2/13/23: Three UFOs Shot Down, General Doesn't Rule Out Aliens, 2024 Race, Lula Shocks CNN on Ukraine Peace, Mr Beast Accused of Ableism, Big Sugar Lobbies Schools, US Killed Ukraine Peace Deal, Ohio Train Derailment

in our wheelhouse, and specifically in soccer's wheelhouse. So we'll bring all of that down for you. Also, we have some big twenty twenty four news. Nikki Haley apparently jumping in the race of this week. We've got a sneak peek at her first ad that she's going to be putting out. And we also have new war of words between Trump and Ronda Santis. Apparently the public nickname is Rhonda sanctimonious private nickname is meatball Ron devastating, Yes, so

we'll talk about that. We also have some pretty extraordinary comments from Brazil's President Lula with Joe Biden about Ukraine, and also new indications that Russia is plotting a new offensive there. We have someone who is now accusing mister Beast of being ablest. You're going to enjoy listening to

this piece. And we also have someone who is on the ground in Ohio is from that region of Ohio where that Norfolk Southern train was derailed and they ended up doing a quote unquote controlled release of the chemicals there that has resulted in a just catastrophic environmental devastation. A lot of questions there of our residents are actually safe to come back to their homes. So we'll get into that as well, But let's go ahead and start with whatever is going on above our above us in

the skies right now. It has been one of the most insane ten days in modern history for our airspace for shootdowns. The NORAD commander actually said yesterday it's the first time ever that we've been shooting down objects in our skies literally in American history. So let that sink in. We've add now four shootdowns in the last eleven days. Let's go and put this up there on the screen since we last saw you. The first object which was shot down was off the Alaskan coast over the Ileutian Island.

So this object was downed at forty thousand feet and posed a quote reasonable threat to the safety of civilian flight. President Biden. All he would say about it is quote it was a success, and the object was shot down somewhere over the islands and allegedly crashed on ice. Now to this, what we know right now this object, which we will get to some of the characteristics of the object itself, has not yet been recovered by US investigators,

despite initial promises that they would do. So they're blaming it on the weather. I mean, you know, you could empathize with that. It's pretty cold out there in Alaska. It literally landed out on the ice. So they're having some mission to try and go retrieve it. So, as of yet, we still have no photo indication, video forensics, nothing about this said object. That was obviously one that caused a lot of consternation because it came immediately after

the balloon. But then lo and behold, on February eleventh, just two days ago, let's go and put this up there on the screen. Perhaps the most shocking one yet to date was Prime Minister Justin Trudeau revealing, quote, I ordered the takedown of an unidentified object that violated Canadian airspace. Nor AD Command, the North American Air Defense shot down this object over the of the Yukon territory. Canadian and US aircraft were scrambled and a us F twenty two

fired at the object. So this was an object that was right above the Yukon territory in Canada, scrambled by the Canadians and by the Americans. Eventually the us F twenty two downs it. Now here's the thing with these objects. With the Alaskan one, we haven't yet received any initial indication. We got conflicting reports about what it looked like. With the Canadian one, though, we are looking at something that's

very interesting. We have some pilots that apparently have been talking behind the scenes with media outlets saying that the object that was shot down interfered with sensors, and some pilots claim to have seen no identifiable propulsion on the object that shot down over Canada. This was described on CNN over the weekend. Just take a listen to that.

Those pilots, we have learned, have given very conflicting accounts of what they actually experience, with some pilots saying that the object interfered with the plane sensors, other pilots saying that they didn't really experience that. Other pilots saying that when they looked at the object, they could identify no identifiable, identifiable propulsion system, and they did not know how it was actually staying in the air cruising at that altitude

of about forty thousand feet. So this has all added to the Pentagon's wariness of describing in more detail what this object actually is. Immediately after the Canadian object, there was another indication let's go and put this up there on the screen over north central Montana, quote unquote, no time TAM was issued calling National Defense Airspace over Montana. That was one of the places where we have an

intercontinental ballistic missile base. Representative Matt Rosendale of Montana put out this statement, quote, I am in constant communication with Norcom. They have just advised me they have confidence there is an object. It was not an anomaly. Now the reason why is that after this no TAM was issued, they called a false alarm crystal and they said, oh, actually the object, it was an anomaly, it wasn't there. Well, that turns out not to have been the case. The

object was there. We actually lost track of the object until it was then shot down yesterday. So let's go ahead and put this up there on the screen, bringing us to our final shootdown. The final note TAM that happened. Yeah, so far, that's a good point. Final not TAM. It was issued closing over Lake Huron and Lake Michigan. Eventually that object was downed. According to what we know now, US representatives had been briefed by the Pentagon that object

was the same one that was seen over Montana. Was actually shot down at a distance much lower. It was like twenty five thousand feet. And this one, apparently the pilots say was had an octagonal shape. So for those who are keeping track, I've put this together. It's a real war on geometry. We've got an octagon, we've got a cylinder, we've got something else. Nobody knows what the hell's happened over Alaska. Some of them have no visible

means of propulsion. They're flying all over the place. Forty thousand feet, forty five thousand feet, twenty thousand feet. It was eventually shot down. Any questions, Yeah, a lot of questions. What's happening here? So look, we're about to talk with a great guest, Tom Rogan, an old friend of the show. He's somebody very tapped into this. He's a fore UFO people. You will know Tom. He's done some great reporting on this.

Now the reason why and I thought about this all the way back from kind of the beginning we were talking about the balloon, which is Christopher mellen, former cust Secretary of Defense, another person very big in the UFO community, has been talking about this for a long time. Here's the consider this reality. This isn't a new phenomenon. We

just recalibrated our sensors. So what they've been talking about crystal is and Christopher Mellon has said this, Look, we gather all this data, but the way that we decipher that data is what tells us everything. Us nor AD radar sensors and all that they're calibrated for enemy aircraft. They were not calibrated for these smaller balloons and other

type of objects. Hence, why whenever we found out that the Trump administration during that time that there were two Chinese overflights of balloons that happened at that time, they only discovered that after the fact because they rolled through the past data. So here's what happened after the balloon. They have recalibrated the data to actually make it sensitive to identify anything as small as a Volkswagen Beetle car.

That's one of the reasons why a lot of what we're discovering our quote unquote car size car size objects. So Tom put this out there. Let's put this up there on the screen. He says, quote likely all of these scrambles for objects are not because the objects just started flying around, but because Norrad expanded its radar hits of interest to include balloons and smaller objects. And also it's political so that the White House told the Pentagon

to tell Norrad intercept immediately if there is any doubt. Now, once again we have zero indication of what these objects are. I will leave it up to all of the imagination. I wouldn't dare speculate here on the show, but you can tell I'm excited. At the same time, it's a

global phenomenon. People, let's put this up there. We've had two separate instances now, the Uruguayan Air Force saying that there were quote flashing lights in the sky over their airspace, and actually China scrambling some jets and saying that they were intercepting some sort of unidentified flying object spotted near the Yellow Sea, so it's almost like a UFO swarm,

if you will. And then the final my personal favorite, while we were all watching the super Bowl, or some people were watching the Super Bowl by the way, condolences to my girlfriend's father, big Eagles fan. I feel bad for the guy this more, but congratulations is one of our cameraman who's one of the biggest Chiefs fans that you will ever meet. Congratulations Coviyn. Let's go ahead and

play this clip. During the Super Bowl, the Pentagon was still giving a press conference about the object that we shot down yesterday over lake here on where he will not rule out the possibility of extraterrest real life. Let's take a listen. Have you ruled out aliens or extra terrestrials and if so, why, because that is what everyone is asking us right now. Thanks for the question, Helene. I'll look the intel community and the counter intelligence community

figured that out. I haven't ruled out anything. At this point. We continue to assess every threat or potential threat unknown that approaches North America with an attempt to identify it. I haven't ruled out anything extraordinary. That is one of the most extraordinary quotes that I've ever heard ever. So, I mean, look, I don't know what to say. Again, my personal bias has been that we have no idea what's been flying around up there for a long time. Also,

here's the other thing. Everyone's like, oh, it's clearly balloons. If they were balloons, they would say, so all right, Like it was the Chinese balloon. We could see it from the naked eye, we had the video. If it was if there was even a string, they would tell us it was a balloon. They're not saying it's a balloon. The people who are one tiny, little, one little string hanging off that thing, they'd be like, oh, it's a balloon, don't worry about it. They the reason why they're telling

us they don't know is because they don't know. And from the pilots. Look these pilots, they're standing up for themselves. They're coming out and they're telling everybody exactly what they saw. They're like, look, we got no visible Everyone's like, oh, well, balloons, balloons don't have visible means of propulsion. That's actually not true. All modern spy balloons are equipped with propulsion that was

including the Chinese balloon. By the way, part of why the explanation for why it blew off course was ludicrous because they actually have motors on board, including our spy balloons. Okay, so let's put that one out the window too. Is in terms of the descriptions of these objects, we've got cylindrical, we've got diagonal, octagon, if you will consider also that that broadly conforms with some of the past UFO videos

have been put out from twenty seventeen onwards. We have a gamble video, we have a triangle UFO, We've got pyramid videos that have come out, you know, so there's some dispute on the pyramid UFO, but look, the point is is that we have had irregular shapes, geometric shapes like this that have been well described by pilots who have spotted these things. The tic TAC as well, also cylindrical.

So this is an extraordinary event. And here's the thing, Christal, I know there's a lot of skepticism from people, rightfully, I mean think it should be. There's a lot of toxic Is this a syop all of that? I am going to err on the side of incompetence and what I've always aired on with UFOs, which is they're not trying to spin you. They have no idea what's going on. That's always been my theory, and they're too afraid to tell us we don't know what's going on up there. Yes, yeah,

it really does. So I buy the idea that, Okay, after the Chinese by balloon situation, and that was like an embarrassing situation administration, they recalibrate the radars and now they're picking up all of these things that it's not that they weren't there before, it's that we just weren't detecting them before. That part I buy. But that still leaves the gigantic question of, Okay, well, then what the

hell are they look? Maybe they're all Chinese, maybe they're all from the same sort of like Chinese buy program. Taiwan is out saying, listen, this happens to us all the time. By the way, China is out this morning now accusing us of flying a bunch of by balloons over their territory. They're like, they've done this to us ten times, which I don't doubt, by the way, so they're like, why are you so upset when you're doing the same stuff to us over here. Could be all Chinese,

but we just don't know. And to your points, I mean, the first one was very obvious. It literally had Chinese characters on it, like it was not in doubt. It was clearly a balloon, clearly had Chinese characters on it. So why are they having so much trouble describing what these are and explaining some American people what is going on? There's other little questions too, like why did Trudeau need us to get involved and shooting down the one over

their territory? What's that all about? And then lastly, and then we'll go ahead and bring in our guests. So maybe I'm sure he doesn't have any definitive answers to these either, but he has a lot of insight into what might be going on here. There's an interesting edit

in the New York Times regarding the extraterrestrial piece. So before that press conference with the NORAD commander when he said listen can't rule anything out, they had this line in the New York Times article that said the incursions seemed to become so common that Biden administration officials have found themselves issuing private assurances that there is no evidence that they involve extraterrestrial activity, but officials also acknowledge privately

that the longer they are unable to provide a public explanation for the provenance of the objects, the more speculation grows, so revealing their little piece of inside reporting that even Biden administration officials are having to tell people around them like, I really don't think that it's extraterrestrial activity, which is remarkable in and of itself, but also an acknowledgment there

that they can't really rule anything out now. Once the press conference happened and they got that answer from the NORAID commander, they updated with that answer and actually removed that piece about the internal Biden administration sort of deliberations and the way that they've had been having to issue guidance privately to people around them. But it is a it is just a remarkable situation, more questions than answers

at this point. We have no idea. And the other thing is we've had some cleanup, you know, from some of these officials. They'll come out and they'll be like, well, it was it resembled a balloon. It's like, well, okay, well was it a balloon? Or not. And once again, none of the debris has been recovered from any of these sites, which I don't know if you remember this.

We had that Chinese balloon in a boat like three hours later there was video literally of like guys on the scene with high resolution cameras who were capturing US Navy divers bringing the balloon into the boat. So where was suddenly? Look, you can I get that it's far away. Last time I checked, we created a thing called helicopters, So you know, I'm pretty sure that we'll be able to just fly to wherever the thing is and take it up and then right there. Yeah, and then yes,

and what we have bases all over Alaska. You're really telling me that we can rescue somebody in a coast guard waters where you can't go out on the ice and go grab this thing or what. We don't have drones that can get high resolution footage. The sun doesn't shine up in Alaska, same in La. You know, I was saying, you know some amateurs who live around that area. I'm not saying you should do this, but if you were to get in your boat and go check it out for us, that would be great because I would

really I would really like to do. What the hell is going on? No photos, no forensics. All we have is actually, this is the real disservice that'll end on before we bring tomm in. All we have our anonymous leaks. Pilots say this, Some say that, oh well, it resembled a balloon, but it didn't. It wasn't definitively a balloon. Officials speculate enough enough. You cannot have this. I mean, this is one of the most again historically, this has

never happened before in American history. Three subsequent shootdowns in less than a week all over US airspace of completely unidentified objects, and where is the president? The guy doesn't give us a press conference. I mean, people are rightfully scared, and they're like trying to figure out what the hell is going on. So anyway, we'll end it there. That's all we know at this time. You know, in terms of speculation, we'll do our best to go and bring

you guys much more detail. We let's ahead and bring in our friend Tom Rogan, the show's standing by. Let's put him up here on the screen, Old friend Tom. Good to see you, Thanks for joining the show man. Good to be with you. Guys. Thanks Tom, you've been doing a lot of reporting on this. We read your tweet earlier about the recalibration of NORAD and systems. What is your read on this situation right now? What are

your sources telling you? Well, I think the fundamental point that you guys just hit on there is number one. The government really has caught itself in a web here by basically playing down, along with a lot of people in the media, quite frankly, the idea that some UFOs are you know, truly unknown and to your point saga that we still don't have debris recovery officially for these

most recent incidents. I think beggars belief based on how the military operates, you know, I fundamentally that I don't think is true. I think they just don't know, at least in a couple of these cases what they shot down. And now they've opened, you know, the basket of worms

by recalibrating the radar systems and their intercepts. So as before they could say that, you know, some of the more unusual UFOs, let's say, to be generous, are you know, sensor aberrations things that you know it's a win the radar is misaligned, et cetera. It's too small to be

a concern. We can just ignore it now because of their changes, because it's political, because of the balloon they're running up and intercepting all this stuff that's probably been there for a very long time and they don't know quite how to deal with. Then. I think the secondary point that's really interesting is the media spin now is well,

there's no evidences extraterrestrial. Well, obviously, I mean, what are they expecting there that there's going to be some communication between these drones and something, you know, in outer space in a foreign language. What they're not saying, though, is

there's evidence here of unconventional technology and capability. The closest we've got to that, which is the most compelling statement, I think, is the norried commanders saying we don't know how it's staying aloft and propulsion, which really roots back to the more extraordinary UFOs. Anyway, unconventional technology quite frankly means it ain't US, and it probably ain't China and

Russia in terms of these capabilities. What we really need to see now, I think, is what is some of the radar showing with what these objects have been doing before the intercept. Have they been moving in ways that really then gets to you know, very far our speeds for example, an anti potentially you know, anti gravity style behavior.

Excellent point. Yeah, those are all great points. You know, we've obviously been covering here that preliminary assessment about the unidentified aerial phenomena, all the reportings and sightings, the videos, the pilot accounts of you know, seeing things that they can't really explain, that moves and ways that seem to defy physics and technology as we understand it. How do these limited descriptions we have of these objects dovetail with

some of those earlier sightings and accounts. Well, I think that the fundamental point goes back to clearly the military knows enough, or at least elements of the military know enough to know that these are you know, unconventional and when we look at you know, the reporting in recent years that unfortunately has been kind of limited to limited journalists wanting to do this, there are the things we would look for in terms of saying that something truly

you know, extraordinary is going on with some UFOs with a very small percentage of UFOs, is you know, hypersonic instantaneous acceleration, trans medium travel, can go under water without cavitation, which is air bubbles so that the submarines will pick them up. On sonar, the ability to kind of stop on a dime, the ability to incur what we would perceive to be you know, g forces raising into the hundreds.

What is really notable though, and I think goes back to that stigma point which is so central to this topic, and frankly, I think underlines where there's been such journalistic malpractice and not being willing to turn it from certain folks such as yourself, is the point that the military has been able to somehow, I don't want to say buy off, but blur off members of the media scientific community by saying, oh, that's probably a radar or sonar

or satellite sensor malfunction, even when it correlates with you know, trained aerial observers. The point I always make that was made to me. You don't put someone in charge of sonar on an attack or ballistic missile submarine or a satellite system or at the highest end, you know, one hundred and forty million dollar fighter jet loaded with weapons if you think they might not be playing with a

full deck, right, what they decide to fly. What if they decide to fly off to New York and do a nine to eleven style attack, if they decide to not alert that there's something coming on on the sonar in the submarine, like, this is just not this is ludicrous. The opposite is true. You put the most you know, coached people in charge as such. That is an excellent point. It's like for for people to say, oh, these guys

were mistaken. You're saying that some of the most seasoned warfighters through the Global War on Terror, who have had flown thousands of hours of air missions, who have presumably in countered millions of different objects or whatever, cannot distinguish from their equipment what is an anomaly and what it's actually real. It's completely ridiculous. Tom One thing I think for people at home, I've received a lot of pushback on this. I'm sure you have as well, is this

is a si oup? What are you guys falling for? Clearly this is all in preparation for this. There's a belief that the US government is competent enough or smart enough in able to craft this big narrative here in the lead up to something However, something you and I have discussed privately and often is the truth is is that they're just terrified to say, we have no idea what's going on up there. Giving your own experience, you're

talking with Pentagon intelligence sources and all that. Which one do you think is the actual scenario that's playing out here. I think there's probably a very small element that has sustained really since the Manhattan Project in the Second World War, which has known that there, you know, is there's some other intelligence operating some of these things. But I think broadly the same principles that the military applied to this issue in the nineteen forties and fifties sustains today, which

is to your point, they truly don't know. They know it's not US, Russia or China again in this very small percentile, But when they have the sensor data matched up with pilots, multiple different platforms, mouldible pilots, multiple aircrews and platforms, sonar operators, for example, something really is compelling going on there and they don't know what to do. Right they have it's an unconventional technology, it behaves in

intelligent ways in terms of its counter maneuver. Sometimes when it's intercepted, and there's a tradition of credible witness accounts, police offers and military whatever you want, going back decades

that talk to something going on. Either there is a mass hallucination that ranges over decades and has some kind of you know, telepathic communication based on people who've never met describing similar incidents, or you know, I think the more realistic answer, which is what we are going to I think find out in the next few years simply

because of more journalistic and scientific scrutiny. That lesser point particularly is that really there is something going on here and the government just doesn't know what to do with it, and you know, how do you address that? And so the stigma point make it all a little bit silly and hope these things don't you know, create issues, although if you look at some of the nuclear weapons portfolio with this, there are points I would say of national

security concern. You know, you're right, the government doesn't know what to do about it. Earlier, Tom, you said you felt pretty confident that this couldn't be Russian or Chinese technology. Why do you feel so certain because I think what, you know, what most people have sort of gone to outside of a extraterrestrial explanation is yea, these are probably all likely Chinese. You know, we had the one Chinese Bibles war Chinese by balloons or other sort of surveillance aircraft.

Or maybe they're partnered up with Russia, or maybe Russia has their own capability or some other country, but you know, most likely I think fingers point at those two. What makes you so confident that they don't have the technological sophistication to achieve things that you know, we've been unable to achieve with regards to our own military and surveillance technology. Yeah. I think the first point to note is you know that some of these things will turn out. I mean

these most recent ones. Why I say that is the nor Ed commander's statement that we don't. It's an unconventional

propulsion source. The Chinese and Russian still at their next generation, which we have good insight too, and I meant least people I've taught to we have pretty good insight into how they're developing their next generation of capability, so hypersonic glide vehicles for example, still based on flight surface characteristics, propulsion, and also the fact that these unconventional things have been essentially described for decades in a way that you would expect,

or you would an adversary or the United States would have deployed these interaction to China, for Taiwan, for example, Russia, Ukraine, the United States, so you know, maintain you know, global you know, foreign policy supremacy, whatever you want, they would have delivered. We have no intelligence information to suggest that there's been some breakthrough by these countries over a period

long period of time. And secondly, I think that the point to note is that you know, when you look at things, these most recent incidents that again being described

as unconventional, how are they're operating? Well, you need a launch platform to get them there, right, you need to you know, submarines can launch these things, but it's very hard for submarines to get that close to the United States, certainly very hard for them to operate something that would suddenly appear in the middle of the country, you know,

and so it just doesn't add up. Again, there are like with the with the drone element off the West Coast, some of that although I think more limited than sometimes people or it's not everything. Certainly there is a Chinese the PLA will fly them off tankers, drones, advanced drones, but the unique ones that show again those breakthrough technologies in terms of the data and the witness reports the Tiktak in two thousand and four Dave Raber for example,

that is not China, Russia in the United States. And because it's not that and no other nation, it leaves, you know, either the mass hallucination effect, which I just don't think is credible, or it leaves something truly unconventional

going on. And again, I suppose the top line answer to your question is everyone I've talked to, and I'm sure far better journalists kind of doing the national security have talked to, there is no information to suggest the Chinese or Russians or another actor Ela Musk the United States have these capabilities in a del livered platform. And again we're talking decades here. This isn't just something that

we've started. That's a good point. Let's actually I want to spend time on this just last thing, because this is an important point, which is they're like what you think, China or Russia doesn't have better technology than us. Here's the difference. Hypersonic missiles is an engineering problem conceptually has been known in science for decades. The atomic bomb was also an engineering problem in the nineteen what thirties or something we knew about the possibility of an atomic weapon.

It was just something very difficult to try and create. The SR seventy one Blackbird a technological marvel, but going mock whatever you know, was theoretically possible. Moving this way is not known in modern science, has not been known

even in the physics laboratory for decades. And that's exactly like you'd have to believe that they have an entire are an entire like stack of research and science and R and D developed outside of the United States, which has the most sophisticated and best, you know, academic environment in the world, which you can just go look at the Nobel Prize that that was developed somehow over the last fifty years. And in secret, am I right, Tom and describing it that way? Absolutely? And I think there's

also more data here, you know. I think CNN actually sort of reported on this that some of the sensor systems supposedly with the jets may have been interfered with. One thing that's notable about this is you will get and why it has been perhaps easier for the government to say this is just ignore it. When radar different sensor, you know, imagery in red whatever, but radar is the particular one i've heard will get close to some of

these things. You can get a distorted return that suggests there's some kind of effect on the radar going in and out, like a time dilation whatever. It is something really unconventional that again, we are talking about I think a new type of physics with these most extraordinary small

potential ship of objects. And as you say, you know, we just had the announcement on nuclear fusion, which is nothing compared to what these things seem to exhibit and have seen to exhibit since you know, the nineteen fourties, right, I think it's chat GPT, it's broken loose jet. GPT's got nothing on as much. Okay, they laugh at Chatchy. It's great to see you and wonderful to have your expertise. Thank you so much for taking some time with us today. We may be calling on you again here soon. I

think you will be a fixture on the show. We appreciate it. Man, thanks for coming on. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Yeah, it's our pleasure, all right, all right, guys, So at the same time as whatever is going on in our skys, we also have here down on the ground some twenty twenty four news, especially with regards to the Republican primary. So Nikki Haley, who is beloved by donors and doesn't seem to be particularly beloved by the Republican base, but she thinks she got a shot at

the presidency. She is announcing for president reportedly this week, just days away, and we're already getting a look at what her first campaign ad will be. Let's take a listen. It's the greatest force for good in human history, and we should never be ashamed to say that. For those that don't have our back, we're taking names. I wear heels. It's not for a fashion statement. It's because if I see something wrong, we're going to kick them every single time.

And there it says two fifteen twenty three, where will you stand? That's the date of her reported announcement. Sorry, I'll just go and get your reaction to how do you have a heal? Line? Literally makes me feel gnauxious. I mean not feeling the conservative girl boss should be there. Imagine having millions of dollars at your disposal. Underwritten by Paul singer, the hedge fund billionaire, presumably all of these

people who do politics for a living. And this is the crap that you come up with as your initial teaser video. How can you possibly think that that is going to resonate in any way? And really what has come through is Desanta socide because the only formidable challenge these people's delusions of grandeur is something that I will

never understand. For maybe that's why I'm not a politician, but I cannot understand how you possibly could think anybody cares about you remotely enough that you were going to win the presidency on such a lame ass message. Yeah like that, Well, this is someone who's been living in a bubble for a while, and this is not you know, Nikki,

that's the Mike PUMPEII. I mean a lot of these John Bolton who apparently thinks he's gonna run a bunch of these people, you know, they live in these little elite circles where everybody treats them like their you know, kings and queens. Nicki Haley for former UN ambassador. And then you're in a group of donors who love you and tell you how you're the next big thing and oh it's time for a woman and a woman of color in the Republican Party. And you know they they

bought the hype, They believe their own hype. They drank their own kool aid. However youone ultimately put it. So anyway, she's gonna jump into the race. Here. I'm just gonna Kyle came up with this, love, but I think it's so accurate. She's basically the Kamala Harris of the Republican Party. Wildly overrated. I mean, you can clip out these little the high heel moment or whatever she has there, but if you actually listen to this woman give a speech,

you're gonna get a lot of Kamala Harris vibes. Ultimately. So this is someone the donor class loves, has love for quite a while, has nothing at the core other than like ambition and desire to climb the ladder. And so that's that's starting this week. So good luck to Nikki Haley. At the same time, we have new reporting for The New York Times about the Trump DeSantis fude and how that is developing and Summer England's go and

put this up on the screen from the Times. The headline here is DeSantis's challenge when and how to counterattack Trump, as the former president loves insults and calls him Ronda sanctimonious. Governor Ronan DeSantis is carefully avoiding conflict, but if he

runs for president, as expected, a clash is inevitable. The you know, the long and short of this is something that we've been tracking here closely, which is that it's a tricky maneuver that DeSantis is going to have to pull off here because if you don't engage, than you look weak and you allow Trump to take all these pot shots at you, which he has been and he's been ramping up. He shared the thing last week like claiming that ron DeSantis is the groomer. So if you

don't respond, you look extremely weak. But if you try to get down in the mud with him, like Republicans you know, periodically did, especially during the twenty sixteen primary, that has never worked out for literally anyone on the Republican side. At the same time, they also have some reporting about the way that Trump is talking about him privately. I will read this quote from The New York Times.

Since November, despite the criticism he faced at the time, mister Trump has periodically hit out at his potential rival, albeit to a relatively small audience. He posted his most recent innuendo about the governor on True Social where he has just under five million followers, and he has insulted mister DeSantis in casual conversations, describing him as quote meatball Ron and a parent at his appearance or shut down Ron, a reference to restrictions the governor put in place at

the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic. Now, one thing you got to say about Trump, he is never worried about like being a hypocrite. I mean, Trump is not a svelt man. He doesn't cut a lean picture at this point in his life, but still not afraid to go ahead and throw a jab at Ron RND Sandy. The thing is about Trump, He's been at his size decades now, whereas DeSantis actually was skinny not that long ago, and then became unseemly fat while he was governor, and that

was proud he took some weight off. Look, I mean, I guess I I'll then rond de Santis on this one. A rare moment. Okay, some people struggle with their weight, and clearly this is like a battle that he has on going. Sure, it's fine, it's relatable, it's very relatable. It is relatable. That's said there is accurate. There is something about Trump though. How tall is DeSantis? DeSantis? I

think he might be six' one. Uh. Trump is tall and for some reason, even though he is more overweight than Rhonda Santis, he's one of those people who can like, oh my, the way he wears this. See that's when you're short and you struggle with this makes it hard. It makes sense. Oh but yeah, Trump for some reason because he's tall and like the way he wears his suits and those like long ass ties. For some reason,

Trump's big dude. Yeah, yeah, he just doesn't come. I guess he's got the big frame and like you know, it's just able to carry it. I think Trump is I got nothing against a big boy. That's not my issue with He's like six two sixty three. I think, yeah, he's big, and he's big in stature. I remember seeing I remember, I just remember that whenever I met him. DeSantis never met him. But you know, in terms of the nickname, I think it is certainly going to stick.

And look what I was talking about with delusions of grander. Let's put this up there on the screen. Tim Scott is now raising presidential buzz with super Pac highers. And actually, just this morning, Crystal, it broke in the Wall Street Journal. It says Tim Scott prepares a presidential wow run. I mean, these people are they are so delusional taking steps running for president. People familiar with this plan said, looking to

rest the party mantle from former President Trump. Yeah, good luck with that, Timlow, I'm sure that you are exactly the person that people are turning to. I mean this this has Scott Walker vibes written all over it. Let's try and to sign so. I think Nikki is the Tim paul Enti of the race. Tim Scott is the Scott Walker of the race. Both these people, as you know, are going to have ungodly amounts of money underwriting their campaign from donors who want to move on from Trump.

DeSantis is the only He's kind of the Ted Cruz figure. He's the only credible, actual challenge to Trump. But as with Cruz, you know, Cruz at the end of the day was not able to unsee Trump because he did not have the capability to unite the party behind him

in an actual head to head matchup. He always had Rubio in the race, or he had John Kasick in the race, and then with the delegate math, Trump would just get forty, sometimes fifty, especially as the race continued to go on and he wins the nomination, Trump actually comes in with even more of the benefit on his side in a non head to head matchup, with such

a consolidated part of the base that's behind him. And just as we predicted, you know, you always can never these people are never going to do what is in that is in the party's best say, yeah, they're egomaniacal narcissists in a lot of ways. The Democrats are more willing to fall in line. You know, with klobchar and Buddha Jeedge bowing to President Obama, They're like, oh, yeah, we're out. Yeah, Elizabeth Warren staying in and you know it would have been helpful if she got act. Every

single person played their part. No, it's true. The Republicans, I mean, ever since twenty sixteen, really have had less control over their candidate field and over the party from like sort of the top down. And maybe it's been

that way for a while. I think Republicans weirdly are more responsive to their base for whatever reason, than the Democratic Party is just a weak party leadership and the Democratic Party exerts stronger control, which I think is a negative thing, by the way, but that's I believe an accurate description of the two parties. And yeah, the irony here is all of these people who have the view okay, it's time to move on from Trump. By all of them jumping into the race, they're helping to ensure that

the party will not be moving on from Trump now. Personally, I think even if it was head to head Trump versus DeSantis, I still think that's a tough road for DeSantis. The base of the party still loves Donald Trump. And as we've said a million times, it's one thing to be kind of out there, you know, doing your thing as governor, just weighing and occasionally say, hey, look at

the scoreboard, or we did well in Florida. It's another thing to be on a debate stage with this guy and have him telling you your you know, meetball Ron and shut down Ron, and Ron to sanctimonius and you're a groomer and whatever, straight to your face. When you are in that situation trying to take the high road and just make a kind of offhand comment about it. A check the scoreboard. It's not going to be sufficient. You're going to look weak in that situation if you

don't have a more forceful response. It's a very challenging situation ultimately for them to be able to navigate. I know, by the way, even if Ron DeSantis did win the nomination, then you have the prospect of is Trump going to endorse him? Is Trump going to actually run third party? I think it's more likely he would just you know, running third parties like a lot of work and requires organization,

et cetera. I think it's more likely he would just take shots and not be a good soldier and you know, deplete sort of some of the energy among the Republican base. And then that's if you lose even a little bit of ground with your own people, then that's going to be devastating the general election. So I don't see a chance in hell, especially in a divided field. Now, look, I could be totally wrong, and there's a lot of

crazy stuff that could happen. It's just look with Desanders as you know, the idea of Trump telling that story about this guy like interrupting him. He begged with tears in his eyes for my endorsement, and you can see Desanters tenses up. He gets un comfortable in those press distances. My friend Henry Rogers asked him about it, and he was like, look, look, this is the press thing. He like pivots to where he's comfortable attacking the media. He

pivots to I'm moving on. You know, look at the scoreboard. Actually was the best moment, and it's because he wasn't defensive, it was offensive well, and he had planned this out. Yeah, and obviously that was a plan line. It's just a good one. It's very different, you know, having a plan line and being able to deliver it is very different from having to respond in real time. And we did get a taste of that. I mean, obviously one for

governor quite easily. But there were moments in his gubernatorial debates where you know, he got asked like, oh, so you're just you're are you going to serve for the full four years? And he didn't have a prepared response, and he just kind of awkwardly stared into the camera and looked very flat footed, and then delivered one of these sort of like can prepared lines, so we'll see how it all goes. Listen, we're like facing an alien invasion right now, so I don't put anything is off

the table whatsoever. But all of this cast of characters deluding themselves into thinking that they have a shot and going ahead and present, preparing their campaigns and having money behind them too. By the way, they're not just out there on a limb by themselves. They've got billionaire backing. This is uh, you know, this is the greatest gift you could possibly give to Donald Trump. You got to admit that, for funny's sake, the idea of aliens coming

down in the first beating they meet is Trump. That's pretty funny. Yeah, you gotta say that. That would be He'd be like, they were like really, like, you're the leader of previous Okay, you're the most powerful person. Surreal timeline. I can possibly not saying it's aliens, but I certainly hope they are. Okay, let's go ahead and move on to Ukraine. So we had a fascinating moment here in Washington, Lula, the president of Brazil, newly elected, visiting DC, visiting allies.

A Stafford interview actually with CNN's Christian amanpur where she pressed him over Ukraine and he refused to bow to say that he would send arms to Ukraine, instead pressing for negotiation. Extraordinary actually for any major power in the global style or really anywhere to talk this way. Let's take a listen to what he said. It looks like you're going to come up against President Biden on a key defense of the United States of democracy around the world,

and that is Ukraine. You do not believe, I don't think in the Western support for Ukraine's defense, and you have said it many times. Why not? And some people have asked, in fact an article, why is Lula so committed to democracy at home and not abroad. I am highly committed with the markets in any part of the planet Earth. What I believe is that in the case of Ukraine and Russia, it is necessary to have someone

talking about peace. It's necessary that we should build up interacts to talk with the different parties that are in confrontation. That's my thesis. We need to find interlock Aitrage that could sit with Breton Guten and show to him the mistake that he made to invade the territory integrity of the Ukrainian territory, and we have to show to Ukraine that they have to talk more so that we can avoid this war. We have to stop the war. And

so why I'm going to talk with President Bidy. I don't know what he's going to say to me, but what I want to say to him is the following. It is necessary to build a set of countries to negotiate peace. And he as you wants to pursue methods to Ukraine, and you said, no, no, there's not the tanks. It was ammunition, okay, O, ammunition it was I didn't want to send because if I sent to the ammunition, I would join the war. If I sent the ammunition

from Brazil, the ammunition that you're asking for. But you just agreed that it was the fest will take us to war. I don't want to go join the war. I want to end with the war. I don't want to join the war. I want to end with the war. Ah, that was an extraordinary moment there. I mean, I have not heard that from a major leader. Let's go and

put this up there on the screen. So actually, while he was here in Washington, President Biden pressed him heavily to actually send ammunition to Ukraine, and he refused President Biden to his face, saying that that was not what was going to happen. He condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine, but he suggested that Zelenski, share Selensky and NATO at least quote share some blame for the war. And he's refusing to sell weapons to Ukraine to try and maintain

neutrality in the conflict. So he says, quote, we need to find interlocutors who can sit with President Putin to show him the mistake he made to invade Ukraine's territory. We have to show Ukraine that they need to talk more so we can end this war. So you haven't heard this from anybody. I think the craziest part was when he said I don't want to join this war. I want to end this war, and talking about the

conditions necessary to push towards a negotiation. Now, look, obviously Brazil, they're probably not going to turn the conflict either way. But you know, it represents millions and millions of people, one of the biggest powers in all of Latin America. So what his position is on this could be a leading indicator, at least from their position in some room for dissent in kind of the global environment, and it would also be possible President Putin sees this, this could

be a major opening right now. As to Lula's own role in perhaps bringing an end to this, I mean that's clearly his view is he wants to maintain somewhat of a neutral stance so that he could be trusted as a figure to be involved in potential negotiations to bring this thing to an end. And you know, I'm joining my monologue today on an extraordinary interview from the former Israeli Prime minister indicating again something we already had hints of, but confirmed that early in this process there

was a potential peace deal that was coming together. No guarantees, no one's saying it was certain, but according to the Israeli Prime minister, there was like a fifty to fifty shot, and the US and NATO, but led by the US, actively said we don't want the deal, we want the war.

So Lula's perspective here that he's offering where he's talking about, he's critical of Biden, and he has been before in a Time magazine interview where he was saying, listen, before this war started he could have flown to Moscow, he could have engaged war. Instead, they sort of laughed off Putin's proposals and his red lines, and of course, you know, with regards to NATO, ignored them for decades. This is a view that is actually widespread outside of the US

and outside of Western media. It's just extremely rare that a US audience actually hears another way of looking at this conflict, and another way of looking at the history and how we got there and exactly who is to blame and how much. Now, obviously, as we have said a million times here, Russia is to blame for the invasion. To ignore all the context of how we got here, and to just paint Putin as this like madman who can't be reasoned with, means that, of course you're not

going to support diplomatic negotiations. At the same time, Rand Corporation, which is largely funded by the Pentagon, is out saying the most likely outcome here is not that Russia will win, our Ukraine will win, but that we will have a stalemate and that it is a disaster if we end

up in a long war. It's very difficult, though, given how long this has already gone on and the level of atrocities that have been committed to now get back to the peace table and negotiating table and be able to come up with the type of deal that was

coming together in the early days. So, you know, I really commend Lula for sticking to his guns here, for not mincing words, for laying out exactly how he sees this conflict, and just to give you, you know, a sense of this guy and how different the way that he talks about this conflict is from anything that you hear in the US press. In that Time magazine article, he was talking about Zelensky and he said, listen, you're encouraging this guy. And then he thinks, ses the cherry

on your cake, we should be having a serious conversation. Okay, you were a nice comedian, but let us not make war for you to show up on TV. He then went on to be very critical of Putin as well. So this is someone who has been unafraid of speaking a very different way about this conflict than anything you're

going to hear anywhere else. Oh. Absolutely, Okay, So let's move on to the next part here about the actual offensive, and this will be this really is the testing ground of what a quote unquote stalemate might even look like, and how Russia has, if at all, regrouped, what their power will look like. Let's put this up there on the screen. Russian offensive and Ukraine appearing to begin some

of the preliminary movements. So we've had operations and treat movements around eastern Ukraine that have sharply increased sharply in the last couple of months as we move away from the more muddier season and the ground becomes easier to use. So here's what they say. They believe that the pace of Moscow operations over the past week has accelerated, specifically in western Luhansk, citing a lot of new skirmishes that are happening along the front line with marginal advances in

that region. So it now appears to be committing a much more of its forces that were held in reserve ever since that highly controversial military draft that happened last fall, and what the actual push on the line will look like remains unclear. So there's thirty different settlements all across eastern Ukraine which have come under intense fire over the

last couple of months. Specifically, Also, we remember Bachmut which President Zelensky visited here visited immediately before visiting the United States. What they say is that the all out, the all out multi front assault is very unlikely to occur at the same moment. Instead, they will likely prioritize a major

advance aimed at seizing the Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts. Present indicators suggest that Moscow is planning to launch this defensive sometime in late February and in mid March, So the traditional skirmishes, getting the intelligence, getting the men ready, moving material and supplies all up to the front line, a beer to be coming. Now. This is also going to be a big test for Ukrainians. Ukrainians had that stunning Spring offensive where they took back a tremendous amount of

territory relative to what was expected of them. Now we've been pumping them full of billions of dollars. We've got new weapons systems that are on the ground there, the tanks and all that are not operational, as I believe, because they still need to be trained on. But nonetheless, you know, they've been able to regroup, they've been pounded

from Russian air power. But they've got now to test whether they can keep some of the areas that they withhold, and can they withstand against the actual Russian offensive, whether it turns into a stalemate or not, is all going to be proven probably in the next two or three months or so of probably terrible fighting, which is really

you know, that's the saddest part. Yeah, absolutely, no, I mean, the general understanding is Thatussia's goal in this new offensive would be to take back the parts of the Donbass region that they had lost Ukraine in particular in that

spring offensive. You know, the tanks haven't arrived yet. There's a reason why Zelenski has been flying around, you know, really putting the screws to leaders in the West to provide fighter jets and other capabilities, because they know that ultimately, i mean, the fundamental balance in this conflict remains what it was on day one, even as Russia has dramatically underperformed, which is, Russia just has way more men that they can ultimately throw at this thing if they want, way

more munitions, way more of an industrial base, and so you know, Zelenski and Ukraine are wholly dependent on the West providing the resources and material that they need in order to be able to maintain their position. Or push forward. But again, you know, the most likely outcome here isn't that Ukraine is able to achieve total victory, and isn't that Russia is able to achieve total victory. It's a brutal, bloody stalemate that could go on endlessly if there isn't

some attempt at a diplomatic resolution. Yeah, that's really where things appear to stand right now. We've got some maps we can put up on the screen there. People are interested, and it just shows what we were talking about those who are watching, where the actual frontline is in the dun Boss and where some of the expected war will

take place. So it's going to be a big, big testing ground for the Ukrainian forces and for the Russian forces frankly, because if they crumble, or if this doesn't it's not victorious, even without any of the advanced weapons that we have provided to Ukraine, then Russia is in some serious trouble. In the years to comment, it would only really mean that they're going to have to escalate even more, perhaps another draft of vicious cycle there. So either side has got a lot to lose based on

what the outcome is here. Yes, indeed, all right, there is no way for me to make a segue to our next Stas segment eloquently, but we wanted to give you a little update continued mister Beast arrangement syndrome. As we covered here previously, mister Beast put out a video gigantic YouTube star. For those of you who don't, I'm sure most of you do. I mean, he's actually the top YouTube creator in the entire world, so very famous

and successful guy. He's known for these sort of acts of random charity and giveaways, and one of his most recent videos he paid for a thousand people to have their blindness treated so that they were no longer visually

impaired and able to see again. He went into the data about how many people around the world suffer from curable blindness, and he was you know with people in the United States, where it's disgusting that they wouldn't have access to this, to this surgery without mister Beast coming in and paying for it. So you know, most normal people, in fact, I would say, all normal people look at this and go, that's good that he did that, right, that's great. A thousand people who wanted to see can see. Now,

that's school all right, let's move on. But that hasn't stopped some people from being deeply offended by the fact that, you know, mister Beast took this approach, let's gun and put this up on the screen. This is from tech Crunch headline here mister Beast's blindness video puts systemic ablism on display. Let me read you a little bit from

this piece. Recently, Megastar creator mister Beasts posted a video to his YouTube in which he spotlights numerous blind and visually impaired people who have undergone a surgical procedure that quote cures their blindness. As in this writing, the video has been viewed more than seventy six million times, and the responses have been visceral in both praise and contempt.

For his part, mister Beast has taken to Twitter to publicly bemoan the fact that so many are so angry at him for putting on what amounts to a publicity stunt under the guise of selfless charity. The truth is straightforward, the video was more ablest than altruistic. His reasoning that he lays out in this article. He says, in the broadest lens, the biggest problem with wanting to cure blindness is that it reinforces a moral superiority of sorts by

those without disabilities over those who are disabled. Although not confronted nearly as often as racism and sexism, systemic ableism is prev if they're on all parts of society. The fact of the matter is that the majority of abled people viewed disability as a failure of the human condition. As such, people with disability should be mourned and pitied. More pointedly, as mister b stated in his videos thumbnail,

disability should be eradicated or cured. Okay, so the argument here is that rather than you know, people getting help if they wanted to you know, recover their vision manting, these people had been you know, had had perfect vision and then had become visually impaired. They wanted this surge. They wanted to be able to see again. It's not like mister Beast was like holding people down who were like, no, I'm good, I actually have like embraced my situation and

my disability and I'm happy. Which if that's you, got more power to you, that's beautiful. But these are people who wanted to be able to see. So it's not like he was like holding them down and forcing them to cure their disability in a way that they didn't want. It's like the Jack Nicholson of having your your eye what does that movie one flew out of the whatever, I'm too young for that anyway, the Jack and Lilson meum of having his eyes like forced open and mister

beast is there like hearing their blindless? No, like this is outright of course. Taylor Lorenz, by the way, got in on the action saying, clockwork Orange there it is, thank you, producer Griffin in my ear. So what do they what do we learn from this, which is that these somehow I don't know why these people despise someone being successful by helping people by hearing their blind list.

I will never understand it, Taylor Lorenz, you know, tweeting this out as if it's some like incredible, you know, think piece that we're supposed to cherish this other sided perspective. What it look if he was saying I can't even believe that people live this way, you know, denigrating them or something, Okay, then I think that's a totally different case. And doing it not even really in an altruistic way, but doing it in a way where he's clearly doing

it for clout or something like that. That'd be also another way of this by all accounts, I mean, watch video. People, I really real people are like it's it's emotional, like people are crying, there are families, they are happy because getting some of the money. They were like breaking down and enjoy and tears and they were I mean, it's a tough one to watch. And as you watch said in your monologue, the point is that such systems shouldn't even exist, right, It's like, how many more millions are

afflicted by this? And what could we do as a society to make sure that it doesn't happen anymore. That's a perfect takeaway, one of which he came away with. At first. You know, we were thinking these are just fringe, strange characters, but no, I mean this is a mainstream look for people who don't know. Tech Crunch is a highly influential publication in Silicon Valley. Like this is as establishment as it gets for a lot of people in

the tech industry. And I'm mystified as to what exactly even compels somebody like Taylor or someone like this guy Stephen Aquino by the way a Quino. He's a Twitter account by the way, because oh really, because of all that criticism. And Stephen, Stephen himself of which she talks about in the piece, has a number of disabilities, and

in his view, okay, he embraces his disabilities. He doesn't want to you know, be quote unquote creed for them or over or like, you know, have them treat or whatever, because he feels like they've made him who he is. So that's the way that he's approached. That's fine, beautiful, wonderful, But why are you he says, he's not judging these people who wanted to have their vision treated and restored.

But that's kind of the subtext here, is that if you have a disability and you would prefer to recover your vision or be able to see for the first time, then that's sort of a failing on your part. So he projects a lot of like, oh, able body people, they have a moral superiority over people with disabilities, which

doesn't come out in this mister Beat's video whatsoever. But the subtext of this piece is some moral superiority over people with disabilities who choose to embrace those disabilities versus those who choose to have them treated. That's the real moral superiority that I see coming through in this piece. So there's a lot going on there, but ultimately, mister Beast did nothing wrong. That's mine. They didn't do a

damn thing wrong. And I actually think it's important to people because you know, it's not like people in the mainstream press are speaking out and saying that Taylor is psychotic or Steven Aquino psychotic for going after mister Beats like that. They're mostly they'll roll their eyes in private, but people need to come out and be like, hey, what are you talking about. You're crazy. You're actually insane if you have this perspective. So anyway, I think we

should stand up for the guy. I really do feel bad because, you know, of all, this is probably the best video he's arguably ever done. Squid Game, even just because it helped so many people, is not just some individual person, and it actually raised a real I think for a lot of younger people who watched this. Really, Hey, I had no idea that this even existed. Yeah, that's

a great thing. Yeah, bring people most of I'm not a big mister Beef consumer, but I've watched a number of his videos, and you know, most of them are not political at all. There's no underlying political message whatever this one there actually was. I mean, you talked about the statistics the number of people whould have their vision restored for one of this simple ten minute surgery, and so you know, on the contrary, it just it wasn't

just like you know, a neutral here. The fact that you're raising awareness about how morally bankrupt this disgusting healthcare system for profit healthcare system that we have here, and the feelings that you know around the world as well, that you're raising awareness about that, that's that's a positive thing. That's a great thing. That's reaching people who otherwise may not have really thought that through. That are just you know,

mister Beast's consumers and they're not deeply political. So anyway, that's my view on it. There you go, all right, Tiger, are you looking at Well, We've been talking a lot here in recent weeks about childhood obesity and the role, if any, that the government can play in shaping it. Philosophically, it's actually a very difficult question. Individually. You can zoom in on parents, you can blame them for an obese kid, but what if the parents themselves are obese and then

have been since children. What if they can't afford to eat healthier or what if they honestly just don't know anything about nutrition. To me, I like to focus in on those questions cost information policy. I'm not and would never claim that the US government can solve childhood obesity, but something I am claiming is that in an aggressive effort on the part of state local governments with the FEDS,

could meaningfully affect it. I mean, just consider this, A ten percent drop in childhood obesity means literally millions of children will not be afflicted with a lifelong problem. The numbers are staggering considering just how many kids and adults in the US are on track for terrible health over the course of their entire lives. That's why I started paying attention and in in the last few days to a really interesting story out of New Mexico where traditional parts

and blinders were not on display. Instead, we had a novel incident a lawmaker who just kind of wanted to help children and he was crushed by a big soda lobby. So New Mexico State Senator Greg Schmidi's he's a Republican, but probably more importantly for this story, Also, a practicing surgeon introduced a bill to prohibit the sale of in New Mexico public schools from pre k to high school. Importantly, his bill would only apply to school hours. It had

exceptions for after school events like concession sales. Here too, it's also worth pausing we are not talking about adults, like Michael Bloomberg's proposed ban from a few years ago. I am of the opinion adults can make choices for themselves. If they want to be obese and they want to drink sixty ounces of soda, be my guest. I myself drink a seven to eleven big gulp of diet soda once a week. I am not perfect. Every time I drink it. I know it's not good for me. I

like it. What can I say? But there's a big difference than in an adult with a fully formed brain, well aware of the trade offs being made with soda, and a child whose dopamine center is being hijacked by sugar. The discussion, at the very least, I think is important, and we need to develop parameters about children and protecting them in an environment where the state, by definition is

responsible for their well being. Perhaps even more important than the idea than the bill, it's how viciously it was fought by big soda. According to the Senate, after he introduced his bill, Coca Cola flew six executives on a private jet immediately to New Mexico to kill the bill. They understood perfectly that if you let even a smaller population state like New Mexico ban soda, that the headlines would be devastating and that all other states might start

asking questions. In fact, it's not just Coca Cola that got in on the action. After the bill was successfully killed, you had Pepsi Co executives doing backflips in the local press. New Mexico local media quoted in an executive who told them, quote, the bill is not needed. Why because quote current USDA regulations already limit beverage calories and schools are in place and followed by schools in New Mexico. Hmm, that actually

gives a way whole game right now. While the USDA does discourage the sale of caffeinated beverages in schools, it still allows it. In fact, the regulations say, quote lower calorie beverages with up to forty calories per eight ounces or sixty calories per twelve ounces may be sold in up to twelve ounce portions. As the Senator said in his hearing quote, who are you going to trust more beverage companies or our committee to care for our children?

Despite his plea, senators killed the bill why because they expressed concern that it would hurt sports and community programs, despite the explicit carve out in the bill for those very activities. You want to tell me with a straight face that the big soda lobby didn't have anything to do with destroying that bill or rigging those USDA regulations. Hmm, Look, are there bigger fish to fry when it comes to

childhood obesity? Absolutely, But as I've laid out here before, the sugar industry has already rigged the system with the FDA where you can have a quote healthy food label on your food and you can't discriminate against the amount of sugar in a label product. Sugar consumption over the course of our lives has skyrocketed, especially in the last fifty years. It is unquestionably a major contributor to childhood obesity.

Simply it's palatable. Unfortunately, in reverse, a similar Parson fight is actually playing out in a state of New York. Mayor Eric Adams, who I have major difference agreements and is pushing of vegan diets and meatless food, is trying to restrict the sale of chocolate milk in school. In response, Representative Elise Stefonic, who Trump has actually touted as potential successor for defending him on TV, introduced a bill and I'm not joking, to require chocolate milk in all schools

across the country. Her statement reads quote and Mayor Adams fails to understand that delicious flavored milk is how many of our kids access the essential nutrients in dairy for their development, and taking options away from children is not the answer. Hm who wants to ask the congresswoman why exactly chocolate milk is delicious? It's because of the sugar in it. In fact, the average school chocolate milk in

the United States has a full twelve grams of added sugar. Sure, it is not as bad as a full sugar soda, but this is a game of inches literally in terms of restricting weight bands. I want to reiterate again, if you are an adult, go for it. But schools we have a say We should not let partisan blinders push us away from talking about what we give kids while they're at school. More so, we cannot let big moneyed interests buy off representatives to quash even the slightest attempts

at getting kids slightly healthier. This entire episode is a very small glimpse into what we're all up against, and I hope everybody is paying attention because it will only get worse in the years to come. Yeah, the chocolate milk thing is really glad you got that, to be fair. I mean, look with Eric Adams, he's trying to require plant based milk. And by the way, there's all kinds of problems with plant based even if you go in

the production. So I'm not defending the guy on its merits, but if you're trying to have a baseline conversation of like, okay, should we have healthier milk in school or not, chocolate milk is not in that discussion. And she wants to require She's like, we should give our kids options. Really, you should give kids options. They're like five years old. What do you think they're gonna be. You're gonna pick

the sugary one, obviously, they're gonna pick the sugar one. Yeah, it makes me think back to the whole culture war about Michelle Obama during the Obama administration, because this was one of her bay like childhood nutrition and like exercise and fitness for kids whatever. That was like her thing that she really focused on as first Lady. And there was this whole culture war freak out I remember over on Fox News about like you'll take our school lunch

cookies from our cold dead hands, et cetera. And at the time I just thought it was like sort of general Obama derangement. That was certainly a part of it. But now I look at it a lot differently of the sort of industry interests behind the scenes that also had, you know, a deep vested financial interest in keeping things exactly as they were. Oh yeah. And then the soda thing though, I mean, it's one of those things where nobody would pay attention to this. I happen to come

across it because Cali means flagged it for me. But you got this like, look, he's in New Mexico State Centator. Nobody's paying attention to this, right, He's just surgeon. He's like, this is crazy. We shouldn't have so and then there. I mean, I don't know how you feel about this, Like I don't think it's the end of the world. You don't sell soda at a freaking football game, but whatever. All right, So they're like, oh, this might hurt Concession Stay.

It's like, all right, fine, we'll fund them for they although that probably shouldn't be the way we fund our football teams. Whatever. So he carves out all of that. They still kill it based upon based upon those fake concerns after the lobbyist Coca Cola fly over there and if you think they weren't doling out money of some kind, yeah, in some way, you're crazy. And then they kill us

on the state legislator level. They've got vending machines in my kids' elementary school, and they're constantly asking can I bring a dollar for the man? Like no, And there's nothing but crap in those things, like why is there a vending machine in an elementary school whatsoever? And this isn't a school where they're like hosting football games or whatever.

There's no reason for them to be that. Look if you put them in the teacher's launch and you know, and the adults in the school, Okay, fine, but to have access for five and six year olds to be able to, like, you know, get their soda or their cookies or whatever their fixes. This is correct. And here's if you're a parent, you want to give your kid Coke's, do what you want. Yeah, you can't. What does a child know about what's in a damn vending machine. They're

going to go for the sugary thing. Of course every time. I can't even believe you are allowed to sell this stuff. I'm starting to lose my mind. Well, and you said, you know, I mean big soda is I think as damaging to health, perhaps more than big tobacco ever was. And there needs to be the same level of scrutiny and acknowledgment of the way that they ring the rules to their benefit because it has devastating health consequences for people for their entire lives. Absolutely, Chrystal, what are you

taking a look at? Well, guys, we're not getting the clearest picture to date of the early days of Russia's were in Ukraine, including Putin's thinking, the concessions that both he and Zelensky were actually open to, and critically the way that NATO, led by the US made a strategic choice to kill a budding piece deal that could have

brought a ceasefire mere weeks into this horrific conflict. In an explosive interview, former Israeli Prime Minister enough Tolly Bennett goes into great depth about his role in attempting to achieve a negotiated settlement a week and a half into this war. Listening to this interview is to come face to face with just how much we have been lied

to and propagandized by the Western press. Every detail about this conflict has been obscured and manipulated, from what the war is even about to what our role in it actually is. Now. Some of you might have seen excerpts from this interview already. It occurred over a week ago now, but it is five hours long, and I wanted to take some time to actually go through it thoroughly before I broke it all down for you. Also, the interviews

in Hebrew. I'm going to read a bit of the English translation and put it the video up on the screen so you can just get a vibe of what it looks like. Right now. We're dropping into the interview after former PM Bennett has already described the outlines of the deal and his role in the negotiations when he explains why this diplomacy all came up empty handed, so he says, I'm just the mediator, but I turned to America.

In this regard, I don't do as I please. Anything I did was coordinated down to the last detail with the US, Germany and France. The interviewer then asked him, so they blocked it, and he replies basically, yes, they blocked it, and I thought they were wrong. In retrospect, it's too soon to know. So in that clip, Bennett there says unequivocally that NATO, led by the US, blocked a budding piece deal. At another point, Bennett claim says, quote, I have one claim. I claim there was a good

chance of reaching a ceasefire. The interviewer then queries whether, but it means they could have achieved a ceasefire had the US not curbed it, and Bennett nods yes in confirmation. Think of how explosive this revelation is. If there was an ounce of credibility in the Western press, this would

be bombshell news. It reveals a portrait of the war in our role in it that is wildly out of step with the narrative that the US public has been fed, in which we are solely supporting Ukraine's ambitions, as Biden says, nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine, and in which our only choices are to let Ukrainians be slaughtered or shipped tanks and probably fighter jets, and court war with the nuclearm superpower.

In reality, Ukraine, led by Zelenski, wanted a deal early in this conflict and was willing to make some hard compromises to get there, and far from the imperialist madman presented the US press, Putin was also seemingly willing to make significant compromises to achieve a ceasefire. Bennett says it was his impression that both of these men wanted a ceasefire at that point. Now, most of the press simply ignored these revelations, which honestly was probably the safest choice,

because the attempt to spin it was hilariously flailing. This attempt to spin from insider claims that actually the Hebrew was translated incorrectly, and when Bennett says quote they blocked it, the correct translation should have been quote they stopped it. Oh well, if the US stopped the peace negotiations. That's totally different than if they blocked the peace negotiations. Come on, people,

they also trot it down. Of course, they're tried and true tactic for shutting down debate by smearing anyone who amplified this interview and the explosive revelations contained therein as a Russian propagandist. But whether the proper Hebrew to English translation is blocked or stopped, this is not the first indication we've gotten that the US killed an emerging deal and chose war over the possibility, not a certainty, but

the possibility of negotiated peace. Bennett, for what it's worth, put that possibility of achieving a settlement in those early days at a fifty fifty chance, not a guarantee, but damn it was worth a shot. Now, you'll recall the Ukrainian press reported that then UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson flew to Kiev early in the conflict, who personally informs

Lensky we did not want a deal. We also had former US National Security Council official Fiota Hill writing about the outlines of that peace deal for Foreign Affairs, saying, quote, Russian and Ukrainian negotiators appeared to have tentatively agreed on

the outlines of a negotiated interim settlement. Russia would withdraw to its position on February twenty three, when it controlled part of the Donbas region and all of Crimea, and in exchange, Ukraine would promise not to seek NATO membership and increase instead received security guarantees from a number of countries.

So coupled those reports with Bennett's revelations here, and it becomes quite clear we wanted this war to go on, with all of the horror that that has entailed, and we blocked possible piece, or stopped a possible piece, if you prefer. There was a lot more. Though in this interview describing as negotiations with Zelenski and Putin, then it calls both leaders quote pragmatic. Again, that's a characterization that

undermines media caricatures of both of these men. As part of the negotiations, Putin had already agreed to drop his demand that Ukraine disarm and had pledged not to kill Zelensky. He agreed to not have regime change. For his part, Zelensky had already agreed to stay out of NATO. That's an issue that Bennett describes as key context by the way, for Putin's decision initially to invade. Bennett says at one point,

quote there are two very different narratives. The Wesse's Putin as an imperialist who wants to take over more places. Putin's perception was wait, when the wall came down, we reached an agreement with NATO that they wouldn't expand and would not touch the belt countries that envelop Russia. Don't bring me NATO my enemy or rival. And why are you introducing Ukraine into NATO. That's how he describes Putin's thinking.

Bennett then goes on to explain that the US has its own Monroe doctrine of regional hegemony and Russia sees are medaling in Ukraine similarly as quote, don't come here, this is my backyard. Now. This is important, again, not because it erases Russia's culpability, but because it suggests that had we engaged in negotiations before the war, maybe this

could have been preventable. It also suggests that this isn't actually a war over values the way it's portrayed, with Putin playing the part of genocidal lunatic in the USS heroic infallible savior. It's rather a more conventional conflict over resources and national interests, where our own arrogance and wilful disregard for Russian redlines plays a not insignificant role helpful

context if you actually care about ending this war. It is astonishing the lengths that the US press has gone to in order to deceive the mayor and public about the very basics of this conflict, to shield us from any inconvenient facts, to mask any and all US complicity, such as our possible role, for one example, in blowing up the Nord stream pipeline, to thoroughly ignore the costs

of our current strategy. And now is a particularly critical time to sober up and to start thinking a lot more clearly, Russia's preparing major offensive, and according the Rand Corporation, which is largely funded by the US government, is unlikely either Ukraine or Russia is going to outright when this war. That means the only end to this conflict is going to come from a negotiated settlement of the type that

we killed. Rand also concludes we need to do whatever we can to avoid a longer war because the costs of such a protracted conflict are unacceptably high. Those costs of a long war include Ukrainian civilian deaths, Ukrainian economic destruction, global loss of life from increased food and energy prices, the risk of a direct hot war between NATO and Russia, and the risk of Russian nuclear usage. As a report drily explains, quote, avoiding these two forms of escalation is

the paramount US priority. At least it should be the paramount US priority. Unfortunately, ASNF Tally Bennett himself acknowledges in the interview, a deal of the sort that was outlined those early days it might now be impossible to achieve. After the horrors of war, the hardening of everyone's positions, and a year of war propaganda, Achieving a ceasefire is

certainly no easy task. Bennett name checks the Russian war crimes committed at Bucha in particular as the sort of atrocity which makes a negotiated settlement so much more difficult. But that degree of difficulty is no excuse for failing to try and continuing to pursue a policy that has only led to more escalation. From invasion to the present day, the Western press has given you a wildly disordered, one sided, and at times outright false understanding of the very basics

of this conflict. They have painted a Disney version of it with simple narratives convenient to bide in the US state, and ignored or dismissed anything inconvenient or complicating for that narrative. Look no further than the total lack of media curiosity about who actually blew up the nord Stream pipeline. This interview is just the latest proof, whatever the media might say,

Biden's decisions have guaranteed carnage and further disaster. It is astonishing, saga that most of the media just ignored this interview, Oh, totally ignored. They ignored the report we covered have been covering about Boris Johnson flying that was actually reported by

Ukrainian like Western aligned Ukrainian media, total blackout here. They ignored what Fiona Hill said about the fact that, hey, here were the contours of the deal that came to light, and now you have, in this lengthy interview, detailed descriptions from former Israeli PM Bennett about how he engaged the calls, he had, the concessions they were willing to put on the table, and the fact that the US directly leading NATO said no, we don't want this. Russia's weakrelent. We

thought we want the war. This was an extraordinary one. And also there is no reason to lie. Why would he lie about this? And the Israelis have been explained this. They have a much very different policy visa weird They don't care about Russia and Ukraine. First of all, they have a large Russian population. They care about themselves. They've always had very friendly relations with Putin because Putin is actually weirdly kind of pro Israel for similar reasons. Well,

they're like allies in Syria. Yeah, exactly, their allies in Syriac exactly. So the point is that they don't care. They don't care exactly what happens. And that's why they've refused to sell a lot of weapons to Ukraine. Ukraine asked them for iron Dome, They're like, no, we're not giving it to you. To the extent that they've helped, it's that they allowed us to take a bunch of AMMO that we have in Israel and give it to Ukraine.

That's it. So he has no reason to lie. He also was clearly privy to a lot of the behind the scenes, and he's telling us what happened in our press. Just lets it go. I mean, it's totally It really is nuts, you know when you just consider like how much, how very different the world could have been. And here's the thing, this is one of those where when the history is written one hundred years from now, you bet that they're going to focus in a lot on this

mab So this was a pivot. The reason I keep coming back to it is it is so much harder now to get back to that place where again, there were no guarantees. Bennett says, fifty to fifty chants, that's a much better chance than where we're at now. After all of the horrors and war crimes and atrocities that have been committed, and the propaganda and everybody hardening their positions, it will be so much more difficult to get back

to that place. And so when I look at Okay, we're literally week and a half in, it was like a weekend, a week and a half in to the war, and they're having actual fruitful negotiations, both sides making key concessions, the outlines of a deal coming together, and we say no, we want the war. Think of all the hundreds of thousands of lives that have been lost between then and now.

Think of the destruction of Ukraine, think of the global pain of the increased food and energy prices, and think of the continued risk of potential nuclear conflagration and the increasingly direct confrontation that we are having with regards to Russia. It's just I will never be able to let it go. And then the crime on top of that is the

press just completely completely erasing it. When you hear how Bennett talks about this conflict in the early days, and I want to say, to be fair, he now says, look, maybe they did make the right choice. It's too early to say maybe they were right in blocking that negotiation. He says, at the time, I thought that they were wrong.

But when you listen to how Brazil's President Lula when he was here talking to Biden, which we covered early in the show, the way he talks about it and the way Bennett was talking about it, you see a lot more congruity and again a portrait that is completely hidden from the US public. Ultimately, so it was astonishing to listen to this interview. I encourage you to take the time to interview itself is five hours the Ukraine. I don't know, it's maybe like forty minutes long. It's

worth taking a listen to exactly how he describes this negotiation. Yeah, well said, all right, guys, we've been closely tracking that Ohio train derailment is actually a part of Ohio that I used to live very close to, and it has turned into just an utter environmental catastrophe. There are reports of animals that have been dying. Residents are saying, hey, you guys told us it safe to come back. It still smells terrible. I'm still getting headaches. What the hell

is going on? We have someone who is an independent journalist, they're locally, John Russell, who is going to give us the very latest on that situation. So let's get to it. John Russell is the author of the Holler Substack and he joins us now, Gritz Caesar, Griscia man, Hey, thanks for having me on. Good to be here, Yeah, our pleasure. Let's go ahad and put your latest piece up on the screen here. The headline is railroaded the Northern Southern

Northbrook Southern Disaster in East Palestine, Ohio. Part one. Rail workers warned us about a preventable disaster like this, And before we jump into the latest, just so people know a little bit of your background. You're from this area, born and raised, you live close by. You also have you're an independent journalist, but you're also a man of the people. You're a dive bar bartender. So you hear a lot from local folks that have I wanted to have you on because you have a full picture of

the local community and what the concerns are. So first, just give everybody who maybe hasn't been following this disaster that closely what exactly happened and where are we now. Yeah, this is a very small rural community on the eastern board of Ohio and Pennsylvania. And what happened, of course, was a catastrophic derailment. You've seen pictures of the explosion. News media and officials are deeming it a controlled release. But Norfolk Southern had a train derail in this town.

I think the really interesting angle here is the corporate practice something called precision scheduled railroading that could definitely have contributed to an axle failure, which is what happened on

this train, which is what caused the derailment. Is directly related to a corporate practice that is cutting the training and the maintenance and an inspection of these trains that are rolling through tiny towns like mine, you know, with less safety measures and crew attending to the chemicals that they're carrying. So obviously that backfired and we have an ecological disaster on our hands right where I grew up. Yeah, and so right now we've got a quol controlled release

of toxic chemicals that are happening in the area. The government claims everything's fine, people can come back. Yeah, I mean, just just look at that. You want to live anywhere. People are saying that what is it? Pets are dying, that people in the air are suffering symptoms. What's the official narrative? And then what are people on the ground actually seeing and thinking. Yeah, So the official narrative that comes out of this, I think is a worthwhile thing

to talk about. This area of the country is highly industrialized. We are used to industrial accidents, we are used to large companies coming in and extracting our wealth. That has been the story of this area for a long long time. So the official narrative in the press is really focused on how much cancer we're all going to get from this. And when I think that we should be asking the question why did this derailment happen? Why are we subjected

to the chemicals that were released from this? And when you talk to workers on the railroad, it's pretty easy to piece together that a story of corporate negligence. Norfolk Southern, because of implementing the practices that cut training, that cut maintenance, that cut inspections on rail cards, have caught the axle that failed in this case. Because they've done all of

those things, they've been able to amass immense profits. I mean, they did ten billion dollars in stock buybacks last year, right. So a lot of the press coverage here has been around the chemicals that have been released and not how Norfolk Southern made a ton of money and left the chance open for catastrophe like this to happen. When we talked to a lot of people on the ground in the area, they're just looking to go back to their

normal life. But that is a hard thing to be focused on here because the long term effects of this kind of release of chemicals aren't going to be known for a very long time. Yeah, And the particular chemical that there's a lot of concerns around is vinyl chloride.

It's described as a colorless compound. It's also a known human carcinogen can be deadline deadly if it's inhaled, and as Saga indicated, there were some local reports of chickens, dyeing, fish turning up dead in the stream, other animals that were ill, and human beings who also felt like they had headache. They could still smell these chemicals even days after the release, and even after officials said, oh, it's

all good, it's all safe. Nothing to see here. I think an important context to John and what you really bring is, you know, this is the part of the country that used to be a sort of you know, very solidly blue, a lot of labor union presence, a lot of sort of like muscle memory for the Democratic Party. And it's the region of the country and I know this because I used to live there that is moved

the furthest to the right the fastest. So this is sort of like the epicenter of the Trump populist revolt. And so there's a lot of mistrust, I would say, at this point of authorities and officials. So when people are hearing from the government. It's all good. You can go home. That's not going to be any problem. We took care of it. You know, are they believing that I would say no, I would say no, they're not. But you know, we're used to this kind of corporate playbook.

I mean, look at this. Here's another great way to think about this. This part of the country also was hit very, very hard by the opioid epidemic. I mean, I graduated with fifty five kids in my high school class. My connection to East Palestine, you know, I used to go up to their homecomings. When you're in a small rural county like this, a lot of the kids know each other. But even in a small high school, I had more, you know, more than ten friends passed from

the opioid epidemic. When we saw pushes for accountability of companies that are here making a ton of profit and sticking areas like this part of the country with the bag from seeking that much profit, the playbook is always the same. You hear, you know, industry line that comes out in the initial initial news reports, and then these companies worth billions and billions of dollars. Nobody faces jail time for addicting a part of the country to pills.

Nobody will face jail time for a train that derails because of profits heeking practices that foreclosed on maintenance. Usually what you see in these cases that are headquartered in this part of the country is these big companies making money handover fist and then just paying out damages when these kinds of things happen from the profits that they made. So I think, once again, this is just more from the corporate playbook in another tragic story for this part

of the country. Yeah, I mean, this part of the country has just been like collateral damage for endless corporate greed and total lack of accountability. And I think you're right that it's, you know, exactly the same playbook that you see unfolding here. John, thank you so much for taking the time. Everybody, go and subscribe to his fantastic sub stack, The Haller, which gives you a wonderful look

at life in this region. And also, you know, there are a lot of broader national implications here and John's always in touch with the labor community there too, which something we care a lot about. Thank you so much for your time today. Thanks man yep, thanks for having us on absolutely our pleasure. Oh what a fun show today, I think depressing now right to talk about that. We're going to stick on a couple of those stories UFOs. Of course, we've had a lot of interests. Some people

are just waking up to what's happening. But this trainee railment, you cannot move on from this. This is the equivalent of like a major chemical disaster. I mean essentially like a chemical I'm not going to call it an attack, but like equivalent to what worst case scenario would look like. And I don't see any coverage of what's going on here. It's nuts. Well, you know, a lot of people could die,

they really could. It's because the reason there's no coverage is because everyone is complicit, right, I mean, the Republicans, the Democrat like, they all have done the bidding of the rail industry. And we saw it very clearly with Biden and the Democrats and the Republicans all joining together to break the potential strike of rail workers and deny them any the paid sick time and other benefits that

they definitely deserve. So I think that's why is because there isn't an easy partisan narrative and so the media doesn't really care. It tells you a lot about what captures their attention and what ultimately doesn't. But for the people that live there, I mean, this is an unbelievable disaster, and for the country, it's an absolute you know, the fact that it was predictable and that in fact was predicted is part of what makes this also galling and horrifying.

Absolutely all right, Well, see you guys later. Thank you to everybody who supports the show. We've got a fun one plan for you tomorrow. We're gonna stick with all these stories and yeah, it's gonna be fun. Week shot, sh shot, shot, keep keep