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Speaker 1: Al Zone Media.

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Speaker 2: Welcome back to It Could Happen Here, a podcast about

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Speaker 2: things falling apart, and today, the thing that's falling apart

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Speaker 2: is our shared concept of reality, our ability to exists

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Speaker 2: as a population within the same world, or at least

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Speaker 2: versions of the same world that even slightly interact with

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Speaker 2: each other. And my guest for this episode about the

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Speaker 2: breaking of reality Garrison, Davis Garrison, what do you know

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Speaker 2: about the USS Eisenhower?

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Speaker 3: Is that is that from Star Trek?

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Speaker 2: Is that a yeah? Huh, that's the ship that they

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Speaker 2: all fly around and in Star Trek, the many voyages

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Speaker 2: of the Starship Eisenhower. It's continuing mission.

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Speaker 3: It's such a different show.

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Speaker 2: Every every episode they're just fucking with Guatemala, Like every

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Speaker 2: single episode, the Cards just finding another way to overthrow

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Speaker 2: the government of Guatemala.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: No, that's like alternate universe evil Gene Roddenberry.

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Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, yeah, if Gene Roddenberry had been like a

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Speaker 2: hardcore conservative. Yeah, speaking of hardcore conservatives, we are talking

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Speaker 2: again about alternate realities and the USS Eisenhower is relevant

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Speaker 2: to that because it's kind of been the subject of

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Speaker 2: a reality fracture recently. Just talking in terms of like

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Speaker 2: things that are actually true. The USS Eisenhower is a

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Speaker 2: very big aircraft carrier. It's got something like five thousand

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Speaker 2: people and its crew. It's nuclear powered. It can stay

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Speaker 2: I think up to like twenty five years. Potentially, it

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Speaker 2: could stay in the field without needing to like refuel

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Speaker 2: or anything like that.

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Speaker 3: That's wild.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, Yeah. Aircraft carriers are insane things. And it is

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Speaker 2: the center of an air Force carrier group, which is

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Speaker 2: a group of I think there's something like ten or

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Speaker 2: eleven other ships in it, a combination of like you've

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Speaker 2: got like destroyers, these little like missile ships. I think

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Speaker 2: there's some submarines, probably an ice cream ship in there somewhere.

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Speaker 2: That's kind of like a Keith thing the US military does. Anyway,

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Speaker 2: the Eisenhower is the ship that's out in the Gulf

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Speaker 2: of Aiden right now, throwing down with the Houthis. And

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Speaker 2: on the thirty first of last month, there was a

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Speaker 2: series of attacks launched by the Eisenhower along with some

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Speaker 2: of our British allies, striking thirteen Hoothy targets at various

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Speaker 2: locations in Yemen. This was in response to a number

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Speaker 2: of attacks that the Hoothies had launched recently on shipping

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Speaker 2: in the region, including I think they hit a Greek

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Speaker 2: ship a couple of times. The strikes came also a

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Speaker 2: day after the Hoothis shot down an m Q nine

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Speaker 2: Reaper drone, which was the third downing of a Reaper

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Speaker 2: drone in May, so the Hoothies have been dropping Reapers

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Speaker 2: pretty regularly. So anyway, all of this led to a

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Speaker 2: massive series of strikes that were kind of you know,

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Speaker 2: launched from the Eisenhower on Houthy targets. Houthy rebels said

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Speaker 2: that the air strikes killed at least sixteen people and

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Speaker 2: wounded thirty five others. I think that death toll has

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Speaker 2: risen since the article, the Washington Post article I'm looking

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Speaker 2: at now, and that you know, we're going to be

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Speaker 2: talking about things that are credible and not credible. If

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Speaker 2: the Hoothies say, given the attacks launched, that death toll

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Speaker 2: seems pretty credible to me, just based on other strikes

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Speaker 2: that I've read about. The Houthis launched a retaliatory strikes

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Speaker 2: on the Enterprise, or at least they claim that they did,

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Speaker 2: wait on the on the Eisenhower. We did used to

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Speaker 2: have an aircraft carrier name the Enterprise. I don't. I

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Speaker 2: think we've decommissioned it since I'm blaming real fast.

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Speaker 3: He would he would not, he will, he.

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Speaker 2: Would, he would be fucking his way through the Houthis

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Speaker 2: already Kirk would have. That's ah, God, Star Trek is

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Speaker 2: so much more fun to talk about than actual geopolitics, uh,

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Speaker 2: which are mostly depressing with the genocide and all. Anyway,

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Speaker 2: the Houthis claimed that they launched an attack on the

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Speaker 2: Eisenhower the US. The do O D says that they

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Speaker 2: did not. The Houthy press person stated that they hit

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Speaker 2: the Eisenhower. The hit was accurate and direct. Again, there's

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Speaker 2: no evidence of this whatsoever that's been posted. The story

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Speaker 2: seems to have started percolating out into kind of lefty

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Speaker 2: media when Huthy Press people made this announcement. I think

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Speaker 2: the first direct statement I found about it outside of

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Speaker 2: like Hoothy press resources was a Twitter account called for

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Speaker 2: an online news magazine calling West Asian geopolitics called The Cradle.

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Speaker 2: I'm not wildly familiar with the Cradle. They've got something

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Speaker 2: like one hundred and nine thousand followers on Twitter, and

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Speaker 2: they seem to mostly be you could say, like a

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Speaker 2: broadly sort of anti imperialist left. Most of their content

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Speaker 2: lately is very pro Gaza. You know, there's stuff like

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Speaker 2: articles about Israeli organ trafficking networks in Turkey. You know,

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Speaker 2: they've got like video clips of like pro Palestinian protesters

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Speaker 2: getting dunks in on pro israel protesters, a like protests

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Speaker 2: and stuff like that, very standard stuff. On the thirty first,

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Speaker 2: they posted a they made a post, yeah, basically restating

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Speaker 2: what the Houthis had said, although they instead of saying

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Speaker 2: the Houthis made a claim that they had struck the Eisenhower,

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Speaker 2: they claimed it was ye Many armed forces. It's an

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Speaker 2: easy way to tell that someone is not accurately reporting

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Speaker 2: on what's happening in Yemen because the Houthis are actively

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Speaker 2: at war with yem Many armed forces. Like that is

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Speaker 2: the actual reality of the situation on the ground over there.

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Speaker 2: So this got picked up by chunks of lefty media,

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Speaker 2: and particularly like American lefty media. I think one of

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Speaker 2: the first big accounts to take this story was a

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Speaker 2: guy named Ashton Forbes. You know Ashton.

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Speaker 3: I don't think I've heard of Ashton Forbes. This is

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Speaker 3: this whole like left media. Yeah, anti imperialism bubble has

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Speaker 3: just gotten so big the past like six months.

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Speaker 2: These are mostly accounts, and I believe this is true

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Speaker 2: for Ashton too, who like they blew up in the

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Speaker 2: wake of October seventh once, particularly once the Israeli started

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Speaker 2: launching massive strikes on Gaza. And they primarily exist within

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Speaker 2: the profit ecosystem that Elon established in Twitter, right, where

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Speaker 2: if you have a verified account and you get a

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Speaker 2: lot of engagements from other verified accounts, you get a

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Speaker 2: chunk of money from Twitter, right, And so all these

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Speaker 2: people figured out that, like there's a huge appetite for

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Speaker 2: reposted videos from Gaza, or videos that you just claim

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Speaker 2: are reposted videos from Gaza. A huge number of them

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Speaker 2: are from Syria, and if they make people really angry

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Speaker 2: or horrified, they'll get shared and get a ton of

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Speaker 2: engagement and you will get a check, right, Like, That's

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Speaker 2: that's where Ashton comes out of. That's where all these

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Speaker 2: guys come out of. So Ashton sees, I don't know

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Speaker 2: if he picked it up directly from the Hoothy Press people.

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Speaker 2: I don't know if he picked it up from that

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Speaker 2: thing on the cradle, but he posts the next day

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Speaker 2: breaking and he's got Of course, of course I'll show you.

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Speaker 2: I'll share screen Garrisons. You can see he's got he's

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Speaker 2: got the two sirens. Yeah, he's got the two little

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Speaker 2: signs on either side. Oh yeah, No, of course there's

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Speaker 2: a million of this guy. This guy is all over

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Speaker 2: the internet. A source has informed me that the USS

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Speaker 2: Eisenhower has been sunk all caps. Mainstream media reports from

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Speaker 2: yesterday claim the ship was not hit by houthy missiles.

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Speaker 2: Social media shows conflicting reports of damage. I'm seeking corroboration

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Speaker 2: on this potentially huge story. So first we see the

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Speaker 2: escalation of the HOUTHI say, we shot at the Eisenhower

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Speaker 2: and we hit it right. They didn't claim they'd sunk it.

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Speaker 2: I think because the houthis are like they're not dumb,

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Speaker 2: and like that's an easy claim to disprove. Whereas, yeah,

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Speaker 2: you can kind of like there's not as much live

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Speaker 2: footage of this, you could kind of get away for

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Speaker 2: a while with making people think maybe you damaged it

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Speaker 2: a little bit, or at least you got close, you know.

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Speaker 2: But a source a source, yes, a source from citizen

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Speaker 2: journalist Ashton Forbes.

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Speaker 3: Speaking Truth to power.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, the evidence that Forbes post because he says, like

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Speaker 2: social media so there's conflicting reports of damage. Is a

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Speaker 2: screen grab of what looks like an aircraft carrier that's

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Speaker 2: on fire. You can see a water very bying.

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Speaker 3: Very very blurry picture as well.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and there's there's there's a watermark. I don't know

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Speaker 2: if you can see it clearly on this gear, but

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Speaker 2: like that says Arabic journal So he clearly took it

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Speaker 2: from another website. Right now, I would describe the image

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Speaker 2: quality of this as cell phone camera circa two thousand

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Speaker 2: and seven.

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Speaker 3: That's accurate. Yeah, it roughly at like three DS camera.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it looked It's not even super clear to

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Speaker 2: me that that's an aircraft carrier. Forbes's post obviously, you know,

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Speaker 2: does not occur in a vacuum here, And it would

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Speaker 2: be deeply fucked up for me to say, like citizen

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Speaker 2: journalists shouldn't exist, Like if someone identifies themselves as that,

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Speaker 2: it's a sign that they're dangerous or that they're they're

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Speaker 2: full of shit, right, because recent history is filled with

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Speaker 2: people who call themselves citizen journalists putting out bullshit. But

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Speaker 2: like it's also filled with instances of citizens doing crucial

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Speaker 2: journalism in the absence of credential professionals.

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Speaker 3: Especially in Gaza right now.

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Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I'm and that's basically everything right, in part

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Speaker 2: because most of the journalists who have tried to report

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Speaker 2: on it have been fucking murdered. But even in the

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Speaker 2: US we have the recent case of Darnella Fraser, who

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Speaker 2: was the eighteen year old woman who filmed the murder

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Speaker 2: of George Floyd on May twenty fifth, twenty twenty. She

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Speaker 2: received a Pulitzer Prise the next year for her video. However, journalism,

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Speaker 2: while again there's a lot of value in citizen journalism,

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Speaker 2: journalism is also a technical trade and there are in

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Speaker 2: fact some things that random dirbs on the Internet should

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Speaker 2: not report on, and an attack on the Eisenhower is

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Speaker 2: maybe one of them. To make a long story short,

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Speaker 2: the USS Eisenhower was not sunk. It is virtually impossible

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Speaker 2: for non state forces like the Houthies, with the weaponry

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Speaker 2: that they currently enjoy, to sink a vessel like the Eisenhower.

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Speaker 2: And for a little bit of context on why that

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Speaker 2: is the case, I want to talk about another aircraft

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Speaker 2: carrier called the USS Independence. The Independence was one of

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Speaker 2: many many aircraft carriers produced by the United States to

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Speaker 2: curb stomp the Empire of Japan during World War Two.

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Speaker 2: After that war, we found ourselves with way more aircraft

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Speaker 2: carriers than we needed or could afford to operate indefinitely

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Speaker 2: at peacetime. So we decided to do the smartest thing

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Speaker 2: we could with all these extra aircraft carriers and nuke them.

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Speaker 3: That was swait.

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Speaker 2: Yes, yes, well, it's classic nineteen forty six America logic.

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Speaker 3: That is true. That is true.

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Speaker 2: That is so the Independence didn't brave nuclear hell fire alone.

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Speaker 2: As part of Operations Crossroads, we detonated two nuclear bombs

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Speaker 2: within seventeen hundred feet of a fleet of ships. That's

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Speaker 2: pretty close to point blank range in nuclear weapons terms.

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Speaker 2: Fourteen ships were sunk out right by these nukes, and

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Speaker 2: the remainder were badly damaged. The Independence was one of

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Speaker 2: the boats that remained floating, though, and it actually was

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Speaker 2: towed back to San Francisco after being nuked twice. Two

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Speaker 2: nukes could not sink a nineteen forty six aircraft carrier.

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Speaker 3: What are they building these things out of?

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Speaker 2: They're very big, and they are if you are attacking

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Speaker 2: them above the water line, it's really hard to sink

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Speaker 2: one of these boats, right, Like, that's kind of the thing.

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Speaker 2: You can lob huge missiles and hit them with huge

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Speaker 2: missiles on the top of the thing, and that can

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Speaker 2: stop them from being able to launch aircraft. It can

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Speaker 2: kill crew, but unless you're actually blowing a big hole

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Speaker 2: in it below the water line, you're not going to

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Speaker 2: send one of these fuckers to the bottom of the ocean. Right,

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Speaker 2: that's just kind of sure physics, you know.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah.

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Speaker 2: So we towed the Independence back to San Francisco. They

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Speaker 2: actually built a radiation lab in the boat itself for

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Speaker 2: a while. And then that's again because the United States

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Speaker 2: be how the United States do. We filled this massive

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Speaker 2: boat with concrete drums full of radioactive waste and sunk

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Speaker 2: it thirty miles off the coast of California with your tour.

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Speaker 3: That's fucking hilarious. That rules.

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Speaker 2: Hell yeah, brother, this country man. So again, once we

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Speaker 2: started lobbing tour, you know, is it this fucker underneath

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Speaker 2: the boat? It was not wildly hard to sink the

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Speaker 2: son of a bitch, right, And that's the reality of

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Speaker 2: the situation. If the houthies were able to get like

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Speaker 2: some subs that were capable of like actually getting through

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Speaker 2: you know, the dragnet of boats that are defending the Enterprise,

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Speaker 2: and they could get any kind of you know, decent

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Speaker 2: sized torpedo underneath it, they might have a chance of

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Speaker 2: sinking it.

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Speaker 3: Photon torpedoes, photon torpedo for the Enterprise, yes, yes, yes, yes,

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Speaker 3: or a quantum torpedo.

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Speaker 2: If we've moved on to d S nine garrison.

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Speaker 3: Oh I've not started DS nine year.

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Speaker 2: Oh oh it's great. It's the horniest Star Trek Garrison,

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Speaker 2: which which is shocking to it is shockingly horny. So

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Speaker 2: I want to note while while I'm talking about the

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Speaker 2: impossibility of the Houthies using their current methods, which are

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Speaker 2: basically when it comes to how they've been attacking the Eisenhower,

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Speaker 2: they've been either flying drones at it, trying to ram

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Speaker 2: it with an explosive drone, or launching cruise missiles at it, right,

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Speaker 2: and all of these are basically aiming for the top

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Speaker 2: of this boat, because that's kind of the option they have.

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Speaker 3: I was not aware that they had like advanced submarine capabilities.

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Speaker 2: They sure don't, as far as I'm aware, they don't. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: now it is it's worth noting potentially it could be

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Speaker 2: surprisingly easy sometimes to sink a modern aircraft carrier if

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Speaker 2: you have a decent submarine. And there's evidence of this

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Speaker 2: that came from a joint Franco US naval exercise off

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Speaker 2: to the coast of Florida in March of twenty fifteen

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Speaker 2: where basically we're doing this exercise with the French at

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Speaker 2: one point. This French submarine is part of the OP four,

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Speaker 2: which is like opposition forces during a war game, and

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Speaker 2: it sinks the Roosevelt and most of its escorts in

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Speaker 2: like a simulated battle. And this is you know, it's

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Speaker 2: very funny because like the French military posted about this

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Speaker 2: and then had to delete it because it was really

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Speaker 2: embarrassing for the Navy, and it's seen as evidence by

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Speaker 2: people who actually know their shit about naval power and

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Speaker 2: naval warfare. Is like, oh, US anti sub interdiction tactics

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Speaker 2: and technology really took a hit in the post Cold

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Speaker 2: War period. We stopped putting money into it because like

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Speaker 2: we thought, well, who's going to send subs after us

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Speaker 2: if the Russians are gone? Right?

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Speaker 3: Yeah exactly, yeah, ye yeah yeah.

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Speaker 2: So I don't mean to say that like these boats

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Speaker 2: are invulnerable. Nothing can stop the US Navy. In fact,

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Speaker 2: the evidence suggests that like a modestly powerful naval power

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Speaker 2: could do some serious damage to a carrier group in

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Speaker 2: the right circumstances. It's just the way the houthis. The

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Speaker 2: claims people are making about how the houthis sunk the

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Speaker 2: Eisenhower is not a way in which the Eisenhower could

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Speaker 2: realistically be sunk. Right, Some bootleg Iranian missiles are not

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Speaker 2: going to sink the most advanced carrier in the world today.

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Speaker 2: Two nukes couldn't do a comparatively shitty carrier in nineteen

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Speaker 2: forty six. Now, this is all pretty obvious to anyone

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Speaker 2: who knows the first thing about modern naval warfare. But

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Speaker 2: it was not obvious to our citizen journalist friend, Ashton Forbes.

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Speaker 2: When numerous people pointed out to him that his claims

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Speaker 2: were absurd, he replied, yeah, I wanted to hold back

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Speaker 2: on this story in case it's not true, but I

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Speaker 2: trust my source and the media reports stink to me.

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Speaker 2: If this ends up being wrong, all ready tracked. But

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Speaker 2: the implications are too huge not to report.

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Speaker 3: Sure, sure, yeah, sure, buddy, why not.

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Speaker 2: We're going to dig into that and the ethics of

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Speaker 2: the journalism that he claims to be uh practicing. But first,

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Speaker 2: the ethics of my journalism are that you should buy

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Speaker 2: whatever these advertisers are selling, and we're back. So I

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Speaker 2: really hate the too huge not to report justification. That's like,

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Speaker 2: that's that's incredibly unethical journalism, because like, if a story

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Speaker 2: is that huge.

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Speaker 3: Actually, Robert, no, no, no, I just got an update

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Speaker 3: from a source that nine to eleven two just happened.

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Speaker 3: Oh wow, I have I have, I have a very

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Speaker 3: blurry picture. I'm going to post it up on Twitter

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Speaker 3: right now. I can't verify, but this is if true,

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Speaker 3: this is groundbreaking, literally in case of you know the ground.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and I know listeners, you're like, there's no way

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Speaker 2: nine to eleven two happened several days ago by the

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Speaker 2: time you listened to this episode, and I haven't heard

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Speaker 2: about it. I want to remind you about the film

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Speaker 2: Mad Max Fury Road. You know, when that came out,

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Speaker 2: none of us were expecting another Mad Max movie and

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Speaker 2: we got a great one. And I think nine to

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Speaker 2: eleven two could be the Fury Road of terrorism attacks.

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Speaker 3: Real promise, real promise. They also could be censoring the story.

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Speaker 3: They may not want you to know. In case you

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Speaker 3: haven't heard.

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Speaker 2: The news doesn't want you to know that nine to

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Speaker 2: eleven two already happened because it's going to destroy the

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Speaker 2: market for nine to eleven one memorabilia. You know, that's

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Speaker 2: everybody needs to read Manufacturing Consent by Chomsky. He lays

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Speaker 2: it all out.

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Speaker 3: As you're saying.

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Speaker 2: So obviously, if a story is as big as this

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Speaker 2: and the sinking of the Eyes, and how would be

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Speaker 2: like the most significant military reversal in the twenty first century? Maybe,

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Speaker 2: you know, I guess you could argue like the US

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Speaker 2: leaving Afghanistan. Maybe, But honest, from a technological standpoint, at

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Speaker 2: least the whoth he's managing to drop an aircraft carrier

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Speaker 2: would be massive. And if a story is that big,

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Speaker 2: you have a responsibility not to report on it until

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Speaker 2: you have any reason at all to believe that it's true.

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Speaker 2: So when somebody says the implication or too the implications

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Speaker 2: are too huge not to report on what they mean

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Speaker 2: is I wanted the clout in traffic from getting this

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Speaker 2: out first, and I don't really care if it's true. Now, yeah,

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Speaker 2: it happens to be quite easy to prove that the

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Speaker 2: US S. Eisenhower is still among the living because the

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Speaker 2: captain of that boat is a poster. His name is

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Speaker 2: oh God, Oh. This man posts like you wouldn't believe Garrison.

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Speaker 2: I've never seen a commanding officer in the US military

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Speaker 2: who posts like this man.

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Speaker 3: Do you think Riker would be a poster. I don't know.

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Speaker 2: Riker would be. He would do a lot of dming.

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Speaker 2: He would be sliding into DMS an awful loss like yeah, yes, absolutely.

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Speaker 2: He would constantly be trying to fuck. But I think

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Speaker 2: the only reason he would actually post is when like

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Speaker 2: something broke and he couldn't figure out how to fix it.

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Speaker 2: He would he would be like adding Jordie constantly like yes,

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Speaker 2: I can't kill my computer working.

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Speaker 3: That makes sense.

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Speaker 2: So the captain of the Enterprise is Christopher F. Hill,

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Speaker 2: and again he's a poster for reasons that I have

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Speaker 2: not bothered to look into and don't care to learn.

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Speaker 2: He goes by chowda on Twitter like with a with

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Speaker 2: a dah I don't I don't know why, and within

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Speaker 2: minutes of the Forbes post about uh or of Forbes's post,

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Speaker 2: he himself posted videos of the bakery on board the Eisenhower,

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Speaker 2: which showed no signs of being underwater. I think that

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Speaker 2: was kind of his subtle way of being like we

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Speaker 2: are still making like cinnamon rolls, like everything is fine

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Speaker 2: on board this ship. In short order, Internet Salutes discovered

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Speaker 2: that the the video clip posted by Forbes that claimed

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Speaker 2: to show the Eisenhower in flames was Garrison. Do you

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Speaker 2: want to guess where this what this was a screenshot from?

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Speaker 3: Is this a video game?

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Speaker 2: It is a video game. It's the video game from

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Speaker 2: ARM three. It's from ARMA three. Every time, every time,

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Speaker 2: whenever this happens in the war in Ukraine too constantly

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Speaker 2: they'll be like, we've shot down you know, a bunch

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Speaker 2: of these MiG twenty ones, or you know, shot down

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Speaker 2: this massive Russian jet that's never been shot down before.

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Speaker 2: Every time it's ARMA three, like every single time.

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Speaker 3: Unbelievable.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, like eighty percent of the time, fake videos of

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Speaker 2: military vehicles being destroyed. It's just clips from ARMA three. Now,

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Speaker 2: a brief glance into the backstory of Ashton Forbes would

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Speaker 2: have made it clear that his claims were nonsense, As

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Speaker 2: this write up by George Allison in the UK Defense

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Speaker 2: Journal notes, Ashton Forbes, despite his self identified role as

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Speaker 2: a citizen journalist, has I'm told history of posting sensational

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Speaker 2: and often unverified claims, particularly about Malaysia Airlines Flight three seventy.

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Speaker 2: It almost seventy was a commercial flight that disappeared in

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Speaker 2: twenty fourteen we'll en rout fro Kuala Lumpur to Beijing,

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Speaker 2: leading to numerous conspiracy theories. Now we don't actually know

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Speaker 2: why MH three seventy went down. I think probably the

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Speaker 2: leading theory was that the pilot committed suicide. But even that,

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Speaker 2: I don't think that there's like strong. I don't think

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Speaker 2: it's it's very unclear, could have just been a fuck up,

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Speaker 2: something like It's we really don't know, which is why

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Speaker 2: there's so much conspiracy.

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Speaker 3: Could have gone into a wormhole.

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Speaker 2: So it could have gone into the wormhole right now.

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Speaker 2: Forbes's belief, according to I found a post by Swift

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Speaker 2: on security, who's a popular security expert, who states that

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Speaker 2: Forbes believes MH three seventy had secret free energy tech

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Speaker 2: on it that was raptured into a wormhole by reptilians.

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Speaker 2: Are you so yeah? You actually got it? He's doing

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Speaker 2: a bit So you got it right, Garrison? Oh my god.

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Speaker 2: Swift provides an example of another one of the citizen

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Speaker 2: journalist's big scoops free energy announcement. Free Energy, otherwise known

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Speaker 2: as over Unity, is one hundred percent real. The devices

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Speaker 2: exists already. I have been told exactly how an operational

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Speaker 2: device works. I signed an NDA, so won't be able

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Speaker 2: to disclosed specifics.

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Speaker 3: One hundred.

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Speaker 2: That's great. I love that the people who figure out

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00:21:07,880 --> 00:21:10,680
Speaker 2: free energy would let you post about it as long

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Speaker 2: as you don't explain how it works.

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Speaker 3: I like that you signed an NDA so you can't

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Speaker 3: talk about it except for this post in what you

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Speaker 3: do talk about it and which have absolutivate about classic

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Speaker 3: classic move now.

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Speaker 2: Once Forbes's post started to gain traction, the entire ecosystem

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Speaker 2: of infogrifters who cropped up like mushrooms to profit off

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Speaker 2: the massacre in Gaza, swung into gear thanks to Elon's

411
00:21:32,320 --> 00:21:35,240
Speaker 2: new ownership of Twitter. Being able to draw viral crowds

412
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Speaker 2: to your content by latching onto the most discussed topics

413
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Speaker 2: of the day is very profitable, as we discussed, and

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Speaker 2: into this mix you do have some state funded actors.

415
00:21:43,040 --> 00:21:45,679
Speaker 2: You've got people working for Iran, for Israel, for Russia,

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Speaker 2: for the United States, all trying to push their own

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Speaker 2: sundry lines of propaganda using the engines of algorithmic virality.

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Speaker 2: And then, of course there are the legitimately hopeful but

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Speaker 2: ill informed. And these are the people that I have

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Speaker 2: sympathy with and who I'm kind of like total focusing on.

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Speaker 2: These are people who are understandably numb from constant exposure

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Speaker 2: to a barrage of photos and videos of war crimes,

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Speaker 2: and they are desperately ready to believe in some kind

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Speaker 2: of miraculous underdog victory. Right, Hollywood fiction has trained us

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Speaker 2: all to see that as possible. This is being thought

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Speaker 2: of by a lot of people who are just numb

427
00:22:20,960 --> 00:22:24,359
Speaker 2: and broken from videos of horror as like, well, I

428
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Speaker 2: don't know, maybe we could have our Star Wars moment, right,

429
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Speaker 2: maybe we've got a Luke Skywalker downing the death Star. Now,

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Speaker 2: the Hoothies aren't Luke Skywalker, and the Eisenhower isn't entirely

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Speaker 2: the death Star. It's like it's got shades of Death Star,

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Speaker 2: it's got some Death Star DNA and it sure, yeah,

433
00:22:43,000 --> 00:22:45,000
Speaker 2: I mean it's closer to closer to a Star destroyer,

434
00:22:45,200 --> 00:22:47,879
Speaker 2: closer to a Star destroyer, right right, right. One of

435
00:22:47,880 --> 00:22:51,159
Speaker 2: the posts I came across Researching this was Alden Marky,

436
00:22:51,280 --> 00:22:54,760
Speaker 2: who describes himself as a counter propagandist and researcher with

437
00:22:54,760 --> 00:22:57,439
Speaker 2: a focus on Yemen. He posted a photoshop of the

438
00:22:57,440 --> 00:23:00,560
Speaker 2: Eisenhower from above with a dagger in the water beneath it.

439
00:23:00,880 --> 00:23:03,560
Speaker 2: This was accompanied by the text uss Eisenhower was just

440
00:23:03,560 --> 00:23:05,679
Speaker 2: struck for the second time in twenty four hours and

441
00:23:05,720 --> 00:23:08,159
Speaker 2: it had something like two thousand likes two hundred and

442
00:23:08,160 --> 00:23:12,080
Speaker 2: fifty thousand views when I came across it. Another account

443
00:23:12,160 --> 00:23:15,080
Speaker 2: quote tweeted this and got nearly five thousand likes, saying

444
00:23:15,119 --> 00:23:17,320
Speaker 2: it won't happen, but it would be so fucking funny

445
00:23:17,359 --> 00:23:20,320
Speaker 2: if Yeman sinks an aircraft carrier, like can you imagine?

446
00:23:20,720 --> 00:23:23,280
Speaker 2: And I think that guy represents the more common attitude,

447
00:23:23,320 --> 00:23:26,000
Speaker 2: which is this mix of on we and desperation. Right,

448
00:23:26,440 --> 00:23:29,560
Speaker 2: nothing is going to stop this massacre. It seems like that.

449
00:23:29,640 --> 00:23:32,040
Speaker 2: It really feels like that, right, But wouldn't it be

450
00:23:32,119 --> 00:23:34,440
Speaker 2: rad if something did? And to be realistic, I don't

451
00:23:34,480 --> 00:23:36,879
Speaker 2: know that. I think there's a real odds that dropping

452
00:23:36,920 --> 00:23:39,919
Speaker 2: the Eisenhower somehow would stop net Yahoo from what he's doing.

453
00:23:40,000 --> 00:23:42,720
Speaker 2: I mean maybe it would, like it would certainly reduce

454
00:23:42,760 --> 00:23:45,960
Speaker 2: the ability of the United States to interdict Iranian missiles

455
00:23:46,000 --> 00:23:48,720
Speaker 2: coming into Israel. But I don't know that. I think

456
00:23:48,720 --> 00:23:51,480
Speaker 2: that it's realistic that that's going to stop Netan Yahoo

457
00:23:51,480 --> 00:23:54,320
Speaker 2: from doing the shit that net Yaho's doing. You can

458
00:23:54,320 --> 00:23:57,720
Speaker 2: feel however you want about that. It's not irrational to

459
00:23:57,760 --> 00:24:00,720
Speaker 2: be like, boy, I don't think this is real, but

460
00:24:00,960 --> 00:24:03,600
Speaker 2: like I wish it was right, So you can feel

461
00:24:03,600 --> 00:24:06,600
Speaker 2: however you want about this guy wanting, you know, thousands

462
00:24:06,640 --> 00:24:10,080
Speaker 2: of US soldiers to get murdered. I get both, Like,

463
00:24:10,640 --> 00:24:13,960
Speaker 2: I don't think that realistically anything the Hoothies are doing

464
00:24:14,160 --> 00:24:17,080
Speaker 2: is going to stop what Israel's doing at this point,

465
00:24:17,480 --> 00:24:21,600
Speaker 2: but I also understand just desperately wanting some violence to

466
00:24:21,680 --> 00:24:24,320
Speaker 2: come down on the other side of this thing after

467
00:24:24,440 --> 00:24:28,680
Speaker 2: months of watching videos of the slaughter in Gaza, you know, especially.

468
00:24:28,280 --> 00:24:31,800
Speaker 3: As you have you have like Nikky Haley signing right

469
00:24:31,840 --> 00:24:35,280
Speaker 3: bombs that that is sending over like come on, Like yeah, no,

470
00:24:35,480 --> 00:24:37,680
Speaker 3: I could understand the emotional like.

471
00:24:37,760 --> 00:24:40,840
Speaker 2: Yeah, braw, it doesn't speak to the best angels of

472
00:24:40,880 --> 00:24:44,200
Speaker 2: our nature, right because you're what you're thinking, You're hoping

473
00:24:44,240 --> 00:24:47,239
Speaker 2: for huge amounts of human death either way, But like,

474
00:24:47,320 --> 00:24:50,320
Speaker 2: I get it, and it's not irrational right, saying there's

475
00:24:50,320 --> 00:24:52,040
Speaker 2: no way this is real, but I wish it was

476
00:24:52,119 --> 00:24:54,879
Speaker 2: is not an irrational feeling, right. You can contrast that

477
00:24:55,240 --> 00:24:59,679
Speaker 2: to the posts of independent journalists and newsgrifter Richard Medhurst

478
00:24:59,760 --> 00:25:03,199
Speaker 2: with four hundred and eighteen thousand followers, who posted this

479
00:25:03,240 --> 00:25:05,800
Speaker 2: on June second, yem instruct the best ship in the

480
00:25:05,880 --> 00:25:08,119
Speaker 2: US Navy with ballistic and cruise missiles. The ship is

481
00:25:08,160 --> 00:25:10,280
Speaker 2: fleeing and the captain of the US S. Eisenhower tried

482
00:25:10,280 --> 00:25:12,080
Speaker 2: to do damage control by posting a video of the

483
00:25:12,119 --> 00:25:14,520
Speaker 2: deck on Twitter. But it's an old Instagram reel from

484
00:25:14,560 --> 00:25:20,000
Speaker 2: thirteen weeks ago. Left Yemen never lie.

485
00:25:19,119 --> 00:25:21,680
Speaker 3: And this is just an alternate reality that they've entered into.

486
00:25:21,800 --> 00:25:27,679
Speaker 2: Now, yes, yes, you have departed reality in favor of

487
00:25:27,720 --> 00:25:31,359
Speaker 2: one that you are crafting because it's more comforting than

488
00:25:31,400 --> 00:25:34,159
Speaker 2: the one in which nothing seems to be able to

489
00:25:34,200 --> 00:25:37,399
Speaker 2: actually alter the course of violence in Gaza, Right, So

490
00:25:37,480 --> 00:25:41,680
Speaker 2: you're just deciding to believe in something else. Now. Community

491
00:25:41,760 --> 00:25:44,480
Speaker 2: notes flagged this post, but it still has something like

492
00:25:44,480 --> 00:25:46,400
Speaker 2: three hundred and fifty thousand views and more than four

493
00:25:46,480 --> 00:25:50,720
Speaker 2: hundred thousand likes. Medhers tis hundred thousand or four thousand

494
00:25:50,920 --> 00:25:54,960
Speaker 2: likes sorry, four hundred and eighteen thousand followers, four thousand

495
00:25:55,080 --> 00:25:56,960
Speaker 2: likes on the post I see four thousand likes? Is

496
00:25:57,000 --> 00:25:59,520
Speaker 2: still a mess? Is a sizable super?

497
00:26:00,000 --> 00:26:00,919
Speaker 3: What's for large number?

498
00:26:01,160 --> 00:26:04,280
Speaker 2: Yeah? Medhurst has leaned hard into repeating claims that the

499
00:26:04,320 --> 00:26:07,200
Speaker 2: Houthis have sunk or damaged the Eisenhower, and another post

500
00:26:07,200 --> 00:26:09,159
Speaker 2: with six thousand likes in eight hundred and twenty one

501
00:26:09,160 --> 00:26:11,560
Speaker 2: thousand views, he describes the IKE as being hit with

502
00:26:11,560 --> 00:26:13,960
Speaker 2: ballistic and cruise missiles and add, yeomen never lie in

503
00:26:14,000 --> 00:26:17,159
Speaker 2: their press breathings, so I'm inclined to believe them. In

504
00:26:17,160 --> 00:26:21,280
Speaker 2: one post, he I know it's. In one post, he

505
00:26:21,359 --> 00:26:23,359
Speaker 2: notes that the Houthis recently shot down an m Q

506
00:26:23,520 --> 00:26:26,120
Speaker 2: nine Reaper drone, which did happen, and claims the US

507
00:26:26,160 --> 00:26:30,120
Speaker 2: won't admit to that either, and like, I haven't run

508
00:26:30,160 --> 00:26:33,240
Speaker 2: into the US denying that this happened. There's three clear

509
00:26:33,320 --> 00:26:36,760
Speaker 2: cases of m Q nine's being shot down last month alone, right, Like,

510
00:26:36,800 --> 00:26:39,120
Speaker 2: we actually know a lot about this, which is part

511
00:26:39,119 --> 00:26:41,320
Speaker 2: of why I don't believe the Eisenhower shot down, as

512
00:26:41,359 --> 00:26:45,159
Speaker 2: they the Houthis were able to prove quite readily that

513
00:26:45,200 --> 00:26:47,920
Speaker 2: they had shot down the MQ nine's. I have seen

514
00:26:47,960 --> 00:26:51,320
Speaker 2: no proof that the Eisenhower's been hit. Right, And this

515
00:26:51,400 --> 00:26:53,359
Speaker 2: isn't just a case where like the Houthis should be

516
00:26:53,400 --> 00:26:56,040
Speaker 2: able to provide some actual proof if they'd done this.

517
00:26:56,400 --> 00:26:59,760
Speaker 2: The Eisenhower is a floating city with a population of thousands.

518
00:27:00,040 --> 00:27:01,840
Speaker 2: There's like seven or eight thousand people. I think at

519
00:27:01,920 --> 00:27:04,280
Speaker 2: least in the whole strike group. I will conceie that

520
00:27:04,320 --> 00:27:07,080
Speaker 2: the military could probably keep a lid on an attack

521
00:27:07,240 --> 00:27:10,560
Speaker 2: against the Isenhower and might even temporarily be able to

522
00:27:10,640 --> 00:27:13,159
Speaker 2: hide the fact that it had suffered minor damage. But

523
00:27:13,240 --> 00:27:17,000
Speaker 2: you're not keeping any anything significant secret for the long haul, right,

524
00:27:17,080 --> 00:27:20,000
Speaker 2: Like you just you can't. You can't keep secrets like that.

525
00:27:20,680 --> 00:27:23,160
Speaker 2: There's too many people. They're going to talk to their families.

526
00:27:23,359 --> 00:27:26,119
Speaker 2: If the boat goes down with thousands of people on board,

527
00:27:26,320 --> 00:27:28,119
Speaker 2: family members are going to be like, boy, none of

528
00:27:28,200 --> 00:27:30,840
Speaker 2: us have heard from our loved ones in a while. Right.

529
00:27:30,960 --> 00:27:33,960
Speaker 3: Also think also like the government would say something and

530
00:27:34,000 --> 00:27:37,320
Speaker 3: like start like a massive batch of retaliation, Like it's

531
00:27:37,359 --> 00:27:40,600
Speaker 3: not like America would be like, oh, sh quiet, we just.

532
00:27:40,560 --> 00:27:42,280
Speaker 2: Have to pretend this didn't happen.

533
00:27:42,520 --> 00:27:45,159
Speaker 3: Yeah, No, they're going to be talking about a NonStop

534
00:27:45,200 --> 00:27:47,880
Speaker 3: for the past like three months.

535
00:27:47,520 --> 00:27:49,680
Speaker 2: We sent the Eisenhower and its crew to a nice

536
00:27:49,720 --> 00:27:56,000
Speaker 2: farm up state exactly. So why why would the Hoothies,

537
00:27:56,080 --> 00:27:58,080
Speaker 2: this is a question to ask, And why would the

538
00:27:58,080 --> 00:28:00,920
Speaker 2: Hoothies make fake claims that are obvious fake claims about

539
00:28:00,920 --> 00:28:02,040
Speaker 2: striking the Eisenhower?

540
00:28:02,200 --> 00:28:02,360
Speaker 1: Right?

541
00:28:02,680 --> 00:28:04,560
Speaker 2: And I think it's because at this point, for a

542
00:28:04,560 --> 00:28:08,040
Speaker 2: sizeable chunk of people, fake Hoothy attacks on US assets

543
00:28:08,080 --> 00:28:10,240
Speaker 2: are just as good as real ones. And I think

544
00:28:10,280 --> 00:28:13,160
Speaker 2: there are people within the leadership cadres of the Houthis

545
00:28:13,240 --> 00:28:16,560
Speaker 2: who know that perfectly well, it is entirely possible that

546
00:28:16,560 --> 00:28:19,679
Speaker 2: the Hoothies find themselves low on munitions after months of

547
00:28:19,760 --> 00:28:23,760
Speaker 2: conflict with the US, and somebody smart realized, like, what

548
00:28:23,800 --> 00:28:26,080
Speaker 2: if we just say we shot at them, right, It'll

549
00:28:26,119 --> 00:28:28,840
Speaker 2: have the same propaganda impact and we won't have to

550
00:28:28,880 --> 00:28:29,639
Speaker 2: waste a missile.

551
00:28:29,760 --> 00:28:32,520
Speaker 3: Right, No, you'll still be able to talk about it

552
00:28:32,560 --> 00:28:36,199
Speaker 3: on your Los Angeles Twitch stream to your hundreds of

553
00:28:36,200 --> 00:28:38,080
Speaker 3: thousands of followers, right.

554
00:28:39,000 --> 00:28:43,560
Speaker 2: The ongoing genocide and if that's what actually is happening here, right,

555
00:28:43,600 --> 00:28:46,120
Speaker 2: I could see that as a reasonably cunning move, you know,

556
00:28:46,160 --> 00:28:48,920
Speaker 2: the ongoing genocide and gaza, the other inability of protest

557
00:28:49,000 --> 00:28:52,160
Speaker 2: or arm resistance to change it in any way leads

558
00:28:52,200 --> 00:28:55,720
Speaker 2: some people to a kind of mad desperation. In this desperation,

559
00:28:55,800 --> 00:28:57,760
Speaker 2: the Houthis have become a symbol of hope to many

560
00:28:57,800 --> 00:28:59,959
Speaker 2: people for the simple reason that they seem to be

561
00:29:00,080 --> 00:29:04,040
Speaker 2: capable of taking action against the forces protecting Israel as

562
00:29:04,080 --> 00:29:07,240
Speaker 2: Israel commits war crimes. Now, the reality of the situation

563
00:29:07,320 --> 00:29:09,720
Speaker 2: is that the Huthis themselves have committed their share of

564
00:29:09,760 --> 00:29:12,040
Speaker 2: war crimes, some of which are reminiscent of the very

565
00:29:12,040 --> 00:29:14,920
Speaker 2: crimes committed by Israel. In December of twenty fourteen, the

566
00:29:14,960 --> 00:29:18,800
Speaker 2: Houthis laid siege to Yemen's second city, Taies, leading to

567
00:29:18,840 --> 00:29:23,040
Speaker 2: a humanitarian catastrophe, as this article from The Guardian lays out. Quote.

568
00:29:23,320 --> 00:29:26,360
Speaker 2: Sincerely April, when the resistance, an alliance of local forces

569
00:29:26,400 --> 00:29:29,120
Speaker 2: dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood, fought off the Houthi's attempt

570
00:29:29,120 --> 00:29:32,320
Speaker 2: to control the city, the militia retaliated by cutting off roads,

571
00:29:32,440 --> 00:29:35,240
Speaker 2: preventing food and medical aid from getting in. Access is

572
00:29:35,280 --> 00:29:38,400
Speaker 2: only allowed through a single checkpoint dubbed the Rafa Crossing

573
00:29:38,480 --> 00:29:40,960
Speaker 2: by the residents after its more famous namesake, on the

574
00:29:41,000 --> 00:29:44,680
Speaker 2: Egypt Gaza border. Every morning, long queues form outside the

575
00:29:44,680 --> 00:29:47,560
Speaker 2: crossing by those wanting to enter the city, Huthi malicious

576
00:29:47,560 --> 00:29:50,960
Speaker 2: search and confiscate medicine, cooking, gas, cigarettes, bottled water, or

577
00:29:51,000 --> 00:29:53,640
Speaker 2: anything more than a small shopping bag of food. In

578
00:29:53,760 --> 00:29:56,640
Speaker 2: order to survive. The city has for months been relying

579
00:29:56,640 --> 00:29:58,920
Speaker 2: on groups of young boys and long trains of donkeys

580
00:29:58,960 --> 00:30:02,160
Speaker 2: to bring its supplies a long and arduous journey through

581
00:30:02,200 --> 00:30:04,920
Speaker 2: the mountains. But donkeys alone can hardly fulfill the needs

582
00:30:04,920 --> 00:30:07,480
Speaker 2: of the city. Medicine and food have all but disappeared

583
00:30:07,480 --> 00:30:09,240
Speaker 2: from the market, and the prices of what are left

584
00:30:09,240 --> 00:30:11,600
Speaker 2: have jumped in the last few months, pushing most of

585
00:30:11,640 --> 00:30:16,080
Speaker 2: the population below the poverty line. Now the comparison between

586
00:30:16,080 --> 00:30:20,000
Speaker 2: Ties and Gaza are striking, right, Like the crossing was

587
00:30:20,000 --> 00:30:21,040
Speaker 2: called Rafa you know.

588
00:30:21,160 --> 00:30:23,960
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, they literally name that for the crossing.

589
00:30:24,400 --> 00:30:26,320
Speaker 2: Yeah, and you know, you hear a lot of the

590
00:30:26,360 --> 00:30:29,120
Speaker 2: same stories, like the hospitals basically were out of you know,

591
00:30:29,160 --> 00:30:31,480
Speaker 2: anything to actually treat the injured. One of the one

592
00:30:31,520 --> 00:30:33,800
Speaker 2: doctor at one of the two functioning hospitals in the

593
00:30:33,840 --> 00:30:36,760
Speaker 2: city told the Guardian, we can't do operations, we can't

594
00:30:36,760 --> 00:30:38,960
Speaker 2: put people in intensive care. We can only patch wounds

595
00:30:39,000 --> 00:30:42,000
Speaker 2: and tell the patient you are welcome. To die here. Now,

596
00:30:42,120 --> 00:30:43,800
Speaker 2: I want to be clear here, the other side in

597
00:30:43,840 --> 00:30:48,280
Speaker 2: this conflict was inarguably even worse. The Saudi led coalition,

598
00:30:48,440 --> 00:30:51,520
Speaker 2: using US weaponry put the whole country in a state

599
00:30:51,560 --> 00:30:56,080
Speaker 2: of siege that like led to catastrophic famines and situations

600
00:30:56,200 --> 00:30:58,160
Speaker 2: very similar and in some cases worse than what the

601
00:30:58,240 --> 00:31:02,600
Speaker 2: Huthi did to Ties. Right, Like, this is the this

602
00:31:02,680 --> 00:31:05,640
Speaker 2: is I mean, it's war, right, this is like unspeakable

603
00:31:05,720 --> 00:31:11,120
Speaker 2: suffering compounding on unspeakable suffering. Right. You've probably heard that

604
00:31:11,160 --> 00:31:14,080
Speaker 2: old saying when you stare into the abyss, the abyss

605
00:31:14,120 --> 00:31:17,160
Speaker 2: stares back. And there's a corollary to that statement that

606
00:31:17,200 --> 00:31:19,480
Speaker 2: I think is relevant to some of the fantasies that

607
00:31:19,560 --> 00:31:22,240
Speaker 2: some people on the left have about the hoovies. When

608
00:31:22,240 --> 00:31:26,640
Speaker 2: you start giving yourself up to false realities, eventually you

609
00:31:26,680 --> 00:31:29,960
Speaker 2: can lose yourself entirely. And we're going to talk a

610
00:31:30,000 --> 00:31:34,760
Speaker 2: little bit about that, but first lose yourself to these products.

611
00:31:46,120 --> 00:31:50,240
Speaker 2: We're back. So people like Medhurst, you know, postlike by

612
00:31:50,240 --> 00:31:53,160
Speaker 2: these guys, they aren't meant to inform people about the

613
00:31:53,200 --> 00:31:57,320
Speaker 2: real world. Medhurst's fans, the people who take him seriously,

614
00:31:57,760 --> 00:32:00,840
Speaker 2: have departed reality in favor of a fantasy. Because that

615
00:32:01,000 --> 00:32:04,360
Speaker 2: fantasy world is the only place in which victory feels possible.

616
00:32:05,400 --> 00:32:07,160
Speaker 2: There's a term that you and I talk about a

617
00:32:07,200 --> 00:32:10,000
Speaker 2: lot garrison, coined by the author Robert Anton Wilson, that

618
00:32:10,040 --> 00:32:12,840
Speaker 2: I think is useful in dealing with situations like this,

619
00:32:12,920 --> 00:32:16,120
Speaker 2: and that term is reality tunnel. The concept is complex

620
00:32:16,120 --> 00:32:18,680
Speaker 2: and explanations of it tend towards long, but the basic

621
00:32:18,720 --> 00:32:20,600
Speaker 2: idea is that we in the modern world are all

622
00:32:20,640 --> 00:32:23,760
Speaker 2: constantly flooded by information from our senses and from the

623
00:32:23,760 --> 00:32:26,800
Speaker 2: different information delivery devices that we filled our world with.

624
00:32:27,160 --> 00:32:29,800
Speaker 2: In order to function, we have to triage that information,

625
00:32:30,120 --> 00:32:32,520
Speaker 2: to pare it away until we get to a reality

626
00:32:32,520 --> 00:32:35,320
Speaker 2: that we can live inside. The fact that human beings

627
00:32:35,320 --> 00:32:38,760
Speaker 2: can and perhaps inherently do this is not necessarily bad,

628
00:32:39,160 --> 00:32:41,480
Speaker 2: and in fact, I might argue that without the ability

629
00:32:41,520 --> 00:32:45,160
Speaker 2: to choose and flip between different realities to change the channel,

630
00:32:45,240 --> 00:32:49,040
Speaker 2: as Wilson put it, positive progress is impossible. I found

631
00:32:49,080 --> 00:32:51,320
Speaker 2: this explained well in an essay on Wilson's work by

632
00:32:51,360 --> 00:32:55,560
Speaker 2: Mikola Bilokonski. Quote, we can slide between reality tunnels by

633
00:32:55,560 --> 00:32:58,520
Speaker 2: consciously choosing to pay attention to things we might normally ignore.

634
00:32:58,840 --> 00:33:00,719
Speaker 2: It's hard at first, but is skill that we can

635
00:33:00,760 --> 00:33:03,640
Speaker 2: develop with practice. Train yourself to pay more attention to

636
00:33:03,640 --> 00:33:05,840
Speaker 2: the emotions of the people you're speaking to, for instance,

637
00:33:05,840 --> 00:33:08,320
Speaker 2: and you'll be surprised at how much richer the world gets.

638
00:33:08,600 --> 00:33:11,040
Speaker 2: Train yourself to pay attention to your caloric intake, and

639
00:33:11,120 --> 00:33:15,040
Speaker 2: eating fundamentally changes. Train yourself to hear the voices of minorities,

640
00:33:15,040 --> 00:33:20,320
Speaker 2: and suddenly you see racism and sexism everywhere. Now, those

641
00:33:20,360 --> 00:33:23,480
Speaker 2: other reality tunnels like that you can key yourself in

642
00:33:23,520 --> 00:33:26,680
Speaker 2: on are always there. They always exist, right, You just

643
00:33:26,840 --> 00:33:30,120
Speaker 2: had to actually learn the filters that you existed within

644
00:33:30,160 --> 00:33:31,440
Speaker 2: in order to access them.

645
00:33:31,480 --> 00:33:34,240
Speaker 3: You know, whether or not you're tuned in doesn't mean

646
00:33:34,280 --> 00:33:35,959
Speaker 3: like they just don't exist.

647
00:33:36,000 --> 00:33:40,080
Speaker 2: They're still there. Yeah. Yeah, So again the constant, you know,

648
00:33:40,120 --> 00:33:42,320
Speaker 2: the fact that people can like pick and choose which

649
00:33:42,360 --> 00:33:44,800
Speaker 2: reality chair and can change the channel, so to speak,

650
00:33:45,160 --> 00:33:48,719
Speaker 2: isn't necessarily bad and in fact is part of you know,

651
00:33:48,880 --> 00:33:52,560
Speaker 2: necessary positive progress. But some people don't want to hop

652
00:33:52,600 --> 00:33:57,000
Speaker 2: between tunnels and explore the dazzling variety of realities that exist.

653
00:33:57,280 --> 00:33:59,240
Speaker 2: They want to pick a tunnel in which they feel

654
00:33:59,280 --> 00:34:02,080
Speaker 2: comfortable and then burrows so deep into it that no

655
00:34:02,200 --> 00:34:04,920
Speaker 2: other realities can find them. I want you to think

656
00:34:04,960 --> 00:34:07,840
Speaker 2: of one of my favorite recent Trump World grifts, right,

657
00:34:08,040 --> 00:34:10,600
Speaker 2: is these kind of this company that started putting out

658
00:34:10,600 --> 00:34:13,759
Speaker 2: these like ads with an obvious AI Donald Trump or

659
00:34:13,760 --> 00:34:16,640
Speaker 2: Elon Musk voice where they're like, Trump is going to

660
00:34:16,760 --> 00:34:19,440
Speaker 2: change the monetary system, and if you buy these like

661
00:34:19,600 --> 00:34:24,040
Speaker 2: trump Bucks debit card things or fake checks, he's going

662
00:34:24,080 --> 00:34:25,759
Speaker 2: to like when he changes it, they'll be worth a

663
00:34:26,120 --> 00:34:28,160
Speaker 2: ten thousand times what you put in. So if you

664
00:34:28,160 --> 00:34:29,840
Speaker 2: put in two or three thousand dollars worth of this,

665
00:34:30,000 --> 00:34:33,000
Speaker 2: you'll be rich. He's doing this to reward his loyal fans.

666
00:34:33,280 --> 00:34:36,360
Speaker 2: He's gonna like he's gonna fix everything, and you'll finally

667
00:34:36,440 --> 00:34:38,919
Speaker 2: be rich. Right, you know you deserve to be rich, right,

668
00:34:39,320 --> 00:34:42,839
Speaker 2: And a bunch of people bought these like fake promisary

669
00:34:42,880 --> 00:34:44,719
Speaker 2: notes and then like went to Bank of America to

670
00:34:44,760 --> 00:34:46,960
Speaker 2: cash them in, and the bank was like, well, no,

671
00:34:47,360 --> 00:34:50,320
Speaker 2: that's not this, this isn't real, this, this is nothing

672
00:34:50,360 --> 00:34:53,240
Speaker 2: at all, right, And you know, these people got fleeced.

673
00:34:53,280 --> 00:34:54,759
Speaker 2: And one way to look at the people who got

674
00:34:54,760 --> 00:34:57,680
Speaker 2: fleeced is like, well they're dumb, right, These people are stupid.

675
00:34:57,719 --> 00:34:59,640
Speaker 2: You know, they did a stupid thing. They believed something

676
00:34:59,640 --> 00:35:03,960
Speaker 2: that was obviously fake, and you can take that out

677
00:35:04,000 --> 00:35:08,480
Speaker 2: of their story if you want. I don't think that's helpful, though.

678
00:35:09,040 --> 00:35:12,640
Speaker 2: The reality is that these people represent a cautionary tale.

679
00:35:13,120 --> 00:35:15,360
Speaker 2: They didn't start out believing that the guy from The

680
00:35:15,400 --> 00:35:19,600
Speaker 2: Apprentice was their messiah. Their break from consensus reality began

681
00:35:19,719 --> 00:35:23,040
Speaker 2: years or decades earlier, and it's going to be different

682
00:35:23,120 --> 00:35:25,560
Speaker 2: for every individual person. When I think about my own

683
00:35:25,640 --> 00:35:29,680
Speaker 2: family members who came to believe pretty unhinged things that

684
00:35:29,840 --> 00:35:32,800
Speaker 2: you know, figures within the Republican Party or Trump himself

685
00:35:32,800 --> 00:35:36,680
Speaker 2: told them, I tend to trace their break from reality

686
00:35:37,280 --> 00:35:40,040
Speaker 2: back to well back to the day when the calming,

687
00:35:40,160 --> 00:35:43,360
Speaker 2: charismatic voice of Ronald Reagan said this about the Iran

688
00:35:43,440 --> 00:35:46,600
Speaker 2: Contra scandal, a deal in which his administration gave Iron

689
00:35:46,680 --> 00:35:50,840
Speaker 2: weapons in exchange for hostages. And this is Reagan. A

690
00:35:50,840 --> 00:35:53,160
Speaker 2: few months ago, I told the American people, I did

691
00:35:53,160 --> 00:35:55,879
Speaker 2: not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best

692
00:35:55,920 --> 00:35:58,360
Speaker 2: intentions tell me that's true, but the facts and the

693
00:35:58,360 --> 00:36:02,239
Speaker 2: evidence tell me it is not. Yes, And I think

694
00:36:02,320 --> 00:36:07,000
Speaker 2: that line is an important moment in the shattering of

695
00:36:07,440 --> 00:36:11,560
Speaker 2: what we might call reality, consensus reality, right, The undeniable,

696
00:36:11,960 --> 00:36:14,480
Speaker 2: actual truth is that Ronald Reagan and many members of

697
00:36:14,480 --> 00:36:17,400
Speaker 2: his administration committed high crimes and light about it. But

698
00:36:17,480 --> 00:36:20,719
Speaker 2: Reagan's supporters, his fans, people like my parents, loved him

699
00:36:20,719 --> 00:36:24,080
Speaker 2: too much to accept this, and old Ronnie offered them

700
00:36:24,080 --> 00:36:26,920
Speaker 2: a way out, ignore the facts and the evidence, and

701
00:36:27,040 --> 00:36:30,640
Speaker 2: embraced the deeper truth of his heart and his best intentions.

702
00:36:31,200 --> 00:36:33,680
Speaker 2: And in that moment, I think that's where a lot

703
00:36:33,800 --> 00:36:36,360
Speaker 2: of Americans, who are now in an even more unhinged place,

704
00:36:36,680 --> 00:36:40,200
Speaker 2: started burrowing down and started tunneling away from their friends

705
00:36:40,200 --> 00:36:43,399
Speaker 2: and family and towards the heart of something dark. As

706
00:36:43,400 --> 00:36:45,960
Speaker 2: the years went on, the consequences of many Reagan era

707
00:36:46,040 --> 00:36:49,960
Speaker 2: economic and social policies became impossible to ignore. No wealth

708
00:36:50,000 --> 00:36:53,800
Speaker 2: trickled down, Mourning did not return to America. The promise

709
00:36:53,800 --> 00:36:56,280
Speaker 2: of the Internet boom yielded to the dot com bubble

710
00:36:56,320 --> 00:36:59,560
Speaker 2: bursting September eleventh sobered us up from the hallucination of

711
00:36:59,600 --> 00:37:02,279
Speaker 2: permanent victory. After the end of the Cold War, the

712
00:37:02,360 --> 00:37:06,359
Speaker 2: housing market crashed, the hideous reality of climate change became unavoidable,

713
00:37:06,600 --> 00:37:09,720
Speaker 2: The promise of a bright future faded, and people buried

714
00:37:09,719 --> 00:37:13,400
Speaker 2: themselves deeper in fantasies to avoid oblique and empty horizon.

715
00:37:14,239 --> 00:37:17,400
Speaker 2: And all Throughout this the left prided itself on a

716
00:37:17,440 --> 00:37:21,320
Speaker 2: sort of logical sobriety, a willingness to stare into the abyss,

717
00:37:21,320 --> 00:37:24,000
Speaker 2: to accept the reality of our dire moment, and to

718
00:37:24,040 --> 00:37:28,120
Speaker 2: propose radical solutions. Yet one by one, the different protest

719
00:37:28,200 --> 00:37:31,640
Speaker 2: movements put out by the left flopped and fizzled. Promising

720
00:37:31,719 --> 00:37:34,920
Speaker 2: organizers and ideological leaders were revealed as frauds or became

721
00:37:34,920 --> 00:37:39,200
Speaker 2: corrupted by the system. Capitalism failed to fall or reform,

722
00:37:39,800 --> 00:37:43,040
Speaker 2: and rather than confront the dire complex reality that leaves

723
00:37:43,120 --> 00:37:47,280
Speaker 2: us in, increasing numbers of leftists found alternative realities, served

724
00:37:47,320 --> 00:37:51,799
Speaker 2: eagerly by an alliance of conmen and paid propagandists. Now,

725
00:37:52,680 --> 00:37:56,280
Speaker 2: leftists have always been just as vulnerable to vicious fantasy

726
00:37:56,320 --> 00:37:59,680
Speaker 2: as conservatives. This has proven well in the last century.

727
00:37:59,680 --> 00:38:03,480
Speaker 2: There's a case of a Marxist academic named Malcolm Caldwell,

728
00:38:03,800 --> 00:38:06,800
Speaker 2: who I think is which I think is valuable depending

729
00:38:06,800 --> 00:38:10,839
Speaker 2: on who you talk to about Caldwell. He's the Scottish academic.

730
00:38:10,920 --> 00:38:15,440
Speaker 2: He was a college professor, apparently a pretty good economist,

731
00:38:15,920 --> 00:38:21,600
Speaker 2: and he also had this weird thing for agrarian communist movements,

732
00:38:21,640 --> 00:38:23,960
Speaker 2: which he thought were He believed that there was this

733
00:38:24,000 --> 00:38:27,120
Speaker 2: like massive global famine coming, and he believed that these

734
00:38:27,239 --> 00:38:30,960
Speaker 2: like back to the land Marxist movements sweeping Southeast Asia

735
00:38:31,000 --> 00:38:34,000
Speaker 2: where the only way forward for a lot of humanity.

736
00:38:34,040 --> 00:38:36,360
Speaker 2: He was this like third worldist. A lot of his

737
00:38:36,440 --> 00:38:38,800
Speaker 2: belief was kind of centering that, you know, the United

738
00:38:38,840 --> 00:38:41,920
Speaker 2: States was the source of all evil in the world effectively,

739
00:38:42,320 --> 00:38:44,600
Speaker 2: but this kind of led him to he became a

740
00:38:44,640 --> 00:38:47,560
Speaker 2: stan of every communist state, even the ones that were

741
00:38:47,560 --> 00:38:49,799
Speaker 2: in conflict with each other. He traveled to like North

742
00:38:49,880 --> 00:38:52,799
Speaker 2: Korea and came back like talking about all of the

743
00:38:52,840 --> 00:38:56,480
Speaker 2: wonderful accomplishments of Jucha ideology. You know, he was in

744
00:38:56,520 --> 00:38:58,440
Speaker 2: love with Vietnam, and he was also in love with

745
00:38:58,560 --> 00:39:02,319
Speaker 2: Khmer Rouge in Cambo. And that's kind of part of

746
00:39:02,320 --> 00:39:05,040
Speaker 2: the evidence that like he had entered a reality tunnel

747
00:39:05,040 --> 00:39:07,520
Speaker 2: that had taken him away from any kind of logical reality,

748
00:39:07,560 --> 00:39:12,280
Speaker 2: because like Cambodia and Vietnam went to war, right, Vietnam

749
00:39:12,320 --> 00:39:16,520
Speaker 2: invaded Cambodia, Like these these two were not like Communist

750
00:39:16,600 --> 00:39:20,320
Speaker 2: fellow travelers on the same side of a conflict. Whenever

751
00:39:20,360 --> 00:39:23,240
Speaker 2: this would get brought up to Caldwell when he'd argue about,

752
00:39:23,320 --> 00:39:25,640
Speaker 2: you know, Vietnam and the conflict that Vietnam was having

753
00:39:25,680 --> 00:39:28,040
Speaker 2: with Cambodia, or he you know, people would try to

754
00:39:28,120 --> 00:39:30,680
Speaker 2: argue with him about the realities of the Khmer Rouge system.

755
00:39:30,920 --> 00:39:33,400
Speaker 2: He would just kind of shut down like he was

756
00:39:33,200 --> 00:39:38,160
Speaker 2: he was, yeah, he couldn't talk about it right now. Eventually, Caldwell,

757
00:39:38,239 --> 00:39:40,600
Speaker 2: because he's an academic, he travels to a lot of

758
00:39:40,600 --> 00:39:42,759
Speaker 2: these countries and you know, it's fine. He travels to

759
00:39:42,800 --> 00:39:45,040
Speaker 2: the USSR, he gets a tour there. He travels to

760
00:39:45,040 --> 00:39:46,719
Speaker 2: North Korea, he gets a tour there, he gets a

761
00:39:46,760 --> 00:39:50,120
Speaker 2: tour at Vietnam. That's all fine. All of those states

762
00:39:50,160 --> 00:39:52,560
Speaker 2: are saying states, right, which is not to say that

763
00:39:52,680 --> 00:39:55,600
Speaker 2: like they don't do bad things, but they're they're run

764
00:39:55,640 --> 00:39:58,600
Speaker 2: by people who like, there's no benefit in us to

765
00:39:58,600 --> 00:40:00,880
Speaker 2: anything bad happening to this guy who's out there in

766
00:40:00,920 --> 00:40:04,560
Speaker 2: the West writing nice things about our regimes. Right, Polepot

767
00:40:04,600 --> 00:40:07,840
Speaker 2: was not sane, The Khmer Rouge was not sane. So

768
00:40:08,239 --> 00:40:11,960
Speaker 2: he goes to Cambodia with two American journalists, one of

769
00:40:12,000 --> 00:40:15,480
Speaker 2: whom had been in Cambodia in the years prior to

770
00:40:15,520 --> 00:40:18,880
Speaker 2: the Khmer Rouge overthrow of the US backed government of

771
00:40:18,960 --> 00:40:21,600
Speaker 2: Law Nol and knew the country well, and when she

772
00:40:21,760 --> 00:40:24,120
Speaker 2: got there, they had all these arguments where he was like,

773
00:40:24,360 --> 00:40:26,720
Speaker 2: I think the revolution is working. You know, it's not perfect,

774
00:40:26,760 --> 00:40:29,000
Speaker 2: but it needs its time. Look at all the wonderful

775
00:40:29,040 --> 00:40:32,359
Speaker 2: accomplishments already. And she would point out, I have been

776
00:40:32,880 --> 00:40:37,120
Speaker 2: to these cities years ago, and there's no people anymore.

777
00:40:37,360 --> 00:40:41,000
Speaker 2: All of the people are gone. Something is terribly wrong,

778
00:40:41,400 --> 00:40:44,040
Speaker 2: and he just couldn't listen to her. So they're there

779
00:40:44,080 --> 00:40:46,719
Speaker 2: a couple of weeks and he gets invited to have

780
00:40:46,760 --> 00:40:50,000
Speaker 2: a meeting with Polepot, and you know, he has a

781
00:40:50,040 --> 00:40:53,200
Speaker 2: meeting with him right after these journalists do, and he

782
00:40:53,239 --> 00:40:55,480
Speaker 2: comes back from it really excited, being like we had

783
00:40:55,520 --> 00:40:58,080
Speaker 2: a great talk. He's such a smart man. You know,

784
00:40:58,120 --> 00:41:01,239
Speaker 2: we talked about economics. I feel he's invited me back

785
00:41:01,320 --> 00:41:03,640
Speaker 2: next year, you know. And by the way, within like

786
00:41:03,760 --> 00:41:06,840
Speaker 2: weeks of this, Vietnam invades and forces Polepot out of

787
00:41:06,840 --> 00:41:12,040
Speaker 2: the capitol, right like the state of the Khmer rouge

788
00:41:12,080 --> 00:41:14,800
Speaker 2: was deeply precarious at this point. But he comes out

789
00:41:14,840 --> 00:41:19,040
Speaker 2: super optimistic, and then later that night a gunman shoots

790
00:41:19,080 --> 00:41:21,839
Speaker 2: him to death and then shoots himself to death. It

791
00:41:21,920 --> 00:41:24,040
Speaker 2: is really unclear to this day. It's a bit of

792
00:41:24,040 --> 00:41:28,520
Speaker 2: a mystery what happened. The most likely explanation is that

793
00:41:28,600 --> 00:41:32,319
Speaker 2: the Khmer Rouge wanted to pin the murder of a

794
00:41:32,440 --> 00:41:37,759
Speaker 2: leftist Western academic on Vietnam to try and generate international

795
00:41:37,760 --> 00:41:42,880
Speaker 2: outrage against Vietnam who was about to invade. It's possible

796
00:41:43,080 --> 00:41:45,440
Speaker 2: Vietnam killed him for but I don't really see a

797
00:41:45,480 --> 00:41:49,440
Speaker 2: benefit to Vietnam and doing that again. They invade right

798
00:41:49,520 --> 00:41:54,319
Speaker 2: after this. It seems like one of the journalists who

799
00:41:54,360 --> 00:41:56,120
Speaker 2: was there basically was like a poppot, was out of

800
00:41:56,160 --> 00:41:58,120
Speaker 2: his fucking mind. Of course he would do this. There's

801
00:41:58,160 --> 00:42:00,560
Speaker 2: no like, there's no trying to lay out like the

802
00:42:00,640 --> 00:42:04,040
Speaker 2: rationality behind this man's actions. I think what's more interesting

803
00:42:04,120 --> 00:42:08,920
Speaker 2: is Caldwell had been presented with plenty of evidence that

804
00:42:09,000 --> 00:42:13,520
Speaker 2: the Khmer Rouge regime was deeply evil and violent, and

805
00:42:13,520 --> 00:42:15,759
Speaker 2: in fact, he had published right before he went over there,

806
00:42:15,920 --> 00:42:18,839
Speaker 2: he published an article about like the successes of their

807
00:42:18,880 --> 00:42:22,800
Speaker 2: agrarian reforms and the Khmer Rouge government official that he

808
00:42:23,000 --> 00:42:25,799
Speaker 2: cited in that paper that's like the basis of most

809
00:42:25,800 --> 00:42:27,720
Speaker 2: of his claims about how well the reforms had worked

810
00:42:28,000 --> 00:42:30,160
Speaker 2: with it like a couple of weeks before he arrived

811
00:42:30,160 --> 00:42:33,200
Speaker 2: in Cambodia was tortured to death in the S twenty

812
00:42:33,239 --> 00:42:33,840
Speaker 2: one prison.

813
00:42:34,400 --> 00:42:35,600
Speaker 3: Well, that's not a great sign.

814
00:42:36,000 --> 00:42:39,520
Speaker 2: Not a great sign anyway. I bring this guy up

815
00:42:39,560 --> 00:42:41,400
Speaker 2: because I think he's maybe the best example of like

816
00:42:42,400 --> 00:42:45,399
Speaker 2: the damage that you do to yourself when you let

817
00:42:45,480 --> 00:42:48,480
Speaker 2: yourself fall into these tunnels. Because Caldwell, he's not one

818
00:42:48,480 --> 00:42:50,440
Speaker 2: of these like gray zone guys. He didn't make a

819
00:42:50,480 --> 00:42:54,480
Speaker 2: bunch of money being a stand for dictatorships. He seems

820
00:42:54,520 --> 00:42:56,719
Speaker 2: to everyone who talked, even the people who thought he

821
00:42:56,880 --> 00:42:59,239
Speaker 2: was like out of his mind and his opinions on

822
00:42:59,239 --> 00:43:02,120
Speaker 2: the Khmer rouge, he was a really nice man. He

823
00:43:02,200 --> 00:43:05,000
Speaker 2: was a family man, he was a good teacher. He

824
00:43:05,640 --> 00:43:09,759
Speaker 2: just completely left reality in this one thing, and it

825
00:43:09,840 --> 00:43:10,880
Speaker 2: led him to oblivion.

826
00:43:11,000 --> 00:43:13,920
Speaker 3: You know, I've been thinking about a lot of similar

827
00:43:13,960 --> 00:43:17,120
Speaker 3: stuff in terms of like what Israel's currently doing, and

828
00:43:17,160 --> 00:43:20,440
Speaker 3: like there's so many people who are just vocally supportive

829
00:43:20,480 --> 00:43:23,080
Speaker 3: every single action that's being done. And there's even been

830
00:43:23,719 --> 00:43:28,600
Speaker 3: attacks where I've seen people like Vietnam ly uh like

831
00:43:28,719 --> 00:43:30,600
Speaker 3: defend what happened. It's like, no, this was like a

832
00:43:30,640 --> 00:43:34,399
Speaker 3: necessary strike. It did for all these reasons, blah blah

833
00:43:34,400 --> 00:43:36,839
Speaker 3: blah blah blah. Even if even if someone like net

834
00:43:36,840 --> 00:43:39,200
Speaker 3: and Yahoo then like like comes out and says like, actually, no,

835
00:43:39,280 --> 00:43:41,440
Speaker 3: this was like quote unquote like terrible accident or whatever,

836
00:43:42,120 --> 00:43:46,000
Speaker 3: there will still be people defending it. And like, I

837
00:43:46,040 --> 00:43:50,799
Speaker 3: don't know if all of these people are literally like bloodthirsty,

838
00:43:50,880 --> 00:43:53,080
Speaker 3: like I don't know if they actually really want to

839
00:43:53,120 --> 00:43:57,480
Speaker 3: see like everyone in Gaza killed. I'm sure there's there's

840
00:43:57,760 --> 00:44:01,440
Speaker 3: maybe some people who are like just bad, But I

841
00:44:01,440 --> 00:44:04,960
Speaker 3: think the reality tunnel version, I think is a lot

842
00:44:05,000 --> 00:44:08,600
Speaker 3: more useful for understanding how there's so many otherwise very

843
00:44:08,680 --> 00:44:13,120
Speaker 3: like normal, normal people who feel totally fine about cheering

844
00:44:13,160 --> 00:44:15,520
Speaker 3: on the actions of the State of Israel right now

845
00:44:15,760 --> 00:44:17,919
Speaker 3: as there you know, as the death toll just gets

846
00:44:18,000 --> 00:44:20,960
Speaker 3: higher and higher and higher every single day. No, it's

847
00:44:20,960 --> 00:44:25,880
Speaker 3: certainly been something I've thought about very often these past

848
00:44:25,880 --> 00:44:28,879
Speaker 3: few months, as I as I'm sure many other people are,

849
00:44:28,920 --> 00:44:31,880
Speaker 3: you know, both staring into the abyss on on Twitter

850
00:44:31,920 --> 00:44:34,440
Speaker 3: dot com, where everyone has a take. But then also

851
00:44:34,520 --> 00:44:36,560
Speaker 3: you know, if if you're ever going outo any like,

852
00:44:36,680 --> 00:44:39,080
Speaker 3: if you're ever going into any of these protests, there

853
00:44:39,120 --> 00:44:41,640
Speaker 3: will probably be like a group of Zionist counter protesters

854
00:44:41,880 --> 00:44:46,320
Speaker 3: yelling something and it's it's a really tricky thing to navigate.

855
00:44:47,520 --> 00:44:51,760
Speaker 2: Yeah, it is like it because like and I guess

856
00:44:51,800 --> 00:44:55,360
Speaker 2: what the scary question to me is, like how do

857
00:44:55,480 --> 00:44:58,239
Speaker 2: you communicate with someone who is not living in the

858
00:44:58,280 --> 00:45:01,799
Speaker 2: same reality? And like, totally, I don't think you really can.

859
00:45:02,360 --> 00:45:05,320
Speaker 2: I think sometimes, I know sometimes because I've seen it happen.

860
00:45:05,680 --> 00:45:09,600
Speaker 2: Sometimes people just get out of that alternate reality on

861
00:45:09,640 --> 00:45:12,879
Speaker 2: their own. Right, that does happen, thank god, But it's

862
00:45:12,920 --> 00:45:16,360
Speaker 2: not like reliable that it happens. And I have you know,

863
00:45:16,400 --> 00:45:19,840
Speaker 2: as someone who has been in this space of researching cults,

864
00:45:19,840 --> 00:45:24,279
Speaker 2: of researching disinformation for years now, I'm not aware of

865
00:45:24,280 --> 00:45:28,319
Speaker 2: any reliable ways to break people out of these now

866
00:45:28,560 --> 00:45:31,359
Speaker 2: you know, the these tunnels when they get themselves in.

867
00:45:31,440 --> 00:45:34,759
Speaker 2: And that's the scariest thing to me. Right, there's a

868
00:45:34,880 --> 00:45:36,680
Speaker 2: number of people. I don't think it's huge in an

869
00:45:36,680 --> 00:45:39,760
Speaker 2: electoral sense, but it's probably thousands or tens of thousands

870
00:45:39,760 --> 00:45:42,319
Speaker 2: of people who now believe that the Eisenhower is either

871
00:45:42,360 --> 00:45:44,839
Speaker 2: badly damaged or at the bottom of the sea, and

872
00:45:44,880 --> 00:45:47,400
Speaker 2: they will keep believing that the same way that like

873
00:45:48,239 --> 00:45:50,239
Speaker 2: a chunk of people believe that when they look up

874
00:45:50,239 --> 00:45:54,400
Speaker 2: and see clouds, every cloud they see is like poison.

875
00:45:54,440 --> 00:45:57,279
Speaker 2: The US government shot out into the sky using our

876
00:45:57,320 --> 00:46:01,120
Speaker 2: secret planes to murder people with fucking whatever. I don't

877
00:46:01,160 --> 00:46:03,680
Speaker 2: know it's anyway, or.

878
00:46:03,600 --> 00:46:06,480
Speaker 3: The belief that literally ever university in Gaza has been

879
00:46:06,480 --> 00:46:08,400
Speaker 3: secretly turned into a military base.

880
00:46:08,480 --> 00:46:10,160
Speaker 2: Right, yeah, yeah, exactly.

881
00:46:10,640 --> 00:46:13,600
Speaker 3: It's they're like underground tunnels. It's like, you know, it's

882
00:46:13,600 --> 00:46:16,439
Speaker 3: all of all of all of these things that it's

883
00:46:16,480 --> 00:46:18,439
Speaker 3: not just like a I don't know if this switch

884
00:46:18,480 --> 00:46:21,680
Speaker 3: happens immediately. I don't think it does. They're there there.

885
00:46:21,960 --> 00:46:24,200
Speaker 3: There may be like a tipping point. It is often

886
00:46:24,200 --> 00:46:27,600
Speaker 3: a very gradual shift into different reality tunnels, and then

887
00:46:27,640 --> 00:46:31,040
Speaker 3: you don't realize how far you are in one until

888
00:46:31,080 --> 00:46:33,200
Speaker 3: you're like fully in it, and then in that case

889
00:46:33,239 --> 00:46:35,640
Speaker 3: you probably don't even realize yourself. People on the outside

890
00:46:35,840 --> 00:46:38,480
Speaker 3: will point out, oh wow, this is this is uh,

891
00:46:38,560 --> 00:46:43,000
Speaker 3: this is some interesting beliefs you have suddenly fallen into. Yeah,

892
00:46:43,080 --> 00:46:45,680
Speaker 3: but it it doesn't, It doesn't happen overnight. It is

893
00:46:45,760 --> 00:46:47,960
Speaker 3: it is. It is a slow shift in a lot

894
00:46:47,960 --> 00:46:51,080
Speaker 3: of cases, and yeah, laying out you know, quote unquote

895
00:46:51,120 --> 00:46:54,319
Speaker 3: facts and logic often cases does not help at all

896
00:46:54,360 --> 00:46:57,400
Speaker 3: and will actually hurt. It will produce a backfire effect.

897
00:46:58,000 --> 00:46:59,640
Speaker 3: That's not the case for everybody, but that is the

898
00:47:00,120 --> 00:47:03,480
Speaker 3: case for a lot of people. And it's easy to discount,

899
00:47:03,560 --> 00:47:06,880
Speaker 3: you know, people yelling horrible things at you at a protest.

900
00:47:06,920 --> 00:47:10,919
Speaker 3: It's easy to discount people you know, saying horrible things

901
00:47:10,960 --> 00:47:14,319
Speaker 3: on Twitter. But it's more frustrating when it's like you're

902
00:47:14,400 --> 00:47:17,120
Speaker 3: on who you like previously, like had a good relationship with,

903
00:47:17,840 --> 00:47:20,759
Speaker 3: and yeah, no, I mean this, this this kind of

904
00:47:20,800 --> 00:47:23,680
Speaker 3: reminds me of like, you know, attempts at QAnon and

905
00:47:23,719 --> 00:47:26,759
Speaker 3: deprogramming back in like twenty nineteen, where you know, we

906
00:47:26,840 --> 00:47:30,560
Speaker 3: had this influx of influx of older people and boomers

907
00:47:31,480 --> 00:47:34,799
Speaker 3: and sometimes just like not super old people either also

908
00:47:34,880 --> 00:47:37,440
Speaker 3: just like like moms in their thirties who started like

909
00:47:37,600 --> 00:47:41,880
Speaker 3: leaving all this stuff and cutting them off from you know,

910
00:47:42,520 --> 00:47:46,359
Speaker 3: contact with you or other people doesn't help, obviously, but

911
00:47:46,440 --> 00:47:48,239
Speaker 3: they can also be really hard to maintain, like a

912
00:47:48,280 --> 00:47:51,399
Speaker 3: good relationship. And yeah, it's a weird balance of being

913
00:47:51,400 --> 00:47:54,279
Speaker 3: able to provide a little bit of like compassion to

914
00:47:54,480 --> 00:47:57,360
Speaker 3: someone and not completely cut them off while also maintaining

915
00:47:57,360 --> 00:48:00,160
Speaker 3: your own personal boundaries. It's it's a really tricky thing.

916
00:48:00,200 --> 00:48:02,240
Speaker 3: But in a lot of the cases of the QAnon stuff,

917
00:48:02,719 --> 00:48:04,919
Speaker 3: all the most successful things that I've heard about people

918
00:48:04,920 --> 00:48:09,360
Speaker 3: getting out of it. It did require a line, like

919
00:48:10,040 --> 00:48:12,840
Speaker 3: there had to be some connecting thread to the person,

920
00:48:13,440 --> 00:48:18,040
Speaker 3: and over time that thread could be pulled upon and

921
00:48:18,080 --> 00:48:20,840
Speaker 3: maybe the person would use that thread as like as

922
00:48:20,920 --> 00:48:24,719
Speaker 3: like a crutch when the reality so slowly started to

923
00:48:24,719 --> 00:48:27,879
Speaker 3: crumble around them. And it's really tricky and I don't

924
00:48:27,920 --> 00:48:30,520
Speaker 3: have any good solutions for this. Nobody does. Anyone who

925
00:48:30,560 --> 00:48:33,879
Speaker 3: does say they do is also a grifter who's lying

926
00:48:33,880 --> 00:48:35,880
Speaker 3: and trying to make money.

927
00:48:36,000 --> 00:48:38,960
Speaker 2: Yeah, I will agree with you. The closest we come

928
00:48:39,080 --> 00:48:43,240
Speaker 2: to there being a solution is don't cut off ties

929
00:48:43,280 --> 00:48:45,239
Speaker 2: with the person. I mean unless you have Obviously, there

930
00:48:45,239 --> 00:48:47,480
Speaker 2: are some things that people can come to believe and

931
00:48:47,600 --> 00:48:49,640
Speaker 2: advocate for that you have to, Like, I'm not saying

932
00:48:49,680 --> 00:48:52,520
Speaker 2: that that line doesn't exist. Like I had someone reach

933
00:48:52,560 --> 00:48:54,680
Speaker 2: out about a family member who had started to believe

934
00:48:55,520 --> 00:48:59,200
Speaker 2: some conspiracy stuff regarding extra terrestrials that was like obviously

935
00:48:59,320 --> 00:49:01,560
Speaker 2: untrue and it worried them, and I was like, well, look,

936
00:49:01,920 --> 00:49:03,279
Speaker 2: you know, you don't have to tell them that you

937
00:49:03,480 --> 00:49:05,319
Speaker 2: believe them. You can say like, I don't you know,

938
00:49:05,680 --> 00:49:07,440
Speaker 2: really feel the same way you do about this, But

939
00:49:07,440 --> 00:49:09,520
Speaker 2: I'm always down to talk about it, right or like

940
00:49:09,640 --> 00:49:12,080
Speaker 2: you know, I'm always you know, here to to listen

941
00:49:12,120 --> 00:49:13,719
Speaker 2: if you want to talk about this and let him

942
00:49:13,760 --> 00:49:16,360
Speaker 2: know that like they have a connection still, if you

943
00:49:16,400 --> 00:49:18,279
Speaker 2: make sure that there's like still a way they can

944
00:49:18,280 --> 00:49:20,840
Speaker 2: get out of that tunnel and back up to something

945
00:49:20,840 --> 00:49:23,200
Speaker 2: that resembles reality, maybe they will, you know.

946
00:49:24,120 --> 00:49:28,560
Speaker 3: Yeah, I I really wish Robert Ana Wilson could have

947
00:49:28,600 --> 00:49:33,440
Speaker 3: seen the twenty era Internet. I'm sure he would have

948
00:49:33,520 --> 00:49:34,240
Speaker 3: had some thoughts.

949
00:49:34,480 --> 00:49:36,840
Speaker 2: He would he would have had some fascinating things to

950
00:49:36,880 --> 00:49:37,440
Speaker 2: write about it.

951
00:49:37,560 --> 00:49:40,720
Speaker 3: Yeah, well this is this has been an exciting tale.

952
00:49:40,800 --> 00:49:43,200
Speaker 2: Yes, indeed, so, I don't know, go.

953
00:49:43,239 --> 00:49:44,520
Speaker 3: Aircraft carrier down.

954
00:49:44,600 --> 00:49:46,880
Speaker 2: We did it, Joe, Yeah, we did it. Joe. Go

955
00:49:47,000 --> 00:49:50,319
Speaker 2: destroy the USS Eisenhower in your own life, just like

956
00:49:50,560 --> 00:49:52,600
Speaker 2: the fake Koothies. Pretend did.

957
00:49:58,160 --> 00:50:00,560
Speaker 1: It Could Happen year as a production of Kools Media.

958
00:50:00,760 --> 00:50:03,440
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website

959
00:50:03,480 --> 00:50:06,600
Speaker 1: coolzonemedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,

960
00:50:06,600 --> 00:50:09,799
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can

961
00:50:09,800 --> 00:50:12,520
Speaker 1: find sources for it Could Happen here, updated monthly at

962
00:50:12,520 --> 00:50:15,800
Speaker 1: coolzonemedia dot com slash sources, thanks for listening.