July 17, 2025 • 40 mins
Nate and Maria share some updates from the final days of the World Series of Poker, and reflect on the importance of making peace with randomness. Then: the Trump administration’s sudden about face on the Epstein Files is ruffling feathers in his usually unruffle-able base. Will he be able to convince the true believers that there is, in fact, nothing to see here? And, how should we think about conspiracy theories in a world where conspiracies are sometimes real?
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:15):
Pushkin. Welcome back to Risky Business, the show about making
better decisions. I'm Maria Kanikova.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
And back in New York City, New York, not Las Vegas.
I'm Nate Silver. What are we talking about, Maria?
Speaker 1 (00:42):
So first we're going to do a little bit of
a poker update. As you guys known, it wasn't here
last week, so you had him in absentsha a pre
taped interview because he had a deep run in the
main I've had a few runs as well, and there's
lots of news from the World Series. So we're going
to start with a poker update. Then we're going to
get a little bit more serious and talk about some
(01:03):
conspiracy theories in the air.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
Maria, is the World Series Poker still going on? It
is like today the last official day where you can
enter a new event. Is that right?
Speaker 1 (01:17):
No, there are two more days night, so we're recording
this on Tuesday, July fifteenth. There are multiple bracelet events,
and then tomorrow there's also a turbo. You know that
we love turbos. They're a nice, nice little ways to
try to get a fast bracelet. At the end of
the series, so a few more days left, I have
(01:39):
been not at the World Series, but at the WPT
event at the Venetian. Had a nice deep run there
and actually busted in fifty third place last hand of
the night yesterday. So we were you know, anyone who
plays poker, you know, at the end of the night
they pause the clock and they say four more hands,
five more hands. Well I wish they had said four
more hands, because on hand number five I was dealt
(02:02):
pocket jacks with eighteen big lines on the button, and
the small blind who was an incredibly of European player
who'd been three betting me all day, three bet me
and we went with the jacks. In that time he
happened to have pocket kings and that was the end.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
What kind of euro Romanian? I try to get the
Euros to talk more like the Romanians the Eastern Europeans
are like, but like someone like the Germans or the Dutch,
or like a little more serious than they need to be.
I try to break them out of their shells, you
know what, Maria.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Yeah, absolutely, absolutely, that's a great strategy. This Romania was
very sweet, very nice, very talkative, and took all my chips.
Speaker 2 (02:41):
I busted the last time of the night, in my
last World Series event, what was a three K midstake something,
although it was someone like like, I don't think that
poker players should intentionally make a goal of like, oh
I made it to X day, Like, if anything, it
reduces your flexibility. In my case, it was to kind
of settle my business and get out of town. But
(03:03):
it might not be playing another tournament or taking an
off day or things like that, and so like it's
an arbitrary cutoff busting out on the last it looked
like but I I, you know, last hand before dinner, break,
last hand, last orbit at the end of the day.
Can sometimes we get opportunity to pick to pick up
chipsyp a little bit tired, right, yep, conflict diverse and yeah, no, no.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
Shame, Maria, No, no, no shame at all. You know.
I actually I have a story about this because psychologically
it's actually a really interesting thing because I think that
this is this is something that carries over, you know,
from the poker world to the real world, where people
just want to like they want to last, right, like
they don't want to they don't want to bust in quotes.
And I back when I was just learning poker and
(03:47):
I was still really working closely with Eric Sidell, and
he was giving me a lot of coaching. I remember
it was a big event. It was late in the night,
you know, we had a few hands left and I
remember folding preflop I think pocket sevens something like that
because I just didn't want to deal with it. I
didn't want to and there were like a few hands
left in the night, and I told him this. I
(04:08):
was like, you know, I was just tired, and he
just he didn't say anything. And then later he came
up to me and he's like, we need to talk
about that. He's like, do you see you know Jason
Kuhn or I Caxton, you know, some of the best
players in the world folding pocket sevens in that spot.
And I was like, no, I guess not. He's like,
you can't do that right, like you're leaving ev And yes,
I understand that you're tired and you don't want to bust,
(04:29):
but these are bad reasons and you need to play
like you are there to play, and you're there to
play your best game, and you have to take those spots,
and you have to take advantage of people who aren't
willing to take those spots. Those are the people who win.
And you know, I think that really that conversation really
stayed with me because it's such important life advice, right, like,
don't don't fold when you're just like feeling a little
(04:52):
risk averse if it's not for the right reasons. The
why has to be correct, and the why can't be
I don't want to bust, right, that's that's not that's
not a good reason.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
Yeah, And also knowing when the marginal spots are and
what's less marginal, right, Like, it's fine to fold the
very marginal stuff, but like you have this exponential thing
where hands quickly escalating value, and in most positions, folding
sevens from some reasonable position is a substantially positive expected
value play. Even if you even if you like lost
(05:23):
twenty IQ points the men you put chips in the hand, right,
you know, you're probably still gonna make enough money by
flopping sets and continuing carefully when the board's dry and
things like that. Right, And like you do have to
pay yourself a little bit. The World series as long
of it, how would you how would you rate your
overall World Series?
Speaker 1 (05:39):
Well, we're not done yet. We're not done yet. Okay,
I still have I still have a few events to go.
I'd give myself, uh a B minus maybe in yeah,
in this world series, but we'll see, we'll see.
Speaker 2 (05:54):
Maybe.
Speaker 1 (05:54):
You know, I bink a bracelet in the last two
days and I'm like, just kidding. No, Actually, I wouldn't
change my rating because you know, the the B minus
isn't for results only, it's for kind of overall play,
et cetera. And I definitely, you know, I think I've
played well in some of it. I think I made
some mistakes in some events, like there's you know, there's
a lot going on, there's a lot to learn, and
(06:14):
there's always room to improve. So I think that that's
a reasonable reasonable grade for myself.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
How about you, Nate, I'll give myself a B plus
as far as how I played. So, I think I've
become like pretty adept to exploitive things. Picking up on
vibes tells just general exploited to play to beat those players.
I focus less on hanging around with elite players, and
I think those spots were more tricky. I'm kind of
in this like weird spot mixed games are I think
(06:42):
it's not Texas no limit hold them basically right, and
like for the first time in some period I put
more study into those mixed games. It also bricked all
my events where you often face like much tougher field.
So it's probably the World Series that like was very
much at the median of like what you could reasonably expect, right,
(07:03):
And the thing is, like, so I wound up. I
think when I tell it up, I'm going to have
lost a little bit of money despite cashing the main
event and when they've have been after that for like
a combined sixty two thousand or whatever, Right, but fifty
thousand offsets a lot of ten K buy ins. I
bought in twice to this win ten k and to
various mixed games ten k's right, And then so yeah,
(07:25):
even then you're like, I think a little bit down
for the tournament. Like I said, I'll do the math,
but like, but that's kind of like I think you
are allowed to look at signs of successful play that
like aren't necessarily just how much you increase your hand
in mob Hendon is the encyclopedia of everybody's poker results, right, Like,
(07:45):
you know, if you're in the mix, as I call it, right,
you're building a big stacks early, You're lasting a long time.
You're part of the story of the tournament. You're attracting
some maybe media attention from your friends. You have some
fun hands that you can play and talk about later.
Like if you're in the mix constantly, then that feels
to me like airing towards the side of a more
successful World Series, even if you do run Jackson King
(08:08):
sometimes or lose, flips, bad meats, et cetera sometimes.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
Yep. I think I think that that is all correct.
I'm also down for the series, not nearly as down
as I was last year. As you know, last year
I was down. I was six figures. That is not
true now. And like I said, a few events left
and as everyone knows and every winning player knows, like
it is all the big scores, right, like that's what matters.
That's that's what actually will make the difference. So we'll
(08:33):
see and we can check back in next week. But
I just want to give a big shout out. By
the time you guys hear this, there will be a winner.
But we have the first woman in over thirty years
at the final table of the World Series main event,
Leo maud Gets from Spain. She's lovely. I've known her
for a number of years and she's very easy to
(08:54):
root for and a great player. And I just want
to give a shout out to a pretty historic moment
for the World Series. I think I think that that's
really great, and it's just it's a crazy final table, right,
the number of players who are incredibly well known players
and good players, it is just astounding. Kenny Hallard, who's
(09:14):
one of my fellow ambassadors from Poker Stars, this is
his second World Series of Poker final table got Mike
Mazraki the Grinder, who is a legend, won the fifty
k Players Championship four times, including this year. Adam Hendrix,
you know, really nice guy, really solid player. So you know,
we a lot of people to root for and everyone
(09:37):
I was anti sweating, and anti sweating is very fun.
It's people you really don't want to win. But I'm
very glad that all of my anti sweats are out
of the main event.
Speaker 2 (09:46):
Yeah, Adam Hendrix is when I play against the most
most nice guy, very good player, talking about someone who's
always in the mix, right, he just always somebody who
seems to have have a lot of chips. You know,
it seems to me like I mean, there are a
few pure amateurs or predominantly amateurs left. Right, It does
seem to me as though you are seeing fewer true
(10:08):
blue amateurs when bracelets or reach very long into the
World Series main event, right, like, there were a lot
of big names at various stages of the top one hundred,
two hundred, three hundred, et cetera, as compared to in
years past. I think, you know, I think that means that,
like I think the games are getting tougher. At the
(10:29):
same time, if you are I don't need call Marie
and I kind of quasi professional, like you do have
more resources to study from than ever before. But like
everything else, right, it's becoming like it's becoming more about
who's putting in, putting in the hours, putting in, putting
in the work, and back.
Speaker 1 (10:45):
To me, because this is all about me speaking of
fish and you know, putting in hours, et cetera. I
have a cautionary tale from this week's World Series from
from my play. Yeah, and this is something that we
can that we can all learn from, whether you play
poker or not. You know, Nate, I've written about this
a lot. How you know, I really into focus and
(11:09):
multitasking bad right, and I went against that. And I
was multi tabling two online bracelet events on Sunday when
there were two online bracelet events going on, the three
K high Roller and the Mystery Bounty. And I was
one of the chip leaders in the three K high
Roller with over eighty big lines. I was in seventh place,
and I had eleven big lines in the Mystery Bounty.
(11:32):
And I went all in in the Mystery Bounty with
a six OFFT suit and then realized that I had
misclicked and went all in in the three K high
Roller with the a six OFFT suit and not the
Mystery Bounty. And I was and I was called by
Pocket Aces and that was the only stack at my
table I actually covered me. I had eighty big lines.
(11:53):
I had eighty biglines. The Pocket Aces had eighty six
big lines. We were two of the biggest stacks in
the tournament. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how you
absolutely torched three thousand dollars on fire. I just I've
never done that before. It has never happened to me.
And I was just I was mortified. I was like,
oh my god, how did I do that? And then
(12:14):
I also imagined the person tagging my profile right online,
I'm being like donkey fish like shoves eighty big lines
over and open with a six opsuit. The funny thing
is that would have actually gotten through like ninety nine
percent of the time. This person just happened to have
pocket aces. But yeah, so so that was a major
(12:35):
mis click. Don't multitask people, It's not a good idea. No.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
Look. One thing you notice is that as you get
deeper in these events and you and maybe deeper in
the series, people are more fatigued. Right, You notice more
puns like avoiding a pun?
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Did do you think that was a punt?
Speaker 2 (12:57):
A certain type of punt. It's a point caused by
fatigue or inattendants. I suppose right.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
The windows had changed places that in my defense, so
so they.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
Use like the wrunk place or something or like I
barely should But.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
No, I don't. I don't you can change I don't
even know how to do that. I think you can
change the felt of all your tables, but I don't
know if you can change the felt of just one.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
Yeah, I like if I when I have barely been
playing online anymore. When I do, I will use different colors.
Give me visual cues. But yeah, look, I think and
I've misclicked in real life too, you know, put out
the wrong chip and and things like that. I think
only I had like one or two of those and
four or five weeks this year, which is for me
(13:41):
pretty good, right. But no, I mean, I know I
went on of the main event and a blaze a glory,
I triple blarow, bluffed with the combo draw. I think
it was a good play. But you know, and even
if you make a misclick, I think you have to
be kind of like butterfly effect as a term pocket
players for some people use for like, everything in the
event's different from the time that you play a hand.
(14:02):
The cards are shuffled differently, you give them back the
dealer differently, right, the random number seat is different online
and so like, well, for sure, I think I think
people make.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
There are lots of Yeah, there are lots of butterfly effects.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
You know.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
Yesterday during the World Poker Tour event that I was playing,
there was one hand where I ended up folding a
big combo draw on the flop. After there was you know,
a bed and a reraise, and I you know, I
just determined that you know, there's no way I'm good
and I'm so basically, I ended up folding and had
I just called, which I was very close to calling,
(14:34):
you know the pod odds we were there, but I
just I ended up folding. It was a big multi
way pot and I actually hit it on the turn,
but I had folded my hand, and I would have
knocked out this incredibly aggressive player who then went on
to build a huge stack. And it's so funny because
I was just thinking back to that hand. I didn't
make a mistake, and you can't think that way, right, Like,
(14:54):
if you made the correct fold, it's okay if you
hit it, Like, you can't think that way. But I
was like, huh, I was actually thinking about the butterfly
effect and kind of downstream effects. I was like, had
I called right, this guy would not have knocked out
all these other players, and so many other people's tournaments
would have been very, very different from that one hand.
And I mean that's true of so many decisions in
(15:16):
life obviously, but in poker you can actually track them.
So it's kind of funny, right in poker, you can track, like,
had this hand played out differently, you know, all of
these other things happen, and I think that that's just
a good to remember and also good not to dwell on, right, Like, yeah,
you know, that's life and that's the nature of randomness.
So yeah, Nate, we can wrap up the World Series,
(15:37):
and we'll wrap up next week after I actually finish
and we know who the main event winner is. Let's
take a break and then switch gears and talk about
something a little bit more serious. So, Nate, the last
(16:04):
few weeks, there's a name that's never really gone away,
but has been a little bit less in the air
and suddenly is back in the spotlight. Jeffrey Epstein.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
Jeffrey Epstein.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
We thought, we thought we were done. We thought we
were done, and we were not done.
Speaker 2 (16:19):
There was a member of the New York State Assembly
named Harvey Epstein who was running in my legislative district.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
That's a little bit of the most talked of fortunate. Okay,
so you know, Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide. I'm going to
put it in quote because we're going to be talking
about conspiracy theories, so I'm going to put it in
in quotation marks. But this is a conspiracy theory that
actually a lot of people believe in he committed suicide
(16:45):
in prison while awaiting trial on various charges of sex trafficking,
et cetera, et cetera. His co conspirator, Gislen Maxwell, is
serving a prison sentence currently, I think twenty years. But
the Epstein files, right, the files that all of this
was built on, clients, video footage, et cetera, et cetera.
(17:06):
There's been talk that this exists, right, that there's like
this treasure trove of data that's been kept secret. And
one of the things that Donald Trump said is, We're
going to bring all these people to justice. We are
going to kind of bring the Epstein files to the light.
We're going to share all of this. And then all
of a sudden, no, there are no there's no there
(17:27):
are no client lists, there's nothing there. We should forget
Jeffrey Epstein. No one cares about him, nothing's going to
be released, and so the statement's completely changed, and so
conspiracy theories are in the air and people think that
there's some massive cover up, and this is one of
those moments. And these moments are incredibly rare. Inn You
and I have talked about this before, where there seem
(17:49):
to be you know, Trump's supporters who are saying, wait, wait,
wait a second, what the hell? Right, we were promised
names and justice for these people who have committed sex
crimes against children, right, what's going on now? Why are
you telling us that there are no names? And so
this is one of those rare moments where people seem
to not be happy on the Republican side as well
(18:12):
as on the Democratic side.
Speaker 2 (18:14):
Yeah, what's a conspiracy theory, Maria in your opinion, Well.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
There are plenty of conspiracy theories in here. I mean,
one of the biggest ones is that, obviously, as Elon
Musk alleged after his falling out with Trump before his
reconciliation with Trump. Although now I think they've fallen out again.
I can't. I can't keep it straining. They're in, they're out,
they're in, they're out. But I think they're out right now.
But Elon Musk alleged Trump's name is in the files,
(18:41):
and not in a good way, because let's uh, let's
just caveat this for a second. So if your name
is in quote unquote the Epstein files, that doesn't actually
mean that you're implicated, right, The Epstein files is just
to catch all name for all of the evidence trial transcripts,
et cetera, et cetera. So you might have been deposed, right,
you might have been giving a statement, you might have
(19:01):
been There's there are a lot of ways your name
can end up in the Epstein files. But what Elon
Musk suggested alleged was that was tied up in it
in not in a deposition way, but in a much
more direct way. And so the biggest conspiracy theory might
be that, you know, Donald Trump does not want these
files released because they implicate him. Right, So that's I
(19:23):
think the biggest conspiracy theory Trump and other people who
are high up in the government.
Speaker 2 (19:28):
I mean, you know, I I'm not sure I love
the term conspiracy theory. It's like a kind of cousin
of misinformation, which is the term I don't like necessarily
and part because like some conspiracy theories like later proved
to be true or plausible, right, I mean, the Lablique
thesis of Covied origins is not generally accepted as the truth.
(19:51):
It's generally accepted though now by the scientific community in
most governments, is a plausible you know, fifty to fifty
or something theory, Right, Things like the Tuskegee experiment or
lower stakes more recent like you know Hunter Biden's laptop.
There's lots of stuff that gets labeled this way, and like,
why wouldn't why shouldn't you be a little suspicious of
(20:11):
whether Epstein really killed himselves? Right? Oh?
Speaker 1 (20:14):
No, I mean that one for sure, that one I
actually am suspicious off as well. I think that a
lot of things get labeled conspiracy theory. I think conspiracy
theory is an incredibly useful term, but it can't get
thrown around on things that it doesn't actually fit. This
is the same argument I make with con artists when
people are like, oh, this is a con artist. That's
a con artist. I'm like, no, you need to be
specific in what a con artist is, right. A con
(20:36):
artist is an incredibly specific term, and you can't start
labeling all people con artists that you disagree with or
that you think our salesmen are, you know, doing something
that you think is a little bit icky, because at
that point, con artist stops meaning anything. And I think
that's the same is true of conspiracy theory. Nate, Have
I told you my favorite conspiracy theory joke about the
jfk assassination, Someone.
Speaker 2 (20:58):
About God or yeah, go tell tell to the audience.
Speaker 1 (21:01):
Yeah, okay, So you know, this guy dies and he's
kind of been an his entire life. He's been obsessed
with the jfk assassination and that's kind of his He
just wants to know. He's been digging and digging and digging.
And he gets to Heaven and he's at the pearly
(21:22):
gates and God says, you know, you have one question,
and I promise to answer it truthfully anything in the
world that you want to know. And he says, okay, yes,
I know exactly what I want to ask. Who killed Kennedy?
And God says, you know, it was Lee Harvey Oswald.
He was acting by himself, there were no co conspirators.
And the guy says, oh man, this thing goes further
(21:45):
up than I thought.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
I've always loved that.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
Yeah, look, I mean it's that joke just absolutely encapsulates
the way that conspiracy theorists' minds work that no matter
what evidence you present, no matter kind of what you
show them, once they believe something, they will go to
the end of the world to prove that that's true.
And you can't bring them out of that conspiratorial frame
(22:12):
of mind. So that's the distinction, right, where with something
like the COVID labliku. By the way, you know, people
were trying to discredit that theory and make it seem
like a conspiracy theory, but you know, as evidence mounted up,
it became less and less plausible to do that. So
(22:33):
you know, you have people on both sides of that,
including people who said it was definitely not a lablak
who did change their minds. So that's kind of a
little bit you know, I think a little bit of
a nuanced difference between before.
Speaker 2 (22:45):
And some of them initially thought it was a lableak
and then changed their mind and then changed their back, right.
I mean, you know, this is a case where it's like, Okay,
what evidence do you have of like people conspiring to
manipulate the evidentiary record. In that case, there was actually
lots of like foid documents and things like that that
seemed to involve discourse. It was like not very scientific. Yeah,
(23:06):
I think one thing you have to like think about
is like who are the alleged co conspirators and how
plausible is it that like that they're all working in
cahoots with what you're.
Speaker 1 (23:18):
Right, absolutely absolutely. I think I think that when you're
looking at conspiracy theories, one of the questions you have
to ask, and this is something that I think we
talk about a lot on the show, is incentives. Right,
what are the incentives here? Who has the incentive to
kind of cover this up? Is? Is it plausible? Right?
And why?
Speaker 2 (23:38):
Right?
Speaker 1 (23:38):
So, in the case of something like the COVID lovel Yeah,
the incentive structure was bad, and it was so that
makes it much more likely. In the case of a
JFK assassination, No, I mean, I'm sorry, Like, the incentive
structure was very different, right, it was the assassination of
a president. Like, everyone's incentives are aligned to try to
figure out what the hell happened. So, you know, those
(23:59):
are two incredibly different situations. Now, in the case of
something like Jeffrey Epstein the Epstein Files, it can get money, right,
because it's become clear that a lot of incredibly powerful
people were involved for years in what in Epstein's antics.
Speaker 2 (24:16):
I mean, I've never really thought much about the Jeffrey
Epstein story until this Trump angle, I guess, right. I mean, look,
I do think on a basic level, when like when
people promised to reveal information and then a very circumspect
about it later. Then that's a very reasonable plug. You know,
if a guy my age wearing a hat probably not
(24:36):
that much underneath. Right, it's not a conspiracy theory. It's
like inference, human inference that normal people would make. Yeah,
And I mean it's like.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
By the way, we do have evidence. But with Jeffrey
Epstein that he there was tons of evidence against him,
and very powerful forces blocked it from coming to trial
many many times until it finally did in twenty nineteen. Right,
there were a lot of attempts to prosecute him, a
lot of attempts to bring him to justice, and they
never went anywhere. So we know that there were a
lot of very powerful forces on his side for a
(25:07):
very very long time. So that's more evidence, just like
your hat night.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
And I guess as I've gotten like older and a
bit wealthier, like I do think that, like you know,
powerful people, the circles are kind of small, I mean,
extremely powerful people, right, the circles are kind of small.
They kind of all know one another. Right. They can
be kind of high on their own supply or unscrupulous
(25:31):
in different ways, I think, Right, like, yeah, I don't know,
and you as to see when they fail, right, Like
in New York, we have a lot of rich people
who are very unhappy as a Roun Mamdanni who won
the primary, and are very unhappy that like all the
alternatives to him suck and have been rejected by voters,
and they are powerless. It's kind of fun to watch it, Like, no,
(25:53):
there's not really any toil. Let's get a right in
on the ballot. You can't really get people off the ballot,
but yeah, it's funny when the perfectable can't control everything.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
Yeah, no, I mean with this specific administration, given how
much information manipulation has to in place. I always you know,
I hate like because I'm so against conspiracy theory like thinking,
and I think it's such a pernicious kind of way
that our minds work because people are very susceptible, and
(26:25):
some people more than others. But our minds do get
susceptible to kind of conspiracy theory like thinking, because there's
a lot of things going on cognitively, right, Like the
human brain loves to see patterns, right, and loves to
find patterns where patterns don't exist. You know, it's something
that like we always do, or patterns seeking animals, and
that manifests themself in all sorts of ways. We like
(26:47):
cause and effect, right, we don't like uncertainty. We like
to tell stories. So there are all of these things
that predispose us to kind of falling for conspiracy's cognitive dissonance.
You know. That's kind of one of the original, kind
of original theories that explains a lot of conspiracy thinking
with Leon Festinger back in nineteen fifty. Now, I'm sure
(27:07):
you know this very famous story, right, the Alien cult
the Seekers. There was a woman, Dorothy Martin, who communicated
with alien civilizations, and she had a date that you know,
aliens were going to come and take all of these
faithful people with her. That everyone believed her. You know,
there was this big cult. The day came and went
(27:29):
and there were no aliens, and then she's like, oh,
you know, we got the dates wrong in this rod
and the cult didn't fall apart, right, They still believed her, right,
They were like, oh, okay, you know she's not lying.
She really does communicate. It was just other stuff and
you explain everything away. And that was kind of one
of the original manifestations that was studied in a serious
(27:49):
way about how the human brain is just capable of
just dismissing everything right and just telling its own story.
So this is all kind of a big aside to
say that I am very much against. As soon as
something is like a conspiracy theory, I want to try
to debunk it, right. But then sometimes you find yourself
(28:10):
being like, Okay, well this is what we were talking about,
Like with the COVID LABLA immediately I was like, no,
this seems actually like it might be plausible, right, Like
even back then, I was like, why are we dismissing
this right away? We have no evidence. There's so much uncertainty,
there's so much unknown, there's so much ambiguity. How can
you know for sure it was one or the other? Right?
You need to as a scientist, you need to entertain
(28:31):
all the possibilities before you get more evidence. And with
the Epstein files, like I actually have the same feeling
like wait, like why are we dismissing it one way
or the other? Like we need more evidence, we need
to know what's going on. And if you look at
the incentive structures, like I don't know, the incentive structures
are all out of whack here. Right, Maybe there's nothing there,
(28:52):
but maybe there is, And we can't just dismiss it.
We can't just say it's a conspiracy theory. Like it's
one of these things where there is this cloud of
uncertainty and ambiguity that hampers accurate decision making, accurate decision assessment.
And those are the moments where we need to be
careful and entertain all sides and not dismiss anyone as
conspiracy theorists as much as I hate to say it.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
Yeah, I take an even more obvious example. You know,
there was a conspiracy I'll use that term among senior
White House officials to cover up Joe Biden's cognitive decline. Right,
And you would be called lots of names if you
kind of pointed that out. And there's an example of
where it was a very small circle, right, I mean,
like sometimes the signs of this are like pretty obvious, right, Like,
(29:35):
it seems like there's got to be some politically inconvenient
angle for Trump somewhere in the Epstein vials, right, don't
know if it's him, or when it's associates, or if
it's minor or super major or whatever else. Right, But
like that's the not just the reasonable for, but the
correct probabilistic inference from from something like that happening.
Speaker 1 (29:53):
Yeah, so I think given how all of a sudden,
you know, the total about face that we have from
the administration, that's just like one eighty. And this administration
pulls one eighties all the time right on very stupid things.
So in and of itself, it's kind of meaningless, but
there is a signal in there as well, because every
time they pull a one eighty, it's for politically expedient purposes. Right,
(30:15):
So when they pull one eighties on tariffs, when they
pull one eighties on immigration or whatever it is, it's
always because of some politically expedient reason. And so what
the easiest explanation here is that there's another politically expedient
reason why they all of a sudden say that there's
no information, there's nothing to be had, there's nothing to
be gained, and let's move on, and nobody cares about Epstein.
(30:38):
So political expedience is always and what's good for Trump, right,
what's good for number one is always the top reason.
And we've seen that his entire administration is very happy
to go along with whatever that is.
Speaker 2 (30:48):
There's a three percent chance that Jeffrey Epstein is found
alive this year by deciding first coordinated polymarket Polymarke, are
you taking me under or the over? I'm taking the
under on that about a little one percent taking me
(31:10):
under on that.
Speaker 1 (31:12):
Although I did just you know, I'm still in Vegas.
I did just see Elvis on the streets.
Speaker 2 (31:16):
So okay, you know, so you never know, people come back.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
From the dad all the time.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
By the way, I'm a paid advisor to Polly Market,
you know, like the where they mentioned like the health
symptoms like really fast, Like I'm a Polly Market. It's
just like compress that in. We should compress that in
for all future episodes. But I do. I do, uh
work with them and receive income for that. Who's the
comedian who people say isn't dead. I don't remember Andy Kaufman.
(31:42):
Andy Kaufen Yah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
Yeah, Andy Kaufman. Yeap, Yes, that is correct. There are
lots of people, you know, Jimmy Hoffa might pop up
at any moment, although I think Jimmy hoff is probably
on the bottom of Lake Mead or in the desert somewhere.
But yeah, there are lots of people who might come
back to life, but conspiracy theories, you know, they're they're
here to stay, were incredibly susceptible to them. In general,
(32:05):
we hear on Risky Business, do not endorse conspiracy theory
like thinking, but you need to learn how to separate
things that you know are actual conspiracy theories from people
voicing opinions that could be labeled conspiracy theories because someone
thinks it's inconvenient and it's a nuanced distinction, and it's
(32:26):
very difficult to make it accurately because some people would say, well,
you know jfk assassination, people are incentivized against me. Well, no,
like you, you really do need to look at the
actual incentives and try to be a little bit more
rational about that to try to make those determinations.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
People will use the phrase like no evidence, right, and
that can be a loaded phrase.
Speaker 1 (32:49):
Right.
Speaker 2 (32:49):
No evidence often means no proof. But in many of
these mysteries, nothing is firmly proven, Like you know, on
the COVID origins, nothing's been firmly proven for example, right,
and so like, So take on different valances when it's
a liberal or conservative cause. What can be frustrating with
(33:10):
certain types of stories. It's like, you know, who do
I really trust to report on like the Epstein case.
I'm not quite I'm not quite sure. I'm not I'm
not sure. If I devoided to vote a week, if
I decide to like become semi obsessed with the Epstein case,
I don't know what I conclude.
Speaker 1 (33:29):
Right.
Speaker 2 (33:29):
It's one of those things that like you almost have
to turn up the news coverage because it's like, Okay,
do I want to go down a rabbit hole here
and like whose claims are trustworthy? And who's a grifter
and and who's not? And that can be that can
be difficult. Let's take a quick break, and when we return,
how will the Epstein rift affect Trump's coalition? Look, I
(34:09):
think the political implications are interesting. It's maybe the closest
we've gotten to like for the MAGA base where this
is an issue where I mean Trump campaigned at various
times on opening up the Epstein files, right, and like,
so you actually see in the MAGA world, or at
least according to these people who interact with it more
than I do, you actually do see some descent. Trump
(34:32):
got ratio that means a negative response on his own
social media platform, like truth social and so it's interesting, right,
It's interesting. It's a popcorn kind of sitting on the
sideline story for me.
Speaker 1 (34:45):
Yeah, so I'm actually, I'm actually this is something that
we haven't talked about yet. But I'm curious about your
thoughts on potential since this is like a popcorn story.
Do you think it's a popcorn story for Trump's base
or do you think it might have some more lasting impact.
So at the beginning, I kind of implied that a
lot of Trump supporters are not happy right with this,
(35:08):
about with this particular about face, right that they were
promised that, you know, there'd be justice and the Epstein files,
and now they're told no Epstein files, and they're like,
what's going on? You know, we want these child sex
criminals brought to justice. We've seen you know, a lot
of quote unquote rifts in Trump's base that then disappear
because then they're like, no, no, okay, fine, we love
(35:31):
we love Donald Trump and everything's going to be fine.
Do you think that this one has potential to be
more lasting or do you think it's also going to
be a blip and then all of the Trump supporters
are going to recoalesce and forget all about it and
move on. Because, as we've already talked about many many
times on the show, memory short and people love Trump.
Speaker 2 (35:51):
One thing I not is like the incentives are a
little bit different now that Trump no longer has anything
to run for. This is, unless he's trying to violent
the constitution. I guess could run for any non president office.
It could become, you know, mayor of New York, mayor
primaries or un or whatever. Right, I sh wouldn't be
a primary, most.
Speaker 1 (36:07):
Likely mayor of New York.
Speaker 2 (36:09):
No, no, no, no, uh. It could be a win win, right,
Maybe you get him out of the presidency. Maybe Bill
Lackman's like, I know a guy, He's a smart businessman, right,
politically moderate, you know, well known celebrity entrepreneur, right real
estate magnate. Donald Trump writing campaign for mayor of New York. Sorry,
(36:31):
what which question, Maria?
Speaker 1 (36:33):
No, look gonna how's this gonna work out for? Do
we think that this is actually going to have any
sort of lasting impact on the Trump based on his coalitionhow? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (36:42):
Looky?
Speaker 1 (36:42):
Is it gonna fizzle out? Again?
Speaker 2 (36:45):
I think it could be a little self for as
Trump gets more unpopular and gets further removed from the
election and does have another election. I think you could
see like people on the right more willing to challenge
him potentially, Right, they got their big beautiful bill pass,
a lot of us being done through executive order. Otherwise,
like not like there's that much good to go on
through Congress if his siplitical standing is is damaged or
(37:06):
I don't know, I'm not like one of these like
right wing group check whisper types exactly. It seems just
in the news coverage that like that you are seeing
rifts that you haven't seen before.
Speaker 1 (37:17):
It does seem that way, And I'm actually I'm going
to be very curious to watch this because one of
the phenomena that we've talked about and that we've observed
many times here is that so far there has been
nothing lasting right. So far, there have been no rifts
that have actually become rifts in that kind of maga
(37:37):
core coalition. Right. We've seen we've seen moments where we're like, oh,
like are people going to turn against Trump for this? Oh,
are they going to turn against Trump for this? And
it hasn't happened. Right, They've kind of forgotten and they've
told the story in different ways cognitive dissonance dissonance reduction
at its best. You know, the aliens are still coming.
It's just the date has changed. But it does like
(38:00):
right now, at least in this stage of the news cycle.
And it's so you know, it's so tough to know
how this will play out long term, but it does
seem like this might be like it might be building
up right, And maybe that's just wishful thinking. I have
no idea, but I'm very, very curious to see how
it will turn out and whether this is a breaking
(38:20):
point or not. You know, I would I would probably
take the or not side of that bet, just because
that's the way that you know, historically it's it's played out.
I think that you know, in a few weeks we'll
look back at the segment and laugh and say, yeah,
of course, everyone's forgotten all about it. But as of now,
it seems like there is at least a non zero
chance that this might have some lasting coalition changes, especially
(38:45):
as other people might start rising up to try to
not challenge Trump but establish themselves as people who might
kind of be party leaders going forward. As we get
deeper into the presidency, closer to the midterm elections closer
to other incentives that might matter to the electorate.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
Right, I think I've thought enough about Jeffrey Episteine for
your day. You want to call the show, Let's do it.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
Thanks everyone for following along. Good luck everyone.
Speaker 2 (39:13):
Like the world series of Poker of this podcast is ending,
not permanently this episode, yes, just for the week, just
for the week.
Speaker 1 (39:23):
Yeah, let us know what you think of the show.
Reach out to us at Risky Business at pushkin dot fm.
And by the way, if you're a Pushkin Plus subscriber,
we have some bonus content for you that's coming up
right after the credits.
Speaker 2 (39:41):
And if you're not subscribing yet, consider signing up for
just six ninety nine a month. What a nice price
you get access to all that premium content and ad
for listening across Pushkin's entire network of shows.
Speaker 1 (39:53):
Risky Business is hosted by me Maria Kannakova.
Speaker 2 (39:56):
And by me Nate Silver. The show is a co
production of Pushkin Industries and iHeartMedia. This episode was produced
by Isabelle Carter. Our associate producer is Sonia Gerwit. Sally
Helm is our editor, and our executive producer is Jacob gold.
Scene mixing by Sarah Bruguer.
Speaker 1 (40:12):
Thanks so much for tuning in mm HM
Pushkin. Welcome back to Risky Business, the show about making
better decisions. I'm Maria Kanikova.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
And back in New York City, New York, not Las Vegas.
I'm Nate Silver. What are we talking about, Maria?
Speaker 1 (00:42):
So first we're going to do a little bit of
a poker update. As you guys known, it wasn't here
last week, so you had him in absentsha a pre
taped interview because he had a deep run in the
main I've had a few runs as well, and there's
lots of news from the World Series. So we're going
to start with a poker update. Then we're going to
get a little bit more serious and talk about some
(01:03):
conspiracy theories in the air.
Speaker 2 (01:10):
Maria, is the World Series Poker still going on? It
is like today the last official day where you can
enter a new event. Is that right?
Speaker 1 (01:17):
No, there are two more days night, so we're recording
this on Tuesday, July fifteenth. There are multiple bracelet events,
and then tomorrow there's also a turbo. You know that
we love turbos. They're a nice, nice little ways to
try to get a fast bracelet. At the end of
the series, so a few more days left, I have
(01:39):
been not at the World Series, but at the WPT
event at the Venetian. Had a nice deep run there
and actually busted in fifty third place last hand of
the night yesterday. So we were you know, anyone who
plays poker, you know, at the end of the night
they pause the clock and they say four more hands,
five more hands. Well I wish they had said four
more hands, because on hand number five I was dealt
(02:02):
pocket jacks with eighteen big lines on the button, and
the small blind who was an incredibly of European player
who'd been three betting me all day, three bet me
and we went with the jacks. In that time he
happened to have pocket kings and that was the end.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
What kind of euro Romanian? I try to get the
Euros to talk more like the Romanians the Eastern Europeans
are like, but like someone like the Germans or the Dutch,
or like a little more serious than they need to be.
I try to break them out of their shells, you
know what, Maria.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Yeah, absolutely, absolutely, that's a great strategy. This Romania was
very sweet, very nice, very talkative, and took all my chips.
Speaker 2 (02:41):
I busted the last time of the night, in my
last World Series event, what was a three K midstake something,
although it was someone like like, I don't think that
poker players should intentionally make a goal of like, oh
I made it to X day, Like, if anything, it
reduces your flexibility. In my case, it was to kind
of settle my business and get out of town. But
(03:03):
it might not be playing another tournament or taking an
off day or things like that, and so like it's
an arbitrary cutoff busting out on the last it looked
like but I I, you know, last hand before dinner, break,
last hand, last orbit at the end of the day.
Can sometimes we get opportunity to pick to pick up
chipsyp a little bit tired, right, yep, conflict diverse and yeah, no, no.
Speaker 1 (03:25):
Shame, Maria, No, no, no shame at all. You know.
I actually I have a story about this because psychologically
it's actually a really interesting thing because I think that
this is this is something that carries over, you know,
from the poker world to the real world, where people
just want to like they want to last, right, like
they don't want to they don't want to bust in quotes.
And I back when I was just learning poker and
(03:47):
I was still really working closely with Eric Sidell, and
he was giving me a lot of coaching. I remember
it was a big event. It was late in the night,
you know, we had a few hands left and I
remember folding preflop I think pocket sevens something like that
because I just didn't want to deal with it. I
didn't want to and there were like a few hands
left in the night, and I told him this. I
(04:08):
was like, you know, I was just tired, and he
just he didn't say anything. And then later he came
up to me and he's like, we need to talk
about that. He's like, do you see you know Jason
Kuhn or I Caxton, you know, some of the best
players in the world folding pocket sevens in that spot.
And I was like, no, I guess not. He's like,
you can't do that right, like you're leaving ev And yes,
I understand that you're tired and you don't want to bust,
(04:29):
but these are bad reasons and you need to play
like you are there to play, and you're there to
play your best game, and you have to take those spots,
and you have to take advantage of people who aren't
willing to take those spots. Those are the people who win.
And you know, I think that really that conversation really
stayed with me because it's such important life advice, right, like,
don't don't fold when you're just like feeling a little
(04:52):
risk averse if it's not for the right reasons. The
why has to be correct, and the why can't be
I don't want to bust, right, that's that's not that's
not a good reason.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
Yeah, And also knowing when the marginal spots are and
what's less marginal, right, Like, it's fine to fold the
very marginal stuff, but like you have this exponential thing
where hands quickly escalating value, and in most positions, folding
sevens from some reasonable position is a substantially positive expected
value play. Even if you even if you like lost
(05:23):
twenty IQ points the men you put chips in the hand, right,
you know, you're probably still gonna make enough money by
flopping sets and continuing carefully when the board's dry and
things like that. Right, And like you do have to
pay yourself a little bit. The World series as long
of it, how would you how would you rate your
overall World Series?
Speaker 1 (05:39):
Well, we're not done yet. We're not done yet. Okay,
I still have I still have a few events to go.
I'd give myself, uh a B minus maybe in yeah,
in this world series, but we'll see, we'll see.
Speaker 2 (05:54):
Maybe.
Speaker 1 (05:54):
You know, I bink a bracelet in the last two
days and I'm like, just kidding. No, Actually, I wouldn't
change my rating because you know, the the B minus
isn't for results only, it's for kind of overall play,
et cetera. And I definitely, you know, I think I've
played well in some of it. I think I made
some mistakes in some events, like there's you know, there's
a lot going on, there's a lot to learn, and
(06:14):
there's always room to improve. So I think that that's
a reasonable reasonable grade for myself.
Speaker 2 (06:21):
How about you, Nate, I'll give myself a B plus
as far as how I played. So, I think I've
become like pretty adept to exploitive things. Picking up on
vibes tells just general exploited to play to beat those players.
I focus less on hanging around with elite players, and
I think those spots were more tricky. I'm kind of
in this like weird spot mixed games are I think
(06:42):
it's not Texas no limit hold them basically right, and
like for the first time in some period I put
more study into those mixed games. It also bricked all
my events where you often face like much tougher field.
So it's probably the World Series that like was very
much at the median of like what you could reasonably expect, right,
(07:03):
And the thing is, like, so I wound up. I
think when I tell it up, I'm going to have
lost a little bit of money despite cashing the main
event and when they've have been after that for like
a combined sixty two thousand or whatever, Right, but fifty
thousand offsets a lot of ten K buy ins. I
bought in twice to this win ten k and to
various mixed games ten k's right, And then so yeah,
(07:25):
even then you're like, I think a little bit down
for the tournament. Like I said, I'll do the math,
but like, but that's kind of like I think you
are allowed to look at signs of successful play that
like aren't necessarily just how much you increase your hand
in mob Hendon is the encyclopedia of everybody's poker results, right, Like,
(07:45):
you know, if you're in the mix, as I call it, right,
you're building a big stacks early, You're lasting a long time.
You're part of the story of the tournament. You're attracting
some maybe media attention from your friends. You have some
fun hands that you can play and talk about later.
Like if you're in the mix constantly, then that feels
to me like airing towards the side of a more
successful World Series, even if you do run Jackson King
(08:08):
sometimes or lose, flips, bad meats, et cetera sometimes.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
Yep. I think I think that that is all correct.
I'm also down for the series, not nearly as down
as I was last year. As you know, last year
I was down. I was six figures. That is not
true now. And like I said, a few events left
and as everyone knows and every winning player knows, like
it is all the big scores, right, like that's what matters.
That's that's what actually will make the difference. So we'll
(08:33):
see and we can check back in next week. But
I just want to give a big shout out. By
the time you guys hear this, there will be a winner.
But we have the first woman in over thirty years
at the final table of the World Series main event,
Leo maud Gets from Spain. She's lovely. I've known her
for a number of years and she's very easy to
(08:54):
root for and a great player. And I just want
to give a shout out to a pretty historic moment
for the World Series. I think I think that that's
really great, and it's just it's a crazy final table, right,
the number of players who are incredibly well known players
and good players, it is just astounding. Kenny Hallard, who's
(09:14):
one of my fellow ambassadors from Poker Stars, this is
his second World Series of Poker final table got Mike
Mazraki the Grinder, who is a legend, won the fifty
k Players Championship four times, including this year. Adam Hendrix,
you know, really nice guy, really solid player. So you know,
we a lot of people to root for and everyone
(09:37):
I was anti sweating, and anti sweating is very fun.
It's people you really don't want to win. But I'm
very glad that all of my anti sweats are out
of the main event.
Speaker 2 (09:46):
Yeah, Adam Hendrix is when I play against the most
most nice guy, very good player, talking about someone who's
always in the mix, right, he just always somebody who
seems to have have a lot of chips. You know,
it seems to me like I mean, there are a
few pure amateurs or predominantly amateurs left. Right, It does
seem to me as though you are seeing fewer true
(10:08):
blue amateurs when bracelets or reach very long into the
World Series main event, right, like, there were a lot
of big names at various stages of the top one hundred,
two hundred, three hundred, et cetera, as compared to in
years past. I think, you know, I think that means that,
like I think the games are getting tougher. At the
(10:29):
same time, if you are I don't need call Marie
and I kind of quasi professional, like you do have
more resources to study from than ever before. But like
everything else, right, it's becoming like it's becoming more about
who's putting in, putting in the hours, putting in, putting
in the work, and back.
Speaker 1 (10:45):
To me, because this is all about me speaking of
fish and you know, putting in hours, et cetera. I
have a cautionary tale from this week's World Series from
from my play. Yeah, and this is something that we
can that we can all learn from, whether you play
poker or not. You know, Nate, I've written about this
a lot. How you know, I really into focus and
(11:09):
multitasking bad right, and I went against that. And I
was multi tabling two online bracelet events on Sunday when
there were two online bracelet events going on, the three
K high Roller and the Mystery Bounty. And I was
one of the chip leaders in the three K high
Roller with over eighty big lines. I was in seventh place,
and I had eleven big lines in the Mystery Bounty.
(11:32):
And I went all in in the Mystery Bounty with
a six OFFT suit and then realized that I had
misclicked and went all in in the three K high
Roller with the a six OFFT suit and not the
Mystery Bounty. And I was and I was called by
Pocket Aces and that was the only stack at my
table I actually covered me. I had eighty big lines.
(11:53):
I had eighty biglines. The Pocket Aces had eighty six
big lines. We were two of the biggest stacks in
the tournament. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how you
absolutely torched three thousand dollars on fire. I just I've
never done that before. It has never happened to me.
And I was just I was mortified. I was like,
oh my god, how did I do that? And then
(12:14):
I also imagined the person tagging my profile right online,
I'm being like donkey fish like shoves eighty big lines
over and open with a six opsuit. The funny thing
is that would have actually gotten through like ninety nine
percent of the time. This person just happened to have
pocket aces. But yeah, so so that was a major
(12:35):
mis click. Don't multitask people, It's not a good idea. No.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
Look. One thing you notice is that as you get
deeper in these events and you and maybe deeper in
the series, people are more fatigued. Right, You notice more
puns like avoiding a pun?
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Did do you think that was a punt?
Speaker 2 (12:57):
A certain type of punt. It's a point caused by
fatigue or inattendants. I suppose right.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
The windows had changed places that in my defense, so
so they.
Speaker 2 (13:08):
Use like the wrunk place or something or like I
barely should But.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
No, I don't. I don't you can change I don't
even know how to do that. I think you can
change the felt of all your tables, but I don't
know if you can change the felt of just one.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
Yeah, I like if I when I have barely been
playing online anymore. When I do, I will use different colors.
Give me visual cues. But yeah, look, I think and
I've misclicked in real life too, you know, put out
the wrong chip and and things like that. I think
only I had like one or two of those and
four or five weeks this year, which is for me
(13:41):
pretty good, right. But no, I mean, I know I
went on of the main event and a blaze a glory,
I triple blarow, bluffed with the combo draw. I think
it was a good play. But you know, and even
if you make a misclick, I think you have to
be kind of like butterfly effect as a term pocket
players for some people use for like, everything in the
event's different from the time that you play a hand.
(14:02):
The cards are shuffled differently, you give them back the
dealer differently, right, the random number seat is different online
and so like, well, for sure, I think I think
people make.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
There are lots of Yeah, there are lots of butterfly effects.
Speaker 2 (14:12):
You know.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
Yesterday during the World Poker Tour event that I was playing,
there was one hand where I ended up folding a
big combo draw on the flop. After there was you know,
a bed and a reraise, and I you know, I
just determined that you know, there's no way I'm good
and I'm so basically, I ended up folding and had
I just called, which I was very close to calling,
(14:34):
you know the pod odds we were there, but I
just I ended up folding. It was a big multi
way pot and I actually hit it on the turn,
but I had folded my hand, and I would have
knocked out this incredibly aggressive player who then went on
to build a huge stack. And it's so funny because
I was just thinking back to that hand. I didn't
make a mistake, and you can't think that way, right, Like,
(14:54):
if you made the correct fold, it's okay if you
hit it, Like, you can't think that way. But I
was like, huh, I was actually thinking about the butterfly
effect and kind of downstream effects. I was like, had
I called right, this guy would not have knocked out
all these other players, and so many other people's tournaments
would have been very, very different from that one hand.
And I mean that's true of so many decisions in
(15:16):
life obviously, but in poker you can actually track them.
So it's kind of funny, right in poker, you can track, like,
had this hand played out differently, you know, all of
these other things happen, and I think that that's just
a good to remember and also good not to dwell on, right, Like, yeah,
you know, that's life and that's the nature of randomness.
So yeah, Nate, we can wrap up the World Series,
(15:37):
and we'll wrap up next week after I actually finish
and we know who the main event winner is. Let's
take a break and then switch gears and talk about
something a little bit more serious. So, Nate, the last
(16:04):
few weeks, there's a name that's never really gone away,
but has been a little bit less in the air
and suddenly is back in the spotlight. Jeffrey Epstein.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
Jeffrey Epstein.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
We thought, we thought we were done. We thought we
were done, and we were not done.
Speaker 2 (16:19):
There was a member of the New York State Assembly
named Harvey Epstein who was running in my legislative district.
Speaker 1 (16:24):
That's a little bit of the most talked of fortunate. Okay,
so you know, Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide. I'm going to
put it in quote because we're going to be talking
about conspiracy theories, so I'm going to put it in
in quotation marks. But this is a conspiracy theory that
actually a lot of people believe in he committed suicide
(16:45):
in prison while awaiting trial on various charges of sex trafficking,
et cetera, et cetera. His co conspirator, Gislen Maxwell, is
serving a prison sentence currently, I think twenty years. But
the Epstein files, right, the files that all of this
was built on, clients, video footage, et cetera, et cetera.
(17:06):
There's been talk that this exists, right, that there's like
this treasure trove of data that's been kept secret. And
one of the things that Donald Trump said is, We're
going to bring all these people to justice. We are
going to kind of bring the Epstein files to the light.
We're going to share all of this. And then all
of a sudden, no, there are no there's no there
(17:27):
are no client lists, there's nothing there. We should forget
Jeffrey Epstein. No one cares about him, nothing's going to
be released, and so the statement's completely changed, and so
conspiracy theories are in the air and people think that
there's some massive cover up, and this is one of
those moments. And these moments are incredibly rare. Inn You
and I have talked about this before, where there seem
(17:49):
to be you know, Trump's supporters who are saying, wait, wait,
wait a second, what the hell? Right, we were promised
names and justice for these people who have committed sex
crimes against children, right, what's going on now? Why are
you telling us that there are no names? And so
this is one of those rare moments where people seem
to not be happy on the Republican side as well
(18:12):
as on the Democratic side.
Speaker 2 (18:14):
Yeah, what's a conspiracy theory, Maria in your opinion, Well.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
There are plenty of conspiracy theories in here. I mean,
one of the biggest ones is that, obviously, as Elon
Musk alleged after his falling out with Trump before his
reconciliation with Trump. Although now I think they've fallen out again.
I can't. I can't keep it straining. They're in, they're out,
they're in, they're out. But I think they're out right now.
But Elon Musk alleged Trump's name is in the files,
(18:41):
and not in a good way, because let's uh, let's
just caveat this for a second. So if your name
is in quote unquote the Epstein files, that doesn't actually
mean that you're implicated, right, The Epstein files is just
to catch all name for all of the evidence trial transcripts,
et cetera, et cetera. So you might have been deposed, right,
you might have been giving a statement, you might have
(19:01):
been There's there are a lot of ways your name
can end up in the Epstein files. But what Elon
Musk suggested alleged was that was tied up in it
in not in a deposition way, but in a much
more direct way. And so the biggest conspiracy theory might
be that, you know, Donald Trump does not want these
files released because they implicate him. Right, So that's I
(19:23):
think the biggest conspiracy theory Trump and other people who
are high up in the government.
Speaker 2 (19:28):
I mean, you know, I I'm not sure I love
the term conspiracy theory. It's like a kind of cousin
of misinformation, which is the term I don't like necessarily
and part because like some conspiracy theories like later proved
to be true or plausible, right, I mean, the Lablique
thesis of Covied origins is not generally accepted as the truth.
(19:51):
It's generally accepted though now by the scientific community in
most governments, is a plausible you know, fifty to fifty
or something theory, Right, Things like the Tuskegee experiment or
lower stakes more recent like you know Hunter Biden's laptop.
There's lots of stuff that gets labeled this way, and like,
why wouldn't why shouldn't you be a little suspicious of
(20:11):
whether Epstein really killed himselves? Right? Oh?
Speaker 1 (20:14):
No, I mean that one for sure, that one I
actually am suspicious off as well. I think that a
lot of things get labeled conspiracy theory. I think conspiracy
theory is an incredibly useful term, but it can't get
thrown around on things that it doesn't actually fit. This
is the same argument I make with con artists when
people are like, oh, this is a con artist. That's
a con artist. I'm like, no, you need to be
specific in what a con artist is, right. A con
(20:36):
artist is an incredibly specific term, and you can't start
labeling all people con artists that you disagree with or
that you think our salesmen are, you know, doing something
that you think is a little bit icky, because at
that point, con artist stops meaning anything. And I think
that's the same is true of conspiracy theory. Nate, Have
I told you my favorite conspiracy theory joke about the
jfk assassination, Someone.
Speaker 2 (20:58):
About God or yeah, go tell tell to the audience.
Speaker 1 (21:01):
Yeah, okay, So you know, this guy dies and he's
kind of been an his entire life. He's been obsessed
with the jfk assassination and that's kind of his He
just wants to know. He's been digging and digging and digging.
And he gets to Heaven and he's at the pearly
(21:22):
gates and God says, you know, you have one question,
and I promise to answer it truthfully anything in the
world that you want to know. And he says, okay, yes,
I know exactly what I want to ask. Who killed Kennedy?
And God says, you know, it was Lee Harvey Oswald.
He was acting by himself, there were no co conspirators.
And the guy says, oh man, this thing goes further
(21:45):
up than I thought.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
I've always loved that.
Speaker 1 (21:49):
Yeah, look, I mean it's that joke just absolutely encapsulates
the way that conspiracy theorists' minds work that no matter
what evidence you present, no matter kind of what you
show them, once they believe something, they will go to
the end of the world to prove that that's true.
And you can't bring them out of that conspiratorial frame
(22:12):
of mind. So that's the distinction, right, where with something
like the COVID labliku. By the way, you know, people
were trying to discredit that theory and make it seem
like a conspiracy theory, but you know, as evidence mounted up,
it became less and less plausible to do that. So
(22:33):
you know, you have people on both sides of that,
including people who said it was definitely not a lablak
who did change their minds. So that's kind of a
little bit you know, I think a little bit of
a nuanced difference between before.
Speaker 2 (22:45):
And some of them initially thought it was a lableak
and then changed their mind and then changed their back, right.
I mean, you know, this is a case where it's like, Okay,
what evidence do you have of like people conspiring to
manipulate the evidentiary record. In that case, there was actually
lots of like foid documents and things like that that
seemed to involve discourse. It was like not very scientific. Yeah,
(23:06):
I think one thing you have to like think about
is like who are the alleged co conspirators and how
plausible is it that like that they're all working in
cahoots with what you're.
Speaker 1 (23:18):
Right, absolutely absolutely. I think I think that when you're
looking at conspiracy theories, one of the questions you have
to ask, and this is something that I think we
talk about a lot on the show, is incentives. Right,
what are the incentives here? Who has the incentive to
kind of cover this up? Is? Is it plausible? Right?
And why?
Speaker 2 (23:38):
Right?
Speaker 1 (23:38):
So, in the case of something like the COVID lovel Yeah,
the incentive structure was bad, and it was so that
makes it much more likely. In the case of a
JFK assassination, No, I mean, I'm sorry, Like, the incentive
structure was very different, right, it was the assassination of
a president. Like, everyone's incentives are aligned to try to
figure out what the hell happened. So, you know, those
(23:59):
are two incredibly different situations. Now, in the case of
something like Jeffrey Epstein the Epstein Files, it can get money, right,
because it's become clear that a lot of incredibly powerful
people were involved for years in what in Epstein's antics.
Speaker 2 (24:16):
I mean, I've never really thought much about the Jeffrey
Epstein story until this Trump angle, I guess, right. I mean, look,
I do think on a basic level, when like when
people promised to reveal information and then a very circumspect
about it later. Then that's a very reasonable plug. You know,
if a guy my age wearing a hat probably not
(24:36):
that much underneath. Right, it's not a conspiracy theory. It's
like inference, human inference that normal people would make. Yeah,
And I mean it's like.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
By the way, we do have evidence. But with Jeffrey
Epstein that he there was tons of evidence against him,
and very powerful forces blocked it from coming to trial
many many times until it finally did in twenty nineteen. Right,
there were a lot of attempts to prosecute him, a
lot of attempts to bring him to justice, and they
never went anywhere. So we know that there were a
lot of very powerful forces on his side for a
(25:07):
very very long time. So that's more evidence, just like
your hat night.
Speaker 2 (25:10):
And I guess as I've gotten like older and a
bit wealthier, like I do think that, like you know,
powerful people, the circles are kind of small, I mean,
extremely powerful people, right, the circles are kind of small.
They kind of all know one another. Right. They can
be kind of high on their own supply or unscrupulous
(25:31):
in different ways, I think, Right, like, yeah, I don't know,
and you as to see when they fail, right, Like
in New York, we have a lot of rich people
who are very unhappy as a Roun Mamdanni who won
the primary, and are very unhappy that like all the
alternatives to him suck and have been rejected by voters,
and they are powerless. It's kind of fun to watch it, Like, no,
(25:53):
there's not really any toil. Let's get a right in
on the ballot. You can't really get people off the ballot,
but yeah, it's funny when the perfectable can't control everything.
Speaker 1 (26:02):
Yeah, no, I mean with this specific administration, given how
much information manipulation has to in place. I always you know,
I hate like because I'm so against conspiracy theory like thinking,
and I think it's such a pernicious kind of way
that our minds work because people are very susceptible, and
(26:25):
some people more than others. But our minds do get
susceptible to kind of conspiracy theory like thinking, because there's
a lot of things going on cognitively, right, Like the
human brain loves to see patterns, right, and loves to
find patterns where patterns don't exist. You know, it's something
that like we always do, or patterns seeking animals, and
that manifests themself in all sorts of ways. We like
(26:47):
cause and effect, right, we don't like uncertainty. We like
to tell stories. So there are all of these things
that predispose us to kind of falling for conspiracy's cognitive dissonance.
You know. That's kind of one of the original, kind
of original theories that explains a lot of conspiracy thinking
with Leon Festinger back in nineteen fifty. Now, I'm sure
(27:07):
you know this very famous story, right, the Alien cult
the Seekers. There was a woman, Dorothy Martin, who communicated
with alien civilizations, and she had a date that you know,
aliens were going to come and take all of these
faithful people with her. That everyone believed her. You know,
there was this big cult. The day came and went
(27:29):
and there were no aliens, and then she's like, oh,
you know, we got the dates wrong in this rod
and the cult didn't fall apart, right, They still believed her, right,
They were like, oh, okay, you know she's not lying.
She really does communicate. It was just other stuff and
you explain everything away. And that was kind of one
of the original manifestations that was studied in a serious
(27:49):
way about how the human brain is just capable of
just dismissing everything right and just telling its own story.
So this is all kind of a big aside to
say that I am very much against. As soon as
something is like a conspiracy theory, I want to try
to debunk it, right. But then sometimes you find yourself
(28:10):
being like, Okay, well this is what we were talking about,
Like with the COVID LABLA immediately I was like, no,
this seems actually like it might be plausible, right, Like
even back then, I was like, why are we dismissing
this right away? We have no evidence. There's so much uncertainty,
there's so much unknown, there's so much ambiguity. How can
you know for sure it was one or the other? Right?
You need to as a scientist, you need to entertain
(28:31):
all the possibilities before you get more evidence. And with
the Epstein files, like I actually have the same feeling
like wait, like why are we dismissing it one way
or the other? Like we need more evidence, we need
to know what's going on. And if you look at
the incentive structures, like I don't know, the incentive structures
are all out of whack here. Right, Maybe there's nothing there,
(28:52):
but maybe there is, And we can't just dismiss it.
We can't just say it's a conspiracy theory. Like it's
one of these things where there is this cloud of
uncertainty and ambiguity that hampers accurate decision making, accurate decision assessment.
And those are the moments where we need to be
careful and entertain all sides and not dismiss anyone as
conspiracy theorists as much as I hate to say it.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
Yeah, I take an even more obvious example. You know,
there was a conspiracy I'll use that term among senior
White House officials to cover up Joe Biden's cognitive decline. Right,
And you would be called lots of names if you
kind of pointed that out. And there's an example of
where it was a very small circle, right, I mean,
like sometimes the signs of this are like pretty obvious, right, Like,
(29:35):
it seems like there's got to be some politically inconvenient
angle for Trump somewhere in the Epstein vials, right, don't
know if it's him, or when it's associates, or if
it's minor or super major or whatever else. Right, But
like that's the not just the reasonable for, but the
correct probabilistic inference from from something like that happening.
Speaker 1 (29:53):
Yeah, so I think given how all of a sudden,
you know, the total about face that we have from
the administration, that's just like one eighty. And this administration
pulls one eighties all the time right on very stupid things.
So in and of itself, it's kind of meaningless, but
there is a signal in there as well, because every
time they pull a one eighty, it's for politically expedient purposes. Right,
(30:15):
So when they pull one eighties on tariffs, when they
pull one eighties on immigration or whatever it is, it's
always because of some politically expedient reason. And so what
the easiest explanation here is that there's another politically expedient
reason why they all of a sudden say that there's
no information, there's nothing to be had, there's nothing to
be gained, and let's move on, and nobody cares about Epstein.
(30:38):
So political expedience is always and what's good for Trump, right,
what's good for number one is always the top reason.
And we've seen that his entire administration is very happy
to go along with whatever that is.
Speaker 2 (30:48):
There's a three percent chance that Jeffrey Epstein is found
alive this year by deciding first coordinated polymarket Polymarke, are
you taking me under or the over? I'm taking the
under on that about a little one percent taking me
(31:10):
under on that.
Speaker 1 (31:12):
Although I did just you know, I'm still in Vegas.
I did just see Elvis on the streets.
Speaker 2 (31:16):
So okay, you know, so you never know, people come back.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
From the dad all the time.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
By the way, I'm a paid advisor to Polly Market,
you know, like the where they mentioned like the health
symptoms like really fast, Like I'm a Polly Market. It's
just like compress that in. We should compress that in
for all future episodes. But I do. I do, uh
work with them and receive income for that. Who's the
comedian who people say isn't dead. I don't remember Andy Kaufman.
(31:42):
Andy Kaufen Yah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
Yeah, Andy Kaufman. Yeap, Yes, that is correct. There are
lots of people, you know, Jimmy Hoffa might pop up
at any moment, although I think Jimmy hoff is probably
on the bottom of Lake Mead or in the desert somewhere.
But yeah, there are lots of people who might come
back to life, but conspiracy theories, you know, they're they're
here to stay, were incredibly susceptible to them. In general,
(32:05):
we hear on Risky Business, do not endorse conspiracy theory
like thinking, but you need to learn how to separate
things that you know are actual conspiracy theories from people
voicing opinions that could be labeled conspiracy theories because someone
thinks it's inconvenient and it's a nuanced distinction, and it's
(32:26):
very difficult to make it accurately because some people would say, well,
you know jfk assassination, people are incentivized against me. Well, no,
like you, you really do need to look at the
actual incentives and try to be a little bit more
rational about that to try to make those determinations.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
People will use the phrase like no evidence, right, and
that can be a loaded phrase.
Speaker 1 (32:49):
Right.
Speaker 2 (32:49):
No evidence often means no proof. But in many of
these mysteries, nothing is firmly proven, Like you know, on
the COVID origins, nothing's been firmly proven for example, right,
and so like, So take on different valances when it's
a liberal or conservative cause. What can be frustrating with
(33:10):
certain types of stories. It's like, you know, who do
I really trust to report on like the Epstein case.
I'm not quite I'm not quite sure. I'm not I'm
not sure. If I devoided to vote a week, if
I decide to like become semi obsessed with the Epstein case,
I don't know what I conclude.
Speaker 1 (33:29):
Right.
Speaker 2 (33:29):
It's one of those things that like you almost have
to turn up the news coverage because it's like, Okay,
do I want to go down a rabbit hole here
and like whose claims are trustworthy? And who's a grifter
and and who's not? And that can be that can
be difficult. Let's take a quick break, and when we return,
how will the Epstein rift affect Trump's coalition? Look, I
(34:09):
think the political implications are interesting. It's maybe the closest
we've gotten to like for the MAGA base where this
is an issue where I mean Trump campaigned at various
times on opening up the Epstein files, right, and like,
so you actually see in the MAGA world, or at
least according to these people who interact with it more
than I do, you actually do see some descent. Trump
(34:32):
got ratio that means a negative response on his own
social media platform, like truth social and so it's interesting, right,
It's interesting. It's a popcorn kind of sitting on the
sideline story for me.
Speaker 1 (34:45):
Yeah, so I'm actually, I'm actually this is something that
we haven't talked about yet. But I'm curious about your
thoughts on potential since this is like a popcorn story.
Do you think it's a popcorn story for Trump's base
or do you think it might have some more lasting impact.
So at the beginning, I kind of implied that a
lot of Trump supporters are not happy right with this,
(35:08):
about with this particular about face, right that they were
promised that, you know, there'd be justice and the Epstein files,
and now they're told no Epstein files, and they're like,
what's going on? You know, we want these child sex
criminals brought to justice. We've seen you know, a lot
of quote unquote rifts in Trump's base that then disappear
because then they're like, no, no, okay, fine, we love
(35:31):
we love Donald Trump and everything's going to be fine.
Do you think that this one has potential to be
more lasting or do you think it's also going to
be a blip and then all of the Trump supporters
are going to recoalesce and forget all about it and
move on. Because, as we've already talked about many many
times on the show, memory short and people love Trump.
Speaker 2 (35:51):
One thing I not is like the incentives are a
little bit different now that Trump no longer has anything
to run for. This is, unless he's trying to violent
the constitution. I guess could run for any non president office.
It could become, you know, mayor of New York, mayor
primaries or un or whatever. Right, I sh wouldn't be
a primary, most.
Speaker 1 (36:07):
Likely mayor of New York.
Speaker 2 (36:09):
No, no, no, no, uh. It could be a win win, right,
Maybe you get him out of the presidency. Maybe Bill
Lackman's like, I know a guy, He's a smart businessman, right,
politically moderate, you know, well known celebrity entrepreneur, right real
estate magnate. Donald Trump writing campaign for mayor of New York. Sorry,
(36:31):
what which question, Maria?
Speaker 1 (36:33):
No, look gonna how's this gonna work out for? Do
we think that this is actually going to have any
sort of lasting impact on the Trump based on his coalitionhow? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (36:42):
Looky?
Speaker 1 (36:42):
Is it gonna fizzle out? Again?
Speaker 2 (36:45):
I think it could be a little self for as
Trump gets more unpopular and gets further removed from the
election and does have another election. I think you could
see like people on the right more willing to challenge
him potentially, Right, they got their big beautiful bill pass,
a lot of us being done through executive order. Otherwise,
like not like there's that much good to go on
through Congress if his siplitical standing is is damaged or
(37:06):
I don't know, I'm not like one of these like
right wing group check whisper types exactly. It seems just
in the news coverage that like that you are seeing
rifts that you haven't seen before.
Speaker 1 (37:17):
It does seem that way, And I'm actually I'm going
to be very curious to watch this because one of
the phenomena that we've talked about and that we've observed
many times here is that so far there has been
nothing lasting right. So far, there have been no rifts
that have actually become rifts in that kind of maga
(37:37):
core coalition. Right. We've seen we've seen moments where we're like, oh,
like are people going to turn against Trump for this? Oh,
are they going to turn against Trump for this? And
it hasn't happened. Right, They've kind of forgotten and they've
told the story in different ways cognitive dissonance dissonance reduction
at its best. You know, the aliens are still coming.
It's just the date has changed. But it does like
(38:00):
right now, at least in this stage of the news cycle.
And it's so you know, it's so tough to know
how this will play out long term, but it does
seem like this might be like it might be building
up right, And maybe that's just wishful thinking. I have
no idea, but I'm very, very curious to see how
it will turn out and whether this is a breaking
(38:20):
point or not. You know, I would I would probably
take the or not side of that bet, just because
that's the way that you know, historically it's it's played out.
I think that you know, in a few weeks we'll
look back at the segment and laugh and say, yeah,
of course, everyone's forgotten all about it. But as of now,
it seems like there is at least a non zero
chance that this might have some lasting coalition changes, especially
(38:45):
as other people might start rising up to try to
not challenge Trump but establish themselves as people who might
kind of be party leaders going forward. As we get
deeper into the presidency, closer to the midterm elections closer
to other incentives that might matter to the electorate.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
Right, I think I've thought enough about Jeffrey Episteine for
your day. You want to call the show, Let's do it.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
Thanks everyone for following along. Good luck everyone.
Speaker 2 (39:13):
Like the world series of Poker of this podcast is ending,
not permanently this episode, yes, just for the week, just
for the week.
Speaker 1 (39:23):
Yeah, let us know what you think of the show.
Reach out to us at Risky Business at pushkin dot fm.
And by the way, if you're a Pushkin Plus subscriber,
we have some bonus content for you that's coming up
right after the credits.
Speaker 2 (39:41):
And if you're not subscribing yet, consider signing up for
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you get access to all that premium content and ad
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Speaker 1 (39:53):
Risky Business is hosted by me Maria Kannakova.
Speaker 2 (39:56):
And by me Nate Silver. The show is a co
production of Pushkin Industries and iHeartMedia. This episode was produced
by Isabelle Carter. Our associate producer is Sonia Gerwit. Sally
Helm is our editor, and our executive producer is Jacob gold.
Scene mixing by Sarah Bruguer.
Speaker 1 (40:12):
Thanks so much for tuning in mm HM
Hosts And Creators
Maria Konnikova
Nate Silver
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