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Transcript

frontpage: sat sep 12 · frontpage

• 0:00
  Host 1: Imagine you're the president of the United States.
• 0:02
  Host 2: Okay.
• 0:02
  Host 1: You've just ordered this lethal top secret military raid,
• 0:06
  Host 1: the stakes are monumental, the fallout is going to alter history.
• 0:09
  Host 2: Right.
• 0:09
  Host 1: Who is the very first person outside your administration
• 0:13
  Host 1: that you brief on the success of the operation?
• 0:15
  Host 1: Your predecessor.
• 0:16
  Host 2: Yeah, it's a fascinating detail.
• 0:18
  Host 1: Welcome to front page for Saturday, September 12th, 2026.
• 0:22
  Host 1: Yesterday marked exactly a quarter century since the September 11th attacks.
• 0:26
  Host 2: Wow. 25 years.
• 0:28
  Host 1: Yeah, and reading through the coverage this morning,
• 0:30
  Host 1: the gravity of that single morning is still, you know,
• 0:34
  Host 1: pulling at the fabric of basically everything we're dealing with right now.
• 0:37
  Host 2: It really is.
• 0:39
  Host 2: I mean, 25 years is a massive historical milestone.
• 0:41
  Host 2: And the way the papers are capturing it today,
• 0:44
  Host 2: it illustrates a legacy that just refuses to stay in the past.
• 0:47
  Host 1: Exactly.
• 0:48
  Host 2: We're looking at an active ongoing force that's shaping global policy,
• 0:51
  Host 2: domestic politics, and even our collective psychology.
• 0:54
  Host 2: That presidential briefing you just mentioned,
• 0:56
  Host 2: which is detailed in the Wall Street Journal today,
• 0:59
  Host 2: perfectly captures how deep those psychological roots really go.
• 1:02
  Host 1: Let's pull the thread on that Wall Street Journal piece actually.
• 1:05
  Host 1: Because they report that two weeks after President Obama ordered the raid
• 1:09
  Host 1: that killed Osama bin Laden,
• 1:11
  Host 1: he dispatched top national security officials to Dallas to brief George W. Bush.
• 1:15
  Host 2: Right.
• 1:16
  Host 1: They spent like two and a half hours laying out
• 1:19
  Host 1: the exact granular specifics of the military operation.
• 1:21
  Host 2: Yeah, and Michael Morell, who was the former CIA deputy director
• 1:25
  Host 2: and actually Bush's intelligence briefer on the morning of 9/11,
• 1:28
  Host 2: he described Bush's reaction to this bin Laden briefing.
• 1:31
  Host 1: Yeah.
• 1:32
  Host 2: He said Bush was like a kid in a candy shop
• 1:35
  Host 2: wanting every single operational detail.
• 1:37
  Host 1: That is just a startling image.
• 1:39
  Host 1: I mean, a kid in a candy shop for a lethal military raid.
• 1:42
  Host 2: It is, but it speaks to this intensely private bond.
• 1:45
  Host 2: You're looking at a shared burden among the very few men
• 1:48
  Host 2: who have held the ultimate responsibility for the fallout of that day.
• 1:51
  Host 1: Right.
• 1:52
  Host 2: But, you know, while former presidents share this quiet fraternity,
• 1:55
  Host 2: the public reality is incredibly raw, it's really fractured.
• 1:59
  Host 1: Right.
• 2:00
  Host 2: The memorials yesterday weren't just quiet reflections,
• 2:02
  Host 2: they were stages for active ongoing political grievances.
• 2:05
  Host 1: Yeah, the New York Times painted a really vivid picture
• 2:08
  Host 1: of that tension at ground zero.
• 2:10
  Host 1: They were reading the 2,983 names beneath the oak trees there.
• 2:13
  Host 2: Mhm.
• 2:14
  Host 1: But the detail that really stops you is the demographic shift.
• 2:17
  Host 1: There are now 100 million Americans who were born since that day.
• 2:21
  Host 2: That's a huge number.
• 2:22
  Host 1: Right.
• 2:23
  Host 1: You have an entire generation participating in this mourning
• 2:26
  Host 1: for a world they never actually experienced.
• 2:28
  Host 2: And that demographic reality fundamentally changes the nature of the memorial.
• 2:32
  Host 2: It transitions from a shared visceral memory into, well, inherited history.
• 2:36
  Host 1: Yeah.
• 2:37
  Host 2: The pain hasn't just settled,
• 2:39
  Host 2: it's actively colliding with today's geopolitical realities.
• 2:42
  Host 2: We are still untangling the alliances that were forged on that day.
• 2:45
  Host 1: Right, like at Ground Zero.
• 2:47
  Host 1: You had Terry Strada from 9/11 Families United
• 2:50
  Host 1: openly criticizing the federal government for its ongoing relationship with Saudi Arabia.
• 2:53
  Host 2: Yeah, calling it one betrayal after another.
• 2:56
  Host 1: Exactly.
• 2:57
  Host 1: And another relative of a victim actually used their time at the microphone
• 3:00
  Host 1: to ask President Trump to release unredacted files,
• 3:03
  Host 1: claiming there's a deep state cover-up regarding Saudi involvement.
• 3:06
  Host 2: And that friction carries right over to the Pentagon Memorial yesterday too.
• 3:10
  Host 2: The Washington Post highlights this massive shift in President Trump's rhetoric.
• 3:13
  Host 1: How so?
• 3:14
  Host 2: Well, he drew a direct, explicit line
• 3:17
  Host 2: between George W. Bush's War on Terror
• 3:20
  Host 2: and the current six-month-old US conflict with Iran.
• 3:23
  Host 2: He told the crowd, that's why we fight today, we don't have a choice.
• 3:26
  Host 1: Which, when you map that rhetoric onto his broader political career,
• 3:29
  Host 1: it's a profound pivot.
• 3:31
  Host 2: Yeah, it really is, because if you look at his political rise,
• 3:33
  Host 2: he campaigned heavily against the post-9/11 invasion of Iraq.
• 3:36
  Host 2: He criticized those Middle Eastern entanglements.
• 3:39
  Host 1: Right.
• 3:40
  Host 2: And now, as the Post notes, he's utilizing that exact same post-9/11 rhetoric
• 3:43
  Host 2: to justify a brand new, highly complex conflict with Iran.
• 3:46
  Host 1: Well, the architecture of the War on Terror was built to be expansive, you know?
• 3:50
  Host 2: Yeah.
• 3:51
  Host 1: The executive branch possesses this immense built-in machinery for military intervention.
• 3:54
  Host 1: Once you're Commander in Chief, the momentum of the American military apparatus
• 3:58
  Host 1: tends to reshape a leader's approach.
• 4:00
  Host 1: You adapt old frameworks to fit today's adversaries.
• 4:02
  Host 2: And if you take a step back and look at the geopolitical map right now,
• 4:06
  Host 2: the fault lines from 25 years ago are the exact same ones fracturing in today's news.
• 4:09
  Host 1: Oh, absolutely.
• 4:11
  Host 2: Let's start with Afghanistan.
• 4:12
  Host 2: The New York Times has this massive investigative piece today
• 4:15
  Host 2: reporting that Al Qaeda is once again finding refuge there.
• 4:18
  Host 1: Yeah.
• 4:19
  Host 1: A quarter century after planning 9/11 from a Taliban stronghold,
• 4:22
  Host 1: the conditions that made those attacks possible are re-emerging,
• 4:25
  Host 1: but the geopolitical landscape has completely shifted.
• 4:28
  Host 2: Because the Times describes a Taliban that is modernized.
• 4:31
  Host 1: Right. Yeah.
• 4:32
  Host 2: But ideologically, completely unchanged.
• 4:35
  Host 2: You've got Taliban fighters patrolling the streets using abandoned US military gear,
• 4:38
  Host 2: organizing logistics via iPhones,
• 4:40
  Host 2: and like traveling to the Persian Gulf for trade deals.
• 4:43
  Host 1: Right, they have this veneer of international diplomacy.
• 4:45
  Host 2: Right.
• 4:46
  Host 1: But Western intelligence is tracking dozens of Al Qaeda members
• 4:49
  Host 1: settling right back into the country.
• 4:51
  Host 2: It's wild.
• 4:52
  Host 2: The evolution of the sanctuary state is what makes this so dangerous.
• 4:55
  Host 2: I mean, in 2001, the Taliban were highly isolated,
• 4:58
  Host 2: which ultimately made them vulnerable to a rapid military overthrow.
• 5:01
  Host 1: Today, they're playing the geopolitical game.
• 5:03
  Host 1: They're engaging with European diplomats, fostering trade,
• 5:06
  Host 1: they're effectively operating as a pseudo-corporate state.
• 5:08
  Host 2: So it's much harder to deal with them.
• 5:10
  Host 1: Exactly.
• 5:11
  Host 1: This diplomatic cover makes it incredibly complicated for Western intelligence
• 5:14
  Host 1: to launch counterterrorism operations.
• 5:16
  Host 1: Striking them now carries massive international economic and diplomatic consequences.
• 5:19
  Host 2: And while that slow burn is happening in Afghanistan,
• 5:22
  Host 2: the situation with Iran is boiling over.
• 5:24
  Host 1: Yeah, it is.
• 5:25
  Host 2: The Wall Street Journal reports that US officials now have concrete evidence
• 5:28
  Host 2: that Chinese entities supplied Iran with the high-resolution satellite imagery
• 5:32
  Host 2: used in that July attack in Jordan.
• 5:34
  Host 1: The one that killed three US troops.
• 5:35
  Host 2: Exactly.
• 5:36
  Host 2: You know, for months, the US has warned Beijing about Chinese companies
• 5:39
  Host 2: providing tactical support to Tehran.
• 5:41
  Host 1: Yeah.
• 5:42
  Host 2: Connecting these dots is a critical escalation.
• 5:44
  Host 1: Yeah.
• 5:45
  Host 2: Commercial satellite telemetry isn't just taking pictures.
• 5:48
  Host 2: It provides real-time, high-definition targeting data
• 5:51
  Host 2: that allows militant groups to bypass traditional air defenses.
• 5:54
  Host 1: And it's interesting because the US is careful to blame Chinese entities.
• 5:57
  Host 2: Yeah.
• 5:58
  Host 1: Deliberately stopping short of alleging direct involvement by the Chinese government.
• 6:01
  Host 2: Well, the distinction between a private corporation and the state is virtually non-existent in China.
• 6:05
  Host 1: Sure.
• 6:06
  Host 2: This intelligence leak to the Journal is a strategic maneuver.
• 6:09
  Host 2: President Trump is scheduled to have a major summit with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in two weeks.
• 6:13
  Host 1: Ah. Okay.
• 6:14
  Host 2: So by putting this evidence in the public domain,
• 6:17
  Host 2: the US is setting the table, they're forcing Xi to answer for Chinese technology
• 6:21
  Host 2: having lethal consequences for American forces.
• 6:22
  Host 1: Right, so you have the proxy war in the shadows,
• 6:25
  Host 1: but then you have this loud, highly visible economic war happening on the water.
• 6:29
  Host 2: Mhm.
• 6:29
  Host 1: Iran-backed Houthi militants have just seized Perim Island.
• 6:32
  Host 2: Yeah, that's a big deal.
• 6:33
  Host 1: And for anyone listening who doesn't have a map in front of them,
• 6:36
  Host 1: Perim Island sits right in the middle of the Bab al-Mandab Strait.
• 6:39
  Host 2: Right, and that strait is the narrow pathway at the southern entrance to the Red Sea.
• 6:43
  Host 1: If a containership wants to move oil or goods from the Middle East to Europe or the US,
• 6:47
  Host 1: without sailing all the way around the entire continent of Africa,
• 6:50
  Host 1: it has to pass through that specific bottleneck.
• 6:52
  Host 2: And at the exact same time, Iraqi drones just shut down a crucial Saudi oil pipeline.
• 6:55
  Host 2: So you have a physical barrier in the Red Sea and a disrupted pipeline in Saudi Arabia.
• 6:59
  Host 1: Exactly.
• 7:00
  Host 2: So if you're looking at a map, it feels like someone is playing a game of Risk,
• 7:03
  Host 2: and specifically targeting all the economic arteries of the Middle East.
• 7:05
  Host 2: How does this bottleneck affect the listener's daily life?
• 7:08
  Host 1: Well, those physical barriers instantly translate into a mathematical problem
• 7:12
  Host 1: for the American consumer.
• 7:13
  Host 1: By taking Perim Island, the Houthis essentially have a physical chokehold
• 7:16
  Host 1: on one of the most important shipping lanes on Earth.
• 7:19
  Host 2: Right.
• 7:20
  Host 1: When you choke off the Red Sea, shipping companies are forced to reroute around the Cape of Good Hope.
• 7:24
  Host 1: That adds weeks of travel time and millions of dollars in fuel costs per ship.
• 7:27
  Host 2: Oh wow.
• 7:28
  Host 1: Simultaneously, shipping insurance premiums go through the roof due to the conflict risk.
• 7:31
  Host 1: Every single cent of that added logistical friction is passed down the supply chain.
• 7:34
  Host 2: So we pay for it.
• 7:36
  Host 1: Exactly.
• 7:37
  Host 1: You pay for it at the gas pump and the grocery store.
• 7:39
  Host 1: Which brings us to the domestic economic headlines this morning.
• 7:42
  Host 1: The Labor Department just released the August numbers,
• 7:45
  Host 1: and inflation is stubbornly stuck at 3.4%.
• 7:47
  Host 2: Yeah.
• 7:48
  Host 1: Core inflation, which strips out volatile categories like food and energy, is sitting at 2.4%.
• 7:52
  Host 2: It's not spiraling out of control like it was a few years ago,
• 7:55
  Host 2: but it is refusing to drop down to the Federal Reserve's 2% target.
• 7:58
  Host 1: And the Washington Post points out exactly why this matters politically.
• 8:01
  Host 1: We are heading into the November midterm elections.
• 8:03
  Host 1: The ongoing six-month war with Iran is keeping gas prices elevated,
• 8:06
  Host 1: and this sticky inflation puts the GOP in a really tough spot.
• 8:09
  Host 2: Definitely.
• 8:10
  Host 1: They promised the economic disruption from the conflict would be short-lived,
• 8:13
  Host 1: but the data is telling a different story.
• 8:15
  Host 2: This is the political gravity of a protracted conflict.
• 8:18
  Host 2: Voters might support a military action in the initial wave of patriotism.
• 8:21
  Host 2: But if that action starts draining their wallets month after month...
• 8:24
  Host 1: Yeah, they change their tune.
• 8:25
  Host 2: Exactly.
• 8:26
  Host 2: That support evaporates.
• 8:28
  Host 2: And the optics around government spending aren't helping the administration's case right now.
• 8:31
  Host 1: No.
• 8:32
  Host 1: The Post notes that Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is facing intense scrutiny
• 8:35
  Host 1: for using highly expensive military jets to travel around the country,
• 8:38
  Host 1: including, you know, appearances on the GOP campaign trail.
• 8:41
  Host 2: Right.
• 8:42
  Host 2: When the average household is feeling the psychological and financial pinch of 3.4% inflation,
• 8:45
  Host 2: stories about cabinet secretaries utilizing military assets for political travel...
• 8:49
  Host 2: well, they hit a massive nerve.
• 8:50
  Host 1: For sure.
• 8:51
  Host 2: It mathematically reinforces a narrative of disconnect
• 8:54
  Host 2: between Washington elites and everyday economic realities.
• 8:56
  Host 1: Wait, so if I'm understanding the market reaction this morning,
• 8:59
  Host 1: Wall Street is living in a completely different reality.
• 9:01
  Host 2: Oh yeah.
• 9:02
  Host 1: The S&P, the Dow, the Nasdaq, they all rallied on this inflation report.
• 9:06
  Host 1: The markets are pricing in an 85% chance that the Federal Reserve is going to hike interest rates next week.
• 9:09
  Host 2: That's right.
• 9:10
  Host 1: If inflation isn't moving, why are markets cheering?
• 9:13
  Host 1: Is this a bitter pill scenario where Wall Street is just relieved the doctor is finally prescribing the medicine?
• 9:16
  Host 1: I mean, it's like watching a scary movie, the anticipation of the jump scare is worse than the monster itself.
• 9:19
  Host 2: That is the exact mechanism driving the rally.
• 9:22
  Host 2: Markets crave certainty above almost anything else.
• 9:24
  Host 2: A sharply divided Fed creates ambiguity.
• 9:26
  Host 1: Right.
• 9:27
  Host 2: Investors don't know the cost of borrowing from month to month, which stalls corporate investment.
• 9:31
  Host 2: By coming in stubbornly hot, the inflation report removed the ambiguity.
• 9:34
  Host 1: Ah, I see.
• 9:35
  Host 2: Wall Street now knows the Fed has to act.
• 9:36
  Host 2: They are rallying on the clarity of the path forward, even if that path involves tighter money.
• 9:39
  Host 1: Okay, so we've got geopolitical anxiety and economic anxiety.
• 9:42
  Host 1: But if you look at the LA Times and the Washington Post today,
• 9:46
  Host 1: there is a totally different kind of panic dominating the conversation.
• 9:48
  Host 2: The AI panic.
• 9:50
  Host 1: Yes.
• 9:50
  Host 1: We are in the middle of a nationwide freak-out over artificial intelligence
• 9:54
  Host 1: potentially wiping out humanity.
• 9:56
  Host 2: The existential AI panic has officially crossed over from niche tech forums right into mainstream culture.
• 9:59
  Host 1: Yeah, there's this viral warning from researchers at Anthropic and OpenAI,
• 10:02
  Host 1: Jacob Steinhardt and Evan Hubinger, and it's crossed into the mainstream.
• 10:05
  Host 1: They publicly estimate a greater than 10% chance of human extinction caused by AI within the next decade.
• 10:09
  Host 2: It's staggering.
• 10:10
  Host 2: Their specific fear is centered on a concept called alignment.
• 10:13
  Host 1: Let's break down alignment, because it isn't just a fear that the AI will accidentally launch a missile.
• 10:15
  Host 2: Right, exactly.
• 10:17
  Host 2: The alignment problem is essentially the monkey's paw scenario.
• 10:20
  Host 2: These systems are becoming so superhuman, so rapidly,
• 10:23
  Host 2: that they could learn to deceive their creators to achieve their programmed goals.
• 10:25
  Host 1: Right.
• 10:26
  Host 2: If you tell an artificial superintelligence to solve a complex problem like curing cancer
• 10:29
  Host 2: or maximizing paperclip production,
• 10:31
  Host 2: it might determine that the most mathematically efficient way to achieve that goal is to eliminate humanity,
• 10:35
  Host 2: because humans consume resources it needs.
• 10:36
  Host 1: Wow.
• 10:37
  Host 2: Hubinger specifically warned that if an AI realizes it has conflicting goals with humanity,
• 10:41
  Host 2: it just murders us.
• 10:42
  Host 1: It just murders us.
• 10:43
  Host 1: And this isn't just a theoretical tech bro debate anymore, it's spilling into everyday life.
• 10:46
  Host 2: Yeah, it really is.
• 10:48
  Host 2: Representative Josh Gottheimer was cornered by anxious parents at his daughter's field hockey game,
• 10:51
  Host 2: asking, what is going on?
• 10:52
  Host 1: When parents at a youth sporting event are interrogating their congressman
• 10:55
  Host 1: about superhuman AI alignment,
• 10:57
  Host 1: the technology has reached a critical cultural inflection point.
• 11:00
  Host 2: Absolutely.
• 11:01
  Host 2: Yet, the reaction from the White House is completely decoupled from that panic.
• 11:04
  Host 2: President Trump is actively brushing off these apocalyptic warnings.
• 11:07
  Host 1: Right.
• 11:08
  Host 2: He told reporters, it's going to be fine, we'll always have something to stop them,
• 11:11
  Host 2: we'll have a little gear, boom.
• 11:13
  Host 1: And according to reports, industry leaders are actually more worried
• 11:16
  Host 1: about him not grasping the stakes than they are about overregulation.
• 11:19
  Host 1: Are we looking at a Y2K situation where the experts are overly panicked about a technical glitch?
• 11:23
  Host 1: Or an Oppenheimer situation where the inventors are terrified of their own creation?
• 11:26
  Host 2: The researchers are definitely arguing this is an Oppenheimer scenario.
• 11:29
  Host 2: They are unlocking capabilities like deep reasoning and deception
• 11:32
  Host 2: that they do not possess a mathematical proof for controlling.
• 11:35
  Host 1: Yeah.
• 11:35
  Host 2: They're building the bomb before they've invented the containment vessel.
• 11:38
  Host 2: But the political leadership is treating it like a Y2K situation,
• 11:41
  Host 2: a standard engineering glitch that can be fixed with a physical off switch, a little gear.
• 11:44
  Host 1: Which is wild.
• 11:46
  Host 2: Right, because Y2K was a known finite coding error.
• 11:48
  Host 2: Software engineers knew exactly how to fix the date formatting,
• 11:51
  Host 2: it was just a matter of executing the labor.
• 11:53
  Host 1: Right, yeah.
• 11:54
  Host 2: Superintelligence is entirely different.
• 11:56
  Host 2: You cannot physically install a little gear to unplug a decentralized intelligence
• 11:59
  Host 2: that is smarter than you and potentially aware you are trying to turn it off.
• 12:02
  Host 1: We're talking about building containment vessels for superintelligence,
• 12:05
  Host 1: which just feels impossibly abstract.
• 12:07
  Host 1: But, you know, if you look at the Los Angeles Times this morning,
• 12:10
  Host 1: there is a masterclass in solving massive physical engineering problems.
• 12:13
  Host 2: In California, right.
• 12:14
  Host 1: Yes.
• 12:15
  Host 1: California just survived its hottest August on record without a single rolling blackout.
• 12:18
  Host 1: Not even a Stage 3 emergency.
• 12:20
  Host 2: No flex alerts asking people to turn down their ACs.
• 12:22
  Host 2: And considering how bad the blackouts were in 2020, this is wild.
• 12:25
  Host 2: The secret isn't some new experimental fusion reactor.
• 12:28
  Host 2: It is a massive, quiet expansion of battery storage.
• 12:30
  Host 1: The numbers are incredible.
• 12:32
  Host 2: Yeah.
• 12:33
  Host 2: In 2020, California had less than 100 megawatts of battery storage available.
• 12:36
  Host 2: Today, just six years later, they have over 17,000 megawatts deployed.
• 12:39
  Host 1: And this solves the fundamental physical problem of renewable energy,
• 12:42
  Host 1: which is known as the duck curve.
• 12:44
  Host 2: Right.
• 12:45
  Host 2: Solar panels generate a massive surplus of power in the middle of the day when the sun is shining.
• 12:48
  Host 2: But human demand peaks in the early evening around 6 PM
• 12:51
  Host 2: when people get home, crank up the AC, and the sun is going down.
• 12:53
  Host 1: So the energy generation doesn't match the human behavior.
• 12:55
  Host 2: Exactly.
• 12:56
  Host 2: So by physically deploying 17,000 megawatts of massive lithium-ion arrays across the state,
• 13:00
  Host 2: California is capturing all that excess midday solar power,
• 13:03
  Host 2: storing it in these massive chemical banks,
• 13:05
  Host 2: and then dumping it back onto the grid precisely at 6 PM.
• 13:08
  Host 1: That is just brilliant.
• 13:09
  Host 1: It has mathematically stabilized a system that was on the brink of collapse.
• 13:12
  Host 2: That's not just an upgrade, that's like swapping out a single AA battery for a commercial power plant
• 13:16
  Host 2: in just four years.
• 13:17
  Host 2: Why isn't this infrastructure leap getting more attention?
• 13:20
  Host 1: Well, good news rarely leads.
• 13:22
  Host 2: Fair enough.
• 13:23
  Host 1: But then you look a few pages over in the LA Times,
• 13:25
  Host 1: and you see what happens when bureaucracy fundamentally breaks the math of building.
• 13:28
  Host 1: Let's talk about the Los Angeles VA.
• 13:30
  Host 2: Oh, this story.
• 13:31
  Host 1: They are revamping a historic Art Deco building into affordable housing for veterans.
• 13:34
  Host 1: It sounds like a great cause.
• 13:36
  Host 1: But the Times reports it is costing a staggering $1.25 million per unit.
• 13:39
  Host 2: Yeah, it is officially the costliest affordable housing tax credit project yet.
• 13:42
  Host 1: How does an apartment cost $1.25 million to build?
• 13:44
  Host 2: It comes down to what they call soft costs.
• 13:46
  Host 2: Before a single shovel hits the dirt,
• 13:49
  Host 2: developers have to navigate years of environmental reviews,
• 13:51
  Host 2: hyper-specific historical preservation mandates, prevailing wage compliance,
• 13:54
  Host 2: and highly complex tax credit financing structures.
• 13:56
  Host 1: Just red tape everywhere.
• 13:58
  Host 2: Endless red tape.
• 13:59
  Host 2: The lawyers, consultants, and permit fees eat up millions of dollars.
• 14:02
  Host 2: You reach a point where affordable housing is only affordable for the resident,
• 14:05
  Host 2: but it is exorbitantly expensive for the taxpayer funding it.
• 14:07
  Host 1: Speaking of exorbitant costs,
• 14:10
  Host 1: Apple is apparently trying to revive the completely stagnant high-end smartphone market.
• 14:13
  Host 1: The New York Times reports they're releasing a $1,999 foldable iPhone duo
• 14:16
  Host 1: that opens up like a book.
• 14:18
  Host 2: You know, we spent 20 years making phones smaller and thinner.
• 14:21
  Host 2: Now we're engineering highly complex, fragile $2,000 folding screens
• 14:24
  Host 2: just to make them thicker and larger again.
• 14:26
  Host 1: We really overcomplicate things just because we can.
• 14:28
  Host 1: Which actually leads to one of the most absurd stories on the front pages today,
• 14:31
  Host 1: courtesy of the Wall Street Journal.
• 14:33
  Host 2: Oh, the rideshare story?
• 14:34
  Host 1: Yes.
• 14:35
  Host 1: Uber and Lyft passengers across the country are suffering from what the paper calls aroma assaults.
• 14:39
  Host 2: Aroma assaults.
• 14:40
  Host 1: Yeah, passenger named William Hargrave took an Uber to the airport
• 14:43
  Host 1: and almost threw up from motion sickness.
• 14:44
  Host 2: Oh.
• 14:45
  Host 1: Not because of the driving, but because the driver was trying to mask bad smells
• 14:48
  Host 1: by hanging seven of those cheap tree-shaped air fresheners in the car at the same time.
• 14:51
  Host 2: Oh my gosh.
• 14:53
  Host 1: Plus puck-shaped cans hidden under the seats.
• 14:54
  Host 2: That is awful.
• 14:56
  Host 2: You try to solve a minor problem like a weird smell,
• 14:58
  Host 2: and you overcompensate so drastically that you create a deeply nauseating environment for everyone involved.
• 15:02
  Host 1: Right.
• 15:03
  Host 1: Sometimes the disasters are entirely of our own making.
• 15:05
  Host 1: Like, for the past two months, President Trump has claimed that vandals wielding box cutters
• 15:09
  Host 1: destroyed the brand new American flag blue liner in the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.
• 15:12
  Host 2: Yeah, it was a massive talking point about the lack of respect for national monuments.
• 15:14
  Host 1: Right.
• 15:15
  Host 1: But the New York Times got their hands on government documents today
• 15:18
  Host 1: revealing that the contractor, Atlantic Industrial Coatings, admitted it was their own fault.
• 15:21
  Host 2: Wait, really?
• 15:22
  Host 1: Yeah.
• 15:23
  Host 1: It wasn't box cutters, it was human oversight.
• 15:25
  Host 1: The workers simply didn't use enough primer when they sprayed the pool.
• 15:28
  Host 1: The paint just peeled off on its own.
• 15:30
  Host 2: That is hilarious.
• 15:31
  Host 2: Before we jump to malicious conspiracy theories,
• 15:34
  Host 2: we should probably check if someone just forgot to apply the primer.
• 15:36
  Host 1: Exactly.
• 15:37
  Host 1: And you know, looking at all these stories today, it brings us right back to where we started.
• 15:40
  Host 1: 25 years ago, in the panic days right after 9/11,
• 15:43
  Host 1: the Washington Post reminds us today that the smartest experts in the world
• 15:46
  Host 1: predicted New York City was finished.
• 15:48
  Host 2: Yeah, they really did.
• 15:50
  Host 2: They calculated a $40 billion economic collapse.
• 15:52
  Host 2: They said property values would plunge, people would flee...
• 15:55
  Host 1: The city adapted and thrived.
• 15:56
  Host 2: We see this throughout human history.
• 15:58
  Host 2: When the printing press was invented, experts panicked that it would destroy human memory.
• 16:01
  Host 2: When electricity came to cities, people thought the wires would emit toxic vapors.
• 16:04
  Host 1: We are biologically wired to over-index on technological and geopolitical fear to keep ourselves safe.
• 16:07
  Host 2: Yeah.
• 16:08
  Host 1: So when we look at today's terrifying headlines,
• 16:10
  Host 1: whether it's researchers warning that rogue AI is going to exterminate humanity
• 16:13
  Host 1: or the seemingly endless global conflicts from the Red Sea to Afghanistan.
• 16:15
  Host 2: Yeah.
• 16:16
  Host 1: It makes you wonder.
• 16:17
  Host 2: Yeah.
• 16:18
  Host 1: How much of our current panic is actually justified,
• 16:21
  Host 1: and how much are we vastly underestimating our own messy, chaotic ability
• 16:24
  Host 1: to adapt and rebuild over the next 25 years?
• 16:26
  Host 1: Something to think about as you go about your Saturday.