Latest / UK Column Radio / Is the US Pushing the World to the Brink? | Silk and Steel

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Is the US Pushing the World to the Brink? | Silk and Steel · UK Column Radio

0:01
Hello and welcome to another episode of the Silk and Steel
0:05
podcast. Today we have back on our show
0:08
Einar, who has been a long term resident of China.
0:12
But the fact that Einar that you are American, you know both
0:16
side, you know, you know America very well, you know China very
0:21
well. And we are at a very crucial
0:23
juncture of the Sino American relationship.
0:27
And This is why I, you know, like to pick your brains a
0:30
little bit on the current situation between China and
0:36
United States. Because you, you, you, you are
0:38
you, you, you have, you know, you have your networks, you,
0:41
you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you know how things work
0:45
inside out. There's a lot of let's just get
0:49
to the recent news, you know, with US kidnapping of President
0:55
Maduro of Venezuela. Now I see a lot of spin, you
1:00
know, in the social media as well as mainstream media.
1:03
And somehow this is was a great victory for the Trump
1:06
administration because now United States has control of all
1:11
the the world's largest oil reserve.
1:14
And this is a great humiliation for China because no Chinese
1:18
envoy were in Venezuela to meet with Maduro 5 hours before the
1:23
US operation began. And now, you know, Trump is
1:28
somehow going to cut off the oil flow to China.
1:31
And I even see a news headline saying that, oh, this is going
1:37
to put Xi Jinping unnoticed because now China will not have
1:42
the oil to go out to do a Taiwan operation.
1:47
To me, this sounds very ridiculous.
1:49
But, you know, nobody listened to me.
1:51
So I, I, so I would like to hear from you.
1:54
I'd are you know your take on this situation.
1:57
Well, guy Carl, let me first thing I, I always get a little
2:02
hinky when people say that they're experts on two
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countries, let alone one. I have friends in China who have
2:10
lived their entire life. They're extremely intelligent,
2:13
well read, and they'll tell me they don't know China.
2:15
So and the same in the US, So knowing both countries is not
2:21
really that possible. But I I do look at some
2:24
differences. So let's break this down a
2:26
little bit. All right.
2:27
First, you have Donald Trump, you know, pumping his chest,
2:31
playing, you know, Lord of the jungle, Donald of the jungle.
2:38
He's successfully in his mind, a rundown to Venezuela seized it.
2:44
He thinks that he's had a great victory.
2:48
But, you know, from a Chinese point of view, yeah, there's
2:51
some short term concerns. China gets between or hasn't
2:56
passed between 2 and 4% of its imported oil coming from
3:01
Venezuela. They put about over $60 billion
3:05
into Venezuela and they still owed about 10 billion.
3:08
A lot of that was for infrastructure and to, you know,
3:11
keep their oil industry going. I personally know one of the
3:16
lawyers who was working on that deal and without violating any
3:21
confidences, he, he, he said it was very interesting.
3:24
The people were extremely interesting on it.
3:30
So, you know, from China's perspective, yes, there are
3:33
short term concerns about that, but it's, it's not irrevocable.
3:37
Maybe the price of heavy oil goes up a little bit, but there
3:41
are other places that are buying for it.
3:43
Remember, we're in the midst of a global slowdown.
3:46
Oil prices were softening this. There's there's room, there's
3:50
capacity there. So there's not a global
3:53
shortage. So, but long term, I think in
3:57
the medium and long term, China has actually come out of this
4:02
looking better and not by anything.
4:04
It's done simply the US by showing that it is a
4:10
irresponsible power that believes that the law of the
4:12
jungle rules the land has shown the the world that it is not
4:18
only unreliable, but that is it is willing on any, you know, any
4:23
pretext to take whatever it thinks it can get.
4:27
And you know, nowhere is is more apparent than that.
4:31
Then it's, you know, his constant threats about
4:33
Greenland. Greenland is not a narco state.
4:37
Reindeer are not terrorists. And you know, 50 some odd
4:42
thousand people there have been living in peace and they haven't
4:45
invaded anybody. So, you know, this is just
4:49
purely a power play. He has switched in theory he's
4:53
trying to tell the world, well, I don't need to be a global
4:56
hegemon. I don't need to control the
4:58
world. I just need to control my
5:00
hemisphere. It's my right.
5:03
The problem with that is I don't think anybody believes that if
5:06
he was able to secure the Western Hemisphere that he
5:09
wouldn't go over the other, go towards the other hemispheres.
5:13
And, and that's very important because if, if he in fact was
5:16
trying to signal that, not that it, it's acceptable, but if he
5:20
was trying to signal that he would be withdrawing troops and
5:24
bases, the 400 bases that surround, you know, in, in Asia
5:28
that basically surround to China, He would be pulling
5:31
troops back from Europe and saying, look, I'm done with all
5:35
that stuff. You guys figured out.
5:36
I'm just going to, you know, take what I want here.
5:39
You know, like I said, law of the jungle.
5:41
So from China's perspective, long term, they've been
5:44
validated. They've expressed concerns about
5:47
the desire of the US and Washington particular, I
5:51
shouldn't say the US people, you know, those people are not In
5:55
Sync with this. But the folks of Washington
5:58
really believe that they have the right to contain other
6:01
countries, whether it's Russia, Iran, China, Venezuela, anybody
6:05
they don't like anybody who doesn't fit their ideological
6:08
core. Well, the of the core, as I
6:12
remember it was free speech, self determination, A ballot
6:18
box. And what do we see happening
6:20
here? The exact opposite.
6:22
The hypocrisy does not bother Donald Trump.
6:25
Happy to go forward with whatever, you know, is necessary
6:29
to get quote, what he wants. You know, you have to give me
6:32
access. I mean that he, he sounds
6:34
exactly like the minor real estate developer that he was.
6:38
And I'd say minor in the sense that he was never one of the big
6:43
New York real estate guys. They all laughed at him.
6:47
They thought he was, you know, a clown, somebody who was
6:51
promoting himself endlessly but didn't have the the wherewithal
6:55
to avoid 6 bankruptcies, turned his father's big fortune into a
7:01
medium sized one, this type of thing.
7:05
But there, there's a, there, there's something that is very
7:08
troublesome to me and that is Trump is the master of
7:13
distraction. And, you know, generally he
7:16
throws out what I call a dead cat or, you know, a bunch of
7:19
white rabbits or both simultaneously on a daily basis.
7:24
So, you know, this distracts this press and they, you know,
7:27
they, you know, look at the dead cat and say, oh, my goodness.
7:30
And then they see the white rabbits and they follow them
7:32
around the room. And then they repeat that the
7:34
next day. There's really never a a pause
7:38
in the ongoing, you know, news cycle, especially when it comes
7:42
to Trump. But if you start looking at the
7:47
that the number of issues that have come on that you know, how
7:50
quickly they follow on each other.
7:52
Most of these issues, for instance, 500% tariffs on India,
7:57
that would have been at least two or three day issue, right?
8:01
You know, distraction if you Venezuela would have been at
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least a couple of weeks just by itself.
8:06
Greenland would have been another three or four days.
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I mean by the fact that he's doing this simultaneously speaks
8:16
to a certain amount of desperation.
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And I say that because I mean, he's been successful in avoiding
8:23
most of the issues regarding the Epstein files, which seems to be
8:29
a huge concern. You have a, you know, they, they
8:32
said there's 3 or 400,000 pages of, of documents and boxes of,
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you know, who knows what recordings, etcetera.
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And that was one thing. Now they discover that there's
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more than 2 million that haven't been really processed.
8:48
And yet they say, oh, this was, you know, completely
8:51
investigated and all this kind of nonsense.
8:53
So he's clearly bothered by the Epstein case.
8:57
He's been fighting every tooth and nail to keep it out.
9:00
You, you heard that recording where he starts swearing that
9:04
he's not going to release them, says some choice things about
9:07
Marjorie Taylor Green. And so, you know, you, you have
9:11
nothing. And then there's other reasons
9:14
to distract. His base is attacking each
9:17
other. It's very easy to put together a
9:20
coalition of people who feel that there's something wrong.
9:24
But it's very hard to control that coalition once you get into
9:28
the, you know, the seat of power.
9:30
And you have to start administrating because they have
9:32
very, very, very different ideas.
9:34
You have white supremacists, You have evangelicals.
9:38
You have people who just, you know, simplistically believe
9:41
that, you know, he could single handedly bring down prices and,
9:45
you know, make make the world better again.
9:47
And you know, his initial speech, a golden age, you know,
9:52
his base lapped it up. They they've been essence become
9:55
a cult. When you talk to them, you say,
9:57
how about this? How about that, you know, the
10:00
Epstein files? No, it's fake news.
10:02
Even things that he's actually said and done, they'll say, no,
10:05
he never said or or did that. And even if you show them,
10:08
they'll just say no, no, no, that's that's not true.
10:11
I don't believe it. And that's it.
10:13
They're not interested in the facts.
10:14
They just accept him emotionally because he reflects in their
10:19
minds their angst and their their troubles, You know, in
10:24
their own lives. They see their life degrading.
10:27
I don't blame them for looking for somebody who can save them,
10:30
some sort of strong man. So often in these cases when
10:34
people are desperate, able to show up to help, aren't there to
10:37
help, they're there to take more.
10:40
And, you know, given that Donald Trump has more than doubled his
10:44
wealth and the net wealth and the net wealth of his children
10:48
in this first year, you know, at some point that's going to come
10:52
home to roost. Then you have, you know, apart
10:56
from his base, you have the over 60% of Americans who are living
11:01
paycheck to paycheck. And guess what?
11:04
They're about to get a real, especially people at the lower
11:08
end of that are about to get a just horrible shock when their
11:12
health insurance premiums go up. And, you know, Donald Trump
11:15
doesn't want to talk about that. And so I think he's, you know,
11:20
ramping up the speed, all right, of the distractions that he's
11:24
putting out there to try to keep the narrative going.
11:29
My question is, every time you do that, then the next thing you
11:33
have say has to be even more outrageous.
11:37
And, you know, seizing a Russian flag tanker, not off Venezuela,
11:43
right, but near England and the Channel coast.
11:47
That is serious. You know, we don't know how far
11:52
he's going to go now. China and Russia are not going
11:56
to fight America in conventional weapons in South America.
12:02
They couldn't for the same reason the US would have a very
12:05
difficult time fighting China. And you know, in the event that
12:09
they, you know, Taiwan decides that they want to declare
12:13
independence, you know, the supply lines are too large.
12:17
I mean, you, you can see large feats, fleets coming for days
12:21
and they would be very vulnerable to attack and things
12:24
like this for some reasons or not.
12:27
But there is the economic side of this.
12:32
You know, Europe has already attacked Russia.
12:34
They've seized, you know, Russian assets and things like
12:37
that. And they said, well, we're just
12:38
basically going to keep them. Well, they tried.
12:42
You had one member said, no, no, we can't do that.
12:45
She wasn't bridge too far. But they said, they certainly
12:47
have said, oh, we're going to take the interest from these
12:50
monies that we've seized or we're embargoing and we're going
12:54
to help Ukraine with that. That's a violation of
12:58
international commerce. I mean, you cannot be secure if,
13:02
you know, governments are Willy nilly deciding what they want to
13:05
decide based on not what you did, but what your government
13:10
did. This idea that all Russians are
13:12
part of the government is kind of silly.
13:16
It's like all Americans are part of the government.
13:18
No, I don't think so. So, you know, it's it's become a
13:22
complex situation, but you know, when you start looking at at his
13:28
distractions and how they're escalating, there's a real
13:32
danger that we will accidentally get into some sort of kinetic
13:38
conflict. And I say that because this
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reminds me of World War One. No one wants a war, but each
13:45
side was trying to draw the line and say, don't cross this line.
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And, you know, do you do this? I'll do that.
13:51
Then it was based on all of these alliances and things like
13:55
this. But today it's based on
13:58
unilateral action by the US as its struggles to maintain its
14:02
hegemony and extremely dangerous.
14:05
It's been very poorly received in in South America or Latin, I
14:09
should say, Latin America, although you know, there have
14:13
been a number of countries who supported it.
14:15
I think that is not representative of the people.
14:19
There's way too much memory going on in South America about
14:24
assassinations. There have been between 56 and
14:28
66 regime change operations acknowledged and recorded since
14:37
World War 2 in Latin America. And this has touched almost
14:43
every single country. And it is something where they
14:46
don't forget. They, they remember this.
14:48
You go to Chile that you know, you say Allende, you know,
14:51
things like that. Don't go to Chile and tell, tell
14:54
them how wonderful you think Henry Kissinger was.
14:59
You know, they, they, they have a difference of opinion there.
15:03
You know, they have relatives that died because of actions of
15:08
the US that were pushed forward by a nascent Henry Kissinger who
15:12
believed great power was, you know, you, you keep, kept your
15:15
power by doing asymmetrical things to anybody who challenged
15:19
you. So if somebody gave you a dirty
15:21
look, you go in and kill them. And if they, you know, actually
15:25
did something, you kill their village.
15:28
This was the kind of angst. I mean, Henry, you know, in
15:31
China, they they admire him. But I always point out that he
15:34
was responsible for millions of deaths in Indonesia, Africa,
15:38
South America, Southeast Asia. I mean, he was a butcher.
15:43
He didn't do the work themselves, but he was certainly
15:45
the mastermind behind all these ideas and strategies and things
15:49
like that. And yet his legacy continues.
15:54
Now he's, you know, a much flaunted, you know, passed away
15:59
strategists who people always like to quote.
16:02
But the The Dirty reality was that, you know, he was right up
16:07
there in terms of the the people who was responsible for more
16:11
deaths probably in history than many others.
16:14
So this is the reality that we're that we're looking at.
16:18
You have the short term or China has some minor concerns.
16:24
It could lead to more if Donald Trump starts to, you know,
16:28
implicant implement this policy of going to through to any Latin
16:36
American country that is doing trade with China and trying to
16:39
sabotage that you you'll note that today Donald Trump said
16:42
that no foreign advisors from the China, Russia, Iran anywhere
16:48
in can be allowed in Venezuela. He's trying to run the country
16:53
by remote. It's difficult to see how that
16:57
is going to work. He can certainly extort them,
17:01
continue to threaten them, get them to give him free oil.
17:06
But at some point he's going to reach a tipping point where, you
17:10
know, unless there is investment, All right.
17:16
And it's to the tune of about, oh, $100 billion would be
17:21
necessary to bring back the Venezuelan oil industry.
17:26
And I don't know that the big oil companies are that
17:30
interested. And people think, well, of
17:33
course, look, you know, huge, plentiful supply.
17:36
Well, you know, it used to be that Venezuela, you know, could
17:40
be counted on as a source for oil.
17:42
Then it wasn't. So the major oil companies moved
17:47
into the oil sands of Canada. They invested half trillion
17:53
dollars, all right. They bought up leases.
17:58
Oil sands is a dirty, nasty business and it requires very
18:01
specialised equipment. It's not like you move it
18:04
somewhere else. It's a very particular type of
18:07
solution. And even within different oil
18:10
fields, you you have slightly different conditions and you
18:12
have to modify them. So it's not like they can take
18:15
their equipment and run down to to Venezuela and start
18:18
processing oil. So they would have to, in
18:20
essence, abandoned those, abandoned their leases and then
18:25
go down to Venezuela, which is going to be a political risk.
18:30
We don't know what happens after Donald Trump leaves.
18:33
We certainly don't know what happens even in the midterms.
18:37
And you could have a situation where internal strife, you could
18:41
get civil unrest there, which would make it difficult to get
18:44
the oil out. You could have a new regime come
18:47
in, in a few years and say we're going to re nationalise this.
18:50
You know, we were illegally invaded by another country and
18:56
we do not accept this. Remember, the people are still
19:00
going to vote, and if they're poor, US is taking the revenue
19:05
source but not repairing the infrastructure.
19:09
That means there's left less revenue to a country that is
19:12
already struggling and the United States has nothing.
19:17
Have you noticed any plan whatsoever to do anything within
19:21
Venezuela? You've heard this.
19:22
Oh, for the benefit of both countries.
19:25
Well, come on, he's not interested in Venezuela.
19:28
He doesn't have a plan to help them.
19:30
He doesn't have a plan. After 18 years of criticising
19:33
American healthcare, he doesn't have a plan.
19:36
Now, how do we expect him to have a plan for a country he
19:41
doesn't even know anything about, he doesn't care about?
19:44
I mean, they had they were unable to articulate anything
19:47
that happened the day after. What happens the day after you
19:50
seize these people. You know, how are you going to
19:53
do this country? And it's, it's complete mess.
19:56
You can see that that goes back to my first point or my second
19:59
point that they he is doing a lot of things just to divert
20:04
attention from other problems, especially as domestic ones.
20:09
So, you know, and then let me just explain one thing and I'll
20:13
stop talking. Why does America, which produces
20:19
more oil than it needs, why is it interested in this oil from
20:24
Venezuela? Does everyone, you know, think
20:26
about that? We we export more than we
20:28
import. The reason is that we export a
20:32
week. The majority of our oil is what
20:34
they call sweet crude. It's it's light.
20:38
It doesn't need a lot of processing and it it has a high
20:41
value. You can turn it into gasoline
20:43
and jet fuel and all of these wonderful things.
20:46
Now, heavy crude, all right, they call it sour.
20:50
It has a lot of sulphur in it. That sulphur has to be taken out
20:55
and and then it has to be processed within a completely
20:58
different way. Now in the United States, 60% of
21:03
our processing is for heavy oil. So what happens if you have this
21:11
problem where the US is geared for heavy oil, but it doesn't
21:15
really have a a great supply? Canada is more expensive, yes,
21:18
but it's also more stable. Venezuela sounds great.
21:23
But, you know, in essence, you're asking the major oil
21:26
companies to take a haircut on their own investments and go
21:29
into an area that is very, very politically risky.
21:34
So this situation of the imbalance and the reason we're
21:38
doing this so that we can, you know, apply heavy oil to these
21:43
refineries, which, you know, Trump came out and said, oh,
21:45
these, these guys need the oil because they they have a
21:48
shortage of heavy crude. Well, and that that sounds
21:51
great, but it's not, it's not a reliable solution, hasn't been
21:55
thought through like many of Trump's ideas.
22:00
He doesn't seem to grasp the reality of the industry.
22:03
And, you know, whether he's helping or actually hurting it,
22:07
the problem is that somebody will start going in and
22:12
developing, you know, Venezuela's oil at some point.
22:17
And when that happens, yes, you're going to have a real
22:19
problem with, you know, the major U.S. oil companies who
22:24
invested in tar sands in Canada because they're going to be at a
22:27
price disadvantage. There's also this idea that
22:31
somehow by lowering the price, you're going to help everything
22:35
that all of a sudden, you know, America will be doing well.
22:37
Well, if you lower the price of oil, America is an exporter of
22:43
oil. So you're going to lose at the
22:46
same time as you're quote winning, but you're losing more
22:49
because the amount you're losing on your sales, which are greater
22:53
than your imports, you know, it's not a a victory at all.
22:58
All right there, there's offsets.
23:01
And this is the complexity that Donald Trump and his his
23:04
administration don't seem to grasp.
23:07
They're uniquely unqualified. They don't.
23:10
They lack the experience, temperaments, you name it, they
23:14
don't have it. It's just simply the cast of The
23:18
Apprentice to Washington Edition.
23:22
All expendable people who, you know, they look great.
23:27
They're completely idiot. I mean, I mean, come on.
23:31
I mean, you have a woman who was used to shuffle papers for
23:35
insurance companies out there trying to prosecute a criminal
23:40
case, a sophisticated criminal case.
23:43
She doesn't even know where to stand or who to talk to or what
23:47
standards are. You know, it's criminal
23:50
incompetence to have people like that.
23:53
But these are the people he surrounds himself with.
23:55
Why? Because they are expendable.
23:58
He can call them in the office and say you're fired, you know,
24:02
and his, his, his base will go nuts.
24:04
Oh, he's really showing him. This is just like The
24:06
Apprentice. OK.
24:08
But reality isn't a show. And Donald Trump is falling way
24:13
short of the mark. The question is, when does it
24:16
catch up with them? Or when does he do something so
24:20
risky that we start to get retaliation and then escalation?
24:27
I'm in complete agreement with you about Trump is doing this as
24:31
a distraction. I mean, he's great for
24:33
television, Trump. Trump knows how to be the
24:35
reality TV show host that he really is.
24:39
But I do have a question about why then he's going to, I mean,
24:45
there's all these other distractions that he could focus
24:48
on unless you said, you know, just focus on Venezuela or focus
24:52
on squeezing tariff out of India.
24:54
Why is he then going after Greenland?
24:57
I mean, that doesn't make sense. If you want to be the hegemon,
25:01
you want to you want to get more people on your side, you know,
25:04
build up your alliance to shore up your position.
25:07
But Trump is looks like he's sing he's single minded to
25:12
destroy NATO, to destroy the the one institution that, you know,
25:18
lock in the Europeans as the American vessels.
25:22
And he is going after a NATO country, Denmark, you know, the
25:26
owner of Greenland. And and when US are red in all
25:31
this reason they throw out for why US need to acquire, acquire
25:35
Greenland because, you know, Greenland said I'm a very
25:37
strategic shipping lane, you know, because you sits on the
25:41
Iceland, UK Greenland gap. You can monitor the Arctic when
25:45
the ice melt. We can, you know, we can deter
25:48
the Russians and the Chinese shipping, you know, in the
25:51
Arctic from from the bases in Greenland.
25:54
But all that excuse is bogus because currently US already
25:58
have access to Greenland per agreement with Denmark, per per
26:03
per agreement with NATO. They can do all that right now.
26:08
So why is it that he was dead set acquiring Greenland while
26:15
antagonising a NATO ally and, and, and potentially turning
26:18
Europe against him? I mean, like the, you know, the,
26:22
the Europeans leaders are ready, you know, they are all
26:24
despising, but they still have to scrape and bow because, you
26:28
know, American power. But now they're really, I mean,
26:31
the Greenland might just be a bridge too far, taking away a
26:35
sovereign territory of, of a NATO country.
26:39
What? What, What do you think is the
26:40
reason he's doing that? Well, Carl, First off, he
26:46
doesn't care about Europe. He sees them as weaklings.
26:50
He said so on many occasions. So the idea that he he takes
26:56
them seriously there, I mean, you, you can see a very clear
26:58
pattern. Any country that stands up to
27:01
him. All right, Oh, he, you know,
27:03
he's like, oh, can't we, can't we be friends?
27:06
We can work this out, You know, China, Russia, the mayor of New
27:10
York. You know, people always ask me,
27:12
he said, what would I know? Why is he so nice to a guy who
27:15
called him a fascist? This is very simple, Donald.
27:19
The way Donald Trump thinks, you know, he's vindictive, if if you
27:24
haven't noticed, and you know, if he was mayor of New York and
27:29
he didn't like the president and the president had a whole bunch
27:32
of real estate inside New York. Donald Trump is very well aware
27:37
of what he would do, which would be to send an army of inspectors
27:40
on a daily basis to every single one of those properties to find
27:45
some excuse to shut them down, to find them, etcetera.
27:48
It's the only reason that Donald Trump did it, self interest.
27:52
And that's the only reason he does anything else in terms of
27:55
Greenland. He he really sees himself carved
28:00
on the on the in the in the rocks of Rushmore.
28:03
He even has a couple of mock ups of him on there.
28:08
So he, he's looking for this big thing.
28:10
OK, so I, you know, I grab South America and I grab Greenland.
28:14
I control the Western Hemisphere and I will be in the history
28:18
books as the greatest president or more important to him, a
28:22
better president than Obama. I mean, there was a real turning
28:27
point when Obama made fun of him at the Gridiron Dinner, the
28:31
annual dinner where they get together and they make jokes
28:34
about each other. Donald Trump was looking, you
28:39
know, Oh my gosh, he was so embarrassed at that.
28:43
And it was, it was widely reported that that was the
28:46
moment he said, I'm going to be president.
28:48
I don't care what it takes. I'll do whatever it is.
28:50
I'm going to make this bastard pay.
28:53
And that's quite clearly what he's done since that point.
28:57
So, yeah, from his, his point of view, he wants to make himself,
29:00
you know, an FDR or whatever. And these are the ways to get
29:05
it. He doesn't care about Europe, as
29:07
he said, they're weaklings. He's going to grab what he can.
29:10
And you know, with Venezuela, he's feeling very, you know,
29:14
he's on a high. I did it.
29:17
No one thought any I would do this.
29:19
I'm showing the I'm the madman of, of diplomacy.
29:23
No one can guess what I'm going to do next.
29:26
And maybe I can extend that. I mean, in his biography he is,
29:30
he has said, they said, I, I don't think about yesterday, I
29:33
don't think about tomorrow. What I think about is how to
29:36
maximise today. So that's exactly how he goes
29:41
about running the presidency is a day by day thing.
29:44
They said throw out dead cats and white rabbits to keep the
29:47
press out there. And then, you know, 'cause chaos
29:51
and commotion and see, see what opportunities shake out.
29:55
This is what he does, all right. He threatens, controls, does
29:59
whatever, and then he watches to see how you're reacting.
30:04
If he senses any weakness, he presses.
30:06
If he senses any strength and ability to push back, he then,
30:11
you know, looks for something else.
30:14
It's just like with China. I mean, he, he thought his
30:17
tariffs were going to reduce China to, you know, a puddle of
30:20
Jelly. Well, instead they, they said,
30:22
look, you know, the world's interconnected and you're not in
30:25
a position to do all this kind of isolationist stuff you wanted
30:30
to. And then they had a meeting in
30:33
Busan and, you know, Trump realised, OK, this isn't going
30:36
the way I expected. China has things like rare
30:38
earth, strategic metals, chemicals, so many things,
30:43
intermediate goods that we have to have.
30:46
So he's kind of says, OK, OK, you know, she we're friends, we
30:49
can work this out. Meanwhile, he goes back home.
30:53
Well, he doesn't. Even before he goes back home,
30:56
before he even goes to meeting Busan, he gives the green light
31:00
to the Japanese ambassador to violate the ambiguity.
31:05
The ambiguity was always about what the US would do in terms of
31:10
Taiwan, because although they agreed to, there is only one
31:14
China and they signed international treaties that
31:18
domestically they pass a law called the Taiwan Relations Act,
31:22
which, you know, it just says, well, yeah, we we agreed to
31:25
that. But now this is a domestic law
31:27
and you know, this, this governs what we we can do.
31:30
And, you know, China don't pay any attention to this, but you
31:33
know, we're going to compete complete supplying them so they
31:36
can repair their their military structure.
31:40
That was the understanding. Now it's become quite a
31:43
different game in part. So he he encourages her to
31:48
violate the ambiguity. Of course, it sets off a storm
31:51
and it's now costing Japan a lot.
31:53
China's announced that they're not going to allow dual use or
31:57
military use of strategic metals and also rare earths, which puts
32:03
Japan in a very difficult position.
32:05
If they extend that to the automobile industry, basically
32:08
it stops. So China has a lot of controls
32:11
on it. China is a huge market for
32:15
Japan. They have a lot of facilities
32:18
here. To lose that for a country that
32:20
depends so heavily on exports would be devastating.
32:24
So China has its own pressures. So then he goes back to the US
32:30
and what's the game plan? OK.
32:31
We can't attack China directly. So what we're going to do is to
32:35
attack them indirectly. We're going to go to every
32:37
country and say you have to stop trading with China.
32:41
And that's exactly what they're doing today.
32:43
And we're going to make it stick by going down and grabbing a
32:48
country like Venezuela, which has close relationships with
32:52
China, where China has invested to send them a message that you
32:56
can't come to our backyard. And if you do, it's going to
32:59
cost you. So, but it's all indirect, all
33:04
right. He has some comments, so expect
33:07
a direct response, though a shame.
33:11
Which obviously is not going to allow strategic metals and rare
33:15
earths to be used in the weapons that the United States wants to
33:20
build, not only to sell to other countries that are antagonistic
33:24
towards China, but also allowing the US to to re supply their
33:29
stockpile of these weapons. And without these zero, they
33:34
they cannot produce. All right, they can try to go
33:37
through and you know, salvage whatever they can use with
33:41
things, but it's going to run out things like heavy magnets
33:48
that are used in, you know, very delicate operations like
33:52
gyroscopes and things like that. Rare earth magnets, China has
33:56
98% of them up market in terms of production, not in terms of
34:00
the minerals. Minerals are all over the place.
34:03
That is not the issue. The issue is that China has a
34:05
production and it would take US at least five years to and a lot
34:11
of money to try to replicate what China is doing now.
34:16
Meanwhile, China will continue to go forward.
34:18
It would take 10 to 15 years for the US to try to come up with
34:24
domestic solutions for their automobiles and things like
34:27
that. Well, whether it's five years or
34:31
15, the fact is there would be no production during that time
34:35
or very, very limited production.
34:37
And this would be a real threat to the US arms industry.
34:40
How do you sell things you can't make?
34:43
You know, I always, I always laughed at the when Donald Trump
34:46
says we're not going to sell you the avionics that you need for,
34:49
you know, from, for your aeroplanes.
34:53
Well, let's think about this. I'm not going to sell you the
34:57
stuff we can't make, OK? I think that's fairly obvious.
35:04
But you know, I don't think he, you know, it's once against, he
35:07
makes an absurd statement like this, not really working it
35:10
through and and that that is the real danger that he takes a huge
35:16
risk, hasn't thought it through. There's some sort of retaliation
35:21
and then escalation and then we don't know where that goes, but
35:24
it's not a good place. You, you mentioned something
35:28
interesting. You're, you're, you're saying
35:30
that the Japanese prime minister's Sanai Taka Ichi's
35:35
provocative statement on Taiwan, which is that US, that, that
35:39
Japan would send its military to Taiwan in case of a conflict.
35:44
You you're saying that is because she received the US
35:48
prodding to do so Not not maybe not out of her own relation of
35:56
So you think US is behind that, behind the escalation of
36:00
tensions between U China and Japan?
36:03
Oh, absolutely. I mean, you look at the timing
36:05
of his visit to there. He knew he was going to Busan
36:09
and that it was not going to go well.
36:11
He had made stops. Vietnam.
36:15
Well, Vietnam had come to the US, but he had made stops in
36:18
Malaysia. No, Vietnam and Malaysia he made
36:22
stops. And it was Australia that had
36:24
you talked to before. These are the main areas where
36:27
they do have some very small amount of processing of rare
36:31
earths. And he was, you know, trying to
36:33
collect these little bits and pieces so he could show up in
36:37
Busan and say, hey, listen, if you don't give us what we want,
36:40
we'll start making them ourselves.
36:42
You know, China said, OK, you know, it'll take you, what, 515
36:45
years? OK Good luck.
36:47
Good luck with that. So he knew he was going into a
36:51
bad situation. So, you know, he was looking for
36:54
leverage. Donald Trump is always looking
36:57
for leverage. And he'll tell you that, you
36:59
know, I got to get leverage on this guy.
37:00
I have to get better cards. All right.
37:02
He sees it all as a game. So, you know, the Japanese are
37:07
are are very careful, All right, They're not going to violate an
37:12
ambiguity clause. Now she wants to, she wants to,
37:16
quote, normalise Japan. And the key to normalising Japan
37:19
is getting out, you know, having their own nuclear umbrella in
37:22
essence. And she wants to move in that
37:25
direction. But I guarantee you, the moment
37:27
she gets her own nuclear devices, the first thing they'll
37:31
do is ask the US to leave. They do not like being an
37:34
occupied nation. Japan is extremely xenophobic.
37:39
A lot of her popularity right now is because she's been
37:42
closing the door on tourism and a lot of the Japanese people are
37:45
reacting very positively. That's not the ones who run the
37:48
businesses, but the people at large saying we don't like
37:51
gaijin, we don't like foreigners here.
37:54
They're impure, they're dirty. They're they're not Japanese, so
37:57
they're not somebody we can deal with.
38:00
So, yeah, she, she wanted to say something like this.
38:04
But the idea that she, this question wasn't planted, I mean,
38:09
I, I used to run. I was in politics myself.
38:12
When I wanted something like that, I would just tell, you
38:14
know, things. Oh, you know, this is a good
38:16
question. You should think about asking
38:18
that. Well, Gee whiz, they ask it and
38:21
then you respond. So she's, this was calibrated.
38:23
She wanted to stand up as kind of an iron britch's lady like
38:27
Margaret Thatcher, who she admires.
38:30
And you know, she wanted to say the world, look, you can't toy
38:33
with Japan. You know, we have our own
38:34
agency. And it dovetails with her desire
38:38
to make Japan into a quote normalised entity.
38:42
But it brings back very bad memories for Asia as a whole.
38:47
Remember, this is 80th anniversary of the end of the
38:52
anti Japanese imperialist war. Fascism supposedly was defeated
39:00
back then and the hope was it wouldn't come back.
39:03
And now you're starting to see it clearly coming forward in
39:07
Japan, also in the United States.
39:10
I mean it, the only way you can describe what Donald Trump is
39:13
doing is fascism. I mean, this is exactly what
39:16
Germany was doing. They're saying for our
39:18
protection, we need to take over this area.
39:21
For their protection, we need to take over this area.
39:24
That was what it was all about. And what happened?
39:27
Europe appeased and led to war. That's where I, you know, I, you
39:32
know, history doesn't repeat, but it does rhyme.
39:36
I, I, I think I would dispute about the the fascist
39:40
description because I know for a fact the train do not run on
39:45
time in United States, you know? They you, you completely
39:53
destroyed my entire argument. Well, they don't run in Germany
39:57
on time anymore either. But yeah, I I guess I'll have to
40:05
rethink that whole thing. Our trains don't run very fast,
40:09
never mind on time. Yeah, go ahead.
40:19
Go ahead, go ahead. No, no, I it's just I mean,
40:22
I've, I've kind of exhausted that.
40:23
I mean, we, we, we know, we know where, you know, the US is and
40:29
its strategy, you know, wants to take over all these areas show
40:33
it's strong. Trump thinks that this is the
40:36
key to, to, you know, wooing the electorate back.
40:40
But the problem is that if you can't eat, you don't really care
40:44
about Venezuela or Greenland. I mean, you know, US people, you
40:48
ask them where Greenland is, point to a map without things,
40:54
they'll be pointing to Central Europe or something like this or
41:00
Iceland or whatever. They, they have no clue about
41:04
geography. So it would be very, very, very
41:07
difficult for them to get excited about 50,000 people in a
41:12
massive ice, ice sheet. They don't know what's shipping
41:17
to them if they can't pay their bills.
41:20
And this is really the, the, the ticking time clock that Trump is
41:25
running against. You know, people think about
41:28
this in international terms. But in America is, you know, we
41:32
both know all politics is local. And he he has a reckoning coming
41:38
up with this mid year election. And the problem is, you know, if
41:44
he follows true to form, he's either before or after the
41:48
election, declare it invalid and try to say no, we're going to
41:52
keep the same slate of people. The problem is about, you know,
41:57
droves of Republicans are in fact, resigning.
42:01
So how, how do you replace them? Maybe he just says we, as long
42:05
as there's more Republicans and Democrats, we'll freeze it.
42:09
I'm sure right now they are trying to figure out if these
42:13
guys do resign, how do we keep the House?
42:18
I'm sure his, you know, Stephen Miller, who is wow, I mean, he's
42:23
something else. Did you see his statement?
42:26
He says we can do anything because we're American.
42:31
This this sounded something like out of was the movie How I came
42:36
to love the bomb Doctor Strangelove.
42:39
I mean, he's he's he's that guy. He's the one sitting there
42:44
going, you know, You know, I keep my essences to myself.
42:49
His his wife is the one who tweeted out with a map of
42:53
Greenland painting the American colour and says you are next,
42:57
Greenland is. Next coming soon.
43:01
I mean, you know, you, you, you really have a bunch of
43:04
characters in there. But as I said, I mean, you know
43:07
what? What happens if Trump becomes
43:09
somewhat enfeebled? Other questions about his
43:12
judgement? Now, obviously the philtre, this
43:16
minimal amount of filtering he had before is completely gone.
43:20
He just says whatever comes to it to mind.
43:25
But if he comes incapacitated and you have the same crew
43:28
there, people should be thinking very carefully what that would
43:30
mean. In essence, that could be
43:32
independent actors. Rubio would get his long wish to
43:37
go into Cuba and take over the government and and then declare
43:42
that all the old families who, you know, lost their lands, you
43:46
know, so many years ago are now back in control.
43:49
And they, they should get interested, you know, basically
43:53
create a surf serfdom society. You know, he might be a hero to
43:58
the few people in Florida left to remember the Cuban
44:03
Revolution, but it certainly isn't going to solve anything.
44:07
And then you have Miller pushing his right wing, White is right
44:10
agenda. I mean, he would be going off in
44:14
a different direction and there would be no controls of it right
44:17
now. They have to bow and scrape
44:20
before Donald Trump have to watch, make sure they don't get
44:24
too much limelight and that they always put him front and centre
44:29
and that, you know, he's going to react to whatever they say.
44:32
He's malleable to a point, but he's always looking at the
44:36
polls. He's he's looking at the news
44:39
and he's, you know, with an eye towards his, you know, glory own
44:43
glorification, making himself into the great man that he isn't
44:47
but wants to be. Well, I mean, we, we, we, I
44:51
think we all agreed the current path that Trump has said US is
44:57
not ultimately sustainable. But Trump is still going to be
45:02
in the office for another three years.
45:05
You know, how, how do you see this all going to end?
45:08
You know, I mean, this is this is asking you, I'm asking you to
45:11
look into your crystal ball for a little bit.
45:14
But like how which he's doing a heck of a job right now to
45:19
distract people from Epistem file, even though there's still
45:24
people on social media asking him to to show show us the
45:27
files. So, you know, he can, he can
45:32
bring pivot from one crisis to the next, But do you think he's
45:37
ever going to run out of this kind of crisis that he can
45:41
artificially create to, to, to keep his, you know, to, to, to,
45:46
to keep himself above the, the, the, you know, the, the, the
45:51
questioning and then and, and go ahead.
45:54
Yeah, that's what I was referring to earlier.
45:56
I mean, you, you have to do more and more outrageous things.
45:59
And when you do, though, there's a risk, as I said, that you
46:04
cross lines, for instance, seizing a Russian oil tanker.
46:09
Well, Russia's going to respond. My, my guess is that they'll
46:11
say, you took one of ours, we're going to take one of yours.
46:14
And if you want yours back, you give us ours back.
46:17
That's, you know, Putin is not a pushover.
46:20
And he's certainly not going to be bowed or or kowtow to Donald
46:25
Trump, who he sees as a fool, kind of floppish clown that he's
46:30
been able to push around because he's the stronger man.
46:34
He's the man that Donald Trump aspires to, ironically.
46:38
So, yeah, there's going to be retaliation.
46:41
And then the question is, does it escalate or does Trump do
46:45
what he's famous for, a Taco? Right now, he's riding high on
46:49
his success in Venezuela. The question is, do his advisors
46:53
say no? You can push.
46:54
You can push these guys further. Don't worry about it.
46:57
We got you covered. They're afraid of us.
47:00
I don't think Putin is afraid of the United States.
47:02
He's wary of them, but he's not afraid of them.
47:05
He's not afraid to act. Otherwise he wouldn't have gone
47:08
into Ukraine. And, you know, quite frankly,
47:13
we, we we baited him into it in 2014 by sponsoring a punch that
47:19
took out hit guy. Somebody was favourable to him
47:22
and put in somebody who was favourable to us.
47:25
That's against the rule. If if you know, Russia did that,
47:30
you know, remember the Cuban missile crisis, we said, OK, we
47:35
don't like these guys and they're out with Russia.
47:37
So we're going to threaten nuclear war.
47:40
Yes, putting missiles there real problematic.
47:43
But we had put missiles in Turkey and the Russians regarded
47:47
the missiles in Turkey the way we regarded the missiles in
47:50
Cuba. So there was, you know, the,
47:53
the, you know, people don't talk about it, but the resolution of
47:57
that is that we took out the missiles in Turkey and they
48:02
agreed not to try to put missiles in Cuba.
48:05
So, you know this this would be international diplomacy.
48:10
But the question is, is Donald Trump capable of that?
48:13
He seems to be, you know, jumping around and because he
48:17
has this pressure to distract the American public, you don't
48:20
know exactly what he's going to do.
48:22
But let's look into the crystal ball.
48:25
We have different options here. One, Trump makes it to his his
48:29
his three years. And actually, that's the best
48:32
scenario because if Donald Trump goes for any reason, he's
48:37
incapacitated, he he's removed under Article 25, whatever.
48:42
You have Darth Vance, and I call him Darth Vance because he
48:45
believes in the Dark Enlightenment.
48:47
I mean, the power of the Dark Force literally.
48:50
I mean, this is the religion that is he and his sponsor, you
48:55
know, the guy who runs or was it not Paradigm?
49:03
What's what's the name of that company?
49:05
Palantir Palantir, Peter Thiel, who's running around the United
49:11
States telling people the devil is here.
49:14
Well, when I look at Peter Thiel and I think what the devil would
49:18
look like, I think that's it. So maybe he's he's just
49:22
advertising his own presence or something like that.
49:24
But he and a bunch of these tech gurus and incredibly rich, they
49:30
have over millions of dollars and and combined net worth and
49:34
they have control over very sensitive areas, especially in
49:37
terms of information and technology.
49:40
You know, our friend Elon Musk is a fellow traveller with them.
49:45
He believes that the world should be run by technocrats
49:49
that they do not believe in democracy.
49:52
They rail against it, right. They they actually in in their
49:57
beliefs. They say democracy doesn't work.
49:59
It's time to end it and to have, you know, the a Lord of the
50:03
techno Lords to guide the world and, you know, put chips in our
50:07
brains and make us better. You know, it's, it's a dystopian
50:10
fantasy reality. And it's not that different,
50:14
unfortunately, from the 18, late 1800s when America went through
50:19
this huge boom and the oil barons, the steel barons, the
50:23
railway barons, and they, they thought exactly the same thing.
50:27
They thought, we know we're so successful, you know, we're so
50:29
incredible, we should be running the world.
50:33
But, you know, invariably what happens with these characters is
50:36
that they all agree that they should running the world, except
50:39
they don't agree on which one of them should be first among
50:43
equals. And they ended up, you know,
50:45
trying to battle each other, literally trying to bankrupt
50:48
each other, petty swobbling that kept them at Bay until, you
50:53
know, there was a real change with the the New Deal and things
50:57
like this. So I it's, it's, it's repeat.
51:01
It's not repeating, but it's certainly is rhyming with
51:03
history. These people have an inflated
51:05
sense of their own abilities. They don't realise that they was
51:09
just luck, that there are more capable people than them.
51:13
But the times weren't right. These people believe that
51:17
they're divine or divinely inspired or, you know, they're
51:21
gods on earth or whatever. So he's a real danger.
51:25
So you want actually want Trump to stay in for three years.
51:29
The problem with Trump is that every day of Trump is 7 days for
51:33
the rest of us. We literally live in dog years.
51:37
And it's, you know, it's, it's really, you know, troubling to
51:42
think that the next three years will be like 21 years in terms
51:47
of, you know, everyday mass distraction, tacos, you name it,
51:53
everything is coming at you. You know, it's, it's, it's if
51:57
you want to live forever, just every moment with Trump is an
52:03
eternity. So just be thankful you're
52:05
living in during this period. I just thinks now what other
52:11
things? Well, obviously there could be
52:13
escalation, some sort of war. I don't think that I'm hoping
52:17
that it doesn't go nuclear. But you just don't know what
52:21
what people are telling him. The military industrial complex
52:24
always believes that they have, you know, they have the
52:28
solution. And isn't Doctor Strangelove, as
52:31
I said, as long as there's one American and no Russians, we
52:34
won. You know, this type of attitude
52:37
is still there. I mean, it's scary, you know,
52:39
it's supposed to be, you know, satire.
52:42
But these people actually believe it.
52:45
So you're going to have escalation there.
52:46
But you, you also, what I think is going to happen is within the
52:50
United States, there's going to be a revulsion towards Donald
52:54
Trump because his base is fractured.
52:57
He's not giving them what they want.
52:59
He's doing the exact opposite of what he advertised he would do.
53:03
Now. They're still amongst his base,
53:05
the cult like group who will excuse anything he does.
53:09
You know, if they show, if they showed him and you know, a
53:13
sexual video with a 14 year old, they'd say it was fake.
53:17
That was created by the Democrats and it's a witch hunt
53:20
and all this kind of stuff. But there are enough people in
53:23
there and we're already seeing that.
53:26
The other day you had the writers, the 1600 people who
53:31
were pardoned for their criminal activity on January 6th.
53:36
Well, some of them showed up in Washington are demanding
53:39
hundreds of millions of dollars in in compensation for their
53:43
hooliganism because they were pardoned, therefore they were
53:46
right. If they're right, they need to
53:48
be compensated for all the bad things that happened to them.
53:51
Now about 2% of these wonderful people have already been
53:56
involved in crimes since then, everything from paedophilia to,
54:01
you know, fraud, attempted murder, you know, just wonderful
54:07
things. You know, the kind of things you
54:08
would expect from a bunch of hooligans who are attracted to
54:12
an opportunity to express their rage and frustration in that
54:16
society because it didn't give them what they wanted.
54:19
So this, this is a real danger in the US.
54:23
You're going to get further polarisation.
54:26
A problem is the Democrats have nothing to offer at this point.
54:29
They're actually infighting themselves.
54:32
They don't like, you know, the mayor of New York because he's
54:36
he doesn't, he doesn't tick off the boxes that they want.
54:43
I mean, you start looking at American politics, what does it
54:46
become? It's party above individual.
54:50
And surprise, surprise, you don't get leaders when you have
54:54
a situation where you say you whether you agree or not, if you
54:57
don't take this box, we're not going to support you.
55:00
If you don't say, oh, I support Israel, OK, you can't be part of
55:04
our, our group, right? If you don't say you know,
55:07
you're, you're for this or against that, you can't be part
55:10
of our group, We'll take away all of our, you know, our
55:14
sophisticated machinery and election, Iran elections have
55:18
become much more money driven and technologically driven.
55:22
And you need people to do door knocks and you know, you, you
55:25
need the, the analysis to determine, you know, how you can
55:31
manipulate people into voting for you.
55:34
How, what are the major issues? How do you craft answers?
55:36
All of these things very, very sophisticated.
55:38
So if you don't have access to that or the money to buy it,
55:43
you're at a disadvantage. And that's why we don't have
55:46
third parties and things like that.
55:48
So the Democrats are offering very, very little at this point.
55:51
Maybe somebody comes for it. I, it would be wonderful if they
55:54
did, but I'm not counting on it because of the structure of the
55:58
party is not aimed at creating leaders.
56:01
It's aimed at creating people who go along with the special
56:04
interests that the party is supporting.
56:07
And, you know, you've seen that clearly.
56:09
I mean, the Democrats used to be the blue collar party and now
56:13
you have more blue collar workers going directly for Trump
56:18
because they feel alienated and, you know, left aside by, you
56:22
know, what they see is a bunch of liberals who don't really
56:25
care about their issues. So, you know, but it does come
56:31
to the head for the rest of the world.
56:33
Independents do not like what Trump is doing.
56:36
They don't see it as valuable. It doesn't answer their issues,
56:40
which are our our bread and butter issues.
56:41
And of course Democrats are going to knee jerk anything anti
56:45
Trump is good. So there's going to be a change.
56:48
The question is how he handles it and whether that results in
56:51
violence or there's some recourse.
56:55
The Supreme Court, which, you know, puts it sides its desire
56:59
to keep Trump in power and says, look, there's limits even to
57:03
what we will allow you to do if that happens.
57:06
And the question is, does Donald Trump comply?
57:11
You know, he didn't comply with the orderly process the last
57:13
time he lost. He tried to overturn it,
57:16
organised a riot to try and try to pressure Mike Pence and to
57:21
not certifying something when he says, look, I'm just a
57:23
figurehead. I don't make the decision.
57:26
I have to have AI can't even have a reason.
57:28
I just get the paper and I read it and that's it.
57:32
I'm not, I'm not the a judge, jury and executioner here.
57:36
Pence recently gave, gave, you know, he alluded to his, his
57:41
message before just recently on the on the anniversary of that,
57:45
talking about how important it was for him to fulfil his
57:49
constitutional duty. So you have a lot of turmoil, a
57:56
lot of chaos. The river is not flowing in One
57:59
Direction. No one knows where it's going
58:02
seems to be a flood in other areas and it's, you know, other
58:05
areas have, you know, no water on them and no one knows exactly
58:08
where the currents are going. And this indecision is, you
58:12
know, affecting business. Businesses work on the notion
58:16
that predictability. I'm going to invest money and
58:19
then I'm, you know, there is, it's good reason to believe that
58:22
that money will return to me and and plus profits.
58:26
But if I don't know what the situation is, there's no way in
58:30
earth, all right, that I'm going to start investing money unless,
58:34
you know, I say, well, you know, I can do something in this three
58:38
years while Donald Trump is president and make all my money
58:42
back and make a profit, right? Yeah, then I'll do it.
58:46
But if it's going to go beyond that, we, we, we know when
58:49
change comes, it's probably going to be fairly dramatic.
58:53
Will it be good change? I don't know that that's, that's
58:56
a tall order. We thought that Biden would
58:58
change things. In actuality, he just carried on
59:01
many of Trump's positions and, and it was just kind of Trump
59:05
light. I'm a nicer Trump.
59:07
I still believe in all that stuff.
59:09
But I, you know, I have a rationale for it.
59:11
But I'm, I'm not going to change anything.
59:12
You know, I'll just be nice to you as I'm taking your stuff.
59:17
OK, I'll, I'll, I'll cite principle because I, I, you
59:22
know, I don't like you and I don't understand you and you're
59:25
not American, so you can't be, you know, you can't be like me
59:29
and if you're not like me, you can't be good.
59:31
So, you know, there's a whole set of rationales that go into
59:34
it. But you know, one of the, at the
59:36
heart of this I, I hate to point to all the problems without
59:39
pointing towards solutions. All right, one solution that is
59:44
absolutely necessary is that America and elites need to
59:49
reflect. Is what we're doing working for
59:53
us? And if it's not, let's look at
59:56
the assumptions that we've made and see which ones are still
1:00:00
valid. You know, we live in a dynamic
1:00:02
world. If you're not looking at your
1:00:04
assumptions, trying to learn, you're really not living a very
1:00:08
full life. You're kind of on automatic.
1:00:12
This, and this is absolutely necessary if if the US is going
1:00:16
to come to this mindset that OK, we're not going to be a hegemon,
1:00:20
but we can still be a very great power.
1:00:23
And the question is how do we make ourselves greater by
1:00:27
cooperating with countries instead of trying to beat them
1:00:30
into submission or take them over in the cost of trying to
1:00:35
take over country are very, very steep.
1:00:38
The the second point is that, you know, the, the, the US has
1:00:46
to look at how the rest of the world is growing and decide
1:00:53
whether or not it wants to be part of it.
1:00:55
And I think the solution is for other countries, especially the
1:01:00
global S Russia, Central Asia, China to come together and say
1:01:07
even with Europe and say, we, we're not going to form an
1:01:10
organisation. We have an organisation.
1:01:12
It's called the UN. But it's time that we all get
1:01:15
together. See Lac, you know, the South
1:01:17
American groups, the African groups, things like that.
1:01:21
Go to Donald Trump and says, listen, you can do whatever you
1:01:26
want to your own people in terms of how much you want to tariff
1:01:29
them. If you want to tax them, that's
1:01:30
between you and your voters. I'm right.
1:01:33
We we, you don't, we're not going to comment.
1:01:36
That's up to you. But you cannot try to pit US
1:01:39
against each other and some cynical colonial divide and
1:01:43
conquer game because that's what is happening here.
1:01:47
And it's time the world just says flatly, we don't agree on
1:01:51
anything except that you're being a bully.
1:01:55
And if this happens, Donald Trump has no choice but to Taco.
1:02:00
And the reason I say that is the US can battle or, you know, to a
1:02:05
standstill like with Russia and China, or it can actually
1:02:09
dominate smaller countries, but it cannot fight everybody.
1:02:15
We still have a huge surplus. That is due to the fact that we
1:02:18
sell services. If these countries got together
1:02:21
and said, look, your services are no longer needed, we're
1:02:25
going to put 500% tariffs on them.
1:02:29
And you know, basically we're going to end all your consulting
1:02:33
and your BIG4 accounting firms and things like that.
1:02:35
We're going to push them out. We have, you know, alternatives
1:02:38
that way then we can use and we can certainly grow our own
1:02:41
expertise and we can use European ones, but you're,
1:02:45
you're finished there. That would take a huge chunk out
1:02:47
of it. Then everything that's going to
1:02:49
America, we're going to put tariffs on.
1:02:53
So we're going to collect the tariffs on this side.
1:02:55
We're not going to let them do on your side.
1:02:58
So what, Before they can come to you, All right, if you order
1:03:01
them, we're going to take money out of it and you're going to
1:03:04
have to pay more. Given the fragile state of
1:03:07
America, Donald Trump would have no choice but to say, oh, you
1:03:13
know, don't take this so seriously.
1:03:14
We can work this out. Come on, you know, all this
1:03:17
stuff. He would still try his little
1:03:18
games and everything like that, but he would be pushed into a
1:03:21
situation where he have to look in different areas for
1:03:25
distractions to keep the American public, you know, from
1:03:30
revolting against him. And that's that's kind of where
1:03:34
I see things like I think that there is hope, but it's
1:03:37
collective action is the only hope.
1:03:39
You can't respond militarily. So you have to respond
1:03:42
economically. And economically is really where
1:03:45
America lives. It's why they object to China,
1:03:48
because China's economics were improving so much.
1:03:51
They're afraid that, you know, the economics leads, you know,
1:03:53
in their mind, you know, because it's funny.
1:03:57
A thief always believes that everyone else is a thief or an
1:04:00
idiot. All right, So you know, I'm just
1:04:04
doing to them what they would do to me, right?
1:04:07
I'm just pre empting them. So there's nothing wrong here,
1:04:10
right? And idiots, who cares?
1:04:12
I'm not an idiot. If they're idiots, they deserve
1:04:14
to, you know, I think deserve to be victims.
1:04:16
They're there. They're the sheep for people
1:04:19
like me, the wolf. So there's always a
1:04:22
justification. So, and that that's kind of
1:04:24
where America is, and it has to move away from that.
1:04:28
So let's hope, let's hope that happens.
1:04:30
Collective action economically is the only rational choice for
1:04:37
countries to put an end to this kind of marauding, marauding,
1:04:42
adventurous adventurism that Donald Trump is promoting.
1:04:48
Wow, Thank you, thank you, thank you for that.
1:04:50
I mean, I, I, I'm glad I, I had you on my show to, to talk.
1:04:54
Us soon. Don't say that yet.
1:04:56
Wait till the reaction comes in and people don't throw darts and
1:05:00
you know, the CIA shows up at your house and says we need to
1:05:03
talk to you. Don't talk to that guy.
1:05:08
Well, that will be another show that that will be the next show.
1:05:13
That's when you that's when you're doing the Maduro thing,
1:05:16
an orange jumpsuit, the handcuffs on saying you're an
1:05:19
enemy of the people. You're a fellow fellow
1:05:22
traveller. Well, that that would be that
1:05:28
would be good for TV, that would be good TVI would do it.
1:05:31
I would do it. I really don't want to see you
1:05:34
in that situation, Carl. I mean, it might be great
1:05:38
television, but I guess sure, you prison is no joke.
1:05:41
I was a prosecutor. I I had to visit these gaols.
1:05:45
Oh my God. I as a defence attorney, they
1:05:47
are not good places. The smell you can cut with a
1:05:50
knife. The people are surprisingly
1:05:53
because they're criminals. They're not nice either.
1:05:58
Well, thank you. Thank you Einar for making your
1:06:03
time to to speak to us if. Really a pleasure.
1:06:07
If people want to follow your work, where, where would they
1:06:10
go? I I under Asia narratives sub
1:06:15
stack I put out some things. Otherwise, I do 14 shows a week
1:06:22
on average. So if you just type my name and
1:06:26
you'll, you'll get, you know, different things.
1:06:28
I, I'm, I don't know, I think 12 different stations in the Middle
1:06:34
East. A lot of it will be
1:06:36
unintelligible because they, they don't broadcast my voice,
1:06:40
just the, the translation Indian TV on probably about 8 or 9
1:06:46
different ones. And then, you know, Bloomberg,
1:06:49
BBC, Chinese TV, obviously, but that's only about, I don't know,
1:06:56
40% of what I do, 60% is global, everything from South Africa,
1:07:02
Power FM, which apparently is a widely known and broadcast not
1:07:07
only South Africa, but throughout Africa.
1:07:11
So I'm, I, I can't complain. I mean, somebody said either I
1:07:14
did a search on you, you know, AI search and I didn't believe
1:07:18
it. So I, I, you know, I consulted
1:07:20
three other ones. They said you, you, you're the
1:07:22
most prolific guy out there. How do you do it?
1:07:25
You know, I said, well, I actually, I, I enjoy it, you
1:07:31
know, to be in many ways I can give answers or what I think are
1:07:35
answers, but they're my opinion. OK, Hopefully they stir people
1:07:39
to thinking, but for me, it's the questions that matter.
1:07:44
When you ask me questions, it tells me about how you're
1:07:47
thinking. And this is a way of gathering
1:07:50
information. So I'm always very cognizant.
1:07:53
I will do the same issue on maybe 7 or 8 different medias
1:08:00
spanning the world. So hearing what they have to
1:08:03
say, what they're interested in, which is apparent through the
1:08:06
questions, is to me the best way of gathering understanding.
1:08:12
I am not in those countries, but if I hear what they are
1:08:15
interested in, I, I start to have a better understanding
1:08:18
where they are. I'm on three think tanks.
1:08:21
Yeah. Write books, all this kind of
1:08:24
nonsense. I wouldn't say that I'm a
1:08:27
paramount of intellectualism, but I, I do enjoy a discussions.
1:08:33
I enjoy talking to you and hearing, you know, what you're
1:08:36
thinking about and things like this.
1:08:38
And hopefully it makes a bit of a difference.
1:08:41
You have a following that is interested in these affairs.
1:08:45
And, you know, I always like to read the comments afterwards
1:08:49
and, and try to learn from them. I believe that, you know, if you
1:08:53
think you know everything, you're basically intellectually
1:08:55
dead. If you understand that there's
1:08:57
so much more to learn, life is more interesting.
1:09:00
It is. And you know, it gives you hope
1:09:03
that maybe things can change. If you know everything,
1:09:06
nothing's going to change. It's why I came to China.
1:09:09
I love China because they said, oh, I came here in 2000.
1:09:13
I want to learn. I want to learn not, you know,
1:09:15
I'm so glad you're here. We want to learn from you.
1:09:17
And I said, well, I don't think you can learn much from me.
1:09:19
But the attitude convinced me that if there is going to be a
1:09:23
renaissance in my lifetime, it would be in China.
1:09:26
And 21 years later, as of January 7th, I have not been
1:09:32
disappointed. There's change.
1:09:34
China has lots and lots of problems.
1:09:37
But the difference is I notices they eventually recognise this
1:09:41
is a problem, then they try to solve it.
1:09:44
In the United States. I lived in a city that was at
1:09:48
the time the most segregated city in the United States,
1:09:51
Milwaukee, WI. It's not a bad place to live,
1:09:54
but it was extremely stratified and had been that way for long.
1:09:59
Now it's only the third most, you know, stratified city.
1:10:05
But my point was I would sit with people in the morning who
1:10:09
ran the Fortune 500 companies. We went to the same Athletic
1:10:13
Club and, you know, ex ex governors, you know, people who
1:10:17
really had a tremendous amount of power.
1:10:20
And and I criticise them and I say, hey, listen, you know, you
1:10:23
guys, you know everything. You have all the power and
1:10:26
nothing has changed. And that was 21 years ago.
1:10:29
And unfortunately, I'd have to say that although there's been
1:10:32
some incremental changes, very small in terms of the, the
1:10:36
metrics, in terms of education, safety of the things where
1:10:41
people live, a cost of living, all of these things, social
1:10:45
development, it, it just hasn't happened.
1:10:48
I, I can't say I had a bad experience.
1:10:50
I ran my own district there, which is definitely still the
1:10:56
most when I took it over, it was not doing very well.
1:11:00
Now it's the leading, one of the leading districts not only in,
1:11:04
in, in Milwaukee, but one in, in the, in the United States as a
1:11:09
public market. We built, we built connected
1:11:12
parks, we built river walks, parking structures and it's
1:11:17
pretty much self contained and self operating and that is good.
1:11:22
So I, I saw hope there and I saw the opportunity to change.
1:11:27
But right, you know, 21 years later, all I see is that very
1:11:31
little has actually changed, that the district continues to
1:11:34
do well based on the impetus of all the people.
1:11:37
Because it wasn't just me. There are others involved, many
1:11:41
involved. It was always a team A-Team
1:11:42
project, but I haven't seen it spread.
1:11:45
I was hoping that this would be, you know, bellwether and that
1:11:49
this would, you know, help the city, you know, think of itself
1:11:55
as, as something that could change because this area was
1:11:59
really not in good shape when it took it over.
1:12:01
I mean, it was worth $16,000,000 and, and, and total value.
1:12:06
And then when we 10 years later was 720 million.
1:12:09
Now I'm sure it's well over 1.5 billion, but that has not been
1:12:14
mirrored in the, in the rest of the of the city.
1:12:17
Now, this area had specific advantages and things like that,
1:12:20
but I do think that we, we have to, you know, put away this idea
1:12:25
of how we think about others because it's a trap.
1:12:28
Once I, you know, if I'm, I'm a cynic or I'm a criminal or, you
1:12:32
know, I, I, I lock myself into a way of thinking where I think
1:12:38
everyone else is the same. And then it's very, very
1:12:41
difficult to create any real change.
1:12:44
You, you have to kind of question that.
1:12:46
And that's what I'm alluding to with America's elite.
1:12:49
They have, they have to see a crack in the wall and say maybe
1:12:54
there's something outside my core beliefs that I should be
1:12:59
paying attention to. Perhaps I should have empathy
1:13:02
for other people, not disdain. I, I can tell you absolutely,
1:13:07
Carl, you know, you have empathy.
1:13:09
That's why I like you and I do your show.
1:13:11
But there's so many people who don't have empathy.
1:13:14
And you know, you, you look at Donald Trump, you know, there's
1:13:16
those two images of him. One one is a, a guy who he knows
1:13:20
who's up on stage. He's going off the stage.
1:13:22
He cracks his head open. Donald Trump is rearing back.
1:13:26
Everyone else is rushing to help the guy.
1:13:27
He's like standing afraid he's going to get blood on his
1:13:30
things. And then most recently he's
1:13:32
speaking and some guy behind him is, I don't know, having an
1:13:34
aneurysm or a heart attack. And he's like looking at him as
1:13:37
if he's, you know, interrupting his.
1:13:41
How dare you interrupt by his speech.
1:13:43
What are you doing? You know, just stop flopping
1:13:45
around like that. You're distracting people from
1:13:48
me. You know, this should be about
1:13:50
me anyway. He doesn't have empathy, a real
1:13:55
empathy. And I, I, I'll tell you, I've
1:13:58
never met a good person who doesn't have empathy and I've
1:14:02
never met a bad person who does have empathy.
1:14:05
So it's something to think about once you can get beyond your own
1:14:10
assumptions and start looking at how other people live and try to
1:14:14
understand their point of view. I think there is hope.
1:14:17
All right. But if if you're locked into
1:14:19
this idea that I'm right, you're wrong, I don't know what I'm
1:14:23
talking about. I don't know what a basis, but I
1:14:24
just feel that I'm right. I might be ignorant, but you
1:14:28
know, that's common sense. I know I'm right.
1:14:30
Once you get locked into that, then you're going to have the
1:14:34
problems. And this is not just Trump
1:14:36
supporters. You have the same thing on the
1:14:37
far left. They're always convinced they're
1:14:40
absolutely right and they're willing to do whatever it takes.
1:14:44
If I have to kill you to save you, so be it.
1:14:48
You know, the old, the old idea that a lot of religious people
1:14:54
have had, you know, during the Inquisition, well, you know,
1:14:57
they're heathens. So if we burn them, God can sort
1:15:00
them out, right? And then it was all based on, I
1:15:04
am absolutely right. I, I, I cannot be wrong.
1:15:09
And that, that, I think, is the real enemy here.
1:15:14
Well, ladies and gentlemen, I nard tangen I, I have learned a
1:15:18
lot and every time I really enjoy our conversation.
1:15:23
Thank you again for for making the time to talk to us and I, I
1:15:27
look forward to have you back. Anytime you want, Carl.
1:15:31
I always enjoy these. Although I I feel afterwards, I
1:15:34
feel like, oh God, you talk too much.
1:15:41
No, This is why I want you to be on my show, so I can do less
1:15:45
work. I'm just all I have to do is
1:15:47
just sit back and and and listen.
1:15:49
That's all I do. I just I just listen and record
1:15:52
make my. Job easier.
1:15:54
I'd like I'd like to interview you one of these days and get
1:15:57
your pitch on lens because you, you talk to so many different
1:16:00
people and you know you, you've developed your own perspective
1:16:04
on so many things and issues. It'd be really wonderful to
1:16:08
reverse roles sometime now I'll interview you.
1:16:12
How's that? Feel free, feel free, you know,
1:16:16
any, anytime we we talk, you can feel free to reverse the table,
1:16:20
reverse the. Next time then I'll come up with
1:16:24
some questions for you and things.
1:16:26
And it's, it's really about how you're thinking about all of
1:16:30
these things because you, you talked, as I said, you talked to
1:16:33
so many people and it's bound to have an effect.
1:16:35
And clearly I can understand your point of view from your
1:16:38
questions, things like that. But I know there's a lot of more
1:16:40
nuances in the way you're thinking and looking at stuff.
1:16:43
And it would be really, really, really nice to hear your voice.
1:16:48
All right, so deal. Let's do it next time, OK?
1:16:53
Whenever you're ready, whenever you recovered from this ordeal,
1:16:56
you can we can think about the next one.
1:16:59
Yes, thank you IR and thank, thank you everyone for tuning
1:17:04
in. Until next time, bye bye.