Latest / Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar / 10/22/26: Troops Evacuated Amid Iran Escalation, Prof Pape ON Trump's Iran Gamble, AI Cybersecurity Nightmare

Transcript

10/22/26: Troops Evacuated Amid Iran Escalation, Prof Pape ON Trump's Iran Gamble, AI Cybersecurity Nightmare · Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar

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Speaker 1: the top for free today good morning everybody happy thursday
0:22
Speaker 1: we have an amazing show for everybody today what do
0:24
Speaker 1: we have crystal Holy.
0:26
Speaker 2: Moly, there is a lot going on in the world, abroad,
0:29
Speaker 2: everywhere in between. Things looking like they may pop off
0:33
Speaker 2: very soon with Iran. Trump making new threats. Netanyahu also
0:37
Speaker 2: making new threats. Troops and diplomats are being evacuated from
0:41
Speaker 2: the region as we speak. So we will bring you
0:44
Speaker 2: all of the news updates. And then Professor Pape is
0:46
Speaker 2: going to join us for his analysis of the calculus
0:49
Speaker 2: that Trump is going through right now. He's prepared a PowerPoint,
0:52
Speaker 2: I understand. So I know everyone will look forward to that.
0:55
Speaker 2: We've also got crazy things unfolding in the cybersecurity world.
0:59
Speaker 2: It's being called Black October and being described as the
1:02
Speaker 2: most serious cybersecurity incident in history. So we'll break down
1:07
Speaker 2: what we understand about what is going on there that
1:09
Speaker 2: could affect as many as 70% of all websites worldwide.
1:15
Speaker 2: We also have our eyes on the midterms. Rich Barris,
1:17
Speaker 2: who is a MAGA-friendly pollster who's gotten a lot of
1:21
Speaker 2: things right, has been sounding the alarm about Republicans.
1:23
Speaker 3: He's going to join.
1:24
Speaker 2: Us to do a deep dive into what he's seeing
1:26
Speaker 2: in the polls. There are a lot of new polls
1:28
Speaker 2: out this morning. There was a big poll out for
1:30
Speaker 2: The New York Times. Sienna yesterday that's taken very seriously
1:33
Speaker 2: that shows a massive Democratic lead on the generic ballot.
1:37
Speaker 2: And we're also going to get him to weigh in
1:38
Speaker 2: on the impact of that deplorable, disgusting, vile ad that
1:43
Speaker 2: Vivek Ramaswamy released yesterday about Amy Acton and her mother.
1:48
Speaker 2: There is a mounting backlash growing, including from other Ohio Republicans.
1:53
Speaker 3: So we'll get into that.
1:54
Speaker 2: And then we've also got our eye on the housing
1:56
Speaker 2: market where sales have just completely collapsed. You've got mortgage rates, obviously,
2:01
Speaker 2: that are really high.
2:02
Speaker 3: So we wanted to keep an eye on what is
2:04
Speaker 3: going on there as well.
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Speaker 1: It really helps other people find the show. But as
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Speaker 1: Crystal said, we're going to start with the chaos in Iran.
3:11
Speaker 1: Significant amounts of news that is breaking overnight. We're going
3:15
Speaker 1: to start with this from NBC. Let's put A1 up
3:18
Speaker 1: here on the screen. Multiple outlets, including Agence France-Presse, which
3:22
Speaker 1: was the first to do so, coming out and saying
3:25
Speaker 1: that U.S. troops and diplomats are now evacuating the Middle East.
3:29
Speaker 1: So you have Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, and Jordan evacuating
3:33
Speaker 1: where you had multiple people who were told to leave,
3:36
Speaker 1: usually family members, dependents, and non-essential staff. Remember, the United
3:42
Speaker 1: States got significant amounts of criticism for launching the war
3:47
Speaker 1: on February 28th, where not actually pulling many of the
3:52
Speaker 1: dependents and families out of the region, which caused significant
3:55
Speaker 1: amounts of chaos after flights were canceled and there were
3:58
Speaker 1: drones launched. and missiles flying everywhere. And now by issuing
4:01
Speaker 1: this order, we can combine it with multiple other pieces
4:05
Speaker 1: of news. Let's go to the next one, guys. This
4:07
Speaker 1: is from our friends over at Dropsite. This is A3, actually.
4:12
Speaker 1: And it's very important, this interview. Shout out seriously to
4:16
Speaker 1: Jeremy Scahill, who landed this interview. Brian Grimm as well,
4:20
Speaker 1: where they say Iran believes the U.S. and Israel may
4:23
Speaker 1: strike before the midterms. The top security official, General Raisi,
4:27
Speaker 1: tells Dropsite Iran has new targets in its sights. And really,
4:32
Speaker 1: I think what I want to focus on in this
4:35
Speaker 1: interview is Iranians' belief that if you look, and we
4:39
Speaker 1: will get to this from The New York Times and
4:42
Speaker 1: others who are reporting about these purported strike plans, which
4:45
Speaker 1: are there about previous attempts from Netanyahu and other statements.
4:50
Speaker 1: It seems all but certain that a renewed bombing campaign
4:54
Speaker 1: is going to happen. The only question is whether it's
4:56
Speaker 1: going to happen before the midterms or after the midterms.
4:59
Speaker 1: So in this interview, General Raisi lays out a couple
5:03
Speaker 1: of different things. Number one, he says a goal is
5:06
Speaker 1: not to survive until the end of Trump's term, but
5:09
Speaker 1: to reinstitute or basically reestablish. reconfigure their entire deterrence to
5:15
Speaker 1: the Western world. They do not view this as a
5:17
Speaker 1: Trump problem. They view this as a Western world problem
5:20
Speaker 1: from France to the EU. Remember who before the Iran
5:23
Speaker 1: war were themselves quite hawkish on Iran. Number two is
5:27
Speaker 1: that they still remain open to the memorandum of understanding.
5:30
Speaker 1: They just want it to be properly implemented. But number three,
5:33
Speaker 1: and this might be the most significant, Iran is ready
5:36
Speaker 1: for the war and will retaliate. Civilian infrastructure will also
5:40
Speaker 1: be a target. And also data centers basically saying we
5:43
Speaker 1: will take aim at any institution or others which is
5:46
Speaker 1: supporting the U.S. war with Iran. And, Crystal, that fits
5:50
Speaker 1: exactly with what the renewed strikes on Iran would look like. Remember,
5:55
Speaker 1: any expansion of strikes are going to fulfill the Trump
5:58
Speaker 1: promise of hitting critical energy infrastructure. Now, in some ways,
6:02
Speaker 1: you know, Iran or at the very least, you know,
6:04
Speaker 1: the Iran axis, I guess, whatever you want to call it,
6:07
Speaker 1: has already been doing that. I mean, literally, while you
6:09
Speaker 1: and I are recording this, the show this morning, we
6:11
Speaker 1: get the news that Saudi Aramco has just told all
6:14
Speaker 1: of its Dharan employees, yeah, you guys are all working
6:17
Speaker 1: from home, which I don't even know how that works.
6:19
Speaker 1: I don't even know if you can pump oil from home,
6:21
Speaker 1: but you know, maybe you can. But nonetheless, critical infrastructure
6:26
Speaker 1: has already been hit. Energy infrastructure, the East-West pipeline by
6:29
Speaker 1: the Houthis, it remains a civilian infrastructure target of the
6:33
Speaker 1: United States and of Israel. And the open question now
6:36
Speaker 1: is just before or after the midterms. All of this
6:39
Speaker 1: news this morning, sending the stock market cratering by at
6:42
Speaker 1: least a percent in the future and Brent crude oil
6:45
Speaker 1: up to one hundred and twelve dollars per barrel, which
6:48
Speaker 1: will easily hit four fifty a gallon in the next
6:50
Speaker 1: couple of weeks or so if that sticks.
6:53
Speaker 4: Yeah.
6:53
Speaker 2: And between what's going on with the Iran war and
6:56
Speaker 2: the cybersecurity incidents, the stock market is really in a
6:58
Speaker 2: kind of free fall this morning. And to your point,
7:01
Speaker 2: oil prices spiking. It's worth noting a couple of things
7:03
Speaker 2: about this drop site article as well. They rely primarily
7:06
Speaker 2: on sources from within Iran, but they do mention that
7:09
Speaker 2: also they spoke with a U.S. official who believes that U.S.
7:12
Speaker 2: and Israel are preparing to resume attacks on Iran and
7:16
Speaker 2: may even launch operations before not just our midterms, but
7:19
Speaker 2: next week's Israeli elections. OK, that happens next week in
7:24
Speaker 2: mere days. So there is a lot going on there.
7:28
Speaker 2: And we'll get to in just a moment the way
7:29
Speaker 2: the Israelis are intentionally trying to provoke and intimidate the
7:35
Speaker 2: Iranians with some provocative military maneuvers. But I think that's
7:40
Speaker 2: really significant. And then the other thing Ryan keeps pointing
7:42
Speaker 2: to is he said, take a look at the White
7:44
Speaker 2: House's statement. They say that the White House, that the U.S.
7:48
Speaker 2: administration is not planning any strikes before the midterm elections.
7:52
Speaker 2: They don't say that Israel isn't. So very noteworthy the
7:56
Speaker 2: way that their denial here quoted in this piece was
8:00
Speaker 2: ultimately phrased.
8:02
Speaker 1: Exactly. And, you know, the denial is fits entirely with
8:05
Speaker 1: what we know. Before we even get to the New
8:07
Speaker 1: York Times, we of course need to look over at
8:09
Speaker 1: the Israelis. The Israeli election, unfortunately, may have more influence
8:13
Speaker 1: over all of our decision-making than our own elections. Let's
8:16
Speaker 1: put A4 up here on the screen. This was some
8:20
Speaker 1: very noteworthy comments from Netanyahu. And for the 99th time, probably,
8:26
Speaker 1: in Netanyahu's history, he says, Tehran is now beginning to
8:29
Speaker 1: develop nuclear weapons. And Katz says, If Iran attacks Israel,
8:36
Speaker 1: Iran will burn. The Iranian regime still has not learned
8:39
Speaker 1: his lesson. Moitaba Khamenei has decided to follow in his
8:42
Speaker 1: father's footsteps. He has taken off the safety, and Iran
8:45
Speaker 1: is once again trying to develop its weapons of death,
8:47
Speaker 1: Netanyahu said at an IDF officer school in southern Israel. Quote, therefore,
8:53
Speaker 1: there is only one way to remove this threat once
8:56
Speaker 1: and for all, to topple the regime, and that is
8:58
Speaker 1: my directive to the IDF, the Mossad, and the security agencies.
9:02
Speaker 1: The defense minister also said, quote, in recent days, we
9:06
Speaker 1: have identified attempts by our enemies, foremost among them Iran
9:09
Speaker 1: and its proxies to carry out terror attacks that would
9:11
Speaker 1: affect the results of the elections in Israel. The Iranian
9:14
Speaker 1: regime is at its weakest point ever, and we identify
9:17
Speaker 1: that weakness could lead to it to make the most
9:19
Speaker 1: extreme measures. So that is obviously very important. Now let's
9:24
Speaker 1: put some of these other pieces together, some other indications
9:27
Speaker 1: of just how close the United States is to reengaging Iran.
9:31
Speaker 1: Let's put A5 up here on the screen. So it
9:34
Speaker 1: appears that while Pete Hegseth was visiting Israel two days ago,
9:38
Speaker 1: that they conducted one of the largest Air Force exercises
9:43
Speaker 1: in Israeli modern history. This exercise took place, quote, beyond
9:48
Speaker 1: Israel's border and was directed by the IDF chief of
9:51
Speaker 1: staff and the Israeli Air Force commander from the IDF
9:54
Speaker 1: Underground Command Center in Tel Aviv. Both Netanyahu and Hegseth
9:58
Speaker 1: closely monitored. the exercise. We do not have the full details.
10:03
Speaker 1: What we do know is, let's put A6 up here
10:06
Speaker 1: on the screen, is that this was a power projection
10:10
Speaker 1: operation near the Iranian border 800 miles away from Israel.
10:15
Speaker 1: We're not exactly sure which border here that they're talking about.
10:19
Speaker 1: We do know that the IDF path consistently flew through Syria,
10:23
Speaker 1: Syrian and Iraqi airspace. As the aircraft approached the border,
10:28
Speaker 1: they turned around and returned to Israel. Obviously, this was
10:33
Speaker 1: a probing operation to test Iranian air defense systems, to
10:38
Speaker 1: basically do a practice run for what we now know
10:41
Speaker 1: is a planned massive bombing campaign by the United States
10:46
Speaker 1: and Israel. The only question is when those plans will
10:52
Speaker 1: be enacted, Crystal. And I do think it's very important
10:55
Speaker 1: to talk about the logic of this, and it fits
10:58
Speaker 1: very much with Professor Pape's analysis. It is a literal
11:02
Speaker 1: carbon copy of everything from the first 33 days of
11:06
Speaker 1: the war. It's a short bombing campaign. It's three days.
11:10
Speaker 1: They will just go in, we'll go in, we'll take
11:13
Speaker 1: them out, come back. They're not going to do anything
11:16
Speaker 1: about it. And it just shows we are stuck right
11:20
Speaker 1: back in the same stupid place. They're like, this time
11:23
Speaker 1: they'll give us concessions, even though they have been hardened
11:26
Speaker 1: more than anything over the last eight months and are
11:29
Speaker 1: even more in an existential crisis for themselves.
11:33
Speaker 2: Yeah, let's go ahead and take a listen to Trump
11:36
Speaker 2: on what his plans are. You know, obviously, the White
11:39
Speaker 2: House put out this very definitive statement to Dropsite and
11:42
Speaker 2: has been leaking to the press that, oh, no, we're
11:44
Speaker 2: not going to do anything before the midterms. But Trump
11:46
Speaker 2: sounding a different note yesterday. Let's take a listen.
11:49
Speaker 5: Well, against Iran, we have a little we have a
11:51
Speaker 5: little conflict against Iran. I think I'll send Evander the
11:54
Speaker 5: real deal over there. but we're doing very well militarily
11:58
Speaker 5: and financially against Syria.
12:00
Speaker 4: Is there any developments with those negotiations? I mean, are
12:03
Speaker 4: they ongoing with Iran at this?
12:05
Speaker 1: Iran?
12:06
Speaker 5: A little bit, but we'll see what happens.
12:08
Speaker 1: Are you over it? Are you over negotiating with the
12:11
Speaker 1: Iranians at this point?
12:12
Speaker 5: No, I think we're not negotiating with them. We are
12:15
Speaker 5: going to have something one way or the other that
12:18
Speaker 5: will happen fairly soon. Most people seem to think it's
12:21
Speaker 5: after the election, and we're going to see what happens.
12:24
Speaker 5: But I will say this. What we've done with Iran
12:27
Speaker 5: is amazing.
12:29
Speaker 2: So Trump there saying we're not negotiating, something is going
12:31
Speaker 2: to happen fairly soon. So a lot of very negative
12:36
Speaker 2: and troubling indications there. And then you've got to factor
12:39
Speaker 2: the Israeli election situation for Netanyahu into this whole thing. Guys,
12:43
Speaker 2: go and listen to Ryan and Emily's interview with Noga yesterday,
12:47
Speaker 2: evaluating what the political landscape looks like in Israel.
12:51
Speaker 3: Netanyahu is not doing well in the polls right now.
12:54
Speaker 2: You really think he's just going to sit back and
12:56
Speaker 2: accept some form of defeat on election day?
12:59
Speaker 4: No.
13:00
Speaker 2: What does he do when he's in trouble, whether it's
13:02
Speaker 2: politically or whether it's with his corruption trials? He goes
13:06
Speaker 2: to he starts a new war. He starts bombing something.
13:09
Speaker 2: He creates some sort of a security incident. So that
13:12
Speaker 2: he can once again either push off the impending doom
13:16
Speaker 2: for his political future or to be able to posture
13:22
Speaker 2: as I'm the only one who can keep you safe
13:24
Speaker 2: from these threats. So would it be any surprise if
13:29
Speaker 2: Netanyahu's October surprise is, by the way, we're going to
13:33
Speaker 2: go back to war with Iran. And of course, what
13:35
Speaker 2: Sagar was talking about before, that he's already laying the
13:37
Speaker 2: rhetorical groundwork talking to IDF saying, hey, they've decided once
13:42
Speaker 2: again they're going to develop nuclear weapons. It is a
13:46
Speaker 2: very dire landscape when you take a look at these things.
13:49
Speaker 2: Some of the speculation, Sagar, about what was going on
13:52
Speaker 2: with that show of force from the Israeli Air Force
13:56
Speaker 2: was that they may have actually been hoping to provoke
14:00
Speaker 2: a response from Iran and that would give them an
14:02
Speaker 2: excuse to go back to an all-out bombing campaign. They
14:06
Speaker 2: were hoping the Iranians would actually fire at some of
14:09
Speaker 2: the jets that they sent over near their border and
14:12
Speaker 2: may have been disappointed that there was not such an
14:16
Speaker 2: attack that would give them a ready-made excuse for going
14:19
Speaker 2: back to war.
14:22
Speaker 1: Let's put actually the New York Times terror sheet up
14:24
Speaker 1: here on the screen, which details so much of this.
14:28
Speaker 1: This says, U.S. and Israel draw up plans for renewed
14:30
Speaker 1: strikes on Iran after the elections. I've teased some of
14:33
Speaker 1: the details, but I'll read it again. Planning for a
14:36
Speaker 1: short but intensive progress, the U.S. and Israeli militaries are
14:39
Speaker 1: stepping up the exercises, flying planes to practice strike maneuvers,
14:43
Speaker 1: and meeting at the highest level between Hegseth and Netanyahu.
14:46
Speaker 1: The targets would include Iranian energy infrastructure, nuclear facilities, missile
14:51
Speaker 1: and drone arsenals. Some officials say that one more big
14:54
Speaker 1: round of attacks could push Iran's economy over the brink
14:58
Speaker 1: and force the country to make diplomatic concessions after eight
15:02
Speaker 1: months of conflict. But of course, there are reasons to
15:05
Speaker 1: be skeptical. They say it is far from certain Trump
15:08
Speaker 1: will approve fresh strikes. Repeatedly, he has now vetoed plans
15:11
Speaker 1: for a return to major combat operations, including this month
15:16
Speaker 1: when the U.S. and Israeli militaries were already ready to attack.
15:19
Speaker 1: This apparently happened about 12 days ago on October 10th.
15:24
Speaker 1: And when there was a planned renewed strikes, both from
15:27
Speaker 1: the Israelis and from the United States, That is when
15:29
Speaker 1: Trump put out that message saying, hey, there will be
15:33
Speaker 1: no strikes before the midterm elections because he's caught in
15:37
Speaker 1: this vice. I mean, even the leaking of all of
15:40
Speaker 1: these plans demonstrates that the news itself is enough to
15:45
Speaker 1: send the price of oil skyrocketing to some hundred and
15:48
Speaker 1: twelve dollars per barrel. And if you do have a
15:50
Speaker 1: renewed strike, not just renewed strikes.
15:52
Speaker 4: Remember this.
15:53
Speaker 1: You know, the first U.S.
15:54
Speaker 4: Strikes happened.
15:55
Speaker 1: With Israeli strikes, it was supposed to topple the whole
15:58
Speaker 1: regime in 48 hours. They literally believed that. I mean,
16:01
Speaker 1: completely idiotically, right? So 72 hours of strikes, rough strike plan,
16:07
Speaker 1: we'll take out the energy infrastructure. And then miraculously, Tehran's
16:10
Speaker 1: security infrastructure will decide, you know what, this time, after
16:15
Speaker 1: all these bombs, after all of this, and after all
16:18
Speaker 1: the blockade, this time we'll pursue diplomatic concessions. I mean,
16:23
Speaker 1: It is completely delusional. But that appears to have basically,
16:28
Speaker 1: you know, Trump appears to have somehow been convinced of this.
16:31
Speaker 1: At least that's what's coming out from the Israelis. Obviously,
16:34
Speaker 1: you need to take all this with a grain of salt.
16:36
Speaker 1: A lot of this could be leaving leaked for different reasons.
16:38
Speaker 1: Let's put a seven up here on the screen. This
16:41
Speaker 1: is from the Israeli media. They say White House sources
16:45
Speaker 1: in the past few hours, there has apparently been a
16:47
Speaker 1: change in the American position in favor of a, quote,
16:50
Speaker 1: preemptive strike on Iran. White House sources explain the change
16:55
Speaker 1: mainly due to the great weight that Trump gave the
16:57
Speaker 1: assessments and intelligence that Hegseth presented to him upon his
17:00
Speaker 1: return from Netanyahu. And so obviously we know exactly what
17:05
Speaker 1: this is, is that they ran the exercise. Then what
17:09
Speaker 1: they probably said is Netanyahu, especially you can just imagine
17:13
Speaker 1: him sitting there, of course, in his perfect English, talking
17:16
Speaker 1: to Trump and to Hegseth and be like, look, they
17:18
Speaker 1: couldn't shoot us down. They can't do anything to us.
17:21
Speaker 1: You know, look at them. You know, we were able
17:23
Speaker 1: to do this massive sortie of right around their border,
17:27
Speaker 1: come and back 800 miles. This shows the air supremacy,
17:31
Speaker 1: you know, that we didn't have the last time around.
17:34
Speaker 1: And they're weak. And obviously, if you're Iran, they're cautious. Like,
17:39
Speaker 1: that's ultimately what doesn't fit with a lot of their narrative.
17:42
Speaker 1: They don't want to be bombed. So, no, they're not
17:45
Speaker 1: going to just shoot down all these planes, unless they
17:47
Speaker 1: actually do cross into their border, they're basically in a
17:51
Speaker 1: waiting game with the Stratiform Moose and trying to choke
17:54
Speaker 1: them off in a vice, all while trying not to
17:56
Speaker 1: be bombed themselves and just have all their energy infrastructure destroyed.
18:00
Speaker 1: But if it comes to that, they have plans that
18:03
Speaker 1: are ready-made to hit all of this other civilian infrastructure
18:06
Speaker 1: all across the Gulf. And I mean, I think people
18:09
Speaker 1: just don't understand that in the White House. One thing,
18:12
Speaker 1: you know, that's possible, all of this is being leaked. potentially, for,
18:17
Speaker 1: you know, to try and push Tehran again to come
18:21
Speaker 1: to the negotiating table. It's not going to work. Every
18:24
Speaker 1: single time they come out and they reject it. I
18:27
Speaker 1: take a look at the drop site interview. I mean,
18:30
Speaker 1: if you're going to talk about credibility, they have a
18:32
Speaker 1: lot more credibility on this subject. They don't care. Tanker
18:35
Speaker 1: for tanker. OK, fine. We're just going to keep shooting.
18:38
Speaker 1: And guess what? You're the people who ultimately we called
18:41
Speaker 1: your bluff and you haven't bombed us in 20 days
18:44
Speaker 1: or something like that.
18:45
Speaker 4: So.
18:46
Speaker 1: You know, I take their word much more than anything
18:49
Speaker 1: from the U.S.
18:50
Speaker 4: Side.
18:50
Speaker 1: And we'll see, obviously, where this goes. But it's nothing good.
18:53
Speaker 1: It's not good.
18:55
Speaker 2: I have a black cat perched over my shoulder now
18:57
Speaker 2: as a sort of a bad omen, I guess, of
18:59
Speaker 2: what things, how spooky bad things may get. Yeah, I mean, look,
19:05
Speaker 2: you may look at this and go, could Trump really
19:07
Speaker 2: be this stupid? Could he really be this stupid? Like,
19:12
Speaker 2: how many times does he have to stick his hand
19:14
Speaker 2: in the fire to before he realizes this war is
19:18
Speaker 2: a disaster, there is no military solution here. If you
19:21
Speaker 2: try to bomb them, it is very, very, very, very
19:24
Speaker 2: likely to just make things worse than they already are.
19:29
Speaker 3: Could he really be so dumb as to do this?
19:31
Speaker 2: Especially days before a midterm election where he is already
19:36
Speaker 2: set to have his party completely wiped down, as we
19:39
Speaker 2: will discuss with Rich Barris later in the show.
19:42
Speaker 3: And the answer may be yes.
19:45
Speaker 2: And this is a good transition to Professor Pate because
19:47
Speaker 2: he has all of the logic of how this could
19:50
Speaker 2: go down, sort of spelled out, including how the political
19:53
Speaker 2: dynamics factor into the equation. But Trump is in a corner.
19:57
Speaker 2: He has no other way out. He may be susceptible
20:01
Speaker 2: to once again, Be convinced by the Israelis that this
20:05
Speaker 2: time it's going to be different. This time you'll be
20:07
Speaker 2: able to secure some sort of a victory that's going
20:10
Speaker 2: to force the Iranians to make concessions they haven't been
20:13
Speaker 2: willing to make so far. This will give you the
20:15
Speaker 2: ability to declare mission accomplished going into your pivotal midterm elections.
20:22
Speaker 2: Is Trump that stupid? It is absolutely possible that we will.
20:26
Speaker 3: Find out he is.
20:27
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I actually will highlight from our friend Dr.
20:30
Speaker 1: Trita Parsi. He says, I have pointed out many similarities
20:34
Speaker 1: between now and February when the U.S. was engaged in diplomacy,
20:37
Speaker 1: but Trump had already decided to attack. There is one
20:40
Speaker 1: significant difference. Back then, Trump was driven by hubris and
20:44
Speaker 1: criminally erroneous Israeli advice. Today, he appears driven by another emotion, revenge.
20:50
Speaker 1: There is a vindictive element to his calculations because of
20:53
Speaker 1: his anger over how Iran has ruined his presidency. and
20:56
Speaker 1: he is likely to suffer humiliation in the midterms. So
20:59
Speaker 1: the push toward a new war is no longer being
21:03
Speaker 1: driven by a flawed geopolitical calculation, but rather by one
21:06
Speaker 1: man's need for revenge against a country that Trump himself
21:10
Speaker 1: chose to attack. I actually think that's very important because
21:13
Speaker 1: you're asking about the stupidity that assumes rationality and calculation.
21:18
Speaker 1: That's just not what's happening. I mean, I think he
21:20
Speaker 1: has literally been stewing in the White House for the
21:23
Speaker 1: last three weeks, after ship, after ship, after ship, after
21:26
Speaker 1: ship has been struck in the Strait of Hormuz. And
21:28
Speaker 1: he's like, I can't deal with this anymore. And so
21:31
Speaker 1: a lot of that is actually very understandable. I mean,
21:34
Speaker 1: you ask, you know, how could anybody be this dumb? Unfortunately,
21:38
Speaker 1: we have so many examples that we can ask even
21:40
Speaker 1: Professor Pape about throughout history. Lyndon Johnson was much smarter
21:44
Speaker 1: than Donald Trump, and he fell for this exact same problem.
21:48
Speaker 1: There have been many leaders throughout our history who reached
21:50
Speaker 1: for the bomb because they just can't stomach the alternative. And,
21:54
Speaker 1: you know, here we are again. The last thing I
21:57
Speaker 1: want to mention is about Saudi Arabia. Let's put A8
22:00
Speaker 1: up here on the screen, where you actually had two
22:03
Speaker 1: foreign nationals yesterday who were killed and two others who
22:07
Speaker 1: were injured after air defenses intercepted a drone attempting to
22:12
Speaker 1: target the facility of Saudi Aramco in one of their
22:15
Speaker 1: oil fields. As I said, Aramco this morning had issued
22:20
Speaker 1: a guidance that some of their employees were should be
22:22
Speaker 1: working from home. And in addition to all of that,
22:26
Speaker 1: you have multiple other strikes at different airports and at
22:31
Speaker 1: different oil facilities in Saudi Arabia overnight. Remember, we are
22:36
Speaker 1: not getting the full picture. There's no video. There's nothing
22:39
Speaker 1: because they will literally throw people in jail, even American citizens,
22:43
Speaker 1: for recording any of this stuff and for reporting it
22:47
Speaker 1: back to us. So that is also a very significant
22:50
Speaker 1: part of the picture. And it's putting huge, obviously major
22:54
Speaker 1: pressure on oil prices this morning. So you put all
22:57
Speaker 1: of that stuff together and markets and others are poised
23:01
Speaker 1: potentially for a major dip, you know, if hostilities do
23:05
Speaker 1: completely break out again. And on top of that, oil
23:09
Speaker 1: is now, there's no slack left in the system. It's
23:12
Speaker 1: been nearly eight months now left of this. If we
23:15
Speaker 1: do resume complete hostilities and there's just no more exports,
23:20
Speaker 1: anything like that, we will reach potentially catastrophic levels after
23:25
Speaker 1: a few more months of something like this, of actual
23:27
Speaker 1: all-out war. It'll be horrible. Joining us now is our
23:33
Speaker 1: great friend, Professor Pape of the University of Chicago, to
23:36
Speaker 1: discuss the ongoing geopolitical situation. Professor, thank you for stopping
23:39
Speaker 1: by again. We understand you've prepared some slides, which I
23:43
Speaker 1: know the audience loves.
23:45
Speaker 6: Well, yeah, so everybody's watching what's going to happen on
23:48
Speaker 6: November 3rd.
23:49
Speaker 4: I'm looking forward.
23:51
Speaker 6: What are the implications of November 3rd for after November 3rd?
23:56
Speaker 6: And I think they're quite important. They're very important to
24:00
Speaker 6: put in front of people. And this is what I'd
24:03
Speaker 6: like to do today. So the central question is, will
24:08
Speaker 6: Trump roll the dice? You see, people are talking a
24:12
Speaker 6: lot about Trump's incentives, but I don't think they're quite
24:16
Speaker 6: getting it right. And mostly what they're doing, folks, is
24:20
Speaker 6: talking about it from the chess game version of strategy,
24:25
Speaker 6: which is an important version, an important dimension, but they're
24:29
Speaker 6: missing the domestic politics driving U.S.
24:34
Speaker 4: Strategy.
24:35
Speaker 6: We are in an escalation trap. We're not just simply
24:39
Speaker 6: playing a chess game with Iran. For eight months, we
24:44
Speaker 6: have watched as a limited strike led to Iran gaining
24:48
Speaker 6: power and then U.S. doubled down in a whole variety
24:52
Speaker 6: of ways. And now Iran has been gaining still more power.
24:57
Speaker 6: And the key question is, is America going to accept
25:01
Speaker 6: defeat or are we going to escalate? And notice that
25:06
Speaker 6: so far, every rung on the ladder, Washington has gotten weaker.
25:10
Speaker 6: So this is not about is there a way out
25:13
Speaker 6: of the war to get victory? The best way to
25:17
Speaker 6: understand the escalation trap is not as a chess game.
25:21
Speaker 6: Think about it as roulette. Think about it as a
25:25
Speaker 6: gambler who is losing. And then as the gambler loses,
25:31
Speaker 6: does the gambler just walk away or does the gambler
25:35
Speaker 6: double down? Put more chips on Red 36, looking for
25:40
Speaker 6: a spectacular strike to make amends and actually come out ahead,
25:46
Speaker 6: looking for the one spin that wins it all.
25:50
Speaker 4: Well, we've seen this in history. So a lot of.
25:53
Speaker 6: People wonder, how could Japan attack America at Pearl Harbor? Well,
25:58
Speaker 6: this is something I teach long seminars about at the
26:02
Speaker 6: University of Chicago. We have all the documents, folks. Japan
26:06
Speaker 6: did not go into this sleepwalking into a major war,
26:10
Speaker 6: not understanding America could come back and club it.
26:15
Speaker 4: The other way around.
26:16
Speaker 6: You see, what happened is Japan had already been making moves.
26:21
Speaker 6: Americans don't really pay attention much to that until Pearl
26:24
Speaker 6: Harbor happened. And that had led to Japan being in
26:28
Speaker 6: an escalation trap. And then they were about to see
26:32
Speaker 6: their regime crumble because the oil embargo was crushing.
26:37
Speaker 4: That's what led them, that deadline, to double down.
26:40
Speaker 6: We saw this in Vietnam, a series of escalations by
26:44
Speaker 6: Lyndon Johnson. And basically notice him saying, I'm not going
26:49
Speaker 6: to be the president who saw Southeast Asia go the
26:52
Speaker 6: way China went. That is a major tell here. They
26:57
Speaker 6: are betting in both cases that because they're going to
27:02
Speaker 6: lose everything, there's a small chance they can win. That's
27:06
Speaker 6: why they're putting the money down.
27:08
Speaker 4: And what are we seeing in the new polls that
27:10
Speaker 4: just came out yesterday?
27:11
Speaker 6: Across the board, it doesn't really matter whose polls you
27:15
Speaker 6: look at, which is this is a political.
27:17
Speaker 4: Bloodbath coming for the Republicans.
27:21
Speaker 6: And it is all dramatic. Now, of course, there can
27:24
Speaker 6: be the shy Trump voter. We don't know for sure
27:26
Speaker 6: what's going to happen, but expectations are driving the train.
27:31
Speaker 6: And those expectations are a political bloodbath coming on November 3rd.
27:37
Speaker 6: And that means that President Trump, what he does next
27:42
Speaker 6: is going to be driven in large part by these expectations.
27:48
Speaker 6: And for President Trump, causing chaos through escalation in Iran,
27:55
Speaker 6: this is a risk he is increasingly likely to accept.
28:03
Speaker 4: You see, if he doesn't.
28:07
Speaker 6: Create some change to the game politically, then he faces
28:12
Speaker 6: a certain loss, a crippling loss, not just for other Republicans,
28:19
Speaker 6: but for his administration with subpoenas as far as the
28:23
Speaker 6: eye can see, likely removals of cabinet members, and also
28:29
Speaker 6: down the road, President Trump may truly be on the
28:33
Speaker 6: bump here with MAGA because MAGA supported him as a winner.
28:38
Speaker 6: What if he now really is demonstrated to be the
28:41
Speaker 6: ultimate Jimmy Carter? And the bigger the strike, the more
28:46
Speaker 6: the chaos, And that means doubling down like the losing gambler.
28:52
Speaker 6: And the odds of this aren't just 50-50, and they
28:55
Speaker 6: are not steady, folks.
28:57
Speaker 4: They grow.
28:59
Speaker 6: And there exists a risk today, that's absolutely true, that
29:03
Speaker 6: we could see escalation before November 3rd. But what you
29:06
Speaker 6: see is the risk grows after November 3rd all the
29:11
Speaker 6: way through to January. This is not, oh, we just
29:14
Speaker 6: need to get to November 3rd or November 4th. And
29:17
Speaker 6: then everything is fine because after November 3rd, Trump suddenly
29:22
Speaker 6: has very little to lose. Before then, over the last
29:28
Speaker 6: few months, you can see if Trump struck, he might
29:32
Speaker 6: lose something in the November 3rd vote. That changes on
29:36
Speaker 6: the night of November 3rd when the polls close. This
29:40
Speaker 6: means that election day is the starting gun.
29:43
Speaker 1: So, sir, what fits with that is some of the
29:46
Speaker 1: latest news that just came out. B5, we just talked
29:49
Speaker 1: about this previously, is about the new plans to draw
29:53
Speaker 1: up for renewed strikes on Iran after the elections from
29:57
Speaker 1: the New York Times. One of the you know, I'm
30:00
Speaker 1: curious if you could contextualize this because Crystal and I
30:02
Speaker 1: were saying it's very difficult to see how despite, you know,
30:07
Speaker 1: the corollaries you just gave about Japan or Vietnam, how
30:10
Speaker 1: they can really still believe of a short three day,
30:15
Speaker 1: 72 hour bombing period, which will miraculously drive Iran to
30:20
Speaker 1: the table. And yet that does seem to be the
30:22
Speaker 1: logic here. Obviously, it fits perfectly. within the escalation trap.
30:26
Speaker 1: But I mean, what is the mindset of someone who
30:28
Speaker 1: can still believe that after eight months?
30:31
Speaker 6: Let me explain the disconnect in the media. They're focusing
30:34
Speaker 6: on the word three-day air plan, and they're comparing it
30:38
Speaker 6: to 40 days of previous war. This is just a
30:42
Speaker 6: disconnect in the media. What you're seeing are white belts
30:45
Speaker 6: trying to pretend they're black belts when it comes to
30:47
Speaker 6: air power. So this is, this three-day air plan looks
30:52
Speaker 6: a lot, once you look under the hood of the details,
30:55
Speaker 6: like the instant thunder air plan in 1991 that kicked
31:00
Speaker 6: off the first Gulf War against Saddam Hussein. And what
31:04
Speaker 6: that plan was, was not just to try to kill
31:07
Speaker 6: Saddam Hussein, kill one leader. It went after a widespread
31:12
Speaker 6: command and control attack.
31:14
Speaker 4: Against the military nodes in Iraq.
31:18
Speaker 6: Now, you'll say, well, didn't we do that back in March?
31:21
Speaker 6: The answer is not very thoroughly, no.
31:23
Speaker 4: And why?
31:24
Speaker 6: Because what's the change is we now have had eight
31:27
Speaker 6: months where hundreds of thousands of our intel and DIA,
31:33
Speaker 6: other intelligence agencies, have been able to identify the command
31:38
Speaker 6: nodes in the Mosaic plan that Iran has. I really
31:43
Speaker 6: have no doubt. And I'm not saying we should do it,
31:46
Speaker 6: by the way. I have no doubt that when you
31:48
Speaker 6: turn 300,000 Intel folks who work 24-7 on this problem,
31:54
Speaker 6: you are going to identify a lot of command and
31:57
Speaker 6: control nodes for the IRGC that we did not know about.
32:02
Speaker 6: And I think that is what is coming. And that
32:04
Speaker 6: three-day plan, again, the media is focusing on this word three.
32:08
Speaker 4: They're missing it.
32:09
Speaker 6: The plan on instant thunder started as a three-day plan.
32:12
Speaker 6: It went all 43 days of the war. So again,
32:15
Speaker 6: the media is focusing on the wrong number because it's
32:19
Speaker 6: a good thumbnail soundbite, three-day.
32:21
Speaker 4: You see what I mean?
32:22
Speaker 6: And the problem is there's just more to it than that.
32:26
Speaker 6: And you need to talk about this with actual air
32:29
Speaker 6: power experts, not just military experts or not marine. I mean,
32:34
Speaker 6: this is instant thunder 2.0. And what we're missing is
32:40
Speaker 6: what would be compelling to Admiral Cooper. And why is
32:43
Speaker 6: General Kane going along with this? Almost surely this is
32:47
Speaker 6: what is going on. We've probably identified hundreds of nodes
32:53
Speaker 6: of the IRGC that we didn't... So remember, in February 28,
32:57
Speaker 6: this was a start from scratch war. We didn't spend
33:01
Speaker 6: six months preparing for this war. Donald Trump just literally...
33:06
Speaker 6: On a Friday afternoon at 315 said strike tomorrow morning.
33:10
Speaker 6: And that happened. You don't have the time to identify
33:13
Speaker 6: all this. I'm not saying this plan is going to win.
33:16
Speaker 6: I'm saying that this is what's sucking them into the
33:19
Speaker 6: escalation trap from the military's perspective.
33:25
Speaker 3: Gotcha.
33:25
Speaker 2: And so, Professor Pape, Trump is obviously not the only
33:29
Speaker 2: world leader who's facing a critical election in the coming weeks.
33:32
Speaker 2: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is as well. We had an
33:35
Speaker 2: Israeli political analyst on yesterday who was indicating he is
33:39
Speaker 2: behind in the polls and may be feeling quite a
33:41
Speaker 2: bit of pressure there. How does that factor into your analysis?
33:46
Speaker 6: Well, so Netanyahu did try, it looks like on October 10th,
33:50
Speaker 6: to start a strike.
33:51
Speaker 4: And then we pulled back.
33:53
Speaker 6: And I think that this is because of what I'm saying,
33:55
Speaker 6: that Trump still thought he's what Trump is trying to
33:58
Speaker 6: do in these final weeks is jump up enthusiasm among
34:02
Speaker 6: the base. That's why that's what you do in a midterm.
34:06
Speaker 6: And that's exactly what Trump is doing. And so what
34:09
Speaker 6: he's and so he just made the call. that he
34:13
Speaker 6: wants to wait. But Pete Hegseth went, met with Netanyahu.
34:17
Speaker 6: It looks like Hegseth was being given some very top
34:22
Speaker 6: secret intelligence. That's at least the leaks that I'm seeing.
34:26
Speaker 6: And then this is planning for strikes after, at least
34:30
Speaker 6: after the Israeli election. And that's why that curve I
34:34
Speaker 6: just showed you, there is a serious risk now, but
34:37
Speaker 6: it's just steady up all the way through January 3rd.
34:42
Speaker 6: So the key thing to know is Trump has less
34:45
Speaker 6: and less to lose and more and more to gain
34:49
Speaker 6: by this politically, domestically every day we go forward from here.
34:55
Speaker 4: Right.
34:56
Speaker 1: Professor, you said you're not you're not saying it's going
34:58
Speaker 1: to work. Your point, though, about why the military would
35:00
Speaker 1: get sucked in actually makes complete sense to me because,
35:03
Speaker 1: you know, that that tracks for why Pete Hegseth is
35:07
Speaker 1: in Israel. He's doing this air power exercise with Bibi.
35:13
Speaker 1: They're convincing him this time around we've got a target set.
35:16
Speaker 1: But you also said, I'm not saying this is going
35:18
Speaker 1: to work. So what do you expect the fallout from
35:21
Speaker 1: this to be from the Iranians?
35:22
Speaker 6: A gigantic disaster. Gigantic disaster. Much worse than I think
35:27
Speaker 6: people are really expecting. Because see, they're focusing on the
35:31
Speaker 6: word three. They're not understanding what happen in the past.
35:36
Speaker 6: So they're just focusing on three. Well, how bad could
35:38
Speaker 6: it be? And they're distracted by November 3rd. So even
35:43
Speaker 6: the best people here just are not understanding what would
35:47
Speaker 6: happen with that so-called three-day air plan. And what is
35:51
Speaker 6: likely to happen is you will see the economy likely
35:55
Speaker 6: continue to go south even more rapidly probably all the
36:01
Speaker 6: way through, if we do this, all the way through
36:04
Speaker 6: April to June. So this is not just, oh, it'll
36:08
Speaker 6: be a bad few days with oil prices. Everything will
36:11
Speaker 6: just snap right back. Because what happened with Instant Thunder
36:15
Speaker 6: is we could never shut down Saddam Hussein's Scud missile attacks.
36:21
Speaker 6: As that leadership campaign went on, And so those scuds
36:25
Speaker 6: kept hitting Tel Aviv. They killed 28 of our troops
36:28
Speaker 6: in Riyadh. So this plan, I think, is very seductive.
36:33
Speaker 6: It's the seductive part of the escalation trap. But the
36:37
Speaker 6: bottom line is military will say, well, wait, we degraded.
36:40
Speaker 6: We lowered the number they could fire. Well, that's still
36:44
Speaker 6: going to wreck the economy.
36:46
Speaker 2: Professor Pate, my last question for you is, you know,
36:49
Speaker 2: you indicated that if there is a massive midterm reckoning
36:53
Speaker 2: for the president and his party, that he will have
36:56
Speaker 2: increasingly less to lose and that will only increase the
37:00
Speaker 2: likelihood that he will escalate. In alternative view, you know,
37:04
Speaker 2: the world I'd like to live in is that there
37:05
Speaker 2: is a reckoning over the Iran war that the democratically
37:08
Speaker 2: elected president looks at that and says, I better change
37:11
Speaker 2: course because this is not what the people want me
37:13
Speaker 2: to do. and goes in a different direction. Why do
37:16
Speaker 2: you feel that Trump will take this moment to escalate?
37:21
Speaker 2: And why would he think that would rescue his political
37:24
Speaker 2: situation in some way?
37:26
Speaker 6: Yeah, so number one, I'm not telling you it's inevitable.
37:29
Speaker 6: I'm showing you the risk curve.
37:32
Speaker 4: That's the best we can do.
37:33
Speaker 6: I know people wanna polymarket everything and try to make
37:37
Speaker 6: money on this. It's not what I'm doing here. So
37:40
Speaker 6: number two, the fundamental problem Trump has is that his
37:44
Speaker 6: whole administration, not just the economy, his whole administration is
37:49
Speaker 6: about to go off a cliff. Now, the cliff doesn't,
37:52
Speaker 6: it doesn't, the ship of the administration doesn't go off
37:55
Speaker 6: the cliff on November 3rd. That's when it starts going
37:58
Speaker 6: off the cliff. It really goes off the first week
38:01
Speaker 6: in January. Because if the Democrats win big, if they
38:05
Speaker 6: take both houses of Congress, then what you're going to
38:09
Speaker 6: see is that people will the administration will just come unglued.
38:15
Speaker 6: Pete Hegseth, whether Pete Hegseth resigns in December to avoid
38:18
Speaker 6: being impeached and removed won't matter.
38:22
Speaker 4: That would only be.
38:22
Speaker 6: More blood in the water for Washington, which loves these frenzies.
38:27
Speaker 4: You see what I mean?
38:28
Speaker 6: So once you get the frenzy of Washington going, there's
38:31
Speaker 6: no stopping ripping apart the Trump administration politically. And that's
38:36
Speaker 6: just going to go on and on and on. And
38:39
Speaker 6: the Democrats just aren't going to sit back and say, oh, sure,
38:42
Speaker 6: in order to calm things down, we're going to let
38:44
Speaker 6: Trump off the hook. We're going to treat him real nicely.
38:48
Speaker 6: That's what you would have to have. You'd have to
38:51
Speaker 6: have the Hakeem Jeffries and Nancy Pelosi go to Trump
38:55
Speaker 6: and say, look, we're just going to help you build
38:58
Speaker 6: your library. You want to raise a billion dollars? We'll
39:01
Speaker 6: help you raise that billion dollars. That's not happening. No,
39:05
Speaker 6: it's going to go the other way around. Trump knows it.
39:07
Speaker 6: And that's when the ship goes off the cliff. It's
39:10
Speaker 6: January 3rd to 6th, somewhere around there. And that deadline
39:15
Speaker 6: of the certain death of the Trump administration politically, that
39:21
Speaker 6: is the gambler's problem in spades.
39:26
Speaker 4: Think about that.
39:26
Speaker 6: This isn't just you're losing money. This is you're about
39:30
Speaker 6: to go bankrupt anyway you've got a few chips left
39:34
Speaker 6: what are you doing with these chips that's the real
39:38
Speaker 6: problem that we face with and by the way this
39:40
Speaker 6: was what the Japanese face this is what Lyndon Johnson
39:44
Speaker 6: face ultimately they go till the chips are gone Lyndon
39:48
Speaker 6: Johnson ran this all the way to the end until
39:52
Speaker 6: he became the ultimate embarrassment. He had to withdraw from
39:57
Speaker 6: running for president. Richard Nixon then won twice as a
40:01
Speaker 6: result of that. Think about the consequences here for the
40:06
Speaker 6: Trump administration. This will be the legacy. And this will
40:09
Speaker 6: be called either Jimmy Carter on steroids or Lyndon Johnson
40:13
Speaker 6: on steroids. this is going to be the worst political
40:19
Speaker 6: shattering of an American administration since the 60s and 70s.
40:24
Speaker 6: This is going to start to look like the Nixon unraveling.
40:28
Speaker 1: Wow. Well, sir, as always, we appreciate your time. Thank
40:32
Speaker 1: you for the slides and everything. We'll see you again.
40:34
Speaker 1: Thank you.
40:35
Speaker 6: Yeah, well, thank you very much. And look, I too
40:37
Speaker 6: hope for a soft landing, but the only way we're
40:40
Speaker 6: going to get there is understanding what's in front of
40:44
Speaker 6: us And for the Republicans to stand up and say no.
40:51
Speaker 1: Well, I don't see that anytime soon.
40:54
Speaker 4: Well, you said what's the solution? There is a solution.
40:57
Speaker 1: No, you're right. We agree, but it's just unfortunate.
41:01
Speaker 4: This is not a Democrat party problem. You see what
41:04
Speaker 4: I mean? This is a Mike Johnson problem.
41:08
Speaker 1: Yep, exactly right. Thank you, sir. Appreciate your time.
41:11
Speaker 4: Thank you. Thanks, Professor.
41:15
Speaker 2: Cybersecurity experts are calling it Black October and saying we
41:19
Speaker 2: may be experiencing the worst cybersecurity incident in history. Let
41:25
Speaker 2: me do my best non-technical attempt to explain exactly what
41:29
Speaker 2: is going on. Let's start with this Wall Street Journal
41:31
Speaker 2: that kicked this whole cycle off. So the headline here
41:34
Speaker 2: is AI just found a bug that puts up to 70%
41:37
Speaker 2: of the world's websites at risk. Artificial intelligence tools help
41:41
Speaker 2: find one of the most severe online bugs ever. Cyber
41:44
Speaker 2: experts are racing to patch it before hackers use AI
41:48
Speaker 2: to exploit it. I will read a little bit of
41:51
Speaker 2: this article to get some of the technical details here.
41:53
Speaker 2: So they say that the creators of PHP, a technology
41:57
Speaker 2: that powers as much as 70% of the world's websites,
42:01
Speaker 2: disclosed a critical security issue Wednesday that could be leveraged
42:05
Speaker 2: by hackers to take control of any system running its
42:09
Speaker 2: software that would allow an attacker to steal information or
42:12
Speaker 2: launch a cyber attack on anyone visiting a hacked website.
42:16
Speaker 2: Security researchers found the vulnerability using AI. Now web administrators
42:21
Speaker 2: are scrambling to protect themselves from the vulnerability which cutting
42:26
Speaker 2: edge AI systems.
42:27
Speaker 3: Could quickly exploit.
42:29
Speaker 2: And so there's a lot to unpack here. However, what
42:33
Speaker 2: I understand of what's going on here is a lot
42:36
Speaker 2: of kind of like older websites that have been around
42:39
Speaker 2: for a while, you know, sort of stayed built on
42:42
Speaker 2: top of a WordPress system. Those are the types of
42:44
Speaker 2: things that will be impacted by this security vulnerability. There's
42:50
Speaker 2: already websites for governments, for major companies around the world
42:54
Speaker 2: that have been taken down in order to try to
42:57
Speaker 2: patch and deal with this potential exploit before it is
43:00
Speaker 2: in fact exploited. It is a massively impactful thing. And
43:04
Speaker 2: you can imagine, Sagar, just my understanding of this in
43:07
Speaker 2: layman's terms is typically when one of these potential vulnerabilities
43:12
Speaker 2: is found, then you issue a patch and it takes
43:15
Speaker 2: some time for everybody to implement it. But you're dealing
43:19
Speaker 2: on the other end of things with humans who would
43:21
Speaker 2: be the ones who would come in and exploit it.
43:23
Speaker 2: It takes time for them to look at the patch,
43:26
Speaker 2: figure out, okay, what is the vulnerability here? How can
43:29
Speaker 2: I exploit it? And so that provides some time for
43:33
Speaker 2: you to create a defense against this. Now, On the
43:37
Speaker 2: one hand, you've got very powerful AI tools that are
43:39
Speaker 2: able to identify these vulnerabilities.
43:41
Speaker 3: But on the other hand, anyone.
43:43
Speaker 2: With some basic hacking knowledge, you don't have to be
43:46
Speaker 2: the best of the best, can take a look at
43:49
Speaker 2: the patch, can immediately figure out what is the exploit
43:52
Speaker 2: and can begin to take advantage of it. So that
43:55
Speaker 2: is the way that AI has changed the game. Let
43:57
Speaker 2: me go ahead and put this next post up on
43:59
Speaker 2: the screen. This is the first element, the new one, Eric,
44:02
Speaker 2: in this block that lays out some of the ramifications
44:06
Speaker 2: of what's going on here. And this is not just
44:08
Speaker 2: to do now with the PHP exploit that I was
44:12
Speaker 2: just describing, but you've got all kinds of issues just
44:15
Speaker 2: over the last 48 hours. So this person says this
44:19
Speaker 2: is the most serious 48 hours in cybersecurity history, Black October,
44:23
Speaker 2: they're calling it. It seems every hour there is a
44:26
Speaker 2: new incident that in a typical year would be one
44:29
Speaker 2: of the biggest incidents of the entire year. Summary of
44:33
Speaker 2: the last 48 hours. Here are the year-level incidents. In
44:36
Speaker 2: a typical year, these would be among the biggest incidents.
44:39
Speaker 2: So PHP to Shell, that's the one I just described,
44:42
Speaker 2: the hole in the software behind 70% of websites. Governments
44:46
Speaker 2: are taking sites offline. Then you have a hole as
44:49
Speaker 2: you've got a California situation. Data on every public school
44:52
Speaker 2: student since 2023 was stolen, including Disability status. You've got
44:55
Speaker 2: a railway incident. Hackers stealing customers' secret keys from a
44:59
Speaker 2: hosting platform used by millions of developers. You have Zboard.
45:04
Speaker 2: 321,000 accounts breached. Company is shutting down.
45:08
Speaker 3: And on and on.
45:09
Speaker 2: We can go to the next page. They then go
45:11
Speaker 2: on to detail. month-level incidents. In a typical month, these
45:15
Speaker 2: would be among the biggest incidents. And you've got issues
45:18
Speaker 2: with Signal, a bug that could leave your mic and
45:20
Speaker 2: camera on after you hang up. Literal stuff of nightmares there, Sagar.
45:24
Speaker 3: You've got WordPress.
45:25
Speaker 2: You've got an issue at Palo Alto. You've got an
45:28
Speaker 2: issue with Meta's Muse, where their AI agent exposed users'
45:32
Speaker 2: personal and business secrets. And then you've got some other
45:35
Speaker 2: serious incidents that they flag here, including the State Bank
45:37
Speaker 2: of India. India's biggest bank confirms a data breach. Siemens,
45:41
Speaker 2: the software hole being used to spread malware. North Korea,
45:44
Speaker 2: state hackers launch a new attack campaign on South Korea. So,
45:48
Speaker 2: you know, I just read off a few selected ones,
45:51
Speaker 2: but you can see that we seem to be in
45:55
Speaker 2: a potentially nightmare scenario where AI has developed to the
46:00
Speaker 2: point now, and this is something that, you know, people
46:02
Speaker 2: have been raising flags about really since Anthropic paused their
46:05
Speaker 2: Mythos release. You now have AI with superhuman technology hacking
46:11
Speaker 2: capabilities that is causing a flood of security incidents across
46:16
Speaker 2: the web. And so, you know, today you may look
46:19
Speaker 2: at this and it really does, Sagar, increasingly feel like
46:22
Speaker 2: we're in the early moments of a sci-fi movie where
46:25
Speaker 2: you're seeing just like the news reports on in the background,
46:28
Speaker 2: the newspapers open at the breakfast table, and you see
46:32
Speaker 2: these headlines that are sort of like troubling, but they're
46:34
Speaker 2: not really sinking into people yet and haven't really massively
46:37
Speaker 2: directly impacted people's lives. But, you know, today it's a
46:42
Speaker 2: bug with signal. Tomorrow it could be a bank that's
46:45
Speaker 2: hacked and accounts are cleared out. The next day it
46:48
Speaker 2: could be an electrical grid that is taken offline with
46:53
Speaker 2: an uncertain amount of time before it's brought back online.
46:57
Speaker 2: That may be the world that we are rapidly approaching.
47:01
Speaker 2: And that's what experts are raising the alarm about right now.
47:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's actually so interesting on this. But again, we're
47:07
Speaker 1: not cybersecurity experts, but relying on some of the quotes.
47:10
Speaker 1: So apparently, so the guy who found this, who runs
47:13
Speaker 1: the foundation of PHP, he actually compared this bug to
47:17
Speaker 1: the heartbleed bug, which I remember vividly in terms of
47:21
Speaker 1: how much damage that one did. But what's even more
47:24
Speaker 1: interesting is that this was a vulnerability that was known
47:28
Speaker 1: about a decade ago. But the conclusion was, is that
47:31
Speaker 1: it's too hard to exploit. They're like, there's nobody who
47:35
Speaker 1: would be smart enough to be able to find a
47:37
Speaker 1: workaround that obviously didn't anticipate algorithms and AI. And then
47:42
Speaker 1: to your point as well, now that everybody else also
47:45
Speaker 1: has access to the same tools, because remember, these tools
47:49
Speaker 1: that were found to find this, that were used to
47:51
Speaker 1: find this bug are the exact same tools that you
47:54
Speaker 1: or I use. are used. It's the same tools that
47:57
Speaker 1: our team can use for a variety of business enterprise applications.
48:00
Speaker 1: It just needs a little bit of a cybersecurity background
48:03
Speaker 1: and some technical know-how. What they're saying is the problem
48:07
Speaker 1: is that now with AI, you can actually reverse engineer
48:11
Speaker 1: the patches into an exploit themselves. You don't actually need
48:16
Speaker 1: to know how to do it. You can use the
48:18
Speaker 1: AI But I do think, you know, combining that with
48:21
Speaker 1: the Monday or like the post that you put up
48:24
Speaker 1: there about some of the problems really does show how, look,
48:29
Speaker 1: you know, we're potentially on the cusp of I think
48:31
Speaker 1: it will be banks. I personally think that it's the
48:33
Speaker 1: banking system, which is extremely vulnerable. I mean, bank I.T.
48:39
Speaker 1: people can sound off. But from what I know about
48:42
Speaker 1: big corporations, there are still multiple Fortune 500s out there
48:46
Speaker 1: that still run off of terminals and IBM software that
48:49
Speaker 1: have all been kludged and patched together from the 1980s
48:53
Speaker 1: onward with some internal security infrastructure. I'm not saying there
48:57
Speaker 1: aren't people who aren't paid millions of dollars to protect it,
49:00
Speaker 1: but they also are still trying to catch up. Some
49:03
Speaker 1: of them obviously are not going to catch up. Some
49:05
Speaker 1: of the executives and others are going to say, eh.
49:07
Speaker 1: You know, we'll see or, you know, we'll put that off.
49:09
Speaker 1: And it's only after a really big incident that other
49:13
Speaker 1: people start to pay attention. That's at least what some
49:15
Speaker 1: of my friends in IT have told me. Like, for example,
49:18
Speaker 1: put CT.
49:19
Speaker 4: Yeah, go ahead.
49:20
Speaker 2: Well, I was just going to say, to your point
49:22
Speaker 2: about banks, I was just looking at a story this
49:24
Speaker 2: morning about how banks are really concerned about all these
49:29
Speaker 2: AI agents that are running loose in their systems already,
49:33
Speaker 2: and in some instances seem to be taking actions independent
49:37
Speaker 2: of what humans told them to. And You can understand
49:41
Speaker 2: how this happens because with Muse in particular, but with
49:46
Speaker 2: any AI agent, you can give it access to your
49:49
Speaker 2: bank accounts and tell it to do stuff. I don't
49:51
Speaker 2: think you should do that. I would really strongly recommend
49:54
Speaker 2: you not do that. But many, many people are. So
49:58
Speaker 2: you've already had a number of banks, I think JP
50:00
Speaker 2: Morgan Chase and a few others that have said we're
50:02
Speaker 2: banning any AI agent access to our system altogether because
50:06
Speaker 2: They also have a selfish reason for doing this as well,
50:10
Speaker 2: which is one of the fears of the banking industry
50:14
Speaker 2: is right now some of their profit margin relies on
50:17
Speaker 2: the friction of moving your money from their bank to
50:21
Speaker 2: another bank or from your savings account into, let's say,
50:24
Speaker 2: a money market account. And so if AI agents take
50:27
Speaker 2: all of that friction out of the system, then you
50:30
Speaker 2: can imagine a scenario where en masse deposits are moving
50:34
Speaker 2: to whatever happens to have the slightly highest.
50:38
Speaker 3: Interest rate return on it.
50:40
Speaker 2: And then if you're reliant on those deposits, obviously, to
50:43
Speaker 2: run your banking business, then you're going to be pretty screwed.
50:47
Speaker 2: So they also are looking at this as like, ah,
50:49
Speaker 2: we got to make sure that people aren't just like
50:51
Speaker 2: pulling their deposits willy nilly now that they have an
50:53
Speaker 2: agent who can do that for them and take the
50:55
Speaker 2: friction out of the transaction. So they have very self-interested
50:59
Speaker 2: reason as well. But you can also understand from a
51:01
Speaker 2: cybersecurity perspective why they're like, you know, I'm not really
51:04
Speaker 2: comfortable with this. So it would not be a surprise.
51:06
Speaker 2: I've seen so many, you know, so many YouTube videos
51:10
Speaker 2: and podcasts. speculating from experts, speculating about when AI may
51:16
Speaker 2: be able to crack encryption such that all of the
51:21
Speaker 2: encryption that we rely on and become very comfortable with
51:24
Speaker 2: banking online. I mean, like our entire adult lives, this
51:28
Speaker 2: has just been something you do. You don't think about it.
51:29
Speaker 2: You don't worry about it. That can completely undermine that.
51:33
Speaker 2: There's a question about whether your Bitcoin wallets are going
51:35
Speaker 2: to be safe. So that is an open question as well.
51:38
Speaker 2: And when you see the scale of what's going on
51:42
Speaker 2: right now, it really makes you feel, okay, we're not
51:45
Speaker 2: really ready for what is here, let alone what is
51:49
Speaker 2: to come.
51:50
Speaker 1: I totally agree. And I was going to show people
51:53
Speaker 1: these NSA things like C2, we can show this. This
51:56
Speaker 1: was an announcement literally put out by NSA Cyber itself.
52:01
Speaker 1: Effective immediately, all organizations using PHP are advised to be
52:04
Speaker 1: prepared for an update addressing two critical vulnerabilities. Then the
52:09
Speaker 1: next one, this is from the FBI Cyber Division. Actually,
52:13
Speaker 1: they say two critical vulnerabilities have been identified. They urge
52:17
Speaker 1: organizations to take the following steps. But I mean, how
52:19
Speaker 1: many people are going to listen? Anybody who has a
52:22
Speaker 1: large business, a massive IT department, they're going to pay attention. But,
52:27
Speaker 1: you know, it's the little ones or others, people who may,
52:31
Speaker 1: you know, mom and pop business, they're not going to
52:33
Speaker 1: pay attention. And they're just so massively vulnerable. now ahead
52:37
Speaker 1: of this in particular. So I think there's a lot
52:40
Speaker 1: of danger here. There really is when we look at it.
52:43
Speaker 1: And I do think the big one will eventually come
52:45
Speaker 1: with the banks. I'm just I'm just I can see it.
52:47
Speaker 1: You know, I don't think it'll be JP Morgan necessarily,
52:49
Speaker 1: but you just have to remember how many credit there's
52:52
Speaker 1: like all these little credit unions and all these things
52:55
Speaker 1: across the country. I mean, I know somebody who has
52:58
Speaker 1: a credit union where they have to pay their credit
53:00
Speaker 1: card bill by like dropping off an envelope of cash
53:03
Speaker 1: over it. I'm like, I'm sorry. I'm There's no way
53:06
Speaker 1: that institution is prepared for this, literally at all. You
53:08
Speaker 1: could outsource it and all of that, but everything is
53:11
Speaker 1: kludged together in the back end. It's highly regulated, so
53:16
Speaker 1: it's not like they can even update their system necessarily
53:19
Speaker 1: to the point where they want it. The biggest will
53:22
Speaker 1: probably be fine, but there are definitely going to be
53:25
Speaker 1: people out there who are going to have some sort
53:28
Speaker 1: of a problem. And I do think that's when people
53:29
Speaker 1: will really wake.
53:30
Speaker 4: Up to this. I do.
53:31
Speaker 5: Yeah.
53:31
Speaker 2: Unfortunately, it is an argument for having your money in
53:34
Speaker 2: the largest institutions, you know.
53:37
Speaker 1: Which I don't want. I think it's bad. I don't
53:40
Speaker 1: think people should do it. I'll be, I'll be honest
53:42
Speaker 1: with you. I used to chase for that exact reason, self-interested,
53:45
Speaker 1: even though I know, I remember one of the most
53:47
Speaker 1: insightful episodes I ever listened to was this Austrian economist,
53:51
Speaker 1: a banking expert. I think it was on Tucker show.
53:53
Speaker 1: where he basically was saying, he's like, look, the biggest
53:56
Speaker 1: problem we have is that we don't have enough banks.
53:58
Speaker 1: He's like, we actually need a lot more banks. Like
53:59
Speaker 1: you need small banks and not these large, too big
54:02
Speaker 1: to fail type institutions, which could create credit. And it's,
54:06
Speaker 1: you know, like things in local community, kind of how
54:08
Speaker 1: it was in the, in the 1940s, 1950s, people could
54:11
Speaker 1: be able to go and be serviced by a local bank,
54:14
Speaker 1: a local banker who has some gives and take and
54:16
Speaker 1: all these national regulations that, and consolidation are actually one
54:20
Speaker 1: of the fuels of not only income inequality, but of
54:24
Speaker 1: lack of business formation and other problems. But yeah, I mean,
54:28
Speaker 1: like you just said, this is one of the arguments, actually,
54:30
Speaker 1: for just using one of the largest banks because they're
54:33
Speaker 1: probably the only ones who are actually prepared and who
54:36
Speaker 1: are on the cutting edge. It's everybody else. Look at
54:39
Speaker 1: Silicon Valley Bank. You remember that entire fiasco as well.
54:43
Speaker 1: Those are some of the richest, most sophisticated people, allegedly.
54:46
Speaker 1: And the entire thing went bust. And if it wasn't
54:48
Speaker 1: for unprecedented bailout and if Trump hadn't been president, then
54:52
Speaker 1: probably wouldn't have happened.
54:54
Speaker 2: Well, and that's the other piece, too, is, you know,
54:56
Speaker 2: they're not going to allow a JPMorgan Chase to just
54:58
Speaker 2: like eat the losses. So, you know, unfortunately, too big
55:01
Speaker 2: to fail, I guess, provides a sort of protection mechanism
55:04
Speaker 2: for you there. I mean, it's grim, but it's that's
55:07
Speaker 2: the reality that we're in right now. A few other
55:10
Speaker 2: things we wanted to get into this block in particular.
55:13
Speaker 2: You know, this fits together with the concerns that the
55:15
Speaker 2: public has about AI.
55:17
Speaker 3: We can put C4 up on the screen.
55:19
Speaker 2: We've got some new polling here from ABC News about
55:22
Speaker 2: their people's sentiments about AI in general. Their headline here
55:26
Speaker 2: is most Americans say AI is bad for society and
55:29
Speaker 2: they oppose more data centers. This truly, once again, there
55:32
Speaker 2: are some partisan differences, but you are talking about a
55:35
Speaker 2: majority of Democrats, independents and Republicans who share similar sentiments
55:40
Speaker 2: and concerns about about AI and want to see more regulation.
55:43
Speaker 2: Let's put the first poll data up on the screen here.
55:48
Speaker 2: So this is a question, is AI good for you personally?
55:51
Speaker 2: People are actually pretty split on this one. It's basically
55:54
Speaker 2: 50-50 of people who feel like it's good for them
55:57
Speaker 2: personally or bad for them personally, which for a new technology,
56:01
Speaker 2: which has incredible promise, is really not a great state
56:04
Speaker 2: of affairs in terms of already how people are feeling
56:07
Speaker 2: before they get to their Concerns for the future. Let's
56:10
Speaker 2: put the next piece up on the screen. Majorities of
56:13
Speaker 2: Americans see high risks with the growth of AI. And
56:16
Speaker 2: lo and behold, what do you think is the number
56:19
Speaker 2: one risk that people are concerned about? It's hacking secure
56:23
Speaker 2: computer systems.
56:24
Speaker 1: Why?
56:24
Speaker 2: Because it's already happening. You know, who are these people
56:27
Speaker 2: that say little to no risk?
56:29
Speaker 3: It's all right here.
56:30
Speaker 2: So you're clearly not consuming the news and absorbing the
56:34
Speaker 2: world as it currently exists. The next greatest concern is
56:37
Speaker 2: eliminating many jobs and then people losing their ability to
56:41
Speaker 2: make their own decisions without AI. So that sort of
56:44
Speaker 2: ability to keep control of your own decision making and
56:48
Speaker 2: not outsource all of your thinking to AI, that looms
56:51
Speaker 2: large for people, which is interesting. Next, you've got increasing
56:55
Speaker 2: economic inequality. And then at the bottom of the list here,
56:58
Speaker 2: but still with very high numbers that think it's either
57:01
Speaker 2: a very high or a moderate risk. A majority of
57:04
Speaker 2: people here, 65 percent, saying they are worried at some
57:08
Speaker 2: level about the risk of human extinction. Let's put the
57:11
Speaker 2: next one up on the screen. Majorities say the federal
57:15
Speaker 2: government is not doing enough. To regulate AI, this is
57:18
Speaker 2: a super majority position. 67% of adults want to see
57:22
Speaker 2: more regulation. That is including a majority of Republicans, 54%,
57:28
Speaker 2: even though Trump has really pushed this deregulation off to
57:32
Speaker 2: the races attitude towards AI development. Let's put the next
57:36
Speaker 2: one up on the screen. Most Americans also oppose new
57:40
Speaker 2: data centers being built in the US overall.
57:43
Speaker 3: And in their communities.
57:45
Speaker 2: So only 30% support new data centers in the U.S., 66%.
57:50
Speaker 2: So again, a super majority opposed. And then if you
57:53
Speaker 2: ask specifically about a data center in their own community,
57:57
Speaker 2: the numbers get even worse. Only a quarter say they
57:59
Speaker 2: would support that and 72% opposed. So you have a
58:01
Speaker 2: broad range. of fears right now, Sagar, about AI development,
58:10
Speaker 2: about the manifestation of that in data centers, in people's communities.
58:14
Speaker 2: And the issue is only going to become more and
58:16
Speaker 2: more salient as the public absorbs these significant cybersecurity incidents
58:21
Speaker 2: and is increasingly directly impacted by them.
58:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. And the public is, as I say, if
58:27
Speaker 1: anything is lagging behind, they're not paying attention. to all
58:30
Speaker 1: of this. And so when it breaks open, I do
58:32
Speaker 1: expect it to be a big, big moment. It's like
58:35
Speaker 1: COVID or any of these other things. COVID is actually
58:38
Speaker 1: a perfect example. You're January 2020, you know, weirdos like
58:42
Speaker 1: me are buying masks and goggles and gloves and survival
58:46
Speaker 1: rations on Amazon and, you know, telling everybody it's coming,
58:50
Speaker 1: it's coming, it's coming, it's coming. You seem totally insane.
58:52
Speaker 1: And then literally the entire world shuts down. I'm not
58:54
Speaker 1: saying it's going to be exactly the same, but it does.
58:56
Speaker 1: It has some flavors, I think, of all of that.