Speaker 1: Hey, guys, ready or not, twenty twenty four is here,
Speaker 1: and we here at Breaking Points, are already thinking of
Speaker 1: ways we can up our game for this critical election.
Speaker 2: We rely on our premium subs to expand coverage, upgrade
Speaker 2: the studio ad staff give you, guys, the best independent.
Speaker 3: Coverage that is possible.
Speaker 2: If you like what we're all about, it just means
Speaker 2: the absolute world to have your support. But enough with that,
Speaker 2: let's get to the show.
Speaker 1: All right, Good morning, and welcome back to Counterpoints. I'm
Speaker 1: glad to be back here in the studio. Emily, how
Speaker 1: you doing.
Speaker 4: I'm good. We came here this morning and Sager had
Speaker 4: a Panera lemonade tap installed, which.
Speaker 3: We thought was he was still awake, like he had
Speaker 3: just stayed here all night long.
Speaker 4: But there was no coffee.
Speaker 3: There's just lemonade because why bother.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we don't need it anymore.
Speaker 1: It's absolute quick quick plug if you go to Breakingpoints
Speaker 1: dot com now, or the note will be in the
Speaker 1: description or the link will be in the show notes.
Speaker 1: Twenty five percent off. As we've been saying, twenty five
Speaker 1: percent off your annual subscription to Breaking Points keeps us
Speaker 1: going here. This is kind of our like NPR plug.
Speaker 3: That's right now. We'll do a telethon at the end
Speaker 3: of the year.
Speaker 1: Our operators are standing by for you to click on
Speaker 1: those links.
Speaker 4: It's just Mac, it's just producer Mac.
Speaker 3: Obviously there's a holiday merch in there.
Speaker 1: You got to get your at my book reading a
Speaker 1: Breaking Points fan had the sweater with the four of
Speaker 1: us on it. It was the first time I had
Speaker 1: seen it. It was kind of a surreal experience.
Speaker 4: You saw it in the wild.
Speaker 1: I saw it in the wild Krystal and I got
Speaker 1: a picture with the guy.
Speaker 3: It was pretty great. It's fantastic.
Speaker 1: Yeah, if you don't have your sweater yet, go get that.
Speaker 1: Go get your annual subscription.
Speaker 4: And remember, if you subscribe, you get Counterpoints the full
Speaker 4: show without any breaks, right, and you get it early,
Speaker 4: So that's an awesome thing. We release a few clips
Speaker 4: on YouTube, but if you're not listening on audio, you
Speaker 4: can see the full video of the show early if
Speaker 4: you're a subscriber.
Speaker 1: So and last week I was last week I was
Speaker 1: in California, so people got to see it. The window
Speaker 1: behind me being completely dark in the beginning of the
Speaker 1: show and then by the end of it totally bright.
Speaker 3: That's how long this goes.
Speaker 4: It reflected how you felt throughout the show started really
Speaker 4: dark and got really light. Yes, all right, Well we
Speaker 4: have a huge news day because obviously we're going to
Speaker 4: start with updates from the Middle East. President Zelenski was
Speaker 4: here in Washington, d C. Yesterday he was meeting with
Speaker 4: people at the Capitol. He was meeting with President Biden.
Speaker 4: So there are all kinds of updates because right now
Speaker 4: House Republicans House Democrats are figuring out and on the
Speaker 4: Senate side, how much money and in what sort of
Speaker 4: format that money should go towards Ukraine and go towards
Speaker 4: Israel as well. Tesla is in a fascinating union battle
Speaker 4: actually with Sweden that is starting to kick off. So
Speaker 4: we're going to go through some updates on that. We're
Speaker 4: going to talk about what just the agreement that was
Speaker 4: reached just last night at the COP conference in Dubai.
Speaker 4: We did find out what COP stands for.
Speaker 3: Yes, stick around and we will tell you what COP
Speaker 3: stands for.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we're going to leave you in suspense because actually
Speaker 4: we were surprised, but.
Speaker 1: I probably forget by the time we do that segment,
Speaker 1: but they did, they reached a deal not a great one,
Speaker 1: but it's a deal, and we'll talk about that.
Speaker 4: And really important updates on the battle over Section seven two.
Speaker 4: You see FISA there on your screen. That's a block
Speaker 4: where we're going to talk about this real fight that's
Speaker 4: happening right now between the intelligence community kind of hawkish
Speaker 4: allies in the Senate and in the House. Here in Congress.
Speaker 4: I actually don't know what Biden would do. He'd probably
Speaker 4: want to keep seven to two.
Speaker 3: But we're going to for sure.
Speaker 1: And it's the most effective coalition ever I think put together,
Speaker 1: between the Progressive Caucus and the Freedom Caucus. And it'll
Speaker 1: be a real test of their strength this week whether
Speaker 1: they can deal a blow to mass surveillance.
Speaker 4: We'll talk about that, and you know what, that's a
Speaker 4: good tease for next week. We have the new chairman
Speaker 4: of the Freedom Caucus, Bob good coming on. We expect
Speaker 4: to talk to him about Section seven oh two as well.
Speaker 4: Let's start with Israel, Bryan, because every day just incredible
Speaker 4: new updates, and incredible not in a good sense, incredible
Speaker 4: in the sense that you know, we have video we're
Speaker 4: actually going to play that looks like straight out of
Speaker 4: Call of Duty.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and so the the news is kind of running
Speaker 1: on a couple of tracks here in Washington. They're talking about,
Speaker 1: you know, the day after the war in Gaza, people
Speaker 1: are just hoping that they can make it one more day,
Speaker 1: as kind of disease and starvation set in, and as
Speaker 1: the as the fighting pushes two million people into tighter
Speaker 1: and tighter confines. And so Joe Biden really kind of
Speaker 1: kicked off this this cycle with some back and forth
Speaker 1: with net Yahoo that we're going to get into.
Speaker 3: Let's let's let's play a little bit of the.
Speaker 1: Biden comments that really made news, and then we'll kind
Speaker 1: of decipher these folks.
Speaker 4: Were there no Israel, there wouldn't be a Jew in
Speaker 4: the world was safe?
Speaker 2: Were there?
Speaker 4: And I was a thirty two year old senator and
Speaker 4: I wrote on the top of BB I love you,
Speaker 4: but I don't agree with the damn thing you had
Speaker 4: to say.
Speaker 3: It's about the same today.
Speaker 5: I love it.
Speaker 1: The first is Joe Biden's kind of very idealistic, fifty
Speaker 1: year old kind of version of Zionism where he was
Speaker 1: where he says that this Honica celebration, you know, if
Speaker 1: it wasn't for Israel, you know, there wouldn't be a
Speaker 1: Jew anywhere in the.
Speaker 3: World that was safe.
Speaker 1: You had a lot of Jewish people around the world,
Speaker 1: particularly here in the United States, outrageously offended by that.
Speaker 1: It's an old saying from many decades ago kind of
Speaker 1: lost its balance, and it also feels strange coming from
Speaker 1: the President of the United States, you know, whose job
Speaker 1: is to protect everybody who's in the United States. Feels
Speaker 1: like a're just throwing up of the hands. But it
Speaker 1: goes back to a kind of split in the in
Speaker 1: the kind of global Jewish community after the Holocaust, where
Speaker 1: you had some portion of survivors who say, you know,
Speaker 1: what we need is to double down on Zionism. We
Speaker 1: need a safe haven in Israel. We need to make
Speaker 1: we need to declare this estate. We need to do
Speaker 1: everything we can to protect and expand it and allow
Speaker 1: immigration from anywhere in the world. That's the only way
Speaker 1: we're going to be protected. Another faction said, no, we
Speaker 1: need to lean into global justice. And that's why one
Speaker 1: reason you see kind of so many Jewish activists in
Speaker 1: the civil rights movement here in the United States but
Speaker 1: around the world saying the only path forward is through
Speaker 1: this and by creating justice around the world for everybody
Speaker 1: that will also free and liberate us and bring justice
Speaker 1: to the Jewish community as well. And so Biden is
Speaker 1: really leaning in on the former one and saying that
Speaker 1: the no, that's impossible.
Speaker 3: The only path forward is Israel.
Speaker 1: Curious for your take on that, But to decipher his
Speaker 1: second point there, that's a story he's told multiple times
Speaker 1: where bb Neetna, who current Prime Minister, was in the
Speaker 1: Foreign Service in the Israeli embassy in the nineteen seventies
Speaker 1: when he met.
Speaker 3: Joe Biden for the first time. It's wild fifty years ago.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Biden signed an eight by eleven photo and he
Speaker 1: wrote on it, BB, I love you, but I don't
Speaker 1: agree with the damn thing you say. And then he
Speaker 1: added he's told that story a couple times in the past.
Speaker 1: What's new is he added this time. That's still the
Speaker 1: same today, and he added it again in a fundraiser later.
Speaker 1: So it is direct criticism. But we're going to talk
Speaker 1: about whether that actually means anything. Anything the president says
Speaker 1: means something because its simple sizes where the United States
Speaker 1: is sitting. What the president does obviously matters more in
Speaker 1: any reaction to either of those.
Speaker 4: Well, yeah, I mean exactly what you've been saying is
Speaker 4: that you've highlighted some reporting that Biden has been intentional
Speaker 4: about saying what his public posture is part of his
Speaker 4: strategy with net and Yahoo that when you hear what
Speaker 4: he's saying publicly, it's part of his private negotiations with
Speaker 4: not in Yahoo. So now we know that Biden is
Speaker 4: telegraphing different things when and that's obviously not abnormal. But
Speaker 4: what I think is abnormal, especially in the relationship between
Speaker 4: the US and Israel, is the level of discomfort that
Speaker 4: the Biden administration has with the Net Yahoo administration at
Speaker 4: this point. And I know we're going to talk about
Speaker 4: that more, but that's part of what's incredible about the
Speaker 4: daily updates coming out of this conflict is that we
Speaker 4: have so much invested, like literally invested, financially invested, or
Speaker 4: resources invested. And this in some ways parallels Ukraine, depending
Speaker 4: on you know, if you're a Republican or Democrat at
Speaker 4: this point, or what kind of Republican or Democrat you
Speaker 4: are at this point. But it's to be on different pages,
Speaker 4: and to be on such different pages, and to have
Speaker 4: that increasingly become a public dispute between the Biden administration
Speaker 4: and the Yahoo administration is terrifying.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and so he zeroed in on that again at
Speaker 1: a fundraiser. If we can put up a two here
Speaker 1: to read this quote, he said, I think he in
Speaker 1: this nut yaw has to change and with this government,
Speaker 1: this government in Israel is making it very difficult for
Speaker 1: him to move. And he went on to say Ben
Speaker 1: Gavie is basically a nut. He's never he's never done.
Speaker 1: He's like, I've known every prime minister since gold In
Speaker 1: my ear, it's true weird that he has. And he's
Speaker 1: saying that this is the most right wing government ever
Speaker 1: and he adds, you know, they don't want anything to
Speaker 1: do with Palestinians. They don't want a too state solution.
Speaker 1: But then, and here's the key point, and this is
Speaker 1: later on. This is right after his his remarks. He says,
Speaker 1: he says, you cannot say there's no Palestinian state at
Speaker 1: all in the future.
Speaker 3: And that's going to be the hard part.
Speaker 1: He's telling the Israeli government you cannot say there's no
Speaker 1: Palestinian state at all in the future. Then he says,
Speaker 1: but in the meantime, we're not going to do a
Speaker 1: damn thing other than protect Israel in the process, not
Speaker 1: a single thing. So if you're Israel and you're getting
Speaker 1: these two messages from President Biden, one you cannot keep
Speaker 1: saying that there's no that you're never going to allow
Speaker 1: Palistinian state. And also two, in the meantime, we're going
Speaker 1: to do everything you ask us too. How are you
Speaker 1: going to receive that?
Speaker 4: And this is exactly why I think it's terrifying, because again,
Speaker 4: you have a situation where we have absolutely no exit strategy,
Speaker 4: because an exit strategy that protects people in Israel and
Speaker 4: is humane for people in Gaza is not anywhere near
Speaker 4: a consensus point between the Israeli government and see Biden.
Speaker 4: To your point, Ryan gives Yahoo himself a little wiggle
Speaker 4: room by saying it's it's the government that net and
Speaker 4: Yahoo is dealing with that's pinning net and Yahoo in.
Speaker 4: So I think Biden is being very intentional to the
Speaker 4: extent that he's capable of intentionality in foreign relations on
Speaker 4: his own at this point. But I think that's a
Speaker 4: clearly a strategic move to say, listen, I know those
Speaker 4: those extremists in your government, that's your problem. I understand.
Speaker 4: I empathize with you, and trying to sort of go
Speaker 4: manoamano with Yahou and say, I know you're coming from
Speaker 4: and they're making it very difficult for you. Let's be reasonable.
Speaker 4: Let's be the reasonable ones here. But when you don't
Speaker 4: have any consensus on that next day plan and you
Speaker 4: just say, by the way, we don't even have consensus
Speaker 4: on the plan right now, which is to quote eradicate Hamas,
Speaker 4: that is not happening. And if you quote eradicate Hamas
Speaker 4: to some degree that you know, Biden says, we want
Speaker 4: to draw down this invasion into Gaza by about the
Speaker 4: first of the year. Okay, So if that's your strategy,
Speaker 4: what does that mean, what does that look like? And
Speaker 4: did you just actually create a vacuum, a power vacuum
Speaker 4: that is not going to be the pals Palsittian authority
Speaker 4: is not going to step into that power vacuum and
Speaker 4: they don't even agree on what to do with the
Speaker 4: Palestinian authority.
Speaker 1: Right and that so Netnya, who responded with that exact point,
Speaker 1: and Colvin, if we can skip a three for now
Speaker 1: and jump to a four.
Speaker 3: This is a Wall Street.
Speaker 1: Journal right up of Yaho's public public response to Biden.
Speaker 1: He put out a He put out a video in
Speaker 1: Hebrew saying basically, we are not going to allow the
Speaker 1: Palistinian authority UH to come into Gazah. And you know,
Speaker 1: once we've gotten rid of hamas he's a palstatiing authority,
Speaker 1: teaches hate, pays suicide bombers if they blow themselves up
Speaker 1: this and we're not going to go back to the
Speaker 1: mistakes of Oslo, he says. The irony, of course, is
Speaker 1: that the Oslo process is what cemented the de facto
Speaker 1: annexation in creeping rule of the Israeli government over the
Speaker 1: disputed territories, the occupied territories, because the PLO in Oslo
Speaker 1: recognized the State of Israel, but did not get any
Speaker 1: recognition for s state in return. What they got instead
Speaker 1: was kind of just to be recognized as the negotiating
Speaker 1: partner with Israel. But throughout the entire process, Israeli prime
Speaker 1: ministers are very clear that they were not endorsing even
Speaker 1: the idea of a Palestinian state. So it's interesting that
Speaker 1: even Oslo, which was so tilted toward Israel, which left
Speaker 1: us in this current situation with seven hundred and fifty
Speaker 1: thousand Israeli settlers in the West Bank and very little
Speaker 1: hope of ever getting to a Palestinian state absent some
Speaker 1: cataclysmic change. Even that is seen by Nanyahu as kind
Speaker 1: of too too much like because it kind of just
Speaker 1: involved negotiations with Palestinian So he's saying, no, we're not
Speaker 1: even going to allow even the Palestinian authority, which is
Speaker 1: basically just a client of the of Israel, to rule Gaza.
Speaker 1: And that comes at the same time that his communications minister,
Speaker 1: if we can put up this next one things is
Speaker 1: a five and get your reaction to this. So this
Speaker 1: is Nat Yahaw's communication Ministers. He says, we respect it,
Speaker 1: and this is the English translation, but it is pretty close.
Speaker 1: We respect and cherish the President of the United States,
Speaker 1: Joe Biden, who went out of his way during the
Speaker 1: most difficult period of the state of Israel.
Speaker 3: This is true friendship. But we live here.
Speaker 1: This is our country, the historical estate of our ancestors.
Speaker 3: There will be no Palestinian state here.
Speaker 1: We will never allow another state to be established between
Speaker 1: the Jordan and the Sea. We will never go back
Speaker 1: to Oslo, he said, echoing Yahou There and in the
Speaker 1: words of President Biden, the security of the Jewish people
Speaker 1: is at stake here. Definitely, Yes, a Palestinian state would
Speaker 1: endanger him, thank you, mister President. So just being as
Speaker 1: clear as they ever possibly could that they have no
Speaker 1: intention of ever allowing a Palestinian state, yet claiming sovereignty
Speaker 1: as the liqud platform does, over everything from the river
Speaker 1: to the sea, which is then that those are the
Speaker 1: claimed borders. Basically, if they claim they have sovereignty over
Speaker 1: everything from the river to sea, that is de facto apartheid.
Speaker 1: Saying that the people inside this region will never have statehood,
Speaker 1: never have sovereignty, won't have the same rights as the
Speaker 1: Israeli citizens of the state.
Speaker 4: Well, I think it's really surreal to see that division
Speaker 4: in particular bubbling to the surface. And I'm going to
Speaker 4: read another quote from Biden here. He said, israel security
Speaker 4: can rest in the United States. But right now it
Speaker 4: has more than the United States. It has the European Union,
Speaker 4: it has Europe, it has most of the world supporting it.
Speaker 4: But they're starting to lose that support by an indiscriminate
Speaker 4: bombing that takes place. That's from the president of the industry.
Speaker 3: So what would you make of that?
Speaker 1: That's that's that's I mean it's obvious to me that
Speaker 1: if you look at and we can talk about the
Speaker 1: UN resolution in a moment where they got lost overwhelmingly.
Speaker 3: But yeah, what did you make of that saying that.
Speaker 1: The Biden actually warning is We're like, we've got you,
Speaker 1: but look out.
Speaker 4: I think it's again the word that I land on
Speaker 4: here is surreal to hear him saying that, and then
Speaker 4: to see net Yaho's communications director tweeting that they're and
Speaker 4: net NYA, who himself has said no more to state solution.
Speaker 4: And it's kind of interesting to think back on OSLO
Speaker 4: because this is now so far in the rear view
Speaker 4: mirror that, you know, whatever you think of the decisions
Speaker 4: that led us to October seventh, we're in a situation
Speaker 4: now where there's almost a realism to the net and
Speaker 4: Yaho outlook here that's like, well, what is a peaceful coexistence?
Speaker 4: There is no legitimate path to peace anymore. This is
Speaker 4: you know, after in this you can you can talk
Speaker 4: about the United States policies in the Middle East as
Speaker 4: well that have to some degree like really stoked the
Speaker 4: flames and really stoked the flames of extremism in the
Speaker 4: Middle East in a way that talking about power vacuums.
Speaker 4: How long has it been since the Arab Spring? Now,
Speaker 4: I mean, we've seen how this has turned out, and
Speaker 4: we now know what if you want to have the
Speaker 4: state of Israel from the river to the sea, the
Speaker 4: degree of I think violence and the degree of all
Speaker 4: of that. And that's exactly what they're saying, by the way,
Speaker 4: that there is no two state solution anymore. There's no
Speaker 4: peaceful coexistence anymore. And I think that's interesting to kind
Speaker 4: of look back on Oslo and say, we're in a
Speaker 4: very very different place. That's what this underscores.
Speaker 1: And the Israeli ligned for decades has been there is
Speaker 1: no partner for peace. And in order to make sure
Speaker 1: that that was true, what the Israelis have done over
Speaker 1: the decades is gone. They have assassinated so many of
Speaker 1: the Palestinian leaders who were more moderate and were trying
Speaker 1: to reach a peace deal.
Speaker 4: The interest of elevating Hamas, you mean.
Speaker 1: Right, and the function was to elevate Hamas. Even within Hamas,
Speaker 1: there was you know, a very a charismatic kind of
Speaker 1: senior official within Hamas, I forget his name, who was
Speaker 1: stridently opposed kind of to suicide bombings and to attacking civilians.
Speaker 1: There was a huge faction within kind of the Palstine
Speaker 1: Liberation movement, generally Fatah Hamas others who said that it's counterproductive,
Speaker 1: it's you know, as Talaran said, it's worse than a crime.
Speaker 1: It's a mistake that all of the goodwill of the
Speaker 1: Palestinians had built with the first mostly nonviolent for a
Speaker 1: long time. Intifada was evaporated when they started killing civilians.
Speaker 1: So stop killing civilians is real killed that guy and
Speaker 1: others who were making that same argument, and then they
Speaker 1: were able to accurately say, well, look who's left no
Speaker 1: partner for peace anymore, and so therefore we can just
Speaker 1: you know, continue on without any any peace deal. It's
Speaker 1: starting to roll throughout the Middle East. Colvin, we can
Speaker 1: go back to that one that we skipped on eighth
Speaker 1: three ree, which is the houthis Yemen Yemen Houthy's have
Speaker 1: you know they hit another they hit a Nigerian tanker.
Speaker 1: That was they've now said, any any tankers that are
Speaker 1: going near Yemeni waters, which is some of the most
Speaker 1: important in the world, uh that are bound for coming
Speaker 1: from Israel are now you know, clean fair military targets uh.
Speaker 1: They they they put out that kind of dramatic footage
Speaker 1: with a helicopter landing and seizing a ship a week
Speaker 1: or two ago. And the US that now the Houthis
Speaker 1: are about to reach a peace deal with Saudi Arabia
Speaker 1: and the UAE to end this you know, years long war.
Speaker 1: The US, before this crisis in Gaz that broke out,
Speaker 1: had been doing everything it could to try to blow
Speaker 1: up this peace deal because the UE and Saudi have
Speaker 1: lost so badly that the Houthis are you going to
Speaker 1: come out of these peace negotiations in a good place?
Speaker 3: And so.
Speaker 1: The US has been throwing all these monkey rans into
Speaker 1: trying to make it so that they.
Speaker 3: Can't reach a deal.
Speaker 1: Now they're saying if they keep attacking tankers that they're
Speaker 1: going to list them as kind of state sponsors of terror.
Speaker 1: And then the number one thing that the Huthies want,
Speaker 1: which is to be able to pay their public servants,
Speaker 1: Like that's the big fight, because Saudi Arabia has managed
Speaker 1: to seize basically all of the revenue and of all
Speaker 1: of Yemen's money, and so all of these teachers, government
Speaker 1: workers and others are just working without pay like for
Speaker 1: years now, and So the key thing is they want
Speaker 1: that money like pay our workers in the world reach
Speaker 1: a peace deal, and the US is saying, well, we're
Speaker 1: going to designate you state sponsors of terror, which means
Speaker 1: then you can't get that money because then that has
Speaker 1: all kinds of banking implications, which then the questions will
Speaker 1: then what then the war starts up again, the war
Speaker 1: that they were already losing.
Speaker 4: I mean, yeah, do you have any confidence that any
Speaker 4: of the people negotiating this are doing any of this
Speaker 4: in the interest of peace and the interest of safety.
Speaker 4: And this is another thing that the realism, I think,
Speaker 4: which I'm sympathetic to at times, gets complicated by not knowing,
Speaker 4: Like there's so many hypotheticals involved, like we're going to
Speaker 4: take this step at point A, and it's likely to
Speaker 4: lead the point B, but we don't know that it's
Speaker 4: going to lead to point B. And that takes us
Speaker 4: back to what we were just talking about with Israel,
Speaker 4: is that like there's this step one, step two process,
Speaker 4: and the US and Israel openly do not agree on
Speaker 4: what's step two of this extremely expensive, costly and I'm
Speaker 4: talking in terms of human life. There's also obviously taxpayer
Speaker 4: money involved, but primarily human life, this costly conflict. We
Speaker 4: don't even agree we are in world in this and
Speaker 4: we don't even agree on step two with the end game.
Speaker 4: But we don't actually agree on step one either. We
Speaker 4: don't agree on what happens. When Joe Biden says January
Speaker 4: first has come around, the Biden administration says January first
Speaker 4: has come around quote indiscriminate bombing, that's Biden conceding, by
Speaker 4: the way, that's he is in his country is supporting
Speaker 4: indiscriminate bombing. That was funding indiscriminate framing.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Absolutely, And I think the interest of the United States
Speaker 4: obviously should be peace, the security of people in Israel,
Speaker 4: the safety of people in Israel. And that's a thing
Speaker 4: that I also find terrifying, is that does anyone believe
Speaker 4: that the steps we're taking right now when you have
Speaker 4: the President of the United States condemning quote indiscriminate bombing,
Speaker 4: supporting the quote indiscriminate bombing, but also in totally like
Speaker 4: it is not a fine line between a two state
Speaker 4: solution and a no two state solution like that is
Speaker 4: that's not a minor disagreement. That is the single.
Speaker 3: Biggest disgress I think state. We don't.
Speaker 4: It's the single biggest disagreement that you could possibly have
Speaker 4: on this question. And the two countries that are most
Speaker 4: responsible for perpetuating this war, for prosecuting this war not
Speaker 4: you know, I'm not saying the US and Israel started
Speaker 4: the war, but the two countries that are right now
Speaker 4: funded and fighting the war don't agree on what the
Speaker 4: war is being fought for.
Speaker 1: Right And so that's the geopolitics of the situation. On
Speaker 1: the ground in Gaza, things are deteriorating. Yesterday the New
Speaker 1: York Times we can put up this next one published
Speaker 1: a remarkable editorial from a coal basically the leaders of
Speaker 1: a coalition of human human rights and basically relief organizations
Speaker 1: like these are people whose job it is to go
Speaker 1: to war zones to if there's an earthquake, if there's
Speaker 1: a civil war, if there's a tsunami. You know, these
Speaker 1: are the people whose organizations go there to try to
Speaker 1: clean up the mess that was left either by man
Speaker 1: or by nature. And they're saying, we have never seen
Speaker 1: anything like what we're witnessing now. One of the poignant
Speaker 1: things that I thought that I that I pulled from
Speaker 1: this was the way that their their staff are telling
Speaker 1: them that they can't really leave their house, like so
Speaker 1: that they're nervous because if they leave their house, are
Speaker 1: going to get killed. But then and then they're also
Speaker 1: nervous that if they leave their house, their family might
Speaker 1: get killed without them.
Speaker 3: So they're making these decisions.
Speaker 1: Do we all stay in the same room so that if, if,
Speaker 1: and when we're killed, we all die together we don't
Speaker 1: have to suffer the sorrow of going on with with
Speaker 1: nobody else. Or do we separate so that somebody can
Speaker 1: survive and that somebody can carry on kind of the
Speaker 1: legacy of this family. Meanwhile, these are the people whose
Speaker 1: job it is to distribute aid aid which isn't getting
Speaker 1: in because of the blockade. The hundreds of trucks were
Speaker 1: needed every single day before October seventh. Now you have
Speaker 1: sometimes one hundred or two hundred getting in, but workers
Speaker 1: can't get to warehouses.
Speaker 3: You know, the workers can't distribute it.
Speaker 1: And they said they're very very close to a complete
Speaker 1: breakdown of order. You can imagine, you know, you see
Speaker 1: what happens like firefest Within like two hours, everybody there
Speaker 1: is just like looting the place and going nuts. You know,
Speaker 1: we're two months into this situation where two million people
Speaker 1: on top of each other without access to much food.
Speaker 1: People are talking about half of a meal a day,
Speaker 1: without access to clean wild without access to sanitary bathrooms.
Speaker 1: They warned that diseases, disease and starvation are spreading rapidly.
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, speaking of the health concerns, we can put
Speaker 4: the next element up on the screen, doctor Teedras of
Speaker 4: the World Health Organization, which is really really see as
Speaker 4: in the same way that the UN and they.
Speaker 3: Think they're hamas they think everybody.
Speaker 4: They definitely have to make some interesting ethical questions to
Speaker 4: operate in Gaza, which is obviously that we need to
Speaker 4: have human rights organizations and humanitarian causes on the ground
Speaker 4: in Gaza, and even Israel knows that. But obviously Israel
Speaker 4: believes they've made some dubious moral calculations in order to
Speaker 4: function in Gaza. So Tedra says that he's extremely worried
Speaker 4: about reports of a raid at a hospital in Gaza.
Speaker 4: After several days of siege, there are sixty five patients,
Speaker 4: according to the Ministry of Health, including several and needing
Speaker 4: intensive care. Of forty five medical staff in the hospital.
Speaker 4: The hospital is already minimally functional due to acute shortage
Speaker 4: as of fuel, water, food, and medical supplies. Then he said,
Speaker 4: who urgently calls for the protection of all persons inside
Speaker 4: the hospital and calls for an immediate ceasefire and for
Speaker 4: sustained humanitarian access to health facilities across the Gaza strip.
Speaker 4: We've seen that, you know, on a daily basis. Basically
Speaker 4: these like horrifying humanitarian concerns and hospitals and all of
Speaker 4: that for more than two months now, and it's not
Speaker 4: going anywhere. It's not like there's a point where we're
Speaker 4: just not gonna you know, the hospitals are going to
Speaker 4: be fine, They're going to be functioning. We're nowhere near that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And so that raid has in the last few
Speaker 1: hours has been carried out. Doctor Hosam Abu Sphia said
Speaker 1: there was a strike that hit them, hit their maternity ward,
Speaker 1: killing two people, injuring two women, firing them to be amputated.
Speaker 1: There were I believe it says that the troops, the
Speaker 1: Israeli troops then pulled all men aged sixteen to sixty
Speaker 1: five out of the building. And then CNN ominously said
Speaker 1: this interview was conducted Monday. Then they write CNN was
Speaker 1: unable to reach doctor Alkalott on Tuesday.
Speaker 3: Sounds like he also was rounded up.
Speaker 1: There have been very credible, you know, on record accounts
Speaker 1: of torture and beatings at the hands of his Israeli forces.
Speaker 3: They've after they've rounded this.
Speaker 1: The men up, beating them in front of you, beating
Speaker 1: you boys, some of them in front of others. So
Speaker 1: it sounds like these medical professionals are as we speak,
Speaker 1: you know, rounded up somewhere undergoing you know, at at
Speaker 1: very best interrogation, at worst beating, beating, in torture, which
Speaker 1: then leaves open the question of what became of the
Speaker 1: patients who were left in this in this hospital, as
Speaker 1: we know that that has not been a priority, as
Speaker 1: we saw with the case of the of the premature
Speaker 1: babies who were left to die after assurances were given
Speaker 1: that they would be taken care of.
Speaker 4: And just to sort of like to bring the segment
Speaker 4: maybe full circle, if you are the people of Israel
Speaker 4: and not even talking about the government. Obviously the supplies
Speaker 4: to the government too, and you it's even put land aside,
Speaker 4: but you're concerned about the safety and security of your
Speaker 4: own people. What the hell are you supposed to do? Right? Now,
Speaker 4: I just it's it's obviously easy to be here in
Speaker 4: d C in a studio, you know, talking about this,
Speaker 4: but there's a it's obviously an incredibly difficult conversation to have.
Speaker 4: It always has been. It's it's never gotten any easier,
Speaker 4: and it's not certainly not easy now. But to have
Speaker 4: so much disagreement over what the actual plan is here
Speaker 4: as people are dying by the thousands and there are
Speaker 4: these these awful series of suffering and by the way,
Speaker 4: the body of an Israeli woman was recovered yesterday, a
Speaker 4: twenty eight year old woman was recovered in a tunnel
Speaker 4: in Gaza yesterday, hostage one of the hostages.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for more reason that a ceasefire and negotiations to
Speaker 1: release the hostages while they're still alive is paramount and
Speaker 1: is just is so quickly pushed to the side. You know,
Speaker 1: you had net Yahoo's ministers saying in the middle of
Speaker 1: these hostage negotiations during the last seasefire, saying, if.
Speaker 3: We don't resume this war, we're going to bring the
Speaker 3: government down.
Speaker 1: These same ministers at the very end had said we
Speaker 1: need to not we need to be cruel and not
Speaker 1: think over much of the hostages, and again and again
Speaker 1: we hear from Israeli ministers things that we just don't
Speaker 1: kind of absorb here in the United States, the.
Speaker 4: UN we should move on. Voted for voted for seas
Speaker 4: for not surprising to anyone yesterday, but that was.
Speaker 1: The lop sided vote. Was something else here we put
Speaker 1: this next element up.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so that was they took a formal vote on
Speaker 4: ceasefire yesterday. And I don't think any of those numbers
Speaker 4: are surprising, right.
Speaker 1: One hundred and fifty three countries around the world voted
Speaker 1: in favor of a ceasefire, twenty three countries abstained, and ten,
Speaker 1: including the United States, voted no. Interestingly, and we're about
Speaker 1: to talk about Ukraine. Ukraine abstained, So the United States
Speaker 1: coalition of no voting countries did not even include Ukraine.
Speaker 3: It's like a Paraguay and like some others who were.
Speaker 1: Like, we don't have any choice, like some you read them,
Speaker 1: you're like, oh, they're a country. They're basically just a
Speaker 1: like protectorate of the United States somewhere in the Pacific.
Speaker 1: And so that's that's our coalition at this point.
Speaker 4: What's interesting is people probably remember that Israel had been
Speaker 4: pressured by the United States and other major powers to
Speaker 4: send weapons and munitions and stuff to Ukraine earlier in
Speaker 4: that conflict and resisted it and with good obviously, and
Speaker 4: they clearly underestimated the threat from Hamas. But that's probably
Speaker 4: still weighing very heavily on the mind of Vladimir Zelenski,
Speaker 4: and we can get to that. In just a moment.
Speaker 4: Ryan flagged this Haretz article that is interesting. This is
Speaker 4: the next element up on the screen. The headline here
Speaker 4: is graphic videos and incitement. How the IDF is misleading
Speaker 4: Israeli's on telegram in the context of the conversation we
Speaker 4: were just having about the way the Israeli government is
Speaker 4: prosecuting this war and the end goal of safety and
Speaker 4: security of the Israeli people. You say your net in Yahoo,
Speaker 4: and your ultimate goal here is not. His goal isn't
Speaker 4: to protect the world. His goal is to protect the
Speaker 4: Israeli people. Even if that's your goal, what is he
Speaker 4: doing in a way that actually is making that goal
Speaker 4: more and more likely? This, I think raises some questions
Speaker 4: about that. What did you find interesting about the Harezz piece.
Speaker 1: Israeli law allows the military, the IDF to run what
Speaker 1: they call kind of information warfare, psychological warfare abroad. If
Speaker 1: you're trying to influence populations in other countries, you're trying
Speaker 1: to do propaganda basically, like that's allowed. They are not
Speaker 1: allowed to do propaganda inside Israel directed at the Israeli people.
Speaker 1: In twenty fourteen, Haretes busted them at the time running
Speaker 1: this gigantic propaganda operation where they were publishing just like
Speaker 1: horrific scenes of carnage coming out of the twenty fourteen
Speaker 1: Gaza war to show to the Israeli public, like look
Speaker 1: at what we're doing in here. And so according to Haretz,
Speaker 1: this operation here run on telegram which is called seventy
Speaker 1: two Virgin seventy two Virgins uncensored. This is a telegram
Speaker 1: channel is in fact a direct product of the IDF.
Speaker 1: The IDF denied it to Haretz, but Haret stands by
Speaker 1: its reporting. Here at the very end of the article,
Speaker 1: they say they even, I haven't seen this in an
Speaker 1: American article. I like the kind of repetition of it.
Speaker 1: Let me see if I can find it here. And
Speaker 1: this is the final article of the piece. It says
Speaker 1: in a statement, the IDF spokesperson's unit said seventy two
Speaker 1: Virgins is not operated on the IDF's behalf. If there
Speaker 1: was any connection by soldiers or other parties connected to
Speaker 1: the IDF with the page or its operation, this was
Speaker 1: done without approval and without authority unquote. However, Haretz reports
Speaker 1: as mentioned a senior military official confirmed that the channel
Speaker 1: was systematically operated by IDF personnel. And we can put
Speaker 1: up some just images of kind of what is being produced,
Speaker 1: but your imagination doesn't have to go too far. They
Speaker 1: were talking about as you're seeing there, you know, people
Speaker 1: being dragged through the streets, one Palestinian getting run over
Speaker 1: multiple times kind of by a jeep. You know, the
Speaker 1: flattening of buildings, and coupled with the most racist, over
Speaker 1: the top type of kind of language directed at the
Speaker 1: victim of this that you could possibly imagine. And this
Speaker 1: goes back to your question earlier, where you were saying,
Speaker 1: what is Israel going to do to keep its people safe?
Speaker 1: Rather than answering that question, what a lot of Israel
Speaker 1: politicians seem to be doing is what are they going
Speaker 1: to do to kind of make the public who is
Speaker 1: braying for revenge feel like they're getting it? And this
Speaker 1: is one of those things just putting up just this
Speaker 1: horrific kind of a combat and a lot of it
Speaker 1: isn't even combat porn. There's this mutilation porn of human beings.
Speaker 1: To then say, look, you wanted revenge, We're giving you revenge,
Speaker 1: and forget about all of our failures leading up to
Speaker 1: October seventh.
Speaker 4: Yeah, there was an interesting point when Biden, this was
Speaker 4: a couple of weeks ago, he was calling for a ceasefire,
Speaker 4: and there were some people on the left in Israel
Speaker 4: who were really upset by that and said, you know what,
Speaker 4: was Ben Giverer saying at that point something like I'll
Speaker 4: throw the government into chaos, something like that, I'll bring
Speaker 4: down the government something like that over the any agreement
Speaker 4: towards a ceasefire, and some people on the left, I'm
Speaker 4: not saying everybody, but I'm saying there were people on
Speaker 4: the left saying that we're with Bengevier. We don't feel
Speaker 4: safe if there's a ceasefire. We don't feel as though
Speaker 4: the appropriate measures towards protecting us will have been taken
Speaker 4: if at that point a few weeks ago there was
Speaker 4: a ceasefire. And that's really interesting. I think that's actually
Speaker 4: a really interesting kind of contrast with the way some
Speaker 4: people on the left here have talked about the conflict,
Speaker 4: but it doesn't make those questions any less important about
Speaker 4: whether a ceasefire versus a continued sort of what a
Speaker 4: Joe Biden said, qute indiscriminate bombing in Gaza is making
Speaker 4: people any more or less safe. And that's as we
Speaker 4: were talking about this in the last segment. These questions,
Speaker 4: when you're engaged in kind of real politic about hypotheticals,
Speaker 4: become impossible, and that makes it really really hard for
Speaker 4: Yahoo to say that pushing this incursion into Gaza into
Speaker 4: January is making the people of Visraal anymore safe. You
Speaker 4: sort of need evidence, and I think that's where Ryan,
Speaker 4: to your point, they're relying on some of this to
Speaker 4: give them cover. They're relying on some of us to
Speaker 4: give them sort of ongoing justification to augment what they're
Speaker 4: saying needs to happen in Gaza. And you know, good
Speaker 4: on Heratz for reporting this out and for kind.
Speaker 3: Of scooping this.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and the propaganda war is going back and forth
Speaker 1: between Hamas and the IDF. Hamas from the very beginning
Speaker 1: was putting out these kind of slick hype videos followed
Speaker 1: by a lot of kind of very explicit videos of
Speaker 1: direct combat now followed the IDF, as the IDF was
Speaker 1: then getting criticized because it put out, you know, it
Speaker 1: put out put out videos of people like just shooting
Speaker 1: in a school and it wasn't clear that there was
Speaker 1: anything else going on. Put out all those videos of
Speaker 1: the shirtless men, many of whom were then immediately identified
Speaker 1: as civilians, And so now they're starting to put out
Speaker 1: videos of actual combat where it's very clear, Okay, there
Speaker 1: is now we know there's combat going on.
Speaker 3: Casualties numbers are coming out of there.
Speaker 1: But the IDF is now countering with some of that
Speaker 1: combat footage, some of it really quite something and nothing
Speaker 1: like we've really seen on a kind of.
Speaker 3: Global level ever.
Speaker 4: And I was gonna say, again, from the real politique perspective,
Speaker 4: propaganda is, you know, I think it's obviously always been
Speaker 4: a part of that, like for longer than we even
Speaker 4: have records. Rapaganda is a part of war, but it's
Speaker 4: very I think we're not used to in the twenty
Speaker 4: first century yet. I think we're not used to it
Speaker 4: in the era of social media yet. And some of
Speaker 4: what the IDEF has been putting out has looked really
Speaker 4: ham fisted and just also odd. It's looked really just weird.
Speaker 4: And again that's easy to say from here in DC
Speaker 4: and from the West, but it's it's just a it's
Speaker 4: a very strange thing and it seemed clumsy, I guess
Speaker 4: over the course the last couple of months.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and Colvin, I don't know.
Speaker 1: Do we have a twelve that's if people are curious
Speaker 1: about the actual countries and how they voted. Oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: there it is, so you can just pause on that
Speaker 1: and kind of scroll through there if you're curious.
Speaker 3: But from Holal flow are front there you go.
Speaker 1: So we Papa, New Guinea, Paraguay, Micronesia, Nahru, Liberia, Guatemala, Israel,
Speaker 1: like those, Austria. Yep, those are basically the countries that's
Speaker 1: stuck with the United States.
Speaker 4: Abstentions from some major countries as well.
Speaker 5: You see their Germany, the UK, right, Yeah, the UK
Speaker 5: asties is a real blow to the United States Argentina
Speaker 5: coalition to continue killing it's shrinking.
Speaker 4: So it's it's the Biden. This is if you're if
Speaker 4: you're Joe Biden, you're looking at these numbers right now. Again,
Speaker 4: this is actually not that unusual for how the UN
Speaker 4: votes in regards to Israel. I mean, it's obviously pressure,
Speaker 4: although you have UK Germany, Italy abstaining. But this is
Speaker 4: not surprising to anyone whatsoever. I'm sure it didn't come
Speaker 4: as any type of shock to the Biden administration. But
Speaker 4: that ongoing split between Biden and Yahoo makes these numbers
Speaker 4: all the more worse, because Biden then has to defend
Speaker 4: something he clearly no longer wants to defend.
Speaker 1: Voladimir Zelenski was in Washington yesterday meeting with Senators and
Speaker 1: also meeting with representatives of the military industrial complex, thanking
Speaker 1: them for their work and leading with members of Congress
Speaker 1: to keep the aid flowing less the entire project collapse.
Speaker 3: We can put up this first image.
Speaker 6: Here we go, Eric Williams pro doctor mean, yeah, well,
Speaker 6: we're thankful that we have SASH friends.
Speaker 5: I've just signed another two hundred million dollar draw down
Speaker 5: to the Department of Defense for Ukraine and that'll be
Speaker 5: coming quickly.
Speaker 2: Thank you much.
Speaker 4: Now, if you were just listening to that, you heard
Speaker 4: the robust White House fire crackling in the background. But
Speaker 4: that's quite a nice touch, Ryan, that was President. So
Speaker 4: if you're again, if you're listening, what you saw was
Speaker 4: Chuck Schumer, Mitch McConnell walking through the capital with Vladimir
Speaker 4: Dea Zelenski, different senators, members of Congress swarming him like
Speaker 4: their backstage at a Jonas Brothers concert. Basically is what
Speaker 4: it looks like. And Schumer said something like, we had
Speaker 4: a quote very good and productive meeting. Then Zelensky appeared
Speaker 4: to have a pretty good meeting with President Biden yesterday.
Speaker 4: Well really didn't face tough questions while he was here,
Speaker 4: at least not publicly. Ryan. But on the next point,
Speaker 4: House speaker Mike Johnson, who Ryan and I will we
Speaker 4: promised to continue our weekly updates as to whether he
Speaker 4: is a real person, and we can re up our
Speaker 4: confirmation that he continues to be real despite having the
Speaker 4: most generic white man name imaginable. Mike Johnson, let's actually.
Speaker 3: A white man necessarily middle It's just.
Speaker 4: Like, yeah, it is just an American name. You're right,
Speaker 4: Thank you for calling me on my non inclusive language.
Speaker 3: Here's here's my Spencer Johnson.
Speaker 4: It's not Spencer Johnson. But what we're going to roll
Speaker 4: is this tape here, and bear in mind that the
Speaker 4: House has very little time left to fund the government
Speaker 4: and is bitterly fighting over all kinds of different goodies
Speaker 4: in Ukraine is obviously on the table. Here's what Speaker
Speaker 4: Mike Johnson said yesterday.
Speaker 7: We need a clear articulation of the strategy to allow
Speaker 7: Ukraine to win, and thus far their responses have been insufficient.
Speaker 7: They have not provided us the clarity and the detail
Speaker 7: that we requested over and over since literally twenty four
Speaker 7: hours after I was handed the gavel as Speaker of
Speaker 7: the House.
Speaker 3: And so what the.
Speaker 7: Biden administration seems to be asking for is billions of
Speaker 7: additional dollars with no appropriate oversight, no clear strategy to win,
Speaker 7: and none of the answers that I think the American
Speaker 7: people are owed.
Speaker 8: President Zelensky made it so clear how he needs help,
Speaker 8: but if he gets the help, he can win this war.
Speaker 8: And he outlined in some great detail a the kind
Speaker 8: of help he needs and how it will help him win.
Speaker 8: Even many of our Republican colleagues talked about we are
Speaker 8: winning this war and if we get the help that
Speaker 8: if he gets the help he needs, he will win.
Speaker 6: Right.
Speaker 4: Okay, so that was obviously Chuckie Schumer. But what's so
Speaker 4: funny there is when he says, even my Republican colleagues,
Speaker 4: he's just talking about Mitch McConnell. Even these even Mitch
Speaker 4: and even you know, because.
Speaker 1: We explain to people how far out on a limb
Speaker 1: Mitch is related to the rest of his conference on this,
Speaker 1: or at least a big faction of the conference he said.
Speaker 4: He has said, this is an almost amazingly like impossible quote,
Speaker 4: but he has really said that it's the most important
Speaker 4: thing that they're doing right now is funding Ukraine, and
Speaker 4: that's for the domestic This is not a domestic hot war.
Speaker 4: This is obviously on another continent. It's not to downplay
Speaker 4: the importance of it. I think it obviously does have
Speaker 4: implications for the United States. But for the Senate Minority
Speaker 4: Leader Mitch McConnell to say that when there's so much
Speaker 4: suffering and business to be taken care of in the
Speaker 4: United States, that is how far out on a limb
Speaker 4: he is. And it's becoming increasingly problematic with about ten
Speaker 4: Republican senators, so you know they're ard. The Senate is
Speaker 4: almost completely split, so ten isn't a huge block, but
Speaker 4: it's enough to cause serious problems for Mitch McConnell, especially
Speaker 4: because you have about ten senators who are increasingly aligned
Speaker 4: with what Mike Johnson just said. There's a huge contract
Speaker 4: between what Mike Johnson said on He has yet to
Speaker 4: hear quote a clear articulation of strategy. This is a
Speaker 4: fairly establishment Republican saying that Kevin McCarthy had similar concerns
Speaker 4: about Ukraine. He really made it possible for the Mike
Speaker 4: Johnson's of the world to start publicly expressing their concerns
Speaker 4: about Ukraine when he said we don't want a blank
Speaker 4: check about a year ago, and obviously from a strategic standpoint,
Speaker 4: that was an olive branch to the Freedom Caucus and
Speaker 4: maybe kept them at bay, kept the Matt Gatess at
Speaker 4: bay for another six months something like that. So mission accomplished.
Speaker 3: Kind of true. Haven't heard of him lately.
Speaker 1: The big news out of the White House was that
Speaker 1: they're open to this hardline kind of their immigration proposal
Speaker 1: border proposal that Republicans have saying. Republicans have said, look,
Speaker 1: you want Ukraine money, Yes you can have it, but
Speaker 1: to get it, you have to do our bill on
Speaker 1: the border, not like some compromise immigration yeah plan, but
Speaker 1: basically you have to just rubber stamp our bill, and the
Speaker 1: White House was signaling yesterday that they're actually open to that.
Speaker 3: What did you make of that?
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's always been I actually think we've talked about
Speaker 4: this for weeks. If there will be any compromise struck
Speaker 4: before the end of the year, and as this funding
Speaker 4: is on the table, it's going to be over immigration,
Speaker 4: I would have zero optimism because Republicans have no leverage.
Speaker 4: I'm fairly supportive of HR two, that's the bill that
Speaker 4: they're talking about, which would basically redo the asylum system here,
Speaker 4: which is at the heart of a lot of the
Speaker 4: problems that are happening at the border and are happening
Speaker 4: in South and Central America. But that said, the reason
Speaker 4: the White House wants to negotiate with it is because
Speaker 4: they know Republicans have basically no leverage. And that's where
Speaker 4: the Freedom Caucus comes in and is going to like
Speaker 4: the odds that all of this gets completely torpedoed and
Speaker 4: Speaker Mike Johnson is out on his butt in a
Speaker 4: couple of weeks are honestly really high, because what Republicans
Speaker 4: don't want to do is allow Biden to say he
Speaker 4: took tough steps to control the border because he negotiated
Speaker 4: with Republicans on HR two and sent more or funding
Speaker 4: to ICE and CBP and sent more funding to the border,
Speaker 4: drones and all of that stuff, which is part of
Speaker 4: HR two. And so it allows him to compromise and
Speaker 4: say I negotiated to pass part of this bipartisan bill.
Speaker 4: If he doesn't touch the asylum situation, it basically doesn't matter.
Speaker 4: You can fund the border as much as you want,
Speaker 4: it doesn't matter if you don't reform that central part
Speaker 4: of it. And so that's what's really a problem for
Speaker 4: Mike Johnson. And when Chuck Schumer said, quote that Zelensky
Speaker 4: provided quote kind of the kind of help he needs,
Speaker 4: he described the quote kind of help he needs to
Speaker 4: win the war. That's a huge contrast with Mike Johnson
Speaker 4: saying there was no clear articulation of strategy. So these
Speaker 4: are some real sticking points going ahead in the next
Speaker 4: couple of weeks.
Speaker 1: And this is where we get to the weird incentives
Speaker 1: that our political system produces. Because on the one hand,
Speaker 1: Republicans want border security like that's they've been running on
Speaker 1: the wall, built the wall, that's 'es central to their
Speaker 1: whole thing.
Speaker 3: At the same time, mass numbers of.
Speaker 1: Migrants at the border and chaos at the border is
Speaker 1: a political as they see it, a political gift to them,
Speaker 1: like that's good for them.
Speaker 3: So it reminds me.
Speaker 1: Of that saying, you know, it's very difficult to convince
Speaker 1: somebody of something, you know, if their paycheck depends on
Speaker 1: not understanding it.
Speaker 3: It's very difficult to get.
Speaker 1: A political party to solve something if support for them
Speaker 1: depends on them not solving the issue. On the flip side,
Speaker 1: Democrats constantly tell their base that they're not for these
Speaker 1: hardline type migration policies, but they would like nothing more
Speaker 1: than to have the Republicans kind of force their hands
Speaker 1: to do a crackdown so that they don't have to
Speaker 1: think about it anymore.
Speaker 4: Yeah. It's weird though, because there's part of the Republican
Speaker 4: argument is that allowing you know, this this unstanched flow
Speaker 4: into the country is good for Democrats because you know,
Speaker 4: everyone who when they're when they're natural, everyone is just
Speaker 4: going to vote Democrat. Like there are just a.
Speaker 3: Publicly believe when they start looking at their own.
Speaker 1: Polling numbers like oh wait, yeah, we actually can win
Speaker 1: these these folks votes.
Speaker 4: The Rio Grand Valley yeah, absolutely, it.
Speaker 3: Doesn't seem to register.
Speaker 1: No, it's like this gigantic democratic scheme to let in
Speaker 1: all of these brown people who then end up voting Republican.
Speaker 3: Yeah, what kind of democratic scheme is that.
Speaker 4: Well maybe after like ten years, but yes, yeah, they
Speaker 4: can't vote for ten years anyway. No, I mean, well,
Speaker 4: but that's the problem, And I mean I think that's
Speaker 4: why these it's not necessary, like HR two is not
Speaker 4: necessarily a hard line. It is in that it would
Speaker 4: make it really hard for people with dubious asylum claims
Speaker 4: to come here, live in sanctuary cities like in the Shadows,
Speaker 4: and maybe never have a path to naturalization. I think
Speaker 4: that's what's so sad about a lot of this is
Speaker 4: that unless and some of them bank on this, Unless
Speaker 4: there's huge reforms that broaden what an asylum claim is,
Speaker 4: are broad in what a legitimate refugee claim is. In
Speaker 4: the United States, there's not a path to naturalization for
Speaker 4: a lot of people who are fundamentally and admittedly they'll
Speaker 4: tell you this economic migrants. That's not the same as asylum.
Speaker 4: These are two different categories, and that's what HR two
Speaker 4: is trying to deal with is kind of streamlining what
Speaker 4: constitutes asylum, so that you don't have people coming here
Speaker 4: and you're going to San Francisco and just trying to
Speaker 4: stay there until the law changes and just straight by
Speaker 4: and just trying to get by living in pretty sad conditions.
Speaker 4: And so the question of what's hardline anymore, I don't
Speaker 4: even know. After how many years of a failled immigration.
Speaker 1: Policy, I'm surprised that since they're combining immigration and Ukraine here,
Speaker 1: I'm surprised that none of the senators have done the
Speaker 1: most cynical thing yet, which is say we'll just draft
Speaker 1: them and send them over to Ukraine and train them
Speaker 1: and put them in the front lines, and then after
Speaker 1: they fight for the US over and Ukraine, they can
Speaker 1: come back here. Because this goes to a little he's
Speaker 1: from Eric Watson here, if we can put up this
Speaker 1: next element, Zelenski told senators that Ukraine is considering description
Speaker 1: of men over forty to bolster frontline troops or Senator
Speaker 1: that's from Senator Wicker as a man over forty like WHOA, Yes,
Speaker 1: I thought I missed my window where I was going
Speaker 1: to get drafted and to go killing, to go kill
Speaker 1: somebody or get killed. But this goes to the a
Speaker 1: fundamental problem that Ukraine has, which is, you know, they've
Speaker 1: something like seven hundred thousand people can check the exact
Speaker 1: stat military age men have left Ukraine, yes, and one
Speaker 1: hundred thousand plus have been killed, many more wounded. You
Speaker 1: can only fight for so long, and so we could
Speaker 1: send you know, military hardware and weapons over there endlessly,
Speaker 1: but at some point they start running out of people,
Speaker 1: whereas Russia does not run. Even if you take the
Speaker 1: US weeks this week at face value and say that
Speaker 1: Russia has lost three hundred thousand plus troops of something
Speaker 1: like an army of three hundred fifty thousand to start with,
Speaker 1: they've done going through a mobilization that is bringing hundreds
Speaker 1: of thousands of more. It's just a look at the map.
Speaker 1: It's just a much bigger country. And so now if
Speaker 1: they're going to have to move to people over forty than.
Speaker 4: What, Yeah, and that brings up a hugely I think
Speaker 4: it should just a pathetic question as to whether the
Speaker 4: will of Mitch McConnell and Chuck Schumer and elite politicians
Speaker 4: in DC to wage this war is more powerful here
Speaker 4: than it is among the Ukrainian people. When you start
Speaker 4: talking about scriptures of men over right.
Speaker 1: Obviously, there are many who are like deeply committed to
Speaker 1: the fight see it as existential to them.
Speaker 4: Absolutely.
Speaker 1: Obviously, if you have to start conscripting people over forty's
Speaker 1: it's not enough.
Speaker 4: Yes too. Yeah, when the United States cares so much
Speaker 4: about the contested territory in the Dambas that they are
Speaker 4: funding a government that is conscripting men over the age
Speaker 4: of forty, you really have to ask that question as
Speaker 4: to whether this is more important to Mitch McConnell than
Speaker 4: it is to the majority of the Ukrainian people. I
Speaker 4: think that is a very good point. There's a lot
Speaker 4: of support in Ukraine for the war, there's no question
Speaker 4: about that. But at the same time, we are how
Speaker 4: many years into it at this point, and the levels
Speaker 4: that we know of death, yeah, two years in February.
Speaker 4: The levels that we know of death right now are staggering.
Speaker 4: I mean, we're talking about hundreds of thousands of people
Speaker 4: who have died over the last couple of years. At
Speaker 4: a certain point, you feel that much more acutely in
Speaker 4: Ukraine than you do in the United States, and that
Speaker 4: is a that is I think a very kind of
Speaker 4: pathetic contrast and will be brought out more going forward.
Speaker 1: Fascinating clash in the EU in Sweden in particular, between
Speaker 1: the kind of Tesla's anti union model we can put
Speaker 1: this up here, which relies on non union labor to
Speaker 1: build Tesla's versus the very strong industrial unions of Europe
Speaker 1: who are now engaged in they've kind of there's a
Speaker 1: very kind of small, relatively small fight, kind of one
Speaker 1: hundred I think it's one hundred and thirty four metal
Speaker 1: workers we're not even putting together, necessarily not working in
Speaker 1: the Tesla plant, but they're working with Tesla Mechanics.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and.
Speaker 1: They they in collaboration with unions around the country, are
Speaker 1: trying to shut Tesla down to force them into bargaining.
Speaker 4: And across the EU you have these like you're saying
Speaker 4: it rippled into Danish transport workers and that's the big
Speaker 4: news this week, saying in solidarity with the Swedish mechanics
Speaker 4: is about one hundred and thirty of them, which isn't
Speaker 4: much in the grand scheme of Tesla's operations. They're not
Speaker 4: unl loading Tesla's like, they're not taking them off of ships,
Speaker 4: they're not going to ship them any more. In solidarity
Speaker 4: with the Swedish workers that have been on strike for
Speaker 4: about a month now.
Speaker 1: Yeap oh, and let's pause for a little bit of
Speaker 1: like labor history and theory here, which.
Speaker 4: Because I was hoping you would, because that's a part
Speaker 4: of why I suggested.
Speaker 3: We do this.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I'm glad one of these articles did make
Speaker 1: the point which is so key for people to understand
Speaker 1: kind of labor politics. They write, Unlike many other European countries,
Speaker 1: Sweden has no legally enforced the minimum wage and little
Speaker 1: in the way of statutory labor market regulation. The very
Speaker 1: beginning of the labor market movement in like the nineteenth
Speaker 1: century here in the United States, the labor movement was
Speaker 1: stridently opposed to minimum wages and to other kind of regulators. No,
Speaker 1: there were four regulations against child labor and things like that.
Speaker 3: But they live, but they did not write.
Speaker 1: But they did not want the state to come in
Speaker 1: and set a minimum wage because from their perspective, what
Speaker 1: the state giveth, the state can take it away, and
Speaker 1: it would be better to build mass worker power and
Speaker 1: just set wages and say, like, it doesn't matter what
Speaker 1: the state says, you have to pay us.
Speaker 3: This is what we want, and you don't have a choice.
Speaker 1: You're paying us as we see what your profit numbers are,
Speaker 1: we see what you can pay, and you know you're
Speaker 1: going to get a little bit of a profit. We're
Speaker 1: going to and work, but we who are providing the
Speaker 1: value are going to get are going to get the
Speaker 1: rest of it. And so that has prevailed in Sweden
Speaker 1: because Sweden has such strong industrial unions. They're like, don't
Speaker 1: worry about a minimum wage. So then a tesla comes
Speaker 1: in and they're like, oh, no minimum wage. Interesting, Okay,
Speaker 1: let's let's see what we can get away with here.
Speaker 1: And you can see why that is a threat to
Speaker 1: the entire system. And so the unions have to come
Speaker 1: in and say, I don't care if it's one hundred
Speaker 1: and thirty four workers, like, you're paying the prevailing wage.
Speaker 1: If you don't, we're shutting you down. And pretty much
Speaker 1: across Sweden there's support for this because you the entire
Speaker 1: kind of culture under stands that their.
Speaker 3: Prosperity depends on this arrangement.
Speaker 1: Even as they kind of sweetened and drifting recently into
Speaker 1: right wing territory, there's still this broad support for you know,
Speaker 1: making sure that you can make a middle class wage
Speaker 1: at a typical job in Sweden.
Speaker 4: And that's why this is such a fascinating class. We
Speaker 4: can put the Jacobin article up on the screen. This
Speaker 4: was a really I highly recommend reading this article because
Speaker 4: I think it outlines the stakes globally really well. In
Speaker 4: the stakes for actually one of the biggest companies in
Speaker 4: the world at this point, they're right. On one side
Speaker 4: is Tesla, by far the world's most valued automaker, currently
Speaker 4: valued higher than the next nine car companies combined. I
Speaker 4: think it is so important to remember that about Tesla's
Speaker 4: you know, it's the cyber truck, and Elon and x It's,
Speaker 4: you know, become sort of a punching bag. But in
Speaker 4: terms of car companies, this is enormously, enormously powerful. It
Speaker 4: has one hundred and thirty thousand workers, jack up and
Speaker 4: continues the two top best selling EV models. On the
Speaker 4: other side is the Swedish Metal Workers Union, a union
Speaker 4: with two hundred and thirty thousand members, organizing eighty percent
Speaker 4: of all workers in its sectors, with a large membership
Speaker 4: that has not taken party in many strikes. The union
Speaker 4: has amassed a war chest of about one billion dollars
Speaker 4: and it's able to pay striking workers one hundred and
Speaker 4: thirty percent of their salary. So this already has been
Speaker 4: going on since October. The strike has already been going
Speaker 4: on since October. It has rippled into other countries. It's
Speaker 4: rippled into electricians and dock workers and jacobin ads. If
Speaker 4: either side caves, it will have profound impacts across Sweden.
Speaker 4: If the unions lose, it might spell the end of
Speaker 4: the Swedish norm based labor market system of high unionization rates,
Speaker 4: sectoral bargaining and few regulations. If Tesla uses, it will
Speaker 4: be the If Tesla loses, it will be the first
Speaker 4: union with which the company has been forced to negotiate.
Speaker 4: So there you have one of the most powerful car companies,
Speaker 4: one of the most high valued car companies in the world,
Speaker 4: potentially having a serious threat to its non union business
Speaker 4: model because of one hundred and thirty workers in Sweden
Speaker 4: who have workers around the EU striking in solidarity with them,
Speaker 4: and TUSLA refusing to negotiate. Ryan, I actually think the
Speaker 4: most likely outcome here, and you've covered this more closely
Speaker 4: than I have for years, so you I'm curious what
Speaker 4: you think. I think Elon is just going to pull
Speaker 4: out of Sweden.
Speaker 1: Oh straight up pull out of Sweden, rather than because
Speaker 1: he doesn't want to set a precedent that.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think this depends on it depends on
Speaker 1: how it depends on how useful Sweden, you know, the
Speaker 1: Swedish production is to his supply chain in Europe, and
Speaker 1: how important that is. I think you could, if you're Elon,
Speaker 1: you know, rationalize it and be like.
Speaker 3: Look, it's Sweden.
Speaker 1: Of course we're in a union, like like okay, but
Speaker 1: that doesn't mean that you here, you know, in the
Speaker 1: United States need to be in a union. And I
Speaker 1: think he's I appreciated his one remark that he made
Speaker 1: about unionization here in the United States.
Speaker 3: He said, if we wind up with a union, we
Speaker 3: deserved it.
Speaker 1: And one of the powers in the positive elements of
Speaker 1: the union movement is to put pressure on bosses.
Speaker 4: He raised salaries like.
Speaker 3: Elon Musk right exactly.
Speaker 1: In fact, in some ways, the best the best situation.
Speaker 1: If let's say you're at you're never going to get this,
Speaker 1: but let's say you get to ninety percent union density
Speaker 1: in the auto industry. Oftentimes the people who are best
Speaker 1: off are that are the other ten percent because the
Speaker 1: bosses are so scared of getting of them getting unionized
Speaker 1: that they push salaries even pay even higher. Now, the
Speaker 1: unions are good at protecting jobs as well, so that
Speaker 1: you know, you can't be you know, arbitrarily disciplined and
Speaker 1: you know, otherwise cracked down upon.
Speaker 3: So that's different.
Speaker 1: But when it comes to just wages and kind of benefits,
Speaker 1: the you know, the pressure of unions pushes them up.
Speaker 1: You saw Toyota Honda after the uaw's big deal. You know, quickly,
Speaker 1: you know, reach out to their workers and be like, hey,
Speaker 1: here's a little extra because as Sean Fain told me
Speaker 1: in an interview I did for my podcast, that they're
Speaker 1: just getting a deluge of messages from auto workers at
Speaker 1: non union plants saying like, please come in and organize
Speaker 1: our plant. Yes, and that in the past had been
Speaker 1: the big hurdle that they would go to a plant
Speaker 1: and they'd be outside of it, going to the grocery stores,
Speaker 1: going to the bars, trying to meet workers that they
Speaker 1: could then talk into like being allies of theirs on
Speaker 1: the inside, rather than workers just organically and reaching out
Speaker 1: and saying, please come in and unionize us and that's
Speaker 1: the difference between kind of a tight labor market and
Speaker 1: a loose one.
Speaker 4: And to the actually your point about Elon and Sweden,
Speaker 4: I mean, this guy is doing business China, so that
Speaker 4: is trying to spread quote socialism with Chinese characteristics, and
Speaker 4: he is lavishing.
Speaker 1: She didn't ping in praise, so capitalism with Swedish characteristic.
Speaker 4: Capitalism with characteristics. So but this is actually I think
Speaker 4: that the Jacobin article, which is actually written I think
Speaker 4: by folks in Sweden who point out that Swedish union
Speaker 4: density is down for like eighty percent, but it's down
Speaker 4: to like sixty two percent, so still a country with
Speaker 4: pretty high union density. But the stakes here, I think
Speaker 4: for both sides absolutely are very high, and especially Ryan
Speaker 4: in light of what we're about to talk about next,
Speaker 4: which is the climate deal that was struck last night.
Speaker 1: Dubai decided that it was going to be the best
Speaker 1: place to host the climate change conference called COP twenty eight.
Speaker 1: So as first of all, it's kind of perfect. Really
Speaker 1: it is perfect. We did figure out what COP stands for. Yes,
Speaker 1: ex tribute questions, Ask yourself, do you know what COP stands?
Speaker 1: Where it's COP twenty four, COP twenty last you know Copenhagen.
Speaker 3: Conference of Parties.
Speaker 4: It's again perfect if you parties. A lot of people
Speaker 4: came into this show today wondering, A, is Mike Johnson
Speaker 4: still a real person? And B what does COPS stand for?
Speaker 4: And by the end of the show we have answered
Speaker 4: successfully those two questions.
Speaker 1: Sort of because it's Conference of Parties of the un FCC. Well,
Speaker 1: I see, I can't even remember of the framework on
Speaker 1: the Climate Change Agreement or whatever that is. It's a
Speaker 1: bunch of countries that get together to try to agree
Speaker 1: on a path forward. Before they reached a deal. Early
Speaker 1: this morning, Al Gore unleashed on the kind of conference
Speaker 1: and shame them a little bit with well, actually, so
Speaker 1: let's put.
Speaker 3: This put this up here. This is al Gore.
Speaker 1: COP twenty eight is now on the verge of complete failure.
Speaker 1: The world desperately needs to phase out fossil fuels as
Speaker 1: quickly as possible. But this obsequious draft reads as if
Speaker 1: opak Opek dictated it word for word.
Speaker 3: It is even worse than many had feared.
Speaker 1: It is of the Petro States, by the Petro States,
Speaker 1: and for the Petro States. It is deeply offensive to
Speaker 1: all who have taken this process seriously, twenty four hours
Speaker 1: left to show whose side the world is on the
Speaker 1: side that wants to protect community's future by kickstarting and
Speaker 1: orderly phase out of fossil fuels, or the side of
Speaker 1: the petro states and the leaders of the oil and
Speaker 1: gas companies that are fueling the historic climate catastrophe. In
Speaker 1: order to prevent COP twenty eight from being the most
Speaker 1: embarrassing and dismal failure in twenty eight years of international
Speaker 1: climate negotiations, the final text must include clear language on
Speaker 1: phasing out fossil fuels. Anything else is a massive step
Speaker 1: backwards from where the world needs to be to truly
Speaker 1: address the climate crisis and make sure that one point
Speaker 1: five degree centigrade.
Speaker 3: Goal doesn't die.
Speaker 1: In Dubai, they did finally come to agreement on phrasing
Speaker 1: around phasing out fossil fuels against the interest obviously of
Speaker 1: any fossil fuel producing companies countries, but environmentalists and climate
Speaker 1: change climatehawks are still saying that it doesn't it doesn't
Speaker 1: really create any path, you know, toward getting there. It's
Speaker 1: it's good that they acknowledge it and said that they're
Speaker 1: going to within ten years kind of you know, transition
Speaker 1: away from fossil fuels. It includes big stops to natural gas,
Speaker 1: which is a big priority of Russia, other other U
Speaker 1: s major natural gas producers, the EU, which is building
Speaker 1: a gigantic terminal for liquid natural gas. A lot of
Speaker 1: developing countries and stretches in the south, you know, are
Speaker 1: are very angry about the fact that there's no financing
Speaker 1: and no plan to say okay, Nderia's saying, okay, well,
Speaker 1: you want us to not develop all of our you know,
Speaker 1: wealth that we've discovered when it comes to fossil fuels,
Speaker 1: but you're also not putting uh in play any type
Speaker 1: of financing that would incentivize us to do that and
Speaker 1: to move in a different direction.
Speaker 3: So so how are we gonna how are we going
Speaker 3: to do that?
Speaker 1: There was there was a big push to uh, you know,
Speaker 1: crack down on coal uh and to insist that any
Speaker 1: new coal plants not add you know, any carbon emissions
Speaker 1: that they be, that they use some type of carbon
Speaker 1: tech to uh that that tech is not developed sufficiently. Indian,
Speaker 1: China and others were able to push back on that,
Speaker 1: and so it's nice they're saying some decent things. It's
Speaker 1: better than it could have been. But We're already at
Speaker 1: like one point two degrees increase, so I'll get stay
Speaker 1: below one point five looks basically impossible.
Speaker 4: There's an interesting line in a Bloomberg article in this
Speaker 4: where they actually go back to the Glasgow conference two
Speaker 4: years ago and say, after a pledge to phase down
Speaker 4: cold Glasgow two years ago, consumption has continued to rise
Speaker 4: and the world remains very likely to unlikely to limit
Speaker 4: warming to the Paris Agreement's target of one point five.
Speaker 4: So yeah, like they talked about this two years ago,
Speaker 4: and cold consumption continues to rise, and that's sort of
Speaker 4: a good, I think, window into how this stuff actually goes.
Speaker 4: It's kind of already being dubbed the quote UAE consensus.
Speaker 4: And this is another line from the Bloomberg piece. They say, well,
Speaker 4: the outcome falls short of the specific fossil fueld quote
Speaker 4: phase out. As Ryan mentioned that most countries wanted, it
Speaker 4: does break new ground. No previous COP text has mentioned
Speaker 4: moving away from oil and gas, the fuels that have
Speaker 4: underpinned the global economy for decades. I was listening to
Speaker 4: an NPR report on this yesterday when I was driving,
Speaker 4: and while I was driving a gas guzzling vehicle and
Speaker 4: they said something. They were talking about how countries, largely
Speaker 4: in the Global South you just mentioned in Nigeria, we're
Speaker 4: really unhappy with the agreement so far because they are
Speaker 4: facing sort of more acute consequences quickly, more quickly than
Speaker 4: countries sort of in the middle are on the geographic middle,
Speaker 4: that is to say, are when it comes to climate
Speaker 4: that these are going to hurt poorer countries in the
Speaker 4: Global South more and more quickly than they are countries
Speaker 4: in the middle. What's interesting about that is actually those
Speaker 4: countries also Nigeria being one example, for the reasons you
Speaker 4: just listed, Ryan, are the ones that will lose from
Speaker 4: some of the modernization and humanitarian benefits that fossil fuels
Speaker 4: brought to different parts of the world really quickly. And
Speaker 4: we're starting to see that become part of the debate
Speaker 4: in the EU and the United States. That's like, listen,
Speaker 4: if you want these countries to have a robust and
Speaker 4: growing middle class, limiting fossil fuel consumption or limiting the
Speaker 4: profits that they can make on other people's fossil fuel
Speaker 4: consumption is saying we got rich off of these fossil fuels,
Speaker 4: but you can't, and that is a real problem I
Speaker 4: think for the left to sort of explain and work
Speaker 4: around this deal itself was.
Speaker 1: Which would you say, well, fine, let's redistribute a lot
Speaker 1: of wealth.
Speaker 4: See that Ryan has the easy, honest answer that John
Speaker 4: Kerry and al Gore don't. They won't go as so
Speaker 4: far as to say this this was.
Speaker 3: Reportedly alight because he's kind of out of power.
Speaker 4: I guess, yeah, at this point you probably John Kerry
Speaker 4: would not. But that is a real problem I think
Speaker 4: for the people who are flying to these conferences in
Speaker 4: private jets and living luxurious lifestyles to say, we got
Speaker 4: rech off this stuff. I'm sure the Heinz fortune came
Speaker 4: in no small part due to fossil fuel consumption and
Speaker 4: use of fossil fuels and shipping that's all over the
Speaker 4: all over the world, actually shipping that delicious ketchup all.
Speaker 3: Over the world, all fifty cent varieties.
Speaker 4: But no, you guys in Nigeria, that's where we're stopping this.
Speaker 3: And so al Gore.
Speaker 1: I'll read some of his follow up statement after they
Speaker 1: reached a deal. By the way, al Gore is seventy
Speaker 1: five years old, six years younger than Joe Biden.
Speaker 3: He says.
Speaker 1: The decision at COP twenty eight to finally recognize this
Speaker 1: is after the agreement was reached, To finally recognize that
Speaker 1: the climate crisis is at its heart a fossil fuel
Speaker 1: crisis is an important milestone, but it is also the
Speaker 1: bare minimum we need and is long overdue. The influence
Speaker 1: of petro states is still evident in the half measures
Speaker 1: and loopholes included in the final agreement. Whether this is
Speaker 1: a turning point that truly marks the beginning of the
Speaker 1: end of the fossil fuel era depends on the actions
Speaker 1: that come next and the mobilization of finance required to
Speaker 1: achieve them.
Speaker 3: And that is a key point, is that the states.
Speaker 1: States are going to have to insert themselves into the
Speaker 1: financial markets to drive financial decision, like they did with
Speaker 1: the Inflation Reduction Act for instance, saying like, look, if
Speaker 1: you invest in this clean tech, it's going to be
Speaker 1: more profitable because we're going to give these x subsidies
Speaker 1: and tax breaks like That's as basically the question that
Speaker 1: the world is facing.
Speaker 3: Do we want to use state power to drive finance
Speaker 3: in that direction.
Speaker 4: Right and then or do we use things like COP
Speaker 4: as a as a cope or as like a shield
Speaker 4: to say, listen, we came to the negotiating table. Reportedly,
Speaker 4: this deal was helped enormously by negotiations that John Kerry
Speaker 4: was having with China. So do we say on the surface,
Speaker 4: you know, this is what we're doing, and privately, we're
Speaker 4: going to continue taking our private jets and investing in
Speaker 4: fossil fuel companies and allowing fossil fuel companies to run
Speaker 4: ads on how they are transitioning to green energy while
Speaker 4: they're still making bank on fossil fuels. And it's all
Speaker 4: just kind of a show that protects you know, that
Speaker 4: gives a little, as Al Gore says, quote bare minimum,
Speaker 4: sort of gives. It gives a little in order to
Speaker 4: continue doing other things beneath the surface.
Speaker 1: The other big news here in Washington is that mass
Speaker 1: surveillance is getting a second look. This a coalition of
Speaker 1: the Progressive Caucus and the Freedom Caucus have been battling
Speaker 1: to reform what they call seven oh two authorities. This
Speaker 1: is the kind of key provisions of the Patriot Act
Speaker 1: that allow the US government to surveil foreigners and through
Speaker 1: the through their surveillance of foreigners, to kind of do
Speaker 1: back door searches with regard to like Americans either abroad
Speaker 1: or uh or or on American soil. A lot of
Speaker 1: dispute and an argument about you know how how often
Speaker 1: it's abused, you know, what the back doors like allow for.
Speaker 1: And so this is an opportunity to say, okay, let's
Speaker 1: let's codify this, let's seriously reform this. On top of
Speaker 1: the kind of developing the developed industry that where private companies,
Speaker 1: you know, obtain all sorts of information that it would
Speaker 1: be illegal for the US government to obtain. There is
Speaker 1: a law that says the US government cannot use a
Speaker 1: private you cannot buy privately what it couldn't obtain legally,
Speaker 1: you know, through a warrant. What they've done is they've
Speaker 1: gone to like third party brokers yes, and said, oh, well,
Speaker 1: we're not buying it directly from then, we're buying it
Speaker 1: from these guys that you know. Pathetically, the courts have
Speaker 1: been like, yeah, sure, that seems fine.
Speaker 3: It's like what you no, what are we idiots? That's
Speaker 3: not fine.
Speaker 1: So so this new push would also make very clear
Speaker 1: that you that you cannot do that. And so, as
Speaker 1: our resident Freedom Caucus correspondent, what's your sense of you
Speaker 1: know how serious the opposition is, and then we can
Speaker 1: get to kind of the where you know, where this is,
Speaker 1: where this is heading today, tomorrow and throughout the week.
Speaker 4: You know, I wouldn't even look to the freedom focus
Speaker 4: on this. I would look to Senator Lee because he
Speaker 4: has been all over this, not just in the last
Speaker 4: couple of months, but for a long time. Because this
Speaker 4: is so FISA's Section seven oh two is expiring on
Speaker 4: December thirty first, and that has the intelligence community scared
Speaker 4: out of their minds because they rely so much on
Speaker 4: this oversight. They have abused it tens of thousands of
Speaker 4: times according to Inspector General reports. So that's according to
Speaker 4: our own government. It has been abused rampantly. And basically
Speaker 4: whenever Chris Ray goes in front of Mike Lee and
Speaker 4: goes in front of the Senate or goes in front
Speaker 4: of the House, he says, just trust us. We have
Speaker 4: put reforms in place and it is not currently being abused.
Speaker 4: But of course we have absolutely no insight into that.
Speaker 4: You really just have to take Chris Ray's word for it,
Speaker 4: or you have to have you know, ongoing ig oversight.
Speaker 4: And what's interesting about FISA is that it came out
Speaker 4: of the Church Committee era. And we've talked about this
Speaker 4: many times, Ryan FISA abuse. It's the abuse of the
Speaker 4: system that was meant to stop abuse at the system.
Speaker 4: And so it shows how easily even the intelligence community's
Speaker 4: sort of self government and it's it's oversight bodies can
Speaker 4: be abused because the intelligence community is able to operate,
Speaker 4: it gets so much sort of leeway to operate in
Speaker 4: the shadows. And so then you really do have to
Speaker 4: just say, hey, Christopher Ray, I'm trusting that you are
Speaker 4: better than Jay Edgar Hoover. I even though you work
Speaker 4: in the JEdgar Hoover building, although not for not for long,
Speaker 4: but we're just trusting that you're doing this and you're
Speaker 4: doing it all on the up and up. And so
Speaker 4: Mike Lee has been just reaming them out publicly, and
Speaker 4: so to have that on the Senate side, Rand Paul
Speaker 4: is also on top of this on the Senate side,
Speaker 4: and to have them the Freedom Caucus with the negotiating
Speaker 4: power that it does. You know, the sort of GOP
Speaker 4: on the House side at large doesn't have much negotiating power,
Speaker 4: but the Freedom Caucus does have a lot of negotiating
Speaker 4: power over the GOP because of the slim margins. They
Speaker 4: have decided to take this up as a cause, and
Speaker 4: rightfully so, because we can put the next element up
Speaker 4: on the screen. This is an article from my colleague
Speaker 4: over at the Federalist Tristan Justice, who actually went and
Speaker 4: looked at a letter that some of the folks in
Speaker 4: the intelligence community released recently, where they said, as you
Speaker 4: well know, our nation is under significant threat today, with
Speaker 4: wars in Europe in the Middle East, a potential conflict
Speaker 4: with China and the Indo Pacific, and the deadly flow
Speaker 4: of fentanyl across the southern border. It is so insulting
Speaker 4: that they just invoked fentanyl to keep spying on people.
Speaker 4: They add, in these circumstances, we cannot hamstring the intelligence community,
Speaker 4: either by failing through a new section seven oh two
Speaker 4: of the Faiza Act or by limiting it in ways
Speaker 4: that would make it difficult for the government to protect Americans.
Speaker 4: People like Mike Lee want them to get a warrant
Speaker 4: every time that they invade our privacy, which is basically
Speaker 4: exactly what the Constitution says they have to do. They
Speaker 4: say they cannot afford to get warrants because that would
Speaker 4: impede their ability to keep Americans safe. That letter was signed,
Speaker 4: As Glenn Greenwald surmised on Twitter, he was like, this
Speaker 4: is you know, there's overlap between this letter and the
Speaker 4: Hunter Biden laptop is disinformation. It must be censored letter.
Speaker 4: Indeed it was, and that's what the federalsto article pointed out,
Speaker 4: and also pointed out that seven oh two was abuse.
Speaker 4: This is where the Freedom Caucus is coming from. Was
Speaker 4: abused in a surveilling Carter Page and the sort of
Speaker 4: Russia collusion hoax.
Speaker 1: And it's funny how we each try to reach our
Speaker 1: respective audiences because over the intercept and we could probably
Speaker 1: put this up and post our our headline was Trump allies,
Speaker 1: we are, you know, gunning for more surveillance authority. Because
Speaker 1: if you're going to reach kind of Norman Democrats want to,
Speaker 1: you want to make it clear to them, hey, okay,
Speaker 1: maybe we don't think you should, but maybe you trust
Speaker 1: Joe Biden or Barack Obama with these authorities.
Speaker 3: Do you really trust Trump with these authorities?
Speaker 1: And so, while it is very much the case that
Speaker 1: a lot of Trump allies are because of their experience
Speaker 1: with crossfire, Hurricane and Carter Page, uh and the flies
Speaker 1: at Court are very hostile to some of these authorities.
Speaker 1: That's why the freedom caucuses there are also some because
Speaker 1: he had plenty of deep staters in his administration who
Speaker 1: were heavily supportive of them. So you've got Mike, Mike Pompeo,
Speaker 1: William Barr, John Ratcliffe, Robert O'Brien, Devin Nunas, all of
Speaker 1: them kind of championing given and giving Biden these reauthorization
Speaker 1: of these authorities that our headline Trump allies are giddy
Speaker 1: about House Intelligence Committee Surveillance bill.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 1: The opponents of it were able to kick that Intelligence
Speaker 1: Committee bill out of the NDAA.
Speaker 3: And so here's how the process is unfolding.
Speaker 1: That the National Defense Authorization Act is this must pass
Speaker 1: piece of legislation which is supposed to go through the House,
Speaker 1: the Senate, in the House this this week and in
Speaker 1: the Senate, Ram Paul Mike Lee, as Emily was talking about,
Speaker 1: are are going to make some the word out of
Speaker 1: the center, are going to make some kind of play
Speaker 1: today to try to reform you know what's what's getting
Speaker 1: rammed through there. That's going to be one line of defense.
Speaker 1: Assuming that that eventually gets overridden. It comes over to
Speaker 1: the House, which is going to try to pass the
Speaker 1: legislation under what's called suspension of the rules. And in
Speaker 1: order to suspend the rules, you need a two thirds vote,
Speaker 1: which means that you only need one hundred and forty
Speaker 1: six members of Congress to stop the NDAA with this
Speaker 1: extension of spying authority in it. One hundred and forty
Speaker 1: six members Republicans and Democrats. You've got Primila Jaia Paul
Speaker 1: organizing on on the left, organizing the Progressive Caucus against it,
Speaker 1: and you've got warrened was it Davison and Oc'donald da
Speaker 1: Davis so Ohio really kind of a popular Republican, soft
Speaker 1: spoken but kind of just absolutely has been losing it
Speaker 1: on the Intel Committee lately. Did you see this that
Speaker 1: he was like, you're effing lying to me, Like yeah,
Speaker 1: And you know, Warren is known by his colleagues as
Speaker 1: just as a good dude basically like and doesn't get
Speaker 1: his feathers ruffled. And so the fact that he's has
Speaker 1: been screaming at Mike Turner behind closed doors, it seems
Speaker 1: to be the thing that blocked what was going to be.
Speaker 1: If we want to get even deeper into the weeds
Speaker 1: on this, they were going to do a thing called
Speaker 1: Queen Queen of the Hill.
Speaker 3: Remember this, So they.
Speaker 1: Were going to put both things up, like, all right,
Speaker 1: here's what the intelligence community wants, here's what the reformers, Jaya, Paul,
Speaker 1: what Warren and Permila say that they want, and whichever
Speaker 1: gets more votes on the floor is the Queen of
Speaker 1: the Hill and then gets put in there.
Speaker 3: But they were getting lied on so horrendously.
Speaker 1: Yeah that Warren was like, no, like this is outrageous,
Speaker 1: We're not doing this, and so and worked with the
Speaker 1: Freedom Caucus members on the Rules Committee, which if anybody says,
Speaker 1: all right, what are the what are the actual wins
Speaker 1: that they've gotten from that speaker fight? Getting the members
Speaker 1: on the Rules Committee at least puts them in a
Speaker 1: position to have more leverage here. So if they can
Speaker 1: cobble together one hundred and forty six members of Congress
Speaker 1: to oppose the NBA with this kind of reauthorization in
Speaker 1: it a huge challenge because there's there's no greater pressure
Speaker 1: put on members of Congress than to just approve this
Speaker 1: military policy.
Speaker 3: To do nothing, just get it's done, move it through.
Speaker 4: This is status quo.
Speaker 1: But if they if they can stop it, then they
Speaker 1: have to negotiate, because then they have to go back
Speaker 1: through the Rules Committee to get it onto the floor.
Speaker 1: And on the Rules committee you've got the Freedom Caucus
Speaker 1: members who are going to say, well, just reauthorize it
Speaker 1: using our bill that includes some very basic reforms. And
Speaker 1: you can tell how shady the intel community is about this.
Speaker 1: All of the kind of authorizations for this spying expire
Speaker 1: by think April eleventh, and this bill extends them through
Speaker 1: April nineteenth. And then what they can do is after
Speaker 1: April eleventh, when they expire, as long as the law
Speaker 1: is still in place, they could.
Speaker 3: Extend them for another year.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, so okay, it expires in April nineteenth, but
Speaker 1: they will then on April twelfth, like extend them all
Speaker 1: the way to April twenty twenty five. And so one
Speaker 1: of the things that Warren and Promila are fighting for
Speaker 1: is say no, you can't do that, right like you
Speaker 1: have to we at least have to have this fight
Speaker 1: again in the spring.
Speaker 4: There was a sunset that happened at one point during
Speaker 4: the Trump administration, and they have all kinds of mechanisms
Speaker 4: to continue justifying seven oh two authority. And that's what
Speaker 4: Davidson and Jipaul understand and realize. And that's why when
Speaker 4: they're crafting the text of this legislation, they're being very
Speaker 4: careful about it. And that's why you've seen the intelligence
Speaker 4: community come out with a letter like the one that
Speaker 4: we mentioned, because they're actually terrified that they're about to
Speaker 4: lose a major power and they're just asking for the
Speaker 4: benefit of the doubt. Now, Mike Lee tweeted last night, Tomorrow,
Speaker 4: the Senate, so that's today, has the chance to remove
Speaker 4: FISA seven oh two from the NDAA. The Senate rules
Speaker 4: can make this happen. And if just forty one senators agree,
Speaker 4: Lee ad advices should be reviewed on its own merits,
Speaker 4: not the NDAA. Not the NDAA is and that's actually
Speaker 4: really important. Rand Paul has a rule twenty eight point
Speaker 4: of order tomorrow and if those forty one senators oppose that,
Speaker 4: so tomorrow, by the way, is today, and Mike Lee
Speaker 4: refers to them as quote the firm, which is pretty funny.
Speaker 4: If they oppose that motion seven oh two is out
Speaker 4: of the NDAA. The firm, Lee continues, will try to
Speaker 4: scare senators, warning of inevitable catastrophe if seven oh two expires.
Speaker 4: At midnight on New Year's Eve, and.
Speaker 1: So once it's crazy, it's not a catastrophe because I
Speaker 1: mean I think it's a catastrophecause it's a bad policy.
Speaker 1: But from their preserved it's not a catastrophe because it's
Speaker 1: good for a year, like even if it expires, you
Speaker 1: still have the authority.
Speaker 3: So they're kind of lying to people.
Speaker 4: Yes, although if there is proactive legislation that passes, like
Speaker 4: the Davidson di Paul negotiations, then they're actually really in
Speaker 4: serious trouble. And one thing to watch out for is
Speaker 4: just because there's a vote on this now on December thirteenth,
Speaker 4: whatever it is, that doesn't mean that they don't find
Speaker 4: a way. When things get really harried at the very
Speaker 4: end of these NDAA negotiations, it somehow ends up back
Speaker 4: in the bill that it somehow gets out of the
Speaker 4: bill because they are doing carrots and sticks from now
Speaker 4: until the end of the year. Although the government could
Speaker 4: shut down, that's a big question. Does the Freedom Caucus
Speaker 4: decide to shut down the government over seven oh two
Speaker 4: huge question, and they would probably say it's also would
Speaker 4: be about Ukraine, It would be about a lot of
Speaker 4: stuff in the funding bills that need to get passed
Speaker 4: in the next couple of weeks in order to avoid
Speaker 4: a government shut down. But to seven oh two become
Speaker 4: part of it. If you follow surveillance and privacy issues,
Speaker 4: seven oh two is like the krem delocreme of surveillance
Speaker 4: malfeasans like, this is the apex of American surveillance problems.
Speaker 4: And you know, is it the worst of the worst.
Speaker 4: I mean, it's all bad, there's no question about it.
Speaker 4: But it's it's been around forever, well not forever, but
Speaker 4: as long as some of these really egregious encroachments have existed,
Speaker 4: high tech encroachments have existed. So they're very scared and
Speaker 4: they should be very scared because there's a lot of
Speaker 4: will right now to get rid of this, and it's
Speaker 4: happening fast.
Speaker 3: And to sum up, here's news you can use.
Speaker 1: If you love spying authority and you trust your government,
Speaker 1: call Congress, tell them.
Speaker 3: To approve the NDAA no changes.
Speaker 1: Get that spying authority over to the spy masters.
Speaker 3: If you're skeptical of.
Speaker 1: The government and you want to and you're skeptical of
Speaker 1: spying authority, call your member of Congress and tell them
Speaker 1: to vote no on the NDAA and force a negotiation
Speaker 1: over reforms of the spying authority's that's basically what it is.
Speaker 3: If you love spy masters, vote yes on the NDA.
Speaker 1: If you don't love the spy masters, you vote no
Speaker 1: on the NDAA. And there's one hundred and forty six o's,
Speaker 1: then they're back to the table.
Speaker 4: And remember what they're asking basically is just for the
Speaker 4: benefit of the doubt, and that's.
Speaker 3: What intelligence is. Just give them one more year.
Speaker 4: The intelligence community relies, it runs on. It is fueled
Speaker 4: by benefit of the doubt. Because it operates so undemocratically.
Speaker 4: It is inherently an anti democratic institution. And that's what
Speaker 4: they operate on. And congressional oversight, I don't know, like
Speaker 4: good luck, good luck overseeing their day to day, their
Speaker 4: day to day abuses of the constitution. You can't possibly
Speaker 4: do it. You just have to trust them. And have
Speaker 4: they in the last ten years after fomenting two major
Speaker 4: lies let's just talk about Trump and Russia collusion, and
Speaker 4: then telling you on the eve of an election that
Speaker 4: an important piece of information was Russian propaganda, when we
Speaker 4: now know that they knew that that wasn't true. Have
Speaker 4: they earned the benefit of the doubt over the last decade.
Speaker 4: Obviously not. And we can go back even more to
Speaker 4: the Iraq War and imperialism in the Middle East, adventurism
Speaker 4: in the Middle East, and all of the malfeasins they
Speaker 4: were up to in the aughts and say, did they
Speaker 4: earn your trust? No, of course they didn't. And so yeah,
Speaker 4: if you believe that we should trust them, go ahead,
Speaker 4: call them up and tell them. Yeah. Past the NDAA Ryan.
Speaker 4: One other thing to keep in mind, I think is interesting.
Speaker 4: About a month ago, I was poking around on this
Speaker 4: and what I was hearing is that they're just not
Speaker 4: there might not be time to deal with seven oh
Speaker 4: two because even by people who wanted to, because the
Speaker 4: schedule is so crowded. And the fact that Lee and
Speaker 4: Rand Paul, Warren Davidson and Jaia Paul have really made
Speaker 4: this an issue, I think speaks to what they've been
Speaker 4: hearing from constituents.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so keep that in mind. There you go.
Speaker 4: That does it for us. On today's edition of Counterpoints,
Speaker 4: Remember twenty five percent off your annual subscription right now
Speaker 4: or breaking Points description over at breakingpoints dot com. Here
Speaker 4: on Counterpoints you can watch full video of the show.
Speaker 3: Uninterrupted, Spotify, YouTube, all that stuff.
Speaker 4: You get it on for breaking points too.
Speaker 3: You're losing money. And if you're not getting this deal right.
Speaker 4: Take your financial advice from rit Ingram.
Speaker 3: That's right.
Speaker 4: Well, no, we appreciate everyone watching and we will be
Speaker 4: back here next week with more see then the