Co-hosts Jared Yates Sexton and Nick Hauselman discuss the ramifications of the Brazilian election for president, as Bolsonaro loses by 5 points and is priming the country to reject the second round election later this month. They then pivot to the Supreme Court's docket this fall and how undemocratic they can make the country before exposing Elon Musk for the ineffectual tech boy wannabe that he is.
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I'm in Chicago and, you know, still traveling, but here to talk about what's going on right now.
Yeah, you were missed terribly this week.
I always like when you come back, we get to renew what we're doing.
And then the good news, Nick, is we get to talk about things like elections and coups and, wait, my notes can't be right here, sex robots.
Oh, I like that.
You know me.
You know, there's nothing wrong with talking about, you know, I told you about my whole West, not West Wing, West World, West World, right?
That's the show?
Yeah.
I want to go there.
You wanna go hang out in Westworld?
I got news for you.
I don't know how far along you are in that show.
It doesn't work out well.
Yeah, I mean, no, I haven't gotten to that part yet.
Okay, well, let's not spoil anything for Nick.
But going ahead and jumping into the news, our first story today, we have to go to Brazil, one of the world's largest democracies.
I had talked about it on last week's Weekender episode.
If you want to listen to that, go over to patreon.com slash muckrake podcast, gain full access to that.
What are you waiting for?
Come on.
And I had talked about the conditions that were in place for a possible violent coup in which President of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, was looking at a defeat in the election.
Of course, his rival, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, or Lula as we'll refer to him from here on out, and we'll get into the ins and outs of that race.
But a little bit of an update.
It turns out that Lula did lead Bolsonaro after the election this past weekend.
He ended up with 48% of the vote.
Unfortunately, Bolsonaro ended up with 43% of the vote.
Nobody broke the 50% threshold, which means that we are now primed for a runoff election on October 30th, which is kind of a mess, Nick, for a variety of reasons.
It means that a really, really volatile situation in Brazil is now going to escalate, because we're heading into this runoff.
It also means that Bolsonaro has more support than what a lot of us hope that maybe he had or didn't have.
He has also been prepped by such people as Steve Bannon and the people around Donald Trump in order to carry out anti-democratic actions, and there's still the specter of a coup.
Nick, bad stuff all around.
Lots to unpack.
You know, I'm surprised that you... We have a good friend of The Breakdown, Mike Wendell, is involved in the Dannon thing as well.
Was that on purpose that you wanted to leave him out and make him feel bad, or just, you know... Well, Mike Wendell is just sort of wandering from one room to another, squeezing his pillow and giving people money.
Yes.
I mean, he's sort of like a walking ATM to these people, so of course he...
Well, you know, I tried to, it's funny, you know, the, the, interestingly enough, the, the polls had indicated that it wouldn't be as close, even though 5% is kind of a, you know, a nice solid lead for Lula.
But like, you know, that gives rise to Bolsonaro to sort of accuse, like, the polls are always wrong.
Everyone's lying about this.
You see, I'm a victim here.
And he's certainly been priming the country to either say that only God is going to remove him or death, and I'm not willing to die for this.
So you have to be very concerned because it sounds a little familiar, doesn't it?
It does.
It does.
And real fast, let's go ahead and let's...
Let's listen to a quick clip.
Let's hear Steve Bannon.
And for context, for those who don't know, this is at one of Mike Lindell's, one of his cyber breakdown conferences a while back.
You lose track.
He does these things all the time.
Basically, people go and get free food.
He gives them a bunch of money.
But it's Bannon sitting next to Mike Lindell.
But who's hanging out with them?
It's Jair Bolsonaro's son, who happens to also be a politician and a bit player in all of this.
Let's give this a listen.
Well, you see, it's just not in the United States, right, Steve?
Well, next October, remember, 30 days, about 30 days before this monumental midterm election.
He's going to face, his father Yair Bolsonaro is going to face the most dangerous leftist in the world, Lula.
A criminal, a communist, and supported by all the media here in the United States, all the left-wing media.
This election is the second most important election in the world, right?
And the most important elections ever in South America.
Bolsonaro will win unless it's stolen by, guess what?
The machines.
The machines.
And again, here we are.
This is the Trumpian playbook, which says very, very succinctly, if he loses, if Bolsonaro loses, then there's nothing else to believe besides the fact that this has been stolen by the machines.
And I have to say, this is one of those weird, mind-bending things, Nick.
Bolsonaro outperformed all of the polls.
All of the polls.
Like, this is actually a victory by Bolsonaro.
But they have to take that victory and spin it into a giant conspiracy.
And they want both things at once, which is, look how much better I did than the polls, but also, I should have more support than this.
It was stolen from me.
It is mind-breakingly stupid.
Well, we have to now look at what the other, what was remaining of the percentage who now drop out of the race and now becomes a two-person race.
I mean, what are your feelings about what the rest of those votes go towards and if Lula is going to be able to just kind of hang on to this lead?
Well, so it looks like in a world that makes sense that Lula is going to walk away with this thing.
It looks like he'll probably end up getting, if I had to put a number on it, and God knows that these numbers don't always mean anything anymore, if I had to put a number on it, I would say that Lula walks out.
If everything stays the way it is, you put it in a vacuum sealed jar and just sort of move it on to October 30th, I'd say Lula ends up with 53-54%.
But there's a couple things that are happening here.
Bolsonaro is going to gain momentum from this, right?
The fact that he outperformed this, he's sending it to a runoff.
Second of all, the lead up to this election, there have been people murdered over the lead up to this election.
People are getting shot.
People are getting stabbed.
There are fights in the streets.
There are all kinds of these aggressive moments in which Bolsonaro supporters are going after Worker Party, Lula's people, and hurting them.
To go ahead and use that conspiracy theory that we're documenting here Basically, they are going to believe that they're going out to defend themselves.
And that means possibly more violence.
That means maybe intimidation at the polls.
So right now, I mean, this thing, it's an etch-a-sketch that's going to get shook up.
And the question also, and this is something, and here's a quick quiz for the Muckrake listeners out there.
Why did Lula underperform?
Yes, there are reasons why people like Bolsonaro.
There's cultural stuff.
There's appeals there.
Nick, this communist leftist, right, do you think that he campaigned as a leftist or do you think he campaigned as a centrist, Nick?
I'll go with centrist for $300, Bob.
Yep, he most definitely did campaign as a centrist because he has sort of brought along a coalition of people.
He, and tell me if this sounds familiar to American politics, he didn't have much of a plan for what's going to happen in the future.
Maybe some light taxing of the wealthy, but that's about it.
There's no real massive change, right?
It's the same sort of conditions that we see here in America.
So what's he going to do now?
Do you go ahead and play conservatively, which we know oftentimes will go ahead and screw you in the long run?
Or do you, like, let your flag fly and you talk about, like, plans and things to move the country forward?
There's no telling what's going to happen at this point, but the one thing that's for sure is there's probably going to be some violence and some radicalization that spills out of this.
For sure.
Well, you know, we couldn't ignore the biggest criticism of Lula's campaign was this guilty verdict that he was found guilty of in terms of money laundering.
And I did do a somewhat, you know, I didn't do like a 20-foot dive into this, but I probably got about, you know, 10 feet into it to kind of pull apart to find out is this the kind of thing that Bolsonaro does pull as a political, you know, hit job to get rid of an opponent, which It's certainly reasonable in that climate that he's been running.
And I gotta tell you, it didn't necessarily feel completely like that.
It seemed like there was a lot of widespread corruption and he had a little part of that, you know, helping one of his townhomes or his vacation homes be remodeled with a million dollars or so of money.
So I wonder if how, you know, that's obviously going to continue to be a big thing.
And then the other part of the coin is, you know, Bolsonaro, is he able to continue getting evangelicals out to the polls, which also sounds very, must be familiar to our American ears, because he tapped into a group that, you know, hadn't always participated like this in the political system down there.
Yeah, and to go ahead and throw this out there, Lula probably, you know, engaged in some corruptive activities.
I mean, these things happen.
They absolutely do.
I don't think it rose to the level.
I think he was thrown in jail for a significant amount of time and eventually the charges were cleared.
But also you take a look at Bolsonaro, one of the most corrupt people in world politics right now.
He's basically handed over Brazil to these corporations and the wealthy.
He's just happened to do it in such a way that has Insulated him for me sort of legal ramifications.
Tell me again if that sounds familiar and here's the thing Nick to go ahead and make this To make this relevant to our listeners.
Why should you care about this this?
Election takes place again, October 30th October 30th, just a few days away from the midterms in the United States of America.
Brazil, not just in sort of the playbook that Bolsonaro has borrowed from Bannon and these Trumpites, but also in the way that this thing has played itself out.
We're going to get a really interesting little case study from Brazil in all of this to see where sort of the temper is and where momentum is sort of happening.
And I got to tell you, all of this, all of these sort of conditions that are in place, I think it's going to be really interesting.
Well, you know, there's another kind of context we have to discuss here in that a lot of countries in that southern hemisphere have been moving to progressive and leftist governments.
And you might remember, as we're coming up on maybe prepping this, you know, pod about Reagan, Reagan had a curious case of priapism, we'll call it, for South America.
It was very strange.
And the Contras down South, in a way that was oversensitive, in a way that we're looking at these conservative people that control elements of the world, who would look at this and say, this has to be our stand.
We can't let...
The Reagan Doctrine really enjoyed taking a look at these far-flung places and did not really care who they gave money and or weapons to.
Correct, exactly.
So it's really, that's interesting and concerning because, I mean, what happens now if it's 48-43 in this one, we cut to October 30th, and what if Bolsonaro actually wins?
That certainly would sound, you know, that would be really interesting.
Well, and here's the thing that you just brought up, which is important to put all of this into context, which is, again, not something you're going to read about in the New York Times, not something you're going to read about in the Washington Post.
Everything that happens downstream from the United States of America, the United States of America has an eye on it.
Let's just say that, right?
Because there's a lot of different moving parts.
We're talking about resources.
We're talking about, you know, sort of economic conditions and political conditions.
And America, part of the reason that they are the major superpower, so to speak, is because they're able to put their thumb on the scale in a lot of things.
So in all of this, here's a question.
Who does the U.S.
and who does the major sort of economic infrastructure, who do they want in this?
Right?
Like, is Lula a leftist who's going to rearrange things?
And Brazil's very large.
And you're exactly right.
Like, in the global south, we're starting to see a lot of people who are saying, we're done with this.
We're going to move towards the left and try something else.
Like, who do they prefer?
And I'm not sitting here saying an election is going to be fixed, although many of them have been.
And I'm not saying somebody's gonna get wiped out.
And many people have been.
But also, if this thing gets pushed, and you're exactly right, Bolsonaro could win this outright.
Or Bolsonaro could go ahead and pull the trigger on a coup.
He has the support of the military, law enforcement, and a lot of these machines of power and force.
So what ends up happening there?
And is that something that the United States is just like, man, we really wish that wouldn't have happened?
Insane.
Right?
Or is it something that's like, no, we're not going to allow this to happen?
There's so many balls up in the air right now.
And bringing up the Reagan thing is absolutely important because this is a question.
How is this going to play out, not just on its own organically, but how's it going to play out in the power structure?
And obviously the biggest thing we haven't even talked about yet is the biggest issue, which is the Amazon and what they're going to allow.
You know, we have Lula who wants to put limits on how much they're going to be able to chop down and develop.
Bolsonaro doesn't give a shit at all and seems willing to torch the whole place down, I guess, is what he'd be willing to do.
I think everyone at his campaign rallies was him setting fire to like another square mile of Amazon rainforest and just being like, I did this because I did it.
Yeah, and indigenous people are just being kicked out because they have no rights at all.
And again, it's a small enough part of the country where they don't have a large enough voice.
But obviously, we recognize how important the Amazon is and how much it does to help with carbon dioxide.
It seems like that has made some inroads.
Plus, when Lula was in power, he did a lot to raise a lot of people out of poverty.
That said, so did Bolsonaro.
He was able to do that in a more manipulative way, it sounded like, basically by handing out money to sort of just, for a very brief moment, get rid of some of the poverty.
But it does feel like Lula, at the very least, you know, I'm not necessarily sold that he's some radical leftist coming out of the war work, but he certainly He certainly is on the right side of the Amazon part, and I would imagine sort of the economic part as well, in terms of making sure that the lower middle classes get more benefits than they are now.
So that makes him, I guess, enticing enough that we all should be hoping that that's the guy that gets into power.
Yeah, and then the question is, are, because listen, Bolsonaro has been absolutely disastrous, not just with the Amazon, but with COVID and with cultural democratic trends.
I mean, just absolutely awful.
It's incredible that people showed up to support him the way that they did.
And by the way, speaking of messes, Nick, We're recording this on Monday, October 3rd.
Supreme Court's back in session, baby!
Do you have the fever?
Do you got Supreme Court fever?
Yes, I do.
I can't wait to find out what they're going to radically change now.
You know what, Nick?
I think the overturning of Roe v. Wade was just a blip on a radar.
I think they're going to come in.
I think they're going to surprise some people.
I think it's going to be incredible.
To go ahead and set the picture here.
The Supreme Court has come back into session this Monday, today, as we're recording this.
Right now, it has the lowest approval rating in the history of the modern Supreme Court.
We're talking about 47%.
about 47%, Nick.
47% support.
As it's coming into session, John Roberts, Chief Justice, is basically going anywhere and everywhere.
He showed up at my house to tell me that the Supreme Court was still legitimate.
Feel free to criticize it, but don't say that we're not a legitimate court, my God.
You've got Ketanji Brown-Jackson, who is coming in basically to vote against the court's decisions and maybe write a couple of disagreements.
Who knows?
We're looking at a hell of a docket, Nick.
We're looking at affirmative action.
We're looking at the ability for businesses to discriminate based on religion and, well, some other things, I have to assume.
We're looking at voting rights, and we're also looking at something very, very large, and it has possible repercussions that we're going to have to talk about in a second, which is independent state legislature theory.
This could be a really, really destructive, momentous session of the Supreme Court.
Well, yeah.
And let's not forget why McConnell might not have cared as much that the Senate was not controlled by the Republicans or the Congress.
Doesn't give much of a shit.
Yeah, and one of the reasons is because he knew if he could control the Supreme Court like they do now, then they could overturn anything that was passed by a liberal process.
The thing about the legitimacy of the Supreme Court is interesting because, again, we talked about how How fragile democracy itself is, and it only exists in so much as people choose to believe that it exists.
And the Supreme Court section of that is probably as vital as any of the other branches as far as the country needs to believe that it is.
I mean, and maybe perhaps this is a question I have for you.
Maybe legitimate isn't the right word, right?
Isn't there a better word that we need to sort of use to figure out how we feel about this court?
Well, so legitimate.
It's funny you say that because rhetorically the reason that they use the word legitimate is because if the Supreme Court isn't legitimate, we don't have to listen to it.
It's actually built on the entire fantasy that we have to listen to the Supreme Court and we have to do whatever it says.
Again, the famous quote is, where's their army?
How are they going to enforce these decisions?
So there's a reason why legitimacy comes up, but you're exactly right.
That doesn't exactly cover it.
It kind of moves it into a realm of rhetoric that isn't all that important.
I mean, because we're really kind of talking about approval rating in a way, right?
Sort of what we're feeling about it, you know?
When's their midterm?
When do we get to vote on those guys?
Well, you have to wait a long time.
Like, never.
We have to wait on mortality to vote on there.
Right.
Like, how gray can your beard get, Jared?
Listen, it's going there.
I'll just say that.
If we have many more sessions like this, we're going to be looking at some, like, real Santa Claus situations.
Yeah.
And you know what?
Legitimacy is the word we'll have to use, but really this is about, like, how much more aligned do we want to get with, like, Christian Dogma, right?
I mean, is that the way, is that, am I describing that right, well enough?
You're 100% right.
And I want to, something you kind of touched on, and you were gone, so we didn't have a chance to talk.
But I was, I was watching, we've covered in recent weeks what was going on with like the GOP Senate and House campaigns, right?
And how like these fights between McConnell and Peter Thiel and a lot of these candidates were starting to sort of like come out in public.
And so I started like burning up the phone lines talking to sources who are around McConnell or familiar.
And one of the things I kept getting told was McConnell literally doesn't give a shit what happens in this election.
He is totally fine if the Republicans don't regain power in the Senate.
He's fine if they don't regain power in the House.
Chances are, I think smart money at this point is the idea on a divided government.
But really, when it comes down to it, and we're going to talk more about this in a few seconds when we talk about this independent state legislature theory.
Power has been so sapped away from the federal level that the House, the Senate, and the presidency at this point, it's a lot of standing around with your hands in your pockets, you know, waiting on the financial world to tell you what you can do.
Real power right now is with the states, but it's also with the Supreme Court, right?
Exactly.
And McConnell looks at this and He basically looks at a lot of these MAGA assholes who are on the ballot, he looks at a lot of the Freedom Caucus assholes who are on the ballot, and he looks at the Peter Thiel assholes, and like, those are all threats to his power.
And at this point, a logjam government, you're not going to get, you're not going to get like a mandate right now.
There's no way to get a mandate in national politics, right?
So at that point, you're just sort of like tossing a hot potato around and you're not really moving anywhere.
And the Supreme Court, I mean, that's his life's work.
He got it done.
He stole the Supreme Court and now they have this backstop that can't be overcome regardless of who gets elected or who doesn't get elected.
Right, that's what I was going to say.
His work is done.
He's at the end of his career.
He's not going to make it much longer than this term anyway.
So, yeah, why not collect any extra money he can on the side from whatever corruption he's probably involved with, as is all of these guys on both sides of the aisle, as we might just quickly insert the notion that Pelosi is not going to let a ban on stock trading go through, it sounds like, right?
I gotta say, the fact that these people can walk out in public after they say we don't want to put a ban on stock trading, it's incredible.
And it's not even like one of the major topics that anybody talks about.
It's disgusting.
What about, do you feel the same way as me when I say that I kind of just want to find Walter Schaub and just give him a nice big hug?
Have you seen, you know, he used to be in charge of ethics?
Oh, can you imagine?
Can you imagine being an ethicist in all this?
Here's something that we haven't talked about because, you know, when you're designing the show or laying it out, you're never sure exactly, like, what you can talk about and how to get it in.
Nick, I don't know if you know about this.
There are new tech firms and new investment firms that are dedicated specifically to following the trades of members of Congress so that they can go ahead and piggyback on those trades!
Like, that's a new thing!
Yes!
Yeah, why can't we get on the grift?
That's really, really good.
But here's the thing.
Aren't those, they report after the fact.
It's almost like it's not timely enough.
Or maybe it is, and they figure out how to get the information quickly.
Well, you still get the crumbs that are crumbling down.
But you're exactly right.
Congress at this point is where people are going in order to go ahead and make sure that their own benefits are being served.
Right?
Or, at the very least, to become a celebrity, right?
Marjorie Taylor Greene, Matt Gaetz, and all these people.
And meanwhile, the real butchery is being done with Supreme Court.
And you, again, look at this docket, Nick.
We're looking at the possibility of wiping out all affirmative action.
Like, I mean, if they got a wild hair, they could do it.
You know what I mean?
Like, if they went in, they're like, we're gonna go big on this, and why wouldn't they?
If you're looking at the idea that businesses can discriminate based on religious ideas, that's just a hop, skip, and a jump away from white and black lunch counters.
I mean, really, it truly is.
You take a look at voting rights, they've already taken a hatchet to them.
If you push further, that's when things start to break down.
This independent state legislature theory, if people don't know about it, this is the idea.
Once I describe this, go ahead and take this where it's going, everybody.
If you go ahead and go down this idea, and this, by the way, was formed in part by William Rehnquist in the decision of the 2000 presidential election.
If alarm bells aren't going off, I don't know what to tell you.
Like a legitimate coup that took place in the United States of America that nobody likes to talk about.
By the way, Nick, did you see that George W. Bush has like a master class on leadership now?
I did not.
How exciting.
That's right up his alley.
Maybe we should take that class.
I don't know, learn something.
Wait, should we edit this and say it really isn't up his alley?
Or did everyone figure that out?
I don't know if I did hit the tone properly or not.
The independent state legislature theory is the idea That state legislatures should control elections without any oversight from courts, from outside politicians, any of that.
And you bring it into the contested right-wing conspiracy theory idea that elections are being stolen and presidential elections are being stolen.
Nick, if that gets the stamp of approval from the Supreme Court, that is going to have Not just mass ramifications, Nick.
We're talking about, like, generational.
Well, I mean, aren't the ramifications the notion of they can ignore Supreme Court decisions completely and basically govern without a federal government in a way, right?
Because what would happen if they violate a federal law, a state, by doing something, well, the normal remedy is they get sued and the Supreme Court decides and then they're forced.
We've seen that happen in any number of cases where the Supreme Court's come down or removed laws, right, in that way.
In theory, this is, let me ask you this, when's the last time we were, as a country, kind of in separate states, independent of each other?
Does that sound familiar?
Did we ever have a situation like that before, where it really got to a boil?
Well, I mean, it started first with the Articles of Confederation, and that thing fell apart in a pretty tremendous way, and they had to create a new system of government.
And then all of a sudden, there's this time, Nick.
God, I want to say 19th century?
Something like that?
Something happened.
I don't know.
You know, when you say Confederates, Confederates, that jogged my memory.
That word just sort of like goes around.
But I gotta tell you, man, I don't know how you're feeling about it at this point, but watching this impotence of like the federal government and the fact that it's been so cut off from any ability to do something whatsoever, Like, right now, like, what happens?
And it would be South Carolina.
It's always South Carolina.
South Carolina is just wild.
Like, South Carolina would be the one that'd be like, toot-a-loo, everybody.
We're taking Charleston and doing our own thing.
I don't know if the federal government at this point could marshal a response.
You know what I mean?
Like, I really, like, the decline of American empire has gotten so bad that, like, it would likely be a thing where it'd be like, oh, thank God.
Right.
You know, it's like at a corporation or a business where you're hoping people leave so you can cut your payroll to an extent.
Well, here's the problem.
The normal, like, movie version would be, like, the state would ignore what the Supreme Court's ordering them to do as a federal level, and then you cut to, you know, the Chief Justice in his office, and when he hears about this, he starts banging his fist.
He's upset.
He's like, we gotta, you know.
But this is the Supreme Court themselves are saying to do this, right?
That is where we're at.
That is the problem.
The call is coming from the house!
Yes, the house that's on fire.
The call is literally coming from like a room on fire.
But it's not, it's literally a rolling back of federal power and the federal bureaucracy in order to move back to a time which, you know, they always talk about this mythical past.
It's before desegregation.
It's what it is.
It's like literally trying to get to a place where a white supremacist oligarchical situation can exist.
I mean this entire docket is about that.
They're picking these cases for a very specific purpose.
Well, let me really quickly.
So gay marriage, for instance, could easily be outlawed in several states without a problem.
Sure.
No one would complain at all.
And that would be where the Supreme Court would have to step in and say no.
Don't you?
It pisses me off every time I hear it.
It's about cakes.
And I love cakes.
Do not get me wrong.
the businesses with the religious stuff it's like the other guy that won't make a cake for a gay couples wedding right that's always the the one they use and that's what happened to once right but yeah that quickly gets you hate by the way that it's such a dumb example don't you i it pisses me off every time i hear it it's about cakes and i love cakes do not get me wrong but i hate that it's that dumb of an example right and I mean, listen, is it true that they went there probably because they knew they weren't going to make it?
That's a real possibility.
You know, because, like, you could just say, as a reasonable person, you know, there's another baker.
Just go to them.
Have your awesome wedding and, you know, have an awesome time.
But there's a principle to that.
And there's plenty of opportunities if you want to be that person, then great.
Like, we wouldn't have had Roe v. Wade without, gosh, I forgot what her real name is, but, you know, She was willing to become the face of a movement.
So we need that.
That's really important.
But at the very least, you're right.
There's no question that at some point in our history of our country, the Supreme Court did recognize the importance of these decisions and how they could be manipulated to no end.
This court doesn't seem to want to recognize that.
And that's sort of when you're asking about precedence.
You're really asking, like, do you feel like the Supreme Court needs to be the overseer of fairness, I guess is the word.
And they don't give a shit about that.
No, and I mean, they're returning to their original function, which was overseeing the system for the benefit of the wealthy.
That's it.
I mean, that's truly what we're talking about here.
And I want to talk about the real world consequences of this.
This is something I was actually interested to talk to you about.
And this is one of those cases where this comes across your radar and you see it and you like shake your head and you're like, what the hell?
But it's also like sort of a precursor for larger things.
At the University of Idaho, which I gotta tell you, I've never been to Idaho.
It's one of the few American states I haven't been to.
You ever been to Idaho?
I was just there.
You were just in Idaho?
I was just in the deserts of Idaho for three and a half days.
How was Idaho?
What's that?
How was Idaho?
Was Idaho nice?
I mean, where we were, it was like desert-ish, really.
You could be on the moon.
They have volcanoes in Idaho, Jared.
Volcanoes.
And as a result, you have volcanic tubes, or whatever they're called, and you go into these caves.
It's amazing, like Indiana Jones style.
And then they have farmland and cows, and it was really, really beautiful, I'll have to tell you.
Wow, that's amazing.
All right, well, in Idaho, it sounds beautiful, but it's going to hell.
So, at the University of Idaho, the faculty and staff and the people employed there, public employees, first of all, I'll go ahead and say that, as a public education advocate and veteran myself, I can say, I understand, like, you get these directives every now and then.
They got a message from the general counsel.
And this is after, of course, the overturning of Roe v. Wade.
And general counsels, by the way, if we have general counsels listening, I understand your job is hard.
You're trying to keep your employers out of legal trouble.
But listen, they are not going to mess around with, like, playing on the skirts of the law.
That's not who they are.
It's not what they do.
But they get directions from the general counsel at the University of Idaho after an abortion ban.
And here's a little bit from the executive summary that they are told.
During all times that university employees are performing their jobs, the law prohibits them from taking any action and from using or providing institution funds or facilities for any of the following.
And this is including promoting abortion, providing or performing an abortion, counseling in favor of abortion, referring for an abortion, dispensing drugs classified as emergency contraception, contracting with abortion providers, and advertising or promoting services for abortion.
Which, by the way, if you read between the lines, Nick, Basically says, don't talk about abortion.
Don't bring it up in class.
Don't talk about the legal battles having to do with it.
Side on the side of safety.
Just go ahead and actually do more than what the law tells you to do.
And it's important in all of this, and I want to hear your take on it.
It's important to point out that when authoritarianism rolls into societies, a large part of it is founded on people Who are afraid of the law and the consequences of running afoul of authorities.
And they not only do what the authorities tell them to do, they do more because they're terrified of it.
And so they actually end up pushing sort of the bleeding edge of this stuff even further, which by the way, real fast, they also said, we're not going to talk about contraception.
Right, and it's worth saying what the punishment is if you do violate these things.
I don't think you said it, but like you know misdemeanor or felony convictions.
I read it fast, but did you hear me say felony?
We're talking about not only being fired, we're talking about legal repercussions, and, and this is an important thing that they keep using, it's incredible, that you would be barred from ever working for the state again, which is a death sentence for a public employee.
Right.
Now you know obviously it's vague enough because you want to make it sound like okay it's reasonable just to stay away from it so you don't have to worry about any legal ramifications but um you know Planned Parenthood is obviously in this in the background here because like if I'm in a class and by accident I happen to just say that those two words in a row together like and then somebody reports me for saying that and it could be a different context like that's probably enough
If you think that there are people in nearly every college class that are ready to get a hold of Turning Point USA or whatever right-wing group that they happen to listen to and associate with, if you think that there aren't classrooms full of those people ready to turn these people in, you are dead wrong.
They are ready to go.
Let me ask you this.
You're a professor.
Might there be a class or two or three that would In the course of a normal, very normal curriculum, have to maybe bring up the word contraception or abortion?
Wouldn't that have to be, you know, if you're truly teaching a class on, I don't know, what subject would you say might need to have to say some of these words?
Well, I mean, first of all, biology.
I mean, let's go ahead and begin with actual scientific processes, which you have to imagine there are many meetings happening in biology departments, but also in feminist studies departments.
Right?
In women and gender studies.
In history classes.
All of these departments are having conversations which are, how do we deal with this?
And some of them, by the way, are going to say, this is a moment for civil disobedience.
People have trampled on my rights.
I have the right to say something.
And it's going to take one person getting fired and or censured for that to begin to roll back.
Because, ta-da!
Public education has been completely starved of resources and funds to the point where you can't mess around with that stuff.
And if you happen to be the outlier, and I've seen this happen, I've been in a department where this has happened, if you are the department that steps out of line and pisses off the administrators and gets the attention of people up the stream in the state, you're screwed.
You're screwed for a very long time and there are consequences.
They won't say it's because of that, but it's very obvious that it's because of that.
But this is going to affect the way people teach, and it's going to affect the university and the environment that these students are going to be in.
What are the chances of a professor of like contemporary American social history, you know, covering the 60s?
And obviously you have to cover the contraception in that context.
What will the odds be like, okay, he gets his lawyer lined up.
Maybe it's a lawyer from the university.
They're going to cover everything for free.
We're going to make this a thing.
What are the odds or percentage that like he does, it drops it in the class and then nothing happens.
And they're just doing this to have a, to make it seem like they're being hard, but they're not actually going to prosecute this stuff.
Well, so there is a real possibility that that would occur.
Because, I mean, listen, the whole point is that when you have these moments of oppression, reactionary oppression, right, these crackdowns, people are hoping, and I'm talking about Republicans, I'm talking about state legislatures, I'm talking about all of the people who were making these things occur.
They are hoping like hell that nobody pushes back.
You know what I mean?
They hope that just the specter of punishment will take care of it.
Because, quite frankly, you don't want this to become a big, giant, national problem, right?
And you don't want it to become, all of a sudden, your ass' grass, because Tucker Carlson's talking about it, Rachel Maddow's talking about it, right?
Everybody in the world is talking about it, and you're the person responsible for it.
So they are hoping like hell that nobody stands up against this thing.
I gotta tell you, like, if you are, if you're listening to this and you are a public employee at the University of Idaho, all I can tell you is sometimes it feels good to take a stand.
I'm not gonna sit here and tell someone to commit a crime, you know, because now we're playing around with the rules.
I'll just say, you know, it feels good every now and then to take a stand.
That's it.
Take a walk, see what happens.
That reaction in your brain that you might get that chemical, like, and by the way, we've had Nick Carmody on the show to talk about that on the other side, because you have to remember, taking a stand for a moral imperative like that, which seems right, is exactly what the insurrectionists were doing on January 6th, in their minds.
Right?
That's what becomes disarming about the entire situation we're in right now, is that these are people who feel like Bobbitt is a martyr, you know, and she was doing what was right and she's standing up for her country.
And that is what becomes so untenable about this entire discourse we're trying to have and how we're supposed to approach people on different sides.
It's fascinating, you know.
And by the way, you know, you said they're hoping that nothing happens, no one actually does violate this.
You know, it's not like anyone is scrubbing, you know, all the abortion stances they have from their websites.
They're keeping them upright, Jared, and they're having them where everyone can verify all the Republican... Yeah, it's not like people are running away from it like black masters.
I mean, I, listen, this whole thing is going to, it's going to get so wild as this oppression gets worse.
It really is.
I mean, there's so many implications that I don't think a lot of these people have thought about and sort of downstream stuff.
And by the way, speaking of things that people haven't thought about very much, it's time to check in on our good friend Elon Musk.
Aren't you excited?
Yeah, only because we can finally make it clear what kind of piece of shit this guy is if no one hasn't figured it out by now.
I talked a little bit on The Weekender about the fact that at the Tesla AI Day, and Nick, I knew it.
He was talking left and right about unveiling his new Optimus Tesla bot, which was going to change humanity forever.
And meanwhile, he says, here it is.
It walks.
Have you seen it?
I saw some photos, yes.
What a piece of shit!
What a terrible embarrassment!
It looks like a toaster that they put on like a little walker.
And it comes out and it waves badly.
The people at the Boston lab with all of their robots, they have to be watching this, like just having a great time.
And then, as it's getting ready to walk off, let's hear old good Elon react to this thing.
So the robot can actually do a lot more than we just showed you.
We just didn't want it to fall on its face.
So we'll show you some videos now of the robot doing a bunch of other things, which are less risky.
That's right, Nick.
I promise you, it does a lot of other things when the camera's not on.
It's not this giant piece of shit that's disappointing.
Backstage, it's doing somersaults, man.
And I know it looks like it's unsteady and unfinished or whatever.
It's terrible.
It's absolutely terrible.
And he's doing such a good job of showing that wealth is not an indicator of talent.
I'm kind of thankful for that because I've seen the other ones that are better.
They're on four legs.
They look kind of like dogs.
That's nightmare fuel, man.
They are nightmarish, and they're going to make sure that you and I are not going to be out protesting.
I'll tell you that damn much.
Right, exactly.
So at least Musk is not going to lead, you know, to... Oh gosh, it was going to be really funny when I told you the name of the company in Terminator, and now I completely forgot what it is.
You're talking about Skynet.
Skynet, thank you.
We're not worried about him inventing Skynet.
He's not going to invent Skynet.
Someone will though, right?
That is going to happen.
Oh no, no, absolutely.
Somebody probably already has invented Skynet and they're teaching it some sort of language that will lead to our destruction.
Yeah, Terminator will become a documentary.
It will.
And I just, man...
I'm sorry, but this robot's so embarrassing.
It's so sad.
And meanwhile, if you watch the extended presentations, like, all of these, like, pencil-necked geeks who just love Elon Musk, who we'll get to in just a second, are falling over each other to get camera footage of him.
And all of this is built up to have one YouTube video after another that's like, my life has forever changed.
And it's incredible the way that this has happened.
And meanwhile, I want people to real fast, I want people to hear Elon talk about what he expects from this thing very quickly.
Just I mean, I think if you say like, extrapolate to, you know, many years in the future, it's like, I think work will become optional.
So, like, there's a lot of jobs that if people weren't paid to do it, they wouldn't do it.
Like, it's not, it's not fun, you know, necessarily.
Like, if you're washing dishes all day, it's like, you know, even if you really like washing dishes, you really want to do it for eight hours a day, every day.
Probably not.
That's right, Nick.
He is promoting a robot that will go ahead and not just replace arduous labor, but, like, make things like washing the dishes something that we don't have to do anymore.
That's right, people at home.
He invented a dishwashing machine.
Congratulations, my man.
Congratulations.
I wish I had something pithy to offer, but it's that sad.
I'm sorry, Jared.
I've let you down.
The amount of money that he makes simply because people want something to believe in and he does it.
And I have to say, Nick, and this will be the last thing we talk about because we have to.
Immediately, as he's talking about this terrible robot that just, it's, you know, you had pointed out this robot that's in, like, grocery stores with, like, googly eyes and it's running around.
I had said on my bourbon talk, like, I got sushi the other day and it was delivered by a quote-unquote robot, which I don't know why.
You know, it's so absurd.
Those robots look light years better than this dumbass robot.
But he makes a side comment.
He says, oh, we're obviously going to make We're going to make feminine robots, and we're going to make cat girls, which is an internet meme or whatever.
And what does everybody do, and it reveals the game, Nick?
Sex robots!
He's going to make sex robots, and everybody's going to get sex robots, and all of these incel idiots are going to get sex robots, and it's going to change the world.
I've got to ask you, because this is actually something I want to talk to you about.
I kind of feel like if a sex robot has ever built, society's done.
I completely agree.
And that might actually be the thing that they break through with.
Like they can't really do anything that they can take.
at this point if he could come up with a sex robot that's real like where it works i completely agree that and that might actually be the thing that they break through with like they can't really do anything that they can take and he keeps claiming and this is important nick he keeps claiming this is going to end labor and usher in peace you know and in poverty which is horseshit they'll use it if it ever works they'll use it to put people out of work and pay them less that's what always happens with these things but this idea of a sex robot it's it's just i
i'm sorry but if that happened just go ahead and close up shop say it's been fun the the human race had its had its time That's it.
That's the end of life as we know it.
Well, I would hope that the sex robots could be like, could whisper, you know, to advocate for women's rights, like while everything, while it's working, like, you know, quietly and that, whatever, something like that.
That's the whole point!
All these assholes are revealing that what do they want?
They want women for their sexual resources, but they don't want women as human beings!
That's the whole game in all of this!
That's everything from getting rid of abortion and contraception, to getting rid of feminist rights, to getting rid of equality in any shape or form it takes.
It's reducing them to sex robots!
That's what it is!
I mean, you know, you saw Ex Machina, right?
That's a really good movie, actually.
Yeah, and I think that's what you were hoping, or maybe you were expecting, it sounds like, as far as standards.
And by the way, by 2022, we certainly should get better than what he developed.
I mean, we already seem better than what he developed, but at some point, yes, they're going to have these robots that, like, you know, the whole premise is, like, can you tell a human from a robot, basically, right?
If you can do it well enough.
But I think that the underlying What you just described is sort of the underlying theme of that movie as well, without even being explicit about it.
Yeah, it is, and that's sort of... There has been this push for men, and it's more exacerbated now.
Like, incel culture is a response to the rise of feminism, but also...
The changing economics and socioeconomic sort of situation in the United States.
It's a bunch of white men who believe that they should have more, that they've been screwed over, that there's a conspiracy against them, and as a result, you know, they're going out and shooting people and advocating for fascist revolution.
I mean, that's literally what's been happening.
It's a bunch of aggrieved white men who feel like they've lost their place atop the hierarchy and things are falling apart.
This stuff, and by the way, we haven't even addressed this yet, Like, just a little bit ago, Elon Musk is, like, trying to give Russia parts of Ukraine.
Like, he's just getting online.
One of the richest men in the world, if not the richest man in the world, is going online advocating for Putin, basically, to have his way in Ukraine.
Like, all of this is about reinstituting that old order.
And this, you know, and I still think about this, Nick.
That time that we podcasted, and you had predicted that Elon Musk was like moving rightward in order to protect his ass, his accusations were coming out.
They are trying to create a new consensus reality and system in which men are able to do what they used to do.
And there are no consequences to it.
And that women are reduced to secondary citizens who are basically, for no other way to put it, like I agree.
And you're always so forward-thinking, but how are you going to characterize people as pencil-necked geeks?
I'm taking offense.
Again, rolling back the progress of the 20th century.
I agree.
And you're always so forward-thinking.
But how are you going to characterize people as pencil-necked geeks?
I'm taking offense.
How could you?
We can't.
Are we allowed to even use that term?
That's an old wrestling term.
Okay.
But, you know, call me crazy, but, you know, people might put you in a category of some sort of nerdy, you know, category.
So, come on.
How dare you!
Hey, listen.
Okay, I'll take it.
Call me a nerd.
I'll completely take it.
You know.
I've always liked the iteration.
It's an old wrestling term.
I've always liked the sound of it.
But, yeah, I'm absolutely a nerd.
That's true.
Right.
Because, listen, I like, you know, those people are always very interesting to talk to.
Well, when they're not advocating for sex robots and sex slavery.
I mean, that is true.
Do you remember, real fast before I bring this plate in for Atlantic, do you remember Ross Dupat talking about, like, redistribution of sexual resources?
Oh, yeah.
After that incel shooting, and he's like, we really need to talk about sexual resource redistribution.
Yeah, he must have been watching Dr. Strangelove just before that or something, right?
I know!
I, and I said this, I said this last night when I was doing my live stream.
Things are about to get weird, Nick.
Like, they're weird right now.
Yeah.
Things are about to get real weird.
Yeah.
You mean like when we're merging technology and Incel, that thing, right?
That weird we're talking about?
Lord.
I mean, you know, everything that we've been talking about today is just about like the sort of approaching strangeness and the ways that this stuff is going to affect our lives in ways that I don't know.
I don't think we really expected or are really prepared for.
But yeah, I think stuff like this is... Whether he makes this robot or whether somebody else makes it.
Because he's not good at making things.
I'm sorry about your car.
I don't mean to insult your car.
Yeah, but he didn't do anything with that.
He just bought the company.
Right?
That's the thing people don't understand.
Musk isn't like a... He might have had some sort of weird engineering education or something in the background of him, but he doesn't... It's not his thing.
He doesn't create things or come up with solutions in code or whatever.
He just buys this shit like a little kid who's got some money and buys toys.
He's just a dude who was born into an exorbitantly rich family and he happened to play a role in developing one of the defining characteristics of the internet infrastructure.
That's it!
And all these people think that the amount of money that they have makes them gods.
And you look at him every single day.
He is doing us an incredible service by showing that he isn't a particularly bright or talented individual.
He's just really good at tapping into that zeitgeist.
He's really good at telling this particular group and population what they want to hear.
That's it.
That's it.
Bingo.
That's it.
That's it.
All right, everybody.
Listen, we could talk about sex robots for hours on this show, but it is certainly good to have Nick Halisman back, and it's great to have you all listening.
We're going to come back on Friday with our usual weekender show.
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