Hey, guys, ready or not, twenty twenty four is here and we here at breaking points, are already thinking of ways we can up our game for this critical election.
We rely on our premium subs to expand coverage, upgrade the studio ad staff, give you, guys, the best independent coverage that is possible. If you like what we're all about, it just means the absolute world to have your support. But enough with that, let's get to the show. Good morning, everybody, Happy Thursday. We have an amazing show for everybody today. What do we have, Krystal Deed.
We do a lot of very interesting stories breaking this morning. We've got some big updates for you out of Hawaii and a lot of residents very concerned about potential disaster capitalism. I think those concerns are pretty justice shy, so we'll break all of that down for you. And the death toll unfortunately continues to rise. US have some new polls
how Americans feel about the latest Trump indictments. And also Fox need is kind of a mess right now trying to figure out what they're going to do because they were on team Rondo Santis that isn't working out. They're floating some new names. It's all kind of hilarious results over there, so we will play.
Some of that for you.
Also, really dire economic numbers coming out of China. We have some reports from there that we can break down for you and see what is going on. And a story that's kind of flying under the radar. Passports are taking forever to be issued by the State Department. It's really a mess people. I mean, you might think, oh, big deal, but you've got wives who are trying to visit their husband's overseas who are deployed and they're not
getting their passports in time. So for a lot of people, this is a major issue and also speaks to broader sort of dysfunction. And we've got an update for you on that story out of Kansas that we brought you earlier this week of a small local newspaper which was rated in incredibly aggressive fashion by the police. So we'll break all of that down for you before we get to any of that, though, Thank all of the premium subscribers out there who've been helping us to do all
sorts of new and exciting things. And we've got a big interview that we are taping today. Shall we go ahead and reveal the name.
This is going to be an interesting you can you can tease it. I think it's still happening. We're making sure.
Yeah, So Chris Matthews of former MSNBC fame is going to be here in studio.
We have lots of questions for him.
We certainly did Gray sorrace questions Biden, how's Biden doing? And also we definitely want to dig into the media with him. None of this would be possible if it wasn't for you beautiful people out there subscribing premium subscribers.
You really make all of this happen.
Yes, and you guys will be getting first access to the interview. So if you want to go ahead and sign up Breakingpoints dot com, all of our big interviews they go first to our premium subs before they debut publicly on our YouTube and our podcast feeds. So we're excited. We'll be releasing that one a little bit separately because I hope that we get to talk to him for a long time, maybe get a little couple barbs in there. I have a few questions about Chris's time.
I want to know if really thought that if Bertie Sanders one he was going to be rounded up and executed.
Yeah, I'm just more curious. You know. It's like, well, you're a fixture of cable television for thirty years. You know, people don't trust the news. I'm like, why do you think that is? Yeah, I'm really excited to get into that with it.
It'll be a good conversation.
Okay, all right, Hawaii, we have to return. Just absolutely continuing devastating news out of Hawaii. President Biden clearly you're basically shamed now into saying that he will visit on Monday, after days of silence. Here he was announcing that at a recent press conference. Let's take a listen.
My wife Jill and I are going to travel to why as soon as we can. That's what I've been talking to the governor about it. I don't want to get in the way. I've been to too many disaster areas, but I want to go make sure we got everything they need. I want to be sure we don't disrupt the ongoler recovery efforts. We're working with the state to make sure survivors that have lost their homes have a
place to call home until we can rebuild. We're also surgery Federal personnel to the state to help the brave firefighters, who first responders, many of whom lost their own home homes. Not just our prayers, every asset, every asset they need will be there for them and will be there at Maui as long as it takes.
Took five days to actually open his mouth about that, three after this infamous and no comment with a smile while he's on vacation. It's obvious that the media and national criticism and really, you know so, I guess thanks to everybody here and our shows, many others out there kind of a cacophony of voices being like, what the hell are you doing? Christle. The thing is about his explanation is he could have given that explanation three days earlier.
There's literally no reason that he had to wait so long, and then is deciding to go on Monday. I mean, look, I think it's good, you know, to go. But more importantly, it is like, are these people actually getting what they need? And interestingly enough, even the press corps is starting to bristle a little bit at some of the Biden administration's claims. Oh, you guys are doing everything. One reporter was like, listen, I'm talking to people after people to say, I don't
have any government resources. I don't see the Feds out here doing anything, so I don't know what the hell you're talking about. The FEMA director herself was directly challenged yesterday. Let's take a listen.
We keep interviewing survivor after survivor who says that either they didn't see any government personnel or assistance for days, or that they still have it. How do you explain the disconnect between what they're saying and what you're saying about all of the resources that are there at Mali. I think you need to understand that this community is
going through an amazingly traumatic event. I can tell you that we have personnel that are on the ground year round and embedded in with the States as soon as the fire started, so we could continue to understand what resources were needed and help move them in.
What do you see there, Christal? I mean, one is reality. One is a spin. And I think from the federal government, don't worry. They do have seven hundred dollars that they're getting as a disaster relief payment, which is just so ridiculous. In the same time, they want twenty four billion or whatever extra for Ukraine. Note also that he's basically using the same Ukraine language now for Mali but later as long as it takes like no matter what. Interesting in
terms of what gets priority and not. But clearly they're on their heels Nash.
Yeah. In terms of the response, yeah, well understandably, especially they were so late to it.
And look, I'm glad he's going.
It's I think pathetic that he had to be shamed into it, but good that he has taking time out of his Tahoe Tahoe vacation to head down there. But you know, the real question continues to be the strength and aggressiveness of the recovery on the ground. It is impossible to wrap your head around the grief and the pain and the terror that these people have experience and continue to experience. The more that I learn about it,
the more horrified that I am. And you know, there was a hopeful story, which I think also underscores why it's important to keep the recovery and relief effort going as quickly as you possibly can. They did actually just find sixty people who were huddled together in one house. Sixty survivors located there at one time. They didn't have any electricity and communications were down, so they weren't able
to alert people. They've now been returned to their families, So there may be other really hopeful stories like that that are out there. But this morning, the latest numbers are one hundred and eleven people confirmed dead. There's still more than a thousand people who are missing, and it's really slow going in terms of searching this charred landscape.
The latest that I saw from yesterday evening is that you know, they've got cadavertises, really grim stuff, cadaver dogs who were going through painstakingly through this area where any place could contain human remains, and they've gotten through about thirty eight percent of the area that was burned. So it is a disastrous situation. And part of what makes it so incredibly heartbreaking and heart wrenching is put this up on the screen. This is from the Wall Street Journal.
What happened is there were a lot of the local schools were supposed to be back in session that day and they had to cancel that morning because the electricity went out because of the storm. And so these are working class parents here in Leahina and Maui, and they had to leave their kids, you know, at home or with grandparents or whatever, and go to their jobs, often working at the tourist resorts that were outside of the burn zone. And so these kids oftentimes were left alone
or like I said, with elderly relatives. So there's a lot of fear that overwhelmingly the numbers of the dead may be little children.
Here's a quote from the piece.
They say several schools in around Lahina were set to open last Tuesday, classes were canceled when the power went out that morning. Many families in the largely working class community left children home alone or with older relatives, while parents went to work at businesses, including resorts, which are outside of Lahina and were largely spared. So it gives you a sense of the heartbreak here. You know, we took a little bit of heat for criticizing Yes, I
just listen. I cannot imagine really going to the mat to say, yes, you're doing. It's already everything that needs to be done for these people who are searching for their potentially dead children. Yes, we should rest on our laurels and I'm sure that they've gotten adequate supplies. No, we're going to continue pushing for an aggressive relief and whatever it takes for the government to do whatever they possibly can for this community.
Let's review the fact, shall we. The president took days in order to open his mouth about this national disaster, at the same time requested billions of dollars for aid, specifically disaster aid for a foreign nation. At the same time, residents of the said disaster say, we are not getting enough aid. We don't know where the federal government is, we don't see it, we are not seeing anyone here.
We are of open conversation and have shown multiple reports from the people themselves here on this show as well as elsewhere about people who are residents saying that they were being actively blocked by the local and state authorities from even organizing separate relief efforts in order to bring supplies to said people who are affected by this disaster. So, okay,
if you want to defend that, that's fine. Okay. I mean, I guess that is you want to flack so hard for the current president and overlook those facts when if you think back to the freak out over Trump's response to Hurricane Maria or Trump's response to Hurricane Harvey, or I mean, I think wasn't there another big hurricane also while Trump was president, or George W. Bush and Katrina, And by the way, I think screwediny of all those
things is a good thing. I think it is a very important order to hold the feet to the fire of the federal government, specifically these administrations, especially whenever we're talking about far flung places parts of the United States of citizens who historically do not get you know, the best looked after by the government. Million getting screwed over mil which we are about to get to. How they're even continuing to try and be screwed. I mean, this
is just basic governance. One oh one, A big part of the show. You know today we're talking about passports. But if you combine all this stuff, the FAA is breaking down. Apparently, you know, a flying is just too difficult. We used to figure it out, not twenty twenty three. It's somehow has gotten worse, more expensive. The freaking government can't even issue the damn passport. Is a little basic
form of government. And then one of the other basic forms is if some really bad stuff happens, the FEDS are the ones who are in charge of, you know, the state themselves. We know that these states historically have been totally unable in order to grapple with this. So these are the most basic functions of government. Yeah, I apologize for holding our leaders to account for that. Yeah,
for literally one of the most basic aspects of the job. Anyway, speaking though, of these people getting preyed on, getting screwed, there has been now a disgusting phenomenon where residents are reporting that realtors, speculators, and other basically agents of the rich are already hounding residents to try and buy their land for pennies on the dollar because this is one of the most desirable vacation spots for the super rich
here in the United States. One resident specifically called us out, let's take a lesson.
Yes, homeowners have been reached out by investors and realtors offering to buy their land. And this is disgusting, disgusting, and we just want to make sure that people around the world understand our situation and know that Lahina is not for sale. It is important that the multi generational families that come from Lahaina get to continue. We've already been displaced so much. You know, the cost of living
in Hawaii is so high. Your median house goes for a million dollars, so you know, already dealing with that and having an affordable housing crisis, and now this just really scares.
Me and concerns me that there be more.
Native Hawaiian displacement happening on our among our community.
They should be scared because, you know, and this is one of those where you look at statements like Jeff Bezos going to donate one hundred million dollars, like Oprah is marshaling resources and all, and I think that's great, don't get me wrong. But you start to read about it and you're like, oh, Oprah owns like eight hundred
acres of land on Maui. Jeff Bezos and all these other people all have vacation houses in Hawaii, and you're like, oh, well, actually a big part of this is that a lot of super rich individuals in the US, billionaires all have
compounds in Hawaii. And then you're questioning here about, well, are we making sure one hundred percent that these people are not only made whole let's say, you know, on insurance purposes for paid out, but then they're going to be able to repurchase or build said land without having speculators come in and be like, oh, no, building materials are going to be actually like a one hundred and fifty percent more expensive in order to make sure this is one of the most basic again projects of the
federal government and residents there, I think rightfully do fear this because, as she pointed to, I've always kind of long been fascinated by the Hawaiian real estate market, where it's like Hanulus, one of the most expensive places in the country. This is why, because it is such a playground for the super rich all across the US. It's early estate in the US, it's one of the easiest places in order to purchase a buy real estate in you know, literally like in a paradise environment. So you know,
they're effectively being priced out of their own land. And then this is the perfect opportunity for those vultures to try to swoop in and build even more vacation compounds while the native people who actually live there, and as you said, how a lot of these people are going, they're not even they weren't even at home because they're going and working on these damn resorts. It's like a White Lotus episode almost come to life here. Yeah, that is so true.
I mean it is like a law of nature under capitalism when these disasters strike.
You see the vultures we made circling.
Immediately, and you know what, without the government getting involved very quickly, she is one hundred percent they're gonna win about what's going to happen here. And the reality is, let's put this up on the screen from Common Dreams. The reality is this has been happening in slow motion over decades now in Lahina and surrounding areas.
That resident we listened.
To there talked about how the median home press in this area is already over a million dollars, so you've already had massive displacement of the original inhabitants of this region.
So now when they're looking at this state of affairs, not only do they have to deal with the grief of losing very close loved ones of their community being charred and destroyed, but they also have to worry about their entire way of life and their whole community basically being wiped out, being continually priced out of this area that is there. You know, that is their home and
has been their home for a long time. So you know they talk to in that piece for Common Dreams, they talk to a number of people who were deeply concerned about this and their increasing reports of just how quickly these speculators have come in to try to turn a buck off of the backs of this horrific tragedy. And it is utterly disgusting and also sadly completely predictable.
Oh yeah, absolutely, And you know you see some of this here where even the Hawaiian governor now is making some very odd claims. Let's go and put this up there on the screen. The governor says that the state is now looking to acquire land which is destroyed in the fires. He says, quote, we want this to be something that we remember after the pain passes. Lahina will rebuild. The tragedy right now is the loss of life. The buildings can be rebuilt over time. Even the banyan tree
may survive. But we don't want this to become a clear space where when people from overseas just come and decide that they are going to take it, the state will take it and preserve it first. I mean, that's possibly a good move, but then you also have to do the follow up here, and you're like, well, okay, make sure that the state then resells it back to Yeah, that wor.
The devil's in the details.
But I mean, if you are going to protect this area for local people, you're going to have to have government involvement here in order to do it. So, you know, like I said, it's all going to depend on how this all goes down, if it actually happens, and who the land is protected and preserved for. You know, is is affordable housing created for local people, local workers, et cetera. Or you know, is this a set aside that really doesn't solve any of the problems that they're dealing with.
Yeah, I mean that's the biggest question. I know, this has been a problem, as you said, no, in Hawaii literally now for decades, where basically, over the last fifty years, all the super rich in the US, and specifically the tech sector because they're in California it's only a five or six hour flight or whatever away. I mean, they
have just cannibalized like the entire the entire state. I think there's one island, I forget which one it is, maybe Lanai, where Larry Ellison basically owns the entire island.
I read an entire piece about this where he's like the landlord and the owner for every president that is there, because it's for some reason it still remains private land where you could acquire almost all of it because he's on the board of Tesla and like built himself a test supercharger on this tiny little Hawaiian island just for
himself so he can rock it around. It's one of those where that obviously is an extreme situation, but out of microcosm, Like Zuckerberg has got a compound down there, the job family, but you know, a long time uh Hawaiian like retreating to Hawaii. We've got Oprah who's got a big compound. Bezos, like all these people have huge areas.
I even remember reading about Zuckerberg like constructing a massive privacy fence around this compound, which you know, native population were very upset about because it was like not only blocking views, but like creating a disturbance. It's like the world does not exist in order to serve just the whims of the ultra wealthy this well, yes, governments that way.
But yeah, I mean that's the thing is Listen, if it's just just it goes to the highest bidder, you know, it's exactly what's going to happen.
And look, it is paradise.
It's absolutely gorgeous, spectacular there, and it's a beautiful thing to be for people to come and appreciate that and enjoy it, but not at the expense of the residents there, who, by the way, are the ones who are working two three jobs to be able to, like, you know, serve you at the hotel or at the resort or whatever.
Yeah, it really is. I really feel like I'm watching White Lotus Season one. Shout out to that show, by the way.
Yeah, we're going to stay on it, guys and keep you updated there. At the same time, we got some news for you over on the Republican side of things. We got some new polls about how Americans feel about the latest Trump indictments that we're going to break down for you, but we wanted to start with a bit of an existential crisis. I think it's fair to say going on over at Fox News. Fox News in disarray because obviously they want to move on from Trump, at
least the leadership grouper Murdock and co. Want to move on from Trump. They picked Asantis as the golden Boy. Golden Boy isn't working out, so now they're shopping around for like, all right, well, who else we got, can you know, can we.
Prop up and give a go at it.
At the same time, they know their audience overwhelmingly still loves Trump. So one of the manifestations of this inner struggle is something they did that was utterly hilarious. They just out of nowhere invented these like powers Kings in the Republican Primer, based on nothing over the other than something they pull down of their own butts. But they're selling this as if it's breaking news, and it's amazing.
Take a listen, our power ranking show former President Trump keeping a firm grip on the party.
So here's what we have, Dana. He is far and away the front runner. Ron de Santist Tim Scott are in contention. You've got five others in the conversation, and the rest are on the outside looking in.
Hi, Dana Envil, that's right feeling right at home here in Iowa. We can tell you that this morning Senator Tim Scott breaking into the top three, and those Fox News Power rankings that were just released. We caught up with him here on the fairgrounds asked him why thinks he's moving up in these polls, he said, it's because of his common sense conservative policies. Listen, do you think you are going to be able to move up in those rankings?
Well, the good news that were we continue to move up. More importantly, I'm not spending any time watching poles.
All my time watching.
People, so foles don't vote, but people do somema spend my time getting to know the average person in the state even better, and so far, so good. I expect that our momental will continue to increase every day.
So again, this is not based on polls. This isn't based on really like invented it.
It's just their own invention that's like fanfic of what they want.
The Republican primary to be like. And it's kind of amazing.
I almost respect the just audacity of making this thing up and then pretending that it's breaking news.
Well, when it pairs next, we're about to show people. It makes sense. They want on our trying to suck up to Trump as much as humanly possible. And then also because they want him to come to the debate, they are desperate for him come to the Republican debate. If he doesn't come to the debate, they're going to look like idiots. It's obviously going to be a side show. I'm already seeing two scenarios where Trump could either turn himself in in Georgia, which would overshadow it completely, or
he just might do competing interviews. I saw a float that apparently is in conversation with Tucker Carlson's team about doing an interview, doing a media blitz at the time, just to be like, yeah, I'm actually the center right here, which you know, why shouldn't he did that during the White House Correspondence Center.
I have to go to the Tim Scott thing because okay, just so you know, I looked up the where he's at in the national average two point six percent, Like it's very obvious. Actually, I was gonna say the thing that's most obvious. I mean, first of all, like they're trying to put on a Tim Scott like trial balloon here.
And by the way, I saw on.
CNN this morning when I was in the gym, they had a similar like, oh, Iowa voters interested in Tim Scott.
So there's a whole media effort right now to try to make Tim Scott. I think that's number one.
Number two They clearly hate Vivak because he is the person who was actually coming up in the polls, has some momentum.
How do you feel about him? Not my cup of tea?
That's fine, you know, like we had good exchange here. I hope he comes back. I hope we talk to him more. But he clearly is the one moving up in the polls and you know, challenging DeSantis in some of these numbers, and they don't give him any.
Sort of grud.
They put up a graph later that had everybody's fundraising and they made sure to put an asterisk in there of like how much came from him, just to sort of like undercut you know, the level of any way, Tim Scott, this is the new thing that they're trying, and I think it's going to work even less well than the Rhonda Santis attempts.
To work here. Oh yeah, absolutely. And just to as we alluded to, this is how much they're sucking up to Trump. They're like playing up as if his big Georgia reveal, where Trump promises on Monday he's did this time, he's going to prove that the election was stolen. This is how they covered it over at Fox. So this one hundred.
Page report that's going to come out on Monday. The former President's going to drop it out at Bedminster, which is his golf resort just to the west of New York City.
And the question is what's going to be in it.
Well, apparently it was in this according to The New York Times this morning, compiled at least in part by a woman by the name of Liz Harrington, and she has been one of his communications staff members. And apparently the document focuses on voting anomalies in the state of Georgia, and Miss Harrington has been on x formerly known as
Twitter instead kind of given a preview. It said, Georgia has been among the most corrupt elections in the country and they haven't gotten any better since twenty twenty.
They've gotten worse.
Two in Monday, and he said on truth Social Donald Trump, they never went after those that rigged the election. They only went after those that fought to find the riggers. And in this indictment in Georgia and all these indictments, it allows him to have discovery. So his lawyers will
have discovery and we'll find out information. And I heard this morning Brian, an attorney said he give us on Fox and Frints first was saying, the best argument he has is to tell the truth, and if he finds out that something did happen in the election, then he would have proof and then maybe he could exonerate himself what he has.
We don't know.
We'll find out on Monday morning at eleven o'clock.
We'll find out on Monday morning at eleven o'clock. Actually, you know what the funniest thing is report already out this morning. Trump's lawyers are desperate for him not to do that. They'll really complicate your legal troubles if you continue to go down this road, and they want him to cancel any very maleway he very well made. So it's just funny to see the way that it's I mean.
It's hilarious that they're like credulously like, oh maybe now we're going.
To get the big revealing.
It only took three years.
Pump this thing up.
But yeah, it shows you that they just don't know where to land with this because they know they want him at the debate desperately, which I don't think is going to happen. They want to obviously keep their audience, which is very overwhelmingly pro Trump, and yet they really don't want him.
To be the guy.
So they're also trying to flirt with DeSantis, flirt with Tim Scott, flirt with whoever might have a shot at defeeding him.
But guess what, guys, it ain't happening.
Not going to work.
Yeah, all right, we've got some polls, as I alluded to you before, about how people feel about this latest charges. Let's go and put this up on the screen. This is from the AP recent poll that they did you approve the Justice Department indicting Trump over his efforts to remain in office after losing the twenty twenty election. Yes, fifty three percent, No, forty seven percent. Will not surprise you to learn that there is a major partisan breakdown
on this question. Let's put this up on the screen. So Democrats eighty five percent approve of the criminal charges brought specifically by Special Counsel Jacksmith. So this isn't the Fulton County one. These are specifically asking about Jack Smith independence forty seven percent, so they're split pretty evenly and Republicans at sixteen percent, so really wide obviously partisan divide in terms of how people feel about all of this.
But the other question that I have is, you know, listen, we talk a lot here about the challenges for Biden and how people feel like he's too old and they're not happy with the economy and all kinds of issues there. But you know, Republicans may well be nominating the one dude who is almost definitely going to lose.
To Joe Biden. Put this up on the screen.
You've got recent poll that this is from.
This is from the AP as well.
Do you want former President Trump to run again in twenty twenty four? Yes, sixty three percent. This is from among Republicans. Back in April twenty two, it was only fifty five percent. So for Republicans, they are overwhelmingly in favor of Trump running again in twenty twenty four. But the next one up on the screen, would you support Donald Trump in the twenty twenty four election? Now this
is for everybody, not just Republicans. So looking ahead to that general election, what kind of a shot does he have. You've already got a majority of the American people fifty three percent who say they will definitely one hundred percent not support Donald Trump. You've got another eleven percent that say they probably won't support Trump, and then you've got
thirty six percent who say yes. Now, listen, the way that this could go down is he doesn't If you've got a few third party candidates in there, he doesn't have to get to fifty percent in order to win. I mean, that's the way that he pulled it off back in twenty sixteen. So you know, the fact that you've got a majority who are against him doesn't necessarily mean that he would be unable to pull it off.
But I mean, I have to think that the fact that this whole election cycle is going to be relitigating twenty twenty stop steal. You know, he's already going out there and want to do press conferences all about this, leaning into all of this was going to be all the coverages about people hate this part of him, Like majority of people hate this part of him outside of the Republican Party. He may well be facing prison time
by the time that the election rolls around. I do think this is a very tough hand for Republicans to overcome.
I just don't ever know. I mean, it's one poll, right, we can say that, you never know. It's one of those where he did win reelection. He did win an election twenty sixteen a thirty percent approval rating. There is the quote unquote silent Trump voter phenomenon. Some people will say that they're not going to vote for him, and then secretly they will vote for him. It's also a year at more than a year out, you know, before the election. Is all kinds of mitigating factors. But would
I rather would I want to be in this position? No, but I'm not yet willing to count him out at the same time, like, I just am not sure though, And as you said too, I mean Hillary won what almost fifty two percent I think of the popular vote something around there. It wasn't actually all that close whenever you look at it. But you know, if you win in the right states, it all came down to thirty forty thousand votes last time, across three states. All you have to do is switch a few more this time.
Some people don't come out to vote, some people vote third party, you can pretty easily win. I mean Bill Clinton won the presidency in two and sorry nineteen ninety two with like forty three percent of the popular vote, and that's not that far off from where Trump is, right.
Yeah, I know, I'm really conflicted.
I go back and forth on this because also you know, it is the case that looking at the national head to head polls between him and Biden, he has never at this point in twenty sixteen or twenty twenty was nowhere close to as strong as his numbers are right now, right, I mean if you look at the head to head numbers, and I think that might be also why you get a little bit of a different picture in this pool, because they're just asking me about how do you feel
about Trump basically, and when you just ask about Trump, yeah, you got a majority of people who were like, no, not doing it again. But when you're like all right, but you're alterative as Joe Biden, then suddenly ends up really close, which is utterly pathetic that, you know, the Democrats have are tied with a dude who is you know, facing like ninety one charges and potential prison time ahead of the election, and yet we still have this state of affairs where it is very it is impossible to
say exactly what's going to happen. But you know, I do think for Republicans who want to win, I do think that they would likely have a much better shot with a candidate who you know, didn't have ninety one charges and multiple indictments across multiple.
Stories on that. I don't think it's deniable. Yeah, but you know, it looks like we're going to go into this. So is it going to work? I saw it. There's a lot of triumphant you know, people have been like, oh, well this you know, Trump definitely can't win. There's just no way. I'm like, how many times we all have to learned this lesson?
Right?
Like I've seen old Donnie wriggle himself out of many situations. Maybe this is it. Okay, it's possible, but I've seen enough where until it happens, I'm just really not ready.
To say a wild situation.
Let's move on to the next one. With China, some really interesting signs. Got to give credit to Peter Zihon, who actually has long been talking about some of the strategic weaknesses inside of the Chinese economy, and we're beginning to see some things come through, even with their official data which does not look good for them post COVID. Let's gohead and put this up there on the screen.
This was just the first indication very reminiscent of the evergrand situation if we'll all recall from a year or so ago where one of the biggest shadow banks inside of China has missed dozens of payments. Many of their products have they missed payments have grown to dozens of other entities. They have no current repayment schedule, and investors inside of China are freaking out. It turns out that there was all kinds of corruption that was going on inside.
They've told their investors that the firm and we missing payments on batches of products on August eighth, adding to delays to multiple others. This is leading to what they say is quote a number of products. The company is now facing quote a tsunami of questions from their own investors' wealth managers. This is about billions of dollars of capital inside of China that touches all sorts of personal and industrial different vestments. This is seen also Crystal on a
bigger macro scale. Let's put this up there. There's actually got a decent chart that everybody can see. This is the Chinese stocks are actually slumping because economic gloom inside of the country is really spreading. They had a bump in January twenty twenty three. As you can see right there up to fifteen percent. That was largely reopening after their zero covid idiocy. But things are all beginning to trend down, very much so in the last couple of months.
And actually the fascinating thing was a new acknowledgment. Actually, and this is the closest you'll ever get from Chinese leaders. They say, quote, there are new difficulties and challenges whenever it comes to China's economy. That was from the actual readout of the latest pull Up Bureau meeting just three weeks ago. And inside all that people are pointing to is the index of Chinese talks straight in Hong Kong
down nine percent of the month. The benchmark for stocks that trade in Hong Kong is down a similar mouth. Amongst the actual members, the Chinese real estate firm is lose half of its value. That's Country Gardens, one of the biggest companies inside of China. The actual stock index for Shanghai and chen Jen is down by five percent.
All of this is indicating that even the real data that they can't spin, which let's be real, it's one of the most opaque countries on planet Earth in terms of the giant economies, you never know whether you're being lied to or not. That no indications are good. Also, if you think our real estate market is bad, home prices have fallen in forty nine out of seventy of the major cities in all of China. The thing is is that this really came through to me from the
Wall Street Journal piece that we'll put up here. It was an op ed, but I actually thought it was really interesting. Is that the economic and the social contract is really fraying. We pointed to this in the Evergrand Situation. One of the biggest you know, the deal with the with the CCP inside of China is they're like, listen, you know, we're gonna put you under surveillance, you're gonna have facial recognition, all of that. We're gonna do what
we do our party bosses and everybody. Everybody's gonna get filthy rich, but we're going to get rich too, So don't worry about it. And that mostly worked. You know, there are no more chaos, no more cultural revolution. We're working through this. Everything's great. It worked in the eighties, worked in the nineties, worked all the way to the
twenty tens. But now that social contractor is really beginning to fall apart, largely actually because of housing, which is a populist issue over there too, where a lot of people are unable in order to keep up with housing market or seeing their home equity go down. Then at the same time, you could put their social problems in terms of the male female mismatch. You put it together an unemployment rate there which seems very high. Nobody knows
really exactly what the actual number is. There's enough social strife that this is causing real problems inside the Chinese economy. So another kind of tick I think in some of Peter's Iion's analysis over the last couple of years on where China could be headed.
Yeah, I thought this was really revealing.
Youth unemployment just hit, according to their numbers, a record high of twenty one point three percent disaster.
Which is a disaster.
And the response was we're just not going to rule the data anymore from the Chinese government that are like, you know enough about that, you don't need to know any more about that. So I think that's an indication whether twenty one point three percent is the accurate number
or not. I think it's an indication that you know obviously things are really dire, and when you have a young population that isn't participating in the new prosperity of the country and has long had, you know, similar issues to what young people here are facing, which is over the past number of years, they have really propped up the real estate market and made it so that prices were ever escalating, ever escalating, ever escalating, which obviously, if
you're already a homeowner, that's great for you. Your value of your assets is going up and up and up. If you're someone who hasn't yet been able to buy into the market, this looks like a complete disaster and so big picture what has happened in China was listening to Martin Wolf of the Financial Times give some of
this analysis. You know, Initially, the just astronomical growth that they experienced there was obviously led by exports there, you know, building out their manufacturing base and all of the factories that are they're famous for that created this incredible growth. As that starts to wane and they sort of like, what as far with that as possible, then they invested massively infrastructure, huge spending there, which also continued to you know, build out the economy.
And once they.
Took that effectively as far as they could. Then the next piece was building up what is effectively now this gigantic real estate bubble. And so when we were covering Evergrand and also when we're covering Country Garden effectively, they realized, Okay, this is unsustainable. We can't just continue in this direction forever, and we are pricing out so much of our population
were ever becoming homeowners. So they started to try to let the air out of that market, and they you know, they've been doing it, but obviously is kind of coming crashing down. They had a good line in that Wall Street Journal up at as well that described the housing situation. They said, ever since, you know, ever since they started propping up this market, housing has functioned for many families as a combination of retirement plan, insurance policy in stock portfolio.
Endlessly rising housing prices and wealth have been a headache for young buyers and a driver of indebtedness, but also helped paper over gaps in the social safety net for middle aged savers. There's another piece of this as well, which is obviously, you know, they had massive COVID lockdowns that was really devastating.
For the economy. So the expectation was when they.
Opened back up that they would restart this huge growth,
and that's just the opposite of what we've seen. They're actually in danger of slipping into a deflationary cycle because residents there, our consumers are worried about the future, worried about the economic future, worried about their finances, so they are saving, they're not spending money, and so where we've had massive inflation, which is starting to come under control, they're actually worried about the opposite impact, which is potential deflation,
which can be really devastating. Now, the big question is is this a blip. China's obituary has been written many times in the past, so let's be really clear about that. This could be a blip. They could It's very hard
to tell exactly what's going on there. They could move forward and get back to you know, they're never going to get back to like ten percent GDP growth, but get back to some level of you know, significant sustainable growth, or this could be you know, the start of a different trajectory that's very difficult for them to pull themselves out of.
There's also an alternative explanation, which is they have they have it's like a time of choosing inside of China because the US, at least the US, much of the Anglo sphere, the UK, Australia have decided like, look, we're not going to necessarily economically decouple with China, but we're going to try to do our best. I don't think we've done even close to enough, but it is starting to make its effect. Net exports and all that have decided to drop out of China overall to the West,
which is hurting their economy. A lot of their economy was built effectively on exporting to the countries which they directly, you know, not necessarily at war with, but you know, they use that rhetoric with those people. They see them as direct challengers. The thing is is that and the reason why I'm not yet willing to count them out entirely. They've got they have got what we don't have. They have hard assets, so outside of oil, which they do
have is still dramatically important. They've got an industrial workforce, they've got actual factories, they've got real stuff that comes out of their ground that they make stuff with that they supply to the rest of the world. And as we found out, which with Russia. Yeah, a financialized economy and all that. You can take the hit like they're having problems right now with their central bank, but they can still produce weapons, they can still produce stuff. We
don't really produce stuff. So they have some structural advantages on their side just inherently by being a more recently industrialized economy then we do because we are much more
of a service and a financialized economy than China. So I'm not yet ready to count them out, but i do think that some of the structural things that Zihon talked about on our show and has been talking about and pointing there for a long time, which is very counter to the narrative that you will often hear about China, a lot of that is being vindicated, I think in
recent months. His population thesis is absolutely correct, and now here on the economics, it's very clear that Look, I don't know if China's going to collapse like he says, but if they have problems that can still lead to I've talked to here about the how brands essay around China, where one of the things is that a state when it's on its way down and it sees that it
near is its apex of its power. That's actually when it becomes the most dangerous, because that's when they're like, okay, well, now if we're going to move, we have to move now when we have the most advantage kind of our on our side. You can think of Japan striking at the United States at Pearl Harbord. You're like, look, we've only got eighteen months before we can We're going to run out of oil. We should strike them now so
they can't strike us later. And on the future you can see very much how that type of calculus also could come in. So it's not necessarily good news, you know, if you're hoping for peace and security around the globe.
Yeah, I mean globe like economic turmoil is usually not good news. Yes, fact for global peace and prosperity. There's a lot more we can say about this, and we'll continue to look at it in the future. But the other the last thing I would say is even if China doesn't continue to grow with the pace that has, even if this truly is like an economic turning point for them, which again is really up in the air, whether this is a blip or this is a longer
term trend. I think the movement towards a multipolar world is going to continue a pace because you're still going to have you know, a huge power center in Asia, not just with China but with other Asian nations. India is overtaking China in terms of population. There's huge, yeah, huge growth there and huge possibility for them that has not been exhausted yet. And you've got you know, prime minister who is very determined to increase their industrial capacity.
So there's a lot there as well.
Obviously, you know, you have Russia doing whatever Russia is doing and forming this new alliance. You already see the makings of a multipolar world. And I don't think whatever happens with China and their future economic growth, I don't think there's any to putting that toothpaste.
Back then, no question at all. All right, let's go on to passport. Everyone should get a passport if we're going to be living in a multipolar world, because it means we've got to go understand what the hell else is going on now. The problem is it's nearly impossible to get a passport right now. Let's go and put
this up there on the screen. It turns out while our government is shipping billions of dollars to Ukraine, and our Secretary of State is always worried about what social issues and all this that the very basics of his
job of not working very well. There is a massive backlog of passport applications quote, creating summer travel nightmares for Americans who are finding getting a new passport or renewing an expired one is taking months on end, forcing them now into panicked races against planned travel dates and an often bewildering bureaucratic maze. The thing is is that this is a bipartisan issue. Senators and congressmen are sounding the alarm because they are getting bombarded with constituent complaints of
I can't get a goddamn passport. And it's amazing because the State department current guidance right now is that you should apply for a renewed passport for nine to twelve weeks ahead of your travel date. That is four months of the processing time. It used to be that routine was six to eight weeks for renewing your passport. The crazy thing is is that it used to be six
to eight weeks. They haven't been able to fulfill that deadline, so people who were promised or passworts not getting their passports and are now they're like, oh no, no, it's going to take weeks and weeks and more, and we have no update for you. If you have the privilege to pay like two hundred dollars or whatever for expedited service, well even that is now returned to what the original promise was. So it's outrageously expensive in order to get a passport. I remember I had to get I had
a passport nightmare situation too. I got really lucky because it was before the big surge. I was able to get one of those emergency appointments here in Washington, d C. It coust like two hundred fifty dollars, And I remember thinking about that but being like, wait, if you have a family of four or a family of five, that's like a thousand bucks. Don't get your path. That's not like a plane ticket.
That's a lot overseas right there.
Yes, I wish it was a plane ticket overseas or really nowadays I've been overseas for a while to overseas plane ticket, Yeah, I three thousand if you're going to Asia like I was. The thing is is that when you think about it. One of the most basic functions here of government is just breaking down and a touch point where millions of Americans are finding themselves fed up. That is actually where states begin to lose the population. It's not always some of the big stuff that we
talk about here. It's like, you know, getting a driver's license for now always a pain in the ass, but usually you can get it, you know, in a semi routine fashion. The same the thing is with the passport is like when it breaks down like that, yeah, and millions of people have to cancel their plans. That is when people really start to understand like the state functions at a most basic level, when those are going away, That's what declining states look like. And you know, I'm
not exaggerating. Put this up there. This is from just a few weeks ago that other media organizations are talking about. Cancel trips with no refunds. Passport delays are derailing travelers. You know, people are out thousands of dollars on these trips because they are not able to get their passport in time. It's not like the airline is going to give you a good excuse for that one. They're like, oh, yeah, we got you Also, millions of people were locked inside
for years. That's part of the reason why travel prices are so high because people put off travel and a lot of people didn't renew their passport then at the time. So we have a record amount of Americans, which I think is great, who do want to travel and want to get out of the country and are unable to. We've got some twenty two million passports that were issued
last year. That's a record high. Twenty four million right now that are currently going through the State Department says it's getting about four hundred thousand applications a week from Americans in order to renew their passport. But the fact that they're unable to keep up with it just shows you that like those again, the basic functions of government are just falling apart. It's like the FAA, and it's like others, and for some reason it's not getting the attention that it really deserves.
Well, no one should be surprised when we've had forty years of both parties attacking government and stripping government capacity. I mean, this has been the ideology since Ronald Reagan. So yeah, after forty years, things are going to fall apart. Just to give you a sense of I know, this can seem like a first world problem, and in some ways it is right by having the luxury and the.
Ability to travel overseas.
But in that piece from NPR, they talked to this woman, Dakota Hendrix, from Virginia Beach, Virginia. She says she did everything right in order to try to visit her husband, who's deployed overseas this summer. This is like her only opportunity to see him. She fought an application for a new passport months in advance, paid for expedited processing to make sure, she spent hours on the phone with the
passport hotline, sought help from her local congressman. Four months later, she had no choice but to miss her flight.
She told NPR.
I applied for this with enough cushion room for there to be delays, but that didn't matter. So she was unable to make that trip to go see her husband who has deployed overseas.
So there's a lot of heartbreak.
That comes along with this, not to mention just the sign of a government that's falling apart. There was this line in the you know, the initial report that we had up on the screen from Senator Mark Warner who was blaming hiring freezes during the Trump administration for helping to create this situation. And I sort of assumed that was probably cope from Democrats, but I actually looked into it,
and there is something to this. So Trump had this, you know, sort of like vendetta against the State Department. This is where Hillary Clinton was part of the deep state, et cetera, et cetera.
And so you not only had the pandemic.
Which led to all sorts of issues, led to this huge backlog, led to this huge surge, record breaking numbers of Americans who wanted to be able to get passports, you also had under Trump a six month, sixteen month hiring freeze that, according to Government Executive Magazine, which is the thing that I was reading to try to get information on this, told its Inspector General in twenty nineteen
that it created critical understaffing for passport services. In twenty seventeen, you're going to love this, ac or you're going to enjoy this. In twenty seventeen, when passport applications started to spike, the State Department implemented a number of resiliency initiatives to help workers deal with the added strain including management meet and.
Greets and casual dress dates.
Officials also deployed Passport Pete, a stuffed porcupine mascot, to regional offices for photo opportunities and activities. Unfortunately, those efforts failed to reverse the workforce trend, so staffing was sort of stripped down during the Trump years. Then they had this huge surge post pandemic of Americans wanting to get passports, record breaking numbers. They've been trying to staff up, but it's just, you know, they have.
It's everally got it again.
I just sawsport Pete couldn't rescue them.
I just saw a guy yesterday, so he had to wait two and a half hours to process customs at Dollar two and a half hours because the TSA had like two passport boots or whatever that was open. I had the same thing. I landed in JFK. I think it took me an hour and forty five minutes in order to clear customs. I mean, it's just ridiculu. And there was only what three planes or whatever at the tarmac LANDA at like six am in the morning, maybe
seven hundred people. I've moved through lines like that years ago. You'll get through them in five ten minutes something like that. This is it's just over and over again. You're seeing complete, like breakdowns of the most basic government functions whenever it comes to travel. And like you said, it can sound like a first world problem, but you know a lot of middle class people, I mean, I grew up in Texas. You don't want to have to be rich to go
to Mexico you need a passport. Or people who are from New York, I mean they're going to Canada all the time, or you know, if you like you said, it's like you got this woman whose husband is deployed overseas. He apparently the way a schedule works only at one break that was the only time in order. Again, that's terrible, It's just terrible. And there's a lot of let me tell you, one of the biggest, one of the worst places on earth that you want to go to as an
emergency passport center. Everybody there is weeping because everybody there basically the only way to get one of those is you've got a dead relative. It's really sad. People are weeping there, like, oh, I've been trying to get my passport my you know, Grandma just died in Africa or whatever. I gotta get this back. I gotta get on a plane like tomorrow. I need this thing right now. It's this,
It's real life. Here is actually affecting people, and these you know, I just can't get away from what it really shows about the government right now.
Yeah, absolutely, I mean these are things like I know, it's easy to just deride, like arm A bureacratser. It feels like it doesn't really impact your life. But this is a place where it really matters to have enough skilled professionals in place and a system in place, and to take it seriously to be able to deliver on basic services for the American people. All Right, we have an update for you on the story we brought you
earlier this week. Wild story about a local Kansas newspaper that was rated by the entirety of the local police department over some weird beef of a local restaurant owner who thought and accused them of getting her DUI record
under suspicious or illegal circumstances. Normally, there are First Amendment protections for journalists that require if you're going to subpoena materials, you subpoena specific materials not this broad search and seizure, which is exactly what they did, taking computers, taking cell phones, even rating the owner of the newspaper's house. One of the elderly co owners died days later out of the stress. A crazy, crazy story. Okay, we have an update for you.
Let's put this up on the screen. So the prosecutor in this small town Marion County has now withdrawn the search warrant that was executed at that small town Kansas newspaper that police raided on Friday, the paper's lawyer said on Wednesday, which the Kansas Bureau of Investigation soon confirmed. All electronic devices seized by police will be returned to the Marion County Record, said Bernie Roads. He's a Kansas City based attorney that is representing the Kansas City Star
and also represents the Marion County Record. Let's put this quote up on the screen. So this lawyer said, we have stopped the hemorrhaging, but it does nothing about taking care of the damage that has already occurred from the
violation of the First Amendment in the first place. The KBI investigation, this Kansas Bureau of Investigations, remains open, but the probe will proceed without review or examination of any of the evidence that was seized Friday, that they will present their findings the prosecutor once the investigation is complete.
In a statement, Marion County Attorney Joel Enzi said he concluded that insufficient evidence existed to establish a legally sufficient nexus between this alleged crime and the places searched and the item ceased.
So there's two pieces here. First of all, you've got this beef with this.
Local, well politically connected restaurant owner. Then it came out that the police chief who was involved directly in this search, he was under investigation by the newspaper for the circumstances surrounding his departure from a different police department, apparently amid some issues with sexual improprieties, so very convenient for him that he could to seize all the materials of their investigation into him as well. But now we have another
layer here that I was just reading about zaar. So one of the questions was this local judge who signed off on this thing, which many experts are saying was completely illegal, this search warrant to start with. So this judge, Laura Vr, she had her own multiple duys which were apparently completely covered up and swept under the rug. Me read you from the news report. The first arrest in Coffee County, about an hour and fifteen minutes southeast of.
Her home, hasn't been reported.
The second came amid an unopposed reelection bid for Morris County Attorney. She wasn't supposed to be driving at all because her driver's license was suspended in that county. She reportedly drove off road and crashed into a school building next to a high school football field while driving then eighth District Magistrate judges Thomas Ball is his name, his vehicle, so she was driving a judge's vehicle, drunk, not supposed to be driving at all, and crashed into a school building.
None of this came out, and they have no record actually of there even being any sort of like case involved. It looks like it was just completely swept under the rug by this local cabal of whatever is going on there.
She'd never sanctioned by the state's Attorney Discipline Board one reelection multiple times as a Republican candid from Worris County attorney because the public had no idea what was going on, and she is by the way up for a retention vote during the twenty twenty four general election, so we'll see if the people take a very different view of what's going on here.
This is as good as it gets for the whole small town corruption Cop four story. It's almost, oh my gosh, I can't even well.
The fact that she had DUIs too is like, oh, that's why you were sympathetic to this lady whose duys are being made.
Public, and just the seizure of all of them. I'm glad it actually captured the nation's attention. And you know, we saw a tremendous amount of interest in it as well, and I think that people will just understand like this is just so fundamentally corrupt and unfair. So glad to see some of it rectified, and we'll continue to get the details out there.
Yeah, absolutely, all right, Sacher. We were looking at.
Well doing this job for a while now. I've lived through some pretty dumb content moderation policies. We started rising in the height of the era of YouTube demonetization, where for some reason or another never could quite figure out why certainly videos are simply deemed not suitable for advertisers. Usually they have the title Epstein in them. On the one hand, I do get it. On the other, as I've told them directly, you're kind of incentivizing people who
do cover the news to not cover controversial topics. Luckily, for us, we have a premium subscription program, but many
people are not so lucky. Little did I know, though, at the time, that worrying about whether Epstein videos are getting demonetized is the least of our problems, especially when COVID began to hit all of a sudden, We're in the midst of one of the most intense censorship regimes the Internet has ever seen, and navigating it was not only a total nightmare, it is now clear in retrospect the regime itself was totally wrong on so many things.
The most obvious is Labla hypothesis. Several content creators banned from various social media websites, but I remember many other ones. They are probably memory hold Sky News, Australia YouTube channel that was banned for questioning the effectiveness of mass and lockdowns because they broke COVID misinformation rules, or when doctors were testifying before Congress about the efficacy of true treatments, or even those at the time that were discussing claims
around the COVID vaccine. It is pretty clear now that allowing questions to surface was correct in many cases. Allowing dissenting views to the medical establishment would have provided Americans and really everyone with proper understandings of medical guidelines. The problem is it would have made people less compliant. We
simply can't have that, can we. In fact, COVID really proved once and for all that trying to navigate any sense of what is true and what is not medically in the sense of a fraud situation like a pandemic, is nearly impossible. The only way to know is to see results in the real world at scale and then adjust accordingly, allowing all kinds of debates, seeing who was
right and who was wrong. Unfortunately, many people are now learning the opposite lesson They think the censorship resim under COVID not only worked, but is now a model for the future. That is very evident some policies YouTube announced yesterday Let's actually dig in YouTube rights that going forward it will streamline all medical misas information guidelines into three categories, prevention, treatment,
and denial. These apply to any specific health condition, treatment, or substance where content quote contradicts local health authorities or the World Health Organization. To determine if a video violates their policy, they quote evaluate whether it is associated with the high public health risk publicly available guidance from health authorities around the world. I can't believe the only one who sees a glaring hole in this policy. What if
the World Health Organization is wrong? Luckily that's never happened before. Right, Well, how about this. For the first several months of the pandemic, the WHO said mass didn't prevent the spread of COVID. Then in June of twenty twenty, they changed their mind, and then this year they changed it again. So which is it at wenny? Which point? Which was it true or not true? And then liable to be taken now
off the YouTube platform. The last few years have been extraordinary in the context of what we really know and don't know. For years, for example, they told this depression was a chemical imbalance, that they had the proof, that's why I have to take this multi billion dollar SSR drug, a treatment regimen still recommended by the WHO. And yet what did we learn? A large meta study showed the
chemical imbalanced thesis is likely bunk. For depression SSRIs. They do kind of work, but we don't really know why. And that's a myriad of other treatments though that may actually be far more beneficial because they have no side effects.
Or who can forget the bombshell study around Alzheimer's where a central study which guided research for sixteen straight years may have been straight up fabricated, or recall one of my more recent monologues about mammograms and has showed that much of our medical guidance, including from the WHO, even in the prevention realm, is really not that well thought out, and that a rigorous debate around recommendations, especially when money is involved, is vital and essential. I say all of
this because I actually care about YouTube. Obviously, it's where we build our careers, but more so I recognize it as one of the most powerful forces on Earth. Somewhere around three quarters of the entire US population uses YouTube. If you want to fix something, you have to look it up on YouTube, I can tell you. As I continue on health journey, there is nothing I love more than going on YouTube and watching debates around diets or
exercise protocols or nutrition. COVID should have been a lesson to all of us that the medical establishment doesn't know nearly as much as they claim to, and it should have been a lesson to the censors the regime really doesn't work. Instead, they have decided to expand it further, showing us that what was promised as a temporary measure has simply become a new normal, and this will make getting good information only harder in the years to come as we navigate who the hell knows what comes next
in our public health discourse. I only know that things today are not that different from the way that things have always been. Free and open debate is always better than the alternative. I thought it was crazy, Crystal that they basically reversed.
And if you want to hear my reaction to Sagres's monologue, become a premium subscriber today at Breakingpoints dot com.
Cristle, what are you taking a look at?
Well?
I've got some devastating new numbers on homelessness to share with you this morning, But contain within them is maybe a little bit of hope or at least some what of a possible answer? Can't be any real silver lining to this level of human carnage, but at the very least, we can begin to chart a path forward and regain some confidence that solving big, intractable problems is still something our nation is actually capable of doing.
So.
First, the numbers.
According to the Wall Street Journal, the US is experiencing a record increase in homelessness. The number of homeless people has risen a full eleven percent year over year. That is the largest single spike recorded since that metric started being tracked part of the Great Recession. So to put that in context, even during the worst of the housing crisis, we did not see numbers jumping up this dramatically. Now, if you watch this show, you'll not be surprised by
the causes. Even as the numbers do continue to shock. Housing has never been more unaffordable. Addiction continues to ravage millions, the pandemic. Aid that was a lifeline to so many expired. It's a disgrace that is a nation. We choose to continue to allow this suffering, and make no mistake, it is a choice.
How do I know. We'll just take a look at this chart.
Just look at how much we actually reduced homelessness in a single year. Back in twenty twenty one, when policymakers decided to make it a priority as COVID was rampaging before there was a vaccine, and during the worst of the crisis, lawmakers were worried enough about the spread of the disease that they actually took some aggressive measures to
house people who needed help. And maybe it should be obvious that getting people housing will dramatically reduce homelessness, but that is not the way that policymakers.
Often look at this issue. But look at this.
They made real progress on a seemingly intractable complex issue, and guys, they could do it again.
It's not just homelessness.
Though I have plenty of critiques of how we did COVID relief, who we helped most, how we structure the program, who got bailouts, who got jacktion, But even imperfectly designed as it was, the unbelievable possibilities of the government to do good for the American people are really clear when you look at the data. All measures of debt, including debt and collections and overall consumer debt plummeted. Credit card
debt actually dropped the largest amount in history. You see, just like when you get people housing, it reduces homelessness. Turns out when you give people money, it reduces debt. The COVID relief checks were a god send to millions, from those who were desperate, were out of work, needed it just to get by, to those who were able to finally get a little bit of breathing room from
the creditors who had been breathing down their necks. Same with the so called superdoll which took regular unemployment and pumped it up to keep people going while businesses were shutter during the pandemic. Many also, as part of that, went through some really dramatic lifestyle changes that had them at home with their support systems instead of papering over their psychic wounds with retail therapy, which also forced them to eat at home, saving money on restaurant meals and
gas with no commutes. Thanks to the short lived Child tax Credit, we also dropped child poverty to a fifty year low.
Just look at that chart.
It is actually stunning and once again provides an ingenious insight, which is that giving money to families with kids can dramatically reduce the number of poor children, and research has shown that that money was largely spent on the kids. An incredibly official ways, school supplies, after school activities, nutritious food.
And the like.
I will never get over the fact that we provided such a wildly successful program for our nations kids and then cruelly ripped it away.
And these economic supports.
Which materially improved the lives of many Americans, did not just stay in the realm of bank accounts. Suicides actually dropped during the pandemic quite significantly. This was counter to the predictions of basically every expert plenty of pundits too, myself included. The pandemic, after all, was really stressful. People were isolated, many measures of mental health deteriorated, But when the numbers came back, suicide rates actually dropped around three
percent during the height of COVID. Experts attribute this to a number of factors. Being forced home wasn't a bad thing for all people. After all, if you were being bullied at school or your soul was being crushed by your boss, you were plenty happy to be at home with your family. Telehealth was also expanded during the pandemic, giving more people easier access to your range of health care, and, of course, for many pandemic, aid programs loosened. The financial
news that had been around their necks. Now, of course we're back to normal and suicides have returned to the ever upward assent. Now, I am not trying to say every aspect of the response was puppies and rainbows.
Far from it.
Lawmakers obviously screwed up a lot, to school closures being the most obvious example. Plenty of people also fell through the cracks of pandemic programs or were the essential workers who were forced to keep working and risk their lives without getting much more than a patronizing pat on the back. But you can see really clearly that even as feckless as our government sometimes seems, it can genuinely do good.
There is no charity or financial planning app or individual bootstrapping that can come close to matching the mass impact of the federal government. And the numbers tell us clearly we do not have to accept this pain. The government helped the people once, and it could do it again. Don't let anyone gaslight you into thinking otherwise.
And sooger. Basically, we had and if you want to hear my reaction to Crystal's monologue, become a premium subscriber today at breakingpoints dot com. All right, guys, we had a great show for all of you today. The Chris Matthews interview should have gone out first, so we apologize for this coming late, but we promised it was definitely worth it. Thanks to all the Bringium subscribers.
I can't wait to see what you want to say about it.
Let us know, let us know what you think. I see you guys later.