Kind: captions
Language: en
as somebody who founded arguably the
most disruptive Media company of this
generation as you look at what's going
on today what do you think is the most
important story that we should be paying
attention to for the first time ever
like we're a post truuth world and I
think Vice our whole thing
was we would go to
Afghanistan and we'd go oh there's a
whole another story going on that
nobody's talking about because news is
institutionalized they have like a guy
who stays in the hotel he has stringers
the stringers come to him he writes a
thing it goes in that goes into a
teleprompter and the host goes blah blah
blah blah blah and then when you go
there you're like yeah nobody's left the
hotel in three years and that we got
into that by mistake because we were
filming the only heavy metal band in
Baghdad as you do as you do and um we
were there coincidentally when Bush came
and said mission accomplished won and we
were in he was in the green zone we were
in the red zone and everyone's shooting
at each other and we're like H the war
isn't
over so we just started going places and
I I'd say 90% of the time when you went
somewhere the story would be completely
different than than what you were being
told
now there's 50 different versions of
every story on social media and that's a
and then B young people believe them
that's two and then there is a lack of
trust in the mainstream news media with
good reason I think and then there's you
know opad crap on one side and snide
comedy on the other and not a lot of
facts so it's a it's a terrible
situation but for guys like us it's a
great situation because we can go out
there and sort of try to find the people
that you know I was watching your
uh podcast this morning with Michael
sailor talking about Bitcoin and you're
like that's interesting and that's going
directly to the source and figuring
stuff out and so it's kind of good but
kind of bad I guess I was going to ask
does the truth matter or does the
interpretation of Truth
matter there in lies the rub I mean but
how do you think about it because you've
said uh multiple times that what you're
trying to do with Vice news presumably
and certainly your own show uh is figure
out why we don't have shared facts and
I'm assuming to try to in all of that
figure out what actually is true yes so
it matters enough to guide your
professional life but I think so I look
I'm a Centrist and I love the political
game and I love watching it unfold and
what's happening now is incredibly
interesting and look I
think 70% of it is bread and puppet or
bread and circus theater uh because we
want to be part of this Grand democracy
which we aren't we don't have a lot of
agency in a two-party system there's
two-party system they're always power
it's a republic it's not a de democracy
like if you want a democracy get four
five six 10 parties I mean it's the same
two parties
forever
so like what is it all for and I was
going to say you know I wanted to do a
show uh called let's go back and let's
go back and see what they said about
Trump all the things that Trump would do
during his first presidency let's go
back and see what they were saying about
Obama and he's going to take the guns
and he's going to do this and he's a
communist and he's a it's all [ __ ]
like nothing ever [ __ ] happens and so
now like there's some stuff happening
but you're like like there's it's always
Doom and Gloom from one side to the
other side and a lot goes on during
those four years so a lot of it is for
we are part of this Grand Democratic
experiment and Democracy in America and
the best country and D and it's like you
know the people are the great beast and
we're going to the circus to watch this
stuff and this is the circus it's the
it's the best and biggest reality show
that everybody in the world tunes into
and we have a new star of that reality
show and he knows how to Milk The Cow so
uh does the truth matter look I like
commonality of facts I like science I
like you know look we're going to run
into a wall uh
let's say climate wise and everyone's
going to go you know why didn't you tell
us or like you know what people are like
doing anything unless you have a gun to
your head and you know I've been doing
environmental programming since I
started in media and nobody gives a [ __ ]
and you can see it now now it's like
okay our house is just burn out they
just burnt you know you're having these
crazy storms and H everyone's like it's
the government it's the government it's
the [ __ ] world is like this is only
the beginning and it's going to get
worse and there is no common they that's
been
politicized right there will be another
pandemic and half the people won't get
vaccinated or what have you because it's
been politicized right there's like AI
is going to happen and upset AI is the
all human endeavor done by machines
that's going to if you look study your
Smith and
Ricardo that's going to have a lag of
people going
from uh I'm like I you you know oh the
wine makers now have to be coal miners
well the wine makers don't know how to
mine coal well there's a lag meaning
people die and so there's going to be a
huge cultural
lag until there's Universal living wage
or until there's something you know that
happens but the capitalist system is not
very forgiving to a huge shift
towards all human endeavor done by
somebody that isn't a human something
that isn't a human so look massive
shifts and if we can't point to a
commonality of facts and everything
becomes politicized then we're [ __ ]
and arguably we are next
question that's uh that is a very um I
think important take I think there's two
ways to look at the Shared facts problem
number one is uh if we don't share facts
and people are just going to argue and
almost certainly the people are framing
things not to get to a um universally
useful outcome they're arguing and
positioning things so that they can get
their way uh but the other is that the
world actually does work in a certain
way like physics are real and if you
understand the physics of money if you
understand the physics of climate then
you can actually navigate the world in
in a more useful way but I find that
there's a really fascinating tension and
it's very interesting to hear you use
almost a Verbatim quote that I said this
morning on the podcast that we'll be
releasing tomorrow which is that reality
is the greatest reality show ever and it
just everything that's happening is so
crazy that it becomes a question of okay
do we engage in
this big game of politics or culture or
whatever rapper you want to put on it
because it's entertaining and we just
it's it's too fascinating not to engage
with or is it that you can actually
improve the direction of all all of
human civilization if you can get closer
to what is actually true which of those
do you feel a bigger pull towards when
you when you think of how to spend your
professional time I think it's both I
think look it's like you know we we're
sitting at this this sort of thing but
like like if you look at Joe Rogan and
you're like okay Joe
Rogan sort of straddles both of those
things but became a sort of
political King maker in the last
election absolutely crazy what he says
ends up being so important not only with
Trump and but like and Elon and like you
know all of it and
so I think
that both of what you say is true so you
have the sort of people on the periphery
who are doing the reality show part of
it but to that you can get close enough
to actually getting in like like RFK
Junior and and Elon and all these people
were on the periphery and now they're
calling the shots and if you look what's
happening with Elon especially you're
like holy [ __ ] like it's kind of great
kind of crazy wild um and to go back to
like
politicized I
mean it brings into question a lot of
things which is um why do people believe
what they believe you know and then you
have to sort of and I look at
myself and you know like a lot of people
in America I'm sort of been moving with
my political spect
um and I'm like why you know did I
believe all that stuff and if you're
really
introspective I went to school in
Canada and I think here they done
studies in like 80% or whatever 90% are
leftists and like 20% are marxists
whatever in Canada like everyone was a
Marxist I was a Marxist when I left
school yeah yeah well you know I I was
again I was I studied it
so my actual paper my final paper was
about how both capitalism Smith and
Ricardo capitalism and marks and angles
communism were effectively the same
thing they were apolog as for the
Industrial Revolution and both wanted in
the synthesis synthesis of Communism it
was a sort of like very small government
that and the markets regulate themselves
and people regulate themselves and then
government just does sort of
infrastructural stuff and so
but yeah I when I when I was going to do
my graduate work I was sort of went with
a hegelian Hegel was
pre-marks and so uh very left and Canada
very politically correct but as a
backlash to how politically correct
Canada was vice started because it was
so stifling and there was so much
censorship we were punks and we're like
[ __ ] you we're going to be [ __ ]
different but still coming from a place
of hyper sort of political awareness
and then as you get older and you get
more in the political game you're like
holy [ __ ] can you believe this stuff and
I think that was a big eye opener but
getting close to the political machine
and being able to move the the needle
look that's a real thing and that's a
great question so I mean I think both
and if you look at Joe like he's a
perfect example yeah it's he's done a
phenomenal job of the way he talks and
engages with the world he finds humor
in The Madness of it all but he can so
quickly switch to but okay this is
really serious and we actually have to
talk about it and he talks to everybody
yeah which is big like you can't talk to
people on the right if you're on the
left and if you're on the left you can't
talk which I've learned yeah Community
coming after you yeah I think Vice was
sort of leftist I mean Vice was a big
thing there's all kinds of things but
like Vice news we tried to be Centrist
and I remember like we had a lot of
young people working for us and you'd be
in the edit suite and you'd be like you
you can't have the the Democrat come in
and be like a and they have the
Republican come in like music stings
like how they cut it like everything
yeah and we were always trying to shove
it towards the center but you know it
was perceived as being very left and
then when I left it got even more left
and woke and all this [ __ ] um and so
when I started doing Shane Smith ask
questions my whole thing is like I love
one of my favorite things we ever did is
I went to we went to a prison with Obama
it was the first time a sitting
president went to a prison prison reform
BL blah blah blah we wanted Emmy so he
gave me basically access to his
presidency last six months to do a to do
a doc and I was look I was going to do a
[ __ ] cream puff like I shouldn't say
those back to back but like a cream pie
like piece like cre this is getting
worse by the second year
Shane called Freudian Freudian slip
Barry I love you um no he gave me this
access to the White House and and I like
again I was just going to do like a nice
you know and
he all they would talk about was the
Republicans and Republic this is at the
peak of the Tea Party and Speaker
Boehner and so I I'm like well now you
brought it up so now I have to go talk
to all these guys so I went to hang with
speaker bner who's a lovely cat like
great guy and so I just was hanging out
with him and he was a great guy started
hanging out with Frank Lun he's a great
guy hanging out with all these people
and you realize oh like there's there's
this like speaker bner got fired from
his own party being Speaker of the House
for going to meet President Obama and
you're like oh that's your [ __ ] job
sorry can't swear no you can swear I can
swear what you
want sometimes we get deep platformed
for the salty language um that's your
job to go see him and so the Tea Party
sort of ousted him just for even going
so what does that mean it means that
there's no consensus Pol politics
anymore it means even if you go meet the
opposite side you can be kicked out just
by meeting them not by doing any deals
with them and that's where we are today
we're in a hyper galvanized into
activity or even worse we're going to go
back and undo what you did in during
your presidency or Andor house so we're
going to our our what we're going to do
is reverse everything that you you guys
did
and so we're we're in this by partisan
not bipartisan partisan partisan bipolar
there we go I got it partisan bipolar
world of near the twain meet like
they're over here they're over here and
during that presidency was that that was
when the Republicans said not one vote
so we're not going to give you one vote
on any of your legislation yeah that's
super
unhelpful correct so uh yeah uh as I
look at this stuff I because my content
used to focus primarily on um what I
always called empowerment so I'd worked
in the inner cities I had a thousand
employees that grew up like hard in the
inner cities and I realized oh some of
these guys are quite a bit smarter than
I am but their lives are going nowhere
because they have a set of ideas that's
just not useful in the real world yeah
and so I said look I'll come in early
I'll stay late I'll teach you everything
I know about entrepreneurship so you can
control your own life that ends up
becoming impact theory was me just
really trying to see if people could
take these ideas and run with them and
uh it was very distressing to see how
few people do once they hit a certain
age but the people that did it had a
similarly positive impact on their life
and the what I call the two centers ends
up being this incredible journey for
them to go on but you begin to realize
okay wait a second ideas matter they
matter a lot your frame of reference
matters it matters a lot depending on
how you engage with the world you can
actually get it to move in a direction
and then just The more I've been in it
the more I kept like getting closer and
closer to like uh the final line which
is politics and culture and as I got
there it became very much the community
was like the initial Community I don't
want to hear about this stuff I don't
want to talk about it everybody's tried
up to your point that if you're talking
to the wrong person then people just
feel betrayed they don't want to ask of
themselves this thing I believe when I
act in accordance with that belief does
it make my life better or worse they
don't even look at it just because it
feels so good to have a team and to feel
like okay the world's very complicated I
don't want to have to parse it all so
just am I blue or red team and then just
give me all the the download and then
I'll know this is how I'm supposed to
think about these different issues and
my thing the reason that like you I'm
always trying to push my own thinking
back to the center is it feels like the
most useful place from which to pick the
best ideas because if you tribe up now
you're no longer looking at an idea
based on its ability to take you where
you want to go it's just am I going to
look to my left and right and be cheered
on yeah it's an ideology exactly and uh
ideologies certainly lead to feeling
good about being on your team they lead
to having a simple answer to very
complex problems but they don't lead to
I know where I'm trying to go and this
thing is actually going to get me there
yeah now do you have like a when you
think about being a Centrist
organization looking at what's happening
in the world do you want that kind of
outcome where it's like hey maybe things
move slowly but they do move and so I
want to give people the information that
they need um or is it something
else um that's a great question I want
to go back to impact here for a second
because you just spurred something on in
me that's a great thing by the way going
to people and saying hey I'm going to
give you all the tools that I had and
whether or not they take it or not
because I was always I went from sort of
being you know a hustler in Montreal
just like trying to make a media company
work to all of a sudden you're in the
stratosphere where everyone's a
billionaire and everyone's got a boat
and everyone's got a plane and
you know there's like
this knock on effect of you made money
and now you're like a design genius
because you know your houses are nice
and you know you're you're you're a
style Guru because you
know all of a sudden you know about
clothes or all of a sudden you know
about travel or where the coolest
restaurants are and all these things and
like you you know is it because of the
money and you were in the right time the
right place with the right product now
because you have money it opens up your
brain and confidence and so you and you
become a sponge and you learn and you
learn and you learn and other people
aren't learning so you do this or were
you sort of predestined because of your
brain to do all this because you can
figure out the systems of modernity you
know better than anybody else that's a
great thing and someone should study
like what's the percentage of if
everyone's given the same tools because
obviously rich people have kids and
those kids a lot of the time don't do
well in fact the opposite so that's just
an very interesting thing we don't back
to go back to to your your direct
question again you're exactly right so
there it's an ideology I don't want to
be an ideologue I like to look at things
critically and say okay look you know
some people on the right have a great
idea like if you ever put a tax on
anything that tax is staying there
forever and and it's never going away
like we just need to tax it now for this
one Bridge we just need to you can go
back and say in 1789 they needed to do a
tax for wigs it's still in there right
so I'm like I'm not very like the more
tax you have the harder everything
becomes an economy and look the the
reason why this country is great is
because people like I'm an immigrant I
come here make money so but yet there
are some things like look you can't walk
around La we were coming here today it
was there was these like sort of hipster
Rich guys over by the chatau Marmont and
there was a dude naked just jacking off
on the street okay and you're like
you're like look the the
homelessness
situation especially in La is insane and
and look I don't know if that's because
people are insane or because of you know
you don't see that in like Denmark you
know like there's got to be a so so
there's there's points but the problem
is if you go too far to the right or too
far to the left to go back to I think
the left went way too far to the left
which is why now you have a huge move to
the right because the left kind of
[ __ ] up and so like I like to look at
both and say what's the best of both and
I think you bring this up a lot on your
podcast is like I want to be able to
pick you know the best person Andor the
best theory and or the best thing you
want a meritocracy I'm exactly that way
and I think if you become an ideologue
you're you're saying I'm going to take
50% of the world and say I'm not going
to look at that I think that's wrong um
so I think you know you should be
Switzerland you should be I I'm G to
take everything from all people yeah my
thing that hides in plain sight that
people seem to ignore for reasons I
really cannot grasp is that you can
certainly chart a different course in
your own life you can probably sway
culture more than you think certainly if
enough people are going in the same
direction but nobody not nobody but very
few people take the time to say I want
to end up but exactly that place and
they'll have goals but they'll be
hopelessly vague so I coach
entrepreneurs and I get that all the
time they say they know what they want
they'll give you an answer and it's
really vague they they don't want to be
poor anymore that honestly sometimes
it's that simple like I want to make
$500,000 this year rad doing what so
it's like they they don't even have the
specifics it's crazy we'll get back to
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advertisement and now let's get back to
to the show if you have what I call the
only belief that matters that if you put
time and energy into getting better at
something you will actually get better
then it's like I want to go there I'm
not good enough to get there yet but I
can get good enough and then you start
putting time and energy into that but to
answer your question about okay if
everybody had the same skills what would
end up happening I don't have the
studies in front of me but from what I
see coming out of the scientific
Community it's roughly 5050 so your
outcomes are 50% based on your brain
your genetics and then 50% is malleable
and it's going to be culture and it's
going to be all the things you do um and
the bad news is that you can really [ __ ]
somebody up by raising them poorly and
like the first three years is all you
need to just absolutely decimate them
really and the example I always use is
that the language centers of somebody's
brain will either develop or not develop
well based on the number of words that
they hear by the age of it's either
three or five and they looked at kids in
lwi income areas compared to people in
the middle class and it was people in
the middle class heard 5 million words
by the time they were let's say three uh
and people in lowincome areas heard
three million words by the time that
they're three and then the ratio is the
middle- inome kids heard 70% positive to
30% negative and for lower income kids
it was exactly reversed wow and then
when you take because they were trying
to answer the question like what is it
that happens that leads a kid who grew
up in the inner cities to effectively
have an accent in their native language
and that was the big thing their the
language centers of their brain do not
develop as much as somebody who just
hears whatever 40% more words volume of
words by the time they're three and
there are realities to be faced about
the way brain brain development happens
and so like you're able to make all
these crazy connections up to like age
11 and then it starts pruning and then
post 13 you're sort of on this downward
trajectory until at 25 your brain is
effectively done developing people are
going to argue the exact moment but it's
effectively done developing now it's
still plastic it can still change it can
go in any direction that you want but
most people don't because at that point
they've gotten all the early easy gains
they've set things like their vision of
themselves their vision of how the world
Works they don't realize that those are
decisions based on oh this thing
happened to me and this is what it means
and they could change that story but
they probably won't uh and then there
are actual developmental things that are
now baked in and I had a guy on the show
Gabor mate and I said Gabor you have two
options before you option number one a
kid is raised unbelievably well up to
the age of three and then after that is
just abused horribly until they're in
let's say their early 20s yeah versus
somebody who is just absolutely in a
terrible uh situation bad parenting
neglected abused whatever until they're
three but after three they're in a
loving relationship they get Highly
Educated which of those two has a better
chance of having a positive outcome and
he said it's the person that has the
good first three years even though
they're going to go through some brutal
stuff they will have had things locked
in to the way that their brain developed
that's going to carry with them forever
attachment Styles and things like that
is going to carry but if they have those
first three years are just brutal then
they're really GNA be in for a hard time
now look the the some of the stuff going
on in Charter Schools proves that you if
you catch somebody at say kindergarten
is you can still really change the
trajectory of their life in a positive
direction but yikes it there are just
hard trees to be faced that's really
interesting makes me feel kind of
good about being a yeah because yeah
just cu the first three years you're
like laser focused on the kid and you
know so you're like oh good I got those
three years and that's good cuz now I
have two teenagers they they definitely
don't want me to be laser focused on
them yes that is a that's a whole thing
also very predictable and that I think
that's one of the things that I am
obsessed with so going back to my
initial question I'd love to hear from
you the thing you think people should
really look at because for me when I
think about okay what's the thing that
matters most if you're really trying to
help people or you're trying to sway
culture to a direction where my
Northstar is human flourishing at scale
so that's great what do we do what do we
have to set up um I am a big comp of
some cultures are more effective at
leading to human flourishing and
therefore we should be adopting whatever
works to get people there um and in
trying to move people in that direction
I just come back to over and over and
over uh the way that money works and if
you make it impossible for people to get
economic progress boy oh boy are you
gonna have all kinds of problems yes
every time I come back to the States I'm
like there's a lot of countries I don't
know
I'm not don't pin me factually but I'll
say 85% of countries you don't get a
kick at the can like I'm like oh you
know I'm on my third kick at the can
like I you know made a lot and then lost
and make it and I was like you know if
you have access to Capital like you can
day trade and you can do stuff with
crypto and you can
and whenever I come back particularly
from you know southeast Asia Africa
Middle East and but Europe I mean if you
have the right name and the right accent
and didn't go to the right school you
don't get to kick at the can and it's
pretty wild like that you don't have any
ability to move that socioeconomic
ladder um and that's most of the world
so that's like when you you're right I
mean capitalism and Hyper capitalism are
the way that people who are smart Andor
dedic ated Andor you know focused Andor
you know who can figure out systems
whatever it is that's that's where it
happens if you have any other type of
fac like going back to the Copenhagen
copenhagen's lovely it's great it's a
great City everyone has clean sheets
beautiful Apartments everyone's riding
bikes and Rosy Cheeks but like what's
what's coming out of Copenhagen like you
know then you look at New York City
which is sort of dirty and F and you
know there's rats everywhere and there's
poor poverty right next to extreme
wealth but it's an atomic engine of
culture man so yeah it's do you put a
value judgment on those what do you mean
uh is one better than the other well I
think it's look coming from Canada it's
two different IDE so yes I was about to
say no but uh coming from Canada
Canada's really a cut off the tall trees
you know country culturally culturally
and um there's a joke uh there's an
American fisherman and a Canadian
fisherman they're standing on the border
and they have two buckets and and both
buckets there's lobsters and the
lobsters are coming over the edge of the
Canadian Fisherman's bucket the American
fisherman says the Canadian fisherman
hey you're going to lose your lobsters
there going over the Ed bucket and he
doesn't look back and he goes no they're
Canadian lobsters his friends will pull
them back in so
we one of the reasons why we left Canada
was because of that it's like really
like everyone just be a B minus and and
if you wanted to polish the turd and
become an A+ there was not a lot of
incentive and in fact there was
disincentive and if you were arrogant
and you said we're going to be the
biggest in the world or we're going to
be the best or we're going to do you you
were kind of like you know that Shane is
a bit of a brager you know and um
whereas when you came to New York it's
like the hardest City to get to but it's
also the hardest City to stay in and
also the hardest City to like like
everyone's having a hard time so they
have you have to be smart and tough and
amazing and have a story and to climb
that ladder is even harder so it's like
you're playing you know NFL Super Bowl
football every day in New York and then
you go to like any other country and
they're just tossing it around in the
backyard and you're like I can really do
this in my sleep and we noticed that
like when you're when you're baptized by
fire in New York and you go to Europe
Europe is a very weak market and and and
sort of five to 10 years behind and you
can get in there and really you know I
know we're going to get a lot of
comments from Europe and Canada on both
those statements but yeah it's it's
brutal but it's like a gladiator War
like it's like Conan on the wheel of
pain like he pushes P pain comes and he
becomes a pit fighter so it's like
Gladiator I mean
Like Gladiator he has to he fights as a
gladiator for whatever the [ __ ] it is
five
years of course he's going to be like
you're gonna fight Caesar I mean like
he's like because he's a gladiator now
like that became his special skill set
so if you're in New York you're learning
all these special skill sets that nobody
else is learning but is it hard yeah
it's hard but like at the end of it
you're like now I can go up against
anybody so right now feels like that
moment so we at least in America we um
had been regulating the life out of
everything things were moving in the
wrong direction uh people were feeling
like they couldn't even speak and
obviously we had with the election of
Donald Trump a huge sort of release from
that um pent up energy and what do you
think about that when you look at how
fast they're moving the move fast break
things the make big cuts we can always
add it back later are you energized by
that or do you think oo uh jent we got
to slow down a little
here I mean I think it's hard not to be
energized I
think um like I said the sort of
American political system was sort of
galvanized into
inactivity and because of the non sort
of you know working
together you know polarization it became
just unbearable and unbearable
politically unbearable for
media um you know everything became
propaganda like
like the right has propaganda the left
has propaganda the left doesn't know
that it's propaganda is propaganda you
know and I think that that came out
which is good I think that's a good
thing I think doing stuff is good I
think um look there was a lot of
[ __ ] you know out there in the world
and now at least if you're moving to one
side you can say is it right or is it
wrong and by the way the Democrats will
have their you know their time to to
Chuck
Spears um but if it works boy oh boy if
it works you know I remember when Obama
got in they were doing demographics and
they're like okay because of gen Z and
Millennials just like the Baby Boomers
were the largest cohort and now it's
going to be Millennials and so there
might never be a Republican president
again because it's just the the young
people vote and now you're
like I mean is there going to be a
Democrat like they have done such a
terrible job of building their bench and
coming up with hard-hitting political
slogans and you know cultural Zeitgeist
moments and Joe Rogan moments and
they've just I mean they just did a
terrible job
and To the victor go the spoils also I
think look I think a lot of people get
to go back to the center the nixonian
great Center the the silent majority um
a lot of people were pissed like a lot
of people were just sitting there going
come on dude what is this now why is
this now everywhere why has this become
what everybody's talking about this
thing like we have bigger fish to fry
here and so I think that there is kind
of a release of people going okay let's
focus on these big things that matter
like I I was listening to you talk about
this but um the sort of unbel so go back
to taxation but the unbelievable
waste that in the Pentagon like you know
they're finding out stuff so I've been
reporting
on you know Iraq and Iran and
Afghanistan for you know I've been going
to Afghanistan for 20 years and I used
to get all these Scoops and be in
Afghanistan and and they' be like where
do you get your stories about all the
waste and all and I was like siger the
American appointed Congressional
appointed Secretary General for the
investigation of Afghanistan the
American government knows it's happening
they know that trillions of dollars are
going out the window W and that's your
money and so for me like look that's
America should be frustrated like the
Pentagon just
spending nearly a trillion dollars a
year with no audits I mean that's crazy
and and having Elon go there and say hey
we should be able to do have an audit I
mean I saw a thing that John Stewart did
and he and the the head of the dod was
was like giving him [ __ ] for like saying
that you know that they should do an
audit and then he just did this thing
where he was like okay I'm not a you
know a specialist but I'm a human being
who's on the earth and you get a
trillion dollars and can't tell me where
any of that money
goes no so I think there's a lot of
common sense that people are waking up
and going thank God why do you think
though because I would read that as at a
minimum political figures and media
figures on the left are are screaming
bloody murder trying to get every uh
judicial Interruption that they can get
uh is that corruption come home to roost
is what is that I'll ask you I don't
know I mean the usaid stuff is
interesting because you don't know
what's true I mean why is political
getting USA ID money I don't know I like
political but like that's crazy like
were they
buying stories I mean I don't know like
that's I'd like to know I mean that's
interesting you know were there slush
funds for money coming back I don't know
but it looks interesting I mean and if
that's the amount of corruption that's
going on in US Aid which is
comparatively small can you
imagine like the Pentagon which is I
mean 80% of our budget not 70% of our
budget I mean it's lots of money
and by the way they can't and it's so
big that they they they say they can't
audit it and you're like why I mean
that's our money so I think that's good
I think there has to be some sanity uh I
yeah I don't understand the
narrative like what soap box you're
going to stand on because if you're
going to stand on no we don't want the
Pentagon to be audited that's a hill
you're going to die on uh politically
and you should die on it and um look
rooting out corruption and waste in
government if you're going to say no we
shouldn't be doing
that then you should look at your your
electorate should look at you should
tell that to your your voters yeah
definitely alarm Bells going off all
right so the new show is Shane Smith has
questions how do you decide what
question you're going to pursue because
when you go down a rabbit hole like you
go pretty far so it's going to be a
pretty big time investment for you yeah
how do you
pick that's a great question too you
should do this for a living
um the idea was uh during the last
election social media which I'm
fascinated by and has become media
uh social media was sort of informing
especially the Republican side of like
questions and policy and narrative like
immigration for example was big one
and so I'm like
nobody's reporting on it like reporting
on the social media like so no one's
looking at it like an investigative
journalist and saying okay where's this
coming from like immigration was the big
one like on this side you had literal
like Gates opening and people flooding
across the gates and I said this on
Rogan and by the way I still
get like thousands thousands to comeing
there was no gate that was open and
people running through like that was you
know 2 miles before 2 miles after the
Border whatever
there were people coming and giving
themselves up and then they get released
into America which is open border versus
being sa back to Mexico which they're
doing now and so you get into it but the
the Republicans had done such a great
job of saying open borders and you know
the criminals and all that stuff and
keep hammering and hammering and
hammering and the Democratic response is
well it's kind of nuanced and sort of
like 80% go back to facts 80% of the
people are showing up for the
adjudication and the Republicans are
saying 90% never show up
and it was illegal immigration versus
legal immigration and da and when you
get into it it's this insanely complex
thing but the Republicans had sort of
boiled it down to something they could
Hammer that people believed in their
bones even if it wasn't true they still
believed it to go back to doesn't matter
if it's true um and the Democrats
couldn't come up with a response and
it's one of the big reasons they lost
the
election and none of it was true and so
we parts of it were true on both sides
like you're going to get more DMS yeah
well parts of it were true but like open
borders is not what people think now
illegal immigration versus legal we
don't have any legal immigration it's
like 85,000 people a year or something
it's nothing so you have to increase
legal immigration and decrease illegal
immigration it's very complicated and
very nuanced and whatever but we don't
have Gates where just PE you the gate
opens and people run through there's no
gate right and so
that's when I started saying okay let's
talk to people because there's no fact
so let's go talk to the Border guards
let's go talk to the homeland security
let's go talk to the sheriffs who are
reporting that you know people from
Sagal are coming in like Straight Out of
Africa who were paid by the UN literally
with un credit cards and you're like
okay let's just go ask questions because
these stories are crazy and so what
happened was basically what you think
would happen which is half the stories
were there's a gate they're let them
through and then the other half were
like there's no gate and what happened
was uh we started releasing them into
America versus releasing them to uh
Mexico because Mexico Supreme Court said
it's unconstitutional for us to release
other people from other countries into
Mexico and now Trump came in and said
well either you take them
or tariff tariff B shff shff apparently
the most beautiful word in the English
language up until now we'll see yeah
it's uh so okay you see something that
people there it is a consequential issue
yeah but people do not yet understand
what's really going on yeah so we do a
deep dive take immigration do did you
walk away from that being like okay I
now have an understanding enough that I
can like if I were asked I could at
least give an opinion on what I think
should be done or is it like hey I make
the facts available to the world and
what they do is what they do I mean
yes and no I think you know I went on
Rogan and and I was halfway through
shooting it and I knew sort of that
there weren't Gates and stuff because
I've been reporting on the border for 20
years but I wasn't sort of fully you
know up to speed as I am now it's going
to be an ongoing story so you know ice
is going to become a huge thing who goes
who stays it's going to be a huge thing
uh it's that's going to become a very
nuan story and interesting because it's
it's not going to be operation wet back
I.E you know back in Eisenhower just
like everybody goes you know
it's and so that's going to be an
interesting space to watch
um there needs to be comprehensive
immigration reform uh what's interesting
is if you look at it you know the
immigration God was Reagan ironically
and and the the Democrats were
anti-immigration because they were the
party of the unions bounces back for so
much it's crazy and so now I think there
needs to be bipartisan like you have to
there has to be legal immigration I mean
if you look at Japan you look at all the
they're offering you know all kinds of
incentives as our Europe you know to
people to come in because we need people
and we're not replacing fast enough and
we need you know people to come and and
be capitalists who want to work and make
money and live the American dream that's
America That's the basis of America but
it has to be legal I'm a legal immigrant
like and and what what happened was
everyone was applying for Asylum and
everyone doesn't deserve Asylum you can
say I want to come
and have like make money economically
and there should be something for that
um but you know everyone was saying yeah
I'm going to be beaten or killed or
whatever in my country which you know a
lot of the time wasn't true so there has
to be sort of comprehensive reform legal
immigration the Border can't be a
question mark even if it's not true it
can't be a question mark you can't just
have it dividing the American people
50/50 so it has to be controlled and I
think both sides realize that like it
has to be controlled and that's just
going to be going forward that has to
happen and on either side and I mean
you're going to be hardpressed even as a
Democrat to say no just let it go man
they really tried for four years that
was certainly the effective design well
so let's argue that point so when I look
at a complex thing like the Border I say
to myself uh the result of a system is
the effective design of that system it
may not be what they set out to do right
but it is the effective design and I
think the reason people think of it as
an open border though I get the um
nuanced linguistical reality of ah there
there would first have to be like a hard
thing for it to be open um but what what
I think people are emotionally trying to
convey is there are a lot of people
coming across the border one way or the
other they're no longer being shoved
away they're being allowed in whatever
way you want to talk about it uh and
they feel some kind of way about that
now my thing is you've got to go back
and ask the bigger question which is why
do they feel some kind of way about this
thing uh because I think that the the
picture actually gets far more
complicated but it really does have to
be simplified into a thing that people
can understand so a phrase I never
thought I'd be saying a lot but I find
myself saying all the time now is the da
that can be named is not the Eternal da
so it's from a book called the daing uh
written 2,300 years ago whatever uh and
what he was getting at the Dow means the
way so translates as the path that can
be explained is not the actual path
right and the second you put words to it
it's no longer
actually literally true but if it's the
thing thing that allows people to get
the gist and to sort of understand where
this goes then it's like you can begin
to unwind all of this stuff because man
my thing is all right I want to look out
at the future of America and I want to
see something good for the people okay
now we have to Define what good is human
flourishing we have to Define what that
is um I'll round everything to the
ability to uh make progress towards an
honorable goal just to like keep it as
simple again as simple as possible um
but now you get into okay people feel
some kind of way because they they can't
make economic progress and they don't
understand why and so oh I can't my
parents in their 20s had access to way
more house than I can get uh you know
they it cost them like a match stick and
a piece of chewing gum to get a house
and then over the next easy to get a
mortgage exactly so they're just like uh
what's happening oh what's happening is
people are flooding over the Border okay
problem and so going back to the initial
debate of is this what's really
happening or not um my thing is the
effective design of the border right now
is that a lot of people are coming over
the Border in a way that's very
noticeable in that um you could send and
many social influencers were podcasters
whatever going down to the Darian Gap
seeing that it's happening reporting on
it showing what was going on and then
conspiracies then run wild and so now
it's like well hold on with the thing I
can see with my own and capture on my
own camera I can see that many people
are entering the country and so if and I
think this is exactly what happened if
the Democrats or anybody else tries to
get people on a technicality to not
believe their Lying Eyes then it's like
you just start hemorrhaging credibility
they failed yeah the the Democrats in
the last election Republicans are saying
the borders chaos and it's bad and there
are criminals coming there are lots of
drugs coming there are things happening
people come from all over the
world and Democrats didn't have response
and one of the major reasons they lost
the election there's many but that's one
of them because they didn't have and you
you hit the nail on the head which it
doesn't matter to go back to our because
we're so good at this we're going to go
back to the original um thing is is it
doesn't matter what the truth is but the
perception is the reality and you're
exactly right in that look economically
I'm not where I want to be there's a lot
of reasons for that thing immigration
can be blamed on a lot of those things
now we always I mean it's the easiest
political tool it's been done since
there's been politics well it's not us
it's them um but there are problems and
and you're saying look there's problems
and my tribe is saying that my problems
are caused by those people which some of
them are and some of them aren't but
some of them are and so you have to
address that and you can't address it
with sort of Namby pambi wishy-washy
well it's kind of so a lot of them do
come to adjudication and we give them a
phone and they come and maybe they get
some money but maybe they don't and
you're like okay dude like you can't do
that like you have to hammer it and by
the way you have to solve the problem so
that's what you get paid to do so you
have have to at least try to solve it or
at least say that you're going to solve
it and I mean Ironically in the last
year before the election they shut down
all like the he had executive orders
Biden to to shut down everything and all
of the way St and Sh were empty and they
started saying everyone else is and but
they couldn't even get that you know
message out there they just failed
miserably at that at that and now so you
have to have comprehensive reform and
you have to control the border which
probably means ironically building some
sort of wall that people can't get
through or around yep yeah as you look
at the future of America somebody you've
traveled all over and I've heard you say
like when you travel you really get a
sense of what America is yeah uh when
you look at the future of America what
do you see where are we going I think
we've lost Africa to China whoa well I
mean I don't think I know you can talk
Ian Bremer about that but I spent a lot
of time in Africa and it's all Chinese I
think America is number one China's
number two that will change at some
point I don't know when to China number
one America number two talking
economically or International influence
sure all of the because if you look at
when America became the hegemonic power
it was post World War II we had just a
bigger Market we were like 4X the market
of of of UK which up until then was
onethird of the world's land mass and it
was just the economic Powerhouse but we
just had a bigger domestic Market we had
manufacturing we had you know population
we had space right and so just
mathematically England could not compete
and also we had modernity we had the new
factories and they had Manchester and
Liverpool and we had like you know
Detroit we can see where this is going
China now has obviously whatever it is a
3X domestic Market to us they have the
manufacturing they have Bo Britain built
the rule which is you get the stuff you
get the trees from Canada you get the
cotton from India you bring it to
England you man and then you sell it to
everybody right so you get manufacturing
and you get the sale of all this
manufactured goods then America really
did a great job of exporting America I
mean we were probably the best at it and
then now China is going from an internal
you know everything is about China to
now external so they need the the raw
materials and so they went to Africa for
example not just Africa they're going to
the world but and saying okay if you're
a
dictator you know we don't give a [ __ ]
about human rights like America is going
to at least you know make you pay and by
the way here's a lot of Technology
facial recognition technology all kinds
of stuff to keep your people in line and
by the way you want to build a like a a
super Stadium to celebrate yourself
named after you fine instead of a
railway fine we'll build you that and by
the way if you can't pay us back that's
no problem either you just give us your
uranium for the next 30 Years so they're
just winning but they're just they're
trading better than
America um and so that but by the way
that has it's not just trade because you
know every Hotel you go to is chines
like it's it's culture once the once
they get there I mean gramsky said that
if you can export your culture and not
your troops that's when you've won
gramsky and hedge money so like cocacola
Hollywood
marbor well China is doing that now and
so for the next few Generations so like
if you look at there's a there is a cold
war going on now with between China and
America that's going to
increase and
the quantum slai I mean it just happened
whatever two weeks ago when they're like
here we're going to give you open source
AI for free that's maybe as good if not
better than for open source and I was
talking to um Mark andreon about this
what's interesting about that
is at the time where we have been
basically saying we're going to control
Ai and the government's going to control
it and we're not going to you know open
source everything and China is saying
we're going to open source it and give
it to the world you're like oh what
America is saying we're we're going to
put dampers on it and China is saying
we're going to open source AI the future
of everything so that just goes to show
you and and there is some question as to
whether or not that's not the CCP saying
that so to me that's wildly interesting
that China's taking the high
road uh on Tech and Ai and when Quantum
comes when Quantum comes it's going to
be Quantum and
Ai and that's going to revolutionize
it's G like if you think there's to go
back to your philosophy of all like
humans picking themselves over of the
Quagmire in the mud that's going to be a
big one because Quantum and AI is going
to further differentiate it's going to
be like super super smart people over
here doing crazy things that nobody
knows what the hell's going on and
people eating mud and like that's going
to be that's going to be like that's
going to be a big one that's going to be
a real wealth redistribution and it's
going to be right now it's going to be
two
countries when you look at that future
what uh what are you most excited about
I mean I think Tech can solve the
majority of our problems
um which is interesting and I think look
you can die and go [ __ ] like if I
thought that environmentally like what
we're seeing now like my kids are like
driving through their neighborhoods that
are gone from the fires from the fires
and you're like you know they had covid
and you know they're they're actually
growing up ironically like I talked to
other dads especially but you know
they're like oh my our kids are you know
we used to grow up tough and we were I'm
sort of you know Gen X and latchy kid
and we just went out until the dark and
lived in the forest and you know the
raft would it was like stand by me every
day and you'd come back like I lived you
know I remember it well and and and our
kids are so weak and not prepared and
then you're like actually like you grew
up dur Co and then there's fires and
there's environmental things there cre
chaos and all stuff they're kind of
learning May are they getting tougher or
are they getting more anxious you learn
how to cope with it or you don't but I
mean you learn how to cope with it and
that's makes you stronger and I see my
kids sort of getting stronger and being
able to adapt to [ __ ] that I never
thought they would um so uh
environmentally I would be
very sad to leave this world to my kids
cuz it's going to get worse and it's
going to be bad like I mean sea level
rise is going to be a big big issue for
them and all the things that that
entails like we think immigration is bad
now to go back to immigration if we
don't get our [ __ ] together now when you
know we have two feet of sea level rise
which means a third of the population's
moving somewhere then it's going to be
really bad so we better get our [ __ ]
together
um
but Tech is going to be like there's
like we didn't have those Solutions
before like we didn't have the now we
can look at
like cloud seeding or ship tracks or
geoengineering all stuff which now seems
stupid and whatever rudimentary but like
anything it's going to get better and we
didn't even have that like when I came
out of school by the way there's no
nothing's changed when I came out of
school my first job was for Greenpeace
and I'm
like yeah we're screwed like I've
already lived in the biggest house and
the biggest I've driven the biggest car
cuz this is my parents like we have to
stop do all this stuff nobody stopped
doing anything and it got worse and it's
going to continue to get worse so we're
not going to stop using fossil fuels
we're just not so Tech has to change
things and and geoengineering eventually
you know we're going to find some stuff
that hopefully work so I think Tech is
going to be like what we've seen hither
to is nothing compared to Ai and Quantum
it's going to be Mo's law on steroids
what do you think about it from uh imp
on people losing their jobs the way the
kids interact with the world what do you
how do you perceive that that's the
problem so to go back to Smith and
Ricardo the reason why communism exists
is because during the Industrial
Revolution if you want to go in Marxist
dialectic let's go Marxist dialectic is
very simple and I love it because I love
history but it's basically you always
have to increase production Humanity has
to increase production so it used to be
horizontal so if you wanton more carrots
you have to go get more land and labor
which is why Humanity was just continual
Warfare because if I want more carrots I
have to come take your carrots right so
that's just how you get more carrots so
it was Warfare all the time just
fighting fighting I want your carrots
you want my carrots it's why we have
castles it's basically the whole of
human existence is around keeping my
carrots from you these [ __ ] carrots
man then it goes to you know vertical
production which is technology the
Industrial Revolution and so everyone
went from farming carrots to like now
you have to learn how to make cotton
genin things work or Fabrics or and most
of the people knew how to make a carrot
by planting the seed in the ground and
then all of a sudden they moved to these
horrible cities and had horrible jobs
and made no money and very few people
made a lot of money and a lot of people
didn't make any money was so
bad that people said wait if we do this
we're going to have a dystopian
world of very few people being rich
everyone else eating [ __ ] coal and
garbage and by the way it was that you
know for a while and then Tech got
better Tech got better we started
getting more people and you know
Education Health Care all the things you
talk about giving a [ __ ] about your kids
like like really that's a very modern uh
way of thinking and
so uh now if you look at it that's going
to go like through the
roof and that's going to happen because
of capitalism and I think it's the best
system for that however will masses of
people be left in the slums of London
you know yes I mean there's going to be
there's going to
be you know instead of the slums of the
London East end or the goral in Scotland
or all these places there's going to be
arguably continents that won't
participate in that
upside there's going to be heavily
populated areas I mean if you look at
climate change like something like 20%
of Bangladesh which is all at sea level
has had to move from the coast into like
Mega slums which are now like 30 40
million people of slums in Bangladesh
which is not enjoyable um and that's
they make the slums of London in the
turn of the century look like you know
Paris in the 20s
so that's going to be a problem for sure
and smart people like yourself or I mean
I think this is why Silicon Valley is
like you know Universal living wage or
whatever the new acronym for it is is
they realize that because you know
there's going to be Quantum and Ai and
then there's going to be dudes with
AK-47s and the new currency is going to
be bullets and if you don't
have some sort of solution to that and
we see it already I mean like if you
look at we we've grown up in a period of
non conflict and non-war and stuff but
the war that we do have is sort of the
war of ignorance where you have a lot of
people who are illiterate being told
what to believe by imams or what have
you and they grow up with a CIS of cof
and eat sand and then we come in with
drones and it's that's the disparity and
the war that's happening and if you look
forward to mass hundreds of millions of
people being being displaced by
environmental degradation and then Super
Rich big brain people with Quantum
things and then they're just going
well I have to feed my kids I mean that
that could be that could be the that
could be a problem unless we unless we
do something to fix that I mean you see
it happening in Europe right now the
well what what do you see happen in
Europe right now I mean you have
subsaharan Africa which is conflict and
poverty right flooding into Europe you
mean yeah and and basically like I'm
so screwed like for example if you go to
study immigration in Europe it's a
different uh ball game but what they'll
do is they'll have like a a boat and
inflatable and they'll have like 50
people in the boat and they come and
they they put a knife into the boat
because in maritime law if you catch a
boat you take the boat back but if the
people are are in the water then you
have to take them right so I mean it's
it's become super super sophisticated
and by the way life-threatening and for
you to sort of Pop about like in the
middle of Mediterranean it has to be
pretty bad right and so but people are
coming and it's it's now it's causing
huge I mean FR National in in France you
know in England it's massive political
upheaval obviously in Italy huge
political upheaval this is like a
trickle like imagine when there's a
drought and you know or you know it
reaches above 50 in subsaharan Africa
for three years in a row what's going to
happen when it's not a trick it's a
flood yeah it seems like you're now on
to another problem uh which is
integration so this is when you look at
I haven't ever had a chance to speak
directly with Douglas Murray but I've
read his work and the whole idea of the
strange death of Europe and people not
recognizing that culture matters and
that if people are coming into your
country and they're not assimilating
then you're going to lose what you think
of as your country but then for the last
however many years you've been called a
bigot if you even brought that up
uh going back to the idea of traveling
makes you look very differently at your
own country um I'm a total japanophile
and so going to Japan and just literally
just seeing Japanese as far as the I can
see it is not a multicultural place you
will literally see the
occasional uh American person but boy oh
boy much more so now than before like
when we prefer I don't know when you
started going but when you you was
nobody like I have no doubt yeah and
when you say much more it's still like
just radically outnumbered now their
birth rate is so low that's going to
change carea is basically not going to
exist yeah but my my whole thesis on all
this stuff is I think AI is going to
bring about as close to a technological
Utopia as you're going to get maybe yeah
but it's on the other side of a horrific
amount of upheaval and I'll call it
pockets of violence I that that
literally is just an act of because I
can certainly paint a picture where it
gets very dire very fast with a lot of
weapons and a lot of Bloodshed but I'll
I'll call it pockets of violence as a an
act of faith that will figure something
out
but nature just does not care about any
one generation so even if the long Arc
of History bends towards Justice uh
there are still people that put 20,000
people on Pikes as a way of scaring off
an invading Army like that just the way
it is read about genas Khan long enough
and you're real fast going to be like yo
humans are capable of tremendous evil
like it is insane but also from said
tremendous evil comes the Silk Road and
the uniting of the world and incredible
trade and so it's like I I don't know
what to do with that but I think that if
we can get on the other side of all of
that then you've got an opportunity
where AI can really help people all over
the world because one thing I learned
working in the inner cities is that
intelligence is more or less evenly
distributed intelligence meaning the
ability to process raw data we'll get
back to the show in just a sec but first
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Theory and now back to the show so no
matter where I drop you off in the world
you're going to find that kid who's just
like ridiculously smart you're like whoa
like what's going on here now whether
they have an outlet or they have access
to any of that information they will
have a mind that just can process the
data and so if you're able to get into
everybody's hands open sourced AI I mean
you've got not only deep seek which is
uh the model from China that you were
talking about but you've got llama
coming out of meta here in America
they're all open source so those things
are already out like there's no putting
that cat back in the bag so that is
going to proliferate like crazy you've
got guys like emod mustach who his whole
mission in life is to build what he
calls Universal basic either compute or
intelligence I forget how he phrases it
but like making sure that everybody
every in the world has access to that
compute so that they can push themselves
forward that they can be an island of
one to not need a strong educational
infrastructure that they can learn the
information now how you get out from
under a bad culture becomes a totally
different question which answers the
question of why I do impact Theory the
way that I do now because culture
matters so much yeah that if you don't
paint a picture for people that they can
grab on to and say oh okay I get it this
is how we have to behave in order to end
up in that space we want to end up and I
admittedly don't have an answer for
scaling culture uh this would be a very
different podcast if I were you know in
a a country that was ruled by a
desperate um doing it here it's like
that's ultimately what I'm looking for
is
for people to be capped only by their
work ethic their curiosity and as much
as I hate it their intellect yeah and if
you can at least create that scenario
you're still going to have very unequal
outcomes just because of that 50% of us
it's hardwire and there's nothing you
can do about it but if we can get to
that situation now we've got a shot for
people to really get ahead but this is
why to me truth does matter and the
reason that truth matters is I think it
is it it exists it's known as physics
virtually everything we think of as
truth is
interpretation but if you
can have some sort of metaphor like for
me it's I have a black bag in front of
me there is an object inside of that
black
bag we're all wearing mittens but we can
reach our hands in and try to feel what
this object is and I'm going to do it
and get my own opinion but I'm gonna ask
you to do it I'm GNA ask Eric to do it
like everybody's going to come in and
try to figure out what this thing is
we're all going to talk about it this is
what I think it is this is what you
think it is and I'm sure as hell not
going to tell you to shut up because you
think it's something different than I
think it is uh I'm G to try to
triangulate on what it really is based
on all the different feedback that I'm
getting
because understanding what is true
allows you to predict the outcome of
your actions and once you can predict
the outcome of your actions and I'll
make this very tangible to anybody that
can hear my voice right now if you're
wondering why you can't get ahead
financially the punchline is that your
money's be inflated to nothing and if
you don't own assets there's no way to
win that battle you will lose and you
will get poor every day uh unless you're
you have a job that gives you a raise
that outstrips inflation which just
isn't going to happen so uh you must own
assets but the vast majority of humanity
doesn't understand that but that's one
of the truths inside of this black bag
that oh I Now understand it and I didn't
understand it two or three years ago and
so through this podcast I have managed
to grope on this thing enough with
enough other really smart people to be
like okay here's a piece of the puzzle
now you can actually go do something
with that information we can start
building this shared future but it
really like I did not think I would ever
talk about politics I could not Escape
it it was a [ __ ] tractor beam because
I didn't ever think I would talk about
Finance but Co hit and literally when Co
hit I was like two or three years out of
having had the Thousand employees that
grew up in the hood and I was like oh
damn everything's going to get closed
those guys are living hand to mouth
they're going to get obliterated but I
didn't understand money Printing and so
I start doing all this financial content
takes off highest performing content uh
and I'm like oh this is interesting but
then as you learn about money you're
like wait a second this isn't how I
thought money worked yeah and so you
just start asking the next question the
next question the next question and
you're just like tumbling down the
rabbit hole and all of a sudden you
understand why the rich get richer and
the poor get poor and it's like wait
these are explainable things that
anybody can do something about but they
don't understand it and I think that
people use complexity to hide the ball y
to make it a uh game that's not only
rigged but that is has a like the way
that they use legal to make sure lawyers
have a job
people make money sound complicated as a
way to make sure that they keep getting
to take advantage of the weird way that
they're the scribes of modernity lawyers
you have to get one you have to have one
yikes just a language yikes the good
news is AI I think is going to make most
of that go away that would be good
because we need tort reform in this
country uh to go back to your bag and
thing in the bag that's uh Plato's Cave
which is so you're you're in good
company W where we're chained by
ignorance and so we see Shadows because
of this fire but if we can break the
chains of ignorance and go through the
fire we have the courage then we
actually see the real thing which is uh
sort of good the other thing I was
thinking is if you go and give everybody
Ai and that's Andre Andre's utopian you
know positive and he's like if you give
everyone an AI assistant then you know
the the the smart people and the people
who use it and the people who are you
know are going to use this thing to
climb the ladder and etc etc what I
think is interesting is there's always
been 10% of the population they just
can't do it they just can't navigate not
even modernity they couldn't navigate it
in 1642 they couldn't navigate in 1942
they can't navigate it now and there's
just always been 10% 10% is just the
number and I
think the I think you're right like you
can go now today and you can get Harvard
professors Oxford whoever the top people
you can get Einstein you know his
lecture you can get everything online
you can get the best education you can
possibly get if you're a little bit um
diligent and and and and and learn how
to sort of search well
um there's probably products that can do
that for you in fact I know there's
products that can do that for you so
that's we're one step away from having
the best of all educations like all you
can have and it'll just be how many
people do you think will Avail
themselves of the greatest education you
could possibly get better than any
University better than Harvard better
than Oxford because it's the it's like
the best professors from every how many
people 20% on the outside sure it's
generous but yeah yeah yeah let's say 15
to
20% okay
why really you want to know yeah uh okay
so this is the complex interplay of
level of intelligence and culture so
given that there's very little you can
do to impact like your true level of
intelligence uh pre- neuralink and
things like that which are way close
than people think uh and then
personality so if we are all a um role
of 120 sided die and that's like what's
your level of curiosity what's your uh
rate of processing data like on and on
and on um how easy there's a thing in
the brain called the basil ganglia which
allows you to switch gears so um some
people if you've ever met somebody that
just they can't shake a trauma or they
can't shake a um a slight that somebody
did they just become obsessed with like
I've got to get them back or whatever uh
that person has a hard time shifting
gears so they get locked in all those
things matter and so we are all
something like that it's probably more
like 10,000 100 sided dice but you get
the idea uh and given that distribution
you will always get wildly uneven
outcomes now 20 is the percentage of
people that would just go all in there
are still people that they're going to
use it to tremendous advantage and it
will make their life way better uh but
it is terrifying that that 10% number
exists that they are they are
definitionally I don't mean this as a
slight they are defin definitionally
morons and so they're never going to be
able to navigate the world um and so
their only hope is either genetic
engineering or uh brain
implants and we'll see but yeah until
something changes at the genetic level
or the interface
level it's going to be wildly uneven
yeah and I think that to go one it's
worse than that Jim he's dead uh because
it's it's just the base line is
10% but when you start adding
in this Moors law on on steroids when
you start adding in
Ai and and Quantum and all of these
things that the the understanding not
just the understanding but the ability
to apply these things to real world you
know Act
that that that uplift you either
intellectually or monetarily that's
going
to like it's it's paint me a picture
think like a Sci-Fi writer for a minute
yeah well I was just saying that the
other day we need um like a like uh
really good like remember was it Gibson
in the 80s yes like like you know
predicted all this stuff or he either
predicted or the Nerds read it and then
made it because they read it in book I
want knowing all theu like we know now
to have like someone like a very a
futurist Gibson to be like here's what
it's going to look like in or what it
could look like because he was even back
in the day talking about neur link and
and stuff which we were all like you're
were crazy and all the stuff you to talk
about anyway I think in one of the books
maybe it was neur I don't know uh
someone was in love with a like a ai ai
hologram like made up person and like
all this like I like the the
I'm not going to say the the platforms
because I don't want to get in trouble
but like there's all these AI porn
things of of like the people in Japan
speak of our favorite place Japan get
crazy crazy right you're GNA fall in
love with an AI and spiked to the the
movie her and you know people probably
don't know your history with him but we
can get to that later yeah uh great guy
but and but yeah he he uh he he he
predicted that in her but it's it's
uh I look at that stuff and I go wow
like there's going to be people who are
ear adopters and people who who get into
it and and and and it's going to go like
this like I really see that there's
going to be and meaning there are people
that have access to it but they don't
use it well and so the people that have
it and use it well will just eat their
lunch are we do you imagine something
like aium where we've got poor people
just can't afford the nice technology
they can't put themselves in orbit uh is
does that come close to what you imagine
I mean what's the there was when when we
were growing up there was a it was a
thing called culture lag or something it
was the I've heard you talk about that
before I never looked up the exact
phrase but culture leg certainly
explains what C I mean it was a big
thing in the 80s and 90s of like
basically you know nothing really
happened and then in the 80s like
computers and so 80s and then 90s was
Tech and then you know 20 the rate of
change begins to speed up there you go
and so there was this societal
philosophy of cultural leg like it takes
us excuse me like five years or 10 years
to take a technology and then sort of
adapt it and be able to use it and I
think that that's just shrinking
shrinking shrinking so you
have kids who are sort of digital
natives um who are already using AI
every day even if they know it or don't
know but they're kind of you know using
it and and really I mean my
seven-year-old is like and we're typical
sort of modern parents of like oh you
can't use technology and let's go to the
park but I mean they're just it's like
when I was a kid we didn't have a TV so
I became obsessed with uh medium got
into med because I you know my my uh my
uh anyway my ex-wife was not allowed
candy and so she became obsessed with
candy and so you there's a medium anyway
but the kids today are just
insane like techn te ology sort of
sponges and they're like really good at
it like really like you know and and
think about it their brain is rewiring
based on their interactions with
technology yeah that is how deep that
rabbit hole goes yes and I was just in
Africa and the big thing in Africa is
micr
banking um like you know dollar $2
dollar here and and not having to use
cash and stuff and and doing it with
with a phone but the phones are like
donated like Nokia 718s or whatever like
they're old I don't want to say analog
cuz they're not analog but they you know
you know what I mean like oh and the
micro not a smartphone not a smartphone
and you're like
oh right there like you go back to your
three you know so you're you're already
wired by the time you're three if my
kids already been using
AI for 20 years I mean the other thing
is education like I I grew up and had
sort of I started my education the
British system and like Reading Writing
and arithmetic like penmanship was a big
deal and you know writing was a big deal
and math and you know and now none of
that is a big deal and older parents are
like what the hell's going on and you're
like look by the time these kids get
into the
workforce it's like calculators in math
what used to be a big thing well now
every phone has a like everyone has calc
like like that changed math you don't
need to memorize everything because we
all have calculators now now pure math
people want you to still do that but you
don't really need to with AI That's
pretty much everything so you have to
figure out what your Niche is within
that AI world right but if you're not
even in that AI
mil then you're at a 20year disadvantage
mhm yeah I I have a feeling it's going
to play out very differently than that
but before I give me
what the Imes you have your head when
you talk about that so uh when you do
you I think in movies so for me it's
very easy to be like oh this is what I
imagine yeah do you think in books
movies movies okay so what movie gets
closest to Imagining the future you
think will come true that's [ __ ]
great question
um it would be dystopian except for the
fact that lately I've
been contemplating things a lot thinking
a
lot because I've been forced to because
of this kind of stuff too it sort of
made me question you know where my
thinking comes
from and I'm I'm just be a little bit
long you're Gen X Gen X Gen X okay so
Gen X was always if people don't know we
were always sort of Forgotten generation
Gen X was where it came from naming
generations and we were forgotten we
were like you know not a lot of
parenting sort of you know fural you
know grew up on her own whatever and
sandwiched between the the Baby Boomers
and the
Millennials and there's two things uh
that I realized one I started thinking a
lot about Carl San and he's like look
imagine time you know we have this tiny
tiny tiny little window where humans can
flourish and the temperature is just
right and it can't be two degrees more
two degrees less and the water is just
right and the ATM spere is just right
and this you know it's just amazing for
humans to live at just one tiny little
time right and so you should enjoy it uh
Gen X arguably has been the best and
greatest window of humanity in the
history of History so we didn't have any
great Wars we had total economic upticks
there was no real murdery kind of crazy
things
happening travel became accessible for
everyone to go all around most most
people uh like luxury became a thing
food Foodies I mean food used to be and
now it's like oh my God this the
greatest Smashburger like
education all of these things and the
environment held up and you're like wow
like we live greater than any
aristocracy ever in the history of the
world I don't know what happens with AI
and I don't know what happen happens
with environmental degradation but if
you look at history it goes upwards Elon
has a thing of like all of history is
sort of like uh you know
death infant mortality and education and
and it goes like this forever sort of
uptick in like the 1500s and a little
tiny instead and then like it just and
and so we're just going straight up so
if you add all those things together
you're like well what has been my
experience my experience has been one of
pure Glory like just great like the
Earth is great my experience has been
great I'm still going great still going
great guns you know you can live longer
we know more things about stuff like my
mom grew up and she lived on a farm she
was told like the Tang was good and like
that you know hungry man dinners or
whatever TV dinners were more healthy
for you because they were made by
scientists and so like we at least have
some modum of Truth and and you know
you're like okay so if you look at
it you should think well why would that
change like your experience with life
has been godhead yep Matt Ridley's the
rational Optimist yeah
but is the environment screwed yes is AI
going to cause a lot of upheaval yes but
if you look at what I experience and I
did a valid dictory address where I said
like I said I've already lived in the
nicest house already driven the nicest
car total [ __ ] I went on to make and
lose
fortunes and I had a
great interesting incredible life that I
have
no reason to think that my kids won't be
even more
so okay so you have what I'll call an
act of faith belief that the future is
good but not necessarily a strong movie
tied vision sorry movie uh that's a good
question okay movie movie
movie there's there's no real movie that
captures that sort of
utopian minimalist Tech it's they're all
too Tech heavy I think Tech's going to
be so good that it's not in the four
like it's just we live in a sort of
Heaven like beautiful environment of
nature that Tech sort of makes for us
like that or manipulates in such a way
that we don't all die um that's a great
question we should make that movie uh
what's a utopian beautiful thing but
it's not too utopian solar Punk no might
be kind of fitting with what you're
grasping for it's um it's clearly
technologically driven but hyper
integrated with nature uh beautiful blue
skies but still that like hard tech Edge
uh I would look at that that might
capture it but but um okay that's
interesting what's yours what's your
movie well movie wise I think is
probably the wrong way to get it where
the future's actually going so my vision
of the future is ready player one is
near-term yeah so call that the next 15
years um probably not VR probably AR but
where you live a substantive portion of
your life in a virtual world that you
have hyper tailored to your preferences
and you've made real friends and some of
those friends are going to be AI
so the pet rock that you earn inside of
your favorite video game uh you'll have
a real relationship with just like in
her it will have memory of you it will
know you it will have its own
personality uh it will have gone on
adventures with you and remember it and
you guys will really be able to share
that uh and if you grant me that that AI
will be able to pass like truly a
touring test where you wouldn't know is
this another person playing in another
city and I've just never met them
physically or is this AI
uh probably the steel trap memory will
give it away it just remembers too much
but that'll that'll be very very near
future but the long-term future is
effectively The Matrix without the body
you live in a world that is code and you
can manipulate that code in any way that
you want and as you become aware of the
code which everybody will be um you can
effectively live any life you want
superhero or other now this is where I
would expect anybody who's paying
attention that understands I really
believe what I'm saying and I mean it
literally uh they will become some
portion of them will become the people
that push back on this and this is where
you get pockets of violence once people
understand AI is really coming for your
job every bit of your job and it's going
to drive energy cost to effectively zero
uh it will drive labor cost to
effectively zero you'll be able to get
anything you want for effectively free
and you're still going to be traumatized
because you have no meaning and
purpose uh people going to start pushing
back on that so I think there's a pretty
near-term timeline where this starts
being problematic 25 is a year it goes
from oh it kind of feels like I have an
intellectual understanding to I feel
that AI is doing something that's this
year 26 is like I'm really starting to
take this seriously and I'm pushing back
I'm getting very vocal and I'm
boycotting companies that use Ai and I'm
getting angry at the people that are
building it 27 is where you start seeing
violence towards robots uh and I hope it
stops her and I hope then it starts
returning dividends enough that people
are like actually this is pretty cool
and it's made a lot of aspects of my
life better and I see cost coming down
and whoa this is wildly deflationary and
I've been lied to about deflation and
deflation is actually awesome it's not
bad uh which is what I think will
actually happen people are confusing
crisis instigated deflation with
Innovation instigated deflation which
are very different phenomena um that
that's my hope there but because this
will be almost certainly humans become a
midwife for a highly technological
version of us like people that are young
now like your kids barring AI hitting a
compute or energy problem they will have
to make the decision of whether they
augment themselves or not yeah and will
we maybe like if we live long enough but
I could certainly see in the next 30
Years this becoming a pretty serious
consideration I would be what uh pushing
80 so will I still be alive it's a
question mark But if I am uh be [ __ ]
Interesting Man it'll be interesting and
look to go back to my utopian version
and it's funny because I would say up
until two years ago I would have said
dystopian but I I'll tell you why if you
ever look at like rich people who by the
way are the people who control a lot of
the the assets that you said you have to
own assets they own most of the assets
where do they go right they go to the
nicest and they carve out the nicest
parts of the world and say I'm going to
be here and then Tech even though
they're made by Tech and get funded by
Tech takes a backseat you want it sort
of as remote and as authentic and as
sort of you know beautiful and simple as
possible that's the sort of peak highend
like I want my own island with my own
stuff and my own Beach and my own thing
that's the sort of aspirational thing
now a lot of the
world uh you can't do that in right like
for example 80 or 90% of America is just
you know just there's nothing there
however now like you can you can make
jungles where there are deserts and and
you can you know seed the clouds and
make and we were talking to a guy about
doing that who's who's actually getting
money from like Utah and Nevada and
stuff and as geoengineering goes there's
going to be more and more play for more
and more people and I think as people
pull themselves look at China as people
pull themselves out of poverty and the
hutongs they move to like these
futuristic cities I think that happened
in America everyone moved to the cities
and then when you're in the city you're
like you know what's nicer than the city
are these have my own house with a pool
and thing in the backyard and I think as
you can have more land that you can put
crazy 3D printed houses for cheap and
you know this and you can have
connectivity through starlink and you
can have all this stuff it opens up a
lot of things outside the city because I
think cities become unlivable after
let's say 20 million people and there's
going to be 40 million 50 million people
City so we're going to use more and more
of the land and that land we're going to
go to where we want the tech to be less
Ready Player one and more like uh um I
keep on thinking of
um you'll probably get this there's a
rare Star Trek uh uh technology where
they it can create a a planet and it
sort of creates a lush Planet a hollow
deck or something no no it's a planet it
creates Planet builds a planet builds a
planet and it's and they they use it I
forget what it's called I I was didn't
really do Star Trek anyway it was it was
like one of the shitty Star Trek it was
like the last of the Captain Kirk uh and
it was it was it was a it was a a
technology that they had developed that
it could build like virgin planets
basically and I think we're going to
have a lot of Technology because you can
make a lot of money um making these sort
of environmentally friendly cities like
we have the technology now to make
reactors out of salt that are totally
fail fail safe that
can power you know 10,000 h Homes a
nuclear reactor yeah with salt salt yeah
I need you to say more words Taylor
Wilson had him on the show know him well
will tell you all about he developed his
technology out of salt yeah and um he he
he developed a technology to to power
like you know one to 10,000 homes uh
with like you know totally fail safe and
um very little waste right so wow yeah
so we're we're there technologically
we're there and we're close we're going
to be within five years I think we're
going to have Fusion you know being a
power source at which point energy
becomes like you said free and so uh
when that happens I think you're going
to go let's create the nicest places on
Earth for rich people then middle class
people want to do what rich people do so
they're going to want to move to the
sort of next to the beautiful places and
then the poor people will be
aspirational and say well we want to
living in a beautiful place too the
reason why I say that is if you move
from New York to LA you're like boy
there's a lot of nice houses in La like
when you're in New York everything's
just an apartment or thing there's a few
houses you know a few rich people but
like you can't really tell who lives in
a nice apartment versus another part and
then you're like here you're like wow
there's a lot of be because people came
and they built this modern city of like
palm trees and movie you know movie
stars and pools and and big houses and
stuff and I'm like if that's the way
we're going because that didn't exist
like as of World War I everybody came
back and everyone had 400 square feet or
whatever it is 800 foot house so we've
moved towards luxury and better quality
of life and higher standard of living
and I think that that
continues it is going to be absolutely
wild uh to see what happens grounding it
back in what we actually have today you
have traveled extensively around the
world um where where have you had the
most Insane
Adventures as somebody who's been at
high risk about to be kidnapped jailed
so I'm with you on the positive side I'm
with you on Japan Japan is my favorite
country uh and I've been going there for
30 years and I just absolutely love it I
love everything about it can you
articulate what it is you love about
Japan they give a
[ __ ] they like every like even if you go
down an Alleyway and you're wasted and
there's some like yakatori guy for a
dollar it's going to be awesome it's
going to be amazing because he cares
there's a movie called temp popo and
this this woman her husband dies and she
was middle class and she goes to being
poor which is terrible in Japan but
she's left like a a truck stop and and
nobody goes to a truck stop she's about
to go bankrupt and and she's and then
one of the truckers says okay because
this guy does the best broth and this
guy does the handful noodles and like so
she goes and she learns how to make the
best broth and hand pull of noodles and
it's basically like a Kung Fu film about
making the best ramen that's Japan
because if you have a truck stop you
better have the best ramen or nobody's
going to stop there and that's everybody
like every like everybody gives a [ __ ]
and when you go there like you go to the
onen and like everything has to be
perfect and you go to the like any any
restaurant from high to low everything
has to be perfect the cabs have to be
perfect like everything and everyone
cares and you're like wow this is good
this is really really good on the
spectacularly crazy side of things
look I mean Middle
East is Bonkers and what happens there
is Bonkers like look Gaza I mean what do
you think about
Gaza I you got 17 hours I mean I spent a
lot of time
there I spent a lot of time in Lebanon
uh which is was basically my favorite
country on Earth and now has been
completely destroyed whoa
um how to go what made it your favorite
obviously what destroyed it is far
clearer it was beautiful it was a place
where you could I mean look as a
journalist you could go I'm going to
Lebanon and be like stay safe Shane and
you cut to like you're on the beautiful
beach turquoise water having Branzino
and delicious wine and the great night
life great food some of the best food in
the world beautiful country great people
casinos like just super fun
and war war
Hezbollah kicking out it used to be a
third the third and the third like in
the Constitution you have to have a
third like a Christian has to be prime
minister a Muslim has to be president
and Drew has to be the CFO or whatever
and then just systematically sort of
kicking everybody there's been a big
brain drain um mismanagement explosions
Iran
Hezbollah uh the war with Israel which
is ongoing uh um poverty now desperation
look people leave if it's shitty and it
became shitty and
uh and now it's just it's like Syria I'm
sorry but like Syria is just terrible
and and it used to be Damascus used to
be the spot and now it's because of so
much war and
Baghdad um Afghanistan is just I mean
you want to talk about the weirdest [ __ ]
on Earth Afghanistan just shows you the
opposite of what we're talking about if
if if that's a Utopia Afghanistan is the
Triumph of the people eating sand and
shooting machine guns I mean it's the
Triumph of the people who have the
biggest hammer and which is the sort of
nerds biggest fear because they were
beat up by the football players in high
school and they're the football players
and by the way they they beat us so um
that's that's you go to Afghanistan and
you learn a lot about Humanity I mean
it's
Grim that sounds like a history buff
talking
uh so what do you learn about Humanity
by seeing that you learn Triumph of the
human will that as long as you don't
give up you know who wins battles or
Wars people who don't give up the big
thing about England was they wouldn't
leave the battlefield which is why they
won most the most of the wars they I
mean Afghanistan just they don't get
give no one's going to ever beat
Afghanistan uh in a war um but that
leads to I mean it's it's a nation of
you
know the the people running the Taliban
are Thugs and so now the thugs are are
are are are running Afghanistan I mean
Afghanistan I could tell you 500 lessons
I mean um you know my favorite story
about Afghanistan is there's a guy named
General Abdul rizik who was a kid uh
when the Taliban took over or started in
Kandahar and he they killed his parents
so went to the tunnels to to the caves
to Pakistan to swat Northwest Frontier
Province and he was sweeping uh uh a
corner store in northwest Frontier
province which is about as poor as you
get in the world uh snuck back into
Kandahar and looks like sort of Adam and
the Ant they had these crazy like
ribbons of fabric that they would wear
huge turbin and they look great and they
they were up in the mountains they
started killing the Taliban so when
America invaded they said bring us
anybody who's fighting the Taliban so he
he he was brought to cabul and he he met
the Americans and they trained him and
gave him money and weapons and he went
back to Kandahar and uh it's like
Colonel CTS like he when he went to
Kandahar all Taliban activity went to
zero done now it went to the other
provinces but but he killed them all
like he was like the he was known as the
Taliban killer and so he then became the
governor of Kandahar and the police
chief and whatever and his brother I
believe killed Kai's brother who was
carai was the prime minister at the time
and they found like2 billion worth a
gold bullion and he became the largest
heroin trafficker you and um I remember
I went to go interview him in in kahar
and I I came back
and and the the they came to get me at
the hotel and and the the uh they took
me to the American Embassy and they're
like What's you know if you give us
rizik we'll give you like Deep Cover
stories and stuff and I'm like what do
you mean give you Ric I don't what do
you mean and they're like what's going
on with him and I'm like what's going on
with him he's your guy I mean I asked
some questions in English and he
responded and pass you we have to
translate I don't know what you're
talking about but like he'd gone off the
reservation and when you realize like
what war is so to go to Apocalypse Now
we want to talk about movies he's
carinal
carts and like that's war and you start
off it's like everyone has a plan to you
punch him in the mouth Mike Tyson that's
War you start off we're going to Nation
build and we're going to do this we're
going to do this and it ends up with
rizing it ends up with [ __ ] murder
and killing and bulling and
assassinations and heroin and bad [ __ ]
that's [ __ ] War it's bad it is a
fullon bad thing we should do whatever
the [ __ ] we can to not go to war with
anyone ever because it doesn't end
well so that started from what you learn
about Humanity does it resonate the idea
of the line between good and evil runs
through every human heart or is there
might makes right do you think about it
from a master morality kind of approach
like what what Glimpse is that into
Humanity well to go back to Marxist
dialectic if you have whatever it is
let's say 5,000 years of land and labor
carrots then it's sort of built into us
fighting so fighting is part of humanity
and survival is part of humanity there
is a good and evil I think good and evil
is in large part A construct of our
Consciousness which is given to us by
parents and books we read and religion
and all those laws and all those things
which by the way right A lot of the
times because it's like chaos is bad
like if we just leave it up to chaos we
all kill each other so so there is a
reason but a lot of our good versus evil
comes from that um do we want to fight
each other and take the carrots yes
that's that's been bred into us we are
dogs and
we're that's kind of stuff is brought
into us we do want to fight and we we
you to see it now we we do brinksmanship
all the time um and it's people who've
never fought in a war are the ones who
threaten to fight a war people who
fought in the War like whatever we can
do don't do that again because it's
really [ __ ] bad let loose the dogs of
war no but let loose
Humanity can focus all of its one%
[ __ ] you know intelligence and like
you know
whatever fast moving fast thinking stuff
and Technology on war like we can do it
on utopian technology and let's make the
environment good or we can how the kill
people really well and so during war we
focused all that energy and stuff on
killing people really well we're really
good at it to go back to dystopian is
you're going to have two countries who
have Quantum and Ai and are well ahead
of everybody else and data sets and
everything and TCH and you have one or
two countries that are forgotten
that have the
weapons from the previous
generation so you have Russia who's
going to be left holding the bag they're
GNA have nothing they're going to have
zero and they're going to have 4,800
warheads and you're going to have North
Korea and by the way
Pakistan and a couple other countries by
you know that have the ability to
destroy the world
and no ability to get
to the the new standard of power which
we've determined that is ours and we own
maybe the Chinese to they're allowed in
so it's us and them oh and these guys
you want to talk about he who has the
biggest hammer or or who's willing to do
the worst
thing the
bully has 4,800 Warheads which is more
than enough to kill everybody on the
planet so that's
dystopian that is dystopian yeah it's
interesting um you are a student of
History what do you have a particular
time period that you find engrossing
modern European history um uh I like
American history European history is
very interesting and I think we get a
lot of Greek history Roman history so
you like it all I like it all I mean
it's all basically modern I mean if it's
ey blink and like you know you look at
it's like we haven't been around that
long in in the sense of of as sensient
beings especially that can write stuff I
mean the Bible being the thing that sort
of changed everything but um Rome is a
big one obviously Greek ancient Greece
um which I've been getting into they
sort of started you're like where did
all this [ __ ] come from like they sort
of started everything and it's hasn't
really changed that you go back to
physics physics Has Changed Taylor
Wilson that like the laws of physics
have been sort of recently upended and
they will be again but um Renaissance
obviously crazy and then you know World
War I World War
[Music]
II like you want to talk about how bad
[ __ ] can get like post World War II was
more deadly than World War II because of
Poli World War II post World War II
because of ideology I mean mounty tongue
in the cultureal revolution in the 60s
killed double the amount of people that
died in World War I yeah it's just crazy
and I don't think people understand just
how deadly that was Stalin and Ma
un believable so I normally I always
read at night helps me fall asleep but
there was one book I just could not read
aight because it was [ __ ] me up so
badly that's the red famine sure which
is about the Ukrainian famine in the
early 20s 1920s yeah terrible and I was
just like God when it got to the part
where the woman eats her seven-year-old
daughter I was like I'm out can't this
is too much it's crazy there's a lot of
amazing amazing speaking of movies
amazing movies made about that time and
and it's just I mean that that era was
shocking yeah and Cultural Revolution
like there was no you know bombs and you
know tanks and panzers and stuff it was
like a pitchfork or like a rusty knife
like it was a lot of murder like a lot a
lot yeah it's crazy now you dodged the
Goda question earlier the who asked your
question Gaza oh Gaza yeah uh the reason
I bring it up is um reading so one of my
particular eras that I love reading
about is the conquest of America and
first just surviving the winters then
dealing with um the fact that hey
there's people already here and a lot of
conflict there and we certainly had
questionable ways of dealing with that
but as you push out west uh and then the
sort of final climactic battle with the
commanche Indians and the Mexicans and
it's a it is a fast fascinating moment
in history with president pul who was
like we are going all the way to the
ocean um that time in
history has these really eerie parallels
to what's going on in Gaza right now for
me yeah where it's like the thing I
can't wrap my head around I hate doing
this to you because maybe this is not
something you want to talk about but um
I look at what's happening and when
Trump came on and was like oh well we're
going to rebuild we're going to just
take him some else it's just Rubble
there's nowhere for them to go we're
going to take him somewhere else and uh
you know I mean it's just been horrible
for them so they shouldn't be a part of
the rebuild I was like wait what why
wouldn't they want to be a part of the
rebuild yes uh that feels very
reminiscent of uh total military Victory
to the spoils To the victor go the
spoils and it feels a little slight of
Handy there at the end and well who
knows what's going to happen first of
all very true very true now listen
the yes in the answer to your but it's
not as crazy as you think and I'll tell
you why you know I used to say I spent a
lot of time in Gaza and the there's a
lot of parallels and there's a lot of
sympathy for Gaza in Ireland right see
that coming yeah because it's the same
kind thing it was partitioned and
Britain and you know made and and uh and
by the way the the the
the IRA spent a lot of time in in in
with the pal the PLO I heard that yeah
yeah okay and so there's a lot of
sympathy in in Ireland anyway um in
Ireland there were 600 years of fighting
and it only stopped when they basically
got telemarketing jobs like literally
there was a sort of techish Revolution
joining the EU they got some money and
the guns just got buried right because
we have some money now we have some
agency we could buy house is because IR
was a very poor country and poverty you
know breeds Warfare um Gaza was poor and
and uh the Iranians fund Hezbollah and
they fund Hamas and Hamas I mean
Hezbollah at one point was like 35 40%
of all working people in Lebanon and
probably 50 to 60% in in Gaza so it's
paid for by Iran and Iran is the
Boogeyman of and you know they want to
keep Israel and GCC separate because the
enemy of my enem is my friend and then
they get encircled and so they're
playing a geopolitical war to sort of
keep the region
destabilized now the reason why this
whole thing happened was because Hamas
came out because the GCC were going to
ratify the Abraham Accords and there
were going to be normalization of
relations between Israel and done by
Jared Kushner uh and and the
GCC monumentally huge like the biggest
thing nobody reported on it but massive
and just before the ratification of it
or right around that time they came out
and you know did a terrorist attack and
again the sad thing about that n 911 is
it proves the terrorism works really
well really well and it it it it put the
sort of History we were at this moment
where it looked like the Middle East is
actually going to be sane for a little
bit barring Iran and um and then this
happened and then we went completely the
other way and and over retaliation and
then basically the flattening of of a of
a you know I want to say a country but
you know whatever you want to call
territory and so very bad like and we
want talk about war like it's bad like
it's like all you have to do just go to
war zone you never want to go to one
again and I remember talking to like
when I would go to Wisconsin you know
all these guys who join the Marines oh
tell me what you know Afghanistan's like
you're like don't go dude like you're
not protecting America you're not
getting anything from America you don't
come back with a manly thing you come
back unable to [ __ ] for the rest of your
life you come back pissing into a
[ __ ] bag what so you can you know
defend a convoy that you know has a can
of Coke in it because they get $100,000
a convoy like what did we win in
Afghanistan we we lost Afghanistan and
all the propaganda we lost Afghanistan
we were calling it five years before
said we're going to leave and taliban's
going to have more territory than when
we came and so it was an unequivocal
loss in a we did nothing in Afghanistan
what do you tell all those parents all
those kids all the trillions of dollars
gone all those lives by the way all the
collateral damage all the afghanis all
the Pakistan all the people who died
what do you tell them was for nothing
it's for zero you can ask any general
that who who went to Afghanistan you can
ask any Soldier so to go back to like
War
zones like blown up children no matter
what the cause is not good M that said
before Gaza happened before all this
stuff happened that that's a Triumph of
terrorism which it it should not have
allowed you can't let terrorism Triumph
or they'll just keep doing it um and
that's just terrorist when I say they
just for comments like that's all
terrorists um however before that I said
look you can solve Gaza have you ever
been go it's beautiful I mean to go back
to
Lebanon turquoise water you know be is
you build a bur gab hipsters want to go
there and say I'm partying in palestin
like it's what Lebanon used to be it's a
forgotten esoteric weird cool place to
go where everyone has a job and have
money I guarantee you the guns get
buried now they won't because the other
problem that you had in Ireland for 600
years is if you kill my brother yeah or
you kill my dad I'm going to kill you
and I'm going to die trying to kill you
and then you're going to kill me and
then I'm going to kill you and then your
son or daughter are going to so right
now you've just reinvigorated Gaza
forever but the idea of making it
into an economic entity rather than a
slum that breeds terrorists was not so
crazy it's crazy now to say now we're
going to do it on the rubble well like
we're going to displace 2 million people
you're going to displace two where
wherever those two million people go
they're going to blow [ __ ] up I mean
already like there's more Palestinians
in Jordan than there are Jordanian like
they're they're going to take over
Jordan at some point and by the way
Lebanon it's huge Palestinian I mean
it's it's geopolitical
instability and that solution might have
worked in a time of like okay we're
going to ratify the the GCC Abraham
Accords and we're going to give Gaza
Arab Saudi or whoever Qatari money to
make it uh Dubai you
know Dubai on the Mediterranean for Arab
people great you can't do it
now very sad Shane Smith where can
people follow along with you uh Shane
Smith has questions we're all better
podcaster born Shane Smith has questions
I love it thank thank you man for being
on the show this was definitely a lot of
fun thank you bro let's keep it going
come back on mine indeed anytime all
right boys and girls if you haven't
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next time my friends be legendary take
care peace if you like this conversation
check out this episode to learn more
Trump has just come into office do we
think or I should say do you think as we
may see this differently do you think
that Trump is um somebody who has the
elite view of like hey the right people
are in power let's make these