Part Of The Problem - Dave Smith - Obviously, It Was America
Aired: 2023-02-11
Duration: 57:46


=== Operation Away Pipeline (08:50) ===

[00:00:00]  Fill her up.
[00:00:02]  You are listening to the Gas Digital Network.
[00:00:09]  We need to roll back the state.
[00:00:10]  We spy on all of our own citizens.
[00:00:12]  Our prisons are flooded with nonviolent drug offenders.
[00:00:16]  If you want to know who America's next enemy is, look at who we're funding right now.
[00:00:22]  Every single one of these problems are a result of government being way too big.
[00:00:34]  What's up, everybody?
[00:00:35]  What's up?
[00:00:35]  Welcome to a brand new episode of Part of the Problem.
[00:00:38]  I'm Dave Smith.
[00:00:39]  He is Rob Bernstein, the fire, king of the caulks.
[00:00:42]  And we are almost on our way out to Dallas, Fort Worth to do some stand-up comedy this weekend.
[00:00:49]  If you're listening to this too late, next weekend we'll be out in Detroit coming all over the place to you.
[00:00:55]  How are you, Rob?
[00:00:56]  I'm doing well and excited for a weekend of some comedy.
[00:00:59]  Hell yeah, me too.
[00:01:01]  So before we start our comedy weekend, let's talk about what's going on in the world.
[00:01:07]  Major, major story written the other day by Seymour Hirsch, who is, of course, if people don't know, he's like, I don't know.
[00:01:19]  He's a true OG journalist who's been around forever.
[00:01:27]  He became famous during the early 70s, exposing stuff that was going on in Vietnam.
[00:01:34]  The Mei Lee massacre, I believe was his big thing that he revealed.
[00:01:40]  And he's just a very, a really great journalist, like one of the few kind of old school, genuinely great journalists.
[00:01:48]  Anyway, he wrote a piece just the other day about the Nordstream pipeline.
[00:01:56]  Really, probably the most damning piece that's been written so far, really just claiming with certainty that this was a U.S. operation.
[00:02:10]  This is a big deal.
[00:02:12]  For people who don't remember, by the way, just to catch everybody up to speed, Nordstream was a pipeline that was built between Russia and Germany, a natural gas pipeline.
[00:02:21]  They'll built two of them.
[00:02:23]  And of course, a few months ago now, they were blown up.
[00:02:28]  And it was determined pretty early on that they were blown up in like a real sophisticated way.
[00:02:33]  These were like underwater explosives that were very precise.
[00:02:38]  And everyone knew it kind of this was some, this was the work of, you know, this wasn't like a rogue actor sneaking some explosives into, you know, some submarines and shit.
[00:02:48]  Like this was clearly was a military operation.
[00:02:53]  We told you right away that it was pretty obvious who the suspects here were.
[00:02:58]  And they were basically all the U.S. Like it could have been the UK or something like that, but it's basically it was coming from the West.
[00:03:07]  The official line, the official narrative was that it was Putin who did it.
[00:03:16]  But of course, that made no sense from the very beginning.
[00:03:20]  Isn't it odd how effective state lying is that the United States government clearly either blew this thing up or at least empowered somebody else to do so and then just gets to go, nope, they blew their own thing that they needed up that was making them money and gives us all the leverage.
[00:03:35]  They did it and just disappeared from the storylines.
[00:03:38]  Yeah.
[00:03:39]  Yeah.
[00:03:39]  No, it is pretty incredible.
[00:03:41]  It really reminded me.
[00:03:42]  I mean, I remember saying this at the time, that it just, it reminded me of the claims of Assad gassing his own people and how it's just on the face of it.
[00:03:50]  I remember being on, I was on SE Cup show back then when she was at CNN still.
[00:03:55]  And I remember being on the next day.
[00:03:59]  And it's kind of tough the next day because, like, right now, I'd have a lot more ammo.
[00:04:02]  I'd be like, oh, look, there's all these whistleblowers from the OPCW who's confirmed that it wasn't, you know what I mean?
[00:04:07]  Like, blah, blah, blah.
[00:04:08]  It doesn't look like it was, you know, a chemical attack coming from Assad's side, blah, blah, blah.
[00:04:13]  At that time, you have nothing except the fact that I know this is bullshit.
[00:04:17]  Like, I'm just like, I know this is bullshit.
[00:04:19]  And I remember arguing this with her and being like, look, this just, it just makes no sense.
[00:04:26]  And you're all, and they're all taking it as gospel right away.
[00:04:29]  Assad gassed his own people.
[00:04:31]  It's not even like there's no allegedly in that story when they read it.
[00:04:35]  It's just like, this is a fact that we know.
[00:04:37]  And I'm like, well, just think about this with me, Essie.
[00:04:40]  Two weeks ago, Donald Trump stated that we're leaving Syria.
[00:04:47]  He goes, we're leaving.
[00:04:49]  ISIS has been defeated.
[00:04:50]  He basically said the regime change is over.
[00:04:52]  We're not attempting it anymore.
[00:04:54]  Assad's been fighting this bloody fight for his life to not end up like Gaddafi, right?
[00:05:00]  And then two weeks ago, Trump says, that's it.
[00:05:03]  We're leaving.
[00:05:03]  He gets to survive and keep ruling the country.
[00:05:06]  And then he's going to do the one thing that would keep American forces and put his own life in danger.
[00:05:13]  The one thing for what strategic value?
[00:05:15]  Like 500,000 people have already died in this civil war.
[00:05:18]  I'm going to kill 150 more of them, but by gas.
[00:05:22]  Like, why?
[00:05:23]  This just, no, I'm not saying that makes it impossible.
[00:05:26]  I mean, okay, maybe someone, he could have just made the biggest strategic military blunder in history or something like that.
[00:05:32]  But it at least starts you with the perspective of like, wait, I'm not buying this.
[00:05:40]  I'm going to need to see some evidence.
[00:05:42]  It was a kind of similar thing with the idea that Putin blew up his own pipeline.
[00:05:48]  Like, why would he do that?
[00:05:51]  It's just now, so he just essentially would have destroyed his own leverage.
[00:05:56]  You know, like if he wants to turn the pipes off, he can turn them off.
[00:06:00]  He doesn't have to deliver natural gas to Germany just because there's a pipeline there.
[00:06:05]  It just gives him the option to do it if he wants to.
[00:06:07]  And of course, that's tremendous leverage that he has over Germany and Western Europe in general.
[00:06:13]  Right?
[00:06:13]  Look, we can get you really cheap energy if you want it.
[00:06:17]  Okay.
[00:06:18]  Why would he take that?
[00:06:19]  It just makes no sense.
[00:06:20]  But then, of course, from the perspective of why would the Americans want to do it?
[00:06:24]  Well, it's obvious what their motive is.
[00:06:27]  So they have a very clear, you know, the American side clearly has means motive and opportunity.
[00:06:37]  You cannot find a motive for the Germans or for the Russians.
[00:06:42]  And so it just seems like the people who have the capability to pull off this strike, it gets very limited down very quickly.
[00:06:51]  And so this seems like the most obvious answer.
[00:06:54]  But this, what Seymour Hirsch writes is quite a bit different.
[00:06:58]  And so the name of his piece is How America Took Out the Nord Stream Pipelines.
[00:07:06]  The subtitle is The New York Times called It a Mystery, but the United States executes a covert COP, executed a covert sea operation that was kept secret until now.
[00:07:16]  I highly recommend people read it.
[00:07:18]  He's got sources who basically are blowing the whistle on this.
[00:07:22]  Now, these are anonymous sources.
[00:07:24]  So, you know, like always, you don't, you never know these things.
[00:07:28]  You know, you don't know exactly who we're talking about.
[00:07:30]  Seymour Hirsch has about as long a track record as being like the real deal.
[00:07:36]  And I don't think he's just making this shit up.
[00:07:39]  I think if he has sources like this, he's telling the truth.
[00:07:41]  This seems to me to be the truth that this was an operation that they ran.
[00:07:47]  And yeah, I don't know.
[00:07:48]  You read the piece.
[00:07:49]  Any thoughts that you want to share?
[00:07:52]  Well, that's a I guess you got to take his word for with the whistleblowers because it seemed to me obvious that we had some sort of involvement, but when you have this level of specificity, and I don't know this guy, I've never read any of his other stuff.
[00:08:07]  I'm always a little bit skeptical of like, how do you have this down to the Hollywood storyline?
[00:08:12]  But it all, I mean, it all sounds reasonable.
[00:08:15]  It all kind of checks out.
[00:08:18]  Well, if you look, you should always, I think, approach stories with anonymous sources with a little bit of skepticism.
[00:08:25]  But like you said, this is a guy who I think has a long, trustworthy career.
[00:08:30]  And this does all seem to make a lot of sense.
[00:08:34]  We don't know these things for 100% certain.
[00:08:38]  Go ahead.
[00:08:39]  Okay, this is kind of an obvious, more minutiae observation, but you read about like these, I guess, your super soldiers, the guys who are like in your most elite ranks of the SEALs or like your absolute best divers.

=== NATO Member Status (13:08) ===

[00:08:51]  And so probably once in their career, they get their call that they're coming down to Washington.
[00:08:55]  And so from their heads, like they're, you know, you put on your suit, you're as intense as possible.
[00:09:01]  You get your briefing and you're like, this is your big moment to serve your country.
[00:09:04]  And so you're in like the depths of DC, CIA's talking to you.
[00:09:08]  You know what I mean?
[00:09:08]  You're like, yes, sir, we got this.
[00:09:10]  We got this mission.
[00:09:11]  And then it's the world's biggest idiots that are handing you your marching orders.
[00:09:15]  It's Blinken and it's whoever else who are basically just working for, I guess, oil companies in America.
[00:09:22]  It's some sort of weird mercantilism here where.
[00:09:26]  Well, there's a couple different schools of thought on this.
[00:09:30]  And there is basically there's, I know, like George Friedman, who I believe it was George Friedman.
[00:09:37]  He's the guy who founded Stratford.
[00:09:39]  His thing was basically, his argument was that it's not really just mercantilism.
[00:09:43]  I mean, I guess it still could be mercantilism by like, you know, with another degree of separation or something.
[00:09:51]  But they say that the big thing is that the big fear of the like kind of American empire, he wouldn't use that term, but I would.
[00:09:58]  But like the big fear of the U.S., you know, government interests is that is Germany and Russia uniting.
[00:10:10]  And that basically if you had like the innovation of Germany and the manpower of Russia, if they were like to like unite, they could actually pose a threat to our people are going to trade more.
[00:10:25]  Like if you just take that one step further, it becomes mercantile because it's like that we can't compete with them.
[00:10:31]  That's why I said it's separated by one more degree.
[00:10:35]  But it does seem like, yeah, look, the fear is like over them being a threat to our global dominance, right?
[00:10:41]  So like, and then yes, which has an idea that there needs to be global dominance.
[00:10:45]  Right.
[00:10:46]  And all, and, right.
[00:10:47]  And then now, of course, people like us, you know, libertarians and I don't know, just sane human beings, we look at it and we would say more like, hey, you know, when Germany and Russia went to war in the 20th century, twice, it was the worst thing in the history of the world.
[00:11:07]  Like literally the worst that the death numbers between, I forget the exact numbers, but in World War II, it's something like 30 million people died just in the war between Germany and Russia.
[00:11:17]  It's like the worst thing ever.
[00:11:19]  And so, holy shit, if they're like becoming close trading partners and now Germany is relying on them for cheap, for cheap natural gas and Russia's relying on them as a customer, oh, it makes it very unlikely that they'd ever fight a war against each other again.
[00:11:33]  That's amazing.
[00:11:34]  But of course, you know, the American, and this is the mercantilism or just the cronyism or whatever you want to call it.
[00:11:39]  But of course, the world empire goes, yeah, yeah, but then we can't make sure our people get rich off these deals and other people might get rich off them.
[00:11:48]  It's absolutely insane.
[00:11:51]  You know, one of the things that, again, I mean, this is like what we've been talking about the whole time.
[00:11:56]  And this is what I was talking about when I was on Rogan last time.
[00:11:58]  And I got some pushback from all the Ukrainian flag, you know, NPCs.
[00:12:05]  But look, if you just understand that this with the Nord Stream thing, and I think anyone being reasonable, looking at this, goes, okay, fine.
[00:12:15]  You don't have to take Seymour Hirsch at his word and go, this is 100% true.
[00:12:19]  And I trust him on his sources.
[00:12:20]  Okay, fine.
[00:12:21]  But you'd have to at least admit that this is a, at this point, a much more compelling case than Vladimir Putin blew up his own pipelines because we say so.
[00:12:38]  The strongest argument I ever heard for why Vladimir Putin blew it, which I can't remember who made this argument, but I think it was one of the cable news guys said, well, he's doing it because it's going to look like it's us.
[00:12:49]  So basically, he's framing us.
[00:12:51]  But like, that's the best argument they can come up with.
[00:12:53]  It's like, well, the reason he did it is because it so obviously looks like it's us.
[00:12:57]  Like, well, okay.
[00:12:58]  So even by your argument, it pretty obviously looks like it's us.
[00:13:02]  But if you accept this, which does seem to be like the overwhelming most likely thing that happened, doesn't it really change the narrative of like the official story here where it's like the official story is like, what?
[00:13:16]  Vladimir Putin's a madman, a psychopath, a war criminal.
[00:13:21]  He wants to take over all of Europe and he's a threat to, even though he can't manage to take over Ukraine and he's totally getting humiliated there, but we still need to send in hundreds of billions of dollars, you know, even though he's getting humiliated and all this.
[00:13:34]  But if you start to look at the reality of the situation, you see something much different.
[00:13:39]  And, you know, there's, as is always the case with when you're dealing with governments, there's no good guys.
[00:13:46]  It's really just a range of, it's a group of bad guys.
[00:13:50]  And then you have to kind of discern who's worse out of the group.
[00:13:54]  But who's America in all of this now?
[00:13:58]  Well, they're not exactly the people who are just like, well, we see democracy being threatened in Ukraine.
[00:14:03]  And so we must send them weapons to preserve democracy because that's in everybody's interest.
[00:14:08]  It's more like, oh, no, you guys are what?
[00:14:13]  I mean, how would you describe it?
[00:14:15]  They're industrial terrorists, environmental terrorists.
[00:14:20]  They're also clearly happy to sacrifice the security and well-being of Western Europeans.
[00:14:28]  Forget just, you know, forget the fact that we're using the Ukrainians as cannon fodder or that we're trying to, you know, destroy the Russian economy.
[00:14:37]  But what about Western Europe?
[00:14:39]  I mean, what about Germany?
[00:14:41]  I mean, like, they would blow up this pipeline just so Germany doesn't have the option to turn it back on through the winter.
[00:14:48]  I mean, that's pretty dark.
[00:14:51]  Isn't it also a little surprising that long-term Germany doesn't go, man, working with the U.S. kind of sucks?
[00:14:57]  Like, here we are.
[00:14:58]  We're trying to pick a fight with Russia.
[00:14:59]  We get them into a war with Ukraine and we want to force Germany's hand into backing us.
[00:15:04]  And we realize that Russia might have some leverage to get Germany to not back us because they got all the cheap natural gas coming in.
[00:15:10]  And so we go, well, and by the way, even that's a side storyline.
[00:15:14]  I think this was just American interest did not want that pipeline.
[00:15:17]  And if you're Germany, like, what are we doing for you?
[00:15:20]  I mean, I'm sure that we're a decent partner, but I'm just saying, like, are we giving you cheaper natural gas?
[00:15:25]  Like, I mean, I'm not sure.
[00:15:28]  I'm not sure you're right about that.
[00:15:30]  I think that this was Germany is the economic heart of Europe.
[00:15:35]  And I think there was real concern that if Germany turned back on Nord Stream 2 and if they started getting this cheap gas from Russia, that was like if it came to it that they needed that, then their support for this war is going to go way down.
[00:15:52]  What I'm saying is I don't think us taking out the pipeline, I don't think the primary reason was the Ukraine war.
[00:15:59]  I think it's more likely that we wanted the Ukraine war as a reason to take out this pipeline.
[00:16:05]  I can't say these as absolutes, but it seems to me like they more maneuvered cover for taking out this pipeline and even the storyline of, oh, this was a last-ditch effort to make sure that Germany would support us.
[00:16:17]  I don't know.
[00:16:17]  Ted Cruz was talking some shit about this pipeline earlier.
[00:16:21]  They were all pissed off about the pipeline from the very beginning.
[00:16:23]  There's no question about that.
[00:16:25]  So that would jive with your theory.
[00:16:28]  I mean, like, there's no question they were against the pipeline from way before Russia invaded Ukraine.
[00:16:35]  I do think for whatever reason, this war is a very big deal to them.
[00:16:40]  I think there might be stuff in Ukraine that they want to protect that they don't want Russia getting their hands on, maybe information about how much corruption has been going on there.
[00:16:50]  Or it's just that they are really, they see this as their opportunity to break Russia and break Vladimir Putin.
[00:16:57]  I'm not sure, but that's an interesting, that's true.
[00:16:59]  I didn't really think about it like that, but that is possible.
[00:17:02]  Either way, once you recognize, once you accept even the possibility that America did this, it just changes how you view the whole conflict, especially if you're like, if you're not already where we are.
[00:17:15]  I mean, it's like, you know, Vladimir Putin, say whatever you will about him.
[00:17:21]  And I think a lot of criticisms of him are fair.
[00:17:23]  And I think it's like, it's he certainly you're going to have a very tough time, although some people try to, you're going to have a very tough time justifying his invasion of Ukraine.
[00:17:35]  You know what I mean?
[00:17:36]  Like it's horrible.
[00:17:37]  A lot of people are dying in Ukraine.
[00:17:40]  And there just has, you know, like, I don't know exactly what it is, but there had to be some other way.
[00:17:47]  But he was basically screaming for years before this war that was like, we have legitimate concerns.
[00:17:56]  And like, we are very serious about this.
[00:17:59]  And no one was listening to him.
[00:18:01]  They were just laughing him off.
[00:18:02]  In fact, he proposed before he invaded Ukraine, he had proposed several like treaties.
[00:18:09]  Like he was proposing like, listen, let's make a deal here.
[00:18:13]  Take Ukraine joining NATO off the table.
[00:18:16]  Demilitarize some of the like or pull back some of the NATO weapons in these countries that are very close to our border.
[00:18:23]  And they just, the U.S. just laughed him off.
[00:18:25]  Like, yeah, no, how about no, we're not going to listen to any of these concerns.
[00:18:29]  And this was, I mean, it goes over and over again.
[00:18:31]  I mean, if you, if you go back and read the cables from Burns, who's the head of the CIA now, back then he was an ambassador.
[00:18:42]  It was like in 2008.
[00:18:44]  That's the whole, you know, that Net Means Net thing.
[00:18:47]  WikiLeaks released it.
[00:18:49]  But it was cables from him back to Condoleezza Rice.
[00:18:51]  And he was like telling Condoleezza Rice, like he was like, yo, they are serious about this.
[00:18:56]  This was right after NATO had announced that Ukraine was going to become a member of NATO.
[00:19:01]  And they were like, this is the brightest of red lines for us.
[00:19:05]  We're not playing around.
[00:19:07]  And that was what the whole, the Net Means Net thing, that's what he was referring to.
[00:19:10]  And even Burns wrote back that he was like, yo, this is not, this is not a game.
[00:19:16]  This is very serious.
[00:19:17]  And it's not just Vladimir Putin.
[00:19:19]  We're like, this is the entire, this is unanimous amongst the entire Russian establishment that they will not put up with this.
[00:19:26]  And I think that essentially what led to this invasion was Russia went to themselves.
[00:19:32]  They went, oh, they basically made Ukraine part of NATO already.
[00:19:37]  They've de facto made them NATO.
[00:19:39]  Like they're sending in weapons to them.
[00:19:42]  You know what I mean?
[00:19:42]  They're integrating them into the EU.
[00:19:44]  They're doing all of these things.
[00:19:45]  They're basically treating them as a NATO member.
[00:19:48]  They did it.
[00:19:48]  They basically did it, even though we told them this was our red line.
[00:19:52]  And if you think about it, even in the way that we've defended them, we've done at least as much as Article 5 would require.
[00:19:59]  Probably more than Article 5 technically requires you to do for a NATO country if they were invaded.
[00:20:05]  So it really is in many ways, like we've made them a de facto member of NATO.
[00:20:09]  Let me actually see if I could pull up that fucking quote because it's such a good idea.
[00:20:13]  Here, yeah, okay, I have it.
[00:20:14]  So this was in 2008 in a cable from the now head of the CIA, Burns, to Condoleezza Rice.
[00:20:27]  And this was right after NATO had announced that Ukraine was joining.
[00:20:32]  And this is the words of Burns.
[00:20:34]  He said, Ukrainian entry into NATO is the brightest of all red lines for the Russian elite, not just Putin.
[00:20:43]  In the more than two and a half years of conversations with key Russian players, from knuckle-draggers in the darkest recesses of the Kremlin to Putin's sharpest liberal critics, I have yet to find anyone who views Ukraine and NATO as anything other than a direct challenge to Russia.
[00:21:01]  Burns also wrote to Rice that it would be, quote, hard to overstate the strategic consequences of bringing Ukraine into NATO.
[00:21:09]  It will create fertile soil for Russian meddling in Crimea and eastern Ukraine.
[00:21:15]  So like back in 2008, they knew this and they were even saying it to each other.
[00:21:21]  They were like, yo, we're risking Crimea and Ukraine by proceeding in this.
[00:21:26]  And it's just so crazy to me that like when I make the argument, which is essentially the argument that I'm, that I made on Rogan that gets you pushback from these fucking Ukrainian flag NPCs, my argument is that Russia was provoked, essentially, that when everybody refers to this as an unprovoked war, that's bullshit.
[00:21:43]  Then they'll be like, oh, this is insane that you're saying Russia was provoked.
[00:21:46]  And you're like, here's the head of the CIA saying it to Condoleezza Rice.
[00:21:51]  He wasn't the head of the CIA at the time, but he is currently.
[00:21:54]  It's like, even they're telling you, like they're saying, we might be provoking them into this.
[00:21:58]  And look what happened.

=== HR Audit Offer (02:44) ===

[00:21:59]  They continued to do that.
[00:22:01]  And look what happened, Crimea and Ukraine.
[00:22:04]  Right?
[00:22:04]  Like it's just, so the argument that it's not provoked just completely falls apart.
[00:22:10]  But look, man, you just read this article by Seymour Hirsch and tell me, you go, you know, these are the good guys in this fight.
[00:22:18]  Or does it turn out that the most war-hungry country in the world, the United States of America, I should say the most war-hungry government in the world, the United States of America, you know, the ones who destroyed Iraq and Afghanistan and Syria and Libya and Somalia and Yemen.
[00:22:34]  It turns out that they weren't motivated by their hatred of war.
[00:22:39]  Like they weren't motivated by war crimes and we must oppose them.
[00:22:42]  Turns out they're motivated by something else.
[00:22:45]  And whether it is, you know, exactly what it is, Rob, whether it's just like the money interests that they represent or there is some grander geopolitical, you know, like aim of world domination or it's a mix of both.
[00:22:56]  They want to dominate the world for their, you know, money interests, whatever it is, it's ugly.
[00:23:02]  And they ain't the good guys.
[00:23:03]  All right, guys, let's take a moment and thank our sponsor for today's show, which is Bambi.
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[00:24:35]  All right, let's get back into the show.
[00:24:37]  So what happens in this case?
[00:24:38]  Does anyone actually full-fledge proof that the United States government did this?

=== Twitter Files Justification (15:24) ===

[00:24:44]  Do, I don't know, do they condemn us in the UN?
[00:24:47]  Like, what happens when we actually, I guess, attack?
[00:24:52]  I mean, that's an attack on Russia, right?
[00:24:54]  Oh, yeah.
[00:24:55]  It's an act of war for sure.
[00:24:57]  But isn't it so weird that aside from this article, it's just kind of been dropped?
[00:25:01]  Like, I guess Russia doesn't want to take on the fact.
[00:25:04]  It's a little bit like...
[00:25:05]  Well, no, Russia is.
[00:25:07]  No, Russia is taking it on.
[00:25:08]  It just doesn't get reported.
[00:25:09]  But Vladimir Putin's been screaming from the rooftops about it.
[00:25:12]  The thing is that in the American media, first off, they've banned like all the Russian media outlets.
[00:25:20]  So you really can't even find them, you know?
[00:25:23]  And it's not like they air Vladimir Putin's speeches every day.
[00:25:26]  I mean, you could find like his declaration of war.
[00:25:30]  He gave two speeches right before he invaded Ukraine.
[00:25:35]  So you could find that stuff, but you don't, but no, he's been saying this constantly.
[00:25:39]  If you look in the right places and just see like the quote, he was demanding that there's like the America must answer questions about this and they have to be grilled.
[00:25:48]  And he's demanding some type of international like court or something like that.
[00:25:52]  But yeah, they're just going to ignore it and not.
[00:25:55]  Yeah.
[00:25:57]  Yeah, that's that's kind of the playbook.
[00:25:59]  Just ignore it and pretend that's not that's not a thing.
[00:26:03]  I'm surprised we haven't seen more Russian cyber attacks.
[00:26:08]  Yeah.
[00:26:08]  Yeah, maybe.
[00:26:10]  Well, I don't know.
[00:26:10]  Maybe they're coming, Rob.
[00:26:13]  We have seen, of course, which was the big story.
[00:26:16]  This hasn't been the big story in the news, but the big story in the news over the last few days has been the, you know, the wild balloon attack from the Chinese, which is really something just to see.
[00:26:29]  It really shows you, like, even in the opposition to Joe Biden, which is obviously Joe Biden deserves to be opposed.
[00:26:37]  But even amongst the like the right, broadly speaking in America, I mean, man, did they just lose their shit about a balloon and not keep their eyes on the prize?
[00:26:46]  Like, you know, it's like, you just like compare like the importance of this story that we're just talking about to this balloon and then look at what dominated the news coverage over the last week.
[00:26:56]  And it's like insane how much everyone all day long, like this balloon.
[00:27:00]  I don't know.
[00:27:00]  I don't even understand like why it was such a sexy story for everyone.
[00:27:04]  And it's like almost like everything.
[00:27:06]  I don't know.
[00:27:06]  I guess it has everything that the right wingers want, which is like proof that Joe Biden's weak on China and China's this huge threat and he's not confronting them.
[00:27:17]  I don't know.
[00:27:19]  Well, it's a pretty in-your-face display that you don't respect our airspace.
[00:27:23]  Yeah, I suppose.
[00:27:24]  Like, you know, moving into Taiwan or even building fake oceans on the other side of the world, we don't see or hear that.
[00:27:32]  But someone actually coming over here, flying shit above us that's a giant fucking balloon and us just doing nothing about it doesn't look great.
[00:27:40]  And then the shadiness of the fact that we wait until it's over the ocean so it can't be easily recuperated is just weird.
[00:27:47]  Yeah.
[00:27:47]  Well, I think it's reasonable that they said they had concerns about shooting it down because like that could.
[00:27:54]  Like the debris could fall on people or property.
[00:27:58]  It was in remote areas.
[00:27:59]  The thing's a giant balloon.
[00:28:01]  And then you're telling me we don't have the technology to go hook things onto that and then deflate it and land it.
[00:28:06]  You don't have like the equivalent of like harpoons on planes.
[00:28:09]  I saw Batman where they takes out a plane and hooks onto it.
[00:28:14]  I don't think for one second you can't land a parachuter onto that thing and just land it.
[00:28:18]  I just don't buy it.
[00:28:19]  Maybe.
[00:28:20]  I don't know.
[00:28:21]  The truth is that I think it's not completely unreasonable, I think, to, if you saw that, to be like, we want to find out information about this.
[00:28:32]  And I don't know that shooting it down immediately is the right move.
[00:28:36]  Or even if we could land it.
[00:28:37]  I just don't know.
[00:28:37]  I'm not saying that.
[00:28:38]  I'm going to put those dog robots in it and then just take some photographs and go, listen, there's nothing in here and we're going to blow it up over the ocean and then I'll believe you.
[00:28:45]  And then I was joking, well, let's get back to them and fly the Macy's Day parade above their country just to be like, we got balloons too, motherfuckers.
[00:28:53]  From what I've read about it, I think a lot of the fear of the balloon, it seems to be overhyped and doesn't really make that much sense.
[00:29:02]  So they were talking about, you know, like, oh, it's they're, they're spying on our like, you know, nuclear sites or they're spying on our military gear.
[00:29:10]  But from everything I've read on it, it's like they could get better pictures from satellites and we wouldn't be able to detect them.
[00:29:18]  This is an oddity, but the guy who I think his official position is head of NORAD, I don't even know what that stands for.
[00:29:24]  But the guy whose job it is to like monitor this shit actually admitted, hey, I messed up and the thing that they had would be more effective than any satellites that they have.
[00:29:36]  The second part I didn't hear.
[00:29:38]  Yeah, that's what he said.
[00:29:39]  He said that because of the size and scope of this, they would be able to...
[00:29:42]  Now, I don't know enough about satellites, but you want to talk about how often does the government actually admit to errors?
[00:29:48]  That's one of the weirdest things in the storyline is the government admitting to an error and saying this actually is a breach and worse than satellites.
[00:29:55]  Well, another aspect of it that's pretty weird is that this basically got uncovered because a dude found it with his camera.
[00:30:02]  You know what I mean?
[00:30:02]  And he was like, hey, what's that thing?
[00:30:05]  And the official government claim is actually like, oh, no, this has happened lots of times.
[00:30:10]  That's actually their official claim.
[00:30:13]  So, and they're using that to be like, no, Trump did it a bunch of times too.
[00:30:16]  Now, who the hell knows with these people?
[00:30:18]  Cause they're all a bunch of liars.
[00:30:19]  But it's interesting that that's their defense.
[00:30:22]  It's like, no, we do this all the time.
[00:30:24]  We let the Chinese violate our airspace.
[00:30:25]  You know what I mean?
[00:30:26]  And we don't do it.
[00:30:27]  Like, this has happened lots of times.
[00:30:28]  Even Trump did it.
[00:30:29]  And it's like, oh, so all of a sudden what Trump did is good in your mind?
[00:30:32]  I don't know.
[00:30:32]  It's just the whole thing is very bizarre.
[00:30:34]  I would say that I think a big missing piece to this that comes with a lot.
[00:30:40]  This almost is always the case.
[00:30:42]  This is basically what the idea of blowback was when the CIA coined the term was the idea was that you have these covert American policies.
[00:30:52]  So you have these secret American policies.
[00:30:55]  And then when these unintended consequences come from those secret policies, the American people have no idea to make the connection because they don't even know about the first policy.
[00:31:06]  This also, this same phenomenon also happens with policies that aren't even covert just because the American people don't really know anything about what their government is doing halfway around the world.
[00:31:16]  So when these things come back.
[00:31:17]  So in other words, like for most American people, when there's the Iranian revolution in 1979 and they're like burning American flags and shit, they're like, whoa, where the hell did this come from?
[00:31:31]  These crazy Muslims hate us all, you know?
[00:31:33]  But that's because they also, they don't know that we overthrew their democratically elected government a couple decades earlier.
[00:31:39]  Now, if they knew that, it makes a lot more sense.
[00:31:42]  You're like, oh, that's why they're burning our flags because they really didn't like this guy who they were overthrowing.
[00:31:47]  And it turns out we installed him, right?
[00:31:50]  Like it just made, and, you know, it's that there's this missing component to almost like all of the mainstream coverage of this stuff where they're like, oh my God, the Chinese, why would they provoke us like this?
[00:32:03]  And you're just like, dude, we run war games constantly right up to China's border, like right in like the, like right on the water outside of China.
[00:32:14]  We're constantly just running exercises.
[00:32:17]  I mean, it was like, imagine like someone like came up to your house and then like on your front lawn started just running drills of how they would like raid your home and pull you and your family out of it.
[00:32:29]  They're just practicing out there right there for you to see constantly.
[00:32:33]  And so, you know, and there's, there's a lot of this stuff where it's like, and even the stuff of like having Joe Biden talk about how we would militarily defend Taiwan and all of these things.
[00:32:43]  There's like, there's this crazy, like, and this is the same thing with what Russian, with the American foreign policy toward Russia has been for so many decades now.
[00:32:53]  It's like this constant policy of provocation.
[00:32:56]  And the justification, at least the stated justification for it, is that it's deterrence, that the reason we do this is so they don't fuck with us, you know, because they see what we can do.
[00:33:07]  In fact, this was the justification for the huge weapons package that was sent into Ukraine under Donald Trump.
[00:33:17]  The justification for why the U.S. was sending Ukraine weapons back well before 2021, 2022, the reason that the justification was to deter Vladimir Putin.
[00:33:33]  However, in hindsight, you'd have to at least, at the very least, argue it didn't deter him.
[00:33:39]  And at the worst, argue that maybe he saw that as a provocation, not a deterrent, right?
[00:33:46]  And so I think this is one of the major problems with like this dominant foreign policy that we have is that it, you know, if you at least consider the possibility, like, oh, maybe this isn't a deterrent.
[00:33:56]  Maybe this is a provocation.
[00:33:57]  It kind of changes all these things.
[00:33:59]  And it's like, why we are so with all of the problems we have in our country right now, why we are so hell-bent on provoking the two nuclear superpowers in the world at once just seems like, it doesn't seem like stupid or insane are not strong enough terms.
[00:34:16]  It seems suicidal.
[00:34:18]  It seems like you would only do this if you were trying to destroy this country.
[00:34:22]  Hey, maybe that is the goal.
[00:34:24]  I don't know.
[00:34:26]  Anyway, I'm much more concerned with the threat of nuclear war than I am with some balloons that they've determined to be spy balloons.
[00:34:34]  I don't even know that they've determined that.
[00:34:36]  There's just, I just know that Fox News was calling them spy balloons from the first day that they were spotted.
[00:34:41]  I don't actually think we've seen any evidence that they were, but they were something.
[00:34:44]  I don't know.
[00:34:45]  All right, guys, let's take a moment and thank our sponsor for today's show, which is Yo Kratom.
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[00:35:14]  So if you like this show and you like Kratom, go get your Kratom at yokratom.com.
[00:35:18]  All right, let's get back into the show.
[00:35:20]  All right.
[00:35:20]  So what else do we got?
[00:35:22]  Okay, there was the Twitter hearings, which we could get into this a little bit.
[00:35:29]  This is kind of, look, as we both know, Rob, we're not going to get much out of a Republican-controlled Congress.
[00:35:36]  We're not going to get much, especially when the Democrats have the Senate and the presidency.
[00:35:42]  But even if they didn't, we're not going to get much.
[00:35:45]  But what you can get when the Republicans don't have enough power to actually do anything, when they have enough power to actually do anything, they'll just do bad things.
[00:35:57]  But when they have no power and the Democrats are doing bad things, they'll speak up against those bad things.
[00:36:02]  But the best we're going to get from a Republican-controlled house is this.
[00:36:06]  So let's try to enjoy the show.
[00:36:08]  And then sometimes some of these hearings, there are some things that are revealed.
[00:36:11]  Sometimes it's just fun to watch the reaction that it provokes from people.
[00:36:16]  I want to play a clip real quick before we get into the discussing the hearings themselves.
[00:36:20]  Here was our good friend, Joe Scarborough over on MSNBC reacting to the prospect of Twitter hearings.
[00:36:29]  14% of Americans care about.
[00:36:31]  But Jen Saki, the problem also with these hearings are you look at these issues.
[00:36:35]  They never produce the Twitter files.
[00:36:37]  You remember the Twitter files?
[00:36:38]  Oh boy, that was like this is going to be the end.
[00:36:42]  It's fascinating that the Twitter files had such an extraordinary blind spot.
[00:36:48]  It ended up being the most biased thing I've ever seen in my life.
[00:36:50]  Because we find out after the Twitter files come out, I guess Elon didn't give them all the information about like Twitter executives cowering in the corner and doing whatever Donald Trump wanted him to do.
[00:37:02]  You've got the Twitter files.
[00:37:03]  You've got the New York Post, the Hunter Biden laptop thing.
[00:37:08]  These things have been looked at.
[00:37:11]  It's just like when they were, you know, who's his special Durham.
[00:37:15]  It's just like Durham.
[00:37:16]  I'd read Durham's pleadings and say, okay, there has to be something here.
[00:37:20]  Yeah, Miko will tell you.
[00:37:22]  I read one pleading all day and I called about 30 legal experts.
[00:37:25]  I go, what's here?
[00:37:26]  And everyone said, been leading it.
[00:37:28]  I don't think anything's here.
[00:37:30]  Conservatives keep doing this.
[00:37:32]  They did it with Durham and their witch hunt against the FBI.
[00:37:36]  They did it on Hunter Biden's laptop and their witch hunt against Twitter.
[00:37:40]  They did it on the Twitter files and their witch hunt.
[00:37:43]  Like they only want to go after blue witches.
[00:37:46]  They don't want to go after red witches.
[00:37:48]  These things never, ever produce the punch they expect.
[00:37:52]  No, I'm into go back to Mike Markles earlier.
[00:37:55]  So we could just pause.
[00:37:57]  That's basically the clip.
[00:37:58]  Yeah.
[00:37:59]  Does the blonde lady ever talk or does she always just sit there with your dad and I have to talk to you, energy?
[00:38:04]  And she just sits there.
[00:38:05]  She does talk at some point, but she's got a real kind of like Robin vibe to his Howard, if that makes sense.
[00:38:11]  You know, it's morning Joe.
[00:38:13]  It's not morning Mika.
[00:38:15]  So it's like his show.
[00:38:17]  He's, she kind of, you know, is that I guess I can understand that, Role.
[00:38:19]  Okay, fair enough.
[00:38:24]  Anyway, it's just, it's very funny to watch.
[00:38:28]  So this is how they deal with these stories now.
[00:38:31]  It's like in hindsight, yeah, there was nothing there.
[00:38:34]  There was nothing even there.
[00:38:35]  He said, in both of those stories, there was so much there.
[00:38:39]  There's so much there.
[00:38:40]  Like, holy shit.
[00:38:41]  Are you kidding me?
[00:38:43]  If, if roles were reversed, you would think these were the biggest bombshell stories in history.
[00:38:48]  You know what I mean?
[00:38:49]  Like there was nothing there.
[00:38:50]  Oh, yeah, sure, sure.
[00:38:51]  Like the FBI colluded with Twitter and other, you know, to change the outcome of an election.
[00:38:59]  I don't know.
[00:39:00]  Yeah, there's direct election interference by the highest, most secretive levels of the government, working against their own president.
[00:39:10]  Yeah, it's a pretty big story.
[00:39:11]  And of course, the Hunter Biden story, I mean, we've gone over a bunch of times.
[00:39:14]  It's like insane.
[00:39:16]  It's like, again, it's just like a crazy story where all of you guys got it completely wrong.
[00:39:22]  And this is one of the things that's just like maddening about these guys, like that they can be so, like, it's, you see, it's like the level of how corrupt they are that you're like, oh, wait, your story about like, just objectively, what happened with the Hunter Biden story is that.
[00:39:41]  It was a real story.
[00:39:42]  All of you guys said it was Russian propaganda.
[00:39:46]  Then you had all of the, you know, former heads of the CIA and different intelligence people come on to say it had all the earmarks of Russian propaganda.
[00:39:54]  Then even now everybody has to admit that's wrong.
[00:39:57]  It turns out you were completely wrong and you were using the deep state to lie to people or the deep state was using you to lie to people.
[00:40:04]  And now when you look back on the story, you go, yeah, remember there was nothing there.

=== Social Platform Creepiness (16:02) ===

[00:40:08]  That's my assessment of it.
[00:40:10]  It was no big thing.
[00:40:13]  So in other words, you're using that story to try to make the opposition look bad when really anyone who's being honest and paying attention knows what it revealed.
[00:40:22]  It's that you guys were all a bunch of liars.
[00:40:24]  And yeah, the fact that you were that you used Twitter to lock the account of one of the biggest newspapers in the country and then ban people from sharing the link.
[00:40:32]  Yeah, that's pretty creepy.
[00:40:35]  Anyway, I just thought that clip was interesting and worth playing.
[00:40:39]  So have you been watching these hearings with our friend Yoel Roth and the other, what's her name, the Indian lady there?
[00:40:46]  What are your thoughts?
[00:40:46]  I will confess at first, I've only seen a few clips.
[00:40:49]  I have not watched that much of it.
[00:40:51]  So I believe it was about six hours long.
[00:40:54]  And on my car ride back from the city last night, I think I probably watched about an hour in clips.
[00:41:00]  So firstly, Yoel Roth, smart guy.
[00:41:03]  And just to kind of lay out the table here, so you got on the Republican side, they're saying it's very clear that the FBI and the Biden administration is colluding with big tech.
[00:41:13]  It's a violation of your freedom of speech, giving marching orders to the tech companies.
[00:41:18]  And then, you know, the other side is that they're saying, nope, these are anyone can go to these platforms.
[00:41:24]  These platforms, they run their own enterprises.
[00:41:26]  They can make their own decisions.
[00:41:27]  And they were making their own decisions here.
[00:41:29]  Now, it is clear that the FBI and these individuals and Yoel Roth is clearly for some reason, very slick in wanting to defend the FBI.
[00:41:39]  He's like, if you just look at the way he's there, even where he goes, well, I wouldn't categorize it.
[00:41:44]  You know what I mean?
[00:41:44]  Like just the way he's talking, he seems to want to be protecting the FBI's interest and at least not even to express that he was pressured by the FBI, which is a very loose claim of, hey, do you feel like you were pressured by the FBI?
[00:41:56]  And we read those emails.
[00:41:57]  There was certainly some pressure in that they had to take money from in the most favorable viewpoint.
[00:42:03]  Twitter had to take money from the FBI to cover their own operational costs of having to do the paperwork and kind of be at the behest and call.
[00:42:12]  At a minimum, they're taking money.
[00:42:13]  So to claim that they're not even pressured by the FBI, that you're not even pressured, that already is taking a very favorable view of the FBI.
[00:42:22]  And then if you just look at it through that lens, it's kind of clear that the guy seems to be somewhat covering for the FBI.
[00:42:29]  With all that being said, very slick in all the maneuverings here because he's never, they have different teams.
[00:42:36]  So he's able to go, oh, I'm never getting direct reporting or I never got the direct decision.
[00:42:41]  I wasn't a part of that.
[00:42:42]  I'm hearing it from this person.
[00:42:43]  No, there wasn't direct pressure.
[00:42:45]  And then no one at the FBI ever gets on a call or is in writing to anybody going, hey, I need you to do this.
[00:42:51]  It's, oh, doesn't that violate your policy?
[00:42:54]  So I don't think you're going to find a violation of law.
[00:42:57]  I think it's very clear that there is intimidation going on here and that there's things like being expected.
[00:43:03]  But overall, the Republicans didn't do a great job of like really pinning him to doing anything illegal.
[00:43:10]  And then, except for one, there was one instance of there was a lady who proved that Yoel Roth was having like back channel conversations on another social media platform with the FBI.
[00:43:22]  So it seems like they're undocumented direct communication.
[00:43:25]  So I don't know, maybe they'll bust him for lying, but it seems like the FBI has been slick in its maneuverings.
[00:43:31]  Yeah.
[00:43:31]  Yeah.
[00:43:32]  No, that's more or less what I figured would be.
[00:43:37]  Like, it's like, okay, you're clearly violating the spirit of the law, but like, do you have a strict legal defense that you never actually, you know what I mean?
[00:43:46]  Like, even with a lot of these things, you know, they, they had, you know, that the email say that Alex Berenson released.
[00:43:51]  I remember we were talking about this at the time.
[00:43:54]  It's the White House was meeting with Twitter execs and they said, why is this guy still on Twitter?
[00:44:00]  Now, if you want to be technical, they didn't say you have to pull this guy off Twitter.
[00:44:06]  You know, so they could say like, oh, we didn't violate anybody's First Amendment rights.
[00:44:09]  We asked a question.
[00:44:10]  But we all know, it's just so obvious what the question is.
[00:44:15]  Hey, I think you're going to have a bit of a problem here.
[00:44:17]  Yeah.
[00:44:17]  It's like.
[00:44:18]  I never said I was going to do anything.
[00:44:19]  I said there'd be a problem.
[00:44:20]  Yeah, no, I said, I said, maybe you don't use our tomato sauce and maybe your place catches on fire.
[00:44:25]  I wasn't threatening the way.
[00:44:26]  You know, it's like, it's shit like that.
[00:44:28]  So it's, it's a difficult situation.
[00:44:30]  I did see the one exchange with, what's her name?
[00:44:33]  Bobbert, Lauren Bobbert, I think is her, her name.
[00:44:37]  The one where she was flipping out about her.
[00:44:38]  It just, I'm not even saying she's wrong.
[00:44:40]  It just came off so petty that she was talking about her Twitter account being banned.
[00:44:45]  Like it just seemed like this weird thing where she's like furious and she's like, you banned my account, my Twitter for this tweet.
[00:44:51]  Look at this tweet.
[00:44:51]  It's a joke.
[00:44:52]  It's hilarious.
[00:44:53]  Like it just sounds like what I would say if I was talking to like a social media platform.
[00:44:57]  I mean, again, she is right in the, you know, like on the issue.
[00:45:02]  I will say, like you realize there's look, the government involvement is obviously the creepiest part of all of this.
[00:45:11]  It's the most, it's the, the, you know, illegal part of all of this, if there is an illegal part, um, certainly is in the violation of the spirit of the freedom of speech and government not interfering with the free press and freedom of speech and things like that.
[00:45:26]  But, you know, you also realize as you watch this that, you know, it, it's hard exactly to know how much, again, because it's at least from what we know, it's not as if you have open threats being made.
[00:45:41]  I mean, there were some threats that were made to the heads of all of these big tech companies when they were hauled before Congress.
[00:45:50]  Like there were threats like we'll regulate you, which is basically a threat of, you know, aggression from the government.
[00:45:58]  But, you know, you also see that like a lot of these people, Yoel Roth included, they, they do believe, I think, ideologically in what the progressives at least claim to believe.
[00:46:13]  You know, so like you could see where like they do believe that Donald Trump is a threat to, you know, the our democracy.
[00:46:20]  And they do believe that January 6th was an insurrection.
[00:46:22]  And they do believe that, you know, trans women are women or whatever.
[00:46:27]  You know what I mean?
[00:46:27]  If you go down the list of it, they believe.
[00:46:29]  So you realize that like, even while they're exerting pressure, they may not have to exert that much pressure to kind of get them to do what they already kind of want to do.
[00:46:38]  And it's really creepy.
[00:46:39]  It's very creepy.
[00:46:41]  Just like you realize that Elon Musk buying this one company and kind of revealing this stuff and then realizing that like this is going on all over the place.
[00:46:51]  And this is really like, it's kind of impossible for any of us to measure.
[00:46:56]  Number one, how much this has already changed the conversation in this country, how much this has already affected our culture and our politics and all of this that the, you know, dissenting voices can really be, if not completely removed, turned way down.
[00:47:13]  And then the other really creepy thing is like, where is all of this going?
[00:47:18]  What's the next, the next logical step from this?
[00:47:21]  All right, guys, let's take a moment and thank our sponsor for today's show, which is Yo Kratom, yokratom.com, home of the $60 kilo.
[00:47:28]  If you are over the age of 21 and you're a fan of Kratom, go grab your Kratom from yokratom.com.
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[00:47:49]  So if you like this show and you like Kratom, go get your Kratom at yokratom.com.
[00:47:54]  All right, let's get back into the show.
[00:47:55]  I don't know if you saw this one to me, I thought was a very interesting story.
[00:48:00]  So Lauren Southern, do you know who she is?
[00:48:04]  She's she's a she's like, she was a libertarian back in the day, and then she became like a kind of right-winger, I guess.
[00:48:13]  And she was like, she got popular on social media.
[00:48:17]  Like I think around like 2016, 2017, around that time, she started blowing up and she made like some documentaries and stuff.
[00:48:24]  She made a documentary on the migrant crisis in Europe.
[00:48:29]  I think she made a documentary on South Africa and like the farmers getting killed out there and stuff.
[00:48:36]  But anyway, so she's she has been kicked off of Airbnb, which is fairly common, I guess.
[00:48:44]  People get kicked off Airbnb.
[00:48:46]  There's a very bizarre one to get kicked off of, you know?
[00:48:50]  It's not like getting kicked off of YouTube or Twitter or something like that.
[00:48:53]  It's like you can't stay in someone's house now.
[00:48:57]  You know, like it's just very strange.
[00:48:59]  Like you can't get a hotel room because of your politics.
[00:49:03]  It's just a much different, much more intimate level thing.
[00:49:08]  And of course, it's like they Airbnb, I guess they're, I think it's Jay Carney is like running it now.
[00:49:13]  He's like one of Obama's former press secretaries.
[00:49:17]  I believe that's right.
[00:49:18]  I could be wrong about that.
[00:49:19]  But so they like said all the people who attended January 6th can't use Airbnb anymore.
[00:49:26]  Like they do shit like this a lot.
[00:49:28]  You might plan an insurrection.
[00:49:29]  Yeah, right.
[00:49:30]  Like it's, it's like, it's not even like, by the way, you could be a felon and go stay at an Airbnb.
[00:49:36]  Like you could, you know what I'm saying?
[00:49:37]  Like I don't, it's, it's just, so it's very bizarre.
[00:49:40]  But this was, I thought, more than just bizarre and actually really creepy.
[00:49:43]  So Airbnb booted Lauren Southern's parents off of Airbnb and sent them an email.
[00:49:52]  Yeah, sent them an email saying that like the reason we're kicking you off because you are, you know, we can see that you're closely related to an account that's been kicked off.
[00:50:05]  So you guys can't use Airbnb anymore either.
[00:50:07]  Anyway, she's got a very big following.
[00:50:09]  So she made a huge thing about this.
[00:50:10]  She was on Tucker Carlson the other night talking about it and Airbnb reversed their decision there because I guess there was it was enough bad PR for them.
[00:50:18]  So they let them back on.
[00:50:20]  The Mr. and Mrs. Southern can rent an Airbnb now.
[00:50:24]  But anyway, I just thought it was an interesting story of like how creepy the kind of the, you know, kind of the slippery slope of this stuff is.
[00:50:32]  And this isn't just like a hypothetical slippery slope.
[00:50:34]  This is like something that actually happened.
[00:50:36]  The idea of punishing your family now for you having the wrong political opinions.
[00:50:41]  Yeah, it gets very close to essentially a social credit system where you got the wrong opinion.
[00:50:46]  Not only can you not be on the platforms, but Uber won't pick you up.
[00:50:49]  You can't stay in a hotel.
[00:50:51]  You can't eat at these restaurants.
[00:50:53]  Well, it's got a digital currency, which makes it easy for them to do that.
[00:50:57]  Well, it's more than just that, right?
[00:50:58]  So it's, there's two aspects to it.
[00:51:00]  There's the social credit aspect, but that's almost just getting kicked off Airbnb.
[00:51:04]  This is now the social credit aspect along with a collective guilt aspect.
[00:51:09]  Right.
[00:51:10]  Your family being pissed at you.
[00:51:11]  You ruined it for us.
[00:51:12]  Right.
[00:51:13]  And just that they're going to punish your family.
[00:51:15]  You know, that's something that changes.
[00:51:17]  You know, there's a lot of people like who I think would say, if there's like some really unpopular truth, but they want to speak the truth.
[00:51:26]  And there'll be people who are, you know, brave enough to say, I'm going to say, I'm going to say that.
[00:51:32]  I don't care.
[00:51:32]  I'm going to do this.
[00:51:34]  Even if something bad might happen to me.
[00:51:37]  But if you said something bad is going to happen to your family, that's a whole different level of deterrent.
[00:51:42]  You know, like there's there, there, I'm sure there could be a lot of things where like if I, you know, said, you know, like, I don't know, pick the, you know, like you're in some real, real high stakes thing, whether it's, you know, they're bringing lockdowns back again, but this time they're for climate change and they go, we're going to lock down six months out of every year or something, something really crazy.
[00:52:03]  And you might be like, I'm willing to risk dying to try to fight against this.
[00:52:07]  But then if I said to you, well, how about your sister and her kids are also going to get killed?
[00:52:12]  That might be something where you go, yeah, like I'd, I'd risk myself dying, but I'm not really comfortable risking my family.
[00:52:19]  You know what I mean?
[00:52:19]  Like there's just, and okay, this isn't like the stakes aren't quite that high, but you still see where there's this thing where we're like, we're going to make life miserable for your family.
[00:52:28]  And also, like you said, probably kind of pit your family against you.
[00:52:32]  Like their life's more difficult now because you had to hold these opinions.
[00:52:35]  It's just a very creepy thing.
[00:52:37]  And when they do it to people that don't have a platform.
[00:52:40]  So like this lady's able to tweet out to her fans and they realize, oh, this press isn't great.
[00:52:45]  But if you did that to me, all right.
[00:52:48]  You know what I mean?
[00:52:49]  Like there's, there's size and scope to this thing.
[00:52:51]  Or how many people out there have they done this to that we don't even know about?
[00:52:54]  Cause they don't, you know what I mean?
[00:52:55]  Like that's the scariest part.
[00:52:57]  They take off the platforms.
[00:52:58]  They remove you from your income or something else.
[00:53:00]  And then at what point are you just a crazy guy in the street screaming?
[00:53:04]  And people are like, all right, that's a crazy guy.
[00:53:06]  Yeah.
[00:53:07]  Yeah.
[00:53:08]  And, you know, look, I mean, like, I, you know, obviously, like I was saying, I think there are like former Democratic operatives who are working at this company.
[00:53:16]  This is very involved.
[00:53:17]  It's all about politics, right?
[00:53:18]  Like that's her great sin is her political opinions and all of this stuff.
[00:53:23]  I will say, I like, I believe in freedom of association.
[00:53:27]  Like, I'm not even arguing like that this should be illegal necessarily to do, but it is fucking horrible and terrifying.
[00:53:34]  And there's got to be some mechanism to like stop this.
[00:53:37]  Cause, man, look, it's not even just like, it's not that much of a slippery slope argument.
[00:53:42]  You're just saying, look how far it's already come.
[00:53:44]  People being debanked, people being, you know, kicked off all the social media platforms.
[00:53:49]  Like, is it really that crazy of a next step for like, I don't know, like a grocery store to do this or like just like, what's the next logical conclusion here?
[00:54:00]  And it's, it's pretty scary and pretty like Orwellian.
[00:54:04]  I mean, it's really like something like, this is like in North Korea, what they do.
[00:54:08]  Like, if you speak up against the government, they will punish your entire family.
[00:54:13]  And that's one of the things that keeps people in line.
[00:54:16]  Or even if someone just accuses you of speaking out against the government, they'll punish your entire family.
[00:54:20]  I don't think it has to be true.
[00:54:21]  And so there's just, you know, okay, it's good that they pulled this one back.
[00:54:29]  The question you raised is a really good one.
[00:54:31]  How many people have they done this to that we don't know about?
[00:54:33]  I don't know if there's any way we're tracking that.
[00:54:35]  But yeah, the fact that now you can kind of have this thing where you get these really huge companies who are very much in bed with the government.
[00:54:46]  It's like, okay, the government can't do these things directly because they still have this, you know, little some degree of constitutional process or something like that.
[00:54:54]  But now they can kind of send their operatives out into these companies.
[00:54:57]  And look, not being allowed to stay at Airbnb isn't like being debanked.
[00:55:02]  It's not like, you know, it's just kind of an inconvenience, I guess, right?
[00:55:05]  Like you could still go get a hotel room, but it's just a little thing like that.
[00:55:09]  It's just to make your life a little bit more fucking difficult.
[00:55:12]  Like just a little needle in there.
[00:55:14]  And to do that to people for having different political opinions is fucking creepy.
[00:55:20]  It's a really, really bad, unhealthy direction for society to go.
[00:55:24]  Also, Airbnb doesn't do all that much to, like, they don't pre-screen you as a user and they don't pre-screen home you.
[00:55:30]  And it'd be one thing if they started linking social profiles and I guess a homeowner could decide, hey, I don't want that racist bigot in my house.
[00:55:38]  Like, all right.
[00:55:39]  Like, you know what I mean?
[00:55:39]  That would at least make sense, but for the platform to do it.
[00:55:42]  And the fees.
[00:55:43]  By the way, I don't like Airbnb for the record.
[00:55:44]  Not an Airbnb guy.
[00:55:46]  I like hotels.
[00:55:48]  Airbnb has its moments, but those fees, there's so much bullshit with that.
[00:55:52]  Can I tell you, I've stayed in them like a couple times ever in my life, and this is where they lose me when you have to write a paragraph literally right there.
[00:56:00]  It's like, I just sit there and I go, hi, I'm Dave, and I'd like to stay in your body.
[00:56:04]  I'm like, I hate this.
[00:56:05]  Just book a hotel.
[00:56:07]  I don't know what to tell you.
[00:56:08]  I want a place where it's just like, give me this room.
[00:56:09]  Okay, that's the rate.
[00:56:10]  Fine.

=== Towels and Hotel Fees (01:35) ===

[00:56:11]  I'll be there.
[00:56:12]  I had with the last guy.
[00:56:14]  Airbnbs are good sometimes when I've done like road shows because I can bring like five comics and for the price of two hotel rooms, you can bring like 10 people type thing.
[00:56:22]  I don't want any of that.
[00:56:22]  No one will be in my room.
[00:56:24]  There you go.
[00:56:24]  That's the only circumstance by which Airbnb has made sense.
[00:56:27]  But even this past time, the guy kept like trying to like text me to just make conversation.
[00:56:31]  And it's like, I want nothing to do with you.
[00:56:32]  If you don't feel comfortable renting me your house, don't.
[00:56:35]  I don't like, you know, like, it was almost like when you get into an Uber and the guy wants to make conversation, you're annoyed, but it was this energy for four days because the guy just wanted to check in or whatever.
[00:56:45]  We're not friends.
[00:56:45]  I need to check in with you in the morning.
[00:56:47]  You're my mom or girlfriend.
[00:56:48]  Leave me alone.
[00:56:49]  Yeah.
[00:56:50]  Got my credit card on file.
[00:56:51]  If I trash the house, he'll charge me.
[00:56:53]  Yeah, really.
[00:56:53]  Yeah.
[00:56:54]  No, I get that.
[00:56:54]  That's why I like that about a hotel.
[00:56:56]  Okay, this is just business.
[00:56:57]  This is just like, we've got a whole system worked out here.
[00:57:00]  I check in, you clean it.
[00:57:01]  I do what I want.
[00:57:02]  200 towels.
[00:57:03]  Everyone gets what they want out of this.
[00:57:05]  I assume that's why you gave me so many towels.
[00:57:07]  Who uses this many towels?
[00:57:09]  How many face towels do I need, really?
[00:57:11]  That's honestly the most respectful place to put it of all the options in a hotel room.
[00:57:16]  It's not bad.
[00:57:17]  Yeah.
[00:57:18]  All right.
[00:57:18]  I think we're going to wrap up there.
[00:57:21]  Looking forward to doing some comedy with you this weekend, brother.
[00:57:24]  Always a fun time.
[00:57:26]  I got something to promote.
[00:57:27]  Firstly, always check out Run Your Mouth coming out basically on the days we don't do this.
[00:57:30]  And then also going to start doing a weekly show in New York City at 8 p.m. at Cafe Bohemia's.
[00:57:36]  $10 tickets.
[00:57:37]  Use the promo code FHIR for $5.
[00:57:39]  Showcase.
[00:57:40]  Put up my friends.
[00:57:41]  Gonna be fun.
[00:57:41]  8 p.m.s.
[00:57:43]  Hell yeah, dude.
[00:57:43]  Awesome.
[00:57:44]  All right.
[00:57:44]  Catch you guys next time.
[00:57:46]  Peace.