Latest / Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar / 9/1/26: Army Official Resigns, China Screw You To Trump, Bond Market Chaos, Trump Defends Data Centers, GOP Panic Over Midterms

Transcript

9/1/26: Army Official Resigns, China Screw You To Trump, Bond Market Chaos, Trump Defends Data Centers, GOP Panic Over Midterms · Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hey guys, Sagar and Crystal here.
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  Speaker 4: Good morning, everybody.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: Happy Tuesday. Have an amazing show for everybody today.
• 0:36
  Speaker 3: What do we have, Crystal?
• 0:37
  Speaker 5: Indeed we do.
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: The Army Secretary has resigned after warning Trump directly about
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: the strain the Iran war is putting on the military.
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: So very interesting palace intrigue there. Putin meets with Xi
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: at an important summit of world leaders. We'll tell you
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: what that means for the world going forward. Global bond
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: sell-off continues this morning. Stock markets looking very shaky. We
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: have Trump saying, if you don't like data centers, you
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: are poor and backwards. So that'll be news to a
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: lot of our viewers out there.
• 1:07
  Speaker 3: I believe.
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: New leaked audio reveals just how screwed Republicans think that
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: they are for the midterms. We've got some new interesting
• 1:13
  Speaker 2: polls on that as well. And the main character himself,
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: Hasan Piker, is going to join us live to tell
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: us directly what he thinks of all of these relentless
• 1:22
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• 1:23
  Speaker 5: So that should be.
• 1:23
  Speaker 3: Good, too.
• 1:24
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• 1:26
  Speaker 1: Got a few questions for her.
• 1:27
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  Speaker 3: But as Crystal said, let's go ahead and start with
• 2:08
  Speaker 3: the situation in Iran. President Trump yesterday, although this did
• 2:11
  Speaker 3: not eventually come true, had been blustering to reporters, Fox
• 2:16
  Speaker 3: News included, about how he was going to hit Iran hard.
• 2:19
  Speaker 3: And this comes on the heels of some more strikes
• 2:22
  Speaker 3: in the Strait of Hormuz that just happened a few
• 2:24
  Speaker 3: hours ago.
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: Here's what he had to say. Yeah, Lawrence, good morning.
• 2:26
  Speaker 6: I just spoke with President Trump, who told Fox News
• 2:29
  Speaker 6: the United States will respond to the Iranian attack on U.S.
• 2:33
  Speaker 6: forces overnight in Jordan. The president said, we're going to
• 2:36
  Speaker 6: hit them hard. There will be a response. He indicated
• 2:39
  Speaker 6: that all of the missiles, except one, were intercepted by U.S.
• 2:43
  Speaker 6: air defense systems. One missile was identified as not going
• 2:46
  Speaker 6: to hit anything significant, and they allowed it to pass
• 2:49
  Speaker 6: through the airspace. This comes as the president said the
• 2:52
  Speaker 6: Iranians want to meet so badly, but he doesn't know
• 2:55
  Speaker 6: if you can count on them to make a deal,
• 2:57
  Speaker 6: but added that the current U.S. sanctions against the Iranian
• 3:00
  Speaker 6: regime are kicking in strongly. But again, the headline here,
• 3:03
  Speaker 6: President Trump telling Fox News that the United States will
• 3:06
  Speaker 6: respond to this attack on U.S. forces in Jordan overnight.
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: That was the attack that we covered yesterday.
• 3:12
  Speaker 3: In addition, that immediately was followed by our handy-dandy Barack
• 3:16
  Speaker 3: Ravid report. You can almost set your watch by it every...
• 3:19
  Speaker 3: 30 days, let's put it up here.
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: On the screen.
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  Speaker 3: Trump is now weighing limited strikes against Iran to curb
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: Hormuz attack. The plan, developed over the past week by
• 3:30
  Speaker 3: the Central Command and supported by Secretary Hegseth, has not
• 3:33
  Speaker 3: yet been approved, but would consider limited strikes just in
• 3:36
  Speaker 3: the Strait of Hormuz to prevent Iran from reconstituting its
• 3:39
  Speaker 3: radar and missile capabilities to attack ships.
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: Now, let's really sit with that sentence.
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: Reconstituting radar and missile capabilities to attack ships. The same
• 3:49
  Speaker 3: radar and missile capabilities that we are told on an
• 3:52
  Speaker 3: almost daily basis do not exist and that have been obliterated.
• 3:57
  Speaker 3: And yet, oh, and by the way, we were even
• 3:59
  Speaker 3: told there's no more mines that are left in the
• 4:01
  Speaker 3: Strait of Hormuz, except the only reason that the bombs
• 4:04
  Speaker 3: had to go off two days ago was to stop
• 4:07
  Speaker 3: more mines from entering the Strait of Hormuz. They even
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: say CENTCOM has now been concerned about Iran's efforts to
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: rebuild radar, air defense, anti-ship missiles in the Strait to
• 4:16
  Speaker 3: target even more ships accurately and One incident that raised
• 4:20
  Speaker 3: significant concern in recent days was an Iranian anti-aircraft missile
• 4:24
  Speaker 3: toward a U.S. F-35 fighter jet that was providing cover
• 4:28
  Speaker 3: to ships in the Strait, which means nothing has changed
• 4:33
  Speaker 3: since the day of the ceasefire when an F-35 was
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: actually clipped. And reminder that it already had been clipped
• 4:40
  Speaker 3: once before by the Houthis when it was forced to
• 4:42
  Speaker 3: take evasive action almost two years ago. at this point.
• 4:45
  Speaker 3: So their missile capabilities, their military capabilities, if they are
• 4:49
  Speaker 3: able to come that close to an F-35 today, that
• 4:52
  Speaker 3: means that the degradation that has all been promised, both
• 4:56
  Speaker 3: from the war itself and in the interim, has not materialized, period.
• 4:59
  Speaker 3: It is a stunning display, actually, of weakness on the
• 5:02
  Speaker 3: United States military's part.
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah, there are reports as well that Iran was able
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: to take out yet another MQ-9 dropper drone, which seemed
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: to be fairly credible. Additional reports of some damage in
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: Jordan that is unconfirmed. We'll basically never know because we
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: don't get any good information, can't trust anyone involved. So
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: who's to say what exactly is going on there? But,
• 5:22
  Speaker 2: you know, there's a lot to say about where we
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: are right now, including there was quite a quote recently.
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: there in that report that you pulled out immediately. They
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: say that the strategy is that we're going to, quote unquote,
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: mow the lawn with regards to Iran. Now, where have
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: you heard that before? That has long been the description
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: Israel has used to describe their policy vis-a-vis Gaza, where
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: every now and again they have to go in and
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: murder some people and blow some things up to put
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: the Palestinian population in their place. So full Israelification of
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: the United States and the United States military happening under
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: the Trump regime.
• 5:59
  Speaker 5: I don't think there's any doubt about it.
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: It appears that their view is that they can try
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: to put this on the back burner. For many Americans,
• 6:07
  Speaker 2: this has already slipped from the headlines, even as they're experiencing.
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: the impact of the Iran war at the gas pump
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: and also in the grocery store every single day. But
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: their strategy seems to be, let's just try to push
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: this off. We'll do a little bit of action here,
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: a little bit of action there that doesn't grab headlines
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: and see if we can muddle through. So far, Iran
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: seems to be basically accepting that reality. They struck back
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: in a proportional way. They did not seek to escalate.
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: They have not continued strikes, although two oil tankers appear
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: to have been hit in the Strait of Hormuz. We
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: don't know exactly what the circumstances were, whether it was Iran,
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: whether they hit mines or what exactly happened there. But
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: in any case, Iran does not look to be escalating
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: to an extraordinary degree at this point. And it's a
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: little bit perplexing because they are suffering. There is no
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: doubt about it. Their economy is in shambles. There is
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: a lot of discontent. There's reports now of gas lines
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: beginning to form in Tehran and other major cities. Inflation
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: is through the roof. So they are being squeezed economically.
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: That part is working.
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: They have not been able to to export any of
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: their oil. So they're missing out on that oil revenue.
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  Speaker 2: So to me, a question of what their plan is,
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: what their limitations are, they may be greater than we
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  Speaker 2: have thought in the past. Or if they're waiting for
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: an opera, more opportune moment to take the next move
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: on the chest.
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  Speaker 3: I do think so. I spoke with some people yesterday
• 7:26
  Speaker 3: who've been in touch with the Iranian regime. Their understanding
• 7:30
  Speaker 3: is that right now they are still so actually had
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: no idea.
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: Some of the constituted oil.
• 7:36
  Speaker 3: Which is in those estimates that are put out by
• 7:39
  Speaker 3: the Trump administration, actually includes Iranian oil. So that means
• 7:44
  Speaker 3: one of the reasons why Tehran is not trying to
• 7:46
  Speaker 3: disrupt things as much as possible is because, in fact,
• 7:50
  Speaker 3: we're probably imbibing too much U.S.
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: Propaganda.
• 7:52
  Speaker 3: Some of their oil is making it out, meaning they're
• 7:55
  Speaker 3: getting paid. So actually some dollars are currently flowing into
• 7:58
  Speaker 3: their coffers. It's not as bad as originally I thought.
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: Now, you're absolutely right. The rationing is happening.
• 8:03
  Speaker 3: But what I didn't realize is that the amount of
• 8:05
  Speaker 3: oil that they're able to sell on the market right
• 8:06
  Speaker 3: now is not zero, despite what the Trump administration said.
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  Speaker 3: So that actually kind of made me rethink why they
• 8:12
  Speaker 3: haven't decided to strike. The second thing, and this comes
• 8:15
  Speaker 3: down to the mow the lawn strategy, makes it, in
• 8:18
  Speaker 3: my opinion, even more likely that we're going to see
• 8:20
  Speaker 3: an escalation is because One of the things that Mow
• 8:23
  Speaker 3: the Lawn actually comes to mind is it was a
• 8:26
  Speaker 3: catastrophically horrific strategic decision on the Israelis' part because their
• 8:31
  Speaker 3: belief was Hamas can be managed easily. These Palestinians, they
• 8:36
  Speaker 3: get uppity every once in a while. You got to
• 8:38
  Speaker 3: go kill a few thousand of them and then return back.
• 8:41
  Speaker 3: They never would have envisioned that Hamas would be able
• 8:43
  Speaker 3: to not only double, triple down, but then be able
• 8:46
  Speaker 3: to mount October 7th, which that strategic logic of October
• 8:51
  Speaker 3: 7th is we needed. And I'm not justifying it. I'm
• 8:53
  Speaker 3: saying that they had to do such a shocking display
• 8:56
  Speaker 3: of being able to break through the enemy to show
• 8:58
  Speaker 3: that they can no longer just come in and do
• 9:00
  Speaker 3: whatever they want to them at a very limited basis.
• 9:02
  Speaker 3: They wanted to bring them in. for some sort of
• 9:05
  Speaker 3: final battle. The point, though, is that mow the lawn
• 9:09
  Speaker 3: is the definition of forever war. It is the definition
• 9:13
  Speaker 3: also of a failed strategy whenever it comes to the
• 9:16
  Speaker 3: Israelis and how they viewed, quote, managing Hamas. In this case,
• 9:20
  Speaker 3: and that's if you accept this is some grand strategic threat. Obviously,
• 9:24
  Speaker 3: you and I would have said, okay, mow the lawn
• 9:26
  Speaker 3: is not working. You guys need to come to an
• 9:27
  Speaker 3: actual deal between the two of you. Same here. Whenever
• 9:30
  Speaker 3: it comes to the U.S., and iran at the same
• 9:32
  Speaker 3: time the strategic logic is so easy for centcom and
• 9:36
  Speaker 3: for the hegseth to push because number one it keeps
• 9:39
  Speaker 3: them in the driver's seat because the longer they're in
• 9:41
  Speaker 3: the driver's seat they get the ego boost they get
• 9:43
  Speaker 3: all the dollars that are flowing i mentioned the f-35
• 9:46
  Speaker 3: you'll be happy to know that lockheed martin just informed
• 9:49
  Speaker 3: congress yesterday that the price of the f-35 has gone
• 9:51
  Speaker 3: up by 10 percent And that 10 percent.
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: Is, quote, for necessary repair.
• 9:57
  Speaker 3: Great. Ten percent of hundreds of billions. You can all
• 10:01
  Speaker 3: guess where all that's going. And it's to a bunch
• 10:04
  Speaker 3: of mansions in northern Virginia. Inflation. It's inflation, guys. It's
• 10:08
  Speaker 3: just inflation like everywhere else in our economy.
• 10:11
  Speaker 2: You also one thing I'm curious for your view of
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: that I've been thinking about is I wonder if this
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: conflict does have some additional dimensions that echo the Russia-Ukraine war,
• 10:22
  Speaker 2: where in the early days of Russia invades Ukraine and
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: they get smacked in the face. Ukraine is way more
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: capable than they thought. They're fighting with outdated techniques. They're
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: kind of in disarray. It's very humiliating, embarrassing for them.
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: I remember covering all those things, their tanks getting stuck
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: in the woods and the mud and all of this. Now,
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: over time, Russia has learned and they have adapted. And
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: so they were able to, you know, take more territory
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: and be more on the front foot.
• 10:52
  Speaker 5: Now it's, you know, more or less a stalemate.
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: But with Russia having the upper hand at this point,
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: I wonder if there isn't a similar dynamic that plays
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: out here. We got smacked in the face, but our
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: leaders are pretty stupid, but they are capable of learning
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: something from this and seem to be attempting to adapt
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: their techniques as well. So it could be a similar
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: dynamic where it's not that Iran is able to fully
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: defeat us and assert their will indefinitely. That there is
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: some learning that happens on the U.S. side and some
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: adjustment that at least leads it to kind of a
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: stalemate situation, which is basically what we're in right now.
• 11:27
  Speaker 3: Very true.
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: However, several key differences.
• 11:29
  Speaker 3: It is literally, I mean, this is kind of a
• 11:31
  Speaker 3: weird thing to say, but nations have characters, right? the
• 11:35
  Speaker 3: character of Russia in all of its history is we
• 11:38
  Speaker 3: do something incredibly stupid. We lose a ton of men.
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: We are humiliated on the world stage. We retrench. We
• 11:46
  Speaker 3: have mass social chaos. However, it usually dies down. Then
• 11:51
  Speaker 3: we triple, quadruple down. We put everything in and we
• 11:54
  Speaker 3: win in the most brutal and bloody way possible. Happened
• 11:56
  Speaker 3: in the Second World War, Operation Barbarossa. It happened in
• 11:59
  Speaker 3: the First World War, although of course it had the
• 12:01
  Speaker 3: Bolshevik Revolution. But My point just being that if you
• 12:04
  Speaker 3: look over the course of their history, their acceptance for
• 12:08
  Speaker 3: massive casualty, the bar on that is it's a world
• 12:11
  Speaker 3: you and I cannot even conceive of where 20 percent
• 12:13
  Speaker 3: of your population gets killed or in this case is
• 12:16
  Speaker 3: hundreds of thousands of casualties. I mean the United States
• 12:20
  Speaker 3: socially erupted over 50,000 deaths in Vietnam. They're looking at
• 12:24
  Speaker 3: many orders of magnitude higher than that, and nothing.
• 12:27
  Speaker 5: Is happening on that street.
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: Well, and I do think that is the biggest difference
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: is the Russian population, whether we like it or not—
• 12:33
  Speaker 2: They support the war.
• 12:34
  Speaker 5: They supported the war.
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: You know, there was— I mean, as far as we could tell,
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: there was a high degree of support for the Russian
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: invasion of Ukraine. And with the Iran war, there was
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: very low support. American support, public support. There was very
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: little effort, even to propagandize us into supporting the war.
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: They're still desperately trying to land on some narrative. Trump
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: is back to talking about the dead protesters again. Now
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: the number's up to 100,000.
• 12:58
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's 100K now.
• 12:59
  Speaker 5: Keeps climbing up.
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: Went double.
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: We can see how much he cares deeply about Iranian
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: civilians from his actions in this war.
• 13:06
  Speaker 5: But I do think you're right.
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: That is a key difference is there's just not the
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: same political horizon for Trump, which is something that the
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: Iranians have spoken out about wanting to capitalize on, that
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: they believe even as much as he blusters about not
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: really caring about what happens in the midterms, that delivering
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: a humiliating political blow to him will be as important
• 13:28
  Speaker 2: as any other tactic that they could deploy in this war.
• 13:31
  Speaker 3: Right. And I'll give– even World War II, everybody has
• 13:34
  Speaker 3: this idea that the United States was like so unified
• 13:38
  Speaker 3: over World War II. And don't get me wrong. The
• 13:41
  Speaker 3: last 400,000 Americans died in the war. But by the end,
• 13:45
  Speaker 3: whenever victory was close, there was serious pressure on the
• 13:48
  Speaker 3: Roosevelt administration. And this is a war where, what, 98
• 13:52
  Speaker 3: percent of the public died? supported.
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: They're like, hey, we need to wrap this up with Truman.
• 13:56
  Speaker 3: That's part of the reason why they decided to do
• 13:58
  Speaker 3: the atomic bomb is there's like there is no appetite
• 14:00
  Speaker 3: whatsoever for a Pacific invasion of the islands of Japan,
• 14:04
  Speaker 3: which could potentially 1.5, 2 million men. We would take
• 14:07
  Speaker 3: hundreds of thousands of casualties. In fact, you know, the
• 14:10
  Speaker 3: island campaign and the bloody toll that happened in Iwo
• 14:13
  Speaker 3: Jima and Okinawa, that shocked people, especially after VE Day.
• 14:17
  Speaker 3: They're like, wait, we're still losing?
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: All of these people. So like the character of our
• 14:21
  Speaker 1: nations is dramatically different.
• 14:23
  Speaker 3: And that was in a war where again, the vast
• 14:25
  Speaker 3: majority of the U S population supported the war and
• 14:28
  Speaker 3: supported the aims. Even they were like, these casualties are
• 14:31
  Speaker 3: too many. And if you look at it a percent
• 14:33
  Speaker 3: basis compared to what the other allies in the war suffered,
• 14:36
  Speaker 3: it's nothing right. Compared to what these nations actually like
• 14:39
  Speaker 3: between Britain and, um, Soviet Union. So my only point
• 14:43
  Speaker 3: is just we are a nation which democratically can support
• 14:46
  Speaker 3: or we can tolerate casualties, but we always need constant
• 14:49
  Speaker 3: reassurance like this thing is going to end in an
• 14:52
  Speaker 3: eventual manner. And that's why generally Iran has the strategic
• 15:00
  Speaker 3: offense on its side because it's able to exploit these
• 15:03
  Speaker 3: already existing divisions just like the North Vietnamese did, or
• 15:06
  Speaker 3: the Korean War, another very forgotten conflict here in the
• 15:09
  Speaker 3: United States where, you know, dramatic public opinion turns against
• 15:12
  Speaker 3: the war and is like, we need this thing to
• 15:15
  Speaker 3: wrap up because there's no end in sight. And these,
• 15:17
  Speaker 3: you know, high-minded stopping communism only to a certain extent.
• 15:21
  Speaker 3: Are we going to sit there and are we going
• 15:23
  Speaker 3: to take it? Same with what's happening in Iran. Let's
• 15:25
  Speaker 3: get to A8 because you mentioned this at the top.
• 15:27
  Speaker 3: Very important, actually. Dan Driscoll, who's the U.S. Army Secretary,
• 15:31
  Speaker 3: resigned yesterday, effective immediately. He said, Driscoll brought up concerns
• 15:36
  Speaker 3: with the administration surrounding army transformation and readiness and Hegsatz
• 15:41
  Speaker 3: blocking those efforts specifically by firing the generals who were responsible.
• 15:46
  Speaker 3: There's some more details that broke overnight in The Atlantic,
• 15:49
  Speaker 3: and here's what I'm going to read. Dan Driscoll brought
• 15:51
  Speaker 3: the concerns about the future of the army directly to
• 15:54
  Speaker 3: President Trump in his resignation, a sign of the tensions
• 15:58
  Speaker 3: between the two leaders. Trump was surprised when Driscoll told him,
• 16:01
  Speaker 3: How many generals, top officers have been fired, pushed out,
• 16:04
  Speaker 3: or passed.
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: Over for promotion?
• 16:05
  Speaker 3: Driscoll argued the army could not transform itself the way
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: that it needs to because of the departure of so
• 16:11
  Speaker 3: many leaders. Added that Trump had expressed concern about the
• 16:13
  Speaker 3: deep cuts to army leadership. Driscoll's personal appeal to Trump
• 16:17
  Speaker 3: was directly to stop Hegsett's meddling in the army. And
• 16:21
  Speaker 3: one of the, this again, it can seem kind of Byzantine,
• 16:23
  Speaker 3: but Dan Driscoll is somebody who was very close with
• 16:27
  Speaker 3: the vice president in law school. So their relationship goes
• 16:30
  Speaker 3: back decades. Everything I understand is that he was much
• 16:34
  Speaker 3: more closer to the vice president or to me whenever
• 16:37
  Speaker 3: it comes to his foreign policy views. He wanted to
• 16:39
  Speaker 3: transform the U.S. Army into what you were talking about,
• 16:43
  Speaker 3: an adaption, adapting their doctrine and their fighting technique. Now, again,
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: just to get back in the weeds, don't forget that
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: Pete Hegstead very recently actually disbanded the drone unit. which
• 16:54
  Speaker 3: is in the U.S. Army, and has decided to take
• 16:57
  Speaker 3: that away, even though we're in the middle of the
• 17:00
  Speaker 3: Iran war. So a lot of this is pissing contests,
• 17:02
  Speaker 3: but the strategic reality of it does matter quite a bit.
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: I don't have some great reverence.
• 17:07
  Speaker 3: A lot of these people are saying people who lost
• 17:09
  Speaker 3: us the war in Afghanistan, you know, so it's not
• 17:11
  Speaker 3: like exactly they're the world's most visionary. But what they
• 17:15
  Speaker 3: did have was a level of professionalism and at least knowledge.
• 17:19
  Speaker 3: General Milley, who I have a lot of criticisms of, remember,
• 17:22
  Speaker 3: he was the one who said, hey, we need a
• 17:23
  Speaker 3: ceasefire in Ukraine. He was very, very clear about the
• 17:27
  Speaker 3: drone threat which was coming. Hegseth and Driscoll's departure should
• 17:30
  Speaker 3: be seen as a proxy both of control, but also
• 17:34
  Speaker 3: of the inability right now to move the military forward
• 17:38
  Speaker 3: in a time when we need absolutely radical change, and
• 17:41
  Speaker 3: not only in the midst of what's happened with the
• 17:43
  Speaker 3: drone warfare, But like.
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: I just said, F-35 price just went up by 10%.
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: Nobody sneezes in Washington.
• 17:49
  Speaker 3: We're talking about hundreds of billions like this just lit
• 17:52
  Speaker 3: on fire.
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: Well, and it'd be one thing if the sense was like, oh,
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: Hegseth is like cutting the fat from the military and
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: getting out the generals that aren't performing up to par.
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: But we all know that's not what this is about.
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: It's just about a loyalty test and who he thinks
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: is going to be under his thumb, who he thinks
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: might have an independent bone in their body. And that
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: was the problem with Dan Driscoll, you know, quite obviously.
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: It says his purge, this Atlantic piece says his purge
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: to the military has been so dramatic that with Driscoll gone,
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: the Army is left without a top civilian leader, a
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: Senate-confirmed top general, a confirmed Army general in charge of operations,
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: or a confirmed commander of Army troops in Europe. Because
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: of all the firings across the surface over the past year,
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: the Army, with more than 450,000 active-duty soldiers positioned across
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: the globe, has fewer generals than at any point in
• 18:37
  Speaker 2: recent history. So, you know, just put yourself in the
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: shoes of, like, reverse the rules. If we saw this
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: kind of turmoil among the Iranian top military brass, we'd say, oh,
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: they're in chaos.
• 18:50
  Speaker 5: It's in tumult. You know, people are being.
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: Fired right and left because the strategy is a disaster
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: and heads are rolling. And so that's very much what
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: it looks like here. You're having these internal battles. Driscoll
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: is correct on the merits about the strain that the
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: Iran war is putting on the military. And we now
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: know from some of the inside reporting that Hegseth was
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: really instrumental in pushing for this war to begin with
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: and saying any sort of objection that was raised about
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: the costs and the problems and the way that Iran
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: would respond, he would say and Kaine would say, don't worry, sir,
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: we'll figure it out.
• 19:23
  Speaker 5: We've got it.
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: We can go forward. You can be the great man
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: of history. This will all go really smoothly. So now
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: that you have someone who has been sounding the alarm
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: and went to Trump directly with his concerns before resigning,
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: That was unacceptable to Hegseth that you had someone who
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: was telling the truth about what a disaster this has
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: been for the military.
• 19:41
  Speaker 3: It also is what gives Trump these like psychosexual fantasies
• 19:45
  Speaker 3: that he posts on AI. Like let's put A4 up
• 19:48
  Speaker 3: here online. on the screen where Trump posted this video
• 19:54
  Speaker 3: of AI showing Karg Island being blown to smithereens, literally
• 20:00
  Speaker 3: like I mean, not even as high quality as like
• 20:03
  Speaker 3: a Call of Duty video, but these are what we're
• 20:07
  Speaker 3: eventually reduced to, is like military victory through false image
• 20:11
  Speaker 3: generation and not actually being able to do anything on
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: the military side. We have, like you said, You know,
• 20:18
  Speaker 3: I love that rule. Take a look. How would you think?
• 20:22
  Speaker 3: Remember when China fired their top general? We're like, oh, wow.
• 20:25
  Speaker 5: What's going on?
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: You know, what's what's happening here?
• 20:27
  Speaker 3: If Russia, Ukraine just fired their top defense secretary is
• 20:31
  Speaker 3: a huge scandal, actually, in Ukraine. By the way, he's
• 20:33
  Speaker 3: started defense tech startup. trying to sell drone technology to
• 20:36
  Speaker 3: everybody else. So he's going to make plenty of money,
• 20:38
  Speaker 3: apparently from taxpayer, probably what he didn't steal.
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: You know what, to be honest, we should probably learn
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: from those. He probably had something worth selling, to be
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: honest with you.
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: Just saying, there's something grotesque about it. You know, you
• 20:49
  Speaker 3: immediately leave and you're like, hey, let me go make
• 20:51
  Speaker 3: billions of dollars. Let me go cash in. Anyway, especially
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: whenever we were the ones who funded you in the
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: first place, but okay. So we take a step back
• 20:58
  Speaker 3: and we can see that we have turmoil at the
• 21:00
  Speaker 3: top ranks of our military with major asset problems. The
• 21:05
  Speaker 3: 82nd Airborne, remember when they were deployed to Iran, they
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: just got a letter, all of them, the deployment letter
• 21:11
  Speaker 3: leaked on Reddit where they're told you're all staying for
• 21:15
  Speaker 3: the foreseeable future. There are some reports that are actually
• 21:18
  Speaker 3: coming out of the army already that the extension has
• 21:21
  Speaker 3: been lined up to 2027 for the 82nd airborne. And
• 21:24
  Speaker 3: so they're actually finding troops that will go and replace
• 21:28
  Speaker 3: some of the people who are already currently forwardly deployed.
• 21:31
  Speaker 3: So this thing's not wrapping up anytime soon. And the
• 21:34
  Speaker 3: expectation from Tehran is actually this is all just a
• 21:37
  Speaker 3: lull and that after the midterms when Trump is a
• 21:39
  Speaker 3: lame duck and has nothing to lose, he's going to
• 21:41
  Speaker 3: go all out. And I think you can see some
• 21:43
  Speaker 3: of the steps. I'm not saying it will happen, but
• 21:44
  Speaker 3: it is very possible. that it could happen. And in
• 21:47
  Speaker 3: the meantime, the world is changing dramatically.
• 21:49
  Speaker 5: Yeah, no doubt about it.
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: I mean, this should be seen in conjunction with the
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: story we covered yesterday about the number of top military
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: brass who issued what they call non-concur with the decision
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: to continue with the Iran war. with the characterization being it's,
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: quote unquote, too much for too long. So there's just
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: too much strain. And while yesterday's action was very limited,
• 22:11
  Speaker 2: the engagement between the U.S.
• 22:13
  Speaker 5: And Iran, we talked about how even that.
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: The estimates are expended something like one sixth of our
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: remaining stockpile of Patriot missile interceptors. So we may have
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: a lot of old dumb bombs that we can just drop.
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: But in terms of the long-range, more modern, technologically advanced munitions, we.
• 22:35
  Speaker 5: Continue to be in deep trouble with that.
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: The problems with our sailors aboard these carriers and other
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: warships have not been resolved.
• 22:42
  Speaker 5: That continues to be a major issue.
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: And ultimately, that does impact your ability to perform effectively
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: if the men and women you're depending on are exhausted
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: and underfed and you know, contemplating suicide and having a
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: horrible time of it. Yeah, of course, that's going to
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: impact your ability to be able to move forward with
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: your plans. But, you know, Trump and Hegseth, to them,
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: it's all just sort of unreal. They're disconnected from it. Just,
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: you know, Trump especially is used to just being the CEO.
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: And if he decides he wants to do a thing,
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: then everyone else has to figure out how to make
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: it happen. He doesn't want to hear any objections. And so,
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: you know, I don't I doubt that he probably really
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: took in what Driscoll had to say. There's a reason
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: why Driscoll resigned immediately after taking those concerns to Trump.
• 23:26
  Speaker 2: And he can sleep at night, at least knowing that
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: he did what he could to raise the alarms about
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: the concerns that he had.
• 23:31
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 23:32
  Speaker 3: He tried, but he's been, you know, sidelined for months now.
• 23:35
  Speaker 3: He's been trying to drum him out of office. Last
• 23:37
  Speaker 3: thing I just want to mention in terms of the
• 23:39
  Speaker 3: situation in Hormuz, let's put up Sal's tweet up here.
• 23:43
  Speaker 3: So Sal from What's Going On With Shipping has found
• 23:47
  Speaker 3: four attacks in Hormuz just overnight that all happened. Shout
• 23:52
  Speaker 3: out to him, by the way, and subscribe to his channel.
• 23:54
  Speaker 3: But you can see that the firing at four of
• 23:57
  Speaker 3: those distinct ships all in the Strait of Hormuz, you
• 24:00
  Speaker 3: can see that Iran is not stepping back anytime soon
• 24:04
  Speaker 3: and at the very least are trying to exert even
• 24:05
  Speaker 3: more pressure, which is currently working. I believe that the
• 24:09
  Speaker 3: price of oil spiked or continued to go up today.
• 24:13
  Speaker 3: So sitting around $ 92 a barrel and Brent crude. So
• 24:17
  Speaker 3: remains pretty high, even with not a ton of kinetic
• 24:21
  Speaker 3: action happening. But the reason why it went back up
• 24:24
  Speaker 3: was the general sense that this is going to continue
• 24:27
  Speaker 3: in this direction. But as I said about a changing world,
• 24:29
  Speaker 3: the Shanghai Cooperation Organization meeting is happening right now in Kyrgyzstan.
• 24:33
  Speaker 3: And there's a lot of interesting updates are coming out
• 24:35
  Speaker 3: of it. Let's get to it. Turning now to the SCO,
• 24:40
  Speaker 3: which is currently happening in Kyrgyzstan. Let's put this up here.
• 24:43
  Speaker 3: Biggest news has come out of the meeting so far.
• 24:45
  Speaker 3: So it's a major summit organized by the great powers
• 24:48
  Speaker 3: in Asia. Iran is actually party right now to this meeting.
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: And the president, Peshawar Khan, actually issued a statement on
• 24:55
  Speaker 3: the sidelines there this morning saying, quote, if the United
• 24:58
  Speaker 3: States returns to its commitments in the memorandum of understanding,
• 25:01
  Speaker 3: the Islamic Republic of Iran will immediately reciprocate. The reason
• 25:05
  Speaker 3: why I think that this is important is that this
• 25:07
  Speaker 3: is happening, obviously, at the same meeting with the gathering
• 25:11
  Speaker 3: of some of the world's most powerful powers. And these powers,
• 25:15
  Speaker 3: many are directly, in most cases, opposed to the United States.
• 25:19
  Speaker 3: Let's go to the next one just to show you
• 25:21
  Speaker 3: a little bit of how things have changed, even since
• 25:24
  Speaker 3: our last SEO and in many cases over the years.
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: You see here the New York Times analysis. The summit
• 25:29
  Speaker 3: with Russia, India, and Iran shows leverage wars have given
• 25:33
  Speaker 3: Xi of China. And I noticed this at the very
• 25:38
  Speaker 3: beginning of the SEO, which is getting zero coverage, really,
• 25:41
  Speaker 3: in our Western media, even though you have the gathering
• 25:44
  Speaker 3: of China and India here, so two of the world's
• 25:47
  Speaker 3: most populous countries, almost a third of the entire global population.
• 25:51
  Speaker 3: You have two of the antagonists in the war, which
• 25:54
  Speaker 3: the West is currently at war with, Russia and Iran,
• 25:57
  Speaker 3: which are both present and having meetings. What the Times
• 26:00
  Speaker 3: points to is how China is using this SCO summit
• 26:04
  Speaker 3: currently in Kyrgyzstan as a direct picture of what multipolarity
• 26:09
  Speaker 3: and its world-leading status looks like right before it comes
• 26:14
  Speaker 3: to the United States. President Xi will be here sometime
• 26:17
  Speaker 3: next month. He's going to do some tours. He's going
• 26:19
  Speaker 3: to do some big meetings with Donald Trump. But the
• 26:21
  Speaker 3: SCO summit this time around is to flex, and I
• 26:24
  Speaker 3: read through all of their official communiques. They consistently say,
• 26:28
  Speaker 3: we are committed to a rising BRICS. We are committed
• 26:31
  Speaker 3: to mutual respect in a multipolar world. We are committed
• 26:34
  Speaker 3: to international law as they like to see it. But
• 26:38
  Speaker 3: what you see even more clearly, actually, is the continuing
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: realignment of the region towards China. So they point to
• 26:46
  Speaker 3: Xi has bailed out Putin from many of the economic
• 26:49
  Speaker 3: sanctions the West put upon him. They've been able to
• 26:52
  Speaker 3: flood the consumer goods and the banking system in Russia
• 26:55
  Speaker 3: to provide them a lifeline. India, though, is, in my opinion,
• 26:59
  Speaker 3: the most interesting part of the summit, because India, of course,
• 27:02
  Speaker 3: long time has juggled its relations between Russia, China, and
• 27:05
  Speaker 3: the United States. They really want to be a center power,
• 27:08
  Speaker 3: which is beholden to nobody. But what they see here
• 27:11
  Speaker 3: is that India has taken upon itself a role of,
• 27:14
  Speaker 3: we are going to do solely what's good for us. Sometimes,
• 27:17
  Speaker 3: and including right now, that means kind of saying, screw you,
• 27:21
  Speaker 3: to the United States.
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: You actually saw this directly.
• 27:24
  Speaker 3: The very first day of the summit, put B2 up
• 27:26
  Speaker 3: here on the screen, Modi put out this picture of
• 27:29
  Speaker 3: meeting with the Iranian President Peshikhan in Bishkek. He says,
• 27:34
  Speaker 3: we reiterated our commitment to strengthening India's longstanding friendship with
• 27:38
  Speaker 3: Iran across diverse sectors. We want to expand and diversify
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: our trade basket in the times to come. We had
• 27:44
  Speaker 3: a discussion on the prevailing situation in the region. India
• 27:47
  Speaker 3: continues to support all efforts aimed at ensuring a lasting peace.
• 27:51
  Speaker 3: And he, again, you know, he listed in Hindi and
• 27:54
  Speaker 3: in Farsi. The point, though, that you see is a
• 27:57
  Speaker 3: smiling picture of the two of them meeting on the sidelines,
• 28:00
  Speaker 3: diversifying our trade basket, not backing down from the purchases
• 28:04
  Speaker 3: of future Iranian oil and their longstanding commitments. You also
• 28:08
  Speaker 3: saw China continuing to push the line, both with Russia
• 28:12
  Speaker 3: and Iran, of multipolarity and of strengthening their own system.
• 28:16
  Speaker 3: So nothing earth-shaking has come out of the meeting, per se,
• 28:21
  Speaker 3: but I feel like not enough of the world is
• 28:23
  Speaker 3: paying attention to what's happening because it's very obvious that
• 28:27
  Speaker 3: they're using it as a grand flex and including, especially
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: right now, as the G20 finance ministers are all meeting,
• 28:35
  Speaker 3: I believe here in the United States, the direct opposition
• 28:39
  Speaker 3: of those two and of the rise of a new order,
• 28:41
  Speaker 3: of a new leader who's able to push things in
• 28:44
  Speaker 3: his own direction to float the powers of Iran and
• 28:47
  Speaker 3: of Russia and to really point to the West and say, hey,
• 28:49
  Speaker 3: there's nothing you can do to any of us, that's
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: the big picture that they want coming into their summit
• 28:55
  Speaker 3: with Washington.
• 28:56
  Speaker 5: Yeah, that's right.
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: Creating more independence from the U.S. I mean, there's a
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: lot to say about this. With regard to that summit
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: that's happening in Asheville, North Carolina, actually the Russian finance
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: minister is there, which is significant. A lot of the
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: European countries were very.
• 29:09
  Speaker 5: Upset about that.
• 29:09
  Speaker 3: Yep. They refused to meet with him. Right.
• 29:12
  Speaker 5: But he met directly with Scott Besson.
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: So it shows you how significant Russia's position is in
• 29:18
  Speaker 2: the world that we feel like we can't ice them out.
• 29:21
  Speaker 5: At this point.
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: And China is a big part of the reason why
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: Russia's economy has remained as resilient as it has. China
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: is a big part of the reason behind the scenes
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: that Iran has been able to perform as well as
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: they have. And then Iran has also been beneficial to Russia.
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: They've provided the drones that have helped Russia on the
• 29:38
  Speaker 2: battlefield as well.
• 29:39
  Speaker 5: So you can see in the line between these three.
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: Countries that they are all mutually benefiting from the relationships
• 29:46
  Speaker 2: that they have. China seems to have taken from our
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: misadventures in the Middle East that they want to avoid
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: getting themselves directly involved in these foreign adventures. So it's
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: not like you're going to see them come in directly
• 30:01
  Speaker 2: on the side of Iran or Russia or anything like that.
• 30:04
  Speaker 2: But that doesn't mean that they're not extremely influential behind
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: the scenes. And in particular, we've talked a lot about
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: their impact on the oil market. They've kind of saved
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: our ass by decreasing the amount of oil they have
• 30:16
  Speaker 2: been importing by an extraordinary amount. We talked to Rory
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: Johnson yesterday about about how that is starting to shift.
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: We don't know how quickly, but in any case, China
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: has certainly shown that they have a lot of cards
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: to play in their negotiations with us. It's a very
• 30:31
  Speaker 2: tenuous relationship, a bit of a detente on the sort
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: of economic warfare front.
• 30:35
  Speaker 5: Between us and China.
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: But, you know, highly significant to see all of these
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: leaders meeting together and, you know, and a sort of
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: a glimpse into the future of this alliance, which I
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: think will continue to strengthen. And especially as Trump does
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: everything he can to weaken the U.S. and force our
• 30:58
  Speaker 2: allies to look at other places as well.
• 31:00
  Speaker 3: Yeah, you were talking about Putin. Let's put B3 up
• 31:02
  Speaker 3: here on the screens. Interesting analysis from the journal. Obviously,
• 31:05
  Speaker 3: you know, they've got their own little bias in here,
• 31:07
  Speaker 3: but there's some factoids which are worth kind of ruminating on.
• 31:10
  Speaker 3: So they say Putin turns again to China's Xi as
• 31:13
  Speaker 3: Russia's clout crumbles. So he says, Russia has suffered from
• 31:16
  Speaker 3: a summer of painful strikes by Ukraine on its oil
• 31:18
  Speaker 3: and gas industry. China has yet emerged from the global
• 31:21
  Speaker 3: shock of the Iran war with more power over oil
• 31:24
  Speaker 3: markets and greater resilience against the West. The shifting power
• 31:28
  Speaker 3: status is front and center when they are meeting in Kyrgyzstan.
• 31:31
  Speaker 3: Evident will be their shared resistance to U.S. power, where
• 31:35
  Speaker 3: the sidelines of the summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization
• 31:38
  Speaker 3: that include Iran will give the regime a measure of
• 31:41
  Speaker 3: added international recognition and They specifically point to, like I
• 31:45
  Speaker 3: said earlier, the lifelines, economic lifelines they've thrown both to
• 31:48
  Speaker 3: Iran and to Russia. They also point to, in some ways,
• 31:52
  Speaker 3: this is even kind of a message to Russia itself
• 31:55
  Speaker 3: of you come to us because Kyrgyzstan, traditionally in the
• 31:58
  Speaker 3: Russian sphere of influence, Moscow actually apparently, I didn't even
• 32:01
  Speaker 3: know this, has an air force base in Kyrgyzstan. But
• 32:04
  Speaker 3: Kyrgyzstan has now begun to turn towards Beijing. So with
• 32:07
  Speaker 3: the power going towards Beijing, it's a realignment on the continent.
• 32:12
  Speaker 3: also point specifically to Moscow's dependence on China, not just
• 32:16
  Speaker 3: for the consumer goods, but also in terms of a
• 32:19
  Speaker 3: banking system where they're able to exact and do trade
• 32:23
  Speaker 3: outside of the Western sanctions. And so that seems to
• 32:26
  Speaker 3: be the key point that both Iran and Russia are
• 32:29
  Speaker 3: relying on and why both of them made kind of
• 32:33
  Speaker 3: a big show, in addition really to India, which has
• 32:35
  Speaker 3: always juggled SEO and has always looked at it a
• 32:38
  Speaker 3: bit skeptically. They don't want to be seen necessarily as
• 32:41
  Speaker 3: kowtowing to chinese interest but they want to maintain strategic
• 32:44
  Speaker 3: balance and i do think that coming at this time
• 32:47
  Speaker 3: of the iran war one thing that we always would
• 32:50
  Speaker 3: emphasize was with asia is japan and south korea are
• 32:54
  Speaker 3: solidly in our corner they kind of have to be
• 32:56
  Speaker 3: constitutionally and just decades long everybody else is up for
• 33:01
  Speaker 3: grabs you know everybody else is like i don't know
• 33:04
  Speaker 3: maybe china looks a little attractive they're not starting wars
• 33:08
  Speaker 3: they're not driving up my gas prices Remember, India suffered dramatically, really,
• 33:12
  Speaker 3: in terms of the natural gas shortage that came out
• 33:14
  Speaker 3: in the early days of the war. They had huge
• 33:16
  Speaker 3: price spikes and actually caused real problems for them. They
• 33:18
  Speaker 3: even had a protest movement, which we didn't end up covering,
• 33:21
  Speaker 3: but it was pretty significant. One of the more domestic,
• 33:23
  Speaker 3: larger domestic protest movements in the entire history of the
• 33:26
  Speaker 3: Modi government. Not entirely economic, but some of it is
• 33:29
  Speaker 3: related at least to social dysfunction that's currently happening on
• 33:33
  Speaker 3: the ground there. A lot of that can be pointed
• 33:35
  Speaker 3: towards the United States and, of course, his own leadership.
• 33:38
  Speaker 3: So he has to figure out you know, his main goal,
• 33:41
  Speaker 3: like any leader of a developing nation is like, I
• 33:43
  Speaker 3: have to keep this engine going and belief in the future.
• 33:46
  Speaker 3: And you can see then that they're not pointing and
• 33:49
  Speaker 3: looking to the United States in a way that even
• 33:51
  Speaker 3: 10 years ago, it would have been relatively unthinkable to
• 33:55
  Speaker 3: see such an embrace, you know, of, abject opponents to
• 34:00
  Speaker 3: the U.S.
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: Empire of both Russia and Iran. That's really what I
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: see out of this.
• 34:04
  Speaker 5: I mean, India's had huge skirmishes and issues with China.
• 34:07
  Speaker 3: Of course, yeah.
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: They already fought a war. Yeah, so it's a big
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: deal to see that direct collaboration. Last thing I'll say
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: on this, we can put B4 up on the screen.
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: This is what I referenced earlier with Besant meeting with
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: the Russian finance minister at this G20 gathering. which is
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: worth taking note of and we'll pay attention if anything
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: comes out of that. But we really need to pay
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: more attention to Russia because they're looking at the same
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: set of facts we're looking at, where they're looking at
• 34:34
  Speaker 2: the fact that the U.S.
• 34:35
  Speaker 5: Is overextended.
• 34:37
  Speaker 2: That we've pulled a lot of things into the Middle East,
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: that we have sailors who are struggling aboard ships, that
• 34:46
  Speaker 2: we've used so much of our ammunition stockpile and just
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: are overall completely depleted and distracted. So they're trying to
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: figure out how they can get out of this kind
• 34:56
  Speaker 2: of grinding war that they're in, that they started with Ukraine.
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: And one thing that they're seriously contemplating is what if
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: we expand into NATO and basically dare the U.S. to
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: do something about it and expose that the NATO alliance
• 35:08
  Speaker 2: is basically dead. And I think the NATO alliance is
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: effectively dead. Do you really think that if Russia struck
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: inside of a NATO country that we would then go
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: to war with Russia?
• 35:19
  Speaker 5: Do you really think that we would do that? They
• 35:20
  Speaker 5: don't think so either.
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: So that's another thing to keep an eye on here
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: as Putin tries to figure out what his next move
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: is going to be. Because as much as the population
• 35:31
  Speaker 2: in Russia has gone along with the war so far,
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: and we were saying before was really pretty supportive at
• 35:36
  Speaker 2: the beginning, and the economy has been more resilient than
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: one would have predicted, they're still taking a lot of losses.
• 35:42
  Speaker 5: It is brutal. It is grinding.
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: And it may be the case that there is more
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: dissatisfaction there than we can see on the surface. So
• 35:50
  Speaker 2: in any case, important to keep an eye on him
• 35:53
  Speaker 2: and what he's up to and the deals that he's
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: striking at these.
• 35:57
  Speaker 4: Sorts of events.
• 35:57
  Speaker 3: I think that the summit... It's going to be very interesting.
• 36:01
  Speaker 3: The summit of Putin, or sorry, of Xi and Trump.
• 36:04
  Speaker 3: Trump is going to just do his, I mean, he's
• 36:05
  Speaker 3: going to flatter him, but he's going to do his
• 36:08
  Speaker 3: absolute best to get even a modicum of concession. And
• 36:13
  Speaker 3: I don't see it right now from the Chinese side.
• 36:15
  Speaker 3: They have held firm on, you know, on the secondary
• 36:17
  Speaker 3: sanctions thing, they said, go ahead, do it. They're like, well,
• 36:20
  Speaker 3: we'll hit you right back. You think you'll like that?
• 36:22
  Speaker 3: You know, major trade war with us in the middle
• 36:25
  Speaker 3: of your inflation problems. We are in a bad spot
• 36:27
  Speaker 3: to demand really anything from them right now. And I'm
• 36:31
  Speaker 3: very curious to see actually what comes out.
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: Trump is going to want them to cut off Iran
• 36:35
  Speaker 2: and to try to coerce North Korea.
• 36:38
  Speaker 5: And why would they do that? Why would China, I mean,
• 36:41
  Speaker 5: what do we, what leverage do we have? They have played, they.
• 36:44
  Speaker 2: Have been so much more strategic in in even locking
• 36:47
  Speaker 2: up the critical supply lines that we know. We already
• 36:49
  Speaker 2: know how this went because we tried to do this
• 36:51
  Speaker 2: trade war with them and basically had to back down
• 36:53
  Speaker 2: because we realized how much they could hurt our economy
• 36:56
  Speaker 2: if push came to shove. So I don't see that
• 36:58
  Speaker 2: that dynamic has changed. If anything, that dynamic has only strengthened.
• 37:02
  Speaker 3: Agreed.
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: All right, let's get to the bonds market.
• 37:06
  Speaker 2: This morning, we are tracking a massive global bond sell-off,
• 37:10
  Speaker 2: which of course will have huge implications directly in your life.
• 37:14
  Speaker 2: Let's go and put this up on the screen. This
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: is something we've been following on the US side for
• 37:17
  Speaker 2: a while. This is from the Kobayashi letter. They say,
• 37:20
  Speaker 2: yields just won't stop. You know it's bad when bond
• 37:24
  Speaker 2: market is quite literally ignoring the US Treasury. That's a
• 37:27
  Speaker 2: reference to Scott Besson's attempt to intervene in the bond
• 37:30
  Speaker 2: market and to stop this sell-off that just continues without
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: missing a beat. 24 hours later, and the 10-year note
• 37:38
  Speaker 2: yield is now pushing into 4.8 percent, its highest since
• 37:41
  Speaker 2: January 2025. That's another plus 20 basis points since the
• 37:44
  Speaker 2: low seen after the U.S. Treasury's intervention announcement 13 days ago. So,
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: like I was saying before, even though the U.S. Treasury
• 37:53
  Speaker 2: tried to intervene in an extremely significant way, the market
• 37:56
  Speaker 2: has just completely ignored that. In a sudden turn of events,
• 37:59
  Speaker 2: 7 percent mortgages are back. The 10-year note yield is
• 38:02
  Speaker 2: nearing 5 percent. Markets are expecting a September rate hike.
• 38:06
  Speaker 2: This marks an 85-point basis point run in the 10-year
• 38:10
  Speaker 2: note yield since the Iran war began.
• 38:12
  Speaker 5: Once again, the U.S. simply cannot afford the 10-year note.
• 38:15
  Speaker 2: Yield at 5% for a sustained period of time. We
• 38:18
  Speaker 2: expect further attempts at intervention immediately, but the question becomes,
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: will markets listen? Let's go ahead and put this Wall
• 38:24
  Speaker 2: Street Journal report up on the screen as well. Headline
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: here is long-term global government bond yields hit fresh highs.
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: The two-year yield reversed an overnight decline and edged higher.
• 38:35
  Speaker 2: Long-dated bond yields reached new highs Monday as fresh military
• 38:38
  Speaker 2: escalation between the U.S. and Iran lifted oil prices. 10-year
• 38:42
  Speaker 2: Treasury yield traded at 4.764% on pace for its highest
• 38:45
  Speaker 2: settlement since January of 2025. Two-year yield reversed an overnight
• 38:49
  Speaker 2: decline edge higher, reaching 4.337%. It's not just here in
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: the U.S.
• 38:55
  Speaker 3: Either.
• 38:56
  Speaker 2: This is part of a global trend of the bond sell-off,
• 39:01
  Speaker 2: so when bonds are sold off. You have to raise
• 39:04
  Speaker 2: the interest rate in order to attract buyers. That's the
• 39:06
  Speaker 2: way this works. What does this mean and what is
• 39:09
  Speaker 2: causing it? Well, the causes are quite numerous, but one
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: of the causes here in the U.S. is the concerns
• 39:16
  Speaker 2: about inflation. You also have the concerns about the continued
• 39:20
  Speaker 2: Iran war, about our overall stability as a nation, about
• 39:24
  Speaker 2: the high level of debt. And then the other piece
• 39:26
  Speaker 2: you have, Sagar, is because there is so much demand
• 39:29
  Speaker 2: for cash right now, for the AI build-out, that is
• 39:32
  Speaker 2: part of what is crowding out investment in U.S.
• 39:35
  Speaker 3: Treasuries.
• 39:36
  Speaker 2: The impact that it has on your life, this impacts
• 39:38
  Speaker 2: all interest rates that you would have to pay if
• 39:40
  Speaker 2: you're borrowing money, if you're especially mortgage rates, in particular
• 39:45
  Speaker 2: housing affordability, obviously being a massive, massive issue. And then
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: it makes our debt even more unsustainable than it already is.
• 39:52
  Speaker 2: I've never been a fiscal hawk. The debt is going
• 39:55
  Speaker 2: to kill us and we're going to have a crisis
• 39:57
  Speaker 2: type of person. We're in a different world now, though,
• 40:00
  Speaker 2: both because of the size of the debt, which has
• 40:02
  Speaker 2: only escalated under the Trump administration, has been driven by
• 40:05
  Speaker 2: numerous tax cuts for the rich over the years, but
• 40:08
  Speaker 2: also because as the world moves away from the dollar
• 40:11
  Speaker 2: as a reserve currency, that changes the dynamic, makes it
• 40:15
  Speaker 2: a lot less easy for us to deal with this
• 40:17
  Speaker 2: level of debt to service. So as those interest rates
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: go up, that makes that debt so much more of
• 40:23
  Speaker 2: a burden on our society.
• 40:24
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I did not realize how actually crazy this is
• 40:27
  Speaker 3: in terms of the international situation. So we're obviously nearing
• 40:31
  Speaker 3: 2006 levels, but here's what the rest of the world is.
• 40:34
  Speaker 3: Tenure Japan is 3% for the first time since 96.
• 40:39
  Speaker 3: British 10-year, highest since mid-07. German, highest since 2011. Those
• 40:44
  Speaker 3: are bad years, especially in the German case. I was
• 40:48
  Speaker 3: in college at that time. Remember the whole discussion? They're like, oh,
• 40:51
  Speaker 3: the Eurozone, it's going to blow up, and Greece, and
• 40:53
  Speaker 3: all of the crazy protests that were happening. Obviously, the Japanese,
• 40:58
  Speaker 3: they've had a crazy situation with interest rates for quite
• 41:00
  Speaker 3: some time. But the British at 2007, and the United
• 41:03
  Speaker 3: States now mimicking 2006. similar situation here with the United States. 2006,
• 41:07
  Speaker 3: we're bogged down in unpopular war. We got a president
• 41:11
  Speaker 3: near all-time low. We have high gas prices. In fact,
• 41:14
  Speaker 3: the highest gas price of all time, inflation adjusted, is
• 41:17
  Speaker 3: right around 2008. So you could see how we can
• 41:20
  Speaker 3: mimic those same social conditions. The AI stuff is fascinating.
• 41:24
  Speaker 3: But the biggest problem, as you were talking about with debt, is,
• 41:27
  Speaker 3: and I have the numbers right here, gross national debt
• 41:30
  Speaker 3: is $ 40 trillion. That's 120% of GDP. Japan's national debt
• 41:35
  Speaker 3: is now more than twice the size of its overall economy.
• 41:37
  Speaker 3: France's public debt is now 117% of GDP. And right now,
• 41:42
  Speaker 3: there is no French bond yields have now climbed above Italy's,
• 41:45
  Speaker 3: which is apparently an unprecedented situation in Europe because France's
• 41:50
  Speaker 3: economy is normally seen as some sort of a safe haven.
• 41:52
  Speaker 3: So you put it all together, you have a declining
• 41:56
  Speaker 3: Western international picture for their economy. The bond yields are
• 42:00
  Speaker 3: squeezing people from both sides. So you have high cost
• 42:03
  Speaker 3: of living and high inflation on top of very, very
• 42:06
  Speaker 3: high borrowing costs. Then you also have the fluctuation for
• 42:11
  Speaker 3: the mortgage rates and for savings CDs, all those other things,
• 42:14
  Speaker 3: and especially the biggest impact on the consumer is from
• 42:18
  Speaker 3: what we understand is that it will stop any, not
• 42:22
  Speaker 3: speculative growth per se, but small business borrowing costs, which
• 42:25
  Speaker 3: is the lifeline of the economy and predominantly the people
• 42:28
  Speaker 3: who will hire or fire based on interest rates. Those
• 42:31
  Speaker 3: are the people who have to pull back the most.
• 42:32
  Speaker 3: And it means that the big guys, AI companies especially,
• 42:36
  Speaker 3: who can afford the high interest debt are the only
• 42:38
  Speaker 3: ones who will be able borrowing. So it gives a
• 42:40
  Speaker 3: lot of top heavy control to the corporations that are
• 42:42
  Speaker 3: currently in control.
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right.
• 42:44
  Speaker 2: And Japan is a very interesting example because they've had
• 42:46
  Speaker 2: this very unique economic situation where they've had interest rates
• 42:50
  Speaker 2: at zero for decades. They've had no inflation. So wages, prices,
• 42:56
  Speaker 2: everything has stayed. the same and so under those conditions
• 43:00
  Speaker 2: when you have zero percent interest rates guess what it's
• 43:02
  Speaker 2: not a big deal.
• 43:03
  Speaker 5: If your debt level is very high.
• 43:06
  Speaker 2: Because you're not paying high interest on that so they
• 43:09
  Speaker 2: could handle that that's why they have the highest some
• 43:11
  Speaker 2: of the highest debt the highest debt level in terms
• 43:13
  Speaker 2: of the developed world now that interest rates are going
• 43:16
  Speaker 2: up oh suddenly this comes at a price suddenly this
• 43:19
  Speaker 2: is going to be something we're actually going to have
• 43:21
  Speaker 2: to reckon with And with the U.S., it's the same.
• 43:24
  Speaker 2: We're in a different position because the dollar continues to
• 43:25
  Speaker 2: be the world's reserve currency. That gives us what has
• 43:28
  Speaker 2: been described as an exorbitant privilege. How long does that last?
• 43:31
  Speaker 2: Is that an indefinite situation? That's a big question. But
• 43:34
  Speaker 2: as we pour more and more and more money into
• 43:37
  Speaker 2: a military, which is failing dramatically on the battlefield, and
• 43:42
  Speaker 2: we leverage our future in order to do so and
• 43:46
  Speaker 2: are racking up these huge amounts of debt, as the
• 43:49
  Speaker 2: interest rate ticks up, that just becomes more and more
• 43:51
  Speaker 2: difficult for.
• 43:52
  Speaker 5: Us to deal with.
• 43:53
  Speaker 3: Don't worry, though.
• 43:54
  Speaker 2: Scott Besant says that the U.S. bond market is just
• 43:56
  Speaker 2: fine and there's nothing to worry about. Let's go ahead
• 43:58
  Speaker 2: and hear that.
• 43:59
  Speaker 7: The U.S., the bond market is the most resilient in
• 44:02
  Speaker 7: the world. And let's just level set here for a minute, Sarah.
• 44:06
  Speaker 7: Everyone's talking about the U.S. bond market.
• 44:08
  Speaker 3: U.S.
• 44:08
  Speaker 7: Bond market this month will have been the best performing
• 44:12
  Speaker 7: bond market. The third year, the yield is down. The 10-year,
• 44:16
  Speaker 7: the yield is flat. No other major bond market can
• 44:19
  Speaker 7: say that. The 10-year yield is flat since President Trump
• 44:23
  Speaker 7: came in. And I'm not hung up on what rating
• 44:27
  Speaker 7: agencies say, but Two weeks ago, Fitch reaffirmed the U.S.
• 44:31
  Speaker 5: Rating.
• 44:32
  Speaker 7: That was an inconvenient truth, so it didn't get any publicity.
• 44:37
  Speaker 7: And if there were a problem in the U.S. bond market, Sarah,
• 44:40
  Speaker 7: then people would be selling U.S. bonds and buying other countries' bonds,
• 44:44
  Speaker 7: but we are the best performing market.
• 44:46
  Speaker 3: I mean, it's technically true.
• 44:49
  Speaker 5: Yeah, that's right.
• 44:51
  Speaker 2: That is a problem that is sort of a global
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: issue and certainly in the West. But, you know, the indication, oh,
• 44:57
  Speaker 2: our allies are doing even worse than we are is
• 44:59
  Speaker 2: not necessarily the own that you think that it is.
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: Yes, exactly.
• 45:02
  Speaker 3: Put the next one up here on the screen. This
• 45:03
  Speaker 3: one was interesting, too. as well in terms of explaining
• 45:06
  Speaker 3: the Fed. So what they talk about here, Kevin Warsh,
• 45:11
  Speaker 3: the Federal Reserve chairman, has said he wants bond investors
• 45:14
  Speaker 3: to react to underlying changes in the economy rather than
• 45:18
  Speaker 3: commentary from the central bank. But right now, they are
• 45:21
  Speaker 3: doing the opposite. Since he became chairman, the three largest
• 45:24
  Speaker 3: daily moves in the Treasury's yield curve have followed his appearances.
• 45:28
  Speaker 3: What that means as to why it all matters is
• 45:31
  Speaker 3: that he obviously not only was Donald Trump's pick, But
• 45:34
  Speaker 3: he's also one where he's got some impetus right now
• 45:39
  Speaker 3: where he needs both. He has a directive from Trump
• 45:42
  Speaker 3: to cut, you know, rates because that's what Trump desperately wants.
• 45:45
  Speaker 3: Trump said yesterday we could have 20 percent GDP growth
• 45:50
  Speaker 3: if we just brought interest rates down, which I don't
• 45:53
  Speaker 3: know has ever happened in the U.S. Maybe one time,
• 45:55
  Speaker 3: like ever, since World War II. So that's 20 percent.
• 45:58
  Speaker 3: In fact, if you have 20 percent economic growth, it's
• 46:00
  Speaker 3: usually a problem. That means that you come out of
• 46:02
  Speaker 3: a Great Depression. or something. The point, though, that they
• 46:05
  Speaker 3: were making was that Warsh was talking about inflation is
• 46:09
  Speaker 3: not slowing, policymakers, quote, must be confident because the central
• 46:13
  Speaker 3: bank has work to do, meaning it's currently priced in
• 46:17
  Speaker 3: that he's more likely to raise interest rates.
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: And that means, apparently, what.
• 46:21
  Speaker 3: It's doing is it's pushing the bond yield curve in
• 46:24
  Speaker 3: exactly the direction that they don't want it to go
• 46:27
  Speaker 3: right now. The only point that we're putting this is
• 46:29
  Speaker 3: that it's not just the global situation with what's happening
• 46:33
  Speaker 3: with Iran, and of course, just like weakening faith in
• 46:36
  Speaker 3: overall Western economies.
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: It's not just the AI build out.
• 46:40
  Speaker 3: It's also the trouble with the Federal Reserve Chairman and
• 46:43
  Speaker 3: his mandate to try to deal with inflation. So it's
• 46:45
  Speaker 3: just all a bad situation, which puts, I mean, it's
• 46:49
  Speaker 3: a morass, you know, trying to get anything done right
• 46:52
  Speaker 3: now in the economy, especially feel for anybody who's trying
• 46:54
  Speaker 3: to buy a home because prices alone, I mean, 6.7%
• 46:57
  Speaker 3: interest rates, just nuts. I don't even know what you
• 47:00
  Speaker 3: do at that point, honestly.
• 47:01
  Speaker 2: Every central bank in the world is basically facing the
• 47:04
  Speaker 2: same situation because normally when you have inflation as we're
• 47:08
  Speaker 2: having and is likely to only escalate because of the
• 47:11
  Speaker 2: Iran war and also other factors, but in particular because
• 47:14
  Speaker 2: of the Iran.
• 47:14
  Speaker 5: War, what do you do? You hike rates if you're
• 47:19
  Speaker 5: president of a central bank.
• 47:20
  Speaker 2: So that would, though, also increase the bond yields and
• 47:24
  Speaker 2: increase those interest rates. So they're stuck in a very
• 47:27
  Speaker 2: difficult position. If you lower rates, then you get that
• 47:31
  Speaker 2: economic growth that Trump is after, but you also help
• 47:34
  Speaker 2: to fuel further inflation. That's the bind that basically every
• 47:40
  Speaker 2: central banker in the world is facing right at this point.
• 47:43
  Speaker 2: There's some other things going on in the economy that
• 47:45
  Speaker 2: we wanted to flag for you.
• 47:46
  Speaker 5: So let's put C4 up on the screen.
• 47:48
  Speaker 2: Corporate profits are doing great, guys. So don't you worry
• 47:51
  Speaker 2: about them. They're doing just fine. And there's a number
• 47:55
  Speaker 2: of factors here. One of them is that you have
• 47:59
  Speaker 2: homeowners who's Home prices are still very high, so they
• 48:03
  Speaker 2: have a lot of equity, so they're able to.
• 48:05
  Speaker 5: Continue to spend.
• 48:07
  Speaker 2: But a significant chunk of this increase in corporate profits
• 48:12
  Speaker 2: is because of the tariff refunds, which we covered previously.
• 48:16
  Speaker 2: But companies that paid the tariffs originally, now they are
• 48:20
  Speaker 2: getting checks from the federal government, and that is helping
• 48:23
  Speaker 2: to juice their profit level significantly. even as very few
• 48:27
  Speaker 2: of them are issuing any refunds to the consumers who
• 48:30
  Speaker 2: paid that price on the back end through increased prices.
• 48:34
  Speaker 2: So consumers really bore the brunt of the tariff cost,
• 48:38
  Speaker 2: but it's these large corporations who are having their profit
• 48:41
  Speaker 2: margins padded thanks to the tariff refund.
• 48:44
  Speaker 5: So it's just incredible in the American economy.
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: It seems like no matter what happens, big corporations at
• 48:49
  Speaker 2: the end of the day always reap the benefit.
• 48:51
  Speaker 3: Yeah, they're like, well, the American incredible consumer, the ever
• 48:55
  Speaker 3: resilient U.S. consumer is fueling the heftiest rise in big
• 48:59
  Speaker 3: company profits in years. But the tariff refund is a
• 49:02
  Speaker 3: significant part of that, too. I mean, they give all
• 49:05
  Speaker 3: kinds of examples. Garmin got a $ 21 million tariff refund,
• 49:09
  Speaker 3: which boosted their margins late quarter. You had Costco, you
• 49:13
  Speaker 3: had Walmart dollar general, apparently had a similar, actual boom.
• 49:18
  Speaker 3: Apparently Best Buy said its shoppers are still continuing to
• 49:23
  Speaker 3: buy up computers, TVs, and AI-enabled glasses, which I would
• 49:27
  Speaker 3: personally ban.
• 49:28
  Speaker 5: Ban that shit.
• 49:29
  Speaker 3: Yeah, the meta glasses, they need to go.
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: Hate them.
• 49:32
  Speaker 3: You see somebody.
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: Wearing them, throw them in the trash.
• 49:33
  Speaker 3: That includes you, dad. I was watching. So a widely
• 49:39
  Speaker 3: watched measure of consumer confidence, as we have right now,
• 49:42
  Speaker 3: has slipped dramatically. Obviously, this consumer sentiment, it was a
• 49:48
  Speaker 3: huge impact on Joe Biden and his presidency. We covered
• 49:52
  Speaker 3: it day in and day out whenever it was happening
• 49:55
  Speaker 3: because it was like month over month in 2022. That's
• 49:58
  Speaker 3: exactly when Trump or when Biden's chances were really started
• 50:02
  Speaker 3: to slip beyond even the conversations around his age. Consumer
• 50:06
  Speaker 3: sentiment and inflation sank his presidency. And obviously, almost certainly
• 50:11
  Speaker 3: one of the main reasons why Kamala ends up losing
• 50:13
  Speaker 3: the election and the popular vote. And so you actually
• 50:17
  Speaker 3: see that consumer sentiment, which has been in free fall
• 50:20
  Speaker 3: since Trump took office, especially in the last six months,
• 50:24
  Speaker 3: has now fallen for the first time actually in three
• 50:27
  Speaker 3: months of a worsening economic outlook And what they say
• 50:31
  Speaker 3: is that the final reading is roughly around the median estimate,
• 50:34
  Speaker 3: even for where things currently are. But what it does
• 50:38
  Speaker 3: show is that you have a darkening economic picture for
• 50:41
  Speaker 3: the overall U.S. consumer heading now into the most important
• 50:46
  Speaker 3: quarter for the entire U.S. retail industry. So I feel
• 50:49
  Speaker 3: like we talk about this every year, is that holiday season,
• 50:53
  Speaker 3: especially in retail. In some cases, many of these brands...
• 50:57
  Speaker 3: between 40% to 80% of their entire year sales will
• 51:01
  Speaker 3: happen during the holiday season. It gets cold and people
• 51:04
  Speaker 3: go nuts buying Christmas gifts. Well, if you see even
• 51:08
  Speaker 3: a 5%, 6% reduction, that's a disaster to the bottom
• 51:13
  Speaker 3: line of a lot of these places. Now, what they're saying,
• 51:15
  Speaker 3: the companies, is, well, the overall spending is at least
• 51:18
  Speaker 3: remaining where it is. But I cannot just believe in
• 51:22
  Speaker 3: price sensitivity. For example, I have to go to a
• 51:25
  Speaker 3: cross-country wedding in a few months. I've had a kid,
• 51:28
  Speaker 3: so I haven't done any cross-country airfare. So it's been
• 51:30
  Speaker 3: like two years since I bought something. Holy shit, when
• 51:34
  Speaker 3: I bought that flight, I could not believe the jet
• 51:38
  Speaker 3: fuel surcharge of what it looks like. I mean, I'm
• 51:42
  Speaker 3: telling you, to fly to California, you know, two people in,
• 51:46
  Speaker 3: I'm talking economy class ticket, it's like $ 1, 000.
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: Insanity.
• 51:53
  Speaker 3: And even looking out for in the future, and I
• 51:55
  Speaker 3: was looking at that, I go, there's no way that
• 51:58
  Speaker 3: you can just expect vacation costs and all this other
• 52:01
  Speaker 3: stuff to remain the same. If you're a family of
• 52:03
  Speaker 3: four or a family of six, forget about it, man.
• 52:05
  Speaker 3: You might as well drive three days or just not go, period.
• 52:08
  Speaker 3: So that type of stuff, it's intuitive and obvious to me,
• 52:12
  Speaker 3: it is going to crush consumer spending. And by the way,
• 52:15
  Speaker 3: travel is a key part of the Thanksgiving and the
• 52:17
  Speaker 3: Christmas holidays as well. And I can't be the only
• 52:20
  Speaker 3: one you know, especially when you're looking at those and
• 52:21
  Speaker 3: being like, I don't know about this.
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: So you look at the bill, it's triple what it
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: used to be.
• 52:26
  Speaker 3: And that is going to be, I mean, there's just,
• 52:28
  Speaker 3: eventually price sensitivity just has to set in for a
• 52:31
  Speaker 3: huge portion of the economy. Yeah.
• 52:33
  Speaker 2: Corporate well-being has completely divorced from consumer and general American well-being.
• 52:39
  Speaker 2: I think they used to be tied more closely together
• 52:41
  Speaker 2: in the past, but it's just not reality anymore.
• 52:43
  Speaker 5: And it's going to.
• 52:44
  Speaker 2: Become even more divorced. from corporate well-being when AI is
• 52:49
  Speaker 2: more fully implemented into the whole situation. Because as companies
• 52:54
  Speaker 2: figure out how to deploy AI in a way where
• 52:57
  Speaker 2: they can reduce their workforce, then you have directly adversarial
• 53:00
  Speaker 2: relationship between corporate profit levels and your average American. So
• 53:04
  Speaker 2: something to look forward to in the future.
• 53:05
  Speaker 3: Yes, that's exactly right. All right, let's get to data centers.
• 53:10
  Speaker 3: Turning now to data centers, Donald Trump weighing in on
• 53:14
  Speaker 3: the data center issue. you would expect the man who
• 53:16
  Speaker 3: won the popular vote to try to always pick the
• 53:19
  Speaker 3: right side of an 80-20 issue. And yet, let's put
• 53:22
  Speaker 3: this one up here on the screen. He says, this
• 53:25
  Speaker 3: was totally unprompted, by the way, the only reason that
• 53:28
  Speaker 3: communities throughout the USA should not want data centers is
• 53:31
  Speaker 3: if they want to end up being backwards and poor.
• 53:34
  Speaker 3: If they want to be successful and rich with far
• 53:37
  Speaker 3: lower taxes and jobs all over the place, let data reign.
• 53:41
  Speaker 1: Data and reign being capitalized.
• 53:43
  Speaker 3: The good news is that there are plenty of other
• 53:45
  Speaker 3: places that want them. If we want to kill the
• 53:48
  Speaker 3: golden goose, capitalized, you will have only yourselves to blame.
• 53:52
  Speaker 3: China could not be happier with this anti-AI data center movement.
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: Actually, they can't believe it is happening. President Donald J.
• 54:01
  Speaker 3: Trump.
• 54:03
  Speaker 1: And you might ask, how are his supporters taking the news?
• 54:06
  Speaker 3: And usually I don't do the comments thing. I think
• 54:09
  Speaker 3: it's unfair just because of the 9991 rule on the internet.
• 54:14
  Speaker 3: But I think you can reasonably assume people who have
• 54:17
  Speaker 3: a truth social account and post on the platform are
• 54:19
  Speaker 3: Trump diehards. Can we assume that?
• 54:21
  Speaker 5: More likely than not, yes.
• 54:23
  Speaker 3: I mean, not even that. It's like, what, 99%, 99.9%?
• 54:26
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 54:27
  Speaker 3: So let's take a look at some of the replies
• 54:30
  Speaker 3: on Trump's, again, own platform. You have lost your mind.
• 54:34
  Speaker 3: You will be known as the president and Freemason who
• 54:37
  Speaker 3: single-handedly destroyed a nation. God help you. What about our
• 54:41
  Speaker 3: water supply? I regret ever supporting you guys.
• 54:44
  Speaker 1: Just keep these up.
• 54:45
  Speaker 3: I'm going to read a lot of them. This statement
• 54:47
  Speaker 3: is insane. I am already on water restriction.
• 54:49
  Speaker 1: You are an idiot.
• 54:50
  Speaker 3: You'll be a moneymaker, I suspect. Meanwhile, our lives get
• 54:53
  Speaker 3: shittier with no water and more noise. Perhaps better messaging
• 54:56
  Speaker 3: is in order? No one agrees with this, sir. Data
• 54:59
  Speaker 3: centers are a gateway for the market of the beast
• 55:02
  Speaker 3: and total control.
• 55:03
  Speaker 1: We love you. I am MAGA.
• 55:05
  Speaker 3: That will always support you.
• 55:06
  Speaker 1: I hate communism. I understand they have convinced you this
• 55:09
  Speaker 1: is right.
• 55:09
  Speaker 3: That is a lie. We the people want to be
• 55:11
  Speaker 3: free and have freedom and trust God and his constitution.
• 55:14
  Speaker 3: We do not want control and surveillance. Those things promote communism.
• 55:19
  Speaker 3: The people are awake to be convinced otherwise.
• 55:21
  Speaker 5: A lot going on with that one.
• 55:23
  Speaker 3: I mean, there's a lot. I think he's right. Let's
• 55:25
  Speaker 3: discuss the power consumption issue. Horrendous messaging. I'd rather have
• 55:29
  Speaker 3: clean water and less surveillance. You mean snap in line
• 55:32
  Speaker 3: so me and my buddies can make more money while
• 55:34
  Speaker 3: we use all your water, electricity, and create an ongoing
• 55:37
  Speaker 3: sound that will drive you insane. I love you, DJT,
• 55:41
  Speaker 3: but if you are concerned about windmills destroying birds and
• 55:43
  Speaker 3: constant humming, then you need to go visit a neighborhood
• 55:45
  Speaker 3: with a data center beside it. In Florida, where our
• 55:47
  Speaker 3: aquifer is so fragile and water is so expensive, data
• 55:50
  Speaker 3: centers are a real threat. The reason we have no
• 55:52
  Speaker 3: data center signs in our yard is because we don't
• 55:55
  Speaker 3: want electrical and water shortage, plain and simple. Fix this
• 55:58
  Speaker 3: and bring them on, not to mention the constant hum
• 56:00
  Speaker 3: put one next to Mar-a-Lago. And so that's a smattering
• 56:05
  Speaker 3: of some of the replies that we have seen here, despite,
• 56:09
  Speaker 3: I will say, you know, a lot of cheering from
• 56:10
  Speaker 3: the tech community who have truly love, truly, you know,
• 56:13
  Speaker 3: are in love with Trump's courage, they say, that are
• 56:17
  Speaker 3: on this issue. You also had the vice president striking
• 56:20
  Speaker 3: what I would say is a pretty different tone when
• 56:22
  Speaker 3: he was asked about it. Let's take a listen.
• 56:23
  Speaker 8: What the president said about data centers is they're an
• 56:26
  Speaker 8: important part of the AI economy. When people build them,
• 56:29
  Speaker 8: they have to build the power plants along with the
• 56:32
  Speaker 8: data centers. I think probably 99% of the backlash to
• 56:35
  Speaker 8: data centers has come in areas where building a data
• 56:38
  Speaker 8: center means higher utility and higher electricity for the people
• 56:42
  Speaker 8: on the ground. So I think what these companies have
• 56:44
  Speaker 8: to do is take advantage of some of the federal
• 56:46
  Speaker 8: deregulatory efforts that we've undertaken. If you build a data
• 56:50
  Speaker 8: center you should be putting power back into the grid,
• 56:53
  Speaker 8: not taking it out. And if that is happening, I
• 56:55
  Speaker 8: don't think the data centers are that controversial. It's when
• 56:58
  Speaker 8: the utility bills get so much higher, that's when it's
• 57:00
  Speaker 8: a real problem.
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: So I think that that was a very different tone,
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: is what I would say.
• 57:06
  Speaker 3: But you also see how they're trying to feel their
• 57:09
  Speaker 3: way through this, because the administration is the most pro-AI
• 57:12
  Speaker 3: administration probably in the entire world. Genuinely, I can't even
• 57:16
  Speaker 3: think of a single other You know, leadership or government,
• 57:20
  Speaker 3: which is this pro-AI. They also have an alliance mostly
• 57:25
  Speaker 3: with the tech industry of convenience, which is floating the
• 57:28
  Speaker 3: entire U.S. economy and all of our GDP growth, which
• 57:32
  Speaker 3: is all just data centered. spend.
• 57:33
  Speaker 1: So they need it to continue.
• 57:35
  Speaker 3: At the same time, every Republican politician who is in
• 57:39
  Speaker 3: a remotely competitive race is lining up against data centers.
• 57:44
  Speaker 3: So Mike Rogers, data center moratorium. Greg Abbott, data center moratorium.
• 57:50
  Speaker 3: Ken Paxton, data center moratorium. Even the popular governors, people
• 57:55
  Speaker 3: who have no chance at losing their election, are just
• 57:57
  Speaker 3: making sure that their flank is covered. Josh Shapiro, who
• 58:01
  Speaker 3: is against now data centers and said he's going to
• 58:03
  Speaker 3: hold up all of their development. I mean, I could
• 58:06
  Speaker 3: go on the list of Ron DeSantis talking about data centers.
• 58:09
  Speaker 3: Byron Donalds is looking like he's going to be, whereas
• 58:12
  Speaker 3: he's said some interesting things on data centers. He's also
• 58:15
  Speaker 3: come out against flock cameras, for example. I mean, we're
• 58:18
  Speaker 3: talking about this stuff, really it's like a bottom to
• 58:21
  Speaker 3: top level uprising, which is across the nation. We're going
• 58:25
  Speaker 3: to talk about midterms here in a second I was told,
• 58:29
  Speaker 3: and I think you were out for this, the Texas
• 58:30
  Speaker 3: conversation that Ryan and I had. I was told that
• 58:33
  Speaker 3: the data center issue, if Greg Abbott is going to lose,
• 58:37
  Speaker 3: and especially Paxton, it will almost certainly be because of
• 58:41
  Speaker 3: depressed Republican rural turnout in West Texas. West Texans furious
• 58:46
  Speaker 3: about the data center issue. And in particular, that's why,
• 58:50
  Speaker 3: remember we played that Texas agricultural commissioner? That's why he
• 58:53
  Speaker 3: was on television, on Fox News nonetheless, attacking the sitting governor,
• 58:58
  Speaker 3: who is a Republican running, obviously for re-election, an unprecedented
• 59:02
  Speaker 3: fourth term. And he's like, oh, he's bought out by
• 59:03
  Speaker 3: the data center industry. Ken Paxton similarly had to come
• 59:07
  Speaker 3: out and put out his like data center rights. Tallarico
• 59:10
  Speaker 3: has been hammering him on that. I genuinely cannot think
• 59:14
  Speaker 3: of a single Republican in a remote swing district, which
• 59:18
  Speaker 3: is even, you know, even sniffing The do you want
• 59:21
  Speaker 3: to be backwards in poor territory? So, you know, the
• 59:24
  Speaker 3: data center people are like, oh, this is a messaging problem. Like, no,
• 59:27
  Speaker 3: you guys have a reality problem.
• 59:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: Like you really do.
• 59:30
  Speaker 5: Well, it's it really is fascinating.
• 59:32
  Speaker 2: I mean, first of all, Trump coming out and saying this,
• 59:34
  Speaker 2: given how closely aligned all of these Republicans are to him,
• 59:37
  Speaker 2: makes it very difficult for them to feel seem credible.
• 59:41
  Speaker 2: When they're coming out with their, oh, I'm actually against
• 59:43
  Speaker 2: the data centers or, oh, we have to require the
• 59:46
  Speaker 2: data centers to do X and Y and Z before
• 59:48
  Speaker 2: they locate in communities. And Abbott is a great example
• 59:50
  Speaker 2: because he was singing a very different tune up until
• 59:54
  Speaker 2: he started realizing the polling was really challenging.
• 59:57
  Speaker 5: And then he flipped, same way Shapiro did in Pennsylvania,
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 5: where he.
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 2: Was celebrating on this big Amazon event. investment in our community.
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 2: We're going to lead the way on AI. Not even
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 2: a year later, suddenly he is issuing very different statements
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 2: and killing off the fast track regulation that was going
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 2: to allow all of these data centers to pop up
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 2: in Pennsylvania in a more rapid clip. And you can
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 2: kind of understand why the politicians got this wrong, because
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 2: as long as they've been in public office, bringing jobs
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 2: and economic development into a community was nothing but a
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 2: net positive. So it is interesting to delve into why
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 2: it is different with the data centers. And we can
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 2: put D5 up on the screen. This is from David Wallace-Wells,
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 2: who digs into this in particular. His headline here for
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 2: The New York Times is, Americans are putting up a
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 2: remarkable fight instead. And he says, basically, first of all,
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 2: the polling is extraordinary. It's 70 percent of Americans who
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 2: are opposed to these data centers. That number has climbed
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 2: dramatically in a very short period of time. So you
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 2: have this very clear supermajority.
• 1:01:05
  Speaker 3: It's Republican.
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 5: It's Democrat.
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 6: It's old.
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 5: It's young.
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: It's black.
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 5: It's white.
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 3: It's rural.
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 5: It's urban.
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 2: Very, very rarely do we see this type of consensus
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 2: form in American politics. So he tries to dig into, OK,
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 2: what is at the root of this? Because you can
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 2: point to examples like Loudoun County, Virginia here, where they
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 2: have had so much tax revenue flood into their county.
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 2: They've been able to build new schools and new sports
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 2: facilities and lower people's taxes. You would normally think that
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 2: people would look at that and say, OK, great. We
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 2: want that for us, too. He highlights a rural county
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 2: where because of the tax revenue that came in to
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 2: a place that was relatively depressed, they were able to
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 2: give all of their teachers $ 50, 000 bonuses. That was more
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 2: than their salary in certain instances. Now, on the other
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 2: side of things, Georgia just came.
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 5: Out with a report.
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 2: They're spending way more on tax credits than they're receiving
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 2: in revenue. Overall, in Virginia, it's the same deal. But
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 2: you could imagine a world where the industry really highlights
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 2: these examples and towns are falling over themselves to have
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 2: data centers located in their vicinity, especially places that have
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 2: been really economically depressed, which is many, many, many places
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 2: in America and especially in rural America. So what is
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 2: it that's different about this? And I think you could
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 2: see in some of those responses to Trump, you could
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 2: see some of the specific concerns, a lot of concerns
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 2: about water. One thing I've learned, you know, working on
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 2: campaigns in rural America is there's deep concerns frequently. I
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 2: think Maha touches on this about clean water and having
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 2: control over their natural resources, a sort of conservation approach
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 2: to environmentalism. You see that you obviously see concerns about
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 2: the electricity rates. But I think and this is kind
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 2: of what David Wallace Wells lands on as well. Those
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 2: are the things that are expressed. There really is a
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 2: deeper issue at stake here, which is, do we have
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 2: Democratic control in our lives, in our communities, in our country?
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 2: We are so used to having everything forced down our throats,
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 2: specifically from Democrats. these tech oligarchs, that the ability to
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 2: push back at all in any small way becomes extremely,
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 2: extremely important and very, very motivating to clearly the vast
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 2: majority of Americans. There are so few places at this
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 2: point where we have the ability to exercise democratic input
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: and control and say, no, we want a say over this.
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 2: Data centers have become the flashpoint and the one place
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 2: where we really feel like we can at least We
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 2: can at least throw.
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 5: Some sand into the gears.
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 2: Maybe it's not going to slow the thing down, but
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 2: at least we can make it a little bit.
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 5: More difficult for them.
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 2: And so even though you have communities that stand theoretically
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 2: to benefit from the tax revenue, Even though that is
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 2: the case, and even if you could assuage the concerns
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 2: about electricity price hikes and water, some of which has
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 2: frankly been overblown on the waterfront in particular, even if
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 2: you could assuage those concerns, people still just want to
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 2: be able to say, fuck you, not in my community. Right.
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 3: And I'm glad you said that. So the thing is,
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 3: is that Karen Howe wrote that book, Empire. By the way, Karen,
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 3: if you're watching, we've been trying to get you on
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 3: the show. So I'd really like to get you. And
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 3: this is in no way like a total criticism, but
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 3: you made an error in your book where she made
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 3: a water claim about– I think she was off by
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 3: like a factor of 1,000.
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 1: So that is where a lot of the concerns come from.
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 3: Now, I've been in a weeks-long fight with the data
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 3: center guys, and they point– so the core disagreement is
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 3: about what you said. They say– incremental polling says that
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 3: people are predominantly concerned over electricity, over water, and over noise.
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 1: So on the waterfront, most of the water stuff is
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 1: frankly bullshit.
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 3: As they point to, data centers, even a hyperscaler data center,
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 3: uses less water than a golf course. Now, we should
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 3: probably have left golf courses, but that's going to be
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 3: a separate conversation. The second one is about electricity. In
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 3: some cases, there has been evidence that data centers, the
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 3: power demand has initially led to a spike. However, it
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 3: leads to an updating of the grid and particularly, you know,
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 3: renewable grid, and it could lower electricity price. And I'm
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 3: being honest here, although, you know, there is, of course,
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 3: going to be some surge in potentially power demand. On
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 3: the noise front, that one I think is the most
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 3: legitimate claim. And there's many cases, Sterling, Virginia, right here
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 3: in Northern Virginia is, you know, exhibit A. However, that's
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 3: eventually a solvable problem. So they're like, when we ask
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 3: people what they're concerned about, that's what they say. But
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 3: you and I know from having covering politics for so
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 3: long is that people are very rarely actually honest about
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 3: what they're concerned about. They cling to various different types
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 3: of concerns when in reality it is about something much deeper.
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 3: So I've talked about this before, like let's say with immigration.
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 3: Is it about the border numbers specifically or is it
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 3: about the notion of sovereignty and control, right? I would
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 3: say the latter, but you can't really give that option
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 3: in a poll. You just have to intuit it, especially
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 3: from where it's coming from. For me, what I think
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 3: that much of this is coming back to, and this
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 3: is what Wallace Wells points to, is that it's like
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 3: this crazy coalition in some cases of cranks and conspiracy
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 3: theorists in some cases of good old-fashioned NIMBYs, and in
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 3: some cases of just people who.
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: Don't really know why but are opposed to the technology.
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 3: I think it's about, fundamentally, it's about AI and also
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 3: an indictment of technology. So I gave that example in
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 3: the recent meta loss, you know, the meta settlement that
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 3: happened with the state's attorneys generals, where they just have
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 3: to admit more screen time has been bad. I think
• 1:06:33
  Speaker 3: everyone intuits that the amount of time they spend on
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 3: their phones using the internet and living a more, quote,
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 3: digital future is not good for them. I think literally
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 3: everyone thinks that. The data center people, and in particular
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 3: the internet industry, they go, well, everyone uses our products.
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 3: I go, yeah, heroin addicts use a lot of heroin.
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 3: That doesn't mean that it's good for them. They might
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 3: even say, oh, I love heroin. It's like, yeah, but
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 3: it's also killing you. That's how I would... point to it.
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 3: I would also say, it's like you were talking about control.
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 3: This is about the internet. The fundamental promise of the
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 3: internet is that by being more connected would bring us
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 3: closer together.
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 1: That has literally not happened.
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 3: In every single case, more use of the internet for
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 3: alleged social purposes has led to a decline in happiness
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 3: and a reduction in of actual sociability in the real world.
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 3: Remember when Tinder came out and there was like a
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 3: moral panic and they were like, oh my God, we've
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 3: been hooking up. Actually, no, teen sex isn't literally at
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 3: all time low. It's like getting 18 year olds to
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 3: go out and meet someone for a date is like
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 3: apparently like a monumental effort at this time. We thought
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 3: that Facebook and all that would lead to more intra-social connection.
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 3: The opposite has happened is that people have less friends
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 3: than ever and they spend all their times looking at
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 3: some idiot influencer online, you know, dreaming about living their life,
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 3: which is probably depressed and, you know, fake actually behind
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 3: the scenes. Yeah, that's what's actually happened as a result
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 3: of social media. So everyone knows, yeah, the internet is
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 3: nice for iMessage, for email, and for being a better
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 3: white collar slave.
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 1: Has it made your actual life a lot better?
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 3: I just think the answer is no.
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 1: And I think that's what the data center thing comes
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: down to.
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 3: So like you said, you have to intuit a lot
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 3: of the social reasons why people, you know, people say
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 3: all kinds of things and the water thing is convenient.
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 3: I genuinely believe though, and as is the case of
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 3: Loudoun and in many of these other communities where they're
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 3: coming in, they're like, Oh.
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 1: We're going to build you this.
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 3: And we're going to give you all these tax people
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 3: are still rising up and saying, no, you really got
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 3: to interrogate why? Cause it's not about water. It's not
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 3: even this about electricity. It's really about the internet. It's
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 3: about control. It's also about private, you know, It's about
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 3: private takeover. And I was, you know, final thing is
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 3: to come back to our entire segment yesterday about gain
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 3: of function and the models. And so if we were
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 3: to think of new frontier model development in AI as
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 3: gain-of-function research, well, then why would we want to proliferate
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 3: BSL-4 labs all over the entire nation? So I have
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 3: to look at this thing, which is designed by their
• 1:09:07
  Speaker 3: own admission to try and replace you, and you want
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 3: to fund its own development. You might get some crumbs
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 3: thrown at you, but in the long run, you're like,
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 3: is this going to be good for me? I think
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 3: that's where it all comes down.
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 2: On the job piece, too, in a lot of these communities,
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 2: the people who are going to be getting the jobs
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 2: are not the people who currently live in the community.
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 2: So you've also had a lot of displacement of people
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 2: who are longtime residents and the rent goes up. And so, yes,
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 2: the town is more economically prosperous, but it didn't necessarily
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 2: benefit the people who had already been living there. So
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 2: I think that's an important piece as well. Let's put
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 2: the D4 up on the screen. You can see that
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 2: the Data center people know they've got a big problem
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 2: on their hands in terms of public sentiment. And so
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 2: what are they doing? They're going to spend lots and
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 2: lots and lots and lots of money, in particular in
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 2: battleground states, to try to push a pro-data center and
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 2: pro-AI message. Build American AI, an advocacy group tied to
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 2: pro-AI super PAC, leaving the future spending big on the
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 2: AI data center fight, Axios writes. with plans to pour
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 2: millions of dollars into battleground states, according to an announcement
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 2: shared first with Axios. Data center backlash becoming a defining
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 2: issue of the midterms. Supporters of the developments are punching back.
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 2: Build American AI, a 501c4 nonprofit, has about $ 50 million
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 2: in cash on hand. Groups campaign will begin in Kansas, Ohio,
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 2: and Wisconsin. Kansas, very interesting. Close polling there in the
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 2: Senate race, quite shockingly. The money will go toward paid advertising,
• 1:10:38
  Speaker 2: grassroots engagement, research, earned media, and public education.
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 5: Public education.
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 2: So in any case, they are planning a big spending push.
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 2: And this comes on the heels of, remember we reported
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 2: on that Republican memo to the AI folks saying, hey,
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 2: you've got a big problem here. Like if you want
• 1:10:57
  Speaker 2: us to support data centers, you need to change the
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 2: narrative because this is political poison for us and we
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 2: are getting killed over it. And you've seen the way
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 2: that Republican politicians have very quickly changed their tune in
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 2: recent weeks and months after they've realized what a dire
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 2: issue this is for them and their political standing. So
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 2: in any case, you can count on the tech oligarchs
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 2: to flood the airwaves with all sorts of pro-data center propaganda.
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 1: Will it work?
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 5: We'll see.
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 3: I think it will eventually work, and I hate to
• 1:11:27
  Speaker 3: say that. And the reason why is, look, they're at
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 3: their nadir. They know they need to spend a lot
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 3: of money. they're gonna take a huge hit in the midterms,
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 3: and this whole moratorium thing is going to happen. They're
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 3: just gonna have to pivot to what we were saying earlier.
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 3: They're going to have to literally shower these communities with
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 3: as many dollars as they can. But the question, and
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 3: when I say work, is that presumes that they're gonna
• 1:11:50
  Speaker 3: keep having that unlimited budget, and that this thing isn't
• 1:11:53
  Speaker 3: gonna go bust.
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 5: You know what's interesting, though? I was just looking.
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 2: Loudoun County is the place where you can point most
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 2: clearly to the benefits, like I said before, taxes have
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 2: gone down. For the residents, huge amount of tax revenue
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 2: flowing in, new schools, new sports facilities, all this kind
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 2: of stuff in a county that, by the way, was
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 2: already relatively healthy.
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 3: I was going to say, I saw Tricia McLaughlin say yesterday,
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 3: she was like, this is why Loudoun County is rich.
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 3: I'm like, what are you talking about? This is one
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 3: of the richest places in America. Yeah. Full of a
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 3: bunch of defense contractors and government excretions.
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 2: People who are getting rich off the Iran war, et cetera.
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 2: So anyway, Loudoun was doing pretty good to start with.
• 1:12:26
  Speaker 2: Now they're doing even better.
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 3: Okay.
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 2: So you would think that the residents of that town
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 2: would be like, I am personally benefiting from the data
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 2: center push. And so I would like to see more
• 1:12:34
  Speaker 2: of this. they are facing a huge backlash. And so
• 1:12:37
  Speaker 2: the elected leadership in the county have pulled back and
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 2: it made it more difficult to locate new data centers
• 1:12:44
  Speaker 2: in the county because the residents there have also shifted
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 2: along with the national mood against data centers, even as
• 1:12:52
  Speaker 2: they are a walking billboard for the economic fruits that
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 2: can be delivered from allowing these data centers into your community.
• 1:13:00
  Speaker 2: So that to me is also evidence that there's something
• 1:13:04
  Speaker 2: very deep that's going on here with regards to how
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 2: Americans are feeling about these things being located in their
• 1:13:10
  Speaker 2: communities that goes beyond The environmental concerns goes beyond the
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 2: electricity bill concerns, because, again, many Loudoun County residents, a
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 2: little bit of a hike in their electrical bill is
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 2: not going to not going to kill them.
• 1:13:21
  Speaker 1: And they're getting a lot of filthy rich on the.
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 5: Other side of things as well.
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 2: So in any case, I think it does go to
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 2: this deeper sense of a loss of control and wanting
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 2: to have input on what the future is. So I
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 2: thought that was pretty interesting that even in a place
• 1:13:36
  Speaker 2: like Loudoun, there has been this same backlash against data centers.
• 1:13:40
  Speaker 3: I agree.
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 1: Meta, Louisiana will be the more interesting test to me.
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 3: So Meta showered this Louisiana community with tons of money.
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 1: It's giving them, like you just said, oh, all these promises.
• 1:13:52
  Speaker 3: Except the big question is going to be, are the
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 3: dollars going to stay forever? As in, we all know
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 3: they make big promises. They might build the data center.
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 3: One guess that I'd really like to try and book
• 1:14:03
  Speaker 3: are these unions. And this is like a fascinating tension
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 3: for the left. There are a bunch of unions that
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 3: are here in the DMV area who are all now
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 3: saying we're not going to endorse any candidate who's against
• 1:14:14
  Speaker 3: data centers because the electricians and the blue-collar workers which
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 3: help build these things, they're making tons of money because
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 3: a lot of it is needed in the interim. So
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 3: that is an interesting tension, too, where and I think
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 3: it's actually worth talking to some of those folks and
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 3: being like, OK, like what?
• 1:14:30
  Speaker 1: You know, yeah, it's good for you. What do you
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 1: make of it in a bigger societal context?
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 2: You are building out the infrastructure for people who are
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 2: telling you they want to replace all labor. So it
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 2: seems like a very short sighted move. But of course,
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 2: they're balancing, OK, we need new members and new jobs
• 1:14:46
  Speaker 2: right now.
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 3: And also for them, they're like, oh, yeah, you can't
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 3: automate me. He's like, you can't automate an electrician or
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 3: a steam fitter.
• 1:14:54
  Speaker 1: That's the goal, ultimately.
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 5: That is ultimately the goal.
• 1:14:58
  Speaker 2: Yeah, a friend of mine who's an electrician in a
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 2: union who works on a data center, first of all,
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 2: told me that they receive bomb threats.
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 3: That's crazy. Regularly.
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: Regularly.
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 5: It's not reported. It's not reported.
• 1:15:12
  Speaker 2: Second of all, there was a hearing, a local hearing
• 1:15:15
  Speaker 2: about a new data center and the union was trying
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 2: to get workers to come and testify and speak in
• 1:15:22
  Speaker 2: favor of it. And, you know, basically they would be
• 1:15:25
  Speaker 2: the only ones that would be there on the pro
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 2: side is the way that these things go down.
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 5: So in any case, a lot of interesting dynamics there.
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 7: That's cool.
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 3: All right. Let's get to midterms.
• 1:15:38
  Speaker 2: The bulwark was able to get their hands on leaked
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 2: audio from a private meeting of an Oklahoma Republican who
• 1:15:45
  Speaker 2: is sounding the alarm about how screwed the Republicans are
• 1:15:48
  Speaker 2: for the midterms.
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 5: Let's go and put this up on the screen.
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 2: Stephanie Bice, representative from Oklahoma, says the challenge we have
• 1:15:55
  Speaker 2: is that we have to get over the narrative that
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 2: I don't like this guy, so I'm going to vote
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 2: for the Democrat. Because I'm telling you right now, I'm
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 2: hearing it already. And what happens is that will impact
• 1:16:06
  Speaker 2: me because two things will either happen. They're going to
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 2: vote for the Democrat and they may split the ticket
• 1:16:10
  Speaker 2: and vote for me and a few others. Or this
• 1:16:13
  Speaker 2: is my bigger fear right now. People don't go vote.
• 1:16:17
  Speaker 2: Vice's comments were made to a gathering of Republican students
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 2: at Oklahoma State University on Thursday evening provide a rare
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 2: glimpse into the gloom some elected Republicans feel about the
• 1:16:26
  Speaker 2: impending midterms. talking to the students, she relayed a recent
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 2: conversation she'd had with a Republican executive who described the
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 2: president in very negative terms. So in any case, you've got, again,
• 1:16:38
  Speaker 2: we're talking about Oklahoma here, one of the most Republican
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 2: places in the entire country. And a representative there is
• 1:16:46
  Speaker 2: even concerned about the number of Republicans who either may
• 1:16:50
  Speaker 2: split ticket or just stay home. All of this relates,
• 1:16:54
  Speaker 2: of course, to the economic situation crafted and created by Trump.
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 2: The fact, as we covered earlier, consumer sentiment is way down,
• 1:17:02
  Speaker 2: inflation concerns way up. People are extremely, they feel betrayed
• 1:17:07
  Speaker 2: by Trump's handling of the economy and especially his decision
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 2: to start the Iran war. We've got Harry Enten talking
• 1:17:13
  Speaker 2: about the numbers for Trump on inflation in particular and
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 2: with independence.
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 5: Let's go ahead and take a listen to that.
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 4: Look at this on inflation. Independence on Trump and inflation.
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 4: In August of 2024, look at that. He was more
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 4: trust in inflation by 12 points over Kamala Harris. A
• 1:17:30
  Speaker 4: very big reason that he won. I don't know why
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 4: that green isn't going.
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 7: Let's see.
• 1:17:34
  Speaker 3: No, it's not going.
• 1:17:34
  Speaker 4: Isn't that interesting? Anyway, that was the reason he won, right?
• 1:17:38
  Speaker 4: Plus 12 points. Look at this net approval rating now, though. Whoa,
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 4: way down there. We're talking about what is that? We're
• 1:17:45
  Speaker 4: talking about a 76-point switcheroo on the president of the
• 1:17:49
  Speaker 4: United States, an issue in which he beat Kamala Harris
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 4: by 12 points.
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 1: He has now 64 points.
• 1:17:55
  Speaker 4: Underwater, you don't see changes like this. But the key issue,
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 4: that guy I'm elected, now he's way down there in
• 1:18:01
  Speaker 4: the Gulf of Mexico. In August of 2022, look at that,
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 4: the Republican Party was trusted more among independents by 27 points,
• 1:18:07
  Speaker 4: 27 points four years ago. Look now who independents trust.
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 4: They now trust Democrats by 18 points. What is that,
• 1:18:14
  Speaker 4: Johnny B? That's a 45-point switcheroo. You can see that
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 4: the chance of gas will be above $ 3. 50 a gallon
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 4: on Election Day. Way up. It was about 50-50 at
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 4: the end of June. Now we're talking much closer to
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 4: about 80%. They're in about Had to get the couchy
• 1:18:30
  Speaker 4: odds in there.
• 1:18:30
  Speaker 3: Disgusting. Thank you, Harry.
• 1:18:32
  Speaker 2: In any case, you saw a nearly 50-point shift towards
• 1:18:36
  Speaker 2: Democrats on inflation. And I think that we have seen
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 2: the way that inflation concerns are incredibly powerful in voters'
• 1:18:45
  Speaker 2: minds as they head to the polls. So this is
• 1:18:47
  Speaker 2: probably the single factor that is dooming Trump and the
• 1:18:49
  Speaker 2: Republicans today.
• 1:18:50
  Speaker 5: Most right now.
• 1:18:50
  Speaker 3: No question. You can even see some of this in
• 1:18:52
  Speaker 3: Ken Paxton's answer when he's asked, actually literally on Fox
• 1:18:55
  Speaker 3: News about his poor polling. Take a listen.
• 1:18:57
  Speaker 9: It shows Tallarico with a pretty solid lead over you
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 9: in three congressional districts that the president carried by double digits.
• 1:19:04
  Speaker 5: You're down eight.
• 1:19:05
  Speaker 9: Points in the 15th, 10 points in the 28th, and
• 1:19:08
  Speaker 9: 11 points in the 34th district.
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 1: This is Texas, after all.
• 1:19:13
  Speaker 9: How did a Democrat get that far ahead in Trump territory?
• 1:19:19
  Speaker 10: Well, first of all, I don't trust all these polls.
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 10: We have our own polling that suggests maybe a little
• 1:19:24
  Speaker 10: different result, but we definitely have a close race. And
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 10: we're in the middle of midterm elections where the party
• 1:19:29
  Speaker 10: in power often has a much bigger challenge. But the
• 1:19:32
  Speaker 10: reality is this is a Republican state. If Republicans get
• 1:19:35
  Speaker 10: out to vote, we're going to win this race. And
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 10: this guy has not been exposed for his record of
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 10: eight years. The media doesn't cover it. He doesn't talk
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 10: about his record. He claims that we're going to call
• 1:19:46
  Speaker 10: him a socialist.
• 1:19:47
  Speaker 3: Yes, we are.
• 1:19:48
  Speaker 10: The guy has complete socialist views.
• 1:19:51
  Speaker 7: And I can tell you this.
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 10: I do not believe once we have the resources to
• 1:19:56
  Speaker 10: expose his views, there's no way he's going to win Texas.
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I'm going to get to the resources in just
• 1:20:00
  Speaker 5: a second.
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 9: But one more question on this polling, because it does
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 9: have you running about 20 points behind President Trump's margin
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 9: in these three districts. And I hear your point that
• 1:20:10
  Speaker 9: it's just one poll and that you don't believe it.
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 9: But is there an issue here with the Trump voters
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 9: not transferring to you? Do you see the claims about
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 9: an electability problem? Or is there anything happening right now
• 1:20:22
  Speaker 9: with the Trump South Texas coalition that Republicans should be
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 9: concerned about?
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 10: No, I just don't think they know the other side.
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 10: They don't know what James Tallarico is all about. He's
• 1:20:34
  Speaker 10: this sort of unnamed guy that they have no idea
• 1:20:38
  Speaker 10: what his views are. In South Texas, his views on
• 1:20:41
  Speaker 10: transing kids, on boys and girls sports, on voting for
• 1:20:46
  Speaker 10: a state income tax, on saying that the oil and
• 1:20:48
  Speaker 10: gas industry should be basically dismantled and that you can't
• 1:20:51
  Speaker 10: be a Christian if you support the oil and gas industry.
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 10: These are all things that in South Texas... When you're
• 1:20:57
  Speaker 10: claiming that there are six genders and that modern science
• 1:20:59
  Speaker 10: has proven it, those are not going to go well
• 1:21:01
  Speaker 10: in South Texas.
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 1: Not so sure.
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 3: You could see how she kind of pressed him there
• 1:21:06
  Speaker 3: on why you think you're sub 20. And we covered
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 3: some of that polling. And you're like, dude, if that
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 3: first of all, look, the culture war stuff, I don't
• 1:21:14
  Speaker 3: even disagree. But I'm like, is that really going to
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 3: hit in an inflation plus eight or whatever environment, especially
• 1:21:21
  Speaker 3: when you're sub 20?
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 1: And the second thing.
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 3: Is his general lack of enthusiasm and infrastructure around him.
• 1:21:27
  Speaker 3: It's actually shocking. So I saw today, for the first time,
• 1:21:31
  Speaker 3: there's $ 15 million that will be supporting him on the airwaves.
• 1:21:34
  Speaker 3: That is the first big money that's actually been come
• 1:21:36
  Speaker 3: out for Ken Paxton. The other big problem for Paxton
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 3: was because the National Republican Senatorial Committee went so hard
• 1:21:42
  Speaker 3: against him in the primary, they're not going to put
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 3: much money in his race whenever it comes to Tallarico,
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 3: which means he needs Trump's MAGA Inc. to come and
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 3: save him, except Trump wants to run a bunch of
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 3: ads how awesome he is, about how awesome Trump is.
• 1:21:56
  Speaker 3: And he told the midterm candidates, he's like, just say
• 1:21:58
  Speaker 3: about how incredible I am.
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 1: It's all a messaging issue.
• 1:22:01
  Speaker 3: So obviously, Paxton is like, but he can't tell Trump,
• 1:22:04
  Speaker 3: please don't do that, because that would sink me.
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 1: In any of these races.
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 3: They need the PAC to come in and hit Tallarico
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 3: on Texas-specific issues.
• 1:22:12
  Speaker 1: So that's just where it all starts to fall apart.
• 1:22:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah, well, and he's got a problem, too. Cornyn just
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 2: came out and said he's not going to campaign for him.
• 1:22:19
  Speaker 3: No, I know.
• 1:22:19
  Speaker 2: So you've got this bitter divide in Texas politics. Now,
• 1:22:23
  Speaker 2: Tallarico also has this issue with Jasmine Crockett, who's like,
• 1:22:25
  Speaker 2: you're not going to campaign with him as well.
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 3: That is a big problem. The black vote in the
• 1:22:29
  Speaker 3: urban area of Texas, that's a problem for him.
• 1:22:31
  Speaker 2: If I had to bet, though, I think that most
• 1:22:35
  Speaker 2: black voters in Texas are going to be highly motivated
• 1:22:37
  Speaker 2: to vote against the Republicans having nothing to do with
• 1:22:40
  Speaker 2: James Tallarico or Jasmine Crockett would be my vote, my guess.
• 1:22:43
  Speaker 2: And that is what the polls seem to be reflecting
• 1:22:46
  Speaker 2: at this point. So and in a year when Republicans
• 1:22:49
  Speaker 2: are already disenchanted and demotivated to also have this divide
• 1:22:55
  Speaker 2: in the Republican Party between Cornyn and Paxton is a
• 1:22:58
  Speaker 2: big problem with a Paxton has all kinds of disgusting
• 1:23:01
  Speaker 2: scandals that people know about that have been covered extensively
• 1:23:05
  Speaker 2: in Texas politics.
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 5: So he's got those issues as well.
• 1:23:08
  Speaker 2: But that polling that Fox News was pressing him on
• 1:23:11
  Speaker 2: is pretty stunning. You're talking about districts that Trump won
• 1:23:14
  Speaker 2: in certain cases by double digits that now, again, according
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 2: to the polls, are going double digits for Tallarico. That
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 2: is a huge shift. And Paxton cannot win. If those
• 1:23:25
  Speaker 2: numbers are real, Paxton cannot win. And even the top
• 1:23:29
  Speaker 2: of the tag, Greg Abbott, might be in trouble if
• 1:23:31
  Speaker 2: that's the kind of landscape that you're ultimately looking at.
• 1:23:33
  Speaker 2: I don't know how much stock to put in this.
• 1:23:34
  Speaker 2: I saw a poll this morning that actually has Darlene
• 1:23:37
  Speaker 2: Graham losing.
• 1:23:38
  Speaker 5: In South Carolina.
• 1:23:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:23:40
  Speaker 5: I think Darlene Graham is going to win in South Carolina.
• 1:23:43
  Speaker 2: But it shows you that they're going to have to
• 1:23:45
  Speaker 2: spend in places like South Carolina, in places like Kansas,
• 1:23:48
  Speaker 2: potentially in Mississippi. There are all kinds of states where
• 1:23:51
  Speaker 2: in order to make sure that the Republican wins a
• 1:23:54
  Speaker 2: race that should be an absolute gimme, they're going to
• 1:23:57
  Speaker 2: have to actually get in and spend money. And so,
• 1:23:59
  Speaker 2: you know, it looks like Paxton's going to be left
• 1:24:01
  Speaker 2: on his own. And Tallarico, meanwhile, is an absolute fundraising juggernaut.
• 1:24:06
  Speaker 2: Let's put E3B up on the screen. It's the latest
• 1:24:08
  Speaker 2: poll out of Michigan with regard to Abdul Alsaid. There's
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 2: been a couple now that show him with a four-point
• 1:24:13
  Speaker 2: lead over Mike Rogers.
• 1:24:15
  Speaker 5: That's the top line.
• 1:24:17
  Speaker 2: You have Rogers winning white voters 49 to 43, Abdul
• 1:24:20
  Speaker 2: winning black voters 77 to 9. So it does not
• 1:24:22
  Speaker 2: appear that there's concerns about, you know, black voters and
• 1:24:25
  Speaker 2: antipathy towards the Arab American community.
• 1:24:28
  Speaker 5: Is showing up at least in the polls here. You
• 1:24:31
  Speaker 5: never know.
• 1:24:32
  Speaker 2: Let's take all the polls with a grain of salt,
• 1:24:33
  Speaker 2: of course. Abdul absolutely crushing in the youngest demographic, 62
• 1:24:37
  Speaker 2: to 31. Also in the next demographic, 35 to 49.
• 1:24:40
  Speaker 2: He's up 48 to 38. In the older voters, Rodgers
• 1:24:46
  Speaker 2: has a lead. His biggest lead appears to me among
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 2: Gen X-ish voters, 52 to 36, narrowly winning boomers by
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 2: three points, at least, again, according to this poll. And
• 1:24:57
  Speaker 2: on the gender divide, Rodgers has a 52-41 edge over
• 1:25:01
  Speaker 2: Abdul among men and Abdul has a 53 34 advantage
• 1:25:07
  Speaker 2: among women in the state of Michigan. And if you
• 1:25:10
  Speaker 2: drill down further into this, Abdul is winning both college
• 1:25:13
  Speaker 2: and non-college women. Rogers is winning non-college men and basically
• 1:25:17
  Speaker 2: even with college educated men. So very interesting in the
• 1:25:21
  Speaker 2: state of Michigan. But I think if you had to
• 1:25:24
  Speaker 2: bet just because of the year and how much Democrats have,
• 1:25:29
  Speaker 2: you know, the win at their back, And also now
• 1:25:31
  Speaker 2: Mike Rogers has taken what I have to think is
• 1:25:33
  Speaker 2: an unpopular position in Michigan with regard to the Canada
• 1:25:36
  Speaker 2: trade war. You know, he's saddled with a lot of
• 1:25:39
  Speaker 2: Trump baggage.
• 1:25:40
  Speaker 3: The data center thing. Trump is saying he's a fool. Yes.
• 1:25:43
  Speaker 3: He's against it.
• 1:25:44
  Speaker 5: Completely.
• 1:25:45
  Speaker 2: And Abdul has been dealing with all of this Hassan
• 1:25:48
  Speaker 2: Piker derangement situation, freak out, all of that's been going on.
• 1:25:53
  Speaker 2: People have not really had, they have not had the
• 1:25:56
  Speaker 2: chance to make the case against Mike Rogers aggressively. This
• 1:25:59
  Speaker 2: is a guy that was supporting the Iran war for
• 1:26:01
  Speaker 2: literally decades. I mean, this is someone who has been
• 1:26:04
  Speaker 2: on board and pushing all sorts of lies about their
• 1:26:06
  Speaker 2: nuclear program for years and years and years.
• 1:26:09
  Speaker 5: So on one of the issues that voters are most
• 1:26:11
  Speaker 5: upset about, Mike.
• 1:26:12
  Speaker 2: Rogers is not only on the wrong side of that,
• 1:26:14
  Speaker 2: he's been on the wrong side of it for decades
• 1:26:17
  Speaker 2: at this point.
• 1:26:18
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm looking at some of these latest ones. Nate
• 1:26:20
  Speaker 3: Silver has the aggregate. I mean, D plus four is
• 1:26:23
  Speaker 3: obviously the best result, but there is a more recent
• 1:26:25
  Speaker 3: one Susquehanna just a couple of days ago, which had
• 1:26:29
  Speaker 3: Abdul up by seven points, 46-39. That fits kind of
• 1:26:33
  Speaker 3: with my modal, kind of where I think things are
• 1:26:35
  Speaker 3: going to go. And I just think this is where
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 3: the trends matter. If you have a guy who lost
• 1:26:41
  Speaker 3: in a wave to Republican election, how were you supposed
• 1:26:45
  Speaker 3: to win in a Democratic wave election? I mean, it
• 1:26:48
  Speaker 3: defies logic. Like, why would you nominate the same person?
• 1:26:52
  Speaker 3: And Rogers, I mean, he's a good point. It's just
• 1:26:55
  Speaker 3: one of those where it honestly makes me feel like
• 1:26:57
  Speaker 3: I'm taking crazy pills where people are acting as if
• 1:26:59
  Speaker 3: he did not just run two years ago and lose
• 1:27:02
  Speaker 3: whenever Donald Trump won the state. by a percentage point
• 1:27:05
  Speaker 3: or more.
• 1:27:06
  Speaker 5: And I mean, he was up against the electoral juggernaut
• 1:27:08
  Speaker 5: of Alyssa's luck.
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 7: Right.
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 1: That's what I mean.
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 3: It's like by the most, one of the most unimpressive
• 1:27:12
  Speaker 3: women in all politics, like, okay. Uh, and so if
• 1:27:15
  Speaker 3: you're going to lose to her, how exactly are you
• 1:27:17
  Speaker 3: going to win right now? It just, that was with
• 1:27:21
  Speaker 3: every conceivable thing going right for a Michigan Republican. And
• 1:27:26
  Speaker 3: you still were not able to win. You lost by
• 1:27:28
  Speaker 3: like 0.2%. or something like that. So first of all,
• 1:27:31
  Speaker 3: it proves that there were split-ticket voters who were Trump-slacking voters.
• 1:27:34
  Speaker 3: There's actually a decent number of them in Michigan. How
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 3: many of those people who were already trusting of Trump
• 1:27:42
  Speaker 3: and still were willing to vote Democrat, how many of
• 1:27:45
  Speaker 3: those people are going to trust Trump on this one?
• 1:27:46
  Speaker 3: He's not even on the ballot to follow him in
• 1:27:49
  Speaker 3: the race. That's why structurally, I'm like, he has no chance.
• 1:27:53
  Speaker 3: Maybe I'm being too optimistic, I guess, for Abdul's chances.
• 1:27:57
  Speaker 3: But To me, it was either Stevens or... Abdul, either
• 1:28:02
  Speaker 3: of those are winning, in my opinion. I just didn't
• 1:28:04
  Speaker 3: even think it was a question. That's why that was
• 1:28:05
  Speaker 3: the real race.
• 1:28:06
  Speaker 2: Mallory McMorrow, Abdul, Haley Stevens. All three were going to win.
• 1:28:10
  Speaker 3: It was more of an internecine conflict because it's kind of,
• 1:28:12
  Speaker 3: you knew that going in.
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 1: Tallarico's a very.
• 1:28:15
  Speaker 3: Different story because it's probably the only, like, Crockett, even
• 1:28:18
  Speaker 3: in the wave, I don't think she had a chance.
• 1:28:19
  Speaker 3: Where with Tallarico, I'm like, yeah, maybe. He fits the right,
• 1:28:22
  Speaker 3: he's got the fundraising thing on his side. He's campaigning well.
• 1:28:25
  Speaker 1: He's got a ton of money on his side.
• 1:28:27
  Speaker 3: He's got the, it hits the The new engaged political
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 3: demographic of Texas like perfectly, the white middle-class, you know,
• 1:28:36
  Speaker 3: liberal woman who's very activated, who may have voted for
• 1:28:39
  Speaker 3: Mitt Romney or something in the past. Like I absolutely
• 1:28:41
  Speaker 3: could see something like that happening. So I just, I
• 1:28:44
  Speaker 3: look at all that. I also structurally, I, this was fascinating. E5,
• 1:28:48
  Speaker 3: I had not considered this. And it's such a smart
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 3: point from Jonathan Martin is one of the nightmares, which
• 1:28:56
  Speaker 3: happened in the GOP for the midterms was that neither
• 1:29:00
  Speaker 3: Clarence Thomas or Samuel Alito announced their retirement. And the
• 1:29:07
  Speaker 3: point that he makes is that for Republicans to come
• 1:29:11
  Speaker 3: out in an unpopular election, they need a reason. So
• 1:29:15
  Speaker 3: we know if you're a Republican, and you're running into midterms, like,
• 1:29:19
  Speaker 3: what is your agenda? To do what? Like, they literally
• 1:29:21
  Speaker 3: are not even telling you to just stop the Democrats
• 1:29:23
  Speaker 3: from doing whatever they're gonna do. I'm like, okay, well,
• 1:29:25
  Speaker 3: what you're doing right now sucks, so why would I
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 3: come out to vote? Well, one of the enduring things
• 1:29:31
  Speaker 3: they've always been able, especially to get their base to
• 1:29:34
  Speaker 3: come out to vote for, is the Supreme Court. And
• 1:29:36
  Speaker 3: so I didn't even think about it, but they're totally right,
• 1:29:39
  Speaker 3: is that if they were going to resign, now would
• 1:29:42
  Speaker 3: have been the time when they have the slight majority
• 1:29:44
  Speaker 3: in the Senate, and then they could have gotten their
• 1:29:46
  Speaker 3: guys through And so if they were going to make
• 1:29:48
  Speaker 3: sure that they really wanted people to come out and vote,
• 1:29:50
  Speaker 3: you would announce your retirement and you would say, I'm
• 1:29:53
  Speaker 3: going to retire after the midterms. And that would mean
• 1:29:56
  Speaker 3: people would be like, oh, my God, we got to
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 3: come out to vote to make sure that we can
• 1:30:01
  Speaker 3: confirm these.
• 1:30:01
  Speaker 1: Just you need to make it real for a lot
• 1:30:03
  Speaker 1: of these people.
• 1:30:04
  Speaker 3: And I'm not joking that that would be a significant
• 1:30:06
  Speaker 3: reason why a lot of people would come out to vote.
• 1:30:08
  Speaker 3: You can imagine on the Democratic side, too. Roe versus Wade,
• 1:30:11
  Speaker 3: people were like, oh, whoa, I have to come out
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 3: and vote for this.
• 1:30:13
  Speaker 2: The Kavanaugh fight was very motivating for Republicans in 2018.
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 2: And even though it still wasn't a great year for them,
• 1:30:18
  Speaker 2: it would have been a lot worse if you didn't
• 1:30:20
  Speaker 2: have the Kavanaugh fight. And that led to a lot of,
• 1:30:23
  Speaker 2: especially places that were red, that Democrats thought they had
• 1:30:26
  Speaker 2: a shot at in the closing weeks with Kavanaugh front
• 1:30:29
  Speaker 2: and center, that really shifted things against Democrats in more
• 1:30:32
  Speaker 2: difficult terrain.
• 1:30:33
  Speaker 3: And it's been a long time for some of our
• 1:30:35
  Speaker 3: younger listeners. You're not going to remember this. Trump Putting
• 1:30:38
  Speaker 3: out the list of conservative justices and being like, these
• 1:30:41
  Speaker 3: are the people I'm going to nominate, that was massive
• 1:30:44
  Speaker 3: for the evangelicals. A huge number of them were like,
• 1:30:47
  Speaker 3: I don't like the guy.
• 1:30:49
  Speaker 1: He's got Pence. He's got the list. Let's go for it.
• 1:30:52
  Speaker 3: I mean, honestly, it's like a forgotten memory at this point.
• 1:30:55
  Speaker 3: And obviously it works. It's one of the great gambles.
• 1:30:57
  Speaker 1: In their history.
• 1:30:58
  Speaker 3: And so not having an affirmative reason to keep the
• 1:31:02
  Speaker 3: Senate is a huge problem, I think, for a lot
• 1:31:05
  Speaker 3: of these Republican candidates.
• 1:31:06
  Speaker 2: He writes in this piece, he's focused on the Midwest
• 1:31:10
  Speaker 2: and talking about Ohio and Kansas and Iowa. He says
• 1:31:15
  Speaker 2: every wave election brings a late surprise. If conditions deteriorate,
• 1:31:18
  Speaker 2: there's a chance Nebraska, Kansas, and even Mississippi could fall.
• 1:31:23
  Speaker 2: The culprits are obvious, the exorbitant cost of living, Trump's
• 1:31:26
  Speaker 2: deep unpopularity with the political center, and the massive enthusiasm
• 1:31:29
  Speaker 2: gap Democrats enjoy over Republicans. Now, that would be extraordinary
• 1:31:34
  Speaker 2: if you had 10 percent, any of those Nebraska, Kansas
• 1:31:37
  Speaker 2: or Mississippi. I do think Dan Osborne has a shot
• 1:31:40
  Speaker 2: in Nebraska. We have seen polling in Kansas that has
• 1:31:43
  Speaker 2: it very close. I don't know the dynamics in Mississippi,
• 1:31:45
  Speaker 2: to be perfectly honest with you. I haven't tuned into it.
• 1:31:47
  Speaker 2: But let's go and put Nate Silver's projections up on
• 1:31:50
  Speaker 2: the screen here.
• 1:31:50
  Speaker 5: This is E4.
• 1:31:52
  Speaker 2: He's got the Democrats leading by 7.7 points on the
• 1:31:56
  Speaker 2: generic ballot.
• 1:31:57
  Speaker 5: That's a very large lead.
• 1:31:59
  Speaker 2: It's been relatively stable, but you can see it increasing
• 1:32:03
  Speaker 2: bit by bit.
• 1:32:04
  Speaker 5: Over time.
• 1:32:05
  Speaker 2: And I'll just say like the, you know, the Midwest
• 1:32:09
  Speaker 2: being crucial in this, Iowa and Ohio in particular, is
• 1:32:13
  Speaker 2: a real problem for Republicans because these are states they
• 1:32:15
  Speaker 2: should win easily. However, they are also states that have
• 1:32:19
  Speaker 2: been hurt the most by Trump's trade wars and by.
• 1:32:23
  Speaker 5: The Iran war.
• 1:32:24
  Speaker 2: So Iowa is at this point, tilt them at least.
• 1:32:29
  Speaker 2: And at the governor level in Iowa, it's really looking
• 1:32:32
  Speaker 2: like Democrats are going to win that seat. The other
• 1:32:34
  Speaker 2: state to pay attention to is Alaska, where they have
• 1:32:37
  Speaker 2: this very unusual political system. They do a jungle primary
• 1:32:42
  Speaker 2: and then they do actually top four, I think, runoff.
• 1:32:45
  Speaker 2: In any case, Mary Paltola, the Democrat, as more votes
• 1:32:47
  Speaker 2: have come in, she is very close to winning 50
• 1:32:50
  Speaker 2: percent in the primary.
• 1:32:53
  Speaker 5: So one of the big.
• 1:32:56
  Speaker 2: Groups that rates these races just shifted this more towards
• 1:32:59
  Speaker 2: Democrats because of her performance in the primary.
• 1:33:03
  Speaker 5: It's one thing to look at polls. It's another thing
• 1:33:04
  Speaker 5: when voters actually.
• 1:33:06
  Speaker 3: Show up and vote.
• 1:33:07
  Speaker 2: For her to be at very close to 50 percent
• 1:33:10
  Speaker 2: in that race, in that initial test, is highly significant.
• 1:33:14
  Speaker 2: It indicates she's got a real path to be able
• 1:33:17
  Speaker 2: to win in Alaska. So that would be huge. We
• 1:33:19
  Speaker 2: talked about Tallarico. I think Abdul is going to be fine.
• 1:33:22
  Speaker 2: Troy Jackson seems to be coasting at this point against
• 1:33:24
  Speaker 2: Susan Collins. Again, the polls have been wrong there.
• 1:33:26
  Speaker 3: In the past.
• 1:33:26
  Speaker 5: You never know.
• 1:33:27
  Speaker 2: She seems to have some extraordinary superpowers there. looking very
• 1:33:30
  Speaker 2: good for him. North Carolina is basically a lock. Sherrod
• 1:33:33
  Speaker 2: Brown looking very strong in Ohio. Iowa looking very good.
• 1:33:36
  Speaker 2: So it's going to be very interesting. And I think
• 1:33:40
  Speaker 2: what we've seen in the special elections, putting all the
• 1:33:42
  Speaker 2: polls aside, is that huge enthusiasm gap between Democrats and
• 1:33:47
  Speaker 2: Republicans where Democrats are winning in places that they didn't
• 1:33:49
  Speaker 2: even think would be possible.
• 1:33:51
  Speaker 3: All the caveats aside. So Iowa, they have it within
• 1:33:53
  Speaker 3: like point two. I mean, we did just have an
• 1:33:55
  Speaker 3: election where the Iowa poll was like the most catastrophically
• 1:33:58
  Speaker 3: historically wrong. Right.
• 1:33:59
  Speaker 1: So you should definitely take that. It wasn't South Carolina.
• 1:34:02
  Speaker 3: Yeah, sure. We'll go with that. Who else am I thinking? Oh,
• 1:34:08
  Speaker 3: South Carolina. What does that remind me of? Remember Jamie Harrison?
• 1:34:11
  Speaker 1: He raised like.
• 1:34:11
  Speaker 3: $ 15, $ 20 million to lose by the same amount as
• 1:34:15
  Speaker 3: his predecessor.
• 1:34:16
  Speaker 5: Or like Amy McGrath in Kentucky.
• 1:34:18
  Speaker 3: Oh my gosh.
• 1:34:19
  Speaker 1: She raised like $ 50 million.
• 1:34:20
  Speaker 3: Oh my gosh. I'm trying to remember. Sarah something against
• 1:34:23
  Speaker 3: Susan Collins. They had her winning by 12. She lost
• 1:34:25
  Speaker 3: by five or something. So this stuff can be wrong
• 1:34:29
  Speaker 3: all the time. Do not take any of this stuff
• 1:34:32
  Speaker 3: with a grin. But it's worth thinking through Some of
• 1:34:35
  Speaker 3: the crazy scenarios. I'm trying to think. I don't even
• 1:34:38
  Speaker 3: remember the last Democrat from Nebraska. The Cornhusker kickback is
• 1:34:43
  Speaker 3: coming to mind. Oh, yeah. Something about 2008.
• 1:34:45
  Speaker 5: Is that Ben Sasse?
• 1:34:46
  Speaker 3: No, no, no.
• 1:34:47
  Speaker 5: Sorry, that is Republican.
• 1:34:48
  Speaker 3: What was his name?
• 1:34:49
  Speaker 5: This is like 2008.
• 1:34:49
  Speaker 3: Oh, my God. Yeah, the Cornhusker kickback is coming to mind. So, like,
• 1:34:52
  Speaker 3: these are things I've read about in books. You know,
• 1:34:54
  Speaker 3: I was a child, literally, when this stuff was happening.
• 1:34:57
  Speaker 3: I'm trying to think, too, where you also had, I
• 1:35:00
  Speaker 3: think there was a Democrat, not from Mississippi per se,
• 1:35:03
  Speaker 3: but there were definitely Democratic senators.
• 1:35:04
  Speaker 5: Ben Nelson. I knew Ben.
• 1:35:06
  Speaker 3: I knew it was Ben.
• 1:35:07
  Speaker 5: Mine wanted to say his ass, yeah.
• 1:35:09
  Speaker 3: Right, so Ben Nelson, Dick Lugar, remember? These types of,
• 1:35:13
  Speaker 3: these are old figures, but they could come back, you know,
• 1:35:16
  Speaker 3: some of these folks. These types of, I don't even know,
• 1:35:19
  Speaker 3: blue dogs, it's not the right word because things have
• 1:35:22
  Speaker 3: just changed so much, but we shouldn't assume 2010 was
• 1:35:26
  Speaker 3: the year that all politics became completely national and in
• 1:35:29
  Speaker 3: such a way where partisanship dominated. The people like Susan
• 1:35:34
  Speaker 3: Collins who were able to define national trends just shrank
• 1:35:37
  Speaker 3: to a tiny number of the Murkowski and the Collins.
• 1:35:40
  Speaker 3: That's why we literally know their names. But we shouldn't
• 1:35:42
  Speaker 3: assume it's an ironclad rule of politics. We were interested
• 1:35:45
  Speaker 3: in politics before 2010. It was a given that you
• 1:35:48
  Speaker 3: would have Democratic senators from Louisiana or from I don't know,
• 1:35:53
  Speaker 3: you know, I'm thinking of Tennessee, Al Gore, like, you know,
• 1:35:56
  Speaker 3: it's like these things have existed in our modern lifetimes.
• 1:35:59
  Speaker 3: There's no reason that it can't switch back. And if
• 1:36:01
  Speaker 3: we're living such an, we already lived through an extraordinary election.
• 1:36:04
  Speaker 3: 2024 was an insane election, literally, where Republican wins a
• 1:36:07
  Speaker 3: popular vote. There's no reason why things can't shift dramatically
• 1:36:10
  Speaker 3: from there too. There's just no reason to assume, and
• 1:36:13
  Speaker 3: I always encourage people to do this, look at the
• 1:36:15
  Speaker 3: 96 electoral map compared to 2000. Like the 96 map
• 1:36:19
  Speaker 3: where Clinton wins like an overwhelming number of states and
• 1:36:22
  Speaker 3: how razor tight things.
• 1:36:24
  Speaker 1: Are for W and Gore four years later.
• 1:36:27
  Speaker 3: Like our politics can change on a statewide level, even
• 1:36:30
  Speaker 3: significant margins, like even on 10, 12% in different directions
• 1:36:35
  Speaker 3: in just a matter of four years or even two years.
• 1:36:37
  Speaker 5: I mean, Obama won Iowa. He won Indiana. You know,
• 1:36:40
  Speaker 5: he won Florida.
• 1:36:41
  Speaker 2: So yeah, it's easy to feel like this is all
• 1:36:44
  Speaker 2: very static, but especially with how much rural America has
• 1:36:49
  Speaker 2: been screwed.
• 1:36:50
  Speaker 7: Mm-hmm.
• 1:36:50
  Speaker 2: And for how long? And I think that farmers are really,
• 1:36:54
  Speaker 2: you know, they culturally they're with Trump. There's a lot
• 1:36:57
  Speaker 2: of just Republican DNA there. They were really willing to
• 1:37:00
  Speaker 2: give them some bandwidth to to operate with the tariffs
• 1:37:04
  Speaker 2: in the first term. But it has just been one
• 1:37:06
  Speaker 2: blow after another. And so for the family farmers that
• 1:37:09
  Speaker 2: are still hanging on, they're calling a farm apocalypse. It's
• 1:37:13
  Speaker 2: a matter of how many bankruptcies there are going to
• 1:37:16
  Speaker 2: be because of the cost of fertilizer. Also, there's been
• 1:37:18
  Speaker 2: they've faced a lot in terms of just climate and drought.
• 1:37:22
  Speaker 5: So there's that. And then you have the.
• 1:37:24
  Speaker 2: Diesel costs, which are so high. They are just getting
• 1:37:28
  Speaker 2: screwed and completely devastated. So at some point. You have
• 1:37:31
  Speaker 2: to think that shows up at the ballot box. Like,
• 1:37:33
  Speaker 2: people will take it for some time. But eventually, if
• 1:37:37
  Speaker 2: they feel screwed over and ignored for long enough, they
• 1:37:40
  Speaker 2: will make other plans.
• 1:37:41
  Speaker 5: They will make other choices.
• 1:37:42
  Speaker 3: Or they just won't vote, which is enough of a— that' s
• 1:37:44
  Speaker 3: the Texas scenario. I don't think any of these West
• 1:37:46
  Speaker 3: Texas Republicans are going to vote for a Democrat.
• 1:37:49
  Speaker 1: But if you just don't vote and a bunch of— I.
• 1:37:50
  Speaker 2: Think Latinos could shift quite significantly from West Texas.
• 1:37:54
  Speaker 3: No, that's for sure. But I meant, you know, the
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 3: traditional crusty white ranchers. I'm like, these people are not liberals. Like,
• 1:38:00
  Speaker 3: they're not coming out to— vote for Tallarica.
• 1:38:02
  Speaker 5: Oh, those ranchers are pissed right now.
• 1:38:04
  Speaker 3: But they are mad. They are pissed. But they may
• 1:38:06
  Speaker 3: just not vote. They might just come out and say,
• 1:38:07
  Speaker 3: screw you, Ken Paxton, screw you, Greg Abbott. Let's see
• 1:38:10
  Speaker 3: where things go in a different direction. That, I could
• 1:38:13
  Speaker 3: see that kind of alchemy come together in a perfect storm, really,
• 1:38:17
  Speaker 3: against a lot of the Republicans.
• 1:38:18
  Speaker 1: But that's, you know, who knows? All right, we've got
• 1:38:21
  Speaker 1: Hassan standing by. Let's get to it.