Nike's CEO Shake-up, Trump's "Deranged" Messaging, and Guests Kate Conger and Ryan Mac - podcast episode cover

Nike's CEO Shake-up, Trump's "Deranged" Messaging, and Guests Kate Conger and Ryan Mac

Sep 24, 20241 hr 19 minEp. 552
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Kara and Scott discuss Microsoft's plan to reopen Three Mile Island to power its data centers, and Qualcomm's potential takeover of Intel. Then, Nike gets a new CEO, but will the corporate shake-up get Nike back in the game? Plus, Trump's bizarre messaging around abortion, and Kamala Harris's attempt to get another debate on the calendar. Our Friends of Pivot are New York Times reporters Kate Conger and Ryan Mac, who are out with a new book, "Character Limit: How Elon Musk Destroyed Twitter." Kate and Ryan share behind-the-scenes stories from Elon's Twitter takeover, and weigh in on the latest chaos in Elon-land. Follow Kate at @KateConger and Ryan at @RMac18. Follow us on Instagram and Threads at @pivotpodcastofficial. Follow us on TikTok at @pivotpodcast. Send us your questions by calling us at 855-51-PIVOT, or at nymag.com/pivot. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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And I'm Scott Galloway. Scott, where are you today? I was in Madrid for the last couple days, but I got an early flyback and I'm back in London. You're all over the map. Why is that? May I ask? I was in Madrid for a speaking gig. The American American equity insurance conference. That was a laugh riot. Oh my God. Those guys know how to party. Thank you. That was a big fun. But you're in Madrid. You're in Madrid. Oh, by the way. So I love in my prediction stack, I've produced cities of the year.

And I love the idea of a lifestyle arbitrage. So 10 years ago, the ultimate lifestyle arbitrage was to move to Florida. It was nice down there. There's a lot of water, good schools, and you can live for about 40% of what it would cost you in New York. And then ultimately every lifestyle arbitrage, like an arbitrage, and the commodities of the financial markets gets starched out because where it gets out and people move down there.

So the question is, what are the lifestyle, the cities that offer a lifestyle arbitrage now? And I've identified three. You want to keep saying the word arbitrage over and over again. I know. I get it. It's making you hot with my financial sector. It's a sexual act. What would arbitrage be? There you go. That's it. That's like, I don't know. That's like basically trading up from Scott to any other man.

Anyway, so the three cities I would offer up as being lifestyle arbitrages that I think are going to attract a lot of human capital. Our first we just mentioned Madrid. Tons of people from Latin America, people with money are moving from Latin America where they see it as more unstable business environment, political situation in Madrid. And by the way, Madrid, I don't know if you've been there recently. Beautiful. I know it is. I've been there. It's beautiful food.

Oh, but it's I taught at Institute of Imprison in 2006. And it was okay. It was kind of a greedy cool city. In the last 18 years, that place has gotten a massive phase lift. Food. Everything. So that's my first lifestyle arbitrage. The second is Athens. I think the Greece is actually done pretty well and they're building all sorts of new resorts and new high-rise condos and good life, great weather, Mediterranean diet, blues on all that stuff.

And then the third I think is Mexico City, which offers fantastic culture food. Are we thinking of moving Scott? Is this another Scott moves to another international place? Well, I gave so funny. I was so taken with Madrid. I thought, what if I were to spend two or three more years and have my, my youngest go to high school at the American School in Madrid. I thought if my oldest goes to college in the US, I don't be that far from them.

But I think Mexico City is basically kind of the hottest cultural hub now for 40% of the cost of similar cultural hubs. And I think it's going to see a human flow of capital. What are your thoughts on cities? I'm going to live here in the rest of my life. You're like, Calorama. Calorama. No, I'm not Calorama. I'm in Cathedral Heights, my friend, which I like to call Cathedral Whites.

You know, my mom moved us around a lot. We moved around, not like we're an army family, but a lot of houses and she was sort of restless. And I like staying by both my brothers and I stay where we are. And my brother, my little brother right now is building like an apocalypse house essentially, like fully off the grid. Jeff's lived in his house forever where he's been living and me too. I've had my San Francisco house since the 90s. So I'm not a mover. I'm not a travel. I'm now I'll be too old.

Yeah, but you're by coastal. You live in DC and kind of San Francisco, right? Well, I go there, but not in not everybody like we're there for Christmas and things like that. But I have to say I by the time I was thinking I was sitting there sitting at the elevator and this morning taking Clara's go she takes her scooter and I chase her. And then I'm having a puffing and puffing to the school, which is walkable very easily walkable.

And I thought I'm going to be like 80 when she goes to college. That's when I get like three. You didn't do the math when she was born. I didn't not just her, but Saul is even and then they're both born at these so they won't really go to college for. Oh my god, a long time. Let's think Saul turn three. Like it'll be a long. Even even worse. By the way, it's super easy to teach your 16 year old daughter how to drive when you're 76. It's a really fun experience.

Yeah, okay. I'm going to be old as fuck. So I'm not going to have that like I think I'll go to Madrid and dance, you know. I will literally be like wheeled around the dread. That's what's going to happen to care. I'm not going to get that. You're going to be 76 and 6 or 14 years anyways. Why not be buying up these 76 in a place with a great wine.

I would agree. I would try. It was just thinking the other day the penny fucking dropped that I'm going to be old as all shit when I get to be a place where I could travel to places like you're talking about easily. Anyway, and that's enough of our travels where I'm not going. I'm staying put right here in Washington DC and you are traveling globe drawing lucky you.

Anyway, we've got a lot to get to today, including Nike's CEO shake up. I know John Donnell pretty well, but we you've talked about is where we want to get to it. Kamala Harris's attempts to get another Donald Trump debate on the calendar. Good luck. Plus our friends of pivot are the New York Times reporters Kate Conner and Ryan Mac. I love this new book character limit how Elon Musk destroyed Twitter.

It's getting a lot of attention. Of course, Elon's helping them out by staying in the news because he's a relentless drama queen. He's having bits of fits because it looks like Kamala Harris is doing rather well, but we'll see we'll see he's pouring money and agony into the into the campaign for Trump. Anyway, the first things a unit of a dormant nuclear power plant three mile island will likely reopen to power the data centers for Microsoft's AI.

This is interesting. I just interviewed the head of Microsoft say I separate unit of the plant was shut down in 1979 after nuclear disaster. Although it wasn't quite as disastrous. It is disastrous. It wasn't they didn't they needed it was bad, but nonetheless nuclear got a really bad bad reputation after that. Microsoft in constellation energy, which runs three mile island of side of 20 year agreement, which will add $16 billion to the pencil.

They use GDP. It's a big deal if approved by regulators. The plant will reopen in 2028. Of course, there's a lot of controversy around nuclear and you and I have been much more of a support of it. Is this a wind? Do you think it's going to be approved? I think the forces that that were against nuclear are much less powerful going forward. It's the worst nucleus the worst managed brand. I mean regenerative energy. I think Josh Josh Wolf had he was saying he started to call it something else.

It's one of the worst managed brands since the China syndrome Chernobyl. And my favorite my favorite sort of summary of nuclear is more people have died and Ted Kennedy's car than a nuclear powerful in the United States. And it's true. This is in addition to the fears about a quote unquote China syndrome.

It's also been a bit of a financial disaster on many levels. And that is I was in my first shot. I was in fixed income in Morgan Stanley and we were selling these Washington public power supply bonds and they started referring to them as whoops. Because this huge set of nuclear reactors sponsored by Washington power never got built because they kept going billions and billions of dollars over budget. And finally voters said screw it. Just leave them there. And we've had it.

You know Bill Gates who distinct what you think of them personally I think is one of the bigger brains on the planet is all in on nuclear and it strikes me that it just in these environmentalists. I think got it wrong and started encouraging Germany to unplug their power plants. There's a lot of activity in nuclear energy. Super hot right now. Small nuclear devices things like that.

The power once restored the power get the 700,000 homes. The US currently has 93 operational reactors across 28 states which are responsible get this. I didn't know this about 19% of US total energy. But that's pretty significant. If they combined emissions of the big five tech firms Amazon Apple Google Microsoft meta were considered as a country in 2022.

The rank is the 33 greatest emitting nations behind our nation just behind the Philippines. And here's a thing they know they're about to go way up in the rankings in terms of the power consumption that they're going to inspire with AI that takes somewhere between 10 and 15 times the energy per query of a Google query. This is a big issue.

Yeah, there's a real renewed interest in nuclear power and lots of investment. This is something I in oddly enough I talked about with Bill Gates two years ago like he was like this is this is a similar thing you know bad branding here.

And it's much safer and it's this and that compared to others and you know he's like renewables aren't going to make it for us you know it's not going to happen and especially around climate change which was his issue but it's a huge symbol right if it could be you know there's a good quote. The symbolism is enormous said Joseph Dominguez chief executive constellation is largest nuclear operators was a site of the industry's greatest failure could now be a place of its rebirth.

But all these were closed and it'll be interesting to see the reaction from not just young people about anti new people because that was such a strong thing. You know the things look scary to right I know it sounds crazy but they they have such a but those movies you know those two movies when one was share also.

Just a number on on the imagery of it when it was you know a lot even including the one in Japan the number of deaths are very low right the biggest mess was the one and Chernobyl but that was largely because of the way Russians handle it because they're so incompetent but they use new nuclear quite a bit right.

But there's a bunch that they may bring back online and summer are two decommissioned but there's one in Michigan the palisites plant there's one in Iowa i'm really interested in this in this fusion is another thing that's important anyway we'll see what goes on here but this is a big it's a big moment it really is we'll see where it goes.

Speaking of a big moment that's really we talked about this for Intel has some big decisions to make chip giant qualcomm is reported the approach until about a takeover.

Polym global management is offered until a capital injection of $5 billion had a very rough year stock being down 53% for the year I can't believe this is a takeover target like Intel inside it's just you talked this you talked about the losers basket you were thinking of making and will it Qualcomm deal have any hope of getting passed anti trust. Regulation I mean I just can't believe this is I mean I haven't really been paying attention but boy what a what a shift right.

It's right will be one of my questions I don't know if she comment on I've been a con coming on our property pod my senses they should.

Intel's Intel struggling and I think if you want to talk about monopoly power talk about Nvidia and so AMD and or Qualcomm acquiring Intel they need to bulk up and Intel needs Intel needs new IP possibly new management I mean they just need they need to do something here they have performed really poorly and you said some nice things about the CEO I don't know I'm a pat galsinger yeah so look I don't know if it'll survive scrutiny I think it should I

well someone called it logically unlikely but this investment by Apollo which is you know these are private investors that come and look at these things. But most people don't think that that will happen will that the Qualcomm will get will get it but what do you think of the investors coming in doing this and treating it like it essentially just you call them a loser basket but distressed properties right correct.

This is a great investment Intel Intel has so much IP such outstanding human capital kind of up and down the stack such strong vendor relationships supply chain I do think these factories they built out which take billions of dollars and decades to build and support.

You know and the fact that it's stock is gotten just I mean it is I think this is a classic Apollo play and that is in five years their stock Intel stock is off 56% if you look at the long term it's trading it basically it's trading at 22 bucks a share and this is this used to be the icon of technology icon and and Andy grow I mean I remember it I

spent time with Andy grow it's just I just to watch this like you look at a company like Microsoft that look like it was on the ropes and then sort of reassert itself and such as magnificent way and then this one missing every turn right and it was so dominant it was crazy to people read about its monopoly status at one point you know.

And the you know they had a good they then they had a bunch of screw ups all at once anyway is it will see what I would so you think Apollo's the move or one of these.

Look I think bulking I mean if I were Apollo okay so if I'm a shareholder and I'm Apollo I want to come in and trying to enact my strategy as a go long strategy and if it doesn't work I pull the rip cord and sell and get my money back I see it almost as a free option so as an investor if I'm Apollo I don't want them to do this deal because I know the deals out there I come in and see if I can go it out at a

loan and capture the upside and if I don't I call call comments they're still interested in doing a deal so it's sort of a what I call when I invested in do you remember Neva the search the the the subscription. Yes sure that Ramaswani I met Sir Dar and he was one of the seminal players of build Google

search. I'm sorry I come street anyways he and I said I'm going to invest in this because while I don't think subscription search or any any player trying to go out there I think that the company has much of a likelihood of survival I think I'll get my money back because I think you even if this company fails I think someone will pay a lot of money for this company just to get you in your

management team and what do you know subscription search didn't work people weren't willing to put out the credit card for what was seen as just a reasonable and so it wasn't working and then snowflake came in and gave all the investors back and I remember writing a note to street are and saying this is like the best venture investment anyone could hope for

because it was I've got a lottery ticket and then when my numbers didn't come up I give it back to the guy and I got my buck back. So if I'm a poll I'd love to invest pre acquisition and see and give it a whirl. Yeah give it all. Yeah. All right and other interesting thing which I was fast Amazon will car corporate employees to be in the office five days a week the company previously allowed to remote days the week employees are not thrilled with the news of many expressing their

discontent on slack and marking themselves open to work on LinkedIn the shift was announced in a memo from CEO Andy Jassy where he also told staff the company to be simplifying corporate structure to fewer managers I think this is a ball or move on his part you know Amazon's an analog and digital company

and I think he's kind of right about corporate culture in this regard this isn't it is and and being remote and I love remote as you know but I feel like kind of a ball I don't know what do you think this is a nuanced argument because look you're an out will employee corporations who pay you and pay for your health insurance get to decide the place of work.

And I think the Amazon has never been known as a friendly soft gentle place to work there about shareholder value in the consumer and so them saying that we want to take advantage of the culture and innovation electricity and

the way that it takes place in person I get it some people would also argue that it's basically their attempt to lay off a certain number of employees quietly because a lot of people resign but I think that they get to do this what's interesting is that remote work has stuck in the US

the majority of Europe and Asian nations are back to work which is just absolutely destroyed the commercial real estate sector in the US and what do you know a lot of young employees who are I don't want to call them entitled but the ultimate arbitrage in the last couple centuries in a modern economy has been first and foremost fossil fuels you just you can build shit faster and cheaper with fossil fuels and anything that's been the ultimate arbitrage.

The second ultimate arbitrage is to find young talented ambitious people who you can pay a hundred thousand dollars to who are 80% as good as the 40 year old dude making 400 thousand. If you can attract young talented people on a regular basis as big tech does you can attract the youngest and most talented people who don't have dogs don't have kids are willing to work around the clock for less money than the 40 year old that's the ultimate economic arbitrage.

We don't like to say that out loud but the firms that can draw those people are the ones that win and young people generally speaking young ambitious people what I found in my firm despite the reports that they all want to walk their dog in Brooklyn Park really young ambitious people actually like the office now having said that who this hurts Kara who this really hurts is caregivers specifically moms and I'd like to see a new classification of worker that called the care worker that says alright.

You're taking care of parents you're taking care of kids you're taking care of yourself you don't make enough money to live in downtown Seattle we're going to give you a different classification and we're going to invest in enabling two three days a week at home because there's some people who just can't be in the office but want to maintain some semblance of a career your thoughts.

I just like I said I think you've got to you have to absolutely think about your where the work forces right and in Seattle I you know with people being laid off there's not as many choices Amazon's a big important choice and so if you're in Silicon Valley it might be a different thing but all you have you know there's lots of companies in Seattle but it is really Microsoft Amazon right to and some of the aerospace giants but I would think that this is this is how we want to run this company.

I don't think he'll lose talent for I think people will just opted and I do as you have talked about think it's important. Even though I never go to the office to begin the office in certain create a company culture I think there's I think he'll lose moms there was a survey the two thirds of C sweet leaders would he provides really great child care like that's the kind of thing he's got it easy.

I don't know that's what I would do if I were him if I was doing this I say we're going to have world fucking class this that's that's what you have to go along with that and I think if there's if there's anything to do if you want to do something that this you have to have a okay we've learned some things during the pandemic about women in the workplace and not just women people with children in the workplace and we've learned a lot about commuting and so here's what we're going to do to help you and so I think if he did that kind of interesting it's an interesting time to sort of glom all kinds of learnings because.

We've got a ton of learnings anyway we'll see Andy interesting move okay let's get to our first big story. Nike stock is surging following the news late last week that CEO John Donoho is stepping down Donoho's for your tenure was a rocky one with Nike losing market share breaking off relations with key retailers and according to some critics losing its cool factor Elliott Hill and Nike veteran is coming out of retirement who you apparently knows got Gallaudet.

To be in the new CEO you had talked about Nike's woes back in July you predicted that Donoho had 12 months to figure out or he'd be removed that's a lot sooner what he. Nike shares rose 8% and after hours trading on Thursday following the news you also predicted that an activist investor was going to come in and make some moves Bill Ackman's Pershing Square.

Perched it purchased 3 million shares of Nike back in the second quarter according recent filings. What do you think let me let me hear your thoughts on him Elliott Hill he's a career Nike man started as an intern. Nike was one of my biggest clients at L2 and I love this company I mean it's super smart people.

I love the unapologetic brand positioning of you didn't win silver you lost gold I think of Nike is intrinsic to an American ideal of individual performance and running so hard you throw up I just I just love the I love the brand they've done an amazing job now.

Bringing in a guy who didn't have a background in merchandising didn't have a background in parallel didn't have a background in sports was basically a consultant very impressive guy and then ran a tech platform was a decision for them to go all in on tech and I want to be clear I would have made the same decision and I basically advocated when I was working with Nike for them to go more direct to consumer.

What they weren't expecting and I wouldn't have predicted and it's easy to money more than quarterbacks let me say I would have gotten this wrong is it retail came surging back much faster post pandemic. Then people had expected and they're enormous bet on direct to consumer at the cost of managing and supporting their third party retail backfire on them in addition we talked about this the China chill has affected infected a lot of these companies.

Including Nike and then what people will say that he has to take responsibility for is their product development hasn't been nearly as innovative as Adidas with their vintage line or Hoko responded to Hoko or on running that they basically been out merchandise this guy I didn't spend a lot of time with them but he's hugely respected and it just feels like the right move from a morale standpoint.

He's a product guy he just he kind of he's out of central casting he's one of these guys when I was in meeting with him he was just sort of with was a great listener and then when he spoke everybody sort of waited to hear what this guy would say so I think it's great they brought back somebody from Nike and Nike alumni.

I thought it might be this woman in high New York Nike she's a super impressive woman but the Nike brand in the relationships they have and the resonance they have and the distribution I mean you just do not want to bet against this company I think it's a I think it's actually a really good buy right now.

Right interesting you talked about that and you know the fill night is the player here like he liked John I think he was that's what I understand anyway I've met him over the years but you know I think he had an audience of one which was keeping him power but at some point you have to you know there's a lot more competition in the space there's a lot more innovation in the space and you you know to just like Intel is like wow this company is sort of lost a step and it's

certainly still I think the most important brand and sports it just is right it's not you know Intel's got a lot of competition and Nike does too like all the people who bought Nike's are now wearing hoca's right because their back hurts or or some there's a bunch of other brands that younger people on on sorry like double I mean on is it is that's the ones in

Dias is advertising with you know there's a lot of people moving into the space but you know to unseat Nike it's it's a mistake on Nike's part right not to continue to be cool who would they who could they sign that would make them super cool would you say I think at all kind of reverse engineers was 17 year old is spending more time on tick tock the watching broadcast television

Nike's weapon of their sword if you will offer for for fighting their wars was broadcast they were the best broadcast advertiser in history but now you have the majority of the customer is now learning about brands for more long tail sources influencers Instagram and sports

there's still really strong and sport but I think their product just got a little a little bit still I think this is more product story and maybe supply chain around being faster to market with new product ideas and maybe reinvesting and showing some more love for their retail partners I don't think it's an endorsement

they wandered around with the with the watch stuff remember the exercise for the fuel band yeah you feel like they wandered around over in digital for a while which makes sense but they wandered a little too bad they didn't do a good job.

I'm saying I think they wandered in areas that weren't didn't really big and made a big deal of them the stores they you know they're huge stores but they close to bunch of them actually they have a big one in San Francisco big couple big ones in New York but they close the DC one here for example but the thing is you know what I'm wearing right now like at least four pieces of Nike right now shoes

that's the problem of the brand care no offense but when sixty two year old podcasters were in Nike that means it's all I know but I like it for a while but now he's you know he's he's a but he still loves Nike I have to say he was a Nike man and he still is I kids I have two teenage boys who are basically their market and one

was new balance in the other words the other was Nike and Adidas and it used to be just all Nike all the time and new balances made a comeback which no one was predicting but this is a it's almost like a bit of a fashion market if you will yeah absolutely but you know what I am cool Scott so I don't know what you understand that that's what you focused on right I'm super focused on I love I do like Nike close I they were better but although I just bought

Uniclo some some joggers that were fantastic in shirts they were fantastic Uniclo makes really great stuff I'm wearing Uniclo underwear right now just in case you're interested Wow and there goes our Uniclo sponsorship

Scott let's go in a quick break can we come back Donald Trump's bizarre comments on abortion and they are bizarre and we'll get to the inside story of Elon's Twitter takeover from our friends a pivot Kate Conger and Ryan Mac support for pivot comes from mint mobile when you discover something amazing it's tempting to share with everyone you see your friends your family maybe even mumbling it to your dentist in the middle of a cleaning well

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excludes tax title license dealer fees and optional equipment dealer sets final price okay scott we're back vice president comaheras has a five point lead of a foreign president don't trump in the latest NBC news poll when it comes to battleground states trump seems to be ahead in Arizona leading in

Georgia and North Carolina according to new york times Santa poll released today these things are the most flip floppy polls i've ever i kind of said in your times one shifts every hour uh... meanwhile trump says women will no longer be thinking about abortion if he's elected in november instead they will be happy healthy confident and free that sounds like literally like margot calling margot at wood uh... handmaid stale he pushed that messaging at a rally

in a lengthy both on true social and dmented one let me just say Michigan governor gretchen wentmer spoke for many people in san an interview on sunday con trump deranged after these comahs they were deranged actually i would agree uh... but again it's not another Tuesday there they're particularly deranged including continuing to double down on pet eating in ohio uh... it's he's focusing on reproductive rights he shouldn't be focusing on reproductive days because nobody trust them

uh... a lot of chaos the eating pets the g.o.p. candidate for governor and north carolina call himself a black nazi i did i was going to say i did not see that coming but i did not see that coming um talk it doesn't seem to stick and we'll get to the debate in a second but comments on these polls and this craziness that's going on so the polls are within the margin of error and i think most media is just acknowledge it's a toss up at this point they just don't know and i think it's more about

i mean first off as a general rule you're never supposed to installed voters for me anyone says they're an undecided voter it's like saying i have my head up my ass i mean it what is it what is it you're gonna figure out you're undecided

what do you drink gasoline in the morning would they want to know more about her they know about him they know about him want to know i don't get that argument either that okay what do you know about him he's supposedly was for abortion before he was against it he was going to ban tiktok now is not

and people say they don't understand vice president i think it's a legitimate criticism that someone who is coordinated didn't compete should should should she can stand on her own two feet and do some more vigorous interviews and if i were on our team i'd say we need two or three policies whether it's whether it's reducing the deficit or something around economic growth we need some two or three policies people can hold on to right now

but generally speaking this whole argument i don't know if you saw our friends definitely rule in bilmar i thought she was fantastic i thought she was fantastic and and bret stevens what do you need to know bret what do you need to know bret well she said she said look perfect not on the menu here

and what do you need to know and she's right we know about him we know about her and the unknowns around vice president harris it's a little bit unfair you basically if you do any research can see that she's kind of center left you have a decent idea how she's going to respond to things based on the

by the harris administration i mean you she had years as a senator years as an age she's tough front crime and the far left would like she's probably more i mean we have a better idea because the way you know someone is there consistent and predictable

you don't know what he's going to do i mean we kind of know that he's comfortable with sort of a a a a series nine of the handmade stale we know that i mean you just who the fuck is undecided that i know i know i know who are they here here you know i'm focusing on it's interesting

donations she's got four times the donations i don't i don't mean just money collecting if you go give a donation you mean it right so why is he not raising enough money from small donors are they tapped out are they tired yeah but there was a lot of pent up demand from democrats who were just

still ongoing it's still going it's by like a lot and it's not rich people all his money's coming from rich people it's just interesting with this point what's more exciting is not how much money she's raised but how much money she's going to get to spend because at this point cara i don't

believe when they interview undecided voters i think they're like well i'm not sure i like you i just so i want so be nicer to me i think they're so full as shit anyone who's an undecided voter claims will be me you undecided is going to go in and vote for trump because they clearly got

their head up their ass already undecided she says christ undecided voter anyways now at this point i think everyone's decided from this point forward and this is where the money kicks in it's about turning out the vote and now they have the money to hire every attractive 18 to 60 year old

to go to homes and say are you read i mean this is what i did for hilly are you registered to vote do you know where your polling place is do you need a ride to the polls are you going out maybe you shouldn't i'm thinking you start calling them itty i'm not where you're understated

your head up your ass get to the polls you're undecided so i think what you're telling me is you're a village idiot is that what you're saying hi enjoy the rest of your day would you like a hair sticker that was interesting going into like going five miles inland from my privilege life

in florida that was dose of the real life and like getting welcomed at the door by a pitball yeah by the way the friendliest nicest dogs in the world very scary though yeah very scary you never know what you're gonna do you feel like you never they actually are very nice most of them

it's the people who own them that are the problem usually i told you this story i'd knock on i went to a neighborhood that you would generously call lower or middle class lower middle class and it was it was a mixed neighborhood it was white and black and when i went into black households

and they invite me in super nice oh yeah we're for Hillary and i'm like all right you know you're voting location is and they'd say oh no i don't know where it is and they take them and i block out of she's gonna lose they're not excited about her they don't they haven't figured out where they're

supposed to vote they like the idea of her in office but they're not they're not passionate about it and then when i when i when i lower middle class white neighborhood when i'd bang on the door in a white person would answer and i'm playing identity politics here but it panned out i'd say hi

with Harris some of these people slammed the door in my i mean literally slammed the door in my face here clinton yeah i'm sorry i'm here for clinton excuse me thank you for that i'm here supporting you know canvassing for Hillary Clinton do you need any different i had in the course of

a nine hour day three people all three Caucasians slammed not even say thank you i'm not interested no i'm not i don't i don't like secretary Clinton but slam the door in my face and i thought you know what did a number on her it's upsetting but you know what they got passion they got pat that

i'm like that person's gonna vote that person's gonna vote did a number on our girl over the years that she didn't help many times but still meanwhile trump says speaking of women will know i mean this abortion thing is to be deranged he is gonna completely sign a national abortion restriction

bill and i think it's gonna matter in voting he also doesn't want to do a debate he shouldn't he sucked at it he said it's too late for a rematch though apparently it's not too late for senator jd vans we don't know where she stands she's willing to do a debate but we don't know where she stands

well the jd vans one uh at with tim walls is gonna be on october first um he's a jd vans says he's open he never stops talking boy he shows up at an opening of a door jd vans and you notice how he's totally doing this for himself in case trump loses what do you think about trump doing a second

debate well i'd like to see it i and i don't i think it should put to rest any criticism that she's not she's not facing the music the most interesting interview she could do is in front of moderators with him real time i mean that's so i i just think those criticisms fall kind of flat when she's

willing to do a second debate strategically for him it's probably a smart move because i just don't think he's i think he got so destroyed i think he's like i think he can help that he watches it yeah he got deepenest by her yeah deep it i thought it was a little tiny or penis even though

he's a mushroom penis i thought you were saying double penetrated a mic was it a three-way debate wait no no no no no by the way the second you're gonna watch the vice president to debate people yeah that'll be fun playing jd vans i interviewed him this week um he's been playing jd vans for two

walls his debate prep um he's really good at that what gay people do they dress up as oh what you mean in a debate prep yeah yeah that's what we date yes that yeah anyway with politician to you dress up as when it's sexy time at home i'm wrong for all the way in what's wrong for all the

in this year and let me just change the subject it'll be a good debate and Tim walls will kick jd vans as because jd vans is a twit um back to how we let's keep on the important stuff what's your costume yeah i don't what dress up it goes for sure oh what's the best this year i'm going to

switch with Simmons i got short shorts that's what you'll like that you can show off your ass headband yeah i don't by the way by the way i am six three eighty seven kilos tom selic when you started magnum p i was six three and eighty seven kilos and we look much

different in shorts carer i don't understand what's going on here i don't understand what's going on anyway um in any case i'm not trusting as anything you're going to be rich Simmons um and the debate will be fine the second president vice president of the day for kara tries it has to keep it has to bring it back somehow bring it back anyway we got things to get to let's bring in our friends of pivot cake conger and ryan mac our technology reporters for the new york times they've

written the new book character limit how elan must destroyed twitter welcome kate and ryan thank you so so much thank you so so there's so much going on with a perfect timing although anytime would be perfect as elan's always the drama queen that he per is these days so anytime but in the last few days he's been has threatened with scc sanctions he's backed down on brazil to get x on bad he said he'll sue the f a he's been sued by a party game company cards against humanity i could go on he had

a meltdown last night about comola haris saying that we're not going to get to marz and humanity is doomed but other than that just another Tuesday so let's get each of your takes on the latest chaos because it seems like he's trying to compete with Donald Trump for attention both of them are

sad pathetic attention sponges but tell me what you think yeah you know elan goes through these phases of tweeting really outrageous things and then kind of ratcheting it back when he gets criticized and we saw on the other day post about you know asking why hasn't anyone tried to

assassinate comola haris and got criticized for that ratcheted back a little bit and now has just been doubling down and posting a lot of really extreme stuff in the last couple of days so you know we've seen him do this over and over again in the reporting in the book where he kind of

has these intense cycles of posting caused by i think it could be any number of things he i think when he's cornered or feels like someone's confronted him he tends to double down and to really push back and start to pick fights and i think that that's kind of what we're seeing here you know he's

gotten pushed back over that one post and so is coming back even stronger and and and posting more stuff i used to have a theory that you know if you stayed up till two a.m. on the west coast you know you

you get to see some of his his tweets and he'd go you know kind of mask off and just start going nuts a little bit and i feel like that's all the time now like he just doesn't stop he's tweeting more than 75 times a day and you know what one of those tweets is gonna end up being the new cycle for

the next day it's it's kind of inevitable at this point and he is you know the most powerful person in the one of the most powerful people in the world he's the richest person in the world he's gonna generate new cycles and he knows that and i think he's like using that to his to his

advantage okay let's talk about that advantage because the book goes into depth sometimes a minute by minute and to elons take over twitter um what is the thing Ryan first that you found particularly surprising um when the purchase of twitter finally went through for example elons reaction was

uh fuck zuck the he just attacked him today again um you also reveal how Walter isis and occasionally influenced uh elons thinking which i'm not surprised by he and i had a tossel over his reporting on that book um but talk each of you first you write and then Kate

i just the lack of planning like this is the richest man in the world he has so many people at his disposal and he came in to twitter with a sort of hubris that he was the best pit best place person around this company um because he had you know electrified cars or he had you know put rockets in

a space he knew how to operate a social media company how hard could it be and that lack of planning has doomed him to this day you know he didn't have an understanding of advertising he thought twitter blew the idea to sell verification badges would be such a spectacular hit it would

create hundreds of millions and a billion dollars in revenue and replace advertising and that lack of planning is is just stunning to me what about you Kate i think this year chaos of those first couple of weeks surprised me even though all that summer long we're really expecting

the deal to go sideways for the takeover to be extremely chaotic uh even knowing all of that the way that it went and some of the decisions that he was making in those early days were surprising to me um you know one of the his first things coming in was insisting on reinstating the Babylon B

and you think of all the priorities he might have and taking over a company and that was at the top of his list i think the layoffs were also he didn't right but i think the layoffs are also incredibly shocking i mean any any mna like this you're gonna have cuts afterwards but the scope and the

just kind of inhumane way that those things were handled was pretty pretty surprising to me and i see you both uh so just to steal man this it it's impossible not to say this was a terrible deal financially this is by almost any metric the worst buyout in history right there's a can't

think of a company that's gone from five billion run rate to two billion sixty seventy percent of the forty four billion dollar value here has been wiped out according to various financial analysts but i'll put forward a thesis you respond it's been a huge win for him and that is he had he ended

up having to come up with more money than he wanted i think he had to come up with about twenty seven billion dollars which is approximately at this point somewhere between twelve and fifteen percent of his net worth and in exchange he's in the news constantly um he has more influence

than he's ever had he's now part of like the geopolitical conversation around everything which he seems to enjoy so if you're an individual with this kind of money and you're a megalimaniac and you want to have an input on everything and more influence globally on every issue whether it's

Taylor Swift or the Russia Ukraine war isn't this in fact despite despite the fact that he has lost some money and a lot of his friends have lost a money so far a win for him i think so yeah i mean he said from the outset he didn't care about the finances of this deal and you know he was really

purely concerned about buying twitter as an ideological maneuver and i think that that's been hugely successful for him he's been able to shift the platform pretty dramatically to the right bring back a lot of right wing accounts that were banned under the former leadership uh and really

like you said insert himself into not just the u.s. political conversation but the global political conversation and you know i think he's very satisfied with all of that yeah i i don't yeah i mean i think he gets a lot of personal satisfaction um you know the subtitle of our book is how you'll

must destroy twitter um you know we meant it to be provocative um i think from you know if a just a name perspective it's no longer twitter we call it twitter but it's x now you know um and from a financial perspective it's it's kind of undoubtable it's like one of us um buying a car

and then you know joy writing it and crashing it but still getting a lot of like fun out of it and i think that is probably the apt analogy here i also think that the value of x is kind of degrading globally especially if you're you know getting a band in certain markets or being seen as a sensor

for authoritarians or uh leaders that like cracking down on speech i think of something like Narendra Modi or or the one in turkey you know he is he is not upholding free speech in those in those markets he is complying with the government you know the biggest play he's making right now

is towards Donald Trump he's slated to be running this government efficiency commission of trump winsey election was just so full of complex of interest they don't care um this is a big win for him if that happens um as i said he's already said uh if harris winsey's would destroy the maris

program and doom humanity i've had him say things like that to me all the time about humanity being doomed if tesla doesn't survive and humanity being doomed if he's not all around he's you know he's clearly narcissistic on a level other people are not um but if trump

talk about if trump wins and if trump loses because if he loses i suspect he's in a world of hurt around tesla around all his businesses and what does he do if that's the case so first uh maybe Kate you take on if if he wins if trump wins and and Ryan if he loses yeah i think you know obviously

you once thrown all his weight behind the trump campaign at this point and if financially financially ideologically he's he's a really strong supporter and he really views trump as essential to the x platform he thinks that trump's presence there will bring a lot of eyeballs and influence back

to the platform so i think if trump wins it's a huge win for masque he gets to say you know i made the right bet i proved you all wrong um and it'll grow the influence of the platform um you also talk about the government efficiency commission which i think is so funny uh but there's

when they've been talking about this there's a scene in the book that it reminds me of where uh musk calls this big cost-cutting meeting over a weekend and makes everyone dial in and just starts going through the budget line by line and a spreadsheet and making everyone account for every

dollar that they're spending and you know i think that is his ambition for the government i think he would love to walk into the office of management and budget and say show me your most complicated spreadsheet right um so you know i think it'll get him a lot of influence and and he'll be very

satisfied with that result if trump does win what about Ryan if he loses if he loses i i don't think it's that big of a deal for him if that's if that's weird to say i think his his companies are so big and so powerful you know testless still the leader in evs um it's only growing bigger in china

and you think of something like space x which has a virtual monopoly on getting things into space there is no blue origin out there you know united launched alliance is probably going to go down the tubes like he knows that and and i think that plays into his thinking here as he's become more

political you know in in 2018 or you know 2016 in that election even 2020 he wasn't overtly political but you know he's realized that i've become so powerful i can say whatever i want i can do whatever i want it's not going to impact my business in fact i can threaten to sue the government and

you know what is it to me uh they're still going to rely on me who are the winners here who do you think is picked up the slack in terms of what platforms have benefited most from twitter's struggles you know obviously facebook comes to mind with threads their competitor at you know there's also all

these all other alternative platforms like blue sky mastered on that have been able to pick up a lot of users from this blue sky in particular saw a huge spike after x was banned in brisil i don't think that that means any of them are replacing twitter yet or taking the place in the

market that twitter holds but his antics have been very advantageous to those companies i mean beyond platforms i think there are specific users that have benefited a lot i think of someone like andryu tape who gets you know pushed into my feed every day someone like cat turned to

mylion opales like you know the the folks that have been allowed back on the platform were not only able to say what they want but get algorithmic boosting from it you know they are on everyone's for you page now they're front and center and those are the voices that that you

want to elevate in that on that platform but the number i mean we're all i mean maybe you guys are still on it but scott and i are tonight have 1.5 million followers and i don't i didn't honestly it didn't help me before and then it got so toxic it was i don't find any difference in my life

you're not you're not checking it at all these days even just to learn no okay no no not at all i know there's no reason i get called a content i don't feel like it in called a content day ryan you don't mind i'll stop yes settle down ryan too but speaking of that you you you

you'll get into elons relationship with women as well as kids how do you think that's impacted his behavior he's quite a toxic misogynist at this point and and his relations with these kids are heinous on every level that he's one kid particular Vivian who's fantastic and actually

interestingly enough has his old sense of humor i hate to him for sure she wouldn't disagree with me but she's got the same very funny quirky when when elon was funny and not quite as toxic i think you know twitter has never had a good relationship with women right this is the platform

that that launched and allowed gamer gate to thrive there's been countless women who've been driven off the platform over the years by very severe harassment campaigns so it's not like the relationship was ever going well that being said you know musk has really taken that into overdrive

he posted something just the other day that appeared to be a screenshot from forechan advocating against women voting he was talking about impregnating Taylor Swift after she endorsed Kamala Harris so you know he's certainly brought that old level of toxicity towards women that we remember

twitter for back to the platform and elevated that kind of thinking you know and it's no surprise when we saw Taylor Swift given endorsement to Kamala that she talked about the threat of AI and you know x is the platform where there were deep fake news of her going viral and x was

seemed either uninterested in stopping it or powerless to do so i would say they would want to encourage it but would go ahead i think about a treatment of women and we have a great anecdote in the book of how he took a name he had set aside for for his daughter he was going to have a daughter

with grimes the singer and there they had set aside a name this name valkyrie and he actually took it that name and used it on another daughter he was having with shavon zillis one of his his staff members and didn't tell grimes and it was just such a you know soap opera type crazy detail that

i couldn't believe was true and it's just in some ways he views women as almost in service of his needs or interchangeable in some ways and it's just kind of it's just sad you know it i don't know how you go through life living your relationships like that but it's just it's just really sad

so easy you end up you end up with 12 kids and you live with none of them yeah yeah i mean it's quite tragic you know and he talks about his origin story being a victim of verbal abuse from his father being subject to these kinds of put downs and and really aggressive behavior from him and

it seems like he has taken that and tried to turn it into his own superpower where he turns around and and uses that sort of uh belligerent behavior to motivate people at his companies and drive them and he's used that same behavior on his kids and it's it's a tragedy i think of his story that

he's chosen to perpetuate that kind of behavior instead of taking a stop to it and so funny there's children in the background of one of them i know i think Ryan lives like to a playground and i think we can hear the kids all right it's okay to say you know i know yeah um just make sure he learns

on out there bothering children um but but go ahead so talk about that idea of of where it's going to end up and you write in the book that Elon was told friends he need five years to turn twitter around i don't think it's turning around i just think he likes to have it like a like a you know a

toxic yacht that he gets to sail around the world and bash into harbors essentially talk a little bit out where it goes as a business because what someone was like he's got a something's got to happen because the banks look i'm like nothing has to happen he's really rich nothing has to have

precisely nothing he can take this going for quite a while correct and then what does actually ultimately happen from your perspective i think you're right that he can keep this afloat sort of indefinitely if he chooses to do so although eventually his tesla shareholders will become

unhappy with him if he has to sell his shares there to you know keep the company afloat um but we haven't talked yet about xai and i think that that's sort of an interesting component in this where he's tamed so much value on the twitter deal itself but he's obtained an incredible corpus of training

data for ai and has been able to raise new uh new financing for if you make a nice lawsuit but yes you're right he's he's shifting the value over there because of the amount of data on on twitter correct and x i mean xai we didn't talk about this it's value that twenty eight billion dollars now

so you know he's lost his value over at extra twitter xai has just sprouted up overnight and he it's added billions of dollars who's not worth you know it's all funny money it's you know we'll see if that actually is an actual valuation when it hits the market but you know he's able to

generate these things and spend them up and he has plenty of believers you know these are the largest venture capitalists in the world he has sovereign wealth funds they're all pulling for him and when you have that level of support you're almost too big to fail everyone is is yeah he also has fans

he also remains remains fans he's creating this sort of godlike persona around himself so the two of you know twitter as well as anybody who doesn't work there right now what recognizing no one has a crystal ball what predictions would you have for the next twelve or twenty four

months for twitter in terms of its business its revenues its influence generally that what's your predictions on twitter over the next twenty four months i think there is really no replacement for it when it comes to breaking news moments and i think it'll still kind of hold the

the lead on that and you know in in the event of a trump presidency i think that might be helpful for elons advertising business you know he's suing advertisers right now who aren't spending with him and kind of trying to force them back onto the platform but in in the event where he

has a very close relationship with the white house advertisers might feel like they are compelled to at least spend you know some courtesy money with x so that they stay in in favor with the white house and with elon so it could be quite beneficial to him and i think you know we could see x really

build on that and that being said you know i think the platform is going to continue its right word shift and users are not happy with that you know people are leaving and going to all these other different platforms and it's becoming increasingly toxic so i think there's going to be

continue to be a drift of people who are getting away from the platform and not happy with the kind of content that they're seeing there but the and the people that stay are are really happy with it you know i we've been tweeting out our book as promotion for it kind of in a trolley kind of way

and we get all these responses from people being like well you're promoting on xx must be better than ever twitter is better than ever and you know there is very insecure there's a very there's a large subset of fans that believe in elon so and and love his companies and i think that'll continue

to exist in five ten years time you know i've used this analogy before but you still have people using yahu male accounts to this day and you know it doesn't mean yahu male yeah it doesn't mean a well or yahu male are growing it's just that there is a you know stickiness to it people like those

features or those the services are going to continue staying with them that doesn't make them good businesses either and i think that's that's where we'll see x or twitter going that's so true i still have a subscription to hustler and carousel shops at unit clubs the underwear are very comfortable

but we asked the last question and unit plus doc crashes overnight analyst the bottle they don't understand we're talking about my underwear so let's just move please sponsor us unit glow thank you you know so so i think i'd be remiss i just want more question about Linda yaku reno oh

we've gotten iar just we just laugh our asses off around her all the time but what what what what she just got a new advertising person i mean a marketing person and you know there's a lot of you know advertising people that need jobs that's my feeling and they have a heavy nut to kick to

crack every month for themselves what's happening with linda give us a little linda update you know i think one of the things that's so fascinating about her is she's really thought of as this sort of captive of elan like she's just trapped in there and making a hostage video but in my

reporting on her i think it's really incredible to realize how much similarity they have and how many viewpoints they share i don't really understand the thinking that people have that she's you know um trapped by him anyway i think she's quite happy with the platform you know i think

when she was at nbc universal previously she felt like she kind of had to keep her politics under wraps a little bit because they might be alienating for advertisers and she's really been able to lean into that now and and feel comfortable speaking about it and and um supporting Trump in the way

that she wants to she enjoys the victimization acting like a victim that's her favorite one of her favorite she was she was more conservative than people realize i the longest three minutes i ever spent was listening to that once when she was at nbc but um but she what what happens to her

she stays there she's a believer she's a true believer i keep telling people that she's a true believer and i think you know in talking to people who are close to her she's also someone who uh doesn't want to admit when she's made a mistake and i think will really ride this out to the

bitter end um and keep trying to prove herself in that situation she's always wanted to be a CEO she finally has that opportunity and i really don't see her backing away from it there's a scene in in our book where linda is is at a sales meeting and it's right after

media matters uh pushes this report you know showing ads next to nazi content on the platform and she's talking to her sales folks and like trying to band them together and keep it more out and she says this one comment where it's like you know my my daughter's wedding was over the weekend

um you know they must have they must have released this report to like fuck with the wedding and fuck with me like and it's just like so crazy to think about like that you have such main character energy that you put yourself the center of this um and think that everyone is just against you

and that's the mindset she has taken into this job it's the mindset she has continued to push and it's it's very much in evil on mindset as well i mean she also over that weekend got phone calls from old advertising colleagues pressuring her to step down and that was part of what she thought

was going on that these people who she knew who was she was close with and had invited to her wedding had like waited until she was in this moment of celebration to put this pressure on her to step down and distance herself from Elon so you know it's really this kind of grand conspiratorial thinking

that we see with a lot of the people who spend a lot of time on x and and spend time in leadership at x yeah so so basically like the clap this is going to be with us for a while correct if you had a pick in 30 years or 50 let's see how old is he 52 so 40 years where is he is he

is he Howard Hughes is he Henry Ford is he someone else he's gonna be such a radical place you know and maybe those comparisons aren't even apt anymore because he's gonna go further than those and yeah i just it's not a it's not a great trajectory for him i think we talked about this sort of

victimization mentality if it's going on here and i think that that's gonna continue he's really invested in that even though he has the biggest account on the platform he has a massive voice all around the world and and so i think that that journey of self pity and radicalization really

continues from here all right then yay anyway thank you k kanger and ryan mag is a great book it's called character limit how elan must destroy twitter thank you so much thanks for our thanks k thank you both it's really a pleasure thanks gara thanks god

all right scott that was interesting one more quick break will be back for wins and fails support for this podcast comes from huntress keeping your data safe is important however if you're a small business owner then protecting the information of yourself through company and your

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first? why don't you go first carer? um fails i think the continued attacks on nations in Ohio by the chaos of the trump stuff is really it just it takes on a life of its own online and everywhere else and it creates all kinds of really disturbing you know the repetition of lies is is something

everyone says it's an obvious lie but this is more than that it's it creates this idea that just doesn't go away um and so i really find i just find it at least all kinds of bad outcomes but i do hope that Tim Walls can shut it down in that debate with JD Vance but there's a lot of people

making excuses that he wants to call attention to things but to call attention via lies is is is really uh absolutely repulsive i think and in my um in my my win um i think i really i've been i'm really excited for a bunch of movies in the theaters as i've said for the fall i was seeing

lots of them come out um but i'm very excited for like 10 movies that they did just show that the i think it was the the venice film festival they just all look great and so even though hollywood's struggling it looks like there's all these really interesting this dimmi more movie angelina joley

lot of wits especially women i saw this amazing movie that's premiering next week in the United States called lee and it's with Kate Winslet and it's about the photographer lee li meller who did that famous photo of hers taking a bath and hitler's bathtubs with the dirty boots right on

the on the front they dirty from a dachau she had just been to dachau and then she took a bath in hitler's bathtub in and i think it was munica must have been rubberland anyway um no it was munica and and and hitler was dying right when she was taking that bath which is really committing

suicide with a pavabron um i just thought this was an astonishing movie Kate Winslet is so fantastic she really goes there with this so you know she's she's beautiful but she looks haggard in this movie really you know she purposely she's obviously covering this is a woman who is a who is a model

for her early career in quite striking and beautiful man ray she was amused for a lot of famous artists too and she then turned around and did the most astonishing war photography including one of the first people to get to the concentration camps with these pictures that are devastating

uh it's it's a wonderful wonderful movie called lee again Kate Winslet she hugged me once and my life has never been the same yeah she's outstanding i'm my favorite original scripted drama i think of 2020 was or 2021 was the mayor of easton is that what it was called uh mayor of eastern yeah mayor

of eastern she was fantastic and i'm also gene smart another person was her plater mother the two of them together was fantastic there's a fantastic scene between gene smart and Kate Winslet in the in the series and i won't spoil the premise but he she basically she basically said you know

you weren't a great mom and she's like you're on it wasn't and i forgave myself and she says to her daughter she says you need to forgive yourself it's very powerful yeah gene smart just won the army so good anyway okay my my win and i need some disclosure here my wins uh vox care the producers

give me license to say what i want and occasionally get upset if i'm not meticulous about the data but this is not this does not represent the views of anyone but scott my win here is i believe the idea and uh the most uh collaborated although they haven't taken credit for it to pull off what i

would argue is the most precise anti terrorist operation in history uh the patreon walkie talkie detonations in lebanon led to significant casualties the first wave on september the 17th at least 12 people were killed and more than 2750 were injured including two children the second wave on

september the 18th 2024 at least 30 more people were killed but at the outset of the war the one of the bigger criticisms and i have empathy for this criticism was that the bombing and the operations in gaza while in according to john spence the head of the urbana warfare institute that the ratio

of combatants to civilians was greater uh than or better if you will than most recent wars there was legitimate empathy and concern about so many innocent civilians being killed and in this instance you know these are enemy combatants who are have been designated by israel in the us

as terrorists and the genius of interrupting supply chain to put three to five grams grams excuse me of rdx and explosive not 10 grams that would have blown this these people in half and then it's come out today that they actually had operatives following them around to make sure that they weren't

too close to proximity to other people i think the media fails to recognize in the west is that the us continues to engage in very similar operations specifically drone strikes from from 2004 to 2018 in pakistan we've killed summer between 2500 and 4000 people using drones in Yemen at the

last 22 years up until the present we've killed summer between a thousand and 1300 people and the ratio or more civilians there's been much more collateral damage in our drone strikes and we're executed here i find there's a media bias um i see across cnn that all i see is israel's

actions threaten escalation of a war but i would argue they're already at war since october of 2023 true there has been a significant escalation this week well i would argue the rockets and the air strikes and sure but i would argue that they've been at war has well has fired more than 8500

rockets into israel since october over 80,000 civilians have been displaced from northern regions of israel to be fair and lebanon more than 100,000 civilians have also been displaced i think i think i think these these entities have been at war for a while and the i picked up the new york times on my flyback from a drida day and the lead story was a guest opinion by a gentleman named michael walser and the title was pager bombs don't belong in a just war i find the terms just and more kind of

interesting interesting combination of wars but he's saying israel would be using the tactics of the terrorists it condemns and what i find is that there's you know there's sort of no winning if you will for israel here the initial condemnation was they weren't being precise enough and the idea

of figuring out a way to find terrorists these people weren't wearing pagers to get messages on substitute teaching for civics class the next day these are combatants planning terrorist acts agreed but and let me say the new york times did refer to hasblah as a militant group designated

the terrorist organization that there's a difference between the reporting and these opinion pieces agreed agreed it was their lead story when you say the media i'm like well there's a difference between some guy who writes an opinion piece and i agree but even active versus past

i don't love everything from the new york times but i think they've been very clear that has been as well as a militant terrorist organization fair enough what i also well what i'll make is my that's my win here is i just i think this will be go down in history is is the most precise

anti terrorist operation in history and the genius here the bravery and at the effectiveness and i would argue that while it's a temporary escalation that this type of action this type of bold action actually in my view brings a greater likelihood of a sustainable peace here i just don't think these

folks were gearing up for peace so my my loss if you will i've been thinking a lot of anti-semitism with the election coming up i just had dan cener on the raging moderates pod and he claims that his the anti-semitism he sees coming out of the far left he finds more scary and i would argue that

it just is in domestic politics the left and the right seem to come together for reckless spending i would argue that anti-semitism throughout history is a virus that infects both the far left and the far right and it's unfair in my opinion to assign anti-semitism to anyone political party it is the virus that keeps popping up it finds purchase almost everywhere and i think the far left is not been great on this issue at the same time on the far right as represented by Donald Trump in a speech

to the israel american council national summit in september twenty twenty four trump suggested that if no joke if he lost the election jewish voters would be partially to blame he stated that the jewish people would have a lot to do with the loss a comment that jewish organizations and political

figures have condemned as reminiscent of historical anti-semitic escape-goating additionally trump or in that if israel that additionally trump or in that israel might not survive if i said president comla heros were elected further exacerbating fears that is rhetoric is feeling

anti-semitism by blaming jewish voters for political outcomes so in some my win here is i think what the idea of and the most i pulled off actually i think the west has a vested interest in destabilizing and terrorizing terrorists we have done it well every other western nation

would respond as aggressively if not more aggressively and i find that the media's portrayal of it they immediately go to well the acts of october seventh require nuance and some empathy for both sides and then when israel goes in with the most precise attack ever levied against terrorists

there's immediately calls uh... of uh... they call it war crimes i just find there's a double triple and quadruple standard for the idea and uh... for israel and perhaps but i do think john state and sees the presidential candidate agreed uh... that's my that's my fail i think i think anti-semitism

finds a home on the far left and the far right and it's it's just a shame that that's the one place they meet well i i in none of it is i escalation is always they at some point these people have got to find some way to get to peace and i understand that homos and has well are not part of that

solution but there's this could spin out of control in a way that's incredibly dangerous and when don't Trump's making remarks like the jews are the reason i'll lose it's really it's not it's not a good thing anyway uh... all right thank you for that Scott uh... uh...

it would have to say let's let's run gene smarts you know what i'm in any case uh... uh... scary it's very scary but i find the whole middle east very scary at this moment in time anyway we want to hear from you send us your questions about business sector whatever's on your

mind and go to n y mag dot com slash pivots is a question for the show or call eight five five one pivot okay scott that is the show will be back on friday for more scott read us out today show is produced by laran amenzo and markets and taylor bruffin marina tade engineer this episode thanks

also to juburos and milcivario you shot kura is box media is exactly producer of audio make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen podcast thanks for listening to pivot new york magazine of box media you can subscribe to the magazine at nmy mag dot com slash pod will be

back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business care i have a great rest of the week this is advertiser content she grew up in a middle-class home she was the daughter of a working mom and she worked at mcdonalds while she got her degree comaharris knows what it's like to be middle-class it's why she's determined to lower health care costs and make housing more affordable donald trump has no plan to help the middle class just more tax cuts for billionaires

being president is about who you fight for and she's fighting for people like you i'm comaharris candidate for president and i approved this message paid for by harris for president canva presents your work harris scope for this week deadlines are in retrograde which we all know can bring some intense energy our advice fend off this forecast with canva like canva whiteboards to counter creative blocks and canva docs for clarity and communications if you have any sales deals coming through

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