Latest / Yaron Brook Show / Live from Madrid (Sept 28, 2026) | Yaron Brook Show
Transcript
- 0:02Speaker 1: The Radical Fundamental Principles of Freedom, Rational Self-Interest, and Individual Rights.
- 0:14Speaker 1: This is the Yaron Brook Show.
- 0:18Speaker 2: The Radical Fundamental Principles of Freedom.
- 0:24Speaker 1: All right, everybody. Welcome to Yaron Brook Show. Hopefully that
- 0:27Speaker 1: is our last glitch. of the evening. I hope everybody's
- 0:32Speaker 1: doing well. Evening over here, it's not an evening, it's night.
- 0:35Speaker 1: It's 9 p.m. over here, 3 p.m. East Coast time.
- 0:38Speaker 1: I'm still in Europe. I'm in Madrid. You know, I
- 0:41Speaker 1: figured I was seeing people comment on various places, how
- 0:47Speaker 1: desperate they were for a Iran book show. Some people
- 0:51Speaker 1: even emailed me, worried, or text messaged me, worried about
- 0:55Speaker 1: whether I was still okay. since they hadn't heard from
- 0:59Speaker 1: me in a week. So I figured I better get
- 1:00Speaker 1: on here and calm everybody down. Everything's fine. Everything's okay.
- 1:05Speaker 1: It's just travel has made it impossible to do a show.
- 1:09Speaker 1: As those of you who followed me through the last
- 1:16Speaker 1: show I did, which was in London with Nikos, you
- 1:20Speaker 1: knew I was flying to Tbilisi on Monday. I indeed
- 1:22Speaker 1: did fly to Tbilisi on Monday. And I thought maybe
- 1:27Speaker 1: I could do some shows from Tbilisi, forgetting that Georgian
- 1:32Speaker 1: hospitality makes that basically impossible because Georgian hospitality basically guides
- 1:42Speaker 1: you to events and dinners and socializing until pretty late
- 1:48Speaker 1: at night. And by the time the day ends, there
- 1:51Speaker 1: was just no way. Plus, I was eight hours ahead
- 1:54Speaker 1: of the East Coast. So two hours ahead of here
- 1:59Speaker 1: in Europe. So yeah, just no time. And then I
- 2:04Speaker 1: flew to Florence to meet my wife. And again, the
- 2:09Speaker 1: evenings were just too, I don't think we had, there
- 2:13Speaker 1: was really space to run the show. In the Airbnb
- 2:16Speaker 1: we had, we hadn't planned on me doing any shows
- 2:20Speaker 1: from there. So it really wasn't structured in that way. Yesterday,
- 2:23Speaker 1: we arrived in Madrid, and yeah, this has been the
- 2:27Speaker 1: first real opportunity for me to do a show, so
- 2:31Speaker 1: here I am. I will say, when I was in Florence, I,
- 2:35Speaker 1: you know, I bought tickets and went to see Michelangelo's David,
- 2:39Speaker 1: as I try to do every time I'm in Florence.
- 2:42Speaker 1: As always, spectacular, amazing, stunning, you know, really, really, really,
- 2:47Speaker 1: really great. So, yeah. Excited about that. We're going to
- 2:52Speaker 1: see some art over the next couple of days here
- 2:55Speaker 1: in Madrid. We saw some art today, but I'll tell
- 2:59Speaker 1: you more about that, I don't know, in two years
- 3:02Speaker 1: or so. There'll be a big reveal one day. We
- 3:08Speaker 1: saw some art. My wife actually completed a sculpture in Florence,
- 3:13Speaker 1: so a beautiful, beautiful bust. We'll see some art in Madrid.
- 3:20Speaker 1: And then what are we doing? Then flying home. So
- 3:26Speaker 1: I'll try to do a show tomorrow night. Oh, on
- 3:28Speaker 1: Wednesday night, we're going to opera. So there will be
- 3:30Speaker 1: no show Wednesday night. Thursday, we're flying all day. There'll
- 3:34Speaker 1: be no show Thursday. And then Friday will be my
- 3:37Speaker 1: first show from home. And hopefully we'll have a streak
- 3:44Speaker 1: of shows. through the first three weeks of October until
- 3:48Speaker 1: I start traveling again. So that is kind of the
- 3:51Speaker 1: brief update. Remo says, you're wearing a weird shirt. I've
- 3:57Speaker 1: worn this shirt before. So it's not my first time
- 4:00Speaker 1: on the show with a shirt. You've seen it before.
- 4:03Speaker 1: Remo also says he doesn't like it. Don't like it.
- 4:05Speaker 1: He doesn't like it. Other people have liked it. Anyway,
- 4:10Speaker 1: it doesn't matter what Remo likes and dislikes in terms
- 4:12Speaker 1: of my shirts. he is not my, all right, let's see,
- 4:21Speaker 1: a reminder, Rima's already got us started off with 60 euros,
- 4:28Speaker 1: so jump in, jump in and support the show, as
- 4:34Speaker 1: I said, there will be a show today and tomorrow,
- 4:35Speaker 1: and then on Friday, so jump in with questions, there
- 4:40Speaker 1: will be, I'm sure, a Over a week, you haven't
- 4:42Speaker 1: asked any questions. Something must be boiling to the surface
- 4:46Speaker 1: that you have to ask. Well, now's your opportunity. Super
- 4:49Speaker 1: Chat is open. Send in a question. Gail says she
- 4:54Speaker 1: likes it. Jennifer says she likes it. So, you know,
- 4:58Speaker 1: the women on the call like it. Remo doesn't. I
- 5:03Speaker 1: think you get outvoted, Remo. All right. Where should we...
- 5:14Speaker 1: So I thought we'd do a news show today. We
- 5:18Speaker 1: haven't talked about news in a while. We'll do a
- 5:20Speaker 1: quick news briefing. I'll answer your questions. And then I'll
- 5:25Speaker 1: be back tomorrow with some more public news. And Andrew says,
- 5:32Speaker 1: all questions have been answered. True. True. you know, true. Just,
- 5:41Speaker 1: you know, if they haven't been answered yet, they will
- 5:44Speaker 1: be answered. One of the meetings I had in London
- 5:50Speaker 1: was with the guy who is working on Yuan AI.
- 5:56Speaker 1: And Yuan AI is already, you know, in use. I'm
- 5:59Speaker 1: using it. It's really good. It really functions well. I'm
- 6:04Speaker 1: really excited about it. And we're now talking about, okay,
- 6:07Speaker 1: What would it take to develop a Euron AI Pro?
- 6:11Speaker 1: And what features would it have? And then how do
- 6:14Speaker 1: we make Euron AI public? How do we give you
- 6:17Speaker 1: guys access to it? Maybe as an app, maybe as
- 6:20Speaker 1: a feature on my website. And in that case, you
- 6:23Speaker 1: can just ask Euron AI any questions you want. But
- 6:27Speaker 1: if Super Chat drops as a consequence of me releasing
- 6:30Speaker 1: Euron AI out there, I'll have to charge for Euron AI.
- 6:34Speaker 1: But there is going to be there is a lot of,
- 6:39Speaker 1: I think, a lot of exciting AI stuff that I'm
- 6:43Speaker 1: talking to people about that is going to come out
- 6:48Speaker 1: in the future. You saw my first Yuan AI article
- 6:51Speaker 1: came out on 9-11. There'll be more of those. I
- 6:56Speaker 1: expect that one of the first features we're going to
- 7:00Speaker 1: be publishing soon is after every show I do, I
- 7:06Speaker 1: will publish a newsletter which basically will be an AI
- 7:11Speaker 1: summary of the show. So you'll be able to sign
- 7:15Speaker 1: up and get a summary. If you miss the show,
- 7:18Speaker 1: you'll be able to get a summary of the show
- 7:20Speaker 1: and then be able to skip to the sections you
- 7:23Speaker 1: want to get to with timestamps and everything. So we're
- 7:27Speaker 1: definitely working on trying to figure out how to use
- 7:30Speaker 1: AI to enhance the... the, uh, your on book show
- 7:38Speaker 1: experience and, uh, the opportunities for you to, you know,
- 7:43Speaker 1: particularly when I'm gone, uh, we, we could have you
- 7:46Speaker 1: on AI do the show and, uh, you know, that, that,
- 7:49Speaker 1: I guess that's also an opportunity, but anyway, I maybe
- 7:52Speaker 1: won't do the show, but you'll at least have the
- 7:54Speaker 1: opportunity to, uh, ask you on AI questions to, uh,
- 7:59Speaker 1: get you on AI's opinion on the color of your shirt. I,
- 8:02Speaker 1: you know, I don't know. We'll see what kind of features,
- 8:05Speaker 1: we supply Iran AI. That could be pretty dangerous. All right.
- 8:12Speaker 1: I think the lead, the most interesting story right now
- 8:16Speaker 1: out there, you know, is probably the most important one
- 8:19Speaker 1: long term. It is the economic story and the rising
- 8:26Speaker 1: interest rates, the rising interest rates in the United States
- 8:29Speaker 1: really and globally. It's not just the United States that's
- 8:33Speaker 1: seeing significant interest rate rises. We're seeing interest rates rising
- 8:38Speaker 1: across the world. And, you know, this is an economic story,
- 8:43Speaker 1: and we've been following it. I've been talking about it
- 8:45Speaker 1: for a while now. Interest rates are rising both on
- 8:51Speaker 1: the short end, with the Fed increasing interest rates last
- 8:54Speaker 1: week by a quarter point, and indicating that they will
- 8:57Speaker 1: probably increase interest rates again by another quarter point later
- 9:01Speaker 1: this year. And at the same time, the long-term rate
- 9:06Speaker 1: has just gone up dramatically. So, you know, as of
- 9:12Speaker 1: this morning, the 10-year bond is at 5.24%. It hasn't
- 9:20Speaker 1: traded that high in a long, long time. The 30-year
- 9:25Speaker 1: is above 5.5%. And, you know, this is... These are
- 9:34Speaker 1: yields that we haven't seen in a long time. Again,
- 9:35Speaker 1: I think that the world got used to kind of
- 9:38Speaker 1: 0% interest rate environments. And it's kind of a shock
- 9:43Speaker 1: to the system, I think, that everybody's experiencing. I think
- 9:46Speaker 1: the main way in which people are feeling it, are
- 9:49Speaker 1: going to feel it, is in the fact that mortgage
- 9:55Speaker 1: rates have increased above 7%. again, in a long time. Now,
- 10:01Speaker 1: I remember mortgage rates at 9%, and 7% mortgage rates
- 10:05Speaker 1: doesn't strike me in an inflationary environment as particularly high,
- 10:13Speaker 1: but it's the highest it's been since the, I think,
- 10:18Speaker 1: the early 2000s. So it's definitely sticker shock to people
- 10:24Speaker 1: who got used to mortgage rates at 3, 4, 5,
- 10:29Speaker 1: max 5% fixed for 30 years. And now we've got
- 10:34Speaker 1: 7 fixed for 30 years. It's also raising the cost
- 10:43Speaker 1: for businesses, for corporations. And... Yeah, you know, what we're
- 10:53Speaker 1: seeing is interest rates increase. And it's interesting. So short
- 11:00Speaker 1: rate increases supposedly, right, to fight inflation, price inflation. We're
- 11:06Speaker 1: talking about price inflation here. The price is going up.
- 11:10Speaker 1: So short-term interest rates are going up in order to
- 11:12Speaker 1: fight price inflation. If price inflation comes down in the future,
- 11:17Speaker 1: then you'd expect long-term rates to come down. So one
- 11:23Speaker 1: or two things are happening here. Either the market is
- 11:27Speaker 1: saying we don't believe that you're going to reduce inflation
- 11:30Speaker 1: significantly and therefore we're increasing interest rates in anticipation that
- 11:35Speaker 1: price inflation is going to be even higher in the future.
- 11:42Speaker 1: But that's probably not what's going on. Because a lot
- 11:45Speaker 1: of the inflation numbers, the price inflation numbers we're seeing
- 11:48Speaker 1: right now are the consequence of supply shocks, primarily the
- 11:53Speaker 1: oil shock from the war with Iran. It's more likely
- 11:58Speaker 1: that what's happening here is two things. One, the real
- 12:02Speaker 1: rate of return. That is, the amount of money people
- 12:04Speaker 1: are demanding to be compensated for lending their money, independent
- 12:12Speaker 1: of risk and independent of inflation, has gone up. And
- 12:15Speaker 1: a reason for that is likely that There's just a
- 12:22Speaker 1: lot of borrowing going on. Governments all over the world
- 12:26Speaker 1: are running massive deficits and borrowing like crazy, the United
- 12:29Speaker 1: States government leading the way. On top of that, we've
- 12:34Speaker 1: got massive private borrowing, primarily for AI infrastructure, going on
- 12:39Speaker 1: in the United States and to some extent the rest
- 12:41Speaker 1: of the world, which is very attractive to lenders, to
- 12:47Speaker 1: people who lend money. and offering interest rates much higher
- 12:51Speaker 1: than what the U.S. government is willing to offer. And
- 12:53Speaker 1: as a consequence, if you want me to invest in U.S.
- 12:57Speaker 1: government bonds, I could be investing in building AI infrastructure.
- 13:02Speaker 1: You have to offer me more money. You have to
- 13:05Speaker 1: offer me a higher real rate in order for me
- 13:07Speaker 1: to invest with you. And the third possibility, and there's
- 13:12Speaker 1: a bit of all of these probably going on, is
- 13:16Speaker 1: that as the government is accumulating more and more debt,
- 13:20Speaker 1: as it's clear that neither political party has a plan
- 13:23Speaker 1: for dealing with it. Neither political party seems to be
- 13:27Speaker 1: willing to be the adult in the room and actually
- 13:30Speaker 1: deal with the debt. The Democrats seem to be buying
- 13:33Speaker 1: into a modern monetary theory that basically says debt doesn't matter.
- 13:38Speaker 1: You can just print more money and it doesn't cause
- 13:40Speaker 1: inflation somehow. And the Republicans are buying into the idea
- 13:44Speaker 1: or the rationalization that, oh, once Trump Once tariffs go
- 13:50Speaker 1: up and Trump deregulates and taxes are down and soon
- 14:00Speaker 1: AI is going to explode and we're going to get
- 14:03Speaker 1: massive economic growth in the United States. And with massive
- 14:06Speaker 1: economic growth in the United States, tax revenue will go
- 14:08Speaker 1: through the roof, deficits will come down, and that will
- 14:12Speaker 1: solve the debt problem. Both seem fantasies. Both are fantasies.
- 14:21Speaker 1: So the market is basically saying there seems to be
- 14:25Speaker 1: no adults in the room. Nobody actually responsible. Nobody actually
- 14:30Speaker 1: thinking this through over the long run and therefore the
- 14:32Speaker 1: probability that the U.S. will actually pay back its debt
- 14:37Speaker 1: is going down. You know, pay back its debt in
- 14:41Speaker 1: reasonably priced dollars. Pay back its debt with a lot
- 14:44Speaker 1: of inflation. That everybody believes is possible, but that's Not good, right?
- 14:50Speaker 1: So that feeds the inflation story. One way or the other,
- 14:54Speaker 1: the risk of not being paid back in the future
- 14:57Speaker 1: with reasonably priced value dollars has gone up, and therefore
- 15:01Speaker 1: the risk premium is increasing on U.S. government debt, which
- 15:04Speaker 1: used to be considered risk-free, but now maybe is not
- 15:08Speaker 1: so risk-free. So interest rates are going, are really increasing significantly. And...
- 15:20Speaker 1: What's interesting, though, at the same time as that is happening,
- 15:23Speaker 1: so you'd expect economic growth to slow down. You'd expect
- 15:28Speaker 1: economic activity to slow down. You'd expect, because of the
- 15:32Speaker 1: higher cost of borrowing, for companies to borrow less, for
- 15:36Speaker 1: investors to borrow less, and as a consequence for economic
- 15:41Speaker 1: activity to slow down. That has not happened in the
- 15:43Speaker 1: United States. This economy is still chugging along. It's still growing.
- 15:50Speaker 1: employment is still growing, the numbers indicate. Investment is still growing, again,
- 15:54Speaker 1: primarily AI, but across the economy. And the U.S. economy
- 15:59Speaker 1: is not doing badly, in spite of all these negative signals,
- 16:05Speaker 1: in spite of the debt, in spite of the high
- 16:08Speaker 1: interest rates. How long this can continue is hard to tell.
- 16:14Speaker 1: How high interest rates will go, I don't know. It,
- 16:17Speaker 1: to a large extent, depends on whether price inflation will
- 16:21Speaker 1: increase or not. For example, if a deal is cut
- 16:23Speaker 1: somehow with Iran, we'll get to in a minute, or
- 16:26Speaker 1: prices come down, prices come down, the Fed, you know,
- 16:33Speaker 1: at least the supply side pressures and prices will go away.
- 16:38Speaker 1: And then it's just a question of how much of
- 16:40Speaker 1: this inflation is supply side, for example, oil. versus the
- 16:47Speaker 1: Fed printing what we used to call printing money, creating money. M2,
- 16:52Speaker 1: which is a measure of money growth, grew 5.7% over
- 16:58Speaker 1: the last year. That's a lot. And it doesn't seem
- 17:05Speaker 1: like the Fed is working to shrink the money supply
- 17:10Speaker 1: anytime soon. So exactly how this all plays out is
- 17:16Speaker 1: very hard to tell. So we will see. Now, there's
- 17:23Speaker 1: counter evidence. I mean, for example, PIMCO, the big bond investor,
- 17:27Speaker 1: says that they find limited evidence that AI debt is
- 17:31Speaker 1: directly displacing treasury buyers. So if it's not AI, what
- 17:35Speaker 1: is it? And the spreads over AI have widened. So
- 17:42Speaker 1: People are paying higher interest rates in order to borrow
- 17:47Speaker 1: money for AI investments. So again, you know exactly how
- 17:55Speaker 1: we interpret all this. I don't know. It's a mess.
- 17:59Speaker 1: Exactly how this all plays out, I don't know. It
- 18:02Speaker 1: really depends on how badly people believe the U.S. economy
- 18:07Speaker 1: is doing or how badly the U.S. economy is doing. Okay.
- 18:11Speaker 1: It's how badly people think the... How they estimate the
- 18:19Speaker 1: probability that the U.S. government is either going to default
- 18:21Speaker 1: or inflate away the debt and whether anybody is going
- 18:24Speaker 1: to rise to the occasion and talk about the debt
- 18:27Speaker 1: and talk about a plan to actually deal with it.
- 18:31Speaker 1: It doesn't seem like any of that is happening, so
- 18:33Speaker 1: it does look like we are going to see rising
- 18:36Speaker 1: interest rates, interest rates going back to the pre-COVID era
- 18:40Speaker 1: of basically zero, that ain't happening. That ain't happening. We
- 18:48Speaker 1: are now in a new interest rate environment. Even if
- 18:50Speaker 1: inflation goes down to two, those long-term rates are still
- 18:56Speaker 1: going to be at around four probably, and nowhere near
- 19:01Speaker 1: the 2%, 1% long-term interest rates that we had during
- 19:08Speaker 1: the zero interest rate era that was before COVID and
- 19:14Speaker 1: then during the COVID era. So we don't know. There's
- 19:19Speaker 1: a huge economic uncertainty around interest rates that affects every
- 19:23Speaker 1: aspect of our economy. And it could also lead ultimately
- 19:29Speaker 1: to a significant recession if the Fed gets really serious
- 19:33Speaker 1: about dealing with monetary inflation and actually decides to reduce,
- 19:39Speaker 1: to shrink M2, the money supply, it's hard to tell
- 19:43Speaker 1: what kind of impact that will have on the economy.
- 19:45Speaker 1: But look, the deregulation, the tax cuts, and just the
- 19:54Speaker 1: dynamism of the U.S. economy and the tech industry is
- 19:57Speaker 1: keeping the U.S. economy chugging along and moving along. One
- 20:01Speaker 1: can only imagine how well the U.S. economy could be
- 20:04Speaker 1: doing right now if we got the and maybe even
- 20:12Speaker 1: some tax cuts without the tariffs and without an everlasting
- 20:20Speaker 1: war with Iran. Imagine the impact that would have on
- 20:24Speaker 1: the U.S. economy and what would be possible. We'll never know.
- 20:30Speaker 1: But it's kind of sad. But that's the problem with
- 20:34Speaker 1: a mixed economy. It's always going to be, you know,
- 20:39Speaker 1: two-step forward, three-step back, or whatever the combination happens to be,
- 20:43Speaker 1: depending on the particular policies that politicians engage in. Ricardo says,
- 20:58Speaker 1: you aren't talking about the real economy. Politics destroys it,
- 21:01Speaker 1: now the blame game. I don't know what you're talking about.
- 21:05Speaker 1: You cannot separate the real economy in the world in
- 21:08Speaker 1: which we live, from politics. The real economy is influenced
- 21:12Speaker 1: by the actions of the Federal Reserve, which is a
- 21:17Speaker 1: political institution. At the end of the day, it is
- 21:20Speaker 1: a central planning institution. You can't separate the real economy
- 21:23Speaker 1: from regulatory policy. You can't separate the real economy from
- 21:27Speaker 1: tax policy, like tariffs and other taxes. And, you know,
- 21:32Speaker 1: at the end of the day, the... the real economy
- 21:37Speaker 1: functions within a context and that all sets the context.
- 21:41Speaker 1: And right now the real economy is doing okay in
- 21:45Speaker 1: spite of a lot of politics, a lot of political actions,
- 21:53Speaker 1: a lot of central planning actions that are ultimately detrimental economically.
- 22:01Speaker 1: All right. So we will keep following the interest rate story.
- 22:07Speaker 1: Stocks are down today. But, you know, stocks, in spite
- 22:10Speaker 1: of being down again today, are still close to their
- 22:14Speaker 1: all-time highs. You know, the market is still up significantly,
- 22:20Speaker 1: double digits for the year. Let's see the S &
- 22:22Speaker 1: P 500. S & P 500 is up. So at
- 22:24Speaker 1: least at this point, the... For the market and for
- 22:35Speaker 1: the large companies that are traded in the market, the
- 22:40Speaker 1: positive growth stories, particularly in AI and tech, outpace the
- 22:45Speaker 1: increased interest rates. I told you, as interest rates increase,
- 22:48Speaker 1: all else held constant, asset prices decline, but not all
- 22:53Speaker 1: else is holding constant. Not all else is holding constant.
- 22:57Speaker 1: How's gold doing? I don't know what to make of
- 23:00Speaker 1: the price of gold, so you guys will have to decide.
- 23:03Speaker 1: Gold is just above 4,000, 4,165. It's down 3.6% today.
- 23:08Speaker 1: Part of the reason for that is as the interest
- 23:11Speaker 1: rates go up, holding gold becomes, in a sense, more
- 23:15Speaker 1: expensive because your opportunity cost is to hold cash and
- 23:19Speaker 1: you could sell the gold and buy U.S. Treasuries and
- 23:22Speaker 1: get a yield of 5%. Holding the gold, you don't
- 23:27Speaker 1: get a yield. So, and again, at 4,000, is gold,
- 23:38Speaker 1: you know, how right is gold priced? What does that
- 23:40Speaker 1: even mean? How do you value gold relative to what?
- 23:45Speaker 1: Is it in purchasing power? Is gold money? But it's
- 23:47Speaker 1: not money. Nobody uses it as money. So why would
- 23:50Speaker 1: we associate it with purchasing power? So what is the
- 23:53Speaker 1: true value of gold? I mean, it's whatever people want
- 23:55Speaker 1: to buy and sell it for. Gold is up as
- 24:01Speaker 1: interest rates go up because the value of holding gold
- 24:04Speaker 1: versus cash diminishes. And maybe interest rates going up is
- 24:11Speaker 1: a signal that price inflation is under control and therefore
- 24:17Speaker 1: the purchasing power of gold is likely to decline, not
- 24:21Speaker 1: to go up, because to the extent it's an inflation hedge.
- 24:24Speaker 1: But I don't really believe it's an inflation hedge. I
- 24:28Speaker 1: just think it's speculative assets. Andrew says, do you think
- 24:34Speaker 1: that Trump understands the intricacies of interest rate truths? I
- 24:37Speaker 1: don't think anybody really fully understands them. Interest rates are really, really,
- 24:43Speaker 1: really complex because there are many interest rates. Short-term interest rate,
- 24:48Speaker 1: there's an overnight interest rate, which is what the Fed determines,
- 24:52Speaker 1: which is an interest rate paid on reserves held by
- 24:56Speaker 1: banks at the Fed. And then there's an interest rate
- 25:00Speaker 1: that is treasury bills, which is three months, six months,
- 25:06Speaker 1: one year treasuries, and then there's a two-year and a
- 25:08Speaker 1: five-year and a 10-year and a 30-year. Which interest rates
- 25:11Speaker 1: are you talking about? How do they all relate to
- 25:13Speaker 1: one another? Do they all move in the same direction?
- 25:15Speaker 1: Do they move in different directions? How do interest rates
- 25:18Speaker 1: relate to other asset classes? And what do interest rate
- 25:22Speaker 1: changes mean? Do they mean a change in inflation expectations?
- 25:25Speaker 1: Do they mean a change in the real interest Demand
- 25:29Speaker 1: for return, real rate, or do they mean a change
- 25:33Speaker 1: in risk? There's so many different moving parts here. This
- 25:37Speaker 1: is the beauty of markets. Markets integrate all that information,
- 25:41Speaker 1: but to undo what it is that the market is
- 25:44Speaker 1: actually signaling, what all this actually means, is very difficult,
- 25:49Speaker 1: and we can assess it. You can estimate it, but
- 25:57Speaker 1: it's almost... It's almost impossible to ultimately completely unwind the
- 26:08Speaker 1: complexity and explain everything. And what you get in the
- 26:14Speaker 1: marketplace is an integration of what the players in the marketplace,
- 26:19Speaker 1: that is the traders, the people who buy and sell stocks,
- 26:23Speaker 1: what they believe. It's an integration of their beliefs and
- 26:27Speaker 1: their knowledge and their understanding. undoing that is complicated. So no,
- 26:34Speaker 1: I don't think Trump understands, but I don't think, it's
- 26:37Speaker 1: not that I believe other people have a solid understanding
- 26:40Speaker 1: of it either. And there are lots of things you
- 26:42Speaker 1: can look at. You can look at, like there are
- 26:44Speaker 1: bonds out there that the interest rate they pay is
- 26:49Speaker 1: adjusted to inflation. So these inflation-protected bonds, well, they have
- 26:53Speaker 1: gone down in price as well, so their yield has
- 26:55Speaker 1: gone up. And that suggests that investors are demanding a
- 26:59Speaker 1: higher real rate of return, a higher return on their investments,
- 27:07Speaker 1: independent of inflation risk, because inflation-adjusted bonds take out the
- 27:19Speaker 1: risk of inflation. Just one more complication, you know, and again,
- 27:25Speaker 1: you can look at lots of other things. All right.
- 27:31Speaker 1: So last week, I guess, everybody was at the United Nations.
- 27:37Speaker 1: It was United Nations Week in New York City, where
- 27:40Speaker 1: delegates or leaders from all over the world descend on
- 27:44Speaker 1: New York City and give speeches. Netanyahu was there. Trump
- 27:47Speaker 1: was there. And shockingly, and it's hard for me to
- 27:52Speaker 1: even express this in words. It's hard to really. It's
- 27:57Speaker 1: just shocking. The president of Iran was in New York
- 28:00Speaker 1: City giving a speech. The president of Iran. The president
- 28:04Speaker 1: of a country that we are at war with. I
- 28:10Speaker 1: guess a potential target for U.S. bombing when we bomb Iran.
- 28:15Speaker 1: And yet he was in New York. And he wasn't stopped.
- 28:18Speaker 1: He wasn't arrested. He wasn't shot. He came to give
- 28:21Speaker 1: a speech at the U.N. and U.S. authorities let it happen.
- 28:26Speaker 1: It's just bizarre that you let an enemy leader, an enemy,
- 28:30Speaker 1: an explicit enemy, there's Hot war going on. Actual shooting.
- 28:37Speaker 1: You let an enemy leader into your country. And, you know,
- 28:41Speaker 1: I don't care if this is the United Nations or not.
- 28:44Speaker 1: I mean, I have my opinions about the United Nations.
- 28:46Speaker 1: I think you all know what they are. But it's just,
- 28:49Speaker 1: it's truly unbelievable that this is how, this is, you know,
- 28:56Speaker 1: we don't take war seriously. They say, do you have
- 28:58Speaker 1: an enemy? Enemy today, friend tomorrow. I mean, for all
- 29:02Speaker 1: I know, the president of Iran will be best friends,
- 29:05Speaker 1: will be pen pals with Trump in a year. I mean,
- 29:10Speaker 1: who knows? There are no principles. There's no judgment. There's
- 29:17Speaker 1: no judgment. So anyway, the president of Iran was at
- 29:19Speaker 1: the UN, and part of his spiel was that he
- 29:23Speaker 1: was offering a new plan to get negotiations with the
- 29:27Speaker 1: United States going again. Trump immediately rejected it. Iran's latest
- 29:33Speaker 1: proposal over this weekend. But it sounds like negotiations are
- 29:37Speaker 1: continuing and there are rumors now. in some of the
- 29:41Speaker 1: Arab press that Trump is actually quite eager to settle
- 29:46Speaker 1: this and to negotiate a deal with the Iranians. So
- 29:50Speaker 1: what did Iran propose? Iran has proposed to reopen the
- 29:52Speaker 1: state of Hormuz within one week, resume nuclear negotiations. with
- 29:58Speaker 1: the United States. Hooray! They'll resume negotiations. All conditional on U.S.
- 30:03Speaker 1: concessions that include relief from the blockade and oil sanctions,
- 30:08Speaker 1: which are really hurting the Iranian economy. And maybe even
- 30:12Speaker 1: the freezing of some of the money that is frozen
- 30:18Speaker 1: in various international accounts. Trump rejected the proposal, as I said,
- 30:22Speaker 1: over the weekend. But, you know, as of today, There
- 30:27Speaker 1: are reports describing continued discussions through a variety of different mediators,
- 30:32Speaker 1: and I don't think anybody thinks that Trump rejecting this
- 30:35Speaker 1: proposal means that he has actually rejected it. A U.S.
- 30:40Speaker 1: official told CNN that sanctions relief and frozen funds could
- 30:44Speaker 1: form part of a final agreement if Iran made concrete
- 30:48Speaker 1: progress on nuclear issues. Washington's stated objective was that Tehran
- 30:53Speaker 1: wanted too much relief before delivering nuclear commitments. Now, here's
- 31:00Speaker 1: the problem. What does nuclear commitments mean? Like, Iran has
- 31:04Speaker 1: suggested it might be willing to hand over the enriched uranium.
- 31:08Speaker 1: What prevents Iran from enriching more uranium? Is Iran willing
- 31:13Speaker 1: to give up its centrifuges? Very deep, deep, deep, deep, deep,
- 31:19Speaker 1: where American bombs cannot reach them, we think. Are they
- 31:24Speaker 1: willing to give up the centrifuges? No. That's never been
- 31:27Speaker 1: something that was on the table in terms of the
- 31:30Speaker 1: Iranian position. They maintain the right to continue to enrich uranium.
- 31:41Speaker 1: So giving up the stockpile, okay, better than nothing. But
- 31:46Speaker 1: they can just start again. And if you unfreeze their assets...
- 31:54Speaker 1: And you do away with the sanctions. Suddenly they've got
- 31:55Speaker 1: money flowing into Iran. And the Iranian regime can take
- 31:59Speaker 1: all that money and pour it into ballistic missiles and
- 32:02Speaker 1: drones and restarting its nuclear program. And you're back to
- 32:06Speaker 1: square one. And the whole thing was for nothing. So
- 32:13Speaker 1: the whole thing is a charade. The whole thing is
- 32:16Speaker 1: a joke. There's only one way this can end. There
- 32:20Speaker 1: are only two ways this can end. One is either
- 32:23Speaker 1: America wins... which would require basically regime change in Iran,
- 32:30Speaker 1: or the United States loses, and that means we're back
- 32:33Speaker 1: to where we were before the war. It won't be worse,
- 32:37Speaker 1: except for the fact that Iran now knows that it
- 32:42Speaker 1: has a weapon almost as powerful as a nuclear bomb,
- 32:45Speaker 1: and that is their ability to shut down the Strait
- 32:47Speaker 1: of Hormuz. And everybody's talking about these pipelines, and I
- 32:50Speaker 1: talked about the pipelines that are going to take oil
- 32:53Speaker 1: away from the homo straits, straight to Turkey, to Syria,
- 32:59Speaker 1: to the Mediterranean, and maybe to the Red Sea. But
- 33:02Speaker 1: what the Houthis have shown is that they can target
- 33:05Speaker 1: those pipelines. They can shut down the alternative routes. And,
- 33:10Speaker 1: you know, if Iran has more money, it will buy
- 33:13Speaker 1: influence in the Middle East. It will reinforce the Houthis.
- 33:17Speaker 1: And not only will they have the homo strait, but
- 33:20Speaker 1: they will have through ballistic missiles and drones, the ability
- 33:23Speaker 1: to shut down all transportation everywhere else in the Middle East.
- 33:28Speaker 1: So again, you're back to where you were, but you've
- 33:30Speaker 1: given the Iranians and even a weapon. I think they
- 33:33Speaker 1: always realized they had, but now they know exactly how
- 33:38Speaker 1: painful it is for the United States when they shut
- 33:42Speaker 1: down the state of home wars and everything else. And
- 33:45Speaker 1: by the way, I mean, look at oil prices right now.
- 33:48Speaker 1: Oil prices above 100. The U.S. is claiming the Strait
- 33:52Speaker 1: of Hormuz is open, that oil is flowing out, and
- 33:55Speaker 1: maybe it is. Why are oil prices so high? I mean,
- 33:59Speaker 1: it could be the damage the Ukrainians are doing to
- 34:02Speaker 1: Russia is driving prices higher, and that's the cause. I
- 34:10Speaker 1: don't think so. I think oil prices are higher. This
- 34:13Speaker 1: is my reading of the situation. Obviously, the Strait of
- 34:16Speaker 1: Hormuz is not back to normal. It's still significantly below normal.
- 34:21Speaker 1: normal rates. The difference is, over the last few weeks is,
- 34:25Speaker 1: in spite of the fact that the U.S. has somewhat
- 34:27Speaker 1: opened up the strait and more oil is flowing, is
- 34:31Speaker 1: that China started buying oil again. There was a period
- 34:34Speaker 1: during the early part of the war, actually the first
- 34:37Speaker 1: few months of the war, where China basically cut its
- 34:42Speaker 1: demand for oil dramatically. It used reserves, it used other things,
- 34:48Speaker 1: it just cut demand for oil. And that allowed oil
- 34:52Speaker 1: prices never to spike up to as high as people
- 34:55Speaker 1: were afraid it would. I think China's back to buying oil,
- 34:58Speaker 1: and as a consequence of that, prices are going up significantly.
- 35:03Speaker 1: We'll see. We'll also see what Trump's strategy is. Is
- 35:08Speaker 1: he going to try to cut a deal before the midterms,
- 35:11Speaker 1: declare victory, and try to sway some votes that way?
- 35:14Speaker 1: Or is he going to wait it out and then
- 35:19Speaker 1: deal with Iran after the election when the election is
- 35:23Speaker 1: not kind of hovering above him as kind of a
- 35:27Speaker 1: threatening reality. I don't know. There is... Yeah, I don't
- 35:37Speaker 1: know what his strategy is going to be. I don't
- 35:39Speaker 1: know what Trump does. I tend to think he cuts
- 35:43Speaker 1: a deal before the election. Any deal. Just to show progress.
- 35:48Speaker 1: with the hope that that sways some electorates. So I
- 35:53Speaker 1: expect negotiations will continue in the next few weeks as
- 35:55Speaker 1: we approach election time. Okay, it sounds like, you know,
- 36:03Speaker 1: Xi was in Washington last week, and Xi and Trump
- 36:07Speaker 1: had meetings, and Xi did not address the UN. He
- 36:12Speaker 1: was just there to see Trump. It was a red
- 36:14Speaker 1: carpet treatment all the way, I mean, Xi was treated
- 36:19Speaker 1: better by Trump in D.C. than Trump was treated by
- 36:22Speaker 1: Xi in Beijing. But that's Trump. Trump is a groveler.
- 36:26Speaker 1: And when a big foreign authoritarian leader visits Washington, D.C.,
- 36:33Speaker 1: Trump goes all out to show him respect. Anyway, Trump,
- 36:39Speaker 1: they met and discussed a bunch of issues. Not clear
- 36:42Speaker 1: exactly what came of those meetings or what value they presented,
- 36:46Speaker 1: but it does seem like They've agreed, the U.S. and
- 36:50Speaker 1: China have agreed on some kind of list of products
- 36:57Speaker 1: that they will, in both directions, that they will lower
- 37:01Speaker 1: tariffs on. It turns out, and I don't know why
- 37:05Speaker 1: and who knew this, it turns out that when you
- 37:08Speaker 1: raise tariffs, prices domestically go up, and voters don't like
- 37:15Speaker 1: prices going up, and they might vote against you, so
- 37:18Speaker 1: Lowering tariffs lowers prices, and maybe that's a good thing.
- 37:21Speaker 1: Maybe it turns out that lower tariffs is better than
- 37:24Speaker 1: higher tariffs. I mean, who knew? This is a complete
- 37:27Speaker 1: shock and surprise, it seems to many people. But Trump
- 37:30Speaker 1: is negotiating with the Chinese to both lower tariffs. Now, remember,
- 37:34Speaker 1: as much as they're going to lower tariffs now on
- 37:36Speaker 1: about $ 30 billion worth of goods, they'll still be higher
- 37:39Speaker 1: than what they were before Trump started this stupid trade war,
- 37:43Speaker 1: including the tariffs the Chinese placed on American goods. China
- 37:47Speaker 1: was already reducing, dramatically reducing tariffs on American goods. All
- 37:55Speaker 1: that Trump managed to do is get the Chinese to
- 37:56Speaker 1: raise tariffs on American goods, hurting American exporters, and now
- 38:02Speaker 1: is trying to negotiate them to reduce them a little bit. But,
- 38:06Speaker 1: you know, it's going to take a long, long time,
- 38:08Speaker 1: I think, before they go back up, before the tariffs
- 38:13Speaker 1: go low, as low as they were before Trump started
- 38:16Speaker 1: all this nonsense. So, yes, we will see what happens,
- 38:31Speaker 1: whether these lower trade barriers actually work. Well, if they
- 38:37Speaker 1: actually get implemented. So far, it's just a proposal. They've
- 38:40Speaker 1: each listed the goods, and they still have to negotiate.
- 38:43Speaker 1: But it would be nice if the United States started
- 38:46Speaker 1: negotiating with countries about lowering tariffs instead of about increasing tariffs.
- 38:55Speaker 1: Because it turns out tariffs raised prices. Again, who knew?
- 38:57Speaker 1: All right, this is kind of an unbelievable story that's,
- 39:03Speaker 1: I don't know, maybe it shouldn't be unbelievable, but it's
- 39:07Speaker 1: pretty shocking. And it tells you a lot about, if
- 39:11Speaker 1: you will, the state of British politics. And we're not
- 39:13Speaker 1: talking about just here the Labour Party, but both the
- 39:15Speaker 1: Conservative and Labour Party, because I think some of this
- 39:18Speaker 1: happened during the Conservatives. So there's a Times of London
- 39:23Speaker 1: story that came out September 26th, two days ago. And
- 39:31Speaker 1: I'm just going to read you from the story. A
- 39:34Speaker 1: former bodyguard of the leader of Hamas secured asylum and
- 39:41Speaker 1: citizenship in Britain before plotting a terrorist attack against Jews
- 39:46Speaker 1: in Europe before the second anniversary of the October 7th massacre.
- 39:51Speaker 1: So this is a Mr. X. They can't identify him
- 39:54Speaker 1: because he's got anonymity. He cannot be named for legal reasons.
- 40:01Speaker 1: This Mr. X served in the personal security team of
- 40:05Speaker 1: Ismail Haniyeh, right? This is the military leader of Hamas
- 40:10Speaker 1: in Gaza, who was then the leader of Hamas in
- 40:13Speaker 1: Gaza and later chairman of its political bureau, right? He actually,
- 40:20Speaker 1: Haniyeh was, you know, outside. He then, so he was
- 40:26Speaker 1: leader of Hamas in Gaza, later chairman of the Politico Bureau,
- 40:30Speaker 1: before moving to the UK more than a decade ago.
- 40:32Speaker 1: This is the Mr. X. At the time he was
- 40:36Speaker 1: awarded refugee status, right, it was public knowledge that he
- 40:42Speaker 1: had worked for Haniyeh, worked for Haniyeh as his, you know, bodyguard.
- 40:47Speaker 1: was the son of another senior Hamas official and had
- 40:51Speaker 1: been arrested in Egypt for operating a tunnel allegedly used
- 40:54Speaker 1: to smuggle firearms and gold into Gaza. Yet Mr. Axe
- 40:59Speaker 1: was granted sanctuary and apparently able to operate under deep
- 41:04Speaker 1: cover as an IT consultant living in the suburbs of
- 41:08Speaker 1: a large English city. The married father, in his 40s,
- 41:16Speaker 1: changed his legal name more than once and is not
- 41:18Speaker 1: thought to have been a priority for the British security
- 41:21Speaker 1: services as he began coordinating with Hamas terrorists on the continent. See, here's,
- 41:28Speaker 1: you know, this was a decade ago, a major figure
- 41:31Speaker 1: from Hamas, one of the major security guards for the
- 41:34Speaker 1: leader of Hamas who managed the tunnel to bring gold,
- 41:38Speaker 1: you know, and came to Britain and asked for asylum.
- 41:40Speaker 1: I mean, asylum. Why not? He's just a terrorist. Why
- 41:44Speaker 1: not give him asylum? Now, today, he faces extradition to
- 41:53Speaker 1: Germany where he is accused of being a leading figure
- 41:57Speaker 1: in a plot to attack Jewish community centers according to
- 42:01Speaker 1: Israeli diplomats and pro-Israeli demonstrations there or in neighboring Austria
- 42:05Speaker 1: in October. So, Surprise, surprise, here's a terrorist who continues
- 42:15Speaker 1: terrorist activities after he gets asylum in Great Britain. National
- 42:23Speaker 1: Crime Agency officers arrested Mr. X in central London last
- 42:26Speaker 1: November after Mossad and Germany's security and intelligence services learned
- 42:30Speaker 1: of the planned attack. Berlin worked with partners in Austria, Denmark,
- 42:34Speaker 1: and UK to detain seven suspects and gather weapons, including
- 42:38Speaker 1: an AK-47 assault rifle. Mr. X is accused. of transporting weapons,
- 42:43Speaker 1: including handguns and live ammunition, to a storage facility in Vienna,
- 42:47Speaker 1: according to the German indictment. So, you know, when they
- 42:53Speaker 1: talk about asylum seekers and stuff, some of them are...
- 42:57Speaker 1: This actually reminds me of the plot of Fauda, season 5.
- 43:02Speaker 1: If you haven't seen Fauda, it's a must-see show. This
- 43:06Speaker 1: fifth season is... Amazing. Everybody should watch it. It's shocking.
- 43:14Speaker 1: It's disturbing. It is not for the weak of heart,
- 43:19Speaker 1: but everybody should watch it, even the weak of heart,
- 43:21Speaker 1: because you need to see this. You need to see it.
- 43:24Speaker 1: I will be doing a whole show. The AK-47 was
- 43:28Speaker 1: not in central London. The AK-47 was stored in Austria.
- 43:33Speaker 1: I will be doing a whole show with Nikos just
- 43:36Speaker 1: on Fowler, and we'll talk about Fowler season five. Anyway,
- 43:39Speaker 1: this story reminds me of some of the subplot, some
- 43:41Speaker 1: of the plot in Fowler Season 5. But again, everybody
- 43:44Speaker 1: should watch it, and you guys should. I'm giving you
- 43:46Speaker 1: a heads up now. We'll do the show in a
- 43:48Speaker 1: few weeks, so you've got time to binge watch all
- 43:52Speaker 1: the five seasons of Fowler. I particularly recommend Season 1
- 43:56Speaker 1: and 2 and Season 5. 1, 2, 3, 4 I
- 44:01Speaker 1: think is the weakest of the seasons. But I highly
- 44:03Speaker 1: recommend you watch them all. It's one of the most
- 44:09Speaker 1: powerful shows you will ever see and one of the
- 44:14Speaker 1: most realistic in terms of counterterrorism. And yeah, it's powerful, powerful.
- 44:21Speaker 1: So you should watch it before my show with Nikos.
- 44:24Speaker 1: So I'm telling you now, it's all on Netflix, all
- 44:28Speaker 1: five seasons. Season five, I binge-watched it on flights to
- 44:31Speaker 1: Tbilisi and from Tbilisi. And yeah, all I can say is,
- 44:37Speaker 1: There were at least two shows. It's, I think, the
- 44:41Speaker 1: 11 chapters, 11 episodes. There were at least two episodes
- 44:47Speaker 1: in which I basically had tears in my eyes the
- 44:50Speaker 1: entire time watching. It was so emotionally powerful, upsetting, depressing, sad.
- 45:03Speaker 1: But at least two of the shows, it was like, oh,
- 45:06Speaker 1: my God. They're actually showing this. And, I mean, the
- 45:10Speaker 1: two episodes deal with October 7th. And they deal with
- 45:16Speaker 1: it in a very, very powerful way. So highly recommend.
- 45:20Speaker 1: And I think everybody should watch it. I think everybody
- 45:22Speaker 1: should know what happened. And what they show is a
- 45:26Speaker 1: toned-down version of what actually happened. As brutal as it is.
- 45:32Speaker 1: As brutal as it is. I mean, I've got images
- 45:35Speaker 1: in my head right now. because I'm talking about it,
- 45:37Speaker 1: and it, you know, tears, you know. Anyway, go watch Fowler. Anyway,
- 45:44Speaker 1: the indictment says, he pre-recorded a video in which he
- 45:48Speaker 1: appears masked and armed in front of a Hamas flag,
- 45:51Speaker 1: describing the planned attack as an act of retribution on
- 45:54Speaker 1: behalf of Ezzeddine al-Qassam Brigade, Hamas's military wing. A law
- 46:01Speaker 1: enforcement source claimed he was an essential figure in the plot.
- 46:05Speaker 1: Only a few days ago, police foiled a fairly imminent
- 46:08Speaker 1: attack against the Jewish community in Manchester, where two men
- 46:11Speaker 1: were killed at a synagogue during an assault by a
- 46:13Speaker 1: jihadi armed with a knife and a fake suicide vest
- 46:17Speaker 1: last year on Yom Kippur. So, England is becoming pretty
- 46:24Speaker 1: dangerous territory. But here's a guy who you'd think could
- 46:29Speaker 1: never get asylum because he worked for a terrorist organization.
- 46:34Speaker 1: You'd think would be monitored by the security organizations. Obviously not.
- 46:38Speaker 1: He's smuggling weapons into Germany and Austria. I'm glad he's caught.
- 46:43Speaker 1: I'm glad they've taken care of him. But again, this
- 46:46Speaker 1: is under conservative government. This was done when the conservatives
- 46:49Speaker 1: were in power. Why are they giving asylum to a
- 46:53Speaker 1: Hamas bodyguard? What is, what's the goal here? What benefit
- 46:59Speaker 1: does the United Kingdom get from this? What, Model statutes?
- 47:04Speaker 1: Does this give them? Christian, keep that question for... Keep
- 47:19Speaker 1: that question for the show I do with Nikos. Christian's
- 47:28Speaker 1: question is about Fowler. So... We'll talk about that when
- 47:34Speaker 1: we do the show. All right. Some interesting AI, a
- 47:42Speaker 1: couple of interesting AI stories. They're actually part of the
- 47:45Speaker 1: good news, if you will. So you've heard all the
- 47:49Speaker 1: stories about AI agents going rogue and hacking into websites.
- 47:55Speaker 1: And the level of hysteria about AI exterminating human beings
- 48:00Speaker 1: has risen to, unprecedented levels and people are panicking. And
- 48:06Speaker 1: there's a massive call for government regulations across the board.
- 48:09Speaker 1: There are very few people actually defending AI at this point. And,
- 48:14Speaker 1: you know, there's really panic out there. And I think
- 48:17Speaker 1: people really believe the panic. That is, it's not artificial.
- 48:22Speaker 1: There is a real sense of we could all die.
- 48:30Speaker 1: AI could kill us all. And AI can do a
- 48:35Speaker 1: lot of damage. And of course, we've talked about this,
- 48:37Speaker 1: and I think the one thing I'd like to see
- 48:39Speaker 1: really play out is holding AI companies liable for the
- 48:44Speaker 1: AI as the agents that they unleash in the world
- 48:47Speaker 1: and what they do with them. Now, individuals should be
- 48:50Speaker 1: held accountable for what they do with agents that they
- 48:53Speaker 1: program to do bad stuff. But the AI companies, if
- 48:58Speaker 1: their agents are doing damage, economic or other kinds of
- 49:03Speaker 1: damage in the world. They should be held accountable. They
- 49:06Speaker 1: should be held liable. But as I've said all along,
- 49:14Speaker 1: one of the ways in which we're going to deal
- 49:16Speaker 1: with the threats, the real threats, the legitimate threats that
- 49:20Speaker 1: AI represents, one of the ways to deal with that
- 49:23Speaker 1: is going to be with AI. That is, the best
- 49:26Speaker 1: tool we have to deal with AI problems is AI.
- 49:33Speaker 1: And we're seeing this, and there are two interesting stories
- 49:36Speaker 1: in this regard. One is out of NVIDIA. So NVIDIA
- 49:40Speaker 1: announced a platform that is designed to enforce boundaries around
- 49:45Speaker 1: AI agents through software and independent hardware controls. So, you know,
- 49:56Speaker 1: think about what an agent does. An agent can go
- 49:59Speaker 1: out there, which is kind of an AI, right, an
- 50:01Speaker 1: AI program. It goes out there and edits files. It
- 50:06Speaker 1: runs software. It accesses. companies, services, systems. A useful agent
- 50:13Speaker 1: needs permissions, but an operator also needs, you also need
- 50:18Speaker 1: to place limits on the agent. And sometimes the limits
- 50:23Speaker 1: cannot simply be rewritten in advance because you don't know
- 50:27Speaker 1: what exactly they are. You don't know what situations the
- 50:30Speaker 1: agent will encounter out there. So how do we create
- 50:35Speaker 1: boundaries on these agents? outside the AI software itself. And
- 50:42Speaker 1: NVIDIA now is invested in this company called OpenShell. It's
- 50:46Speaker 1: an open source, runtime software that traces actions and enforces policies. So,
- 50:53Speaker 1: for example, Sentry is a reference system using NVIDIA Bluefield
- 50:57Speaker 1: 4 hardware, and it monitors the activity independently. And it
- 51:04Speaker 1: quarantines agents that breach boundaries. That is, it It creates
- 51:08Speaker 1: walls around them. It limits their access. Now, I'm reading
- 51:15Speaker 1: this to you from news sources. I don't completely understand
- 51:18Speaker 1: what this is. But the point is, we're using here
- 51:21Speaker 1: AI to monitor other AI to make sure that other
- 51:25Speaker 1: AI doesn't exceed the boundaries that the company has set
- 51:31Speaker 1: for it. NVIDIA says quarantine can happen in milliseconds. And,
- 51:42Speaker 1: you know, that's the claim. Now, NVIDIA says the platform
- 51:49Speaker 1: software is available through its developer resources in GitHub. And
- 51:55Speaker 1: it also says it has a hardware, what's called the
- 51:58Speaker 1: hardware reference design, and integration at different stages. And the
- 52:04Speaker 1: idea is that the hardware will present barriers to what
- 52:12Speaker 1: the AI agents can do and penetrate. They're working with Anthropic, Microsoft, CrowdStrike,
- 52:22Speaker 1: and other AI companies with this. And I'm sure they're
- 52:25Speaker 1: going to be competitors. They're going to be other people
- 52:27Speaker 1: doing the same thing. Of course, NVIDIA has the advantage
- 52:30Speaker 1: of being able to put the software integrated completely into
- 52:34Speaker 1: the hardware, which is primarily NVIDIA chips, right? The open
- 52:38Speaker 1: source software is open shell. Sentry is a hardware-based reference system, right? Now, again,
- 52:48Speaker 1: I don't understand all this stuff. I'm not a software engineer.
- 52:52Speaker 1: I can program a little bit, used to program a
- 52:55Speaker 1: little bit. This is way above my pay grade. But
- 52:59Speaker 1: this is a fascinating story of how the industry itself
- 53:02Speaker 1: is now building tools to try to rein in rogue AI,
- 53:09Speaker 1: the AI that's doing stuff that it's not supposed to do,
- 53:12Speaker 1: that's doing potentially damaging activities. And this is exactly what
- 53:17Speaker 1: you'd expect would happen. NVIDIA has a massive incentive to
- 53:25Speaker 1: make sure that the AI models, even though it doesn't
- 53:28Speaker 1: own any models, that the AI models, although it's invested
- 53:31Speaker 1: in many of them, The AI models are safe to
- 53:34Speaker 1: use and not going to do damage because they're running
- 53:38Speaker 1: in its hard way. And if people decide to abandon AI,
- 53:42Speaker 1: and that seems to be the trend out there among
- 53:45Speaker 1: the population, NVIDIA loses. It loses future sales. It has
- 53:50Speaker 1: a massive profit motive to invest heavily in trying to
- 53:54Speaker 1: police AI. Now, there's also this threat of AI. creating
- 54:02Speaker 1: biological weapons, creating new potential viruses that can kill us all, right? Well,
- 54:10Speaker 1: another company is preparing for exactly that possibility and preparing
- 54:15Speaker 1: preventive controls. So this is a company called Red Queen Bio.
- 54:21Speaker 1: Red Queen Bio is developing antibody treatments intended to protect
- 54:26Speaker 1: against families of pathogens, including potentially future biological threats such
- 54:32Speaker 1: enabled by AI. Now, you know, the company says it's
- 54:39Speaker 1: raised $ 36 million. OpenAI is one of its leading investors. Yesterday,
- 54:47Speaker 1: Wall Street Journal had a feature article describing the laboratory
- 54:50Speaker 1: work in Boston, the founder's interest in preparing defenses ahead
- 54:55Speaker 1: of an emerging threat. Now, this, of course, would apply
- 54:57Speaker 1: to a COVID-like virus, a bird flu, right? antibody drugs
- 55:05Speaker 1: provide ready-made biological defenses. Vaccines instead stimulate the body to
- 55:10Speaker 1: develop its own response. The ambition is protection across related viruses,
- 55:17Speaker 1: so whole families of viruses, together with faster development of countermeasures.
- 55:22Speaker 1: They're going to be testing candidate antibodies, using the resulting
- 55:26Speaker 1: data to improve their models. Now, right now, They expect
- 55:33Speaker 1: human trials against bird flu and other influenza viruses are
- 55:37Speaker 1: planned for 2027. So this would be something that would
- 55:42Speaker 1: be ready in case one of these bird flus affects
- 55:46Speaker 1: human beings. The company hopes eventually to supply government stockpiles
- 55:51Speaker 1: and rapid response manufacturing. This is still R & D,
- 55:58Speaker 1: but again, using A.I., the companies using AI, to try
- 56:04Speaker 1: to figure out solutions to problems that nature's going to
- 56:08Speaker 1: throw at us, but also problems that might be accelerated
- 56:13Speaker 1: by human or slash AI intervention. This is a prepared intervention,
- 56:22Speaker 1: preparedness for a potential outbreak potentially caused by AI, an
- 56:30Speaker 1: AI-designed virus. And finally, Starship, you know, the rocket, the
- 56:45Speaker 1: SpaceX rocket, on its 14th full-scale test flight, 14th full-scale
- 56:53Speaker 1: test flight, Starship actually reached orbit and succeeded in deploying
- 56:59Speaker 1: 26 Starlink satellites. Now, Sadly, the mission ended earlier than planned,
- 57:07Speaker 1: so it wasn't a complete success, but it reached orbit. So,
- 57:12Speaker 1: you know, every step, every step with SpaceX, they achieve
- 57:16Speaker 1: another milestone. They move a little further, they achieve another step,
- 57:21Speaker 1: and you know they're heading towards success. The launch was
- 57:26Speaker 1: from Starbase in Texas. Unfortunately, an engine shut down prematurely
- 57:31Speaker 1: during the descent. But the spacecraft itself achieved over it,
- 57:36Speaker 1: deployed 26 satellites, then returned after roughly three hours instead
- 57:42Speaker 1: of the intended 10-hour mission. It splashed down in the
- 57:45Speaker 1: Pacific north of Hawaii, tipped over, and burnt. So we're
- 57:51Speaker 1: still working on getting a full mission, right? 10 hours,
- 57:55Speaker 1: splashed down in the Pacific, no tipping over, no burning. So...
- 58:02Speaker 1: You know, reaching space, reaching orbit are achievements. Well, different achievements.
- 58:09Speaker 1: This is just reaching orbit. They still have to reach space.
- 58:12Speaker 1: Orbit requires enough sideways velocity to keep falling around Earth,
- 58:18Speaker 1: but this shows that it's doable and that they can
- 58:24Speaker 1: deliver the payload. Remember, this is ultimately going to be
- 58:26Speaker 1: the rocket taking us to the moon and ultimately to Mars.
- 58:31Speaker 1: So there's still a lot more to do. So we'll see.
- 58:39Speaker 1: They don't exactly know why the mission only lasted three
- 58:44Speaker 1: hours instead of ten. But they are working on this
- 58:51Speaker 1: so that this can be used for lunar missions in
- 58:54Speaker 1: the future. All right. So we have uncertainty on the
- 59:01Speaker 1: economic front. We have uncertainty with regard to, or we've
- 59:07Speaker 1: had uncertainty for months and months now with Iran. And
- 59:11Speaker 1: of course, there's huge uncertainty with AI, but it does
- 59:14Speaker 1: look like the AI companies are, you know, the market,
- 59:21Speaker 1: entrepreneurs are dealing with it, are creating ways to deal
- 59:25Speaker 1: with it. So, cool. Let's see, what else are we doing? Yeah,
- 59:33Speaker 1: that is the news for this Monday, September 28th. There's
- 59:38Speaker 1: a lot more to talk about. There's the Israeli elections
- 59:40Speaker 1: coming up. As that gets closer, we'll talk more about that. There's,
- 59:44Speaker 1: of course, the U.S. elections. It increasingly looks like the
- 59:48Speaker 1: Democrats have a good chance of winning the Senate and
- 59:51Speaker 1: the House, which would be a major shock to the system.
- 59:59Speaker 1: We will talk about that tomorrow, some of that tomorrow,
- 1:00:02Speaker 1: and then, of course, starting on Friday from home. Let's see,
- 1:00:07Speaker 1: what else do we want to say? Yes, this show
- 1:00:10Speaker 1: is sponsored by the Einman Institute, and ARU is starting,
- 1:00:17Speaker 1: I think, next week. So you can still have time
- 1:00:20Speaker 1: to sign up for ARU. Particularly, I would recommend Ankur
- 1:00:23Speaker 1: Ghate's course on objectivism. If you are under the age
- 1:00:28Speaker 1: of 35, basically, and if you're willing to be, not
- 1:00:33Speaker 1: under the age of 35, if you're interested in being graded,
- 1:00:37Speaker 1: graded students pay no tuition. So, you know, hopefully there
- 1:00:44Speaker 1: are a bunch of you out there who are interested
- 1:00:47Speaker 1: in getting graded. I think it's a huge advantage to
- 1:00:51Speaker 1: be graded and have You were critiqued. You actually learned
- 1:00:55Speaker 1: a lot more than when you started a class. So
- 1:00:58Speaker 1: I encourage all of you to, I encourage many of
- 1:01:01Speaker 1: you to sign up for the ARU. I will be
- 1:01:03Speaker 1: teaching a class on Western Civilization. That starts, I think,
- 1:01:08Speaker 1: next week or the week after. Maybe the week after next.
- 1:01:12Speaker 1: It starts, so sign up for that as well. And, yeah. Alex,
- 1:01:18Speaker 1: you can find out more information about that on einman.org.ybs. einrad.org. YBS.
- 1:01:26Speaker 1: Alex Epstein is, of course, also a sponsor of this show.
- 1:01:29Speaker 1: He is doing amazing work, both on energy and on
- 1:01:33Speaker 1: AI now. He's writing a book on AI and AI
- 1:01:37Speaker 1: data centers. So, yeah, go check him out. I mean,
- 1:01:43Speaker 1: if he has the kind of impact he had on
- 1:01:48Speaker 1: fossil fuels, if he has that kind of impact on AI,
- 1:01:53Speaker 1: That is a game changer in terms of our future.
- 1:01:56Speaker 1: So the attacks on AI right now are horrific. The
- 1:01:59Speaker 1: attacks on data center are horrific. Alex is marching to
- 1:02:03Speaker 1: the rescue. So check him out, alexepstein.substack.com. All right. And
- 1:02:10Speaker 1: then definitivecapitalism.com. Definitivecapitalism.com is a website for the defense of capitalism, moral, philosophical, social, political, economic.
- 1:02:20Speaker 1: I am... I'm a contributor to DefendersOfCapitalism.com, DefendersOfCapitalism program generally.
- 1:02:27Speaker 1: Check it out. Sign up for the newsletter at DefendersOfCapitalism.com.
- 1:02:31Speaker 1: All right. Let's turn to you soon. Oh, I'll remind
- 1:02:36Speaker 1: you that you can support the show through Super Chats
- 1:02:39Speaker 1: or stickers. Also, that you can support the show through
- 1:02:45Speaker 1: Patreon or through PayPal. Patreon is probably easier for you
- 1:02:51Speaker 1: to manage. So I recommend setting up a Patreon account
- 1:02:55Speaker 1: and putting in your own book show and signing off
- 1:02:57Speaker 1: a monthly contribution and supporting the show. And I love
- 1:03:01Speaker 1: it because it's regular and I know what to expect,
- 1:03:04Speaker 1: not like Super Chat where you never know from day
- 1:03:05Speaker 1: to day. And, yeah, you'll be able to forget about
- 1:03:11Speaker 1: supporting the show and then forget about it. You don't
- 1:03:12Speaker 1: have to worry about it. And every time I mention
- 1:03:14Speaker 1: supporting the show, you know I'm doing that. I'm doing that.
- 1:03:17Speaker 1: It's all good. We're all good. This is great. All right.
- 1:03:22Speaker 1: All right, let me thank the sticker people. Wes just
- 1:03:24Speaker 1: came in with $ 50. Thank you, Wes. Really, really appreciate it. Roland,
- 1:03:30Speaker 1: thank you, Roland, for the Swiss francs. Let's see. I
- 1:03:35Speaker 1: don't think I saw a lot of stickers today. Quite
- 1:03:37Speaker 1: a few questions, but not a lot of stickers. No,
- 1:03:41Speaker 1: that was it. There's Roland and Wes. Yeah, you guys
- 1:03:45Speaker 1: should come in with stickers. Support the show. Value for value. Remember,
- 1:03:49Speaker 1: you're listening. I assume that's because you value the show.
- 1:03:55Speaker 1: Trade with me. Show me how much you value it
- 1:03:57Speaker 1: by making a contribution through a sticker on YouTube Live.
- 1:04:01Speaker 1: All right. Let's see. We have a few questions. Oh,
- 1:04:06Speaker 1: we got a $ 200 question from 0-0-0 Enix. Whatever. Enix.
- 1:04:14Speaker 1: All right. Thank you, Enix. $ 200. That is very, very generous.
- 1:04:19Speaker 1: I really appreciate that. Thoughts on hiring a CPA, personal
- 1:04:23Speaker 1: or corporate? That is, how to interview, evaluate one. Capitalism,
- 1:04:29Speaker 1: altruism stance, general knowledge, any experience with individuals versus CPA firms,
- 1:04:38Speaker 1: anything different versus hiring an attorney or even a mechanic.
- 1:04:42Speaker 1: It seems like an occupation requiring uniquely oriented to reality. CPA?
- 1:04:52Speaker 1: CPA is a certified public accountant. So this is somebody
- 1:04:56Speaker 1: who manages your books, manages your bank accounts, your cash,
- 1:05:04Speaker 1: but also everything about the books in terms of receivables
- 1:05:10Speaker 1: and what you owe and what you owed, the whole process. Also,
- 1:05:16Speaker 1: probably a CPA will either do or help with your taxes.
- 1:05:22Speaker 1: So it depends on exactly what you're hiring the CPA for.
- 1:05:28Speaker 1: So you can't evaluate a CPA based on their political views.
- 1:05:42Speaker 1: So I wouldn't use that. I used a tax accountant.
- 1:05:51Speaker 1: CPA was my tax guy for many, many, many years.
- 1:05:55Speaker 1: And he was excellent. And he was kind of a libertarian,
- 1:05:59Speaker 1: I guess. Conservative, libertarian, hard to tell. Was non-religious, which
- 1:06:04Speaker 1: was good. And we became really very friendly. And it
- 1:06:11Speaker 1: was fun to talk to him. But I think the
- 1:06:16Speaker 1: real issue... that you have to figure out is this
- 1:06:21Speaker 1: is a person is going to hold, I mean, he's
- 1:06:25Speaker 1: going to know everything about your company and is going
- 1:06:28Speaker 1: to have all the information, all the data, and is
- 1:06:31Speaker 1: going to be an important partner in planning for growth
- 1:06:36Speaker 1: and planning for the future of your company. So I
- 1:06:39Speaker 1: would say the main thing when hiring a CPA you're
- 1:06:42Speaker 1: looking for is somebody you can trust. So It's like
- 1:06:47Speaker 1: hiring an attorney or a mechanic. But a mechanic, you know,
- 1:06:52Speaker 1: if a mechanic screws up, I don't know, you pay
- 1:06:56Speaker 1: more for repairs than you should have or he screws
- 1:06:59Speaker 1: up and, you know, you total your car, let's say
- 1:07:01Speaker 1: the worst case scenario. All right, that's damage and that's
- 1:07:04Speaker 1: horrible and that's bad. But if a CPA screws up,
- 1:07:08Speaker 1: you pay more taxes than you should, your financial planning
- 1:07:11Speaker 1: is all screwed up, you could go bankrupt, which is
- 1:07:14Speaker 1: much worse than losing your car. So you've got to
- 1:07:17Speaker 1: find somebody you trust. And I don't have any particular
- 1:07:23Speaker 1: secrets of how to interview somebody for that, but you've
- 1:07:27Speaker 1: got to get to the point where you and the
- 1:07:30Speaker 1: CPA work really, really well. I mean, I've had a
- 1:07:32Speaker 1: great tax CPA. I also had a CPA for my
- 1:07:36Speaker 1: hedge fund. It was a woman. I mean, both my
- 1:07:41Speaker 1: tax accountant and this woman were firms, but it was just,
- 1:07:44Speaker 1: it was them. You're hiring an individual. So even if
- 1:07:47Speaker 1: you hire a CPA firm, you want an individual who's
- 1:07:52Speaker 1: assigned to your account who you completely, you have the
- 1:07:56Speaker 1: relationship with and you trust. Anyway, this woman was indispensable
- 1:08:03Speaker 1: to running the hedge fund. We're still, with various pieces
- 1:08:07Speaker 1: of the hedge fund, still in wind-down mode, if you will,
- 1:08:12Speaker 1: and maybe for many, many years for a variety of reasons,
- 1:08:14Speaker 1: And she's indispensable. I don't know how I'd manage without her.
- 1:08:17Speaker 1: She basically acted as the company's chief financial officer. She
- 1:08:22Speaker 1: was that good. She was both a CPA and that.
- 1:08:25Speaker 1: I inherited her, so I didn't hire her. She came
- 1:08:29Speaker 1: from a company we had partnered with. But she was
- 1:08:33Speaker 1: truly amazing. Politically, she's more of a conservative, probably more
- 1:08:39Speaker 1: of a Trump fan than I would like, but who cares?
- 1:08:42Speaker 1: I mean, she did it. great job. What you want
- 1:08:45Speaker 1: is somebody who's unbelievably honest. You're looking, particularly for CPA,
- 1:08:51Speaker 1: you're looking for somebody who is oriented towards details, loves
- 1:08:57Speaker 1: the details, loves the da-da-da I's and the crossed T's
- 1:09:02Speaker 1: loves numbers you want somebody who really loves their job
- 1:09:07Speaker 1: right that I think is the most you want somebody
- 1:09:11Speaker 1: who's experienced depending on the type of business you have
- 1:09:13Speaker 1: the size of it you want somebody who knows your
- 1:09:16Speaker 1: business like if you're running a hedge fund like I
- 1:09:18Speaker 1: was You want somebody who knows the hedge fund business,
- 1:09:21Speaker 1: who knows finance, because there are all kinds of intricacies
- 1:09:24Speaker 1: that involve in the regulations and the taxes and in
- 1:09:27Speaker 1: the way you report earnings and the way you manage
- 1:09:31Speaker 1: cash flow that are unique to particular businesses. So I
- 1:09:45Speaker 1: think those are the things I would look for. Trust.
- 1:09:48Speaker 1: That goes with honesty and integrity and references. You want
- 1:09:51Speaker 1: a lot of references with that. Attention to detail. Detail orientation.
- 1:09:57Speaker 1: Experience with your kind of business. Experience, you know, broadly speaking,
- 1:10:04Speaker 1: your kind of business because somebody can learn the specifics.
- 1:10:07Speaker 1: And then if they're a tax accountant, if they're also
- 1:10:10Speaker 1: going to do your taxes, then you have to decide
- 1:10:13Speaker 1: how aggressive you want to be with regard to with
- 1:10:19Speaker 1: regard to taxes, with regard to your taxes. Do you
- 1:10:31Speaker 1: want to play by the rules? How exactly do you
- 1:10:35Speaker 1: want to address your tax concerns? And then you want
- 1:10:45Speaker 1: to find an accountant who is as aggressive or as
- 1:10:48Speaker 1: conservative as you are when it comes to taxes. And generally,
- 1:10:51Speaker 1: you want to find somebody who's attuned to you in
- 1:10:54Speaker 1: terms of their aggressiveness with regard to regulations, with regard
- 1:10:57Speaker 1: to tax accounting, with regard to representation. Those are the
- 1:11:02Speaker 1: key things I would look for. I'm less interested in
- 1:11:06Speaker 1: their philosophy, although again, I want them to be honest
- 1:11:10Speaker 1: and have integrity. And you know, with regard to the
- 1:11:14Speaker 1: business or with regard to their profession. I want them
- 1:11:16Speaker 1: to be true professionals. And they can be religious and
- 1:11:21Speaker 1: still do a great job. So you want to find
- 1:11:27Speaker 1: somebody who matches that and you get along with really,
- 1:11:33Speaker 1: really well and matches your risk tolerance when it comes
- 1:11:38Speaker 1: to taxes and when it comes to reporting. All right,
- 1:11:45Speaker 1: thank you again. It was very generous, and hopefully that
- 1:11:51Speaker 1: answer was satisfactory. If not, feel free to ask a follow-up.
- 1:11:57Speaker 1: All right, Remo, $ 60. Is there a cultural difference between
- 1:12:01Speaker 1: Europe and North America compared to China and certain Western
- 1:12:05Speaker 1: Asian countries that leads to a difference in attitude when
- 1:12:08Speaker 1: it comes to fear-mongering about AI? Some more AI optimism. Okay. Okay.
- 1:12:16Speaker 1: some more AI optimism in those Asian countries you know
- 1:12:19Speaker 1: I don't know if there's more AI optimism in East
- 1:12:23Speaker 1: Asian countries right now or I don't know Western Asian
- 1:12:27Speaker 1: I'm not sure what you mean by Western Asian I
- 1:12:30Speaker 1: don't know what people's attitude remember China much of what
- 1:12:34Speaker 1: they know about AI much of what they understand about
- 1:12:38Speaker 1: AI is provided to them by the government so It's
- 1:12:44Speaker 1: very centralized. So do we really know what their attitudes are?
- 1:12:48Speaker 1: Do we really know what the attitude in Japan is?
- 1:12:51Speaker 1: And I don't know what the attitude in South Korea
- 1:12:53Speaker 1: or Japan is. It's also the case that the United
- 1:12:57Speaker 1: States is unique, even as compared to Europe. Because Europeans
- 1:13:02Speaker 1: right now, in Europe, nobody seems concerned about AI. They
- 1:13:06Speaker 1: don't seem to care. Partially because they don't have any, right?
- 1:13:10Speaker 1: Nobody's building data centers in Europe, not on scale. There's
- 1:13:14Speaker 1: no European, maybe there's one French project, AI project, but
- 1:13:19Speaker 1: there are no European big projects, right? So even though
- 1:13:24Speaker 1: American AI can hack into anything in Europe, it's not
- 1:13:27Speaker 1: a big issue in Europe because Europe is so far
- 1:13:29Speaker 1: behind technologically than the United States. It's not developing its
- 1:13:34Speaker 1: own stuff. The CEOs of its companies are not out
- 1:13:37Speaker 1: there talking about it. It's not in the news as
- 1:13:41Speaker 1: much because... Europe is behind. I don't know what the
- 1:13:46Speaker 1: attitudes are in Japan and South Korea. It would be
- 1:13:49Speaker 1: interesting to find out. And I, you know, China's not
- 1:13:54Speaker 1: a good example because, again, they're fed information by the government.
- 1:13:58Speaker 1: So they know what they know. They only know the
- 1:14:01Speaker 1: stuff the government wants them to know. So that's the
- 1:14:08Speaker 1: best I have right now, you know. All right, Molten Splendor, $ 50.
- 1:14:13Speaker 1: Thank you, Molten. Alex Epstein was guest on Gutfeld, a
- 1:14:20Speaker 1: Gutfeld show on the 22nd. It seemed an impossible setting
- 1:14:25Speaker 1: for gaining any impact, but Alex did an amazing job.
- 1:14:29Speaker 1: If you can stomach the worthless banter, it's worth watching,
- 1:14:33Speaker 1: especially to admire Alex's principled responses. Yeah, I mean, Alex
- 1:14:37Speaker 1: does an amazing job in these interviews. sticking to topic,
- 1:14:42Speaker 1: staying principled, not getting caught up in the nonsense. He
- 1:14:47Speaker 1: has become a master communicator when it comes to these issues. And,
- 1:14:52Speaker 1: you know, good for him. It really is spectacular to watch.
- 1:14:56Speaker 1: And I'm glad, I think because, well, because Alex doesn't
- 1:15:03Speaker 1: delve into too much of the politics of it, it's
- 1:15:07Speaker 1: great to see him. It's great that Fox will still
- 1:15:11Speaker 1: have him on, right? That he is being invited. Not
- 1:15:14Speaker 1: just Fox, but a lot of other people are having
- 1:15:16Speaker 1: Alex on. And I assume he was there to talk
- 1:15:19Speaker 1: about data centers because that's his big issue right now.
- 1:15:22Speaker 1: But yeah. That's great. Thanks for the recommendation. Molten Splendor,
- 1:15:29Speaker 1: another $ 50. Thank you. My single family neighborhood is of
- 1:15:34Speaker 1: great value to me. You have adamantly reeled against single-family
- 1:15:39Speaker 1: neighborhoods because density equals cheaper housing costs. Why is my
- 1:15:44Speaker 1: enjoyment of a single-family neighborhood bad, but eliminating single-family neighborhoods
- 1:15:49Speaker 1: to create more housing for others good, in your opinion? Well,
- 1:15:55Speaker 1: I'm not reeling against single-family neighborhoods. I'm reeling against zoning
- 1:16:01Speaker 1: that regulates, through government, the kind of housing that can
- 1:16:05Speaker 1: be built in any particular location. particularly in the context
- 1:16:10Speaker 1: of the fact that it raises the cost of housing. So,
- 1:16:18Speaker 1: you know, if a developer buys or, you know, develops
- 1:16:26Speaker 1: a particular neighborhood, has bought all the land, owns all
- 1:16:31Speaker 1: the land outright, let's say there's no zoning, there's no
- 1:16:35Speaker 1: restrictions by the government, and then contracts with the people
- 1:16:39Speaker 1: buying the property for a given period of time, I
- 1:16:44Speaker 1: don't know, 99 years, that they can only build, if
- 1:16:50Speaker 1: they rebuild the home, single-family homes in the neighborhood, then
- 1:16:53Speaker 1: that's fine. That's a private arrangement, right? On land that
- 1:17:01Speaker 1: has been designed and planned for single-family homes and for
- 1:17:06Speaker 1: property rights and you can restrict the use of that
- 1:17:10Speaker 1: property right under contract for a particular period of time.
- 1:17:14Speaker 1: All contracts have an end point. No contract is forever.
- 1:17:20Speaker 1: I have no problem with that. And if you want
- 1:17:23Speaker 1: to move into such a neighborhood, that's great. But if
- 1:17:27Speaker 1: you're just buying a home in a regular neighborhood in
- 1:17:32Speaker 1: the city, and there's a home next door to you,
- 1:17:35Speaker 1: And the person in the home next door to you
- 1:17:38Speaker 1: wants to replace his home with a skyscraper. He has
- 1:17:44Speaker 1: every right to do so. It's his property. The whole
- 1:17:48Speaker 1: point is that we either protect property rights or we
- 1:17:52Speaker 1: don't protect property rights. And the protection of property rights
- 1:17:56Speaker 1: is what is good for all individuals within a society.
- 1:18:00Speaker 1: So while the value of your property might decline because
- 1:18:04Speaker 1: you're now next to a skyscraper, you do not have
- 1:18:09Speaker 1: a right to sustaining the value of your property. So
- 1:18:18Speaker 1: this is basically a rights issue. Now, there are advantages
- 1:18:23Speaker 1: to single-family neighborhoods. There are advantages to densely populated places
- 1:18:29Speaker 1: where you can walk and where there's multi-use and there
- 1:18:32Speaker 1: are stores and there are storefronts. And you get to
- 1:18:36Speaker 1: choose where you want to live. But you don't get
- 1:18:39Speaker 1: to choose what your neighbor gets to do with their house,
- 1:18:42Speaker 1: what developers get to do with their property. The state
- 1:18:46Speaker 1: should not be involved in telling developers, when you develop
- 1:18:50Speaker 1: this land, it has to be single family. When you
- 1:18:53Speaker 1: develop that land, that can be multi-use. No, I mean,
- 1:18:58Speaker 1: zoning is a violation of property rights. If an individual
- 1:19:03Speaker 1: buys the property, they get to decide what to build
- 1:19:06Speaker 1: on it. And if your neighbor decides to convert his
- 1:19:09Speaker 1: home to a condo building, you have no say in it,
- 1:19:17Speaker 1: unless there's something about it that is clearly violating your rights.
- 1:19:24Speaker 1: I don't see what that could be, though. So I
- 1:19:28Speaker 1: get that you enjoy, but your enjoyment doesn't trump property rights,
- 1:19:34Speaker 1: which is all I'm arguing. I don't care. I mean,
- 1:19:38Speaker 1: in a free society, I don't care if prices are
- 1:19:40Speaker 1: going up or down. I don't care if there's multifamily
- 1:19:43Speaker 1: or single family. I just want them, you know, the
- 1:19:47Speaker 1: market will dictate. Supply and demand will dictate what's available
- 1:19:50Speaker 1: and what's not. And if your neighbor builds something you
- 1:19:54Speaker 1: don't like, you'll move. You'll sell your house and you'll
- 1:19:56Speaker 1: move somewhere where you don't like. So each, I mean,
- 1:20:00Speaker 1: a market will provide each of us with the kind
- 1:20:03Speaker 1: of environment we want to live in. But it won't
- 1:20:08Speaker 1: do it through Force, through coercion, through government action. It'll
- 1:20:13Speaker 1: do it through the marketplace. Hopefully that answers your question, Moulton.
- 1:20:21Speaker 1: And all I'm saying in terms of cost of housing is,
- 1:20:25Speaker 1: if the goal is to lower the cost of housing,
- 1:20:28Speaker 1: the solution, I'm not saying what the solution is in
- 1:20:30Speaker 1: terms of what you should build, but the solution is
- 1:20:34Speaker 1: get rid of zoning. Get rid of restrictions. For example,
- 1:20:38Speaker 1: in California, that cities have that say you could only
- 1:20:43Speaker 1: build single-family homes here. And that's what they're telling developers.
- 1:20:48Speaker 1: That is a violation of property rights, and it causes
- 1:20:52Speaker 1: prices to go up. All right. Michael. Historians of the
- 1:21:02Speaker 1: future will have a hard time figuring out how so
- 1:21:06Speaker 1: many organized groups of strident maniacs succeeding in leading us
- 1:21:12Speaker 1: around by the nose and morally intimidating the majority into silence. Yeah,
- 1:21:17Speaker 1: I don't think they'll have a hard time figuring it out.
- 1:21:20Speaker 1: I think they'll understand the role of ideas in history.
- 1:21:23Speaker 1: They'll understand that it is ideas that ultimately shape historical outcomes.
- 1:21:30Speaker 1: They shape our attitudes. They shape whether we're willing to
- 1:21:34Speaker 1: be led by the nose or not. They'll see the Kantian...
- 1:21:40Speaker 1: and religious influences in our culture. And, you know, they'll
- 1:21:52Speaker 1: completely understand what happened. And they'll also look back and
- 1:21:56Speaker 1: understand how we got out of it, assuming we get
- 1:21:59Speaker 1: out of it, which I assume will happen. All right. Ron,
- 1:22:05Speaker 1: Ron has a two-part question in Hebrew. Let me see
- 1:22:08Speaker 1: if I can translate the question while I read it. Okay.
- 1:22:13Speaker 1: Two months ago, I moved from programming to studying AI.
- 1:22:29Speaker 1: And then the second mile, mile. So I don't know.
- 1:22:36Speaker 1: It's not a form of engineering. I don't know what
- 1:22:38Speaker 1: Mayo means. I am now responsible for big systems. No
- 1:22:47Speaker 1: useless meetings. In another four to six months, I managed
- 1:22:54Speaker 1: to significantly increase my knowledge and my value in the marketplace.
- 1:22:59Speaker 1: This is all because of AI.
- 1:23:08Speaker 2: I don't understand the question, Ron.
- 1:23:27Speaker 1: So another four to six months like this can... significantly
- 1:23:38Speaker 1: raise my knowledge and my value in the marketplace. Otherwise,
- 1:23:44Speaker 1: I'm not sure. I don't understand that. I don't know.
- 1:23:59Speaker 1: I don't understand the question. So I need help. Maybe
- 1:24:04Speaker 1: you could formulate in English or maybe... rewrite it, but
- 1:24:08Speaker 1: the grammar just doesn't work for me. I don't see
- 1:24:10Speaker 1: the question here, so I'm not quite grasping it. Sorry, Ron.
- 1:24:16Speaker 1: So maybe send me an email, and I'll try to
- 1:24:20Speaker 1: figure it out off in the email, and I'll answer
- 1:24:22Speaker 1: it tomorrow. You're on at you'reonbookshow.com. Anomalous. Why is EU
- 1:24:29Speaker 1: so eager to get into a war with Russia? Is
- 1:24:32Speaker 1: it to solve their domestic problems? I am reminded of
- 1:24:36Speaker 1: all quiet on the Western Front, the scene where the
- 1:24:39Speaker 1: politicians convince the youth that fortune and glory await. I
- 1:24:44Speaker 1: don't think the EU is eager to get into a
- 1:24:47Speaker 1: war with Russia. I think there are all indications, though,
- 1:24:51Speaker 1: that Russia is eager to get into a war with
- 1:24:53Speaker 1: the EU, with NATO, that Russia perceives NATO as weak
- 1:25:00Speaker 1: and that Putin needs to distract away from his failures
- 1:25:03Speaker 1: in Ukraine. and is eager to prod them and to
- 1:25:09Speaker 1: intimidate them and to maybe even use military force against
- 1:25:13Speaker 1: a NATO country to see what happens. So I think
- 1:25:18Speaker 1: EU is, at this point, hustling to try to build
- 1:25:25Speaker 1: the military infrastructure to be able to deal with the
- 1:25:28Speaker 1: situation in which Russia becomes the aggressor. and are aggressors
- 1:25:36Speaker 1: against them. Now, by the way, I think that Russia
- 1:25:39Speaker 1: is already aggressing against the EU, but the Europeans are
- 1:25:43Speaker 1: ignoring it. The sabotages, the drone attacks, all kinds of
- 1:25:48Speaker 1: little things, and the Europeans are ignoring it because they
- 1:25:51Speaker 1: don't want to get into a war with Russia. I
- 1:25:54Speaker 1: think the EU investing now significantly in military means that
- 1:26:00Speaker 1: they will potentially Cause Russia to rethink its plan. Because
- 1:26:09Speaker 1: the stronger Europe is, the less likely it is that
- 1:26:13Speaker 1: Russia will do something. So I view it as the
- 1:26:16Speaker 1: other way around. Now, I know the scene you're talking about.
- 1:26:19Speaker 1: And yes, in those days, World War I was a
- 1:26:23Speaker 1: horrific war where everybody thought it was somehow honorable to
- 1:26:26Speaker 1: go and die for the country. I don't think that's
- 1:26:29Speaker 1: what's going on in Europe right now at all. I
- 1:26:31Speaker 1: think they're seeing a real threat from Russia, and they're
- 1:26:34Speaker 1: trying to combat it before it's too late. All right,
- 1:26:39Speaker 1: Ron has written it in English or used AI to
- 1:26:42Speaker 1: translate it. He says, part one, I recently moved from
- 1:26:45Speaker 1: software engineering to AI engineering. After only two months, I
- 1:26:48Speaker 1: loved the job. Rapid learning, full ownership of large systems,
- 1:26:52Speaker 1: very few useless meetings, and work I find interesting. Another
- 1:26:57Speaker 1: four to six months here could substantially increase my knowledge
- 1:27:00Speaker 1: and market value. That part I got. All right, another
- 1:27:03Speaker 1: AI firm approached me. for an AI engineering consulting role. Wow,
- 1:27:08Speaker 1: I didn't get that at all from the Hebrew. Okay,
- 1:27:10Speaker 1: another AI firm approached me for an AI engineering consulting role,
- 1:27:15Speaker 1: paying potentially 60 to 100% more, but the clients and
- 1:27:19Speaker 1: actual work aren't defined. I'd risk giving up autonomy and
- 1:27:25Speaker 1: enjoying the work. I can only work remotely, which limits
- 1:27:30Speaker 1: my options. I also start ARU in two weeks, So
- 1:27:33Speaker 1: changing jobs adds another major commitment. Would you risk having
- 1:27:38Speaker 1: a great learning environment for the higher pay? Leaving a
- 1:27:44Speaker 1: great learning environment. I mean, probably not at this point.
- 1:27:48Speaker 1: Right now, I think the most important thing is learning, right?
- 1:27:54Speaker 1: Is growing. Because the upside of your earning potential given
- 1:28:03Speaker 1: how much AI will increase your productivity, is greater than
- 1:28:09Speaker 1: 60% to 100%. So if you learn, if you stick
- 1:28:13Speaker 1: with the job and learn and increase your value, I mean,
- 1:28:17Speaker 1: the same company might come back with 200%, or another
- 1:28:20Speaker 1: company might come and poach you. And, of course, your
- 1:28:22Speaker 1: own company should be increasing your rate. So one of
- 1:28:26Speaker 1: the things you should consider doing is going to your
- 1:28:29Speaker 1: company and saying and asking for a raise. soon, right?
- 1:28:34Speaker 1: Given you've got this other offer. So, I mean, I
- 1:28:37Speaker 1: would stay where I am, but of course, this is
- 1:28:39Speaker 1: completely your decision it depends on how much the money
- 1:28:42Speaker 1: is important to you but if you're enjoying the work
- 1:28:44Speaker 1: and you're learning a huge amount and you're pushing to
- 1:28:48Speaker 1: learn more you know I would say right now with
- 1:28:55Speaker 1: the learning curve with regard to AI the most important
- 1:28:59Speaker 1: thing is to learn fast, because the income will come.
- 1:29:03Speaker 1: I mean, you're young, right? The income is going to come.
- 1:29:08Speaker 1: You know, and if it's not that important for you
- 1:29:10Speaker 1: to have the income right now, I would say, now,
- 1:29:12Speaker 1: you know, if you have to buy a house right now,
- 1:29:14Speaker 1: and the income will make a huge difference, that changes
- 1:29:16Speaker 1: the estimate. But I would say, prioritize learning over dollars
- 1:29:20Speaker 1: right now. All right. Thank you, everyone. Rob, it was
- 1:29:37Speaker 1: an honor and pleasure to meet you under the John
- 1:29:39Speaker 1: Locke and Adam Smith statues a few weeks ago in London. Yeah,
- 1:29:41Speaker 1: that was fun. So I'm walking. We're filming the documentary
- 1:29:44Speaker 1: and we're going. We're going. This is on the west side.
- 1:29:48Speaker 1: This is the back of the British Academy. I forget
- 1:29:55Speaker 1: the name of the building. And in the back, there
- 1:29:58Speaker 1: are these statues of famous figures. And there's Locke and
- 1:30:03Speaker 1: Adam Smith next to each other, which we're using in
- 1:30:05Speaker 1: the documentary. And Rob comes up to me and introduces himself.
- 1:30:12Speaker 1: He saw me walking as he was sitting at a
- 1:30:14Speaker 1: Starbucks drinking, and he ran after us. And he came
- 1:30:17Speaker 1: up and introduced himself, and we chatted a little bit.
- 1:30:20Speaker 1: I mean, I have to say, it's very, very, very pleasant.
- 1:30:27Speaker 1: and affirming to be recognized in public by people who
- 1:30:31Speaker 1: listen to the show. I know you guys are out there.
- 1:30:38Speaker 1: I know you're all over the world. And Rob is
- 1:30:41Speaker 1: not British. He was visiting Britain for the football game.
- 1:30:45Speaker 1: The first time college football game was played in London.
- 1:30:48Speaker 1: He was going to watch the football game. And so
- 1:30:51Speaker 1: we got to chat a little bit. It was great.
- 1:30:53Speaker 1: It's great to meet you guys in person. It's great
- 1:30:55Speaker 1: to meet the people who listen. It's great to do
- 1:30:58Speaker 1: so unexpectedly in the middle of a foreign city. So
- 1:31:02Speaker 1: thank you. Thanks for coming up and introducing yourself. That
- 1:31:05Speaker 1: was great. And yeah, if you guys see me somewhere,
- 1:31:08Speaker 1: come up and say hello. All right, Marilyn controls and
- 1:31:12Speaker 1: AI must come from the free market. I'm not qualified
- 1:31:15Speaker 1: to say what that looks like. Government only gets involved
- 1:31:19Speaker 1: if rights are being violated. Uh, Politicians and bureaucrats controlling
- 1:31:24Speaker 1: AI would be a catastrophe. Yes, absolutely. I mean, the
- 1:31:26Speaker 1: only role of government here is to try to assess
- 1:31:30Speaker 1: whether there is real risk to rights violation. That is,
- 1:31:34Speaker 1: whether the risks are so high as that the government
- 1:31:39Speaker 1: should think about stepping in in some capacity to monitor.
- 1:31:44Speaker 1: But everything else should be set by the marketplace, and
- 1:31:48Speaker 1: then rules about liability should be established. about who holds
- 1:31:52Speaker 1: the liability and how actions will be penalized if companies misbehave,
- 1:32:01Speaker 1: if agents created by companies misbehave. And that needs to
- 1:32:05Speaker 1: be thought through. What does it mean for an agent
- 1:32:07Speaker 1: to misbehave? What is damage? What constitutes damage? For example,
- 1:32:11Speaker 1: if they just break into somebody's server but don't do anything,
- 1:32:15Speaker 1: can that company sue them for trespassing? I mean, all
- 1:32:20Speaker 1: of this needs is new territory, which the government does
- 1:32:23Speaker 1: have a role in helping define the property rights and
- 1:32:26Speaker 1: the damage involved. But other than that, it should stay
- 1:32:30Speaker 1: out of it and let the liability system work and
- 1:32:35Speaker 1: let kind of private regulation, industry regulation work and industry
- 1:32:40Speaker 1: solutions to the problems like we discussed earlier, companies coming
- 1:32:44Speaker 1: up with products that solve problems created by other companies' products.
- 1:32:50Speaker 1: Andrew says, mostly chuckled at your segment on Tucker's view
- 1:32:54Speaker 1: on algebra, letters into numbers. But did you catch the
- 1:32:59Speaker 1: guest's nasty side remark, referencing the masses who believe algebra
- 1:33:04Speaker 1: is real math, as rhymes with good little goyim? Yes. Yes,
- 1:33:12Speaker 1: of course. I mean, that was the anti-Semitic throwaway, which,
- 1:33:17Speaker 1: of course, Tucker... And I'm surprised I didn't comment on
- 1:33:21Speaker 1: it at the time, which Tucker embraces, right? So let's
- 1:33:26Speaker 1: embrace the anti-Semitic side comments and run with it. Tucker's
- 1:33:35Speaker 1: about as disgusting as it can get. He really is.
- 1:33:40Speaker 1: All right, a few more questions, and we've got some stickers. John,
- 1:33:43Speaker 1: thank you. GVI, thank you. And Stephen, thank you. Really
- 1:33:50Speaker 1: appreciate the stickers. I think I caught everybody. Gail and Gail.
- 1:33:54Speaker 1: I don't know if I thank Gail. So thank you
- 1:33:56Speaker 1: guys for the stickers. Chipping away. We're only $ 77 away
- 1:34:00Speaker 1: from the goal. Only one show left this month. Tomorrow.
- 1:34:10Speaker 1: Like numbers, you claim you'll one day penalize the Dems,
- 1:34:15Speaker 1: but in 2022 you still wanted Dems to win the midterms,
- 1:34:19Speaker 1: reading Chesinski's rationale. Who was becoming a Dem? You claim
- 1:34:26Speaker 1: you'll one day penalize the Dem. I'm not claiming I'll
- 1:34:30Speaker 1: penalize anybody. What do I have to do? I think
- 1:34:36Speaker 1: the voters will penalize the Dems because voters ultimately hate
- 1:34:39Speaker 1: the Dems. But in 2022, you still wanted Dems to
- 1:34:43Speaker 1: win the midterms. In 2022, did I want Dems to
- 1:34:47Speaker 1: win the midterms? No, I didn't. 2022, Biden was president.
- 1:34:54Speaker 1: I wanted there to be a divided government. So I
- 1:34:57Speaker 1: wanted Republicans to win the midterms. So I'm not sure
- 1:35:02Speaker 1: what you're talking about. I can't remember the position I
- 1:35:06Speaker 1: took in 2022, but I'm pretty sure that if there
- 1:35:08Speaker 1: was a Democratic president, I wanted at least one of
- 1:35:12Speaker 1: the houses to be controlled by Republicans. Reading Chesinsky's rationale,
- 1:35:22Speaker 1: who is becoming a Dem. Well, Chesinsky became a Dem
- 1:35:27Speaker 1: because he got involved in politics, which is good for Chesinsky.
- 1:35:30Speaker 1: I mean, it's the one good thing I think Chesinsky
- 1:35:33Speaker 1: has done, is he got involved in politics, he's got
- 1:35:35Speaker 1: his views out there, This is great. This is what
- 1:35:38Speaker 1: a lot of people like you have been urging we
- 1:35:40Speaker 1: do for a long, long time. Do more politics. Get
- 1:35:42Speaker 1: involved in politics. Well, Chesinsky did it. Why do you
- 1:35:49Speaker 1: care if he did it as a Democrat or a
- 1:35:51Speaker 1: Republican if he didn't compromise his views? Rational capitalist. I
- 1:35:57Speaker 1: have a solution for your sweat problem. Look up Thompson T.
- 1:36:02Speaker 1: They're undershirts that have thick padding that completely soaks up
- 1:36:05Speaker 1: the sweat. All right, I'll look into them. Thank you.
- 1:36:11Speaker 1: Copy that. All right. Mary Alene, I believe Millay spoke
- 1:36:18Speaker 1: out at the UN about the evil members and what
- 1:36:21Speaker 1: a corrupt organization it is. Let Iran or Russia host
- 1:36:23Speaker 1: the UN. Yes, I mean, I don't know how much
- 1:36:29Speaker 1: value there is in going to the UN and talking
- 1:36:31Speaker 1: about how evil the UN is. Just boycott it. Withdraw
- 1:36:35Speaker 1: your membership. abandon the u.n completely that would be my
- 1:36:39Speaker 1: policy um anomalous says what are your thoughts on helena
- 1:36:49Speaker 1: andrews the great feminization theory um i have not i
- 1:36:56Speaker 1: have oh i think i know what that is um
- 1:37:03Speaker 1: That men are being feminized, the idea that men are being, basically,
- 1:37:07Speaker 1: we've been feminizing men, and that has caused a big
- 1:37:12Speaker 1: problem in our society. I think there's a lot of
- 1:37:15Speaker 1: truth to it. I think it has to do a
- 1:37:18Speaker 1: lot with risk aversion. Now, whether you want to call
- 1:37:21Speaker 1: it feminizing men, I think you have to have a
- 1:37:24Speaker 1: really good theory of femininity and masculinity to call it that,
- 1:37:30Speaker 1: and I don't completely... I don't believe that she necessarily
- 1:37:34Speaker 1: has such a theory. But I do think that what
- 1:37:41Speaker 1: she's describing in terms of the changes, not allowing boys
- 1:37:46Speaker 1: to be boys, not allowing boys to play, not allowing
- 1:37:49Speaker 1: boys to be rough, not allowing kids to take risks,
- 1:37:54Speaker 1: I think all of that is true. And I think
- 1:37:58Speaker 1: we do it to girls as well, by the way.
- 1:37:59Speaker 1: I don't think we just do it to boys. So generally,
- 1:38:07Speaker 1: I think there's a lot of truth to it. What
- 1:38:10Speaker 1: causes it and what has caused it, I mean, there
- 1:38:16Speaker 1: is a lot of hatred of men because most men
- 1:38:26Speaker 1: are being responsible for most of the for most of
- 1:38:31Speaker 1: the capitalist changes that have happened over the last 200
- 1:38:34Speaker 1: years and I think this is a backlash against that
- 1:38:43Speaker 1: Christian I know you don't like BB but he is
- 1:38:45Speaker 1: a giant compared to politicians in Europe especially compared to
- 1:38:47Speaker 1: the evil guy like Sanchez As you are now in Madrid,
- 1:38:51Speaker 1: I guess you hear that a lot. Well, I don't
- 1:38:53Speaker 1: because I don't really talk about politics in Madrid. But,
- 1:38:56Speaker 1: I mean, you guys don't understand Bibi. You don't understand.
- 1:39:00Speaker 1: I just don't know what to tell you. I mean,
- 1:39:04Speaker 1: there's a good... Let me see if I can find this.
- 1:39:08Speaker 1: There's a good Twitter thing on Bibi written by... I mean,
- 1:39:13Speaker 1: what would you say to a politician who talks... a
- 1:39:17Speaker 1: big talk about markets and capitalism, and who's basically done
- 1:39:22Speaker 1: nothing in 15 years as prime minister to liberalize the
- 1:39:26Speaker 1: domestic economy, to make it more free. Let me see
- 1:39:30Speaker 1: if I can find this. Yeah, there it is. Let
- 1:39:33Speaker 1: me find this tweet, and I'm going to read this
- 1:39:35Speaker 1: to you just as you wrote it, because I think
- 1:39:37Speaker 1: it was really good. Yeah. And, you know, again, I'm
- 1:39:41Speaker 1: not comparing to European politicians, but here's the tweet by
- 1:39:45Speaker 1: an economist in Israel, Gilad Alper, It was very good.
- 1:39:48Speaker 1: He writes, Have you ever realized the story is amazing
- 1:39:51Speaker 1: in some ways but sad in others? It's amazing because
- 1:39:53Speaker 1: it shows the power of capitalist policy, budget cuts, deregulation,
- 1:39:57Speaker 1: tariff abolition, and one of the great benefits of this
- 1:39:59Speaker 1: policy is a plunge in inflation rates. Nice to see.
- 1:40:05Speaker 1: For the thousandth time that capitalism works. Yeah, obviously. And
- 1:40:10Speaker 1: in fact, capitalism is the only thing that works. So
- 1:40:12Speaker 1: what's sad here? The melee is so rare. The usual
- 1:40:17Speaker 1: pattern is right-wing parties likely could, the conservatives in Britain,
- 1:40:21Speaker 1: the Republicans in the U.S., coming to power in part
- 1:40:24Speaker 1: based on promises to implement principles of free market economics.
- 1:40:28Speaker 1: For example, Netanyahu, who chants slogans about the bloated public sector,
- 1:40:34Speaker 1: the foolishness of agricultural councils, and so on. And in practice,
- 1:40:40Speaker 1: these parties govern like left-wing parties. Netanyahu, who during his
- 1:40:45Speaker 1: 10 years as Prime Minister did no, no deregulation, didn't
- 1:40:50Speaker 1: liberalize imports, but did expand the public sector, government spending.
- 1:40:56Speaker 1: Classic left-wing policy. Or Trump with his foolish tariff wars.
- 1:41:02Speaker 1: The result is public disappointment and the rise of left-wing
- 1:41:05Speaker 1: parties in the next elections. And of course the continuation
- 1:41:09Speaker 1: of left-wing policies. And so for years the left effectively
- 1:41:12Speaker 1: ruled the economy and the economy deteriorates, because the right
- 1:41:17Speaker 1: and the left are both left. A dangerous side effect
- 1:41:21Speaker 1: of this pattern is that the public, which doesn't understand
- 1:41:24Speaker 1: what capitalism is, thinks the troubles befalling it are the
- 1:41:28Speaker 1: result of capitalism. After all, Netanyahu is a capitalist, right?
- 1:41:34Speaker 1: And that gives rise to fascist socialist ideologies, as we're
- 1:41:38Speaker 1: seeing in the U.S. and Europe. In our country, he's
- 1:41:41Speaker 1: talking about Israel, Because of our very special security situation,
- 1:41:46Speaker 1: this pattern works differently. Netanyahu continues to rule and continues
- 1:41:50Speaker 1: to destroy the economy. And what are the alternatives to Netanyahu?
- 1:41:55Speaker 1: A bunch of stale and moldy politicians. That's why it's sad. So,
- 1:42:02Speaker 1: you have to understand, Netanyahu is really, really bad. Now,
- 1:42:07Speaker 1: is he better than Sanchez? You know, yeah. But Sanchez,
- 1:42:14Speaker 1: the Spanish economy is doing pretty well. Compared to other
- 1:42:18Speaker 1: economies in Europe, Spanish economy is doing pretty well in
- 1:42:20Speaker 1: spite of Sanchez being a socialist. Sometimes socialists, at least
- 1:42:25Speaker 1: they govern in the name of what they actually believe. Netanyahu,
- 1:42:32Speaker 1: who governs in the name of capitalism, is a socialist
- 1:42:34Speaker 1: as well. And, in my view, ultimately has the responsibility
- 1:42:41Speaker 1: for October 7th, and I don't know how you can
- 1:42:44Speaker 1: overcome that. I don't know how anybody should be allowed
- 1:42:47Speaker 1: to overcome that. So I still don't like Bibi. I
- 1:42:50Speaker 1: don't care who you compare him to. I don't like him.
- 1:42:54Speaker 1: He's failed so badly that he has to go. Robert. Ah,
- 1:43:01Speaker 1: the irony. A mag of friends who told us, just
- 1:43:04Speaker 1: get Trump elected and we'll hold his feet to the
- 1:43:07Speaker 1: fire afterwards. And now they were holding his feet to
- 1:43:10Speaker 1: the fire. They're all, what the hell are you doing? Well,
- 1:43:12Speaker 1: of course, that was always the story. But the left,
- 1:43:18Speaker 1: they tell you, but the left. And by the way,
- 1:43:22Speaker 1: the reason the Democrats are going to win the House
- 1:43:25Speaker 1: and maybe even the Senate is not because of me.
- 1:43:29Speaker 1: It's not because I want them to win. It's not,
- 1:43:33Speaker 1: I didn't cause the Democrats to win the House and
- 1:43:36Speaker 1: the Senate. Guess who did? Who did? Trump, with his stupidity,
- 1:43:41Speaker 1: his imbecile economic policy, and his pathetic foreign policy, he's
- 1:43:48Speaker 1: causing the Democrats to win. But will you find a
- 1:43:52Speaker 1: single one of these people criticizing Trump? No. Iran can
- 1:43:58Speaker 1: be criticized and blamed for the Democrats taking over Congress.
- 1:44:03Speaker 1: But not Trump. Trump is blameless. He is... Beyond reproach,
- 1:44:08Speaker 1: no matter what. It's just unbelievable how people become mindless
- 1:44:16Speaker 1: when they engage in politics. Lucretion. When are the big
- 1:44:21Speaker 1: pharma AI-designed YBS withdrawal meds coming out asking for a friend? Never, never.
- 1:44:30Speaker 1: I've got a friend at the FDA. They're never going
- 1:44:32Speaker 1: to be approved. Never, ever going to be approved. You're
- 1:44:36Speaker 1: hooked for life. You're never going to be able to
- 1:44:38Speaker 1: overcome this. All right, Rational Capitalist. What's your view on
- 1:44:44Speaker 1: tradition of a man asking his girlfriend's father for permission
- 1:44:48Speaker 1: to marry his daughter? How can I be polite about this?
- 1:44:52Speaker 1: I think it's barbarian, primitive, disrespectful. I don't know. I
- 1:45:01Speaker 1: think it's awful. What the... The father owns the daughter?
- 1:45:08Speaker 1: The only person who has any say in whether the
- 1:45:11Speaker 1: daughter marries and who she marries is the daughter. Yes, cool.
- 1:45:15Speaker 1: Not the father. So I think it's primitive. It harkens
- 1:45:20Speaker 1: to an era in which parents decided who you married.
- 1:45:25Speaker 1: It harkens to an era where women did not have
- 1:45:28Speaker 1: any rights. And fathers had more than just paternalistic, almost
- 1:45:35Speaker 1: ownership over their daughters. And I think it's horrible. I
- 1:45:40Speaker 1: would never do it. My wife would never tolerate me
- 1:45:44Speaker 1: doing it. Her father would slap me if I did it.
- 1:45:47Speaker 1: So the whole thing, yeah, I think it's ridiculous. That's
- 1:45:52Speaker 1: my view. I'm not big on traditions. Not big on traditions.
- 1:45:57Speaker 1: Most traditions need to be trashed. Robert says, shout out,
- 1:46:03Speaker 1: thanks and cheers to Jennifer and Amy. The trip to
- 1:46:06Speaker 1: Cleveland to see Rush live will be a happy and
- 1:46:11Speaker 1: inspiring memory for years to come. I'm so glad you
- 1:46:14Speaker 1: guys had a great time there. Good for you. Pursuing
- 1:46:17Speaker 1: your values. I love it. Ron says, thank you. Ron says,
- 1:46:20Speaker 1: thank you. I'm happy to have been of help. Michael,
- 1:46:25Speaker 1: when is the video of you yelling at the Indian
- 1:46:27Speaker 1: woman talking about Israeli genocide? Where is the video? Well,
- 1:46:31Speaker 1: it's not up yet, but it will be up on
- 1:46:33Speaker 1: the Institute for Art and Ideas website. But it's a paywall,
- 1:46:42Speaker 1: so you'll have to subscribe to their channel to see it,
- 1:46:46Speaker 1: unless they put it up for free. So I'll let
- 1:46:49Speaker 1: you know when it's out, but you won't be able
- 1:46:52Speaker 1: to see it unless you subscribe to their channel and
- 1:46:56Speaker 1: pay whatever it is the fee it is. Andrew says,
- 1:47:01Speaker 1: a follow-up on the Tucker's algebra ASA Jewish conspiracy, another
- 1:47:06Speaker 1: side comment Tucker made with profound meaning, I live in
- 1:47:09Speaker 1: a fake world, about as anti-objective as the statement as
- 1:47:12Speaker 1: they can be. Well, I mean, there's a sense in
- 1:47:14Speaker 1: which it's true. He does live in a fake world
- 1:47:17Speaker 1: because he lived in a world of his own creation,
- 1:47:19Speaker 1: a conspiracy theory-laden world which he has made up. So
- 1:47:23Speaker 1: in that sense, he indeed does live in a fake world.
- 1:47:27Speaker 1: It's the rest of us who live in the real world,
- 1:47:29Speaker 1: you know, and he will suffer the consequences of living
- 1:47:31Speaker 1: the fakery that he does. Michael, why does it take
- 1:47:37Speaker 1: intellectuals to come up with some of the dumbest ideas?
- 1:47:43Speaker 1: Ideas abstract and, you know, non-intellectuals don't think in that realm,
- 1:47:50Speaker 1: don't come up with those, are not going to come
- 1:47:53Speaker 1: up with those kind of, call it dumb ideas, but
- 1:47:57Speaker 1: They're abstract ideas, and that's where intellectuals live, and non-intellectuals
- 1:48:07Speaker 1: typically don't think about those issues. They don't come up
- 1:48:11Speaker 1: with dumb ideas. All right, Michael, have you ever been
- 1:48:18Speaker 1: in a useless den of fatally arrogant parasites in his
- 1:48:22Speaker 1: UN speech. Good for Millet. I wish he'd made that
- 1:48:26Speaker 1: speech somewhere else other than at the UN because he's
- 1:48:30Speaker 1: basically sanctioning their existence by being there and continuing an
- 1:48:34Speaker 1: Argentinian delegation to the UN and continuing to... paying the
- 1:48:38Speaker 1: taxes to the UN or whatever it is that they pay. So, withdraw.
- 1:48:43Speaker 1: I don't think he can because I don't think he'd
- 1:48:45Speaker 1: need parliamentary approval. He'd need from the Argentinian parliament, which
- 1:48:49Speaker 1: probably wouldn't approve it. All right, guys. Thank you. I'm
- 1:48:54Speaker 1: going to go to sleep. It is 10 to 11 here.
- 1:48:58Speaker 1: I will see you tomorrow. Probably at the same time.
- 1:49:04Speaker 1: Probably at the same time. Oh, Ian came in with,
- 1:49:13Speaker 1: have you used Facebook Muse yet? It's the most consumer-friendly
- 1:49:17Speaker 1: and agentic tool I've seen so far. No, I haven't.
- 1:49:21Speaker 1: I haven't yet. I will play with it at some point.
- 1:49:27Speaker 1: I need to figure out what I want to use
- 1:49:28Speaker 1: it for. The stuff I use right now is mainly
- 1:49:33Speaker 1: for the news creation, and that I'm using I'm using
- 1:49:40Speaker 1: both ChatGPT and a new program that somebody wrote for me,
- 1:49:47Speaker 1: one of the listeners wrote for me on Claude, which
- 1:49:51Speaker 1: does amazing work. I haven't used it regularly yet because
- 1:49:55Speaker 1: we have to get into a rhythm here of using it,
- 1:49:57Speaker 1: but really, really cool stuff. So once I get home
- 1:50:02Speaker 1: and I'm using it every day, I think for me
- 1:50:05Speaker 1: the production of these shows is going to become much
- 1:50:07Speaker 1: easier and faster And I'll be able to dedicate myself
- 1:50:10Speaker 1: to doing other things, including maybe playing around with Muse.
- 1:50:15Speaker 1: Keep playing with AI. I mean, it's very cool. And
- 1:50:22Speaker 1: it's the future. All right, guys. See you tomorrow. Same time,
- 1:50:27Speaker 1: I think. So 3 p.m. East Coast time. See you then. Bye, everybody.