Epstein Distractions, Columbia’s Big Check, and Tesla Underwhelms

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This week on The Gray Area, the president of Wesleyan College tells me what's happening on American campuses. The Trump administration is attacking colleges and universities because they want to take them over. Not because they shouldn't have had encampments or because not enough conservatives are going into physics. What does the attack on higher ed mean for America? That's this week on The Gray Area with me, Sean Elling. New episodes every Monday, available everywhere.

I was with a group of women last night that used terms like fractal laser, brow lift, kegels, but no, I've never heard a straight woman use the term bearing wall.

Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. And I'm Scott Galloway. Scott, I'm in San Francisco, my beloved San Francisco today. Oh, really? Why are you there? More filming. I ate cell-created salmon yesterday. Oh, really? Yeah. Cool. Yeah, that...

Well, good for you. And what does that supposedly do for you? Well, it's just the idea that we have to have healthier foods, and they're trying to do all kinds of really interesting lab experiments on how to create food. How do we feed the world in a healthy way?

them live longer. We give poor people more money. That's correct. That's the other way to do it. But there's not enough. There's my virtue signaling. Thank you. Anyway, it's got it. Where are you right now? I'm in Chicago. I'm at the Soho House Chicago. Oh.

Wow, you look like one fantastic hotel after the next. Yeah, the storehouse is always just a decent plan B. My son is coming, my 14-year-old, you know, once you are trying to shake a... trip with them just solo and i tell them they can go wherever i want and he picked chong choy i guess some city in china that's supposed to be something out of a video game and i said okay i can't do that and then he said chicago he's never been to chicago so

We have a great 14-year-old day tomorrow. Tonight we're going to Gibson's, which is supposed to be the best steakhouse in the world. Tomorrow we're going to, for breakfast, to have the, according to the Guinness Book of World Records, the deepest dish pizza in the world for breakfast.

And then we're going, of course, to the McDonald's Museum, or as I like to call it, the Museum of Colorectal Cancer. It's actually cool. I'm sure. And then we do what every 14-year-old must do in every city. We're going to the tallest building to look at the rest of the city. Going to the observation deck. May I make some suggestions? One thing I would suggest, and this sounds crazy, but he would love it. There's an architectural tour on the river. I did it.

a month ago with my older son. It's great. We're going to do bikes instead along the river. Oh, that's great. And, of course, get yourself a wiener. I've got one. Her name's Kara. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. You meant a...

A Chicago dog. Yeah, you can go to. There's lots of places. Obviously, the famous one is Wiener Circle, which we almost went to. But there's a bunch of them, right? Probably where you're staying right there. I didn't realize you knew so much about Chicago. I love Chicago. I love Chicago. It's one of my favorite places.

And Louis had a summer program there, cooking. There's a cooking school there. And so I went and got it. I've spent a lot of time in Chicago. I have a lot of friends. And it's a great city. Oh, I'm being interviewed by David Pogue today. Oh. Somewhere talking about.

How do we reinvigorate the tech scene in Chicago? Which I've given a lot of thought to because I take my speaking engagements very seriously. Are you hanging out with the Obamas? The Obamas live here? No, I don't think they do. They're from there. Sometimes they do. I think they're there sometimes. He's in the middle of stuff. We'll talk about that in a minute. Anyway, that's great. Where are you going next? Where's your next situation? I go to Manhattan on Saturday. And then you see me. Oh.

Oh, yeah, and I'm excited about it. What are we doing again? Aren't we like injecting the cells of some small Indian boy from a remote village thinking it'll make us younger again? Yes, that's weird. No. I'm going to have thick black hair and start doing better on the SAT. That is so racist in so many ways. It's terrible. It's awful. It's just awful. I spoke at the Aspen Institute yesterday. Speaking of like, I could not be.

any wider right now. I thought you wouldn't go. I am translucent. Oh, are you? What do you mean? No. I have never seen an auditorium full of more 60-year-old men and 58-year-old women trying to keep them on the porch by doing Pilates 11 times a day.

God, it's literally— You just described that festival. Is it the festival? Is it the festival? Aspen might as well be, like, sponsored by Aloe and Lululemon. It's like, do any of these women wear anything but athleisure? Oh, my God, you totally nailed it.

Yeah, it's really. It's so true. Is that the festival? Did you go to the festival? We were supposed to do it together, and I declined because you declined. I want to go every year. It's like there's a few things I want to do every year, and they always come at weird times. I never end up doing them. The Aspen Festival, for some reason, comes.

at a weird time. It's the end of the kid's school year. Every year, I plan to go to Burning Man. My criteria are very simple. I want to camp with a chef and tons of Russian hookers, and those exist. But it comes at a weird time because that's the beginning of the kids' school year. And the other one is every year I plan to go to the Milken Institute, and it comes at a weird time. Oh, and then you don't. And Aspen Festival, too. They wanted us to do Live Pivot there. Someday we'll do it.

Well, you always say no. I'm not going. Why would I go there? Why would I do that? I'm going to be dead soon. Why would I do that? We get asked, just for people to know, we get asked a whole lot by people to come to do a live pivot in different places. Scott, I always am like, oh, sure, because I love spending time.

I'm a Scott and Scott, so it's like, why should I do that? Are they going to bring me something, a large pile of money or whatever it happens to be, whatever you want? You know, okay, hold on. It's not because you want to spend time with me. It's because you have no sense of the finite nature of life and health. and you're like a carry-on bag, it's easy for you to travel.

When I travel, it means lower back pain and I bang my head on an overhead. I can't sleep. I end up taking Xanax and up till four in the morning thinking about the series of bad decisions that led me to a place where nobody loves me. That's how I start thinking.

You need to put some aloe on in Lululemon. That's what needs to happen. Yeah, that's right. I need athleisure. Yeah, those people have a good life, I guess, if that's the life you want to have. Anyway. Oh, my God. I know. But I totally don't envy them, though. I have to say, I don't.

Oh, really? Mm-mm. I wouldn't want to be that person. I think they've got it figured out, Kara. I don't want to be that person. I don't want to anyway. Oh, really? Yeah. No, it just seems empty. Yeah, but as far as empty, meaningless experiences go, it's pretty good.

That's true. That's true. It's better than a lot of empty, meaningless experiences. It's like sex with strange women. It's like a series of empty, meaningless experiences that are pretty good as far as empty, meaningless experiences go. I'm Chicago. I need to find a men's room and get in trouble and start a... scandal here. I have a wide stance. I have a wide stance.

But you know what? I'm not even going to get head from some stranger at O'Hare. I'm going to do it at Midway. I'm going to do it at Midway just to bring the whole brand down. Okay. Bankoff will say, okay, if you'd had, if you'd performed illicit acts at O'Hare, I would have gotten it. But Midway, that's a bridge to. Too far. That's a bridge too far. I like Midway. We've got a lot to get to today, including.

Trump's AI action plan and Tesla and Alphabet's earnings. But first, Elon Musk was right. Donald Trump is in the Epstein files. Not a really big surprise, but Trump was reportedly informed by AG Pambondi back in May that his name appears.

multiple times in the files, probably quite a lot, according to the Wall Street Journal. Bonnie says nothing warranted further investigation or prosecution. Another obscene news, the federal judge in Florida denied a DOJ request to release the grand jury transcripts, of course.

committee voted to subpoena the DOJ for Epstein files hours before the House adjourned for early, early for its summer recess. Mike Johnson did this on purpose, so they didn't have to keep voting on the Epstein situation. Yeah, nothing to see here. Go home. Nothing to see here.

close down the store. The committee has subpoenaed Epstein Associate Jelaine Maxwell. Of course, it's another, you know, very performative thing with the number two person at the Justice Department is taking his time to go talk to her probably today.

get to Trump's latest distraction maneuvers in a minute, which got talked about. And boy, did he land a big one, another another bearing wall of the MAGA movement around President Obama. But let's first talk about where things stand with Trump and Epstein. Is there anything that he. can do to stop the drip drip at this point? Is it an opportunity?

for Democrats. And we'll go through, if you want to go through distractions first, distractions is one way, but what else? And then we'll get to the distractions. I think it's already underway. I think somebody has communicated to Ghislaine Maxwell in prison that if she exonerates the president, she'll get a pardon by the end of his term which makes it worse though right correct doesn't that make it even more

I don't know. I think his base, I think if she quote unquote, I mean, think about how ridiculous this is. All of a sudden they've decided they might want to speak to Jelaine Maxwell. I mean, think about it. That just dawned on the attorney general's office that maybe they should go speak to her. So it's been, in my opinion, just. Logic has said, okay, if you provide us with information or credible information or just basically say he was there, but make it.

Make it believable like he was there, but he never engaged in anything like that. Before the end of the term, wink, wink, you're going to be back in Long Island or wherever she's from. I just don't. And will it get worse? I don't know. His bass seems to want... I can't... I don't feel as if I really understand his bass at all. And I've been more wrong on this than right, and you've been more right on this than wrong.

Throw it back to you. What do you think is going on here? I think he's not going away. I think he's sort of, I think the Obama thing, which we'll talk about in a second, is the smart one. Because if there's two things this group is enamored with, which is that there was a Russian hoax to stop. You know, the election was stolen.

I'm not sure which one is a bigger bearing wall for this group, the Epstein stuff or this. And they're intertwined in the idea of a deep state. So it's hard to know if this one will work, and especially when it's being led by such an idiot like.

Chelsea Gabbard. Let's talk about these distractions. You said last week we should track his attempts to distract the public and media from Epstein. Let's go into what he's been up to, most of which is...

Pointless. It doesn't work. Taking credit for Stephen Colbert's cancellation and sending a warning to The View. I think that's a nothing burger. Threatening to block a deal for the Washington commander's new stadium. If the team doesn't go back to their old name, I'm not even sure he can do that. Another nothing burger. Releasing over 230,000 pages of files related to MLK's assassination. Again, I think that came and went. Visiting the Federal Reserve, another came and went.

They're also proposing to rename the Kennedy Center's Opera House after Melania Trump. I don't even understand that. But the one that seems to be the big one is Trump accusing former President Barack Obama of committing treason, claiming he rigged the 2016 election, which is also, as I said, a bearing wall of the MAGA movement's conspiracy theories. Trump told...

reporters in the Oval Office this week that it's time to go after people calling out Obama, Biden, Comey, and others. He cited declassified materials recently released by Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, which seemed to fall apart on initial scrutiny. Gabbard says The documents detail a years-long coup by Obama's intelligence officials against Trump. Obama is finally pushing back. I actually talked to...

people with him. And I was like, are you finally going to say something? Because I told you he was coming here. His spokesman described Trump's comments as bizarre allegations and called this a ridiculous and weak attempt at distraction. I think it's not a weak attempt. I think it's actually a

strong attempt at distraction and probably the only one that has any legs. Your thoughts, Scott? You were 100% right about all these distractions, of course. My thoughts are that you've never heard a heterosexual woman use the term bearing wall. I was with a group of women last night that used terms like fractal laser.

Brow lift, kegels. But no, I've never heard a straight woman use the term bearing wall. I've done kegels. I mean, could you be a bigger lesbian? I'm in San Francisco, and every metaphor is a construction term. The bearing wall. Well, you got my point, didn't you? Did I make my point for you? No, it makes sense. It's why you are who you are. The pillar. Lean into it. Lean into it. You like you. What is it? Foundation. Foundation. I think Obama, I would.

I thought Obama was nearly bulletproof. Again, these distractions are becoming so, they're so ridiculous. And yet every day I turn on CNBC or CNN or Fox and they're just going for it. They're like, wherever he takes us, we'll take the bait.

I would have thought that Obama at this point, these types of allegations would only, I don't know, undermine his credibility. I think on this stuff, you just get it more than I do. You think this is going to work or you think that it's going to be in the short term effective? I don't know.

I do think it's the right one if you're looking for a distraction. That's all I'm saying. It's the right distraction. Because I don't think anyone cares about JFK anymore. I think some people do. I don't think anyone cares about MLK. I don't think anyone cares about Melania Trump.

or the commanders. He's not going to follow through, and I don't think his fights with Rosie O'Donnell or The View or whatever matter. I don't think this animates these people. What does animate these people is the rigging of the 2016 election thing. This does satisfy them. It scratches their itch. And I don't know if it scratches their itch more than Epstein. That's the thing that I don't, I'm not sure which one animates them more. They like to let Trump off the hook. That's for sure.

Yeah, it's I mean, I'm waiting for what the next distraction at some point is going to release a sex tape of him and Charlie Kirk. Say my name, Chuck. Say my name. Oh, my God, that is now in my head. Teeing off, hole number four. Five heads. Bearing wall. I don't got a lot going on today. I don't have a lot of insight, so I'm going very dirty. I don't know. Look, this is no...

Okay. These guys are kept from the same plot. My Tesla earnings are fucked, so I'm going to launch a diner. I mean, the art of distraction here, as Don Draper once told a client, if you don't like what's being said, change the conversation.

And this is the mother of all that. Every day, and I've said this before, I think there are three or four, they have great communications people in a room with AI saying with this massive prompt around something that's... that doesn't the maximum amount of distraction to the minimum amount of damage to trump and maximum amount of damage to his enemies so

The Obama thing, AI came back and said, accuse Obama of being involved in the Russia hoax. This is all brought to you by AI. And every day it's the same thing. Look over here. The term I use is we're at the Nuremberg trials. went on trial, whips out the kazoo, hoping that everyone forgets why exactly we're there and what they did. And it's not working. I feel as if these things are creating a lot of noise, but maybe they are a bit of a distraction, but it feels like everyone is...

The general public, including Republicans, it's like a dog on a soup bone. They're just not letting it go. On the Epstein. On Epstein. Part and parcel of the same conspiracy theories. I just interviewed Doni from CNN and Julie K. Brown, who actually broke the original Epstein. She's the Miami reporter? Miami reporter who did that. And one of the things they were doing. She's the hero. all of this. She is. She is. And she's been...

banging away at this for years. And one of the things she did say, though, is that things, I mean, Donny from CNN is amazing. He covers conspiracy theories. He's like, he couldn't tell which one will work, but these two are intertwined, this idea of a deep.

state, right? That's at the heart of both of these conspiracy theories, essentially, is that there's a deep state, there's a cabal, there's a group, there's always a cabal. It has, you know, in the Epstein case, which I hadn't thought of, it had vague anti-Semitic attacks. because Epstein was Jewish. And there's all kinds of that idea. Israel is in there and different things like that.

I think Trump has to be very careful about what he does around Jelaine Maxwell, right? Because if he lets her off or if there's any hint that he's letting her off, he looks like he's been taken in. The other thing he's got to watch out for is that he's relying on Tulsi Gabbard, who's such a slob. terrible national intelligence head. The stuff she's putting out is so easily provably wrong that it creates strength. I do think the press should take...

whatever they're saying seriously and look into it no matter what, right? Okay, let's show us the stuff. We're going to do the reporting and then likely overturn it, right? But I don't think it does any... even if it's coming from a clown like Tulsi Gabbard, it's not something the press shouldn't say, okay, you're saying this, let's go through it, just like they did with the drawing, etc. It's like, okay, you say you don't draw, you draw.

Right? That kind of stuff. Just do reporting on all this stuff. I do think Epstein has longer legs than anything, even this stolen election stuff. I think they are just, it has so many elements of what works in a conspiracy theory.

I don't know about Obama. You're right. I thought he was untouchable. I thought he should have said something way before this and weakened Trump long ago, as you know. But he's going to now be on his back foot on this stuff. Because how do you push, you know, when did you stop beating your wife, sir, kind of thing. Yeah, force them to deny it. But just the only thing, the only wrinkle I would add or nuance is that.

I think the fix is already in. I think someone has already communicated to Jillian Maxwell that if she says she's going to have to give testimony and it's going to be on the record, and if by chance the truth comes out that the president was a friend but was not...

involved in any of this, that who knows what might happen by the end of your term, wink, wink. And at the end of his term, at Trump's term, when he pardons Jillian Maxwell, which is what I think is going to happen after she lies and says he was not involved in anything.

He's an obese octogenarian who has no love in his life. That, generally speaking, means you're going to die soon. I think biology is going to take care of Donald Trump. I said the most dangerous person in the world was Peter Thiel. I don't think he cares. I think the fix is already in. And what are they going to do to the guy when he's 83 and they're like, oh, my God, he's pardoned Jelaine Maxwell and this is outrageous. What the fuck is he going to care?

Why would he care? Yeah, that's an excellent point. The fix is already in. He's gotten away with it. Why have they all of a sudden figured out it'd be a good idea to talk to Jelaine Maxwell? Well, one is because she committed perjury, I believe, and she also has not really.

One of the things that Julie was pointing out, and I think correctly, is Julian Maxwell is as culpable as Epstein in this. She was an equal predator to him, though he had the dramatic death. But she was part and parcel to this. pair that, you know, the Bonnie and Clyde of pedophiles essentially. And she was just as culpable. And so I think letting her off would.

is a little stronger than that because she's not like some bystander. She has not cooperated. She has not said things. She's been found to lie. I think letting her off will stick to Trump in a way that maybe is not. I don't think he cares. I think you're right.

If you're 83 and about to die and all you got is maybe seven more rounds of golf, what the fuck do you care what sticks to it or what doesn't? All he cares about is getting off this topic right now. That's it. What would be a strong distraction? Any ideas? Oh, gosh, I have no idea. I mean, I did not see, we can't change the name to the Washington Commanders coming. I didn't see. I mean, the most ridiculous trade deal, by the way, the trade deal with Japan is we've...

we've absolutely ceded advantage to Japanese automakers. On the announcement of this new quote-unquote big framework, Japanese automakers soared 12% to 18%. They're desperate to just do anything. I think it'll mostly... His biggest weapon right now, because it gets a lot of attention, is something around Powell, something around tariffs. But you're right. If he comes up with three or four new accusations each day on the Obamas...

Because Clinton can't really beat that horse anymore, right? The Clinton, Mrs. Clinton. The Hillary emails? I think even they're tired of that. I think Obama's a much better target for him in that regard. We'll see if it works, though, because Obama's got his own skills. Let's just say. Anyway, okay, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, Elon's warning after Tesla's disappointing earnings.

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Scott, we're back with more news. Time for a quick roundup of earnings. First up, Tesla is on Musk that Tesla could quote. probably have a few rough quarters, unquote, you think, Elon. After the company's latest earnings, the Musk company reported a 16% year-over-year decline in automotive revenue, which is hard because it's an automotive company. Adjusted net income fell 23% to 1.4%.

billion. This makes Twitter look like a great business. Sales of Model Y and Model 3 fell 12%, and Cybertruck sales fell 52%. I mean, that's gone right through the ground. I'll just mention the others. Alphabet's overall revenue grew I had a many-year-ago discussion with Sundar. shy about why they're not in the cloud computing business as much as they were a long time ago. And they seem to be right there.

pushed by obviously AI and stuff. For GM, the auto company said his profits fell by more than a third in the second quarter due to tariffs costing the company over a billion. And as Scott pointed out, that it's going to get hit further with this Japanese deal.

Scott, any thoughts on any of these? Well, you covered the, I mean, Tesla's earnings, again, no automobile company in the world trades at a PE of 180 and has a trillion dollar market cap. And at the same time. Their revenues are declining faster than any automobile company in the world. And Musk knows those two do not stay in unison for very long. At some point, he either has to massively reignite growth or the stock is going to crash. And it feels like a merger of some sort.

or say xai or announcing a diner or we're not a car company we're doing robots the fact that he opened this diner just days before these earnings came out is again no accident i'm not exaggerating 40 hours 48 hours ago

came out. I said to Ed Elson on Property Markets, I said, that means he's about to puke on the earnings call and he's trying to get everyone to look away. Their revenues are down 12%. The bright spot was their services or their supercharging station. But this thing's trading at a trillion dollar valuation and it's...

It's declining faster than Renault. I mean, there's no car company in the world that's posting these numbers this bad. On a more meta level, I think what's happened here, I think 2025 will be the year that late night TV. turned out the lights. And also, I think this is the year where we kind of officially seed anything resembling leadership, the automotive industry. I think the automotive industry now in the U.S.

is on kind of the Green Mile Death March. And what do you have? You have our national champion, Tesla, which was worth more than the rest of the automobile industry combined, starting to throw up. And they released the worst product, car product of the year, the Cybertruck. They're grasping at Strauss right now saying, we're AI, we're this.

So that is a huge blow to the American automobile industry because Tesla was the national champion. And then the traditional player, General Motors, just announced that their earnings were taken down by a billion dollars because of tariffs. And then you have... Japanese car companies. I love that Trump announces it's a big victory, that they won't charge any tariffs on our cars going into Japan. Okay, let's just talk about what a give that is.

We buy about $54 billion of the Japanese cars in the U.S. Do you know how many, do you know the dollar volume of cars the Japanese buy from U.S.? $26. $2 billion. Right. So what is it? A few Japanese billionaires buy Escalates. That's it. The Japanese want nothing to do with our cars. This trade agreement is going to keep flat or lower the tariffs coming to the U.S. So what do you have? You have more pressure from amazing manufacturers, specifically Japanese manufacturers.

national champion going into the shitter. And you have our old guard, General Motors, announcing that these tariffs are really hurting them. And then if you want validation of just how bad this deal is for America. The ultimate neutral arbiter that absorbs millions of points of lights and is not politicized, it's totally focused on fear and greed is the markets. And what happened in the market when these tariffs, this Japanese big, beautiful deal was announced yesterday?

Toyota was up 16% or 17%. Right, right, as usual. And he's made it worse. He's made it worse if he's talking about protecting manufacturing here. He's decided not to protect them, actually making it worse for them. What about Alphabet?

Staggering. And I'm talking my own book here. Every year I make a big tech stock pick and it's based on valuation. And OK, the existential threat, you know, quote unquote, search is being undermined by AI. Search revenue. search revenue grew 12%. This quote-unquote technology that's supposedly being disrupted by AI, it grew double digits. YouTube up 13%.

Cloud up 32%. They have five different businesses. As you've noted. They could be independent companies. And they have Search, an unbelievable display ad network, YouTube, subscriptions. And seven products that have over 2 billion users, Search Maps, Gmail, Android, Chrome, Play Store, and YouTube. And now their new growth vehicle is Waymo.

which is by far the most dominant autonomous player with more than 100 million total miles logged on on public roads. In addition, this company trades at, I think the average S&P company trades it at PE multiple of 26. So Google, which is growing faster than the S&P, much faster and has this incredible, incredible leadership.

is cheaper than the average S&P company. And pick your average S&P company. I would say it's Dow Chemical or P&G. Great companies. Call them the average. Would you rather have autonomous in YouTube than, you know... I mean, this company relative the existential threat or the overhang of the existential threat of AI has been vastly exaggerated at Alphabet. And then if you look at the IP they have and the investments they're making and they announced.

They announced massive CapEx here that, you know, they're just going to, they're going to be like, we're going to get there just on money. They've announced that they're increasing their CapEx up to 85 billion. from 75. Microsoft is at 80. Meta's between 64 and 72. And Amazon is up to 100 billion. But if you want to talk about CapEx going into AI, you know, a lot of Amazon CapEx goes into boring shit like, you know, like distribution centers and planes and things.

So what do you have? You have unbelievable businesses that continue to grow. You have probably some of the deepest IP around AI. You have a cloud business growing 33% a year.

and a company that's trading at a lower multiple than the S&P. So anyway, I'm very bullish. I would agree. One of the things, everyone focuses so much on Mark Zuckerberg overpaying for talent. I would look at Google. I think he's going to maybe blow the money in that regard in terms of catching up. He thinks he can do it by this brute force.

research, essentially. Are you talking about Sundar or Mark? Sundar is quietly, he has a lot of businesses to pull levers on, as you know. And I think they have a better story than the sort of flashy jazz hands version that Meta is doing.

which is stealing talent all over the place. Like Cinder is, I've been thinking a lot about, they asked me at this thing last night, who should run for president or who would like to see as president? And I said, I think competence, we're entering an age where competence and the amount of press you get are inversely correlated.

And that is, I think one of the most accretive actions for the quality of life of Americans would be a president like Michael Bennett, who lacks the charisma to be in your face and in the news cycle every day. I think I spend easily an hour a day thinking about or having Trump rent free in my brain. And I hate to admit it, but just a competent...

You know, good governance is really fucking boring and doesn't get headlines. And really competent leaders don't feel a need to be attention merchants and want you to have time to focus on your kids and your relationships and making money. And Sundar Pichai is that kind of CEO. He's not out there like Musk or even, yeah, they're just like, I'm just going to do the boring shit that moves the needle. I don't need press.

I don't need to be in your face every day. I don't need to virtue signal and talk about not working with this company. These guys aren't jonesing for the camera every fucking day or in your face every day. Yeah.

Yeah, I was like, shut the fuck up. And you see a Sundar not doing that. You see a Satya not doing that. I mean, they give interviews, but it's very typical, right? It's the typical, rather than the sort of jazz hands performative stuff. Do you remember during COVID when we did those series of specials? webinars or podcasts and Cinder came on. Yeah.

I think his kid was coming in the room. He kept looking over and like waving people off. I don't know if it was his kid or his comms person saying, get off of the bearing wall, bitch. She's going to make us look bad. You're going to use, let me just tell you, your next appearance in Aspen.

Ladies of Aloe, you'll use the word bearing wall. I swear to God. You know you are. You've said it so much. You're like, oh, that was good. They love me. They're like, oh, why won't the Democrats listen to you? And I'm like, well, hello, what's your name? I think we have the same dermatologist. Let's go to San Ambrose. Would you like to take a hike with me tomorrow? No, no one wants to take a hike with you.

And you don't hike. I can't imagine you hiking. I'm young and good looking for Aspen. Most of the guys have literally like too much time in the sun. You made a lot of money, but you didn't spend enough on sunblock. Those guys. Anyway, speaking of which, Elon's XAI is...

working to raise up to $12 billion in debt for a massive supply of NVIDIA chips to help train and power Grog. Valor Equity Partners, whose founder has closed ties to Musk, has been working with lenders to secure capital to lease the chips for the company. This is a big fight. First of all, Musk doesn't partner with anybody like OpenAI and the others, Anthropic. Secondly, they're losing $13 billion. It's like...

crazy how much money this thing is losing and almost no revenues. And they're raising the money. And by the way, speaking of which is money making thing over at SpaceX. Paperwork sent to investors discussing a tender offer included an interesting risk factor that Elon Musk may return to politics. This feels like... I love that. I hope so. He's running on the hot topic ticket. I know, but one of the things is...

This is a lot, the $13 billion, he's raising 12. I mean, it's always good to bet on Elon, but I was like, this guy's a high wire act of all high wire acts here around everything he's doing. And then he overed SpaceX. which we would assume would be his seat corn, his bearing wall, so to speak. He's really kicking it in the foundations in a lot of ways with this political stuff.

I don't think he has any choice. If you look at it, the guy's a brilliant guy. And the reason he's the wealthiest, there's a myth. And I hate it when usually venture capitalists or entrepreneurs say this, they get on stage and someone references their wealth or money or the stock price. And I say, you know, I never really thought about money. I just wanted to build something great. These guys would fuck their sister for a nickel. These guys are obsessed.

obsessed with money. And let me be clear, if you want to have a lot of money, you need to be thinking about it all the time. Roger Federer thinks about tennis a lot. You have to be, and I... I think young people, I love it when they talk about stocks. I try to be very open and transparent about my investments and how much money I've made or lost. You need to be financially literate. And this guy understands the relationship between.

The means of production, revenues, profits, and also in an era of perception, where essentially the multiple you get on whatever revenues you have is purely a function of the perception of you as an innovator. And this is where he has between SpaceX. Tesla and Twitter, he has about $1.4 trillion in value. The lion's share of that is $1 trillion in value from Tesla. And he looks at it and goes, this is a $50 billion company pretending to be a trillion dollar market cap.

The only thing he can do to possibly keep that trillion dollar balloon from bursting is is two words. First is a second is I. So he is doing. anything he can to try and figure out a way to establish the perception of AI leadership and wrap it around all of this shit. So he is not afraid to spend. He has the only way. This his empire stays worth 1.4.

trillion dollars, and he maintains his status as the wealthiest man in the world, is to figure out a way for Tesla to get some perception or to get wrapped in an AI glove. So he doesn't care what it costs. And $13 billion. Tesla was down, what, 7%? Tesla lost $70 billion yesterday after their earnings. So $13 billion. He can't spend money fast enough.

If someone comes in and says, you know, I think this will give us a slight little bit of a little AI juju, but it's going to cost a billion dollars and I have no idea if it's going to work. Greenlight it. Greenlight it. He has to get the AI veneer over this $1.35 trillion enterprise that is worth SpaceX, I believe, is worth $350 billion. Tesla, 50. Twitter, 10.

I mean, all he's thinking about is how do I keep Tesla in the limelight? And the only thing he can do, again, is the AI Botox brow lift fractal laser here. Yeah, I know. The thing is with SpaceX, I think Trump can still do damage to it. Even though they said we can't live without it, I think they're trying to figure out a way to live without it, right? Now they're on that path. And so that's even, you know, and especially if he returns into U.S. politics.

politics, and it will be loudly, by the way, so it will take focus off of it. And that'll be a problem. And by the way, Peter Thiel is back spending money on politics, which he said he was getting out of quietly, right? Speaking of quiet competence.

He, you know, that's what he's doing where nothing is at risk. But I don't think Musk can resist himself. I think he's just the most high wire act I've ever seen. And in some ways it's, I don't want to use the term admirable, but it's like, gee, when I saw that number. I was like, Jesus, this guy's... Good luck. I don't know if it's the galaxy. What number? The number is... The $13 billion in losses. Like, wow. He just isn't... He's playing all, you know, the sort of...

This game that he's playing is really high level in a way that I would never do. It's terrifying, but this is him. This is the way he is. He's going to go down in flames. And probably it'll go down in flames. But ultimately, it's really quite astonishing to watch it. And I think you're right. The valuations are way off of what they actually will be. And at some point, they'll come down to earth. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, Trump says he's removing the red.

Tape around AI. Hey, this is Peter Kafka, the host of Channels, a show about media and tech and what happens when they collide. And this may be hard to remember, but not very long ago, magazines were a really big deal. And the most important magazines were owned by Condé Nast, the glitzy publishing empire that's the focus of a new book by New York Times reporter Michael Grinbaum. The way Condé Nast elevated its editors, the way they paid for their mortgages so they could live in beautiful...

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Took all the disabled vets that were selling merchandise, you know, to see the guys with the hats and stuff, and they kicked them out of Midtown Manhattan. Why? You want me to name politics? Yeah, let's name. Donald Trump. He kicked every vet out of Midtown Manhattan by buying off all the politicians in Albany. Listen wherever you get your podcasts or watch on youtube.com slash yourrichbff.

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Scott, we're back with more news. Trump says he's removing the red tape around AI. The president spoke about his AI action plan, signed three executive orders at a summit hosted by the All In podcast in Washington this week. I wonder why they didn't invite us. The orders aim to fast track... permitting for data centers, which, okay, promote American technology abroad, okay, and ban ideologically based.

AI systems from federal contracting, that's just stupid, but a little meat for his base. One other thing Trump thinks is holding AI back, copyright law, incredibly. So he's kicked one industry in the nuts. So let's listen to a clip. You can't be expected to have a successful AI program when every single article, book, or anything else that you've read or studied, you're supposed to pay for. Gee, I read a book. I'm supposed to pay somebody. And, you know, we appreciate that.

but you just can't do it because it's not doable. Okay, this is amazing. I thought that was amazing. I thought the whole thing was kind of ridiculous, hand-wavy stuff, and it was sort of basic basics of like, yes, we could have less regulation, but it essentially was Silicon Valley getting back its money for spending on Trump.

That's what it looked like. And then he also went off scripted number. He talked about trans athletes. He talked about tariffs. He talked about everything. But it looked like Silicon Valley was getting its bit. David Sachs was sort of the leader of that. He's on the All In podcast. But to me, it was sort of a nothing burger. I think a lot of people didn't pay attention to it. It was very showy. But essentially, his minions...

his minions in tech getting the payback for what they've gotten. I don't think there was anything here except for the copyright law, which showed an astonishing lack of knowledge about the real problem here. So he's sort of giving the green light for... tech to do what it did before what are your thoughts i see this as nothing but a kind of a long-term transfer of wealth from los angeles and new york to silicon valley and that is if if

Late night TV could go back in time. They would have partnered with every other high-end TV show and said, we can't have YouTube crawl. We've all got to bind together and license it for more money because basically... with YouTube, I can go see the best two minutes of Colbert and I don't have to endure 22 minutes of advertising through the hour. So they're basically, and they let them do it. And the time to stop it would have been 10 or 15 years ago.

And effectively, what they're saying here is they're going back in time and saying, OK, these are they're opting for Facebook's right or Google's right to crawl IP. slice it, dice it, and to a certain extent, probably make more shareholder value than the traditional media companies have been able to do. The problem is that journalism is weakening, an industry that employs more people is weakening.

So it's disruption, but it's also, all right, what is the incentive to do good work and create original IP into investigative journalism? The asset light companies that don't have to hire people or hire gaffers or sound people can just come in and crawl our data. And they claim that you couldn't do this. Well, actually, the music industry has figured out a way to do it. Every radio station in America can crawl any song and then play it.

But they pay a small fee, like probably a quarter of a cent. And every year they send a check to a royalty or an artist group that then says, OK, Madonna, here's your check. for $685,000 from the radio stations in the Southeast. So they could have figured out, in my opinion, this is payback for Silicon Valley, who said, We want to continue to crawl and molest other people's data that they've spent money on, that they've risked their lives sometimes going into hotspots to cover reporting or...

I mean, it's just a transfer of wealth to Silicon Valley by saying, OK, AI needs to run, you know, needs to run flat out with no friction, not have to pay anybody else, crawl books, crawl music. And we get to do it. And the argument you would make is that part of America's leadership.

from a market capitalization standpoint, innovation standpoint, is that we err on the side of a lack of regulation. So that is a real argument. And also you could argue, okay, so we're stealing a dollar from the garage of Warner Brothers. But we can take that dollar we're stealing and turn it into seven, whereas they turn it into 50 cents. So there is sort of an economic argument or an innovator's argument that this is good for AI. Let our thoroughbreds run.

But we've been to this movie before, folks. Just keep in mind, don't let your kids go into original IP or art or the creative because now AI can just crawl it and doesn't have to pay it back. Yeah, well, the problem is I don't think he's... necessarily going to, he's just saying this, whether it's, everything he says, like, I'm going to dig the commanders out. He's not. He's not. And for example, on Monday, Josh Hawley from Missouri and Senator Blumenthal, Richard Blumenthal from Connecticut.

Democrat, Republican Democrat, unveiled legislation that would require AI companies to get consent of individuals for using their content and data and developing assets. This is not going to—copyright law is quite robust in that regard. And so just because Trump—

says it's not so. First of all, he's as dumb as a box of hammers. But they also, by the way, they didn't mention deep fakes in this thing, which is supposed to be their big thing. They didn't mention like so many things out of this thing. It was just a show. It was such a...

such a nothing burger of an everything. And one of the things that, you know, especially around, and I have to say, Governor Newsom, who has on point social media these days, wrote President Trump's executive order on AI threatens. to defund states like California with strong laws against AI generated.

child porn, some might say that's an interesting priority, particularly in light of his close ties with Jeffrey Epstein. I thought that was quite good, his picture of him with Jeffrey Epstein. So I don't know if this is going to be such an easy thing. I know that the tech companies would like to get out of there. this, but I don't think they are. I don't think in this case, copyright is quite strong. I think there's a lot of supporters of that, even if not just

you know, media. I think it's movies. There's lots and lots and lots of people that still have some juice. And we'll see if they can do that. They also are showing some signs of weakness. SoftBank and OpenAI's $500 million Stargate project intended to boost USAID.

facing setbacks over disagreements about key terms of the deal, including where to build data centers. The company's pledged to immediately invest $100 billion in the project in January, but the only plan right now is to build a small data center by the end of the year. It's pretty pathetic, actually.

cost tens of millions of dollars, maybe 50. Like, just because Trump says it, like a lot of things doesn't mean it's happening. And this AI thing was incredibly weak sauce, I thought. I was sort of like, well, I wasn't invited, but I'm kind of glad I wasn't. And it just looked like...

a payoff to me um the one that i thought was more disturbing was columbia university agreeing to pay 200 million dollar fine to resolve the trump administration's investigation into alleged violations of federal anti-discrimination laws and all kinds of stuff around DEI. It essentially gave Trump an ability to, the government, an ability to meddle in emissions. And so I just love your thought on that.

Because, you know, I know you talk about the overuse of DEI programs, etc. This seems like a first—the founding fathers did not, like— were not worried about woke, they were worried about this. This is what they actually, I mean, it's annoying, but it's different than what is happening here, which is a

Clear violation of the government meddling in private enterprise. But go ahead. Well, we've never had a president that's more socialist. He demands a golden share to control a steel company. He's doing one-off deals with companies. And now he's decided.

If you want to appoint Supreme Court justices that overturned a race-based affirmative action, which has happened, I get it. You may agree or not agree with that decision, but it's meant to be a thoughtful, slow, grinding process that affects every university. But when you show up and start threatening using the full weight of the DOJ and government to go after individual universities and then just make these vague statements, you want to have input into less politically correct.

admissions that's just not how you run a government it's not how it's so it's it's socialism and then it's kind of thought control uh the places that are supposed to have the most freedom of thought that is why they are so successful is that We provide this ridiculous thing called tenure, which is very expensive.

And occasionally someone says something so stupid they'd be fired anywhere else. And we can't fire them because the whole idea is we built universities outside of the city center so people could say crazy shit like, well, maybe the world isn't flat and not risk being burnt at the stake.

And so when government starts coming in and telling the admissions department, I do think that if you are going to provide millions of dollars in assistance and federally backed student loans, you do have some input. But that input should be systemic across all universities. I do believe that if you are not growing your freshman class faster than population growth,

And you have an endowment over a million dollars. You should lose your tax-free status because you're no longer a public servant. You're a hedge fund offering courses. And then I like the carrot idea. Offer, instead of student debt relief, offer. A capital investment, if they one, keep their tuition flat for 10 years, and two, increase their enrollments by 3%, what do you end up with? College in the 80s.

where the admissions rates are double what they are now. And on an inflation adjusted basis, tuition comes down by a third and then force them to have non four year degrees in things like nursing and specialty construction. So I am very much up for the federal government. providing both sticks and carrots to reformat higher education such that it returns to its original mission.

of increasing the likelihood that middle-class unremarkable kids have a shot. I'm all about reform. And quite frankly, I'm all about showing up and saying, oh, we're not asking. But the way you do that is by passing laws, and then everyone is subject to these laws, not going after Columbia because they pissed you off. Let me tell you, with the Epstein things, they're not interested in the victims. They're not.

Yeah, that's not why they're there. That's not why they're there. And you know why? Trump is not at these universities to make them better. If they made a mistake around not protecting Jewish students, fine them for that. And tell them they have to fix something. That's a very easy fix, right? But this is something very different. The government should not be telling universities what to say. Just period, period, period, period. And again, I think you're...

exactly right. It should be based on finances versus race, maybe. And that will fix the problem anyway, probably. But it should certainly, this is such an overreach, it's crazy. And Columbia, I went to Columbia, by the way, for graduate school. And they will never see another, I don't give them money anyway, so they'll never.

ever see that money from me. They're an embarrassment to their long and storied history, but it's an embarrassment for Columbia. And I hope Harvard and others, as much pressure as they're under, don't. fall prey to this kind of nonsense because it doesn't make these universities better to let more white people in. It just doesn't. It doesn't solve the problem that we have here. But they don't care. They don't care about the victims in Epstein. They don't care about...

They don't care about AI and having a really robust AI system. They just want to get what's good for them. Their instincts in some ways are correct. It's again, the execution is wrong. 60 years ago. Not the government's business. 60 years ago, 12 black people at Harvard, Princeton, and Yale combined. That was a problem, race-based affirmative action. Now, 60% of Harvard's freshman class identifies as non-white, but the problem is 70% of those non-whites come from upper-income households.

Most Republicans and all Democrats agree that there are some people who face such incredible headwinds through no fault of their own that if the government gives them a hand up, Okay, we're down with that. The question is, and all the argument is over, is who qualifies for the hand up? And Tyler Perry and Trevor Noah's kids should not get a hand up. There has been, quite frankly, and this triggers people, too much advantage shoved into the kids.

of non-white parents. Those are the ones getting the most advantage right now. And a lot of good kids have been pushed out by foreign students and by, quite frankly, wealthy wealthy non-whites, and they've said, okay, fine, we need to reconfigure affirmative action as the University of California did. And they made it an adversity index. But this says to the white community who's poor and from single parents, you got the same. shot. We're going to lift you up. And at the same time says, okay.

Okay, you know, Tyler Perry's kids, sorry, you have the same advantages as a rich white kid. Except, Scott, they never address the white kid rich kids, right? They never, like, go, oh, wait a minute. Like, it's always like, okay, now— Well, they're talking about doing it with legacies. Yes. That's what I mean. Do away with legacies. But again.

This is not the government's job. I'm sorry. It's just they should not tell a university what to say, how to operate. The one thing is if they didn't protect students, Jewish students, whoever the students that were. attacked on campus, that's something the government might want to get involved in. But otherwise,

Help poor kids get into colleges and help figure out a way to get colleges to open up more. As you said, instead of being a private hedge fund that happens to give classes, figure out a way to get more people educated, especially at the lower level. of the economic rung. That is a brilliant idea. And there are models out there. UW-Madison, University of North Carolina, which prioritizes in-state applicants. University of California.

The University of California, they are doing their level best to let in as many kids as possible such that they can go deeper and deeper into the barrel. Because here's the bottom line. No individual or institution can be the arbiter of predicting greatness when a kid is 17 or 18. You just don't know. The key is, and by the way, the kid's getting in right now.

If you come from a 1% income earning household, you're 77 times more likely to gain admissions to an elite university. And here's the truth of it. The top 1%, they need college the least. They already show up well educated. They already have contacts. They've already gone to camps. They've already gotten really good socialization. Dad is already super well connected. It's the bottom 90 that need college the most.

Anyway, the one place we do disagree here is I do believe if you're going to back, you're going to federally back student loans, you're going to offer Pell Grants, you're going to offer tax-free status. They've cut Pell Grants, Scott. They don't care.

I'm just saying. No, I agree. What I'm saying, though, is that the federal government should have should have and nothing's for free input into the policies. But it should be in the word we always use is systemic. It should apply to everybody, not one offs based on where. Aaron did or did not get into college. Right. I agree with you. That's not the argument I'm making is the government should not tell colleges what to teach.

Scholars can decide, and then the market will decide of what they do. It's just they need to keep their dirty little hands out of it. It gets complicated fast, Kara, because universities have taken in $14 billion. from other governments. Four of the 14 billion has come from a nation with 300,000 people, Qatar. And what do you know? We have all of these Middle East studies departments who, quite frankly,

aren't teaching that Israel has a right to exist. So it does get pretty gray pretty fast. I think it's a complicated issue. The government should not be deciding this. I'm sorry. It's First Amendment. Look, I'm not loving Qatar doing it. I didn't take money from Qatar. Well, they shouldn't be allowed to get money. Maybe so. That's a great solution.

Great. That's great. That's a good idea. But here's the deal. Our government should be funding these educational institutions more, and they don't. Instead, they give out handouts to the very wealthy AI people and, you know, just take from it. Anyway, it's a long getting thing. I just feel like.

Colombia, you should be embarrassed by yourselves, by what you've done here. You've created a really bad precedent, and I hope the others don't follow. All right, we have to take a quick break, and we'll be back for predictions. Barry Diller was behind many of America's favorite movies and shows. Now, he's giving an intimate look into his personal life. To me, business risks were meaningless. I couldn't care less about business risks. I'm Preet Bharara, and this week...

Diller joins me on my podcast, Stay Tuned with Preet, to discuss his sexuality, the end of Hollywood, and how the media industry broke. The episode is out now. Search and follow Stay Tuned with Preet wherever you get your podcasts.

OK, Scott, let's hear a prediction. I just want to there's one that I could throw out at you. President Trump met with Jeff Bezos at the White House last week in a meeting that lasted over an hour. What do you predict they were talking about? I predict Trump wants in on the bachelor party. I don't.

Didn't that already happen? Did it? I didn't hear about that. I would have been so good at that. Would you have a post-marriage bachelor party? Lauren's not putting up with that shit. Oh, yeah. It's called a midlife crisis. It's called a second marriage and daddy getting together with his friends every six weeks. Anyways.

My prediction, I already made my prediction. The fix is in. Someone has communicated to Jelaine Maxwell that if she were to provide states evidence or testimony that in any way reflects well on the president. that the president has a habit of pardoning people towards the end of his administration. And there's nothing like jail to convince you to lie and do whatever you need to do to get out of jail. I think the fix is in.

What we're going to have is something resembling, it'll be a kangaroo court where they took testimony, pretend to take it seriously, pretend they're pursuing the truth. And all evidence from Jelaine Maxwell will show that the president, while was a friend and showed errors in judgment, was not involved in any illicit or illegal activity. And then on the eve before. Trump takes off and J.D. Vance is elected president or...

Or in my opinion, if I were to bet on anyone right now, and I might do this on Polymarket, is someone you mentioned earlier. People vastly underestimate Governor Newsom. He is the only one pushing back right now. I believe if I had to bet on anyone, he would be the president. But anyways, whoever. 30 days before the next president is inaugurated, she will be pardoned. Uh-huh.

Okay, well, we'll see. Just so you know, two things. Gillian Maxwell is a liar. She faced two perjury charges stemming from these accusations. She lied under oaths around Epstein. They dropped those things because she also had sex trafficking. she received in December of 2021. So let me just say, she's a sex trafficker.

So think about that, people, that he's going to let off a convicted sex trafficker who is probably just as equally culpable in what happened. We need a special counsel with Matt Gaetz. I mean, are we in a simulation here? I know. Literally, are we in a simulation?

Ghislaine Maxwell is a terrible person and should die in prison. And again, the focus is off the people it should be on, which are these young women who are terrified now because the president is trying to cover this up. And that's what the president's doing. He's trying to cover up. a sex trafficking scandal where his name is involved. And so everybody, all this stuff, whether you're going to get Trump or not get Trump, just remember all these.

Possibly hundreds of women, they think, were sexually abused here. And that is lost in this entire thing. Even worse, hundreds of girls. Girls, exactly. People have correctly corrected me and said, these are not underage women, they're girls. they're girls and that is what we should be focusing on and we never have and these these they're women now they're older

They they're not here. They have been traumatized. And Trump is further traumatizing them with this fucking circus. And that's what we need to focus in on. That's my when we won't. My prediction is we won't because we don't value the lives. women, as much as we do as rich, old, you know, syphilitic. These are syphilitic men. Anyway, your prediction? That she's going to be, that this is going to happen? The fix is in. She's going to be pardoned 30 to 60 days before the end of his term.

Well, everybody, she's a liar and a sex trafficker, so take that for the thing. Anyway, okay. All right, but it won't come till the end, you're saying. It won't come till the end of the administration. Well, I think that he'll create some distance to try and lower the volume of the outrage. The fix was in, and this woman basically came out and lied and took the heat down. Yeah, what the fuck do you care? Pardon her. The fix is in. The fix is in. All I just say is remember the girls.

of all of it. Release the empty tiles is fine, but remember the girls. A real attorney general has a group of people who are doing nothing but trying to convince people to narc and impugn more powerful people. They work their way up the chain. This is the first Department of Justice. that an attorney general who is trying to figure out a way to get people to flip and exonerate people more senior than them. This is exactly what they are not supposed to do. They're supposed to be truth to power.

The law affects everyone means that, quite frankly, you work your way up the food chain. Oh, you're a small-time dealer. This is how we're going to give you one year in prison and not 10. You're going to help us find the kingpin here and put him in prison. They realize that there's a... The key to law enforcement is that the more senior, more powerful, more mendacious you get in criminal activity, the more important it is that that person get put away. You want to punish. You want a progressive.

Just as we're supposed to have a progressive tax structure, which is part of our culture, we're supposed to have a progressive criminal prosecution structure that says the more senior and powerful, the more damage you're doing, the more we try to find. the truth on you. And this is entirely the opposite. Let's give her a pardon if she lowers the heat on the most powerful person in the world.

I think this one is so obvious. I know that. But again, I want to stress, to Pam Bondi, these are hundreds of girls. And you horrible, shameful person to do this. And this is the woman who sexually abused them. Absolutely. 100% has been convicted of that. You're a... You know, I'm going to do a lesbian thing and quote Gladiator because it's my favorite movie. The time for honoring yourself is at an end.

I'm just disgusted. The time for honoring yourself is at an end. You know, remember when he's, the guy's, he's getting all the attention and the emperor's all pissed. And then the emperor tries to. you know, tell him about his wife and child being killed in a terrible way, including rape in this thing. And he turns around, instead of hitting him, he goes, the time for honoring yourself will soon be at an end. Such a great line.

That's what I feel about these people. Yeah, I don't. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say Attorney General Bondi's ethics and morals around the president are sometimes a little bit patchy. Patchy. Patchy. You're a termagant. The time for honoring yourself. She's a heinous termagant is what she is. And I'll blame the men just as much, but when a woman does this, even worse. These are girls, Pam. Girls, okay?

Anyway, we want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business, tech, or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. Elsewhere in the Kara and Scott universe, this week on Profki Conversations.

that we talked about earlier this week. Scott spoke with Governor Gretchen Whitmer, the 49th governor of Michigan. Let's listen to a clip of Big Gretch with Scott. Well, I'm going to say something that's going to be really depressing, and that is... We're five months in to a 48-month term. As a governor, I have a role. You know, I have an important role. How do we band together and show Americans what Democratic leaders do?

It's by delivering in our states. It's by fighting the federal government when they're impacting our states. But we are not the counterpoint to the executive branch and the federal government. That's Congress. That's their whole job is to be that counterpoint. So you liked that interview, Scott? Yeah, every time I get to know some of these individuals on both sides of the aisle, I'm really impressed and heartened.

I think Governor, I think I said this last show, Governor, I do this no mercy no. Every presidential candidate is calling one or both of us. And we will interview between now and then, I think, any viable candidate. At least on the Democratic side. And I do this no mercy, no malice review of the interview. And to the upside, she reeks of integrity and character. There's just she's just one of those people that within a minute you think this is a competent, decent woman. And...

And also, Michigan has a lot to be proud of. It's not an easy environment to have a manufacturing-based economy. She's managed to maintain economic growth, even if it's not stellar. The quality of life of Michigan, meaning affordability relative to salaries, is some of the best in the nation. lot to run on. My downside was she's infected with the same rhetorical flourish and avoidance of hard policies. The Democrat that's going to

That race to the head of the polls is going to be someone who comes out with crazy bold solutions and says, we're going to lower Medicare eligibility by two years every year and socialize medicine. We are going to have an alternative minimum tax of 40%. We're going to do away with the exemption on real estate. on trust. There is such an opportunity now for someone to come out.

with big, fucking... Big, bold, fucking ideas. We're moving Social Security back to 72 when we're means testing it. Sorry, folks. It's time to be the grown-up in the room. An alternative minimum tax on corporations who are paying their lowest taxes since 1939 of 30%. Scott Galloway for president. But there's such a huge opportunity. And she wants to talk about, you know, in very big, bold, flowery speech, Americans. And I'm like, OK, folks, Obama.

You're not going to out-Obama Obama. We need someone who has real policies. And also, this is not the way the world should be. It's the way the world is. Democrats are going to elect and nominate a straight white male over six feet. We are highly luxist. They are not going to, for the third time, nominate a woman. No fucking way. They're not going to nominate a gay man because they're worried about blacks in South Carolina. They're not going to nominate anyone under.

5-11 because they realize America is so goddamn luxist and sexist still. So I don't, I think. No Scott Galloway for president. I'm just saying. Pointing it out. You fit all that criteria. The problem is I wouldn't enjoy it and I wouldn't be very good at it. You're in my job, Cara, is to bring attention and oxygen to fantastic Democrats and help them get elected. Anyways.

The she is she I think is on everyone's short list for VP because she is she's she would be she's just a great foot soldier. And she also she's hugely popular in a swing state. She is. She's very she's still very popular. Let me just say, I think you're right about all those things, unfortunately.

Whatever you think, Mondami, and there's lots of attacks on him recently, I think the reason he broke through was big ideas, whether you think they're right or not, they were big, interesting ideas. He's saying something. But they were kind of interesting. Some of them were good, some of them were good.

100%. And he's good at social media, and he's handsome, and he's well-spoken. Like, to me, like, get away from whether you'll, same thing with Abby Spanberger, by the way. Great speaker, great looking, great communicator.

saying things of real meaning. Like, what are you going to do for the people of Virginia? Or what are you going to do for the people of blank? And what are you going to do for the people of the United States? You're 100% right. Scott, you should run for office. I can be your vice president. I'll be fine.

run the show, as we do here. We will build a giant bearing wall. We will build. I like that. We'll build a bearing wall for America. Oh, my God. You could not be more lesbian. Oh, my God. Bearing wall. I'm going to go build one right now. That's your go-to metaphor.

That is your go-to metaphor. I'm going to build one right here in San Francisco, and then I'm going to have a kombucha. I hate kombucha. Do you want to hear the most offensive thing I said at the Aspen Ideas Festival? I'm sure I'll get a text. I was joking about masturbation, and I said, I've found the ultimate birth control, and that is I get lotion. I have this lotion that I put on myself, and if I put it on for more than two minutes, I don't need to have sex.

And there was this awkward silence. And then a bunch of women in aloe who liked me and laughed and then looked around to say, can I laugh? And it would be like, I'm laughing. You just can't tell. I've had so much poison injected into my face. Oh, Mike Scott. Scott, oh my God. There you go. You know what you need to do? This is the thing you need to do. Let me just give another recommendation. Go watch Hunting Wives. Hunting Wives? Hunting Wives with Mal and Ackerman.

And others, Malin Ackerman, Brittany Snow, it's based on a book set in Texas. It's about a bunch of sort of rich East Texas ladies. And you think it's going to be all about shopping and drinking, but it turns out to be a lesbian drama.

and a murder mystery. And it is so good because Malin Ackerman and Brittany Stowe are really hot and they have sex all day. But everyone's making, all the women are making out in it. I'll see it twice. Exactly. You need to watch it. You're going to thank me next week. Okay, that's the show. Thanks for listening to Pivot, and be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll be back next week. Scott.

Read us out. There you go. Today's show was produced by Lara Neiman, Zoe Marcus, Taylor Griffin, and Kevin Oliver. Ernie Intertot engineered this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows, Ms. Savera, and Dan Chalon. Nishat Kroa is Vox Media's executive producer of podcasts. Make sure to follow Pivot on your favorite podcast platform.

Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine at nymag.com slash pod. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Darren Wall. Lara, do not take that stuff out. You hear me?