3/2/23: Republicans Battle Over East Palestine Aid, Trump Surges 2024 Polls, Vivek Ramaswamy 2024 Interview, Insulin CEO Cuts Prices, Havana Syndrome Debunked, China Threatens Elon, Media Mogul Arrested, Lab Leak Coverup, Ukranian Democracy

Breakingpoints dot com. Good morning, everybody, Happy Thursday. We have an amazing show for everybody's day. Extra amazing because Crystal's back, thanks to be back. Has something to take care of on Tuesday. But I know Ryan did a fantastic time. He did. He did. Let's to get into this morning. We are starting to get to look at a bipartisan actually pretty good potential response to Ohio. We can see whether it gets through the House in the Senate, but

we'll tell you all about that. Also, new developments on the twenty twenty four front. We've got a bunch of new polls that show Trump extending his lead, and we also have new comments from Ronda Santas about Trump that are very interesting. Some actually good news on insulin prices. So we will break all of that down for you. What exactly does it mean and how far reaching is it?

A new report from the government. I guess the government this week is like in the business of admitting things that were obvious for a long time since that we're obviously true that they'll just air out into the publicat guys, guess what Havana syndrome was fake all along? New report says it's not Russia, it's not China. Guess we'll just

never know what it is. So anyway, we will break that down for you as long as well as a little bit look back in time at the way that all of this was sold to the public, so that we do not forget. And we also have a bit of a warning coming from China towards Elon Musk and Bronco. Marchaitic is going to be on to talk about the state of democracy in Ukraine as a really in depth report that is worth digging into. But let's go ahead

and start with the very latest out of Ohio. Let's go and put this up on the screen in terms of a bipartisan response that is in the works here, we've got a group of six senators who are introducing what they're calling the Railway Safety Act of twenty twenty three. It is aimed at preventing a repeat of what they describe as the toxic firestorm in East Palestine, Ohio. The senators involved evenly split between Democrats and Republicans. You like

to see that, you've got jd Vance shared Brown. Of course, the two senators from Ohio. You also have the two senators from Pennsylvania, neighboring state where the toxic plume floated, that is Bob Casey and John Fetterman. And then you also have Marc Rubio of Florida and Josh Holly of Missouri. Details on what they are proposing here. This is according to a summary that Politico saw. The legislation would number one, require rail carriers to give advanced notice to state emergency

response officials before running trains carrying hazardous materials. Apparently, some of the firefighters and other first responders first on the scene had no idea what they were dealing with, which is bad in terms of response, it's very in terms of their health. So that's number one. Number two, they would mandate trains run with at least two person crews. Now, this train in particular did have three people on board, but we know this is far from the only derailment

that happens in a given year. There are roughly one thousand trained derailments. This is different than other countries around the world, and the rail industry has been pushing and this is insane to me to reduce the crew numbers from two down to one. And this is something that others have been entertaining in the past. So that's number two. Number three require better monitoring of railcar wheel bearings, which overheated in the Ohio train accident according to the NTSB

and likely cause the train to jump the tracks. And number four increase penalties for wrongdoing in the industry. So some mestrics there to try to hold the industry to account. JD. Van said, through this legislation, Congress has a real opportunity to ensure that what happened in Ease Palatine will never happen again. We owe every American the peace of mind that their community is protected from catastrophe of this kind.

And we have a quote from Shared Brown. Of course, the other Ohio senator rail lobbyists have fought four years to protect their profits at the expense of communities like East Palestine and Steubenville and Sandusky. Those are all neighboring communities. These common sense, bipartisan safety measures will finally hold big railroad companies accountable. So this is maybe not everything, but this is a real response that could make a measurable difference.

And it is very, very encouraging to see. Yes it is. And unfortunately, despite the fact that it was introduced in a bipartisan way by the both of the senators from Ohio and both of the senators from Pennsylvania, you have these corporate lobbyists effectively who are in Congress, who represent from the Republican Party, specifically Representative Troy Nels. He is on the Transportation Committee. He's one of the leading people who with this legislation would have to go through. And

let's put this up there on the screen. He's already saying. He's like, well, you know, hold on a second here, we have to make sure that there's not too many bird some regulations. He said, quote, A lot of people have a lot of ideas right now. The NTSB had their preliminary report. They'll be more information coming, but here's the most discussing quote that we've seen yet, crystal quote. The real industry has a very high success rate of

moving hazardous material to the point of ninety nine percent. Plus. Let's not have some more burdensome regulations and all this other stuff. The other one, Representative Rick Crawford, who is the top Republican on the rail panel before the housewipt for control, he also said, we need to wait for the experts before quote, we start speculating on what legislative fixes might be offered if it's necessary. Probably a little premature at this point. You almost cannot make those quotes up.

And this, you know, If anything, it just shows you where the continued split in the GOP is. And unfortunately, you know, Holly, Rubio and Vans are far on the uh. They are absolutely, you know, away from where the mainstream of much of the party is. They want to use most of the Republicans in this party want to use it as an opportunity to cleave Buddha Jege over the head. Okay, I'm here for that, but then when it comes time

to actually increase the fines on the railroad. The other point is on Congressman Nail's point a ninety nine percent plus success rate. Okay, but if the tail end disaster is really bad, then you need to make sure that you do everything possible to make sure that a mass poisoning of an American town never happens again. And this shows you more than anything where the logjam could come from. I also do want to say, is not a guarantee

right now that this legislation could pass the Senate. I'm assuming most of the Democrats will probably be able to come on board, but you need nine Republicans. There's only four that are on that list. Can you really get five to cross over here? That's right, you need to get to sixty. I suspect every Democrat would be on board. The divide here really is in the Republican Party, and it's very interesting. I mean, you can see what the rail lobbyist strategy is here. And this is totally classic.

We've seen this a million times before. They just want to delay, They want to kick it down the road where people forget about all of this. And so the line you're hearing from these Republican house members, many of whom, by the way, are in the pocket of the railroad industry. They want to say, well, we got an NTSB preliminary report, but we got to wait for the final findings before we really come in and figure out what to No, we know plenty about this incident and about so many

other derailments to go ahead and act. But that's what they always try to do. If they can just delay, if they can just push it down the road until people have forgotten about the emotion and the horror of this incident, then they think they can kill the thing altogether. And look, it works all the time. So it is a good and effective strategy, especially when you have people like these bozos in the house who are ultimately on your side. Let me tell you there's another piece of

the response that JdE Vance has been proposing. This also meeting with a lot of pushback from Republicans. Let's go and put this up on the screen. So he's proposing an aid program for this area specifically, because think about it, guys, you got people. Now you think you can sell your house in East Palestine, good luck? What do you think your house is worth? Now? What do you think this is like? Now? For you know, people who don't have a choice and have to stay there, or for people

who feel like this is not safe. I need to go. There has been a huge financial hit. You think people are gonna want to go, and you know, visit the local coffee shop in East Palestine now and risk whatever still floating in the air and floating in the water. This is going to be a huge economic hit to this area, which, by the way, guys, has been hit hard many times before. So Vance is pitching a PPP style program for Ohio. Basically every Republican that they quoted

here was like, let's just wait and see again. Same thing. They then don't necessarily say no, although some of them did come out and basically say no. They're like, let's just wait and see what happens, see what happens down the road, which again is code for let's just wait until everybody forgets about this and we can do absolutely nothing. Yeah. Look, look here's Shelley Moore Capital and you know why this

drives me nuts. She's Virginia. You should be on board exactly what type because they'd be good for West Virginia too. If you set this presdent quote, it's something I'd be willing to take a look at. It would be difficult. I want to see those small businesses get back. I know they're having trouble with that. But how do you quantify a training derailment over some kind of other thing.

I don't know. Look at the pre market, pre disaster value of a house or of a business, then figure out how much they lose after and try and make them home again. It's something to consider. I'd have to see how he would enact something like that. Why don't you help him? You're from one of the most impover states in the entire country? Or here? John? Can this? You know these people drive the same thing Louisiana. Louisiana, by the way, has its own fair share of horrific

environmental disaster. Same thing. I understand where Senat Advance is coming from. We've all had natural disasters. When we do, we try to help each other. But it needs to be thought through. A little time needs to pass. We don't even know what the health impacts are going to be yet of a trained d railman, much less the economic impact. I would look at anything that JD wants to propose. What does that mean? Of course, we don't know what the health impact is going to be. Get

out in front of it. One of the things that we actually do know is that income is one of the single best determiners of whether you are going to live a long time and be able to seek treatment or not. Good luck if you're poor, you don't have health insurance or you have some terrible high deductible plan that you're going to go and seek the medical treatment that you would otherwise. You've been talking about medicare about being able. We have to make the whole point of

help something we cover here all the time. Don't just treat the symptom, try and make sure that it doesn't become a problem. If you've been exposed now to toxic chemicals, man, it's time to kick it into high gear. Like you've got to really take care of your body and make sure that you are getting wet by maybe quarterly blood tests, like you need a lot of modern insurance not going

to cover any of that. So why would we wait until you get cancer before we're going to start Ten years down the road and there's a cancer cluster bingo, think of how hard it was and how by the skin of its teeth. The legislation I think is called the Packed Act. Yes No for toxic burn pit victims who you know suffer from all kinds of different cancers from their exposure while they were in war zones fighting for our country. Think of how hard it was to

get that done in Congress. You think that ten years down the line, if you have a cancer cluster here, that you're going to be able to get action through Congress. No, if anything is going to happen, it's gonna happen now while the media is still covering it, while this is still fresh in people's minds, while it's still in the news. You wait, you're right, Senator Kennedy. He was the one who made that comment. Oh, we don't know what the

long term health impacts are. We don't know. That's why, at the very least these people should have health care, but they should definitely have economic assistance too. And you want to make Norfolk Southern pay for it? I am all, well, that would have a Senator Brown said, Norfolk Southern's going to pay for all of this percent. Good to go with that. But this is no excuse for just turning the other cheek and say, oh, well, we'll just wait and see what happens and hope it all gets better.

The White House, there's some reporting they are also weighing if they could provide some kind of economic relief. It seems like they are very sort of like all over the place and very uninformed in terms of what their thoughts are and what they could do. Let's go and put this up on the screen. This from our friend Jeff Steing over the Washington Post. Biden aids weigh economic

aid for East Palestine after derailment. The administration wants to make Norfolk Southern pay for any cost, but is exploring backup options. It says the exact details of any White House action are unknown. Administration say it's determined to force

Norfolk Southern to pay. They also might face challenges in crafting financial aid package for a town that is fewer than five thousand people, but many residents have already decided to leave the town keep their children out of school, putting pressure on the federal government to help the reeling ross community. And as part of that process, AIDS have looked at whether existing federal dollars could be used to

help small businesses. The administration is also considering infrastructure improvements in the area. The talks are described as preliminary, and administration of stress it remains possible the White House decides against devoting economic aid to East Palestine. Everybody spoke on condition of anonymity, So that's good there. Yeah, let's just speak on and I don't know, I mean just the level.

You know, look on a purely political basis, you don't think it's very popular for the Republican senator to team up with the Democratic senator and to offer up cash and to a railway safety bill. Why is the White House letting himself get outflanked on this? I don't understand, Biden. I'm a union guy Scranton, Joe, what are you doing? Say? You know, first, it started with breaking the railway strike. That was probably original sin number one in terms of

basically telling you guy, these guys screw you. Two, visiting Kiev before East Palestine. Three, then basically turning at political and saying since Trump went to Theaset Palistine, I can't go to these Palestine and saying no, the president has no plans to go over there, and then just you know,

these middling plants. It's it's really disgusting because you're basically watching the establishment Republicans team up with what maybe just maybe just lazy or just non thinking the establishment Democratic Party on this. They just want to move. They're like, yeah, okay, but now that it's become a political hotbed issue, we don't want to be seen caving. And the actual people there are the ones who are actually getting screwed. Yeah, And that's that's actually why I think it's such a

terrible story. They don't want to set a precedent of actually helping people when they need help. I mean, that's the bottom line. It's five thousand people. This is nothing in terms of like the federal budget, even if they can't force Norfolk Southern to ultimately pay for which of course they obviously should. But that's what they're afraid of, is the precedent of, like, oh my god, then we might have to help people in the future when things

get screwed up. They don't want that precedent ultimately. But to your point on the politics, Biden re member, he did that bipartisan press conference with Mitch McConnell in Kentucky, travel there to teut the infrastructure bill. Could do the same thing here with Jade Vance. Go jd Vance, shared Brown, go to Ohio. You know, Greatack his ppp idea or work together with him on crafting something else, if there's

a better approach that you prefer. Ultimately, you know, that would be a boon to show that this is a price cident. Who really cares about citizens of Ohio state that not so long ago was a swing state and sort of back up his working class man of the people supposed credibility. So I just think they have both on the substance and on the politics of this, really

bungled this whole situation. But just to go back to the beginning, the fact that there is a bipartisan bill that addresses some real issues is a very hopeful thing. It has difficult odds, especially in the Republican held House, but perhaps there's a chance here because of the public pressure and scrutiny on this event. Ultimately, back to let's

go ahead to this next piece. So I mentioned that the strategy of the rail lobbyists is to delay, delay, delay, And then also when you heard some of the Republicans echoing this exact talking point, they are now placing ads in Politico, which in instances has been very favorable to

industry on this whole Ohio story. They're paying Politico to place ads that are touting their great record of safety, they say Politico presented by the Association of American Railroads, this is all reporting from our friends over at Lever News, and they say, when it comes to safety, ninety nine point nine percent is not enough. Well, ninety nine point nine percent of all hazmat shipments that move by rail reach their destination safely. We know a single incident can

have significant impacts. So basically the idea here, Sager is like government doesn't need to act us could folks at the rail Association, lobbyist group, whatever they're called, We're working on it. We've got this. Don't you worry about it? Yeah? I mean, what the hell are they doing over there? And you know, this is one of those which we brought you some of the reporting from Politico. But this is part of what the problem is with corporate media.

Like when you have straight up newsletters and other things that are being straight sponsored by the Association of American Railroads. Do you think that it's an accident that the Railroad Association calls plut and say, hey, we need to buy some status on your newsletter. Do you know why they do this? Let's explain. Politico is one of those outlets,

especially that newsletter that we brought you play book. Everybody in Washington reads this thing, and I really do mean like everybody from the lowest level staffer all the way up to probably the White House Chief of staff. It's like an internal it's almost like a gossip girl, to be honest with you, for like the biggest losers in DC. There you go, Tiger, That's right. That's a great way

of putting it. And so the reason why these associations, these lobbyists and all these others buy ad space in them is it's the easy way where you're not just targeting let's say, a mass audience. You know, people like who we speak to. You're speaking directly to the decision makers, to the people who would be most influenced by the lobbyists. And their direct hope is to try and get their ads,

their spin, their propaganda in front of their eyes. Okay, I mean, you can understand why they would want to do that, But if you're a journalistic outlet, how can you possibly report fairly on this when you were taking money from them at the exact same time that it's outrageous And they do this with everything just so people know when they're reporting on anti trust Facebook miraculously just

starts coughing up whenever they're reporting on what was. Whenever they're reporting on medical issues, you'll have the American Medical Association. I've seen the defense industry sponsors technologs of times. It's one of those where and here everybody thinks it's business as usual. It's like you and I are some of the only people in this town are like, hey, this is kind of crazy, right, are we just not going to talk about this well? And to add insult to

injury here? I mean, you're so right that this is just core to the disgusting corporate business corporate media business model and why they will never be good arbiters of like facts and journalism, especially when it comes to an issue related to industry. Before politicos started running these new ads, their national Politics reporter actually attacked the Lever for asking their readers to help fund their continued reporting on East Palestine derailment and train safety RL. So think about this.

The Lever gets attacked for asking readers to support their work like grassroots reader sponsored journalism, not getting a bunch of money from the rail industry to then report on this, and then you know they turn around and that's exactly what they get. So they're criticizing the funding of Lever News, getting grassroots readers, supported, donations and funding, and meanwhile they're just taking cash from industry and somehow that scene as

a superior. It's insane. Yeah, so can you explain it again? What is their exact critique here? So here, I'll pull up the tweet that he's sent. He basically so this guy, Adam Ran is his name, to call him out, national politics correspondent for Politico. He tweeted David sirot as the lever it's fundraising off of the East Palestine Ohio train derailment. No, it's called if you are independent news, you rely on regular citizens to fund your journalism instead of industry lobbyists

like Politico does. So he is smearing David as somehow and the Lever as somehow like disgraced on this. Oh, David does his job. He exposes this before anybody else and then ask people to help support his mission. I get emails from the Washington Post in the New York Times every time they break some stupid ass Trump scoop being like, do you want to stick it to power? Sign up for the New York Times. So okay, first

of all, it's fine what he's doing. You know, people do have to make a living, and if you want to support that type of work, we are very happy to partner with the lever and official break import I think the very first one. Right, So first break, why do you think this is exactly the reason? And you know, he can't even fathom that this is somehow something that he needs to highlight as some some sort of nefarious act. When this guy's getting you know, at least in part

some of his paycheck, it's coming from somewhere. He should absolutely be coming from railroad lobbyists, defense industry, oil and gas, like any lobbyist interest in the city has spun in Politico, and he has the nerve to come after David Szerota for doing grassroots fundraising for independent media. Right anyway, all right,

it's really something. Yes, let's talk about twenty twenty four, some fun stuff and an interview actually conducted yesterday which will bring you some parts of But let's start very first with the twenty twenty four race with Ron DeSantis and with Donald Trump. So of course, you know, despite everything that you might hear in the media, for Trump, things are actually going pretty well. Let's go and put

this up there on the screen. Four of the latest polls of GOP primary voters not only see Trump leading DeSantis, they actually show him extending his lead over DeSantis. So here's the four aggregation Emerson Trump fifty five, DeSantis twenty five, Yahoo News Trump forty seven, Desantus thirty nine, Echelon Trump forty six, DeSantis thirty one, Fox News Trump forty three, DeSantis twenty eight. All four of them show an increase for Trump in February over the last month. So this

is why it's important. Let's say and bacon polling errors and many of these other types of things. Let's say that the poles can be off significantly as they were, then it's important within these poles to see movement because obviously the polsters are going to have the same errors baked in, and then within that we can see some track. So we can't infer truth. You know, even the aggregate of in twenty twenty two is totally wrong. Yeah, found and these poles in this race right then, oh, all

over the laces, all of them map. So you got him all the way from thirty nine down to what was twenty five was the lowest. I mean, that's not actually not terrible if you consider like what the range is, and again importantly all four Sea movement towards Trump. Why is that? Well, A Desanta's not a candidate. So if I was a DeSantis person, I'd be like, look, he's not even a declared Canadate. I haven't even had the

race on, But what are we learning? The first mover of trump advantage is so immense, and he is near fifty in almost every single one of these. That's higher than where he started off in twenty sixteen when he swept all of the early primaries going into Super Tuesday. So if you see the increasing trend of candidates getting in the race, Nikki Haley, viviak Ramaswami, you got Pence on the line. Possibly DeSantis. He's going on a tour. He's got a new book out. Apparently he's going to

South Carolina and New Hampshire and Iowa. Complete coincidence. Who else why would anyone go there for a book tour? But I think we know said we have Tim Scott who wants to get in the race. Who got all these other people? Right? K? Yeah, Glenn you know, everybody's on the fence right now. You know, probably half the people I mentioned are either already running or going to run, and you're just recreating the same dynamic, except that Trump

is actually stronger right now than he was. That's last time. That's the most important thing. And you know, there was a lot of second guessing of when he launched his campaign, remember after the midterms didn't go well for him and did go really well for Ron DeSantis. That was like, oh, I don't know if this is the time to launch when he's weak. I think that was I mean, we said at the time, we thought it was exactly the right time to launch, actually to try to lock in

support and get that first mover's advantage. And listen, not trying to say I told you so, but I think we can see that there has been an advantage for him in coming out first the you know, the hit he took both from the midterms and also from the initial phases of the whole classified document situation. I think that has all really faded so that now not only is he doing well against Ron de Santis, by the way, he's also doing well against Joe Biden. And he's he's

now he's sort of let go. I wouldn't say he's really you know, put it in the past, but he's talking a little bit less about his election conspiracy obsessions, and he's focused on issues that are quite intelligent for him to be focused on, in particular social security and Medicare and also Ukraine. These are issues where there's a real divide in the Republican Party. He's positioning himself alongside the base against where a lot of the Republican sort

of elite commentariat is. That's precisely straight out of the twenty sixteen playbook, and it's putting a lot of his adversaries, including Ron de Santis, in a difficult position, ultimately extraordinary difficult position. And we have here's the other problem for DeSantis. His responses and his comebacks to Trump have just been

weak as hell, like we need to all be. They're getting, they're degrading, they're honestly like Ted Cruz twenty sixteen levels of just like, dude, what the hell are you doing? So here is his response Brian Kilmead on the Brian kill Meads Show, where he says it's silly season. That's all he could come up with. Let's take a listen, so govern I'm too. As soon as they close the book,

I said, this guy's running for president. This seems to be a blueprint to run for president, because if I look at your career, and if I look at what you say, you don't just say this was good for today. This is good for families, It's good for state, this is good for a country. You were concerned about the country from the day you stepped into the campus of Yale, reinforced Harvard, fought for it in Iraq? Am I wrong to assume that there's in the excellent chance you're running

for president. Having kids in school during covid on, opposing the employer vax mandates and things like that. Education we've led the way. I like to see a competition amongst all the all the red states about you know, who can kind of outdo each other. Think it's a blueprint for other states. I do think it can be applied nationally. But it's less about me than about I think the underlying principles that we need to restore our country. I

read the whole thing. Now, one disparaging word about President Trump. Are you guys speaking now? Do you plan on speaking to him, he sees to be taking some shots at you. No, I mean, look, I mean it's silly season. I mean, you know how some of this stuff goes. And obviously he does his thing, and it's just that's kind of

kind of who is. But what I wanted to do was was just given honest appraisal of kind of how we got to this point, the failures of the DC Republican establishment and how Donald Trump was speaking to things that some of the old guard refused to address. And that's just a fact. What is this? And then he turns around and praises Trump. That's the point. That's always the issue. You know, we're about to get to we'll talk a little bit a little bit. I interviewed viag Ramaswami,

same thing. You know, he had to praise Trumpy. He offered a little bit of and we'll play you exactly what that was. But that's a big problem when you can't criticize the person that you ostensibly want to replace. I mean, what are we doing here? It's just not going to happen. And look, I'm sorry, it's silly season. That ain't gonna cut it. Like, you have got to come through with an actual critique of why you would be better And I'm sorry, nobody cares about your book.

Like I was telling you while we were listening to them, like why do they even bother with these books? You know, all these guys, No politician book is ever good, always springboards stuff. Tell you why. The technical reason part of why they do it is because of the intricacies of campaign finance. So it allows them to go through the store and do royalties and have staff that are involved with it and pay that staff and not like officially

have launched a presidential campaign. So that's one reason why they ultimately do it. But I did. I listened to this whole interview. It was really embarrassing on Brian Kilmean's part because, Okay, you have a guy who's governor of an important state, who is almost certainly going to run for president, who is a very strong contender to run for president, and you spend like fifteen minutes of your twenty minute interview talking to him about his Walt Disney wedding.

Like come on, I mean, that's just embarrassing as a journalists. And one of the things that you see is, yeah, it's true. I think Fox News really likes Ron DeSantis. The whole Rupert Murdoch empire really likes DeSantis. But one of the things that's come out in all of these text messages and exchanges from the dominion lawsuit is they

don't really have control over the Republican base anymore. You know, they wanted to initially try to steer them in one direction, and then when the base was going one way on stop the deal and they were trying to go on the other way, ultimately they're like, yeah, we can't do it. We're just going to go for the ratings because these people will all abandon us. So they don't have the

control over the Republican base that perhaps ultimately they once did. Right, Yeah, I think you're right, and just you know, in general, it's a humiliating, just way that these guys are unable fundamentally to critique the leading candidates. And that is why

he is the leading candidate. Yes, he's in the race, and you know what, to the extent like they never directly criticize him, but to the extent that they carve out positions that are different from him, their positions are worse, right, right, They're like, actually, we need to cut like Mike Pence, we need to cut we need to privatize Social Security, and we also need a national abortion band like. Those are worse, Yes, you are different from Trump. Those are

worse positions. Ultimately, Nikki Haley, same thing. Got to put entitlements on the table. And she's also you know, going against the Republican base in terms of Ukraine Aid as well. So he's also positioned himself better politically than almost any of the other contenders to the extent that they carve

out any different positions whatsoever. And you got at this with a Vivek as well, who one of the areas where he's different from Trump is he also would put entitlement cuts on the table and says that Trump spent too much money when he was an office show. That's not an improvement over Donald Trump for like eighty percent of the public. That makes you worse. And speaking of this, we had a hilarious moment on Fox News, so Killmead

goes down to a Florida diner. By the way, diner Fox News might be the most mid and awful Fox of all time. Just I don't know why people in a diner are somehow more representative of everybody else but whatever. I don't know why these people are in a diner on workday. That's another question. Let's get to that. So Brian kill Me and his Florida diner is like, so, who's gonna vote for Ronda Sanders? Anybody want to vote for rond de Sanders? The results are unintentionally hilarious. Let's

take a listen. First off, Met Jroe dining here. I got a question for you, ready, Hi, twenty twenty four? Who's pumped up for the election? TI wrapped fire? Who's your man? Who's your woman? My man? Donald Trump? Donald Trump, Donald Trump, Christy Trump, Christie? No, who's your man? Trump woman? Trump Trump Trump? A lot of Trump fans Trump and Nicky Haley, Nicky Haley, Donald Trump and Nicky Haley. All right, so far, a lot of Donald Trump? I see, I see, uh,

Governor DeSantis? What about President sand I like it? I like it? Who's your pick? Oh, gos, I'm either yes, Trump Trump Trump trump trumpet des Santa's either or that's a problem. He goes over this lady, she's literally wearing a dessanta shirt, thinking that like, surely this one's going to give me Desanta's and she's like they're both good either one. I hate to be proven right in many of these cases. And I understand that a lot of

people would like to move on from Trump. I'm not saying it wouldn't be better, but you know, you got to live in reality sometimes. And if you want to talk about some of the most hardcore people who are going to show up in a GOP primary, people who take time out of their workday and or are retired in a Florida diner, showing up for a Fox News event is about as good as it gets for a testing ground of like, Hey, how is this all going

to work out? And what did we hear? Whoa? And that was almost almost every single answer was Trump, Nikki Hale. But she said Trump, and yeah, exactly, she goes Trump and Nikki Haley. So it's like ep right exactly, so and she's like, yeah, she's all right, but Trump Trump at the first listen. I've tried to explain it here, like Trump has a special connection to the Republican base in a way that no Republican politician has had since Ronald Reagan and likely before that since I don't even know,

maybe Barry Goldwater. And it's one of those where it's difficult to explain. You kind of have to see it to believe it. Honestly, even just talking and listening to people like us trying to tell you about it, it's

always better to just hear it from them themselves. Now, look, let's be fair, not necessarily representative, but if you were to look where you might see an actual explosion of to Santa's interest and a possibility of winning people over, it would be in a Florida day and a Florida diner is a pretty likely say that was clearly what he thought as well going to that, that's what I I don't think that's how he thought that would all unfold.

I mean, listen, it really does have a lot of a lot of twenty sixteen vibes when everybody but Trump was fighting to basically be the Trump alternative, taking shots at each other. They're not afraid to come after one another, right Mike Pence going after Ron DeSantis for example, a lot of other shots taken at Rond de Santis. They're

not afraid to fight amongst each other. But if you think Trump is just going to implode and go away, like there's nothing in recent history that suggests that's ultimately the case. And meanwhile, while this is all happening on the sidelines, his poll numbers are going up. So at some point somebody, and this is the problem, is they know that whoever actually comes after him, kind of a prisoner's dilemma, ya, is probably going to get noved ye, And so none of them wants to be that person,

and so they all just step back. Actually, his administration was great, and his policies they were wonderful, and you know, I think he said a lot of things that needed to be said. Okay, then why aren't you then why should anyone vote for you over the guy that you are telling them was actually wonderful and great too good. It's one of those where I just think they will never be able to work themselves out of it. And the longer that this goes on, the better off Trump is.

Trump is fun again in a way that he hasn't been in a long time. He seems, I think always has been better off whenever he's not president. That's kind of like whenever he was at his most full Fulsome he's got the team around him. Some of the guys like Jason Miller's original comms director from twenty sixteen. He's on a very very light staff and frankly, that's frankly, we know whenever he best operates. Yeah, I'm only talking here as a politician, not as a competent commander in chief.

But look, that's ultimately how you get elected. And from this point forward, I think this is going to be the most formidable dynamic. Okay, so sticking with this. Had the opportunity yesterday. Vivik Ramaswami just recently and renounced his run for president. He's a former biotech executive who sold his company and made a lot of money, made some

interesting rumblings over the last couple of years. So he wrote a book called Woke, Inc. It was actually a fantastic book in my opinion, because it was about ESG, and specifically about the takeover and the use of shareholder capitalism to push values that don't necessari not only align with American public, but really much more hurting the country using these values and others to go away from the core value of business. Let me go ahead, let me just say, because I think we have a different view

on this. My critique of ESG is that it's just like a basic corporate virtue signal that is actually meaningless and doesn't really accomplish what they claim that it's ultimately accomplishing. His view is like corporations have too much power. But then also he doesn't actually have any critique of corporate power, of like argument of how you would check corporate power. I actually wouldn't even disagree. One of the original disagreements if a vac and I ever had was I was like, well,

held on a second, here, I hate ESG. I'm very against ESG. And I was like, but what if an American company wanted to actually take make less money by making stuff in America? I'm like, would you be against that? And he's like, well, you know, it would possibly conflict with shareholder capitalism. So the point that I'm making is that he is probably much more of a free market died in the wool capitalist. Yes, he's got a good I think critique of ESG. I don't necessarily agree with

a lot of what he says. All right, let's put that to this, let's put that to the side. So he wrote this book, kind of became prominent. He was on Fox News quite often. He wrote another book about the Nation of Victims, kind of outlining his philosophy. So I had the opportunity to interview Vivegue and one of the things I wanted to get to with the Vegue is, look, I tried. You know. One of the things I told him at the top, I said, I'm going to take

you seriously. I'm gonna take you seriously as a candidate. We took Andrew Yang seriously, we took Telsea Gabbard seriously. He came on the re alignment because it's comfortable. We've interviewed him a couple of times there and we have a long standing relationship. But in this you're going to see that Marshall and I press him a little bit on some of the interesting political questions that he hasn't

gotten to. And one of those that I was really intent on getting was Trump, because I'm like, look, you cannot sit here just and say Trump is a friend, and why I'm moving forward? What was wrong with America? First? One point zho why two point zero? A lot of people from that diner that we just played you that clip, they liked, why should they vote for you? And he offered what I thought to date was his first tapid criticism of Trump. Let's take a listen to some of that,

as well as some of the policy disagreements. What was wrong with America? First? One point? Oh, why is that nothing was wrong with America? Person But I would I wouldn't borrow the lingo America first if I thought something was wrong with it. I care a lot about national unity, and I know President Trump, he's a friend. He's misunderstood on this. He cares about national unity too, I know he does, but he I don't think is capable in the same way of delivering it, because if he was,

we wouldn't be where we are right now. On the election of twenty twenty, was it stolen or not? Yes or no question? Yes, but not in the way that not in the way that you mean that question. Okay, so what do you mean? But I think the technology companies tilted the scales of public debate. Okay, I think that this was I think the Hunter Biden laptop story epitomizes what was wrong with the lead up to that

election cycle. There was a true story that was censored in the name of misinformation, actually created more misinformation that somehow this was Russian disinformation. Guess what this was American disinformation that that actually wasn't a true story. No disagreement on much of what you said, but I do have to get specific because it's an important thing. I'm talking about mass voter fraud. There was no mass voter fraud in the twenty twenty election. I have not seen any

evidence of mass voter fraud. I distinguished that from micro examples that have clearly been reported and documented. So, you know, the first first initial criticism that Iyet to see from him from Trump still tepid, let's be honest, which was, well, you know, I want to unit America and if Trump could have done it, then he would have done it, which actually I don't think is a bad message for a general election candidate, but in a Republican primary. I

don't know how that's going to fly. Also, let's all be here, like, look, I think he's correct, there was no massive voter fraud in the twenty twenty election. I think you're going to have a tough time winning in the nomination with a blunt, basically statement of fact like that, as much as I would like it to be that way, Crystal, how many GOP primary candidates did we say go down overstop the steal? Yeah, over a dozen yes. Now, look all of them lost tests in GOP primary. It's huge.

We have to be honest here. So I think that that answer certainly could be a problem for some of the folks in MAGA. If you listen to some of the longer interview, one of the things is I asked him out America. I think, really it came down to this two point oh versus one point zero. I would love to believe that there is a two point zero, but I'm looking at that diner. I think people like one point h and when I say one point oh, they like Trump. It's just a it's a personality. It's

paired with Trump. Occasionally there's some policy and stuff that is sprinkled within there. And I just, you know, I didn't get from that interview yet. I'm like, you know, based on what I know and have seen from the dynamics of primaries with Republicans, I think it would be tough. It's a tough way. I mean, he uses a lot of buzzwords that don't mean a lot, like his whole like we need a national identity. I don't really know what that means concretely. And then when you talk about

specific policy differences that he has from Trump. As I said earlier, he's worse. He's worse in terms of listen, I mean in terms of my opinion, but also in terms of the opinion of like eighty percent of people, including an overwhelming majority of the Republican primary base, that wants Social Security and medicare to stay intact. So he's actually,

in a way not America first two point zero. He's sort of like a regression, a throwback on issues like that to more of the Paul Ryan Mitt Romney mindset, the other piece that we get a glimpse of there, And actually Marshall asked him a really great question about He was like, Okay, you say you want to be a unifier, but what you're saying about climate change in particular is going to like instantly piss off half of the country. And I think what he's speaking to there

is a core Listen. I'm not a Republican, obviously, this guy's not for me, and I have a disagreement with him on any number of issues. However, I think the core flaw at the center of his case is he wants to be a unifier, but he's talking about and leaning into culture war issues, which are inherently going to divide the country figues, but that's what the base likes,

and that's fine. But to be honest, but if you want to be a unifier, there's an obvious set of issues that you talk about which have appeal, you know, non like across partisan aisles, which are listen, what do most people care about? They want a job, they want a good wage, they want to have healthcare. He doesn't talk about any of that, which for most normal people, like these are the things that they really care deeply about, or being able to depend on social security when they retire.

That's an actual unifying agenda. If you want to be a unifier, leaning into like transgenderism and you know, the central bank, digital currency and affirmative action or whatever whatever you think about those issues, they're not exactly big national unifying issues. I couldn't help but think that to be honest. You know, look, I would love to brand affirmative action now that you'd be very popular thing. Would I run on it? Probably not. It's one of those where it's

just not really at the top. You know, I'm a commentator, I can talk about it. I know it's popular certainly, But like if I were running for office. I'm not sure that be the one that I would lead into. It's just missing the point of like the core issue. It's yes, okay, I agree with your posies, that's fine, right, but like that's your platform, And that was the first thing. He brought it up multiple times. I mean, that's the thing he's leaning it, and okay, you know, we'll see

if it works out for him. My actual uh, I will say I actually thought one of the more interesting parts is on Medicare. And I was like, okay, well what about soci security medicare because it actually goes on a little bit more than the critique of spending. And he was like, well, maybe we would cap medicare at like ten million, And I was like, dude, that's just that's like not a lot of people. He was he said, that's a lot of people. I was like, I don't

think that's a lot things testing. I mean, these are classic neoliberal, like conservative suggestions about these products. Have no issue with means testing into ten million. But it's one of those where I'm like, I don't think that even scratches the surface, because how many people have more than ten million dollars in this country? Maybe one hundred thousand, like maybe, I mean that's er point oh one percent almost.

I do have an issue with means testing, even at the high end, because the reason these programs are so popular and successful is because everybody feels they have a stake. That's fair. But I'm saying without ten million dollars, you're not going to use medicare you have private health insurance. It's one of those is a non issue, like it's you know, we're not paying for your hel You're going

to save the government three dollars congratulations, maybe less. Yeah, So anyway, so that was actually you'll actually lose the government money because of the additional paperwork it will take for people to prove that their income is lowered than so we have that that was there. I also press them a little bit on abortion, and I actually think that it was an interesting answer that it gave more politically popular, but also could be a problem for him

in the primary. Let's take a listen. One of the vice president Pence, and big disagreement between him and President Trump is on a national abortion ban. Where do you stand on national abortion ban? So? I am pro life, However, I think that for years, on constitutional grounds we have correctly argued that this is a state's issue, and I think it should remain a state issue. I think overturning Row in the Dobbs decision I think was the right

decision on hard constitutional grounds, full stop. I'm hardline on that, crystal clear. I think that we constitutionally finally got it right. That's where I'm at. For years it was argued to be a state's rights issue, and both for constitutional as well as public policy reasons, I think that's where it rested. So would you sign any federal abortion legislation fifteen week ban,

twenty two week ban as proposed in the Congress. As somebody who is staunchly pro life and unapologetic about that fact, I think that the states should get to that answer. So one of the things that he said, Crystal is I would leave it to the states. If you want to continue watching. I actually press him for this might actually be the biggest problem for him in the primary. I said, okay, but what about a federal ban, like do you remember the Lindsay Graham fifteen week He actually said,

I wouldn't sign any federal legislation. I would leave it fully up to the states. Now I'm not necessarily posted to that, but from a primary standpoint, the pro life community is definitely going to have an issue because that gives California, DC and others the ability to have legalized like late term abortions if they want to at the same time that you would have in Alabama or a Texas or any of these other places that do have

an abortion band. So that act think actually could be a little bit dicey in terms of Now I'm not saying it isn't politically popular, but one of the reasons that Trump probably has way more wiggle room than anybody else is he appointed the justices that got roversus way done. So that's the first time I've heard vivag talk about abortion, or at least pressed on that, And I think actually that might be one of the more significant ones where

there could be some disagreement with the evangelicals. Now for su would he ever win them in the first place? No? No, No, probably. I mean if Mike Pans isn't they got place right, They already got their guys. So I actually thought this was one of his better and more clear answers. She clearly knew what he thought about it. You pressed him on Okay, would you sign anything? Is like, no, leave

it to the States consistent. So I thought that was actually a pretty solid answer, because yeah, I don't think the evangelical vote was really up for grabs for him in any case. Yeah, I think that's fair. And then finally there was a thing where Veg went on Hugh Hewitt Show, and Hugh Hewett, I don't really know why. He's a conservative radio host. For those who know don't know. He has these weird pay issues. He's obsessed that everybody

know about. One of them is the nuclear Triad. So for those who don't know about the nuclear triad, it's nuclear defense of the United States land, sea, and air anyway, So he asked Vivik, do you know what the nuclear triad is? And Vivik was like, no, I don't. He said, but I'm a quick study. And one of the things that Marshall actually really pushed him on. He's like, look,

you said you're a quick study. He's like, but you're running for president now, He's like, how are you gonna get to the level of knowledge that you need to be president? And look, some of these are arbitrary, but it does matter, right, Like whether you have a familiarity with issues and some of that he gave an interesting answer. Let's take a lesson. You had an interesting interview with Hugh hewittt earlier in the week. You didn't know what the nuclear triad meant, pride was. We'll put that to

the side. You can learn what that term means. I know you know what it is now that said, I think the significance behind the question, though, is the president is in charge of the means to end the Earth. You can definitely train to learn what acronyms mean. I'm not convinced that you could learn in a year and a half. Bring partisan Fox News hits podcasts like this, How do I actually sit down with Shijing PingER Vladimir Putin?

Convince me otherwise? Because I got your point about how I work, and thank you for taking the superficiality out of it, because you know, anyone can learn a term, right, So this is a word. Okay, I understand that there's land, air and see. But but I'm approaching this with humility. So I think I think one of the things that's different is yes, I'm I fast, steady. Yes, have I taken on other complicated problems before and learn them fast. Sure, but I got to approach this, and I am approaching

this with humility. So I'll just tell you where I came from. Earlier today, I was having lunch upstairs in my house. I'm in the basement now with a former cabinet level secretary from the Trump administration who was over here visiting me. We spent two hours training. We're going to tape that. We're gonna do it daily. We got two hours at least daily where there's somebody coming in fly in here spending time with me in Columbus, Ohio. We're going to actually let the world watch how I learn.

So it's an interesting idea. I mean, look, on the one hand, realities. Look, I appreciate the humility. I will say this. I mean, I don't want to laugh at anybody, because what do we learn with Yang campaign? All Right, Like with Yang, there's like you can have two percent of the Democratic Party or whatever and you can have a significant impact on the battle of ideas, et cetera. So I'm not going to dismiss it. I've known the

guy for a while. I do think he's smart. That said, I think the biggest hole here is with the Republican primary voter, and you know his bet is basically the Obama bet, like New Hampshire and Iowa. But you know a lot of these issues they might do well on Twitter absolutely, you know, like you're talking about central bank digital currency, actually do care about that. I definitely would be opposed to it, But if I was running for office, I would never run on that count your like core platform.

I also just think look with Trump, I mean the stop the Steel answer that he gave. I just think that's going to be the biggest problem for him. And I don't know if you want a primary that way. I wish it weren't so, But look at every Republican politician who was successful in a primary in twenty twenty two, almost all of them endorsedtop the Steel, and if they didn't, they came pretty damn close to actually losing their seat. That tells you something. Yeah, we've seen how it's gone

when people try to do high brow stop. Yeah, we see. Because ultimately his response to you was like, I don't mean it was stolen in the way you're saying it. It's no, no, it's not the way you're saying it. It's the way that the like seventy percent of Republican voters who think it was stolen. They don't think like, oh, social that's part of it, right, No, they mean the what deneshe desuza like mules and bamboo ballots and like they mean real votes were changed, kind of voter fraud.

And so you know, you're trying to have it both ways by saying, yes, I think it was fraudulent, but you know, I don't think any votes were actually stolen. That's not going to be sufficient for what they want to hear. Ultimately, I agree completely. So anyway, you can go watch the full thing. Yeah, I thought you did a good job interviewing, getting some things to him that he hadn't been pressed on before, which is always an

interesting it's important additive to the conversation. My goal. Look, you know this is the problem like when he's an author, it's one thing because we're just talking, you know whatever, go to sick of that. But I was like, hey, man, like you're running for a Republican president. I got to ask you about the debt ceiling. I got to you know, like we've got abortion, stop the steal, Like these are all we live in this world. You and I Crystal and like you, and I know what the actual checkboxes

are for anybody wants to make it in Washington. And that was kind of marshall Nized goal in getting out of that. So go watch the full thing if you're interested. Unfortunately we didn't have as much time as I would have liked, but he said he would come back, so we'll see, we'll see. Why did we get to it? We have some actually good news. So giant drugmaker Eli Lilly announced that they are going to cap the price

of insulin. Now there are a few caveats that I'll get to in a moment, but first let me play for you the CEO of that company announcing the change today. We're announcing a seventy percent price cut on our most commonly used insulins, which will phase in over this year and effective today, a thirty five dollars cap. As you

said on out of pocket why is that pharmacy counter. Yeah, So this is a culmination of about seven years of work we've been doing to reduce the price of our insulince launching our own generic to our own best selling brand. But with the change last year in the Medicare party benefit, the senior benefit to thirty five dollars. We think that should be the new standard in America. And so what we could wait for Congress to act or the healthcare

system in general to apply that standard. We're just applying it ourselves. So what he's referring to there was a change that was part of the Inflation Reduction Act that would limit out of pocket costs for those who are on Medicare. And he's basically saying, Okay, well, that's the new standard, so we're going to move forward with that. President Biden's reaction here. Put this up on the screen.

He says, huge news. Last year, we capped insulin prices for seniors on Medicare, but there was more work to do. I called on Congress and manufacturers to lower insulin prices for everyone else. Today, Eli Lilly is heeding my call. Others should follow. Let me go ahead and show you why this matters so much and just how much you're being ripped off right now by these drug companies when it comes to insulin. But this is the case for

so many drugs across the board. Put the next up on the screen here, So this chart shows you the average price per vile of insulin by country. Here in the US it's damned near one hundred dollars. The next highest Japan at fourteen dollars, so still way less than

the thirty five that they're moving it down to. Of course, thirty five is huge improvement over the one hundred dollars that it is basically now in Canada, just across the border's twelve dollars, Germany eleven, France nine, UK seven fifty in an Australia seven dollars. So this is again not just insulin. Every drug is like, we pay so much more for prescription drugs than every other country in the world. They use you and our healthcare system like their piggybank.

This is where they make the overwhelming majority of their profits. All right, let's go and put this next piece up on the screen, which gives you some of the caveats here because I think myself you everyone's sort of like, what's their play? Because I know you're not just doing the sound and the goodness of your heart. Here's the New York Times article. They say Eli Lily says it will cut the price of insulin. The company also trumpeted an existing policy that caps monthly out of pocket costs

for its saving products at thirty five dollars. They go on to report that their moves are somewhat limited. The lower list prices, which will take a factor over the course of this year, apply only to the company's older insulin products, and a large percentage of diabetes patients who need insulin take products made by two other major drug manufacturies,

Santa Fies. Maybe how you say that At Novo Nordisk, insulin costs are estimated at ten dollars per file to manufacture, so they're still making a hefty profit here, and they also have I think it's important to always remember this. When insulin was actually invented by Frederick Banting. When he helped invent the drug, he refused to put his name on the first patent application. He thought it would be at odds with the hippocratic oath he had taken as

a physician. The two scientists who's names were on the patent application transferred it to the University of Toronto for one dollar in hopes of making it as widely available and affordable as possible. That, of course, has not happened, they say. In recent years, the leading insulin manufacturies, including Lily, have replaced older products with newer, costlier versions and steadily increased their prices. So catch here is most patients are

using other products from other companies number one. Number two, it only applies to the older versions of insulin that Eli Lilly themselves offer. And so if I had to guess, you know, they like the brand play, they like the halo that they get from making this big announcement on

cable news and all of the coverage. They're hoping to eat into some of the market share of those other companies, and ultimately they still can make a hefty profit on this, even at the thirty five dollars price point, which again is still more than what everybody in other countries gets charged for this. That's why the Inflation Reduction Act thing was so stupid. It's because we're only capping it for seniors who are on Medicare. And look, I'm not saying

that it's a bad thing. I think that's great. But you know a lot of people also have diabetes who are not on Medicare. So you know, I actually just saw the numbers. One in ten Americans have diabetes, about a third are pre diabetic. You're myself included by the way working on that. If you are too, God speed to you, I know that it's going to be a

difficult journey. Now. The point is, though, is that this drug is vitally important for those one to ten Americans and many have died and or can go bankrupt simply because of insulin management. Now, if you have a good healthcare, that's one thing, but if you don't, this is a genuine like this will not only save your life, think about also the type one diabetics. So that's a whole

other story. You know, with people who actually produce no insulin, this is one hundred percent of something they rely on, and many of them who come from disadvantaged backgrounds have along had problems here. Another problem also that we talk I've talked about ad nauseum is the rebates with the drug companies. So one of the fakeries here is that you will have a child or a family member who's got diabetes and then you have an X amount of

spend that you're allowed to spend on drugs. And so with these costs, like you're going there, you're paying this fake thing and it comes out of the amount of money you need to spend on prescription drugs, and the drug in the price inflation negotiated between the drug companies and the pharmaceutical companies is such that it's much higher than you would have paid if you've just paid out

of pocket. That's the nuts part of it, because then let's say that this person with diabetes, who probably statistically has obesity or some other underlying health condition, if then they need more drugs, then a lot of it is already come out of the pre spend that they're allowed to have on drugs. And next thing you know, you're

unfallable on medical bankruptcy. And what did you just do your monologue on one of the biggest reasons why people have low credit scores in the South, which deprives you of a hell of a lot in American life, is medical bankruptcy. Medical debt. Medical debt is now the number one source of debt held by collection, so debt that is behind that's the number one driver of bankruptcies is medical debt. It is Our healthcare system is pure insanity. I mean, listen, I don't want to like I told

you the caveats. This is good. It's an improvement, don't get me wrong. And I do think there is something to say here about the fact that you had, you know, a lot of political attention on this issue, you had the president involved, you actually got some legislation pass. So they can kind of see the writing on the wall here as well in terms of the direction that things might be heading in. And so they decided, all right, we'll just take the hit and get a little bit

of a halo, and it's pr out of it. So it just shows you when the president actually does use his bully pulpit, when Congress actually does take some actions, it can force industry to at least do a little bit to make people's lives better as well. And so I think that's an important piece of this ultimately too. Yeah, No,

I think it's important. I think people should take away from this that it's just, you know, the fact is this is mostly pr Most people still are going to have to pay a hell of a lot more for insulin than they should. Yeah, it's an even at thirty five dollars, they're still making a massive, massive profit off of all of us. Okay, next flock turns out, I know you CAUs will be shocked. Havana syndrome was fake all along. Who could have possibly predicted it and put

this up on the screen. This is just amazing. So this is from the Washing Post. They say Havana syndrome not caused by energy weapon or foreign adversary. Intelligence review finds after years long assessment, five US intelligence agencies conclude it's quote very unlikely and enemy wielding a secret weapon was behind the mysterious ailment. Now, I don't know if you followed our coverage on all of this, but this

was always highly suspicious. There was an infamous sixty minutes airview where they played what this Havanah syndrome supposedly sounded like, and they go to grade likes, it's not the sound that causes the injury, it's the impet the sounds of byproduct whatever. Well, people analyze the sound and they're like,

that's literally crickets. It's literally just crickets making that sound. Yes, So there has never been any actual proof offered to the American public that this was some crazy new energy directed weapon, and it was always Russia that they wanted to pin this on, even though again no evidence offered for any of this. So we were, I would say, deeply skeptical from the beginning. Let me read you a

little bit of this report. They say that the mysterious ailment known as Havanason did not result from the actions of a foreign adversary. The new intelligence assessment caps a year's long effort by the CIA and several other US intelligence agencies to explain my career diplomats, intelligence officers, and others serving in US missions around the world experience but

they described as strange and painful acoustic sensations. Many of the afflicted personnel say they were the victims of a deliberate attack, possibly at the hands of Russia or another adversarial government. Claimed that the report contradicts in nearly every respect.

They ow go cocker, Yeah, I mean, look, this is one of those which smelled from the beginning and it became this insane deep state like one of those things where they looked at it as an opportunity to I highlight the dangers of the things that they face overseas and what they exactly that they have to deal with. And look, we have a couple of clips here from some of the Wild Times on MSNBC where they aired

so called survivors of Havana syndrome. What it did to have Ana syndrome and the credulousness which which they offered. It was clearly in the spirit of Russia Gate, because that was supposedly, you know, Russia was the main, number one major culprit who was poisoner using secret weapons on our diplomats. Let's take a listen to some of that.

Was there a possibility that you'd been attacked in some way? Well, you know, well, you know, the first thing that went that came through my mind was it might be something like food poisoning. You know, I mean, look, I traveled all around the world. I think I'd been sick in

every continent. But my suspicions started growing when you know, the next day and the days after, the symptoms didn't necessarily abide, and when I got back to the United States, particularly in early twenty eighteen, you know, I developed symptoms such as brain fog, I lost my long distance vision. You know. At that point, I think, you know, it was it was pretty clear to me that something very unusual had happened. This is a big deal. You know,

these are attacks. You know, it's it's you know, it's an active war against US officials, active war against US statist That is a big deal. Saga maybe we just had food poison That would have been a big deal. Yeah, maybe he just had food poisoning. My dude, Like, what

is going on here? So these people there's I got to play for you this other one and it's the whole thing is just amazing because it's one of NBC's main like national security reporters, Kendelanian, and uh, they don't present this as like there's this crazy theory out there that maybe it was Russia, but you know, there's no evidence to really back that up. No, his sources tell him that they actually have communications that they intercepted that

indicate Russian officials are talking about this. And again to go back to the Washing Post report that's now debunking all of this quote, Uh, this person added there was no intelligence that foreign leaders, including in Russia, had any knowledge of or had authorized an attack on US personnel that could explain the symptom. So something got lost in

translation there with our guy ken Over at NBC. But just again, take a listen to the way that this was presented to the American public, not like an out there theory that people are thinking about and maybe possibly, but this would be really out there. No, no, no, This was presented as all but fact of what was going on here. Take a listen exclusive new reporting this

morning from NBC News. Intelligence agencies investigating attacks on US diplomats in Cuba and China now strongly suspect that Russia is to blame. Twenty six government workers in Havana had mysterious brain injuries starting in late twenty sixteen, and then this year, one US worker in China was diagnosed with similar symptoms. Joining me now with more on this as NBC News Intelligence at National Security reporter Kendelanian. So this

has been a mystery. The CIA, the FBI, other intelligence agencies have all been working to try to figure out what exactly happened here. Why do they suspect Russia now? And what's the evidence that they have. Well, it's still partially a mystery, Chris, but they have more and more evidence, they say, three US officials tell us pointing to Russia, including communication intercepts that suggest that the Russian intelligence agency was involved. Now, really there was only three suspects from

the beginning here, Russia, China, and the Cubans. The Russian and the Chinese intelligence services operate in force in Cuba and it's still believed that it's possible that some element

of the Cuban intelligence services cooperated with this. The other interesting thing we're reporting here is that one of the technologies used to injure these American spies and diplomats was some kind of microwave weapon that is so sophisticated the Americans don't even fully understand it, and they've been testing some kinds of aspects of this technology, so kind of

reverse engineering, is that what they're trying to do? Absolutely, because the military has been the US military has worked on microwave technology and tried to deploy it as weapons over the years. Apparently the Russians have as well, and it can make people think they're hearing sounds. That's why initially this was thought to be a sonic attack of some sort. Chris, what do we know about the people? Were individuals targeted? Was it just a group that was targeted?

And do we have any idea about a motive why these people? And then again these are only theories, But what our sources are telling us is that this was an intentional attack, because initially people thought it could be a byproduct of some spying technology gone awry, but it's now believed that this was meant to hurt these spies

and diplomats who have suffered serious brain injuries. And if this is confirmed it was Russia, Chris, it would be a game changer because the sort of unwritten rules of the spying game are you don't go after the other person's spies and diplomats, you don't try to hurt them. Yeah. So anyway, that's that's the way it was presented, like this was all It was definitely Russia. They intercepted these communications that they really were leaning in this direction of

this energy directed weapon all amount of sense. Yeah, and this is not a joke. That wasn't just that was NBC News that was on like actual network television that went out to buy some smod's like five six million people. Where's the retraction? What kind of reporting is this? It's complete bs to the extent that the Russians probably did talk about it there. Can you believe these dumbasses things that we shot microwaves at them in Havana. They're literally

laughing at us probably in Moscow that we took it seriously. Also, let's not forget the US Congress and Biden passed and signed into law quote unquote aid for victims of havanas, so do we get our money? Pack? What happens to that money? They did that before they were able to get their act together in the Packed Act for burn Pit Victims correct burn Pit victims were bailed out after quote victims of Havana syndrome. I actually really want to

know what happens to that money. Now. I don't wish sickness on anyone, but you know, there's probably a high correlation between being a spook, being deployed for a long time, and neurosis. Can I just say that sure, probably stressful. I'm sure it's a very stressful job that can lead to all types of like real symptoms where you're having like real physical impacts. Everybody deserves the care that they need. But let's not invent fake syndromes. Let's just say it

was probably psychosomatic from day one. And yeah, anyway, that's what we'll leave it at that. Let's go to the

next one here. This is a very interesting story that actually highlights one of the initial problems about Elon buying Twitter that most people were not focusing on, which is that Tesla, the company of which the vast majority of Elon wealth is based in of course, has major business ties to the CCP beyond actually just financial but manufacturing ev battery supply chain, a major reliance on being able to do business in China that was negotiated and now

long years long into the deal, such that if Tesla did he lose some of its Shanghai facilities and some of its other battery supply chain and others inside of China would be a devastating blow to the company well as predicted his ownership of Twitter, and now the voicing of his opinions is causing a bit of a problem.

So let's put this up there on the screen. Chinese state run media warned the Tesla CEO, Elon Musk, he was risking his relationship with China after he retweeted about the US government's quote low confidence assessment in the COVID pandemic originating in a Wuhan lab. The warning is one of the first that has yet been issued towards Elon, and it was actually published in the Global Time. So for people who don't know what the Global Times is, it's kind of all state All media in China is

state run, So let's put it that way. That said, it's nuanced because the state run media they allow the hard line like the tiger element of the CCP. That's the Global Times. They're like the attack dogs, and then they have the more diplomatic ones. We're like, no, we shouldn't write that in the Globals is the one Matt Gates does, That's right, Yeah, so, like the Global Times is one of those where they they'll frequently attack people

on Twitter and even though there's no Twitter in China. Hilariously, anyway, the point is is that they warned Elon that by publishing this that you are quote breaking the pot of China. Breaking the pot after eating in Chinese means quote biting the hand that feeds you. So China is not dumb. They know exactly what their relationship to Tesla means. They

know that Elon needs them quite a bit. We should also not forget I've did an entire monologue about this, not only about the business ties, but Elon in the

past has set some sketchy stuff about China. He's used like Chinese social media to be like congratulations to like the anniversary of the Communist revolution and congratulating them on the you know, like anniversary of their government, and he has made a lot of trips to China and met with some of the most senior officials, and it just comes down to the fact that China owns about eighty five percent of the ev battery supply chain around the world,

and with Tesla specifically, they need that Shanghai facility in order to make sure that they can continue. The growth of the company is vital to the stock price, which is making a hit right now. So this actually could be from my knowledge, really the most consequential thing to come yet from Elon's ownership of Twitter, because it's specifically

him retweeting and airing these concerns. And you know, on top of ideologically, of course he's kind of aligned with that he's into cash twenty two or what he's going to do. It's and it's the supply chain, and it's also obviously China's domestic market for its huge if he has massive So this is really important for Tesla. And just I pulled a couple examples of what you were

talking about, Sager. So days after the US enacted the Weager Forced Labor Prevention Act in January, Tesla opened a brand new showroom in Jinjang, that is the region with the four labor camps center. Mark or Rubio at that time accused Tesla quote helping the Chinese Communist Party cover

up genocide and slave labor. There's also another incident that I was reading about where there was a lot of criticism on Chinese social media over some accidents that people were claiming were caused by like Tesla's breaking system and perhaps a self driving system or whatever. And Musk reportedly actually reached out to the government to get them to try to censor that. Not so, I mean, it just gives you a sense of like, you know, this business

relationship has been very close, it's been very symbiotic. The Chinese government likes having Tesla there. It's prestigious. You know, they need high quality cars to feed for their own ev domestic market. That's important to them, but it's far more important. Like China can afford to lose Tesla, no problem, Elon, Musk can't really afford to lose the Chinese market and

the supply chain and all the pease built. What China did with Elon was brilliant, And this is why I look as much, you know, I don't want them to. I admire them. I have to. So one of the things that they did is they're like, hey, we got cheap labor, we got the raw materials. Come on in here. You build up this nice facility, which we never allow

American companies to do. Well. One of the things that a company like Tesla does when they build that facility is then they go out and they find the sources and they build this whole vertically supply chain right from the suppliers to the companies and the workers and the facilities and all that. But lo and behold all of the infrastructure that supports the Tesla supply chain. Oh, let's

use it for the Chinese EV supply chain. So they not only got to keep control of Tesla basically now by controlling his access to facility, now they have all of these sourcing areas and companies and all of the know how and the technology for the Chinese supply chain. And then ten years from now, if they kick Tesla out, they're like I don't care about you. They're like, I don't think about you at all. We have our own

EV companies. You built the supply chain, and the gave us a technical know how and brought all your executives in you made us rich and it didn't cost us a single dime. In fact, you paid us to do it. This is what they do in a lot of different facilities. So again, you know, like they are our advisars, but I got to admire them. They're smart the way that

they handle themselves over there. For Elon, I think this is a big problem, and it's one of those where it might be one of the most consequential things that ends up, because look, what if there's a future Hong Kong protests, what if there's more COVID zero protests that are happening. Do you think that they will not resort to telling Elon, we will kick your ass out of China if you don't censor that on Twitter. They know and have done it before to many tech CEOs, including

the TikTok CEO of xiang Jiming. They have no qualms whatsoever about putting the screws on you. From that angle, I really think he's very vulnerable. Well, and to zoom out from Elon specifically, this is the perfect case in point of why having any of your like democracy, free speech infrastructure in the hands of one person whoever that person is whether you think that they're aligned with you or have the right values or well in touched or whatever.

You're always going to run into issues like this because people are flawed, they have conflicts of interest, they have blind spots, et cetera. So this is just kind of a cautionary tale of that mode of hoping that one good billionaire is gonna rescue your democratic infrastructure. Salt democracy, Crystal,

what are you taking a look at? Well, got a new entry for you in our travelog as we journey across scam Land, fake media mogul who's now been indicted and interested on multiple charges of fraud in what the government says was a multi year, multi million dollar effort to defraud investors, including some wild tales of fake documents, selling stock that didn't exist, and even identity theft. Meet

Carlos Watson. We first introduced you to Carlos in September of twenty twenty one, when Ben Smith, who was then at The New York Times, blew the lid off of his whole puffed up media scam. Here is that article. In its Smith explains how Watson attracted a who's who list of investors for his millennial media play was called Ozzie.

From Loreene Palll Jobs to Silicon Valley venture capitalist Ron Conway, to some big institutional players like publishing giant Axel, Springer, media investment bank, Lion Try, the Ford Foundation and iHeartMedia. Billionaire hedge funder and major dem donor Mark Lazr ended up as chair of the board. All in, Ozzy was

able to raise more than eighty three million dollars. Now, Ozzie build itself as a quote diverse, global and forward looking median entertainment company focused on the new and the next bunch of garbage buzzwords that apparently rich people fell all over themselves for now. Their launch video, which is still pinned to their YouTube channel, includes both Hillary Clinton and Carl Rove, even as the text on that video declares that Ozzie is for the daring and the unconventional.

So won't shock you to find out that all of those millions of dollars went to produce a bunch of content that was safe, unoriginal garbage that absolutely no one cared about. It was an instant and consistent failure. A quick perusal of the Ozzi YouTube channel exposes quite clearly just how much of a failure are Ozzi ultimately was. Their average video garnered mere hundreds of views. Some didn't

even break into the hundreds. Even videos that were able to crack into the thousands often had next to no engagement, creating a strong suspicion that the views they did receive were probably purchased. Now. According to Ben Smith's reporting, there'd long been rumors about Ozzie's actual success versus all of its puffery, but the wheels really came off with one fateful conference call. So Ozzie was trying to raise additional

cash to keep their head above water. The company was now loaded up with high interest debt, churning through massive amounts of cash in order to just keep the lights on. Goldman Sachs was considering an investment, but there was one catch. The investment bank wanted to hear from YouTube about their partnership with Ozzie and about Ozzie's supposedly great performance on

the channel. Of course, there was no partnership, and Ozzie's numbers, readily available to anyone who had the Internet, were absolute garbage Rather than defeat. However, Watson and his co founder Samir Raw cooked up another scheme. Now, Rao got the meaning switched from Zoo, where of course faces are visible, to a regular old conference call. He then used voice altering software to mask his own normal speaking voice and pretended to be a YouTube executive attesting to the company's

phenomenal partnership and track record. Goldman actually wasn't buying it. After the call, they reached out to the actual, very confused YouTube executive who Rao had impersonated, and confirmed what they had suspected all along, that the whole call was completely faked. In response, Carlos Watson, well, he immediately threw Rao, his co filen founder, under the bus. Watson claimed he had no idea about the call at all, and that Rao was just having a mental breakdown, which led to

this outrageous behavior. Once the whole situation was exposed in The New York Times, Watson doubled down on these claims and proclaimed to Today's Shows Craig Melvin that far from killing the company, these revelations would lead to Ozzie's Lazarus Moment joining us now exclusively. Carlos Watson, Ozzie Media's CEO. Good morning two Starm, good morning, good see Thanks for coming in. Let's start with the status of Ozzy as we say it right now. Reports that the company shutdown

on Friday? Is that true? Is the company shut down? Are you still loving for business? You know we're going to open for business, so we're making news today. This is our Lazarus moment, if you will. This is our tail and all moment. Last week was traumatic, It was difficult, heartbreaking in many ways, and at the end of the week we did suspend operations with a plan to wind down. But as we spend time over the weekend, we talked to advertising partners, we talked to some of our readers

and our viewers, our listeners, our investors. I think Ozzie's is part of this moment, and it's not going to be easy. But I think what we do with newsletters, what we do with TV shows, original TV shows, podcasted more, I think is a place. Let's talk about this phone call. I mean, did you know that your partner, the co found of this company, was going to impersonate a YouTube executive on a call. Yeah? No, and it's sad and it's difficult. It was wrong. Obviously they figured it out

very quickly. But here's the thing. Someone would wonder perhaps, I mean, you're on a call with Golden Sacks, you're trying to score forty million dollars in funding. Why were you not on the call? And how did you not have any knowledge of the call? You know, part of the fundraising process, you end up talking to a lot of people, and I'm not on every call, and there are lots of these reference calls that happen. They I think probably ended up talking to three, four, maybe five

of our references. They also to talk to members of the team, They talk to more other investors, and so they're a fair number of things that are involved, and you're not a part of all of them. Now, this was not, in fact, their Lazarus moment. In reality, was the beginning of the end. Last week, Carlos Watson was arrested. He was charged with conspiracy to commit securities fraud, conspiracy

to commit wire fraud, and aggravated identity theft. He'll be shocked to learn that Watson Courtney of the government was in the room coaching row when that infamous Golden Sax conference call all went down. Now, Rao has already pled guilty along with Watson's former chief of staff, and they are presumably singing to the Feds about everything that they know.

According to the indictment, this was not even the first time that Watson impersonated a media executive in a desperate bid to raise more millions for the whole failing enterprise. For years, he allegedly engaged in a web of just outright lies about the company's revenue, their projected revenue, the nature and existence of their TV contracts, the timing of their stock offerings. He invented the possibility of a company's sale.

They forged documents and signatures, and in one noteworthy instance, a bank they were trying to secure funds from wanted to see proof of a cable network contract for the second season of an Ozzi TV show. Of course, that contract didn't actually exist. So what, according to the indictment, did Watson do in face with this dilemma, Well, he directed Ozzie's then CFO to send the bank a fake signed contract between Ozzie and the cable network reporting to

be for the second season. When the then CFO refused, raw with Watson's approval, sent the fake contract, which contained terms favorable to Ozzie and a forged signature, to the bank. Copying the then CFO. Later that day, the then CFO emailed Watson and Row to say that she was resigning, effective immediately. She explained, quote, this is illegal, This is fraud. This is forging someone's signature with the intent of getting an advance from a publicly traded bank. She continued to

be crystal clear. What you see as a measured risk, I see as a felony. Ozzie accumulated years of lies and fraud and obvious public failure when it came to the content. Yet Watson was able to fool so many elites in parting with millions of dollars. Even at the end. Once the whole Goldman Sacks conference call debacle was all exposed, billionaire chair of the Board Mark Lasari stood by his man,

apparently buying the whole mental breakdown cover story. He told The Times quote, the board was made aware of the incident and we fully support the way it was handled. The incident was an unfortunate, one time event. Carlos and his team show the kind of compassion we would all want if any of us faced a difficult situation in

our own lives. How did they all get van boozled well Carlos had worked at Golden Sacks himself, not to mention McKinsey Consulting, It was a Harvard grad former MSNBC anchor, so his elite credentials card was fully filled out. Those positions also gave him knowledge the elite circles and the language of finance and media, so that he knew how to fake and lie what he needed to fake and lie.

He was a black founder making content that was totally comfy for the ruling class at a time when there was a big push for trailblazers and hollow identity plays well radical black media. They didn't have a chance of getting funded, but this Every billionaire in the country, dying to burnish their brand and sue their conscious could get behind this kind of drivel and Watson's pitch it landed

at exactly the right time. He sold them all on reaching a millennial audience that they didn't really understand, but which they were desperate to cash in on literal fake media. Now, as for me, I'm going to take Carlos's downfall and unmasking the official elite paper of record, The New York Times, as a hopeful sign. Maybe, just maybe, the shelf life of the type of vapid identity play that Watson was peddling. Maybe it's finally reached its expiration date. So we tracked

this one early. And if you want to hear my reaction to Crystal's monologue, become a premium subscriber today at breakingpoints dot com. What do you look at zagre Well, I won't lie and say it hasn't been satisfying watching the mainstream media reckon with the fact that the Energy Department and now the FBI director say they believe COVID is the result of a lab league from the Wuhan Institute of Virology. They were so smug for so long

on the possibility. They smeared people who discussed it as racists. They kept it out of the public consciousness for years. One way to look at it is the truth inevitably came out. That's a victory, right. But another way, and the way I'm increasingly looking at it, is this is a classic Washington story. Corruption, no accountability, time, disclosures, captured media,

most importantly, no consequences. When you step back and you consider it, the origin of COVID matters immensely for many reasons. Number one, We need to make sure this never happens again. If this is the type of gain of function research which led to one deadly pandemic, we should be damn sure we have the highest safety standards worldwide if it

continues to be practiced. Number two. Even the Chinese controlled World Health Organization says that some three quarters of a billion people have been confirmed infected with COVID, which means a real number is likely orders of magnitude higher. Some seven million people have died from it. While it could have been a lot worse, COVID was still a disaster for the human race. It shut down our societies. It

gave immense power to the government. It fundamentally reset a lot of American and global life, the relationship to the state. As important as it is right now to grapple with those changes, not lose sight of what caused it in the first place. And I made a comment in one of our last shows about how this is just like IRAQ WMD. I increasingly believe that a comparison rings true.

IRAQ WMD was, depending on who you believe, either fake from the beginning or the greatest intelligence failure in modern mystery. It was used right senior government officials to manipulate the press and the American people to lead us into a similarly disastrous war in Iraq. It took full year, two full years after the invasion of Iraq for Congressional Commission on What WMD's and Intelligence to admit it was fake

the whole time. It took months later even for President Bush to admit to the American people he was wrong, and really up until two thousand and six before he would really fully acknowledge it. Why did that delay matter, because by the time the debate of that was happening was about what to do in Iraq, should we surge and withdraw? How do we deal with insurgency? And because by that time, the CIA director, the man perhaps most responsible for the false intelligence estimate in Iraq, had already

resigned from the government. By the time we really and fully acknowledging in Rumsfeld, George Tenant, Paul Wolfowitz, Scooter Libby, many of the others who are no longer in they were no longer in positions of power that they once held. And sure there were yells from Democrats in Congress and the media about how they were liars, how they should be held accountable, but not one to this day has suffered any consequence for their role in leading the American

people to the war in Iraq. In fact, when the report dropped, of course it was a big deal, but most people had mostly moved on. It was just a fact of life that the government had lied about wmd Now what to do with the mess in Iraq? And the hundreds of American troops are getting killed by IEDs. The crazy party is, though, is when you compare this lab league Lablaque honestly might be worse. At least, the US Congress agreed on a bipartisan commission to investigate whether

WMDs were a lie or not. Our Congress is totally split on partisan lines. Republicans are the only ones willing to investigate the lab league. Democrats repeatedly blocked these attempts in Congress. In fact, the only reason that we even know about this Energy Department and FBI intelligence assessment is because the GOP took control of House and the intelligence community was preparing summaries for subpoenas that they are expected to deliver on the intelligence as related to the lab leak.

To date, none of this has been publicized, None of it has been declassified for the American people or people like us to go through and read the raw documents or the intelligent summaries or interviews of any of these people involved. It is not an accident you're hearing about this three years later because the principal actors involved can

no longer suffer any real consequences. The chief criminal amongst them is doctor Fauci, the man most responsible for dispensing US funds to the Wuhan Lab and for covering it up in the media. He's gone. He left the government in an NIH in December. He's no longer subject to the same requirements to appear before Congress, and he's no longer an employee of the US government subject to previous scrutiny he made his millions documentaries, book deals, speaking fees.

I have zero confidence whatsoever anything will happen to him for lying to us repeatedly about the lab leak and about actively covering it up at the time or the media angle. There's no more famous example on a rack WMD than Judy Miller, who published straight up Bush propaganda on a rack for WMD for the New York Times. Now Look. She eventually was fired for her role in that, and she had to apologize on lab leak though, look

at this. Apoorva Mondavli, the lead COVID reporter for the New York Times, She wrote in May twenty twenty one, quote, someday we will stop talking about the lab leak theory and maybe even admit its racist roots. Alas that day is not yet here. She not only wrote that she won a Pulitzer Prize for her coverage of COVID in twenty twenty one. Now that the US government even admits lab leak is almost certainly true, is there an apology recrimination? No? Nothing,

that's the crazy part. Absolutely no consequences. The same people who dismissed it with a straight face, pretending they never did. And just like with the rack WMD, they just wanted to fade away into the distance, become something else. That something else can be important, but the original sin must never be forgotten. And that's just one of those where I keep coming back to it. And if you want to hear my reaction to Sagre's monologue, become a premium

subscriber today at Breakingpoints dot com. Bronco Marchatic is a staff writer for Jackman and he joins us, now great to Caeesar. Good see many fleas flanks over. Yeah. Absolutely, I think I'm getting better at saying your name, so I've been worth working on it here. So let's go and put this latest piece up on the screen, which is thoroughly reported and I think really significant and important. The headline here is the state of Ukrainian democracy is

not strong, subhad is. One year after Russia's invasion, Ukraine is backsliding away from democratic freedoms and liberal pluralism. Let me just read another piece here. You write Bronco. While authoritarianism is nothing new in the country, and the country being Ukraine, it is severely worsened in the wake of the invasion, which has seen a centralization of power by Zelenski's government and a crackdown on dissonance and all things

quote pro Russian. A lack of Western Median per book attention, coupled with US and European policies actively exacerbating it, are helping to fuel the problem. So give us the outlines of what you found here. Yeah, I mean, as you said, authoritarism in Ukraine is not a new thing. I mean even in the Zelenski in tween nineteen, Ukraine has been ranked lower than in Hungary by Freedom House in terms

of you know, democratic credentials. It's actually gone lower by some measures under Zelenski, you know, started cracking down on opposition parties and the like as his popularity started plummeting, you know, towards twenty twenty one or so. But it's really ratchet up since the start of the war, which to some extent is understandable. I mean, I think any country, you know, you look at at war time, you tend to see a curtailment of freedoms and civil liberties and

so on and so forth. But I mean, you know, just to say that it happens and it's an organic outcome of a country being attacked does not mean that it's okay. And I think, you know, if we really take these ideas about defending Ukrainian democracy seriously, I think

it's the something that we have to pay attention to. So, you know, what we've seen in Ukraine is dissidents, not just people on the left, but all kinds of anti war voices, all kinds of voices that are you know, taking a different line towards his conflict than say the Ukrainian authorities would like who, you know, talk about the fact that this was a civil war before it was an invasion by Russia and so on and so forth. They've been rounded up, arrested, There's been allegations of torture.

You know, Zelenski has basically eliminated all kinds of opposition media. He's centralized all the TV networks almost under one government platform. There was a law passed recently that he signed into law and I think December that basically gave the Ukrainian government under Zelensky wide latitude to basically censor media that

that that was inconvenient in some way. You've had crackdown on sort of things that perceived as pro Russian or parts of Russian culture, which is very significant because that was already one part of the grievance that that that that led to civil strife within Ukraine even before this invasion. So you've had raids and so on on on the Ukrainian Orthodox Church around the country, you know, monasteries and

churches and the like. You had book banning the banning of speaking Russian, and you know, there's a country where a lot of people spoke Russian before the war, and and and still do. I mean, you know, some people have definitely voluntarily decided to abandon Russian as the sort of patriotism, but there's still people who speak Russian and consider a Russian cultural heritage pretty central to their lives.

You've had, you know, you've had a lot of people being harassed and like by Ukraine's security service, the SPU. You've had this proliferation of blacklists, private blacklists, which basically less people who are meant to be traders in the like. Uh. And then you know they sometimes less their addresses, their phone numbers, so on and so forth, identifying details. You know,

often the evidence is flimsy to to non existent. You have the prosecution of collaborators, and those collaborators again it's a very elastically defined term. For in some cases it's just people who have voiced opinions that are not any longer considered you know, appropriate. Uh. You know I've already mentioned,

you know, mentioning civil war. But also you might add to that just people who happen to work trying to survive under Russian occupation, who take on positions say running a hospital or fixing rail lines and so on and so forth, and then when when those areas have been liberated, they have been charged as collaboratives for doing work under

those occupiers. So there's a there's a broad range of stuff, but overall it paints a pretty grim picture for Ukrainian democracy, and it is kind of liberal pluralism, which I think we in the West see as kind of you know, pretty natural to any sort of liberal democracy. But it's slowly in this case, rapidly disappearing in So why does that matter then for the end state of like whatever that this might look like. And what does it pose as a problem, if any, for the West in trying

to deliver a peace for this conflict. I mean one problem, as I mentioned, the conflict between rival or dueling visions of what the country is. You know, is there a single Ukrainian identity that comes under sage that you know, people everyone speaks Ukrainian, everyone has this kind of culture versus this is a pluralistic society where you know, you haveeople speaking multiple languages, where people you know, you can have people with existing within Ukraine or having some sort

of ties to Russian heritage. You know that that was an issue that was alive before the war, and it was the product of a lot of conflict within the country. I mean, that's part of the reason why there's been this war on the Dombas for the last nine years. And so if the idea is that it's just gonna you know, you're going to solve that problem by just basically using force or using government power to kind of stamp out all this, I think that's going to cause

problems long term. However, much you know, people may be unified now naturally as they kind of resist the Russian invasion, I think it's a little naive to think that's going to hold. And I mean, you know, in terms of what the endgame looks like. I mean, you know, some people might say, well, this is only temporary, this is just during wartime. But again, I mean, these trends were happening with Zelenski beforehand. It wasn't just Zelenski, of course,

I mean the previous prison before in Porshenko. He was also known for some authoritarian measures. So I would love to say that, you know, this is just going to be a temporary thing, but I fear that this is going to be a trend that if and when this war finally ends, which hopefully it does that it really

poses some real challenges to having a proper democracy. I think it also speaks to the Disney version of this war that has been sold to the American public, where it's portrayed as this really clear cut war over values, with liberal democracy Ukraine on one side and authoritarian Putin on the other side. And what you're showing here is that the reality at best is a lot more complex than what is being portrayed in the Western media and what is being sold to the American public as well.

I'd love for you for people who don't understand, to just help situate Zelenski on political spectrum, help situate his allies on a political spectrum the you know, prior to the war, the descent against him, like give us a sense of where the political dividing lines are and were in Ukraine. Well, I think Zelenski now is portrayed as this kind of Churchilean figure. He's this guy who's defending Ukrainian democracy, he's helping it to survive and possibly even thrive.

And you know, as you said, this whole war is about a battle between democracy and authoritarianism. I mean that's not really quite the case. And first of all Zelenski, as I said, he began centralizing power. Before this happened. He actually his leading parliamentary opposition, the Pro Russian Opposition for Life bloc, They had ten percent of seats in parliament. You know, after after Zelensky's popularity started falling down, they they actually ended up being sort of nick and neck

with him in the polls. And not just that, but I one of their candidates beat one of Zelenski's own parties candidates seven other people party. They beat this candidate in Selenski's own hometown, which was a bit of a one of those bellwether elections. So they were definitely an electoral threat, you know, leading into into into elections between twenty three and uh, you know, Zelensky sanctioned it's It's leader. He closed its leaders opposition as sorry as media outlets,

which is a pretty extreme thing to do. Was actually condemned by the EU at the time. Interestingly, it was it was kind of cheered on by US officials at the time, but there you go. You know, in terms of his politics, I mean, besides the kind of centualization of power which you know, you consider readers, maybe an act of disparation from a politician who has lost some of the shine that you had when you first came in. Zelensky is a a party a pretty neo liberal. I mean.

One of the big things that that they put forward and they actually managed the past during during the pandemic in tween twenty, was to start selling off Ukrainian farmland, which is of course, you know, the richest agricultural land in the world. And there was there was a there was a law from the time of independence that that banned the sale of farmland to private hands, which Selenski opened up finally, and by the way, he opened it up at the urging of of of the the EU

and the IMF. You know, these these institutions that are meant to be sort of you know, supposedly guaranteeing Ukraine's sovereignty. Even there was a there's a you can find a piece from the Atlanta Council interestingly back in I think one but they talk about how you came into powers as kind of liberal figure, but actually him and his party's record on LGBTQ issues, for instance, has been pretty warnful, which again stands in star contrast to the kind of

image that we've been given absolutely, Yeah, good point. I think that's all all said. I really encourage people to read the piece just for a very nuanced and specific and detailed, well reported view of what is going on on the ground there Bronco. It's always great to see you. Thank you so much for taking the time. Thanks Man, absolutely, thank you guys so much for watching. Really appreciate it.

By the way, Chrystal, I just checked before the show, this is officially the biggest week in Breaking Points history. So that's cool in terms by all of our numbers, in terms of subscribers, in terms of our downloads, and in terms of our views cumulatively. So I want to say thank you to everybody for sticking with us. You guys are absolutely incredible. It's just been it's been what an absolute wild month of February was for all of us,

starting with Rogan and Austin and all of that. And we had a lot of fun stuff that happened here on the show, and just want to say thank you to everybody. You guys really enjoyed Counterpoints yesterday. We could see that, so thank you for sticking with them for enjoying all this content. We've got some fun stuff coming for you. On the weekend for Crystal specifically, so look out for the channel on that. I think you guys

are really going to enjoy that good content. Other than that, we will see you all on Monday.