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Episode Two Hundred Thirty One: Eat Your Shit Sandwich · The Death Of Journalism

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to episode two hundred and thirty one of the
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  Speaker 1: Death of Journalism podcast. My name is John Zigler. I'm
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  Speaker 1: your host. On today's show, we will, of course analyze
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  Speaker 1: the massive Zelensky Trump White House dust up and Trump's
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  Speaker 1: very trumpy speech to Congress, plus the oscars, my theory
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: on what really happened to Gene Hackman, and an analysis
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: of the Epstein Files fiasco. You will not hear anywhere else.
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  Speaker 1: It is another jam packed edition of the Death of
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  Speaker 1: Journalism podcast. Every single week when I prepare this podcast,
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  Speaker 1: I think there's just no way that there can be
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  Speaker 1: more to talk about next week, and yet almost every
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  Speaker 1: single week there is. And this is another example of that.
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  Speaker 1: We're not even going to begin with the absolutely crazy
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  Speaker 1: White House confrontation between President Zelensky, Donald Trump, and JD. Vance.
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  Speaker 1: We're gonna get to that in a little bit, because
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  Speaker 1: I want to begin with Trump's speech to Congress or
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  Speaker 1: I guess what used to be called, or is normally
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  Speaker 1: called the State of the Union address. It's not called
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  Speaker 1: that with a new incoming president, but it de effectively
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  Speaker 1: exactly the same. And this was if we were not
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  Speaker 1: desensitized in extraordinary event in some ways. It was even
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  Speaker 1: more backcrap crazy than what happened with Zelenski at the
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  Speaker 1: White House late last week. It began with a stunt,
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  Speaker 1: and it was a stunt that was I think obvious
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  Speaker 1: and anticipated by the Trump speech writers, because Trump already
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  Speaker 1: had it in his teleprompter to effectively respond to it.
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  Speaker 1: But you had the Democrats acting like complete jackasses. One
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  Speaker 1: in particular, Congressman Al Green, standing up with his cane,
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  Speaker 1: refusing to stay sit down, refusing to sh sh up
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  Speaker 1: even when being admonished by Speaker Johnson. He was eventually
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  Speaker 1: tossed out of the event, which is obviously exactly what
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  Speaker 1: he wanted. The Democrats sat there with their stupid signs
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  Speaker 1: and looked incredibly weak, incredibly out of touch. I mean,
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  Speaker 1: this was, from an optical standpoint, just terrible for Democrats.
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  Speaker 1: I'm not one hundred percent sure what they should have done.
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  Speaker 1: But when you're taking when you're being forced to eat
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  Speaker 1: a shit sandwich, as they were by Donald Trump, maybe
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  Speaker 1: it's just best to sit back, take it and not
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  Speaker 1: make yourself look like idiots and assholes, but at least
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  Speaker 1: get some semblance of the moral high ground. At least
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  Speaker 1: there be some people out there that might be thinking, well,
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  Speaker 1: Trump is taking this too far. But Democrats don't have
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  Speaker 1: any impulse control much like Trump. That's one of the
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  Speaker 1: great ironies of this whole situation is that psychologically Trump
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  Speaker 1: Democrats are not that different. They both have massive impulse
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  Speaker 1: control problems. They both overplay their hands very very dramatically
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  Speaker 1: and very very predictably, and we saw a lot of
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  Speaker 1: that last night. So I have absolutely no sympathy for
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  Speaker 1: the way that the Democrats acted, and I totally get
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  Speaker 1: I totally understand why Trump fans loved Donald Trump's speech.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, maga and I guess now the vast majority
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  Speaker 1: of the Republican base loved it, and there were lots
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  Speaker 1: of things to love about the speech once it finally
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  Speaker 1: got on track after the initial craziness that ensued. Again all,
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  Speaker 1: in my opinion, very scripted on both sides, but the
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  Speaker 1: substance of what Trump talked about basically taking a victory
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  Speaker 1: lap on the things he has supposedly done already and
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  Speaker 1: all the things that he's going to do. You know,
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  Speaker 1: if you are somebody who is a believer in Donald Trump,
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  Speaker 1: it was awesome. I totally get why the approval rating
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  Speaker 1: among Republicans for that speech will be off the charts,
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  Speaker 1: off the charts. It was basically a dunkathon on Democrats.
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  Speaker 1: And if you believe what he said is true, and
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  Speaker 1: you believe in his promises and think that they're legitimate,
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  Speaker 1: I totally get why you loved it. I did not
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  Speaker 1: love it because I don't believe a lot of what
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  Speaker 1: he said is true, and I don't believe a lot
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  Speaker 1: of his promises are legitimate. I mean, just this morning,
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  Speaker 1: for instance, the US Supreme Court ruled in a pretty
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  Speaker 1: shocking decision five to four, with Roberts and Barrett siding
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  Speaker 1: with the Democratic judges against Donald Trump on the issue
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  Speaker 1: of US Aid cuts. Now, I'm not a legal expert.
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  Speaker 1: I'm certainly not an expert on this particular case. You know,
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  Speaker 1: there seem to be some semblance of logic for why
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  Speaker 1: Roberts and Barrett did this, because this was money that
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  Speaker 1: is perceived as having already been owed, as opposed to
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  Speaker 1: being in the process of being spent. But their descent
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  Speaker 1: among the four real conservative justices was pretty strong as well.
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  Speaker 1: But here's the bottom line. This is really the first
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  Speaker 1: major case that the US Supreme Court has weighed in
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  Speaker 1: on regarding all these things that Trump is doing since
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  Speaker 1: taking office, and it's not a good sign. It's not
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  Speaker 1: a good sign if you're somebody who is concerned that
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  Speaker 1: a lot of this stuff is going to get tied
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  Speaker 1: up or eviscerated in court because Roberts and Barrett, who
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  Speaker 1: are now basically the two swing votes. I mean, Barrett
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  Speaker 1: was nominated by Trump, but you know, she has made
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  Speaker 1: it very clear that she is willing to go against him.
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  Speaker 1: If Roberts and Barrett, philosophically and maybe even politically, are
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  Speaker 1: willing to go against Trump on this, that is very
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  Speaker 1: ominous because unless this is this case is an aberration,
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  Speaker 1: that means that a lot of this stuff is going
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  Speaker 1: to end up losing in court. I'm not talking about
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  Speaker 1: the fact that every case is slightly different, right, But
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: unfortunately we live in a world where are yous Supreme Court.
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: And maybe this was always the case and we didn't
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  Speaker 1: fully realize or appreciate it, but it's obviously the case
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: now that it's a very partisan court and that a
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  Speaker 1: lot of these decisions are not based purely on the law,
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: they're based in the political leanings and what each particular
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  Speaker 1: justice in this case thinks of Donald Trump. And I've
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  Speaker 1: talked many times in the past about how Roberts I
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: think has been turned from a moderate conservative to a
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  Speaker 1: moderate liberal because he does not like Donald Trump. And
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  Speaker 1: once again here he cided against Trump, and because Barrett
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  Speaker 1: went with him that side one. If that is in
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  Speaker 1: fact where the court stands politically on what Trump is
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  Speaker 1: doing in the bigger picture, that is very ominous, very
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: ominous if you're somebody who is a big fan of
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: what Trump has been trying to do, because this could
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  Speaker 1: be a sign of things to come. I don't think
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  Speaker 1: this particular case is all that important in the micro,
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: but in the macro it may very well maybe, And
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  Speaker 1: it's representative and symbolic of one of my biggest problems
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  Speaker 1: with what's happening with this Trump two point zero administration.
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  Speaker 1: The reality is that almost everything he is saying is
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: either and claiming to have done is either bullshit and
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  Speaker 1: it's just for his own ego, like making English the
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  Speaker 1: official language of the United States, something I fully one
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  Speaker 1: hundred percent support, but there's absolutely no legal impact to
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  Speaker 1: him doing that. And that's one of many many examples. Another,
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  Speaker 1: by the way, came up in the speech last night
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  Speaker 1: in a way that I thought was fascinating and that
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  Speaker 1: nobody else that I saw online picked up on. And
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  Speaker 1: this is a topic I've discussed many many times in
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  Speaker 1: the past, and the issue is biological men playing in
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  Speaker 1: female sports. When he signed his executive order to much
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: fanfare and much celebration, I said, I don't think this
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  Speaker 1: is necessarily going to do anything. And Trump took a
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  Speaker 1: victory lap on that, pretending as if he had ended
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  Speaker 1: the issue, and he didn't even mention, didn't even mention
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  Speaker 1: that just this week there were forty five Democratic Senators
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  Speaker 1: who successfully stopped an actual bill that would have made
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  Speaker 1: it illegal for biological males to play in high school
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  Speaker 1: and college, which would have definitively ended the issue and
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  Speaker 1: actually done something significant instead of just having a press
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  Speaker 1: event where Republicans can cheer and everyone can feel good
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  Speaker 1: about themselves for a day. Hey we did it, when
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  Speaker 1: nothing has actually been done. And again and it's in
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  Speaker 1: the micro not a huge deal, not the biggest issue,
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  Speaker 1: but an important issue and certainly one that has great
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  Speaker 1: symbolic power. But how as if you're Trump, how can
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  Speaker 1: you possibly do an address to the Nation and address
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  Speaker 1: to Congress that the facto state of the Union address,
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  Speaker 1: and you're dunking on Democrats constantly, and you don't even
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  Speaker 1: mention because the vast majority of the country doesn't know
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  Speaker 1: this happened. You don't even mention, You don't even you know,
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  Speaker 1: physically point out in the audience at least a couple
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  Speaker 1: of key Democratic senators who voted to keep that band
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  Speaker 1: from even moving forward to a vote. Why don't you
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  Speaker 1: do that? Well, you could. It could have been a misstep,
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: an oversight, a strategic mistake, a missed opportunity. Maybe it
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: happened too late in the process of the speech. There's
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  Speaker 1: all sorts of excuses you can make, But the one
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  Speaker 1: that I come up with is that Trump doesn't want
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  Speaker 1: to acknowledge that what he did doesn't have any real
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  Speaker 1: power or impact because if they're voting on it in Congress,
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  Speaker 1: and by the way, it again his side is losing
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  Speaker 1: in the Senate. That shows, at least to the rational person,
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  Speaker 1: that nothing that happened with regard to his executive order
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  Speaker 1: had any real merit, any real staying power, because if
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  Speaker 1: it did, you wouldn't need a law. Well, I'm somebody
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  Speaker 1: who still believes in the legislative process, and you know,
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  Speaker 1: I don't think that many of these executive orders have
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  Speaker 1: nearly the weight that Trump is pretending in the right
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  Speaker 1: wing media is pretending that they do, and they certainly
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  Speaker 1: have zero weight the moment that Trump leaves office. That's
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  Speaker 1: one hundred percent certainty. So you have this situation where
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  Speaker 1: Trump is talking this wonderful game of fulfilling all of
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  Speaker 1: his promises, when the reality is very little has been done,
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  Speaker 1: and you know now you're losing major Supreme Court battles
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  Speaker 1: and you can't. I mean, and that the issue of
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  Speaker 1: the biological males and female sports is I think particularly
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  Speaker 1: interesting because it's so overwhelmingly popular Trump's position is among
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  Speaker 1: the public. Almost eighty percent of the public in every
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  Speaker 1: poll is on Trump's side of this, and even on
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  Speaker 1: that issue, even from that issue, as a brand new
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  Speaker 1: president claiming to have a mandate in the alleged honeymoon period,
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  Speaker 1: can't even get a vote, can't even get a vote
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  Speaker 1: in the US Senate. Now, I think Democrats were idiotic
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  Speaker 1: for doing that. And there are a couple of Democrats
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  Speaker 1: who are vulnerable in the next midterms who took that vote,
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  Speaker 1: which I just don't understand politically, and maybe they'll be punished.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, there's a lot of people talking a good
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  Speaker 1: game about how they'll be punished, But think about how
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: daunting that is, how ominous that is. This is talk
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  Speaker 1: about dunking. This is a slam dunk issue politically, and
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  Speaker 1: Trump can't even get it through the Senate, can't even
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  Speaker 1: get a vote in the Senate. And so my guess
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  Speaker 1: is he didn't mention that in the speed because it
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: disrupts his narrative that he's already fixed the problem when
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  Speaker 1: he hasn't fixed shit. I realize that that pisses off
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: a lot of MACA supporters because they love this speech,
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  Speaker 1: and there was a lot to love about it, Okay,
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  Speaker 1: not just from the standpoint of the substance and all
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: the promises and making America great again. I agree with
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: most of it, not all of it, but I totally
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: understand why people who love Donald Trump were incredibly enthusiastic
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: about the speech. But to me, it's all about it's
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: very much like as it always has been with regard
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  Speaker 1: to Trump. It's like a drug binge. It feels really good.
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  Speaker 1: I get it. I've never been a drug user, so
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  Speaker 1: I don't know this for sure, but basically, you know,
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  Speaker 1: what it appears to be what everyone says and everyone
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: you know writes about when it comes to drug use,
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  Speaker 1: that there's the high and it feels great, and that's
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  Speaker 1: why you get addicted, and then in the long run
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  Speaker 1: it always ends poorly. Well, I've always felt that that's
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  Speaker 1: the way it is with Trump. If you don't like
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: that analogy, I mean, Trump is driving around this new
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: sports car like a maniac, incredibly fast, doing all sorts
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  Speaker 1: of tricks, and it looks fantastic and it's entertaining as hell.
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  Speaker 1: But eventually the car's gonna crash when and how I
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: don't know. How bad the crash is gonna be, I
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: don't know, But those are just the law of averages.
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  Speaker 1: And on the downside, if you're looking at this politically,
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  Speaker 1: Trump has really created a trap for himself. Maybe he's
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: done it on purpose, maybe he's oblivious to this, maybe
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  Speaker 1: he just doesn't care, but he has, through this speech
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: and the entire narrative of Trump two point zero, he
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: has done two things that are incredibly dangerous politically. He
• 14:43
  Speaker 1: has created extraordinarily high expectations. I mean, if you listen
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  Speaker 1: to that whole speech, my god, he's gonna change the world.
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  Speaker 1: He's gonna save the world, he's gonna make America great
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  Speaker 1: again for everybody. It's all gonna be just rainbows and
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: puppy dogs. And that's a very very dangerous thing to
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: do politically, to create expectations that are that high, especially
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: when there's a good chance there's gonna be at best
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: short term pain for maybe long term game, something that
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: if you listen carefully, and I'm Trump even acknowledges that,
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: especially on the economic side of things, and there's already
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: storm clouds gathering economically. Some of them may be more
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: real than others, but there's all sorts of data points
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: if you wanted to make the argument right now, and
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: I'm not an expert enough to know, I don't think
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: anybody is, because I don't think that the experts are
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: particularly good in most areas, and they're certainly not perfect
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: in this area. But if you wanted to make the
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: argument then in at least in the short run, we
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: are headed for a very difficult time economically, and that
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: things are going to get worse, maybe significantly worse than
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: before where they get better. You could make a very
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: strong argument in that particular situation. And that gets me
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: to the second part of this trap that Trump has
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  Speaker 1: basically set for himself. He's created extremely high expectations, and
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: because he is doing all these sorts of things, or
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: try to do all these sorts of things, he has
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: created the impression, I mean a very very clear impression
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  Speaker 1: that he is disrupting everything. Every element of government is
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  Speaker 1: literally being upended, which means he owns it. He owns
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: all of it. He owns all of it already, He's
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: not even two months in and he owns everything. Now
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: he's trying and I'm seeing this from a lot of
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: Trump's supporters. Now, this narrative, all things were worse under
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: Biden than we even realized that the mess. They laughed,
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: and this is still all gonna be Biden's fault. I'm sorry,
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: with the majority of the American people, that is not
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  Speaker 1: gonna work. When you come in and you disrupt everything
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  Speaker 1: in a way like we've never seen before, you own it. Now,
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: if it works out, that's fantastic, that's that's a bonanza.
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: But if it doesn't work out, then you get all
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: the blame because the you know, the dog ate my homework,
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: and it's Joe Biden's fault. Isn't gonna hack it. That
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: could hack it under normal circumstances, if you were just
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: trying to make your changes on the edges, as virtually
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: every president has ever tried to do before, because they've realized,
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: for better or for worse, that massive radical change is
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: incredibly difficult and dangerous. But if you do that, if
• 17:51
  Speaker 1: you if you go by that philosophy, then you get
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: a leadway period, You get a honeymoon period, You get
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: a year at least before people start to say, okay,
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: this is on you now. And frankly, I've always believed
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: that even that time period was too short, because I
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: think things take a lot longer to filter through the
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: system than most people understand. But regardless, politically, you always
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: got at least a year. Now I think that time
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: period is already up. So you know, this is an
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: incredibly risky strategy that Trump is and Trump's people are using.
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: I'm not one hundred percent sure they understand how perilous
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: it is, but it is perilous when you create high
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: expectations and you own everything, and you yourself even acknowledge
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: we may be going through short term pain to hopeful
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: theoretical longer term gain. That's problematic, and I'm not sure
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: that Trump. In fact, I know Trump fans are not
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: remotely fully aware of that. Now I will all so
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: one hundred percent of knowledge. There were some great moments
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: in this speech. Now, a lot of them happened probably
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: after the non Trump fans, if they even tuned in
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: to begin with, had already tuned out because this was
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: the longest speech of its kind in American history, and
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: it was getting to be very late at night. But
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: there was some wonderful human moments in the second half
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: of the speech. The tribute to Lake and Riley and
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: her family, the thirteen year old boy, the cancer survivor
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: who was made an honorary Secret Service agent, and his
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: absolutely adorable reaction to that, another young man being told
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: live during the address to Congress that he had been
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: admitted to West Point, which was his lifelong dream. All
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: of that was fantastic stuff. Now you got a little bit,
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: a little bit game showing to be a little bit
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: reality show, but that's obviously Trump's background. I mean, it
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: did feel a little bit like Oprah's you know, you
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: get a car, and you get a car, you get
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: a car. Or in fact, at one point when Trump
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: announced that a terrorist had been apprehended. My wife, who
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: was a big Trump fan, rather hilariously declared, in Trump's
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: tone and voice that and now I point you to
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: the to the rafters of this building, where this terrorist
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: will be hanged live for your entertainment. I'm paraphrasing what
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: she said, but that was that was where she was
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: going with that. Frankly, given the tone of the speech,
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: it wouldn't have been all that shocking had Trump done
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: something like that. I mean, it's are you not entertained?
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: But I am the first to acknowledge as a Trump critic,
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: that there was some great stuff from a human standpoint
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: in the second half of that speech. However, I don't
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: know that you know, very many people were watching, certainly
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: not that weren't already Trump fans. And that gets me
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: to another aspect of why I didn't like this speech.
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: In totality, it's not just because I don't believe much
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: of what Trump said, and I don't believe that his
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: promises are legitimate or obtainable. But I also don't like
• 21:22
  Speaker 1: how partisan this speech has become. And I realized this
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: is something that confuses a lot of people, because you know,
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: I am no moderate. Politically, I'm extremely conservative and I
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: am not bashful about expressing my opinions, never have been,
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: and I'm as aggressive as anybody there is out there. However,
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: I don't like the fact that the so called State
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: of the Union address has become that partisan. And to
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: be clear, this is not something that started last night,
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: but I think last night was where we officially left
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: the gravitational pull of the rational earth. There's no coming
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: back from last night. And I get that it feels
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: good for Trump fans. I understand that using the drug
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: analogy again, but I'm somebody who looks at the bigger
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: picture and further down the road. And you know, my
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: my greatest, biggest, most important priorities when it comes to
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: this country are the basics. I really don't have that
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: high of expectations anymore because I think we're in great peril.
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: But so to me, the most important things are no kings, right,
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: this is this is, this is our founding mission as
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: the United States of America. No kings. Preserve freedom and
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: liberty and justice for all, and preserve the Union. Those
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: are my three biggest things when it comes to the
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: United States, because that's what we were all about. At
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: the beg, So no kings, preserving liberty and freedom, justice
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: for all, everyone being treated equally, and we preserve the Union.
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: And I don't see how what has happened to the
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: so called State of the Union address is at all
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: good for the long term survival of the Union. And
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: let me take this, as I often say, out of
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: the theoretical and into the practical. So now that this
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: State of the Union address has become so overtly an
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: absurdly partisan on both sides. And again it didn't start
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: last night, but last night was the worst it's ever
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: been from a partisanship perspective. I mean, this was a
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: Trump rally. This was you know, Trump was almost physically
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: only giving the speech to one half of Congress, his half,
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: the Republican half. Here's what's going to have happen in
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: the future. Now, this has already been happening for many years,
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: but I think we're now reached the breaking point. There
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: is going to be no reason whatsoever, whether it's during Trump's,
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: the rest of Trump's term, or whoever is the next president.
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: Once we have established that the State of the Union
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: address is nothing more than a partisan political rally, then
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: only political partisans who already favor that president will tune in.
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: This has been happening in this direction for a while,
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: but I think we're now it's going to be accelerated
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: because now it's as clear as day that that's all
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: this event is, and that has dramatic ramifications into the future.
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: I believe that the State of the Union will no
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: longer be a significant event. I think we will see
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: opposition party members no show up. I think Supreme Court
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: justices will not show up. I think the media coverage
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: of it will eventually diminish greatly, the ratings for it
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: will diminish greatly. It's going to be a lot like
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: the Oscars, which we're going to get to a little
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: bit later on in this episode of the podcast, a
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: very similar evolution where what was once a major cultural
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: and largely unifying event for the Union, the State of
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: the Union, in a country where we have fewer and
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: fewer events that even remotely qualify as a communal event.
• 25:43
  Speaker 1: We've lost the Oscars, and we're in the process of
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: losing the State of the Union address. Once that happens,
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: there's no getting it back. There is no getting it back,
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: and and it will be lost something that used to
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: be a positive in unifying the country at least a
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: little bit, at least putting us all on the same
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: page politically for maybe an hour, although in the case
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: of Trumpets, two hours is now going to be another
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: event that's simply divisive, that simply divides us instead of
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: unites us, because it is going to be seen as
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: nothing but politically partisan, and there aren't that many percentage
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: wise political partisans in this country. I know people who
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: are politically partisan and spend a lot of time on
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: social media think that everyone's that way. That's not the case.
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: That is not the case. And there are so few
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: events in this day and age where ABC, NBCCBS, and
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: the cable news networks CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, Channel News Nation,
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: they're all airing the same scheduled event at the same time.
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: And I just don't think that's going to happen much
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: in the future. I think we were gonna I think
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: we may end up seeing who knows, maybe even in
• 27:07
  Speaker 1: Trump's presidency, we may have a situation where some of
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: the liberal networks don't even bother because the ratings are
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: going to be so poor because there's nothing in it
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: for someone who's not a Trump fan. Why would you
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: tune in to be dunked on? Why would you tune
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: in to a Trump political rally? And now that Trump
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: has done it and taking it to the to the
• 27:31
  Speaker 1: most extreme degree we've ever seen, then that's the way
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: it's going to be in the future. There's no going back.
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: I mean, it's hard to imagine anyway the scenario where
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: we go back, because once you go down this path,
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: this is why it's a dangerous path, why it's a
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: Pandora's box. Once we do that, there's really no going back,
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: and there won't be people to watch and care about
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: the thirteen year old answer survivor, or the young man
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: who got into West Point, or the tribute to Lake
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: and Riley and her family, except for those that are
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: already in the choir. They're already converted. It won't be
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: a national event. It may already be a situation where
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: it's not really a national event. But this is classic Trump.
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: Trump doesn't care. Trumps actually benefited throughout his entire life
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: and certainly his political career by looking at situations where
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: he can crack the foundation of something that's important, but
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: it doesn't get crushed in the short run, so he
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: can take advantage of it. He can reap the benefits
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: of cracking that foundation, and he's gone by the time
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: there are any real serious ramifications of that. I don't
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: know how much he thinks about it, but that's the
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: reality of his life and his political career, and he's
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: a savant at it, whether it's conscious or subconscious or
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: somewhere in between. And so that's the part of this
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: that I didn't like. I don't like where this is headed.
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: As I tweeted last night, we don't live in a
• 29:13
  Speaker 1: monarchy yet, but you can see one from where we are.
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: That speech is very close to what a monarchy might
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: look like someday in this country. And I get I
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: get that Conservatives loved it, and they love the dunking
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: on Democrats, and Democrats deserve everything they get. I understand it.
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: Nobody has more disdained for the modern Democratic Party than
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: I do. But I am concerned about the union. I'm
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: concerned about how the hell this whole thing is going
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: to hold together when they're all sorts of societal and
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: media forces tearing it apart. Something I predicted a long
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: time ago in two thousand and five, twenty years ago
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: when I wrote a book called The Death of Free Speech,
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: that media fragmentation was going to do this to us,
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: and it's happened, maybe even more dramatically than I ever imagined.
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: But there are two moments in the speech in particular
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: that I want to reference that I think show that
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: Donald Donald Trump deserves some substantive criticism for what he said.
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: That he won't get anywhere in the right wing media,
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: that's for sure. And the first is a topic that
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: I have referenced before. I'm probably one of the very
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: very few, especially conservative commentators that even has mentioned this.
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: I get attacked for it, especially online, every time I
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: do it. But it deals with Trump's view of what
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: happened during the assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania last year.
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: Now.
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: I have criticized Trump in the past for saying that
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: he believes very clearly that God saved him that day
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: because he was chosen to make America great again. And
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: I've said that doesn't make any sense, that that is
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: a very dangerous view of God, that is a very
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: dangerous view of yourself. That sounds very much like the
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: divine right of kings. I mean, they are all sorts
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: of incredibly significant and dangerous implications of that that if
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: a democratic president ever said that, conservatives would be all
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: over But you're not allowed to be all over it
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: because the reput right wing media and the Republican Party
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: is a cult now, and so you can't be seen
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: as criticizing Trump. You have to actually agree. Oh. Yes,
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: God saved Donald Trump that day in Butler. He I
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: guess he redirected that bullet so that it only grazed
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: his ear, the perfect, perfect amount of damage to help
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: him win reelection. This is all planned by God, I guess,
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: and Trump's mind. I'd love for someone to do some
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: follow up questioning, but no one ever will. So how
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: exactly did this happen? I mean, of course, the easiest
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: way for this to occur would have been for you know,
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: the assailant there would be assailant, they get a flat
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: tire that day, and so nobody would have been injured
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: and nobody would have been killed. And That's been a
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: huge part of my concern about Trump's belief on this.
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: What about Corey the Fireman. Well, last night we had
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: the extraordinary, extraordinary in my view, circumstance where Trump spent
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: a couple of minutes talking about Corey and his family
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: and his widow and his daughters who were there at
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: the event and honoring him, And I'm all for that.
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: That's all fantastic, that's great. I get it one hundred percent,
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: because by all accounts, Corey died a hero, and it's
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: tragic and it's horrendous. But he did die in the
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: exact same event where the President of the United States
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: is claiming God saved him Trump to save America. And
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: I could not believe it when in the same breath
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: where Trump is honoring the family of Cory, the fireman
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: who died that day in Butler, Pennsylvania, Trump reiterated his
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: belief as clearly as he ever has in the past,
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: that God saved him that day, apparently oblivious to the
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: logical implications of what that would mean for Corey the
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: firefighter or his family who was right there in the audience.
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: And here's what that sounded like. I believe that my
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: life was saved that day in Butler very very good reason.
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: I was saved by God to make America great again.
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: I believe that.
• 34:04
  Speaker 3: I'm sorry, I am completely baffled by how you can
• 34:23
  Speaker 3: logically interpret what Trump said there in any other way.
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: Than that he believes in a God who saved him
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: that day, but didn't think that Cory the Fireman's life
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: was worth saving.
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: Now I realize there are people who say God works
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: in mysterious ways. John, maybe God's plan for Corey was
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: different and there was a reason why he didn't save Corey. Okay, fine, Yah,
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: you don't believe in a logical god.
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: That's fine. I get it, and I you know, and
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: I'm someone who, for a lot of people, has no
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: credibility on this because I don't believe in organized religion.
• 35:09
  Speaker 1: I consider myself to be agnostic on a good day
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: and atheist on a bad day. But you know, as
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: soon as you have an illogical God, you lose me.
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: I mean, why couldn't he have saved Corey too? I mean,
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: he saved a couple other people that were shot that day.
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: Why didn't he save Corey? And I would love to
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: know what Trump's answer. This is why it's important. What
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: would Trump's answer be to that? Because no one's ever
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: going to ask him that question in the right wing media,
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: that's for damn sure, you know, and the left wing
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: media never has the opportunity anymore, and they don't think
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: about God in this this sort of way. So, I mean,
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: what does Trump believe? Does Trump believe that God actually
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: changed events so that he would survived that day? But
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: he didn't give a shit about Corey? And what set
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: me over the edge on this is that he's using
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: that's too strong. He's technically using Corey's widow and his
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: daughter's as a prop I don't think necessarily that was
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: his intention. I'm not that cynical. I mean, he's trying
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: to honor them. But he then makes the statement that
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: I just played for you, and you have this bizarre
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: spectacle of the widow and his daughter's standing and applauding
• 36:39
  Speaker 1: Trump's statement that God saved him that day without anyone
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: there at least and certainly not in Trump's mind, I
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: guess ever putting this all together and going well, wait
• 36:52
  Speaker 1: a minute, why didn't God save Cory? And so that
• 36:57
  Speaker 1: that was troubling to me. That was very because again
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: it's troubling from the standpoint of the theology and your
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: view of God. But to me, the most important part
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: is that is scary if Trump really believes that, And
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: I don't know if Trump really believes that, because I
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: have never believed that Trump it believes in any sort
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: of God, certainly not an act of God. Certainly, not
• 37:22
  Speaker 1: in any in any sort of religion. Now, is it
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: possible that the assassination attempt changed his view of God? Yeah,
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: that's certainly possible. That has happened in the past. Of course,
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: It's particularly interesting that if it did change his view
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: of God, it's because he now decided that God thinks
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: so well of Trump that he intervened to save Trump
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: from certain deaths. So, given Trump's mentality, I can understand
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: why that would have him think a lot better of
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: God than maybe he did previously. Anyway, I realized that
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: that is not an argument I can win with anybody,
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: because I'm in a club that can fit in a
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: phone booth. The phone booth still exists existed when it
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: comes to this sort of stuff, especially when Trump is involved.
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: But I do think that there's a story to be
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: told there that nobody, especially not in the right wing media,
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: is going to tell other than maybe me. There's another
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: part of the speech that I think deserves to at
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: least be noted, because it goes to the much larger
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: issue of how much of what Trump is saying and
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: what Elon Musk is saying is actually true, specifically with
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: regard to the alleged budget cuts or federal spending cuts
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: that are being instigated by DOGE, the Department of Government Efficiency,
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: something which philosophically I'm one hundred percent in favor of,
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: but about which I'm very skeptical because the more I
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: read about what's actually transpiring, I'm not all that impressed.
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: And I think what's happening is they're realizing that this
• 39:02
  Speaker 1: is not nearly as easy as it sounds, and that
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: once you get rid of the really low hanging fruit,
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: this becomes much more complicated. Well, Trump went through a
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: grocery list, if you will, of some of the greatest
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: or the worst hits and the government waste and fraud
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: and corruption that they have allegedly found, and a lot
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: of it was obviously ridiculous, and I'm in favor of
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: Trump highlighting that. But when you do this, when you
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: do this, you better make sure you have all your
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: i's dotted and your t's crossed, because if you do not,
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: and it turns out that something you say is totally untrue,
• 39:50
  Speaker 1: it is going to destroy with the non Trump fan,
• 39:54
  Speaker 1: the trust in the entire process, because a lot of
• 39:59
  Speaker 1: this requires trust. No one's going to go through all
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: the details themselves. And when you tell a blatant and
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: obvious lie, especially one that brings into question just how
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: much research and expertise is being used in this process
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: in a rational world, that's a problem. And if this
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: was done by Joe Biden or any other Democratic president,
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: this would be a massive problem. This is all, This
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: is all the right wing media would be talking about
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: today if Trump was a Democrat or if there was
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: a democratical If Trump was a Democrat, the right wing
• 40:36
  Speaker 1: media would probably still be in favor of him. But
• 40:39
  Speaker 1: if there was another Democratic president not named Donald Trump,
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: and they were listing all these amazing cuts that they
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: have found, all this remarkable waste that they have uncovered,
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: and they made the mistake of misinterpreting some money, fairly
• 41:00
  Speaker 1: small amount of money in terms of the federal budget,
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: but so millions of dollars whatever it was. They misunderstood
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: transgetic experiments as transgender, two totally different things. And that's
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: what Trump did last night. And not only did he
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: do it, this was with regard to alleged experiments related
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: to transgender mice. As he put it, he put an
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: exclamation point on it by saying, this is real. And
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: here's what that sounded like, eight million dollars for making
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: mice transgender. This is real. The problem is that's not real.
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: And it seems pretty clear that that's not real, that
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: this was a at best a misinterpretation of two words
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: that soundedlike transgenic versus transgender and had nothing to do
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: with transgenderism and mice. And apparently, and I'm not an
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: expert obviously on this, but from what I have read
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: prior to this podcast, there's some logical explanations for why
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: this was an area of study that is legitimate, but
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: it doesn't matter because it's close enough to transgender. And
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: now there are millions of people and I've seen it
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: online already, who are using transgender mice as a talking
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: point for the absurdity of government spending and why doge
• 42:38
  Speaker 1: is doing such a great job. And it's a lie.
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: It's a lie. It's an obvious, certifiable lie. And Trump
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: not only told it, but he added, this is real,
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: it's not real. Look it up for yourself. And so
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: I'm sorry, folks, I'm sorry that I'm I'm you know,
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: the deb dow, but I just I am becoming increasingly
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: pessimistic about how all this is gonna work itself out.
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: I hope it somehow does, but to me, I see
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: storm clouds everywhere politically, economically, and now you know, more
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: so in the realm of foreign policy. Even if Trump
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: seems to be on the verge at least as of
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: this taping, things can change very fast. Of a victory
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: of sorts when it comes to the entire Ukraine Russia situation,
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: which obviously became a massive news story because of what
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: happened at the White House last Friday. Now for some context,
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: I rarely ever talk about Ukraine and Russia because one,
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: I don't talk about things I don't consider myself to
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: be an expert in. And I've just there's so much
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: to talk about domestically that which interests me a hell
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: of a lot more than what's happening, you know, a world away.
• 44:04
  Speaker 1: So I occasionally will reference it, but I've never been
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: big into it. And part of the reason I've never
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: been big into it is now only I'm not an expert.
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: I don't have a dog in the hunt. I have
• 44:18
  Speaker 1: disdain and fear of Putin. I do not trust Zelensky.
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: I think Zelensky is a prima donna. I think he's
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: a fraud. I don't trust him at all. I don't
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: think Ukraine is nearly as pristine as a lot of
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: liberals who put the Ukrainian flag as their profile picture
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: pretend that they are. I don't think that there's a
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: good guy in this whole situation. I think this is
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: an incredibly complex set of circumstances that goes back decades
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: and decades. You could argue that this is really related
• 44:52
  Speaker 1: to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the agreement
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: of these unification of Germany back during the Bush administration,
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: the first Bush administration, and I mean all the machinations
• 45:04
  Speaker 1: that have occurred since then. There are no good guys
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: in this story. So I don't trust Putin, I don't
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: trust Zelenski. I certainly didn't trust Biden, And when it
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: comes to Trump, I don't fully trust him either. I
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: trust him a little bit more than I did Biden,
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: but when it comes to Russia, I still have questions
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: about where he really stands and why he seems to
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: like Putin so much. But more importantly, when it comes
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: to psychoanalyzing Trump. Here's a guy who promised that the
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: war would be over in one day of his presidency.
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: It's almost a direct quote. And obviously that has not happened.
• 45:44
  Speaker 1: So Trump wants to fulfill that promise, and it certainly
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: appears as if he is doing everything he possibly can,
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: regardless of what the long term price of that might be.
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: And this goes back to you know what I said
• 45:58
  Speaker 1: a little bit ago. This is Trump's m where he
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: will allow or even facilitate the cracks in the foundation
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: of some sort of institution, where he doesn't give a
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: shit about the long term implications of that, and he
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: reaps the short term rewards, which is rather ironic because
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: it's exactly the opposite of his economic theory. His economic
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: theory is, well, we'll deal with some short term pain
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: for longer term gain and we'll see whether or not,
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: you know, that happens, and how that works out. But
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: I digress. The point here is that you know, Trump
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: has no problem cracking the foundation of the stability of Europe.
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: And you know, all these alliances that we've had with
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: European countries obviously since at least World War two and Frankly,
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: a lot of what's happening here in the aftermath of
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: this now infamous meeting between Trump and Vance and Zelensky
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: at the at the White House is the is essentially
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: the end of the post World War two global structure.
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: And a lot of people think, oh, that's fantastic, and
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: I say, is it? Maybe? Okay, there's a lot of
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: problems with that structure in the United States gets taken
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: advantage of quite a bit. But this is a structure
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: that has made the world mostly safe and has allowed
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: the United States to be the dominant force in the world.
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: Are we sure we want that structure to be completely disbanded?
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: Are we sure? Because you never know. It's why I'm
• 47:44
  Speaker 1: a conservative. You never know. You know, sometimes even though
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: you might like change, change can turn out to be
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: bad and maybe very very bad. So yeah, I think
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: Trump really does want peace, partially because he promised it,
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: but at what cost and what ramifications? So I go
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: into that Zelenski Trump Vance situation with no one to
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: root for and trusting nobody, and it won't surprise you
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: to learn that I think that everybody was wrong in
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: that situation, and almost everybody has and now analyzed it
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: in a way that is incorrect. I don't see anybody
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: coming out as a hero in that whole situation. So
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: let me go through it again. I don't like Zelensky
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: at all. I don't trust Zelenski. I think he's an egomaniac.
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: I think he's a pre Madonna. And frankly, I think
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: the most underrated element of this whole fiasco, the entity
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: that deserves the most blame, that didn't get any for
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: what transpired, is the left wing media and left wing
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: politicians who set Zelensky up, both literally and figuratively for
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: failure because they kissed this guy's ass for so long
• 49:18
  Speaker 1: and so hard that I think he got a ridiculously
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: delusional view of his own importance and his own leverage
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: when it comes to the United States, And in a
• 49:34
  Speaker 1: weird way, I have a little bit of empathy for him.
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: I mean, if you have American politicians and American celebrities
• 49:42
  Speaker 1: salabbering all over you for years, and you know you're
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: a hero, and you come to the White House and
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: you know, in the first Trump term you had a
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: pretty good relationship with Trump, although you know it ended
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: up indirectly causing his impeachment which is a whole other
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: story for another day. And that's that's a part of
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: this equation that cannot be forgotten. I mean, there's no
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: way that Trump has forgotten that whole situation, and so,
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: you know, but in Zelensky's mind, he cannot possibly It's
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: clear from the way he responded to this whole situation
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: he cannot possibly understand how little leverage he has with
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: Trump and the United States, and how vulnerable he is,
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: and how much of a shit sandwich he must be
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: prepared to eat in order to make sure this thing
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: doesn't go off the rails. So I have, right off
• 50:43
  Speaker 1: the bat, I blame Zelensky and his enablers, which include
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: the American left wing media, the left wing Democratic Party,
• 50:55
  Speaker 1: even you know, entertainment figures who were kissing Zelenski's ass.
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: But that was I think the key to this whole situation, because,
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: as I've said many times in the past, Trump views
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: himself and acts many times like a mob boss. And
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: in this particular case, Trump was the mob boss. Jade
• 51:18
  Speaker 1: Vance was his muscle, and they were having a meeting
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: that happened to be in public, in front of the
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: whole world, in front of all sorts of live television
• 51:26
  Speaker 1: cameras where they were not at first, but eventually they
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: felt so disrespected that they had to put this figure
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: in his place. They needed the show in their minds
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: Zelenski literally who was boss? And anybody who understands anything
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: about Trump, what would get that? If you disrespect him
• 51:56
  Speaker 1: in a situation where you have no leverage and where
• 51:59
  Speaker 1: he thinks understandably so he's doing you a massive favor
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: and you start to get into it with a snotty attitude,
• 52:10
  Speaker 1: and instead of eating your shit sandwich, you pretend that
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: you're equal to him. That's gonna be a problem. That's
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: gonna be a huge problem. I mean, a lot of
• 52:21
  Speaker 1: this reminded me, and this is classic Strange Zig comparisons.
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: But hopefully you'll appreciate this. We see this same problem
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: in my family all the time. My twelve year old daughter, Grace,
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: you know, almost a teenager. She's starting to get to
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: those years where you know, they have a delusional view
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: of who they are. There's a Lensky. Okay, they have
• 52:46
  Speaker 1: no leverage, but they think they're on equal footing. And
• 52:50
  Speaker 1: my wife and Grace love each other very very much,
• 52:54
  Speaker 1: but they have an I guess, like a lot of
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: mothers and daughters, they have a very complex relationationship, one
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: that I can't fully understand or comprehend. All I know
• 53:05
  Speaker 1: is that when it goes badly, it goes very badly.
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: It gets very ugly, almost invariably right at bedtime, where
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: my wife is exhausted after having worked all day, and
• 53:17
  Speaker 1: I hate it, and they get in all sorts of knockdown,
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: drag out fights, you know, verbal fights, usually just before bedtime.
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: And the core problem is almost invariably that my daughter
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: thinks that she's on the same level as my wife,
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: her mom, and me. This happens with me too. Grace
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: has gotten somehow this idea that she is to be
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: treated equally. She does not understand fully that she is
• 53:50
  Speaker 1: the daughter and that we are the parents. Now I'm
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: sure we deserve some blame for that, and I think
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: COVID has something to do with that. Talked before about
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: how COVID stunted everything because there was nothing to take
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: away at a very critical point in her her growing up,
• 54:08
  Speaker 1: and it's a you know, very complex situation. Again another
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: story for another day. The point here is I think
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: it's a pretty good analogy for what happened with Zelensky
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: and Trump. Trump is my wife, and you know, maybe
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: I'm maybe maybe I'm Trump and she's Jdvants. I'm not
• 54:27
  Speaker 1: sure which is what. But you my wife is clearly
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: in charge, so I guess she's Trump and and my
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: daughter is Zelensky. And I think that what like with
• 54:37
  Speaker 1: my daughter and my wife, what really sets my wife
• 54:40
  Speaker 1: off is when Grace starts to pretend that somehow she's
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: on equal footing and then it gets off the rails. Well,
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: that's effectively what happened in that meeting. And and by
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: the way, I think there's another analogy here with my wife,
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: and I'm even and talk to my wife about this.
• 55:01
  Speaker 1: I've made this analogy to my wife in the last
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: few days. It didn't go that well, but I still
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: think it's a valid comparison, and that is, there's another
• 55:12
  Speaker 1: way of looking at this whole situation. My wife, understandably
• 55:16
  Speaker 1: is very frustrated by the fact that she does almost
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: all the work in the family. Right She's the primary breadwinner,
• 55:25
  Speaker 1: and she does, you know, most of the cooking for
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: dinner and a lot of the cleaning. Although you know,
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: we do have a maid come in every week or so.
• 55:34
  Speaker 1: But the point is she is a great burden, a
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: great burden, and I fully understand, appreciate that, and acknowledge it.
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: But her whole thing is, you know, I think I'm
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: getting a raw deal here. You know, why is it
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: that I have to do everything? And I made the
• 55:52
  Speaker 1: analogy to her that she's like the United States when
• 55:56
  Speaker 1: it comes to the world order and to specifically Europe.
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: And the reason why I made this analogy is, Okay, yeah,
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: you carry a lot of the burden on probably no
• 56:13
  Speaker 1: question you're getting a raw end of the deal, but
• 56:15
  Speaker 1: you get benefits for that that you don't fully understand.
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: And she's like one of those I said, Well, you
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: are the moon, the sun, and the stars of our family.
• 56:26
  Speaker 1: You're the one that gets all the love. You know,
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: You're the one that dictates the entire you know, timeline
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: of the family. That everything that happens is it goes
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: through you. You're You're in charge. You get all the love,
• 56:41
  Speaker 1: you get all the respect. You know, you dictate where
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: we go on vacations. So, whether you realize it or not,
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: you get benefits from not Now you may not think
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: those benefits are good enough in exchange for what you
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: put out, but you are getting benefits that you may
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: fully realize. And I think there's, as I told her,
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: there's a decent analogy to be made here to the
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: United States's place in the world. Yeah, we get screwed
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: over a lot, but we are also reaping some benefits
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: to that that we may not fully realize until they're gone.
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: All sorts of things that occur, and in the broader
• 57:22
  Speaker 1: scheme of things, it's we are the top dog. We
• 57:27
  Speaker 1: are we dictate virtually everything that happens in the world.
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: Everything goes through us. Now, if we don't want that
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: position anymore, okay, But there are ramifications to that, and
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: they could be grave. So whether you appreciate the analogy
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: to my wife, you probably hopefully you appreciated it more
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: than my wife did, because she said, I want out
• 57:50
  Speaker 1: of that deal. She acknowledged that there was some semblance
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: of rationality to the analogy, but she didn't she wants
• 57:58
  Speaker 1: out of the deal. Now. Whether or not that actually
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: happens or not, whether or not she blows up NATO
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: in our family or not, I don't know. But I
• 58:05
  Speaker 1: think there's some some rationality to that, something that could
• 58:09
  Speaker 1: be understood to what actually transpired here between Zelensky and
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: Trump and Vance. And you know, there was a liberal
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: media narrative out there that that somehow this was an ambush.
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: And you know, when I first heard about it on Friday,
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: I was actually hitting golf balls on the driving range,
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: and so all I saw was two or three minutes
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: of a clip, and I even thought, okay, is that
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: possible that this was an ambush? There was this plan
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: to set Zelensky up so that we could substantiate getting
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: the hell out of this thing and not supporting Ukraine anymore.
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: And then later on I realized, well, there were forty
• 58:54
  Speaker 1: to forty five minutes of what happened here before it
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: really got out of control. And during that forty or
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: forty five minutes, Trump was actually exceedingly polite and respectful
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: of Zelenski. And I'm sorry, folks, you know anything about
• 59:13
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump, he's not really well known for his self
• 59:18
  Speaker 1: discipline and self restraint. If this was somehow a plan ambush,
• 59:24
  Speaker 1: I don't think he could have held back, nor could
• 59:27
  Speaker 1: have JD. Vance for forty or forty five minutes. This
• 59:31
  Speaker 1: was a situation where they had just had enough. They
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: were feeling disrespected and they needed to put Zelenski in
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: his place, and I have no problem with that. If
• 59:44
  Speaker 1: this was done behind close doors, that's my major problem
• 59:51
  Speaker 1: with it. Substantively. I have almost no problem with anything
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: that Trump or Vance said, but I don't think it
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: was helpful to do this out in public. And the
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: reason why I think that's important, and why it is
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 1: that things have always been done this way, that we've
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 1: always kept these things private, is because when you do
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 1: it publicly, you know, Trump used the poker game analogy
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 1: quite a bit. You don't have the cards, you don't
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: have the cards, which is true, but you don't let
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 1: Putin know for sure that that's the case. One that
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: Zelenski doesn't have any cards, and two that you're not
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: going to provide him any cards because now that Putin
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 1: knows this so clearly and so decisively, Putin has no
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: incentive to make a piece deal that is remotely remotely
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 1: in Ukraine's interest. Why would he Because he just found
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: out that the United States is very likely to pull
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: all support from Ukraine unless the relationship can be re established.
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: And Zelensky since this occurred, has been trying to suck
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: back up to Trump and says he's willing to sign
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 1: the mineral deal, which may or may not happen. Trump
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: was somewhat ambiguous about that last night during the speech.
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 1: But there are reports that we have cut off intelligence
• 1:01:30
  Speaker 1: to Ukraine, that we've cut off support at least temporarily
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 1: to Ukraine. And so if you're putin, why in the
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: world would you agree to anything that wasn't one thousand
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: percent in your favor. That's why you don't do this publicly.
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: There are reasons. You know, the establishment is terrible in
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 1: a lot of ways, but there are certain things the
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 1: establishment does that has kept things I'm getting out of
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 1: control in the past, and one of those is you
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: keep fights between allies behind closed doors. You don't do
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: this so publicly in a way that made Trump's fans cheer,
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: but I don't think was very helpful to the ultimate
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 1: process and the ultimate goal of some semblance of stability
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 1: in Europe. I don't care that much about Ukraine, although
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 1: I've gotten a little bit more into it recently because
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: I mentioned my daughter Grays. It's another ironic element of
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: this whole using my daughter as an analogy here, because
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 1: one of her best friends is a Ukrainian refugee, and
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 1: so now she's all into the whole Ukraine situation. But
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: even despite that, I still don't have a dog in
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: this hime. I just want there to be I would
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: love for there to be peace. I just want there
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 1: to be stability, and I want the United States's place
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 1: in the world to still be what it has always been,
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 1: because if it's not US, then who you know? Zelenski
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: came running to the to the European so called I
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 1: guess you would call them powers of Great Britain and France,
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 1: which you know might have been might have been relevant
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 1: one hundred years ago. But and JD. Vance has been
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 1: taking an awful lot of criticism in the British press
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 1: for being perceived he denies this, but being perceived as
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 1: having mocked, uh, you know, British forces and French forces,
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 1: basically saying good luck with them. You know, they're not
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 1: gonna be able to do very much for you unless
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 1: you have the United States. By the way, when it
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: comes to JD. Vance, you know, I really want to
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 1: like jd. My good friend Steve Cortes swears by JD. Vance,
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 1: worked with him closely on his senatorial campaign, thinks he's
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: the greatest guy in politics he's ever met, and I
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: think he's very, very smart. I do wonder about his
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 1: impulse control, because he really was the person that threw
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: the grenade that forced this whole situation off the rails
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: for good. I get it, I get why he did it.
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: If it was a private conversation, I'd be one hundred
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: percent in jd Vance's camp. But I just didn't think
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: that that was helpful. I do think also it's extraordinary
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: how much jd Vance believes and apparently you know, not
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: without reason, that he has a wide, an incredibly long
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 1: leash from Donald Trump, that Donald Trump has given jd
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 1: Vance a remarkable amount of freedom. I mean, the balls
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 1: that jd Vance must have to in that situation have
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: to know that he's about to blow up an incredibly
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 1: or potentially blow up an incredible important relationship in the
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 1: middle of a war with Donald Trump sitting less than
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 1: two feet from him on live television. For him to
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 1: have the confidence to do that, I mean, I had
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 1: to respect the balls on it, regardless of how effective
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 1: it was, how smart it was, what the intent was.
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 1: But the reality is I was amazed. I was absolutely
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: amazed that jd man's had the balls to toss that
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: grenade into that situation, and that was really when that situation,
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: you know, was no longer redeemable. That was it was
• 1:05:34
  Speaker 1: off the rails. It was, you know, we left the
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 1: gravitational pull of the rational earth. There was there was
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 1: no coming back from that. And that was my biggest
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: takeaway from regardless of how right or wrong JD. Mans
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 1: may have been. My God, One he's got huge balls,
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 1: and two he has a I guess is related. He
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: has a lot of faith that Donald Trump is not
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 1: going to come down on him, either publicly or privately,
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 1: and that's pretty remarkable. Now, I want to talk about
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 1: some of the media reaction to this whole fiasco that
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 1: occurred at the White House, and specifically to what I
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: would refer to was very very different left wing outlets.
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 1: The first was sixty minutes and sixty minutes, you know,
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 1: was basically apoplectic about what transpired with regard to the
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 1: Zelensky Trump advance meeting. I mean, they were, you know,
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 1: if you know, greater on a scale of one to ten,
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 1: they were at about a nine of urgency and alarm.
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 1: And in the past that would have had some credibility
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 1: and impact. I mean, sixty minutes used to have enormous cachet,
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 1: but especially in right wing circles, they have no credibility anymore.
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: Their audience is not nearly large enough to have an
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 1: enormous impact over the public narrative anymore. They don't even
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 1: have the ability to totally shape the media narrative among
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 1: left wing media outlets anymore. But I did watch it,
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 1: and I did think that they made some decent points.
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 1: But this is where the media pays the price, especially
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 1: on anything related to Russia, for having been so catastrophically
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 1: wrong in the past. I talk all the time about
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 1: how they have squandered their credibility and their trust, and
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 1: when it comes to Russia, there is a perfect storm,
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 1: a perfect storm that is frankly, rather dangerous because we
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: now have a situation where because it is perceived among
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 1: the vast, vast majority of the Republican Party that Russia
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: Gate was a total scam, that there was nothing to it. Now.
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 1: I've never been in that camp. I think there were
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: legitimate concerns about what was found by Robert Muller in
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: the Russian investigation. Collusion was clearly not part of that equation.
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 1: But that doesn't mean it was all a scam okay,
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 1: And that doesn't mean that there's not some reason that
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 1: Donald Trump is incredibly soft on Putin and Russia. It
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: could just be because he respects strong leaders and people
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 1: with a lot of money and a lot of power.
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 1: It could be as simple as that, but there could
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 1: still be something more to it than that, more nefarious
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: than that. I don't know, but I do know this.
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 1: No one, no one who is remotely a fan of Trump,
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 1: will give that idea any credibility whatsoever. Because the media
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 1: blew it. They put all of their eggs in the
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 1: basket on this Russia Gate situation. That's all we heard
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 1: about for over a year. They said all sorts of
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: crazy things, many of which turned out to be totally false,
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: and their over all narrative turned out to be false.
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 1: So now Trump is completely insulated from this issue. He
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 1: is inoculated, He has been vaccinated. He is immune to
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 1: any and all diseases or allegations related to Russia. And
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 1: so in a weird way, he's able to get away
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 1: in his second administration with being even more pro Trump
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 1: pro Trump. He's very pro Trump. We know that more
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 1: pro Putin than he was in his first administration, because
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 1: in his first administration, there were still a lot of people,
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 1: some even Republicans, who were like, boy, this is weird.
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 1: What's going on here? Is there's something more to this story.
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 1: But that's no longer in the case. And the media
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 1: has lost their balls completely when it comes to even
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 1: bringing this issue up because they were burned so badly
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 1: the first time. So now it's quite possible, and I
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 1: hope this is the case, that that's just a weird
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 1: situation that doesn't have any real impact on what happens,
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: because Trump isn't beholden to booting in any sort of way,
• 1:10:30
  Speaker 1: and you know, he's just doing things because he honestly
• 1:10:34
  Speaker 1: thinks this is what's best for the United States and
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: best for the world. I hope that's the case. I
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 1: hope that's the case. I think that's still the most
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 1: likely scenario. But the idea that it could be something
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 1: bigger or worse than that is no longer viable because
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 1: of this perfect storm, and it actually of the media
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 1: in competence, and it actually gives Trump wide latitude to
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 1: do whatever he wantsa on Putin because any allegations that
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 1: he is pro Putin have lost all of their power
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 1: among anybody that really matters. And so that to me
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 1: was really amazing that we've reached that point where sixty
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 1: minutes can come out with all guns of blazing on
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 1: an issue that is seemingly, you know, as important as
• 1:11:27
  Speaker 1: the future of Europe and the United States is place
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 1: in what happens there, and the future of NATO and
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 1: the future of this Ukraine Russia war. And you know,
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 1: we've got Trump's two former national security advisors McMaster and Bolton,
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 1: who both have their hair on fire, almost literally about
• 1:11:50
  Speaker 1: what's going on. And these were people hired by Donald Trump,
• 1:11:53
  Speaker 1: and they have no credibility among Trump fans at all.
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 1: And you know, John Bolton's a guy I have some
• 1:11:59
  Speaker 1: respect for because I think that he is smart. I
• 1:12:03
  Speaker 1: think that he is well intentioned. I think that obviously
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 1: he was hired by Trump. I think he's got balls.
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 1: He's wrong a lot now, A lot of times, smart, experienced,
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 1: educated people can be wrong. I've experienced that myself many
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 1: times in my career, oftentimes wrong. I do think John Bolton,
• 1:12:26
  Speaker 1: and many people probably listening to this podcast will disagree
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 1: with me. I think Bolton is sincere doesn't mean he's right.
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 1: I think he's sincere and he thinks that this is
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 1: a total disaster. I'm not convinced this is going to
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 1: be a total disaster in the short run. In the
• 1:12:40
  Speaker 1: short run, right now, it looks like Trump is going
• 1:12:44
  Speaker 1: to get a victory. To me, I think Ukraine will
• 1:12:47
  Speaker 1: sign the mineral deal, which seems like a boondoggle to
• 1:12:50
  Speaker 1: the United States frankly, especially in comparison to what we
• 1:12:53
  Speaker 1: were getting during the Biden administration. And he will also
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 1: set up a situation where Ukraine will have to sign
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 1: a piece agreement, probably very much to Putin's favor. But
• 1:13:08
  Speaker 1: all Trump cares about is getting a piece deal that holds,
• 1:13:12
  Speaker 1: you know, at least for a little while, so he
• 1:13:14
  Speaker 1: can claim victory. So if Trump can say, oh, I
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: got a mineral deal and and you know, we're not
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 1: getting ripped off anymore, were stopping all this spending and
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 1: there's peace, that's a huge win for Trump. Huge And
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 1: I think that's very likely where we're heading on this.
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 1: But it's a short term victory. One of the long
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 1: term global ramifications of that they could be profound and
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 1: no one's gonna know. But this is this is Trump's
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 1: m Trump doesn't care. He's about the short term victory.
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 1: And the very high likelihood is that if even if
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 1: this turns into some sort of disaster, it's not going
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 1: to turn into a disaster for the United States while
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 1: he's still president. But he does own this. This is
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 1: like the economy and every other element of society, the
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 1: government and the cutbacks and immigration. He owns anything now
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 1: that happens with regard to global conflict that it remotely
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 1: deals with Ukraine versus Russia. He owns this. So you know,
• 1:14:21
  Speaker 1: if it goes south, there's going to be ramifications I
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 1: think for Trump, But I think the most likely scenario
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: is he is a winner. We'll see, but that's my prediction.
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 1: I think he will clearly have enough to be able
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 1: to declare some sort of victory, especially among his fans,
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 1: regardless of how this all turns out. Now the other
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 1: media responds to this, I just want a reference for
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 1: a couple different reasons. Came from Saturday Night Live this
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 1: past weekend. Now, I spent an enormous amount of time
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 1: a couple of episodes ago talking about the fiftieth anniversary
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 1: of SNL, and you know, I probably spend too much
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 1: time on it, But I think I said some things
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 1: that no one else has said regarding that, and if
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 1: you've missed it, I think there's some pretty interesting analysis
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 1: related to SNL's impact on comedy and our media culture
• 1:15:15
  Speaker 1: and why it has had such a remarkable demise over
• 1:15:19
  Speaker 1: the years, and all the complex reasoning behind that. But
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 1: you know, they got a pretty good rating for their
• 1:15:26
  Speaker 1: fiftieth anniversary, and obviously there was a lot of renewed
• 1:15:29
  Speaker 1: interest in SNL. They took a week off, and so
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 1: they come back the day after this massive news story
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 1: where there's you know, I've talked during that analysis of
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 1: the fiftieth anniversary of SNL that one of the problems
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: that SNL has is it's so rare that there's something
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: that has happened that they can make fun of that
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 1: everybody instantly knows what they're referring to. Well, the Zelenski
• 1:15:53
  Speaker 1: Trump dust up clearly fit in that category because that
• 1:15:58
  Speaker 1: hit way beyond just new junkies Virsually anybody who who
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 1: cares about what's going on in the world had some
• 1:16:05
  Speaker 1: knowledge of what happened with Zelensky and Trump, So it
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 1: was perfect even though there wasn't much time to prepare.
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 1: It was perfect for Saturday Night Live, and sure enough
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 1: they began their first post fifty anniversary episode with a
• 1:16:21
  Speaker 1: live open which tried to duplicate the or mock the
• 1:16:26
  Speaker 1: Zelenski Trump advance meeting. Now, I didn't have high expectations
• 1:16:31
  Speaker 1: for this, but I was curious as to what they
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 1: were going to do, and I have to tell you
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 1: it was the worst, the most unfunny live open after
• 1:16:43
  Speaker 1: a major news event that I could ever recall in
• 1:16:48
  Speaker 1: my probably at least forty five years of watching the show.
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 1: I'm not exaggerating. It was that bad. It was not funny.
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 1: The Trump impersonator. I don't even understand why they used
• 1:17:04
  Speaker 1: that person because Shane Gillis was hosting the show fired
• 1:17:09
  Speaker 1: former was there for one day, got fired. Now he's
• 1:17:12
  Speaker 1: been back hosting the show for a second time. Shane Gillis,
• 1:17:15
  Speaker 1: the comedian. Shane Gillis does a really good Trump. I
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 1: would have preferred to have seen Shane Gillis do Trump
• 1:17:21
  Speaker 1: because I don't like the guy who does Trump for SNL.
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 1: But I thought the Trump impersonator was terrible. The substance.
• 1:17:28
  Speaker 1: I hate the JD Vans impersonator because they use a
• 1:17:30
  Speaker 1: gay Asian guy, and the substance of it was just ridiculous.
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 1: Now I realize that it's a comedy sketch and it's
• 1:17:41
  Speaker 1: not supposed to be a documentary. I've talked many times
• 1:17:45
  Speaker 1: about part of how it is that their Sarah Palin
• 1:17:49
  Speaker 1: impression done by Tina Faye during the two thousand and
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 1: eight presidential election. Why it had so much impact was
• 1:17:55
  Speaker 1: that they tried, sometimes very successfully, to almost use Palin's
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 1: exact words. They didn't do it all the time, not
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 1: know as much as they claimed, but there was at
• 1:18:07
  Speaker 1: least some semblance of truth to what was happening. You know,
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 1: truth is a big part of comedy. I mean, that's
• 1:18:15
  Speaker 1: why something is funny, because there's at least some truth
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 1: in it. Well, there was nothing remotely true about how
• 1:18:22
  Speaker 1: they portrayed this. They tried to portray this as an ambush,
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 1: first of all, which is absurd. It was not an
• 1:18:29
  Speaker 1: ambush for the reasons I've already given. But they didn't
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 1: make fun of Zelensky at all. It was all about
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 1: trying to mock Trump advance. They brought in Mike Myers
• 1:18:43
  Speaker 1: as Elon Musk, which you know Musk obviously wasn't at
• 1:18:47
  Speaker 1: the meeting. It was one of those classic things where well,
• 1:18:51
  Speaker 1: we don't have anythingthing really funny written, so we're just
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 1: gonna use a celebrity cameo that the crowd will go
• 1:18:58
  Speaker 1: wild over because it's Mike Myers, and you know he'll
• 1:19:02
  Speaker 1: do his I guess you would call it Elon Musk impression,
• 1:19:05
  Speaker 1: but it sounded to me more like he was doing
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 1: a combination of his old Austin powers and Mick Jagger impressions.
• 1:19:12
  Speaker 1: It didn't seem like Elon Musk to me at all.
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 1: That to mention the fact that it distracted from the
• 1:19:18
  Speaker 1: actual thing you were mocking or commenting on it, I
• 1:19:22
  Speaker 1: just thought the whole thing was stupid, It was not funny,
• 1:19:26
  Speaker 1: and it was colossally untrue. And to me that was like, wow, okay,
• 1:19:32
  Speaker 1: you just got sent manna from heaven. Manna from heaven.
• 1:19:37
  Speaker 1: With regard to the timing of this event, you could
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 1: have at least mocked everybody involved, but no, they showed
• 1:19:46
  Speaker 1: their true colors once again that these were a bunch
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 1: of out of touch, unfunny liberals who are just going
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 1: to use this situation to attack Donald Trump and JD.
• 1:19:56
  Speaker 1: Vance and protect their liberal heroes w and so I
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 1: just thought, okay, there we go. So the fiftieth anniversary
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 1: really was the end of the show, because you had
• 1:20:07
  Speaker 1: a tremendous opportunity both to do great comedy, because there
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 1: was a lot to mock in that whole situation, but
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 1: also an opportunity to show that you're not just you know,
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 1: doing this show to make liberals feel good about themselves.
• 1:20:23
  Speaker 1: But that's what it was. In fact, this thing was
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 1: so liberal and so unfunny. I'm not sure it would
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 1: have been any different than if it had been produced
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 1: by the Democratic Party or by you know, who's ever
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 1: left at MSNBC. I mean that sincerely, it was that
• 1:20:41
  Speaker 1: bad and and and frankly disappointed because I thought, okay,
• 1:20:45
  Speaker 1: this could be pretty funny. They got a great opportunity
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 1: here and they totally blew it. Now, part of why
• 1:20:51
  Speaker 1: I wanted to mention SNL is that I think that
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 1: there's a lot of parallels between the demise of the
• 1:20:58
  Speaker 1: social and cultural influence of SNL and what has happened
• 1:21:02
  Speaker 1: with the Oscars or the Academy Awards. And of course
• 1:21:06
  Speaker 1: the Oscars were this past Sunday, and there is no
• 1:21:10
  Speaker 1: event I talked with regard to the State of the
• 1:21:13
  Speaker 1: Union address, and how I fear that this is going
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 1: to go by the wayside because of the hyper partisan
• 1:21:19
  Speaker 1: nature of it. But there is no social cultural event,
• 1:21:24
  Speaker 1: at least not in my lifetime, that has diminished more
• 1:21:28
  Speaker 1: than the Academy Awards have done. It is absolutely astonishing.
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 1: The Academy Awards used to be on par with the
• 1:21:40
  Speaker 1: Super Bowl when it came to cultural communal events. Now
• 1:21:46
  Speaker 1: that hasn't been the case for quite a while, but
• 1:21:48
  Speaker 1: it is still worth looking at just how much that
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 1: has diminished. They have lost at least at least of
• 1:22:00
  Speaker 1: two thirds of their audience in a fairly short period
• 1:22:04
  Speaker 1: of time. Now, COVID really pushed it off a cliff
• 1:22:08
  Speaker 1: and they're still trying to recover from COVID and this
• 1:22:12
  Speaker 1: particular Academy Awards. The first reports were that they were
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 1: down from last year. Now they're trying to say, well,
• 1:22:20
  Speaker 1: with streaming, we're actually up from the last few years,
• 1:22:25
  Speaker 1: the best in five years, in other words, the best
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 1: since before COVID. Who knows. The point is they didn't
• 1:22:31
  Speaker 1: even get twenty million viewers, not even twenty million viewers
• 1:22:35
  Speaker 1: when you consider the amount of promotion that that show gets.
• 1:22:40
  Speaker 1: I mean, frankly, the entire Awards season is built on
• 1:22:46
  Speaker 1: building up to the Academy Awards, to the Oscars, and
• 1:22:51
  Speaker 1: it's in the whole ecosystem, an ecosystem that is disintegrating
• 1:22:56
  Speaker 1: before our eyes. I don't even know how it's sustainable,
• 1:22:59
  Speaker 1: because those no pot of gold at the end of
• 1:23:01
  Speaker 1: the rainbow anymore. When you put everything into this, all
• 1:23:07
  Speaker 1: these other shows, the Golden Globes, the SAgs, screenwriters, you know,
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 1: all of them leading up to this, and all the
• 1:23:16
  Speaker 1: promotion that ABC puts into this, and all the hype,
• 1:23:20
  Speaker 1: and you can't even get twenty million viewers. You're basically
• 1:23:23
  Speaker 1: getting the same as the women's college basketball National Championship
• 1:23:29
  Speaker 1: Game last year with Caitlin Clark. You're getting basically what
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 1: NBC does on a normal Sunday night for Sunday Night
• 1:23:38
  Speaker 1: NFL football, you're doing worse than a disappointing college football
• 1:23:44
  Speaker 1: national championship game that's no longer a communal event. And
• 1:23:51
  Speaker 1: the way this happened is a lot like what happened
• 1:23:54
  Speaker 1: with SNL. There's a political element of it, no doubt
• 1:23:57
  Speaker 1: about it. They went woke and they went broke. Effectively,
• 1:24:02
  Speaker 1: that was a big part of it, but it's I
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 1: think it's way more complicated than that. I think a
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 1: lot like Saturday Night Live. As their audience started to
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 1: diminish and the events started to diminish, their power to
• 1:24:16
  Speaker 1: create stars. And this is a key part if you
• 1:24:19
  Speaker 1: care at all about Hollywood, this is a key part
• 1:24:22
  Speaker 1: of this equation that nobody talks about their ability to
• 1:24:25
  Speaker 1: create stars no longer exists, a star could be born.
• 1:24:31
  Speaker 1: That was part of why the Oscars used to be
• 1:24:35
  Speaker 1: so popular. I'm dig into my analogies. I think that
• 1:24:41
  Speaker 1: they're the Oscars could learn a lot might be too
• 1:24:44
  Speaker 1: late from the way that Augusta National and the Masters
• 1:24:49
  Speaker 1: have done their tournament. Their tournament has always been based
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 1: upon the idea that we're going to create a circumstance
• 1:24:58
  Speaker 1: where something really good or really bad is going to
• 1:25:02
  Speaker 1: happen to somebody famous. That's really been their philosophy, and
• 1:25:07
  Speaker 1: we're going to honor the past in every way we
• 1:25:09
  Speaker 1: possibly can, and things are are going to change at
• 1:25:13
  Speaker 1: a glacial pace because we understand the magic that we
• 1:25:17
  Speaker 1: have captured and we're not going to do anything to
• 1:25:20
  Speaker 1: endanger that magic. Now, I frankly think that the Masters
• 1:25:24
  Speaker 1: actually has overexposed itself and maybe some of the magic
• 1:25:27
  Speaker 1: is starting to leak out, but by and large, that's
• 1:25:31
  Speaker 1: been the formula, and that was a formula that worked
• 1:25:36
  Speaker 1: for the Academy Awards. And just like the Master's Golf Tournament,
• 1:25:41
  Speaker 1: you win that tournament, your life changes forever. You are
• 1:25:44
  Speaker 1: a star forever in the golf world. That used to
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 1: be the way it was with the Academy Awards. You
• 1:25:53
  Speaker 1: won an Academy Award, your life changed one hundred percent
• 1:26:00
  Speaker 1: now to varying degrees depending on how you you took
• 1:26:03
  Speaker 1: advantage of it. But you know that was a star
• 1:26:07
  Speaker 1: making event. I don't think the Academy Awards has really
• 1:26:11
  Speaker 1: the ability to create stars anymore, certainly not superstars, and
• 1:26:15
  Speaker 1: we have seen that in recent years. Tell me the
• 1:26:20
  Speaker 1: last time that somebody became a megastar because they won
• 1:26:24
  Speaker 1: an Academy Award. I'll show you lots of situations where
• 1:26:27
  Speaker 1: someone won an Academy Award it did almost nothing for them.
• 1:26:32
  Speaker 1: It was ironic to me that what followed the Academy
• 1:26:36
  Speaker 1: Awards was an episode of American Idol. American Idol is
• 1:26:40
  Speaker 1: exactly the same situation. American Idol no longer has the
• 1:26:46
  Speaker 1: ratings to be able to make an American idol. You know,
• 1:26:51
  Speaker 1: the Kelly Clarkson and Kelly Underwood days are over. When
• 1:26:55
  Speaker 1: the show doesn't have enough of an audience, it can't
• 1:26:58
  Speaker 1: launch you in you start them, especially in this highly
• 1:27:02
  Speaker 1: fragmented world. And this past Oscars was the most starless
• 1:27:09
  Speaker 1: event that I can recall, other than the COVID Year.
• 1:27:13
  Speaker 1: I'm not even to count the COVID Year, which was
• 1:27:15
  Speaker 1: an absolute joke and an abomination, but there were no
• 1:27:20
  Speaker 1: stars there. It was. It was ridiculous. And part of
• 1:27:26
  Speaker 1: that's because we're running out of stars. A lot of
• 1:27:30
  Speaker 1: them are in retirement or dying an alarming clip. And
• 1:27:35
  Speaker 1: a lot of those that are still working, you know
• 1:27:39
  Speaker 1: that generation, the generation that's in their forties or their
• 1:27:42
  Speaker 1: fifties or sixties. You know, they don't think it's even
• 1:27:45
  Speaker 1: worth it for them to show up for an event
• 1:27:47
  Speaker 1: where there's only going to be at most twenty million
• 1:27:50
  Speaker 1: people watching. Oh my god, darrel'hannah was a presenter. Darrel'hannah
• 1:27:59
  Speaker 1: couldn't get a joke, Bob, you know, an actual movie
• 1:28:03
  Speaker 1: if her life depended on it. And yet somehow she's
• 1:28:07
  Speaker 1: a presenter. Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal. I mean, you know,
• 1:28:12
  Speaker 1: when Harry met Sally is a fine movie, but they
• 1:28:15
  Speaker 1: get reunited, reunited to present the most prestigious award of
• 1:28:20
  Speaker 1: the night, the Best Picture. Are you kidding me? I
• 1:28:24
  Speaker 1: mean there were there were almost no movie stars there.
• 1:28:27
  Speaker 1: The only movie stars I could count were Robert Downey,
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 1: Junior halle Berry, and Emma Stone. I would consider those
• 1:28:36
  Speaker 1: three people to be movie stars, not mega stars, but
• 1:28:39
  Speaker 1: they're movie stars. Those were the only three movie stars
• 1:28:43
  Speaker 1: that actually made it onto the stage. And I guess,
• 1:28:47
  Speaker 1: I guess Adrian Brody because he won a second Oscar.
• 1:28:50
  Speaker 1: Now he's now he's a star. But you know, the
• 1:28:53
  Speaker 1: Adrian Brody thing I thought was hilarious because that was
• 1:28:57
  Speaker 1: one of the two elements of what trans inspired that
• 1:29:01
  Speaker 1: somehow got a remarkable lack of publicity and news coverage.
• 1:29:07
  Speaker 1: And that is that. And I didn't even know this
• 1:29:09
  Speaker 1: until he won. But his girlfriend, Adrian Brody, his girlfriend
• 1:29:16
  Speaker 1: is actually Harvey Weinstein's ex wife. Harvey Weinstein had children
• 1:29:22
  Speaker 1: with this woman. My god, did she parachute off at
• 1:29:25
  Speaker 1: the exact right time. She goes from being married for
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 1: an extended period of time with Harvey Weinstein dumping him
• 1:29:31
  Speaker 1: when the scandal hits, and now she's Adrian Brody's girlfriend,
• 1:29:36
  Speaker 1: and I don't think the vast, vast, vast majority of
• 1:29:39
  Speaker 1: people are even aware of how bizarre that is. But
• 1:29:43
  Speaker 1: that pales in comparison to the other element of this
• 1:29:48
  Speaker 1: old thing that got not nearly enough attention, frankly, even
• 1:29:51
  Speaker 1: in the right wing media, and that is that one
• 1:29:53
  Speaker 1: of the nominees to be Best Actress was a biological male,
• 1:30:02
  Speaker 1: a biological mail from Emilia Perez movie, a transgendered biological
• 1:30:10
  Speaker 1: male was nominated for Best Actress. I would love to
• 1:30:16
  Speaker 1: know how many people were even aware of this, because
• 1:30:19
  Speaker 1: in my view, this didn't get nearly as much attention
• 1:30:23
  Speaker 1: as it could have or it should have, especially given
• 1:30:25
  Speaker 1: the fact that transgenderism is such a huge issue in
• 1:30:28
  Speaker 1: today's age, especially in the right wing media. Now, it
• 1:30:31
  Speaker 1: get reported, but it did not get massive coverage, even
• 1:30:35
  Speaker 1: when that transgendered actor or actress was found to have
• 1:30:42
  Speaker 1: put out a number of very problematic and somewhat pro Nazi,
• 1:30:47
  Speaker 1: pro Hitler tweets which torpedoed any chance they had of
• 1:30:53
  Speaker 1: actually winning an award. But I thought at that point,
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 1: once the old tweets came out, this is going to explode,
• 1:30:59
  Speaker 1: and the left wing media is still so terrified of
• 1:31:03
  Speaker 1: this transgender issue that they largely just said, Okay, let's
• 1:31:07
  Speaker 1: just ignore this, all right, We're just gonna ignore this.
• 1:31:11
  Speaker 1: I mean, not one major Hollywood actress had the gouts
• 1:31:15
  Speaker 1: to stand up and go, what are we doing? What
• 1:31:18
  Speaker 1: are we doing? How are we? You know, we hear
• 1:31:21
  Speaker 1: all the time about how women are outraged about how
• 1:31:24
  Speaker 1: difficult it is to get a break in Hollywood, especially
• 1:31:28
  Speaker 1: after a certain age, And we're gonna give an Academy
• 1:31:32
  Speaker 1: Award nomination for Best Actress to a biological male in
• 1:31:37
  Speaker 1: a movie that, by all accounts I didn't see it,
• 1:31:39
  Speaker 1: but based upon the rotten Tomato scores, sucked hard. I mean,
• 1:31:45
  Speaker 1: this is a terrible movie and it got thirteen nominations,
• 1:31:49
  Speaker 1: and so this is their own damn fault. Do you
• 1:31:51
  Speaker 1: want America to give a shit about this? And you're
• 1:31:55
  Speaker 1: gonna give thirteen nominations to a crappy movie because it's
• 1:32:00
  Speaker 1: you know, it's checking all the PC boxes, including you know,
• 1:32:04
  Speaker 1: being Spanish speaking and having a transgendered star, and the
• 1:32:09
  Speaker 1: movie sucks. I'm sorry. I'm amazed that almost twenty million
• 1:32:13
  Speaker 1: people viewed this whole thing and it was one movie
• 1:32:17
  Speaker 1: and Noora that won all the major awards. I presume
• 1:32:21
  Speaker 1: it's decent. It is the least watched movie, at least
• 1:32:25
  Speaker 1: box office wise, in the history of the Best Picture category.
• 1:32:31
  Speaker 1: And you know, this is another great example of how
• 1:32:33
  Speaker 1: the Oscars has lost its punch and its ability to
• 1:32:37
  Speaker 1: make stars in the past. If you had a movie,
• 1:32:39
  Speaker 1: let's say, Anora is really great, I have no idea
• 1:32:42
  Speaker 1: if it really is or not. I've heard some good
• 1:32:44
  Speaker 1: things about it, but let you know, let's pretend that
• 1:32:46
  Speaker 1: it's great. My friend Cyrus Narrasta, who's a filmmaker, as
• 1:32:51
  Speaker 1: a major movie coming out later this year from a
• 1:32:53
  Speaker 1: major production company, which hopefully we'll talk about later on
• 1:32:58
  Speaker 1: in this year, assuming everything goes as planned. He tried
• 1:33:03
  Speaker 1: to watch Anora and he couldn't even get through most
• 1:33:06
  Speaker 1: of it, so he didn't like it. But sometimes and
• 1:33:10
  Speaker 1: different on what's a good movie. But let's pretend it's
• 1:33:12
  Speaker 1: a good movie. Right in the past, if you had
• 1:33:15
  Speaker 1: a movie that had no box office and won that
• 1:33:17
  Speaker 1: many Academy awards, including Best Picture and the director wins
• 1:33:20
  Speaker 1: virtually everything, you would see a massive surge of people
• 1:33:26
  Speaker 1: interested in watching that movie. It would be re released
• 1:33:30
  Speaker 1: in theaters and it would be there for weeks and weeks,
• 1:33:32
  Speaker 1: and that would have a massive impact down the line.
• 1:33:36
  Speaker 1: I doubt we're gonna see that here. I'm sure there
• 1:33:38
  Speaker 1: will be some renewed interest and we're probably going streaming
• 1:33:41
  Speaker 1: and get you a good do good streaming business, but nothing,
• 1:33:45
  Speaker 1: nothing in comparison to what used to happen. And that's
• 1:33:49
  Speaker 1: all because it's no longer a must see event, it's
• 1:33:53
  Speaker 1: no longer a communal event. It's now in the realm
• 1:33:56
  Speaker 1: of oh okay. Yeah, a decent night of television ratings
• 1:34:00
  Speaker 1: wise for ABC in this very very fragmented era. And
• 1:34:07
  Speaker 1: I think a lot of this as it's this symbiotic
• 1:34:09
  Speaker 1: relationship a lot like I said with SNL, the more
• 1:34:13
  Speaker 1: it diminishes, the more diminishes. It's a downward cycle. Well,
• 1:34:17
  Speaker 1: because Hollywood has a massive star problem, just like SNL
• 1:34:22
  Speaker 1: and just like American Idol, they can't create new stars.
• 1:34:27
  Speaker 1: And now we're seeing where there are no stars left
• 1:34:31
  Speaker 1: to put on stage, at least that are interested enough
• 1:34:34
  Speaker 1: to show up for an event that's not even going
• 1:34:36
  Speaker 1: to get twenty million viewers. So they're in a downward spiral.
• 1:34:42
  Speaker 1: They can't create stars anymore. That literally is the origin
• 1:34:47
  Speaker 1: of the word as we know it, the star system.
• 1:34:51
  Speaker 1: It's out of Hollywood. It relies on stars, and they
• 1:34:56
  Speaker 1: can't create any stars anymore for a whole host of reasons,
• 1:35:01
  Speaker 1: one of which is, much like the American news media,
• 1:35:05
  Speaker 1: they lost the trust of the American viewer. Plus, people
• 1:35:11
  Speaker 1: don't go to movie theaters anymore. And I think there's
• 1:35:13
  Speaker 1: a big difference watching movies on your television screen or
• 1:35:17
  Speaker 1: on your phone than there is in the theater. In
• 1:35:20
  Speaker 1: the theater it's magical. On your phone, it's YouTube, it's
• 1:35:25
  Speaker 1: not the same. It doesn't have the same impact. It's
• 1:35:30
  Speaker 1: you know, I think people have a subconscious reaction to
• 1:35:35
  Speaker 1: the type of medium that they are consuming. Like, for instance,
• 1:35:41
  Speaker 1: you know, this being an audio podcast, it doesn't have
• 1:35:44
  Speaker 1: nearly the same impact that it would if it was
• 1:35:48
  Speaker 1: a video podcast. Well, similarly, you watch a movie in
• 1:35:53
  Speaker 1: a theater with a crowd that has an impact on you,
• 1:35:58
  Speaker 1: but that very rarely happens anymore, And so that magic
• 1:36:03
  Speaker 1: is gone, and I don't know that there's any way
• 1:36:06
  Speaker 1: to recapture it, but I am positive that we are
• 1:36:10
  Speaker 1: going to see a catastrophic loss of what stars actually
• 1:36:16
  Speaker 1: still exist in the Hollywood realm. I'm going to get
• 1:36:21
  Speaker 1: to Gene Hackman in a moment. Gene Hackman was ninety five,
• 1:36:25
  Speaker 1: so that was inevitably going to happen. But I mean,
• 1:36:28
  Speaker 1: think about it, folks. I went through this list, you know,
• 1:36:32
  Speaker 1: as I was thinking about it. In the next probably
• 1:36:36
  Speaker 1: couple of years, the following actors are probably all going
• 1:36:41
  Speaker 1: to be gone. If they're not going to be gone,
• 1:36:43
  Speaker 1: they're going to be out of public life one hundred percent.
• 1:36:46
  Speaker 1: Clint Eastwood, Anthony Hopkins, Dustin Hoffman, Jack Nicholson, who remarkably
• 1:36:53
  Speaker 1: made an appearance at the SNL fiftieth anniversary and I
• 1:36:56
  Speaker 1: think might be his last television appearance, Robert de Niro,
• 1:37:00
  Speaker 1: al Pacino. You might even put Joe Peshy into that category.
• 1:37:06
  Speaker 1: You know, there's some other names that maybe aren't as big,
• 1:37:09
  Speaker 1: but there is an entire generation, especially on the male side,
• 1:37:14
  Speaker 1: that are all gonna be gone and there's nothing to
• 1:37:18
  Speaker 1: replace them. Well, you got Timothy Shallo. May seems like
• 1:37:23
  Speaker 1: a nice actor, good potential. He's somewhat of American, you know,
• 1:37:29
  Speaker 1: he knows seemingly knows a lot about college football. So
• 1:37:32
  Speaker 1: I like Timothy Shallo May but you know he's dating
• 1:37:36
  Speaker 1: at Kardashian. This is this is not the golden age
• 1:37:40
  Speaker 1: of Hollywood, and and there's not much beyond Timothy Shallo
• 1:37:45
  Speaker 1: May when it comes to straight white American actors. And
• 1:37:49
  Speaker 1: by the way, I don't give a ship there white
• 1:37:50
  Speaker 1: or not. I mean Denzel Washington wasn't there even though
• 1:37:54
  Speaker 1: he had a movie yet last year. Uh, I mean
• 1:37:57
  Speaker 1: there's there's all. I would like there to be stars
• 1:38:02
  Speaker 1: because I actually want to see This is maybe what
• 1:38:04
  Speaker 1: makes me different from most conservatives. Even though I hate
• 1:38:08
  Speaker 1: what Hollywood has become. I think Hollywood needs to succeed
• 1:38:12
  Speaker 1: because I think it's an important part of what made
• 1:38:14
  Speaker 1: this country great to begin with. And in a weird way,
• 1:38:18
  Speaker 1: I see what's happening with Hollywood to be somewhat similar
• 1:38:22
  Speaker 1: with what Trump seems to be doing with America's role
• 1:38:25
  Speaker 1: in the world. Visit v Ukraine. I think there's a
• 1:38:28
  Speaker 1: presumption that we're always going to be the top dog. Well,
• 1:38:32
  Speaker 1: that's a presumption in Hollywood that it's very dangerous. Hollywood
• 1:38:36
  Speaker 1: is incredibly vulnerable to being almost irrelevant, almost irrelevant. Almost
• 1:38:43
  Speaker 1: no movies get made here in the Los Angeles area anymore.
• 1:38:47
  Speaker 1: For a whole lot of reasons, including the liberal insanity
• 1:38:50
  Speaker 1: of California itself, but you know, kind of goes back
• 1:38:55
  Speaker 1: to the whole movie industry and the theater thing and
• 1:39:00
  Speaker 1: the technology involved in this. It used to part of
• 1:39:03
  Speaker 1: the reason, the main reason why Hollywood became the hub
• 1:39:07
  Speaker 1: of the movie making business was two basic reasons. Good
• 1:39:11
  Speaker 1: weather and that brought everyone here. And this is where
• 1:39:15
  Speaker 1: the equipment was. It used to be to make a movie,
• 1:39:18
  Speaker 1: you needed massive amounts of equipment that was incredibly expensive.
• 1:39:22
  Speaker 1: So just by inertia, everything was made here. Well, now
• 1:39:28
  Speaker 1: everybody and their mother can provide a tax break around
• 1:39:32
  Speaker 1: the world, usually not in the United States. For somebody
• 1:39:36
  Speaker 1: wants to make a movie a lot cheaper than they
• 1:39:39
  Speaker 1: can make it in southern California, and you know you can.
• 1:39:43
  Speaker 1: You can almost make a movie on your phone now.
• 1:39:46
  Speaker 1: So the monopoly that Hollywood had on this is long gone.
• 1:39:52
  Speaker 1: And it is not written in stone that Hollywood will
• 1:39:56
  Speaker 1: always be the center of the entertainment universe. It's not
• 1:39:59
  Speaker 1: written in stone that New York City is always going
• 1:40:02
  Speaker 1: to be the center of the financial universe, especially if
• 1:40:06
  Speaker 1: the things that Trump does ends up causing Europe to
• 1:40:09
  Speaker 1: no longer use the dollar for instances as their primary currency,
• 1:40:15
  Speaker 1: backing their own currency. That's just one example. Anyway, I'm
• 1:40:19
  Speaker 1: getting far afield here, But the point here is I
• 1:40:22
  Speaker 1: am fascinated by the demise of the OSCARS and I
• 1:40:25
  Speaker 1: don't like it. I wish it wasn't the case. And
• 1:40:28
  Speaker 1: it's not just because you know, our Southern California economy
• 1:40:32
  Speaker 1: largely relies on it. My god, the engine that used
• 1:40:35
  Speaker 1: to be the economic benefits of the OSCARS has completely
• 1:40:41
  Speaker 1: broken down. I already referenced it as far as what
• 1:40:44
  Speaker 1: happens after the OSCARS, but I don't even know how
• 1:40:47
  Speaker 1: this ecosystem maintains itself. I mean, there used to be
• 1:40:51
  Speaker 1: an incredible amount of economic activity related to the lead
• 1:40:56
  Speaker 1: up to the production of and the aftermath of the OSCARS.
• 1:41:01
  Speaker 1: It's like the Super Bowl with regard to the sports media.
• 1:41:05
  Speaker 1: Imagine if the Super Bowl suddenly lost two thirds of
• 1:41:08
  Speaker 1: its audience and there's no longer the reason to care
• 1:41:12
  Speaker 1: about everything. You know, the whole reason why everyone cares,
• 1:41:16
  Speaker 1: or the sports media cares so much about every machination
• 1:41:19
  Speaker 1: of the National Football League is that there's that pot
• 1:41:22
  Speaker 1: at the end of the rainbow. Because people still care
• 1:41:26
  Speaker 1: about Oh, well, this all matters because you might make
• 1:41:30
  Speaker 1: the super Bowl and you might win a super Bowl.
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 1: And the reason why that matters is one hundred and
• 1:41:34
  Speaker 1: twenty five million people are likely to watch, especially if
• 1:41:37
  Speaker 1: Taylor Swift's boyfriend is involved, and so that's a big
• 1:41:41
  Speaker 1: stinking deal. So that's why it all matters. That's why,
• 1:41:44
  Speaker 1: you know, the freaking NFL combine matters. To some people
• 1:41:48
  Speaker 1: who take that away, the whole thing collapses. And that's
• 1:41:51
  Speaker 1: what's happened with the entertainment industry and the death of
• 1:41:55
  Speaker 1: the oscars. Thanks for listening to today's free drop of
• 1:41:59
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• 1:42:02
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• 1:42:30
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