Latest / Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar / 4/30/26: Tim Dillon Rips US On Iran AI Lego Clips, Dave Smith On Trump Humiliation, Ellison Hollywood Merger

Transcript

4/30/26: Tim Dillon Rips US On Iran AI Lego Clips, Dave Smith On Trump Humiliation, Ellison Hollywood Merger · Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Hey, guys, Saga and Crystal here.
• 0:01
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  Speaker 1: dot com.
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: So, as Rory was just saying there, this war has
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: been predictably I guess, super online, but I think many people,
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: myself included, have been surprised by the high degree of
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: cultural competency that the Iranians have been able to display
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: in their propaganda videos, and most notably that shows up
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: in these lego videos that have been produced. I don't
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: know how many of these have been put on at
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: this point, but they are, you know, very well done.
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: They really demonstrate and under standing of both American online
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: culture and political culture et cetera. Uh, let's take a
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: look at a little bit of some of the highlights
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: of these lego videos.
• 1:10
  Speaker 3: Make America great again? Now would you will see what happens? Yeah,
• 1:14
  Speaker 3: watch this secret defense. We're protecting the sort of why
• 1:17
  Speaker 3: you sacrifice so just to pay for your spoil you
• 1:20
  Speaker 3: point you were.
• 1:20
  Speaker 4: In the blow singing on your throne.
• 1:22
  Speaker 3: Now we're turning every base into a bed of stone,
• 1:25
  Speaker 3: slot out a trap you couldn't see.
• 1:27
  Speaker 5: Welcome to the graveyard of you vanity to see Kris Alik.
• 1:33
  Speaker 4: The pressure is rising. Were locked on the target.
• 1:38
  Speaker 6: And now you arello s see ye're we spelling nuts
• 1:43
  Speaker 6: in length.
• 1:43
  Speaker 4: Well watch the drunken e dunk with a drunken ex.
• 1:51
  Speaker 5: Earl crazy eyes, Epstein files, cover rub lies truely redicted
• 1:59
  Speaker 5: rungerstone wall before you drop them.
• 2:01
  Speaker 4: But you crawled Tony kirk Long guying cuffs.
• 2:04
  Speaker 5: We got him oops, total bust room champlan.
• 2:10
  Speaker 3: You absolute trip sid honeypoon.
• 2:13
  Speaker 5: Girlfriend trap EXAs Wilkins.
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: If we don clap back, I mean the detail too
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: ash like like you've got the Epstein files, you got
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: cash his girlfriend, you got the hockey team thing, you
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: got Pete Hegseth being you know an alcoholic like they're
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: they're hitting all the notes here, and I read an
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: analysis of not just these lego videos, but the evolution
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: of Iranian propaganda in particular, and apparently these guys who
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: produce the lego videos, which we're going to show you
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: an interview later with one of them, and dropsyche News
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: you've got like an exclusive with them. But they are
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: not like a wing of the government. They say they're
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: independent and that the government is a customer of theirs.
• 2:54
  Speaker 2: This report that I read also talked about how they
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: have seeded all of these like media labs to sort
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: of independently go out and do their thing, and that
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: there's been a real evolution and modernization of the Iranian
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: propaganda efforts, where it used to be everything was framed
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: in this very like, very heavily wrought.
• 3:13
  Speaker 7: Religious terms, flowery, very flowery.
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: And also the perception was to portray the goal was
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: to portray Iran as a victim, whereas these videos don't
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: portray Iran as a victim.
• 3:24
  Speaker 7: They portray Iran.
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: As a victor, as a hero that is able, you know,
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: this tiny mighty nation, able to take down this giant superpower.
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: And so every single one of these things goes viral.
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: You know, plenty of Norman Americans are watching this content
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: sort of with delight and enjoying the way that they're
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: picking up on our cultural means. And I think it's been,
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: you know, from their perspective, incredibly effective.
• 3:49
  Speaker 7: Of course as manter of fact.
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: And that's why it's like, look, you don't want to
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: like cheer it because ultimately it's about our country. But
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: then also though there are a lot of people who
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: are cheering it because people don't support the war, this
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: is very ineffective. Look, I mean, you know, you've had
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: efforts like this. The North Vietnamese famously would do all
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: kinds you know, the famous hanoid joint Jane all that
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: they would invite a lot of anti war activists there
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: obviously caused a lot of controversy in the US at
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: the time. But this one is very different because you
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: don't even have like this wholesale like support campaign for
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: the war in the way that even Vietnam did as
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: bad as that one. I also think the Iranian point
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: is really important. The Iranian is the way that they
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: used to talk is crazy to be and actually showed
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: a total misunderstanding. I'm sure you know that famous meme
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: of the Iranian president Katami saying Alexis to Tokville, who
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: I ensure most Americans have read where it's like, dude,
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: you clearly don't know anything about us. But I went
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: and I actually read the full transcript of that interview.
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: It was crazily like like it was like targeted at
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: a college professor and their understanding of the US, Like
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: I'll read some of this. Actually, it goes. The book
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: reflects the virtuous and human side of the America's civilization.
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: In this view, the significance of the civilizations that liberty
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: found religion as a cradle for its growth, and religion
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: found protection of liberty as his divine calling. And so
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: he seeks to link the American founding and Alexis to
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: Toueville and early American society to the Iranian Revolution into
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: theirs where by about five seconds, the average person is like,
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: I don't even know what you're talking about. Yeah, Like
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: you're like, you know, I've read, even I have not
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: read Alexis to Toueville's Full Democracy in America. Sorry assume me.
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: I think it's boring, but like that's what they used
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: to be and now it's very Internet based. I think
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: what they were trying to do effectively is they have AI,
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: they have the tools to be able to cre create
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: these videos, but they understand like memification in the same
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: way that Trump is the first meme president, like the
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: McDonald's thing. Who will forget the image like of Trump
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: leaning out and handing out McDonald's.
• 5:54
  Speaker 7: To some guy.
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: Well, they get it too, and they're living in asymmetric
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: conflict where they need to try and to humiliate the
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: current president. They can't do it necessarily through traditional media,
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: so they're bypassing it. Yeah, it is a genuine new age.
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: It's pitch perfect for our like brain rotted internetified yes,
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: slapaganda culture, and so yeah, that's it's going to land
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: much more effectively than the lengthy intellectual discourse that is
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: being offered by some of Iranian leadership. And I also
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: think you know, to your point about how different the
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: landscape is, it's impossible to imagine, even if the technology exists,
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: it's impossible to imagine similarly pitched videos during the Iraq
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: War landing the same way with the American public. But
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: because there is such dissatisfaction with Trump, with this cast
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: of you know, buffoonish characters around him, and then most
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: importantly with the war. It creates a fertile ground for
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: Americans not to just take in this content but to
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: actively like have it resonate with them, which is which
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: is a crazy thing, right, It's a crazy thing to see.
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: And I also think, you know, it undercuts all of
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: the a lot of the Western media propaganda efforts to
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: paint aron like this, you know, theocratic extreme monolith lyft,
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: because if you're connecting with us on like the level
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: of our cultural memes and debates, et cetera, then it
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: shrinks that distance between you know, the perception of who
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: Iranians are and what the Iranian state is and the
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: reality that you have to grapple with of like, oh,
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: they understand as well enough to put these videos together,
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: which are well produced and very clever, and like I
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: said before, like really tap into all of these cultural flashpoints.
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: Tim Dillon had a funny bit on this in one
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: of his recent episodes where he's talking about, like, what
• 7:49
  Speaker 2: the hell, how are the Iranians even beating us in shit?
• 7:52
  Speaker 7: Talking? This should be above all else where we are.
• 7:55
  Speaker 7: Number one, Let's go ahead and listen to.
• 7:56
  Speaker 6: That we're not even winning the shit talking war. We're
• 8:02
  Speaker 6: not even winning that the shit talk. You think America
• 8:08
  Speaker 6: would win that at least, if we're gonna win one thing,
• 8:13
  Speaker 6: we're getting bodied by Iranian AI in the war of
• 8:19
  Speaker 6: shit talk. Truly, how embarrassing. We're the country that invented
• 8:26
  Speaker 6: shit talk and we're getting lit up.
• 8:30
  Speaker 7: It makes a great point.
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: I mean it's not even close, honestly, the yeah. I mean,
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: just think about Pete Hegseth getting up there and talking
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: about like wrapping himself in the Bible to justify all
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: these bombing campaigns.
• 8:41
  Speaker 7: I mean, that's our version of propaga.
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: And remember during the war, what would they do. They
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: would release all these call of duty modern warfare memes
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: from the White House Twitter account, So they were trying
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: to do the same thing. And I mean, I think
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: that actually is more of a more proof of how
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: this is the modern media landscape. Ate it here personally,
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: you know, like slopaganda literally from both but this effort
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: to make you laugh or to make you cheer on.
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: I mean during the war, I remember remember a lot
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: of the criticism of the White House. They were like, guys,
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: we're in a war, Like it's not a joke. It's
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: not a video game, literally, and that's what you're trying
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: to do. They would do all of these spliced up
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: propaganda videos of people getting incinerated or getting killed, and
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: the whole point was like, there's a real seriousness this.
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: But by unleashing this force, I think what they also
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: did was allow the very nation that you're fighting to
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: try to play that same game with irony and with
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: irony with humor, and that really undercuts like this big
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: bra like big strong image that we had here and
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: the Internet specifically and the virality element, like these were
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: designed to go viral and they did, and like, unless
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: you're gonna ban it outright, this is what the future
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: looks like. And it is a real change for Iran itself.
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: Like really that detou Fo the time of Destoauxville and
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: Fucu and like all of their I don't know what's
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: up with their society, but they their leaders just seem
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: to like be extremely well educated but flourish people, like
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: totally disconnected from the way you would talk to a
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: normal democracy. And now though these people who are running
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: these accounts, it kind of makes sense because what we
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: learn from these drop sign interviews. They're not government officials.
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: They're really young, they're like twenty five years old. And
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: more importantly, they were critics of the regime previously, but
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: not in the raise off holl Ofy way, but they're
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: nationalists at the end of the day, and they're like,
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: look now, our civilization is under attack. Literally, the president
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: said that we're going to do what we can to
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: try and undermine the war effort.
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so let's take a listen to a little bit
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: of this interview that Ryan and Drop Site News was
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: able to get with one of the lego video one
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: of the individuals behind these lego videos, just talking about
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: their approach. And I mean, another thing that I think
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: is interesting here, as you were talking about the u
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: US government videos that are being put out, those are
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: also meant like the audience is also intended to be
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: American consumers.
• 11:07
  Speaker 7: These lego videos.
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: The audience it's intended to be the world, but I
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: think mostly targeted at American consumers. And it also displays
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: the fact that the Iranians understand us so much better
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: than we understand them, which has shown up in the
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: war strategy and the failed war strategy at this point
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: as well. But In any case, let's go and run
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: D two a little bit of this interview with Dropsite
• 11:30
  Speaker 2: and one of the Lego creators.
• 11:31
  Speaker 8: What kind of messages are you getting from Americans? And
• 11:35
  Speaker 8: did it surprise you to get this much support from
• 11:38
  Speaker 8: the American people?
• 11:40
  Speaker 9: You know, the American people, and we don't expect that,
• 11:42
  Speaker 9: but they, you know, become us and much more than expectations.
• 11:48
  Speaker 9: Many people they're very ashamed of about their government and
• 11:52
  Speaker 9: their military service done to us, and they say sorry,
• 11:57
  Speaker 9: I can very well remember that. One of our fans
• 12:01
  Speaker 9: told us in America, told us that I am on
• 12:04
  Speaker 9: fire of what our government doing to you, and I'm
• 12:08
  Speaker 9: so sorry. And some of other people deliver us in
• 12:11
  Speaker 9: some points that can help us for our next videos
• 12:14
  Speaker 9: to improve them. How did you decide to use Lego
• 12:17
  Speaker 9: as a medium, You know, because Lego is charming, simple
• 12:21
  Speaker 9: and instantly understood. It doesn't need to exaggerate reality in Lego,
• 12:27
  Speaker 9: yet it gives you the freedom to add the tiniest,
• 12:30
  Speaker 9: most delightful details that you can enjoy it. And it's
• 12:33
  Speaker 9: a universal language. Almost everyone everywhere has a memory tied
• 12:37
  Speaker 9: to it.
• 12:38
  Speaker 8: How long is the process of making one of these videos?
• 12:41
  Speaker 8: And what is the process, How do you start? What
• 12:44
  Speaker 8: are the steps that you go through?
• 12:46
  Speaker 9: You know, it's different for different videos. We allocate different times.
• 12:50
  Speaker 9: For videos that including poetry, it takes it longer and
• 12:55
  Speaker 9: for others it's less. And usually it takes twenty hours
• 13:01
  Speaker 9: to make a video and sometimes it takes two days.
• 13:05
  Speaker 10: Could you talk a little bit about how many people
• 13:07
  Speaker 10: work on one video?
• 13:08
  Speaker 11: And then how many people are in your team?
• 13:11
  Speaker 9: You're less than ten numbers ten people and average rage age.
• 13:17
  Speaker 7: Is about twenty one of us to.
• 13:20
  Speaker 9: Gather different ideas from everywhere during the day, and the
• 13:24
  Speaker 9: time is when the time is coming, we pick up
• 13:27
  Speaker 9: fund we think is much more problem and after that
• 13:31
  Speaker 9: directing and writing, directingja begins and editing begins.
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: Incredible to hear the process there. You've got fewer than
• 13:41
  Speaker 2: ten people overage age twenty five. They can spin out
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: one of these videos, which are you know, really impressive,
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: in twenty four to forty eight hours, and that speed
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: is part of what has made them so resonant, because
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: something will happen of significance, either in American politics or
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: with regards to war. And by the next morning when
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: I'm waking up, people are already sharing a new LEGO video
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: that deals with the subject matter. I just saw our
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: team sent as Treeta was tweeting about the latest Lego
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: video and he says it marks a significant pivot instead
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: of tawning the US military reflects a new chapter where
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: Tehran will seek peace by reaching out directly to the
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: American people bypassing the US government mirror image of the
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: US strategy of the past decades. Some of the lines
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: are quite noteworthy and will likely resonate with the anti
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: establishment sentiments prevailing among American youth. In particular, quote, I
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: love the Constitution the way it was meant, but not
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: the way your leaders bypass consent. And that is one
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: thing that's like really different in this era. They don't
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: have to go through you know, they don't have to
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: go and sit down for an interview and hope it
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: gets the American people. They can go directly to the
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: world and to the American people, and that creates a
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: very different dynamic.
• 14:49
  Speaker 4: Totally.
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: It's a new age. It's the slop age. We're all
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: living in it. I guess it's just about who does
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: it better. It is what it is, all right, Let's
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: get to Dave Smithy staying by.
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: Join us now to talk about the war and some
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: of the political aspects of it is Dave Smithy, of
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: course's comedian, commentator, notable libertarian, and.
• 15:08
  Speaker 7: Host of Part of the Problem pod. Great to see
• 15:11
  Speaker 7: Dave Kushi Man.
• 15:12
  Speaker 4: Oh, good to see both of you guys. Thanks for
• 15:13
  Speaker 4: having me.
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah, of course, So just give us your sense of
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: where things are right now, where things are going, and
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: what you see as the least bad outcome at this point. O.
• 15:23
  Speaker 10: Man, it's such a weird position to be in. Yeah,
• 15:26
  Speaker 10: I know, you guys have been in the anti war
• 15:29
  Speaker 10: world for a while and I have to, and it's
• 15:32
  Speaker 10: just for all of us. It's like, this is the
• 15:35
  Speaker 10: war that we've been warning against. I've been against this
• 15:37
  Speaker 10: war for twenty years, you know, and because they've been
• 15:41
  Speaker 10: trying to push it the whole time, because Benjamin Netanya,
• 15:43
  Speaker 10: who's been saying they're weeks away from making a newke
• 15:45
  Speaker 10: And it's this weird, dark feeling to be vindicated in
• 15:50
  Speaker 10: the worst possible way. You're like, just so many years
• 15:53
  Speaker 10: of being like this will be a disaster. We do
• 15:55
  Speaker 10: not have escalation dominance. They can close the strait of
• 15:58
  Speaker 10: her and then it goes down and you're like, yeah,
• 16:00
  Speaker 10: exactly exactly what we all thought, and party like part
• 16:05
  Speaker 10: of me at the very beginning of the other thing
• 16:06
  Speaker 10: where they're like they're really convinced that they can take
• 16:10
  Speaker 10: out this regime through the air, and I'm kind of like,
• 16:12
  Speaker 10: I don't know, I mean, maybe seems unlikely, but we
• 16:15
  Speaker 10: do have a very impressive air for like maybe they
• 16:18
  Speaker 10: could hit the guy. And then it goes, oh, no,
• 16:20
  Speaker 10: it's exactly what we thought. That's right. So I mean, look, yeah,
• 16:24
  Speaker 10: I know you guys have been covering this. I've been
• 16:26
  Speaker 10: watching your show every day for a very long time,
• 16:29
  Speaker 10: and there's so I guess if I would just put
• 16:31
  Speaker 10: this together at this point, this is the terrible situation
• 16:34
  Speaker 10: that we're in now. Is that the best case scenario
• 16:37
  Speaker 10: is that Donald Trump just walks away from this, But
• 16:40
  Speaker 10: it is just so politically impossible, and particularly with the
• 16:43
  Speaker 10: personality of Donald Trump. You know when Donald Trump gave
• 16:46
  Speaker 10: that uh was it a couple of weeks ago, he
• 16:49
  Speaker 10: had that he gave a speech right after the markets closed,
• 16:52
  Speaker 10: like eight or nine pm, and he signaled, if you
• 16:55
  Speaker 10: remember that we don't really care about the Strait of Hermos.
• 16:59
  Speaker 10: He said, ah, that's not really are problem. Everyone else
• 17:01
  Speaker 10: gets their oil from the straight of from where we
• 17:03
  Speaker 10: make all our own oil. And then he said it'll
• 17:05
  Speaker 10: just naturally open up, and he called on other countries
• 17:08
  Speaker 10: to open up. But there was something very positive about
• 17:10
  Speaker 10: that signal, because at least he was signaling we're gonna
• 17:13
  Speaker 10: call it a win regardless. But then, of course you
• 17:15
  Speaker 10: saw what Marco Rubio said just on Monday about how
• 17:19
  Speaker 10: well we can't accept the reality of Iran, you know,
• 17:23
  Speaker 10: determining who can and who can't cross and what currency
• 17:26
  Speaker 10: they can use. And I was saying on my show,
• 17:28
  Speaker 10: I know you guys were saying back then that even
• 17:30
  Speaker 10: when Donald Trump was trying to make it out like
• 17:33
  Speaker 10: he well, the problem here is that if you were
• 17:35
  Speaker 10: to leave right now and leave Iran controlling the strait
• 17:39
  Speaker 10: up Hermos, then this is the greatest military defeat in
• 17:42
  Speaker 10: the history of the United States of America. There's zero comparison,
• 17:45
  Speaker 10: just zero comparison. And no, we didn't lose, you know,
• 17:48
  Speaker 10: we didn't lose as many people or spend as much
• 17:50
  Speaker 10: money as we did in Vietnam. And we've had losses
• 17:53
  Speaker 10: in Vietnam and Afghanistan. In Iraq, however, you determine a loss.
• 17:58
  Speaker 10: You know, you lose hundreds of thousands of people, kill
• 18:01
  Speaker 10: millions of people, spend trillions of dollars, and the communists
• 18:03
  Speaker 10: still rule Vietnam. Well, then I guess that's a loss.
• 18:06
  Speaker 10: But we've never transformed our opponent into a global power
• 18:12
  Speaker 10: to take around this relegated, sanctioned, crippled third world country
• 18:17
  Speaker 10: and then transformed them into a global power.
• 18:20
  Speaker 4: And you know, I.
• 18:22
  Speaker 10: Talked about this a bit when I was on Tucker
• 18:23
  Speaker 10: Carlson Last and then meet Me and Sager. We were
• 18:28
  Speaker 10: talking about this a bit after where we were at
• 18:30
  Speaker 10: my place getting really high and me and Sager were
• 18:32
  Speaker 10: talking about we're so baked.
• 18:35
  Speaker 4: And then I'm just kidding, But.
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: What did Bill Clinton said? He said, I inhaled, I didn't.
• 18:42
  Speaker 4: He didn't know, he didn't.
• 18:46
  Speaker 10: But so like and me, I'm just so interested in
• 18:49
  Speaker 10: talking about this because it's like, look, if you're trying
• 18:51
  Speaker 10: to be a political actor here, then you should say
• 18:53
  Speaker 10: what Joe Kent is saying. And he and of course
• 18:56
  Speaker 10: he's a different guy than me. He's a Kendall military
• 19:00
  Speaker 10: and so he'll say Donald Trump is the only one
• 19:02
  Speaker 10: strong enough to walk away from this now and still survive.
• 19:05
  Speaker 10: But I'm no good at being a political actor. I
• 19:07
  Speaker 10: tried to influence the Trump campaign, and we all see
• 19:10
  Speaker 10: how well that worked out. So I'm only good at
• 19:13
  Speaker 10: telling the truth on podcasts. And the truth is that
• 19:16
  Speaker 10: that's not right. That's not right that Donald Trump can't
• 19:19
  Speaker 10: save his presidency by leaving it would It's still the
• 19:21
  Speaker 10: best thing that could happen, but Donald Trump would have
• 19:24
  Speaker 10: to accept humiliation and defeat. Just think about where we're at.
• 19:28
  Speaker 10: To avoid catastrophe, Donald Trump has to sacrifice his ego.
• 19:34
  Speaker 10: Like if that's not out of a Greek tragedy, I
• 19:37
  Speaker 10: don't know what is. But of course, as I think,
• 19:39
  Speaker 10: Professor Pape has done a very good job of breaking
• 19:42
  Speaker 10: down and I never I never have as much confidence
• 19:44
  Speaker 10: in any predictions I make as he seems.
• 19:46
  Speaker 4: To have in his.
• 19:47
  Speaker 10: But I do think that he is right that essentially
• 19:51
  Speaker 10: it's almost like the obvious answer here would be to
• 19:54
  Speaker 10: just walk away let other countries figure out the straight
• 19:56
  Speaker 10: All of the economic incentives are for them to work
• 19:59
  Speaker 10: out a de right like Iran wants to have some control,
• 20:02
  Speaker 10: but they don't want the things shut down. But the
• 20:04
  Speaker 10: problem is that that hands them a win, that hands
• 20:06
  Speaker 10: some veto power over the region going forward, and it's
• 20:10
  Speaker 10: just an utter humiliation. But at least we could end
• 20:12
  Speaker 10: this without a catastrophe if we were to do that.
• 20:15
  Speaker 10: But that still means Donald Trump sinking down to probably
• 20:18
  Speaker 10: in the twenties in the polls. I mean, if if
• 20:20
  Speaker 10: this whole thing is over and he has nothing to
• 20:22
  Speaker 10: show for it, like he didn't get the enriched geranium,
• 20:24
  Speaker 10: they still support Hesbela. The regime still stands, and we
• 20:27
  Speaker 10: have this issue with the strait that we didn't have
• 20:29
  Speaker 10: before the war. There just is no spinning that into
• 20:32
  Speaker 10: a win. However, the alternative is the escalation trap, which
• 20:38
  Speaker 10: is just really bad. And he knows he can't. He
• 20:41
  Speaker 10: knows he can't follow through on Bridge and Tunnel day
• 20:43
  Speaker 10: because he knows the Iranians could take out a salination
• 20:46
  Speaker 10: plant or two. Just we don't have options. And then
• 20:49
  Speaker 10: just the last thing I'll say is, you guys have
• 20:51
  Speaker 10: been covering very well. We really don't know how much
• 20:55
  Speaker 10: damage we've already incrude, you know.
• 20:58
  Speaker 4: Like we don't know. I mean, these things.
• 21:01
  Speaker 10: The markets are not very good at predicting these things,
• 21:03
  Speaker 10: you know, the markets, And I think you guys made
• 21:05
  Speaker 10: this point on the show. But when they were pumping
• 21:07
  Speaker 10: trillions of dollars into the economy in twenty twenty while
• 21:10
  Speaker 10: the country was locked down, just huge infusions of cash
• 21:15
  Speaker 10: the market. The market was at all time highs. Yes,
• 21:18
  Speaker 10: so the bailout worked. The market was crashing. They pumped
• 21:20
  Speaker 10: brillions of dollars into it, and it went into all
• 21:22
  Speaker 10: time highs. The market wasn't foreseeing crippling inflation, but that
• 21:26
  Speaker 10: did come the next year, you know. And so the
• 21:30
  Speaker 10: fact that I don't know this is beyond my pay grade,
• 21:32
  Speaker 10: but twenty percent of the world's oil goes through the
• 21:35
  Speaker 10: strait of Hermose. I'm reading all the reports the same
• 21:37
  Speaker 10: you guys are. Since the US blockade, less total ships
• 21:40
  Speaker 10: have been getting through than at any other point in
• 21:42
  Speaker 10: the war. It's even worse than just the Iranian blockade.
• 21:45
  Speaker 10: I don't know what we find out in four or five,
• 21:48
  Speaker 10: six months from now there how much longer can we go?
• 21:51
  Speaker 10: These are big questions, and there were really risking calamity already.
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: Right, I was saying, you know, I talked earlier in
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: the show, there's a new three hundred and fifty dollars
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: jet fuel charge for any flight from Japan, And I
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: was like, well, that's the least of our problems because
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: in a few months or just being no flight, it
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: was like the flight's just not going to happen, which
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: is I mean, a disaster, Dave. To your point, we
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: want to turn a little bit of domestic politics, which
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: he talked about. There's some new polling here showing Trump
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: actually lower than Jimmy Carter on the issue of inflation
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: in nineteen eighty.
• 22:18
  Speaker 7: Let's take a listen. We'll get your reaction.
• 22:20
  Speaker 12: The number one financial issue. It's the number one issue
• 22:22
  Speaker 12: folks saying it's facing their families right now. And Donald
• 22:25
  Speaker 12: John Trump is in the worst position he has ever
• 22:28
  Speaker 12: been on inflation and more than these are the worst
• 22:31
  Speaker 12: numbers I've ever seen for any president. I mean, just
• 22:34
  Speaker 12: look at this. Look at this according to IPSOS, look
• 22:36
  Speaker 12: at this net approved rating on inflation. We got the
• 22:38
  Speaker 12: latest poll up. He's forty nine points underwater. That means
• 22:42
  Speaker 12: that forty nine percent more of the public disapproved than
• 22:44
  Speaker 12: the proof of the job he's doing. I went back.
• 22:46
  Speaker 12: You remember Joe Biden, Inflation absolutely crushed his presidency, but
• 22:51
  Speaker 12: at his worst, according to IPSOS, he was just forty
• 22:54
  Speaker 12: three points underwater. So Trump is lower now on inflation
• 22:57
  Speaker 12: than Joe Biden ever was, according to IPSOS. And I
• 23:00
  Speaker 12: will note that the inflation right right right now is
• 23:03
  Speaker 12: only about a third as it was back in June
• 23:05
  Speaker 12: of twenty twenty two. Yet Trump's numbers are significantly worse
• 23:09
  Speaker 12: than Biden's ever. Were you think about inflation singing presidencies,
• 23:13
  Speaker 12: you think of Jimmy Carter. But just look here, Okay,
• 23:16
  Speaker 12: if we look right now, we're talking about net approvals
• 23:19
  Speaker 12: on inflation, this number should actually be forty six percent,
• 23:23
  Speaker 12: forty minus forty six And if you look at this, though,
• 23:26
  Speaker 12: even if I raise it a little bit, I correct
• 23:28
  Speaker 12: my era right here live on air, we're talking about
• 23:30
  Speaker 12: minus forty six points versus minus forty nine points. Donald
• 23:35
  Speaker 12: Trump is in worst position on inflation that Jimmy Carter
• 23:38
  Speaker 12: was when, of course, Carter then got blown out by
• 23:40
  Speaker 12: Ronald Reagan back in nineteen hundred and eighty on cost
• 23:43
  Speaker 12: a living. Country is on the wrong track or right truck.
• 23:46
  Speaker 4: Look at this.
• 23:46
  Speaker 12: Among independents, seventy five percent, seventy five percent say the
• 23:51
  Speaker 12: wrong truck, just nine percent say the right truck. Look
• 23:53
  Speaker 12: among Republicans, the plurality of Republicans say that the country
• 23:57
  Speaker 12: is on the wrong track when it comes to the
• 23:59
  Speaker 12: cost of versus just thirty nine percent, forty five versus
• 24:02
  Speaker 12: thirty nine. Donald Trump has lost every single part of
• 24:05
  Speaker 12: this electorate. And when you take his name out of
• 24:07
  Speaker 12: the equestion, you see even the plurality of Republicans say
• 24:10
  Speaker 12: that the country is on the wrong track when it
• 24:12
  Speaker 12: comes to beef prices. We're heading in the summer. Just
• 24:14
  Speaker 12: take a look here, chance that April twenty twenty six
• 24:17
  Speaker 12: versus twenty twenty five, the beef prices are fifteen percent higher,
• 24:20
  Speaker 12: a corna kaushi prediction market seventy five percent. People are
• 24:23
  Speaker 12: feeling the pain across different issues, including beef prices, as
• 24:27
  Speaker 12: well as at the guess tank.
• 24:29
  Speaker 7: Quite something, isn't it, Dave?
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: For the president who is literally elected to try and
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: to get inflation under control, to end up back here.
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: And you know I was talking about this early in
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: the show. I'm curious your reaction. I will not forgive
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: Biden you and I ruthlessly criticize the man over inflation
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: and over his management of the Russia in Ukraine. At
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: the end of the day, he did not invade Ukraine
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: this time. Trump actually is the sole reason why this
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: entire thing is happening. The actual choice element of it is,
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: I think why it's starting to reflect in the polls
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: over inflation and over betrayal by so many of the voters.
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: I'm curious for what you think.
• 25:05
  Speaker 10: Yeah, well that's I mean, I think that's almost the
• 25:07
  Speaker 10: only explanation that could explain. Like I was surprised by
• 25:11
  Speaker 10: that poll because I thought his numbers would be bad,
• 25:13
  Speaker 10: but worse than Biden when the immediate price inflation was
• 25:16
  Speaker 10: so much worse.
• 25:17
  Speaker 4: And same with Jimmy Carter. And I think you hit
• 25:19
  Speaker 4: on it right.
• 25:19
  Speaker 10: I mean, the idea is that the whole your whole point,
• 25:23
  Speaker 10: the whole thing you ran on was to not get
• 25:27
  Speaker 10: to not focus on stupid foreign wars and instead to
• 25:30
  Speaker 10: focus on bringing prices down. And of course, as you
• 25:33
  Speaker 10: guys know, I mean, you know, inflation is cumulative, so
• 25:36
  Speaker 10: they brag about how it's down. But I think it
• 25:38
  Speaker 10: was Michael Malice who first had the joke.
• 25:40
  Speaker 4: But it's just so perfect.
• 25:41
  Speaker 10: But it's like if you gained one hundred pounds in
• 25:43
  Speaker 10: a year and then the next year you gain fifty
• 25:45
  Speaker 10: pounds and you go, I've lost weight, and you're like,
• 25:47
  Speaker 10: you know, you have not and for everybody who actually
• 25:51
  Speaker 10: you know, for regular people, which is the biggest story
• 25:54
  Speaker 10: in America right now, is that regular people can't get by,
• 25:58
  Speaker 10: like you know, the guy the at the average guy,
• 26:01
  Speaker 10: even like someone who has like a good job, like
• 26:03
  Speaker 10: a plumber or something like that, can't buy a house,
• 26:06
  Speaker 10: you know, and they're paying their grocery bills are more
• 26:09
  Speaker 10: expensive than they were under Joe Biden. But I will say,
• 26:12
  Speaker 10: because I just since you played that clip, I really
• 26:14
  Speaker 10: want to take a shot. I don't know that guy's name,
• 26:16
  Speaker 10: but to me, he's a knockoff Steve Karanaki. He doesn't
• 26:21
  Speaker 10: have the mastery of the you know, say what you
• 26:22
  Speaker 10: will about MSNBC that Steve Karnaki is the best numbers
• 26:25
  Speaker 10: guy out there.
• 26:26
  Speaker 13: Man.
• 26:26
  Speaker 10: I mean he is just he's memorized every anyway.
• 26:29
  Speaker 4: It's incredible, you know.
• 26:31
  Speaker 7: I used to just on the Karnaki boy.
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: I used to co host show with him on MSNBC
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: when I first started there, and I remember, his brain
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: is just different. He can if you give him a date,
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: you can say like January twenty first, nineteen ninety one,
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: and he will tell you what the headlines in the
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: newspaper work.
• 26:48
  Speaker 7: He can tell you what he had for breakfast. He
• 26:49
  Speaker 7: can remember his day.
• 26:51
  Speaker 4: It's on election day.
• 26:52
  Speaker 7: On another level.
• 26:54
  Speaker 10: I still turn into MSNBC on election days just because
• 26:57
  Speaker 10: Steve Kornaki knows every county in country. But like, anyway,
• 27:01
  Speaker 10: this guy should be launched the to the front lines.
• 27:05
  Speaker 10: He should literally have for them running that maga one
• 27:08
  Speaker 10: hundred percent approval poll nonsense.
• 27:11
  Speaker 4: At the beginning of this.
• 27:11
  Speaker 10: Thing, that actually really seemed, of course, because Donald Trump
• 27:15
  Speaker 10: is Donald Trump. He's brought it up like fifteen different times,
• 27:18
  Speaker 10: Like it really seems like that actually pushed him together.
• 27:21
  Speaker 10: And it's on the level, you know, like as you
• 27:23
  Speaker 10: guys know, the way you could manipulate poles. Like so,
• 27:25
  Speaker 10: when Barack Obama first became president, he was very very popular,
• 27:29
  Speaker 10: had approval ratings in like the seventy percent. He had
• 27:31
  Speaker 10: no track record, he was charismatic, great public speaker. We
• 27:34
  Speaker 10: all hated Bush. We were hoping he would be better.
• 27:37
  Speaker 10: By by the end of his presidency, his approval it
• 27:40
  Speaker 10: was way down from there, not like Trumps or but
• 27:42
  Speaker 10: it was way down. And imagine someone I just run
• 27:45
  Speaker 10: but amongst hope and change Democrats, he's still at one
• 27:49
  Speaker 10: hundred percent. Well, yeah, if you put his slogan in
• 27:52
  Speaker 10: front of it, but like what so they they really
• 27:55
  Speaker 10: in an effort, and you guys have been doing a
• 27:57
  Speaker 10: good job covering this, but there's this like fox opposition
• 28:01
  Speaker 10: by the democratic and media establishment that's like, oh, we're
• 28:04
  Speaker 10: against this thing, but we're also going to kind of
• 28:06
  Speaker 10: like give you all you need this war. If the
• 28:08
  Speaker 10: polls tell us anything, I don't really trust poles. You know,
• 28:11
  Speaker 10: remember during the campaign when it came out that the
• 28:14
  Speaker 10: internal White House polls showed that Joe Biden was going
• 28:17
  Speaker 10: to lose like by this huge landslide. But it's like, wait,
• 28:20
  Speaker 10: so you get real polls, but we get nonsense poll
• 28:23
  Speaker 10: I don't understand it. It's above my pay grade. That
• 28:26
  Speaker 10: being said, if the polls tell us anything, it's that
• 28:29
  Speaker 10: this is the most unpopular war in American history. Donald
• 28:31
  Speaker 10: Trump's approval ratings are about where George W. Bush's was
• 28:35
  Speaker 10: were after two disastrous wars and he destroyed the economy.
• 28:39
  Speaker 10: And if this thing keeps going bad, Donald Trump's going
• 28:42
  Speaker 10: to be in the twenty percent. Like this is gonna
• 28:44
  Speaker 10: and you're going to see, Look, as long as he's
• 28:47
  Speaker 10: trying to overthrow the Iranian regime or as long as
• 28:49
  Speaker 10: there's a chance that he might topple the regime and
• 28:51
  Speaker 10: the war is still going, the Israel lobby will be
• 28:54
  Speaker 10: behind him no matter what. If he stopped short of
• 28:57
  Speaker 10: regime collapse, they will turn on him. But what you're
• 29:00
  Speaker 10: going to see in the next few months is the
• 29:04
  Speaker 10: not Israel lobby just kind of pro Trump pundits, the
• 29:08
  Speaker 10: Stephen Crowders and Benny Johnson's those guys, they're going to
• 29:12
  Speaker 10: all start turning on Trump too, because as soon as
• 29:14
  Speaker 10: they realize that there's just no popularity anymore in defending this,
• 29:18
  Speaker 10: it's all going to go downhill. So but these numbers,
• 29:21
  Speaker 10: I mean, when you really dig into where he is
• 29:23
  Speaker 10: with independence and as you guys said, on this inflation,
• 29:27
  Speaker 10: which is the biggest issue. I mean, look, people give
• 29:30
  Speaker 10: him credit for securing the border, and I do too.
• 29:33
  Speaker 10: I Mean, I think that was a real crisis that
• 29:35
  Speaker 10: is over now. But the number one issue, this is
• 29:37
  Speaker 10: why Democrats are winning on unaffordability.
• 29:40
  Speaker 4: It's all anyway.
• 29:40
  Speaker 10: There's one statistic that defines America more than anything else
• 29:44
  Speaker 10: right now, which is that the average first time home
• 29:46
  Speaker 10: buyer is forty years old. It doesn't matter if you're
• 29:49
  Speaker 10: left or right or progressive or conservative. You can't run
• 29:53
  Speaker 10: a functioning.
• 29:54
  Speaker 4: Society that way.
• 29:55
  Speaker 10: If twenty five year olds, twenty eight year olds, twenty
• 29:58
  Speaker 10: nine year olds have to get a check from their
• 30:01
  Speaker 10: mom every month, or have to live at home or
• 30:03
  Speaker 10: have to then they're not grown ups. They can't go
• 30:06
  Speaker 10: start families. They can't go like there's as we all know, right,
• 30:10
  Speaker 10: because we used to be kids and now we're grown ups.
• 30:12
  Speaker 10: There's the thing about like it doesn't matter. I'm not
• 30:14
  Speaker 10: saying you have to be in a mansion. You got
• 30:17
  Speaker 10: to be supporting yourself in order to like feel good
• 30:20
  Speaker 10: about yourself, in order to feel like an adult who's contributing,
• 30:23
  Speaker 10: to be in the ownership class where you actually care
• 30:26
  Speaker 10: about society. You know, the difference between when you rent
• 30:28
  Speaker 10: a place and when you own a place, And all
• 30:30
  Speaker 10: of a sudden, when you own a place, you're like,
• 30:32
  Speaker 10: all right, let's let's not freeze any pipes. Let's make
• 30:35
  Speaker 10: sure this doesn't credit.
• 30:36
  Speaker 7: Also punk as kid on my lawn.
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: It enrages me. Now that you own a lawn, you're like,
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: get the fuck off my lawn, like you.
• 30:45
  Speaker 4: Have someone drives a little too fast.
• 30:47
  Speaker 10: Yeah, okay, someone drives a little too fast zone.
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: My god, I'm hot.
• 30:53
  Speaker 2: You guys would fit in well in my hoa. To
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: your point, Dave, let me put some of There's this
• 31:02
  Speaker 2: focus group done by the New York Times of Trump
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: voters who were disappointed in Trump, and it's very interesting
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: some of the things that they say. First of all,
• 31:10
  Speaker 2: the median voter brain is something I will never be
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: able to fully comprehend. But in any case, put E
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: four up on the screen. We grabbed a couple of
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: the of the comments from this group, and first of all,
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: you got in one or two words finished the sentence.
• 31:23
  Speaker 2: I'm feeling blank about the country these days. Disappointed and sad,
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: disappointed and hopeful, Okay, concerned, worried, anxious, frustrated, annoyed, discouraged,
• 31:32
  Speaker 2: surprised and discouraged, concerned, apathetic, betrayed, And that betrayal really
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: ran through a lot.
• 31:38
  Speaker 7: Of the response to Sho's butt.
• 31:40
  Speaker 2: The next one up on the screen, what grade would
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: you give Donald Trump second term? One dude gave him
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: a C. Everybody else gave him d was the most
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: dominant answer, and then three people gave him an F.
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: Let's go to the next one here, I think we
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: have one more slide. What word comes to mind when
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: you think about vote for Trump in twenty twenty four?
• 32:02
  Speaker 7: Regret?
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: Is there anything you wish you could tell your twenty
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: twenty four self as you were about to vote in
• 32:07
  Speaker 2: twenty twenty four? Think carefully when people show you who
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: they are, believe them. Don't trust any of them arganists.
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: Who's the one who said don't trust and he said
• 32:15
  Speaker 2: it exactly, I would repeat it, don't trust none of them.
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: If someone's making big claims, they're probably overcompensating for something else.
• 32:22
  Speaker 7: I like that.
• 32:22
  Speaker 2: Insight, But you know, you do raise a good point
• 32:26
  Speaker 2: about Look, the truism about Trump's base is he could
• 32:31
  Speaker 2: shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and it wouldn't matter. And
• 32:34
  Speaker 2: it is true that his voter like his core base,
• 32:38
  Speaker 2: not as voters necessarily because some of them were independent
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: and had voted for Biden previously, et cetera. But his
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: core base does still support the war, is still with him,
• 32:48
  Speaker 2: will still buy if he comes out with some kind
• 32:50
  Speaker 2: of a victory narrative, even as we're looking at it
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: and like this is insane, they will still believe it.
• 32:56
  Speaker 2: So what makes you think that there will be even
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: among those individuals that there could be some erosion as
• 33:02
  Speaker 2: a result of this catastrophic decision.
• 33:05
  Speaker 10: Well, so like when you as you said at the
• 33:07
  Speaker 10: beginning there, it's like getting inside the voter, the head
• 33:11
  Speaker 10: of like the median voter is a very like it's
• 33:15
  Speaker 10: hard for I think we always got to remember, right,
• 33:17
  Speaker 10: there's a difference between the median voter and the people
• 33:19
  Speaker 10: who are say watching Breaking Points, Yeah, which people watch. Yeah,
• 33:24
  Speaker 10: the people who watch your show were watch my show
• 33:26
  Speaker 10: where but they're just they're more invested, they're more involved
• 33:29
  Speaker 10: in this consumer right, Yes, well, look, I mean if
• 33:33
  Speaker 10: Joe Biden, So when Joe Biden was forced to decide
• 33:38
  Speaker 10: to pull out of the election, right, it's because essentially
• 33:41
  Speaker 10: enough people in the Democratic establishment go he can't win,
• 33:43
  Speaker 10: Like after that debate performance, we don't think he can win. Yeah,
• 33:46
  Speaker 10: but if Joe Biden, and he would have lost probably
• 33:49
  Speaker 10: worse than Kamala Harris if he had run, probably, but
• 33:53
  Speaker 10: Joe Biden still would have gotten thirty something percent, maybe
• 33:56
  Speaker 10: forty percent of the voters.
• 33:58
  Speaker 7: Yeah, probably would have gone. I would if I to
• 34:00
  Speaker 7: guess forty five. Yeah.
• 34:02
  Speaker 10: Right, So even in the worst case scenario, even when
• 34:05
  Speaker 10: the president is a vegetable there's still like a huge
• 34:09
  Speaker 10: percentage of people who just yeah, they vote Democrat or
• 34:11
  Speaker 10: they vote Republican or they So the question, like the
• 34:14
  Speaker 10: action is always in the coalition, the act. So the
• 34:18
  Speaker 10: difference between Donald Trump having like fifty percent approval ratings
• 34:21
  Speaker 10: as he did a year and a half ago or
• 34:23
  Speaker 10: having thirty three percent approval right, well, that's the whole
• 34:25
  Speaker 10: different That's the difference between a blowout loss or winning
• 34:29
  Speaker 10: the popular vote and every single swing state. So he's
• 34:32
  Speaker 10: already destroyed that now. You know, I'll just say this
• 34:36
  Speaker 10: because I don't know. I guess, you know, And I've
• 34:39
  Speaker 10: been getting in some arguments with some people about this. Yeah, yeah,
• 34:44
  Speaker 10: you know, I'm known to even some people close to you.
• 34:46
  Speaker 10: It's uh, Crystal, but listen, I mean, and look, I
• 34:51
  Speaker 10: have really nothing against Kyle or anything like that, but
• 34:54
  Speaker 10: I do think that, Look, it is true there's always
• 34:57
  Speaker 10: been this criticism of Donald Trump supporters that they're like
• 35:00
  Speaker 10: cult like following. There's no question that there is an
• 35:02
  Speaker 10: element of that with a lot and that the comment
• 35:05
  Speaker 10: about shooting people on Fifth Avenue, like yeah, okay, there
• 35:09
  Speaker 10: essentially we're running that experiment right now and finding out
• 35:12
  Speaker 10: who will stay by him no matter what. But I
• 35:14
  Speaker 10: do have to say just my opinion, and maybe I'm
• 35:17
  Speaker 10: not the best guy to sell this message because I
• 35:19
  Speaker 10: did support Donald Trump and vote for him, and I
• 35:21
  Speaker 10: did come on your show before all the others and
• 35:23
  Speaker 10: apologize for that. Even though that is very that is
• 35:27
  Speaker 10: very trendy these days. I was seven or eight months
• 35:30
  Speaker 10: ahead of most people on that. But whatever, I can't
• 35:33
  Speaker 10: really brag. I voted for Donald Trump, and now I'm
• 35:35
  Speaker 10: saying that was a mistake. But I'm just saying. Barack
• 35:38
  Speaker 10: Obama ran on peace. He ran on ending the wars.
• 35:41
  Speaker 10: He ran on closing Guantanamo Bay, he ran on restoring
• 35:43
  Speaker 10: Habeas Corpus, He ran on a million things that he
• 35:47
  Speaker 10: just never did and not only didn't do them, but
• 35:50
  Speaker 10: expanded the worst of the Bush policies, and himself was
• 35:53
  Speaker 10: even worse than George W.
• 35:55
  Speaker 4: Bush. If you look up the civil war.
• 35:56
  Speaker 10: That he kicked off in Syria, the toppling of Good
• 36:00
  Speaker 10: in Libya, backing the Saudis in Yemen, Barack Obama killed
• 36:04
  Speaker 10: like a couple million people, just slaughtered innocent people, destroyed
• 36:08
  Speaker 10: allD countries, and by the way, surged in Afghanistan and
• 36:12
  Speaker 10: then pulled out of Iraq and then reinvaded the country
• 36:15
  Speaker 10: of Iraq.
• 36:16
  Speaker 4: And how many prominent, how many of.
• 36:18
  Speaker 10: The most popular pro Obama people turned on him in
• 36:23
  Speaker 10: the middle of his presidency, said he ought to be
• 36:24
  Speaker 10: impeached and removed. He's maybe even the anti Christ. This
• 36:28
  Speaker 10: got not that many, you know, and with Donald Trump,
• 36:32
  Speaker 10: it's been a tsunami. So look, I'm nut. I don't
• 36:36
  Speaker 10: think the move Like at the same I mourned the
• 36:38
  Speaker 10: death of the anti war left for fifteen years. I
• 36:41
  Speaker 10: was the anti war left before I got converted to
• 36:43
  Speaker 10: being a libertarian. It broke my heart that they all
• 36:46
  Speaker 10: disappeared under Obama. And when they all came charging back
• 36:50
  Speaker 10: under about Gaza, I was like, let's go.
• 36:53
  Speaker 4: They're back.
• 36:54
  Speaker 10: Like, I don't think we need to sit here and
• 36:55
  Speaker 10: get into these arguments of but you supported Biden and
• 36:58
  Speaker 10: therefore the genocide is your responsibility or something like that, Like, look, man,
• 37:04
  Speaker 10: Joe Biden and Kamala Harris deserve to lose a thousand times.
• 37:07
  Speaker 10: They deserve to lose a thousand deaths and be launched
• 37:10
  Speaker 10: to the moon and never allowed back on Earth for
• 37:12
  Speaker 10: funding the genocide in Gaza. For their whole last year
• 37:15
  Speaker 10: their administration just totally unforgivable, and Donald Trump deserves the
• 37:19
  Speaker 10: same for all of this. So I think at this
• 37:22
  Speaker 10: point we're in a really dangerous situation. This war could
• 37:25
  Speaker 10: really spin out of control very easily. And we've never
• 37:29
  Speaker 10: really been in a situation before where there's a war
• 37:31
  Speaker 10: launched and the propaganda apparatus is non existent. They cannot
• 37:35
  Speaker 10: sell the American people for this. This is why Mark
• 37:38
  Speaker 10: Levin is openly talking about how we got to bring
• 37:40
  Speaker 10: tech censorshit back. These guys know, they got to shut
• 37:44
  Speaker 10: all of us down. So instead of us sitting here
• 37:46
  Speaker 10: quibbling with each other over who, in a forced binary
• 37:50
  Speaker 10: decided this candidate versus that candidate and for what reasons,
• 37:53
  Speaker 10: I think we should just all be opposing this as
• 37:56
  Speaker 10: loud as possible, and just to say because people will
• 37:59
  Speaker 10: say sometimes to me, they'll be like, oh, se, you
• 38:01
  Speaker 10: criticize all the presidents, who was your favorite president? You
• 38:04
  Speaker 10: don't have one who you give a pass to. And
• 38:06
  Speaker 10: it's like, yeah, they're all war criminals, they're all genocidal maniacs.
• 38:10
  Speaker 10: Why should we set the standards so low? They all
• 38:13
  Speaker 10: get an F The grade from George W. Bush to
• 38:17
  Speaker 10: Obama to Biden to Trump, every single one of them
• 38:19
  Speaker 10: gets an F is just terrible. And I think you
• 38:23
  Speaker 10: do you know you do see Maybe, yes, there are
• 38:27
  Speaker 10: a percentage of people who will support Trump no matter what,
• 38:30
  Speaker 10: but I think less so than any other president of
• 38:32
  Speaker 10: my lifetime.
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: I also, I hope you're right that we at least
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: see that whenever it comes to war, Dave, as always,
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: we appreciate your time, my friend.
• 38:39
  Speaker 4: Thank you very much.
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: I'll see you at our next smoke session.
• 38:43
  Speaker 4: I got some good stuff. I got some good stuff.
• 38:45
  Speaker 4: Don't you worry about that.
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: I think that's what the kids are saying.
• 38:48
  Speaker 4: No, I really can I just just say I really.
• 38:50
  Speaker 10: I know I say this every time I'm on, but
• 38:51
  Speaker 10: I really do admire both of you guys so much.
• 38:53
  Speaker 4: This show is phenomenal.
• 38:54
  Speaker 10: I've been watching you guys since rising, and I will
• 38:58
  Speaker 10: say I think I think this war and around your coach,
• 39:01
  Speaker 10: I think this has been the best period of your show.
• 39:05
  Speaker 2: I think we feel the same way about that as
• 39:06
  Speaker 2: you do about you know, being vindicated in your anti
• 39:09
  Speaker 2: war analysis of like, we would take a lower chart
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: ranking and let's revenue for the world to be more peaceful.
• 39:17
  Speaker 10: But you know you don't get to but you don't
• 39:19
  Speaker 10: get to pick that, so you take your consolation prize,
• 39:22
  Speaker 10: which is two million subscribers and fifteen on YouTube, but
• 39:25
  Speaker 10: still is really great. And look, it's really important to
• 39:27
  Speaker 10: get the truth out to as many people as we can,
• 39:29
  Speaker 10: so thank you guys.
• 39:30
  Speaker 7: Well, thank you.
• 39:31
  Speaker 2: It's one of the things that does give me hope
• 39:32
  Speaker 2: is even with the overwhelming propaganda, you know, on the
• 39:37
  Speaker 2: genocide in Gaza, on you know, pushing for war in
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: Iran and all of that, that people are seeing the truth. Now,
• 39:43
  Speaker 2: do we have a democracy worth a salt where that
• 39:45
  Speaker 2: matters too much? That's another question, but that's something to
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: work towards in the future.
• 39:50
  Speaker 7: Dave, good to see you. Thank you so much.
• 39:52
  Speaker 4: Thanks guys.
• 39:55
  Speaker 13: Why don't we take a look at another industry in
• 39:59
  Speaker 13: a America known as Hollywood with a special guest that
• 40:03
  Speaker 13: we have this morning. We have to talk about the
• 40:09
  Speaker 13: Hollywood merger. We have actor India Moore here with us
• 40:16
  Speaker 13: this morning. They are the star of FX's pose and
• 40:22
  Speaker 13: one of these signatures over four thousand signatures on a
• 40:26
  Speaker 13: petition to prevent or demand the stopping of the merger
• 40:31
  Speaker 13: between Warner Brothers and Paramount India.
• 40:35
  Speaker 4: Welcome to the show. How are you this morning?
• 40:36
  Speaker 14: Thank you?
• 40:37
  Speaker 15: I'm okay.
• 40:37
  Speaker 4: How are you okay? Good?
• 40:40
  Speaker 13: Thanks for asking? Okay is understandable, and considering the news.
• 40:45
  Speaker 14: Grateful that I'm grateful. I'm still grateful.
• 40:49
  Speaker 13: We're grateful to have you. Maybe not grateful for this merger.
• 40:52
  Speaker 13: But why did you react to the news yesterday that
• 40:56
  Speaker 13: the Warner Brothers shareholders have approved this eighty one billion
• 41:01
  Speaker 13: dollar merger to combine Paramount and Warner Brothers. What is
• 41:07
  Speaker 13: your reaction to that and why did you sign your
• 41:10
  Speaker 13: name on this petition?
• 41:14
  Speaker 15: I think, well, my reaction is that I was really
• 41:17
  Speaker 15: disappointed and heart sunk, but also not surprised. I think
• 41:22
  Speaker 15: that shareholders are prioritizing and are centering, you know, their
• 41:28
  Speaker 15: financial interests, and not really the interests of the people
• 41:32
  Speaker 15: who ultimately were serving through our art. I think that
• 41:36
  Speaker 15: it's a it's a difficult sort of dissonance between the artists,
• 41:41
  Speaker 15: the creatives, and the people who have money, you know,
• 41:45
  Speaker 15: the business people. I don't think that their their values
• 41:49
  Speaker 15: are not always in alignment with the motivations of the
• 41:53
  Speaker 15: artists of today, and I think that's what makes this
• 41:56
  Speaker 15: merger so difficult and.
• 42:00
  Speaker 2: Some of the I was just going to ask, what
• 42:02
  Speaker 2: are some of the industry impacts that you're most concerned
• 42:06
  Speaker 2: about here from an artist's creative perspective.
• 42:10
  Speaker 14: Well, I think that.
• 42:13
  Speaker 15: What it seems is that Paramount, the creatives, not the creatives,
• 42:18
  Speaker 15: excuse me, but the executives behind Paramount, seem to be
• 42:23
  Speaker 15: in political solidarity with the current administration. And you know,
• 42:28
  Speaker 15: I I think the political agenda of the current administration
• 42:35
  Speaker 15: is really scary. You know, they're prioritizing a sort of
• 42:40
  Speaker 15: homogeneous monolith of values and principles that don't fit everyone
• 42:48
  Speaker 15: and that don't include everyone. And I think that, you know,
• 42:52
  Speaker 15: based on what we've seen so much of this, the
• 42:56
  Speaker 15: political landscape that the administration is created is one where
• 43:00
  Speaker 15: they are deciding ultimately who deserves to live and who
• 43:06
  Speaker 15: deserves to die.
• 43:07
  Speaker 14: And I think that it's really really unfortunate. I don't
• 43:12
  Speaker 14: think that.
• 43:14
  Speaker 15: I think our job as an art as artists, is
• 43:19
  Speaker 15: to reflect the times, is to reflect people, is to
• 43:23
  Speaker 15: reflect the truths that people are living and experiencing, and
• 43:26
  Speaker 15: also to innovate. Right, it's also to be really creative
• 43:31
  Speaker 15: and what we imagine for our future, what we imagine
• 43:34
  Speaker 15: for ourselves, for each other. And I think so much
• 43:37
  Speaker 15: of that could be so beautiful and it can include
• 43:41
  Speaker 15: so many people, and it should right. But I think
• 43:46
  Speaker 15: that the current administration feels like a betrayal of the
• 43:49
  Speaker 15: American dream, because I think the American dream is ultimately
• 43:54
  Speaker 15: what everybody deserves. It's to live, it's to have a family,
• 43:59
  Speaker 15: it's to be safe, it's to you know, have to
• 44:03
  Speaker 15: have you know, your country respect you. And they're picking
• 44:08
  Speaker 15: and choosing who gets to be a part of that.
• 44:10
  Speaker 15: And I think that this is what this merger is
• 44:13
  Speaker 15: going to amplify in our works, you know. I think
• 44:15
  Speaker 15: they're going to continue to amplify the sort of messaging
• 44:19
  Speaker 15: of who gets to be represented and who doesn't, and
• 44:22
  Speaker 15: that should never be up to people who are whose
• 44:26
  Speaker 15: values are not people whose values are money, you know.
• 44:30
  Speaker 15: And I think that it's I think that it's really unfortunate,
• 44:36
  Speaker 15: but it's not a done deal. The fight is not over,
• 44:39
  Speaker 15: and I think that there's a lot, you know, that
• 44:41
  Speaker 15: people could remain hopeful for. I think we we have
• 44:44
  Speaker 15: to continue to sustain pressure, but I think it's also
• 44:48
  Speaker 15: really important to look at what that pressure is. Is
• 44:51
  Speaker 15: that pressure a screaming, you know and saying no, no,
• 44:55
  Speaker 15: this is wrong. Or is it actually bringing context to
• 44:59
  Speaker 15: why this is a devastating decision right? And I think
• 45:02
  Speaker 15: that context that I would hope people are able to
• 45:08
  Speaker 15: amplify and deliver is that the reason why we reflect
• 45:13
  Speaker 15: the experiences of different people is because we live with
• 45:17
  Speaker 15: different people. We share the earth with different people, you know,
• 45:21
  Speaker 15: we share our cities with different people, the land, you know, supermarkets,
• 45:27
  Speaker 15: you know, businesses. And I think that if we're not
• 45:33
  Speaker 15: able to rationalize why it's important to include everybody on
• 45:37
  Speaker 15: a planet that we're all from that includes everybody, I
• 45:40
  Speaker 15: think we're going to have a lot of difficulty not
• 45:43
  Speaker 15: just in understanding why a merger is bad, but also
• 45:47
  Speaker 15: in understanding why it's important to love. I think ultimately,
• 45:53
  Speaker 15: for me, the political question hits a wall at some point,
• 45:58
  Speaker 15: you know, the political question is it hits a wall
• 46:02
  Speaker 15: when at some point people are like, well, why should
• 46:05
  Speaker 15: I care about issues that I'm not affected by? And
• 46:09
  Speaker 15: that's hard to explain if you don't have love, you know,
• 46:13
  Speaker 15: if love is not something that is a value and
• 46:16
  Speaker 15: something that we're not actually sharing a definition around and
• 46:21
  Speaker 15: exploring what that is. And it's okay that a lot
• 46:24
  Speaker 15: of us struggle with understanding what that means for each
• 46:27
  Speaker 15: other and what the responsibility love holds us to with
• 46:32
  Speaker 15: one another on a shared planet. But I think that
• 46:36
  Speaker 15: art would not exist without love.
• 46:40
  Speaker 8: And for you as on a concrete level as an artist.
• 46:43
  Speaker 8: If let's say this merger does go through and basically
• 46:47
  Speaker 8: all of the entities within this new company become basically
• 46:52
  Speaker 8: political vehicles that are off limits to a huge swath
• 46:58
  Speaker 8: of artists, Like what does that take off the table
• 47:01
  Speaker 8: for you as you're thinking about like what projects are possible?
• 47:05
  Speaker 8: And like where where? Where are the spaces where in
• 47:08
  Speaker 8: a world where this has approved and goes through, where
• 47:10
  Speaker 8: are the spaces where freedom of expression can still flourish?
• 47:15
  Speaker 8: Like the Netflix? Like are they still decent? Like what's
• 47:18
  Speaker 8: the artists are thinking? Like Okay, this would be a
• 47:21
  Speaker 8: cool show. Let's let's pitch it to X y Z,
• 47:25
  Speaker 8: Like what what are the places left where?
• 47:27
  Speaker 15: I'm not sure where where the safe spaces are? I
• 47:34
  Speaker 15: think we were still in a journey to creating safe
• 47:37
  Speaker 15: spaces for people who have historically been marginalized for who
• 47:41
  Speaker 15: they are before this administration came in.
• 47:44
  Speaker 14: You know, we were already still in.
• 47:46
  Speaker 15: That journey, and so I think, uh, the bar has
• 47:52
  Speaker 15: been set a lot lower, and I think, you know,
• 47:58
  Speaker 15: what it means for me is that, you know, it's
• 48:01
  Speaker 15: going to be a lot more difficult for me to work.
• 48:03
  Speaker 15: You know, I've been really vocal about the importance of
• 48:09
  Speaker 15: not not fighting without the not hurting innocent civilians and
• 48:15
  Speaker 15: people not not engaging in irrational wars, and also the
• 48:21
  Speaker 15: lack the lack of need. There's no need for for this, uh,
• 48:25
  Speaker 15: the kind of war and conflicts that we're seeing right now.
• 48:28
  Speaker 15: And so I think that if if people who are
• 48:32
  Speaker 15: also if people are benefiting from the war, and those
• 48:38
  Speaker 15: same people who are benefiting from the war are also
• 48:40
  Speaker 15: behind the media landscape and who gets to work, then
• 48:44
  Speaker 15: people who are anti war are going to have a
• 48:47
  Speaker 15: difficult time working. And I think also, you know, I
• 48:55
  Speaker 15: I am a woman of trans experience, and I know
• 48:57
  Speaker 15: that a lot of people have different different opinions or
• 49:03
  Speaker 15: beliefs or projections about whether, you know, my expression of
• 49:08
  Speaker 15: the sincerity of my owner witness of myself is true
• 49:10
  Speaker 15: or not as a woman, And I don't think that
• 49:14
  Speaker 15: I think people deserve to work out for themselves how
• 49:18
  Speaker 15: they are trying to figure out what it means to
• 49:22
  Speaker 15: to understand people right everybody deserves to have that journey,
• 49:25
  Speaker 15: but I think there's so much more at stake for
• 49:29
  Speaker 15: people who are who are seen as less important, or
• 49:35
  Speaker 15: less valuable or just weird because of the way that
• 49:38
  Speaker 15: they exist. And I think that that's becoming such a
• 49:42
  Speaker 15: political issue and it shouldn't be. I think that it's
• 49:48
  Speaker 15: a devastating it's a devastating direction that we've gone.
• 49:52
  Speaker 14: And my hope is that.
• 49:57
  Speaker 15: I think my hope is that, you know, real still
• 50:00
  Speaker 15: be able to have the resources and motivation and love
• 50:05
  Speaker 15: to continue to build and create our own foundations for media,
• 50:10
  Speaker 15: for media and storytelling. I think that that's a really
• 50:14
  Speaker 15: important thing. But I also think it's important for everyone
• 50:17
  Speaker 15: to value everyone's story. I think it's incredibly important for
• 50:21
  Speaker 15: every single person who carries a different experience to also
• 50:26
  Speaker 15: think about other people who carry a different experience in
• 50:29
  Speaker 15: their pursuit to creating spaces for storytelling, because ultimately, you know,
• 50:34
  Speaker 15: what we want to fight against is this idea that
• 50:40
  Speaker 15: stories get to be told one way and for one
• 50:43
  Speaker 15: kind of people.
• 50:44
  Speaker 14: And I think that.
• 50:47
  Speaker 15: When we do take on the responsibility of creating spaces
• 50:51
  Speaker 15: for people to reflect reality, that it's respected, you know,
• 50:59
  Speaker 15: And I think like, it's really interesting because you can
• 51:07
  Speaker 15: take a snapshot of someone's life and make a movie
• 51:12
  Speaker 15: out of it, and then someone will call it political.
• 51:15
  Speaker 15: But for that person that the snapshot is made of,
• 51:18
  Speaker 15: they're just existing, right, And so I think that even
• 51:24
  Speaker 15: the language political is really confusing. It's really scary, and
• 51:28
  Speaker 15: I think it's been weaponized in a way that is
• 51:31
  Speaker 15: manufactured consent to erase people. You know, you see a
• 51:34
  Speaker 15: black person on TV, Oh that's political. You know, it's like,
• 51:38
  Speaker 15: we don't want politics, and so politics has become a
• 51:41
  Speaker 15: word to codify like trouble or discomfort or chaos, and
• 51:51
  Speaker 15: it's really unfair to I think, to create a broad
• 51:57
  Speaker 15: I think landscape out of that when that landscape is
• 52:03
  Speaker 15: made out of just regular people trying to live their life,
• 52:07
  Speaker 15: who just exist, who are human. So I think we
• 52:10
  Speaker 15: have a lot to do in depoliticizing Sorry, oh no, no,
• 52:15
  Speaker 15: I was just going to be We have a lot
• 52:17
  Speaker 15: of and depoliticizing what it means to be alive. And
• 52:22
  Speaker 15: I think that, you know, we have to we have
• 52:26
  Speaker 15: to be careful not to define politics by this notion
• 52:30
  Speaker 15: of who gets to live and who deserves not to live,
• 52:33
  Speaker 15: because ultimately that's what we're seeing right now, and it's
• 52:38
  Speaker 15: it's not good for the future of our humanity, for
• 52:42
  Speaker 15: anyone's humanity. And I think the people who are who
• 52:45
  Speaker 15: are unaffected the most should care the most. You know,
• 52:50
  Speaker 15: the people who are affected the most are very angry,
• 52:52
  Speaker 15: are very hurt, are traumatized, are scared, especially when those
• 52:57
  Speaker 15: people don't have resources. So I think that we need
• 53:00
  Speaker 15: more voices, We need more people who can articulate why
• 53:04
  Speaker 15: this is wrong without having you know, people who.
• 53:07
  Speaker 14: Don't, who don't who wouldn't be affected.
• 53:09
  Speaker 15: I think are are really are really are really important
• 53:13
  Speaker 15: figures to rationalize why it's important for us to include
• 53:17
  Speaker 15: as many people h and everything that is about people.
• 53:24
  Speaker 16: And I wanted to ask about artificial intelligence. My own
• 53:26
  Speaker 16: perspective on this is that there was already the industry
• 53:29
  Speaker 16: is already overly consolidated, and that was already creating some
• 53:32
  Speaker 16: real ideological weaponization might be the right way to put it.
• 53:37
  Speaker 16: But with artificial intelligence, I mean, everything that's getting fed
• 53:40
  Speaker 16: into the AI. The new season of The Comeback is
• 53:42
  Speaker 16: actually really interesting on this. I was curious Inja what
• 53:45
  Speaker 16: you're you're seeing around you, Like, what is the mood
• 53:49
  Speaker 16: of the industry the letter has so many signatories. You're
• 53:53
  Speaker 16: starting to see this problems with AI consolidation be expressed
• 53:57
  Speaker 16: in some of the art itself. Like I just mentioned
• 54:00
  Speaker 16: the season of the comeback, there's a real uh. It
• 54:03
  Speaker 16: seems to me from the outside, you really do sense
• 54:07
  Speaker 16: that there's some life left in the artists and the
• 54:09
  Speaker 16: creatives who are pushing back. Right now, that splashy Hollywood
• 54:12
  Speaker 16: Reporter profile of the writer who had been uh, he's
• 54:15
  Speaker 16: now working as a contractor. He couldn't find work that
• 54:18
  Speaker 16: was published this week and he's now working as a contractor.
• 54:22
  Speaker 16: It seems like people are really, really really starting to
• 54:24
  Speaker 16: push back and raise the alarm. Is that your sense, like,
• 54:27
  Speaker 16: what are you seeing around you on the ground in
• 54:30
  Speaker 16: the LA area. I'm not in LA in the industry
• 54:36
  Speaker 16: or I guess good for you, Yeah, good joy.
• 54:39
  Speaker 14: Sorry.
• 54:43
  Speaker 15: I think people are I think there's two things that
• 54:46
  Speaker 15: are happening.
• 54:47
  Speaker 14: I think that there are people who just really want
• 54:48
  Speaker 14: to work.
• 54:49
  Speaker 15: And who are who are trying to protect themselves by
• 54:53
  Speaker 15: maybe not being too vocal. And I think that there
• 54:56
  Speaker 15: are people who are also who are who are worried
• 55:00
  Speaker 15: about other people's experience. A lot of people who are
• 55:02
  Speaker 15: worried about other people's experiences who are being vocal, you know,
• 55:07
  Speaker 15: and who are fighting back, you know. So I think
• 55:10
  Speaker 15: that that's really important. Artificial intelligence is just another way
• 55:13
  Speaker 15: I think. I think it's another way that people are
• 55:17
  Speaker 15: being erased. You know, a lot of a lot of
• 55:20
  Speaker 15: you know, the heart of what of what it means
• 55:23
  Speaker 15: to interface with a person that really exists.
• 55:26
  Speaker 14: You know, where an artist is.
• 55:31
  Speaker 15: Is drawing from something that comes from the force that
• 55:35
  Speaker 15: makes them alive when they're you know, either writing on
• 55:39
  Speaker 15: paper or performing on screen, and that it's really scary.
• 55:46
  Speaker 15: We don't know what the invisible connections are between a
• 55:48
  Speaker 15: person that is interfacing with art is you know, like
• 55:52
  Speaker 15: we don't know what the metaphysical relationship is to the
• 55:56
  Speaker 15: way that we receive art. But I think that if
• 55:59
  Speaker 15: we replace I'm I mean, like I'm I don't mean
• 56:02
  Speaker 15: to get woo woo, but like we're not afraid. Yeah,
• 56:09
  Speaker 15: but like I think that you know, it is it's
• 56:12
  Speaker 15: it is. It feels spiritually disrespectful to replaced art with
• 56:17
  Speaker 15: artificial intelligence. I think that I think a lot of
• 56:21
  Speaker 15: people feel that, Yeah, there's something that feels like it's
• 56:25
  Speaker 15: betraying what makes us alive, what makes us live and
• 56:29
  Speaker 15: the stories that come from that, and so I think
• 56:32
  Speaker 15: that it's it's really I feel really sad and emotional
• 56:36
  Speaker 15: about anything that is taking away from life.
• 56:40
  Speaker 14: I I don't know. I think that.
• 56:45
  Speaker 15: Life or money, life money, but those things shouldn't. It
• 56:48
  Speaker 15: shouldn't be life or money. It should it should be
• 56:51
  Speaker 15: life in money sort of.
• 56:53
  Speaker 13: Oh yeah, yeah, Well, I am very sympathetic to the
• 56:57
  Speaker 13: Woo Woo case. But for people who maybe just treat
• 57:01
  Speaker 13: movies and TV shows as entertainment, I do think there's
• 57:04
  Speaker 13: a ton for anyone to be worried about with this merger,
• 57:08
  Speaker 13: because not only is it going to potentially silence interesting
• 57:12
  Speaker 13: stories like the ones that you've mentioned, but there's just
• 57:15
  Speaker 13: gonna be less a lot less movies, TV shows and jobs.
• 57:20
  Speaker 14: Now.
• 57:20
  Speaker 13: I know a lot of people that work at Paramount,
• 57:22
  Speaker 13: and they talk about how everyone at Paramount is walking
• 57:25
  Speaker 13: around kind of like the walking Dead, like a zombie.
• 57:28
  Speaker 13: They all kind of know when these mergers hit that
• 57:31
  Speaker 13: there's gonna be mass layoffs. And for anyone that's used
• 57:36
  Speaker 13: Netflix over the last five years, you can see sort
• 57:39
  Speaker 13: of the slopification of content. There's just a million shows
• 57:44
  Speaker 13: that look thinner and feel thinner and don't feel like
• 57:47
  Speaker 13: the movies and TV shows that we used to watch,
• 57:51
  Speaker 13: and that comes from sort of a industry consolidation, and
• 57:56
  Speaker 13: of course this one is a major one. I just
• 57:58
  Speaker 13: wanted to list off some of the consolidation that Larry
• 58:01
  Speaker 13: Ellison and David Ellison would be now owning if this
• 58:05
  Speaker 13: merger goes through. TikTok, Warner Brothers, Paramount, DC Studios, Discovery Channel, CNN, CBS, HBO, Fandango,
• 58:13
  Speaker 13: Run Tomatoes, Nickelodeon, MTV, Cartoon Network, Food Network, Travel Channel,
• 58:19
  Speaker 13: Animal Planet, Comedy Central, Showtime, TBS, HG TV, among others.
• 58:25
  Speaker 13: So it does seem like there is going to be
• 58:28
  Speaker 13: a lot less for you to watch, and what it
• 58:31
  Speaker 13: will be will be worse. Is there is there a
• 58:34
  Speaker 13: fear in Hollywood being less jobs?
• 58:38
  Speaker 14: I I can't.
• 58:40
  Speaker 15: I think, yes, I think there's a fear for less
• 58:44
  Speaker 15: jobs for everyone outside of Hollywood as well.
• 58:47
  Speaker 14: But I just want to say it's extremely frustrating.
• 58:49
  Speaker 15: For you know, the Ellison's, you know, and I wish,
• 58:54
  Speaker 15: you know, I think that I wish I wish them.
• 58:56
  Speaker 14: Well in life.
• 58:56
  Speaker 15: Honestly, I really want them to be able to have
• 58:59
  Speaker 15: fruitful life without destroying other peoples.
• 59:02
  Speaker 14: But I think that it's really frustrating.
• 59:04
  Speaker 15: I think I heard the elder Ellison say something to
• 59:08
  Speaker 15: the degree of I think there was like a speech
• 59:15
  Speaker 15: or something that he gave to the beat of creating
• 59:19
  Speaker 15: a system of surveillance or some kind of system that
• 59:23
  Speaker 15: ensures that people are well behaved or something like that.
• 59:25
  Speaker 14: I don't know if you remember that will be on
• 59:28
  Speaker 14: their best behavior.
• 59:29
  Speaker 15: Yeah, that it's really it's really patronizing, it's really condescending,
• 59:34
  Speaker 15: and I think it's really stupid because these are some
• 59:37
  Speaker 15: of the most unbehaved people on the planet. You know,
• 59:42
  Speaker 15: I think that they're supporting people who behave horribly, you know,
• 59:46
  Speaker 15: toward other people. So we don't really you know, when
• 59:48
  Speaker 15: I look down at when I look at what it
• 59:50
  Speaker 15: means to be well behaved to them, it's really to
• 59:53
  Speaker 15: be submissive. You know, they're calling our good behavior submission,
• 59:57
  Speaker 15: and you know, I think that that's really really, it's terrible.
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 15: You know, they're they're turning people into into slaves, right.
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 15: They want to they want to create, they want to
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 15: create a new sort a Neil, forgive me for I
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 15: don't know if I can find a better language for this,
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 15: But you know when if you can't, if you can't
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 15: tell the truth about what your experience is, about what
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 15: you're about, what you're seeing, if you can't complain about
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 15: the experience you're having, if you can't, if you can't
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 15: protest oppression and hurt, you know, like or neglect, that's that's.
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 14: Not good behavior. That is that's suppression, that's slavery. Right.
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 15: So I think that that's an issue, and I don't
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 15: have faith in whatever they're doing. I think that whatever
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 15: they're doing, it's it's very dark and it's scary.
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 14: I also want to say that.
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 15: Everyone should be concerned with the advent of AI, especially
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 15: in TV and film, but especially most of the people
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 15: who would be audiences to what we make, most of
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 15: the people who are audiences to TV and film are
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 15: not are not like business owners, they're not entrepreneurs. A
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 15: lot of them are people who work under business owners.
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 15: They work under they work under entrepreneurs. These are people
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 15: who do a lot of manual labor. These are people
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 15: who you know, who work very hard to bag our groceries,
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 15: to scan our groceries when we're checking out in the supermarket.
• 1:01:37
  Speaker 15: These are people who work in different areas of service right,
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 15: And I think that if those people don't speak up,
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 15: those people are also manufacturing consent for their jobs to
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 15: be replaced by AI. So this is a this is
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 15: a really if we look at TV and film and
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 15: the consumer base that we have, the people who are
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 15: made up of the consumer base of media are people
• 1:02:06
  Speaker 15: who are are working, you know, hard labor that is
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 15: being threatened, and that hard labor is being threatened to
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 15: be replaced with the same sorts of computer systems that
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 15: we're seeing generate TV and film content.
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 14: So they're the connections are.
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 15: Overwhelming, and and and and they they are. It's just
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 15: there's so there's just so many reasons why everybody should
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 15: have an issue with this. And I think a lot
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 15: of us are tired.
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 14: I'm tired, if you know I'm tired. I We're all.
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 11: Tired, and for so many different reasons, you know, like
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 11: I'm trying to heal from my own you know background
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 11: in history, what I've gone through, and it's exhausting, and
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 11: like the constant there's so much fight that we have
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 11: to do. But I think that we have to evolve
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 11: the way that we're fighting. We have to evolve that
• 1:03:07
  Speaker 11: we're fighting so that so that the way that we're
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 11: fighting doesn't just take away from us, but it also
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 11: gives to us. And I think that we're not gonna
• 1:03:15
  Speaker 11: win what we're doing if we don't send in love.
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 14: I really believe that.
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 13: Speaking of the fight, and now the shareholders have approved it,
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 13: some people are calling on the California Attorney General to
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 13: still block the merger. I guess my final question, if
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 13: I could give from India and thank you so much
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 13: for coming on the show, is do you do you
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 13: fear a career reprisal from signing this list? Because this
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 13: list of people is big, but obviously this could easily
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 13: turn into a blacklist if you sign it already?
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 15: Is I mean I'm already on a blacklist? I guess
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 15: I would hope not, you know, but I think, like
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 15: I think, I think we need we need someone to
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 15: represent people who care about, people who have who has
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 15: a lot of power, who's behind.
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 14: You know, I wish Mark Ruffalo and you know.
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 13: There's a ton of names in the list. Robert Deniers
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 13: just joined, Paula Hunter, Sophia Coola.
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 15: Yeah, like, but I think a lot of some of
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 15: these people are still working right, A lot of these
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 15: people are still working. A lot of these people have
• 1:04:37
  Speaker 15: been vocal about the most controversial things and they're still working.
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 15: And I think that if they are not in solidarity
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 15: with artists who share and who share the same values,
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 15: who've given up their visibility, their platforms, their careers to
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 15: sounding the alarm, you know, in what's happening to humanity,
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 15: not just in these silos that we're referring to industries,
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 15: you know, that referring to as industries like but like,
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 15: I think that everybody, everybody has to like, I think
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 15: all of these people have to eat. I mean, I
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 15: would encourage them, you know, page of piscal like you know,
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 15: these are like I would love for them to advocate more,
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 15: for artists to not be blackballed, you know, for valuing
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 15: other people, you know.
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 14: The I I think that.
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 15: It's just we're we're advocating in silos, and I think
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 15: that if we're not creating more more solidarity across artistry,
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 15: across talent, across industry, then it's going to be a
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 15: lot more difficult to fight to fight back, I think,
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 15: to push back against this.
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 14: So I mean that's my message.
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 15: I think it's intersectional advocacy and solidarity, and I think
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 15: I hope that people are willing to take up the challenge.
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 1: To do that.
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 13: Okay, fantastic, Well India, thank you so much for joining
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 13: us today. We hope that this merger has a different
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 13: outcome than what it seems is coming on the horizon. Well,
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 13: of course, link to you and our video description.
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 4: Thank you so much for joining us today.
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 15: Great to meet you, and thank you so much for
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 15: your work in for amplifying you know what's going on.
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 15: I really appreciate it. Nice to meet you all, I hope.
• 1:06:28
  Speaker 1: Thank you guys so much for watching. We appreciate We
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 1: will see you all. Oh, no Friday show tomorrow.
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 4: They'll see you then.