Speaker 1: Hey, guys, ready or not, twenty twenty four is here,
Speaker 1: and we here at breaking points, are already thinking of
Speaker 1: ways we can up our game for this critical election.
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Speaker 2: let's get to the show. Hello, everybody, it was a
Speaker 2: major breaking news. We're changing our entire show and we're
Speaker 2: putting this up at the top. We have the breaking
Speaker 2: news that happened literally as we were recording. Vice President
Speaker 2: Kamala Harris has chosen Governor Tim Walls of Minnesota as
Speaker 2: her vice presidential pick for the Democratic nomination. So I'm
Speaker 2: sure that Crystal's doing some backflips at home, and I'm
Speaker 2: sure she wishes that she was here on the show
Speaker 2: with us. So Ryan, we got this breaking news. Governor
Speaker 2: Walls really surged in the last forty eight hours or
Speaker 2: so in the betting markets. There was a lot of speculation.
Speaker 2: I personally thought it was going to be Governor Josh
Speaker 2: Shapiro just because of the electoral calculus. But Tim Walls
Speaker 2: here is a popular Minnesota governor Minnesota in the Midwest.
Speaker 2: He coined the whole weird attack on Republicans. He was
Speaker 2: the choice of organized Labor. There were also some late
Speaker 2: breaking problems, it seems, with Governor Josh Shapiro and some
Speaker 2: of the baggage that he may bring to the tickets.
Speaker 2: So what do you make of the pick right now?
Speaker 2: I know we've only had minutes of process.
Speaker 1: It's stunning in the sense that it's something that makes
Speaker 1: me happy.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I'm.
Speaker 1: Not used to that when it comes to Democratic Party politics.
Speaker 1: Tim Walls was always represented a rural district in Minnesota
Speaker 1: that became increasingly suburban over the time that he represented it.
Speaker 1: But by twenty sixteen it swung like fifteen to twenty
Speaker 1: points for Trump, and he held it rather comfortably, not
Speaker 1: totally comfortably, but comfortably for a Democrat. And he did
Speaker 1: not do so by tacking right like the classic Democratic
Speaker 1: blue dog of old. He did it by championing kind
Speaker 1: of populist values, like his first ad for Congress was
Speaker 1: talking about how due to his military service he lost
Speaker 1: a lot of his hearing. He was able to get
Speaker 1: medical treatment that was able to restore his hearing. And
Speaker 1: one morning he woke up and he asked his wife,
Speaker 1: what is that sound, And he said, that's that's my daughter.
Speaker 3: That's your daughter laughing wow.
Speaker 1: And he said she'd been waking up giggling every morning,
Speaker 1: but he had not been able to hear her. And
Speaker 1: he finishes the ad by saying, like, every father should
Speaker 1: be able to hear their children child's laugh in the morning.
Speaker 3: Everyone should have that kind of access to healthcare.
Speaker 1: And so that's the kind of populism that pushes forward
Speaker 1: a kind of leftist agenda that people have been like
Speaker 1: crying out for. That that's arguing like, that's why Bernie
Speaker 1: Sanders was able to appeal so well to people who
Speaker 1: are independents. And so to have somebody like Wallace who's
Speaker 1: able to win these world districts with that populist message
Speaker 1: and rather than sounding weird like a social justice warrior
Speaker 1: kind of democrat of the twenty tens, to call out
Speaker 1: Republicans as being the weird ones, to kind of center
Speaker 1: his version of populist lefty politics, and to have the
Speaker 1: entire Democratic Party kind of think that that is electorally
Speaker 1: beneficial suggests something interesting going on.
Speaker 3: With the party.
Speaker 2: Well, let's think then a little bit about how this
Speaker 2: was Josh Shapiro's to lose.
Speaker 3: Can we put B two please up on the screen?
Speaker 2: This was former Speaker Nancy Pelosi yesterday was on CNN.
Speaker 2: Asked about the problems with Governor Josh Shapiro, and they said,
Speaker 2: just a stem from anti Semitism. She says, I think
Speaker 2: it's probably more about policy, but the decision will be
Speaker 2: made by our candidate for potus. I think that it
Speaker 2: would be better if they weighed in more privately.
Speaker 3: Clearly, she's throwing her weight behind Tim Walls.
Speaker 2: Reportedly we had brought that to everybody on our show
Speaker 2: on Monday. Tim Wall's a former House colleague, helped make
Speaker 2: speaker sixth race, helped make her Speaker of the House.
Speaker 2: But I'm also just thinking a little bit about here
Speaker 2: about Look, I mean, Shapiro was probably the most obvious pick,
Speaker 2: so that in a certain sense it's his to lose.
Speaker 2: I think that the Israel stuff obviously contributed to the decision,
Speaker 2: perhaps in terms of it might split the coalition. But
Speaker 2: let's not forget that organized labor played a role here,
Speaker 2: including here with Nancy Pelosi's pick. Right, So and her support,
Speaker 2: not only personally, you had the charter school issue, which
Speaker 2: Crystal had talked about here previously.
Speaker 3: So give us a sense of, you.
Speaker 2: Know, like why Kamala might have picked Tim Walls over
Speaker 2: a governor Josh Shapiro who is, let's be honest, means
Speaker 2: the literally popular governor of the must wing tipping point state.
Speaker 2: I mean, that's it. It takes some guts to pick
Speaker 2: somebody else in that.
Speaker 1: Extremely talented politician too, like, very well liked in Pennsylvania,
Speaker 1: and there was some analysis has said that he might
Speaker 1: pick up zero point four percent of the vote liked
Speaker 1: add point four percent to Democrats totals in Pennsylvania, which
Speaker 1: is in a razor thin margin, an absolutely huge amount. Yes,
Speaker 1: the charter school thing doesn't make him a huge fan
Speaker 1: of doesn't make the teachers' unions huge fans of him.
Speaker 1: I think I think it was more this murder suicide
Speaker 1: thing that came out towards towards the very end.
Speaker 3: So what's going on with.
Speaker 1: That when he was attorney general. Some it's very very complicated.
Speaker 1: People can go read it, but it's now in the
Speaker 1: Pennsylvania Supreme Court just now coincidentally, brutal timing for Shapiro.
Speaker 1: But basically, there was a somebody died, a woman who
Speaker 1: and he knew the family, he knew that people involved.
Speaker 1: His office ruled it a suicide for years, with the
Speaker 1: family saying no, no, no, like, we believe that this
Speaker 1: is a side and there are people I haven't looked
Speaker 1: at the details close enough to be an expert on this.
Speaker 3: People say that some.
Speaker 1: Of the wounds that she had in the back of
Speaker 1: her head after she died, so it's like, how can
Speaker 1: that possibly be a suicide? But get getting too deep
Speaker 1: into these details, is you're you're gonna, you're gonna, You're
Speaker 1: gonna go down a rabbit hole. But the point is,
Speaker 1: I don't think the Harris campaign wants to go down
Speaker 1: that rabbit hole because you know, some of the family
Speaker 1: of the suspect donated money.
Speaker 3: It's a Shapiro and Shapiro ties them.
Speaker 1: But then his defenders were saying, well, this is this
Speaker 1: is also anti Semitism because they all went to the
Speaker 1: same Hebrew schools. You're saying that therefore anybody who went
Speaker 1: to the school can't be governor. It's like he later
Speaker 1: accused himself he probably should have done that at the
Speaker 1: very beginning. You can tell from just talking about that
Speaker 1: it's a giant mess. Yeah, it's a mess, nobody. And
Speaker 1: so if if you have this giant mess, likeugh, is
Speaker 1: this really what we want to spend our time talking
Speaker 1: about for the next.
Speaker 2: I know these things sound stupid, Remember, guys, we want
Speaker 2: got ninety some days to the election. You don't waste
Speaker 2: a single day on something dumb. When we think to
Speaker 2: Minnisota was not a layup, well yes and no, but
Speaker 2: I mean, I mean Kamala was up by six, you know,
Speaker 2: very lately. And yes, I think Joe, but I think
Speaker 2: it's right. I mean one of the endurances over all
Speaker 2: of this is that a friend of mine this weekend
Speaker 2: I was talking with him and he's like, you know,
Speaker 2: Biden dropping out really makes me think like Trump was
Speaker 2: actually going to win New Mexico, Like it wasn't some
Speaker 2: right wing fever dream. He's like, I think he might
Speaker 2: actually have won like New Mexico and Virginia Minnesota, right
Speaker 2: which he barely lost him in twenty sixteen. When we
Speaker 2: think here too, let's go first of all, so let's
Speaker 2: think about the electoral map. I also thought some very
Speaker 2: interesting analysis, which is that my theory of the election
Speaker 2: the whole Pennsylvania two hundred and seventy plus one electoral
Speaker 2: vote may be incorrect in that Kamala, by reconsolidating the
Speaker 2: Democratic coalition, picking somebody like a Tim Wallas who gets
Speaker 2: suburban people, I think very excited, you know. I think
Speaker 2: I think Democrats really like the idea, you know, the
Speaker 2: street talking dad, and he's one of the you know,
Speaker 2: just playing weird that's all they are.
Speaker 4: Now.
Speaker 2: I'll say, I'm sure we'll have many fights over weirdness
Speaker 2: and all that in the coming months, But just thinking
Speaker 2: about the electoral like who he excites, and I think
Speaker 2: there is like a if we think the swing coalition here,
Speaker 2: Kamala needs to win white men back at the same
Speaker 2: rate that's Biden won in twenty twenty.
Speaker 3: That's really why Joe Biden won the race.
Speaker 2: So you pick like the quintessential white dude from the
Speaker 2: Midwest high school football coach and all of that, the
Speaker 2: straight talker. He's got a couple pounds on him, I guess,
Speaker 2: which is as American as can be. And you make him,
Speaker 2: you know, like the number two on the ticket. Well,
Speaker 2: now we're not necessarily just playing the Midwest game. And
Speaker 2: just assuming that the sun Belt is gone, it could
Speaker 2: be that those same suburban white people who delivered Georgia
Speaker 2: and Arizona to Joe Biden in twenty twenty, well maybe
Speaker 2: they're back in play. So Kamala may actually have a
Speaker 2: path to the White House where perhaps she could lose
Speaker 2: a Wisconsin, a Pennsylvania, or a Michigan. But if you
Speaker 2: pick up Georgia, you can make up enough electoral votes,
Speaker 2: you can hold down the fort in Nevada, New Hampshire,
Speaker 2: places like that, and you could still get there, you know.
Speaker 2: To two hundred and seventy I think it's two seventy nine,
Speaker 2: is something like that. So I was playing a little
Speaker 2: bit with two seventy one, and that kind of challenged
Speaker 2: my thinking a little bit. In the contra to the
Speaker 2: Josh Shapiro case. If her internal polls show a tight
Speaker 2: race in the Midwest but a lot more fluidity in
Speaker 2: the Sun Belt, well the sun Belt then comes back
Speaker 2: into play. I had not assumed that, but it's possible
Speaker 2: that that's what her thinking was in her path to
Speaker 2: two hundred and seventy. Here where Tim Waltz get those
Speaker 2: suburban people, keep them in the coalition.
Speaker 3: These are the they use.
Speaker 2: People are rich, they have a lot of money, they
Speaker 2: love to vote, and they're obsessed with abortion. So excite them,
Speaker 2: turn out the vote, you know, demoralize Already Republicans kind
Speaker 2: of in a little bit of a mess. He They're
Speaker 2: not really sure what to do, and they feel like
Speaker 2: they're on their back foot. They were so excited because
Speaker 2: they thought they were the only ones who were pumped
Speaker 2: up for the race, and now they're a little bit
Speaker 2: you know, trying to figure out their strategy in running.
Speaker 3: And I think two things on that.
Speaker 1: One is it in the Sunbelt and in Georgia, a
Speaker 1: lot of those people are actually from like Pennsylvania and
Speaker 1: the Midwest and New England and elsewhere, like there literally
Speaker 1: are from there and so and then the second related point,
Speaker 1: there are no regions anymore.
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, everything is national like this, this idea that
Speaker 3: and this.
Speaker 1: This was the this was the check that the Framers
Speaker 1: thought would keep you know, partisan intrigue at a minimum,
Speaker 1: because the different regions had such significant interests that they
Speaker 1: would butt heads with each other.
Speaker 3: In New England versus the you.
Speaker 1: Know, the middle South and the bottom South, It's deep South,
Speaker 1: et cetera. That's gone we're like a monoculture. You drive
Speaker 1: around this country, you go anywhere in this country, we're
Speaker 1: the same place. Whether it's Arizona, you know, Wisconsin, Georgia, Pennsylvania.
Speaker 1: I mean, there's some moderate differences here. And also people
Speaker 1: are moving around constantly all the time. And if you
Speaker 1: have a person who just it seems like an authentic
Speaker 1: individual like Walls, then he's going to play.
Speaker 3: And I think your point is exactly right.
Speaker 1: In Georgia and in Arizona. I'm not as well as
Speaker 1: he plays in Minnesota because people know him, you know,
Speaker 1: extremely well there, but he's going to play just fine.
Speaker 1: The joke that I've seen from kind of centrist Democrats
Speaker 1: is that they've been saying, like, hey, you left wing
Speaker 1: Democrats out there who've been pushing for Tim Walls, do
Speaker 1: you know that he called the National Guard out during
Speaker 1: the George Floyd riots. Don't you want to criticize him
Speaker 1: for that for the next three months? Like they think
Speaker 1: if people like me on the left just beat him
Speaker 1: up for being too tough on the riots in twenty twenty,
Speaker 1: then that will make him look better and tougher on crime.
Speaker 2: I'm glad you brought that up, though, because I've actually
Speaker 2: seen the opposite, which is apparently the Minnesota Senate to
Speaker 2: heavily criticize Tim Walls for not for his bad handling.
Speaker 1: That's why they want the left to criticize for being
Speaker 1: too strong saying okay, so but anyway, he apologized, he
Speaker 1: said I failed.
Speaker 2: So well, That's what I think is interesting is now
Speaker 2: I think there will be a little bit so I've seen.
Speaker 2: The right wing reaction that I've seen right now is
Speaker 2: that Okay, let's go, let's play, you know, let's play,
Speaker 2: let's let's talk about BLM, let's talk about the bail
Speaker 2: fund with Kamma unless. I mean, that is kind of
Speaker 2: one of the that is probably one of the more
Speaker 2: potent attacks now.
Speaker 3: In general, the issue is, guys, it was four years ago. Now.
Speaker 2: I'd love to relitigate BLM, but it's not going to happen.
Speaker 2: I mean, most people have moved on. I think you're right.
Speaker 1: I think I think people agree with them, agree with
Speaker 1: Republicans on this point, but also don't care and want
Speaker 1: to move past it.
Speaker 3: It's possible.
Speaker 2: So for example, I'll give people a taste of the
Speaker 2: right wing reaction here. I've got Charlie Kirk. He says,
Speaker 2: welcome to the race, Tim Walls, Let's make sure America
Speaker 2: knows who you are. You helped ignite the George Floyd
Speaker 2: Riot's the worst country's seen in decades. While Minneapolis burned,
Speaker 2: you stalled undeployment National Guard. You let your daughter leave
Speaker 2: the Guard's deployment plans online so that rioters would know
Speaker 2: they had to loot the city. Minneapolis is a war
Speaker 2: zone because of you. Days after the attempted murder of
Speaker 2: Donald Trump, you called him in his supporter's fascist. You
Speaker 2: have overseen some of the most radical youth transsurgery laws
Speaker 2: in the country. You have the most radical abortion laws
Speaker 2: in the country, zero limits on immigration. You famously said
Speaker 2: you wanted to provide a ladder so that invaders could
Speaker 2: come over the wall. You oversaw the worst fraud of
Speaker 2: the COVID era, the feed our future case.
Speaker 3: I don't know anything about that. I guess I'll have
Speaker 3: to get us up. There was some fraud with Minnesota
Speaker 3: got ripped off during COVID.
Speaker 2: You approved five hundred million dollars in hero pay, only
Speaker 2: for forty percent of that money to go to people
Speaker 2: who were literally deceased.
Speaker 3: In the House.
Speaker 2: You were Pelosi's sidekick and did whatever the Democrats demanded.
Speaker 2: You know, of all everything he said so far, only
Speaker 2: BLM and the Pelosi.
Speaker 3: Sidekick right now are like clicking for me.
Speaker 2: The Pelosi sidekick thing is interesting just because I mean,
Speaker 2: she's not exactly the most beloved figure, and that's part
Speaker 2: of the way that they could help. They could help
Speaker 2: energize Republicans perhaps against they tries.
Speaker 1: They ran against Pelosi for twenty years, that's true, and
Speaker 1: it never worked.
Speaker 3: I worked in twenty ten. Let's be it worked in
Speaker 3: twenty ten, So it was a while. I don't know
Speaker 3: if that was Pelosi or that was Obama.
Speaker 2: I think, yeah, I mean, I guess I'm just I'm
Speaker 2: sitting here just trying to grapple with the real let's
Speaker 2: think here. I'm just I'm sitting here just trying to
Speaker 2: grapple with why you turned down to Shapiro. I mean,
Speaker 2: so you brought up the murder case, you brought up
Speaker 2: the Israel stuff. I mean, but my contention was, I'm
Speaker 2: curious what you think.
Speaker 3: I think.
Speaker 2: Let's be honest, I think a lot of the israel
Speaker 2: people are willing to cut kamalas shit ton of slack
Speaker 2: because they're.
Speaker 3: Like maybe we can bleer whatever. You know, who knows
Speaker 3: what this lady actually believes.
Speaker 2: I mean, at the same time, Tim Wallas, I mean,
Speaker 2: this guy's signed like BDS legislation and he's prosed, he's
Speaker 2: pro Israel as it gets right, So what do you
Speaker 2: really think the Israel stuff was the main reason not
Speaker 2: to pick Shapiro. I understand the whole KKK thing and
Speaker 2: some of the comments, but I mean substantively, I don't think.
Speaker 3: There's a lot of a lot of daylight here between
Speaker 3: the two people, don't. I don't think it was Israel.
Speaker 1: I think there was some probably vibes element to it
Speaker 1: that that some of her advisers probably thought, Okay, well,
Speaker 1: if we picked Shapiro, the vibes online are going to
Speaker 1: be not good for several days, and the vibes like
Speaker 1: it's been a purely vibes campaign for two weeks. No interviews,
Speaker 1: no press commerces, no policies.
Speaker 2: Just no, no, you can't say that there's been no policies.
Speaker 2: There's been disavowing of every policy that she's ever taken. Right,
Speaker 2: there's been unpolicies. Yeah, yeah, it's been sixteen days now.
Speaker 2: This lady's running for press.
Speaker 1: I think part of it also maybe is that Hero is, Yes,
Speaker 1: he's a governor, he was just elected. He's a little young,
Speaker 1: and so people are looking.
Speaker 3: At Harris how good question. I bet he's like sixty or.
Speaker 2: Sixty years old spring chicken, you know when it comes
Speaker 2: to our current politics.
Speaker 1: But he's but he was in the House for ten
Speaker 1: to fifteen years and then governor since twenty eighteen, whereas
Speaker 1: Shapiro is really kind of new to the scene.
Speaker 3: And so.
Speaker 1: You know, the knock on from political consultants and knock
Speaker 1: on a woman candidate for president is that they say
Speaker 1: that she's not ready to be a commander in chief.
Speaker 1: Like that's that's what the political consults worry about from
Speaker 1: their focus groups, is.
Speaker 3: A woman ready to lead?
Speaker 1: And if you think back to when, you know, twenty
Speaker 1: years ago, you would attach a general or something to them.
Speaker 1: You know, Hillary ended up going with Tim Kaine, one
Speaker 1: of the most boring picks ever. I think people regret
Speaker 1: going with Tim Kaine there. But I think that Shapiro
Speaker 1: just didn't have the kind of national garavi toass Maybe
Speaker 1: I don't know, Walls is pretty obscure figure too.
Speaker 2: Coming back to ambition, I think that's what it has
Speaker 2: to be, because Kamala is a deeply insecure person. The
Speaker 2: only reason she's doing well right now is because she
Speaker 2: got it handed to her.
Speaker 3: She didn't actually have to run for it.
Speaker 2: Every time that she's ever actually been in a like
Speaker 2: a real competition, she's crumbled in an interview, in press
Speaker 2: conference or you know, not even a contentious one, but
Speaker 2: you know, on the debate stage. Famously, I think it's
Speaker 2: very possible that Josh Shapiro just coded is way too ambitious.
Speaker 2: I mean, obviously he wanted to be president, and he
Speaker 2: was going hard for the job, all the Obama impersonation.
Speaker 2: I think it may have just it could have come
Speaker 2: down to personality where look, let's be honest too, Whilst
Speaker 2: anybody who spends their career in politics, you're a weirdo
Speaker 2: and you're also ambitious, and you also very much want
Speaker 2: to be president, but it also comes it matters the
Speaker 2: way that it comes across.
Speaker 3: And I think with Walls, it's very possible that they
Speaker 3: just got along. Well.
Speaker 2: You know, this is these are two people. They meshed well.
Speaker 2: She didn't think that he would try to upstage her. Really,
Speaker 2: all you could really ask for in a VP is
Speaker 2: a loyal number two. He's a good attack dog, that's
Speaker 2: what they want. They also could let him absorb some
Speaker 2: of the hits sent him out there to do interviews
Speaker 2: and all these things and protect the top of the ticket,
Speaker 2: who is a lot more averse to media. So I
Speaker 2: see some of the wisdom, but really, like if I
Speaker 2: zoom out fifty thousand feet, this just tells me that
Speaker 2: their theory of victory, which I have to assume is
Speaker 2: based on something, is not the what I had envisioned
Speaker 2: for them. The two seventy plus one just hold down
Speaker 2: the blue wall. They really believe they can be competitive
Speaker 2: in Arizona and in Georgia, and so that this is
Speaker 2: a historic decision in that it gives us insight to
Speaker 2: how their theory of victory actually looks. And they're map
Speaker 2: to two seventy, which is very different than Joe Biden's
Speaker 2: original too original map.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and Shapiro didn't go on air like Tim Walls did,
Speaker 3: That's true.
Speaker 1: He didn't go on to lot and he's he's really
Speaker 1: good on air, So yeah, that was I think a
Speaker 1: blunder on his part. If it makes me go back
Speaker 1: to the opening that they had for an actual open
Speaker 1: process for president, where you would have like a five
Speaker 1: week period where Harris would make her case on online,
Speaker 1: on cable, having rallies, Walls would make his case, Prints
Speaker 1: or Shapiro, They'd all make their case, and the kind
Speaker 1: of vibes would then end up picking you know who
Speaker 1: they nominated in Chicago for president. And I think that's
Speaker 1: basically what happened here. The vibes were drifted towards Walls's direction.
Speaker 1: I think in an open five week situation like that,
Speaker 1: Walls could have actually won the nomination.
Speaker 2: People were like, how ironic is that? I r l
Speaker 2: If he actually ran in an open thing, he might
Speaker 2: have won. Like, that's the craziest part here is that
Speaker 2: he is probably a far better camp. I mean, so
Speaker 2: was Josh Shapiro if he.
Speaker 3: Would have run against Biden. No, he would Phillips crush him. Yeah, absolutely, Yeah.
Speaker 2: Who would have thought that the Minnesota Democrat who would
Speaker 2: triumph from this whole process was not Dean Phillips and
Speaker 2: was actually Tim Waldon And.
Speaker 1: Last wee we've talked about this with Emily on Counterpoints.
Speaker 1: Minnesota and Iowa used to both be swing states. Minnesota
Speaker 1: s lightly becomes blue and i was slightly becomes red.
Speaker 1: I was rammed through enormous amounts of right wing legislation.
Speaker 1: Minnesota ram through enormous amounts of left wing legislation. So
Speaker 1: there might not be a governor other than say Pritzker
Speaker 1: in the entire country with with a as solid a
Speaker 1: progressive legislative record as walls from materials, so class social
Speaker 1: super stuff.
Speaker 2: Also, the Democratic Party there called like the farm Democratic
Speaker 2: Farm Labor.
Speaker 3: Yeah that's right. I mean that's a good name, right,
Speaker 3: that's that's the group. Yes, that's right.
Speaker 2: We also I said, interesting analysis here. It says if
Speaker 2: the Obama folks had anything to do with this, and
Speaker 2: they probably did, a big factor would have been picking
Speaker 2: a run of me, ostensibly with limited personal horizons, who
Speaker 2: covers obvious weaknesses and will stick to a defined role,
Speaker 2: aka what Joe Biden did. And they're crayts, and I
Speaker 2: think they're really yeah, I mean, look, I think it
Speaker 2: definitely wants to be president.
Speaker 3: But maybe he just didn't. Maybe he just came across
Speaker 3: a lot less.
Speaker 1: Because because urban Democrats, like cosmopolitan democrats, are fooled by
Speaker 1: the aw shucks thing.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, I know, you and I have been in
Speaker 2: Washington long en have to not to have met the
Speaker 2: real ashucks people when the cameras are off and.
Speaker 3: Be like, oh man, you're just like everybody else.
Speaker 2: But most people don't. They don't pay attention to as
Speaker 2: much as this, and I don't blame them. They should
Speaker 2: be living their lives doing something else. So I guess
Speaker 2: the thing that we can zoom out and say a
Speaker 2: couple of things. Number one, kay my big one Kama
Speaker 2: theory of victory very different and how I originally envisioned it.
Speaker 2: And that's very interesting to me because maybe they have
Speaker 2: some data points. You know, everyone's saying that this is
Speaker 2: very online. I don't know it's possible, but I think
Speaker 2: these people really want to win. I mean, that's that's
Speaker 2: actually what I have taken away from the last couple
Speaker 2: of weeks. I'm like, oh, these people are playing to win.
Speaker 1: They're gonna win on vibes and maybe, yeah, maybe Harris
Speaker 1: can dodge doing any interviews.
Speaker 3: I think she can forever putting walls out totally. Hey,
Speaker 3: why do you want to hear from me? You got this?
Speaker 2: That's what I was thinking, is you put the number
Speaker 2: two out there and you're like, what, our campaign has
Speaker 2: been the most transparent in history. And everybody's like, hey, lady,
Speaker 2: what do you believe? Do you believe anything literally at all?
Speaker 1: Let's see if she can do an entire eight year Oh,
Speaker 1: let's not forget this right.
Speaker 2: We don't even have a debate right now on the schedule.
Speaker 2: Trump is like, I'll be at the Fox News debate.
Speaker 2: Kamala says she'll be at the ABC debate.
Speaker 3: Are we aven going to get a single one?
Speaker 4: Yes?
Speaker 2: And Tim Wallas go debate. Hopefully we'll get a JD
Speaker 2: Vance versus Tim Wallas debate. I would enjoy seeing that,
Speaker 2: actually the guy who coined weird versus the person who
Speaker 2: allegedly is weird.
Speaker 3: My own bias the side. I'd like to see JD
Speaker 3: clean as clock. But we'll see.
Speaker 2: What else can we think about Josh Shapiro, It was
Speaker 2: his to lose. He based loss Mark Kelly. Yeah, what
Speaker 2: a disaster too for him. I mean, look, all these
Speaker 2: people will be loyal. This is a gamble. I do
Speaker 2: think it is a gamble. She didn't pick the quote
Speaker 2: unquote save choice. A lot of the right wing reaction
Speaker 2: is that this was a bad pick. Only time will tell.
Speaker 2: There's just no way to say immediately in the moment
Speaker 2: it could be brilliant. Honestly, it could cement that theory
Speaker 2: of victory for where she goes. I am telling Republicans, though,
Speaker 2: do not underestimate these people, because I just think every
Speaker 2: choice that they have made in the last sixteen days,
Speaker 2: from you know, not agreeing to interviews, to disavowing everything,
Speaker 2: to running basically on nothing except I'm not Trump and
Speaker 2: I'm not Joe Biden. I hate to say that, it
Speaker 2: is it is the very viable path to.
Speaker 1: The Poles kept saying generic Democrats beat Trump, and they
Speaker 1: went and found that's true.
Speaker 2: And so anyway, I think also, I mean, let's not
Speaker 2: let's not whitewash this. The media is on these people's side.
Speaker 2: You know, the media doesn't even care. They don't even
Speaker 2: They're like, oh, interviews, you don't need to do that,
Speaker 2: that's fine.
Speaker 4: Uh.
Speaker 2: And so they're gonna make Tim Wallace the next Jesus Christ,
Speaker 2: you know, and it's Republicans they'll scream about it.
Speaker 3: But that's not how it works, guys.
Speaker 2: You actually have to really run something, you gotta you
Speaker 2: need to see a lot more discipline, I think too
Speaker 2: from Trump. You know, what did I just talk about here,
Speaker 2: Ryan that their theory of victory could be different. Well,
Speaker 2: maybe attacking Brian Camp in the middle of that new
Speaker 2: theory of victory maybe not such a good idea, huh,
Speaker 2: not necessarily the one I want to be running on
Speaker 2: whatever I see such a massive change joined I am
Speaker 2: seeing a report here that Tim Wallace will be at
Speaker 2: that rally in Philadelphia. Man, that sucks to be Josh Shapiro.
Speaker 2: To have your rival anointed in your city, that's rough.
Speaker 2: I'm sure that he'll get some. He'll you have some,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: Also, if Kamala and Walls lose, right, Shapiro's well positioned.
Speaker 3: Great.
Speaker 2: So yeah, if you are Josh, now you are the
Speaker 2: number one out of.
Speaker 3: This whole process. Yeah.
Speaker 2: And Whitmer too. Oh, she's kind of kept a low
Speaker 2: profile recently. I guess it'll be a battle between the
Speaker 2: two of them. So anyway, that's our snap interesting analysis.
Speaker 2: I'm sure you guys will have a show tomorrow so
Speaker 2: you can break down everything and kind of tell us
Speaker 2: about maybe Tim Wallas's.
Speaker 3: Speech, et cetera.
Speaker 2: But let's get to the rest of the show that
Speaker 2: we were recording previously before this news broke. Terrible news
Speaker 2: out yesterday evening. Let's put this up there on the screen.
Speaker 2: US personnel wounded in this attack against the US base
Speaker 2: in so the details are actually a very scant unfortunately,
Speaker 2: it just says at least five US personnel were injured
Speaker 2: in this attack against a military base, US officials said,
Speaker 2: as the Middle East braces for a possible new wave
Speaker 2: of attacks by Iran and its allies following last week's
Speaker 2: killing of senior members of a militant groups by Hamas
Speaker 2: and has Bola. There were two Katusha rockets that were
Speaker 2: fired and a Lasad air base in western Iraq, according
Speaker 2: to two Iraqi officials. Iraqi security sources said that rockets
Speaker 2: fell inside the base. It was quote unclear whether this
Speaker 2: was linked to attacks by Iran. The Iranian connected group
Speaker 2: katub has Bulah in Iraq Ryan has claimed responsibility for
Speaker 2: the attack. And the big question remains, is this the
Speaker 2: precursor to a larger movement by the Iranian regime in
Speaker 2: response to both the United States and to Israel after
Speaker 2: that assassination of the Hamas leader in the middle of Tehran.
Speaker 2: But as of now, the region continues to boil, and
Speaker 2: this is just the first sign perhaps of what's the cop.
Speaker 1: And it's a good sign of how inflamed the region
Speaker 1: is that you can't tell whether these types of attacks
Speaker 1: actually presage part of the cooming Iranian retaliation or are
Speaker 1: just part of the bubbling conflagration that has been kicked
Speaker 1: off since October seventh. You also had has been launched
Speaker 1: some drone attacks on the north of Israel. Again, are
Speaker 1: those just the repetitions of attacks that have been happening
Speaker 1: for weeks and months now, or does this presage something bigger.
Speaker 1: You also don't know whether or not Iran directed this
Speaker 1: Iraqi militia to attack this US base or gave a
Speaker 1: green light to it. And one problem that Israel is
Speaker 1: walking itself into through its assassination campaign, which the US
Speaker 1: is also involved in the sense that they also assassinated
Speaker 1: cost Some Solomoni so Kausa. Solomoni was the guy that
Speaker 1: basically had a lock on all of these militias across
Speaker 1: across the region.
Speaker 3: It became a boogeyman. Trump assassinated him.
Speaker 1: After that, the grip that the Iranians had on all
Speaker 1: of these proxies is loosened just a little bit.
Speaker 3: Like that's how that's how organizations work.
Speaker 1: When you have such a kind of charismatic leader putting
Speaker 1: things he'd be you know, for decades, he'd been putting
Speaker 1: this structure together. Then you get a new guy in place,
Speaker 1: he gets assassinated.
Speaker 3: Each time. The grip that Iran has on these proxies
Speaker 3: loosens a little bit. And maybe you'd say, well, that's a.
Speaker 1: Good thing, because Iran is evil and they're doing dastardly
Speaker 1: things with these proxies. These proxies have their own capacity,
Speaker 1: and so cutting the leash might not actually be to
Speaker 1: the benefit of the US or or to Israel, because
Speaker 1: now we don't even know for sure, is this Iraqi
Speaker 1: militia now just fed up at Iran's inability to protect
Speaker 1: the leaders of the access of resistance.
Speaker 2: That is a very difficult thing, is we have no
Speaker 2: ideas is directed by the regime or not. I mean, regardless,
Speaker 2: we have five guys who were injured. Don't forget we
Speaker 2: had three US service members who were killed in that
Speaker 2: base in Jordan on the Syrian border. It does, of
Speaker 2: course raise the question of why are all these people
Speaker 2: over there exactly in the American troops wire American hurt
Speaker 2: in Iraq as members in Iraq. Yeah, in twenty twenty four,
Speaker 2: more than twenty one years after the initial invasion. Yeah,
Speaker 2: maybe somebody should be asking that question. Of course, most
Speaker 2: people just continue to go on with their lives.
Speaker 3: Versus Syria, and for that matter, about this. Yeah, I
Speaker 3: mean Syria, that's a whole other one more than they're
Speaker 3: not getting. Where is that Afghanist? Oh right? Oh, because
Speaker 3: we're not there? Oh right, interesting, how that works? Right? Well?
Speaker 2: You know, the U s Secretary of State, of course,
Speaker 2: is very inspiring words and language. After US service members
Speaker 2: have been confirmed to have been injured in this attack,
Speaker 2: one apparently has been very seriously injured. Let's take a
Speaker 2: listen to what Secretary of State Blincoln had to say.
Speaker 5: A few words on the situation in the Middle East,
Speaker 5: because it is a critical moment. We are engaged in
Speaker 5: intense diplomacy pretty much round the clock with a very
Speaker 5: simple message. All parties must refrain from escalation. All parties
Speaker 5: must take steps to ease tensions. Escalation is not in
Speaker 5: anyone's interests.
Speaker 3: It will only lead.
Speaker 5: To more conflict, more violence, more insecurity. It's also critical
Speaker 5: that we break this cycle by reaching a ceasefire in
Speaker 5: Gaza that in turn will unlock possibilities for more enduring
Speaker 5: comm not only in Gaza itself, but in other areas
Speaker 5: where the conflict could spread. So for the United States,
Speaker 5: for many other countries, both in the region and beyond.
Speaker 3: This is our focus, and what.
Speaker 5: It comes down to really is all parties finding ways
Speaker 5: to come to an agreement, not look.
Speaker 3: For reasons to delay or to say no.
Speaker 5: It is urgent that all parties make the right choices
Speaker 5: in the hours and days ahead.
Speaker 2: It is urgently must make the right choices in all
Speaker 2: the days ahead, he says. As the US continues to
Speaker 2: flood the region with US service members, let's put this
Speaker 2: up there on the screen. This was the Iranians, Iranian
Speaker 2: media taking responsibility and kind of touting this attack on
Speaker 2: US troops. Two explosions reported near Iraq's allsat Arab Base,
Speaker 2: which houses American service members. The IRGC says that Iran
Speaker 2: backed militant groups have launched the rocket attack against the
Speaker 2: US base. So the fact that the IRGC basically taking
Speaker 2: responsibility for the attack does tell us a little bit
Speaker 2: about at the very least, you know, they want to
Speaker 2: appear connected.
Speaker 3: President Biden reared.
Speaker 2: His ugly head, as they some say, put this up
Speaker 2: there on the screen, came out of nowhere. He's in
Speaker 2: the dungeon in the White House to Situation Room tweeted
Speaker 2: out this photo. He says earlier, the Vice President and
Speaker 2: I were briefed in the Situation Room on developments in
Speaker 2: the Middle East. We received updates on threats posed by
Speaker 2: Iran and its proxies, diplomatic efforts to de escalate regional tensions,
Speaker 2: and preparations to support Israel should it be attacked again.
Speaker 2: Everybody really focus in on that one. We also discussed
Speaker 2: the steps we are taking to defend our forces and
Speaker 2: respond to any attack against our personnel in a manner
Speaker 2: and a place of our choosing, So that is always
Speaker 2: the Biden line. Of manner and a place of our
Speaker 2: choosing doesn't mean very much, But what it does mean
Speaker 2: is that there are significant US assets in the Middle East. Here.
Speaker 2: We have actually a map. Let's put this up there.
Speaker 2: Please just realize the sheer scale of everything that we
Speaker 2: have here. From an amphibious group, the USS Roosevelt, the
Speaker 2: US is Bulkelly. You've got the Roosevelt Carrier Strike Group
Speaker 2: over there, the USS Russell, the USS Michael Murphy, the
Speaker 2: USS Coal, the USS Laboon, all of that basically poised
Speaker 2: all around the region. Also both in a place where
Speaker 2: they can protect Israel. Should they need to to use
Speaker 2: guided missile destroyers and other US assets to shoot down
Speaker 2: anything incoming from Iran. You've also got them on the
Speaker 2: other side, basically just hanging out right next to Iran.
Speaker 2: Should they need to also interdict anything there? On top
Speaker 2: of the continuing you know hoo they mission that happens
Speaker 2: with Yemen. So the situation is not good. You've basically
Speaker 2: got the entire you know, Middle East surrounded there by
Speaker 2: US naval assets.
Speaker 3: You don't even want to.
Speaker 2: Know how much this one is costing us right minute,
Speaker 2: every minute, every Yeah, I mean, this is what people
Speaker 2: don't get in terms of the sheer dollars. Like just
Speaker 2: think about that. You've got a US aircraft carrier alone.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's like a floating city. Do you know
Speaker 2: how much money costs just to make it move a
Speaker 2: single foot and now thousand feet and then feed everybody
Speaker 2: on board and resupply this thing and keep it going,
Speaker 2: you know, basically in continuum. And that's what we have
Speaker 2: signed up for for the last ten months. I would
Speaker 2: venture say it's probably cost north of over one hundred
Speaker 2: billion dollars probably just in the last ten months. If
Speaker 2: we think about continuous operations, we know that it costs
Speaker 2: a billion dollars in a single day just to shoot
Speaker 2: down those Iranian missiles on that were launched on Tel
Speaker 2: Aviv or on Israel in retaliation for the embassy attack.
Speaker 3: But yeah, I mean, what do you think of this?
Speaker 1: It's asymmetric because the weapons that the Iraqi militia or
Speaker 1: Iran or Hesbalo or Hamas fire off are dirt cheap
Speaker 1: compared to what we caught.
Speaker 3: Same with the Houthis.
Speaker 1: Hoothis are spending you know, in the in the thousands
Speaker 1: of dollars you know for some of these rockets, and
Speaker 1: are sometimes going after drones that are worth like millions
Speaker 1: of dollars. It's the the asymmetry is completely unsustainable. Like it,
Speaker 1: we can sustain it for a very long time, but
Speaker 1: it's not indefinitely sustainable.
Speaker 3: Now that was blinking comments.
Speaker 1: A lot of people read his comments as directed largely
Speaker 1: at Israel because Iran. The US can say what it
Speaker 1: wants to Iran, and you know, we can, we can
Speaker 1: offer carrots, we can offer sticks about what the response
Speaker 1: is going to look like, but ultimately we don't have
Speaker 1: an enormous amount of leverage over what Iran is going
Speaker 1: to do. Right, we do have over what Israel is
Speaker 1: going to do. But if you listen to Blincoln there
Speaker 1: and you follow his body language, you would think that
Speaker 1: we had zero leverage whatsoever, that we're we're just out
Speaker 1: here after three days of not sleeping, just pleading with
Speaker 1: net Yahoo to just please, please stop doing all this
Speaker 1: stuff that you're doing. Please, it's not in anybody's interesting
Speaker 1: And he keeps saying escalation is not in anybody's interests.
Speaker 3: That assertion has.
Speaker 1: Just been made over the last several months without being
Speaker 1: backed up by evidence. There is increasing understanding among the
Speaker 1: global diplomatic community that nen Yahoo and a lot of
Speaker 1: elements of the Israeli government do actually believe that escalation
Speaker 1: isn't in their interests, and not for any obviously rational
Speaker 1: like here's how we're going to win a regional war
Speaker 1: against Iran, but that the trajectory that they have put
Speaker 1: themselves on due to their response to October seventh has
Speaker 1: them headed towards international isolation and economic collapse internally, and
Speaker 1: political collapse in anarchy and chaos. As we saw over
Speaker 1: the last couple of weeks, and so therefore you need
Speaker 1: to flip the table like that's that's that's the closest
Speaker 1: that you get to a rational argument for why a
Speaker 1: regional war would actually be in the interest of Israel.
Speaker 1: That you need to just absolutely reset everything and then
Speaker 1: sifting through the rubble and the ashes several years later,
Speaker 1: maybe people will forget what happened in the months after.
Speaker 2: It's basically the US nine to eleven strategy, which you
Speaker 2: know they were warned repeatedly, but you know, in the moment,
Speaker 2: it makes complete rational sense for BB Netanyahu to escalate, escalate, escalate,
Speaker 2: escalate the war. You also have from the Financial Times
Speaker 2: I just read this morning that the new president of
Speaker 2: Iran says quote Iran will definitely retaliate against Israel for
Speaker 2: the killing of Hania and said a response time for
Speaker 2: crimes and insolence as the US continues to send its reinforcement.
Speaker 2: So we are definitely on a trajectory yet, which is
Speaker 2: not good right now.
Speaker 3: People who don't have you followed this.
Speaker 1: This is a new president who ran on closer ties
Speaker 1: with the United States, I know, and Sontnya who's attack
Speaker 1: on Honi inside Iran was understood to be a provocation
Speaker 1: against this new Iranian government because any any any diplomacy
Speaker 1: that gets the United States and any of Israel's adversaries
Speaker 1: closer to deal makingtya who considers to be a threat.
Speaker 1: And that's why you know Apeg is one of the
Speaker 1: lead opponents of the Iran nuclear deal for instance, and
Speaker 1: pushed to have that blown up.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's it's very troubling.
Speaker 2: There was also the US finds itself in knots because
Speaker 2: it really doesn't know how to respond to any idea
Speaker 2: of quote unquote Iranian self defense. So here we had
Speaker 2: a reporter that asked the US State Department, does Iran
Speaker 2: have a right to respond for self defense? Have you
Speaker 2: continually acknowledged on the Israeli side. Let's take a listen
Speaker 2: to what he had to say.
Speaker 4: Did they have the light to respond? I mean, is
Speaker 4: that part of self defense?
Speaker 6: So I just answered that question. I just answered that
Speaker 6: question in response to what it got from Simon. Right,
Speaker 6: is one thing taking steps that are productive and are
Speaker 6: conducive of the interests of their people, they're conducive to
Speaker 6: the interests of the broader region or another question, and
Speaker 6: in no way what a retalitary action by Iran anyway
Speaker 6: serve the interests of the Iranian people or the broader region.
Speaker 4: And that's precisely why I'm asking you.
Speaker 7: Because you mentioned the word right, so you are acknowledging
Speaker 7: that they do have the right to respond.
Speaker 8: No, I did not acknowledge that acknowledged that question.
Speaker 7: Okay, let me ask you if this was, let's say,
Speaker 7: happened in any of the western capitals, wouldn't they be
Speaker 7: sort of obligated to respond.
Speaker 8: I'm not going to deal with a happenings, Okay.
Speaker 4: All right, we'll deal with something real.
Speaker 7: Last week, we could go yesterday Sunday and Aaron rocket
Speaker 7: hit or maybe intentional hit a small town or madorical chemps,
Speaker 7: a Syrian town, Syrian citizens and so on, and you
Speaker 7: said that Israel had a right to defend itself. I'm
Speaker 7: not you a person, but I'm saying, so, what's different?
Speaker 7: I mean, you know everybody was that all everyone was
Speaker 7: saying everyone has a right to defend itself. Why doesn't
Speaker 7: Iron have right to when the guest house, you know,
Speaker 7: I don't want to make comparison. I don't like the
Speaker 7: guest house in London or maybe Blair House and anything.
Speaker 7: I mean, something that really touched the sovereignty of Iran.
Speaker 6: So I take the point of your question said, it
Speaker 6: is not in any way, however, useful at all for
Speaker 6: anyone in the region for Ron to consider taking such
Speaker 6: steps because of the risk.
Speaker 8: As I said, that this could.
Speaker 6: Potentially get out of control, and that's the message we
Speaker 6: will continue to impress on him.
Speaker 2: He is not acknowledging the right to self defense. Now,
Speaker 2: I think this whole right to self defense thing is
Speaker 2: annoying because like, who bestows a right to a sovereign state? Nobody, Okay,
Speaker 2: the legitimacy I think of its population. Those are the
Speaker 2: people who confer the right. The way that you check
Speaker 2: that quote unquote right is where you have to turns
Speaker 2: and you have enough weapons to make sure to try
Speaker 2: and guide their defense. So there is no such thing
Speaker 2: as a right to self defense. There's the ability to
Speaker 2: have self defense and to try and guarantee that ability,
Speaker 2: and that I think, I mean, this is where I
Speaker 2: look at with Iran. This is a blustering nation which
Speaker 2: for decades has held itself up.
Speaker 3: Is his check against Israel against the West.
Speaker 2: I mean, what self respecting nation can tolerate a you know,
Speaker 2: a guest being blown up in the middle of their
Speaker 2: most secure compound and the beginning of a presidential inauguration.
Speaker 2: It's not possible, you know, as a self respecting nation
Speaker 2: to tolerate that now. At the same time, they don't
Speaker 2: want to be suicidal, so they have to check and
Speaker 2: think about But I would caution everyone to think that
Speaker 2: just because they don't respond right now does not mean
Speaker 2: that they don't have the ability, or the fortitude and
Speaker 2: the foresight to actually set the stage where they can
Speaker 2: cause real problems. So for example, Russia, as Serrogei Shogu,
Speaker 2: the former defense minister, is spotted in Iran, you know,
Speaker 2: immediately after this attack, it comes out that the Iranians
Speaker 2: are likely to get their hands on the S four
Speaker 2: hundred missile system. I mean this is a real issue, okay,
Speaker 2: Like this is sophisticated to technology that the Russians don't
Speaker 2: just hand out to everybody. You can ask NATO planners
Speaker 2: and others about how well that system can work when
Speaker 2: it wants to. And that's just another both alliance between
Speaker 2: the Iranians and the Russians. It creates more problems for
Speaker 2: any future quote unquote attack by Israel or by potential
Speaker 2: conflagration with the United States and just ratchets up you know,
Speaker 2: how much worse the conflict would be when it already
Speaker 2: would be a complete and a total nightmare.
Speaker 1: So what do you think, Yeah, what makes it hard
Speaker 1: for us to analyze it here in the United States
Speaker 1: is that we are bathed in this kind of propaganda
Speaker 1: that Iran is the most evil country on earth and
Speaker 1: run by complete mad men when and it makes it
Speaker 1: very difficult to understand this fact, which is that Iatola
Speaker 1: Kamane and also this new kind of US leaning president
Speaker 1: are both very reluctant to take major risks, right, But
Speaker 1: just saying that just clashes so kind of flagrantly with
Speaker 1: the idea that well, I thought, this is a blood
Speaker 1: thirsty madman just once you know, Hitler like domination of
Speaker 1: the world, and the only thing holding them back is
Speaker 1: you know, Israel in the United States constraining them.
Speaker 3: And so.
Speaker 1: People who are watching Iran think that there might be
Speaker 1: a possibility here that well, to your point, the longer this,
Speaker 1: the longer delay we see in their response, the worse
Speaker 1: it might end up being.
Speaker 3: But on the other hand, there's.
Speaker 1: A possibility that they do not take a severe response,
Speaker 1: that they do something similar to what they did last time.
Speaker 1: For the geopolitical reasons that you laid out. They are
Speaker 1: now successfully positioning themselves globally as a rational actor in
Speaker 1: contrast to the unhinged, irrational Israeli actor in the region.
Speaker 1: And so if they go over the top and break
Speaker 1: international law in their response to what Israel did too
Speaker 1: Hania inside Tehran, then they upset that balance that they've
Speaker 1: been able to strike. And they like this new kind
Speaker 1: of global perception that they're a sane, in normal country
Speaker 1: and Israel's completely out of control. So they have a
Speaker 1: lot of incentive to actually keep that going. If they
Speaker 1: can keep it going, it makes it easier than for
Speaker 1: Russia to send the kinds of weapon systems that your time,
Speaker 1: makes it easier for China to be more tightly invested
Speaker 1: in the economy. And if the more that they are
Speaker 1: seen as a rogue state, the harder it is for
Speaker 1: Russia and China to kind of bring them into the fold.
Speaker 2: And then the final thing that I worry the most
Speaker 2: about is here the sheer hubris of the American system
Speaker 2: and the American foreign policy elite to just think, yeah,
Speaker 2: this is no problem. You know, hundreds of billions of dollars. Cool,
Speaker 2: don't worry about it. Two front war, what a joke.
Speaker 2: Of course, we can handle that. Aaron Mante flagged this
Speaker 2: clip of President Biden speaking just I think last October
Speaker 2: and scoffing at the idea that America is not prepared
Speaker 2: for a two front war.
Speaker 3: Let's take a listen.
Speaker 9: Are the wars in Israel and Ukraine more than the
Speaker 9: United States can take on? In the Secretary of the
Speaker 9: United States of America, for God's sake, the most powerful
Speaker 9: nation in the history, not in the world, and the
Speaker 9: history of the world, the history of the world, we
Speaker 9: can take care of both of these and still maintain
Speaker 9: our overall international defense.
Speaker 4: We have the capacity to do this.
Speaker 9: We have an obligation to We are the essential nation
Speaker 9: is to the former Secretary of State, and as we don't,
Speaker 9: who does.
Speaker 2: I believe he was trying to reach for indispensable nation?
Speaker 2: That does not age well if we think a little
Speaker 2: bit about it. That was in the hubris of the
Speaker 2: Clinton administration. And that is where his age just is
Speaker 2: so grading to anybody who has lived through two failed
Speaker 2: wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to see the strain that
Speaker 2: the two front war of I Rock and Afghanistan put
Speaker 2: on the US military. They're at the time, we're not
Speaker 2: even fighting like real peer competitors. The America that exists
Speaker 2: in his head is gone, and it's largely gone because
Speaker 2: of people like him with limitations.
Speaker 3: You know already we faced you know.
Speaker 2: Look, I've been tracking this situation and continue to track
Speaker 2: it almost daily.
Speaker 3: In Ukraine. Well, it turns out that the Ukrainian.
Speaker 2: The average age forty five fifty starting to get acknowledged.
Speaker 2: Oh oh, we've sent f sixteens over there, that's going
Speaker 2: to turn the tide. Nope, I just checked this morning.
Speaker 2: A strategic town in the east is literally on the
Speaker 2: brink of falling Ukrainian manpower disaster. So just because you know,
Speaker 2: you can pour money into this thing and try and
Speaker 2: appear tough and feel cool, doesn't mean that the Russian colossus,
Speaker 2: which basically can produce weapons for one tenth the cost
Speaker 2: and has basically unlimited manpower through its vast reserves on
Speaker 2: top of a total war economy, can't quite easily overcome
Speaker 2: that in the long run. Yes, in the short term
Speaker 2: you've cost them some damage, But I mean, if anything,
Speaker 2: we've battle tested the blood the Russian military, we help them,
Speaker 2: you know, reform its economy for total war production. Who's
Speaker 2: the loser here, it's definitely that it's it's not them.
Speaker 1: But we certainly did the opposite of degrading the Russian military.
Speaker 1: The Russian military of twenty twenty four and twenty five
Speaker 1: is much superior to one twenty twenty two.
Speaker 2: And it's just when we think about that, we think
Speaker 2: about here, you know, with the continued situation with Iran,
Speaker 2: the speed in wishes can get out of control is
Speaker 2: just one that we should never underestimate. Perhaps some good
Speaker 2: news just came across the wire. Russian President Putin has
Speaker 2: asked the Supreme Leader for quote a restrained response to
Speaker 2: Israel exactly.
Speaker 3: So this really backs up Russia exactly.
Speaker 1: Russia and China see this as a way to make
Speaker 1: the US and Israel look insane like the aggressors, and
Speaker 1: that they are that they can no longer responsibly run
Speaker 1: a hegemonic kind of global operation.
Speaker 3: Yes, all right, well, that certainly does. We're certainly helping
Speaker 3: every step of the way.
Speaker 2: Creating them continued US decline and position for US in
Speaker 2: the world. Five of our service members injured, and can
Speaker 2: anybody credibly answer the question for what. No, they can't,
Speaker 2: So everyone's just gonna memory hold it and we'll continue.
Speaker 3: To move on.
Speaker 2: Absolutely massive news about Google being officially ruled a quote
Speaker 2: monopolist by a US federal judge landmark in the history
Speaker 2: of the US economy.
Speaker 3: Let's go ahead and put this up there on the screens.
Speaker 2: This ruling came out yesterday and according to the US
Speaker 2: District Court for the District of Columbia, Judge am At
Speaker 2: Mata said in a two hundred and seventy seven page ruling,
Speaker 2: Google had abused monopoly over the search business. He says
Speaker 2: that Google acted illegally to maintain monopoly in online search
Speaker 2: quote landmark decision that strikes at the power of tech
Speaker 2: giants in the modern Internet error and will fundamentally alter
Speaker 2: the way that they do business. The Justice Department sued
Speaker 2: Google previously, accusing it of quote illegally cementing its dominance
Speaker 2: by paying other companies like Apple and Samsung billions of
Speaker 2: dollars a year to have Google automatically handle search queries
Speaker 2: on their smartphones and web browsers. Google is a monopolist
Speaker 2: as active as one to maintain its monopoly. So what
Speaker 2: this means potentially.
Speaker 5: Now.
Speaker 2: Of course, let's be honest, like this is going to
Speaker 2: make its way through the US court system and it
Speaker 2: will take probably a decade before any of this is resolved. Nonetheless,
Speaker 2: the ruling by the federal judge on the most significant
Speaker 2: anti trust case against probably the largest company and emblem
Speaker 2: of a quote unquote monopolist in the entire business, it
Speaker 2: does both, I mean, a significant setback for Amazon and
Speaker 2: online shopping, for Facebook and Instagram whenever it comes to
Speaker 2: social media, the ownership of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp for
Speaker 2: future acquisitions and driving company behavior. This is both a
Speaker 2: bipartisan effort that was done by the Trump administration continued
Speaker 2: by the Biden administration. And the fact is is that
Speaker 2: the ruling only sets the stage now for what some
Speaker 2: sort of future quote unquote unwinding may look like, because
Speaker 2: he did not include remedies in his decision, and there
Speaker 2: are all kinds of interesting possibilities. The idea could be
Speaker 2: that Google Search and ad Sense might have to remain
Speaker 2: its own company.
Speaker 3: They would have to divest itself.
Speaker 2: Perhaps YouTube, the platform they are talking about here right now.
Speaker 2: I mean, we haven't seen significant changes and actions like
Speaker 2: that in the US economy in literally decades. And it's
Speaker 2: something that a lot of anti monopoly activists, people like
Speaker 2: Matt Stoler and others, have been pushing for quite some time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and the case on the search side is pretty straightforward.
Speaker 1: What Google has been doing has been paying companies like
Speaker 1: Mozilla and a Apple to make its search engine the
Speaker 1: default search engine. And quite simply, the judge said that's illegal,
Speaker 1: that that is cementing your monopoly.
Speaker 3: You can't do that.
Speaker 1: That it has disincentivized these other companies from fostering competition,
Speaker 1: and it has allowed Google to turn into a crappy
Speaker 1: search engine.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because they don't have any competition.
Speaker 1: And I think anybody uses Google, which is everybody basically
Speaker 1: can attest that it's not as good as it used
Speaker 1: to be, and that be becoming a monopoly has predictably
Speaker 1: done what people predict what happened to monopolies. The quality
Speaker 1: of the product gets lousier, the amount of money that
Speaker 1: they extract from the different clients that they work with, advertisers,
Speaker 1: et cetera, just goes up and up and up, and
Speaker 1: consumers and small businesses are harmed by it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's really interesting.
Speaker 2: I mean, here I'm going to read a little bit
Speaker 2: from Matt Stoler on his big sub stack, and he
Speaker 2: just says, today's a big day for American business. Fifteen
Speaker 2: years after it was first and guest investigated search Shie,
Speaker 2: Google is finally going to be held accountable for unfairly
Speaker 2: forwarding competition, he says. I'm going to discuss the complaint
Speaker 2: against Google, why it lost, the next steps, and what
Speaker 2: this case means for American business going forward, he says,
Speaker 2: But make no mistake, the decision is huge for Google,
Speaker 2: the web and the revival of monopolytion monopolization law against
Speaker 2: giants across the economy. It's a big deal before anti monopoly.
Speaker 2: As he talks about, what he really discusses is that
Speaker 2: the crux of the case is that paying not only Apple,
Speaker 2: but LG, Motorola, Samsung AT and T T Mobile, Mozilla, Opera,
Speaker 2: Verizon to make sure it is the only search engine
Speaker 2: the consumers ever saw. You also note that Google allegedly,
Speaker 2: according to the judge, destroyed evidence actually that was due
Speaker 2: for its case, and the judge noted that this was
Speaker 2: obviously going to contribute not only to his decision to
Speaker 2: the behavior of the company, but also urged you know,
Speaker 2: future judges and others to keep that into consideration the
Speaker 2: behavior of the company. I mean, what's also been interesting
Speaker 2: is to see the competitors of Google discussed this. Rumble,
Speaker 2: for example, a video platform which we also post on
Speaker 2: and which we're parted to partner with via Locals Talked.
Speaker 2: You know, the CEO says, today's decision confirms what everybody knows.
Speaker 2: Google is a monopolist. Rumble has been making this argument
Speaker 2: for years in multiple anti strust lawsuits against Google, both
Speaker 2: currently and ongoing. You also saw Baning celebrate this decision
Speaker 2: because bing has effectively been not even allowed to compete,
Speaker 2: you know, even if it wanted to to try and
Speaker 2: become the default search engine on other mobile platforms or
Speaker 2: with other browsers out there. And we think about the
Speaker 2: sheer scale of like the vertical integration of the Google empire,
Speaker 2: this just shows us that the idea of the whole
Speaker 2: pay for pay for play that really exists in a
Speaker 2: lot of these companies, and with social media as well.
Speaker 2: Doing a way with that would allow a more competitive ecosystem,
Speaker 2: perhaps you know, to rise, although at this point I'm
Speaker 2: not sure you know, the damage may I'll be done.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it might be and we might just get overcome
Speaker 1: by China and others that have actual innovation.
Speaker 3: Like inspiring economies.
Speaker 1: The remedy phase is what comes next, and that will
Speaker 1: then be up to either the Harris administration or the
Speaker 1: Trump administration and his stolar rights and his piece. He
Speaker 1: doesn't have confidence in either of them to pursue this
Speaker 1: as vigor as the Biden administration, because this is Jonathan
Speaker 1: Canter pursuing this from the Department of Justice, who is
Speaker 1: just massive enemy of big tech and other monopolists. And
Speaker 1: then of course he's an ally of Lena.
Speaker 3: Khan and her.
Speaker 1: Very strong FTC, who Kamala Harris has still to this
Speaker 1: day not said that she will stand behind in the
Speaker 1: face of billionaire pressure from Diller and from Reid Hoffman
Speaker 1: urging her to get rid of them like the billionaire
Speaker 1: class which is under the gun by the FTC, and
Speaker 1: Canter at the DOJ is at the same time giving
Speaker 1: money to the Harris administration and asking them to then
Speaker 1: roll back on their prosecutions of these of these anti
Speaker 1: trust cases. Now, so we noted there's some there is
Speaker 1: some bipartisan nature to this. This case started under the
Speaker 1: Trump administration and it was then taken to completion by
Speaker 1: by Canter and the DOJ. The concern is that a
Speaker 1: new depart Partment of Justice had who would not be
Speaker 1: cantor if they push him out, would go to Google
Speaker 1: and say, look, it's the remedy phase here. You're going
Speaker 1: to appeal this, It's going to go on for years.
Speaker 1: Let's just let's just come to a settlement here. You
Speaker 1: will promise to do good behavior in the future. Give
Speaker 1: us a couple hundred million dollars, a couple of billion dollars,
Speaker 1: whatever it is, and you know, well, this will all
Speaker 1: just go away, rather than breaking it up and recor
Speaker 1: and potentially creating a playing field that would allow for
Speaker 1: innovation again. Because if you think about the amount of
Speaker 1: innovation that the tech sector had from the two thousands
Speaker 1: into like the mid twenty tens, it was exponential, and
Speaker 1: then it just flattened off as Soccerberg, Bezos, Apple and
Speaker 1: the rest of them just got complete control of everything.
Speaker 1: Every new startup that came along no longer was interested
Speaker 1: in becoming a company that was serving people. It wasn't
Speaker 1: even interested in becoming an IPO. What they all they
Speaker 1: wanted to get their ten X was to get bought
Speaker 1: by Facebook or Google or somebody else. You just threatened
Speaker 1: to be like a successful company that's innovating, and then
Speaker 1: you would get bought off and you'd become a multimillionaire,
Speaker 1: and then you would go do that again after your
Speaker 1: lockout phase is over. That is the opposite of any
Speaker 1: type of economic innovation. And it's not surprising that then
Speaker 1: TikTok sweeps in with a new algorithm and just takes
Speaker 1: everything over.
Speaker 3: So there you go.
Speaker 2: It just shows us both the holes of where everything
Speaker 2: is and also what the landmark decision means there for Google.
Speaker 2: I also wanted to give an update, you know, just
Speaker 2: on the economy. Things have actually rapidly changed since yesterday.
Speaker 2: As we said, so just in the morning, we brought
Speaker 2: everybody yesterday the news that they're the largest single day
Speaker 2: drop in the NICK since nineteen eighty seven. Let's put
Speaker 2: this up there on the screen. Is this nineteen eighty
Speaker 2: seven all over again? They're all these questions, Well, it
Speaker 2: turns out, you know, a dropped by I think twelve
Speaker 2: percent in a single day. It also while we were
Speaker 2: all sleeping. Guess what, guys, it rose by ten percent
Speaker 2: after its worst one day drop, which led to the
Speaker 2: global route, and the yen was quote giving back some
Speaker 2: of the gains that it made on Tuesday morning. So
Speaker 2: it does look like there's a significant amount of volatility.
Speaker 2: It also look I don't yet know where the market
Speaker 2: will close at the end of the day, but both
Speaker 2: Dow and S and P five hundred futures are up
Speaker 2: a little bit despite their three percent loss or so
Speaker 2: yesterday and the one thousand point drop in the Dow Jones.
Speaker 2: Just to say that there's a lot of whip sawing
Speaker 2: going around. People don't exactly know, you know, people don't
Speaker 2: exactly know where this market will end up and what
Speaker 2: the fundamentals were driving.
Speaker 3: So in Japan, you know, for example.
Speaker 2: Part of what triggered this was a lot of fear
Speaker 2: over US slowdown and then consumer spending, which if they
Speaker 2: should be real about because we have seen the bad
Speaker 2: unemployment report here in the US too. Apparently there was
Speaker 2: a lot of there were a lot of traders that
Speaker 2: were doing something with the Japanese yen in which they
Speaker 2: were borrowing low interest dollars here in the US then
Speaker 2: buying you know, high interest stuff in Japan, and you know,
Speaker 2: taking the spread as profit. The Japanese traders I believe,
Speaker 2: were trying to drive some of that out. So there's
Speaker 2: a lot of stuff going on behind the scenes, which
Speaker 2: is difficult kind of to wrap our heads around. But
Speaker 2: I think in general we can probably say Ryan that
Speaker 2: when we have this amount of chaos, it's just not good.
Speaker 2: It's not good for US financial markets, for the US system.
Speaker 2: In fact, US retail brokers, let's put this up there
Speaker 2: please on the screen, actually had massive outages yesterday because
Speaker 2: so many people were trying to check their portfolios, including
Speaker 2: Charles Schwab, Vanguard Infidelity.
Speaker 3: I mean, those are three of the largest.
Speaker 2: You don't love consuper retail brokers, I mean at the
Speaker 2: same time, so while look, I agree they should not
Speaker 2: have gone down, they inadvertently probably saved people like billions
Speaker 2: of dollars. It's just stopping them from panic selling because
Speaker 2: it mamagined to be panic sold yesterday at the bottom,
Speaker 2: and then now today you're seeing, especially if you're like
Speaker 2: invested in some Japanese etf.
Speaker 3: Something like oh my god, I gotta go, I gotta sell.
Speaker 2: Themon bounced back ten percent after you were sleeping. So
Speaker 2: just let that be a lesson. You should never sell
Speaker 2: you know whatever, we should never pan excel. You should
Speaker 2: always try and think rationally about probably.
Speaker 3: Going to get taken to the cleaners. Yeah, anytime you
Speaker 3: try to be a professional of this.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, in general, like you're not a structor and
Speaker 2: even you know, the real question or the real answer
Speaker 2: is that even the day traders, as we learned with
Speaker 2: this whole Japan.
Speaker 3: Situation, they don't even know what they are doing.
Speaker 2: So it's all kind of a as personal likes to say,
Speaker 2: the graph of rich people sit. It's all about the line.
Speaker 1: Like, if you're a day trader when the market is
Speaker 1: going up, then most of your trades are going to
Speaker 1: be work out well for you. Yes, if you're a
Speaker 1: day trader when the market is going down, you're going.
Speaker 3: To lose most of your trades.
Speaker 1: And people just get a sense of their own impos
Speaker 1: You know, I was a stockbroker like twenty years ago.
Speaker 1: Really we can talk about an actually stock series seven six. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I could call you up and.
Speaker 3: You would place a trade for me. Why wouldn't I
Speaker 3: just do that on each trade?
Speaker 1: Oh okay, that's part of the would have gotten my expertise?
Speaker 3: Yeah, oh of course, right, that's what you're.
Speaker 1: Paying the tea.
Speaker 3: That's what the fee is for. Uh.
Speaker 2: The Trump campaign is trying to capitalize on this, calling
Speaker 2: it the caot Kamala crash.
Speaker 3: Here's what they had to say. Here we go, look
Speaker 3: at them go down what some would call history. Don't
Speaker 3: say that.
Speaker 1: I've never been down a thousand points ever, not even
Speaker 1: inter day.
Speaker 3: On the now step, Bidenomics is working. It's working.
Speaker 6: The stock markets just taking a big old nosedive this morning.
Speaker 5: Now Jones is down about one thousand and ten points.
Speaker 3: That is called fidnomics.
Speaker 2: The Dow fell more than six hundred points Friday, on
Speaker 2: a weeker than expected.
Speaker 5: Jobs are for five percent, Meta, six percent, Amazon six percent,
Speaker 5: Apple nine percent.
Speaker 3: Downmics is working. Fears of a recession began after Friday.
Speaker 3: Disappointing July jobs are for Bidenomics is working. Rise like
Speaker 3: that is historically a sign that a recession is imminent.
Speaker 3: This isomics we're just.
Speaker 10: Seeing right now.
Speaker 3: The stock market is what Americas have been feeling for
Speaker 3: the last three years. It's just a manifestation of it
Speaker 3: all that is called Bidenomics. All right, Let's see if
Speaker 3: that sticks.
Speaker 2: Ryan, I'm not sure yet if it will, especially since
Speaker 2: the stocks went ahead and reback.
Speaker 1: Like, yeah, Trump has been saying that the you know,
Speaker 1: he deserves credit for the stock markets rise during a
Speaker 1: Biden administration, but it's actually Kamal that deserves the blame
Speaker 1: for the crash.
Speaker 3: I like that.
Speaker 9: I like that.
Speaker 2: Inconsistency is a hallmark a good politician. All right, let's
Speaker 2: go ahead to the UK. There's been chaos erupting in
Speaker 2: the United Kingdom with riots over immigration, far right and
Speaker 2: immigrant protesters.
Speaker 3: Clashing in the streets. Quite literally.
Speaker 2: Let's go in and put some of the video our team
Speaker 2: assembled here. This is just some examples of what's been happening.
Speaker 2: I will tell everybody how this all kicked off. But
Speaker 2: in the meantime, what you're watching here is a group
Speaker 2: of protesters surround a holiday inn Express That hotel allegedly
Speaker 2: was holding a side seekers that have been coming to
Speaker 2: Great Britain. This then erupted into literal street violence with
Speaker 2: flags and others of the so called English Defense League
Speaker 2: and protesters. You then simultaneously saw activated immigrant protesters who
Speaker 2: took the streets. There you go, you can see that
Speaker 2: in front of you. This has spread to multiple kind
Speaker 2: of working class cities all across the UK. Of where
Speaker 2: immigration and tensions between the population has been high for
Speaker 2: quite some time. And if we think about going all
Speaker 2: the way back to Brexit and the impetus for that. Yeah,
Speaker 2: here you see people literally getting beaten up in the
Speaker 2: middle of the street. It's unclear exactly you know, who
Speaker 2: were what is happening here? Then we, of course time
Speaker 2: on and tradition looting literally happening in the middle of
Speaker 2: these riots. Lots of the so called you know, anti
Speaker 2: immigrant protesters also just making sure they stop by a
Speaker 2: grocery store and take whatever they get free. Yeah I'm
Speaker 2: not sure i'd be taking English chocolate, but hey, that's
Speaker 2: just me.
Speaker 3: So what do you think, Ryan?
Speaker 4: Uh?
Speaker 1: And so you're you're also now seeing anti racist protesters,
Speaker 1: like explicitly anti race. They're basically versions of like Antifa
Speaker 1: over in England are now showing up and doing battle
Speaker 1: with the far right protesters across England.
Speaker 6: Uh.
Speaker 1: You know this all started when, I guess a little
Speaker 1: more than a week ago, three three girls were killed
Speaker 1: at a.
Speaker 2: Yeah, why don't we put this up there the Financial
Speaker 2: Times is a pretty good breakdown.
Speaker 3: Just go ahead, you can continue to Yeah.
Speaker 1: So three girls are killed at a basically a Taylor
Speaker 1: Swift event, like it's like a yoga studio or something
Speaker 1: that was playing like Taylor Swift song or something.
Speaker 3: Guy shows up kills three of them from well not
Speaker 3: from Rwanda. I think he was born in the UK.
Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, So immediately it starts disseminating on Twitter
Speaker 1: and elsewhere that this was an undocument illegally immigrant that
Speaker 1: came in and killed that was a Muslim illegal emorate
Speaker 1: that came in and killed these these three girls. Turns
Speaker 1: out as a person was born in Wales from Rwanan
Speaker 1: parents and was Christian actually, and the UK took the
Speaker 1: rare step of publishing all the information about the suspect
Speaker 1: and said, look, it's not true, this is not it
Speaker 1: didn't it didn't matter.
Speaker 3: Side note here.
Speaker 1: If you go back and read the histories of almost
Speaker 1: every famous riot throughout of American history, but also European
Speaker 1: history too, even the storming of the Best Deal, they
Speaker 1: all start with. Usually misinformation is not necessarily the right word,
Speaker 1: but rumors that are incorrect and spread out of control
Speaker 1: when they when they stormed the Best Deal, they expected
Speaker 1: to find like hundreds of political political prisoners who've been
Speaker 1: abused by the king and they found like six like
Speaker 1: completely insane people.
Speaker 3: Basically, I mean, I'm oversimplifying here.
Speaker 1: They're like, well, well, nevertheless, let's have a revolution anyway
Speaker 1: you have. But you're so you're seeing this like demand
Speaker 1: for Twitter and others to like stop spreading all this
Speaker 1: like hateful misinformation, which okay.
Speaker 3: Let's don't spread hateful stuff.
Speaker 1: Great, But even before social media, whether you know any
Speaker 1: whether whatever it is, like you go back and normally
Speaker 1: these riots are the result of just word of mouth
Speaker 1: and getting the correct information out there didn't matter, because
Speaker 1: what matters is whether or not you're on a tinder box.
Speaker 3: Here, the UK is on a powder keg.
Speaker 1: It's it's on the one hand, blowback from the British
Speaker 1: Empire like going out and you know, propping yourself up
Speaker 1: for hundreds of years, you know, based on raping and
Speaker 1: pillaging around the world and then and then taking the
Speaker 1: refus from those parts of the country and putting them
Speaker 1: in your poorest districts back in England.
Speaker 3: That that.
Speaker 1: Process is kind of playing itself out without British imperial
Speaker 1: power anymore.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a very odd situation. And there's also an
Speaker 2: economic thing to consider. Here is a lot of Americans
Speaker 2: don't understand how poor British people actually are. British people's
Speaker 2: GDP per capita is lower than the state of Mississippi.
Speaker 2: If they were stated in the New US, they'd be
Speaker 2: the fifty first poorest state. Everybody thinks about London, it's like, well, yeah,
Speaker 2: that's where the financial and rich elite live.
Speaker 3: You know, where the king and the queen. The rest
Speaker 3: of the country like global elite. Yeah.
Speaker 2: If you've ever been actually spent time in real England,
Speaker 2: UK Scotland, you know, not in the major cities.
Speaker 3: It's a very poor country. You actually see something like
Speaker 3: how can you be an empire for so long?
Speaker 2: I can, as you know, there's nothing I love more
Speaker 2: than dunking on Europeans. That said, if we've got back
Speaker 2: to this the real like and I think there's a
Speaker 2: lot of dangers here for America. And this is part
Speaker 2: of the reason why we decided to do this story
Speaker 2: is perhaps this could be a precursor to what things
Speaker 2: are here. When you bring in a bunch of very
Speaker 2: low educated, low skilled workers and then you also have
Speaker 2: a very stagnant economic growth on top of literal assimilation problems,
Speaker 2: then you basically set up the situation where we have
Speaker 2: right now, where you've had like immigrant enclaves and neighborhoods
Speaker 2: which don't feel British even though they may be British
Speaker 2: citizens or UK citizens in name. And then you have
Speaker 2: the population itself which is very angry both about that
Speaker 2: lack of assimilation, the lack of cultural meshing on top
Speaker 2: of the economic problems of literally feeling as if you
Speaker 2: are in a stagnant country which is not delivered for
Speaker 2: you for quite some time. And that's where I think
Speaker 2: the powder keg comes from more than anything, is the
Speaker 2: lack of outlook of growth and of potential in the UK.
Speaker 2: And if we think about the economic situation now going
Speaker 2: into this, these people were crushed by energy prices after
Speaker 2: the war in Ukraine. Obviously, Brexit, you know, even though
Speaker 2: I supported Brexit, Brexit turned out to be kind of
Speaker 2: a nightmare just in terms of the execution of that
Speaker 2: the economic prospects of the country. Part of the reason
Speaker 2: that they took it out on the Conservative Party is
Speaker 2: they're like, hey, you guys are just bandits for the rich.
Speaker 2: And so they're giving the Labor Party, you know, this
Speaker 2: massive victory that it's had, but the Labor victory does
Speaker 2: not paper over the social tensions which have been brewing
Speaker 2: now in the UK for quite some time. We've seen
Speaker 2: stuff like this pop off in Ireland too. I don't
Speaker 2: think it's an accident that it happens at a time
Speaker 2: of economic stagnation and frankly like decades of mismanagement of
Speaker 2: their own immigration policy. Look, they are another country. They
Speaker 2: can do whatever they want. I'm just saying I wouldn't
Speaker 2: personally have done it the way that they did.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and the Conservative government did not actually even restrict immigration.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's well.
Speaker 2: That was a huge thing with Nigel Faraj and with
Speaker 2: a lot of the UK RTIs is that they were like,
Speaker 2: why exactly should we support Conservatives? You guys are not
Speaker 2: even you know, restricting immigration, because remember their asylum situation
Speaker 2: too is very different.
Speaker 3: I mean, yeah, we have major border.
Speaker 2: Problems here with Venezuela and all the people coming from
Speaker 2: basically everywhere all across South America. On top of anybody
Speaker 2: can buy a plane ticket to Mexico. But you know,
Speaker 2: they also have had now what a ten year sustained
Speaker 2: asylum nightmare with the Syrian Civil War, with Afghans, the
Speaker 2: whole Germany situation in twenty fifteen and they've had major
Speaker 2: flare ups and this was a major contribution literally to Brexit,
Speaker 2: was you know, was not wanting to be party to
Speaker 2: EU refugee policy. So I think that what this sets
Speaker 2: up is, well, a, we saw the death of the
Speaker 2: Conservative Party and that kind of liberal immigration policy. That's
Speaker 2: definitely that's over now though, and this is something funny.
Speaker 2: I think that the euro rightis have significantly overplayed their
Speaker 2: hand because they don't have free speech in England. In England,
Speaker 2: the major commentators are all calling for Tommy Robinson, who's
Speaker 2: the former head of the Defense League. He's kind of
Speaker 2: the one. He's like the King protesters. He's not even
Speaker 2: in the country right now. But if we see how
Speaker 2: the government is responding to this. This is one of
Speaker 2: the biggest surveillance states in the world GHQ, and they
Speaker 2: have no they have no literally no First Amendment, no
Speaker 2: freedom of speech. They're all the leading European columnists are
Speaker 2: calling for his deplatforming off Twitter.
Speaker 3: And for his prosecution. They're gonna throw them in jail.
Speaker 2: I genuinely I don't think he should ever return to England,
Speaker 2: like he is going to prison and over there with
Speaker 2: their home office. They don't even need a pretext. They
Speaker 2: can just imprison you forever. He's alluded to it. Well,
Speaker 2: let's get to that. So we have a statement here
Speaker 2: from the Prime Minister, Caer Starmer. Let's take a listen
Speaker 2: to what he had to say.
Speaker 11: I had a Cobra meeting this morning, which was an
Speaker 11: opportunity that I took to thank the police for their
Speaker 11: work over the last few days, to express my support
Speaker 11: for the police officers who have been injured and the
Speaker 11: communities impacted by this mindless thuddery. For a number of
Speaker 11: actions that came out of the meeting. The first is
Speaker 11: we will have a standing army of specialist officers public
Speaker 11: duty officers so that we'll have enough officers to deal
Speaker 11: with this where we need them. The second is we'll
Speaker 11: ramp up criminal justice. There have already been hundreds of arrests,
Speaker 11: some have appeared in court this morning. I've asked for
Speaker 11: early consideration of the earliest naming and identification of those
Speaker 11: involved in the process who will feel the full force
Speaker 11: of the law. And thirdly, have been absolutely clear that
Speaker 11: the criminal law applies online as well as offline, and
Speaker 11: I'm assured that that's the approach that is being taken.
Speaker 3: So you saw a little bit of that already.
Speaker 2: I mean, I think the English you have quite literally
Speaker 2: the labor government in a supermajority in power. Then you've
Speaker 2: one of the most oppressive governments in Europe when they
Speaker 2: want to be.
Speaker 3: And you don't have to ask me.
Speaker 2: It's funny ask the Islamic population of England what it
Speaker 2: was like in two thousand and six. They can throw
Speaker 2: your ass in prison, or it can put you under
Speaker 2: house arrest for no reason and place you under surveillance,
Speaker 2: and they can even revoke your citizenship if they want to,
Speaker 2: with no trial, as they have done on multiple occasions.
Speaker 2: So I think they're going to have a similar situation
Speaker 2: to what we had here where they're going to use
Speaker 2: their security state apparatus architected after the War on Terror
Speaker 2: and basically turn it onto their own, you know, right
Speaker 2: wing protesters that are in the country. So police state
Speaker 2: just seems even more likely in the.
Speaker 1: After this, and Starmer said that they were going to
Speaker 1: make sure that there was accountability for people who instigated
Speaker 1: this on social media. Right, And yes, Tommy Robinson, I
Speaker 1: think he's in Corsica vacation or something but he's been.
Speaker 3: You know, he's being a storm.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he's he's been sharing a lot of the stuff
Speaker 1: that no questions instigated. The question is, you know, should
Speaker 1: that be a prosecutable offense?
Speaker 3: As you and I would say obviously obviously not in England,
Speaker 3: They're like, obviously it should be. Yeah, Yeah, they're crazy. Yeah,
Speaker 3: he's been to jail like four or five times.
Speaker 2: All yeah, that's right, he has been in prison before.
Speaker 2: So this is one where look, I think it's going
Speaker 2: to be. At the same time, you know, there's a
Speaker 2: lot of American rightists that are kind of seizing onto this.
Speaker 3: I just think my only WoT.
Speaker 1: They're saying, like they're trying to justify the rioting. We
Speaker 1: live in such an amazing like doom loop.
Speaker 2: Look, writing is bad. I think we should all just
Speaker 2: probably stick with that. The other thing that I would
Speaker 2: urge Americans is this is a very different country. It's
Speaker 2: totally different. This is a tiny Their immigrant population by
Speaker 2: and large is very different from our at least legal
Speaker 2: immigrant population. Now, don't get me wrong, I do think
Speaker 2: it's crazy that eight to ten million people are here illegally,
Speaker 2: but they don't even have anywhere close to the same
Speaker 2: level of like generational problems and you know, establishing these
Speaker 2: like immigrant enclays and they have major clashes over Engli.
Speaker 3: Also doesn't have the whole melting pot myth thos.
Speaker 2: I was gonna say, yeah, I mean Margaret Thatcher very
Speaker 2: famously said like America's you know, was America's built in
Speaker 2: an idea. English Europe is built on history something to
Speaker 2: that effect.
Speaker 3: But it's true. I mean, it.
Speaker 2: Literally is a population and place that has all been
Speaker 2: stratified by like cultural affinity and language going back like
Speaker 2: a thousand years, very different story to you know, to
Speaker 2: assimilate into on top of stagnating economy. They don't have
Speaker 2: never anywhere clothed to the same level of GDP growth,
Speaker 2: you know that we have or the myth thos to
Speaker 2: take those two things, you're setting yourself up for a
Speaker 2: real class here with the immigrant population. So regardless, I
Speaker 2: do think that the rights and all these others, the
Speaker 2: riots are a precursor potentially to some immigrant backlash by
Speaker 2: conservative voters who lost faith in the Conservatives, and they
Speaker 2: would go towards somebody like Nigel Faraj. But in the interim,
Speaker 2: with the labor government so solidly in power, the almost
Speaker 2: certain outcome is that all these people are just.
Speaker 3: Gonna be throwing from a massive round up. Yeah. Ye,
Speaker 3: that seems like most likely what's gonna.
Speaker 1: Happen if you're participating in those riots on any side,
Speaker 1: Like there's going to be cameras.
Speaker 3: Good luck with the mass.
Speaker 2: Actually, yeah, leeve London was one of the most survealed
Speaker 2: cities in the entire world. I'm not sure. So that's
Speaker 2: the only thing I saw a challenge. You think they'll
Speaker 2: even throw the immigrant riders in prison? Yeah, oh, that's well,
Speaker 2: we'll see. That'll be a good test as to whether
Speaker 2: you know there will be equal application.
Speaker 3: Of the law.
Speaker 2: A lot of the eurortersts don't think that they will.
Speaker 2: They think that they'll let them.
Speaker 3: Go, and that they misunderstand the center. You think, so, okay,
Speaker 3: all right, I'll hold you to it. Okay.
Speaker 2: Onto the RFK Junior story, perhaps one of the most
Speaker 2: bizarre incidents yet that we've covered here on the show.
Speaker 2: I say this with no I guess judgment electorally or whatever,
Speaker 2: only to say that the circumstances are genuinely shocking. So
Speaker 2: all of it began when RFK Junior released a video
Speaker 2: talking about how he left a dead bear cub in
Speaker 2: Central Park. The photo has been released of the bear
Speaker 2: and RFK Juniors put this up here on the screen.
Speaker 2: Came out yesterday in the New Yorker with a profile.
Speaker 2: Here we see r K Junior. He's roughly like sixty
Speaker 2: years old now at this time, in the back of
Speaker 2: his trunk with a bear, clearly who's been wounded. We'll
Speaker 2: get to that the bear was run down. I think
Speaker 2: the bear was it hit by a car? I was
Speaker 2: just lie down.
Speaker 3: I didn't say that. That's funny.
Speaker 2: Who amongst us it's happened.
Speaker 3: It happens.
Speaker 2: RK has got his hand in the bear's mouth. This
Speaker 2: reminiscent of the previous photo that was released of him.
Speaker 2: Remember though, that I did ask about him, what was it?
Speaker 2: The Daily Beasts or somebody claimed it was a dog?
Speaker 2: He told me it was goat. So anyway, this time
Speaker 2: he's not disputing that it was a bear. Let's take
Speaker 2: a listen to his version of events of how he
Speaker 2: encountered this bear and where he ended up dumping this bear.
Speaker 3: Let's take a listen.
Speaker 8: In front of me.
Speaker 12: Hit a bear and killed it, a young bear. So
Speaker 12: I pulled over and I picked up the bear. And
Speaker 12: put him in the back of my van because I
Speaker 12: was going to skin the bear and it was very
Speaker 12: good condition, and I was just going to and put
Speaker 12: the meat my refrigerator and you can do that in
Speaker 12: the or to say you can get a bear a
Speaker 12: tag for a road killed bear. Instead of going back
Speaker 12: to my home in Leicester, I had to go right
Speaker 12: to the city because there was a dinner at Peter
Speaker 12: Luger's steakhouse. And at the end of the dinner it
Speaker 12: went late and I realized I couldn't go home. I'd
Speaker 12: go to the airport and the bear was in my
Speaker 12: car and I didn't want to leave the bear and car.
Speaker 3: Because there would have been bad People.
Speaker 12: Were drinking with me who thought this was a good idea,
Speaker 12: and I said, well, I had an old bike in
Speaker 12: my car that somebody'd asked me to get rid of it.
Speaker 12: I said, let's go point the bear in the central
Speaker 12: park and we'll make it look like you got So
Speaker 12: everybody thought that's a great idea. So we went and
Speaker 12: did that, and we thought it would be a music
Speaker 12: for whoever found it or something. You know, it's going
Speaker 12: to be a bad story.
Speaker 2: So that was him with a Roseanne bar and what
Speaker 2: to summarize. The bear was hit, he saw the bear.
Speaker 2: He then wanted to skin the bear and eat the bear,
Speaker 2: so he put it in his trunk.
Speaker 3: Then he was he was out falconing. They were running late.
Speaker 3: I love that part.
Speaker 2: So yeah, I know. He drove to Manhattan with the
Speaker 2: bear in his drunk. He had dinner, then he had
Speaker 2: to catch a flight. Perfect so he had to get
Speaker 2: rid of the bear out of his car, this bloody
Speaker 2: dead bear. So he decided to put it in Central
Speaker 2: Park and state That's where I don't understand the staging.
Speaker 2: Why don't you just jump the bear? Why do you
Speaker 2: have to make it look like there was a well,
Speaker 2: what did he say? A bike accident?
Speaker 1: So he said, so this is around the time twenty fourteen,
Speaker 1: just as they're putting all the bike lanes in New
Speaker 1: York City. Okay, and if you remember from this time,
Speaker 1: a lot of bikers were getting killed by the garbage
Speaker 1: trucks and cars that weren't used to the lanes, and
Speaker 1: so there were these weekly or daily tragedies occurring. And
Speaker 1: RFK Junior's idea was this would humorously slot into these
Speaker 1: multiple tragedies by making it look like instead of a
Speaker 1: car or truck killing a biker. That a biker had
Speaker 1: killed and run over a bear, right, okay, so how
Speaker 1: would that even happen?
Speaker 3: That's you have.
Speaker 1: To be pretty I don't know how many bottles of
Speaker 1: wine they had at Peter Luger, but it was the lost.
Speaker 3: He's sober, but listen the circumstances.
Speaker 1: Everybody else was drinking it. But apparently, but he says
Speaker 1: he was the one that had the idea.
Speaker 3: So he said he had Okay, so he had the idea.
Speaker 3: This is accorded to him. Now here's the funniest part.
Speaker 2: Look at the way that this set off a firestorm
Speaker 2: in New York at the time after the bear was discovered.
Speaker 3: Take a listen to the local news.
Speaker 10: Bear cub is discovered dead and of all places, Central
Speaker 10: Park and an apparent case of animal ruelty. CBS two's
Speaker 10: Matt Kozar has more on the bear mystery.
Speaker 13: In a popular section of Central Park, an unusual crime.
Speaker 3: Scene about over here.
Speaker 13: Floren Slatkin says she was walking her dog this morning
Speaker 13: when she saw something furry underneath the bushes. Police say
Speaker 13: the three foot long black bear cub had stab and
Speaker 13: slash wounds and appears to have been dumped there. Adding
Speaker 13: to the mystery, Slackkin says, the baby bear was lying
Speaker 13: on top of this bicycle, which police confiscated as evidence.
Speaker 3: The bicycle was under the bushes. Part of the bicycle
Speaker 3: was sticking out, and that's what we saw, and when
Speaker 3: we look closer, we could see something on the back wheel.
Speaker 3: We're just laying on the back wheel. It's horrible.
Speaker 6: It's very bizarre to think that somebody with criminal intense
Speaker 6: would do such a thing right here in our backyard.
Speaker 8: Is disturbing.
Speaker 3: New York bikers are outraged.
Speaker 5: Now.
Speaker 2: To add even more craziness to the stories, put this
Speaker 2: up here is The person who wrote the bear story
Speaker 2: in the New York Times was JFK's granddaughter, Tatiana Schlosberg,
Speaker 2: his close relative. She wrote the headline bear found in
Speaker 2: Central Park was killed by a car. Official say, so
Speaker 2: this set off an absolute firestorm ten years ago. Nobody
Speaker 2: knew who dumped the bear, how the whole bear thing
Speaker 2: came to happen. And look, I don't really have anything
Speaker 2: electoral or anything to say. This is just the most
Speaker 2: insane thing. And as I previously said, the craziest thing
Speaker 2: to me is that I believe every word of his explanation.
Speaker 2: And that's why it's so funny to me, is that
Speaker 2: every word I'm like, I'm like, I would never do that,
Speaker 2: but I see how you got there. And that's how
Speaker 2: the chain of events unfolds as even crazier than it
Speaker 2: initially sounded.
Speaker 1: The other the one thing I think we can add
Speaker 1: to this too, is that it paints a portrait of
Speaker 1: RFK Junior's life at the time. Okay, so here's something
Speaker 1: so that New York Times October seventh, October seven, fourteen,
Speaker 1: which interesting coincidence, But so I just looked that up
Speaker 1: because I'm curious about RFK Junior's life. Okay, that's a Tuesday, whoa,
Speaker 1: which means he was falcon Tuesday. Well, he came out
Speaker 1: on a Tuesday, which means the day he described, Yes,
Speaker 1: was it.
Speaker 3: A month Monday?
Speaker 1: Monday Monday for this diletant of an environmental lawyer who
Speaker 1: was like, you know what I'm gonna do today, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna drive up to the Hudson Valley. I'm going to
Speaker 1: a falcon all day. Oh hit a bear. Oh, but
Speaker 1: then I've got a dinner, just a random dinner at
Speaker 1: Peter Luger Steakhouse on Monday evening and then we're gonna
Speaker 1: get wasted. I won't be wasted because I'm sober, and
Speaker 1: then we're gonna go dump this on. Not that any
Speaker 1: of this is okay on a Saturday, but this is
Speaker 1: Saturday behavior.
Speaker 3: This is not this is not Monday.
Speaker 1: This is not Monday behavior. So if this is a
Speaker 1: Monday for our k JR.
Speaker 3: My goodness, that's I mean. If I was the scion
Speaker 3: to the cat exactly, that's what he is, That's what
Speaker 3: I'd be doing on it. I would also be doing that.
Speaker 3: He is who you think he is, and he's a balcony.
Speaker 2: He's uh, he's hanging out with Peter Lui. He's got
Speaker 2: a flight to catch and he's dropping off. My bear
Speaker 2: is you know, he's a health nut. And as I understand,
Speaker 2: you know, bears are like gross animals. I don't mean
Speaker 2: that in a disparaging way. I'm saying like they eat,
Speaker 2: they eat like trash, like rotten, garbage, killing.
Speaker 3: Rotish or gross.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but don't have to cook the ship out of
Speaker 2: it like to anyway. So I can't really see how
Speaker 2: it would be all that appetizing. Because he called he
Speaker 2: was like it was a beautiful bear and all that.
Speaker 2: I don't look at that and be like, oh, what
Speaker 2: a beautiful.
Speaker 1: Well he said it was a baby bear, so maybe maybe, yeah,
Speaker 1: he was less.
Speaker 2: Less riddled with trick and nosis. But yeah, I'm not
Speaker 2: I'm not eating bear that literal road.
Speaker 1: His actual road can That's the difference between Larry Larry
Speaker 1: David is never eating roadkill.
Speaker 3: But otherwise this is like dark Larry David behavior.
Speaker 1: It's like the whole thing and winding up on the
Speaker 1: news and the fact that he's married to Cheryl Hines.
Speaker 3: It's just what kind of world are we blessed to
Speaker 3: live in? It's a little bit too perfect.
Speaker 1: New reporting in Semaphore this week, and we can put
Speaker 1: this element up on the screen from media reporter.
Speaker 3: Max Tanney headline.
Speaker 1: Journals still can't confirm January story about un Agency for
Speaker 1: Palestinians and SOSAGA. If you remember, the New York Times
Speaker 1: and the Wall Street Journal both simultaneously roughly reported two
Speaker 1: facts on The New York Times reported that Israel had
Speaker 1: said that twelve people affiliated with UNRA employees had participated
Speaker 1: in some way in the October seventh attacks. The Wall
Speaker 1: Street Journal that quickly followed with an explosive story that
Speaker 1: said that according to intelligence sources, ten percent of UNRA
Speaker 1: employees had some affiliation and they were very loose in
Speaker 1: their definition of affiliation with Hamas or Palestinian Islamic yeah Jahad.
Speaker 3: In the wake of that.
Speaker 1: The United States immediately suspended all aid going to the
Speaker 1: primary aid organization supplying doing relief efforts in Gaza, ultimately
Speaker 1: leading to a congressional ban on US funding as well
Speaker 1: as to other countries around the world, also suspending funding
Speaker 1: for UNRA, which no doubt led to a significant number
Speaker 1: of deaths in Gaza, but also escalated the amount of suffering,
Speaker 1: probably exponentially between January and where we are now. And
Speaker 1: so what Semaphore did is they checked in on this
Speaker 1: reporting that the Wall Street Journal had done on this
Speaker 1: ten percent figure. And just I'll read this quote from
Speaker 1: a private email that was sent by Elena Charney, the
Speaker 1: chief news editor that an email obtained by Semaphore. She wrote, quote,
Speaker 1: the fact that the Israeli claims haven't been backed up
Speaker 1: by solid evidence doesn't mean our reporting was inaccurate or misleading,
Speaker 1: that we have walked it back, or that there is
Speaker 1: a correctable error here. So, in other words, the Wall
Speaker 1: Street Journal, according to Semaphore's reporting, worked extremely hard to
Speaker 1: try to back up what it had already reported. It
Speaker 1: talked to intelligence sources in the US and Israel. It
Speaker 1: did its own it did its own forensic efforts to
Speaker 1: try to verify what they had already reported was the case,
Speaker 1: and they were unable to do so. And they basically
Speaker 1: concluded they can't stand up this reporting. But they say,
Speaker 1: we're standing by it because all we said was that
Speaker 1: Israel made this claim. Now, if you go back and
Speaker 1: read the Wall Street Journal report on first reference, all
Speaker 1: they say is intelligence sources.
Speaker 3: Wall Street Journal is an American newspaper.
Speaker 1: That strong implication there is that you have American intelligence
Speaker 1: sources that are making this claim. They reference intelligence sources
Speaker 1: like fourteen or fifteen times in that article. Only one
Speaker 1: time do they say, oh, yeah, by the way, are
Speaker 1: Israeli intelligent sources that were that we're relying on here.
Speaker 1: And so yesterday I asked a State Department spokesperson, Matt Miller,
Speaker 1: about these revelations from Semaphore.
Speaker 3: We can roll this clip.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure if you saw there's a report in
Speaker 1: Semaphore that the Wall Street Journal tried valiantly to try
Speaker 1: to confirm its reporting on the unreal allegations made by Israel.
Speaker 1: Talk to American intelligence sources, is rarely intelligences. We're completely
Speaker 1: unable to substantiate them. Does the State partner have anything
Speaker 1: new about those UNRA allegations? And in the future, will
Speaker 1: the State Department consider allegations coming from Israel differently? Give
Speaker 1: and that these have not yet been backed up, but
Speaker 1: such drastic medical So I did see that report.
Speaker 6: I think it is a good time to remind everyone
Speaker 6: that the action that we took was not in response
Speaker 6: to information that the Government of Israel brought to us.
Speaker 6: It was in response to UNRA coming to us and
Speaker 6: UNRE saying that they had received these allegations from the
Speaker 6: Government of Israel and they found them credible, And so
Speaker 6: that was what made us. That was what led us
Speaker 6: to make the decision that we made. It wasn't getting
Speaker 6: anything from the Government of Israel. Is when under itself
Speaker 6: said they found the allegations credible, that we thought it
Speaker 6: was an appropriate step to take to pause the funding.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So he also we went back and forth a
Speaker 3: little bit longer.
Speaker 1: We also alluded to he also alluded to a statement
Speaker 1: by the United Nations, which.
Speaker 3: We can put up here. Put up this Reuter's element here.
Speaker 1: Basically, what the Unit Nations is saying is that they
Speaker 1: that they investigated Israeli claims that nineteen because eventually they
Speaker 1: sent more They sent seven more staff names to UNREST
Speaker 1: saying that they had participated.
Speaker 3: They investigated it and.
Speaker 1: Found that nine likely or very likely participated in these attacks.
Speaker 1: Now UNRA has also said, well, so, first of all,
Speaker 1: UNRA never said that the ten percent claimed that ten
Speaker 1: percent of their staff were hamas was credible. What happened
Speaker 1: is that Israel shared this dossier of about twelve UNRA
Speaker 1: employees saying that they had various levels of evidence that
Speaker 1: they had participated in October seventh, and NRA immediately passed
Speaker 1: that on to the State Department. There's no evidence that
Speaker 1: they said, look we believe all of this, or just
Speaker 1: saying like this is what these rallies have given us here,
Speaker 1: like we don't want to cover it up for you,
Speaker 1: were just going to share what Israelis have given you,
Speaker 1: and the US used that the fact that UNRA passed
Speaker 1: it on to them to then cut all the funding.
Speaker 1: They said that for seven of the nineteen or for
Speaker 1: many of the nineteen they were unable to find any
Speaker 1: evidence that has happened, but for nine, and they said
Speaker 1: it's likely that they actually did participate. Now ONRA has
Speaker 1: about thirty five thousand employees.
Speaker 3: It's the biggest employer in.
Speaker 1: Gaza, uh teachers, janitors, custodians like and on and on.
Speaker 1: So it actually would be kind of shocking that only nine,
Speaker 1: you know, were somehow involved in the arm resistance there,
Speaker 1: Like you would you would kind of you would you
Speaker 1: think in a society like let's say in the United States,
Speaker 1: like if there's an arm if there's the National Guard
Speaker 1: is going you know, a certain percentage of your teachers
Speaker 1: are in the National Guard.
Speaker 3: Like this's just kind of how it works.
Speaker 1: So it did, and and and the allegations against some
Speaker 1: of these nine were that there were civilians but once
Speaker 1: once the fence was busted, like they went across, did
Speaker 1: some like looting or some otherwise participated in the like
Speaker 1: the ransacking of southern Israel, which in some areas went
Speaker 1: on for several days, like it was complete and total chaos. So,
Speaker 1: you know, did that happen? Yes, The unres says it's
Speaker 1: highly likely that a handful of them did. But the
Speaker 1: rajor claim was that ten percent number, because that is
Speaker 1: much more systemic and goes to a central rot If
Speaker 1: that is true, we have absolutely no evidence whatsoever that
Speaker 1: it's true, and it just gets repeated, and for US
Speaker 1: media to stand by it because they say, well Israel,
Speaker 1: Israel says it's true. Try to flip it around. Remember
Speaker 1: when there was a bombing of the hospital and Hamas said,
Speaker 1: and there may be some mistranslation going on, but Hamas
Speaker 1: five hundred casualties, which then got translated to five hundred
Speaker 1: deaths from an Israeli rocket attack. And then there was speculator, wait,
Speaker 1: maybe this was a p IJ rocket that actually landed
Speaker 1: arrantly here. Since then there's been counter speculation that, well, actually,
Speaker 1: maybe it was an iron dome rocket. The New York
Speaker 1: Times issued a public apology for its headline that said
Speaker 1: Hamas claims five hundred dead, but Hamas did claim, Well,
Speaker 1: they mistranslated it. But let's pretend hot Hamas did claim that.
Speaker 1: So in just the same way that Israel is claiming X.
Speaker 1: So the American media uses the fact that Israel is
Speaker 1: claiming X to stand by their reporting. But when Hamas
Speaker 1: claims X and then that's called in a question.
Speaker 3: There's a public mayor cultus.
Speaker 1: So which is it? Like, what's the standard here? And
Speaker 1: obviously the standard is the bias is extreme towards Israel.
Speaker 2: Here and you also challenged the State Department spokesperson again incity.
Speaker 3: Yeah, this is an interesting one.
Speaker 1: The IDF announced that it had assassinated the economy minister.
Speaker 1: And according to international law, and we can discuss this,
Speaker 1: you actually can't go around just assassinating civilian ministers or
Speaker 1: like the CEOs of like let's say, Raytheon.
Speaker 3: Maybe you should be able to It's an interesting question.
Speaker 3: Let's let's let's roll roll this clip from this day
Speaker 3: Spartan briefing.
Speaker 1: Yesterday, the IDF also announced that they assassinated the Gaza
Speaker 1: Minister of the Economy.
Speaker 3: I'm curious if does the State Department consider somebody like
Speaker 3: that to be a combatant.
Speaker 8: So I do know, I didn't see that announcement. I
Speaker 8: don't know who the person was.
Speaker 6: I don't know if he had an active role in
Speaker 6: you know, Hamas' military wing or not.
Speaker 8: So I would to be able to answer that question.
Speaker 8: I'd have to know more about.
Speaker 14: This specific said his they said his They said he
Speaker 14: counts because he had a roll over the economy, and
Speaker 14: the economy has a rollover manufacturing, and within manufacturing there
Speaker 14: are weapons that are manufactured.
Speaker 6: Again, I would have I'd have to look at it
Speaker 6: more detailed before I could give you any kind of
Speaker 6: detailed assessment.
Speaker 1: So at least in his response there he's he actually
Speaker 1: is assuming that he needs to have ties to the
Speaker 1: military wing in order to be combat Did you notice
Speaker 1: that in a response.
Speaker 3: Yeah, which Israel does not believe.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, as you and I were talking a
Speaker 2: little bit before, there is an interesting question as to
Speaker 2: whether that should be a legitimate target. I actually kind
Speaker 2: of do think so, I'm not justifying the strike. I'm
Speaker 2: just like, yeah, well, in a total war, you go
Speaker 2: to war in the totality of the society. That's actually
Speaker 2: what a war looks like. Now, though, if we zoom
Speaker 2: out a little bit, what I think you're getting at
Speaker 2: is that the US defense is always like, well, that's
Speaker 2: complying with international law, and it's like, well, obviously that
Speaker 2: is outside the scope of what a real total war
Speaker 2: would look like. I just think broadly, the media example
Speaker 2: of what you gave and the falling apart of so
Speaker 2: many of these stories in American newsrooms, has really diminished
Speaker 2: a lot of their credibility, from the October seventh rape
Speaker 2: story that they've never retracted to the Wall Street Journal
Speaker 2: story which had massive holes in it at the time.
Speaker 2: At every instance, a lot of these organizations they bet
Speaker 2: their reputation by, you know, basically believing their sources and
Speaker 2: then are refusing to issue retractions, which is just massively
Speaker 2: intrumental to their long term reputation on any future conflict.
Speaker 1: For what it looks like, and it's wild because Israel is.
Speaker 2: Not going to be mad at the Wall Street Journal.
Speaker 2: They got what they want. They got what they wanted,
Speaker 2: they got what they needed.
Speaker 1: And the Israeli comment was very clear at the time
Speaker 1: that they were trying to get UNRAS shut down and
Speaker 1: diminished and destroyed, and this was a method of doing that.
Speaker 1: It worked, you know, so they're satisfied if the Wall
Speaker 1: Street Journal at this point put an update. We can't
Speaker 1: verify any of this, like it wouldn't it wouldn't like
Speaker 1: it wouldn't be like all of a sudden, Congress would
Speaker 1: then reauthorize funding for UNRA like you won.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you got what you wanted congratulations. All right, well,
Speaker 3: thank you Ryan for breaking that down. It was super interesting.
Speaker 2: Just another good media example of what all of this
Speaker 2: is going to look like. And as we continue to
Speaker 2: parse all of those events, think, I'm glad you were here,
Speaker 2: my friend. It was fast show, we got the VP pick.
Speaker 2: That's a big show that people are going to remember
Speaker 2: for breaking points. We will see you all later.
Speaker 8: Would keep