WEBVTT - It Could Happen Here Weekly 196 0:00:01.720 --> 0:00:02.880 Cool Zone Media. 0:00:03.320 --> 0:00:05.760 Hey everybody, Robert Evans here and I wanted to let 0:00:05.800 --> 0:00:09.480 you know. This is a compilation episode. So every episode 0:00:09.560 --> 0:00:12.719 of the week that just happened is here in one 0:00:12.800 --> 0:00:16.560 convenient and with somewhat less ads package for you to 0:00:16.600 --> 0:00:19.040 listen to in a long stretch if you want. If 0:00:19.079 --> 0:00:21.000 you've been listening to the episodes every day this week, 0:00:21.040 --> 0:00:22.759 there's going to be nothing new here for you, but 0:00:23.160 --> 0:00:24.520 you can make your own decisions. 0:00:25.560 --> 0:00:27.640 Hey, it could happen your listeners. 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Listen now on the iHeartRadio app, 0:01:02.600 --> 0:01:05.319 Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. 0:01:08.840 --> 0:01:13.399 This is it could happen here. I'm Garrison Davis. One 0:01:13.480 --> 0:01:17.000 place that it is happening right now is Washington, d C, 0:01:17.600 --> 0:01:22.199 where Trump has undergone a quasi military takeover of the city. 0:01:22.680 --> 0:01:26.199 And to discuss this, I'm joined by bridget Todd, DC 0:01:26.440 --> 0:01:27.959 resident gare So. 0:01:28.319 --> 0:01:30.800 I was on the podcast a few months ago talking 0:01:30.800 --> 0:01:35.240 about Trump's history of threats to DC and that has 0:01:35.360 --> 0:01:37.760 really all come to a head. So I'm really happy 0:01:37.840 --> 0:01:40.080 to be sitting down with you to talk about it. 0:01:40.080 --> 0:01:42.800 It has been a rough few days here in DC. 0:01:43.480 --> 0:01:45.639 I mean if I am coming off like I sound 0:01:46.160 --> 0:01:49.400 tired or weird or stressed, it's because I do feel 0:01:49.440 --> 0:01:49.840 those things. 0:01:49.840 --> 0:01:51.640 That's been a lot of feelings. Most of it. 0:01:51.760 --> 0:01:54.240 I just hate watching Donald Trump get up in front 0:01:54.240 --> 0:01:58.480 of America and straight lie about my city and my home. 0:01:58.520 --> 0:02:00.960 A place like DC that you know where I'm from, 0:02:01.040 --> 0:02:04.200 It's where it's met most of my life. It's pretty 0:02:04.400 --> 0:02:08.320 difficult to have the national conversation be about what a 0:02:08.600 --> 0:02:12.239 bombed out shithole my home is. So I sort of 0:02:12.280 --> 0:02:14.440 wanted to get into the basics of what's going on 0:02:14.600 --> 0:02:16.960 and what I think it all means for everyone, not 0:02:17.000 --> 0:02:20.440 just people in DC. So by now you've probably seen that. 0:02:20.720 --> 0:02:23.760 On Monday, the Trump administration announced that they were federalizing 0:02:23.919 --> 0:02:27.600 DC's police force, the Metropolitan Police Department, or MPD. They 0:02:27.639 --> 0:02:30.840 also announced that they'd be sending national Guard to DC. 0:02:31.480 --> 0:02:35.320 Because DC is not a state, Trump actually and any 0:02:35.440 --> 0:02:39.000 president would actually have authority over DC's National Guard. So 0:02:39.040 --> 0:02:41.640 despite not being a state, DC does have a national Guard. 0:02:42.000 --> 0:02:44.239 The authority over it is just in the hands of 0:02:44.280 --> 0:02:46.240 the president, so with a stroke of a pen, he 0:02:46.280 --> 0:02:49.200 can just deploy DC's National Guard whenever he wants. 0:02:49.600 --> 0:02:52.360 He's also sending in national guard from other states. 0:02:52.840 --> 0:02:53.200 To do this. 0:02:53.240 --> 0:02:56.600 Trump evoked what's called Section seven forty of DC's Home 0:02:56.680 --> 0:02:58.960 Rule Act, which allows for the president to take over 0:02:59.080 --> 0:03:01.880 MPD for forty eight hours with possible extensions up to 0:03:01.960 --> 0:03:05.680 thirty days in times of emergencies. I'm kind of putting 0:03:05.720 --> 0:03:09.720 emergency in quotes because the emergency that he is saying 0:03:10.240 --> 0:03:12.919 is crime. But we'll get into why that doesn't really 0:03:12.919 --> 0:03:15.800 hold water in a moment. So I really can't overstate, like, 0:03:16.400 --> 0:03:19.760 how on precedented this is. No president has ever done 0:03:19.800 --> 0:03:20.400 this before. 0:03:20.840 --> 0:03:25.000 Yeah, no, I somewhat relate to your pain here of 0:03:25.000 --> 0:03:29.080 your city suddenly being thrust into national spotlight as Trump 0:03:29.320 --> 0:03:35.160 sends in you know, military style police, and I guess 0:03:34.600 --> 0:03:39.800 a version although with very different methods justifications happened to 0:03:39.840 --> 0:03:43.640 my density Portland, Oregon in twenty twenty, which I'm sure 0:03:43.640 --> 0:03:47.080 most people listening are familiar with. It's very similar reporting 0:03:47.120 --> 0:03:51.080 on how it's burned to the ground. It is only 0:03:51.120 --> 0:03:55.040 a husk remains. There's just one massive bonfire where downtown 0:03:55.160 --> 0:03:58.360 used to be, and of course it's fine, but the 0:03:58.400 --> 0:04:02.840 actual presence of the you know, groups like BORTAC actually 0:04:02.880 --> 0:04:07.760 create situations where there's massive amounts of violence being done 0:04:07.440 --> 0:04:11.720 by men in army fatigues. What's in DC is is 0:04:11.880 --> 0:04:15.640 I think notably different and like a semi extension of 0:04:16.240 --> 0:04:18.240 how he was testing out this type of thing in 0:04:18.360 --> 0:04:20.919 LA earlier this year, but with less of like an 0:04:21.080 --> 0:04:25.679 endpoint like at LA's stuff was more about trying to 0:04:25.720 --> 0:04:29.160 push forward these deportations and renditions as quickly as possible. 0:04:29.480 --> 0:04:32.279 So he's just like taking control of the whole city, 0:04:32.360 --> 0:04:35.200 like indefinitely, it seems now for DC. 0:04:35.680 --> 0:04:38.919 In some ways, yes, to be clear, because DC is 0:04:38.960 --> 0:04:41.919 not a state, it is unique from any other place 0:04:41.920 --> 0:04:44.440 in the country, and that the president kind of does 0:04:44.640 --> 0:04:47.560 have more authority over DC than he would have other places. 0:04:47.560 --> 0:04:50.480 And so yeah, he definitely this is definitely a federalization 0:04:50.760 --> 0:04:53.960 of our police department. In terms of it being a 0:04:54.400 --> 0:04:57.880 larger takeover of DC, We're not there yet. This is 0:04:57.880 --> 0:05:00.039 something that he has definitely threatened. This is something that 0:05:00.080 --> 0:05:04.080 he loves to talk about. That would include the president 0:05:04.120 --> 0:05:07.360 taking over pretty much every aspect of life in DC, 0:05:07.520 --> 0:05:11.160 so our public schools, our roads, our social services, all 0:05:11.160 --> 0:05:13.680 of that, provoking home rule, that's what that would be. 0:05:14.200 --> 0:05:16.800 He definitely that is definitely a threat. We should all 0:05:16.800 --> 0:05:19.360 be very aware of that. And like it really makes 0:05:19.440 --> 0:05:22.880 clear why DC needs full statehood yesterday, right, Like this 0:05:22.920 --> 0:05:24.960 is an issue that should have been solved forever ago, 0:05:25.360 --> 0:05:29.320 but right now we're talking about you know, specifically law 0:05:29.400 --> 0:05:32.520 enforcement and the police, which on its own is is 0:05:32.560 --> 0:05:34.279 like pretty bad. 0:05:34.560 --> 0:05:37.160 No, that's always the first step. Like, as soon as 0:05:37.160 --> 0:05:40.960 you take control of the enforcement mechanism, then no one 0:05:41.040 --> 0:05:43.800 really is able to stop you from doing other things. 0:05:43.960 --> 0:05:46.960 And that's why the first steps in all of these 0:05:47.000 --> 0:05:51.200 like you know, weird weird like far right Silicon Valley 0:05:51.320 --> 0:05:54.080 like plans for how they can fix quote unquote fix 0:05:54.080 --> 0:05:56.160 the government being able to take total control over the 0:05:56.279 --> 0:05:58.920 law enforcement apparatus is always the first step because then 0:05:58.960 --> 0:06:00.839 you can kind of do what you want from there 0:06:00.880 --> 0:06:02.680 and no one's going to stop you. 0:06:03.120 --> 0:06:05.600 Yeah, in order to revoke home rule, it would take 0:06:05.640 --> 0:06:08.359 an Act of Congress, which this Congress seems more than 0:06:08.400 --> 0:06:09.599 willing to do whatever Trump wants. 0:06:09.640 --> 0:06:12.080 So that's something to keep in mind. Yeah, I think that. 0:06:12.120 --> 0:06:15.440 For residents of DC, I think the changes have been 0:06:16.279 --> 0:06:19.400 so stark in the last just couple of forty eight 0:06:19.440 --> 0:06:22.920 hours that I think it's very important to keep in 0:06:23.000 --> 0:06:26.360 mind what could be coming down the pike and definitely 0:06:26.440 --> 0:06:28.760 be aware of it. But you know, residents need to 0:06:28.800 --> 0:06:31.080 know what this means for them and US today. And 0:06:31.120 --> 0:06:33.159 I think that, like it's is really important to like 0:06:33.600 --> 0:06:35.960 highlight that. I think that because of the nature of 0:06:36.000 --> 0:06:39.599 DC being the nation's capital but also where more than 0:06:39.640 --> 0:06:42.320 half a million people live, I think it's really easy 0:06:42.360 --> 0:06:45.320 for people to forget that like the experience of like 0:06:45.360 --> 0:06:48.080 people who live here, like me, you know, And I 0:06:48.080 --> 0:06:50.839 think it's in this moment the people that I'm talking 0:06:50.880 --> 0:06:53.479 to on the ground really are like focused on making 0:06:53.520 --> 0:06:56.320 sure that folks know what's going on, have resources, you know, 0:06:56.560 --> 0:06:59.160 understand their rights, understand that their rights have not changed 0:06:59.839 --> 0:07:02.240 just because of this act this week. And so, I mean, 0:07:02.279 --> 0:07:05.320 the thing that I am emotionally and personally struggling with 0:07:05.839 --> 0:07:10.480 is this smear of my city being this like dangerous 0:07:10.480 --> 0:07:13.120 hell whole. How did you manage that? What was the 0:07:13.160 --> 0:07:15.600 experience of going through that, like like the dissonance of 0:07:15.640 --> 0:07:18.800 like your experience every day navigating the streets of this 0:07:18.840 --> 0:07:21.400 place where you live, and then hearing the national conversation 0:07:21.480 --> 0:07:24.520 about it be so different from how you were experiencing it. 0:07:24.960 --> 0:07:27.560 I think eventually it is kind of became like a 0:07:27.760 --> 0:07:32.480 point of pride and more like an absurd aspect which 0:07:32.720 --> 0:07:36.600 keeps like unwanted tourism down. I don't think it really 0:07:36.840 --> 0:07:41.200 in the end bothered people in the long run. And 0:07:41.240 --> 0:07:44.440 the reason why people had a big problem with it 0:07:44.520 --> 0:07:47.640 specifically was because of federal law enforcement who were taking 0:07:47.640 --> 0:07:49.160 over blocks in the city like that that was the 0:07:49.200 --> 0:07:53.240 actual like like crux, Like Republicans constantly talked about, how, 0:07:53.320 --> 0:07:57.280 you know, insert any city here is like falling apart, 0:07:57.480 --> 0:08:01.280 is overridden by crime, is you know, a fallen state? 0:08:01.360 --> 0:08:04.080 You can't go out, and like they just kind of 0:08:04.080 --> 0:08:06.080 pick a new one to put all the attention on, 0:08:06.240 --> 0:08:09.200 like once a week so we're kind of like used 0:08:09.240 --> 0:08:12.560 to this, to this rhetoric. It's more so the actual 0:08:12.720 --> 0:08:15.760 like physical presence of law enforcement and how that changes 0:08:16.720 --> 0:08:18.800 we're able to go throughout the city and the presence 0:08:18.800 --> 0:08:21.880 of like militarized federal law enforcement. That yeah, affects like 0:08:21.920 --> 0:08:25.640 just regular people. It's not just rhetoric. It actually changes 0:08:25.720 --> 0:08:28.560 how you get to interact with your city. And I 0:08:28.560 --> 0:08:31.480 guess that's the thing that actually caused people in Portland 0:08:31.520 --> 0:08:34.280 to be much more upset, which results in tens of 0:08:34.320 --> 0:08:37.280 thousands of people going out into the streets and saying no, 0:08:37.360 --> 0:08:40.520 we don't want you here. So I think more so 0:08:40.679 --> 0:08:45.400 than just like the rhetoric of how x y city 0:08:45.520 --> 0:08:48.640 is burned to the ground, it's more so they like 0:08:48.679 --> 0:08:52.800 the actual physical daily life that produces the actual tension 0:08:53.000 --> 0:08:55.960 within within the city and how they gets changed and 0:08:56.000 --> 0:08:58.640 altered with federal law enforcement exactly. 0:08:58.679 --> 0:09:01.040 I mean, that's pretty much what's happening on my streets 0:09:01.080 --> 0:09:03.920 in DC. So about eight hundred and fifty officers and 0:09:04.040 --> 0:09:06.559 agents took part in this what they called massive law 0:09:06.640 --> 0:09:10.079 enforcement surge across DC, where they had between one hundred 0:09:10.080 --> 0:09:13.680 and two hundred soldiers out patrolling the streets like beat 0:09:13.760 --> 0:09:16.840 coops at any given time. And so you know, some 0:09:16.960 --> 0:09:19.280 of the things that we've seen in the last couple 0:09:19.320 --> 0:09:22.199 of days just simply as a longtime resident, like just 0:09:22.240 --> 0:09:25.800 simply do not make sense, right, having federal agents patrol 0:09:25.920 --> 0:09:28.880 places like Georgetown, which is very safe at ten o'clock 0:09:28.880 --> 0:09:29.160 at night. 0:09:29.200 --> 0:09:30.200 That happened last night. 0:09:30.120 --> 0:09:33.240 Well, Georgetown actually might be the most dangerous place in 0:09:33.280 --> 0:09:37.520 the city well in some ways, right if you thinking. 0:09:37.320 --> 0:09:41.280 About like the kind of crime they're talking tough about, yes, 0:09:41.400 --> 0:09:44.880 or like the National Mall at qpm a weekday, places 0:09:44.880 --> 0:09:47.080 where it's like it don't even make sense for y'all 0:09:47.080 --> 0:09:50.080 to be posted up there. You know, there was a 0:09:50.280 --> 0:09:54.760 big display of force and arrests on my block just 0:09:54.840 --> 0:09:56.880 last night in the middle of the night, where we 0:09:56.920 --> 0:09:58.199 looked out the window and it was. 0:09:58.360 --> 0:10:01.079 Car after car after car, order patrol. 0:10:00.880 --> 0:10:03.400 They set up the lights, they made arrests, and my 0:10:03.480 --> 0:10:05.920 block is residential. So it's like places where it's like 0:10:05.920 --> 0:10:08.440 it doesn't even seem to be making sense. And that's 0:10:08.480 --> 0:10:12.080 why we know it's really not about crime. All of 0:10:12.120 --> 0:10:15.240 the stuff that Trump said about crime and his pressor, 0:10:15.640 --> 0:10:18.680 I mean, it was all just lies. 0:10:18.760 --> 0:10:20.800 Like I guess I don't you tell anybody listening to this. 0:10:20.840 --> 0:10:23.200 But like in case you are curious whether or not 0:10:23.320 --> 0:10:25.080 there's any credence to the fact, we're like, oh, well, 0:10:25.520 --> 0:10:26.640 is crime going up in DC? 0:10:27.160 --> 0:10:28.240 That is not true, right. 0:10:28.080 --> 0:10:30.280 So violent crebs have been going down the past two 0:10:30.320 --> 0:10:31.760 years in DC consistently. 0:10:32.040 --> 0:10:34.560 Absolutely, So, it is true that DC did have a 0:10:34.640 --> 0:10:37.480 spike in crime in twenty twenty three, but since then 0:10:37.760 --> 0:10:40.040 crime is going down. If you watched that press conference, 0:10:40.240 --> 0:10:42.160 he threw out a lot of stats about how crime 0:10:42.200 --> 0:10:44.360 is going in the wrong direction by every measure, that's 0:10:44.360 --> 0:10:47.880 simply not true. He said that in twenty twenty three, 0:10:48.040 --> 0:10:50.560 the murder rate in DC reached the highest rate. This 0:10:50.679 --> 0:10:54.000 is him, He said, probably ever going back twenty five years, 0:10:54.120 --> 0:10:56.520 but that they don't know what that means because the 0:10:56.640 --> 0:11:00.000 data just only goes back twenty five years, saying basically 0:11:00.120 --> 0:11:02.760 that they didn't collect crime statistics way back then. Think 0:11:02.760 --> 0:11:04.719 about that for a second. Twenty five years ago was 0:11:04.720 --> 0:11:07.439 the year two thousand. Do you really think that crime 0:11:07.679 --> 0:11:10.200 data was not being collected in the year two thousand? 0:11:10.320 --> 0:11:11.280 It absolutely was. 0:11:11.320 --> 0:11:14.040 We absolutely know what crime in DC looked like in 0:11:14.040 --> 0:11:16.200 the year two thousand and beyond. And so if There's 0:11:16.240 --> 0:11:18.000 one thing people might know about DC is that in 0:11:18.040 --> 0:11:20.400 the eighties and the nineties we were hit hard, but 0:11:20.480 --> 0:11:22.760 the crack epidemic crime was genuinely very high. 0:11:23.040 --> 0:11:25.599 The city's own crime statistics, which. 0:11:25.400 --> 0:11:28.360 We did collect from the seventies, eighties and nineties when 0:11:28.400 --> 0:11:30.920 the population in DC was smaller, show that there was 0:11:31.120 --> 0:11:33.640 much more higher numbers of homicides and murders. 0:11:33.640 --> 0:11:34.760 So that's not just a lie. 0:11:34.800 --> 0:11:38.160 It's also a weird, obvious lie, and one that when 0:11:38.200 --> 0:11:40.000 I watched the press or I almost didn't catch. 0:11:40.000 --> 0:11:40.080 It. 0:11:40.120 --> 0:11:41.760 Wasn't until I sat that and went through the notes 0:11:41.760 --> 0:11:43.560 and I was like, oh, this is not just a lie. 0:11:44.120 --> 0:11:47.280 This is like a weird, glaring lie. I can't believe. 0:11:47.280 --> 0:11:49.760 I like, I guess I said that to say, there 0:11:49.760 --> 0:11:53.320 are so many lies being thrown out in a short 0:11:53.360 --> 0:11:56.600 amount of time. When they're all washing over you, it's 0:11:56.679 --> 0:11:58.120 kind of hard to catch them one by one. But 0:11:58.160 --> 0:12:00.120 then when you actually sit down, you're like, wow, oh, 0:12:00.200 --> 0:12:01.040 this was just bullshit. 0:12:01.360 --> 0:12:04.000 Yeah, that's the intention. That's the what Steve Bennen calls 0:12:04.080 --> 0:12:07.040 like muzzle velocity. You have to shoot out these things constantly, 0:12:07.080 --> 0:12:10.400 one after another, so that it's impossible to actually hone 0:12:10.440 --> 0:12:14.000 in and quote unquote debunk each and every one, because 0:12:14.040 --> 0:12:16.160 by the time you're doing that, they've already moved on 0:12:16.240 --> 0:12:18.640 to fifteen new things. You can never keep up with it. 0:12:18.720 --> 0:12:21.719 And that's like the whole intention. That's like how they 0:12:21.760 --> 0:12:25.400 craft literally like their sentences so that you can't just 0:12:25.480 --> 0:12:27.920 like debunk everything they say because they just throw it 0:12:27.960 --> 0:12:31.839 all out there and it creates this massive structure that 0:12:32.120 --> 0:12:34.360 even if you tried chipping away at the sides, it 0:12:34.400 --> 0:12:37.079 doesn't actually make any effect and it doesn't matter at all. 0:12:37.480 --> 0:12:39.440 And like's what's the real effect they're trying to do 0:12:39.480 --> 0:12:43.640 here with sending in National Guard, federalizing the police. It's 0:12:43.640 --> 0:12:46.560 to like scare black people, and it's to scare homeless people. 0:12:46.800 --> 0:12:48.800 And that's really what they actually mean when they say 0:12:48.800 --> 0:12:51.600 there's high crime. And I think DC is what like 0:12:51.640 --> 0:12:53.840 the has like the third third largest black population in 0:12:53.880 --> 0:12:54.400 the country. 0:12:54.920 --> 0:12:57.360 That's right. We formally called chocolate City. 0:12:57.400 --> 0:12:59.760 We're more like a latte city today, but yeah, we 0:13:00.040 --> 0:13:02.560 we have a heavily black and brown population here. 0:13:02.840 --> 0:13:06.280 Yeah, that's that's what Trump's actually like focusing on. That's 0:13:06.280 --> 0:13:08.840 actually what he's doing. I feel like that's that should 0:13:08.880 --> 0:13:11.120 be pretty clear to anyone who's like familiar with like 0:13:11.400 --> 0:13:14.480 crime panic narratives and how they've been strategically deployed throughout 0:13:14.480 --> 0:13:17.120 the past twenty five years and you know, thirty forty 0:13:17.160 --> 0:13:18.160 years of the country. 0:13:18.640 --> 0:13:21.679 Yeah, I mean, I don't see how somebody could see 0:13:21.720 --> 0:13:24.920 what's happening and see the way that he is clearly like, 0:13:24.920 --> 0:13:26.920 like even at that press or the list of cities 0:13:26.920 --> 0:13:30.600 he was planning on going to next, Chicago, Baltimore, It's like, okay, 0:13:30.720 --> 0:13:33.560 heavily black cities with black political leadership and black mayor. 0:13:33.600 --> 0:13:37.000 Oh, Oakland, this is very clear what's going on? Yeah? Interesting, 0:13:37.120 --> 0:13:39.760 interesting choice, buddy, Yeah, Like what do all these places 0:13:39.760 --> 0:13:40.280 have in common? 0:13:40.360 --> 0:13:40.520 Right? 0:13:50.760 --> 0:13:52.880 One of the things I've seen people say is that 0:13:53.280 --> 0:13:57.160 this whole thing is about the attack on the former 0:13:57.240 --> 0:13:59.319 DOGE staffer known as big Balls. 0:13:59.440 --> 0:14:02.679 Big Ball I think it's that's his technical term. Yes, 0:14:03.080 --> 0:14:06.720 possibly to receive the Presidential Medal of I think freedom. 0:14:07.080 --> 0:14:08.920 I think he got a medal. I think it happened. 0:14:09.160 --> 0:14:13.720 It's quite possible, So we should show big Balls some 0:14:13.800 --> 0:14:15.200 respect for his. 0:14:16.800 --> 0:14:18.080 Struggles, I guess. 0:14:18.600 --> 0:14:18.840 Yeah. 0:14:18.920 --> 0:14:21.040 I mean it's I never thought I would see the 0:14:21.080 --> 0:14:23.040 day where I'd be like reporting on a story happening 0:14:23.040 --> 0:14:25.360 in the city and talking about somebody named Big Balls. 0:14:25.400 --> 0:14:27.440 But here we go. Really, you didn't see this coming. 0:14:27.480 --> 0:14:28.120 You didn't see. 0:14:27.960 --> 0:14:31.040 Someone of my being go cardcare. For a podcast that 0:14:31.120 --> 0:14:33.920 I host about local DC news and issues called City 0:14:33.920 --> 0:14:36.840 Cast DC, I interviewed Mark C. Graves, who was like 0:14:36.840 --> 0:14:39.560 a long time DC reporter, and I said, Oh, is 0:14:39.600 --> 0:14:42.840 there any truth to the idea that this attack on 0:14:42.960 --> 0:14:43.760 Big Balls is? 0:14:43.800 --> 0:14:43.920 Like? 0:14:44.000 --> 0:14:45.200 What was the impetus to all this? 0:14:45.280 --> 0:14:48.280 That Elon Musk was like, Trump, you need to federalize 0:14:48.320 --> 0:14:51.240 DC's police department because of what happened to my former staffer. 0:14:51.640 --> 0:14:55.120 And I understand why people where that narrative was coming from. 0:14:55.160 --> 0:14:57.920 But he really pointed out something, which is that you know, 0:14:58.080 --> 0:15:01.120 Trump has been talking about taking over d police department 0:15:01.160 --> 0:15:03.640 for a very long time. He referenced it during his 0:15:03.680 --> 0:15:05.720 first administration a little bit a lot less than he 0:15:05.760 --> 0:15:08.120 did it the second time around. He really dialed it 0:15:08.200 --> 0:15:10.960 up in his second campaign. He began talking about it 0:15:11.000 --> 0:15:13.360 even in his first few months in office by threatening 0:15:13.360 --> 0:15:16.360 to take control over MPD if our Mayor Muriel Bowser 0:15:16.640 --> 0:15:20.240 did not make certain concessions like clearing homeless encampments near 0:15:20.240 --> 0:15:22.560 the White House and removing Black Lives Matter Plaza from 0:15:22.600 --> 0:15:25.040 outside the White House. He also threatened to take over 0:15:25.160 --> 0:15:29.440 MPD and DC in general when a former Trump administration staffer, 0:15:29.480 --> 0:15:32.040 Mike gil was shot and killed during a carjacking in 0:15:32.120 --> 0:15:34.840 DC back in February. So when that happened again, he 0:15:34.960 --> 0:15:36.960 was like, I'm taking over MPD, I'm taking over EMPT. 0:15:37.160 --> 0:15:42.240 So well, the Big Balls thing alleged carjacking of Big Balls, 0:15:42.560 --> 0:15:43.520 I will say this. 0:15:43.920 --> 0:15:45.600 You know those stories where you're like, we're gonna get 0:15:45.600 --> 0:15:47.600 more information about this, so it's best to just wait. 0:15:48.560 --> 0:15:50.760 A I don't know anything. I don't have any special details, 0:15:50.800 --> 0:15:53.840 but like my senses, this is one of those situations 0:15:53.840 --> 0:15:57.440 where it's like, you know, first the story was I 0:15:57.600 --> 0:15:59.960 was with a girlfriend in her car. 0:16:00.160 --> 0:16:02.360 We were carjacked by two unarmed teens. 0:16:02.720 --> 0:16:06.440 Then Elon Musk, super spreader of misinformation that he is, 0:16:06.880 --> 0:16:09.720 was like, oh, he was attacked while trying to rescue 0:16:09.720 --> 0:16:10.720 an elderly woman. 0:16:10.920 --> 0:16:14.320 Like I just have seen enough about crime and DC. 0:16:15.200 --> 0:16:15.640 I am. 0:16:15.760 --> 0:16:18.400 I'm looking forward to hearing more information about what actually 0:16:18.400 --> 0:16:18.880 went down there. 0:16:18.880 --> 0:16:19.520 I'll just put it that. 0:16:19.520 --> 0:16:21.640 Way if that makes sense with mister big Balls. With 0:16:21.720 --> 0:16:24.520 mister big Balls, I guess mister Balls. I guess big 0:16:24.600 --> 0:16:28.120 is the first Mister Balls. Please, mister Balls is my father. 0:16:30.800 --> 0:16:31.920 So yeah, Like, I think. 0:16:31.720 --> 0:16:34.000 The Big Balls thing might have been very convenient timing 0:16:34.080 --> 0:16:36.560 or like a good excuse to actually move forward. But 0:16:36.720 --> 0:16:39.680 I think narratives that Big Balls got attacked and now 0:16:39.680 --> 0:16:42.280 Trump is taking over MPDE, I think that like doesn't 0:16:42.320 --> 0:16:44.280 really tell the whole story, which is that this has 0:16:44.320 --> 0:16:45.840 been a long time coming. This has been something that 0:16:45.840 --> 0:16:48.560 Trump has been like obsessed with for quite some time, 0:16:48.640 --> 0:16:51.119 even going back from before his second administration. 0:16:51.880 --> 0:16:53.800 And there's there's been like a media campaign in the 0:16:53.840 --> 0:16:58.320 past few months of specifically taking like public trendsit robbery 0:16:58.440 --> 0:17:01.880 videos and making them super vi role of like teens 0:17:01.880 --> 0:17:05.440 who will like steal like designer clothes on public transit, Yeah, 0:17:05.480 --> 0:17:09.359 and turning turning this into like a national epidemic. And 0:17:09.359 --> 0:17:11.080 again you can look at look at look at the 0:17:11.280 --> 0:17:13.919 like the shoplifting videos from a few years ago, that 0:17:14.000 --> 0:17:16.960 even though crime was going down, there was videos that 0:17:17.119 --> 0:17:21.040 very visible videos of shoplifting that went super viral to 0:17:21.119 --> 0:17:25.240 help form this this crime wave narrative that the statistics 0:17:25.240 --> 0:17:29.600 don't necessarily support, to the point where you have Republicans 0:17:29.880 --> 0:17:33.000 actually like denying the FBI's own crime statistics. F the 0:17:33.040 --> 0:17:37.920 FBI famously soft on crime institution the FBI, but Republicans 0:17:37.920 --> 0:17:41.000 saying that these debts have to be wrong because we 0:17:41.040 --> 0:17:42.960 all know that there's crime everywhere, and like, how do 0:17:43.040 --> 0:17:45.760 we know that? Because you're seeing like a TikTok video 0:17:45.880 --> 0:17:48.399 about it, and that's your proof as you've seen, you 0:17:48.440 --> 0:17:51.679 saw one or two videos of like people robbing an 0:17:51.680 --> 0:17:54.439 apple store, and now you think that crime must be 0:17:54.560 --> 0:17:58.760 statistically higher everywhere, Okay, Yeah, And I think. 0:17:58.600 --> 0:18:02.679 That's why the big narrative continues to really be so sticky. 0:18:02.800 --> 0:18:05.560 Ooh, I don't like that. Yeah, I don't mean it 0:18:05.600 --> 0:18:06.199 how it sounds. 0:18:06.480 --> 0:18:10.600 But like, it doesn't matter if you have statistics from 0:18:10.600 --> 0:18:12.919 the FBI saying that crime is going down whatever, whatever, 0:18:13.160 --> 0:18:15.600 when you if you have a visceral image of like 0:18:15.600 --> 0:18:17.520 a bloodied big balls. 0:18:17.240 --> 0:18:19.240 Beaten on the street, right like and so I think 0:18:19.280 --> 0:18:20.320 that it's it's really. 0:18:20.520 --> 0:18:23.720 Interesting how and I guess I'll just say it, how 0:18:23.760 --> 0:18:27.840 easily manipulated people are, yeah, and how they're able to 0:18:28.160 --> 0:18:30.679 go against the facts when they are confronted with an 0:18:30.680 --> 0:18:33.280 image of like teens robbing a CVS or like oh, 0:18:33.320 --> 0:18:35.439 like yeah, like eluted out CBS totally because that is 0:18:35.480 --> 0:18:38.280 so visceral. And so that's something I've really struggled with, 0:18:38.400 --> 0:18:42.120 is like I don't know how to counter these emotionally charged, 0:18:42.240 --> 0:18:46.639 visceral TikTok videos and images that present one thing with facts, 0:18:46.640 --> 0:18:48.280 Like it's like very difficult to be like, well the 0:18:48.359 --> 0:18:50.639 data says this when people are being motivated by a 0:18:50.640 --> 0:18:51.160 different thing. 0:18:51.520 --> 0:18:53.440 No, and that's why it's almost kind of fruitless to 0:18:53.440 --> 0:18:55.320 go about that strategy at this point. And like, I 0:18:55.359 --> 0:18:57.439 don't know how to approach this, And I think it's 0:18:57.480 --> 0:19:00.159 also worth mentioning, like you're we are not immune to 0:19:00.240 --> 0:19:03.760 this either. We might get targeted with like different narratives 0:19:03.760 --> 0:19:06.480 may maybe a CVUS robbery doesn't do it for us, 0:19:06.840 --> 0:19:10.080 but no, like everyone's motivated by like emotional reactions to 0:19:10.320 --> 0:19:13.600 things that we see as like bad or often horrific, 0:19:13.640 --> 0:19:16.000 and that that does change the way that we understand 0:19:16.040 --> 0:19:19.560 like the physical aspects, like the statistical patterns of the 0:19:19.600 --> 0:19:24.240 world very clearly. Like we're emotional creatures. That's what drives us. 0:19:24.760 --> 0:19:27.560 The fact that the emotional plight of big Balls is 0:19:27.640 --> 0:19:30.719 driving the ruling party in the country right now is 0:19:31.480 --> 0:19:34.600 just a little bit more notable because it's one white 0:19:34.680 --> 0:19:36.000 guy named Big Balls. 0:19:36.359 --> 0:19:39.640 Yeah, it's true, and it almost doesn't even make sense 0:19:39.680 --> 0:19:42.240 to like come back the idea that this is about crime. 0:19:42.280 --> 0:19:44.480 But I know it's not about crime because one, the 0:19:44.480 --> 0:19:48.879 Trump administration recently made very drastic cuts to DC security funding, 0:19:48.920 --> 0:19:52.560 and so if he was really very invested in crime 0:19:52.640 --> 0:19:55.840 and DC seems like something that his administration would not 0:19:55.880 --> 0:19:56.320 have done. 0:19:56.720 --> 0:19:59.119 Also, something that our mayor, who I do want. 0:19:59.000 --> 0:20:01.560 To talk about, has said is that, as you were 0:20:01.600 --> 0:20:05.520 sort of alluding to earlier, federal agents and military personnel 0:20:05.800 --> 0:20:07.960 are not the people who are going to be useful 0:20:08.160 --> 0:20:11.199 when it comes to DC like street crime. These are 0:20:11.240 --> 0:20:15.400 people who probably aren't even informed about DC's local ordinances 0:20:15.400 --> 0:20:17.880 and laws. Why would they be right, And so these 0:20:17.920 --> 0:20:21.359 are not people whose jobs it is to be out 0:20:21.400 --> 0:20:25.280 engaging with civilians about quality of life crimes like open 0:20:25.320 --> 0:20:26.960 containers or drinking on sidewalks. 0:20:27.000 --> 0:20:27.560 I saw a. 0:20:27.520 --> 0:20:30.200 Pretty viral video of the police going up and stopping 0:20:30.240 --> 0:20:33.359 somebody for he says, smoking a joint on his porch. 0:20:33.880 --> 0:20:36.760 In DC, you are allowed to possess marijuana. 0:20:37.240 --> 0:20:39.560 But he also was like, just so you know, Trump 0:20:39.680 --> 0:20:42.240 is cracking down on all of these quality of life crimes. 0:20:42.400 --> 0:20:44.479 So you can't drink a beer on your portion anymore, 0:20:44.520 --> 0:20:47.200 that's incorrect in the District of columb But you absolutely 0:20:47.200 --> 0:20:51.200 can drink alcohol on your private property outside. 0:20:51.280 --> 0:20:53.080 And it's like, well, how would he know. He's not 0:20:53.080 --> 0:20:53.560 even from here. 0:20:53.600 --> 0:20:55.600 He's a federal agent, So like, yeah, these are not 0:20:55.840 --> 0:20:59.840 people who are trained or skilled in combating the kind 0:20:59.880 --> 0:21:02.560 of civilian level street crime that we're seeing them do. 0:21:02.640 --> 0:21:05.560 This is just not an appropriate use of these people. 0:21:05.560 --> 0:21:07.919 And so the thing that kind of gets me is 0:21:07.960 --> 0:21:10.200 that for the amount of money that we are spending 0:21:10.320 --> 0:21:14.160 on having federal agents deal with low level street crime 0:21:14.240 --> 0:21:17.600 like per MPD and per the DOJ's own statistics, the 0:21:17.680 --> 0:21:20.440 kind of crimes that they have been combating this week 0:21:20.440 --> 0:21:24.160 are things like open container fair evasions. It was like, yeah, 0:21:24.160 --> 0:21:26.240 you need you need an FBI agent to deal with this. 0:21:26.320 --> 0:21:28.720 What are you talking about? But the money that we're spending, 0:21:28.800 --> 0:21:32.159 we probably could house every single unhoused person in the 0:21:32.200 --> 0:21:34.560 District of Columbia with the money that we are spending 0:21:34.680 --> 0:21:37.280 on this nonsense. It's like, that's the thing that makes 0:21:37.320 --> 0:21:39.480 me so angry. I don't want to live in a 0:21:39.520 --> 0:21:42.120 city that's full of crime. Luckily, I don't because crime 0:21:42.200 --> 0:21:46.200 is going down. But if you genuinely wanted to combat crime, 0:21:46.240 --> 0:21:48.280 there is a reasonable way to do this, and this 0:21:48.440 --> 0:21:51.160 is just a big show of force to freak everybody 0:21:51.160 --> 0:21:55.000 out and basically demonstrate that Trump can go into cities. 0:21:54.640 --> 0:21:55.120 And do this. 0:21:55.760 --> 0:21:58.040 It's not actually about lowering crime. The reason why they 0:21:58.040 --> 0:22:00.920 would never want to house people's because they don't actually 0:22:01.000 --> 0:22:03.560 want to. They don't want homeless people to live good lives. 0:22:03.600 --> 0:22:06.800 They want to exercise power. That's the primary motivator. And 0:22:06.840 --> 0:22:09.040 not only can bringing an out of state police be 0:22:09.200 --> 0:22:13.400 like inconvenient, it can have lethal consequences, right because they 0:22:13.440 --> 0:22:15.399 do not know the areas that they're policing, They do 0:22:15.440 --> 0:22:18.600 not know the people in those areas. They don't understand 0:22:18.640 --> 0:22:21.560 what it's actually like. When I was at the Republican 0:22:21.680 --> 0:22:26.040 National Conference Committee, I don't know. How do how do 0:22:26.080 --> 0:22:28.680 I not know what the RNC is? I think convention. 0:22:28.880 --> 0:22:31.000 It depends on if you're talking about the event or 0:22:31.040 --> 0:22:33.159 the like entity the entity. 0:22:33.359 --> 0:22:36.359 When I was at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, 0:22:36.400 --> 0:22:41.679 Wisconsin last year, I responded to the scene of a 0:22:41.720 --> 0:22:44.560 police shooting where police from out of state who were 0:22:44.600 --> 0:22:49.000 brought in for the convention. We're policing outside of the 0:22:49.080 --> 0:22:52.920 area the convention and shot and killed a homeless black 0:22:52.920 --> 0:22:56.320 man because they did not understand where the homeless people 0:22:56.600 --> 0:22:59.760 have their encampments, how they solve disputes, how people can 0:22:59.800 --> 0:23:01.639 get in two fights. But that does not mean like 0:23:01.920 --> 0:23:04.560 you have to kill people who are having a fight. 0:23:04.960 --> 0:23:08.560 So no, this has drastic consequences. Something that the police 0:23:08.560 --> 0:23:12.120 in Milwaukee would have been aware of this encampment, would 0:23:12.119 --> 0:23:14.919 have possibly been aware of the normal way that homeless 0:23:14.920 --> 0:23:17.200 people can get into fights with each other but are 0:23:17.400 --> 0:23:20.919 not going to kill each other. Instead, you have an 0:23:20.920 --> 0:23:23.320 out of state cop from like Ohio or something get 0:23:23.400 --> 0:23:26.480 freaked out that two people are fighting and then shoot 0:23:26.520 --> 0:23:30.320 one of them and stuff like this is why like 0:23:30.400 --> 0:23:33.760 out of state police are so dangerous when they're being 0:23:33.760 --> 0:23:37.400 brought into communities that they really just don't understand exactly that. 0:23:38.000 --> 0:23:40.680 I did an interview with a local community organizer in 0:23:40.720 --> 0:23:42.520 DC and they told me pretty much the same thing, 0:23:42.600 --> 0:23:46.280 that there is an aspect of trust and relationship building 0:23:46.400 --> 0:23:50.639 that goes into not just like solving crimes, but combating 0:23:50.640 --> 0:23:52.760 crimes before they start, right, Like, there is a level 0:23:52.800 --> 0:23:55.919 of deep relationship building and trust building that has to 0:23:56.080 --> 0:23:59.600 be in effect there, and that is what actually can 0:23:59.680 --> 0:24:02.600 some time times make communities safer. But it comes to 0:24:02.720 --> 0:24:05.280 unhoused people and immigrants. These are not people who are 0:24:05.280 --> 0:24:07.840 committing crimes. These are people who are statistically more likely 0:24:07.920 --> 0:24:10.000 to be the victims of crimes. And so when you 0:24:10.040 --> 0:24:13.120 bring in outside forces who do not have trust, who 0:24:13.119 --> 0:24:15.560 do not who have not built that relationship, and they're 0:24:15.680 --> 0:24:18.679 terrorizing the communities that are statistically more likely to be 0:24:18.680 --> 0:24:20.760 the victims of crime, that's going to be the thing 0:24:20.760 --> 0:24:23.640 that results in the opposite of crime going down, right, 0:24:23.640 --> 0:24:27.399 because you are damaging whatever trust and whatever relationship and 0:24:27.440 --> 0:24:30.880 whatever understandings have been built with this community and law 0:24:30.960 --> 0:24:32.439 enforcement going forward. 0:24:32.520 --> 0:24:32.680 Right. 0:24:32.680 --> 0:24:36.159 And so if we're genuinely interested in buildings are for communities, 0:24:36.240 --> 0:24:39.800 bringing in all of these outside military and federal personnel 0:24:39.880 --> 0:24:41.239 is simply not how you do it. 0:24:41.280 --> 0:24:43.680 That's how I know it's bullshit. They don't actually care about. 0:24:43.440 --> 0:24:45.120 Any of this, and like it is, it is sort 0:24:45.119 --> 0:24:47.080 of crazy making because I feel like they want us 0:24:47.119 --> 0:24:48.840 spinning out about all of this stuff, all of this 0:24:48.960 --> 0:24:51.639 bullshit that they're spinning, which fucking guilty is charged for 0:24:51.680 --> 0:24:53.879 me this week is all I've been doing. But you know, 0:24:54.200 --> 0:24:56.520 it's just it's this. They're so effective at the spin 0:24:56.680 --> 0:24:57.520 and the manipulation. 0:24:58.280 --> 0:25:01.600 No, I'm one of the for Fox News hosts who 0:25:01.800 --> 0:25:05.440 somehow has a position in government Heath. No, it was 0:25:05.960 --> 0:25:08.439 another one. No, No, there is another. 0:25:08.680 --> 0:25:10.720 This is which one? 0:25:12.359 --> 0:25:15.320 It was one of the ones who looks like you're evil? 0:25:15.359 --> 0:25:19.520 Aunt oh, Gnian Pierro, Yes, Oh my god, I'm glad 0:25:19.560 --> 0:25:21.800 that we could figure that out based on that description. 0:25:22.119 --> 0:25:25.000 That's all you had to say. 0:25:25.400 --> 0:25:28.480 But she was specifically asked like, what are you gonna 0:25:28.480 --> 0:25:30.639 do to address the root cause of crime? And she says, 0:25:31.119 --> 0:25:33.360 we don't want to. We're not going to. That's not 0:25:33.400 --> 0:25:36.240 what we're actually focusing on. We're focusing on just like 0:25:36.520 --> 0:25:40.960 eliminating crime through like force, through intimidation, and not even 0:25:41.000 --> 0:25:44.560 actually eliminating crime, just just just exercising power, which is 0:25:44.560 --> 0:25:46.960 what they're actually trying to say. And that's that's the 0:25:47.000 --> 0:25:48.040 whole point of this. 0:25:48.800 --> 0:25:52.640 Yes, and it's not just crime written large through force. 0:25:52.720 --> 0:25:55.080 It is crime in cities that are run by democrats 0:25:55.080 --> 0:25:57.840 and how are heavily black and brown populations, because you 0:25:57.840 --> 0:26:00.879 don't see them going into white commun unities. 0:26:00.520 --> 0:26:02.600 That have crime, which white communities do have crime. 0:26:02.720 --> 0:26:04.919 You don't see them going into like cities where they 0:26:05.000 --> 0:26:09.160 have Republican mayors where crime is also quite bad. No, 0:26:09.359 --> 0:26:12.040 that's not even that's not even like part of the conversation. 0:26:12.160 --> 0:26:14.440 It is very clear what they are saying. This is 0:26:14.480 --> 0:26:14.919 an attack. 0:26:15.000 --> 0:26:15.720 It's about power. 0:26:15.880 --> 0:26:18.639 Yeah, this is a show of power to communities that 0:26:18.680 --> 0:26:20.879 we don't like. And I have to say something about this, 0:26:20.920 --> 0:26:23.760 which is that you know, when on this first happened, 0:26:23.880 --> 0:26:27.160 when I was interviewing that longtime reporter Mark Seagraves, something 0:26:27.160 --> 0:26:29.239 that he told me that really scared me was that 0:26:29.520 --> 0:26:33.360 the administration is doing this entirely legally and by the book. 0:26:33.440 --> 0:26:35.280 He was like, Oh, it's clear that they are following 0:26:35.760 --> 0:26:37.080 every letter of the law, to the. 0:26:37.000 --> 0:26:40.320 Point where the first statement out of our mayor's office 0:26:40.560 --> 0:26:43.240 was that they were not challenging this takeover of MPD 0:26:43.640 --> 0:26:45.400 because they did not feel like they had any kind 0:26:45.400 --> 0:26:47.959 of legal grounds to do so, which is grim That 0:26:48.000 --> 0:26:50.080 really tells me that they have got their act together. 0:26:50.600 --> 0:26:52.480 There was a time where people were like, Oh, they're 0:26:52.520 --> 0:26:54.800 just gonna do things and see what sticks and see what, 0:26:54.880 --> 0:26:56.679 you know, see what gets challenged in court, see what 0:26:56.680 --> 0:26:58.439 they can get away with. It really tells me a 0:26:58.440 --> 0:27:00.399 lot that in this instance, they're like, we're doing this 0:27:00.520 --> 0:27:02.879 by the book so that there is no legal challenge 0:27:02.880 --> 0:27:03.640 to what we are doing. 0:27:15.160 --> 0:27:18.199 What has the reaction been like from Lake City government? 0:27:18.920 --> 0:27:18.960 Ugh? 0:27:19.560 --> 0:27:23.440 I mean, I will say I came on this podcast 0:27:23.480 --> 0:27:26.400 a while ago, and I would say, like, I don't 0:27:26.400 --> 0:27:29.280 want to say I defended our mayor Muriel Bowser, but 0:27:29.359 --> 0:27:31.359 I did want to say, like, she is in a 0:27:31.400 --> 0:27:34.439 position that no other election official in the country is in, 0:27:34.480 --> 0:27:37.160 where she has to sort of play nice with a madman. 0:27:37.640 --> 0:27:39.840 I plame on the show and I said that she 0:27:39.960 --> 0:27:44.320 had this strategy of appeasement and making concessions, which, you know, 0:27:44.600 --> 0:27:46.439 say what you would look at it, I believe was 0:27:46.520 --> 0:27:49.600 grounded in an attempt to like work with Trump to 0:27:49.640 --> 0:27:51.920 avoid worse outcomes. 0:27:51.440 --> 0:27:54.960 To avoid this from happening, to avoid this from happening. 0:27:55.080 --> 0:27:57.639 So my point is now, I mean, it really shows 0:27:57.680 --> 0:28:00.920 you the futality of trying to make concession with a fascist. 0:28:01.000 --> 0:28:01.840 Right. What's the point. 0:28:01.960 --> 0:28:04.119 Yeah, because the thing that we were trying to avoid, 0:28:04.240 --> 0:28:07.600 the thing that all of these little appeasements and concessions. 0:28:07.040 --> 0:28:09.120 Were meant to avoid, has happened. 0:28:09.520 --> 0:28:12.439 To be clear, Trump has not taken over DC entirely, 0:28:12.440 --> 0:28:15.160 and home rules still stands, and so the very worst 0:28:15.240 --> 0:28:18.000 outcome has not happened yet. But this is pretty damn bad, 0:28:18.040 --> 0:28:19.760 and so part of me is like, what did all 0:28:19.760 --> 0:28:24.240 those concessions get you? And today, just this morning, she 0:28:24.320 --> 0:28:27.760 has totally flipped her tune on this. She actually flew 0:28:27.800 --> 0:28:29.919 to mar A Lago to see Trump yesterday and she 0:28:30.040 --> 0:28:32.879 came back saying, well, maybe having more law enforcement in 0:28:32.920 --> 0:28:36.159 communities in DC will make people safer. And I just 0:28:36.520 --> 0:28:39.880 cannot express to you how much it feels like I 0:28:39.960 --> 0:28:41.760 was speak for myself. It feels like we have been 0:28:41.800 --> 0:28:45.280 abandoned by leadership when we need it most. Right in DC, 0:28:45.560 --> 0:28:47.720 we have the mayor Muriel Bowser, who I just told 0:28:47.760 --> 0:28:51.320 you about. We have a congressional Representative, Eleanor Holmes Norton, 0:28:51.480 --> 0:28:54.320 who has a long time a history of being a 0:28:54.640 --> 0:28:59.080 fighter and protector of DC's autonomy. However, she can't vote, 0:28:59.080 --> 0:29:01.200 so she doesn't really have a lot of power, and 0:29:01.720 --> 0:29:03.520 a big conversation in DC has been the fact that 0:29:03.560 --> 0:29:06.320 she is really aging. She is, like, I think, the 0:29:06.440 --> 0:29:09.920 second oldest member of Congress in the United States, and 0:29:10.400 --> 0:29:12.680 it just we don't feel like we have anybody who 0:29:12.680 --> 0:29:14.720 can fight for us, who can speak up for us? 0:29:15.040 --> 0:29:17.480 And I will say this, like, I'm very disappointed in 0:29:17.560 --> 0:29:19.680 our mayor. I'm very disappointed in the fact that she 0:29:19.840 --> 0:29:23.040 has seems to have really been behind Trump on this. 0:29:23.560 --> 0:29:27.400 She does have a not terrible relationship with Trump, which 0:29:27.400 --> 0:29:29.240 in some ways can be good or bad depending on 0:29:29.280 --> 0:29:31.160 how you look at it. But I went into this 0:29:31.240 --> 0:29:32.720 having a sense that, oh, well, I think our mayor 0:29:32.760 --> 0:29:34.000 is going to fight for us, Our mayor is going 0:29:34.000 --> 0:29:35.160 to fight for DC's autonomy. 0:29:35.400 --> 0:29:38.400 And I'm coming out of it thinking I don't think that. 0:29:38.360 --> 0:29:39.960 She is fighting for us like the way that I 0:29:39.960 --> 0:29:43.120 would want her to be positioning herself in this moment, I'm. 0:29:42.960 --> 0:29:43.680 Not seeing her do. 0:29:44.120 --> 0:29:47.320 And the reality is, unfortunately the mayor of DC doesn't 0:29:47.360 --> 0:29:49.320 really have a lot of power and protection. She does 0:29:49.360 --> 0:29:51.880 when you when you compare that to somebody like Gavin Newsom, 0:29:52.080 --> 0:29:55.360 who when Trump sent the National Guard into LA knows 0:29:55.360 --> 0:29:58.239 that he has like the power of two senators behind him, 0:29:58.320 --> 0:30:01.280 right like our mayor doesn't have that. And it just 0:30:01.320 --> 0:30:05.120 really made clear when it comes to protecting DC. 0:30:05.680 --> 0:30:08.120 We're really on our own. We're really all we have. 0:30:08.360 --> 0:30:10.320 We don't really have a lot of power. 0:30:10.680 --> 0:30:13.520 We are really depending on folks like you. 0:30:13.800 --> 0:30:16.480 Care to get the word out to people who do 0:30:16.680 --> 0:30:19.920 have elected officials that they can call and advocate, because like. 0:30:19.920 --> 0:30:21.840 There's really nobody to call. 0:30:21.960 --> 0:30:24.560 And I will say I will say this, if the 0:30:24.600 --> 0:30:28.120 worst thing happens and DC's home Rule is overturned, which 0:30:28.120 --> 0:30:30.920 would be a disaster, Like I should come back on 0:30:30.960 --> 0:30:32.840 the show and talk about what that would look like. 0:30:33.320 --> 0:30:35.960 If that happens, DC will have no one. 0:30:36.200 --> 0:30:38.840 The only people who will be in charge of how 0:30:38.920 --> 0:30:43.200 DC is run is Trump and a small handful of 0:30:43.280 --> 0:30:46.560 people that he would personally appoint to be the commissioner 0:30:46.560 --> 0:30:48.320 of DC. So the last time that DC did not 0:30:48.440 --> 0:30:50.560 have home Rule, it was the only people who were 0:30:50.600 --> 0:30:52.480 in charge were the President and I think it was 0:30:52.520 --> 0:30:55.760 three commissioners that he personally appointed. None of these people 0:30:55.840 --> 0:30:57.560 lived in DC other than the President who lived in 0:30:57.600 --> 0:31:01.240 the White House. And so down to the smallest aspect 0:31:01.280 --> 0:31:04.040 of city life, I'm talking about social services, DC health, 0:31:04.120 --> 0:31:07.920 like unemployment, the streets, the schools, all of that would 0:31:07.920 --> 0:31:11.080 be run by President Trump. I cannot express to you 0:31:11.120 --> 0:31:14.640 what a disaster this would be. And the smallest thing 0:31:15.240 --> 0:31:17.720 getting done in DC, down to a pothole being be 0:31:17.800 --> 0:31:20.120 paved would take congressional oversight. 0:31:20.360 --> 0:31:21.760 So anybody who thinks that. 0:31:21.640 --> 0:31:24.920 That is a reasonable way to run a city, oh 0:31:25.000 --> 0:31:26.720 my god, wake up. 0:31:27.600 --> 0:31:30.480 Well I am not thrilled about the idea of commissioner 0:31:30.680 --> 0:31:34.040 big balls because that would happen. You know that, I know. 0:31:34.280 --> 0:31:37.000 And it's funny you mentioned Newsome, and Newsom was another 0:31:37.000 --> 0:31:39.400 guy who was trying to make concessions with Trump, specifically 0:31:39.440 --> 0:31:40.760 around like trans sports. 0:31:41.000 --> 0:31:42.680 Oh my god, don't even get me started. 0:31:42.840 --> 0:31:45.240 And he tried to, you know, make make those sort 0:31:45.240 --> 0:31:47.720 of like concessions and like roll back some aspects of 0:31:47.760 --> 0:31:51.320 supporting trans people in schools and trans kids. And then 0:31:51.440 --> 0:31:55.080 Trump's Department of Education still went after California schools, so like, yeah, 0:31:55.120 --> 0:31:57.000 no matter what concessions you give, they will still go 0:31:57.080 --> 0:31:59.640 after you. Earlier, you mentioned there was like a rest 0:31:59.640 --> 0:32:01.840 in your on your block last night, Like how how 0:32:01.920 --> 0:32:05.680 is this affected daily life for you and other are 0:32:05.680 --> 0:32:06.800 the residents of like DC? 0:32:06.960 --> 0:32:09.480 So far it has been grim. 0:32:09.680 --> 0:32:14.160 You know, we've seen border patrol, DA, FBI, National Guard 0:32:14.240 --> 0:32:17.800 just walking the streets. And again, like something about DC 0:32:18.000 --> 0:32:20.640 is that in August pretty much everybody leaves towns. 0:32:20.640 --> 0:32:21.680 What's a bit of a ghost town. 0:32:21.880 --> 0:32:27.440 There is nothing that justifies the massive disruption in city 0:32:27.520 --> 0:32:28.920 services that has happened. 0:32:29.160 --> 0:32:30.200 On my street last. 0:32:30.040 --> 0:32:35.600 Night they had a row of Border Patrol SUVs blocking 0:32:35.680 --> 0:32:39.480 traffic for genuinely no reason. Like The level to which 0:32:39.520 --> 0:32:42.800 to say are they are purposely disrupting the flow of 0:32:42.920 --> 0:32:46.360 city life cannot be overstated. And you know, I want 0:32:46.360 --> 0:32:48.320 to make it clear also, this is, as you said, 0:32:48.360 --> 0:32:51.200 a real attack on the unhoused community in DC. We 0:32:51.240 --> 0:32:54.400 have already seen very disturbing images of unhoused people being 0:32:54.400 --> 0:32:56.400 taken away by police yesterday in the White House at 0:32:56.400 --> 0:32:58.920 that they were going to be forcibly removing unhoused people, 0:32:59.200 --> 0:33:02.200 forcing them into show helter's, hospitals or jails, and if 0:33:02.200 --> 0:33:05.800 they didn't go, they would face five I mean, finding 0:33:05.840 --> 0:33:08.280 somebody who was living on the street, Like what are 0:33:08.280 --> 0:33:08.640 you doing? 0:33:08.800 --> 0:33:10.400 Yeah, finding someone who has no money? 0:33:10.560 --> 0:33:10.800 Yeah. 0:33:10.840 --> 0:33:15.000 And DC has a long history of having an issue 0:33:15.040 --> 0:33:18.280 with the unhoused community. We do not have enough shelters 0:33:18.280 --> 0:33:20.960 to accommodate people, and even if we did not, everybody's 0:33:21.000 --> 0:33:22.920 gonna want to go to a shelter. And so this 0:33:23.000 --> 0:33:25.400 has been an issue long before Trump was ever in DC. 0:33:25.600 --> 0:33:29.160 And it does take some complexity and thoughtfulness to solve it, 0:33:29.520 --> 0:33:33.040 not just going in and removing people by brute force, 0:33:33.120 --> 0:33:35.240 Like that is the absolute worst thing that you can 0:33:35.280 --> 0:33:35.920 be doing for this. 0:33:36.080 --> 0:33:38.440 No, I mean that that relates to Trump's like anti 0:33:38.560 --> 0:33:42.040 vagrancy executive order from a few weeks ago, where he 0:33:42.080 --> 0:33:45.240 wants to lock homeless people up in like mental hospitals 0:33:45.720 --> 0:33:49.320 and jails and like like like forcibly so and change 0:33:49.440 --> 0:33:52.640 change the rules for how how shelters work, how shelters 0:33:52.680 --> 0:33:58.360 can get funding mandatory like drug treatments, and yeah, really 0:33:58.480 --> 0:34:03.120 actually just trying to like involuntarily commit people into civil 0:34:03.160 --> 0:34:07.120 institutions exactly. I see parts of what he's doing in 0:34:07.200 --> 0:34:11.440 DC is trying to demonstrate his plan for that and 0:34:11.520 --> 0:34:13.880 how he wants that to spread across the country and 0:34:14.000 --> 0:34:17.200 just yeah, taking people off the street but then locking 0:34:17.280 --> 0:34:20.279 them either in a jail or onto like a hospital bed. 0:34:21.080 --> 0:34:24.600 Yes, and there was also an ice raid at the 0:34:24.640 --> 0:34:29.279 home Depot out in Northeast this week. Basically, I do 0:34:29.440 --> 0:34:31.880 think that first and foremost this is an attack on 0:34:32.120 --> 0:34:36.080 DC's black, brown, immigrant, and unhoused community. But you know, 0:34:36.640 --> 0:34:40.560 I've seen images of empty bars and empty restaurants where 0:34:40.640 --> 0:34:43.760 Ice and border patrol are inside the place. 0:34:43.920 --> 0:34:45.440 Yeah, why would you want to go out? So if 0:34:45.440 --> 0:34:48.839 there's a fucking like the military parading around. 0:34:48.800 --> 0:34:51.360 Yes, it's fucking up the vibes right, Like that's I 0:34:51.520 --> 0:34:51.839 will say. 0:34:51.880 --> 0:34:55.200 Like so in addition to the attacks on these vulnerable communities, 0:34:55.560 --> 0:34:57.120 like if you want to have a community where people 0:34:57.120 --> 0:34:59.040 feel safe to go out, they want to spend money, 0:34:59.080 --> 0:35:00.520 they want to like in joy of the. 0:35:00.480 --> 0:35:02.280 City, the vibes are terrible. 0:35:02.320 --> 0:35:05.880 This is this is just everything that makes DC great 0:35:06.239 --> 0:35:07.880 and a good place to live in a place that 0:35:07.880 --> 0:35:10.040 people want to come and spend time and and start 0:35:10.080 --> 0:35:13.400 their families. This kind of show of force goes against 0:35:13.440 --> 0:35:15.560 that and threatens that. It really does threat like DC 0:35:15.680 --> 0:35:17.840 is a particular place. It's like why this is my home. 0:35:18.320 --> 0:35:21.200 This kind of stuff really threatens our way of life 0:35:21.239 --> 0:35:22.120 in ways that are just. 0:35:22.120 --> 0:35:23.160 It really is just sad. 0:35:23.880 --> 0:35:26.160 I'm not sure if you have like examples like what 0:35:26.200 --> 0:35:30.080 people are trying to do to cope with this or 0:35:31.360 --> 0:35:34.480 try to like like stand their ground in their community. 0:35:34.560 --> 0:35:37.040 I guess, But like how are people like channeling their 0:35:37.080 --> 0:35:38.160 frustration right now? 0:35:38.520 --> 0:35:41.000 Well, there was a very viral video of somebody throwing 0:35:41.040 --> 0:35:44.680 a sub sandwich at a military personnel on us to eat. 0:35:44.480 --> 0:35:46.960 So well, that's a start. As long as we if 0:35:46.960 --> 0:35:50.080 we can get fifty thousand people with sub sandwiches, we 0:35:50.160 --> 0:35:51.520 might be onto something. 0:35:51.280 --> 0:35:52.560 Hero DC needs. 0:35:52.560 --> 0:35:57.200 So that's one literally the hero DC needs. Yeah, I 0:35:57.239 --> 0:35:58.280 see what you did there. 0:35:58.760 --> 0:36:01.840 Yeah, I would say, so there are I feel grateful 0:36:01.880 --> 0:36:04.960 that there are organizations in DC, like local organizations that 0:36:05.000 --> 0:36:07.919 were preparing for this, and so organizations like Free DC. 0:36:08.120 --> 0:36:10.919 I spoke to one of their representatives earlier this week 0:36:10.960 --> 0:36:14.000 about what they're doing, and they're really focused on giving 0:36:14.040 --> 0:36:17.360 residents resources and so they're running cop watching trainings. 0:36:17.520 --> 0:36:18.319 That's good. That's good. 0:36:18.360 --> 0:36:19.080 They're making sure that. 0:36:19.080 --> 0:36:21.520 Folks know that their rights have not changed, know their 0:36:21.600 --> 0:36:24.000 rights if an agent comes up to you to talk 0:36:24.000 --> 0:36:26.759 to you. They're making sure people know what they do 0:36:26.880 --> 0:36:28.840 and don't have to say in those situations, which I 0:36:28.840 --> 0:36:31.000 think is important. People should definitely check out Free DC. 0:36:31.160 --> 0:36:33.239 They've been around since the sixties or they have been 0:36:33.640 --> 0:36:36.960 protecting DC's autonomy for a very long time. One of 0:36:37.000 --> 0:36:39.920 the things that they were telling folks to do was 0:36:40.480 --> 0:36:43.000 do you remember how in twenty twenty people would go 0:36:43.040 --> 0:36:46.480 outside and bang pots and pans to thank essential workers 0:36:46.480 --> 0:36:50.000 and medical personnel. They were telling folks because the streets 0:36:50.000 --> 0:36:52.640 feel so militarized. Not everybody's gonna feel like going out 0:36:52.680 --> 0:36:54.640 to a protest or going out to a march at 0:36:54.680 --> 0:36:57.160 eight o'clock at night. Make as much noise as you can, 0:36:57.200 --> 0:36:59.399 whether it's from your open window or from your block 0:36:59.480 --> 0:37:02.640 or from your do as a way to like demonstrate 0:37:02.840 --> 0:37:05.640 opposition to this. And so if you want more information 0:37:05.640 --> 0:37:08.080 about the kinds of that kind of organizing that they're 0:37:08.120 --> 0:37:11.160 trying to provide for folks, definitely check out Free DC. 0:37:11.760 --> 0:37:16.160 But I do think, I mean, the vibes are rage, 0:37:16.880 --> 0:37:20.880 and I hate that that rage feels so impotent that 0:37:20.920 --> 0:37:23.960 we that like this is just another a million examples 0:37:24.040 --> 0:37:26.279 of why we need full state that we've needed it 0:37:26.320 --> 0:37:30.160 for so long, because we are being disenfranchised. We have 0:37:30.200 --> 0:37:33.719 the possibility that people in power in DC could be 0:37:33.719 --> 0:37:36.920 people that nobody elected. Trump could appoint anybody as Commissioner 0:37:36.920 --> 0:37:39.880 of DC, and yeah, it could be big balls, right, 0:37:39.920 --> 0:37:42.800 And so we are in a situation that is so grim, 0:37:42.840 --> 0:37:45.560 and I think that shows, you know, people, people are 0:37:45.560 --> 0:37:47.839 really feeling that. And I guess one thing I want 0:37:47.880 --> 0:37:51.480 to I want to add is that I was talking 0:37:51.520 --> 0:37:54.560 earlier about how it's frustrating that I find that I'm 0:37:54.640 --> 0:37:58.600 often in this conversation like trying to combat Trump, and 0:37:58.640 --> 0:38:00.880 I feel I feel like I'm in a a stance 0:38:00.880 --> 0:38:03.200 that I hate, which is this reactive stance where he 0:38:03.480 --> 0:38:05.120 used bullshit, and I feel like it's my job to 0:38:05.120 --> 0:38:06.480 debunk it, and it's like, well, it's a bullshit I 0:38:06.480 --> 0:38:07.399 could be doing other things. 0:38:07.719 --> 0:38:09.440 I hate that. 0:38:09.680 --> 0:38:13.480 We have gotten this narrative that cities are bad, and 0:38:14.080 --> 0:38:18.000 that goes against our shared understanding of this country where 0:38:18.040 --> 0:38:20.359 cities are good. If you live in a city, don't 0:38:20.440 --> 0:38:23.640 let Trump turn you against city life. Don't let Trump 0:38:23.680 --> 0:38:26.000 turn you against cities. People want to be in cities. 0:38:26.040 --> 0:38:29.040 Cities are good, cities are safe, cities are cool to live, 0:38:29.080 --> 0:38:30.799 and people want to be in the city. If people 0:38:30.840 --> 0:38:32.600 didn't want to live in DC, my rent wouldn't be 0:38:32.640 --> 0:38:34.719 so goddamn high. Right, people want to be here for 0:38:34.760 --> 0:38:36.880 a reason. When Trump got up on that presser and 0:38:36.920 --> 0:38:39.719 talked about how tourists come to DC this and that 0:38:39.840 --> 0:38:43.520 he's right. If DC were truly a bombed out hell hole, 0:38:43.640 --> 0:38:46.640 Taurus wouldn't want to bring their families here. Cities are good, 0:38:46.920 --> 0:38:48.800 and I don't think that we should let Trump rewrite 0:38:48.800 --> 0:38:51.520 the narrative that our cities are bad. Cities are good, 0:38:51.520 --> 0:38:53.440 they are good places to be. We don't have to 0:38:53.440 --> 0:38:57.240 get caught up in his fake bullshit narrative of demonizing cities. 0:38:57.880 --> 0:39:01.000 So that's why I think everyone should travel to Let's 0:39:01.040 --> 0:39:03.319 all go to the capitol, put on some put on 0:39:03.360 --> 0:39:06.239 some masks, wave some flags, and just get in there 0:39:07.880 --> 0:39:10.960 to show could we could take it over, we can 0:39:11.080 --> 0:39:14.520 take the city back. Joe Biden, twenty twenty eight. Let's go. 0:39:14.680 --> 0:39:17.560 Yeah. I mean, I did see this interview on News 0:39:17.640 --> 0:39:19.720 Nation where I think it was Mehdi Hassan was talking 0:39:19.719 --> 0:39:22.240 to some shithead and he was like, oh, if Trump 0:39:22.280 --> 0:39:24.440 cares about crime so much, why did he pardon a 0:39:24.520 --> 0:39:28.920 bunch of January sixth attackers who threatened and attacked law enforcement? 0:39:29.040 --> 0:39:30.000 And it's like, oh, he would be. 0:39:30.080 --> 0:39:32.239 The interviewer was just like, oh, come on, come on, 0:39:32.440 --> 0:39:33.640 you want to talk about that, come on. 0:39:33.680 --> 0:39:34.480 And it's like, okay, I. 0:39:34.480 --> 0:39:36.879 Thought tough on crime. Huh, tough on crime? 0:39:36.920 --> 0:39:42.000 Okay, No, it's it's it's crime with three ellipses, not 0:39:42.080 --> 0:39:45.799 the actual category of crime exactly crime wink wink. 0:39:46.200 --> 0:39:46.359 Yeah. 0:39:46.400 --> 0:39:48.959 It's like we know what they're what they're trying to say, 0:39:49.080 --> 0:39:51.239 but Honestly, just talking to you about this has made 0:39:51.280 --> 0:39:52.200 me feel a lot better. 0:39:52.640 --> 0:39:55.000 I've been raging all week. 0:39:54.880 --> 0:39:56.239 So this is the first time that I feel like 0:39:56.280 --> 0:39:58.120 I've actually like gotten it all out. 0:39:58.239 --> 0:39:59.920 So thank you for talking to me about it. 0:40:01.440 --> 0:40:04.640 Yeah, no, we will. We will certainly keep up with 0:40:04.680 --> 0:40:07.319 what's happening in d C with you know how long 0:40:07.440 --> 0:40:10.160 National Guard's going to be there, how long this this 0:40:10.239 --> 0:40:14.359 federalization lasts. Maybe they'll eliminate all crime within thirty days 0:40:14.360 --> 0:40:16.200 and things will go back to normal. Who knows. 0:40:16.680 --> 0:40:19.359 I mean the day that he took over there was over. 0:40:19.400 --> 0:40:21.239 There was a shooting like an hour or two later, 0:40:21.320 --> 0:40:22.479 So I was like, oh, at job, we're going. 0:40:22.360 --> 0:40:26.160 To handle this well, I guess not, but no, we will. 0:40:26.200 --> 0:40:28.360 We will keep up with this as well as Trump's 0:40:28.400 --> 0:40:32.640 promise is to go further and expand to five other cities. 0:40:32.960 --> 0:40:36.960 So thank you for sharing your your thoughts and experiences 0:40:37.000 --> 0:40:38.440 as a resident of d C. 0:40:38.640 --> 0:40:42.279 Bridget, Thank you for having me, and yeah, like, if 0:40:42.320 --> 0:40:46.240 you're out there in d C, stay safe, keep hope alive. 0:40:46.280 --> 0:40:49.200 We're all we got. Where else can people find you 0:40:49.320 --> 0:40:52.239 on the internet, Bridget? Besides, you know, on the on 0:40:52.280 --> 0:40:54.760 the steps of the Capitol waving an American flag. 0:40:56.280 --> 0:40:57.040 Yeah in a mask. 0:40:57.560 --> 0:40:58.520 Yeah. 0:40:58.560 --> 0:40:59.960 You can find me at my podcast. 0:41:00.280 --> 0:41:02.239 I have a podcast on iHeartRadio called There Are No 0:41:02.320 --> 0:41:04.840 Girls on the Internet. I have a podcast about local 0:41:04.920 --> 0:41:08.040 DC news and issues called Citycast DC. You can also 0:41:08.080 --> 0:41:10.080 find me on Instagram at bridget rain d C, on 0:41:10.160 --> 0:41:12.160 TikTok at bridget rain DC, or on YouTube. 0:41:12.200 --> 0:41:13.640 And there Are No Girls on the Internet. 0:41:14.120 --> 0:41:14.440 Cheers. 0:41:33.120 --> 0:41:35.960 I'm Michael Phillips, an historian and the author of a 0:41:36.000 --> 0:41:39.640 book about racism in Dallas called White Metropolis, and the 0:41:39.680 --> 0:41:42.680 co author of a recently published book about the eugenics 0:41:42.719 --> 0:41:45.560 movement in Texas called The Purifying Knife. 0:41:45.760 --> 0:41:49.640 And I'm Stephen Monicelli. I'm an investigator reporter in Dallas, 0:41:49.680 --> 0:41:53.760 where I contribute to a variety of publications as well 0:41:53.800 --> 0:41:57.560 as Cool Zone Media. I cover political extremism in Texas 0:41:57.840 --> 0:42:01.319 and beyond. Elon Musk has dominated the news since the 0:42:01.360 --> 0:42:05.160 twenty twenty four presidential campaign, and for a lot of reasons. 0:42:05.760 --> 0:42:09.880 There's a billionaire's flirtation with neo Nazi politics. There's his 0:42:09.960 --> 0:42:13.680 gutting of the social safety net through Doge. His soap 0:42:13.719 --> 0:42:17.840 opera estrangement from President Trump also grabbed much of the Spotlight. 0:42:18.320 --> 0:42:21.359 In the past two years, Musk has resuscitated in two 0:42:21.480 --> 0:42:24.840 Texas communities, one of the worst ideas from the robber 0:42:24.880 --> 0:42:28.000 baron age. In an effort to control his workers' lives 0:42:28.040 --> 0:42:31.040 on and off the clock, Musk is bringing the company 0:42:31.080 --> 0:42:32.600 town back to life. 0:42:33.280 --> 0:42:35.880 On May third of this year, on the South Texas 0:42:35.920 --> 0:42:38.759 coast of the Gulf of Mexico, people went to the 0:42:38.840 --> 0:42:43.080 voting booth on a peninsula called Boca Chica. They voted 0:42:43.120 --> 0:42:45.880 to turn their one and a half square mile patch 0:42:45.880 --> 0:42:50.759 of unincorporated land into a city called Starbase. Almost all 0:42:50.760 --> 0:42:54.920 of the voters were employees of musk SpaceX Rocket Company. 0:42:55.560 --> 0:42:58.640 So are the candidates elected to govern Texas newest city. 0:42:59.239 --> 0:43:02.719 But Musk is clearly the power behind the throne. 0:43:02.760 --> 0:43:07.640 Meanwhile, in Bastrup County near Austin in central Texas, Musk 0:43:07.760 --> 0:43:11.760 gobbled up local real estate in loosely governed unincorporated lands. 0:43:12.239 --> 0:43:15.560 That's where, in addition to Starbase, he's working to create 0:43:15.640 --> 0:43:20.360 another company town he calls Snailbrook. Many Bascht rep presidents 0:43:20.360 --> 0:43:24.680 say Musk's businesses are poisoning the water, air, and soil 0:43:24.760 --> 0:43:28.000 in their community. On this episode of It could Happen 0:43:28.000 --> 0:43:31.799 Here we'll discuss the unfortunate history of company towns in 0:43:31.800 --> 0:43:36.440 the United States, how company towns have always undermined democracy 0:43:36.560 --> 0:43:40.280 and workers' rights, and what these elon musk company towns 0:43:40.360 --> 0:43:43.319 may mean for the future of United States capitalism. 0:43:43.920 --> 0:43:46.680 Speaking of capitalism will be back after a few words 0:43:46.680 --> 0:44:00.640 from our sponsors. Roughly between eighteen eighty in the mid 0:44:00.719 --> 0:44:05.480 nineteen thirties, an astounding twenty five hundred company towns dotted 0:44:05.520 --> 0:44:07.480 the American landscape. 0:44:07.560 --> 0:44:09.280 A product of Gilded Age greed. 0:44:09.719 --> 0:44:14.279 At best, these corporate planned communities represented paternalistic experiments of 0:44:14.320 --> 0:44:18.520 mind control. At their worst, they became miniature police states. 0:44:19.200 --> 0:44:23.280 In Steinway Village in New York, where not surprisingly, workers 0:44:23.320 --> 0:44:28.680 manufactured Steinway pianos, Paulman, Illinois, where employees made train cars, 0:44:29.080 --> 0:44:33.440 and Hershey's Pennsylvania, which was, of course, a chocolate manufacturing center. 0:44:33.960 --> 0:44:37.560 Employers built the houses that the workers lived in, the 0:44:37.640 --> 0:44:40.840 stores where they shopped, the saloons where they drank, and 0:44:40.920 --> 0:44:42.840 the schools where their children learned. 0:44:43.440 --> 0:44:46.719 Chad Pearson is an historian of American labor at the 0:44:46.800 --> 0:44:49.840 University of North Texas, and he's the author of a 0:44:49.880 --> 0:44:55.279 noted book called Capitalism's Terrorists. Klansmen, lawmen, and employers in 0:44:55.320 --> 0:44:58.200 the long nineteenth century. We talked to him about the 0:44:58.280 --> 0:45:00.600 rise and fall of company towns in the mid eighteen 0:45:00.680 --> 0:45:04.640 hundreds to the early twentieth century. Could you explain how 0:45:04.680 --> 0:45:07.200 company towns got started in the United States and the 0:45:07.239 --> 0:45:09.279 motives of the businessmen who started them. 0:45:09.760 --> 0:45:13.799 Certainly, so, really, I think we can identify three periods, 0:45:13.840 --> 0:45:16.680 three phases. So the first phase would be we might 0:45:16.719 --> 0:45:19.960 associate with the so called Lowell Girls in Lowell, Massachusetts, 0:45:20.160 --> 0:45:24.120 which began in the eighteen twenties and continued into the 0:45:24.160 --> 0:45:29.880 subsequent decades. These were young women girls and basically, you know, 0:45:30.160 --> 0:45:33.000 they lived on the campus the town. The boss would 0:45:33.000 --> 0:45:35.600 decide when they would work and when they would eat, 0:45:35.680 --> 0:45:38.080 and that sort of thing. After that, we have another 0:45:38.160 --> 0:45:41.600 phase which we could identify with George Pullman and the 0:45:41.600 --> 0:45:45.800 Pullman Company just outside of Chicago in the late nineteenth century, 0:45:45.880 --> 0:45:49.600 really in the eighteen eighties. Again, these were very controlling 0:45:49.920 --> 0:45:53.160 environments in which you know, the employer had all to say, 0:45:53.800 --> 0:45:56.960 workers would live in company housing. Again, they'd go to 0:45:56.960 --> 0:46:00.480 the company church, and you know, we're really control both 0:46:00.520 --> 0:46:03.000 during and after the workday. And then we have a 0:46:03.000 --> 0:46:07.120 whole bunch of them, mostly in mining and textile lumber communities. 0:46:07.480 --> 0:46:10.880 By nineteen thirty nine, there were seventy planned industrial settlements 0:46:10.920 --> 0:46:13.160 built after nineteen hundred. 0:46:13.320 --> 0:46:14.160 So quite a few. 0:46:14.600 --> 0:46:18.240 So whatever period we're talking about, these places where infamous 0:46:18.239 --> 0:46:21.759 for management's use of surveillance and power. This is designed 0:46:21.800 --> 0:46:26.799 really to fundamentally control folks, which round expression again in homes, workplaces, 0:46:26.800 --> 0:46:27.440 and churches. 0:46:27.880 --> 0:46:29.200 You would have to sign contracts. 0:46:29.200 --> 0:46:31.920 So in a place like mining towns in West Virginia, 0:46:31.920 --> 0:46:33.680 you'd have to sign a contract that gave the boss 0:46:33.719 --> 0:46:37.080 the authority to evict labor activists or people, you know, 0:46:37.280 --> 0:46:41.200 workers who might be involved in trying to improve their 0:46:41.239 --> 0:46:45.120 conditions by fighting back, or they would be evicted for 0:46:45.160 --> 0:46:49.239 so called undesirable behavior, again that generally involved things like 0:46:49.360 --> 0:46:50.239 union organizing. 0:46:51.040 --> 0:46:54.960 Pearson described these company towns as many dictatorships in which 0:46:55.000 --> 0:46:58.600 fighting for better conditions could result in harsh retaliation, and 0:46:58.640 --> 0:47:01.480 in which ministers that were hired by the company and 0:47:01.640 --> 0:47:05.440 a church built by the company bosses fed workers a 0:47:05.520 --> 0:47:07.560 steady stream of propaganda. 0:47:08.160 --> 0:47:11.360 This happened in places like New England textile mills to 0:47:11.760 --> 0:47:14.520 coal mining areas in Alabama and West Virginia. 0:47:14.840 --> 0:47:15.560 Well might happened. 0:47:15.600 --> 0:47:18.120 You'll say you're you're active in a union, or you're 0:47:18.160 --> 0:47:22.080 resisting your boss. Right, the boss or his underlings might 0:47:22.200 --> 0:47:26.080 send in mind guards and say you and your family 0:47:26.160 --> 0:47:29.040 get out, throw the stuff, their furniture on the street, 0:47:29.360 --> 0:47:32.360 and there would be no no accountability, no way to 0:47:32.800 --> 0:47:37.200 you know, address that that problem. You'd also have company towns. 0:47:37.480 --> 0:47:41.760 You'd have a religious you'd have preachers who would preach 0:47:42.000 --> 0:47:44.960 the company line as well. Right, So that kind of 0:47:45.400 --> 0:47:50.759 pro business, pro capitalist and doctrination was expressed both in 0:47:50.800 --> 0:47:52.640 the workplace and from the pulpit. 0:47:53.480 --> 0:47:57.080 A key way that company towns control workers was by 0:47:57.120 --> 0:48:01.920 not paying them an actual American dollars paper certificates called script. 0:48:02.320 --> 0:48:05.520 They could only be spent at company owned stores. This 0:48:05.600 --> 0:48:09.640 gave the company monopoly power over what their workforce bought. 0:48:10.800 --> 0:48:13.800 A twenty five pounds sack of flower costs two fifty 0:48:13.840 --> 0:48:17.719 at the company's store. It costs only one ninety elsewhere. Right, 0:48:17.840 --> 0:48:21.400 So this was a way for companies to sort of 0:48:21.640 --> 0:48:24.319 corner the market, if you will, right, they could jack 0:48:24.400 --> 0:48:25.160 up prices. 0:48:25.440 --> 0:48:28.360 You were basically a slave to the system. 0:48:29.040 --> 0:48:33.200 George Pullman, who established the company that made luxury railroad cars, 0:48:33.600 --> 0:48:37.120 created a company town in Illinois in eighteen eighty one, 0:48:37.360 --> 0:48:40.680 Pullman presented his experiment to the world as a utopia. 0:48:41.200 --> 0:48:44.600 The workers' houses there had natural gas and running water, 0:48:44.719 --> 0:48:47.960 which was not the norm at the time. Some even 0:48:48.000 --> 0:48:52.120 had indoor plumbing. The town had retail shops and well 0:48:52.120 --> 0:48:56.160 supplied markets, and tourists visited it as a supposed ideal 0:48:56.160 --> 0:48:57.440 community of the future. 0:48:57.760 --> 0:49:01.080 In spite of the apparent shininess of Pullman Illinois, the 0:49:01.120 --> 0:49:05.360 relationship between Pullman and his employees turned violent in eighteen 0:49:05.440 --> 0:49:08.319 ninety four. A is doctor Pearson explains. 0:49:08.320 --> 0:49:12.279 So Pullman, George Pullman, began creating this utopian community in 0:49:12.360 --> 0:49:17.480 eighteen eighty Okay, that's shortly after this massive nationwide strike 0:49:17.520 --> 0:49:20.279 in eighteen seventy seven of railroad workers. So a lot 0:49:20.320 --> 0:49:24.720 of bosses in the aftermath of these massive confrontations were like, Okay, 0:49:24.880 --> 0:49:26.720 we've got to do something. We've got to do something 0:49:26.800 --> 0:49:30.320 to solve what they called the labor problem, the labor question. 0:49:30.680 --> 0:49:34.240 And one way they did that was through welfare work, 0:49:34.640 --> 0:49:38.279 trying to be more benevolent right parents as opposed to 0:49:38.360 --> 0:49:41.839 only six and so Pullman was established in eighteen eighty 0:49:41.840 --> 0:49:45.400 four just outside of Chicago, had about twelve thousand residents 0:49:45.640 --> 0:49:49.440 and it was at the time the largest, most famous. 0:49:49.040 --> 0:49:50.160 Company town in the nation. 0:49:50.760 --> 0:49:52.799 And he did, I mean, let's give credit where credit 0:49:52.880 --> 0:49:56.880 is due some things that did improve the conditions for employees. 0:49:56.920 --> 0:50:00.560 So he had a company doctor. He oversaw good school 0:50:00.600 --> 0:50:04.400 system funded athletic programs a company banned and he modeled 0:50:04.440 --> 0:50:08.480 this on a company town outside of Bradford, England. So 0:50:08.560 --> 0:50:11.440 what we see is, you know, the company towns do 0:50:11.520 --> 0:50:13.719 not originate in the United States. They are sort of 0:50:13.719 --> 0:50:16.839 a phenomenon that we see across the industrialized world. But 0:50:16.880 --> 0:50:19.560 of course there was also a darker side. He banned alcohol, 0:50:19.560 --> 0:50:23.279 he restricted tobacco use, He imposed a curfew, right, so 0:50:23.320 --> 0:50:25.880 you want to go out, you know, it's five o'clock somewhere. 0:50:25.920 --> 0:50:26.839 No, it's not right. 0:50:27.120 --> 0:50:30.319 And so it was also pretty expensive to live there. 0:50:31.120 --> 0:50:33.520 Residents had to spend something like thirty percent of their 0:50:33.560 --> 0:50:37.239 money on rent, and when they saved enough money an 0:50:37.320 --> 0:50:40.640 impossible thing to do. Often when they did save that money, 0:50:40.680 --> 0:50:42.000 they would they would get out. 0:50:42.520 --> 0:50:46.480 Pullman's experiment in welfare capitalism came crashing down when the 0:50:46.560 --> 0:50:49.719 United States sank into an economic depression that lasted from 0:50:50.000 --> 0:50:53.640 eighteen ninety three to eighteen ninety seven, at one point 0:50:53.920 --> 0:50:57.960 three million people, or about twenty percent of the country's workforce, 0:50:58.320 --> 0:51:02.799 could not find jobs. Hunger and suicide became rampant as 0:51:02.800 --> 0:51:06.360 hard times dragged on, and Pullman laid off hundreds of 0:51:06.400 --> 0:51:09.680 workers and slashed wages by thirty three percent. 0:51:09.800 --> 0:51:13.080 During this time, residents of the company town in Illinois 0:51:13.120 --> 0:51:16.680 struggled to pay rent at the Pullman owned housing, where 0:51:16.800 --> 0:51:21.160 management refused the lower prices. Eugene Debs, who would soon 0:51:21.239 --> 0:51:23.800 emerge as the leader of the Socialist Party of America 0:51:24.160 --> 0:51:27.560 and would served five times as that party's presidential nominee, 0:51:27.800 --> 0:51:31.400 led one hundred and fifty thousand member American Railway Union 0:51:32.120 --> 0:51:35.759 the ARU, stage a strike calling for a rollback in 0:51:35.840 --> 0:51:39.160 pay cuts in a reduction rents at the company housing. 0:51:39.680 --> 0:51:43.680 The strike spread nationwide, with railroad workers refusing to handle 0:51:43.760 --> 0:51:46.000 trains carrying Pullman cars. 0:51:46.560 --> 0:51:50.600 President Grover Cleveland dispatched twelve thousand troops to crush the 0:51:50.640 --> 0:51:54.319 uprising and reopen the rail lines. Federal marshalls shot two 0:51:54.400 --> 0:51:58.200 strikers to death in Kensington, Illinois, not far from Chicago, 0:51:58.680 --> 0:52:01.680 while authorities arrested Dabbs and put him in prison for 0:52:01.760 --> 0:52:05.160 defying the court order by continuing the strike in a 0:52:05.239 --> 0:52:08.840 stop to workers, the House and Senate unanimously passed a 0:52:08.880 --> 0:52:12.560 bill creating what we now know today as Labor Day. 0:52:13.400 --> 0:52:17.680 Later on, in jail, using depths becomes radicalized, reading marks 0:52:18.160 --> 0:52:21.120 runs for president. A few times after that, bottom line 0:52:21.120 --> 0:52:24.640 workers lost a strike, but Pullman's experiments soon ended. The 0:52:24.640 --> 0:52:28.000 Illinois Supreme Court rule that George Pullman's ownership of the 0:52:28.040 --> 0:52:32.239 community was in violation of its charter and dismantled the 0:52:32.280 --> 0:52:37.000 town in eighteen ninety eight. So a dramatic period in 0:52:37.480 --> 0:52:40.600 US history, one of the most important struggles in US 0:52:40.719 --> 0:52:44.720 labor history, and it really showed the way in which 0:52:45.200 --> 0:52:49.840 bosses the state came together to really fight labor. 0:52:50.239 --> 0:52:52.839 By around the end of the eighteen hundreds, about three 0:52:52.920 --> 0:52:56.640 percent of the American population lived under the almost complete 0:52:56.640 --> 0:53:01.160 control of their corporate masters. Meanwhile, an extensive network of 0:53:01.200 --> 0:53:07.960 spies filled company towns. These corporate agents posed as fellow workers, bartenders, mailmen, 0:53:08.280 --> 0:53:11.400 or just another customer at the store. They reported to 0:53:11.480 --> 0:53:15.320 management any e mail content who complained about working hours 0:53:15.400 --> 0:53:19.320 or wages. Fired workers were often placed on a blacklist 0:53:19.360 --> 0:53:23.360 that was widely distributed among corporations and made landing a 0:53:23.400 --> 0:53:27.800 new job even more difficult, Some mining towns resembled prison camps. 0:53:28.760 --> 0:53:32.239 Arm guards surrounded the towns to keep out union organizers 0:53:32.880 --> 0:53:36.800 in the corporate overlords in company towns use violent means 0:53:37.040 --> 0:53:42.680 to maintain tyrannical control. We asked doctor Pearson to explain this. Now, 0:53:42.719 --> 0:53:46.640 Doctor Pearson, you titled one of your books Capitalism's Terrorists. 0:53:46.680 --> 0:53:50.120 Then you were referring basically to the fact that corporations, 0:53:50.120 --> 0:53:54.360 including the ones that owned company towns, often used private armies, 0:53:54.520 --> 0:53:58.160 armed militias, or they basically hired outside violent groups to 0:53:58.200 --> 0:54:00.759 control labor. Did you go into that a little bit more? 0:54:01.200 --> 0:54:05.480 Let me read you an anecdote from Vandergriff, Pennsylvania. Vandergrift, 0:54:05.480 --> 0:54:08.680 Pennsylvania is a company pound not far from Pittsburgh. It's 0:54:08.719 --> 0:54:11.439 a steel town. And in July nineteen oh nine, during 0:54:11.480 --> 0:54:15.279 a strike against the American Sheet and Tinplay Company, the 0:54:15.320 --> 0:54:19.239 company's superintendent was a guy named Oscar Lindquist. He led 0:54:19.280 --> 0:54:22.560 a mob of hundreds to a hotel in the nearby 0:54:22.600 --> 0:54:25.200 town of Apollo, where the union organizers were staying. So 0:54:25.239 --> 0:54:30.040 there's an effort to build union membership in this company town. 0:54:30.160 --> 0:54:34.040 And Linquist was so pissed about their presence, so he 0:54:34.120 --> 0:54:36.879 informed the organizers that they had an hour to leave 0:54:36.920 --> 0:54:39.200 town and that he would burn the building down if 0:54:39.200 --> 0:54:43.040 they refused to comply. When they protested, insisting that they 0:54:43.080 --> 0:54:46.440 had free speech and assembly rights, Linquist claimed that quote 0:54:46.640 --> 0:54:49.960 his word was the law. A local town official, reinforcing 0:54:50.040 --> 0:54:52.680 linquist demand, gave the men until the next morning to leave. 0:54:53.320 --> 0:54:57.240 So we have threats of like burning places down, killing 0:54:57.280 --> 0:55:03.600 people right, and ultimately no accountability. I think it's fair 0:55:04.160 --> 0:55:06.080 to call these people terrorists. 0:55:06.840 --> 0:55:11.120 The harshness of company towns inspired worker resistance, including what 0:55:11.239 --> 0:55:15.000 came to be known as the Colorado Coalfield War. We'll 0:55:15.040 --> 0:55:18.080 hear more about that, and a tragedy that came to 0:55:18.120 --> 0:55:22.719 be known as the Ludlow Massacre. After this break sponsored 0:55:22.760 --> 0:55:36.960 by some companies, one of the bloodiest confrontations between a 0:55:37.040 --> 0:55:41.640 company militia and striking workers in American history took place 0:55:41.680 --> 0:55:46.320 in Ludlow, Colorado, in the early twentieth century. The Colorado 0:55:46.360 --> 0:55:49.239 Fuel and Iron Company controlled several coal mines, and it 0:55:49.320 --> 0:55:52.640 was owned by the world's richest man, John D. Rockefeller, 0:55:52.840 --> 0:55:56.760 who also owned the Standard Oil Company. The coal workers 0:55:56.840 --> 0:56:01.200 were unhappy with several things there were king twelve hour days, 0:56:01.360 --> 0:56:04.960 six days a week, sometimes seven. Through their union, the 0:56:05.080 --> 0:56:08.160 United Mine Workers, they asked for rays and for their 0:56:08.200 --> 0:56:11.279 workday to be no more than eight hours. They also 0:56:11.400 --> 0:56:13.719 demanded the right to live in housing that wasn't part 0:56:13.760 --> 0:56:17.120 of the company town controlled by Rockefeller, and to spend 0:56:17.120 --> 0:56:20.480 their hard earned money in stores that he didn't control. 0:56:21.080 --> 0:56:24.439 The relationship between the United Mineworkers and Rockefeller broke down 0:56:24.800 --> 0:56:28.600 when he refused to negotiate with them. Between September nineteen 0:56:28.640 --> 0:56:32.280 thirteen and December nineteen fourteen, the coal miners and Ludlow 0:56:32.280 --> 0:56:36.160 stage strikes against the richest man on the planet at 0:56:36.160 --> 0:56:36.600 the time. 0:56:37.320 --> 0:56:42.719 Instead of negotiating, Rockefeller assembled a private army of local sheriffs, deputies, 0:56:42.760 --> 0:56:46.719 and private detectives. The militia armed itself with a motorized 0:56:46.760 --> 0:56:52.319 gatling gun that Rockefeller's goons named the Death Special. The 0:56:52.400 --> 0:56:55.960 nation recoiled in horror when on April twentieth, nineteen fourteen, 0:56:56.440 --> 0:57:00.359 militia troops attacked a company miner's tent colony. They were 0:57:00.360 --> 0:57:02.640 living in the tent colony because that had been kicked 0:57:02.640 --> 0:57:07.640 out of company housing. During the armed assault, Rockefeller's troops 0:57:07.719 --> 0:57:11.480 killed sixty six men, women, and children. They doused the 0:57:11.560 --> 0:57:15.920 tents with kerosene, incinerating eleven hiding in a pit, including 0:57:15.960 --> 0:57:16.800 a pregnant woman. 0:57:17.240 --> 0:57:20.600 The folk singer Woody Guthrie immortalized the horrific scene at 0:57:20.680 --> 0:57:23.680 Ludlow in his ballad the Ludlow Massacre. 0:57:25.120 --> 0:57:28.440 You struck a man in the blaze it started. 0:57:29.000 --> 0:57:32.280 You pulled the triggers of your gabling guns. 0:57:32.880 --> 0:57:37.640 I made around for the children, for the farwells of me. 0:57:38.720 --> 0:57:42.920 Thirteen children died from your guns. 0:57:43.160 --> 0:57:45.840 About two hundred people in all died in what came 0:57:45.880 --> 0:57:49.400 to be called the Colorado Coalfield War. So we asked 0:57:49.400 --> 0:57:52.080 doctor Pearson about the long term impact of the Ludlow 0:57:52.160 --> 0:57:56.080 massacre and what happened to company towns in the subsequent years. 0:57:56.640 --> 0:57:59.640 So basically, on the morning of April twenty at nineteen fourteen, 0:58:00.280 --> 0:58:04.120 guardsmen who were aligned with the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, 0:58:04.320 --> 0:58:07.320 which is owned by John D. Rockefeller, attacked this camp 0:58:07.680 --> 0:58:12.800 of strikers, mineworkers strikers, ultimately killing twenty one people, including 0:58:12.960 --> 0:58:17.640 eleven children. This brutality, this brutality lasted for fourteen hours. 0:58:18.000 --> 0:58:21.640 The guards torched the colony, and this came in the 0:58:21.640 --> 0:58:23.920 midst of a strike that had been going on for months, 0:58:24.240 --> 0:58:29.520 which started in September nineteen thirteen, and so this was 0:58:29.880 --> 0:58:34.280 a real struggle. It was a terrible public relations disaster. 0:58:34.680 --> 0:58:38.760 From the vantage point of Rockefeller in the company, the 0:58:38.840 --> 0:58:42.040 pressure to do something was great. And so what we 0:58:42.080 --> 0:58:46.240 see as we see government officials meeting and discussing this event, 0:58:46.600 --> 0:58:49.960 there are these various gatherings of business people and labor 0:58:50.040 --> 0:58:53.320 unions trying to resolve it. And in the aftermath of this, 0:58:53.800 --> 0:58:58.960 Rockefeller worked closely with what we might call industrial relations specialists, 0:58:59.200 --> 0:59:04.280 and he became a champion of welfare capitalism. Welfare capitalism, 0:59:04.400 --> 0:59:09.080 like company unions, they sort of top down initiatives designed 0:59:09.120 --> 0:59:13.080 to win, as I pointed out, factory solidarity instead of 0:59:13.120 --> 0:59:17.520 class solidarity. And so how successful that was probably not. 0:59:18.040 --> 0:59:21.280 These bosses continued to exploit, but they did so with 0:59:21.360 --> 0:59:22.280 smiley faces. 0:59:22.880 --> 0:59:24.840 As you mentioned at the beginning of the episode, company 0:59:24.880 --> 0:59:28.520 towns never completely died, and they're making a bit of 0:59:28.560 --> 0:59:33.280 a disturbing comeback via Rockefeller's successor as the world's richest man. 0:59:33.920 --> 0:59:38.480 South African native and Texas transplant Elon Musk. Texas Governor 0:59:38.480 --> 0:59:41.400 Greg Abbott has been a big ally of Musk at 0:59:41.480 --> 0:59:44.040 least until his nasty split with Trump over the president's 0:59:44.120 --> 0:59:47.760 tax and spending policies. But nonetheless, Musk is still popular 0:59:47.840 --> 0:59:50.320 in Texas, and the state and local governments, for instance, 0:59:50.560 --> 0:59:53.960 have given Musk sixty four million dollars worth of tax 0:59:54.000 --> 0:59:58.280 breaks to establish his Tesla factory called Giga Texas in 0:59:58.400 --> 1:00:01.200 Travis County, not far from the state capitol. 1:00:02.000 --> 1:00:06.000 COVID nineteen restrictions in California during the pandemic and rage, 1:00:06.080 --> 1:00:11.200 Musk for a time defied state law. He derided California 1:00:11.200 --> 1:00:16.880 as defined by quote overregulation, over litigation, and over taxation, 1:00:17.120 --> 1:00:20.880 poop on the sidewalk, and scorn. In contrast, Texas stood 1:00:20.880 --> 1:00:24.600 out for its lax environmental and labor standards. As Abbot 1:00:24.600 --> 1:00:26.959 bragged to the Fox Business Channel. 1:00:26.880 --> 1:00:29.200 A need that Elon had with speed. 1:00:29.240 --> 1:00:32.720 He does everything fast, and this would have taken five, 1:00:32.800 --> 1:00:36.360 maybe ten years to accomplish in California. I told him 1:00:36.360 --> 1:00:38.920 that Texas moves at the speed of business. He was 1:00:38.960 --> 1:00:43.560 able to complete a mal long gigafactory in a year 1:00:43.600 --> 1:00:47.280 and a half. That is unheard of, probably not replicable 1:00:47.520 --> 1:00:48.440 in any other state. 1:00:49.080 --> 1:00:53.320 Whether Bastor residents liked Musk or not, it soon became 1:00:53.400 --> 1:00:56.920 clear that he was making a very large local footprint. 1:00:57.640 --> 1:01:01.800 Bastrip County has always been as for its beauty. This 1:01:01.960 --> 1:01:05.480 is how Bastro sold itself to tourists, businesses, and potential 1:01:05.480 --> 1:01:07.120 residents in the early two thousands. 1:01:07.360 --> 1:01:09.920 Next time you're on the way between Houston and Austin 1:01:10.160 --> 1:01:13.800 or points in between, you want to stop here in Bastrov. 1:01:14.080 --> 1:01:16.919 We've got a pretty little place here along the Colorado River, 1:01:17.760 --> 1:01:22.120 a place with charm and great natural beauty. We're the 1:01:22.160 --> 1:01:25.760 home of the lost times. So cross the bridge into 1:01:25.840 --> 1:01:29.520 the old town and have a look. We've been growing 1:01:29.600 --> 1:01:33.200 here since eighteen thirty two, and growing in a good way, 1:01:33.840 --> 1:01:36.760 a way that looks to the future and that preserves 1:01:36.800 --> 1:01:42.480 the landmarks of the past. Bastrop has more than one 1:01:42.560 --> 1:01:45.920 hundred and twenty homes and other commercial and public buildings 1:01:45.960 --> 1:01:51.360 on the National Register of Historic Places. Some people come 1:01:51.360 --> 1:01:55.000 here just to drive around town and see the pretty houses. 1:01:57.080 --> 1:02:00.240 There's a heavy price for moving at Greg Abbott's beat 1:02:00.240 --> 1:02:05.200 a business. However, chap Ambrose, a landowner in Bashtrop County, 1:02:05.560 --> 1:02:09.040 thirty three miles southeast of Austin, said that he admired 1:02:09.160 --> 1:02:12.880 Musk for being a high tech titan. He was excited 1:02:12.880 --> 1:02:14.840 when the billionaire announced he was going to move part 1:02:14.880 --> 1:02:19.280 of his business empire to the small, mostly agricultural county. 1:02:19.480 --> 1:02:22.920 Ambrose describes his feelings about musk arrival in his YouTube 1:02:23.000 --> 1:02:25.320 series Keep Bashstrop Boring. 1:02:30.960 --> 1:02:34.520 The weird part here is I'm actually an Elon Musk fan. 1:02:35.280 --> 1:02:40.760 I have my Tesla cybertruck reservation here from November of 1:02:40.840 --> 1:02:46.760 twenty nineteen, and SpaceX's Starlink, their satellite service. I've also 1:02:46.840 --> 1:02:48.120 signed up for last year. 1:02:49.200 --> 1:02:52.800 All of Bashtrop's natural and architectural splendor, however, is in 1:02:52.920 --> 1:02:57.560 danger since Musk came to town. In Texas counties have 1:02:57.640 --> 1:03:00.640 even less ability to protect the environment than these cities, 1:03:01.360 --> 1:03:05.480 and Musk, hat strategically places operation on land will face 1:03:05.640 --> 1:03:09.520 lax local oversight. He used his fortune to buy about 1:03:09.520 --> 1:03:13.120 thirty five thousand acres of what was once farmland in 1:03:13.200 --> 1:03:16.920 Bastrop County, which is now headquarters for the Boring Company. 1:03:17.680 --> 1:03:21.640 The Boring Company plans to build tunnels Musk hoops one 1:03:21.760 --> 1:03:26.040 day will provide high speed underground alternatives to our current 1:03:26.120 --> 1:03:30.200 web of interstates. Musk has secured permits to dig six 1:03:30.280 --> 1:03:33.520 test tunnels in Baschtup County, which is now also officially 1:03:33.520 --> 1:03:37.520 the headquarters of his social media platform X formerly known 1:03:37.640 --> 1:03:41.560 as Twitter. The Musk Industrial complex also includes a five 1:03:41.720 --> 1:03:46.960 hundred thousand square foot warehouse where the Space Exploration Technologies Corporation, 1:03:47.360 --> 1:03:51.040 more commonly known as SpaceX, builds terminals for another Musk 1:03:51.120 --> 1:03:56.640 business venture, the satellite company Starlink. Neuralink, which manufactures computer 1:03:56.720 --> 1:03:59.680 chips that have been experimentally implanted in test subjects brains 1:04:00.120 --> 1:04:05.040 and resulted in the deaths of many chimpanzees, is also nearby. 1:04:05.400 --> 1:04:09.680 The Tesla Gigafactory, which produces electronic cars, is just thirteen 1:04:09.720 --> 1:04:14.200 miles west on an unincorporated land neighboring Travis County. I've 1:04:14.200 --> 1:04:18.320 seen it driving down the highway. It's an abomination. Construction 1:04:18.400 --> 1:04:22.680 has also begun on a company town Musk has named Snailbrook. 1:04:23.400 --> 1:04:27.360 Plans for Snailbook eventually include one hundred and ten single 1:04:27.400 --> 1:04:31.440 family rental homes actually owned by Musk. So far, fewer 1:04:31.480 --> 1:04:35.960 than twenty modular homes have been completed. According to teen Vogue, 1:04:36.200 --> 1:04:39.160 plans are that rent for these houses will start at 1:04:39.200 --> 1:04:42.560 about eight hundred a month for two or three bedroom dwelling, 1:04:42.600 --> 1:04:45.760 which is well below the nineteen hundred and twenty five 1:04:45.800 --> 1:04:50.439 dollars median rent. In bashtrop County, a Montessori school called 1:04:50.480 --> 1:04:54.040 ad Astra, which from the Latin which means too the Stars, 1:04:54.120 --> 1:04:57.960 is open, along with the boring bodega, which the Austin 1:04:58.000 --> 1:05:04.000 American Statesman notes offers snacks, soda, coffee, beer, wine, a 1:05:04.120 --> 1:05:08.480 children's playground, lounge space complete with video games and beanbag toss, 1:05:09.120 --> 1:05:11.360 a pickleball court that can be rented for a dollar 1:05:11.360 --> 1:05:15.320 an hour, and of course, a variety of boring company merchandise, 1:05:15.880 --> 1:05:18.560 such as a T shirt that says tunnel Mars. 1:05:19.720 --> 1:05:24.000 This purported worker utopia already has a Gilded Age style catch. 1:05:24.400 --> 1:05:27.480 If workers get fired by Musk Long, famous for his 1:05:27.640 --> 1:05:31.240 volatility and mass layoffs at his companies, they will only 1:05:31.280 --> 1:05:34.160 have a month to vacate their homes. And, as with 1:05:34.520 --> 1:05:37.800 the Gilded Age, much under the Snailbrook glitter is not gold. 1:05:38.240 --> 1:05:41.440 The town's playground, for instance, lack shade from the broiling 1:05:41.520 --> 1:05:44.720 summertime Central Texas heat, and much of the equipment is 1:05:44.760 --> 1:05:49.120 broken and made of inferior materials. The Monastery school initially 1:05:49.160 --> 1:05:52.040 admitted fifty students, but the campus wasn't big enough. Only 1:05:52.080 --> 1:05:55.960 sixteen actually attended when classes first opened. Because the facilities 1:05:55.960 --> 1:05:57.200 were too small. 1:05:57.440 --> 1:06:01.800 Musk once marketed himself as an environmental savior. His electric 1:06:01.880 --> 1:06:05.720 cars would supposedly save the planet from climate change. However, 1:06:05.760 --> 1:06:09.760 in Bashstrop County, he's a major polluter. The Boring company 1:06:09.760 --> 1:06:12.360 petitioned Texas for the right to pour one hundred and 1:06:12.440 --> 1:06:17.080 forty three thousand gallons of treated wastewater into the Colorado 1:06:17.160 --> 1:06:21.480 River every single day. Meanwhile, the Texts Commission on Environmental 1:06:21.560 --> 1:06:25.320 Quality to date has cited SpaceX and the Boring Company 1:06:25.400 --> 1:06:30.120 thirteen times because the unauthorized discharge of water used to 1:06:30.200 --> 1:06:33.880 clean concrete trucks. The company also failed to meet state 1:06:34.000 --> 1:06:38.200 standards regarding erosion control and the release of toxic chemicals 1:06:38.200 --> 1:06:42.360 in the soil, As teen Vogue reported. However, the resulting 1:06:42.440 --> 1:06:45.440 fines represent mere pocket change for a man who earns 1:06:45.480 --> 1:06:49.960 an estimated one thousand dollars a second. The self professed 1:06:50.040 --> 1:06:54.000 Musk fan Chap Ambrose, who he heard from earlier, said 1:06:54.040 --> 1:06:55.360 he's disappointed about all this. 1:06:55.920 --> 1:06:59.520 There's a culture of secrecy and it seems they're actively 1:06:59.560 --> 1:07:02.800 trying to obscure the truth, not just from neighbors, but 1:07:03.200 --> 1:07:06.600 also are county officials. If you're going to prototype the 1:07:06.680 --> 1:07:10.760 world's fastest tunneling machine in minderborhood. Then I expect the 1:07:10.800 --> 1:07:14.480 most innovative and transparent safety systems to go alongside it. 1:07:14.920 --> 1:07:17.760 Why do they refuse to give direct answers? And why 1:07:17.760 --> 1:07:20.520 won't they put their promises in writing? Why do they 1:07:20.520 --> 1:07:24.000 refuse to follow the very minimal restrictions we have in 1:07:24.040 --> 1:07:26.920 Texas for development? And why do I have to go 1:07:26.960 --> 1:07:29.640 to Commissioner Court so that they put in a legal 1:07:29.680 --> 1:07:32.880 septic system. It seems to me that they only follow 1:07:32.920 --> 1:07:35.280 the rules and behave when they're being watched. 1:07:35.960 --> 1:07:40.880 Transparency may have disappeared forever for residents. Amost other company town, 1:07:41.680 --> 1:07:46.200 one of most most lucrative companies, SpaceX, launches its rockets 1:07:46.200 --> 1:07:49.640 about twenty miles outside of Brownsville on the Texas Gulf 1:07:49.720 --> 1:07:53.320 Coast near the Mexican border. Most of the residents near 1:07:53.360 --> 1:07:56.640 the launch site, known as Boka Chica Village or Tehano's 1:07:57.360 --> 1:08:02.080 and many struggle economically. Lands and beaches are considered sacred 1:08:02.120 --> 1:08:06.200 by members of the Carazou called Mekrudo tribe of Texas. 1:08:06.800 --> 1:08:09.560 The area residents were clearly invisible to us during a 1:08:09.600 --> 1:08:12.760 twenty eighteen press conference when he spoke of how test 1:08:12.800 --> 1:08:15.560 flights such as those as he planned at the Book 1:08:15.600 --> 1:08:18.920 at Chica site, were a necessary first step for exploration 1:08:18.960 --> 1:08:22.719 in the Moon and Mars. The subsequent controversy was reported 1:08:22.720 --> 1:08:25.120 by a local TV station KRGV. 1:08:25.520 --> 1:08:27.600 When asked how soon flights would be going to the 1:08:27.640 --> 1:08:30.920 Moon or Mars, must talked about the necessary test flights 1:08:30.920 --> 1:08:32.679 that would need to take place first. 1:08:33.240 --> 1:08:36.240 Most likely it's going to cover having at a Brownsvie location, 1:08:37.320 --> 1:08:39.320 because we've got a lot of land with nobody around, 1:08:39.600 --> 1:08:40.599 and so if it was. 1:08:40.600 --> 1:08:41.200 Up, it's cool. 1:08:41.760 --> 1:08:44.360 The people at Brownsville didn't agree that if a rocket 1:08:44.360 --> 1:08:47.479 ship blew up in their neighborhood it would be quote cool. 1:08:48.000 --> 1:08:50.960 His comment is not sitting well with Gail McConaughey. 1:08:51.280 --> 1:08:53.639 He's been out here before. He damn sure. I ought 1:08:53.640 --> 1:08:56.519 to know that he's seen the village. You gotta know 1:08:56.600 --> 1:08:57.679 that it's not a ghost home. 1:08:58.120 --> 1:09:01.200 McConaughey and his wife have been living at Bukachka Village 1:09:01.240 --> 1:09:04.559 every winter for the past eleven years. He says he's 1:09:04.600 --> 1:09:08.280 offended that he and the other residents are considered nobody. 1:09:08.640 --> 1:09:11.360 It also raises questions, he adds, about how safe the 1:09:11.439 --> 1:09:13.040 launches will be in. 1:09:13.000 --> 1:09:16.000 A rocket that size or any size that would go up, 1:09:16.000 --> 1:09:18.599 and who knows what might happen. It might start tipping 1:09:18.600 --> 1:09:21.439 the wrong direction. Who knows if something happened to the 1:09:21.439 --> 1:09:25.360 engines and explodes, that's cool when you're talking about there's 1:09:25.400 --> 1:09:27.240 lives here, that's a mile and a half away. 1:09:27.840 --> 1:09:32.719 Kane's words were prophetic. In subsequent years, Musk's rockets did 1:09:32.840 --> 1:09:35.519 blow up, such as in April twenty twenty three, when 1:09:35.520 --> 1:09:39.240 a SpaceX special obliterated the concrete launch pad, leaving behind 1:09:39.240 --> 1:09:44.080 a massive crater. As Scientific American reported, quote, particular debris 1:09:44.160 --> 1:09:47.400 as well as concrete and steel shrapnel from the bosched 1:09:47.479 --> 1:09:51.919 launch scattered far and wide across the surrounding landscape, igniting 1:09:51.960 --> 1:09:56.479 fires and slamming into protected habitats and public beaches. Ash, 1:09:56.760 --> 1:09:59.760 dust and sand grains hurled aloft by this first star 1:09:59.800 --> 1:10:03.240 ship test rained down as far as Port Isabelle, about 1:10:03.240 --> 1:10:07.200 five miles from the launch site end quote. Another Musk 1:10:07.280 --> 1:10:10.960 rocket launch, this time from Bokachika, exploded again this past 1:10:11.000 --> 1:10:15.639 June nineteenth, as reported by WTCHR, whoa in. 1:10:15.600 --> 1:10:19.840 The skies over South Texas overnight, A massive fireball after 1:10:19.880 --> 1:10:23.679 a SpaceX rocket exploded during a static rocket test. 1:10:23.760 --> 1:10:26.320 A ground test for an upcoming launch, the. 1:10:26.360 --> 1:10:27.680 Ship thirty sixers blew up. 1:10:27.880 --> 1:10:29.240 Ship thirty six ers blue up. 1:10:29.479 --> 1:10:33.480 SpaceX, led by Elon Musk, said the Starship Rocket experienced 1:10:33.520 --> 1:10:36.880 a major anomaly while preparing for its tenth flight test, 1:10:37.280 --> 1:10:39.840 adding that all personnel are safe and there are no 1:10:39.960 --> 1:10:46.759 hazards to residents in surrounding communities. The explosion rattled nearby 1:10:46.880 --> 1:10:50.439 residents who posted videos on social media, one telling my 1:10:50.600 --> 1:10:53.920 San Antonio News quote, our whole neighborhood felt it. It 1:10:54.040 --> 1:10:55.400 shook all of our houses. 1:10:56.240 --> 1:10:59.679 In spite of this record at Mayhem. On Saturday, May third, 1:10:59.760 --> 1:11:03.320 the Chika Village held an election on whether to incorporate 1:11:03.320 --> 1:11:06.240 as a city of Starbase. The proposal to create the 1:11:06.280 --> 1:11:09.360 state's newest city carried by a vote of two hundred 1:11:09.360 --> 1:11:12.960 and twelve to six. Nearly two thirds of the electorate 1:11:13.040 --> 1:11:18.160 lived near SpaceX's launch site. Overwhelmingly the voters were Musk employees. 1:11:18.840 --> 1:11:23.040 All three candidates elected to Starbas's New City Commission ran unopposed, 1:11:23.520 --> 1:11:26.720 and one without putting up a single campaign sign or 1:11:26.760 --> 1:11:31.280 hosting a single candidate forum. All three were employees of 1:11:31.400 --> 1:11:32.760 Musk and SpaceX. 1:11:33.640 --> 1:11:36.799 As The Texas Tribune has reported, the new city government 1:11:36.880 --> 1:11:40.160 increased control over the nearby public beach, revered by local 1:11:40.160 --> 1:11:43.400 indigenous people. Some local residents feel the creation of the 1:11:43.400 --> 1:11:46.720 company town gives them even less power to protect what's 1:11:46.760 --> 1:11:47.960 seen as a local treasure. 1:11:48.400 --> 1:11:51.599 Starbase is only about one and a half square miles. It's, 1:11:51.640 --> 1:11:54.400 of course, the home of SpaceX, and the main goal 1:11:54.600 --> 1:11:58.600 is sending humans to Mars. According to the FAA, Starbas 1:11:58.600 --> 1:12:02.000 is aiming for twenty five rocket launches a year. But 1:12:02.080 --> 1:12:05.280 this is all coming with a bit of controversy, especially 1:12:05.360 --> 1:12:07.160 over access to the popular. 1:12:06.760 --> 1:12:07.880 Boca Chica Beach. 1:12:08.240 --> 1:12:12.280 Any SpaceX rocket launcher engine test requires closing a local 1:12:12.360 --> 1:12:15.519 highway to the beach, and some say Starbase is giving 1:12:15.600 --> 1:12:19.080 Musk too much control. People gathered at the beach Saturday 1:12:19.160 --> 1:12:20.480 night to protest. 1:12:20.640 --> 1:12:22.840 They're just tearing it up and doing whatever they want 1:12:23.040 --> 1:12:24.800 because they want to gentrify. They want to be a 1:12:24.880 --> 1:12:28.360 city by themselves. When you gentify the land, you're gentrifying 1:12:28.680 --> 1:12:29.719 the soul of the people. 1:12:30.520 --> 1:12:33.559 Juan Massias, the protester you just heard, is the chair 1:12:33.600 --> 1:12:37.600 of the Carazau called the Crudeo tribe of Texas. He 1:12:37.680 --> 1:12:41.320 told the Texas Tribune quote, these hills are sacred to us. 1:12:42.120 --> 1:12:44.240 They don't know the history of the land, and they're 1:12:44.280 --> 1:12:47.479 trying to erase that. Of course, Musk has a history 1:12:47.520 --> 1:12:51.559 as well, is one characterized by labor abuses. 1:12:51.800 --> 1:12:54.519 Like the Robert Barons who ruled as emperors over their 1:12:54.560 --> 1:12:58.799 Gilded Age company towns. Musk has been accused of firing 1:12:58.960 --> 1:13:03.479 union organizers at his Austin gigafactory. Workers claim Musk either 1:13:03.520 --> 1:13:07.040 didn't pay them for overtime or shortchange them. Those same 1:13:07.080 --> 1:13:10.719 workers charged that records were faked to document their safety training, 1:13:11.120 --> 1:13:14.479 and according to the Texas Observer of Publication I'm glad 1:13:14.560 --> 1:13:17.840 to contribute to, one worker said he was forced to 1:13:17.920 --> 1:13:20.760 work in a flooded part of the factory and had 1:13:20.800 --> 1:13:23.599 to work on a metal roof at night without lights. 1:13:24.040 --> 1:13:26.280 These are clear POSHA violations. 1:13:26.840 --> 1:13:29.880 Is highly unlikely that the state of Texas will require Musk 1:13:29.960 --> 1:13:34.679 to provide any transparency about his business practices. Governor Abbott 1:13:34.680 --> 1:13:38.320 recently refused the request of a media outlet, the Texas Newsroom, 1:13:38.720 --> 1:13:42.200 to release emails between him and Musk, claiming the extensive 1:13:42.240 --> 1:13:46.280 communication between the pair was quote intimate and potentially quote 1:13:46.320 --> 1:13:50.720 embarrassing and therefore not a public interest. With so much 1:13:50.720 --> 1:13:53.759 a Musk enterprise in the state, operating in company towns 1:13:53.760 --> 1:13:58.599 he politically controls on county land with little oversight. Musk 1:13:58.680 --> 1:14:01.719 has become the lone star state. It's modern, unchecked robber 1:14:01.800 --> 1:14:05.160 baron extraordinaire, and with the aid of his on again 1:14:05.360 --> 1:14:08.639 off again allied Donald Trump, he has blazed a trail 1:14:08.720 --> 1:14:12.760 for other tech billionaires. When Trump ran for president last year, 1:14:12.800 --> 1:14:15.639 he floated a proposal to build what he called quote 1:14:15.680 --> 1:14:20.160 freedom cities across the country, pushed by oligarchs like Peter Thiel, 1:14:20.600 --> 1:14:24.720 Mark Andresen and Sam Altman, who ironically now has a 1:14:24.720 --> 1:14:27.599 bit of a fit and a fight with Elon Musk. 1:14:27.600 --> 1:14:30.679 They hate each other and it's really funny. These proposed 1:14:30.680 --> 1:14:35.240 fiefdoms would function as libertarian oasis. Coal miners were once 1:14:35.360 --> 1:14:39.120 paid in scrip, and the federal government banned script in 1:14:39.240 --> 1:14:42.960 nineteen thirty eight. But nevertheless, Jeff Bezos already uses something 1:14:43.040 --> 1:14:46.559 he calls quote swag bucks that are redeemable at Amazon 1:14:46.600 --> 1:14:49.400 to reward those in the company he deems his most 1:14:49.439 --> 1:14:53.639 productive workers. Workers in the freedom cities under discussion would 1:14:53.720 --> 1:14:58.160 not earn us legal tender, but would get cryptocurrency instead, 1:14:58.280 --> 1:15:02.599 the historically stay store of value that has never ripped 1:15:02.600 --> 1:15:06.519 off thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of 1:15:06.560 --> 1:15:10.920 people in the municipal monstrosities imagined in the scheme. Workers 1:15:10.920 --> 1:15:13.600 would be paid not in US currency, but, as I 1:15:13.720 --> 1:15:18.080 just said, this insane highly volatile cryptocurrency. These corporate havens 1:15:18.120 --> 1:15:22.520 would operate with the barest nods to workplace safety, environmental protections, 1:15:22.560 --> 1:15:26.760 and job security, and god forbid, might even scam their 1:15:26.800 --> 1:15:31.680 workers by trading in that same highly volatile cryptocurrency that 1:15:31.720 --> 1:15:35.000 they're paying them in back in bash Stop. Chap Ambrose 1:15:35.160 --> 1:15:38.760 thinks we can still embrace the future with that surrendering 1:15:38.800 --> 1:15:43.040 a more old fashioned concept of community. He helps them 1:15:43.120 --> 1:15:44.679 must one day sees the light. 1:15:47.080 --> 1:15:49.960 I truly hope the borrowing company succeeds in its efforts. 1:15:50.360 --> 1:15:53.120 I think tunneling makes sense, and if they can improve 1:15:53.240 --> 1:15:56.559 traffic into Austin and around it, that'd be great. But 1:15:56.920 --> 1:16:00.040 you have to be better neighbors. Texas has strongly and 1:16:00.120 --> 1:16:03.720 owner rights and you can do pretty much what you 1:16:03.760 --> 1:16:06.800 want on your land. However, Texas law also says that 1:16:06.840 --> 1:16:09.760 we share the air and you share the groundwater with 1:16:09.840 --> 1:16:12.040 me and my one year old son. So if you're 1:16:12.040 --> 1:16:15.040 going to come to my neighborhood and build the fastest 1:16:15.080 --> 1:16:19.360 and most efficient tunneling operation, then I expect the most 1:16:19.400 --> 1:16:23.320 innovative and transparent safety systems to go alongside it. 1:16:24.400 --> 1:16:27.439 The struggle against the absolute power wielded by the rulers 1:16:27.479 --> 1:16:31.320 of the Gilded Age's company towns led to actual battles 1:16:31.680 --> 1:16:36.200 with literal casualties on American soil. Doctor Pearson reminded us 1:16:36.479 --> 1:16:39.240 that the hard life and the Gilded Era, the era 1:16:39.360 --> 1:16:43.919 of company towns, represented an American norm rather than an exception, 1:16:44.920 --> 1:16:48.240 and because of Musk Teal and other modern robber barons, 1:16:48.560 --> 1:16:52.479 the battles fought in Pullman, Illinois and Ludlow, Colorado might 1:16:52.560 --> 1:16:53.960 have to be fought once again. 1:16:54.439 --> 1:16:57.040 Some of you folks may be aware of Jefferson Cowie 1:16:57.040 --> 1:16:59.879 and Nick Salvatory's book, which he calls The Great Exception, 1:17:00.439 --> 1:17:03.439 and they argue that, you know, most of American history 1:17:03.479 --> 1:17:05.360 is like the guilded. Yeah, we had a forty to 1:17:05.360 --> 1:17:07.920 fifty year period from I don't know, the thirties the 1:17:08.000 --> 1:17:11.080 seventies when things were kind of better, right, you know 1:17:11.280 --> 1:17:13.959 what Blue Magas and Red magas alike like to celebrate, 1:17:14.320 --> 1:17:16.479 But the fact is, you know, there's things were pretty 1:17:16.479 --> 1:17:19.639 exploitative then as well. And so what kind of lessons 1:17:19.680 --> 1:17:23.880 can we learn from resistance to capitalism in its various forms? 1:17:23.880 --> 1:17:26.360 And I think the key one is to trust one another. 1:17:26.720 --> 1:17:30.400 There's no substitute for working class solidarity. Stop having illusions 1:17:30.400 --> 1:17:32.120 in the Democratic Party. They're not going to save you. 1:17:32.520 --> 1:17:36.280 And so to see, you know, where where there are 1:17:36.840 --> 1:17:40.599 victories when when workers are are united, and we see 1:17:40.640 --> 1:17:43.000 a little bit of that, you know, kicking ice agents 1:17:43.000 --> 1:17:46.120 out of towns, right, I mean, that's politicians aren't helping 1:17:46.200 --> 1:17:49.280 us there, that's you know, collective action of working class people. 1:17:49.280 --> 1:17:51.840 It's not formal unions, but it's something, you know, I 1:17:51.880 --> 1:17:55.120 see hope. I see hope in the mass mobilization of 1:17:55.479 --> 1:17:59.080 working class people irrespective of race, gender, class, and any 1:17:59.120 --> 1:18:00.320 other identity. 1:18:00.680 --> 1:18:03.120 I'm Michael Phillips, So you can find me on substack 1:18:03.200 --> 1:18:06.960 at doctor m Phillips two thousand and one, on Blue 1:18:07.000 --> 1:18:12.120 Sky and Facebook. Google my name and quote White Metropolis. 1:18:11.760 --> 1:18:13.680 And I'm Stephen Wana Charlie. You can find me on 1:18:13.720 --> 1:18:16.439 Blue Sky, and I've got a Patreon and all those 1:18:16.479 --> 1:18:19.479 other things. Thank you for listening, and we hope that 1:18:19.560 --> 1:18:24.680 you found this delightful topic about Elon Musk's desire to 1:18:24.680 --> 1:18:28.160 bring back company towns informative. Thanks for listening. 1:18:44.640 --> 1:18:47.720 Hello, hell helloo, and welcome to get up and here. 1:18:48.400 --> 1:18:52.360 I'm Andrew Siege otherwise doing this andresm on YouTube and 1:18:52.560 --> 1:18:53.240 I'm here. 1:18:53.040 --> 1:18:56.839 With James, just James, and have a YouTube. 1:18:57.439 --> 1:18:59.960 Well than just James, I mean, I love talking to you, 1:19:00.240 --> 1:19:01.840 so in more than just James to me. 1:19:02.320 --> 1:19:05.000 Oh, thank you, Andrew. It's very sweet. I enjoyed these two. 1:19:05.120 --> 1:19:05.920 It's the phone for me. 1:19:06.520 --> 1:19:08.479 Yeah, So I really I'd like to get into one 1:19:08.520 --> 1:19:11.679 of the hotter topics as of late. Not the heat, 1:19:12.040 --> 1:19:18.120 so that is a hot topic. But yeah, YEAHI Artificial intelligence. 1:19:18.120 --> 1:19:19.960 Oh good, Yeah, my favorite thing. 1:19:20.520 --> 1:19:23.800 Yeah, and more specifically the ways in which AI has 1:19:23.880 --> 1:19:28.040 contributed to and accentuated alienation and the capitalism and the 1:19:28.080 --> 1:19:31.240 state in the twenty first century. So that's a mouthful, 1:19:31.280 --> 1:19:32.960 but it's obviously very important. 1:19:33.200 --> 1:19:34.479 Okay, Yeah, I like you so lot. 1:19:34.920 --> 1:19:38.599 In my opinion, alienation with all its meaning is really 1:19:39.280 --> 1:19:41.000 is one of those words that you could really use 1:19:41.040 --> 1:19:45.960 to describe the current side guys, the experience of separation 1:19:46.240 --> 1:19:49.519 from yourself, from your work, from the products of your work, 1:19:49.640 --> 1:19:54.160 from your community, all these things both philosophical and material 1:19:54.280 --> 1:19:58.080 get wrapped up into this concept of alienation because it's 1:19:58.080 --> 1:20:01.960 both an experience, it's something that people feel internally, it 1:20:02.000 --> 1:20:04.639 describes the way that they see their lives, and it's 1:20:04.640 --> 1:20:09.880 also just a fact of how people work into society. 1:20:10.280 --> 1:20:13.800 You're dispossessed of the products of a labor and you're 1:20:13.840 --> 1:20:16.960 disconnected from the process of aliable and the outcomes of ilabor. 1:20:18.040 --> 1:20:20.599 And this is of course all thanks to development of 1:20:20.640 --> 1:20:26.600 capitalism and industrialization and this development of a mass society 1:20:26.760 --> 1:20:31.160 quote unquote with all the apathy and loss of agency 1:20:31.240 --> 1:20:34.600 and weaken social fabric that generates. 1:20:35.200 --> 1:20:37.960 Yeah, it's I think alienation is like something we don't 1:20:37.960 --> 1:20:41.559 talk about enough. It's like the thing that ties together 1:20:42.120 --> 1:20:46.800 that despare the loneliness. The loneliness is is maybe like 1:20:48.479 --> 1:20:51.719 it's a way that capitalism has come to talk about 1:20:51.760 --> 1:20:55.960 alienation without acknowledging the capitalism is creating alienation. Every sort 1:20:55.960 --> 1:21:00.360 of developed state in the colonial core have a knowledge 1:21:00.479 --> 1:21:02.920 loneliness is a problem. Right, I saw Gavin Newsome was 1:21:03.000 --> 1:21:08.200 with launching a loneliness campaign. But like the system is 1:21:08.200 --> 1:21:11.600 a problem. The alienation is created by the way that 1:21:11.960 --> 1:21:14.960 things are and like we can't fixate without changing the 1:21:14.960 --> 1:21:15.839 way those things. 1:21:15.640 --> 1:21:20.160 Are exactly exactly. It comes down to conditions. I mean, 1:21:20.240 --> 1:21:24.280 in particular, I think we see alienation manifest in most 1:21:24.520 --> 1:21:28.240 in our relationships, of course, and in our works. And 1:21:28.280 --> 1:21:31.960 it's been an issue for some decades now. And what 1:21:32.080 --> 1:21:36.320 I'm really intrigued by is, you know, this has been 1:21:36.360 --> 1:21:40.200 an issue for a while, but how is AI interacting 1:21:40.560 --> 1:21:43.920 with these issues? How is EI impacting the alienation that 1:21:43.960 --> 1:21:47.120 we already experience under the system. 1:21:47.560 --> 1:21:52.680 Yeah, that's fascinating. I'm currently teaching a class at the 1:21:52.840 --> 1:21:57.720 community college to class about pre sixteen hundred history, and like, 1:21:58.479 --> 1:22:00.320 I teach a little bit every year, right, and every 1:22:00.400 --> 1:22:04.240 year I've seen what AI use. But this year this 1:22:04.560 --> 1:22:08.800 is fully blackpilled me, Like, I don't quite know how 1:22:08.840 --> 1:22:13.880 to describe the feelings I'm experiencing, I guess, but it's 1:22:13.920 --> 1:22:17.160 class I assigned like David Graeber, I assigned Jim Scott. 1:22:17.400 --> 1:22:20.120 I assigned Charles Tilly on state making and war making, right, 1:22:20.200 --> 1:22:25.120 like very basic left libertarian kind of text, right, which 1:22:25.400 --> 1:22:28.280 for many people will be the first time they encounter 1:22:28.360 --> 1:22:31.360 the concept of like what if no state? What if 1:22:31.400 --> 1:22:34.960 state bad? And I think they're all writing in a 1:22:34.960 --> 1:22:37.479 way that's very approachable to people who don't, you know, 1:22:37.520 --> 1:22:41.479 like dense academic writing is annoying and pretentious and I 1:22:41.479 --> 1:22:44.160 don't like it. Every time I do this, Couse, it 1:22:44.280 --> 1:22:45.760 used to be the case of like thirty to forty ten, 1:22:45.800 --> 1:22:48.640 the students would be like, holy fuck. Whether they like 1:22:48.680 --> 1:22:51.559 it or not, it's a new concept and it's cool, 1:22:51.640 --> 1:22:54.880 and they engage with it in like a passionate way, 1:22:54.960 --> 1:22:59.439 a human way. Every year it's got worse, and now, 1:22:59.479 --> 1:23:02.000 like I can think of two students out of one 1:23:02.040 --> 1:23:05.719 hundred who are like engaging with it in any human way, 1:23:06.000 --> 1:23:08.400 and I'm sure most of them, I would imagine they 1:23:08.479 --> 1:23:10.920 buy the AI, summarized the text, or in many cases 1:23:10.920 --> 1:23:14.760 they certainly have used AI to just respond. I let 1:23:14.800 --> 1:23:17.439 my students respond in ways that they feel appropriate, right, 1:23:17.520 --> 1:23:21.040 so that they could do videos or different things if 1:23:21.080 --> 1:23:23.200 they wanted to do like a they wanted to make 1:23:23.200 --> 1:23:24.960 a video about instead of doing an essay, That's fine 1:23:24.960 --> 1:23:26.240 with me. I don't care. I just want them to 1:23:26.240 --> 1:23:29.719 read the shit and think about it. But like, there's 1:23:29.840 --> 1:23:32.479 been no human reaction, and that's so sad to me. 1:23:32.600 --> 1:23:35.120 Like the reason they teach is to get young people 1:23:35.479 --> 1:23:37.840 to see the world differently. It certainly isn't for the 1:23:37.840 --> 1:23:42.200 fucking money, And that's just i'man capable of doing that now, 1:23:42.439 --> 1:23:45.639 or like I can't get through that alienation that like 1:23:46.439 --> 1:23:51.719 I can't get people to engage, and like, think about it. Obviously, 1:23:51.760 --> 1:23:53.280 I got to work that shit out, right, Like this 1:23:53.479 --> 1:23:56.519 generation of people who went through high school when AI 1:23:56.640 --> 1:24:00.000 with a thing and detecting AI, use in long form 1:24:00.120 --> 1:24:02.280 writing was not very well developed, so they were able 1:24:02.280 --> 1:24:04.000 to use it instead of doing long form writing and 1:24:04.840 --> 1:24:08.600 maybe even reading long form, And like, I have to 1:24:08.640 --> 1:24:11.479 work out how to get those people to engage, not 1:24:11.880 --> 1:24:15.519 to be so sort of alienated from the concept of 1:24:15.880 --> 1:24:19.160 reading and absorbing big ideas. But I haven't fuckly worked 1:24:19.200 --> 1:24:19.759 it out yet. 1:24:20.360 --> 1:24:23.120 Yeah, it's a it's a really big issue, and it's 1:24:23.280 --> 1:24:27.280 only cruent, you know, as EI expands, I mean, it's 1:24:27.320 --> 1:24:30.160 not so much the focus of this episode, but it 1:24:30.240 --> 1:24:32.439 is something that I wanted to touch on. You know, 1:24:32.520 --> 1:24:34.800 people used to be doing fine without it, used to 1:24:34.840 --> 1:24:38.120 be able to function without it three years ago, and 1:24:38.160 --> 1:24:40.680 now you talk to them and they can't live without it. 1:24:40.680 --> 1:24:44.080 They have to run everything through AI. You know, people 1:24:44.120 --> 1:24:50.000 have offloaded most of their cognitive processes the yeah, yeah, yeah, 1:24:50.040 --> 1:24:52.320 you know, and yeah, you know, we talk about the 1:24:52.400 --> 1:24:55.760 environmental impact of that, the way the data centers are 1:24:55.840 --> 1:24:59.360 damage in the environment, taking fresh water and taking vast 1:24:59.400 --> 1:25:02.200 amounts of any from the system. So we all rely 1:25:02.320 --> 1:25:05.000 upon to live and you know, we could, as we 1:25:05.080 --> 1:25:09.200 touched on, talk about called schools and the education systems 1:25:09.200 --> 1:25:12.880 pretty much falling apart. Yeah, I mean, I know you're 1:25:12.880 --> 1:25:18.880 one of those, you know, genuinely passionate professors. But I've 1:25:19.000 --> 1:25:23.240 noticed is this this whole fast now in many sections 1:25:23.240 --> 1:25:27.559 of the education system where you have students he I 1:25:27.640 --> 1:25:32.479 summarize in material if even doing that, you know, submit 1:25:32.560 --> 1:25:36.240 an EI generated essays or AI generated material, and the 1:25:36.280 --> 1:25:38.120 professors just heah, I created. 1:25:38.560 --> 1:25:40.360 Yeah, I've heard of this. 1:25:40.800 --> 1:25:43.800 So it's just one one big puppet schew, you know, 1:25:43.960 --> 1:25:46.160 one one big fast god. 1:25:47.560 --> 1:25:51.200 Yeah, yeah, exactly, one big charade, which you know, to 1:25:51.240 --> 1:25:53.400 an extent, education has always just been that, right, one 1:25:53.400 --> 1:25:56.920 big fast. But there are things that are redeemable about it. 1:25:57.120 --> 1:25:59.519 And I'm just talking about teaching now, and I'll stop 1:25:59.560 --> 1:26:01.840 in a minute. There's very little demand for in person 1:26:01.880 --> 1:26:06.240 classes compared to online classes anymore, so like that makes 1:26:06.280 --> 1:26:10.000 it harder for us to break through that alienation, right, 1:26:10.080 --> 1:26:14.559 Like there's something special about sitting in a room and 1:26:15.040 --> 1:26:17.240 talking just just find it's just like being like we're 1:26:17.280 --> 1:26:20.440 going to be here for ninety minutes, none of us. 1:26:20.479 --> 1:26:21.919 That's a dynamic, yeah. 1:26:21.920 --> 1:26:23.920 And it's an important dynamic. Like the function of the 1:26:24.000 --> 1:26:27.120 university is to fucking turn out people with stem degrees 1:26:27.160 --> 1:26:29.360 who can go on and make shitty apps we don't need. 1:26:30.160 --> 1:26:33.639 It's to prepare us to be citizens in the community, exactly, 1:26:33.960 --> 1:26:37.599 and we are failing at that. And yes, intead, I'm 1:26:37.640 --> 1:26:39.400 just great and chet GPT all day know. 1:26:40.200 --> 1:26:42.280 Yeah, And that's that's a big piece of the puzzle 1:26:42.280 --> 1:26:46.439 that we end up missing. Because the way in which 1:26:47.240 --> 1:26:49.559 the sort of dynamics and the connections that you would 1:26:49.560 --> 1:26:53.000 get from the university class or I'm beyond just sort 1:26:53.040 --> 1:26:55.519 of connections in general is lacking in an alienated rule 1:26:55.600 --> 1:26:59.599 and it's worsened by you know, the instruction of the eye. 1:27:00.600 --> 1:27:04.760 I managed to complete most of my education, most of 1:27:04.800 --> 1:27:09.880 my bachelor's degree, that is, prior to the pandemic. Right, 1:27:09.960 --> 1:27:14.080 I was nearing the end of my third year when lockdown, 1:27:14.360 --> 1:27:15.840 you know, came into fourth and then it just I 1:27:15.880 --> 1:27:18.720 did my entire fourth year online And honestly, I'm so 1:27:18.880 --> 1:27:22.479 glad that I was able to do my classes in person, 1:27:23.040 --> 1:27:26.799 you know, And I'm so glad that I did my classes, 1:27:27.600 --> 1:27:29.599 you know, entirely on my own in a time where 1:27:30.320 --> 1:27:33.360 you know, yeah, I was not a thing. You know, 1:27:33.439 --> 1:27:35.479 there were times where you know, it probably feels like, 1:27:35.520 --> 1:27:37.960 oh my god, it's so stressful, like, but he just 1:27:38.000 --> 1:27:40.680 had a buckle alone. You had to buckle down and 1:27:40.920 --> 1:27:44.080 figure out a way to get it done. And because 1:27:44.080 --> 1:27:47.360 we could talk about the perverse incentives of breeding systems 1:27:47.479 --> 1:27:50.839 and schools and how that sort of pushes some students 1:27:50.880 --> 1:27:54.639 who you know, may have learning difficulties or time matgement 1:27:54.680 --> 1:27:56.840 difficulties or whatever to actually do their stuff, they end 1:27:56.920 --> 1:28:00.240 up going down the air route. But yeah, I mean, 1:28:00.360 --> 1:28:03.840 even just looking back at my experience, because lockdown hits 1:28:04.120 --> 1:28:07.320 during the semester, I had a writing class that I 1:28:07.439 --> 1:28:09.760 was a part of, and every time we went into class, 1:28:09.800 --> 1:28:13.240 it was so dynamic, was so lively, it was so engaging. 1:28:13.479 --> 1:28:15.479 All the ideas were just bouncing off for each other. 1:28:16.560 --> 1:28:20.599 After the lockdown, that class completely feels a lout. Everything 1:28:20.640 --> 1:28:23.080 that we were getting from it was just absent because 1:28:23.120 --> 1:28:28.000 we were entirely online and yeah, it's really a struggle. 1:28:28.080 --> 1:28:31.000 And I think social life, not just coming out of 1:28:31.080 --> 1:28:35.760 the education conversation, social life, community and connection all ends 1:28:35.880 --> 1:28:39.679 up lacking because of the aliineas and nature of the system, 1:28:39.800 --> 1:28:41.759 the way that things have been set up. But also 1:28:42.320 --> 1:28:45.160 AI is playing a major role too. AI in a 1:28:45.280 --> 1:28:48.400 sense as a category is you know, you can have 1:28:48.439 --> 1:28:52.040 a whole discussion about that quibbolo for definitions. But in 1:28:52.160 --> 1:28:54.080 a sense AI has already been playing a major role 1:28:54.120 --> 1:28:57.439 into how people socialize even before these large language models 1:28:57.520 --> 1:28:59.760 came to be in because you have a sort of 1:29:00.040 --> 1:29:04.360 official intelligence in the algorithms that people interact with on 1:29:04.479 --> 1:29:08.400 social media. You know, people have the content they consume 1:29:08.640 --> 1:29:14.439 being curated by algorithms. They end up in these sort 1:29:14.479 --> 1:29:19.160 of echo chambers, these reinforcement loops and outrage bait and 1:29:19.240 --> 1:29:24.040 then dopamine loops, and all those things have lended to 1:29:24.400 --> 1:29:28.400 people spending more and more time online because you know, 1:29:28.680 --> 1:29:32.680 it's hitting that part of the brain, and everybody is 1:29:32.720 --> 1:29:35.240 hyper connected and always online, and more and more of 1:29:35.360 --> 1:29:38.160 life takes place on the Internet, and that has left 1:29:38.200 --> 1:29:45.120 people feeling isolated. I think loneliness is obviously not entirely 1:29:45.280 --> 1:29:51.040 the result of social media and now AI. But the 1:29:51.160 --> 1:29:54.599 sort of irony is that loneliness has been a side 1:29:54.600 --> 1:29:59.400 effect of this digital hyper connection. They may look at 1:29:59.439 --> 1:30:02.479 some of the fact that are contributing to this, this 1:30:02.800 --> 1:30:05.760 already isolated nature of our world. Right, you know, people 1:30:05.800 --> 1:30:08.160 won't have as much free time. You know, there's in 1:30:08.200 --> 1:30:10.760 as much public space as there used to be. Some 1:30:10.880 --> 1:30:14.280 people have no public space available to them. Public spaces 1:30:14.320 --> 1:30:17.080 that do exist are not open in the times when 1:30:17.200 --> 1:30:20.000 people are available to go to them. Libraries are a 1:30:20.000 --> 1:30:22.160 famous example. A lot of them are you know, not 1:30:22.439 --> 1:30:26.360 open for working people pretty much. And then people who 1:30:26.400 --> 1:30:28.320 do want to go out and socialize and stuff. You know, 1:30:28.360 --> 1:30:30.439 you're dealing with the higher cost of living, so there's 1:30:30.520 --> 1:30:33.160 little resources that you can use to you know, go 1:30:33.280 --> 1:30:34.960 and put yourself out there because you have to spend 1:30:34.960 --> 1:30:38.240 money to go to places. And then it also just 1:30:38.320 --> 1:30:42.080 burnt out energy wise because of you know, the long 1:30:42.160 --> 1:30:44.320 work week, long work hours, just trying to make against 1:30:44.360 --> 1:30:49.479 meet psychological to all of that. Yeah, and so part 1:30:49.560 --> 1:30:52.000 of what AI has been doing is pushing these AI 1:30:52.120 --> 1:30:55.200 companions on people. And you know, I don't mean to 1:30:55.320 --> 1:30:57.320 fare Mongo anything because I know there are a lot 1:30:57.360 --> 1:30:59.920 of people who reject AI and who stand against AI. 1:31:00.160 --> 1:31:02.560 And of course that could just be the bubble that 1:31:02.640 --> 1:31:07.479 I'm in, but yeah, I also know somebody in person, 1:31:08.200 --> 1:31:11.519 or rather I knew somebody in person who spoke to 1:31:12.240 --> 1:31:19.240 chachipt like their partner and therapists. Yeah, they listen like, yeah, 1:31:19.320 --> 1:31:24.720 that's it's I mean, it's sad. Yeah, it's as you said, 1:31:24.760 --> 1:31:29.240 almost kind of black pillin you know, because these chat 1:31:29.320 --> 1:31:36.240 bots they listen in a simulated sense, they respond in 1:31:36.320 --> 1:31:40.400 a simulated sense, and they affume what the person is 1:31:40.520 --> 1:31:44.160 dealing with, is going through, is venting about. They're almost 1:31:44.240 --> 1:31:47.000 like a hug box because you don't really see chat 1:31:47.080 --> 1:31:51.680 bots disagree and with the people they're speaking to. Chat 1:31:51.760 --> 1:31:55.360 Bots are very much like you know, faming, you know, 1:31:55.439 --> 1:31:59.040 they try their best to affume everything that a person 1:31:59.160 --> 1:32:01.320 is telling them. So you have this kind of cuddle 1:32:01.360 --> 1:32:04.599 box for people's egos, which in two makes it even 1:32:04.640 --> 1:32:07.000 more difficult for them to connect to real people because 1:32:07.040 --> 1:32:08.679 you know, real people are going to call you out, 1:32:09.560 --> 1:32:11.240 you know they're going to disagree with you, You're going 1:32:11.320 --> 1:32:14.960 to have friction and conflict, but there's also a lot 1:32:15.000 --> 1:32:17.360 of joy that comes from interact with real people and 1:32:18.360 --> 1:32:20.439 Unfortunately a lot of people because they're not getting that, 1:32:20.640 --> 1:32:26.200 they're turned into this on demand affection, this on demand flirtation, 1:32:26.920 --> 1:32:31.759 this pseudo therapy, and it's it's brutal, you know, Lonliness 1:32:31.840 --> 1:32:35.200 is a brutal experience. Relationships are very hard and therapy 1:32:35.360 --> 1:32:38.880 is extremely expensive for a lot of people. So I 1:32:39.040 --> 1:32:51.439 understand that, you know, you can only put so much 1:32:51.439 --> 1:32:53.760 blame on individuals because the will is not really set 1:32:53.880 --> 1:32:57.479 up to support those kind of lasting connections. People live 1:32:58.080 --> 1:33:02.040 very spread out, They have few and fewer opportunities to 1:33:02.120 --> 1:33:03.920 interact with each other. In fact, a lot of times 1:33:04.760 --> 1:33:08.599 the last time a policon had extended exposure with other 1:33:08.680 --> 1:33:12.160 people was in school or in college. And outside of 1:33:12.240 --> 1:33:16.439 that you're just kind of on your own. Yeah, and 1:33:16.680 --> 1:33:20.960 places are increasingly not walkable, the more coccentric, the sourt 1:33:20.960 --> 1:33:26.720 of spontaneity and friction and interaction that would have made 1:33:26.840 --> 1:33:31.840 relationships blossom naturally and my religious possible, as messy and 1:33:31.880 --> 1:33:35.040 inconvenience as they can be, sometimes those things are lacking 1:33:35.160 --> 1:33:38.439 now and unfortunately some for action of people, And I 1:33:38.479 --> 1:33:40.840 don't know what the actual number will be because I 1:33:40.880 --> 1:33:44.000 could imagine a lot of people will not admit that 1:33:44.320 --> 1:33:48.000 they turned to a chat pot for companionship. But it 1:33:48.160 --> 1:33:53.160 is a frightening oman of what direction we're going in. 1:33:54.040 --> 1:33:58.280 And I also worry about the potential outcomes of you know, 1:33:58.760 --> 1:34:04.360 egoic behavior that my results from that sort of continue 1:34:04.439 --> 1:34:07.840 us interaction with something that is affirming in every belief 1:34:08.000 --> 1:34:11.479 and thought and conclusion. What kind of google are we 1:34:11.560 --> 1:34:12.120 going to be there for? 1:34:12.439 --> 1:34:12.600 You know? 1:34:13.439 --> 1:34:17.640 Yeah, it's the world that super rich people already live in. 1:34:18.120 --> 1:34:21.679 One of the reasons that the gulf between the rest 1:34:21.720 --> 1:34:24.640 of us and the super rich, like the really you know, 1:34:25.360 --> 1:34:27.559 incredibly wealthy people. Part of that is that no one 1:34:27.640 --> 1:34:30.160 says no to a lot of those people, and that's 1:34:30.240 --> 1:34:33.920 why they exclusively end up socializing with each other. Right, 1:34:34.080 --> 1:34:38.720 Like they're they're they're surrounded by nothing but affirmation. 1:34:39.200 --> 1:34:39.360 Right. 1:34:39.840 --> 1:34:41.439 One of the things we see was Trump, right, is 1:34:41.640 --> 1:34:43.519 that like, if there is a reality that he doesn't like, 1:34:43.600 --> 1:34:47.519 he manifests his own reality. He just speaks things and 1:34:47.960 --> 1:34:49.759 expects them to be accepted as truths. 1:34:49.960 --> 1:34:50.080 Right. 1:34:51.320 --> 1:34:54.000 Growing up, my dad worked for a lot of extremely 1:34:54.120 --> 1:34:57.439 wealthy people, and so I've interacted with them, and like, 1:34:57.880 --> 1:35:00.479 there's a lot of people who just aren't used to hearing, know, 1:35:01.080 --> 1:35:03.000 or why, but not a lot that there is a 1:35:03.400 --> 1:35:05.559 number of them, And like I think when you see 1:35:05.640 --> 1:35:08.439 I was just thinking about it. The behavior that you 1:35:08.479 --> 1:35:10.760 know Trump now asserting with the Epstein thing is like 1:35:10.840 --> 1:35:13.160 it is made up, right, and it's a hoax, and 1:35:13.280 --> 1:35:15.320 it just when we were talking about AI. It sort 1:35:15.360 --> 1:35:18.400 of reminds me of that, right that like constant affirmation, 1:35:18.400 --> 1:35:19.760 because what a I want you to do is to 1:35:19.840 --> 1:35:22.360 please you so that you spend more time on it, 1:35:22.400 --> 1:35:24.680 I assume, And it's some way that it attempts to 1:35:24.720 --> 1:35:26.600 monetize that, I'm sure, and it just wants you to 1:35:26.680 --> 1:35:28.559 keep interacting with it so it can get more information 1:35:28.680 --> 1:35:29.960 to take into its model. I guess. 1:35:30.120 --> 1:35:30.320 Yeah. 1:35:30.360 --> 1:35:33.840 The dates are called rush yeah, right, And people are 1:35:33.840 --> 1:35:35.760 doing the same with with wealthy people, right, They just 1:35:35.840 --> 1:35:37.840 want to interact with them so so they can siphon 1:35:37.880 --> 1:35:40.280 off some of the resources that those people have accumulated. 1:35:40.960 --> 1:35:43.040 Like it's not maybe it's not the same. I think 1:35:43.160 --> 1:35:46.320 that still humans interacting with wealthy people is distinct from 1:35:46.360 --> 1:35:50.080 an AI interacting with humans, but it sort of gives 1:35:50.160 --> 1:35:53.040 us a window into what the impact of that being 1:35:53.160 --> 1:35:55.200 most of your human interaction over time. 1:35:55.720 --> 1:35:55.800 And. 1:35:57.760 --> 1:35:59.960 As we speak of wealthy people. I suppose we should 1:36:00.080 --> 1:36:03.720 look at the other way in which AI is intersecting 1:36:03.760 --> 1:36:08.639 with alienation, right, because you know, for the current narrative 1:36:08.760 --> 1:36:11.280 has been about you know, AI is taking jobs, and 1:36:11.760 --> 1:36:15.640 before then it's about automation was taking jobs. AI is 1:36:15.920 --> 1:36:19.519 you know, a form of automation, and before that it 1:36:19.720 --> 1:36:24.240 was just innovations in general, just steps in some technological 1:36:24.280 --> 1:36:28.400 direction would be eliminating jobs. But always marvel at stepping 1:36:28.439 --> 1:36:31.559 back and looking at the whole conversation about this has 1:36:31.600 --> 1:36:34.160 taken jobs, that has taken jobs is at the root 1:36:34.200 --> 1:36:39.080 of it is this dependence on employment, on jobs for 1:36:39.160 --> 1:36:42.160 people to have, you know, life, to be able to live, 1:36:42.400 --> 1:36:45.439 to have a quality of life. We have gotten more 1:36:45.479 --> 1:36:48.880 and more productive, and I mean that productivity has helped 1:36:48.920 --> 1:36:51.280 people in some ways, and it's harmed to the environment 1:36:51.360 --> 1:36:55.360 in a lot of ways. But we have a certain 1:36:55.479 --> 1:36:58.920 level of productivity now and we've produced so much now 1:36:59.120 --> 1:37:01.760 that in some sectors we have more of the enough 1:37:01.840 --> 1:37:04.760 for several decades to come. I think fashion is one 1:37:04.800 --> 1:37:08.360 of them where we have like quite the excess of 1:37:08.479 --> 1:37:11.680 clothing everybody. And of course you could talk about how 1:37:11.720 --> 1:37:14.960 that level of productivity is done damage to our creativity 1:37:15.280 --> 1:37:18.280 or craftsmanship. But it's all the worse when you think 1:37:18.280 --> 1:37:21.680 about how even with all our productivity, the work has 1:37:21.800 --> 1:37:25.479 hardly benefited. You know, more productivity doesn't necessarily mean more pay. 1:37:26.000 --> 1:37:28.080 And so even before AI came around, we were having 1:37:28.160 --> 1:37:32.000 issues with labor and alienation, right, people disconnected from their 1:37:32.040 --> 1:37:34.479 work from whether it be a service job, a factory job, 1:37:34.560 --> 1:37:38.800 or delivery job, whatever, any of these jobs that you 1:37:38.920 --> 1:37:41.120 look at, it's structured at the end of the day, 1:37:41.200 --> 1:37:45.080 not around providing a product or providing a service, but 1:37:45.200 --> 1:37:50.680 around profit, around the power dynamic between the owner, the 1:37:50.800 --> 1:37:54.840 capitalist and the worker. The worker who is not in 1:37:55.040 --> 1:37:57.799 control is alienated from their labor and from the products 1:37:57.800 --> 1:38:01.280 of their labor. And it's just what Famously spoke about, 1:38:01.360 --> 1:38:03.920 but he wasn't the only one to speak about it. 1:38:05.240 --> 1:38:09.840 The sort of alienated label that is compelled rather than creative, 1:38:10.040 --> 1:38:13.200 that has no control for work, and where workers are 1:38:13.240 --> 1:38:17.400 treated as commodities on a labor market. Samefully, I haven't 1:38:17.439 --> 1:38:19.120 had to look for a job in a while, but 1:38:20.120 --> 1:38:23.200 I've had to see my friends seeking jobs and it's 1:38:23.479 --> 1:38:27.799 not a nice experience. And you have to spend weeks 1:38:27.880 --> 1:38:32.400 months sometimes looking for a job. But you will most 1:38:32.560 --> 1:38:35.600 likely heed, but you need to survive, you know. And 1:38:35.720 --> 1:38:37.280 a lot of these jobs you end up looking for 1:38:37.479 --> 1:38:40.160 end up getting into and not even necessary jobs. There 1:38:40.160 --> 1:38:43.040 are a lot of bullshit jobs. And I don't contribute 1:38:43.120 --> 1:38:46.720 to a person's you know, development and fulfillment or they 1:38:46.800 --> 1:38:51.200 could have humanity in any way. Yeah, And then a 1:38:51.280 --> 1:38:53.439 lot of the benefits that people have fought for, even 1:38:53.479 --> 1:38:56.960 for these jobs have either been eroded you know, rolled 1:38:57.040 --> 1:39:01.960 back over time, or they've been loophole doubt. So you know, 1:39:02.040 --> 1:39:05.000 for example, you don't even get enough hours to qualify 1:39:05.200 --> 1:39:09.439 for benefits when you work at certain places, or you 1:39:09.560 --> 1:39:14.000 are an independent contractor instead of an employee, so they 1:39:14.040 --> 1:39:16.599 can get away from you know, giving me your due. 1:39:17.680 --> 1:39:20.800 And so then in this environment you have EI coming 1:39:20.880 --> 1:39:26.519 in now and taking certain rules varying levels of quality 1:39:26.680 --> 1:39:31.160 and writing and in art and coding and administrative work. 1:39:31.600 --> 1:39:35.040 And I don't know, I think for one, EI does 1:39:35.080 --> 1:39:37.360 a lot of these jobs very poorly. But then there's 1:39:37.400 --> 1:39:41.400 also cases where I don't like copyrighting, which is something 1:39:41.439 --> 1:39:45.720 I used to do. The EI copyrighting and the sort 1:39:45.760 --> 1:39:49.600 of copyrighting that I had to write is back in 1:39:49.640 --> 1:39:53.240 the days almost indistinguishable in terms of it feels you 1:39:53.320 --> 1:39:56.800 know generic, quite less, you know slop, like it's just 1:39:57.320 --> 1:40:01.200 you're pumping this out to pollute the waves in a sense. 1:40:01.920 --> 1:40:05.000 Yeah, it's very like it has a very formulaic nature 1:40:05.320 --> 1:40:08.240 when a human does it. It's funny when I think 1:40:08.240 --> 1:40:11.320 about copywriting, right, Like you can see that people have 1:40:11.439 --> 1:40:14.679 identified the completely generic nature of it, because occasionally you'll 1:40:14.720 --> 1:40:18.040 have like brands who do it in a non formulaic 1:40:18.160 --> 1:40:21.439 way and briefly see success from it, like just by 1:40:22.200 --> 1:40:25.160 having some element of humanity in it. 1:40:25.400 --> 1:40:27.800 Yeah, like Wendy is when they did that for a 1:40:27.840 --> 1:40:30.880 little while. Then yeah, then every brand to copy that 1:40:31.040 --> 1:40:33.679 method and then it became steel and yeah, yeah. 1:40:33.640 --> 1:40:35.720 Someone wist sometimes like puncture it for a minute and 1:40:35.800 --> 1:40:37.560 then ye, like you say, everyone will run after it 1:40:37.680 --> 1:40:40.920 like a pit viper. Sunglasses, this one, I guess they're 1:40:41.000 --> 1:40:43.760 very popular with like right wing bigots. Every time like 1:40:43.880 --> 1:40:46.679 biggots are pictured in their sunglasses, they'll like donate money 1:40:46.760 --> 1:40:51.559 to LGBTQ affirming causes or like gender affirming care stuff 1:40:51.640 --> 1:40:54.000 or whatever depends what the people are being bigoted about. 1:40:54.439 --> 1:40:56.200 And like briefly I saw them have success with that 1:40:56.360 --> 1:40:58.840 just because like people are so accustomed to brands being 1:40:59.080 --> 1:41:02.439 a political rather just being like no, fuck you. So 1:41:02.760 --> 1:41:05.799 by doing the kind of basics of being a good person, 1:41:06.479 --> 1:41:09.840 it appears human and therefore not so generic, and people 1:41:10.880 --> 1:41:13.000 you know, briefly fall in love with it or. 1:41:13.000 --> 1:41:15.880 Well yeah, but I mean, at the end of the day, 1:41:16.439 --> 1:41:21.280 of the corporations are our persons. There are people behind corporations. Yeah, 1:41:21.720 --> 1:41:23.760 And I guess I sort of sort of wonder with 1:41:23.920 --> 1:41:26.840 these kinds of jobs that are all being build in 1:41:27.080 --> 1:41:31.719 at least in part by AI, what is the impact 1:41:31.960 --> 1:41:35.920 on a person self worse? Oh yeah, but their their 1:41:36.760 --> 1:41:41.839 skilled to be just sort of swapped out for a machine. 1:41:42.120 --> 1:41:45.640 You know, a lot of people have already felt that 1:41:45.760 --> 1:41:48.200 their work is non essential, and then you have a 1:41:48.240 --> 1:41:53.120 sense of being replaceable and unneeded. And in some cases 1:41:53.200 --> 1:41:55.960 the difference is negligible because, like I said, the work 1:41:56.040 --> 1:41:58.320 they was already being put out was the sort of 1:41:58.439 --> 1:42:04.080 generic stuff that it sort of fills people, yeah, and 1:42:04.200 --> 1:42:07.360 fill screens. But then you also have more necessary, the 1:42:07.439 --> 1:42:09.800 more creative work. It is also just being sort of 1:42:09.840 --> 1:42:13.200 funneled out. You know, I'm seeing billboards all over the 1:42:13.280 --> 1:42:18.920 place that just have like this nasty, smooth looking like 1:42:19.160 --> 1:42:23.840 AI generated pictures. Yeah, just a lot of slop you know, 1:42:24.000 --> 1:42:28.280 slop content, slop ad, slop emails, you know, even on 1:42:28.400 --> 1:42:31.240 YouTube now Like I like to listen to these sort 1:42:31.240 --> 1:42:35.000 of music mixes while I work sometimes, and most of 1:42:35.040 --> 1:42:38.919 the channels being recommended with music mixes on YouTube nowadays, 1:42:39.240 --> 1:42:40.960 at least to the genres that I would listen to, 1:42:41.880 --> 1:42:45.240 it's just like, yeah, I generated jazz chill. The thing 1:42:45.320 --> 1:42:47.880 is they were't title it that way. Yeah, you know, 1:42:48.000 --> 1:42:51.040 the titlet some some word and they probably haven't somewhat 1:42:51.080 --> 1:42:54.640 AI generated thumbnail and whatever. And then you just, you know, 1:42:54.680 --> 1:42:58.240 if you're unaware of the pattern of how those channels operate. 1:42:58.760 --> 1:43:00.400 My click on it, thinking oh, it's just like a 1:43:00.479 --> 1:43:03.160 music mix, like every other music mix, and then you 1:43:03.280 --> 1:43:04.720 listened to it for a while and listen to a 1:43:04.760 --> 1:43:06.640 few of them, when you realize, oh, this is just 1:43:06.800 --> 1:43:11.000 like a machine made this. It has no flavor, yeah, 1:43:11.280 --> 1:43:14.200 like no soul. There's also a lot of articles that 1:43:14.360 --> 1:43:17.240 just fill in the Internet. It's just like slow yeah, yeah, 1:43:17.560 --> 1:43:21.040 you know, just AI generated articles that feed into the 1:43:21.400 --> 1:43:25.240 AI pool of references, and it's the AI almost eats itself. Yeah, 1:43:25.680 --> 1:43:28.800 and it's sad, but I think it was like we 1:43:28.960 --> 1:43:31.680 always going in this direction in a sense, not to 1:43:31.720 --> 1:43:34.519 say it was entirely inevitable, but this was the trajectory 1:43:34.560 --> 1:43:37.200 that we appointed that this actually could have been changed. 1:43:37.360 --> 1:43:39.559 But now it hasn't been. So it's how we kind 1:43:39.600 --> 1:43:51.160 of got here. I don't know if it's just me, 1:43:51.280 --> 1:43:54.040 but I feel like there was a time when boy, 1:43:54.200 --> 1:43:56.639 it may it may still be true that still flus 1:43:56.720 --> 1:43:59.360 is not always a good thing. There's something to be 1:43:59.439 --> 1:44:04.280 said about the value that we impue to things when 1:44:04.400 --> 1:44:07.840 they are a bit rarer, you know, when it's you 1:44:07.920 --> 1:44:10.320 have to be more attentive and engaging with it. 1:44:11.200 --> 1:44:11.320 You know. 1:44:11.560 --> 1:44:13.479 I was actually thinking about it earlier today when I 1:44:13.520 --> 1:44:15.600 was a child and I was watching TV. You know, 1:44:15.640 --> 1:44:17.439 if they didn't have anything on the TV that I 1:44:17.479 --> 1:44:18.600 wanted to watch, and I have to go and do 1:44:18.720 --> 1:44:22.599 something else, right, Yeah, And nowadays TV is pretty much 1:44:22.640 --> 1:44:25.680 unlimited because at any point in time, you couldn't have 1:44:26.320 --> 1:44:30.160 access to anything that an algorithm could see. If you're 1:44:30.200 --> 1:44:33.439 update is perfectly curated to your interests. Yeah, and it's 1:44:33.479 --> 1:44:36.000 auto play and everything. It's just one hits after the next. 1:44:36.880 --> 1:44:41.040 In that excess, I just feel like we've lost the 1:44:41.120 --> 1:44:45.640 sort of attentive curation of your tease, curation of and 1:44:45.760 --> 1:44:50.200 evaluation of things. Of the effort and energy and craft 1:44:50.320 --> 1:44:52.200 goes into making things. We just end up sort of 1:44:52.200 --> 1:44:53.840 taking things for granted, and. 1:44:53.920 --> 1:44:56.640 Like I think we kind of lower the standard that 1:44:56.720 --> 1:44:59.760 we will accept because it's just so much of it, 1:45:00.080 --> 1:45:01.880 so much volume of it. Yeah, Like, and you're not 1:45:02.000 --> 1:45:04.360 so attentive to it because it's always there that like 1:45:05.320 --> 1:45:08.759 slop becomes okay, it just kind of fills the gaps 1:45:08.880 --> 1:45:11.519 in this non stop stream of content. 1:45:11.960 --> 1:45:14.240 Yes, just filling feeling the noise. I have to catch 1:45:14.320 --> 1:45:17.760 myself sometimes, yeah, because I mean just like sometimes I 1:45:17.880 --> 1:45:20.640 just put something on because it was there, you know, 1:45:20.720 --> 1:45:23.160 and just feeling noise, Like sometimes I have to remind myself, 1:45:23.360 --> 1:45:27.200 you know, palls, just be with your thoughts for a bit, 1:45:27.400 --> 1:45:27.519 you know. 1:45:28.360 --> 1:45:28.599 Yeah. 1:45:28.760 --> 1:45:32.040 Yeah, and I try not to put too much blame 1:45:32.120 --> 1:45:35.600 on myself even as I try to work on it, 1:45:36.120 --> 1:45:39.040 because all of this, once again is high design. 1:45:39.520 --> 1:45:39.720 Yeah. 1:45:39.760 --> 1:45:43.240 You know, these platforms and these algorithms have been set 1:45:43.360 --> 1:45:48.960 up to perfectly. They're perfectly hone into their abilities exploit 1:45:49.160 --> 1:45:53.040 the little shortcuts and weaknesses in the human mind to 1:45:53.400 --> 1:45:56.760 endy just for as long as possible. Yeah. Like so 1:45:57.120 --> 1:45:58.800 even if you feel like, oh my gosh, I want 1:45:58.840 --> 1:46:00.120 to get off those media, I want to quit this, 1:46:00.280 --> 1:46:03.519 that and the other, it's hard. Yeah, you know, even 1:46:03.560 --> 1:46:08.000 on you when you know in your mind that it's detrimental, 1:46:08.120 --> 1:46:11.519 that it's affecting your negatively, you still end up going 1:46:11.600 --> 1:46:15.040 back because again it's it's hacked into your brain in 1:46:15.160 --> 1:46:15.559 a sense. 1:46:16.240 --> 1:46:16.439 Yeah. 1:46:17.080 --> 1:46:19.720 But so I'd just really frustrated by the way that 1:46:20.000 --> 1:46:25.519 AI has contributed to this sort of disconnect because I 1:46:25.600 --> 1:46:28.440 also think it makes the whole breath of human creativity 1:46:28.880 --> 1:46:33.679 a lot less valued, practiced and supported, you know, instead 1:46:33.720 --> 1:46:40.280 of people actually respecting and you know, supporting the craft 1:46:40.360 --> 1:46:43.840 and the effort that goes into into things, it's just like, oh, 1:46:43.920 --> 1:46:46.160 scroll toed the next thing, scrollted the next thing, or 1:46:46.720 --> 1:46:50.439 for some people who seem to love HI, it's just oh, yeah, 1:46:50.479 --> 1:46:53.680 you're you're you're obsolete. Now you could be replaced by 1:46:53.760 --> 1:46:55.599 this you know junk. 1:46:56.160 --> 1:46:58.640 Yeah, of just thinking about like like I see it 1:46:58.880 --> 1:47:03.200 so often in like like given in revolutionary spaces, I'll 1:47:03.240 --> 1:47:05.479 see it right like there, I guess sometimes is what 1:47:05.600 --> 1:47:07.840 it is actually is AI accounts that have no idea 1:47:07.880 --> 1:47:10.000 what a revolution is. There incapable of doing so because 1:47:10.000 --> 1:47:13.639 they're not human. But like I'm just designed to monetize clicks. 1:47:14.280 --> 1:47:17.799 You know, you'll see there's a bunch of fucking Israel 1:47:17.880 --> 1:47:22.040 stands with Kurtistan ads, which you'll just like AI generate 1:47:22.560 --> 1:47:26.400 pictures of yep as women like the women who fight 1:47:26.560 --> 1:47:31.040 for their anes, right, and like it's just I don't 1:47:31.080 --> 1:47:33.200 think these are not again, people are actually part of 1:47:33.240 --> 1:47:35.200 the revolution, right, there are people who just who want 1:47:35.240 --> 1:47:37.760 to in a sense objectify the revolution and the women 1:47:37.800 --> 1:47:40.040 who fought in it and continue to fight in it 1:47:40.520 --> 1:47:44.040 for financial benefit. But like it's the antithesis of the 1:47:44.120 --> 1:47:48.360 beautiful life that people are trying to build there, right, 1:47:48.439 --> 1:47:51.679 Like it is the opposite of everything that that revolution 1:47:51.840 --> 1:47:52.320 stands for. 1:47:53.040 --> 1:47:56.439 So you're seeing people are like AI generates and these 1:47:56.520 --> 1:47:57.800 human fighters. 1:47:57.880 --> 1:48:03.240 Yeah, yes, exactly, and then using that for some either 1:48:03.479 --> 1:48:06.360 just straight because you get paid per click on X 1:48:06.479 --> 1:48:11.600 now right, or for some nefarious propaganda bullshit, But like 1:48:11.840 --> 1:48:16.040 it's and then by contrast, right by friends in Memma, 1:48:16.960 --> 1:48:19.120 there's a group called Art Strike Collective who do these 1:48:19.160 --> 1:48:22.960 cul drawings of various individuals who have fought in the revolution, 1:48:23.640 --> 1:48:26.599 and like one is a beautiful thing that shows your 1:48:26.640 --> 1:48:29.639 respect for these people, many of whom have given their 1:48:29.680 --> 1:48:33.360 life for this revolution. And another is just complete fucking 1:48:33.479 --> 1:48:36.760 slop that is actively harming the thing it's supposed to 1:48:36.840 --> 1:48:37.720 be supporting. 1:48:38.720 --> 1:48:42.600 Yeah, unfortunately, and it's a cliche at this point, but 1:48:42.800 --> 1:48:43.759 many such cases. 1:48:44.439 --> 1:48:44.679 Yeah. 1:48:45.000 --> 1:48:45.200 Yeah. 1:48:45.840 --> 1:48:50.679 I saw this short lecture on YouTube by a professor 1:48:51.160 --> 1:48:54.120 professor name as jam This just a short clip from 1:48:54.120 --> 1:48:56.320 I'm assuming a longer lecture, he said. The title of 1:48:56.360 --> 1:48:58.080 the video is really what captured me. It was something 1:48:58.080 --> 1:49:02.200 along the lines of consumerism is the perfection of slavery, 1:49:03.400 --> 1:49:07.000 and it was really speaking about how we are able 1:49:07.200 --> 1:49:12.000 to be so perfectly locked into our role as workers, 1:49:12.080 --> 1:49:15.080 as cogs in this machine to become, you know, so 1:49:15.280 --> 1:49:22.160 docile because of just how good the consumeristic system has 1:49:22.280 --> 1:49:27.280 gotten at keeping us chasing that next you know, dopamine, 1:49:27.360 --> 1:49:30.000 hit that next purchase, that next thing to consume. 1:49:30.400 --> 1:49:30.519 You know. 1:49:30.680 --> 1:49:33.799 So we're still being exploited, We are still wage slaves 1:49:33.920 --> 1:49:37.800 in a sense, but we are either unaware of it 1:49:38.040 --> 1:49:43.560 or we accept that role just to chase after, you know, 1:49:43.640 --> 1:49:44.839 the next tie of consumption. 1:49:46.280 --> 1:49:49.720 H Yeah, Like when you think about a brave new 1:49:49.720 --> 1:49:53.240 world in nineteen eighty four, right, these two dystopian novels roughly, 1:49:54.080 --> 1:49:56.200 I mean briefly work came up before eight if nineteen 1:49:56.200 --> 1:49:56.559 eighty four. 1:49:56.680 --> 1:49:56.800 Right. 1:49:57.160 --> 1:50:00.400 The difference is one is like a boot jamping on 1:50:00.439 --> 1:50:02.479 the human face forever, which is like nearly four in 1:50:02.600 --> 1:50:07.000 hux Leaves, Dystopia is based on people being essentially bought 1:50:07.080 --> 1:50:07.880 off through pleasure. 1:50:08.040 --> 1:50:11.160 Right. Yeah, it's like unlimited cookie in for every wine. 1:50:11.479 --> 1:50:14.599 Yeah, yeah, yeah, they call it. It's called sohmer. I think, right, 1:50:14.840 --> 1:50:17.240 we're in the unlimited Cane for everyone world, right, like 1:50:17.360 --> 1:50:18.200 it's it's stuf. 1:50:18.240 --> 1:50:19.840 I mean, I think we're in both. You know, it's 1:50:19.880 --> 1:50:23.960 a simultaneously a hux LEYA and all. Well, yeah, yeah dystopia. 1:50:24.240 --> 1:50:26.080 You know what's the fourth worlds? 1:50:26.400 --> 1:50:30.000 Yeah, you're right. I'm starting to read Jack London's Dystopia 1:50:30.120 --> 1:50:32.800 the Iron Heel. Now I've I've decided I want to 1:50:32.960 --> 1:50:36.160 work out who was best calling the dystopia. But yeah, 1:50:36.200 --> 1:50:38.040 we we have a little bit of both. Now we 1:50:38.160 --> 1:50:40.720 have the they'll get you at both ends, right, Like 1:50:40.840 --> 1:50:43.679 they'll try and give you things to keep you placid 1:50:43.720 --> 1:50:46.719 and then also things to keep you afraid. Yeah. 1:50:47.640 --> 1:50:49.840 So, I mean there's there's a lot of reasons to 1:50:49.920 --> 1:50:53.920 the spare. You know, people just blankly embracing eie and 1:50:54.000 --> 1:50:55.280 they don't see the problem with you was in the 1:50:55.280 --> 1:50:58.599 eye and all these different things. There's also, as I'd 1:50:58.640 --> 1:51:01.360 like to end things on reason to right, there are 1:51:01.560 --> 1:51:06.080 people who are willing to voycott it. Who are you know, 1:51:07.000 --> 1:51:09.320 maintaining a stigma around it? You know, people are not 1:51:09.400 --> 1:51:11.880 taking it lined down? Artists, why are not taking it 1:51:12.040 --> 1:51:15.960 lined down? Writers are taking it line doown? Designers? We're 1:51:15.960 --> 1:51:20.240 not taking it lined down. People are still craving the authenticity, 1:51:20.439 --> 1:51:24.799 connection and craft that comes from human people. And although 1:51:25.680 --> 1:51:30.200 there's little any individual can do to resist the alienation 1:51:31.000 --> 1:51:35.959 of this society, whether be at work or relationships by themselves, 1:51:36.040 --> 1:51:39.040 you know, it's very hard, there are things we can 1:51:39.120 --> 1:51:42.000 do together in tandem to make things a little bit 1:51:42.080 --> 1:51:46.479 easier as we sort of try and strive toward social revolution. 1:51:47.000 --> 1:51:51.120 You know, there's the classic you know, touch graphs, you know, 1:51:51.280 --> 1:51:54.599 log off and try and find where people are. There's 1:51:54.680 --> 1:52:01.240 also the individualist solution of reclaiming your agency by finding 1:52:01.400 --> 1:52:04.840 some version of digital minimalism that works for you, you know, 1:52:05.000 --> 1:52:09.200 taking a break, so now limiting your screen time here 1:52:09.200 --> 1:52:13.599 and there. But really it's gonna take system change. It's 1:52:13.600 --> 1:52:16.920 gonna take collective action. It's gonna take us boycotton both. 1:52:17.000 --> 1:52:20.040 You know, of course the AI products, there's a boycott 1:52:20.040 --> 1:52:22.599 already taking place with those. But then also just yeah, 1:52:23.800 --> 1:52:27.320 striking add the pressure points of the system and prefiguring 1:52:28.120 --> 1:52:33.519 about the world for everyone. Yeah, and you know, I 1:52:33.640 --> 1:52:36.240 hope that everybody is able to do what they can 1:52:36.439 --> 1:52:40.679 to take steps in that direction. And yeah, so please 1:52:40.720 --> 1:52:41.320 don't use the I. 1:52:42.640 --> 1:52:47.160 Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think I always like that Supermandante 1:52:47.280 --> 1:52:50.040 Marcos quote where he says, like, it's not necessary to 1:52:50.080 --> 1:52:52.240 conquer the world, it's sufficient to build a new one. 1:52:52.880 --> 1:52:55.000 I like that approach to this AI stuff. The way 1:52:55.040 --> 1:52:58.360 we make it so people in our community don't turn 1:52:58.439 --> 1:53:00.720 to AI to talk about things they want to talk 1:53:00.720 --> 1:53:02.519 about is to be there for them to talk to, right, 1:53:02.640 --> 1:53:06.920 to build community, to build real human interactions with each other, 1:53:07.400 --> 1:53:10.639 so people don't have real human conversations with the computer. 1:53:11.240 --> 1:53:16.160 Absolutely agreed. Yeah, and that's all they have for today. 1:53:17.720 --> 1:53:20.479 So all thought, it's all the people. This has been, 1:53:20.520 --> 1:53:23.160 It could happen here. I've been Andrew, this has been 1:53:23.400 --> 1:53:25.559 James and Lasst Yeah. 1:53:25.960 --> 1:53:44.759 Thanks. We had a very funny introduction. 1:53:45.040 --> 1:53:45.920 It was really good. 1:53:46.360 --> 1:53:50.600 Yeah, it referenced our company sexual harassment protocols. It was hilarious. 1:53:51.160 --> 1:53:53.080 You're never going to hear it. We weren't recording. 1:53:53.920 --> 1:53:56.200 I was recording, so you can hear my seesh. Okay. 1:53:56.240 --> 1:53:59.519 Yeah, if you can just accept what Garrison said without 1:53:59.600 --> 1:54:02.639 contract and we'll open with that, that'll be great. Yeah. 1:54:06.520 --> 1:54:10.360 That is a classic Robert Evans intro. You just did it. 1:54:11.040 --> 1:54:12.559 I feel like it always comes from insight. 1:54:13.360 --> 1:54:17.920 Welcome to it could happen here a podcast about journalistic objectivity. 1:54:18.080 --> 1:54:21.760 That's right, a thing that we've just demonstrated perfectly. 1:54:22.760 --> 1:54:27.360 Yeah, yeah, that's the professional media class. So let's have 1:54:27.439 --> 1:54:30.000 a little talk about media objectivity. Right. It's been a 1:54:30.080 --> 1:54:34.680 major tenor of traditional legacy media that they must remain unbiased. 1:54:35.640 --> 1:54:38.120 This hasn't always been the case in the United States. 1:54:38.240 --> 1:54:41.720 Right used to have explicitly partisan news sources, which we 1:54:42.080 --> 1:54:45.040 have now with Fox News, I guess. But that's why 1:54:45.120 --> 1:54:47.040 you have newspapers like I think Saint Louis has a 1:54:47.080 --> 1:54:50.080 Saint Louis Democrat or the SO and so Republican like 1:54:50.200 --> 1:54:54.240 that they would be very explicitly a partisan newspaper. It's 1:54:54.360 --> 1:54:57.480 only really when journalism sort of took on this strong 1:54:57.680 --> 1:55:00.800 professional and I mean professional here in terms of like 1:55:00.960 --> 1:55:05.080 the professions, right, like law, accounting, jobs that are associated 1:55:05.120 --> 1:55:09.680 with university education, and a class identity that it started 1:55:09.760 --> 1:55:13.400 to assert this kind of it's an attempt to appear 1:55:13.520 --> 1:55:16.760 rational and scientific in its methodologies, right. And one of 1:55:16.840 --> 1:55:19.760 the ways that journalism did this was to talk about objectivity. 1:55:20.280 --> 1:55:23.440 I should indicate here that objectivity is supposed to be 1:55:23.520 --> 1:55:28.080 a means of verifying information. I like that we should 1:55:28.080 --> 1:55:30.200 objectively check that what we have written is correct. 1:55:30.480 --> 1:55:33.120 The example I always give is that if I'm in 1:55:33.240 --> 1:55:36.400 a protest scene where there's a clash between crowd boys 1:55:36.680 --> 1:55:39.480 and you know, a group of leftists, and you know, 1:55:39.600 --> 1:55:41.360 someone on the left pulls out a can of mace 1:55:41.480 --> 1:55:44.760 and sprays it first, that's objectively what happened. Now, that 1:55:44.840 --> 1:55:48.600 doesn't mean that that's the only thing I report. For example, 1:55:48.640 --> 1:55:51.040 if the person they maye is somebody who has been 1:55:51.360 --> 1:55:54.520 like harassing those individuals online for weeks, or has been 1:55:54.600 --> 1:55:56.960 doxing them, or that as salted them at previous like, 1:55:57.080 --> 1:55:59.600 all of that is like relevant context, but it doesn't 1:55:59.680 --> 1:56:03.360 change objectively happened in that instant, right, Like, it's not 1:56:04.120 --> 1:56:07.400 on me to pretend that I think these sides are equal, 1:56:07.800 --> 1:56:10.880 but it is on me to accurately report like what happens. Yes, 1:56:11.400 --> 1:56:13.640 And I think one of the one of the areas 1:56:13.720 --> 1:56:16.240 in which a lot of people, especially when we were 1:56:16.280 --> 1:56:19.480 talking about, like, you know, situations like this, a lot 1:56:19.520 --> 1:56:21.880 of folks in kind of legacy media get stuff wrong. 1:56:22.040 --> 1:56:23.720 Is they think that all that matters and what is 1:56:23.800 --> 1:56:27.200 what happens in that moment, right, and what happened previously, 1:56:27.320 --> 1:56:30.320 what's happened in other engagements, what's happened like over you know, 1:56:30.440 --> 1:56:32.520 the last two or three years of however long the 1:56:32.600 --> 1:56:35.400 conflict has been going on that city is immaterial. Well, 1:56:35.400 --> 1:56:37.360 all that matters is what happened in that second when 1:56:37.400 --> 1:56:41.240 that reporter was Onseene. And if you're thinking that way, 1:56:41.640 --> 1:56:44.000 you're going to miss more than someone who comes in 1:56:44.360 --> 1:56:46.440 with just an outright bias, you know. 1:56:46.840 --> 1:56:50.000 Yeah, And like I think very often it's seen as 1:56:50.080 --> 1:56:52.040 kind of instead of being like a value of the 1:56:52.080 --> 1:56:54.560 outlet and the way it verifies information, it seems being 1:56:54.600 --> 1:56:58.960 a personal kind of like quality that journalists should have 1:56:59.120 --> 1:57:02.320 in every aspect their lives. Yeah, Like, I'm aware that 1:57:02.520 --> 1:57:04.960 some of the big legacy broadsheets in the us, like, 1:57:05.600 --> 1:57:09.760 you can't attend to protest unless you are covering the protest, right. 1:57:10.400 --> 1:57:12.840 And there's even that famous case of the journalists being like, 1:57:12.920 --> 1:57:14.520 I don't vote because I think that that would be 1:57:14.560 --> 1:57:16.440 a violation of my objectivity. 1:57:16.600 --> 1:57:18.400 Yeah, yeah, yeah, I remember that. I got have forgotten 1:57:18.400 --> 1:57:18.920 about that one. 1:57:19.360 --> 1:57:22.360 Like you're allowed to have opinions, that's just not supposed 1:57:22.400 --> 1:57:25.600 to be the entire basis of your reporting, you know exactly. 1:57:25.800 --> 1:57:29.160 Yeah, Like, and I think sometimes because people always do 1:57:29.280 --> 1:57:32.600 have opinions, right, but the opinions that are conceived of 1:57:32.840 --> 1:57:36.280 as neutral and the ones that are conceived of as 1:57:36.400 --> 1:57:41.320 being subjective are very telling, right, Like, the media for 1:57:41.360 --> 1:57:45.160 a long time has been the domain of educated, older 1:57:45.200 --> 1:57:47.880 white men, like people like me. I guess I'm not old, 1:57:48.040 --> 1:57:50.480 but getting that way. And it also has been the 1:57:50.520 --> 1:57:53.200 domain of like capital in the state, right, like Jeffrey 1:57:53.240 --> 1:57:58.680 Bezos owned several newspapers pro market biases, pro capitalism, biases, 1:57:59.200 --> 1:58:02.960 pro state by those are not really investigated much in 1:58:03.040 --> 1:58:07.280 the media in the way that other biases might be. Right, 1:58:07.880 --> 1:58:12.280 It's also created this idea that the media always needs 1:58:12.320 --> 1:58:15.280 to shoot for the middle in any given discussion, which 1:58:15.320 --> 1:58:18.800 I kind of want to investigate a bit when Donald 1:58:18.880 --> 1:58:21.840 Trump says something which is overt, like Donald Trump has 1:58:21.840 --> 1:58:24.440 said things which are nativists, right, Nativism is a form 1:58:24.480 --> 1:58:28.520 of racism. Donald Trump, therefore has said racist shit. The 1:58:28.640 --> 1:58:30.640 way that this is far too often treated in the 1:58:30.720 --> 1:58:34.839 legacy media is it's the racist shit that Donald Trump said, correct, 1:58:35.080 --> 1:58:38.240 or like, maybe we should consider this racist thing that 1:58:38.360 --> 1:58:41.200 so and so has said, right, rather than this shit 1:58:41.360 --> 1:58:43.879 is racist Donald Trump has said some shit that it's racist, 1:58:44.040 --> 1:58:48.600 or other members of the Republican Party. All this serves 1:58:48.640 --> 1:58:53.000 to do is when we have a topic and the 1:58:53.720 --> 1:58:57.000 people in Congress anchor themselves on very far right, what 1:58:57.200 --> 1:59:00.360 is acceptable discourse, The media then moves discourse to to 1:59:00.440 --> 1:59:02.600 write such so that position is in the center right, 1:59:02.720 --> 1:59:05.760 it serves to ratchet the Overton window to the right. 1:59:06.000 --> 1:59:08.720 I'm demonstrating this for my colleagues with hand signals, which, 1:59:08.760 --> 1:59:11.720 of course only two of the hundreds of thousands of 1:59:11.800 --> 1:59:14.200 people listening to me will be able to see the 1:59:14.320 --> 1:59:15.720 right way to our podcast. 1:59:16.400 --> 1:59:20.560 Yeah, it was a very compelling mime of a ratchet 1:59:21.400 --> 1:59:23.960 like it looked like you basically were doing it. I 1:59:24.000 --> 1:59:24.680 could not tell. 1:59:25.120 --> 1:59:27.800 I couldn't tell the difference. No, that's why we call 1:59:27.880 --> 1:59:31.720 you ratchet straps out, got. 1:59:31.680 --> 1:59:34.280 Me a ratchet, Jimmy, Yeah, it's This podcast is sponsored 1:59:34.280 --> 1:59:37.160 by Invisible Ratchet. Now it's time to pivot to add. 1:59:37.600 --> 1:59:39.880 It's not time to pivot to add yet. I think 1:59:40.160 --> 1:59:43.200 we should talk about the way other professions concerned with 1:59:43.320 --> 1:59:47.840 the truths deal with this topic, right, because journalism is 1:59:47.840 --> 1:59:52.120 pretty much unique and considering objectivity something that we as 1:59:52.160 --> 1:59:55.720 individuals have to embody in every action that we take, 1:59:56.160 --> 1:59:58.280 and I guess the most relevant one will be academia, 1:59:58.600 --> 2:00:01.360 which is something else I am unfortunate enough to have 2:00:01.520 --> 2:00:04.560 participated in for far too much of my adult life. 2:00:05.240 --> 2:00:09.680 So academia still not great, But we have accepted that 2:00:09.840 --> 2:00:11.840 everyone is biased in academia. 2:00:11.920 --> 2:00:12.040 Right. 2:00:12.880 --> 2:00:17.280 We rely on, among many other things, something called standpoint theory, right, 2:00:17.320 --> 2:00:20.400 which is a cornerstone of modern feminist thought. Most of 2:00:20.440 --> 2:00:21.720 you will be aware of it, even if you're not 2:00:21.800 --> 2:00:23.880 aware of it. Basically, it holds that we see the 2:00:23.920 --> 2:00:29.920 world differently based on where we see it from. Our gender, sexuality, raise, ethnicity, experience, age, 2:00:29.960 --> 2:00:32.240 and a million other things impact the truth we know 2:00:32.360 --> 2:00:35.200 in the world we experience, and standpoint theory posits that 2:00:35.280 --> 2:00:38.839 perhaps people not from a certain thretting may have valuable 2:00:38.920 --> 2:00:42.000 insights into it. Right, So sometimes the outsider perspective is 2:00:42.000 --> 2:00:44.840 a valuable one. But also people from that setting may 2:00:44.960 --> 2:00:48.760 see things outsiders may not see, and we have to 2:00:48.800 --> 2:00:52.480 acknowledge those biases, right, and then continue to tell the truth. 2:00:53.400 --> 2:00:55.400 How do we tell the truth in academia we do 2:00:55.480 --> 2:00:59.600 something called peer review. Peer review is bad. Peer review 2:01:00.280 --> 2:01:06.120 strongly reinforces the status quote right. I will give one example. 2:01:06.520 --> 2:01:09.320 I once had a journal article, right for a history journal, 2:01:09.600 --> 2:01:12.200 killed in peer review. The piece was about the nineteen 2:01:12.240 --> 2:01:15.879 oh nine tour of Catalonia that was a bicycle competition 2:01:16.000 --> 2:01:18.200 for those of you who aren't familiar. It was killed 2:01:18.240 --> 2:01:23.440 because my media analysis didn't mention television coverage. The television 2:01:23.760 --> 2:01:26.040 was kind of crudely invented in the nineteen twenties, and 2:01:26.080 --> 2:01:28.440 did it become widely available until the nineteen forties, Right, Like, 2:01:28.560 --> 2:01:33.280 this is not a reasonable objection. Nonetheless, someone was able 2:01:33.360 --> 2:01:35.200 to kill my piece because of it. Because that's how 2:01:35.280 --> 2:01:37.200 peer review works, right. The people who are established, the 2:01:37.200 --> 2:01:39.440 people who are in positions of power, can kill your 2:01:39.440 --> 2:01:41.120 shit if they want to, and they can give the 2:01:41.200 --> 2:01:44.600 most ludicrous region. That is how peer review. Among other 2:01:44.680 --> 2:01:48.920 things reinforces status quo. Right. The other thing that we 2:01:49.160 --> 2:01:53.400 do in academias we declare our conflicts of interest, and 2:01:53.520 --> 2:01:55.800 this is something we don't do in journalism, right, Like 2:01:56.360 --> 2:01:58.920 outlets may have a conflict of interest policy, but again, 2:01:59.120 --> 2:02:03.800 like conflicts of interest aren't explicitly declared in a piece 2:02:04.280 --> 2:02:06.800 like you wouldn't see sometimes NPR does its. 2:02:06.800 --> 2:02:10.040 Actually, yeah, I mean a number of outlets do declare like, 2:02:10.160 --> 2:02:13.440 for example, this outlet is owned by someone who has 2:02:13.520 --> 2:02:15.800 a financial interest in the company we're reporting on, or 2:02:15.840 --> 2:02:16.280 something like that. 2:02:16.720 --> 2:02:19.480 Yeah, if the Washington Post is doing a story about 2:02:19.880 --> 2:02:24.040 Jeff Bezos or Amazon, Yeah, usually they will say in 2:02:24.160 --> 2:02:26.680 the bottom or the top that the paper is owned 2:02:26.680 --> 2:02:28.440 by said said figure. 2:02:29.040 --> 2:02:32.280 Yeah. Where it becomes more murky is like sometimes people 2:02:32.360 --> 2:02:35.400 have a financial interest or if something is your beat, right, 2:02:35.640 --> 2:02:38.240 you may have other financial interest within that beat. 2:02:38.600 --> 2:02:41.280 Well, and there's there's the very common case of people, 2:02:41.800 --> 2:02:45.400 especially now within kind of the sub stack journalism, being 2:02:45.560 --> 2:02:48.920 like friends and social with people that they are reporting 2:02:49.000 --> 2:02:51.200 on and not disclosing to their wider audience. 2:02:51.680 --> 2:02:54.960 Yeah, like access journalism more generally, right, Yeah, Like the 2:02:55.040 --> 2:02:57.280 way I got this piece was by being invited to 2:02:57.360 --> 2:02:59.080 the drinks party, and if I say anything, I'm kind 2:02:59.120 --> 2:03:01.680 about this person, I went invited to a drinks party. Yeah, 2:03:02.560 --> 2:03:04.960 or simply the conflict of interest and is presented by 2:03:05.760 --> 2:03:08.720 the more ludicrous my headline, the more people will click 2:03:08.760 --> 2:03:10.720 on this website, and the more time they will spend 2:03:10.760 --> 2:03:12.880 on the page, and the more addative you they might generate. 2:03:13.080 --> 2:03:16.400 Yeah, And that's really the largest issue with modern journalism 2:03:16.560 --> 2:03:20.200 is that that kind of determines almost everything for an outlet. 2:03:20.360 --> 2:03:23.160 Is like, what's what's going to get clicks, what's going 2:03:23.240 --> 2:03:26.240 to rile people up as much as possible, And that 2:03:26.840 --> 2:03:29.200 doesn't count as financial interest, right, Like the fact that 2:03:29.280 --> 2:03:31.640 the outlet has a vested financial interest in keeping you 2:03:31.760 --> 2:03:34.400 on the page as often and as long as possible 2:03:34.960 --> 2:03:38.000 doesn't count as like a conflict of interest in any way. 2:03:38.200 --> 2:03:41.400 And that's kind of one of the fundamental issues, whereas, 2:03:41.600 --> 2:03:44.200 like a lot of times, a lot of outlets won't let, 2:03:44.400 --> 2:03:47.560 for example, a black journalist report on a black man 2:03:47.640 --> 2:03:49.840 being murdered by the police, right because they see that 2:03:49.880 --> 2:03:52.880 as like an inherent conflict of interest. And the gap 2:03:53.000 --> 2:03:55.600 between those two things is where a lot of the 2:03:55.640 --> 2:03:57.760 real problems, a lot of the worst problems in modern 2:03:57.840 --> 2:03:58.920 journalism arise. 2:03:59.120 --> 2:04:14.040 Yeah, problems we need to pay to adds. Sure, all right, 2:04:14.080 --> 2:04:17.920 we are back. Part of this also manifests in like 2:04:18.640 --> 2:04:22.600 journalists being supposed to not have any individual opinions about anything, 2:04:22.800 --> 2:04:25.840 even if it's irrelevant to their beat. This has been 2:04:26.160 --> 2:04:29.880 the case for a lot of people regarding the genocide 2:04:29.920 --> 2:04:33.320 of Palestinian people. Right, Like you could be the weekend editor, 2:04:33.480 --> 2:04:36.760 you could write about brunch, and if you work at 2:04:36.800 --> 2:04:40.800 certain outlets, you are like under pain of losing your job, 2:04:41.040 --> 2:04:43.360 not allowed to post to what is happening in Gaza 2:04:43.520 --> 2:04:47.240 is a genocide to take a stance on these issues, right, 2:04:47.800 --> 2:04:51.000 and that is bad. Like journalists are human beings too, 2:04:51.240 --> 2:04:55.920 and it's ridiculous to suggest that that we shouldn't or 2:04:55.960 --> 2:04:58.720 can't have opinions on these things and still do good reporting, 2:04:58.920 --> 2:05:00.320 right we can. We just have to make sure that 2:05:00.360 --> 2:05:06.520 they're reporting itself is accurate. Sometimes what this leads to 2:05:07.040 --> 2:05:09.120 is like like what I guess another like Rubbie, you 2:05:09.120 --> 2:05:11.880 spoke about it that like the inherent conflict of interests 2:05:11.960 --> 2:05:15.880 that like traffic on a website presents for journalism. Another 2:05:16.040 --> 2:05:19.680 like inherent issue is that like every source is seen 2:05:19.720 --> 2:05:21.920 as biased, right, Like you said, like black folks might 2:05:22.000 --> 2:05:24.360 not be allowed to report on black men being shown 2:05:24.400 --> 2:05:28.080 by the cops accept state sources, which are far too 2:05:28.200 --> 2:05:30.400 often seen as speaking the verbatim truth. 2:05:30.600 --> 2:05:32.400 Right, Well, this is what the police said. 2:05:32.720 --> 2:05:35.000 Yes, yeah, that is how we get I guess. A 2:05:35.040 --> 2:05:36.880 pretty good example of this, I'll link to it in 2:05:37.000 --> 2:05:40.640 the show notes is a piece I wrote five years 2:05:40.680 --> 2:05:46.160 ago I think about police officers overdosing on fentanyl. Some 2:05:46.360 --> 2:05:47.960 of you will be familiar with this, some of you 2:05:48.040 --> 2:05:51.240 will not, but it is not possible to overdose on 2:05:51.400 --> 2:05:56.280 fentanyl just from being in its presence, like in an 2:05:56.360 --> 2:05:59.040 outdoor area, next to a thing that has fental in it. 2:05:59.800 --> 2:06:02.680 The piece I wrote dealt with the San Diego Union Tribune, 2:06:03.040 --> 2:06:07.200 who this was a spectacular instance, I guess, of journalists 2:06:07.400 --> 2:06:10.520 like serving as police scenographers. What happened here is that 2:06:10.600 --> 2:06:14.400 the police had produced an edited video with like music 2:06:14.440 --> 2:06:17.360 and shit of this supposed overdose right of a of 2:06:17.480 --> 2:06:20.320 a young cop who was like, I don't know what 2:06:20.360 --> 2:06:22.960 they call it. He's like apprentice with an older cop, 2:06:23.720 --> 2:06:26.160 like with a more experienced cop. And they were going 2:06:26.200 --> 2:06:28.960 around doing cop stuff. They found some stuff. They tested 2:06:29.000 --> 2:06:32.560 it for fen andil, and this guy collapses the younger cop. 2:06:32.600 --> 2:06:35.120 The older cop gives him several knark Hans. He's not 2:06:36.080 --> 2:06:39.440 just wisteo. Yeah no, just like I think there was 2:06:39.520 --> 2:06:46.320 one instant where someone received seven Knarkans, which like that's 2:06:46.360 --> 2:06:49.120 a threat to your fucking nasal integrity of nothing else. 2:06:49.320 --> 2:06:52.680 Yeah, if Knarkan doesn't work the first time, like I mean, 2:06:52.760 --> 2:06:56.240 people do sometimes often it's not especially like with serious ods. 2:06:56.280 --> 2:06:58.720 They'll often put people like in the hospital on drips, 2:06:58.800 --> 2:07:01.400 but you would have to take a mess of dose, 2:07:01.600 --> 2:07:04.440 not just be near fucking yeah. 2:07:04.480 --> 2:07:06.960 Yeah, like be like I think this instance, I get 2:07:07.000 --> 2:07:09.000 they were outside testing it in like they're the boot 2:07:09.040 --> 2:07:11.920 of a car. Like it's ludicrist to think that you 2:07:12.160 --> 2:07:14.880 and like it would be good if they familiarize themselves 2:07:14.960 --> 2:07:18.320 with some of the what an overdose looks like, right, yeah, 2:07:19.320 --> 2:07:20.080 and I'm mixed. 2:07:20.280 --> 2:07:23.240 If they weren't cops, I'd respect the desire to like 2:07:23.640 --> 2:07:25.600 time theft from work, because I think that's what a 2:07:25.640 --> 2:07:27.640 lot of this is. It's like, oh shit, if I 2:07:27.720 --> 2:07:31.560 have an overdose, like I get to stay out of 2:07:31.640 --> 2:07:33.000 work a couple of days. 2:07:32.840 --> 2:07:36.000 With day that's a that's a that's a framing. I'm 2:07:36.080 --> 2:07:39.680 a medabal to you. Unfortunately they archives for if you're 2:07:39.720 --> 2:07:44.240 a reporter though, like it is absolutely on you to, oh, 2:07:44.320 --> 2:07:46.680 this person having an overdose, What are the symptoms of 2:07:46.720 --> 2:07:49.760 an overdose? What does an overdose look like? Should I 2:07:49.880 --> 2:07:52.640 talk to a medical professional or you could just ask 2:07:53.480 --> 2:07:56.880 the perlice information officer who shared this with you, how 2:07:56.960 --> 2:07:59.760 did you verify this as an overdose? With whom did 2:07:59.800 --> 2:08:03.800 you discuss the toxicology report in this case? That information 2:08:03.880 --> 2:08:06.440 wasn't available right the way I was able to obtain 2:08:06.560 --> 2:08:09.480 that just to do I guess clarity is, first of all, 2:08:09.840 --> 2:08:13.160 I saw the publication where they didn't mention any fact 2:08:13.240 --> 2:08:16.720 checking that they'd done. You can also pra the emails 2:08:16.920 --> 2:08:18.800 to the police as well as from the police, right, 2:08:18.880 --> 2:08:21.400 so you can see if other reporters have done fact 2:08:21.480 --> 2:08:23.800 checking that way or have asked any follow up questions 2:08:23.840 --> 2:08:26.120 that way I done, that they would have found out 2:08:26.120 --> 2:08:28.840 that you say that you can't overness in fentanyl this way, 2:08:29.280 --> 2:08:31.440 they didn't even try. And like both sides this, I 2:08:31.480 --> 2:08:34.160 guess like sometimes you'll see outlets doing that now, like 2:08:34.360 --> 2:08:38.040 this cop over dose from fentanyl, but doctors say they can't, 2:08:38.400 --> 2:08:42.000 Like it's a which I still think is an absolute 2:08:42.080 --> 2:08:46.120 ludicrous practice. Right. That's like saying this person tried to fly, 2:08:46.480 --> 2:08:49.160 but you know that people say gravity will make them 2:08:49.200 --> 2:08:51.920 fall to the ground. Like, what are these things we 2:08:52.000 --> 2:08:55.600 know to be true? So I guess what I would 2:08:55.680 --> 2:09:00.440 propose we do instead of this ludicrous practice of tending 2:09:00.640 --> 2:09:03.840 to be objective about everything all the time, is that 2:09:04.040 --> 2:09:07.520 we are honest about our biases, honest about our conflict 2:09:07.520 --> 2:09:10.320 of interest, We're honest about like our standpoint, and then 2:09:10.920 --> 2:09:14.720 we do reporting, which is obviously verifiable, right, And that means, 2:09:14.840 --> 2:09:17.000 like you'll see that at the end of these episodes, right, 2:09:17.080 --> 2:09:20.600 we share our sources that we used after we're try 2:09:20.640 --> 2:09:23.240 and communicate where we got information from and how we 2:09:23.360 --> 2:09:26.880 got it. And I think we should strive for moral 2:09:26.960 --> 2:09:29.720 clarity in the way we say things instead of striving 2:09:29.760 --> 2:09:32.080 to this middle ground. So, like, what do I mean 2:09:32.120 --> 2:09:34.640 by moral clarity? I mean saying the cops killed someone, 2:09:35.320 --> 2:09:39.280 not officer involved shooting. Right. If you work with fucking 2:09:39.360 --> 2:09:42.200 words and you find yourself writing something as convoluted as 2:09:42.280 --> 2:09:48.080 officer involved shooting, then you have strayed from the foundational 2:09:48.760 --> 2:09:50.320 reason for journalism existing. 2:09:50.440 --> 2:09:52.560 Yeah, you have gone beyond God's light. 2:09:52.880 --> 2:09:56.160 Yeah yeah, yeah, you live in the darkness. There is 2:09:56.240 --> 2:09:59.600 I think a place for fact checkers. I think people 2:09:59.680 --> 2:10:03.040 got to a bit carried away with fact checking. I 2:10:03.080 --> 2:10:05.760 don't quite know how to phrase this correctly. I had 2:10:05.760 --> 2:10:08.520 an experience once where I'd written a piece. The fact 2:10:08.960 --> 2:10:12.000 checking of that piece centered on the fact that I 2:10:12.120 --> 2:10:17.280 had used the noun beach chair to refer to this chair. Yes, 2:10:18.200 --> 2:10:20.640 the fact checker believed that it was a lawn chair. 2:10:21.760 --> 2:10:27.520 To me, did not impact the overall thrust of the piece, 2:10:28.160 --> 2:10:31.000 right like the nature of the chair. Unfortunately, that ended 2:10:31.080 --> 2:10:33.520 up killing the story. We ran out of time to 2:10:33.720 --> 2:10:36.000 go over to court documents because of the nature of 2:10:36.040 --> 2:10:38.480 the chair discussion. And I'm not sure that's what we 2:10:38.560 --> 2:10:38.880 need to do. 2:10:40.120 --> 2:10:42.839 No, I mean, and I think the other and probably 2:10:42.840 --> 2:10:46.240 the larger problem with fact checking is fact checking is 2:10:46.440 --> 2:10:47.840 an in in and of itself is ha ha. 2:10:48.280 --> 2:10:49.360 I showed that they were wrong. 2:10:49.440 --> 2:10:51.480 I checked the fact where it's like, yeah, but what 2:10:51.600 --> 2:10:53.720 they wrote got out to thirty million people and your 2:10:53.760 --> 2:10:56.240 fact check got out to like sixty So what you 2:10:56.280 --> 2:10:58.240 did didn't really matter. And what we should probably be 2:10:58.360 --> 2:11:02.080 doing is looking at an intervention higher up on the 2:11:02.200 --> 2:11:04.680 line to stop the bullshit from getting out rather than 2:11:04.720 --> 2:11:07.520 being obsessed with well, I've actchecked it, like, well but 2:11:07.640 --> 2:11:10.280 that didn't really help you know, yeah, right, Just at 2:11:10.320 --> 2:11:12.440 what point do we give that up as pointless? 2:11:13.840 --> 2:11:17.640 Yeah, like you are like not even a footnote to 2:11:17.760 --> 2:11:18.960 this other thing that this person. 2:11:19.200 --> 2:11:21.680 No, we need to the intervention needs to be happening 2:11:21.800 --> 2:11:24.360 earlier because the bullshit is still getting out. 2:11:25.160 --> 2:11:28.640 Yeah, absolutely, And this happens like we're in this bizarre 2:11:28.720 --> 2:11:32.480 situation where like writing outlets can say what the fuck 2:11:32.680 --> 2:11:37.840 they want, right like, like we have whole massive media 2:11:37.880 --> 2:11:40.160 empires going in on this idea that the twenty twenty 2:11:40.200 --> 2:11:44.800 election was stolen. Then we have like centrist outlets instead 2:11:44.800 --> 2:11:47.600 of being like, no, the election wasn't stolen. That that's bullshit, 2:11:48.480 --> 2:11:52.160 constantly trying to like investigate those claims as if they 2:11:52.200 --> 2:11:55.840 were credible and useful, rather than illustrating why they should 2:11:55.880 --> 2:11:58.480 be dismissed and then moving on, right like, instead of 2:11:59.160 --> 2:12:02.680 investigating this conspiracy is so important. We see that a 2:12:02.720 --> 2:12:06.360 lot with immigration right now, But we saw a ton 2:12:07.160 --> 2:12:09.920 in the presidential debates, right Like, It's a good example 2:12:09.920 --> 2:12:11.960 of what you were saying. Jd Vance can just lie 2:12:12.720 --> 2:12:16.240 and even Donald Trump actually can lie about people eating 2:12:16.360 --> 2:12:19.920 dogs and cats, and it doesn't hugely matter if an 2:12:20.000 --> 2:12:22.880 hour later and use outlet tweets, oh we fact check him, 2:12:22.880 --> 2:12:26.400 and it's not okay. Right, You're still broadcast to millions 2:12:26.440 --> 2:12:29.120 of people that Haitian migrants eat dogs and cats and 2:12:29.200 --> 2:12:32.200 that's not true. And I think we need to strive 2:12:32.280 --> 2:12:35.120 for something that it's closer to the truth, and it's 2:12:35.120 --> 2:12:38.440 closer to fairness, and it gives us moral clarity because 2:12:39.000 --> 2:12:41.840 what we're all doing right now, what the legacy media 2:12:41.920 --> 2:12:44.800 doing is doing right now, is like woefully inadequate to 2:12:44.880 --> 2:12:45.480 meet the moment. 2:12:46.400 --> 2:12:49.680 Yeah, I mean I agree, Like I think, where I 2:12:49.720 --> 2:12:54.560 don't actually know how to solve things is the incentive structure, Yeah, 2:12:54.680 --> 2:12:57.360 is so broken. And to an extent, all of us 2:12:57.440 --> 2:13:00.320 talk about objectivity. And when I say that, I'm like, 2:13:00.440 --> 2:13:04.440 the talk that outlets and editors have about objectivity, is 2:13:04.520 --> 2:13:08.040 there more than anything to obscure the fact that the 2:13:08.240 --> 2:13:12.840 economics of journalism make it almost impossible for it to 2:13:12.920 --> 2:13:17.160 be anything but a willing agent of disinformation. That's the 2:13:17.280 --> 2:13:21.320 real issue is you can have the Washington Post and 2:13:21.440 --> 2:13:24.640 you can have the New York Times host good reporting, 2:13:25.240 --> 2:13:28.160 but a huge amount of their income will always come 2:13:28.200 --> 2:13:32.520 from having columnists whose entire job is to piss people 2:13:32.640 --> 2:13:36.560 off or to stoke the egos of people in power. 2:13:37.080 --> 2:13:40.080 And I don't know that the good work those outlets 2:13:40.120 --> 2:13:45.920 does outweighs the crap that they spill into the public discourse, 2:13:46.560 --> 2:13:51.120 because that's what's incentivized. And so I think to an extent, 2:13:51.840 --> 2:13:56.960 there's almost no point in actually engaging with the objectivity 2:13:57.040 --> 2:13:59.560 debate with the people who are pushing it, because they're 2:13:59.600 --> 2:14:02.480 not push it honestly, They're pushing it as a way 2:14:02.520 --> 2:14:05.360 to obscure the fact that they make their money the 2:14:05.440 --> 2:14:08.040 same way Mark Zuckerberg makes his money, which is by 2:14:08.520 --> 2:14:10.920 spreading fear, anger, and doubt. 2:14:11.720 --> 2:14:15.280 Yeah. Yeah, that's the bad op ed industrial complex. Like 2:14:16.080 --> 2:14:18.320 I've been guilty of that. Right, you see a fucking 2:14:18.360 --> 2:14:21.320 headline on social media and you're like, that's bullshit, and 2:14:21.400 --> 2:14:22.320 then you click and read. 2:14:22.520 --> 2:14:22.640 Right. 2:14:23.120 --> 2:14:24.600 I used to, like when I was a little baby, 2:14:24.680 --> 2:14:27.160 journalist's engage with this and be like that's bullshit because 2:14:27.600 --> 2:14:29.960 and either try and write about it somewhere or post 2:14:30.000 --> 2:14:32.400 you on social media. But I have come to realize 2:14:32.440 --> 2:14:35.680 and in doing that, I'm doing exactly what they want 2:14:35.720 --> 2:14:38.000 me to do, which is continue sending people to their 2:14:38.040 --> 2:14:40.880 website to click on adverts and to make the money. 2:14:41.040 --> 2:14:42.600 So I think it's better that we do not do that. 2:14:42.760 --> 2:14:47.320 But yeah, that is the fundamental conceit of journalism right now. 2:14:47.840 --> 2:14:50.880 How it pays the bills is keeping you on that page, 2:14:50.920 --> 2:14:52.320 and a way it keeps you on that page is 2:14:52.480 --> 2:14:55.720 making you angry. There is like a model, I think, 2:14:56.440 --> 2:15:00.720 And you see this like in community small community newspapers 2:15:00.800 --> 2:15:03.160 right now, like I guess outlets like Left Coast Right 2:15:03.240 --> 2:15:07.880 Watching in California and Oregon, where like people genuinely buy 2:15:08.040 --> 2:15:11.120 building trust and telling the truth, gain the support of 2:15:11.640 --> 2:15:15.480 their communities and financed by them. But I mean the 2:15:15.680 --> 2:15:19.320 orders of magnitude and income difference are like they're not 2:15:19.360 --> 2:15:21.600 making Washington Post money over at Left Coast Right Watch. 2:15:21.880 --> 2:15:25.960 I know this should be true. So yeah, pretty fucked, 2:15:26.520 --> 2:15:30.360 and it will only get worse. I think like as 2:15:30.400 --> 2:15:33.360 we as far as we continue to slide into like 2:15:33.480 --> 2:15:37.440 the post truth fascism world, I can't really see our 2:15:37.560 --> 2:15:41.480 legacy outlets doing much about it. If all they are 2:15:41.480 --> 2:15:43.880 ever going to do is strive for the middle ground 2:15:43.960 --> 2:15:44.160 on this. 2:15:45.200 --> 2:15:49.680 Well, all right, okay, everybody, all right, they got off 2:15:49.720 --> 2:15:51.080 a good day in that world. 2:16:10.160 --> 2:16:14.200 This is it could happen here Executive Disorder, our weekly 2:16:14.320 --> 2:16:16.280 news gaest covering what's happening in the White House, the 2:16:16.320 --> 2:16:18.720 crumbling world, what it means for you. I'm Garrison Davis 2:16:18.760 --> 2:16:22.840 this episode, I'm joined by Robert Evans, James Stout, and 2:16:23.000 --> 2:16:26.880 Sophie Lichterman. Maybe maybe Sophie will decide to comment on 2:16:26.960 --> 2:16:29.840 some of this important important news we have today. 2:16:30.240 --> 2:16:33.160 To bless us, and maybe Robert will decide to forgive 2:16:33.200 --> 2:16:35.879 you for jumping into giving the title of this show 2:16:36.000 --> 2:16:39.320 and not letting me say electile dysfunction or something like that. 2:16:39.959 --> 2:16:43.600 We know I have not gotten over living. Let's talk 2:16:43.640 --> 2:16:48.879 about a pedophile. It's time for your Friday pedophile Update. Yeah, 2:16:49.480 --> 2:16:52.400 we call it the FREEO file minute. I don't like 2:16:52.520 --> 2:16:56.920 that it is free to callos SO. On August fifteenth, 2:16:57.040 --> 2:17:01.360 twenty twenty five, at eight thirty six Annoan that means 2:17:01.480 --> 2:17:04.920 in the morning, the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department Office 2:17:04.959 --> 2:17:07.800 of Public Information put up a press release with the 2:17:07.879 --> 2:17:11.800 title eight child sex predators arrested during undercover operation. 2:17:12.480 --> 2:17:12.600 Now. 2:17:12.879 --> 2:17:16.600 This was a report on a multi agency operation going 2:17:16.640 --> 2:17:19.240 after child sex predators that was headed by the Nevada 2:17:19.320 --> 2:17:24.240 Internet Crimes Against Children or ICAC organization, which is a 2:17:24.360 --> 2:17:27.280 joint operation that involves a mix of There's some detectives 2:17:27.320 --> 2:17:29.920 from the Las Vegas Metropolitan to Police, there's some folks 2:17:29.959 --> 2:17:33.160 from the FBI Child Exploitation Task Force, and then I 2:17:33.200 --> 2:17:35.560 guess the ICAC has its own task force. I've never 2:17:35.600 --> 2:17:38.360 heard of this group before, but there's a number of 2:17:38.400 --> 2:17:41.480 other law enforcement agents involved, including North Las Vegas Police, 2:17:41.560 --> 2:17:45.280 Henderson Police who actually posted declaration of arrest for the 2:17:45.360 --> 2:17:48.400 person that we'll be talking about. That's the Henderson Nevada Police, 2:17:48.760 --> 2:17:52.920 Homeland Security Investigations, and the Nevada Attorney General's Office. This 2:17:53.200 --> 2:17:56.400 was your standard sting to try and catch people who 2:17:56.440 --> 2:17:58.760 are attempting to have sex with kids, where you have 2:17:59.200 --> 2:18:02.440 undercover agents who are online. In this case, they were 2:18:02.560 --> 2:18:06.600 using an app called Pure and on WhatsApp. It looks like, 2:18:06.840 --> 2:18:10.280 as a general rule, these guys met the person that 2:18:10.360 --> 2:18:13.320 they thought was a minor on Pure and then took 2:18:13.440 --> 2:18:16.320 the conversation to WhatsApp to plan for an in person 2:18:16.440 --> 2:18:20.119 meeting where they then they you know the whole what's 2:18:20.200 --> 2:18:22.280 that guy who used to do the TV show where 2:18:22.320 --> 2:18:25.520 he would bust pedophiles And there were some ethical problems 2:18:25.560 --> 2:18:27.680 with Chris Hansen. They'd have their Chris Hansen moment, right, 2:18:27.720 --> 2:18:31.040 I'm familiar with this. Oh man, it didn't go well. 2:18:31.520 --> 2:18:34.520 So the story that people have been hearing and that 2:18:34.640 --> 2:18:36.400 kind of went viral out of this is that one 2:18:36.440 --> 2:18:41.160 of these eight people arrested was tom Ardiam Alexandrovitch, who 2:18:41.360 --> 2:18:44.600 was a high ranking cybersecurity official. He was the director 2:18:45.080 --> 2:18:48.600 of one of the divisions of Israel's top cybersecurity agency. 2:18:49.120 --> 2:18:52.439 So you know in Israeli government official working in cybersecurity 2:18:52.560 --> 2:18:54.640 is one of the guys arrested. He was in town 2:18:54.840 --> 2:18:57.920 in Las Vegas for the black Hat convention, which is 2:18:58.080 --> 2:19:01.520 like a hacking convention, and like a lot of hacking conventions, 2:19:01.560 --> 2:19:03.880 over time it has turned from a bunch of guys 2:19:03.920 --> 2:19:06.560 who do not like the Feds to just Feds, right, 2:19:06.760 --> 2:19:09.400 Like I think that's why the guy guy from Israel 2:19:09.480 --> 2:19:13.080 cybersecurity agency is at this thing, hitten on so fed 2:19:13.240 --> 2:19:17.880 allegedly fifteen year olds. So this guy is arrested and 2:19:18.080 --> 2:19:21.000 then he posts bail at ten grand and he flies 2:19:21.080 --> 2:19:23.080 back to Israel, which gets a lot of people in 2:19:23.160 --> 2:19:27.840 an uproar. Obviously, anything involving officials of the Israeli government 2:19:27.959 --> 2:19:31.080 is receiving heightened scrutiny right now, what with the genocide, 2:19:31.480 --> 2:19:33.640 and also for a long time, there's a lot of 2:19:33.680 --> 2:19:36.200 evidence of special treatment being given to agents of the 2:19:36.240 --> 2:19:39.440 government of Israel by the United States government, and so 2:19:39.560 --> 2:19:41.879 people are like, is that what's going on here, because 2:19:41.879 --> 2:19:44.280 this seems pretty fucked up. And I guess the first 2:19:44.320 --> 2:19:46.320 thing I should say is that it doesn't seem like 2:19:46.480 --> 2:19:49.879 he's being treated differently from anyone else in this sting. 2:19:50.560 --> 2:19:55.040 This is per statements made by the local government and 2:19:55.200 --> 2:19:59.039 by the Attorney General's office. This is the standard bail 2:19:59.120 --> 2:20:02.560 amount for this crime. And when people post bail for 2:20:02.760 --> 2:20:05.040 this crime, which is the standard amount of ten grand, 2:20:05.400 --> 2:20:08.480 there aren't conditions usually on the bail, which means it 2:20:08.520 --> 2:20:11.000 would not be standard to stop him from traveling or 2:20:11.040 --> 2:20:13.240 returning home. He's due to return to the United States 2:20:13.320 --> 2:20:16.440 in several weeks for the court proceedings to go on. 2:20:16.840 --> 2:20:20.000 So the short answer to this seems to be that, like, no, 2:20:20.200 --> 2:20:22.480 this is just kind of how the system works, and 2:20:23.360 --> 2:20:25.360 that might not be great, But he doesn't seem to 2:20:25.440 --> 2:20:28.600 have been given special treatment because he was an official 2:20:28.640 --> 2:20:31.160 of the Israeli government. Now, does that mean that that's 2:20:31.200 --> 2:20:33.640 going to prove to be what happens in the long run, No, Because, 2:20:33.640 --> 2:20:35.800 among other things, he might just not come back to 2:20:35.920 --> 2:20:39.640 the US. And if the Israeli government is a party 2:20:39.720 --> 2:20:41.840 to that, and like there isn't any kind of like 2:20:42.680 --> 2:20:45.400 action taken to force him to return to go through 2:20:45.440 --> 2:20:47.880 the legal process, then I'd say, yeah, there's something to 2:20:47.959 --> 2:20:50.560 be particularly upset about here. But I think the broader 2:20:50.600 --> 2:20:52.680 thing to maybe be upset about here is that guys 2:20:52.720 --> 2:20:54.520 can get caught for this and then have a no 2:20:54.640 --> 2:20:56.960 condition bail that allows them to flee the country, which 2:20:57.120 --> 2:20:58.840 might be a flaw in the system. 2:20:59.160 --> 2:20:59.280 Right. 2:20:59.840 --> 2:21:02.360 I'm a big innocent until proven guilty guy. I'm a 2:21:02.520 --> 2:21:04.800 big reasonable bail guy. But I'm also a big I 2:21:04.840 --> 2:21:06.560 don't know man. Maybe if the agent of a foreign 2:21:06.600 --> 2:21:09.080 government gets caught trying to fuck a child, they shouldn't 2:21:09.080 --> 2:21:10.520 be able to fly back home immediately. 2:21:11.120 --> 2:21:12.400 Do they bail out? I don't know. 2:21:13.440 --> 2:21:15.280 To seems that it's a reasonable objection. 2:21:15.879 --> 2:21:16.119 Yeah. 2:21:16.640 --> 2:21:18.560 So you know, this is a classic case. 2:21:18.600 --> 2:21:21.680 If you've got the story what actually happened here, then 2:21:21.720 --> 2:21:24.680 you've got how it's interpreted online, and then you've got 2:21:25.200 --> 2:21:28.560 how it's being interpreted online by the stupidest person on 2:21:28.600 --> 2:21:31.160 the world, on the planet, in the planet, and in 2:21:31.280 --> 2:21:33.200 that planet that didn't work. 2:21:33.560 --> 2:21:35.160 Oh, it'd be good if he was, wouldn't it in 2:21:35.240 --> 2:21:38.680 the molten cools? Yeah, that would be nice. 2:21:39.400 --> 2:21:42.519 You've got how this story is being interpreted by particularly 2:21:42.959 --> 2:21:45.600 bad journalists. Let's say that that's the nice way to 2:21:45.640 --> 2:21:48.360 put it. And I'm talking about Michael Tracy. If you're 2:21:48.400 --> 2:21:51.480 not familiar with Michael Tracy, he is ostensibly a leftist 2:21:51.560 --> 2:21:54.680 and anti authoritarian. He's the kind of guy who just 2:21:54.720 --> 2:21:58.040 sort of reflexibly if the US is involved, whatever is 2:21:58.120 --> 2:22:01.200 the worst case scenario for the US doing something is 2:22:01.240 --> 2:22:04.480 what's happening. During the invasion of Ukraine, he alleged that 2:22:04.480 --> 2:22:07.040 the US was sending troops into Ukraine. I think because 2:22:07.080 --> 2:22:09.400 he saw some guys outside of an embassy in Poland, 2:22:09.480 --> 2:22:10.520 some American soldier for. 2:22:10.600 --> 2:22:12.840 The marine details and some of the marine detail. 2:22:12.879 --> 2:22:14.480 It was like, we're getting ready to invade. 2:22:15.879 --> 2:22:16.800 That did not happen. 2:22:17.760 --> 2:22:21.680 Now, Michael Tracy has a sub stack, of course, many 2:22:21.800 --> 2:22:24.360 such cases. And he published an article titled was an 2:22:24.440 --> 2:22:27.920 Israeli pedophile really allowed to flee the United States? And 2:22:28.920 --> 2:22:31.279 I can't tell He starts with like a whole paragraph 2:22:31.320 --> 2:22:33.920 about Jeffrey Epstein, and I can't actually tell what his 2:22:34.040 --> 2:22:36.680 stance is on this, and I don't really want he's 2:22:36.680 --> 2:22:38.520 talking about how people are eager to prove him wrong 2:22:38.560 --> 2:22:40.880 about Jeffrey Epstein. I have no desire to know what 2:22:40.959 --> 2:22:42.520 this guy thinks about Jeffrey Epstein. 2:22:43.040 --> 2:22:45.560 This is probably a Jeffrey Epstein was a secret massad 2:22:45.640 --> 2:22:46.520 agent type thing. 2:22:47.160 --> 2:22:49.920 Well, except for his whole argument here is that there's 2:22:50.560 --> 2:22:54.320 people are being incredibly unreasonable to think that this guy 2:22:54.480 --> 2:22:57.160 is guilty or to think that he probably did anything wrong. 2:22:57.280 --> 2:23:02.040 And the reason Michael Tracy suggests that Alexandrovitch probably didn't 2:23:02.040 --> 2:23:05.480 do anything wrong is that the terms of the app pure, 2:23:05.800 --> 2:23:08.480 which is where the authorities say he first got in 2:23:08.560 --> 2:23:11.640 contact with the officer pretending to be a child, requires 2:23:11.680 --> 2:23:13.760 you to be eighteen years or older. And in this 2:23:13.840 --> 2:23:18.720 substack he posts post the terms of service to be 2:23:18.879 --> 2:23:21.520 like ce. There is even what appears to be a 2:23:21.640 --> 2:23:24.960 rigorous age verification process to ensure that no minor gains 2:23:25.000 --> 2:23:27.879 access to the app. Government issued documents must be submitted 2:23:27.879 --> 2:23:30.000 to ensure that only persons at least eighteen years of 2:23:30.080 --> 2:23:32.200 older allowed on the app. And he's like does this 2:23:32.360 --> 2:23:35.839 mean the government was faking documents, was pretending. 2:23:35.480 --> 2:23:37.119 To be a child to this app. 2:23:37.440 --> 2:23:39.720 Yet that's what they were doing, Well, they were pretending 2:23:39.720 --> 2:23:42.240 to be a child, Jeremary, Yeah, that's probably what they 2:23:42.280 --> 2:23:44.959 were doing. And the other thing what's really funny about 2:23:44.959 --> 2:23:46.640 this is like that's his whole point is that the 2:23:46.720 --> 2:23:49.040 app requires them to be eighteen, So it's you know, 2:23:49.400 --> 2:23:52.360 the authorities must have been doing something fucked up and 2:23:52.480 --> 2:23:54.440 lying to the app for this to have happened at all. 2:23:54.760 --> 2:23:56.920 And this is just an example of Michael Tracy not 2:23:57.160 --> 2:24:01.039 reading the declaration of arrest, which he links in his article, 2:24:01.440 --> 2:24:04.440 because the declaration of arrest does say that, yes, this 2:24:04.600 --> 2:24:07.160 person got in contact with the undercover agent bearing the 2:24:07.200 --> 2:24:09.680 peer up and then the same sentence says and later 2:24:09.920 --> 2:24:12.880 WhatsApp with phone number dot dot dot and says that 2:24:13.080 --> 2:24:16.360 on WhatsApp, this is where they talked about the person 2:24:16.760 --> 2:24:18.960 in this case being a minor, and this is where 2:24:19.000 --> 2:24:22.000 they set up like to arrange a meeting. This Israeli 2:24:22.040 --> 2:24:24.200 cybersecurity official was going to take them to circ the 2:24:24.280 --> 2:24:25.800 slat and had them bring a condom. 2:24:26.360 --> 2:24:29.199 Like that's all in the declaration of arrest. 2:24:29.400 --> 2:24:33.320 Now, obviously Alexandrovitch maintains his innocence, maintains he thought this 2:24:33.400 --> 2:24:36.400 person was eighteen all the entire time. All I've got 2:24:36.440 --> 2:24:38.920 here is the declaration of arrest. I don't have hard evidence, 2:24:39.000 --> 2:24:43.000 but per the source that Michael Tracy cites, like this 2:24:43.200 --> 2:24:46.360 is not just happening on pure This is as is 2:24:46.480 --> 2:24:48.959 often the case, by the way, when pedophiles go after kids, 2:24:49.160 --> 2:24:51.640 they meet them on whatever app and then take them 2:24:51.720 --> 2:24:54.840 to a second digital location, right, Like That's just the 2:24:54.920 --> 2:24:57.400 way these things work. And that's really all I have 2:24:57.520 --> 2:24:59.320 to say about this. You know this, This is the 2:24:59.400 --> 2:25:01.039 kind of I keep an eye on this in case 2:25:01.120 --> 2:25:03.200 this guy doesn't go back and the Israeli government does 2:25:03.320 --> 2:25:05.920 hide him. But it's entirely possible that this will go 2:25:06.120 --> 2:25:08.320 the way court cases and this sort of thing are 2:25:08.360 --> 2:25:11.200 supposed to go. There's one other funny thing, considering this 2:25:11.280 --> 2:25:14.960 guy is a high ranking Israeli cybersecurity official, there's just 2:25:15.080 --> 2:25:17.400 like a list of, you know, statements about like what 2:25:17.560 --> 2:25:21.760 Alexandrovitch said to detectives when he was being interrogated, you know, 2:25:21.879 --> 2:25:24.640 the stuff like Alexander Alexandrovitch stated he did not know 2:25:24.680 --> 2:25:27.280 the numbers for the Israeli government. Alexandrovitch stated his family 2:25:27.400 --> 2:25:30.160 was an Israel Alexandrovitch stated it was important he get 2:25:30.240 --> 2:25:33.119 numbers for his flight, and then Alexandrovitch stated his phone 2:25:33.160 --> 2:25:35.840 does not have a password but uses his right thumb print. 2:25:36.040 --> 2:25:42.480 No, a biometric user, cybersecurity expert for the histor government 2:25:42.640 --> 2:25:45.640 and not sending the best people. Oh my god, your 2:25:45.720 --> 2:25:48.840 fucking thumb print, dude, your fucking thumb print. 2:25:49.200 --> 2:25:54.960 Okay, yeah, it's just famous, most secure possible access code. 2:25:55.200 --> 2:25:57.960 Anyway, That's all I've got for peta Friday tune in 2:25:58.080 --> 2:25:59.680 next week we'll have another pedophile. 2:26:00.480 --> 2:26:14.600 I'm sure of it. Oh yeah, here's ads. All right, 2:26:14.640 --> 2:26:17.240 we're back, and it is a pedophile free will. We 2:26:17.280 --> 2:26:20.880 can't guarantee that, I suppose, but we're hoping Peter free 2:26:20.959 --> 2:26:24.440 zone from here on it. Talking of things which are 2:26:24.760 --> 2:26:31.880 incontrovertibly crimes, Israel has deliberately murdered for Al Jazeera journalists 2:26:31.920 --> 2:26:34.360 in Gaza. Among them was an us Our Sharif, a 2:26:34.440 --> 2:26:38.040 prominent correspondent for the network in Gaza. The IDF also 2:26:38.200 --> 2:26:45.120 killed correspondent Mohammed Karka, cameraman Ibrahim Zaiah and driver in cameeronman. 2:26:45.240 --> 2:26:48.400 Mohammed Nofal Al Jazeera has named all of these people. 2:26:48.520 --> 2:26:51.840 The strike also killed two freelancers. One of them was 2:26:52.080 --> 2:26:56.400 mom And Aliwa and al Shariff's nephew, who was a 2:26:56.480 --> 2:27:00.959 student studying journalism for weeks before the written pre meditated 2:27:01.040 --> 2:27:03.560 war crime to war crime under a Rome statue and 2:27:03.640 --> 2:27:07.120 also a violation of the Geneva Conventions because journalists are 2:27:07.160 --> 2:27:11.720 also civilians. The idea of engaged in manufacturing consent for 2:27:11.800 --> 2:27:14.280 the strike. They did this through unit that nine to 2:27:14.320 --> 2:27:18.640 seven two magazine has reported on called the quote legitimization cell. 2:27:19.360 --> 2:27:22.360 You're always doing great way when you have a unit 2:27:22.440 --> 2:27:26.640 called the legitimization cell. Yeah, that's yeah. It's pretty fucked 2:27:26.840 --> 2:27:29.600 to quote from the piece which are link below. It 2:27:29.720 --> 2:27:32.240 has been a signed to identify Gaza based journalist it 2:27:32.320 --> 2:27:35.199 could betray as undercover her mass operatives in an effort 2:27:35.320 --> 2:27:39.600 to blunt growing global outrage over Israel's killing of reporters. 2:27:40.640 --> 2:27:44.000 You should read this article like it goes through instances 2:27:44.040 --> 2:27:46.960 whether they have a very clear confirmation bias right, and 2:27:48.000 --> 2:27:51.200 the case of Alcherifhys is a pretty good example of 2:27:51.360 --> 2:27:54.280 how ridiculous this can be. They released this document. They 2:27:54.320 --> 2:27:56.879 tweeted it actually claiming he was in her masks from 2:27:56.959 --> 2:28:01.320 twenty thirteen to twenty seventeen. The document clearly wasn't original document, 2:28:01.400 --> 2:28:03.400 Like it was a PDF done up with like a 2:28:03.480 --> 2:28:06.600 navy blue background and stuff. It's laughable to think that 2:28:06.680 --> 2:28:10.840 they like captured this pdf somehow. It just doesn't line 2:28:10.920 --> 2:28:13.600 up even if we take that to be true, right, 2:28:13.680 --> 2:28:15.480 that he had been a member of her mass till 2:28:15.520 --> 2:28:19.040 twenty seventeen, that was eight years ago. Like, isn't the 2:28:19.120 --> 2:28:20.920 whole point of the thing that they're saying that they 2:28:20.959 --> 2:28:23.640 want people to stop being in her mass, like killing 2:28:23.720 --> 2:28:27.320 them because they wanted that, And I don't believe them. 2:28:28.440 --> 2:28:31.200 It still doesn't make sense, right. They've done this in 2:28:31.360 --> 2:28:34.920 other cases with other Juras, specifically other Al Jazeera journalists. 2:28:35.480 --> 2:28:38.400 In July this year, the CPJA that's a committee to 2:28:38.440 --> 2:28:41.320 protect journalists if you're not familiar, warned that they were 2:28:41.440 --> 2:28:43.640 worried about an attack on al Sharif due to the 2:28:43.720 --> 2:28:47.040 increasingly detached from reality smear campaign being pursued against him 2:28:47.040 --> 2:28:51.400 by IDs spokesman of Vich Adray. For example, on the 2:28:51.440 --> 2:28:55.120 twenties July Adray accused him of being quote part of 2:28:55.240 --> 2:28:59.600 a quote false her Mask campaign on Starvation as he 2:28:59.640 --> 2:29:03.600 played footage of Alcherif crying after seeing a woman collapse 2:29:03.640 --> 2:29:07.200 from hunger on camera. Speaking about the campaign, al Chherif 2:29:07.360 --> 2:29:10.120 said it is not only a media threat or an 2:29:10.160 --> 2:29:13.440 image destruction, it is a real life threat. He said 2:29:13.480 --> 2:29:16.320 it's in his interview with CPJ. He also said, I 2:29:16.440 --> 2:29:18.160 live with the feeling that I could be bombed and 2:29:18.280 --> 2:29:21.320 martyred at any moment. My family is also in danger, 2:29:22.040 --> 2:29:24.080 and his nephew was killed with him right in the 2:29:24.200 --> 2:29:27.680 earth strike. When I think about like, I have colleagues 2:29:27.760 --> 2:29:29.879 I've worked with through a Palestinian who work in Gaza. 2:29:30.200 --> 2:29:35.320 I remember twenty twenty three October tenth, twenty twenty three, 2:29:35.400 --> 2:29:39.720 I was in Syria and Rajaba specifically, and I was 2:29:39.760 --> 2:29:42.520 sitting in a t shop because the Wi Fi and 2:29:42.560 --> 2:29:45.000 my hotel was non existent, and I wanted to check 2:29:45.040 --> 2:29:47.760 in on my friends, right who worked there, And I 2:29:47.800 --> 2:29:51.800 remember this guy helping me translate one of these videos 2:29:51.840 --> 2:29:54.360 in which you see a dead person in the blue 2:29:54.400 --> 2:29:56.480 press vest, right, and I was concerned that it might 2:29:56.520 --> 2:29:58.320 be someone I've worked with before, so I was trying 2:29:58.320 --> 2:30:00.320 to work out it with them, and he saying in 2:30:00.360 --> 2:30:03.280 this video at the funeral, people were saying that another 2:30:03.360 --> 2:30:05.640 journalist would take up the dead journalist camera and the 2:30:05.720 --> 2:30:08.720 flag jacket and keep reporting, which is very touching for me. 2:30:08.959 --> 2:30:11.920 But journalists in Gaza have been targeted by the IDF 2:30:12.000 --> 2:30:14.480 for a very long time, and this is one of 2:30:14.640 --> 2:30:18.640 many examples, and it's disgusting and reprehensible. That's about all 2:30:18.680 --> 2:30:20.200 I have to say on it. Should we turn to 2:30:20.280 --> 2:30:25.440 immigration for something equally despondent and sad? Yeah, all right. 2:30:26.200 --> 2:30:30.959 USCIS US Citizenship and Immigration Services has issued a new 2:30:31.320 --> 2:30:34.920 guidance material to instruct offices in cases where they can 2:30:35.040 --> 2:30:37.959 use their discretion to look at whether the person has 2:30:38.040 --> 2:30:41.840 quote endorsed, promoted, or supported, or otherwise espouse the views 2:30:41.840 --> 2:30:45.600 of a terrorist organization or group, including those who support 2:30:45.720 --> 2:30:49.920 or promote anti American ideologies and activities, anti Semitic terrorism 2:30:50.080 --> 2:30:53.400 from skipping a bit here, and anti Semitic ideologies. This 2:30:53.640 --> 2:30:57.440 discretion can be used in extension of staycases, change of 2:30:57.560 --> 2:31:01.880 status cases, reinstatement or f or non immigrant status, and 2:31:01.959 --> 2:31:05.200 certain employment authorization requests, they say in the moment. The 2:31:05.320 --> 2:31:09.120 USCIS policy Manual also lists other instances where discretion could 2:31:09.120 --> 2:31:13.720 be used These include TPS, temporary protected status, humanitarian parole, 2:31:14.400 --> 2:31:16.840 partition to classify an alien as a fiancee of a 2:31:16.959 --> 2:31:21.080 US citizen, asylum and refugee status. So I looked up 2:31:21.120 --> 2:31:25.080 what the quote anti American activities were. There's a footnote right. 2:31:25.320 --> 2:31:29.760 The footnote links to IA three one three, a Immigration 2:31:29.920 --> 2:31:33.760 Naturalization Act. Most of the anti American activities are things 2:31:33.760 --> 2:31:37.240 which already had a bar to naturalization, and most of 2:31:37.240 --> 2:31:40.119 those pertain directly to being a member of the Communist Party, 2:31:40.800 --> 2:31:45.119 like a literal card carrying member of the literal Communist Party, 2:31:45.240 --> 2:31:48.280 right capital C, Capital P. The US who had a 2:31:48.400 --> 2:31:51.480 bar on naturalization for people who are members of the 2:31:51.520 --> 2:31:54.800 Communist Party for some time. I believe they still have 2:31:54.959 --> 2:31:58.120 a bar on naturalization for people who were members of 2:31:58.200 --> 2:32:01.320 the Nazi Party. Preview a waiver, I should say, not 2:32:01.400 --> 2:32:04.600 actually a visa. When people from Europe coming to United States, 2:32:04.640 --> 2:32:07.240 you'd have to answer a short questionnaire. One of the 2:32:07.320 --> 2:32:10.000 questions was about whether you or anyone related to you 2:32:10.120 --> 2:32:13.040 had been a member of the Nazi Party. I remember, 2:32:13.240 --> 2:32:15.960 like once being some German people in Europe and they 2:32:16.000 --> 2:32:17.920 were telling me they'd had to answer this question entering 2:32:17.959 --> 2:32:21.800 the United States. So the anti American activities is the 2:32:21.840 --> 2:32:25.000 one that's been getting the most attention, But it does 2:32:25.040 --> 2:32:29.199 specifically footnote to the communist stuff, which is again something 2:32:29.280 --> 2:32:31.480 that that has been US policy for a while. What 2:32:31.840 --> 2:32:35.720 I'm more worried about is stuff about anti Semitic terrorism. 2:32:36.440 --> 2:32:40.480 Yeah, because that means one, you've shared a pro Palestine 2:32:41.160 --> 2:32:42.760 post on social media. 2:32:42.920 --> 2:32:44.200 Yeah you said genocide bad. 2:32:44.480 --> 2:32:46.840 Yeah, that can mean so many things that as we've 2:32:46.840 --> 2:32:48.680 already seen, like we've seen some of this stuff already 2:32:48.720 --> 2:32:52.440 be enforced. This is new guidance material, but we've seen 2:32:52.520 --> 2:32:54.520 reports coming from people trying to enter the country or 2:32:54.560 --> 2:32:57.240 trying to get visas that show that this is happening 2:32:57.720 --> 2:33:00.480 for like months ever since, like you know, like March, 2:33:00.560 --> 2:33:03.080 I started to see a lot of stuff regarding either 2:33:03.200 --> 2:33:08.000 pro Palestinian statements or like posts or campus protests that 2:33:08.080 --> 2:33:08.640 sort of stuff. 2:33:09.240 --> 2:33:11.040 Yeah. The f visa I mentioned there is it's a 2:33:11.080 --> 2:33:13.640 non immigrant student visa right for full time students. So 2:33:13.920 --> 2:33:16.760 like that is the one where we've seen students having 2:33:16.800 --> 2:33:19.440 to turn over their social media handles or social media 2:33:19.520 --> 2:33:22.440 can't be locked. It's very easy to see how these 2:33:22.440 --> 2:33:24.000 two things lind up. Yeah, and as a guy said, 2:33:24.040 --> 2:33:26.800 like people. They have always been able to use their discretion. 2:33:26.920 --> 2:33:28.600 This is just guidance on how they should use it, 2:33:28.640 --> 2:33:31.320 but they have been using it for some time. The 2:33:31.360 --> 2:33:36.000 administration has also moved the goalpost for naturalization, so naturalization 2:33:36.160 --> 2:33:38.959 is becoming a citizen of the United States. Right, there 2:33:39.080 --> 2:33:42.240 is a requirement that people who naturalize as citizens have 2:33:42.520 --> 2:33:46.360 quote good moral character. Previously, the way they did this 2:33:46.640 --> 2:33:50.480 was there were bars for certain crimes, right murdered genocide, 2:33:51.120 --> 2:33:53.600 something called aggravated felony, which is something that only exists 2:33:53.600 --> 2:33:56.880 in immigration law. Going forward, their changing to I guess 2:33:56.920 --> 2:33:59.400 a more holistic idea of what a good moral character 2:33:59.520 --> 2:34:03.080 might be. I'm going to quote again. Going forward, USCIS 2:34:03.200 --> 2:34:06.360 officers must account for an alien's positive attributes and not 2:34:06.560 --> 2:34:10.520 simply the absence of misconduct in evaluating whether or not 2:34:10.760 --> 2:34:13.920 an alien has met the requirement for establishing GMC. That's 2:34:13.920 --> 2:34:17.160 a good moral character. The officer must take a holistic 2:34:17.240 --> 2:34:20.760 approach in evaluating whether or not an alien seeking naturalization 2:34:20.920 --> 2:34:24.680 has affirmatively established that he or she has met their 2:34:24.720 --> 2:34:27.640 burden of establishing that they are worthy of assuming the 2:34:27.720 --> 2:34:30.400 rights and responsibilities of United States citizenship. 2:34:31.920 --> 2:34:35.320 The worthy what does that mean? You have to prove 2:34:35.440 --> 2:34:37.240 to an officer that you're a good person. 2:34:37.560 --> 2:34:39.160 Yeah, how so. 2:34:39.879 --> 2:34:42.560 Yes, by the officer's definition, I'm assuming. 2:34:42.600 --> 2:34:48.320 Yeah, yeah, I mean this is guys for like discretionary enforcement. 2:34:48.480 --> 2:34:50.840 So I don't like the word holistic here. 2:34:51.600 --> 2:34:55.680 I don't. Yeah, there is literally asking him to take 2:34:55.680 --> 2:34:57.960 into account everything they know about this person and then 2:34:58.080 --> 2:35:00.280 just make a call. Is this someway you want to 2:35:00.280 --> 2:35:01.760 have as your neighbor, you know? Like, I don't know 2:35:01.879 --> 2:35:04.360 what the oh, I mean, I can guess how this 2:35:04.480 --> 2:35:08.119 might manifested. It's worth noting that as DHS goes, USCIS 2:35:08.240 --> 2:35:11.240 officers tend to be the least right wing right CBP 2:35:11.600 --> 2:35:14.280 and I so the much higher proportion of people who like, 2:35:14.360 --> 2:35:17.519 for instance, they had some issues with getting people vaccinated 2:35:17.640 --> 2:35:20.440 and CBP that kind of stuff right, indicators that people 2:35:20.520 --> 2:35:23.879 might be sort of down this conspiracy pipeline. We also 2:35:24.040 --> 2:35:28.000 learned this week that Todd Blanche directed federal cops to 2:35:28.200 --> 2:35:31.640 arrest Mayor rasp Baraka outside of a detention center in 2:35:31.680 --> 2:35:35.400 New Jersey in May. We noticed because of body cam footage, 2:35:35.440 --> 2:35:37.240 we don't have the footage, but the footage is reported 2:35:37.280 --> 2:35:41.240 on in court documents, and the footage a DHS official says, quote, 2:35:41.640 --> 2:35:44.400 we are resting the mayor right now, per the Deputy 2:35:44.440 --> 2:35:47.160 Attorney General of the United States. Anyone that gets in 2:35:47.240 --> 2:35:49.240 our way, I need you guys, give me a perimeter 2:35:49.360 --> 2:35:51.520 so I can cuff him. So that the agent talked 2:35:51.560 --> 2:35:53.000 on the phone and then gave this statement. 2:35:53.080 --> 2:35:53.200 Right. 2:35:53.320 --> 2:35:56.120 So it seems that the deputy ag there with the 2:35:56.160 --> 2:35:58.440 one who gave the order to arrest rasp Baraka right, 2:35:59.480 --> 2:36:03.320 ice has also arrested a cop. This is our little 2:36:03.360 --> 2:36:03.800 moment of. 2:36:03.959 --> 2:36:06.440 Like harp pond cut violence, top pond cut violence. 2:36:06.520 --> 2:36:06.720 Yeah. 2:36:07.840 --> 2:36:11.240 John Luke Evans was a reserve officer for the Old 2:36:11.440 --> 2:36:15.120 Orchard Beach Police Department in Maine. The police chief of 2:36:15.360 --> 2:36:18.840 Orchard Beach, who's called at least charred, said that the 2:36:18.920 --> 2:36:22.880 department had used Everify to check if you could work legally, right, 2:36:23.000 --> 2:36:25.680 which is the thing that you are supposed to do. 2:36:26.320 --> 2:36:29.800 E Verify. It's a database run by the Department of 2:36:29.840 --> 2:36:33.200 Homeland Security. I think it's also in combination with another 2:36:33.280 --> 2:36:37.360 department that allows you to verify if somebody can work 2:36:37.440 --> 2:36:38.640 legally in the United States. 2:36:38.760 --> 2:36:38.880 Right. 2:36:39.320 --> 2:36:43.560 Tritian McLachlin characterized it as reckless, which is weird because 2:36:43.680 --> 2:36:47.240 dhs who she's speaking on behalf of the other ones 2:36:47.280 --> 2:36:52.000 who put that information into the database. It's possible that 2:36:52.240 --> 2:36:54.840 someone entered at something in wrong at some point right, 2:36:55.120 --> 2:36:57.880 someone put in a wrong number, they switched an O 2:36:58.120 --> 2:37:00.920 for a zero, or something like that. This came to 2:37:01.080 --> 2:37:05.280 light because Evans attempted to make a firearm purchase and 2:37:05.480 --> 2:37:08.440 he filled out his forty four to seventy three and 2:37:08.560 --> 2:37:12.000 the eighty f then notified ICE that a non citizen 2:37:12.040 --> 2:37:15.080 who wasn't eligible for firearms ownership had attempted to purchase 2:37:15.120 --> 2:37:19.240 a firearm, and that was how ICE came to detain him. 2:37:19.879 --> 2:37:22.520 He is being allowed to leave the USA voluntarily. He's 2:37:22.640 --> 2:37:25.480 not being deported. He's not being charged with attempting to 2:37:25.520 --> 2:37:27.440 make the firearm purchase, which he could be charged with, 2:37:28.320 --> 2:37:31.760 and the city of Orchard Beach is going pretty hard 2:37:32.080 --> 2:37:35.039 in his defense. They've released some elements of a personnel file, 2:37:35.080 --> 2:37:37.560 but none of them that pertained to his immigration status. 2:37:38.200 --> 2:37:40.600 They're sticking by their claim that they believe he was 2:37:40.800 --> 2:37:44.400 eligible to work in the USA. ICE are claiming, I 2:37:44.440 --> 2:37:47.280 guess DHS now are claiming that his visa expired in 2:37:47.360 --> 2:37:52.360 twenty twenty three, which was years before he began working 2:37:52.440 --> 2:37:55.640 at the police Department. He was a seasonal reserve officer 2:37:56.120 --> 2:37:59.000 and he had been working since earlier this year. 2:38:00.000 --> 2:38:01.720 Before we go on break, I want to do a 2:38:01.840 --> 2:38:05.600 quick update on the Texas Democrats who fled the state 2:38:05.800 --> 2:38:11.520 to delay or prevent the gerrymandering. And after their two 2:38:11.600 --> 2:38:15.400 week walkout, the Texas House has now reached quorum once 2:38:15.480 --> 2:38:19.039 again and a vote on the new redistricting map, which 2:38:19.080 --> 2:38:23.959 would add five Republican congressional seats, is slated for Wednesday, 2:38:24.480 --> 2:38:27.439 August twentieth, which is the day that we are recording. 2:38:28.040 --> 2:38:30.920 After Democrats returned to the Capitol from their walkout, they 2:38:31.000 --> 2:38:33.320 were subjected to twenty four to seven surveillance by the 2:38:33.400 --> 2:38:36.800 Texas Department of Public Safety, and in order to leave 2:38:36.840 --> 2:38:39.680 the House chamber, they had to sign what the Democrats 2:38:39.720 --> 2:38:44.000 are calling quote unquote permission slips, agreeing to surveillance in 2:38:44.120 --> 2:38:45.600 their just everyday life. 2:38:45.959 --> 2:38:48.760 Is that why I think it was a collier slept 2:38:48.800 --> 2:38:49.160 at her. 2:38:49.240 --> 2:38:53.360 Desk one person's I think a state senator refused to 2:38:53.480 --> 2:38:57.400 sign the slip and stayed in the Capitol overnight. There enough, 2:38:58.040 --> 2:39:02.640 the Texas House Minority Leader Jeen Wu made a statement saying, quote, 2:39:03.000 --> 2:39:07.199 we killed the corrupt special session was stood unprecedented surveillance 2:39:07.200 --> 2:39:11.039 and intimidation, and rallied Democrats nationwide to join this extential 2:39:11.080 --> 2:39:15.800 fight for fair representation, reshaping the entire twenty twenty sixth landscape. Unquote. 2:39:16.360 --> 2:39:20.039 There's a very celebratory tone here, which is slightly odd 2:39:20.080 --> 2:39:23.200 to me because this vote is still probably going through. 2:39:23.640 --> 2:39:24.720 Yeah, they kind of lose. 2:39:25.200 --> 2:39:26.440 This is going to get voted in. 2:39:26.600 --> 2:39:26.800 Yeah. 2:39:26.840 --> 2:39:29.400 Now, Wu has said that the Democrats are going to 2:39:29.520 --> 2:39:33.520 challenge the redistricting maps in court even if they are 2:39:33.560 --> 2:39:37.120 able to pass through this House vote, and as we know, 2:39:37.480 --> 2:39:40.440 the courts are the last bastion for democracy and will 2:39:40.600 --> 2:39:45.720 save us all. We suspected that this whole walkout is 2:39:45.800 --> 2:39:48.720 more performative than anything else and would not actually lead 2:39:48.800 --> 2:39:53.240 to than killing this map, and instead of remaining out 2:39:53.240 --> 2:39:57.120 of the state longer for an undeterminate amount of time, 2:39:57.280 --> 2:40:01.040 possibly until November, they have ret turned and quorum is 2:40:01.120 --> 2:40:01.600 in the chamber. 2:40:01.720 --> 2:40:05.800 So yeah, it's it's like it's not nothing, but it's 2:40:05.920 --> 2:40:08.560 like the next just it's one step up from nothing. 2:40:08.920 --> 2:40:10.720 It's the most democrat thing to do. 2:40:10.959 --> 2:40:13.880 Yes, yeah, but why why only do half of what 2:40:14.080 --> 2:40:14.760 was necessary? 2:40:15.240 --> 2:40:19.480 Yeah, Sophie, you you're asking this question because you didn't 2:40:20.000 --> 2:40:21.080 grow up in Texas. 2:40:21.760 --> 2:40:25.240 I went to the Democratic National Convention. I understand the 2:40:25.320 --> 2:40:25.960 half effort. 2:40:26.160 --> 2:40:27.080 Here's the reality. 2:40:27.480 --> 2:40:32.120 Texas Democratic Party exists to disappoint you. That's why, that's 2:40:32.160 --> 2:40:33.240 why all this is happening. 2:40:34.440 --> 2:40:38.240 I just feel like the entire Texas Democratic Party is 2:40:38.400 --> 2:40:42.480 just like a Beto O'Rourke, like the not not literally, 2:40:42.560 --> 2:40:44.400 but the concept of Beto o'rour. 2:40:45.000 --> 2:40:47.640 Yeah, not wrong, Yeah, it's all. 2:40:47.840 --> 2:40:48.440 It's all there. 2:40:48.959 --> 2:40:51.520 Never never put your faith in Texas and any part 2:40:51.560 --> 2:40:54.560 of Texas, and you you'll be disappointed less. I've been 2:40:54.600 --> 2:40:56.119 telling people this for a long time. 2:40:56.720 --> 2:40:58.720 Yeah, it's like the second thing you told me. 2:40:59.280 --> 2:40:59.800 Every year. 2:41:00.600 --> 2:41:03.640 Democrats in other parts of the country every couple of 2:41:03.720 --> 2:41:06.840 years get like excited. It's the Charlie Brown system where 2:41:06.840 --> 2:41:08.840 they're like, oh my god, Texas might be about to 2:41:08.879 --> 2:41:12.120 flip or something otherwise, good Ted Ted Cruz is going 2:41:12.200 --> 2:41:14.160 to get forced out. We're finally going to have something 2:41:14.240 --> 2:41:17.480 good happen in Texas politics. And every time, every time 2:41:17.560 --> 2:41:18.840 that football gets pulled away. 2:41:19.879 --> 2:41:20.800 Yeah, so it. 2:41:21.360 --> 2:41:26.119 Feels not great that the minority leaders kind of patting 2:41:26.200 --> 2:41:30.080 themselves on the back for taking basically a two week 2:41:30.200 --> 2:41:34.760 vacation to Illinoising California and then returning and having this 2:41:34.959 --> 2:41:38.840 go through. So I don't know, we'll see this develops. 2:41:38.879 --> 2:41:42.440 The California is promising to do their own redistricting to 2:41:42.840 --> 2:41:47.199 equal out the amount of like map changes, both adding 2:41:47.320 --> 2:41:49.440 five more seats for the respective parties. 2:41:50.920 --> 2:41:51.600 It's annoying. 2:41:52.080 --> 2:41:52.920 It's just annoying. 2:41:53.120 --> 2:41:57.400 It's just annoying, like a nice piece of performance. So 2:41:57.440 --> 2:42:00.720 I guess you know what else is annoying things? 2:42:01.080 --> 2:42:03.039 I don't think they're annoying at all. I value each 2:42:03.080 --> 2:42:04.320 and every advertiser. 2:42:04.680 --> 2:42:07.560 Garrison actually personally vets all of our advertisers so you 2:42:07.600 --> 2:42:08.520 can reach out to them. 2:42:14.800 --> 2:42:17.560 No, no, no, I I agree this is canon. Now, 2:42:18.480 --> 2:42:21.880 if you're ever unhappy with an advertiser, find Garrison's personal 2:42:21.959 --> 2:42:23.680 phone number and hit him up. 2:42:24.000 --> 2:42:29.520 No no, no, no, oh God, time to go into 2:42:29.560 --> 2:42:30.360 blocking spree. 2:42:41.680 --> 2:42:42.800 All right, we are back. 2:42:43.879 --> 2:42:45.840 Putin, I guess is a guy. 2:42:47.160 --> 2:42:49.760 That's actually how I would describe the meeting between a 2:42:50.120 --> 2:42:52.240 Trump and Putin and Alaska Putin. 2:42:52.400 --> 2:42:56.520 I guess, yeah, that's pretty much how it went. They had, 2:42:56.640 --> 2:42:57.560 they had a little meeting. 2:42:58.040 --> 2:43:01.280 There are some insane, cannspiracy theories that he sent a 2:43:01.320 --> 2:43:01.880 body double. 2:43:02.040 --> 2:43:04.920 Oh wow, yeah, yeah, it's one of my favorite things. 2:43:05.040 --> 2:43:09.960 There's always insane conspiracy theories supported from BBC News actually, 2:43:10.120 --> 2:43:14.040 which I find funny. Yeah, I'm glad that BBC's is 2:43:14.120 --> 2:43:17.119 on the is on the pulse of theories spreading online. 2:43:17.720 --> 2:43:18.560 Yeah, yeah, no. 2:43:18.800 --> 2:43:21.880 And and people are just now figuring out again that 2:43:22.080 --> 2:43:26.040 whenever world leaders travel to foreign countries for summits at 2:43:26.080 --> 2:43:29.039 this level, they take their poop back with them. And yeah, 2:43:29.080 --> 2:43:31.000 I saw an article being like, is it true, did 2:43:31.080 --> 2:43:33.120 Putin really take his poop back? And yes, they all 2:43:33.200 --> 2:43:35.600 do because they don't want it to get analyzed to 2:43:35.680 --> 2:43:38.280 find evidence of health issues. Like the President has his 2:43:38.360 --> 2:43:41.120 poop taken home every time he goes overseas. This is 2:43:41.200 --> 2:43:42.080 just the way things are. 2:43:43.000 --> 2:43:46.080 Frankly. I think if we're able to get the Putin poop, 2:43:46.200 --> 2:43:48.280 you can make a clone of Putin and then that 2:43:48.400 --> 2:43:55.000 could be the body show we use. Yeah yeah, stuff 2:43:55.040 --> 2:43:59.519 that like the fifties of CIA still existed. 2:43:59.080 --> 2:44:02.200 As they still use. It'd be a lot more fun. Yeah, 2:44:02.760 --> 2:44:05.359 we would be doing would hoover. 2:44:06.800 --> 2:44:09.520 Really unethical human cloning project where you had this like 2:44:09.640 --> 2:44:14.400 shambling like undead corpse of that we can problem Christ. 2:44:14.720 --> 2:44:18.119 But that's basically how the meeting went. Sorry for derailing 2:44:18.440 --> 2:44:21.560 my bad, no, because the meeting is kind of a 2:44:21.600 --> 2:44:25.320 nothing burger. At this point. There was reports that Putin 2:44:25.360 --> 2:44:28.240 basically ranted to Trump about how Ukraine's always has been 2:44:28.280 --> 2:44:31.879 a part of Russia, and the meeting didn't really go anywhere. 2:44:31.959 --> 2:44:34.600 Putin ignored a question on if he would quote stop 2:44:34.720 --> 2:44:39.000 killing civilians. So yeah, that's basically how the whole how 2:44:39.040 --> 2:44:42.480 the whole debacle went. And I think it's really indicative 2:44:43.200 --> 2:44:46.640 that like a day or two after this happened, Trump 2:44:46.720 --> 2:44:49.600 had the Zelensky meeting two point zero in the White House, 2:44:49.680 --> 2:44:53.640 which went much better than the previous Zelinsky meeting, and 2:44:53.680 --> 2:44:56.880 Trump was a lot more friendly with Silinskily this time around. 2:44:57.240 --> 2:45:00.640 Apparently Zelensky has been going around other European leaders getting 2:45:00.640 --> 2:45:02.360 advice on how to like talk with it Trump. 2:45:02.640 --> 2:45:05.160 Yeah, he gave him, gave him a letter which which 2:45:05.200 --> 2:45:09.560 Trump Trump really appreciates and likes. S he uh started 2:45:09.640 --> 2:45:12.760 by thanking, uh, thanking the first Lady for a letter 2:45:12.840 --> 2:45:15.960 as well. So there's always like little polite gestures that 2:45:16.040 --> 2:45:17.360 Trump really enjoys. 2:45:17.879 --> 2:45:20.320 Yeah, he likes to be like honored and venerated. 2:45:20.800 --> 2:45:24.480 Yeah, so Zelenski indulged in that war of of a 2:45:24.560 --> 2:45:27.760 fairly a fairly spiffy all black suits. I liked it. 2:45:28.080 --> 2:45:30.520 It's a good it was a good suit. So it's 2:45:30.680 --> 2:45:32.400 but it is. It is very indicative if you look 2:45:32.400 --> 2:45:34.760 at like how the last Selenski meeting went, and then 2:45:34.840 --> 2:45:37.760 after Trump was around Putin for like a few hours. 2:45:38.320 --> 2:45:42.000 How how how Trump's mood was noticeably different around Zelensky 2:45:42.320 --> 2:45:45.520 this time around. So we'll see. I don't think we're 2:45:45.560 --> 2:45:49.160 gonna have any conclusion to the conflict in Ukraine anytime 2:45:49.240 --> 2:45:52.360 soon based on how these two meetings went. There was 2:45:52.400 --> 2:45:54.120 there was reporting that they were trying to set up 2:45:54.120 --> 2:45:57.240 a meeting between Putin and Selensky, though that has since 2:45:57.320 --> 2:46:01.440 been denied. It sits this like back and forth like 2:46:01.680 --> 2:46:03.920 it has been the past, like two four years. 2:46:04.040 --> 2:46:05.800 But Trump is going to bring an end to the war. 2:46:05.920 --> 2:46:08.320 He's the peace president, kind of get a Nobel prize. 2:46:08.600 --> 2:46:11.879 Yeah, did you know that Trump's ended six wars? Six seven, 2:46:12.000 --> 2:46:13.240 six or seven? Wow? 2:46:13.720 --> 2:46:14.000 Wow? 2:46:16.000 --> 2:46:17.280 It's I love it. 2:46:17.360 --> 2:46:19.080 I love it when you can't keep track of how 2:46:19.120 --> 2:46:20.120 many wars you ended. 2:46:22.680 --> 2:46:25.080 I got one other story I would like to discuss. 2:46:25.200 --> 2:46:27.240 I'm sure James will have some comments sense as well 2:46:27.840 --> 2:46:32.920 on a series of unfortunate ICE actions, including the first 2:46:32.959 --> 2:46:36.160 instant that I'm aware of, where federal agents have shot 2:46:36.200 --> 2:46:40.480 their firearms during an enforcement operation, at least as of 2:46:40.720 --> 2:46:44.920 like the Trump administration two point zero. On Saturday morning, 2:46:45.160 --> 2:46:48.959 August sixteenth, in San Bernardino, a family is pulled over 2:46:49.120 --> 2:46:52.160 by massed federal agents in what DHS has since claimed 2:46:52.280 --> 2:46:56.760 was a quote unquote targeted enforcement operation. As Customs and 2:46:56.840 --> 2:46:59.520 Border Protection approached the vehicle, the family inside stread of 2:46:59.600 --> 2:47:03.800 recording on their cell phones and asked for identification. When 2:47:03.800 --> 2:47:06.200 the family refused to roll down the windows of the car, 2:47:06.360 --> 2:47:09.080 federal agents smashed windows on both sides of the vehicle 2:47:09.200 --> 2:47:12.320 and reached inside. At this point, the driver pulled the 2:47:12.400 --> 2:47:15.720 car forward, and federal agents shot at the vehicle three 2:47:15.879 --> 2:47:20.160 times before the car sped away. I'll play the video 2:47:20.280 --> 2:47:21.440 here for posterity. 2:47:22.000 --> 2:47:24.880 Yeah, do you want what do you want? 2:47:25.000 --> 2:47:47.800 Identification? So those three pops at the end were the 2:47:48.000 --> 2:47:51.600 three gunshots. Yeah, this is a wild one, the driver 2:47:51.840 --> 2:47:55.960 told NBC Los Angeles, quote I had to protect my 2:47:56.120 --> 2:47:58.520 life and my family en quote. 2:47:58.879 --> 2:48:02.760 Yeah, it's worth and guess these agents like them more 2:48:02.879 --> 2:48:03.760 uniformed than some. 2:48:04.280 --> 2:48:07.880 Yeah, they have badges visible on plate carriers. 2:48:08.360 --> 2:48:08.560 Yeah. 2:48:08.760 --> 2:48:12.840 They did not establish much communication between themselves and the 2:48:12.959 --> 2:48:15.680 family as they approached the vehicle. There's a lot of 2:48:15.720 --> 2:48:16.920 like yelling back and forth. 2:48:17.640 --> 2:48:19.520 Yeah. You can hear the man telling his son they 2:48:19.560 --> 2:48:20.600 don't open it. Yeah. 2:48:20.680 --> 2:48:22.600 The father's telling his kids in the car not to 2:48:22.800 --> 2:48:24.840 roll down the windows, not open the doors as the 2:48:24.920 --> 2:48:27.640 federal agents asked for the car to be opened, and 2:48:27.720 --> 2:48:29.039 then they initiate force. 2:48:29.240 --> 2:48:29.440 Yeah. 2:48:29.959 --> 2:48:32.640 The man here has lived in the US for twenty 2:48:32.720 --> 2:48:35.600 three years and does not have legal status as to 2:48:35.760 --> 2:48:39.000 adult sons who are in the vehicle are both US citizens, 2:48:39.120 --> 2:48:42.320 according to Javier or Hernandez, the executive director of the 2:48:42.400 --> 2:48:45.960 Inland Coalition for Immigrant Justice, who has spoken about this 2:48:46.080 --> 2:48:50.840 incident on behalf of the family to local press. DHS 2:48:51.120 --> 2:48:54.160 gave a statement to NBC Los Angeles. Quote, in the 2:48:54.240 --> 2:48:57.480 course of the incident, the suspect drove his car at 2:48:57.760 --> 2:49:01.600 the officers and struck two Customs of Voter Protection officers 2:49:01.680 --> 2:49:05.879 with his vehicle on quote, saying that because the driver 2:49:06.040 --> 2:49:10.119 tried to quote unquote run down the agent's a CPB 2:49:10.320 --> 2:49:14.560 officer was forced to quote discharge his firearm in self defense. 2:49:14.920 --> 2:49:17.840 Unquote Yeah, So that is the justification that they are using, 2:49:18.360 --> 2:49:21.480 is that this vehicle was moving in the direction of 2:49:21.600 --> 2:49:25.119 officers and officers acted in self defense by shooting at 2:49:25.240 --> 2:49:25.560 the car. 2:49:26.200 --> 2:49:28.520 That doesn't seem to line up with the video that 2:49:28.600 --> 2:49:29.080 we just saw. 2:49:29.400 --> 2:49:33.000 No, the cell phone footage from inside does not show 2:49:33.160 --> 2:49:36.640 officers being hit by the vehicle. It could be the 2:49:36.800 --> 2:49:39.120 case that you can see that one of the officers 2:49:39.160 --> 2:49:41.400 reaching into the car. You can see if the car 2:49:41.560 --> 2:49:46.120 was pulling away, his arm may have the door. Like 2:49:46.600 --> 2:49:49.200 the officers are standing next to the car in the video, 2:49:49.240 --> 2:49:51.600 it's not clear that there's any officers placed in front 2:49:51.640 --> 2:49:52.240 of the vehicle. 2:49:52.400 --> 2:49:54.880 So yeah, his foot could have got run over. Maybe 2:49:54.959 --> 2:49:57.879 if he's like leaning standing there close to the car. 2:49:58.280 --> 2:50:01.640 The car may have bumped office. It does not appear 2:50:01.720 --> 2:50:03.640 like this man I was trying to quote unquote run 2:50:03.760 --> 2:50:05.000 over the police. 2:50:05.240 --> 2:50:07.640 In fact, he was driving away from them. Yes. 2:50:08.720 --> 2:50:11.560 The family says that federal agents refused to identify themselves 2:50:11.720 --> 2:50:14.640 and did not provide a judicial warrant, that DHS has 2:50:14.680 --> 2:50:19.080 refused to answer whether agents had warrants, and after the shooting, 2:50:19.240 --> 2:50:21.800 the driver called the San Bernardino Police Department to report 2:50:21.879 --> 2:50:24.959 that massman pulled his car over, broke windows, and shot 2:50:24.959 --> 2:50:27.200 at him and his family. Police came to his house 2:50:27.240 --> 2:50:28.880 and spoke with the driver, but did not arrest the 2:50:28.959 --> 2:50:32.080 man because California police cannot legally assist federal agents with 2:50:32.160 --> 2:50:35.280 immigration enforcement. According to a statement from the police department, 2:50:36.400 --> 2:50:40.040 DHS made a statement criticizing the police for not taking 2:50:40.160 --> 2:50:44.000 the driver into custody. Quote. This reckless decision came despite 2:50:44.040 --> 2:50:47.640 the subjects outright refusal to comply, and his wounding of 2:50:47.760 --> 2:50:52.240 two federal officers has yet another tragic example of California's 2:50:52.280 --> 2:50:57.680 pro sanctuary policies that shield criminals instead of protecting communities. Unquote, 2:50:58.120 --> 2:51:02.680 this is what we're calling wounding. Yeah, The severity of 2:51:02.800 --> 2:51:07.920 the two officers alleged woundings has not been specified. Police 2:51:07.959 --> 2:51:10.600 later returned to the home along with ice and Homeland 2:51:10.640 --> 2:51:13.840 security investigations, but the family did not let them enter 2:51:13.959 --> 2:51:16.480 as they did not have a warrant, though police made 2:51:16.600 --> 2:51:20.520 one non immigration related arrest outside of the home as 2:51:20.600 --> 2:51:24.320 community members rallied together in support of the family. As 2:51:24.400 --> 2:51:26.920 of two days ago, the DHS has said that quote 2:51:27.240 --> 2:51:29.360 the suspect remains at large. 2:51:30.360 --> 2:51:34.640 JESU Christ, this is a needless escalation that put people 2:51:34.680 --> 2:51:37.200 in danger, Like, yeah, what. 2:51:37.280 --> 2:51:40.360 Else is there to say though, Like, it's bullshit. This 2:51:40.560 --> 2:51:43.160 is not an excuse to discharge a weapon. This isn't 2:51:43.200 --> 2:51:46.840 count as wounding. These people should never been pulled over 2:51:46.879 --> 2:51:50.680 in the first place. But you know what we are 2:51:50.720 --> 2:51:53.440 where we are, this is the way ice works. 2:51:54.160 --> 2:51:56.800 Yeah, then this will probably happen again. I guess, like, 2:51:57.080 --> 2:52:01.040 I'm mildly surprised if sam Benadina police did not detain 2:52:01.240 --> 2:52:04.000 the man on suspicion of assaulting a federal agent, which 2:52:04.040 --> 2:52:06.680 is something that they could detain him for. Right it's 2:52:06.720 --> 2:52:11.440 not immigration crime, Yeah, and that is an extremely broad 2:52:11.560 --> 2:52:14.160 defense and one doesn't have to know the person's a 2:52:14.200 --> 2:52:15.439 federal agent, for example. 2:52:16.480 --> 2:52:20.560 So I guess like, raere, We'll see how this develops. Yeah, 2:52:20.720 --> 2:52:23.240 it's still unclear what's going to happen to this man. Yeah, 2:52:23.280 --> 2:52:26.240 I'll check for an update next week. A few days before, 2:52:26.400 --> 2:52:30.520 on Thursday, August fourteenth, a man fleeing an ice rate 2:52:30.560 --> 2:52:33.480 at a home depot in Monrovia, California, was hit and 2:52:33.640 --> 2:52:37.760 killed while attempting to cross the two to ten freeway 2:52:38.160 --> 2:52:42.280 on foot. Local activists say that during the same raid, 2:52:42.440 --> 2:52:45.360 ice hit someone in the leg with one of their vehicles, 2:52:45.959 --> 2:52:48.280 and that person was taken into custody. 2:52:49.240 --> 2:52:53.240 This is tragic, right, Yeah, the reckless use of vehicles 2:52:53.720 --> 2:52:58.600 in LA was remarkable, and I've covered a good deal 2:52:58.640 --> 2:53:03.040 of protests and a good deal of places. The use 2:53:03.120 --> 2:53:09.160 of vehicles in an extremely dangerous way by police was notable. 2:53:09.200 --> 2:53:11.440 When I was up there covering the protests, I think 2:53:11.440 --> 2:53:14.199 it was in June. It was something that in certainly 2:53:14.440 --> 2:53:17.600 was very concerning to me. So it would not shock 2:53:17.720 --> 2:53:20.720 me if people had been hit by anic vehicle. But yeah, 2:53:20.760 --> 2:53:23.760 this is a tragedy. And again, like because the stakes 2:53:23.800 --> 2:53:27.560 are taking everything in someone's life away from them, we're 2:53:27.640 --> 2:53:29.200 going to see this happen more often. 2:53:29.320 --> 2:53:32.720 Right, No, it can cause people to do brash, run 2:53:32.760 --> 2:53:35.320 safe things. They attempt to cross the busy freeway. Yeah, 2:53:35.360 --> 2:53:38.040 the two town is a very busy freeway always. Now 2:53:38.080 --> 2:53:39.320 it's extremely tragic. 2:53:39.920 --> 2:53:44.040 Yeah, this is yeah, really sad. So Ed Sauce reporting 2:53:44.160 --> 2:53:48.320 that a student out of California, Benjamin Guerrero Kruth, who 2:53:48.560 --> 2:53:50.400 had just turned eighteen to begin a senior year of 2:53:50.480 --> 2:53:54.360 high school, was detained by immigration authorities from walking his dog. 2:53:55.080 --> 2:53:59.840 One of his former teachers visited him and mentioned that 2:54:00.600 --> 2:54:02.840 he had overheard. He had told her that he had 2:54:02.920 --> 2:54:05.800 overheard ICE agent talking about receiving a fifteen hundred dollar 2:54:06.440 --> 2:54:08.120 bounty for making his arrest. 2:54:09.320 --> 2:54:12.080 Yeah. Well, like in some promotional videos from DHS and ICE, 2:54:12.120 --> 2:54:15.160 they've been boasting about bonuses not only for signing on 2:54:15.320 --> 2:54:17.720 for this recruitment dry that they're doing, but also like 2:54:17.920 --> 2:54:22.480 cash bonuses for immigrants getting arrested and deported. And there's 2:54:22.520 --> 2:54:26.560 been multiple clips of agents like talking about this or like, 2:54:26.640 --> 2:54:28.600 you know, talking about, I wonder how much of a 2:54:28.640 --> 2:54:30.680 bonus we're going to get for these batchel of arrests. 2:54:31.520 --> 2:54:34.840 So this is this has been something noticed in multiple states. 2:54:34.879 --> 2:54:37.600 I've heard of this in Florida, and this sounds like 2:54:37.640 --> 2:54:40.880 it's in California. You said, yeah, California. Yeah, yeah, So 2:54:41.160 --> 2:54:43.440 this is this is a pattern, and it's not even 2:54:43.560 --> 2:54:46.240 very glorified bounty hunting, because it's not really glorified, but 2:54:46.320 --> 2:54:48.760 it's essentially essentially bounty hunting. 2:54:49.080 --> 2:54:51.480 Yeah, that might be why we're seeing some of these 2:54:51.600 --> 2:54:55.480 like insane arrests right of people who would never normally 2:54:55.520 --> 2:54:56.199 expect to see. 2:54:57.000 --> 2:54:59.240 We reported the news here, We. 2:54:59.360 --> 2:55:00.240 Reported the new news. 2:55:01.120 --> 2:55:02.040 We reported the news. 2:55:08.400 --> 2:55:11.520 Hey, we'll be back Monday with more episodes every week 2:55:11.600 --> 2:55:13.480 from now until the heat death of the universe. 2:55:14.280 --> 2:55:16.760 It Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone Media. 2:55:16.959 --> 2:55:19.959 For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website 2:55:20.080 --> 2:55:23.600 foolzonmedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app, 2:55:23.720 --> 2:55:25.640 Apple Podcasts, or wherever. 2:55:25.440 --> 2:55:26.560 You listen to podcasts. 2:55:27.040 --> 2:55:28.960 You can now find sources where it Could Happen Here 2:55:29.000 --> 2:55:31.960 listed directly in episode descriptions. 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