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Will AI Kill Us? Your Kids or 'Our Kids?' Talarico's Tall Tales | Last Call · 3 Martini Lunch – Political Humor & Commentary

0:02
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Three Martini Lunch. Grab a stool next
0:05
Speaker 1: to Greg Karambas of Radio America and Jim Garrity of
0:08
Speaker 1: National Review. Three martinis coming up.
0:13
Speaker 2: Welcome to the last call of the week for the
0:15
Speaker 2: Three Martini Lunch. This is our weekly recap of the
0:18
Speaker 2: biggest stories of the week. This has been a week
0:20
Speaker 2: of difficult anniversaries. For our extended reflections on 25 years
0:25
Speaker 2: since the 9-11 terrorist attacks, please listen to Friday's Three
0:29
Speaker 2: Martini Lunch. And on Thursday, we shared our thoughts on
0:32
Speaker 2: the year since Charlie Kirk was brutally murdered. In this edition,
0:38
Speaker 2: an AI whistleblower says companies are quickly losing control of
0:41
Speaker 2: the technology, and we could all be dead because of
0:44
Speaker 2: AI within the next decade. Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed
0:48
Speaker 2: is the latest lefty to declare that your kids are
0:50
Speaker 2: not your kids, they're our kids. And Texas Senate hopeful
0:54
Speaker 2: James Tallarico tries to sound like he's tough on his
0:57
Speaker 2: own party, until the truth comes out. And in our
1:00
Speaker 2: Chaser of the Week, Pennsylvania Democratic Senator John Fetterman participates
1:04
Speaker 2: at the Republican Midterm Convention. What does his political future
1:08
Speaker 2: look like? But we begin with really dire warnings from
1:12
Speaker 2: the AI world. All right, Jim, we're all going to die,
1:15
Speaker 2: which is true. But most people don't think we're all
1:17
Speaker 2: going to die in the next decade unless... You work
1:21
Speaker 2: in AI, and that is certainly the situation right now.
1:26
Speaker 2: You read about it in the Jolt today. Axios has
1:28
Speaker 2: reported on it, Fox News and others have reported on it, CNN.
1:32
Speaker 2: Former anthropic AI, and that term still bugs me because
1:36
Speaker 2: anthropic resorts to human. That's what the root of that
1:38
Speaker 2: word is, is human. But anthropic AI researcher, Jacob Coxon,
1:42
Speaker 2: You right in the jolt today caused more than a
1:44
Speaker 2: little bit of a stir when he posted on X
1:45
Speaker 2: Tuesday evening, quote, I resigned from Anthropic today. I spent
1:49
Speaker 2: the last three years doing pre-training research at both OpenAI
1:52
Speaker 2: and Anthropic. Neither company is acting responsibly. They are racing
1:56
Speaker 2: straight to self-improving superintelligence and gambling with our lives. The
2:01
Speaker 2: people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us
2:04
Speaker 2: all by the end of the decade. This is not
2:06
Speaker 2: a marketing stunt. If anything, many executives and senior researchers
2:09
Speaker 2: will couch their phrasing in the press to sound sensible,
2:12
Speaker 2: but I hear the same people express fear privately. No
2:16
Speaker 2: other human activity poses this level of danger. And so
2:21
Speaker 2: another guy who was at Anthropic named Evan Hubinger that
2:26
Speaker 2: you quote in the jolt today says, Jacob is correct.
2:28
Speaker 2: We really do believe AI could kill all humans. I
2:30
Speaker 2: personally think it is a greater than 10% chance within
2:33
Speaker 2: the next decade. I believe Anthropic is trying its best,
2:36
Speaker 2: but we do not have a plan to solve alignment
2:38
Speaker 2: for superintelligence and are not clearly on track to. Now,
2:42
Speaker 2: Coxon was on Fox News Channel with Brett Baer last
2:45
Speaker 2: night saying, yes, it's a huge problem, but it's not unsolvable.
2:49
Speaker 2: He says it's not like we think this is some
2:51
Speaker 2: impossible thing. It's just we're racing so fast we haven't
2:54
Speaker 2: got time to solve it correctly. We're not being careful
2:56
Speaker 2: and everyone wants to be careful. So he's sounding the
2:59
Speaker 2: alarm that we need to put some guardrails on this
3:01
Speaker 2: thing before it's too late, and it sounds like it
3:03
Speaker 2: might already be too late. So, Jim, this seems like
3:07
Speaker 2: more concern than, you know, ending net neutrality is going
3:10
Speaker 2: to kill us all, or Republican tax cuts are going
3:12
Speaker 2: to kill us all. But this is probably overkill. But
3:16
Speaker 2: when the people who invent this stuff have no way
3:18
Speaker 2: to control it, it does become pretty alarming.
3:21
Speaker 1: Greg, if someone who really understood how things work came
3:24
Speaker 1: to you and I and said, guys, I hate to
3:26
Speaker 1: tell you this, but if you continue doing the Three
3:29
Speaker 1: Martini Lynch podcast, there's a 10% chance it could destroy
3:33
Speaker 1: human civilization and kill every human being on the planet.
3:37
Speaker 1: I think that's the end of the show. It's not
3:40
Speaker 1: a great risk, but is it worth it to do
3:44
Speaker 1: the podcast if it's going to kill that many people? Thankfully,
3:47
Speaker 1: no one has said that, and so we are going
3:49
Speaker 1: to continue into perpetuity. So I try to walk through
3:53
Speaker 1: a lot in this. I try not to use one
3:55
Speaker 1: of my cliches, but there is a lot to unpack here.
3:58
Speaker 1: And I will begin that Coxon, I'm sure he's a
4:01
Speaker 1: bright guy. I don't know whether his message is considered
4:04
Speaker 1: more credible or less credible by the fact that he
4:07
Speaker 1: looks like he graduated from Hogwarts last week. A very
4:11
Speaker 1: bizarre Harry Potter resemblance there. Look, anytime someone from the
4:17
Speaker 1: AI industry comes out and says, wow, I'm freaked out,
4:20
Speaker 1: I'm walking away from this. And his co-workers say, yeah,
4:23
Speaker 1: but it's like 10%. That still does not, like, most
4:27
Speaker 1: of us operate, like the Three-Way Retaining Lunch podcast, there's
4:31
Speaker 1: really a 0.0 chance we're going to destroy the universe
4:34
Speaker 1: just by doing this sort of thing. And I also
4:37
Speaker 1: would note when people say, you know, there's a 10%
4:39
Speaker 1: chance that our work might destroy all of humanity, I
4:43
Speaker 1: notice they never quite elaborate how. They just kind of
4:47
Speaker 1: basically say at some point the AI will break out
4:50
Speaker 1: of containment, and it'll become self-aware, and everyone kind of
4:54
Speaker 1: reverts to James Cameron movies. And the whole thing out
4:57
Speaker 1: of this Terminator thing was, you know, and they explain
5:00
Speaker 1: this in the second one, like, you know, the Skynet
5:02
Speaker 1: is this great program, the Defense Department loves it, hooks
5:06
Speaker 1: it up to everything in the Defense Department, including the
5:09
Speaker 1: nuclear arsenal, and effectively gives Skynet the authority to launch
5:13
Speaker 1: nuclear weapons. And that's, you know, it launches them at Russia,
5:16
Speaker 1: because it wants Russia to destroy the U.S. government, And
5:19
Speaker 1: then before you know it, you've got giant metal skeletons
5:21
Speaker 1: walking across a devastated landscape. I think, as I've looked through,
5:26
Speaker 1: not just from the thriller research, from other stuff, like
5:28
Speaker 1: there's a lot of ways that if AI decided to
5:30
Speaker 1: mess with us, it could do so. One of the
5:34
Speaker 1: novels I wrote about quantum computing, and like if the
5:36
Speaker 1: day somebody breaks through on this, You could make an
5:38
Speaker 1: argument that basically all firewalls in all computer systems are hackable.
5:42
Speaker 1: There's nothing safe anymore. That basically these things that we
5:45
Speaker 1: think are utterly unbreakable suddenly become breakable fairly easily. Now,
5:50
Speaker 1: that's really bad, Greg. I don't know if it ends
5:53
Speaker 1: with the Statue of Liberty and the beach and intelligent
5:56
Speaker 1: apes walking around. You go from like, oh, that would
5:59
Speaker 1: be really bad to that would be the end of
6:01
Speaker 1: human civilization. I don't know if we necessarily get there. Now,
6:04
Speaker 1: I also found an article in the Wall Street Journal
6:06
Speaker 1: from early summer, where basically people were using open AI
6:10
Speaker 1: and basically saying, how can I create a really devastating
6:13
Speaker 1: biological weapon? How can I create a strain of measles
6:17
Speaker 1: that would infect those who already have vaccinations? AI doesn't
6:23
Speaker 1: have to become self-aware to become really destructive. And the
6:27
Speaker 1: idea of enabling people who are angry at the world
6:30
Speaker 1: or who have malevolent intentions or something like, and giving
6:33
Speaker 1: them ideas and giving them the knowledge that is necessary
6:37
Speaker 1: to do something that is really devastating, that'd be really bad. Honestly,
6:42
Speaker 1: we don't need the intelligent AI, self-aware AI. That by
6:45
Speaker 1: itself is really bad as is. And the other thing
6:49
Speaker 1: I kind of wonder about, and again, we could talk
6:51
Speaker 1: about this for hours and hours and we try not
6:53
Speaker 1: to make this podcast go too long. Greg, how many
6:56
Speaker 1: times in your life have you said, except terms and conditions,
6:59
Speaker 1: And it's like 40 pages of solid text in, you know,
7:02
Speaker 1: six point font. And they could have language in there.
7:05
Speaker 1: I have, you know, we reserve all rights to your firstborn.
7:07
Speaker 1: And you just got to click OK because I want
7:09
Speaker 1: to use the app or something like that. You know,
7:11
Speaker 1: we live in an era with that in which God,
7:13
Speaker 1: we have no idea what we're agreeing to, you know,
7:16
Speaker 1: giving a company or an app access to our phone,
7:18
Speaker 1: to our computers, all that stuff. We live in an
7:20
Speaker 1: era where our refrigerators are connected to the internet. We
7:23
Speaker 1: live in an era where our cars have computer systems.
7:25
Speaker 1: Like the idea of, oh, we've created this AI program
7:29
Speaker 1: that can alter things. And it might break out of its,
7:33
Speaker 1: it may not operate by the rules we think it does.
7:35
Speaker 1: I found this fascinating article by the Washington Post tech
7:38
Speaker 1: columnist who says, I told the AI to find eggs
7:41
Speaker 1: that were cheap and it ordered a dozen eggs for
7:45
Speaker 1: $ 31 and they arrived at my house. And I realized
7:47
Speaker 1: that when I gave it access to the supermarket app,
7:50
Speaker 1: I had forgotten it had access to my credit card
7:52
Speaker 1: and it just bought it by itself and it didn't
7:54
Speaker 1: bother to check with me. So I could see a
7:58
Speaker 1: lot of problems coming out of that. The idea of
8:01
Speaker 1: we end up giving an AI access to that. And
8:04
Speaker 1: this was not, you know, at no point was the
8:08
Speaker 1: AI ordering eggs must destroy humanity, you know, that sort
8:12
Speaker 1: of thing. It just was like, oh, I'm going to
8:13
Speaker 1: help you. I'm going to spend $ 31 on a dozen
8:16
Speaker 1: eggs because you have not told me that is too
8:19
Speaker 1: much to pay By the way, fairly generous tip from
8:21
Speaker 1: the AI. So I know when they say that AI
8:24
Speaker 1: is malevolent, I think it still takes care of workers,
8:26
Speaker 1: so good for that. But there are real legitimate reasons
8:31
Speaker 1: to be concerned about AI. And I would also note
8:33
Speaker 1: that as someone who uses Microsoft Word to write the
8:37
Speaker 1: morning jolt, and we use computers all the time, I
8:39
Speaker 1: don't love how AI is getting shoved in my face
8:42
Speaker 1: by every app, everything that I use. Google, right? Oh,
8:45
Speaker 1: we're not going to give you links. We're just going
8:46
Speaker 1: to give you the AI explanation. Don't worry, you know.
8:50
Speaker 1: The inescapability of AI, by the way, I think all
8:52
Speaker 1: of this, by the way, I think is a driving
8:54
Speaker 1: factor in the panic over data centers. So, look, there
8:58
Speaker 1: are legitimate reasons to be concerned about. I have also
9:01
Speaker 1: heard people kind of not as convinced that this guy
9:04
Speaker 1: Coxon knows as much as he seems to or as
9:06
Speaker 1: he spent as much time there as he seems to. Again,
9:10
Speaker 1: you know, don't panic. My closing note in the morning
9:13
Speaker 1: jolt was Y2K. You know, you and I are of
9:15
Speaker 1: a certain age. We remember that was a very big deal.
9:17
Speaker 1: And the U.S. total spent like $ 100 billion updating the
9:20
Speaker 1: software for all that stuff. So we've seen this sort
9:23
Speaker 1: of thing before where people are like, this is a
9:25
Speaker 1: really terrible deal. The world's going to end. I put
9:27
Speaker 1: up a link to this fascinating video narrated by Leonard Nimoy, Spock,
9:32
Speaker 1: talking about all the dangers of how the Y2K pug
9:36
Speaker 1: is going to destroy your society and how you can
9:38
Speaker 1: help your family prepare. And of course, January 1st, 2000,
9:43
Speaker 1: life went on. It was not a disaster the way
9:46
Speaker 1: the doomsday predictions were. So, you know, this is worth
9:49
Speaker 1: keeping an eye on. I would not go into a
9:51
Speaker 1: panic over it. I would not be, you know, digging
9:53
Speaker 1: a shelter in my backyard or moving out to the
9:56
Speaker 1: middle of nowhere. But um nobody who gets involved in
10:00
Speaker 1: ai like joins signs up to become a participant and
10:03
Speaker 1: to build it because they don't like it everybody gets
10:06
Speaker 1: into it because they like it and they see all
10:07
Speaker 1: the wonderful possibilities of it i don't think there's a
10:09
Speaker 1: lot of pessimism in silicon valley and as a jets
10:12
Speaker 1: fan who is very pessimistic i think pessimism is always
10:15
Speaker 1: a good voice to have at the table Couple of
10:17
Speaker 1: thoughts here.
10:17
Speaker 2: I'm sure at the time that Leonard Nimoy documentary was fascinating,
10:22
Speaker 2: as he always used to say as Spock on Star Trek. Also,
10:25
Speaker 2: I've talked to some IT people and they differ on
10:28
Speaker 2: whether Y2K was a nothing burger or whether they had
10:31
Speaker 2: enough time to prepare for it so it became a
10:33
Speaker 2: nothing burger. So I don't know if there's a parallel
10:36
Speaker 2: to AI there. Also, Jim, prominent political figure I almost
10:39
Speaker 2: had the opportunity to interview who years ago wanted, I
10:42
Speaker 2: guess it was probably three years ago, wanted to bring
10:46
Speaker 2: the world together to put guardrails on AI, kind of
10:49
Speaker 2: in a UN style. Michael Dukakis was trying to get
10:53
Speaker 2: everybody on board to put the guardrails on that. I
10:55
Speaker 2: ended up talking to his chief researcher who I couldn't
10:58
Speaker 2: understand a word he said because English was not his
11:00
Speaker 2: first language. So we didn't end up running the interview.
11:02
Speaker 2: But Michael Dukakis was one of the first people concerned
11:05
Speaker 2: about this thing getting out of control.
11:07
Speaker 1: Well, you know, Greg, he's got the time to look
11:08
Speaker 1: into that sort of thing. Yes, yes.
11:13
Speaker 2: He's had lots of free time since 1990 when he
11:16
Speaker 2: stopped being governor of Massachusetts and not being in the
11:18
Speaker 2: White House.
11:19
Speaker 1: All right.
11:20
Speaker 2: Well, let's talk about your future. Let's hope you have one.
11:24
Speaker 2: I think you'll still have one. So it's still a
11:26
Speaker 2: good idea to prepare for retirement. I don't think AI
11:28
Speaker 2: is going to get you before then, but you need
11:30
Speaker 2: to be ready for it either way. And you definitely
11:33
Speaker 2: need to make sure that your portfolio is diversified and
11:35
Speaker 2: you have the most secure retirement possible. And that includes
11:38
Speaker 2: a chat with the good folks over at Noble Gold Investments.
11:41
Speaker 2: They'll explain the precious metals, why that might be right
11:43
Speaker 2: for you. You make the decision. One thing they do
11:46
Speaker 2: want you to know, though, is that some of these
11:47
Speaker 2: emerging industries, whether it's AI, whether it's data centers, on
11:50
Speaker 2: and on it goes, silver is more and more critically important.
11:54
Speaker 1: You know, Greg, if and when we live in a
11:56
Speaker 1: Terminator-style apocalyptic landscape. Is your 401k going to be accessible?
12:01
Speaker 1: Probably not. Is the green pieces of paper in your
12:04
Speaker 1: wallet going to be accessible and worthwhile? Gold would probably
12:08
Speaker 1: be worth it. But, you know, if you don't take
12:09
Speaker 1: my word for it, you can always talk to the
12:11
Speaker 1: good people at Noble Gold Investments. They're going to be
12:14
Speaker 1: able to explain it and probably give you a sense of, like, look,
12:16
Speaker 1: even what if the world doesn't end? Is gold going
12:19
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12:22
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12:25
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12:28
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12:49
Speaker 2: that's noblegoldinvestments.com slash 3ML. Earlier this week, Michigan Democratic U.S.
13:02
Speaker 2: Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed became the latest leftist to want
13:06
Speaker 2: control over your kids. Over a decade ago, you and
13:10
Speaker 2: I talked about this a lot at the time, These
13:14
Speaker 2: crazy left MSNBC at the time hosts would cut these
13:17
Speaker 2: ads talking about their far left dream. And one of
13:21
Speaker 2: these commentators was Melissa Harris Perry talking about how kids
13:26
Speaker 2: shouldn't belong to parents.
13:28
Speaker 1: We have.
13:29
Speaker 3: Never invested as much in public education as we should
13:32
Speaker 3: have because we've always had kind of a private notion
13:34
Speaker 3: of children. Your kid is yours and totally your responsibility.
13:38
Speaker 3: We haven't had a very collective notion of these are
13:41
Speaker 3: our children. So part of it is we have to
13:42
Speaker 3: break through our kind of private idea that kids belong
13:45
Speaker 3: to their parents or kids belong to their families and
13:48
Speaker 3: recognize that kids belong to whole communities. Once it's everybody's
13:51
Speaker 3: responsibility and not just the households, then we start making
13:54
Speaker 3: better investments.
13:55
Speaker 2: Yeah, Melissa, I don't think so. But Abdul El-Sayed seems
13:59
Speaker 2: to love that. Here he is talking about how in
14:01
Speaker 2: his estimation, you know, if we thought of everybody's kids
14:05
Speaker 2: as all of our kids, we'd be making better policy.
14:08
Speaker 4: You know, the number of times people debate whether I'm
14:11
Speaker 4: a socialist or a capitalist, I'm not a socialist.
14:14
Speaker 1: I'm a scientist. I'm a doctor.
14:16
Speaker 4: But if I have one political philosophy, right, it's that
14:20
Speaker 4: I want us to build what we would build if
14:22
Speaker 4: we took seriously the idea that that all of our
14:25
Speaker 4: kids were all of our kids. If we started with
14:26
Speaker 4: that idea, every child is our child, we would build
14:30
Speaker 4: incredible public schools.
14:32
Speaker 1: We would guarantee everybody healthcare.
14:34
Speaker 2: We would guarantee childcare.
14:35
Speaker 4: We would stop putting money in bombs and tanks that
14:38
Speaker 4: kill kids. And we would start investing them in infrastructure
14:43
Speaker 4: and opportunity for kids.
14:44
Speaker 1: Yeah.
14:45
Speaker 2: I don't want you making decisions for my kids. That's
14:47
Speaker 2: my job, but we'll get into that a little bit
14:49
Speaker 2: more in just a second. Then he was in another setting.
14:51
Speaker 2: This one was with Neera Tanden, who I don't know,
14:54
Speaker 2: five minutes ago, Jim was warning Democrats about candidates like this.
14:57
Speaker 2: But I guess once he's won the primary, I'll bygones
15:00
Speaker 2: or bygones. But this one, he's a little bit right
15:04
Speaker 2: in the beginning, but definitely wrong at the end.
15:06
Speaker 5: We've got this culture in our society that we've allowed
15:09
Speaker 5: to fester where we think that when people when people don't.
15:16
Speaker 5: have means, it's because they have failed. Poverty is not
15:19
Speaker 5: a failure. That when people live in persistent poverty, it
15:22
Speaker 5: is a failure on our society and not on those people.
15:25
Speaker 5: And that we should be driving that conversation and have
15:27
Speaker 5: the courage to have that conversation against this cult of
15:30
Speaker 5: hard work like everybody's got bootstraps to be pulling up.
15:33
Speaker 2: Okay. First of all, just because you're poor doesn't mean
15:36
Speaker 2: you're not trying hard and working hard. Those two can
15:39
Speaker 2: certainly be right. But the idea that there's a cult
15:41
Speaker 2: of hard work and that it's society's fault whenever somebody
15:46
Speaker 2: doesn't measure up and finds themselves in poverty. So Jim,
15:49
Speaker 2: target rich environment here. He wants to call the shots
15:52
Speaker 2: for your kids and all that hard work. What a canard.
15:56
Speaker 1: Greg, when you start the program with two clips from
16:00
Speaker 1: Abdul Al-Sayed, you put me in a situation where I
16:02
Speaker 1: have no choice but to be clear. There's a lot
16:04
Speaker 1: to unpack here. First of all, thinking back to that
16:08
Speaker 1: Melissa Harris Perry promo for MSNBC, now MSNOW, the US spends,
16:14
Speaker 1: we just passed the threshold of $ 1 trillion on public
16:17
Speaker 1: schooling from coast to coast and everyone. So one question is,
16:20
Speaker 1: when would you, she says we've always underfunded our public schools.
16:24
Speaker 1: Have we? Like what is the threshold in which you
16:27
Speaker 1: would say, okay, that is a sufficient level? Because my
16:30
Speaker 1: suspicion is no matter how much it goes up, The
16:34
Speaker 1: argument from the left is always going to be, you
16:36
Speaker 1: have to go higher. Fairfax County, where I'm in right now,
16:39
Speaker 1: they spend a pretty penny on schools. They might be
16:41
Speaker 1: spending a little bit less than in previous years. There
16:44
Speaker 1: are times where you can go over, but they pride
16:46
Speaker 1: themselves on that. By the way, public schooling has traditionally
16:49
Speaker 1: been a local priority. Richer communities have more to spend
16:52
Speaker 1: than poorer communities. But however, there's an extensive amount of
16:55
Speaker 1: federal grants that are available. The federal government, state governments
16:58
Speaker 1: do a lot to help out poorer school districts. Anyway,
17:01
Speaker 1: none of this fits in into an MSNBC one. When
17:05
Speaker 1: Abdul Al-Sayed echoes this argument of it's not your kids,
17:08
Speaker 1: it's not my kids, it's all of our kids. I
17:11
Speaker 1: am reminded of former Texas Senator Phil Graham, who was,
17:14
Speaker 1: I believe, running for president. He was up in New
17:16
Speaker 1: Hampshire or something like that. And some woman at a
17:19
Speaker 1: town hall insisted that she cared about Phil Graham's kids
17:23
Speaker 1: as much as he did. And he did not believe that.
17:25
Speaker 1: And they went back and forth until finally he said,
17:27
Speaker 1: what are their names? And unsurprisingly, the woman could not
17:31
Speaker 1: name them. So the argument that I abstractly care about
17:35
Speaker 1: your kids as much as you do as their actual parent,
17:39
Speaker 1: that just doesn't hold water. It just doesn't. You can
17:41
Speaker 1: be a very good, well-meaning person, but that doesn't necessarily
17:44
Speaker 1: mean that you're going to care more, ergo your decisions
17:46
Speaker 1: are the right ones. Thirdly, When I see him say, like,
17:52
Speaker 1: there was a while where the for the children turned
17:54
Speaker 1: into this, like, there was this backlash against it. People
17:58
Speaker 1: started to recognize that any terrible policy can be justified
18:03
Speaker 1: if you say it's for the children. Flock cameras, we
18:06
Speaker 1: need this for the children. You know, the Orwellian surveillance state,
18:10
Speaker 1: we need this for the children. The U.S. government knowing every,
18:13
Speaker 1: you know, like, every, whatever you're doing, they can basically say, well,
18:16
Speaker 1: what do you not care about kids?
18:17
Speaker 4: You know.
18:18
Speaker 1: Remy, who makes funny videos for the Reason channel, makes
18:23
Speaker 1: a very funny song, which is basically called People Will Die.
18:26
Speaker 1: And it was basically like, if you want the speed
18:28
Speaker 1: limit above 15 miles an hour anywhere in the country,
18:31
Speaker 1: people will die. You know, the idea that any policy
18:34
Speaker 1: could be justified in the name of safety. This is
18:36
Speaker 1: the philosophy that's at work here. When Abdullah said we
18:39
Speaker 1: shouldn't be spending money on bombs and tanks that kill kids,
18:41
Speaker 1: any bomb or tank that can kill any adult... is
18:44
Speaker 1: also going to be capable of killing kids. Now, you
18:46
Speaker 1: try not to. Our side does not aim for kids.
18:49
Speaker 1: The other side, we might be coming up on an
18:51
Speaker 1: important anniversary coming up this week. They don't care about
18:54
Speaker 1: civilian casualties. They don't care if they hit kids. The
18:57
Speaker 1: Beslan School Massacre, things like that. I suppose Abdullah Syed
19:01
Speaker 1: would like our tanks to be made of Nerf, so
19:04
Speaker 1: they're squishy and you won't have contact with it. Finally,
19:07
Speaker 1: the argument, the cult of hard work. Mike Rogers, please
19:10
Speaker 1: run an ad on this and please say, Do you
19:12
Speaker 1: think the problem with America is that we work too hard?
19:15
Speaker 1: Or do you think the problem with America is that
19:16
Speaker 1: not enough people work hard enough? And I think that
19:19
Speaker 1: I find it very hard to believe that the problem
19:22
Speaker 1: is that Americans work too hard. Are there Americans who
19:25
Speaker 1: are overworked? Are there Americans who work too hard? Yeah, probably.
19:29
Speaker 1: But this argument, like you point out, no, not everyone
19:31
Speaker 1: who's poor has made bad decisions that have put themselves
19:34
Speaker 1: in that situation. But some have. And it's really unfair.
19:38
Speaker 1: The fact that you're poor is not automatically a sign
19:41
Speaker 1: of being virtuous. It's not automatically a sign that you've
19:43
Speaker 1: made good decisions. It's not automatically a sign that you
19:45
Speaker 1: have worked hard. So again, it does not surprise me
19:49
Speaker 1: that a democratic candidate is denouncing the cult of hard work.
19:52
Speaker 1: And let me point out, had you talked to me
19:54
Speaker 1: anywhere from like teenagerhood to maybe 25 or so, when
19:59
Speaker 1: that delayed development of executive function and male brains finally
20:02
Speaker 1: kicks in. I might have agreed with you, that's darn
20:05
Speaker 1: cult of hard work. There was a time in my
20:07
Speaker 1: life I was kind of lazy. So that's when I
20:09
Speaker 1: was in the target demographic for Abdul El-Sayed in this message. Nonetheless,
20:13
Speaker 1: I'm hoping this does not succeed. I've got to admit,
20:14
Speaker 1: the polling has had him a small lead so far.
20:17
Speaker 1: Mike Rogers, got to get on the stick. Let's go.
20:18
Speaker 1: This is about beatable guys you're ever going to find
20:21
Speaker 1: in the state of Michigan. Exactly.
20:23
Speaker 2: But the left has gone down this road, not just
20:25
Speaker 2: since that ad from Melissa Harris Perry, but well before that,
20:29
Speaker 2: thinking that they just know better. I mean, that's their
20:31
Speaker 2: mantra on everything. And so just get on board. Nancy Pelosi,
20:35
Speaker 2: you'll find out what's in the bill after we pass it,
20:37
Speaker 2: that kind of thing.
20:38
Speaker 1: Just trust us.
20:39
Speaker 2: We know better. about what is good for you than
20:42
Speaker 2: you do. So instead, most of us would be like,
20:45
Speaker 2: give me as much of my money back as possible
20:48
Speaker 2: from the taxes that I pay and let me make
20:50
Speaker 2: the decisions on where my kids go to school, what
20:52
Speaker 2: doctors they see and that sort of thing. Instead, Abdul
20:55
Speaker 2: El-Sayed and so many others just want government to dictate
20:58
Speaker 2: all this stuff. That's their idea of these being our kids.
21:01
Speaker 1: You know, like you get the ads right themselves. What
21:04
Speaker 1: has the federal government done To make you believe that
21:08
Speaker 1: they deserve more power and more authority about how your
21:11
Speaker 1: children are raised.
21:12
Speaker 2: Yes.
21:13
Speaker 1: Get out of my life. Put it that simply.
21:16
Speaker 2: I don't want the government in my children's life.
21:18
Speaker 1: Hardly at all.
21:20
Speaker 2: But anyway, like we said, target rich environment for Mike
21:24
Speaker 2: Rogers and other groups potentially involved in that campaign. So
21:29
Speaker 2: we will see. We will see. There's less than two
21:31
Speaker 2: months now to go. before Election Day. But speaking of
21:34
Speaker 2: health care, if Abdul El-Sayed gets its way, it's going
21:37
Speaker 2: to be a lot more complicated. He'll be waiting a
21:39
Speaker 2: lot longer and it's just going to be, you know,
21:41
Speaker 2: eventually lead to rationing because there's no other way out
21:43
Speaker 2: of it once you start trying to trying to not
21:46
Speaker 2: hemorrhage money all over the place. But for right now,
21:49
Speaker 2: when it's time to find a doctor, there's no better
21:51
Speaker 2: way to do that than with ZocDoc. ZocDoc could not
21:55
Speaker 2: be easier. It lets you search and compare local in-network doctors.
21:59
Speaker 2: Jim and I have both used ZocDoc and have had
22:01
Speaker 2: great results.
22:02
Speaker 1: You know, Greg, I don't know if Abdul El-Sayed is
22:04
Speaker 1: on ZocDoc. He's not a practicing physician, so he's probably not.
22:09
Speaker 1: His wife is a practicing physician. She's a psychiatrist and
22:12
Speaker 1: she does not take Medicare. But ironically, of course, Abdul
22:18
Speaker 1: El-Sayed wants Medicare for all, which you won't have private insurance.
22:21
Speaker 1: And then you're going to have to do this through
22:24
Speaker 1: the government. Look, Whatever your insurance plan, ZocDoc can help
22:28
Speaker 1: you find a doctor. It lets you search and compare
22:30
Speaker 1: local in-network doctors, more than 150,000 providers within more than
22:34
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22:38
Speaker 1: have tons of reviews from real patients and detailed doctor
22:41
Speaker 1: profiles to help you choose the right one and not
22:43
Speaker 1: one who says, like, I want to raise your children
22:45
Speaker 1: for you.
22:47
Speaker 2: Your health matters and taking care of yourself should not
22:50
Speaker 2: be complicated. So find and book the right doctor with ZocDoc.
22:53
Speaker 2: Head to ZocDoc.com slash 3ML to get started and check
22:57
Speaker 2: that appointment off your to-do list. That's Z-O-C-D-O-C dot com
23:02
Speaker 2: slash 3ML. Ah, James Tallarico, you thought you were off
23:14
Speaker 2: the hook today because we talked about Abdul El-Sayed and
23:16
Speaker 2: the first martini. Not so, my friend, not so. Well,
23:19
Speaker 2: James Tallarico, of course, is trying to pretend that he's
23:21
Speaker 2: a centrist now because he's running in Texas and needs
23:23
Speaker 2: to win statewide in the general election. So he sat
23:26
Speaker 2: down with CBS News and he's claiming, oh, I was
23:31
Speaker 2: very critical of Joe Biden's handling of the border crisis.
23:34
Speaker 2: And to his credit, the CBS reporter during the interview says,
23:37
Speaker 2: when exactly was that? Before Biden left office or after?
23:42
Speaker 2: and watch the slick way that James Tallarico tries to
23:47
Speaker 2: slip out of the trap here. Now, hat tip to
23:51
Speaker 2: Western Lensman online for getting not only the CBS News clip,
23:55
Speaker 2: but the actual speech Tallarico is referring to here and
23:59
Speaker 2: how it doesn't match up at all to what Tallarico
24:01
Speaker 2: says it did.
24:02
Speaker 6: I called out Joe Biden when he failed us on
24:04
Speaker 6: our southern border, when there was complete chaos in our
24:07
Speaker 6: border communities.
24:08
Speaker 1: I called him out for his failures on immigration.
24:11
Speaker 6: And I'll continue to call out any Democrat who is
24:13
Speaker 6: not serving the people of Texas.
24:15
Speaker 1: When did you push back against President Biden's policies?
24:18
Speaker 7: Was it during his presidency or was it after the presidency?
24:21
Speaker 6: Yes, you know, I gave a speech in 2022 in
24:23
Speaker 6: the middle of his presidency calling out the failures of
24:26
Speaker 6: the administration.
24:27
Speaker 1: Mr.
24:27
Speaker 7: President, you saved our nation once by defeating Trump. Now
24:33
Speaker 7: we need you to restore its soul by defeating Trumpism.
24:39
Speaker 1: We need.
24:42
Speaker 7: We need you and our nation's leaders to start using
24:46
Speaker 7: every tool in the toolbox to protect our freedom. Lease
24:50
Speaker 7: federal land to abortion providers, declare a public health emergency,
24:55
Speaker 7: impeach justices who lied under oath, prosecute Trump and his
25:00
Speaker 7: fellow insurrectionists, and finally call the filibuster what it is,
25:04
Speaker 7: a Jim Crow relic that's standing between the American people
25:08
Speaker 7: and cheap prescription drugs, universal pre-K, and a livable planet. Mr. President,
25:14
Speaker 7: play to the fullest extent of the rules.
25:17
Speaker 2: So you'll notice that right before he said, I condemn
25:21
Speaker 2: the administration in 2022, he didn't mention that he was
25:24
Speaker 2: condemning them for their horrible immigration policy. If anything, that
25:28
Speaker 2: was back in his, the border should be a welcome
25:31
Speaker 2: mat phase of his political career. So Jim, you got
25:34
Speaker 2: to pay close attention to these people because they'll try
25:36
Speaker 2: to fool you all the time.
25:37
Speaker 1: Greg, I tell you, James Tallarico treats the truth and
25:40
Speaker 1: his constituents the way Ken Paxton treats his wife. Just
25:44
Speaker 1: one betrayal after it. I hope people are watching on
25:48
Speaker 1: the YouTube version just to see Greg's reaction when I
25:50
Speaker 1: say these things. No, but like this is, here's the thing.
25:53
Speaker 1: People of Texas, Ken Paxton is an exceptionally flawed human being.
25:57
Speaker 1: But you know what? Ken Paxton's fairly honest about what
26:00
Speaker 1: he's done in office. If James Tallarico is telling you, oh, yeah,
26:04
Speaker 1: I stood up against this. Oh, yeah, I was, you know,
26:07
Speaker 1: and then he didn't. If he can't be honest about
26:10
Speaker 1: what he's done, why do you think he's going to
26:12
Speaker 1: be honest about what he's going to do? You're not
26:15
Speaker 1: going to get even a John Fetterman style Democrat if
26:18
Speaker 1: you elect this guy. You are going to get a
26:20
Speaker 1: Bernie Sanders down the line lefty guy. And, you know,
26:23
Speaker 1: is Texas perhaps not quite as red as it used
26:25
Speaker 1: to be? Yeah, it's been 30 some years since any
26:28
Speaker 1: Democrat has won statewide. Nonetheless, like this guy, like there's
26:32
Speaker 1: a certain shamelessness there. I talk about having the dead
26:36
Speaker 1: eyes of a reanimated Howdy Doody doll. There's just the
26:39
Speaker 1: absolute confidence in which he insisted that all he made
26:43
Speaker 1: it sound like he got in Joe Biden's face.
26:45
Speaker 3: Right.
26:45
Speaker 4: He was.
26:45
Speaker 1: Oh, no, you weren't. No. Are you to the point
26:49
Speaker 1: to the degree you should criticize Joe Biden's presidency? It's
26:52
Speaker 1: because you thought he wasn't hard enough to the left
26:54
Speaker 1: because he wasn't progressive enough. And you wanted to get
26:57
Speaker 1: rid of this quote unquote Jim Crow relic. Would that
27:00
Speaker 1: be the same Jim Crow relic that Democrats are using
27:02
Speaker 1: right now to block a whole bunch of Trump administration
27:05
Speaker 1: priorities that Republicans want to do? So Democrats are the minority.
27:09
Speaker 1: So the filibuster is good again, right? And if they
27:12
Speaker 1: win the majority, it's going to go back to being bad.
27:14
Speaker 1: We can see this. You say these things on camera.
27:17
Speaker 1: They don't disappear. And you're all hoping that people won't
27:21
Speaker 1: go back and check what you said. So there is
27:24
Speaker 1: a shamelessness here. That is kind of shudder-inducing in the
27:27
Speaker 1: case of Tallarico. The utter confidence. I mean, I just
27:30
Speaker 1: think he should probably be doing that A24 documentary that's
27:35
Speaker 1: coming out with the Theranos lady. That raw ability to lie.
27:40
Speaker 1: I'm just doing wide-ranging in my pop culture references today, Greg.
27:46
Speaker 2: No, no, this is just amazing, but completely par for
27:50
Speaker 2: the course, you know, and this happens across the political
27:53
Speaker 2: spectrum to some extent. People think they can glibly get
27:56
Speaker 2: their way out of any political bind based on, you know,
27:59
Speaker 2: their ability to just have the gift of gab. You know,
28:03
Speaker 2: the Republicans, they shouldn't have done it, but what they
28:06
Speaker 2: should have just threatened to do publicly... like when the
28:09
Speaker 2: Democrats want a court pack and you want to add
28:12
Speaker 2: four more justices, the Republicans like a year ago should
28:14
Speaker 2: have been like, okay, let's do it right now. When
28:16
Speaker 2: the Democrats freak out, I'm like, oh, so it's not
28:17
Speaker 2: a good idea or it's only a good idea when
28:20
Speaker 2: you have the votes to do it.
28:21
Speaker 1: So at some point, you know, there's going to be a,
28:25
Speaker 1: you know, someone's going to say to Tallarico, wait, are
28:27
Speaker 1: you absolutely sure you stood up to Biden? That sounds
28:30
Speaker 1: like a deception. He's going to say, of course, I'm
28:32
Speaker 1: not deceiving you. I'm engaging with you as a human being.
28:35
Speaker 1: Why would I deceive you? There's no reason for me
28:38
Speaker 1: to do that. You're being real right now? I'm always
28:41
Speaker 1: being real. For those who have not seen, this is
28:43
Speaker 1: a movie coming out. It's a documentary about the woman
28:46
Speaker 1: who founded Theranos shortly before she goes to prison. And
28:49
Speaker 1: she just comes across as the most unbelievably disturbing, you
28:53
Speaker 1: cannot trust this woman crazy eyes one you've ever seen
28:56
Speaker 1: in your life. And the reaction of the interviewer is
28:59
Speaker 1: pretty funny as well. Just the sense of like, oh God,
29:02
Speaker 1: I'm dealing with someone who would stab me if there
29:05
Speaker 1: was any advantage to her.
29:07
Speaker 2: The eyes tell a lot, people. Pay attention to the eyes.
29:09
Speaker 2: All right. Let's talk about a way to make those
29:12
Speaker 2: teeth healthy, though. You need to brush at least twice
29:15
Speaker 2: a day, right? You also need to floss. Your dentist
29:18
Speaker 2: is not wrong about that, of course. But there's also
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29:31
Speaker 1: You know, Greg, I hope to be around for a
29:33
Speaker 1: long time, but when I kick the bucket, I want
29:35
Speaker 1: my headstone to say, Jim Garrity, good father, good husband,
29:39
Speaker 1: hard worker. learned how to pronounce nanohydroxyapatite because that ranks
29:45
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29:48
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30:04
Speaker 2: Yeah, I love the toothpaste. Been using it for weeks.
30:07
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30:09
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30:35
Speaker 2: real quick here in our chaser. John Fetterman showed up,
30:38
Speaker 2: sort of, at the GOP midterm convention. He appeared by
30:40
Speaker 2: video to introduce his great friend and Pennsylvania Republican senator,
30:45
Speaker 2: Dave McCormick, he immediately issued a statement saying this doesn't
30:48
Speaker 2: mean I'm not going to stay in the Democratic Party.
30:50
Speaker 2: I vote with you people 90 percent of the time.
30:52
Speaker 2: I think the number is slightly less than that, but
30:54
Speaker 2: it's still overwhelmingly most of the time. But you had
30:57
Speaker 2: folks on the CNN panel yesterday saying, oh, he's a
30:59
Speaker 2: traitor to the Democratic Party. Other people saying, oh, he's
31:02
Speaker 2: certainly going to jump now. He insists he's not. Other
31:06
Speaker 2: Democrats are telling me. some other Democrats to calm down
31:09
Speaker 2: because they think they need that vote in the next
31:12
Speaker 2: Congress and so forth. But it's a little bit further
31:15
Speaker 2: down the road when you start showing up at other
31:17
Speaker 2: people's conventions.
31:18
Speaker 1: So, Greg, at the start of the week, I wrote
31:20
Speaker 1: about this in my Washington Post column. I had been
31:22
Speaker 1: a skeptic of the notion that Fetterman was going to
31:25
Speaker 1: switch parties. The last number I'd seen was 78% of
31:28
Speaker 1: the time he votes with the Democratic Party. So if
31:30
Speaker 1: you're a Republican- In Pennsylvania, why would you want a
31:34
Speaker 1: senator who only votes your way roughly one out of
31:37
Speaker 1: every five times? Maybe you can get up to one
31:39
Speaker 1: out of every four, but you figure you could find
31:42
Speaker 1: any replacement level Republican would do better. Now, if you're
31:45
Speaker 1: a Pennsylvanian, I would say enjoy it while you have it.
31:48
Speaker 1: Having one Republican senator and one Democratic senator who get
31:50
Speaker 1: along very well and work together on your state's priorities,
31:54
Speaker 1: that's really good. But that used to be fairly normal
31:57
Speaker 1: in the U.S.
31:58
Speaker 3: Senate.
31:58
Speaker 1: It was not that rare to have states that had
32:00
Speaker 1: one Democrat and one Republican. And whatever else they thought
32:03
Speaker 1: of each other or other disagreements, they had to work
32:05
Speaker 1: together to serve their constituents as best they can, and
32:08
Speaker 1: particularly to protect local industries and things like that. But
32:12
Speaker 1: I now look at something like this. Fetterman knows what
32:14
Speaker 1: he's doing. This is a highly symbolic gesture here. His
32:19
Speaker 1: odds of re-election, his approval rating amongst Republicans and Democrats
32:23
Speaker 1: has basically flipped over the last two years, which, by
32:26
Speaker 1: the way, demonstrates how little people pay attention to voting records.
32:29
Speaker 1: And I think if you're a Pennsylvania Republican... You can
32:32
Speaker 1: love the guy for his stance on Israel. You can
32:34
Speaker 1: love the guy for his stance on saying border security
32:37
Speaker 1: is not xenophobia. We love how he makes fun of
32:40
Speaker 1: Bob Menendez, who's now making license plates. There's a lot
32:44
Speaker 1: to like about the guy. I'd also be very glad
32:46
Speaker 1: that he recovered from the stroke as well as he has.
32:48
Speaker 1: But in the end, he's not really a Republican. I
32:52
Speaker 1: do think it's very likely he's going to run for re-election,
32:54
Speaker 1: which is not a guarantee. He's going to run as
32:55
Speaker 1: an independent. I think his path, there's no way he
32:57
Speaker 1: wins a primary in that state. And again, I don't
33:00
Speaker 1: think it makes sense for him to switch to the
33:01
Speaker 1: Republicans because in the end, he is more left of
33:04
Speaker 1: center than he is right of center, even though he
33:06
Speaker 1: has some very high-profile exceptions to that. But something like this, look,
33:10
Speaker 1: is it a nice thing to do for McCormick? Sure.
33:12
Speaker 1: Does he kind of know that this is going to
33:13
Speaker 1: enhance his image as a guy who reaches across the aisle? Sure.
33:17
Speaker 1: But also, this is a Republican midterm convention. And if
33:22
Speaker 1: Fetterman shows up there, he is well along the road
33:26
Speaker 1: to Zell Millardom.
33:27
Speaker 2: True, but Zell Miller never switched parties. He did give
33:30
Speaker 2: the keynote address at the 2004 Republican Convention. So if
33:32
Speaker 2: John Fetterman shows up at the GOP convention in two
33:35
Speaker 2: years and says that the Democratic nominee is going to
33:37
Speaker 2: hollow out the military to the point where we're going
33:39
Speaker 2: to be left fighting with spitballs, then you know he's
33:42
Speaker 2: gone full Zell Miller.
33:43
Speaker 1: Yeah, for a good point. But I think he's going
33:45
Speaker 1: down that road. That is the direction he's pointing at.
33:47
Speaker 1: Or Joe Lieberman-ishness. That is the probably best parallel of
33:50
Speaker 1: a guy who lost his primary, ran as an independent-
33:53
Speaker 1: and remained in the Senate for, I believe, Joe Lieberman,
33:56
Speaker 1: former Three Martini Lunch podcast guest, I should point out.
33:59
Speaker 2: That's the last call of the week for the Three
34:01
Speaker 2: Martini Lunch. Please subscribe to the Three Martini Lunch Monday
34:04
Speaker 2: through Friday. Also, please leave us a review. You can
34:07
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34:13
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34:23
Speaker 2: on Monday for the next Three Martini Lunch.