1
00:00:00,240 --> 00:00:08,399
Speaker 1: Hmm, what's bomb in my neighborhoods filled with women in?

2
00:00:08,840 --> 00:00:12,719
Speaker 1: This is not an intro. I should I should continue?

3
00:00:14,600 --> 00:00:15,800
Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't How do you? How do

4
00:00:15,840 --> 00:00:18,080
Speaker 1: you open part two of the episode on Bashar al

5
00:00:18,120 --> 00:00:21,759
Speaker 1: Assad the greatest mass murder of the century? Not that way?

6
00:00:21,920 --> 00:00:26,720
Speaker 1: That was clearly wrong, Uh, wildly wildly wrong. Never should

7
00:00:26,720 --> 00:00:29,440
Speaker 1: have been attempted. Sophie is shaking her head at me,

8
00:00:29,880 --> 00:00:34,360
Speaker 1: and oh damn, no, I thought you were going to

9
00:00:34,400 --> 00:00:37,279
Speaker 1: be ashamed too, but you just doubled down. I appreciate that.

10
00:00:37,560 --> 00:00:39,960
Speaker 1: You know, it's a true friend who sees you digging

11
00:00:39,960 --> 00:00:42,680
Speaker 1: your own grave and grabs a shovel and it's like, yeah,

12
00:00:42,760 --> 00:00:50,880
Speaker 1: let's fucking make this whole bigger. It's a mark of friendship. Now.

13
00:00:51,440 --> 00:00:55,840
Speaker 1: And you know, we had a lot of fun. No

14
00:00:55,960 --> 00:00:58,639
Speaker 1: we didn't. Uh you're the co host of the Ethnically

15
00:00:58,680 --> 00:01:03,760
Speaker 1: Ambiguous podcast, I am, and uh we're talking about Bashar

16
00:01:03,800 --> 00:01:08,360
Speaker 1: al Assad. So my favorite um probably micro penis holder.

17
00:01:08,600 --> 00:01:11,520
Speaker 1: Oh my god, if you added six inches to his dick,

18
00:01:11,600 --> 00:01:15,360
Speaker 1: you'd still need tweezers to find it. It's probably non existent,

19
00:01:15,400 --> 00:01:17,800
Speaker 1: which is why he's so angry. Yeah, I mean, you know,

20
00:01:18,000 --> 00:01:19,600
Speaker 1: that's why he wanted to get his eyes. You know,

21
00:01:19,640 --> 00:01:21,320
Speaker 1: he wanted to fix everyone's eyes so they could see

22
00:01:21,319 --> 00:01:23,600
Speaker 1: his penis because he's being like to see it. So

23
00:01:23,680 --> 00:01:25,960
Speaker 1: maybe I'll become an optometrist. Maybe someone will fucking see

24
00:01:25,959 --> 00:01:30,840
Speaker 1: my penis everybody. I was going to go on this

25
00:01:30,880 --> 00:01:33,320
Speaker 1: thing about how we shouldn't like demonize micro penis is,

26
00:01:33,360 --> 00:01:36,119
Speaker 1: but then you made a really fucking good joke, and uh,

27
00:01:36,840 --> 00:01:39,480
Speaker 1: we should have seized micro penis is because if you

28
00:01:39,560 --> 00:01:42,360
Speaker 1: have one, it doesn't matter. Nothing matters the fact that

29
00:01:42,400 --> 00:01:44,560
Speaker 1: you can still you can still come, and that's all

30
00:01:44,560 --> 00:01:47,480
Speaker 1: that matters. You can still have child. And if you

31
00:01:47,520 --> 00:01:53,200
Speaker 1: can't come, that that's fine too. Uh, we're getting way

32
00:01:53,240 --> 00:01:56,520
Speaker 1: off the subject of Bashar al Assad here. Well, I

33
00:01:56,560 --> 00:01:58,960
Speaker 1: feel like I'll only demonize it if you are someone

34
00:01:59,000 --> 00:02:01,520
Speaker 1: like Bachar la saw who who takes it out on

35
00:02:01,560 --> 00:02:08,640
Speaker 1: other people by murdering yeah yeah, children, Like I would

36
00:02:08,760 --> 00:02:11,239
Speaker 1: never make fun of anyone for having a squeaky voice.

37
00:02:11,360 --> 00:02:15,600
Speaker 1: But if you're like a little fascist media personality who

38
00:02:15,720 --> 00:02:18,680
Speaker 1: argues about how all Muslims are monsters and you have

39
00:02:18,680 --> 00:02:20,840
Speaker 1: a voice that sounds like you've been in haling helium

40
00:02:20,880 --> 00:02:23,280
Speaker 1: for the last thirty years and your name is Ben Shapiro.

41
00:02:23,600 --> 00:02:26,920
Speaker 1: I might make fun of that, like, hey, I'm popular,

42
00:02:30,080 --> 00:02:38,679
Speaker 1: so anna. Uh do you know the name Mohammed Boiseiz No. Well,

43
00:02:38,720 --> 00:02:40,760
Speaker 1: he was a twenty five year old man in the

44
00:02:40,840 --> 00:02:43,600
Speaker 1: year two thousand ten. He worked as a street vendor

45
00:02:43,639 --> 00:02:46,880
Speaker 1: in Tunisia. His father had died when he was young,

46
00:02:47,040 --> 00:02:50,280
Speaker 1: and Mohammed wound up supporting his family through a very

47
00:02:50,360 --> 00:02:53,320
Speaker 1: rough economy, even managing to pay for one of his

48
00:02:53,400 --> 00:02:55,840
Speaker 1: sisters to attend university. He seems to have been a

49
00:02:55,880 --> 00:02:58,160
Speaker 1: real stand up guy, dropped out of school, you know,

50
00:02:58,200 --> 00:03:00,280
Speaker 1: put his own dreams on hold in order to take

51
00:03:00,320 --> 00:03:03,320
Speaker 1: care of like several brothers and sisters and like a

52
00:03:03,360 --> 00:03:07,040
Speaker 1: couple of elderly relatives. Uh. Now, for some reason, local

53
00:03:07,080 --> 00:03:10,840
Speaker 1: police officers took a dislike to Mohammed. Uh. They regularly

54
00:03:10,919 --> 00:03:14,280
Speaker 1: confiscated his wares, likely because he could not afford to

55
00:03:14,320 --> 00:03:17,720
Speaker 1: bribe them not to do so. One day in mid

56
00:03:17,760 --> 00:03:21,400
Speaker 1: December two thousand ten, this happened again, and Mohammed tried

57
00:03:21,440 --> 00:03:24,360
Speaker 1: to seek redress through the organs of his local government.

58
00:03:24,760 --> 00:03:27,640
Speaker 1: But Tunisia was a state ruled by an autocratic dictator

59
00:03:27,760 --> 00:03:31,120
Speaker 1: and an ossified bureaucracy. That existed primarily to let people

60
00:03:31,160 --> 00:03:34,000
Speaker 1: with family connections make money by fucking over poor folks

61
00:03:34,000 --> 00:03:37,360
Speaker 1: like Mohammed Boisiz. His quest ended at the governor, who

62
00:03:37,440 --> 00:03:40,120
Speaker 1: refused to talk to him, even after Mohammed said, if

63
00:03:40,160 --> 00:03:44,920
Speaker 1: you don't see me, I'll burn myself. Mohammed immediately left

64
00:03:45,000 --> 00:03:47,920
Speaker 1: to do just that. He acquired a can of gasoline

65
00:03:47,920 --> 00:03:50,600
Speaker 1: from a nearby station and lit himself on fire in

66
00:03:50,680 --> 00:03:54,280
Speaker 1: front of the governor's office. He died on January fourth,

67
00:03:54,280 --> 00:03:58,400
Speaker 1: two thousand eleven, after days of unspeakable agony. But in death,

68
00:03:58,600 --> 00:04:01,480
Speaker 1: the governor and the dictator, a real president of Tunisia,

69
00:04:01,720 --> 00:04:05,720
Speaker 1: could not ignore Mohammed Boisiz. His death is generally seen

70
00:04:05,760 --> 00:04:09,240
Speaker 1: as having ignited the Arab Spring, which overthrew the president

71
00:04:09,320 --> 00:04:12,720
Speaker 1: of Tunisia as well as the dictators of Egypt and Libya.

72
00:04:13,080 --> 00:04:15,520
Speaker 1: For a time, Bashar al Assad thought he would be

73
00:04:15,560 --> 00:04:18,599
Speaker 1: safe from the fires of revolution sweeping through the Arab world.

74
00:04:19,160 --> 00:04:21,120
Speaker 1: David lash is the writer who spent a lot of

75
00:04:21,120 --> 00:04:22,920
Speaker 1: time with Bashar. We heard about him in the last

76
00:04:22,960 --> 00:04:25,560
Speaker 1: episode UH. He wrote a book called The Fall of

77
00:04:25,640 --> 00:04:28,359
Speaker 1: the House of Assad. It cites several articles that the

78
00:04:28,360 --> 00:04:31,480
Speaker 1: regime published during this time. Both in its own magazine

79
00:04:31,680 --> 00:04:35,360
Speaker 1: Forward and in a Wall Street Journal interview with Assad quote.

80
00:04:35,920 --> 00:04:38,800
Speaker 1: Both articles in the February issue reflected the presidents and

81
00:04:38,800 --> 00:04:41,680
Speaker 1: the regime sense of immunity from the virus of protests

82
00:04:41,720 --> 00:04:44,719
Speaker 1: spreading elsewhere in the Arab world. The editor in chief

83
00:04:44,720 --> 00:04:47,080
Speaker 1: of the magazine, Dr Samim will bay It, is a

84
00:04:47,080 --> 00:04:49,800
Speaker 1: professor of international relations in the country and one of

85
00:04:49,800 --> 00:04:53,440
Speaker 1: its foremost commentators. He has access to high places in Syria,

86
00:04:53,520 --> 00:04:57,119
Speaker 1: and therefore his essays often reflect regime sentiments. For this issue,

87
00:04:57,160 --> 00:05:00,159
Speaker 1: he wrote a piece entitled Lessened from Egypt West is

88
00:05:00,200 --> 00:05:03,880
Speaker 1: not best. In it, Mbaiad repeatedly hammers home the point

89
00:05:03,920 --> 00:05:06,000
Speaker 1: that the dictators in the Arab world who had either

90
00:05:06,040 --> 00:05:09,440
Speaker 1: fallen by then President Bin Ali and Tunisia or were

91
00:05:09,440 --> 00:05:12,279
Speaker 1: on their way out President Hostnu Mobarik of Egypt and

92
00:05:12,360 --> 00:05:14,960
Speaker 1: President of Doula, Sala and Yemen were being run out

93
00:05:15,000 --> 00:05:18,320
Speaker 1: of office by widespread popular protest, primarily because over the

94
00:05:18,400 --> 00:05:21,240
Speaker 1: years they had been the lackeys of the West, particularly

95
00:05:21,279 --> 00:05:25,560
Speaker 1: of the United States. So Assad and his cronies at

96
00:05:25,600 --> 00:05:28,120
Speaker 1: first thought they would be safe from the Arab spring, because,

97
00:05:28,160 --> 00:05:32,400
Speaker 1: of course, Assad hadn't been an American lackey Mbaiad's article

98
00:05:32,560 --> 00:05:36,000
Speaker 1: ends ironically by accurately describing the forces then sweeping the

99
00:05:36,040 --> 00:05:38,240
Speaker 1: Arab world, which they just didn't think We're gonna come

100
00:05:38,240 --> 00:05:41,120
Speaker 1: for them. Quote. What is so beautiful about the Tunisian

101
00:05:41,120 --> 00:05:43,800
Speaker 1: and Egyptian stories is that this time it wasn't flamboyant

102
00:05:43,800 --> 00:05:47,560
Speaker 1: and inexperienced young officers toppling the young king norma. Was

103
00:05:47,600 --> 00:05:50,760
Speaker 1: it turbent clerics toppling an autocratic and aging royal like

104
00:05:50,800 --> 00:05:54,000
Speaker 1: Iran nineteen seventy nine. It was also not US tanks

105
00:05:54,040 --> 00:05:56,440
Speaker 1: rubbling into Tunisia, as was the case with Baghdad in

106
00:05:56,480 --> 00:05:58,839
Speaker 1: two thousand three. It was the people of Tunisia, the

107
00:05:58,920 --> 00:06:01,040
Speaker 1: young and the old, the innale actual and the unemployed.

108
00:06:01,080 --> 00:06:03,640
Speaker 1: It was the glorious people of Egypt who said enough

109
00:06:03,720 --> 00:06:07,520
Speaker 1: is enough. What mubay It and other Assadus did not

110
00:06:07,640 --> 00:06:09,960
Speaker 1: see is that the exact same forces that had made

111
00:06:09,960 --> 00:06:13,480
Speaker 1: Tunisia right for revolution and demi crushing corruption that robbed

112
00:06:13,520 --> 00:06:15,839
Speaker 1: young people have paths towards a decent life and left

113
00:06:15,880 --> 00:06:19,719
Speaker 1: them hopeless, underemployed, and enraged. That was present in Syria

114
00:06:19,839 --> 00:06:23,000
Speaker 1: as well. While assad had opened up the economy somewhat,

115
00:06:23,040 --> 00:06:25,719
Speaker 1: every reform was calculated in one way or another to

116
00:06:25,800 --> 00:06:29,080
Speaker 1: benefit his core supporters or gain him new supporters, because

117
00:06:29,080 --> 00:06:33,000
Speaker 1: every dictatorship in every country is just a gigantic gangster

118
00:06:33,200 --> 00:06:35,440
Speaker 1: enterprise when you get right down to it. Wait, so

119
00:06:35,560 --> 00:06:38,359
Speaker 1: they he thought that his people hadn't noticed what he

120
00:06:38,400 --> 00:06:41,520
Speaker 1: was up to. Basically, he thought his people loved him

121
00:06:41,560 --> 00:06:44,200
Speaker 1: and that they would not revolt because he hadn't been

122
00:06:44,200 --> 00:06:46,279
Speaker 1: a lackey of the US. He thought the Arab spring

123
00:06:46,360 --> 00:06:49,760
Speaker 1: was people being angry at dictators in their region, uh

124
00:06:49,800 --> 00:06:51,839
Speaker 1: doing what the US wanted. And he was like, well,

125
00:06:51,880 --> 00:06:54,840
Speaker 1: I'm I don't like the US, so people will back me,

126
00:06:55,120 --> 00:06:59,279
Speaker 1: Like obviously they're going to keep loving bashar God. These dudes.

127
00:07:01,000 --> 00:07:03,200
Speaker 1: That's what's crazy, is like they have no sense of

128
00:07:03,240 --> 00:07:06,719
Speaker 1: what's going on around them, Like not at all. No,

129
00:07:06,839 --> 00:07:09,960
Speaker 1: that's what happens when you have the bat like arresting

130
00:07:10,080 --> 00:07:13,400
Speaker 1: and torturing everybody who is like, maybe things could be

131
00:07:13,480 --> 00:07:17,000
Speaker 1: less corrupt. I guess you don't pay people to tell

132
00:07:17,080 --> 00:07:21,000
Speaker 1: you anything negative. You pay people to tell you we

133
00:07:21,080 --> 00:07:24,600
Speaker 1: have arrested X number of dissidents and they are in

134
00:07:24,680 --> 00:07:27,920
Speaker 1: a dark hole instead of being like just f y,

135
00:07:28,000 --> 00:07:32,840
Speaker 1: I like, so we took a survey and it looks like, um,

136
00:07:32,840 --> 00:07:37,880
Speaker 1: people like think you're shady. Yeah, people don't like that

137
00:07:37,920 --> 00:07:40,680
Speaker 1: we throw so many people in the dark holes that

138
00:07:41,040 --> 00:07:44,800
Speaker 1: actually the dark hole approval rating is like eight percent.

139
00:07:45,120 --> 00:07:48,120
Speaker 1: No no one in this yeah, no one almost no

140
00:07:48,160 --> 00:07:50,480
Speaker 1: one's we like the dark holes. That's the eight percent

141
00:07:50,640 --> 00:07:53,720
Speaker 1: is the is the Macabat vote. They vote for dark holes,

142
00:07:53,760 --> 00:07:56,280
Speaker 1: but everyone else really against the dark holes that we

143
00:07:56,320 --> 00:07:58,480
Speaker 1: throw dissidents into. It looks like we're not We're not

144
00:07:58,480 --> 00:08:02,000
Speaker 1: getting the numbers we were hoping for dark holes. We're

145
00:08:02,000 --> 00:08:06,480
Speaker 1: thinking of rebranding the dark hole that we throw dissidents into.

146
00:08:06,160 --> 00:08:13,560
Speaker 1: What about this rainbow circle? I love it? I love it.

147
00:08:13,840 --> 00:08:15,640
Speaker 1: That's the I forget which one of us now is

148
00:08:15,680 --> 00:08:23,080
Speaker 1: the brand name? Yeah. In February two th eleven, Maria Siasna,

149
00:08:23,160 --> 00:08:25,200
Speaker 1: a fourteen year old kid, was hanging out with his

150
00:08:25,280 --> 00:08:28,720
Speaker 1: friends in the Syrian town of Dara. Tunisia's dictator had

151
00:08:28,720 --> 00:08:31,240
Speaker 1: just been forced out of power, and these kids were ornery,

152
00:08:31,480 --> 00:08:34,240
Speaker 1: so they scared up some red paint and daubed your

153
00:08:34,320 --> 00:08:38,679
Speaker 1: Turn Doctor on the walls of their school. Now Dara

154
00:08:38,840 --> 00:08:41,400
Speaker 1: is a fairly small rural town near the border with

155
00:08:41,520 --> 00:08:43,880
Speaker 1: Jordan's At that point, Syria was in the grip of

156
00:08:43,920 --> 00:08:46,640
Speaker 1: an intense drought, which had reduced crop yields and crippled

157
00:08:46,679 --> 00:08:50,640
Speaker 1: the already stumbling economy. Youth unemployment was particularly bad, and

158
00:08:50,679 --> 00:08:52,960
Speaker 1: Maria and his friends had little hope of growing up

159
00:08:52,960 --> 00:08:55,280
Speaker 1: in a world with many options for them if things

160
00:08:55,280 --> 00:08:58,040
Speaker 1: continued on the way they were going. So they painted

161
00:08:58,040 --> 00:09:00,800
Speaker 1: a threat against their dictator on the wall of their school,

162
00:09:01,320 --> 00:09:04,560
Speaker 1: and soon after that all hell broke loose. Assad's men

163
00:09:04,679 --> 00:09:06,840
Speaker 1: quickly arrested the tenth graders and sent them back to

164
00:09:06,920 --> 00:09:09,440
Speaker 1: Damascus to be brutally tortured by a bunch of Nazi

165
00:09:09,480 --> 00:09:13,199
Speaker 1: trained torture experts. This was a pretty normal move from Mikabarat,

166
00:09:13,280 --> 00:09:16,320
Speaker 1: but unknown to Bashar the in those secret policemen, the

167
00:09:16,360 --> 00:09:18,800
Speaker 1: winds of the world had just changed. The people of

168
00:09:18,880 --> 00:09:22,679
Speaker 1: Dara were quite suddenly unwilling to accept this kind of bullshit.

169
00:09:23,360 --> 00:09:25,800
Speaker 1: On March of two thousand eleven, they took to the streets.

170
00:09:26,080 --> 00:09:28,960
Speaker 1: Hundreds of people, many of them relatives of the arrested boys,

171
00:09:29,040 --> 00:09:32,080
Speaker 1: protested the regime. The crowd grew to thousands. B Shar's

172
00:09:32,120 --> 00:09:35,320
Speaker 1: police opened fire, killing four and dispersing the crowd, But

173
00:09:35,360 --> 00:09:38,520
Speaker 1: the next day, twenty thousand furious Syrians took to the streets,

174
00:09:38,720 --> 00:09:41,000
Speaker 1: and the days that followed things grew more violent, and

175
00:09:41,080 --> 00:09:45,480
Speaker 1: Mukabarat offices were vandalized, more protesters were murdered in larger numbers.

176
00:09:45,720 --> 00:09:48,720
Speaker 1: Funerals of the dead became protests, and so the regime

177
00:09:48,760 --> 00:09:55,200
Speaker 1: banned funerals. Yeah, when you're banning funerals, you might be

178
00:09:55,960 --> 00:09:59,120
Speaker 1: uh monstrous statalitarian dictating. Yeah, I mean it's crazy that

179
00:09:59,120 --> 00:10:00,800
Speaker 1: these kids had no I do what they were about

180
00:10:00,880 --> 00:10:04,440
Speaker 1: to literally like domino effect into but like how could

181
00:10:04,440 --> 00:10:09,120
Speaker 1: they have possibly known? So, I mean you're banning funerals,

182
00:10:09,160 --> 00:10:12,520
Speaker 1: it's like, then stop fucking killing everybody. Maybe like taking

183
00:10:12,559 --> 00:10:15,120
Speaker 1: as a goddamn hint. If people are this upset, maybe

184
00:10:15,120 --> 00:10:20,720
Speaker 1: you shouldn't be easy to reduce the funerals. Stop killing people.

185
00:10:21,000 --> 00:10:23,280
Speaker 1: I guess common sense isn't a thing within regime, So

186
00:10:23,360 --> 00:10:25,559
Speaker 1: I don't know what I'm even saying. Yeah, I mean

187
00:10:25,600 --> 00:10:29,720
Speaker 1: it's a type of common sense within the logic of

188
00:10:31,040 --> 00:10:34,320
Speaker 1: murdering people, within regime logic where you're like, well, yeah,

189
00:10:35,040 --> 00:10:38,839
Speaker 1: says that we, you know, have to murder everyone who

190
00:10:38,880 --> 00:10:41,960
Speaker 1: stands up to us. Yeah, if you're a regime, it

191
00:10:42,080 --> 00:10:45,280
Speaker 1: makes sense. Yeah, none of this work to stop the

192
00:10:45,320 --> 00:10:48,880
Speaker 1: growing unrest. A single act of childish graffiti and Dara

193
00:10:49,000 --> 00:10:51,640
Speaker 1: wound up being the spark that started the Syrian Civil War,

194
00:10:52,480 --> 00:10:54,719
Speaker 1: which is so far at the deadliest civil war of

195
00:10:54,760 --> 00:10:58,080
Speaker 1: the twenty first century. According to David lesh Quote, it

196
00:10:58,160 --> 00:11:01,160
Speaker 1: is almost certain that Bashar al Assad absolutely shocked when

197
00:11:01,160 --> 00:11:03,640
Speaker 1: the uprisings in the Arab world started to seep into

198
00:11:03,679 --> 00:11:06,280
Speaker 1: his country in March two thousand eleven. I believe he

199
00:11:06,320 --> 00:11:08,640
Speaker 1: truly thought he was safe and secure and popular in

200
00:11:08,640 --> 00:11:11,360
Speaker 1: the country and was beyond condemnation. But this was not

201
00:11:11,440 --> 00:11:13,440
Speaker 1: the case in the Middle East of two thousand eleven,

202
00:11:13,440 --> 00:11:16,280
Speaker 1: where the stream of information via the Internet, Facebook, Twitter,

203
00:11:16,400 --> 00:11:18,760
Speaker 1: YouTube and mobile phones could not be controlled as it

204
00:11:18,840 --> 00:11:23,120
Speaker 1: once had been. On March two thousand eleven, but Shar

205
00:11:23,200 --> 00:11:26,360
Speaker 1: al Assad addressed his nation over the continuing unrest. He

206
00:11:26,400 --> 00:11:29,680
Speaker 1: promised vague reforms, which of course he could not actually

207
00:11:29,720 --> 00:11:33,160
Speaker 1: deliver upon. Any reforms to reduce corruption would be taking

208
00:11:33,200 --> 00:11:35,640
Speaker 1: money out of the pockets of his supporters, which of

209
00:11:35,679 --> 00:11:37,680
Speaker 1: course he could not afford to do at the moment.

210
00:11:37,920 --> 00:11:41,280
Speaker 1: Any actual political openness would be seized upon his weakness

211
00:11:41,320 --> 00:11:44,199
Speaker 1: and lead to his fall from power. So he promised nothing,

212
00:11:44,240 --> 00:11:47,360
Speaker 1: and ended his speech with quote, I shall remain the

213
00:11:47,400 --> 00:11:49,920
Speaker 1: faithful brother and comrade who will walk with his people

214
00:11:49,960 --> 00:11:52,640
Speaker 1: and lead them to build the Syria. We love the Syria.

215
00:11:52,720 --> 00:11:55,600
Speaker 1: We are proud of the Syria, which is invincible to

216
00:11:55,720 --> 00:12:00,120
Speaker 1: its enemies. You know, I do wonder if he like

217
00:12:00,920 --> 00:12:03,240
Speaker 1: he just was in over his head and started I

218
00:12:03,240 --> 00:12:05,640
Speaker 1: mean not that I'm in any way defending LA, but

219
00:12:05,679 --> 00:12:07,800
Speaker 1: I wonder if he was over his head and then

220
00:12:07,920 --> 00:12:11,240
Speaker 1: just started to panic, like just being like yeah, yeah, yeah,

221
00:12:11,320 --> 00:12:14,480
Speaker 1: kill it, kill kill mall yeah. And then now he's like, ship, Well,

222
00:12:14,480 --> 00:12:17,120
Speaker 1: now that I've like in my panic have started acting

223
00:12:17,120 --> 00:12:19,000
Speaker 1: like a full psycho, I guess I just have to

224
00:12:19,240 --> 00:12:23,360
Speaker 1: keep it going. Yeah. You know there's a version of

225
00:12:23,400 --> 00:12:25,440
Speaker 1: this where that is what goes on, where he's kind

226
00:12:25,440 --> 00:12:28,200
Speaker 1: of like a Czar Nicholas figure, and like the initial

227
00:12:28,240 --> 00:12:31,560
Speaker 1: bloodletting is more accidental because of how the regimes set up,

228
00:12:31,600 --> 00:12:34,679
Speaker 1: that's how the security forces respond. You the leader are

229
00:12:34,760 --> 00:12:36,920
Speaker 1: left grappling with it. But then things hit a certain

230
00:12:37,000 --> 00:12:39,800
Speaker 1: point and it's like, well they're gonna kill me or

231
00:12:39,880 --> 00:12:42,120
Speaker 1: I can kill all of them. Yeah. There is kind

232
00:12:42,120 --> 00:12:44,319
Speaker 1: of like a vibe, like a really dumb vibe where

233
00:12:44,320 --> 00:12:48,440
Speaker 1: he's like, I guess I'm a dictator now, Like it's like,

234
00:12:48,600 --> 00:12:53,040
Speaker 1: you fucking idiot, But he had been before, like you

235
00:12:53,480 --> 00:12:57,319
Speaker 1: operated Nazi torture dungeons, then let the CIA use them

236
00:12:57,400 --> 00:13:03,679
Speaker 1: like Bashar wasn't. Yeah, it's he's there's definitely an aspect

237
00:13:03,679 --> 00:13:05,760
Speaker 1: of this that is a guy like obviously he didn't

238
00:13:05,760 --> 00:13:08,800
Speaker 1: want this. Nobody, no, none of these people want there

239
00:13:08,840 --> 00:13:10,560
Speaker 1: to be a civil war because there's a chance that

240
00:13:10,640 --> 00:13:15,240
Speaker 1: like you get thrown out of power. Um, I don't know,

241
00:13:15,600 --> 00:13:18,360
Speaker 1: you know, we'll we'll talk about that more by the end.

242
00:13:18,360 --> 00:13:21,600
Speaker 1: We'll see what conclusion you come to about how how

243
00:13:21,760 --> 00:13:25,920
Speaker 1: his journey on this. For most of the world, Friday

244
00:13:26,000 --> 00:13:29,480
Speaker 1: April one was April Fool's Day. In Syria. In two

245
00:13:29,520 --> 00:13:32,880
Speaker 1: thousand eleven, it was the Friday of Martyrs. This was

246
00:13:32,880 --> 00:13:35,360
Speaker 1: the name given to a day of furious protests across

247
00:13:35,400 --> 00:13:37,400
Speaker 1: the country, conducted in the name of the dozens who

248
00:13:37,440 --> 00:13:39,760
Speaker 1: had been shot dead by security forces and the hundreds

249
00:13:39,800 --> 00:13:42,840
Speaker 1: who were currently being tortured. This time, but char al

250
00:13:42,880 --> 00:13:45,520
Speaker 1: Assad ordered snipers up on the roofs of cities around

251
00:13:45,559 --> 00:13:48,840
Speaker 1: the country. They fired randomly into crowds of activists and

252
00:13:48,880 --> 00:13:52,680
Speaker 1: shot anyone who broke curfew. Next, according to Lesha's book

253
00:13:52,760 --> 00:13:55,560
Speaker 1: quote in New May and June two thousand eleven, the

254
00:13:55,600 --> 00:13:59,400
Speaker 1: regime continued to engage in a schizophrenic response to the protests.

255
00:13:59,559 --> 00:14:02,600
Speaker 1: While can hinduing to make some concessions and announce reform measures,

256
00:14:02,679 --> 00:14:05,960
Speaker 1: the military and security forces intensified their crackdown in cities

257
00:14:05,960 --> 00:14:09,360
Speaker 1: across Syria that were hit by demonstrations. To the outside observer,

258
00:14:09,559 --> 00:14:13,120
Speaker 1: this approach may seem contradictory and indicative of fissures within

259
00:14:13,160 --> 00:14:15,280
Speaker 1: the ruling elite on how to respond to the crisis.

260
00:14:15,520 --> 00:14:17,520
Speaker 1: On the other hand, from the perspective of the shar

261
00:14:17,600 --> 00:14:19,720
Speaker 1: in his inner circle, it could be seen as two

262
00:14:19,800 --> 00:14:21,960
Speaker 1: sides of the same coin in a way that came

263
00:14:22,000 --> 00:14:24,400
Speaker 1: to be expected of the Assad regimes old and new.

264
00:14:24,480 --> 00:14:26,840
Speaker 1: It was something of an axiom of power politics that

265
00:14:26,880 --> 00:14:30,200
Speaker 1: one offers concessions only from a position of strength, never

266
00:14:30,280 --> 00:14:33,200
Speaker 1: from a position of weakness. Therefore, while there was also

267
00:14:33,240 --> 00:14:35,560
Speaker 1: a practical side to the Assad approach in terms of

268
00:14:35,560 --> 00:14:38,800
Speaker 1: repressing the unrest, it also clearly indicated that the regime

269
00:14:38,840 --> 00:14:41,880
Speaker 1: wanted to portray itself is only making concessions and offering

270
00:14:41,880 --> 00:14:46,760
Speaker 1: reform measures from a position of strength. Mhm, so he

271
00:14:46,920 --> 00:14:51,360
Speaker 1: just okay, sorry and yeah, no, I mean he he

272
00:14:51,440 --> 00:14:54,640
Speaker 1: wants to He's willing to give people concessions, but only

273
00:14:54,680 --> 00:14:56,440
Speaker 1: if he stays in control. And the only way to

274
00:14:56,440 --> 00:14:58,600
Speaker 1: stay in control is to kill people, right, But he

275
00:14:58,640 --> 00:15:01,200
Speaker 1: didn't really like what were the concession Like, did any

276
00:15:01,360 --> 00:15:04,680
Speaker 1: did anything come of that? Yeah? No, not really, Like

277
00:15:04,720 --> 00:15:06,760
Speaker 1: it was the same as the concessions he offered at

278
00:15:06,760 --> 00:15:08,760
Speaker 1: the start of his reign, where it's like, I'll open

279
00:15:08,840 --> 00:15:10,720
Speaker 1: things up, but like you already did that and then

280
00:15:10,720 --> 00:15:13,000
Speaker 1: closed them down again because it was bad for you.

281
00:15:13,280 --> 00:15:18,280
Speaker 1: Like why would you trust Bashar al Assad at this point? Uh? Yeah.

282
00:15:18,480 --> 00:15:20,480
Speaker 1: One of the people who died so but schar could

283
00:15:20,520 --> 00:15:23,840
Speaker 1: offer reform from a position of strength was Hamza al Katib.

284
00:15:24,120 --> 00:15:26,480
Speaker 1: He was thirteen years old when he went missing on

285
00:15:26,520 --> 00:15:29,880
Speaker 1: the twenty ninth of April. His battered and abused corpse

286
00:15:29,960 --> 00:15:32,760
Speaker 1: was returned to his family a month later. His family

287
00:15:32,840 --> 00:15:35,720
Speaker 1: shared pictures of their boys torn up body on social media,

288
00:15:35,800 --> 00:15:39,360
Speaker 1: and raged at his murder, spread viral. E Asad's government,

289
00:15:39,360 --> 00:15:42,240
Speaker 1: of course, denied torturing the child. They had a doctor

290
00:15:42,320 --> 00:15:45,720
Speaker 1: who worked for the government examined the body. He concluded

291
00:15:45,760 --> 00:15:48,120
Speaker 1: that all of the scars and holes and injuries were

292
00:15:48,160 --> 00:15:51,440
Speaker 1: not consistent with torture. Bashar al Assad made a big

293
00:15:51,480 --> 00:15:55,120
Speaker 1: show of visiting the family to share his uh sadness

294
00:15:55,120 --> 00:15:57,440
Speaker 1: that this tragic and inexplicable death that he and his

295
00:15:57,520 --> 00:16:00,520
Speaker 1: security apparatus had no role in the Like, Yeah, yeah,

296
00:16:00,560 --> 00:16:05,120
Speaker 1: it looks like no no torture here, So sorry about

297
00:16:05,200 --> 00:16:08,920
Speaker 1: your boy. What a mystery. Yeah, you know, based on

298
00:16:09,360 --> 00:16:12,320
Speaker 1: you know, my work as an optometrist, I can see

299
00:16:12,920 --> 00:16:16,840
Speaker 1: there is no torture. M hmm. Yeah, his eyes look great,

300
00:16:17,560 --> 00:16:22,400
Speaker 1: look good. Good piece of ship, yeah, real piece of ship.

301
00:16:22,920 --> 00:16:25,360
Speaker 1: This photo up with the grieving family of a murdered

302
00:16:25,360 --> 00:16:29,040
Speaker 1: boy did not shockingly reduce opposition to the Assad regime.

303
00:16:29,600 --> 00:16:32,600
Speaker 1: A Facebook page was created in his name, garnering sixty

304
00:16:32,960 --> 00:16:36,440
Speaker 1: thousand supporters. One commenter wrote, there is no place left

305
00:16:36,480 --> 00:16:39,520
Speaker 1: here for a regime after what they did to Hamsa.

306
00:16:40,120 --> 00:16:45,280
Speaker 1: On July eleven, seven Syrian Arab Army officers defected from

307
00:16:45,280 --> 00:16:48,440
Speaker 1: the military, forming the core of the Free Syrian Army.

308
00:16:48,680 --> 00:16:50,880
Speaker 1: By November, the f s A was strong enough to

309
00:16:50,960 --> 00:16:54,280
Speaker 1: launch armed attacks on the regime itself in this way

310
00:16:54,400 --> 00:16:57,400
Speaker 1: and stops and starts the protests and street activism and

311
00:16:57,520 --> 00:17:01,760
Speaker 1: violent state repression gradually escalated to full fledged warfare. In

312
00:17:01,840 --> 00:17:04,920
Speaker 1: January of two thousand twelve, Neustra Front and his Lamist

313
00:17:04,960 --> 00:17:08,560
Speaker 1: rebel group declared their opposition to the regime. Whole cities

314
00:17:08,600 --> 00:17:12,159
Speaker 1: wound up an open rebellion to the state in February

315
00:17:12,200 --> 00:17:15,520
Speaker 1: two thousand twelve, but Shar had his army assault Holmes,

316
00:17:15,720 --> 00:17:19,080
Speaker 1: the third largest city in Syria. Four hundred people, virtually

317
00:17:19,080 --> 00:17:21,359
Speaker 1: all of them civilians, were killed on the first day.

318
00:17:21,920 --> 00:17:25,160
Speaker 1: You see, Assad's army crumbled fairly quickly in the face

319
00:17:25,160 --> 00:17:27,960
Speaker 1: of the rebellion. It had never been a particularly potent force,

320
00:17:28,000 --> 00:17:29,840
Speaker 1: and many of its men had deserted for the other

321
00:17:29,920 --> 00:17:32,560
Speaker 1: side once the fighting started. At one point, he had

322
00:17:32,640 --> 00:17:35,439
Speaker 1: less than five thousand soldiers in the whole country, so

323
00:17:35,520 --> 00:17:39,320
Speaker 1: Assad relied heavily on random artillery strikes and equally random

324
00:17:39,359 --> 00:17:41,760
Speaker 1: bombings by his air force, which was the one thing

325
00:17:41,800 --> 00:17:44,840
Speaker 1: he had that the rebels did not. The Syrian air

326
00:17:44,880 --> 00:17:47,960
Speaker 1: force was from the beginning Assad's greatest weapon against his

327
00:17:47,960 --> 00:17:50,800
Speaker 1: own people. In August two thousand twelve, the regime was

328
00:17:50,840 --> 00:17:53,640
Speaker 1: filmed dropping its very first barrel bomb on the city

329
00:17:53,720 --> 00:17:56,280
Speaker 1: of Halms. Now, and you know what a barrel bomb

330
00:17:56,440 --> 00:18:01,719
Speaker 1: is Um, I'm gonna guess most people have heard the term. Yeah.

331
00:18:01,840 --> 00:18:04,600
Speaker 1: It's probably the iconic weapon of the Syrian Civil War,

332
00:18:04,640 --> 00:18:07,040
Speaker 1: and it's essentially a huge metal barrel packed full of

333
00:18:07,119 --> 00:18:10,280
Speaker 1: high explosives and shrapnel, nails, metal bits, whatever. It all

334
00:18:10,320 --> 00:18:12,480
Speaker 1: functions the same with a few dozen pounds of r

335
00:18:12,560 --> 00:18:15,360
Speaker 1: d X behind it. A barrel bomb is the kind

336
00:18:15,359 --> 00:18:18,120
Speaker 1: of weapon you deploy when you don't care who you kill.

337
00:18:18,640 --> 00:18:23,639
Speaker 1: And uh, yeah, it's there's a video on YouTube that

338
00:18:23,640 --> 00:18:26,520
Speaker 1: I would recommend listeners watch. If you just type in

339
00:18:26,640 --> 00:18:31,879
Speaker 1: a sod barrels, you will find it. Um it's horrific. Uh,

340
00:18:32,440 --> 00:18:35,520
Speaker 1: one of the worst things I've ever seen. Like the

341
00:18:35,920 --> 00:18:42,800
Speaker 1: wake of these bombings is um, almost indescribable. Uh. It's

342
00:18:42,840 --> 00:18:46,600
Speaker 1: it's worse than what I've seen in the wake of

343
00:18:46,720 --> 00:18:50,240
Speaker 1: US air strikes, which is pretty horrific in and of itself,

344
00:18:50,359 --> 00:18:53,320
Speaker 1: But an explosive like this, it's just like a particularly

345
00:18:53,359 --> 00:18:56,760
Speaker 1: awful way to wage war, like even worse than a

346
00:18:56,760 --> 00:19:00,760
Speaker 1: hell fire missile. It's like I don't understand, Like he's like, oh,

347
00:19:00,840 --> 00:19:05,920
Speaker 1: you know, that's what's crazy. Like he's he says, Okay,

348
00:19:05,960 --> 00:19:08,840
Speaker 1: I'm gonna I'm gonna give concessions I'm gonna work with

349
00:19:08,880 --> 00:19:12,360
Speaker 1: you guys, so you don't keep protesting me. And then

350
00:19:12,359 --> 00:19:15,880
Speaker 1: he just goes and like kills a town. What's what's

351
00:19:15,920 --> 00:19:19,040
Speaker 1: the issue with the regime, what's everybody's problem? I'm gonna

352
00:19:19,119 --> 00:19:22,440
Speaker 1: drop just barrels of death on you guys. Why is it?

353
00:19:22,680 --> 00:19:25,600
Speaker 1: Why is nobody like me? Yeah, it's like, dude, like

354
00:19:26,440 --> 00:19:32,040
Speaker 1: fucking read the room. Yeah, read the room. What are

355
00:19:32,040 --> 00:19:35,040
Speaker 1: we doing here anymore? I don't even this is it's

356
00:19:35,080 --> 00:19:37,240
Speaker 1: so crazy, Like it's so hard to wrap your mind

357
00:19:37,280 --> 00:19:41,480
Speaker 1: around someone who in a way, like when you first

358
00:19:41,520 --> 00:19:44,119
Speaker 1: think about it, like he didn't want to become the leader.

359
00:19:44,520 --> 00:19:46,840
Speaker 1: He had so much potential to just be a good

360
00:19:47,040 --> 00:19:51,760
Speaker 1: human being in an office running a country, like coming

361
00:19:51,800 --> 00:19:54,480
Speaker 1: from his point of view of being like I don't

362
00:19:54,520 --> 00:19:56,280
Speaker 1: really want to run a country, like I just want

363
00:19:56,320 --> 00:19:58,920
Speaker 1: to be this regular doctor like blah blah blah. It's

364
00:19:58,920 --> 00:20:01,040
Speaker 1: like I could just be an easy going guy who's

365
00:20:01,080 --> 00:20:03,920
Speaker 1: like one of the people. Um. I mean, honestly, it

366
00:20:03,960 --> 00:20:07,160
Speaker 1: goes back to bad parenting. Uh, but this is insane.

367
00:20:07,600 --> 00:20:09,639
Speaker 1: It's like so insane that he was like, all right,

368
00:20:09,720 --> 00:20:13,600
Speaker 1: let's just turn this around and kill everybody. Yep, Yes,

369
00:20:13,680 --> 00:20:18,120
Speaker 1: I'm murdering. Yeah, and uh, he got right to murdering. Um.

370
00:20:18,119 --> 00:20:20,440
Speaker 1: I'd like to quote from a Doctor's Without Borders article

371
00:20:20,440 --> 00:20:22,920
Speaker 1: about the use of barrel bombs primarily in the city

372
00:20:22,960 --> 00:20:27,520
Speaker 1: of Aleppo during the fighting there. Barrel bombings and Eastern

373
00:20:27,600 --> 00:20:30,120
Speaker 1: Aleppo were so unpredictable and widespread that they have sown

374
00:20:30,200 --> 00:20:32,680
Speaker 1: fear throughout the city. It is extremely difficult for someone

375
00:20:32,720 --> 00:20:35,280
Speaker 1: to take measures to protect their families and improve their safety.

376
00:20:35,359 --> 00:20:38,560
Speaker 1: What contributes to higher levels of psychological stress. You never

377
00:20:38,600 --> 00:20:40,639
Speaker 1: know when a bomb can happen. This is the problem.

378
00:20:40,680 --> 00:20:42,719
Speaker 1: You could be at home having dinner, you could be sleeping,

379
00:20:42,720 --> 00:20:44,640
Speaker 1: you could be walking to the shop. At any time

380
00:20:44,680 --> 00:20:47,000
Speaker 1: it might happen. Especially coming to Turkey. For those who

381
00:20:47,040 --> 00:20:48,840
Speaker 1: have to go to Turkey for work or two unite

382
00:20:48,880 --> 00:20:51,280
Speaker 1: family members, it is a very scary route as you

383
00:20:51,320 --> 00:20:53,080
Speaker 1: don't know who you might meet and what might happen.

384
00:20:53,160 --> 00:20:54,960
Speaker 1: You don't know if you will return home safe or

385
00:20:54,960 --> 00:20:57,720
Speaker 1: see your family again. That's a quote from a Tarik,

386
00:20:57,880 --> 00:21:04,040
Speaker 1: a health worker in Alsama, Aleppo. So but Charlasad punished

387
00:21:04,040 --> 00:21:06,920
Speaker 1: Aleppo and other cities for their disobedience by leveling the

388
00:21:07,000 --> 00:21:09,840
Speaker 1: vast majority of the buildings there with endless reigns of

389
00:21:09,880 --> 00:21:13,320
Speaker 1: barrel bombs during the four year battle for Aleppo, residents

390
00:21:13,359 --> 00:21:16,000
Speaker 1: would celebrate whenever the weather was cloudy, because it meant

391
00:21:16,000 --> 00:21:17,840
Speaker 1: that they would at least get a few hours break

392
00:21:17,920 --> 00:21:21,280
Speaker 1: before the next bombs fell. One staff member told Doctors

393
00:21:21,280 --> 00:21:24,080
Speaker 1: Without Borders quote, one day when we were working at

394
00:21:24,080 --> 00:21:26,040
Speaker 1: the hospital in eastern Aleppo was the day of a

395
00:21:26,080 --> 00:21:28,000
Speaker 1: high number of barrel bombings. It was like the city

396
00:21:28,040 --> 00:21:29,800
Speaker 1: was in chaos, and lots of people were being brought

397
00:21:29,880 --> 00:21:32,320
Speaker 1: to us, dead and alive. I remember when two bodies

398
00:21:32,359 --> 00:21:34,680
Speaker 1: were brought in, an old man and his small grandson.

399
00:21:34,760 --> 00:21:36,359
Speaker 1: They both had the same name. They must have been

400
00:21:36,359 --> 00:21:39,080
Speaker 1: together when the bomb hit. The family was searching for

401
00:21:39,160 --> 00:21:41,399
Speaker 1: them in all the hospitals of Aleppo, but couldn't find them.

402
00:21:41,440 --> 00:21:43,359
Speaker 1: Their neighbors had also been bombed, so there was no

403
00:21:43,400 --> 00:21:45,639
Speaker 1: one to ask about the whereabouts of these two. Finally

404
00:21:45,640 --> 00:21:48,240
Speaker 1: they came and the bodies were identified. It was all

405
00:21:48,359 --> 00:21:55,720
Speaker 1: just one instance, but still we all felt so sad. Yeah, yeah, no, one,

406
00:21:56,960 --> 00:21:59,159
Speaker 1: that's so sad. There's like just no, you just don't know.

407
00:21:59,240 --> 00:22:01,960
Speaker 1: You don't know what's going to happen at any point

408
00:22:02,280 --> 00:22:06,040
Speaker 1: at any time. You just live in fucking fear that

409
00:22:06,119 --> 00:22:08,680
Speaker 1: the man who runs your country just may like casual

410
00:22:08,720 --> 00:22:12,680
Speaker 1: decide to bomb your town or your home. Yeah, you're

411
00:22:12,720 --> 00:22:15,320
Speaker 1: just like, oh, well, you know, one of those days. Oh,

412
00:22:15,320 --> 00:22:20,439
Speaker 1: thank god for the clouds so we don't get barrel bombed.

413
00:22:21,119 --> 00:22:27,720
Speaker 1: The president can't murder us today unless the clouds go away. Yeah.

414
00:22:28,040 --> 00:22:31,359
Speaker 1: Chris kozak Assyria research analysts for the Institute of the

415
00:22:31,359 --> 00:22:34,600
Speaker 1: Study of War, explains that the regime's strategy with barrel

416
00:22:34,640 --> 00:22:38,560
Speaker 1: bombs is to quote, inflict mass punishment against opposition supported

417
00:22:38,600 --> 00:22:41,720
Speaker 1: populations or populations that were perceived to be supportive of

418
00:22:41,760 --> 00:22:44,040
Speaker 1: the opposition in order to prevent the formation of a

419
00:22:44,160 --> 00:22:47,720
Speaker 1: viable alternative to the regime. And it really seems to

420
00:22:47,760 --> 00:22:50,240
Speaker 1: have worked. Like the Free Syrian Army at the start

421
00:22:50,320 --> 00:22:53,199
Speaker 1: was a really secular force run by a lot of

422
00:22:53,200 --> 00:22:57,240
Speaker 1: really brave men, and it's sort of degraded into kind

423
00:22:57,240 --> 00:22:59,840
Speaker 1: of a lot of bandits and extremists at this point,

424
00:22:59,840 --> 00:23:02,360
Speaker 1: just because everybody at the start of the civil war

425
00:23:02,480 --> 00:23:05,880
Speaker 1: who was like providing a viable alternative to Bashar's government

426
00:23:06,400 --> 00:23:08,720
Speaker 1: and like was a hope of civil society. Like he

427
00:23:08,800 --> 00:23:11,880
Speaker 1: killed them all, um, Like that was a big part

428
00:23:11,880 --> 00:23:13,520
Speaker 1: of his strategy is like, oh, they want to run

429
00:23:13,720 --> 00:23:16,359
Speaker 1: Syria without me, Well I'll just murder everybody who can

430
00:23:16,440 --> 00:23:23,680
Speaker 1: run Syria without me. Yeah, everyone's gone, Yeah, everybody's everybody's gone,

431
00:23:23,720 --> 00:23:26,480
Speaker 1: and all the survivors are too shell shocked and terrified

432
00:23:26,600 --> 00:23:31,560
Speaker 1: to do anything but hide. That's a strategy. Do we

433
00:23:31,640 --> 00:23:34,960
Speaker 1: know how many people are left in his army? No?

434
00:23:35,160 --> 00:23:37,800
Speaker 1: I mean at this point, he's conscripted a lot more,

435
00:23:37,880 --> 00:23:39,919
Speaker 1: and it's it's it's up to a higher level. But

436
00:23:39,920 --> 00:23:42,320
Speaker 1: there was one point where they were essentially militias and

437
00:23:42,400 --> 00:23:45,719
Speaker 1: gangs that were allied with the regime were way larger

438
00:23:45,760 --> 00:23:49,000
Speaker 1: than the actual Syrian Erab army, you know, especially if

439
00:23:49,000 --> 00:23:52,240
Speaker 1: you're talking like two fourteen. Yeah, he's got like help

440
00:23:52,320 --> 00:23:58,320
Speaker 1: from Iran in other places, Yeah, yeah, a lot of yeah,

441
00:23:58,760 --> 00:24:01,840
Speaker 1: help from Iran, help from his blah, help from help

442
00:24:01,880 --> 00:24:06,320
Speaker 1: from Russia. Um B Shar's favorite target for his barrel

443
00:24:06,359 --> 00:24:10,080
Speaker 1: bombs outside of the crowdit apartment buildings as hospitals. On

444
00:24:10,080 --> 00:24:12,440
Speaker 1: one day, he struck a left post in tent hospital

445
00:24:12,480 --> 00:24:15,800
Speaker 1: with two barrel bombs, two cluster bombs in one rocket. Now,

446
00:24:15,840 --> 00:24:19,000
Speaker 1: striking hospitals is a war crime, but Assad figures what's

447
00:24:19,040 --> 00:24:21,280
Speaker 1: the harm in committing war crimes when you know nobody

448
00:24:21,359 --> 00:24:24,080
Speaker 1: is ever going to punish you. They're not really crimes,

449
00:24:24,080 --> 00:24:27,840
Speaker 1: then are they. He also loves bombing elementary schools, and

450
00:24:27,880 --> 00:24:31,320
Speaker 1: one two fourteen attack he killed twenty five small children

451
00:24:31,400 --> 00:24:34,959
Speaker 1: with a single bomb. When interviewed by the BBC, Bashar

452
00:24:35,040 --> 00:24:37,960
Speaker 1: al Assad denies his regime has ever deployed barrel bombs,

453
00:24:37,960 --> 00:24:41,040
Speaker 1: saying it's a childish story that keeps repeating in the West.

454
00:24:41,119 --> 00:24:43,480
Speaker 1: If someone who is against his people and against regional

455
00:24:43,480 --> 00:24:45,719
Speaker 1: powers and the great powers in the West, how did

456
00:24:45,720 --> 00:24:48,119
Speaker 1: they survive? If you kill the Syrian people, do they

457
00:24:48,119 --> 00:24:50,440
Speaker 1: support you or do they turn against you? As long

458
00:24:50,480 --> 00:24:52,320
Speaker 1: as you have the public support, it means you are

459
00:24:52,359 --> 00:24:54,800
Speaker 1: defending the people. If you kill the people, they turn

460
00:24:54,840 --> 00:25:02,160
Speaker 1: against you. It's commons sense. You can watch people drop

461
00:25:02,200 --> 00:25:05,640
Speaker 1: barrels out of Syrian Air Force planes on the buildings,

462
00:25:06,119 --> 00:25:11,080
Speaker 1: but you know there's no like he's bombing hospitals because

463
00:25:11,119 --> 00:25:16,840
Speaker 1: they're like treating people who aren't for him like that

464
00:25:17,840 --> 00:25:20,879
Speaker 1: because they're in rebel controlled chunks of the city and

465
00:25:21,240 --> 00:25:24,199
Speaker 1: kill them all. Yeah, a big part of it is

466
00:25:24,280 --> 00:25:28,240
Speaker 1: just completely destroying any kind of resistance to the regime.

467
00:25:28,359 --> 00:25:31,600
Speaker 1: That's the kind of war he's waging. Like, I was

468
00:25:31,640 --> 00:25:35,200
Speaker 1: not against when the US went and bombed what they

469
00:25:35,200 --> 00:25:39,199
Speaker 1: thought were his chemical weapon factories. Everyone was offended by it,

470
00:25:39,280 --> 00:25:41,600
Speaker 1: being like we're going to war. I was like, no,

471
00:25:41,720 --> 00:25:44,359
Speaker 1: we're fucking doing something. Fuck this guy. It's one of

472
00:25:44,400 --> 00:25:46,640
Speaker 1: those things. I mean, we didn't actually like I'm against

473
00:25:46,640 --> 00:25:50,920
Speaker 1: it because it was completely useless and accomplished nothing. I'm

474
00:25:50,960 --> 00:25:54,840
Speaker 1: not against attacking the Syrian regime and trying to destroy

475
00:25:54,840 --> 00:25:56,960
Speaker 1: their chemical weapon stock piles. But if you're talking about

476
00:25:56,960 --> 00:26:00,399
Speaker 1: the Trump administration's cruise missile attack, like it just didn't

477
00:26:00,440 --> 00:26:03,600
Speaker 1: fucking do anything, but it was I like that it

478
00:26:03,720 --> 00:26:07,600
Speaker 1: was something to be like, we fucking see you, bro. Yeah, yeah,

479
00:26:07,680 --> 00:26:10,520
Speaker 1: it's at least it's it's not nothing. Um So I'll

480
00:26:10,520 --> 00:26:13,440
Speaker 1: give it that, like it's better than nothing. But I

481
00:26:13,800 --> 00:26:20,959
Speaker 1: will say it didn't accomplish anything other than maybe scaring

482
00:26:21,040 --> 00:26:22,760
Speaker 1: him a little bit. But I don't even know how

483
00:26:22,840 --> 00:26:25,440
Speaker 1: much it scared him because the next day he fucking

484
00:26:25,560 --> 00:26:29,000
Speaker 1: released that photo of himself walking through with a briefcase,

485
00:26:29,000 --> 00:26:31,480
Speaker 1: which is like, motherfucker, were you even carrying a briefcase?

486
00:26:32,440 --> 00:26:36,320
Speaker 1: What are you keeping that briefcase? Like you fucking asshole.

487
00:26:36,400 --> 00:26:40,840
Speaker 1: Fucking b shoe you you baby, you've got nothing. You

488
00:26:40,880 --> 00:26:44,320
Speaker 1: know who's not an asshole walking with a briefcase through

489
00:26:44,359 --> 00:26:51,240
Speaker 1: the ruins of his destroyed airfield. Anna, the advertisers who

490
00:26:51,359 --> 00:26:57,840
Speaker 1: support this show nice. Yes, that's the behind the bastards guarantee.

491
00:26:57,920 --> 00:27:00,840
Speaker 1: None of our advertisers are bashar all assade. And watch

492
00:27:00,880 --> 00:27:03,600
Speaker 1: the fucking next ad that gets randomly. It's going to

493
00:27:05,280 --> 00:27:11,639
Speaker 1: Damascus Airport now open for business again, see the wonderful beaches.

494
00:27:13,560 --> 00:27:15,720
Speaker 1: I would love to see Damascus if there was a

495
00:27:15,720 --> 00:27:18,960
Speaker 1: way to do it without you know, putting, putting putting.

496
00:27:19,000 --> 00:27:21,600
Speaker 1: Well no, I mean it's pretty safe for travelers. It's

497
00:27:21,640 --> 00:27:23,800
Speaker 1: just you'd be putting money into the regime and I

498
00:27:23,840 --> 00:27:27,480
Speaker 1: don't want to do that. But Damascus is a city

499
00:27:27,480 --> 00:27:32,480
Speaker 1: I've always wanted to say anyway, Yeah, it's incredible. My

500
00:27:32,480 --> 00:27:36,320
Speaker 1: my Arabic teacher was a Syrian and he was from Aleppo,

501
00:27:36,480 --> 00:27:39,240
Speaker 1: and this was back in two thousand six. Um. I

502
00:27:39,320 --> 00:27:41,800
Speaker 1: just remember how much he would talk about how beautiful

503
00:27:41,880 --> 00:27:44,760
Speaker 1: his city was, proud he was of his country, about

504
00:27:44,760 --> 00:27:47,040
Speaker 1: how we created the alphabet, like that's a real thing

505
00:27:47,080 --> 00:27:53,280
Speaker 1: that the Syrians aim. Yeah, fucking made math. Yeah, horrible tragedy.

506
00:27:53,440 --> 00:27:57,960
Speaker 1: What's happened not a horrible tragedy? Are our products and services?

507
00:27:59,359 --> 00:28:00,960
Speaker 1: Was that a good ad break, Sophie? Do we do

508
00:28:01,000 --> 00:28:14,280
Speaker 1: it right? No? Well it's done. Products, we're back, We're

509
00:28:14,320 --> 00:28:16,600
Speaker 1: back after what I have to assume is the best

510
00:28:16,680 --> 00:28:19,879
Speaker 1: ad break anyone has ever done. Um, it's gonna be like,

511
00:28:20,280 --> 00:28:24,040
Speaker 1: do you like regimes? You're gonna love but charlads And

512
00:28:24,080 --> 00:28:29,480
Speaker 1: you're like, wait, what just literally an ad for places

513
00:28:29,560 --> 00:28:32,080
Speaker 1: on our side? He's like, hey, guys, I get a

514
00:28:32,080 --> 00:28:34,240
Speaker 1: lot of heat. But what you don't know is I'm

515
00:28:34,280 --> 00:28:37,000
Speaker 1: actually quite self deprecating in a real fun guy and

516
00:28:37,040 --> 00:28:40,680
Speaker 1: people love my giggle. He's actually he's hosting a new

517
00:28:40,720 --> 00:28:45,040
Speaker 1: podcast about Phil Collins. That would that would be so wild.

518
00:28:45,080 --> 00:28:47,320
Speaker 1: He's like, guys, I love Phil Collins and my first

519
00:28:47,360 --> 00:28:52,080
Speaker 1: guests are Brad and Angelina. Check it out on the

520
00:28:52,360 --> 00:28:57,720
Speaker 1: Sadcast podcast. I hate to say it, but that's a

521
00:28:57,720 --> 00:29:00,360
Speaker 1: it's a solid it's a solid name. So we make

522
00:29:00,400 --> 00:29:05,520
Speaker 1: that podcast. No, under no circumstances should we make that podcast? Cool?

523
00:29:06,520 --> 00:29:13,160
Speaker 1: You're not? Okay? Yeah, let's uh, let's not make that podcast. So. Yeah.

524
00:29:13,200 --> 00:29:18,080
Speaker 1: You can watch dozens of videos of Assad's regime dropping

525
00:29:18,080 --> 00:29:20,520
Speaker 1: barrel bombs if you want to see that yourself. For

526
00:29:20,600 --> 00:29:23,440
Speaker 1: some reason, at least a hundred and eighty one thousand,

527
00:29:23,560 --> 00:29:25,800
Speaker 1: five hundred and fifty seven civilians have been killed in

528
00:29:25,880 --> 00:29:29,520
Speaker 1: battle by the Syrian regime, which is ninety five point

529
00:29:29,600 --> 00:29:32,120
Speaker 1: seven percent of the total combat death toll in the

530
00:29:32,240 --> 00:29:36,120
Speaker 1: Syrian Civil War. These are just confirmed dead, with total

531
00:29:36,160 --> 00:29:39,200
Speaker 1: expected fatalities over half a million. The real number is

532
00:29:39,280 --> 00:29:43,120
Speaker 1: much likely higher. The regime has killed at least eighteen thousand,

533
00:29:43,160 --> 00:29:46,320
Speaker 1: four hundred and fifty six children, nine three point six

534
00:29:46,320 --> 00:29:48,240
Speaker 1: percent of the children who are known to have died

535
00:29:48,280 --> 00:29:51,840
Speaker 1: in the Syrians Civil War. Now, that number leaves out

536
00:29:51,840 --> 00:29:54,600
Speaker 1: a hundred and twenty eight thousand people who have been missing,

537
00:29:54,680 --> 00:29:57,800
Speaker 1: in many cases for years, inside the secret prisons run

538
00:29:57,800 --> 00:30:01,200
Speaker 1: by the Bashar al Assad government. According to the New

539
00:30:01,240 --> 00:30:05,080
Speaker 1: York Times quote, government memos smuggled out of the country

540
00:30:05,120 --> 00:30:08,200
Speaker 1: show that officials who reported directly to Mr. Alissad ordered

541
00:30:08,200 --> 00:30:11,640
Speaker 1: the crackdowns on civilians and new of atrocities. They ordered

542
00:30:11,680 --> 00:30:15,040
Speaker 1: a harsh treatment of specific detainees, and complained of increasing

543
00:30:15,120 --> 00:30:18,840
Speaker 1: detainee deaths as corpses piled up and decomposed. One government

544
00:30:18,840 --> 00:30:22,320
Speaker 1: memo urged personnel to complete paperwork and protect officials from

545
00:30:22,400 --> 00:30:26,560
Speaker 1: future prosecution. Detainees are regularly beaten, hung by their wrists,

546
00:30:26,600 --> 00:30:30,680
Speaker 1: beaten while crammed inside tires, shocked with electricity, and sexually assaulted.

547
00:30:30,920 --> 00:30:33,920
Speaker 1: More baroque forms of torture include forcing detainees to act

548
00:30:33,960 --> 00:30:36,720
Speaker 1: like animals, beat or kill one another, and dousing them

549
00:30:36,720 --> 00:30:40,840
Speaker 1: with fuel and burning them. It's possible that more than

550
00:30:40,880 --> 00:30:47,560
Speaker 1: a hundred thousand people have died that way, yeah, which

551
00:30:47,640 --> 00:30:54,120
Speaker 1: is for reference in Libya since two thousand eleven. If

552
00:30:54,160 --> 00:30:55,920
Speaker 1: you include all of the deaths in the fighting to

553
00:30:56,000 --> 00:30:58,360
Speaker 1: overthrow Kaddafi and all of the deaths in the violence

554
00:30:58,360 --> 00:31:04,080
Speaker 1: since Kaddafi's overthrow, two nineteen fifty people have died from

555
00:31:04,080 --> 00:31:07,280
Speaker 1: the violence in Libya. But char Alassa it has tortured

556
00:31:07,320 --> 00:31:10,400
Speaker 1: twice that many people to death, not counting the barrel bombs,

557
00:31:10,560 --> 00:31:14,360
Speaker 1: not counting the chemical weapons, not counting gunfire, not counting mortars,

558
00:31:14,400 --> 00:31:18,600
Speaker 1: not counting rockets, not counting Russian airplanes, just torturing people

559
00:31:18,600 --> 00:31:20,640
Speaker 1: to death twice as many people as have died in

560
00:31:20,680 --> 00:31:26,080
Speaker 1: Libya since two thousand eleven fighting God bless all them people,

561
00:31:26,760 --> 00:31:30,880
Speaker 1: because fighting for what you believe in in the Middle

562
00:31:30,920 --> 00:31:36,080
Speaker 1: East is suicides. Yeah, it's always for the most part,

563
00:31:36,160 --> 00:31:38,680
Speaker 1: not going to get the way you would like. Has

564
00:31:38,760 --> 00:31:44,080
Speaker 1: not in a while. Uh now, after all this horrifying brutality,

565
00:31:44,200 --> 00:31:46,640
Speaker 1: all these senseless deaths. I know what you're wondering, Anna,

566
00:31:47,440 --> 00:31:50,560
Speaker 1: how has this war been for Bashar and his lovely

567
00:31:50,600 --> 00:32:00,360
Speaker 1: wife Ozma. Well, your your face, you skin cancer. Yeah,

568
00:32:00,360 --> 00:32:03,040
Speaker 1: it's one of those things where it's like cancer, get

569
00:32:03,080 --> 00:32:08,640
Speaker 1: your boys like this. These are the people to to

570
00:32:08,760 --> 00:32:12,200
Speaker 1: happen to. But they'll probably both live to a hundred

571
00:32:12,280 --> 00:32:16,920
Speaker 1: and three. Um, but I know you're curious as to

572
00:32:17,120 --> 00:32:20,880
Speaker 1: what their daily life has been. The good news is

573
00:32:20,920 --> 00:32:23,240
Speaker 1: that thousands of their emails were leaked to The Guardian,

574
00:32:23,360 --> 00:32:25,160
Speaker 1: so we actually have a pretty good idea of what

575
00:32:25,200 --> 00:32:27,120
Speaker 1: they got up to in between all the barrel bombs

576
00:32:27,120 --> 00:32:30,040
Speaker 1: and such. First off, so how did their emails get leaked?

577
00:32:31,160 --> 00:32:33,440
Speaker 1: I don't know, It's just just something that happens. They

578
00:32:33,480 --> 00:32:35,600
Speaker 1: confirmed it. The Guardian confirmed it with a number of

579
00:32:35,600 --> 00:32:37,959
Speaker 1: different people, including recipients of the emails, that they were

580
00:32:38,000 --> 00:32:41,240
Speaker 1: legitimate and stuff. Um, you know, it's one of those things.

581
00:32:41,280 --> 00:32:45,000
Speaker 1: How did fucking you know, shiploads of people's emails get

582
00:32:45,040 --> 00:32:49,080
Speaker 1: leaked out these days? It's just the how what happens

583
00:32:49,240 --> 00:32:53,640
Speaker 1: got the hackers out there? Them hackers. Now, Uh, first off,

584
00:32:54,120 --> 00:32:56,800
Speaker 1: you're gonna guess what the assad's favorite TV show has

585
00:32:56,840 --> 00:33:01,080
Speaker 1: been during the Civil War? Oh know, like what like

586
00:33:01,240 --> 00:33:07,000
Speaker 1: Friends on Netflix? America's got talent? Oh my god, yea,

587
00:33:07,120 --> 00:33:11,760
Speaker 1: they are such trash. They are basic bitches. I feel

588
00:33:11,840 --> 00:33:15,360
Speaker 1: comfortable saying that. Uh. Also big fans of the Harry

589
00:33:15,400 --> 00:33:17,320
Speaker 1: Potter movies. There was some worry at one point that

590
00:33:17,360 --> 00:33:19,080
Speaker 1: they wouldn't be able to get their hands on Harry

591
00:33:19,080 --> 00:33:21,600
Speaker 1: Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part two because of the war,

592
00:33:21,720 --> 00:33:23,760
Speaker 1: but they did get a copy. So I'm actually not

593
00:33:23,800 --> 00:33:25,720
Speaker 1: surprised by that because I bet but chars he's a

594
00:33:25,720 --> 00:33:30,080
Speaker 1: lot of himself and like Baltimore, like, you know, this

595
00:33:30,160 --> 00:33:32,560
Speaker 1: guy makes a lot of good points. This guy is

596
00:33:32,560 --> 00:33:34,520
Speaker 1: making a lot of He's saying all the right things.

597
00:33:35,680 --> 00:33:44,720
Speaker 1: He was death eaters, Yeah, good luck. Yeah. Here's the

598
00:33:44,760 --> 00:33:48,120
Speaker 1: Guardian quote in one email, all a sad laughs at

599
00:33:48,160 --> 00:33:50,760
Speaker 1: democratic reforms. When his wife tells him she'll come home

600
00:33:50,800 --> 00:33:53,160
Speaker 1: early one day, he quips, this is the best reform

601
00:33:53,200 --> 00:33:55,200
Speaker 1: any country can have. That you told me where you

602
00:33:55,240 --> 00:33:57,040
Speaker 1: will be. We are going to adopt it instead of

603
00:33:57,080 --> 00:34:00,600
Speaker 1: the rubbish laws of parties, elections, media and that funny

604
00:34:00,760 --> 00:34:06,720
Speaker 1: how about you fuck you don't like his dictator women?

605
00:34:06,880 --> 00:34:10,000
Speaker 1: Am I right? It's like, get the fuck out of here,

606
00:34:10,040 --> 00:34:14,520
Speaker 1: you're killing people. Al Assad joked with how deal al Ali,

607
00:34:14,520 --> 00:34:17,279
Speaker 1: one of his media consultants, while Arab League monitors were

608
00:34:17,280 --> 00:34:20,000
Speaker 1: in serious seeking to bring it into the carnage. Al

609
00:34:20,000 --> 00:34:23,280
Speaker 1: Assad ridiculed the mission, sending al Ali a YouTube parody

610
00:34:23,320 --> 00:34:26,600
Speaker 1: of the violence that uses children's toys. Check out this video,

611
00:34:26,680 --> 00:34:29,440
Speaker 1: he wrote. She responded with ha ha ha ha ha

612
00:34:29,600 --> 00:34:34,960
Speaker 1: o MG exclamation point, exclamation point, exclamation point, what m

613
00:34:35,520 --> 00:34:39,080
Speaker 1: this bitch? And there was a sad fucking looking up

614
00:34:39,080 --> 00:34:44,400
Speaker 1: YouTube videos while his forces are murdering, bombing hospitals. Yeah.

615
00:34:44,800 --> 00:34:47,319
Speaker 1: The only vague suggestion one gets that Bashar might have

616
00:34:47,400 --> 00:34:49,920
Speaker 1: something that approaches a conscience comes from an email he's

617
00:34:49,920 --> 00:34:52,879
Speaker 1: sent on February five, two th twelve, on the day

618
00:34:52,920 --> 00:34:55,640
Speaker 1: after his artillery had killed four hundred civilians in the

619
00:34:55,680 --> 00:34:58,719
Speaker 1: city of Halms, pulping flesh and bone and concrete into

620
00:34:58,719 --> 00:35:02,080
Speaker 1: a powdered slurry. If broke and lives, Assad sent his

621
00:35:02,120 --> 00:35:05,400
Speaker 1: wife an iTunes download of a country song by Blake Shelton.

622
00:35:05,800 --> 00:35:08,000
Speaker 1: He wrote out some of the lyrics in the email.

623
00:35:09,080 --> 00:35:11,640
Speaker 1: I've been a walk in heart heartache. I've made a

624
00:35:11,640 --> 00:35:14,400
Speaker 1: mess of me. The person that I've been lately ain't

625
00:35:14,440 --> 00:35:19,000
Speaker 1: who I want to be. Are you? I am fucking

626
00:35:19,120 --> 00:35:22,520
Speaker 1: serious if that is not a reason to fucking blow

627
00:35:22,680 --> 00:35:26,080
Speaker 1: his brains out, Like what are you even talking about?

628
00:35:26,719 --> 00:35:31,600
Speaker 1: There's nothing relatable about you, fool, No fucking Blake Shelton,

629
00:35:31,800 --> 00:35:35,480
Speaker 1: Like I would say, listen to Chris Christofferson, but Chris

630
00:35:35,520 --> 00:35:40,320
Speaker 1: Christofferson's music would like destroy itself before it let it

631
00:35:40,360 --> 00:35:43,080
Speaker 1: self into a dictation. Honestly, I'm actually not surprised because

632
00:35:43,080 --> 00:35:46,600
Speaker 1: he probably agrees with like Blake Shelton's like skittles are

633
00:35:46,640 --> 00:35:52,000
Speaker 1: for gay people, tweets or something that Blake Shelton, he

634
00:35:52,040 --> 00:35:55,120
Speaker 1: makes it. Yeah, exactly, Fucking Blake Shelton. You should be

635
00:35:55,160 --> 00:35:58,160
Speaker 1: a shame too. Blake Shelton, You're a part of the problem.

636
00:35:58,200 --> 00:36:01,680
Speaker 1: You're a part of the problem. I would be so

637
00:36:01,800 --> 00:36:03,759
Speaker 1: bummed out if it turned out a dictator was a

638
00:36:03,760 --> 00:36:06,239
Speaker 1: fan of any of my work like that. Would that

639
00:36:06,280 --> 00:36:12,239
Speaker 1: would be such a fucking bummer. Oh god, yeah, I'd

640
00:36:12,239 --> 00:36:14,239
Speaker 1: be bummed out if I was JK rowling to know

641
00:36:14,360 --> 00:36:16,920
Speaker 1: that they were watching movies based off my books even

642
00:36:16,960 --> 00:36:19,360
Speaker 1: though like, you know, you didn't do anything wrong there,

643
00:36:19,440 --> 00:36:25,799
Speaker 1: but like still bummer. Like the producers of America's Got Talent, like,

644
00:36:27,440 --> 00:36:31,200
Speaker 1: oh no, they've been playing to the Assad demographic for years.

645
00:36:31,239 --> 00:36:33,840
Speaker 1: That's a critical part of America's Got Talent. Do you

646
00:36:33,880 --> 00:36:36,280
Speaker 1: think he's ever tried to make like a serious got talent?

647
00:36:36,719 --> 00:36:39,120
Speaker 1: I bet that's coming once the warrants and everyone's like

648
00:36:39,200 --> 00:36:45,480
Speaker 1: performing at gunpoint, or it's trying out his hobbies. Him

649
00:36:45,480 --> 00:36:48,440
Speaker 1: doing like a tight five. Yeah, it's guess who wins

650
00:36:48,560 --> 00:36:51,920
Speaker 1: bar every single time every year. It's you again. But

651
00:36:52,800 --> 00:36:56,839
Speaker 1: his wife is the judge, it's the talent, and it's

652
00:36:56,920 --> 00:37:01,120
Speaker 1: him versus the memory of his dead brother. Yeah, he's

653
00:37:01,120 --> 00:37:04,640
Speaker 1: just like, looks like he can in because he's dead. Oh,

654
00:37:04,920 --> 00:37:09,600
Speaker 1: looks who's better at computers now? Bessel, Like, oh boy,

655
00:37:09,960 --> 00:37:13,680
Speaker 1: what a sad, sad, sad experience. In July of two

656
00:37:13,680 --> 00:37:16,320
Speaker 1: thousand eleven, when tens of thousands of Syrians were taking

657
00:37:16,320 --> 00:37:18,520
Speaker 1: to the streets to protest the hopelessness of life under

658
00:37:18,520 --> 00:37:20,320
Speaker 1: the rule of the Assads and the brutality of the

659
00:37:20,360 --> 00:37:24,000
Speaker 1: state security apparatus, Ozma al Assad ordered through her cousin

660
00:37:24,280 --> 00:37:27,440
Speaker 1: bespoke jewelry from a small jeweler in Paris. She ordered

661
00:37:27,440 --> 00:37:31,600
Speaker 1: four necklaces quote, one turquoise with yellow gold diamonds and

662
00:37:31,640 --> 00:37:34,600
Speaker 1: a small puff on the side, one full black onyx

663
00:37:34,600 --> 00:37:37,759
Speaker 1: and amethyst and white gold diamonds. She stated that she

664
00:37:37,800 --> 00:37:39,759
Speaker 1: hoped it would be ready in September, but she said

665
00:37:39,800 --> 00:37:42,160
Speaker 1: that she understood if it took longer, telling her cousin,

666
00:37:42,400 --> 00:37:45,600
Speaker 1: I am absolutely clueless when it comes to find jewelry.

667
00:37:45,719 --> 00:37:48,000
Speaker 1: She ended the letter by saying, kisses to you both,

668
00:37:48,040 --> 00:37:52,200
Speaker 1: and don't worry. We're well. See, someone needs to like

669
00:37:53,200 --> 00:37:59,000
Speaker 1: take it upon themselves to um fill that jewelry with

670
00:37:59,080 --> 00:38:02,560
Speaker 1: like poison gag us that comes out when they put

671
00:38:02,600 --> 00:38:05,640
Speaker 1: them on. She would be nice. I assume they have

672
00:38:05,719 --> 00:38:07,640
Speaker 1: the jewelry by now, but if you can poison the

673
00:38:07,640 --> 00:38:11,080
Speaker 1: Assades jewelry, clearly she's gonna buy more. I would say,

674
00:38:11,120 --> 00:38:13,799
Speaker 1: do it, yeah, yeah, she's gonna buy If you're a

675
00:38:13,800 --> 00:38:16,480
Speaker 1: French jeweler, just poison all your jewelry that probably we

676
00:38:16,480 --> 00:38:19,040
Speaker 1: shouldn't be shouldn't be urging that. I assume other people

677
00:38:19,080 --> 00:38:22,280
Speaker 1: buy French jewelry, only jewelry that's going to the ASSAD regime.

678
00:38:22,880 --> 00:38:27,360
Speaker 1: Only jewelry that's going to the Assad regime. Another email,

679
00:38:27,719 --> 00:38:30,720
Speaker 1: sent in December of two eleven, as the protest campaign

680
00:38:30,719 --> 00:38:33,600
Speaker 1: broke out into a full fledged civil war, Ozma messaged

681
00:38:33,600 --> 00:38:35,960
Speaker 1: her husband quote, if we are strong together, we will

682
00:38:36,000 --> 00:38:40,000
Speaker 1: overcome this together. I love you. Shortly thereafter, she ordered

683
00:38:40,000 --> 00:38:45,320
Speaker 1: a three thousand dollar of oz from Herod's Cool. Yeah,

684
00:38:45,360 --> 00:38:48,160
Speaker 1: I don't like reading shops while this is all going around,

685
00:38:48,560 --> 00:38:51,360
Speaker 1: she shops a ton and reading all this, I'm reminded

686
00:38:51,400 --> 00:38:53,560
Speaker 1: of a quote I came across in a CNN article

687
00:38:53,640 --> 00:38:57,440
Speaker 1: from former Bush administration officer Flint Leverett. He said of

688
00:38:57,680 --> 00:39:00,879
Speaker 1: shar Al Assad, quote, I think whim and Mary says

689
00:39:00,920 --> 00:39:03,719
Speaker 1: a good deal about him. I think that he was

690
00:39:03,760 --> 00:39:08,720
Speaker 1: actually correct, like the fact that he's married to Marie

691
00:39:08,760 --> 00:39:12,840
Speaker 1: Antoinette here really really looking at photos of them together

692
00:39:12,920 --> 00:39:14,600
Speaker 1: right now, and they kind of look like their siblings.

693
00:39:15,400 --> 00:39:17,680
Speaker 1: They do a little bit, right. Yeah. They have like

694
00:39:17,719 --> 00:39:22,799
Speaker 1: the same face, yeah, yeah, the same little randy face. Now,

695
00:39:22,920 --> 00:39:25,520
Speaker 1: you'll notice that we've made it through nineteen or twenty

696
00:39:25,520 --> 00:39:29,040
Speaker 1: pages of b char lassade history without talking about chemical weapons.

697
00:39:29,239 --> 00:39:31,160
Speaker 1: There's a couple of good reasons for this. One of

698
00:39:31,160 --> 00:39:32,799
Speaker 1: them is that for the last couple of years, a

699
00:39:32,800 --> 00:39:35,800
Speaker 1: pernicious series of myths and lies has cropped up, helped

700
00:39:35,800 --> 00:39:40,440
Speaker 1: along by incompetent, senile, or outright ethically compromised journalists, claiming

701
00:39:40,480 --> 00:39:42,920
Speaker 1: that the chemical weapons attacks by Baschar Lassade on his

702
00:39:42,960 --> 00:39:46,160
Speaker 1: own people were false flags. These rumors have spread on

703
00:39:46,200 --> 00:39:49,120
Speaker 1: the far right because actual fascists love Bashar al Assad

704
00:39:49,280 --> 00:39:51,120
Speaker 1: since he is a fascist and he's doing what they'd

705
00:39:51,160 --> 00:39:53,360
Speaker 1: like to do to all of their political opponents. The

706
00:39:53,400 --> 00:39:55,400
Speaker 1: same rumors have spread on the far left because it

707
00:39:55,440 --> 00:39:58,000
Speaker 1: allows leftists to have an easy justification for why they

708
00:39:58,000 --> 00:39:59,920
Speaker 1: don't think any action should be taken to stop the

709
00:40:00,040 --> 00:40:02,239
Speaker 1: Shar from carrying out the greatest mass killing of the

710
00:40:02,280 --> 00:40:06,600
Speaker 1: twenty first century. There is no truth to this nonsense. However,

711
00:40:06,840 --> 00:40:09,200
Speaker 1: I wanted to make it super clear that even if

712
00:40:09,200 --> 00:40:13,040
Speaker 1: Bishar had never ordered a single chemical weapon strike, he

713
00:40:13,200 --> 00:40:16,719
Speaker 1: is still the single greatest monster of the twenty one century.

714
00:40:16,920 --> 00:40:19,560
Speaker 1: Even if he had never launched any Sarah, never dropped

715
00:40:19,560 --> 00:40:24,160
Speaker 1: any chlorine like that ship is fucking icing on the

716
00:40:24,280 --> 00:40:28,400
Speaker 1: piece of ship Dictator Cake, Sophie is h is putting

717
00:40:28,440 --> 00:40:31,359
Speaker 1: two fingers in front of the camera, which means that

718
00:40:31,719 --> 00:40:34,600
Speaker 1: this is clearly a great time for an ad break.

719
00:40:34,840 --> 00:40:39,120
Speaker 1: Nothing gets advertisers excited like talking about chemical weapons attacks.

720
00:40:39,120 --> 00:40:42,560
Speaker 1: Now she's flipping me off, and I don't understand why. Anna,

721
00:40:42,680 --> 00:40:45,840
Speaker 1: you look very uncomfortable. You know I will not get involved.

722
00:40:46,680 --> 00:40:48,040
Speaker 1: You don't want to. You don't want to get involved

723
00:40:48,040 --> 00:40:51,800
Speaker 1: with mommy and daddy fighting. No comment on what just happened,

724
00:40:52,000 --> 00:40:54,640
Speaker 1: No comment on what just happened. Well, what's about to

725
00:40:54,680 --> 00:41:01,240
Speaker 1: happen is products and services. I'm happier about the services

726
00:41:01,239 --> 00:41:04,680
Speaker 1: and the products. Are we on break? I mean no

727
00:41:05,080 --> 00:41:07,480
Speaker 1: we I haven't said products yet. And the voice that

728
00:41:07,520 --> 00:41:09,680
Speaker 1: I say, are you are you ready for us to

729
00:41:09,680 --> 00:41:12,000
Speaker 1: be on break? Anna? Are you bored? No? But I

730
00:41:12,040 --> 00:41:14,880
Speaker 1: was going to tell you something during our break. Oh okay,

731
00:41:14,920 --> 00:41:24,200
Speaker 1: well products, we're back. And uh. The thing that Anna

732
00:41:24,320 --> 00:41:26,840
Speaker 1: was going to tell me is that asthma al Assad

733
00:41:27,080 --> 00:41:30,680
Speaker 1: does have cancer. Now she has breast cancer, so sometimes

734
00:41:31,239 --> 00:41:34,719
Speaker 1: cancer gets it right. Yeah, that's it's fascinating. It's kind

735
00:41:34,719 --> 00:41:36,040
Speaker 1: of funny that we said that and then all of

736
00:41:36,080 --> 00:41:39,520
Speaker 1: a sudden she got cancer. I hope it spreads to

737
00:41:39,560 --> 00:41:42,960
Speaker 1: her husband. I'm sure it's aggressive karma because apparently I

738
00:41:43,000 --> 00:41:45,600
Speaker 1: was just looking that she was offered asylum to get

739
00:41:45,640 --> 00:41:47,360
Speaker 1: out of there, and she said no, and then she

740
00:41:47,480 --> 00:41:50,759
Speaker 1: like came out against the like air strikes, being like

741
00:41:50,840 --> 00:41:55,200
Speaker 1: so irresponsible for you guys to strike our chemical weapon factories.

742
00:41:55,239 --> 00:42:00,560
Speaker 1: It's like, what, dude, what bit funk off with your

743
00:42:00,600 --> 00:42:03,960
Speaker 1: fucking I have an idea, suck a dit dude. Yeah. No,

744
00:42:04,040 --> 00:42:06,200
Speaker 1: it's one of those things where I did look into

745
00:42:06,239 --> 00:42:09,279
Speaker 1: it to make sure she had so many opportunities to

746
00:42:09,320 --> 00:42:12,000
Speaker 1: get the funk out. And in fact, there's even suggestions

747
00:42:12,000 --> 00:42:13,680
Speaker 1: that at one point, when the war was going more

748
00:42:13,680 --> 00:42:16,520
Speaker 1: against the regime, they actually tried to flee the country,

749
00:42:16,560 --> 00:42:19,640
Speaker 1: but she still stood by her man, so to speak,

750
00:42:19,760 --> 00:42:22,080
Speaker 1: like she she was. There was at no point where

751
00:42:22,120 --> 00:42:26,160
Speaker 1: she was like, bar, maybe we shouldn't be mass murdering people.

752
00:42:26,200 --> 00:42:28,600
Speaker 1: Maybe we could just take our ill gotten money and

753
00:42:28,640 --> 00:42:31,319
Speaker 1: go live in France or something. They could have worked

754
00:42:31,360 --> 00:42:34,080
Speaker 1: that deal out right. Also, I just saw a thing

755
00:42:34,280 --> 00:42:36,359
Speaker 1: part of the emails that leak that she was saying

756
00:42:36,360 --> 00:42:40,360
Speaker 1: that she's the real dictator. Yeah, she's joked about that

757
00:42:40,400 --> 00:42:44,120
Speaker 1: a number of times. What the fuck, dude, you're such

758
00:42:44,160 --> 00:42:50,600
Speaker 1: a bit. She's a monster. Trust beautiful people in power. No, no, no, no, no,

759
00:42:50,680 --> 00:42:56,440
Speaker 1: it's always bad. It's always bad. Uh, Yeah, they're just

760
00:42:56,680 --> 00:43:00,640
Speaker 1: too damn sexy, which is why I did not support

761
00:43:00,640 --> 00:43:05,600
Speaker 1: Barack Obama's election now, but but it did worry me

762
00:43:05,680 --> 00:43:08,960
Speaker 1: how good looking he was. Um. Thankfully, now that we

763
00:43:09,000 --> 00:43:11,120
Speaker 1: have an ugly man as president, everything's on the up

764
00:43:11,120 --> 00:43:14,440
Speaker 1: and up. There's the same problem with George W. Bush.

765
00:43:14,480 --> 00:43:18,719
Speaker 1: Too much raw sexual power was just I know, I know,

766
00:43:18,880 --> 00:43:21,360
Speaker 1: we all did, we all did. Everyone at the press

767
00:43:21,360 --> 00:43:24,600
Speaker 1: pool was just tweaking their nipples during his briefings. It

768
00:43:24,680 --> 00:43:28,520
Speaker 1: was it was. It was a problem now. The deadliest

769
00:43:28,880 --> 00:43:32,320
Speaker 1: of Bhar's chemical weapons attacks occurred in two thousand thirteen,

770
00:43:32,400 --> 00:43:35,200
Speaker 1: when he launched a barrage of rockets containing seren nerve

771
00:43:35,280 --> 00:43:39,799
Speaker 1: gas on Gudha, a rebel controlled suburb of Damascus. Undred

772
00:43:39,880 --> 00:43:44,400
Speaker 1: people were killed. The un confirmed, overwhelming and indisputable evidence

773
00:43:44,440 --> 00:43:47,680
Speaker 1: of saren used at the massacre. Gary Quinlan, the Australian

774
00:43:47,760 --> 00:43:50,880
Speaker 1: UN Ambassador and President of the UN Security Council, is

775
00:43:50,920 --> 00:43:53,759
Speaker 1: set in the report on the attack. Quote confirms in

776
00:43:53,800 --> 00:43:55,799
Speaker 1: our view that there was no remaining doubt it was

777
00:43:55,880 --> 00:43:59,279
Speaker 1: the regime that used chemical weapons. A more recent two

778
00:43:59,280 --> 00:44:02,880
Speaker 1: thousand seventeen chemical weapon attack on kane Kun killed eighty

779
00:44:02,960 --> 00:44:06,120
Speaker 1: six people. Doctors without Borders independently confirmed the use of

780
00:44:06,160 --> 00:44:09,120
Speaker 1: chemical weapons in this attack. This attack prompted the Trump

781
00:44:09,120 --> 00:44:13,759
Speaker 1: administration to fire cruise muscles at a mostly empty air base. Uh, Like,

782
00:44:15,320 --> 00:44:17,640
Speaker 1: there's a lot. Like you can go in a rabbit

783
00:44:17,680 --> 00:44:19,960
Speaker 1: hole and read a bunch of people putting out like, oh,

784
00:44:19,960 --> 00:44:21,880
Speaker 1: look at this detail of this picture means that these

785
00:44:21,920 --> 00:44:24,000
Speaker 1: attacks were fake, or that there wasn't a chemical weapon,

786
00:44:24,080 --> 00:44:26,200
Speaker 1: or that it was the rebels that did it. It's

787
00:44:26,239 --> 00:44:28,040
Speaker 1: the same if you have spent a lot of time

788
00:44:28,040 --> 00:44:31,040
Speaker 1: looking at nine eleven conspiracies, it's the same bullshit. The

789
00:44:31,080 --> 00:44:35,400
Speaker 1: difference is that some respectable journalists like Seymour Hirsch have

790
00:44:35,560 --> 00:44:38,080
Speaker 1: gotten caught up in it because in his case, he's

791
00:44:38,120 --> 00:44:41,600
Speaker 1: fucking old and doesn't know anything about chemical weapons, and

792
00:44:42,080 --> 00:44:45,040
Speaker 1: uh is one of those people who is reflexively going

793
00:44:45,080 --> 00:44:48,160
Speaker 1: to be like whatever America says isn't the truth. Even

794
00:44:48,400 --> 00:44:50,440
Speaker 1: it's like fucking I've I've seen the US commit war

795
00:44:50,520 --> 00:44:54,279
Speaker 1: crimes there have reported on them like fuck everything, but

796
00:44:54,480 --> 00:44:57,880
Speaker 1: fuck pretending these chemical attacks aren't real. There's been like

797
00:44:57,960 --> 00:45:01,759
Speaker 1: three hundred and thirty documented chemical weapons attacks, like percent

798
00:45:01,840 --> 00:45:03,640
Speaker 1: of them have been the Syrian regime. There have been

799
00:45:03,640 --> 00:45:06,000
Speaker 1: a couple by like isis and whatnot who have like

800
00:45:06,080 --> 00:45:09,400
Speaker 1: made like chlorine gas bombs and ship But it is

801
00:45:09,600 --> 00:45:12,600
Speaker 1: very well documented. You can what you can do, like

802
00:45:12,840 --> 00:45:15,040
Speaker 1: go to the Bell and Cat articles documenting some of

803
00:45:15,040 --> 00:45:18,000
Speaker 1: the more recent attacks where they've dropped gas canisters through

804
00:45:18,120 --> 00:45:20,400
Speaker 1: roofs and like go through every picture of it and

805
00:45:20,480 --> 00:45:23,360
Speaker 1: look at the documentation and trace back the research for

806
00:45:23,400 --> 00:45:26,040
Speaker 1: yourself if you really fucking want to. But doctors without

807
00:45:26,080 --> 00:45:30,120
Speaker 1: Borders and the fucking you in observers who have tested

808
00:45:30,560 --> 00:45:35,000
Speaker 1: like the fucking soil and people's bodies and done thousands

809
00:45:35,040 --> 00:45:38,000
Speaker 1: of hours of research into this are all on the

810
00:45:38,040 --> 00:45:40,640
Speaker 1: same page. And it's that the Assad regime is repeatedly

811
00:45:40,680 --> 00:45:45,320
Speaker 1: deployed chemical weapons against its people. Fuck, I get angry

812
00:45:45,320 --> 00:45:48,759
Speaker 1: about this. It's very fucked up. Shows how we keep

813
00:45:48,760 --> 00:45:52,520
Speaker 1: they really are. Yeah, yeah, it's it's it's and this

814
00:45:52,600 --> 00:45:55,080
Speaker 1: is I think one of the reasons there's a conspiracy

815
00:45:55,080 --> 00:45:57,600
Speaker 1: around this is because a lot of people can't understand

816
00:45:57,640 --> 00:46:00,200
Speaker 1: why Bashar al Assad would deploy chemical weapons on his

817
00:46:00,239 --> 00:46:03,799
Speaker 1: own people in risk foreign intervention. There's this idea that like, oh,

818
00:46:03,840 --> 00:46:06,120
Speaker 1: it's just so risky, why would he do it? And

819
00:46:06,160 --> 00:46:09,000
Speaker 1: I think the answer is that he took the measure

820
00:46:09,080 --> 00:46:11,640
Speaker 1: of the United States during the Bush years, and for

821
00:46:11,760 --> 00:46:14,319
Speaker 1: eight years he balanced helping the US with hindering it,

822
00:46:14,360 --> 00:46:17,360
Speaker 1: and he watched our occupation of Iraq turned into a quagmire,

823
00:46:17,640 --> 00:46:20,240
Speaker 1: and he came to a very clear and very accurate

824
00:46:20,280 --> 00:46:23,600
Speaker 1: conclusion that the United States no longer had the guts

825
00:46:23,640 --> 00:46:27,160
Speaker 1: to intervene seriously in a situation where intervention might cost

826
00:46:27,200 --> 00:46:30,840
Speaker 1: American lives. And he gambled on that gut feeling and

827
00:46:30,920 --> 00:46:34,720
Speaker 1: he won it as simple as that. It's like Hitler

828
00:46:34,760 --> 00:46:38,440
Speaker 1: gambling on fucking annexing the Sudetan land, like it was

829
00:46:38,480 --> 00:46:41,239
Speaker 1: a gamble. It could have fucked up. He had, by

830
00:46:41,280 --> 00:46:44,320
Speaker 1: some accounts, more to lose than to win, but everybody

831
00:46:44,320 --> 00:46:46,839
Speaker 1: else was a fucking coward, so we won. That's how

832
00:46:46,840 --> 00:46:52,560
Speaker 1: it works with dictators, Like I know, it's it's that's

833
00:46:52,560 --> 00:46:56,600
Speaker 1: why I'm like, you know, I have no problem with us. Yeah,

834
00:46:56,600 --> 00:46:58,440
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't even know. Let's send it at

835
00:46:58,440 --> 00:47:03,200
Speaker 1: this point, at this point, there's Honey Potter's and yeah,

836
00:47:03,400 --> 00:47:05,360
Speaker 1: like at this point, I mean the Syrian regime in

837
00:47:05,360 --> 00:47:08,319
Speaker 1: the Russian air forces pounding a province called i Lib

838
00:47:08,360 --> 00:47:10,640
Speaker 1: which has like three million people in it. The vast,

839
00:47:10,719 --> 00:47:14,200
Speaker 1: vast majority of humor civilians. I support trying to enforce

840
00:47:14,239 --> 00:47:16,600
Speaker 1: some sort of no fly zone to stop those people

841
00:47:16,640 --> 00:47:20,640
Speaker 1: from being massacred because the same fucking bombings, saturation bombing

842
00:47:20,719 --> 00:47:23,319
Speaker 1: is happening there. But like there's no good in two

843
00:47:23,320 --> 00:47:26,719
Speaker 1: thousand eleven twelve, a good thing could have been worked out.

844
00:47:27,719 --> 00:47:30,600
Speaker 1: That's that there's no possibility. Now there's too many people

845
00:47:30,600 --> 00:47:34,440
Speaker 1: are dead, Like everything's fucked now, we didn't do a

846
00:47:34,520 --> 00:47:39,800
Speaker 1: world Yeah. So um. The other reason he deployed chemical

847
00:47:39,840 --> 00:47:42,560
Speaker 1: weapons is a little bit cannier. At the very start

848
00:47:42,600 --> 00:47:45,239
Speaker 1: of the uprising against his rule, Assad had claimed that

849
00:47:45,280 --> 00:47:47,960
Speaker 1: the forces behind the rebels were not Syrians but foreigners

850
00:47:48,000 --> 00:47:51,480
Speaker 1: trying to undermine his country. Lesh, who's probably the Westerner

851
00:47:51,480 --> 00:47:54,040
Speaker 1: who knows Bshar's mind best, says that once Assad was

852
00:47:54,080 --> 00:47:56,280
Speaker 1: able to convince himself of this, any kind of violence

853
00:47:56,320 --> 00:47:59,400
Speaker 1: was justified, especially since his forces didn't have the manpower

854
00:47:59,440 --> 00:48:01,720
Speaker 1: to fight street district to take back the country. Quote,

855
00:48:02,120 --> 00:48:04,560
Speaker 1: so they need to use the asymmetric methods like chemical

856
00:48:04,560 --> 00:48:08,200
Speaker 1: weapons to brutalize them. There's a good courts article tracking

857
00:48:08,200 --> 00:48:11,080
Speaker 1: out Asad's decision making on this. It quotes a couple

858
00:48:11,120 --> 00:48:14,600
Speaker 1: of Syrian dissidents, who suggests that Assad was quote invoking

859
00:48:14,680 --> 00:48:17,480
Speaker 1: something akin to medieval Western monarchs belief in the divine

860
00:48:17,560 --> 00:48:20,160
Speaker 1: right of kings. Like his father, he always believed that

861
00:48:20,160 --> 00:48:21,680
Speaker 1: he had the right to do whatever he wants to

862
00:48:21,719 --> 00:48:24,279
Speaker 1: his own people, to kill them, torture them, disappear them.

863
00:48:24,480 --> 00:48:26,480
Speaker 1: They are my own people, and that's the sovereignty I

864
00:48:26,520 --> 00:48:29,680
Speaker 1: have explained siata Asad, he says, sees himself as the

865
00:48:29,719 --> 00:48:32,560
Speaker 1: father punishing his errant sons. The father is allowed to

866
00:48:32,560 --> 00:48:35,440
Speaker 1: do whatever when the sons make mistakes. He doesn't understand

867
00:48:35,440 --> 00:48:40,960
Speaker 1: that there's a social contract between the Syrians and elected officials. Yeah,

868
00:48:42,640 --> 00:48:47,160
Speaker 1: don't kill innocent people. Don't massacred women and children and

869
00:48:47,239 --> 00:48:51,719
Speaker 1: old people with poison from the sky or fire from

870
00:48:51,719 --> 00:48:58,520
Speaker 1: the sky. Anyone could well, I mean it's a lot

871
00:48:58,520 --> 00:49:01,920
Speaker 1: of countries do that. It's not as obvious a lesson.

872
00:49:01,960 --> 00:49:04,560
Speaker 1: Not that I'm defending them, but like we could stand

873
00:49:04,560 --> 00:49:09,279
Speaker 1: to use that lesson too. Yeah. Whatever. The truth of

874
00:49:09,280 --> 00:49:11,759
Speaker 1: Assad's thinking, time has proven him right on the bet

875
00:49:11,800 --> 00:49:14,120
Speaker 1: that the US and the international community would never be

876
00:49:14,160 --> 00:49:17,600
Speaker 1: willing to take a stand against him. In two thousand eighteen,

877
00:49:17,680 --> 00:49:21,560
Speaker 1: Bin Rhodes, President Obama's Deputy National Security Advisor and host

878
00:49:21,600 --> 00:49:25,160
Speaker 1: of Pots Safe America Right, he's one of the hosts

879
00:49:25,160 --> 00:49:30,280
Speaker 1: of that. Wrote an article for The Atlantic titled Inside

880
00:49:30,280 --> 00:49:33,000
Speaker 1: the White House during the Syrian Red Line crisis. He

881
00:49:33,080 --> 00:49:35,320
Speaker 1: traces out how the Obama White House went from shock

882
00:49:35,360 --> 00:49:37,400
Speaker 1: and rage in an impulse to do something at the

883
00:49:37,440 --> 00:49:40,840
Speaker 1: Syrian chemical weapons attacks, to gradually conferring with other world

884
00:49:40,920 --> 00:49:43,840
Speaker 1: leaders and backing down. There are a number of reasons

885
00:49:43,880 --> 00:49:46,279
Speaker 1: for this. Fear of being drawn into a disaster like

886
00:49:46,320 --> 00:49:49,360
Speaker 1: a rack, fear of having the Republicans use intervention against

887
00:49:49,360 --> 00:49:52,240
Speaker 1: them as they had in Libya, concerns about Assad's chemical

888
00:49:52,239 --> 00:49:55,040
Speaker 1: weapons winding up in the hands of terrorists, and the

889
00:49:55,080 --> 00:49:58,040
Speaker 1: picture been paints. By the end of the decision making process,

890
00:49:58,080 --> 00:50:00,640
Speaker 1: the ideal logs and the administration had been beaten down

891
00:50:00,640 --> 00:50:03,600
Speaker 1: by real politique. They had all been inspired by writings

892
00:50:03,600 --> 00:50:06,279
Speaker 1: Obama had put out prior in his presidency arguing that

893
00:50:06,320 --> 00:50:08,960
Speaker 1: the US could have saved lives by intervening in Rwanda

894
00:50:09,040 --> 00:50:11,719
Speaker 1: during that genocide. But after weeks of debate over whether

895
00:50:11,800 --> 00:50:14,160
Speaker 1: or not to enforce the Red Line in Syria been

896
00:50:14,239 --> 00:50:18,799
Speaker 1: and the President had this conversation quote, maybe we never

897
00:50:18,840 --> 00:50:22,080
Speaker 1: would have done Rwanda, Obama said the comment was jarring.

898
00:50:22,160 --> 00:50:24,840
Speaker 1: Obama had written about how we should have intervened in Rwanda,

899
00:50:24,880 --> 00:50:27,040
Speaker 1: and people like me had been deeply influenced by that

900
00:50:27,080 --> 00:50:29,520
Speaker 1: in action. But he also frequently pointed out that the

901
00:50:29,520 --> 00:50:32,600
Speaker 1: people urging intervention in Syria had been silent when millions

902
00:50:32,600 --> 00:50:35,040
Speaker 1: of people were killed in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

903
00:50:35,480 --> 00:50:37,600
Speaker 1: There's no way there would have been any appetite for that.

904
00:50:37,640 --> 00:50:40,120
Speaker 1: In Congress, you could have done things short of war,

905
00:50:40,200 --> 00:50:42,960
Speaker 1: I said, like, what like jamming the radio signals they

906
00:50:42,960 --> 00:50:45,520
Speaker 1: were using to incite people. He waved his hand at

907
00:50:45,520 --> 00:50:48,520
Speaker 1: me dismissively. That's wishful thinking. You can't stop people from

908
00:50:48,600 --> 00:50:51,040
Speaker 1: killing each other like that, He let the thought hang

909
00:50:51,040 --> 00:50:53,440
Speaker 1: in the air. I'm just saying, maybe there's never a

910
00:50:53,440 --> 00:50:55,719
Speaker 1: time when the American people are going to support this

911
00:50:55,800 --> 00:50:58,680
Speaker 1: kind of thing. In Libya, everything went right. We saved

912
00:50:58,719 --> 00:51:01,120
Speaker 1: thousands of lives, we didn't have a single casualty, and

913
00:51:01,160 --> 00:51:03,560
Speaker 1: we took out a dictator who killed hundreds of Americans.

914
00:51:03,760 --> 00:51:06,480
Speaker 1: And at home it was a negative. I saw what

915
00:51:06,520 --> 00:51:09,440
Speaker 1: he had been doing, testing Congress, testing public opinion to

916
00:51:09,480 --> 00:51:11,720
Speaker 1: see what the real maneuvering room was for his office.

917
00:51:11,719 --> 00:51:14,120
Speaker 1: When it came to intervention in Syria. It was the

918
00:51:14,160 --> 00:51:16,760
Speaker 1: same thing he'd done in situation room meetings on Syria

919
00:51:16,840 --> 00:51:19,439
Speaker 1: and in his mind, testing whether anything we did could

920
00:51:19,440 --> 00:51:21,839
Speaker 1: make things better there or whether it would turn out

921
00:51:21,840 --> 00:51:24,960
Speaker 1: to be like Afghanistan and Iraq, if not worse. It

922
00:51:25,000 --> 00:51:27,439
Speaker 1: wasn't just politics he was wrestling with. It was something

923
00:51:27,480 --> 00:51:30,919
Speaker 1: more fundamental about America, our willingness to take on another war,

924
00:51:31,239 --> 00:51:34,719
Speaker 1: a war whose primary justification would be humanitarian, a war

925
00:51:34,880 --> 00:51:38,520
Speaker 1: likely to win badly. People always say never again, he said,

926
00:51:38,960 --> 00:51:44,560
Speaker 1: but they never want to do anything. You know. There's

927
00:51:44,600 --> 00:51:47,799
Speaker 1: a real darkness to all that, obviously because politics is

928
00:51:47,800 --> 00:51:54,680
Speaker 1: all dark. But the idea that we were so damaged

929
00:51:54,800 --> 00:51:58,919
Speaker 1: by what happened with the Iraq War and the Bush

930
00:51:58,960 --> 00:52:04,000
Speaker 1: administration and Cheney that now like any sort of step

931
00:52:04,120 --> 00:52:07,080
Speaker 1: of like we're going to another country, it doesn't matter

932
00:52:07,120 --> 00:52:09,520
Speaker 1: if we're helping or what we're doing, sending troops, no

933
00:52:09,560 --> 00:52:13,799
Speaker 1: matter what, there's such a negative reaction to it that

934
00:52:13,800 --> 00:52:16,800
Speaker 1: that we can't do anything to help these people because

935
00:52:16,840 --> 00:52:20,040
Speaker 1: the American public loses their minds, like we can't see

936
00:52:20,080 --> 00:52:24,160
Speaker 1: beyond what Dick, Cheney and Bush did. And so now

937
00:52:24,440 --> 00:52:28,840
Speaker 1: all these people are basically just gonna die and we can't.

938
00:52:29,480 --> 00:52:34,360
Speaker 1: We're just like literally like tiptoeing around being like should

939
00:52:34,440 --> 00:52:40,919
Speaker 1: we can we Like it's it's actually very insane, how

940
00:52:41,080 --> 00:52:43,439
Speaker 1: literally I mean. It all goes back to fucking piece

941
00:52:43,480 --> 00:52:46,799
Speaker 1: of shit asked the Bush dynasty and Dick Cheney and

942
00:52:46,840 --> 00:52:50,560
Speaker 1: the fucking devils they were have ruined anyone's chance of

943
00:52:50,640 --> 00:52:52,879
Speaker 1: wanting to go into Syria and being like, wait, let's

944
00:52:52,920 --> 00:52:56,120
Speaker 1: go stop this, And it's it's a lot of that

945
00:52:56,200 --> 00:52:58,960
Speaker 1: playing on a bit of racism too, even among people

946
00:52:59,000 --> 00:53:01,560
Speaker 1: on the left, to where this idea of like, well

947
00:53:01,560 --> 00:53:03,320
Speaker 1: but look at Iraq and it's like they're two different

948
00:53:03,320 --> 00:53:05,839
Speaker 1: countries and two completely different groups of people. They're not

949
00:53:05,880 --> 00:53:08,640
Speaker 1: the same country, they're not the same place. And it's

950
00:53:08,680 --> 00:53:11,319
Speaker 1: it's also not the same like why did Iraq go

951
00:53:11,440 --> 00:53:13,200
Speaker 1: so badly? Well, you can kind of trace it back

952
00:53:13,239 --> 00:53:15,160
Speaker 1: to the fact that the day after we conquered it,

953
00:53:15,200 --> 00:53:17,680
Speaker 1: we fired the entire army and put half a million

954
00:53:17,680 --> 00:53:20,440
Speaker 1: men out of work with their guns and they made

955
00:53:20,480 --> 00:53:23,520
Speaker 1: an insurgency. Like a lot of it you can tie

956
00:53:23,520 --> 00:53:26,480
Speaker 1: back to that, Like it's it's number one, the fact

957
00:53:26,480 --> 00:53:30,560
Speaker 1: that like nobody in America has a very nuanced understanding

958
00:53:30,719 --> 00:53:33,680
Speaker 1: of these places or these struggles. Um. And it's like

959
00:53:33,800 --> 00:53:35,120
Speaker 1: one of the things I tried to do in this

960
00:53:35,160 --> 00:53:38,040
Speaker 1: episode is really trace out how the civil war evolved

961
00:53:38,719 --> 00:53:41,759
Speaker 1: UM out of protests into fighting, because one of the

962
00:53:41,840 --> 00:53:44,279
Speaker 1: things I hear a lot when I argue with people

963
00:53:44,280 --> 00:53:45,880
Speaker 1: who are on the left is like, well, you know,

964
00:53:45,960 --> 00:53:48,120
Speaker 1: the US was funding the rebels the whole time, and

965
00:53:48,160 --> 00:53:52,280
Speaker 1: it's like, no, dude, Like we eventually started giving them

966
00:53:52,400 --> 00:53:54,920
Speaker 1: some aid and it was too little, too late, and

967
00:53:54,960 --> 00:53:57,880
Speaker 1: it was mostly shitty and small arms, and it was

968
00:53:57,960 --> 00:54:01,640
Speaker 1: like like, yeah, we funded some of the rebel groups, Like,

969
00:54:02,000 --> 00:54:07,160
Speaker 1: but the people started the civil war by wanting to

970
00:54:07,200 --> 00:54:11,240
Speaker 1: not have a dictator murdered them, and they were active

971
00:54:11,280 --> 00:54:16,160
Speaker 1: in the streets four months, fighting and building connections between

972
00:54:16,200 --> 00:54:20,120
Speaker 1: one another and building a revolution. Like and it's fucking

973
00:54:20,200 --> 00:54:22,680
Speaker 1: racist to say that the Civil War only happened because

974
00:54:22,680 --> 00:54:25,320
Speaker 1: the US came in and gave them money. No people

975
00:54:25,320 --> 00:54:27,640
Speaker 1: are able to rise up against their dictators without us.

976
00:54:27,640 --> 00:54:29,520
Speaker 1: They did it in Libya. We just helped them not

977
00:54:29,560 --> 00:54:33,680
Speaker 1: get massacred by Kaddafi's planes. They've done it everywhere. That's

978
00:54:33,960 --> 00:54:36,399
Speaker 1: what people to get upset and be like, no more

979
00:54:36,440 --> 00:54:39,160
Speaker 1: of this ship has nothing to do with us. It's

980
00:54:39,160 --> 00:54:40,560
Speaker 1: the thing where like you pould be like, you know,

981
00:54:40,600 --> 00:54:43,799
Speaker 1: the White Helmets are just like American plants because they've

982
00:54:43,800 --> 00:54:47,520
Speaker 1: received international funding. And it's like any given person who

983
00:54:47,600 --> 00:54:50,080
Speaker 1: has done that job is braver than anyone who has

984
00:54:50,160 --> 00:54:55,320
Speaker 1: made that complaint will ever be like you fucking cowards,

985
00:54:56,120 --> 00:54:59,360
Speaker 1: like accusing them of faking attacks when they are running

986
00:54:59,400 --> 00:55:02,040
Speaker 1: out every and pulling I've seen people do that job,

987
00:55:02,080 --> 00:55:05,719
Speaker 1: pulling corpses from rubble. It's the worst fucking thing I

988
00:55:05,760 --> 00:55:08,759
Speaker 1: can imagine. And fuck you for accusing them of being

989
00:55:08,800 --> 00:55:13,920
Speaker 1: anything but heroes. Like It's I get really heated when

990
00:55:13,960 --> 00:55:16,720
Speaker 1: I talk about this. I mean, what type of person

991
00:55:16,800 --> 00:55:18,520
Speaker 1: goes and does that? You know? It's like it's not

992
00:55:18,760 --> 00:55:22,600
Speaker 1: someone who's here is. It's incredibly frustrating to be like,

993
00:55:23,120 --> 00:55:25,799
Speaker 1: you don't know what these people do every day. You

994
00:55:25,840 --> 00:55:29,200
Speaker 1: can't know what they see for every day, especially since

995
00:55:29,239 --> 00:55:30,720
Speaker 1: most of them and I guess the only dead body

996
00:55:30,719 --> 00:55:33,680
Speaker 1: you've seen is maybe at a funeral. You can't imagine

997
00:55:33,719 --> 00:55:37,320
Speaker 1: what these people are going through, Like you just can't.

998
00:55:38,320 --> 00:55:42,759
Speaker 1: Uh And I I'm so angry at everyone all the

999
00:55:42,800 --> 00:55:51,360
Speaker 1: time because of Syria. It's uh so shout out to

1000
00:55:51,440 --> 00:55:59,560
Speaker 1: my Syrian homies. Sorry, the real bastard at the end

1001
00:55:59,600 --> 00:56:02,759
Speaker 1: of this episode is is everybody. And I guess that's

1002
00:56:02,800 --> 00:56:05,239
Speaker 1: one of the things that that is really telling to me.

1003
00:56:05,320 --> 00:56:07,600
Speaker 1: It's like, you look at Barack Obama is a man

1004
00:56:07,680 --> 00:56:10,680
Speaker 1: who I have intense disagreements with, but I believe has

1005
00:56:10,719 --> 00:56:13,680
Speaker 1: always wanted to do the right thing. But he's also

1006
00:56:13,760 --> 00:56:18,000
Speaker 1: a really really smart guy and a fundamentally a scholar,

1007
00:56:18,080 --> 00:56:22,960
Speaker 1: and he thinks through everything too much. And Bashar al

1008
00:56:23,000 --> 00:56:28,839
Speaker 1: Assad did not. He gambled. He's willing to gamble. Dictators

1009
00:56:28,880 --> 00:56:31,240
Speaker 1: usually are because it's the only way they can prosper,

1010
00:56:31,760 --> 00:56:35,040
Speaker 1: and Barack Obama was not willing to gamble, and as

1011
00:56:35,040 --> 00:56:38,640
Speaker 1: a result, half a million Serrians died. That's what it

1012
00:56:38,680 --> 00:56:41,319
Speaker 1: comes down to. And you can say Obama was right

1013
00:56:41,360 --> 00:56:46,280
Speaker 1: or wrong, that's your opinion. But this is the reason.

1014
00:56:46,440 --> 00:56:49,160
Speaker 1: This is the same basic logic that let Hitler get

1015
00:56:49,160 --> 00:56:51,920
Speaker 1: as far as he did. Dictators being willing to do

1016
00:56:51,960 --> 00:56:55,719
Speaker 1: the reckless thing and gamble and brave conscience or not brave,

1017
00:56:55,760 --> 00:56:59,920
Speaker 1: but conscientious, decent, smart men not being willing to gamble

1018
00:57:00,040 --> 00:57:04,560
Speaker 1: and letting them get away with murder, right, yep, which

1019
00:57:04,600 --> 00:57:09,080
Speaker 1: is nevill fucking Chamberlain. Yeah, how do you even like

1020
00:57:10,320 --> 00:57:13,759
Speaker 1: reconcile any of that? It's like, Wow, he really didn't

1021
00:57:13,800 --> 00:57:17,960
Speaker 1: step up because he was fucking thinking it out, like

1022
00:57:18,040 --> 00:57:21,160
Speaker 1: thinking of all the ways it could go wrong and

1023
00:57:21,200 --> 00:57:25,360
Speaker 1: what would happen, and it's like you can't do anything,

1024
00:57:25,360 --> 00:57:29,680
Speaker 1: Like there's nothing, you know, there's nothing. It's it's it's

1025
00:57:29,720 --> 00:57:32,200
Speaker 1: incredibly tough, and like it's one of those things where

1026
00:57:32,240 --> 00:57:35,280
Speaker 1: I do like I would say his failure to respond

1027
00:57:35,320 --> 00:57:38,400
Speaker 1: adequately in Syria is the single worst thing that Obama did.

1028
00:57:39,480 --> 00:57:42,760
Speaker 1: But if I'm tracing it back, which American I blame

1029
00:57:42,800 --> 00:57:44,800
Speaker 1: most for Syria, it's still going to be George W.

1030
00:57:44,960 --> 00:57:48,760
Speaker 1: Bush and Dick Cheney, Like you know, they're a team there. Yeah, yeah, yeah,

1031
00:57:49,040 --> 00:57:50,600
Speaker 1: I don't. I don't, you know, I don't. I am

1032
00:57:50,640 --> 00:57:52,120
Speaker 1: one of those people that will push back a little

1033
00:57:52,120 --> 00:57:54,040
Speaker 1: bit and giving too much credit to Cheney and not

1034
00:57:54,160 --> 00:57:55,600
Speaker 1: enough to Bush because I think he was a more

1035
00:57:55,640 --> 00:57:57,880
Speaker 1: active partner than he a lot of people give him

1036
00:57:57,880 --> 00:57:59,800
Speaker 1: credit for. But both of them, I mean, he was

1037
00:57:59,840 --> 00:58:05,440
Speaker 1: a fool, but he got to where he was somehow. Yeah,

1038
00:58:05,720 --> 00:58:08,360
Speaker 1: And I ironically having a little bit more of that

1039
00:58:08,400 --> 00:58:11,600
Speaker 1: shoot from the hip, gut attitude that Bushhead might have

1040
00:58:11,680 --> 00:58:15,080
Speaker 1: been helpful in Syria if like their positions had been reversed.

1041
00:58:15,520 --> 00:58:21,680
Speaker 1: But if we never invaded Iraq. Yeah, if only we'd

1042
00:58:21,720 --> 00:58:24,760
Speaker 1: picked the right country to invade and not fucked it up.

1043
00:58:25,040 --> 00:58:26,920
Speaker 1: I don't know, like that's even dumb to say, like

1044
00:58:26,960 --> 00:58:29,360
Speaker 1: all of it's dumb. Everything's fucked up. I hope you

1045
00:58:29,400 --> 00:58:33,560
Speaker 1: all enjoyed this episode of my Upbeat and Fun podcast.

1046
00:58:34,720 --> 00:58:37,160
Speaker 1: You know, it's another reason why I say, uh, currently,

1047
00:58:37,200 --> 00:58:41,400
Speaker 1: because we're in such high tensions with Iran. Guess who's

1048
00:58:41,440 --> 00:58:44,720
Speaker 1: in bed with Iran? Syria a psycho path. So don't

1049
00:58:44,760 --> 00:58:48,000
Speaker 1: go after Iran unless you want, you know, some ally

1050
00:58:48,120 --> 00:58:52,160
Speaker 1: heat from like Syria and Russia. It's not great. We're

1051
00:58:52,160 --> 00:58:54,880
Speaker 1: not a great place. Let's not funk with the evils.

1052
00:58:55,120 --> 00:58:57,439
Speaker 1: You know. This is part of the thing where it's

1053
00:58:57,520 --> 00:58:59,680
Speaker 1: like it makes it so hard with like picking a

1054
00:58:59,720 --> 00:59:03,440
Speaker 1: press residents, like you want to say, pick not a

1055
00:59:03,480 --> 00:59:06,080
Speaker 1: crazy person, but then we get the sanest man who's

1056
00:59:06,080 --> 00:59:09,120
Speaker 1: ever been president. I think that's probably is Barack Obama,

1057
00:59:09,560 --> 00:59:13,640
Speaker 1: and he's sometimes too careful and people pay the price

1058
00:59:13,720 --> 00:59:15,560
Speaker 1: for it. And now we've got a funk. I mean,

1059
00:59:15,600 --> 00:59:18,400
Speaker 1: it's certainly having a lunatic in charge is not the

1060
00:59:18,520 --> 00:59:22,040
Speaker 1: right thing, because who knows what the funk Trump's gonna do. Um.

1061
00:59:22,080 --> 00:59:27,520
Speaker 1: But maybe presidents are a bad idea. Should just have

1062
00:59:27,560 --> 00:59:32,280
Speaker 1: like a parliament, like so classically European. Yeah, that'll work.

1063
00:59:32,640 --> 00:59:34,840
Speaker 1: I don't know, maybe so European. They don't have dinner

1064
00:59:34,880 --> 00:59:39,280
Speaker 1: to like eleven pm, like so European. That'll fix our problems.

1065
00:59:39,440 --> 00:59:43,760
Speaker 1: Or we just make a dog president. It would be funny.

1066
00:59:44,320 --> 00:59:49,160
Speaker 1: No war woof, couldn't be worse. Bud, buddy, you're so great,

1067
00:59:49,240 --> 00:59:51,640
Speaker 1: you're to do a boy said, you go president, So

1068
00:59:51,840 --> 00:59:55,680
Speaker 1: you go president. The dog still has not appointed a

1069
00:59:55,720 --> 00:59:58,320
Speaker 1: Supreme Court. Or if the dog just makes everyone on

1070
00:59:58,360 --> 01:00:01,800
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court be dogs. M and then you just

1071
01:00:01,840 --> 01:00:07,040
Speaker 1: trained Supreme Court dogstice m. He peed on the lawyer.

1072
01:00:07,160 --> 01:00:10,320
Speaker 1: I think that means the case is thrown out. Classic

1073
01:00:10,640 --> 01:00:17,040
Speaker 1: move by spot m hmm. Chief Justice Spot spots court.

1074
01:00:17,320 --> 01:00:23,200
Speaker 1: Really groundbreaking legal precedent, not in channel, you know what

1075
01:00:23,240 --> 01:00:26,080
Speaker 1: I mean? Literally groundbreaking because he dug a lot of

1076
01:00:26,080 --> 01:00:31,400
Speaker 1: holes in the yard of the of the court. Yeah. Well,

1077
01:00:32,600 --> 01:00:35,640
Speaker 1: did you enjoy this very fun episode of Behind the Bastards? Anna?

1078
01:00:36,000 --> 01:00:39,160
Speaker 1: Look honestly like you know me, I love me episodes

1079
01:00:39,160 --> 01:00:43,440
Speaker 1: about Syria. Oh boy, oh no, it's you know, a

1080
01:00:43,480 --> 01:00:46,080
Speaker 1: lot of this um starting from like how it started.

1081
01:00:46,160 --> 01:00:48,720
Speaker 1: You know, we talked about on our show. UM, a

1082
01:00:48,760 --> 01:00:51,840
Speaker 1: lot of the background I did not know, which, you know,

1083
01:00:51,880 --> 01:00:54,280
Speaker 1: it's very interesting. Of course, the brand Jelina hanging out

1084
01:00:54,280 --> 01:00:56,160
Speaker 1: with them is probably the most shocking thing I've ever

1085
01:00:56,240 --> 01:01:00,120
Speaker 1: learned in my life. Um. And you know what a

1086
01:01:00,120 --> 01:01:04,080
Speaker 1: second I felt bad saying I hope asma Alissa gets cancer,

1087
01:01:04,240 --> 01:01:06,040
Speaker 1: but then it's like, now that she has it, it's like,

1088
01:01:06,040 --> 01:01:08,600
Speaker 1: oh wait, no, that's just how karma works. Like, if

1089
01:01:08,640 --> 01:01:11,760
Speaker 1: you're a horrible person, we might not be able to

1090
01:01:11,800 --> 01:01:14,360
Speaker 1: get to you, but here's praying that some sort of

1091
01:01:14,440 --> 01:01:18,919
Speaker 1: natural disease or cause comes for you. Because you don't

1092
01:01:18,960 --> 01:01:21,480
Speaker 1: seem to care about human life, So why should we

1093
01:01:21,520 --> 01:01:24,040
Speaker 1: care about your human life? You know, like you're not

1094
01:01:24,360 --> 01:01:30,160
Speaker 1: you compared to the millions of innocence of like babies, children, mothers, fathers,

1095
01:01:30,240 --> 01:01:33,840
Speaker 1: grandparents who have died. Who the fuck are you? You

1096
01:01:33,880 --> 01:01:37,120
Speaker 1: don't deserve ship. Yeah, that cancer diagnosis is the most

1097
01:01:37,240 --> 01:01:41,280
Speaker 1: uplifting thing about this episode. Yeah, good for you, honey,

1098
01:01:41,640 --> 01:01:49,480
Speaker 1: good luck, good luck with that good stupid bitch, you know,

1099
01:01:49,600 --> 01:01:53,040
Speaker 1: I'm the real dictator. It's like, honey, that's not funny.

1100
01:01:53,720 --> 01:01:58,360
Speaker 1: Millions of people are dead, Like, fuck you, you're that's

1101
01:01:58,400 --> 01:02:01,280
Speaker 1: not the joke to make when you're haspen is literally

1102
01:02:01,360 --> 01:02:07,240
Speaker 1: a dictator. Yeah, but I don't like these pure trash

1103
01:02:07,280 --> 01:02:11,959
Speaker 1: ass bitch anyway, you want to plug some plugables? Yeah,

1104
01:02:12,080 --> 01:02:17,200
Speaker 1: dropped down zone. Um podcast dictator here Anna, UM. You

1105
01:02:17,240 --> 01:02:19,960
Speaker 1: know I have a podcast Ethnically Ambiguous with Green Units.

1106
01:02:20,040 --> 01:02:21,800
Speaker 1: Check it out if you like news in the Middle East.

1107
01:02:21,840 --> 01:02:24,720
Speaker 1: We have an episode called we Are Syria. When We're

1108
01:02:24,760 --> 01:02:26,760
Speaker 1: we talked, it was right after the air strikes happened

1109
01:02:26,800 --> 01:02:28,880
Speaker 1: that we kind of break down our feelings and what happened.

1110
01:02:28,880 --> 01:02:30,800
Speaker 1: If you want to go check that out, and then

1111
01:02:30,840 --> 01:02:32,760
Speaker 1: you know, of course all the other episodes. You know,

1112
01:02:32,800 --> 01:02:36,840
Speaker 1: currently we are talking about the year on US tensions situation.

1113
01:02:36,880 --> 01:02:39,440
Speaker 1: If you want to listen to that. Um. Yeah, you

1114
01:02:39,440 --> 01:02:41,440
Speaker 1: can follow me on Twitter at Anna host n A

1115
01:02:41,960 --> 01:02:44,040
Speaker 1: N N A H O S S N I E H.

1116
01:02:44,080 --> 01:02:47,880
Speaker 1: You know, I'm constantly constantly talking politics and other good

1117
01:02:47,920 --> 01:02:50,920
Speaker 1: stuff and you know The Bachelor because that's where my

1118
01:02:50,960 --> 01:02:53,760
Speaker 1: interests lie in Middle Eastern politics and the Bachelor. And

1119
01:02:54,120 --> 01:02:57,080
Speaker 1: something interesting I noticed recently Robert does not follow me

1120
01:02:57,120 --> 01:03:03,560
Speaker 1: on Twitter, so I burnt. All right, all right, I'll

1121
01:03:03,640 --> 01:03:07,640
Speaker 1: I will correct that bad at social meds and I'm

1122
01:03:07,680 --> 01:03:13,160
Speaker 1: mostly just ship post and argument. Yeah yeah, and I

1123
01:03:13,240 --> 01:03:17,680
Speaker 1: am a podcast viceroy. I always wanted to be a

1124
01:03:17,760 --> 01:03:22,840
Speaker 1: viceroy podcast general. No, I want to be a viceroy

1125
01:03:22,880 --> 01:03:26,800
Speaker 1: that seems like more fun, less responsibility, and more than

1126
01:03:26,840 --> 01:03:28,840
Speaker 1: Parliament will consider it. We'll let you know what we

1127
01:03:29,240 --> 01:03:35,600
Speaker 1: have decided on. Thank you well, Uh podcast Viceroy Robert

1128
01:03:35,640 --> 01:03:37,480
Speaker 1: Evans signing off. You can find me on Twitter and

1129
01:03:37,520 --> 01:03:41,440
Speaker 1: Instagram at Bastards pod. You can find uh this podcast

1130
01:03:41,520 --> 01:03:43,720
Speaker 1: on the web at bond the Bastards dot com. I

1131
01:03:43,720 --> 01:03:47,120
Speaker 1: have another podcast called it Could Happen Here about everything

1132
01:03:47,160 --> 01:03:49,720
Speaker 1: that happened to Syria if it happened in America, which

1133
01:03:49,760 --> 01:03:51,720
Speaker 1: actually part of why I made the show was just

1134
01:03:51,800 --> 01:03:54,000
Speaker 1: a backdoor way of trying to make people empathize with

1135
01:03:54,040 --> 01:03:58,400
Speaker 1: the horrible things happen against Syria. Um. And also, you

1136
01:03:58,520 --> 01:04:02,600
Speaker 1: can find to shirts ont public. Some of them are ours,

1137
01:04:02,600 --> 01:04:07,280
Speaker 1: others or not. You can buy whichever ones you would like. Uh, Sophie,

1138
01:04:07,280 --> 01:04:12,880
Speaker 1: do I have to say anything else? I do love

1139
01:04:12,920 --> 01:04:15,840
Speaker 1: about of you, and I love a d percent of

1140
01:04:15,880 --> 01:04:18,840
Speaker 1: the poison room that's sitting behind Anna right now. Oh

1141
01:04:18,880 --> 01:04:22,919
Speaker 1: my god, I love poison. We all we're all big

1142
01:04:22,960 --> 01:04:29,240
Speaker 1: poison stands, all right. Uh, listeners, chill out, enjoy some

1143
01:04:29,280 --> 01:04:32,640
Speaker 1: poison of your own, and or don't because that might

1144
01:04:32,680 --> 01:04:36,200
Speaker 1: be me inciting you to, uh to do horrible things.

1145
01:04:36,200 --> 01:04:39,720
Speaker 1: Don't do horrible things. UH, do good things or at

1146
01:04:39,760 --> 01:04:44,040
Speaker 1: least neutral things. Uh. But sometimes being neutral is you

1147
01:04:44,040 --> 01:04:46,920
Speaker 1: know what the episode has done. It's over, Go do

1148
01:04:47,040 --> 01:04:47,560
Speaker 1: something else.