WEBVTT - It Could Happen Here Weekly 224 0:00:01.760 --> 0:00:03.120 Also media. 0:00:03.320 --> 0:00:05.760 Hey everybody, Robert Evans here, and I wanted to let 0:00:05.800 --> 0:00:09.440 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 --> 0:00:24.760 you can make your own decisions. 0:00:28.600 --> 0:00:32.480 Hi everyone, and welcome to it could happen here. It's 0:00:32.520 --> 0:00:34.880 me James today and I am very lucky to join 0:00:34.960 --> 0:00:39.519 by Garrison. Iige. Hello, Hi Garrison. I've summoned you here 0:00:39.560 --> 0:00:43.600 today to talk about boats, a topic that white men love. 0:00:43.960 --> 0:00:45.839 But we're not going to talk about like going out 0:00:45.840 --> 0:00:49.800 on the lake and looking for bass today. I've only 0:00:49.880 --> 0:00:51.600 done bass fishing ones. It's not for me. 0:00:51.840 --> 0:00:53.800 Do you hold up the fish for the picture? Do 0:00:53.840 --> 0:00:54.600 you do the picture? 0:00:54.840 --> 0:00:57.720 I wasn't blessed with a bass on that trip, but 0:00:57.800 --> 0:00:59.640 I did get to It was very interesting because a 0:00:59.640 --> 0:01:02.400 guy had like a purple boat with gold flex in it. 0:01:02.560 --> 0:01:05.400 It didn't represent who I thought he was as a person. 0:01:05.520 --> 0:01:07.440 Turned out, actually he had a boat sponsorship and he 0:01:07.480 --> 0:01:09.480 was going to sell it. But ah, it was a 0:01:09.480 --> 0:01:12.200 cool boat. I got to drive that boat pretty fast 0:01:12.240 --> 0:01:15.120 through some doughnuts and stuff. So that's another thing that 0:01:15.200 --> 0:01:18.440 calls to a part of my soul. I want to 0:01:18.480 --> 0:01:22.280 talk about private maritime security today. The reason why, of course, 0:01:22.440 --> 0:01:26.720 is that Iran is currently attacking boats in the Strait 0:01:26.760 --> 0:01:29.120 of Horn Moves and elsewhere. 0:01:29.200 --> 0:01:29.320 Right. 0:01:29.360 --> 0:01:33.600 There's some boats were attacked in portant Basara yesterday. We're 0:01:33.640 --> 0:01:37.160 recording this on Thursday. At the time of recording, they 0:01:37.160 --> 0:01:40.600 have attacked six boats. It's more likely than not that 0:01:40.640 --> 0:01:43.240 there will be more boats attacked by the time you 0:01:43.280 --> 0:01:45.759 are listening to this. It's been a really bad week 0:01:45.800 --> 0:01:46.880 for boat guys. 0:01:47.120 --> 0:01:50.120 It's been a bad year for boats in general. 0:01:50.320 --> 0:01:55.200 Oh, Venezuela, Yeah, yeah, let's talk about private maritime security. 0:01:55.280 --> 0:01:58.480 So like, when these boats are transmitting the Strait of 0:01:58.520 --> 0:02:01.400 Horn Moves, right, the United States has offered and then 0:02:01.560 --> 0:02:04.760 rescinded the offer to escort them through the straight up 0:02:04.760 --> 0:02:07.120 hor Moos. It's very unlikely that the United States is 0:02:07.120 --> 0:02:10.959 going to be able to sufficiently escort every boat that 0:02:11.040 --> 0:02:13.480 goes through the State of hormor Moves. And this is 0:02:13.520 --> 0:02:18.399 a longstanding issue, right, I think probably lots of listeners 0:02:18.440 --> 0:02:23.200 won't be aware of the long history of private security 0:02:23.440 --> 0:02:26.000 on ships. Right, I'm only going to talk about this 0:02:26.040 --> 0:02:27.800 in the context of the twenty first century, but this 0:02:27.880 --> 0:02:31.400 goes a lot further back. It's largely a consequence of 0:02:31.440 --> 0:02:35.080 the way the law governs the ocean. It's actually the 0:02:35.080 --> 0:02:38.400 same Wow. Sorry, yah, daddy long legs. I don't know 0:02:38.400 --> 0:02:40.560 if it's an American word for that that. I don't know, 0:02:40.800 --> 0:02:44.320 Daddy long legs. That's okay, Yeah, absolute unit has just 0:02:44.480 --> 0:02:49.359 entered my office space. A world LM be the reason 0:02:49.400 --> 0:02:52.840 that we can have private security contractors, often with machine guns, etc. 0:02:53.160 --> 0:02:56.440 On boats. It's the same reason that horrific labor abuses 0:02:56.480 --> 0:02:59.840 are perpetrated on boats on a daily basis. Right, Perhaps 0:03:00.120 --> 0:03:03.959 the most well documented are among the most well documented 0:03:03.960 --> 0:03:06.240 are the ones off Thailand on fishing ships, which often 0:03:06.280 --> 0:03:10.840 involve Burmese refugees or people fleeing Mianma. Right there, essentially 0:03:10.960 --> 0:03:15.200 enslaved on these boats or in sort of indentured servitude 0:03:15.360 --> 0:03:18.680 of trying to quote unquote pay off their trip out 0:03:18.720 --> 0:03:21.200 of the country they were fleeing. Right, I'm not talking 0:03:21.200 --> 0:03:23.440 about labor abuses today. I want to talk more about 0:03:23.440 --> 0:03:28.720 private security. Most of security provided two boats in the 0:03:28.760 --> 0:03:31.920 world in general is not provided by states. It is 0:03:31.960 --> 0:03:35.960 provided by private military contractors. Right earlier on in the 0:03:36.000 --> 0:03:38.480 twentieth century, the typical profile of one of these people 0:03:38.480 --> 0:03:40.520 would have been that they'd left the military and a 0:03:40.600 --> 0:03:44.440 state in the global north. They had found let's say, 0:03:44.720 --> 0:03:46.760 life for employment in the civilian world to be difficult 0:03:46.800 --> 0:03:50.200 for them. And I've met a number of these people 0:03:50.240 --> 0:03:52.840 in a number of places. Many of them went to 0:03:53.400 --> 0:03:56.160 parts of Africa thinking that they were going to work 0:03:56.200 --> 0:04:02.040 protecting wildlife and then ending up protecting large container ships instead, 0:04:02.400 --> 0:04:04.640 or attempting to work for a company that would one 0:04:04.720 --> 0:04:08.000 day let them protect wildlife or something similar. Generally, the 0:04:08.040 --> 0:04:10.280 companies they end up working for are generally referred to 0:04:10.320 --> 0:04:15.400 as private maritime security companies pmsc's, as opposed to PMC 0:04:15.560 --> 0:04:19.320 private military contractor, although it is a version of the 0:04:19.320 --> 0:04:22.479 same thing. Generally, these companies offer a shipping company a 0:04:22.560 --> 0:04:25.760 sort of package, and it's not just armed. Security also 0:04:25.760 --> 0:04:30.479 include stuff like intelligence, crisis response, and potential intervention. I 0:04:30.520 --> 0:04:32.680 spoke to someone, for instance, who had worked for a 0:04:32.680 --> 0:04:35.080 shipping company and his major job was to deal with 0:04:35.320 --> 0:04:39.320 when people were kidnapped off the boats. He would then 0:04:39.440 --> 0:04:43.200 either go and rescue the people or negotiate with the 0:04:43.200 --> 0:04:44.679 people who would kidnapped them. 0:04:44.920 --> 0:04:49.640 These are like cargo ships, oil tankers, like what kind of. 0:04:49.960 --> 0:04:52.720 Yeah, so mostly there are on large commercial vessels, right, 0:04:52.760 --> 0:04:56.920 cargo ships, oil tankers, things with an expensive cargo, although 0:04:56.920 --> 0:05:01.159 it is not unheard of. For pms. For instance, you 0:05:01.160 --> 0:05:04.040 may have a maritime security company to secure your large 0:05:04.080 --> 0:05:07.680 mega yacht, sure right, or another boat that you're worried about. 0:05:08.080 --> 0:05:10.280 Did these happen on my cruise ships? Sometimes? 0:05:10.400 --> 0:05:12.760 Yes, there was. There was a shootout in the early 0:05:12.800 --> 0:05:16.440 two thousand so I shoot out, it's probably private security 0:05:16.520 --> 0:05:18.680 characters on it. I think it was an Italian cruise 0:05:18.680 --> 0:05:22.039 ship fired at pirates who are attempting to board the 0:05:22.040 --> 0:05:27.240 cruise ship. Huh. It's a lot less uncommon than you 0:05:27.279 --> 0:05:28.120 would think. 0:05:28.920 --> 0:05:32.200 So when we're planning the twenty twenty eight Cool Zone 0:05:32.240 --> 0:05:35.960 Media Cruise all all access included, we're going to have 0:05:36.000 --> 0:05:37.600 to contact with one of these companies. 0:05:37.720 --> 0:05:39.640 I think we can probably bring that in house. I 0:05:39.680 --> 0:05:42.679 think that that would be the goal at that point. 0:05:42.800 --> 0:05:48.320 Right within the Greater iHeart Ecosystem Garrison, we have so 0:05:48.520 --> 0:05:52.280 many automatic weapons you don't listen to the like a 0:05:52.960 --> 0:05:59.039 Belfed machine Gun podcast, the iHeart Militia, it's US and 0:05:59.120 --> 0:06:02.159 Ted cruise and where we haven't really agreed on very 0:06:02.240 --> 0:06:05.040 much other than gun ownership, maybe we should talk about 0:06:05.040 --> 0:06:08.719 when the real reason like PMSCs took off in the 0:06:08.920 --> 0:06:13.520 twenty first century was the rise in piracy off Somalia. 0:06:13.640 --> 0:06:17.200 Right before this, piracy had existed mostly in Southeast Asia. 0:06:17.200 --> 0:06:19.279 On piracy has guested for as long as people going 0:06:19.279 --> 0:06:23.039 on boats has existed, right but specifically paracy off Southeast 0:06:23.040 --> 0:06:26.000 Asia had before this been more of a like a 0:06:26.080 --> 0:06:29.280 smash and grab kind of situation, like turn up, take 0:06:29.320 --> 0:06:34.359 what you can leave. What was distinct in this piracy 0:06:34.400 --> 0:06:36.360 that we began to see from like two thousand and 0:06:36.400 --> 0:06:40.239 eight onwards was that pirates were either trying to see 0:06:40.440 --> 0:06:44.719 the entire cargo of a vessel the vessel itself, or 0:06:45.040 --> 0:06:49.200 to kidnap people from the vessel and hold them for ransom. 0:06:49.760 --> 0:06:54.680 I guess the most high profile case was called the Mayerscalabama. 0:06:54.760 --> 0:06:55.960 Are you familiar with this one? 0:06:56.440 --> 0:06:56.520 No? 0:06:57.440 --> 0:06:59.600 Okay? This is that's good because you get to hear 0:06:59.640 --> 0:07:04.040 a story. I don't keep up with piratenews dot org. Really, 0:07:04.200 --> 0:07:07.360 I can see you being like pirate curious, No, you're 0:07:07.400 --> 0:07:08.040 not interested in. 0:07:08.400 --> 0:07:10.880 I've always had kind of a love hate relationship with pirates, Okay, 0:07:11.200 --> 0:07:15.119 you know, undeniably cool in some way, also a little 0:07:15.120 --> 0:07:15.640 bit messy. 0:07:15.720 --> 0:07:18.600 They can be messy. Yeah, yeah, lots of lots of 0:07:18.640 --> 0:07:21.800 overlap between pirates and anarchism. I'm sure you've this is true. 0:07:21.880 --> 0:07:25.280 Yeah, some of my same critiques there for you both sides. 0:07:25.400 --> 0:07:26.800 Yeah, yeah, I can also be messy. 0:07:27.000 --> 0:07:29.560 As soon as the pirates all start wearing matching black suits, 0:07:29.600 --> 0:07:30.760 then we can talk. 0:07:30.520 --> 0:07:33.640 And I think that's inherently like the piracy isn't about that. 0:07:33.640 --> 0:07:36.200 Piracy is about self expression. That's the thing, got it? 0:07:36.720 --> 0:07:37.760 Yeah, I see, Well. 0:07:38.160 --> 0:07:41.360 Yeah, great, disagree. I like I like a diverse pirate 0:07:41.400 --> 0:07:46.240 outfit personally, in this case, a small vessel, right. I 0:07:46.280 --> 0:07:49.440 think they had four or five pirates. They had like 0:07:49.520 --> 0:07:54.320 pretty basic weaponry, write like kalashnikovs. I think they boarded 0:07:54.440 --> 0:07:58.360 the mess Galabama. The boat had a pirate alarm, and 0:07:58.400 --> 0:08:03.080 they sounded the pirate alarm. In this you have to 0:08:03.120 --> 0:08:09.320 struggle to repress your like eighteenth century like mind palast right. Yeah, yeah, 0:08:09.360 --> 0:08:13.160 the crew sheltered in. They had like a safe room. Yeah, 0:08:13.800 --> 0:08:16.240 they went in this safe room. Well, they captured the 0:08:16.280 --> 0:08:19.800 captain of the ship pretty quickly. The ship didn't have 0:08:19.840 --> 0:08:23.080 any means of defending itself other than it tried to 0:08:23.280 --> 0:08:25.800 like I'm not a massive boat, understander, It tried to 0:08:25.920 --> 0:08:29.520 use its rudder to swamp the pirate ship as it 0:08:29.560 --> 0:08:32.040 was coming up, so like kind of flick it that 0:08:32.040 --> 0:08:35.600 that didn't work. Yeah, And one member of the ship's 0:08:35.640 --> 0:08:42.079 crew who hid himself with a knife and successfully subdued 0:08:42.120 --> 0:08:46.920 and captured the leader of the pirates, and the crew 0:08:47.120 --> 0:08:51.160 then attempted to trade this person for their captain. They 0:08:51.200 --> 0:08:55.079 tied up the pirate who they had captured, attempted to 0:08:55.080 --> 0:08:59.920 trade him for their captain. The pirates took the leader 0:08:59.920 --> 0:09:01.760 of the pirates that then never gave the crew their 0:09:01.760 --> 0:09:05.360 captain and then made off in a lifeboat with a 0:09:05.400 --> 0:09:09.320 large amount of cash and the captain. This resulted in 0:09:09.360 --> 0:09:13.400 a standoff. Now, the Meskalabama was I believe a US 0:09:13.440 --> 0:09:16.880 flagged ship. It may have been a US Dutch ship, 0:09:16.920 --> 0:09:18.680 but it was flagged to like a nation in the 0:09:18.679 --> 0:09:21.439 major in the global north right. This would become relevant later. 0:09:22.120 --> 0:09:27.400 The United States sent two boats which proceeded to engage 0:09:27.440 --> 0:09:30.880 in a standoff with the lifeboat for several days, where 0:09:31.080 --> 0:09:33.760 they first attempted to drop a SAT phone and a 0:09:33.800 --> 0:09:36.280 mobile phone to the pirates in the lifeboat. The pirates 0:09:36.320 --> 0:09:38.120 through those in the ocean because they thought that they 0:09:38.120 --> 0:09:40.560 were using them to communicate with the captain of the ship. 0:09:40.640 --> 0:09:43.320 At one point, the captain, who they'd held hostage, ended 0:09:43.360 --> 0:09:45.680 up in the ocean, but then he got back into 0:09:45.720 --> 0:09:51.000 the lifeboat. The situation was resolved eventually by the Navy 0:09:51.000 --> 0:09:53.880 seals shooting all the pirates. They were based on one 0:09:53.920 --> 0:09:56.920 of the US ships, and they used sniper rifles to 0:09:57.240 --> 0:10:00.360 shoot the pirates. Really yep, they shot them all off 0:10:00.400 --> 0:10:02.920 the lifeboat while the captain of the ship was also 0:10:02.920 --> 0:10:06.880 in the lifeboat. WHOA yeah, no, then I would be 0:10:06.920 --> 0:10:09.120 shocked if that's not a film about this, or I 0:10:09.160 --> 0:10:11.040 know the captain of the ship has written a book 0:10:11.720 --> 0:10:15.200 about his time being captured. But obviously, like this kind 0:10:15.200 --> 0:10:18.400 of rattled the world, right, It scared a lot of people, 0:10:18.400 --> 0:10:21.160 specifically in the shipping industry, because this is a scary 0:10:21.200 --> 0:10:24.679 thing to happen, and specifically this change in the nature 0:10:24.679 --> 0:10:29.920 of piracy from taking stuff to potentially capturing people. And 0:10:30.320 --> 0:10:32.400 I believe the goal of the pirates here was to 0:10:32.400 --> 0:10:35.000 get the captain ashore where they could hide him more easily, 0:10:35.080 --> 0:10:38.640 right in Somalia. And then it becomes entirely different issue 0:10:39.480 --> 0:10:42.200 when you're trying to get US troops into a completely 0:10:42.200 --> 0:10:46.439 different country to rescue someone a different land mass. Yeah. Yeah, 0:10:46.640 --> 0:10:49.520 And I think it's really important to talk about like 0:10:49.559 --> 0:10:54.200 the jurisdictional issues here because they are what gives the 0:10:54.320 --> 0:10:57.600 PMSCs so much leeway. I think we'll take a little 0:10:57.640 --> 0:11:12.280 break talking about jurisdiction and we will come back. All right, 0:11:12.320 --> 0:11:16.840 we're back. So to understand private maritime security companies, you've 0:11:16.840 --> 0:11:19.959 got to understand the world of flags of convenience. First. 0:11:19.960 --> 0:11:22.600 Are you familiar with flags the convenience garrison? No? 0:11:22.600 --> 0:11:22.680 No? 0:11:22.920 --> 0:11:26.120 Okay, this is this is good. This is James gets 0:11:26.160 --> 0:11:29.400 to download shit that he reads at for no reason 0:11:29.440 --> 0:11:33.760 at like eleven o'clock at night. There are nations in 0:11:33.840 --> 0:11:37.439 the world states that allow vessels to register under their 0:11:37.480 --> 0:11:39.679 flag even if the owner of the vessel is not 0:11:39.720 --> 0:11:42.880 a citizen of that country. It's called an open registry. 0:11:43.240 --> 0:11:45.760 So if you hang out in the port, spend time 0:11:45.760 --> 0:11:47.680 looking at boats, look at the flags of the boats. 0:11:48.080 --> 0:11:51.600 You will often see flags of a few countries. The 0:11:51.640 --> 0:11:56.160 most common ones are Liberia, Panama, and the Republic of 0:11:56.160 --> 0:12:01.120 the Marshall Islands. The reason that boat own might choose 0:12:01.280 --> 0:12:04.520 let's say you Garrison have a boat right there, you 0:12:04.800 --> 0:12:09.640 shipping company Garrison Davis Boats Incorporated, and you don't want 0:12:09.679 --> 0:12:12.640 to register them in Canada or the United States. Might 0:12:12.679 --> 0:12:15.800 be to avoid tax liability. Might be to avoid like 0:12:16.040 --> 0:12:20.600 what you consider to be burdens and safety regulations, okay. 0:12:21.640 --> 0:12:26.120 Might be to avoid the frustrating constraints of Canadian labor law. 0:12:27.120 --> 0:12:30.360 Or it might be to avoid some ecological constraints on 0:12:30.400 --> 0:12:34.800 your boats which your flag nation might impose. And generally 0:12:35.320 --> 0:12:37.840 flags of convenience have very little in the way of 0:12:37.880 --> 0:12:42.040 taxation and regulation, right and so people might choose to 0:12:42.080 --> 0:12:45.840 flag their vessel in Liberia, Panama, Publican Marshall Islands, Hong 0:12:45.960 --> 0:12:51.000 Kong instead to avoid some of those issues. Right now, 0:12:51.640 --> 0:12:55.080 The issue comes when you read say you register your 0:12:55.080 --> 0:12:57.559 boat in Liberia and your boat is off on its 0:12:57.559 --> 0:13:01.080 way delivering things, and then some pirates seize your boat. 0:13:01.080 --> 0:13:03.800 I'm guessing Liberia is not going to be of much assistance. 0:13:04.000 --> 0:13:07.880 Yeah, they're not coming, yeah, yeah, the Liberian Navy is 0:13:07.920 --> 0:13:10.880 not available to help you in that instance, right now, 0:13:11.520 --> 0:13:16.360 because there tend to be very little constraint on flags 0:13:16.360 --> 0:13:18.880 of convenience, there's also very little constraint on what can 0:13:18.960 --> 0:13:23.400 happen on those boats, right So you could hire a 0:13:23.440 --> 0:13:26.880 private maritime security company and they could protect your boat, 0:13:26.920 --> 0:13:30.080 and the chances are the flagger convenience country would not 0:13:30.480 --> 0:13:34.000 regulate anything that they did on your boat or the 0:13:34.040 --> 0:13:38.240 weaponry they held on your boat. Ah, the rmiders the 0:13:38.280 --> 0:13:42.200 Marshall Islands does just regulate somewhat the weaponry that the 0:13:42.240 --> 0:13:45.000 Marshal Islands flagged boats could have. I think the reason 0:13:45.040 --> 0:13:47.280 there are so many boats flagged in the Marshall Islands, 0:13:47.280 --> 0:13:49.800 at least in part, is because half the world's tuna 0:13:49.960 --> 0:13:54.000 is caught in Marshall Islands waters. So a lot of 0:13:54.040 --> 0:13:56.880 those vessels will probably have they'll choose to have the 0:13:56.880 --> 0:13:58.959 Marshal Islands flag because it allows them to fish in 0:13:59.040 --> 0:14:02.160 territorial waters. Would be my guess. I've met some some 0:14:02.200 --> 0:14:04.200 contractors on Marshal Lea's boat, so I'm not a guy 0:14:04.200 --> 0:14:07.280 who was a helicopter pilot for a tuna fishing boat 0:14:08.120 --> 0:14:11.160 in a bar once. I guess they fly the helicopter 0:14:11.240 --> 0:14:14.240 to look for the fish and then the boat comes 0:14:14.280 --> 0:14:18.600 and catches the fish. Huh yeah, fascinating world. I don't 0:14:18.640 --> 0:14:21.200 think it's a highly enjoyable job, but I think it's 0:14:21.400 --> 0:14:22.960 people do it to get their flight hours up so 0:14:23.000 --> 0:14:27.880 they can do other things. So because of this legal 0:14:28.800 --> 0:14:30.680 it's not really a legal gray area, just the fact 0:14:30.680 --> 0:14:33.120 that these people are not regulated in any way. Right, 0:14:33.440 --> 0:14:36.480 people can carry weapons on ships. Now. In the case 0:14:36.520 --> 0:14:39.800 of piracy off Somalia specifically, the United Nations did authorize 0:14:39.800 --> 0:14:43.960 military action against Somali pirates and between twenty and forty 0:14:44.040 --> 0:14:48.480 boats were there at any given time in the next 0:14:48.520 --> 0:14:53.360 four years trying to police piracy. But that's not enough 0:14:53.360 --> 0:14:57.480 boats because every boat that is moving through that area 0:14:57.520 --> 0:15:00.560 is at risk for piracy. And pirates can use very 0:15:00.600 --> 0:15:04.920 small boats to board very big boats, right, And unless 0:15:05.360 --> 0:15:08.520 that very big boat is somehow able to defend itself, 0:15:08.600 --> 0:15:11.080 all they need is a few weapons and the ability 0:15:11.080 --> 0:15:12.760 to get on board, and they're hard to trut. 0:15:12.880 --> 0:15:13.040 Right. 0:15:13.480 --> 0:15:15.720 I've heard from people who did contracting in the pre 0:15:15.880 --> 0:15:18.000 two thousand and eight era that basically that they put 0:15:18.000 --> 0:15:19.920 barbed wire on the edge of the boat to stop 0:15:19.920 --> 0:15:22.120 people getting on and then they had the l rad 0:15:22.200 --> 0:15:25.680 like they was that long range. The sound weapon, Yeah, 0:15:25.720 --> 0:15:27.680 the sound weapon, and I'm not sure that it was 0:15:27.720 --> 0:15:29.600 there as a weapon. I think it was there to 0:15:29.640 --> 0:15:33.320 notify other ships like get out the way, but that 0:15:33.360 --> 0:15:35.760 it could be weaponized. And then after that it was 0:15:35.800 --> 0:15:39.160 like big sticks and harsh words, I guess. So like 0:15:39.400 --> 0:15:41.120 when you have the guys who took over the MESK 0:15:41.120 --> 0:15:44.400 Galabama coming in with a few kalashnikov they have the 0:15:44.480 --> 0:15:47.600 balance of force on their side, right, That is no 0:15:47.720 --> 0:15:50.920 longer the case anymore. Initially in two thousand and nine, 0:15:50.960 --> 0:15:53.440 groups like Blackwater tried to get in all this, and 0:15:54.440 --> 0:15:57.520 they did it actually by more or less, I guess, 0:15:57.640 --> 0:16:01.440 like copying the privateer model that we'd seen in the 0:16:01.520 --> 0:16:06.720 nineteenth century. They refitted commercial boats with weapons and offered 0:16:06.760 --> 0:16:10.760 them like for higher as like a rental, like as 0:16:10.800 --> 0:16:11.760 an accompaniment. 0:16:11.920 --> 0:16:13.760 They would like escort another ship. 0:16:14.280 --> 0:16:18.440 Yeah, they'd escort you through this dangerous area and then 0:16:18.760 --> 0:16:20.920 turn around and escort someone who was going the other way. 0:16:21.120 --> 0:16:24.240 Or that was the idea. Sure it didn't really work 0:16:24.760 --> 0:16:27.520 a because it was expensive right to run these vessels, 0:16:27.640 --> 0:16:30.440 and b because you'd need so many of them, and 0:16:30.480 --> 0:16:33.200 so what they ended up doing instead was actually stationing 0:16:33.320 --> 0:16:37.920 people on the vessels. So like these security contractors will 0:16:37.920 --> 0:16:42.200 now live on the oil tanker or the container ship, 0:16:42.560 --> 0:16:44.480 either for its all journey or for the duration of 0:16:44.520 --> 0:16:47.280 the time which it's considered danger well. 0:16:47.320 --> 0:16:49.920 And also, I mean if pirates try to get onto 0:16:50.000 --> 0:16:53.320 the big ship and all of the military guys are 0:16:53.320 --> 0:16:55.960 on a different ship a little bit behind, you have 0:16:56.000 --> 0:16:58.840 to get those guys onto the other ship, right, and then. 0:16:58.840 --> 0:17:00.720 Then now you're shooting at the ship that you're supposed 0:17:00.760 --> 0:17:02.640 to be protecting. And I can see that. 0:17:02.240 --> 0:17:04.160 That does just make it a little bit more complicated. 0:17:04.280 --> 0:17:09.840 Yeah, yeah, Unfortunately, the way, according to reports I've read, 0:17:09.840 --> 0:17:11.520 I should say, the way they have got around this 0:17:11.560 --> 0:17:16.600 issue is by preemptively shooting at vessels that they consider 0:17:16.680 --> 0:17:19.399 to be a threat. Sure, and there are plenty of 0:17:19.440 --> 0:17:22.240 allegations of that will get onto the lack of really 0:17:22.280 --> 0:17:25.920 any means of legal accountability at some point. What they 0:17:25.960 --> 0:17:30.800 do instead is they allow contractors to go on the ships, 0:17:30.960 --> 0:17:33.399 and these contractors then have to be armed. Right. The 0:17:33.440 --> 0:17:36.399 way they tend to be armed is depending on the 0:17:36.400 --> 0:17:39.359 flag of the ship and what regulations it has. Right generally, 0:17:39.359 --> 0:17:41.240 if they're entering into an area where they can't be armed, 0:17:41.240 --> 0:17:43.919 they have what are called floating armories. Those are what 0:17:43.960 --> 0:17:47.199 they sound like. You don't understand how long in my 0:17:47.320 --> 0:17:51.000 freelance career I spent trying to get onto one of 0:17:51.040 --> 0:17:53.640 these particular boats. It was a long time. 0:17:54.040 --> 0:17:56.480 So is this just like a tiny boat on a 0:17:56.520 --> 0:17:58.359 string with whole winter of guns on it? Like what 0:17:58.880 --> 0:17:59.400 it could be? 0:17:59.480 --> 0:18:02.960 It could be an oil platform, could be a little boat, 0:18:03.000 --> 0:18:07.040 it could be a big boat sometimes the contractors themselves 0:18:07.200 --> 0:18:10.480 or like that's where the contractors will meet the big boat, 0:18:10.560 --> 0:18:12.720 right and they'll get on it there, so they have 0:18:12.800 --> 0:18:14.399 like an area they can hang out, like it has 0:18:14.520 --> 0:18:18.119 living facilities. Huh. I've spoken to a few people in 0:18:18.160 --> 0:18:20.439 this world, but you know, if you happen to be 0:18:20.480 --> 0:18:23.480 listening and you're a boat security guy, I know. This 0:18:23.600 --> 0:18:25.760 is continues to fascinate me as an area where like 0:18:25.800 --> 0:18:28.679 the state doesn't exist and we have this like post 0:18:28.840 --> 0:18:31.200 state private militarization. 0:18:31.800 --> 0:18:33.280 It's like anarcho capitalism. 0:18:33.440 --> 0:18:36.359 Yeah yeah, yes, yeah, yeah exactly is it is a 0:18:36.440 --> 0:18:39.520 vision of the ancap future that I don't love. That 0:18:39.640 --> 0:18:43.040 is very interesting, Right, there were states that offered to 0:18:43.160 --> 0:18:46.840 have like vessel detachments. The Dutch did this. I believe 0:18:46.880 --> 0:18:49.320 they would be like we will send you. I'm not 0:18:49.359 --> 0:18:53.479 familiar with the Dutch military. Sorry, Dutch listeners, Dutch marines, I imagine, right, 0:18:53.520 --> 0:18:55.359 and you can have a few of them on your boat. 0:18:55.400 --> 0:18:59.720 But even Dutch companies or Dutch flag vessels weren't using 0:18:59.760 --> 0:19:02.679 it because it was so much paperwork and the government 0:19:02.720 --> 0:19:04.680 couldn't keep up with their demands. They right, now, we'll 0:19:04.680 --> 0:19:07.120 just get some guys, what's pay them? Be fine? Yeah. 0:19:07.200 --> 0:19:12.080 The state has more or less completely removed itself from 0:19:12.080 --> 0:19:17.400 the sphere and removed itself from doing anything approaching accountability, 0:19:17.960 --> 0:19:23.000 and so it is extremely hard for these people to 0:19:23.200 --> 0:19:28.800 be held accountable for things that they do in international waters. Right. 0:19:29.720 --> 0:19:34.720 There are like industry standards in the industry itself sets 0:19:35.240 --> 0:19:36.920 in the same way that there are standards for cops 0:19:36.960 --> 0:19:40.040 at the cops themselves set, and those have generally not 0:19:40.560 --> 0:19:43.760 been the best means of accountability. Right in the theory, 0:19:44.440 --> 0:19:48.200 anytime they engage someone, certainly, if they kill someone, the 0:19:48.320 --> 0:19:52.720 ship's authorities should report that. Yeah hopefully, yeah cool, I'm 0:19:52.720 --> 0:19:55.080 sure they will. I'm sure they love to do the paperwork. 0:19:55.400 --> 0:19:56.879 But then who would they report it to, right, do 0:19:56.920 --> 0:20:00.000 they report it to the country? They suspect the peace 0:20:00.000 --> 0:20:04.200 people they are shooting at their country. Do they report 0:20:04.240 --> 0:20:07.760 it to the flag of convenience country? Do they report 0:20:07.800 --> 0:20:11.040 it to the company they work for? Like I'm sure 0:20:11.080 --> 0:20:14.680 there is some jurisdiction of maritime law which would give 0:20:14.760 --> 0:20:18.240 us an answer to that, But in practice there appears 0:20:18.240 --> 0:20:21.880 to be very little mechanism for accountability in the same 0:20:21.880 --> 0:20:24.920 way that there is very little mechanism for accountability for 0:20:25.040 --> 0:20:28.480 labor law violations at sea. I would recommend if people 0:20:28.520 --> 0:20:31.960 haven't listened as a podcast called Outlaw Ocean. It's probably 0:20:32.400 --> 0:20:34.640 five or six years old at this point. I think 0:20:34.680 --> 0:20:38.359 it was in New York Times Investigation along with someone else. 0:20:38.440 --> 0:20:41.280 It was a good podcast about labor violations at sea, 0:20:41.840 --> 0:20:45.160 and they specifically looked at some of these fishing vessels 0:20:45.680 --> 0:20:47.760 and the fact that they use people who are essentially 0:20:47.760 --> 0:20:51.240 an indentured servitude. But they also touched on private maritime security. 0:20:52.280 --> 0:20:56.840 These days, we see a lot less piracy off Somalia 0:20:56.920 --> 0:21:01.399 right like it has reached its peak. This little little 0:21:01.520 --> 0:21:04.080 chunk in an article I was ringing on jastore this 0:21:04.119 --> 0:21:07.520 morning that I thought was interesting quote maritime security companies 0:21:07.560 --> 0:21:11.000 have been consulted on greenpeace activists attempt to climb onto 0:21:11.000 --> 0:21:14.280 a gas prom off your platform in September twenty thirteen 0:21:14.880 --> 0:21:17.960 to protest ruling in the Arctic and attacks against oil 0:21:17.960 --> 0:21:20.560 and gas installations by the Movement for the Emancipation is 0:21:20.600 --> 0:21:23.240 a niche a delta. So I guess these people have 0:21:24.280 --> 0:21:28.120 a wide remit in which they operate. As I say, 0:21:28.200 --> 0:21:33.680 they's somewhat different from like land based PMCs because land 0:21:33.720 --> 0:21:37.280 brace private military contractors are generally operating either with backup 0:21:37.280 --> 0:21:39.280 from a state or as back up to a state, 0:21:39.920 --> 0:21:44.880 and so there is like an accountability mechanism somewhat there. 0:21:45.240 --> 0:21:49.399 We saw in the Global War on Terror that that 0:21:49.560 --> 0:21:54.280 we still lack accountability mechanisms for private military contractors on land, 0:21:54.280 --> 0:21:57.640 but that certainly remains the case on the ocean. Right. Yeah, 0:21:57.840 --> 0:22:01.439 So another thing we should consider here is a historical parallels, right, 0:22:01.480 --> 0:22:05.000 And the obvious historical parallel would be looked to nineteen 0:22:05.040 --> 0:22:07.760 eighty seven and the what's generally referred to as the 0:22:07.880 --> 0:22:12.040 tanker War. Right, what the United States attempted to do 0:22:12.320 --> 0:22:14.800 was to open up a channel. The straightform moves is 0:22:14.840 --> 0:22:16.399 very narrow. As I said, it's narrowest point, it's just 0:22:16.440 --> 0:22:19.359 twenty one miles. There are two channels because obviously not 0:22:19.400 --> 0:22:21.879 the entire twenty one miles is deep enough ships to 0:22:21.920 --> 0:22:24.639 go through. There are two channels that are each about 0:22:24.680 --> 0:22:27.320 two miles wide, and think they're three kilometers wide. It's 0:22:27.320 --> 0:22:30.800 still not very great at that conversion. So the United 0:22:30.840 --> 0:22:32.840 States attempted is to open one channel and then run 0:22:32.880 --> 0:22:35.959 a convoy system. Right. Think about when you have roadworks 0:22:35.960 --> 0:22:37.520 and you know the cars go one way and then 0:22:37.760 --> 0:22:39.119 the cars go the other way, and someone goes in 0:22:39.160 --> 0:22:40.760 front of you and they have it like a flashing 0:22:40.800 --> 0:22:42.680 light till you'd follow them or what have you. And 0:22:42.760 --> 0:22:46.399 the United States attempted to escort convoys of mostly reflagged 0:22:46.440 --> 0:22:50.560 Kuwaiti oil tankers through the straight Horn moves right. The 0:22:50.680 --> 0:22:55.760 very first escort mission involved a Kuwaiti oil tanker that 0:22:55.800 --> 0:22:59.240 had reflagged as an American tanker had become the Bridgeton. 0:23:00.080 --> 0:23:04.399 It was the Bridgiton that struck an underwater mine on 0:23:04.440 --> 0:23:07.840 that very first mission. I didn't cause any casualties, it 0:23:07.840 --> 0:23:10.800 did cause damage to the ship. During that same operation 0:23:10.840 --> 0:23:13.879 in a United States ship also struck a mine. It 0:23:13.920 --> 0:23:17.000 was called the United States Samuel Roberts Samuel B. Roberts. 0:23:17.040 --> 0:23:20.959 I believe it struck a mine while transiting international waters. 0:23:21.160 --> 0:23:23.040 It just goes to show that when there are minds 0:23:23.880 --> 0:23:27.280 in this area, in any area, it's very hard to 0:23:27.280 --> 0:23:29.080 know when they've all been removed, and it's very hard 0:23:29.160 --> 0:23:33.240 to know where they all are right now. During that 0:23:33.440 --> 0:23:38.800 same operation, a United States warship mistakenly shot down an 0:23:38.840 --> 0:23:42.200 Aralian civilian flight, killing all two hundred and ninety people 0:23:42.280 --> 0:23:47.880 on board. This goes to show how crowded the space 0:23:48.160 --> 0:23:51.080 is around the straight offore moves, and it goes to 0:23:51.160 --> 0:23:54.800 show how I mean, even in a relatively modern war, 0:23:55.080 --> 0:23:59.320 the possibility for mistakes is very high. And that's before 0:23:59.320 --> 0:24:01.320 you even considered the fact that the Trump administration is 0:24:01.359 --> 0:24:05.560 willing to accept, even among administrations as the United States, 0:24:05.560 --> 0:24:09.000 they are willing to accept a very high number of 0:24:09.080 --> 0:24:12.639 innocent deaths. I also want to talk about, because this 0:24:12.760 --> 0:24:15.919 is such a small straight to crowded straight right, the 0:24:15.960 --> 0:24:21.119 possibility of attack is not just limited to naval attack 0:24:21.200 --> 0:24:23.800 right to boats. We know that US destroyed most of 0:24:23.840 --> 0:24:26.680 Iran's navy, and we're going to speak about how the 0:24:26.680 --> 0:24:30.320 IRGC navy is not the same as Iran's regular flag navy. 0:24:30.440 --> 0:24:35.239 Right when we talk about the Iranian navy, big gray boats. Yes, 0:24:35.320 --> 0:24:38.359 the US has destroyed many of those with the IGC. 0:24:38.560 --> 0:24:42.399 We're looking at much smaller, fast attack vessels, right, sometimes 0:24:42.440 --> 0:24:46.240 civilian vessels with a machine gun mounted to them. Those 0:24:46.320 --> 0:24:48.160 have not all been destroyed, and it will be very 0:24:48.200 --> 0:24:50.640 hard for United States to destroy those all from the air, 0:24:51.200 --> 0:24:53.639 as it will be for the United States to destroy 0:24:54.520 --> 0:24:58.199 the ground attack capability that Iran has. Right. They have 0:24:58.359 --> 0:25:03.720 jrnmus missiles, they have Shahed drones. They can use regular 0:25:04.160 --> 0:25:08.840 unguided rockets. A Shahed drone from anywhere in the country 0:25:09.280 --> 0:25:12.960 of Iran, given its range, could hit a boat in 0:25:13.040 --> 0:25:17.360 the Strait of Hormos. These horn Moose class missiles. They're 0:25:17.359 --> 0:25:20.359 called Hormos missiles, so they're launched from vehicles. Right. It 0:25:20.359 --> 0:25:22.920 looks like a lorry and it comes out and it 0:25:22.960 --> 0:25:25.359 pops up its back. It lifts up the miss island 0:25:25.400 --> 0:25:29.240 launches it. These are very easy to hide, right. Lots 0:25:29.440 --> 0:25:32.480 of entities in this region use tunnels and caves to 0:25:32.520 --> 0:25:35.919 hide things. I'm sure the Iranian state does too, But 0:25:35.960 --> 0:25:38.320 you could hide one of these missile launches anywhere in 0:25:38.359 --> 0:25:40.120 a city in a cave and a tunnel. It only 0:25:40.119 --> 0:25:43.639 needs to pop out, deliver its missile and then it 0:25:43.640 --> 0:25:46.080 can be abandoned, right, or it can go back into 0:25:46.080 --> 0:25:49.400 its cave whatever it wants. But the Iranians don't need 0:25:49.440 --> 0:25:53.560 to destroy every ship that transits the Strait of Hormoos 0:25:53.600 --> 0:25:55.840 to close the Straight of Hormoos. First of all, there 0:25:55.880 --> 0:25:57.280 are only two three kilometer channels. 0:25:57.359 --> 0:25:57.479 Right. 0:25:57.520 --> 0:25:59.760 If there is a wrecked ship in one of those channels, 0:26:00.040 --> 0:26:03.040 channel get smaller and smaller, and therefore your chance of 0:26:03.119 --> 0:26:06.240 hitting the minds that are there gets higher and higher. Right, 0:26:06.280 --> 0:26:10.960 because there's less way to go around them. The Iranians 0:26:10.960 --> 0:26:17.000 only have to make transiting the Strait of Hormus uninsurable 0:26:17.320 --> 0:26:20.359 to succeed, right. So what has happened with private maritime 0:26:20.400 --> 0:26:25.080 security contractors so far is that their presence has made 0:26:25.160 --> 0:26:28.639 transiting high risk areas areas at high risk for piracy 0:26:29.520 --> 0:26:35.399 an insurable effort. Because frequently you will hear that a 0:26:35.560 --> 0:26:39.520 ship with armed security has never been taken by pirates. 0:26:40.000 --> 0:26:43.040 That's really hard for us to confirm, right, like, there's 0:26:43.040 --> 0:26:45.960 no independent data on that, but certainly it it likely 0:26:46.000 --> 0:26:48.000 reduces a chance so then being taken by pirates, and 0:26:48.040 --> 0:26:52.680 that has made them insurable. The Iranians knocking out one 0:26:52.800 --> 0:26:56.600 or two tankers will make the Straight of hormones an 0:26:56.720 --> 0:27:00.320 uninsurable passage, or it will make the insurance so costly 0:27:01.119 --> 0:27:05.320 that commercial entities will not be willing to undertake that journey. 0:27:05.400 --> 0:27:07.560 Right now, Donald Trump is said the United States will 0:27:07.600 --> 0:27:12.640 act as the insurer. I know, man like it will 0:27:12.680 --> 0:27:14.639 be a lot of tankers for us to buy the 0:27:15.000 --> 0:27:17.600 if the Iranians keep you know, they've knocked out two 0:27:17.640 --> 0:27:22.120 large vessels overnight, it seems unlikely. Donal Trump has said 0:27:22.119 --> 0:27:23.720 a lot of things right, not all of them are true. 0:27:23.880 --> 0:27:26.440 Very well, even in the last few weeks, Donal Trump 0:27:26.520 --> 0:27:28.040 said a lot of things about the straight of Horror 0:27:28.040 --> 0:27:31.199 moves that were not true. So we will see that 0:27:31.280 --> 0:27:33.639 I wanted to explain some of those threats. Let's have 0:27:33.680 --> 0:27:36.639 a talk about the specific naval threat now that IGC 0:27:36.840 --> 0:27:49.560 Navy all right, So let's move on to discussing what 0:27:49.640 --> 0:27:53.119 exactly this means in the current era. Right when the 0:27:53.200 --> 0:27:55.359 United States is saying the straight of Horror moves is 0:27:55.400 --> 0:27:58.600 open except for Iran shooting at ships, and Iran is 0:27:58.760 --> 0:28:01.800 radioing ships right now and telling them they're not allowed 0:28:01.840 --> 0:28:03.639 to enter the straight of horm moves, and they're obviously 0:28:03.680 --> 0:28:08.080 threatening them if they do. So, what we will see 0:28:08.200 --> 0:28:10.760 right now in the straight of hornor moves is this 0:28:10.880 --> 0:28:15.120 situation where Iran has a few mechanisms for attacking these 0:28:15.400 --> 0:28:18.160 these ships. Right, the one that's being talked about the 0:28:18.200 --> 0:28:22.600 most are minds, and the mindset it ran has to 0:28:22.600 --> 0:28:25.439 my understanding of just straight up World War two leg 0:28:25.560 --> 0:28:27.920 s minds. Have you ever played mind sweeper Garrison? 0:28:28.000 --> 0:28:28.160 Yeah? 0:28:28.240 --> 0:28:30.080 Yeah, yeah, yeah, So they look like that, right. They 0:28:30.080 --> 0:28:32.359 have these big contact fuses on them, that is what 0:28:32.400 --> 0:28:34.720 they are, right the way the current works in a 0:28:34.760 --> 0:28:38.080 straight of hornor moves, if they can kind of circulate around, okay, 0:28:38.360 --> 0:28:39.960 which will make them you know, you can't be like, 0:28:40.000 --> 0:28:42.719 okay that this area is mine, that we're just going 0:28:42.760 --> 0:28:45.560 to avoid the minds. Yeah, right, like this whole strait 0:28:45.600 --> 0:28:48.760 is mine now. And as we covered in ed on Friday, 0:28:48.920 --> 0:28:53.320 the US doesn't have a great capacity to remove those minds. 0:28:53.800 --> 0:28:56.600 But the thing which has been less discussed is that 0:28:56.640 --> 0:29:01.400 the IGC has tons, and if they don't have, if 0:29:01.440 --> 0:29:03.280 they run out, it's very easy to make more right 0:29:03.320 --> 0:29:07.920 of like civilian fast boats. Think of a little boat 0:29:07.960 --> 0:29:10.080 with a motor on the back and a belt fed 0:29:10.120 --> 0:29:13.960 machine gun in the front, right, Like, very easy to 0:29:14.080 --> 0:29:19.160 take those boats and swarm a large vessel, right, Like, 0:29:19.200 --> 0:29:22.440 even if that vessel has private security on board, the 0:29:22.440 --> 0:29:25.640 straightforard moves is twenty one miles across. Like, you could 0:29:25.640 --> 0:29:27.200 harass people if you had a jet ski. 0:29:27.360 --> 0:29:30.240 Yeah, have a little jet ski technical I just tell you, yeah, yeah, 0:29:30.280 --> 0:29:31.440 with an RPG on the back. 0:29:31.600 --> 0:29:35.920 Yeah yeah yeah. And then most dudes rock vessel that 0:29:36.000 --> 0:29:38.200 has ever taken to the seas. Yeah. I might have 0:29:38.240 --> 0:29:40.040 to hand it to that LGC if they did that. 0:29:39.960 --> 0:29:40.120 But. 0:29:42.400 --> 0:29:46.200 Under very few circumsts. I don't know circumstances. Yeah, do 0:29:46.240 --> 0:29:48.440 you have to hand it to the Yeah, the Iranian 0:29:48.480 --> 0:29:51.440 state in any capacity. Now I'm shitting around, like I 0:29:52.120 --> 0:29:55.680 think the state of irun is terrible, misogynist, violent and 0:29:55.720 --> 0:29:59.920 oppressive entity and shouldn't exist just to be like super dupicle. 0:30:01.000 --> 0:30:06.000 They also have what are called uncrewed surface vessels. I'm 0:30:06.040 --> 0:30:09.520 sure they use like the gender neutral framing, but they 0:30:09.640 --> 0:30:13.360 are think of a large think of a boat that 0:30:13.400 --> 0:30:16.640 doesn't have anyone driving it, right, And it was uncrewed 0:30:16.680 --> 0:30:20.040 surface vessels that they used last night at the time 0:30:20.400 --> 0:30:25.200 of recording to explode a tanker in the port in Barcera, Right, Okay, 0:30:25.320 --> 0:30:31.360 very hard for the United States to stop these uncrewed 0:30:31.400 --> 0:30:34.480 surface vessels. Right, they are like the Shihi drone of 0:30:34.480 --> 0:30:38.320 the ocean. This boat's not coming home. It's designed to 0:30:38.840 --> 0:30:42.440 eliminate another boat. But it can be It could be steered, right, 0:30:42.880 --> 0:30:46.800 It's not just like a torpedo. So what exactly are 0:30:46.800 --> 0:30:50.040 the options I guess for the United States? Trump has 0:30:50.080 --> 0:30:53.120 offered to secure shipping through the straight ofform moose, right, 0:30:53.960 --> 0:30:57.360 he offered to accompany ships. The Navy doesn't have the 0:30:57.440 --> 0:31:01.080 capacity to do that. To accompany the amount of the 0:31:01.120 --> 0:31:03.400 world shipping that goes through the straight ofform moves would 0:31:03.480 --> 0:31:07.720 require masses of ships to accompany them, right, They'd have 0:31:07.760 --> 0:31:10.120 to travel at the same speed as these ships. Some 0:31:10.160 --> 0:31:13.920 of these ships are flagged to countries all over the world, right, 0:31:14.000 --> 0:31:16.320 including countries the US doesn't have the best relationship with, 0:31:16.480 --> 0:31:22.680 especially right now. The companies could hire more private maritime security, 0:31:22.720 --> 0:31:25.680 and I'm sure they will, but also like, part of 0:31:25.680 --> 0:31:28.200 the role of private maritime security companies is to be like, 0:31:28.280 --> 0:31:31.240 don't do that, it's too dangerous. And going through a 0:31:31.240 --> 0:31:35.160 straightform moods right now is probably too dangerous, right, sure, 0:31:35.680 --> 0:31:39.720 So I don't know how you would quickly equip a 0:31:39.880 --> 0:31:42.840 ship in a way that you could be like cast 0:31:42.880 --> 0:31:46.120 iron secure that it will be able to fend off 0:31:46.560 --> 0:31:50.280 like a little swarm of little boats trying to attack it. Right, 0:31:50.760 --> 0:31:52.960 I don't think an RPG could sink one of these ships, 0:31:52.960 --> 0:31:55.280 but it could really fucking give it a bad day. 0:31:55.400 --> 0:31:57.200 Oh you know, Like there's not a good situation when 0:31:57.240 --> 0:31:59.800 there's a hole in your boat from what I understand. So, 0:32:00.200 --> 0:32:03.080 like the other option would be for the US to 0:32:03.120 --> 0:32:07.800 put personnel on these ships, which would be problematic from 0:32:07.800 --> 0:32:11.840 a number of approaches. Right, it is a Liberian flagship, 0:32:11.960 --> 0:32:15.080 and now you're asking what US marines to risk their 0:32:15.120 --> 0:32:18.120 lives to defend the Liberian flagship so everyone can get 0:32:18.120 --> 0:32:21.840 their TIMU purchases. And like we can not slow down 0:32:21.840 --> 0:32:26.280 global trade. There is not a good option here. Like 0:32:27.040 --> 0:32:30.600 the state the States of the world couldn't find a 0:32:30.640 --> 0:32:33.080 good option when we were dealing with piracy in two 0:32:33.120 --> 0:32:37.600 thousand and nine, ten, eleven, twelve. Right, they felt better 0:32:37.680 --> 0:32:42.440 outsourcing the accountability for that to private companies. The States 0:32:42.480 --> 0:32:47.640 didn't want to have to wear the reputation damage for 0:32:47.800 --> 0:32:50.400 like this boat once again opened up with a belt 0:32:50.440 --> 0:32:52.920 fed on what turned out to be a fishing vessel, 0:32:53.000 --> 0:32:56.240 or they felt like that liability was too much for them, right, 0:32:56.280 --> 0:32:57.600 so they didn't want to do it and they would 0:32:57.640 --> 0:33:02.560 much rather have private companies do it. I don't really 0:33:02.720 --> 0:33:07.760 see an option here that makes the shipping safe going 0:33:07.760 --> 0:33:08.480 through this area. 0:33:08.680 --> 0:33:11.080 You could not start a war with Iran. 0:33:11.600 --> 0:33:13.680 Yeah, yeah, that is a really good option, actually one 0:33:13.720 --> 0:33:17.400 that one that sadly that ship has sailed as they say, Garrizon, 0:33:17.840 --> 0:33:22.360 But yeah, it is. This industry is already problematic, Like 0:33:22.880 --> 0:33:26.480 even before the United States started bombing Venezuela and the 0:33:26.520 --> 0:33:29.680 Colombian fishing vessels or vessels that it accused of being 0:33:29.880 --> 0:33:33.200 drug traffickers, there has been a long history of a 0:33:33.320 --> 0:33:37.240 lack of accountability for people being killed at sea and 0:33:37.400 --> 0:33:41.040 for people being abused at sea through labor violations. I 0:33:41.080 --> 0:33:44.960 don't really see a way we come out of this 0:33:45.120 --> 0:33:51.000 without more damage to innocent lives, right, Like, either the 0:33:51.120 --> 0:33:54.560 United States just decides that it's going to go like 0:33:54.680 --> 0:33:57.400 scorched Earth on any boat its seas in the straight 0:33:57.400 --> 0:34:00.480 of Horn moves isn't like a big tanker. And then 0:34:00.920 --> 0:34:03.680 these these vessels, they're not all US flagged, right, the 0:34:03.880 --> 0:34:06.200 US doesn't have a means to be like, Okay, you 0:34:06.200 --> 0:34:09.000 can go now you can't go now the straightforward moves 0:34:09.080 --> 0:34:12.640 is not in the United States. It doesn't control that water, 0:34:13.680 --> 0:34:17.120 and so I don't really see a solution for this now. 0:34:17.239 --> 0:34:20.040 Like one thing that the world of private maritime security 0:34:20.080 --> 0:34:24.680 shows us is that neoliberal globalism is willing to look 0:34:24.760 --> 0:34:28.439 the other way a great deal and allow a great 0:34:28.480 --> 0:34:31.840 deal of violence on behalf of corporations, not on behalf 0:34:31.880 --> 0:34:35.200 of the state. Right Like when people are getting engaged 0:34:35.239 --> 0:34:39.279 by these vessels, it is to protect property. Granted, sometimes 0:34:39.360 --> 0:34:41.360 it is also to protect life, right like these pirates 0:34:41.360 --> 0:34:44.160 have killed people and kidnap people in search. But the 0:34:44.200 --> 0:34:47.000 state has been willing to see its monopoly on violence 0:34:47.320 --> 0:34:51.040 at the high seas because it could find a good 0:34:51.080 --> 0:34:53.799 solution to this, and it's been willing to overlook a 0:34:53.840 --> 0:34:56.080 lot of loss of life. And I just don't see 0:34:57.000 --> 0:34:59.200 a way that this doesn't lead to more loss of life. 0:35:00.040 --> 0:35:01.680 That is probably what we have to look forward to. 0:35:03.000 --> 0:35:04.840 It may have already begun happening in the straight of 0:35:04.840 --> 0:35:07.800 horn Moves between when we record this and when you 0:35:07.840 --> 0:35:11.319 hear it, but it is deeply concerning and pretty shit, 0:35:11.440 --> 0:35:13.759 given that there are so many people just trying to 0:35:13.800 --> 0:35:17.360 make their way and live their lives in that area. Yeah, 0:35:17.840 --> 0:35:21.160 it's a happy one. Shout out to Greenpeace also for 0:35:22.200 --> 0:35:23.960 also patronizing these companies. 0:35:24.360 --> 0:35:25.640 Yeah, you told me this was going to be a 0:35:25.680 --> 0:35:27.080 recording about pirates. 0:35:27.440 --> 0:35:31.680 There were pirates in it. That was a yeah. But 0:35:32.440 --> 0:35:34.520 I know, if you're a pirate and you're listening, I 0:35:34.560 --> 0:35:36.200 would love to hear it from more pirates. 0:35:36.440 --> 0:35:40.920 Between the pirates, the private maritime contractors, and the governments, 0:35:40.960 --> 0:35:45.120 it's like everyone here has their own issues. Yeah, and 0:35:45.160 --> 0:35:49.080 all these issues are getting massively intensified by the conflict 0:35:49.360 --> 0:35:50.759 in Aran obviously. 0:35:51.120 --> 0:35:53.759 Yeah, before we even talk about the ecological crisis that 0:35:53.800 --> 0:35:56.200 we will see in the Gulf, right, Like you start 0:35:56.239 --> 0:35:59.440 putting holes in oil tankers, that is going to be 0:35:59.520 --> 0:36:03.439 absolute horrific for the environment. Again in an area where 0:36:03.440 --> 0:36:05.919 people are ready to struggling to make it by, I mean. 0:36:05.840 --> 0:36:08.719 Why don't they just pull a pull of Fitzgernaldo. Why 0:36:08.760 --> 0:36:13.560 don't they just pull those ships up? Oh God, avoid 0:36:13.560 --> 0:36:14.480 them straight altogether. 0:36:14.680 --> 0:36:16.800 Maybe people haven't seen this, and this surface is like 0:36:16.840 --> 0:36:19.799 every three days right now on Twitter, like why don't 0:36:19.800 --> 0:36:23.920 they just go across land? It turns out that mountains, 0:36:23.960 --> 0:36:27.799 big mountains, hard water doesn't like going uphill, quite a 0:36:27.840 --> 0:36:31.760 challenging terrain to transit. I think maybe people don't realize 0:36:31.800 --> 0:36:33.800 that eighty percent think believe it's eighty percent of global 0:36:33.840 --> 0:36:37.480 trade still travels by boat. Yeah, like it is still 0:36:37.520 --> 0:36:40.640 the way that most things get to most places. And 0:36:41.239 --> 0:36:44.040 I think we are about to find out that the 0:36:44.320 --> 0:36:47.520 boat ignorers are about to find out. If this continues 0:36:47.840 --> 0:36:50.440 for weeks or months, then it will be incredibly detrimental. 0:36:51.120 --> 0:36:53.759 Is this a good or a bad time to enter 0:36:53.840 --> 0:36:56.920 the private mirror time contracting business? 0:36:57.239 --> 0:37:02.439 How much are you enjoying your life decently? Well, okay, yeah, 0:37:02.640 --> 0:37:04.280 probably stay out of it if I with you. 0:37:04.160 --> 0:37:05.879 Because they got to be getting a lot of money. 0:37:05.880 --> 0:37:07.960 But also they're in the one of the most highest 0:37:08.000 --> 0:37:09.279 positions they've probably ever been in. 0:37:10.000 --> 0:37:14.319 So yeah, this was already an area of military contracting 0:37:14.360 --> 0:37:17.040 that people looked to get into and get out of. 0:37:17.280 --> 0:37:19.759 I would say, like the bulk of these folks now 0:37:19.920 --> 0:37:23.239 will be the ones I've met have been Colombians. The 0:37:23.320 --> 0:37:26.000 Colombians provide a lot of military contractors around the world. Now, 0:37:26.560 --> 0:37:30.239 the people who are able to get out of it 0:37:30.280 --> 0:37:32.640 will do business in other areas, right, Like they'll do 0:37:33.680 --> 0:37:35.960 the private close protection and stuff like that there are 0:37:36.000 --> 0:37:38.600 protective details for journalists I know in who are operating 0:37:38.680 --> 0:37:41.040 in Iraq right now. Sure, yeah, these people will be 0:37:41.080 --> 0:37:44.000 making a lot of money, I think, especially like probably 0:37:44.040 --> 0:37:47.319 consulting right now with global shipping. I was reading about 0:37:47.320 --> 0:37:50.240 the East India Company this morning. I was learning, for instance, 0:37:50.239 --> 0:37:53.280 that the value of a t ship leave in China 0:37:53.719 --> 0:37:57.320 was a billion dollars in twenty twenty four money, which 0:37:57.360 --> 0:38:01.360 is how like these private maritime security companies in another 0:38:01.400 --> 0:38:04.000 age were able to develop right because it was worth 0:38:04.600 --> 0:38:08.239 boat jacking, that boat pirrating, whatever that's called, because of 0:38:08.320 --> 0:38:10.880 the value of tea at that time. So it's not 0:38:10.920 --> 0:38:13.800 a new problem. But there was a relatively short period 0:38:13.800 --> 0:38:16.719 of time in global trade history in which the state 0:38:16.760 --> 0:38:21.160 attempted to advance any form of hegemony over the high seas, 0:38:21.239 --> 0:38:23.680 and it is completely retreated from that in the twenty 0:38:23.680 --> 0:38:27.759 first century. But it will be very difficult for any 0:38:27.800 --> 0:38:30.200 state to try and regain that now, Like I don't 0:38:30.239 --> 0:38:33.440 see even the United States doesn't really have the capacity 0:38:33.480 --> 0:38:36.480 to do that. Garrison looks ponderous. 0:38:37.080 --> 0:38:40.040 Yeah, well, I guess I'll cancel my TIMU orders. 0:38:41.120 --> 0:38:44.799 They'll come someone someone right now is strapping a belt 0:38:44.840 --> 0:38:46.839 fed machine gun to a boat to make sure that 0:38:46.880 --> 0:38:50.279 you get your team orders. It is like, really kind 0:38:50.320 --> 0:38:55.480 of fucked that we're asking people to run a mine field, right, 0:38:55.520 --> 0:38:58.000 Like an understand global trade. It's not just temu orders, 0:38:58.040 --> 0:39:00.200 but certainly a lot of stuff is consumed when the 0:39:00.200 --> 0:39:03.080 global author doesn't need to be consumed. And it is 0:39:03.160 --> 0:39:05.920 wild that right now, the solution of the global shipping 0:39:05.960 --> 0:39:08.239 industry seems to be some of these people will die, 0:39:08.400 --> 0:39:11.200 but we will keep the oil moving and the treats moving. 0:39:11.719 --> 0:39:15.040 But that has been, as I hope I've illustrated here right, like, 0:39:15.360 --> 0:39:17.439 some people will die, but we will keep the treats moving, 0:39:17.480 --> 0:39:20.240 has been pretty much the status of the shipping industry 0:39:20.280 --> 0:39:21.520 for most of the twenty first century. 0:39:21.680 --> 0:39:21.839 Yeah. 0:39:21.880 --> 0:39:25.480 Yeah, that's the status of the entire world at this point. Yeah, yeah, 0:39:25.480 --> 0:39:28.040 that is the capitalist logic, right. It's just it's like 0:39:28.120 --> 0:39:32.520 particularly I think particularly naked here. Yeah. I highly recommend 0:39:32.520 --> 0:39:35.080 the Outlaw Ocean podcast if you're interested in learning more 0:39:35.080 --> 0:39:38.799 about this. I will link to some of the jastore 0:39:38.800 --> 0:39:41.520 deep dive that I went on this morning if you 0:39:42.200 --> 0:39:44.080 are able to get past the jay Store paywall and 0:39:44.120 --> 0:39:46.520 would like to read that. I think that's about all 0:39:46.520 --> 0:39:48.840 we got anything else you want to say about boats. 0:39:48.840 --> 0:39:53.440 Garrison now is the age of pirates. Yeah, our flag 0:39:53.480 --> 0:40:07.800 means a complete lack of accountability. 0:40:08.800 --> 0:40:11.440 Hello everyone, a welcome to it could happen here. My 0:40:11.560 --> 0:40:12.439 name is Dad Al Kern. 0:40:12.760 --> 0:40:15.879 I'm an associate professor of political science, a senior non 0:40:15.880 --> 0:40:18.960 resident fell at the Arab Center Washington, and I specialize 0:40:18.960 --> 0:40:22.400 in Palestinian and Arab politics. Although Gaza has sort of 0:40:22.480 --> 0:40:26.080 leaked off the headlines with everything going on domestically, there's 0:40:26.120 --> 0:40:28.680 still obviously a lot happening on the issue of Palestine. 0:40:29.000 --> 0:40:30.920 I feel like I've started the last few episodes like this, 0:40:31.000 --> 0:40:34.040 but it's worth repeating. So here's an update on what's 0:40:34.040 --> 0:40:38.400 been happening in Gaza specifically, despite the ceasefire agreement, reports 0:40:38.440 --> 0:40:42.560 indicate ongoing demolition of homes in Gaza City and restricted 0:40:42.680 --> 0:40:46.000 entry of food, medical, and humanitarian aid. Again, since the 0:40:46.040 --> 0:40:48.680 ceasefire started, more than six hundred Palestinians have been killed 0:40:48.719 --> 0:40:51.719 by Israeli fire, with one hundreds more injured. For some reason, 0:40:51.800 --> 0:40:54.799 these don't count as ceasefire violations, and according to the 0:40:54.920 --> 0:40:58.960 Gaza Government Media Office, there's been over sixteen hundred violations 0:40:58.960 --> 0:41:02.160 by Israeli forces, including air attacks, shelling, and direct shooting. 0:41:03.000 --> 0:41:05.560 Of the past one hundred and thirty some days of 0:41:05.600 --> 0:41:09.120 the ceasefire, Analsis shows attacks on one hundred and eleven 0:41:09.200 --> 0:41:11.839 of them, at least in a previous episode, I also 0:41:11.920 --> 0:41:13.799 talked about what the yellow line was, which was this 0:41:13.960 --> 0:41:18.759 kind of unilaterally imposed military boundary inside Gaza to make 0:41:18.800 --> 0:41:23.080 sure that Palestinians are sequestered into smaller spaces, and Israeli 0:41:23.080 --> 0:41:27.120 forces have continued to target individuals and structures across this 0:41:27.200 --> 0:41:29.960 yellow line, claiming that these actions are necessary to stop 0:41:30.000 --> 0:41:33.480 militants and now JA zero reports, however, that Israeli backed 0:41:33.520 --> 0:41:36.520 gangs armed gangs are operating back and forth across the 0:41:36.600 --> 0:41:40.360 yellow line, so they're allowed now. Rapach Crossing, which is 0:41:40.360 --> 0:41:44.480 at the southern tip of Gaza, has officially opened but 0:41:44.640 --> 0:41:48.560 is operating under intense Israeli security with some monitoring by 0:41:48.560 --> 0:41:52.200 the Palestinian authority and EU officials, but reports indicate that 0:41:52.320 --> 0:41:54.160 only about fifty to one hundred and fifty people are 0:41:54.200 --> 0:41:56.800 allowed to cross daily, which is far below the demand 0:41:57.200 --> 0:42:01.040 for the estimated twenty thousand plus sick or wounded Palstinians 0:42:01.080 --> 0:42:05.520 needing evacuation. And since it's opened, its face closures. There's 0:42:05.560 --> 0:42:09.560 been a lot of confusion about policy, with many reporting 0:42:09.600 --> 0:42:13.680 harsh treatment, invasive searches, and restrictions on personal belongings for 0:42:13.719 --> 0:42:17.239 those passing through, and that crossing is not functioning for 0:42:17.320 --> 0:42:20.480 commercial or humanitarian aid, which must go through other Israeli 0:42:20.480 --> 0:42:24.640 controlled crossings. At the Munich Security Conference that was held 0:42:24.840 --> 0:42:29.719 February thirteenth, the top US appointed diplomat overseeing the ceasefire, 0:42:30.040 --> 0:42:34.880 Bulgarian diplomat Nicolaim Ladanov said, quote continued violations of the 0:42:34.960 --> 0:42:38.400 agreement pose major obstacles to the Pastinian committee expected to 0:42:38.440 --> 0:42:42.000 oversee post war governance and reconstruction end quote, and he 0:42:42.080 --> 0:42:46.000 was specifically talking about Hamas basically violating the agreement by 0:42:46.040 --> 0:42:49.719 not laying down its weapons not disarming, and the Paladian 0:42:49.760 --> 0:42:53.160 Foreign Minister Varsen Shaheen, speaking at the same panel, focused 0:42:53.200 --> 0:42:55.319 on this idea that Gaza must not be severed from 0:42:55.320 --> 0:42:58.200 the West Bank and that the Palsidian authority, meaning the 0:42:58.239 --> 0:43:01.399 government in the West Bank that she represents, will need 0:43:01.440 --> 0:43:04.080 to take control of governance at some point in Gaza 0:43:04.120 --> 0:43:07.360 so that Pastinians could maybe have a state in the future. 0:43:07.520 --> 0:43:11.399 Something of course, the Israeli government has rejected outright, which 0:43:11.440 --> 0:43:14.560 brings us to this issue of disarming Hamas. Now, this 0:43:14.640 --> 0:43:17.480 has been a condition of the US and its representatives 0:43:17.480 --> 0:43:19.840 on the Board of Peace. Here's Trump on this a 0:43:19.880 --> 0:43:21.800 few days after the ceasefire was announced. 0:43:22.280 --> 0:43:25.360 Will it take Hamas to disarm and can you guarantee 0:43:25.400 --> 0:43:25.680 that is. 0:43:25.680 --> 0:43:26.160 Going to happen? 0:43:26.160 --> 0:43:28.560 Well, I'm going to disarm and because they said they 0:43:28.560 --> 0:43:30.880 were going to disarm, and if they don't disarm, we 0:43:30.920 --> 0:43:31.839 will disarm them. 0:43:32.239 --> 0:43:34.600 How you do that, I don't have to explain that 0:43:34.680 --> 0:43:34.840 to you. 0:43:35.320 --> 0:43:38.080 But if they don't disarm, we will disarm them. They 0:43:38.120 --> 0:43:40.160 know I'm not playing games, okay. 0:43:40.880 --> 0:43:44.840 On February fifteenth, he announced on social media his Truth 0:43:44.920 --> 0:43:48.239 Social that he had gotten five billion dollars pledged by 0:43:48.320 --> 0:43:51.399 members of his quote unquote Board of Peace. As one 0:43:51.480 --> 0:43:54.960 article noted, reconstruction of Gaza is expected to cost seven 0:43:55.000 --> 0:43:58.600 hundred billion dollars according to the United Nations, World Bank, 0:43:58.640 --> 0:44:02.359 and European Union est, especially after more than two years 0:44:02.400 --> 0:44:05.840 of war. Trump has also claimed that countries had committed 0:44:05.840 --> 0:44:08.399 a bunch of troops to the International Security Force that's 0:44:08.400 --> 0:44:11.719 supposed to go into Gaza, secure Gaza and disarm Hamas. 0:44:12.160 --> 0:44:14.520 He didn't name which of these countries had committed troops, 0:44:14.520 --> 0:44:18.520 but Indonesia did confirm that it will send eight thousand troops. 0:44:19.239 --> 0:44:22.120 And in that same truth social post, Trump again reiterated 0:44:22.160 --> 0:44:25.920 that quote very importantly, HAMAS must uphold its commitment to 0:44:26.040 --> 0:44:31.239 full and immediate demilitarization end quote so. Back in December, 0:44:31.560 --> 0:44:34.759 in an interview with Israel's Channel twelve, as reported by 0:44:34.800 --> 0:44:38.320 drop site News, US Ambassador to the UN Mike Waltz, 0:44:38.440 --> 0:44:41.680 said that the International Security Force was intended to disarm 0:44:41.719 --> 0:44:45.000 Hamas one way or the other. Specifically, he said, quote 0:44:45.000 --> 0:44:49.200 by all means necessary, and that quote obviously it'll be 0:44:49.239 --> 0:44:52.920 a conversation with each country. Those rules of engagement are ongoing. 0:44:53.400 --> 0:44:56.520 I'll tell you this. President Trump has repeatedly said HAMAS 0:44:56.560 --> 0:44:59.160 will disarm one way or another, the easy way or 0:44:59.160 --> 0:45:03.160 the hard way. Now. Hamas, for its part, claims it 0:45:03.200 --> 0:45:05.839 never agreed to disarm. In an interview with drop site 0:45:05.880 --> 0:45:08.759 News in December twenty twenty five, senior HAMAS leader had 0:45:08.760 --> 0:45:11.520 Ad Micheald said that while HAMAS is open to quote 0:45:11.520 --> 0:45:15.720 freezing or storing its defensive weapons, it wouldn't disarm unless 0:45:15.760 --> 0:45:18.520 it was in the quote context of establishing a Palestinian 0:45:18.600 --> 0:45:21.760 army or security force capable of defending itself from Israeli aggression. 0:45:22.440 --> 0:45:24.880 Hamas has claimed that it only has a mandate to 0:45:24.920 --> 0:45:28.200 negotiate a ceasefire at exchange of captives, and that every 0:45:28.200 --> 0:45:30.040 other issue needs to be handled through some sort of 0:45:30.120 --> 0:45:34.839 consensus process involving the other Palestinian political factions. And in 0:45:34.840 --> 0:45:37.880 that same interview, Michild rejected the idea of an international 0:45:37.920 --> 0:45:41.680 security force disarming them, saying that quote we accept them 0:45:41.680 --> 0:45:44.480 on the borders as separation forces between the Palestinian side 0:45:44.480 --> 0:45:47.280 and the Israeli side, not as forces deployed inside Gaza 0:45:47.800 --> 0:45:50.640 as was intended for them, and as Nittanyaja wants for 0:45:50.719 --> 0:45:53.480 them to clash with Palestinians and disarm them end quote. 0:45:54.120 --> 0:45:54.200 So. 0:45:54.360 --> 0:45:56.960 Speaking at an Al Jazera forum on February eighth, the 0:45:57.000 --> 0:46:00.480 same person, hadath Micheald reiterated this argument, saying that the 0:46:00.520 --> 0:46:04.560 calls for Hamas's disarmament is not an international demand but 0:46:04.719 --> 0:46:07.200 and Israeli dictate being pushed onto Washington. 0:46:07.880 --> 0:46:09.040 He also said that calls to. 0:46:09.040 --> 0:46:12.440 Disarm Palstinians while the occupation continues would quote leave Gaza 0:46:12.480 --> 0:46:18.520 defenseless against Israel's overwhelming military power and exterminationist agenda. As 0:46:18.640 --> 0:46:22.040 job site News reported on their social media quote, mitchad 0:46:22.040 --> 0:46:25.960 acknowledged the need for pragmatic post war framework to enable 0:46:26.000 --> 0:46:29.279 reconstruction and prevent a return to fighting, but explained that 0:46:29.320 --> 0:46:33.000 it could not be built on total disarmament. So with 0:46:33.080 --> 0:46:35.320 that as an introduction, I wanted to take this episode 0:46:35.360 --> 0:46:39.800 to talk about what Palestinians think of disarmament and broadly 0:46:40.080 --> 0:46:43.640 and more generally arm tactics. And when I say Palestinians, 0:46:43.960 --> 0:46:46.600 I hope it's clear I don't just mean Hemas. I 0:46:46.640 --> 0:46:49.279 know that comes as a shock to some, but Pastinians 0:46:49.280 --> 0:46:51.960 aren't monolithic. And there has been a great deal of 0:46:52.000 --> 0:46:55.000 debate since the Octu over seventh attacks by hems on 0:46:55.080 --> 0:46:58.160 the role of arm tactics armed groups, especially in the 0:46:58.200 --> 0:47:03.200 absence of national institutions or functioning national liberation movements. In 0:47:03.280 --> 0:47:06.560 December of last year, twenty twenty five, the New Arab 0:47:06.600 --> 0:47:10.600 hosted a very interesting debate between different Pastinian representatives of 0:47:11.040 --> 0:47:15.160 Hamas Fateh, the party of the Pasidian Authority, and a 0:47:15.239 --> 0:47:18.960 human rights activist and writer. And they hosted this in Gaza, 0:47:19.440 --> 0:47:22.440 literally on the grounds of the bombed out of Shippe hospital, 0:47:23.200 --> 0:47:26.600 and they've debated some key questions, for example, who has 0:47:26.640 --> 0:47:30.319 the right to decide or in peace for Palestinians, How 0:47:30.320 --> 0:47:34.400 can Pastinians understand October seventh, does Hamas need to disarm? 0:47:34.640 --> 0:47:37.560 Who should govern Gaza? And you know what, this may 0:47:37.560 --> 0:47:39.279 come as a shock to both the American left and 0:47:39.320 --> 0:47:42.080 the American right, but the Pasadian speakers at this interview 0:47:42.120 --> 0:47:44.440 did not all agree with each other. So I'm going 0:47:44.520 --> 0:47:48.239 to give a brief rountdown of what this panel discussed. 0:47:49.080 --> 0:47:52.839 The main Hamas spokesperson hasn't caused him basically argued that 0:47:52.960 --> 0:47:55.560 decisions on war and peace should be made through national 0:47:55.560 --> 0:48:00.760 consensus within a unified Pastinian institution, not unilatterally by any faction, 0:48:01.560 --> 0:48:05.320 but that in the absence of functioning institutions, then Hamas 0:48:05.360 --> 0:48:07.960 is a part of the Palastinian body politic has a 0:48:08.040 --> 0:48:11.319 right to engage in violence and defend Palestinians. He also 0:48:11.440 --> 0:48:13.960 argued that it wasn't Hamas's fault that there wasn't national 0:48:13.960 --> 0:48:18.280 consensus or functioning national institutions. His narrative was that Hamas 0:48:18.360 --> 0:48:21.640 consistently sought unity first by entering into elections in two 0:48:21.680 --> 0:48:25.000 thousand and six and supporting election attempts that President Mahmad 0:48:25.000 --> 0:48:28.360 Abbas of the Party and the Paladian Authority ended up canceling. 0:48:29.360 --> 0:48:33.000 He also reiterated that Hamas doesn't mind handing over governance 0:48:33.000 --> 0:48:36.600 in Gaza to a technocratic body, which proves from his perspective, 0:48:36.640 --> 0:48:39.279 that they aren't trying to govern alone. And on the 0:48:39.360 --> 0:48:42.680 question of disarmament, he said Hamas would commit to cease fire, 0:48:43.280 --> 0:48:46.040 they would commit to maybe storing their weapons, but they 0:48:46.080 --> 0:48:49.520 wouldn't disarm entirely, and they maintained that armed tactics are 0:48:49.520 --> 0:48:53.600 illegitimate right. He also emphasized that Israel alone was responsible 0:48:53.600 --> 0:48:55.440 for the destruction of Gaza and that no one could 0:48:55.480 --> 0:49:10.040 have anticipated the level of brutality Israel would unleash now. 0:49:10.080 --> 0:49:13.840 The Faateehespauk's person Munder Hayek understandably disagreed with many of 0:49:13.880 --> 0:49:18.520 these points. He represents the opposing party, and from his perspective, 0:49:18.840 --> 0:49:22.160 the October seventh attacks were launched without national consensus and 0:49:22.200 --> 0:49:24.880 that Concessus could only operate through the Past Time Liberation 0:49:25.040 --> 0:49:29.200 Organization the PLO, which is the internationally recognized representative of 0:49:29.200 --> 0:49:32.919 the Palestinian people. Hayak also made the reasonable argument that 0:49:33.200 --> 0:49:37.040 even if everyone agrees armed resistance is a right that 0:49:37.160 --> 0:49:40.279 those engaging in that tactic should consider the regional and 0:49:40.320 --> 0:49:44.239 international context, as well as the impact of these kinds 0:49:44.280 --> 0:49:47.520 of tactics and the likelihood of their success, and in 0:49:47.560 --> 0:49:50.480 his view, because these things were not considered October seventh 0:49:50.560 --> 0:49:53.839 led to very negative results for Palestinians and a lack 0:49:53.880 --> 0:49:59.080 of meaningful international support. He also admonished Hamas leadership for 0:49:59.160 --> 0:50:01.680 making what he thinks this is a political decision of 0:50:01.719 --> 0:50:05.600 not negotiating a ceasefire earlier, accusing them of having been 0:50:05.640 --> 0:50:07.440 able to stop the war in the first six months 0:50:07.440 --> 0:50:10.680 and limit the bloodshed. And finally, he criticized Hamas for 0:50:10.760 --> 0:50:13.799 prolonging negotiations and refusing to put the PA in charge 0:50:13.800 --> 0:50:16.799 of Gaza. And he landed on the argument that there 0:50:16.800 --> 0:50:19.440 could be no future for Hamas from his perspective, as 0:50:19.480 --> 0:50:23.080 part of a national liberation movement unless it accepted the PLO, 0:50:23.640 --> 0:50:28.120 it disarmed, it renounced violence, and understood that the PA, 0:50:28.200 --> 0:50:31.680 the Palsenian Authority, was the only legitimate authority that could 0:50:31.719 --> 0:50:34.799 control both territories, the West Bank and Gaza. And the 0:50:34.800 --> 0:50:38.840 way to quote unify Palstinen geography is through the Palsenian 0:50:38.840 --> 0:50:41.920 authority and doing that would be the only way to 0:50:41.960 --> 0:50:44.960 get back to the state building project. I'm just summarizing 0:50:45.000 --> 0:50:46.600 here to be clear, his words, not mine. 0:50:47.719 --> 0:50:47.919 Now. 0:50:47.960 --> 0:50:50.759 The final panelist, Mustaf Ebrahim is a writer and human 0:50:50.840 --> 0:50:53.600 rights activist in Gaza who took a critical position of 0:50:53.640 --> 0:50:57.240 both parties. He basically said that both Hamas and Fate 0:50:57.640 --> 0:51:01.000 share the blame for the division in the Palestinian body 0:51:01.040 --> 0:51:02.640 politic and the fact that there was a lack of 0:51:02.680 --> 0:51:08.520 mechanism for collective Pastenian decision making and no functioning national institutions. 0:51:08.560 --> 0:51:11.839 He blamed both sides, and he accused both sides of 0:51:11.880 --> 0:51:14.680 not actually being serious about any of the dialogue sessions 0:51:14.719 --> 0:51:17.160 that were held between the two parties in the past 0:51:17.200 --> 0:51:20.759 in Cairo, Beirut, and Beijing. But he agreed with the 0:51:20.760 --> 0:51:25.120 fatehpokesperson that October seventh has not been allowed to be 0:51:25.160 --> 0:51:28.719 assessed properly and that Palestinians never got to decide if 0:51:28.760 --> 0:51:32.000 the consequences justified whatever October semath was trying to do, 0:51:32.680 --> 0:51:36.239 and he blamed Hamas for that, so, agreeing with the 0:51:36.239 --> 0:51:39.080 other panelists that the rights to resist as legitimate. He 0:51:39.200 --> 0:51:44.279 also acknowledged that disarmament was an internationally demanded condition, so 0:51:44.360 --> 0:51:47.400 he posed the question how would Palestinians navigate this, and 0:51:47.440 --> 0:51:50.200 from his perspective, Hamas should be more flexible on the 0:51:50.239 --> 0:51:53.720 weapons and disarmament issue, especially given the degree of people's 0:51:53.719 --> 0:51:58.360 suffering and the need for reconstruction in Gaza. I summarize 0:51:58.400 --> 0:52:01.440 all of this for you, because this debate held in 0:52:01.480 --> 0:52:04.680 Gaza among people who had directly lived through the last 0:52:04.680 --> 0:52:08.080 two years of genocide, should demonstrate that there is no 0:52:08.200 --> 0:52:11.560 national consensus, and that it's not because Postinians don't know 0:52:11.560 --> 0:52:14.600 how to resolve these issues, it's because they haven't been 0:52:14.600 --> 0:52:17.440 given the space to do so. There has been a 0:52:17.440 --> 0:52:21.200 lot of discussion about how to unify these different parties, 0:52:21.960 --> 0:52:25.760 about reviving the Pastaine Liberation Organization, making it more inclusive 0:52:25.800 --> 0:52:28.960 and democratic and therefore more legitimate as an actor, so 0:52:28.960 --> 0:52:31.600 that it could make decisions the Pastinian people would accept, 0:52:32.320 --> 0:52:34.759 and so that not one faction can do what at 0:52:34.760 --> 0:52:38.360 once can engage in tactics without considering the consequences. But 0:52:38.520 --> 0:52:40.880 none of these attempts, and there have been plenty, like 0:52:40.880 --> 0:52:45.239 the Palstinian National Conference, have really been incorporated into discussions 0:52:45.239 --> 0:52:49.040 of post conflict processes or management by the international community. 0:52:49.920 --> 0:52:52.640 Perhaps I shouldn't be surprised when the idea we're going 0:52:52.680 --> 0:52:55.840 with is the quote Board of Peace basically functioning as 0:52:55.840 --> 0:52:58.400 a colonial oversight board and a club for authoritarian regimes. 0:52:58.440 --> 0:52:59.440 But I digress. 0:53:00.360 --> 0:53:01.880 I think it's also important. 0:53:01.480 --> 0:53:02.600 To make two points here. 0:53:03.280 --> 0:53:07.080 First, that polling of the Palestinian people by the Palstinian 0:53:07.120 --> 0:53:10.560 Center for Policy and Survey Research shows that most Palestinians 0:53:10.560 --> 0:53:13.920 are not supportive of either party, neither Fetah or Hamas. 0:53:14.320 --> 0:53:17.200 There is a degree of malaise and cynicism where both 0:53:17.200 --> 0:53:19.839 parties are seen as a part of an unacceptable status quo. 0:53:20.480 --> 0:53:22.960 For example, when asked about whether they would support a 0:53:23.040 --> 0:53:26.480 Hamas candidate or a Fete candidate if elections were held 0:53:26.520 --> 0:53:30.640 for the presidency, thirty four percent of Palestinians say they 0:53:30.680 --> 0:53:33.839 would vote for a Fute candidate, twenty four percent would 0:53:33.840 --> 0:53:37.239 say a Hamas candidate, nine percent would say they would 0:53:37.280 --> 0:53:41.000 keep president Mahammad Abbass, and a whopping thirty two percent 0:53:41.000 --> 0:53:43.760 would say they wouldn't even vote, And this non voting 0:53:43.800 --> 0:53:46.960 percentage goes up to forty seven percent if the elections 0:53:46.960 --> 0:53:50.480 are just between Mahmud Abass and a Hamas candidate. And 0:53:50.960 --> 0:53:53.400 they also ask about direct support of political parties, so 0:53:53.400 --> 0:53:55.759 there's a more direct question. In the latest poll from 0:53:55.760 --> 0:53:59.160 October twenty twenty five, again it shows twenty four percent 0:53:59.200 --> 0:54:03.600 support FATEH, hardly a majority, thirty five percent support MS, 0:54:03.600 --> 0:54:07.759 again hardly a majority, nine percent support third parties, and 0:54:07.840 --> 0:54:10.640 thirty two percent either say they don't know or refuse 0:54:10.680 --> 0:54:14.360 to answer. So this is not a situation where either 0:54:14.360 --> 0:54:16.879 of these parties have im mandate, and it's clear that 0:54:16.920 --> 0:54:20.359 neither party is representing the Pasenian people right now, nor 0:54:20.400 --> 0:54:24.360 do their actions have majority support. Now, some might wonder 0:54:24.880 --> 0:54:27.440 is this debate emerging because of the sheer level of 0:54:27.440 --> 0:54:30.560 destruction in Gaza. We are talking over seventy thousand people 0:54:30.600 --> 0:54:32.799 killed in Gaza that we can even confirm so far. 0:54:33.800 --> 0:54:36.600 Is it that, in this context, this context of severe 0:54:36.600 --> 0:54:40.560 consequences from Israel, what prompted this debate and self reflection? 0:54:41.840 --> 0:54:42.880 Well, the short answer is no. 0:54:43.719 --> 0:54:47.400 Pastenians have always debated these issues, and in the absence 0:54:47.440 --> 0:54:51.600 of a functioning national liberation movement with all of its institutions, 0:54:51.640 --> 0:54:55.160 they haven't been able to hold any particular party accountable 0:54:55.160 --> 0:54:57.440 for its actions. I could point to a lot in 0:54:57.480 --> 0:55:00.880 Paustenian history to demonstrate this, but I'll point out an 0:55:01.040 --> 0:55:04.560 essay by a Pastinian intellectual, Asmibshada, that he wrote and 0:55:04.600 --> 0:55:08.080 released within a month of October seventh. This essay, titled 0:55:08.239 --> 0:55:12.040 Moral Matters and Hard Times, again demonstrates the Palestinians have 0:55:12.200 --> 0:55:15.600 never shied away from this discussion and indeed made criticisms 0:55:15.600 --> 0:55:19.200 of these political parties very quickly following the attacks. Now, 0:55:19.239 --> 0:55:22.160 of course, Bashada lays the blame for civilian deaths on Israel, 0:55:22.640 --> 0:55:25.359 given that it targets Palestinian civilians as he argues out 0:55:25.360 --> 0:55:28.480 of racism, and as he argues to try to turn 0:55:28.560 --> 0:55:32.160 the population against armed tactics and armed resistance, and he 0:55:32.239 --> 0:55:35.440 quotes Israeli leaders directly here. So he talks about President 0:55:35.480 --> 0:55:38.920 Herzog saying there are no innocence in Gaza and Israeli 0:55:38.920 --> 0:55:42.480 Defense Minister you Off Gallant at the time calling people 0:55:42.520 --> 0:55:45.359 in Gaza human animals. And he also points out that 0:55:45.440 --> 0:55:48.440 Israeli society at the time was overwhelmingly supportive of cutting 0:55:48.440 --> 0:55:52.640 off food, water, and medicine to Gaza. So, although Bashada 0:55:52.640 --> 0:55:55.640 rejects this kind of absolute evil framing of the attacks 0:55:56.120 --> 0:55:58.920 and says we need to understand the context of a 0:55:59.400 --> 0:56:04.120 seventeen year see John Gaza settlement expansion, incursions on the 0:56:04.239 --> 0:56:08.359 al Axamosk and prisoner mistreatment. He also plainly argues that 0:56:08.920 --> 0:56:13.680 immoral acts committed during October seventh So to him, documented 0:56:13.719 --> 0:56:17.799 instances of harm to civilians, theft, mistreatment, et cetera, are 0:56:17.840 --> 0:56:21.440 not acts of resistance, and in fact, from his perspective, 0:56:21.480 --> 0:56:25.720 they harm legitimate resistance, and he argues again a month 0:56:26.000 --> 0:56:29.400 within the attacks, that the leadership of the quote unquote 0:56:29.440 --> 0:56:32.360 resistance have a duty to clarify what happened and condemn 0:56:32.680 --> 0:56:37.360 those immoral acts. He says, quote having recognized a people's 0:56:37.440 --> 0:56:40.840 right to resist occupation, can it be concluded that we 0:56:40.880 --> 0:56:43.160 are not permitted to judge the morality of acts of 0:56:43.200 --> 0:56:47.080 resistance to occupation. My answer is that, on the contrary, 0:56:47.440 --> 0:56:50.840 it is not only permissible, but perhaps necessary end quote. 0:56:51.640 --> 0:56:53.960 So he argues that the right to resist does not 0:56:54.120 --> 0:56:59.200 exempt these movements from moral judgment, and distinguishing between legitimate 0:56:59.200 --> 0:57:02.360 military operations and a moral acts against civilians is essential 0:57:02.400 --> 0:57:05.680 to maintaining the justice of the Pastinian cause. Even as 0:57:05.719 --> 0:57:09.239 we can acknowledge and emphasize the quote moral depravity of 0:57:09.320 --> 0:57:13.239 the Israeli response end quote. Now, whether you agree with 0:57:13.320 --> 0:57:15.520 him or not, whether you side with one of the 0:57:15.520 --> 0:57:18.440 panelists I mentioned from the interview or the other, what 0:57:18.560 --> 0:57:20.440 I want people to take away from this episode is 0:57:20.480 --> 0:57:23.280 that all of this clearly shows Palestinians have been taking 0:57:23.360 --> 0:57:26.440 seriously the strategic and moral implications of all of these 0:57:26.440 --> 0:57:29.520 tactics arm tactics included, and that there isn't any one 0:57:29.560 --> 0:57:32.400 party that speaks for what Postinians want right now. The 0:57:32.480 --> 0:57:34.720 only way to get national consensus is to allow the 0:57:34.720 --> 0:57:38.520 Palestinians to create or revive the institutions necessary for that 0:57:38.560 --> 0:57:44.680 to take place. Disempowering Palestinians, ignoring their aspirations and ignoring 0:57:44.720 --> 0:57:48.560 the need for their input, or blocking them from undergoing 0:57:48.720 --> 0:57:51.960 this essential process will only prolong the conflict and prolong 0:57:52.000 --> 0:57:55.040 the suffering. That's it for me today, Thanks for listening. 0:58:07.640 --> 0:58:10.880 Welcome to It Could Happened Here, a podcast frequently about 0:58:11.160 --> 0:58:14.240 the horrifying tech gouls and in this case, venture capital 0:58:14.240 --> 0:58:17.640 gouls who are plotting to take over the United States 0:58:17.640 --> 0:58:20.960 and have already made your lives significantly worse. I am 0:58:21.080 --> 0:58:24.640 your host, Mia Wong, and with me today, I'm very, 0:58:24.760 --> 0:58:28.480 very excited about this to talk about the forces of 0:58:28.560 --> 0:58:32.200 venture capital and how they're ruining our lives. Is Shaneley, 0:58:32.240 --> 0:58:34.920 who is one of the people who puts together the 0:58:34.960 --> 0:58:38.520 website VC Infodocs, which I really cannot recommend enough. It 0:58:38.600 --> 0:58:42.600 is the most comprehensive, compile source of information on these 0:58:42.720 --> 0:58:45.480 venture capital firms and the network state and all the 0:58:45.480 --> 0:58:47.600 things that I've been talking about that I've ever encountered. 0:58:47.640 --> 0:58:50.680 It was a very significant source for the episodes that 0:58:50.680 --> 0:58:53.800 I did about Abundance. Shanley, Welcome to the show. 0:58:54.080 --> 0:58:55.760 Thank you so much for having me. 0:58:56.120 --> 0:59:00.120 This is actually the first podcast I've ever done, so 0:59:01.200 --> 0:59:01.640 thank you. 0:59:04.000 --> 0:59:05.080 I feel very special. 0:59:06.560 --> 0:59:09.120 So it's great, It's it's good to be here with you. 0:59:09.600 --> 0:59:09.840 Yeah. 0:59:09.960 --> 0:59:11.480 Do you want to talk a little bit about your 0:59:11.520 --> 0:59:15.120 work and about your time confronting the sort of Leviathan 0:59:15.360 --> 0:59:16.440 of venture capital. 0:59:17.240 --> 0:59:17.760 Yeah. 0:59:17.880 --> 0:59:21.600 Absolutely, So. I actually used to work in the tech industry. 0:59:21.760 --> 0:59:25.280 It feels like a lifetime ago, but I remember when 0:59:25.320 --> 0:59:30.760 I first started encountering venture capital, like I knew in 0:59:30.840 --> 0:59:33.520 my body and my heart and my soul that something 0:59:33.680 --> 0:59:36.440 was terribly wrong with this situation. 0:59:37.720 --> 0:59:41.520 And so I started following that down, you know, over. 0:59:41.320 --> 0:59:43.880 The course of years, and now I've been doing it 0:59:43.920 --> 0:59:47.320 for about thirteen years. At different times, I've been more 0:59:47.360 --> 0:59:51.880 of an activist. I ran a tech critical magazine at 0:59:51.880 --> 0:59:54.840 one point, and now I really do a bunch of 0:59:54.880 --> 0:59:58.440 research and work with other researchers around the world to 0:59:58.520 --> 1:00:02.360 try to bring as much much serious and material information 1:00:02.600 --> 1:00:06.200 about venture capital and what we're facing as possible and 1:00:06.240 --> 1:00:08.880 put it in people's hands who can do something about it. 1:00:09.640 --> 1:00:14.160 Yeah, and those hands are amazingly You the listener, You, 1:00:14.320 --> 1:00:16.480 dear listener, can be one of the people who helps 1:00:16.560 --> 1:00:21.320 end these people's reign over the world. Absolutely so, all right, 1:00:21.400 --> 1:00:25.600 I think the place that we should start is I 1:00:25.600 --> 1:00:28.160 think when people think about and it's something that you have 1:00:28.240 --> 1:00:32.240 talked about, when people think about sort of venture capital 1:00:32.320 --> 1:00:34.640 and tech and the wave that they're trying to take 1:00:34.680 --> 1:00:39.840 over the country, there is this myopic focus on Peter 1:00:40.000 --> 1:00:44.240 Thiel and Jarvin Curtis because they are these sort of 1:00:44.720 --> 1:00:48.400 almost semi mythological at this point figures who have a 1:00:48.480 --> 1:00:51.320 bunch of really really unhinged beliefs and love talking about 1:00:51.320 --> 1:00:52.000 them constantly. 1:00:52.680 --> 1:00:57.400 Yes, one hundred percent. It almost turns into a circus. 1:00:58.040 --> 1:01:02.240 Look at these freaks, get these like three freaks that 1:01:02.360 --> 1:01:06.800 then get sort of obsessively focused on and Sam Altman 1:01:06.920 --> 1:01:09.640 and one is one of those. Peter Tiela's one of those. 1:01:09.800 --> 1:01:12.960 Curtis Jarvin is one of those. And it kind of 1:01:13.080 --> 1:01:16.440 ends up being people are looking at this through the 1:01:16.560 --> 1:01:19.720 lens of individuals, through the lens of sort of these 1:01:19.800 --> 1:01:23.680 cults of personalities that are being created. They're relating to 1:01:23.880 --> 1:01:29.840 this issue through sort of like individual players in the environment, 1:01:30.800 --> 1:01:34.600 and that's actually very limiting when we're talking about a 1:01:34.640 --> 1:01:39.160 system that consists of trillions of dollars, hundreds of venture 1:01:39.200 --> 1:01:43.280 capital firms, thousands and thousands and thousands of startups, and 1:01:43.480 --> 1:01:47.040 all of the financial structures that are around them. So 1:01:47.200 --> 1:01:52.400 it has this effect of almost minimizing what's happening, yeah, 1:01:52.440 --> 1:01:58.200 and also kind of diverting something so serious into something 1:01:58.240 --> 1:02:01.000 that is kind of like, well, we can just make 1:02:01.040 --> 1:02:05.800 fun of them and that's gonna do something, and that's activism. 1:02:05.960 --> 1:02:07.800 The reality is they. 1:02:07.600 --> 1:02:11.320 Think that we are labrats. Yeah, they do not care 1:02:11.440 --> 1:02:16.040 what we think about them. So having this very like 1:02:16.480 --> 1:02:19.120 we're gonna call them stupid, we're gonna call them dumb, 1:02:19.120 --> 1:02:22.120 we're gonna make fun of them, we're gonna do whatever, 1:02:22.800 --> 1:02:26.120 that becomes the dominant form of critique and that takes 1:02:26.200 --> 1:02:29.480 us way off course of what's actually happening. 1:02:30.360 --> 1:02:32.280 Yeah, it's like it's a kind of like Great Man 1:02:32.320 --> 1:02:35.160 theory a venture capital yes, yeah, And this isn't a 1:02:35.200 --> 1:02:37.360 situation where it's like, you know, you're looking at like 1:02:37.440 --> 1:02:41.240 Napoleon history on horseback stuff and you're you're debating whether 1:02:41.320 --> 1:02:43.320 or okay, to what extent is just like the Great 1:02:43.360 --> 1:02:45.360 Man and to what extent this is like the structural 1:02:45.360 --> 1:02:48.040 forces of history. This is a situation where like we're 1:02:48.040 --> 1:02:50.600 looking at a structural force and everyone is like looking 1:02:50.600 --> 1:02:52.760 at the clown they've stuck on top of the structural force. 1:02:52.840 --> 1:02:55.360 It's like, no, no, no, no, no, we got to understand 1:02:55.440 --> 1:02:59.160 the actual structures here, which I think you've done maybe 1:02:59.200 --> 1:03:02.640 the best job I've ever seen, and actually looking at 1:03:02.840 --> 1:03:07.560 what we're dealing with, which is these networks of hundreds 1:03:07.600 --> 1:03:13.200 of venture capital firms and startups and yeah, this entire 1:03:13.240 --> 1:03:17.920 sort of ecosystem that has become a sort of force 1:03:17.960 --> 1:03:18.560 of history. 1:03:19.400 --> 1:03:23.560 Yes, one hundred person And that's where the conversation needs 1:03:23.640 --> 1:03:28.480 to go is towards like what are we actually dealing with, 1:03:28.520 --> 1:03:30.800 Like what are we actually facing and what are the 1:03:31.880 --> 1:03:36.200 causes of that So I always like to start with 1:03:36.240 --> 1:03:39.040 sort of talking about you know, what are some of 1:03:39.080 --> 1:03:41.320 the core dynamics that are. 1:03:41.200 --> 1:03:43.880 Happening within venture capital. 1:03:44.480 --> 1:03:49.000 One of them is that venture capitalists act as a 1:03:49.120 --> 1:03:56.200 central coordinator of this giant machinery of startups and technological 1:03:56.240 --> 1:04:00.440 development and infrastructure. So one thing I often see, like 1:04:00.520 --> 1:04:04.200 you might be looking at like fifteen different startups and 1:04:04.480 --> 1:04:07.440 that's all the same thing. Yeah, you're even looking at 1:04:07.880 --> 1:04:11.320 five different VC firms. That is all the same thing. 1:04:11.760 --> 1:04:12.360 It is our. 1:04:12.280 --> 1:04:17.520 Cartel that it has a central financial backbone that is 1:04:17.720 --> 1:04:24.240 generating companies at an incredible speed with incredible efficiency. They 1:04:24.240 --> 1:04:29.760 are machines for turning out these startups which they're then 1:04:29.920 --> 1:04:34.440 able to orchestrate to work together, and that becomes just 1:04:34.480 --> 1:04:39.880 a profound force and a very efficient force in changing 1:04:39.960 --> 1:04:43.280 the world, in interacting with the world, and as we 1:04:43.400 --> 1:04:46.840 increasingly see, you know, impacting geopolitics. 1:04:47.760 --> 1:04:50.680 So for people like me who are fortunate enough to 1:04:50.800 --> 1:04:54.000 not sort of live inside one of these people's center 1:04:54.080 --> 1:04:56.160 of power, which is you know, like places like the 1:04:56.200 --> 1:04:59.280 Bay or like these these places where these concentrations of 1:04:59.360 --> 1:05:04.240 tech capital have fundamentally reshaped the world to the extent 1:05:04.280 --> 1:05:07.000 that it feels just being in one of these places 1:05:07.000 --> 1:05:08.880 feels so different than being in a place that's not 1:05:09.040 --> 1:05:11.240 like a tech capital center. For those of us who 1:05:11.280 --> 1:05:14.400 like aren't living as much under the eye of the panopticon. 1:05:14.800 --> 1:05:18.440 Can you explain a little bit about what venture capital 1:05:18.760 --> 1:05:22.040 is dex and then what the effect on sort of 1:05:22.080 --> 1:05:24.400 the tech sector that it's had has been. 1:05:25.120 --> 1:05:25.440 Yeah. 1:05:25.520 --> 1:05:31.040 Absolutely, So, you know, venture capital essentially what it does. 1:05:31.160 --> 1:05:35.920 It takes in capital from around the world. And one 1:05:35.920 --> 1:05:38.920 of the interesting things about venture capital is like we 1:05:39.040 --> 1:05:42.280 do not have a lot of visibility into where their 1:05:42.320 --> 1:05:46.200 money is coming from. We know some things about them, 1:05:46.360 --> 1:05:48.840 but we do not get a list of like here's 1:05:48.920 --> 1:05:50.760 everyone who's giving us money. 1:05:51.160 --> 1:05:54.240 So we have all this money coming in, and then 1:05:54.840 --> 1:05:55.200 on the. 1:05:55.240 --> 1:06:00.880 Outside of that, weapons companies are coming out, Yeah, crypto 1:06:00.880 --> 1:06:05.600 companies are coming out, and you know, derne companies coming out, 1:06:05.920 --> 1:06:09.400 nuclear energy companies are coming out. So you sort of 1:06:09.520 --> 1:06:13.200 have this like it's almost like a black box where 1:06:13.360 --> 1:06:15.960 unknown money goes in. Yeah, and then all of this 1:06:16.080 --> 1:06:18.360 shit comes out the other side. 1:06:18.600 --> 1:06:20.160 And that becomes really. 1:06:19.920 --> 1:06:22.240 Scary when you start to look at things like we 1:06:22.400 --> 1:06:28.040 know that Israel is funding many venture capital firms in 1:06:28.080 --> 1:06:31.320 the US, and those venture capital firms are turning out 1:06:31.440 --> 1:06:35.280 dozens and dozens of weapons companies, and then those weapons 1:06:35.320 --> 1:06:39.920 companies are going to Israel and being used in the genocide. 1:06:40.120 --> 1:06:41.920 So you have these very sort of. 1:06:41.960 --> 1:06:47.560 Complex relationships going on between like the investors, between other 1:06:47.680 --> 1:06:50.680 nations and what venture capital is doing. 1:06:51.560 --> 1:06:55.040 One of the things that this reminds me of is 1:06:56.160 --> 1:06:58.200 this is something we've talked about on this show to 1:06:58.240 --> 1:07:02.640 some extent, but one of the major forces that kind 1:07:02.640 --> 1:07:06.200 of reshaped the latter half of the twentieth century was 1:07:07.400 --> 1:07:10.000 after the sort of oil shocks, where you know, you 1:07:10.080 --> 1:07:11.960 have all of these countries, like you have like countries 1:07:12.000 --> 1:07:14.480 like Saudi Arabia, like the golf monarchies who are like 1:07:14.640 --> 1:07:17.040 very intimately tied to all of these All of these 1:07:17.080 --> 1:07:20.800 venture capital firms are certainly just flush with oil money, 1:07:21.400 --> 1:07:25.000 and they have this problem, which is that, Okay, we 1:07:25.080 --> 1:07:27.880 have all of these piles of money, but this money 1:07:27.920 --> 1:07:29.919 is capital, right, and capital wants to be turned into 1:07:29.920 --> 1:07:32.440 more and increasing amounts of capital. But how do you 1:07:32.880 --> 1:07:35.440 do that, Like where do you actually put this money 1:07:35.520 --> 1:07:38.480 in an economy where you know, like this is the 1:07:38.680 --> 1:07:41.440 context of the seventies, where like output everywhere is decreasing 1:07:41.440 --> 1:07:43.480 and like the returns are on capital are falling, and 1:07:44.160 --> 1:07:46.720 you know the long range rate of returns collapsing, what 1:07:46.720 --> 1:07:49.760 do you do with it? And in the seventies, the 1:07:49.800 --> 1:07:51.760 thing that they did with it was they put it 1:07:51.800 --> 1:07:54.760 into like third world debt. And this is like why 1:07:54.840 --> 1:07:57.040 the term third world is a slur now when it 1:07:57.120 --> 1:07:59.680 used to be a political movement, is that, you know, 1:07:59.720 --> 1:08:03.360 these countries took all of these redgestable interest rate loans 1:08:03.400 --> 1:08:04.720 and then when the interest rate went to like two 1:08:04.760 --> 1:08:09.240 hundred percent or whatever, they got completely annihilated. And some 1:08:09.400 --> 1:08:14.000 of that capital went to weapons, because weapons are a 1:08:14.560 --> 1:08:19.240 thing that you can put capital into that destroys capital. 1:08:19.800 --> 1:08:22.000 And also it let's you know it lets like Saudi 1:08:22.040 --> 1:08:24.240 the Saudi monarchy stay in power. But it's also a 1:08:24.240 --> 1:08:25.680 thing where like you don't find a way to make 1:08:25.720 --> 1:08:28.000 money with that capital. You could just buy a bunch 1:08:28.040 --> 1:08:30.720 of jet fighters from the US, which do nothing, but 1:08:30.760 --> 1:08:33.680 you spent your money on something one hundred percent. 1:08:33.960 --> 1:08:38.519 And I think to that point, specifically Saudi Arabia, one 1:08:38.520 --> 1:08:41.880 of the main reasons what's happening in venture capital now 1:08:42.040 --> 1:08:46.599 is because Saudi Arabia is trying to diversify its wealth 1:08:46.800 --> 1:08:53.200 outside of oil, and they want a globally competitive technology industry, 1:08:53.400 --> 1:08:56.679 so they're going to turn to the people who can 1:08:56.760 --> 1:08:59.880 give them that, and that is venture capital, and that 1:09:00.040 --> 1:09:03.880 a tech companies in America. There's sort of this race 1:09:04.000 --> 1:09:07.639 happening all over the world of countries trying to make 1:09:07.680 --> 1:09:11.759 sure that they're able to compete or at least exist 1:09:12.040 --> 1:09:15.800 on the technological plane of what's being developed. And that 1:09:15.920 --> 1:09:21.600 makes venture capital almost like the crown jewel now that 1:09:21.760 --> 1:09:23.800 everyone is trying to get ahold of. 1:09:24.479 --> 1:09:27.759 So now they have this huge leverage. 1:09:27.720 --> 1:09:31.800 And you hear them. They hang out with MBS. They 1:09:31.920 --> 1:09:35.760 sing the praises of MBS, you know, to the heavens, 1:09:36.000 --> 1:09:39.639 and they have done a lot of work to quote 1:09:39.720 --> 1:09:44.400 unquote repair the image of MBS, particularly after the killing 1:09:44.720 --> 1:09:49.880 of Jamal Kushogi, who is a huge major journalist, and 1:09:49.960 --> 1:09:53.560 for a time that cooled relations between Saudi Arabia and 1:09:53.640 --> 1:09:57.439 vendor Capital, at least on the surface. But they don't 1:09:57.439 --> 1:09:59.120 care about that stuff, you know. 1:10:00.080 --> 1:10:02.280 Yeah, And you know, and I think I think the 1:10:02.320 --> 1:10:04.160 other part of that campaign too, and this this is 1:10:04.240 --> 1:10:06.800 just one of my mia on the soapbox things, is 1:10:06.800 --> 1:10:08.559 that the other thing they were trying to get everyone 1:10:08.560 --> 1:10:13.840 to forget about. Was the hideous, hiteous war that all 1:10:13.880 --> 1:10:16.120 of the Golf states, particularly Saudi Arabia, but also the 1:10:16.240 --> 1:10:18.320 UAE has a massive part in this. We're fighting in 1:10:18.400 --> 1:10:21.800 Yemen where they we literally don't know how many people 1:10:21.800 --> 1:10:23.800 they killed, like they tried, they tried to do a 1:10:23.840 --> 1:10:26.200 starvation genocide of the whole country because they couldn't win 1:10:26.240 --> 1:10:30.800 the war militarily. They were deploying Sudanese child soldiers as 1:10:30.880 --> 1:10:34.599 mercenaries who have been taken from the Jualadid, the group 1:10:34.600 --> 1:10:37.120 who's now like doing a genocide in Sudan. They are 1:10:37.160 --> 1:10:39.760 also people who do the genocide and are four back 1:10:39.760 --> 1:10:42.200 in the two thousands. Like this is like the scale 1:10:42.200 --> 1:10:46.400 of atrocity that they're committing. You know, everyone's very focused 1:10:46.400 --> 1:10:48.919 on walkashowgime is like yeah, it's very very bad obviously 1:10:49.040 --> 1:10:51.439 to like kill journalists and like cut them up with 1:10:51.520 --> 1:10:53.680 bone salt. But like these are people who were doing 1:10:53.760 --> 1:10:56.800 airstrikes on school buses. These are people who were again 1:10:56.880 --> 1:11:02.360 deploying Sudanese the child soldiers on battlefields. And these people 1:11:03.120 --> 1:11:05.280 are going, no, fuck it. Not only are we going 1:11:05.320 --> 1:11:07.280 to rehabilitate their image, we're going to take their money, 1:11:07.280 --> 1:11:09.200 and we're going to build them fucking weapons forever. 1:11:10.000 --> 1:11:10.439 Yeah. 1:11:11.040 --> 1:11:12.760 You know, when you talk about like what is a 1:11:12.880 --> 1:11:15.800 venture capitalist, and one of the things that they really 1:11:15.800 --> 1:11:19.760 do is they are like constructing entire markets. They're not 1:11:20.040 --> 1:11:23.920 just they're not just creating a startup hoping it succeeds. 1:11:23.960 --> 1:11:26.759 And then the case of the military, you know, people 1:11:26.840 --> 1:11:30.479 focus on and Dural. They have hundreds of weapons companies 1:11:30.520 --> 1:11:35.320 now hundreds of weapons companies, and they have the big 1:11:35.439 --> 1:11:39.000 prime companies like and Dural that are really like the 1:11:39.160 --> 1:11:43.160 power houses that are supposed to be like Lockheed and raytheon. 1:11:43.600 --> 1:11:47.920 But they also have weapons part manufacturers. They have drone 1:11:48.000 --> 1:11:52.200 companies for like all layers of earth see you know, 1:11:52.360 --> 1:11:58.040 air everything like that. They're doing hypersonic missiles, They've advocated 1:11:58.120 --> 1:12:02.720 for a new Manhattan project. They're working on developing weapons 1:12:02.760 --> 1:12:07.040 of mass destruction. So when venture capital is going into 1:12:07.080 --> 1:12:10.360 these spaces like they are going into win, they are 1:12:10.400 --> 1:12:15.439 going in with a fully envisioned picture of what the 1:12:15.560 --> 1:12:20.560 new age military looks like with AI technologies, with autonomous technologies, 1:12:20.880 --> 1:12:23.880 you know, with everything that they've been able to developed, 1:12:23.960 --> 1:12:27.000 and now they have a fully featured war platform that 1:12:27.040 --> 1:12:29.880 they have to try to get other countries to buy 1:12:30.240 --> 1:12:31.120 because it's ready. 1:12:31.560 --> 1:12:34.320 Yeah, so they need wars. 1:12:34.320 --> 1:12:37.759 Which is extremely bad news for everyone on Earth. 1:12:38.240 --> 1:12:40.559 Everybody, Yes, everyone on Earth. 1:12:40.560 --> 1:12:46.960 And you know, they have been so deeply complicit in 1:12:47.000 --> 1:12:48.880 the genocide of Palestinians. 1:12:49.120 --> 1:12:53.000 They are so incredibly enmeshed with Israel. 1:12:53.400 --> 1:12:58.479 Venture capitalists refer to Israel as a technocratic state and 1:12:58.600 --> 1:13:03.040 as sort of like the ideal state and a model 1:13:03.320 --> 1:13:09.280 for what they can be as a technocratic state because Israel, 1:13:09.640 --> 1:13:14.760 by proportion, the share of tech GDP in Israel is 1:13:14.800 --> 1:13:20.639 actually twice as much as in the US, and as 1:13:20.840 --> 1:13:24.240 parts of the Israeli economy have suffered as a result 1:13:24.320 --> 1:13:28.599 of the genocide, the tech industry is doing amazing yah, 1:13:28.680 --> 1:13:32.320 and venture kapitalists are pouring money into it. And so 1:13:32.400 --> 1:13:35.920 you see that one of the immediate things that has 1:13:35.960 --> 1:13:41.560 come out of, you know, the Israel American VC relationship 1:13:42.280 --> 1:13:48.160 is the genocide, and is the ongoing development of themselves 1:13:48.240 --> 1:13:50.840 and of Israel's the technocratic state. 1:13:51.360 --> 1:13:52.880 It's awful. 1:13:52.520 --> 1:14:08.160 Yeah, So I think I want to zoom out a 1:14:08.200 --> 1:14:11.519 little bit. We've we've talked a bit about you know, 1:14:11.600 --> 1:14:15.200 what these companies do. Do you want to talk about 1:14:15.280 --> 1:14:18.040 some of the major firms that are building all of 1:14:18.080 --> 1:14:20.320 these things and building all of these startups that people 1:14:20.479 --> 1:14:22.120 haven't heard about and need to know about. 1:14:22.479 --> 1:14:29.280 Yeah, one hundred percent, So people have heard about andresen Horowitz, 1:14:29.880 --> 1:14:32.000 but not enough. 1:14:35.680 --> 1:14:36.960 Definitely not enough. 1:14:37.160 --> 1:14:41.519 If I had to put a firm that is the 1:14:41.520 --> 1:14:46.080 most responsible for what's going on, it is definitely andresen Horowitz. 1:14:46.720 --> 1:14:50.000 One of the things that's happening in the venture capital market. 1:14:50.479 --> 1:14:53.080 Why this is happening is because a small number of 1:14:53.120 --> 1:14:57.960 firms is forming a monopoly on venture capital, and andresen 1:14:57.960 --> 1:15:01.120 Horowitz is right there. And in fact, in twenty twenty five, 1:15:01.520 --> 1:15:06.560 dresen Horowisz raised over eighteen percent of all venture capital 1:15:06.680 --> 1:15:10.800 dollars just that one firm. Okay, so now you start 1:15:10.880 --> 1:15:14.040 adding that up the other firms that they work most 1:15:14.080 --> 1:15:17.160 closely with and are working on the exact same things 1:15:17.240 --> 1:15:21.439 and fund the exact same startups. Founder's fund, Peter Thiel's 1:15:21.520 --> 1:15:25.200 firm is one of those. General Catalysts is another one 1:15:25.200 --> 1:15:30.439 that's very very important. And General Catalyst looks a lot 1:15:30.640 --> 1:15:32.000 like andresen Horowitz. 1:15:32.040 --> 1:15:33.679 They are very close. 1:15:33.720 --> 1:15:37.160 And you see this throughout like you're like you have 1:15:37.280 --> 1:15:41.880 different names on your offices but y'all are the same thing. 1:15:42.520 --> 1:15:45.760 Sequoia is another big one. They were one of the 1:15:45.960 --> 1:15:49.759 early venture capital firms. They did not make their first 1:15:50.000 --> 1:15:53.960 devents investment until twenty twenty three, but they were founded 1:15:53.960 --> 1:15:57.599 in nineteen seventy two. So this is an example of 1:15:57.640 --> 1:16:02.360 how a giant VC firm has really been yoked to 1:16:02.520 --> 1:16:07.080 an agenda that started in sort of these other younger 1:16:07.439 --> 1:16:12.280 upstart players and Andres and Horoz has talked about how 1:16:12.520 --> 1:16:17.120 ultimately venter capital will consist of four or five major 1:16:17.200 --> 1:16:21.360 firms and then basically no mid size firms and then 1:16:21.400 --> 1:16:24.800 some sort of boutique firms that are a little bit 1:16:24.840 --> 1:16:28.720 more specialized. So in that that kind of category, we 1:16:28.880 --> 1:16:33.519 have firms like lux Capital. Lex Capital is one of 1:16:33.560 --> 1:16:43.960 the most bloodthirsty, sociopathic, zionist, weird biotech shit, weird weapon shit, 1:16:44.600 --> 1:16:50.120 out and out bloodthirsty extremists, like just openly maybe one 1:16:50.120 --> 1:16:56.000 of the most in that sense. They're incredibly Zionist, and 1:16:56.040 --> 1:17:00.120 they are a relatively small firm, but they're able to 1:17:00.160 --> 1:17:05.160 be in the mix because they have this sociopathy, this 1:17:05.320 --> 1:17:08.840 blood lust that you actually see across all of these 1:17:08.920 --> 1:17:12.920 firms is that like there's sort of like outright sadistic 1:17:13.520 --> 1:17:18.519 at a certain point. You know, Andresen Horowitz actually hired 1:17:18.920 --> 1:17:27.759 Daniel Penny too killed jordan' neely, who was a thirty 1:17:28.439 --> 1:17:33.120 year old, you know, black homeless man. And this guy 1:17:33.439 --> 1:17:40.120 was not a venture capitalist and Mark Andresen hired him. 1:17:40.520 --> 1:17:44.639 There's a degradation in morality, and there's sort of this 1:17:44.800 --> 1:17:49.840 like welling up in the venture capital space of this 1:17:50.000 --> 1:17:58.200 like extremely depraved like anti morality where they hired this murder. Yeah, 1:17:58.760 --> 1:18:01.960 you know, someone who killed a black man and and 1:18:02.160 --> 1:18:05.120 made press releases about it and they talk about what 1:18:05.200 --> 1:18:09.599 a great VC he is, and so they're immersed in 1:18:09.640 --> 1:18:13.280 this like this like culture of sort of of of 1:18:13.479 --> 1:18:19.759 war and like genocide and like killing them so super disserting, So. 1:18:19.720 --> 1:18:23.719 Any any great things happening here the most powerful people 1:18:23.800 --> 1:18:24.680 in the world. 1:18:26.600 --> 1:18:27.920 Yeah, really bad. 1:18:28.680 --> 1:18:32.040 It's it's a moral free fall for sure. So so yeah, 1:18:32.080 --> 1:18:34.760 you have that type of stuff going on. But you 1:18:34.800 --> 1:18:38.240 know Lux Capital we talked about that. You have Eric Schmidt, 1:18:38.280 --> 1:18:41.760 who's the Google CEO. He runs a number of sort 1:18:41.800 --> 1:18:46.639 of smaller scale venture capital firms, and then you have 1:18:46.800 --> 1:18:52.200 some of the major crypto firms like Ribbit Capital, Paradigm 1:18:52.800 --> 1:18:57.360 Blockchain Capital, and actually Blockchain Capital, which runs a crypto cartel, 1:18:57.560 --> 1:18:59.000 is an investor in Blue Sky. 1:19:00.120 --> 1:19:01.960 He thinks great. 1:19:01.960 --> 1:19:05.400 So everyone who's thinking that, you know, blue Sky is 1:19:05.439 --> 1:19:09.800 this wonderful alternative, Like Blue Sky is owned by a 1:19:09.920 --> 1:19:12.759 venture capitalists who are running a crypto cartel. 1:19:13.600 --> 1:19:16.400 So those are some of those firms. 1:19:16.479 --> 1:19:19.160 And you know, you have y Combinator, which is a 1:19:19.320 --> 1:19:20.720 smaller firm feeding in. 1:19:21.240 --> 1:19:24.200 Then you have some other kind of pieces outside that. 1:19:24.720 --> 1:19:28.599 One that's super important is and this is always tough 1:19:28.640 --> 1:19:31.240 for me to talk about because people look at you 1:19:31.400 --> 1:19:35.080 like you're conspiracy theorists if you say anything about the CIA. Yeah, 1:19:35.120 --> 1:19:41.559 if it's one hundred percent true. But the CIA made 1:19:41.720 --> 1:19:45.519 a venture capital firm many many years ago, and that 1:19:45.640 --> 1:19:49.200 venture capital firm is called inq tel and they have 1:19:49.320 --> 1:19:51.920 funded over eight hundred startups. 1:19:51.960 --> 1:19:55.479 It's amazing, incredible stuff. Also, the fact that they called 1:19:55.520 --> 1:19:56.719 it in q tel. 1:19:56.800 --> 1:20:02.680 Is just like incredible. Come on, So, yeah, we're gonna. 1:20:02.400 --> 1:20:04.320 Put intail in the name of it, but we're gonna 1:20:04.320 --> 1:20:09.040 put it in qtel because fuck you god, it's like 1:20:09.280 --> 1:20:10.759 qt spy bullshit. 1:20:11.160 --> 1:20:16.400 Yes, it's totally mild. And I always tell this story. 1:20:16.640 --> 1:20:19.559 You know, I worked at startups and sliconbl I worked 1:20:19.600 --> 1:20:25.640 in database startups, Internet infrastructure APIs, like you know, infrastructure 1:20:25.800 --> 1:20:29.559 service stuff like that. I went to a big data 1:20:29.600 --> 1:20:34.760 conference in like maybe like twenty twelve or something like that. 1:20:34.760 --> 1:20:37.559 I won't say, I don't know for sure which one 1:20:37.560 --> 1:20:39.920 it was, but it was in New York. There was 1:20:40.000 --> 1:20:43.960 all all these companies there. One of the keynote speakers 1:20:44.120 --> 1:20:46.960 was the Chief Technology Officer of the. 1:20:46.960 --> 1:20:49.000 CIA, J's Christ. 1:20:49.920 --> 1:20:50.400 Yeah. 1:20:50.960 --> 1:20:54.080 So none of this has been a secret to people 1:20:54.240 --> 1:20:55.400 in the industry. 1:20:55.240 --> 1:20:57.639 The CAA operates. 1:20:57.120 --> 1:21:00.360 Openly in the industry and invests openly in thery. 1:21:01.479 --> 1:21:02.360 But he got on. 1:21:02.400 --> 1:21:07.280 Stage and he said, our goal is to collect all 1:21:07.320 --> 1:21:10.719 of the data in the world and save it forever. 1:21:13.360 --> 1:21:14.640 And I looked around me. 1:21:14.760 --> 1:21:19.240 To see if anyone else was And this was months 1:21:19.280 --> 1:21:24.280 before the soda and revelations. Yeah, so the CIA was 1:21:24.360 --> 1:21:28.280 openly admitted into all all of this stuff anyways. But 1:21:28.439 --> 1:21:31.240 point being, you know, and in q Tel has been 1:21:32.000 --> 1:21:35.880 so key to this because they have brought all of 1:21:35.920 --> 1:21:40.280 the venture capital startups into the government, into intelligence and 1:21:40.320 --> 1:21:45.719 into defense. From the CIA's perspective, this has also given 1:21:45.800 --> 1:21:50.720 them a revenue source and a way to operate outside 1:21:50.760 --> 1:21:54.640 of just the government budget. And we can go back 1:21:54.680 --> 1:21:57.679 to this when we're talking about the network state, because 1:21:58.280 --> 1:22:01.200 what the CIA is really good at is cooing and 1:22:01.360 --> 1:22:05.800 other countries. And now you see the network state down 1:22:05.840 --> 1:22:09.479 in Latin America trying to keep governments down there. So 1:22:09.520 --> 1:22:14.000 there's been in there's been an incredible fusion of the 1:22:14.240 --> 1:22:19.280 CIA with venture capital that has has transformed both of them. 1:22:19.320 --> 1:22:21.000 They are both changed by this. 1:22:21.680 --> 1:22:23.599 Yeah, it's like it's like tech is the new like 1:22:24.000 --> 1:22:27.439 running opium out of like Vietnam or whatever. It's like, 1:22:27.479 --> 1:22:32.400 I guess we've replaced. We've replaced doing like really overt 1:22:32.479 --> 1:22:35.960 drug running shit to fuel our operations with uh oh, hey, 1:22:35.960 --> 1:22:38.360 we can just get on stage and like talk to 1:22:38.400 --> 1:22:41.200 all of these venture capital gouls and get a bunch 1:22:41.200 --> 1:22:43.920 of money that way for a like whatever weird shit 1:22:44.000 --> 1:22:44.840 we want to be up to. 1:22:45.880 --> 1:22:50.160 Yeah, it's it's wild. So you have that. 1:22:50.400 --> 1:22:53.519 And then another piece of it is that venture capital 1:22:53.560 --> 1:22:58.680 has formed this incredibly close relationship with black Rock and Blackstone, 1:22:58.760 --> 1:23:02.040 so they have a trigal finance backing. 1:23:02.800 --> 1:23:06.080 Can you explain for people who are not familiar what 1:23:06.120 --> 1:23:08.160 Blackrock and Blackstone are and that I can tell my 1:23:08.960 --> 1:23:11.559 completely deranged Blackstone story. 1:23:12.200 --> 1:23:19.120 Okay, so, yes, Blackrock is a giant, you know, financial beast, 1:23:19.439 --> 1:23:26.200 a monster monstrosity. Yeah. I don't have the most up 1:23:26.240 --> 1:23:30.559 to date numbers on how much money that they manage, 1:23:30.680 --> 1:23:34.719 but as of twenty twenty five, it was over twelve 1:23:34.840 --> 1:23:40.160 trillion dollars in assets under management. Christ So you are 1:23:40.240 --> 1:23:42.599 talking about a absolutely, you. 1:23:42.560 --> 1:23:45.719 Know, huge, huge financial entity. 1:23:46.240 --> 1:23:50.000 So they have been one of the first to really 1:23:51.040 --> 1:23:55.560 back venture capital in the traditional finance world in crypto. 1:23:56.280 --> 1:23:58.840 So they are the ones that started bringing. 1:23:58.640 --> 1:24:02.920 To market the ETFs that made it easy to invest 1:24:02.960 --> 1:24:08.680 in in bitcoin. They have ETFs that are trading. They 1:24:08.720 --> 1:24:10.640 also have one for ethereum. 1:24:11.120 --> 1:24:12.680 Can you explain what an ETF is. 1:24:13.320 --> 1:24:17.800 Yes, what an ETF is, It's basically, you know, what 1:24:17.880 --> 1:24:21.800 it does for crypto is, instead of having to buy 1:24:22.000 --> 1:24:28.320 and manage your own crypto assets, the financial institution basically 1:24:28.439 --> 1:24:35.759 takes on the administration and management of those underlying assets. So, 1:24:35.880 --> 1:24:42.160 you know, for investors who don't want to be on coinbase, 1:24:42.920 --> 1:24:47.720 you know, buying from these like sketchy companies, these were 1:24:47.800 --> 1:24:53.799 ways to make these assets available to the investment market 1:24:53.880 --> 1:24:58.800 and crypto really needed that and Blackrock came in to 1:24:58.920 --> 1:25:02.479 do that, and the they partnered with Coinbase, and they 1:25:02.520 --> 1:25:07.360 partnered with other you know, venture capital things, so they 1:25:07.400 --> 1:25:07.680 did the. 1:25:07.720 --> 1:25:09.479 VC is a big solid there. 1:25:09.880 --> 1:25:13.000 And then to our point, like they are very invested 1:25:13.280 --> 1:25:17.160 with this, Saudi is as well partnered with the Saudi 1:25:17.520 --> 1:25:22.960 Sovereign Wealth Fund, you know, the leading to weapons deals. 1:25:23.240 --> 1:25:27.200 They are also doing a bunch of data centers in 1:25:27.280 --> 1:25:32.240 the UK and they've been operating in Israel for a 1:25:32.320 --> 1:25:34.920 really long time, so that you know, this was a 1:25:35.080 --> 1:25:40.120 very natural partner, I would say for venture capital. 1:25:40.200 --> 1:25:43.479 But it also gives venture capital. 1:25:45.080 --> 1:25:45.479 A lot. 1:25:46.439 --> 1:25:48.960 The Chicapo has gotten a lot out of this deal. 1:25:49.760 --> 1:25:52.799 So you have that start to happen. And one question 1:25:53.040 --> 1:25:56.320 I've always asked is, like to crypto people who have 1:25:56.360 --> 1:25:58.720 said like this is the way around the banks and 1:25:58.760 --> 1:26:02.040 blah blah blah, Well, why is Wall Street getting crypto 1:26:02.120 --> 1:26:02.559 before you? 1:26:03.080 --> 1:26:06.960 Yeah? It really truly not. It does not really seemed 1:26:06.960 --> 1:26:08.360 to be doing that. It's not. 1:26:08.640 --> 1:26:11.080 It's just the math is not math in here. 1:26:23.240 --> 1:26:25.080 One of the things I think is interesting about what 1:26:25.120 --> 1:26:28.879 you've done is talking about what the relationship between crypto 1:26:28.920 --> 1:26:31.559 and these venture capital firms is and what purpose crypto 1:26:31.680 --> 1:26:32.240 serves for them. 1:26:32.439 --> 1:26:34.479 Yes, can you get into that. 1:26:34.960 --> 1:26:39.000 Yeah, So crypto one of my absolute favorite topics to 1:26:39.080 --> 1:26:42.960 talk about. There are a lot of ways of looking 1:26:43.000 --> 1:26:45.920 at this. One of the ones that I find most 1:26:46.040 --> 1:26:50.959 interesting is when the first sort of dot com bubble 1:26:51.400 --> 1:26:57.479 happened and when they first started making absolute fucked tons 1:26:57.479 --> 1:27:00.160 of money. So they have tons of money coming and 1:27:00.200 --> 1:27:04.800 they're making tons of money, and they are putting that 1:27:04.960 --> 1:27:09.120 money in banks they don't own and financial infrastructure they 1:27:09.120 --> 1:27:11.040 don't own, and they're paying a lot of. 1:27:11.040 --> 1:27:15.960 Taxes on it. So it's some point the decision. 1:27:15.640 --> 1:27:18.160 Is made by them, like why would you want to 1:27:18.200 --> 1:27:21.559 make so much money and then have that money going 1:27:21.760 --> 1:27:25.120 right out the door to a bunch of bankers who 1:27:25.160 --> 1:27:27.439 are going to take all your money. So at some 1:27:27.640 --> 1:27:31.519 point it occurs to them, all of this money that's 1:27:31.600 --> 1:27:36.200 transacting not just through us, but over the internet overall 1:27:36.800 --> 1:27:39.000 is something we can make a ton of money on. 1:27:39.720 --> 1:27:43.559 And one of Mark Andresen's first things was trying to 1:27:43.720 --> 1:27:48.720 get internet credit card payments working over the browser, and 1:27:48.760 --> 1:27:52.360 then you have PayPal, So at the point that they 1:27:52.479 --> 1:27:55.719 sort of were like, we're going to do our. 1:27:55.680 --> 1:27:57.560 Own financial infrastructure. 1:27:58.120 --> 1:28:01.639 Okay, Now they have a financial infrastructure that is literally 1:28:01.720 --> 1:28:05.000 in competition with the sovereign financial system of the United 1:28:05.000 --> 1:28:09.559 States of America. And this, more than anything else, might 1:28:09.720 --> 1:28:15.240 be the source of the rupture between the American government 1:28:15.479 --> 1:28:20.599 and between venture capital because as soon as you start 1:28:20.640 --> 1:28:24.240 developing this ecosystem and people think that crypto is just 1:28:24.320 --> 1:28:30.000 like bitcoin and like doge coin and like ethereum, no, no, no, no. 1:28:30.479 --> 1:28:34.919 These people have a whole bunch of banks. They have banks, 1:28:35.479 --> 1:28:39.519 They are developing stock markets and stock exchanges. They have 1:28:39.640 --> 1:28:42.720 point of sales systems, they have betting markets. 1:28:42.880 --> 1:28:45.200 Oh god, crypto betting markets. 1:28:45.240 --> 1:28:46.559 Oh yeah, they. 1:28:46.479 --> 1:28:50.200 Have gotment, they have you know, they have loans programs, 1:28:50.320 --> 1:28:52.160 they have savings, they have. 1:28:52.120 --> 1:28:53.480 Blah blah blah. 1:28:53.560 --> 1:28:59.479 Like crypto is really a very fully featured financial system, 1:29:00.479 --> 1:29:04.479 and they need to get is much money out of 1:29:04.560 --> 1:29:10.200 the existing financial system moved into their financial system. So 1:29:10.400 --> 1:29:16.200 they are in this war essentially over that. And that's 1:29:16.320 --> 1:29:19.639 what we're looking at, is the global financial system being 1:29:19.760 --> 1:29:23.200 replaced with a financial system that is owned and controlled 1:29:23.640 --> 1:29:29.120 by venture capitalists. And that's a profound thing that has 1:29:29.200 --> 1:29:32.800 profound implications. We're going to talk about the network state more. 1:29:32.880 --> 1:29:36.599 But another reason why the network stay has happened is 1:29:36.680 --> 1:29:40.439 because as the crypto market really kind of started to 1:29:40.560 --> 1:29:44.599 take off, they decided, we don't want to pay taxes 1:29:44.640 --> 1:29:48.479 on this. We did this all by ourselves. And one 1:29:48.520 --> 1:29:50.920 of the things the network state is it is a 1:29:51.240 --> 1:29:56.000 series of global tax shelters and tax evasion zones all 1:29:56.000 --> 1:29:59.440 over the world because they knew that they were striking 1:29:59.520 --> 1:30:02.280 goal and they wanted to make sure they get it 1:30:02.479 --> 1:30:05.840 out of having to pay it to the irs and 1:30:05.960 --> 1:30:08.599 having to pay it to the people in this country 1:30:08.600 --> 1:30:09.560 and other countries. 1:30:10.200 --> 1:30:12.200 Yeah, and then you know, like the more control you 1:30:12.200 --> 1:30:15.080 can get over like what there is of the American state, 1:30:15.120 --> 1:30:17.200 the more you can just be like, hey, look, we're 1:30:17.200 --> 1:30:19.360 just gonna not ever look into the fact that there's 1:30:19.400 --> 1:30:21.920 all this tax evation shit going on. You can just 1:30:22.000 --> 1:30:26.640 like use our control of like vant and you know, 1:30:26.720 --> 1:30:28.600 like our control of the levers of the state to 1:30:28.600 --> 1:30:30.840 make sure that like we're just allowed to do this. 1:30:31.479 --> 1:30:34.800 M yeah, one hundred percent. You know. 1:30:34.920 --> 1:30:37.879 It also goes back to like what are the roots 1:30:37.920 --> 1:30:41.840 sort of causes of tech fascism or whatever you would 1:30:41.920 --> 1:30:45.200 like to call them. And one of the big reasons 1:30:45.240 --> 1:30:49.040 for that is because as venture capital itself is diversified 1:30:49.400 --> 1:30:52.760 and it's moving into finance, and it's moving into medicine, 1:30:52.800 --> 1:30:55.799 and it's moving into land, and it's moving into energy. 1:30:56.360 --> 1:31:00.040 There are existing monopolies in every single part. 1:31:00.479 --> 1:31:02.559 Of those markets that they have to. 1:31:02.640 --> 1:31:05.759 Fight in order to get into them, and they've openly 1:31:05.880 --> 1:31:09.479 talked about this. So when they're entering these markets, they're 1:31:09.520 --> 1:31:13.320 going to war with existing monopolies in order to create 1:31:13.360 --> 1:31:16.880 their own monopolies. And that's forced them to these really 1:31:16.920 --> 1:31:21.280 like sort of extreme and perverse strategies like we're going 1:31:21.320 --> 1:31:30.280 to cure the US government, like God, and they've been 1:31:30.280 --> 1:31:34.040 really successful at that. So they work hard. Everyone's like 1:31:34.080 --> 1:31:36.479 they're lazy, they don't do anything, they're not smart, blah 1:31:36.479 --> 1:31:39.599 blah blah. I'm like Mark and Dresen works like the devil. 1:31:39.840 --> 1:31:41.360 He does not take a day off. 1:31:41.880 --> 1:31:42.200 He is. 1:31:43.920 --> 1:31:44.840 Unfortunately. 1:31:47.720 --> 1:31:51.519 So the story here, I think is one of these 1:31:51.520 --> 1:31:56.160 companies getting you know, heavily invested into the defense sector, 1:31:56.640 --> 1:32:01.599 heavily invested into building their own sort of financial system, 1:32:01.800 --> 1:32:04.920 like to some accept building links with the major financial 1:32:05.000 --> 1:32:06.920 powers that already exists, and to some extent, you know, 1:32:07.320 --> 1:32:09.600 like combating the powers that they want that are like 1:32:09.840 --> 1:32:14.320 monopolizing the places where they want to expand into. But 1:32:14.880 --> 1:32:17.840 there's also a global strategy here that's all kind of 1:32:17.880 --> 1:32:21.479 like a part of this larger plan, and I was 1:32:21.479 --> 1:32:23.160 wondering if you could talk a little bit about that 1:32:23.240 --> 1:32:26.000 before we go much deeper into a next episode. 1:32:26.200 --> 1:32:30.000 Yes, absolutely, so, you know, I think what we have 1:32:30.080 --> 1:32:32.439 talked about so far as we'really looking at like kind 1:32:32.479 --> 1:32:38.240 of root causes, dynamics, new markets they're going into, and 1:32:38.320 --> 1:32:41.439 the next sort of stage of thinking about that is. 1:32:41.400 --> 1:32:44.280 Like what what demands. 1:32:43.880 --> 1:32:48.400 And what global program and strategy comes out of sort 1:32:48.439 --> 1:32:53.479 of their needs for capital, for returns, for expansion, for 1:32:53.640 --> 1:32:57.720 fighting monopolies, for tax evasion, everything like that. And what 1:32:57.760 --> 1:33:01.160 they've come up with what we can already see, is 1:33:01.200 --> 1:33:03.919 really like a global playbook. 1:33:03.520 --> 1:33:07.400 For how they're going to do that. And this is about. 1:33:07.520 --> 1:33:11.280 Running everything in the world as venture capital firms and 1:33:11.320 --> 1:33:15.479 their startups and including the government. So what is happening 1:33:15.600 --> 1:33:18.960 in America is the venture capitalists are trying to replace 1:33:19.040 --> 1:33:22.840 the government with venture capital firms and their startups who 1:33:22.880 --> 1:33:28.000 are operating the state that can be done everywhere. They 1:33:28.040 --> 1:33:33.280 want global deregulation, they want global suspension of taxes all 1:33:33.320 --> 1:33:37.040 over the world. They're going to bolster techno fascists align 1:33:37.200 --> 1:33:42.200 right wing politicians. We already see this with Bukele, with Malay. 1:33:42.880 --> 1:33:45.599 They're going to do the interference in elections, the lobby 1:33:45.640 --> 1:33:49.240 and the bribery, social medium manipulation, everything that they need 1:33:49.280 --> 1:33:52.360 to do to make sure they get politicians all over 1:33:52.400 --> 1:33:56.080 the place who are going to take their orders. As 1:33:56.120 --> 1:33:59.920 we discuss replacing the global economic system with the crypto 1:34:00.120 --> 1:34:05.400 financial system, and then these megaprojects, the data centers, the 1:34:05.439 --> 1:34:08.599 new cities in order to feed all of their data 1:34:08.600 --> 1:34:12.280 centers and all of their new factories and their new manufacturing. 1:34:12.800 --> 1:34:15.760 We're headed for a new age of resource extraction where 1:34:15.800 --> 1:34:19.200 they're literally already going all over the world with AI 1:34:19.360 --> 1:34:24.720 mining companies to find li the uranium and cobalt. They 1:34:24.760 --> 1:34:28.120 need to re arm all of Europe, they need to 1:34:28.160 --> 1:34:32.400 recolonize Latin American Africa. They need to suppress leftism and 1:34:32.439 --> 1:34:39.000 communism globally. And you know, ultimately this all unfolds within 1:34:39.360 --> 1:34:42.760 a war with China, because that's what's waiting for them 1:34:44.040 --> 1:34:47.479 at the end of this thing. And once you have 1:34:47.600 --> 1:34:51.080 all these things in place, you're looking at the rise 1:34:51.320 --> 1:34:55.840 of the techno fascist civilization, which is the network. 1:34:55.520 --> 1:34:58.280 State, which we are going to talk about in our 1:34:58.320 --> 1:34:59.760 next episode. It sounds u. 1:35:02.560 --> 1:35:02.760 Yep. 1:35:06.400 --> 1:35:07.680 So you could look forward to. 1:35:09.360 --> 1:35:12.840 God the global systemic tech fashion state. 1:35:15.160 --> 1:35:20.880 Tomorrow. Oh God, Okay, Chayley. 1:35:20.960 --> 1:35:24.439 Where can people find your work and more information about this? 1:35:24.880 --> 1:35:28.960 Yes, please check out the research site. It's a vc 1:35:29.520 --> 1:35:33.680 infodox dot com and like, please help us get this 1:35:33.800 --> 1:35:37.719 information out there because people all over the world need 1:35:37.760 --> 1:35:41.240 to know stuff and to know what's hitting them. Particularly 1:35:41.520 --> 1:35:45.120 this affects other countries, and you know, we really need 1:35:45.160 --> 1:35:49.080 people who can activate around this information and make sure 1:35:49.280 --> 1:35:53.920 when we show up and we build our resistance that 1:35:54.000 --> 1:36:00.560 like that resistance is not designed to take down Curtis Yarvin. Yeah, 1:36:00.840 --> 1:36:17.240 it is designed to take down a capitalist system. 1:36:17.400 --> 1:36:19.720 Welcome to it could happen here the podcast where it's 1:36:19.720 --> 1:36:22.760 happening both here and everywhere else. I am your host 1:36:22.880 --> 1:36:27.559 Fo Wong, and today we're talking about the it being 1:36:27.960 --> 1:36:30.960 the fascist network state that the all of these ventured 1:36:31.040 --> 1:36:33.840 capital tech ghouls are trying to set up. 1:36:34.439 --> 1:36:35.160 And with you. 1:36:35.280 --> 1:36:38.559 Once again to talk about this is Shaneley, who is 1:36:38.600 --> 1:36:42.599 one of the contributors and people behind vc infodox, which 1:36:42.640 --> 1:36:46.360 is one of the best resources about these bloodthirsty tyrants. 1:36:47.400 --> 1:36:49.040 Shy Welcome to the show. 1:36:50.000 --> 1:36:52.479 Thank you, thank you for having me again. 1:36:53.479 --> 1:36:55.479 I constantly have these moments where it's like, oh great, 1:36:55.479 --> 1:36:57.000 I'm talking to people who are really cool, and I 1:36:57.040 --> 1:36:59.680 really wish I was talking to them about literally anything else, 1:36:59.720 --> 1:37:03.599 because oh my god, this stuff sucks. Like please, please 1:37:03.760 --> 1:37:05.880 cause the end of this system, so I could talk 1:37:05.920 --> 1:37:08.440 to people about things that are good instead. 1:37:08.040 --> 1:37:09.640 Of things that are imers. 1:37:10.439 --> 1:37:15.479 Yes, my dream is to not wake up every single 1:37:15.640 --> 1:37:18.439 morning and the first thing I think about is Winter Capital. 1:37:18.479 --> 1:37:19.880 I think about it every second of. 1:37:19.840 --> 1:37:22.799 Every day, and then that's when I go to sleep 1:37:22.840 --> 1:37:25.880 thinking about and then that is also sometimes what I 1:37:25.960 --> 1:37:28.280 dream about, which is unfortunate. 1:37:29.360 --> 1:37:31.679 You know, we've all been there. 1:37:32.400 --> 1:37:33.439 We've all been there. 1:37:33.960 --> 1:37:39.920 Oh god, So speaking of things all being in places, Look, 1:37:39.960 --> 1:37:42.120 they pay me the mediocre bucks if you have a 1:37:42.200 --> 1:37:48.519 better transitions more. But you know, let's get into what 1:37:48.560 --> 1:37:52.080 the network state actually is, because I think it's something 1:37:52.080 --> 1:37:55.040 that is not understood particularly well. 1:37:55.360 --> 1:37:56.879 Yeah, one hundred percent. 1:37:57.400 --> 1:38:01.080 So again this kind of comes in what we're talking 1:38:01.080 --> 1:38:03.960 about last episode, that kind of people's ideas about what 1:38:04.280 --> 1:38:09.559 these projects are not necessarily like fully fully formed. And 1:38:09.600 --> 1:38:12.160 I think a lot of people think that the network 1:38:12.200 --> 1:38:17.120 state is just kind of like them going to do 1:38:17.360 --> 1:38:22.240 weird shit, which yes, that's that's part of it. But 1:38:22.439 --> 1:38:26.000 I think something that you know, people don't really see 1:38:26.160 --> 1:38:31.759 is how how many purposes that the network state sites 1:38:31.840 --> 1:38:34.839 have for them. You know, the network state is basically 1:38:34.880 --> 1:38:40.440 creating zones around the world where they can execute their projects. 1:38:40.760 --> 1:38:44.880 So you know, some of these are more of the 1:38:45.080 --> 1:38:50.080 like ideological projects like maybe like practice or something like that. 1:38:50.600 --> 1:38:53.400 But you also see network state sites that are very 1:38:53.439 --> 1:38:58.720 focused on being like industrial centers, manufacturing centers, you know, 1:38:58.840 --> 1:39:02.960 biotech and start development where they can get away from 1:39:03.040 --> 1:39:06.880 regulations where they can sort of benefit from like co 1:39:07.120 --> 1:39:11.240 development on a campus. You know, you have sort of 1:39:11.360 --> 1:39:16.559 new city ideas like California Forever. You have network state 1:39:16.680 --> 1:39:19.360 sites that the only thing they're doing right now is 1:39:19.400 --> 1:39:26.720 they're registering startups to operate in different countries and favorable terms. 1:39:27.120 --> 1:39:31.640 You have a whole sort of bunch of different versions 1:39:32.000 --> 1:39:37.439 of this, so it's a very like extensible concept for them. 1:39:38.360 --> 1:39:42.439 I think some other you know, interesting properties of the 1:39:42.479 --> 1:39:45.719 network state is that it can become like a point 1:39:45.800 --> 1:39:49.559 of sort of negotiation with the with the host country. 1:39:49.640 --> 1:39:51.640 Like one of the points of the network state is 1:39:51.680 --> 1:39:56.240 to open up a country to the cryptocurrency markets, to 1:39:56.439 --> 1:39:58.240 mining markets. 1:39:58.320 --> 1:40:01.520 To you know, just the different for biotech markets. 1:40:01.960 --> 1:40:04.759 This is a way of them getting into a country 1:40:04.880 --> 1:40:08.599 like kind of on their own terms. 1:40:08.560 --> 1:40:11.960 Which I think is a big, big function of it. 1:40:12.240 --> 1:40:14.719 A lot of it has to do with crypto adoption, 1:40:14.960 --> 1:40:19.400 because if they're going to make cryptocurrency work, they need 1:40:19.439 --> 1:40:21.400 it to be adopted. 1:40:21.400 --> 1:40:22.439 Around the world. 1:40:22.600 --> 1:40:27.040 And this is why coinbase is making such extreme investments 1:40:27.160 --> 1:40:29.760 in the network state, because this is a way to 1:40:30.200 --> 1:40:34.680 also you know, get crypto into all of these markets, 1:40:35.080 --> 1:40:40.599 start entering into trade with other nation states where the 1:40:40.640 --> 1:40:46.160 points of negotiation are around regulation, are around taxation, around 1:40:46.200 --> 1:40:48.360 access to land and minerals. 1:40:49.280 --> 1:40:51.800 So can you describe kind of what does it look 1:40:51.960 --> 1:40:54.559 like inside one of these zones, like for example, like 1:40:55.080 --> 1:40:58.800 how do these compare to say, like a special economic zone, 1:40:58.840 --> 1:41:01.040 which is the kind of models of this that we've 1:41:01.080 --> 1:41:02.040 had traditionally. 1:41:02.920 --> 1:41:07.040 Yeah. Absolutely, And you know, the network state is built 1:41:07.160 --> 1:41:13.240 using special economic zones, so it's really not functionally different 1:41:13.560 --> 1:41:16.040 on a lot of different levels. It's more about like 1:41:16.680 --> 1:41:19.720 who is using this special economic zone and what do 1:41:19.760 --> 1:41:24.200 they want to do with it? Yea, and medical experimentation 1:41:24.880 --> 1:41:29.360 is actually a huge goal here because you know, again 1:41:29.439 --> 1:41:33.840 when we're talking about them getting into medical development, developing 1:41:33.960 --> 1:41:38.320 all of these biotech startups, they're facing existing monopolies in 1:41:38.360 --> 1:41:38.760 the US. 1:41:38.800 --> 1:41:40.559 They're also facing the FDA. 1:41:41.200 --> 1:41:45.400 The Network State book by Belaji shrina Vasan, who's an 1:41:45.840 --> 1:41:50.280 andresen Horowitz like guy for life like he's andresen Horowitz. 1:41:50.880 --> 1:41:53.720 One of the main motivations for the Network State is 1:41:53.800 --> 1:41:58.640 getting to a place where you can't have any medical regulations, 1:41:58.720 --> 1:42:02.800 and so in hanjurists they've been doing that. They've been 1:42:02.800 --> 1:42:07.920 doing unregulated clinical trials. The doctors in Honduras have been 1:42:08.080 --> 1:42:11.439 organizing to try to shut this down and they haven't 1:42:11.439 --> 1:42:15.720 been able to and they're gonna have way worse problems 1:42:15.800 --> 1:42:21.360 now because Trump just installed a new president, install the 1:42:21.400 --> 1:42:27.519 president there who is in support and is taking the 1:42:27.600 --> 1:42:32.479 steps to you know, support this a special economic zone 1:42:33.040 --> 1:42:37.200 called their ZA. But that's that's one of the big 1:42:37.240 --> 1:42:42.680 reasons that they're doing it. Their medical offering is profound. 1:42:42.960 --> 1:42:48.040 They're doing clinical trials, drug developments, activating clinical research sites. 1:42:48.720 --> 1:42:55.600 They're also involved in like insurance software, insurance marketplaces, IVF, longevity, 1:42:55.800 --> 1:42:59.559 anti aging, like the whole you know thing. And this 1:42:59.600 --> 1:43:02.599 goes back. It's like when venture capital is entering a 1:43:02.640 --> 1:43:06.040 new market now, like they come like locked and loaded 1:43:06.600 --> 1:43:13.360 with a full platform and getting more accelerated clinical trials 1:43:13.600 --> 1:43:18.120 is something that is going to move their project forward significantly. 1:43:18.640 --> 1:43:21.599 Network state is is a way to accomplish that. 1:43:22.439 --> 1:43:24.880 So these these sort of nodes that they're setting up 1:43:24.920 --> 1:43:28.080 of these networks stix sites are places where you know, 1:43:28.120 --> 1:43:30.920 they've been able to sort of carve out special economic 1:43:31.000 --> 1:43:33.920 zone status that means that like the traditional sort of 1:43:33.960 --> 1:43:37.759 regulatory structure of the country simply does not apply. Yes, yeah, 1:43:37.800 --> 1:43:40.439 which is very which is in a lot of ways, 1:43:40.439 --> 1:43:42.360 and this is like a special economics zone thing in general. 1:43:42.479 --> 1:43:45.559 It's like very sort of like fascist state of exception 1:43:46.439 --> 1:43:49.000 where like oh yeah, no, we've just you know, there's 1:43:49.000 --> 1:43:50.880 like a crisis in the crisis is that we can't 1:43:50.880 --> 1:43:54.240 do like human experimentation, and so we've now created this 1:43:54.439 --> 1:43:55.720 zone where just none of. 1:43:55.680 --> 1:43:56.400 The laws apply. 1:43:56.439 --> 1:43:59.879 It's like the kind of like evil Mirror World Universe 1:44:00.160 --> 1:44:03.160 version of like temporary autonomous zones, except it's like what 1:44:03.760 --> 1:44:06.640 if we had a permanent zone of fascism where all 1:44:06.680 --> 1:44:09.080 the laws didn't apply, if we could just do whatever 1:44:09.120 --> 1:44:09.880 we wanted. 1:44:10.200 --> 1:44:11.200 One hundred percent. 1:44:11.280 --> 1:44:19.160 It's also deeply concerning because the obsession with accelerating clinical innovation, 1:44:19.360 --> 1:44:23.240 drug innovation, like whatever that is, like at some point 1:44:23.400 --> 1:44:27.320 there is a like what makes that stuff move the fastest, 1:44:27.560 --> 1:44:32.040 and it's human trials and human experiments and the more 1:44:32.200 --> 1:44:35.960 people that you can shove, the faster you can shove 1:44:36.160 --> 1:44:37.800 through medical development. 1:44:38.520 --> 1:44:40.360 And that's very concerning. 1:44:40.520 --> 1:44:43.040 So to me, I see this as like a recipe 1:44:43.080 --> 1:44:46.040 for large scale medical abuse and disaster. 1:44:46.880 --> 1:44:49.639 Oh yeah, so yeah when you when you. 1:44:49.560 --> 1:44:55.960 Look at them doing is unregulated and unethical medical experiments 1:44:55.960 --> 1:44:59.640 and trials in Honduras, and then you see and this 1:45:00.080 --> 1:45:03.200 other part of the world in different countries in Africa 1:45:03.240 --> 1:45:07.000 that the network site is also targeting that you know. 1:45:07.160 --> 1:45:11.639 Recently news came out about a very controversial and very 1:45:11.840 --> 1:45:18.440 unethical experiment in Guinea Buso to test the vaccine timing 1:45:18.600 --> 1:45:24.439 of eppetitis B on fourteen thousand infants, and the acting 1:45:24.479 --> 1:45:27.680 director of the CDC at the time that this was 1:45:28.400 --> 1:45:33.639 approved is Jim o'nill. And Jim o'nill is from Peter 1:45:33.880 --> 1:45:39.320 Thiel's Vendor Capital from myth Roles and he was also 1:45:39.360 --> 1:45:42.200 on the board of the C studying Institute, which is 1:45:42.320 --> 1:45:46.360 where a lot of this sort of network state stuff 1:45:46.560 --> 1:45:50.519 does come from. So this is a recipe for like 1:45:50.760 --> 1:45:54.639 mass scale medical abuse. And even if you look at 1:45:54.680 --> 1:45:58.639 like what world coin, which is Sam Altman's like eyeball 1:45:58.760 --> 1:46:02.640 scanning thing like that is a biotech thing like that 1:46:02.800 --> 1:46:07.920 starts to get into the the realm of like medicine 1:46:08.240 --> 1:46:11.800 and stuff like that. So you see these sort of 1:46:12.000 --> 1:46:16.880 forces starting to converge in these areas, like these aren't 1:46:16.880 --> 1:46:20.519 infants that they are doing these babies that they're doing 1:46:20.560 --> 1:46:24.640 these on. And at the same time, in that same country, 1:46:25.360 --> 1:46:30.400 an extremely well established executive in the network state is 1:46:30.439 --> 1:46:33.080 looking to build a network state city. 1:46:33.360 --> 1:46:37.200 So you know, getting these sites. 1:46:36.840 --> 1:46:40.519 In there into different countries in Africa, they can go 1:46:40.600 --> 1:46:44.320 after the precious minerals. They have a labor source there. 1:46:44.400 --> 1:46:49.320 They're already exploiting people there for the AI content moration 1:46:49.760 --> 1:46:53.799 and tagging and like all of that with disastrous effects. 1:46:53.800 --> 1:46:56.479 You also have the really concerning factor of like so 1:46:56.600 --> 1:47:00.920 many people in the top of the venture capital apparatus 1:47:01.000 --> 1:47:04.960 are South Africans, and when you just start to put 1:47:05.000 --> 1:47:10.400 all those pieces together, it's extremely worrying. One of the 1:47:10.560 --> 1:47:15.800 venture capital mining startups because now they have multiple mining startups. 1:47:16.080 --> 1:47:21.400 Discovered the largest discovery of copper in ten years from 1:47:21.560 --> 1:47:27.040 computers in Berkeley, and then they showed up in Zambia, 1:47:27.400 --> 1:47:32.280 Oh God, to start extracting the copper. So, you know, 1:47:33.240 --> 1:47:37.360 the network state opens up these countries to like this 1:47:37.439 --> 1:47:44.640 new era of like exploited labor, mineral harvesting, medical experiments, 1:47:44.840 --> 1:47:48.439 and the network state gives them a way to get 1:47:48.479 --> 1:47:51.400 into a country and start exploiting the fuck out of it. 1:47:52.080 --> 1:47:53.440 Yeah, it's corporate colonization. 1:47:53.800 --> 1:47:54.839 Yeah, period. 1:47:55.280 --> 1:47:57.400 You know, it's a bunch of these people going like, oh, 1:47:57.439 --> 1:47:59.160 the problem with the East India company was that they 1:47:59.200 --> 1:48:03.120 actually had to like run the country, which is really expensive. 1:48:03.439 --> 1:48:05.559 So what if instead of that, we just took over 1:48:05.680 --> 1:48:08.200 like the nodes that we wanted to use and then 1:48:08.320 --> 1:48:10.880 use that to push everything sort of further instead of 1:48:10.920 --> 1:48:15.880 like building a giant army and marching through India one. 1:48:15.880 --> 1:48:21.920 Hundred percent and you know, the labor exploitation that is 1:48:22.000 --> 1:48:24.880 like developing some of this stuff that we're starting to 1:48:25.040 --> 1:48:28.360 see where like you know, Venture Capital has a very 1:48:28.400 --> 1:48:32.120 close relationship with bou kell and al Salvador. Yeah, bou 1:48:32.200 --> 1:48:35.600 Kelly is sitting on a prison full of people that 1:48:35.840 --> 1:48:39.519 haven't had due process and he's now using them for 1:48:40.400 --> 1:48:41.720 free labor. 1:48:42.280 --> 1:48:43.320 Slave labor. 1:48:44.040 --> 1:48:46.320 This is the Seacot person that you might remember, like 1:48:46.320 --> 1:48:49.360 Trump had been deporting people here, and this place is 1:48:49.439 --> 1:48:54.920 just unbelievably hideous abuses. Yeah, it's an entire facility that 1:48:55.000 --> 1:48:59.440 is just dedicated to inflicting violence and suffering and humiliation 1:48:59.640 --> 1:49:03.759 on these people who have no trials, have no access 1:49:03.760 --> 1:49:07.680 to rights through legal system, and it's just this like 1:49:08.160 --> 1:49:09.360 nightmare black hole. 1:49:10.000 --> 1:49:24.320 Yes, you know, there's always lots of factors involved when 1:49:24.360 --> 1:49:27.200 I talk about stuff like I'm talking about the venture 1:49:27.240 --> 1:49:31.800 capital aspect, and there are other players involved, but one 1:49:31.840 --> 1:49:36.240 of the big things is like what happens when venture 1:49:36.360 --> 1:49:41.719 capital starts interacting with another country. Yeah, and what we 1:49:41.840 --> 1:49:47.560 see in Latin America is that they make contact with Hunterists, 1:49:47.720 --> 1:49:51.439 they set up a colony, they start terrorizing the people 1:49:52.080 --> 1:49:57.559 on the island, They become material actors in installing an 1:49:57.640 --> 1:50:01.800 illegitimate president with Trump's. 1:50:01.000 --> 1:50:02.839 Help, and then you know. 1:50:02.800 --> 1:50:07.200 They make contact with El Salvador and El Salvador becomes 1:50:07.320 --> 1:50:11.719 quote unquote bitcoin country, and l Salvador becomes a prison 1:50:11.840 --> 1:50:15.840 state and like a slave labor state in Argentina, same 1:50:15.920 --> 1:50:19.400 things the venture capitalists back to Malay to the absolute 1:50:19.520 --> 1:50:25.679 health Malay is now gutted to government, deregulated everything. He 1:50:26.080 --> 1:50:30.719 is putting these terrible labor abuse policies through. 1:50:31.439 --> 1:50:33.719 So when when. 1:50:33.880 --> 1:50:37.479 Venture capital contacts these countries, it is transforming them, is 1:50:37.600 --> 1:50:41.440 changing them, it's changing their politicians, it's changing their policies, 1:50:41.760 --> 1:50:44.679 it's changing their land, it's changing their financial system. 1:50:45.439 --> 1:50:47.800 And that is really concerning. 1:50:47.920 --> 1:50:50.040 And you know, one of the things about the venture 1:50:50.080 --> 1:50:53.320 capital model, this goes back to even just the fact 1:50:53.360 --> 1:50:58.280 that like they have operated global IT systems, so they 1:50:58.320 --> 1:51:02.320 have servers everywhere in the world, and all of the 1:51:02.400 --> 1:51:05.800 servers are exactly the same. And so when you look 1:51:05.840 --> 1:51:07.800 at what the network stata is going to look like, 1:51:07.920 --> 1:51:08.400 it's going. 1:51:08.360 --> 1:51:09.280 To be very similar. 1:51:09.320 --> 1:51:12.200 It's going to be the same thing everywhere, and those 1:51:12.240 --> 1:51:14.719 will be basically commanding control nodes. 1:51:15.200 --> 1:51:17.840 Yeah, and it seems like they've done a very very 1:51:17.880 --> 1:51:22.960 good job of kind of either subverting or like allying 1:51:23.040 --> 1:51:27.120 with factions of the traditional sort of like right wing 1:51:27.160 --> 1:51:31.080 elite and then you know, propelling them to power and 1:51:31.120 --> 1:51:33.280 then using their power and influence and the fact that 1:51:33.280 --> 1:51:34.880 they were able to get these people into power in 1:51:34.880 --> 1:51:38.040 the first place to sort of set up zones of 1:51:38.080 --> 1:51:41.920 extraction for them and increase their power inside of these states. 1:51:41.960 --> 1:51:42.960 One thousand percent. 1:51:43.280 --> 1:51:45.799 And you know, if you look at how much they've 1:51:45.840 --> 1:51:49.960 been able to compromise the American government. 1:51:50.400 --> 1:51:52.680 Yeah, and then these. 1:51:52.439 --> 1:51:57.479 Countries do not have the wealth, the infrastructure of that, 1:51:58.000 --> 1:52:01.479 you know, anything like that, they're so vulnerable to this 1:52:01.600 --> 1:52:04.639 type of attack. So if in order to get its 1:52:04.680 --> 1:52:09.880 global projects done, venture capital needs to install favorable politicians 1:52:10.000 --> 1:52:14.439 all over the world. They're offering packages to all of 1:52:14.520 --> 1:52:19.839 those politicians. They're offering the money, the social media attention 1:52:20.200 --> 1:52:23.760 and platform that they can give them. They're giving them 1:52:24.320 --> 1:52:27.599 an economic policy that they can go forward and say, 1:52:27.600 --> 1:52:31.000 we're going to turn this country into like a technology 1:52:31.080 --> 1:52:33.840 industry and we're going to bring all this foreign investment 1:52:34.720 --> 1:52:37.800 blah blah blah. You know, they can really just like 1:52:38.200 --> 1:52:42.639 hand pick politicians and pretty easily like set them up 1:52:42.680 --> 1:52:47.400 with a guaranteed win and over time, that's like a 1:52:47.479 --> 1:52:49.440 global tech fascist access. 1:52:50.120 --> 1:52:50.360 Yeah. 1:52:50.400 --> 1:52:52.679 And one of the things that we know about sort 1:52:52.720 --> 1:52:56.519 of the way that fascist stay construction works is that 1:52:56.560 --> 1:52:58.719 if you're constructing, you've constructed a bunch of these nodes 1:52:58.760 --> 1:53:02.240 of the sort of this fascist network state. But fascist 1:53:02.240 --> 1:53:05.160 states always need to sort of create an enemy for themselves, 1:53:06.000 --> 1:53:09.040 and the enemy has been China. So do you want 1:53:09.040 --> 1:53:12.040 to talk about the way that they've been seeing Belton 1:53:12.200 --> 1:53:16.679 Road and how they've turned this into a civilizational conflict? 1:53:17.360 --> 1:53:21.519 One hundred percent? You know, if you listen to what 1:53:21.760 --> 1:53:24.320 venture capitalists say about who. 1:53:24.200 --> 1:53:29.080 The enemy is, like, it is China. They talk literally 1:53:29.280 --> 1:53:34.280 constantly about China. Almost all of their startups in every 1:53:34.320 --> 1:53:37.880 single sector talk about China all of the time, but 1:53:38.040 --> 1:53:43.959 particularly in the weapons part of that and the premise 1:53:44.120 --> 1:53:47.200 of their military build out. What they say is that 1:53:47.280 --> 1:53:51.679 this is about China, and this is about fighting China, and. 1:53:51.600 --> 1:53:52.880 This is very serious to them. 1:53:52.880 --> 1:53:56.600 And the fundamental cause is like their technology competing with 1:53:56.720 --> 1:54:00.760 China's technology, And actually venture capitalists would admit that China 1:54:00.840 --> 1:54:03.320 has better technology than us and that they're ahead of us, 1:54:03.920 --> 1:54:06.800 so this is a crisis for them. 1:54:06.920 --> 1:54:08.600 This is all, in some sets, very silly to me. 1:54:08.720 --> 1:54:10.920 The girl the girl who saydies China a lot, because 1:54:10.920 --> 1:54:13.799 it's like all the Tinese tech people you're competing against, 1:54:13.840 --> 1:54:16.200 like believe like ninety five percent of the same shit 1:54:16.280 --> 1:54:18.920 you do, All of you could simply work together and 1:54:18.960 --> 1:54:19.839 make money forever. 1:54:20.240 --> 1:54:22.599 But instead you've decided to do this like. 1:54:23.560 --> 1:54:27.400 Oh god, this like unhinged genocidal military build up because 1:54:27.439 --> 1:54:29.720 like you needed a great enemy in order to like 1:54:30.280 --> 1:54:34.120 keep doing yourking fascist bullshit. 1:54:35.080 --> 1:54:38.200 Oh god yeah. 1:54:38.240 --> 1:54:41.840 And like via absolute worst case scenario for the world 1:54:41.880 --> 1:54:45.880 would probably be like the top technocratic elite from China 1:54:46.000 --> 1:54:49.280 and the top technocratic elite from the US deciding they 1:54:49.320 --> 1:54:52.520 were gonna work together and just fucking literally everyone else 1:54:52.600 --> 1:54:53.360 in the world. 1:54:53.600 --> 1:54:56.560 Like yeah, it's like they were like on the road 1:54:56.600 --> 1:54:57.320 to doing that. 1:54:57.440 --> 1:54:59.720 It was like like this is like China wto integration. 1:55:00.160 --> 1:55:00.800 This was a thing. 1:55:01.280 --> 1:55:03.400 This this was like a version of history they could 1:55:03.440 --> 1:55:05.800 have had where it's like, yeah, congratulations, you've created like 1:55:06.120 --> 1:55:09.400 prominent technocratic rule, but like no, no, eat shit, we 1:55:09.480 --> 1:55:13.840 want to fight each other for obscure and nebulous ideological 1:55:13.880 --> 1:55:17.080 reasons is to generate the sort of fear necessary to 1:55:17.120 --> 1:55:18.800 do their projects. It's just like, oh. 1:55:18.680 --> 1:55:24.680 My god, yeah, one thousand percent. 1:55:24.880 --> 1:55:27.640 It's very it's very strange. 1:55:27.720 --> 1:55:31.120 But you know, like Palmer Lucky, who you know, and 1:55:31.200 --> 1:55:34.000 Palmer Lucky, like people make fun of a lot of 1:55:34.040 --> 1:55:37.040 the tech people for being dumb, and like Palmer Lucky 1:55:37.080 --> 1:55:41.080 is absolutely not dumb, Like he is a very very 1:55:41.680 --> 1:55:45.440 smart person and he's spending every single moment of every 1:55:45.480 --> 1:55:48.520 single day figuring out how to defeat China. And then 1:55:48.600 --> 1:55:52.040 that's the case for his entire company. But this, this 1:55:52.200 --> 1:55:56.520 is an issue for them. It's shapying sort of the dialectic. 1:55:56.920 --> 1:55:59.520 And so within this the net where is the network 1:55:59.560 --> 1:56:05.000 staying well? China's Belt and Road initiative is creating infrastructure 1:56:05.080 --> 1:56:09.440 projects and nation state alliances across Latin America and across 1:56:09.520 --> 1:56:14.040 Africa for China, and you see the network state really 1:56:14.080 --> 1:56:19.320 investing in Latin America and Africas. While so certainly, one 1:56:19.360 --> 1:56:24.600 way to conceptualize this is as the network state is 1:56:24.720 --> 1:56:29.240 a counter to Belt and Road and it is part 1:56:29.360 --> 1:56:33.360 of their cold war with China which is playing out 1:56:33.520 --> 1:56:35.600 across all of these regions. 1:56:36.200 --> 1:56:38.800 Yeah, it's another thing where it's just like I have 1:56:38.960 --> 1:56:42.879 seen how how both of these groups treat the workers 1:56:42.880 --> 1:56:45.200 in Africa that they're employing. Like both of you two 1:56:45.280 --> 1:56:49.240 believe the same shit. You're both fucking racist doing colonialism, 1:56:49.320 --> 1:56:52.560 but like you've decided to drag the entire fucking world 1:56:52.600 --> 1:56:57.120 into your Like oh god, okay, I'm gonna I'm gonna 1:56:57.120 --> 1:56:59.640 tell one China racism story here, because we've be getting 1:56:59.640 --> 1:57:02.760 in a normal am out of American racism, like like 1:57:02.800 --> 1:57:05.080 this is this is a country where like, like China's 1:57:05.120 --> 1:57:07.240 the country where like you get soapbads, where like you 1:57:07.360 --> 1:57:09.920 have a black person and they like rub their skin 1:57:10.000 --> 1:57:12.800 with soap and they like turn white. This is like 1:57:12.800 --> 1:57:14.680 the kind of racism you're dealing with. One of the 1:57:14.720 --> 1:57:17.800 big ecological moments in China was there's a documentary called 1:57:17.880 --> 1:57:19.960 Under the Dome. So we're gonna get a little bit 1:57:20.000 --> 1:57:21.800 far field here, but this I think matters a lot 1:57:21.840 --> 1:57:25.280 in terms of why this is happening. The CCP allowed 1:57:25.640 --> 1:57:28.480 this woman who'd been a state broadcaster like a television 1:57:28.480 --> 1:57:32.000 personality like broadcaster for a long time. She had a kid, 1:57:32.080 --> 1:57:33.800 so she was taking time off. This is like the 1:57:33.840 --> 1:57:36.360 early twenty tens, like the height of like air pollution 1:57:36.440 --> 1:57:39.600 in China, and she does this like giant documentary about 1:57:39.680 --> 1:57:41.720 air pollution. It's allowed to stay on the Internet for 1:57:41.720 --> 1:57:44.120 like a couple of days before it's taken down. And 1:57:44.280 --> 1:57:46.720 one of the big points of this is that part 1:57:46.760 --> 1:57:48.600 of the reason that pollution is so bad is that 1:57:48.600 --> 1:57:50.440 there are all of these cars in China that don't 1:57:50.440 --> 1:57:53.040 meet Chinese emission standards for being sold to the Chinese market, 1:57:53.400 --> 1:57:55.480 And the reason they're producing these cars is that they 1:57:55.520 --> 1:57:59.160 specifically have an entire class of cars that are like way, 1:57:59.200 --> 1:58:03.080 way way more pollutant and shittier that they specifically designed 1:58:03.120 --> 1:58:05.320 to sell to Africa. Like it's like that kind of 1:58:05.320 --> 1:58:08.120 like structure of racism, right, and it's like, you know, 1:58:08.240 --> 1:58:10.240 it's just like the sort of horror show of like 1:58:10.320 --> 1:58:14.720 watching these two just like different versions of this sort 1:58:14.760 --> 1:58:18.520 of like nightmare colonialism entity where you know, like China 1:58:18.680 --> 1:58:21.240 is trying to find a way to reproduce its own 1:58:21.240 --> 1:58:24.040 capital as its growth rate like slows, and the networks 1:58:24.040 --> 1:58:25.800 that people, you know, I have also had this project 1:58:25.840 --> 1:58:27.840 of like we want to sort of install our own 1:58:27.920 --> 1:58:29.880 version of fascism here, and they're just sort of like 1:58:30.440 --> 1:58:33.560 building these like parallel networks against each other just like 1:58:35.040 --> 1:58:37.840 I don't know, it makes me so miserable that so 1:58:37.840 --> 1:58:41.440 many people are getting fucked by just like the global 1:58:41.480 --> 1:58:44.800 capital of superpowers and the way that like venture capital 1:58:44.800 --> 1:58:48.000 money has become a political force that can do their 1:58:48.120 --> 1:58:52.400 own unbelievably like probably more hideously fucked versions of what 1:58:53.000 --> 1:58:54.400 Chinese capital has been able to do. 1:58:54.800 --> 1:58:57.480 Yeah, I think you know, at the end of the day, 1:58:57.600 --> 1:59:00.800 that's where where we need to come back to, is 1:59:00.840 --> 1:59:04.680 like this is about capitalism, Like this is about colonialism, 1:59:04.760 --> 1:59:08.360 it's about like imperialism, and like, yeah, we fight this 1:59:09.040 --> 1:59:13.840 at that level, at the level of structural analysis, of 1:59:14.000 --> 1:59:19.600 historical analysis, of like full analysis, of unflinching analysis, and 1:59:19.640 --> 1:59:23.720 that that is the only way to get out of 1:59:23.800 --> 1:59:26.000 this situation that we're in. 1:59:26.480 --> 1:59:29.120 Yeah, is to understand what is actually happening at a 1:59:29.360 --> 1:59:33.600 structural level and understand the actual forces that are operating 1:59:33.640 --> 1:59:39.440 instead of the big, flashy name people who the spotlight 1:59:39.480 --> 1:59:39.880 has been on. 1:59:41.000 --> 1:59:43.960 Yeah. That is one of the few things that makes 1:59:44.000 --> 1:59:47.280 me excited about venture capital because like, here is a 1:59:47.400 --> 1:59:54.080 lens where we can actually see capitalism in a live 1:59:54.480 --> 2:00:00.800 movie and active, dynamic, destructive, very much visible. You can 2:00:00.800 --> 2:00:03.960 see this, you can see it happening, and that is 2:00:04.000 --> 2:00:17.800 like such an opportunity to wrap up the network state stuff. So, 2:00:18.600 --> 2:00:21.520 you know, a lot a lot is sort of said 2:00:21.600 --> 2:00:25.200 about this being their own state, which it absolutely is. 2:00:25.480 --> 2:00:28.760 It leads to that, but once you add up these 2:00:29.760 --> 2:00:33.640 pieces of them having land and them having cities, and 2:00:33.680 --> 2:00:38.000 then they're racism. So they think that they're better than everyone, 2:00:38.080 --> 2:00:42.360 and they're like misogyny and like their wealth and them 2:00:42.480 --> 2:00:47.760 being sort of in their own kind of category which 2:00:47.800 --> 2:00:52.000 also has all of the different sort of pieces of civilization. 2:00:52.200 --> 2:00:56.480 Like out of that they derive both an identity and 2:00:56.640 --> 2:01:01.800 like a drive for civilization building. And so one thing 2:01:01.920 --> 2:01:06.400 that people talk about a lot is eugenics, and like 2:01:06.480 --> 2:01:10.240 eugenics beliefs sort of in the tech class, but we 2:01:10.360 --> 2:01:15.120 are so far beyond that and into an actual eugenics 2:01:15.160 --> 2:01:19.920 project where venture capitalists are encouraging the tech class to 2:01:20.040 --> 2:01:24.000 create more and more babies. They are creating a dizzying 2:01:24.960 --> 2:01:33.120 number of fertility startups, IVF, genetic screening, you know, engineering 2:01:33.920 --> 2:01:38.080 of the genome, like all of these different areas. And 2:01:38.560 --> 2:01:42.560 they see Israel as the example of that because the 2:01:42.920 --> 2:01:48.560 Israeli fertility rate is really high despite it being a technocratic. 2:01:48.240 --> 2:01:51.520 This is there where it's not mine. Yeah, yeah, just 2:01:51.600 --> 2:01:53.360 to be clear, this is what they say. 2:01:53.400 --> 2:01:57.120 They say Israel is aspirational because it's the technocratic state 2:01:57.160 --> 2:01:59.520 where they have a really high birth rate, and that 2:01:59.520 --> 2:02:02.120 that is what they want to emulate, you know, through 2:02:02.240 --> 2:02:06.840 the network state, and they want to you know, selectively 2:02:07.480 --> 2:02:10.240 breed and they want to use these technologies to breed 2:02:10.560 --> 2:02:15.240 and hyperbreed. And one of the tech philosophers that should 2:02:15.280 --> 2:02:18.560 actually get way more intention than Curtis Yarvin but doesn't 2:02:18.920 --> 2:02:19.839 is Nick Land. 2:02:20.080 --> 2:02:21.360 And nick Land. 2:02:21.120 --> 2:02:25.640 Basically yeah, but nick Land's one of his main thing 2:02:25.880 --> 2:02:31.080 is that a small elite will use eugenics technology to 2:02:31.520 --> 2:02:35.880 rapidly outpace the rest of the world to such an 2:02:35.880 --> 2:02:42.040 extent that it creates basically like a new species in 2:02:42.040 --> 2:02:46.040 that sense, I see, you know, ideology being something that 2:02:46.200 --> 2:02:50.640 emerges out of all of this other things that they're doing. 2:02:51.200 --> 2:02:53.120 They do all of this crazy shit. 2:02:53.160 --> 2:02:55.680 They have all this economic stuff going on, you know, 2:02:55.720 --> 2:02:58.400 they have all this medical stuff going on, and then 2:02:58.520 --> 2:03:01.680 what comes out of that is this is our civilization. 2:03:02.400 --> 2:03:06.080 We are going to breed to populate this civilization, and 2:03:06.120 --> 2:03:10.480 we are going to surpass the rest of humanity which 2:03:10.680 --> 2:03:14.320 we lolls and which we see as lab rats and 2:03:14.440 --> 2:03:17.440 guinea pigs and vermin and scum. 2:03:18.040 --> 2:03:21.680 Yeah, And it's the situation where like, like this is 2:03:21.720 --> 2:03:24.520 like a thing that a lot of the worst right 2:03:24.560 --> 2:03:28.360 wingers have believed for a long time. But these people 2:03:28.480 --> 2:03:31.800 control vast sections of the global economy, and because they 2:03:31.880 --> 2:03:36.120 do that, whatever, like unhinged like racist eugenic breeding project 2:03:36.120 --> 2:03:37.640 thing they want to do, they could just do it 2:03:37.680 --> 2:03:41.000 because they have the capital to like actually create these things. 2:03:41.080 --> 2:03:43.000 It's like, well, like obviously they're not going to be 2:03:43.000 --> 2:03:46.000 able to successfully like create a super race or whatever, 2:03:46.120 --> 2:03:50.000 because like that's just digenics doesn't work, right, Like but 2:03:50.080 --> 2:03:52.200 like it's you know, but like it doesn't matter. They 2:03:52.200 --> 2:03:54.520 have achieved a level of power and a level of capital. 2:03:55.000 --> 2:03:58.880 Where like the actual quote behind the reality based community thing, 2:03:59.640 --> 2:04:01.840 where for the Push administration, we're like the thing that 2:04:01.880 --> 2:04:03.840 got into like the media was like calling their roles 2:04:03.880 --> 2:04:06.640 the reality based community. The actual quote is about how 2:04:06.640 --> 2:04:10.160 liberals observe reality and conservatives create it, and so they're 2:04:10.200 --> 2:04:14.879 trying to sort of just hammer reality into their preferred 2:04:14.880 --> 2:04:20.880 shape through this combination of wealth and violence. And because 2:04:20.920 --> 2:04:23.840 of that, yeah, they can just fucking do this, all 2:04:23.880 --> 2:04:26.320 of this like eugenic shit that people just talk about. 2:04:26.360 --> 2:04:28.280 They can just attempt to do it. 2:04:29.160 --> 2:04:30.120 Yeah, you know. 2:04:30.720 --> 2:04:38.480 It's they're telling their workers to have more children. They're 2:04:38.560 --> 2:04:43.040 doing their own school programs, elite schools for these kids. 2:04:43.040 --> 2:04:46.680 They've talked about having their children being able to work 2:04:46.720 --> 2:04:48.120 at a startup by the age of. 2:04:48.120 --> 2:04:49.800 Fifteen Jesus Christ. 2:04:50.320 --> 2:04:55.080 Ah, Yeah, it's really wild. This is very much a reality. 2:04:55.080 --> 2:04:58.800 It's something that is allready happening now. And so one 2:04:58.880 --> 2:05:01.480 of the main messages that I have for peoples, like 2:05:02.120 --> 2:05:05.200 they are so much more advanced in these projects than 2:05:05.200 --> 2:05:09.680 anyone has awareness of, Like things are way beyond the 2:05:10.240 --> 2:05:16.840 emergency moment, and we need global response, and we need 2:05:16.880 --> 2:05:22.720 global emergency response, and we need resistance. When venture capitalists 2:05:22.760 --> 2:05:26.160 show up to these areas, the people there don't know 2:05:26.160 --> 2:05:26.960 what's hitting them. 2:05:27.000 --> 2:05:27.760 And that's even. 2:05:27.600 --> 2:05:30.800 True in the US, where these venture capitalists came from, 2:05:31.200 --> 2:05:34.560 people did not know that they were about to take 2:05:34.720 --> 2:05:38.640 the presidency. In other countries, they definitely don't know. We 2:05:38.680 --> 2:05:42.640 need global defense from this. Everywhere they fucking go. They 2:05:42.680 --> 2:05:45.960 should be met not only by people there who have 2:05:46.080 --> 2:05:49.440 been told and have the access to the information, but 2:05:49.560 --> 2:05:52.560 also to a global coalition that's ready to stand by. 2:05:52.760 --> 2:05:55.839 These are invasions of countries, These are invasions of sovereign 2:05:55.880 --> 2:05:58.920 nations and of communities, and that's what we need to 2:05:58.960 --> 2:06:03.080 fight back. And I think my research and other researchers 2:06:03.080 --> 2:06:06.800 and what's on vcmfhodox like leads to that conclusion of 2:06:06.840 --> 2:06:09.240 like that is how we're going to have to fight this. 2:06:10.360 --> 2:06:15.520 Yeah, and I think that's something that right now feels unimaginable. 2:06:15.800 --> 2:06:20.880 But also unless you are really really young, you have 2:06:21.080 --> 2:06:24.080 lived in a period where something like that existed, you know, 2:06:24.080 --> 2:06:26.160 to a large extent. This is what the global justice 2:06:26.200 --> 2:06:28.680 movement was. There's a bunch of different names, but like 2:06:28.720 --> 2:06:32.080 the original anti globalization movements, like the one that was 2:06:32.080 --> 2:06:34.200 born out of the nineties, the one that was born 2:06:34.200 --> 2:06:38.320 out of the Zapatista's rebellion against NAFTA, Like the Zapatista 2:06:38.360 --> 2:06:42.360 is brought together hundreds and hundreds of groups from all 2:06:42.360 --> 2:06:44.840 over the world, like to these giant convergencies, and they 2:06:44.880 --> 2:06:48.680 planned like an international strategy to presist these sort of 2:06:48.760 --> 2:06:53.240 these like free trade proposals. And you know, were they 2:06:53.320 --> 2:06:57.400 able to like defeat capitalism and like retake the globe. No, 2:06:57.480 --> 2:07:00.280 but they were successful in killing basically all new free 2:07:00.280 --> 2:07:03.040 trade agreements like in the period after. And this is 2:07:03.040 --> 2:07:05.040 where you get like the Battle of Seattle and like 2:07:04.880 --> 2:07:08.680 the whole Giant, like all the protests at all of 2:07:08.720 --> 2:07:12.000 the summits, and like Genoa, and this is the process 2:07:12.040 --> 2:07:15.400 that built the modern left right, like the modern American 2:07:15.480 --> 2:07:18.040 left comes out of occupy, which is a bunch of 2:07:18.080 --> 2:07:21.720 the veterans of that movement by doing this. Yeah, and 2:07:22.360 --> 2:07:25.600 like you all, like everyone listening to this, unless you 2:07:25.640 --> 2:07:28.640 were born in like the twenty tens, have lived in 2:07:28.680 --> 2:07:29.920 a world where people did this. 2:07:30.160 --> 2:07:31.920 It's kind of a parallel movement. 2:07:31.960 --> 2:07:35.160 But one of the things that happens in this period 2:07:35.240 --> 2:07:39.200 in your lifetimes almost certainly, is that a bunch of 2:07:39.240 --> 2:07:42.440 people like took the city of Wahaka in like two 2:07:42.440 --> 2:07:47.080 thousand and six, we have taken major North American cities 2:07:47.120 --> 2:07:50.640 from them in your lifetime. We can do this. We 2:07:50.800 --> 2:07:52.920 just have to be willing to work together and fight. 2:07:53.520 --> 2:07:56.680 Yes, one hundred percent. And as much as I like 2:07:57.000 --> 2:07:59.600 live in this issue and look at this, and I'm like, 2:07:59.640 --> 2:08:00.920 what the fuck are we gonna do? 2:08:01.120 --> 2:08:02.200 Like it's over, it's over. 2:08:02.360 --> 2:08:07.080 Like I also am like, this is a chance because 2:08:07.320 --> 2:08:10.120 what's having a mentor capital It's one of the fastest 2:08:10.160 --> 2:08:13.440 moving parts of capitalism, one of the most dynamic, one 2:08:13.480 --> 2:08:16.080 of the most powerful, one of them that has the 2:08:16.280 --> 2:08:19.560 most infrastructure. Like, yeah, what if we got all the 2:08:19.640 --> 2:08:23.800 computers back? Yeah, what if we could use the computers 2:08:23.800 --> 2:08:26.200 for you know, this is a chance. And I think 2:08:26.320 --> 2:08:30.960 there's a possibility, and I hope to build a global 2:08:31.320 --> 2:08:34.280 resistance around this. And that's why I'm here, and that's 2:08:34.280 --> 2:08:37.200 why I stay in this because this fucking sucks and 2:08:37.240 --> 2:08:41.240 there's not a lot of community support. It's isolating, da 2:08:41.320 --> 2:08:44.240 da da. But I think this is I think this 2:08:44.280 --> 2:08:47.080 is a fight we can win if we're all willing 2:08:47.200 --> 2:08:50.360 to get on board about what is happening and do 2:08:50.560 --> 2:08:54.320 the work of building that. So I am I'm excited 2:08:54.360 --> 2:08:56.120 for that. I think I think it can happen. 2:08:56.320 --> 2:09:00.120 So yeah, And I think this is something that it's 2:09:00.160 --> 2:09:02.520 really really easy to look into the world and despair, 2:09:02.600 --> 2:09:04.280 and I think one of the things that helps with 2:09:04.320 --> 2:09:08.520 that is remembering that people have faced odds that were 2:09:08.760 --> 2:09:12.120 so much worse than this, right, Like if you look 2:09:12.120 --> 2:09:15.120 at like the origin of Pan Africanism, right, and like 2:09:15.160 --> 2:09:17.600 you look at like C. L. R. James and a 2:09:17.640 --> 2:09:20.760 bunch of like his friends are like meeting in these 2:09:20.880 --> 2:09:24.880 rooms in like London, and you know, they're looking out 2:09:24.880 --> 2:09:30.959 at it across entire continents that are colonized and fifteen 2:09:31.000 --> 2:09:33.760 to twenty years later, literally like the people who are 2:09:33.840 --> 2:09:37.080 his friends who are there have liberated Africa, right, Like 2:09:37.120 --> 2:09:38.880 you know, we're talking about like this this what looked 2:09:38.880 --> 2:09:41.720 like a just a group of just like random people 2:09:41.760 --> 2:09:45.480 facing within a completely impossible project of defeating colonialism. Suddenly 2:09:45.960 --> 2:09:48.560 you know again, like twenty years later, it's like Julius 2:09:48.600 --> 2:09:53.520 de Reira is like running Tanzania, right, And the odds 2:09:53.600 --> 2:09:57.720 that they faced are so much longer than the odds 2:09:57.760 --> 2:10:02.320 that we faced, and were they able to create exactly 2:10:02.320 --> 2:10:04.560 the world that they wanted to know. But the world 2:10:04.760 --> 2:10:11.920 that they left after them was one where entire continents 2:10:12.320 --> 2:10:16.640 were no longer It's literally directly ruled by colonizers. Yes, 2:10:17.000 --> 2:10:20.360 and yeah, like that is probably the kind of response 2:10:20.400 --> 2:10:24.040 that this requires, but I don't know, people have done 2:10:24.080 --> 2:10:25.560 it before, and it can be done again. 2:10:26.560 --> 2:10:29.320 It can be done again, and you know, if you 2:10:30.280 --> 2:10:35.320 people who are interested in that reach out and like, 2:10:35.480 --> 2:10:38.440 let's get a movie in because this is like, this 2:10:38.520 --> 2:10:41.600 is a chance, This is a chance, and we need 2:10:41.640 --> 2:10:45.760 to take it because if we just let this go 2:10:46.240 --> 2:10:49.520 and like, today is our best chance of stopping it. 2:10:49.880 --> 2:10:51.760 You know, today is our best chance. 2:10:51.760 --> 2:10:55.480 So if we can hop on this and be professional 2:10:55.640 --> 2:11:00.480 in the sense of like being a professional resist in 2:11:00.840 --> 2:11:06.720 anti colonialists and anti fascists and take this as not 2:11:06.920 --> 2:11:10.360 just an ideological thing, but this is a tactical situation. 2:11:10.960 --> 2:11:13.960 We need to be figuring out strategies and tactics to 2:11:14.040 --> 2:11:14.840 take this down. 2:11:15.640 --> 2:11:16.000 Yeah. 2:11:16.160 --> 2:11:19.440 And I think on that note, where can people go 2:11:19.560 --> 2:11:22.720 to find your work and find more information about this 2:11:23.120 --> 2:11:24.480 and start this process? 2:11:24.840 --> 2:11:25.120 Yeah? 2:11:25.160 --> 2:11:25.760 Absolutely. 2:11:26.240 --> 2:11:32.280 Vcinfodox is at www dot vcinfodox dot com. There's a 2:11:32.560 --> 2:11:36.200 contact email address on that page. Would love to hear 2:11:36.880 --> 2:11:42.000 from you. We give presentations also, or happy to just 2:11:42.080 --> 2:11:47.160 talk to any other organizers. And I am on social media. 2:11:47.240 --> 2:11:49.880 I'm a Blue Sky and Twitter and I have a 2:11:49.920 --> 2:11:51.360 blog at. 2:11:51.080 --> 2:11:53.640 Shanlee dot com, so any. 2:11:53.440 --> 2:11:56.760 Of those, but definitely want to hear from people who 2:11:56.840 --> 2:12:00.720 are serious about building a movement around this. And thank 2:12:00.760 --> 2:12:02.880 you so much. Thank you so much for having me, 2:12:03.040 --> 2:12:04.920 Thank you for being my first podcast. 2:12:08.120 --> 2:12:09.200 Thank you so much for doing this. 2:12:09.280 --> 2:12:12.960 And I don't know, I hope we can help contribute 2:12:12.960 --> 2:12:16.920 to the start of something that changes the state of things. 2:12:31.440 --> 2:12:36.640 Welcome to Executive Dysphonia, a podcast about people who are 2:12:36.840 --> 2:12:40.520 in executive positions but can't hear well. Right, isn't that 2:12:40.560 --> 2:12:41.760 what the show we're doing is? 2:12:42.200 --> 2:12:44.680 This is it could happen here? Executive disorder. 2:12:44.760 --> 2:12:47.680 Oh, I guess I have Executive Dysphonia. 2:12:47.240 --> 2:12:50.560 Our weekly newscast covering what's happening in the White House, 2:12:50.640 --> 2:12:53.000 the crumbling world, and what it means for you. I'm 2:12:53.000 --> 2:12:56.920 Garrison Davis. That was Robert Evans, also joined by James Stout, 2:12:56.960 --> 2:13:00.360 with a segment later on by Mia Wong said, we 2:13:00.400 --> 2:13:05.000 are covering the week of March eleventh to March eighteenth. 2:13:04.200 --> 2:13:07.000 And I was wrong about dysphonia. That's just horseness. 2:13:07.040 --> 2:13:09.800 Okay, well, yeah, they probably are people in the executive 2:13:09.800 --> 2:13:11.400 branch who a horse. 2:13:11.200 --> 2:13:14.160 Yeah, yeah, horse and wearing shoes too big for their feet. 2:13:14.440 --> 2:13:19.080 We have to start by issuing an apology, that's right, 2:13:19.200 --> 2:13:23.760 a serious apology. We have both failed you, the audience 2:13:23.840 --> 2:13:29.040 and ourselves as an outlet by neglecting to cover a 2:13:29.080 --> 2:13:32.360 story the way that it deserves to. Last week we 2:13:32.440 --> 2:13:38.160 reported on the buffalo wild wings Espresso Proteini, that's right, 2:13:39.000 --> 2:13:42.880 and promised an in depth report on the drink upon 2:13:43.080 --> 2:13:47.040 delivery this past weekend, which was National E Spresso Martini Day. 2:13:47.880 --> 2:13:53.600 And there I was Sunday, March fifteenth, on my phone 2:13:54.000 --> 2:13:58.000 googling to find the closest buffalo wild wings when I 2:13:58.080 --> 2:14:01.520 discovered that these us at Bertini was in fact, only 2:14:01.840 --> 2:14:09.560 to be served in five cities. Yeah, in Tennessee, Illinois, Georgia, Texas, 2:14:09.720 --> 2:14:14.160 and the Sea World location in Orlando, Florida. And I 2:14:14.240 --> 2:14:18.000 failed myself and you by not traveling specifically to the 2:14:18.040 --> 2:14:21.040 Sea World location to try the Espresso Proteini, which would 2:14:21.040 --> 2:14:22.760 have been the correct choice. 2:14:22.480 --> 2:14:24.200 That would have been the right move to. 2:14:24.240 --> 2:14:28.000 Deliver the sort of coverage that you expect out of 2:14:28.080 --> 2:14:31.120 us and deserve. It's going to take a while to 2:14:31.160 --> 2:14:33.040 win your trust back, and we understand this, and we 2:14:33.400 --> 2:14:35.880 are hoping to be able to demonstrate that to you 2:14:36.000 --> 2:14:37.720 in the coming in the coming weeks. 2:14:38.240 --> 2:14:41.640 Gary, this isn't all your fault, you know, I knew 2:14:42.240 --> 2:14:45.040 years ago that we should have moved the entire production 2:14:45.160 --> 2:14:48.400 team to the Buffalo Wild Wings at SeaWorld. This was 2:14:48.440 --> 2:14:51.760 a foreseeable mistake, you know. Sophie and I are to 2:14:51.800 --> 2:14:54.160 blame for this as well, is all I'm saying. And 2:14:54.200 --> 2:14:55.520 we apologize then. 2:14:55.520 --> 2:14:59.080 Obviously, as a British person, the Sea World location in Orlando, 2:14:59.120 --> 2:15:03.080 Florida is house spiritual home, so that really should have 2:15:03.120 --> 2:15:04.480 been at the very center of my be. 2:15:05.240 --> 2:15:07.840 Just imagine how much more sunburnt you could be every 2:15:07.880 --> 2:15:10.240 single day we record this podcast, James. 2:15:10.240 --> 2:15:12.160 You could be I'm wearing a red shirt right now 2:15:12.160 --> 2:15:14.920 for this. You could probably never tell if I lived 2:15:14.920 --> 2:15:17.120 in Orlando, Florida, if I was wearing a red shirt 2:15:17.160 --> 2:15:20.480 or just had extensive sunburns. Yeah. 2:15:20.640 --> 2:15:26.280 So yeah, let's go for some small news items. Meta 2:15:26.400 --> 2:15:30.000 is shutting down. It's VR Metaverse Worlds. 2:15:30.040 --> 2:15:35.200 On June fifteenth, it stuck being named Metahu. 2:15:36.840 --> 2:15:40.640 It's the Horizon. Worlds continued to exist as a mobile 2:15:40.680 --> 2:15:45.920 phone only application. The metaverse portion is going to be sunseted. 2:15:46.320 --> 2:15:48.400 Like I said on the fifteenth of June. 2:15:48.920 --> 2:15:51.320 I'll be on there in June fourteenth, throat up till midnight. 2:15:51.480 --> 2:15:55.320 Just it's enjoying my final moments of beauty. Is there 2:15:55.320 --> 2:15:58.400 a SeaWorld Orlando that I can visit in the Metaverse? 2:15:59.000 --> 2:16:01.880 I bet there was too soon, James, too soon. 2:16:03.480 --> 2:16:06.560 In the United District of Illinois, Evanston mayor Daniel Biss 2:16:06.800 --> 2:16:11.280 beat Kat Abagazzali and Laura Fine this one over thirty 2:16:11.320 --> 2:16:15.080 five thousand votes. Kat won over thirty one thousand votes 2:16:15.080 --> 2:16:18.360 and find the Apac back to candidate to got twenty 2:16:18.400 --> 2:16:19.360 four thousand. 2:16:19.960 --> 2:16:21.080 Yeah, you know it. 2:16:21.960 --> 2:16:25.280 It was a really impressive first campaign from Kat who's 2:16:25.280 --> 2:16:28.160 a friend of the show. We're proud of her and 2:16:28.200 --> 2:16:32.879 her whole team. And yeah that's politics. Baby, onto the 2:16:32.920 --> 2:16:34.320 next thing, I guess. 2:16:35.400 --> 2:16:39.640 Columbia student Lka Cordella was released from ice custody after 2:16:39.800 --> 2:16:43.840 over a year in detention after government lawyers declined to 2:16:44.000 --> 2:16:48.720 appeal a judge's third release order. Her name was one 2:16:48.760 --> 2:16:51.440 of the four on the list that Marmon Donnie gave 2:16:51.560 --> 2:16:53.279 to Trump during their last meeting. 2:16:54.160 --> 2:16:58.400 Cuba is facing another blackout makes its aging infrastructure in 2:16:58.400 --> 2:17:01.400 a United States enforced BLOCKERID on the country. It has 2:17:01.440 --> 2:17:06.280 been running largely on thermoelectric, solar, and natural gas sources 2:17:06.280 --> 2:17:10.520 of electricity as imports from Venezuela have ceased. The United 2:17:10.520 --> 2:17:14.760 States has threatened to tariff anybody sending oil to Cuba, 2:17:14.800 --> 2:17:18.440 but on Sunday, Claudio Scheinenbaum, president of Mexico, did say 2:17:18.440 --> 2:17:21.600 that Mexico would continue to send aid to the Caribbean nation. 2:17:22.040 --> 2:17:24.880 Also checking in on the Shield of the Americas, which 2:17:24.879 --> 2:17:28.520 we mentioned last week, Gustavo Petro, president of Columbia, has 2:17:28.520 --> 2:17:31.800 responded to what appears to be an Ecuadorian bomb falling 2:17:31.840 --> 2:17:35.280 on Colombia. So we are a couple of weeks into 2:17:35.280 --> 2:17:39.640 this and Ecuador's already bombed the wrong country. Oh good, 2:17:40.400 --> 2:17:42.280 not great. It was in an area very close to 2:17:42.320 --> 2:17:45.800 the border. But Petro posted today on egg dot com, 2:17:45.800 --> 2:17:49.080 the everything website, I'm blighted by the fact that groc 2:17:49.160 --> 2:17:51.520 thinks it can speak Spanish better than meat. So I'm 2:17:51.560 --> 2:17:54.240 just going to read whatever this shitty translation is. I 2:17:54.280 --> 2:17:56.920 suppose it has been confirmed that the bomb in Colombian 2:17:57.000 --> 2:18:01.080 territory belongs to the Ecuadorian Army. The investigat continues and 2:18:01.240 --> 2:18:04.560 a diplomatic protest note will be sent. So yeah, that's 2:18:05.120 --> 2:18:09.680 Ecuador playing with fire there. Yeah. Finally, PBS is reporting 2:18:09.680 --> 2:18:13.200 today that an offer is on the table from the 2:18:13.240 --> 2:18:16.920 White House to end the shutdown. I'm just going to 2:18:17.080 --> 2:18:21.840 read I guess the terms that have been offered by 2:18:21.840 --> 2:18:24.959 the White House. So the first one would be the 2:18:25.080 --> 2:18:28.840 expansion in the use of body worn cameras by DHS 2:18:28.920 --> 2:18:34.200 law enforcement, and they will increase congressional oversight by requiring 2:18:34.280 --> 2:18:37.840 retention of body worn camera footage. The next one, they 2:18:37.879 --> 2:18:42.480 would limit civil immigration enforcement at certain sensitive locations. They 2:18:42.480 --> 2:18:46.480 go on to say sensitive locations include places like hospitals 2:18:46.560 --> 2:18:50.840 and schools, which is current practice. There were other places 2:18:50.840 --> 2:18:54.880 that were considered sensitive locations previously not to be churches, right, 2:18:55.480 --> 2:18:58.520 But that's not a definitive list, and I don't does 2:18:58.560 --> 2:19:00.560 it mean they will return to the old sensitive his doctrine. 2:19:00.560 --> 2:19:05.280 It's a little unclear. Yeah, they talk again about increasing 2:19:05.360 --> 2:19:10.439 congressional oversight, particularly by creating mandatory review and compliance reporting 2:19:10.440 --> 2:19:13.520 from the Spectro General of the HS. They talk about 2:19:13.640 --> 2:19:19.280 visible officer identification and the administration would require officers to 2:19:19.720 --> 2:19:23.480 clearly verbalize their agency and identification upon request when engaging 2:19:23.520 --> 2:19:27.280 in official duties. And then finally they will adhere to 2:19:27.600 --> 2:19:32.320 existing practices of law and practice of not deporting US citizens. 2:19:32.440 --> 2:19:34.039 And then they go and say they only detain them 2:19:34.040 --> 2:19:37.560 of a crime has taken place. Some of these appear 2:19:37.640 --> 2:19:39.800 like concessions, but they kind of only matter in so 2:19:39.920 --> 2:19:41.920 much as you trust them. They've always got like even 2:19:41.920 --> 2:19:45.600 the sensitive places has an exemption for like a terrorist threat, 2:19:46.000 --> 2:19:50.480 given that, for instance, it was suggested very shortly after 2:19:50.480 --> 2:19:52.760 Alex Pretty was killed that he was a terrorist attempting 2:19:52.760 --> 2:19:57.000 to kill officers, etc. Yeah, none of this matters, and 2:19:57.320 --> 2:19:59.200 like it's still going to be this is we are 2:19:59.240 --> 2:20:03.879 pleasing ourselves, right, Perhaps we should move on talking of DHS. 2:20:04.640 --> 2:20:09.560 Let's talk about Friend of the Podcast, Gregory Bovino. 2:20:10.000 --> 2:20:14.040 Oh, Greg, Oh, Greg Gregy b. 2:20:14.840 --> 2:20:18.600 Yeah, he's been a frequent, frequent cool Zone all across 2:20:18.640 --> 2:20:19.720 the cool Zone universe. 2:20:20.000 --> 2:20:23.760 Yeah, friend of the Pod. But no, nothing gold can stay, 2:20:23.920 --> 2:20:24.160 you know. 2:20:24.680 --> 2:20:28.680 Nope, And sadly Greg cannot stay at his job. 2:20:29.480 --> 2:20:33.680 Yeah, it'd be fair. Even before Trump took office, he 2:20:33.720 --> 2:20:35.880 was talking about retiring in like two years, Like he's 2:20:35.920 --> 2:20:38.200 been talking about that for a while. So yeah, it's 2:20:38.240 --> 2:20:40.880 not this is not like super weird, but the timing 2:20:40.920 --> 2:20:43.520 of it is earlier than he'd previously talked about wanting 2:20:43.600 --> 2:20:46.800 to do. And I think pretty undeniably connected to you know, 2:20:48.040 --> 2:20:51.400 him being made the sacrificial bond of the regime. 2:20:52.040 --> 2:20:55.240 Yeah, and the fact that he he for instance, said 2:20:55.280 --> 2:20:58.800 shortly after Alex Pretty was killed by CBP agents, Pretty 2:20:58.879 --> 2:21:02.160 was planning to quote ATTACA agents. We have seen no 2:21:02.320 --> 2:21:03.800 evidence that that is true. 2:21:04.040 --> 2:21:04.240 Right. 2:21:05.120 --> 2:21:08.680 He's currently the chief patrol agent of the El Centro sector. Previously, 2:21:08.680 --> 2:21:13.760 he was CBP's commander at large of its interior enforcement operations. 2:21:14.360 --> 2:21:16.520 That he was removed from that job in late January. 2:21:17.200 --> 2:21:22.199 He gave an exclusive interview to bright Bart News Bright 2:21:22.240 --> 2:21:24.160 but I have a former Border Patrol agent who writes 2:21:24.160 --> 2:21:27.360 to him. So I'm guessink that's why saying quote, watching 2:21:27.400 --> 2:21:29.600 these agents out there giving it there all in some 2:21:29.640 --> 2:21:32.280 of the most dangerous of environments we have ever faced, 2:21:32.640 --> 2:21:38.039 was humbling. Cool. He will be retiring just a few 2:21:38.160 --> 2:21:42.600 days after his fifty sixth birthday. The agency's mandatory requirement 2:21:42.680 --> 2:21:44.800 ages fifty seven, and I've seen a lot of places 2:21:44.840 --> 2:21:47.720 citing that that applies to offices hired after the middle 2:21:47.720 --> 2:21:50.000 of two thousand and eight. Bavino was hired in nineteen 2:21:50.080 --> 2:21:54.039 ninety six, but at fifty five, with thirty years of service, 2:21:54.680 --> 2:21:58.800 he would be eligible for optional retirement under the FERS. 2:21:59.400 --> 2:22:02.760 He hasn't reached a minimum retirement age, so I think 2:22:02.840 --> 2:22:06.520 that would impact the amount of retirement he gets. Oh interesting, Oh. 2:22:06.480 --> 2:22:09.360 Yeah, yeah, he usually does, unless they make a special 2:22:09.480 --> 2:22:10.720 exception for him or something. 2:22:10.840 --> 2:22:14.800 Yeah, because previously, right, like previously, Border patrol agents were 2:22:15.040 --> 2:22:18.720 essentially hired. It's like federal employees or civil servants. It 2:22:18.760 --> 2:22:22.480 was only after two thousand and eight that they're hiring, 2:22:22.520 --> 2:22:25.840 I guess came slightly more in line with people in 2:22:25.879 --> 2:22:28.880 the armed services, for instance, or police, and so like 2:22:29.200 --> 2:22:31.600 under first you'd have to do the thirty years plus 2:22:31.600 --> 2:22:35.359 reach the minimum retirement age, versus under the newer system 2:22:35.920 --> 2:22:39.120 when they have a mandatory retirement of fifty seven. I 2:22:39.200 --> 2:22:42.440 do feel like this, plus Gnome, plus the stuff that 2:22:42.440 --> 2:22:45.960 you've mentioned up top Garrison, it suggests that the tides 2:22:46.000 --> 2:22:50.360 are perhaps turning. Plus this, we've seen Republican sheriffs in 2:22:50.480 --> 2:22:55.160 Florida opposing mass deportations this week, right, we've seen Republican 2:22:55.240 --> 2:23:00.000 congress people making public statements about this. We are probably 2:23:00.240 --> 2:23:05.279 really beginning to see the beginning of the end of 2:23:05.320 --> 2:23:10.400 the Right being in lockstep behind mass deportations. I don't 2:23:10.400 --> 2:23:12.280 think that means with it going to see the end 2:23:12.400 --> 2:23:15.120 of ice raids. I don't think that means we're going 2:23:15.160 --> 2:23:19.480 to see the end, no, of massive detention and of 2:23:19.640 --> 2:23:25.279 massive deportation. But it's clearly, as we are looking towards 2:23:25.360 --> 2:23:28.920 the midterms, something that some parts of the Republican Party 2:23:29.000 --> 2:23:32.000 want to distance themselves from. And there's movement on this, 2:23:32.160 --> 2:23:35.520 and it shows that these forces are fluid in can 2:23:35.680 --> 2:23:39.600 actually be changed through taking like agency, like through through 2:23:39.760 --> 2:23:44.240 through imparting yourself upon the world, like what's happened in 2:23:44.480 --> 2:23:47.360 Minneapolis for those for those weeks to to you know, 2:23:47.680 --> 2:23:52.400 months showed that the world actually can be changed through 2:23:52.840 --> 2:23:57.320 through mass action. Yeah, like like Border Patrol and Ice 2:23:57.720 --> 2:24:00.680 went to Minneapolis to fight, and it seems like they 2:24:00.680 --> 2:24:03.120 came off worse, right, Like they were not able to 2:24:03.160 --> 2:24:07.560 subdue the city in a meaningful way and it has 2:24:07.640 --> 2:24:11.320 resulted in most of their leadership being removed. Yeah. 2:24:11.360 --> 2:24:13.840 Well, I wanted to talk a little bit about something 2:24:14.040 --> 2:24:17.680 that's happened this week that I kind of I felt 2:24:17.680 --> 2:24:21.120 a deep sense of foreboding reading this article. It's going 2:24:21.160 --> 2:24:23.400 to sound like this is another piece of kind of 2:24:24.360 --> 2:24:27.680 Israel Palestine reporting, but it's really not. I mean, that's 2:24:27.760 --> 2:24:30.600 where this particular story is set. But we're we're talking 2:24:30.640 --> 2:24:32.840 about something that's going to be an increasing factor in 2:24:32.879 --> 2:24:36.520 the lives of everyone gathering news and everybody consuming it, 2:24:36.600 --> 2:24:40.640 which is poly market our gamble on everything happening in 2:24:40.680 --> 2:24:43.680 the world. App that apparently the world needed for some reason. 2:24:44.200 --> 2:24:48.240 So on Tuesday, March tenth, twenty twenty six, as you know, 2:24:48.360 --> 2:24:53.960 hostilities continued between Iran and Israel, ballistic missile got past 2:24:54.160 --> 2:24:58.080 Israel's defense systems and landed in near the city of 2:24:58.080 --> 2:25:01.280 bait Schemesh, just outside of j Rusalem. It did not 2:25:01.440 --> 2:25:05.080 land near anything, but it looks like trees, you can see. 2:25:05.120 --> 2:25:08.680 There was video captured of the explosion and posted by 2:25:08.720 --> 2:25:12.480 a journalist named Immanubal Fabian Oh yeah, who wrote with 2:25:12.560 --> 2:25:15.560 his post, no injuries are reported in Iran's latest ballistic 2:25:15.560 --> 2:25:18.000 missile attack on Israel. The fourth to day one missile 2:25:18.000 --> 2:25:21.080 struck an open area just outside beit Chamesh first responder say, 2:25:21.080 --> 2:25:24.039 and footage shows, and the footage does indeed show a 2:25:24.040 --> 2:25:27.040 ballistic missile impacting. There is an explosion. This does not 2:25:27.080 --> 2:25:29.560 look like fragments of a missile that were taken down. 2:25:30.480 --> 2:25:33.279 You know, based on what I know of ballistic missiles, 2:25:33.280 --> 2:25:35.160 and based on what people who I know no more 2:25:35.200 --> 2:25:38.640 than me know about ballistic missiles, this was an intact 2:25:38.640 --> 2:25:42.720 ballistic missile hitting. It didn't hit a target that was valuable, 2:25:42.760 --> 2:25:45.039 It didn't hurt anybody as far as we're aware, but 2:25:45.080 --> 2:25:46.959 it got through the missile shield and a hit in 2:25:47.000 --> 2:25:51.200 Israeli territory. Normally you would wonder like, why does this this? 2:25:51.360 --> 2:25:54.400 I mean, this matters, you know if you're a local reporter, obviously, 2:25:54.440 --> 2:25:55.960 but why would anyone else care? 2:25:56.520 --> 2:25:56.760 Well? 2:25:57.080 --> 2:26:00.879 The day after, Manny Fabian posted this and this brief 2:26:00.879 --> 2:26:04.879 bit of reporting. He started receiving emails, weird emails, mostly 2:26:04.920 --> 2:26:08.440 in Hebrew, and like, here's one example from Times of 2:26:08.520 --> 2:26:11.480 Israel piece that he wrote, sorry for reaching out without 2:26:11.480 --> 2:26:13.400 a prior introduction, but I assume we will get to 2:26:13.440 --> 2:26:13.960 know each other. 2:26:14.040 --> 2:26:14.280 Well. 2:26:14.400 --> 2:26:17.000 I have an urgent request regarding the accuracy of your 2:26:17.000 --> 2:26:19.400 report on the missile attack on March tenth. I would 2:26:19.400 --> 2:26:22.320 really appreciate a response if possible. There is an inaccurate 2:26:22.320 --> 2:26:24.240 report from you about the missile attack on March tenth, 2:26:24.280 --> 2:26:26.640 and it's causing a chain of errors. If you could 2:26:26.680 --> 2:26:28.560 reply to me tonight, you would be helping me many 2:26:28.600 --> 2:26:30.560 others and of course the State of Israel, and along 2:26:30.600 --> 2:26:32.200 the way you would gain a good source. 2:26:32.920 --> 2:26:34.080 So that's really weird. 2:26:34.240 --> 2:26:36.680 Yeah, the fuck is going if you're this guy. All 2:26:36.720 --> 2:26:38.520 you did was post, oh, hey, a rocket hit but 2:26:38.520 --> 2:26:40.960 it didn't hit anything. Yeah, like not a big deal. 2:26:41.879 --> 2:26:44.320 Give him the state of the war. And he starts 2:26:44.320 --> 2:26:47.320 getting spammed with a bunch of similar emails like this, 2:26:47.920 --> 2:26:50.200 And in addition to that, he's got people like on 2:26:50.280 --> 2:26:53.720 Twitter responding saying like hey, One person responded to one 2:26:53.760 --> 2:26:55.880 of his posts saying there are people saying they've received 2:26:55.920 --> 2:26:58.080 word from you that the missile strike in bite Schamesh 2:26:58.120 --> 2:27:00.440 on March tenth was in fact intercepted. Is this true 2:27:00.480 --> 2:27:04.120 or did no such interaction occur? So people start posting 2:27:04.280 --> 2:27:06.480 and sharing in other places that oh, I reached out 2:27:06.520 --> 2:27:08.240 to this guy and he said the missile was actually 2:27:08.240 --> 2:27:10.120 intercepted and it was just a piece that fell, and 2:27:10.160 --> 2:27:13.120 he reported it wrong, which is not at all what 2:27:13.240 --> 2:27:16.240 this guy had reported. So he's really confused. He has like, 2:27:16.280 --> 2:27:18.600 why are all these people bugging me about this very 2:27:18.640 --> 2:27:22.120 minor story and why are they spreading disinformation claiming that 2:27:22.200 --> 2:27:25.040 I debunked my own story when I didn't. 2:27:25.640 --> 2:27:25.959 Well. 2:27:26.680 --> 2:27:29.840 The obvious reason why is that people that day on 2:27:29.959 --> 2:27:34.200 polymarket on March tenth were gambling on when Iran would 2:27:34.200 --> 2:27:37.680 strike Israel. There were fourteen million dollars waged that there 2:27:37.680 --> 2:27:40.520 would be a strike on March tenth. The rules of 2:27:40.560 --> 2:27:43.840 the bet per polymarket stated, this market will resolve to 2:27:44.080 --> 2:27:47.160 yes if Iran initiates a drone, missile or airstrike on 2:27:47.240 --> 2:27:50.160 Israel soil on the listed date in Israel time gmt 2:27:50.200 --> 2:27:54.080 plus two. Otherwise, this market will resolve. No missiles or 2:27:54.120 --> 2:27:57.360 drones that are intercepted will not be sufficient for a 2:27:57.440 --> 2:28:03.360 yes resolution. Right, So that's why fourteen million dollars was 2:28:03.400 --> 2:28:03.920 in the air. 2:28:04.240 --> 2:28:08.760 It's people who had a lot of money on this event. Yeah, yes, specifically. 2:28:08.760 --> 2:28:10.400 And these people don't care if anyone was right. They 2:28:10.400 --> 2:28:12.160 don't care that a missile was fired. All they care 2:28:12.200 --> 2:28:15.000 about is whether or not the missile made it through 2:28:15.040 --> 2:28:18.560 the defense network intact, right, because these were people who 2:28:18.680 --> 2:28:21.320 I guess had bet against that because they didn't want 2:28:21.320 --> 2:28:22.199 that to be the case. 2:28:22.320 --> 2:28:22.960 Right, right. 2:28:23.560 --> 2:28:27.039 He initially ignores these weird emails, and they start getting 2:28:27.040 --> 2:28:28.760 more and more aggressive, and people are like, when you're 2:28:28.760 --> 2:28:31.280 gonna update the article, Daniel, Daniel, update the article. You 2:28:31.320 --> 2:28:33.240 have to update the article. You know you were wrong. 2:28:33.879 --> 2:28:34.600 And after the. 2:28:34.560 --> 2:28:37.240 Weekend he starts getting messages like you have exactly half 2:28:37.280 --> 2:28:40.240 an hour to correct your attempted influence, despite the fact 2:28:40.240 --> 2:28:42.680 that you receive countless inquiries, you insist on leaving it 2:28:42.720 --> 2:28:44.760 this way. If you do not correct this by one 2:28:44.760 --> 2:28:47.160 am is reel time today, March fifteenth, you are bringing 2:28:47.240 --> 2:28:50.240 upon yourself damage you have never imagined you would suffer. 2:28:52.840 --> 2:28:54.959 That's already easer if I've ever seen one. 2:28:55.280 --> 2:28:59.280 Like, there's a bunch of shit like this. Someone said 2:28:59.360 --> 2:29:01.720 after you make a lose nine hundred thousand dollars, we 2:29:01.720 --> 2:29:06.680 will invest no less than that to finish you. This 2:29:06.800 --> 2:29:10.680 is insane, but it's inevitable if you think about how 2:29:10.720 --> 2:29:15.280 polymarket works, right that once people are putting fortunes on 2:29:15.360 --> 2:29:18.680 the line around stupid shit, you know, like betting whether 2:29:18.760 --> 2:29:20.640 or not, oh the missile make it through or not 2:29:20.720 --> 2:29:23.680 on this That is dumb, right, missiles and stuff that's 2:29:23.840 --> 2:29:25.320 very serious to a lot of people who live in 2:29:25.320 --> 2:29:28.440 the region, But betting on it this way is fundamentally stupid. 2:29:28.959 --> 2:29:32.200 But it's all Polymarket's all stupid bets like this, and 2:29:32.400 --> 2:29:34.920 they are going to increase only come after people once 2:29:34.959 --> 2:29:37.240 they realize, hey, maybe I can actually change and get 2:29:37.240 --> 2:29:40.800 a winning resolution or whatever if I harass the journalist 2:29:40.920 --> 2:29:44.160 on the ground. There's a vested financial interest in going 2:29:44.200 --> 2:29:46.760 after people over stuff like this. So this is this 2:29:46.840 --> 2:29:50.280 particular story is happening in Israel, involves the reporting of 2:29:50.280 --> 2:29:54.160 an Israeli journalist. This isn't gonna stay limited to that 2:29:54.400 --> 2:29:56.240 conflict or to that region of the world. This is 2:29:56.280 --> 2:29:58.360 going to be thing that journalists all over the world 2:29:58.360 --> 2:30:01.600 increasingly deal with. This isn't important story and one that 2:30:01.640 --> 2:30:04.440 I think says some pretty bleak shit about the immediate 2:30:04.480 --> 2:30:06.959 future of news gathering in this country. 2:30:07.160 --> 2:30:08.840 Yeah, so that's cool. 2:30:09.520 --> 2:30:13.160 On the upside, Polymarket is about to open a splashy 2:30:13.200 --> 2:30:17.400 new bar in Washington, DC called the Situation Room, and 2:30:17.440 --> 2:30:21.480 I found Polymarket made a post on their substack in 2:30:21.480 --> 2:30:25.199 which they announced this, saying, the world's first bar dedicated 2:30:25.240 --> 2:30:28.520 to monitoring the situation. Imagine a sports bar, but just 2:30:28.600 --> 2:30:32.800 for situation monitoring live X feeds, flight radar, Bloomberg terminals, 2:30:32.800 --> 2:30:38.679 and Polymarket screens. Grand opening this Friday. Imagine the first response. 2:30:38.400 --> 2:30:40.280 This is every bar in Washington, d C. 2:30:40.520 --> 2:30:43.240 First response is just someone saying, drink your way through 2:30:43.280 --> 2:30:47.160 World War three, which just also every bar in Washington DC. 2:30:48.720 --> 2:30:50.640 Someone else says, this seems awful, but I guess that 2:30:50.720 --> 2:30:52.680 perfectly aligns with your company in general. 2:30:55.160 --> 2:30:58.080 Get uh cool? 2:30:58.440 --> 2:31:02.080 Yeah, so I love poly Market. It's good that this 2:31:02.120 --> 2:31:04.080 is what we've turned society into. 2:31:04.360 --> 2:31:04.959 No notes. 2:31:05.720 --> 2:31:07.840 Yeah, I'll just add this to the list of things 2:31:07.840 --> 2:31:12.120 that prediction markets will destabilize geopolitically. Yeah great, not just 2:31:12.160 --> 2:31:14.560 the insider trading problems of people with you know, before 2:31:14.640 --> 2:31:17.680 had knowledge of military strikes or certain world events, but 2:31:18.280 --> 2:31:23.240 trying to influence the reporting of events to sway polymarket 2:31:23.320 --> 2:31:27.680 or Calshi's decision on whether whether the market was correctly fulfilled. 2:31:27.920 --> 2:31:29.480 Yeah, yeah, that's interesting. 2:31:30.280 --> 2:31:32.959 Yep, interesting and yeah foreboding. 2:31:33.959 --> 2:31:34.839 Yeah. 2:31:34.959 --> 2:31:44.560 Anyway, so yeah, here's some Ads. You built the animals. 2:31:50.720 --> 2:31:53.400 We're back. Here's some James. You built the animals. 2:31:54.560 --> 2:31:57.280 Yeah, lucky you. First, I want to talk about the 2:31:57.320 --> 2:31:59.520 Supreme Court, and then I'm going to throw it to 2:31:59.560 --> 2:32:02.120 Garrison talk about some other court stuff. This is our 2:32:02.160 --> 2:32:06.760 court segment. The Supreme Court has schedule cases for the TPS. 2:32:06.760 --> 2:32:10.520 That's a temporary protected status pretending to Syria and Haiti 2:32:10.920 --> 2:32:14.520 for April, meaning these statuses will remain in effect, likely 2:32:14.600 --> 2:32:17.800 until the end of June or July. The justices didn't 2:32:17.840 --> 2:32:20.400 alter the position of the New York and DC judges 2:32:20.440 --> 2:32:24.000 who indefinitely postpone the termination of the TPS. The Trump 2:32:24.000 --> 2:32:26.480 administration has hustled really hard to get this to the 2:32:26.520 --> 2:32:29.199 Supreme Court. They first tried to get the Supreme Court 2:32:29.280 --> 2:32:31.760 to let them remove people while it waited to weigh 2:32:31.800 --> 2:32:34.120 in on the case, and then they tried to get 2:32:34.120 --> 2:32:36.640 the Supreme Court to take the case before the Second 2:32:36.640 --> 2:32:39.360 Circuit had a chance to weigh in This is called 2:32:39.440 --> 2:32:42.280 thirty or right before judgment. It's how the case got 2:32:42.320 --> 2:32:45.480 to the Supreme Court. This, I should note it's different 2:32:45.640 --> 2:32:49.120 from the Venezuela case where the TPS was terminated because 2:32:49.160 --> 2:32:51.720 the numbers are much smaller, and therefore it's going to 2:32:51.760 --> 2:32:54.560 be harder for the US government to show harm. Right, 2:32:55.080 --> 2:32:58.959 it pertains to thirty forty thousand people ever had to 2:32:58.959 --> 2:33:03.200 guess by con trust. It's very easy for people to 2:33:03.240 --> 2:33:07.000 show potential harm in Haiti or Syria. Right, just to 2:33:07.040 --> 2:33:10.400 give an example of Syria that has been folenced directed 2:33:10.440 --> 2:33:15.840 against Alavites, Drew's people and Kurds largely unimpeded by the 2:33:15.879 --> 2:33:20.720 government since a sad fell last year, and Syria remains 2:33:20.760 --> 2:33:23.720 on the State Departments do not travel list. Yeah, you 2:33:23.760 --> 2:33:26.039 had some stuff about prairie Land. Do you want to 2:33:26.040 --> 2:33:26.480 share in it? 2:33:26.879 --> 2:33:30.120 Yes, let's talk about the prairie Land trial. Yeah, we're 2:33:30.200 --> 2:33:35.560 going to be doing a more in depth episode next 2:33:35.640 --> 2:33:37.800 week the start of next week on prairie Land. It's 2:33:37.800 --> 2:33:42.320 about double the length of today's summary, But I do 2:33:42.400 --> 2:33:46.320 want to go over some essential information about the trial 2:33:46.440 --> 2:33:50.800 that concluded last week. So last week the Trump administration 2:33:50.959 --> 2:33:56.400 got their first conviction in an antifat heroism case. On Friday, 2:33:56.400 --> 2:33:59.039 March thirteenth, eight people were convicted by a federal grand 2:33:59.120 --> 2:34:02.440 jury on charge of riot, conspiracy to use and carry 2:34:02.440 --> 2:34:07.720 an explosive, and providing material support to terrorists. One of 2:34:07.760 --> 2:34:10.440 the defendants was convicted of attempted murder of a police officer, 2:34:10.720 --> 2:34:14.560 and another person was convicted on two accounts of concealing documents, 2:34:14.840 --> 2:34:18.400 bringing the total number of federal defendants to nine. This 2:34:18.680 --> 2:34:21.959 case stemmed from what the defense argued was a noise 2:34:22.080 --> 2:34:26.600 demonstration protest outside of an ICE attention facility in Prairie Land, Texas, 2:34:26.680 --> 2:34:30.720 last summer on the night of July fourth. After protesters 2:34:30.840 --> 2:34:35.960 through fireworks and vandalized property, DHS personnel called local police 2:34:35.959 --> 2:34:40.000 for assistance. One officer arrived, drew his handgun, and yelled 2:34:40.120 --> 2:34:42.200 stop at a person in all black clothes who was 2:34:42.280 --> 2:34:45.760 running away. One of the defendants, named Benjamin's Song, then 2:34:45.840 --> 2:34:50.279 yelled get to the rifles, before firing toward the officer 2:34:50.320 --> 2:34:52.400 with an air of fifteen, hitting him in the neck. 2:34:53.080 --> 2:34:55.600 A week into the trial, US District Court Judge Mark 2:34:55.640 --> 2:34:59.080 Pittman ruled at defense attorneys could not argue that the 2:34:59.120 --> 2:35:03.400 defendants include the accused shooter were acting in self defense 2:35:03.600 --> 2:35:07.440 or the defense of others against unlawful force just because 2:35:07.480 --> 2:35:10.840 the officer had already drawn and pointed his handgun before 2:35:11.000 --> 2:35:15.720 Song fired. Prosecutors compared this to Waco. Judge Pittman ruled 2:35:15.760 --> 2:35:18.039 that the officer drawing and pointing his handgun at a 2:35:18.080 --> 2:35:22.000 fleeing suspect is not quote unquote excessive as a matter 2:35:22.080 --> 2:35:25.360 of law because the officer did not actually use deadly 2:35:25.440 --> 2:35:29.279 force or shoot first, and he listed three federal precedents 2:35:29.320 --> 2:35:33.400 for this. Let's get into this action and the role 2:35:33.440 --> 2:35:37.920 of Antifa in the court case. This action was originally 2:35:37.920 --> 2:35:41.840 planned on the encrypted messaging app Signal and via an 2:35:41.879 --> 2:35:45.840 in person quote unquote gear check meeting. The day before 2:35:45.920 --> 2:35:49.520 the action. Benjamin Song advertised the action in a larger 2:35:49.560 --> 2:35:53.720 group chat of dozens of quote unquote trusted individuals. When 2:35:53.720 --> 2:35:57.760 asked about bringing firearms during action planning, Song repeatedly stated, 2:35:58.080 --> 2:36:01.279 I'm not going back to prison, I'm not getting arrested. 2:36:01.520 --> 2:36:03.400 I'm bringing guns. Quote. 2:36:03.800 --> 2:36:06.600 So the trial, Song was characterized as the de facto 2:36:06.720 --> 2:36:10.720 leader of the Antifa cell or affinity group, but he 2:36:10.720 --> 2:36:13.439 did not have a close relationship with all fellow defendants. 2:36:14.040 --> 2:36:17.320 At the gear Check meeting on July third, Song proposed 2:36:17.360 --> 2:36:21.520 to free detainees using quote unquote suppressive fire, but this 2:36:21.600 --> 2:36:24.560 idea was shot down by other meeting attendees. 2:36:25.280 --> 2:36:25.640 Some of the. 2:36:25.560 --> 2:36:29.280 Defendants attended a daytime protest outside the ICE facility earlier 2:36:29.360 --> 2:36:32.840 that day, on July fourth, after which they reported back 2:36:32.879 --> 2:36:36.480 to fellow defendants details regarding the facility security prior to 2:36:36.480 --> 2:36:41.359 the nighttime action. Two defendants were neither in these planning 2:36:41.440 --> 2:36:45.280 chats nor attended the gear check meeting, but all of 2:36:45.360 --> 2:36:49.760 defendants that attended the protest carpooled in two vehicles, bringing 2:36:49.760 --> 2:36:53.400 a total of eleven firearms, body armor, eye facts, and 2:36:53.480 --> 2:36:56.680 all war Black Bloc which were all presented as government 2:36:56.840 --> 2:37:01.440 evidence exhibits. The government argued that the defendants were members 2:37:01.480 --> 2:37:06.400 of a quote unquote North Texas Antifa cell. The indictment 2:37:06.560 --> 2:37:10.600 describes Antifa as a quote militant enterprise made up of 2:37:10.640 --> 2:37:15.040 networks of individuals and small groups, primarily ascribing to a revolutionary, 2:37:15.120 --> 2:37:18.760 anarchist or autonomous Marxist ideology which explicitly calls for the 2:37:18.800 --> 2:37:21.800 overthrow of the United States government, law enforcement authorities, and 2:37:21.920 --> 2:37:26.240 the system of law. Prosecution argued that this cell was 2:37:26.360 --> 2:37:31.119 linked through a triple ven diagram of the Socialist Rifle Association, 2:37:31.280 --> 2:37:34.560 the John Brown Gun Club, and the Emma Goldman Book Club, 2:37:35.000 --> 2:37:38.720 which is a local Zene Destro group that also put 2:37:38.760 --> 2:37:43.320 on community events. Prosecution said that this ven diagram converged 2:37:43.360 --> 2:37:48.520 on quote unquote direct militant action. The government called on 2:37:48.760 --> 2:37:53.599 David Kyle Sheeter as an expert witness to testify about Antifa. 2:37:53.720 --> 2:37:57.200 Cheter's a member of the Center for Security Policy, an 2:37:57.280 --> 2:38:02.840 SPLC designated hate group. Defense tried to object to this 2:38:02.920 --> 2:38:06.920 witness's expertise, but the judge informed the defense that they 2:38:07.000 --> 2:38:10.640 missed the deadline for such objections, which would have been 2:38:11.120 --> 2:38:14.920 in a pre trial motion. Much of this case was 2:38:15.240 --> 2:38:20.680 spent arguing over whether the defendants were quote unquote Antifa, 2:38:20.760 --> 2:38:25.000 what that even means, and if it's relevant to the charges. 2:38:25.920 --> 2:38:30.800 According to Prairie Land Support Committee court notes, Judge Pittman 2:38:30.959 --> 2:38:34.800 asked the prosecution, quote is it necessary to prove this 2:38:34.959 --> 2:38:40.280 stuff about Antifa? The prosecution responded that Antifa ideology, particularly 2:38:40.360 --> 2:38:43.880 black block, was how the group operated. The judge pressed, 2:38:44.200 --> 2:38:47.720 whether it's Antifa or the Methodist Women's Auxiliary, why does 2:38:47.720 --> 2:38:51.600 it matter? The prosecution argued, they took direct action against 2:38:51.680 --> 2:38:55.840 the ice facility. The prosecution argued black Block and Antifa 2:38:55.959 --> 2:38:59.959 ideology were central to how the alleged attack was carried out. 2:39:00.560 --> 2:39:00.840 Quote. 2:39:01.320 --> 2:39:04.200 The government described black block for the purposes of this 2:39:04.280 --> 2:39:07.959 case as quote dark clothing with head and face coverings 2:39:08.000 --> 2:39:12.359 that concealed their identities, designed to hide each individual's identity, 2:39:12.520 --> 2:39:15.400 but also aid in a bet those members engaged in 2:39:15.440 --> 2:39:19.280 illegal acts by making members indistinguishable from one another to 2:39:19.480 --> 2:39:24.560 law enforcement. Now, all of this raises the question whether 2:39:24.600 --> 2:39:29.560 this prosecution is against the defendant's political ideology or the 2:39:29.600 --> 2:39:33.240 specific criminal acts of throwing fireworks or shooting at a 2:39:33.240 --> 2:39:37.960 police officer, rather than being convicted of being members of 2:39:38.360 --> 2:39:41.280 Antifa the terrorist group, something that still doesn't really have 2:39:41.400 --> 2:39:48.000 legal precedent. Prosecutors argued that the Antifa ideology, left wing 2:39:48.040 --> 2:39:52.320 anti authoritarianism played a role in inspiring defendants, formed the 2:39:52.360 --> 2:39:55.879 basis of political affinity that brought the collection of individuals together, 2:39:56.280 --> 2:40:00.000 and relates to a collection of security practices, subcultural practices, 2:40:00.040 --> 2:40:03.760 and associated tactics which were employed before, during, and after 2:40:04.200 --> 2:40:08.200 the criminal acts related to the Noise Demo protest. There's 2:40:08.240 --> 2:40:11.280 been a lot of reporting on people being convicted for 2:40:11.800 --> 2:40:16.640 possessing zines. These are short political pamphlets, usually with some 2:40:16.760 --> 2:40:19.520 kind of radical political ideology. There's a lot of anarchist 2:40:19.680 --> 2:40:22.840 zines out there now. Zines did play a role in 2:40:22.879 --> 2:40:25.879 this trial, a two part role. Prosecution argued that the 2:40:25.879 --> 2:40:32.000 presence of insurrectionary zines is indicative of an alignment with Antifa, 2:40:32.440 --> 2:40:35.160 even if possession of these zines itself is not a crime. 2:40:36.200 --> 2:40:39.000 The other relevancy of zines to this case relates to 2:40:39.040 --> 2:40:43.840 the concealing documents charges against Daniel Ronaldo Sanchez Estrada and 2:40:43.920 --> 2:40:48.440 his wife Marcela Rueda, based on transporting a box of 2:40:48.480 --> 2:40:52.440 political zines from his wife's house to a friend's house 2:40:52.520 --> 2:40:56.959 in dent In, Texas. The government claimed that Rieda called 2:40:57.040 --> 2:41:01.480 Sanchez Estrada from jail on July seven, instructing him to 2:41:01.560 --> 2:41:05.560 conceal evidence by telling her husband to tow her vehicle, 2:41:05.600 --> 2:41:09.480 which was at the action staging site. Quote toe it. 2:41:09.959 --> 2:41:12.880 My phone is in the back. Do what you got 2:41:12.959 --> 2:41:17.080 to do. Just toe it unquote. The defense claimed that 2:41:17.160 --> 2:41:21.160 she was worried about her car being repoed. Centisstrada never 2:41:21.240 --> 2:41:24.640 got to the car or the phone, but Raeda also 2:41:24.760 --> 2:41:28.080 said quote move whatever you need to move in the 2:41:28.160 --> 2:41:34.400 house unquote. Saniasstrada mentioned already being at the house and replied, 2:41:34.760 --> 2:41:38.080 we're good quote unquote in reference to moving stuff from 2:41:38.080 --> 2:41:43.119 the house. Prosecution argued this meant moving evidence. Defense noted 2:41:43.560 --> 2:41:46.920 that Raeda was talking about her pets at the time. 2:41:47.680 --> 2:41:52.520 According to support committee notes, Sanchisstrada and his wife Rida 2:41:52.560 --> 2:41:56.600 were found guilty of conspiracy to conceal documents and other 2:41:56.680 --> 2:42:00.640 objects that would implicate Reeda in the riot and shooting 2:42:00.959 --> 2:42:05.680 at the Prairie Land Facility. Now nine of the counts 2:42:06.760 --> 2:42:11.920 count one, two, four, and five through ten cited Pinkerton versus. 2:42:12.080 --> 2:42:17.120 United States, nineteen forty six. The judge explained to the 2:42:17.200 --> 2:42:21.640 jury that a defendant can be criminally liable for the 2:42:21.680 --> 2:42:26.720 offenses committed by another co conspirator if the offense was 2:42:26.800 --> 2:42:33.879 quote reasonably foreseeable and committed in furtherance of the conspiracy unquote. 2:42:33.920 --> 2:42:36.760 From very early on in the trial, prosecution argued that 2:42:36.959 --> 2:42:41.400 song firing on the officers was quote unquote reasonably foreseeable 2:42:41.959 --> 2:42:45.320 based on the planning of the protest and previous statements 2:42:45.400 --> 2:42:50.200 made by Song. The jury found all defendants charged guilty 2:42:50.240 --> 2:42:54.760 of counts one two, three and four that's riot material sport, terrorists, 2:42:54.920 --> 2:42:59.480 and explosive charges, but did not find other defendants besides 2:42:59.520 --> 2:43:03.520 Song guilty of attempted murder or discharging a firearm using 2:43:03.600 --> 2:43:09.320 this Pinkerton co conspirator liability. Lastly, let's discuss two charges 2:43:10.040 --> 2:43:13.880 which now could carry worrying potential to be used against 2:43:13.879 --> 2:43:18.760 protesters in the future based on this case's precedent. First 2:43:19.120 --> 2:43:22.480 conspiracy to use and carry an explosive and using and 2:43:22.520 --> 2:43:27.360 carrying an explosive during a riot. The only explosives used 2:43:27.480 --> 2:43:31.280 were fireworks, and even the judge confirmed in this case 2:43:31.320 --> 2:43:34.360 that it was established that the fireworks caused no damage 2:43:34.400 --> 2:43:38.520 to the ice facility. Yet Stephen Brenneman and ats explosives 2:43:38.560 --> 2:43:42.720 a special agent, testified that fireworks still meet the statutory 2:43:42.760 --> 2:43:47.360 definition of explosives under eighteen usc. Section eight four four 2:43:47.440 --> 2:43:54.199 IJ because they contain gunpowder as defined in the statute. 2:43:54.240 --> 2:43:57.520 Me and Robert have been to and reported on a 2:43:57.560 --> 2:44:00.560 fourth of July protest also in from of a government 2:44:00.600 --> 2:44:04.600 building back in twenty twenty, where people launched a lot 2:44:04.640 --> 2:44:07.520 of fireworks up at that Federal courthouse. 2:44:07.480 --> 2:44:11.000 A lot of fireworks and other places. 2:44:11.040 --> 2:44:13.800 And this was a very similar event with the launching 2:44:13.800 --> 2:44:16.879 of fireworks at federal property, which now under this president, 2:44:16.959 --> 2:44:21.160 could be charged as a crime. Finally, let's talk about 2:44:21.280 --> 2:44:26.520 providing material support to terrorists. That's eighteen Usc. Two three 2:44:26.680 --> 2:44:33.000 three nine. This statute has two sections. One relates to 2:44:33.520 --> 2:44:38.720 material support provided to a designated foreign terrorist organization. This 2:44:38.760 --> 2:44:41.080 is not what the defendants were charged under. They're not 2:44:41.160 --> 2:44:44.959 saying that Antifa qualifies as one of these designated foreign 2:44:45.000 --> 2:44:48.359 terrorist organizations. That's not what's being argued here. The defendants 2:44:48.360 --> 2:44:52.560 were charged under Section A, alleging they provided and attempted 2:44:52.600 --> 2:44:56.960 to provide material support and resources, including property that can 2:44:57.040 --> 2:45:04.160 be money, services, training, communic pations, equipment like walkie talkies, weapons, explosives, 2:45:04.240 --> 2:45:09.840 personnel including themselves, and transportation, knowing and intending that they 2:45:09.920 --> 2:45:13.200 were to be used in preparation for and in carrying 2:45:13.200 --> 2:45:17.080 out an offence identified as a federal crime of terrorism, 2:45:17.480 --> 2:45:19.880 or in carrying out the concealment of an escape from 2:45:19.959 --> 2:45:23.760 set offense. The statute lists at least twenty eight possible 2:45:24.160 --> 2:45:28.600 terrorism offenses. Relevant to this case are three eighteen Usc. 2:45:29.080 --> 2:45:32.240 Eight four to four F. It's maliciously attempting to damage 2:45:32.280 --> 2:45:36.600 government property by means of fire or an explosive fireworks 2:45:36.720 --> 2:45:42.760 count eighteen USC. One three sixty one, willful depredation against 2:45:42.920 --> 2:45:46.240 any property of the United States exceeding one thousand dollars. 2:45:46.600 --> 2:45:49.000 This is property damaged by other means exceeding that one 2:45:49.040 --> 2:45:54.840 thousand dollars threshold. And eighteen USC one one four killing 2:45:55.000 --> 2:45:58.160 or attempting to kill any officer or employee of the 2:45:58.280 --> 2:46:02.160 United States. Government accused the defendants of providing material support 2:46:02.200 --> 2:46:05.400 to terrorists in these three different ways, but to convict, 2:46:05.520 --> 2:46:07.959 the jury only had to decide there was proof beyond 2:46:08.000 --> 2:46:11.640 reasonable doubt on one of these ways. They didn't need 2:46:11.680 --> 2:46:15.440 all three. To quote the jury instructions, Quote, if a 2:46:15.480 --> 2:46:20.800 defendant's speech, expression, or associations were made with intent to 2:46:20.879 --> 2:46:24.360 knowingly provide material support or resources to be used to 2:46:24.360 --> 2:46:27.200 prepare for or carry out a violation of federal law, 2:46:27.640 --> 2:46:29.840 or to carry out the concealment of an escape from 2:46:29.879 --> 2:46:33.440 such violation, then the First Amendment would not provide a 2:46:33.520 --> 2:46:35.240 defense to that conduct. 2:46:35.560 --> 2:46:36.720 Unquote. 2:46:36.760 --> 2:46:40.080 Benjamin's Song now faces a minimum penalty of twenty years 2:46:40.120 --> 2:46:44.360 and a maximum of life imprisonment. Other defendants at Prairie 2:46:44.440 --> 2:46:47.240 Land face sentences ranging from a minimum of ten years 2:46:47.280 --> 2:46:50.039 to up to sixty years in federal prison, and the 2:46:50.120 --> 2:46:53.400 husband convicted of concealing documents faces up to forty years 2:46:53.440 --> 2:46:54.320 in federal prison. 2:46:55.120 --> 2:46:58.040 Yeah, this is a very bleak case and I don't 2:46:58.080 --> 2:46:59.000 really have much to add. 2:46:59.040 --> 2:47:03.240 It's very sad m Yeah, no, and it's worth understanding 2:47:03.560 --> 2:47:07.520 the specific way they're using this material support statute. Yeah, 2:47:07.879 --> 2:47:11.560 just establishing someone is a member of quote unquote Antifa 2:47:11.640 --> 2:47:13.680 is not really what they're going after. But they're using 2:47:13.720 --> 2:47:17.440 Antifa as this way to link the defendants through this 2:47:17.520 --> 2:47:21.160 ideological unity to show that there's a conspiracy, some kind 2:47:21.160 --> 2:47:24.039 of like political conspiracy that then could be tied to 2:47:24.480 --> 2:47:29.560 offenses that are terrorism, like damaging government property with the 2:47:29.560 --> 2:47:34.760 intent to influence or intimidate government policy. Right, that's the 2:47:34.800 --> 2:47:37.640 sort of framing that was used in the guilty please 2:47:38.160 --> 2:47:40.920 for some other former defendants of this case, And that's 2:47:40.959 --> 2:47:43.520 what the government is trying to argue here. We're gonna 2:47:43.560 --> 2:47:47.080 go on a break and return for one final segment 2:47:47.200 --> 2:48:05.600 touching on the economy and Iroan. Sorry lacking. 2:48:07.320 --> 2:48:16.200 Locking jazz bob, locking jazz bot, Sorry lacking locking jazz bo, 2:48:16.720 --> 2:48:18.039 locking jazz bo. 2:48:20.200 --> 2:48:23.160 Let's check in with the strait of ramuse where things 2:48:23.160 --> 2:48:27.000 are going extremely poorly for the US, Israel and every 2:48:27.000 --> 2:48:30.600 country in the world that relies on oil and liquefied 2:48:30.640 --> 2:48:33.000 natural gas, as well as helium fertilizer at a whole bunch 2:48:33.000 --> 2:48:38.080 of other exports. All attempts to actually open the Strait 2:48:38.440 --> 2:48:43.320 have failed. Now, Iran has still been shipping a decent 2:48:43.840 --> 2:48:47.200 amount of oil out to some extent, They've been able 2:48:47.240 --> 2:48:49.160 to send their own tankers through and the US and 2:48:49.240 --> 2:48:53.320 Israel have not attacked them thus far. Now there has 2:48:53.400 --> 2:48:56.480 been some developments in terms of attempts to open the Strait. 2:48:56.560 --> 2:49:00.720 Israel claimed they would help reopen the Strait. We also 2:49:00.760 --> 2:49:05.640 got a report in Reuters that Britain, France, Germany, Italy, 2:49:05.720 --> 2:49:09.959 the Netherlands and Japan have agreed to help open the Strait. 2:49:10.800 --> 2:49:13.400 This is a kind of weird group of countries. It 2:49:13.520 --> 2:49:15.960 is the G seven, which is the Good Group of Seven, 2:49:15.959 --> 2:49:19.439 which is a very sort of influential group of American allies. 2:49:20.440 --> 2:49:24.000 But it's the G seven minus Canada with the Netherlands 2:49:24.000 --> 2:49:27.200 in its place, which is sort of odd. Now, this 2:49:27.280 --> 2:49:30.240 is not going to do anything to actually open the Straits. 2:49:30.480 --> 2:49:33.880 There are two reasons for this. One is that none 2:49:33.920 --> 2:49:36.720 of these countries have actually committed to do anything other 2:49:36.760 --> 2:49:41.280 than quote to contribute to appropriate efforts to ensure safe 2:49:41.320 --> 2:49:46.920 passages through the Strait and start quote preparatory planning, which 2:49:46.959 --> 2:49:50.400 means absolutely nothing. And the second reason is that if 2:49:50.480 --> 2:49:53.440 all of these countries, you know, put every single naval 2:49:53.480 --> 2:49:56.400 asset at the disposal for some reason, to put all 2:49:56.440 --> 2:49:58.720 of them in the street and four news, it wouldn't 2:49:58.760 --> 2:50:01.360 do anything to actually open them straight. There's a good 2:50:01.360 --> 2:50:04.920 piece and defector about this called Trump to World, Please 2:50:05.000 --> 2:50:09.800 help Me Unshoot my own leg off, where the author 2:50:10.280 --> 2:50:13.160 Albert Burneco points out, and I think this is a 2:50:13.240 --> 2:50:16.320 very useful way of understanding the problem here that these 2:50:16.360 --> 2:50:17.400 oil tankers are. 2:50:17.280 --> 2:50:19.360 The size of skyscrapers. 2:50:19.600 --> 2:50:22.000 They're not They're not getting oil takers do the straight 2:50:22.040 --> 2:50:22.600 as long as. 2:50:22.520 --> 2:50:25.680 The run on do this. Every week I say this, 2:50:25.760 --> 2:50:26.520 and every week. 2:50:26.360 --> 2:50:28.480 A bunch of people go, oh, they're gonna open the 2:50:28.520 --> 2:50:31.320 straight Ooh do There's all these pre cycles, and like 2:50:31.680 --> 2:50:34.680 the stock market, oil prices go down and the stock 2:50:34.720 --> 2:50:38.640 market goes up, and then everyone collectively realizes it's not true, 2:50:38.680 --> 2:50:40.440 and then the herd animals go back to raising the 2:50:40.440 --> 2:50:44.600 stock prices. So this leaves us in the same situation 2:50:44.840 --> 2:50:49.080 we were before, except everything has gotten significantly worse because 2:50:49.120 --> 2:50:53.080 on Wednesday, Israel hit the largest natural gas field in 2:50:53.160 --> 2:50:57.240 the world when they attack the Runs South Pars gas field. Now, 2:50:57.280 --> 2:50:59.879 as political points out, these are the fields that few 2:51:00.360 --> 2:51:03.160 Iran's domestic energy grade, which means any hit to them 2:51:03.360 --> 2:51:06.400 is extremely painful because it means that people lose like 2:51:06.520 --> 2:51:11.080 heat and power. Now, Trump did very quickly make an 2:51:11.120 --> 2:51:14.520 extremely funny post that is sadly too long to read 2:51:14.560 --> 2:51:17.440 here begging Iran not to attack Cotter, saying the US 2:51:17.440 --> 2:51:19.080 didn't know anything about it and that Cotter didn't have 2:51:19.080 --> 2:51:20.640 anything to do with the strike. There's been a bunch 2:51:20.640 --> 2:51:26.120 of contradictory information. Netanyahu has claimed publicly now that the 2:51:26.280 --> 2:51:29.320 US didn't know anything about the strike in Israel, you know. Laterally, 2:51:29.400 --> 2:51:31.160 there's also been reports of the US knew it was 2:51:31.160 --> 2:51:34.640 going to happen this whole The US didn't know anything 2:51:34.680 --> 2:51:36.920 about it. Please don't hit Cotter seems to be a 2:51:36.959 --> 2:51:39.680 kind of pr strategy on their parts. It didn't work. 2:51:39.879 --> 2:51:43.279 Iran ignored it and retaliated on Thursday by hitting Cotter's 2:51:43.760 --> 2:51:46.280 massive liquid natural gas processing facility. This is one of 2:51:46.320 --> 2:51:50.240 the largest facilities in the world for liquid natural gas, 2:51:50.680 --> 2:51:53.640 of which Cotter is one of the world's largest suppliers. 2:51:54.080 --> 2:51:56.600 I think they're the second largest of liquid natural gas. 2:51:56.720 --> 2:51:58.640 I'm going to read this from Reuter's because this is 2:51:58.640 --> 2:52:00.440 what the straight laced analysts are saying now. 2:52:00.800 --> 2:52:01.400 Quote. 2:52:01.640 --> 2:52:04.240 We are now well on the road to the doomsday 2:52:04.400 --> 2:52:07.959 gas crisis scenario, said Saul Kavona, can energy analyst at 2:52:08.040 --> 2:52:11.640 MST Financial. Even once the war ends, the disruption to 2:52:11.720 --> 2:52:15.040 liquord natural gas supply could last for months or even years. 2:52:16.040 --> 2:52:19.680 Writers got some statements from Carter State natural gas firm 2:52:20.080 --> 2:52:22.560 saying that they had lost seventeen percent of their total 2:52:22.600 --> 2:52:24.760 export capacity and that that was destroyed for three to 2:52:24.840 --> 2:52:30.000 five years. That is catastrophic for significant parts of the 2:52:30.080 --> 2:52:33.000 economy worldwide. As we are going to talk about in 2:52:33.000 --> 2:52:35.600 a second. All of this is also happening in the 2:52:35.600 --> 2:52:38.360 context of Trump's threats to destroy carg Island, which is 2:52:38.360 --> 2:52:42.160 where ninety percent of Iran's oil imports flow through, which 2:52:42.200 --> 2:52:47.320 would likewise be absolutely catastrophic for the Iranian economy because 2:52:47.320 --> 2:52:50.279 it would take a significant amount of time to repair. However, Comma, 2:52:51.120 --> 2:52:53.959 these are all kind of empty threats. Well, when I 2:52:53.959 --> 2:52:55.840 say empty threats. They don't mean that the US or 2:52:55.879 --> 2:52:57.840 Israel won't do it. I mean that it doesn't solve 2:52:57.840 --> 2:53:00.720 the problem, because the problem with any threat you can 2:53:00.760 --> 2:53:04.560 make against Iran is like you already killed the Iya Toola, 2:53:04.640 --> 2:53:06.480 Like what else are you going to do? Right, you 2:53:06.480 --> 2:53:09.880 can completely destroy Iran's economic capacity for a significant period 2:53:09.879 --> 2:53:13.560 of time, But if you do that, then the Iranian 2:53:13.560 --> 2:53:16.400 government is still just going to not open the strait. Right, 2:53:16.920 --> 2:53:19.120 the more you attack them, the more incentive they have 2:53:19.200 --> 2:53:21.760 to continue to retaliate. And that's what's going to happen 2:53:22.120 --> 2:53:24.240 if you continue this campaign, which it seems like the 2:53:24.320 --> 2:53:26.840 US and Israel determined to do. They're just holding all 2:53:26.879 --> 2:53:28.800 this talk about like revenger to do phase of the war, 2:53:28.840 --> 2:53:30.280 and the war is going to now last like several 2:53:30.280 --> 2:53:33.200 months longer. And again, the problem here is that the 2:53:33.200 --> 2:53:35.800 more that you attack critical infrastructure inside Iran, the more 2:53:35.800 --> 2:53:38.039 that the Iranian government gives less of a shit about 2:53:38.080 --> 2:53:41.560 again destroying significant portions of the world's natural gas supply, 2:53:41.680 --> 2:53:44.640 or hitting more oil facilities or you know, and this 2:53:44.680 --> 2:53:46.959 is the one that I really haven't seen any talk about, 2:53:47.400 --> 2:53:50.640 but is a thing that Iran could do if they 2:53:50.640 --> 2:53:53.680 decided that you know, this is like the end for 2:53:53.760 --> 2:53:57.760 our people is starting to hit desalinization plants in places 2:53:57.800 --> 2:54:01.240 like the UAE and Cotter, which are i mean, infrastructure 2:54:01.280 --> 2:54:05.840 that will make the country's uninhabitable. And right now there 2:54:05.840 --> 2:54:08.640 haven't been any attacks on them because that's a really 2:54:08.720 --> 2:54:10.640 hideous thing to do, and it's also the sort of 2:54:10.640 --> 2:54:13.480 absolute last resort. But it's a thing that like, you know, 2:54:13.600 --> 2:54:15.920 if you keep hitting them, they're going to keep hitting 2:54:15.959 --> 2:54:20.440 more and more targets that are going to significantly impact 2:54:20.440 --> 2:54:23.720 the lives of everyone in the region and around the world. Now, 2:54:24.240 --> 2:54:27.640 on the sort of economics end, we've been kind of 2:54:27.920 --> 2:54:32.240 in this little bouncing up and down Stace's lock, A 2:54:32.280 --> 2:54:34.920 little bit of this has been broken because of again 2:54:34.959 --> 2:54:38.520 we're now seeing instead of just the already very very 2:54:38.560 --> 2:54:41.640 bad damage of nothing can get to the strait, we're 2:54:41.680 --> 2:54:45.520 now starting to see permanent damage to oil infrastructure. Right 2:54:46.240 --> 2:54:47.520 and by the way, it's us as are worth noting 2:54:47.600 --> 2:54:51.240 Royer's reports that the estimated damage i think both from 2:54:51.280 --> 2:54:54.320 revenue lost and from to actually repair the facility that 2:54:54.360 --> 2:54:56.480 Carter State run gas company is talking about, they're talking 2:54:56.520 --> 2:55:00.680 about twenty billion dollars of damage. This has fine caused 2:55:00.760 --> 2:55:03.040 a sort of tank in the Asian markets, which are 2:55:03.040 --> 2:55:06.199 down like around three percent. In a lot of places, 2:55:06.200 --> 2:55:08.000 we're seeing like somewhere between two to three percent for 2:55:08.080 --> 2:55:11.440 things like the DK in Japan. We're seeing like one 2:55:11.480 --> 2:55:17.000 percent down in Shanghai. And you know this is because 2:55:17.120 --> 2:55:20.200 a lot of these countries, particularly in Asia, use a 2:55:20.360 --> 2:55:25.040 large quantity of not just oil but also natural gas 2:55:25.080 --> 2:55:27.240 from the Gulf, which means that these are the countries 2:55:27.280 --> 2:55:30.200 that are on the front lines of this crisis. Now, 2:55:30.480 --> 2:55:32.640 the Brink Crude Index, which is your sort of basemark 2:55:32.640 --> 2:55:35.400 for oil prices, is over one hundred dollars. Now it's 2:55:35.400 --> 2:55:38.160 staying over one hundred dollars. Experts are saying it's only 2:55:38.200 --> 2:55:40.360 going to increase, which yes, no shit, of course, it's 2:55:40.360 --> 2:55:42.240 only going to increase. It's just going to be continued 2:55:42.280 --> 2:55:45.680 to be more tax I have seen some reporting saying 2:55:45.720 --> 2:55:47.400 that like, worst case scenario, we could see it at 2:55:47.440 --> 2:55:50.640 two hundred dollars. Two hundred dollars is like a nightmare, 2:55:51.120 --> 2:55:56.480 like the nine dollars gasoline. Unbelievable, hideous nightmare. I'm not 2:55:56.520 --> 2:55:58.640 going to weigh in on whether we're going to get 2:55:58.640 --> 2:56:02.800 to that point before Trump, like Baiales out of this war, 2:56:03.400 --> 2:56:07.199 but it's going to continue to go up as both 2:56:07.320 --> 2:56:11.240 the actual global oil supply is reduced and also as 2:56:11.879 --> 2:56:15.640 the capacity for a rebound once if this war ends, 2:56:16.600 --> 2:56:20.320 is decreased by the continued destruction of oil infrastructure. So 2:56:20.879 --> 2:56:24.800 all in all, things continue to be extremely bad, and 2:56:24.920 --> 2:56:27.720 the outlook for the global economy is very bad. The 2:56:27.720 --> 2:56:30.240 outlook for the people of Iran is very bad. The 2:56:30.240 --> 2:56:32.879 outlook for people across the world is not good. 2:56:34.240 --> 2:56:36.840 Thank you, miya. And for a final segment, I'm going 2:56:36.920 --> 2:56:41.000 to talk about the ongoing war against Iran, Yeah, which 2:56:41.040 --> 2:56:43.800 I guess we're still deciding if it's a war or not. 2:56:44.320 --> 2:56:48.440 Earlier this week, Donald Trump denied the existence of uncrewed 2:56:48.520 --> 2:56:50.760 surface vessels, something Garrison and I talked about in the 2:56:50.800 --> 2:56:54.760 podcast that came out earlier this week. I'm just going 2:56:54.840 --> 2:56:56.039 to pay you the clip. 2:56:57.240 --> 2:57:01.000 So they put out phone and furnish during the Mkazi boats. 2:57:01.360 --> 2:57:05.640 The comic Kazi boats don't exist. They're fake and you 2:57:05.680 --> 2:57:07.520 can almost see that when you look at them. You 2:57:07.600 --> 2:57:10.680 look sam, yeah, because if they did exist, we'd hit 2:57:10.760 --> 2:57:13.160 them just like we hit other boats all over the place. 2:57:13.640 --> 2:57:15.720 But they don't exist. In fact, some of the people 2:57:15.800 --> 2:57:18.640 say where are the boats? Well, how come nobody see 2:57:18.680 --> 2:57:19.000 the boats? 2:57:19.160 --> 2:57:21.199 You know why? Because it's AI generated. 2:57:21.720 --> 2:57:24.560 It's fake and I found it, realized this before they 2:57:24.680 --> 2:57:28.400 we started. But Iran is known for a lot of 2:57:28.400 --> 2:57:31.680 fake news, and they deal with our fake news. And 2:57:31.760 --> 2:57:36.960 I actually think it's pretty criminal because our media companies, 2:57:36.959 --> 2:57:42.160 who have no credibility whatsoever, are putting out information that they. 2:57:42.040 --> 2:57:46.920 Know is foll Yeah. So uncrewed safesce vessels are real. 2:57:47.120 --> 2:57:47.960 Yes, they sure are. 2:57:48.000 --> 2:57:51.920 They've been used massively in Ukraine among other places. 2:57:52.600 --> 2:57:54.720 Yeah. In fact, rob it would you like to hear 2:57:54.840 --> 2:57:59.760 about Saint com Commander Admiral Brad Cooper talking about uncrewed 2:58:00.160 --> 2:58:00.800 his vessels. 2:58:00.879 --> 2:58:03.360 I will always listen to someone named Brad James. You 2:58:03.400 --> 2:58:04.039 know that about me? 2:58:04.200 --> 2:58:04.760 Okay? Yeah. 2:58:05.440 --> 2:58:07.600 Here you see a photo from March first of a 2:58:07.680 --> 2:58:10.640 naval drone storage facility located near the Strait of Hoar. 2:58:10.640 --> 2:58:14.560 Moves, so as you can see naval drones uncrewed surface vessels. 2:58:15.240 --> 2:58:19.040 This is going to be an issue in this conflict 2:58:19.800 --> 2:58:23.600 and many others going forward. People are going to deny 2:58:23.680 --> 2:58:26.240 any reality that they don't want to engage with by 2:58:26.280 --> 2:58:29.920 saying that it is AI yep, and that's deeply troubling. 2:58:30.720 --> 2:58:34.120 So let's talk about what has been happening since we 2:58:34.200 --> 2:58:37.039 last spoke. Hag Island and no, only did the Persian 2:58:37.080 --> 2:58:42.599 Gulf that is replete with oil infrastructure and storage facilities, 2:58:42.760 --> 2:58:45.959 it's the island throughach a large amount of Iran's oil 2:58:46.040 --> 2:58:47.199 exports ravel. 2:58:47.680 --> 2:58:50.720 Yeah, there's a basically, so the most of the coast 2:58:50.720 --> 2:58:54.160 of Iran is too shallow for the huge vessels that 2:58:54.240 --> 2:58:58.120 are necessary to actually move crude oil and carg Island 2:58:58.280 --> 2:59:01.280 is like a very rare deep on port basically, so 2:59:01.600 --> 2:59:02.680 it's kind of the hub. 2:59:03.000 --> 2:59:05.480 Yeah, I was struck by the United States last weekend 2:59:05.520 --> 2:59:08.879 of raid the plane that the raid only hit oil 2:59:08.959 --> 2:59:12.879 infrastructure on Kyleg Island. It's very hard to get any 2:59:13.040 --> 2:59:18.800 independent information from Iran currently because of blackouts, because of 2:59:18.840 --> 2:59:22.040 the lack of connectivity, and because of ratiome oppression. Right, 2:59:22.080 --> 2:59:24.760 So we just it's quite possible that what the US 2:59:24.840 --> 2:59:26.600 is saying is not true. It's also quite possible what 2:59:26.600 --> 2:59:28.680 the Iranian state is saying is not true. We can 2:59:28.720 --> 2:59:31.920 confirm that there were strikes there using all kinds of 2:59:31.920 --> 2:59:34.600 information by satellite imagery, open source flight threatening, et cetera. 2:59:34.680 --> 2:59:39.160 That strikes definitely happened. Strikes this week by the IDF 2:59:39.800 --> 2:59:46.320 also killed Ali Larijani and basiege unit Commada Hola Moreza Solemoni. 2:59:46.800 --> 2:59:50.280 Shortly after these claims first surfaced, a note was published 2:59:50.280 --> 2:59:55.400 in Lara Johanni's handwriting. But it is fairly certain now 2:59:55.400 --> 2:59:59.560 that he is dead. Larijani's assassination, I guess or killing 2:59:59.600 --> 3:00:02.760 one of your call it by the IDF is notable 3:00:02.920 --> 3:00:06.040 because he's one of the people who would have had 3:00:06.120 --> 3:00:10.560 the sway in the regime to negotiate with the United States. 3:00:11.320 --> 3:00:16.680 You could make a case that the IDF killing him 3:00:17.120 --> 3:00:20.480 is a way for a negotiated piece to be even harder, 3:00:21.160 --> 3:00:25.039 for this conflict to continue even more. He is also 3:00:25.080 --> 3:00:27.920 a person who is responsible for massive crimes against the 3:00:27.959 --> 3:00:33.640 citizens of Iran, right including the violent, murderous clampdown on 3:00:33.680 --> 3:00:37.200 protests that we saw in January of this year. The 3:00:37.320 --> 3:00:41.560 United States is also deploying the thirty first Marine Expeditionary 3:00:41.879 --> 3:00:44.680 Unit to the Middle East as part of an amphibious 3:00:44.720 --> 3:00:50.000 response group that includes the USS Tripoly. In fact, it's 3:00:50.240 --> 3:00:54.720 approximately twenty five hundred marines who will be deployed. This 3:00:54.920 --> 3:00:58.560 is the closest we've seen twenty official communication of United 3:00:58.600 --> 3:01:01.959 States boots on the ground in the region. There's a 3:01:02.040 --> 3:01:06.080 number of things that a marine expedition unit could do. 3:01:06.879 --> 3:01:08.879 One of them is to do search and rescue or 3:01:08.879 --> 3:01:12.039 provide evacuations for people on vessels in the straight of 3:01:12.040 --> 3:01:15.760 horn moves that are struck right. Another of them is 3:01:15.800 --> 3:01:20.760 to assault or take islands where Iran may have based 3:01:20.800 --> 3:01:25.119 its military infrastructure, so to do things that are either 3:01:25.160 --> 3:01:29.800 not possible or not easy with air strikes. Another one 3:01:29.879 --> 3:01:32.240 is to add more air power that's closer to the 3:01:32.320 --> 3:01:35.680 region that the Tripoli can carry their thirty five lightnings, 3:01:36.160 --> 3:01:39.000 So it could be that. Another one is for these 3:01:39.200 --> 3:01:43.440 two thy five hundred marines to invade Iran, right and 3:01:43.879 --> 3:01:48.680 to begin a land war to attempt to They could 3:01:48.720 --> 3:01:52.240 also be training Iranian opposition groups, right that that's possible. 3:01:52.240 --> 3:01:55.640 It wouldn't. It's not like a core Marine Corps mission, 3:01:55.840 --> 3:01:59.280 but there's a Special Forces mission. But there's a number 3:01:59.360 --> 3:02:01.680 of things it can be doing. There are also a 3:02:01.800 --> 3:02:05.600 number of more marine expeditionary units and other forces that 3:02:05.680 --> 3:02:08.480 could be moved to the region. It's interesting to see 3:02:08.520 --> 3:02:10.480 this just a few months after we saw that National 3:02:10.480 --> 3:02:16.440 Security strategy which focused heavily on the Western hemisphere. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, right, 3:02:16.480 --> 3:02:18.440 the US isn't going to involve its OLM Forever Wars 3:02:18.440 --> 3:02:19.359 in the release anymore. 3:02:19.480 --> 3:02:20.320 I can't believe it. 3:02:20.800 --> 3:02:21.680 Yeah shocking. 3:02:22.000 --> 3:02:23.920 What's the status of these marines right now? 3:02:24.600 --> 3:02:27.800 I believe they are motoring who the region? Right? So 3:02:28.480 --> 3:02:32.119 TRIPLEY is a big boat. It's called an amphibious assault boat. 3:02:32.120 --> 3:02:34.480 But that makes it sound like it's like a Higgins boat. 3:02:34.560 --> 3:02:36.800 Yeah yeah, like if this is not the boat that 3:02:36.840 --> 3:02:39.400 you see in the d DA movement. Okay, in fact, 3:02:39.440 --> 3:02:42.360 I don't think it can actually have this particular one 3:02:42.360 --> 3:02:45.879 if I understand correctly, doesn't carry those kinds of boats, 3:02:45.879 --> 3:02:48.560 Like it's not set up for doing like a beach 3:02:48.680 --> 3:02:52.560 landing and Amphoebius assault. But these marine expeditioning units are 3:02:52.560 --> 3:02:56.279 like the like the first response, I guess, like they 3:02:56.360 --> 3:02:59.560 have their own air power, they have helicopters. Yeah, obviously 3:02:59.560 --> 3:03:01.560 they come on a boat. They can move quite quickly. 3:03:01.640 --> 3:03:04.440 They have the marine so capable of doing infantry stuff. 3:03:04.800 --> 3:03:06.560 So like it makes sense that this would be what 3:03:06.600 --> 3:03:10.480 they would sayd talking of US forces in the region. 3:03:10.720 --> 3:03:14.160 A US case one pint thirty five aircraft crashed over 3:03:14.200 --> 3:03:16.920 Iraq last week. This is not a combat aircraft, right, 3:03:16.959 --> 3:03:20.039 it's not another a fighter bomber. But to my knowledge, 3:03:20.080 --> 3:03:23.360 the only way out of these planes is bailing, and 3:03:23.400 --> 3:03:25.920 all six crew members on board are confirmed to have died. 3:03:26.920 --> 3:03:30.080 The United States SAT Consas has flown over six thousand 3:03:30.200 --> 3:03:32.680 sorties since OEF began. 3:03:33.000 --> 3:03:35.920 Oh, yes, there's Operation Epic Fury. 3:03:36.320 --> 3:03:39.560 Yeah it's great because Operation During Freedom had the same acronym, 3:03:39.600 --> 3:03:41.560 and I'm sure it's not a mistake. But yeah, this 3:03:41.600 --> 3:03:45.520 is Operation Epic Fury. It's a very high tempo, right, 3:03:45.600 --> 3:03:49.840 and it's a very crowded airspace. The six thousand sorties yeap, Yeah, 3:03:49.879 --> 3:03:53.360 that's a lot. Yeah, accidents like this will happen, right, 3:03:53.680 --> 3:03:56.880 Not everybody who dies in warfare dies in combat. And thirdly, 3:03:56.920 --> 3:03:59.520 this means that another six people are coming home from 3:03:59.560 --> 3:04:05.520 Iraqi coffins as they have been since before. Many of 3:04:05.520 --> 3:04:07.720 our listeners who were born and of course a lot 3:04:07.760 --> 3:04:10.080 of people in Iraq who have no quarrel with anyone 3:04:10.080 --> 3:04:12.920 that will also be innocent victims of this. I don't mean, 3:04:12.959 --> 3:04:16.199 by any means to suggest it's only US service people 3:04:16.200 --> 3:04:18.640 who are the victims. Here. I want to talk about 3:04:18.640 --> 3:04:21.840 the conflict between the United States and Hashda Shabi. The 3:04:21.959 --> 3:04:24.720 US has carried out a series of air strikes against 3:04:24.760 --> 3:04:29.560 PMF groups, so these are popular mobilization forces for Shia 3:04:29.840 --> 3:04:35.200 groups in Iran for the Islamic State. A strike on 3:04:35.240 --> 3:04:38.320 a house in Baghdad killed the leader of Katib Hasbola 3:04:38.400 --> 3:04:41.600 in a Raq. The strike was confirmed on Sabrine News. 3:04:41.600 --> 3:04:46.240 Sabrine News is like their telegram outlet. It's like an 3:04:46.240 --> 3:04:50.560 aligned telegram news outlet for the group. Yeah, for the PMF, 3:04:51.200 --> 3:04:53.640 and they made the statement quote, we announced you the 3:04:53.680 --> 3:04:58.160 martyrdom of hajj Abu Ali al Askari. In the days 3:04:58.200 --> 3:05:02.080 since he's killing, we have I've seen many attacks on 3:05:02.280 --> 3:05:07.320 United States facilities in it Rut. The embassy's cram CRAM 3:05:07.680 --> 3:05:12.560 is counter rocket artillery and mortar. When you see videos 3:05:12.720 --> 3:05:15.879 of drones being shot down, when you see like a 3:05:15.959 --> 3:05:18.200 you hear like a runt and then you see a 3:05:18.200 --> 3:05:20.440 burst of like tracer fire and the drone explodes, it's 3:05:20.440 --> 3:05:23.760 normally the c RAM, So the embassy cram egaz and 3:05:23.879 --> 3:05:28.320 is destroyed drone. But other footage posted online shows an 3:05:28.400 --> 3:05:32.440 FPV drone that's the first person view drone FPV drone. 3:05:32.440 --> 3:05:34.440 It looks like you're flying as opposed to like you're 3:05:34.440 --> 3:05:38.680 looking directly down flying over the embassy compound for almost 3:05:38.800 --> 3:05:46.720 two minutes. I'm guessing it was a fiber optic controlled drone, right, 3:05:46.760 --> 3:05:49.879 so there's no means of like jamming the signal, but 3:05:50.200 --> 3:05:55.720 this is still a monumental failure for security. Right. At 3:05:55.720 --> 3:05:58.360 the same time, we saw two drones at least enter 3:05:58.560 --> 3:06:02.120 and explode in the Victory Base, which is near Baghdad Airport. 3:06:02.720 --> 3:06:04.720 The videos from those are bizarre. It seems like the 3:06:04.800 --> 3:06:08.160 drone gets into the base and then it's just like whoa, 3:06:08.240 --> 3:06:09.879 what the hell, Like it didn't seem like they had 3:06:09.879 --> 3:06:11.680 a clear target. It kind of flies around and like 3:06:11.720 --> 3:06:14.080 seems so shocked that it was able to penetrate this 3:06:14.520 --> 3:06:17.280 supposedly impenetrable area. 3:06:17.640 --> 3:06:20.920 How much of these security systems are designed to counter 3:06:21.160 --> 3:06:24.840 drones versus originally designed to counter older types of like 3:06:25.080 --> 3:06:26.160 aerial threats. 3:06:26.600 --> 3:06:29.840 Yeah, drones is a broad category, I guess. So you 3:06:29.879 --> 3:06:32.800 have like your Shahed drone, which kind of blurs the 3:06:32.840 --> 3:06:34.959 line between a drone and a missile, right, It's like 3:06:35.000 --> 3:06:38.560 a missile that can take a more varied flight path. Yeah, yeah, 3:06:38.560 --> 3:06:40.840 it doesn't just don't go in the arc like ballistically. 3:06:41.520 --> 3:06:43.560 In those cases there are things that there are things 3:06:43.560 --> 3:06:45.640 that you can do to shoot them down. Right, you 3:06:45.680 --> 3:06:48.160 can have your Patriot missiles, you can use of see RAM, 3:06:48.240 --> 3:06:51.280 you can shoot them down with various weapon systems on 3:06:51.320 --> 3:06:55.320 an aircraft. But if we group FPV and like drop 3:06:55.320 --> 3:06:59.760 A drones as commercial office shelf drones, this is the thing, right, 3:07:00.160 --> 3:07:04.560 you know, the United States has been supporting Ukraine since 3:07:04.640 --> 3:07:07.520 twenty one, since before twenty twenty two, but it's including 3:07:07.560 --> 3:07:10.760 since twenty twenty two with the false galvation. It has 3:07:10.840 --> 3:07:14.560 not been supporting the revolution in the Ammar. But clearly 3:07:15.440 --> 3:07:18.280 they have not learned enough from those two conflicts, right 3:07:18.360 --> 3:07:20.800 in terms of the use of these small commercial off 3:07:20.840 --> 3:07:26.360 the shelf drones, And this is now showing up as 3:07:26.360 --> 3:07:30.360 a weakness in their defense strategy. Like this is a 3:07:30.400 --> 3:07:33.680 serious thing for the US government for someone to be 3:07:34.360 --> 3:07:38.080 and for them to just fly a recondrone over the embassy, 3:07:38.080 --> 3:07:42.119 obviously they now know where everything is, and for them 3:07:42.160 --> 3:07:47.440 to publish that footage is like a public somewhat like humiliation, right, 3:07:48.080 --> 3:07:52.879 the sort of security infrastructure. So finally, I guess a 3:07:52.879 --> 3:07:55.640 couple more things. Iran is now militarizing the area of 3:07:55.720 --> 3:08:01.160 Kurdistan between the Iranian and Iraqi states. So that's the 3:08:01.200 --> 3:08:05.039 Iran Iraq border in kurdis Dan. Right, it seems to 3:08:05.080 --> 3:08:08.160 have issued orders preventing people moving around the region as 3:08:08.200 --> 3:08:12.000 they habitually. Would people move around because they've always moved around. 3:08:12.080 --> 3:08:16.840 People move around with their animals, right. The Iranian government 3:08:16.840 --> 3:08:19.320 appears to have ordered its troops to shoot people who 3:08:19.480 --> 3:08:23.640 perceived to be moving around without permission. People often gather 3:08:23.800 --> 3:08:26.720 near the border with a ruck to access cell signal, 3:08:27.280 --> 3:08:30.800 and the government forces appear to have left their bases 3:08:30.840 --> 3:08:33.160 in the region in favor of occupying the mountains as 3:08:33.160 --> 3:08:36.400 well as local educational institutions and sports facilities. Right, So 3:08:36.480 --> 3:08:38.760 that means that people in town are now its threat, 3:08:39.600 --> 3:08:42.560 and Hengar has some incidents where people have been shot 3:08:42.640 --> 3:08:47.600 by security forces in that region. Finally, then I want 3:08:47.640 --> 3:08:51.320 to talk about the resignation of the director of the 3:08:51.440 --> 3:08:57.680 National Countess Terrorism Center, Joe Kent. Kent resigned this week saying, quote, 3:08:57.760 --> 3:09:01.560 Iran posed no imminent threat to our nation. It does 3:09:01.600 --> 3:09:03.800 seem that that is where a lot of people stopped 3:09:03.879 --> 3:09:06.920 reading anything. Kent said, Yeah, are people who did not 3:09:07.120 --> 3:09:10.279 know who Joe Kent is, right, and don't have access 3:09:10.280 --> 3:09:13.840 to Google for reasons that I don't understand. Yeah, yeah, 3:09:13.959 --> 3:09:18.360 some really incredibly shitty reporting on this. Kent went on 3:09:18.680 --> 3:09:24.279 in his note to among other things, talk about the 3:09:24.320 --> 3:09:28.160 death of his wife, which is genuinely tragic. Kent has 3:09:28.200 --> 3:09:31.960 some disgusting views, right, Like, but it does seem that 3:09:32.000 --> 3:09:34.520 the death of his wife was kind of a I guess, 3:09:34.520 --> 3:09:36.280 a turning point. It's a fair to say, yeah, like 3:09:36.520 --> 3:09:39.360 you've looked at Kent a lot, like in his politics. 3:09:39.360 --> 3:09:41.440 He talks about it a lot. Yeah, Yeah, it's it's 3:09:41.560 --> 3:09:43.080 very load bearing for him. 3:09:43.200 --> 3:09:45.720 Yeah, So it's just with people aren't aware. His wife, Shannon, 3:09:45.760 --> 3:09:50.160 was a cryptologist and linguist attacked to the ISA intelligence 3:09:50.200 --> 3:09:54.200 support activity sometimes called Task Force Orange. She was in 3:09:54.280 --> 3:09:57.400 Mambies in Syria when she was killed by in Islamic 3:09:57.440 --> 3:10:00.600 State suicide bomber. She was in the buffer zone that 3:10:00.600 --> 3:10:04.800 that was like the buffer that Turkey had forced to exist. 3:10:05.280 --> 3:10:08.680 He calls that in his resignation statement quote a war 3:10:08.760 --> 3:10:12.320 manufactured by Israel, and he also seems to suggest that 3:10:12.360 --> 3:10:15.640 Trump was conned by Israel into starting the war with Iran. 3:10:16.440 --> 3:10:18.840 Far too much reporting has missed this context, so he's 3:10:18.920 --> 3:10:22.840 essentially using what, on the face of it is an 3:10:22.840 --> 3:10:24.920 anti submit like saying, I mean, yeah he. 3:10:25.120 --> 3:10:29.039 He like is he is like an anti Semitic fascist, Yes. 3:10:29.080 --> 3:10:32.480 His reason for retiring is like explicitally anti Semitic. 3:10:32.520 --> 3:10:34.960 This like yeah, this is the same justification that someone 3:10:34.959 --> 3:10:38.080 like Nick Quentes uses to oppose the war in Iran. 3:10:38.680 --> 3:10:42.920 Not out of you know, principled solidarity. These people don't 3:10:42.920 --> 3:10:46.680 care about civilians dying in Iran. No, And it's not 3:10:46.720 --> 3:10:50.600 actually about any sort of like notion of anti imperialism. 3:10:50.720 --> 3:10:51.840 No, it's anti Semitism. 3:10:52.320 --> 3:10:56.720 They believe that this is a Zionist occupied government in 3:10:56.800 --> 3:10:59.920 the zog meaning of the term, like there's like a 3:11:00.480 --> 3:11:05.039 literally literally like a total Jewish control over all state operations, 3:11:05.440 --> 3:11:10.480 not linked to actual lobbying groups that lobby for Israel 3:11:10.560 --> 3:11:16.160 within the United States, but conspiratorial framework invoking anti Semitic 3:11:16.120 --> 3:11:18.840 tropes and stereotypes. This is the sort of it army 3:11:18.879 --> 3:11:21.320 that Joe Kent comes out of. As we are recording this, 3:11:21.680 --> 3:11:24.800 Joe Kent has an interview dropping with Tucker Carlson, Yes, 3:11:24.920 --> 3:11:29.199 where he's going to expound on this. Carlson has similarly 3:11:29.480 --> 3:11:34.840 voiced these sorts of objections based on if any intelligent 3:11:34.879 --> 3:11:38.320 person you know reads into it based on anti Semitism, 3:11:38.360 --> 3:11:43.640 not actually based on again principled solidarity with oppressed people's 3:11:43.879 --> 3:11:45.519 or anti imperialism. 3:11:46.440 --> 3:11:49.280 Yeah, and I think if you're reading new sources like 3:11:49.320 --> 3:11:51.360 oh wow, Trump is beginning to lose people and they 3:11:51.360 --> 3:11:54.040 have mention any of this, really consider if you want 3:11:54.080 --> 3:11:56.600 to be reading those news sources. I'll just say that, 3:11:56.760 --> 3:12:00.480 I guess. Caroline Levitt responded with a post on X quote. 3:12:00.520 --> 3:12:02.640 The Commander in chief determines what does and does not 3:12:02.680 --> 3:12:05.520 constitute a threat because he is the only one constitutionally 3:12:05.560 --> 3:12:08.119 empowered to do so, and because the American people went 3:12:08.160 --> 3:12:10.720 to the ballot box and it trusted him and him 3:12:10.720 --> 3:12:14.440 alone to make such final judgments. That is a remarkable 3:12:14.480 --> 3:12:16.560 statement for those of us who lived through the whole 3:12:17.040 --> 3:12:21.119 Iraq has WNDS era. But the United States has long 3:12:21.240 --> 3:12:23.920 history of involvement in the Middle East, and yes, the 3:12:23.959 --> 3:12:26.200 extent to which we are partnering with Israel is often 3:12:26.320 --> 3:12:29.560 in support of our other objectives in the Middle East 3:12:29.720 --> 3:12:32.280 and our ability to use Israel as like a proxy state. 3:12:32.400 --> 3:12:36.280 That's why the Unitedate government has such a large interest 3:12:36.800 --> 3:12:41.240 in Israel. Is we have other reasons for wanting to 3:12:41.240 --> 3:12:44.520 be active and control parts of the region or influence 3:12:44.560 --> 3:12:48.720 the region. Yeah, often the priorities of Israel not always right, 3:12:48.760 --> 3:12:51.880 like in the first time the United States invaded the 3:12:51.920 --> 3:12:55.200 Persian Gulf. That often they are fighting alongside each other 3:12:55.240 --> 3:12:57.920 because they have similar interest not because of any nefarious 3:12:58.360 --> 3:13:02.680 Jewish conspiracy. Yeah, yep, which. 3:13:02.680 --> 3:13:04.760 Very frustrating that continues to be something that needs to 3:13:04.760 --> 3:13:05.520 be reiterated. 3:13:05.680 --> 3:13:07.640 Yeah, even on the left, but it does. 3:13:07.920 --> 3:13:10.960 And the first time I started seeing people who had 3:13:11.240 --> 3:13:15.600 previously been doing other campus ships start using the phrase zog, 3:13:15.760 --> 3:13:18.000 I was like, Okay, we've come, We've come full circle. 3:13:18.120 --> 3:13:21.519 Everything's where it was always going to be beautiful. 3:13:21.879 --> 3:13:26.879 The normalization of zog and like goy across parts of 3:13:26.920 --> 3:13:27.840 the online left. 3:13:27.680 --> 3:13:31.440 Is from anarchistparian of the new Turks, the Young Turks 3:13:31.440 --> 3:13:32.840 whatever the fuck the ty t they. 3:13:32.720 --> 3:13:36.039 Call them, the young has fallen. Yeah, well let's yeah, 3:13:36.120 --> 3:13:39.840 let let's be honest. Choosing that name didn't predispose them 3:13:39.840 --> 3:13:41.320 to the anti genocide. 3:13:41.520 --> 3:13:44.600 She has always been like that, she's sucked for a while, 3:13:44.680 --> 3:13:47.040 but just seeing her use the fray the word GOI 3:13:47.280 --> 3:13:48.160 like that was like. 3:13:48.200 --> 3:13:50.279 Whoa wow, Yeah, I haven't seen it, Okay. 3:13:50.959 --> 3:13:52.959 I used to have to go to Telegram to see 3:13:53.000 --> 3:13:54.600 people boasting ship like that. 3:13:54.680 --> 3:13:56.640 Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, that's sort of shit. You would 3:13:56.640 --> 3:14:00.359 hear like ham radio, Like it's just like old school racism. Yeah. 3:14:00.480 --> 3:14:03.880 No, there is this interesting emergence of like a red 3:14:03.879 --> 3:14:10.480 brown alliance specifically targeting like Israel or people's notions of 3:14:10.640 --> 3:14:12.119 Israel's global influence. 3:14:12.760 --> 3:14:15.360 Yeah yeah no, great, no, great stuff a tool. 3:14:16.280 --> 3:14:20.000 Yeah, So we should just say, since this is going 3:14:20.080 --> 3:14:22.560 to be one of the big news stories this week 3:14:22.600 --> 3:14:24.959 and coming into next week, the New York Times has 3:14:25.000 --> 3:14:30.560 published a in article with very extensive sourcing, including from 3:14:30.600 --> 3:14:35.360 people very close to Cesser Chavez, who reported that he 3:14:35.600 --> 3:14:41.440 sexually assaulted, raped, molested an abused mix of girls and women, 3:14:41.560 --> 3:14:45.720 including a lot of girls preteen girls, started grooming them 3:14:45.760 --> 3:14:48.320 as young as eight or nine. In some cases, there's 3:14:48.360 --> 3:14:51.119 evidence of molestation of girls as young as like twelve thirteen. 3:14:51.879 --> 3:14:55.760 And then Deloresuerta, who was very famously one of his 3:14:55.879 --> 3:14:58.840 organizing partners for quite a long time, came out and 3:14:58.840 --> 3:15:01.119 said that he's sexually assault to her on at least 3:15:01.200 --> 3:15:04.680 raped her on at least two occasions, which led to pregnancies. 3:15:05.360 --> 3:15:07.879 So that is all coming out now and it's all 3:15:07.920 --> 3:15:11.720 pretty horrific. But yeah, I like, there's not much more 3:15:11.800 --> 3:15:16.119 to say. You can read the article, yeah, and should Yeah. 3:15:16.240 --> 3:15:18.880 I will link to finish shure it. If you'd like 3:15:18.959 --> 3:15:22.560 to email us, you can send a message to cool 3:15:22.680 --> 3:15:24.480 Zone Tips at proton dot me. 3:15:25.160 --> 3:15:28.360 That's for tips, that's for news gathering tips. 3:15:28.760 --> 3:15:33.560 Yes, it is for It is not for you to 3:15:33.640 --> 3:15:36.760 pitch your boss to come on Robert's podcast. It is 3:15:36.800 --> 3:15:39.360 not for you to tell us about your new book. 3:15:39.920 --> 3:15:43.400 It is not for you to share how much you 3:15:43.720 --> 3:15:47.480 enjoy a podcast. So that's very sweet. If you want 3:15:47.480 --> 3:15:50.280 to send that kind of stuff, you can do it 3:15:50.320 --> 3:15:54.640 to cool Zone mediaiheartmedia dot com. If you, as a 3:15:54.640 --> 3:15:58.480 public relations company, send a large number of emails to 3:15:58.560 --> 3:16:00.560 our tips list, I will block you. 3:16:00.640 --> 3:16:01.440 I will find you. 3:16:01.760 --> 3:16:06.760 Yeah, I'm not believe me, buddy. We're gonna if people 3:16:06.800 --> 3:16:09.000 keep trying this ship, we're gonna have a list and 3:16:09.000 --> 3:16:10.640 we're gonna read it at the end of everybody, and 3:16:10.640 --> 3:16:13.040 I will give them your remail address. 3:16:13.560 --> 3:16:17.560 I will do anti advertising. I will accuse your boss 3:16:17.600 --> 3:16:20.400 that you want to go on my podcast of various crimes. 3:16:20.480 --> 3:16:23.760 And thanks to my understanding of libel laws in the 3:16:23.840 --> 3:16:27.720 United States. I should be fine. Yeah, where's that slander? 3:16:27.760 --> 3:16:30.680 I always yeah, well I'll do both. It'll be fine. 3:16:30.840 --> 3:16:33.640 Yeah, we're right, it will say, we'll post it. 3:16:33.959 --> 3:16:36.680 We we reported the news. 3:16:37.160 --> 3:16:39.080 Mm hm, we reported the news. 3:16:44.480 --> 3:16:47.640 Hey, we'll be back Monday with more episodes every week 3:16:47.680 --> 3:16:49.600 from now until the heat death of the Universe. 3:16:50.360 --> 3:16:52.959 It Could Happen Here is a production of cool Zone Media. 3:16:53.040 --> 3:16:56.119 For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website 3:16:56.160 --> 3:17:00.959 Coolzonemedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app, podcasts, 3:17:01.040 --> 3:17:03.840 or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can now find 3:17:03.879 --> 3:17:06.920 sources for It Could Happen Here, listed directly in episode descriptions. 3:17:07.240 --> 3:17:08.080 Thanks for listening.