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Speaker 1: Joining me now is my friend David Sachs.

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Speaker 2: He's the venture capitalist at Craft Ventures and host of

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Speaker 2: the All In podcast.

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Speaker 1: David, it's great to step in person, my friend.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, good to be here.

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Speaker 1: All right.

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Speaker 2: So, David, you were the Cassandra on Ukraine. You have

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Speaker 2: been now for two years, far before it was in vogue.

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Speaker 2: So day one, the Ukraine War is happening you all

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Speaker 2: of a sudden, I mean, in some people's estimation, I think,

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Speaker 2: especially for the Neoconzi come out of nowhere and you're

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Speaker 2: very counter narrative.

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Speaker 1: So where did that come from? Just give us some

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Speaker 1: of the background as.

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Speaker 2: To why you decide to speak out on the conflict

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Speaker 2: from very very early days and really be intimately involved

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Speaker 2: in trying to help shape the narrative away from the

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Speaker 2: mainstream on Ukraine eight, on how the Ukrainians were doing,

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Speaker 2: and on some of the historical background of the conflict.

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Speaker 4: Well, I started paying attention to it in January of

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Speaker 4: twenty twenty two because we covered it on our podcast. So,

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Speaker 4: like you mentioned, All In as a weekly podcast, we

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Speaker 4: do current events, a lot of business and markets. We

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Speaker 4: also do geopolitics and politics at any event. In January

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Speaker 4: of twenty twenty two, the media star reporting that there

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Speaker 4: was this conflict that could even become a war, And

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Speaker 4: you know, I was a little bit familiar with the

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Speaker 4: conflict and with the idea that NATO expansion was something

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Speaker 4: that the Russians really didn't like, and so I started

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Speaker 4: advocating on the pod that just we should just take

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Speaker 4: NATO expansion off the table. That's clearly a huge irritant

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Speaker 4: here in the situation. And even if you believe that

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Speaker 4: Putin is just using that as a pretext for whatever

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Speaker 4: he's going to do, we should rob him of that

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Speaker 4: pretext by just saying that, you know, EU Craine's not

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Speaker 4: going to become part of NATO. So I started saying

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Speaker 4: that on the pod before the war broke out, and

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Speaker 4: then when the war broke out, I gave a talk

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Speaker 4: here at an American Moment reiterating that position. And the

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Speaker 4: more I kind of got into it and the more

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Speaker 4: I sort of researched it, the more I realized that

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Speaker 4: this was all kind of the result of a deliberate

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Speaker 4: US policy, kind of a Neocon policy that either wanted

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Speaker 4: this war or certainly wasn't willing to avoid this war.

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Speaker 4: That NATO expansion they weren't willing to take no expansion

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Speaker 4: off the table to avoid the war. So so yeah,

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Speaker 4: I just started speaking out about it, I guess, using

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Speaker 4: my channels to talk about it, and the more resistance

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Speaker 4: I got, I'd say, the more hysterical resistance I got,

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Speaker 4: the more that kind of encouraged me. I guess I'm

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Speaker 4: just kind of stupid that way. And so here we

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Speaker 4: are two years later.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, you, in particularly, you drive these people crazy in

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Speaker 2: a way that I honestly aspired to.

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Speaker 1: I wish I could be in their heads.

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Speaker 2: I mean, I guess the criticism that I often see

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Speaker 2: is like this guy is a sass adventure capitalist.

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Speaker 1: I doesn't even know what he's talking about.

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Speaker 2: But I mean, in my estimation, youment far more correct

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Speaker 2: on the conflict than they have.

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Speaker 1: So then where are getting your information from?

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Speaker 2: I mean, this is a question that we get to

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Speaker 2: here all the time, like where do you guys get

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Speaker 2: this information we talked previously, I know about like Advika others.

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Speaker 1: You know, we're looking at open source channels.

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Speaker 2: Why and where can you look to get the real

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Speaker 2: information you can help our audience maybe look in the

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Speaker 2: same places.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, so it's a very interesting question. So what you

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Speaker 4: do when you're an investor or. When you're an investor,

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Speaker 4: you have a track record. It's very easy to size

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Speaker 4: up an investor based on their track record. I mean,

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Speaker 4: that's all you really have to do with these information

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Speaker 4: channels is what do they say was going to happen

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Speaker 4: and then what actually happened. Nobody ever does that in

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Speaker 4: the information space, So you know, I figured out pretty

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Speaker 4: early which channels were sort of telling the truth and

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Speaker 4: which ones weren't. And the mainstream media in ISW, they

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Speaker 4: were always really shading the truth or not telling us

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Speaker 4: what was really happening in the war, and independent channels

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Speaker 4: were the ones that were giving the information that turned

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Speaker 4: out to be accurate. And I think the Battle of

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Speaker 4: Bachmot was really a turning point where I could clearly

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Speaker 4: see you had the independent channels I really came to

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Speaker 4: rely on saying that the Russians were actually winning, whereas

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Speaker 4: IW and the mainstream media were saying that the Russian

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Speaker 4: attack had culminated, that was the big word. The independent

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Speaker 4: channels were saying, actually, the Russians they created a cauldron,

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Speaker 4: so it's sort of culmination versus cauldron. Turned out the

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Speaker 4: cauldron was exactly correct. That the Ukrainians basically destroyed themselves

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Speaker 4: by pouring all these resources in and then with the

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Speaker 4: Summer account offensive same thing. So in terms of like

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Speaker 4: who do I respect, who do I listen to? I

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Speaker 4: mean the Duran as a geopolitics podcast where they summarized

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Speaker 4: the war virtually daily. They've turned out to be much

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Speaker 4: more accurate than other sources. Stephen Bryan, who's a columnist

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Speaker 4: for I think Asia Times, who's a former Undersecuary Defense

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Speaker 4: so as a weekly call him, he's been very accurate. Daniel,

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Speaker 4: Colonel Daniel Davis has been very good. There's a Twitter

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Speaker 4: account called Aiden who has a podcast called Calibrated with

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Speaker 4: Scott I think is his actual name, and he's turned

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Speaker 4: out to be pretty accurate. I'm probably forgetting there's other

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Speaker 4: ones to but yeah, this.

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Speaker 1: Is because people ask us the same thing.

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Speaker 2: And this is you know, you're someone that I really

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Speaker 2: look to, you know, for my information, which I'm sure

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Speaker 2: people will call me out on. But I mean, I

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Speaker 2: guess it gets back to the track rider question and

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Speaker 2: what you're talking about with the conflict. But at the

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Speaker 2: base like passion level, I mean I can assume I

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Speaker 2: know I personally, I mean I've spoken out on BLM,

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Speaker 2: I'm spoken on COVID a lot of things. I have

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Speaker 2: never seen any more pushback, and on NATO expansion on

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Speaker 2: Ukraine specifically, it might be the single most controversial topic.

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Speaker 2: So why do you feel passionate about it? Like, why

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Speaker 2: do you even care? You know, you've got this investment

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Speaker 2: thing going on. I would assume this is probably not

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Speaker 2: the best thing for that, you know, in terms of

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Speaker 2: some of the people, the milliu that you surround yourself with.

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Speaker 1: So why do you care?

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Speaker 3: Well?

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Speaker 4: I just can't believe what a big blunder the United

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Speaker 4: States is making. I mean, this was a horrible policy decision.

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Speaker 4: This is easily the biggest foreign policy mistake by the

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Speaker 4: US since the Iraq War. It might end up being

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Speaker 4: a bigger mistake than the Iraq War. It was entirely avoidable,

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Speaker 4: and yet you have the whole mainstream media stampeding us

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Speaker 4: into this policy and the sort of the taboo they're

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Speaker 4: trying to create around it, where a lot like the

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Speaker 4: Iraq War, where anyone who opposed it was considered unpatriotic

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Speaker 4: or sort of treasonous. That's the argument that you're making

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Speaker 4: that is made today. In fact, I think it's even

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Speaker 4: worse the sort of the consensus that they're trying to

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Speaker 4: manufacture around this. So I think that I guess I

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Speaker 4: wouldn't speak out as much about it if I thought

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Speaker 4: that the issue is being covered accurately, and it is

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Speaker 4: such an important issue. I mean, this could lead to

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Speaker 4: World War three, or what I call woke War three,

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Speaker 4: if we're not careful. So I think that, you know,

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Speaker 4: just again, the magnitude of the policy mistake and the

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Speaker 4: importance of the issue relative to how inaccurately it's been

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Speaker 4: covered sort of encourages me to kind of keep posting

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Speaker 4: about it.

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Speaker 1: What do you mean by world War three? Dig into

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Speaker 1: that a little bit.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, Well, one of the things I noticed early on

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Speaker 4: in this war is that there's been a fusion of

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Speaker 4: the woke left and the neocon right in supporting this war,

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Speaker 4: and they both support the same cancelation tactics. They've both

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Speaker 4: tried to make it unacceptable to support the idea of

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Speaker 4: a negotiated settlement. Apparently any kind of peaceful resolution in

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Speaker 4: the conflict other than total Ukrainian victory is pro Russian

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Speaker 4: in their view, And you know, and it's you saw

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Speaker 4: this actually, remember when Elon came out pretty early in

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Speaker 4: the war with his peace proposal. I think this is

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Speaker 4: in I think this must have been around September of

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Speaker 4: twenty twenty two.

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Speaker 2: That sounds right, Yeah, it was in the height of

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Speaker 2: the ukn't craze.

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Speaker 4: Right right, exactly, yeah, And it is a craze. And

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Speaker 4: Zelenski himself came out to denounce that Elon's proposal as

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Speaker 4: pro Russian and there was this huge pylon. But that

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Speaker 4: and that's just one example. But the point is just

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Speaker 4: anyone who has contracted the official narrative basically gets demonized

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Speaker 4: as as pro putin, a puppet for the outside, what

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Speaker 4: have you. And the problem with this is that it

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Speaker 4: creates a one way ratchet because there's only one acceptable position,

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Speaker 4: which is to keep escalating the war. And that is

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Speaker 4: in fact what we've seen. I mean, the administration has

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Speaker 4: continuously escalated the type of support they're going to provide.

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Speaker 4: In the beginning, Biden said that providing things like F

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Speaker 4: sixteen's or Abram's tanks or long range missiles could start

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Speaker 4: World War three. Now they've done all those things. So

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Speaker 4: we've seen this pattern where the thing that initially was

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Speaker 4: considered to be too risky eventually you know, it becomes normalized.

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Speaker 4: And the discussion we're having right now, led by European

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Speaker 4: leaders like Macron, is what we send in ground troops.

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Speaker 4: And again this has been dismissed now, but the pattern

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Speaker 4: we've seen is this thing starts to get kind of

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Speaker 4: normalized by talking about it, the fearor sort of dies down,

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Speaker 4: and then the deep sate kind of does what they want.

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Speaker 4: So I think it's very important that there is actually

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Speaker 4: like a healthy public debate about this question because it

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Speaker 4: could lead somewhere even more disastrous than it's already led.

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Speaker 1: I totally agree.

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Speaker 2: So give us the kind of the forks of the

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Speaker 2: decisions where for where we go from here? So as

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Speaker 2: you said, you know, we've Macrone and Germany kind of

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Speaker 2: in a spat here, and so it's like Macrone and

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Speaker 2: the Brits and then Germany kind of weirdly in the

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Speaker 2: middle somewhere where do the Europeans do?

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Speaker 1: What do you think that they're going to do? What

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Speaker 1: do you think the US is going to do?

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Speaker 2: Let's say we have two forks here some aid, no aid,

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Speaker 2: and then finally the Ukrainians kind of in this question,

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Speaker 2: where are some possible like decision trees.

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Speaker 1: We could see the conflict going well.

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Speaker 4: It's very interesting the debate you're seeing in Europe. The

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Speaker 4: pressure is really on o Love Schultz right now to

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Speaker 4: deliver these these Taurists missiles, these long range missiles. Jen Stoltenberg,

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Speaker 4: the Secretary of General of Natives, already said that it's

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Speaker 4: now acceptable for the Ukrainians to hit targets inside of Russia.

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Speaker 4: And then you've got Macron saying that that he's trying

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Speaker 4: to normalize the idea of ground troops. So where all

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Speaker 4: of this is headed is World War three if we

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Speaker 4: go for it. It's kind of ironic that Macron's the

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Speaker 4: one pushing this because he's the one in the past

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Speaker 4: he's always talked about strategic autonomy for Europe, that you're

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Speaker 4: atuet making its own decisions. Apparently what he means by

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Speaker 4: that is that Europe should be even more hawkish than

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Speaker 4: the United States, that Europe should adopt the American position,

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Speaker 4: but actually push it even further. It's not that Europe

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Speaker 4: should rethink whether the American position on this war is

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Speaker 4: actually good for them. The American position on this ward

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Speaker 4: has been disastrous for Europe. It's basically, especially Germany has

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Speaker 4: plunged the europe tribes exactly.

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Speaker 3: So in any of.

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Speaker 4: That that that's sort of the debate that's been set

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Speaker 4: up in terms of where this goes from here. We

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Speaker 4: will either escalate or the Ukraine will lose. It's very simple.

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Speaker 4: I mean, there's nothing really we can do any more

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Speaker 4: to help them. And whether this sixty billion or not

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Speaker 4: past this doesn't matter. We're out of ammunition to give them.

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Speaker 4: I mean, uless we're going to deplete the stock policy

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Speaker 4: at a reserved for our own readiness, which would be

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Speaker 4: very dangerous. I would though, yes, it is possible, but

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Speaker 4: the bottom line is we don't have the ammunition and

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Speaker 4: they don't have the manpower anymore so, and they wasted

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Speaker 4: a lot of time when they should have been building

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Speaker 4: defensive fortifications. They were sort of charging headlong into the

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Speaker 4: minefields and during the sum counter offensive. So it's entirely

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Speaker 4: too late now I think for Ukraine to be building

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Speaker 4: the proper kinds of defensive fortifications that they need. So

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Speaker 4: the simple reality is what you're seeing right now is

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Speaker 4: it's not a stalemate. It's never been a stale mat

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Speaker 4: It's always been a war of attrition. The Ukrainians have

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Speaker 4: been at treated the Russians are getting more powerful. They

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Speaker 4: have more soldiers, are enlisting, more coming out of training,

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Speaker 4: and their industrial capacity is really ramping up. They have

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Speaker 4: this huge industrial war machine that they inherited from the

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Speaker 4: Soviet Union east of the Urals. It's now been fully

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Speaker 4: ramped up and is producing more of everything, more of artillery, shells, drones, tanks, planes, everything.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, And you know it's interesting because you go back

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Speaker 2: to twenty twenty two, I think it fell out for

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Speaker 2: some of those two. You're like, man, these Russians, you

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Speaker 2: can't even beat the Ukrainians, right, And it's like, wow,

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Speaker 2: three years later, you've replaced every single one of these

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Speaker 2: dead people with conscripts. Doesn't seem to be that much

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Speaker 2: consternation Domestically. You produce in four and a half million shells.

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Speaker 2: Europe can barely deliver half a million. If we were

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Speaker 2: to get into some port of prolonged conflict Russia, China.

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Speaker 1: Whatever, do you think America?

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Speaker 2: How long do you think it would take America to

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Speaker 2: actually reach full readiness? Because I fear, a truly fear,

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Speaker 2: that this war has only exposed and then further depleted

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Speaker 2: us to the point where it could take years to

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Speaker 2: be able to ramp up production, even if we were

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Speaker 2: to really be in a situation where we had a

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Speaker 2: genuine strategic interest in front of us and we may

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Speaker 2: have to make some serious concessions.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, I think the war has really exposed the extent

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Speaker 4: to which we've deindustrialized ourselves and how we've hallowed out

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Speaker 4: our defense industrial base. If you look at artillery ammunition,

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Speaker 4: for example, at the beginning of the war, we were

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Speaker 4: producing about fourteen thousand shells a month. We're now what

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Speaker 4: two years into it, and they've only as of a

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Speaker 4: few months ago, what I saw publicly reported was that

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Speaker 4: they had roughly doubled production to twenty eight thousand a month.

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Speaker 4: That's still only what is that about three hundred thousand

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Speaker 4: a year. It's one tenth what the Russians can do.

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Speaker 4: It's pathetic, And what the Pentagon has said is that

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Speaker 4: we're going to double it this year and then double

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Speaker 4: it next year. That's still only gets you to generously

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Speaker 4: one hundred thousand a month, which is a quarter to

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Speaker 4: a third maybe of what the Russians can do now,

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Speaker 4: never mind what they're going to be able to do

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Speaker 4: in two years.

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Speaker 3: So we have figured out or learned.

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Speaker 4: I think just how pathetic our dib or has become.

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Speaker 4: And the other thing we've learned is that it is

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Speaker 4: how inefficient it is. So the Newer Times reported that

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Speaker 4: the cost to the United States are producing one artillery

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Speaker 4: shells in the five to six thousand dollars range, it

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Speaker 4: costs the Russians six hundred dollars. So now, at the

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Speaker 4: beginning of the war, You're right, the Russians were accused

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Speaker 4: of being this incredibly inept kleptocracy. The idea is that

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Speaker 4: their military was hollow colass because you know, their kleptocracy

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Speaker 4: had stolen everything. Well, as it turns out, we're ten

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Speaker 4: times more inefficient than they are. So what does that

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Speaker 4: make us If they're a acocracy oligarchic kleptocracy, we just

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Speaker 4: have a different kind of kleptocracy.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, let's say.

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Speaker 2: And that's the fascinating part is you know, in many

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Speaker 2: ways people part of the case for Ukraine is we

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Speaker 2: got to weeken Russia. And I'm like, well, it seems

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Speaker 2: as if every step that we've made and by par

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Speaker 2: attracting the conflict, you blood the army. It's very key

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Speaker 2: if we go in the history of military conflict. We've

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Speaker 2: rapidly increased their industrialization for their defense capacity. They have

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Speaker 2: become more sanctioned proofd today than ever before. I mean,

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Speaker 2: they seem better capable of mounting even more arrest of

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Speaker 2: action against the West. I'm not shaying that they want

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Speaker 2: to necessarily that before the war had happened. On top

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Speaker 2: of adding some eight hundred miles to our NATO border

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Speaker 2: with the expansion, which goes to the root of the

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Speaker 2: conflict that we began this interview with.

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Speaker 3: So I call this Biden's big backfire.

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Speaker 4: If you look at all of his claims at the

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Speaker 4: beginning of the war, they've all come true in reverse.

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Speaker 4: He said that we would weaken Russia in order to

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Speaker 4: prevent them from waging this type of war again. In fact,

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Speaker 4: we've made the Russian military stronger. It's larger, it's larger

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Speaker 4: than it was before. It's produced far more weapons, the

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Speaker 4: industrial base is ramped up. Plus it's now battle tested

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Speaker 4: on battle hardened, especially against Western weapons. So it's a

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Speaker 4: much more formidable military Biden has created on the part

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Speaker 4: of the Russians than when we started. Meanwhile, it's the

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Speaker 4: United States that has seen in stockpiles depleted and hollowed out.

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Speaker 4: Then you look at the economic claims that Biden made.

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Speaker 4: He said that sanctions would crush the Russian economy. In fact,

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Speaker 4: the Russian economy is growing faster than any of the

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Speaker 4: G seven economies.

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Speaker 3: It's really booming.

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Speaker 4: And it's our European allies economies that have been crushed

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Speaker 4: by the sanctions. So you know this policy that he's

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Speaker 4: pursued has really boomeranged and again come true in reversed.

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Speaker 4: Then you take the humanitarian claims he said that we

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Speaker 4: would help ease the suffering of the Ukrainians. In fact,

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Speaker 4: we've led to I think our support of this proxy

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Speaker 4: war and our willingness to fight to the last Ukrainian,

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Speaker 4: like Lindsay Graham said, this is the best way we've

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Speaker 4: ever spent, using Ukrainians to kill Russians. This has led

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Speaker 4: to an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe in Ukraine, where something like

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Speaker 4: ten million plus people, mostly women and children, have left

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Speaker 4: the country. I think at least half million casualties killed,

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Speaker 4: are seriously wounded, and the population of the country has

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Speaker 4: reduced from something like forty four million to twenty eight million. Yes,

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Speaker 4: and if you look at the demographic pyramid, something like

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Speaker 4: ten to twelve million or pensioners.

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Speaker 3: They can't really work.

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Speaker 4: So what we've done is really leading to the demographic

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Speaker 4: death in this country.

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Speaker 1: So I want to shift gears a little bit.

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Speaker 2: In the early days of the war in Gaza, you

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Speaker 2: and I, as many others were warning about expanded war

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Speaker 2: in the Middle East. So we're several hundred days now

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Speaker 2: or whatever into the conflict of Gaza.

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Speaker 1: Do you still worry about that?

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Speaker 2: In President Biden's handling, how would you rate the handling

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Speaker 2: of the conflicts so far?

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Speaker 4: Well, what I said about in the wake of October seventh,

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Speaker 4: the first thing I said was that it's a little

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Speaker 4: bit of reminiscent of nine to eleven, that the purpose

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Speaker 4: of an outrageous terrorist attack is usually provoking overreaction. Yes,

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Speaker 4: and I hope that the Israelis would react wisely and

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Speaker 4: not in the nine to eleven manner like the United

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Speaker 4: States did. It's safe to say now that the Israeli

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Speaker 4: reaction is exactly it has to be exactly what a

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Speaker 4: moas wanted, because they've created this humanitarian crisis in Gaza,

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Speaker 4: and it's basically turned the whole Middle East and most

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Speaker 4: of the world against israel I mean that I'm actually

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Speaker 4: shocked by some of the arguments that I'm seeing now

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Speaker 4: that this this sort of decolonization narrative that used to

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Speaker 4: really just be in academic circles has now kind of

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Speaker 4: gone mainstream, and you're seeing lots of people on social

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Speaker 4: media take the position that that that the Israel doesn't

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Speaker 4: have a right to exist, you know, which I strongly

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Speaker 4: disagree with. But I think this has been that reaction

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Speaker 4: has been caused by the way that Israel has reacted

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Speaker 4: to this.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, obviously every reaction is an eco operation, right exactly.

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Speaker 4: Well, I think Biden made a huge mistake of basically

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Speaker 4: going to the Middle East initially and hugging.

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Speaker 3: And Yahoo and giving him a carte blanche.

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Speaker 4: I mean, if you look at the history of the

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Speaker 4: relationship between American presidents and you know, Israel the prime

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Speaker 4: ministers in war, it's usually the American role to pull

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Speaker 4: the Israelis back from going too far. Yes, so you know,

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Speaker 4: Eisenhower stopped these release from going too far with Suez.

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Speaker 4: Let's see, it was Kissinger and Nixon who stoped from

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Speaker 4: going too far. In nine seventy three, Reagan called up

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Speaker 4: Knock and began in nineteen eighty two and said that

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Speaker 4: stop bombing Lebanon, you're creating a holocaust, actually use that word.

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Speaker 4: So it's historically been the American role not to encourage

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Speaker 4: the Israelis to basically go to the limit, but to

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Speaker 4: kind of pull them back before they do something that

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Speaker 4: frankly is not in their own interests, never mind ours.

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Speaker 4: And Biden kind of missed the opportunity to do that,

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Speaker 4: to kind of set some boundaries on what America is

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Speaker 4: willing to support. And I think it's been disastrous for

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Speaker 4: the Israelis. I don't think that what they're doing is

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Speaker 4: in their own interest. When they started bombing Gaza, I

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Speaker 4: basically tweeted that I also got ratio for this, that yeah,

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Speaker 4: Israel has a right to defend itself. What happened on

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Speaker 4: October seventh was an outrage and an atrocity. And yet

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Speaker 4: it's pretty obvious that indiscriminately bombing a civilian population in

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Speaker 4: Gauza is going to backfire horribly on them, right, And

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Speaker 4: that's what I see you happening.

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Speaker 2: So I said that the most controversial thing I've spoken

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Speaker 2: out on is Ukraine. I think the discussion you and

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Speaker 2: I have had, why is this so difficult. So you

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Speaker 2: and I swim in right wing circles. I think it's

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Speaker 2: fair to say, or at least you have, you know,

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Speaker 2: much longer than I have. What you and I are

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Speaker 2: saying right here is anathema for a lot of people,

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Speaker 2: but it's self evidently obvious, especially if you're going to

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Speaker 2: in play, if you were going to embrace a restraint

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Speaker 2: philosophy whenever it comes to Ukraine. It equally applies to

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Speaker 2: the enmeshment that we've had over some twenty some years

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Speaker 2: in the Middle East with respect Israel, and you can

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Speaker 2: say that we should, as you said, take a leading

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Speaker 2: role and we should try to at least concur some

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Speaker 2: restraints for our own sake, if not for you know,

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Speaker 2: the survival of the Israeli state. But I don't see

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Speaker 2: a lot of the discussion, David, amongst the right wing

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Speaker 2: politicians that I am. What explains that?

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Speaker 1: What do you think?

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Speaker 4: Well, I think a lot of people think that the

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Speaker 4: way to be quote pro Israel is just to support

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Speaker 4: Israel no matter what they do, ye And I guess

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Speaker 4: I don't think that's intellectually honest. I mean, look, I

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Speaker 4: want Israel to survive and thrive. I just don't see

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Speaker 4: how the current strategy that they're pursuing is in their

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Speaker 4: long term interest. I mean, at the end of the day,

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Speaker 4: here there's going to be what two million plus Palestinians

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Speaker 4: in Gaza. There's another three million plus in the West Bank.

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Speaker 4: Where are they going to go? What are you going

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Speaker 4: to do with them? I mean, it seems to me

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Speaker 4: that you're radicalizing that population even more. I mean by

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Speaker 4: again by indiscriminately killing civilians, which I don't think you

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Speaker 4: can argue that they're not.

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Speaker 3: At this point.

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Speaker 4: That you know, again you're turning this whole population, you're

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Speaker 4: radicalizing them against you, and then again you're losing the

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Speaker 4: support of the world, which you know may not matter

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Speaker 4: in the next month or two, but eventually it seems

437
00:20:46,040 --> 00:20:48,040
Speaker 4: like it's going to matter. It seems like you look

438
00:20:48,040 --> 00:20:50,320
Speaker 4: at you look at polling of young people in America,

439
00:20:50,359 --> 00:20:52,840
Speaker 4: like eighteen to twenty four year olds, really crazy poor

440
00:20:52,840 --> 00:20:55,760
Speaker 4: result that of eighteen to twenty four year olds, the

441
00:20:55,800 --> 00:20:58,920
Speaker 4: majority belief that Israel's just be handed over to Hamas. Yeah,

442
00:20:58,960 --> 00:21:02,879
Speaker 4: now I think that's an insane view. I mean, I

443
00:21:02,920 --> 00:21:07,240
Speaker 4: don't score anything like that. But Israel's actions are because

444
00:21:07,280 --> 00:21:10,280
Speaker 4: they're going so far are going to fement that type

445
00:21:10,400 --> 00:21:11,359
Speaker 4: of backlash.

446
00:21:11,440 --> 00:21:11,640
Speaker 1: Yeah.

447
00:21:11,760 --> 00:21:13,280
Speaker 2: I mean, look, we saw so much of a different

448
00:21:13,359 --> 00:21:15,800
Speaker 2: after the Iraq War as well, in terms of backlash

449
00:21:15,840 --> 00:21:19,920
Speaker 2: against the United States. It seems again so self evidently obvious.

450
00:21:19,960 --> 00:21:22,399
Speaker 2: And yet, you know, we come back to this restraint

451
00:21:22,440 --> 00:21:24,240
Speaker 2: is philosophy. That's actually something I wanted to talk to

452
00:21:24,240 --> 00:21:26,800
Speaker 2: you a little bit about. I've noticed you. You're one

453
00:21:26,800 --> 00:21:29,680
Speaker 2: of the few people I view as actually principled within

454
00:21:29,720 --> 00:21:31,400
Speaker 2: this discussion. I think a lot of people are very,

455
00:21:31,400 --> 00:21:33,520
Speaker 2: you know, less selectively restrained dis whenever they want to

456
00:21:33,560 --> 00:21:35,639
Speaker 2: be and then not. So who are the people what

457
00:21:35,760 --> 00:21:38,879
Speaker 2: help formed your views? So I've seen you've been attacked previously.

458
00:21:38,920 --> 00:21:40,399
Speaker 2: I think you were on c SPAN in two thousand

459
00:21:40,400 --> 00:21:42,280
Speaker 2: and two advocating for the Iraq War.

460
00:21:42,400 --> 00:21:45,119
Speaker 1: So give us some political philosophy.

461
00:21:44,600 --> 00:21:47,320
Speaker 2: Background of yourself. I you're involved with the teal folks

462
00:21:47,359 --> 00:21:49,159
Speaker 2: and all of that. So what did you read for

463
00:21:49,280 --> 00:21:50,880
Speaker 2: you to arrive at the place that you are today,

464
00:21:50,880 --> 00:21:52,040
Speaker 2: which I think is very unique for a lot of

465
00:21:52,040 --> 00:21:52,720
Speaker 2: people in your position.

466
00:21:52,800 --> 00:21:55,359
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, so I think the two intellectual giants for

467
00:21:55,520 --> 00:21:59,679
Speaker 4: me are John Meerscheimer and Pappy Buchanan. Yes, absolutely, So,

468
00:21:59,760 --> 00:22:02,960
Speaker 4: you know, pat sort of represents this isolationist school of thought,

469
00:22:03,000 --> 00:22:06,160
Speaker 4: and then Meersteim represents this realist school of thought. When

470
00:22:06,200 --> 00:22:08,080
Speaker 4: the two of them agree, I think you can take

471
00:22:08,119 --> 00:22:09,960
Speaker 4: that to the bank like one hundred percent accurate, and

472
00:22:10,000 --> 00:22:12,320
Speaker 4: then when they disagree, you have to think a little

473
00:22:12,320 --> 00:22:14,159
Speaker 4: bit harder about Yeah.

474
00:22:14,200 --> 00:22:16,720
Speaker 2: So yeah, I mean, well, so what were some of

475
00:22:16,720 --> 00:22:18,680
Speaker 2: the big breaking points for you post Iraq?

476
00:22:18,800 --> 00:22:20,600
Speaker 1: Like what happened? Just take us back to that time

477
00:22:20,640 --> 00:22:22,440
Speaker 1: as somebody who was kind of involved in the discourse.

478
00:22:22,880 --> 00:22:26,800
Speaker 4: Well, I wasn't really involved in the discourse around Iraq.

479
00:22:26,840 --> 00:22:29,320
Speaker 4: I mean, some people doing OPO on me discovered some

480
00:22:29,520 --> 00:22:31,960
Speaker 4: clts that that where I was really promoting a book

481
00:22:32,000 --> 00:22:34,919
Speaker 4: about about political correctness at Stanford at the time, and

482
00:22:34,920 --> 00:22:36,520
Speaker 4: then I got a question by Iraq, and really I

483
00:22:36,560 --> 00:22:39,359
Speaker 4: just repeated the conventional wisdom at the time. And I

484
00:22:39,400 --> 00:22:41,919
Speaker 4: think that when I saw the result of the Iraq

485
00:22:42,040 --> 00:22:44,520
Speaker 4: War and that we had been led into it, I

486
00:22:44,600 --> 00:22:47,640
Speaker 4: mean so egregiously, and I don't think there's any other

487
00:22:47,640 --> 00:22:51,760
Speaker 4: word for the untruth that we were told about it,

488
00:22:52,119 --> 00:22:55,080
Speaker 4: that started to really change my point of view on

489
00:22:55,160 --> 00:22:59,760
Speaker 4: this Neokon forum policy. I mean, are going into Iraq

490
00:22:59,760 --> 00:23:01,879
Speaker 4: and the and I mean it wasn't just Iraq who

491
00:23:01,880 --> 00:23:04,440
Speaker 4: was also staying in Afghanistan for twenty years. It was

492
00:23:04,560 --> 00:23:08,639
Speaker 4: the you know, the covert war we waged against Syria,

493
00:23:09,320 --> 00:23:11,080
Speaker 4: what we did in Libya. I mean, these things were

494
00:23:11,200 --> 00:23:15,960
Speaker 4: it was a total fiasco. We unleashed you know, incredible

495
00:23:15,960 --> 00:23:19,159
Speaker 4: amounts of death and destruction, created this huge refugee problem.

496
00:23:19,520 --> 00:23:20,119
Speaker 3: In any event, I.

497
00:23:20,080 --> 00:23:22,439
Speaker 4: Don't need to recite all of that, but yeah, I

498
00:23:22,440 --> 00:23:26,760
Speaker 4: think anybody who lived through that and didn't reconsider American's

499
00:23:26,800 --> 00:23:29,600
Speaker 4: foreign policy and to really start asking questions about the

500
00:23:29,640 --> 00:23:33,680
Speaker 4: foreign policy establishment that gave us those wars, Yes, hasn't

501
00:23:33,720 --> 00:23:34,440
Speaker 4: been paying attention.

502
00:23:35,160 --> 00:23:37,080
Speaker 1: I couldn't agree more. Libya was a big one for me.

503
00:23:37,359 --> 00:23:39,199
Speaker 2: I will say just you know, personally, I want to,

504
00:23:39,240 --> 00:23:40,399
Speaker 2: you know, just shift gears a little bit.

505
00:23:40,400 --> 00:23:41,639
Speaker 1: You talk a lot about free speech.

506
00:23:41,680 --> 00:23:44,280
Speaker 2: You've helped Elon, you know, kind of with the takeover

507
00:23:44,400 --> 00:23:46,600
Speaker 2: of Twitter. So we've been more than a year or

508
00:23:46,600 --> 00:23:48,639
Speaker 2: so in that. Now what's your assessment. Do you think

509
00:23:48,640 --> 00:23:49,760
Speaker 2: free speech is better on Twitter?

510
00:23:49,800 --> 00:23:50,920
Speaker 1: Is it worse? What do you think?

511
00:23:51,200 --> 00:23:54,199
Speaker 4: Oh, it's much better. I mean, thank goodness Elon did that.

512
00:23:54,320 --> 00:23:58,679
Speaker 4: It's the only the fact or the fact that Elon

513
00:23:58,800 --> 00:24:01,680
Speaker 4: decided to acquire Twitter. I think it's the only reason

514
00:24:01,680 --> 00:24:05,159
Speaker 4: we have meaningful free speech online anymore. You have to remember,

515
00:24:05,200 --> 00:24:07,560
Speaker 4: it's not just about the fact that he rolled back,

516
00:24:08,359 --> 00:24:11,520
Speaker 4: you know what Twitter was doing. It's also the fact

517
00:24:11,520 --> 00:24:14,879
Speaker 4: that that censorship movement had a momentum to it, and

518
00:24:14,880 --> 00:24:17,800
Speaker 4: they kept adding new categories of thought and opinion that

519
00:24:17,840 --> 00:24:20,320
Speaker 4: you couldn't you couldn't say. I mean, imagine if we

520
00:24:20,359 --> 00:24:22,959
Speaker 4: had this Ukraine war under the old Twitter management.

521
00:24:23,040 --> 00:24:23,320
Speaker 1: I can't.

522
00:24:23,480 --> 00:24:25,760
Speaker 4: Yeah, remember, like during COVID, there were all sorts of

523
00:24:25,840 --> 00:24:28,240
Speaker 4: positions that we now know are true that you couldn't

524
00:24:28,240 --> 00:24:33,880
Speaker 4: say without getting censored exactly. Look, it's the censorship, it's

525
00:24:34,280 --> 00:24:37,159
Speaker 4: protein and morphs in order to protect official narratives. At

526
00:24:37,200 --> 00:24:39,280
Speaker 4: least that's what it was doing and still does in

527
00:24:39,359 --> 00:24:42,960
Speaker 4: other major tech companies. And so I think that it

528
00:24:42,960 --> 00:24:45,280
Speaker 4: would problem had gotten worse and worse if Elon hadn't

529
00:24:45,400 --> 00:24:48,399
Speaker 4: essentially pulled an intervention by buying Twitter.

530
00:24:48,680 --> 00:24:50,880
Speaker 2: So the other thing is, I know e've ben more

531
00:24:50,880 --> 00:24:54,240
Speaker 2: recently involved in electoral politics. You did this the launch

532
00:24:54,320 --> 00:24:56,840
Speaker 2: with Governor DeSantis, and I know you supported him, or

533
00:24:56,840 --> 00:24:59,080
Speaker 2: at least I think you have something for him.

534
00:24:59,119 --> 00:25:01,879
Speaker 1: So what's your s of what went wrong for that campaign?

535
00:25:01,920 --> 00:25:03,119
Speaker 1: Are you talking a little bit about it?

536
00:25:03,119 --> 00:25:04,639
Speaker 2: But I mean a lot of people pointing to the

537
00:25:04,760 --> 00:25:06,600
Speaker 2: x space that you guys launched on.

538
00:25:06,680 --> 00:25:07,760
Speaker 1: Do you think it was a miss? I mean, not

539
00:25:07,800 --> 00:25:10,200
Speaker 1: your fault. It was good to do, but on his part,

540
00:25:10,200 --> 00:25:11,679
Speaker 1: you know, was it a mistake for him to do that?

541
00:25:11,720 --> 00:25:13,800
Speaker 1: Do you think he was too online? What went wrong

542
00:25:13,800 --> 00:25:14,600
Speaker 1: for him? What do you think?

543
00:25:14,920 --> 00:25:17,000
Speaker 4: You know, I don't think that that Twitter space was

544
00:25:17,000 --> 00:25:18,800
Speaker 4: that big deal. We got started fifteen minutes late, and

545
00:25:18,840 --> 00:25:21,720
Speaker 4: then the people people are always looking for something to

546
00:25:22,680 --> 00:25:26,520
Speaker 4: some fault. Fine, Look, I just think that desantss's main

547
00:25:26,560 --> 00:25:29,760
Speaker 4: problem is that the party wasn't willing or ready to

548
00:25:29,760 --> 00:25:32,840
Speaker 4: move on from Trump. And you know, Trump would have

549
00:25:32,920 --> 00:25:36,680
Speaker 4: to like absolutely botch his campaign, and then the answer

550
00:25:36,680 --> 00:25:39,760
Speaker 4: would be have to be absolutely perfect in order to

551
00:25:39,760 --> 00:25:42,800
Speaker 4: have a chance, and or maybe maybe it might may

552
00:25:42,840 --> 00:25:45,760
Speaker 4: not even work. And the reality is is that Trump

553
00:25:45,840 --> 00:25:48,520
Speaker 4: is still pretty much, you know, at or near the

554
00:25:48,520 --> 00:25:50,160
Speaker 4: top of his game. I mean, I think that when

555
00:25:50,200 --> 00:25:52,680
Speaker 4: Trump did that CNN town hall and he kind of

556
00:25:52,720 --> 00:25:55,560
Speaker 4: walked into the lions Den and he kind of pulled

557
00:25:55,600 --> 00:25:57,920
Speaker 4: out of his pocket the tweets that he said, look,

558
00:25:57,960 --> 00:25:59,639
Speaker 4: I'm January sixth, I tweeted this, this, this.

559
00:26:00,119 --> 00:26:02,480
Speaker 3: He was ready for them, That's yeah, he was. Yeah.

560
00:26:02,760 --> 00:26:04,679
Speaker 4: Kitlyn Collins had the whole C and N studio inter

561
00:26:04,800 --> 00:26:07,280
Speaker 4: ear piece trying to get Trump and they couldn't get him.

562
00:26:07,880 --> 00:26:09,680
Speaker 4: And I think everyone's like, Okay, this guy still on

563
00:26:09,720 --> 00:26:11,160
Speaker 4: the top of his game. I think that was it.

564
00:26:11,359 --> 00:26:14,679
Speaker 4: And and you know, look, Justsances didn't run a perfect campaign,

565
00:26:14,680 --> 00:26:16,320
Speaker 4: but I don't think it mattered. I mean, the reality

566
00:26:16,400 --> 00:26:18,520
Speaker 4: is the Republican Party is still likes Trump.

567
00:26:19,200 --> 00:26:20,960
Speaker 2: So then politically, what do you think is going to

568
00:26:21,000 --> 00:26:23,000
Speaker 2: happen in this election? What's your assessment?

569
00:26:24,680 --> 00:26:27,200
Speaker 4: Well, I mean, if you believe the polling right now,

570
00:26:27,200 --> 00:26:29,920
Speaker 4: Trump's gonna win. So it's gonna be Trump versus Biden.

571
00:26:30,040 --> 00:26:31,639
Speaker 4: It's kind of a you.

572
00:26:31,840 --> 00:26:34,480
Speaker 2: And I are talking onesdays. It's definitely good to be

573
00:26:34,560 --> 00:26:36,360
Speaker 2: Trump versus b controversy.

574
00:26:36,640 --> 00:26:39,040
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, it's funny how we've been talking for

575
00:26:39,160 --> 00:26:41,040
Speaker 4: months and months and months about whether it's going to

576
00:26:41,080 --> 00:26:44,240
Speaker 4: be Trump. You know, it was, it was always inevitable.

577
00:26:45,080 --> 00:26:47,080
Speaker 4: It was sort of unthinkable and yet inevitable at the

578
00:26:47,080 --> 00:26:51,360
Speaker 4: same time. So, you know, I think we really need

579
00:26:51,359 --> 00:26:54,720
Speaker 4: a change an administration in Washington. I get really worried

580
00:26:55,480 --> 00:27:00,760
Speaker 4: about this administration about whether about how objective they can

581
00:27:00,800 --> 00:27:03,159
Speaker 4: be on what our next steps in Ukraine are, because

582
00:27:03,640 --> 00:27:06,680
Speaker 4: just some cost fallacy that they may feel the need

583
00:27:06,720 --> 00:27:10,960
Speaker 4: to protect their previous policy choices avoid having egg on

584
00:27:11,000 --> 00:27:14,720
Speaker 4: their face by continually escalating the situation in Ukraine, and

585
00:27:15,560 --> 00:27:17,920
Speaker 4: Bind by no means has been the craziest on the

586
00:27:18,040 --> 00:27:20,760
Speaker 4: Ukraine War. I mean, there are people in Washington, like

587
00:27:20,840 --> 00:27:24,800
Speaker 4: Lindsey Graham, even like Mitch McConnell who wanted more escalations sooner,

588
00:27:25,280 --> 00:27:28,520
Speaker 4: or like McCrone in Europe. So you know there are

589
00:27:28,640 --> 00:27:31,960
Speaker 4: forces pulling him in a direction of even more escalation.

590
00:27:32,040 --> 00:27:35,880
Speaker 4: And then you know, since he got us into this war,

591
00:27:36,000 --> 00:27:39,119
Speaker 4: this proxy war, he may his administration may have the

592
00:27:39,119 --> 00:27:41,919
Speaker 4: incentive to really keep doubling down. So I think it's

593
00:27:41,960 --> 00:27:43,919
Speaker 4: really important to have a change administration.

594
00:27:44,320 --> 00:27:46,520
Speaker 2: My worry with the Trump administration is I covered it

595
00:27:46,680 --> 00:27:48,680
Speaker 2: extensively at the time. I interviewed him four times at

596
00:27:48,680 --> 00:27:50,520
Speaker 2: that time, as you could always see that he didn't

597
00:27:50,520 --> 00:27:53,199
Speaker 2: particularly care about what was going on. He outsourced, I mean,

598
00:27:53,200 --> 00:27:55,000
Speaker 2: he cared about a few things. We would outsource things.

599
00:27:55,040 --> 00:27:57,399
Speaker 1: John Bolton or you know, whoever was running at h

600
00:27:57,480 --> 00:27:58,920
Speaker 1: r McMaster and these people were nuts.

601
00:27:59,480 --> 00:28:02,120
Speaker 2: Yeah, Pompeia, I mean, these people are more psychotic than

602
00:28:02,280 --> 00:28:04,520
Speaker 2: many of the people in the Biden administration. Do you

603
00:28:04,880 --> 00:28:07,640
Speaker 2: think that Trump has learned his lesson? Do you think

604
00:28:07,640 --> 00:28:10,120
Speaker 2: that things will be different in the Trump too kind

605
00:28:10,160 --> 00:28:12,320
Speaker 2: of policy? Because that's the biggest question to me when

606
00:28:12,400 --> 00:28:14,280
Speaker 2: I want to change the administration two one hundred percent,

607
00:28:14,320 --> 00:28:17,119
Speaker 2: But with him, it genuinely is like I never know

608
00:28:17,160 --> 00:28:18,000
Speaker 2: which way he's going to go.

609
00:28:18,440 --> 00:28:21,480
Speaker 4: Well, I think the biggest knock on the first Trump

610
00:28:21,560 --> 00:28:24,200
Speaker 4: term was personnel, and that Trump ended up choosing a

611
00:28:24,200 --> 00:28:27,200
Speaker 4: lot of people who didn't support either his policy or

612
00:28:27,200 --> 00:28:32,080
Speaker 4: at least his policy instincts, right, And my suspicion is

613
00:28:32,119 --> 00:28:34,199
Speaker 4: he's learned his lesson, if for no other reason than

614
00:28:34,240 --> 00:28:40,840
Speaker 4: all those people betrayed him. So I think that he

615
00:28:41,240 --> 00:28:42,760
Speaker 4: hopefully he's done with all those people.

616
00:28:42,960 --> 00:28:44,600
Speaker 1: Yeah, all right, well I hope So, David, thank you

617
00:28:44,640 --> 00:28:45,560
Speaker 1: so much for joining me, my friend.

618
00:28:45,640 --> 00:28:48,480
Speaker 2: Really appreciate it all in podcasts, you can go and subscribe,

619
00:28:48,560 --> 00:28:50,600
Speaker 2: highly recommend it, and we'll have a link down to

620
00:28:50,640 --> 00:28:52,040
Speaker 2: his Twitter as well where you can go and check

621
00:28:52,120 --> 00:28:52,360
Speaker 2: him out.

622
00:28:52,440 --> 00:28:53,920
Speaker 1: So thank you, David, Thanks for taking the time here.

623
00:28:54,000 --> 00:28:56,000
Speaker 5: Hey, Guys, if you like that video, go to Breakingpoints

624
00:28:56,000 --> 00:28:58,840
Speaker 5: dot com, become a premium subscriber, and help us build

625
00:28:58,840 --> 00:29:01,120
Speaker 5: the best independent media organization on the planet.

626
00:29:01,200 --> 00:29:03,600
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627
00:29:03,640 --> 00:29:06,280
Speaker 2: want to replace these failing mainstream media organizations

628
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