May 9, 2025 • 58 mins
Krystal, Ryan, Emily and Kyle break down the Friday news with a new American Pope, Trump caving to China, Laura Loomer outraged at Casey Means pick for Surgeon General, and more!
Damian Mark Thompson: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/holy-smoke/id1163175265
James Li: https://www.youtube.com/@5149jamesli
If you need any help, please contact http://breakingpoints.locals.com/contact
To connect your RSS feed, use this link: https://breakingpoints.locals.com/rss
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Breaking Points at Chrystal.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
Good morning, Good morning Emily. Lovely to see you, and
lovely to see our guest right right.
Speaker 3 (00:07):
We are joined now by Damian Thompson. He is an
editor at The Spectator. He hosts the Holy Smoke podcast
over there.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
And Damian, we may see.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
Our co host Ryan Graham pop up at some point
while we're chatting with you.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
In fact timing here he is.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
But Damian, I first want to say you are in
Rome right now. You have been covering the events of
the last twenty four hours.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
The first American pope has been chosen.
Speaker 3 (00:33):
So first, Damien, thank you so much for being here,
and if you could just give us your initial reaction.
This was a surprising pickstep Ban and I think last
week described him as the quote dark horse, a potential
dark horse candidate, and that's actually what happened.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
So you're the expert here, Damien, what do you make
of all this?
Speaker 4 (00:51):
Well, I think the first thing we want to say is
that there's a mood of real optimism in Rome today.
People who had dismissed Cardinal Prevost's Francis Mark too some
sort of hopeless scheming liberal have been very pleasantly surprised,
(01:12):
first of all by the sight of him coming on
to the loader of Saint Peter's wearing the traditional robes
that France has rejected. Secondly by the choice of name Leo,
which is a very traditional one, by his style, and
on checking his record, they discover that he isn't perhaps
as liberal as they thought. That he seems to have
(01:33):
relatively orthodox views on the sensitive issues of sexuality that
have proved to be so divisive in the Catholic Church.
And there are also rumors that he's sympathetic to the
traditional Latin mats. So all of that is causing traditionalists
who initially reacted with dismay when they heard the name,
(01:56):
to shame hinge their verdicts fairly quickly, and you can
see it happening on Twitter. They like the way he's
presented himself, They like the thoughtful theological message. They particularly
liked his very christ centered homily in the Sistine Chapel
(02:18):
to the gardens this morning. So I think, above all
is just a sense of relief that the bizarre, quixotic
and often I think personally cruel pontificate of Francis has
come to an end. There will not be a Francis
the second. As I've written many times, Francis was involved
(02:39):
in so many horrible abuse cover ups that I think
his legacies profoundly tainted.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
So one of the things, of course that people immediately
noticed is a prevost social media profile being the modern era,
and several of his recent tweets, actually, all of his
recent tweets seem to be quite critical of the Trump
and menministruation. This one in particular, he chimes in here
and says JD Vance is wrong. Jesus doesn't ask us
(03:06):
to rank our love for others. So that led to that,
among other things, led to Republicans like Laura Lumer calling
him a woke Marxist pope and really despairing about his
liberal inclinations. What do you make about his political commentary
with regard to Jade Vance and also the meeting with
(03:27):
President Trump and the Kelly in the White House.
Speaker 4 (03:30):
Well, he's not a big fan of MAGA, that's for sure.
But there's a big difference between a woke Marxist and
somebody who doesn't approve of the second Trump administration. And
there are plenty of woke Marxists in the Catholic Church,
but there's no evidence that Pope Leo is one of them.
(03:51):
He is probably left leaning on the subjects of migration.
And you know, it's always it's always puzzled me that
the Catholic Church is so keen on advocating mass migration
without any thought about its longtime social consequences. On the
other hand, and perhaps you guys can help clear up
(04:12):
this mystery for me. What's his business about him not
being a registered Republican because I understand that the state
of Illinois doesn't doesn't have doesn't have registration in that way,
but having voted in a series of Republican primaries, could
somebody clear.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
That up for me?
Speaker 3 (04:28):
Yes, you know, I think that might be. Charlie Kirk
pulled his voting history. Charlie Kirk also is from the
Chicago area. Pulled his voting history, and it might be
the case that he's sort of from the never Trump
school of the conservative movement here in the United States.
He's a Chicago guy. It's very interesting, Damien. I guess
(04:48):
we'll see. And you know, it's always difficult to map
go ahead ahead.
Speaker 4 (04:52):
We know that he's pro life, and it's very very
hard for an orthodox pro life Catholic and the new
pope certainly the dogs on the subical abortion to support
the Democrats, who you know, who are incredibly dogmatic in
their support for abortion, including late time abortions. So you know,
I would have been very surprised, for example, if the
(05:16):
new Popa supported Kamala Harris support either of them.
Speaker 5 (05:22):
What do we know about his his time in Peru
relative to child sex abuse cover ups, That's an open question,
Like I don't know. I've just seen some some talk
about that.
Speaker 4 (05:34):
This was why my job taper. When I heard Robert Francis,
I immediately knew who it was because I had just
been reading some very detailed coverage and the influential Catholic
investigative publication of The Pillar, which is very highly respected,
(05:54):
about allegations that Cardinal pre asked when Bishop of Chicayo
in Peru brushed aside complaints by women that they've been
abused by priests, and he was also accused of he
also accused of them watering down the severity of their accusations.
(06:15):
And therefore, you know, before the conclave, abuse survivors organizations
were worked drawing attention to what they claimed was his
bad record on this, and there's also a case dating
back to two thousand in which, as an Augustinian prior
or whatever he was in Chicago, he was accused of
(06:38):
allowing a pedophile priest to live and operate near a school.
And as I understand it, the new Pope has merely
invoked some sort of formal excuse for the Chicago for
the Chicago excuse me if I get the peruan complaints
(07:00):
by these women, and offered no explanation for what happened
in Chicago. So that is being followed up, as it
was followed up in the Daily Mail today, and.
Speaker 6 (07:10):
It won't go away.
Speaker 4 (07:11):
But I think I would make a distinction, and it's
a very these things have to be taken incredibly seriously,
but I wouldn't make a distinction between failure to deal
adequately with abuse allegations, which is terrible but of which
vast unders of bishops have been guilty, and the sort
(07:31):
of grossly negligent and culpable covering up of in some
cases convicted abuses that Pote Francis indulged, in which I think,
you know, I regard his Pontifica's a disgrace for that
reason alone. And the failure of the press to follow
that up. So it would be a little bit stranger
(07:53):
if the press concentrated so much attention on following up
this absolutely legitimate story and ignoring the fact that the
late pope has a record which you know, had he
been ahead of state anywhere in the wet western world,
would have forced him to resign years before he died.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
Damien, what do you make of the politics of choosing
an American pope? What is the significance of that? And
you know, do you have any have you heard any
rumors about some of the internal politics about how he
was chosen From an ideological perspective as well.
Speaker 4 (08:30):
Well, I'm not so sure that the cardinals thought of
him as an American pope, because this is a guy
who has spent nearly his entire career, certainly his entire
episcopal career in Latin America, and before that he was
a missionary in Latin America. So I suspect that it
(08:53):
was the Latin American voting bloc, which might perhaps otherwise
have gone to Cardinal Tagle, the married him over the
two thirds majority, So I'm not so sure. I mean,
obviously people are aware that he was born and brought
up in America, but he is, you know, he has
a you know, mixed ancestry and had spent so much
(09:15):
of his adult life in Latin America that I think
it was a Latin American block really backed him. But
that's conjecture.
Speaker 5 (09:24):
I saw something about the name Leo potentially signaling some
type of reference to Leo the thirteenth, labor and cyclical.
I'm deeply out of my depth when it comes to
this stuff, but I I understand there was.
Speaker 4 (09:40):
Some much O the other I think was doctrinally orthodox
and in some ways the founder of modern Catholic social teaching.
The choice of the name Leo if it refers to
the thirteenth and many other great pope cooed Lear, including
(10:01):
some not so great poets cord Leer. But if it
is a reference to theater the thirteenth, then that might
indicate some sort of balance between doctrinal orthodoxy. And it
does seem to be doctrinal orthodox, more so than Francis's
bizarre and haphazard mixture of impenetrable spirituality, I think, and
(10:26):
a very pronounced social conscience, one that has, whether you
agree with him or not, already let him into conflict
with the Trump administration. But I think President Trump is
actually very keen to in as far as he possibly can,
have good relations with the Catholic Church. So I think
(10:47):
Trump will will take inside, but he won the won't
be the same sort of insults and sniping and you know,
goading that France is directed at Trump. If Pope Leo
wants to criticize the Trump administration, he will do so
in an honest, straightforward and civil manner.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Damian. One thing that people like myself, I'm not a Catholic,
but people who are on the left who appreciated Pope
Francis really respected was his commitment to and focusing on
an anti war message, and especially vis A VI the
atrocities committed in Gaza. I wonder if you have any
insight into Popolio's perspective on that conflict.
Speaker 4 (11:27):
I want to ask you something. You're talking about respecting
a man who protected a serial rapist of nuns. How
does he earn your respect? I'm not having a get
you Crystal passy because I've foun of yours, but really,
a man who doesn't that, I mean, really doesn't that
overshadow everything? So many abuse victims had their stories ignored,
(11:54):
and that the abusers upheld and detected by this man. Francis,
how can any anyone Well.
Speaker 5 (12:05):
I mean, I'll answer that I think that people who
are not intimately involved with are familiar with the Catholic
Church and don't know the details of it, assume that
pretty much everybody, and you know, the leadership there is
involved and to some degree with covering up the media.
Speaker 4 (12:22):
That's a growth favure of the media.
Speaker 6 (12:26):
Covered up.
Speaker 5 (12:26):
I think maybe Greesel knows the most recent numbers, something
like thirteen thousand children have been killed by Israel, and
so anybody who speaks out against that is going to
get a hearing from people who are opposed to that.
Speaker 4 (12:41):
It's a pope to abuse his abuse his personal authority
to protect a Jesuit ex jesuit accused of abusing and raping,
you know, twenty young women, including religious sisters in order
which is basically sex cult and for him to enjoy
(13:03):
the personal protection of the pope who kept his bile
artwork on the door of his on the wall of
his apartment till the day he does this.
Speaker 1 (13:11):
Is this is repnic that we're talking about.
Speaker 4 (13:14):
Exactly this Damien story, but there was a there was
a corrupt that compressed call who kept the story out
of the headlines.
Speaker 5 (13:21):
Yeah, I to explain why, I think, yeah, why why
people like us don't think that there's a whole lot
of difference in in the choice, like, Okay, whoever you're
going to get is going to be protected by this.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
But Damien, I do want to get back this point.
Speaker 4 (13:36):
There's a huge difference. Both are appalling, but there's a
difference between cover ups and the sort of very very
active protection of convicted abuses that France has indulged in, which.
Speaker 2 (13:50):
Is Damien fair fair enough? I hear your point. I
hear your point, and I confess to being, you know,
ignorant on many of the specifics about who covered up
and what their level of culpability was. But I do
want to know if you have any perspective on what
how Pope Leo may orient himself vis a v war
and peace, and specifically with regard to Israel's atrocity in Gaza.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
And also Ukraine. I think there's a question of that
as well.
Speaker 4 (14:18):
I just don't know at this stage. By my assumption
is that he'll want to be a peacemaker my assumption
is that he would condemn some of Israel's actions as
(14:40):
well as of course condemning the appalling slaughter of Israelis
by Hamas. I wouldn't expect him to align very clearly
with either side. I would be surpris ris if he
(15:01):
was as indulgent of Russia as Possis seems to have
been on occasion, but that's speculation.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
So dam.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
My last question, just to actually kind of wrap all
of this up, is I've relied a lot on your
reporting over the course of the last papacy, and I
know that Leo uh is an ally of Francis, and
I'm genuinely curious if everything that you just explained that
has really been a failure of the media to cover
deeply and to focus on and to you know, put
(15:42):
front and center of the discourse about what was happening
in Vatican City. Does the new pope have any complicity
in the in Francis's regime of covering things up and
silencing and indulging particular guilty parties.
Speaker 4 (15:56):
It's it's a really good question because in US, I mean,
he was a very senior member of the Curia in
a sense, every cardinal who failed to speak up about
what they knew was happening, which was that the pope
was covering up for convicted as well as credibly accused
vile sex abuses. Really has some explaining to do, and Poplio,
(16:20):
like the cardinals who elect him, not only has some
explaining to do, I would say, on that count, but
has to do something about it. And what everybody's been
saying to me in ren a few years is as
soon as Francis dies, it will all come out. I
hope it does. And when it does come out, the
level of complicity of Francis in covering up sex crimes
(16:42):
all over the world, if that really does come out,
then that will be a huge diplomatic problem for the
new pope, But at least it will be confronted, which
it desperately needs to be, because the fact that the
general public doesn't know the extent of the pravity is
shocking in itself.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
Damien.
Speaker 3 (17:05):
We are all non Catholics here and so we really
appreciate you coming on, especially someone so well sourced, literally
in Rome right now, to help us understand.
Speaker 6 (17:16):
A great pleasure.
Speaker 4 (17:17):
Let me just emphasize the mood here is upbeat.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
Thank you, Damian. We really appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (17:23):
Thanks a lot, all right, So interesting perspective from the
right there. I you know, I have listen, I have
no idea what the reality of how Pope Leo is
going to position himself. But you know, I will say
the reaction I've seen has been quite different. You know,
the left very encouraged by even the choice as Ryan
(17:47):
was getting at of Leo as the name. Certainly the
sniping at jd Vance, the upset from much of the right,
including the Laura Lumers of the world. So you know,
a lot to be seen about how he positions himself.
But also to your point, Emily, I mean he he
was someone who was close to Pope Francis and had
been put in this position of selecting many of the
(18:08):
cardinals and bishops, which also may have put him sort
of in the pole position to achieve this position, you know,
not knowing anything about the politics involved here, But what
do you make of this, Emily? Before we let you go,
because I know you've got things to do today too.
Speaker 3 (18:21):
Well, flight to catch, so hopefully the real idea doesn't
mess that up. But yeah, my Catholic friends are I mean,
I would put it this way, I think One of
the things that Damian said is really interesting that the
initial reaction was pretty uncomfortable. As soon as you know,
people started scrolling through his twitter feed, Popolio's twitter feed.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
And it's extremely political.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
It was as though the only times he was tweeting
or retweeting was to make political statements.
Speaker 1 (18:46):
Now that's not exactly accurate, but.
Speaker 3 (18:48):
It accounts for probably fifty to sixty percent of the
tweets over the last several years on his speed, which
means that he has a well of frustration with MAGA
as an American and with the Trump administration, with jd Vance,
who is a Catholic convert. One of Francis's I think
points at tension with jd Vance and others is that
there's this wing of Catholic converts, particularly in the United States,
(19:09):
who do like the Latin Mass and that's what Damien
was alluding to, and they see that as kind of
a proxy for this anger at the modernization attempts in
the Vatican.
Speaker 1 (19:18):
And so all this is to say, I.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
Thinically about Latin Mass sort of codes right wing correct. Yeah,
this is like the jd Vance like version of Catholicism.
Speaker 3 (19:30):
Yeah, like tradcasts and I don't know if Jad does
Latin Mass, but it's sort of seen as like a
proxy for that. But Leo comes from that sort of strain,
the Francis type of strain of the church. And so
I think what Damian pointed out was interesting that over
the last twenty four hours some of the people who
were hoping for a more conservative choice have come to
reconsider whether Leo might have things that they really like,
(19:53):
and they're now failing quote unquote upbeat.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
We'll see.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
But my last big thought on this is just I
think think my Catholic friends might not like me saying this,
but there's a desperation for a breath of fresh air
because Francis is mismanaged things. Whether you're liberal or conservative,
the guy mismanaged things, He was complicit in cover ups.
It is such an intense character that I think there's
a some of my conservative friends who get really frustrated
(20:18):
with mapping contemporary American politics onto the Vatican left right.
Speaker 1 (20:22):
It doesn't work perfectly, that's absolutely true.
Speaker 3 (20:25):
At the same time, this guy with posting seemingly only
to make a point against the American right over and
over again. So I get that it's complicated, but I
think he's probably closer to Francis than some of my
conservative Catholic friends probably will uh, they'll probably find this
out in ways that are unpleasant to come.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
Yeah, so there's some there's some coping, coping going on potentially.
Speaker 5 (20:49):
Here if you're a psile cope. We got everybody got
Francis wrong. Like the first day or two after when
Francis was named, everybody thought he was kind of a concervative.
Speaker 2 (21:01):
Oh really, I don't remember that.
Speaker 1 (21:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (21:03):
There was like a twenty four hour period where the
right was celebrating and the left was freaking out, and
then he went around like you know, kissing people's feet
and people are like, oh wow.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
Yeahs was like really really really anti abortion.
Speaker 2 (21:18):
I mean any isn't any pope gonna be anti abortion?
Speaker 1 (21:22):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (21:22):
For him, it was like he had you know that
everyone has sort of like a suite of issues under
their priorities, and that was definitely one of his. So
that's what the rights were reacted to immediately when it
came to got Yah.
Speaker 6 (21:31):
So they got that wrong.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
Yeah all right, So I guess we'll see anyway, Emily,
I'll let you go for the day. Great to see us.
Always have a great weekend. We'll see you next week.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
Thanks guys.
Speaker 2 (21:41):
See ye, Ran, how are you this morning?
Speaker 6 (21:44):
Wonderful? How about yourself?
Speaker 1 (21:46):
Good?
Speaker 2 (21:46):
Thank you for standing up for my honor with Damien
Like well, you know, yes, this is obviously the sexual
abuse scandal is an incredibly important one, but also you
know there there are issues that we could discuss here
as well. So in any case, speaking of other issues discussed,
there's a ton that I want to get to in
the show. And also, by the way, guys, Ryan's going
(22:08):
to have to jump about ten o'clock. We have a
special guest, very special guest who has a long commute
from two rooms away in order to join us this
morning for the premium portion of the show. And we've
got lots of stuff to get into with regard to trade,
and I definitely want to get Ryan's take before he
goes on the Abundance Caucus newly formed, and if we
(22:30):
have time, get a little bit of your your thoughts
on casey means she may be right up your alley, Ryan,
I don't know you have.
Speaker 6 (22:36):
Yeah, shrooms and crystals?
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Yeah, man, talking to trees, it might be your gal?
Speaker 6 (22:42):
Is she talking to trees?
Speaker 5 (22:43):
Is just listening to them, because if you're listening to
trees and hearing from them, I'm with that. If you're
talking to them, that's too.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
Far, that's too fa Okay, all right, we'll investigate. We'll
investigate first. I want to let me see what I
got here first. I want to get into this strade stuff.
And in particular, there's some news this morning. I don't
know if you've seen this yet, I'm sure you probably have,
but Trump posted that he thinks that an eighty percent
tariff on China seems right up to Scott b being
(23:12):
Scott Bessett. So basically china strategy of do nothing and
win seems to be working out. Ryan.
Speaker 5 (23:18):
Yeah, and markets jumped on that on the UK trade
deal yesterday because it was it was kind of a
nothing burger of a deal.
Speaker 6 (23:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (23:29):
Basically, apparently the UK makes cars and they're going to
be allowed to sell like one hundred thousand cars into
the US that are reduced tariff rate, and in exchange,
they will reduce their digital tax that they were hitting
our big tech companies with, and there's some tariff reciprocity.
Basically a free trade steal zone that we're creating with
the UK, and we're still going to then hit other
(23:51):
steal with the twenty five percent tariff, and because it
wasn't really much to it, and Trump sold it as
this like historic, you know deal with our you know,
our best friends across the pond. That sent a signal
to the markets that he's looking for face saving ways
out of this trade war. And so the hope then
(24:14):
from the markets is Okay, he understands he's lost, and
he's gonna wind this down. And so I think that's
why the markets popped. I think the markets might be
a little wrong, like which probably you know, dial up
Jeff Stein again see what he thinks. But I think
he might be more committed to continuing this until he
gets a real punch in the face that he doesn't
(24:36):
recover from him quickly. But so that that's that's where
we are. And then you know, the China knocking TIFFs
on China down to eighty percent is also silly, because
you know, anything above a pretty trivial percentage is a
is a is a meaningful tariff. So the difference between
(25:01):
eighty and one hundred and forty five isn't isn't that significant?
Because in either case, most importers. Most businesses that rely
on Chinese imports are out of business, So whether you're
out of business at eighty percent or out of business
at one hundred and forty five percent doesn't really matter
to the company that goes bankrupt me in that direction.
Speaker 2 (25:22):
Let me show you this, which is kind of shocking.
So China apparently reported bumper April exports ahead of crucial
trade talks with the US. China's experts actual exports actually
grew sharply in April, despite Trump's Liberation Day terrafts on
shipments to the US, strengthening Beijing's hand ahead of crucial
trade negotiations due to start this weekend. Strong performance came
(25:44):
as Chinese companies diverted trade flows to South East Asia,
Europe and other destinations following the imposition of prohibitively high
tit for tat tariffs between the world's two largest economies.
Exports rows eight point one percent in dollar terms compared
with a year earlier, China's and said on Friday, beating
analyst forecast in a poll by Reuters of one point
nine percent growth, but slowing from twelve percent growth in March,
(26:07):
when figures were buoyed by export is seeking to get
ahead of expected tariffs by front loading shipments to the US.
So in spite of a dramatic reduction in trade with US,
in fact, China's exports grew post Liberation Day and grew
sharply year over year because we are not the entire world.
(26:29):
And it turns out that they had other options available
to them, especially as we did everything we could to
you piss off all of the countries around the entire world,
contrary to the proposal. I think Scott Bessen and laid
down of Hey, we're going to have this encirclement strategy
and we're going to try to isolate China, and then
they go about it by basically pissing off everyone that
(26:49):
they possibly.
Speaker 5 (26:50):
Can, right, And I think one thing that is underestimated
is the role of kind of inertia in global affairs.
Like China has been selling stuff to us because that's
because that's what they do. Like the relationships are set up,
the contracts are in place, it's it's smooth, it works,
(27:11):
We've got to figure it out. And that doesn't mean
that they didn't have other options where they could sell stuff.
And we kind of took that to mean that we
were the only buyer in the world, you know, for
these products. And what China is showing here is that
actually if they do the if they do, if they're
(27:32):
forced to do the work to find other buyers, Southeast
Asia and Europe, you know, do have some consumers who
are you know, willing to buy the twenty eight dollars.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
That that we're not allowed to do anywhere, that we're
not going to have anymore. This is kind of contrary
to what you were saying about the UK trade deal.
So let me get your reaction to this. Charles Gasparino says,
now you know why Powell didn't cut rates after the
UK deal. If the ten percent tariff is in the
UK deal, not sure how we escape some economic repercussions
(28:03):
i e. Inflation in the short term at the very least,
since UK is a friend where we sell more stuff
to than we import i e. Ten percent on the
UK means much higher on countries we have deficits with.
That's the tariff investment calculation you're hearing on Wall Street
right now. So basically, like you said, the UK deal,
I mean, first of all, we should be clear it's
not even actually a deal yet. It's like you know,
concepts of a play on kind of a deal, but
(28:25):
it leaves in place most of the ten percent tariff,
which is what it was already at.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
Now.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
There were other provisions involved, as you laid out some
of them previously, but basically what Gasparino is saying is like, Okay,
well ten percent is the baseline, that's the best deal
you're going to be able to get. Then that indicates
some significant inflationary pressures on countries around the world.
Speaker 5 (28:47):
Again, so it's it's like irrationality layered on top of irrationality,
and it's this weird game theory where everybody is trying
to figure out what irrational thing and and unpredictable thing
is going to happen and trying to predict that. So
in this case, what I think is going on is
that the mark and the markets only ended up up
(29:10):
like eighty or something. They were up significantly throughout the
day and then came down. I think what they took
from it is that, Okay, he's not really going to
keep that ten percent on them, like he's saying that
for now, but he reached a deal, and the point
of the deal is that the tariffs are going to
come down, and so you know, once once they start
to bite a little bit and have real world consequences,
(29:31):
because we've gotten the deal, he's going to use the
deal to quietly just get rid of those. Now, they
could be totally wrong about that, and this is why
I'm saying it's irrationality layered over irrationality. But I think
that's what they're I think that's the assumption there because
Gasprino's right that, like, if that ten percent is solid,
then yeah, that signals everyone's going to get at least
(29:54):
ten and other people are going to get higher. But
what about Trump's approach to any of this suggests that
any of this is.
Speaker 2 (30:01):
Solid, that anything is solid.
Speaker 5 (30:02):
Yeah, So that's why I think that's what I think
is going on it that they assume that this is
all soft.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
I want to get your reaction to Jadie Vance got
asked about the number of dolls that anyone will be
permitted to have here. So let me go ahead and
pull this up because his answer was interesting, let me
go ahead and get your reaction to those.
Speaker 7 (30:22):
Right, So the President said, you know, maybe American kids
should have three dollars instead of thirty or whatever the
number was.
Speaker 1 (30:30):
Do you agree.
Speaker 7 (30:32):
Do you tell the people of this country that you
need to make some sacrifices in order to reorganize this
bad trade relationship?
Speaker 8 (30:41):
Well, I think the President's point here is that, yeah,
we do need to become more self reliant, and that's
not going to happen overnight, and it's not.
Speaker 6 (30:48):
Always going to be easy. Mark.
Speaker 8 (30:49):
But what I'd ask people is not whether they want
two dollars or five dollars or twenty dollars for their kids.
I'd ask American moms and dads, would you like to
be able to go into a pharmacy and know that
the drugs your.
Speaker 6 (31:00):
Kids need are actually available to you?
Speaker 8 (31:03):
As an American parent, would you like to God forbid,
if your country goes to a war and your son
or daughter is son off to fight, would you like
to know that the weapons that they have are good
American made stuff, not made by a foreign adversary. What
President Trump is talking about is bringing self reliance back
to the United States economy.
Speaker 2 (31:22):
We have a what do you think of that explanation here?
Speaker 5 (31:26):
You know, I I I wish that it didn't feel
like this stuff was reverse engineered, you know what and
by what? And what I mean by that is, Trump
seems to now understand that, oh, the shelves are going
to be empty. Now I have to come up with
a rationale for why I support, why the shelves being
(31:47):
empty is actually a good thing. Right when when you
if you actually start from the principle that we consume
too much junk, it's it's it's spiritually degrading, it's it's
bad for the environment, it doesn't make us feel better
about ourselves. Uh, it's it's empty.
Speaker 6 (32:07):
Uh.
Speaker 5 (32:07):
Then and then you flow from there and and try
to bring the whole country together around that idea that's
still to me, that's delightful and a replace the spiritual
regeneration of the of an entire public wonderful, agreed.
Speaker 2 (32:23):
And And but there has to be not just you're
not going to have dolls, but there has to be
a replacement for that consumerist ideology that we've been sold
for decades and decades.
Speaker 5 (32:32):
Right, which which we don't have. Like consumerism is a
thing that stitches us together. Yeah, and you you pull
that apart without replacing it with anything, you know, God
save us, you know, so it could so, But if
you know the process of getting to that, the process
(32:54):
of working it through. If we did it collectively, you know,
could result in you know, less you know, lower levels
of unhappiness, less plastic in our bloodstream. Like all of
these things would be would be good. Like I mean,
you you've got young kids, like it should be a
crime like that every single uh kid's birthday party they
(33:19):
have to give you a giant bag of plastic when
you walk out that the kids play play with for
thirty seconds in the car on the way home and
then don't then then don't touch again. And it's it's,
it's it's it's genuinely awful, Like that's horrible.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
Stuff to me that the deeper worry and I suspect
you share this is actually about social media and specifically
with regard to AI. And you know, this administration is
running a million miles an hour to wild West AI.
We're just going to take off all the breaks we've
got to win the AI race. We're just going to
unleash this potentially extraordinarily destructive force on society with it's
(34:00):
not even contemplating what the impacts will be without planning
for them, without creating any sort of a safety net.
If there's mass job replacement, I'm sure you read the uh,
what was it? A New York magazine piece about everybody
cheating on their college tests, and like, you know that
particular like narrow problem you could figure out. Okay, well
now you just have to write us days in class
(34:20):
instead of you can't.
Speaker 5 (34:21):
You know, there's we're taking out your phone father trying
to figure that out though.
Speaker 2 (34:24):
Yeah, but to me it speaks correct. But also to
me it speaks to you know, the same way that
I use this example with Emily Estra that GPS made
us like unable to navigate, like that part of our
brain just atrophied completely.
Speaker 6 (34:38):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (34:38):
AI is going to do that for basically everything. Yeah,
and if we were a functioning society, we would be
dealing with that, right, We would be figuring about it,
we would be planning for it, we would be braining
it in. And so you know, that's just an example
of how contrary to the idea that there's some plan
(34:59):
here for the Trump administration to remake the social contract
in a way that is going to be healthier and
more fulfilling. And you know, spiritually regenitaive regenerative, I think
is the word that you use. It's the exact opposite
we're running a million miles in the other direction and
not even looking to consider where we might be headed, and.
Speaker 6 (35:20):
Doubling our energy usage in order to do it.
Speaker 2 (35:23):
Yes, Yeah, No. Naomi Klein talks about how this is
like a vampiric technology because it eats up the resources
that you actually need for not just humanity, but for creation.
Speaker 6 (35:34):
Your part.
Speaker 2 (35:36):
That's right in order to create this mirror world. And
it's it's endlessly disturbing to me, and you know, I
don't know what to do about it other than to
complain and worry. The last economic piece that I wanted
to I actually really want you to make I want
to make sure I'm thinking about this the right way,
because the media has been saying, oh, Trump wants to
(35:56):
lift taxes on the rich. He's he called Mike Johnson,
he told him he wants to hike the top tax rate.
But as I was reading the details here, it's not
exactly as it's being portrayed. So the change here would
roll back one of the tax cuts that Trump signed
into law in twenty seventeen, as the Tax Cuts and
Jobs AC That measure reduced the rate on income earned
(36:18):
in the top bracket to thirty seven percent from thirty
nine point six percent this year. The top income bracket
starts at roughly six hundred thousand dollars for an individual
of aster. Trump is effectively seeking to restore the previous
top rate, but at a much higher income level. So
just so people know, if nothing happens the Tax Cut
and Jobs Act, those tax breaks expire and taxes go
(36:40):
up on everybody, but especially because they got the biggest
cuts on the rich. So what we're talking about here,
what Trump is proposing, is still giving a tax break
to the rich, but not as much, quite as much
of one as he had previously given. Am I understanding
this correctly?
Speaker 6 (36:55):
That's right, except for some.
Speaker 5 (37:00):
You could imagine a rich person who makes twenty million
dollars a year, which is you know that there are
I think there's in the hundreds or maybe the thousands
at the most of people in the United States who
make that amount of money. People can look it up.
It's that that number is available. Those people would pay
a little bit more because everything above a certain threshold,
(37:21):
they're you know, they're jumping from whatever it was, you know,
thirty six something to like thirty nine, And so that
those couple points would then hit everything above that level.
But that's a tiny number of people. So if you're
a typical.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
But if you don't, if you don't renew the Task
Cuts and Jobs Act, which is the whole four trillion
dollars that they're trying to do, Yeah, then taxes are
going to go up on the far more.
Speaker 5 (37:45):
It's a huge it's a huge cut relative to not
doing anything.
Speaker 6 (37:49):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (37:50):
Yeah. So it's still a cut.
Speaker 6 (37:51):
Even on the right, as much of.
Speaker 2 (37:53):
A cut as what he had originally planned.
Speaker 5 (37:56):
Yes, still giving a big cut to the very rich,
but a little bit less than he gave to them.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
Yes, Okay, all right, all right, let me get your
take on this Abundance Caucus, because you've been, you've been,
you had some interesting insights on this. So you have
some Democrats now who are starting an abundance Caucus, in
abundance inspired caucus in particular, what is this guy's name,
Josh Harder from California, says House Democrats are getting asra
(38:27):
cline pilled. Bipartisan group of lawmakers led by Josh Harder
as launching a new roughly thirty member block claiming inspiration
from abundance movement championed by the liberal commentator client. I
guess my question is like is this really necessary because
I feel like we have ideological groups that are already
pretty abundance pilled.
Speaker 5 (38:47):
Well, I mean, got to seize the Abundance Caucus, and
you know, maybe they hope that they'll be able to
get Ezra to come speak to their caucus, like he's
you know, he spoke to the Senate retreat recently. This guy, uh,
I forget who was it, Serota?
Speaker 6 (39:04):
Maybe that flagged it.
Speaker 5 (39:05):
The funniest thing that like one of Harder's you know,
chief accomplishments was blocking this water project.
Speaker 2 (39:11):
I think it was Stolar.
Speaker 6 (39:13):
Was that Solar?
Speaker 5 (39:13):
Yes, yeah, just which is just hilarious because that's like
the whole like to the extent that abundance.
Speaker 6 (39:21):
You know, has a villain.
Speaker 5 (39:22):
It's like, you know, environmentalists who are standing in the
way of these types of infrastructure projects, and here he
was blocking one of these water projects on environmental grounds.
Speaker 2 (39:35):
I have it here, Congressman behind the Abundance Caucus, Josh
Harder has as a signature accomplishment stopping a water project
from getting a permit.
Speaker 5 (39:42):
There you go, So, yeah, the the we'll see who
winds up And this is this is what I said yesterday, like,
we'll see who winds up joining this caucus. But here
here's a prediction, and you can map this prediction then
against the analysis of whether this abundance is you know,
seriously aimed at, you know, lifting everybody up, or is
(40:04):
actually just kind of rebranded neoliberalism. My suspicion is that
the Abundance Caucus will eventually be populated almost exclusively by
people who are also in what's known as the New
Democrat Coalition New Democrat Governference. New Democrats were created by
the DLC, the Democratic Leadership Council, which itself was created
(40:27):
in the nineteen eighties as a as the vehicle for
the faction that said, we need deregulation, we need lower taxes,
we need we need to end big government. We need
to get Democrats away from civil rights, environmentalism, feminism, big unions,
big government, you know, tax and spend liberalism. We need
(40:47):
to be the kind of we need to basically do
Reaganomics light and they were.
Speaker 6 (40:53):
That was the DLC. There was a New Democrats.
Speaker 5 (40:55):
So I think all I think everybody who joins this
Abundance Caucus is probably going to be New Democrats.
Speaker 6 (41:01):
And if I'm wrong about that.
Speaker 5 (41:03):
Then uh, then maybe I'm wrong about my whole analysis
of abundance. But you know, let's check back in in
a couple of weeks and see who harder has been
able to recruit into this caucus. Now, you're definitely gonna
have some There are some progressive people in the Progressive
Caucus who are also in the New Democrats. And there
are which is a lot of embarrass caucus. Are are really,
(41:26):
you know, underneath that kind of neoliberal you know, you know,
Clinton type Democrats who have who have you know, progressive
social values And I think you'll you'll find those kinds
of people too, will be really intrigued by the the
the abundance framing because it's nice. Who's against abundance?
Speaker 2 (41:44):
Yeah, I mean I feel like yeah. But so Bill
Clinton is you know, his his framing is the DLC
and it's neoliberals. It's really the Democratic Party sort of
embracing the Ronald Reagan era framing, and Jimmy Carter, to
be fair, initially, is the one who starts to move
Democrats away from the New Deal and into the neoliberal era.
Bill Clinton really cements that. I sort of feel like
(42:06):
Barack Obama is almost like another rebranding. That's like a
different rebranding of neoliberalism and now and that was coming
out of the wilderness of George W.
Speaker 1 (42:15):
Bush.
Speaker 2 (42:16):
And you know, how could we have lost to this guy?
Oh my god. Okay, here we go another rebranding neoliberalism.
And then it seems like Abundance is the attempt again
to rebrand neoliberalism as something new and fresh and different
out of the wake of the you know, devastating loss
for Democrats to Donald Trump.
Speaker 5 (42:33):
Right, and the Affordable Care Act, Obama's signature achievement, you know,
was all about using the market and doing a you know,
doing healthcare reform without you know, not not even without
adding to the deficit, but reducing the deficit. And yes,
very very Clintonian.
Speaker 2 (42:51):
Well it brought a bunch of Clinton people into his administration.
So I mean, the you know, the carryover from the
Clinton administration was quite quite real and not just not
just theoretical. Let me get your take also, Ryan, since
we didn't have you yesterday before, you have to jump
on Casey means. So there's all sorts of there's all
(43:13):
sorts of things going on here. I don't even know
where to start, But let me pull up a friend
of show, Laura Lumer, who has been was first very
upset about the first Trump search and general pick and
was probably influential and getting her spiked. Then Trump picks
Casey Means, the sister of Callie Means and Emily and
(43:33):
I talked about her a good bit yesterday. She's really
a like MAHA influencer star. She's been on with Tucker,
She's been on with Joe Rogan. She runs some health
company herself, like Glucose monitoring company. She wrote a book
along with her brother, Callie Means, and so when she
got picked, I thought that Lumer and certainly the MAHA
(43:54):
people like Nicole Shanahan would be delighted, But I was wrong.
Some people were delighted. Nicole Shanahan, notably, was really really upset,
and Laura Lumer continued to you know, raise hell about
this pick as well, and despair truly over the UH
over the vetting team, not Trump. Of course, it's not
Trump's fault, but over the vetting team that is deserving Trump.
(44:15):
So in any case, Lord tweeted this, which I thought
was interesting. She said, I'm glad I initiated the Maha breakup.
Many of these grifters needed to be exposed for who
they are. And also I was amused by Richard Hanania
chiming and being like, here's another one, go after him
as well. In any case, give me your give me
your thoughts on Casey Means, on the Maha and Maga
tensions that are emerging, and Laura Lumer's role in all
(44:38):
of this stuff.
Speaker 5 (44:39):
Yeah, I mean, look, I love all the folks that
are into the crystals and the reiki and the the moon.
Speaker 2 (44:46):
And you have some background in this.
Speaker 5 (44:49):
Yes, in the nineties, I used to I used to
go to reiki sessions. Then I became like a reiki practitioner.
Speaker 6 (44:57):
Stuff.
Speaker 2 (44:57):
Of course you did the shock.
Speaker 6 (45:00):
This is important stuff.
Speaker 5 (45:02):
I don't I I don't think you want the Surgeon
general though.
Speaker 6 (45:07):
From that world.
Speaker 5 (45:10):
Like, I think it's fine if you know it's a
compliment to our system of Western medicine, because there are
there are a lot of things that Western medicine doesn't
understand about the body clearly, and there's a lot left
to be learned about it. But I think it's fine
(45:30):
that that it lives off in on your YouTube land
and in the basements and in churches and wherever where
you know you want to get you want to do reiki, great,
it's great, go do it.
Speaker 6 (45:43):
It's wonderful.
Speaker 5 (45:44):
But to but to make that person the surgeon general,
it's like, well, no, the Western medicine is also responsible
for enormous number of advances.
Speaker 2 (45:55):
Like when you're when your wife's got cancer, to go
to the specialist, to the occupuncture, the doctor.
Speaker 5 (46:01):
And you might go to the acupuncturist as well to right,
was some of the side effects true? But no, it's
it becomes dangerous when you you're throwing the Western medicine
out with the bathwater like this. Because look, Steve Jobs,
for instance, like you know, you know, thought he could
cure his own cancer with his with his spirit and smoothies,
(46:24):
and that's true and whatever, and what you know, the
way that he just try to approach it with his
spirit or his will or whatever. And he, as far
as I understand, like that was a cancer that he
should have beaten, you know, with treatment, but he didn't
and then he died.
Speaker 2 (46:40):
And there's a similar story with Kyle's dad actually, who
was going to a chiropractor who was telling him, oh,
I got you, you know, and he didn't he didn't
go to a regular doctor, so he didn't get a
cancer diagnosis until it was far too late, because the
chiropractor promised him that he would be able to heal
whatever ailed him.
Speaker 5 (46:57):
Right, And yes, then that's that's the real danger of that.
Like it as a as a compliment to your life
and to your you know, your spiritual pursuits great to
supplant to literally supplant medicine, Western medicine and have the
person as a certain general it's like.
Speaker 2 (47:15):
Uh, well here's here's the other thing, Ryan, is there's
another piece of this I want to talk to you about,
which is like the realignment from those types from the left.
I mean, this used to be very much the you know,
the Crystal people were very much within the firmitment of
the Democratic Party. And that realignment is interesting to be
which is how you know, Mariann and R. F. K.
(47:35):
Junior knew each other, ran the same circles and whatever.
Our K Junior of course is like the emblem of
that realignment, you know, the Woo woo realignment into the
Republican Party. But the thing that really drives me crazy
about our K Junior's ideology Casey means Callie means from
what I can tell is like number one, you know,
the position on the left is that ourns you have
(47:57):
access to medicine, not that there shouldn't be medical or
that we shouldn't trust, but it's that people should have
access to the advances of Western medicine. So that's number one.
Number two, they'll oftentimes talk accurately about the corruption of
the food industry, about the corruption of the medical industry,
of big pharma, et cetera, but then there's no effort
to actually root out the corruption. Instead, there's just a
(48:19):
redirection into alternative health profiteering, of which Casey and Gala
means both participate. You know, that's their livelihood, and that
stuff is wildly untested. I mean, there are much say
what you will about the FDA, the standards for actually
getting a drug approved much higher than there are no
sane standards for these you know, supplements and you know
(48:41):
things that you sell on the internet, and all these
influencers you go on say I take this, I take that.
They're getting paid and then they're selling it to you,
and there's no very little standards or testing with regard
to that. So that's the other piece of it and
the fact that there's no focus on Okay, you're right
that the profit motive at the center of healthcare is
is actually deadly because that creates mass incentives for guess
(49:05):
what's most profitable for people to be chronically sick, so
that you can continue to have to treat them and
treat them and treatment them over many years. There's no
effort to root that out through something like Medicare for
All system. Instead, it's just redirecting people into things that
are worse, less tested and at least as corrupt and.
Speaker 5 (49:25):
Right, the profiteering is outrageous that the entire reason we
have the FDA is in response to and I wrote
about this in my first book. What were they used
to be called patent medicines? Right, and like literally snake
oil snake like that's where we get the phrase snake oil.
Like people would come by and say, look, this oil
from a snake, you know, rub it here, and this
(49:47):
is going to be effect and oftentimes like it wouldn't
even be snake oil. It would be like not that
the snake oil would work, but they weren't even selling
you snake oil, which good because like you probably you know,
exterminate all the snakes if you had to do that.
Speaker 6 (50:00):
Uh.
Speaker 5 (50:00):
And so the FDA was brought in and and it
was the it was actually the first kind of assertion
of of federal government, you know, regulatory power, which is
why there's this alliance with corporate power linking up with
the MAHA people because they they they understand both historically
(50:21):
and intuitively that that the f d A is sort
of like the tip of the spear for this regulation
of of corporate profiting. And if they can they can
cut that, they can they can roll back, you know,
so they can roll back so much else. Uh and
so uh that's why that's how you wind up with
like a chemical chemical industry lobbyist being put into place
(50:43):
by the Trump administration to you know, over over oversee
you know what the MAHA people thought was going to
be an effort to like root out toxic chemicals.
Speaker 2 (50:54):
Right, And then how do you think, like, what do
you think of what are your reflections on the MAHA
movement into magaworld, some the tensions there and how that
comes about. I mean, I think the most obvious thing
is just to say that many of them were skeptics
of the COVID vaccine, or skeptics of the school closures,
the you know, the lockdown, those sorts of things. But
(51:15):
I also think in general, the right has just become
like the magnet for sort of all conspiracy theories, and so,
you know, there's just been and the Democratic Party has
become like the party of the experts, trust the science,
like that's that's you know, especially with the Democratic Party
becoming more heavily college educated, although there are also plenty
(51:39):
of MAHA people for sure, college educated, very highly educated, wealthy,
successful whatever. I mean, that was kind of the Hollywood
liberal type. But anyway, what do you what do you
make of that transition? Where do you think it comes from?
Speaker 5 (51:50):
My basic sense is that when when a lot of
these people gave up on the idea of collective change
and instead began to pursue kind of individual you know,
self improvement, self help, as the atomization of society and
(52:10):
of communities took hold, uh, they they moved right. And
the male version is you know, we see it all
the time, and the.
Speaker 2 (52:21):
Manager that the Bernie bros.
Speaker 5 (52:22):
Yeah, and also right, the Bernie bros. Who then now
the thing that they know or tell themselves that they're
going to focus on is you know, they're like you know,
taking you know, taking the right supplements, drinking the right powders,
you know, work you know, doing the right kind of workout,
the right amount of testosterone or whatever like that in.
Speaker 2 (52:40):
Set of medicare for all the collective project, it's all right, well,
let me just let me get fit, let me do
what I can do individually, and and.
Speaker 5 (52:49):
That's the that's the that's the male version of the
kind of woo woo you know, reiki maha stuff that
will you know, where you're just like, let let me
find my own individual spiritual practice that's gonna you know,
you know, get me out of this toxic culture or
make me detoxify it, detoxify myself as much as possible,
(53:11):
because you've you've given up the possibility of kind of
collective de liberation.
Speaker 2 (53:18):
Do you think there's a parallel to the Back to
the Land movement of the seventies, Yeah.
Speaker 5 (53:23):
Same same thing, same thing. Yeah, Like we're going to
make we're going to change the world in the sixties
and then you give it and you're like, wow, this
world is just didn't work, not only unchangeable.
Speaker 6 (53:32):
All our efforts backfired and so we're just going to
go live on a commune.
Speaker 2 (53:36):
We're just going to withdraw from society altogether, live on
a commune, and then the commune.
Speaker 5 (53:41):
Is going to fall apart, and then we're going to
go sell out and go to Wall Street or go
just do the thing that we were.
Speaker 6 (53:49):
Destined to do.
Speaker 2 (53:51):
I told you, I told you. I read this this
book about the Back to the Land movement and focused
on Vermont that Bernie Sanders randomly shows up in at
some commune and they have to make believe because he
won't stop like distracting everyone from their work and talking
about millionaires. Yeah, just tuber. I was like, oh my god.
He was at that time writing for some like you know,
socialist adjacent newspaper or something, and so he shows up
(54:12):
with the commune to like interview them and then just.
Speaker 6 (54:13):
Talking about eugen Shut up about Eugene Debs.
Speaker 2 (54:16):
Yeah, something like that. Yeah, something like that. Oh. Here,
Kyle's here, special guest, Special guest. Kyle Kalinsky in the house.
Speaker 9 (54:23):
Hey babe, literally in the house. I'm in the bedroom.
Speaker 2 (54:29):
We were just wrapping up talking about Casey Means and
then sort of digressed into thinking about the way that
there are parallels between this moment of men in particular
withdrawing from like being the birdie bro looking at the
collective solution into like let me you know, work out
and take whatever supplements and trust whatever influencers and whatever,
(54:50):
to the moment after the sixties and the seventies when
there's Okay, well we were going to change the world.
Now we're going to go back to the land and
we're going to like set up these communes and kind
of like do our own thing. And Ryan the other
thing that was interesting out of that book is that
I never realized how many food companies, like organic food
company type things that are big names now actually came
out of that vaccal land movement as well.
Speaker 6 (55:11):
Oh totally.
Speaker 5 (55:12):
That makes a lot of sense. And if we're right,
then over the next you know, five years, we may
see communes starting to pop up where this is kind
of like the Timpoles type of compound situation.
Speaker 2 (55:25):
Right or like the the trad wife and the what
do they call the people who there There is a
movement of this of people who are like you know,
moving out of cities, and this is all in the
right becoming getting them like farms going and trying to
be fully sustainable. There's a term for them completely oh.
Speaker 5 (55:44):
Sovereign sovereign citizens maybe, but yeah, they're like there's usually
right wingers, the sovereign citizens.
Speaker 6 (55:51):
It's going to be a right wing version.
Speaker 1 (55:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (55:53):
Well, and it goes with like the trad wife stuff
as well. You know, it's like we're withdrawing from society.
We're going to go back to these other ways we're
gonna in this. I mean there were vibes of this, yeah,
I mean there was vibes of this with the seventies
thing on the left to where it was like, okay,
these new modern ways of doing agriculture, we don't want
any of this mechanization. We're going to figure out how
to use like a horse and a cart to do
(56:15):
our truly, like we're going to make our own tools.
We're not going to have electricity. That was the pure
way to do it.
Speaker 9 (56:22):
So anyway, Yeah, whenever I think of how to become happy,
I go let me copy the Amish. That'll work out.
Speaker 2 (56:29):
Well, I don't know it might I have more I
have more sympathy to that, wen, you do, babe.
Speaker 9 (56:36):
We rely on so much stuff that we take for granted,
you know, like, whenever the power goes out and I
lose the TV, I'm always like, holy shit, the TV
is amazing. I wish I had that thing all the time.
So I have like the opposite philosophy of those people.
And the other thing is self self health help stuff
in general. Like I feel like the only times I've
(56:57):
been even somewhat interested in that in my life, they
were like the worst points of my life.
Speaker 2 (57:04):
So I feel like, yeah, well there's submit to that.
Speaker 9 (57:06):
Yeah, going down this path in general is a symptom
of an underlying misery or depression or being lost in
the same way that like hyper religiosity, you're being an
adult convert to a religion. That's a sign of like, hey, guys,
let me tell you I didn't kill myself last night.
I came up with this reason to not kill myself.
So it's a sign of a like decaying society.
Speaker 2 (57:26):
Yes, I think we'll all agree with that. All right, Ryan,
We'll let you go. I know you got a meeting,
you got a Junco.
Speaker 5 (57:31):
Thank you brother, all right, see you guys later, bye,
right bye?
Speaker 2 (57:34):
All right, guys. That concludes the Free Show. If you
want to see what Kyle has to say about Biden's
re emergence on the view. There's a lot to say
about that one, about Judge Jennine being put in instead
of Ed Martin as US attorney for DC, and all
kinds of other good things. Also, we're going to answer
a few of premium subscribers questions. Make sure to subscribe
over at Breakingpoints dot com. Thank you, guys so much
(57:56):
for your support. Have a great weekend.
Speaker 3 (58:00):
Yeah,
Welcome to Breaking Points at Chrystal.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
Good morning, Good morning Emily. Lovely to see you, and
lovely to see our guest right right.
Speaker 3 (00:07):
We are joined now by Damian Thompson. He is an
editor at The Spectator. He hosts the Holy Smoke podcast
over there.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
And Damian, we may see.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
Our co host Ryan Graham pop up at some point
while we're chatting with you.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
In fact timing here he is.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
But Damian, I first want to say you are in
Rome right now. You have been covering the events of
the last twenty four hours.
Speaker 1 (00:30):
The first American pope has been chosen.
Speaker 3 (00:33):
So first, Damien, thank you so much for being here,
and if you could just give us your initial reaction.
This was a surprising pickstep Ban and I think last
week described him as the quote dark horse, a potential
dark horse candidate, and that's actually what happened.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
So you're the expert here, Damien, what do you make
of all this?
Speaker 4 (00:51):
Well, I think the first thing we want to say is
that there's a mood of real optimism in Rome today.
People who had dismissed Cardinal Prevost's Francis Mark too some
sort of hopeless scheming liberal have been very pleasantly surprised,
(01:12):
first of all by the sight of him coming on
to the loader of Saint Peter's wearing the traditional robes
that France has rejected. Secondly by the choice of name Leo,
which is a very traditional one, by his style, and
on checking his record, they discover that he isn't perhaps
as liberal as they thought. That he seems to have
(01:33):
relatively orthodox views on the sensitive issues of sexuality that
have proved to be so divisive in the Catholic Church.
And there are also rumors that he's sympathetic to the
traditional Latin mats. So all of that is causing traditionalists
who initially reacted with dismay when they heard the name,
(01:56):
to shame hinge their verdicts fairly quickly, and you can
see it happening on Twitter. They like the way he's
presented himself, They like the thoughtful theological message. They particularly
liked his very christ centered homily in the Sistine Chapel
(02:18):
to the gardens this morning. So I think, above all
is just a sense of relief that the bizarre, quixotic
and often I think personally cruel pontificate of Francis has
come to an end. There will not be a Francis
the second. As I've written many times, Francis was involved
(02:39):
in so many horrible abuse cover ups that I think
his legacies profoundly tainted.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
So one of the things, of course that people immediately
noticed is a prevost social media profile being the modern era,
and several of his recent tweets, actually, all of his
recent tweets seem to be quite critical of the Trump
and menministruation. This one in particular, he chimes in here
and says JD Vance is wrong. Jesus doesn't ask us
(03:06):
to rank our love for others. So that led to that,
among other things, led to Republicans like Laura Lumer calling
him a woke Marxist pope and really despairing about his
liberal inclinations. What do you make about his political commentary
with regard to Jade Vance and also the meeting with
(03:27):
President Trump and the Kelly in the White House.
Speaker 4 (03:30):
Well, he's not a big fan of MAGA, that's for sure.
But there's a big difference between a woke Marxist and
somebody who doesn't approve of the second Trump administration. And
there are plenty of woke Marxists in the Catholic Church,
but there's no evidence that Pope Leo is one of them.
(03:51):
He is probably left leaning on the subjects of migration.
And you know, it's always it's always puzzled me that
the Catholic Church is so keen on advocating mass migration
without any thought about its longtime social consequences. On the
other hand, and perhaps you guys can help clear up
(04:12):
this mystery for me. What's his business about him not
being a registered Republican because I understand that the state
of Illinois doesn't doesn't have doesn't have registration in that way,
but having voted in a series of Republican primaries, could
somebody clear.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
That up for me?
Speaker 3 (04:28):
Yes, you know, I think that might be. Charlie Kirk
pulled his voting history. Charlie Kirk also is from the
Chicago area. Pulled his voting history, and it might be
the case that he's sort of from the never Trump
school of the conservative movement here in the United States.
He's a Chicago guy. It's very interesting, Damien. I guess
(04:48):
we'll see. And you know, it's always difficult to map
go ahead ahead.
Speaker 4 (04:52):
We know that he's pro life, and it's very very
hard for an orthodox pro life Catholic and the new
pope certainly the dogs on the subical abortion to support
the Democrats, who you know, who are incredibly dogmatic in
their support for abortion, including late time abortions. So you know,
I would have been very surprised, for example, if the
(05:16):
new Popa supported Kamala Harris support either of them.
Speaker 5 (05:22):
What do we know about his his time in Peru
relative to child sex abuse cover ups, That's an open question,
Like I don't know. I've just seen some some talk
about that.
Speaker 4 (05:34):
This was why my job taper. When I heard Robert Francis,
I immediately knew who it was because I had just
been reading some very detailed coverage and the influential Catholic
investigative publication of The Pillar, which is very highly respected,
(05:54):
about allegations that Cardinal pre asked when Bishop of Chicayo
in Peru brushed aside complaints by women that they've been
abused by priests, and he was also accused of he
also accused of them watering down the severity of their accusations.
(06:15):
And therefore, you know, before the conclave, abuse survivors organizations
were worked drawing attention to what they claimed was his
bad record on this, and there's also a case dating
back to two thousand in which, as an Augustinian prior
or whatever he was in Chicago, he was accused of
(06:38):
allowing a pedophile priest to live and operate near a school.
And as I understand it, the new Pope has merely
invoked some sort of formal excuse for the Chicago for
the Chicago excuse me if I get the peruan complaints
(07:00):
by these women, and offered no explanation for what happened
in Chicago. So that is being followed up, as it
was followed up in the Daily Mail today, and.
Speaker 6 (07:10):
It won't go away.
Speaker 4 (07:11):
But I think I would make a distinction, and it's
a very these things have to be taken incredibly seriously,
but I wouldn't make a distinction between failure to deal
adequately with abuse allegations, which is terrible but of which
vast unders of bishops have been guilty, and the sort
(07:31):
of grossly negligent and culpable covering up of in some
cases convicted abuses that Pote Francis indulged, in which I think,
you know, I regard his Pontifica's a disgrace for that
reason alone. And the failure of the press to follow
that up. So it would be a little bit stranger
(07:53):
if the press concentrated so much attention on following up
this absolutely legitimate story and ignoring the fact that the
late pope has a record which you know, had he
been ahead of state anywhere in the wet western world,
would have forced him to resign years before he died.
Speaker 2 (08:14):
Damien, what do you make of the politics of choosing
an American pope? What is the significance of that? And
you know, do you have any have you heard any
rumors about some of the internal politics about how he
was chosen From an ideological perspective as well.
Speaker 4 (08:30):
Well, I'm not so sure that the cardinals thought of
him as an American pope, because this is a guy
who has spent nearly his entire career, certainly his entire
episcopal career in Latin America, and before that he was
a missionary in Latin America. So I suspect that it
(08:53):
was the Latin American voting bloc, which might perhaps otherwise
have gone to Cardinal Tagle, the married him over the
two thirds majority, So I'm not so sure. I mean,
obviously people are aware that he was born and brought
up in America, but he is, you know, he has
a you know, mixed ancestry and had spent so much
(09:15):
of his adult life in Latin America that I think
it was a Latin American block really backed him. But
that's conjecture.
Speaker 5 (09:24):
I saw something about the name Leo potentially signaling some
type of reference to Leo the thirteenth, labor and cyclical.
I'm deeply out of my depth when it comes to
this stuff, but I I understand there was.
Speaker 4 (09:40):
Some much O the other I think was doctrinally orthodox
and in some ways the founder of modern Catholic social teaching.
The choice of the name Leo if it refers to
the thirteenth and many other great pope cooed Lear, including
(10:01):
some not so great poets cord Leer. But if it
is a reference to theater the thirteenth, then that might
indicate some sort of balance between doctrinal orthodoxy. And it
does seem to be doctrinal orthodox, more so than Francis's
bizarre and haphazard mixture of impenetrable spirituality, I think, and
(10:26):
a very pronounced social conscience, one that has, whether you
agree with him or not, already let him into conflict
with the Trump administration. But I think President Trump is
actually very keen to in as far as he possibly can,
have good relations with the Catholic Church. So I think
(10:47):
Trump will will take inside, but he won the won't
be the same sort of insults and sniping and you know,
goading that France is directed at Trump. If Pope Leo
wants to criticize the Trump administration, he will do so
in an honest, straightforward and civil manner.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
Damian. One thing that people like myself, I'm not a Catholic,
but people who are on the left who appreciated Pope
Francis really respected was his commitment to and focusing on
an anti war message, and especially vis A VI the
atrocities committed in Gaza. I wonder if you have any
insight into Popolio's perspective on that conflict.
Speaker 4 (11:27):
I want to ask you something. You're talking about respecting
a man who protected a serial rapist of nuns. How
does he earn your respect? I'm not having a get
you Crystal passy because I've foun of yours, but really,
a man who doesn't that, I mean, really doesn't that
overshadow everything? So many abuse victims had their stories ignored,
(11:54):
and that the abusers upheld and detected by this man. Francis,
how can any anyone Well.
Speaker 5 (12:05):
I mean, I'll answer that I think that people who
are not intimately involved with are familiar with the Catholic
Church and don't know the details of it, assume that
pretty much everybody, and you know, the leadership there is
involved and to some degree with covering up the media.
Speaker 4 (12:22):
That's a growth favure of the media.
Speaker 6 (12:26):
Covered up.
Speaker 5 (12:26):
I think maybe Greesel knows the most recent numbers, something
like thirteen thousand children have been killed by Israel, and
so anybody who speaks out against that is going to
get a hearing from people who are opposed to that.
Speaker 4 (12:41):
It's a pope to abuse his abuse his personal authority
to protect a Jesuit ex jesuit accused of abusing and raping,
you know, twenty young women, including religious sisters in order
which is basically sex cult and for him to enjoy
(13:03):
the personal protection of the pope who kept his bile
artwork on the door of his on the wall of
his apartment till the day he does this.
Speaker 1 (13:11):
Is this is repnic that we're talking about.
Speaker 4 (13:14):
Exactly this Damien story, but there was a there was
a corrupt that compressed call who kept the story out
of the headlines.
Speaker 5 (13:21):
Yeah, I to explain why, I think, yeah, why why
people like us don't think that there's a whole lot
of difference in in the choice, like, Okay, whoever you're
going to get is going to be protected by this.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
But Damien, I do want to get back this point.
Speaker 4 (13:36):
There's a huge difference. Both are appalling, but there's a
difference between cover ups and the sort of very very
active protection of convicted abuses that France has indulged in, which.
Speaker 2 (13:50):
Is Damien fair fair enough? I hear your point. I
hear your point, and I confess to being, you know,
ignorant on many of the specifics about who covered up
and what their level of culpability was. But I do
want to know if you have any perspective on what
how Pope Leo may orient himself vis a v war
and peace, and specifically with regard to Israel's atrocity in Gaza.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
And also Ukraine. I think there's a question of that
as well.
Speaker 4 (14:18):
I just don't know at this stage. By my assumption
is that he'll want to be a peacemaker my assumption
is that he would condemn some of Israel's actions as
(14:40):
well as of course condemning the appalling slaughter of Israelis
by Hamas. I wouldn't expect him to align very clearly
with either side. I would be surpris ris if he
(15:01):
was as indulgent of Russia as Possis seems to have
been on occasion, but that's speculation.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
So dam.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
My last question, just to actually kind of wrap all
of this up, is I've relied a lot on your
reporting over the course of the last papacy, and I
know that Leo uh is an ally of Francis, and
I'm genuinely curious if everything that you just explained that
has really been a failure of the media to cover
deeply and to focus on and to you know, put
(15:42):
front and center of the discourse about what was happening
in Vatican City. Does the new pope have any complicity
in the in Francis's regime of covering things up and
silencing and indulging particular guilty parties.
Speaker 4 (15:56):
It's it's a really good question because in US, I mean,
he was a very senior member of the Curia in
a sense, every cardinal who failed to speak up about
what they knew was happening, which was that the pope
was covering up for convicted as well as credibly accused
vile sex abuses. Really has some explaining to do, and Poplio,
(16:20):
like the cardinals who elect him, not only has some
explaining to do, I would say, on that count, but
has to do something about it. And what everybody's been
saying to me in ren a few years is as
soon as Francis dies, it will all come out. I
hope it does. And when it does come out, the
level of complicity of Francis in covering up sex crimes
(16:42):
all over the world, if that really does come out,
then that will be a huge diplomatic problem for the
new pope, But at least it will be confronted, which
it desperately needs to be, because the fact that the
general public doesn't know the extent of the pravity is
shocking in itself.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
Damien.
Speaker 3 (17:05):
We are all non Catholics here and so we really
appreciate you coming on, especially someone so well sourced, literally
in Rome right now, to help us understand.
Speaker 6 (17:16):
A great pleasure.
Speaker 4 (17:17):
Let me just emphasize the mood here is upbeat.
Speaker 1 (17:21):
Thank you, Damian. We really appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (17:23):
Thanks a lot, all right, So interesting perspective from the
right there. I you know, I have listen, I have
no idea what the reality of how Pope Leo is
going to position himself. But you know, I will say
the reaction I've seen has been quite different. You know,
the left very encouraged by even the choice as Ryan
(17:47):
was getting at of Leo as the name. Certainly the
sniping at jd Vance, the upset from much of the right,
including the Laura Lumers of the world. So you know,
a lot to be seen about how he positions himself.
But also to your point, Emily, I mean he he
was someone who was close to Pope Francis and had
been put in this position of selecting many of the
(18:08):
cardinals and bishops, which also may have put him sort
of in the pole position to achieve this position, you know,
not knowing anything about the politics involved here, But what
do you make of this, Emily? Before we let you go,
because I know you've got things to do today too.
Speaker 3 (18:21):
Well, flight to catch, so hopefully the real idea doesn't
mess that up. But yeah, my Catholic friends are I mean,
I would put it this way, I think One of
the things that Damian said is really interesting that the
initial reaction was pretty uncomfortable. As soon as you know,
people started scrolling through his twitter feed, Popolio's twitter feed.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
And it's extremely political.
Speaker 3 (18:41):
It was as though the only times he was tweeting
or retweeting was to make political statements.
Speaker 1 (18:46):
Now that's not exactly accurate, but.
Speaker 3 (18:48):
It accounts for probably fifty to sixty percent of the
tweets over the last several years on his speed, which
means that he has a well of frustration with MAGA
as an American and with the Trump administration, with jd Vance,
who is a Catholic convert. One of Francis's I think
points at tension with jd Vance and others is that
there's this wing of Catholic converts, particularly in the United States,
(19:09):
who do like the Latin Mass and that's what Damien
was alluding to, and they see that as kind of
a proxy for this anger at the modernization attempts in
the Vatican.
Speaker 1 (19:18):
And so all this is to say, I.
Speaker 2 (19:21):
Thinically about Latin Mass sort of codes right wing correct. Yeah,
this is like the jd Vance like version of Catholicism.
Speaker 3 (19:30):
Yeah, like tradcasts and I don't know if Jad does
Latin Mass, but it's sort of seen as like a
proxy for that. But Leo comes from that sort of strain,
the Francis type of strain of the church. And so
I think what Damian pointed out was interesting that over
the last twenty four hours some of the people who
were hoping for a more conservative choice have come to
reconsider whether Leo might have things that they really like,
(19:53):
and they're now failing quote unquote upbeat.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
We'll see.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
But my last big thought on this is just I
think think my Catholic friends might not like me saying this,
but there's a desperation for a breath of fresh air
because Francis is mismanaged things. Whether you're liberal or conservative,
the guy mismanaged things, He was complicit in cover ups.
It is such an intense character that I think there's
a some of my conservative friends who get really frustrated
(20:18):
with mapping contemporary American politics onto the Vatican left right.
Speaker 1 (20:22):
It doesn't work perfectly, that's absolutely true.
Speaker 3 (20:25):
At the same time, this guy with posting seemingly only
to make a point against the American right over and
over again. So I get that it's complicated, but I
think he's probably closer to Francis than some of my
conservative Catholic friends probably will uh, they'll probably find this
out in ways that are unpleasant to come.
Speaker 2 (20:45):
Yeah, so there's some there's some coping, coping going on potentially.
Speaker 5 (20:49):
Here if you're a psile cope. We got everybody got
Francis wrong. Like the first day or two after when
Francis was named, everybody thought he was kind of a concervative.
Speaker 2 (21:01):
Oh really, I don't remember that.
Speaker 1 (21:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (21:03):
There was like a twenty four hour period where the
right was celebrating and the left was freaking out, and
then he went around like you know, kissing people's feet
and people are like, oh wow.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
Yeahs was like really really really anti abortion.
Speaker 2 (21:18):
I mean any isn't any pope gonna be anti abortion?
Speaker 1 (21:22):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (21:22):
For him, it was like he had you know that
everyone has sort of like a suite of issues under
their priorities, and that was definitely one of his. So
that's what the rights were reacted to immediately when it
came to got Yah.
Speaker 6 (21:31):
So they got that wrong.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
Yeah all right, So I guess we'll see anyway, Emily,
I'll let you go for the day. Great to see us.
Always have a great weekend. We'll see you next week.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
Thanks guys.
Speaker 2 (21:41):
See ye, Ran, how are you this morning?
Speaker 6 (21:44):
Wonderful? How about yourself?
Speaker 1 (21:46):
Good?
Speaker 2 (21:46):
Thank you for standing up for my honor with Damien
Like well, you know, yes, this is obviously the sexual
abuse scandal is an incredibly important one, but also you
know there there are issues that we could discuss here
as well. So in any case, speaking of other issues discussed,
there's a ton that I want to get to in
the show. And also, by the way, guys, Ryan's going
(22:08):
to have to jump about ten o'clock. We have a
special guest, very special guest who has a long commute
from two rooms away in order to join us this
morning for the premium portion of the show. And we've
got lots of stuff to get into with regard to trade,
and I definitely want to get Ryan's take before he
goes on the Abundance Caucus newly formed, and if we
(22:30):
have time, get a little bit of your your thoughts
on casey means she may be right up your alley, Ryan,
I don't know you have.
Speaker 6 (22:36):
Yeah, shrooms and crystals?
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Yeah, man, talking to trees, it might be your gal?
Speaker 6 (22:42):
Is she talking to trees?
Speaker 5 (22:43):
Is just listening to them, because if you're listening to
trees and hearing from them, I'm with that. If you're
talking to them, that's too.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
Far, that's too fa Okay, all right, we'll investigate. We'll
investigate first. I want to let me see what I
got here first. I want to get into this strade stuff.
And in particular, there's some news this morning. I don't
know if you've seen this yet, I'm sure you probably have,
but Trump posted that he thinks that an eighty percent
tariff on China seems right up to Scott b being
(23:12):
Scott Bessett. So basically china strategy of do nothing and
win seems to be working out. Ryan.
Speaker 5 (23:18):
Yeah, and markets jumped on that on the UK trade
deal yesterday because it was it was kind of a
nothing burger of a deal.
Speaker 6 (23:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (23:29):
Basically, apparently the UK makes cars and they're going to
be allowed to sell like one hundred thousand cars into
the US that are reduced tariff rate, and in exchange,
they will reduce their digital tax that they were hitting
our big tech companies with, and there's some tariff reciprocity.
Basically a free trade steal zone that we're creating with
the UK, and we're still going to then hit other
(23:51):
steal with the twenty five percent tariff, and because it
wasn't really much to it, and Trump sold it as
this like historic, you know deal with our you know,
our best friends across the pond. That sent a signal
to the markets that he's looking for face saving ways
out of this trade war. And so the hope then
(24:14):
from the markets is Okay, he understands he's lost, and
he's gonna wind this down. And so I think that's
why the markets popped. I think the markets might be
a little wrong, like which probably you know, dial up
Jeff Stein again see what he thinks. But I think
he might be more committed to continuing this until he
gets a real punch in the face that he doesn't
(24:36):
recover from him quickly. But so that that's that's where
we are. And then you know, the China knocking TIFFs
on China down to eighty percent is also silly, because
you know, anything above a pretty trivial percentage is a
is a is a meaningful tariff. So the difference between
(25:01):
eighty and one hundred and forty five isn't isn't that significant?
Because in either case, most importers. Most businesses that rely
on Chinese imports are out of business, So whether you're
out of business at eighty percent or out of business
at one hundred and forty five percent doesn't really matter
to the company that goes bankrupt me in that direction.
Speaker 2 (25:22):
Let me show you this, which is kind of shocking.
So China apparently reported bumper April exports ahead of crucial
trade talks with the US. China's experts actual exports actually
grew sharply in April, despite Trump's Liberation Day terrafts on
shipments to the US, strengthening Beijing's hand ahead of crucial
trade negotiations due to start this weekend. Strong performance came
(25:44):
as Chinese companies diverted trade flows to South East Asia,
Europe and other destinations following the imposition of prohibitively high
tit for tat tariffs between the world's two largest economies.
Exports rows eight point one percent in dollar terms compared
with a year earlier, China's and said on Friday, beating
analyst forecast in a poll by Reuters of one point
nine percent growth, but slowing from twelve percent growth in March,
(26:07):
when figures were buoyed by export is seeking to get
ahead of expected tariffs by front loading shipments to the US.
So in spite of a dramatic reduction in trade with US,
in fact, China's exports grew post Liberation Day and grew
sharply year over year because we are not the entire world.
(26:29):
And it turns out that they had other options available
to them, especially as we did everything we could to
you piss off all of the countries around the entire world,
contrary to the proposal. I think Scott Bessen and laid
down of Hey, we're going to have this encirclement strategy
and we're going to try to isolate China, and then
they go about it by basically pissing off everyone that
(26:49):
they possibly.
Speaker 5 (26:50):
Can, right, And I think one thing that is underestimated
is the role of kind of inertia in global affairs.
Like China has been selling stuff to us because that's
because that's what they do. Like the relationships are set up,
the contracts are in place, it's it's smooth, it works,
(27:11):
We've got to figure it out. And that doesn't mean
that they didn't have other options where they could sell stuff.
And we kind of took that to mean that we
were the only buyer in the world, you know, for
these products. And what China is showing here is that
actually if they do the if they do, if they're
(27:32):
forced to do the work to find other buyers, Southeast
Asia and Europe, you know, do have some consumers who
are you know, willing to buy the twenty eight dollars.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
That that we're not allowed to do anywhere, that we're
not going to have anymore. This is kind of contrary
to what you were saying about the UK trade deal.
So let me get your reaction to this. Charles Gasparino says,
now you know why Powell didn't cut rates after the
UK deal. If the ten percent tariff is in the
UK deal, not sure how we escape some economic repercussions
(28:03):
i e. Inflation in the short term at the very least,
since UK is a friend where we sell more stuff
to than we import i e. Ten percent on the
UK means much higher on countries we have deficits with.
That's the tariff investment calculation you're hearing on Wall Street
right now. So basically, like you said, the UK deal,
I mean, first of all, we should be clear it's
not even actually a deal yet. It's like you know,
concepts of a play on kind of a deal, but
(28:25):
it leaves in place most of the ten percent tariff,
which is what it was already at.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
Now.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
There were other provisions involved, as you laid out some
of them previously, but basically what Gasparino is saying is like, Okay,
well ten percent is the baseline, that's the best deal
you're going to be able to get. Then that indicates
some significant inflationary pressures on countries around the world.
Speaker 5 (28:47):
Again, so it's it's like irrationality layered on top of irrationality,
and it's this weird game theory where everybody is trying
to figure out what irrational thing and and unpredictable thing
is going to happen and trying to predict that. So
in this case, what I think is going on is
that the mark and the markets only ended up up
(29:10):
like eighty or something. They were up significantly throughout the
day and then came down. I think what they took
from it is that, Okay, he's not really going to
keep that ten percent on them, like he's saying that
for now, but he reached a deal, and the point
of the deal is that the tariffs are going to
come down, and so you know, once once they start
to bite a little bit and have real world consequences,
(29:31):
because we've gotten the deal, he's going to use the
deal to quietly just get rid of those. Now, they
could be totally wrong about that, and this is why
I'm saying it's irrationality layered over irrationality. But I think
that's what they're I think that's the assumption there because
Gasprino's right that, like, if that ten percent is solid,
then yeah, that signals everyone's going to get at least
(29:54):
ten and other people are going to get higher. But
what about Trump's approach to any of this suggests that
any of this is.
Speaker 2 (30:01):
Solid, that anything is solid.
Speaker 5 (30:02):
Yeah, So that's why I think that's what I think
is going on it that they assume that this is
all soft.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
I want to get your reaction to Jadie Vance got
asked about the number of dolls that anyone will be
permitted to have here. So let me go ahead and
pull this up because his answer was interesting, let me
go ahead and get your reaction to those.
Speaker 7 (30:22):
Right, So the President said, you know, maybe American kids
should have three dollars instead of thirty or whatever the
number was.
Speaker 1 (30:30):
Do you agree.
Speaker 7 (30:32):
Do you tell the people of this country that you
need to make some sacrifices in order to reorganize this
bad trade relationship?
Speaker 8 (30:41):
Well, I think the President's point here is that, yeah,
we do need to become more self reliant, and that's
not going to happen overnight, and it's not.
Speaker 6 (30:48):
Always going to be easy. Mark.
Speaker 8 (30:49):
But what I'd ask people is not whether they want
two dollars or five dollars or twenty dollars for their kids.
I'd ask American moms and dads, would you like to
be able to go into a pharmacy and know that
the drugs your.
Speaker 6 (31:00):
Kids need are actually available to you?
Speaker 8 (31:03):
As an American parent, would you like to God forbid,
if your country goes to a war and your son
or daughter is son off to fight, would you like
to know that the weapons that they have are good
American made stuff, not made by a foreign adversary. What
President Trump is talking about is bringing self reliance back
to the United States economy.
Speaker 2 (31:22):
We have a what do you think of that explanation here?
Speaker 5 (31:26):
You know, I I I wish that it didn't feel
like this stuff was reverse engineered, you know what and
by what? And what I mean by that is, Trump
seems to now understand that, oh, the shelves are going
to be empty. Now I have to come up with
a rationale for why I support, why the shelves being
(31:47):
empty is actually a good thing. Right when when you
if you actually start from the principle that we consume
too much junk, it's it's it's spiritually degrading, it's it's
bad for the environment, it doesn't make us feel better
about ourselves. Uh, it's it's empty.
Speaker 6 (32:07):
Uh.
Speaker 5 (32:07):
Then and then you flow from there and and try
to bring the whole country together around that idea that's
still to me, that's delightful and a replace the spiritual
regeneration of the of an entire public wonderful, agreed.
Speaker 2 (32:23):
And And but there has to be not just you're
not going to have dolls, but there has to be
a replacement for that consumerist ideology that we've been sold
for decades and decades.
Speaker 5 (32:32):
Right, which which we don't have. Like consumerism is a
thing that stitches us together. Yeah, and you you pull
that apart without replacing it with anything, you know, God
save us, you know, so it could so, But if
you know the process of getting to that, the process
(32:54):
of working it through. If we did it collectively, you know,
could result in you know, less you know, lower levels
of unhappiness, less plastic in our bloodstream. Like all of
these things would be would be good. Like I mean,
you you've got young kids, like it should be a
crime like that every single uh kid's birthday party they
(33:19):
have to give you a giant bag of plastic when
you walk out that the kids play play with for
thirty seconds in the car on the way home and
then don't then then don't touch again. And it's it's,
it's it's it's genuinely awful, Like that's horrible.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
Stuff to me that the deeper worry and I suspect
you share this is actually about social media and specifically
with regard to AI. And you know, this administration is
running a million miles an hour to wild West AI.
We're just going to take off all the breaks we've
got to win the AI race. We're just going to
unleash this potentially extraordinarily destructive force on society with it's
(34:00):
not even contemplating what the impacts will be without planning
for them, without creating any sort of a safety net.
If there's mass job replacement, I'm sure you read the uh,
what was it? A New York magazine piece about everybody
cheating on their college tests, and like, you know that
particular like narrow problem you could figure out. Okay, well
now you just have to write us days in class
(34:20):
instead of you can't.
Speaker 5 (34:21):
You know, there's we're taking out your phone father trying
to figure that out though.
Speaker 2 (34:24):
Yeah, but to me it speaks correct. But also to
me it speaks to you know, the same way that
I use this example with Emily Estra that GPS made
us like unable to navigate, like that part of our
brain just atrophied completely.
Speaker 6 (34:38):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (34:38):
AI is going to do that for basically everything. Yeah,
and if we were a functioning society, we would be
dealing with that, right, We would be figuring about it,
we would be planning for it, we would be braining
it in. And so you know, that's just an example
of how contrary to the idea that there's some plan
(34:59):
here for the Trump administration to remake the social contract
in a way that is going to be healthier and
more fulfilling. And you know, spiritually regenitaive regenerative, I think
is the word that you use. It's the exact opposite
we're running a million miles in the other direction and
not even looking to consider where we might be headed, and.
Speaker 6 (35:20):
Doubling our energy usage in order to do it.
Speaker 2 (35:23):
Yes, Yeah, No. Naomi Klein talks about how this is
like a vampiric technology because it eats up the resources
that you actually need for not just humanity, but for creation.
Speaker 6 (35:34):
Your part.
Speaker 2 (35:36):
That's right in order to create this mirror world. And
it's it's endlessly disturbing to me, and you know, I
don't know what to do about it other than to
complain and worry. The last economic piece that I wanted
to I actually really want you to make I want
to make sure I'm thinking about this the right way,
because the media has been saying, oh, Trump wants to
(35:56):
lift taxes on the rich. He's he called Mike Johnson,
he told him he wants to hike the top tax rate.
But as I was reading the details here, it's not
exactly as it's being portrayed. So the change here would
roll back one of the tax cuts that Trump signed
into law in twenty seventeen, as the Tax Cuts and
Jobs AC That measure reduced the rate on income earned
(36:18):
in the top bracket to thirty seven percent from thirty
nine point six percent this year. The top income bracket
starts at roughly six hundred thousand dollars for an individual
of aster. Trump is effectively seeking to restore the previous
top rate, but at a much higher income level. So
just so people know, if nothing happens the Tax Cut
and Jobs Act, those tax breaks expire and taxes go
(36:40):
up on everybody, but especially because they got the biggest
cuts on the rich. So what we're talking about here,
what Trump is proposing, is still giving a tax break
to the rich, but not as much, quite as much
of one as he had previously given. Am I understanding
this correctly?
Speaker 6 (36:55):
That's right, except for some.
Speaker 5 (37:00):
You could imagine a rich person who makes twenty million
dollars a year, which is you know that there are
I think there's in the hundreds or maybe the thousands
at the most of people in the United States who
make that amount of money. People can look it up.
It's that that number is available. Those people would pay
a little bit more because everything above a certain threshold,
(37:21):
they're you know, they're jumping from whatever it was, you know,
thirty six something to like thirty nine, And so that
those couple points would then hit everything above that level.
But that's a tiny number of people. So if you're
a typical.
Speaker 2 (37:36):
But if you don't, if you don't renew the Task
Cuts and Jobs Act, which is the whole four trillion
dollars that they're trying to do, Yeah, then taxes are
going to go up on the far more.
Speaker 5 (37:45):
It's a huge it's a huge cut relative to not
doing anything.
Speaker 6 (37:49):
Absolutely.
Speaker 2 (37:50):
Yeah. So it's still a cut.
Speaker 6 (37:51):
Even on the right, as much of.
Speaker 2 (37:53):
A cut as what he had originally planned.
Speaker 5 (37:56):
Yes, still giving a big cut to the very rich,
but a little bit less than he gave to them.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
Yes, Okay, all right, all right, let me get your
take on this Abundance Caucus, because you've been, you've been,
you had some interesting insights on this. So you have
some Democrats now who are starting an abundance Caucus, in
abundance inspired caucus in particular, what is this guy's name,
Josh Harder from California, says House Democrats are getting asra
(38:27):
cline pilled. Bipartisan group of lawmakers led by Josh Harder
as launching a new roughly thirty member block claiming inspiration
from abundance movement championed by the liberal commentator client. I
guess my question is like is this really necessary because
I feel like we have ideological groups that are already
pretty abundance pilled.
Speaker 5 (38:47):
Well, I mean, got to seize the Abundance Caucus, and
you know, maybe they hope that they'll be able to
get Ezra to come speak to their caucus, like he's
you know, he spoke to the Senate retreat recently. This guy, uh,
I forget who was it, Serota?
Speaker 6 (39:04):
Maybe that flagged it.
Speaker 5 (39:05):
The funniest thing that like one of Harder's you know,
chief accomplishments was blocking this water project.
Speaker 2 (39:11):
I think it was Stolar.
Speaker 6 (39:13):
Was that Solar?
Speaker 5 (39:13):
Yes, yeah, just which is just hilarious because that's like
the whole like to the extent that abundance.
Speaker 6 (39:21):
You know, has a villain.
Speaker 5 (39:22):
It's like, you know, environmentalists who are standing in the
way of these types of infrastructure projects, and here he
was blocking one of these water projects on environmental grounds.
Speaker 2 (39:35):
I have it here, Congressman behind the Abundance Caucus, Josh
Harder has as a signature accomplishment stopping a water project
from getting a permit.
Speaker 5 (39:42):
There you go, So, yeah, the the we'll see who
winds up And this is this is what I said yesterday, like,
we'll see who winds up joining this caucus. But here
here's a prediction, and you can map this prediction then
against the analysis of whether this abundance is you know,
seriously aimed at, you know, lifting everybody up, or is
(40:04):
actually just kind of rebranded neoliberalism. My suspicion is that
the Abundance Caucus will eventually be populated almost exclusively by
people who are also in what's known as the New
Democrat Coalition New Democrat Governference. New Democrats were created by
the DLC, the Democratic Leadership Council, which itself was created
(40:27):
in the nineteen eighties as a as the vehicle for
the faction that said, we need deregulation, we need lower taxes,
we need we need to end big government. We need
to get Democrats away from civil rights, environmentalism, feminism, big unions,
big government, you know, tax and spend liberalism. We need
(40:47):
to be the kind of we need to basically do
Reaganomics light and they were.
Speaker 6 (40:53):
That was the DLC. There was a New Democrats.
Speaker 5 (40:55):
So I think all I think everybody who joins this
Abundance Caucus is probably going to be New Democrats.
Speaker 6 (41:01):
And if I'm wrong about that.
Speaker 5 (41:03):
Then uh, then maybe I'm wrong about my whole analysis
of abundance. But you know, let's check back in in
a couple of weeks and see who harder has been
able to recruit into this caucus. Now, you're definitely gonna
have some There are some progressive people in the Progressive
Caucus who are also in the New Democrats. And there
are which is a lot of embarrass caucus. Are are really,
(41:26):
you know, underneath that kind of neoliberal you know, you know,
Clinton type Democrats who have who have you know, progressive
social values And I think you'll you'll find those kinds
of people too, will be really intrigued by the the
the abundance framing because it's nice. Who's against abundance?
Speaker 2 (41:44):
Yeah, I mean I feel like yeah. But so Bill
Clinton is you know, his his framing is the DLC
and it's neoliberals. It's really the Democratic Party sort of
embracing the Ronald Reagan era framing, and Jimmy Carter, to
be fair, initially, is the one who starts to move
Democrats away from the New Deal and into the neoliberal era.
Bill Clinton really cements that. I sort of feel like
(42:06):
Barack Obama is almost like another rebranding. That's like a
different rebranding of neoliberalism and now and that was coming
out of the wilderness of George W.
Speaker 1 (42:15):
Bush.
Speaker 2 (42:16):
And you know, how could we have lost to this guy?
Oh my god. Okay, here we go another rebranding neoliberalism.
And then it seems like Abundance is the attempt again
to rebrand neoliberalism as something new and fresh and different
out of the wake of the you know, devastating loss
for Democrats to Donald Trump.
Speaker 5 (42:33):
Right, and the Affordable Care Act, Obama's signature achievement, you know,
was all about using the market and doing a you know,
doing healthcare reform without you know, not not even without
adding to the deficit, but reducing the deficit. And yes,
very very Clintonian.
Speaker 2 (42:51):
Well it brought a bunch of Clinton people into his administration.
So I mean, the you know, the carryover from the
Clinton administration was quite quite real and not just not
just theoretical. Let me get your take also, Ryan, since
we didn't have you yesterday before, you have to jump
on Casey means. So there's all sorts of there's all
(43:13):
sorts of things going on here. I don't even know
where to start, But let me pull up a friend
of show, Laura Lumer, who has been was first very
upset about the first Trump search and general pick and
was probably influential and getting her spiked. Then Trump picks
Casey Means, the sister of Callie Means and Emily and
(43:33):
I talked about her a good bit yesterday. She's really
a like MAHA influencer star. She's been on with Tucker,
She's been on with Joe Rogan. She runs some health
company herself, like Glucose monitoring company. She wrote a book
along with her brother, Callie Means, and so when she
got picked, I thought that Lumer and certainly the MAHA
(43:54):
people like Nicole Shanahan would be delighted, But I was wrong.
Some people were delighted. Nicole Shanahan, notably, was really really upset,
and Laura Lumer continued to you know, raise hell about
this pick as well, and despair truly over the UH
over the vetting team, not Trump. Of course, it's not
Trump's fault, but over the vetting team that is deserving Trump.
(44:15):
So in any case, Lord tweeted this, which I thought
was interesting. She said, I'm glad I initiated the Maha breakup.
Many of these grifters needed to be exposed for who
they are. And also I was amused by Richard Hanania
chiming and being like, here's another one, go after him
as well. In any case, give me your give me
your thoughts on Casey Means, on the Maha and Maga
tensions that are emerging, and Laura Lumer's role in all
(44:38):
of this stuff.
Speaker 5 (44:39):
Yeah, I mean, look, I love all the folks that
are into the crystals and the reiki and the the moon.
Speaker 2 (44:46):
And you have some background in this.
Speaker 5 (44:49):
Yes, in the nineties, I used to I used to
go to reiki sessions. Then I became like a reiki practitioner.
Speaker 6 (44:57):
Stuff.
Speaker 2 (44:57):
Of course you did the shock.
Speaker 6 (45:00):
This is important stuff.
Speaker 5 (45:02):
I don't I I don't think you want the Surgeon
general though.
Speaker 6 (45:07):
From that world.
Speaker 5 (45:10):
Like, I think it's fine if you know it's a
compliment to our system of Western medicine, because there are
there are a lot of things that Western medicine doesn't
understand about the body clearly, and there's a lot left
to be learned about it. But I think it's fine
(45:30):
that that it lives off in on your YouTube land
and in the basements and in churches and wherever where
you know you want to get you want to do reiki, great,
it's great, go do it.
Speaker 6 (45:43):
It's wonderful.
Speaker 5 (45:44):
But to but to make that person the surgeon general,
it's like, well, no, the Western medicine is also responsible
for enormous number of advances.
Speaker 2 (45:55):
Like when you're when your wife's got cancer, to go
to the specialist, to the occupuncture, the doctor.
Speaker 5 (46:01):
And you might go to the acupuncturist as well to right,
was some of the side effects true? But no, it's
it becomes dangerous when you you're throwing the Western medicine
out with the bathwater like this. Because look, Steve Jobs,
for instance, like you know, you know, thought he could
cure his own cancer with his with his spirit and smoothies,
(46:24):
and that's true and whatever, and what you know, the
way that he just try to approach it with his
spirit or his will or whatever. And he, as far
as I understand, like that was a cancer that he
should have beaten, you know, with treatment, but he didn't
and then he died.
Speaker 2 (46:40):
And there's a similar story with Kyle's dad actually, who
was going to a chiropractor who was telling him, oh,
I got you, you know, and he didn't he didn't
go to a regular doctor, so he didn't get a
cancer diagnosis until it was far too late, because the
chiropractor promised him that he would be able to heal
whatever ailed him.
Speaker 5 (46:57):
Right, And yes, then that's that's the real danger of that.
Like it as a as a compliment to your life
and to your you know, your spiritual pursuits great to
supplant to literally supplant medicine, Western medicine and have the
person as a certain general it's like.
Speaker 2 (47:15):
Uh, well here's here's the other thing, Ryan, is there's
another piece of this I want to talk to you about,
which is like the realignment from those types from the left.
I mean, this used to be very much the you know,
the Crystal people were very much within the firmitment of
the Democratic Party. And that realignment is interesting to be
which is how you know, Mariann and R. F. K.
(47:35):
Junior knew each other, ran the same circles and whatever.
Our K Junior of course is like the emblem of
that realignment, you know, the Woo woo realignment into the
Republican Party. But the thing that really drives me crazy
about our K Junior's ideology Casey means Callie means from
what I can tell is like number one, you know,
the position on the left is that ourns you have
(47:57):
access to medicine, not that there shouldn't be medical or
that we shouldn't trust, but it's that people should have
access to the advances of Western medicine. So that's number one.
Number two, they'll oftentimes talk accurately about the corruption of
the food industry, about the corruption of the medical industry,
of big pharma, et cetera, but then there's no effort
to actually root out the corruption. Instead, there's just a
(48:19):
redirection into alternative health profiteering, of which Casey and Gala
means both participate. You know, that's their livelihood, and that
stuff is wildly untested. I mean, there are much say
what you will about the FDA, the standards for actually
getting a drug approved much higher than there are no
sane standards for these you know, supplements and you know
(48:41):
things that you sell on the internet, and all these
influencers you go on say I take this, I take that.
They're getting paid and then they're selling it to you,
and there's no very little standards or testing with regard
to that. So that's the other piece of it and
the fact that there's no focus on Okay, you're right
that the profit motive at the center of healthcare is
is actually deadly because that creates mass incentives for guess
(49:05):
what's most profitable for people to be chronically sick, so
that you can continue to have to treat them and
treat them and treatment them over many years. There's no
effort to root that out through something like Medicare for
All system. Instead, it's just redirecting people into things that
are worse, less tested and at least as corrupt and.
Speaker 5 (49:25):
Right, the profiteering is outrageous that the entire reason we
have the FDA is in response to and I wrote
about this in my first book. What were they used
to be called patent medicines? Right, and like literally snake
oil snake like that's where we get the phrase snake oil.
Like people would come by and say, look, this oil
from a snake, you know, rub it here, and this
(49:47):
is going to be effect and oftentimes like it wouldn't
even be snake oil. It would be like not that
the snake oil would work, but they weren't even selling
you snake oil, which good because like you probably you know,
exterminate all the snakes if you had to do that.
Speaker 6 (50:00):
Uh.
Speaker 5 (50:00):
And so the FDA was brought in and and it
was the it was actually the first kind of assertion
of of federal government, you know, regulatory power, which is
why there's this alliance with corporate power linking up with
the MAHA people because they they they understand both historically
(50:21):
and intuitively that that the f d A is sort
of like the tip of the spear for this regulation
of of corporate profiting. And if they can they can
cut that, they can they can roll back, you know,
so they can roll back so much else. Uh and
so uh that's why that's how you wind up with
like a chemical chemical industry lobbyist being put into place
(50:43):
by the Trump administration to you know, over over oversee
you know what the MAHA people thought was going to
be an effort to like root out toxic chemicals.
Speaker 2 (50:54):
Right, And then how do you think, like, what do
you think of what are your reflections on the MAHA
movement into magaworld, some the tensions there and how that
comes about. I mean, I think the most obvious thing
is just to say that many of them were skeptics
of the COVID vaccine, or skeptics of the school closures,
the you know, the lockdown, those sorts of things. But
(51:15):
I also think in general, the right has just become
like the magnet for sort of all conspiracy theories, and so,
you know, there's just been and the Democratic Party has
become like the party of the experts, trust the science,
like that's that's you know, especially with the Democratic Party
becoming more heavily college educated, although there are also plenty
(51:39):
of MAHA people for sure, college educated, very highly educated, wealthy,
successful whatever. I mean, that was kind of the Hollywood
liberal type. But anyway, what do you what do you
make of that transition? Where do you think it comes from?
Speaker 5 (51:50):
My basic sense is that when when a lot of
these people gave up on the idea of collective change
and instead began to pursue kind of individual you know,
self improvement, self help, as the atomization of society and
(52:10):
of communities took hold, uh, they they moved right. And
the male version is you know, we see it all
the time, and the.
Speaker 2 (52:21):
Manager that the Bernie bros.
Speaker 5 (52:22):
Yeah, and also right, the Bernie bros. Who then now
the thing that they know or tell themselves that they're
going to focus on is you know, they're like you know,
taking you know, taking the right supplements, drinking the right powders,
you know, work you know, doing the right kind of workout,
the right amount of testosterone or whatever like that in.
Speaker 2 (52:40):
Set of medicare for all the collective project, it's all right, well,
let me just let me get fit, let me do
what I can do individually, and and.
Speaker 5 (52:49):
That's the that's the that's the male version of the
kind of woo woo you know, reiki maha stuff that
will you know, where you're just like, let let me
find my own individual spiritual practice that's gonna you know,
you know, get me out of this toxic culture or
make me detoxify it, detoxify myself as much as possible,
(53:11):
because you've you've given up the possibility of kind of
collective de liberation.
Speaker 2 (53:18):
Do you think there's a parallel to the Back to
the Land movement of the seventies, Yeah.
Speaker 5 (53:23):
Same same thing, same thing. Yeah, Like we're going to
make we're going to change the world in the sixties
and then you give it and you're like, wow, this
world is just didn't work, not only unchangeable.
Speaker 6 (53:32):
All our efforts backfired and so we're just going to
go live on a commune.
Speaker 2 (53:36):
We're just going to withdraw from society altogether, live on
a commune, and then the commune.
Speaker 5 (53:41):
Is going to fall apart, and then we're going to
go sell out and go to Wall Street or go
just do the thing that we were.
Speaker 6 (53:49):
Destined to do.
Speaker 2 (53:51):
I told you, I told you. I read this this
book about the Back to the Land movement and focused
on Vermont that Bernie Sanders randomly shows up in at
some commune and they have to make believe because he
won't stop like distracting everyone from their work and talking
about millionaires. Yeah, just tuber. I was like, oh my god.
He was at that time writing for some like you know,
socialist adjacent newspaper or something, and so he shows up
(54:12):
with the commune to like interview them and then just.
Speaker 6 (54:13):
Talking about eugen Shut up about Eugene Debs.
Speaker 2 (54:16):
Yeah, something like that. Yeah, something like that. Oh. Here,
Kyle's here, special guest, Special guest. Kyle Kalinsky in the house.
Speaker 9 (54:23):
Hey babe, literally in the house. I'm in the bedroom.
Speaker 2 (54:29):
We were just wrapping up talking about Casey Means and
then sort of digressed into thinking about the way that
there are parallels between this moment of men in particular
withdrawing from like being the birdie bro looking at the
collective solution into like let me you know, work out
and take whatever supplements and trust whatever influencers and whatever,
(54:50):
to the moment after the sixties and the seventies when
there's Okay, well we were going to change the world.
Now we're going to go back to the land and
we're going to like set up these communes and kind
of like do our own thing. And Ryan the other
thing that was interesting out of that book is that
I never realized how many food companies, like organic food
company type things that are big names now actually came
out of that vaccal land movement as well.
Speaker 6 (55:11):
Oh totally.
Speaker 5 (55:12):
That makes a lot of sense. And if we're right,
then over the next you know, five years, we may
see communes starting to pop up where this is kind
of like the Timpoles type of compound situation.
Speaker 2 (55:25):
Right or like the the trad wife and the what
do they call the people who there There is a
movement of this of people who are like you know,
moving out of cities, and this is all in the
right becoming getting them like farms going and trying to
be fully sustainable. There's a term for them completely oh.
Speaker 5 (55:44):
Sovereign sovereign citizens maybe, but yeah, they're like there's usually
right wingers, the sovereign citizens.
Speaker 6 (55:51):
It's going to be a right wing version.
Speaker 1 (55:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (55:53):
Well, and it goes with like the trad wife stuff
as well. You know, it's like we're withdrawing from society.
We're going to go back to these other ways we're
gonna in this. I mean there were vibes of this, yeah,
I mean there was vibes of this with the seventies
thing on the left to where it was like, okay,
these new modern ways of doing agriculture, we don't want
any of this mechanization. We're going to figure out how
to use like a horse and a cart to do
(56:15):
our truly, like we're going to make our own tools.
We're not going to have electricity. That was the pure
way to do it.
Speaker 9 (56:22):
So anyway, Yeah, whenever I think of how to become happy,
I go let me copy the Amish. That'll work out.
Speaker 2 (56:29):
Well, I don't know it might I have more I
have more sympathy to that, wen, you do, babe.
Speaker 9 (56:36):
We rely on so much stuff that we take for granted,
you know, like, whenever the power goes out and I
lose the TV, I'm always like, holy shit, the TV
is amazing. I wish I had that thing all the time.
So I have like the opposite philosophy of those people.
And the other thing is self self health help stuff
in general. Like I feel like the only times I've
(56:57):
been even somewhat interested in that in my life, they
were like the worst points of my life.
Speaker 2 (57:04):
So I feel like, yeah, well there's submit to that.
Speaker 9 (57:06):
Yeah, going down this path in general is a symptom
of an underlying misery or depression or being lost in
the same way that like hyper religiosity, you're being an
adult convert to a religion. That's a sign of like, hey, guys,
let me tell you I didn't kill myself last night.
I came up with this reason to not kill myself.
So it's a sign of a like decaying society.
Speaker 2 (57:26):
Yes, I think we'll all agree with that. All right, Ryan,
We'll let you go. I know you got a meeting,
you got a Junco.
Speaker 5 (57:31):
Thank you brother, all right, see you guys later, bye,
right bye?
Speaker 2 (57:34):
All right, guys. That concludes the Free Show. If you
want to see what Kyle has to say about Biden's
re emergence on the view. There's a lot to say
about that one, about Judge Jennine being put in instead
of Ed Martin as US attorney for DC, and all
kinds of other good things. Also, we're going to answer
a few of premium subscribers questions. Make sure to subscribe
over at Breakingpoints dot com. Thank you, guys so much
(57:56):
for your support. Have a great weekend.
Speaker 3 (58:00):
Yeah,
Popular Podcasts
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Therapy Gecko
An unlicensed lizard psychologist travels the universe talking to strangers about absolutely nothing. TO CALL THE GECKO: follow me on https://www.twitch.tv/lyleforever to get a notification for when I am taking calls. I am usually live Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays but lately a lot of other times too. I am a gecko.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.