Speaker 1: Hey, guys, ready or not, twenty twenty four is here,
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Speaker 1: Breakingpoints dot com. Good morning, everybody, Happy Thursday. We have
Speaker 1: an amazing show for everybody's day. Extra amazing because Crystal's back,
Speaker 1: thanks to be back. Has something to take care of
Speaker 1: on Tuesday. But I know Ryan did a fantastic time.
Speaker 1: He did. He did. Let's to get into this morning.
Speaker 1: We are starting to get to look at a bipartisan
Speaker 1: actually pretty good potential response to Ohio. We can see
Speaker 1: whether it gets through the House in the Senate, but
Speaker 1: we'll tell you all about that. Also, new developments on
Speaker 1: the twenty twenty four front. We've got a bunch of
Speaker 1: new polls that show Trump extending his lead, and we
Speaker 1: also have new comments from Ronda Santas about Trump that
Speaker 1: are very interesting. Some actually good news on insulin prices.
Speaker 1: So we will break all of that down for you.
Speaker 1: What exactly does it mean and how far reaching is it?
Speaker 1: A new report from the government. I guess the government
Speaker 1: this week is like in the business of admitting things
Speaker 1: that were obvious for a long time since that we're
Speaker 1: obviously true that they'll just air out into the publicat guys,
Speaker 1: guess what Havana syndrome was fake all along? New report
Speaker 1: says it's not Russia, it's not China. Guess we'll just
Speaker 1: never know what it is. So anyway, we will break
Speaker 1: that down for you as long as well as a
Speaker 1: little bit look back in time at the way that
Speaker 1: all of this was sold to the public, so that
Speaker 1: we do not forget. And we also have a bit
Speaker 1: of a warning coming from China towards Elon Musk and Bronco.
Speaker 1: Marchaitic is going to be on to talk about the
Speaker 1: state of democracy in Ukraine as a really in depth
Speaker 1: report that is worth digging into. But let's go ahead
Speaker 1: and start with the very latest out of Ohio. Let's
Speaker 1: go and put this up on the screen in terms
Speaker 1: of a bipartisan response that is in the works here,
Speaker 1: we've got a group of six senators who are introducing
Speaker 1: what they're calling the Railway Safety Act of twenty twenty three.
Speaker 1: It is aimed at preventing a repeat of what they
Speaker 1: describe as the toxic firestorm in East Palestine, Ohio. The
Speaker 1: senators involved evenly split between Democrats and Republicans. You like
Speaker 1: to see that, you've got jd Vance shared Brown. Of course,
Speaker 1: the two senators from Ohio. You also have the two
Speaker 1: senators from Pennsylvania, neighboring state where the toxic plume floated,
Speaker 1: that is Bob Casey and John Fetterman. And then you
Speaker 1: also have Marc Rubio of Florida and Josh Holly of Missouri.
Speaker 1: Details on what they are proposing here. This is according
Speaker 1: to a summary that Politico saw. The legislation would number one,
Speaker 1: require rail carriers to give advanced notice to state emergency
Speaker 1: response officials before running trains carrying hazardous materials. Apparently, some
Speaker 1: of the firefighters and other first responders first on the
Speaker 1: scene had no idea what they were dealing with, which
Speaker 1: is bad in terms of response, it's very in terms
Speaker 1: of their health. So that's number one. Number two, they
Speaker 1: would mandate trains run with at least two person crews. Now,
Speaker 1: this train in particular did have three people on board,
Speaker 1: but we know this is far from the only derailment
Speaker 1: that happens in a given year. There are roughly one
Speaker 1: thousand trained derailments. This is different than other countries around
Speaker 1: the world, and the rail industry has been pushing and
Speaker 1: this is insane to me to reduce the crew numbers
Speaker 1: from two down to one. And this is something that
Speaker 1: others have been entertaining in the past. So that's number two.
Speaker 1: Number three require better monitoring of railcar wheel bearings, which
Speaker 1: overheated in the Ohio train accident according to the NTSB
Speaker 1: and likely cause the train to jump the tracks. And
Speaker 1: number four increase penalties for wrongdoing in the industry. So
Speaker 1: some mestrics there to try to hold the industry to account. JD.
Speaker 1: Van said, through this legislation, Congress has a real opportunity
Speaker 1: to ensure that what happened in Ease Palatine will never
Speaker 1: happen again. We owe every American the peace of mind
Speaker 1: that their community is protected from catastrophe of this kind.
Speaker 1: And we have a quote from Shared Brown. Of course,
Speaker 1: the other Ohio senator rail lobbyists have fought four years
Speaker 1: to protect their profits at the expense of communities like
Speaker 1: East Palestine and Steubenville and Sandusky. Those are all neighboring communities.
Speaker 1: These common sense, bipartisan safety measures will finally hold big
Speaker 1: railroad companies accountable. So this is maybe not everything, but
Speaker 1: this is a real response that could make a measurable difference.
Speaker 1: And it is very, very encouraging to see. Yes it is.
Speaker 1: And unfortunately, despite the fact that it was introduced in
Speaker 1: a bipartisan way by the both of the senators from
Speaker 1: Ohio and both of the senators from Pennsylvania, you have
Speaker 1: these corporate lobbyists effectively who are in Congress, who represent
Speaker 1: from the Republican Party, specifically Representative Troy Nels. He is
Speaker 1: on the Transportation Committee. He's one of the leading people
Speaker 1: who with this legislation would have to go through. And
Speaker 1: let's put this up there on the screen. He's already saying.
Speaker 1: He's like, well, you know, hold on a second here,
Speaker 1: we have to make sure that there's not too many
Speaker 1: bird some regulations. He said, quote, A lot of people
Speaker 1: have a lot of ideas right now. The NTSB had
Speaker 1: their preliminary report. They'll be more information coming, but here's
Speaker 1: the most discussing quote that we've seen yet, crystal quote.
Speaker 1: The real industry has a very high success rate of
Speaker 1: moving hazardous material to the point of ninety nine percent. Plus.
Speaker 1: Let's not have some more burdensome regulations and all this
Speaker 1: other stuff. The other one, Representative Rick Crawford, who is
Speaker 1: the top Republican on the rail panel before the housewipt
Speaker 1: for control, he also said, we need to wait for
Speaker 1: the experts before quote, we start speculating on what legislative
Speaker 1: fixes might be offered if it's necessary. Probably a little
Speaker 1: premature at this point. You almost cannot make those quotes up.
Speaker 1: And this, you know, If anything, it just shows you
Speaker 1: where the continued split in the GOP is. And unfortunately,
Speaker 1: you know, Holly, Rubio and Vans are far on the uh.
Speaker 1: They are absolutely, you know, away from where the mainstream
Speaker 1: of much of the party is. They want to use
Speaker 1: most of the Republicans in this party want to use
Speaker 1: it as an opportunity to cleave Buddha Jege over the head. Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm here for that, but then when it comes time
Speaker 1: to actually increase the fines on the railroad. The other
Speaker 1: point is on Congressman Nail's point a ninety nine percent
Speaker 1: plus success rate. Okay, but if the tail end disaster
Speaker 1: is really bad, then you need to make sure that
Speaker 1: you do everything possible to make sure that a mass
Speaker 1: poisoning of an American town never happens again. And this
Speaker 1: shows you more than anything where the logjam could come from.
Speaker 1: I also do want to say, is not a guarantee
Speaker 1: right now that this legislation could pass the Senate. I'm
Speaker 1: assuming most of the Democrats will probably be able to
Speaker 1: come on board, but you need nine Republicans. There's only
Speaker 1: four that are on that list. Can you really get
Speaker 1: five to cross over here? That's right, you need to
Speaker 1: get to sixty. I suspect every Democrat would be on board.
Speaker 1: The divide here really is in the Republican Party, and
Speaker 1: it's very interesting. I mean, you can see what the
Speaker 1: rail lobbyist strategy is here. And this is totally classic.
Speaker 1: We've seen this a million times before. They just want
Speaker 1: to delay, They want to kick it down the road
Speaker 1: where people forget about all of this. And so the
Speaker 1: line you're hearing from these Republican house members, many of whom,
Speaker 1: by the way, are in the pocket of the railroad industry.
Speaker 1: They want to say, well, we got an NTSB preliminary report,
Speaker 1: but we got to wait for the final findings before
Speaker 1: we really come in and figure out what to No,
Speaker 1: we know plenty about this incident and about so many
Speaker 1: other derailments to go ahead and act. But that's what
Speaker 1: they always try to do. If they can just delay,
Speaker 1: if they can just push it down the road until
Speaker 1: people have forgotten about the emotion and the horror of
Speaker 1: this incident, then they think they can kill the thing altogether.
Speaker 1: And look, it works all the time. So it is
Speaker 1: a good and effective strategy, especially when you have people
Speaker 1: like these bozos in the house who are ultimately on
Speaker 1: your side. Let me tell you there's another piece of
Speaker 1: the response that JdE Vance has been proposing. This also
Speaker 1: meeting with a lot of pushback from Republicans. Let's go
Speaker 1: and put this up on the screen. So he's proposing
Speaker 1: an aid program for this area specifically, because think about it, guys,
Speaker 1: you got people. Now you think you can sell your
Speaker 1: house in East Palestine, good luck? What do you think
Speaker 1: your house is worth? Now? What do you think this
Speaker 1: is like? Now? For you know, people who don't have
Speaker 1: a choice and have to stay there, or for people
Speaker 1: who feel like this is not safe. I need to go.
Speaker 1: There has been a huge financial hit. You think people
Speaker 1: are gonna want to go, and you know, visit the
Speaker 1: local coffee shop in East Palestine now and risk whatever
Speaker 1: still floating in the air and floating in the water.
Speaker 1: This is going to be a huge economic hit to
Speaker 1: this area, which, by the way, guys, has been hit
Speaker 1: hard many times before. So Vance is pitching a PPP
Speaker 1: style program for Ohio. Basically every Republican that they quoted
Speaker 1: here was like, let's just wait and see again. Same thing.
Speaker 1: They then don't necessarily say no, although some of them
Speaker 1: did come out and basically say no. They're like, let's
Speaker 1: just wait and see what happens, see what happens down
Speaker 1: the road, which again is code for let's just wait
Speaker 1: until everybody forgets about this and we can do absolutely nothing. Yeah. Look,
Speaker 1: look here's Shelley Moore Capital and you know why this
Speaker 1: drives me nuts. She's Virginia. You should be on board
Speaker 1: exactly what type because they'd be good for West Virginia too.
Speaker 1: If you set this presdent quote, it's something I'd be
Speaker 1: willing to take a look at. It would be difficult.
Speaker 1: I want to see those small businesses get back. I
Speaker 1: know they're having trouble with that. But how do you
Speaker 1: quantify a training derailment over some kind of other thing.
Speaker 1: I don't know. Look at the pre market, pre disaster
Speaker 1: value of a house or of a business, then figure
Speaker 1: out how much they lose after and try and make
Speaker 1: them home again. It's something to consider. I'd have to
Speaker 1: see how he would enact something like that. Why don't
Speaker 1: you help him? You're from one of the most impover
Speaker 1: states in the entire country? Or here? John? Can this?
Speaker 1: You know these people drive the same thing Louisiana. Louisiana,
Speaker 1: by the way, has its own fair share of horrific
Speaker 1: environmental disaster. Same thing. I understand where Senat Advance is
Speaker 1: coming from. We've all had natural disasters. When we do,
Speaker 1: we try to help each other. But it needs to
Speaker 1: be thought through. A little time needs to pass. We
Speaker 1: don't even know what the health impacts are going to
Speaker 1: be yet of a trained d railman, much less the
Speaker 1: economic impact. I would look at anything that JD wants
Speaker 1: to propose. What does that mean? Of course, we don't
Speaker 1: know what the health impact is going to be. Get
Speaker 1: out in front of it. One of the things that
Speaker 1: we actually do know is that income is one of
Speaker 1: the single best determiners of whether you are going to
Speaker 1: live a long time and be able to seek treatment
Speaker 1: or not. Good luck if you're poor, you don't have
Speaker 1: health insurance or you have some terrible high deductible plan
Speaker 1: that you're going to go and seek the medical treatment
Speaker 1: that you would otherwise. You've been talking about medicare about
Speaker 1: being able. We have to make the whole point of
Speaker 1: help something we cover here all the time. Don't just
Speaker 1: treat the symptom, try and make sure that it doesn't
Speaker 1: become a problem. If you've been exposed now to toxic chemicals, man,
Speaker 1: it's time to kick it into high gear. Like you've
Speaker 1: got to really take care of your body and make
Speaker 1: sure that you are getting wet by maybe quarterly blood tests,
Speaker 1: like you need a lot of modern insurance not going
Speaker 1: to cover any of that. So why would we wait
Speaker 1: until you get cancer before we're going to start Ten
Speaker 1: years down the road and there's a cancer cluster bingo,
Speaker 1: think of how hard it was and how by the
Speaker 1: skin of its teeth. The legislation I think is called
Speaker 1: the Packed Act. Yes No for toxic burn pit victims
Speaker 1: who you know suffer from all kinds of different cancers
Speaker 1: from their exposure while they were in war zones fighting
Speaker 1: for our country. Think of how hard it was to
Speaker 1: get that done in Congress. You think that ten years
Speaker 1: down the line, if you have a cancer cluster here,
Speaker 1: that you're going to be able to get action through Congress. No,
Speaker 1: if anything is going to happen, it's gonna happen now
Speaker 1: while the media is still covering it, while this is
Speaker 1: still fresh in people's minds, while it's still in the news.
Speaker 1: You wait, you're right, Senator Kennedy. He was the one
Speaker 1: who made that comment. Oh, we don't know what the
Speaker 1: long term health impacts are. We don't know. That's why,
Speaker 1: at the very least these people should have health care,
Speaker 1: but they should definitely have economic assistance too. And you
Speaker 1: want to make Norfolk Southern pay for it? I am all, well,
Speaker 1: that would have a Senator Brown said, Norfolk Southern's going
Speaker 1: to pay for all of this percent. Good to go
Speaker 1: with that. But this is no excuse for just turning
Speaker 1: the other cheek and say, oh, well, we'll just wait
Speaker 1: and see what happens and hope it all gets better.
Speaker 1: The White House, there's some reporting they are also weighing
Speaker 1: if they could provide some kind of economic relief. It
Speaker 1: seems like they are very sort of like all over
Speaker 1: the place and very uninformed in terms of what their
Speaker 1: thoughts are and what they could do. Let's go and
Speaker 1: put this up on the screen. This from our friend
Speaker 1: Jeff Steing over the Washington Post. Biden aids weigh economic
Speaker 1: aid for East Palestine after derailment. The administration wants to
Speaker 1: make Norfolk Southern pay for any cost, but is exploring
Speaker 1: backup options. It says the exact details of any White
Speaker 1: House action are unknown. Administration say it's determined to force
Speaker 1: Norfolk Southern to pay. They also might face challenges in
Speaker 1: crafting financial aid package for a town that is fewer
Speaker 1: than five thousand people, but many residents have already decided
Speaker 1: to leave the town keep their children out of school,
Speaker 1: putting pressure on the federal government to help the reeling
Speaker 1: ross community. And as part of that process, AIDS have
Speaker 1: looked at whether existing federal dollars could be used to
Speaker 1: help small businesses. The administration is also considering infrastructure improvements
Speaker 1: in the area. The talks are described as preliminary, and
Speaker 1: administration of stress it remains possible the White House decides
Speaker 1: against devoting economic aid to East Palestine. Everybody spoke on
Speaker 1: condition of anonymity, So that's good there. Yeah, let's just
Speaker 1: speak on and I don't know, I mean just the level.
Speaker 1: You know, look on a purely political basis, you don't
Speaker 1: think it's very popular for the Republican senator to team
Speaker 1: up with the Democratic senator and to offer up cash
Speaker 1: and to a railway safety bill. Why is the White
Speaker 1: House letting himself get outflanked on this? I don't understand, Biden.
Speaker 1: I'm a union guy Scranton, Joe, what are you doing? Say?
Speaker 1: You know, first, it started with breaking the railway strike.
Speaker 1: That was probably original sin number one in terms of
Speaker 1: basically telling you guy, these guys screw you. Two, visiting
Speaker 1: Kiev before East Palestine. Three, then basically turning at political
Speaker 1: and saying since Trump went to Theaset Palistine, I can't
Speaker 1: go to these Palestine and saying no, the president has
Speaker 1: no plans to go over there, and then just you know,
Speaker 1: these middling plants. It's it's really disgusting because you're basically
Speaker 1: watching the establishment Republicans team up with what maybe just
Speaker 1: maybe just lazy or just non thinking the establishment Democratic
Speaker 1: Party on this. They just want to move. They're like, yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: but now that it's become a political hotbed issue, we
Speaker 1: don't want to be seen caving. And the actual people
Speaker 1: there are the ones who are actually getting screwed. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And that's that's actually why I think it's such a
Speaker 1: terrible story. They don't want to set a precedent of
Speaker 1: actually helping people when they need help. I mean, that's
Speaker 1: the bottom line. It's five thousand people. This is nothing
Speaker 1: in terms of like the federal budget, even if they
Speaker 1: can't force Norfolk Southern to ultimately pay for which of
Speaker 1: course they obviously should. But that's what they're afraid of,
Speaker 1: is the precedent of, like, oh my god, then we
Speaker 1: might have to help people in the future when things
Speaker 1: get screwed up. They don't want that precedent ultimately. But
Speaker 1: to your point on the politics, Biden re member, he
Speaker 1: did that bipartisan press conference with Mitch McConnell in Kentucky,
Speaker 1: travel there to teut the infrastructure bill. Could do the
Speaker 1: same thing here with Jade Vance. Go jd Vance, shared Brown,
Speaker 1: go to Ohio. You know, Greatack his ppp idea or
Speaker 1: work together with him on crafting something else, if there's
Speaker 1: a better approach that you prefer. Ultimately, you know, that
Speaker 1: would be a boon to show that this is a
Speaker 1: price cident. Who really cares about citizens of Ohio state
Speaker 1: that not so long ago was a swing state and
Speaker 1: sort of back up his working class man of the
Speaker 1: people supposed credibility. So I just think they have both
Speaker 1: on the substance and on the politics of this, really
Speaker 1: bungled this whole situation. But just to go back to
Speaker 1: the beginning, the fact that there is a bipartisan bill
Speaker 1: that addresses some real issues is a very hopeful thing.
Speaker 1: It has difficult odds, especially in the Republican held House,
Speaker 1: but perhaps there's a chance here because of the public
Speaker 1: pressure and scrutiny on this event. Ultimately, back to let's
Speaker 1: go ahead to this next piece. So I mentioned that
Speaker 1: the strategy of the rail lobbyists is to delay, delay, delay,
Speaker 1: And then also when you heard some of the Republicans
Speaker 1: echoing this exact talking point, they are now placing ads
Speaker 1: in Politico, which in instances has been very favorable to
Speaker 1: industry on this whole Ohio story. They're paying Politico to
Speaker 1: place ads that are touting their great record of safety,
Speaker 1: they say Politico presented by the Association of American Railroads,
Speaker 1: this is all reporting from our friends over at Lever News,
Speaker 1: and they say, when it comes to safety, ninety nine
Speaker 1: point nine percent is not enough. Well, ninety nine point
Speaker 1: nine percent of all hazmat shipments that move by rail
Speaker 1: reach their destination safely. We know a single incident can
Speaker 1: have significant impacts. So basically the idea here, Sager is
Speaker 1: like government doesn't need to act us could folks at
Speaker 1: the rail Association, lobbyist group, whatever they're called, We're working
Speaker 1: on it. We've got this. Don't you worry about it? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I mean, what the hell are they doing over there?
Speaker 1: And you know, this is one of those which we
Speaker 1: brought you some of the reporting from Politico. But this
Speaker 1: is part of what the problem is with corporate media.
Speaker 1: Like when you have straight up newsletters and other things
Speaker 1: that are being straight sponsored by the Association of American Railroads.
Speaker 1: Do you think that it's an accident that the Railroad
Speaker 1: Association calls plut and say, hey, we need to buy
Speaker 1: some status on your newsletter. Do you know why they
Speaker 1: do this? Let's explain. Politico is one of those outlets,
Speaker 1: especially that newsletter that we brought you play book. Everybody
Speaker 1: in Washington reads this thing, and I really do mean
Speaker 1: like everybody from the lowest level staffer all the way
Speaker 1: up to probably the White House Chief of staff. It's
Speaker 1: like an internal it's almost like a gossip girl, to
Speaker 1: be honest with you, for like the biggest losers in DC.
Speaker 1: There you go, Tiger, That's right. That's a great way
Speaker 1: of putting it. And so the reason why these associations,
Speaker 1: these lobbyists and all these others buy ad space in
Speaker 1: them is it's the easy way where you're not just
Speaker 1: targeting let's say, a mass audience. You know, people like
Speaker 1: who we speak to. You're speaking directly to the decision makers,
Speaker 1: to the people who would be most influenced by the lobbyists.
Speaker 1: And their direct hope is to try and get their ads,
Speaker 1: their spin, their propaganda in front of their eyes. Okay,
Speaker 1: I mean, you can understand why they would want to
Speaker 1: do that, But if you're a journalistic outlet, how can
Speaker 1: you possibly report fairly on this when you were taking
Speaker 1: money from them at the exact same time that it's
Speaker 1: outrageous And they do this with everything just so people
Speaker 1: know when they're reporting on anti trust Facebook miraculously just
Speaker 1: starts coughing up whenever they're reporting on what was. Whenever
Speaker 1: they're reporting on medical issues, you'll have the American Medical Association.
Speaker 1: I've seen the defense industry sponsors technologs of times. It's
Speaker 1: one of those where and here everybody thinks it's business
Speaker 1: as usual. It's like you and I are some of
Speaker 1: the only people in this town are like, hey, this
Speaker 1: is kind of crazy, right, are we just not going
Speaker 1: to talk about this well? And to add insult to
Speaker 1: injury here? I mean, you're so right that this is
Speaker 1: just core to the disgusting corporate business corporate media business
Speaker 1: model and why they will never be good arbiters of
Speaker 1: like facts and journalism, especially when it comes to an
Speaker 1: issue related to industry. Before politicos started running these new ads,
Speaker 1: their national Politics reporter actually attacked the Lever for asking
Speaker 1: their readers to help fund their continued reporting on East
Speaker 1: Palestine derailment and train safety RL. So think about this.
Speaker 1: The Lever gets attacked for asking readers to support their
Speaker 1: work like grassroots reader sponsored journalism, not getting a bunch
Speaker 1: of money from the rail industry to then report on this,
Speaker 1: and then you know they turn around and that's exactly
Speaker 1: what they get. So they're criticizing the funding of Lever News,
Speaker 1: getting grassroots readers, supported, donations and funding, and meanwhile they're
Speaker 1: just taking cash from industry and somehow that scene as
Speaker 1: a superior. It's insane. Yeah, so can you explain it again?
Speaker 1: What is their exact critique here? So here, I'll pull
Speaker 1: up the tweet that he's sent. He basically so this guy,
Speaker 1: Adam Ran is his name, to call him out, national
Speaker 1: politics correspondent for Politico. He tweeted David sirot as the
Speaker 1: lever it's fundraising off of the East Palestine Ohio train derailment. No,
Speaker 1: it's called if you are independent news, you rely on
Speaker 1: regular citizens to fund your journalism instead of industry lobbyists
Speaker 1: like Politico does. So he is smearing David as somehow
Speaker 1: and the Lever as somehow like disgraced on this. Oh,
Speaker 1: David does his job. He exposes this before anybody else
Speaker 1: and then ask people to help support his mission. I
Speaker 1: get emails from the Washington Post in the New York
Speaker 1: Times every time they break some stupid ass Trump scoop
Speaker 1: being like, do you want to stick it to power?
Speaker 1: Sign up for the New York Times. So okay, first
Speaker 1: of all, it's fine what he's doing. You know, people
Speaker 1: do have to make a living, and if you want
Speaker 1: to support that type of work, we are very happy
Speaker 1: to partner with the lever and official break import I
Speaker 1: think the very first one. Right, So first break, why
Speaker 1: do you think this is exactly the reason? And you know,
Speaker 1: he can't even fathom that this is somehow something that
Speaker 1: he needs to highlight as some some sort of nefarious act.
Speaker 1: When this guy's getting you know, at least in part
Speaker 1: some of his paycheck, it's coming from somewhere. He should
Speaker 1: absolutely be coming from railroad lobbyists, defense industry, oil and gas,
Speaker 1: like any lobbyist interest in the city has spun in Politico,
Speaker 1: and he has the nerve to come after David Szerota
Speaker 1: for doing grassroots fundraising for independent media. Right anyway, all right,
Speaker 1: it's really something. Yes, let's talk about twenty twenty four,
Speaker 1: some fun stuff and an interview actually conducted yesterday which
Speaker 1: will bring you some parts of But let's start very
Speaker 1: first with the twenty twenty four race with Ron DeSantis
Speaker 1: and with Donald Trump. So of course, you know, despite
Speaker 1: everything that you might hear in the media, for Trump,
Speaker 1: things are actually going pretty well. Let's go and put
Speaker 1: this up there on the screen. Four of the latest
Speaker 1: polls of GOP primary voters not only see Trump leading DeSantis,
Speaker 1: they actually show him extending his lead over DeSantis. So
Speaker 1: here's the four aggregation Emerson Trump fifty five, DeSantis twenty five,
Speaker 1: Yahoo News Trump forty seven, Desantus thirty nine, Echelon Trump
Speaker 1: forty six, DeSantis thirty one, Fox News Trump forty three,
Speaker 1: DeSantis twenty eight. All four of them show an increase
Speaker 1: for Trump in February over the last month. So this
Speaker 1: is why it's important. Let's say and bacon polling errors
Speaker 1: and many of these other types of things. Let's say
Speaker 1: that the poles can be off significantly as they were,
Speaker 1: then it's important within these poles to see movement because
Speaker 1: obviously the polsters are going to have the same errors
Speaker 1: baked in, and then within that we can see some track.
Speaker 1: So we can't infer truth. You know, even the aggregate
Speaker 1: of in twenty twenty two is totally wrong. Yeah, found
Speaker 1: and these poles in this race right then, oh, all
Speaker 1: over the laces, all of them map. So you got
Speaker 1: him all the way from thirty nine down to what
Speaker 1: was twenty five was the lowest. I mean, that's not
Speaker 1: actually not terrible if you consider like what the range is,
Speaker 1: and again importantly all four Sea movement towards Trump. Why
Speaker 1: is that? Well, A Desanta's not a candidate. So if
Speaker 1: I was a DeSantis person, I'd be like, look, he's
Speaker 1: not even a declared Canadate. I haven't even had the
Speaker 1: race on, But what are we learning? The first mover
Speaker 1: of trump advantage is so immense, and he is near
Speaker 1: fifty in almost every single one of these. That's higher
Speaker 1: than where he started off in twenty sixteen when he
Speaker 1: swept all of the early primaries going into Super Tuesday.
Speaker 1: So if you see the increasing trend of candidates getting
Speaker 1: in the race, Nikki Haley, viviak Ramaswami, you got Pence
Speaker 1: on the line. Possibly DeSantis. He's going on a tour.
Speaker 1: He's got a new book out. Apparently he's going to
Speaker 1: South Carolina and New Hampshire and Iowa. Complete coincidence. Who
Speaker 1: else why would anyone go there for a book tour?
Speaker 1: But I think we know said we have Tim Scott
Speaker 1: who wants to get in the race. Who got all
Speaker 1: these other people? Right? K? Yeah, Glenn you know, everybody's
Speaker 1: on the fence right now. You know, probably half the
Speaker 1: people I mentioned are either already running or going to run,
Speaker 1: and you're just recreating the same dynamic, except that Trump
Speaker 1: is actually stronger right now than he was. That's last time.
Speaker 1: That's the most important thing. And you know, there was
Speaker 1: a lot of second guessing of when he launched his campaign,
Speaker 1: remember after the midterms didn't go well for him and
Speaker 1: did go really well for Ron DeSantis. That was like, oh,
Speaker 1: I don't know if this is the time to launch
Speaker 1: when he's weak. I think that was I mean, we
Speaker 1: said at the time, we thought it was exactly the
Speaker 1: right time to launch, actually to try to lock in
Speaker 1: support and get that first mover's advantage. And listen, not
Speaker 1: trying to say I told you so, but I think
Speaker 1: we can see that there has been an advantage for
Speaker 1: him in coming out first the you know, the hit
Speaker 1: he took both from the midterms and also from the
Speaker 1: initial phases of the whole classified document situation. I think
Speaker 1: that has all really faded so that now not only
Speaker 1: is he doing well against Ron de Santis, by the way,
Speaker 1: he's also doing well against Joe Biden. And he's he's
Speaker 1: now he's sort of let go. I wouldn't say he's
Speaker 1: really you know, put it in the past, but he's
Speaker 1: talking a little bit less about his election conspiracy obsessions,
Speaker 1: and he's focused on issues that are quite intelligent for
Speaker 1: him to be focused on, in particular social security and
Speaker 1: Medicare and also Ukraine. These are issues where there's a
Speaker 1: real divide in the Republican Party. He's positioning himself alongside
Speaker 1: the base against where a lot of the Republican sort
Speaker 1: of elite commentariat is. That's precisely straight out of the
Speaker 1: twenty sixteen playbook, and it's putting a lot of his adversaries,
Speaker 1: including Ron de Santis, in a difficult position, ultimately extraordinary
Speaker 1: difficult position. And we have here's the other problem for DeSantis.
Speaker 1: His responses and his comebacks to Trump have just been
Speaker 1: weak as hell, like we need to all be. They're getting,
Speaker 1: they're degrading, they're honestly like Ted Cruz twenty sixteen levels
Speaker 1: of just like, dude, what the hell are you doing?
Speaker 1: So here is his response Brian Kilmead on the Brian
Speaker 1: kill Meads Show, where he says it's silly season. That's
Speaker 1: all he could come up with. Let's take a listen,
Speaker 1: so govern I'm too. As soon as they close the book,
Speaker 1: I said, this guy's running for president. This seems to
Speaker 1: be a blueprint to run for president, because if I
Speaker 1: look at your career, and if I look at what
Speaker 1: you say, you don't just say this was good for today.
Speaker 1: This is good for families, It's good for state, this
Speaker 1: is good for a country. You were concerned about the
Speaker 1: country from the day you stepped into the campus of Yale,
Speaker 1: reinforced Harvard, fought for it in Iraq? Am I wrong
Speaker 1: to assume that there's in the excellent chance you're running
Speaker 1: for president. Having kids in school during covid on, opposing
Speaker 1: the employer vax mandates and things like that. Education we've
Speaker 1: led the way. I like to see a competition amongst
Speaker 1: all the all the red states about you know, who
Speaker 1: can kind of outdo each other. Think it's a blueprint
Speaker 1: for other states. I do think it can be applied nationally.
Speaker 1: But it's less about me than about I think the
Speaker 1: underlying principles that we need to restore our country. I
Speaker 1: read the whole thing. Now, one disparaging word about President Trump.
Speaker 1: Are you guys speaking now? Do you plan on speaking
Speaker 1: to him, he sees to be taking some shots at you. No,
Speaker 1: I mean, look, I mean it's silly season. I mean,
Speaker 1: you know how some of this stuff goes. And obviously
Speaker 1: he does his thing, and it's just that's kind of
Speaker 1: kind of who is. But what I wanted to do
Speaker 1: was was just given honest appraisal of kind of how
Speaker 1: we got to this point, the failures of the DC
Speaker 1: Republican establishment and how Donald Trump was speaking to things
Speaker 1: that some of the old guard refused to address. And
Speaker 1: that's just a fact. What is this? And then he
Speaker 1: turns around and praises Trump. That's the point. That's always
Speaker 1: the issue. You know, we're about to get to we'll
Speaker 1: talk a little bit a little bit. I interviewed viag Ramaswami,
Speaker 1: same thing. You know, he had to praise Trumpy. He
Speaker 1: offered a little bit of and we'll play you exactly
Speaker 1: what that was. But that's a big problem when you
Speaker 1: can't criticize the person that you ostensibly want to replace.
Speaker 1: I mean, what are we doing here? It's just not
Speaker 1: going to happen. And look, I'm sorry, it's silly season.
Speaker 1: That ain't gonna cut it. Like, you have got to
Speaker 1: come through with an actual critique of why you would
Speaker 1: be better And I'm sorry, nobody cares about your book.
Speaker 1: Like I was telling you while we were listening to them,
Speaker 1: like why do they even bother with these books? You know,
Speaker 1: all these guys, No politician book is ever good, always
Speaker 1: springboards stuff. Tell you why. The technical reason part of
Speaker 1: why they do it is because of the intricacies of
Speaker 1: campaign finance. So it allows them to go through the
Speaker 1: store and do royalties and have staff that are involved
Speaker 1: with it and pay that staff and not like officially
Speaker 1: have launched a presidential campaign. So that's one reason why
Speaker 1: they ultimately do it. But I did. I listened to
Speaker 1: this whole interview. It was really embarrassing on Brian Kilmean's
Speaker 1: part because, Okay, you have a guy who's governor of
Speaker 1: an important state, who is almost certainly going to run
Speaker 1: for president, who is a very strong contender to run
Speaker 1: for president, and you spend like fifteen minutes of your
Speaker 1: twenty minute interview talking to him about his Walt Disney wedding.
Speaker 1: Like come on, I mean, that's just embarrassing as a journalists.
Speaker 1: And one of the things that you see is, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's true. I think Fox News really likes Ron DeSantis.
Speaker 1: The whole Rupert Murdoch empire really likes DeSantis. But one
Speaker 1: of the things that's come out in all of these
Speaker 1: text messages and exchanges from the dominion lawsuit is they
Speaker 1: don't really have control over the Republican base anymore. You know,
Speaker 1: they wanted to initially try to steer them in one direction,
Speaker 1: and then when the base was going one way on
Speaker 1: stop the deal and they were trying to go on
Speaker 1: the other way, ultimately they're like, yeah, we can't do it.
Speaker 1: We're just going to go for the ratings because these
Speaker 1: people will all abandon us. So they don't have the
Speaker 1: control over the Republican base that perhaps ultimately they once did. Right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think you're right, and just you know, in general,
Speaker 1: it's a humiliating, just way that these guys are unable
Speaker 1: fundamentally to critique the leading candidates. And that is why
Speaker 1: he is the leading candidate. Yes, he's in the race,
Speaker 1: and you know what, to the extent like they never
Speaker 1: directly criticize him, but to the extent that they carve
Speaker 1: out positions that are different from him, their positions are worse, right, right,
Speaker 1: They're like, actually, we need to cut like Mike Pence,
Speaker 1: we need to cut we need to privatize Social Security,
Speaker 1: and we also need a national abortion band like. Those
Speaker 1: are worse, Yes, you are different from Trump. Those are
Speaker 1: worse positions. Ultimately, Nikki Haley, same thing. Got to put
Speaker 1: entitlements on the table. And she's also you know, going
Speaker 1: against the Republican base in terms of Ukraine Aid as well.
Speaker 1: So he's also positioned himself better politically than almost any
Speaker 1: of the other contenders to the extent that they carve
Speaker 1: out any different positions whatsoever. And you got at this
Speaker 1: with a Vivek as well, who one of the areas
Speaker 1: where he's different from Trump is he also would put
Speaker 1: entitlement cuts on the table and says that Trump spent
Speaker 1: too much money when he was an office show. That's
Speaker 1: not an improvement over Donald Trump for like eighty percent
Speaker 1: of the public. That makes you worse. And speaking of this,
Speaker 1: we had a hilarious moment on Fox News, so Killmead
Speaker 1: goes down to a Florida diner. By the way, diner
Speaker 1: Fox News might be the most mid and awful Fox
Speaker 1: of all time. Just I don't know why people in
Speaker 1: a diner are somehow more representative of everybody else but whatever.
Speaker 1: I don't know why these people are in a diner
Speaker 1: on workday. That's another question. Let's get to that. So
Speaker 1: Brian kill Me and his Florida diner is like, so,
Speaker 1: who's gonna vote for Ronda Sanders? Anybody want to vote
Speaker 1: for rond de Sanders? The results are unintentionally hilarious. Let's
Speaker 1: take a listen. First off, Met Jroe dining here. I
Speaker 1: got a question for you, ready, Hi, twenty twenty four?
Speaker 1: Who's pumped up for the election? TI wrapped fire? Who's
Speaker 1: your man? Who's your woman? My man? Donald Trump? Donald Trump,
Speaker 1: Donald Trump, Christy Trump, Christie? No, who's your man? Trump woman?
Speaker 1: Trump Trump Trump? A lot of Trump fans Trump and
Speaker 1: Nicky Haley, Nicky Haley, Donald Trump and Nicky Haley. All right,
Speaker 1: so far, a lot of Donald Trump? I see, I see, uh,
Speaker 1: Governor DeSantis? What about President sand I like it? I
Speaker 1: like it? Who's your pick? Oh, gos, I'm either yes,
Speaker 1: Trump Trump Trump trump trumpet des Santa's either or that's
Speaker 1: a problem. He goes over this lady, she's literally wearing
Speaker 1: a dessanta shirt, thinking that like, surely this one's going
Speaker 1: to give me Desanta's and she's like they're both good
Speaker 1: either one. I hate to be proven right in many
Speaker 1: of these cases. And I understand that a lot of
Speaker 1: people would like to move on from Trump. I'm not
Speaker 1: saying it wouldn't be better, but you know, you got
Speaker 1: to live in reality sometimes. And if you want to
Speaker 1: talk about some of the most hardcore people who are
Speaker 1: going to show up in a GOP primary, people who
Speaker 1: take time out of their workday and or are retired
Speaker 1: in a Florida diner, showing up for a Fox News
Speaker 1: event is about as good as it gets for a
Speaker 1: testing ground of like, Hey, how is this all going
Speaker 1: to work out? And what did we hear? Whoa? And
Speaker 1: that was almost almost every single answer was Trump, Nikki Hale.
Speaker 1: But she said Trump, and yeah, exactly, she goes Trump
Speaker 1: and Nikki Haley. So it's like ep right exactly, so
Speaker 1: and she's like, yeah, she's all right, but Trump Trump
Speaker 1: at the first listen. I've tried to explain it here,
Speaker 1: like Trump has a special connection to the Republican base
Speaker 1: in a way that no Republican politician has had since
Speaker 1: Ronald Reagan and likely before that since I don't even know,
Speaker 1: maybe Barry Goldwater. And it's one of those where it's
Speaker 1: difficult to explain. You kind of have to see it
Speaker 1: to believe it. Honestly, even just talking and listening to
Speaker 1: people like us trying to tell you about it, it's
Speaker 1: always better to just hear it from them themselves. Now, look,
Speaker 1: let's be fair, not necessarily representative, but if you were
Speaker 1: to look where you might see an actual explosion of
Speaker 1: to Santa's interest and a possibility of winning people over,
Speaker 1: it would be in a Florida day and a Florida
Speaker 1: diner is a pretty likely say that was clearly what
Speaker 1: he thought as well going to that, that's what I
Speaker 1: I don't think that's how he thought that would all unfold.
Speaker 1: I mean, listen, it really does have a lot of
Speaker 1: a lot of twenty sixteen vibes when everybody but Trump
Speaker 1: was fighting to basically be the Trump alternative, taking shots
Speaker 1: at each other. They're not afraid to come after one another,
Speaker 1: right Mike Pence going after Ron DeSantis for example, a
Speaker 1: lot of other shots taken at Rond de Santis. They're
Speaker 1: not afraid to fight amongst each other. But if you
Speaker 1: think Trump is just going to implode and go away,
Speaker 1: like there's nothing in recent history that suggests that's ultimately
Speaker 1: the case. And meanwhile, while this is all happening on
Speaker 1: the sidelines, his poll numbers are going up. So at
Speaker 1: some point somebody, and this is the problem, is they
Speaker 1: know that whoever actually comes after him, kind of a
Speaker 1: prisoner's dilemma, ya, is probably going to get noved ye,
Speaker 1: And so none of them wants to be that person,
Speaker 1: and so they all just step back. Actually, his administration
Speaker 1: was great, and his policies they were wonderful, and you know,
Speaker 1: I think he said a lot of things that needed
Speaker 1: to be said. Okay, then why aren't you then why
Speaker 1: should anyone vote for you over the guy that you
Speaker 1: are telling them was actually wonderful and great too good.
Speaker 1: It's one of those where I just think they will
Speaker 1: never be able to work themselves out of it. And
Speaker 1: the longer that this goes on, the better off Trump is.
Speaker 1: Trump is fun again in a way that he hasn't
Speaker 1: been in a long time. He seems, I think always
Speaker 1: has been better off whenever he's not president. That's kind
Speaker 1: of like whenever he was at his most full Fulsome
Speaker 1: he's got the team around him. Some of the guys
Speaker 1: like Jason Miller's original comms director from twenty sixteen. He's
Speaker 1: on a very very light staff and frankly, that's frankly,
Speaker 1: we know whenever he best operates. Yeah, I'm only talking
Speaker 1: here as a politician, not as a competent commander in chief.
Speaker 1: But look, that's ultimately how you get elected. And from
Speaker 1: this point forward, I think this is going to be
Speaker 1: the most formidable dynamic. Okay, so sticking with this. Had
Speaker 1: the opportunity yesterday. Vivik Ramaswami just recently and renounced his
Speaker 1: run for president. He's a former biotech executive who sold
Speaker 1: his company and made a lot of money, made some
Speaker 1: interesting rumblings over the last couple of years. So he
Speaker 1: wrote a book called Woke, Inc. It was actually a
Speaker 1: fantastic book in my opinion, because it was about ESG,
Speaker 1: and specifically about the takeover and the use of shareholder
Speaker 1: capitalism to push values that don't necessari not only align
Speaker 1: with American public, but really much more hurting the country
Speaker 1: using these values and others to go away from the
Speaker 1: core value of business. Let me go ahead, let me
Speaker 1: just say, because I think we have a different view
Speaker 1: on this. My critique of ESG is that it's just
Speaker 1: like a basic corporate virtue signal that is actually meaningless
Speaker 1: and doesn't really accomplish what they claim that it's ultimately accomplishing.
Speaker 1: His view is like corporations have too much power. But
Speaker 1: then also he doesn't actually have any critique of corporate power,
Speaker 1: of like argument of how you would check corporate power.
Speaker 1: I actually wouldn't even disagree. One of the original disagreements
Speaker 1: if a vac and I ever had was I was like, well,
Speaker 1: held on a second, here, I hate ESG. I'm very
Speaker 1: against ESG. And I was like, but what if an
Speaker 1: American company wanted to actually take make less money by
Speaker 1: making stuff in America? I'm like, would you be against that?
Speaker 1: And he's like, well, you know, it would possibly conflict
Speaker 1: with shareholder capitalism. So the point that I'm making is
Speaker 1: that he is probably much more of a free market
Speaker 1: died in the wool capitalist. Yes, he's got a good
Speaker 1: I think critique of ESG. I don't necessarily agree with
Speaker 1: a lot of what he says. All right, let's put
Speaker 1: that to this, let's put that to the side. So
Speaker 1: he wrote this book, kind of became prominent. He was
Speaker 1: on Fox News quite often. He wrote another book about
Speaker 1: the Nation of Victims, kind of outlining his philosophy. So
Speaker 1: I had the opportunity to interview Vivegue and one of
Speaker 1: the things I wanted to get to with the Vegue is, look,
Speaker 1: I tried. You know. One of the things I told
Speaker 1: him at the top, I said, I'm going to take
Speaker 1: you seriously. I'm gonna take you seriously as a candidate.
Speaker 1: We took Andrew Yang seriously, we took Telsea Gabbard seriously.
Speaker 1: He came on the re alignment because it's comfortable. We've
Speaker 1: interviewed him a couple of times there and we have
Speaker 1: a long standing relationship. But in this you're going to
Speaker 1: see that Marshall and I press him a little bit
Speaker 1: on some of the interesting political questions that he hasn't
Speaker 1: gotten to. And one of those that I was really
Speaker 1: intent on getting was Trump, because I'm like, look, you
Speaker 1: cannot sit here just and say Trump is a friend,
Speaker 1: and why I'm moving forward? What was wrong with America? First?
Speaker 1: One point zho why two point zero? A lot of
Speaker 1: people from that diner that we just played you that clip,
Speaker 1: they liked, why should they vote for you? And he
Speaker 1: offered what I thought to date was his first tapid
Speaker 1: criticism of Trump. Let's take a listen to some of that,
Speaker 1: as well as some of the policy disagreements. What was
Speaker 1: wrong with America? First? One point? Oh, why is that
Speaker 1: nothing was wrong with America? Person But I would I
Speaker 1: wouldn't borrow the lingo America first if I thought something
Speaker 1: was wrong with it. I care a lot about national unity,
Speaker 1: and I know President Trump, he's a friend. He's misunderstood
Speaker 1: on this. He cares about national unity too, I know
Speaker 1: he does, but he I don't think is capable in
Speaker 1: the same way of delivering it, because if he was,
Speaker 1: we wouldn't be where we are right now. On the
Speaker 1: election of twenty twenty, was it stolen or not? Yes
Speaker 1: or no question? Yes, but not in the way that
Speaker 1: not in the way that you mean that question. Okay,
Speaker 1: so what do you mean? But I think the technology
Speaker 1: companies tilted the scales of public debate. Okay, I think
Speaker 1: that this was I think the Hunter Biden laptop story
Speaker 1: epitomizes what was wrong with the lead up to that
Speaker 1: election cycle. There was a true story that was censored
Speaker 1: in the name of misinformation, actually created more misinformation that
Speaker 1: somehow this was Russian disinformation. Guess what this was American
Speaker 1: disinformation that that actually wasn't a true story. No disagreement
Speaker 1: on much of what you said, but I do have
Speaker 1: to get specific because it's an important thing. I'm talking
Speaker 1: about mass voter fraud. There was no mass voter fraud
Speaker 1: in the twenty twenty election. I have not seen any
Speaker 1: evidence of mass voter fraud. I distinguished that from micro
Speaker 1: examples that have clearly been reported and documented. So, you know,
Speaker 1: the first first initial criticism that Iyet to see from
Speaker 1: him from Trump still tepid, let's be honest, which was, well,
Speaker 1: you know, I want to unit America and if Trump
Speaker 1: could have done it, then he would have done it,
Speaker 1: which actually I don't think is a bad message for
Speaker 1: a general election candidate, but in a Republican primary. I
Speaker 1: don't know how that's going to fly. Also, let's all
Speaker 1: be here, like, look, I think he's correct, there was
Speaker 1: no massive voter fraud in the twenty twenty election. I
Speaker 1: think you're going to have a tough time winning in
Speaker 1: the nomination with a blunt, basically statement of fact like that,
Speaker 1: as much as I would like it to be that way, Crystal,
Speaker 1: how many GOP primary candidates did we say go down
Speaker 1: overstop the steal? Yeah, over a dozen yes. Now, look
Speaker 1: all of them lost tests in GOP primary. It's huge.
Speaker 1: We have to be honest here. So I think that
Speaker 1: that answer certainly could be a problem for some of
Speaker 1: the folks in MAGA. If you listen to some of
Speaker 1: the longer interview, one of the things is I asked
Speaker 1: him out America. I think, really it came down to
Speaker 1: this two point oh versus one point zero. I would
Speaker 1: love to believe that there is a two point zero,
Speaker 1: but I'm looking at that diner. I think people like
Speaker 1: one point h and when I say one point oh,
Speaker 1: they like Trump. It's just a it's a personality. It's
Speaker 1: paired with Trump. Occasionally there's some policy and stuff that
Speaker 1: is sprinkled within there. And I just, you know, I
Speaker 1: didn't get from that interview yet. I'm like, you know,
Speaker 1: based on what I know and have seen from the
Speaker 1: dynamics of primaries with Republicans, I think it would be tough.
Speaker 1: It's a tough way. I mean, he uses a lot
Speaker 1: of buzzwords that don't mean a lot, like his whole
Speaker 1: like we need a national identity. I don't really know
Speaker 1: what that means concretely. And then when you talk about
Speaker 1: specific policy differences that he has from Trump. As I
Speaker 1: said earlier, he's worse. He's worse in terms of listen,
Speaker 1: I mean in terms of my opinion, but also in
Speaker 1: terms of the opinion of like eighty percent of people,
Speaker 1: including an overwhelming majority of the Republican primary base, that
Speaker 1: wants Social Security and medicare to stay intact. So he's actually,
Speaker 1: in a way not America first two point zero. He's
Speaker 1: sort of like a regression, a throwback on issues like
Speaker 1: that to more of the Paul Ryan Mitt Romney mindset,
Speaker 1: the other piece that we get a glimpse of there,
Speaker 1: And actually Marshall asked him a really great question about
Speaker 1: He was like, Okay, you say you want to be
Speaker 1: a unifier, but what you're saying about climate change in
Speaker 1: particular is going to like instantly piss off half of
Speaker 1: the country. And I think what he's speaking to there
Speaker 1: is a core Listen. I'm not a Republican, obviously, this
Speaker 1: guy's not for me, and I have a disagreement with
Speaker 1: him on any number of issues. However, I think the
Speaker 1: core flaw at the center of his case is he
Speaker 1: wants to be a unifier, but he's talking about and
Speaker 1: leaning into culture war issues, which are inherently going to
Speaker 1: divide the country figues, but that's what the base likes,
Speaker 1: and that's fine. But to be honest, but if you
Speaker 1: want to be a unifier, there's an obvious set of
Speaker 1: issues that you talk about which have appeal, you know,
Speaker 1: non like across partisan aisles, which are listen, what do
Speaker 1: most people care about? They want a job, they want
Speaker 1: a good wage, they want to have healthcare. He doesn't
Speaker 1: talk about any of that, which for most normal people,
Speaker 1: like these are the things that they really care deeply about,
Speaker 1: or being able to depend on social security when they retire.
Speaker 1: That's an actual unifying agenda. If you want to be
Speaker 1: a unifier, leaning into like transgenderism and you know, the
Speaker 1: central bank, digital currency and affirmative action or whatever whatever
Speaker 1: you think about those issues, they're not exactly big national
Speaker 1: unifying issues. I couldn't help but think that to be honest.
Speaker 1: You know, look, I would love to brand affirmative action
Speaker 1: now that you'd be very popular thing. Would I run
Speaker 1: on it? Probably not. It's one of those where it's
Speaker 1: just not really at the top. You know, I'm a commentator,
Speaker 1: I can talk about it. I know it's popular certainly,
Speaker 1: But like if I were running for office. I'm not
Speaker 1: sure that be the one that I would lead into.
Speaker 1: It's just missing the point of like the core issue.
Speaker 1: It's yes, okay, I agree with your posies, that's fine, right,
Speaker 1: but like that's your platform, And that was the first thing.
Speaker 1: He brought it up multiple times. I mean, that's the
Speaker 1: thing he's leaning it, and okay, you know, we'll see
Speaker 1: if it works out for him. My actual uh, I
Speaker 1: will say I actually thought one of the more interesting
Speaker 1: parts is on Medicare. And I was like, okay, well
Speaker 1: what about soci security medicare because it actually goes on
Speaker 1: a little bit more than the critique of spending. And
Speaker 1: he was like, well, maybe we would cap medicare at
Speaker 1: like ten million, And I was like, dude, that's just
Speaker 1: that's like not a lot of people. He was he said,
Speaker 1: that's a lot of people. I was like, I don't
Speaker 1: think that's a lot things testing. I mean, these are
Speaker 1: classic neoliberal, like conservative suggestions about these products. Have no
Speaker 1: issue with means testing into ten million. But it's one
Speaker 1: of those where I'm like, I don't think that even
Speaker 1: scratches the surface, because how many people have more than
Speaker 1: ten million dollars in this country? Maybe one hundred thousand,
Speaker 1: like maybe, I mean that's er point oh one percent almost.
Speaker 1: I do have an issue with means testing, even at
Speaker 1: the high end, because the reason these programs are so
Speaker 1: popular and successful is because everybody feels they have a stake.
Speaker 1: That's fair. But I'm saying without ten million dollars, you're
Speaker 1: not going to use medicare you have private health insurance.
Speaker 1: It's one of those is a non issue, like it's
Speaker 1: you know, we're not paying for your hel You're going
Speaker 1: to save the government three dollars congratulations, maybe less. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So anyway, so that was actually you'll actually lose the
Speaker 1: government money because of the additional paperwork it will take
Speaker 1: for people to prove that their income is lowered than
Speaker 1: so we have that that was there. I also press
Speaker 1: them a little bit on abortion, and I actually think
Speaker 1: that it was an interesting answer that it gave more
Speaker 1: politically popular, but also could be a problem for him
Speaker 1: in the primary. Let's take a listen. One of the
Speaker 1: vice president Pence, and big disagreement between him and President
Speaker 1: Trump is on a national abortion ban. Where do you
Speaker 1: stand on national abortion ban? So? I am pro life, However,
Speaker 1: I think that for years, on constitutional grounds we have
Speaker 1: correctly argued that this is a state's issue, and I
Speaker 1: think it should remain a state issue. I think overturning
Speaker 1: Row in the Dobbs decision I think was the right
Speaker 1: decision on hard constitutional grounds, full stop. I'm hardline on that,
Speaker 1: crystal clear. I think that we constitutionally finally got it right.
Speaker 1: That's where I'm at. For years it was argued to
Speaker 1: be a state's rights issue, and both for constitutional as
Speaker 1: well as public policy reasons, I think that's where it rested.
Speaker 1: So would you sign any federal abortion legislation fifteen week ban,
Speaker 1: twenty two week ban as proposed in the Congress. As
Speaker 1: somebody who is staunchly pro life and unapologetic about that fact,
Speaker 1: I think that the states should get to that answer.
Speaker 1: So one of the things that he said, Crystal is
Speaker 1: I would leave it to the states. If you want
Speaker 1: to continue watching. I actually press him for this might
Speaker 1: actually be the biggest problem for him in the primary.
Speaker 1: I said, okay, but what about a federal ban, like
Speaker 1: do you remember the Lindsay Graham fifteen week He actually said,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't sign any federal legislation. I would leave it
Speaker 1: fully up to the states. Now I'm not necessarily posted
Speaker 1: to that, but from a primary standpoint, the pro life
Speaker 1: community is definitely going to have an issue because that
Speaker 1: gives California, DC and others the ability to have legalized
Speaker 1: like late term abortions if they want to at the
Speaker 1: same time that you would have in Alabama or a
Speaker 1: Texas or any of these other places that do have
Speaker 1: an abortion band. So that act think actually could be
Speaker 1: a little bit dicey in terms of Now I'm not
Speaker 1: saying it isn't politically popular, but one of the reasons
Speaker 1: that Trump probably has way more wiggle room than anybody
Speaker 1: else is he appointed the justices that got roversus way done.
Speaker 1: So that's the first time I've heard vivag talk about abortion,
Speaker 1: or at least pressed on that, And I think actually
Speaker 1: that might be one of the more significant ones where
Speaker 1: there could be some disagreement with the evangelicals. Now for
Speaker 1: su would he ever win them in the first place? No? No, No, probably.
Speaker 1: I mean if Mike Pans isn't they got place right,
Speaker 1: They already got their guys. So I actually thought this
Speaker 1: was one of his better and more clear answers. She
Speaker 1: clearly knew what he thought about it. You pressed him
Speaker 1: on Okay, would you sign anything? Is like, no, leave
Speaker 1: it to the States consistent. So I thought that was
Speaker 1: actually a pretty solid answer, because yeah, I don't think
Speaker 1: the evangelical vote was really up for grabs for him
Speaker 1: in any case. Yeah, I think that's fair. And then
Speaker 1: finally there was a thing where Veg went on Hugh
Speaker 1: Hewitt Show, and Hugh Hewett, I don't really know why.
Speaker 1: He's a conservative radio host. For those who know don't know.
Speaker 1: He has these weird pay issues. He's obsessed that everybody
Speaker 1: know about. One of them is the nuclear Triad. So
Speaker 1: for those who don't know about the nuclear triad, it's
Speaker 1: nuclear defense of the United States land, sea, and air anyway,
Speaker 1: So he asked Vivik, do you know what the nuclear
Speaker 1: triad is? And Vivik was like, no, I don't. He said,
Speaker 1: but I'm a quick study. And one of the things
Speaker 1: that Marshall actually really pushed him on. He's like, look,
Speaker 1: you said you're a quick study. He's like, but you're
Speaker 1: running for president now, He's like, how are you gonna
Speaker 1: get to the level of knowledge that you need to
Speaker 1: be president? And look, some of these are arbitrary, but
Speaker 1: it does matter, right, Like whether you have a familiarity
Speaker 1: with issues and some of that he gave an interesting answer.
Speaker 1: Let's take a lesson. You had an interesting interview with
Speaker 1: Hugh hewittt earlier in the week. You didn't know what
Speaker 1: the nuclear triad meant, pride was. We'll put that to
Speaker 1: the side. You can learn what that term means. I
Speaker 1: know you know what it is now that said, I
Speaker 1: think the significance behind the question, though, is the president
Speaker 1: is in charge of the means to end the Earth.
Speaker 1: You can definitely train to learn what acronyms mean. I'm
Speaker 1: not convinced that you could learn in a year and
Speaker 1: a half. Bring partisan Fox News hits podcasts like this,
Speaker 1: How do I actually sit down with Shijing PingER Vladimir Putin?
Speaker 1: Convince me otherwise? Because I got your point about how
Speaker 1: I work, and thank you for taking the superficiality out
Speaker 1: of it, because you know, anyone can learn a term, right,
Speaker 1: So this is a word. Okay, I understand that there's land,
Speaker 1: air and see. But but I'm approaching this with humility.
Speaker 1: So I think I think one of the things that's
Speaker 1: different is yes, I'm I fast, steady. Yes, have I
Speaker 1: taken on other complicated problems before and learn them fast. Sure,
Speaker 1: but I got to approach this, and I am approaching
Speaker 1: this with humility. So I'll just tell you where I
Speaker 1: came from. Earlier today, I was having lunch upstairs in
Speaker 1: my house. I'm in the basement now with a former
Speaker 1: cabinet level secretary from the Trump administration who was over
Speaker 1: here visiting me. We spent two hours training. We're going
Speaker 1: to tape that. We're gonna do it daily. We got
Speaker 1: two hours at least daily where there's somebody coming in
Speaker 1: fly in here spending time with me in Columbus, Ohio.
Speaker 1: We're going to actually let the world watch how I learn.
Speaker 1: So it's an interesting idea. I mean, look, on the
Speaker 1: one hand, realities. Look, I appreciate the humility. I will
Speaker 1: say this. I mean, I don't want to laugh at anybody,
Speaker 1: because what do we learn with Yang campaign? All Right,
Speaker 1: Like with Yang, there's like you can have two percent
Speaker 1: of the Democratic Party or whatever and you can have
Speaker 1: a significant impact on the battle of ideas, et cetera.
Speaker 1: So I'm not going to dismiss it. I've known the
Speaker 1: guy for a while. I do think he's smart. That said,
Speaker 1: I think the biggest hole here is with the Republican
Speaker 1: primary voter, and you know his bet is basically the
Speaker 1: Obama bet, like New Hampshire and Iowa. But you know
Speaker 1: a lot of these issues they might do well on
Speaker 1: Twitter absolutely, you know, like you're talking about central bank
Speaker 1: digital currency, actually do care about that. I definitely would
Speaker 1: be opposed to it, But if I was running for office,
Speaker 1: I would never run on that count your like core platform.
Speaker 1: I also just think look with Trump, I mean the
Speaker 1: stop the Steel answer that he gave. I just think
Speaker 1: that's going to be the biggest problem for him. And
Speaker 1: I don't know if you want a primary that way.
Speaker 1: I wish it weren't so, But look at every Republican
Speaker 1: politician who was successful in a primary in twenty twenty two,
Speaker 1: almost all of them endorsedtop the Steel, and if they didn't,
Speaker 1: they came pretty damn close to actually losing their seat.
Speaker 1: That tells you something. Yeah, we've seen how it's gone
Speaker 1: when people try to do high brow stop. Yeah, we see.
Speaker 1: Because ultimately his response to you was like, I don't
Speaker 1: mean it was stolen in the way you're saying it.
Speaker 1: It's no, no, it's not the way you're saying it.
Speaker 1: It's the way that the like seventy percent of Republican
Speaker 1: voters who think it was stolen. They don't think like, oh,
Speaker 1: social that's part of it, right, No, they mean the
Speaker 1: what deneshe desuza like mules and bamboo ballots and like
Speaker 1: they mean real votes were changed, kind of voter fraud.
Speaker 1: And so you know, you're trying to have it both
Speaker 1: ways by saying, yes, I think it was fraudulent, but
Speaker 1: you know, I don't think any votes were actually stolen.
Speaker 1: That's not going to be sufficient for what they want
Speaker 1: to hear. Ultimately, I agree completely. So anyway, you can
Speaker 1: go watch the full thing. Yeah, I thought you did
Speaker 1: a good job interviewing, getting some things to him that
Speaker 1: he hadn't been pressed on before, which is always an
Speaker 1: interesting it's important additive to the conversation. My goal. Look,
Speaker 1: you know this is the problem like when he's an author,
Speaker 1: it's one thing because we're just talking, you know whatever,
Speaker 1: go to sick of that. But I was like, hey, man,
Speaker 1: like you're running for a Republican president. I got to
Speaker 1: ask you about the debt ceiling. I got to you know,
Speaker 1: like we've got abortion, stop the steal, Like these are
Speaker 1: all we live in this world. You and I Crystal
Speaker 1: and like you, and I know what the actual checkboxes
Speaker 1: are for anybody wants to make it in Washington. And
Speaker 1: that was kind of marshall Nized goal in getting out
Speaker 1: of that. So go watch the full thing if you're interested.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately we didn't have as much time as I would
Speaker 1: have liked, but he said he would come back, so
Speaker 1: we'll see, we'll see. Why did we get to it?
Speaker 1: We have some actually good news. So giant drugmaker Eli
Speaker 1: Lilly announced that they are going to cap the price
Speaker 1: of insulin. Now there are a few caveats that I'll
Speaker 1: get to in a moment, but first let me play
Speaker 1: for you the CEO of that company announcing the change today.
Speaker 1: We're announcing a seventy percent price cut on our most
Speaker 1: commonly used insulins, which will phase in over this year
Speaker 1: and effective today, a thirty five dollars cap. As you
Speaker 1: said on out of pocket why is that pharmacy counter. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So this is a culmination of about seven years of
Speaker 1: work we've been doing to reduce the price of our
Speaker 1: insulince launching our own generic to our own best selling brand.
Speaker 1: But with the change last year in the Medicare party benefit,
Speaker 1: the senior benefit to thirty five dollars. We think that
Speaker 1: should be the new standard in America. And so what
Speaker 1: we could wait for Congress to act or the healthcare
Speaker 1: system in general to apply that standard. We're just applying
Speaker 1: it ourselves. So what he's referring to there was a
Speaker 1: change that was part of the Inflation Reduction Act that
Speaker 1: would limit out of pocket costs for those who are
Speaker 1: on Medicare. And he's basically saying, Okay, well, that's the
Speaker 1: new standard, so we're going to move forward with that.
Speaker 1: President Biden's reaction here. Put this up on the screen.
Speaker 1: He says, huge news. Last year, we capped insulin prices
Speaker 1: for seniors on Medicare, but there was more work to do.
Speaker 1: I called on Congress and manufacturers to lower insulin prices
Speaker 1: for everyone else. Today, Eli Lilly is heeding my call.
Speaker 1: Others should follow. Let me go ahead and show you
Speaker 1: why this matters so much and just how much you're
Speaker 1: being ripped off right now by these drug companies when
Speaker 1: it comes to insulin. But this is the case for
Speaker 1: so many drugs across the board. Put the next up
Speaker 1: on the screen here, So this chart shows you the
Speaker 1: average price per vile of insulin by country. Here in
Speaker 1: the US it's damned near one hundred dollars. The next
Speaker 1: highest Japan at fourteen dollars, so still way less than
Speaker 1: the thirty five that they're moving it down to. Of course,
Speaker 1: thirty five is huge improvement over the one hundred dollars
Speaker 1: that it is basically now in Canada, just across the
Speaker 1: border's twelve dollars, Germany eleven, France nine, UK seven fifty
Speaker 1: in an Australia seven dollars. So this is again not
Speaker 1: just insulin. Every drug is like, we pay so much
Speaker 1: more for prescription drugs than every other country in the world.
Speaker 1: They use you and our healthcare system like their piggybank.
Speaker 1: This is where they make the overwhelming majority of their profits.
Speaker 1: All right, let's go and put this next piece up
Speaker 1: on the screen, which gives you some of the caveats
Speaker 1: here because I think myself you everyone's sort of like,
Speaker 1: what's their play? Because I know you're not just doing
Speaker 1: the sound and the goodness of your heart. Here's the
Speaker 1: New York Times article. They say Eli Lily says it
Speaker 1: will cut the price of insulin. The company also trumpeted
Speaker 1: an existing policy that caps monthly out of pocket costs
Speaker 1: for its saving products at thirty five dollars. They go
Speaker 1: on to report that their moves are somewhat limited. The
Speaker 1: lower list prices, which will take a factor over the
Speaker 1: course of this year, apply only to the company's older
Speaker 1: insulin products, and a large percentage of diabetes patients who
Speaker 1: need insulin take products made by two other major drug manufacturies,
Speaker 1: Santa Fies. Maybe how you say that At Novo Nordisk,
Speaker 1: insulin costs are estimated at ten dollars per file to manufacture,
Speaker 1: so they're still making a hefty profit here, and they
Speaker 1: also have I think it's important to always remember this.
Speaker 1: When insulin was actually invented by Frederick Banting. When he
Speaker 1: helped invent the drug, he refused to put his name
Speaker 1: on the first patent application. He thought it would be
Speaker 1: at odds with the hippocratic oath he had taken as
Speaker 1: a physician. The two scientists who's names were on the
Speaker 1: patent application transferred it to the University of Toronto for
Speaker 1: one dollar in hopes of making it as widely available
Speaker 1: and affordable as possible. That, of course, has not happened,
Speaker 1: they say. In recent years, the leading insulin manufacturies, including Lily,
Speaker 1: have replaced older products with newer, costlier versions and steadily
Speaker 1: increased their prices. So catch here is most patients are
Speaker 1: using other products from other companies number one. Number two,
Speaker 1: it only applies to the older versions of insulin that
Speaker 1: Eli Lilly themselves offer. And so if I had to guess,
Speaker 1: you know, they like the brand play, they like the
Speaker 1: halo that they get from making this big announcement on
Speaker 1: cable news and all of the coverage. They're hoping to
Speaker 1: eat into some of the market share of those other companies,
Speaker 1: and ultimately they still can make a hefty profit on this,
Speaker 1: even at the thirty five dollars price point, which again
Speaker 1: is still more than what everybody in other countries gets
Speaker 1: charged for this. That's why the Inflation Reduction Act thing
Speaker 1: was so stupid. It's because we're only capping it for
Speaker 1: seniors who are on Medicare. And look, I'm not saying
Speaker 1: that it's a bad thing. I think that's great. But
Speaker 1: you know a lot of people also have diabetes who
Speaker 1: are not on Medicare. So you know, I actually just
Speaker 1: saw the numbers. One in ten Americans have diabetes, about
Speaker 1: a third are pre diabetic. You're myself included by the
Speaker 1: way working on that. If you are too, God speed
Speaker 1: to you, I know that it's going to be a
Speaker 1: difficult journey. Now. The point is, though, is that this
Speaker 1: drug is vitally important for those one to ten Americans
Speaker 1: and many have died and or can go bankrupt simply
Speaker 1: because of insulin management. Now, if you have a good healthcare,
Speaker 1: that's one thing, but if you don't, this is a
Speaker 1: genuine like this will not only save your life, think
Speaker 1: about also the type one diabetics. So that's a whole
Speaker 1: other story. You know, with people who actually produce no insulin,
Speaker 1: this is one hundred percent of something they rely on,
Speaker 1: and many of them who come from disadvantaged backgrounds have
Speaker 1: along had problems here. Another problem also that we talk
Speaker 1: I've talked about ad nauseum is the rebates with the
Speaker 1: drug companies. So one of the fakeries here is that
Speaker 1: you will have a child or a family member who's
Speaker 1: got diabetes and then you have an X amount of
Speaker 1: spend that you're allowed to spend on drugs. And so
Speaker 1: with these costs, like you're going there, you're paying this
Speaker 1: fake thing and it comes out of the amount of
Speaker 1: money you need to spend on prescription drugs, and the
Speaker 1: drug in the price inflation negotiated between the drug companies
Speaker 1: and the pharmaceutical companies is such that it's much higher
Speaker 1: than you would have paid if you've just paid out
Speaker 1: of pocket. That's the nuts part of it, because then
Speaker 1: let's say that this person with diabetes, who probably statistically
Speaker 1: has obesity or some other underlying health condition, if then
Speaker 1: they need more drugs, then a lot of it is
Speaker 1: already come out of the pre spend that they're allowed
Speaker 1: to have on drugs. And next thing you know, you're
Speaker 1: unfallable on medical bankruptcy. And what did you just do
Speaker 1: your monologue on one of the biggest reasons why people
Speaker 1: have low credit scores in the South, which deprives you
Speaker 1: of a hell of a lot in American life, is
Speaker 1: medical bankruptcy. Medical debt. Medical debt is now the number
Speaker 1: one source of debt held by collection, so debt that
Speaker 1: is behind that's the number one driver of bankruptcies is
Speaker 1: medical debt. It is Our healthcare system is pure insanity.
Speaker 1: I mean, listen, I don't want to like I told
Speaker 1: you the caveats. This is good. It's an improvement, don't
Speaker 1: get me wrong. And I do think there is something
Speaker 1: to say here about the fact that you had, you know,
Speaker 1: a lot of political attention on this issue, you had
Speaker 1: the president involved, you actually got some legislation pass. So
Speaker 1: they can kind of see the writing on the wall
Speaker 1: here as well in terms of the direction that things
Speaker 1: might be heading in. And so they decided, all right,
Speaker 1: we'll just take the hit and get a little bit
Speaker 1: of a halo, and it's pr out of it. So
Speaker 1: it just shows you when the president actually does use
Speaker 1: his bully pulpit, when Congress actually does take some actions,
Speaker 1: it can force industry to at least do a little
Speaker 1: bit to make people's lives better as well. And so
Speaker 1: I think that's an important piece of this ultimately too. Yeah, No,
Speaker 1: I think it's important. I think people should take away
Speaker 1: from this that it's just, you know, the fact is
Speaker 1: this is mostly pr Most people still are going to
Speaker 1: have to pay a hell of a lot more for
Speaker 1: insulin than they should. Yeah, it's an even at thirty
Speaker 1: five dollars, they're still making a massive, massive profit off
Speaker 1: of all of us. Okay, next flock turns out, I
Speaker 1: know you CAUs will be shocked. Havana syndrome was fake
Speaker 1: all along. Who could have possibly predicted it and put
Speaker 1: this up on the screen. This is just amazing. So
Speaker 1: this is from the Washing Post. They say Havana syndrome
Speaker 1: not caused by energy weapon or foreign adversary. Intelligence review
Speaker 1: finds after years long assessment, five US intelligence agencies conclude
Speaker 1: it's quote very unlikely and enemy wielding a secret weapon
Speaker 1: was behind the mysterious ailment. Now, I don't know if
Speaker 1: you followed our coverage on all of this, but this
Speaker 1: was always highly suspicious. There was an infamous sixty minutes
Speaker 1: airview where they played what this Havanah syndrome supposedly sounded like,
Speaker 1: and they go to grade likes, it's not the sound
Speaker 1: that causes the injury, it's the impet the sounds of
Speaker 1: byproduct whatever. Well, people analyze the sound and they're like,
Speaker 1: that's literally crickets. It's literally just crickets making that sound. Yes,
Speaker 1: So there has never been any actual proof offered to
Speaker 1: the American public that this was some crazy new energy
Speaker 1: directed weapon, and it was always Russia that they wanted
Speaker 1: to pin this on, even though again no evidence offered
Speaker 1: for any of this. So we were, I would say,
Speaker 1: deeply skeptical from the beginning. Let me read you a
Speaker 1: little bit of this report. They say that the mysterious
Speaker 1: ailment known as Havanason did not result from the actions
Speaker 1: of a foreign adversary. The new intelligence assessment caps a
Speaker 1: year's long effort by the CIA and several other US
Speaker 1: intelligence agencies to explain my career diplomats, intelligence officers, and
Speaker 1: others serving in US missions around the world experience but
Speaker 1: they described as strange and painful acoustic sensations. Many of
Speaker 1: the afflicted personnel say they were the victims of a
Speaker 1: deliberate attack, possibly at the hands of Russia or another
Speaker 1: adversarial government. Claimed that the report contradicts in nearly every respect.
Speaker 1: They ow go cocker, Yeah, I mean, look, this is
Speaker 1: one of those which smelled from the beginning and it
Speaker 1: became this insane deep state like one of those things
Speaker 1: where they looked at it as an opportunity to I
Speaker 1: highlight the dangers of the things that they face overseas
Speaker 1: and what they exactly that they have to deal with.
Speaker 1: And look, we have a couple of clips here from
Speaker 1: some of the Wild Times on MSNBC where they aired
Speaker 1: so called survivors of Havana syndrome. What it did to
Speaker 1: have Ana syndrome and the credulousness which which they offered.
Speaker 1: It was clearly in the spirit of Russia Gate, because
Speaker 1: that was supposedly, you know, Russia was the main, number
Speaker 1: one major culprit who was poisoner using secret weapons on
Speaker 1: our diplomats. Let's take a listen to some of that.
Speaker 1: Was there a possibility that you'd been attacked in some way? Well,
Speaker 1: you know, well, you know, the first thing that went
Speaker 1: that came through my mind was it might be something
Speaker 1: like food poisoning. You know, I mean, look, I traveled
Speaker 1: all around the world. I think I'd been sick in
Speaker 1: every continent. But my suspicions started growing when you know,
Speaker 1: the next day and the days after, the symptoms didn't
Speaker 1: necessarily abide, and when I got back to the United States,
Speaker 1: particularly in early twenty eighteen, you know, I developed symptoms
Speaker 1: such as brain fog, I lost my long distance vision.
Speaker 1: You know. At that point, I think, you know, it
Speaker 1: was it was pretty clear to me that something very
Speaker 1: unusual had happened. This is a big deal. You know,
Speaker 1: these are attacks. You know, it's it's you know, it's
Speaker 1: an active war against US officials, active war against US
Speaker 1: statist That is a big deal. Saga maybe we just
Speaker 1: had food poison That would have been a big deal. Yeah,
Speaker 1: maybe he just had food poisoning. My dude, Like, what
Speaker 1: is going on here? So these people there's I got
Speaker 1: to play for you this other one and it's the
Speaker 1: whole thing is just amazing because it's one of NBC's
Speaker 1: main like national security reporters, Kendelanian, and uh, they don't
Speaker 1: present this as like there's this crazy theory out there
Speaker 1: that maybe it was Russia, but you know, there's no
Speaker 1: evidence to really back that up. No, his sources tell
Speaker 1: him that they actually have communications that they intercepted that
Speaker 1: indicate Russian officials are talking about this. And again to
Speaker 1: go back to the Washing Post report that's now debunking
Speaker 1: all of this quote, Uh, this person added there was
Speaker 1: no intelligence that foreign leaders, including in Russia, had any
Speaker 1: knowledge of or had authorized an attack on US personnel
Speaker 1: that could explain the symptom. So something got lost in
Speaker 1: translation there with our guy ken Over at NBC. But
Speaker 1: just again, take a listen to the way that this
Speaker 1: was presented to the American public, not like an out
Speaker 1: there theory that people are thinking about and maybe possibly,
Speaker 1: but this would be really out there. No, no, no,
Speaker 1: This was presented as all but fact of what was
Speaker 1: going on here. Take a listen exclusive new reporting this
Speaker 1: morning from NBC News. Intelligence agencies investigating attacks on US
Speaker 1: diplomats in Cuba and China now strongly suspect that Russia
Speaker 1: is to blame. Twenty six government workers in Havana had
Speaker 1: mysterious brain injuries starting in late twenty sixteen, and then
Speaker 1: this year, one US worker in China was diagnosed with
Speaker 1: similar symptoms. Joining me now with more on this as
Speaker 1: NBC News Intelligence at National Security reporter Kendelanian. So this
Speaker 1: has been a mystery. The CIA, the FBI, other intelligence
Speaker 1: agencies have all been working to try to figure out
Speaker 1: what exactly happened here. Why do they suspect Russia now?
Speaker 1: And what's the evidence that they have. Well, it's still
Speaker 1: partially a mystery, Chris, but they have more and more evidence,
Speaker 1: they say, three US officials tell us pointing to Russia,
Speaker 1: including communication intercepts that suggest that the Russian intelligence agency
Speaker 1: was involved. Now, really there was only three suspects from
Speaker 1: the beginning here, Russia, China, and the Cubans. The Russian
Speaker 1: and the Chinese intelligence services operate in force in Cuba
Speaker 1: and it's still believed that it's possible that some element
Speaker 1: of the Cuban intelligence services cooperated with this. The other
Speaker 1: interesting thing we're reporting here is that one of the
Speaker 1: technologies used to injure these American spies and diplomats was
Speaker 1: some kind of microwave weapon that is so sophisticated the
Speaker 1: Americans don't even fully understand it, and they've been testing
Speaker 1: some kinds of aspects of this technology, so kind of
Speaker 1: reverse engineering, is that what they're trying to do? Absolutely,
Speaker 1: because the military has been the US military has worked
Speaker 1: on microwave technology and tried to deploy it as weapons
Speaker 1: over the years. Apparently the Russians have as well, and
Speaker 1: it can make people think they're hearing sounds. That's why
Speaker 1: initially this was thought to be a sonic attack of
Speaker 1: some sort. Chris, what do we know about the people?
Speaker 1: Were individuals targeted? Was it just a group that was targeted?
Speaker 1: And do we have any idea about a motive why
Speaker 1: these people? And then again these are only theories, But
Speaker 1: what our sources are telling us is that this was
Speaker 1: an intentional attack, because initially people thought it could be
Speaker 1: a byproduct of some spying technology gone awry, but it's
Speaker 1: now believed that this was meant to hurt these spies
Speaker 1: and diplomats who have suffered serious brain injuries. And if
Speaker 1: this is confirmed it was Russia, Chris, it would be
Speaker 1: a game changer because the sort of unwritten rules of
Speaker 1: the spying game are you don't go after the other
Speaker 1: person's spies and diplomats, you don't try to hurt them. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So anyway, that's that's the way it was presented, like
Speaker 1: this was all It was definitely Russia. They intercepted these
Speaker 1: communications that they really were leaning in this direction of
Speaker 1: this energy directed weapon all amount of sense. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: this is not a joke. That wasn't just that was
Speaker 1: NBC News that was on like actual network television that
Speaker 1: went out to buy some smod's like five six million people.
Speaker 1: Where's the retraction? What kind of reporting is this? It's
Speaker 1: complete bs to the extent that the Russians probably did
Speaker 1: talk about it there. Can you believe these dumbasses things
Speaker 1: that we shot microwaves at them in Havana. They're literally
Speaker 1: laughing at us probably in Moscow that we took it seriously. Also,
Speaker 1: let's not forget the US Congress and Biden passed and
Speaker 1: signed into law quote unquote aid for victims of havanas,
Speaker 1: so do we get our money? Pack? What happens to
Speaker 1: that money? They did that before they were able to
Speaker 1: get their act together in the Packed Act for burn
Speaker 1: Pit Victims correct burn Pit victims were bailed out after
Speaker 1: quote victims of Havana syndrome. I actually really want to
Speaker 1: know what happens to that money. Now. I don't wish
Speaker 1: sickness on anyone, but you know, there's probably a high
Speaker 1: correlation between being a spook, being deployed for a long time,
Speaker 1: and neurosis. Can I just say that sure, probably stressful.
Speaker 1: I'm sure it's a very stressful job that can lead
Speaker 1: to all types of like real symptoms where you're having
Speaker 1: like real physical impacts. Everybody deserves the care that they need.
Speaker 1: But let's not invent fake syndromes. Let's just say it
Speaker 1: was probably psychosomatic from day one. And yeah, anyway, that's
Speaker 1: what we'll leave it at that. Let's go to the
Speaker 1: next one here. This is a very interesting story that
Speaker 1: actually highlights one of the initial problems about Elon buying
Speaker 1: Twitter that most people were not focusing on, which is
Speaker 1: that Tesla, the company of which the vast majority of
Speaker 1: Elon wealth is based in of course, has major business
Speaker 1: ties to the CCP beyond actually just financial but manufacturing
Speaker 1: ev battery supply chain, a major reliance on being able
Speaker 1: to do business in China that was negotiated and now
Speaker 1: long years long into the deal, such that if Tesla
Speaker 1: did he lose some of its Shanghai facilities and some
Speaker 1: of its other battery supply chain and others inside of
Speaker 1: China would be a devastating blow to the company well
Speaker 1: as predicted his ownership of Twitter, and now the voicing
Speaker 1: of his opinions is causing a bit of a problem.
Speaker 1: So let's put this up there on the screen. Chinese
Speaker 1: state run media warned the Tesla CEO, Elon Musk, he
Speaker 1: was risking his relationship with China after he retweeted about
Speaker 1: the US government's quote low confidence assessment in the COVID
Speaker 1: pandemic originating in a Wuhan lab. The warning is one
Speaker 1: of the first that has yet been issued towards Elon,
Speaker 1: and it was actually published in the Global Time. So
Speaker 1: for people who don't know what the Global Times is,
Speaker 1: it's kind of all state All media in China is
Speaker 1: state run, So let's put it that way. That said,
Speaker 1: it's nuanced because the state run media they allow the
Speaker 1: hard line like the tiger element of the CCP. That's
Speaker 1: the Global Times. They're like the attack dogs, and then
Speaker 1: they have the more diplomatic ones. We're like, no, we
Speaker 1: shouldn't write that in the Globals is the one Matt
Speaker 1: Gates does, That's right, Yeah, so, like the Global Times
Speaker 1: is one of those where they they'll frequently attack people
Speaker 1: on Twitter and even though there's no Twitter in China. Hilariously, anyway,
Speaker 1: the point is is that they warned Elon that by
Speaker 1: publishing this that you are quote breaking the pot of China.
Speaker 1: Breaking the pot after eating in Chinese means quote biting
Speaker 1: the hand that feeds you. So China is not dumb.
Speaker 1: They know exactly what their relationship to Tesla means. They
Speaker 1: know that Elon needs them quite a bit. We should
Speaker 1: also not forget I've did an entire monologue about this,
Speaker 1: not only about the business ties, but Elon in the
Speaker 1: past has set some sketchy stuff about China. He's used
Speaker 1: like Chinese social media to be like congratulations to like
Speaker 1: the anniversary of the Communist revolution and congratulating them on
Speaker 1: the you know, like anniversary of their government, and he
Speaker 1: has made a lot of trips to China and met
Speaker 1: with some of the most senior officials, and it just
Speaker 1: comes down to the fact that China owns about eighty
Speaker 1: five percent of the ev battery supply chain around the world,
Speaker 1: and with Tesla specifically, they need that Shanghai facility in
Speaker 1: order to make sure that they can continue. The growth
Speaker 1: of the company is vital to the stock price, which
Speaker 1: is making a hit right now. So this actually could
Speaker 1: be from my knowledge, really the most consequential thing to
Speaker 1: come yet from Elon's ownership of Twitter, because it's specifically
Speaker 1: him retweeting and airing these concerns. And you know, on
Speaker 1: top of ideologically, of course he's kind of aligned with
Speaker 1: that he's into cash twenty two or what he's going
Speaker 1: to do. It's and it's the supply chain, and it's
Speaker 1: also obviously China's domestic market for its huge if he
Speaker 1: has massive So this is really important for Tesla. And
Speaker 1: just I pulled a couple examples of what you were
Speaker 1: talking about, Sager. So days after the US enacted the
Speaker 1: Weager Forced Labor Prevention Act in January, Tesla opened a
Speaker 1: brand new showroom in Jinjang, that is the region with
Speaker 1: the four labor camps center. Mark or Rubio at that
Speaker 1: time accused Tesla quote helping the Chinese Communist Party cover
Speaker 1: up genocide and slave labor. There's also another incident that
Speaker 1: I was reading about where there was a lot of
Speaker 1: criticism on Chinese social media over some accidents that people
Speaker 1: were claiming were caused by like Tesla's breaking system and
Speaker 1: perhaps a self driving system or whatever. And Musk reportedly
Speaker 1: actually reached out to the government to get them to
Speaker 1: try to censor that. Not so, I mean, it just
Speaker 1: gives you a sense of like, you know, this business
Speaker 1: relationship has been very close, it's been very symbiotic. The
Speaker 1: Chinese government likes having Tesla there. It's prestigious. You know,
Speaker 1: they need high quality cars to feed for their own
Speaker 1: ev domestic market. That's important to them, but it's far
Speaker 1: more important. Like China can afford to lose Tesla, no problem, Elon,
Speaker 1: Musk can't really afford to lose the Chinese market and
Speaker 1: the supply chain and all the pease built. What China
Speaker 1: did with Elon was brilliant, And this is why I
Speaker 1: look as much, you know, I don't want them to.
Speaker 1: I admire them. I have to. So one of the
Speaker 1: things that they did is they're like, hey, we got
Speaker 1: cheap labor, we got the raw materials. Come on in here.
Speaker 1: You build up this nice facility, which we never allow
Speaker 1: American companies to do. Well. One of the things that
Speaker 1: a company like Tesla does when they build that facility
Speaker 1: is then they go out and they find the sources
Speaker 1: and they build this whole vertically supply chain right from
Speaker 1: the suppliers to the companies and the workers and the
Speaker 1: facilities and all that. But lo and behold all of
Speaker 1: the infrastructure that supports the Tesla supply chain. Oh, let's
Speaker 1: use it for the Chinese EV supply chain. So they
Speaker 1: not only got to keep control of Tesla basically now
Speaker 1: by controlling his access to facility, now they have all
Speaker 1: of these sourcing areas and companies and all of the
Speaker 1: know how and the technology for the Chinese supply chain.
Speaker 1: And then ten years from now, if they kick Tesla out,
Speaker 1: they're like I don't care about you. They're like, I
Speaker 1: don't think about you at all. We have our own
Speaker 1: EV companies. You built the supply chain, and the gave
Speaker 1: us a technical know how and brought all your executives
Speaker 1: in you made us rich and it didn't cost us
Speaker 1: a single dime. In fact, you paid us to do it.
Speaker 1: This is what they do in a lot of different facilities.
Speaker 1: So again, you know, like they are our advisars, but
Speaker 1: I got to admire them. They're smart the way that
Speaker 1: they handle themselves over there. For Elon, I think this
Speaker 1: is a big problem, and it's one of those where
Speaker 1: it might be one of the most consequential things that
Speaker 1: ends up, because look, what if there's a future Hong
Speaker 1: Kong protests, what if there's more COVID zero protests that
Speaker 1: are happening. Do you think that they will not resort
Speaker 1: to telling Elon, we will kick your ass out of
Speaker 1: China if you don't censor that on Twitter. They know
Speaker 1: and have done it before to many tech CEOs, including
Speaker 1: the TikTok CEO of xiang Jiming. They have no qualms
Speaker 1: whatsoever about putting the screws on you. From that angle,
Speaker 1: I really think he's very vulnerable. Well, and to zoom
Speaker 1: out from Elon specifically, this is the perfect case in
Speaker 1: point of why having any of your like democracy, free
Speaker 1: speech infrastructure in the hands of one person whoever that
Speaker 1: person is whether you think that they're aligned with you
Speaker 1: or have the right values or well in touched or whatever.
Speaker 1: You're always going to run into issues like this because
Speaker 1: people are flawed, they have conflicts of interest, they have
Speaker 1: blind spots, et cetera. So this is just kind of
Speaker 1: a cautionary tale of that mode of hoping that one
Speaker 1: good billionaire is gonna rescue your democratic infrastructure. Salt democracy, Crystal,
Speaker 1: what are you taking a look at? Well, got a
Speaker 1: new entry for you in our travelog as we journey
Speaker 1: across scam Land, fake media mogul who's now been indicted
Speaker 1: and interested on multiple charges of fraud in what the
Speaker 1: government says was a multi year, multi million dollar effort
Speaker 1: to defraud investors, including some wild tales of fake documents,
Speaker 1: selling stock that didn't exist, and even identity theft. Meet
Speaker 1: Carlos Watson. We first introduced you to Carlos in September
Speaker 1: of twenty twenty one, when Ben Smith, who was then
Speaker 1: at The New York Times, blew the lid off of
Speaker 1: his whole puffed up media scam. Here is that article.
Speaker 1: In its Smith explains how Watson attracted a who's who
Speaker 1: list of investors for his millennial media play was called Ozzie.
Speaker 1: From Loreene Palll Jobs to Silicon Valley venture capitalist Ron Conway,
Speaker 1: to some big institutional players like publishing giant Axel, Springer,
Speaker 1: media investment bank, Lion Try, the Ford Foundation and iHeartMedia.
Speaker 1: Billionaire hedge funder and major dem donor Mark Lazr ended
Speaker 1: up as chair of the board. All in, Ozzy was
Speaker 1: able to raise more than eighty three million dollars. Now,
Speaker 1: Ozzie build itself as a quote diverse, global and forward
Speaker 1: looking median entertainment company focused on the new and the
Speaker 1: next bunch of garbage buzzwords that apparently rich people fell
Speaker 1: all over themselves for now. Their launch video, which is
Speaker 1: still pinned to their YouTube channel, includes both Hillary Clinton
Speaker 1: and Carl Rove, even as the text on that video
Speaker 1: declares that Ozzie is for the daring and the unconventional.
Speaker 1: So won't shock you to find out that all of
Speaker 1: those millions of dollars went to produce a bunch of
Speaker 1: content that was safe, unoriginal garbage that absolutely no one
Speaker 1: cared about. It was an instant and consistent failure. A
Speaker 1: quick perusal of the Ozzi YouTube channel exposes quite clearly
Speaker 1: just how much of a failure are Ozzi ultimately was.
Speaker 1: Their average video garnered mere hundreds of views. Some didn't
Speaker 1: even break into the hundreds. Even videos that were able
Speaker 1: to crack into the thousands often had next to no engagement,
Speaker 1: creating a strong suspicion that the views they did receive
Speaker 1: were probably purchased. Now. According to Ben Smith's reporting, there'd
Speaker 1: long been rumors about Ozzie's actual success versus all of
Speaker 1: its puffery, but the wheels really came off with one
Speaker 1: fateful conference call. So Ozzie was trying to raise additional
Speaker 1: cash to keep their head above water. The company was
Speaker 1: now loaded up with high interest debt, churning through massive
Speaker 1: amounts of cash in order to just keep the lights on.
Speaker 1: Goldman Sachs was considering an investment, but there was one catch.
Speaker 1: The investment bank wanted to hear from YouTube about their
Speaker 1: partnership with Ozzie and about Ozzie's supposedly great performance on
Speaker 1: the channel. Of course, there was no partnership, and Ozzie's numbers,
Speaker 1: readily available to anyone who had the Internet, were absolute
Speaker 1: garbage Rather than defeat. However, Watson and his co founder
Speaker 1: Samir Raw cooked up another scheme. Now, Rao got the
Speaker 1: meaning switched from Zoo, where of course faces are visible,
Speaker 1: to a regular old conference call. He then used voice
Speaker 1: altering software to mask his own normal speaking voice and
Speaker 1: pretended to be a YouTube executive attesting to the company's
Speaker 1: phenomenal partnership and track record. Goldman actually wasn't buying it.
Speaker 1: After the call, they reached out to the actual, very
Speaker 1: confused YouTube executive who Rao had impersonated, and confirmed what
Speaker 1: they had suspected all along, that the whole call was
Speaker 1: completely faked. In response, Carlos Watson, well, he immediately threw Rao,
Speaker 1: his co filen founder, under the bus. Watson claimed he
Speaker 1: had no idea about the call at all, and that
Speaker 1: Rao was just having a mental breakdown, which led to
Speaker 1: this outrageous behavior. Once the whole situation was exposed in
Speaker 1: The New York Times, Watson doubled down on these claims
Speaker 1: and proclaimed to Today's Shows Craig Melvin that far from
Speaker 1: killing the company, these revelations would lead to Ozzie's Lazarus
Speaker 1: Moment joining us now exclusively. Carlos Watson, Ozzie Media's CEO.
Speaker 1: Good morning two Starm, good morning, good see Thanks for
Speaker 1: coming in. Let's start with the status of Ozzy as
Speaker 1: we say it right now. Reports that the company shutdown
Speaker 1: on Friday? Is that true? Is the company shut down?
Speaker 1: Are you still loving for business? You know we're going
Speaker 1: to open for business, so we're making news today. This
Speaker 1: is our Lazarus moment, if you will. This is our
Speaker 1: tail and all moment. Last week was traumatic, It was difficult,
Speaker 1: heartbreaking in many ways, and at the end of the
Speaker 1: week we did suspend operations with a plan to wind down.
Speaker 1: But as we spend time over the weekend, we talked
Speaker 1: to advertising partners, we talked to some of our readers
Speaker 1: and our viewers, our listeners, our investors. I think Ozzie's
Speaker 1: is part of this moment, and it's not going to
Speaker 1: be easy. But I think what we do with newsletters,
Speaker 1: what we do with TV shows, original TV shows, podcasted more,
Speaker 1: I think is a place. Let's talk about this phone call.
Speaker 1: I mean, did you know that your partner, the co
Speaker 1: found of this company, was going to impersonate a YouTube
Speaker 1: executive on a call. Yeah? No, and it's sad and
Speaker 1: it's difficult. It was wrong. Obviously they figured it out
Speaker 1: very quickly. But here's the thing. Someone would wonder perhaps,
Speaker 1: I mean, you're on a call with Golden Sacks, you're
Speaker 1: trying to score forty million dollars in funding. Why were
Speaker 1: you not on the call? And how did you not
Speaker 1: have any knowledge of the call? You know, part of
Speaker 1: the fundraising process, you end up talking to a lot
Speaker 1: of people, and I'm not on every call, and there
Speaker 1: are lots of these reference calls that happen. They I
Speaker 1: think probably ended up talking to three, four, maybe five
Speaker 1: of our references. They also to talk to members of
Speaker 1: the team, They talk to more other investors, and so
Speaker 1: they're a fair number of things that are involved, and
Speaker 1: you're not a part of all of them. Now, this
Speaker 1: was not, in fact, their Lazarus moment. In reality, was
Speaker 1: the beginning of the end. Last week, Carlos Watson was arrested.
Speaker 1: He was charged with conspiracy to commit securities fraud, conspiracy
Speaker 1: to commit wire fraud, and aggravated identity theft. He'll be
Speaker 1: shocked to learn that Watson Courtney of the government was
Speaker 1: in the room coaching row when that infamous Golden Sax
Speaker 1: conference call all went down. Now, Rao has already pled
Speaker 1: guilty along with Watson's former chief of staff, and they
Speaker 1: are presumably singing to the Feds about everything that they know.
Speaker 1: According to the indictment, this was not even the first
Speaker 1: time that Watson impersonated a media executive in a desperate
Speaker 1: bid to raise more millions for the whole failing enterprise.
Speaker 1: For years, he allegedly engaged in a web of just
Speaker 1: outright lies about the company's revenue, their projected revenue, the
Speaker 1: nature and existence of their TV contracts, the timing of
Speaker 1: their stock offerings. He invented the possibility of a company's sale.
Speaker 1: They forged documents and signatures, and in one noteworthy instance,
Speaker 1: a bank they were trying to secure funds from wanted
Speaker 1: to see proof of a cable network contract for the
Speaker 1: second season of an Ozzi TV show. Of course, that
Speaker 1: contract didn't actually exist. So what, according to the indictment,
Speaker 1: did Watson do in face with this dilemma, Well, he
Speaker 1: directed Ozzie's then CFO to send the bank a fake
Speaker 1: signed contract between Ozzie and the cable network reporting to
Speaker 1: be for the second season. When the then CFO refused,
Speaker 1: raw with Watson's approval, sent the fake contract, which contained
Speaker 1: terms favorable to Ozzie and a forged signature, to the bank.
Speaker 1: Copying the then CFO. Later that day, the then CFO
Speaker 1: emailed Watson and Row to say that she was resigning,
Speaker 1: effective immediately. She explained, quote, this is illegal, This is fraud.
Speaker 1: This is forging someone's signature with the intent of getting
Speaker 1: an advance from a publicly traded bank. She continued to
Speaker 1: be crystal clear. What you see as a measured risk,
Speaker 1: I see as a felony. Ozzie accumulated years of lies
Speaker 1: and fraud and obvious public failure when it came to
Speaker 1: the content. Yet Watson was able to fool so many
Speaker 1: elites in parting with millions of dollars. Even at the end.
Speaker 1: Once the whole Goldman Sacks conference call debacle was all exposed,
Speaker 1: billionaire chair of the Board Mark Lasari stood by his man,
Speaker 1: apparently buying the whole mental breakdown cover story. He told
Speaker 1: The Times quote, the board was made aware of the
Speaker 1: incident and we fully support the way it was handled.
Speaker 1: The incident was an unfortunate, one time event. Carlos and
Speaker 1: his team show the kind of compassion we would all
Speaker 1: want if any of us faced a difficult situation in
Speaker 1: our own lives. How did they all get van boozled
Speaker 1: well Carlos had worked at Golden Sacks himself, not to
Speaker 1: mention McKinsey Consulting, It was a Harvard grad former MSNBC anchor,
Speaker 1: so his elite credentials card was fully filled out. Those
Speaker 1: positions also gave him knowledge the elite circles and the
Speaker 1: language of finance and media, so that he knew how
Speaker 1: to fake and lie what he needed to fake and lie.
Speaker 1: He was a black founder making content that was totally
Speaker 1: comfy for the ruling class at a time when there
Speaker 1: was a big push for trailblazers and hollow identity plays
Speaker 1: well radical black media. They didn't have a chance of
Speaker 1: getting funded, but this Every billionaire in the country, dying
Speaker 1: to burnish their brand and sue their conscious could get
Speaker 1: behind this kind of drivel and Watson's pitch it landed
Speaker 1: at exactly the right time. He sold them all on
Speaker 1: reaching a millennial audience that they didn't really understand, but
Speaker 1: which they were desperate to cash in on literal fake media. Now,
Speaker 1: as for me, I'm going to take Carlos's downfall and
Speaker 1: unmasking the official elite paper of record, The New York Times,
Speaker 1: as a hopeful sign. Maybe, just maybe, the shelf life
Speaker 1: of the type of vapid identity play that Watson was peddling.
Speaker 1: Maybe it's finally reached its expiration date. So we tracked
Speaker 1: this one early. And if you want to hear my
Speaker 1: reaction to Crystal's monologue, become a premium subscriber today at
Speaker 1: breakingpoints dot com. What do you look at zagre Well,
Speaker 1: I won't lie and say it hasn't been satisfying watching
Speaker 1: the mainstream media reckon with the fact that the Energy
Speaker 1: Department and now the FBI director say they believe COVID
Speaker 1: is the result of a lab league from the Wuhan
Speaker 1: Institute of Virology. They were so smug for so long
Speaker 1: on the possibility. They smeared people who discussed it as racists.
Speaker 1: They kept it out of the public consciousness for years.
Speaker 1: One way to look at it is the truth inevitably
Speaker 1: came out. That's a victory, right. But another way, and
Speaker 1: the way I'm increasingly looking at it, is this is
Speaker 1: a classic Washington story. Corruption, no accountability, time, disclosures, captured media,
Speaker 1: most importantly, no consequences. When you step back and you
Speaker 1: consider it, the origin of COVID matters immensely for many reasons.
Speaker 1: Number one, We need to make sure this never happens again.
Speaker 1: If this is the type of gain of function research
Speaker 1: which led to one deadly pandemic, we should be damn
Speaker 1: sure we have the highest safety standards worldwide if it
Speaker 1: continues to be practiced. Number two. Even the Chinese controlled
Speaker 1: World Health Organization says that some three quarters of a
Speaker 1: billion people have been confirmed infected with COVID, which means
Speaker 1: a real number is likely orders of magnitude higher. Some
Speaker 1: seven million people have died from it. While it could
Speaker 1: have been a lot worse, COVID was still a disaster
Speaker 1: for the human race. It shut down our societies. It
Speaker 1: gave immense power to the government. It fundamentally reset a
Speaker 1: lot of American and global life, the relationship to the state.
Speaker 1: As important as it is right now to grapple with
Speaker 1: those changes, not lose sight of what caused it in
Speaker 1: the first place. And I made a comment in one
Speaker 1: of our last shows about how this is just like
Speaker 1: IRAQ WMD. I increasingly believe that a comparison rings true.
Speaker 1: IRAQ WMD was, depending on who you believe, either fake
Speaker 1: from the beginning or the greatest intelligence failure in modern mystery.
Speaker 1: It was used right senior government officials to manipulate the
Speaker 1: press and the American people to lead us into a
Speaker 1: similarly disastrous war in Iraq. It took full year, two
Speaker 1: full years after the invasion of Iraq for Congressional Commission
Speaker 1: on What WMD's and Intelligence to admit it was fake
Speaker 1: the whole time. It took months later even for President
Speaker 1: Bush to admit to the American people he was wrong,
Speaker 1: and really up until two thousand and six before he
Speaker 1: would really fully acknowledge it. Why did that delay matter,
Speaker 1: because by the time the debate of that was happening
Speaker 1: was about what to do in Iraq, should we surge
Speaker 1: and withdraw? How do we deal with insurgency? And because
Speaker 1: by that time, the CIA director, the man perhaps most
Speaker 1: responsible for the false intelligence estimate in Iraq, had already
Speaker 1: resigned from the government. By the time we really and
Speaker 1: fully acknowledging in Rumsfeld, George Tenant, Paul Wolfowitz, Scooter Libby,
Speaker 1: many of the others who are no longer in they
Speaker 1: were no longer in positions of power that they once held.
Speaker 1: And sure there were yells from Democrats in Congress and
Speaker 1: the media about how they were liars, how they should
Speaker 1: be held accountable, but not one to this day has
Speaker 1: suffered any consequence for their role in leading the American
Speaker 1: people to the war in Iraq. In fact, when the
Speaker 1: report dropped, of course it was a big deal, but
Speaker 1: most people had mostly moved on. It was just a
Speaker 1: fact of life that the government had lied about wmd
Speaker 1: Now what to do with the mess in Iraq? And
Speaker 1: the hundreds of American troops are getting killed by IEDs.
Speaker 1: The crazy party is, though, is when you compare this
Speaker 1: lab league Lablaque honestly might be worse. At least, the
Speaker 1: US Congress agreed on a bipartisan commission to investigate whether
Speaker 1: WMDs were a lie or not. Our Congress is totally
Speaker 1: split on partisan lines. Republicans are the only ones willing
Speaker 1: to investigate the lab league. Democrats repeatedly blocked these attempts
Speaker 1: in Congress. In fact, the only reason that we even
Speaker 1: know about this Energy Department and FBI intelligence assessment is
Speaker 1: because the GOP took control of House and the intelligence
Speaker 1: community was preparing summaries for subpoenas that they are expected
Speaker 1: to deliver on the intelligence as related to the lab leak.
Speaker 1: To date, none of this has been publicized, None of
Speaker 1: it has been declassified for the American people or people
Speaker 1: like us to go through and read the raw documents
Speaker 1: or the intelligent summaries or interviews of any of these
Speaker 1: people involved. It is not an accident you're hearing about
Speaker 1: this three years later because the principal actors involved can
Speaker 1: no longer suffer any real consequences. The chief criminal amongst
Speaker 1: them is doctor Fauci, the man most responsible for dispensing
Speaker 1: US funds to the Wuhan Lab and for covering it
Speaker 1: up in the media. He's gone. He left the government
Speaker 1: in an NIH in December. He's no longer subject to
Speaker 1: the same requirements to appear before Congress, and he's no
Speaker 1: longer an employee of the US government subject to previous
Speaker 1: scrutiny he made his millions documentaries, book deals, speaking fees.
Speaker 1: I have zero confidence whatsoever anything will happen to him
Speaker 1: for lying to us repeatedly about the lab leak and
Speaker 1: about actively covering it up at the time or the
Speaker 1: media angle. There's no more famous example on a rack
Speaker 1: WMD than Judy Miller, who published straight up Bush propaganda
Speaker 1: on a rack for WMD for the New York Times.
Speaker 1: Now Look. She eventually was fired for her role in that,
Speaker 1: and she had to apologize on lab leak though, look
Speaker 1: at this. Apoorva Mondavli, the lead COVID reporter for the
Speaker 1: New York Times, She wrote in May twenty twenty one, quote,
Speaker 1: someday we will stop talking about the lab leak theory
Speaker 1: and maybe even admit its racist roots. Alas that day
Speaker 1: is not yet here. She not only wrote that she
Speaker 1: won a Pulitzer Prize for her coverage of COVID in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty one. Now that the US government even admits
Speaker 1: lab leak is almost certainly true, is there an apology recrimination? No? Nothing,
Speaker 1: that's the crazy part. Absolutely no consequences. The same people
Speaker 1: who dismissed it with a straight face, pretending they never did.
Speaker 1: And just like with the rack WMD, they just wanted
Speaker 1: to fade away into the distance, become something else. That
Speaker 1: something else can be important, but the original sin must
Speaker 1: never be forgotten. And that's just one of those where
Speaker 1: I keep coming back to it. And if you want
Speaker 1: to hear my reaction to Sagre's monologue, become a premium
Speaker 1: subscriber today at Breakingpoints dot com. Bronco Marchatic is a
Speaker 1: staff writer for Jackman and he joins us, now great
Speaker 1: to Caeesar. Good see many fleas flanks over. Yeah. Absolutely,
Speaker 1: I think I'm getting better at saying your name, so
Speaker 1: I've been worth working on it here. So let's go
Speaker 1: and put this latest piece up on the screen, which
Speaker 1: is thoroughly reported and I think really significant and important.
Speaker 1: The headline here is the state of Ukrainian democracy is
Speaker 1: not strong, subhad is. One year after Russia's invasion, Ukraine
Speaker 1: is backsliding away from democratic freedoms and liberal pluralism. Let
Speaker 1: me just read another piece here. You write Bronco. While
Speaker 1: authoritarianism is nothing new in the country, and the country
Speaker 1: being Ukraine, it is severely worsened in the wake of
Speaker 1: the invasion, which has seen a centralization of power by
Speaker 1: Zelenski's government and a crackdown on dissonance and all things
Speaker 1: quote pro Russian. A lack of Western Median per book attention,
Speaker 1: coupled with US and European policies actively exacerbating it, are
Speaker 1: helping to fuel the problem. So give us the outlines
Speaker 1: of what you found here. Yeah, I mean, as you said,
Speaker 1: authoritarism in Ukraine is not a new thing. I mean
Speaker 1: even in the Zelenski in tween nineteen, Ukraine has been
Speaker 1: ranked lower than in Hungary by Freedom House in terms
Speaker 1: of you know, democratic credentials. It's actually gone lower by
Speaker 1: some measures under Zelenski, you know, started cracking down on
Speaker 1: opposition parties and the like as his popularity started plummeting,
Speaker 1: you know, towards twenty twenty one or so. But it's
Speaker 1: really ratchet up since the start of the war, which
Speaker 1: to some extent is understandable. I mean, I think any country,
Speaker 1: you know, you look at at war time, you tend
Speaker 1: to see a curtailment of freedoms and civil liberties and
Speaker 1: so on and so forth. But I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: just to say that it happens and it's an organic
Speaker 1: outcome of a country being attacked does not mean that
Speaker 1: it's okay. And I think, you know, if we really
Speaker 1: take these ideas about defending Ukrainian democracy seriously, I think
Speaker 1: it's the something that we have to pay attention to. So,
Speaker 1: you know, what we've seen in Ukraine is dissidents, not
Speaker 1: just people on the left, but all kinds of anti
Speaker 1: war voices, all kinds of voices that are you know,
Speaker 1: taking a different line towards his conflict than say the
Speaker 1: Ukrainian authorities would like who, you know, talk about the
Speaker 1: fact that this was a civil war before it was
Speaker 1: an invasion by Russia and so on and so forth.
Speaker 1: They've been rounded up, arrested, There's been allegations of torture.
Speaker 1: You know, Zelenski has basically eliminated all kinds of opposition media.
Speaker 1: He's centralized all the TV networks almost under one government platform.
Speaker 1: There was a law passed recently that he signed into
Speaker 1: law and I think December that basically gave the Ukrainian
Speaker 1: government under Zelensky wide latitude to basically censor media that
Speaker 1: that that was inconvenient in some way. You've had crackdown
Speaker 1: on sort of things that perceived as pro Russian or
Speaker 1: parts of Russian culture, which is very significant because that
Speaker 1: was already one part of the grievance that that that
Speaker 1: that led to civil strife within Ukraine even before this invasion.
Speaker 1: So you've had raids and so on on on the
Speaker 1: Ukrainian Orthodox Church around the country, you know, monasteries and
Speaker 1: churches and the like. You had book banning the banning
Speaker 1: of speaking Russian, and you know, there's a country where
Speaker 1: a lot of people spoke Russian before the war, and
Speaker 1: and and still do. I mean, you know, some people
Speaker 1: have definitely voluntarily decided to abandon Russian as the sort
Speaker 1: of patriotism, but there's still people who speak Russian and
Speaker 1: consider a Russian cultural heritage pretty central to their lives.
Speaker 1: You've had, you know, you've had a lot of people
Speaker 1: being harassed and like by Ukraine's security service, the SPU.
Speaker 1: You've had this proliferation of blacklists, private blacklists, which basically
Speaker 1: less people who are meant to be traders in the like. Uh.
Speaker 1: And then you know they sometimes less their addresses, their
Speaker 1: phone numbers, so on and so forth, identifying details. You know,
Speaker 1: often the evidence is flimsy to to non existent. You
Speaker 1: have the prosecution of collaborators, and those collaborators again it's
Speaker 1: a very elastically defined term. For in some cases it's
Speaker 1: just people who have voiced opinions that are not any
Speaker 1: longer considered you know, appropriate. Uh. You know I've already mentioned,
Speaker 1: you know, mentioning civil war. But also you might add
Speaker 1: to that just people who happen to work trying to
Speaker 1: survive under Russian occupation, who take on positions say running
Speaker 1: a hospital or fixing rail lines and so on and
Speaker 1: so forth, and then when when those areas have been liberated,
Speaker 1: they have been charged as collaboratives for doing work under
Speaker 1: those occupiers. So there's a there's a broad range of stuff,
Speaker 1: but overall it paints a pretty grim picture for Ukrainian democracy,
Speaker 1: and it is kind of liberal pluralism, which I think
Speaker 1: we in the West see as kind of you know,
Speaker 1: pretty natural to any sort of liberal democracy. But it's
Speaker 1: slowly in this case, rapidly disappearing in So why does
Speaker 1: that matter then for the end state of like whatever
Speaker 1: that this might look like. And what does it pose
Speaker 1: as a problem, if any, for the West in trying
Speaker 1: to deliver a peace for this conflict. I mean one problem,
Speaker 1: as I mentioned, the conflict between rival or dueling visions
Speaker 1: of what the country is. You know, is there a
Speaker 1: single Ukrainian identity that comes under sage that you know,
Speaker 1: people everyone speaks Ukrainian, everyone has this kind of culture
Speaker 1: versus this is a pluralistic society where you know, you
Speaker 1: haveeople speaking multiple languages, where people you know, you can
Speaker 1: have people with existing within Ukraine or having some sort
Speaker 1: of ties to Russian heritage. You know that that was
Speaker 1: an issue that was alive before the war, and it
Speaker 1: was the product of a lot of conflict within the country.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's part of the reason why there's been
Speaker 1: this war on the Dombas for the last nine years.
Speaker 1: And so if the idea is that it's just gonna
Speaker 1: you know, you're going to solve that problem by just
Speaker 1: basically using force or using government power to kind of
Speaker 1: stamp out all this, I think that's going to cause
Speaker 1: problems long term. However, much you know, people may be
Speaker 1: unified now naturally as they kind of resist the Russian invasion,
Speaker 1: I think it's a little naive to think that's going
Speaker 1: to hold. And I mean, you know, in terms of
Speaker 1: what the endgame looks like. I mean, you know, some
Speaker 1: people might say, well, this is only temporary, this is
Speaker 1: just during wartime. But again, I mean, these trends were
Speaker 1: happening with Zelenski beforehand. It wasn't just Zelenski, of course,
Speaker 1: I mean the previous prison before in Porshenko. He was
Speaker 1: also known for some authoritarian measures. So I would love
Speaker 1: to say that, you know, this is just going to
Speaker 1: be a temporary thing, but I fear that this is
Speaker 1: going to be a trend that if and when this
Speaker 1: war finally ends, which hopefully it does that it really
Speaker 1: poses some real challenges to having a proper democracy. I
Speaker 1: think it also speaks to the Disney version of this
Speaker 1: war that has been sold to the American public, where
Speaker 1: it's portrayed as this really clear cut war over values,
Speaker 1: with liberal democracy Ukraine on one side and authoritarian Putin
Speaker 1: on the other side. And what you're showing here is
Speaker 1: that the reality at best is a lot more complex
Speaker 1: than what is being portrayed in the Western media and
Speaker 1: what is being sold to the American public as well.
Speaker 1: I'd love for you for people who don't understand, to
Speaker 1: just help situate Zelenski on political spectrum, help situate his
Speaker 1: allies on a political spectrum the you know, prior to
Speaker 1: the war, the descent against him, like give us a
Speaker 1: sense of where the political dividing lines are and were
Speaker 1: in Ukraine. Well, I think Zelenski now is portrayed as
Speaker 1: this kind of Churchilean figure. He's this guy who's defending
Speaker 1: Ukrainian democracy, he's helping it to survive and possibly even thrive.
Speaker 1: And you know, as you said, this whole war is
Speaker 1: about a battle between democracy and authoritarianism. I mean that's
Speaker 1: not really quite the case. And first of all Zelenski,
Speaker 1: as I said, he began centralizing power. Before this happened.
Speaker 1: He actually his leading parliamentary opposition, the Pro Russian Opposition
Speaker 1: for Life bloc, They had ten percent of seats in parliament.
Speaker 1: You know, after after Zelensky's popularity started falling down, they
Speaker 1: they actually ended up being sort of nick and neck
Speaker 1: with him in the polls. And not just that, but
Speaker 1: I one of their candidates beat one of Zelenski's own
Speaker 1: parties candidates seven other people party. They beat this candidate
Speaker 1: in Selenski's own hometown, which was a bit of a
Speaker 1: one of those bellwether elections. So they were definitely an
Speaker 1: electoral threat, you know, leading into into into elections between
Speaker 1: twenty three and uh, you know, Zelensky sanctioned it's It's leader.
Speaker 1: He closed its leaders opposition as sorry as media outlets,
Speaker 1: which is a pretty extreme thing to do. Was actually
Speaker 1: condemned by the EU at the time. Interestingly, it was
Speaker 1: it was kind of cheered on by US officials at
Speaker 1: the time, but there you go. You know, in terms
Speaker 1: of his politics, I mean, besides the kind of centualization
Speaker 1: of power which you know, you consider readers, maybe an
Speaker 1: act of disparation from a politician who has lost some
Speaker 1: of the shine that you had when you first came in.
Speaker 1: Zelensky is a a party a pretty neo liberal. I mean.
Speaker 1: One of the big things that that they put forward
Speaker 1: and they actually managed the past during during the pandemic
Speaker 1: in tween twenty, was to start selling off Ukrainian farmland,
Speaker 1: which is of course, you know, the richest agricultural land
Speaker 1: in the world. And there was there was a there
Speaker 1: was a law from the time of independence that that
Speaker 1: banned the sale of farmland to private hands, which Selenski
Speaker 1: opened up finally, and by the way, he opened it
Speaker 1: up at the urging of of of the the EU
Speaker 1: and the IMF. You know, these these institutions that are
Speaker 1: meant to be sort of you know, supposedly guaranteeing Ukraine's sovereignty.
Speaker 1: Even there was a there's a you can find a
Speaker 1: piece from the Atlanta Council interestingly back in I think
Speaker 1: one but they talk about how you came into powers
Speaker 1: as kind of liberal figure, but actually him and his
Speaker 1: party's record on LGBTQ issues, for instance, has been pretty warnful,
Speaker 1: which again stands in star contrast to the kind of
Speaker 1: image that we've been given absolutely, Yeah, good point. I
Speaker 1: think that's all all said. I really encourage people to
Speaker 1: read the piece just for a very nuanced and specific
Speaker 1: and detailed, well reported view of what is going on
Speaker 1: on the ground there Bronco. It's always great to see you.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for taking the time. Thanks Man, absolutely,
Speaker 1: thank you guys so much for watching. Really appreciate it.
Speaker 1: By the way, Chrystal, I just checked before the show,
Speaker 1: this is officially the biggest week in Breaking Points history.
Speaker 1: So that's cool in terms by all of our numbers,
Speaker 1: in terms of subscribers, in terms of our downloads, and
Speaker 1: in terms of our views cumulatively. So I want to
Speaker 1: say thank you to everybody for sticking with us. You
Speaker 1: guys are absolutely incredible. It's just been it's been what
Speaker 1: an absolute wild month of February was for all of us,
Speaker 1: starting with Rogan and Austin and all of that. And
Speaker 1: we had a lot of fun stuff that happened here
Speaker 1: on the show, and just want to say thank you
Speaker 1: to everybody. You guys really enjoyed Counterpoints yesterday. We could
Speaker 1: see that, so thank you for sticking with them for
Speaker 1: enjoying all this content. We've got some fun stuff coming
Speaker 1: for you. On the weekend for Crystal specifically, so look
Speaker 1: out for the channel on that. I think you guys
Speaker 1: are really going to enjoy that good content. Other than that,
Speaker 1: we will see you all on Monday.