cultural elite rule now and I hate it, and so
Speaker 3: I'm just gonna go with the other option. And I
Speaker 3: don't even particularly like the other option that much. In
Speaker 3: a lot of ways, the flight ninety three election was
Speaker 3: twenty twenty five, it was not twenty and sixteen. Maybe
Speaker 3: we shoul debate that at some point with a lot
Speaker 3: of other people, But in terms of the way people felt,
Speaker 3: they genuinely felt as if there was no escape from
Speaker 3: the crisis of competence, of chaos, insanity, pressure, culture, whatever,
Speaker 3: all came together in terms of Trump because of who
Speaker 3: he is at a showman level, his ability to convey
Speaker 3: the message of I'm just gonna do what I want.
Speaker 3: I'm willing to hit the red button and I'm going
Speaker 3: to vote for Trump. And I've been grappling with like,
Speaker 3: how did this happen over the last four years? And
Speaker 3: it's interesting because I think what it comes back to
Speaker 3: is an indictment of liberal cultural elite rule and so
Speaker 3: much of it when you're faced with because we're about
Speaker 3: to talk about meme coin, this is why it's a
Speaker 3: good transition. Yeah, is really is really just comes down
Speaker 3: to they're like, okay, but Bill Gates, you know, blah
Speaker 3: blah blah, And there's just not enough people who have
Speaker 3: been involved at the high levels of democratic politics to
Speaker 3: call that out or establish any credibility on issue that
Speaker 3: they're like, screw you each shit, I'm not going to
Speaker 3: listen to somebody you know who took money from George
Speaker 3: or posing with Alex Soros and posing with Mark Zuckerberg
Speaker 3: and all these other people you know four years ago.
Speaker 1: I don't want to hear it from you, right, And.
Speaker 3: So then the issue becomes a non And that's exactly
Speaker 3: how bipartisan. What is it? The bigotry of low expectations.
Speaker 3: That's what's effectively now happening to American politics is that
Speaker 3: people have so little faith that the other side is
Speaker 3: going to do anything even remotely principled, that they say,
Speaker 3: screw it. I'm just going to pick the person who
Speaker 3: I think will get a little bit of what I
Speaker 3: want done.
Speaker 1: And I totally under I did that that.
Speaker 3: I don't like this position, But what a rational actor
Speaker 3: in a bad model?
Speaker 1: Now, how you fix that? I have no idea.
Speaker 3: Okay, you're talking to the wrong guy, But I do
Speaker 3: think that that feeling is so important for especially a
Speaker 3: lot of this New Bros. Fear in others is they
Speaker 3: just feel so beaten down by a lot of the
Speaker 3: democratic institutions and others that they just feel like as
Speaker 3: if they have no choice but to have a total escape.
Speaker 1: And that's a very hard problem to solve. You know.
Speaker 2: My view is effectively that after the Rock War and
Speaker 2: the financial collapse like that, sort of like twin blow,
Speaker 2: the neoliberal order was basically done. Now, this is not
Speaker 2: the way that any normal person poort articulated, but it's
Speaker 2: like the system as it exists, like this is bankrupt,
Speaker 2: this has failed, this is not delivering for me in
Speaker 2: any sort of a meaningful way.
Speaker 4: We got to do something different.
Speaker 2: And so you have these twin rival movements that you
Speaker 2: know arise. You've got the Bernie movement and you've got
Speaker 2: the Trump movement. And Democrats really had kind of a choice.
Speaker 2: They could have either focused their primary efforts on defeating
Speaker 2: trump Ism and you know, making that the priority and
Speaker 2: using models from history of how we defeat did you know,
Speaker 2: fascism in the past and right wing reactionary movements in
Speaker 2: the past, which was through the New Deal Coalition, et cetera.
Speaker 2: Or Democratic elites could primarily train their fire on that.
Speaker 2: Bernie Sanders grossterswovem and so that they could maintain their
Speaker 2: grip on power within the Democratic Party and that was
Speaker 2: goal number one. I'm not going to say they didn't
Speaker 2: want a defuture, of course they did, but that was
Speaker 2: goal number one. There were even there were New York
Speaker 2: Times articles about how they were they were willing to
Speaker 2: risk quote unquote party damage to defeat Bernie Sanders movement,
Speaker 2: and with that as their primary goal, they were wildly successful.
Speaker 4: Wildly successful.
Speaker 2: That's what the and Ryan was treating about this this morning.
Speaker 2: That was what the identity politics invention from Hillary Clinton,
Speaker 2: That's what that was all about. That was about saying, like,
Speaker 2: you all aren't even really progressive because you're not talking
Speaker 2: about intersectionalism and breaking up the big banks, isn't going
Speaker 2: to end racism, blah blah blah. Very effective, okay, and
Speaker 2: also really annoying to the population and created a massive
Speaker 2: backlash to the Democratic Party. And number two, like Russia Gate,
Speaker 2: was also part of making sure that after Hillary Clinton
Speaker 2: was defeated, the most logical takeaway for people to have,
Speaker 2: you know, come to at that point was this lady
Speaker 2: who was like the queen of the neoliberals. This way
Speaker 2: of doing politics, this doesn't work to defeat Trump. This
Speaker 2: isn't the thing, Like we need to do something different.
Speaker 2: But instead of having that takeaway, they had a takeaway
Speaker 2: of Russia and collusion and the p tape and Komi
Speaker 2: and whatever told a distraction tactic from their manifest failures
Speaker 2: at that time, and again it worked. It worked for
Speaker 2: what their primary goal was. It works like a charm.
Speaker 2: And so you know, to me, the real you know,
Speaker 2: from my perspective, off ramp from this moment where trump
Speaker 2: Ism is ascendant, dominant, no breaks on the car maximist
Speaker 2: approach to governance, which we're already seeing with you know,
Speaker 2: pardoning all the Jasics people and launching his own shit
Speaker 2: coins and just like blatant, brazen theft of tens of
Speaker 2: billions of dollars from his own supporters. That was back
Speaker 2: really in twenty sixteen was where the road diverge. And
Speaker 2: then there was another bite of the apple in twenty
Speaker 2: twenty with Bernism again. But you know, that kind of
Speaker 2: to me was when the course was ultimately set. So
Speaker 2: you know, and the pieces you say are not you know,
Speaker 2: that's that's another way of looking at that story, right.
Speaker 2: I don't think that those two things are like at
Speaker 2: odds with each other. But my own view of our
Speaker 2: recent history and how we ended up with this. Really,
Speaker 2: twenty sixteen is kind of the pivot point where, yeah,
Speaker 2: where Democrats decide that rather than embracing their own left
Speaker 2: wing response to trump Ism, they're going to try to
Speaker 2: hold on to this bankrupt, discredited ideology.
Speaker 4: That is being rejected, not just here, but rejecting it
Speaker 4: around the world.
Speaker 3: Not only that, but actively embracing, pushing the culture and
Speaker 3: really making that the cornerstone of a lot of your
Speaker 3: argument against yes, the right and basically make against the left.
Speaker 3: I mean, look, I'm personally enjoying it, right Like I've
Speaker 3: hated this shit from the beginning. It's literally the only
Speaker 3: reason that that's what turned me to right wing politics
Speaker 3: was a rejection of what I thought was like cultural
Speaker 3: liberal overreach. And so to see so much of the
Speaker 3: population completely blackpilled on any credibility of the media, on
Speaker 3: a lot of cultural like left wing shibbalts and things
Speaker 3: that we weren't even allowed to say over the last
Speaker 3: eight ye or you could say, but you're gonna have
Speaker 3: problems and all of that. I'm I'm really really enjoying that.
Speaker 1: I do.
Speaker 3: I'm curious too to see how much of that is
Speaker 3: all Trump needs to do in some cases is not
Speaker 3: even do anything. As long as the economy is fine
Speaker 3: and as long as a lot of this bullshit is
Speaker 3: not in our culture.
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people might think that he's
Speaker 1: very successful.
Speaker 3: I just know so many people who are so disaffected
Speaker 3: and so repulsed by these commanding heights of culture and
Speaker 3: other that just the victory of Trump himself was enough.
Speaker 3: I've been going back and doing some more reading about
Speaker 3: the Reagan era. Very similar actually, if you go back
Speaker 3: and you look at one of the reasons why Ronald
Speaker 3: Reagan was part of the reason why the eighties was
Speaker 3: looked as like a way to save yourself from horror,
Speaker 3: the horrible like consternation of the nineteen seventies and all
Speaker 3: of that was a very similar period of like inflation,
Speaker 3: chaos of foreign policy issues, but also just like crazy
Speaker 3: shit going on in terms of like movements on the
Speaker 3: street from the new Left and the fall of the
Speaker 3: Vietnam activism, and I mean even on the riot we
Speaker 3: don't talk about and look at some of the big
Speaker 3: right wing the Goldwaterism and stuff like that that Reagan
Speaker 3: was able to resurrect with the John Birch Society. I mean,
Speaker 3: these were huge huge debates in the country at the time.
Speaker 3: Reagan was able to use this like showman aspect of
Speaker 3: command in power, where look, he's an actor, right, yeah,
Speaker 3: he was a governor, but he had some beliefs.
Speaker 1: But at the end they didn't do a lot.
Speaker 3: But by doing that, just by kind of existing and
Speaker 3: buying being the showman, this cheerleader of the United States
Speaker 3: against Soviet Communism, he really was able to achieve like
Speaker 3: a massive approval rating and real vibe shift, you know,
Speaker 3: in the country. I have huge criticisms with Reagan presidency,
Speaker 3: but you know, I like to study. I'm like, why
Speaker 3: are people popular in their time? I think I think
Speaker 3: Trump will be a huge beneficiary of a similar movement.
Speaker 2: Maybe I don't know. I already see signs of like,
Speaker 2: you know, tremendous over like the partnering the J six people.
Speaker 4: That's not popular. No, I don't really, I don't think
Speaker 4: people care.
Speaker 2: I repoined it really unpopular. So I think, I mean, see,
Speaker 2: I see this is possible. It's possible. But I think
Speaker 2: you're likely to see a backlash against him. I mean,
Speaker 2: I think there's I think there's also going to be
Speaker 2: a backlash against the you know more like aggressive and
Speaker 2: like visibly cruel immigration crackdown. I think it's also I
Speaker 2: don't think there's any guarantees about where the economy is
Speaker 2: going to be either. I think there's, you know, very
Speaker 2: possible that we have like an AI or crypto bubble
Speaker 2: that completely bursts.
Speaker 4: So a lot of question.
Speaker 2: Marks about how this is all going to go for him.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's look again possible, but I think I
Speaker 2: think it's more likely that you're going to get some
Speaker 2: level of backlash too, because they're reading a mandate that
Speaker 2: is much broader than what voters actually handed them, and
Speaker 2: that leads to a lot of political It.
Speaker 1: Only depends on which Yeah, I don't disagree.
Speaker 3: I mean that point yesterday right in terms of overreach
Speaker 3: and what all of that stuff look likes. But I'll
Speaker 3: tell you why I disagree on the jan six stuff.
Speaker 3: This is a settled question. And in terms of what
Speaker 3: I mean by that is that the January sixth Americans
Speaker 3: heard more about January sixth and Donald Trump for four
Speaker 3: years straight period than any other issue about Donald Trump.
Speaker 3: He still won the popular vote, and he won his
Speaker 3: own party. The idea that there would be some backlash
Speaker 3: to Donald Trump doing what he basically said he was
Speaker 3: going to do at least you know, maybe it's a
Speaker 3: little bit more that I didn't.
Speaker 4: Say he was going to pardon people, but he like
Speaker 4: beating up police.
Speaker 1: He didn't really say anything. That's what a lot of
Speaker 1: people forget. Jade May said something, right, but Republicans.
Speaker 2: That was not I think clear to people. But listen,
Speaker 2: and people vote on a range of issues. So the
Speaker 2: fact that Trump still gets elected by a point a
Speaker 2: half doesn't mean that they were like, actually, January sixth.
Speaker 3: Was fine, okay, But at this point Trump doesn't need
Speaker 3: to run for reelection. He's going to do it on
Speaker 3: day one, and people will forget about it in one week.
Speaker 3: One of the reasons why.
Speaker 2: Things build, right, what I'm saying is it's a sign
Speaker 2: of the overreach. It's a sign maximalist. This happened like
Speaker 2: last night at nine pm.
Speaker 1: That's my point. I mean, okay, but the traveling.
Speaker 2: Of the maximust approach to governance that vastly overreads the
Speaker 2: mandate that he actually received from voters. So you know,
Speaker 2: I think these things build on each other, right. I
Speaker 2: think part of Trump why he was able to succeed
Speaker 2: this time is that there was sort of rose color
Speaker 2: grats and glasses because he had been out of power
Speaker 2: for four years and people didn't really remember how chaotic
Speaker 2: it was and all of the worst things that they
Speaker 2: didn't like about him, but this was one of the
Speaker 2: things that they liked that they were the most upset about.
Speaker 2: And it is a big part of the reason why
Speaker 2: Republicans in particular in twenty twenty two did so poorly
Speaker 2: all the Republicans that were associated with So to your point,
Speaker 2: he doesn't have to run for reelection, but some Republicans
Speaker 2: is going to have to, and not all of them
Speaker 2: are as Actually none of them are as like uniquely
Speaker 2: charismatic and magically politically skilled as Donald Trump is.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: No, look, I don't disagree, but I think is day one,
Speaker 3: one of the things that they're doing is flood his
Speaker 3: own strategy is to embrace the vibe shift, is to
Speaker 3: do basically whatever they can at the height of their
Speaker 3: powers and try not to do anything too unpopular. So far,
Speaker 3: I think they've succeeded. I mean in terms of a
Speaker 3: lot of these executive orders. Yeah, they're gonna bitch and
Speaker 3: moan on CNN about January sixth. People just don't care
Speaker 3: I really believe that people do not care about the party,
Speaker 3: or if they do, forget about it in a week.
Speaker 1: Okay. The stuff that sticks with people is both a
Speaker 1: long term vibe.
Speaker 3: So in terms of overreach, what would that look like,
Speaker 3: It would look like foreign chaos, it would look like
Speaker 3: major inflation.
Speaker 1: Remember American stuck with Biden for what seven months? Eight months?
Speaker 3: In the first eight months there was high inflation. At
Speaker 3: that time, they were like, hey, do something about this,
Speaker 3: do something about this. And it was only after a
Speaker 3: while when you didn't do anything about it, they were like, Okay,
Speaker 3: now we're going to turn on you. It takes a while,
Speaker 3: So these things need to bleed. You're talking about immigration.
Speaker 3: I mean, first of all, as we said, there's a
Speaker 3: huge reality change. Also, if you look at the New
Speaker 3: York Times pulling on this issue with shocking in terms
Speaker 3: of the mass majority support for deportation, there's actually a
Speaker 3: huge support for mass deportation.
Speaker 1: What I mean by that is mass.
Speaker 3: Deportation of all illegal immigrants, a plus twelve issue from
Speaker 3: the New York Times. Now to your point, am I
Speaker 3: going to take that to the bank?
Speaker 1: Right? If I'm not stupid?
Speaker 3: I know how the media and how people are going
Speaker 3: to receive the reality of it. I know exactly what
Speaker 3: it looks like. I don't think most people do, so
Speaker 3: we'll see. You know, it prophsibly could change. But the
Speaker 3: fact that it's almost a seventy plus percent issue on
Speaker 3: deporting at least all of the people who are here
Speaker 3: illegally under the Biden administration is crazy, and that shows
Speaker 3: you the change in the status quo.
Speaker 1: As long as it is executed, I think somewhat competently,
Speaker 1: he will be I think he will be more popular
Speaker 1: for it. The only way it goes south is well, actually,
Speaker 1: this is an interesting question too.
Speaker 3: I'm not so sure if it can go south in
Speaker 3: the same way the trust in media has now gone
Speaker 3: down so much in the last eight years, the same
Speaker 3: conditions for the outrage over the travel ban and for
Speaker 3: the deportation or closing the border. I don't know if
Speaker 3: that mechanism still exists in the same way. I could
Speaker 3: be totally wrong, but I do not see the same organic.
Speaker 1: Level of pushback.
Speaker 3: You know, if you scroll my barometer is like normal
Speaker 3: friends Instagram stories. I'm not seeing the same stuff about racism,
Speaker 3: sexism coming to the Women's March.
Speaker 1: Can't believe he did this.
Speaker 3: I mean, you know, you remember people were showing up
Speaker 3: at Dulles Airport lawyers to try and help people to
Speaker 3: go through the travel bank.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't see any that happening.
Speaker 3: I don't see you know, Catholic charities and others organizing
Speaker 3: to try and help Guatemalans across the border, like all
Speaker 3: this infrastructure. ACLU right raised a billion dollars over the
Speaker 3: Trump administration. They can file and fight, show me your
Speaker 3: ten ninety nine. I don't think that they're raising the
Speaker 3: same amounts of money this time. So I just I
Speaker 3: think the country's changed. It's been eight years. The level
Speaker 3: of trust in the media and all the stuff on
Speaker 3: this issue is way down. The reality situation has changed.
Speaker 3: And another thing that I guess Trump and JD and
Speaker 3: all these other people deserve credit for is they have
Speaker 3: stuck to this argument now for a long time, and
Speaker 3: I'm they've won in my opinion. Now the Democrats might
Speaker 3: be able to you know, if we have maybe I
Speaker 3: think the big overreach like what you're talking about would
Speaker 3: be like a mass deportation of DACA. Right, That's an
Speaker 3: issue which is definitely on the other side. Absent that
Speaker 3: I don't really see it yet. But again, a lot
Speaker 3: of this is competence based.
Speaker 2: So it's worth remembering that at the height of the
Speaker 2: initial George Floyd protests in Minnesota, there was a significant
Speaker 2: majority in favor of protesters burning down a police station.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but again they didn't know what that meant.
Speaker 2: But yeah, you're right, well yeah, And that's my point
Speaker 2: is it's one thing to in theory, support something when
Speaker 2: it sounds bloodless and painless, and you've been told that
Speaker 2: this will bring down prices for you and help deal
Speaker 2: with housing costs and labor. Sure, you know you'll get
Speaker 2: better wages, blah blah blah. It's another thing to see
Speaker 2: the human reality of it and what that actually entails,
Speaker 2: and especially another thing when you know that human reality
Speaker 2: and cruelty ensues and guess what, your life isn't actually better.
Speaker 2: It didn't actually make your wages go up, It didn't
Speaker 2: actually make it so that housing was more affordable, or
Speaker 2: that other like core material problems you're struggling with with
Speaker 2: in your life improve. And then you add to that
Speaker 2: the fact that the terriffs are very likely I mean,
Speaker 2: if he institutes anything like what he's talking about, the
Speaker 2: terraiffs will be inflationary, and that he doesn't believe he
Speaker 2: said this yesterary. He doesn't really believe that inflation was
Speaker 2: important to people. He said he thought it was overrated.
Speaker 2: He said he thought it was overrated as a problem.
Speaker 2: So he is not taking seriously that the cost of living.
Speaker 2: I think cost of living is a core, core concern
Speaker 2: for people, core, and so he, I think, is telling
Speaker 2: himself that because that gives him permission to pursue a
Speaker 2: terror strategy, which at least in the short term, is
Speaker 2: almost certainly going to be inflationary.
Speaker 4: So you know, you're right that. I mean, I don't
Speaker 4: think if he just did the J.
Speaker 2: Six thing and you know, pardon them and then everything
Speaker 2: else people liked, like, no, that's not going to sink him.
Speaker 2: What I'm saying is that's indicative of a maximist strategy
Speaker 2: to overinterpret the mandate and indulge his worst instincts and
Speaker 2: worst excesses. And I think it's unlikely that over the
Speaker 2: long term it will ultimately be popular.
Speaker 4: But gonna We're gonna see.
Speaker 2: We uh, you know, he drops this shit coin trump coin,
Speaker 2: then the next day he drops a Milania yes shit coin.
Speaker 1: Or maybe she dropped it.
Speaker 2: We don't know yet, whatever, it doesn't matter. I mean
Speaker 2: he already like just the Milania dropping, the Milania coin
Speaker 2: totally undercut the trunk coin, so al right, it dropped
Speaker 2: like what instantly after the Milania thing drops, I saw
Speaker 2: this warning. I don't know, I have to check double
Speaker 2: check the numbers on this, but that the Millennia coin
Speaker 2: was already down like seventy percent from its peak or something,
Speaker 2: you know, Just for so people who aren't crypto people
Speaker 2: understand these meme coins.
Speaker 4: They're literally they don't exist. I mean, all it.
Speaker 2: Is is is hype. It is a pure ponzi scheme.
Speaker 2: At least with bitcoin, which I'm also not a big
Speaker 2: fan of, But at least with bitcoin there's a story
Speaker 2: about a new technology and using it as actual currency,
Speaker 2: you know, for transaction, cross national transactions and frictionless and
Speaker 2: not having to deal with government blah blah blah.
Speaker 4: At least there's a story.
Speaker 2: With these there's no even pretense that this adds anything
Speaker 2: valuable or productive to the economy. It's just a total
Speaker 2: greater fool cash grap meaning that you buy in with
Speaker 2: the hope, in the assumption that there will be people
Speaker 2: dumber and more gullible than you, who are going to
Speaker 2: come in after you and push the price up so
Speaker 2: that you can be one of the winners. But I mean,
Speaker 2: by and large, these are just massive upward transfers of wealth.
Speaker 2: The Trump coin eighty percent is held by insiders. The
Speaker 2: Milania coin I saw eighty nine percent is held by
Speaker 2: a single wallet, So those people are guaranteed to come
Speaker 2: out on the positive net winner side. And then all
Speaker 2: of the suckers who not all, but many of the
Speaker 2: suckers who get pulled in after are the ones who
Speaker 2: will bear real cash losses from purchasing this entirely fake, invented,
Speaker 2: bullshit thing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and you know, I, generally, as people know, I
Speaker 3: think it's bad. We have talked how many times on
Speaker 3: the show Trump Hotel, Trump super Pack.
Speaker 1: Saying he's going to challenge stop to steal. Yeah, Trump,
Speaker 1: Birch Trump.
Speaker 4: This is another level.
Speaker 3: Though, Chrystally, you're right, But guess what at a certain point,
Speaker 3: this guy's remember a conversation we had before the holiday,
Speaker 3: and I was talking about sports gambling and how no
Speaker 3: matter how much information I or others put out there
Speaker 3: about people getting ripped off about sports gambling that sports
Speaker 3: gambling becomes more popular in the United States, even though
Speaker 3: you're literally losing if you're placing gambles. At a certain point,
Speaker 3: people want to be ripped off, and I just I'm
Speaker 3: stopping feeling bad.
Speaker 2: They want they want the fantasy of this soft.
Speaker 3: For the consequences. At this point, you guys don't care
Speaker 3: about this, then fine, like deal with it. You guys
Speaker 3: don't feel bad anymore.
Speaker 4: It's just such naked I don't know.
Speaker 2: And they want to end stage capitalism, where Like I said, look,
Speaker 2: there's tons of fakery in the stock market, right Like
Speaker 2: oftentimes stock prices are not really related to like the
Speaker 2: value of that company, and a lot of that is
Speaker 2: based on hype and.
Speaker 4: Blah blah blah blah blah.
Speaker 2: At least there's a story about some product or service
Speaker 2: that is being offered that is some sort of a
Speaker 2: benefit to humanity. This is just pure theft, cash grab,
Speaker 2: And I mean, to me, it's wild that it's legal.
Speaker 4: It's wild that this is allowed at all.
Speaker 2: That you can just like invent a fake thing and
Speaker 2: steal a bunch of people's money and is perfectly fine.
Speaker 2: But this is, I mean, is very similar to what
Speaker 2: the hawk Tua chick. No, it's the same shit that
Speaker 2: this lady did. And so now you know again anybody
Speaker 2: who doesn't have an issue with this on the Republican side,
Speaker 2: like I don't want to hear about your Hunter Biden corruption,
Speaker 2: James Biden corruption, Nancy Pelosi. Inside is that is pennies
Speaker 2: compared to what we're talking about here Trump. What I mean,
Speaker 2: he massively inflated his own network. He is now predominantly
Speaker 2: his wealth is from this freaking crypto.
Speaker 3: That's part of why it's absurd is that it's going
Speaker 3: to collapse. So everyone, yeah, oh Trump is worth twenty
Speaker 3: five billion. It's like, no, he's worth I don't know
Speaker 3: whatever the postcrash price will be, which will be like
Speaker 3: zero point one cent. So yes, I guess technically on
Speaker 3: paper he's worth twenty five billion or whatever the paper.
Speaker 2: The bulk of his wealth is now in the stupid
Speaker 2: and trumpp coin.
Speaker 1: I will also say a coin.
Speaker 3: A lot of this is Don Junior and Eric too,
Speaker 3: who are actually the ones behind. I think it's called
Speaker 3: like world liberty financial.
Speaker 1: I don't know what to say.
Speaker 3: Like I said to you, I think people are enjoying
Speaker 3: getting ripped off at a certain point, if you, by
Speaker 3: the way, if you're invested in trumpoint, you're fucking idiot.
Speaker 3: All right, let's just say it, like, can we all
Speaker 3: be honest If you're going online and you're buying.
Speaker 1: Scraped like, you're in moron.
Speaker 3: And a lot of the people who do invest in
Speaker 3: this stuff do so specifically for speculative purposes, to try
Speaker 3: and get in on the idiots who will buy it.
Speaker 3: I just no longer I feel exhausted by the conversation now, frankly,
Speaker 3: just because it's so obvious to me now in the
Speaker 3: more socially libertarian, isolated America, this is un ironically what
Speaker 3: people want. And at a certain point, why try and
Speaker 3: protect people from what they want? Like they want to gamble,
Speaker 3: they want to play the lottery, they want to buy
Speaker 3: trump coin because they think it's funny, or you know,
Speaker 3: or ticket to wealth. What are we supposed to do whenever, look,
Speaker 3: the argument against Trump has been made, the corruption argument
Speaker 3: has happened, It's been plastered all over the news. People
Speaker 3: don't give a shit. So it's like what I was
Speaker 3: telling you previously. They think that the Democratic Party is
Speaker 3: so equally corrupt that their guy is corrupt. But he
Speaker 3: does this stuff that they like. I don't think it's
Speaker 3: a good thing, but that's what they think. They have
Speaker 3: no problem, and so it's a hypocrisy race to the bottom.
Speaker 3: And when they hear people who are Democrats Chris Murphy
Speaker 3: and I saw on others or criticizing this as like, dude,
Speaker 3: you know they're just gonna point to your photo with
Speaker 3: Alex Soros and they're gonna say you're equally corrupt. You're
Speaker 3: not even wrong absolutely on absolute terms. You know, what
Speaker 3: what's Closi worth on paper? One hundred million something like that.
Speaker 2: I mean getting some board seat or whatever. Nothing, nothing
Speaker 2: compared to an absolute terms. So just the thing I'm saying,
Speaker 2: soccer is first of all, number one. I don't think
Speaker 2: that like I can't just throw my hands up because
Speaker 2: I think these things are I think corruption is actually
Speaker 2: really important.
Speaker 1: And you know they controls like.
Speaker 4: You obviously too.
Speaker 2: You did a whole long monologue about your problems with
Speaker 2: online gambling, and you may acknowledge like, okay, politically, like
Speaker 2: I'm in the minority here, but that didn't stop you
Speaker 2: from feeling like it was No. Of course, the argument,
Speaker 2: which is my physician here as well, but It's also
Speaker 2: like you know, again, if you don't have any smoke
Speaker 2: for Trump on don't tell me.
Speaker 4: About Pelo season, so you don't care.
Speaker 2: You actually don't care, and you are just a total
Speaker 2: partisan hack if you have no smoke for Trump on this.
Speaker 2: But the only corruption you see is on the Democratic
Speaker 2: side because in that hypocrisy race to the bottom, let
Speaker 2: me tell you, buddy, he just won because no one
Speaker 2: show me another instance where a politician has managed to
Speaker 2: grift tens of billions of dollars off their own primarily
Speaker 2: their own supporters, something that is just completely fake.
Speaker 3: Again, really say, I mean he actually is able to
Speaker 3: realize any of these games, I would be I.
Speaker 4: Would be able to realize some of them.
Speaker 3: I would bet at best you can realize like maybe
Speaker 3: fifty million.
Speaker 1: Like I'm not putting it down, but fifty.
Speaker 4: Million, I've been saying amount of money.
Speaker 1: Yeah, sure, but it's not twenty five million. Look, I'm
Speaker 1: not defending it.
Speaker 3: What I'm just saying is it's very clear that the
Speaker 3: way that the way that this is all played out,
Speaker 3: like Dave Portenoy buying trump coin, pumping trump coin.
Speaker 1: Right, people getting in on this.
Speaker 3: I saw a lot of this during the whole robin hood,
Speaker 3: you know, gm thing, and now you really see it,
Speaker 3: and really what you see it in today is just
Speaker 3: gambling people, single game parlays and their willingness and want
Speaker 3: they want more gambling products.
Speaker 1: They love to be ripped off.
Speaker 3: It's it's the most remarkable thing in the world.
Speaker 2: And I love the promise of the possibility of what
Speaker 2: it could they want to buy into. Like you know,
Speaker 2: fortune favors the brave, and there are of examples of
Speaker 2: random people who place the crypto bet at the right
Speaker 2: time that they're like, that could be me, that could
Speaker 2: be me, and lacking better in some instances, lacking better
Speaker 2: prospects or any other real pathway to that sort of
Speaker 2: like luxury lifestyle or even being able to just like
Speaker 2: make it and have a normal middle class lifestyle. Yeah,
Speaker 2: they're gonna chase They're gonna be susceptible to chase it.
Speaker 2: I just I don't know how society survived, truly. I
Speaker 2: don't know how a society survives where it is illegal
Speaker 2: to just make up money with the explicit purpose of
Speaker 2: robbing people. I mean that's what this is, like, it
Speaker 2: is this, It is a pure Ponzi scheme at least
Speaker 2: the Ambay people like sell some shit. Right, this doesn't
Speaker 2: even have that, Like it doesn't even have the pretense
Speaker 2: of that it's just invented. And this is like this
Speaker 2: is a core part of the economy.
Speaker 3: Like I just know it's not a core part of
Speaker 3: the economy. Increasingly it's less than one percent of overall.
Speaker 2: This is but this is like a central Also promise
Speaker 2: of the Trump administration is like moving more in the dry,
Speaker 2: let's have the bitcoin crypto reserve. I don't know, I
Speaker 2: just to me, it's such a sign. I mean, first
Speaker 2: of all, just the brezonness of Trump, right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but also and he is getting away with.
Speaker 2: It, but I know he gets away with everything that
Speaker 2: what's gotten away with every cares of Trump and also
Speaker 2: just like pure societal decline and the end stage capitalism
Speaker 2: that it's hard for me to wrap my head around
Speaker 2: that it's like actually a real thing.
Speaker 3: Oh, I mean, I mean, look, historically this is actually
Speaker 3: pretty pretty par for the course. You know, we talked
Speaker 3: a lot about yesterday the nineteen hundreds and the way
Speaker 3: that you had literal like robber barons and other people
Speaker 3: who would be in power both politically and then also
Speaker 3: similarly either involved in.
Speaker 1: Big business or price discrimination, etc.
Speaker 3: Just a natural extension of an extremely low trust society.
Speaker 3: That's what we're in. You know, if people are trying
Speaker 3: to parse the differences of like, oh.
Speaker 1: But Pelosi and all those bad, Oh but.
Speaker 3: Trump is bad, and when neither have any credibility on
Speaker 3: the issue, they again they just choose like the lesser
Speaker 3: of two evils.
Speaker 4: I really do.
Speaker 2: I saw someone tweetus, and I think this is right.
Speaker 2: I think Citizens United really was like the beginning of
Speaker 2: the end of any semblance of democracy because I do think,
Speaker 2: like you know, effectively, capitalism and democracy very difficult for
Speaker 2: the two to coexist, very difficult. If it's going to work,
Speaker 2: you're going to have to have some strict controls on
Speaker 2: money and politics. And not only do we not have
Speaker 2: strict control, we basically have no controls on money in
Speaker 2: politics effectively effectively. And yeah, so I mean that's what
Speaker 2: you're going to end up with is a bunch of
Speaker 2: oligarchs who run the government and get what they want
Speaker 2: and you know, get taxpayer goodies and get the decisions
Speaker 2: on AI and crypto and whatever that's going to further
Speaker 2: enrich them and screw over working people because they won't
Speaker 2: have thebility to join labor unions or organize or fight
Speaker 2: back against the AI that's going to come and take
Speaker 2: their jobs. Like that is the natural endpoint of the
Speaker 2: system that we set up. And that to your point, Soccer,
Speaker 2: that both parties have at this point like wholly embraced space.
Speaker 3: But what I can't move away from is that's what
Speaker 3: people want. Majority of people are not majority. A huge
Speaker 3: portion of households who are Union voted for Trump. It's
Speaker 3: just like, okay, well, you know, don't complain. I don't
Speaker 3: know what's say like they like him. They don't care
Speaker 3: about that an l RB or whatever. They think it's
Speaker 3: like bureaucratic bullshit. And then Trump will just you know,
Speaker 3: it'll change everything up.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 2: It's not like the other option was really great, No, sure,
Speaker 2: but I mean Colin Harris was a terrible candidate, stood
Speaker 2: for nothing and barely lost.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't say barely.
Speaker 3: I mean point seven swing states, yes, point and a half,
Speaker 3: but he lost all swepens seven swing states, and importantly,
Speaker 3: even within that point and a half. The Democratic the
Speaker 3: demographic movement is deeply important for what the future of
Speaker 3: that looks like.
Speaker 1: No doubt, and who's left in if.
Speaker 4: It continues in that direction.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, nothing is you know, nothing thing in politics
Speaker 3: is permanent, et cetera, et cetera. But really what we
Speaker 3: are looking at is the new birth of like socially
Speaker 3: libertarian America. This is what it looks like like this
Speaker 3: is the snake oil salesman era of the early nineteen hundreds.
Speaker 3: And I think the trumpe again. If you want to
Speaker 3: change that, you have to think about why.
Speaker 1: Is it so popular? I will never understand it.
Speaker 3: Why people put their money on FanDuel and look, five
Speaker 3: ten dollars is not what we're all worried about here.
Speaker 3: We're talking about people who are gambling away their life
Speaker 3: savings or if ya, if you put your life savings
Speaker 3: in Trump. This is where the bootstrap part of me
Speaker 3: comes in. I don't know, you deserve it, I don't
Speaker 3: know what Like that's an IQ test, that's social Darwinianism
Speaker 3: at a certain point. And what we have got to
Speaker 3: is a society that venerates and wants this get rich
Speaker 3: quick and all of this. Now there's a lot of
Speaker 3: reasons for that. A lot of people in power are responsible,
Speaker 3: but let's all so not let people off the hook. Sure,
Speaker 3: I like it, And I don't know what to say.
Speaker 3: In a country which loves weed and porn and gambling
Speaker 3: and you know, is constantly searching for get rick quick stuff,
Speaker 3: and they make fun of people like Dave Ramsey and
Speaker 3: others who tell them to save their money and put
Speaker 3: it in the freaking s and P.
Speaker 1: Five hundred, and they're like, oh, that's.
Speaker 3: Boomer shit, even though that's like the greatest return that
Speaker 3: you probably could have ever asked for compared to the
Speaker 3: idiot stuff that you're doing. I mean, like, people have
Speaker 3: a choice, their individual responsibility and wishes are a thing.
Speaker 1: This is what they want.
Speaker 2: Sure, yeah, I don't want to deny people individual agency
Speaker 2: for their decisions. But when you have a mass societal trend,
Speaker 2: then you have to ask what is contrued, what are
Speaker 2: the underlying economic, social, political conditions that are leading to
Speaker 2: that trend, because they don't just come out of nowhere.
Speaker 2: And my contention would be that in an era of
Speaker 2: mass inequality the likes of which we have never seen
Speaker 2: in human history, where you know, the price of goods
Speaker 2: that are required in order to obtain like just a
Speaker 2: basic middle class life have been going up and up
Speaker 2: and up, for decades. And you know, also there's a
Speaker 2: lot of cultural trends. I mean, you do see like
Speaker 2: the valorization of the businessman who breaks the rules but
Speaker 2: gets away with it and gets rich and gets the
Speaker 2: girl and whatever.
Speaker 4: Like there's the social cultural trends as well.
Speaker 2: But yeah, that leads a lot of people to be
Speaker 2: very susceptible to mythology about you know, whether it's how
Speaker 2: Trump is going to save them and they put all
Speaker 2: their trust in him and that's part of you know,
Speaker 2: that parlays right into this crypto theft high scheme, or
Speaker 2: if it's trust in like this is this is my shot.
Speaker 4: This is my lot of ticket to be able to
Speaker 4: make it to the good life.
Speaker 3: I don't disagree necessarily, I just sometimes have to, like truly,
Speaker 3: I mean I think about this with lead, I think
Speaker 3: about this with porn.
Speaker 1: I think about this with gambling. These are massively popular services.
Speaker 3: I could show people all the social research in the
Speaker 3: world that will show this is so bad for you.
Speaker 3: If you live your life the opposite to this, you
Speaker 3: will be better off.
Speaker 1: They don't want to do it. They like it.
Speaker 3: It's like I can and look, we're not a dictatorship.
Speaker 3: You can't control people. And yes, there's a lot of
Speaker 3: people who what there's a lot of you know, economic reasons,
Speaker 3: et cetera and all that, but a lot of it
Speaker 3: is cultural, a lot of is familial.
Speaker 1: And I think we're gone. I mean, I think we've long.
Speaker 3: Passed moved what that even looks like in terms of
Speaker 3: what that everything will look like for a fix. I
Speaker 3: don't think Donald Trump is going to fix it. I
Speaker 3: don't even think it's literally possible. I think maybe he
Speaker 3: could usher in an age where we ask bigger questions
Speaker 3: in a society. Maybe more of you will be able
Speaker 3: to grapple with bigger questions and other stuff, and with
Speaker 3: media and the new environment. But you know, in the interim,
Speaker 3: there's just there's this is the you know, the this
Speaker 3: is the celebration. And you know, it's just funny every
Speaker 3: time I talk about gambling or whatever, narc you're a
Speaker 3: nerd weed, same thing, porn.
Speaker 1: You know, they start laughing when we talk about all
Speaker 1: these things.
Speaker 4: Uh.
Speaker 3: And and they they will fight to the death for
Speaker 3: their right to consume the things that are bad for them.
Speaker 1: And you know, look at prohibition. Prohibition was a good idea.
Speaker 3: Sorry, it's true, people were drunk and they were beating
Speaker 3: their wives, and the women are the ones who wanted it,
Speaker 3: and then they got it overturned because they just want
Speaker 3: to be drunk all the time. It's like, okay, you know,
Speaker 3: at a certain point, you just got to give people
Speaker 3: what they want.
Speaker 1: It.
Speaker 4: Also, we don't have to fight about prohibition today.
Speaker 2: But you know, I mean it led to a massive
Speaker 2: increase in crime, and organized gang.
Speaker 3: Was also the great suppression, but people conveniently leave that
Speaker 3: out of the story.
Speaker 4: True.
Speaker 3: Yeah, like in terms of what the where a lot
Speaker 3: of the crime and all that came. One of the
Speaker 3: main reasons they brought it back is needed a tax revenue. Ironically, Yes, yeah,
Speaker 3: it's if we think about it with all of the
Speaker 3: stuff that's super popular today and look at male culture,
Speaker 3: look at what young people, dudes and all that are
Speaker 3: looking at. I think there's a lot of economic reasons
Speaker 3: for it, but I also think it's a huge cultural
Speaker 3: component to all of this. And uh, the more the
Speaker 3: more I see of how it is not only dominated
Speaker 3: but has become overwhelmingly popular, the less optimistic I am
Speaker 3: that anything is ever going to change.
Speaker 1: Do you need anything?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 4: Yeah, if you guys could bring me some.
Speaker 1: Water whenever, control room. Can we get water in here? Please?
Speaker 4: But we can go ahead and a fight about Elon
Speaker 4: now if you like.
Speaker 3: Oh, oh okay, all right, sure let me let me
Speaker 3: finish this coffee then.
Speaker 2: So a huge controversy broke out yesterday over whether or
Speaker 2: not Elon Musk did a Nazi salute like a whole
Speaker 2: pile Hitler situation during one of his speeches.
Speaker 4: The explanations will show you the video, let me before
Speaker 4: I give you.
Speaker 2: The explanations, and Sager will give you his explanation. I
Speaker 2: want you guys to be able to see the video
Speaker 2: for yourselves, and then we can we can discuss.
Speaker 1: And I just want to say thank you for making
Speaker 1: it happen.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 4: So that's it.
Speaker 2: So immediately people were like, that looks like a Nazi salute.
Speaker 3: You don't think so, okay, if every time someone raises
Speaker 3: their hand like that, is it a Nazi salute?
Speaker 1: It comes down to intention.
Speaker 3: Yes, do we believe that Elon Musk is a literal
Speaker 3: Nazi who is intentionally zeg hiling, or do we have
Speaker 3: a high functioning autistic weirdo who, if you watch the
Speaker 3: full video, is spastically dancing like this on stage and
Speaker 3: unable to control all of his movements, and also did
Speaker 3: some weird like my heart is with you type gesture.
Speaker 3: Which of those two things do you think is more accurate?
Speaker 3: I don't think it takes a genius to figure this out. Well,
Speaker 3: so that's why the controversy go over. This is so
Speaker 3: it's so twenty seventeen to me. Oh, it's like whenever
Speaker 3: this was supposed to be racist, do you remember that,
Speaker 3: and people were like, oh, this is right, Okay, go
Speaker 3: ahead and screen grab it.
Speaker 1: Call me a racist. I don't fucking care. This stuff
Speaker 1: is stupid. It's twenty twenty five. We've been through all
Speaker 1: of this. I find this whole thing exhaustingly. I would
Speaker 1: be Are we saying Elon is a Nazi?
Speaker 2: Uh?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: But I mean I would be more inclined to give
Speaker 2: him the benefit of the doubt if he didn't. My
Speaker 2: Twitter timeline after he took over is like and I
Speaker 2: think it would agree filled with literal Nazis, who he occasionally,
Speaker 2: not that infrequently, makes a point of agreeing with, and
Speaker 2: you know, and elevating backs the AfD in German.
Speaker 3: Game AFT is not Nazi is a legitimate pl So
Speaker 3: are you saying that all the people who voted for
Speaker 3: their Nazis in Germany, like I'm just.
Speaker 2: Saying Sager in terms, that's no plausible deniability. That is
Speaker 2: the most real, that is the most reactionary party in Germany.
Speaker 2: Part of it, the wing of it is actually banned
Speaker 2: because of their extremism, tied to like video.
Speaker 1: Nazi, because they have insane laws on the books.
Speaker 2: So when you talk about like you said, okay, it
Speaker 2: comes down to intent, true. Yeah, what I'm offering is
Speaker 2: that there is enough evidence of this white South African
Speaker 2: who is very.
Speaker 4: Comfortable and very.
Speaker 2: Very comfortable obviously elevating Nazis on Twitter, very comfortable using
Speaker 2: a lot of the rhetoric about like birth rates and
Speaker 2: population decline and invasion et cetera, et cetera, and that
Speaker 2: you know, is a backer of the furthest right, most
Speaker 2: reactionary parties in Germany itself. That you know, look, the
Speaker 2: people who think that this was a Nazi salute are
Speaker 2: pretty much everybody left of center, and actual Nazis also
Speaker 2: were like, that's our guy.
Speaker 1: I just can't believe.
Speaker 4: I just can't believe that.
Speaker 2: You know, I'm supposed to believe that the smartest man
Speaker 2: on the planet. This brilliant genius doesn't know what he's
Speaker 2: doing in this situation, Like come.
Speaker 3: On, yeah, but don't we also know he's a fucking
Speaker 3: idiot at times, and just like anybody moving around does
Speaker 3: weird socially awkward stuff, like maybe a guy named Ewon
Speaker 3: who's at did like this for his entire life.
Speaker 2: If he hadn't dabbled in Nazi ideology, I would be but.
Speaker 1: I can't say talking about birth rates is Nazi idio.
Speaker 4: And then the other thing, yea, why is a.
Speaker 3: Guy who's a Nazi advocating for more unrestricted h one
Speaker 3: b Indian visas at his company? That's like pretty right,
Speaker 3: So that kind of conflicts a little bit with racialist ideology.
Speaker 1: This just gets to the whole election.
Speaker 3: Everybody's tried this shit before, Nazism, birth rates, if you
Speaker 3: care about immigration, it's been totally rejected at the ballot box.
Speaker 3: People who are predominantly black and Hispanic are the majority
Speaker 3: new entrance to the Trump coalition, specifically on behalf of
Speaker 3: this terms have meaning.
Speaker 1: Elon is not look and people here.
Speaker 3: No, I'm not some Elon fanboy. I hate community notes.
Speaker 3: Twitter has gotten way more annoying ever.
Speaker 1: Since we used it.
Speaker 3: The reason why I think Nazis get elevated on your
Speaker 3: Twitter feed is because the algorithm is designed to piss
Speaker 3: you off.
Speaker 1: And you know what I get too on mine?
Speaker 3: I get a bunch of shithead leftists who are constantstantly
Speaker 3: bitching about race or whatever because that's what makes me
Speaker 3: mad or trans bullshit.
Speaker 1: That's That's what I'm trying to say.
Speaker 3: So like saying the right wing reaction to your part
Speaker 3: AfD believes in less immigration for Germany, that's not Nazi.
Speaker 3: Talking about birth rates that's not Nazi. Saying that people
Speaker 3: who care about those issues are Nazi adjacent is the
Speaker 3: same thing as tagging people like you have your beliefs
Speaker 3: and saying it's communists ludicrous. That's not communism to believe
Speaker 3: in a fire department. Oh, that's collectivism, which is part
Speaker 3: of Karl Marx. Again, like these terms are clear, delineated.
Speaker 3: People naturally understand that when we say Nazi is a
Speaker 3: very specific connotation meaning intent, belief policy. Do we really
Speaker 3: believe that Elon has that? There is no evidence for
Speaker 3: it unless you seek that interpretation. I just made about
Speaker 3: drawing any sort of like socialist or what any sort
Speaker 3: of democratic socialist belief and.
Speaker 1: Saying you're full blown Marxist. I mean, you know that
Speaker 1: we don't talk like that here. Why does it apply
Speaker 1: to Nazism?
Speaker 2: Well, I mean it sure looks like a Nazi salute
Speaker 2: and he's dabbled in Nazi ideology?
Speaker 1: Well, what does that mean? Does Nazi?
Speaker 2: I would be very much more willing to give him
Speaker 2: the benefit of the doubt if not for that and
Speaker 2: the fact that he did it twice and the fact
Speaker 2: that a bunch of Nazis think that it was enough.
Speaker 1: What is what does Nazi ideology?
Speaker 3: Has Elon proposed saying that we have to care about
Speaker 3: birth rates and we want less immigration?
Speaker 1: That's not Nazi pomic.
Speaker 2: All this conversation about yeah, birthrate and civilization, cline and
Speaker 2: invasions and you know, racializing crime, all of these things
Speaker 2: are adjacent.
Speaker 3: So but that's like saying social democratic socialism is Marxism's
Speaker 3: Is that adjacent to communism?
Speaker 1: Obviously? Yeah, kind of.
Speaker 4: I think this man knows what he's doing.
Speaker 1: No, I don't.
Speaker 2: I absolutely think this man knows what he's doing. And so,
Speaker 2: you know, look, do I think that people are going
Speaker 2: to care? Do I think it is? Does feel sort
Speaker 2: of like you know, twenty seventeen ish and like kind
Speaker 2: of cringe or whatever. Yeah, but guess but sometimes things
Speaker 2: that are popular are bad.
Speaker 4: Sometimes things that are popular like.
Speaker 2: Actually genuinely evil, And that is not going to stop
Speaker 2: me from speaking out against things that I think are
Speaker 2: wrong and extremism that I think has been welcomed back
Speaker 2: into political discourse. And yeah, I do think AfD is
Speaker 2: an extremist party. I think his backing of that, I mean,
Speaker 2: his dabbling in the UK political situation, like he's going
Speaker 2: further than Nigel Farage even as willing to go in
Speaker 2: terms of, you know, backing Tommy Robinson who was an
Speaker 2: explicit racist islamophobe who was in prison for like you know,
Speaker 2: like horrifically smearing this teenage kid and lying about him.
Speaker 4: And so yeah, I don't.
Speaker 2: Think it's crazy to think that like this is a
Speaker 2: signal that he's throwing out there and give himself enough
Speaker 2: plausebul deniability. I think that is what's going on.
Speaker 3: I just think it's I honestly think that's ridiculous, like
Speaker 3: to say that is an intentional zeg kile salute. I mean,
Speaker 3: by the way, has it been beneficial to the Trump Movement,
Speaker 3: or Elon Musk or Tesla or even his other companies.
Speaker 3: I mean, I think the guy is just spastic and weird.
Speaker 3: Anybody I know who's ever met Elon No no, I
Speaker 3: was gonna say Roman salute if we all want to talk, right,
Speaker 3: as an Indian, Actually, you know, this is something that's
Speaker 3: always pissed me off, is that Hitler appropriated various different
Speaker 3: symbols that have now become conflated with Nazism. So, for example,
Speaker 3: many Hindus, a lot of white tourists.
Speaker 1: When they go to India, they're.
Speaker 3: Like, why are there so many Nazi swastikas over here?
Speaker 3: It's like, oh, it turns out as an ancient Hindu symbol.
Speaker 3: It's the other way, and the swastika is you know,
Speaker 3: something that has nothing to do with that. In India
Speaker 3: and India they are very able to say, yeah, actually
Speaker 3: it's ancient Hindu symbol and yes not to hugest. So
Speaker 3: we're not just gonna let people tart and will actually
Speaker 3: continue to paint it on temple floors, put it all over.
Speaker 1: And we're just gonna continue with the Roman salute.
Speaker 3: The quote unquote zeke Kile was literally appropriated from the
Speaker 3: ancient Roman salute, which is famous in any of these statues. Now,
Speaker 3: I am I gonna go around Zeghiland or Roman saluting?
Speaker 1: No? Well.
Speaker 4: Also, the Roman salute apparently was not a real thing.
Speaker 2: It was like made up movies and then adopted by
Speaker 2: fascist that's right.
Speaker 3: It was appropriated by fascist ideology in the early nineteen hundreds,
Speaker 3: specifically Mussolini, Oswald Mosley and others, because they were trying,
Speaker 3: specifically Mussolini as well, to try and bring back this
Speaker 3: idea of like Romanism and greatness to the Italian Empire,
Speaker 3: which also Hitler was greatly influenced by in the nineteen twenties.
Speaker 3: But again with Elon, with all of this Nazism and
Speaker 3: calling someone a Nazi or even implying all this stuff
Speaker 3: around people is in my opinion, a huge reason why
Speaker 3: the cultural left has so much less credibility and the
Speaker 3: media today, Like you have to ask people very basic
Speaker 3: questions like I just said, do you think this person
Speaker 3: is a Nazi?
Speaker 1: Like I just don't. Look, maybe you do.
Speaker 3: I don't think that that's the case at all. And
Speaker 3: to get there you have to do what you know,
Speaker 3: all this mental gymnastics about adjacent and see, which I
Speaker 3: find just is annoying when right wingers say this about
Speaker 3: any social democratic thing and say that's literal stalinesque communists.
Speaker 1: I would say the same thing.
Speaker 2: I think I think he and I think Trump are
Speaker 2: like I think this administration is a fascist administration. Like
Speaker 2: we've had, I mean, we've had this debate before. But
Speaker 2: if you look at the definition, and especially with the
Speaker 2: merging of you know, the richest man in the world
Speaker 2: and the business with the government and you know, I mean,
Speaker 2: we have a raft of executive orders that are enlisting
Speaker 2: the military in draconian border policies like you know, not
Speaker 2: to be whatever. But like you said, words do have meaning,
Speaker 2: and if you look through the definition, yeah, I think
Speaker 2: I think it fits. I think that I do think
Speaker 2: that this is a fascist administration that at its core
Speaker 2: that is in power. I think Elon is obviously a
Speaker 2: key part of that.
Speaker 4: So that's what I would say.
Speaker 3: I mean, I just think this will go on forever.
Speaker 3: But I mean again, it's like it's deeply within the
Speaker 3: American context, which I don't think has always been core.
Speaker 1: I mean fascist.
Speaker 2: The American context is Florida with fascism in the paw
Speaker 2: so I don't.
Speaker 4: It's not Americas as.
Speaker 3: Long as it's being qualified, like that's fine, But it's
Speaker 3: like again, like terms I think are important, and I
Speaker 3: also think they should be reserved for extraordinary things. So
Speaker 3: if we had Reichstag fires, false flags, militarization, end of government,
Speaker 3: and then the fusing of the economy and the state,
Speaker 3: then sure, I'll talk about fascism until that, as long
Speaker 3: as there's a court system and what Congress, which can
Speaker 3: frequently and often does change, and a democratic populace it
Speaker 3: frequently changes its mind and has the ability.
Speaker 1: To have pushback, et cetera.
Speaker 3: Like to say they're living in fascist countries frankly insane.
Speaker 3: I mean, you can say that there's fascist tendencies or
Speaker 3: would want to be you know, fine, I mean think
Speaker 3: all of those are okay, but.
Speaker 4: I think it would want to be.
Speaker 2: And you know, this is what I've expressed for a
Speaker 2: while that I think this administration, because there are no
Speaker 2: real checks left, because there are no real guardrails left,
Speaker 2: will be able to more fully exercise those tendencies this
Speaker 2: time around. And you know, I think there's already some
Speaker 2: significant signs of that.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I mean, like again, if we're using the idea of
Speaker 3: executive power or use.
Speaker 1: To the military or whatever.
Speaker 3: If that's always fascist, then that erases the meaning. No,
Speaker 3: but if that's the tendency, then it erases the meaning
Speaker 3: of that, and then that means then that FDR, who
Speaker 3: often did many of the same things that Trump is
Speaker 3: currently doing, actually far more in terms of his executive power.
Speaker 2: Fascism is explicitly right wing.
Speaker 1: No, not necessarily, No, he started out as.
Speaker 2: A social definition of fascism. Any basic definition that you
Speaker 2: would look up online with just one of the descriptors.
Speaker 4: Would be far right.
Speaker 3: Well, it's difficult, and that's more because of a connotative
Speaker 3: with the Hitlerism. If we actually look and study like
Speaker 3: the history of fascism with Italy, a lot of it
Speaker 3: started out as is left wing that got fused with nationalism.
Speaker 3: Kind of beside, the point issue is not about right
Speaker 3: wing per se.
Speaker 1: It's we're talking about tendencies.
Speaker 3: Like the reason why you're using the term is because
Speaker 3: of actions like military or executive order. Those are standard
Speaker 3: executive powers under the American imperial presidency.
Speaker 1: Well again.
Speaker 2: To the stenship, which is part of the constitution, is
Speaker 2: not a standard.
Speaker 1: Executive Okay, But if it gets struck invoking.
Speaker 4: The Foreign Enemies Act? Is that what it's called foreign?
Speaker 2: Yeah, the Alien Enemies Act, which is what was used
Speaker 2: to justify Japanese internment and has never been used in
Speaker 2: this context. Like, that's not an ordinary executive order. So
Speaker 2: you know, I mean these and and again partly this
Speaker 2: will play on in terms of how far to Strump
Speaker 2: want to go because if some of these things do
Speaker 2: get struck down by the Supreme Court, and which is
Speaker 2: no guarantee, because the Supreme Court is more or less
Speaker 2: on his side at this point, and he's like, I
Speaker 2: don't care, I'm doing it anyway.
Speaker 4: I don't you think that that's a possible buility he.
Speaker 3: Does that, then that would be Ah, do I think
Speaker 3: it's a possibility honestly?
Speaker 1: No, especially on birthday because.
Speaker 4: When we talked about earlier, you said you thought it.
Speaker 3: Was possible, no the birthright students. I said, yeah, anything
Speaker 3: is possible. But like, do I think that that's the
Speaker 3: most likely outcome?
Speaker 1: Absolutely not.
Speaker 3: No, I mean there's no evidence of that previously. Now
Speaker 3: you know this, I mean even the whole Andrew Jackson thing,
Speaker 3: Like we really think that's gonna fly like today, So look,
Speaker 3: we're going to base it back, and this I have
Speaker 3: no idea. Also the political utility of this, because Nazism itself,
Speaker 3: I think is commonly understood to mean what I think
Speaker 3: it means, and so when the term is misappropriated and
Speaker 3: applied as it was to Donald Trump and then rejected
Speaker 3: at the ballot box, it causes a loss of credibility
Speaker 3: in media, and also really make also makes it more
Speaker 3: difficult if you want to criticize actual Nazis about a
Speaker 3: lot of this stuff. So conflation makes it more difficult
Speaker 3: to have nuance or even interesting conversation around any of
Speaker 3: these issues. And I really think this is the democratic
Speaker 3: socialist communist argument is the perfect one. Do you know
Speaker 3: how many people called FDR communists back in his time?
Speaker 3: Do I think he's a communist?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 3: But the reason why was because any sort of social
Speaker 3: government or any of that, even if it's supported.
Speaker 4: By the people. Let me ask you this.
Speaker 2: So Trump calls people like Kamala Harrison whatever communists all
Speaker 2: the time, Yeah, all the time?
Speaker 1: How many times? I say you don't?
Speaker 2: But do you think do you think that has caused
Speaker 2: him a loss of credibility? Do you think that that's
Speaker 2: to diminish his standing?
Speaker 4: Blah blah blah.
Speaker 1: That's a good question.
Speaker 3: Actually, I mean, honestly, don't you think kind of has
Speaker 3: with a lot of people, because we've talked a lot about.
Speaker 4: This in the fact to work for him pretty well,
Speaker 4: to be honest with you, No, but.
Speaker 3: We've talked in the past how they used to say
Speaker 3: that about Joe Biden, and most people didn't believe Joe Biden.
Speaker 2: I'm pretty sure he called Kamala a fascist and a communist.
Speaker 3: Don't know, and called Republicans always called Democrats communists.
Speaker 2: And that's why I think it is like there's so
Speaker 2: much smoke for people being like Trump's a fascist and
Speaker 2: here's why, and here's the reasons.
Speaker 4: But when he.
Speaker 2: Does it, and when Republicans constantly do it all the time,
Speaker 2: it's like, yeah, that's fine, it doesn't cost their cause
Speaker 2: a loss of credit.
Speaker 1: Right, Like that doesn't mean you should play the same game.
Speaker 2: Now I'm not the same game because when I like,
Speaker 2: it's like the idea that Kamala Harris as a communist
Speaker 2: is so preposterous.
Speaker 4: The like, if you look.
Speaker 2: At the definition of fascism, you know, far right, ultranationalist,
Speaker 2: militaristic off in a ligne directly, like, you know, co
Speaker 2: opting large parts of big business.
Speaker 4: I think there's a pretty reasonable case to be made.
Speaker 4: One may disagree, and you are fair.
Speaker 2: It's perfectly fine for you to disagree, and we've had
Speaker 2: this disagreement before.
Speaker 4: It's cetera, et cetera.
Speaker 2: But I do feel the way you do of like
Speaker 2: well wards top meaning, and this seems to fit the
Speaker 2: you know, fit to a te pretty close.
Speaker 1: But I made an awkward movement. I mean, that's where
Speaker 1: I'm just looking.
Speaker 4: An awkward movement.
Speaker 3: Part of the reason why I feel and hate this
Speaker 3: whole conversation is just so fucking stupid in my opinion, Like, look,
Speaker 3: at the end of the day, I don't think most
Speaker 3: people think Elan is a Nazi, So you know, like
Speaker 3: what are we doing here. We're analyzing the movement of
Speaker 3: Elon because it's like an autistic, spastic weird though, Like
Speaker 3: if an autistic kid did that at a celebration for
Speaker 3: a school, what do you think we would all think?
Speaker 1: We're like, oh, you know.
Speaker 4: It's like its ablest. I'm being ableist right.
Speaker 3: Now, I guess, yeah, good question, that's that's perfect. We
Speaker 3: should Elon is neurodiversion that's what all of you people
Speaker 3: are not.
Speaker 4: I'm sorry his.
Speaker 3: Neurodivergence has his neurodiversence is not being appropriately applied to
Speaker 3: the context within all of this.
Speaker 4: I just well, the ADL agree, Why it's.
Speaker 1: So important, Well, that's where the ADL is currying favor
Speaker 1: with power.
Speaker 3: Okay, that's a different story the ADL.
Speaker 2: Yeah, go ahead and put the ADL thing up, because
Speaker 2: at least then we can end by both shitting on
Speaker 2: the ADL. They you know, this is the group that
Speaker 2: if you do a rally chant that they don't like,
Speaker 2: it's a hate crime. If you wear a cafia, it's
Speaker 2: an anti Semitic attack. I mean, we showed you, showed
Speaker 2: you the move. Soger disagrees. It does look many people
Speaker 2: are saying though it does look like sighail. It does
Speaker 2: look like it. But the ADL no smoke for Elon.
Speaker 2: Of course, this is a delicate moment. It's a new day,
Speaker 2: so many are on edge. Politics are inflamed, and social
Speaker 2: media only adds the anxiety. It seems that Elon Musk
Speaker 2: made an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm, not
Speaker 2: a Nazi salute. But again, we appreciate that people are
Speaker 2: on edge in this moment. All sides should give one
Speaker 2: another a bit of grace, perhaps even the benefit of doubt,
Speaker 2: and take a breath. This is a new beginning. Let's
Speaker 2: hope for healing and worked or unity in the months
Speaker 2: and years ahead. I mean curring favor with power number one.
Speaker 2: Number two, I mean Elon supports the Israeli genocide and
Speaker 2: kaza and that's probably their primary goal and concern. So
Speaker 2: if you're good on that, then you can do whatever
Speaker 2: else else you know you want, And you're pretty much
Speaker 2: going to be good to go with regard to the ADL.
Speaker 1: No one can accuse me hypocrisy on the ADL issue.
Speaker 3: Ironically, if you recall, Elon was heavily against the ADL
Speaker 3: back in the day. But the ADL wants to keep
Speaker 3: curry themselves up with power with the Trump administration with Elon,
Speaker 3: I think they correc see this as like this, you know,
Speaker 3: kind of like Twitter type controversy media thing that doesn't
Speaker 3: have any actual influence or whatever, and they want to
Speaker 3: stay cozied up like Miriam Aidelson is one of their
Speaker 3: biggest donors, right, and they want access and continued ability
Speaker 3: to influence us censorship and power, and so within all
Speaker 3: of this context it makes perfect sense. And yes, I
Speaker 3: agree they're total hypocrites because in the past this is
Speaker 3: exactly the type of thing that they would have latched
Speaker 3: onto and they have frequently derided.
Speaker 2: In Well, if it was a college kid doing the
Speaker 2: same thing, you know, at a you know, college kid
Speaker 2: with aspergers doing the same thing, I agree with that
Speaker 2: at a pro That's why I think both are bad.
Speaker 3: They would you know, I mean, there's plenty of screen
Speaker 3: grabs Crystal of people in Kefia's doing Zhile's Like should
Speaker 3: we take them seriously or do I correctly see? Like, Okay, yeah,
Speaker 3: there's some real anti Semites who are probably doing this.
Speaker 3: The vast majority of people who I know who are
Speaker 3: pro pal sign are not anti Semitic. You're just horrified
Speaker 3: by the action. I think the same thing with Elon.
Speaker 3: That's what I'm trying to say. I'm giving people a
Speaker 3: benefit of the doubt here, like and not even benefit
Speaker 3: of the doubt, but just like exparsing the overall thing
Speaker 3: and then trying to cast it correctly for what the
Speaker 3: core motivation is, Like, are this the core motivation for
Speaker 3: Donald Trump?
Speaker 1: Every day?
Speaker 3: When it gets up to be a fascist, hitlarian dictator,
Speaker 3: Like no, is this core motivation for the people who
Speaker 3: support Elon or even Elon himself. Elon, all he cares
Speaker 3: about is making more money. That's not fascist, you know.
Speaker 3: If anything, it's as American tale, as old as time
Speaker 3: is to try and to curry favor with the incoming administration.
Speaker 3: So anyway, I just I really don't think that this
Speaker 3: does any service to good discourse to politics. And I
Speaker 3: think most people who see this stuff rightfully think it's
Speaker 3: just so stupid bullshit, and I think it loses a
Speaker 3: lot of credibility honestly, people like the media CNN and
Speaker 3: others like Pushing trying to turn this into a thing
Speaker 3: like it just feels exactly like so many of those
Speaker 3: Trump controversies which Push pushed actively pushed a lot of
Speaker 3: people away from me.
Speaker 4: You know, I would have agreed with obviously.
Speaker 2: I do think he knew what he was doing here,
Speaker 2: So we'll put that to aid the side. I actually
Speaker 2: would have maybe agreed with that point previously. But then
Speaker 2: I'm like, well, the Republican Trump like they do that
Speaker 2: shit all the time. Call every fascist, send me the
Speaker 2: people like communists, blah, blah blah, and.
Speaker 4: Doesn't seem to have hurt them too much.
Speaker 2: He's he said way more like extreme insane things about
Speaker 2: Kamala Harris than she ever said about him and her
Speaker 2: like when she made the case he was a fascist,
Speaker 2: which by the way, is not just something I said,
Speaker 2: It's something that people like Mark Milly, who served with
Speaker 2: him also said. The reason the reason, Yeah, well, at
Speaker 2: least he was there to be like, let's not shoot
Speaker 2: protesters in the likes, which is also a behavior I
Speaker 2: believe of a you know, a fascist inclined individual. But
Speaker 2: in any case, that was the context of which that
Speaker 2: came up.
Speaker 4: And Trump has like called her every name in the book.
Speaker 4: So the idea that like, oh, you were too.
Speaker 2: Mean to him and that's why you didn't have that,
Speaker 2: I just don't buy it.
Speaker 4: I don't buy it. I just don't think that that's
Speaker 4: the lesson of this election.
Speaker 2: When the guy who was the most obnoxious and the
Speaker 2: meanest and the most divisive and the most playing to
Speaker 2: this like tribal in group out group mentality, that's the
Speaker 2: guy that won. So I'm just not you know, I'm
Speaker 2: not as persuaded by that point as I perhaps would
Speaker 2: have once been.
Speaker 1: I don't think that's a bad point.
Speaker 3: I think the reason why it is hypocritical fundamentally is
Speaker 3: that right wing culture kind of itself is basically right
Speaker 3: wing culture, and criticism of the mainstream is still seen
Speaker 3: as insurgent, and thus is one where paying the price
Speaker 3: and the you know, the checking action like what you're
Speaker 3: talking about is not one which is going to land
Speaker 3: similarly with that audience, as opposed to when Trump says
Speaker 3: so and so is a communist. And I mean, look,
Speaker 3: I'm how many times have I said here before. I
Speaker 3: think calling people communists is stupid. I think calling Bernie
Speaker 3: a communist and all that is foolish. He should actually
Speaker 3: debate these things on their merits and actually dive into them,
Speaker 3: and that you know, if we stoop to the oh
Speaker 3: this is Marxist, oh this is socialist stuff, you actually
Speaker 3: lose any ability to win over somebody who was a
Speaker 3: Bernie Sanders order. But you know what, maybe you're right
Speaker 3: because Trump called Kamma and all of them communists and
Speaker 3: he wanted tell me.
Speaker 1: And he called her a fascists.
Speaker 2: Yeah he I mean, all all of these things were said.
Speaker 2: So I think it matters a lot about Listen, I
Speaker 2: mean Trump is also able to get away with things
Speaker 2: that people other people aren't. Yes, true, But the thing
Speaker 2: Derek Thompson when we had him on said about how
Speaker 2: it wrote in his piece about how Trump really capitalized
Speaker 2: on the social media all tribe no village dynamic where
Speaker 2: everything is about just like tribal in group out group signaling.
Speaker 2: And so it wasn't that he won in spite of
Speaker 2: calling Kamala a communist and a fascist and an enemy of.
Speaker 4: The people or whatever. It's in part because of that.
Speaker 2: I think that that is I think that's an important insight.
Speaker 2: It's a bad insight, like it's bad for politics and
Speaker 2: it's bad for the future, et cetera. But I you know,
Speaker 2: I don't think that he's necessarily wrong about that.
Speaker 4: That he knows how.
Speaker 2: Politics is inherently divisive, and this is something Democrats are
Speaker 2: stupid and run away from, right they are so afraid
Speaker 2: of conflict and whatever or like, can't make a decision,
Speaker 2: blah blah blah. Trump sees this as a divisive conflict
Speaker 2: and he is going to draw the lines of that
Speaker 2: divide and aggressively so and unrelentingly so. And so that's
Speaker 2: why because he is the person who shaped that divide
Speaker 2: and drew the line and enforced it in the most aggressive,
Speaker 2: vigorous way you possibly could. He's the victor and so
Speaker 2: so yeah, I think you know that doesn't mean that,
Speaker 2: like it was the best argument for Hi for Kamla
Speaker 2: to make about like fascism or whatever. But I think
Speaker 2: that central insight of like, you have to have a
Speaker 2: device of politics, you have to draw the divide in
Speaker 2: a way that is politically beneficial to you. I think
Speaker 2: Trump understands that. Nooid JOm Croston.
Speaker 1: I let's end it on that, because I totally agree.
Speaker 3: With that, Okay, r I go, I just I think
Speaker 3: evidence has shown us the Nazi one doesn't really work.
Speaker 3: You got to find something else. You got to find
Speaker 3: something that hits with people. Maybe it will hit with people,
Speaker 3: people could start actually turning against it, but I'm somewhat
Speaker 3: doubtful personally at this point, especially in this shitcoin illegal
Speaker 3: gam or pro gambling era. Anyways, that's a way longer conversation, Chris,
Speaker 3: So I enjoyed doing the stream. How long we've been
Speaker 3: going for two hours and twenty minutes. Yeah, I think
Speaker 3: that's pretty good.
Speaker 1: Guys like it. Thank you very much.
Speaker 3: You can sign up Breaking Points Premium subscriber at breakingpoints
Speaker 3: dot com. Maybe we'll do this something like this and
Speaker 3: again in the wild do I mean it's free wheeling.
Speaker 3: Like you got to ask about the Aussie Open thing.
Speaker 3: I was like, you know, it was just fun and
Speaker 3: then here you know, we're not worried about time and
Speaker 3: putting the show out or whatever.
Speaker 4: True, I'm really.
Speaker 1: Actually enjoying it.
Speaker 3: We can just talk as much as we want. And honestly,
Speaker 3: you know, I was watching some of the live numbers.
Speaker 3: It didn't really go down that much. We're talking for
Speaker 3: twenty or thirty minutes.
Speaker 1: So I was like, hey, maybe it works.
Speaker 4: Yeah, maybe I do it like once a week.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well that's a lot. Okay, maybe maybe we'll talk.
Speaker 2: We have some figure on. Yeah, it's a totally different
Speaker 2: business model too. I have to think about all those things.
Speaker 2: But anyway, it was fun. Thank you guys. Interesting week
Speaker 2: and Counterpoints that be here for you tomorrow. Will be
Speaker 2: back for you Thursday, so we'll see you then.