📄 Extracted Text (36,799 words)
[00:00:05] All right, Michael, we're getting ready
[00:00:06] to start the big interview here, but we
[00:00:08] have this we have this segment we do
[00:00:10] before the big interview called the hot
[00:00:13] question. So, here we go. In World War
[00:00:16] II, the trigger was visible. September
[00:00:19] 1st, 1939, and the world had a line you
[00:00:23] could point to. Today there are, excuse
[00:00:26] me, today there may never be a single
[00:00:28] invasion moment because everything is
[00:00:31] being weaponized at once. Narratives,
[00:00:33] markets, technology, supply chains, and
[00:00:37] domestic division with psychological
[00:00:39] warfare coming from outside and from
[00:00:42] within.
[00:00:45] Excuse me. So, here's the question. Are
[00:00:48] we watching the modern version of the
[00:00:50] 1930s where pressure campaigns and
[00:00:53] propaganda set the conditions until a
[00:00:55] major war becomes unavoidable?
[00:00:57] And if so, what are the clearest World
[00:01:00] War II era parallels you see playing out
[00:01:03] in real time right now?
[00:01:05] >> Wow,
[00:01:06] that's that's quite the question. Um,
[00:01:10] I'm actually going to take it back a
[00:01:13] war.
[00:01:13] >> Okay. uh before World War I,
[00:01:17] >> all historial historians would say the
[00:01:19] world was a tinder box. It was ready to
[00:01:21] go,
[00:01:22] >> right? And then you had the
[00:01:24] assassination of Archduke Ferdinand and
[00:01:27] that kind of kicked everything off,
[00:01:28] right?
[00:01:30] Even more than in 1939. 1939, Hitler
[00:01:33] invaded Poland and people were on edge.
[00:01:36] But in World War I, even more than that,
[00:01:39] there was more going on that the whole
[00:01:41] world was on edge, right, and ready to
[00:01:43] go.
[00:01:45] I frequently when I'm talking to my
[00:01:47] wife, I'm saying, you know, the world
[00:01:48] right now is a tinder box. Everybody is
[00:01:51] on the edge of their seat waiting to see
[00:01:53] what's going to happen.
[00:01:54] >> Mhm.
[00:01:55] >> I see massive parallels to before World
[00:01:58] War I. I think we are more of a
[00:02:01] tinderbox than we were before World War
[00:02:04] II.
[00:02:05] World War II,
[00:02:07] there was still a possibility for
[00:02:10] diplomacy and some actions that could
[00:02:13] have been taken that may have forstalled
[00:02:16] a world war. World War I, everybody was
[00:02:19] so ready to jump in that it was almost a
[00:02:23] foregone conclusion. So, having said
[00:02:25] that,
[00:02:27] yeah, I see a lot of parallels right
[00:02:29] now. Um, information is a huge area of
[00:02:33] warfare.
[00:02:35] um the way information is disseminated,
[00:02:38] how it's disseminated, who it's
[00:02:39] disseminated to is pitting people
[00:02:42] against each other. In the US, I think
[00:02:45] we are more divided than we've ever
[00:02:47] been. It's us versus them and we talk at
[00:02:51] each other instead of with each other.
[00:02:54] I think internationally
[00:02:57] um we are
[00:02:59] not just us. Everybody is starting to
[00:03:03] position and for those of us who are a
[00:03:06] little bit older and played the game of
[00:03:07] risk where you used to like put things
[00:03:10] on a board and figure out where you're
[00:03:12] going to get power and get ready. I'm
[00:03:15] seeing all of the pieces moving around
[00:03:20] and it scares me. What what exactly are
[00:03:23] you seeing as far as is pieces moving
[00:03:26] around in in strategic locations? I
[00:03:28] mean, we've we've been talking about
[00:03:29] Greenland. We've been talking about
[00:03:31] Panama. Yep.
[00:03:32] >> China, Taiwan situation, Russia,
[00:03:34] Ukraine,
[00:03:35] >> right?
[00:03:35] >> Now, Venezuela, right?
[00:03:37] >> I don't know if that's a strategic
[00:03:38] location other than oil.
[00:03:41] >> I think it's it's strategic not only for
[00:03:43] oil. A lot of people are saying, "Hey,
[00:03:45] it's oil, right?" And it is
[00:03:47] >> largest oil reserves in the world,
[00:03:48] right? It's also a positioning maneuver.
[00:03:51] It's positioning the US as we can do
[00:03:55] what we want, where we want, when we
[00:03:57] want,
[00:03:58] >> and we have power. And it's kind of
[00:03:59] putting everybody else on notice.
[00:04:01] >> I mean, I don't feel like that's a new
[00:04:03] thing.
[00:04:04] >> What's that?
[00:04:04] >> I don't feel like that's a new thing.
[00:04:06] >> It's not, but it's never been so overt.
[00:04:09] We're more in the open with it now. I
[00:04:11] think before we were a little more
[00:04:13] subtle. When when is before we talking
[00:04:16] pre World War I or we talking
[00:04:18] >> No, no, actually I would say Yeah. It's
[00:04:20] funny because in in my book I detail a
[00:04:23] number of countries that we've done this
[00:04:25] to.
[00:04:26] >> Mhm.
[00:04:26] >> Um and it's not new. We
[00:04:31] we started, you know, back in the
[00:04:33] SpanishAmerican War and then in Haiti
[00:04:36] and in Nicaragua and in Honduras, you
[00:04:39] know, we've been doing this for a while.
[00:04:41] I feel like now it it's being because of
[00:04:44] information. The internet is great for
[00:04:48] getting information out, but it's also
[00:04:50] great for getting selective information
[00:04:52] out, if you will.
[00:04:54] >> Right now, the way that things are
[00:04:57] happening, more people are aware of
[00:05:00] what's happening and we have to be
[00:05:03] careful about the way it's being spun in
[00:05:04] the narrative. when we, for example, we
[00:05:08] helped uh Panama secede from Colombia,
[00:05:13] right?
[00:05:15] Yeah. Not Colombia. Yeah. Um
[00:05:20] when we did that, how many people know
[00:05:22] right now if you talk to people and say,
[00:05:23] "Well, Panama's always been a country,
[00:05:25] right?" No, it hasn't. We help them
[00:05:28] declare independence and then we put
[00:05:31] warships off of the east and west coast
[00:05:33] to make sure that they maintained it
[00:05:34] because we wanted control of the whole
[00:05:36] canal area.
[00:05:38] >> That information is lost but and even at
[00:05:42] the time not that many people knew it
[00:05:43] unless you read it in a newspaper
[00:05:45] somewhere. Now we're live casting
[00:05:49] from Venezuela. We're live casting from
[00:05:52] Ukraine. We're live casting from Gaza.
[00:05:56] you know, the information is out there
[00:05:59] so fast and unfiltered
[00:06:02] and then you've got people coming in and
[00:06:04] trying to filter it and spin to a
[00:06:06] narrative, right? I think this creates a
[00:06:10] whole different battleground, if you
[00:06:13] will. Um,
[00:06:16] because now
[00:06:18] people can't just trust their government
[00:06:19] to say, "Well, you guys have the
[00:06:21] information. I'll trust you're doing the
[00:06:23] right thing." They're looking at, hey, I
[00:06:25] just saw this on the news. What are you
[00:06:27] doing?
[00:06:28] >> Does that make sense?
[00:06:30] >> Yeah, it makes perfect sense. They don't
[00:06:32] know how to deal with it.
[00:06:33] >> They They don't. And quite honestly, um
[00:06:38] you and I have seen things in warfare,
[00:06:40] you more than I.
[00:06:42] We're broadcasting it into people's
[00:06:45] living rooms now.
[00:06:46] >> Mhm.
[00:06:47] And I I think we're we're causing PTSD
[00:06:51] in the human population from seeing
[00:06:54] this.
[00:06:56] And that has its own set of issues and
[00:06:59] its own set of consequences.
[00:07:02] Yeah. What what other parallels are you
[00:07:06] seeing?
[00:07:09] Was
[00:07:12] the country this div I I mean was the
[00:07:14] country this divided before World War I?
[00:07:17] Was that is that a parallel? I
[00:07:21] >> not as much. And now we're going to I'm
[00:07:23] going to skip all over.
[00:07:25] >> Not as much not as divided as much as in
[00:07:27] World War I as it was prior to World War
[00:07:29] II. Um, remember right before we entered
[00:07:34] World War II, before uh Pearl Harbor,
[00:07:39] we were very divided on whether or not
[00:07:40] we should enter the war. A lot of people
[00:07:42] were isolationist and like, hey, let's
[00:07:44] just stay out of it, not our war, right?
[00:07:46] Other people were, no, we have to go
[00:07:48] help. Uh, Pearl Harbor kind of
[00:07:51] galvanized everyone together under one
[00:07:54] opinion that, hey, we got to go. We were
[00:07:57] attacked. We're going right for all the
[00:08:00] right reasons.
[00:08:02] I see I haven't seen though. I think we
[00:08:06] are more divided right now than I have
[00:08:08] seen or that I have noticed in history.
[00:08:13] Um we're very partisan now.
[00:08:16] >> Mhm. I mean I look we're going to get
[00:08:19] deep into some things here.
[00:08:21] I kind of trace that back personally. I
[00:08:24] trace it back to mid80s.
[00:08:28] Uh N. Gingrich
[00:08:30] was one of the first ones in our
[00:08:32] Congress that started looking at
[00:08:34] political parties as warfare
[00:08:37] and started saying you know we have to
[00:08:39] treat this as warfare right we have to
[00:08:42] attack the enemy we have to overcome
[00:08:44] right
[00:08:46] and he wasn't he didn't have um a
[00:08:49] monopoly on that but that before that
[00:08:52] even though there were arguments in
[00:08:54] Congress it seemed that people were more
[00:08:56] willing to negotiate and say we both
[00:09:00] agree on the same outcome. We just agree
[00:09:04] on how disagree on how we should get
[00:09:06] there.
[00:09:08] Today I don't see that willingness.
[00:09:12] I see it as more as those people are bad
[00:09:16] >> and we hate them and we don't want to
[00:09:19] believe anything they say and we're
[00:09:20] good. And then four years later it's
[00:09:23] like well those people are bad and we
[00:09:26] don't agree with them, right? And we try
[00:09:28] and undo
[00:09:29] everything instead of building on what
[00:09:32] has happened before. Every four years we
[00:09:34] try and undo what they did.
[00:09:36] >> Right? And you you can't do that and
[00:09:39] move forward. I mean, think about it in
[00:09:41] business. How would a business do that
[00:09:43] where every time you changed a a
[00:09:46] department head?
[00:09:46] >> No. It'd be destroyed.
[00:09:47] >> They wanted to come in. Yeah. I'm going
[00:09:48] to undo everything they did. I mean,
[00:09:50] we're we're I mean, even we're talking
[00:09:53] about people moving chess pieces on the
[00:09:56] board all over the world, you know, and
[00:09:58] I mean, we just saw with Afghanistan. I
[00:10:01] mean, China is a huge threat. We gave up
[00:10:03] Bram, super strategic location for a
[00:10:07] potential conflict with China and we
[00:10:10] [ __ ] gave it up
[00:10:11] >> and now we got this guy in, he wants it
[00:10:14] back, you know, and it's it's I just
[00:10:17] it's like we're two separate. It's like
[00:10:20] we're two
[00:10:22] It's like we're two different countries.
[00:10:24] So, it is
[00:10:25] >> it's like we're a schizophrenic country.
[00:10:27] >> It is. It is. And it it's gotten to the
[00:10:30] point I love debating things with
[00:10:32] people.
[00:10:34] And I am the consumate devil's advocate.
[00:10:38] >> Whatever you're going to tell me, I'm
[00:10:40] going to argue the other point. I may
[00:10:42] not believe the other point, but I want
[00:10:45] to argue it if nothing else than to just
[00:10:47] sharpen my own understanding. like I
[00:10:49] want to hear. I I want to learn. I want
[00:10:51] to hear what have you got.
[00:10:53] >> Mhm.
[00:10:53] >> Right. Because that helps me understand.
[00:10:57] I don't see a lot of that happening
[00:10:59] today. A lot of it is just
[00:11:02] as soon as you hear something you don't
[00:11:04] like, you just say, "I don't believe
[00:11:06] that. Fake news, conspiracy theory, not
[00:11:10] true. Not even going to consider it."
[00:11:14] Well, what if it's not not true? You've
[00:11:18] got to at least consider it and think
[00:11:20] about it.
[00:11:22] And if there's one thing I think I've
[00:11:24] learned in life is perspective is
[00:11:26] everything.
[00:11:28] I've sat on a number of juries in my
[00:11:31] life and it's fascinating where the
[00:11:35] prosecution comes in and they give their
[00:11:36] opening statement and you're thinking,
[00:11:39] "Oh, this this person's guilty of sin.
[00:11:41] Mhm.
[00:11:42] >> There's no way, right? We can just stop
[00:11:45] the trial right now. He's guilty. And
[00:11:48] then the defense attorney comes in and
[00:11:50] tells you the same thing, but using
[00:11:51] different words. You're like, "Oh, he's
[00:11:53] absolutely innocent."
[00:11:55] It's all how you spin it and how you
[00:11:58] approach it, which a large part of my
[00:12:00] book is about. It's about
[00:12:03] how Americans live in information
[00:12:05] bubbles.
[00:12:05] >> Mhm.
[00:12:06] >> Right. We don't see all of the
[00:12:08] information and then we make choices on
[00:12:11] partial information
[00:12:13] and that leads to bad choices.
[00:12:15] >> I don't even know if it's possible to
[00:12:17] get all the information anymore with the
[00:12:18] way the algorithms are set up and put
[00:12:20] you in a cage, right?
[00:12:21] >> It would be I mean I I just I don't even
[00:12:24] know if it's a possibility.
[00:12:25] >> I agree.
[00:12:27] >> And then you have to sift through all
[00:12:29] the [ __ ]
[00:12:30] >> whether it's mainstream media or social
[00:12:32] media.
[00:12:34] And one of the techniques of keeping
[00:12:37] people confused is overloading them.
[00:12:39] They don't have time.
[00:12:41] >> Who has time
[00:12:43] >> to sift through all of this? So what you
[00:12:45] do is you find somebody that you think
[00:12:48] sifts through it and you listen to them.
[00:12:51] >> Y
[00:12:52] >> right. That's dangerous.
[00:12:54] >> Yep.
[00:12:55] >> Um because you never re-evaluate once
[00:12:59] you've made your decision and said, "I
[00:13:01] trust this person." You don't go back
[00:13:03] and go, "Do I still trust this person?"
[00:13:05] Right? Am I going to re-evaluate? You
[00:13:07] just you buy what they say. Yeah. Right.
[00:13:09] And they have ulterior motives as well.
[00:13:12] I'm going to do a a a gratus plug, if
[00:13:16] you will. Um I use a an app called
[00:13:21] Ground News that I I love.
[00:13:24] >> Uh I found it. I'm always looking for a
[00:13:26] news aggregator to get as much news as I
[00:13:28] can because I want it from different
[00:13:30] places.
[00:13:32] Ground News does that and they I love it
[00:13:36] because they say here's a here's a
[00:13:38] headline.
[00:13:40] Here's the bias bar. 20% of the
[00:13:43] left-wing newspapers are covering this.
[00:13:47] 50% of the right-wing are covering this.
[00:13:50] So, you're going to get more right-wing
[00:13:51] coverage than leftwing.
[00:13:53] Then they have this has been in 44
[00:13:57] newspapers. Here they all are on a graph
[00:14:00] of where those newspapers generally lie.
[00:14:05] Choose which one you want to read
[00:14:07] and we'll give you an overview, but you
[00:14:10] can choose and see what kind of bias
[00:14:12] you're going to get when you read this.
[00:14:14] >> Interesting.
[00:14:14] >> I'm like, well, that's nice.
[00:14:17] And I'll typically on on kind of hard
[00:14:20] charging issues, I'll pick the most
[00:14:23] right-wing one and the most leftwing one
[00:14:25] I can and read both articles and kind of
[00:14:27] see, okay, what do we where are we?
[00:14:30] What's going on?
[00:14:30] >> Yeah, there's another
[00:14:33] site called Real News No [ __ ]
[00:14:36] >> Oh, yeah.
[00:14:37] >> You might want to check that one out.
[00:14:38] It's pretty good, too.
[00:14:39] >> I've had the uh I've had them on.
[00:14:42] >> Yeah.
[00:14:42] >> So,
[00:14:43] >> people are trying.
[00:14:44] >> They are. They are trying.
[00:14:47] >> Even some politicians are trying.
[00:14:49] >> Some,
[00:14:49] >> not very many.
[00:14:50] >> I I got to tell you, I saw the most
[00:14:53] interesting ad the other day and I think
[00:14:56] it was
[00:14:59] God, I think it was governor of
[00:15:01] Wisconsin. Are they reelecting one? No
[00:15:04] idea. I forgot.
[00:15:07] But both of the candidates
[00:15:10] came on together and said, "We need to
[00:15:13] improve. here's what needs to improve.
[00:15:16] And they both looked at each other and
[00:15:17] went, "Right." And they both went,
[00:15:18] "Yeah." And one guy said, "I think we
[00:15:21] can best improve by doing it this way."
[00:15:24] The other guy said, "I think we can best
[00:15:26] improve by doing it this way."
[00:15:29] >> And he said, "Wow." And one guy said, "I
[00:15:30] hope you vote for me and I hope you
[00:15:32] agree." The other one said, "I hope you
[00:15:33] vote for me and hope you agree." And
[00:15:35] they looked at each other and said,
[00:15:36] >> "When did this happen?"
[00:15:37] >> And they said, "We approve this
[00:15:39] message." I'm like,
[00:15:40] >> "Oh my god."
[00:15:41] >> Wow. Holy [ __ ] This is what politics
[00:15:44] should be.
[00:15:45] >> Yeah.
[00:15:46] >> Disagree on how you're going to get
[00:15:47] there, but let's agree on what we need
[00:15:50] to do.
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[00:17:38] There's a follow-up question here. Do
[00:17:40] you think we are being herded into World
[00:17:42] War II?
[00:17:45] >> Feels that way.
[00:17:46] >> It sure does, doesn't it?
[00:17:48] >> Absolutely does.
[00:17:50] >> When you look at everything going on,
[00:17:54] the outlook does not look good.
[00:17:57] Um,
[00:18:00] when I was a pilot,
[00:18:02] we talked about chain of events.
[00:18:05] Whenever there was a mishap, when
[00:18:07] something happened, it didn't happen in
[00:18:10] a vacuum.
[00:18:12] An event happened, but you look back and
[00:18:15] you're like, well, before that,
[00:18:17] this aircraft had a maintenance issue.
[00:18:20] The pilot had a flat tire on the way to
[00:18:23] the the squadron that day, right? The
[00:18:27] other pilot had was in a fight the night
[00:18:30] before. You know, um you go back and you
[00:18:34] see a chain of events and we were
[00:18:36] trained to start noticing those. Notice
[00:18:40] when you see a chain starting to form
[00:18:42] and break it, it's okay to come in and
[00:18:45] say, "Hey, someone else needs to take
[00:18:47] this flight because I see this
[00:18:49] happening."
[00:18:51] And if I just extrapolate,
[00:18:53] it's not going to end up in a good spot.
[00:18:55] I see a chain of events happening right
[00:18:58] now.
[00:18:59] I It It worries me. It worries me a lot
[00:19:04] because
[00:19:06] not because the chain is forming and I
[00:19:09] don't think I'm the only one to see it.
[00:19:10] I think a lot of people are feeling
[00:19:11] uncomfortable.
[00:19:13] The thing that worries me is that the
[00:19:15] people that should be able to break that
[00:19:18] chain are not.
[00:19:20] >> Would you say they're escalating it?
[00:19:22] >> I would actually.
[00:19:24] >> How so?
[00:19:25] >> If you look at world events right now, I
[00:19:27] mean, was there a reason for for Russia
[00:19:29] to invade Ukraine right now? Are we
[00:19:32] talking about bombing Iran right now?
[00:19:35] Are we
[00:19:37] toppling the government in Venezuela
[00:19:39] right now? Talking about Greenland right
[00:19:41] now? I mean, if you look back, there are
[00:19:45] so many things happening right now.
[00:19:47] >> Mhm.
[00:19:48] >> It's hard not to put those together and
[00:19:50] say it's building, it's escalating.
[00:19:55] >> I'm with you. I just
[00:19:58] I try to look for something positive and
[00:20:02] I can't find it. So, I I don't know if
[00:20:06] the
[00:20:08] world had less activity
[00:20:12] 25 years ago or not because I wasn't
[00:20:14] paying attention. I was I just wasn't
[00:20:16] old enough to give a [ __ ]
[00:20:17] >> Yeah.
[00:20:17] >> And um so I don't know, you know, if
[00:20:21] this is
[00:20:24] >> more escalation than what we've seen,
[00:20:27] you know,
[00:20:28] >> I think it is. It feels like it.
[00:20:30] >> It It does. Um
[00:20:34] when I look back, same same thing,
[00:20:36] right? When you're young, you don't
[00:20:37] notice a lot of stuff going on.
[00:20:39] >> Mhm.
[00:20:40] >> But you start to and then you think back
[00:20:43] and you can go back and research and go,
[00:20:46] was there ever this much stuff going on?
[00:20:50] And I would say, not to this degree of
[00:20:54] number and not to this intensity.
[00:20:57] There's a lot going on
[00:21:00] >> and I
[00:21:02] something has to change. Either we end
[00:21:06] up in a world war or somebody
[00:21:09] deescalates somehow.
[00:21:11] But even a world war, it's not going to
[00:21:13] be the way it was. World War I and World
[00:21:15] War II were what, 10, 12 years apart.
[00:21:17] The same kind of warfare, upgraded
[00:21:19] weapons a little bit, but generally
[00:21:22] speaking, same kind of warfare.
[00:21:24] >> Mhm.
[00:21:25] >> Not today.
[00:21:26] >> Yeah. We're almost It It won't even look
[00:21:28] similar to the Afghanistan Iran.
[00:21:30] >> No.
[00:21:31] >> No.
[00:21:32] >> I mean, I can I can
[00:21:35] I don't know. I'm out of the military. I
[00:21:37] don't have any access to anything
[00:21:40] classified. I know what was around when
[00:21:43] I was in. And if I extrapolate that,
[00:21:48] um,
[00:21:50] wow. I can't imagine.
[00:21:54] You know, we see things that happen and
[00:21:56] a lot of people, us, all of us, we don't
[00:22:00] always connect the dots and say, "Well,
[00:22:01] if this happened here, then this could
[00:22:04] happen here."
[00:22:07] And little things, well, not little, but
[00:22:10] they seem separated.
[00:22:13] Remember when um New Orleans, the uh
[00:22:17] dyke broke and flooded most of New
[00:22:19] Orleans after the hurricane, right?
[00:22:22] It was a disaster. People couldn't get
[00:22:25] food. They had no electricity,
[00:22:28] you know, uh started uh getting disease,
[00:22:31] famine, everything in a major US city,
[00:22:35] right?
[00:22:37] All an enemy has to do is turn off our
[00:22:39] power,
[00:22:41] right? And that's
[00:22:43] could be cyber security. Our cyber
[00:22:46] security and our power system has not
[00:22:48] been upgraded
[00:22:50] to a great extent for the last 15 years.
[00:22:54] I can't if I were another country that
[00:22:57] wanted to attack us. I don't need
[00:22:59] bombers. I don't need nuclear weapons. I
[00:23:03] need cyber. I need to turn off your
[00:23:06] power. I need to turn off your
[00:23:08] communication. And I need to somehow
[00:23:12] shortcircuit your supply system.
[00:23:15] All of those are not hard to do.
[00:23:18] So when we say World War II, I'm not
[00:23:21] seeing bombs and lines of battle. And I
[00:23:25] think it's going to be much more
[00:23:28] systemic than that than anything else.
[00:23:32] When I look at some of the stuff that
[00:23:36] China is saying, Russia,
[00:23:41] they don't like us being the world
[00:23:42] police. I don't like us being the one
[00:23:43] thing. American police don't want us to
[00:23:45] be the world police, but
[00:23:47] >> bricks.
[00:23:48] >> Yep.
[00:23:53] >> I just I don't know if we have any real
[00:23:56] allies.
[00:24:00] I think it would be
[00:24:05] I think we're going to have a run for
[00:24:06] our money here and I don't think it's
[00:24:08] going to go kinetic.
[00:24:10] >> I agree. I don't think it'll be kinetic.
[00:24:12] >> I don't even know if they would
[00:24:17] because right now, I mean, if you think
[00:24:19] if you look at what they're doing right
[00:24:20] now with all the propaganda and and I
[00:24:23] mean, I think we're doing a great job of
[00:24:26] turning ourselves against each other as
[00:24:28] it is, but Russia's also doing it.
[00:24:30] China's also doing it. I'm sure there's
[00:24:32] other players involved as well.
[00:24:35] And that's, you know, they're they're
[00:24:36] dumping gas on this. And I just had this
[00:24:39] conversation. I can't remember with who,
[00:24:40] but
[00:24:43] I think we are so fragile right now as a
[00:24:46] country
[00:24:49] that
[00:24:51] they're not going to need to cut our
[00:24:53] power. They're not going to need I I
[00:24:56] don't think they're going to need to do
[00:24:57] anything where there could be a trace
[00:25:00] back to them. I
[00:25:02] >> think we'll do it to ourselves. I think
[00:25:03] we'll do it. I think they're helping us
[00:25:05] do it to ourselves and they're dumping
[00:25:07] gas on
[00:25:08] >> on the fuel for us to do it to
[00:25:09] ourselves. But if they can do it, if
[00:25:11] they can cause a civil war, regime
[00:25:13] change,
[00:25:15] >> same [ __ ] that just it's going on in
[00:25:17] Iran right now.
[00:25:18] >> Yeah.
[00:25:18] >> If they can cause that to happen here,
[00:25:20] and we're pretty [ __ ] close.
[00:25:22] >> We are close.
[00:25:22] >> And we I mean, look at what's going on
[00:25:24] in Minnesota right [ __ ] now and
[00:25:28] probably in a lot of other cities.
[00:25:32] I think we're we are very close. We're
[00:25:34] on the brink. It could go into civil
[00:25:36] war. It could go into regime change. A
[00:25:38] lot of things could happen. Once it does
[00:25:40] happen, though, the amount of guns and
[00:25:44] weapons in this country.
[00:25:52] It is astronomical.
[00:25:55] Astronomically more than anything that
[00:25:57] I've ever seen. And I've been in some
[00:25:58] nasty [ __ ] places.
[00:26:00] >> Yeah. And so if they can get that to
[00:26:03] happen, we will we this will become the
[00:26:08] most dangerous country in the world.
[00:26:11] Nobody's coming in here.
[00:26:12] >> I I
[00:26:13] >> there's no nation building.
[00:26:14] >> No.
[00:26:15] >> When the US turns it on itself,
[00:26:17] >> no,
[00:26:17] >> it is [ __ ] pure carnage everywhere
[00:26:20] you look. And everybody here is armed to
[00:26:23] the teeth. And I think quite honestly if
[00:26:26] we're honest with ourselves,
[00:26:29] we are already one of the most dangerous
[00:26:32] countries in the world. Other countries,
[00:26:36] you know, we warn US citizens, don't go
[00:26:39] to Iran, right? Don't go to Venezuela.
[00:26:42] Don't go to wherever.
[00:26:44] Other countries are warning their
[00:26:46] citizens, don't go to the US.
[00:26:49] I mean, if you look at the number of
[00:26:51] civilians that are shot and killed every
[00:26:55] year, we're number one.
[00:26:59] What country has more of its citizens
[00:27:03] in prison than any other in the world?
[00:27:06] We're number one,
[00:27:09] right? I mean, if you step outside the
[00:27:12] US
[00:27:13] and you start looking in,
[00:27:16] we're not a safe place.
[00:27:18] >> I mean, you you don't even have to pull
[00:27:21] up statistics.
[00:27:22] >> And by the way, I'm very pro gun. I love
[00:27:25] I I am pro- 2A.
[00:27:26] >> I am too.
[00:27:27] >> Want to give them up.
[00:27:28] >> I I am too,
[00:27:29] >> but it is a fact. And
[00:27:32] >> but I mean, you
[00:27:35] pretty well traveled. We travel a lot,
[00:27:37] you know, for business. We go to other
[00:27:39] parts of the world.
[00:27:41] I mean, this county is really nice, but
[00:27:45] go to go to Chicago and then go to some
[00:27:50] city overseas and which one's shittier.
[00:27:53] >> What's that?
[00:27:54] >> Tell me which one which one is shittier.
[00:27:56] Which one has outdated infrastructure?
[00:27:59] Where do you feel where do you feel like
[00:28:03] there are constantly threats around you?
[00:28:05] where you it it
[00:28:08] it's a big [ __ ] lie.
[00:28:11] >> It's funny. I I go to Tokyo. I walk
[00:28:14] around downtown Tokyo in the middle of
[00:28:16] the night as a foreigner and feel
[00:28:18] absolutely safe. I was recently in
[00:28:22] Istanbul. 2:00 in the morning, we decide
[00:28:25] let's go get some food.
[00:28:28] Just walk around Istanbul. Feel
[00:28:30] absolutely safe.
[00:28:32] I go to New York City,
[00:28:35] I'm looking over my shoulder every two
[00:28:37] feet, you know? I I don't I feel very
[00:28:41] unsafe there.
[00:28:43] >> Right. Los Angeles, same thing. Chicago,
[00:28:46] same thing.
[00:28:48] It's weird
[00:28:50] because we have this
[00:28:54] American exceptionalism where we are the
[00:28:56] best.
[00:28:58] Okay.
[00:29:00] And we are we're a great country.
[00:29:03] But we shouldn't be afraid to go out in
[00:29:06] our own cities. And if we are, we have
[00:29:09] to be honest and look ourselves in the
[00:29:10] face and say why?
[00:29:14] It's not just a system. It's not just a
[00:29:16] symptom of a large city cuz other large
[00:29:20] cities in the world aren't like that.
[00:29:22] >> So what is it? What are we doing?
[00:29:27] We have
[00:29:32] I think it's a number of things. I think
[00:29:33] it's greed.
[00:29:35] All of our money is leaving the country.
[00:29:38] I think it is
[00:29:45] the
[00:29:47] bastardization of
[00:29:50] law enforcement,
[00:29:52] the lack of resp not just all the [ __ ]
[00:29:55] we see in the news right now. It is I
[00:29:57] mean we have we have we have destroyed
[00:30:00] trust in and law enforcement.
[00:30:02] >> Mhm.
[00:30:03] >> Um
[00:30:04] so there's that. Now all these guys are
[00:30:07] too scared to do their job. Rightly so.
[00:30:12] If they make a mistake, they're probably
[00:30:14] going to pay with a with their life set
[00:30:16] in prison. You know,
[00:30:19] it's
[00:30:23] those are the two things that come to my
[00:30:24] mind.
[00:30:28] It's uh
[00:30:29] >> lack of trust in institutions.
[00:30:32] >> All institutions, right? Um, and when
[00:30:36] you look at it, all of our major
[00:30:38] institutions that make a country what it
[00:30:41] is, our government, our health care, our
[00:30:46] education,
[00:30:47] our law enforcement,
[00:30:50] our social services,
[00:30:52] our military.
[00:30:55] We've lost faith in almost all of them
[00:30:58] because of things that have happened.
[00:31:01] And how do you lose faith, right? Well,
[00:31:04] you never see any you never see any
[00:31:06] consequences or repercussions or anybody
[00:31:10] held accountable in any position of
[00:31:12] power. It's obvious obviously a
[00:31:14] two-tiered system. This isn't a [ __ ]
[00:31:16] conspiracy anymore. It is a [ __ ]
[00:31:18] two-tiered system
[00:31:19] >> without a doubt,
[00:31:20] >> you know, and and so how do you get the
[00:31:23] trust back? Well, first you have to pin
[00:31:25] somebody's ass to the wall who actually
[00:31:26] did something wrong. And these people
[00:31:28] don't have the [ __ ] courage to do
[00:31:29] that.
[00:31:30] >> Without a doubt. You know what? And if
[00:31:32] there's I just finished uh Assad Khan's
[00:31:36] book betrayal of command
[00:31:39] and you know he was talking about some
[00:31:42] of this right and if there's anything I
[00:31:46] take out of that and anything that I
[00:31:48] like to see in the US and what I used to
[00:31:52] see in the Marine Corps and I haven't
[00:31:54] been in the Marine Corps since 1994
[00:31:58] right
[00:32:00] but
[00:32:01] Marines Marines
[00:32:03] used to be proud that they were Marines.
[00:32:06] And no matter what, if you said
[00:32:08] something, that's the way it was. If you
[00:32:10] did something wrong,
[00:32:12] at least the people I was with, you
[00:32:15] would say, "Yeah, my bad. I screwed up."
[00:32:18] >> Mhm.
[00:32:19] >> I'll fix it. Or tell me what I need to
[00:32:21] do to fix it, but I screwed up. Right.
[00:32:25] You don't see that a lot today.
[00:32:27] >> There's no ownership.
[00:32:29] >> No. And especially with our government,
[00:32:31] you see something happen. I'm like, just
[00:32:33] we see what happened. We're not stupid.
[00:32:36] We see what happened. Just own up to it
[00:32:40] and tell us how you're going to fix it.
[00:32:43] Don't blame it on everybody else.
[00:32:44] >> Yeah.
[00:32:45] >> That is the weakest,
[00:32:47] I would say, form of leadership, but
[00:32:49] it's not even leadership. That's the
[00:32:51] that is the largest abdication of
[00:32:54] leadership when you won't even own up to
[00:32:56] things.
[00:33:04] Hey, I know we both just take a deep
[00:33:05] breath and like, what are we going to
[00:33:07] do? Cuz it's not going to get fixed.
[00:33:11] It's not. It's entrenched now and it's
[00:33:13] systemic.
[00:33:15] And that means that there has to be a
[00:33:18] systemic
[00:33:20] change. And I don't want to be the one
[00:33:22] that comes on your show and says
[00:33:24] revolution, right?
[00:33:26] But
[00:33:28] things have to change and um
[00:33:32] we are right now whether we want to
[00:33:35] define ourselves that way or not in the
[00:33:38] world. We're an empire. We control other
[00:33:42] countries economically, militarily. We
[00:33:45] tell them what to do and they have
[00:33:47] little choice but to comply. We're an
[00:33:49] empire. If you study every empire that
[00:33:54] has ever existed on the planet, they all
[00:33:57] end and they all end badly because they
[00:33:59] start believing their own lies
[00:34:02] and they stop taking accountability for
[00:34:06] what they do. They do it because they
[00:34:08] can and they get away with it because
[00:34:10] they can
[00:34:12] and nobody ever calls them on it until
[00:34:15] you just you can't do it anymore. It's
[00:34:18] like a Ponzi scheme. Eventually, it
[00:34:20] falls.
[00:34:22] If we had leaders that took more
[00:34:24] accountability,
[00:34:26] like I said, if something went wrong,
[00:34:28] say it went wrong. Don't try and spin
[00:34:31] it. Don't try and convince us that it
[00:34:34] was the right thing. We all see it.
[00:34:37] And I think that's one of our biggest
[00:34:39] things that has to change
[00:34:41] or the future will change us.
[00:34:47] What was the last empire?
[00:34:50] >> Oo, the last empire. The last empire.
[00:34:53] Um,
[00:34:55] >> the last empire that fell this way
[00:34:57] >> or last Great Britain.
[00:34:59] >> Before that you had the Spanish.
[00:35:02] Um, obviously you had things like the
[00:35:04] Ottoman Empire. You've had a couple of
[00:35:07] Chinese dynasties.
[00:35:09] >> How about the Soviet Union? Soviet Union
[00:35:11] was never I don't really look at them as
[00:35:15] having been a strong empire. They were a
[00:35:17] strong country.
[00:35:20] They were building a strong military and
[00:35:22] starting to challenge,
[00:35:24] but they didn't have
[00:35:27] functional
[00:35:29] um
[00:35:31] um
[00:35:32] they weren't functionally established in
[00:35:34] other countries to where they could
[00:35:36] control them and the people around them.
[00:35:39] I think the United States actually did a
[00:35:40] pretty good job of containing that.
[00:35:44] But you look at look at the colonies,
[00:35:48] all the colonial stuff from Great
[00:35:50] Britain, right?
[00:35:51] >> Mhm.
[00:35:52] >> There's a joke, what is Great Britain
[00:35:54] given to the world more than any other
[00:35:56] country? And the answer is independence
[00:35:58] days, right? They were everywhere.
[00:36:02] And eventually you get overextended. the
[00:36:05] Roman Empire,
[00:36:07] huge, lasted for what, 2,000 years. But
[00:36:10] eventually they got so big, you can't
[00:36:12] sustain it anymore.
[00:36:15] >> And then you get regional fighting and
[00:36:17] you don't have the power to stop that.
[00:36:21] Their Senate started arguing amongst
[00:36:24] themselves,
[00:36:26] not taking responsibility. It was this
[00:36:28] person, it was that person. And Rome
[00:36:30] falls.
[00:36:33] When you look at the parallels, they're
[00:36:35] not
[00:36:38] they're not as um
[00:36:41] not tangential as you think. They're
[00:36:43] they're closer than you think.
[00:36:47] >> I think a lot of people don't see the
[00:36:48] empire because it's not our flag
[00:36:51] everywhere. It's not it's not the risk
[00:36:53] board that every country's one color,
[00:36:56] >> right?
[00:36:56] >> It's it's proxies.
[00:36:59] It is proxy and it's also if it is us
[00:37:03] it's not necessarily boots on the
[00:37:06] ground. It's economic,
[00:37:09] >> right? We hold economic control where
[00:37:12] you know we've got
[00:37:14] we have the top seats at the World Bank.
[00:37:17] You need help, we'll give you big loans,
[00:37:20] but when we do that, you have to do what
[00:37:22] we want you to do now. And again, a lot
[00:37:24] of people would say, well, that's just
[00:37:25] real politic, right? That's just
[00:37:27] politics. we're going to do something
[00:37:29] for you and you have to do something
[00:37:30] back and that's okay
[00:37:34] unless it goes a little too far and it's
[00:37:36] like well now you're not just giving
[00:37:38] something back we're holding you hostage
[00:37:42] and it's not just us by the way um
[00:37:46] there's a whole system of this in the
[00:37:48] world
[00:37:49] >> China
[00:37:50] >> yeah absolutely
[00:37:51] >> China and Africa
[00:37:52] >> absolutely
[00:37:55] space.
[00:37:58] >> There's one that we haven't seen yet. I
[00:38:02] think there I I think whenever something
[00:38:04] happens, we're going to see stuff that
[00:38:07] we're just like, where did this come
[00:38:10] from?
[00:38:11] >> We didn't even see that coming.
[00:38:13] >> I mean, do you think, you know, we I I
[00:38:14] had told you, you know, my theory or
[00:38:18] whatever you want to call it about
[00:38:21] division,
[00:38:22] >> you know, and that I don't think it
[00:38:23] could be kinetic. I do think there are
[00:38:25] other ways.
[00:38:28] Do you think there could be a transfer
[00:38:30] of power that's not kinetic?
[00:38:33] >> I guess driving us into civil war,
[00:38:36] revolution,
[00:38:38] regime change, whatever you want to call
[00:38:39] it.
[00:38:40] >> Yeah.
[00:38:40] >> I mean, that's still semicinetic, but
[00:38:43] you know, when I'm thinking about World
[00:38:45] War II and power transfer and all this
[00:38:47] stuff, I mean, when we look at China,
[00:38:48] you you brought up the power grid
[00:38:50] earlier, you know, how infiltrated they
[00:38:52] are in our power grid. We've covered
[00:38:54] that several times on the show. People
[00:38:55] are anybody listening should be well
[00:38:58] educated on that.
[00:39:00] That could be a catalyst for a transfer
[00:39:02] of power. The
[00:39:05] supply chain, which China seems to own,
[00:39:08] that could be a transfer of power. Space
[00:39:10] race, transfer of power, AI race,
[00:39:14] transfer of power. There's four other
[00:39:17] things that could potentially lead to
[00:39:23] maybe a peaceful transfer of power.
[00:39:26] Maybe if they just overtake us with
[00:39:28] technology and then we we I mean if if
[00:39:32] you look at ship building capacity in
[00:39:34] China, the amount of power that they are
[00:39:35] harnessing,
[00:39:37] um
[00:39:39] I think they've overtaken us with power.
[00:39:42] They're building nuclear already.
[00:39:44] Or send a nuclear up to space, I
[00:39:46] believe. Um,
[00:39:52] and we're still here [ __ ] around with
[00:39:54] a 50-year-old grid. We are. And I
[00:40:01] marvel
[00:40:03] that we spend so much money on other
[00:40:06] countries. We send so much money to
[00:40:10] other countries. And I'm going to I'm
[00:40:11] just going to say Israel.
[00:40:13] >> Mhm.
[00:40:13] >> Because they're our number one. They're
[00:40:16] a first world country with a better
[00:40:18] standard of living than we have. And
[00:40:20] we're sending them billions of dollars
[00:40:23] when our own infrastructure is
[00:40:25] crumbling.
[00:40:26] >> Mhm.
[00:40:26] >> We've got veterans that are homeless.
[00:40:29] We've got bridges
[00:40:31] that are rated D,
[00:40:34] you know, on a scale of ABCDF, ready to
[00:40:37] fall. the worst fentanyl crisis in the
[00:40:40] world,
[00:40:41] >> right?
[00:40:42] But we're sending money to other people.
[00:40:46] >> I'm like, you know, it's time to say,
[00:40:48] hey,
[00:40:50] we like to help, but we need to take
[00:40:53] care of ourselves cuz if we don't, we
[00:40:56] won't be around to help. It's kind of
[00:40:58] like that in the airplane. If the oxygen
[00:41:00] mask falls, put it on yourself first
[00:41:02] before you help others.
[00:41:04] >> Yeah. Because if if you pass out, you
[00:41:07] can't help anybody. If we keep sending
[00:41:09] all of our money everywhere else and our
[00:41:12] own infrastructure crumbles, there won't
[00:41:15] be any money to send to anybody else.
[00:41:16] We'll just have a collapse
[00:41:18] infrastructure.
[00:41:18] >> I was going to bring that up as well. I
[00:41:20] mean, there's also the devaluation of
[00:41:21] the US dollar, the world reserve
[00:41:23] currency. We have bricks actively doing
[00:41:25] that. I mean, it doesn't take a [ __ ]
[00:41:27] genius to see how how worthless our
[00:41:31] money is becoming. I mean, just since co
[00:41:32] I mean, gold was what $1,000 an ounce.
[00:41:35] >> Yeah, I still remember it at 400.
[00:41:38] >> Six six years later, it's what what is
[00:41:41] it like $4,300 an ounce today, I think.
[00:41:44] >> Yeah. Something crazy.
[00:41:46] >> [ __ ] four times.
[00:41:47] >> Everybody's buying it.
[00:41:49] >> And we took oursel off the gold
[00:41:51] standard, right?
[00:41:52] >> And right now, countries are buying deep
[00:41:54] into gold because it's it's an asset.
[00:41:57] It's something you can hold.
[00:42:00] I'm not a big fan of
[00:42:03] digital currency.
[00:42:05] I look at it like, okay, this is just
[00:42:07] made up.
[00:42:08] >> Somebody decided, I'm going to have this
[00:42:10] and somebody else said, "Yeah, I'll
[00:42:12] believe it
[00:42:13] >> and I'll assign a worth to it."
[00:42:15] >> But then when you look at it, ever since
[00:42:17] we went off the gold standard,
[00:42:20] the dollar is a digital currency. We're
[00:42:22] just people Yeah. People think it has
[00:42:25] value, so it does, but it has nothing
[00:42:27] behind it specifically. I mean, we do
[00:42:30] have the country and everything, but it
[00:42:31] it's not tied to anything
[00:42:36] >> and it that makes it a little more
[00:42:39] susceptible to fluctuations and changes
[00:42:41] in world economy.
[00:42:43] >> Mhm.
[00:42:46] >> You know,
[00:42:48] do you think we have any real allies in
[00:42:50] the world?
[00:42:52] No, I think we have associates
[00:42:55] >> and I think we have allies of
[00:42:56] convenience. But if there was somebody
[00:42:58] where our back was up against the wall
[00:43:02] and we said, "Hey, even if it is
[00:43:05] difficult and hurts you, you got to come
[00:43:06] help us." I mean, come on. If you got a
[00:43:09] buddy and you're real allies, they get
[00:43:11] in a fight, you're like, "I'm going to
[00:43:13] jump in. I'm going to get hurt, but I'm
[00:43:15] going to help you."
[00:43:16] >> Yeah.
[00:43:16] >> I don't think there's another country
[00:43:18] like that for us. And quite honestly,
[00:43:22] we're not like that for any other
[00:43:23] country.
[00:43:25] We're not willing to jump in
[00:43:28] unless there is something in it for us.
[00:43:30] >> No.
[00:43:31] >> Yeah.
[00:43:31] >> Right. I mean, we'll go do it if like,
[00:43:34] well, yeah, I'm going to help you out,
[00:43:36] but
[00:43:36] >> Mhm.
[00:43:37] >> you're going to do this for me
[00:43:38] afterwards.
[00:43:39] >> If you have a real ally, that's not the
[00:43:42] conversation.
[00:43:44] If you have a buddy that gets in a
[00:43:46] fight, you're going to go in the fight
[00:43:47] with them cuz they're your buddy. Do you
[00:43:49] think anybody has a real ally?
[00:43:51] >> Any country?
[00:43:53] >> No, I think they're all opportunist.
[00:43:55] >> You don't think Russia, China, India?
[00:43:58] >> No, I think they're opportunist.
[00:44:01] I think u they wouldn't take damage to
[00:44:05] themselves to help the other. I'm going
[00:44:08] to go back to the buddy in a fight.
[00:44:11] You know, if my best friend gets in a
[00:44:14] fight, am I going to jump in? Yeah. Is
[00:44:15] there anything in it for me? No.
[00:44:18] Right. May I get hurt? Yeah. Is a
[00:44:21] country going to do that?
[00:44:24] And should a country do that?
[00:44:25] >> I don't know. I think they would.
[00:44:27] >> You think so?
[00:44:28] >> I think they would. I think there's
[00:44:29] enough hatred for this country in the
[00:44:31] world that when the world realizes how
[00:44:33] many of them there are versus how many
[00:44:35] of us,
[00:44:36] >> just like in this country,
[00:44:38] >> there are about 200 people running this
[00:44:40] [ __ ] country, there are 340 million
[00:44:42] of us.
[00:44:45] And look at Pakistan now has well India
[00:44:48] has more money than China has or not
[00:44:50] more money more people
[00:44:52] than China does.
[00:44:54] >> Do they really?
[00:44:55] >> They do. They they have crossed the
[00:44:56] line. They have more they have a larger
[00:44:58] population than China.
[00:45:00] >> Wow. I did not Wow.
[00:45:02] >> Yeah. Check that.
[00:45:04] >> It just happened like a year ago.
[00:45:05] >> Pakistan
[00:45:07] or India.
[00:45:09] See again I got to go check it out. But
[00:45:11] I India or Pakistan now has more people
[00:45:14] than China because I always always
[00:45:17] thought China
[00:45:18] >> billions of people.
[00:45:20] >> Yeah. Well,
[00:45:21] >> well, the one child policy didn't work
[00:45:22] out too well.
[00:45:23] >> Oh, that was a horrible horrible.
[00:45:27] >> All you had to do was, you know, again,
[00:45:29] that was one of those things
[00:45:32] where you you solve the symptom right
[00:45:35] now and create a bigger problem down the
[00:45:39] road. Mhm.
[00:45:40] >> You you've heard of the the cobra
[00:45:43] conundrum. Have you heard of this one?
[00:45:44] >> No.
[00:45:45] >> In India, they had a problem with
[00:45:47] cobras.
[00:45:48] >> Too many cobras. So the government,
[00:45:50] rightly so, said, "We need to do
[00:45:52] something." So they said, "We're going
[00:45:54] to pay a bounty for every cobra you guys
[00:45:57] bring in that's dead. We'll pay you so
[00:45:59] much." Right? Sounds good. Okay. Well,
[00:46:04] then a couple enterprising people
[00:46:06] figured out, well, we're going to start
[00:46:08] raising cobras. So, they started raising
[00:46:11] them so that they could just bring in,
[00:46:14] you know, hundred of them and get the
[00:46:16] money. Well, the government figured that
[00:46:18] out and said, "Yeah, we're going to stop
[00:46:20] it. No more. No more payments for
[00:46:22] cobras." So, all the people that were
[00:46:24] raising them just let them all go. Well,
[00:46:27] now they have more cobras than they
[00:46:28] started with. So the solution to their
[00:46:31] problem actually created a bigger
[00:46:32] problem in the future because they
[00:46:34] didn't think it through. They should
[00:46:36] have put constraints on it and just
[00:46:38] said, you know,
[00:46:40] whatever something small. They could
[00:46:42] have said, we'll pay you for every one
[00:46:43] you bring in up to
[00:46:45] >> Yeah. five a year, right? But you can't
[00:46:47] bring us in 100 and whatever.
[00:46:50] that whole one child thing. I mean, all
[00:46:53] you had to do is extrapolate out 18
[00:46:55] years and go, "We're going to be
[00:46:57] hurting,
[00:46:59] right?" And they didn't. And now, and
[00:47:02] now once they lifted it,
[00:47:05] a lot of the families don't want more
[00:47:06] than one cuz they're like, "What?
[00:47:09] They're going to cost us money.
[00:47:11] Why would I do that? I'm I'm living a
[00:47:13] good life."
[00:47:14] >> Yep.
[00:47:15] >> And their population is shrinking.
[00:47:22] There's an interesting
[00:47:23] >> lot of populations in the world
[00:47:24] shrinking right now.
[00:47:25] >> Um they are there's a really interesting
[00:47:28] book called uh the next hundred years.
[00:47:31] It's written back in uh
[00:47:34] I think 2008 or so around then and the
[00:47:37] guy predicted here's what's going to
[00:47:38] happen over the next hundred years.
[00:47:41] So far it's not far off. But one of the
[00:47:46] most interesting things he wrote was he
[00:47:48] said if you take nothing else from this
[00:47:50] book take this one fact
[00:47:54] and that is the rate that the population
[00:47:58] is growing is decreasing.
[00:48:02] It will cap at about 2050. So the
[00:48:05] population is still going up
[00:48:07] but it's going up less and less. And
[00:48:10] they said, "We're going to cap,
[00:48:12] unless something weird happens, we're
[00:48:15] going to cap around 2050 and then the
[00:48:17] population's going to start decreasing
[00:48:19] on the planet."
[00:48:21] >> On the planet.
[00:48:21] >> On the planet. He says, "Planetwide,
[00:48:25] the population growth, the rate of
[00:48:28] population growth planetwide is
[00:48:31] decreasing.
[00:48:33] We're not growing as fast as we were." I
[00:48:36] mean he's his projections are about 2050
[00:48:41] we'll we'll hit the tipping point and
[00:48:44] we'll actually start decreasing. He
[00:48:46] gives a lot of reasons for it like uh
[00:48:51] we all started as agrarian nations
[00:48:55] and in an agrarian nation the more
[00:48:57] people you have the more money you can
[00:48:59] make because more people can work the
[00:49:01] fields right and say everything. Once we
[00:49:05] became more of an industrial nation,
[00:49:10] having more kids does not get you more
[00:49:12] money. It gives you more expense. They
[00:49:14] don't bring anything to you.
[00:49:18] And he said because of that, family
[00:49:20] sizes have gotten smaller and smaller
[00:49:22] over the years. And we see a lot of
[00:49:24] people now with one child. Well, there's
[00:49:27] two of you, right? So, you need two just
[00:49:29] to break even. Three if you want the
[00:49:31] population to grow, right? And we're not
[00:49:35] seeing that. And as he's tracking this
[00:49:37] year after year after year, you can you
[00:49:40] can see the chart, right? Population is
[00:49:42] growing like this. And then it just
[00:49:44] starts
[00:49:46] curving off a little bit.
[00:49:49] Once that happens,
[00:49:52] now the world population starts to be in
[00:49:55] a decline for a while.
[00:49:57] And that creates a whole new dynamic.
[00:50:01] What happens when you have more houses
[00:50:02] available than you have people?
[00:50:04] >> I think about this all. I think that's
[00:50:06] going to happen when the baby boomer
[00:50:07] generation is displaced.
[00:50:09] >> I mean, you look, you look,
[00:50:11] >> we're still Look at Floridaers.
[00:50:13] >> It's [ __ ] crazy,
[00:50:15] >> right?
[00:50:15] >> They're building apartment complex after
[00:50:17] apartment complex after 55 plus um
[00:50:21] neighborhood after 55 plus neighborhood.
[00:50:23] It's [ __ ] crazy.
[00:50:26] >> What are I think I literally think about
[00:50:29] this all the time. What is just in the
[00:50:33] country alone? What is going to happen
[00:50:34] when the baby boomers are gone,
[00:50:36] >> right? What happens? What happens when
[00:50:38] you've got more houses than you have
[00:50:40] people? What happens when you have more
[00:50:42] jobs to get done than you have people?
[00:50:46] Right? All of a sudden, you're like,
[00:50:48] well, we don't even enough have enough
[00:50:50] people to run the machinery that we
[00:50:52] have.
[00:50:53] >> What do you do then? I mean, everything
[00:50:57] we've had happen on this planet
[00:51:00] up until when that happens has been
[00:51:03] under a growing population.
[00:51:06] We have more people than we have room
[00:51:07] for. People start fighting for more
[00:51:10] room, right? We have we have more people
[00:51:14] than we can feed. You know, all of this
[00:51:16] stuff. What happens when the opposite is
[00:51:17] true? We have no experience with that. I
[00:51:20] can't even imagine how that's going to
[00:51:22] look.
[00:51:24] What do you even fight or argue over
[00:51:29] people? You can't go steal them and
[00:51:32] bring them in, you know? Uh we can't
[00:51:36] press them into service like, you know,
[00:51:38] the Royal Navy did when they needed
[00:51:40] sailors.
[00:51:42] So, what happens then? And I have no
[00:51:45] idea. That is so far beyond my event
[00:51:47] horizon vision. I can't imagine. But I
[00:51:50] can imagine it's going to be a problem.
[00:51:56] We've not seen this.
[00:51:57] >> No. Ever.
[00:51:59] >> Wow.
[00:52:00] >> We see microcosms.
[00:52:03] I mean, the US microcosm that comes to
[00:52:06] mind, Detroit. People moved out of
[00:52:09] Detroit. What happened? Crime shot up.
[00:52:14] Whole neighborhoods went abandoned. And
[00:52:18] when that happened,
[00:52:21] rats and cats and everything moved in,
[00:52:23] you know, and and in order to just keep,
[00:52:28] you know, disease away, the city ends up
[00:52:30] having to go in and just bulldoze
[00:52:33] whole tracks of land.
[00:52:35] >> I actually did not know that happened.
[00:52:37] >> Yeah.
[00:52:38] >> Wow. So, it's a total reset.
[00:52:40] >> Yeah. And then then what?
[00:52:48] Back to the basics.
[00:52:51] >> I don't know.
[00:52:53] Back to hunting and gathering. And I I I
[00:52:56] have I don't know.
[00:52:57] >> You know what I mean?
[00:53:00] You were a SEAL. I was in the Marines
[00:53:03] in football. As soon as things get too
[00:53:06] complicated, you always say, "Let's go
[00:53:07] back to the basics. What do we need?"
[00:53:10] Maslo's hierarchy of needs, right? We
[00:53:12] need shelter, food, water.
[00:53:15] first couple things, right?
[00:53:17] Self-actuation,
[00:53:19] whatever. But
[00:53:22] you go back to basics.
[00:53:23] >> Yep.
[00:53:24] >> I don't know what that'll mean for our
[00:53:26] country, though. What does that look
[00:53:29] like?
[00:53:30] >> I think that looks like there is no more
[00:53:32] country and it's every man for
[00:53:34] themselves.
[00:53:36] >> That's what I think.
[00:53:37] >> Could be. Could be. You do start to ask
[00:53:40] yourself
[00:53:42] what is the purpose of a country? The
[00:53:45] purpose of a country is to provide for
[00:53:47] its people, provide for the common good,
[00:53:50] welfare, public defense. You know, we we
[00:53:53] outline those in the constitution.
[00:53:56] If that
[00:53:57] >> it's a it's a system that you trade,
[00:54:00] >> what's that?
[00:54:00] >> You trade your freedom for this system
[00:54:02] that is supposed to protect you and take
[00:54:05] care of you. Now that system is
[00:54:10] >> damaged,
[00:54:10] >> gone rogue.
[00:54:11] >> Yeah, it's it's on life support.
[00:54:13] >> And uh still here we are.
[00:54:17] >> That's I mean I I hate to say it like
[00:54:20] that, but that's that's what a I mean I
[00:54:22] What do you think a country is? That's
[00:54:24] what I think it is.
[00:54:25] >> It it a country is supposed to be there
[00:54:27] to provide services for its citizens.
[00:54:29] You're trading
[00:54:30] >> opposed to and you do you give up
[00:54:32] >> you trade freedom for
[00:54:34] >> right
[00:54:35] >> for
[00:54:36] >> convenience
[00:54:36] >> civilization
[00:54:37] >> for safety
[00:54:38] >> safety
[00:54:39] >> h well it it you you've heard
[00:54:41] >> a system
[00:54:42] >> a system of of
[00:54:46] >> whatever a system
[00:54:47] >> a system that's able to do things that
[00:54:49] you can't do as an individual I can't go
[00:54:52] out and buy
[00:54:54] grain from another country
[00:54:57] >> a country can go buy grain from another
[00:54:59] country and bring it in. Right? So, you
[00:55:01] do trade some personal liberties
[00:55:05] for hopefully
[00:55:07] a system that gives you more than you
[00:55:10] could have gotten on your own.
[00:55:13] But I think human nature is if you're
[00:55:15] not getting anything back,
[00:55:18] then you start asking why am I giving up
[00:55:20] something if I've got nothing back?
[00:55:22] >> Mhm.
[00:55:27] And it's a lot of what I write about in
[00:55:29] the book. I write about systems, right?
[00:55:32] You have to look at the system and see
[00:55:33] what is it doing?
[00:55:36] Why is that system there? And is that
[00:55:38] system operating the way it should?
[00:55:40] Because if it's not,
[00:55:42] you need to either change the system or
[00:55:45] get rid of it.
[00:55:48] >> And the worst part is when you don't
[00:55:50] even see what the system's doing. I go a
[00:55:53] lot back a lot to like George Orwell's
[00:55:55] 1984. You don't even see what's
[00:55:57] happening,
[00:55:59] right? And that's the tragedy.
[00:56:03] >> Damn.
[00:56:06] >> Well, this is going to be a heavy
[00:56:08] interview.
[00:56:09] >> What's that?
[00:56:10] >> This is going to turn into a heavy
[00:56:12] interview.
[00:56:12] >> Yeah. Well, you know,
[00:56:14] >> was it good talk?
[00:56:15] >> Yeah.
[00:56:16] >> You ready to get into the big one?
[00:56:17] >> We're not done again.
[00:56:20] Let's get into the big one.
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[00:58:56] Yeah. So, uh, mutual friend introduced
[00:58:59] us and, uh, he had told me he's got a
[00:59:02] friend that wrote a book. I get about a
[00:59:03] thousand of those a day,
[00:59:05] >> right?
[00:59:05] >> But, um, but he's mutual friend. And
[00:59:08] then when he told me the title of the
[00:59:09] book, I was like, "Oh, man. I've talked
[00:59:12] about
[00:59:13] >> I've talked about are We the bad guys
[00:59:16] several times on this show, mostly
[00:59:18] mostly about the Iraq Afghanistan war."
[00:59:21] >> Yep. Absolutely. But um but you I'm I'm
[00:59:25] really excited about this conversation.
[00:59:27] I think this is going to be an eye
[00:59:29] openener for a lot a lot of people. So
[00:59:33] you wrote a book, we are the bad guys.
[00:59:36] What
[00:59:38] I mean what why did you write it? It's a
[00:59:42] great question. Uh I get that a lot,
[00:59:45] right? And the answer is easy. I started
[00:59:49] noticing more and more my time in the
[00:59:52] Marine Corps and when I would travel,
[00:59:54] and I think a lot of people notice this,
[00:59:56] they just don't know how to articulate
[00:59:58] it, that what we're seeing and what
[01:00:02] we're seeing happen in the world doesn't
[01:00:04] match what we're hearing.
[01:00:06] >> Mhm.
[01:00:06] >> We get told one thing and then we say,
[01:00:09] "Yeah, I'm told this, but I'm seeing
[01:00:11] this. That doesn't make sense." And we
[01:00:15] all get this uneasy feeling, right? that
[01:00:18] something's not right.
[01:00:21] I have a brain that that can't ignore
[01:00:23] that. So, I kept digging into it and
[01:00:26] digging into it and talking more. And I
[01:00:29] had more and more episodes where I would
[01:00:32] talk to people and find things out
[01:00:36] that led me to believe, hey, you know
[01:00:38] what? In the world stage,
[01:00:41] we're not the good guys. We have this
[01:00:44] idea of ourselves that this American
[01:00:46] exceptionalism, right? We're the
[01:00:49] defenders of democracy. We are the
[01:00:51] champions of liberty and freedom. And
[01:00:54] then you talk to people from other
[01:00:56] countries and they're like, why do you
[01:00:59] think that?
[01:01:01] And unfortunately, we don't have a good
[01:01:04] answer.
[01:01:06] And I think one of the most important
[01:01:07] things in any democracy
[01:01:11] is that the people that are
[01:01:13] participating in the democracy need to
[01:01:15] know what's going on. You can't make
[01:01:18] good decisions. You can't know who to
[01:01:21] vote for if you don't know the whole
[01:01:24] story.
[01:01:24] >> Mhm. And right now I think we don't get
[01:01:28] the full story. So, what I wanted to do
[01:01:31] was
[01:01:32] basically
[01:01:34] help people see some of the stuff they
[01:01:36] may not see. Let's talk about why we
[01:01:39] don't have the full story. Let's talk
[01:01:42] about the story you didn't hear, right?
[01:01:47] And I give examples. Um, in the
[01:01:50] introduction, I talk about Christopher
[01:01:51] Columbus. Christopher Columbus
[01:01:53] discovered America, right? He went out
[01:01:55] to find new worlds.
[01:01:58] And we love that story.
[01:02:01] And in elementary school, you hear
[01:02:05] Christopher Columbus discovered America.
[01:02:07] Great. Then in high school, you learn,
[01:02:10] well, not really. The Vikings knew about
[01:02:13] it before, right? Then you go to college
[01:02:18] and you learn, you know what, he never
[01:02:19] even set foot on the continental United
[01:02:22] States. closest he got was the Bahamas,
[01:02:26] right? On his fourth voyage. Did you
[01:02:28] know he made four voyages? Most people
[01:02:31] don't. They just thought he went out
[01:02:32] once, he found America, and he came
[01:02:33] back. Did we teach that
[01:02:37] he was arrested and brought back to
[01:02:41] Spain in chains
[01:02:44] just 8 years later in 1500? He
[01:02:46] discovered in America in 1492. In 1500,
[01:02:51] he was charged with brutality, with
[01:02:53] embezzling money, stealing, theft, and
[01:02:57] chained and brought back to Spain to
[01:02:59] stand charges. And Queen Isabella and
[01:03:02] King Ferdinand didn't want the big
[01:03:04] scandal, so they just pardoned him and
[01:03:07] made it go away and died. He died eight
[01:03:10] years later, penniless, without titles,
[01:03:13] without anything that he thought he
[01:03:14] earned. We don't teach that part, but
[01:03:18] it's important that people know it so
[01:03:20] that they know, hey, you know what?
[01:03:24] The story we were taught is not the full
[01:03:26] story.
[01:03:28] And that's what my book does is it
[01:03:30] starts to bring out the rest of the
[01:03:32] story and say, "Here's the stuff you
[01:03:35] didn't know, and here's probably why you
[01:03:37] didn't know it, but you should know it
[01:03:40] in order to be a good functioning person
[01:03:42] in our society." Mhm. Wow. I actually
[01:03:46] didn't know that.
[01:03:48] >> The book's full of that. Uh I was
[01:03:51] talking to one of your staff earlier
[01:03:53] today and telling them, "Look at Hawaii,
[01:03:57] right? One of our states, Hawaii. Did
[01:03:59] you know that they didn't want to be a
[01:04:00] state? Did you know that we landed
[01:04:02] Marines and had a naval vessel there and
[01:04:04] forced them pretty much at gunpoint to
[01:04:07] become a state?" Did you know that their
[01:04:10] queen at the time said, "I will abdicate
[01:04:12] power, but only because I don't want the
[01:04:15] United States to kill my people."
[01:04:17] >> I did not know that.
[01:04:19] >> Changes the story, right? But it's not
[01:04:23] the story that we teach.
[01:04:26] And I go back to uh George Orwell's book
[01:04:30] 1984, and he has a statement in there.
[01:04:35] He says, 'W whoever controls the present
[01:04:38] controls the past
[01:04:41] because they get to write the history
[01:04:42] books and whoever controls the past
[01:04:45] controls the future because that's what
[01:04:48] the kids learn.
[01:04:51] We
[01:04:53] don't teach the full past. And I think
[01:04:55] we need to if we want to be honest with
[01:04:57] ourselves about where we are, what we're
[01:04:59] doing, and how we're getting there.
[01:05:04] >> Yeah.
[01:05:06] Wow.
[01:05:08] Let me give you an introduction here.
[01:05:09] All right.
[01:05:12] Michael Lester, author of We Are the Bad
[01:05:14] Guys, which is which is an examination
[01:05:17] of American power. Graduate of the US
[01:05:20] Naval Academy and decorated Marine Corps
[01:05:22] combat pilot. You're also a member of
[01:05:24] Mensah with degrees in history,
[01:05:26] engineering, and leadership. I asked uh
[01:05:29] Jeremy what Mensah was and then he told
[01:05:31] me it's for people with high IQ and I
[01:05:34] said that's why I don't know
[01:05:35] >> it's a club
[01:05:36] >> it's a club
[01:05:37] >> but uh uh you now you teach graduate
[01:05:40] level cyber security courses and uh you
[01:05:43] have a quote in the book I was proud to
[01:05:46] defend my country show the flag and
[01:05:49] support democracy but I slowly started
[01:05:51] feeling that something was off I felt
[01:05:55] that too
[01:05:56] >> in the wars that I fought and uh and EB
[01:05:59] articulated that several times. So that
[01:06:02] really resonated with me. And um and
[01:06:04] before we dig into uh your analysis of
[01:06:07] American power, I figured we'd check on
[01:06:08] the wisdom of the crowd. So are you
[01:06:11] familiar with Poly Market?
[01:06:13] >> No.
[01:06:14] >> Okay. Well, Poly Market is a site and
[01:06:17] and
[01:06:19] a lot of people are on there and and
[01:06:20] they they they talk about the chances
[01:06:23] that things will or will not happen. So
[01:06:25] Poly Market says there's only a 1%
[01:06:27] chance that the US will not conduct
[01:06:30] strikes against another country before
[01:06:32] 2027. One only a 1% chance. Somalia on
[01:06:36] the other hand has a 57% chance of being
[01:06:40] the country of being the being the next
[01:06:43] country struck. So man, that's not good
[01:06:48] odds. Only a 1% chance that the US will
[01:06:51] not conduct strikes against another
[01:06:52] country before 27. Yeah.
[01:06:55] >> No new wars, though, right?
[01:06:57] >> Uh,
[01:06:57] >> it's the rumor.
[01:06:59] >> Yeah, right. That's what we're told.
[01:07:01] >> That's that's that's what we were told.
[01:07:03] >> No new wars. Must be true. Must be true.
[01:07:06] I heard it on TV.
[01:07:07] >> It's going great. It's going real good.
[01:07:09] But um and then we have a uh we have a
[01:07:12] subscription account. It's on Patreon
[01:07:14] and uh there's about 100,000 people on
[01:07:17] there. It's quite the community and um
[01:07:20] they're the reason that I get to sit
[01:07:21] here with you today. And uh so one of
[01:07:23] the things we do is we give them the
[01:07:25] opportunity to ask every guest a
[01:07:27] question. And this is from Dana Bowen.
[01:07:32] Drawing on both your combat experience
[01:07:34] and your 20-year investigation using
[01:07:37] declassified records, what moment or
[01:07:40] discovery most fundamentally challenged
[01:07:42] your belief in America's role as a force
[01:07:44] for good? And how did that realization
[01:07:47] change the way you understand national
[01:07:49] security today?
[01:07:51] Great question. Um, difficult to answer.
[01:07:56] I will I will attempt to answer it
[01:07:59] and hopefully this answer is
[01:08:01] satisfactory.
[01:08:03] I didn't have a single aha moment where
[01:08:06] I just went, "Oh, I see it now." Right?
[01:08:09] The fog is lifted. Here it is.
[01:08:12] It's a slow learning process of well
[01:08:16] this didn't make sense and this didn't
[01:08:19] make sense and this didn't make sense.
[01:08:21] If I start drawing the line
[01:08:24] I'm seeing a pattern here, right?
[01:08:28] There have been some events that are
[01:08:30] larger than others. Um, a minor event
[01:08:33] was I was
[01:08:37] long story
[01:08:39] stuck in Italy without a passport
[01:08:43] uh and without money once and I had to
[01:08:46] go to this hotel and I started talking
[01:08:47] to people. I speak German. I was
[01:08:49] speaking German to them because they
[01:08:51] were past the point where
[01:08:53] um they're in in the u in the northern
[01:08:56] area they speak German and Italian and
[01:08:58] then you get a little further south they
[01:09:00] speak just Italian. I was stuck in an
[01:09:02] area where they only speak Italian. So
[01:09:04] the people I were speaking to all spoke
[01:09:07] broken German about as well as I did.
[01:09:11] And they all asked me like, "Where are
[01:09:12] you from?"
[01:09:14] After we had been talking for a while,
[01:09:16] we're talking, laughing, joking the best
[01:09:17] we can. And then they said, "Where are
[01:09:19] you from?" And I said, "Where do you
[01:09:20] think I'm from?" And they said, "Uh, not
[01:09:23] German. Your German's not good enough."
[01:09:26] Denmark. Like, "No." They're like,
[01:09:28] "Ntherlands?"
[01:09:29] No,
[01:09:31] we don't know. And I said, I'm from the
[01:09:32] United States. And the demeanor changed.
[01:09:36] And this was back in the late 80s.
[01:09:39] They all just went, oh.
[01:09:42] >> In the 80s.
[01:09:43] >> In the 80s, late ' 80s.
[01:09:46] They all just kind of went, "Oh." And
[01:09:48] the conversation was kind of over.
[01:09:51] Um, and I remember thinking about that.
[01:09:54] I just thought, well, that's weird.
[01:09:57] I wonder why that is. Maybe. And of
[01:09:59] course, my own American exceptionalism,
[01:10:01] I thought, maybe they were intimidated.
[01:10:04] Later, I look back and go, no, maybe it
[01:10:06] wasn't intimidation. Maybe they just
[01:10:08] looked at the United States as not being
[01:10:11] the best people to be allied with.
[01:10:14] later
[01:10:16] Gulf War, first Gulf War,
[01:10:19] um second Gulf War, I started looking at
[01:10:22] things like, you know, we're going to go
[01:10:25] into Iraq because of weapons of mass
[01:10:28] destruction. We all knew there were no
[01:10:30] weapons of mass destruction. We had just
[01:10:32] been there. All of our weapons
[01:10:35] inspectors were telling us on the
[01:10:36] ground, "Hey, we're here looking every
[01:10:38] day. They don't exist." But we went
[01:10:40] anyway.
[01:10:42] those kind of things that you see and
[01:10:45] you say, "Okay, this doesn't match." The
[01:10:48] things we're doing and why we're saying
[01:10:50] we're doing them just don't match.
[01:10:53] >> So, there is no event. There is a series
[01:10:57] of events, if that makes sense.
[01:11:00] >> Wow. Back in the 80s.
[01:11:01] >> Yeah. Right.
[01:11:02] >> That's surprising to me.
[01:11:03] >> It it I had to think back on that one,
[01:11:06] but I I remember it now. And then in the
[01:11:12] again 80s I was an exchange officer with
[01:11:15] the Japanese Navy
[01:11:18] and everything was fine and good you
[01:11:20] know we're all happy
[01:11:23] allies
[01:11:26] um but then at night
[01:11:28] they'd take you out and they'd start
[01:11:30] doing some drinking and start saying
[01:11:34] things and you're like that doesn't
[01:11:36] sound like you really like us much
[01:11:41] kind of put up with us maybe
[01:11:44] and again thinking this is our ally but
[01:11:46] once the nicities end there's an
[01:11:50] undercurrent
[01:11:53] of dislike.
[01:11:55] >> Mhm.
[01:11:57] >> And
[01:11:58] you have to ask yourself then why?
[01:12:01] >> Probably because we bombed them after
[01:12:02] they surrendered.
[01:12:05] >> Right. What?
[01:12:08] Um, I mean, you would you would assume
[01:12:10] there would be some animosity there,
[01:12:12] right? After they surrendered, they they
[01:12:14] had a surrender.
[01:12:16] But then we're saying, okay, they're our
[01:12:17] ally. We're we're we're linked with
[01:12:19] them.
[01:12:22] But it didn't look that way underneath
[01:12:25] the covers a little bit.
[01:12:28] And again, you have to ask why. Why
[01:12:31] was it because, okay, we defeated you in
[01:12:33] the war. Okay. What was the reason in
[01:12:35] Italy?
[01:12:38] When I go to another country, what's the
[01:12:39] reason? And they all have their reasons.
[01:12:42] And then you have to start looking at
[01:12:44] yourself and saying, "Is it all of
[01:12:47] them?"
[01:12:47] >> Mhm.
[01:12:48] >> Or is it me? What am I doing? What am I
[01:12:51] doing that's not building friendships?
[01:12:54] What am I doing that's causing people to
[01:12:56] dislike me?
[01:12:57] >> Now, I agree with everything you're
[01:12:59] saying and everything that we had talked
[01:13:00] about on the hot question. What I want
[01:13:02] to ask you is how do you decipher what
[01:13:05] is
[01:13:07] justified animosity towards the United
[01:13:09] States and just regular jealousy?
[01:13:11] It's difficult. I think justified
[01:13:14] animosity follows a pattern. It's
[01:13:18] usually not one thing either. You can be
[01:13:21] jealousy and and say, "Hey, look, you've
[01:13:22] got this and that, right?" We don't.
[01:13:25] >> Mhm.
[01:13:26] >> Um but then again, dig a little deeper.
[01:13:30] We believe people all want to be live in
[01:13:33] America.
[01:13:35] Um,
[01:13:37] statistically,
[01:13:39] we don't have a better lifestyle.
[01:13:42] We have, what are we? We're seventh in
[01:13:44] life expectancy, 55 in
[01:13:47] freedom of speech or whatever. Uh, we're
[01:13:51] we incarcerate more of our people than
[01:13:53] any other country on the planet.
[01:13:56] So our exceptionalism where we think
[01:13:58] everybody wants to be us isn't always
[01:14:01] well founded in facts.
[01:14:04] >> When you start digging into that and
[01:14:06] saying okay
[01:14:08] is it jealousy or is it animosity
[01:14:11] because of what we're doing?
[01:14:15] And a lot of times I think you find
[01:14:18] our activities around the world are not
[01:14:21] building good friendships. We are we use
[01:14:24] people more than help people.
[01:14:28] And we all have I would say friends, but
[01:14:30] not really friends, acquaintances
[01:14:32] that try to use you, but as soon as you
[01:14:35] ask them for something back, they're
[01:14:36] like, "Nah."
[01:14:38] >> Mhm.
[01:14:38] >> I'm busy, right?
[01:14:41] Um that's a problem. You make friends by
[01:14:46] being a friend.
[01:14:48] And sometimes we don't do that. Not
[01:14:51] always, but sometimes.
[01:14:59] I think a lot of countries have a a
[01:15:04] justified gripe
[01:15:07] about the way the US conducts business.
[01:15:11] I don't know that I feel that way about
[01:15:13] Europe.
[01:15:18] I don't see Europe as a
[01:15:21] a big issue.
[01:15:23] I think a lot of countries I I I agree.
[01:15:26] I think a lot of countries have a
[01:15:28] justifiable reason for not liking us.
[01:15:32] And I think we sometimes have the choice
[01:15:34] of how to do things and sometimes we
[01:15:37] choose the expedient way. Hey, this is
[01:15:40] fast and we can get this done. like,
[01:15:43] yeah, but we'd leave a lot of hate and
[01:15:45] discontent in it in its wake.
[01:15:48] >> If we took a little more time and were a
[01:15:50] little more
[01:15:52] uh diplomatic about it, we would
[01:15:54] probably do better long term.
[01:15:57] >> We tend to have a very short-term view
[01:15:59] on getting things done.
[01:16:05] >> How long did you spend writing this
[01:16:07] book?
[01:16:09] >> I've got two I've got two answers to
[01:16:11] that. If you take my entire time that I
[01:16:13] was just
[01:16:15] processing it in my brain, 20 years.
[01:16:20] Eventually though, everything got to a
[01:16:21] point I'm like, I've got to start
[01:16:23] putting this down. From the time I
[01:16:25] started putting it down, it was a year
[01:16:28] and a half.
[01:16:30] And it's it's funny. Uh it's the only
[01:16:32] book I've ever written so far. Now I've
[01:16:36] got about three or four others in the
[01:16:38] the hopper that I want to get out.
[01:16:41] But I learned something about writing a
[01:16:42] book. Writing a book is like having a
[01:16:44] child.
[01:16:46] What you see when they're born is not
[01:16:49] what they become when they're 18 and
[01:16:51] they leave the house.
[01:16:53] >> It
[01:16:54] matures.
[01:16:56] I mean, the book started with seven
[01:16:58] chapters, but then I'm like, well, that
[01:17:01] doesn't explain this, you know? So, you
[01:17:03] add and then you add another one and
[01:17:06] then you're like, well,
[01:17:08] but this should be its own section. this
[01:17:10] should just talk about this and you
[01:17:12] write a whole section. Then you're like,
[01:17:14] but then that doesn't explain this.
[01:17:17] So it it it matures and it grows over a
[01:17:21] year and a half from what it started as
[01:17:24] until what you finish with.
[01:17:27] And another thing I learned is you have
[01:17:30] to know when you're done.
[01:17:33] You can keep going forever, right? and
[01:17:35] all of a sudden you've got a 4,000page
[01:17:37] book that no one will ever look at,
[01:17:41] you know? Uh, so you've got to know
[01:17:43] like, okay, this is deep enough. We'll
[01:17:47] stop.
[01:17:49] >> Well, let's talk about the origin story.
[01:17:52] >> Okay, the origin story, how it all
[01:17:56] started.
[01:17:57] >> Yeah, let's talk about how it started.
[01:17:58] >> The the book.
[01:18:00] >> Mhm.
[01:18:02] Um,
[01:18:06] like I said, it's a number of points.
[01:18:09] I told you Italy and Japan. Then I went
[01:18:13] in the military
[01:18:15] and you I was in Desert Storm. Why are
[01:18:18] we there? Well, we're there because the
[01:18:20] Iraqis invaded Kuwait.
[01:18:23] >> Were you thinking that back then or were
[01:18:24] you thinking that in Russia?
[01:18:25] >> Well, no. At the time, we would sit
[01:18:27] there and ask, why are we here? Well,
[01:18:29] like Iraq invaded Kuwait and we have a
[01:18:31] treaty with Kuwait.
[01:18:34] Okay, that makes sense.
[01:18:37] But then sit by yourself in a desert for
[01:18:39] 9 months.
[01:18:41] You do a lot of thinking and you start
[01:18:43] thinking, well, wait a minute. Did we
[01:18:45] not see this coming? Did we not know
[01:18:48] about this?
[01:18:50] Why are we here? What's our goal? What
[01:18:52] is our goal? Right? When do we know when
[01:18:55] we're done here? Is our goal to just
[01:18:58] push them out of Kuwait?
[01:19:01] No, that wasn't it. Is our goal to
[01:19:03] invade Iraq?
[01:19:06] No. So, what is the goal? The goal is to
[01:19:10] remove all of their military power.
[01:19:12] Okay, got that. Um, why did they invade
[01:19:17] Kuwait?
[01:19:19] Because, you know, we're just told,
[01:19:21] well, they wanted their territory.
[01:19:23] Well, then you go back and you learn,
[01:19:24] well, there was more than that. There
[01:19:27] were some um Iraq
[01:19:30] believed that Kuwait was really part of
[01:19:31] Iraq to start with. And look back,
[01:19:34] that's not untrue. Um there were charges
[01:19:39] that Kuwait was horizontally drilling
[01:19:41] under Iraq's borders into their oil
[01:19:45] fields.
[01:19:47] Most of that has been debunked,
[01:19:49] I believe.
[01:19:51] Um, then we've got some incidents where
[01:19:55] Saddam Hussein actually talked to the
[01:19:58] Arab League and others and said, "Hey,
[01:20:01] I've got a beef with Kuwait. We need
[01:20:03] help. You guys got to step in." And they
[01:20:05] go, "No, we're not going to do that."
[01:20:08] Um, April Glasby, who was part of our
[01:20:12] State Department,
[01:20:14] talked to Saddam Hussein and he said,
[01:20:16] "Hey, you guys gotta
[01:20:19] do something." And April Glassby told
[01:20:21] him, "We have no interest in Arab Arab
[01:20:25] affairs
[01:20:27] and we don't want to get in in a war
[01:20:29] over oil."
[01:20:31] Well, Saddam Hussein took that as US is
[01:20:34] going to stay out of it, I'm going to go
[01:20:36] in. And as soon as he goes in, the US
[01:20:39] jumps in. And it surprised
[01:20:42] Saddam Hussein. He didn't think we were
[01:20:44] going to do anything after what our
[01:20:45] State Department told him.
[01:20:49] Again, these are things that we weren't
[01:20:50] told.
[01:20:52] >> But when you start learning more about
[01:20:54] the system and what happened, you start
[01:20:56] saying
[01:20:58] maybe our hands aren't as clean here as
[01:21:00] we thought.
[01:21:02] Maybe there are other issues.
[01:21:05] Then I know as a personal kind of a
[01:21:06] front when we were in Saudi Arabia,
[01:21:10] we got word that, you know, we listen to
[01:21:12] the news like, well, Saudi Arabia is
[01:21:14] paying for us to be there, right?
[01:21:18] and a bunch of the other pilots and I
[01:21:20] looked at each other and goes, "Well,
[01:21:21] then we're just mercenaries."
[01:21:24] We're not doing this for the United
[01:21:25] States. We're doing this because
[01:21:26] somebody else paid us to. That's not
[01:21:28] what I signed up for.
[01:21:31] And that's when it starts eroding some
[01:21:34] of the the belief and trust and you
[01:21:36] start it's a process.
[01:21:40] Once that starts, once you start looking
[01:21:42] at it, you can't unsee it. Mhm.
[01:21:45] >> And the more you look, the more you see.
[01:21:48] And the deeper you dig and the more you
[01:21:49] pull that thread, the more it unravels.
[01:21:53] That's how this started. And I kept
[01:21:55] pulling the thread. I wouldn't let go of
[01:21:57] it.
[01:21:58] >> Well, I can tell you how how it popped
[01:22:01] on my radar cuz like I said, I've been
[01:22:02] talking about this for a while. And and
[01:22:04] um you know, the the Dick Cheney
[01:22:08] connection to KBR in the Iraq war, the
[01:22:12] looking for weapons of mass destruction.
[01:22:14] Yep.
[01:22:15] >> Yep.
[01:22:15] >> They're way way too [ __ ] long.
[01:22:18] >> Yep.
[01:22:19] >> That
[01:22:21] is what tipped me off. Tipped me off.
[01:22:25] And then also in Afghanistan, we spent
[01:22:29] what 21 20 22 years
[01:22:32] >> the place where empires go to die.
[01:22:34] >> Yeah. And I mean I was work I was work I
[01:22:38] worked there on the SEAL teams. I worked
[01:22:39] there when I was contractor for CIA.
[01:22:41] >> Yeah.
[01:22:44] for a while there. Um
[01:22:48] I mean I really believed in what we were
[01:22:50] doing and then probably around
[01:22:54] I'm going to say right around 2010 time
[01:22:56] frame. I just it was I mean the rules of
[01:22:58] engagement changed, the mission changed,
[01:23:00] everything changed and everybody was
[01:23:02] confused. Everybody was wondering what
[01:23:04] the [ __ ] are we doing here? Why are we
[01:23:07] this isn't doing anything? We're putting
[01:23:08] ourselves at more risk.
[01:23:10] >> Right. and and
[01:23:13] um it seemed like that that the it
[01:23:16] seemed like the
[01:23:18] administrations were working against our
[01:23:21] own people.
[01:23:23] And um anyways, that's that's that's
[01:23:27] when I started thinking about it.
[01:23:30] >> And I think it's it's funny because
[01:23:34] I was afraid when I first wrote this. I
[01:23:38] thought I thought I'm going to be the
[01:23:40] lone voice in the wilderness. I am gonna
[01:23:43] get no support from writing this. And
[01:23:47] then I published it and a lot of my
[01:23:50] classmates, I asked my classmates, I
[01:23:52] said, "Hey, go read this."
[01:23:54] Other people that went to the Naval
[01:23:55] Academy and served, you know, some of
[01:23:57] them, you know, 20 years, 25, 30 years.
[01:24:01] And I thought, I'm going to get
[01:24:03] ostracized
[01:24:04] for writing this. And I was shocked. I
[01:24:08] was shocked at the number of veterans,
[01:24:10] classmates and other veterans that came
[01:24:12] back and said, "I've been feeling this.
[01:24:15] I've seen this.
[01:24:18] We're with you." Like,
[01:24:21] it's not just me seeing it.
[01:24:23] >> So many veterans are seeing and they all
[01:24:26] have basically the same story. We all
[01:24:28] came in believing in the country, still
[01:24:32] believe in the country, but believing in
[01:24:34] the mission, believing on why we're
[01:24:36] there.
[01:24:37] But after you're there for a while,
[01:24:39] you're like, "This this isn't what they
[01:24:40] said.
[01:24:42] This is not what I signed up for.
[01:24:46] And the rules, the things you're telling
[01:24:48] me to do
[01:24:50] are are
[01:24:52] This isn't right."
[01:24:54] >> It makes you wonder
[01:24:57] how much of what you think you know is a
[01:24:59] lie.
[01:25:00] >> Mhm.
[01:25:02] It does.
[01:25:04] >> How much do you think you know is a lie?
[01:25:06] Absolutely.
[01:25:08] >> And why were you told what you were
[01:25:10] told? What's
[01:25:12] what's the agenda?
[01:25:14] >> What is the goal?
[01:25:17] And again, I write about this. We we
[01:25:19] have these information bubbles and we
[01:25:21] are fed information in a certain way so
[01:25:24] that we believe certain things.
[01:25:27] And it it it's also done in a way that
[01:25:30] people dig in. they get entrenched
[01:25:33] where you can't challenge what they
[01:25:35] think they know, right? Because they I I
[01:25:39] know this is true. I'm like, maybe not.
[01:25:42] You're like, don't tell me maybe not.
[01:25:43] That's fake news, right? Or I don't
[01:25:46] believe that or whatever. Whatever they
[01:25:49] want to say to shut down the
[01:25:50] conversation.
[01:25:51] Rarely do we have the conversation where
[01:25:53] people say, "You don't think that's
[01:25:56] true? Why?
[01:25:59] What? Give me some facts. talk to me.
[01:26:01] Tell me what you think.
[01:26:03] We don't get a lot of that anymore. We
[01:26:05] just get digging the heels in and
[01:26:07] pushing back.
[01:26:10] And I think it's important for us to ask
[01:26:12] why.
[01:26:13] We should be able to articulate
[01:26:16] why we have a certain thought. And we
[01:26:18] should actually look forward to people
[01:26:22] questioning it.
[01:26:24] If I believe in something, I want people
[01:26:26] to question me. I think I'm right. If
[01:26:29] I'm not, show me that I'm not because I
[01:26:32] don't want to be wrong
[01:26:34] >> and I want to be able to articulate to
[01:26:36] you. And if I can't do that, then
[01:26:38] there's more of a feeling than something
[01:26:41] that I know.
[01:26:44] >> People are people refuse to poke holes
[01:26:46] in their own in their own stories these
[01:26:48] days.
[01:26:49] >> It's comfortable. It's comfortable to
[01:26:50] believe something and just stay within
[01:26:52] that comfort area.
[01:26:53] >> Mhm.
[01:26:54] >> We fall into confirmation bias, right?
[01:26:57] I'm going to look up information that
[01:26:59] confirms what I already think I know.
[01:27:02] What about looking up information that
[01:27:04] refutes it? No, I don't want to do that.
[01:27:07] That would require a lot of effort and
[01:27:09] thought, and I'm comfortable just
[01:27:12] re-evaluating or revalidating over and
[01:27:14] over again what I think I already know.
[01:27:17] >> Discomfort.
[01:27:20] >> Well, it's destroying us.
[01:27:24] It is. It is. Um,
[01:27:28] and I've said it many times, the most
[01:27:31] important part of a democracy is an
[01:27:33] informed
[01:27:35] electorate. You can't make good choices
[01:27:38] if you don't have the right information.
[01:27:40] >> I mean, it's impossible to get Are you
[01:27:42] talking about voting?
[01:27:43] >> Voting.
[01:27:44] >> How How would you get the right
[01:27:46] information?
[01:27:47] >> I mean, I've sat here for the past two
[01:27:50] years.
[01:27:50] >> Yeah.
[01:27:51] >> And probably interviewed about half of
[01:27:53] the current administration.
[01:27:54] >> Yeah. I've interviewed a [ __ ] ton of
[01:27:56] politicians.
[01:27:57] >> Yeah.
[01:27:59] >> And
[01:28:01] you know, nothing they say they're going
[01:28:04] to do happens.
[01:28:06] >> Mhm.
[01:28:07] >> For example,
[01:28:09] no new wars.
[01:28:10] >> Mhm.
[01:28:11] >> Here we are one [ __ ] year in.
[01:28:13] >> Mhm.
[01:28:14] >> Venezuela, Ukraine, Iran, Gaza.
[01:28:19] >> Yeah.
[01:28:20] >> Like
[01:28:21] the [ __ ] is this? And oh, was told the
[01:28:26] Ukraine Russian war will be done before
[01:28:28] he ever takes office.
[01:28:30] >> Right. Right.
[01:28:31] >> Here we are.
[01:28:32] >> Yep.
[01:28:34] >> So you have to ask yourself,
[01:28:36] >> make it go Epstein files,
[01:28:38] >> right? We're going to release them all.
[01:28:39] >> Yeah.
[01:28:41] >> And then lines over everything.
[01:28:43] >> Oh,
[01:28:44] >> in less than 1%.
[01:28:46] >> I I I love the uh
[01:28:49] at one point in time we're going to
[01:28:50] release the Epstein files. Then it was
[01:28:51] like, "Well, they don't actually exist."
[01:28:53] Yeah.
[01:28:54] >> Well, you just last week said they were
[01:28:56] on your desk.
[01:28:56] >> Mhm. Mhm.
[01:28:57] >> Well, yeah, but
[01:28:59] >> had a bunch of influencers go to the
[01:29:01] high influencers go to the White House
[01:29:02] and hold up a bunch of binders.
[01:29:04] >> Right.
[01:29:06] >> And I People ask me, "What do you think
[01:29:07] about the Epstein Files?" I'm like,
[01:29:10] "None at this point in time. There's
[01:29:12] been so much water under the bridge."
[01:29:14] >> Mhm.
[01:29:15] >> I can't believe that even if they
[01:29:16] released everything they have, I can't
[01:29:19] believe that's it anymore.
[01:29:20] >> Yeah. It's I can't believe that's it. I
[01:29:22] can't believe hell I can go on Photoshop
[01:29:25] and make whatever you want. Right.
[01:29:28] >> Yeah.
[01:29:29] >> Tell me that all of that is exactly what
[01:29:31] it was. Hasn't been changed. And yeah,
[01:29:34] they'll redact a bunch of stuff so we
[01:29:36] feel like, you know, it's original, but
[01:29:38] >> they they they redacted all of the
[01:29:40] abusers names.
[01:29:41] >> Right. Right.
[01:29:42] >> They redacted all of the abusers names.
[01:29:45] >> Yeah. Right. I I just
[01:29:49] it's
[01:29:50] >> it is definitely the most transparent
[01:29:52] administration of all time. That's for
[01:29:54] damn sure.
[01:29:56] >> But but but the point is, you know,
[01:30:00] whatever. Being hard on this
[01:30:01] administration. I don't think the last
[01:30:02] one was any better. Probably worse. But
[01:30:07] >> um point being, they're all just [ __ ]
[01:30:11] liars.
[01:30:12] >> They are legitimately all just [ __ ]
[01:30:14] liars. So, how would the American people
[01:30:16] even formulate an educ the the the the
[01:30:20] opinion or or their decision would be
[01:30:23] formulated off complete [ __ ] anyways
[01:30:25] because everybody in office is a lying
[01:30:27] piece of [ __ ]
[01:30:28] >> for the most part. But then you have to
[01:30:31] ask yourself why. So, do you believe
[01:30:35] that everybody before they went into
[01:30:36] government
[01:30:38] was just a liar to start with? Is that
[01:30:40] just politics? If you go into politics,
[01:30:42] are you a liar? and lot
[01:30:44] >> not necessarily but I do think that it
[01:30:46] does have a certain draw
[01:30:47] >> it does
[01:30:49] it does I think that's true I think we
[01:30:53] also have to look at
[01:30:56] incentives we incentivize the wrong
[01:30:59] things
[01:31:01] if we look at the same thing happening
[01:31:03] administration after administration
[01:31:04] after administration regardless of who's
[01:31:07] in power and it's always the same
[01:31:11] then you have to say okay it's It's not
[01:31:13] the administration. It's not the
[01:31:15] Republicans. It's not the Democrats.
[01:31:17] It's not the Libertarians. They all do
[01:31:19] the same thing.
[01:31:22] Then it's the system.
[01:31:23] >> Mhm.
[01:31:24] >> Something's wrong with the system. And
[01:31:26] then you'd look at the system and say,
[01:31:28] "What's wrong with it?"
[01:31:30] And usually it's
[01:31:33] the system is set up to incentivize
[01:31:37] money,
[01:31:39] not necessarily the outcome that the
[01:31:41] system should have.
[01:31:43] I'm going to use a hopefully a fairly
[01:31:46] nonpartisan example. Look at our
[01:31:49] education system. We spend more money
[01:31:52] per student than any other country in
[01:31:54] the world.
[01:31:56] So, you would think we would have the
[01:31:59] best rankings in education.
[01:32:03] We're what, fifth in math, 10th in
[01:32:06] reading, and 25th in science or
[01:32:08] something like that. Those I may have
[01:32:09] mixed up which ones are which, but it's
[01:32:12] 515 and 25 right now. But we spend more
[01:32:14] than any other country.
[01:32:17] If we cut funding,
[01:32:19] we're still 5th, 10th, and 25th. Money
[01:32:22] is not the issue, but we're obviously
[01:32:25] incentivizing the wrong things. We're
[01:32:28] not incentivizing learning.
[01:32:31] So, what are we incentivizing?
[01:32:34] Well, we're the only country in the
[01:32:37] world that has education for profit.
[01:32:41] What are we incentivizing? We're
[01:32:43] incentivizing profits.
[01:32:45] Well, if we incentivize profits, then
[01:32:47] you don't care about grades. and
[01:32:50] the results show that. So, it's not that
[01:32:53] people say, "Hey, we need better
[01:32:54] education." It's like our system is set
[01:32:56] up wrong.
[01:32:59] Change the system if you want a
[01:33:00] different outcome. Don't throw more
[01:33:02] money at it. Don't cut money from it.
[01:33:04] Those are great talking points for an
[01:33:07] election, but they have zero effect on
[01:33:09] the outcome because the system is still
[01:33:11] the same.
[01:33:13] And that's just education. I we can talk
[01:33:16] about every other system we have in the
[01:33:18] US and they all follow the same kind of
[01:33:20] pattern.
[01:33:25] >> How about the power system?
[01:33:29] >> Power grid.
[01:33:30] >> Mhm.
[01:33:31] >> I think it's
[01:33:33] old.
[01:33:34] It's uh falling apart. I think it's
[01:33:38] not as secure as we would want.
[01:33:41] >> Mhm. uh being in cyber security I look
[01:33:44] at that obviously
[01:33:46] it hasn't been updated in in a
[01:33:50] meaningful way you know I'm sure
[01:33:53] somebody in in
[01:33:55] power distribution system say oh no we
[01:33:57] updated this yeah okay
[01:34:00] in a meaningful way have we kept up with
[01:34:02] what we can do with cyber security
[01:34:05] >> no
[01:34:06] close we haven't did we update the
[01:34:09] software on the servers Yeah, we did.
[01:34:12] Are we still running servers from the
[01:34:14] 70s? Yeah, we are.
[01:34:17] Right. Do you think there's no other
[01:34:20] I mean, China produced the transformers,
[01:34:22] >> right?
[01:34:26] >> Yeah. Our our power distribution system,
[01:34:28] I think, is
[01:34:31] precarious.
[01:34:32] >> Yep.
[01:34:34] >> Yeah. Without a doubt.
[01:34:36] >> Yeah.
[01:34:37] And we were talking a little earlier,
[01:34:40] if something happens in the future,
[01:34:44] the future conflict,
[01:34:47] uh, kinetics won't be that important.
[01:34:52] If you can take out our power, take out
[01:34:54] our food distribution systems, water,
[01:34:58] I mean, who can fight, who can do
[01:34:59] anything if you're
[01:35:02] hungry, hungry, dehydrated, and have no
[01:35:04] electricity. Mhm.
[01:35:05] >> But hard to fight.
[01:35:06] >> Mhm.
[01:35:08] >> Can't even pump gasoline. Might have it.
[01:35:10] Can't pump it. No power.
[01:35:15] >> Just like we talked about in the hot
[01:35:17] question, then we just turn on each
[01:35:18] other.
[01:35:18] >> Yeah. Back to basics, right?
[01:35:22] >> Mhm.
[01:35:22] >> U could be. I see a lot of
[01:35:27] see a lot of people that are uneasy
[01:35:29] today,
[01:35:31] more so than I've seen before, because
[01:35:33] they all feel like something's going to
[01:35:36] happen.
[01:35:38] If nothing else, they feel like we can't
[01:35:40] continue, right? That this can't stay
[01:35:43] like this.
[01:35:45] And most of us that have that uneasy
[01:35:48] feeling though,
[01:35:50] we don't know what's going to happen.
[01:35:52] like what is going to happen? I I don't
[01:35:54] know. Um
[01:35:57] maybe people that are a little bit
[01:35:59] closer to the centers of power do. I'm
[01:36:01] not sure what's going to happen, but I
[01:36:03] do know it it can't continue like this.
[01:36:06] Something's got to happen.
[01:36:10] >> Do you feel like that's something sooner
[01:36:12] than later?
[01:36:14] >> Constantly.
[01:36:16] Uh I get nervous.
[01:36:19] I keep feeling like something's coming.
[01:36:24] I think a lot of Americans do when I
[01:36:27] talk to people, even around where I
[01:36:28] live.
[01:36:30] Um, a lot of people feel uneasy.
[01:36:35] It's not a good, hey, everything's, you
[01:36:39] know, rainbows and we're out drinking
[01:36:41] margaritas having fun. do for a little
[01:36:44] bit to try and, you know, get away from
[01:36:46] it. But deep down, people are concerned.
[01:36:50] >> Yeah. I don't know anybody that um
[01:36:54] has no concern.
[01:36:56] >> Right. Every You don't know anybody
[01:36:57] that's just saying, "Oh, things are
[01:36:59] good.
[01:36:59] >> Don't know what you're talking about."
[01:37:00] >> Yeah. Yeah.
[01:37:02] >> Everybody's a little concerned right
[01:37:04] now. Everybody's a little at ease. Un at
[01:37:07] unie.
[01:37:08] >> So, where do we start with we are the
[01:37:10] bad guys? Where do you want to start?
[01:37:12] Where do we want to start?
[01:37:16] You know, I wrote the book and my my
[01:37:21] first editor
[01:37:24] uh was my wife and she read through it,
[01:37:27] gave me all sorts of pointers and said,
[01:37:30] "Might want to tone this down. Might
[01:37:32] want to do a little better here. Don't
[01:37:34] need to go in depth here. Missed a
[01:37:37] comma." You know, all that sort of
[01:37:39] stuff.
[01:37:40] But it's funny, when she got done, she
[01:37:43] said, "You know what this is?
[01:37:47] This is your love letter to the United
[01:37:49] States."
[01:37:51] I said, "You know, not the way I thought
[01:37:54] of it. What do you mean?" She goes,
[01:37:56] "Well, you're you're pointing out what
[01:37:59] has to change."
[01:38:01] And I thought about that a little bit
[01:38:03] more.
[01:38:04] And I thought, you know what? If you
[01:38:06] love somebody and they're doing
[01:38:08] something destructive, they're ruining
[01:38:11] their life,
[01:38:13] they're drinking too much, they're doing
[01:38:14] drugs, whatever, whatever it is, they're
[01:38:16] gaming, whatever, whatever it is they're
[01:38:18] doing, it's starting to affect their
[01:38:20] life.
[01:38:22] If you don't talk to them about it,
[01:38:25] that's not a kindness. That's avoidance.
[01:38:29] And avoidance is not helping them. If
[01:38:31] you truly love them, you confront them
[01:38:33] and say, "Hey, look, I've noticed this
[01:38:36] happening,
[01:38:37] and you need to start noticing it, too,
[01:38:40] because we have to make changes because
[01:38:43] I don't like where this is going to end
[01:38:45] up."
[01:38:48] That's what this book is about. This
[01:38:50] book is about saying
[01:38:53] things have to change. And maybe you're
[01:38:56] not even aware of why. Maybe you're so
[01:39:00] involved you don't even see it.
[01:39:04] I'm going to try to help you
[01:39:07] see it. And I'm going to do that by
[01:39:13] giving you examples of things that have
[01:39:14] happened that we've done in other
[01:39:16] countries
[01:39:18] so that you know why other countries
[01:39:21] look at us like you're not the good
[01:39:23] guys.
[01:39:25] I'm gonna cover
[01:39:27] this is why you think that
[01:39:30] not your fault. We live in information
[01:39:33] bubbles.
[01:39:35] And I cover, you know, one of the first
[01:39:36] things, you know, when you're a SEAL,
[01:39:39] when you're talking to somebody, when
[01:39:40] you're interrogating somebody, you want
[01:39:42] information, right? One of the first
[01:39:44] things you do is isolate them. You don't
[01:39:47] want them to have other information. And
[01:39:49] then you feed them the information you
[01:39:51] want, and then you reinforce it. We do
[01:39:54] that to ourselves.
[01:39:56] I mean, first we have one country to the
[01:39:59] north and one country to the south. We
[01:40:00] don't get around to a lot of other
[01:40:02] countries. So, we are already isolated.
[01:40:05] And then through algorithms,
[01:40:08] through the internet, through our news
[01:40:10] channels, we isolate ourselves even
[01:40:12] more.
[01:40:14] >> Well, when all you get is one piece of
[01:40:15] information,
[01:40:17] >> I can tell you what your opinion is
[01:40:19] going to be.
[01:40:19] >> Mhm.
[01:40:21] So, let's get more pieces of
[01:40:23] information. Let's get more visibility
[01:40:26] and let's start having the discussion.
[01:40:30] That's how this came about.
[01:40:35] So, I had the conversation all the time
[01:40:36] with people verbally. Finally, I just
[01:40:38] said, "You know what? I've got to get
[01:40:40] this down."
[01:40:41] >> Yeah.
[01:40:43] What are some things we've done in other
[01:40:47] countries that H Yeah.
[01:40:50] Um,
[01:40:52] there are some things that are just it
[01:40:54] it's
[01:40:55] you and I talked about some it's amazing
[01:40:58] the things that we don't know.
[01:41:01] I start to point them out to people and
[01:41:03] they look at me like,
[01:41:05] "Huh? Are are you crazy?" Right? Uh I'm
[01:41:10] like, "No, it's all documented." I I
[01:41:12] have to point out, too, I've got 448
[01:41:14] pages. 120 some are footnotes
[01:41:18] because I would tell people all the
[01:41:19] time, don't believe a word I say. Don't
[01:41:22] believe me. Please, for God's sakes, go
[01:41:24] research it yourself. Here's the
[01:41:26] footnotes. Here's the documents.
[01:41:29] And no, the footnotes aren't Wikipedia.
[01:41:33] Right? Here are the actual documents. Go
[01:41:35] read them. Validate this for yourself.
[01:41:39] I mention um I use the example because a
[01:41:43] lot of people can relate to it and it
[01:41:45] it's close to home. Hawaii
[01:41:49] Hawaii did not choose and want to be a
[01:41:52] state. We forced them to be a state at
[01:41:55] gunpoint. We landed Marines and we had
[01:41:58] Navy ships and essentially told them be
[01:42:02] a state or we're going to come in and
[01:42:04] occupy you and make you a state anyway.
[01:42:07] And the queen at the time of Hawaii
[01:42:09] said, "I will abdicate
[01:42:12] my rule under protest purely to keep the
[01:42:16] Americans from killing my people." How
[01:42:19] many people know that about Hawaii? We
[01:42:22] just look at it as, "Oh, it's a
[01:42:23] beautiful place. We get to go there and
[01:42:24] have Lays and, you know, drink
[01:42:27] margaritas on the beach, but we don't
[01:42:30] look at what we did to get it."
[01:42:32] >> Mhm. uh Panama were talking about we
[01:42:36] should take back the Panama Canal,
[01:42:40] not ours to take back.
[01:42:42] But Panama wasn't even a country. It was
[01:42:44] part of Colombia.
[01:42:47] And then our CIA went down and helped
[01:42:51] some dissident say, you know, shouldn't
[01:42:54] you guys be your own country? We would
[01:42:56] support you if you did.
[01:42:58] and we helped them form a little mini
[01:43:03] revolution. And one day they said,
[01:43:06] "We're now an independent country called
[01:43:08] Panama.
[01:43:10] Uh we immediately put two warships, one
[01:43:13] on the east coast, one on the west
[01:43:14] coast, off the coast, and said, "Colia,
[01:43:18] if you try to take this back, you're
[01:43:21] going to fight us. They're independent
[01:43:22] now."
[01:43:24] We gave them their constitution. Said,
[01:43:26] "You guys are a new country. You need a
[01:43:28] constitution. Here's one. We already
[01:43:30] wrote it for you. Oh, by the way, yeah,
[01:43:32] it contains some things in there that
[01:43:34] says, "We reserve the right to come in
[01:43:36] anytime we think things aren't going the
[01:43:38] way we want it to, but pay that no
[01:43:40] mind." Um, it was signed
[01:43:46] by um,
[01:43:49] forgot their names. It was signed with
[01:43:51] not a single representative from Panama.
[01:43:53] >> Are you kidding? It was signed with a a
[01:43:56] French person and an American
[01:44:00] before the paname panameanians even knew
[01:44:03] it. We're like, "Yep, we already signed
[01:44:04] a treaty. You're good. You're a country.
[01:44:08] Here's your here's your documents to run
[01:44:11] your country, right? Here's your
[01:44:13] constitution."
[01:44:15] Does that make us the good guys?
[01:44:18] >> No. If you looked at any other country,
[01:44:20] all the other countries around there,
[01:44:22] they would look at that and go, "This
[01:44:25] isn't a friend. This is somebody we need
[01:44:27] to be afraid of."
[01:44:29] Right?
[01:44:31] We did similar things in Honduras. We
[01:44:34] did similar things in Nicaragua.
[01:44:37] You know, we had the whole Iran Contra
[01:44:40] affair.
[01:44:42] Um,
[01:44:43] you can look back at that. You know, we
[01:44:45] were selling weapons illegally under our
[01:44:48] own laws and then funneling funds,
[01:44:53] you know, to the Contras.
[01:44:54] >> Mhm.
[01:44:55] >> Does that make us the good guys?
[01:44:58] No.
[01:44:58] >> No.
[01:45:01] >> Think about how much everything else in
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[01:46:56] I mean, with that being said, I'm just
[01:46:59] curious of your opinion. I mean, we're
[01:47:00] not the only ones doing this.
[01:47:02] >> No,
[01:47:03] >> China's doing this.
[01:47:04] >> No,
[01:47:04] >> Russia's doing this.
[01:47:06] >> Yeah.
[01:47:07] >> Um,
[01:47:09] especially China, all over Africa,
[01:47:12] >> South America,
[01:47:16] Taiwan,
[01:47:22] >> while I do not disagree with you. Are we
[01:47:24] the bad guys? I would think we are.
[01:47:31] What should an empire be doing?
[01:47:35] >> Well, first
[01:47:37] I love that you use that term. We are an
[01:47:39] empire
[01:47:41] and you have to ask yourself,
[01:47:44] what does an empire do? And what
[01:47:46] constitutes an empire? An empire is a
[01:47:50] country that controls other countries.
[01:47:54] And we are one. We control
[01:47:57] a lot of the world. Um maybe not
[01:48:01] militarily always, but economically,
[01:48:04] socially.
[01:48:06] Um we have more control in the world
[01:48:08] right now. I would argue the United
[01:48:10] States has more control in the world
[01:48:11] than any other country. Is China a
[01:48:14] superpower? Yes. Is Russia a superpower?
[01:48:18] Yes.
[01:48:19] What makes us different?
[01:48:24] We spend 10 times as much on our
[01:48:26] military. I'm sorry, wrong statement. We
[01:48:29] spend more on our military than the next
[01:48:32] 10 countries combined. That includes
[01:48:35] China and Russia.
[01:48:38] China, Russia, and the next eight
[01:48:39] countries, we spend more than them.
[01:48:43] We are the biggest power on the planet,
[01:48:46] and we can coers them. You say, you
[01:48:49] know, other countries do this too. They
[01:48:51] do.
[01:48:52] Not to the extent we do. And we are
[01:48:55] paying a huge price for that. That $1
[01:48:59] trillion
[01:49:01] could go to fixing our bridges and our
[01:49:03] power system so that we're not weak. Are
[01:49:06] we being
[01:49:08] I think there's a real
[01:49:11] scenario where our power system could
[01:49:13] get attacked.
[01:49:16] We're spending money on kinetic weapons
[01:49:19] and new bombs,
[01:49:21] you know, and now we're talking about
[01:49:22] making a new
[01:49:25] Trump class destroyer, right? Or not
[01:49:28] destroyer, battleship, right? We phased
[01:49:30] out battleships for a reason. We don't
[01:49:32] need battleships, especially in the age
[01:49:34] of drones and satellites and everything.
[01:49:36] >> Autonomous.
[01:49:37] >> It's a sitting target. I mean, it just
[01:49:39] makes no sense.
[01:49:40] >> We're making another [ __ ] battleship
[01:49:41] now.
[01:49:42] >> Well, you have you not heard this?
[01:49:43] What's this one going to be named?
[01:49:45] >> The Trump class battleship.
[01:49:46] >> Of course, it's going to be [ __ ]
[01:49:47] named the Trump class.
[01:49:48] >> The Trump class battleship. It's going
[01:49:50] to be the biggest best battleship there.
[01:49:53] >> Beautiful battleship.
[01:49:54] >> Beautiful battleship.
[01:49:56] >> Yep.
[01:49:57] >> While everybody else is making
[01:49:58] autonomous vehicles, we're making
[01:50:00] [ __ ] battleships.
[01:50:02] >> We
[01:50:03] figured out
[01:50:04] >> so we can slap a [ __ ] name on it,
[01:50:06] >> right?
[01:50:06] >> Amazing. We figured out that that
[01:50:08] swarming
[01:50:10] and multiple, you know, hundreds, if not
[01:50:13] thousands of small drones
[01:50:16] are harder to combat than one
[01:50:21] centralized threat. So now we're going
[01:50:24] to build a new battleship that makes no
[01:50:27] sense at all.
[01:50:30] Right? And and this is kind of where
[01:50:32] we're we're going down the wrong
[01:50:33] directions,
[01:50:36] but I'm I'm getting off topic. Uh other
[01:50:39] other countries do this, but we're the
[01:50:42] biggest baddest ones out there. We're
[01:50:43] doing it the most.
[01:50:46] We have 740
[01:50:49] some military bases around the world.
[01:50:53] 740.
[01:50:55] There's only 198 recognized countries by
[01:50:58] the UN. got 740 bases manned by
[01:51:02] Americans out there. No other country
[01:51:05] comes close to that. One of our biggest
[01:51:08] enemies right now is Iran, right? Didn't
[01:51:11] used to be, by the way. Used to be our
[01:51:13] only friend in the Middle East. We can
[01:51:15] go into that. How many foreign bases
[01:51:18] does Iran have?
[01:51:21] >> Zero.
[01:51:22] >> One small little outpost in Aritria.
[01:51:26] Itria. One little outpost. We've got
[01:51:29] 740ome bases.
[01:51:31] How many does Russia have?
[01:51:34] I I don't know the number, but it's I
[01:51:36] it's it's under 100. China, how many
[01:51:40] bases around the world?
[01:51:43] Nowhere near. I mean, so so we are
[01:51:46] acting like an empire.
[01:51:49] And then you have to The thing that
[01:51:51] frightens me is not that we're an
[01:51:53] empire.
[01:51:55] thing that frightens me is that
[01:51:56] historically every empire has eventually
[01:52:00] fallen and it falls because it starts
[01:52:05] it falls because of maintenance. People
[01:52:07] don't attack it. It can't maintain
[01:52:09] itself any longer.
[01:52:11] It gets so spread out and tries to do so
[01:52:14] much and it's people aren't supporting
[01:52:18] it,
[01:52:20] right? And when people stop supporting
[01:52:22] it, then you have to fight them for it.
[01:52:24] And that takes energy away from your
[01:52:27] populace.
[01:52:29] So now instead of again fixing our
[01:52:31] infrastructure, we're sending money
[01:52:33] overseas to other countries.
[01:52:38] Why are we why why do we send so much
[01:52:40] money overseas?
[01:52:41] >> I have no idea.
[01:52:43] >> I mean, I the only thing I can think of
[01:52:45] is greed. The
[01:52:46] >> only thing you can think of is
[01:52:47] >> is greed.
[01:52:50] greed and control. Honestly, I I
[01:52:55] here here we go. Ready? I think our
[01:52:57] country is occupied.
[01:53:01] I think most of our politicians
[01:53:04] are
[01:53:06] beholden to other forces.
[01:53:08] >> Do you think they even know that?
[01:53:10] >> Oh, yeah, they do.
[01:53:12] >> All of them.
[01:53:12] >> Uh, it would be hard not to.
[01:53:16] Do you feel like the caliber of person
[01:53:19] that's going into polit politics
[01:53:23] is
[01:53:24] lower cal caliber than before?
[01:53:27] >> I think they're opportunists.
[01:53:29] You think they go in as opportunists?
[01:53:31] >> I think they Well, I think many of them
[01:53:34] do. I think many of them go in with all
[01:53:37] the right reasons and then get
[01:53:39] corrupted. I have a friend in uh Atlanta
[01:53:43] that is running
[01:53:45] and I he asked, you know, hey, I'm
[01:53:48] running, right? I'm the challenger. I
[01:53:51] can use funding. Can you help out?
[01:53:54] Right? I said, I'd love to, but I said,
[01:53:57] as a friend, I I would hate to see you
[01:54:00] win
[01:54:02] because if you win and you go there, you
[01:54:04] will become dirty. You can't get around
[01:54:06] it.
[01:54:08] You will need to make deals with the
[01:54:10] devil. And it starts with a small one
[01:54:13] and then a bigger one and then a bigger
[01:54:14] one. And eventually you get four or five
[01:54:16] years down the road, you're like,
[01:54:19] I'm bought.
[01:54:21] >> I can't help it. I did it for all the
[01:54:23] right reasons.
[01:54:26] But now I I owe this person that because
[01:54:30] I agreed to that, and I owe this person
[01:54:32] this because I agreed to this.
[01:54:34] And I don't think either of those are
[01:54:36] right. But I have no choice.
[01:54:39] >> You're trapped.
[01:54:40] >> You're trapped.
[01:54:43] >> I think that certain people are propped
[01:54:45] up because they would be very easy to
[01:54:48] manipulate. I see I think you see that
[01:54:51] all over.
[01:54:53] >> And let's not talk about the Epstein
[01:54:54] files here, right?
[01:54:56] >> I'm sure there was none of that in
[01:54:57] there.
[01:54:57] >> Yeah. Yeah. it. Um,
[01:55:01] but I do I think that that that some of
[01:55:04] these freshman congressmen and probably
[01:55:07] senators as well, I think that they have
[01:55:09] been hand selected because they are
[01:55:12] young
[01:55:14] and stupid.
[01:55:18] >> They're young.
[01:55:20] They're impressable. They need funds.
[01:55:24] and just so happens there's a huge pack
[01:55:27] out there that's ready to give them
[01:55:29] everything they need to win because they
[01:55:31] want their support.
[01:55:33] >> Who do you think we're occupied by?
[01:55:36] >> Apac.
[01:55:40] >> A lot of people think that
[01:55:42] >> I The evidence is there.
[01:55:46] The evidence is all there. It's
[01:55:51] it's Come on. We spend eight, we send
[01:55:55] $18 billion a year to Israel.
[01:55:59] Why? Just ask the question, what do we
[01:56:02] get out of it? Nothing. We get nothing.
[01:56:07] Are we doing humanitarian work? No.
[01:56:10] They're charged with genocide. They're
[01:56:12] killing off Palestinians.
[01:56:14] Um,
[01:56:16] are we helping them survive? Well,
[01:56:18] they've got a higher standard of living
[01:56:20] than we do, a longer lifespan than we
[01:56:22] do. free education, free housing, free
[01:56:25] healthcare,
[01:56:28] but we're sending them money.
[01:56:30] Why?
[01:56:32] Ask yourself why a US congressman can
[01:56:35] wear an Israeli military uniform in
[01:56:38] congressional chambers.
[01:56:40] I would think that would be an act of
[01:56:41] treason.
[01:56:44] But they did. Nobody said anything. ask
[01:56:48] why the Israeli prime minister can
[01:56:51] bypass the president, fly directly in
[01:56:54] and speak to our Congress
[01:56:57] without
[01:56:58] any other government interaction.
[01:57:01] >> I didn't know that could happen.
[01:57:02] >> Oh yeah. Netanyahu did flew straight in,
[01:57:04] bypassed the president, talked to talked
[01:57:06] to the Congress. Congress gave him 26
[01:57:09] standing ovations.
[01:57:13] I think most pop stars would like 26
[01:57:15] standing ovations. Our Congress gave
[01:57:17] Netanyahu, a foreign prime minister, 26
[01:57:21] standing ovations.
[01:57:26] I have difficulty
[01:57:29] looking at that
[01:57:31] in any other way than
[01:57:34] we're occupied.
[01:57:38] Statistically speaking,
[01:57:41] we have shown that whoever spends the
[01:57:43] more money on a an election wins 94% of
[01:57:48] the time. Whoever spent the most wins.
[01:57:53] We can also show that every time
[01:57:55] somebody spoke out against Israel or
[01:58:00] Apac,
[01:58:02] the next election their challenger was
[01:58:04] highly funded and wins.
[01:58:09] The facts are all there. All you have to
[01:58:12] do is look at them.
[01:58:14] Now, we shut down that conversation
[01:58:16] quickly, right? Whenever we try to talk
[01:58:18] about it, you get told, "Well, that's
[01:58:20] anti-Semitic."
[01:58:21] >> Mhm. No, it's not.
[01:58:27] Calling things the way they are is not
[01:58:28] anti-Semitic,
[01:58:32] >> right? Um,
[01:58:34] in my book, I have a whole section on
[01:58:36] Zionism where I cover this. Uh,
[01:58:38] Mirshimer and Waltz wrote a book called
[01:58:40] the Apac Lobby where they went in depth
[01:58:44] and looked at this.
[01:58:46] And again, the data is there.
[01:58:49] You just have to look at it. their book.
[01:58:51] They got threatened.
[01:58:53] They got threatened with personal harm
[01:58:55] and shut out of a lot of things as soon
[01:58:58] as they published their book.
[01:59:00] Um,
[01:59:03] what happened to them?
[01:59:05] >> They're still teaching right now at
[01:59:07] universities and whatnot, but they're
[01:59:11] their book did not
[01:59:13] it sold well, but did not take off as
[01:59:16] much as it should. It got hammered
[01:59:19] by people saying, "Well, this is just
[01:59:20] anti-semitic. You're just you hate us."
[01:59:24] I'm like, you know what? Again, I cover
[01:59:27] a whole section on Zionism.
[01:59:29] Zionism is a political movement.
[01:59:34] Excuse me. Zionism is a political
[01:59:35] movement
[01:59:37] that says you must agree with everything
[01:59:39] Israel does, no matter what. I don't
[01:59:42] agree with everything the US does, no
[01:59:44] matter what. Why should I agree with
[01:59:46] another government? If you're doing
[01:59:49] something wrong, I should be able to say
[01:59:50] so. That has nothing to do with
[01:59:55] Judaism. It has nothing to do with the
[01:59:58] rights of of Jewish people. We're
[02:00:00] talking about a political movement
[02:00:04] that has
[02:00:06] bought
[02:00:08] much of the Congress of the United
[02:00:09] States, if not many of the presidents.
[02:00:13] We had Biden come out and say, "I am a
[02:00:14] Zionist."
[02:00:16] Really?
[02:00:18] You support another country's expansion
[02:00:22] over everything no matter what? Aren't
[02:00:25] you supposed to be the president of the
[02:00:26] United States?
[02:00:31] That doesn't seem right.
[02:00:36] I mean, we've seen a lot of things, a
[02:00:38] lot of I mean, for example, when we
[02:00:41] bombed Iran,
[02:00:45] >> it's been told to me by people on the
[02:00:48] inside that not one of our 18
[02:00:50] intelligence agencies reported that they
[02:00:52] were enriching uranium. Then MSAD comes
[02:00:55] along and tells us they're enriching
[02:00:56] uranium.
[02:00:59] >> Absolutely. And we sense so but
[02:01:01] >> who was the number one source of hey
[02:01:03] they've got weapons of mass destruction
[02:01:06] msad
[02:01:10] >> if you look at it.
[02:01:11] >> So let me ask you this. Yeah cuz I've
[02:01:13] heard I've heard all this before and I
[02:01:16] didn't know we were going here. I'm not
[02:01:18] afraid of the conversation. I do know
[02:01:20] there's a lot of loudmouths out there
[02:01:22] that are just spewing this [ __ ] for
[02:01:25] views and and and and um fame or
[02:01:29] whatever they want. But
[02:01:32] and so it gets hard. It gets hard to
[02:01:34] like the information more that we were
[02:01:36] talking about. It gets hard to figure
[02:01:37] out what is [ __ ] and what's not. But
[02:01:40] there are a lot of things visible like
[02:01:42] what I just said
[02:01:44] >> happening right now. Probably more under
[02:01:47] this administration than the last. At
[02:01:49] least at least what from what I'm
[02:01:51] noticing. And
[02:01:54] it's [ __ ] alarming. Very alarming.
[02:01:59] In fact,
[02:02:01] it seems like just about everything we
[02:02:03] do, they have influence over.
[02:02:05] >> Mhm.
[02:02:07] More than we would think. And again,
[02:02:10] once you start to see it, you notice it
[02:02:15] >> before you see it the first time.
[02:02:19] You don't even think about it, right?
[02:02:22] >> Once you start to notice, then you're
[02:02:24] like, "This but this is everywhere."
[02:02:28] >> Yeah, kind of. Kind of is everywhere.
[02:02:33] So, let me ask you this
[02:02:38] because I've heard I've heard that I
[02:02:40] didn't know that they were calling them
[02:02:42] weapons of mass destruction. I was busy
[02:02:45] back then. and I was involved and right
[02:02:47] >> I didn't have time
[02:02:48] >> look around
[02:02:49] >> you didn't have the nicity to stop and
[02:02:50] think h let's talk about politics
[02:02:52] >> but um but so what is the goal
[02:02:57] what is the goal
[02:02:59] >> whose goal
[02:03:01] >> well if we are occupied by Israel
[02:03:04] >> then what is their goal
[02:03:06] >> the greater Israel
[02:03:09] now what does that mean
[02:03:10] >> does that mean we become Israel
[02:03:12] >> no
[02:03:14] it's interesting ing the Israelis have
[02:03:18] this idea
[02:03:20] similar to what we had of manifest
[02:03:23] destiny. It is our destiny to control
[02:03:26] this much.
[02:03:29] Their idea is pretty much all of
[02:03:32] Palestine,
[02:03:35] about half of Lebanon, about half of
[02:03:37] Syria, all of Jordan,
[02:03:40] and a great swath of Saudi Arabia, what
[02:03:44] is now Saudi Arabia. Now, you would
[02:03:46] think that seems pretty ambitious.
[02:03:51] All you have to do is look at an Israeli
[02:03:54] uniform right now.
[02:03:57] We have an American flag on our
[02:03:59] shoulder. Look at the Israeli uniforms.
[02:04:02] They have a symbol of what they call the
[02:04:07] greater Israel, which is everything I
[02:04:09] just told you.
[02:04:11] Palestine, part of Lebanon, part of
[02:04:12] Syria, all of Jordan, Saudi Arabia.
[02:04:16] That's what they have on their uniform
[02:04:18] right now. That's what their vision is.
[02:04:21] That's what they want.
[02:04:23] >> Why Why do they want those specific
[02:04:24] regions? They believe that that is their
[02:04:28] God-given land. God gave it to us. All
[02:04:32] of this, we deserve it back. We'll take
[02:04:36] it.
[02:04:38] You've been in the Middle East. I've
[02:04:40] been in the Middle East.
[02:04:43] When I start looking at a lot of the
[02:04:45] things we've done in the Middle East, at
[02:04:48] first we say, well, it's because of oil.
[02:04:49] It's because of this.
[02:04:52] Even that doesn't always fit.
[02:04:55] The thing that fits the closest is when
[02:04:58] you start saying, "How does this affect
[02:05:00] Israel?"
[02:05:02] Iraq was building a huge military force.
[02:05:06] It would have been a threat to Israel.
[02:05:08] We need to get rid of that
[02:05:11] weapons of mass destruction. We'll go in
[02:05:13] and kill a million Iraqis and kill all
[02:05:15] and destroy all of their military. Okay,
[02:05:18] no longer an issue.
[02:05:20] Uh Libya is growing a huge military.
[02:05:25] They're also trying to break away from
[02:05:27] the dollar and form a pan-African
[02:05:30] monetary system that would challenge,
[02:05:33] you know, the American u dollar as a
[02:05:37] trading thing. Can't have that.
[02:05:39] >> Wait, that's not not part of bricks.
[02:05:41] There's another initiative.
[02:05:43] >> Oh, this is before. This is before with
[02:05:45] Gaddafi. Okay.
[02:05:46] >> Sorry. Uh yeah, this is not bricks.
[02:05:50] Before with Gaddafi, Gaddafi had the
[02:05:52] idea of a thing he called
[02:05:56] Oh, I don't remember what it was, but it
[02:05:58] it it was basically a pan-African
[02:06:02] currency that they could use and not use
[02:06:05] the dollar.
[02:06:06] >> Didn't Gaddafi actually mentioned
[02:06:08] something about Zionism in the US?
[02:06:10] >> Oh, he did. Yeah, he said Yeah.
[02:06:12] >> What did he say? He he was saying that
[02:06:14] the Zionist influence was keeping the US
[02:06:18] entrenched in the Middle East to do
[02:06:20] their bidding basically
[02:06:23] and he fought against that.
[02:06:26] So what happens? The US go in and bomb
[02:06:28] him and and kill him and you you wanted
[02:06:31] to know what have we done. Was Gaddafi a
[02:06:34] great leader? No.
[02:06:37] He did a lot of bad things. He tortured
[02:06:40] people and everything.
[02:06:42] We have Guantanamo Bay, right? We're
[02:06:46] waterboarding people and whatnot. Well,
[02:06:48] we say we're not, but
[02:06:50] anyway. Um, but he also took a country
[02:06:54] that had an a literacy rate of less than
[02:06:57] 5% and got it up to almost 100%.
[02:07:01] He
[02:07:03] made infrastructure so that they had
[02:07:05] water and they had electricity.
[02:07:08] He increased education.
[02:07:11] They started, you know, having more uh
[02:07:14] entrepreneurs.
[02:07:17] He gave every newly married couple funds
[02:07:20] to help purchase their own house so that
[02:07:22] they could all be affluent. The country
[02:07:25] was growing.
[02:07:27] >> Sounds like a lot of [ __ ] that needs to
[02:07:29] happen in the US.
[02:07:30] >> Yeah. Then we bombed them and now it's
[02:07:33] just it's been civil war and strife and
[02:07:35] and it's nothing what it used to be.
[02:07:39] Again, going back to were we the good
[02:07:41] guys? Why did we do that? Well, we did
[02:07:44] it to protect our dollar economy. We did
[02:07:47] it to protect Israel from their
[02:07:49] military.
[02:07:51] Now we've got Iran. Iran's building a
[02:07:53] big military.
[02:07:55] can't have that because if Israel tries
[02:07:59] to move in, Iran will fight them. Well,
[02:08:02] we'll get rid of it.
[02:08:06] I don't want to sound like a conspiracy
[02:08:08] theorist, but the more you look at this,
[02:08:12] the closer the parts fit
[02:08:15] and you start putting all the parts
[02:08:17] together and you're like,
[02:08:20] "Call me crazy, but the data
[02:08:24] is showing this."
[02:08:28] And you've got that whole concept of
[02:08:30] AAM's razor, right? You cut away
[02:08:32] everything that can't be true and what's
[02:08:34] left regardless of how plausible it
[02:08:37] sounds is what the truth is.
[02:08:40] Then you start cutting things away and
[02:08:42] looking at it and you're like,
[02:08:46] this pretty much leads to one
[02:08:48] conclusion.
[02:09:03] This hits different when somebody like
[02:09:04] you are talking about it.
[02:09:08] >> It's a tough subject.
[02:09:11] The opening part of this section in my
[02:09:14] book, I say something to the effect of
[02:09:16] when you're searching for the truth,
[02:09:19] eventually you come across something
[02:09:21] that is so sensitive, so highly
[02:09:24] protected that to even question it risks
[02:09:28] ruin.
[02:09:31] And in our government, that topic is
[02:09:33] Zionism.
[02:09:36] As soon as you go down that path, you
[02:09:38] are courting ruin. Mir Shimemer and
[02:09:42] Waltz found that out.
[02:09:44] I had friends after they read this
[02:09:46] saying,
[02:09:48] "You need to start looking after your
[02:09:51] personal safety cuz they are not going
[02:09:54] to like this."
[02:09:58] I told him, "Hey, the book's out. Doing
[02:10:00] something me wouldn't hurt me." People
[02:10:02] like you have more of a risk because
[02:10:04] you're an ongoing,
[02:10:07] you know, show. But still, as soon as
[02:10:11] you address this topic,
[02:10:14] you get more than just push back.
[02:10:19] I've seen it.
[02:10:20] >> No doubt. No doubt.
[02:10:24] >> Are you worried?
[02:10:26] >> I'm not.
[02:10:28] I'm not. Me personally or as a country?
[02:10:32] >> You personally.
[02:10:33] >> Me personally,
[02:10:36] I'm not. Like I said, the book's already
[02:10:39] out.
[02:10:42] You know, the bell has been rung. What
[02:10:44] do you do? I'm retired,
[02:10:48] you know. Um, yeah. Can you go after my
[02:10:51] social security? Okay. Yeah. I mean,
[02:10:53] look at what we're doing,
[02:10:56] you know, to our admirals. Um,
[02:11:00] can things happen? Sure. Does that mean
[02:11:02] we should be quiet?
[02:11:05] No.
[02:11:06] If you're afraid to speak the truth,
[02:11:08] you've already lost.
[02:11:12] If we believed that, then we wouldn't be
[02:11:14] a country. Our founding fathers would
[02:11:17] have just not said anything and said,
[02:11:19] "Well, if we fight the British, we could
[02:11:21] lose,
[02:11:23] you know, our land."
[02:11:25] >> Mhm. Did they shy away from that? No,
[02:11:28] they didn't. That's why we're a country.
[02:11:36] How else How else are we being
[02:11:38] influenced?
[02:11:43] Money.
[02:11:46] I mean, I hate to say that capitalism is
[02:11:47] the problem. Capitalism is the best
[02:11:49] economical system we've been able to
[02:11:51] find on this planet so far,
[02:11:55] but it needs a little bit of pruning.
[02:12:00] I mean, if you let a rose bush grow
[02:12:03] without pruning, you don't get pretty
[02:12:05] roses. You get a big gnarly bush that's
[02:12:08] got a lot of thorns on it.
[02:12:11] >> But if you prune it and keep it growing,
[02:12:12] you get something beautiful.
[02:12:15] We
[02:12:17] our government
[02:12:19] is so
[02:12:22] focused on money and where the money
[02:12:24] goes.
[02:12:27] We have this system now and I get it.
[02:12:31] Congressmen should fight for things for
[02:12:33] their people in their state, right?
[02:12:35] That's the way our system is set up.
[02:12:39] But there's also got to be some sort of
[02:12:44] conscious control over it somehow.
[02:12:47] And I don't have the answer to what that
[02:12:49] means.
[02:12:52] Excuse me.
[02:12:55] But there's got to be a way to not do
[02:12:58] what we're doing.
[02:13:00] The F-35 was a great example of this. A
[02:13:03] part of it is built in all 50 states.
[02:13:06] Really? Is that the most efficient way
[02:13:08] to do that? We've got parts being built
[02:13:11] in places that have no infrastructure to
[02:13:14] build them. So, we'll go build a big
[02:13:16] factory because every state needs a part
[02:13:18] of the pie, right? And instead of
[02:13:20] saying, well, hey, we'll take this from
[02:13:22] this
[02:13:24] program, you guys take that from that
[02:13:27] program, every senator and congressman
[02:13:29] is in there fighting saying, we need a
[02:13:31] part of every single program.
[02:13:34] I mean, we've got
[02:13:36] parts from the Navy being built in, you
[02:13:38] know, Montana, Wyoming, and Kansas.
[02:13:42] Really, is that the most efficient?
[02:13:44] And then we'll ship them all somewhere
[02:13:46] else and see if they fit. And if there's
[02:13:48] a change, we'll ship them back. And then
[02:13:49] they'll change it, and we'll ship them
[02:13:51] back. And I'm like, it creates so much
[02:13:54] waste,
[02:13:55] but it is all driven by money. Who gets
[02:13:58] the money?
[02:13:58] >> Mhm.
[02:14:03] And we even have haven't even gotten
[02:14:05] into
[02:14:08] that doesn't answer your question about
[02:14:10] how we're being being controlled.
[02:14:12] >> It doesn't. It only
[02:14:14] >> is ever since we did the
[02:14:18] Citizens United and said that companies
[02:14:20] are to be treated like individuals and
[02:14:22] they can have the freedom of speech and
[02:14:26] freedom of choice to do what they want.
[02:14:28] We now have large corporations
[02:14:32] similar to what IP, Apac is doing,
[02:14:34] giving huge amounts of money
[02:14:38] to candidates.
[02:14:40] And if you get hundreds of thousands or
[02:14:43] million or millions of dollars from a
[02:14:46] donor,
[02:14:48] you are going to help do what they want
[02:14:50] you to do.
[02:14:51] >> Mhm.
[02:14:52] >> There's no way around that.
[02:14:55] Um, and we have large corporations doing
[02:14:58] that. We have healthcare doing that. We
[02:14:59] have defense doing that, defense
[02:15:01] contractors.
[02:15:02] >> We have billionaires doing that.
[02:15:03] >> We have billionaires doing that.
[02:15:04] >> We have individuals.
[02:15:05] >> Absolutely.
[02:15:06] >> Absolutely.
[02:15:07] >> I want to I want to ask you more about
[02:15:09] APEC.
[02:15:10] >> Yeah.
[02:15:11] >> Because I've heard a lot about this,
[02:15:12] too. I'm concerned.
[02:15:14] >> Yeah. Yeah, I've seen a lot of people
[02:15:16] talk about I I saw something with Matt
[02:15:18] Gates the other day where he's talking
[02:15:19] about they would hang a barcode over
[02:15:22] each congressman and senator and
[02:15:23] literally scan it and
[02:15:27] and there comes your donation.
[02:15:29] >> Yeah. Right.
[02:15:30] >> At least I I I think that's what he was
[02:15:32] saying. Something along those lines.
[02:15:34] >> I hadn't heard that. Anyways,
[02:15:37] so I dove into some of the sites and I
[02:15:39] looked and to see, you know, how much
[02:15:42] money is APEC donating to congressmen,
[02:15:45] senators?
[02:15:47] Yeah. I mean, it's it's
[02:15:50] >> I don't think it's a substantial amount.
[02:15:53] >> It's not
[02:15:53] >> I don't think it's a sub substantial. I
[02:15:55] looked and I 50,000 here, 250,000 here.
[02:16:00] Yeah, 50,000 can make a lot of people
[02:16:02] dance and do whatever the [ __ ] you want,
[02:16:04] but I mean, if you're making what,
[02:16:06] $175,000
[02:16:08] a year in Congress, I mean, is 50 grand
[02:16:10] really that much?
[02:16:11] >> No.
[02:16:12] >> Is it really enough to make you sell
[02:16:14] your country out?
[02:16:16] >> No.
[02:16:16] >> I don't know. So then I called some
[02:16:18] friends that are in Congress and in
[02:16:20] Senate and I asked them about it and
[02:16:28] they
[02:16:31] are staunch defenders of Israel.
[02:16:34] >> Um
[02:16:37] going off of their faith,
[02:16:39] what the Bible says that that that's
[02:16:41] what they're that's how they decipher
[02:16:43] it. Fair enough. They're doing what they
[02:16:46] believe in. And they told me that the
[02:16:49] they go, "If you think that the
[02:16:53] AP pack has a lot of funds, then you
[02:16:55] should look at the Saudi Arabia pack
[02:16:57] >> without a doubt."
[02:16:58] >> And so then I'm, you know, I I hear that
[02:17:02] and I'm like, "All right." And I I have
[02:17:04] I love this person. I trust this person.
[02:17:07] Uh, I think that he I don't want to um
[02:17:12] reveal his name, but I I think that he
[02:17:14] I've seen I've I have no reason to think
[02:17:16] that that guy is not doing what he truly
[02:17:19] believes in and and and is serving his
[02:17:23] constituents. One of the only [ __ ]
[02:17:25] people in there.
[02:17:27] So, I I I take what he has to say very
[02:17:30] seriously. And
[02:17:33] so, tell me about APEC because that's
[02:17:35] what I know.
[02:17:37] I know that they are not registered as a
[02:17:39] foreign lobbying firm or what whatever
[02:17:42] that is.
[02:17:42] >> Yeah. When
[02:17:44] >> when what?
[02:17:45] >> You got to go back and always ask when.
[02:17:46] So Apac didn't start as Apac. started as
[02:17:49] the American Zionist
[02:17:52] something group
[02:17:55] when the Foreign Agents Act was passed
[02:17:59] and said you need to now register as a
[02:18:02] foreign agent if you are supporting a
[02:18:05] foreign country.
[02:18:08] The American Zionist, whatever group, I
[02:18:11] forgot their name again, should have
[02:18:12] registered.
[02:18:14] Instead, they renamed themselves Apac
[02:18:18] and said, "We are not we are no longer
[02:18:21] representing a foreign company. We are
[02:18:23] now representing Americans
[02:18:26] who have certain beliefs."
[02:18:29] Okay. Well, that keeps them now from
[02:18:31] registering as a foreign agent.
[02:18:34] Little slight of hand, but okay.
[02:18:38] And you're absolutely right. Go look and
[02:18:40] see how much money APAC has contributed
[02:18:43] to people. In the big scheme of things,
[02:18:47] minimal.
[02:18:50] So, let's say, and I know this would
[02:18:52] never happen, right? But let's say
[02:18:55] I wanted to give you some money, but I
[02:18:58] don't want everybody to know that I gave
[02:19:01] you money.
[02:19:03] What can I do? [ __ ] bill. I can go call
[02:19:06] 10 of my friends and I go, "Hey, I want
[02:19:09] you to go give Shawn
[02:19:12] 20,000 and you give Shawn 20,000 and you
[02:19:15] give Shawn 20,000.
[02:19:17] You give Shawn 20,000. I've got 200
[02:19:20] friends.
[02:19:22] All of a sudden, you've got a lot of
[02:19:24] money. Now, who donated to you?"
[02:19:26] Individuals.
[02:19:28] A company here, an LLC there, an
[02:19:30] individual here. APAC itself
[02:19:34] is not giving a large amount of money
[02:19:37] but they orchestrate
[02:19:39] huge amounts of money. They tell people
[02:19:44] you should support this candidate
[02:19:47] and if you start and this is again where
[02:19:50] you start pulling the thread. If you
[02:19:53] start going down a few levels and
[02:19:55] looking then you start finding this.
[02:19:59] There's another uh APAC used to do a lot
[02:20:02] of things that they don't do now. There
[02:20:05] is another organization,
[02:20:09] forgot the name,
[02:20:11] their sole purpose is education. We're
[02:20:16] trying to do education, a lofty goal,
[02:20:20] right? We'd all agree education is good.
[02:20:22] What does that mean?
[02:20:24] They're a 501c3.
[02:20:27] So you can donate to them and your money
[02:20:29] is taxdeductible.
[02:20:31] All they do is pay for congressmen and
[02:20:34] people in power to have free trips to
[02:20:36] Israel so that they can go show them
[02:20:39] look how wonderful we are. We gave you a
[02:20:41] free trip to Israel. We'll take you
[02:20:43] around Tel Aviv and show you how
[02:20:45] wonderful this is and why we need more
[02:20:46] money and then send you home.
[02:20:49] But it's education, right?
[02:20:54] Are they is that APAC? They're
[02:20:57] affiliated and Apac works with them,
[02:21:02] right? There's five or six other larger
[02:21:04] groups. Last I saw, there were over 200
[02:21:10] charities, groups, political action
[02:21:14] committees that support this. And that's
[02:21:18] just the groups that are registered.
[02:21:20] That's not the individuals. So Apac,
[02:21:23] think of Apac like a clearing house.
[02:21:29] They're the clearing house, but they're
[02:21:32] good. You can't just say, "Hey, you just
[02:21:35] gave $2 million to this person."
[02:21:38] But again, look at the results.
[02:21:41] Every time there's a person
[02:21:45] in Congress that speaks out against
[02:21:47] Israel,
[02:21:49] the very next election, they have a
[02:21:52] challenger who is very pro-Israel that
[02:21:54] has huge amounts of funding.
[02:21:57] That's not by accident. That didn't just
[02:21:59] happen. And it's not just that it
[02:22:01] happened in one state. It happens in
[02:22:04] every single state in the union. That's
[02:22:06] not accidental.
[02:22:11] Are they the only ones doing this?
[02:22:13] >> Pardon? Are they the only ones doing
[02:22:15] this?
[02:22:15] >> Are they the only ones?
[02:22:19] >> I don't know. What about China,
[02:22:22] >> in the US?
[02:22:23] >> Mhm.
[02:22:26] >> I don't feel like they have that much
[02:22:28] that they need to control with us. They
[02:22:30] already own so many things. We let them
[02:22:32] buy properties and buildings and
[02:22:35] businesses.
[02:22:36] >> Our power grid
[02:22:39] You know, we buy Chinese goods because
[02:22:41] they're cheap.
[02:22:42] >> Well, I mean, if you look at I mean,
[02:22:44] there's there's a handful of politicians
[02:22:47] that have Chinese businesses. Mitch
[02:22:49] McConnell, one of them, is has a
[02:22:51] shipping business.
[02:22:55] Feinstein had something.
[02:23:00] There's a handful of them. You know,
[02:23:01] it's amazing how you go into Congress
[02:23:04] with a net worth of 3400,000. You get
[02:23:06] paid $170,000 a year and four or five
[02:23:09] years later you're worth 8 to 10
[02:23:12] million.
[02:23:13] >> Oh yeah, we talked.
[02:23:13] >> Isn't that amazing?
[02:23:14] >> It is. It is.
[02:23:15] >> It's amazing.
[02:23:17] >> Tell me that that's ethical.
[02:23:21] >> I don't think anything in DC is ethical.
[02:23:23] >> No, I I I agree. I agree. And we can sit
[02:23:28] here and and tell tell everybody
[02:23:30] everything's wrong, right? That doesn't
[02:23:32] do anything.
[02:23:34] The only way to start fixing these
[02:23:36] things is to be informed,
[02:23:39] understand what's happening, and try not
[02:23:43] to be influenced by it.
[02:23:47] >> How far does this go back?
[02:23:56] at least 50s.
[02:24:01] >> Why? What happened in the 50s?
[02:24:02] >> At least well 40s.
[02:24:05] Um
[02:24:08] before that actually. And again, I'm
[02:24:10] going to go back to the whole Israeli
[02:24:12] thing.
[02:24:14] So, Israel was
[02:24:17] created
[02:24:19] in our current world by resolution 181
[02:24:23] of the United Nations that said the
[02:24:25] Israeli people should have a homeland of
[02:24:27] their own. Many people know that fact.
[02:24:30] What they don't know is is that same
[02:24:32] resolution 181 said you may not displace
[02:24:36] people that already live there.
[02:24:40] It didn't say you get to have a state
[02:24:43] that is
[02:24:45] only Jewish and everybody else has to
[02:24:49] leave or you get to expel them. It also
[02:24:53] said there will be a Palestinian state.
[02:24:56] There will be an Israeli state and a
[02:24:57] Palestinian state. Said that resolution
[02:25:00] 181
[02:25:02] that was passed in November of 1947.
[02:25:08] In 1948,
[02:25:10] Israel declared itself a
[02:25:14] distinct, free, and new nation.
[02:25:19] You know how government works.
[02:25:22] When somebody says something and you
[02:25:24] want a resolution or you want to do
[02:25:26] something, how long does that take in
[02:25:28] government?
[02:25:30] >> Years.
[02:25:30] >> Could be.
[02:25:34] Israel just declared themselves
[02:25:35] independent. President Truman recognized
[02:25:38] them seven minutes later.
[02:25:41] Seven minutes.
[02:25:43] It's like he's hovering over the phone
[02:25:45] just waiting for the call. They said
[02:25:47] they're independent now. I recognize
[02:25:48] Israel.
[02:25:51] What about the rest of the resolution?
[02:25:53] Did he recognize Palestine at the same
[02:25:54] time? No. Had Truman recognized
[02:25:58] Palestine and Israel at the same time,
[02:26:01] we wouldn't be having this issue.
[02:26:05] But we started it off right there. That
[02:26:07] was that was where it started.
[02:26:13] And of course you can go back before
[02:26:14] that the Balffor agreement.
[02:26:16] >> What's that?
[02:26:17] >> Sykespico. Uh
[02:26:20] so there were a couple of people. Uh
[02:26:24] >> this is going on during World War II.
[02:26:26] >> Oh yeah. Yeah. Before well before
[02:26:29] >> before
[02:26:29] >> well before.
[02:26:32] So Theodore Herzel wrote a paper a
[02:26:35] treatise called uh Darudenat in German
[02:26:39] and it means the Jewish state. And he
[02:26:41] said the Jewish people should have their
[02:26:44] own state. They should be allowed, you
[02:26:47] know, to to not be under any other state
[02:26:50] because we should be our own people,
[02:26:52] right? He petitioned the British
[02:26:55] government and said, "Hey,
[02:26:58] you know, we we need to make a place for
[02:27:01] the Jews."
[02:27:03] Lord Balffor, who was um
[02:27:08] I forgot his position, but he was a lord
[02:27:10] in the government,
[02:27:12] wrote a letter then said, "The British
[02:27:15] government recognizes that the Jewish
[02:27:18] people should have their own state."
[02:27:22] Well, the British government didn't
[02:27:24] actually say it. Lord Balffor did, but
[02:27:26] the British didn't want to be
[02:27:28] embarrassed and say, "We're going to go
[02:27:29] against one of our own lords." So, they
[02:27:30] didn't refute it.
[02:27:34] Herzel and some others took this and
[02:27:36] then petitioned the League of Nations
[02:27:40] and said, "We should be our own state."
[02:27:41] They said, "Well, we don't recognize you
[02:27:43] yet." Right?
[02:27:45] After World War II, feeling a lot of
[02:27:47] guilt,
[02:27:49] they again pulled up the Balffor letter
[02:27:52] and said, "You guys said we should get
[02:27:54] our own state. You need to do something
[02:27:58] after World War II. We're carving up all
[02:28:00] the land, right?"
[02:28:03] Sykes and Pico,
[02:28:05] um the two people that were um assigned
[02:28:10] to kind of figure everything out said,
[02:28:12] "Well, we'll we'll give this to Israel.
[02:28:16] We'll
[02:28:18] give the Hasheite kingdom over here
[02:28:21] to this brother who helped us fight the
[02:28:23] Ottomans. And then we'll carve out this
[02:28:25] part over here. We'll call that the
[02:28:27] Hasheite Kingdom of Jordan.
[02:28:30] will make the rest of Palestine a
[02:28:33] mandatory Palestine that will continue
[02:28:36] to manage,
[02:28:38] you know, and they divvied everything up
[02:28:42] pretty much on the back of a napkin.
[02:28:45] There was not a lot of thought. They
[02:28:48] drew lines and said, "What do you think
[02:28:49] about this?" Yeah, okay. We'll do that.
[02:28:52] That was Sykes Pico that
[02:28:54] basically distributed everything, all
[02:28:57] the land after World War II.
[02:29:01] Palestine became the mandatory Palestine
[02:29:04] under British rule.
[02:29:07] Um, Palestinians didn't really like
[02:29:09] that. Neither did the Jewish people.
[02:29:11] There were a lot of battles between
[02:29:13] Israelis and the British and
[02:29:16] Palestinians and the British,
[02:29:19] you know, and then the British finally
[02:29:21] at one point said, you know, we're out.
[02:29:23] Kind of like the French did in Vietnam,
[02:29:26] right? And said, yeah, we're done. We're
[02:29:27] out. And and they left.
[02:29:31] Um, and Israel took what they were
[02:29:35] supposed to have and expanded and took
[02:29:38] all sorts of other land, expelling all
[02:29:42] sorts of Palestinians. There's the
[02:29:44] Nakba, the catastrophe
[02:29:48] of when all of these Palestinians were
[02:29:50] forced out of their land.
[02:29:52] And now you hear things like, well, you
[02:29:54] know, there's the right of return.
[02:29:58] Sounds good. until you realize the right
[02:30:00] of return doesn't mean Palestinians.
[02:30:02] Palestinians don't get to return.
[02:30:05] The right of return is a term that
[02:30:06] Israel uses that says anybody that's
[02:30:08] Jewish can come back here. Well, what
[02:30:10] about the people you kicked out? Yeah,
[02:30:12] they they can't come back. We're not
[02:30:15] we're not letting them back.
[02:30:18] I mean, today try try having Palestinian
[02:30:22] ancestry and going into Israel. You'll
[02:30:25] be disallowed. You won't be allowed in.
[02:30:30] So yeah, this started
[02:30:32] this is not new. This has been going on
[02:30:35] for 70 years at least and had the
[02:30:38] precursors even before that.
[02:30:43] I think this is something that happens
[02:30:45] quite often. We see the current state.
[02:30:49] We don't spend enough time going back
[02:30:51] and saying how did we get here?
[02:30:56] And I was a history major at the academy
[02:30:58] and that's I mean you always went back
[02:31:00] and said to understand the battle today
[02:31:04] we have to understand how we got here
[02:31:06] because otherwise we don't understand
[02:31:08] what the motivations are.
[02:31:09] >> Mhm. Right.
[02:31:16] What do you think?
[02:31:19] >> I don't know yet.
[02:31:21] >> I join you with that.
[02:31:25] It's a journey. It's a journey as you
[02:31:28] build more information and you start
[02:31:30] looking. And
[02:31:33] I've got to tell you, when I was
[02:31:34] researching this book, I rejected
[02:31:39] a lot of information when I first heard
[02:31:41] it.
[02:31:42] I would hear information, I would think,
[02:31:44] that that can't be right.
[02:31:46] I don't believe that. I would say the
[02:31:48] same thing, right? Then I'd find a
[02:31:51] second piece and be like, well, that
[02:31:54] supports that, but
[02:31:56] God, if I believe that,
[02:31:59] that leads to a dark place and I don't
[02:32:02] want to believe that.
[02:32:04] And then I find more and more
[02:32:06] information. And after a while, you're
[02:32:07] like, I can't I can't argue it anymore.
[02:32:09] This is true.
[02:32:12] We have
[02:32:14] people, we have organizations in our
[02:32:17] country that are controlling our
[02:32:19] Congress not for the good of Americans.
[02:32:22] I don't like that. It leads me to a bad
[02:32:25] spot,
[02:32:28] but I can't refute it. I I don't have
[02:32:33] any conclusive evidence to the opposite,
[02:32:36] and I have a large body of evidence that
[02:32:38] shows that is true.
[02:32:42] And I always tell people, prove me
[02:32:44] wrong. For God's sakes, give me more
[02:32:46] info. I'm happy to change my opinion.
[02:32:49] And if you can show me information
[02:32:52] that this is not correct, that has yet
[02:32:55] to happen.
[02:33:03] Gives you pause, doesn't it? Yeah.
[02:33:12] Let's take a break.
[02:33:14] >> Sounds good.
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[02:36:07] right, Michael, we're back from the
[02:36:08] break.
[02:36:10] This took a very unexpected turn, but it
[02:36:14] did. It went a little deeper than I
[02:36:16] thought we would, but that's okay. These
[02:36:17] things need to be talked about.
[02:36:20] >> Let's continue.
[02:36:21] >> All right.
[02:36:24] Where do we start?
[02:36:28] I don't know. You're the expert.
[02:36:33] Uh, all right.
[02:36:35] It's uh
[02:36:37] >> how are they doing this? What other un
[02:36:40] what other countries
[02:36:43] are being influenced?
[02:36:45] >> It it's not just us. Uh there have been
[02:36:49] a lot of there has been a lot of push
[02:36:51] back in Great Britain
[02:36:54] uh about the same thing. Too much
[02:36:56] Zionist influence.
[02:36:58] Um
[02:37:00] the thing is is you need to have
[02:37:04] a strong democracy with
[02:37:09] strong freedoms of speech, assembly,
[02:37:14] and uh some sort of rules about
[02:37:19] making donations and things without
[02:37:21] limits.
[02:37:22] >> Mhm. That constrains you.
[02:37:25] How much of how much effect can Zionism
[02:37:28] have in China? Not much. They don't get
[02:37:31] to do that, right? So,
[02:37:34] they're a little blocked there. Russia,
[02:37:38] Russia has its own reasons for doing
[02:37:40] whatever it is it's going to do, right?
[02:37:43] Do they support Israel?
[02:37:46] Some, not to the effect we do. We We
[02:37:50] have our own democracy and our own
[02:37:55] our own freedoms used against us.
[02:38:00] And our founding fathers, they were
[02:38:03] smart men,
[02:38:05] but I I heard the statement, they
[02:38:08] weren't demigods, right? They were just
[02:38:10] men in their 30s trying to form a new
[02:38:14] country. Could they think of everything?
[02:38:17] No. Could they have in their wildest
[02:38:19] dreams
[02:38:21] imagined the internet, instantaneous
[02:38:24] communication everywhere,
[02:38:27] um freedom to do the things we do today?
[02:38:30] There there's no way
[02:38:32] they envisioned
[02:38:34] senators and congressmen
[02:38:37] being
[02:38:39] business people or farmers that would
[02:38:42] come and serve for a period of time and
[02:38:45] go back, right? They never envisioned
[02:38:49] having a whole class of people whose
[02:38:53] lifelong job was to go serve in
[02:38:55] Congress.
[02:38:57] That was never part of the vision. And
[02:39:00] that has morphed and changed.
[02:39:04] And it's these things that give rise to
[02:39:07] the
[02:39:08] the nuances
[02:39:11] that allow the influence from foreign
[02:39:14] governments or proponents of foreign
[02:39:16] governments that we see today.
[02:39:21] And I'm not a congressional,
[02:39:24] you know, uh, lawyer that that that goes
[02:39:28] deep in this, but from what I've seen,
[02:39:32] you wouldn't have these freedoms in
[02:39:34] other places. And that is used against
[02:39:36] us.
[02:39:46] What do we do?
[02:39:51] It's a great question.
[02:39:55] I would love to just say, "What do you
[02:39:56] think we should do?" But that doesn't go
[02:39:58] very well.
[02:40:00] Um,
[02:40:02] I think there's a number of things we
[02:40:04] can do.
[02:40:06] Uh, first, anybody that advocates for
[02:40:09] another country should be registered as
[02:40:12] a foreign agent.
[02:40:14] >> I wanted to ask you about that.
[02:40:15] >> Yeah.
[02:40:19] So, okay, APEC is not considered a what
[02:40:23] is it? A foreign
[02:40:25] >> foreign agent.
[02:40:25] >> Foreign agent.
[02:40:26] >> Yeah.
[02:40:27] >> They're not registered.
[02:40:28] >> Let's say that now they're registered as
[02:40:30] a foreign agent. Yeah. What changes?
[02:40:32] >> They have to disclose everything that
[02:40:34] they're doing. Um they have reporting
[02:40:38] and saying we did this because of this.
[02:40:40] We're giving this much money. This is
[02:40:43] where the money came from and this is
[02:40:46] the money that we are advocating others
[02:40:49] to do. It makes everything a lot more
[02:40:52] transparent.
[02:40:56] >> Do you think that would actually work
[02:40:58] >> to a degree? I don't think it's the
[02:40:59] silver bullet.
[02:41:01] I think there's always ways around
[02:41:03] things. Mhm.
[02:41:05] >> Um I think systemically in our
[02:41:07] government we have other issues that we
[02:41:10] need to take care of to prevent things
[02:41:12] like this from happening.
[02:41:15] Um
[02:41:17] term limits for senators and
[02:41:20] congressmen. You shouldn't be able to
[02:41:21] spend a lifetime there. The longer you
[02:41:24] spend, the more you get beholden to
[02:41:26] other people because of the deals you
[02:41:28] have to make.
[02:41:30] I think it's a a nature of the system,
[02:41:33] right? Um I think things like
[02:41:40] we shouldn't have writers on bills. You
[02:41:42] shouldn't have a healthc care bill that
[02:41:44] you attach
[02:41:46] farm subsidy bill to, right? You vote on
[02:41:49] one or the other, but it shouldn't be
[02:41:51] like, well, if you want this, you also
[02:41:53] have to agree to these other 10 things
[02:41:55] we tacked on. Do you think voting
[02:41:56] matters
[02:41:58] >> in Congress
[02:42:00] >> anywhere?
[02:42:00] >> Yes. I think in Congress because when
[02:42:03] they pass a bill, they have to vote on
[02:42:04] it.
[02:42:04] >> Do we have sovereign elections?
[02:42:07] >> Do we?
[02:42:08] >> Mhm.
[02:42:11] >> Less and less
[02:42:13] less and less
[02:42:15] uh because of gerrymandering,
[02:42:18] because of media influence.
[02:42:22] I think I I said earlier in the show, we
[02:42:25] have statistics that show that whoever
[02:42:28] spends the most money wins 94% of the
[02:42:31] time. Well, that's not a democratic
[02:42:34] system.
[02:42:35] >> What about the last presidential
[02:42:37] election?
[02:42:37] >> Yeah.
[02:42:38] >> Who spent more money?
[02:42:39] >> Oh, by far. Trump did by far.
[02:42:42] >> Did he?
[02:42:43] >> Oh, yeah. You know what's really funny
[02:42:45] is uh
[02:42:47] >> Are you sure about that?
[02:42:48] >> I I think so. I
[02:42:51] Okay, I won't state it as an absolute,
[02:42:53] but I am pretty sure about that.
[02:42:56] Bernie Sanders was originally trending
[02:43:00] higher in the ratings.
[02:43:04] Um, but he got less airtime. Why? He
[02:43:08] wasn't spending the money on it and he
[02:43:10] wasn't one of the two parties.
[02:43:14] That to me seems like we're being fed
[02:43:19] the person that we want to win
[02:43:25] because the reason I'm asking is I think
[02:43:27] the guess what I how do we fix this? I
[02:43:31] think the only way that we could fix
[02:43:32] this is through education.
[02:43:36] >> I've got a different way. Education is
[02:43:39] and and in my book I talk about
[02:43:42] education as one of the prime things
[02:43:45] always to fix a lot of ills. Now what I
[02:43:47] mean by education is educating the
[02:43:49] population about this.
[02:43:51] >> Yeah.
[02:43:53] >> But
[02:43:55] if you don't think we have a sovereign
[02:43:56] election system
[02:43:59] then that really doesn't do anything
[02:44:00] anyways.
[02:44:01] >> The vote doesn't matter.
[02:44:02] >> Yeah.
[02:44:05] But let's look at the system, right?
[02:44:09] First, we've got the voters. Need to
[02:44:12] educate them so that they can make
[02:44:13] educated decisions.
[02:44:16] Um, there's been a lot of research done
[02:44:19] on the last election.
[02:44:22] Most of the people that voted for Trump
[02:44:25] voted on a more emotional level. I feel
[02:44:28] like he's the best person, right?
[02:44:32] the opponent. I think they are the best
[02:44:35] person. We have this this think versus
[02:44:38] feel thing going on.
[02:44:41] Uh and we see it a lot when we see the
[02:44:44] news.
[02:44:46] People feel this way, they think this
[02:44:48] way. That that creates a dichotomy.
[02:44:54] Now, if you
[02:44:56] if you
[02:44:58] will accept that if we have people that
[02:45:00] are educated that know what's going on
[02:45:06] and then you have to look at it and say,
[02:45:07] is the voting fair?
[02:45:10] I would say the voting is not
[02:45:15] u again because of gerrymandering and
[02:45:17] redrawing districts and everything else.
[02:45:20] I saw this wonderful thing once where it
[02:45:22] had five columns of 10 and it said,
[02:45:26] "Let's color them all in. We'll make
[02:45:28] three columns blue and two columns red.
[02:45:31] If you just total the votes, who's going
[02:45:33] to win?"
[02:45:35] The three blue column. You've got, you
[02:45:38] know, 30 to 50, right?
[02:45:41] They said, "What if we go across and we
[02:45:43] say, "Okay, but we're going to vote by
[02:45:45] county and each row is a county."
[02:45:48] Well, if you go by county,
[02:45:52] by row,
[02:45:54] there's three blue, two red.
[02:45:58] It votes blue.
[02:46:01] You tally it up, you've got 10 votes for
[02:46:02] blue, right? Because you're that's the
[02:46:06] way you're counting now. So, first it
[02:46:08] was 30 to 50. If you do a popular, if
[02:46:12] you go by row,
[02:46:14] then it's 30.
[02:46:18] If you go by column, you've got three
[02:46:20] red and two blue. Now it's three to two.
[02:46:23] And then they said, "But what if
[02:46:27] we redraw this like this?" And they they
[02:46:29] show this shape.
[02:46:31] And if you redraw it like that, it comes
[02:46:34] out 3 to two red, even though it's
[02:46:39] 60% red, 20% blue.
[02:46:44] Unless I'm mixing my colors here. But
[02:46:47] it's all about how you draw the lines
[02:46:49] and say this is what we're going to
[02:46:50] vote. And it showed how you can redraw
[02:46:53] the lines so that you do not represent
[02:46:55] the populace.
[02:46:58] We have that going on. It's called
[02:47:00] gerrymandering. It happens all the time.
[02:47:02] Every time somebody's in power, they
[02:47:03] redraw everything so that they can win
[02:47:05] the next election. That is
[02:47:07] anti-democratic.
[02:47:10] That is not following the principles of
[02:47:12] a democracy. It's following the
[02:47:15] principles
[02:47:17] of someone in power that wants to
[02:47:18] maintain power.
[02:47:20] A lot of people are doing that.
[02:47:22] >> A lot of people are doing that
[02:47:24] without a doubt.
[02:47:29] If we want to fix, going back a little
[02:47:31] bit, if you educate people,
[02:47:34] they should vote
[02:47:38] more for what they think is right. If
[02:47:39] they know all, if they have the
[02:47:41] information, they can make a more
[02:47:42] informed decision.
[02:47:45] And I cover in the book a lot about how
[02:47:47] they don't get all the right
[02:47:48] information. So then you have to ask,
[02:47:50] why don't they have the right
[02:47:52] information?
[02:47:54] This goes back to the statistic I said
[02:47:56] earlier. Whoever spends the most money
[02:47:58] wins. Why? They get to do the most
[02:48:02] advertising. They get to do the most
[02:48:03] marketing.
[02:48:05] Right? Whoever is influencing your
[02:48:08] opinion the most is the one that wins.
[02:48:10] How can we stop that?
[02:48:14] How about campaign limits?
[02:48:17] Saying, "Hey, if you're running a
[02:48:18] presidential race, you cap out at $20
[02:48:21] million. That's all you get. You can't
[02:48:24] spend 20 million in one."
[02:48:27] So, both of you, assuming that you can
[02:48:29] raise the same amount, are going to get
[02:48:30] 20 million. you get an equal shot at
[02:48:33] convincing your electorate. Senate
[02:48:37] 2 million, congressmen 500,000, whatever
[02:48:41] it is. I don't know what the numbers
[02:48:42] are, but put a limit. And this would get
[02:48:45] rid of any
[02:48:47] one large donor saying, "Hey, I'm going
[02:48:49] to give, you know, a billion dollars to
[02:48:51] this candidate.
[02:48:53] Doesn't matter. They can only spend this
[02:48:54] much."
[02:48:56] That gets rid of so many things. If we
[02:48:58] could just do that,
[02:49:01] we won't because the only people that
[02:49:02] can do that is Congress and they don't
[02:49:04] want that. Yeah.
[02:49:09] >> So your question what can we do
[02:49:11] >> and even education
[02:49:13] covered it earlier
[02:49:14] >> right?
[02:49:15] >> People don't want to believe what
[02:49:17] doesn't
[02:49:19] align with whatever they're thinking.
[02:49:22] >> Yeah. They want to be comfortable.
[02:49:24] Challenging your beliefs is not
[02:49:25] comfortable.
[02:49:27] It's it's painful.
[02:49:31] Um, college is painful because you are
[02:49:34] learning new things and challenging
[02:49:37] assumptions and beliefs that you were
[02:49:39] forming early on. That's difficult.
[02:49:43] Especially as we get older, we're like,
[02:49:44] I don't want to waste time with that.
[02:49:48] I already feel this. I'll just keep
[02:49:50] doing that.
[02:49:54] But that doesn't lead to a good place.
[02:49:59] And that's again What I'm trying to do
[02:50:02] is just give people more information.
[02:50:05] Ask the questions. Question everything.
[02:50:10] That should be my tagline. Question
[02:50:12] everything.
[02:50:14] >> Ours is everything is a lie.
[02:50:16] >> Or well,
[02:50:18] which many times it is, right?
[02:50:23] In other countries, are they seeing the
[02:50:24] same thing we are? I don't think so. Not
[02:50:27] that I've seen.
[02:50:30] And again, I'm not an international
[02:50:33] academic. I I can only, you know, tell
[02:50:36] you what I've seen.
[02:50:38] I haven't seen the same level of
[02:50:41] influence that we have.
[02:50:44] Which sort of makes sense because even
[02:50:45] if you could have the same level,
[02:50:51] we're the biggest country.
[02:50:52] >> We have the biggest military. If you
[02:50:54] want to
[02:50:55] >> influence somebody, influence us, right?
[02:50:57] So it's not unreasonable that we would
[02:51:00] be the biggest target for influence.
[02:51:03] >> So just another question if if
[02:51:12] they need our money if they have enough
[02:51:14] money to influence.
[02:51:17] No, they don't. No. Yeah.
[02:51:21] It it's a it's an ROI equation, right? I
[02:51:24] can influence with one billion and get
[02:51:28] >> 18 to 20 year after year for the next
[02:51:32] you know how many years.
[02:51:36] By the way that 18 billion doesn't get
[02:51:37] paid peace meal through the year. We
[02:51:39] give it lump sum which we don't always
[02:51:41] have. So we f sell bonds and take on
[02:51:43] debt in order to be able to give it to
[02:51:45] them.
[02:51:47] It's a crazy crazy system and that
[02:51:50] doesn't include all of the military gear
[02:51:52] we give. And
[02:51:55] >> you know what what bothers me is we
[02:51:57] believe in democracy. We are a
[02:51:58] democracy. Well, and just because I
[02:52:01] don't want somebody coming up and going,
[02:52:03] "No, we're not. We are a democratically
[02:52:05] elected republic."
[02:52:08] Um,
[02:52:15] we don't always act like a democracy and
[02:52:19] we don't act like we believe in
[02:52:21] democracy.
[02:52:23] I see this most blatantly at the UN.
[02:52:28] What is a democracy? The greatest good
[02:52:31] for the greatest number.
[02:52:34] Whatever the people decide is what we
[02:52:36] do, right?
[02:52:39] So we have cases numerous over and over
[02:52:42] and over especially with Israel
[02:52:45] in the UN where the vote in the UN is
[02:52:50] unanimous
[02:52:52] except for Israel and the United States.
[02:52:57] So if you think you've got 196 countries
[02:53:00] voting yes and Israel and the United
[02:53:03] States votes no,
[02:53:06] it would pass. It would be yes. It's 196
[02:53:09] to2.
[02:53:11] But when we helped write the charter of
[02:53:13] the United Nations, we said that anybody
[02:53:15] on the security council, one of them
[02:53:18] being us, can unilaterally veto
[02:53:20] anything. So every time a vote comes up,
[02:53:23] there have been
[02:53:26] I don't want to see an exact number. Um,
[02:53:30] between 50 and 100 resolutions censoring
[02:53:34] Israel and saying we should do this cuz
[02:53:37] they're not behaving well as a country.
[02:53:41] Every single time the US vetos it, all
[02:53:44] the other countries vote for it and we
[02:53:45] veto it. Like that's not democracy.
[02:53:49] How can we say we believe in democracy
[02:53:52] when we just veto every time what most
[02:53:56] of the people want?
[02:53:59] And then it comes back to okay, I get
[02:54:01] it. Democracy for us, not for you.
[02:54:06] Well, if you believe that, then you
[02:54:08] can't believe that democracy is the best
[02:54:10] system.
[02:54:15] So, which is it? Is democracy not the
[02:54:17] best system
[02:54:19] or are we not believing in it and using
[02:54:24] it the way we should?
[02:54:27] I happen to believe that democracy is a
[02:54:29] good system.
[02:54:31] I believe the people should decide what
[02:54:34] they want. But you can't say good for
[02:54:36] me, not for you.
[02:54:54] Let's talk about how we are the bad
[02:54:55] guys.
[02:55:01] You know, I get people ask a lot of
[02:55:04] times, "Are we the bad guys? Are we
[02:55:07] always the bad guys?
[02:55:09] Don't you have anything good to say?
[02:55:11] Right.
[02:55:13] Um and my answer to that is always
[02:55:17] what I am trying to do
[02:55:21] is give the other side of information
[02:55:23] that you don't have.
[02:55:26] You've already been told over and over,
[02:55:29] you're the good guy. You're the good
[02:55:31] guy. Right? It's it's like the the young
[02:55:34] person whose mom and grandma and aunt
[02:55:37] all tell him they're the best singer.
[02:55:39] You are the best singer. You should be a
[02:55:42] professional. And then they go on
[02:55:43] America's Got Talent and they can't
[02:55:45] carry a tune at all. And Simon Cowell
[02:55:47] goes, "Who who told you you could sing?
[02:55:50] I've always been told I could sing."
[02:55:52] Yeah, somebody should have told you you
[02:55:54] can't
[02:55:55] before you get up here and embarrass
[02:55:57] yourself.
[02:55:58] Right. We keep telling ourselves we're
[02:56:01] the good guys. We're the good guys.
[02:56:02] We're the good guys. Maybe somebody
[02:56:04] should go, you know, um not always.
[02:56:09] Let's look at what we're doing.
[02:56:12] And again, I I
[02:56:15] I've said history will not judge us on
[02:56:17] our intent.
[02:56:19] History will judge us on our outcome.
[02:56:23] Are Americans bad guys? No.
[02:56:26] American people are are caring, loving,
[02:56:29] good people. They mean well.
[02:56:32] Is the outcome of what we're doing in
[02:56:34] the world viewed by the rest of the
[02:56:37] world as us being the bad guys?
[02:56:40] Yes.
[02:56:42] It would be hard to look at what we've
[02:56:44] done in so many countries
[02:56:47] and for another country to look at us
[02:56:48] and go, "Oh yeah, you did that for the
[02:56:50] best benefit of everyone."
[02:56:53] versus, you know, you may have benefited
[02:56:55] you, but you screwed everybody else.
[02:57:00] And then you want to come to us and say,
[02:57:02] "Hey, do you want to be our friend?"
[02:57:04] Yeah. I don't trust you because from
[02:57:06] what I just saw, you're going to turn on
[02:57:09] me as soon as it's not in your best
[02:57:11] interest.
[02:57:13] And again, some people will say, "Well,
[02:57:14] that's politics. That's just being the
[02:57:17] big dog and getting along."
[02:57:19] And you can believe that and that works
[02:57:22] for a period of time,
[02:57:25] but it doesn't work forever.
[02:57:28] And the
[02:57:30] empires,
[02:57:32] the societies that have lasted the
[02:57:34] longest have learned this and try to be
[02:57:38] more
[02:57:40] beneficial to everyone
[02:57:42] who rather than not. Um,
[02:57:46] Romans did a fairly good job. Ottoman
[02:57:48] Empire m the um Persian Empire actually
[02:57:53] didn't do too badly with that.
[02:57:59] We're only 250 years old
[02:58:03] and we're seeing some big cracks. Mhm.
[02:58:08] These other empires lasted for thousands
[02:58:10] of years.
[02:58:13] I can't imagine us lasting thousands of
[02:58:15] years operating the same way we operate
[02:58:17] today.
[02:58:18] And this gets back to like a business
[02:58:20] plan, right? Businesses grow and mature
[02:58:23] and you change.
[02:58:25] If you don't change, then you become
[02:58:27] obsolete and you die out.
[02:58:30] America needs to change.
[02:58:33] We need to change some things and cannot
[02:58:35] continue doing the things we're doing
[02:58:37] today.
[02:58:39] It's it's just that easy. We can see
[02:58:41] where it's leading.
[02:58:44] The only question becomes not do we need
[02:58:47] to change. The question is will we
[02:58:50] choose to change or will change be
[02:58:54] forced upon us.
[02:58:56] Those are the only two options.
[02:59:01] It's easier to do the change yourself
[02:59:04] but harder to make that decision.
[02:59:10] So, as we're talking about all of this,
[02:59:11] I think that's where we're at.
[02:59:17] And I know now, how do you make those
[02:59:19] changes, right?
[02:59:21] How do you get people to want to change?
[02:59:26] I had a uh gentleman once that was in
[02:59:29] business, salesman.
[02:59:32] He said, "Every salesperson sells the
[02:59:35] same thing. You sell change
[02:59:38] because everybody's got a way to do
[02:59:40] something. You're trying to convince
[02:59:41] them to change to your way of doing
[02:59:43] something. That's what you're selling.
[02:59:46] I thought that was an interesting way to
[02:59:49] look at things. You sell change,
[02:59:53] right? Every once in a while, a product
[02:59:54] comes around that
[02:59:57] everybody thinks they need now that
[02:59:58] wasn't there before. And you don't need
[03:00:01] to sell that because everybody just
[03:00:02] looks at it and goes, I want that.
[03:00:05] But as soon as they've got it, how do
[03:00:08] you sell the next one? You have to
[03:00:09] convince them to change from the first
[03:00:11] one to the next one. Right?
[03:00:15] >> People don't want to change. Change is
[03:00:17] hard. I heard one person say, "Change is
[03:00:20] what you want other people to do, not
[03:00:23] you."
[03:00:25] Right?
[03:00:26] But this is a I think this is a part of
[03:00:29] our country and our society we need to
[03:00:31] look
[03:00:33] strongly at and say what do we need to
[03:00:38] do to change? How do we need to change
[03:00:43] to grow for the next 250 years?
[03:00:49] Let's fast forward 250 years. What do we
[03:00:51] need to look like?
[03:00:53] And again, businesses do this all the
[03:00:55] time.
[03:00:56] Markets change quickly and you've got to
[03:00:58] pivot. You've got to say we need to
[03:00:59] change and do this otherwise we're going
[03:01:02] to be left in the dust. I think as a
[03:01:04] country we need to look at ourselves and
[03:01:07] say how do we become
[03:01:10] what do we want to be in the future?
[03:01:14] Where do we want to be? What do we want
[03:01:16] to be?
[03:01:19] We might decide, hey, we're okay being
[03:01:21] the United States by ourselves.
[03:01:24] We don't want to be the world's
[03:01:25] policeman. We don't want to enforce
[03:01:27] everything. We just want to survive by
[03:01:29] ourselves. And and that's okay if that's
[03:01:31] what we decide.
[03:01:33] We may decide we want to be an empire
[03:01:35] that rules most of the planet
[03:01:38] if that's what we decide. But we need to
[03:01:40] decide
[03:01:42] and make a logical decision about it,
[03:01:44] not just blunder into it, and then
[03:01:46] figure out what do we need to change to
[03:01:49] get there.
[03:01:54] That sounds impossible.
[03:01:59] I will tell you that
[03:02:01] of the empires I have studied, it has
[03:02:04] never been done.
[03:02:07] Empires get change forced upon them
[03:02:10] because changing internally is just too
[03:02:12] difficult.
[03:02:16] That's a sad way to look at it, though.
[03:02:19] Maybe we can be the first.
[03:02:29] What patterns have you seen with regime
[03:02:32] regime change with countries that we
[03:02:34] occupy
[03:02:37] and how far back does the pattern go?
[03:02:39] >> Well, regime change is interesting
[03:02:41] because usually when we say that
[03:02:45] there's an external force.
[03:02:48] Many times the external force is us.
[03:02:51] We go in and say, "We don't like this
[03:02:54] leader. We don't like what's happening.
[03:02:56] We're going to
[03:02:58] help you change." And we force them.
[03:03:03] We've got the CIA. We've got our our
[03:03:06] economics. You know, we'll
[03:03:09] we'll uh help overthrow one leader or
[03:03:13] kidnap them and we'll sponsor the next
[03:03:17] one. you know, and make sure they get in
[03:03:19] power and they have enough to get
[03:03:21] situated and get get going.
[03:03:26] Um, every once in a while you have a
[03:03:28] regime change that is internally driven.
[03:03:31] We saw that in 1979 in the cultural
[03:03:34] revolution in Iran,
[03:03:36] right? What usually happens there is,
[03:03:40] and you've seen this, you know this, um,
[03:03:44] people are so unhappy with the way
[03:03:46] things are going,
[03:03:49] they figure even if we get killed doing
[03:03:51] it, we're better off than if we just
[03:03:53] keep living like this and they start an
[03:03:56] internal revolution. The problem with
[03:03:58] internal revolutions
[03:04:02] is you've got a huge pendulum swing.
[03:04:06] you know, the the country has gotten
[03:04:08] over to here and people get
[03:04:12] unhappy.
[03:04:14] They're like, "We need to fight, right?
[03:04:16] We need to change this." Well, when they
[03:04:20] change it, the pendulum doesn't come
[03:04:21] back to the middle. They're like, "We
[03:04:24] need to offset this." So, the pendulum
[03:04:26] swings all the way over here. And now
[03:04:28] you've got the exact
[03:04:31] same kind of regime, just the opposite.
[03:04:36] Right. Um, we were very secular, now
[03:04:39] we're very religious. We're very
[03:04:40] religious, now we're going to be very
[03:04:42] secular.
[03:04:44] Rarely does it come back to the middle
[03:04:47] without some external force.
[03:04:51] So, most of the regime changes I've seen
[03:04:54] internally
[03:04:56] get this pendulum swing and that becomes
[03:04:58] just as dangerous as anything else.
[03:05:00] >> We already have that.
[03:05:01] >> Yeah.
[03:05:05] Yeah,
[03:05:09] we see it here in a kind of microcosm
[03:05:13] every four years.
[03:05:16] We see it in other countries when they
[03:05:18] have had internal revolutions.
[03:05:22] China had one,
[03:05:25] Iran had one.
[03:05:28] Um,
[03:05:30] there's some others, not as major. We
[03:05:32] think of those mostly.
[03:05:35] We go back and forth.
[03:05:40] It would be nice if we could put a
[03:05:41] dampener on that pendulum and kind of
[03:05:43] say
[03:05:45] change is good. Let's dampen how fast we
[03:05:49] change. And maybe maybe we can
[03:05:53] >> settle in the middle a little bit where
[03:05:55] everybody is happy. the greatest
[03:05:56] happiness for the greatest number.
[03:06:01] >> Have we ever had a successful regime
[03:06:03] change where the country thrived after
[03:06:05] we've left?
[03:06:06] >> Wow, that is a great question.
[03:06:13] I cannot think of one. I cannot think of
[03:06:16] any regime change that we have fermented
[03:06:20] in one way or another where that country
[03:06:23] is better off after we were there than
[03:06:26] before.
[03:06:28] Because usually one of the first things
[03:06:30] we do after a regime change is put
[03:06:33] somebody in power that is, you know,
[03:06:36] very friendly with our desires.
[03:06:40] That usually means priv or uh usually
[03:06:44] means allowing our companies to come in,
[03:06:49] buy land,
[03:06:52] um use resources,
[03:06:54] take whatever it is their country has,
[03:06:57] process it, sell it usually to us for a
[03:07:01] deal, to others for a little bit more.
[03:07:05] And usually that does not translate to
[03:07:08] money to the populace. It usually
[03:07:10] translates to money to whoever is in
[03:07:13] power.
[03:07:16] I can't think of a single instance where
[03:07:18] the country as a whole
[03:07:21] was better off.
[03:07:25] There are situations similar. You can
[03:07:28] look at wars where we have defeated
[03:07:30] somebody in a war.
[03:07:33] And I remember when I was a kid, I was I
[03:07:36] was told at one point in time, the best
[03:07:38] way to rebuild your country is pick a
[03:07:40] war with the US and lose because we'll
[03:07:43] go help rebuild you, right?
[03:07:46] But I think it would be um amazingly
[03:07:50] arrogant to think that any country that
[03:07:52] grew after being defeated by us, it was
[03:07:55] all because we helped them rebuild.
[03:07:58] Think of specifically of Japan.
[03:08:02] Japan is a thriving economy. I don't
[03:08:05] think it's because we rebuilt them.
[03:08:08] I think they had, you know, their own
[03:08:10] drive.
[03:08:13] Um,
[03:08:15] did we help some? Yeah. Right. At first,
[03:08:18] but I don't I don't think that we were
[03:08:20] the reason that they then became as
[03:08:22] successful as they are today. But that's
[03:08:25] different than a regime change.
[03:08:28] We didn't go in and try and just
[03:08:30] overthrow a government and put a new
[03:08:32] government in.
[03:08:35] I think that's a completely different
[03:08:36] situation.
[03:08:39] Can you think of any that are better
[03:08:41] off?
[03:08:42] >> No.
[03:08:43] >> Yeah. I can't.
[03:08:46] >> Maybe Panama.
[03:08:49] >> I think the Panameanians might have a
[03:08:51] different view of that.
[03:08:56] Um,
[03:09:03] yeah, I'm thinking around the world. I
[03:09:06] can't
[03:09:08] think of any.
[03:09:11] And again, it goes back to were we the
[03:09:14] good guys then?
[03:09:17] And we come in a lot of times and say,
[03:09:19] "Hey, the ruler you have right now,
[03:09:21] they're a desperate.
[03:09:24] They're a horrible ruler. We want to
[03:09:26] come in and help you guys. We'll
[03:09:27] overthrow them.
[03:09:30] Sounds good. Sounds like we have all the
[03:09:33] right intent. But then what we do after
[03:09:35] that
[03:09:37] does not help the country as a whole.
[03:09:42] And again, usually because we just put
[03:09:43] somebody in power
[03:09:46] that will do our bidding.
[03:09:50] And like we talked about earlier,
[03:09:53] is that just what empires do?
[03:09:57] You want the if if the goal is just to
[03:09:59] grow the empire at any cost
[03:10:03] and you don't care what happens to
[03:10:04] anybody else, then that works
[03:10:09] until it doesn't. Until you need a
[03:10:11] friend somewhere because you can't do it
[03:10:13] all alone and there's nobody left.
[03:10:16] >> Yeah.
[03:10:20] I want to touch back on the if I can the
[03:10:23] question you asked earlier. Do we have
[03:10:24] any allies?
[03:10:26] It's a great question
[03:10:32] because it doesn't seem like we do.
[03:10:35] And once you come to that realization,
[03:10:39] and I hadn't thought about it that way
[03:10:40] until you asked it, but it's been
[03:10:43] rolling around in my brain here while
[03:10:45] we're talking.
[03:10:47] That's like somebody coming and asking
[03:10:49] you, do you have any friends?
[03:10:52] And if you answered, no, I don't have
[03:10:54] any.
[03:10:56] You kind of have to ask why.
[03:11:00] Why not?
[03:11:03] Now, as we get older, you know, people
[03:11:04] move apart, but you still keep
[03:11:06] friendships wherever they are, right?
[03:11:07] It's not like in high school where, hey,
[03:11:09] this is my best friend. I'm with him
[03:11:11] every day and everything. But you still
[03:11:13] have friends.
[03:11:15] But if you get to the point where you
[03:11:17] say, "I don't have any."
[03:11:20] Then you have to ask, "Why not?"
[03:11:23] Either I just don't want any. Don't
[03:11:25] think they're important.
[03:11:27] >> You have to self-reflect.
[03:11:29] >> Yeah.
[03:11:31] And I think that's what we need to do as
[03:11:32] a country. And I think that's what we
[03:11:34] need to do as individuals in our
[03:11:36] country. We need to self-reflect. Look
[03:11:38] at ourselves in the mirror.
[03:11:41] Ask the hard questions.
[03:11:43] be honest with ourselves.
[03:11:51] >> I mean, I'm with you. The only way that
[03:11:53] I can see that happening is by trying to
[03:11:56] bring people together. And that's what
[03:11:58] I'm trying to do here.
[03:12:02] But it's not working.
[03:12:06] >> It's hard. There's
[03:12:08] >> don't want it. They're not ready for it,
[03:12:10] >> you know, and
[03:12:11] >> they don't want to compromise. I'm
[03:12:12] right. You're wrong. Why should I even
[03:12:14] try?
[03:12:15] >> Well, they won't even listen.
[03:12:17] >> True. They won't.
[03:12:18] >> They won't even listen. And I mean, I
[03:12:22] brought people on here that I
[03:12:25] despised before meeting them, but open
[03:12:28] the floor hoping for a civilized
[03:12:32] discussion. And we got those.
[03:12:34] And
[03:12:38] everybody hated me for it. And then I
[03:12:42] did it again.
[03:12:43] >> Good for you.
[03:12:44] >> And I'll do it again.
[03:12:45] >> Yeah.
[03:12:46] >> And maybe I'm ahead of my time or maybe
[03:12:48] we'll never arrive at this, but it's I
[03:12:51] just it's nobody's talking. Nobody's
[03:12:55] talking.
[03:12:55] >> We talk at each other instead of with
[03:12:58] each other.
[03:12:59] >> Exactly.
[03:13:00] I wrote a small article on uh
[03:13:05] on pardons that I put on LinkedIn at and
[03:13:08] at the very bottom I said sources
[03:13:11] welcome. Tell me I'm wrong. I'd love to
[03:13:14] have the conversation.
[03:13:18] Not a single reply. No one ever replied
[03:13:21] to it.
[03:13:23] I'm like, you know, we shouldn't be
[03:13:25] afraid of the conversation.
[03:13:28] We shouldn't be afraid of being wrong.
[03:13:32] Oh, I'm wrong all the time.
[03:13:35] You know, I don't think any of us has a
[03:13:37] monopoly on that one.
[03:13:40] But we shouldn't be afraid of that
[03:13:44] and we should welcome the conversations.
[03:13:46] I I love I love sitting and debating
[03:13:50] things with people
[03:13:52] as long as it's respectful. Mhm.
[03:13:54] >> I'm happy to respectfully have a
[03:13:56] conversation and debate anything. Tell
[03:13:58] me I'm wrong. I'll tell you why I don't
[03:14:01] think I am. You tell me why you think
[03:14:03] why you think I am. I'll tell you the
[03:14:05] opposite.
[03:14:07] But if we can't exchange that
[03:14:08] information, we can't grow.
[03:14:12] But we've got to be able to do it
[03:14:13] respectfully
[03:14:15] and not just yell at somebody and go,
[03:14:17] "Well, you're an idiot and you're
[03:14:19] wrong."
[03:14:20] >> Right?
[03:14:22] That just shuts down the conversation.
[03:14:23] Now, what did you learn? You learned
[03:14:26] nothing.
[03:14:28] And you're stuck in the same spot you
[03:14:29] were before.
[03:14:33] You're doing a great job trying to get
[03:14:34] information out to people.
[03:14:37] You can't make them listen,
[03:14:40] but at least the information is there if
[03:14:42] they choose to. Mhm. And slowly over
[03:14:45] time,
[03:14:48] you know, given enough exposure
[03:14:52] and maybe taken away some of the
[03:14:54] constant confirmation bias reinforcement
[03:14:57] where they reinforce their own idea from
[03:14:59] others that believe the same thing.
[03:15:02] Um
[03:15:05] maybe maybe they start to question.
[03:15:09] Unfortunately, to your point, I see too
[03:15:12] many people that have already made up
[03:15:14] their mind and all they do is listen to
[03:15:17] one newscast over and over all day long
[03:15:19] 24/7
[03:15:21] to get reinforced of the same ideas they
[03:15:23] already have.
[03:15:25] And over a day, a week, a month, a year,
[03:15:29] those ideas become so reinforced,
[03:15:32] those pathways become so ingrained in
[03:15:34] their brain, it's almost impossible to
[03:15:37] break them.
[03:15:39] Now I don't know maybe there is some
[03:15:41] positivity here. I mean if I think about
[03:15:44] you when I'm talking about
[03:15:46] really any of these interviews a lot of
[03:15:48] these interviews get million 2 million
[03:15:53] >> over that views plus plus all the
[03:15:56] downloads on Spotify.
[03:15:57] >> Yeah. And yeah, you know, I don't read
[03:15:59] all the com. I read a handful of the
[03:16:01] comments every once in a while and
[03:16:03] especially when we release one like that
[03:16:05] and they are overwhelmingly negative,
[03:16:10] but maybe there's 50,000 comments on a
[03:16:13] video that has 2 million views. The
[03:16:16] loudest, you know, the loudest person in
[03:16:18] the room is always the biggest [ __ ]
[03:16:21] And if you look at where we're at, I
[03:16:24] mean, today we're ranked number two on
[03:16:28] Spotify
[03:16:29] out of everybody.
[03:16:31] >> That's awesome. Out of the way.
[03:16:32] >> Congratulations.
[03:16:33] >> So, and that's I mean, I'm not saying
[03:16:34] that to brag. I'm not I'm saying that
[03:16:38] >> if you look at the comment to view ratio
[03:16:40] or the the comment to download ratio,
[03:16:44] there's a lot more down there's a lot
[03:16:45] more people listening in not commenting
[03:16:48] than there are commenting. So maybe
[03:16:50] there maybe maybe a lot more people,
[03:16:54] >> you know,
[03:16:57] are paying attention than I think.
[03:16:59] >> I I think they're listening.
[03:17:02] I think they are.
[03:17:05] Like I said, it takes time.
[03:17:08] Um we started this whole conversation
[03:17:11] with you said, you know, what caused me
[03:17:13] what what event caused me to write this
[03:17:15] book? And I said there was no one aha
[03:17:18] event, right?
[03:17:20] >> It takes time.
[03:17:22] And I think as people listen, it takes
[03:17:25] time,
[03:17:28] but they've got to be exposed to a
[03:17:30] different form of information over time
[03:17:33] and that will slowly make a change.
[03:17:37] The only question I have
[03:17:40] is do we have that much time?
[03:17:45] I hope we do.
[03:17:47] I don't think the United States is going
[03:17:49] to end. I I do think we're going to have
[03:17:52] to change.
[03:17:54] I think, you know, you asked, are we are
[03:17:56] we getting ready for World War II? Is
[03:17:58] something coming? Change is coming.
[03:18:03] How does that look? I don't know. And is
[03:18:05] it going to be a one-time thing? No.
[03:18:08] Is it going to be like, okay, this
[03:18:09] changed, now we're done for the next 200
[03:18:11] years? No. We're going to continue to
[03:18:13] change. So I think the dissemination of
[03:18:16] information is important.
[03:18:20] It has to be
[03:18:23] and you know one of the first things you
[03:18:25] want to do if you want to
[03:18:28] brainwash people or make them think a
[03:18:31] certain way is just give them one set of
[03:18:33] information just yours. Don't allow them
[03:18:36] to see any other information that will
[03:18:38] refute that. Mhm. So the more we get
[03:18:41] information out,
[03:18:43] us, others, the other side of the story,
[03:18:46] everything, the better we are.
[03:18:55] >> Do you think information is going away
[03:18:56] with going away of AI?
[03:19:01] >> AI is interesting.
[03:19:03] Um, do I think it's going away?
[03:19:07] No. Maybe maybe not information
[03:19:10] truthful.
[03:19:15] >> I don't think AI is the culprit here.
[03:19:18] >> I mean, all they need to do is feed a I
[03:19:20] mean, they feed AI whatever
[03:19:22] >> whatever data point they want and then
[03:19:24] that becomes
[03:19:25] >> it becomes what AI tells you.
[03:19:26] >> That becomes truth.
[03:19:28] >> Yeah.
[03:19:30] >> Just like history. But we when when we
[03:19:32] open this
[03:19:33] >> Yeah. Yeah.
[03:19:36] It's interesting. I saw a statistic the
[03:19:38] other day and I can't repeat it but it
[03:19:41] was an interesting data point
[03:19:45] where it said it was about YouTube and
[03:19:48] about films and Hollywood
[03:19:52] and it said
[03:19:54] I'm going to make this up so anybody
[03:19:57] listening do not quote me on this
[03:20:00] something to the effect of
[03:20:03] there's more YouTube video being
[03:20:05] uploaded every A than was created the
[03:20:09] entire time since film started until
[03:20:12] 2020 whatever.
[03:20:15] Interesting.
[03:20:17] The more interesting part was we have
[03:20:19] lost more film
[03:20:22] than is uploaded every day in in
[03:20:25] YouTube.
[03:20:27] And I'm thinking really we have there's
[03:20:30] a lot of films that no longer exist. We
[03:20:32] made them. They were hits in the time.
[03:20:35] Maybe they weren't digitized yet. Maybe
[03:20:37] they were just, you know,
[03:20:39] cellulose film and there was a fire.
[03:20:41] We've lost them. They're gone.
[03:20:44] There's a lot of information in history
[03:20:47] that has just disappeared. We no longer
[03:20:49] have it.
[03:20:53] The internet
[03:20:55] is an interesting thing.
[03:20:58] Here's a question for you.
[03:21:01] How many times have you looked on your
[03:21:02] computer for information you know you
[03:21:04] have and you can't find it?
[03:21:09] >> A handful.
[03:21:10] >> Yeah. It's like I know I have this.
[03:21:13] >> Yeah.
[03:21:13] >> You would think that I can put on a
[03:21:15] search engine or something and find it.
[03:21:17] I know it's here. But you can't. You
[03:21:19] can't find it. Somewhere somehow
[03:21:21] something happened. It's gone.
[03:21:25] There's no way to get that back.
[03:21:28] And I know when I was again when I was
[03:21:30] studying history at the academy, we used
[03:21:32] a lot of written information. People
[03:21:34] would write letters, you know, and they
[03:21:36] would survive for a long time, right?
[03:21:38] We'd find them or diaries or or journals
[03:21:42] or whatnot.
[03:21:46] We don't have the same thing
[03:21:47] electronically. We say, "Hey, we can we
[03:21:49] can back it up. We can keep it." That's
[03:21:52] true,
[03:21:53] but we tend not to do that. It tends to
[03:21:56] get lost.
[03:21:58] I've had,
[03:22:01] you know,
[03:22:03] I I know I had a video of my daughter
[03:22:05] when she was, you know, one year old.
[03:22:08] Can't find it.
[03:22:10] I've looked everywhere. I've tried
[03:22:12] everything. I'm sure somewhere someplace
[03:22:14] it was on one hard drive that crashed
[03:22:17] and it wasn't backed up in the right
[03:22:18] place. You know, it's just gone.
[03:22:22] So, we lose information. And when we do
[03:22:24] that, we lose a vision into how we got
[03:22:27] here.
[03:22:29] So AI, AI can only go off what it has,
[03:22:33] right?
[03:22:35] >> People can remember things even if they
[03:22:36] can't produce it, AI can't.
[03:22:40] So I think AI both expands our reach
[03:22:44] into information
[03:22:46] and it constricts it to whatever AI
[03:22:48] knows.
[03:22:51] Now AI is a interesting topic.
[03:22:55] Uh in my courses I teach students to use
[03:22:58] AI. It's a tool. Use it but be careful
[03:23:04] how you use it because it will give you
[03:23:06] wrong answers
[03:23:08] you know
[03:23:10] and
[03:23:14] different AI are trained on different
[03:23:16] language models. They will give you
[03:23:18] different answers.
[03:23:21] So, you could ask a question. Well, I'll
[03:23:23] give you an example. Here's a here's a
[03:23:25] great example. Um, I use AI to do
[03:23:29] research sometimes
[03:23:31] because I can go out and do 50 Google
[03:23:34] searches to try and find the right
[03:23:36] document
[03:23:37] or I can just tell AI, I need a document
[03:23:41] that I know exists. It's about this from
[03:23:44] around this time. Can you find it? AI
[03:23:47] goes out and goes, is this it? I'll be
[03:23:49] like, "No, that's not it. Is this it?"
[03:23:51] "Okay, yeah, that's the one I'm looking
[03:23:53] for. Where can I find that?" And I'll
[03:23:56] say, "Oh, well, that's in the National
[03:23:57] Archives. Here, here's the address." And
[03:24:00] then I go to the National Archives and I
[03:24:01] get the document, then I can read the
[03:24:03] document, right? That's a good use of
[03:24:05] AI.
[03:24:08] >> But if you just ask it a question,
[03:24:12] so we were talking about Zionism
[03:24:14] earlier. I asked AI once. I'm like,
[03:24:16] "What do you think about Zionism?" And
[03:24:17] he goes, "I can't answer that because
[03:24:19] that would be anti-Semitic or something
[03:24:21] like that." And I'm like, "Seriously?"
[03:24:24] I said, "What if I asked you?" And I I
[03:24:26] had a conversation with the ayat. So,
[03:24:29] what if I asked you about what do you
[03:24:30] think about white supremacy?
[03:24:33] And it's like, "Oh, well, that's blah
[03:24:34] blah blah blah blah." And it starts
[03:24:35] going, I'm like, "Why did you answer
[03:24:36] this and not that?"
[03:24:39] It's like, "Well, one is politically
[03:24:40] charged about, you know, people's
[03:24:43] religion and the other is not." And I'm
[03:24:44] like, "No, they're not.
[03:24:47] I said, 'You biasing your information,
[03:24:50] and you've got to be careful. AI will do
[03:24:51] that to you.
[03:24:53] If you use AI for your information
[03:24:55] source, you're probably just as bad as
[03:24:58] just
[03:24:59] >> Mhm.
[03:25:00] >> getting it from, you know, one news
[03:25:01] station.
[03:25:06] >> That's scary.
[03:25:07] >> Here's a trick for you. I teach my
[03:25:09] students this. Um, there's an old
[03:25:12] riddle.
[03:25:14] If you're trapped in a room and there's
[03:25:16] two doors, one leads to heaven and one
[03:25:17] leads to hell and you have two
[03:25:20] computers.
[03:25:22] One computer always lies and one
[03:25:24] computer always tells the truth. But you
[03:25:26] don't know which one is which and you
[03:25:28] don't know which door is which.
[03:25:31] You can ask one computer one question.
[03:25:36] How do you figure out which door to go
[03:25:39] through?
[03:25:41] Right? It's a logic riddle. And the
[03:25:44] answer is go to
[03:25:45] >> ask them what door they're going to go
[03:25:47] through.
[03:25:47] >> But if you use the computer that lied,
[03:25:50] it would tell you the wrong thing. If
[03:25:51] you use a computer that tells the truth,
[03:25:53] it would tell you the right thing. But
[03:25:55] you don't know which one is which.
[03:25:59] So the answer is to go to any door and
[03:26:02] ask one computer, if you were the other
[03:26:04] computer, would you tell me that this is
[03:26:07] the door to heaven? And whatever it
[03:26:08] answers, it's the opposite.
[03:26:11] because you know that you're absolutely
[03:26:13] going to get a negative answer
[03:26:16] regardless of which one you picked,
[03:26:18] right?
[03:26:20] I tell my students to do this with AI.
[03:26:24] Ask AI a question and then go to a
[03:26:26] different AI
[03:26:28] and say is this question correct? Is
[03:26:32] this answer I asked this question got
[03:26:34] this answer. Is this correct? Is there
[03:26:36] anything that is not correct in it?
[03:26:38] would you say, you know, and maybe even
[03:26:41] use three AI models,
[03:26:44] then see what they say. It'll be amazing
[03:26:46] how much they might contradict each
[03:26:47] other and and give you a little bit of
[03:26:49] different answer.
[03:26:55] So, what does this have to do with how
[03:26:58] we get people to know more? It it's
[03:27:03] people are using AI. They can't just ask
[03:27:06] the question they think they want to
[03:27:07] know because they might get the wrong
[03:27:09] answer.
[03:27:11] >> And whoever owns the AI
[03:27:14] is the one that's giving it the
[03:27:16] information that it wants to pull from.
[03:27:18] >> Mhm.
[03:27:21] That was what I was getting at.
[03:27:22] >> Yeah. I heard something the other day
[03:27:25] and wow.
[03:27:27] Again, I I can't recreate it exactly,
[03:27:29] but something like somebody asked
[03:27:32] Grock
[03:27:35] who is Elon Musk's
[03:27:37] AI, you know, who is the biggest threat
[03:27:40] to American democracy or something like
[03:27:42] that. And it came back and it answered
[03:27:44] Elon Musk. And you're like, I'll bet
[03:27:47] they're going to fix that one on that.
[03:27:50] That's not going to last very long.
[03:27:53] >> Yeah,
[03:27:53] >> we need to tweak that model a little
[03:27:55] bit.
[03:27:58] >> Yeah, it's interesting stuff. Uh
[03:28:00] information
[03:28:04] You know, we used to say way back in the
[03:28:05] 80s when I was in the military,
[03:28:07] information will be the battleground of
[03:28:08] the future.
[03:28:11] And we were looking at more as
[03:28:13] tactically. How do we tactically have
[03:28:16] enough information to do what we do?
[03:28:20] I mean, I'll date myself. When I went to
[03:28:22] the Gulf War, GPS didn't exist. We had
[03:28:26] no GPS.
[03:28:29] So, you had maps.
[03:28:33] Well, a map of a flat desert doesn't do
[03:28:35] you much. It's kind of hard to navigate
[03:28:37] when everything's just
[03:28:39] >> flat or topographically I've got a 5-ft
[03:28:43] ridge. Like, how could I see that in a
[03:28:45] helicopter, right?
[03:28:47] >> Um,
[03:28:49] and then today, you know, you've got GPS
[03:28:51] and tracking and you've got pips
[03:28:54] everywhere that tell you where you are.
[03:28:56] Everybody knows where you are. They can
[03:28:57] track you.
[03:28:59] It's different and we were looking at
[03:29:01] information as the battleground of the
[03:29:03] future. That way we were thinking
[03:29:05] tactically in theater
[03:29:08] we can have better information to see
[03:29:10] what's happening on the ground.
[03:29:13] We didn't really consider
[03:29:15] that
[03:29:17] in the future
[03:29:19] information is the battleground for the
[03:29:21] human mind.
[03:29:24] how people think, what they think, how
[03:29:27] they feel about it, and what they're
[03:29:29] going to do
[03:29:31] is the battleground.
[03:29:35] And I I use those terms specifically
[03:29:37] because I taught a course on
[03:29:38] communication. And I say there's three
[03:29:40] parts to every
[03:29:42] communication.
[03:29:44] What do you want people to think? What
[03:29:46] do you want people to feel? And what do
[03:29:48] you want people to do?
[03:29:50] Frequently, we only think about the
[03:29:52] first one. What do I want them to think?
[03:29:54] And you give them information.
[03:29:57] But you have to think more and think,
[03:29:58] what do I want them to feel about this?
[03:30:00] Okay, they know this piece of
[03:30:02] information. Do I want them to feel good
[03:30:03] about it or bad about it? Indifferent,
[03:30:07] which will usually give you different
[03:30:10] results.
[03:30:12] I can tell you something. Do I want you
[03:30:14] to think that's a bad thing or a good
[03:30:16] thing? How do I want you to feel? Then
[03:30:18] what do I want you to do? If I just gave
[03:30:20] you information and made you feel good
[03:30:23] about it or bad about it,
[03:30:26] what do I want you to do? Because if
[03:30:28] there's no action, then why bother? Why?
[03:30:32] If it doesn't change you in any way,
[03:30:34] then why did we spend that time
[03:30:36] communicating?
[03:30:40] >> You will spurt it around.
[03:30:42] >> What's that?
[03:30:43] >> Spurt it around.
[03:30:49] It's
[03:30:54] It's interesting.
[03:31:07] I'm gonna I'm going to go back to the
[03:31:08] book for a second.
[03:31:10] What do I want people to think?
[03:31:14] I want them to think that
[03:31:17] maybe
[03:31:19] what they've been told is not the full
[03:31:21] truth.
[03:31:23] Maybe there's more to the story that
[03:31:24] they should know. What do I want them to
[03:31:27] feel? I want them to feel
[03:31:31] like
[03:31:33] maybe they're being lied to. I want them
[03:31:35] to feel uneasy that, hey, I don't know
[03:31:38] the whole story.
[03:31:40] And I'm going to feel bad if I'm saying
[03:31:42] something and it's not the whole story.
[03:31:44] I'm I'm going to look like an idiot.
[03:31:47] And what do I want them to do?
[03:31:50] I want them to ask questions.
[03:31:53] Ask questions. Do research.
[03:31:56] Find the answers.
[03:31:58] Make your own decisions. Not what
[03:32:00] somebody else decided they thought you
[03:32:02] should think.
[03:32:05] I think that's how we change things.
[03:32:10] >> Do you feel it? That something's off?
[03:32:12] >> This is Propaganda as a weapon.
[03:32:15] >> The revolutionary audio docu series.
[03:32:17] >> It's essential for the experiment that
[03:32:19] you continue.
[03:32:20] >> Hosted by Sha Ryan.
[03:32:22] >> They're called Scops
[03:32:23] >> is now available to you for free.
[03:32:26] >> There's no question that it is my
[03:32:28] control.
[03:32:30] >> Hear from whistleblowers.
[03:32:31] >> Why have I got a letter from the CIA?
[03:32:33] Shocking insights from experts.
[03:32:35] >> If you've ever wondered who's really
[03:32:37] pulling the strings, it's time to find
[03:32:39] out.
[03:32:43] >> Target Intelligence SCOP, an ironclad
[03:32:47] original hosted by Shaun Ryan. Listen
[03:32:50] today wherever you get your podcasts or
[03:32:53] watch the enhanced version on YouTube at
[03:32:56] this is ironclad.
[03:33:02] When did you see it become dangerous to
[03:33:03] ask questions?
[03:33:12] You know, even in my time in the Marine
[03:33:14] Corps,
[03:33:16] and this was late 80s and 90s
[03:33:21] in the military, a lot of times don't
[03:33:23] ask questions. Just take this for the
[03:33:25] way it is,
[03:33:27] right? Um,
[03:33:30] I think that has been that way for a
[03:33:33] while. I couldn't comment from before I
[03:33:35] was in. I couldn't comment about when I
[03:33:37] was out.
[03:33:40] But yeah, you were not encouraged to ask
[03:33:43] questions.
[03:33:45] In the civilian world,
[03:33:52] I seem to remember
[03:33:58] Early on, we were encouraged to ask
[03:34:00] questions.
[03:34:02] I seem to remember even
[03:34:06] thinking back
[03:34:10] even mid 90s,
[03:34:13] late 90s, we were encouraged to ask
[03:34:15] questions,
[03:34:17] right? Think about what you're doing.
[03:34:19] Think about why you're doing it.
[03:34:23] around the 2000s or so is when I started
[03:34:27] hearing more
[03:34:30] don't ask, right? Or or it wasn't you
[03:34:33] were told not to ask.
[03:34:35] It's you were
[03:34:38] not treated well if you'd asked. It's
[03:34:41] >> what were the questions that were
[03:34:42] forbidden back then?
[03:34:44] >> Back then?
[03:34:45] >> Mhm. In the early 2000s.
[03:34:47] >> Oh, in my in my opinion, it's co
[03:34:54] you know, CO was a good one. Um,
[03:34:58] a lot of controversy around that,
[03:35:01] right? A lot of different feelings.
[03:35:04] Quite honestly, 9/11.
[03:35:07] I was at a dinner the other night and
[03:35:09] somebody asked me, "What do you think
[03:35:10] about 9/11? Was it a conspiracy?
[03:35:14] Did it happen the way it was supposed
[03:35:15] to? You know, what happened?"
[03:35:18] I told him quite honestly, I don't have
[03:35:20] an opinion. I I would I can give you my
[03:35:24] opinions. They are not researched and I
[03:35:26] don't like giving opinions that are not
[03:35:29] researched because I could be a 180
[03:35:32] degrees off.
[03:35:35] I said the only thing I will say is
[03:35:37] there's conflicting information and kind
[03:35:39] of the same thing with COVID. There is
[03:35:41] conflicting information.
[03:35:43] >> Mhm.
[03:35:44] >> Do I have feelings? Yeah.
[03:35:48] Do I think it just spontaneously erupted
[03:35:50] out in the wild?
[03:35:52] Yeah, sure.
[03:35:54] Right. Um,
[03:35:58] statistically
[03:36:00] not.
[03:36:02] You know, but can I do I have any proof?
[03:36:05] No.
[03:36:09] Um, there was a lot of
[03:36:12] misinformation, a lot of urban legend
[03:36:15] stuff going on. Mhm.
[03:36:18] >> Um, and it's it's bad when that happens
[03:36:20] because there's so many outlandish
[03:36:22] things being said, they mask things that
[03:36:26] may have been true.
[03:36:28] And it's really difficult to dig through
[03:36:31] all of that and figure out what is
[03:36:33] correct and what isn't.
[03:36:35] And to some extent, I think it's more
[03:36:38] difficult to do that than it was in the
[03:36:40] past.
[03:36:43] It's hard. I and that's why some things
[03:36:46] I'm like I I don't I can't even form an
[03:36:48] opinion on that
[03:36:51] >> because there's conflicting information
[03:36:52] and I can't find enough other
[03:36:54] information to
[03:36:57] make one
[03:36:59] more reasonable than the other. You
[03:37:03] start to lean that way as you get more
[03:37:04] and more information.
[03:37:07] But I'm like so far I
[03:37:10] right just don't ask.
[03:37:13] getting better at hiding things
[03:37:16] in my opinion.
[03:37:18] So, what do you think about CO?
[03:37:21] >> What do I think about CO?
[03:37:22] >> Yeah.
[03:37:26] And I I I think that
[03:37:35] I think it was planned.
[03:37:39] You think the release was planned? I
[03:37:41] think we were lied to.
[03:37:43] >> I think we were lied to. Do you think
[03:37:45] they plan to release it?
[03:37:49] >> I think the
[03:37:54] I don't know.
[03:37:56] I think it's a very good possibility.
[03:37:59] It's funny though, we talk about the
[03:38:01] Corona virus, right? And again, connect
[03:38:04] the dots.
[03:38:06] First we heard about SARS,
[03:38:09] Southeast Asia respiratory syndrome.
[03:38:11] It's a corona virus.
[03:38:14] >> It was
[03:38:17] not very contagious, but if you got it,
[03:38:21] it had a high mortality rate. It was
[03:38:23] dangerous to get, but it was hard to
[03:38:25] get.
[03:38:27] Four, five years later, we have MS,
[03:38:29] Middle East respiratory syndrome, a
[03:38:31] corona virus that is amazingly
[03:38:36] easy to get but not low mortality rate.
[03:38:41] It's almost like we bracketed it and
[03:38:43] said, "Okay, now we have COVID.
[03:38:46] Fairly easy to get, fair mortality rate.
[03:38:50] All we have to do," and we all say,
[03:38:53] everybody says we're not working on
[03:38:54] chemical weapons,
[03:38:57] right? We're not working on chemical
[03:38:58] weapons. Nobody else is either.
[03:39:00] Why do you call
[03:39:04] working on one part of a virus an
[03:39:09] increase of function? Right. That sounds
[03:39:12] kind of military
[03:39:14] to me.
[03:39:16] And
[03:39:19] yeah, do do I think that all of these
[03:39:22] just happened?
[03:39:24] Seems a little weird that they happened
[03:39:26] in the way that they did.
[03:39:27] >> Mhm.
[03:39:29] >> Right. And then
[03:39:33] kind of scary though. Um, even back in
[03:39:35] the 80s, people asked me, "Are you
[03:39:37] worried about nukes? Somebody
[03:39:42] getting a suitcase of nuclear material
[03:39:44] into the US?" I'm like, "No, I'm not.
[03:39:48] That would be so difficult with some of
[03:39:50] our tracking systems and everything. I'm
[03:39:53] worried about somebody infecting
[03:39:55] themselves with anthrax coming over to
[03:39:57] the US and throwing themselves in the
[03:39:58] New York water supply or anything else.
[03:40:02] I mean, once you release something,
[03:40:05] there's no stopping it. It's Pandora's
[03:40:07] box. You can't get it back.
[03:40:10] That's what worries me.
[03:40:11] >> Mhm.
[03:40:12] >> And it takes a lot to make
[03:40:15] a
[03:40:17] visionable material to a degree that you
[03:40:20] could use. It doesn't take that much to
[03:40:23] create something in a lab.
[03:40:26] That's scary.
[03:40:29] >> Do you think we had a part in CO?
[03:40:32] >> Do you think we had a part
[03:40:33] >> the US?
[03:40:37] >> Yeah, I do.
[03:40:41] We had doctors over in Wuhan. We We were
[03:40:46] coordinating.
[03:40:48] >> What do you think that was?
[03:40:50] What do I think it was?
[03:40:51] >> Yeah.
[03:40:53] >> The the virus itself.
[03:40:55] >> Do you think it was planned?
[03:40:58] >> Was it scheduled?
[03:41:01] >> I don't think the release was planned.
[03:41:03] >> You think it was an accident?
[03:41:04] >> I think it it was accidental.
[03:41:08] >> Why don't you think there was any
[03:41:10] repercussions for China from the entire
[03:41:13] [ __ ] world?
[03:41:14] >> Why there was any what?
[03:41:15] >> Why don't you think there was never any
[03:41:17] repercussions?
[03:41:19] It's a great question, right?
[03:41:21] Every time something happens, we say
[03:41:23] we're going to investigate it. Just
[03:41:25] >> for what the [ __ ] are we investigating?
[03:41:28] >> We should investigate. Were we trying
[03:41:29] were or were the people in Wuhan
[03:41:33] trying to create a virus that was
[03:41:36] virulent to human population?
[03:41:40] Were we? We say we're just we're trying
[03:41:44] to figure out what someone else would do
[03:41:46] so we could guard against it. really did
[03:41:48] we guard against it?
[03:41:51] Because yes, we came out with vaccines.
[03:41:54] Lots of controversy about those, but
[03:41:58] and we came out with them fairly fairly
[03:42:00] fast. So you might say maybe they were
[03:42:03] working on them beforehand
[03:42:04] >> and testing
[03:42:05] >> and testing
[03:42:06] >> that didn't work.
[03:42:08] >> But if that's true,
[03:42:12] why didn't we even have them when the
[03:42:13] first release came through? I mean, if
[03:42:16] we if our goal was to find out how to
[03:42:18] make something and then guard against
[03:42:20] it, why didn't we already know that?
[03:42:24] Or is it that hey, timing was bad? We we
[03:42:27] had figured out, hey, we can make this,
[03:42:29] but we haven't figured out how to stop
[03:42:31] it yet.
[03:42:33] Was it an accident?
[03:42:37] I don't know. If I look at what is the
[03:42:40] reasoning someone would want to release
[03:42:42] it, I don't come up with anything good.
[03:42:46] >> What is the reason somebody would want
[03:42:47] to release it?
[03:42:51] >> Well, that's the problem. What is the
[03:42:53] reason? I I can't think of a good one
[03:42:55] why someone would say, "Hey, we should
[03:42:57] go release this."
[03:43:00] Unless you wanted just general worldwide
[03:43:03] population control.
[03:43:06] Said, "Hey, we're growing too fast. too
[03:43:07] many people. Let's get rid of a million.
[03:43:12] That seems like a not the best way to do
[03:43:15] that. Oh, we've killed that in a single
[03:43:17] war. It' be faster just to, you know,
[03:43:20] pick a war with somebody.
[03:43:22] I don't I don't see a good reason for
[03:43:24] that. And that's why I tend to believe
[03:43:27] it was an accidental release.
[03:43:29] >> Do you think it was an experiment
[03:43:32] >> that we were experimenting on it or an
[03:43:34] experiment to release it? a scup.
[03:43:40] >> I don't know.
[03:43:40] >> Maybe not a scup. That wrong word.
[03:43:44] >> Yeah, I don't think it was a scup. I
[03:43:46] don't see that.
[03:43:46] >> A a a
[03:43:49] FTX.
[03:43:52] >> I think it would have been careless to
[03:43:54] release it if we didn't know we could
[03:43:58] control it. Anybody you're gonna you're
[03:44:02] gonna I mean, it's indiscriminate,
[03:44:04] right?
[03:44:06] So anybody to release it without having
[03:44:08] a way to control it, I think would be
[03:44:10] irresponsible. I can't see a good reason
[03:44:12] for it, which again makes me believe, do
[03:44:16] I believe that it was created in a lab?
[03:44:17] I personally do. I don't think that
[03:44:20] spontaneously just erupted in nature.
[03:44:23] >> Mhm.
[03:44:24] >> Um I know that people will disagree with
[03:44:26] that and that is a feeling I have no
[03:44:32] real, you know, proof of that.
[03:44:35] I can't think of a reason to release it
[03:44:39] specifically.
[03:44:41] It just makes no sense to me.
[03:44:46] What did anyone gain? Did anyone gain
[03:44:48] anything from it?
[03:44:50] >> Well, Fizer and Madna did.
[03:44:52] >> Well, yeah, that's true. That's
[03:44:54] absolutely true.
[03:44:57] >> They asked them to give up their profit
[03:44:59] so they could use it and they said no.
[03:45:02] >> What's that? It was a gross abuse of
[03:45:04] power.
[03:45:05] >> Oh, that's true.
[03:45:08] >> I'm sure they learned.
[03:45:12] >> It gets back to a lot of things talking
[03:45:14] about
[03:45:16] our system
[03:45:19] that is based on who makes the most
[03:45:21] money,
[03:45:24] right? FISA and Maderma made a lot of
[03:45:26] money.
[03:45:29] Okay.
[03:45:30] um quite a large price to pay for making
[03:45:33] that money.
[03:45:35] Hopefully that wasn't the reason.
[03:45:39] But there's a lot of times in our
[03:45:40] society where
[03:45:43] money is the deciding factor, not
[03:45:45] people.
[03:45:48] If we can make a profit, but
[03:45:51] yeah, you know what?
[03:45:53] A lot of people might die.
[03:45:57] We'll make the money.
[03:45:59] I mean, we see that in in some of the
[03:46:02] water pollution that we've done with
[03:46:04] different
[03:46:04] >> We see it in Iraq with KBR.
[03:46:06] >> Absolutely. Right. Absolutely.
[03:46:09] >> Totally different scenario.
[03:46:11] >> Yeah.
[03:46:12] >> Same [ __ ] thing.
[03:46:13] >> Do we care? No. We made money. Who made
[03:46:15] money? Well, all the weapons
[03:46:18] manufacturers did. Our
[03:46:20] military-industrial complex did.
[03:46:24] We pull out of Afghanistan and leave how
[03:46:26] much equipment there?
[03:46:29] Do we care?
[03:46:32] We have to replace it all now. Yep.
[03:46:35] As a country, we give away military
[03:46:38] equipment every year.
[03:46:41] And somebody asked me, "Why do we do
[03:46:42] that?" I go, "Well, think about it.
[03:46:44] Think if you're a car dealer,
[03:46:48] you buy as many cars as you think you're
[03:46:50] going to sell during the year. The new
[03:46:52] year comes along, new models come out,
[03:46:55] you have a bunch of old models left.
[03:46:57] What do you do? You discount them and
[03:47:00] get rid of them because you need to make
[03:47:01] room for the new ones. Every year we
[03:47:04] need new weapons.
[03:47:06] So what do we do? We just give away our
[03:47:07] old ones to our allies,
[03:47:12] right? We resupply them and go, "Here,
[03:47:15] we'll give you all these because we've
[03:47:16] got a new one that we want." And we keep
[03:47:19] rebying our own military equipment over
[03:47:21] and over again every year. That's why we
[03:47:23] have a $1 trillion budget.
[03:47:27] Now, the other option is, you know, I
[03:47:30] don't want to do the Soviet model where
[03:47:32] we're fighting 1980 and 1990 battles
[03:47:35] with, you know, 1940 and 50 tanks and
[03:47:38] things. That's a little
[03:47:40] >> bad. But do we have to upgrade it as
[03:47:41] much as we do?
[03:47:44] Do we
[03:47:47] need everything that we're using?
[03:47:51] I remember in the military, you may too,
[03:47:54] being given a lot of equipment. I'm
[03:47:56] looking at going,
[03:47:58] I'm not going to use this. I don't want
[03:47:59] it. I don't want to carry it. I don't
[03:48:02] want to maintain it. Well, you have to
[03:48:05] have that. That's part of your your load
[03:48:07] out. Um,
[03:48:13] you know, we always used to joke that
[03:48:15] the stocks on the M16 are madeated by
[03:48:18] made by the lowest bidder. there. I
[03:48:20] think Mattel was making them for a
[03:48:21] while.
[03:48:23] So, we had Mattel toys.
[03:48:25] >> I mean, I would rather have it not need
[03:48:27] it than need it and not have it.
[03:48:30] >> I agree that that is that is always a
[03:48:32] thing to think about.
[03:48:33] >> I am all about an abundance of military
[03:48:36] equipment. I am not about [ __ ]
[03:48:38] selling it and giving it away just so
[03:48:40] that primes can reproduce the same damn
[03:48:42] thing.
[03:48:43] >> Yeah.
[03:48:44] and resell it and give it away and buy
[03:48:47] new. And
[03:48:51] I am not in favor of
[03:48:54] getting weapons and things that are
[03:48:57] there because somebody thought it was a
[03:48:59] good idea, but people in the field look
[03:49:01] at it and go, "This isn't what we need."
[03:49:05] I mean, in the Gulf War, we were given
[03:49:06] holsters for berettas that were straight
[03:49:09] out of World War II and Vietnam, made
[03:49:11] out of leather, you know.
[03:49:14] and went on webbing, you know, on your
[03:49:16] waist. I'm like, that nobody needs this.
[03:49:19] >> We need it on our thigh. It's got to be
[03:49:22] where we can grab it, you know, but you
[03:49:25] couldn't do that. You've got to have
[03:49:27] this leather flap closed over it and
[03:49:29] everything. I'm like, this is what is
[03:49:30] this going to do in the desert?
[03:49:34] You know,
[03:49:36] it was interesting when I when I was at
[03:49:38] the postgrad school, I had a course on
[03:49:41] international politics and whatnot.
[03:49:43] given by one of the gentlemen and I
[03:49:45] forgot his name but he was in line to be
[03:49:48] one of the choices for secretary of
[03:49:49] defense. Other person got it. He went to
[03:49:52] postgrad school and taught
[03:49:56] really interesting pieces of information
[03:49:58] from him and he said you know when you
[03:50:01] were in the Gulf War like yeah just got
[03:50:04] back right
[03:50:07] and he said uh
[03:50:10] how was the ammunition and he go we
[03:50:12] didn't have enough when I was in the
[03:50:15] Gulf War
[03:50:17] uh we got there we had 50 cals on the
[03:50:20] helicopters you you know, we're doing
[03:50:23] some practice with them. We each got
[03:50:25] nine mills as pilots, got some
[03:50:28] ammunition for those.
[03:50:30] And then one day about
[03:50:32] 6 months in, they came up and said,
[03:50:35] "There is no more ammunition. Whatever
[03:50:37] you got, you need to hold."
[03:50:40] And we said, "Yeah, but what about when
[03:50:41] the supply ship comes from the US?" And
[03:50:44] they said, "There is no supply ship.
[03:50:46] There is no more ammunition."
[03:50:49] When the push came in January and we
[03:50:53] started moving north,
[03:50:56] I was flying a 53 Echo.
[03:50:59] We had one can of 50 cal for two
[03:51:03] weapons.
[03:51:05] >> That's like 50 rounds.
[03:51:07] >> Yeah. I said, "We can blow that in 4
[03:51:09] seconds."
[03:51:10] And they said, "That's all you get."
[03:51:14] I said, "Well, we need more." and
[03:51:15] they're like, "There is no more."
[03:51:18] And I said, "Well, then we might as well
[03:51:20] just take these off their mounts and
[03:51:21] throw it at them cuz we could do more
[03:51:23] damage." So, I went back to the postgrad
[03:51:26] school and I thought, "This was stupid.
[03:51:27] I don't know what happened here." Supply
[03:51:29] logistics.
[03:51:32] And this guy was telling us, you know
[03:51:33] what happened was about eight years ago,
[03:51:37] they needed money for this new weapon
[03:51:40] system, but they didn't have it. So they
[03:51:44] said, 'Well, we've got a stockpile of
[03:51:45] ammunition.
[03:51:47] We don't need to replace it every year.
[03:51:49] So, we'll take the money that we were
[03:51:50] going to spend replacing ammunition and
[03:51:52] we'll put it over here on this new Star
[03:51:55] Wars whatever you system and next year
[03:52:00] we'll buy more ammunition. Well, the
[03:52:02] next year came along and said, you know,
[03:52:04] we've still got a stockpile less than we
[03:52:05] did before, but we still have one.
[03:52:10] We've got cost overruns over here. So,
[03:52:12] let's take this year's ammunition budget
[03:52:16] and we'll put it over here. Next year,
[03:52:20] we'll do three times this much. We'll
[03:52:21] order more. Well, next year comes along
[03:52:23] and they look at it and go,
[03:52:26] "We can't spend that much on ammunition.
[03:52:28] We've never spent that much on
[03:52:29] ammunition."
[03:52:32] And we don't really need that much. So,
[03:52:34] we'll just take half of it and we'll put
[03:52:36] it over here on this weapon system. and
[03:52:38] next year we'll buy three and a half
[03:52:40] times as much. He said, "What happens is
[03:52:43] you build this bow wave of debt,
[03:52:47] right, that you can't ever fill again."
[03:52:50] Well, then the Gulf War happens and
[03:52:53] we're like, "We don't have any more
[03:52:54] ammunition. There is none."
[03:52:57] And I'm like, "We went into war
[03:53:00] without the ammunition to sustain it."
[03:53:02] I'm like, "Had our enemy known that,
[03:53:05] they could have just waited us out and
[03:53:06] run us over.
[03:53:08] I'm like that
[03:53:12] is
[03:53:14] fighting warfare through economics
[03:53:16] through through
[03:53:19] I mean it's not economic warfare but but
[03:53:22] that's capitalism ruining our ability to
[03:53:25] defend ourselves.
[03:53:28] I was that's one of the points that I
[03:53:30] was so disappointed at. You know, when
[03:53:32] I'm thinking and building this book, I'm
[03:53:35] taking data like that and going, "This
[03:53:37] is the wrong idea. We're doing the wrong
[03:53:39] things, and we're saying it's for the
[03:53:41] right reasons,
[03:53:44] but it's the wrong thing to do."
[03:53:47] And when I finally learned this, I was
[03:53:49] like, you know, it makes total sense
[03:53:51] now. Everything they told us
[03:53:54] makes sense because it made no sense at
[03:53:56] the time.
[03:53:58] I really envisioned a cargo ship showing
[03:54:02] up from the US with more munitions
[03:54:07] and it just didn't exist.
[03:54:10] That's a sobering thought as you're
[03:54:12] heading into combat.
[03:54:15] >> I think we just had that happen
[03:54:16] recently, didn't?
[03:54:17] >> Yeah. Well,
[03:54:19] then they came out with the win hold
[03:54:22] win. We'll win one more while we're
[03:54:25] holding the other, then we'll pivot and
[03:54:27] do the other one. I'm like, yeah, how
[03:54:28] well do you think that's going to work?
[03:54:30] We can't even do one right now without
[03:54:32] running out of equipment.
[03:54:37] But what did we do? We bought more
[03:54:39] ammunition. We replaced all of our
[03:54:42] equipment that we left in the Gulf. We
[03:54:45] replaced all the equipment we left in
[03:54:46] Afghanistan.
[03:54:50] All of the military-industrial
[03:54:53] businesses made billions of dollars of
[03:54:56] profit.
[03:54:58] All the congressmen could go say, "I
[03:55:00] brought money into my state."
[03:55:03] But is that how we run a country?
[03:55:06] >> No.
[03:55:07] >> Not well.
[03:55:10] Not well.
[03:55:15] Could you talk about seeing the pattern
[03:55:18] of the imperial playbook? I think this
[03:55:21] is um
[03:55:24] something that people would like to hear
[03:55:27] about.
[03:55:28] >> Yeah, imperialism is
[03:55:31] we don't talk about imperialism a lot.
[03:55:34] We are an empire
[03:55:36] and as an empire we have to do things
[03:55:39] that empires do and frequently those
[03:55:43] things are not what's best for everyone
[03:55:46] else. It's very very focused on what's
[03:55:49] best for me,
[03:55:51] not what's best for everybody. And you
[03:55:54] have to be careful with that
[03:55:56] because if you essentially poison the
[03:55:59] waters for everyone, you poison your own
[03:56:01] waters,
[03:56:03] right?
[03:56:05] Um, if I understand your question right,
[03:56:09] as an empire, we end up doing a lot of
[03:56:12] things that I think are shortsighted.
[03:56:17] They protect the empire.
[03:56:19] They don't protect the environment we
[03:56:21] live in. And we can talk about, for
[03:56:23] example, the environment.
[03:56:26] It does us no good to be an empire if
[03:56:29] all we're doing is poisoning ourselves.
[03:56:33] But we do, right? I would that it's
[03:56:37] funny the um I was in the military.
[03:56:39] Number one poller in the world is the US
[03:56:41] military.
[03:56:43] Hands down.
[03:56:45] Uh we have signed all sorts of accords
[03:56:48] with other countries saying we're
[03:56:49] reducing impact. And we have an
[03:56:53] exclusion that says except for our
[03:56:55] military, we don't report on it. We
[03:56:57] don't say what we're doing. We don't say
[03:56:58] how much fuel we're burning. We don't
[03:57:01] talk about what we're throwing overboard
[03:57:02] in the ocean, you know. We don't talk
[03:57:05] about the munitions that we bury or
[03:57:08] leave behind or, you know, what metals
[03:57:11] they're made out of or what they're
[03:57:13] doing to the water supply. You know, we
[03:57:14] just we just ignore all of that.
[03:57:18] That is one of the trappings of empire.
[03:57:20] We don't care about it because it
[03:57:23] doesn't help us build the empire at all.
[03:57:26] Um,
[03:57:30] there's a number of things that work
[03:57:33] like this. Economically, we do the same
[03:57:35] thing as an empire. We will do what's
[03:57:37] best for the empire,
[03:57:39] >> but not what's best for the world
[03:57:40] economy. Well, the empire only operates
[03:57:44] in the world economy. It's kind of one
[03:57:46] of those things like a rising tide lifts
[03:57:48] all boats, right?
[03:57:51] >> A lowering tide will do all boats sink.
[03:57:55] You might be the biggest boat, but if
[03:57:58] the tide is going down, you're going to
[03:57:59] sink just like everybody else did.
[03:58:03] I do have a section in the book talking
[03:58:05] about empire and the things we do
[03:58:07] because of that. Um, economics is a big
[03:58:11] one.
[03:58:12] Global um um ecology is one.
[03:58:19] And these things are things that we get
[03:58:21] caught up in. And I think they're the
[03:58:23] trappings of empire that they're hard to
[03:58:25] not get trapped in. I don't know how to
[03:58:28] get out of it
[03:58:30] other than to understand sometimes it's
[03:58:33] not just what's best for you. It has to
[03:58:36] be what's best for everyone.
[03:58:39] Does that make sense?
[03:58:40] >> Of course.
[03:58:42] >> Yeah. It's
[03:58:45] we're uh we need oil, right? We live on
[03:58:49] oil.
[03:58:50] We don't even have to [ __ ] live on
[03:58:52] oil.
[03:58:53] >> We don't have to.
[03:58:56] >> But we
[03:58:56] >> should be focusing on nuclear.
[03:58:58] >> Yeah.
[03:58:58] >> And here we are.
[03:58:59] >> I know.
[03:59:00] >> [ __ ] around in Venezuela with oil.
[03:59:02] >> Yeah. And we're the largest producer of
[03:59:04] oil in the world right now,
[03:59:06] >> right? And what are we doing? We're
[03:59:08] going to drill more.
[03:59:09] >> It's it's it
[03:59:11] becoming an obsolete source of fuel.
[03:59:15] >> Yeah.
[03:59:15] >> And it's definitely not the most
[03:59:17] efficient. And here we are in an AI race
[03:59:20] with China and we're [ __ ] around with
[03:59:22] oil.
[03:59:25] >> We have unfortunately 130 years of
[03:59:27] infrastructure built on delivering oil
[03:59:29] problems.
[03:59:30] >> Already a losing strategy.
[03:59:32] >> Yeah, it is. It is.
[03:59:33] >> They're focusing Yeah. They're they're
[03:59:36] implementing coal right now, but they're
[03:59:38] focusing on nuclear and we're [ __ ]
[03:59:40] around with oil and gas.
[03:59:43] >> When's the last time we built a new
[03:59:44] nuclear plant?
[03:59:45] >> I can't I can't I can't remember. It's
[03:59:48] it's been a long time.
[03:59:49] >> Right. Right. We built a bunch and said,
[03:59:52] "Hey, these work. These are good." I
[03:59:54] think we had, you know, you had
[03:59:56] Fukushima
[03:59:58] and and um was it Grenobyl?
[04:00:03] Yeah. And everybody's like, "Woo, let's
[04:00:07] not do this anymore."
[04:00:08] >> Mhm.
[04:00:09] >> Yeah. You know what? It's dangerous. It
[04:00:11] can be. We need safeguards,
[04:00:14] but we can put in to place the right
[04:00:16] safeguards. We've had nuclear power
[04:00:19] plants on our ships now for the last 25
[04:00:21] years. We build them very carefully and
[04:00:24] train people very well. Seven Mile
[04:00:27] Island, you know, all of this stuff.
[04:00:29] It's like, well, we're afraid of it now.
[04:00:32] Really, you should be afraid of
[04:00:33] everything we're doing with oil.
[04:00:36] the amount of money we spend to move it
[04:00:38] around the world
[04:00:40] and burn it and what it does to the
[04:00:44] atmosphere, what it does to us. You
[04:00:47] know, uh oil is in everything. I don't
[04:00:51] know what we would do without it right
[04:00:52] now. We build plastic with it. We
[04:00:55] everything has oil product in it
[04:00:57] somewhere.
[04:00:59] But we've got to get away from that. We
[04:01:01] have to. And quite honestly, most of the
[04:01:04] problems in the Middle East go away once
[04:01:05] we get off an oil standard.
[04:01:10] >> What I was referring to was regime
[04:01:13] change, instability, sanctions, civilian
[04:01:17] suffering.
[04:01:18] >> Yeah.
[04:01:18] >> Proxy wars, plausible deniability.
[04:01:21] >> Yeah.
[04:01:22] >> Yeah.
[04:01:24] All the things we do as an empire. Um,
[04:01:28] we talked earlier about how
[04:01:32] Has a country ever been better off after
[04:01:36] we have done a regime change?
[04:01:38] And it hasn't. It's better for us.
[04:01:41] Hasn't been better for them, right?
[04:01:45] Um
[04:01:47] proxy wars
[04:01:49] better for us. We don't have to fight on
[04:01:52] our ground. We can use other people's
[04:01:53] land, fight their better for them. No.
[04:01:58] Do we go fight Russia directly? No.
[04:02:01] you know, we can fight in Afghanistan
[04:02:02] and Ukraine and whatnot, right?
[04:02:07] It gives us a position of deniability
[04:02:11] that's not good because we don't see the
[04:02:14] consequences of what we're doing.
[04:02:17] And this gets back to do people
[04:02:20] understand and know what's going on?
[04:02:23] Because when we fight proxy wars, they
[04:02:26] don't see it.
[04:02:27] And it's easy to ignore it if you don't
[04:02:30] see it. But it's just as devastating
[04:02:34] economically when we are
[04:02:39] we we have a tendency to there was a
[04:02:41] good book um
[04:02:44] confessions of an economic hitman where
[04:02:46] he talks about how his job this author I
[04:02:49] forgot his name Peterson
[04:02:53] he would go in and
[04:02:56] convince countries you need to help have
[04:02:59] us come in and help you we'll give you a
[04:03:01] loan
[04:03:02] we'll give you a loan and we will make
[04:03:04] sure that we build out your
[04:03:06] infrastructure and everything.
[04:03:08] You just pay back the loan with
[04:03:10] everything you make from what we've
[04:03:12] given you, right? Um what it does though
[04:03:15] is it locks these other countries into
[04:03:17] loans that can never be repaid. They're
[04:03:19] in debt to us forever. And actually, we
[04:03:22] look forward to them defaulting on the
[04:03:25] loan because then we can go in and
[04:03:27] restructure it and do it all over again.
[04:03:32] He was saying that we've done this in
[04:03:34] Brazil, we've done it in Venezuela,
[04:03:38] um
[04:03:39] Saudi Arabia.
[04:03:42] 1978,
[04:03:44] I think it was 78, 77, 78,
[04:03:48] mid70s,
[04:03:50] um Saudi Arabia cut off our oil. We were
[04:03:53] in dire straits. I remember being a kid,
[04:03:57] 16, 17 at the time, driving a car. you
[04:03:59] couldn't get gasoline. You would line up
[04:04:02] in a line almost a mile long and then be
[04:04:04] limited to five gallons because there
[04:04:07] just wasn't any because they cut us off.
[04:04:11] Now, after that, what did we do? We did
[04:04:14] two things. First, that's when we
[04:04:16] started the strategic oil reserve and
[04:04:19] said, "We're never going to allow
[04:04:20] somebody to hold us hostage like this
[04:04:22] again, right?" So, we started
[04:04:24] stockpiling our own oil.
[04:04:27] Good choice.
[04:04:29] We also went back to Saudi Arabia and we
[04:04:31] said, "Look, we're going to make some
[04:04:33] deals with you." And Saudi Arabia was
[04:04:35] not a huge
[04:04:38] country at the time in terms of of
[04:04:40] profit and whatnot. Look back at maps
[04:04:42] and things. You'll see they they don't
[04:04:44] have huge shiny cities and all. We said,
[04:04:47] "We're going to come in here and we're
[04:04:49] going to pay to sink your wells. We're
[04:04:52] going to pay to build refineries.
[04:04:55] We're going to loan you a lot of money
[04:04:57] and you're going to pay us back from the
[04:05:00] um proceeds.
[04:05:03] Also, you're going to sign an agreement
[04:05:05] that you will provide x amount of oil to
[04:05:08] us for the next
[04:05:11] 50 years, I think it was.
[04:05:14] Well, that agreement just ran out a
[04:05:16] couple years ago. And you may have heard
[04:05:18] where Saudi Arabia was talking about.
[04:05:21] Oh, that agreement said they could only
[04:05:23] sell oil in US dollars
[04:05:26] to help our economy.
[04:05:29] >> I know where you're going.
[04:05:30] >> Couple years ago, you heard
[04:05:34] chatter about Saudi Arabia saying,
[04:05:36] "Maybe we'll sell oil in rubles now
[04:05:40] because our agreement ran out."
[04:05:43] And they started rattling the our cage a
[04:05:46] little going, you know, unless you give
[04:05:47] us a new agreement that we like,
[04:05:51] we're going to start trading in yen and
[04:05:53] we're going to start trading in ruble
[04:05:56] and when everybody can buy our oil in
[04:05:58] yen and rubble, they don't need the
[04:06:00] dollar anymore and your economy is going
[04:06:02] to collapse. And we were frightened.
[04:06:07] Same thing with bricks. if everybody
[04:06:10] starts using a different
[04:06:12] >> currency
[04:06:15] doesn't keep ours afloat anymore, right?
[04:06:17] And that is that is terrifying to us.
[04:06:20] That's why anybody that has tried to
[04:06:22] sign on to bricks, we are not friendly
[04:06:25] to
[04:06:27] um
[04:06:27] >> it's getting bigger.
[04:06:29] >> Pardon?
[04:06:29] >> It's getting bigger.
[04:06:30] >> Yeah, it is.
[04:06:33] It is. You can only hold it off for so
[04:06:35] long.
[04:06:38] But we made those deals with Saudi
[04:06:40] Arabia and Saudi Arabia sold oil only in
[04:06:43] US currency and made a ton of money. You
[04:06:48] know, they've got so much money now
[04:06:50] they're spending it building 100
[04:06:51] kilometer long straight cities that make
[04:06:55] no sense.
[04:06:57] But uh but a couple years ago, yeah,
[04:07:00] they were talking about maybe moving off
[04:07:02] the dollar.
[04:07:02] >> Yep. I remember.
[04:07:04] >> I don't know what happened. All I know
[04:07:07] is they were talking about it. A lot of
[04:07:10] people got frightened. Next thing,
[04:07:12] nobody's talking about it again. And
[04:07:13] we're all buddy buddy.
[04:07:16] Um, now we're selling them some
[04:07:18] fighters, too. I think recently I just
[04:07:21] saw we were sending a new shipment of
[04:07:24] fighters over to Saudi Arabia.
[04:07:26] >> Sure that wasn't Israel?
[04:07:28] >> Uh, no. We would send them to them all
[04:07:30] the time. But I was surprised because I
[04:07:32] flew with some Saudi
[04:07:35] air force and I'm like, I don't see them
[04:07:36] flying these.
[04:07:41] I don't know. Or was Israel selling them
[04:07:43] to them? Israel was
[04:07:45] >> I believe we just sold $6 billion in
[04:07:49] F-15s. Oh, excuse me.
[04:07:52] >> Did I use the word sold?
[04:07:54] >> He did.
[04:07:55] >> My bad. Gave them.
[04:07:57] >> Yeah.
[04:07:58] >> About $6 billion in F-15s.
[04:08:00] That was about a week ago.
[04:08:02] >> I thought this was something else. This
[04:08:03] was about a month ago. I'm going to have
[04:08:05] to look into it.
[04:08:06] >> I'm just going to look this up real
[04:08:07] quick.
[04:08:07] >> Yeah. Yeah, look into that.
[04:08:08] >> I was actually having a conversation
[04:08:10] with Mike Walsh about funding
[04:08:14] to Israel and he said we did not do that
[04:08:18] and then
[04:08:22] beautiful thing
[04:08:23] >> the next day.
[04:08:24] >> Yeah. Right. Right. Next day we would
[04:08:28] never do that.
[04:08:30] It's amazing how many times we say we're
[04:08:32] not doing that and then the next day or
[04:08:34] next week you see the news that yeah,
[04:08:36] it's exactly what we did.
[04:08:37] >> Yeah.
[04:08:40] >> I'm joking with my kids all the time
[04:08:42] because they ask a question and I say,
[04:08:43] you know, it's too bad you don't have a
[04:08:45] small device you could hold in your hand
[04:08:46] that connected you to the some knowledge
[04:08:49] of all human information
[04:08:53] where you could research that.
[04:09:04] anything.
[04:09:06] Here we go.
[04:09:09] Yes. The United States recently awarded
[04:09:12] Boeing an $ 8.6 billion contract to
[04:09:16] supply up to 50 F-15 fighter jets to
[04:09:19] Israel through the foreign military
[04:09:22] sales program. with the initial batch of
[04:09:25] 25 aircraft funded largely by US
[04:09:28] military aid.
[04:09:30] >> Can you look if we just sent any to
[04:09:32] Saudi Arabia?
[04:09:35] I thought I just saw that we were doing
[04:09:39] that.
[04:09:41] >> Boeing offered F6 F-15 to Saudi Arabia
[04:09:44] on November 16th, 2025, but no deal was
[04:09:48] signed.
[04:09:49] >> Okay.
[04:09:52] Yeah. That surprised me because like I
[04:09:54] said, we worked with the Saudi Arabian
[04:09:59] Air Force back in Desert Storm. That was
[04:10:02] a while ago. I just didn't see them
[04:10:05] flying these aircraft.
[04:10:12] But still,
[04:10:14] >> why do you think we import so many
[04:10:16] refugees
[04:10:18] >> after we leave a country that we went to
[04:10:20] war with
[04:10:21] or
[04:10:23] had war on their turf?
[04:10:25] >> Yeah.
[04:10:28] You know, the bigger question is why do
[04:10:30] we make so many refugees?
[04:10:34] You know, um
[04:10:37] I do believe in we were talking about
[04:10:39] being accountable.
[04:10:41] If we create refugees,
[04:10:44] especially through a proxy war, we
[04:10:46] should do something about that.
[04:10:49] I don't think it's I don't think it's
[04:10:51] ethical to go create refugees and then
[04:10:54] say, "Okay, you're on your own."
[04:10:58] Um, I think we should do the right thing
[04:11:01] as a country. either help them
[04:11:05] build what they need so they don't have
[04:11:07] to be refugees or take them in. The
[04:11:11] easiest thing is to take them in. But
[04:11:14] then you have to think about, okay, can
[04:11:17] we take in all the world's refugees? No,
[04:11:20] we can't. Should we take in some? Yes,
[04:11:24] we should. Well, let's be intelligent
[04:11:27] about the way we do it. Let's make sure
[04:11:30] we get them what they need to become
[04:11:35] contributing people in the United
[04:11:37] States. That doesn't mean just put them
[04:11:39] somewhere and go, "Okay, you're on your
[04:11:40] own. We brought you here now struggle to
[04:11:44] survive."
[04:11:45] That's not a good plan. Unfortunately, I
[04:11:48] think we do that a lot of times.
[04:11:50] >> Mhm. I think we bring people in, don't
[04:11:53] give them what they need to be able to
[04:11:55] succeed,
[04:11:57] >> and then sit there and say, "Why aren't
[04:11:59] you
[04:11:59] >> Why don't you think we do that?"
[04:12:03] >> So [ __ ] counterproductive.
[04:12:04] >> I think two things. Number one, money
[04:12:06] costs money. And number two, it doesn't
[04:12:08] buy any political capital. Nobody gets
[04:12:11] to their next election by saying, "Look
[04:12:12] what I did to help these people."
[04:12:16] And this gets back to our main problem
[04:12:18] with our political system that is based
[04:12:20] on money and politicking for the next
[04:12:23] election instead of doing what's right.
[04:12:25] I mean, I just had this conversation
[04:12:27] with Ro Conor. I mean, he's he is the if
[04:12:30] you're not familiar with him, he just he
[04:12:31] wanted to raise the billionaire tax in
[04:12:33] California, 1%,
[04:12:36] >> Silicon Valley lost a trillion dollars
[04:12:38] in wealth in what, one week.
[04:12:41] >> And so we had the conversation. it was
[04:12:43] civilized conversation, you know, and
[04:12:45] he's he's I mean, he wants
[04:12:49] people to have medical um uh health
[04:12:52] insurance and you know, all the all the
[04:12:55] things that you would need to be
[04:12:56] successful. But, you know, I just I
[04:12:59] said, "What
[04:13:03] what do you I asked him. I said, "What
[04:13:05] are you even going to spend the money
[04:13:06] on? We have all this waste, fraud, and
[04:13:07] abuse in the country, and second of all,
[04:13:09] we send all of our money
[04:13:12] to Ukraine, to Israel,
[04:13:16] to Afghanistan,
[04:13:18] to Iraq,
[04:13:21] and everywhere.
[04:13:23] But here,
[04:13:24] >> yeah,
[04:13:32] >> it's What was it? Was it last week? They
[04:13:34] estimated 600 billion dollars in waste,
[04:13:36] fraud, and abuse
[04:13:38] >> in the country.
[04:13:39] What if you took a billion What if you
[04:13:41] took $2 billion and put it in the top
[04:13:44] 300 cities in the US,
[04:13:46] >> right?
[04:13:47] >> Why don't Why don't you tackle the
[04:13:50] waste, fraud, and abuse first before you
[04:13:52] ask for more [ __ ] money that is going
[04:13:55] to leave unaccounted for?
[04:13:58] >> And you know what?
[04:13:58] >> He didn't have an answer.
[04:14:00] >> And taking Musk and having just randomly
[04:14:03] cut people from different jobs was not
[04:14:06] the answer.
[04:14:06] >> What? But what what what why wouldn't
[04:14:08] they just why wouldn't you fix the waste
[04:14:12] how is that not even
[04:14:14] >> it's like it's not even it it's not even
[04:14:18] a viable option in these people's minds.
[04:14:21] >> Yeah,
[04:14:23] I know. Think
[04:14:25] >> I want everybody to have [ __ ]
[04:14:26] healthcare. Yeah.
[04:14:27] >> I want everybody to have free education.
[04:14:30] I want that's great.
[04:14:32] >> I think it betters our country.
[04:14:34] >> Yeah.
[04:14:34] >> But I don't want to [ __ ] pay for it.
[04:14:36] I don't want to pay more
[04:14:37] >> when
[04:14:39] we have $9 billion in Minnesota alone
[04:14:42] going to Somalia.
[04:14:43] >> Yep.
[04:14:45] >> We have $600 billion in the country in
[04:14:47] one year. That's that's that's waste,
[04:14:49] fraud, and abuse.
[04:14:50] >> And who in that? Who got that?
[04:14:53] >> Who got that?
[04:14:54] >> That 600 billion. Where did it go?
[04:14:56] >> We don't Nobody knows.
[04:14:58] >> But somebody got it.
[04:14:59] >> Yep.
[04:15:00] >> It's not like that money just
[04:15:02] disappeared. So when you say it's waste,
[04:15:04] fraud, and abuse, who did that money go
[04:15:06] to?
[04:15:09] >> That's a great question. But nobody
[04:15:12] wants to tackle it. It's it's okay.
[04:15:15] Well, great. You're going to you're
[04:15:17] going to tax us another 1%. How much of
[04:15:19] that is going to go to [ __ ]
[04:15:20] >> Yeah.
[04:15:21] >> How much of that is going to leave the
[04:15:22] [ __ ] country? How much of that is
[04:15:24] going to go to a country that has free
[04:15:26] housing, free education, free
[04:15:27] healthcare, free everything?
[04:15:32] probably damn near zero poverty.
[04:15:34] >> Yeah,
[04:15:36] we spend more money on other countries
[04:15:38] and waste, fraud, and abuse than we do
[04:15:41] on our own citizens.
[04:15:42] >> And we allow it to happen.
[04:15:43] >> And we do. And why?
[04:15:47] That's the question, right? I I happen
[04:15:49] to believe our our politicians
[04:15:52] are more
[04:15:55] involved in getting elected again than
[04:15:57] they are in doing what's right.
[04:16:00] >> Yeah.
[04:16:02] waste fraud and abuse. Yeah. If you were
[04:16:04] running a company, if you're running a
[04:16:06] corporation,
[04:16:06] >> I have a congressman right now that's
[04:16:09] after me.
[04:16:11] Sent me a cease and desist, tried to
[04:16:13] silence me, tried to sue me.
[04:16:15] >> Yeah.
[04:16:16] >> Went back at him.
[04:16:18] He he he he he
[04:16:21] tells everybody I'm doing this [ __ ] for
[04:16:24] clicks and views. This guy's done more
[04:16:26] podcasts than I have in the past two
[04:16:29] weeks. And I'm a [ __ ] podcaster. And
[04:16:31] it's all about his re-election because
[04:16:33] he's probably not going to get
[04:16:34] reelection,
[04:16:35] >> right?
[04:16:36] >> Re-elect. He's probably going to get
[04:16:37] primar because I [ __ ] blasted his ass
[04:16:40] and it got, I don't know, 10, 20, 30
[04:16:43] million views.
[04:16:44] >> Yeah.
[04:16:44] >> While he goes on something, gets 800
[04:16:46] views. It's going to take a lot of
[04:16:48] podcasts with 800 views to [ __ ] dig
[04:16:51] yourself out of that hole.
[04:16:53] >> Yeah. But that's the only thing that guy
[04:16:55] gives a [ __ ] about.
[04:16:57] >> Yeah,
[04:16:57] >> we have I mean I just listed off all the
[04:17:00] [ __ ] that's going on in the country, but
[04:17:01] this [ __ ] guy is worried about
[04:17:05] [ __ ] talking on the internet.
[04:17:07] >> Right. Right. Oh, they do it all day
[04:17:10] long.
[04:17:12] >> Yeah, I saw
[04:17:13] >> that's all he does.
[04:17:14] >> I saw.
[04:17:14] >> And you know what? He's probably going
[04:17:16] to get [ __ ] reelected. Like I would
[04:17:18] love to say that he's going to get
[04:17:19] primar. they will probably [ __ ]
[04:17:22] reelect the same [ __ ] again and
[04:17:25] complain about the same [ __ ] [ __ ]
[04:17:28] again. And so it it's almost like we
[04:17:30] deserve exactly what we're living in.
[04:17:33] >> Almost. I mean, think about half the
[04:17:36] stuff that happens here. We didn't pass
[04:17:37] a budget.
[04:17:39] We The Congress did not pass a budget.
[04:17:43] What did they do when the budget didn't
[04:17:44] pass?
[04:17:47] They went on vacation.
[04:17:49] Are you freaking kidding me?
[04:17:51] >> Then we allow it.
[04:17:52] >> If I was running, I mean, if the budget
[04:17:55] budget didn't pass, they should be
[04:17:57] locked in congressional chambers and fed
[04:18:00] pizzas until it passes. You don't leave.
[04:18:04] I I look at being a military officer and
[04:18:06] I'm like, can you imagine if you're out
[04:18:09] in the middle of combat somewhere
[04:18:12] and you just said, you know, yeah, I
[04:18:14] didn't get this, so I'm going to leave.
[04:18:16] I'm just going to go. I'll come back and
[04:18:18] finish this later.
[04:18:20] We want everybody else to be ethical and
[04:18:22] and dedicated and our own Congress
[04:18:27] is
[04:18:28] I don't know.
[04:18:31] They're not public servants. They're
[04:18:32] public masters.
[04:18:34] And they act like that. It's like, you
[04:18:36] know what? You were elected.
[04:18:39] that doesn't make you some
[04:18:42] superstar,
[04:18:44] you know, king, whatever. Uh, I feel the
[04:18:48] same way about movie actors. It's like,
[04:18:50] you act in a movie.
[04:18:52] >> I I'm not going to glorify you. You got
[04:18:55] elected. I'm not going to glorify you.
[04:18:57] You work for me. You work for all of us.
[04:19:00] You should act like a public servant.
[04:19:04] And if you were running a company,
[04:19:07] say you're the CEO of a company,
[04:19:10] hey, your company made however many
[04:19:14] billion or a trillion or
[04:19:17] but you lost 600 billion.
[04:19:20] You want to increase your profit, go
[04:19:23] find out where the 600 billion went,
[04:19:26] right? You either you either cut
[04:19:28] expenses or you create income,
[04:19:31] >> right? Create revenue.
[04:19:34] 600 billion. I I
[04:19:38] it boggles the mind that nobody cares.
[04:19:41] They almost look at that like a rounding
[04:19:43] error, though. Yep. On our whole
[04:19:46] economy, they're like, "Ah, 600
[04:19:48] billion."
[04:19:49] You know, based on the whole economy,
[04:19:51] that's a decimal point. Yeah. Well, that
[04:19:54] decimal point could pay for
[04:19:58] you more than pay for universal health
[04:20:00] care for everybody in the country and
[04:20:03] free health and uh free education for
[04:20:05] everybody in the country. That rounding
[04:20:07] air is not insignificant
[04:20:11] to us.
[04:20:13] You know, if you're talking about
[04:20:14] trillions, you may not care, but to us,
[04:20:18] that's not insignificant. It affects the
[04:20:20] way we live and it affects our standard
[04:20:22] of living. I think it just proves that
[04:20:24] the money isn't even real.
[04:20:26] >> You think it's what?
[04:20:27] >> It's not. It's the money isn't real.
[04:20:29] >> No, it it's not. It's numbers. It's
[04:20:32] numbers.
[04:20:36] I agree with that.
[04:20:39] And we keep paying keep paying our taxes
[04:20:44] and have less say of where it goes.
[04:20:51] I mean, and you see things all the time
[04:20:54] that you ask yourself, "What happened to
[04:20:56] this?"
[04:20:58] And I'm I'm I'm going to pick on this
[04:21:00] one for a minute
[04:21:02] in Trump's first administration. I'm
[04:21:06] going to build a wall. It's very
[04:21:07] important we build a wall. We have to
[04:21:09] build a wall. Okay.
[04:21:12] The wall didn't get built. Okay. People
[04:21:14] pushed back on it. I get it. You didn't
[04:21:17] have Cart Blanch.
[04:21:20] Biden comes in. We're not building the
[04:21:21] wall. Okay. Trump comes in again.
[04:21:26] This was the most important thing. Are
[04:21:28] Are you building the wall? I'm worried
[04:21:31] about Greenland.
[04:21:33] Well, you just told us this was the most
[04:21:34] important thing. We did spend a couple
[04:21:35] billion on it. Yeah, but I'm worried
[04:21:38] about Greenland now. Was it important or
[04:21:41] wasn't it?
[04:21:43] If it wasn't, we just wasted a lot of
[04:21:45] money.
[04:21:47] And that's our shortsightedness where
[04:21:49] it's always like, you know, what am I
[04:21:50] doing today? How am I getting people
[04:21:53] riled up today? How am I getting
[04:21:54] reelected today? Not a long-term view.
[04:21:58] >> Mhm.
[04:21:59] >> When I was a kid, they uh they were
[04:22:01] going to build a bridge uh from where my
[04:22:03] dad lived over to this island. There was
[04:22:07] a small bridge. They're like, "We're
[04:22:08] going to we're going to upgrade the
[04:22:09] bridge. Going to build this beautiful
[04:22:11] beautiful new bridge, right?" They said,
[04:22:13] "We are going to pay for it." uh with a
[04:22:17] toll to go across the bridge should pay
[04:22:19] for itself in four years. Okay. So, they
[04:22:23] brought out all these barges and
[04:22:25] everything and they were sinking these
[04:22:26] huge,
[04:22:28] you know,
[04:22:31] whatever you call them, pedestals down,
[04:22:33] you know, to build this bridge. I
[04:22:35] remember looking at it going, you know,
[04:22:37] I've seen the growth projections of this
[04:22:40] island.
[04:22:42] And I said, "This two-lane bridge is
[04:22:45] going to be too small in 5 years.
[04:22:51] Why not right now while you have the
[04:22:53] barges, why not build the pedestals for
[04:22:56] four lanes and then you can just add it
[04:23:00] later, right?"
[04:23:04] And I was told it's it's politics.
[04:23:07] None of the taxpayers want to pay for
[04:23:09] that today.
[04:23:11] So, you want to be able to say, "I put
[04:23:13] this in today, get reelected, and then
[04:23:16] you can use another new addition to the
[04:23:20] bridge as your next election campaign.
[04:23:25] Whereas, if you said, "Hey, we're going
[04:23:27] to go more in debt right now for
[04:23:28] something in the future," people
[04:23:30] wouldn't reelect you again. I said,
[04:23:32] "That seems so shortsighted.
[04:23:36] We waste more money because of that.
[04:23:39] But it's all about the election cycle.
[04:23:44] You can get two election cycles if you
[04:23:46] build it twice
[04:23:50] versus one election cycle.
[04:23:52] >> Yeah.
[04:23:53] >> And that just wastes money.
[04:23:54] >> Yeah.
[04:23:58] That's part of our system where, you
[04:24:00] know, every congressman, every senator
[04:24:02] fights for their state
[04:24:04] and nobody is overseeing the federal
[04:24:06] budget in a way that makes sense.
[04:24:12] Again, goes back to education, though.
[04:24:14] People need to see what's going on.
[04:24:20] >> What do you want to talk about that we
[04:24:22] haven't talked about yet? H. What do I
[04:24:24] want to talk about that we haven't
[04:24:26] talked about yet?
[04:24:28] That is a broad opening.
[04:24:32] I feel like throwing something out
[04:24:34] that's just totally off the wall.
[04:24:37] And you'd be like,
[04:24:38] >> might be a good thing.
[04:24:38] >> You'd be like, "What? Where did you come
[04:24:41] up with that?"
[04:24:43] H We've talked about a lot.
[04:24:45] >> We have.
[04:24:46] >> We have. We've covered a lot.
[04:24:48] >> Um,
[04:24:49] >> do you have any words of encouragement?
[04:24:52] >> I do.
[04:24:53] Thank God I do.
[04:24:56] Education is the best thing you can do
[04:24:58] for yourself, your kids, and everything
[04:25:00] else. You've got to know what's going
[04:25:02] on. It's not too late.
[04:25:06] We can
[04:25:08] make things better.
[04:25:11] The only thing we're missing, the only
[04:25:13] thing I'm seeing missing sometimes
[04:25:16] is the gumption to go do that. Just go
[04:25:20] do it. Ask questions. Question
[04:25:23] everything. Every time somebody tells
[04:25:26] you that something, ask yourself the
[04:25:28] question,
[04:25:30] do they have an agenda?
[04:25:32] What is the opposite point of view?
[04:25:36] How do I know this is true?
[04:25:41] >> Love that.
[04:25:41] >> And you'll be surprised sometimes,
[04:25:43] especially when somebody says, "Hey,
[04:25:44] this." And you go, "How do I know that's
[04:25:46] true?"
[04:25:49] And I see it all the time where somebody
[04:25:51] says something to someone and a day
[04:25:52] later they parrot the same thing. Oh
[04:25:55] well this I'm like did you validate
[04:25:57] that? Do you know that's true?
[04:26:00] So question everything. Ask questions.
[04:26:04] Do your research yourself.
[04:26:07] Love it.
[04:26:08] Thank you. And I forgot to give you a
[04:26:11] gift.
[04:26:11] >> Uh-oh.
[04:26:12] >> Everybody gets one.
[04:26:14] >> Oh. Are these these the gummies?
[04:26:16] >> Those are the gummy bears. I saw those.
[04:26:18] >> Still legal in all 50 states.
[04:26:20] >> So,
[04:26:21] >> I'm excited for these.
[04:26:24] Thank you.
[04:26:24] >> You're welcome. You're welcome.
[04:26:26] >> I appreciate that,
[04:26:27] >> Michael.
[04:26:29] That is a conversation that I've been
[04:26:31] wanting to have for a long time.
[04:26:33] >> I enjoyed it thoroughly.
[04:26:35] >> Very hard to find the right person to do
[04:26:37] it and um
[04:26:40] you were the right person to do it with.
[04:26:42] >> I appreciate that. I appreciate you
[04:26:44] having me on the show. I appreciate you
[04:26:46] giving them the opportunity to meet all
[04:26:48] of your listeners. Um, let them know who
[04:26:52] I am, what I'm doing.
[04:26:54] >> Where can they get the book?
[04:26:55] >> You can get the book on Amazon.
[04:26:57] >> Perfect.
[04:26:58] >> Best place. I tell everybody if you get
[04:27:00] the book, write me a review. That's what
[04:27:02] tells other people that it's uh it's
[04:27:04] worthwhile.
[04:27:05] >> I think you're about to sell a lot of
[04:27:06] books.
[04:27:07] >> I I hope so. I really hope so. And more
[04:27:09] than selling the books, I hope I can
[04:27:13] change
[04:27:14] some perceptions and ideas
[04:27:17] and help people make this country even
[04:27:19] better than it is today.
[04:27:22] That's my goal. I know that's your goal.
[04:27:25] And
[04:27:30] another reason that you were the right
[04:27:31] guy is there are so many voices out
[04:27:34] there that
[04:27:37] I just don't trust them.
[04:27:39] >> Yeah.
[04:27:40] >> You know, I just don't trust them.
[04:27:41] They're getting
[04:27:43] notoriety. They're getting f. They're
[04:27:45] getting something out of talking about
[04:27:46] this. And a lot of it out a lot of it is
[04:27:50] outrage. And um
[04:27:53] I know damn well you're not going to
[04:27:56] make your retirement off selling that
[04:27:57] book and and I know you're here for the
[04:27:59] right reasons and that is extremely
[04:28:01] important to me and my audience. So
[04:28:04] thank you.
[04:28:04] >> I appreciate that. Thank you.
[04:28:06] >> My pleasure. I hope to see you after the
[04:28:08] next book.
[04:28:08] >> Well, I was going to say when I read the
[04:28:10] when I when I finish the next book,
[04:28:12] we'll talk again. Sounds good.
[04:28:14] >> All right. Thank you, sir. Appreciate
[04:28:16] it.
[04:28:29] No matter where you're watching the
[04:28:30] Shawn Ryan Show from, if you get
[04:28:32] anything out of this at all, anything,
[04:28:35] please like, comment, and subscribe. And
[04:28:40] most importantly, share this everywhere
[04:28:44] you possibly can. And if you're feeling
[04:28:47] extra generous, head to Apple Podcast
[04:28:49] and Spotify and leave us a
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