1 00:00:00,160 --> 00:00:06,680 Speaker 1: Or okay, everybody, We are incredibly fortunate to have by far, 2 00:00:07,360 --> 00:00:12,000 Speaker 1: one of the most requested guests and regulars on the 3 00:00:12,119 --> 00:00:16,480 Speaker 1: David Rutherford Show. David Rutherford Show. Excuse me, uh and 4 00:00:16,520 --> 00:00:19,159 Speaker 1: that's Bryce. Welcome brother, Nice to see you. 5 00:00:19,239 --> 00:00:22,640 Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm at Merry Christmas and it's great to wrap 6 00:00:22,720 --> 00:00:26,119 Speaker 2: up the year with like an in studio version of 7 00:00:26,160 --> 00:00:28,280 Speaker 2: the podcast with you. So I'm glad we could make 8 00:00:28,320 --> 00:00:28,760 Speaker 2: this work. 9 00:00:38,720 --> 00:00:41,360 Speaker 1: Let's start out first and foremost with I think the 10 00:00:41,400 --> 00:00:47,800 Speaker 1: most obvious, which is Venezuela. Give us your understanding of Venezuela, 11 00:00:48,240 --> 00:00:53,280 Speaker 1: Venezuelan economy, and then more so what role Venezuela plays 12 00:00:53,360 --> 00:00:57,600 Speaker 1: with our economy and the impact that might have on 13 00:00:57,680 --> 00:00:58,920 Speaker 1: a broader perspective. 14 00:00:59,200 --> 00:01:02,120 Speaker 2: Yeah. Absolutely, so Venezuela, I guess, like, let's hit the 15 00:01:02,120 --> 00:01:04,120 Speaker 2: big bullet points. Venezuela used to be one of the 16 00:01:04,160 --> 00:01:08,760 Speaker 2: richest countries in the world. You know. Famously they went 17 00:01:08,920 --> 00:01:14,720 Speaker 2: from a more market based economy towards Hugo Chavez was elected, Okay, 18 00:01:14,760 --> 00:01:19,360 Speaker 2: and Hugo Chavez nationalized the oil industry and so this 19 00:01:19,400 --> 00:01:23,680 Speaker 2: is something that really upset like powerful American organizations, right 20 00:01:23,880 --> 00:01:27,680 Speaker 2: and basically put them on the You know, they got 21 00:01:27,720 --> 00:01:29,920 Speaker 2: black balled by the US government, right, So it's been 22 00:01:30,000 --> 00:01:32,800 Speaker 2: now I can't remember when Hugo Chavas was exactly elected, 23 00:01:32,840 --> 00:01:37,200 Speaker 2: but yeah, so a few decades now of basically being 24 00:01:37,240 --> 00:01:39,840 Speaker 2: on the outs of the international community, sanctioned by the 25 00:01:39,959 --> 00:01:43,560 Speaker 2: United States, basically US putting all the geopolitical pressure we 26 00:01:43,600 --> 00:01:48,120 Speaker 2: can on them to you know, give up their socialist government. Right. 27 00:01:48,160 --> 00:01:51,840 Speaker 2: And now Hugo Javas is gone, but Nicholas Maduro took 28 00:01:51,920 --> 00:01:54,120 Speaker 2: over for him. Everybody's kind of seen him in the news. Now. 29 00:01:54,360 --> 00:01:58,240 Speaker 2: He's sort of Hugo chaves a successor, right, and represents 30 00:01:58,280 --> 00:02:04,800 Speaker 2: the same type of basically like Venezuelan nationalism mixed with socialism. Right, 31 00:02:04,800 --> 00:02:08,600 Speaker 2: we're gonna you know, they expropriated these assets, but they 32 00:02:08,600 --> 00:02:12,440 Speaker 2: didn't steal, you know, assets from really rich Venezuelans. They 33 00:02:12,440 --> 00:02:17,359 Speaker 2: stole assets from wealthy international corporations, right, and nationalize them 34 00:02:17,360 --> 00:02:20,280 Speaker 2: for Venezuela. So that's sort of the origins of our 35 00:02:20,360 --> 00:02:22,920 Speaker 2: dislike of Venezuela. It all comes down to, like the 36 00:02:22,919 --> 00:02:26,239 Speaker 2: oil industry for the most part, and you know, I 37 00:02:26,240 --> 00:02:28,360 Speaker 2: think the United States also doesn't like the fact that 38 00:02:28,400 --> 00:02:32,079 Speaker 2: there's a socialist government in our backyard. This is sort 39 00:02:32,080 --> 00:02:35,560 Speaker 2: of a holdover from the Cold War essentially, and so 40 00:02:37,040 --> 00:02:39,920 Speaker 2: you've seen tensions ramp up with them. Obviously, we're doing 41 00:02:40,000 --> 00:02:43,360 Speaker 2: strikes on these drug boats quote unquote drug boats. Nobody really, 42 00:02:43,440 --> 00:02:46,400 Speaker 2: I mean, there probably are drugs on them, but I 43 00:02:46,400 --> 00:02:49,640 Speaker 2: think the whole drug sort of angle to this is 44 00:02:49,680 --> 00:02:52,320 Speaker 2: an excuse to do what we wanted to do anyway, 45 00:02:52,360 --> 00:02:55,120 Speaker 2: which is put pressure on them and get Maduro to 46 00:02:55,160 --> 00:02:58,160 Speaker 2: step down and instead put in you know, essentially like 47 00:02:58,200 --> 00:03:03,920 Speaker 2: a Western puppet sort of leader. Okay, and if anybody's 48 00:03:04,000 --> 00:03:08,880 Speaker 2: really I guess has been paying attention. Okay, there's this 49 00:03:08,960 --> 00:03:11,480 Speaker 2: lady that just got the Nobel Peace Prize that was 50 00:03:11,520 --> 00:03:16,440 Speaker 2: the opposition quote unquote leader for Venezuela. The exact same 51 00:03:16,480 --> 00:03:19,399 Speaker 2: thing happened in Trump's first term. There's a guy named 52 00:03:19,480 --> 00:03:24,760 Speaker 2: Juan Guido who was supposedly like the democratic person that 53 00:03:25,400 --> 00:03:28,440 Speaker 2: the people of Venezuela really wanted, and we tried to 54 00:03:28,440 --> 00:03:30,920 Speaker 2: install him kind of multiple times. It didn't really work 55 00:03:30,960 --> 00:03:34,239 Speaker 2: out because the reality is as much as in the 56 00:03:34,360 --> 00:03:36,520 Speaker 2: United States, we want to make this about like socialism 57 00:03:36,600 --> 00:03:38,840 Speaker 2: versus capitalism. And again, I think a lot of this 58 00:03:38,920 --> 00:03:41,120 Speaker 2: is a holdover from the Cold War and the Soviet 59 00:03:41,200 --> 00:03:45,080 Speaker 2: Union and all this stuff. It's really more about nationalism 60 00:03:45,200 --> 00:03:47,839 Speaker 2: for the Venezuelan people, and they probably don't really love 61 00:03:47,920 --> 00:03:52,200 Speaker 2: Nicholas Maduro that much. Hugo Javis was extremely popular, but 62 00:03:52,800 --> 00:03:55,640 Speaker 2: when we tried to put in Juan Guido, you know, 63 00:03:55,680 --> 00:03:59,360 Speaker 2: there was a million person something march on the capitol 64 00:04:00,160 --> 00:04:03,640 Speaker 2: in protest of like this Western sort of attempt to 65 00:04:03,640 --> 00:04:08,080 Speaker 2: install Wan Guido in power. So it's not really about 66 00:04:08,080 --> 00:04:10,720 Speaker 2: socialism as much as it is about nationalism, I think 67 00:04:10,720 --> 00:04:13,560 Speaker 2: for the Venezuelan people and for the United States, and 68 00:04:13,560 --> 00:04:16,680 Speaker 2: we're talking about like wealthy, powerful corporations that are upset 69 00:04:16,680 --> 00:04:20,440 Speaker 2: about their assets being expropriated. And I think for Donald Trump, 70 00:04:20,480 --> 00:04:22,279 Speaker 2: like there's a reasonable case to be made like, hey, 71 00:04:22,279 --> 00:04:26,200 Speaker 2: if there are Western companies in there helping with this infrastructure, 72 00:04:26,560 --> 00:04:28,680 Speaker 2: I think they would be generating more oil. I think 73 00:04:29,440 --> 00:04:32,280 Speaker 2: actually speaking like a non socialist economy would probably be 74 00:04:32,320 --> 00:04:35,160 Speaker 2: good for Venezuela. Right. But part of their problem too, 75 00:04:35,240 --> 00:04:37,159 Speaker 2: is just that we've been sanctioning them so hard and 76 00:04:37,200 --> 00:04:40,600 Speaker 2: for so long, and at this point I think you're 77 00:04:40,640 --> 00:04:44,919 Speaker 2: seeing these strikes on these drug boats. Really what this 78 00:04:45,240 --> 00:04:47,400 Speaker 2: is is one we want to get rid of this 79 00:04:47,480 --> 00:04:50,800 Speaker 2: government we have for three decades. Okay, so nothing's really 80 00:04:50,839 --> 00:04:53,800 Speaker 2: changed there. But you have Donald Trump, who's like a 81 00:04:54,880 --> 00:04:58,360 Speaker 2: like a media branding guy who's very good at attention. Right. 82 00:04:59,720 --> 00:05:02,160 Speaker 2: I think these drug strikes are essentially what have One 83 00:05:02,160 --> 00:05:04,599 Speaker 2: put pressure on the Venezuelan government right sees the oil 84 00:05:04,640 --> 00:05:07,400 Speaker 2: tanker as well, it's big part of their economy. But two, 85 00:05:07,520 --> 00:05:10,120 Speaker 2: it's really about sending a message to the rest of 86 00:05:10,160 --> 00:05:13,719 Speaker 2: South America. Okay, because what's really going on here, in 87 00:05:13,760 --> 00:05:17,039 Speaker 2: my personal opinion, is like Monroe Doctrine two point zero. 88 00:05:17,560 --> 00:05:21,440 Speaker 2: Monroe Doctrine is about like the United States controlling its 89 00:05:21,440 --> 00:05:26,040 Speaker 2: own hemisphere and keeping other world powers out. And I 90 00:05:26,040 --> 00:05:29,800 Speaker 2: think what's happened is basically mostly China, but you know 91 00:05:29,880 --> 00:05:33,240 Speaker 2: Russia a little bit in Venezuela. You've seen these other 92 00:05:33,279 --> 00:05:36,720 Speaker 2: geopolitical powers, you know, Muscle In give a lot of 93 00:05:36,720 --> 00:05:41,000 Speaker 2: money for infrastructure, kind of selling influence in South America, 94 00:05:41,040 --> 00:05:43,560 Speaker 2: and the United States doesn't like that. So that's why 95 00:05:43,560 --> 00:05:47,520 Speaker 2: I think the Venezuela conflict is ramped up again. You know, 96 00:05:47,760 --> 00:05:51,320 Speaker 2: you've seen a similar thing with US, like supporting Colombia 97 00:05:51,360 --> 00:05:55,640 Speaker 2: for example. There's like a couple other examples down there. 98 00:05:55,720 --> 00:05:57,640 Speaker 2: I think this is more about like the Monroe Doctrine 99 00:05:57,640 --> 00:06:00,800 Speaker 2: than it is about drug boats or even really Venezuela 100 00:06:00,839 --> 00:06:03,200 Speaker 2: in general. I'm trying to remember the name of that 101 00:06:03,240 --> 00:06:05,560 Speaker 2: like general that was down there that helped like South 102 00:06:05,600 --> 00:06:09,680 Speaker 2: America break away from Spain. It'll come to me eventually, 103 00:06:09,720 --> 00:06:15,320 Speaker 2: but famous general that helped basically liberate South America from 104 00:06:15,640 --> 00:06:18,000 Speaker 2: like Spain and the other sort of like colonial powers 105 00:06:18,040 --> 00:06:22,760 Speaker 2: at the time. I believe he was Venezuelan. So part 106 00:06:22,800 --> 00:06:25,040 Speaker 2: of this I really want to emphasize is, like I think, 107 00:06:25,080 --> 00:06:28,800 Speaker 2: for them, it's about nationalism, it's about independence from like 108 00:06:28,880 --> 00:06:32,200 Speaker 2: colonial powers, and that message just resonates in South America 109 00:06:32,200 --> 00:06:34,640 Speaker 2: if you talk to anybody from South America. So you 110 00:06:34,760 --> 00:06:37,640 Speaker 2: got the United States trying to exert influence Monroe Doctrine, 111 00:06:38,120 --> 00:06:40,080 Speaker 2: keep the Chinese out, and you've got sort of these 112 00:06:40,160 --> 00:06:43,800 Speaker 2: Latin American countries wanting to maintain a little bit more 113 00:06:43,800 --> 00:06:47,480 Speaker 2: independence and like decision making power. That makes sense, you know. 114 00:06:47,720 --> 00:06:51,400 Speaker 1: Two weeks ago I interviewed a gentleman by the name 115 00:06:51,440 --> 00:06:54,760 Speaker 1: of George Pazzulo. He's a New York Times bestselling author. 116 00:06:54,760 --> 00:06:57,599 Speaker 1: He's written like thirty books. One of my favorite GWO 117 00:06:57,760 --> 00:07:02,320 Speaker 1: books called the Jawbreaker, which is the story of Gary Bernston, 118 00:07:02,480 --> 00:07:06,440 Speaker 1: a CIA paramilitary case officer who led the charge in 119 00:07:06,720 --> 00:07:10,760 Speaker 1: the invasion of Afghanistan. He was on the case or 120 00:07:10,840 --> 00:07:14,480 Speaker 1: the trail of Bin Laden. There's this famous Mexican standoff 121 00:07:14,520 --> 00:07:17,840 Speaker 1: that took off place, you know, as he and his 122 00:07:18,600 --> 00:07:22,600 Speaker 1: Delta CIA ground branch team were like an hour away 123 00:07:22,600 --> 00:07:24,520 Speaker 1: from him, and then there was just like we want 124 00:07:24,560 --> 00:07:27,040 Speaker 1: more money, and then he tried to get Tommy Franks 125 00:07:27,080 --> 00:07:31,320 Speaker 1: to launch rangers to cut off the border. Anyways, George 126 00:07:31,320 --> 00:07:34,720 Speaker 1: Bluzzo teamed up with Gary Bernstein recently and another guy 127 00:07:34,760 --> 00:07:39,800 Speaker 1: named Martin Rodill. And Martin is a Venezuelan American who's 128 00:07:39,840 --> 00:07:42,160 Speaker 1: been working for the DEA for the last twenty years 129 00:07:42,640 --> 00:07:47,080 Speaker 1: and he's been running human sources for the cartel industry 130 00:07:47,120 --> 00:07:49,720 Speaker 1: and the DEA in all these different regions. Well, after 131 00:07:49,800 --> 00:07:52,520 Speaker 1: twenty twenty election, they partnered up and conducted They have 132 00:07:52,600 --> 00:07:57,040 Speaker 1: their own consulting firm, Asset Recovery Firm, and they did 133 00:07:57,080 --> 00:08:03,640 Speaker 1: conducted a massive, massive investigation and discovered they believe that 134 00:08:04,040 --> 00:08:08,400 Speaker 1: all of dominion voting machines and smartmatic voting machines around 135 00:08:08,400 --> 00:08:13,840 Speaker 1: the world are controlled by source code that originated from Chavez. 136 00:08:14,520 --> 00:08:15,400 Speaker 2: These three. 137 00:08:16,800 --> 00:08:23,240 Speaker 1: American Venezuelan American coders who actually started i mean Smartmatic 138 00:08:23,640 --> 00:08:27,880 Speaker 1: started in Delray Beach, Florida, and they live in Boca. 139 00:08:27,680 --> 00:08:28,360 Speaker 2: Some of them, and. 140 00:08:30,080 --> 00:08:34,040 Speaker 1: They like these guys, believe that that's the reason why 141 00:08:34,880 --> 00:08:39,920 Speaker 1: socialism swept over South America because if you look at 142 00:08:39,960 --> 00:08:43,360 Speaker 1: all of the countries over that time since Chavez, really 143 00:08:43,360 --> 00:08:45,720 Speaker 1: where this went into place was when he was recalled 144 00:08:46,000 --> 00:08:49,480 Speaker 1: in two thousand and two or three, when it was 145 00:08:49,960 --> 00:08:53,520 Speaker 1: that's when they implemented the electronic voting machines. And then 146 00:08:53,600 --> 00:08:58,560 Speaker 1: over they believe over since that time, over seventy two 147 00:08:58,600 --> 00:09:02,559 Speaker 1: different countries have been flipped with the dominion or Smartmatic 148 00:09:02,640 --> 00:09:06,200 Speaker 1: source code, you know, and that's internationally. Smartattic is the 149 00:09:06,200 --> 00:09:10,280 Speaker 1: international company and they have ties to Open Society Foundation. 150 00:09:10,679 --> 00:09:14,040 Speaker 1: China did a six hundred million dollar investment, Russia did 151 00:09:14,080 --> 00:09:18,520 Speaker 1: like a twenty million dollar investment. And they also believe 152 00:09:18,559 --> 00:09:21,439 Speaker 1: that they flipped over ten thousand elections in the United 153 00:09:21,440 --> 00:09:24,079 Speaker 1: States and they believe that the first one they flipped 154 00:09:24,160 --> 00:09:27,880 Speaker 1: was in Cook County, Illinois, when they flipped the primary 155 00:09:27,920 --> 00:09:30,120 Speaker 1: between Obama and Clinton. 156 00:09:30,280 --> 00:09:31,880 Speaker 2: They put him in. 157 00:09:32,480 --> 00:09:37,600 Speaker 1: And they have human source testimonial that of a guy 158 00:09:37,679 --> 00:09:41,079 Speaker 1: that was in that during there when Chavez bragged that 159 00:09:41,160 --> 00:09:44,240 Speaker 1: I'm about ready to get the first black American president elected. 160 00:09:45,280 --> 00:09:48,760 Speaker 1: I bring that up because you know, some people are 161 00:09:48,840 --> 00:09:54,440 Speaker 1: saying that this is a derivative of that right that 162 00:09:55,800 --> 00:10:00,720 Speaker 1: the Trump administration obviously fully believes, or Trump himself fully believes, 163 00:10:00,720 --> 00:10:03,760 Speaker 1: and people within the administration fully believed that twenty twenty 164 00:10:03,880 --> 00:10:07,280 Speaker 1: was completely stolen. I think the I had another guy 165 00:10:07,360 --> 00:10:11,320 Speaker 1: on I named David Clements, who's a former prosecutor in 166 00:10:11,360 --> 00:10:15,599 Speaker 1: New Mexico and did an investigation for years and was 167 00:10:15,640 --> 00:10:18,720 Speaker 1: a big part of the cyber team led by Mike 168 00:10:18,800 --> 00:10:22,400 Speaker 1: Lindell to discover what happened. And he believes the same 169 00:10:22,400 --> 00:10:24,800 Speaker 1: thing many people. There's thousands of people obviously I believe 170 00:10:24,840 --> 00:10:29,280 Speaker 1: it January sixth, and that this is a bigger part 171 00:10:29,520 --> 00:10:34,400 Speaker 1: of the whole thing, you know. That being said, I 172 00:10:34,559 --> 00:10:38,000 Speaker 1: agree with you. I think that's a bunch of it. 173 00:10:38,320 --> 00:10:42,520 Speaker 1: But I also agree with you that it's this oil 174 00:10:42,640 --> 00:10:45,280 Speaker 1: play because when you look at the organizations that really 175 00:10:45,320 --> 00:10:50,160 Speaker 1: had a pivotal foothold in Venezuela and you know oil production, 176 00:10:50,280 --> 00:10:53,720 Speaker 1: it was what Chevron and Exxon and all these I 177 00:10:53,720 --> 00:10:56,160 Speaker 1: think Shell was down there maybe, but it was all 178 00:10:56,200 --> 00:11:00,439 Speaker 1: these big consortium you know, international oil organizations that were 179 00:11:00,520 --> 00:11:03,720 Speaker 1: kicked out and lost access to that. So I think 180 00:11:03,760 --> 00:11:11,440 Speaker 1: it's one of the more complicated instances of geopolitics, right, 181 00:11:11,840 --> 00:11:15,960 Speaker 1: all these different facets. And obviously they do have the 182 00:11:16,080 --> 00:11:22,120 Speaker 1: largest cartel, the Cartel do Solas, which is some people 183 00:11:22,280 --> 00:11:26,120 Speaker 1: estimate is two trillion dollars annually of international sales. They 184 00:11:26,160 --> 00:11:29,920 Speaker 1: don't manufacturer produce, but they've they've recruited, you know, the 185 00:11:29,960 --> 00:11:34,599 Speaker 1: farc from Colombia to move the materials from Columbia or 186 00:11:34,600 --> 00:11:39,360 Speaker 1: Bolivia or wherever into assemble and then ship out of 187 00:11:39,840 --> 00:11:41,839 Speaker 1: and then you know, also, I had a couple of 188 00:11:41,920 --> 00:11:43,679 Speaker 1: g WAT guys that I was listening to last night. 189 00:11:44,280 --> 00:11:47,800 Speaker 1: We're saying that, you know, potentially what's also happened is 190 00:11:47,880 --> 00:11:52,440 Speaker 1: are massive arms deals. So on those oil tankers, it's 191 00:11:52,440 --> 00:11:57,920 Speaker 1: not just oil, it's it's you know, cocaine, it's arms deals, 192 00:11:57,960 --> 00:11:58,520 Speaker 1: it's it's. 193 00:11:58,400 --> 00:12:00,880 Speaker 2: A lot caught with a lot of Russian arms. I 194 00:12:01,000 --> 00:12:03,240 Speaker 2: believe this was maybe Trump's first term, and maybe this 195 00:12:03,320 --> 00:12:06,319 Speaker 2: is a shabaz thing, but there's a long standing relationship 196 00:12:06,360 --> 00:12:09,880 Speaker 2: between them and Russia, and I almost look at Venezuela 197 00:12:09,920 --> 00:12:15,280 Speaker 2: at least personally, right, as like the Western hemispheres version 198 00:12:15,360 --> 00:12:18,839 Speaker 2: of like Iran. Yeah, okay, because the exact same thing 199 00:12:18,920 --> 00:12:23,640 Speaker 2: happened in Iran where you had like a nationalist leader. 200 00:12:24,000 --> 00:12:25,920 Speaker 2: And I believe this is like the seventies, or I 201 00:12:25,960 --> 00:12:27,880 Speaker 2: guess this would have been the sixties that this happened. 202 00:12:28,440 --> 00:12:32,320 Speaker 2: Nationalist leader comes to power, wants to expropriate the oil 203 00:12:32,360 --> 00:12:34,120 Speaker 2: industry at least keep a little bit more of the 204 00:12:34,160 --> 00:12:36,280 Speaker 2: profits and the infrastructure is all owned by like Great 205 00:12:36,280 --> 00:12:40,120 Speaker 2: Britain in the United States at the time, and you know, 206 00:12:40,600 --> 00:12:43,200 Speaker 2: roughly like a pretty moderate guy. Actually, I think he 207 00:12:43,240 --> 00:12:44,840 Speaker 2: just wanted to keep a little bit more for like, 208 00:12:45,120 --> 00:12:48,640 Speaker 2: you know, Iran itself, right, And what we did is 209 00:12:48,640 --> 00:12:50,800 Speaker 2: we basically staged a coup and got rid of them, right, 210 00:12:51,320 --> 00:12:53,840 Speaker 2: And this led to the shop being in power was 211 00:12:53,960 --> 00:12:58,199 Speaker 2: very popular area, right. And then obviously this culminates in 212 00:12:58,240 --> 00:13:01,080 Speaker 2: the Iranian Revolution, right, and it's been like a theocratic 213 00:13:01,120 --> 00:13:01,959 Speaker 2: state ever since. 214 00:13:02,120 --> 00:13:02,280 Speaker 1: Right. 215 00:13:02,800 --> 00:13:05,120 Speaker 2: And so I think it's a similar thing in Venezuela 216 00:13:05,240 --> 00:13:09,120 Speaker 2: basically where these Western oil companies look at the same 217 00:13:09,160 --> 00:13:11,720 Speaker 2: way Iran is. And by the way, it's the same 218 00:13:11,720 --> 00:13:14,040 Speaker 2: thing in Cuba with the casinos and the mods, right, 219 00:13:14,200 --> 00:13:17,600 Speaker 2: that's right, So my Landsky, Yeah, you just have these 220 00:13:17,679 --> 00:13:21,480 Speaker 2: very powerful interest groups. That's either you know, billions of 221 00:13:21,480 --> 00:13:25,560 Speaker 2: dollars in assets get expropriated and can put a lot 222 00:13:25,559 --> 00:13:29,280 Speaker 2: of pressure financially and diplomatically on getting the US government 223 00:13:29,320 --> 00:13:32,720 Speaker 2: to do something about it. So and the dominion voting machine. 224 00:13:32,760 --> 00:13:34,800 Speaker 2: I had heard at something about that with like Shavas 225 00:13:34,840 --> 00:13:37,200 Speaker 2: being involved in all of that. I haven't like seen 226 00:13:37,200 --> 00:13:39,040 Speaker 2: all the evidence for that great book. 227 00:13:39,360 --> 00:13:42,520 Speaker 1: I highly recommend it's called Stolen Elections by Ralph Bazula. 228 00:13:42,600 --> 00:13:44,520 Speaker 2: I've heard that he's a part of the whole thing 229 00:13:44,600 --> 00:13:48,920 Speaker 2: though absolutely. You know, at the same time, like Donald 230 00:13:48,960 --> 00:13:52,080 Speaker 2: Trump was involved in regime change in Venezuela in his 231 00:13:52,120 --> 00:13:54,840 Speaker 2: first term in office before any of this controversy around 232 00:13:54,880 --> 00:13:57,679 Speaker 2: the twenty twenty election happened, right, So I do think 233 00:13:57,679 --> 00:14:01,600 Speaker 2: there's a long standing sort of conflict with them that 234 00:14:01,640 --> 00:14:06,080 Speaker 2: comes down to Western assets basically being expropriated. And really 235 00:14:06,120 --> 00:14:08,520 Speaker 2: this is about like, hey, if we're gonna have this 236 00:14:08,600 --> 00:14:11,560 Speaker 2: global economy with the United States at the center, like 237 00:14:11,600 --> 00:14:16,040 Speaker 2: the Imperial core yep, Right, our responsibility is to essentially 238 00:14:16,080 --> 00:14:21,000 Speaker 2: police the world right and maintain multinational corporate interests and 239 00:14:21,040 --> 00:14:24,520 Speaker 2: their property rights. That's what holds everything kind of together. 240 00:14:24,960 --> 00:14:29,360 Speaker 2: So that's why like Venezuela, Iran really sticks in people's craw. 241 00:14:29,440 --> 00:14:32,360 Speaker 1: I think, can you give us a little bit of more. 242 00:14:32,760 --> 00:14:37,080 Speaker 1: How how big a role does does South Center? Let's 243 00:14:37,080 --> 00:14:40,360 Speaker 1: go South America. How big a role does South America 244 00:14:40,440 --> 00:14:44,440 Speaker 1: play in terms of the US economy in terms of 245 00:14:44,440 --> 00:14:47,440 Speaker 1: either exports or imports. You know, there's a big thing 246 00:14:47,880 --> 00:14:52,880 Speaker 1: about South American beef right right now, there's a feud 247 00:14:52,960 --> 00:14:57,400 Speaker 1: with our farm our cattle farmers and South American farmers. Obviously, 248 00:14:57,440 --> 00:15:02,400 Speaker 1: there's a tremendous amount of produce that comes with bananas, avocados, whatever. 249 00:15:03,840 --> 00:15:07,560 Speaker 2: You know. Also, I think you know other types. 250 00:15:07,600 --> 00:15:11,040 Speaker 1: I mean, obviously there's NAFTA and all those agreements. How 251 00:15:11,080 --> 00:15:14,560 Speaker 1: big of a role to set to South America play 252 00:15:14,680 --> 00:15:16,320 Speaker 1: for the US economy. 253 00:15:16,760 --> 00:15:20,880 Speaker 2: In like dollar terms, like a percentage of imports? Pretty small, okay? 254 00:15:21,000 --> 00:15:24,720 Speaker 2: Now they do have like a big share of agricultural produce, 255 00:15:24,800 --> 00:15:27,320 Speaker 2: like Peru has recently started importing a lot into the 256 00:15:27,400 --> 00:15:31,800 Speaker 2: United States. Argentina with the beef you mentioned, obviously, although 257 00:15:31,800 --> 00:15:34,360 Speaker 2: we just bailed out Argentina's central bank, right one of 258 00:15:34,400 --> 00:15:34,960 Speaker 2: the reasons. 259 00:15:34,960 --> 00:15:37,120 Speaker 1: Why can you explain that a little bit? Yeah, that 260 00:15:37,400 --> 00:15:38,960 Speaker 1: was I was like, wait what. 261 00:15:39,240 --> 00:15:42,080 Speaker 2: Yeah, So argent this is again, this is a Monroe 262 00:15:42,120 --> 00:15:44,760 Speaker 2: doctrine fit. Right, So people hear about this, they're like, 263 00:15:44,760 --> 00:15:47,480 Speaker 2: why are we spending money to bail out Argentina's Central 264 00:15:47,520 --> 00:15:50,440 Speaker 2: bank and the Paso down there? You know, these soybean 265 00:15:50,480 --> 00:15:52,440 Speaker 2: farmers aren't getting taken care of, but we're gonna bail 266 00:15:52,440 --> 00:15:55,800 Speaker 2: out Argentina. Again, it comes down to Monroe doctrine. You 267 00:15:55,800 --> 00:15:59,760 Speaker 2: can either have you know, Javier Malay in there, who's 268 00:15:59,840 --> 00:16:03,000 Speaker 2: kind kind of a pro Western or kind of like 269 00:16:03,080 --> 00:16:08,440 Speaker 2: almost like a libertarian type ideological guy with his chainsaw. 270 00:16:08,480 --> 00:16:12,680 Speaker 2: He's very entertaining, right, that's sort of turning the ship 271 00:16:13,120 --> 00:16:17,160 Speaker 2: in Argentina after I think it's been like seventy eighty 272 00:16:17,280 --> 00:16:22,640 Speaker 2: years of like this big government nationalist policy. Okay down there, 273 00:16:23,880 --> 00:16:26,640 Speaker 2: and it's either him or it's going to be somebody 274 00:16:26,680 --> 00:16:29,560 Speaker 2: that's West, pro Western, right, that's kind of the idea. 275 00:16:29,560 --> 00:16:30,960 Speaker 2: So we're gonna bail him out and keep him in 276 00:16:30,960 --> 00:16:35,680 Speaker 2: office because he's an ally. A similar thing happened in Brazil, right, 277 00:16:35,800 --> 00:16:39,120 Speaker 2: the Brazil the tariffs on Brazil because of their political situation. 278 00:16:39,800 --> 00:16:42,640 Speaker 2: We're in a tariff Brazilian coffee. We did that because 279 00:16:43,520 --> 00:16:46,880 Speaker 2: Jyra Bolsonaro, who is like a pro kind of Trump 280 00:16:46,960 --> 00:16:51,360 Speaker 2: pro Western guy, basically got thrown in jail by the 281 00:16:51,400 --> 00:16:55,080 Speaker 2: socialist former president Lula de Silva, who was also just 282 00:16:55,120 --> 00:16:58,560 Speaker 2: in jail. Right. Brazil's crazy, Yeah, Brazil's crazy. But the 283 00:16:58,560 --> 00:17:00,960 Speaker 2: way to understand a lot of this Latin American political 284 00:17:01,000 --> 00:17:04,560 Speaker 2: stuff is it's the United States exerting Monroe doctrine. Don't 285 00:17:04,640 --> 00:17:06,720 Speaker 2: gotta So there's all this kind of like chaotic different 286 00:17:06,720 --> 00:17:09,719 Speaker 2: stuff happening, and by itself, it seems like, why are 287 00:17:09,720 --> 00:17:13,560 Speaker 2: we intervening in Argentina. It doesn't matter. It's about getting 288 00:17:13,560 --> 00:17:16,639 Speaker 2: as many governments on our side versus like China as possible. Right, 289 00:17:16,800 --> 00:17:20,560 Speaker 2: But to wrap back to your original question, I don't 290 00:17:20,560 --> 00:17:22,199 Speaker 2: know the exact numbers at the top my head, but 291 00:17:22,400 --> 00:17:24,119 Speaker 2: all of South America you're going to talk, it's going 292 00:17:24,160 --> 00:17:27,600 Speaker 2: to be something like fifteen percent of US imports at maximum. 293 00:17:28,119 --> 00:17:32,320 Speaker 2: It's mostly commodity things like agriculture. What you're starting to 294 00:17:32,400 --> 00:17:37,840 Speaker 2: see though, is, ever since the COVID pandemic and the 295 00:17:37,880 --> 00:17:41,040 Speaker 2: fact that China controls certain elements of supply chains, right, 296 00:17:41,400 --> 00:17:47,240 Speaker 2: rare earth elements have been a major issue recently, or lithium. Recently, 297 00:17:48,160 --> 00:17:51,800 Speaker 2: we've started to look in South America as an alternative 298 00:17:51,840 --> 00:17:54,560 Speaker 2: source of supply for some of these key elements, like 299 00:17:55,480 --> 00:17:58,320 Speaker 2: Chile famously has like one of the biggest deposits of 300 00:17:58,359 --> 00:18:01,960 Speaker 2: lithium in the world. Right, So I think you're starting 301 00:18:01,960 --> 00:18:04,359 Speaker 2: to see more and more relationships get built down there. 302 00:18:04,440 --> 00:18:06,439 Speaker 2: And again, I think the idea for the United States is, 303 00:18:07,200 --> 00:18:09,919 Speaker 2: we can't keep policing the entire world. We have to 304 00:18:09,960 --> 00:18:12,800 Speaker 2: retrench a little bit here, you know, do a little 305 00:18:12,800 --> 00:18:15,560 Speaker 2: bit of like a fighting retreat and gain our strength 306 00:18:15,680 --> 00:18:18,120 Speaker 2: and like rebuild supply chains in a more resilient way. 307 00:18:19,040 --> 00:18:21,800 Speaker 2: Everything can't come from China and the Far East anymore, 308 00:18:22,200 --> 00:18:24,200 Speaker 2: and so Latin America is kind of a natural place 309 00:18:24,240 --> 00:18:26,200 Speaker 2: to do that. And I think once we started looking 310 00:18:26,240 --> 00:18:29,680 Speaker 2: down there again and paying attention, people realized, oh, hey, 311 00:18:29,720 --> 00:18:31,919 Speaker 2: the Chinese are paying for all of the ports to 312 00:18:31,960 --> 00:18:34,400 Speaker 2: be modernized in Peru, Like they're doing all this debt 313 00:18:34,440 --> 00:18:37,240 Speaker 2: diplomacy stuff down there, which by the way, they learned 314 00:18:37,240 --> 00:18:40,240 Speaker 2: from US. Right, people are very upset at China, and 315 00:18:40,280 --> 00:18:43,600 Speaker 2: I understand why. And again I'm on America's side. Right, 316 00:18:43,680 --> 00:18:48,600 Speaker 2: But yeah, China is incredibly impressive because they basically have 317 00:18:48,680 --> 00:18:51,160 Speaker 2: taken everything that the United States did to grow into 318 00:18:51,160 --> 00:18:54,080 Speaker 2: a world superpower, and they've just copied us. That's right, right, 319 00:18:54,160 --> 00:18:57,840 Speaker 2: the teariffs, the industrial policy, the keeping out imports, the 320 00:18:57,840 --> 00:19:02,760 Speaker 2: building up domestic industry, that's the American system. We invented 321 00:19:02,800 --> 00:19:06,359 Speaker 2: that in the United States. Right. Debt, you argue the 322 00:19:06,400 --> 00:19:11,520 Speaker 2: Brits invented right mercantism or whatever. Yeah, but you know, 323 00:19:11,680 --> 00:19:14,000 Speaker 2: debt diplomacy, right, lending you a bunch of money so 324 00:19:14,040 --> 00:19:16,720 Speaker 2: you can build a hydro electric dam that we know 325 00:19:16,880 --> 00:19:20,040 Speaker 2: is never going to work, right, But Westinghouse gets the 326 00:19:20,080 --> 00:19:23,199 Speaker 2: contract and then the government owes, you know, us a 327 00:19:23,200 --> 00:19:25,359 Speaker 2: bunch of money, and then when they can't make the payments, 328 00:19:25,359 --> 00:19:27,320 Speaker 2: which we knew they wouldn't be able to, we get 329 00:19:27,359 --> 00:19:30,119 Speaker 2: to come in and influence the political situation. Right. So 330 00:19:30,480 --> 00:19:31,920 Speaker 2: China's is doing the same thing we did. 331 00:19:32,040 --> 00:19:37,560 Speaker 1: Yeah. Uh, it's interesting part of the story with Gary Bernstein. 332 00:19:37,640 --> 00:19:42,960 Speaker 1: He after Afghanistan, he ended up becoming the station chief 333 00:19:43,080 --> 00:19:47,120 Speaker 1: for Bolivia and there was a moment after Obama got 334 00:19:47,119 --> 00:19:54,080 Speaker 1: into office that basically they ramped down all these operations 335 00:19:54,160 --> 00:19:56,919 Speaker 1: because a lot of these station chiefs he was suggesting 336 00:19:57,440 --> 00:20:00,199 Speaker 1: that were like, hey, we've got a problem down here. 337 00:20:00,280 --> 00:20:04,320 Speaker 1: Socialism is spreading rampantly. We've been so fixated on the 338 00:20:04,359 --> 00:20:07,520 Speaker 1: Middle East. All of our assets, all of our focus, 339 00:20:07,680 --> 00:20:10,800 Speaker 1: all of our all of our personnel, all of our collection, 340 00:20:11,200 --> 00:20:14,520 Speaker 1: everything is focused on the Middle East and the g WATT. 341 00:20:15,080 --> 00:20:22,080 Speaker 1: We've negated this responsibility, thus allowing this massive flourish of 342 00:20:22,080 --> 00:20:24,000 Speaker 1: of national socialism. 343 00:20:24,040 --> 00:20:26,360 Speaker 2: I mean, I think many tastes that's what it is. 344 00:20:26,400 --> 00:20:32,120 Speaker 1: Right and and now you you have everybody going, oh wait, 345 00:20:32,720 --> 00:20:35,320 Speaker 1: we've got a major problem. There's a lot of other 346 00:20:35,440 --> 00:20:38,679 Speaker 1: things that are resulting out of not paying attention to it. 347 00:20:39,080 --> 00:20:41,040 Speaker 1: And it was I had a buddy of mine that 348 00:20:41,119 --> 00:20:43,280 Speaker 1: I knew at the agency who is one of the 349 00:20:43,320 --> 00:20:46,840 Speaker 1: guys on the original China desk when you know about 350 00:20:46,920 --> 00:20:49,800 Speaker 1: I don't know, a few years ago, the agency was like, hey, 351 00:20:49,840 --> 00:20:52,280 Speaker 1: we need to start a China desk, like we have 352 00:20:52,320 --> 00:20:53,440 Speaker 1: to have a full blown. 353 00:20:53,200 --> 00:20:55,080 Speaker 2: Now we didn't have that for some reason. Yeah, for 354 00:20:55,160 --> 00:20:58,760 Speaker 2: some oldest civilization and world history and the oldest we 355 00:20:59,119 --> 00:21:00,640 Speaker 2: blew off a China desk. 356 00:21:00,720 --> 00:21:03,320 Speaker 1: Right. Well, I mean the CTC, the counter Terrorism Center, 357 00:21:03,359 --> 00:21:07,240 Speaker 1: took over everything out of like ninety three, and he 358 00:21:07,440 --> 00:21:09,919 Speaker 1: was in charge at a large part in terms of 359 00:21:09,960 --> 00:21:13,800 Speaker 1: South America, and he was flying down meeting with leaders regularly. 360 00:21:13,800 --> 00:21:16,080 Speaker 1: And at one point, I remember we were chatting, we 361 00:21:16,080 --> 00:21:18,919 Speaker 1: were having lunch up in DC and and he was like, 362 00:21:19,040 --> 00:21:23,639 Speaker 1: you know what, he's like, there's only one pro democratic 363 00:21:23,800 --> 00:21:27,560 Speaker 1: Western supporting country down there, and that's Paraguay. And I'm like, 364 00:21:27,840 --> 00:21:30,960 Speaker 1: that's not true. I'm like Brazil. And he walked through 365 00:21:30,960 --> 00:21:35,040 Speaker 1: Brazil and the movement towards Lula, right, we walked through 366 00:21:35,160 --> 00:21:38,399 Speaker 1: all the other organism, you know, all the other countries, 367 00:21:38,440 --> 00:21:40,800 Speaker 1: and I was just like, oh my gosh. And I 368 00:21:40,880 --> 00:21:43,639 Speaker 1: was like, well, what does that mean? And he goes, 369 00:21:43,920 --> 00:21:48,000 Speaker 1: it means China grabs a strategic foothold in our hemisphere exactly. 370 00:21:48,119 --> 00:21:51,639 Speaker 1: And I think, you know, that is finally now coming 371 00:21:51,680 --> 00:21:54,960 Speaker 1: to fruition with with all of these synergies, whether it's 372 00:21:55,160 --> 00:22:01,040 Speaker 1: you know, drug production or distribution oil, natural menials, right, 373 00:22:01,160 --> 00:22:03,960 Speaker 1: you know, whatever it might be, but it's really about 374 00:22:03,960 --> 00:22:04,920 Speaker 1: that Monroe doctor. 375 00:22:04,920 --> 00:22:06,600 Speaker 2: And I'm glad you'd summarize that. 376 00:22:06,640 --> 00:22:09,720 Speaker 1: All right, let's shift from South or central South America 377 00:22:09,760 --> 00:22:13,000 Speaker 1: and let's let's move over to the European Union. I 378 00:22:13,040 --> 00:22:16,639 Speaker 1: think one of the biggest things that I'm seeing that 379 00:22:16,720 --> 00:22:18,720 Speaker 1: I talked about recently in one of the shows I did, 380 00:22:18,840 --> 00:22:28,240 Speaker 1: is there's this massive insistence that the EU dominates the 381 00:22:28,800 --> 00:22:33,159 Speaker 1: or not dominates, but works itself into the peace talks 382 00:22:33,200 --> 00:22:39,360 Speaker 1: between Ukraine and Russia right and and basically destroyed all 383 00:22:39,400 --> 00:22:43,600 Speaker 1: of the negotiations that were taking place. And in the 384 00:22:43,640 --> 00:22:48,480 Speaker 1: same time, you've seen the European Union and NATO, led 385 00:22:48,520 --> 00:22:53,040 Speaker 1: by Mark Root really begin to talk about war footing 386 00:22:53,520 --> 00:22:58,119 Speaker 1: and the escalation of war spending, the escalation of NATO 387 00:22:58,200 --> 00:23:01,879 Speaker 1: budgets increasing more now and then the other thing, and 388 00:23:01,920 --> 00:23:04,600 Speaker 1: the one I wanted you to talk about, uh, in detail, 389 00:23:04,600 --> 00:23:06,000 Speaker 1: you can talk about all of it, but the thing 390 00:23:06,000 --> 00:23:09,119 Speaker 1: that really I found fascinating was that they are going 391 00:23:09,280 --> 00:23:14,680 Speaker 1: to take Russian assets that they're sitting on and up 392 00:23:14,680 --> 00:23:18,440 Speaker 1: into including the Chelsea football team that was bought by 393 00:23:18,480 --> 00:23:22,240 Speaker 1: some you know, some oligar, Russian oligar for two point 394 00:23:22,359 --> 00:23:26,639 Speaker 1: five billion dollars. They're taking that money and they're gonna 395 00:23:26,760 --> 00:23:31,600 Speaker 1: give it right to Zolensky to fund the effort. Because 396 00:23:32,480 --> 00:23:34,840 Speaker 1: I would imagine, I wish and I kind of want 397 00:23:34,880 --> 00:23:37,560 Speaker 1: you to lay this out, you know, is it because 398 00:23:37,680 --> 00:23:41,200 Speaker 1: the European Union, the economies are all struggling, they don't 399 00:23:41,240 --> 00:23:44,760 Speaker 1: have those types of defense reserves. And and then also 400 00:23:45,000 --> 00:23:47,959 Speaker 1: has you know have do you know of any time 401 00:23:48,160 --> 00:23:52,680 Speaker 1: where you know, hoarding you know, civilians, if you will, 402 00:23:52,880 --> 00:23:56,520 Speaker 1: their assets and using it to fund a war against. 403 00:23:56,440 --> 00:23:57,160 Speaker 2: Their own people. 404 00:23:57,200 --> 00:24:00,479 Speaker 1: I just think this is a ramp up and way 405 00:24:00,840 --> 00:24:05,199 Speaker 1: that could have profound negative impacts and ultimately lead to 406 00:24:05,240 --> 00:24:08,040 Speaker 1: I think a conflict probably in Eastern Europe. 407 00:24:08,240 --> 00:24:11,880 Speaker 2: Yeah, so it's really interesting to see like the Europeans 408 00:24:11,920 --> 00:24:15,680 Speaker 2: here because typically right, like at least my whole life, 409 00:24:15,880 --> 00:24:18,080 Speaker 2: it was always like the United States sort of dragging 410 00:24:18,119 --> 00:24:22,399 Speaker 2: the Europeans kicking and screaming into different conflicts really and 411 00:24:22,440 --> 00:24:24,800 Speaker 2: they'd always be really upset at us. And by the way, 412 00:24:24,840 --> 00:24:28,000 Speaker 2: I think the European like normal people are still that way, 413 00:24:28,080 --> 00:24:30,160 Speaker 2: and I think they look at their leaders out there 414 00:24:30,160 --> 00:24:31,080 Speaker 2: like what is going on? 415 00:24:31,240 --> 00:24:33,600 Speaker 1: Well, well, sentiment on the street is hilarious. I love 416 00:24:33,680 --> 00:24:36,359 Speaker 1: the interviews on the streets because you can't find a 417 00:24:36,480 --> 00:24:41,280 Speaker 1: single young person in any of these countries Germany, Switzerland, 418 00:24:42,320 --> 00:24:45,480 Speaker 1: London anywhere that are like, yeah, well we'll go fight 419 00:24:45,720 --> 00:24:46,800 Speaker 1: for sure, We're up for it. 420 00:24:46,880 --> 00:24:51,040 Speaker 2: Yeah, that's exactly right. And you know, I think basically 421 00:24:51,119 --> 00:24:53,080 Speaker 2: like a couple things are going on, all right. One 422 00:24:53,200 --> 00:24:57,480 Speaker 2: is that Europe isn't really a democracy in any sense 423 00:24:57,520 --> 00:25:00,399 Speaker 2: of the world. Okay. When the European Union was created, 424 00:25:00,440 --> 00:25:01,919 Speaker 2: it was the idea of like, hey, let's get us 425 00:25:01,920 --> 00:25:04,440 Speaker 2: all together and like this monetary union and well, lower 426 00:25:04,480 --> 00:25:07,840 Speaker 2: trade barriers and whatever. And over time what you've seen 427 00:25:07,960 --> 00:25:11,159 Speaker 2: is all of these different countries with distinct cultures have 428 00:25:11,359 --> 00:25:17,360 Speaker 2: essentially seeded their sovereignty okay, to Brussels, which is where 429 00:25:17,359 --> 00:25:21,159 Speaker 2: the government has actually run out of and there's you know, 430 00:25:21,280 --> 00:25:25,240 Speaker 2: like six layers of bureaucracy between like the actual people 431 00:25:25,280 --> 00:25:29,960 Speaker 2: and the actual like policymakers, and so you voting in 432 00:25:30,040 --> 00:25:35,240 Speaker 2: Germany or you know, Portugal or whatever, it doesn't matter. Unfortunately, 433 00:25:35,600 --> 00:25:38,200 Speaker 2: it matters very little. And so I think what you're 434 00:25:38,200 --> 00:25:44,280 Speaker 2: seeing is like this this elite European elite in Brussels 435 00:25:44,280 --> 00:25:48,680 Speaker 2: who's completely disconnected from what the people on the ground think, 436 00:25:49,560 --> 00:25:53,159 Speaker 2: dragging them all into war here. And I think the 437 00:25:53,200 --> 00:25:56,240 Speaker 2: reason why is maybe it's like a couple of things. Okay. 438 00:25:56,280 --> 00:25:59,640 Speaker 2: One is I think these people that are in Brussels 439 00:25:59,680 --> 00:26:03,280 Speaker 2: that are like running the European Union are very fearful 440 00:26:03,320 --> 00:26:06,160 Speaker 2: of Russia, okay from a historical perspective, and they see 441 00:26:06,200 --> 00:26:10,360 Speaker 2: the United States pulling back basically saying, hey, Europe, you're 442 00:26:10,480 --> 00:26:13,160 Speaker 2: just as wealthy as the United States as a whole. 443 00:26:13,720 --> 00:26:16,560 Speaker 2: Why can't you fund your own defense? And nobody really 444 00:26:16,560 --> 00:26:20,960 Speaker 2: has a good argument against that, okay, and so they're 445 00:26:21,040 --> 00:26:24,320 Speaker 2: sort of losing it over that. They're very concerned, and 446 00:26:24,359 --> 00:26:27,400 Speaker 2: I think part of this is just posturing and making 447 00:26:27,440 --> 00:26:31,200 Speaker 2: themselves look all puffed up. Yeah, yeah, you know, it's 448 00:26:31,320 --> 00:26:33,320 Speaker 2: kind of like what a weak person does. 449 00:26:33,280 --> 00:26:36,119 Speaker 1: England when it's one hundred and what fifty nine thousand 450 00:26:36,160 --> 00:26:38,120 Speaker 1: active duty troops, A one hundred and eighty an thats 451 00:26:38,160 --> 00:26:38,679 Speaker 1: whatever it is. 452 00:26:38,840 --> 00:26:41,800 Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, there's been The military in Europe is 453 00:26:42,040 --> 00:26:45,880 Speaker 2: unfortunately a joke, and by the way, that was on purpose. 454 00:26:45,960 --> 00:26:49,159 Speaker 2: The whole point of NATO is to keep Europe down 455 00:26:49,440 --> 00:26:52,479 Speaker 2: and away from Russia, right and kind of under our thumb. 456 00:26:53,000 --> 00:26:55,639 Speaker 2: So I think they're sort of scrambling and realizing, oh 457 00:26:55,640 --> 00:26:58,119 Speaker 2: my god, you know, we're out here by ourselves and 458 00:26:58,160 --> 00:27:00,240 Speaker 2: we've got nothing, and so part of it's just they're 459 00:27:00,280 --> 00:27:02,760 Speaker 2: puffing themselves up, and you know, they want to keep 460 00:27:02,880 --> 00:27:05,560 Speaker 2: Ukraine in as long as possible to keep Russia distracted 461 00:27:05,640 --> 00:27:06,760 Speaker 2: and maybe. 462 00:27:06,440 --> 00:27:11,840 Speaker 1: And draining their which is ironic because you know, yes, 463 00:27:12,040 --> 00:27:15,880 Speaker 1: war drains commodity, but with one hundred and fifty million people, right, 464 00:27:15,920 --> 00:27:18,160 Speaker 1: and they have some type of reserve of another two 465 00:27:18,200 --> 00:27:21,440 Speaker 1: million if they needed. You know, what they're gaining is 466 00:27:21,440 --> 00:27:26,560 Speaker 1: is hardened war experience on the modern battlefield. And that's 467 00:27:26,720 --> 00:27:31,680 Speaker 1: the pivotal thing, right how I mean, obviously, I think 468 00:27:31,720 --> 00:27:33,919 Speaker 1: one of the funniest things about the whole thing was 469 00:27:33,960 --> 00:27:39,520 Speaker 1: that throughout this entire conflict, you know, the European Union 470 00:27:39,560 --> 00:27:43,520 Speaker 1: has been purchasing Russian oil, right, some ungodly amount of 471 00:27:43,560 --> 00:27:44,200 Speaker 1: Russian oil. 472 00:27:45,600 --> 00:27:46,400 Speaker 2: Two questions. 473 00:27:46,600 --> 00:27:51,880 Speaker 1: One, did Europe moving into the European Union make it 474 00:27:53,760 --> 00:27:59,040 Speaker 1: much more much stronger economically as a as a global power? 475 00:27:59,560 --> 00:28:00,919 Speaker 2: And then what. 476 00:28:02,600 --> 00:28:07,080 Speaker 1: Is transpiring you in terms of the individual countries and 477 00:28:07,119 --> 00:28:10,840 Speaker 1: their economies right now as a potential result of. 478 00:28:10,760 --> 00:28:14,040 Speaker 2: All this, Yeah, did it make Europe more powerful and 479 00:28:14,160 --> 00:28:17,240 Speaker 2: like a global scale? I think in some ways it did, 480 00:28:17,359 --> 00:28:20,840 Speaker 2: because you know, you can sort of speak from Brussels 481 00:28:20,840 --> 00:28:24,600 Speaker 2: as like one unit, okay, but at the same time 482 00:28:25,200 --> 00:28:30,080 Speaker 2: they've tied themselves all to this one currency and essentially 483 00:28:30,160 --> 00:28:33,440 Speaker 2: like a it's great for Germany. Right, So Germany gets 484 00:28:33,480 --> 00:28:36,360 Speaker 2: like a lower exchange rate because it's tied to Portugal 485 00:28:36,400 --> 00:28:38,680 Speaker 2: and Spain, but it's really bad for like Portugal and 486 00:28:38,760 --> 00:28:42,040 Speaker 2: Spain and Greece, right, And so I think for the 487 00:28:42,080 --> 00:28:45,760 Speaker 2: southern European states this has been probably not a good 488 00:28:45,760 --> 00:28:47,880 Speaker 2: deal at all, especially by the way what they did 489 00:28:47,880 --> 00:28:52,880 Speaker 2: to Greece during like the Greek bankruptcy. At the time, 490 00:28:52,920 --> 00:28:55,200 Speaker 2: I was sort of like, hey, these Greeks, like they're 491 00:28:55,240 --> 00:28:57,959 Speaker 2: not paying their bills whatever else. Right, I was very 492 00:28:58,000 --> 00:29:00,280 Speaker 2: much like, hey, Greece, you know, should have to deal 493 00:29:00,320 --> 00:29:03,280 Speaker 2: with their own problems. The more I researched into that, 494 00:29:03,320 --> 00:29:05,160 Speaker 2: you know, Greece had a worse recession than like the 495 00:29:05,160 --> 00:29:07,760 Speaker 2: Great Depression, and it's still not back to where it 496 00:29:07,920 --> 00:29:11,520 Speaker 2: was pre banking crisis. They basically threw Greece to the 497 00:29:11,560 --> 00:29:15,560 Speaker 2: wolves and like sold off its national assets. And listen, 498 00:29:16,240 --> 00:29:18,680 Speaker 2: if you can't pay your loan, that's partially your faults 499 00:29:20,040 --> 00:29:21,960 Speaker 2: at the scale of like a country, though that's part 500 00:29:22,000 --> 00:29:24,680 Speaker 2: of the bank, it's partially the banker's fault as well, right, 501 00:29:24,720 --> 00:29:26,960 Speaker 2: I think it's always the bankers. There should have been 502 00:29:27,080 --> 00:29:30,160 Speaker 2: massive right downs, They should have let Greece off the 503 00:29:30,200 --> 00:29:33,160 Speaker 2: hook on that, but they essentially threw them to the wolves. 504 00:29:33,880 --> 00:29:35,960 Speaker 2: And so I think it's been great for Germany. I 505 00:29:36,000 --> 00:29:38,800 Speaker 2: think the EU has been a big win for Germany, 506 00:29:39,040 --> 00:29:41,640 Speaker 2: maybe even for France. I think for the rest of 507 00:29:41,640 --> 00:29:45,600 Speaker 2: the countries probably not so much. And that's why you've seen, 508 00:29:46,520 --> 00:29:50,680 Speaker 2: you know, so much. I guess strife over like the 509 00:29:50,720 --> 00:29:53,800 Speaker 2: loss of sovereignty to Brussels, right, and this has mostly 510 00:29:53,840 --> 00:29:57,360 Speaker 2: been centered around immigration. It's the reason why Great Britain 511 00:29:57,480 --> 00:29:59,640 Speaker 2: left the I mean they were only in the trade Union, 512 00:29:59,680 --> 00:30:02,160 Speaker 2: they kept the pound. But you know, you also see 513 00:30:02,160 --> 00:30:08,200 Speaker 2: countries like Hungry, for example, Poland. These are essentially, you know, 514 00:30:08,560 --> 00:30:15,000 Speaker 2: countries that want to maintain like an ethnic you know, homogeny, right, 515 00:30:15,640 --> 00:30:18,080 Speaker 2: and they don't like the loss of sovereignty that they 516 00:30:18,080 --> 00:30:20,200 Speaker 2: were having to Brussels. And the idea was basically, hey, 517 00:30:20,240 --> 00:30:22,640 Speaker 2: let's just import a bunch of people in here, because 518 00:30:22,680 --> 00:30:26,440 Speaker 2: nobody's having kids from North Africa to work in the factories. 519 00:30:27,080 --> 00:30:28,720 Speaker 2: And obviously this has turned out to be kind of 520 00:30:28,760 --> 00:30:32,520 Speaker 2: a disaster. So I think generally, speaking of your Germany 521 00:30:32,600 --> 00:30:34,240 Speaker 2: and you want to sort of exert yourself on the 522 00:30:34,240 --> 00:30:36,719 Speaker 2: world stage or France, I think the EU is probably 523 00:30:36,720 --> 00:30:39,520 Speaker 2: a positive for the rest of the European States. I 524 00:30:39,560 --> 00:30:44,000 Speaker 2: think it's much more of a wash and probably leaning 525 00:30:44,000 --> 00:30:46,640 Speaker 2: more towards the negative. I mean, you don't have a 526 00:30:46,680 --> 00:30:50,920 Speaker 2: sovereign currency anymore. You've lost all your decision making to Brussels. 527 00:30:51,440 --> 00:30:52,600 Speaker 2: You know, at the end of the day, Like how 528 00:30:52,680 --> 00:30:56,800 Speaker 2: much power does Belgium have the Belgian people, You don't matter. 529 00:30:56,960 --> 00:31:00,240 Speaker 2: It's like, you know in the United States, where kind 530 00:31:00,240 --> 00:31:02,120 Speaker 2: of are like the European Union in a way, right, 531 00:31:02,200 --> 00:31:04,880 Speaker 2: and you have this problem of like people don't feel 532 00:31:04,920 --> 00:31:07,000 Speaker 2: like they have a lot of sovereignty. 533 00:31:07,480 --> 00:31:11,000 Speaker 1: Well, I heard a great analysis on it yes yesterday. 534 00:31:11,760 --> 00:31:14,880 Speaker 1: I heard someone say, well, you know, the United States 535 00:31:14,960 --> 00:31:19,480 Speaker 1: is essentially its own empire, right. We have all these 536 00:31:19,480 --> 00:31:23,960 Speaker 1: different you know, sects of people, all these different this 537 00:31:24,160 --> 00:31:30,560 Speaker 1: mass land area, all these different you know, resources, capabilities, production. 538 00:31:31,400 --> 00:31:35,480 Speaker 1: We're essentially our own empire contained here. And and that's 539 00:31:35,800 --> 00:31:39,880 Speaker 1: what the European Union was intending to do. However, they 540 00:31:39,920 --> 00:31:45,960 Speaker 1: haven't been able to really leverage that collectivisation because I think, 541 00:31:46,280 --> 00:31:49,719 Speaker 1: you know, fundamentally, each one of these countries are so 542 00:31:49,960 --> 00:31:55,720 Speaker 1: radically independent in their sovereignty that there's an automatic conflict 543 00:31:55,760 --> 00:31:58,080 Speaker 1: of interest going on across each one of them. 544 00:31:58,160 --> 00:32:00,880 Speaker 2: Yeah, there's so many distinct cultures in your I mean, 545 00:32:00,920 --> 00:32:03,240 Speaker 2: you get on a train and you ride for two hours, 546 00:32:03,280 --> 00:32:05,200 Speaker 2: and you're in a different place, of the different language, 547 00:32:05,200 --> 00:32:08,560 Speaker 2: with a different distinct culture. That's five hundred, one thousand 548 00:32:08,600 --> 00:32:10,800 Speaker 2: years old. And I think one of the reasons why 549 00:32:10,800 --> 00:32:14,080 Speaker 2: the United States became an empire right as we basically 550 00:32:14,120 --> 00:32:17,760 Speaker 2: as the country was formed, had like a monoculture of 551 00:32:17,840 --> 00:32:23,680 Speaker 2: like Protestant sort of white Anglo Saxon Christian people coming 552 00:32:23,720 --> 00:32:26,960 Speaker 2: over here. You had in the Irish and their Catholic right, 553 00:32:27,080 --> 00:32:31,360 Speaker 2: you add in like the Italians or whatever, but generally speaking, 554 00:32:31,400 --> 00:32:34,400 Speaker 2: it was a very homogeneous culture. And then we were 555 00:32:34,480 --> 00:32:36,800 Speaker 2: forging the fire of the Indian Wars. For like one 556 00:32:36,880 --> 00:32:40,640 Speaker 2: hundred years, we fought the Indians and took this entire continent. 557 00:32:40,920 --> 00:32:42,800 Speaker 2: And then as soon as that's over, it's like, hey, 558 00:32:42,800 --> 00:32:45,080 Speaker 2: we beat Spain in the Spanish American War in like 559 00:32:45,280 --> 00:32:49,920 Speaker 2: three weeks or something, right, and San Juan Hill and 560 00:32:49,960 --> 00:32:51,800 Speaker 2: all that, but we destroyed their navy in like two 561 00:32:52,000 --> 00:32:54,360 Speaker 2: three weeks. And then after that it's like we go 562 00:32:54,400 --> 00:32:58,280 Speaker 2: to World War One. You got basically an entire army 563 00:32:58,320 --> 00:33:01,720 Speaker 2: of like cowboys that have spent a generation or two 564 00:33:01,760 --> 00:33:06,440 Speaker 2: generations in like the hardest conditions in the world fighting Indians. 565 00:33:06,760 --> 00:33:08,240 Speaker 2: It's like, we show up in Europe and. 566 00:33:09,160 --> 00:33:14,720 Speaker 1: No dog's That's one of my favorite stories from World 567 00:33:14,720 --> 00:33:19,000 Speaker 1: War One was, you know, when the Marines hit what 568 00:33:19,160 --> 00:33:23,440 Speaker 1: was it, Bello bello, bello, bellowood right, and just the 569 00:33:23,440 --> 00:33:27,959 Speaker 1: ferocity with which they just again they were fighting a starving. 570 00:33:28,200 --> 00:33:30,160 Speaker 2: But the German, what is going on? 571 00:33:31,160 --> 00:33:33,360 Speaker 1: The French, the English were like, oh my god, you know, 572 00:33:33,520 --> 00:33:35,440 Speaker 1: it's literally was cowboys showing up. 573 00:33:35,600 --> 00:33:38,560 Speaker 2: I mean, that's like the reality. And so I think 574 00:33:38,600 --> 00:33:41,080 Speaker 2: one of the problems that Europe is having right now 575 00:33:41,120 --> 00:33:43,400 Speaker 2: with all this like we have all this these different 576 00:33:43,400 --> 00:33:45,680 Speaker 2: cultures and how do we keep them all together right 577 00:33:45,880 --> 00:33:48,200 Speaker 2: and like a unified thing, and they've never been able 578 00:33:48,200 --> 00:33:50,760 Speaker 2: to make it work right. You're not seeing like the 579 00:33:50,880 --> 00:33:53,280 Speaker 2: United States have this happened in the reverse way, where 580 00:33:53,280 --> 00:33:56,120 Speaker 2: we just had so much immigration from so many different 581 00:33:56,160 --> 00:33:59,920 Speaker 2: cultures so quickly without any of it being like digested 582 00:34:00,040 --> 00:34:02,640 Speaker 2: by the system or any even being you know, sort 583 00:34:02,640 --> 00:34:05,360 Speaker 2: of like assimilated, and we don't really have like a 584 00:34:06,640 --> 00:34:10,400 Speaker 2: unified like I don't know, like cultural identity here anymore. 585 00:34:10,760 --> 00:34:12,880 Speaker 2: That the United States is not starting to break apart 586 00:34:12,920 --> 00:34:15,400 Speaker 2: from the inside, right, like the cracks are forming, because 587 00:34:15,800 --> 00:34:18,440 Speaker 2: now you have all these distinct cultures and so it's 588 00:34:18,480 --> 00:34:20,640 Speaker 2: hard to keep that all together without like a national 589 00:34:20,760 --> 00:34:22,800 Speaker 2: identity that's consistent. I agree. 590 00:34:22,880 --> 00:34:25,120 Speaker 1: Yeah, all right, let's do kind of this loop down. 591 00:34:25,560 --> 00:34:32,759 Speaker 1: We've been seeing a tremendous amount of investment we'll call it, 592 00:34:33,120 --> 00:34:37,720 Speaker 1: to what degree that's going to emerge or or actually 593 00:34:37,800 --> 00:34:42,880 Speaker 1: translate into jobs and profits for America from the Middle East, 594 00:34:43,080 --> 00:34:48,200 Speaker 1: right from you know, Qatar, from all those Middle Eastern countries, 595 00:34:48,239 --> 00:34:51,040 Speaker 1: they're putting trement. I just saw, you know, a few 596 00:34:51,160 --> 00:34:54,120 Speaker 1: about a month ago, there was a huge economic symposium 597 00:34:54,120 --> 00:34:56,959 Speaker 1: down in Miami, and all these Middle Eastern countries were 598 00:34:57,480 --> 00:34:59,359 Speaker 1: wanting to come in and dedicate. I mean, they're buying 599 00:34:59,440 --> 00:35:02,200 Speaker 1: up real estate. You know, they're making these huge investments. 600 00:35:03,520 --> 00:35:07,760 Speaker 1: What's your impression of why they're doing this? And then 601 00:35:08,000 --> 00:35:11,200 Speaker 1: how is it going to impact the American economy? 602 00:35:12,719 --> 00:35:15,319 Speaker 2: And then and then you know, once we get through that, 603 00:35:15,360 --> 00:35:17,960 Speaker 2: we'll come and we'll finish with the America's economy. Yeah. 604 00:35:18,000 --> 00:35:20,520 Speaker 2: So I think it's it's twofold, okay. And on one hand, 605 00:35:20,560 --> 00:35:23,520 Speaker 2: you have basically the United States over the past let's 606 00:35:23,560 --> 00:35:26,319 Speaker 2: say twenty years or so, going from being a net 607 00:35:26,360 --> 00:35:28,800 Speaker 2: importer of energy and not producing a lot of oil 608 00:35:28,800 --> 00:35:30,759 Speaker 2: and natural gas and now being the biggest producer of 609 00:35:30,760 --> 00:35:33,799 Speaker 2: oil and natural gas in the world because of hydraulic fracturing. Right. 610 00:35:33,960 --> 00:35:36,040 Speaker 2: So essentially what that did is it broke like the 611 00:35:36,080 --> 00:35:40,400 Speaker 2: OPEC oil monopoly and made us like a new swing 612 00:35:40,400 --> 00:35:43,160 Speaker 2: producer in the world. And so I think in the 613 00:35:43,239 --> 00:35:46,879 Speaker 2: Middle East, these people look at that situation and say, hey, 614 00:35:47,600 --> 00:35:50,400 Speaker 2: we can't just be dependent on like oil revenue alone 615 00:35:50,719 --> 00:35:53,520 Speaker 2: for the foreseeable future, right, we need to have more 616 00:35:53,719 --> 00:35:55,880 Speaker 2: links to like the United States, more links to this 617 00:35:56,239 --> 00:35:59,120 Speaker 2: like the Imperial core than we have in the past. 618 00:35:59,520 --> 00:36:04,040 Speaker 2: And so they're trying to diversify into entertainment, into technology 619 00:36:04,160 --> 00:36:07,919 Speaker 2: and to AI and all kinds of defense. Right, get 620 00:36:07,960 --> 00:36:11,600 Speaker 2: on our side in like the Middle East more, you know, 621 00:36:11,960 --> 00:36:14,600 Speaker 2: unify with Israel if you're Saudi Arabia, right, get them 622 00:36:14,680 --> 00:36:18,719 Speaker 2: kind of on your side versus Iran. So that's part 623 00:36:18,719 --> 00:36:20,440 Speaker 2: of it, is just like the oil monopoly kind of 624 00:36:20,440 --> 00:36:23,879 Speaker 2: got broken, and they're scrambling to maintain relevance and sort 625 00:36:23,920 --> 00:36:27,759 Speaker 2: of diversify their investment portfolio. The other side of it. 626 00:36:28,200 --> 00:36:30,680 Speaker 2: And this is really more of a broad point, okay, 627 00:36:30,800 --> 00:36:34,000 Speaker 2: is it's about trade deficits because when you have a 628 00:36:34,080 --> 00:36:36,359 Speaker 2: trade deficit, so the United States, I think our trade 629 00:36:36,400 --> 00:36:38,600 Speaker 2: deficit annually is like a trillion dollars. Okay, we buy 630 00:36:38,600 --> 00:36:40,600 Speaker 2: a trillion dollars more from other countries than they buy 631 00:36:40,600 --> 00:36:45,000 Speaker 2: from us. When that happens, Like if you read a 632 00:36:45,040 --> 00:36:47,840 Speaker 2: textbook from like the nineteen eighties or the nineteen nineties 633 00:36:47,840 --> 00:36:50,520 Speaker 2: about it, it'll say like, hey, trade deficits are good 634 00:36:50,680 --> 00:36:53,799 Speaker 2: because you know, we get stuff they worked hard to make, 635 00:36:54,440 --> 00:36:57,440 Speaker 2: and you know, we just give them dollars that we printed, right, 636 00:36:57,520 --> 00:37:00,359 Speaker 2: So it's a huge win for us. Right, But that's 637 00:37:00,400 --> 00:37:04,880 Speaker 2: not true that that's always been kind of a misleading 638 00:37:05,400 --> 00:37:08,640 Speaker 2: sort of half truth, okay, because we don't give them dollars, 639 00:37:09,040 --> 00:37:11,920 Speaker 2: we give them ownership of national assets. That's what a 640 00:37:11,960 --> 00:37:15,279 Speaker 2: trade devisit is, right, the dollars go abroad. They don't 641 00:37:15,280 --> 00:37:16,719 Speaker 2: just sit there, They don't just stand with their one 642 00:37:16,760 --> 00:37:20,839 Speaker 2: hundred dollars bills, right, They take the dollars and they 643 00:37:20,920 --> 00:37:23,480 Speaker 2: use them to buy assets in the United States. Right, 644 00:37:23,560 --> 00:37:25,600 Speaker 2: So that could be the S and P five hundred, 645 00:37:26,120 --> 00:37:29,080 Speaker 2: that could be farmland next to a military base. That 646 00:37:29,120 --> 00:37:33,399 Speaker 2: could be members of Congress right, or lobbying firms in Washington, DC. 647 00:37:34,360 --> 00:37:39,080 Speaker 2: Or you know, it could be institutions universities right, institutions universities, 648 00:37:39,600 --> 00:37:42,960 Speaker 2: Or that could be single family homes in America. Blackrock 649 00:37:43,080 --> 00:37:46,040 Speaker 2: is a big player in that space. Or it could 650 00:37:46,080 --> 00:37:48,520 Speaker 2: be you know, hey, we're going to build a factory 651 00:37:48,520 --> 00:37:52,120 Speaker 2: in the US. Right. So when you hear about like 652 00:37:52,120 --> 00:37:55,400 Speaker 2: FEI indirect investment, that's another argument is like, hey, trillion 653 00:37:55,400 --> 00:37:56,879 Speaker 2: dollars go broad, but they just come back as four 654 00:37:56,960 --> 00:38:01,440 Speaker 2: indirect investment. Again, it's a half truth because most of 655 00:38:01,480 --> 00:38:04,359 Speaker 2: what foreign direct investment is, or traditionally has been over 656 00:38:04,360 --> 00:38:07,160 Speaker 2: the past thirty years, is just I take my dollars 657 00:38:07,160 --> 00:38:09,400 Speaker 2: and I buy an asset from you. So all that 658 00:38:09,440 --> 00:38:12,640 Speaker 2: happens is like paper changes hands and the asset goes 659 00:38:12,719 --> 00:38:15,960 Speaker 2: up in value. So the same real estate still exists, 660 00:38:16,320 --> 00:38:18,560 Speaker 2: it's just worth more. Got it. Now, what's starting to 661 00:38:18,560 --> 00:38:22,400 Speaker 2: happen is the for indirect investment is actual like physical capex, 662 00:38:23,000 --> 00:38:26,880 Speaker 2: like production capacity happening in the United States. So I 663 00:38:26,880 --> 00:38:29,840 Speaker 2: think it's a good thing. I mean, listen, if Saudi 664 00:38:29,880 --> 00:38:34,080 Speaker 2: Arabia owns a semiconductor factory or like a pharmaceutical facility 665 00:38:34,160 --> 00:38:36,640 Speaker 2: or something. I have no issue with that at all, honestly, 666 00:38:36,680 --> 00:38:40,719 Speaker 2: as long it's as it's domestic, because in a bad situation, 667 00:38:41,400 --> 00:38:44,120 Speaker 2: that gives us a lot of leverage in this country sure, 668 00:38:44,480 --> 00:38:47,400 Speaker 2: and keeps people on our side. If Saudi Arabia owns 669 00:38:47,560 --> 00:38:52,319 Speaker 2: a pharmaceutical facility in Doha or in you know, in 670 00:38:52,840 --> 00:38:56,360 Speaker 2: riod or whatever, and they just import pharmaceuticals into the 671 00:38:56,440 --> 00:38:59,640 Speaker 2: United States, that's not as good for us, right, So 672 00:38:59,800 --> 00:39:03,319 Speaker 2: I think having the plant equipment domestic is a positive thing. 673 00:39:03,600 --> 00:39:06,640 Speaker 1: Good good and we I mean, I think the two 674 00:39:06,719 --> 00:39:10,279 Speaker 1: prior times first show that one of everybody's favorites was 675 00:39:10,320 --> 00:39:13,120 Speaker 1: of obviously the teriff launch back in the day everybody's 676 00:39:13,160 --> 00:39:16,200 Speaker 1: freaking out. And then the second one was just the 677 00:39:16,200 --> 00:39:20,799 Speaker 1: the impact of reindustrialization. And so as we're seeing this, 678 00:39:21,400 --> 00:39:23,840 Speaker 1: you know, I think a lot of people are like, 679 00:39:24,000 --> 00:39:28,160 Speaker 1: all right, Trump is really you know, he's spout and 680 00:39:28,160 --> 00:39:30,560 Speaker 1: he's you know, patting himself on the back, taking his 681 00:39:30,680 --> 00:39:32,920 Speaker 1: victory lap this at the end of the year, with 682 00:39:33,520 --> 00:39:37,040 Speaker 1: how strong the US economy is and how much he's 683 00:39:37,120 --> 00:39:41,680 Speaker 1: kicked ass and how how he's shifted the consensus of 684 00:39:41,719 --> 00:39:44,040 Speaker 1: the world to want to reinvest in America in a 685 00:39:44,040 --> 00:39:47,960 Speaker 1: big way. But yet we also still hear, you know, 686 00:39:48,280 --> 00:39:53,440 Speaker 1: the horror stories of your generation and their inability to 687 00:39:53,440 --> 00:39:56,399 Speaker 1: buy homes, and you know, and the whole thing. 688 00:39:56,440 --> 00:39:58,120 Speaker 2: I mean, it's just a repetitive cycle. 689 00:39:58,160 --> 00:40:02,040 Speaker 1: And I and and as many I think correct pundits 690 00:40:02,040 --> 00:40:06,400 Speaker 1: have evaluated, this is the reason for a Mundani getting elected. 691 00:40:06,440 --> 00:40:10,000 Speaker 1: This is the reason for a Democratic mayor getting elected 692 00:40:10,080 --> 00:40:14,000 Speaker 1: in Miami Beach for the first time in thirty nine years. 693 00:40:15,040 --> 00:40:19,719 Speaker 1: What's your assessment of currently where we're at in the economy. 694 00:40:19,840 --> 00:40:24,040 Speaker 1: Is Trump's economic plan working? And then what's the truth 695 00:40:24,239 --> 00:40:28,759 Speaker 1: about you know, regular folks trying to eke out a 696 00:40:28,800 --> 00:40:29,359 Speaker 1: live in here. 697 00:40:29,719 --> 00:40:33,960 Speaker 2: Yeah, so listen. I will give Donald Trump credit on 698 00:40:34,120 --> 00:40:36,560 Speaker 2: reshoring to a certain extent. Okay, I think he did 699 00:40:36,680 --> 00:40:40,480 Speaker 2: popularize this issue in his first term in office. Then 700 00:40:40,520 --> 00:40:43,080 Speaker 2: what really made this takeoff is not Donald Trump. It 701 00:40:43,160 --> 00:40:47,120 Speaker 2: was COVID, Okay, because COVID changed the status quo around 702 00:40:47,200 --> 00:40:50,640 Speaker 2: free trade and globalization in Washington, d C. Didn't matter 703 00:40:50,680 --> 00:40:52,440 Speaker 2: who you voted for, you couldn't buy toilet paper and 704 00:40:52,520 --> 00:40:55,759 Speaker 2: baby formula. So everybody got on board. And I think 705 00:40:55,840 --> 00:40:59,759 Speaker 2: what's really Trump's biggest legacy to me at least, is 706 00:40:59,800 --> 00:41:03,279 Speaker 2: that he's completely shifted the Overton window around globalization. Now, 707 00:41:03,360 --> 00:41:06,240 Speaker 2: if you look like the Democratic Party, they basically agree 708 00:41:06,280 --> 00:41:10,600 Speaker 2: with them. They've just given they've completely seated that issue 709 00:41:10,640 --> 00:41:12,920 Speaker 2: and they totally agree with them. So I think he 710 00:41:13,000 --> 00:41:15,919 Speaker 2: deserves a lot of credit on that front. Okay, as 711 00:41:15,960 --> 00:41:21,400 Speaker 2: of this second term, Listen, I'm in supportive of certain tariffs. Personally, 712 00:41:21,960 --> 00:41:24,000 Speaker 2: I think he's been way too ad hoc and chaotic 713 00:41:24,040 --> 00:41:26,480 Speaker 2: about this whole thing. You can't just slap tariffs on 714 00:41:26,560 --> 00:41:28,840 Speaker 2: pull them off, you know, putting in a tariff on 715 00:41:28,840 --> 00:41:31,399 Speaker 2: Canada because of a TV commercial. That's the reason why 716 00:41:31,400 --> 00:41:33,600 Speaker 2: they're in the Supreme Court. It's getting challenged, right, So 717 00:41:34,120 --> 00:41:35,880 Speaker 2: I think teriffs need to be targeted. I think they 718 00:41:35,880 --> 00:41:37,680 Speaker 2: need to be consistent, and there needs to be like 719 00:41:37,719 --> 00:41:41,360 Speaker 2: a you know, a vision behind them, right, And so 720 00:41:42,120 --> 00:41:43,480 Speaker 2: I think tariffs are going to be around for a 721 00:41:43,520 --> 00:41:46,320 Speaker 2: long time. I think that this big increase in tariffs 722 00:41:46,360 --> 00:41:49,799 Speaker 2: that Trump basically did during Liberation Day, most of them 723 00:41:49,840 --> 00:41:51,439 Speaker 2: are going to remain in place. They're going to bring 724 00:41:51,440 --> 00:41:54,400 Speaker 2: a lot of revenue into the treasury going forward consistently. 725 00:41:55,040 --> 00:41:57,239 Speaker 2: And so I think he shifted the Overton window and 726 00:41:57,480 --> 00:42:01,040 Speaker 2: I think there are positives to tariffs. Okay, now that 727 00:42:01,120 --> 00:42:05,239 Speaker 2: all being said, I think he's managed this all very poorly. Right, 728 00:42:05,520 --> 00:42:09,080 Speaker 2: As I mentioned, it's been very chaotic the revenue from tariffs. Okay, 729 00:42:09,920 --> 00:42:11,719 Speaker 2: they have no plan for this revenue. And we're talking 730 00:42:11,719 --> 00:42:15,080 Speaker 2: about three hundred billion dollars a year. Right. They should 731 00:42:15,160 --> 00:42:17,600 Speaker 2: earmark every single dollar that comes into the treasury from 732 00:42:17,680 --> 00:42:21,120 Speaker 2: tariffs for like infrastructure modernization and other types of like 733 00:42:21,160 --> 00:42:25,360 Speaker 2: industrial policy investments. So I'm gonna invest in Intel and 734 00:42:25,400 --> 00:42:27,920 Speaker 2: take an equity stake. I'm gonna invest in this rare 735 00:42:27,960 --> 00:42:30,400 Speaker 2: earth element mining company and take an equity stake. That 736 00:42:30,440 --> 00:42:31,920 Speaker 2: should just be tariff money going into that. 737 00:42:32,080 --> 00:42:34,640 Speaker 1: You think the government should take an active stake in 738 00:42:34,680 --> 00:42:35,480 Speaker 1: these companies. 739 00:42:35,600 --> 00:42:37,960 Speaker 2: I think they're going to. And I think there's nothing 740 00:42:38,000 --> 00:42:40,560 Speaker 2: really new about this. They did this with the automakers 741 00:42:40,640 --> 00:42:43,239 Speaker 2: during two thousand and eight, two thousand and nine, right, 742 00:42:43,280 --> 00:42:47,719 Speaker 2: and I think that the situation is relatively dire, and 743 00:42:47,800 --> 00:42:50,520 Speaker 2: so listen, if they're going to invest and make money 744 00:42:50,520 --> 00:42:53,839 Speaker 2: off of these investments, I think that's a fine thing 745 00:42:54,280 --> 00:42:56,400 Speaker 2: for the taxpayer, and they should just use the tariff 746 00:42:56,440 --> 00:42:58,880 Speaker 2: revenue for all of this. Why do you say dire. 747 00:42:59,600 --> 00:43:02,719 Speaker 2: It's because there's certain key elements of supply chains we 748 00:43:02,760 --> 00:43:05,359 Speaker 2: have no control over. Rarest elements are like the most 749 00:43:05,400 --> 00:43:06,200 Speaker 2: recent ones. Yeah. 750 00:43:06,239 --> 00:43:11,040 Speaker 1: I've got some friends that are part of an organization 751 00:43:11,200 --> 00:43:19,759 Speaker 1: that tries to coordinate agreements within the US government, private companies, 752 00:43:19,840 --> 00:43:22,880 Speaker 1: mining companies, and foreign countries to put them together to 753 00:43:22,920 --> 00:43:27,759 Speaker 1: be able to for the US to exploit those rare 754 00:43:27,840 --> 00:43:30,920 Speaker 1: earth to bring some of the ninety three percent that 755 00:43:31,040 --> 00:43:34,440 Speaker 1: China dominates the world and over back to US a 756 00:43:34,880 --> 00:43:36,200 Speaker 1: national security perspective. 757 00:43:36,600 --> 00:43:38,919 Speaker 2: Yeah, so I think that's a dire situation that needs 758 00:43:38,960 --> 00:43:42,360 Speaker 2: to be rectified. And like I'm I'm generally speaking like 759 00:43:42,400 --> 00:43:45,520 Speaker 2: a libertarian person, Okay, but I think the reality is 760 00:43:45,560 --> 00:43:49,280 Speaker 2: that COVID exposed a huge problem in the United States, 761 00:43:49,840 --> 00:43:52,719 Speaker 2: and the problem is that thirty years of globalization, especially 762 00:43:53,040 --> 00:43:55,239 Speaker 2: post collapse of the Civiet Union, there is basically no 763 00:43:55,480 --> 00:43:59,719 Speaker 2: justification for unilaterally low tariff barriers. I think we gave 764 00:43:59,760 --> 00:44:03,400 Speaker 2: away the farm to other countries because it benefited you know, 765 00:44:03,520 --> 00:44:05,560 Speaker 2: one percent of people in the country, and we sold 766 00:44:05,560 --> 00:44:08,320 Speaker 2: out the middle class. And you know, there's this really 767 00:44:08,320 --> 00:44:14,239 Speaker 2: interesting paradox when it comes to economic freedom, Okay, and 768 00:44:14,400 --> 00:44:16,719 Speaker 2: the paradox is that when you have a lot of 769 00:44:16,800 --> 00:44:21,200 Speaker 2: economic freedom internationally, it leads to less economic freedom domestically 770 00:44:21,400 --> 00:44:24,719 Speaker 2: and vice versa. Right, So the United States, starting as 771 00:44:24,719 --> 00:44:29,400 Speaker 2: a country, lots of economic freedom domestically, internationally, high tariff 772 00:44:29,440 --> 00:44:33,360 Speaker 2: barriers keep England out like this is our continent, stay away. 773 00:44:34,200 --> 00:44:38,239 Speaker 2: We did not have a libertarian economic policy internationally at all, 774 00:44:38,360 --> 00:44:41,360 Speaker 2: and it led to the most free, prosperous nation in 775 00:44:41,400 --> 00:44:44,840 Speaker 2: the world because it created a very strong, fast growing 776 00:44:44,880 --> 00:44:48,080 Speaker 2: like middle class. And to have like a democracy that thrives, 777 00:44:48,120 --> 00:44:51,760 Speaker 2: you need broad representation. You need people that are paying attention, 778 00:44:51,880 --> 00:44:54,040 Speaker 2: that are invested. If you have a bunch of people 779 00:44:54,040 --> 00:44:56,880 Speaker 2: that don't own assets, and we'll get into that shortly, 780 00:44:57,440 --> 00:44:59,279 Speaker 2: you know, they have no stake in the future and 781 00:44:59,680 --> 00:45:02,239 Speaker 2: they just become demoralized and don't want to participate. And 782 00:45:02,280 --> 00:45:05,520 Speaker 2: so you need a kind of a broad middle class 783 00:45:05,960 --> 00:45:10,040 Speaker 2: to generate like a consistent, self renewing republic. And I 784 00:45:10,080 --> 00:45:13,280 Speaker 2: think the way you do that is, you know, internationally, 785 00:45:13,960 --> 00:45:17,640 Speaker 2: economic freedom is not the priority. Domestically, economic freedom is 786 00:45:17,640 --> 00:45:20,440 Speaker 2: the priority, and you have what we have, which is globalization, 787 00:45:20,480 --> 00:45:24,439 Speaker 2: in my opinion, created this huge stratification and wealth all. 788 00:45:24,520 --> 00:45:27,960 Speaker 2: You know, one percent of people have all the money. Well, 789 00:45:28,000 --> 00:45:29,640 Speaker 2: when they have all the money, they're going to use 790 00:45:29,680 --> 00:45:32,280 Speaker 2: it to lobby the government. The only people they really 791 00:45:32,320 --> 00:45:34,880 Speaker 2: have any kind of like cultural affinity with are elites 792 00:45:34,880 --> 00:45:37,960 Speaker 2: from other countries because they're just traveling to Europe and 793 00:45:38,000 --> 00:45:40,160 Speaker 2: they're traveling all over the world. They're not like in 794 00:45:40,200 --> 00:45:43,279 Speaker 2: their hometown at all. And so it creates this like 795 00:45:44,239 --> 00:45:49,000 Speaker 2: super like national class of people that are sort of 796 00:45:49,160 --> 00:45:52,560 Speaker 2: like untethered and that really only have like affinity for 797 00:45:52,600 --> 00:45:55,680 Speaker 2: each other. And I think it's a huge problem, and 798 00:45:55,760 --> 00:45:58,840 Speaker 2: it's led to us importing a lot of like Chinese 799 00:45:58,840 --> 00:46:02,120 Speaker 2: style likes, you know, censorship into the United States. How 800 00:46:02,120 --> 00:46:05,200 Speaker 2: do we keep these you know, these pearls, these peasants 801 00:46:05,239 --> 00:46:08,120 Speaker 2: from rebelling, you know, when the idea should be, hey, 802 00:46:08,160 --> 00:46:10,719 Speaker 2: how do we make our own country people feel appreciated 803 00:46:10,760 --> 00:46:13,000 Speaker 2: and part of like a greater collective that maybe I'm 804 00:46:13,160 --> 00:46:16,400 Speaker 2: I'm leading here. Right, there's no no bless obleege with 805 00:46:16,480 --> 00:46:19,800 Speaker 2: the ruling class in the America or really anywhere else anymore. 806 00:46:19,880 --> 00:46:23,200 Speaker 2: So there's a paradox of freedom. And I think we 807 00:46:23,239 --> 00:46:27,920 Speaker 2: should go away from international economic freedom towards national economic 808 00:46:28,040 --> 00:46:32,680 Speaker 2: freedom and focus on, you know, the domestic people in America. 809 00:46:32,840 --> 00:46:34,880 Speaker 2: I think that's like the ideal way to do things. 810 00:46:36,320 --> 00:46:39,680 Speaker 2: But Okay, all that being said, we'll talk about asset 811 00:46:39,719 --> 00:46:42,560 Speaker 2: holders in a second. The United States economy. Okay, Donald 812 00:46:42,560 --> 00:46:46,440 Speaker 2: Trump is bragging about the US economy and like, listen, 813 00:46:46,480 --> 00:46:50,440 Speaker 2: on the surface, like the economy is doing fine. I 814 00:46:50,480 --> 00:46:52,920 Speaker 2: think like the jobs numbers we've gotten now after the 815 00:46:52,960 --> 00:46:56,880 Speaker 2: government has reopened, shows the labor markets adding seventy thousand 816 00:46:56,960 --> 00:46:59,359 Speaker 2: jobs a month. That's slower than last year, but it's 817 00:46:59,360 --> 00:47:01,880 Speaker 2: really slower because we cracked down on illegal immigration heavily. 818 00:47:02,760 --> 00:47:05,800 Speaker 2: We've laid off three hundred thousand government employees in the 819 00:47:05,880 --> 00:47:10,200 Speaker 2: United States. That's a policy choice. So it decreases jobs, 820 00:47:10,320 --> 00:47:13,720 Speaker 2: right or job growth on net, But it's a policy choice, 821 00:47:13,760 --> 00:47:15,960 Speaker 2: and that's what Donald Trump got elected on and I 822 00:47:16,000 --> 00:47:18,120 Speaker 2: personally agree with it. Yeah, I think the federal government 823 00:47:18,160 --> 00:47:20,840 Speaker 2: was bloated, and then you've got like AI is having 824 00:47:20,920 --> 00:47:24,480 Speaker 2: a marginal effect I think as well. Right, so, hey, 825 00:47:24,600 --> 00:47:28,359 Speaker 2: job markets slowed down, but consumer spending remains strong. And 826 00:47:28,680 --> 00:47:31,040 Speaker 2: at the same time, you have this massive cap X boom, right, 827 00:47:31,080 --> 00:47:33,800 Speaker 2: all the investment in plan equipment happening in the United States, 828 00:47:33,800 --> 00:47:36,560 Speaker 2: which I do think Donald Trump deserves some credit for 829 00:47:37,200 --> 00:47:39,320 Speaker 2: and so the combination of those two things means GDP 830 00:47:39,480 --> 00:47:43,280 Speaker 2: is growing either way. Okay. I think the most interesting 831 00:47:43,360 --> 00:47:46,680 Speaker 2: question here, and one that you've alluded to, is why 832 00:47:46,760 --> 00:47:51,600 Speaker 2: has consumer spending remains so strong because the labor market, 833 00:47:51,600 --> 00:47:54,000 Speaker 2: as I mentioned, is slowing down. I think there's basically 834 00:47:54,000 --> 00:47:56,600 Speaker 2: no argument against that. I think the economy is going 835 00:47:56,640 --> 00:48:00,200 Speaker 2: to continue to grow, probably next year. I'll tell you 836 00:48:00,239 --> 00:48:04,680 Speaker 2: maybe a reason why that could change, but consumer spending 837 00:48:04,719 --> 00:48:08,160 Speaker 2: is gonna hold up. And the reason why is and 838 00:48:08,160 --> 00:48:10,680 Speaker 2: this gets to the asset owner problem we have in 839 00:48:10,760 --> 00:48:13,640 Speaker 2: the United States. My whole career, I was always told 840 00:48:13,640 --> 00:48:16,440 Speaker 2: to watch people thirty to fifty four years old, okay, 841 00:48:16,480 --> 00:48:19,840 Speaker 2: because they're the biggest producer and consumer demograph. Right. They're working, 842 00:48:19,880 --> 00:48:22,160 Speaker 2: they're starting families, they're buying houses, they're buying cars, they're 843 00:48:22,160 --> 00:48:26,040 Speaker 2: buying appliances. Right. They're the engine of the US economy 844 00:48:26,239 --> 00:48:29,080 Speaker 2: because they produce a lot, but they also consume a lot. 845 00:48:29,719 --> 00:48:32,440 Speaker 2: And you know, they have kids and they spur the 846 00:48:32,480 --> 00:48:37,080 Speaker 2: economy forward. Right. What's happened recently in the United States? 847 00:48:37,280 --> 00:48:39,759 Speaker 2: And I guess it started really ten years ago, but 848 00:48:39,880 --> 00:48:42,160 Speaker 2: as of twenty twenty two, thirty to fifty four year 849 00:48:42,160 --> 00:48:44,319 Speaker 2: olds are not the biggest consumer demographic in the United 850 00:48:44,360 --> 00:48:47,560 Speaker 2: States anymore. Today, the biggest consumer demographic in the United 851 00:48:47,600 --> 00:48:51,920 Speaker 2: States is people sixty five years or older. It's retired people. Well, okay, 852 00:48:52,480 --> 00:48:56,160 Speaker 2: and that's never happened before in the United States, and 853 00:48:56,960 --> 00:48:59,920 Speaker 2: I don't think ever before in world history. Right, Like, 854 00:49:00,200 --> 00:49:02,920 Speaker 2: you retire, you kind of step back a little bit. 855 00:49:04,360 --> 00:49:06,200 Speaker 2: You're on a fixed income or you have to you know, 856 00:49:06,239 --> 00:49:07,920 Speaker 2: your savings that you have to deal with, so you 857 00:49:07,920 --> 00:49:11,239 Speaker 2: have to be a little bit more prudent. Right today, 858 00:49:11,960 --> 00:49:16,719 Speaker 2: the baby boomers have massively benefited from the asset boom 859 00:49:16,719 --> 00:49:20,360 Speaker 2: that's happened during globalization. Houses have gone way up in value, 860 00:49:21,560 --> 00:49:26,680 Speaker 2: tax advantage, savings accounts, brokerage accounts, all these different things. 861 00:49:26,680 --> 00:49:29,400 Speaker 2: They're in charge of the government, right, okay, And so 862 00:49:29,480 --> 00:49:30,760 Speaker 2: they have a lot of money to spend. 863 00:49:30,800 --> 00:49:34,600 Speaker 1: How much how much how many total assets or their 864 00:49:34,719 --> 00:49:38,000 Speaker 1: net worth? Does the boomer sixty five and over a 865 00:49:38,080 --> 00:49:40,880 Speaker 1: tribute for the economy, for the markets? 866 00:49:42,000 --> 00:49:44,960 Speaker 2: How big is that? I mean, they're twenty two percent 867 00:49:45,000 --> 00:49:47,480 Speaker 2: of consumer spending as of I think it is twenty 868 00:49:47,520 --> 00:49:50,680 Speaker 2: twenty two. So I'm guessing it's higher today because it's 869 00:49:50,680 --> 00:49:53,600 Speaker 2: been on an upper trend line for twelve years or something. 870 00:49:53,760 --> 00:49:56,840 Speaker 2: So maybe a quarter of consumer spending is baby boomers 871 00:49:56,880 --> 00:50:00,680 Speaker 2: that are retired. Okay, it's a lot in twenty twelve, 872 00:50:01,280 --> 00:50:04,480 Speaker 2: so it's not that long ago. Right. They're the lowest 873 00:50:04,480 --> 00:50:07,200 Speaker 2: consumer demographic, and before that they were always the lowest 874 00:50:07,200 --> 00:50:09,160 Speaker 2: consumer demographic in the United States. 875 00:50:09,239 --> 00:50:11,920 Speaker 1: So is that a numbers thing because there's just. 876 00:50:11,920 --> 00:50:13,800 Speaker 2: More boomers, there's more of that. 877 00:50:13,880 --> 00:50:16,960 Speaker 1: Gen X is smaller, Millennials are kind of small, and 878 00:50:16,960 --> 00:50:18,360 Speaker 1: then it blows up with gen Z. 879 00:50:18,600 --> 00:50:22,440 Speaker 2: Right, it's that, But it's also you know the fact 880 00:50:22,520 --> 00:50:27,320 Speaker 2: that the United States economic policy has been to benefit 881 00:50:27,360 --> 00:50:31,000 Speaker 2: asset owners since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Again, 882 00:50:31,040 --> 00:50:33,120 Speaker 2: I think before that you can have this globalization argument 883 00:50:33,160 --> 00:50:35,960 Speaker 2: that like it's a geopolitical thing, we need to do it. Yeah, 884 00:50:36,360 --> 00:50:38,880 Speaker 2: that it just went away after the Soviet Union collapsed, 885 00:50:38,960 --> 00:50:40,960 Speaker 2: and so after that it was just a cash grab 886 00:50:41,360 --> 00:50:43,920 Speaker 2: by asset owners. In my opinion, that was bad for 887 00:50:44,000 --> 00:50:47,239 Speaker 2: the country on net and the beneficiaries of that are 888 00:50:47,239 --> 00:50:49,520 Speaker 2: asset owners. I own a lot of assets, right, it's 889 00:50:49,520 --> 00:50:51,920 Speaker 2: good for my brokerage account. But we're getting to the 890 00:50:51,960 --> 00:50:55,320 Speaker 2: point now that like the entire economy, the consumer spending 891 00:50:55,440 --> 00:50:58,880 Speaker 2: is like the top ten percent are fifty five percent 892 00:50:58,920 --> 00:51:01,759 Speaker 2: of consumer spending, top ten percent of income earners, and 893 00:51:01,840 --> 00:51:05,759 Speaker 2: then retired people are twenty five percent or something. Right now, 894 00:51:05,840 --> 00:51:08,960 Speaker 2: there's overlap there. It's not seventy five percent of consumer spending. 895 00:51:09,000 --> 00:51:12,560 Speaker 2: But if you're a normal person, a working person, you 896 00:51:12,560 --> 00:51:15,319 Speaker 2: know you're getting a much smaller piece of the pie. 897 00:51:15,800 --> 00:51:18,400 Speaker 2: And so, yeah, people are upset because they can't afford 898 00:51:18,400 --> 00:51:21,360 Speaker 2: to buy houses or like live a middle class, normal 899 00:51:21,480 --> 00:51:24,239 Speaker 2: life because all those assets have gotten very expensive. There's 900 00:51:24,280 --> 00:51:27,000 Speaker 2: like a saying that globalization made all the stuff that 901 00:51:27,040 --> 00:51:30,600 Speaker 2: we want cheap and all the stuff that we need expensive. Right. 902 00:51:30,719 --> 00:51:32,680 Speaker 2: You can buy all the cheap junk on Amazon that 903 00:51:32,719 --> 00:51:36,040 Speaker 2: you want, but a house is going to be completely unaffordable, right, 904 00:51:36,080 --> 00:51:39,720 Speaker 2: And again that's the trade deficit. Dollars go abroad instead 905 00:51:39,719 --> 00:51:42,359 Speaker 2: of getting paid to a domestic employee, you know, they 906 00:51:42,400 --> 00:51:46,560 Speaker 2: get paid to a Chinese manufacturing firm. As the line 907 00:51:46,760 --> 00:51:49,520 Speaker 2: worker in the factory getting a dollar in his paycheck. 908 00:51:49,640 --> 00:51:53,080 Speaker 2: No management's keeping the dollars. It's going to the Chinese 909 00:51:53,120 --> 00:51:55,239 Speaker 2: Communist Party. It's going to the finance sector who at 910 00:51:55,280 --> 00:51:58,000 Speaker 2: billionaires over there. Then they reinvested in assets in the 911 00:51:58,120 --> 00:52:03,160 Speaker 2: United States. Right, So it's made wealth and equality worse. 912 00:52:03,520 --> 00:52:07,600 Speaker 2: It's made assets way too expensive in the United States, 913 00:52:08,239 --> 00:52:12,080 Speaker 2: and the entire economy is basically asset owners are running everything. 914 00:52:12,160 --> 00:52:16,400 Speaker 2: Now AI probably makes that worse, honestly, and so I 915 00:52:16,400 --> 00:52:19,720 Speaker 2: think you're going to see a massive backlash continue to happen. 916 00:52:20,280 --> 00:52:22,920 Speaker 2: You know, it's being shown up as like mom Donnie 917 00:52:22,920 --> 00:52:27,600 Speaker 2: in New York or whatever, socialism is becoming more popular 918 00:52:28,200 --> 00:52:30,440 Speaker 2: because people that did everything right and got the right 919 00:52:30,440 --> 00:52:32,480 Speaker 2: degree and took out a bunch of student loan debt 920 00:52:32,600 --> 00:52:34,879 Speaker 2: or whatever, can't afford a house, can't afford to get married, 921 00:52:34,920 --> 00:52:37,239 Speaker 2: can afford to have kids, and they see this as 922 00:52:37,320 --> 00:52:41,040 Speaker 2: very inequitable. And listen, the baby boomers saved money and 923 00:52:41,080 --> 00:52:43,200 Speaker 2: they did what they were kind of told to do, 924 00:52:43,400 --> 00:52:48,680 Speaker 2: and so I'm not blaming them specifically, but it's nice that, hey, 925 00:52:48,719 --> 00:52:51,799 Speaker 2: asset owners are huge young consumer spending. Because the job 926 00:52:51,840 --> 00:52:54,359 Speaker 2: market slows down, people spend money still, right. It makes 927 00:52:54,400 --> 00:52:58,040 Speaker 2: the economy a little bit more or like less cyclical 928 00:52:58,080 --> 00:53:02,640 Speaker 2: and makes it more stable. Right. But the problem is, Hey, 929 00:53:02,680 --> 00:53:05,239 Speaker 2: if you have all the money and you're retired and 930 00:53:05,280 --> 00:53:07,399 Speaker 2: somebody who's you know, trying to start out and buy 931 00:53:07,440 --> 00:53:10,040 Speaker 2: a house or have kids. Doesn't have any money till 932 00:53:10,040 --> 00:53:14,600 Speaker 2: they're forty years old. Right, Well, by the time you're forty, 933 00:53:14,640 --> 00:53:16,960 Speaker 2: you can't really have any kids. That's right, that's the 934 00:53:17,000 --> 00:53:19,319 Speaker 2: problem here. Yeah, I think that's a real issue. If 935 00:53:19,520 --> 00:53:23,160 Speaker 2: there was no biological clock around reproduction in humans, which 936 00:53:23,200 --> 00:53:27,040 Speaker 2: there just is scientifically, okay, this would be less of 937 00:53:27,080 --> 00:53:29,960 Speaker 2: an issue. But the problem is it's taking away people's 938 00:53:30,000 --> 00:53:32,200 Speaker 2: future essentially because they can't afford to do it in 939 00:53:32,280 --> 00:53:34,560 Speaker 2: like that window where reproduction. 940 00:53:34,120 --> 00:53:37,600 Speaker 1: Is viable thirty five right, exactly, all right, all right, 941 00:53:37,640 --> 00:53:39,719 Speaker 1: that's an incredible assessment. 942 00:53:39,760 --> 00:53:40,160 Speaker 2: Thank you. 943 00:53:40,480 --> 00:53:45,879 Speaker 1: All right, last question as well, it's two parts one 944 00:53:46,560 --> 00:53:52,520 Speaker 1: moving into twenty six. Do you feel the economy is 945 00:53:53,160 --> 00:53:55,640 Speaker 1: going to be steady? Is it going to be it's 946 00:53:55,680 --> 00:53:58,319 Speaker 1: gonna we're gonna have some volatility. If so, where might 947 00:53:58,360 --> 00:54:01,720 Speaker 1: it originate? And then your last whole thing, what can 948 00:54:02,000 --> 00:54:06,960 Speaker 1: people younger in your opinion, really focus on in terms 949 00:54:06,960 --> 00:54:12,280 Speaker 1: of developing those assets, developing you know, a way to 950 00:54:12,400 --> 00:54:16,040 Speaker 1: increase wealth and prepare and plan for the future. 951 00:54:17,120 --> 00:54:20,600 Speaker 2: Yeah, so I think next year, okay, you've got again 952 00:54:20,760 --> 00:54:24,279 Speaker 2: top heavy asset owner consumer base that's not going to 953 00:54:24,360 --> 00:54:26,480 Speaker 2: really change. So They're going to keep spending money no 954 00:54:26,480 --> 00:54:27,920 Speaker 2: matter what. They don't care how the job market of 955 00:54:27,960 --> 00:54:30,400 Speaker 2: the economy really is, right, as long as the assets 956 00:54:30,400 --> 00:54:33,200 Speaker 2: are worth a lot of money, they're going to spend money. Also, Baby, 957 00:54:33,239 --> 00:54:35,560 Speaker 2: once you're retired, it's like you're going to die eventually, 958 00:54:36,040 --> 00:54:37,880 Speaker 2: so you might you don't want to take it with you. 959 00:54:38,000 --> 00:54:41,520 Speaker 2: That's kind of the idea. I'm not trying to broad 960 00:54:41,560 --> 00:54:43,960 Speaker 2: brush the baby boomers, but that's kind of the idea 961 00:54:44,000 --> 00:54:44,719 Speaker 2: of that generation. 962 00:54:44,840 --> 00:54:48,319 Speaker 1: Okay, Well, that those assets are going to transfer to 963 00:54:48,320 --> 00:54:49,640 Speaker 1: to a certain degree, right. 964 00:54:49,480 --> 00:54:51,680 Speaker 2: Maybe, yeah, if they don't spend it all. There's like 965 00:54:51,719 --> 00:54:54,560 Speaker 2: a whole movement to like, hey, don't take anything with you, right, Yeah, 966 00:54:55,239 --> 00:54:57,879 Speaker 2: it's not leaving money to kids. It's like that's kind 967 00:54:57,880 --> 00:55:02,080 Speaker 2: of a more public, I guess, display of what's consistent 968 00:55:02,120 --> 00:55:04,120 Speaker 2: in that generation, just like I had to do it myself, 969 00:55:04,160 --> 00:55:08,520 Speaker 2: so you should too. Okay, So consumer spending is going 970 00:55:08,560 --> 00:55:10,440 Speaker 2: to probably continue to increase at the same da you 971 00:55:10,480 --> 00:55:13,600 Speaker 2: have massive foreign direct investment CAPEX happening. So the two 972 00:55:13,640 --> 00:55:16,560 Speaker 2: of those things mean GDP goes up yep. Right, so 973 00:55:16,600 --> 00:55:19,919 Speaker 2: I think the economy probably grows next year. What could 974 00:55:20,000 --> 00:55:22,960 Speaker 2: change that is the AI bubble pops. Okay, I think 975 00:55:23,000 --> 00:55:27,000 Speaker 2: that's by far the biggest risk here because listen, it's 976 00:55:27,000 --> 00:55:30,359 Speaker 2: seven companies have driven everything for years. It's a very 977 00:55:30,360 --> 00:55:32,960 Speaker 2: powerful story. I understand that. I know. I look at 978 00:55:33,000 --> 00:55:35,880 Speaker 2: AI in my life and I see most of it 979 00:55:35,920 --> 00:55:39,040 Speaker 2: as like it's kind of a parlor trick, right. It's 980 00:55:39,080 --> 00:55:42,520 Speaker 2: interesting that chat GBT can summarize things, but like, it's 981 00:55:42,520 --> 00:55:46,040 Speaker 2: not really revolutionizing production in the United States at all. No, 982 00:55:46,400 --> 00:55:49,080 Speaker 2: we don't really see it in productivity statistics at all. 983 00:55:49,760 --> 00:55:52,400 Speaker 2: MIT did a study ninety five percent of businesses that 984 00:55:52,440 --> 00:55:55,600 Speaker 2: buy AI tool see no return on investment. Wow, so 985 00:55:56,200 --> 00:56:01,880 Speaker 2: that's MIT, you know, so maybe that changes, right, But 986 00:56:02,520 --> 00:56:04,879 Speaker 2: I think a lot of this is just theoretical right now. 987 00:56:04,920 --> 00:56:08,640 Speaker 2: And I think Silicon Valley loves AI because the one 988 00:56:08,760 --> 00:56:15,399 Speaker 2: area that it's automated very effectively is computer programming. It's programming, right, 989 00:56:15,560 --> 00:56:19,480 Speaker 2: it's coding. So does that really translate into other sectors 990 00:56:19,480 --> 00:56:23,120 Speaker 2: of the economy very well? So far not really. So 991 00:56:24,040 --> 00:56:27,000 Speaker 2: I'm worried that, hey, something causes the music to stop. 992 00:56:27,360 --> 00:56:29,680 Speaker 2: These stocks fall, Okay, if they follow are going to 993 00:56:29,719 --> 00:56:31,680 Speaker 2: fall in tandem, it's going to cause a big correction 994 00:56:31,719 --> 00:56:35,040 Speaker 2: in the stock market. If that happens, one those asset 995 00:56:35,080 --> 00:56:37,319 Speaker 2: owners that are doing all the consumer spending, they look 996 00:56:37,320 --> 00:56:39,920 Speaker 2: at their brokerage accountant's down a lot. They might pull back. 997 00:56:39,960 --> 00:56:42,960 Speaker 2: They might not take that second vacation to Europe this year. Right, Okay, 998 00:56:43,560 --> 00:56:46,120 Speaker 2: I guess that does that really impact consumer spending the US? 999 00:56:46,200 --> 00:56:48,640 Speaker 2: Probably not, but you get what I'm saying, flights and 1000 00:56:49,120 --> 00:56:55,080 Speaker 2: flights whatever. Number two is all that AI data center 1001 00:56:55,160 --> 00:56:57,920 Speaker 2: construction that we've all heard so much about this year. 1002 00:56:58,160 --> 00:57:00,560 Speaker 2: All those companies probably pull back on Capex AI data 1003 00:57:00,600 --> 00:57:01,279 Speaker 2: centers as well. 1004 00:57:01,640 --> 00:57:01,759 Speaker 1: Right. 1005 00:57:02,040 --> 00:57:04,200 Speaker 2: The factory construction is going to keep happening anyway. It's 1006 00:57:04,320 --> 00:57:06,279 Speaker 2: four times as much as data centers, so I think 1007 00:57:06,360 --> 00:57:10,440 Speaker 2: there's there's some tailwind still. But Kapex slows down in 1008 00:57:10,520 --> 00:57:12,480 Speaker 2: that situation. So you have a one two bunch of 1009 00:57:12,600 --> 00:57:15,200 Speaker 2: like less consumer spending and less Capex that could cause 1010 00:57:15,239 --> 00:57:18,320 Speaker 2: a recession. So it's AI and it's impact on the 1011 00:57:18,400 --> 00:57:21,280 Speaker 2: economy and this story sort of falling apart that makes 1012 00:57:21,320 --> 00:57:24,280 Speaker 2: me the most worried. Got it as as far as 1013 00:57:24,360 --> 00:57:30,800 Speaker 2: like what could a young person do? Yeah, to get ahead, man, 1014 00:57:30,840 --> 00:57:33,920 Speaker 2: I think like spend as little time in like the 1015 00:57:33,960 --> 00:57:38,560 Speaker 2: digital world as possible. That's like my gut tells me, like, 1016 00:57:38,720 --> 00:57:41,360 Speaker 2: that's the you waste so much time in the digital world. 1017 00:57:41,880 --> 00:57:43,840 Speaker 2: I'm just as guilty of it as everybody. I travel 1018 00:57:43,920 --> 00:57:46,080 Speaker 2: for work. I'm in the airport, I'm stuck on my tone. 1019 00:57:46,680 --> 00:57:50,640 Speaker 1: But I hate But it also, you know, it benefits 1020 00:57:51,000 --> 00:57:54,480 Speaker 1: your profession as well too. It gives you greater assessment 1021 00:57:54,600 --> 00:57:55,880 Speaker 1: of all things. 1022 00:57:56,040 --> 00:57:58,080 Speaker 2: I'd like to say that, Dave, but I don't think 1023 00:57:58,120 --> 00:58:03,280 Speaker 2: it's really true. I think that maybe thirty minutes of 1024 00:58:03,360 --> 00:58:07,080 Speaker 2: my day on social media, maybe that's beneficial, but it's 1025 00:58:07,120 --> 00:58:08,560 Speaker 2: really you know, if I want to know about something, 1026 00:58:08,560 --> 00:58:12,520 Speaker 2: I read a book, right right, read more books, go outside, 1027 00:58:12,800 --> 00:58:16,959 Speaker 2: have hobbies, interact with real people. Any time you spend 1028 00:58:17,000 --> 00:58:20,040 Speaker 2: in the digital world is probably a complete waste. Ninety 1029 00:58:20,040 --> 00:58:21,320 Speaker 2: percent of the time you're on your phone is a 1030 00:58:21,440 --> 00:58:25,000 Speaker 2: waste of time easily. These companies don't care about you. 1031 00:58:25,720 --> 00:58:28,720 Speaker 2: Everything that's free is not actually free. You're you're being 1032 00:58:28,800 --> 00:58:31,560 Speaker 2: sold as the product, or you're being sold commercials like 1033 00:58:32,280 --> 00:58:36,920 Speaker 2: Instagram is a giant commercial. So I think just if 1034 00:58:36,920 --> 00:58:40,280 Speaker 2: you can interact less with digital spaces, and that takes 1035 00:58:40,320 --> 00:58:43,200 Speaker 2: a lot of discipline, it's very difficult to do create 1036 00:58:43,280 --> 00:58:46,240 Speaker 2: more bonds with people more bonds with people. Just literally 1037 00:58:46,320 --> 00:58:48,760 Speaker 2: build a skill in the real world whatever. This stuff 1038 00:58:48,840 --> 00:58:51,560 Speaker 2: doesn't seem like it matters, But the older I get, 1039 00:58:51,720 --> 00:58:54,000 Speaker 2: like the more I realize, Like I was so lucky 1040 00:58:54,040 --> 00:58:57,040 Speaker 2: to be raised in the nineties when the Internet didn't exist, 1041 00:58:57,080 --> 00:58:59,200 Speaker 2: and I was like Huckleberry Finn in like the woods 1042 00:58:59,240 --> 00:59:01,520 Speaker 2: for eight hours a day, and I know how to 1043 00:59:01,560 --> 00:59:05,680 Speaker 2: make eye contact with people. And I just hate the Internet, honestly, 1044 00:59:05,800 --> 00:59:08,640 Speaker 2: They're more powerful. It gets somewhere. I hate it and 1045 00:59:08,760 --> 00:59:10,920 Speaker 2: resent it. And I think the last time you can 1046 00:59:10,960 --> 00:59:13,840 Speaker 2: spend in digital space is like, you know, other than 1047 00:59:13,880 --> 00:59:18,600 Speaker 2: watching the Dave Rock the podcast, right, no, man, if 1048 00:59:18,680 --> 00:59:21,480 Speaker 2: people turn it off and go outside them go outside, 1049 00:59:21,560 --> 00:59:24,520 Speaker 2: touch grass, Like I know that's sort of a stereotype. 1050 00:59:24,760 --> 00:59:27,120 Speaker 2: But put your time into something else, build a skill 1051 00:59:27,320 --> 00:59:29,920 Speaker 2: and like this stuff it doesn't seem like it matters, 1052 00:59:30,080 --> 00:59:32,960 Speaker 2: but it compounds over time. Like me and you connected 1053 00:59:33,080 --> 00:59:36,040 Speaker 2: over firearms, right. I didn't get raised with firearms. I 1054 00:59:36,160 --> 00:59:37,760 Speaker 2: was just interested in them, and I put a lot 1055 00:59:37,800 --> 00:59:41,120 Speaker 2: of time into like investigating and buying them and playing 1056 00:59:41,160 --> 00:59:43,760 Speaker 2: around with them and like learning to shoot. And most 1057 00:59:43,800 --> 00:59:45,600 Speaker 2: of that time was by myself. I didn't have anybody 1058 00:59:45,640 --> 00:59:47,600 Speaker 2: else to do it. I never put it on Instagram, 1059 00:59:48,080 --> 00:59:51,320 Speaker 2: but oh it creates a connection with somebody, right, That's 1060 00:59:51,400 --> 00:59:54,600 Speaker 2: how the world works. So less time in digital spaces. 1061 00:59:55,160 --> 00:59:57,080 Speaker 2: Anybody that tells you it's about staying in touch with 1062 00:59:57,200 --> 01:00:01,200 Speaker 2: people or it's all bowl, it's all eye, it's justifying 1063 01:00:01,360 --> 01:00:04,840 Speaker 2: addiction to digital technology. This stuff is not helpful at 1064 01:00:04,880 --> 01:00:07,480 Speaker 2: all for the most part. Awesome, all right. 1065 01:00:07,560 --> 01:00:11,040 Speaker 1: Last one is what's Santa bringing Bryce in terms of 1066 01:00:11,120 --> 01:00:12,280 Speaker 1: firearms for Christmas? 1067 01:00:12,640 --> 01:00:15,440 Speaker 2: Santa's what is Santa bringing to Rice for firearms? You 1068 01:00:15,520 --> 01:00:17,680 Speaker 2: know what? I don't think I'm gonna have any other guns? 1069 01:00:17,760 --> 01:00:21,920 Speaker 2: Well that's not true. So two of my buddies just 1070 01:00:22,120 --> 01:00:27,400 Speaker 2: bought some land in Texas. So as a gift. I 1071 01:00:27,520 --> 01:00:31,080 Speaker 2: bought them like a lever action rifle. It's not really 1072 01:00:31,160 --> 01:00:33,000 Speaker 2: for me. I guess I purchased it and I'm gonna 1073 01:00:33,000 --> 01:00:34,800 Speaker 2: receive it by then. I'm just gonna pass it right 1074 01:00:34,840 --> 01:00:37,720 Speaker 2: along so they can. You'll play out their cowboy fantasies 1075 01:00:37,760 --> 01:00:41,040 Speaker 2: out there, right? Are they gonna build a range for you, Bud? 1076 01:00:41,440 --> 01:00:44,919 Speaker 2: I might have to do that myself. But that's that's 1077 01:00:45,000 --> 01:00:47,040 Speaker 2: like the big firearm news is. I think there's sort 1078 01:00:47,040 --> 01:00:49,720 Speaker 2: of like a new retro thing happening in the firearms 1079 01:00:49,760 --> 01:00:53,640 Speaker 2: absolutely right. You're seeing revolvers make a huge comeback. You're 1080 01:00:53,640 --> 01:00:55,840 Speaker 2: seeing like lever action rifles have been blowing up for 1081 01:00:55,880 --> 01:00:59,160 Speaker 2: a while, and a lot of it's like gen Z, 1082 01:00:59,320 --> 01:01:01,880 Speaker 2: it's like younger people. It's like the return to tradition 1083 01:01:02,120 --> 01:01:04,640 Speaker 2: thing with jet My Generous is a call of duty. 1084 01:01:04,720 --> 01:01:06,600 Speaker 2: It's like, yeah, I want every gun in call of 1085 01:01:06,720 --> 01:01:09,240 Speaker 2: duty that I play growing up them. It's like I 1086 01:01:09,320 --> 01:01:13,960 Speaker 2: want to collect old Smith and Wesson revolvers and yeah, 1087 01:01:14,080 --> 01:01:14,880 Speaker 2: blued steel. 1088 01:01:15,080 --> 01:01:15,280 Speaker 1: Yes. 1089 01:01:15,760 --> 01:01:17,240 Speaker 2: So I think that's going to be a huge trend 1090 01:01:17,280 --> 01:01:19,240 Speaker 2: going forward. All these used old guns are going to 1091 01:01:19,280 --> 01:01:21,840 Speaker 2: go up in value and they're pretty fun to shoot, right, 1092 01:01:21,920 --> 01:01:22,920 Speaker 2: even though they're obsolete. 1093 01:01:23,320 --> 01:01:27,560 Speaker 1: Awesome, Bryce gil Man, God bless you. Merry Christmas, and 1094 01:01:27,680 --> 01:01:30,960 Speaker 1: thank you so so much for being such an awesome 1095 01:01:31,040 --> 01:01:32,520 Speaker 1: part of the Dave Rudford. 1096 01:01:32,160 --> 01:01:36,200 Speaker 2: Show manah Man, Merry Christmas, Happy New Year. Ye awesome